Tag: 4@4

1. BBC News reports that Carbon dioxide being emitted from ships is ‘twice that of planes’. “Global emissions of carbon dioxide from shipping are twice the level of aviation, one of the maritime industry’s key bodies has said. A report prepared by Intertanko, which represents the majority of the world’s tanker operators, says emissions have risen sharply in the past six years… Some 90,000 ships from tankers to small freighters ply the world’s oceans.”

   According to The Independent, Shipping pollution ‘far more damaging than flying’. Each year, “one billion tonnes” of greenhouse gases are emitted. “Since the 1970s, the bulk of commercial vessels have run on heavy ‘bunker’ fuel, a by-product of the oil refining process for higher grade fuels. One industry insider described it as ‘the crap that comes out the other end that’s half way to being asphalt’. It has potentially lethal side effects such as the release of sulphur dioxide, carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxide and sulphuric acid. I suspect if the environmental cost of shipping goods from overseas was part of the equation, then “cheap” Asian goods wouldn’t be quite so cheap. I wonder if it is economically viable yet to have a fleet of modern “clipper” ships?

2. Some positive news concerning global warming for a change. According to the Kansas City Star, a Coal power plant was denied a permit! Reporters David Klepper and Karen Dillon write, “Delivering a stunning victory to those concerned about global climate change, Kansas’ top regulator rejected a proposal to build a coal plant in western Kansas.”

   “I believe it would be irresponsible to ignore emerging information about the contribution of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to climate change and the potential harm to our environment and health if we do nothing,” Rod Bremby, the state’s secretary of health and environment, said in a statement.

   Steven Mufson of the Washington Post has more on the news in slightly misleading headline, ‘Power plant was rejected over carbon dioxide for first time.’ “The Kansas Department of Health and Environment yesterday became the first government agency in the United States to cite carbon dioxide emissions as the reason for rejecting an air permit for a proposed coal-fired electricity generating plant, saying that the greenhouse gas threatens public health and the environment.”

   The Kansas agency’s decision comes after a Supreme Court decision in April that said greenhouse gases “should be considered pollutants under the Clean Air Act.” Two plants were to be built by Sunflower Electric Power in Holcomb to supply electricity for Kansas and eastern Colorado. “Together the plants would have produced 11 million tons of carbon dioxide annually”.

   This decision is a victory Kathleen Sebelius, the Democratic governor of Kansas. “Sebelius has been promoting the expanded use of renewable energy, especially wind. In her state of the state address this year, she said: ‘The question of where we get our energy is … no longer just an economic issue, nor solely an issue of national security. Quite simply, we have a moral obligation to be good stewards of this state.'” After the ruling, according to the story in the Kansas City Star, Sebelius “hailed Bremby’s decision in a statement as ‘a decision about all of us — today and into the future.'”

   Sunflower is likely to challenge the decision in court. “We are extremely upset over this arbitrary and capricious decision… This is a grievous error. To deny this on the basis of CO2 is pulling it out of thin air,” sputtered Steve Miller, Sunflower spokesman. Previously coal power plants have been stopped by the governors of Florida and California due to their negative climate change impact.

3. The New York Times reports on a New task for the Coast Guard in the Arctic’s warming seas. Matthew Wald and Andrew Revkin write, “The Coast Guard is planning its first operating base [in the Arctic] as a way of dealing with the cruise ships and the tankers that are already beginning to ply Arctic waters.” The new base is likely to be in Barrow, Alaska.

   “I’m not sure I’m qualified to talk about the scientific issues related to global warming,” the Coast Guard commandant, Adm. Thad W. Allen, said in an interview. “All we know is we have an operating environment we’re responsible for, and it’s changing.”

   “The Coast Guard has also begun discussions with the Russians about controlling anticipated ship traffic through the Bering Strait” such as freighters taking advantage of the Northwest Passage shaving more than 5,000 miles off a voyage between Asia and Scandinavia.” In another sign of less polar ice, “Royal Dutch Shell is preparing for exploratory oil drilling off Alaska’s Arctic coast beginning next year.”

Today’s Guns of Greed is below the fold.

This is an OPEN THREAD. Here are four stories in the news at 4 o’clock to get you started.

1. After four years of waiting for the Bush administration to get the electricity working again, James Glanz of The New York Times reports that “Iraq has agreed to award $1.1 billion in contracts to Iranian and Chinese companies to build a pair of enormous power plants, the Iraqi electricity minister said Tuesday.” Of course, the news of this deal is not sitting well with U.S. military officials who claim Iran’s involvement could “mask military activities”.

