Five Blasts Put Delhi on High Alert

NEW DELHI — In the latest in a string of audacious terrorist attacks, India’s capital was thrown into chaos on Saturday evening as five serial blasts left at least 18 people dead and 100 injured. The central business district of Connaught Place and busy markets in Karol Bagh and Greater Kailash-I were targeted between 6 and 7 p.m. and three more bombs were defused in Connaught Place. As of Saturday evening, one arrest had been reported. [read more]

by Madhur Singh | on www.time.com | Posted: 19  Sept 2008

It’s Obama and McCain who are running – not their wives

Voters are losing a sense of proportion in this election.

Detroit – Politicians involve their spouses unnecessarily in campaigns with increasing and disturbing regularity.… At the recent political conventions, both John McCain and Barack Obama had their wives give speeches in very prominent time slots.… That’s right, during the valuable air time supposed to be used by the party to present their platform to the American people, spouses vouched for their husbands. [Read More Story]

By Chris W. Bell | on www.csmonitor.com | from the 16 Sept 2008 edition

Was Jesus Christ a revolutionary

Terry Eagleton sifts through the texts of the Gospels and comes up with some ambiguous answers.

Jesus certainly kept some shady political company. One of his inner circle was known as Simon the Zealot, the Zealots being an underground anti-imperialist movement dedicated to driving the Romans out of Palestine. The Roman presence in the province was not in fact particularly oppressive. No Roman institutions, legal, educational or religious, were imposed on the people. In Jesus’s own home territory of Galilee there was no official Roman presence at all, [Read More Story...]
on the New Internationalist online |

Nattering Nabobs: The GOP’s Endless Assault Against the Media

From “nattering nabobs” to hypocritical demands for privacy, the GOP attack machine never stops

In the 1992 presidential race, President George H. W. Bush attacked the media as his campaign was sinking fast against Democratic Gov. Bill Clinton of Arkansas. “Annoy the Media: Re-elect Bush” became a regular bumper sticker on the cars of Republicans. While Bush eased off on the sloganeering later, he helped foster a toxic atmosphere conducive to those who love to hate the press.… While assaulting the press, the Republican attack dogs conveniently forgot that Clinton himself was the [Read More Story...]

By John Mashek | U.S.News & World Report | Posted: 9 Sept 2008

Let It Rain

A couple of weeks before August 28th—the night that Barack Obama accepted the Democratic nomination for President, in a Denver football stadium—Stuart Shepard, the digital-media director of the lobbying arm of Focus on the Family, one of the most powerful organizations on the religious right, posed a question to his Internet viewers. “Would it be wrong,” he asked, “to pray for rain?” Shepard’s answer, apparently, was no, because he proceeded [read more]

by Hendrik Hertzberg | on newyorker.com | Posted: 15 Sept 2008

In Frantic Day, Wall Street Banks Teeter

In one of the most dramatic days in Wall Street’s history, Merrill Lynch agreed to sell itself to Bank of America for roughly $50 billion to avert a deepening financial crisis, while another prominent securities firm, Lehman Brothers, hurtled toward liquidation after it failed to find a buyer.

The humbling moves, which reshape the landscape of American finance, mark the latest chapter in a tumultuous year in which once-proud financial institutions have been brought [read more]

by Andres Ross Sorkin | on www.nytimes.com | Posted: 15 Sept 2008

This article was reported by Jenny Anderson, Eric Dash and Andrew Ross Sorkin and was written by Mr. Sorkin

Lehman: This time, feds let a big bank fall

As venerable Wall Street firms succumb to the home loan crisis, focus shifts to limiting taxpayer cost.

America’s financial crisis has entered a difficult new phase as policymakers try to contain the fallout from the collapse of the fourth largest US investment bank.

The challenge is partly in the ripple effects of Lehman Brothers going into bankruptcy. But it’s also much more. Lehman’s fall, a battle for survival at insurance giant AIG, and a rushed merger between Merrill Lynch and Bank of America are just the latest signs that a real-estate investment bust [read more]

By Mark Trumbull | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor | from the 16 Sept 2008 edition

Banks: Dominoes Ready to Fall

Many of the world’s elite banking houses are tottering on the edge. What does this portend for the global economy?

Behind the closed doors of private boardrooms in the tallest skyscrapers in New York City, London, Frankfurt and elsewhere, economic history is being made.… By private invitation, some of the most respected financial analysts and bankers in the world have repeatedly assembled for secret economic summits. [read more]

by Robert Morley | Columnist | From theTrumpet.com | Posted: 02 September 2008

Seven Questions: Reading the Tea Leaves in Pyongyang

Kim Jong Il’s mysterious failure to show up for his country’s 60th birthday bash has set off a wave of speculation about Dear Leader’s health. To find out what might be happening in Pyongyang, FP spoke with expert Ken E. Gause, who has been studying the North Korean regime for two decades.

Few people have the chance to watch a shy young man grow into a ruthless dictator—and live to talk about it. But, for one North Korean professor, Kim Jong Il is much more than the man holding his country hostage. He’s a former student. [read more]

By Kim Hyun Sik | on www.foreignpolicy.com | Posted September 2008

Behind Chavez’s Anti-US Rant

Who needs diplomacy and all its excruciating politeness? Not even the traditional “Yankee Go Home” was enough to convey the pique of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez on Thursday as he announced that he had given U.S. Ambassador Patrick Duddy 72 hours to leave Venezuela. “Hothead Yankees, go to hell!” Chávez thundered at a campaign rally in Carabobo state Thursday, announcing that he had also asked Venezuela’s ambassador to Washington, Bernardo Alvarez, to return home until a new government is elected in the U.S. [read more]

By Tim Padgett and Virginia Lopez/Caracas | on www.time.com | Posted: 12 Sept. 2008

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