IDF denies disciplining top officers over white phosphorous use in Gaza war
The Israel Defense Forces on Monday denied that two of its senior officers had been summoned for disciplinary action after headquarters staff found that the men exceeded their authority in approving the use of phosphorus shells during last year's military campaign in the Gaza Strip, as the Israeli government wrote in a recent report.

US missile test mimicking Iran strike fails
A U.S. attempt to shoot down a ballistic missile mimicking an attack from Iran failed after a malfunction in a radar built by Raytheon Co (RTN.N), the Defense Department said.

Plan to oust Saddam drawn up two years before the invasion
Secret document signalled support for Iraqi dissidents and promised aid, oil and trade deals in return for regime change

Gadhafi angrily leaves African Union
As Mr Gadhafi vacated his chair, he told African leaders they had angered him by refusing to go along with his plan for a so-called United States of Africa.

Female suicide bomber hits Iraq pilgrims, kills 54
Iraqi officials say a female suicide bomber mingling among Shiite pilgrims in northern Baghdad has detonated an explosives belt, killing at least 54 people.

Does Secret CIA-Mossad Meeting Signal Preparation for Iran Attack?
A secret meeting between the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Leon Panetta and Israeli officials has reportedly centered on Iran's nuclear program.

Flashback - 16 United States Intelligence Agencies are unanimous in agreement that Iran is not building and does not possess nuclear weapons.

Flashback - As Required, Iran Informs IAEA About New Enrichment Site and is abiding by Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty which it has signed.

Iraq to sue US, Britain over depleted uranium bombs
Iraq's Ministry for Human Rights will file a lawsuit against Britain and the US over their use of depleted uranium bombs in Iraq, an Iraqi minister says.

'Iran will deliver telling blow to global powers on Feb. 11'
'Iran will deliver telling blow to global powers on Feb. 11'

Secret airstrip built at Zimbabwe diamond field
A secret airstrip is being built in a diamond field illegally seized by the Zimbabwean army 14 months ago which would enable clandestine weapons shipments.

China bugs and burgles Britain
The security service MI5 has accused China of bugging and burgling UK business executives and setting up “honeytraps” in a bid to blackmail them into betraying sensitive commercial secrets.

Russia unveils its first stealth fighter jet - the Sukhoi T-50
Russia showed off its first stealth fighter jet yesterday, immediately proclaiming it a challenger to American military dominance of the skies.

US and GB refuse discussion of Afghanistan’s opium problem during conference
Like every other Afghanistan conference, this latest held January 28 in London failed to address the country’s opium problem.

Scenarios: How could China hit back at U.S.?
China warned on Saturday that Washington's announcement of arms sales to Taiwan would seriously damage cooperation between the two global powers.

Accused 9/11 plotter likely to face execution
Accused Sept. 11 plotter Khalid Sheikh Mohammed will be tried and convicted and is likely to be executed, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said on Sunday.

Yemen clashes continue, ceasefire offer rejected
Yemen rejected a ceasefire offer from Shi'ite rebels on Sunday and said fighting was continuing, as neighbouring Saudi Arabia accused the insurgents of mounting sniper attacks inside its territory.

CIA chief holds secret talks with Egypt, Israel
The Director of the CIA, Leon Panetta, has held secret talks with Egyptian and Israeli officials over expanded US intervention in Yemen.

Terrorists ‘plan attack on Britain with bombs INSIDE their bodies’ to foil new airport scanners
Britain is facing a new Al Qaeda terror threat from suicide ‘body bombers’ with explosives surgically inserted inside them.

Blair warns that world faces decision to halt Iran’s nuclear programme
World leaders might have to go to war to stop Iran developing its weapons programme, Tony Blair suggested yesterday.

Clinton warns China to stay the course on Iran nuclear sanctions
In Paris, the U.S. secretary of State tells Beijing to think about the longer-term consequences even though it may seem 'counterproductive' to sanction a country from which it gets key resources.

Dubai police say Mossad may have killed Hamas chie
Dubai's police chief said on Sunday that Israel's spy agency Mossad could have been behind the murder of a top Hamas leader in a Dubai hotel room.

US suspends Haiti evacuations
There are fears that critically ill victims of Haiti's earthquake will die after the US military suspended evacuation flights.

EU's Ashton says Iran 'worrying', UN next route
European Union's new foreign affairs chief says disappointed in Islamic Republic's failure to accept dialogue, next step would be debate at Security Council

US accelerating missile defenses in Gulf: report
The US administration is speeding up deployment of defenses against potential Iranian missile attacks in the Gulf to heed off any possible retaliation, The New York Times reported Saturday.

Chilcot War Inquiry: We STILL think Blair lied, say 8 out of 10
Tony Blair has been dealt a devastating verdict on his appearance at the Iraq War Inquiry.