   The Iraqi electricity minister, Karim Wahid, said that the Iranian project would be built in Sadr City, a Shiite enclave in Baghdad that is controlled by followers of the anti-American cleric Moktada al-Sadr. He added that Iran had also agreed to provide cheap electricity from its own grid to southern Iraq, and to build a large power plant essentially free of charge in an area between the two southern Shiite holy cities of Karbala and Najaf…

   The agreements between Iraq and Iran come after the American-led reconstruction effort, which relied heavily on large American contractors, has spent nearly $5 billion of United States taxpayer money on Iraq’s electricity grid. Aside from a few isolated bright spots, there was little clear impact in a nation where in many places electricity is still available only for a few hours each day.

   A Chinese company, Shanghai Heavy Industry, will construct a new power plant in Wasit at an estimated cost of $940 million. The plant could add 1,300 megawatts of electricity to Iraq’s power grid, which currently has a total capacity “of roughly 5,000 megawatts.”

2. News from the Washington Post that Tough punishment is expected for B-52 nuke warhead errors. “The Air Force has decided to relieve at least five of its officers of command and is considering filing criminal charges in connection with the Aug. 29 ‘Bent Spear’ incident in which nuclear-armed cruise missiles were mistakenly flown from North Dakota to Louisiana, two senior Air Force officials said yesterday.”

   A formal announcement, according to WaPo is expected tomorrow “along with the detailed findings of an internal, six-week investigation into how a B-52 bomber crew mistakenly flew from one military air base to another with six nuclear warheads strapped to its wings.” “A colonel commanding one of the Air Force wings is likely to be the highest-ranking officer to be relieved”. “Letters of reprimand will be issued to several enlisted service members” and criminal charges may possibly follow.

3. Spiegel reports that Bloodstained rubies fund Burmese regime. “Large, deep red rubies from Burma command prices of tens of thousands of euros per carat, making them the most exclusive stones a gemstone dealer can offer.”

   The Burmese military regime forces workers to extract the precious stones under brutal conditions in its heavily guarded mines. Roughly 90 percent of the global supply of rubies comes from Burma. According to eyewitness accounts, mining bosses mix amphetamines into the workers’ drinking water to boost productivity. Sometimes children also work in the muddy mines…

   There are no exact figures for the junta’s gem trade. Estimates of the amount of income generated by the business range as high as hundreds of millions of dollars per year. At the state-organized gem auction in Yangon, where only middling quality stones come under the hammer, the regime has taken in some $300 million so far in 2007.

Below the fold is today’s “Guns of Greed”.

This is an OPEN THREAD. Here are four stories in the news at 4 o’clock to get you started.

1. The New York Times reports Parliament in Turkey votes to allow Iraq incursion. “The Turkish Parliament today granted authorization for a cross-border offensive to strike Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq, although diplomatic efforts continued to prevent any military action. The motion passed in the Parliament by 526 votes in favor to 19 votes against. It was drafted by the ruling Justice and Development Party, and grants the government open authority for one year to launch military incursions against rebels who carry out attacks in Turkey from northern Iraq.” Meanwhile, the Washington Post and others report that House support wanes for Armenian genocide bill. As much as the media and the Bush administration is linking the two, the Turks have had these incursion plans in the works for a long time. Good thing the Bush doctrine allows countries to invade to stop terrorism.

2. The Guardian reports Britain to claim more than 1m sq km of Antarctica and the move would extend UK oil, gas and mineral rights.

   

   The United Kingdom is planning to claim sovereign rights over a vast area of the remote seabed off Antarctica, the Guardian has learned. The submission to the United Nations covers more than 1m sq km (386,000 sq miles) of seabed, and is likely to signal a quickening of the race for territory around the south pole in the world’s least explored continent.

   The claim would be in defiance of the spirit of the 1959 Antarctic treaty, to which the UK is a signatory. It specifically states that no new claims shall be asserted on the continent. The treaty was drawn up to prevent territorial disputes.

   So what’s motivating this grab? Well likely, Britain has been ‘frozen” out of the land grab going on at the North Pole by Russia, Canada, the U.S. and other countries. (For more info, see my essay from September, “Mapping Claims to the Spoils of Global Warming”.) In addition, the rising price of oil, which is at $88 a barrel, is intensifying pressure to secure new potential oil sources.

   Unfortunately, this will be nothing but bad news for penguins and other creatures that live in Antarctica. In another story at The Guardian, science correspondent Alok Jha reports, WWF calls for protected areas for Antarctica. “Large parts of the oceans around Antarctica should be turned into marine reserves to protect the rapidly declining biodiversity on the continent,” according to the WWF. The environmental charity “will call on diplomats, environmentalists and scientists to support their plan to identify and designate a network of protected marine reserves to safeguard Antarctica and its surroundings, which occupy some 40% of the world’s surface.”

Below the fold is an article about the poverty line, which one ground says should be $74,044 for a 2-parent family of four living in Los Angeles, today’s “Guns of Greed”, and a “extra” report on the Solomon Island’s sale and export of 28 dolphins to Dubai taking place today.

This is an OPEN THREAD. Here are four stories in the news at 4 o’clock to get you started.

