Here We Go Again With the Iranian Nuclear Scare
by Eric Margolis via reed 2009-03-10 10:53:49

While the United States was fighting for its economic life, Obama administration officials and the media issued a blizzard of contradictory claims over Iran’s alleged nuclear threat, leaving one wondering who is really in charge of US foreign policy?

Much of the uproar over Iran’s so-far non-existent nuclear weapons must be seen as part of efforts by the Israeli lobby to block President Barack Obama’s proposed opening to Teheran, and to keep pressing the US to attack Iran’s nuclear infrastructure.

Israel’s supporters and most Israeli military experts insist Iran has secret weapons programmes. Israel knows about covert nuclear programs, having run one of the world’s largest and most productive.

The hawkish Hillary Clinton’s naming of veteran Israel supporter Dennis Ross as her special adviser on Iran and the Gulf suggest she is more interested in building future domestic political support than securing balanced advice.

Meanwhile, confusion over Iran grew sharply. New CIA director, Leon Panetta, said ‘there is no question, they (Iran) are seeking that (nuclear weapons) capability.’

Pentagon chief Adm. Mike Mullen claimed Iran had ‘enough fissile material to build a bomb.’ Fox News claimed Iran already had 50 nuclear weapons. While the American Rome burns, here we go again with renewed hysteria over MWMD’s - Muslim Weapons of Mass Destruction. Wars drums are again beating over Iran.

The czar of all 16 US intelligence agencies, Adm. Dennis Blair, stated Iran could have enough enriched uranium for one atomic weapon by 2010-2015. But he reaffirmed the 2007 US National Intelligence Estimate that Iran does not have nuclear weapons and is not pursuing them. Defence Secretary William Gates backed up Blair. So does the 
UN nuclear agency. Some of the confusion over Iran comes from misunderstanding nuclear enrichment, and lurid scare stories.

Iran is producing low-grade uranium-235 (LEU), enriched to only 2.5 per cent, to generate electricity. Teheran has this absolute right under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Its centrifuge enrichment process at Natanz is under 24-hour international inspection. Iran’s soon to open nuclear plant at Bushehr cannot produce nuclear weapons fuel. Its spent fuel will be 
returned to Russia.

Today, some 15 nations produce LEU U-235, including Brazil, Argentina, Germany, France, and Japan. Israel, India and Pakistan, all covert nuclear weapons powers, refused to sign the non-proliferation treaty. North Korea abrogated it. UN inspectors report Iran has produced 1,010 kg of 2-3 per cent enriched uranium for energy generation, insists Iran. Theoretically that is enough for one atomic bomb.

But to make a nuclear weapon, U-235 must be enriched to over 90 per cent in an elaborate, costly process. Iran is not doing so, say UN inspectors.

Highly enriched U-235 or plutonium must then be milled and shaped into a perfect ball or cylinder. Any surface imperfections will prevent achieving critical mass. Next, high explosive lenses must surround the core, and detonate at precisely the same millisecond. In the gun system, two cores must collide at very high speed. In some cases, a stream of neutrons are pumped into the device as it explodes.

This process is highly complex. Nuclear weapons cannot be deemed reliable unless they are tested. North Korea recently detonated a device 
that fizzled. Iran has never built or 
tested a nuclear weapon. Israel and South Africa jointly tested a nuclear weapon in 1979.

Even if Iran had the capability to fashion a complex nuclear weapon, it would be useless without delivery. Iran’s sole medium-range delivery system is its unreliable, inaccurate 1,500 km ranged Shahab-3. Miniaturizing and hardening nuclear warheads capable of flying atop a Shahab missile is another complex technological challenge.

It is inconceivable that Iran or anyone else would launch a single nuclear weapon. What if it didn’t go off? Imagine the embarrassment and the retaliation. Iran would need at least ten warheads and a reliable delivery system to be a credible nuclear power.

Israel, the primary target for any Iranian nuclear strike, has an indestructible triad of air, missile and sea-launched nuclear weapons pointed at Iran. An Israeli submarine with 
nuclear cruise missiles is on station off Iran’s coast. Iran would be wiped off the map by even a few of Israel’s 200 
nuclear weapons. Iran is no likelier to use a nuke against its Gulf neighbours. The explosion would blanket Iran with radioactive dust and sand.

