USA And The Future Of The World -II

[ramana]

How much were the US founding fathers influenced by Oliver Cromwell's actions?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_Cromwell

[acharya]

Public trust in US media eroding: Pew study

* Posted on - Mon Sep 14, 2009 12:06PM EDT

WASHINGTON (AFP) -

Public trust in the US media is eroding and increasing numbers of Americans believe news coverage is inaccurate and biased, according to a study released on Monday.

Just 29 percent of the 1,506 adults surveyed by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press between July 22-26 said news organizations generally get the facts straight.

Sixty-three percent said news stories are often inaccurate, up from 34 percent in a 1985 study, Pew said.

Sixty percent of those polled said the press is biased, up from 45 percent in 1985. Just 26 percent in the latest survey said that news organizations are careful their reporting is not politically biased.

Seventy-four percent said news organizations tend to favor one side in dealing with political and social issues. Eighteen percent said they deal fairly with all sides.

Pew said Republicans tend to be more critical of the news media than Democrats although negative attitudes toward the news media were also increasing among Democrats.

Fifty-nine percent of those who identified themselves as Democrats said news organizations are often inaccurate, up from 43 percent just two years ago.

Two-thirds of the Democrats polled said the press tends to favor one side rather than to treat all sides fairly, up from 54 percent in 2007.

Just 20 percent of those polled said news organizations are independent of powerful people and organizations and only 21 percent said they are willing to admit their mistakes.

The poll found television remained the dominant news source for the public, with 71 percent saying they get most of their national and international news from television.

Forty-two percent said they get most of their news from the Internet compared with 33 percent who cited newspapers.

Fifty-nine percent rated news organizations as "highly professional," down from 66 percent two years ago and 72 percent in 1985.

Sixty-two percent of those polled said news organizations are being fair to the Obama administration while 23 percent said media coverage has been unfair.

Forty percent said the major cable news outlets -- CNN, Fox News and MSNBC -- were their main source for national and international news with 22 percent saying they relied on CNN, 19 percent on Fox and six percent on MSNBC.

Seventy-two percent of Republicans view Fox News positively compared with just 43 percent of Democrats.

Those polled were starkly divided along party lines when it came to The New York Times.

Republicans viewed the Times negatively by a margin of 31 percent to 16 percent while Democrats viewed it positively by 39 percent to eight percent margin.

Sixty-eight percent of those polled said it would be a major loss if large national newspapers like the Times, USA Today and The Wall Street Journal were to stop publishing.

The survey had a margin of error of between plus or minus three percentage points.

[acharya]

<b>
No we can't? UK think tank says US power is fading</b>
AP


Dr John Chipman, Director-General and Chief Executive of the International AP – Dr John Chipman, Director-General and Chief Executive of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, …

By RAPHAEL G. SATTER, Associated Press Writer Raphael G. Satter, Associated Press Writer – Tue Sep 15, 11:12 am ET

LONDON – A weakened United States could start retreating from the world stage without help from its allies abroad, an international strategic affairs think tank said Tuesday.

The respected London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies said President Barack Obama will increasingly have to turn to others for help dealing with the world's problems — in part because he has no alternative.

"Domestically Obama may have campaigned on the theme 'yes we can'; internationally he may increasingly have to argue 'no we can't'," the institute said in its annual review of world affairs.

The report said the U.S. struggles against insurgent groups in Iraq and Afghanistan had exposed the limits of the country's military muscle, while the near-collapse of the world financial markets sapped the economic base on which that muscle relied.

The report also claimed that the U.S. had lost traction in its efforts to contain Iran's nuclear program and bring peace to the Middle East.

"Clearly the U.S. share of 'global power,' however measured, is in decline," the report said.

The head of another respected London think tank, Robin Niblett of Chatham House, said the rise in the relative power of China, India, Russia and the European Union has made it harder for the U.S. to exercise its influence.

"America should apply changes in leadership style, but I wouldn't overplay the decline because decline is relative," said Niblett — who was not involved in drawing up Tuesday's report. "One should not doubt that the U.S. remains the most powerful nation in the world, but it's difficult to use the power and to use it to influence others."