1. The New York Times reports In Iran, Putin warns against military action. “President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia told a summit meeting of five Caspian Sea nations in Iran today that any use of military force in the region was unacceptable and in a declaration the countries agreed that none of them would allow their territories to be used as a base for launching military strikes against any of the others.”

   “We should not even think of making use of force in this region,” Mr. Putin said…

   He was the first Kremlin leader to travel to Iran since 1943, when Stalin attended a wartime summit meeting with Churchill and Roosevelt…

   “Not only should we reject the use of force, but also the mention of force as a possibility,” Mr. Putin said. “This is very important. We must not submit to other states in the case of aggression or some other kind of military action directed against one of the Caspian countries.”

   … Mr. Putin added that the two countries planned to cooperate on space, aviation and energy issues and suggested that the tensions with the West over Iran’s nuclear program had provided Russia a unique role. “Russia is the only country that is helping Iran to realize its nuclear program in a peaceful way.”

   Putin to Cheney: Check. Your move. And to prove she would be just as crazy as the Bush administration, The Guardian reports Hillary Clinton would use violence against Tehran.

   Hillary Clinton today moved to secure her position as the most hawkish Democrat in the 2008 presidential race, saying she would consider the use of force to compel Iran to abandon its nuclear programme.

   In an article for Foreign Affairs magazine intended as a blueprint for the foreign policy of a future Clinton White House, the Democratic frontrunner argues that Iran poses a long term strategic challenge to American and its allies, and that it must not be permitted to build or acquire nuclear weapons.

   “If Iran does not comply with its own commitments and the will of the international community, all options must remain on the table,” Ms Clinton said.

In the rest of today’s Four at Four — the upcoming G-7 conference and the weak U.S. dollar, another episode of “Guns of Greed”, and an expedition to measure ice thickness at the North Pole. So, put on your mukluks and parkas and journey north with me to that frozen region we call below the fold…

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1. Not surprisingly, there is a lot of reports coming from the speech of Hu Jintao, China’s president and the Communist party general secretary, opening the Communist Party’s 17th National Congress. The New York Times reports Communist Party’s 17th National Congress. “Chinese President Hu Jintao promised to address social fissures, a degraded environment and rampant corruption during his second term as China’s top leader, but he all but ruled out more than cosmetic political reform… Mr. Hu spoke extensively about his ‘scientific view of development,’ a set of lofty, vague principles supporting harmonious economic, social and political development.” The NY Times think a shift in Hu’s rhetoric “suggests that Mr. Hu thinks the economy can outperform what he and his predecessors considered possible — or prudent — at the last party congress in 2002.”

   NPR focuses on Hu Making a peace overture to Taiwan. Hu “proposed talking with Taiwan about a formal peace accord, but included preconditions that Taiwanese officials previously found unacceptable. Hu stressed Beijing’s desire for a peaceful, negotiated settlement to the 58-year-old conflict with Taiwan. ‘We would like to make a solemn appeal: On the basis of the one-China principle, let us discuss a formal end to the state of hostility between the two sides, reach a peace agreement,'” Hu said. Taiwan’s has rejected Hu’s offer.

   The Guardian reports that Hu admits Communist shortcomings. “Hu Jintao promised a more open and sustainable model of development today in a speech that will set the policy of the nation for the next five years… Mr Hu acknowledged that the ruling party had failed to live up to the expectations of the people and proposed a series of modest reforms aimed at improving the skills, morals and accountability of cadres… The shift from quantity to quality in both party management and economic development underpins Mr Hu’s theory of ‘scientific development’, which will be written into the charter of a party that has moved from revolution to plutocracy.”

   Lastly, AFP reports China to go eco-friendly. “We will increase spending on energy and environmental conservation with the focus on intensifying prevention and control of water, air and soil pollution and improving the living environment for both urban and rural residents,” Hu said. “We will enhance our capacity to respond to climate change and make new contributions to protecting the global climate.” “Hu called the environmental effort ‘vital to the immediate interests of the people and the survival and development of the Chinese nation’. He said the government would seek to develop a ‘resource-conserving and environmentally friendly society’ and will ‘get every organisation and family to act accordingly,’ while offering no specific policy plans.” That last bit sounds almost Bushesque.

There’s more today including a story about how ‘Al-Qaeda in Iraq is crippled’, today’s episode of “Guns of Greed”, and the discovery of an enormous dinosaur fossil found in Patagonia. So, step into the Lost World, below the fold.

OPEN THREAD, this is. Hmmmmmm… Four stories, there are. Yes. Get you started, they will. Hmmmmm…?

1. Elizabeth Bumiller reports for The New York Times that At an Army school for officers, there is blunt talk about Iraq.

