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Former CIA officer and Antiwar.com columnist Philip Giraldi has a new scoop at the American Conservative blog.
There is considerable speculation and buzz in Washington today suggesting that the National Security Council has agreed in principle to proceed with plans to attack an Iranian al-Qods-run camp that is believed to be training Iraqi militants. The camp that will be targeted is one of several located near Tehran. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was the only senior official urging delay in taking any offensive action. …
Words fail me. Afghanistan was (and is) a debacle. Did Bush and his band of warmongers learn anything? Nope. On to Iraq! Five years, thousands dead, and a trillion dollars later, it makes Afghanistan look like a well run operation by comparison. Did they learn this time? Hell no. So off to Tehran we go!
My advice: buy gold, store some food and water, and get your bike in working order. When Bush gets done “protecting” us, you’ll need to take out a loan to fill up your gas tank, and that assumes he doesn’t get us all killed first.
Learn to grow your own food, then when your stores run out, you can still eat. Make friends with your neighbors, too. Get a dog for protection! They’re much smarter than guns.
As for Afghanistan, every invader loses in Afghanistan. Even Alexander the Great decided to move on after 5 years.
Lester Ness
Yah, I would definately suggest people start preparing. A good start is a stock of the essentials, food, water, and fuel. although a dog is good for protection it’s no match for a gun. I will stay armed and keep my dogs both for protection and hunting. Living in a remote area of Northen Michigan may not seem ideal to many, but it lets me have a degree of comfort. I already grow much of my own food, I hunt, fish and gather for even more. It’s sad to say but I sure wouldn’t want to be stuck in the city when the s**t hits the fan.
Peace!
Jesu Cristo, you’re Yooper!
Don’t think I ever shared half a brain with a Yooper before.
Oil over $126 a barrel
BANGKOK, Thailand May 9, 2008 (AP) — Oil prices hit a new record high above $125 Friday as a weaker U.S. dollar drove investments into commodities.
U.S. crude for June delivery rose as high as $126.20 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange early Friday morning. On Thursday, the contract rose to a record settle of $123.69 a barrel. ….
One of these days, Brad, one might like to see the predicates you attach to the word “Capitalism”.
Ain’t heard a peep from the SEC in a coon’s age.
WSJ columnist trying to get folks to hoard.
Hmmm.
Cherry orchards–Kirschwasser!
Ain’t Slivowitz, it’s true, but I recall the days when the four of us would have a little toke of it before Armenian History.
Shortly afterwards, after a little experiment with Purple Cows, that lasted three days unfortunately, figured out that putting the histamines BACK in the brew is really dumb.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f7/Burgess-cow.jpg
Is it a comedy turned tragedy or vice-versa?
http://cache.eb.com/eb/image?id=11992&rendTypeId=4
Euripedes?
Euripides.
“Five years, thousands dead, and a trillion dollars later, it makes Afghanistan look like a well run operation by comparison. Did they learn this time?”
Learn what? You think the “warmongers” are *disapopinted* by the outcomes? Just where do you think that trillion *went*?
A trillion? A trillion? Surely you josh. $3-7 trillion minimum and that’s just direct. Meanwhile the meter is running, and that means, say 15 to 20 trillion over perhaps fifteen years. If there are fifteen years and US papermaking is up to the challenge….
One estimate is that, if the war had stopped months ago, Veteran’s Care alone, for the lifetime of the Americans maimed and wounded, will cost about $1,000,000,000,000.
Naturally veterans themselves are being encouraged to die off in droves, aren’t they?
Much cheaper that way.
And with no one watching the body count or the bodies coming back who knows what is going from the cargo planes to the pet cemetery crematoria without passing go or collecting $200?
Stoopnocracy is peachy.
Then there’s Blackwater and the other private military contractors, as in New Orleans, and coming soon to a local police department and border patrol near you.
With a fence in place, it begins to look more and more like that well-known heaven on earth, the Gaza Strip.
You folks are just going to have to learn to work harder and save more on less pay.
After all, everybody has to make sacrifices in war, don’t they?
Let us sing:
Swing low, Sweet Chariot–Arbeit macht frei!
We cannot operate without private security firms in Iraq. If the contractors were removed, we would have to leave Iraq.