In addition to a rise in regional powers, Niblett said the U.S. has long been viewed as being part of the problem rather than the solution on many issues — including climate change, the financial crisis, and the failure of the Middle East peace process.

"It's also carrying the baggage of failed policies and of a failed financial approach," Niblett said, referring to the Bush administration. "There's a lot of catching up to be done."

The IISS report praised Obama, saying that he recognized there was only so much America could do "to impose its views on others."

After years of often thorny relationships between the U.S. and its allies during Bush's administration, Obama has talked of the need to work with other nations on such issues as the financial meltdown, climate change and nuclear proliferation.

"These are challenges that no single nation, no matter how powerful, can confront alone," Obama said in April after attending the G-20 summit in London.

"The United States must lead the way," he said. "But our best chance to solve these unprecedented problems comes from acting in concert with other nations."

The think tank's report said Obama could help restore the United States' standing by working with other nations to contain emerging threats to its position as the world's pre-eminent power. Controlling the nuclear ambitions of Iran and North Korea would require help from regional allies, the report said. The same was true of Afghanistan, where the U.S. has had difficulty persuading its NATO partners to follow its lead in boosting the number of troops sent to fight a resurgent Taliban.

"In the next year or two, the greatest demand on U.S. talents and power will be to persuade more to become like minded and adopt greater burdens," the report said.

Niblett said Obama was moving in the right direction.

"This administration is far more frank about the U.S. interdependence with rest of the world, and that's a good thing," Niblett said.

___

Associated Press Writer Karolina Tagaris contributed to this report.

[acharya]

Evenimentul Zilei, Romania
<b>How 9/11 Made the World Forget About Civil Rights</b>
By Adrian Cochino

[acharya]

Chinanews, China
<b>Resolving Sino-U.S Naval Military Issues</b>

[Guest]

<b>FBI unit set for more anti-terror raids in Queens; Fears of Madrid-style subway bombings</b>

[acharya]

I think you are quite right there. As a Frenchman, I always perceived the UK's implicit assertion that the it had a special relationship with the US as self-delusional. The US don't care much about any other country.
They have a keen interest in coutries when money can be made, fair enough.
They certainly admire Germany for being a tough nut to crack in WWII. They also admire the Japanese for being able to build powerful industrial empires.
For France, they have a feeling of mixed contempt and amusement: we are the country of wine-lovers and fashion. Like the Italians, we are fun-loving losers.
There is a genuine cultural bond between the former white members of the British empire (England, Ireland, Scotland, Australia, NZ, SA...) but somehow the American citizen does not really fit in.
I would say the US {moderately) like England because, of course, the first settlers were English after all, and also the Brits have this funny queen and court life which reminds them so much of the wonders of Disney Land. But at the end of the day, the US remain the most important country in the world, if not the only country in the world.
The US are probably surprised that the UK claims to have a special relationship, but are quite happy to have someone so faithfully following their policies; it gives a bit more credit on the international scene, it comes quite handy sometimes.
Why would the Brits claim to have a special relationship with the US? I don't think there is anything romantic or emotional about that. The UK doesn't really care about the US, at the end of the day. What the UK wants is some comfort to soothe the pains of a lost pride. With the US, the UK can say: "sure, now we are not so great, but see what we produced, does it not somehow reflect positively on us?"
The thing is, the 16th-17th century is a long time ago, especially by american standards, and the US today owe probably as much -in historical and cultural terms- to Ireland, Italy, Russian and German Jews, Chinese, Mexicans (!) as to England.
It is not a drama for the US, it is a drama for England. The James Bond movies portray a relationship which is false: no, the US intelligence services do not rely on, nor do they admire, the intelligence services of England, wakie, wakie! There is a lack of maturity in the UK's approach to the US, and, in return, the US despises the UK with quite some cynicism, it is painful to watch.

[acharya]

Actually, there is too much angst in Britain about the "special relationship." To most Americans, there is a fondness for Britain at a cultural level. We marvel at your castles and your Parliament. We think of your accent as cultivated, and the names of Oxford and Cambridge still resonate as the pinnacle of intellectual sophistication. We even admire the monarchy - even though most don't understand it and would not want it for our own country. In that cultural sense, Britain will always be "special" to America.

