S.O.S Nomad has just posted a video clip streaming from Halaltube.com. This new trend of Islamization like other Halal products such as Halal meat, Halal Banking etc ( Also known as Sharia Compliant) inspired me to pose a question to our Nomads on this site of how to establish a Halal Government in Somalia? Does the current conditions warrant the acceptance of Haraam Government run by officials who have names such as ( Xaaraan Ku Naax) instead of insisting on a Halaal Government for Somalia? Since any Somali Constitution states that Islam is the Official Religion of the Nation, Shouldn't our Somali Scholars ( Culimadeenna) set Sharia Compliance Standard for any national or regional Somali government? Like Halaal Meat which we consume, shouldn't our government be also a halaal Government? Nur

Conned Again By Paul Craig Roberts November 09, 2008 "ICH" -- If the change President-elect Obama has promised includes a halt to America’s wars of aggression and an end to the rip-off of taxpayers by powerful financial interests, what explains Obama’s choice of foreign and economic policy advisors? Indeed, Obama’s selection of Rahm Israel Emanuel as White House chief of staff is a signal that change ended with Obama’s election. The only thing different about the new administration will be the faces. Rahm Israel Emanuel is a supporter of Bush’s invasion of Iraq. Emanuel rose to prominence in the Democratic Party as a result of his fundraising connections to AIPAC. A strong supporter of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, he comes from a terrorist family. His father was a member of Irgun, a Jewish terrorist organization that used violence to drive the British and Palestinians out of Palestine in order to create the Jewish state. During the 1991 Gulf War, Rahm Israel Emanuel volunteered to serve in the Israel Defense Forces. He was a member of the Freddie Mac board of directors and received $231,655 in directors fees in 2001. According to Wikipedia, “during the time Emanuel spent on the board, Freddie Mac was plagued with scandals involving campaign contributions and accounting irregularities.” In “Hail to the Chief of Staff,” Alexander Cockburn describes Emanuel as “a super-Likudnik hawk,” who as chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 2006 “made great efforts to knock out antiwar Democratic candidates.” My despondent friends in the Israeli peace movement ask, “What is this man doing in Obama’s administration?” Obama’s election was necessary as the only means Americans had to hold the Republicans accountable for their crimes against the Constitution and human rights, for their violations of US and international laws, for their lies and deceptions, and for their financial chicanery. As an editorial in Pravda put it, “Only Satan would have been worse than the Bush regime. Therefore it could be argued that the new administration in the USA could never be worse than the one which divorced the hearts and minds of Americans from their brothers in the international community, which appalled the rest of the world with shock and awe tactics that included concentration camps, torture, mass murder and utter disrespect for international law.” But Obama’s advisers are drawn from the same gang of Washington thugs and Wall Street banksters as Bush’s. Richard Holbrooke, son of Russian and German Jews, was an assistant secretary of state and ambassador in the Clinton administration. He implemented the policy to enlarge NATO and to place the military alliance on Russia’s border in contravention of Reagan’s promise to Gorbachev. Holbrooke is also associated with the Clinton administration’s illegal bombing of Serbia, a war crime that killed civilians and Chinese diplomats. If not a neocon himself, Holbrooke is closely allied with them. According to Wikipedia, Madeline Albright was born Marie Jana Korbelova in Prague to Jewish parents who had converted to Catholicism in order to escape persecution. She is the Clinton era secretary of state who told Leslie Stahl (60 Minutes) that the US policy of Iraq sanctions, which resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children, had goals important enough to justify the children’s deaths. Albright’s infamous words: “we think the price is worth it.” Wikipedia reports that this immoralist served on the board of directors of the New York Stock Exchange at the time of Dick Grasso’s $187.5 million compensation scandal. Dennis Ross has long associations with the Israeli-Palestinian “peace negotiations.” A member of his Clinton era team, Aaron David Miller, wrote that during 1999-2000 the US negotiating team led by Ross acted as Israel’s lawyer: “we had to run everything by Israel first.” This “stripped our policy of the independence and flexibility required for serious peacemaking. If we couldn't put proposals on the table without checking with the Israelis first, and refused to push back when they said no, how effective could our mediation be?” According to Wikipedia, Ross is “chairman of a new Jerusalem-based think tank, the Jewish People Policy Planning Institute, funded and founded by the Jewish Agency.” Clearly, this is not a group of advisors that is going to halt America’s wars against Israel’s enemies or force the