Patrick F. Kennedy (Under Secretary of State for Management)
Poor babies. Why isn’t that highly classified? After all there are only about 800 Blackwater private military contractors working for State at one time, no?
Oooooo.
The problem here is people don’t understand, or perhaps choose not to understand, that we are ALREADY at war. We are already at war with radical Islam. And who is we? We is not only the United States but France, England, Australia and all the rest of Western Civilization. Radical Islam is at war with us and it does not matter whether radical Islam is represented in a particular battle by the Sunni radicals of Al-Quida or the Shia maniacs in Hizzbollah. Hamas, Hizzbollah, Al Quida and all the rest are just different parts of the same whole. They are all radical Muslims.
Western Civilization is basically too stupid and politically correct to admit that our civilization is superior, that is right, I said superior to the Muslims. So we play this game and continue with this joke called “multi-culturalism” where we pretend that the Muslims are all peaceful and loving and that their civilization with their barbaric, sexist, and homophobic ways, is not inferior to ours.
That’s fine. Let the Muslims get nuclear weapons. They are all loving and peaceful people. Just read the Quran and the Hadith and you will see how loving they are and I am sure they would never use nuclear weapons to kill.
So, what gives you the right to channel a Munich Speech, exactly? I consider about 30% of the USA to be composed of subhumans of the barbaric, sexist, homophobic and generally fascist persuasion (not to mention totally obnubilated by some religious bollocks of the worst sort). I can live with that.
This has zero to do with nukes. This is about selling the another PNAC war to the ignorant masses, a sort of supersized Operation Ajax part II.
I can’t believe people cannot see this, and learned nothing from the latest Iraq lie-marathon.
Tim R do you realize how much like Hitler you sound?
FloridaFrank says:
“Tim R do you realize how much like Hitler you sound?”
And why is that? Did I ever say we should nuke the Muslims? Did I ever say we should kill them all? I never said such a thing. On the contrary, I think we, as a civilized people, must do everything in our power to make sure innocent Muslims don’t get killed. But at the same time we have to recognize the fact that radical Islam is at war with western civilization. And we should operate on the thesis that our civilization is far superior to the Muslims and we have a right to defend it from their aggression.
If the Muslim barbarians want to live with a 7th century mentality, they can go right ahead. But just leave the rest of the civilized world alone!
Perhaps you never enunciated a platform of genocide, but it is not here that the similarities are found. Rather, your binary approach to politics, your classification of Muslim “civilization” as “inferior”, your attempts to ascribe Islamic violence to intrinsic proclivity rather than circumstance, your belief that this is a timeless quality, and your hostility toward anyone professing a belief in accommodation or cultural pluralism exactly mirror Nazi rhetoric and have, as their logical conclusion, a program of violence, racism, collectivism, and mass murder- if a whole people can be regarded as disciples of a depraved moral code, they are deprived of their moral weight, and genocide can be handily excused as an unfortunate necessity.
Well said that man.
Or is it how much Hitler sounded like Tim R.? Nice job, T.R.(oll), in getting everyone’s blood pressure up and warming up the posts.
Ballocks! Latin (”western”) civilization, Byzantine (Russia and neighbors)civilization, Middle Eastern (”Islamic”) are Siamese triplets, not only pretty much alike, but unable to seperate each other. Learn to make friends with your neighbors, and your life will be better. Keep on picking fights, and in the end, you will destroy yourself.
Lester Ness, alive in the bitter sea
Well, gee, Tim, um…
For most of us, “war” is, like, you know, bombing or invading stuff….
But no! You say we’re already at war with Iran. OK, OK, so we can’t say we’re against “going to war against Iran”, because you personally own the meaning of the word “war”.
Well, let’s say we’re against “undertaking a bombing and/or invasion of Iran”, and there’s just no handy way to say that — since Tim R. has claimed the English language for himself, bulldozed it, built a settlement on it, and run it through some Hebrew processor so that everything comes out bass ackwards….
“They are all loving and peaceful people. Just read the Quran and the Hadith and you will see how loving they are”
Tim, I have read them both, and what I read was a lot of loving and caring and advice how to live safely and happily. I guess it all depends on how you view the world, and then how you interpret what you read to fit your world view. From your words I think we are quite aware of your world view, and to me it’s not that different from the so-called terrorists you Muslims you preach against.
