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***1237***SPX has major support line at 1237, if that were to break this market is heading to CAPITULATION. Max
He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
Spear Report 7/4:Boom & Bust or Doom & Gloom?
Executive Summary
TSR editor Ken Reid is on vacation this week. We bring you instead Gregory Spear's commentary from this week's Spear's ETF Analyst. Please note: This edition of The Spear Report will not contain 'Printer friendly PDF' or mail-only hard copy versions.
Timing model is -25% invested.
The Best 4 Quants portfolio this week has only four picks, which is typically a bearish signal. They are: GYMB, NTY, PETS, WDC. GYMB is new. The rest were on last week's list.
Best 4 Quants Model Portfolio Performance
Year-to-date:
Best 4 Quants Model: -0.8%
S&P 500: -14.6%
Since Inception 3/14/2003 - Compounded Annual Growth Rate (CAGR):
Best 4 Quants Model: 29.8% per year
S&P 500: 8.1% per year
Market Commentary
Boom & Bust or Doom & Gloom?
Not a very nice choice, is it? And we could have both. So the S&P is down over 20% from the October high, and a little bit worse than it was at the March low. So what? Well, here's what. The intervening boom and bust in the period since March will make it very hard for investors to "believe" the next rally. Any moves up will be opportunities to sell, and this selling will keep the market from making any progress, as if it won't be having enough trouble from its own internal fundamentals.
And those fundamentals are in dire shape. All projections are for big economic trouble coming down the road. Unemployment is stable, but that's just the number of people actively looking for work. U.S. companies cut about 79,000 jobs in June. Non-farm payroll was down for the sixth consecutive month. The Service Sector contracted, upsetting expectations of a slight expansion. Credit card debt is up 21% in the last year. US workers are not doing so well.
U.S. auto sales are lower than anytime in the last 15 years and GM is at risk of bankruptcy. This is serious.
The credit crisis continues to produce shock waves every week with new news about financial institutions thought to be inured from damage revealing that they own more of the junk than they previously said, or knew. Wall Street firms are busy ratting each other out and downgrading each other's stock. According to Citi, UBS is in need of $7 billion in fresh capital and the Swiss bank is on the ropes with both Federal and Massachusetts regulators, investigating it for serious tax fraud and other problems.
Warren Buffett says the economy is stuck in stagflation. "I think the 'flation' part will heat up and I think the 'stag' part will get worse," he said.
OPEC doubts that oil demand is really escalating, so it is hesitant to invest in new exploration and production. Meanwhile supply may be further restrained by attacks upon the oil infrastructure of Nigeria that have already taken a million barrels a day offline.
There is no end in sight to the increase in oil prices or food prices. US Treasury Secretary Paulson hopes the current Doha round of trade talks will help control food inflation, but US weather problems, the diversion of corn to ethanol production, and worldwide rice shortages will continue to plague economies around the world, while oil prices must eventually cause a decline in manufacturing and/or a serious increase in inflation. It gets worse, because inflation can only be fought by raising interest rates - which will curtail capital spending and limit growth. The Federal Reserve and the central banks of Europe and Asia are deeply worried about inflation, and so interest rates are already on the rise in Europe. But the US Fed is unlikely to act by raising rates until after the November presidential election. The delay could prove deadly.
How's the rest of the world doing? These are the percentages by which the major indices of each country are down from their highs:
China -56%
India -35%
Hong Kong -31%
France -30%
Japan -27%
Singapore -24%
Australia -24%
Germany -22%
South Korea -21%
United Kingdom -19%
So the US, at -20%, is about the best of the bunch. A small consolation. It IS a world economy, and when the folks we buy from and sell to are doing this badly, it ain't good.
What's An Investor To Do?
A lifetime plan factors in bad times. The goal is to not do so badly in downtimes and to do somewhat better is up times. Today is bad times and we're doing very well at not doing badly - very well indeed. We have seen this happen from time to time before. Downturns, in economies and in markets, are inevitable. The variable is the duration of the bad times. Endless models predict the answer and agree to periods of a quarter to a decade (!) Panic is one reasonable response. A deep breath and a portfolio review is another. Retrenchment to caution is reasonable, but it guarantees the equally unpredictable upside reversal. A diligent hands-on and historically grounded strategy will outperform both tortoise and hare.
Our plan is to tread water while others are drowning, and to sprint when others stroll. We believe in proven quantitative methods and rigorous backtesting. Common Sense (as in Consensus of Leading Analysts) necessitates standing far enough back to see the whole picture, as one would an impressionist painting. Fads (usually historically repetitive) rarely take down the great investors. Look for and avoid bubbles and Ponzis. Understand what you buy and why you will profit. We'll keep on with our job, you remember to live your life.
All right, I got it already. Bonds aren't putting the kids through college; most stock indices suggest they better get jobs to help their old parents. But we got commodities. Spear told me early about coal, gold, oil, emerging markets, and more and again I seem bright at any cocktail party that is willing to invite an "insider" know-it-all.
But hold my horses, does gravity apply even here, and could that account for my recent bout of insomnia? I can get my Ambien refilled, but how about my portfolio?
Sometimes stuff makes me money because folk need it and supply decreases. Sometimes stuff makes me money because we all buy it and make the price go up. There never seems to be a bubble around when we're in one. Only a killjoy saw the dot com moment. Only an annoying grandparent (upon inspecting your new house) saw real estate as inflated. Call me a smarty-pants. I like oil. I like gold. I used to like tulips, Hunt Brother's Silver, Tokyo Real Estate. What does that have to do with my safe oil mutual fund?
We keep hearing, "this is different" always. But maybe not. Yes, kids, you heard it here first - sort of. OPEC agrees, but they're just pesky Arabs, and South Americans, and Asians, so who listens to them? The secret is, oil does not have to be $148 a barrel. Well, not now, anyway. Yes, world demand is increasing, but it's not anywhere near this level yet, and yes, Iraq and Nigeria and occasionally elsewhere there are some wells offline, but there are always some wells offline somewhere. Nothing has happened in the last six months to justify the price of oil doubling. Tulips, kid. Black, sticky, ugly tulips.
The good news is that when it comes back to being daisies, it will be a big boon to the rest of the economy. It is a serious advantage that the world does not have to live with $148/barrel oil forever. We do not have to factor this price into our ten year projections.
Don't get us wrong, we like oil, and we like gold, and we don't love them. We buy and then we protect our capital and don't get greedy!
He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
10day ema P/C ratio for CBOE NYSE Composite is presently 1.08 on a rising trend. The last 4 intermediate term bottoms occured at readings topping between 1.2 amd 1.3. Max
Very Dangerous Market 7/3/08
by Carl Swenlin
July 3, 2008
A bullish take on the stock market would be that (1) market indicators are very oversold, (2) there is a triple bottom setup on the S&P 100 Index(Edit:this is longterm quite bearish, that triple bottom--max, and (3) sentiment polls show a lot of bearishness. I agree that those conditions exist, but we are in a bear market and these conditions can easily see price movement transition into a crash. The reason, as I have said many times before, is that bullish setups don't always work so well in bear markets, and an oversold market can very quickly become significantly more oversold.