Ex-MI6 chief likely to give evidence to Chilcot inquiry behind closed doors
Crucial evidence to the Iraq inquiry by Sir Richard Dearlove, the head of MI6 at the time of the 2003 invasion, is likely to be heard in private.

To gasps from the gallery, Blair said we should be proud of the war
His voice was hoarse from six hours of questioning. But still he was unrepentant.

Americans arrested taking children out of Haiti
Haitian police have arrested 10 U.S. citizens caught trying to take 33 children out of the earthquake-stricken country in a suspected illicit adoption scheme, authorities said on Saturday.

Wet Summer, More Demand Could Create Seed Shortage
Home gardeners might have a hard time finding some seeds this year. Seed dealers say wet weather that made for a poor growing season last year and increased orders from Europe could result in a shortage of seeds this spring for the most popular cucumber variety and some vegetables.

War spending surges in President Obama's budget
President Barack Obama’s new budget, to be released Monday, forecasts two consecutive years of near $160 billion in war funding, far more than he hoped when elected and only modestly less than the last years of the Bush Administration.

CIA moonlights in corporate world
In the midst of two wars and the fight against Al Qaeda, the CIA is offering operatives a chance to peddle their expertise to private companies on the side — a policy that gives financial firms and hedge funds access to the nation’s top-level intelligence talent, POLITICO has learned.

Obama budget plan calls for generic drugmaker fees
President Barack Obama on Monday proposed fees on generic drugmakers to help reduce review times for the cheaper copycat medicines and clear a backlog of applications.

Review shows dramatic shift in Pentagon's thinking
The Pentagon will no longer shape the U.S. military to fight two major conventional wars at once, but rather prepare for numerous conflicts and not all in the same style, according to a draft of a new strategic outlook the Pentagon is announcing on Monday.

Industry push to send leftover FEMA trailers to Haiti stirs backlash, called ?self-serving?
The trailer industry and lawmakers are pressing the government to send Haiti thousands of potentially formaldehyde-laced trailers left over from Hurricane Katrina — an idea denounced by some as a crass and self-serving attempt to dump inferior American products on the poor.

Pentagon to Rank Global Warming as Destabilizing Force
US defense review says military planners should factor climate change into long term strategy

The Secessionist Campaign for the Republic of Vermont
The President on Wednesday may have reassured Americans that the state of the Union is "strong," but, just the week before, a group of Vermont secessionists declared their intention to seek political power in a quest to get their state to quit the Union altogether.

Obama Faces New Pressure to Try Terror Suspects in Military Tribunal
As the Justice Department searches for a new venue to hold the trial of confessed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, critics are pouncing on the Obama administration's steadfast refusal to consider a military tribunal to bring the terror suspect and his four alleged accomplices to justice.

Obama’s climate card: nuclear power
Billions on table in bid to get GOP support for emissions law

Why the Tea Party Convention is tea-tering on the edge
With two major speakers throwing in the towel, the first-ever Tea Party convention is giving Americans a glimpse at internecine fighting over the direction of the libertarian movement. But for now, the show goes on in Nashville.

U.S. steps up arms sales to Persian Gulf allies
The Obama administration is quietly working with Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf allies to speed up arms sales and rapidly upgrade defenses for oil terminals and other key infrastructure in a bid to thwart future military attacks by Iran, according to former and current U.S. and Middle Eastern government officials.

Obama's 2011 budget will include phantom cap-and-trade revenue
A trade publication is reporting this afternoon that President Obama's 2011 federal budget proposal will assume receipt of billions of dollars in revenue generated from the cap-and-trade program even though that proposal appears now to be all but dead in Congress.

Pachauri fails to get UK support over ‘unsubstantiated’ climate report claims
Rajendra Pachauri, who has faced criticism as chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change following allegations of inaccurate statements in panel reports, suffered a fresh blow last night when he failed to get the backing of the British government.

Hundreds of Quakes Are Rattling Yellowstone
In the last two weeks, more than 100 mostly tiny earthquakes a day, on average, have rattled a remote area of Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, putting scientists who monitor the park’s strange and volatile geology on alert.

UHI is alive and well
One of the most ridiculous claims recently related to Menne et al 2010 and my surfacestations project was a claim made by DeSmogBlog (and Huffington Post who carried the story also) is that the “Urban Heat Island Myth is Dead“.

Genetically Modified Forest Planned for U.S. Southeast
International Paper Co. and MeadWestvaco Corp. are planning to transform plantation forests of the southeastern United States by replacing native pine with genetically engineered eucalyptus

New iBailout app for iPhone (Video)
The econ game allows players to control a greedy, robotic character called "The Fed."

Solar Flare To Hit Earth in 2012
Astro physicist Michio Kaku discusses the threat from solar flares.

Bill, Melinda Gates Pledge $10 Billion for Vaccines
Bill and Melinda Gates said their foundation will commit $10 billion over the next decade to help develop vaccines for the world’s poorest countries, a project that may save the lives of 8.7 million children.

