International Affairs: March 2009 Archives
The Voice of the Martyrs just sent out a bulletin asking for prayer and petition signature for the release of Gao Zhisheng from Chinese torture.
Christian human rights attorney Gao Zhisheng, has now been missing 50 days, and there is increasing concern for his life. He was last seen being hauled away from his home by more than a dozen police officers on February 4. Reports from inside China indicate he is undergoing brutal torture.The situation is critical, and with each day that passes, Gao Zhisheng's life hangs in the balance.
Because of Gao's work defending house church Christians and others persecuted in China, the Chinese government wants to silence his voice. ChinaAid president, Bob Fu calls Gao's torture "the most severe persecution in China's modern history." Gao's wife and two children, who have also been abused and tormented by the police, escaped to the U.S. less than two weeks ago. His family is afraid that authorities, furious at their escape, are taking revenge on Gao.
ChinaAid and The Voice of the Martyrs, together with Gao Zhisheng's wife and children, call on all Christians and those who value human dignity and justice to speak out on Gao Zhisheng's behalf by signing a petition to free Gao.
Sign the petition and send emails to the Chinese government. From what I've read, the Chinese government is very sensitive to its reputation among Westerners, and there's a good chance that Gao's release may be accomplished if we can draw enough attention to his situation.
Does anyone else find it hard to believe that President Obama is now complaining about the difficulty of the war in Afghanistan by asserting that "Iraq was easier"?
On Afghanistan, Obama said he is looking for a “comprehensive strategy” that stresses diplomacy that includes engagement with neighboring Pakistan. While Obama is studying requests from the military for more troops, he warned that, “there's gotta be an exit strategy. There-- there's gotta be a sense that this is not perpetual drift.”He said Afghanistan is a more complex problem than Iraq. “Iraq was actually easier than Afghanistan. It's easier terrain,” Obama told Kroft. “You've got a-- much better educated population, infrastructure to build off of. You don't have some of the same destabilizing border-- issues that you have between Afghanistan and Pakistan. And so this is going to be a tough nut to crack. But-- it is not acceptable for us to simply sit back and let safe havens of terrorists plan and plot.”
Is this the same guy who called Iraq a "disaster" two years ago and wanted to retreat ASAP?
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama said Tuesday U.S. combat forces should be out of Iraq by spring 2008 to end "a foreign policy disaster" but he stopped short of endorsing a cutoff in funds. ...Obama's bill would cap troop levels in Iraq at the early January level of around 130,000, when Bush announced he would send 21,500 additional U.S. forces to Iraq. It would require that troops begin coming home on May 1 with the goal of removing all combat brigades by March 31, 2008.
So if Afghanistan is harder than Iraq, shouldn't our President be retreating as fast as his little legs can carry him?
Or, I don't know, maybe he should have looked for an easier job.
Update: Not that Obama was paying much attention to Iraq.
More: Obama lacks "basic understanding" of the War on Terror:
The other illuminating moment in the interview came when Kroft brought up Dick Cheney’s criticism of closing Guantanamo Bay. Again, the unbearable lightness of Barack Obama came shining through like a beacon. Here is the first key quote from Obama’s response,“After all these years, how many convictions came out of Guantanamo? How many terrorists have actually been brought to justice under the philosophy that is being promoted by Vice President Cheney? It hasn’t made us safer….”If Obama believes that the purpose of Gitmo is to get “convictions” of terrorists, you have to question whether he has even the most basic understanding of the war on terror he’s currently in charge of fighting.
Gitmo is there to hold captured terrorists, to keep them from killing more Americans, and for interrogations that are designed to gain information for that same purpose.
Remember when the Prime Minister of the UK, our closest ally, gave President Obama a pen holder made from an anti-slavery ship that was the sister of the ship that the President's desk is made from? And in return President Obama gave Gordon Brown a stack of DVDs? Well it turns out that the crappy DVDs we gave to our closest ally can't even be played in Europe thanks to their copyright encryption.