Washington would do better to stop worrying about Iran and focus on its economic meltdown.

Copyright applies.

http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22176.htm

The Long Legs of the Crash: 13 Unexpected Consequences of the Financial Crisis
by Daniel W. Drezner via quill 2009-03-10 21:15:31

Last year had more than its share of vertigo-inducing headlines: major banks suddenly disappearing, the Dow plunging day after day, and billion-dollar bailouts failing to make a dent in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

Already, the Wall Street way of life seems to have gone the way of the dodo. An entire country—are you reading this, Iceland?—went belly up overnight. And good luck if your last job title was “mortgage-backed securities trader.” But if there are some predictable economic hardships we can expect from the current crisis, there are also some trickle-down effects that aren’t so foreseeable. Here, 13 surprising consequences of the crash:

1. Your government will get smarter... In a global recession, governments around the globe will be able to recruit a better class of bureaucrats. Just a few years ago, the U.S. government had serious recruitment problems in the Foreign Service because no world-savvy 25-year-olds wanted to work for the civil service when they could make serious cash on Wall Street. In a severe downturn, however, the stability and security of a government job look far more appealing.

2 ... and more corrupt. Politicians’ palms are about to get greasier. A global downturn shrinks the demand for goods and services worldwide. That means the security of a government contract will look pretty sweet to any businessperson struggling to stay afloat. A January report from Transparency International warned that corruption is bound to increase worldwide during the current crisis, as businesses prioritize survival over corporate integrity.

3. Gray skies are gonna clear up (at least a little). The central factor in projections about global warming is long-term extrapolations of current economic growth. Thing is, I doubt the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change expected Wall Street to tank as spectacularly as it has. The longer the global economy stays in recession, the less greenhouse gases are emitted into the atmosphere. You still might not be able to breathe easy in Beijing, but your odds just got better.

4. The Internet is about to get a lot more #@%$ing annoying. Newspapers are looking to online advertising revenue to deliver them from bankruptcy court (and eventually, total eradication). So, expect more Web advertising on your news sources—pop-up ads, welcome screens, articles hacked into ever shorter segments to maximize clicks—that cannot be escaped easily. Or at least not without getting extremely frustrated.

5. Glory days for evangelicals. Bad times are boon times for evangelical churches. Economist David Beckworth of Texas State University has crunched U.S. church attendance numbers and found that congregation growth at evangelical churches jumped 50 percent during each recession between 1968 and 2004.

6. Your kids will be savers. Macroeconomic realities in your childhood have a profound effect on your financial choices later in life, regardless of how much money you make, according to a study by economists Ulrike Malmendier and Stefan Nagel of the University of California, Berkeley, and Stanford University, respectively. The generation that grew up during the Great Depression, for example, was more risk-averse than its parents and its children when it came to money. Your kids, in other words, won’t be addicted to E*Trade, but you’ll probably find their allowances stuffed under their mattresses.

7. Skirts will get longer. Here’s a piece of Wall Street folk wisdom: There is a rough correlation between bull markets and bare knees. During boom times, skirts get shorter. In these bearish times, prepare for hemlines to head south. Somewhat in relation, we’ll see something else go north: the age and weight of Playboy centerfolds. Evolutionary biology encourages people to seek “more mature” mates during times of economic insecurity, argue Terry F. Pettijohn and Brian J. Jungeberg in one of the more interesting studies published recently in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. To support their claim, the researchers showed that during recessions, centerfolds get older and, well, rounder. Similar studies have confirmed an identical trend in movie comedies—male and female leads get older during recessions.

8. Your military just got bigger. The age group that will be hit hardest by the current downturn? The world’s 18- to 24-year-olds. This group just so happens to be the prime recruiting age bracket for militaries, which can generally offer a steady paycheck and decent benefits. Indeed, the U.S. Army exceeded its recruitment goals in the last three months of 2008 for the first time in 5 years. And as the war in Iraq winds down, these new soldiers’ fears of being deployed in a hostile combat environment should wane. The few and the proud might grow into the many and the desperate.