The problem is not what you are but the degree to which you seem to, in American eyes, be less and less what you have been. Churchill, Thatcher and Blair are icons in American eyes, but most Brits seem to have little regard for them - a perspective that mystifies Americans who admire strong leaders. The British political system - hereditary peers included - is admired, but Britain seems more and more determined to be less like Britain and more like us - or worse still from our perspective - France.

The British military, once viewed as powerful if smaller than our own, has been gutted and reduced to a shmabolic mess through neglect. We see Britons going to the funerals of your honored dead but who are unwilling to pony up the cash to take care of the troops and keep them alive. Where once the British armed forces were seen as the exception to the rule of weak European militaries, you are now seen, even by our own military professionals of whom I know a few, as just as small and ineffective, unaware that you are living off a decaying reputation. If anything, Americans seem more appreciative of Britain's military than do the British people.

The point is not that Britain is any less special to America, but rather that Britain seems content to let itself become less special. Sentimentally, Americans will always have a soft spot for our British allies - in fact, we probably like you better than you like us. In the hard world of power-politics, however, Britain seems content to crave the status of a special power without doing the hard work necessary to retaining that status, and for that we only shake our heads in bewilderment.

[dhu]

<b>The West’s duplicity</b>
Premen Addy

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->America and its trans-Atlantic allies have willingly shut their eyes to China’s nuclear proliferation and Beijing’s supply of nuclear know-how to Islamabad. This is in sharp contrast to the West’s castigation of Iran for its nuclear programme. For US, a Pakistani Bomb is good, an Iranian Bomb is bad!

The plot thickens. A purloined letter penned by Pakistani rogue scientist Dr AQ Khan is in the possession of Dutch intelligence following a raid on his niece’s house in Amsterdam; a copy with his London-based daughter, Dina, was destroyed on the instructions of her sobbing father after a harrowing session of ISI interrogation. There was, however, another copy; it belongs to the English journalist Simon Henderson, who has been on the trail of the ‘father’ of Pakistan’s Islamic bomb since the mid-1970s, when Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto ruled the roost in Islamabad as premier. The trail went cold; Henderson’s projected biography of Khan was in deep freeze until 2003, when America’s fraught relationship with Iran reached critical mass. Khan’s dealings with the Tehran regime made him the cynosure of baleful eyes, the ISI’s most of all, since Washington was keen to nobble the errant doctor Frankenstein.

The story was up and running again, ignited by a call from Henderson’s ‘Deep Throat’ telling him of Khan’s renewed interest in establishing contact through a telephonic code. Henderson’s tale in The Sunday Times Magazine (September 20) is as riveting as it is intriguing. He writes: “The first customer of its (Khan Research Laboratories) enrichment plants was China — which itself had supplied Pakistan with enough highly enriched uranium for two nuclear bombs in the summer of 1982,” and subsequently tested one of its own on Pakistan’s behalf in May 1990, as revealed in a book, titled Deception, by two other journalists working for the paper.

After 9/11, US pressure on the Pervez Musharraf Government mounted. <b>The General was probably offered a way out by his American interlocutors: “Work with us and we will support you. Blame all the nuclear nonsense on Khan”.</b> Done. Gen Musharraf’s peans to Khan may have echoed in every corner of Pakistan, yet our hero soon put Khan under house arrest under ISI watch. Li Chew, the senior Minister who ran China’s nuclear weapons programme, had Khan warned about the Pakistan Army: “As long as they need the bomb, they will lick your balls. As soon as you have delivered the bomb, they will kick your balls.” Khan’s demure rephrasing to his wife read: “The bastards first used us and are now playing dirty games with us.”

<b>The West’s haste to impugn Iran for its nuclear ambitions contrasts strangely with its discreet silence </b>on China’s complicity in the illicit traffic of nuclear proliferation, masterminded by their common ally, the Pakistan Government and its military controllers.