Now it turns out Brown can't play the discs because of region-specific limitations, The Daily Telegraph reports.DVD players are coded to limit themselves to material meant for specific geographic areas. The United States and Canada are Region 1. Western and Central Europe are Region 2.
Is it too much to ask that we have one humiliation-free day from our new President?
Why exactly are American taxpayers bailing out foreign banks?
I added up the various lists provided by AIG by country (see below), and the results were quite revealing. About $44 billion went to counterparties headquartered in the U.S., such as Goldman Sachs and states such as California and Virginia.But as I expected, the majority of the funds—$58 billion—went to banks headquartered outside the U.S. The big winners were French and German banks, which pulled in $19 billion and $17 billion respectively.
To put these numbers in perspective, remember that the U.S. fiscal stimulus bill passed in February provided only $27.5 billion for highway and bridge construction.
Country AIG-related payments
billions of dollars
US 43.5
France 19.1
Germany 16.7
UK 12.7
Switzerland 5.4
Netherlands 2.3
Canada 1.1
Spain 0.3
Denmark 0.2
101.3
So me, my daughter, and my grandkids will be paying extra taxes to cover the losses of these foreign banks. Uh, why?
Princess Leia: "The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers."
The flight of profitable companies from the United States to low-tax countries is accelerating thanks to President Obama's determination to increase taxes on corporations and the wealthy.
ZUG, Switzerland, March 12 (Reuters) - The tidy towns and mountain vistas of Switzerland are an unlikely setting for an oil boom.Yet a wave of energy companies has in the last few months announced plans to move to Switzerland -- mainly for its appeal as a low-tax corporate domicile that looks relatively likely to stay out of reach of Barack Obama's tax-seeking administration. ...
Over the past six months companies including offshore drilling contractors Noble Corp and Transocean, energy-focused engineering group Foster Wheeler and oilfield services company Weatherfield International have all announced plans to shift domicile to Switzerland.
"Switzerland has a stable and developed tax regime and a network of tax treaties with most countries where we operate," Transocean Chief Executive Bob Long said in a statement in October, when it announced its move. "As a result, the redomestication will improve our ability to maintain a competitive worldwide effective corporate tax rate."
Guido Jud, head of Zug's tax office, said about 1,200 companies had set up shop there in 2008 -- in line with the long-term average, though it is difficult to assess how many of those are foreign companies until they file tax returns.
Swiss cantons are free to set their own tax rates. For example in Zug, corporate tax is about 16 percent but can fall as low as 9.5 percent for companies that do most of their business outside Switzerland. That compares with an average global corporate tax rate of 25.9 percent, according to consultancy KPMG.
But lucky us, we'll get to keep General Motors, Chrysler, Citigroup, AIG....
Christians are the world's most persecuted group. We American Christians need to be in prayer for our brothers around the world who are suffering to spread the gospel of Christ to unbelievers. Here's one example of Christians being persecuted in Uzbekistan.
UZBEKISTAN – Government Cracks Down on Religious Literature – Forum 18 NewsThe Uzbekistan government is continuing its persecution of Christians and Baptists, punishing them for distributing free literature. In one case Christians were questioned for seven hours without food or water, according to Forum 18 News. A Baptist believer was fired from his job as an electrician after the secret police confiscated his religious literature. Pray for believers living under intense pressure in Uzbekistan. Ask God to give them courage and endurance. Pray they will forgive their persecutors.
Follow the link for news from more countries.
Really? We've got $900,000,000 just sitting around?
Donors at an international summit in Egypt on Monday pledged a total 5.2 billion dollars to reconstruct Gaza, Egypt's foreign minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit announced on Monday. The figure, promised by 70 countries, was "beyond our expectations," said Gheit.Saudi Arabia pledged 1 billion dollars for Gaza.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Washington would donate 900 million dollars and vigorously seek to advance peace between Israel and the Palestinians.
"Our response to today's crisis in Gaza cannot be separated from our broader efforts to achieve a comprehensive peace," she said.
It's worth noting that the $1,000,000,000 pledged by Saudi Arabia is also coming from America indirectly through our gasoline purchases. And hey, we're borrowing our money from the Chinese!