Israeli government to accept the necessary conditions for a real peace in the Middle East. Ralph Nader predicted as much. In his “Open Letter to Barack Obama (November 3, 2008), Nader pointed out to Obama that his “transformation from an articulate defender of Palestinian rights . . . to a dittoman for the hard-line AIPAC lobby” puts Obama at odds with “a majority of Jewish-Americans” and “64% of Israelis.” Nader quotes the Israeli writer and peace advocate Uri Avnery’s description of Obama’s appearance before AIPAC as an appearance that “broke all records for obsequiousness and fawning.” Nader damns Obama for his “utter lack of political courage [for] surrendering to demands of the hard-liners to prohibit former president Jimmy Carter from speaking at the Democratic National Convention.” Carter, who achieved the only meaningful peace agreement between Israel and the Arabs, has been demonized by the powerful AIPAC lobby for criticizing Israel’s policy of apartheid toward the Palestinians whose territory Israel forcibly occupies. Obama’s economic team is just as bad. Its star is Robert Rubin, the bankster who was secretary of the treasury in the Clinton administration. Rubin has responsibility for the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act and, thereby, responsibility for the current financial crisis. In his letter to Obama, Nader points out that Obama received unprecedented campaign contributions from corporate and Wall Street interests. “Never before has a Democratic nominee for President achieved this supremacy over his Republican counterpart.” Obama’s victory speech was magnificent. The TV cameras scanning faces in the audience showed the hope and belief that propelled Obama into the presidency. But Obama cannot bring change to Washington. There is no one in the Washington crowd that he can appoint who is capable of bringing change. If Obama were to reach outside the usual crowd, anyone suspected of being a bringer of change could not get confirmed by the Senate. Powerful interest groups--AIPAC, the military-security complex, Wall Street--use their political influence to block unacceptable appointments. As Alexander Cockburn put it in his column, “Obama, the first-rate Republican,” “never has the dead hand of the past had a ‘reform’ candidate so firmly by the windpipe.” Obama confirmed Cockburn’s verdict in his first press conference as president-elect. Disregarding the unanimous US National Intelligence Estimate, which concluded that Iran stopped working on nuclear weapons five years ago, and ignoring the continued certification by the International Atomic Energy Agency that none of the nuclear material for Iran’s civilian nuclear reactor has been diverted to weapons use, Obama sallied forth with the Israel Lobby’s propaganda and accused Iran of “development of a nuclear weapon” and vowing “to prevent that from happening.” http://news.antiwar.com/2008/11/07/obama-hits-out-at-iran-closemouthed-on-tactics/ The change that is coming to America has nothing to do with Obama. Change is coming from the financial crisis brought on by Wall Street greed and irresponsibility, from the eroding role of the US dollar as reserve currency, from countless mortgage foreclosures, from the offshoring of millions of America’s best jobs, from a deepening recession, from pillars of American manufacturing--Ford and GM--begging the government for taxpayers’ money to stay alive, and from budget and trade deficits that are too large to be closed by normal means. Traditionally, the government relies on monetary and fiscal policy to lift the economy out of recession. But easy money is not working. Interest rates are already low and monetary growth is already high, yet unemployment is rising. The budget deficit is already huge--a world record--and the red ink is not stimulating the economy. Can even lower interest rates and even higher budget deficits help an economy that has moved offshore, leaving behind jobless consumers overburdened with debt? How much more can the government borrow? America’s foreign creditors are asking this question. An official organ of the Chinese ruling party recently called for Asian and European countries to “banish the US dollar from their direct trade relations, relying only on their own currencies.” “Why,” asks another Chinese publication, “should China help the US to issue debt without end in the belief that the national credit of the US can expand without limit?” The world has tired of American hegemony and had its fill of American arrogance. America’s reputation is in tatters: the financial debacle, endless red ink, Abu Ghraib, Gitmo, rendition, torture, illegal wars based on lies and deception, disrespect for the sovereignty of other countries, war crimes, disregard for international law and the Geneva Conventions, the assault on habeas corpus and the separation of powers, a domestic police state, constant interference in the internal affairs of other countries, boundless hypocrisy. The change that is coming is the end of American empire. The hegemon has run out of money and influence. Obama as “America’s First Black President” will lift hopes and, thus, allow the act to be carried on a little longer. But the New American Century is already over.

