Barbara Walters: Governor, let’s talk about some issues. The Middle East. The Obama administration does not want Israel to build any more settlements on what they consider “Palestinian territory.” What is your view on this?

Sarah Palin: I disagree with the Obama administration on that. I believe that, um, the Jewish, uh, settlements should be allowed to be expanded upon, because that population of Israel is, is going to grow. More and more Jewish people will be flocking to Israel in the days and weeks and months ahead. And, um, I don’t think that the Obama administration has any right to tell, um, Israel that, that, uh, the Jewish settlements cannot expand.

Barbara Walters: Even if it’s Palestinian areas?

Sarah Palin:I believe that the Jewish settlement should be allowed to expand.

Why Walters didn’t do her journalistic best and follow up on Palin’s assertion (in bold above) about the flocking, if only to hear whether theories like this one are behind Palin’s ability to ignore the immigration statistics and trends in Israel, including the fact that immigration has hit all-time lows there, including a 3,000 person drop from 2007 to 2008, is beyond me.

In getting advice about serving on city council, I recently was advised that the response, “I don’t know,” is acceptable at times. Like, when, for example, you don’t actually know something.  Palin’s response to Walters would have been completely adequate (regardless of whether one agrees with it or not), if she’d left out the section I’ve bolded.

It is this adding in of assertions that lack any basis in reality that sink Palin’s credibility as a person with the potential to lead a major super power. It’s one thing to swap Iraq for Iran and Iran for Iraq, like she did with Sean Hannity the other night (a forum topic on Hannity’s website on that very mix-up has been deleted).  I recently wrote a column where I asserted something about abortion rights advocates when I meant abortion rights opponents (it’s since been corrected).

But in the case of Israel’s settlement policy, there was no need for Palin to fabricate, unless she’s truly pushing the theological notion of the Second Coming. I’m honestly not sure which upsets me more, as something being promoted by a person being taken this seriously by so many Americans – making stuff up to give a false sense that you know a few things, or believing, as supposedly 50-60 million Americans do, that Jews will indeed flock to Israel and be converted as part of the Second Coming of Jesus.

It’s also an indication that she hasn’t listened to Charles Krauthammer or anyone else who has said for more than a year that if she wants to be a contender (and maybe this is our answer – she doesn’t) for the U.S. presidency, she better bone up on some knowledge.

Now that we’ve gotten some of the Chinese reaction to president Obama’s trip, it’s time to start sampling the reaction of the rest of the world.

This article by the great Thomas Klau of Germany’s Financial Times Deutschland is not encouraging – and points out that without the U.S. able to exercise effective leadership, it’s time to grapple seriously with stronger global institutions.

According to Klau, President Obama’s China visit signals that a moment the Europeans have dreaded for hundreds of years has come when he writes:

“At least since the time of Napoleon, we Europeans have lived with a somewhat fearful suspicion that China will likely wake up one day as a giant of global politics. Now that time has come.”

As far as what the trip shows about the United States, Klau is even less sanguine, and more than a little “peeved” that Obama is treating Beijing better than he does the European Union:

“Obama’s China visit was more than a passing episode. It most likely documents the definitive end of a historic epoch, in which the foremost Western power was able to present itself internationally as the ultimate authority on good government and good business, without incurring more than the weak protestations of those who were comparatively unsuccessful. … the turnaround year of 1989 [year the Berlin Wall fell] marked the beginning of the end of a historic era – an era in which Western concepts of good governance and good business almost entirely dominated the global discourse. If things stay this way because China continues to do splits between free and un-free politics, the Tiananmen Square massacre will be, unfortunately, the 1989 event with the strongest influence on the future.”

“We are slowly beginning to get used to this new, post-American world. Peeved, we see that the globally more modest United States treats its coolly-controlling lender China with greater care than it does the European Union.”

By Thomas Klau*

Translated By Stephanie Martin

November 19, 2009

Germany – Financial Times Deutschland – Original Article (German)

After the cool treatment of Europeans, now comes a soft stance toward China. During his first visit to Asia, U.S. President Barack Obama, sober as always in his approach to foreign policy, has drawn his conclusions about the reorganization of the global power arena. In accordance with the wishes of the Chinese leadership, human rights rhetoric was almost entirely missing from Obama’s public statements. Behind closed doors he may have made demands on some key issues like Iran; in public, however, anything that may have suggested America as school master and China as the one receiving instruction was avoided.

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What is the significance of President Obama’s habit of bowing to foreign royalty? Continuing with our coverage of China’s reaction to president Obama’s Asia tour, Diguo Zhunjiang for China’s state-controlled Global Geographic Times asserts that while this results in a great loss of face for the United States, he warns his readers not to be lulled into a sense of complacency by Obama’s apparent shows of respect.