Could you imagine this speech from a “terrorist” leader:
“The problem here is people don’t understand, or perhaps choose not to understand, that we are ALREADY at war. We are already at war with the West. And who is we? We is not only Afghanistan but Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Syria and all the rest of Islamic Civilization. The Imperialistic West is at war with us and it does not matter whether it is represented in a particular battle by NATO soldiers in Afghanistan or US maniacs in Iraq. America, Britain, Israel and all the rest are just different parts of the same whole. They are all greedy Westerners.
Muslims are basically too stupid admit that our civilization is superior, that is right, I said superior to the West. So we play this game and continue with this joke called “peace process” where we pretend that the West is peaceful and loving and that their civilization with their barbaric, sexist, and homophobic ways, is not inferior to ours.
That’s fine. Let the West use nuclear weapons. They are all loving and peaceful people. Just read the crap coming from the line-up of potential US presidents and you will see how loving they are and I am sure they would never use nuclear weapons to kill.”
Sound awfully familiar Tim?
Amen, Edalat.
It is extraordinary that after the obvious falsities utilized as an excuse for the invasion of Iraq the myth of WMD is once again fooling the apparently painfully naive into believing a similar situation exists with Iran.
To some the truth never matters much-never mattered in the case of Iraq,and would matter in the case of Iran,Syria,etc -their agenda has to be implmented.
“I guess it all depends on how you view the world, and then how you interpret what you read to fit your world view.”
It depends not only on interpretation but also on which snippets you happen to cherry-pick, and on which sects or cults you happen to focus. All three Abrahamic religions have a myriad of different sects and the Koran, hadith, Bible, Christian theological works, and the Talmud and its derivative works all have passages that are bloodthirsty. Of course, those who call for violence in all three traditions tend to point to the bloodthirsty passages of their own religious texts as justification. There are millions of Christian Dispensationalist in the US who support Israel regardless of how brutal the Israelis become, because they believe it will hasten the coming of the Rapture and Armaggedon. That doesn’t mean that most Christians aren’t loving and peaceful, unlike Tim R.
Tim also needs to keep in mind that the West has been lording it over the Muslim world for hundreds of years, especially since WW I. We’ve been stealing their oil ever since Churchill converted the British fleet to oil 100 years ago. For most of that time there was no Muslim terrorism in Europe or the US. We supported the bloody Shah for 26 years. We meddled in Iraq, destabilizing the post-Faisal regime there and encouraging the coup that brought the Ba’ath and Saddam Hussein to power. We instigated the Iran-Iraq War and armed both sides in pursuit of “dual containment”. We invaded Lebanon several times, propping up the Phallangists. We took sides in their civil war, shelling Shia neighborhoods in Beirut. The CIA attempted to assassinate a Lebanese Ayatollah with a car bomb, missing him but killing scores of women and children. None of these attacks and aggressions were in any way justified any more than 9-11 was, but they all occurred before 9-11, and they were the motivation for that bloody crime. They hate us not because we’re Christian or Jewish or “Western” but because of what we’ve been doing. And we just keep right on doing it. They’re not over here; we’re over there.
Bill Rood:
You raise some valid points that I will concede. The United States and the West has meddled in the Middle East, often times in ways that were injurious to the Arab Muslims over there. Some of the things we did, like helping to arm Saddam with chemical weapons that he used to kill thousands of innocent people were shameful and inexcusable. I never said the west was perfect (just superior to Muslim civilization by comparison) You are correct that the Muslims have some legitimate grievances with us. But my point is that if it were not for Islamic radicalism and religious zealots, they would find better ways of dealing with their grievances. The Dali Lama has some very legitimate grievances against the Chinese Communist Party but I don’t see him calling on his people to hijack airplanes and ram them into skyscrapers in Beijing.
One last point though: You said that we have been “stealing their oil” for a hundred years. So why is it that we spend so much money on oil? Over a 120 a barrel and I have to pay almost 4 dollars at the pump? Meanwhile and Iranian can fill up at the pump for not even half that. And the in-bred Saudi princes get to build 500 room mega mansions with our oil money? If we were stealing it we would just be taking it. Seems to me like OPEC is making plenty of money off us. So I don’t see how we are stealing it.