Let me be clear, I am not predicting a crash. If the market does crash, I will not claim to have "called" it, because that is not what I am trying to do. I want my readers to be aware of the danger and not try to pick the exact bottom of this decline. That bottom could be very far away.
Our first chart contains three indicators (one each for price, breadth, and volume), and you can see that they are all very oversold. You can also see the triple bottom setup. This oversold condition is repeated on most of our other indicator charts.
SPX:If we have our near term bottom, on relief rally we have mild resistance at 1301, significant resistance at 1331 and EXTREME resistance at 1360.
i would consider 1350 area a sell area.
Conditions are quite oversold on Stos/CCI/MACD and such, but we did not achieve capitulation oversold.
We remain in a Bear Market of a Slow Death, "Death by a Thousand Cuts" Bear.
The loooooong term bottom point for this Bear is nowhere in sight, imo. Max
Night begins with DOW futures -36 and SPX -6.8. But there is a looooong time between now and open. Outa here.Max
Love it. Haven't heard someone double the line "To Love and Be Loved in Return/TO LOVE AND BE LOVED IN RETURN" --and , then there is the "scat" touch.
i am NOT one of those blokes that can say "And on guitar we had xxxxxxxx and on piano xxxxxxxxxxx" (i don't know my line-ups:) but o my they are good. Max
Just a link to the audio from 1977 "In Flight" album.
War drums becoming deafening
Linda Heard, sierra12th@yahoo.co.uk
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=7§ion=0&article=111390&d=1&m=7&y=2008
THE Americans and the Israelis are acting in concert vis-à-vis Iran. The unmistakable message they are putting out loud and clear is that an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities is on the cards in the event Tehran doesn’t cave into their demands. Are they bluffing as part of an arm-twisting strategy or are they seriously planning to transform this region into an inferno?
Pundits have been analyzing the probability of a US or Israeli attack on Iran for several years now. Some have even come up with likely dates but most of those have come and gone eroding the analysts’ credibility and dulling fears. There’s been so much chatter on the subject that we may reach the point when a “will they or won’t they?” discussion will turn into nothing more than an academic exercise on the basis it hasn’t happened so, therefore, it probably never will. The danger is Iran and the region could easily be lured into letting down its guard. Certainly, members of the Iranian leadership have indicated they don’t take the threat very seriously even though they are planning for every contingency and threatening to set the Middle East aflame if attacked.
In recent weeks, since the Israelis launched a supposed dry run in the eastern Mediterranean using 100 fighter planes and aerial tankers, the chatter has reached a crescendo. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has vowed, “Iran will not be nuclear”. Deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz has termed a strike on Iran “unavoidable”.
Retired Mossad chief Shabtai Shavit warned that if Israel doesn’t destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities within a year, Israel would be vulnerable to nuclear incineration. He says that even if Israel doesn’t receive a green light from the US, it should be prepared to go it alone. Shavit believes there is a window of opportunity before the upcoming US election when the deed should be done in case of a win by Barack Obama, who has advocated jaw-jaw before war-war.
ARCH neoconservative and former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton says he believes Israel is poised to strike in November once the ballot has taken place.
Knesset member and retired Maj. Gen. Dani Yotom, who isn’t known for his hawkish views, says sanctions against Iran aren’t working and so “a military operation is needed”. Even the normally moderate Israeli historian Benny Morris recently said, “If the issue is whether Israel or Iran should perish, then Iran should perish”.
Suspicions that an attack might be in the pipeline were heightened after leaks supposedly forced the Israeli prime minister to admit he had secretly met with Aviam Sela, a brilliant military tactician said to be the architect of Israel’s 1981 strike on Iraq’s Osirak reactor. It is believed that Sela was asked to give his opinion on the feasibility of similarly putting Iran’s nuclear facilities out of action.
There is no doubt that Israelis genuinely fear a nuclear-armed Iran, which they believe would constitute an existential threat, but why are Israelis being so upfront about their intentions when history tells us they normally strike first and answer questions later?
Given that Iran is not Iraq circa the 1980s as far as airpower, weaponry, technology and sophisticated communications go and in light of the fact Iran’s main nuclear facilities are buried under layers of steel and concrete as much as 100 feet underground, eradicating Tehran’s nuclear capability would be challenging for any military unless it was prepared to unleash nuclear bunker-busters. Moreover, unlike the Osirak surprise strike, an attack on Iran would trigger serious military repercussions that could involve Syria, Hezbollah and pro-Iranian Shiite Iraqi groups. Such a pre-emptive move would probably result in a massive loss of life on all sides and would have a devastating effect on the global economy with oil prices reaching hitherto unimaginable heights.
Further, since neither Israel nor the US are in any position to launch a ground invasion without the complicity of anti-government Iranian surrogates, strikes on Iranian nuclear plants would probably result in Tehran not only reconstructing but setting their sights on developing nuclear weapons even if they’ve no plans to do so now. It’s worth mentioning that the Osirak reactor was for peaceful purposes and it was only after it was hit that Saddam Hussein actively sought a bomb.
According to the New Yorker’s veteran investigative journalist Seymour Hersh in an article titled “Preparing the Battlefield”, President George W. Bush has sanctioned covert operations and requested $400 million designed to destabilize Iran outside the sphere of the US military. These will largely be carried out by Iranian dissidents rather than Americans in the field, he says. But, once again, Iran is not Iraq. It’s a far more cohesive country and although not all of its citizens support the government, most identify themselves as proud Iranians who harbor a historical aversion to neoimperialist plots. There is no doubt that Israel and the US would like the Iranian government to be wiped off the face of the earth along with its nuclear ambitions but both countries are divided on what to do. So far their joint and separate belligerency isn’t working. If their bellicose words and provocative actions are, indeed, a giant bluff they are ineffective. They are simply causing the Iranian leadership to dig its heels in further and assert its right under the NPT to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes. Even if this is a coordinated bluff, it could so easily reach the point of no return when to maintain strategic credibility, the players will have to make good on their threats. Certainly, one Iranian commander Brig. Gen. Mir-Faisal Baqerzadeh is taking these to heart already. According to Press TV, he has already got his troops digging more than 320,000 graves within Iran’s bordering provinces to provide any invading force with “the respect they deserve”.
i haven't heard it, will do so! I love that "Space Cadet" Mr.Benson:)Max
i wasn't sure of TOU here --so "FUCK UPS!" it is :)
War Pigs!-dedicated to the Group of 8 Big Fat Pigs that meet tomorrow in Japan.