9. State schools will be cool. A prolonged downturn will profoundly affect institutions of higher learning. For the past decade, private schools far outpaced state schools in terms of resources and expenditures as their endowments swelled from the long financial boom. Many elite universities followed Harvard’s lead and adopted need-blind admissions with generous financial-aid packages.

That’s all about to change. Endowments in the United States have declined 10 to 30 percent during the past year, which will make need-blind admissions a thing of the past and financial-aid offers far less generous. The credit crunch will also make it more difficult for young people to secure reasonable student loans.

10. Boomers will refuse to leave the building. A whole tier of older employees who planned on retiring now or in a few years simply can’t—their 401(k) retirement accounts look way too scary. In 2008 alone, U.S. workers aged 55 to 64 who have had 401(k)s for at least 20 years saw their retirement balances drop an average of 20 percent. This means those who expected promotions when the boomers cleared out are going to have to stew in their own juices and gripe around the water cooler. Office politics just got a lot nastier.

11. The world is no longer flat—and fewer people will care. Global downturns often breed protectionism and other barriers to foreigners. Cross-border tourism is likely to plummet. Study-abroad programs will also be affected—the New York Times recently reported a dramatic decline in South Koreans studying overseas. News outlets are also likely to further scale back their foreign news bureaus to cut costs.

12. Nouriel Roubini’s frequent flyer miles will go through the roof. One business will be big this year: conferences on the crisis of capitalism. The Dr. Dooms and Cassandras of the most recent bubble era—economists such as Nouriel Roubini, Robert Shiller, Stephen Roach, and Joseph Stiglitz—will be doling out advice and “I told you sos” in convention halls and conference rooms around the globe. Indeed, in the month of January alone, Roubini traveled to Istanbul, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, London, Riyadh, Zurich, Davos, and Moscow. The likely difference now? Seats in coach.

13. Great Depression lit will be chic. Eras like to mine the cultural tropes of analogous eras from the past. So, expect books about the Great Depression to dominate Amazon rankings. Already, Hodding Carter IV has received a big advance to write A Year of Living Within Our Means, a book about his family living strictly within its budget by using cost-cutting measures from the 1930s. And somewhere, you just know Ken Burns is making a 25-part documentary on the Tom Joads of this world.

© 2009 Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive, LLC

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=4689

Timidity Derails Obama Intel Choice
by Ray McGovern via reed 2009-03-12 07:11:52

On Tuesday morning, Director of National Intelligence, Admiral Dennis Blair, employed the indicative mood in describing the high value that Chas Freeman, his appointee to head the National Intelligence Council (NIC), will bring to the job — “his long experience and inventive mind,” for example.

By five o’clock that afternoon, Freeman announced that he had asked that his selection “not proceed.”

Not one to mince words, Freeman, spelled out the strange set of affairs surrounding the flip-flop and the implications of what had just happened.

Borrowing from George Washington’s Farewell Address the pointed warning against developing a “passionate attachment” to the strategic goals of another nation, Freeman made it clear that he was withdrawing his “previous acceptance” of Blair’s invitation to chair the NIC because of the character assassination of him orchestrated by the Israel Lobby.

The implications? Freeman was clear:

“The outrageous agitation … will be seen by many to raise serious questions about whether the Obama administration will be able to make its own decisions about the Middle East and related issues. [It casts] doubt on its ability to consider, let alone decide what policies might best serve the United States rather than those of a Lobby intent on enforcing the will and interests of a foreign government…

“The aim of this Lobby is control of the policy process through the exercise of a veto over the appointment of people who dispute the wisdom of its views … and the exclusion of any and all options for decision by Americans and our government other than those it [the Lobby] favors.”

Foreign policy analyst Chris Nelson described the imbroglio as a reflection of the “deadly power game on what level of support for controversial Israeli government policies is a ‘requirement’ for U.S. public office.”

Before the flip-flop on Freeman was announced, Nelson warned, “If Obama surrenders to the critics and orders Blair to rescind the Freeman appointment, it is difficult to see how he can properly exercise leverage, when needed, in his conduct of policy in the Middle East. That, literally, is how the experts see the stakes in the fight now under way” — the fight that is now over.