I might ask what you mean by “Islamic civilization”, and to operationalize the concept of “inferior”. For distinct social structures and the tangible facts of socioeconomic life you substitute the nebulous notion of “civilization” as an analytically bereft epithet. As a sociological unit, “Islamic civilization” does not exist- it is a discursive invention. Islamic states has a long history of intellectual and financial fecundity; their current pitiful status is rather recent development. While we’re at it, I’d query what you mean by “the West” and “Islamic civilization” and how they differ in their proficiencies (as “superior” premises a fixed teleology), as well as how the west is “superior” to “Islamic civilization”, as opposed to the current cluster of Islamic states. For once, let’s see something besides broad generalities and spurious correlations.
Thanks for this history lesson fr. Bill Rood, who refers to Tim R. as a Christian, although Tim R. in the past has referred to himself as a Jewish conservative Democrat. I can tell.
Tim R,
I am a Muslim. Do you know any Muslims? Have you actually ever read the Qu’ran or hadith or do you rely on the distortions of racist hate sites? Who are you to say Muslims are not peaceful people when you are the one obviously lusting for war from the PC in your mother’s basement? What justification do you have to say that “Western” (whatever that is) civilization is superior to Islamic civilization? Based on what? Drug use? Unwed pregnancies? Violent crime? What? What criteria are you using to base this? Your imagined freedoms?
If you could turn off Fox News for a second and actually LISTEN to what the Iranians have said, they consider it an abomination to use nuclear weapons. This is a sound religious opinion. I know you’re not familiar with a government that may actually be telling the truth or is composed of religious members who actually believe in and practice their religion instead of posing to get the rubes to vote them into office so they can slowly bleed them to death, but you are the one who is hostile and warmongering. I want peace.
How would you feel if a foreign entity invaded and occupied, for example, Canada, and routinely stationed war ships 50 miles off the coast of New York? What would you do? The nuclear issue is a dead one. Iran is operating perfectly within the confines of international law and in accordance with the Non-Proliferation Treaty. You know, the one your darling friend Israel REFUSES to sign? The one your great ally REFUSES to sign and you reward with nuclear incentives?
You can demonize a culture with your mythology and stay ensconsed in your happy fantasy land, but basically it makes you sound like an idiot.
Yes Tim, we know, ze Arab untermensch ar zo inferior to ze Vestern Supermen. Zey should be liquidated and zer land integrated into our tausend year Dominion!
Mike writes:
“Have you actually ever read the Qu’ran or hadith ”
Yes, I have indeed read them. And that is why I feel so strongly on the subject.
If you tell me Islam is a peaceful religion I will tell you that the moon is made out of cream cheese.
What you read are transelations by persons who mistranselate in order to advance their agenda and yours.But how much peace the west has showered the rset of the world since 1900.You will feel so strongly on the subject as long as there are people who refuse to be ruled by Israel.
Tim R,
I bet that what you’ve read of the Koran, is the excerpts that a Mr. Robert Spencer, picked out for his little books. You, yourself, pointed this out in a posting urging all to read Mr. Spencer. Robert Spencer writes about Islam in the style of Ann Coulter writing about liberals. I believe one of his little gems is something called “The Politically Incorrect guide to Islam” and another is dedicated to calling Mohammed a “throat slitting camel thief” or something equally uplifting. Spencer calls himself a Bibical scholar but I understand that he has not had a word published by any respectful journal. If what you know of Islam comes from what you have learned at Spencer’s knee, then it explains a lot about your ridiculous caricatures of Islam. As the saying goes “garbage-in, garbage-out”.
Richard Vajs,
Yes, I have certainly read Spencer’s works. But as someone trained in law I know the importance of going to the source text itself. Someone else’s version of the Quran is not as reliable as the source itself. So I would never take Spencer’s word on anyone elses word as to what the Quran says. I have always double checked chapter and verse in various differen translations of the Quran so as to make sure that it is, indeed, as violent as Spencer says it is.
And it is.