They the Olympian gods this slave planet and its massive HERD of The Blind Deaf and Dumb. Max
This is Cake's cover of the original War Pigs by Black Sabbath(excellent video)
<<I think you're one man I couldn't handle ?>>
Regards Brig, he is a castrati compared to us--LOL!
What about us? We eat Goths for an appetizers.
Breathe you F-ck Ups!!!
Unions announce platinum mining strike 3rd July 2008
South Africa's umbrella union, COSATU, has announced a strike on August 6th that could halt the production at some of the country's biggest platinum mines.
The strike has been called in protest against job cuts that are linked to the power crisis.
Firms including Anglo Platinum and Impala Platinum could be hit by the strikes and further losses would be difficult to recoup, particularly after the energy crisis earlier this year and the rising price of electricity.
The Chamber of Mines, which represents the mining firms across South Africa, said it would be disappointed if the strike went ahead.
"It will add to the losses incurred by the sector after it shut down in January," Roger Baxter, head negotiator of the Chamber of Mines, told Reuters.
The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) has backed the strike and will also hold a series of protests, starting on July 9th and finishing on July 23rd.
Regional protests are expected to send a strong message to mining firms as well as the government and Frans Baleni, the General Secretary of the Num, said that miners are suffering.
***"They can no longer afford their houses while the price of basic food is unaffordable, sending millions into starvation," he told Reuters.***
Source:
S.African miners union sets August 6 strike date, 3/07/08
Charts:CCE/COKE/HANS Daily(Deleted)-iHub transfer rejection.
He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
***VLO Chart Daily
***TSO chart Daily and Weekly.
Bear Market rallies Dow 1929-1932(the DOW dropped 90% in that time)
Iran's Leaders Divided on U.S.
Recent Contradictory Remarks Illustrate Debate Over Relations
By Thomas Erdbrink
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, July 6, 2008; A14
TEHRAN -- A senior adviser to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has rejected a proposed expansion of the U.S. diplomatic presence in Iran, saying in an interview that the idea is a "propaganda pose."
Mojtaba Samareh Hashemi, in an interview last Sunday, said that to improve relations with Iran, the United States would have to withdraw its military forces from Iraq and accept Iran's nuclear program.
During a visit to the United Nations last week, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki signaled willingness to allow the first U.S. diplomats to work in Tehran, at an interests section now staffed by non-Americans. He also called for direct flights between Tehran and New York, repeating an Iranian proposal made in 2007.
The contrast between the two officials' statements illustrates the contentious debate taking place here over Iran's relations with the United States, which were severed after the U.S. Embassy hostage crisis in Tehran in 1979. It shows the complexity of Iran's leadership structure, in which politicians and unelected clerics sometimes have overlapping areas of responsibility but differing goals and policies.
Facing international pressure over its nuclear program, the Iranian leadership is now looking for ways to deal with the United States.
Samareh Hashemi, an old friend of Ahmadinejad and now his top adviser, expressed Iranian interest in negotiations on a June proposal by the United States and five other powers for breaking the impasse over Iran's nuclear program. "There is a chance for negotiations, an opportunity," he said.
On Friday, Iran gave a response to the proposal that diplomats characterized as a positive step. Details were not given. But on Saturday, an Iranian government spokesman said Iran had "no intention of discussing its right to enrich uranium," a key demand in the proposal.
Analysts say politicians and advisers affiliated with Ahmadinejad are more interested in lengthy negotiations than in restoring relations and are more influential than technocrats, who genuinely want to improve ties between the two countries.
"The group which has taken power in Iran the last years is convinced that there is no path to any agreement with the United States. They feel that the only outcome of this conflict is when one side loses," said Abbas Abdi, who took part in the 1979 hostage-taking but is now critical of Iran's leaders.
"On the other hand, more pragmatic, experienced politicians now on the fringes of the power circle are actively contemplating how to establish relations with the U.S. in order to solve problems,Abdi says )(edit "on the fringes" i take seriously, and that is where they will remain, they are probably already high on the list of U.S. regime change wannabes.U.S. will NEVER back down on the "uranium enrichment" outrageous demand and this is the card they are playing to FORCE a Gotterdammarung . i concur that U.S. is playing one game only and these fellows have it right "The group which has taken power in Iran the last years is convinced that there is no path to any agreement with the United States. They feel that the only outcome of this conflict is when one side loses,". i see the insanity in that is The U.S.American Exceptionalist are so fanatic/evil, they will consider it their privilege to Nuke Iran rather than EVER accept defeat.And the a significant segment of the american public themselves are not that upset with nuking Iran. As i say, we are a diseased country.--max)
Other analysts said the two countries are at a crossroads. "We are in a period in which confrontation with the U.S. or normalization of ties could take place," said Sadegh Kharrazi, a former Iranian ambassador to France.
The idea of enlarging the U.S. interests section was raised in a recent Washington Post article that cited State Department and other U.S. officials.
"We want more Iranians visiting the United States. . . . We are determined to reach out to the Iranian people," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told reporters, hinting at the proposal. At present, Iranians have to travel to Turkey or Dubai to apply for U.S. visas.
For decades, calls in Iran for establishing ties were often answered by angry protests on the streets of Tehran denouncing the idea as a betrayal of the Islamic revolution.
But in 2006, Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has final say in matters related to U.S.-Iranian relations, lifted the ban on direct negotiations by allowing Iranian diplomats to talk to their American counterparts in Iraq. The purpose was "to make America understand that they have to leave Iraq alone and allow the Iraqis to govern their own country," Khamenei said.
Samareh Hashemi's cautionary words in the interview are in line with the policies outlined by Khamenei, who said in January that restoring relations under current circumstances would endanger Iran's security, because it would "provide opportunity for security agents to come and go, as well as for espionage."
"Iranian-American relations have become one-dimensional," said Abdi, the former hostage-taker, who writes columns and publishes a blog. "Whatever both countries demand from each other, practically no measures for rapprochement are really viable.
"The United States has a certain view of the world, and Iran opposes this view. So there will be conflicts as long as this is the case."
Interests sections, housed in the embassies of third countries, are a device of international relations by which hostile countries communicate even though they have no formal diplomatic ties.
Iran has an interests section, employing 30 to 40 diplomats, that operates under the umbrella of the Pakistani Embassy in Washington, according to Kharrazi, the former envoy to France.
The United States, meanwhile, is represented in Tehran by an interests section in the Swiss Embassy, where about 20 non-Americans and local staff members handle U.S. interests in Iran, Iranian staff members working there say.
Samareh Hashemi said that if progress is to occur, "the U.S. must first reform, and then we will see what happens." He said he was not afraid of military strikes on Iran. "The forces of any government which would attack Iran will no longer have any security in our region or anywhere else," Samareh Hashemi said. "They will no longer be safe, wherever they are."
He accused the United States of training the 12 Iranians arrested in May in connection with a bombing at a religious center in the Iranian city of Shiraz that killed 12.