Congressional Boasting

Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-New York, led Lobby boasting just minutes after the Freeman debacle was announced. Schumer was clear: “His [Freeman’s] statements against Israel were way over the top. … I repeatedly urged the White House to reject him, and I am glad they did the right thing.”

And, as Glen Greenwald has noted, “Lynch mob leader Jonathan Chait [of The New Republic and author of an influential op-ed for the Washington Post] who spent the last week denying that Israel was the driving force behind the attacks on Freeman,” now concedes the obvious.

Greenwald quotes Chait: “Of course I recognize that the Israel Lobby is powerful, and was a key element in the pushback against Freeman.”

Neoconservative Daniel Pipes offered an anatomy of the crime, blog-bragging about how it was conducted:

“What you may not know is that Steven J. Rosen of the Middle East forum was the person who first brought attention [on Feb. 19] to the problematic nature of Freeman’s appointment. … Within hours, the word was out and three weeks later Freeman has conceded defeat. Only someone with Steve’s stature and credibility could have made this happen.”

The same Steve Rosen who is currently on trial for violations of the Espionage Act involving the transmission of classified information intended for Israel? One and the same! This has to be the purest brand of gall that ever came down the Pipes.

This “morning after,” I find myself wondering when White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel – another staunch supporter of the Lobby who reportedly was Schumer’s go-to guy on the get-Freeman campaign – saw fit to let Admiral Blair in on the little secret that no way could he have Freeman. And why Blair tucked tail.

In a March 8 letter to Admiral Blair, we Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) endorsed his appointment of Freeman and decried the campaign to derail it.

We seven signatories (with cumulative experience of 130 years) noted that the Freeman case was the first time we witnessed such a well-coordinated campaign to reverse the appointment of an official to an intelligence job not requiring Senate confirmation.

In other words the influence of the Israel Lobby is seeping ever deeper into the ranks of the intelligence community.

Military Mind-Set

It seems altogether possible that Admiral Blair, accustomed to military command authority, assumed he had the right to appoint his senior staff and did not think to check the naming of Freeman out with politicians sensitive to such pressures.

And this points up a host of other problems. One is that of having military officers, active or retired, running national intelligence. It appears to be beyond their ken to consider resigning on principle.

I imagine it never occurred to Blair that he should have quit on the spot as soon as he learned that Freeman was being jettisoned. Or at least Blair might have threatened to quit if the Obama administration let itself be bullied in this way.

Blair is no neophyte, but he clearly underestimated the power of the Lobby vis-à-vis his own. The White House seems to have told Blair to treat the Freeman appointment as though in the subjunctive mood — long enough to “run it up the flagpole and see who salutes,” as the saying goes.

Then, when the Lobby made sure there were no salutes, but rather the strongest and most scurrilous spitting, Freeman was hauled on down.

The Freeman flip-flop is merely the latest sign that Obama is afraid to take on the Lobby – and the world is watching. Most will interpret the new President’s acquiescence in this outcome as a sign of weakness — of his not being his own man.

This is a distinct liability as Obama prepares to meet next month with the likes of Vladimir Putin who will be taking his measure.

The encounter with Putin brings to mind another young President’s encounter with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev in Vienna in June 1961. Khrushchev had studied the fiasco of the Bay of Pigs in April 1961; he would have understood if Kennedy had left Castro alone or destroyed him.

When Kennedy was rash enough to approve a strike on Cuba but not bold enough to finish the job, in Khrushchev’s view, the latter decided he was dealing with an inexperienced young leader who could be intimidated and blackmailed — one who would shrink from hard decisions.

Kennedy later said of his encounter with Khrushchev in Vienna, "He beat the hell out of me." The meeting led Khrushchev to believe that Kennedy might well back down if the USSR put missiles in Cuba.

As for Israel, the Russians were better able to understand Washington’s “passionate attachment” to Israel in strategic terms, as the Cold War played out in the Middle East and Washington had a perceived need to have Israel as a permanent “battleship” there.

Now the Russians see the power of the Israel Lobby for what it is — who can miss it? The Obama administration is seen as caving under political pressure.