   As the war grinds through its fifth year, Fort Leavenworth has become a front line in the military’s tension and soul-searching over Iraq. Here at the base on the bluffs above the Missouri River, once a frontier outpost that was a starting point for the Oregon Trail, rising young officers are on a different journey — an outspoken re-examination of their role in Iraq…

   Officers were split over whether Mr. Rumsfeld, the military leaders or both deserved blame for what they said were the major errors in the war: sending in a small invasion force and failing to plan properly for the occupation.

   But the consensus was that not even after Vietnam was the Army’s internal criticism as harsh or the second-guessing so painful, and that airing the arguments on the record, as sanctioned by Leavenworth’s senior commanders, was part of a concerted effort to force change…

   Much of the debate at Leavenworth has centered on a scathing article, “A Failure in Generalship,” written last May for Armed Forces Journal by Lt. Col. Paul Yingling, an Iraq veteran and deputy commander of the Third Armored Cavalry Regiment who holds a master’s degree in political science from the University of Chicago. “If the general remains silent while the statesman commits a nation to war with insufficient means, he shares culpability for the results,” Colonel Yingling wrote…

   One question that silenced many of the officers was a simple one: Should the war have been fought?

   No.

Below the fold is the rest of today’s Four at Four: terrorist training in Pakistan, “Guns of Greed”, and a story about flying in a Zeppelin.

This is an OPEN THREAD. Here are four stories in the news at 4 o’clock to get you started. Hearts are the depositories of secrets. Lips are their locks, and tounges are their keys.

1. Kevin Doyle, reporting for The Guardian from Rangoon, writes After the riots, Burma returns to an unspoken terror. “With only 30 minutes to curfew, no one takes chances with the Burmese military these days…”

   With the killing of an unknowable number of peaceful protesters and the imprisonment of thousands more during the pro-democracy demonstrations last month, many people fear reprisals by the military. At the Shwedagon pagoda, the nucleus of the protests, the military is still in force. Wearing steel helmets, flak jackets and carrying extra ammunition, the number of troops far exceeds the few old monks who potter among the golden spires of what is the spiritual centre of Burmese life…

   Sources said that around 1,000 monks had lived and studied at these small monasteries, but where they have gone is not a question that anyone ponders aloud. One man simply put his wrists together in the sign of locked handcuffs when asked where they are.

   “We cannot speak. We cannot defend. We have no weapons. They have all the weapons,” said another 30-year-old man, who cannot be identified for his own safety.

2. Ian Black of The Guardian reports, The honeymoon for is ending on ‘mission impossible’. Reality has begun to sink in for Tony Blair, former British prime minister, about his work as peace envoy.

   “Mr Blair was appalled by what we told him,” said Mats Lignell, spokesman for the international observers stationed here “temporarily” in 1994 after a Jewish extremist from the nearby settlement of Kiryat Arba massacred 29 Palestinians praying in the Ibrahimi Mosque…

   “Blair was really astonished and angry,” says the UN official who gave him a presentation on the devastating effects of Israel’s “security barrier”, settlements, checkpoints, and closures on the lives of Palestinians in the occupied territories. “He asked very smart questions, though I did think that someone who was prime minister for so long should already have known these facts.” …

   Crucially, Mr Blair is keeping away from the Gaza Strip, which is under international boycott and cut off from the West Bank since Hamas took over.

   He has said privately that Israel and the Palestinian Authority will eventually have to talk to the Islamists. The hope is that success in the West Bank will demonstrate the achievements of the moderates and weaken Hamas – ignoring evidence, from Iraq and elsewhere, that sanctions and collective punishment do not work.

3. Okay, this is coming from The New York Times, which has a history of manipulating the news to fit the Bush administration’s agenda, but the newspaper is reporting — ‘Analysts Find Israel Struck a Nuclear Project Inside Syria‘.

   Israel’s air attack on Syria last month was directed against a site that Israeli and American intelligence analysts judged was a partly constructed nuclear reactor, apparently modeled on one North Korea has used to create its stockpile of nuclear weapons fuel, according to American and foreign officials with access to the intelligence reports…

   Many details remain unclear, most notably how much progress the Syrians had made in construction before the Israelis struck, the role of any assistance provided by North Korea, and whether the Syrians could make a plausible case that the reactor was intended to produce electricity…

   “There wasn’t a lot of debate about the evidence,” said one American official familiar with the intense discussions over the summer between Washington and the government of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel. “There was a lot of debate about how to respond to it.”

   Okay, once again the legitimacy of the “evidence” isn’t being questioned. Just like they “knew” where the WMDs were hidden in Iraq. Plus, Bush has advocated increased use of nuclear energy, which a Syrian (or Iranian) reactor could be used for, to counter climate change, but then they go an bomb any nation they don’t like that is building a reactor. Plus, these are the same people that claim the scientific evidence of global warming isn’t conclusive, but don’t even bat an eye at evidence of a nuclear weapons program in Syria? And still there are some people that believe Republicans are strong on security? Oy vey!