For China’s Global Geographic Times, Diguo Zhunjiang writes in part:

“I regard this as a performance. If we say that his bow upon meeting the Saudi king was a genuine expression of traditional royal awe by the newly-elected Obama, then we can also say that this time, his bow was a way of getting back at domestic critics. His intentions are quite obvious: he wants a change from the cowboy-style arrogance of his predecessor Bush in order to re-establish the United States as a model of civility, but on a deeper level, repair the damage that the Iraq and Afghanistan wars have done to America’s image.

“Regardless of how humble it is in appearance, arrogant strategic thinking is in America’s bones and will continue to be so. So we shouldn’t place any hope in this false smile that has been grafted onto the United States. Rather, we should be more vigilant.”

By Diguo Zhunjiang

Translated By Mark Klingman

November 15, 2009

People’s Republic of China – Global Geographic Times – Original Article (China)

While in Tokyo, at noon on November 14, U.S. President Barack Obama met the Japanese emperor and empress at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo. Upon meeting him at the door of the royal residence, the tall Mr. Obama made an almost 90-degree bow and shook the Emperor’s hand. Obama stopped just shy of a deep bow, and shook hands warmly with the emperor and empress, saying, “it’s really an honor to meet you, your majesty.”

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Can President Obama persuade China not to be so dependent on growth, particularly trade-dependent growth? Likening Beijing’s obsession with growth to a Chinese version of the ‘Berlin Wall,’ Feng Mengyun of China’s state-run Global Geographic Times expresses his hope that President Obama can do something to talk the Beijing leadership into turning over a new leaf.

With some surprising criticism of the regime, Feng Mengyun writes for the Global Geographic Times in part:

“Prior to thirty years ago, the old Chinese model caused tremendous suffering. But an even graver sin would have been to stick with the system that caused such suffering.

“While [Chinese] exports stand at $1.7 trillion, domestic sales are only $860 billion. China’s trade deficit with the U.S. is $300 billion. This seems like a huge trade surplus, not to mention a contradiction. More difficult to fathom is how much foreign exports are responsible for China’s rise. Today, even with 20 percent of the world’s doors closed to trade, China unceasingly opposes trade protection and domestic unemployment is rising by the million. Is China capable of dealing with this?

“The unpredictable issue is China itself. Because rising growth has become China’s ‘Berlin Wall.’

“Obama’s ‘mutually beneficial’ thinking has already received widespread support in liberal countries, which is why the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize went to the first Black U.S. president. Since he arranged to visit China before going to Norway to collect his Prize, I hope while visiting China, Obama declares: ‘Mr. Hu Jintao, tear down this wall!’

By Feng Mengyun [???]

Translated by Jimmy Chow

November 16, 2009

People’s Republic of China – Global Geographic Times – Original Article (China)

U.S. President Barack Obama, “Ambassador of Peace,” has finally set foot in Beijing. Ahead of his visit, North Korea fired missiles, there was a sea battle between North and South Korea, and Somali pirates took 28 Chinese sailors hostage. What do these events tell Chinese who their enemies and friends are!

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Her story represents the stories that I dread will become absolutely the norm and her story represents the stories that other women who are unhappy with the new guideline recommendations about breast cancer screening dread.  That, under the new recommendations, a 30 year old woman will either not perform self-breast examinations which otherwise would give her something with which she could go to a doctor and ask for more screening, or that if she does ignore the new guidelines (which argue against self-examination: “[the task force] discouraged doctors from teaching breast self-examination” – yes, you read that right) and go ahead and do self exams, that when they then go to their doctors and ask for the screening, the doctor will require some ridiculous threshold before he or she will approve or recommend the screening. And that even then, the woman’s insurance won’t cover it since the guidelines say that it’s imperfect and not recommended for women under 50.

That passivity will be approved and routine.  That women will not trust themselves to know their body, that they will not bother because the system does not want to bother – because the system is so concerned about the harm of anxiety and over-biopsying.

I’ve read the guidelines, the reports and the very carefully worded explanations written by people I trust and admire.

But I am trusting my instinct on this and I am telling you – disapproving of self breast-examination and suggesting that women will have to walk in with such a threshold of concern for what they’re feeling about their body absolutely makes me irate at the thought of what a set back this is for women – for humans, for patients – to be in control of their health.

And the utter disregard for the human toll these illnesses take on everyone around the one diagnosed with the breast cancer.