Nomads, I hate to spoil parties for telling you this, but I was caught speeding by police radar, the fun of getting to where I was going was over quickly when I was served with the speeding citation. If humans can get you on a radar and make you pay, it sure makes sense the highway of life is also being watched by Constables On Patrol ( Angel COPs), they are just invisible to the eye, but that shouldn't fool you saaxib, because they can see you. The police radar is rather simple, it uses doppler effect to measure your speed, if you are within the allowed range, you are OK, if you are exceeding, you are in trouble. Unlike the police, the Angels have more soffisticated invisible gears to measure thousands of parameters collectively known as Morals, can you imagine how many of these moral standards we cross daily without being aware of the presence of Angels!? whenever you lie, or hide the truth, you feel like you have crossed a red light, deep inside, you know you are wrong, even if you are President of the USA. Then after the lie, what happens next?, usually sh... happens, a crime against humanity, like killing Million people in Iraq, along with some 5000 American kids looking for the GI Bill to pay for college. Anyone who can lie without any remorse, is really sick, their morals are dead, no hope! Angels also measure your intentions, they know when you are sincere of what you are telling the public, and when you just want to get elected. In the day of judgement, we will be served our final earthly traffic record, Allah will tell us " Iqra kitaabak, kafaa bi nafsikal yawma caleyka xasiibaa" meaning " Read your own record, you need no one but yourself to audit you today" Next time you see a COP on the highway, think about the angels. When you see an auditor, think about the day of judgement, and when you see the torture chambers at Guantanamo or Abu Ghureib, think about Hell. Of course , Maui should remind you of Paradise! Walillahul mathalul aclaa! Nur

Baarakallah feek akhi, Allaha ka abaal mariyo Sheikh Idriis Xasuusinta geerida iyo in aan diyaar u noqonno. Culimadeenna kaalin weyn bey kaga jiraan wacyi galinta diiniga ah( Awareness) ee jaaliyooyinka dibedda ku nool. Nur

Is Western Democracy-For-Export a front for neo-colonialism? Read the following excerpt: " In December 1991, the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) won a landslide victory in Algeria’s national democratic elections. But before the parliamentary seats could be taken in January 1992, the Algerian military violently overturned democracy. The elections were canceled while the Army rounded up tens of thousands of Algerian FIS voters into concentration camps in the middle of the Sahara…. This was a dark day for democracy. According to Ben Lombardi, who is with the Directorate of Strategic Analysis at the Department of National Defense in Ottawa, Canada: “In 1991, the West supported the coup in Algeria in an effort to prevent Islamic fundamentalists from coming to power through the ballot box.” As noted by John Entelis, professor of political science and director of the Middle East Program at Fordham University in New York: “The Arab world had never before experienced such a genuinely populist expression of democratic aspirations…. Yet when the army overturned the whole democratic experience in January 1992, the United States willingly accepted the results…. In short, a democratically elected Islamist government hostile to American hegemonic aspirations in the region… was considered unacceptable in Washington.” The new junta, in contrast, expressed “willingness to collaborate with American regional ambitions,” which included “collaborating with Israel in establishing a Pax Americana in the Middle East and North Africa. Not long after the coup, hundreds of civilians were being mysteriously massacred by an unknown terrorist group… calling itself the Armed Islamic Group (GIA)…[whose] “core members are the thousands of ‘Afghans,’ men who have received their military training from Afghanistan.” , Not surprisingly, Algeria’s primary resource is oil." From: "Sins of Statecraft: The War on Terror Exposed" . Theories on Militarism, and Prospects for Transformation By Brian Bogart