   Also, remember this partially contradicts what Night Owl relayed that Laura Rozen wrote about the attacks and a recent scud missiles shipment coming from North Korea; however, the North Korean angle is the same. But this whole Syria nuclear bit, to quote Yogi Berra, “It’s like déjà vu all over again.”

But that’s not all, Four at Four continues with today’s episode of “Guns of Greed” and an article about the “doomsday” seed vault in Norway. It’s a great story, so please make the voyage to the frozen land below the fold…

This is an OPEN THREAD. Here are four stories in the news at 4 o’clock to get you started.

1. Greg Miller of the Los Angeles Times reports the CIA investigates conduct of its inspector general. Gen. Michael Hayden, the CIA Director, “has mounted a highly unusual challenge to the agency’s chief watchdog, ordering an internal investigation of an inspector general who has issued a series of scathing reports sharply critical of top CIA officials… The move has prompted concerns that Hayden is seeking to rein in an inspector general who has used the office to bring harsh scrutiny of CIA figures including former Director George J. Tenet and undercover operatives running secret overseas prison sites. The inquiry is focused on the conduct of CIA Inspector General John L. Helgerson and his office.”

   The New York Times reports that the investigation is “particularly focused on complaints that Mr. Helgerson’s office has not acted as a fair and impartial judge of agency operations but instead has begun a crusade against those who have participated in controversial detention programs.” CIA officers have complained about length of the inspector general’s investigations and that they have “derailed careers and generated steep legal bills for officers under scrutiny”.

   A 2004 report by Helgerson’s office “warned that some C.I.A.-approved interrogation procedures appeared to constitute cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment, as defined by the international Convention Against Torture.” His office also “rankled agency officials when it completed a withering report about the C.I.A’s missteps before the Sept. 11 attack — a report that recommended ‘accountability boards’ to consider disciplinary action against a handful of senior officials.”

2. The Guardian reports China joins UN censure of Burmese regime. “China turned against the Burmese government last night and supported a UN security council statement rebuking the military regime for its suppression of peaceful protests, and demanding the release of all political prisoners.” This “marked the first time that Beijing had agreed to UN criticism of the junta. The statement did not threaten sanctions, but the significance of its unanimous support by all 15 members of the security council would not have been lost on Burma’s generals, who had hitherto been able to count on China, a neighbour and key trading partner, to block UN censure.” The Independent reports that in order to secure “the agreement of China and Russia”, Western countries had to “water down a draft statement that had originally demanded a transition to democracy in the country.”

3. The New York Times reports Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, has criticized top Bush administration officials over missile defense shield. “President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia sharply upbraided the visiting American secretaries of state and defense on Friday as little specific progress was made during negotiations intended to resolve growing disagreements over missile defense and other security issues.

   “During a day of lengthy negotiations here, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates presented what they described as a series of ‘new ideas’ intended to narrow the divide between the countries.” BBC News reports that the Russians have urged a U.S. missile ‘freeze’. “After high-level talks in Moscow, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Russia saw the shield as a ‘potential threat’ and wanted to ‘neutralise’ it.” Rice said the Bush administration would not stop its missile “shield” plans. According to the NY Times:

   Mr. Putin himself set the tone for the day when he kept Ms. Rice and Mr. Gates waiting 40 minutes for a morning meeting at his suburban residence, or dacha, and then surprised them with a derisive lecture in front of the television cameras…

   Mr. Putin appeared to catch Mr. Gates and Ms. Rice off guard with his remarks since no public statements were planned in advance.

   Mr. Putin, though, arrived with notes and spent eight minutes welcoming the opportunity to talk about where Russia strongly disagreed with the Bush administration. Ms. Rice appeared angered, though Mr. Gates reacted impassively.

   No one could have predicted being ambushed by Putin. Rice is out of her league. At least Gates kept his poker face.

There’s more below the fold. Today’s “Guns of Greed” with HUGE news about a U.S. Army report that details how Blackwater fired at vehicles fleeing the scene of the Nisoor Square massacre. Plus a bonus story about a collector of vintage and obsolete computer equipment — the time lord of technology. So, step into that TARDIS disguised as an old mainframe and voyage to the place known only as… below the fold.

This is an OPEN THREAD. Here are four stories in the news at 4 o’clock to get you started.

1. Rosalind Russell of The Independent reports that ‘Only now, the full horror of Burmese junta’s repression of monks emerges‘. “Monks confined in a room with their own excrement for days, people beaten just for being bystanders at a demonstration, a young woman too traumatised to speak, and screams in the night as Rangoon’s residents hear their neighbours being taken away.” First-hand accounts, smuggled out of Burma, are now revealing a “systematic campaign of physical punishment and psychological terror”.