Anxiety sucks. I’ve been there done that for years with shadows on films and MRIs that required additional testing.  And while I have a “family history” we don’t have the gene – and a very small percentage of women do have the gene mutations currently known to be responsible for a very small percentage of breast cancer.  My Gale score isn’t high enough to get me into most clinical trials.

From the New York Times:

While many women do not think a screening test can be harmful, medical experts say the risks are real. A test can trigger unnecessary further tests, like biopsies, that can create extreme anxiety. And mammograms can find cancers that grow so slowly that they never would be noticed in a woman’s lifetime, resulting in unnecessary treatment.

Over all, the report says, the modest benefit of mammograms — reducing the breast cancer death rate by 15 percent — must be weighed against the harms.

Screening in the 40-49 decade results in a 15% reduction in fatalities? I’ll take that over reducing the harm of anxiety and overbiopsying anyday.

According to this blog entry from the Web site of China’s Global Geographic Times, a U.S. Embassy request that China use a new spelling of Obama’s Chinese name has been met with suspicion among that nation’s ‘Netizens.’

So what’s in a name, one might ask?

For the Global Geographic Times, Scholar Jiang Huai writes in part:

“On November 12, officials at the U.S. Embassy in China told reporters that the U.S. president’s name had been changed. (The president’s name is written with three Chinese characters, and they wanted to change the first so that, when read out loud, it sounds more like ‘Oubama’ (???) rather than ‘Aobama’ (???)).”

Puzzling over the explanation for this, Jiang Huai writes:

“When people translate Chinese, they often fail to pay close attention to the sound of Chinese characters. The U.S. suspects that the original name ‘Aobama’ contains the Chinese characters for ‘Australia’ and ‘fawn over.’ Now that China and Australia are increasingly close, the U.S. will of course be concerned about this. ‘Oubama,’ on the other hand, includes the Chinese characters for ‘Europe’ and ‘fawn over,’ within which may be hidden America’s great ambition to have Europeans once again pledge their allegiance to it.”

By Scholar Jiang Huai (????)

Translated by Jimmy Chow

November 13, 2009

People’s Republic of China – Global Geographic Times – Original Article (Chinese)

What’s the best name???

On November 12, officials at the U.S. Embassy in China told reporters that the U.S. president’s name had been changed. (The president’s name is written with three Chinese characters, and they wanted to change the first so that, when read out loud, it sounds more like “Oubama” (???) instead of “Aobama” (???)). Embassy officials explained that this transliteration was closer to the English. Is this just about an American word, or is there something else going on here?

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On my trips abroad, I have rarely found an Indian restaurant that would satisfy my native taste buds. In the West, there has been a “curry” revolution and its impact has been the most in Britain. However, there is a growing realization that Indian cooking is not just meant to set your tongue on fire or titillate the palate, it actually mixes common sense with the ancient science of Ayurveda, gaining popularity as alternative medicine.

“Ever since the first British curry house opened its doors (the country now has an estimated 9,000 Indian restaurants) Indian food has become synonymous, in many minds, with the macho pursuit of tongue-bothering spice and fattening takeaway blowouts washed down with gallons of beer,” reports The Independent.

“Of course, there is another side to Indian food, and in recent years a small but determined group of cooks have sought to break through the stereotype.

“Monisha Bharadwaj is one of Britain’s top Indian cooks and an award-winning writer. Her latest book, Healthy Indian in Minutes, is mouth-watering collection of dishes… ‘The majority of British takeaways do not offer the best example of good Indian cooking,’ Bharadwaj says. ‘But you have to think about what they are. When they first opened, curry houses were catering to people who were used to eating heavy food with all its gravy, cream and stodginess. Takeaways offered something similar but with added spice.’

“But Bharadwaj says there is a growing demand for something different. I meet her in Hounslow, where she moved from her native Mumbai 22 years ago. As well as writing she now runs a cookery school in her kitchen. ‘More and more people want to cook home-cooked Indian food that’s fresh and healthy,’ she says. ‘They know that it is something different but they don’t know what it is because you can’t get it in restaurants.’

“Bharadwaj’s courses are proving a hit with everyone from housewives and husbands short of inspiration to top chefs looking to expand their repertoires.

“Bharadwaj is particular in the kitchen but that’s just how she learned to cook. Indian home cooking is governed by rules, some of them common sense but others more complex and founded on the ancient Indian science of Ayurveda. First recorded more than 5,000 years ago, the world’s oldest known system of medicine casts the kitchen as an apothecary in which herbs have healing powers.” More here…

Amazon website has this to say about Bharadwaj’s book: “People often see Indian food as greasy, fatty and labour-intensive, but everyday Indian home cooking is neither unhealthy nor difficult to prepare. Monisha Bharadwaj will prove that it is in fact a highly nutritious, gentle cuisine that has always included natural and whole foods such as whole wheat flour, raw cane sugar, lots of vegetables, beans, lentils and any number of healing spices.