"During unrest near Orumieh in northwestern Iran, we have found American instruments," Samareh Hashemi said, adding that evidence will be provided soon.
Iranian officials contend that many overtures toward the United States have gone unanswered. In 2001, Iran provided information for U.S. troops fighting the Taliban, an Iranian enemy. "In return, we were labeled as part of the 'axis of evil,' " Kharrazi said. "And in 2007, President Ahmadinejad wrote a direct letter to George W. Bush, which was completely ignored by the U.S."
The roots of Iran's animosity toward the United States run much deeper than the country's 1979 Islamic revolution. In 1953, the CIA organized a coup d' etat against the democratically elected prime minister, Mohammed Mossadegh, who two years earlier had nationalized Iran's oil, angering Britain, whose state oil company had a long-running lease to exploit Iran's oil.
The great-grandson of Mossadegh said he was proud of what his ancestor had done for Iran. "My great-grandfather led a movement for decolonization," Ali Mossadegh said, showing black-and-white pictures of Mossadegh pleading Iran's case for oil nationalization before the U.N. Security Council. The coup led to absolute rule by an American ally, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, until he was overthrown in 1979.
The younger Mossadegh saw no political use for an American interests section now. "First, an apology for the coup of 1953 would be an important step to restore relations between both countries," he said.
When Abbas Abdi climbed the walls of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979, he had that same kind of anger in mind, he said. "Try and look at it from the Iranian point of view: They had really hurt us, so we had to hurt them back," Abdi said, referring to the takeover.
He said he did not feel responsible for the diplomatic stalemate that followed. "It was an opportunity for the United States to get on with our relations with a clean slate," Abdi said. "But things took a different course."
Staff researcher Robert E. Thomason in Washington contributed to this report.
He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
Jimi Hendrix - Stockholm - The Wind Cries Mary (live 1967)
Lizz Wright - Nature Boy: C4T i think this an excellent rendition of "Nature Boy"
"And these words he said to me 'The greatest thing you will ever learn is to love and be loved in return'"
Sade - No Ordinary Love
Sade - Nothing Can Come Between Us
Dedicated to a lady named Rochelle, that has proven even with her death, that "Nothing Can Come Between Us"
She has taught me so much since her passing over to the otherside.
Shiite clergy want referendum over US troop presence
(edit: This request comes from Sistani which thus allies him with Sadr on this issue which thus makes the pathetic quisling Puppet Maliki attempts to snake slither this Colonist Pact with U.S. into reality is doomed--imo-max)
Jul 4, 2008, 12:34 GMT
Baghdad - Iraq's Shiite leadership indicated Friday that it will press the Baghdad government to hold a national referendum on the issue of a further stationing of US forces in the country.
Imam Sadreddin al Kabandji said at the Friday prayers in the Shiite holy city of Najaf: 'The Iraqi nation regards with concern the Iraqi-American treaty whose contents are not exactly known.'
The imam, an aide to Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the supreme religious leader of Iraq's Shiites, said that the draft of the long- term military and cooperation agreement which Baghdad is currently negotiating with Washington must finally be made public.
'The treaty must be presented to the people and the clergy,' he demanded. It was unacceptable that the government was negotiating 'behind closed doors' with the Americans, al-Kbandji added.
His comments came as an original deadline for the treaty to be ready for signing by the end of July was approaching. The treaty is to govern the conditions applying to those US forces remaining in Iraq after the current UN mandate expires at the end of the year.
But several issues remain unresolved, including the number of US army bases to remain in Iraq, immunity of American soldiers from prosecution, the operations of foreign security firms, and when US forces must request permission from the Baghdad government for a military operation.
i think it was Xenophanes that wrote "If cows could draw they would draw god in an image of a cow" Not positive it was Xenophanes, but think so.
Max
He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
Obama now in chameleon slither mode of morphing into "I Am ONE WITH THE ONE PARTY The War Party"
My editorial comment to this item points this out.
My position: Boycott voting for either the Democratic or Republican Candididate for POTUS.
IOW, show somes GUTS and express you are a free person and not just some twit herd member of the One Party , that is, the bi-partisan War Party.
<<Iraqi Shiites denounce security pact with US Fri Jul 4, 9:14 AM ET
via AFP
Large crowds of Shiites on Friday denounced the security pact Baghdad is negotiating with Washington for a long-term US military presence in violence-wracked Iraq.
In Baghdad's Sadr City, the bastion of radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, Shiite men, women and children shouted anti-American slogans as they demonstrated against the security deal after the weekly Friday prayers.
"No, no to colonisation! Out, out you occupier!" the crowd shouted in the centre of Sadr City where fierce battles raged in March and April between Shiite militants and US forces in which hundreds of people were killed.( NOT! surprisingly Obama has begun BACKTRACKING FAST about pulling out of Iraq--he has flipped to "Orwellian Speak" of now saying "MORE SLOWLY"--max/otraque)
The fighting ended with a truce on May 10.
Washington and Baghdad are currently negotiating a security pact on the long-term foreign troop levels in Iraq.
Last November US President George W. Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki agreed to sign the pact by July 31 this year.
However the country's political factions have strongly opposed the agreement, saying it would put Iraq on the path of "slavery."
On Thursday Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari tried to dispel such fears by saying that the agreement would not compromise Iraqi sovereignty.
He said if the two countries failed to sign the deal then Iraq may have to ask for the renewal of the UN mandate which expires in December 2008 or sign a separate bilateral deal with Washington.
The UN mandate is the legal basis for the presence of US-led foreign forces in the country.
Friday's protests against the security agreement reverberated across all Shiite regions of Iraq.
In the central town of Kufa, protesters chanted anti-US and anti-Israel slogans.
"No to America! No to Israel! We reject signing the agreement with the occupation," shouted devotees.
In the city of Karbala, an aide of revered Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani urged Baghdadto refrain from signing a deal that would compromise national interests.
"If the government signs the deal it has to preserve the interests of the people, not compromise sovereignty and not permit Iraq to be used as a base for attacks on neighbouring countries," said Sheikh Abdul al-Mahdi al-Karbalae.
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He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
Iraqi Shiites denounce security pact with US Fri Jul 4, 9:14 AM ET
via AFP
Large crowds of Shiites on Friday denounced the security pact Baghdad is negotiating with Washington for a long-term US military presence in violence-wracked Iraq.
In Baghdad's Sadr City, the bastion of radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, Shiite men, women and children shouted anti-American slogans as they demonstrated against the security deal after the weekly Friday prayers.
"No, no to colonisation! Out, out you occupier!" the crowd shouted in the centre of Sadr City where fierce battles raged in March and April between Shiite militants and US forces in which hundreds of people were killed.(Edit: NOT! surprisingly Obama has begun BACKTRACKING FAST about pulling out of Iraq--he has flipped to "Orwellian Speak" of now saying "MORE SLOWLY"--max)
The fighting ended with a truce on May 10.