Tim R,
I, myself, have tried to read the Koran. It is very difficult for me. But, from what I have slogged through, the Koran emphasizes that God (Allah) is just, kind and all-merciful. The Koran, rather than dehumanizing women, seems to me to go to great lengths to spell out women’s rights in marriage, divorce and inheritance. The Koran does speak harshly about infidels (hostile atheists) but it also, to me, clear that Christians are not infidels but are referred to as followers of the scriptures. Jews do not come off as well as the Christians in the Koran, which makes one wonder why anyone thought that establishing a Jewish enclave right in the center of Islam was such a good idea.
But Tim R, comparing the Torah (first 5 chapters of the Old Testament) against the Koran for violence is no contest. The Old Testament G-d is a “jealous god”, a vengeful god that exists only to scourge Israel’s rivals. It is not universal or tolerant; it is racist (a god that recognizes only the sanctity of Jewish life). A god needing endless slaughter of humans and animals. Leviticus and Deuteronomy are weird beyond anything in the Koran. In Leviticus, it actually lays out the scenario that if two mens are fighting and the wife of one contestant grabs the testicles of her husband’s adversary, she should be killed. (Seems like that guideline never comes up in sermons). And when it comes to really pornographic stuff, one can’t beat Ezekiel full of comparisons of Israel as a whore or a she-ass lusting after the large penises of the Chaldeans.
Maybe, Tim R you are a non-observing Jew. If you are, I can’t blame you. I believe like Thomas Jefferson, that the Old Testament is fiction and pretty coarse fiction, at that. If you are non-observant, please lay off the Islamic religion. If you are devoutly Jewish, how could you not know these things.
YOU are at war with HUMANITY!
Humanity always WINS!
1/3 that will survive when it’s all done
YOU is
N azi
A nglo-american
T errorist
O rganization
N azi
E ndowment for
D ictatorships
and a whole bunch of other “freedom and liberties” tools
In the last century alone how many wars were started by your so called ’superior civilization’,and how many millions of humane lives destroyed by such a civilization?When it comes to barbarism none surpass your Western Civilization!The muslim world has been at the recieving end of such westren barbrism for over 2 centries non-stop.For your information,the west has never and will never consider Judaism part of western civilization ,wish as much as you may or like to pretend.
What you are doing here is to make Israel enemies the west enemies,and have the west fight them on your behalf!
When the Europeans came in contact with other non-european people whose lands and resources the Europeans coveted,the Europeans subjecated ,opperessed ,and in many instants destroyed such people by claiming of being superior to those people that ”that our civilization is superior”.Since these people so inferior in every aspect whatever is done to them was all accepetable!Nothing much changed!
“We is not only the United States but France, England, Australia and all the rest of Western Civilization. “.
Would France be included in the list years back when it was part of the “old Europe” and refused to be part of the coalition of the willings!?But why is Israel not included in it?!!Why Germany is not there either?
Yes. I would include Germany on the list as well as most all the western european nations.
How about Israel!?
Gee, Tim, tired of life, Western Civilization really demonstrated its superiority by attempting suicide in 1914. The suicidal creature made another failed attempt using Fascism, Communism, Zionism, National Socialism and the New Deal as its instruments of self destruction resulting in a massive vein slashing in 1939.
Still tired of living, superior Western Civilization has gone on to concoct a toxic brew of nuclear weapons in a military industrial complex goblet which it is now threatening to force on the rest of the world in order to save us all from the horrors of Islam.
First of all, the plan has always been to take over (or reshape) the entire Middle East. This is obvious from the writtings from the project for a New American Century, the neo-conservitive think tank. http://www.newamericancentury.org
Whether you believe their motive is oil, Isreal, the fight against radical Islam, greed, religious proficy or about a dozen other posible reasons, it should be clear that this would be a huge mistake. The deaths of millions of people will be the result. It will not make us safer unless of course we think we can wipe out the 1.3 billion Muslims that are currently on earth, without a backlash from the other nations of the world.
I believe in a strong Unitied States of America, however this is not the way to make us strong, just more vulnerable. We should bring our troops home, man the borders, stop the support and medling we are doing for any and all of the countries in the world. It’s time we worry about us and not them. If you wish to call me an isolationist thats fine (although I do support free and not managed trade).