“Indian eating is based on the ancient science of Ayurveda, a system of holistic living that is the oldest form of medicine known to man. Broken down into straightforward chapters – curries, dry dishes, light one-pot meals, salads and raitas, chutneys and relishes, drinks and sweets – ‘Healthy Indian in Minutes’ will give readers the tips and strategies they need to cook healthy home-style food in a matter of minutes.” More here…

In the years that we have pursued this project, today’s posting is one of the strangest international press articles I can recall. And while it indicates that Hamas may be allowing more press freedom than we thought – the conclusions of the author are anything but comforting.

Keeping in mind that the accused killer is of Palestinian origin, the author of this article from the Al Watan Voice, a newspaper published in Hamas-controlled Palestinian territory, while blaming the Fort Hood shootings on a conspiracy of either Zionism or Freemasonry [not unusual for the Arab press], agrees with the reasoning of the conspirators he seeks to expose.

And what is this reasoning? That President Obama, in showing humility and forgiveness toward Arab and Muslim states, is regarded by them as weak, and that the only way to deal with such states is the way George W. Bush did.

For the Al Watan Voice, columnist Hameed Al Wasity writes in part:

“Barack Obama has shown and continues to show inappropriate weakness and unjustified humility. This has been taken advantage of by Arab and Muslim governments.

“The Fort Hood shooting was organized by the hidden world government, international Zionism or Freemasonry (who nominated Obama for a presidential run), and was designed to push an Arab-Muslim officer – and a doctor with the rank of Major – to teach Obama and others a primary lesson: when an American doctor and officer would betray and kill in an instant, one cannot so easily trust Arabs and Muslims – and he [Hasan] was an Arab and a Muslim!!

“Unless Obama changes his policies and begins following in the footsteps of those who preceded him by bringing back American prestige, then there’ll be yet another lesson and another opportunity!! …”

By Hameed Al Wasity

Translated By Nicolas Dagher

November 12, 2009

Palestinian Territories [Gaza] – Al Watan Voice – Original Article (Arabic)

CNN has carried a report of an Arab officer who killed 13 American soldiers and wounded dozens at the Fort Hood military base in Texas.

And the officer, Major Nidal Hasan, is a psychiatrist responsible for treating American soldiers. There are so many colorful stories about his nationality. Some of his colleagues say he’s Jordanian, while certain news outlets report he’s of Palestinian origin.

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With the powers invested in me by executive order, the first and only decision I will make is abolish the Bowl Championship Series aka BCS.

College football is the only major sport in America not decided on the field but by sportswriters, broadcasters, coaches and computers. It is not an objective way to determine a national champion. The reason it is this way is money, greed by college presidents and ESPN.

My plan is to install a 16-team playoff format. It would consist of conference champions, independents-at-large (i.e. Notre Dame) and, if necessary, conference runners-up if their records warrant an invitation to the Sweet 16. That way, the school ranked 17th, has no one to blame but itself. More on those guys later.

I would reduce the season to 11 games that would conclude on the Thanksgiving weekend with conference championship games played. The three Saturdays in December would hold the first three rounds of the playoffs. The national championship game would be played the first week in January. Proceeds from the games would be distributed proportionally to all the conferences participating based on how far they progressed.

That would mean the most any two teams would play is 15 games in a season which is two more than the way it is now under the BCS. Four teams would play 14 and, of course, 16 play 13. I believe that deflates the argument the college football season is too long since more than 100 other NCAA Division One teams would play 11 or 12 at the most.

Most of the nation is glued to their television sets during March Madness when college basketball holds its 64-team tournaments. Who’s to say college football couldn’t draw equal frenzy?

Under the playoff system, no longer would we hear sour grapes from Boise State or TCU because they played a weaker conference schedule than the SEC, Big 8, Big 10 or Pac 10.

It also would determine if the Southeast Conference is really the best football conference in America. They say they are but that’s not enough. Prove it on the gridiron, not the press box.

I’m a native Southern Californian and for years believe the East Coast bias short-changed the really good teams playing in that media’s wrong time zone. USC under coach Pete Carroll has received its national acclaim rightfully. But, why are they in the top 20 at the moment when they have been killed by Oregon and Stanford as well as losing to Washington?