A Plea from Israel Come, Obama, Change My Life By Edna Canetti November 07, 2008 --- Obama my dear, they tell me that you are going to change the world. Do me a favor, come and change my life personally. Come to Israel, grab its styupid leadership by the throat and take its foot off the neck of another people. Come and force us to do what is clear, and written, and fitting, and necessary, come and get us out of the Territories, if necessary do it with a smile that reveals million-dollar teeth. If necessary bare your teeth and force us to do it. Make it so that I don’t have to get up in the morning – I who hate to get up early, to go to the checkpoints, to watch and to weep. Make it so I will not have to see 19-year-old children who have been duped into believing that they are defending the home front by pointing rifles at five-year-old children. Make it so that when my daughters take a shower for half an hour I don’t have to think about Ayad’s family from Awarta that puts buckets under all the washbasins in order to reuse the water which is more precious than gold. Because the settlements need the West Bank’s water more than the Palestinians do. Make it so that when I sit in a traffic jam I don’t have to think about the vast numbers of cars that are standing at the entrance to Tul Karem while each one is checked by soldiers and dogs because there has been a warning that they’re about to blow up Tul Karem. Make it so that when my sister urgently rushes to the hospital to give birth and when I rush my husband to the hospital practically with red lights flashing, I don’t have to think about the women giving birth and the heart patients and the wounded people who are stopped at the entrance to Nablus because their vehicle has no permit to enter. Make it so that when I see a soldier in uniform on the street I do not wonder what he did last night. What house he entered in a “Straw Widow procedure”,* what boy he beat up in the alleys of Hawara because he smiled the wrong way. Make it so that in the morning I don’t hear the satisfaction in the voice of the radio newsreader who relates that the IDF has killed six terrorists. Obama my dear, this autumn I did not go to the olive harvest. It didn’t work out. Please make it so that I will not suffer from pangs of conscience because I am not doing enough. That I am living my own good life, pursuing my career, while for the other people just to get home safely is a career in itself. Please relieve me of this pain that I have all the time deep in my belly. It never lets up, I can never really enjoy life, children, friends or work, because my mind is preoccupied with the image of the shepherd in Baq’a standing by the locked gate and shivering with cold because the redhead with the key has not showed up, and the bound blindfolded boy, and the three-year-old girl who got hit on the head by the carousel at the checkpoint, and the barriers of dirt and the concrete blocks that stop the lives of so many people from flowing smoothly. Come, Obama, come and save us from ourselves. And if that is what they mean when they say you are not a friend of Israel, then don’t be a friend. We have already had friends who arm us and justify every horror we carry out and save us from the international courts. Be a true friend. Save us from ourselves. And don’t do it for the world, do it only for me, so I can have peace. You owe it to me. I do not believe in God but still I prayed for you. *The IDF practice of forcibly occupying private Palestinian homes temporarily, for tactical purposes – translator Edna Canetti wrote this for MachsomWatch. Ther piece was translated from Hebrew by George Malent.