Although the Russians continue to be amazed at the Lobby’s strong influence over U.S. policy, the Russians are happy as clams to sit back and watch as the identification of the U.S. with Israeli policy inflicts incalculable damage to U.S. interests throughout the region and beyond.

Though a sportsman, Putin is best at chess. He is likely to shy away from playing basketball with our new President. Obama will have to beat Putin at his own game – and Obama now has shown himself easy to push around.

Israeli Adventurism

With Freeman’s withdrawal, there is surely much gloating among the politically aware in Israel. However, gloating is one thing; dangerous miscalculation is another.

That danger is particularly high as Benjamin Netanyahu takes over as Israeli prime minister. Netanyahu and his close “neoconservative” friends in the U.S. have made no bones about their preference for a Bush/Cheney-style preventive strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

As Gareth Porter and I write in the Miami Herald, the specter of such a strike takes on more reality with Netanyahu as prime minister. He, too, is taking the measure of our young President and may draw very dangerous conclusions from Obama’s subservience to the Lobby.

The effect of the Freeman affair on the intelligence community is easy to predict.

Those who were looking forward to fearless integrity will be deeply disappointed. They may seek honest work elsewhere, if they perceive that Blair is only the titular head of intelligence and that pro-Lobby political operatives are calling the shots.

On the other hand, those intelligence managers and analysts who were pleased as punch to be sent over to brief the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), created by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), will be delighted with the news on Freeman.

This briefing practice, which was encouraged by the Bush/Cheney administration, was highly irregular for a non-partisan intelligence community to be engaged in. It can be expected to flourish now, with the abject object lesson of Freeman’s demise.

On Oct. 5, 2007, I published an article about Israel’s deliberate attempt on June 8, 1967, to sink the USS Liberty in international waters off the Sinai, killing 34 of the Liberty crew and wounding over 170 in the process.

The lead was:

“So Who’s Afraid of the Israel Lobby? Virtually everyone: Republican, Democrat — Conservative, Liberal. The fear factor is non-partisan, you might say, and palpable. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee brags that it is the most influential foreign policy lobbying organization on Capitol Hill, and has demonstrated that time and again, and not only on Capitol Hill.”

The point? In June 1967, the Israelis learned that they could get away, literally, with murder and still not endanger their influence in Washington.

Events of the past weeks demonstrate that they and their Lobby are equally good at character assassination. It is embarrassingly shameful to watch President Obama acquiesce in all this.

Author retains copyright.

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2009/031109a.html

Total [Reform] recall for NSW Parliament: Opposition
by staff report via rialator 2009-03-12 20:03:45

The New South Wales Opposition Leader Barry O'Farrell says there needs to be a debate about whether the community should be given the power to bring on an early election.

Barry O'Farrell says it is time the concept of recall elections was considered in New South Wales, which would end the practice of fixed four-year parliamentary terms.

A recall election was held in California in 2003 because of voter anger about the state's finances - which led to Arnold Schwarzenegger's entry into politics.

In a speech last night to the Sydney Institute, Mr O'Farrell said the idea was worthy of consideration.

"The public should have a say on whether they should have the power to bring on an early election in circumstances where Government is failing to fulfil its mandate or its purpose," he said.

"The spectre of being forced to an election by the community could, I believe, provide the stimulus needed for government, even a New South Wales Labor Government, to perform throughout its term, as well as provide the public with a safeguard against political abuses."

However, Associate Professor Anne Twomey, from Sydney University's Law Faculty, says the move could lead to governments becoming politically cautious.

"Any government that knows it can be removed at any time may not make the hard decisions, that may be the responsible decision you need to take," she said.

And the Premier, Nathan Rees, has question Mr O'Farrell's priorities.

"We're interested in getting on with the biggest infrastructure spend in Australian history as we create jobs and support employment in the face of a global financial crisis. Barry O'Farrell's response is a constitutional lawyers picnic," he said.

"Whilst we've been in the Parliament this week debating our stimulus package underpinning 180,000 jobs over two years in the biggest spend on infrastructure since the Olympics, bigger than the Olympics, his only response is to come out today with a plan for his own job, and that's a reelection of the priority that he places on jobs for NSW."