Climate chief was told of false glacier claims before Copenhagen
The chairman of the leading climate change watchdog was informed that claims about melting Himalayan glaciers were false before the Copenhagen summit, The Times has learnt.

The End Of The US Dollar? Struggling Towns Printing Their Own Cash
In an echo of the Great Depression, local currencies with their own special flavors are popping up all over in attempts to give commerce and communities a lift.

Goldman Sachs and the $100 million question
Goldman Sachs, the world’s richest investment bank, is facing a potential political storm over how much it pays its chief executive, Lloyd Blankfein.

The Financial Crisis, Through Paulson’s Eyes
When it comes to the collapse of Lehman Brothers, former Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. blames the British.

Implications For Gold In The Aftermath Of The Greek Crisis
With the euro having dropped substantially from a high of around $1.51 to less than $1.40 in the span of a few short months, it has sent gold buyers looking for cover, mostly as a function of the linear (and at times sigmoidal) inverse correlation between gold prices and the DXY which throughout 2009 has held surprisingly strong.

Goldman: After Six Months, We Can Safely Say This Is No V-Shaped Recovery
Last Friday's lights-out GDP report has revived hopes among bulls that we still might get the V-shaped recovery everyone was predicting last summer.

The Middle Class Destruction through Unemployment Corporate Jargon.
It is amazing how many financial analysts usually from the too big to fail banks have gone onto the media circuit to claim that employment is always a lagging indicator in economic recoveries.

Double Dip Risk Rises After Inventory Blowout
When is quarterly gross domestic product growth of almost 6 percent bad news? When it looks like what was reported last week.

Six more regional banks fail, bringing U.S. tally for 2010 to 15
U.S. regulators have closed down another half-dozen banks, including a large one in California, bringing to 15 the count of bank failures already this year, as the credit crisis continued to take its toll.

Watchdog: Bailouts Created More Risk in System
The government's response to the financial meltdown has made it more likely the United States will face a deeper crisis in the future, an independent watchdog at the Treasury Department warned.

Swiss warn UBS bank could collapse
Switzerland's justice minister warned in an interview on Sunday that top bank UBS could collapse if sensitive talks with the United States over a high-profile tax fraud investigation fall through.

GDP Mirage - The Last Hurrah
4th quarter GDP came in at 5.7%. Discounting revisions (and probably even counting them), that was the last hurrah. Here is the story from two highly respected analysts.

True free markets are recovery
“Globalisation,” often removed most of the natural market regulations that could have prevented the mess the Western nations are facing.

Sarkozy seeks a new order and throws down gauntlet to China
President Sarkozy has promised to put the huge trade imbalances between the East and West at the centre of global financial reform when France takes over leadership of the G8 next year.

TARP Cop: Some Bailout Goals Still Unmet
Neil Barofsky, the Special Inspector General of the Troubled Asset Relief Program, says policymakers still have not addressed fundamental problems that triggered the financial crisis.

AIG Draws $2.4 Billion From Fed Credit Line, Most Since October
American International Group Inc., the insurer bailed out by the U.S., increased its borrowing under a Federal Reserve credit line by the most since October to repay debt from an expiring government commercial paper program.

Banksters Fight Back: Deficiency Judgments
King is among a rising number of borrowers who are learning that they can be on the hook for years after losing their homes. Amid a crisis that stripped $6.4 trillion, or 28 percent, from the value of U.S. residential real estate since the 2006 peak, lenders are exercising their rights to pursue unpaid mortgage balances. To get their money, they can seize wages, tap bank accounts and put liens on other assets held by debtors.

Judge Andrew Napolitano: Future Governor of Texas Debra Medina (Video)
Debra Medina On Freedom Watch with Judge Andrew Napolitano.

Hillary Clinton’s Prescription: Make The World A NATO Protectorate
By Rick Rozoff
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was busy in London and Paris last week advancing the new Euro-Atlantic agenda for the world.

The Precarious State of the Union
By Peter Schiff
In this week's much anticipated State of the Union address, President Obama again demonstrated his poor understanding of the fundamental problems that confront our nation.

Texas Race For Governor : The Debra Medina Show: How She Unveiled Rick Perry's Fake Tea Party Persona
If she can raise $500,000 or more from next Tuesday's money bomb, Medina will have enough to continue making a focused GOTV effort for her campaign -- which will keep her in the race. Who knows what happens if she makes enough from her money bomb to go on television. (Perry and Hutchison are both connected to Bilderberg, establishment insiders. Medina is the only REAL candiate.)

JPMorgan vs. Goldman Sachs: Why the Market Was Down 7 Days in a Row
By Ellen Brown
We are witnessing an epic battle between two banking giants, JPMorgan Chase (Paul Volcker) and Goldman Sachs (Rubin/Geithner). The bodies left strewn on the battleground could include your pension fund and 401K.

