The Civic Platform - A Political Journal of Ideas and Analysis

A free public service of the Institute for Historical Review

January 20, 2008
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Oceans Growing Acidity Alarms Scientists
McClatchy Newspapers
http://www.mcclatch ydc.com/staff/ les_blumenthal/ story/23138. html

Seven hundred miles west of Seattle in the Pacific at Ocean Station Papa, a first-of-its- kind buoy is anchored to monitor a looming environmental catastrophe .. . As the oceans absorb more and more carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, they’re gradually becoming more acidic. And some scientists fear that the change may be irreversible. At risk are sea creatures up and down the food chain, from the tiniest phytoplankton and zooplankton to whales, from squid to salmon to crabs, coral, oysters and clams. The oceans are already 30 percent more acidic than they were at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, as they absorb 22 tons of carbon dioxide a day.

Israeli Crimes in 2006 Coming to Light
Jonathan Cook
http://www.counterc urrents.org/ cook050108. htm

It apparently never occurred to anyone in our leading human rights organisations or the Western media that the same moral and legal standards ought be applied to the behaviour of Israel and Hizbullah during the war on Lebanon 18 months ago. Belatedly, an important effort has been made to set that right. A new report, written by a respected Israeli human rights organisation, one representing the country’s Arab minority not its Jewish majority, has unearthed evidence showing that during the fighting Israel committed war crimes not only against Lebanese civilians — as was already known — but also against its own Arab citizens. This is an aspect of the war that has been almost entirely neglected until now.

Subprime Nation
Patrick J. Buchanan
http://www.worldnet daily.com/ staticarticles/ article59693. html

.. . Washington drifts mindlessly toward the maelstrom. With the dollar sinking, oil surging to $100 a barrel, the Dow having its worst January in memory, foreclosures mounting, credit card debt going rotten, and consumers and businesses unable or unwilling to borrow, we appear headed into recession .. . This self-indulgent generation has borrowed itself into unpayable debt. Now the folks from whom we borrowed to buy all that oil and all those cars, electronics and clothes are coming to buy the country we inherited. We are prodigal sons, and the day of reckoning approaches.

GAO Report Challenges Effect of Longtime U.S. Sanctions on Iran
The Washington Post
http://www.washingt onpost.com/ wp-dyn/content/ article/2008/ 01/16/AR20080116 03711.html? hpid=sec- world

A three-year international effort to pressure Iran is faltering, with a new report to Congress questioning the impact of 20 years of U.S. economic sanctions on Tehran and a long-sought U.N. resolution against Iran in trouble. In a report released yesterday, the investigative arm of Congress challenged the impact of U.S. sanctions against Iran dating to 1987. Tehran has circumvented many economic sanctions, it concluded, noting Iran’s ability to negotiate $20 billion in contracts with foreign firms since 2003 to develop its energy resources. With the country’s oil wealth, Iranian banks also have funded their activities in currencies other than the dollar.

Bobby Fischer, Dead at 64, Was an Anti-Semite
European Jewish Press - AFP
http://www.ejpress. org/article/ 23292

US-born Chess world champion Bobby Fischer, who died at the age of 64 in Iceland, was an outspoken anti-Semite, who, despite having a Jewish mother of German origin, used broadcasts at far-flung radio stations to accuse Jews of everything from his legal woes to an alleged conspiracy to kill off elephants. In 2002, a magazine reported that during a Filipino radio broadcast in Manila he described his enemies as “Jews, secret Jews, or CIA rats who work for the Jews.” In recent years, Fischer became better known for his outspoken criticism of the United States.

Germany Overturns Conviction in 1933 Reichstag Fire Verdict
Bloomberg
http://www.bloomber g.com/apps/ news?pid= 20601100&sid=a1uFc6Al9J_ c&refer=germany

Germany overturned the 1933 verdict against Marinus van der Lubbe, a Dutchman convicted at the beginning of the Nazi era for setting fire to the Reichstag parliament building in Berlin. The Dec. 23, 1933, verdict sentencing van der Lubbe to death for treason and arson was overturned by a 1998 law. The Federal Prosecution Office declared that the law applies to the case, the office said in a statement yesterday. Van der Lubbe was executed in 1934.

Israel’s Richest Man Moves to Britain
The Independent (Britain)
http://news. independent. co.uk/uk/ this_britain/ article3318016. ece

Lev Leviev, who until a week ago was classified as the richest man in Israel, has joined the growing list of Israeli billionaires who have made their homes in London, where wealthy foreigners are not asked to pay tax on income earned overseas .. . News of his departure has shocked the Israeli business community and created a political headache for its government, because of the drain of wealth from Tel Aviv to London.

Following the Spinka Money Trail: Prominent Rabbi Indicted
Jewish Journal (Los Angeles)
http://www.jewishjo urnal.com/ home/preview. php?id=18767

.. . On Dec. 19, 2007, the U.S. Attorney General’s Office filed an indictement in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California naming the Chasidic yeshiva and four other Spinka organizations, as well as eight people, in a multimillion dollar tax fraud and money-laundering ring that stretched from Brooklyn to Los Angeles to Israel and elsewhere. Two of those indicted are Rabbi Naftali Tzi Weisz, 59, the Grand Rabbi of Spinka, a Brooklyn-based Chasidic sect, whose yeshiva is in this undistinguished building, and his gabbai (assistant), Moshe Zigelman, 60.

Mona Lisa Identity Revealed
Reuters
http://www.reuters. com/article/ topNews/idUSL117 9689520080114? feedType= RSS&feedName=topNews

German academics believe they have solved the centuries-old mystery behind the identity of the “Mona Lisa” in Leonardo da Vinci’s famous portrait. Lisa Gherardini, the wife of a wealthy Florentine merchant, Francesco del Giocondo, has long been seen as the most likely model for the sixteenth-century painting .. . Now experts at the Heidelberg University library say dated notes scribbled in the margins of a book by its owner in October 1503 confirm once and for all that Lisa del Giocondo was indeed the model for one of the most famous portraits in the world

Columbus Carried Syphilis From New World to Europe, Study Suggests
HealthDay News
http://news. yahoo.com/ s/hsn/columbusca rriedsyphilisfro mnewworldtoeurop estudysuggests

A new analysis of the genetics of syphilis provides support for the theory that the disease hitched a ride with Christopher Columbus from the New World back to the Old World. But in a new wrinkle, the research suggests the disease may not have been transmitted through sex until it adapted to the environment in Europe. “It evolved this whole new transmission mode, and it didn’t take very many genetic changes,” said study lead author Kristin Harper, a graduate student at Emory University.

New Push to Investigate ‘Israel Lobby’ MPs
Jewish Chronicle (Britain)
http://www.thejc. com/home. aspx?ParentId= m11&SecId=11&AId=57452&ATypeId=1

In what appears to be a fresh challenge to Israel’s UK supporters, a group of boycott campaigners has called on a Parliamentary committee to investigate the so-called “Israel lobby” which it claims has a powerful influence on the [British] government’s Middle East policy. Their letter, to Charles Ramsden, the secretary of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, accuses British MPs of “eating out of the Israeli government’s hand” and claims “friends of Israel” have embedded themselves “in the British political establishment and at the very heart of government” to sway British policy.

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