   Most of the detained monks, the low-level clergy, were eventually freed without charge as were the children among them. But suspected ringleaders of the protests can expect much harsher treatment, secret trials and long prison sentences. One detained opposition leader has been tortured to death, activist groups said yesterday. Win Shwe, 42, a member of the National League for Democracy, the party of the detained democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, has died under interrogation, the Thai-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners said, adding that the information came from authorities in Kyaukpandawn township. “However, his body was not sent to his family and the interrogators indicated that they had cremated it instead.” Win Shwe was arrested on the first day of the crackdown.

   Monks and novices, as young as 10 years old, were confined to a room — 400 in one room — with no toilets, beds, blankets, buckets, or water. “The room was too small for everyone to lie down at once. We took it in turns to sleep. Every night at 8 o’clock we were given a small bowl of rice and a cup of water. But after a few days many of us just couldn’t eat. The smell was so bad.” Onlookers who applauded the monks were taken away and beaten. One such spectator “is so scared she won’t even leave her room” or talk to anyone.

   Another Rangoon resident told the aid worker: “We all hear screams at night as they [the police] arrive to drag off a neighbour. We are torn between going to help them and hiding behind our doors. We hide behind our doors. We are ashamed. We are frightened.”

   The junta’s “intelligence agents are scrutinising photographs and video footage to identify demonstrators and bystanders. They have also arrested the owners of computers which they suspect were used to transmit images and testimonies out of the country.”

2. The New York Times reports that Turks are angry over a House committee’s Armenian Genocide vote. “Turkey reacted angrily today to a House committee vote in Washington on Wednesday that condemned the mass killings of Armenians in Turkey during World War I as an act of genocide, calling the decision ‘unacceptable.'” Turkey’s president, Abdullah Gul, criticized the vote saying “Unfortunately, some politicians in the United States have once more dismissed calls for common sense, and made an attempt to sacrifice big issues for minor domestic political games… This is not a type of attitude that works to the benefit of, and suits, representatives of a great power like the Unites States of America. This unacceptable decision of the committee, like similar ones in the past, has no validity and is not worthy of the respect of the Turkish people.”

   The Bush administration’s concern that passage of the resolution could hamper their ability to continue the occupation of Iraq. “Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates noted that about 70 percent of all air cargo sent to Iraq passed through or came from Turkey, as did 30 percent of fuel and virtually all the new armored vehicles designed to withstand mines and bombs.” “Turkey severed military ties with France after its Parliament voted in 2006 to make the denial of the Armenian genocide a crime.” Turkey has recalled its ambassador for 10 days of consultations.

   Meanwhile in northern Iraq, The New York Times reports Iraq’s worries on Turkish border grow. Mahmoud Othman, a “Kurdish lawmaker in the Iraqi Parliament today condemned preparations by Turkey’s government for potential cross-border military action against Kurdish rebels in Iraq, even as he reported that the Turkish military was mobilizing on the border and Turkish warplanes were flying close to Iraq.” Othman said Turkey’s military was mobilizing on the frontier and “Turkish warplanes were flying close to the border but not crossing it.” Reuters reports that Turkey may request incursion into Iraq. Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s prime minister, “will ask parliament next week to authorize a military push into north Iraq to fight Kurdish rebels”. The Washington Post confirms Turkey’s military mobilization. “On Tuesday, Turkey’s top civilian and military authorities ordered the armed forces to their highest state of alert. On Wednesday, the Turkish air force used F-16 and F-14 fighter jets and Cobra helicopter gunships to bomb suspected PKK hideouts and escape routes in the mountainous border region, the Turkish Dogan news agency reported. Iraqi residents said Turkish artillery shells landed in Iraqi territory, according to news reports from the border area.” The U.S. and European Union have implored Turkey not to invade northern Iraq.

There is more below the fold: a mixed court ruling on Al Gore’s film, today’s “Guns of Greed”, and a bonus story on the natural evolution of English irregular verbs.

This is an OPEN THREAD. Here are four stories in the news at 4 o’clock to get you started.

1. The following from Washington Post columnist, Dana Milbank, is offered without comment:

   House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was in a determinedly good mood when she sat down to lunch with reporters yesterday. She entered the room beaming and, over the course of an hour, smiled no fewer than 31 times and got off at least 23 laughs.

   But her spirits soured instantly when somebody asked about the anger of the Democratic “base” over her failure to end the war in Iraq.

   “Look,” she said, the chicken breast on her plate untouched. “I had, for five months, people sitting outside my home, going into my garden in San Francisco, angering neighbors, hanging their clothes from trees, building all kinds of things — Buddhas? I don’t know what they were — couches, sofas, chairs, permanent living facilities on my front sidewalk.”

   Unsmilingly, she continued: “If they were poor and they were sleeping on my sidewalk, they would be arrested for loitering, but because they have ‘Impeach Bush’ across their chest, it’s the First Amendment.”