<b>Years before the inconvenience of Al Qaeda and the Taliban became corrupting flesh, the Reagan Administration and its immediate successor headed by George Bush Sr provided the protective arm of the CIA around AQ Khan, </b>when Richard Barlow at the agency’s Pakistan desk blew the whistle on his dubious activities. The recalcitrant Barlow got the boot for his refusal to recant. Questions remain about the murky Anglo-American relationship with Pakistan. What are its true contours, what its hidden depths? And how do they fit in with Beijing’s anti-India realpolitik?

The philosopher Hegel went to some pain explaining his “Cunning of Reason;” but it was base cunning surely that drove the Countess of Minto’s triumphal entry in her diary on the troubled future that awaited India following the birth of the All India Muslim League in Dhaka in 1905 after her husband, the viceroy of India, had presided over its rite of passage. Against malevolent odds, India survived partition and has prospered.

Meanwhile, in the north and east of the sub-continent was created an Army cantonment called Pakistan, where are today seeded myriad agonies that wait to blight England’s once green and pleasant land.

Islamic terrorism, incubated in the very Muslim dominion whose seed was blessed with the holy water of the Raj, stalks the United Kingdom. The bomb plot designed to destroy transatlantic airliners in mid-flight and the long gaol sentences awarded the plotters — Tanvir Hussain, Abdulla Ahmed and Assad Sarwar — by a London court, are further evidence of the looming Pakistan-bred Islamic monster.

The late Robin Cook, spoke boldly of an ethical British foreign policy, on assuming office as New Labour’s Foreign Secretary. He cut a forlorn figure on the back benches of the Commons as his master, Mr Tony Blair, announced Britain’s support for the US war to destroy Saddam’s non-existent “weapons of mass destruction” in Iraq.

And so to a panoramic view of games great and small. British media Piranhas are much given to ritual attacks on Stalin’s August 1939 non-aggression pact with Hitler, describing it as the road to World War II. The British Government’s betrayal of Czechoslovakia in the Munich settlement of 1938, which forced the surrender of Czech Sudetenland to Nazi Germany and Hitler’s subsequent march into Prague are rarely mentioned. Similar indulgence marks their approaches to the dilatory tactics of the British delegation at the Moscow talks with the Soviet Union to forge a common front against the Third Reich.

The Right-wing Max Hastings in his recent study of Churchill as warlord refers to the intense hatred of Russia in the higher echelons of the British establishment where hopes burned brightly for a Russo-German conflict of mutual destruction. Stalin refused to oblige, buying time with his own accord with the Fuhrer. He repeated the performance with fascist Japan a year later (without being blamed for Pearl Harbour), thus laying for the Soviet Union the spectre of a war on two fronts. The Germans suffered irreparable loss at Stalingrad when Soviet forces from the far east joined the battle to deliver the coup de grace to Hitler’s vaunted Sixth Army.

Hastings reveals British disbelief at the possibility of French defeat, with an Army ensconced behind the supposedly impregnable Maginot Line; the same British elements dismissed any prospect of sustained Soviet resistance to the Nazi onslaught.

<b>At the fag end of the war, Winston Churchill asked his military staff to draw up a plan for an Anglo-American assault with remnants of the Wehrmacht on the Soviet Union. </b>Operation Unthinkable, as it was called, would have been an act of unsurpassed treachery. Conceived in Churchillian folly as a defence of the national interest, it was never implemented.

Joseph Stalin, true keeper of the seamless robe of grand strategy, had the last word. His stock in Russia is high and rising. Understandably so. <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

[dhu]

<b>Twilight of Pax Americana</b>

[Guest]

http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20090928_ob...ontent=readmore

<b>Obama's Move: Iran and Afghanistan</b>
By George Friedman

[dhu]

Despite all the loose ends of neocolonialism, the Freedom Fighters should be at least be credited for physically removing colonizer from the soil. We don't have to worry about gora pretending to be 'native indian' as they are 'native south african'. here is colonizer striking pose on native soil, what a smile.