Very interesting read SOS bro. My Dream if true gives Obama maximum of 24 months in office, how he leaves office is more likely after a scandal of sorts created for him by his confidants, to give Biden the Chance to plagiarize the US presidency. The priests of deception never run out of new hat tricks, just when I thought that Americans had it, here comes another self perpetuating trick with life of its own called Obama. The con artists arournd this man are exploiting the soft spot of weary citizens who have been lied to by the Bushladin people, now, Obama has to take the lie from where Bush left it, for an assured down hill fall of the Empire. African Americans have to take the credit for taking the nation to its new neighborhood, the Third World, where most African Americans feel at home! The American House is in deep trouble, and neither Obama nor Mc Cain could've offered a real solution, as both of them are part of the inner establishment that created the problem to begin with. The best Obama could do is to take Bush and his team to a Nuremberg style court for crimes against humanity, as well as theft of public funds, and breach of public confidence in their Government, Will he do that? No way. Nur

S.O.S. The days to come will further clarify the new administrations commitment to the "CHANGE". Slogans are for fooling voters, they should never be taken at face value. If this trend continues, as it looks, I have a strong believe that my other dream will materialize, Obama, the first black president may set another first, the first to leave office in his first 24 months as president, which will pave the way for Joe Biden,, the Openly Zionist law maker as the next president of the USA. The Future is interesting! Nur Note: Occupied Territories : "West Bank, Gazza, Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, EU, AU, World bank, IMF, US Congress, US Senate and now the White House!"

A Look Under the Hood at the (Potential) Obama Administration By Joshua Frank November 06, 2008 -- - Tuesday’s celebration hangovers have finally started to wear off, and the pieces are beginning to fall into place. Change will be coming to Washington in January, but it is difficult to decipher what form it will take. Early clues, however, suggest that Barack Obama’s administration will prove unlikely to alter the fundamental political machinery that has led us into war and economic turmoil. Below is a brief summary of Obama’s potential choices for a few key roles in his administration. Chief of Staff Obama’s key White House position will go to Rep. Rahm Emanuel of Illinois. While Emanuel knows his way around the corridors of Washington, qualifying him in the traditional sense, this alone doesn’t mean he’s the guy you want drawing up Obama’s policy papers day after day. For starters, Emanuel is a shameless neoliberal with close ties to the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC), even co-authoring a strategy book with DLC president Bruce Reed. Without Emanuel, Bill Clinton would not have been able to thrust NAFTA down the throats of environmentalists and labor in the mid-1990s. Over the course of his career, Emanuel’s made it a point to cozy up to big business, making him one of the most effective corporate fundraisers in the Democratic Party. He’s also a staunch advocate of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories. Emanuel’s shinning moment came in 2006 as he helped funnel money and poured ground support into the offices of dozens of conservative Democrats, expanding his party’s control of the House of Representatives. Emanuel, who supports the War on Terror, and expanding our presence in Afghanistan, worked hard to ensure that a Democratic House majority would not alter the course of US military objectives in the Middle East. In short, Rahm Emanuel is not only a poor choice for Obama’s Chief of Staff; he’s one of the least progressive picks he could have made. While he may have decent views on abortion, tax policy, and social security, Emanuel’s broader vision is more of the same: war and corporate dominance. Treasury Secretary For arguably the most important position Obama will be appointing, the President-Elect may pick well-regarded economist Paul Volcker, former chairman of the Federal Reserve under Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan. Volker is one of Obama’s closest economic advisors and is thought to be the top-choice for the position of Treasury Secretary. During the late 1970s and early 1980s, Volker, in an attempt to cut inflation, dramatically raised interest rates, which helped the elite maintain value in their assets but strangled the working class as credit dried up. In his book, A Brief History of Neoliberalism, David Harvey writes that Volker personified one of the key facets of the neoliberal era. “[Volker] engineered a draconian shift in U.S. monetary policy. The long-standing commitment in the U.S. liberal democratic state to the principles of the New Deal, which meant broadly Keynesian fiscal and monetary policies with full employment as a key objective, was abandoned in favour