Stanford is getting no love outside of the West Coast because they have the reputation of bad teams in the past. The last two weekends they could have beaten Florida, Alabama or Texas. The Pac 10 does not have a championship game so their chances for the national title are nil in the BCS format but a darling of destiny in a playoff system.

Under the playoff system, teams not qualifying could still play in bowl games and the bragging rights for the winners just the same as under the BCS. Last year, the Pac 10 was 5-0 in bowl games which raised no eyebrows from those elitist experts on the East Coast.

Unless they lose their next games, the BCS most likely will select either an undefeated Boise State or TCU play the loser of the SEC championship game. That’s a half loaf compared to what really would be meaningful under a playoff format.

You see, Glenn Beck, being a czar is not a bad gig. Besides, I have the president covering my backside. He, too, wants a playoff system in college football.

Yours truly, a West Coast biased football fan. Go (Oregon) Ducks. Go (Stanford) Cardinal.

According to China’s state-run Global Geographic Times, the state-controlled Internet chat rooms are filled with tough questions for, and sharp criticism of, President Obama. On his Global Geographic Times blog page, a man named Tian Yifeng lays out some of the comments and explains why they show the insight of Chinese Netizens. The topics of the comments run the gamut, from economics, to history, to human rights campaigners like the Dalai Lama. Here are just a few:

“For the press conference, I’ve prepared a shoe to throw at you. Please choose Nike or Adidas.”

“Brother Obama, how come the United States always has trade friction with us? Why are you limiting exports to our developing country? … Didn’t Lincoln teach you how to be a good president?”

“Money is loaned to you, and then it’s burned to ashes in your country. … What steps are you taking to ensure that China’s money (particularly bonds of U.S. government debt) is safe? … In fact, at this moment you are applying for bankruptcy protection.”

By Tian Yifeng

Translated by Jimmy Chow

November 13, 2009

People’s Republic of China – Global Geographic Times – Original Article (Chinese)

“For the press conference, I’ve prepared a shoe to throw at you. Please choose Nike or Adidas.”

A day ahead of the U.S. president’s visit to China, this is the witty message an Internet user submitted to one of the many Internet sites that have offered a place for suggestions on, “What I would say to Obama.”

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I don’t think this looks like a presidential campaign…[it has] more the sense of a campaign that is creating a large national personality who’s also going to make a lot of money.

Matthew Continetti, conservative journalist and associate editor at The Weekly Standard and author of, The Persecution of Sarah Palin: How the Elite Media Tried to Bring Down a Rising Star, had this to say regarding 2012:

She’s an impulsive politician. She reaches decisions very quickly, very suddenly. I think when the time comes, you know, if she’s faced with a choice, that’s when she’ll decide.

I give that quote from Continetti an “A” for honesty.

This article from the China Daily either indicates an opening up of China’s state-run media, or officials in Shanghai have done something serous to anger Beijing. Whatever the case, in this China Daily op-ed, columnist Hong Liang uses the imminent visit of Barack Obama to explain why young people in Shanghai love the president – and loath the ‘authoritarian excess’ that critics regard as the hallmark of the Beijing regime.

For the China Daily, Hong Liang writes in part:

Shanghai has caught Obama fever. … Obama is idolized by Shanghai’s youth because he embodies the personality and character of a leader with whom they can relate to – as opposed to some of the stern-faced Chinese officials they have learned to dread.

Later, relating an encounter with a uniformed official to illustrate his point, Hong Liang writes:

“At the front door of a downtown office building, a Shanghai colleague and I were once ordered by a uniformed guard to get out of a taxi line because we failed to prove we were guests of a tenant there. Seeing no point in arguing with her and not wanting to disturb our host, we walked to the street and got into a taxi making the turn to pick up passengers waiting in the line we just left. We evened the score.

“But at times like these, I wonder how people feel about such official arrogance. The Obama factor has made it clear that many people in Shanghai, particularly the younger ones, feel just as indignant as I do about authoritarian excess.”

By Hong Liang

November 14, 2009

People’s Republic of China – China Daily – Original Article (English)

Shanghai has caught Obama fever.

Scheduled on Monday to make a grand appearance in the mainland’s most cosmopolitan city during his first visit to China, U.S. President Barack Obama is revered by young people here as much for his superstar appeal as for being the leader of the world’s sole superpower.