The Speaker of the New South Wales Parliament, Richard Torbay, says wider constitutional reform at all levels of government should be examined. [Emphasis added.]

"I think if we were asked again how we would set up our governmental arrangements, it wouldn't be the way they're set up today," he said.

"Should we have three levels of government? Should there be upper houses in our state parliaments? How can we bolster regional structures?"

Recall election provisions are in place a number of other US states, and in the Canadian province of British Columbia.

© 2009 ABC

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/13/2515029.htm

[Congressman] Ron Paul Wants to Make the Sale of Raw Milk Legal
by Jennifer Lance via talya 2009-03-12 20:18:24

Do you drink raw milk?  Unless you milk your own cow, the answer is probably no since the sale of raw milk is illegal in about half of the United States.

Consumption of raw milk is legal in all 50 states, but current federal regulation prohibits interstate commerce of raw milk and raw milk products for human consumption.

Ron Paul would like to change that law.

U.S. Congressman Ron Paul has introduced H.R. 778 which would “authorize the interstate traffic of unpasteurized milk and milk products that are packaged for direct human consumption.”  According to the Organic Consumers Association:

The bill would not force a state to legalize the sale of raw milk from local producers, nor would it force a state to allow the sale of raw milk from out-of-state producers in its retail stores. The bill would, however, enable consumers to enter into transactions to obtain raw milk and raw milk products from other states without the transactions being in violation of federal law.

The current regulation banning raw milk sales 21 CFR 1240.61 states:

…no person shall cause to be delivered into interstate commerce or shall sell, otherwise distribute, or hold for sale or other distribution after shipment in interstate commerce any milk or milk product in final package form for direct human consumption unless the product has been pasteurized….

The only legal milk to be sold across state lines is pasteurized. Pasteurization kills disease causing germs and prevents souring by keeping milk at a temperature of 145 degrees F for at least half an hour, then reducing the temperature to no more than 55 degrees F.  According to “Raw Milk Vs. Pasteurized Milk” published in a British Medical Journal in 1938:

It is undoubtedly beneficial to destroy dangerous germs, but pasteurization does more than this-it kills off harmless and useful germs alike, and by subjecting the milk to high temperatures, destroys some nutritious constituents…But, after pasteurization, the lactic acid bacilli are killed. The milk, in consequence, cannot become sour and quickly decomposes, while undesirable germs multiply very quickly… Besides destroying part of the vitamin C contained in raw milk and encouraging growth of harmful bacteria, pasteurization turns the sugar of milk, known as lactose, into beta-lactose — which is far more soluble and therefore more rapidly absorbed in the system, with the result that the child soon becomes hungry again.

Probably pasteurization’s worst offence is that it makes insoluable the major part of the calcium contained in raw milk. This frequently leads to rickets, bad teeth, and nervous troubles, for sufficient calcium content is vital to children; and with the loss of phosphorus also associated with calcium, bone and breain formation suffer serious setbacks.

Pasteurization also destroys 20 percent of the iodine present in raw milk, causes constipation and generally takes from the milk its most vital qualities.

Of course, there are critics that suggest raw milk is not beneficial and milk borne illnesses are on the rise. Ron Paul’s response:

My office has heard from numerous people who would like to obtain unpasteurized milk. Many of these people have done their own research and come to the conclusion that unpasteurized milk is healthier than pasteurized milk.

Americans have the right to consume these products without having the Federal Government second-guess their judgment about what products best promote health. If there are legitimate concerns about the safety of unpasteurized milk, those concerns should be addressed at the state and local level.

H.R. 778 has been referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce.  You can read the full text of the legislation that would allow the interstate commerce of raw milk.   Personally, I would not want to buy raw dairy products from an out of state farmer because of transportation costs and concerns about freshness.  Whether you believe raw milk is healthier or not, at the heart of the issue is US constitutional law that allows Congress to regulate interstate traffic (Art. I, section 8, Clause 1), but such commerce should not be impeded. Do we really need to regulate the sale of raw milk across state borders when consumers can seek it out locally?

Some Rights Reserved

http://redgreenandblue.org/2009/03/09/ron-paul-wants-to-make-the-sale-of-raw-milk-legal/