We cannot afford the cost of these wars, including the costs of life, money, moral standing, etc. War does not create, it only destroys. We should take what resourses we have left and rebuild our country. If we are attacked by all means we should be willing and able to defend ourselves. However, we should never be involved in preemptive wars of choice.
Peace!
The plan predates the Project for a New American Century PNAC. Before PNAC, there was the “Clean Break” paper, written by some so-called “Americans” working for an Israeli think tank.
Clean Break, what a joke! Pretty Orwellian wouldn’t you say? Peace through endless war, great stuff. Organized by the amazing Richard Perle, with help from James Colbert, Charles Fairbanks, Jr., Douglas Feith, Robert Loewenberg, David Wurmser, and Meyrav Wurmser.
Sad to say but they are already about halfway there.
Peace!
Here’s a great timeline:
http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/timeline.jsp?timeline=complete_911_timeline&geopolitics_and_9/11=centralAsia
Isn’t it amazing when a plan comes together? kind of reminds me of mein kampf. It’s all been written out for anyone to read. But who has time for reading when your so dumbed down you can’t comprehend? What will it take to wake people up to the ugly reality? The hardest part is being one of the few who sees and feeling the hopelessness that comes without the ability to affect change. But you never know, it’s kind of like the pebble thrown in a pool, one ripple goes on and on. Keep up the good work and mabey your stone will reach the other side.
Thanks for the timeline, I bookmarked it!
Peace!
Amen and Amen!
Actually the “kill the muslims” crowd also want to liberate the Chinese of their lives, limbs, self-respect, etc. Probably they don’t have too high an opinion of the average American, either.
Lester Ness, alive in the bitter sea
Tim R. says,
…….Just read the Quran and the Hadith and you will see how loving they (Muslims) are and I am sure they would never use nuclear weapons to kill.
Yeah, because the Talmud is a book of peace?? If you are so anti-Muslim, then join the IDF and fight your own damn battles you big pussy!!! Leave us alone.
Semi-bluff
In games with multiple betting rounds, to bluff on one round with an inferior or drawing hand that might improve in a later round is called a semi-bluff. A player making a semi-bluff can win the pot two different ways: by all opponents folding immediately or by catching a card to improve the player’s hand. In some cases a player may be on a draw but with odds strong enough that he is favored to win the hand. In this case his bet is not classified as a semi-bluff even though his bet may force opponents to fold hands with better current strength.
For example, a player in a stud poker game with four spade-suited cards showing (but none among their downcards) on the penultimate round might raise, hoping that his opponents believe he already has a flush. If his bluff fails and he is called, he still might be dealt a spade on the final card and win the showdown (or he might be dealt another non-spade and try his bluff again, in which case it is a pure bluff on the final round rather than a semi-bluff).
[wikipedia]
Giraldi is being used, conscisously or unconsciously.
I have not seen the Game Theory that applies to the case of trying to persuade an outside observer indirectly to communicate a bluff (pure, semi-, etc.) as not a bluff to other players in the game and as part of the game.
Putin and the Russians are one step ahead here.
Whoever is feeding Giraldi this info is likely using him for their own means no doubt. However, it’s also possible that the intention is to leave us with the belief that the attack will be small. Don’t you think it’s possible that it’s not a bluff but disinformation made to cover for a much larger attack? Remember that many games of chance are played with the rule of winner takes all. So far it seems as if these are the games the neo-cons like the best. The board is already set and we have made the first move (never a good idea).
Peace!
Yep.
But add to the mix–which was what I was getting at–is that Giradli himself is quite bright and very subtle.
You hit the nail on the head with “small”, for example.
The Neo-Cons, by the way, are God-Awful poker players.
Do you see what’s happening here? Not only has your opponent wised up to your pattern of always bluffing each time you had a busted drawing hand, but more importantly, your results are not a function of your actions. Instead, the results you achieve are wholly dependent on the choices your opponent made. You are no longer in charge, and that’s a bad thing. Your playing strategy has allowed the locus of control to pass to your opponent, who, by virtue of his decisions about whether to call or fold, is the one who determines how much you win or lose….”