Washington and Baghdad are currently negotiating a security pact on the long-term foreign troop levels in Iraq.
Last November US President George W. Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki agreed to sign the pact by July 31 this year.
However the country's political factions have strongly opposed the agreement, saying it would put Iraq on the path of "slavery."
On Thursday Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari tried to dispel such fears by saying that the agreement would not compromise Iraqi sovereignty.
He said if the two countries failed to sign the deal then Iraq may have to ask for the renewal of the UN mandate which expires in December 2008 or sign a separate bilateral deal with Washington.
The UN mandate is the legal basis for the presence of US-led foreign forces in the country.
Friday's protests against the security agreement reverberated across all Shiite regions of Iraq.
In the central town of Kufa, protesters chanted anti-US and anti-Israel slogans.
"No to America! No to Israel! We reject signing the agreement with the occupation," shouted devotees.
In the city of Karbala, an aide of revered Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani urged Baghdadto refrain from signing a deal that would compromise national interests.
"If the government signs the deal it has to preserve the interests of the people, not compromise sovereignty and not permit Iraq to be used as a base for attacks on neighbouring countries," said Sheikh Abdul al-Mahdi al-Karbalae.
Copyright © 2008 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AFP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Agence France Presse.
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He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
This post by CG on SI got 17recommendations(extremely high!) and i can guarantee if Russ W. read this post he is one of the 17(i was one of them).
<<To: mishedlo who wrote (80858) 6/30/2008 6:06:37 AM
From: Crimson Ghost 17 Recommendations of 81065
Mish:
Your take on inflation is the same as the Fed's -- namely that it will go away by itself; therefore no need to hike rates.
The Fed has been pushing this idea for many months as have you. The result -- a crashing dollar and surging prices for many of life's necessities even as home prices continue to slide. The result -- little or no Fed credibility on inflation any more.
So you and they actually have much in common despite your frequent denunciation of that institution. >>
He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
Note i love parrots(Grey Parrot's are awesome!) and cats and horses and bunnies and consider them to be species quite superior of the Homosapiens.
There are a whole lot of earthly things i consider BETTER than the HomoSapien.
Ever play catch with an Octopus? i have---i could see its' eyes twinkle:) Few realize how intelligent they are, and their ability to match themselves with any baground(Including PokaDotted backgrounds, or impreesionistic nuanced backgrounds, a sight to amaze) Max
He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
RussWinter and MadMaxEconomy:Listening to the most excellent Russ Winter on Wall Street Examiner Radio this week was an experience.
Russ would describe the crisis we are in and his desperate hope that CBs and Fed will do what they MUST, move those rates up.
Lee Adler and Aaron Krowne, would throw cold water on his hope, and Russ would say "Well. that's it then we go into a MadMax Economy as there is global financial collapse"
He, rightly states the Fed is being operated by criminals, and he stresses he isn't being facetious, when he says criminals, he MEANS criminals, no better than the Mafiosa.
He stated he sees the next 6 months as rampant criminality by Paulson and all the psychopaths that rule Wall Street and the U.S. Economy.
He sounded deep sarcasm on the insane Core Rate of Inflation calculation(that is inflation MINUS Food and Energy)
That all emergency actions of this year have been to save the butts of the rich and powerful and using Russ Winter's glossary(for which he is well known) and let "Aunt Million and all the widows and orphans" Drown.
Saying these thugs would let the world economy collapse if it saved their butts.
To Paulson saying the bail-out of Bear-Sterns was completely right as the first priority is market stability,
Russ said "Market Stability!" and then started stating that the retail investors are in PAIN, major pain, and it is only going to get worse.
i agree completely with Winter's view the Market Place is now under the control of PSYCHOPATHS.
But, hey, Vonnegut at the end said, it is a requirement that to be a world leader today one must be a psycopath.
He stated the world is now ruled by PSYCHOPATHS.
i of course was DELIGHTED to hear K.V.jr come to such insights in his last 4 years.:) i am just plain "wicked" yah no.
The Death Ray to Pollyanisms:) Max
P.S. Do i believe the crimianlity Winter sees includes giving premeditated PHONY numbers to the public by "the powers"?
OMG, yes!!!
He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
There is a major flaw in the excerpt i quote about Our Universe, the excerpt is an a classic example even the best minds can not grasp life on another plane/level/dimension, the remain sadly prisoners of their own blindness.
<< But is our luck about to run out? Smoot's and Perlmutter's work is part of a revolution that has forced their colleagues to confront a universe wholly unlike any they have ever known, one that is made of only 4 percent of the kind of matter we have always assumed it to be -- the material that makes up you and me and this magazine and all the planets and stars in our galaxy and in all 125 billion galaxies beyond. The rest -- 96 percent of the universe -- is ... who knows?
''Dark,'' cosmologists call it, in what could go down in history as the ultimate semantic surrender. This is not ''dark'' as in distant or invisible. This is ''dark'' as in unknown for now, and possibly forever.
If so, such a development would presumably not be without philosophical consequences of the civilization-altering variety. Cosmologists often refer to this possibility as ''the ultimate Copernican revolution'': not only are we not at the center of anything; we're not even made of the same stuff as most of the rest of everything. ''We're just a bit of pollution,'' Lawrence M. Krauss, a theorist at Case Western Reserve, said not long ago at a public panel on cosmology in Chicago. ''If you got rid of us, and all the stars and all the galaxies and all the planets and all the aliens and everybody, then the universe would be largely the same. We're completely irrelevant.''
All well and good. Science is full of homo sapiens-humbling insights. But the trade-off for these lessons in insignificance has always been that at least now we would have a deeper -- simpler -- understanding of the universe.>> The Hidden Universe/Out There
http://www.siliconinvestor.com/readmsg.aspx?msgid=23591199
*************
Lawrence A. Krause reveals the hopeles closemind of the homo sapiens. Even though he is aware the entire universe as we know it is most likely an irrelevance a pollution, he that proceeds into IDIOCY by includiong in that all aliens /everybody!!!.
Forget that that non-elemental universe is teeming with life on a whole other dimension made of total otherness, no ignore that--- why? Homo Sapiens in the main can't grasp otherness even though they realize they only grasp 4% of what is.
As i said one Einstein later quotes was "Reality is an Illussion, albeit, a persistent one"
Buddhist mystics have known this for ages.
We have first contact with "primitive, pre-historic tribes"(both Amazonian and Indonesian) that knew BEFORE the Buddhist that life is but an illussion.
There are Amazonian and Indonesian tribes never met by modern man until the 2nd half of the 20th century that have knowledge that is largely based on the Kabala/Gnostic Heresy(this heresy is common to Judaism/Islam and Christian, they are the esoterics, outside of normal human knowledge.And this heresy adopts many of the principles of Buddhism. So when i say life is a hoax and not counting Buddhist, i still have plenty of company( perhaps as much as 1% of the population discounting the Buddhist World)).