S. African mine discovers 507-carat white diamond

<img src='http://d.yimg.com/a/p/ap/20090929/capt.79d81b8791a64d6b80b35e1c7b24e961.south_africa_diamond_joh801.jpg' border='0' alt='user posted image' />

[Guest]

In last 10 days, couple of very serious event took place.
1) US had thrown Israel under bus.
2) US kept Iranian others nuclear sites report hidden from public, despite these reports, they were forcing Israel to compromise.
3) During UN speech, Obama called Israel occupier and demand continuous land for Palestine.
4) Refused defense shield to Poland and send GE CEO to Russia for business deals.
5) Supporting loon Honduras ex-dictator and permitted him to call UN.
6) Obama had spoken once with Gen McChrystal.
7) Today Obama called Afghanistan is NATO war.
8) France Premier openly made fun of Obama.

Now my take -
Europe is nervous with new far left US President. Europe normally spend lot of money on free dole to its citizen because of socialist system, now they have to spend money on defense including Germany. They will be next in chopping block.
There will be light weight sanctions on Iran.
US forces will move out of Afghanistan and will ask UN to supply peace force in Afghanistan. My take, he will do it before 2010 election.

[Guest]

<b>DOLLAR INDEX SPOT</b>:

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/cbuilder?ticker1=DXY:IND

[Guest]

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Obama Cuts Off Funding for Iranian Human-Rights Documentation </b>  [Michael Rubin]
I've got to say, even for the Obama administration, this is a real shocker.

The Clinton State Department has decided to cut off all funding for the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center (IHRDC), which was compiling lists of protestors imprisoned in this summer's unrest, as well as those who were killed in the crackdown.

IHRDC is what human-rights advocates should be: methodical, precise, and apolitical in their work. And yet, the Obama administration has, without explanation, cut off all federal funding to the group which has consistently fulfilled its mandate.

Anyone, across the political spectrum who has any interest in human rights in Iran keeps the IHRDC reports on their desks.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

It means Iran is able to put pressure on US administration.

[Naresh]

<b>Obama focusing on al-Qaida, not Taliban</b>

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama is prepared to accept some Taliban involvement in Afghanistan's political future and will determine how many more U.S. troops to send to the war based only on keeping al-Qaida at bay, a senior administration official said Thursday.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

Cheers <!--emo&:beer--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/cheers.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='cheers.gif' /><!--endemo-->

[Guest]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/eu_nobel_peace

<b>President Barack Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize</b><!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->OSLO – President Barack Obama won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize on Friday in a stunning decision designed to encourage his initiatives to reduce nuclear arms, ease tensions with the Muslim world and stress diplomacy and cooperation rather than unilateralism.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

This just shows how corrupt is Noble Peace Prize committee. A full joke. A complete left loon organization.
What is Obama achievement? Only speeches written by some staff and read from teleprompter.
Leftists get credit for their intentions rather than accomplishments

[Guest]

<b>Rush Limbaugh pounces on Barack Obama's Nobel Peace Prize</b>

Conservatives pounced on the the Nobel Prize committee's decision to award President Barack Obama the Nobel Peace Prize, with talk-radio host Rush Limbaugh calling it a "greater embarrassment" than losing the Olympics.

<b>"This fully exposes the illusion that is Barack Obama," Limbaugh told POLITICO in an e-mail. "And with this 'award' the elites of the world are urging Obama, THE MAN OF PEACE, to not do the surge in Afghanistan, not take action against Iran and its nuclear program and to basically continue his intentions to emasculate the United States."

Limbaugh continued: "They love a weakened, neutered U.S and this is their way of promoting that concept. I think God has a great sense of humor, too."</b>

The Nobel award comes a week to the day after Obama's personal pitch for the 2016 Olympics in Chicago was rejected by the International Olympic Committee.

Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele echoed the view:<b> “The real question Americans are asking is, ‘What has President Obama actually accomplished?’ It is unfortunate that the president’s star power has outshined tireless advocates who have made real achievements working towards peace and human rights. One thing is certain – President Obama won’t be receiving any awards from Americans for job creation, fiscal responsibility, or backing up rhetoric with concrete action.”</b>

[acharya]

De Tijd, Belgium
<b>Hated Currency</b>

[Guest]

<b>President Barack Obama Nobel Peace Prize win mocks award; GOP has ammunition on Iran, Afghanistan</b>