   Though opposed to the war herself, Pelosi has for months been a target of an antiwar movement that believes she hasn’t done enough. Cindy Sheehan has announced a symbolic challenge to Pelosi in California’s 8th Congressional District. And the speaker is seething.

   “We have to make responsible decisions in the Congress that are not driven by the dissatisfaction of anybody who wants the war to end tomorrow,” Pelosi told the gathering at the Sofitel, arranged by the Christian Science Monitor. Though crediting activists for their “passion,” Pelosi called it “a waste of time” for them to target Democrats. “They are advocates,” she said. “We are leaders.”

2. If I were president decider, this is not the kind of headline I’d want to see in the Los Angeles Times — ‘Bush urges ‘no’ vote on Armenian genocide bill‘ or in The New York Times — ‘Bush Argues Against Armenian Genocide Measure‘. But then after invading countries, sanctioning and using torture, and systematically eroding away your own citizens’ civil liberties, then I suppose you might get a bit squeemish about the House passing a resolution recognizing, in yet another non-binding resolution, genocide.

   From George W. Bush’s statement today:

   On another issue before Congress, I urge members to oppose the Armenian genocide resolution now being considered by the House Foreign Affairs Committee. We all deeply regret the tragic suffering of the Armenian people that began in 1915. This resolution is not the right response to these historic mass killings, and its passage would do great harm to our relations with a key ally in NATO and in the global war on terror.

   So, Mr. Bush. What is the “right response”? According to the Washington Post story on Bush’s remarks, “Three former defense secretaries, in their own letter, said Turkey probably would cut off U.S. access to a critical air base. The government of Turkey is spending more than $300,000 a month on communications specialists and high-powered lobbyists… to defeat the initiative.” Bush has offered no alternative to the reslution other than continuing to ignore genocide.

   [EVENING UPDATE] According to Bloomberg, House panel backs Armenian measure over objections. “A congressional panel approved a resolution calling for the U.S. to designate the World War I-era killings of 1.5 million Armenians as genocide, amid warnings that the measure would harm relations with Turkey. ¶ The nonbinding resolution, backed by the House Foreign Affairs Committee on a 27-21 vote, calls for a reversal in the practice by successive presidential administrations of avoiding referring to the deaths as genocide in an annual April message commemorating the event. More than half of the House’s 435 members have signed on as co-sponsors.”

3. The Guardian reports that Russian president, Vladimir Putin said there is no proof Iran is trying to make nuclear weapons.

   “We do not have data that says Iran is trying to produce nuclear weapons. We do not have such objective data,” Mr Putin told a news conference in Moscow after talks with the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy.

   “Therefore we proceed from a position that Iran has no such plans, but we share the concern of our partners that all programmes should be as transparent as possible.”

   So, will Putin provide an effective check to President-in-waiting Cheney? Would Russian protection extend over Iran? Welcome to the Neo Cold War. Now with even more insanity!

News item no. 4, ‘Tensions heat up between China and Taiwan’ and today’s “Guns of Greed” is below the fold.

This is an OPEN THREAD. Here are four stories in the news at 4 o’clock to get you started.

1. The Guardian reports Aung San Suu Kyi has rejected talks with Burma junta. “The prospect of a meeting between Burma’s detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and the military ruler faded today, after she refused to accept preconditions for the talks set by the junta.” In a statement today, she said: “The success of a dialogue is based on sincerity and the spirit of give and take. The will for achieving success is also crucial and there should not be any preconditions.” China has again rejected sanctions against the regime.

2. The New York Times reports that Turkey has said its troops can cross Iraq border. “Turkey took a step toward cross-border military action in Iraq today, as a council of the country’s top political and military leaders issued a statement today allowing troops to cross to eliminate separatist Kurdish rebel camps in the mountainous northern region.” The announcement that “parliamentary approval normally needed for cross-border movement of troops was not needed for special units’ in hot pursuit” of Kurdish separatists from the PKK (Kurdish Worker’s Party) came after 13 soldiers were killed Sunday by a landmine that exploded 15 miles from the Iraqi border in Sirnak Province.

   Reuters reports the U.S. State Department has warned against Turkish action in Iraq. “If they have a problem, they need to work together to resolve it and I am not sure that unilateral incursions are the way to go, the way to resolve the issue,” said State Department spokesman Sean McCormack. However, “asked whether Washington had urged restraint on both sides, McCormack said sovereign states had to make their own decisions about how best to defend themselves.”

3. There have been reports of ongoing heavy fighting in the North Waziristan region of Pakistan. Most of the fighting is centered around Miral. Casualties have been difficult to confirm, but “soldiers, civilians, and militants” have all been killed reports The New York Times. The Pakistani military has said at least 45 soldiers have been killed and another 50 are missing. The AP reports at least 250 people killed in the fighting. “Pakistani aircraft bombed a village bazaar packed with shoppers near the Afghan border… The attack on Epi village in North Waziristan tribal region killed dozens of militants and civilians”.