How much is that? In the area of 60 million.
Now iHub and SI are WebSites that should read "For the Bourgeoisie ONLY" Which thus makes it MAJORLY stupider than the rest of the world.
But even given that, i would say there are as many as 100 persons out their through research/experience or just hardcore intuition, that have a knowing life is illusssion that is NOT based on the Fundamentalist Dogmas.
All fundamantalist are rejeted post haste as simpatico at all with me , as one, they are humancentric, and also contend God created the earth, and is lord and master of it.
As that is patented BS. Max
Repeat post defending the call to BOYCOTT this election
<<Posted by: otraque Date: Saturday, January 19, 2008 1:15:18 AM
In reply to: IxCimi who wrote msg# 309970 Post # of 335490
Don't Follow Leaders Watch The Parking Meters
an otraque rap
************************************************************
In my attack on the herd , that is, the not caring or not paying attention or for their slobbing up propaganda i am finding another group and its' ranks are building in number, these are the ones that feel a pox on all their houses and are pulling into a shell turtle style on having had the revelation their views will never be heard that all is now full of the sound and the furious Bull Sh-t signifying nothing.
They just now are trying to be good people within their own life and tune out the world out as their bitter and quite real experiences has taught them a hard lesson, that is, to be involved in politics in this world is to be involved in a farce.
(Such i decision of withdrawal is perfectly compatible with the rights of individuality, and should be respected by those chanters of "stay involved" in this BS, please!)
Where they 4 years ago were charged up against say the Iraq War, they have gone silent because they are gone through all the time since the 2004 election only to see that their vote was disrespected to an extreme and to a defiling degree.
The horror of the democratic party's betrayal has done so much dreadful damage to the the democratic party that i will say 20% that got out and voted for the lesser of evil of two terrible picks, and voted for Kerry; will not vote for either presidential candidate, they sense the failure of democracy and learned the brutal lesson in trying to believe we actually have one.
These retreating voters will include all those that have loyalty to Ron Paul and/or Dennis Kucinich as they have witnessed how the powers marginalize and adroitly spin the two into being but "fringies".
i myself am one this group.
i now feel shame that i bought the lesser evil BS(which i vocally disdained before i voted) and did cop out and vote for Kerry.
i am here to present a reality and that is as much as 20% that voted for Kerry in 2008, will not vote for either republican or democratic Presidential candidate in 2008.
i write this to this thread as a reality message to those that are perhaps political junkies, to say the "we have had it" non-political junkies have been lost to you, we have left the the decaying, crumbling edifice cruelly called Democracy---yes we have left the building.
Of those candidates that have a real chance to get the nomination, yes only Obama, do i see as possibly throwing off the Israeli Lobby and the War Party, that bipartisan power house, but we will not ever risk being so betrayed again. (EDIT: 6/11/2008: i can now say Obama has revealed himself to be just another AIPAC groveling and War-Party DREG.max)
We will not be voting or will be voting awrite-in or if someone like Paul ran as an independent/ or on an anti-war libertarian ticket.
But even now the Libertarian Party is destroying itself with destructive battle between pro-war libertarians and anti-war libertarians.The anti-war Libertarians are the true founders of the Libertarian Party, it was founded on the foundation of anti-imperialism and no war ever be fought unless it is a manifesly obvious to all war be in self defense(9/11 was not even REMOTELY such a case--it was a cult attack that with a hardcore membership at the time that was at best 5,000).
My 'politics' are a strange mix of StudsTerkel and Robinson Jeffers. Terkel of a new deal socialist bent and Jeffers a anti-war Libertarian.
i have been compatible with these supposed opposites, and to StudsTerket who is still extraordinarily alive in his mind, has proven with his recently released memoirs, as his writing blazes still with a vital mind.(He is 95 i believe)
But in an interview i recently heard he spoke disdainfully of the politics in america, he feels the generation now, the Boomers and younger, are in the overall frightenly ignorant.
He is appalled at what america has become and that includes the Democratic Party.
As for Jeffers, he prophesized what we have become, his dark view of the future has come to being.
As for who will be the next POTUS, i don't really care, this train America is heading for hell and will take the world with it.
i close with "Don't follow leaders, watch the parking meters, it doesn't take a weatherman to tell which way the wind blows!! " from Subterranean Homesick Blues, OF COURSE.
and as Looney Tunes close "And thhatthat that's all folks!"
Otraque
****************************************************************
He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
Video of our brave good country bringing love to the world.
Soulfly doing "FRONTLINES.
An interview with MaxCavalera, that captures his sweetness, the what people don't grasp that exists outside of the rebel rousers ragers i associate, these are the most excellent people.Better oft than those that carry their gentleness like a sheep's cloak--those i call the passive-aggressive, they stab you in the back with stealth.
If the going gets rough, they vanish.
And like in the movie SHAMEN(Bergman), the central character is a so gentle sensitive, speaks of it, narcissitically cherishes it, holds it as a superiorness, the world to rude for his superior artistic nature, but when THE TEST COMES, he is a betrayer that causes the death of his friends, because is actually a shallow phony, a coward, scratch his "i a gentle sensitive" and you find a little weaselly fascist.
They see my people and say, they are so HOSTILE, their ATTITUDE confrontational, their not civilized.
The style is meant to fit the reality of our future , not with BS but just the hard reality, this earth is HELL for those with the guts to face that fact.Freedom begins with realizing WHERE YOU ARE!
So here is Max in interview.
<<There has been considerable speculation in recent days that Tehran was softening its tone on the nuclear standoff.
The foreign policy adviser to supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Ali Akbar Velayati, said it would be in Iran's interest to accept the negotiations.
Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki has also spoken of a "new process."
Velayati however on Thursday said his comments had been misinterpreted, insisting: "I talked about accepting negotiations and not accepting the proposed package.">>
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080704/ts_afp/irannuclearpolitics
July 4th protesters:I tip my hat to the these people, these are the people that matter to me, they are the feint pulse of rightness in this diseased and fascist country that i despise.
Kurt Vonnegut last book was entitled "Man Without a Country " , the man was K.V.jr, himself.
Any bozos that contend that Vonnegut died thinking the human race will conquer it's awfulness and improve WAKE UP! Kurt Vonnegut went out of his way to get one last book published so people could read that he had come to despise the human race, he went so far as to say he sees the creator as Satan and humanity as Satan's demons.
Those that don't like reading that, tough shit: IT IS A FACT.
Vonnegut wrote this and went on to say he has joined Mark Twain and Einstein, who both utterly denounced the human race in their late years.
People, like these protesters, are not of the horrid HERD---must of specifically the Ruling Class and their sycophant enablers The Bourgeois.
Note: Thomas Jefferson spirit was surely with those screaming "Fascist". If Jefferson were alive today he would be calling for A REVOLUTION to overthrow the The U.S.Government. His OWN writings make that clear.