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Claude Lévi-Strauss, who died on October 30th (aged 100), made the study of anthropology as fashionable as philosophy and poetry. The Economist pays a tribute: “Before Claude Lévi-Strauss revolutionised the discipline, anthropology in France, and generally elsewhere, was a matter of ill-attended lectures in small, cold halls, and the collection of feathers and fish-hooks as evidence of the quaint divergences of the ‘primitive’ tribes of mankind…

“As he faded, he mourned the vanishing of the tribes. ‘Primitive’ man was not nobler or purer than he was, but they were, in the deepest sense, connected: for universal laws linked his thinking, in all its book-lined complexity, to that of the Indian clad only in tree-bark, trailing a deer along a forest path…

“Mr Lévi-Strauss, throwing down the gauntlet in ‘La Pensée Sauvage’ in 1962, saw nothing primitive about the tribes he studied. Totemism, for example, was a system as complex as the Linnaean classification…”

More here…

Levi-Strauss drew comparisons between American Indian myths and the story of Cinderella; demonstrated how some Amazonian tribes divided their villages into rival halves that synthesize through marriage; and tracked diverse folk tales through Latin America to show how they were related in form, says Bloomberg.

“Intellectuals such as Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida cited Levi-Strauss’s methods in their social analyses. Seminal French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre engaged him in debate over the issue of personal freedom, while feminist Simone de Beauvoir agreed with his human-kinship theories, which focused on the social exchange of females in non-Western societies.” More here…

Levi-Strauss left France as a result of the anti-Jewish laws of the collaborationist Vichy regime and during World War II joined the Free French Forces, reports Associated Press.

“Levi-Strauss also won worldwide acclaim and was awarded honorary doctorates at universities, including Harvard, Yale and Oxford, as well as universities in Sweden, Mexico and Canada.

“A skilled handyman who believed in the virtues of manual labor and outdoor life, Levi-Strauss was also an ardent music-lover who once said he would have liked to have been a composer had he not become an ethnologist.

“He was married three times and had two sons, Matthieu and Laurent.” More here…

While in New York, Lévi-Strauss immersed himself in the great body of anthropological accounts of North and South Amerindians that early US anthropologists and linguists had been accumulating for more than a century, says The Guardian obituary. “The data collected from the Amerindians and its complexity delighted him, and made him react permanently against reductionist explanations of culture, which implicitly denied the intellectual achievement that indigenous mythology and social thought represented.

“The basis of the structural anthropology of Lévi-Strauss is the idea that the human brain systematically processes organised, that is to say structured, units of information that combine and recombine to create models that sometimes explain the world we live in, sometimes suggest imaginary alternatives, and sometimes give tools with which to operate in it.

“The task of the anthropologist, for Lévi-Strauss, is not to account for why a culture takes a particular form, but to understand and illustrate the principles of organisation that underlie the onward process of transformation that occurs as carriers of the culture solve problems that are either practical or purely intellectual.

“For him anthropology was scientific and naturalistic, that is scientific in the way that structural linguistics had become scientific. By looking at the transformations of language that occur as new utterances are generated, by using the tools that a particular language makes available, structural linguistics was able, so Lévi-Strauss believed, to understand not only the irreducible specificities of a particular language, but also the principles that made their production possible.

“In this way, linguistics, as he understood it, was a branch of the humanities and a natural science that is able to connect directly with psychology and neurology.” More here…

Continuing our coverage of the global reaction to the Fort Hood killings, this morning we posted this Arabic op-ed from the United Arab Emirates – a moderate Arab state considered friendly toward the United States.

Writing for the Dar Al Khaleej, columnist Saad Mehyo suggests a common Arab explanation for many of the world’s difficulties: a conspiracy directed by the “extremist right-wing Jewish-American alliance,” in this case, designed to scuttle President Obama’s attempts to improve U.S. relations with the Arab world. This may sound far fetched to Americans – but to many people beyond our shores, it’s an article of faith.

For Dar Al Khaleej, Saad Mehyo forecasts two possible explanations for why Major Hasan opened fire on his fellow soldiers – Mehyo himself calling his second possible explanation a conspiracy theory:

“First, the incident of Major Nidal Hassan may truly have resulted from his abysmal psychological state. But despite this, the black knights [extremist right-wing Jewish-American alliance] will seek to exploit the tragedy to the point that the hearts and minds of Americans will take their side in the tug-of-war with those who favor dialogue.

“Second, (and here is where the conspiracy theory comes in) someone may have manipulated the mind of this officer with drugs and psychological pressure, in order to push him to commit this act.”

And why does Mehyo think option number two is such a likelihood? Because, he writes, it has happened before:

“American investigative journalist James Bamford (who relied on official government documents), wrote that in the early 1960s, senior U.S. military commanders planned subversive operations, including the implementation of terrorist operations in many American cities – in addition to hijacking planes and the sinking an American ship off Cuba’s Bay of Pigs. The plan, which was approved by the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff and planned with the help of the super-secret National Security Agency, stated: ‘If we execute these operations, the loss of (U.S.) life published in newspapers will spark a national wave of revulsion. That will help us a great deal.’ Now let’s see – what would Bamford have to say about the Fort Hood incident?”