   In related news, Reuters reports the White House is saying that Al Qaeda is trying to boost efforts in U.S.. “Although we have discovered only a handful of individuals in the United States with ties to al Qaeda senior leadership, the group likely will intensify its efforts to place operatives here in the homeland,” said a report titled “National Strategy for Homeland Security”. The report also noted that al Qaeda had protected its leadership, found new “operation lieutenants” and “regenerated in a safe haven” in Pakistan.

   The deaths are likely to intensify opposition within Pakistan to Gen. Pervez Musharraf’s government and alliance with the Bush administration. Musharraf is also trying to secure another term as president. He awaits the decision from the Pakistani Supreme Court if his re-election is valid. The AFP reports that an extra Pakistan judge was added to hear Musharraf election case.

4. The Washington Post reports Dragonfly or Insect Spy? Scientists at Work on Robobugs. People attending anitwar rallies and other political events in New York and Washington have claimed to have spotted “mechanical” dragonflies or “little helicopters” hovering over them. “Some suspect the insectlike drones are high-tech surveillance tools, perhaps deployed by the Department of Homeland Security… No agency admits to having deployed insect-size spy drones… But the CIA secretly developed a simple dragonfly snooper as long ago as the 1970s.”

   This story seems specifically written to increase paranoia. It comes right after news of the Myanmar junta soliders rounding up people, shouting “We have photographs. We are going to make arrests!”

Today’s “Guns of Greed” is below the fold…

This is an OPEN THREAD. Here are four stories in the news at 4 o’clock to get you started.

1. Another day, another report on how the Bush administration is helping al Qaeda. Reuters reports Report says war on terror is fueling al Qaeda. “The ‘war on terror’ is failing and instead fueling an increase in support for extremist Islamist movements” according to a report by the Oxford Research Group (ORG).

   If the al Qaeda movement is to be countered, then the roots of its support must be understood and systematically undercut,” said Paul Rogers, the report’s author and professor of global peace studies at Bradford University in northern England.

   “Combined with conventional policing and security measures, al Qaeda can be contained and minimized but this will require a change in policy at every level.”

   He described the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq as a “disastrous mistake” which had helped establish a “most valued jihadist combat training zone” for al Qaeda supporters.

   The report recommends immediate redeployment from Iraq and intensifying diplomacy in the region, including with Iran and Syria. Rogers said it will take “at least 10 years to make up for the mistakes made since 9/11.

   “Going to war with Iran”, he said, “will make matters far worse, playing directly into the hands of extreme elements and adding greatly to the violence across the region. Whatever the problems with Iran, war should be avoided at all costs.”

   I suspect no one will pay any attention to this study because the author is a professor of peace studies and thinks “war should be avoided at all costs”. BBC News reports on the ORG study as well, covering the same ground, but adds the “report said al-Qaeda had benefited from the removal of the Taleban regime in Afghanistan by coalition forces. The terror network got a propaganda boost from the extraordinary rendition and detention of terrorism suspects, it said.” Any bets on if we’ll see any mention of this report from the traditional media in America?

2. Some Iraqi leaders have given up trying to reconcile their difference. Joshua Partlow reports for the Washington Post that Top Iraqis pull back from key U.S. goal.

   Iraqi leaders argue that sectarian animosity is entrenched in the structure of their government. Instead of reconciliation, they now stress alternative and perhaps more attainable goals: streamlining the government bureaucracy, placing experienced technocrats in positions of authority and improving the dismal record of providing basic services…

   Legislation to manage the oil sector, the country’s most valuable natural resource, and to bring former Baath Party members back into the government have not made it through the divided parliament. The U.S. military’s latest hope for grass-roots reconciliation, the recruitment of Sunni tribesmen into the Iraqi police force, was denounced last week in stark terms by Iraq’s leading coalition of Shiite lawmakers.

   Oh, and no one could have predicted the following when the U.S. military began arming locals to “fight” “al Qaeda in Iraq”.

   Some potential progress toward reconciliation has run into recent trouble. The U.S. effort to recruit Sunni tribesmen to join the police force and fight the insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq was strongly opposed last week by Shiite officials, who asserted that the Sunni recruits were killing innocent people under the guise of fighting insurgents.

   “We demand that the American administration stop this adventure, which is rejected by all the sons of the people and its national political powers,” the leading Shiite political coalition said in a statement. “Their elements are criminals who cannot be trusted or relied upon.”

Four at Four continues below the fold with stories on:

3. Today’s “Guns of Greed” starring Blackwater CEO Erik Prince as Bruce Wayne, er Batman.

4. Ocean wave energy generation in the Pacific Northwest.

Plus a bonus story about Mad Max’s Wind Farm in Australia. So jump below the fold, the Bat-Signal is on.