Obama Administration Maintains Bush Position on 'Extraordinary Rendition' Lawsuit
The Obama Administration today announced that it would keep the same position as the Bush Administration in the lawsuit Mohamed et al v Jeppesen Dataplan, Inc.
A source inside of the Ninth U.S. District Court tells ABC News that a representative of the Justice Department stood up to say that its position hasn't changed, that new administration stands behind arguments that previous administration made, with no ambiguity at all. The DOJ lawyer said the entire subject matter remains a state secret.
...
«Σκοπός των μοντέρνων είναι η ασφάλεια μέσα στις ιδιωτικές απολαύσεις. Και ονομάζουν ελευθερία τις εγγυήσεις που παρέχουν οι θεσμοί στις απολαύσεις αυτές».
Η αυτοκρατορία του μικρότερου κακού
Jean-Claude Michea
“In every planning scenario we built, our worst assumptions on the state of the global economy have been met or exceeded, with the continuing grip on credit and declining consumer confidence being the most damaging factors,” Nissan’s chief executive, Carlos Ghosn, said in a statement.
"A few wild poppies are blooming in my littered weedy garden. When I walk out with the dogs I see the poppies opening here and there among the weeds, and here and there a few sickly wilting narcissi. Surely death is no dream, or hopefully not, and that being the case, there is then in truth a homeland, a nowhere, a notime, noiseless and peaceful, the ultimate utopia, the eternal freedom, the end to all hunting for goodness and home."
Στο διπλωματικό πεδίο, η Γαλλία θα μιλήσει με τη Χαμάς όταν η οργάνωση αυτή «αποδεχθεί» την ειρηνευτική διαδικασία, δήλωσε χθες ο γάλλος υπουργός Εξωτερικών Μπερνάρ Κουσνέρ, ο οποίος υποστήριξε την έκκληση του Μαχμούντ Αμπάς για τον σχηματισμό κυβέρνησης «εθνικής ενότητας» που θα περιλαμβάνει μέλη και των δύο κινημάτων, της Φατάχ και της Χαμάς.
In a move that will affect blogs everywhere, including some of those hosted here, YouTube is now muting videos that make unauthorized use of copyrighted material. Once again, as the general public tries to share music and construct miniature radio stations of their own, various branches of the entertainment industry conspire to stop them. The logical end of this will be that, after shooting themselves in as many left feet as they can see past their bellies, the remaining major labels will limp to Washington and beg for a collective bailout. I am hoping the new Administration’s apparently genuine sense of empathy will not be wasted on these chronic killjoys, misers, and exploitative puds.
By BRIAN ENO
It's a tragedy that the Israelis - a people who must understand better than almost anybody the horrors of oppression - are now acting as oppressors. As the great Jewish writer Primo Levi once remarked "Everybody has their Jews, and for the Israelis it's the Palestinians". By creating a middle Eastern version of the Warsaw ghetto they are recapitulating their own history as though they've forgotten it. And by trying to paint an equivalence between the Palestinians - with their homemade rockets and stone-throwing teenagers - and themselves - with one of the most sophisticated military machines in the world - they sacrifice all credibility.
The Israelis are a gifted and resourceful people who fully deserve the right to live in peace, but who seem intent on squandering every chance to allow that to happen. It's difficult to avoid the conclusion that this conflict serves the political and economic purposes of Israel so well that they have every interest in maintaining it. While there is fighting they can continue to build illegal settlements. While there is fighting they continue to receive huge quantities of military aid from the United States. And while there is fighting they can avoid looking candidly at themselves and the ruthlessness into which they are descending.
Gaza is now an experiment in provocation. Stuff one and a half million people into a tiny space, stifle their access to water, electricity, food and medical treatment, destroy their livelihoods, and humiliate them regularly...and, surprise, surprise - they turn hostile. Now why would you want to make that experiment?
Because the hostility you provoke is the whole point. Now 'under attack' you can cast yourself as the victim, and call out the helicopter gunships and the F16 attack fighters and the heavy tanks and the guided missiles, and destroy yet more of the pathetic remains of infrastructure that the Palestinian state still has left. And then you can point to it as a hopeless case, unfit to govern itself, a terrorist state, a state with which you couldn't possibly reach an accommodation.
And then you can carry on with business as usual, quietly stealing their homeland.
Brian Eno is a musician and music producer.