By Saad Mehyo

Translated By Nicolas Dagher

November 9, 2009

United Arab Emirates – Dar Al Khaleej – Home Page (Arabic)
Is the Fort Hood shooting, in which the accused is an American-Muslim officer of Palestinian descent named Nidal Hasan, some astonishing hurricane that came out of a clear blue sky? Not at all. It was like a bolt of lightning that will come and go at the speed of light. America’s sky is as clear as ever.

READ ON AT WORLDMEETS.US, your most trusted translator and aggregator of foreign news and views about our nation.

Anti-Israel partisans were soundly defeated in their effort to convince the Norwegian NTNU to boycott Israel, as the university’s executive board unanimously rejected the measure.

Rhode Island’s governor vetoed a bill which would have allowed domestic partners the right to dispose of their partner’s remains. It’s a slippery slope to human dignity, after all.

In happier news, the LDS in Utah has surprisingly come out in favor of several important pieces of gay rights legislation in the state. Who would have guessed that Utah would be trumping Rhode Island on the gay rights axis today?

A new study finds people carry their racism online with them, and take it out on dark-skinned avatars. Anyone who has observed how female avatars are treated in virtual worlds shouldn’t be that surprised.

The Florida marine who beat up a Greek priest he thought was a terrorist is going for the ol’ “”gay Islamic Arab rapist terrorist defense.” A classic yet bold gambit.

And I’m spent.

As the Venezuela article we posted yesterday headlined If War Breaks Out, Venezuela’s ‘Fifth Column’ Will Have to Be Confronted ably demonstrates, tensions – and paranoia – are increasing along the Venezuela-Colombia border.

A few days ago during his weekly radio show Hello President, Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez told his country to ‘prepare for war’ against Colombia and the United States. This article from Venezuela’s Ultimas Noticias provides details of his comments not covered by the wire services.

According to this news account from Ultimas Noticias, the Venezuelan head of state said in part:

“This world is infected with a viral disease by which the most powerful use the most terrible violence against the most vulnerable … many people have had illusions of change in the United States with the arrival of Obama to the presidency. … We were always cautious about the triumph of President Obama; early on we began to realize the truth – that imperial rule there is alive and more menacing than ever. … One must talk to the master, and so I say to the president: don’t take a wrong turn and launch an aggression against Venezuela by using Colombia.”

Then, referring to the agreement signed last week permitting the U.S. to operate seven military bases in Colombia, Chavez said in part:

“The two governments have joined together in order to lie to the world, to try and lie to the world … Therefore, gentleman and fellow soldiers, let us not lose even a single day in fulfilling our primary mission: to prepare ourselves for war and to help the people prepare for war, because that is the responsibility of all of us.”

Translated By Barbara Howe

November 10, 2009

Venezuela – Ultimas Noticias – Original Article (Spanish)

President Hugo Chavez called on the military and civilians who support him to prepare for war, and warned the governments of Colombia and the United States that Venezuelans are “ready for anything.”

READ ON AT WORLDMEETS.US, your most trusted translator and aggregator of foreign news and views about our nation.

1) Memphis is a great city. Beale Street has the best blues clubs in the country. Graceland was interesting but I have a question: Why is U.S. 51 named for Danny Thomas in town but Elvis Presley outside of Memphis? Is the King not good enough to have the entire road named for him?

2) Happy Veterans Day! I know it was yesterday, but as a veteran, I was too busy eating my free meals at Denny’s and Applebee’s to write yesterday. Seriously, to all of my fellow veterans, Thank You for your service.

3) The FBI is on my dump list today. How could they put the lives of our men and women in uniform in jeopardy by not telling the Army that they had Nidal Hasan under surveillance for over a year? The agents involved should be brought up on charges to prevent this kind of turf war from happening again. Bureaucratic turf wars that cost the lives of innocent people serving their country is wrong!

4) As a Baltimore Raven fan, if the Steelers and the Colts play in the playoffs, who do you root for? The Steelers or the Colts with Matt Stover as their kicker?

Hold on to your hats! As if there wasn’t enough conflict occurring at the present time, the war of words between Colombia and Venezuela seems to be escalating – along with the paranoia. And just as Washington has won permission to open seven military bases in Colombia.

This somewhat hair-raising article from Venezuela’s El Universal shows just how thorny such a war would be – and warns of ‘the enemy within’ in the case of a ‘Colombia-U.S.’ attack.