<<Protesters Interrupt Bush at Independence Day Ceremony for New Citizens
Friday, July 04, 2008
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,376402,00.html
Protesters made it hard to hear President Bush Friday as he welcomed new citizens and marked Independence Day at the home of Thomas Jefferson.
As is the tradition each Fourth of July, a naturalization ceremony was held at Monticello in Charlottesville, Va. This year, 76 immigrants from 30 different countries came to take the oath of citizenship.
But Bush repeatedly was interrupted as he welcomed the guests.
"That man is a fascist!" one protester yelled. Another swore at him.
The protesters later were removed from the ceremony by law enforcement officials.
He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
For me to give a full comment i actually can't as i now realize i would now have to collect various key posts that i have posted over 5 years that carry one relentless message, and that is to interpret what will happen via the use of reason will produce the WRONG answer.
i am an intensely intuitional thinker, for instance i can document that early a July 2003 i had stated the single most important person in Iraq was Muqtaqa al Sadr.
i went into one my patented "i am fed up!!" when i realized i had made about 5 posts talking of the extreme importance of Sadr and i had got not one response(all generated entirely from one source, my mind, nothing else)
i realized not a damn person paid attention to me, and unless i wrote with the CONSENSUS view i was ignored.
Well here i go, i am going to tell people what this tells us means, and how it fits like a glove what i have been arguing for 5 years.
No--i will not.
i will just say all i have been arguing for 5 years has major support in that article.
i will just say all the arguments of how U.S. can be stopped rejects considering what i mean when i say this U.S. Regime is aGOTTERRDAMMARUNG REGIME, i feel people refuse to even want to consider what that means.
Like with Sadr back in 2003, every post i have made along the gotterdammarunging theme was been met with ABSOLUTE silence.
So i really don't see the point of my backtracking.
He played his video game night and day.
The MAZE of Death.
But that is the game we all are in, the trick, don't believe it.Get above it all and imagine nothing is what it seems.Kill the machine.otraque
Important post regards Iran :This is a PM i received. i will post its content and respond to it with comment of how i feel it it need be seen.
<<Iran willing to talk
By Kaveh L Afrasiabi
Jul 3, 2008
This week, Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki is in New York to attend a meeting of the United Nations' Economic and Social Council, as well as to shore up support for Iran's embattled diplomacy.
Increasingly, Mottaki has been playing a leading role in the nuclear crisis and much depends on his ability to conduct skillful diplomacy with regard to the "Iran Six" group that has recently proposed a package of incentives to Iran in exchange for Iran's suspension of its uranium-enrichment program. The group comprises the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany.
On Monday, Mottaki met with several US editors and reporters at
Iran's mission to the UN, and in addition to sounding conciliatory and in favor of earnest negotiations without preconditions, he promised to reply to the letter of the "Iran Six" foreign ministers accompanying their package "within a couple of weeks".
At the outset of his interview, Mottaki emphasized the need to have a "correct analysis" of situations, otherwise it would lead to "incorrect policies". He also emphasized the importance of "common understanding" of problems and hinted at his own flexibility by stating that "the first word a diplomat learns is compromise".
On the question of Israel's reported preparedness to attack Iran's nuclear facilities, Mottaki dismissed that possibility as "near zero" and blamed Israel for seeking to assert itself through such threats partly to make up for its "defeat in the hands of Lebanese resistance".
[When asked about the US threat, Mottaki stated that this issue "has appeared in American public every six months" and then went on to add that "some of our friends" informed Iran last year that the attack was imminent and even "furnished the date, the places that would be hit" and "other detailed information". Mottaki interpreted this as a form of "psychological warfare" and added that "we do not deny that it is not plausible, yet what we deny is that the consequences are predictable". However, Mottaki doubted that the American public would be willing to embrace such a nightmare scenario.
With respect to the recent news of President George W Bush's authorization of covert action inside Iran, Mottaki said that for some 30 years the US has pursued coercive policies toward Iran and now it is time for US leaders "to sit down and rethink their policy". He reminded his audience that the "Iranian people will never trade the 'sweet' of their independence with the 'bitterness' of American dependency".
In response to a question about the impact of sanctions on Iran, Mottaki stated that the easiest thing in the world today is trade and then meaningfully added, "right now some US companies are doing business with Iran but we will not name them for obvious reasons". He also added that, "in the past six months, we have signed major contracts with European companies and with the Asian countries". The deals, he said, have been even more important and Iran's non-oil exports in 2007 have been twice that of the preceding year, 2006.
Mottaki accused the US of "taking risks out of Europe's pocket" and charged that when the US's own interests are at stake, such as with regard to Iraq's oil, Europe is kept out. Still, Mottaki sounded conciliatory toward the US and encouraged cultural and academic exchanges. He proposed direct flights between US and Iran and defended the idea of a US interests section in Tehran. He also defended the US-Iran dialogue on Iraq's security and described the end goal of this dialogue to be none other than finding a solution for Iraq's crisis.
On the question of presumptive Democratic US presidential candidate Barack Obama's idea of sitting down with Iranians without setting any preconditions, Mottaki stated that Iran looks at real policies and not the declared policies and has learned through time not to pin its hopes on this or that US candidate.
With respect to the nuclear negotiations, Mottaki indicated that the recent Tehran trip of European Union's foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, was "serious and somewhat different from the past" and emphasized the "common points" between Iran's package and the "Iran Six" package of incentives and added that he was happy that the latter nations had viewed Iran's package "positively".
"We see dialogue as a sound basis for pursuing this issue ... and on this basis the two packages present a good potential for translating into a work agenda ... dialogue is a good means to reach common points acceptable to all. This appears to be the message of '5 +1' [Iran Six] letter to me that raises the possibility of a resolution."
On the other hand, Mottaki refused to answer questions about the demand for Iran to suspend its uranium enrichment program and confined himself to saying that the commencement of a new round of negotiations was a distinct possibility. He denied adamantly that Iran was proliferating nuclear weapons and said that Iran "saw no need for nuclear weapons" which are "weapons of the past".
On Iran-Syria relations and Syria's on-going talks with Israel, Mottaki described those relations as solid and supported Syria's bid to regain its lost territory (for example, the Golan Heights) from Israel.
Regarding Afghanistan, Mottaki blamed the US's past policies as a root cause of extremism and reminded his audience that at one point the US even trained those extremists (fighting the Soviets) and then, when they rose to power, the US fought them and dislodged them from Kabul and then "met them at Mousa Ghale and in European capitals; where are they going with this policy?"
Mottaki insisted that Iran has never benefited from extremism in the region and described Iran's "biggest interest in the region" as "regional stability". He claimed that the security situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating and that most Afghani people feel less secure now than they did in 2007, and "less in 2007 than they did in 2006, etc".
