Thursday, August 29, 2013

Mail call

Billboard with portrait of Assad and the text God protects Syria on the old city wall of Damascus 2006 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Bashar and Asma al-Assad, President and first-wife of Syria. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Coat of arms of Syria -- the "Hawk of Qureish" with shield of vertical tricolor of the national flag, holding a scroll with the words الجمهورية العربية السورية (Al-Jumhuriyah al-`Arabiyah as-Suriyah "The Syrian Arab Republic"). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

British Prime Minister David Cameron has lost a vote endorsing military action against Syria by 13 votes, a stunning defeat for a government which had seemed days away from joining the U.S. in possible attacks to punish Bashar Assad’s regime over an alleged chemical weapons attack.

There goes the neighborhood: Mideast prepping for Syria spillover into all-out religious* war

fallout from expected military strikes on Syria

Mr. Assad is an Alawite, a branch of the Shia school of Islam, which is also the official religion in theocratic Iran, his main sponsor in the region.
Iraq is majority Shia, and there is already a violent insurgency by Sunni terrorist groups there. Dozens die almost daily in car bomb and other terrorist attacks by al Qaeda-aligned Sunni extremists.
Most of the rebels fighting Damascus are also Sunnis, and many are linked with al Qaeda in Iraq.
Jordan is ruled by a Sunni monarchy, as are the Gulf states, though they all have Shiite populations of varying sizes. Bahrain, home of the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet, has a majority Shiite population.
Lebanon, the country worst hit so far by violent spillover from Syria, is a religious and ethnic patchwork of Muslims, Christians, Arabs and others. It is led by the Iranian-backed Shiite militant group Hezbollah, which has been fighting alongside government forces in Syria to such deadly effect.
This week, Hezbollah’s political heartlands in Beirut’s suburbs have been struck by indiscriminate and deadly car bombs blamed on Sunni extremists.

* What are they smoking ?

White House stands firm as questions emerge over who controls chemical weapons in Syria

I’ve worked my fair share of political campaigns.

We’ve won some and we’ve lost some – but we always respect the choice voters make.

That’s more than I can say for Stephen Harper and his Conservatives, who keep appointing failed Conservative candidates to the Senate.

Like in British Columbia where Conservative Yonah Martin lost to New Democrats in 2008. That’s the choice voters made – but Stephen Harper didn’t like it. So just months after her defeat, he appointed her to the Senate.

Appointing failed candidates to the unelected, unaccountable Senate is the ultimate insult to voters.

That’s the important message Tom Mulcair is bringing to British Columbia today on his cross-country Senate tour – but he can’t do it alone.

Stand with Tom and New Democrats across the country. Chip in $5, $10 or $15 to show your support today.

Our campaign to abolish the Senate is an ambitious one – we're putting toolkits, messaging materials and organizers on doorsteps across the country. And now Tom is travelling coast-to-coast to reach as many Canadians as possible.

Nathan Rotman
National Director
Canada’s New Democrats

FOLLOW TOM ON FACEBOOK FOLLOW TOM ON TWITTER

Reader Supported News

FOCUS | NYPD Labels Mosques As Terror Groups and Spies on Them

Guardian UK
Excerpt: "New York Police Department has secretly labeled entire mosques as terrorism organizations, a designation that allows police to use informants to record sermons and spy on imams, often without specific evidence of criminal wrongdoing."
READ MORE

Special Coverage: The Trial of Bradley Manning
Reader Supported News
Reader Supported News is at Fort Meade reporting on the Court-Martial Trial of war crimes whistle-blower Bradley Manning. Despite significant opposition from the Army's court administrators, RSN remains on the base gathering facts and pursuing its Media Access action against the Army. Stick with RSN for the latest developments from The Trial of Bradley Manning.
READ MORE

Rebranding the Nigerian Scam - again

Hello,

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This information is priviledge to me, contact me on my private email: (wkohler@qq.com) for details.

Best Regards,
Dr. Winfried Kohler.

Levees.Org

This morning, eight years ago

We owe the Vetted Facts about the
New Orleans Flood to the Survivors

Dear Supporter

Early this morning, eight year ago, levees and canal walls in and around the City of New Orleans failed far below their design capacity.

Neighborhoods throughout the city region – from St. Bernard Parish to the Lower Ninth Ward to Gentilly to Lakeview – were catastrophically flooded.

Over eighteen hundred lost their lives and hundreds of thousands lost their belongings.

But history, both the good and the bad, shall be recorded.

So we are pleased that the Louisiana State Office of Historic Preservation told us last week that they will work with us toward placing the breach of the 17th Street Canal on the prestigious National Register of Historic Places.

The breach of the 17th Street Canal is the most clear-cut and most non-controversial example of federal negligence in its levee building.

In the 1980s, the Army Corps of Engineers recommended against building a gate at the mouth of the 17th Street Canal and instead recommended raising the heights of the canal walls.

Then, the Corps botched a study and concluded they needed to drive steel sheeting down to depths of only 17 feet instead of 46.

The switch to short sheet piles saved the Corps District a million dollars.

And on August 29, 2005, the sheet piles in the newly raised canal walls fell over from water that was still 5 feet from the top of the wall.

The breach of the 17th Street Canal is not a shining example of American civil engineering, but nonetheless, it is a historic event.

Even if it takes years, we will continue to work hard to place the breach site on the National Register of Historic Places.

Please take a moment and view this memorial ceremony at the 17th Street Canal breach site. If you're pressed for time, advance to minute 2:00.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lnooTnAmo70&list=PL67E5E4B88D674CC1

Want to do more?

Please sign our Letter to the Director of the George Bush Museum and demand that verbiage on the federal failures during Katrina be included in the exhibits.

http://go.levees.org/BushMuseum

Thank you for your support of Levees.org.

With your help, we truly are winning.

Sandy Rosenthal

Founder, Levees.org

www.levees.org

PLEASE CONSIDER A DONATION TO HELP INSTALL HISTORIC PLAQUES AT BREACH SITES: http://go.levees.org/TK5Ekp

New York Chapter
bhschaffer@levees.org

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DrLevine@levees.org

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Oregon@levees.org

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