For El Universal, pro-Chavez columnist Clodovaldo Hernandez writes in part:

“We have to accept it: this fifth column, long stewing in its own juices (a thick broth of yearning to topple President Chávez at any cost), is a mystery that must be accounted for in any military equation. One doesn’t have to be a Clausewitz to figure that out.

“According to political scientist Prodigio Pérez, one mustn’t underestimate the number of internal allies of Colombian-U.S. forces, who, if war beyond the usual storm of declarations broke out, would strike Venezuela. ‘No less than 25 percent of Venezuelans would in some way work for the other side,’ he says without batting an eye.

“‘Are there that many traitors among us?’ I asked. Prodigio replied that in actuality, they are all patriots, but that everyone, as we all know, loves their country in their own way. “They [anti-Chavez Venezuelans] would gleefully support a Colombian-U.S. military operation in order to achieve their life-long dreams of regime change and the installation of their own style of democracy.”

By Clodovaldo Hernández

Translated By Halszka Czarnocka

November 7, 2009

Venezuela – El Universal Original Article (Spanish)
In a hypothetical war with the Commonwealth of Colombia, one must consider not only what Colombians living in Venezuela might do – of whom there are many, and what a pigheaded crowd they are! – but the possible actions of Uribe’s Venezuelan allies [Uribe is president of Colombia]. Take a look at their plans.

READ ON AT WORLDMEETS.US, your most trusted translator and aggregator of foreign news and views about our nation.

Despite the mind-boggling number of issues he must attend to – was it a mistake for President Obama to refrain from traveling to Germany for the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall?

According to Le Figaro’s chief editorialist, Pierre Rousselin, President Obama not only missed a chance to demonstrate the strength of democracy, he showed how low Europe is on his list of priorities.

For Le Figaro, Pierre Rousselin writes in part:

“The absence of Barack Obama in Berlin yesterday, among the leaders of countries which have been central to our history, is a telling confirmation of his indifference toward a continent that is no longer a priority for the United States.

“But it was also a missed opportunity: the fall of the Berlin Wall symbolizes the firmness of democracies in the face of oppression. America, like Europe, should be inspired by this event to tear down all walls, in Iran, Afghanistan, the Middle East and elsewhere.”

Editorial By Pierre Rousselin

Translated By Sandrine Ageorges

November 9, 2009

France – Le Figaro – Original Article (French)
Any American president other than Barack Obama would have traveled to Berlin for the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Wall – if for no other reason than to celebrate the essential role of the United States in the victory of freedom in Europe.

READ ON AT WORLDMEETS.US, your most trusted translator and aggregator of foreign news and views about our nation.

Yes – today is the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. A reading of this op-ed by former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev shows, however, that the wounds that divide Russia and the West – and even Europe’s East and West – are far from being healed.

For Rossijskaya Gazeta, a newspaper that he partly owns, Mikhail Gorbachev writes of the fall of the Wall in 1989, who is most responsible for the end of the Cold War, and what remains to be done to secure a truly united Europe:

“Immediately after the end of the Cold War, we discussed the creation of new mechanisms to ensure security on our continent. There was talk of a European Security Council or a ‘directorate’ that would have broad and real authority. Such proposals were put forward by the USSR, Germany and the United States.

“Unfortunately, events took a different trajectory. This has affected all European institutions and has slowed the construction of a united Europe. Instead of the old dividing lines, new ones appeared. Europe was again rocked by war and bloodshed [reference to the breakup of Yugoslavia]. … A lack of trust and outdated stereotypes remain. Russia is suspected of evil and even aggressive imperialistic intentions. I was amazed at the June letter written by politicians of Central and Eastern Europe that was addressed to President Obama. It was in fact a call to abandon the policy of engagement with Russia.”

“In Europe, unfortunately, there are many politicians who would like to impose an unequal model of relations with Russia: a ‘teacher – student’ or ‘prosecutor – defendant’ type of relationship. Russia will not accept such a model. She wants to be understood. We stand for equality and mutually-advantageous cooperation.”

By Mikhail Gorbachev, former USSR president

Translated By Igor Medvedev

November 7, 2009

Russia – Rossijskaya Gazeta – Original Article (Russian)

1989 was a turning point for developments in Europe and the world. History sharply accelerated. The symbol of this acceleration was the fall of the Berlin Wall. In the countries of central and eastern Europe, “Velvet Revolutions” occurred. Totalitarian and authoritarian regimes left the historical arena.

READ ON AT WORLDMEETS.US, your most trusted translator and aggregator of foreign news and views about our nation.