Radical Inequality Is Literally Killing Us
By Sam Pizzigati
Two British intellectuals — one a distinguished, gray-haired professor emeritus, the other a rising young academic superstar — have just finished a 15-day speaking tour across the United States. They came to fan the flames of “populist rage.”

The Terror Card: Fear is the Key to Obedience
By Rev. Richard Skaff
Contrived terror will continue to be a great tool of control and wealth for the elites who have rendered their mercenaries and bandits into famous terrorists and global stars.

The Fateful Geological Prize Called Haiti
By F. William Engdahl
Evidence that there may well be more in the minds of the US Administration in Haiti than the improvement of the lot of the devastated Haitian people, is to be found in nearby waters off Cuba directly across from Port-au-Prince.

Climategate: time for the tumbrils
By James Delingpole
A mighty outpouring of rage today from Philip Stott, foaming with righteous indignation, on the life and imminent death of the AGW scam.

Zinn Said "Largest Lie" Was "Global War on Terror"
By Sherwood Ross
The “largest lie,” wrote hisorian Howard Zinn who died yesterday at age 87, is that “everything the United States does is to be pardoned because we are engaged in a ‘war on terrorism.’”

Ron Paul - A Tale of Two Speeches (Video)
One speech calls for further government intervention and control. The other calls for a return to the ideas of freedom and liberty that will restore our prosperity.

Depopulation by government edict
By Deanna Spingola
In 1922, Margaret Sanger wrote The Pivot of Civilization with an introduction by eugenicist H. G. Wells. The Rockefeller Foundation "enthusiastically supported the concept of 'eugenics,' which encourages the reproductive efforts of those deemed to have 'good' genes, while discouraging or stopping procreation by undesirables.

They Don't Own Shovels, Crowbars Or Even Gloves!
By J. Speer-Williams
The ever exploding twin towers of US debt and trade deficits are to be expected from a country that's engaged in two foreign invasions, maintains over 170 military bases overseas, gives trillions of dollars to foreign bankers, yet produces nothing anyone in the world wants or can use.

National Insecurity
By Philip Giraldi
The National Security Act of 1947 created the Central Intelligence Agency. The CIA was supposed to become a central office where all the information being collected by the US government could be pulled together and analyzed.

The Only Way to Get Money Out of Politics
By Sheldon Richman
Last week's Supreme Court ruling striking down the ban on corporate and union spending at election time is both a blessing and a curse.

Did the Late J.D. Salinger Include a Satire of George H.W. Bush in The Catcher In The Rye?
By Webster G. Tarpley
I thought of Salinger in 1991 when I was writing The Unauthorized Biography of George H. W. Bush.

Osama bin Laden, Climate Expert
By Alan Caruba
In this quest, Obama has now been joined by Osama.

Obama Flounders Without Teleprompters (Video)
A gutsy college student asks Obama a question. The president states, “The Middle East is obviously an issue that has plagued the region for centuries.”

Speech Therapy: Reality Bleeds Through the State of the Union Circus
By Chris Floyd
As the overflow of pundit effluent after the State of the Union speech continues to sulfurize the political air, Glenn Greenwald brings up a background point that we have been hammering on about here for years: i.e., the fact that the President of the United States claims the arbitrary right to kill anyone on earth -- including U.S. citizens -- without charges, without trial, without warning.

Taser introduces app that tracks kids phones and driving (Video)

Ed Miliband declares war on climate change sceptics
Climate secretary Ed Miliband broke his silence on the ongoing row about man-made climate change by declaring war on the 'siren voices' who denied global warming was real or man-made.

'No scan, no flight' at Heathrow and Manchester
It is now compulsory for people selected for a scan to take part, or they will not be allowed to fly.

Cocaine, Spices, and Hormones Now Being Found in Drinking Water
A University of Washington research team recently released the results of a study it conducted on contaminant residue in the waters of Puget Sound in Washington State. Various spices, flavorings and other substances are being identified as making their way out of water treatment plants and back into the world's water supply.

Vancouver police get sonic crowd control device
Vancouver police have a new crowd control device capable of emitting painfully loud blasts of sound, just in time for the 2010 Winter Olympics, CBC News has learned.

Controversial climate change boss uses car AND driver to travel one mile to office… (but he says YOU should use public transport)
He is the climate change chief whose research body produced a report warning that the glaciers in the Himalayas might melt by 2035 and earned a Nobel Prize for his work – so you might expect Dr Rajendra Pachauri to be doing everything he can to reduce his own carbon footprint.

Polish priest checks fingerprints for mass attendance
A Polish priest has installed an electronic reader in his church for schoolchildren to leave their fingerprints in order to monitor their attendance at mass, the Gazeta Wyborcza daily said on Friday.