Turning to Iraq, Mottaki predicted that the Iraqi government would not sign the controversial security pact with the US that allows a long-term US military presence in Iraq. According to Mottaki, the US has artificially linked that pact with Iraq's current status under UN's Chapter IIV, adding that the two main reasons for that status, namely Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction and its occupation of Kuwait, are no longer relevant and therefore Iraq today should not be "penalized for Saddam Hussain's crimes".
"The US uses the threat of terrorism to justify its presence ... the US armed the first Iraqi militia and even today there are several militias that operate outside the purview of the Iraqi government and are supported by the US."
Mottaki described Iran as "one of the biggest supporters of the Iraqi government" and confirmed that Iran played a mediating role between Baghdad and the Shi'ite militias in Basra and urged the US government to take the US-Iran dialogue on Iraq's security more seriously. The reason Iran was sensitive to the US-Iraq security pact was, according to Mottaki, due to the fact that "security issues impact the whole region", which is why Iran pursues the goal of "collective security".
Kaveh L Afrasiabi, PhD, is the author of After Khomeini: New Directions in Iran's Foreign Policy (Westview Press) and co-author of "Negotiating Iran's Nuclear Populism", Brown Journal of World Affairs, Volume XII, Issue 2, Summer 2005, with Mustafa Kibaroglu. He also wrote "Keeping Iran's nuclear potential latent", Harvard International Review, and is author of Iran's Nuclear Program: Debating Facts Versus Fiction.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/JG03Ak02.html
i can find NO confirmation of what Gareth Porter is Reporting.
Until i get something more substantial i reject this as valid information.
i am surprised Gareth Porter released this So Fast.
!!!Iran is Buckling to Israel!!!! Incredible!!!!
i hope this is just a false rumour
They do this and they will lose face in all the Arab World.
If they dpo this, it means FEAR has won. Thjey have KOWTOWED to the demand NO TALKS with suspending Uranium Enrichment, which is the FUNDAMENTAL RIGHT by INTERNATIONAL LEARN.
<<Official Says Iran Accepts P5+1 Talks Proposal
by Gareth Porter
A senior Iranian official reportedly told members of the Iranian parliament Monday that Iran has agreed to freeze its enrichment program for six weeks and begin negotiations with the P5+1 group of states as early as next week, according to reports of that decision by the Iranian Student News Agency (ISNA) and by a Farsi-language website in Iran.
Remarks by Iranian Foreign Minister Manoucher Mottaki and a top adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei Tuesday also seemed to indicate that decision to accept a "freeze for freeze" proposal from the P5+1 to begin at least preliminary negotiations.
The P5+1 consists of the permanent members of the UN Security Council – the United States, Britain, France, China and Russia – and Germany.
The apparent Iranian decision comes in the wake of an atmosphere of heightened threat of attack on Iran by Israel created by a series of moves by Israeli and US officials in recent days.
The head of Iran's atomic energy agency, Gholam-Reza Aghazadeh, told members of the Majlis energy committee Monday that Iran has agreed to start the talks, according to the Farsi-language Iranian website Fararou. It said "informed sources" had specified that Iran had accepted a six-week freeze on any expansion of enrichment as a condition on such negotiations, as proposed by European Union foreign affairs chief Javier Solana.
The P5+1 proposal also offers to suspend further progress in advancing UN sanctions against Iran. It does not address sanctions organized outside the UN Security Council framework, however.
ISNA reported in a brief item on Monday that an Iranian parliamentary energy committee member, whom it did not name, had declared that Iran "has agreed to start talks with 5+1 countries group". It added that the talks "will begin next week".
Although ISNA did not report that the official had said Iran would freeze its nuclear activities, in the sense of foregoing any increase in centrifuges, it implied as much by reporting that the P5+1 proposal delivered by Solana Jun. 14 "required Iran to suspend nuclear activities in exchange for a set of economic and security incentives".
The news further quoted unnamed "Iranian officials" as saying that "common points of the two packages can be a launching pad to start talks".
The Farsi-language website Fararou identified the member of the committee who had quoted Aghazadeh as informing committee members that Iranian authorities had agreed to negotiate with the 5+1 group as Seyed Admad Hosseini. It was Hosseini who was quoted as telling reporters that the talks should start next week.
Fararou also provided additional details on the Aghazadeh's briefing. It said the secretary of the Majlis energy committee, Moayyed Hosseini, told its reporter that the Aghazadeh had pointed to "positive aspects" of the negotiations with the P5+1, "including the fact that the west was accepting Iran's possession of 3,000 centrifuges."
That comment suggested that Tehran will present the "freeze for freeze" proposal as a concession to Iran's right to enrich uranium.
The committee secretary was quoted by Fararou as stating flatly that the proposal for a six-week freeze on enrichment "has been accepted by Tehran".
The same parliamentarian was quoted as saying the atomic energy chief had declared that the "package" of proposals from the P5+1 was still being studied, and that Iran would respond by the end of the week.
The formal P5+1 proposal given to Iranian officials by EU foreign affairs commissioner Javier Solana Jun. 14 was a repackaging of the mid-2006 proposal to Tehran. But it was accompanied by a six-week "freeze for freeze" proposal under which Iran would not increase the level of its enrichment efforts and the P5+1 would freeze the movement towards tougher sanctions against Iran, according to diplomats in London quoted by Reuters Jun. 21.
That would enable "pre-negotiations" to begin between the two sides on "parameters for formal negotiations", according to the diplomats.
Beginning formal negotiations, however, were said to require that Iran to "fully suspend" enrichment, meaning that it would actually temporarily halt the enrichment.
The formal negotiations envisaged would last "up to six months", according to the diplomats cited by Reuters, during which time the halt to enrichment would have to continue.
The remarks by energy committee secretary Hosseini implied that Iran's commitment was only to the six-week freeze on the level of its nuclear activities and not to an actual suspension of enrichment as required for the formal stage of negotiations.
But Mottaki, in remarks at a luncheon meeting with reporters at the Iranian mission in New York, suggested that the Iranians might be prepared to go further.
Mottaki said that there were sufficient commonalities between the Solana proposal on behalf of the P5+1 and Iran's own proposals for negotiations to provide the basis for talks. That remark, paralleling the unattributed view reported by ISNA on Monday, suggested that Iran was preparing to enter into substantive negotiations. Furthermore, Mottaki failed to repeat the standard Iranian statement that enrichment is Iran's legitimate right, even though he was repeatedly questioned on the point.
Further indicating an Iranian desire to take advantage of any diplomatic opening in a period of rising threat from Washington and Tel Aviv, Ali Akbar Velyati, a top foreign policy adviser to Khamenei, said, "Americans wanted Iran not to accept Solana. Therefore our interests imply that we should embrace Solana."
(Inter Press Service)
Fact that VIX is at a mere 24.xx indicates a lot of BAD ahead.
Last 2 sell down to lows were not complete until hit VIX 37.57 and 35.50.Max