Lou Krieger
Yes, and it appears Hezbollah is now in control of Lebanon, having called the half-bluff attempt to cripple their communication network. It remains to be seen what will happen in the next round, but I have a sneaking suspicion that any card our Proxy Siniora plays will be a loser. It appears perhaps the Lebanese people are not willing to fight the only force capable of withstanding Israeli aggression. The civil war we are attempting to instigate would clearly open Lebanon up to invasion. Let us hope there are enough Lebanese who remember earlier times that such a disaster can be avoided. Let us hope Hezbollah acts with sufficient restraint and humility. Wouldn’t it be ironic if this results in a new Constitution that does away with the confessional system and allows coallescense of a real Lebanese national identity and the strengthening of the polity against US and Israeli aggression?
Beritus (Berytus) Nutris Legum (Beirut Mother of Law)
Towards the middle of the third century after Christ a school of law and jurisprudence arose at Berytus, which attained high distinction, and is said by Gibbon to have furnished the eastern provinces of the empire with pleaders and magistrates for the space of three centuries (A.D. 250-550). The course of education at Berytus lasted five years, and included Roman Law in all its various forms, the works of Papinian being especially studied in the earlier times, and the same together with the edicts of Justinian in the later. Pleaders were forced to study either at Berytus, or at Rome, or at Constantinople, and, the honours and emoluments of the profession being large, the supply of students was abundant and perpetual. External misfortune, and not internal decay, at last destroyed the school, the town of Berytus being completely demolished by an earthquake in the year A.D. 551. The school was then transferred to Sidon, but appears to have languished on its transplantation to a new soil and never to have recovered its pristine vigour or vitality.
In many respects, one of the most important cities of Phoenicia during the time of the Roman Empire was Berytus. It became the seat of the most famous provincial school of Roman law. The school, which probably was founded by Septimius Severus, lasted until the destruction of Berytus itself by a sequence of earthquakes, tidal wave, and fire in the mid-6th century. Two of Rome’s most famous jurists, Papinian and Ulpian, both natives of Phoenicia, taught as professors at the law school under the Severans. Their judicial opinions constitute well over a third of the Pandects (Digest) contained in the great compilation of Roman law commissioned by the emperor Justinian I in the 6th century AD.
Two great enterprises had substantially despatched Justinian’s work; however, he, or rather Tribonian, who seems to have acted both as his adviser and as his chief executive officer in all legal affairs, conceived that a third book was needed, viz. An elementary manual for beginners which should present an outline of the law in a clear and simple form. The little work of Gaius, most of which we now possess under the title of Commentarii institutionum, had served this purpose for nearly four centuries; but much of it had, owing to changes in the law, become inapplicable, so that a new manual seemed to be required. Justinian accordingly directed Tribonian, with two coadjutors, Theophilus, professor of law in the university of Constantinople, and Dorotheus, professor in the great law school at Berytus, to prepare an elementary textbook on the lines of Gaius. This they did while the Digest was in progress, and produced the useful little treatise which has ever since been the book with which students commonly begin their studies of Roman law, the Institutes of Justinian. It was published as a statute with full legal validity shortly before the Digest. Such merits as it possesses – simplicity of arrangement, clearness and conciseness of expression – belong less to Tribonian than to Gaius, who was closely followed wherever the alterations in the law had not made him obsolete. However, the spirit of that great legal classic seems to have in a measure dwelt with and inspired the inferior men who were recasting his work, the Institutes is better both in Latinity and in substance than we should have expected from condition of Latin letters at that epoch, better than the other laws which emanate from Justinian….</i
[phoenicia.org]
The “Israel” of the Zionists, “Israel”, is what–60 years old. What a joke.
Is Chertoff going to ban Syrians, Lebanese, and Iranians from Las Vegas, do you suppose?
Russia Joins New UN Sanctions on Iran 08 May 2008
Russia has adopted new United Nations economic sanctions on Iran aimed at getting Tehran to suspend its nuclear enrichment activities.
The Kremlin announced Thursday that former President Vladimir Putin signed the sanctions into law earlier this week, just before stepping down to be replaced by Dmitri Medvedev.
[newsvoa.com]
I’d be a little suspicious of VOA. It is actually the voice of the US government.
Lester
Indeed.
And the message Monsieur Putin is sending over VOA is….
I had that sucker hypnotized
He couldn’t even make a sound
I proceeded to tell him his future then
As long as he was hanging around,<