of a policy designed to quell inflation no matter what the consequences might be for employment. The real rate of interest, which had often been negative during the double-digit inflationary surge of the 1970s, was rendered positive by fiat of the Federal Reserve. The nominal rate of interest was raised overnight … Thus began ‘a long deep recession that would empty factories and break unions in the U.S. and drive detour countries to the brink of insolvency, beginning a long-era of structural insolvency’. The Volker shock, as it has since come to be known, has to be interpreted as a necessary but not sufficient condition of neoliberalism.” In supporting Henry Paulson’s bailout package, Volker would not re-regulate the banks nor provide more power to shareholders, he’s simply carry on one facet of neoliberalism: tightening federal budgets which inevitably will put great budgetary pressure on federal agencies. Another potential pick for the post is Robert Rubin, who served under Clinton in the same position and is currently Director and Senior Counselor of Citigroup. Rubin played a key role in abetting another neoliberal objective: deregulation. Where Volker was hung up on economic austerity, Rubin pushed for more deregulatory policies that ended up shifting jobs, and entire industries, overseas. Rubin even pushed for Clinton’s dismantling of Glass-Steagall, testifying that deregulating the banking industry would be good for capital gains, as well as Main Street. “[The] banking industry is fundamentally different from what it was two decades ago, let alone in 1933,” Rubin testified before the House Committee on Banking and Financial Services in May of 1995. “[Glass-Steagall could] conceivably impede safety and soundness by limiting revenue diversification,” Rubin argued. While the industry saw much deregulation over the years preceding these events, the Gramm-Leach-Biley Act of 1999, which eliminated Glass-Steagall, extended and ratified changes that had been enacted with previous legislation. Ultimately, the repeal of the New Deal era protection allowed commercial lenders like Rubin’s Citigroup to underwrite and trade instruments like mortgage backed securities along with collateralized debt and established structured investment vehicles (SIVs), which purchased these securities. In short, as the lines were blurred among investment banks, commercial banks and insurance companies, when one industry fell, others could too. Robert Rubin is in part responsible for supporting the policies that pushed us to the brink of a great recession. When the subprime mortgage crisis hit, instability and collapse spread across numerous industries. Another name that is in the hunt for the top spot is Lawrence Summers, who served during the last 18 months of the Clinton administration. Summers is greatly responsible for expanding Rubinomics and is credited by many for the collapse in the derivatives market, which later imploded the housing market. Defense Secretary While Obama’s choice for this important role is speculative, quite a few fingers are pointing to Richard Holbrooke. After Gerald Ford’s loss and Jimmy Carter’s ascendance into the White House in 1976, Indonesia, which invaded East Timor and slaughtered 200,000 indigenous Timorese years earlier, requested additional arms to continue its brutal occupation, even though there was a supposed ban on arms trades to Suharto’s government. It was Carter’s appointee to the Department of State’s Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, Richard Holbrooke, who authorized additional arms shipments to Indonesia during this supposed blockade. Many scholars have noted that this was the period when the Indonesian suppression of the Timorese reached genocidal levels. During his testimony before Congress in February 1978, Benedict Anderson of Cornell University cited a report that proved there never was a United States arms ban, and that during the period of the alleged ban; the US initiated new offers of military weaponry to the Indonesians at Holbrooke’s request. Over the years Holbrooke, who is philosophically aligned with Paul Wolfowitz and other neoconservatives, has worked vigorously to keep his bloody campaign silent. Holbrooke described the motivations behind his support of Indonesia’s genocidal actions: “The situation in East Timor is one of the number of very important concerns of the United States in Indonesia. Indonesia, with a population of 150 million people, is the fifth largest nation in the world, is a moderate member of the Non-Aligned Movement, is an important oil producer — which plays a moderate role within OPEC — and occupies a strategic position astride the sea lanes between the Pacific and Indian Oceans … We highly value our cooperative relationship with Indonesia.” Other foreign policy advisors may also include the likes of Madeline Albright, the great supporter of Iraq sanctions, which killed hundreds of thousands of innocent people. Madeline Albright, when asked by Leslie Stahl of 60 Minutes about the deaths caused by U.N. sanctions, infamously condoned the deaths. “I think this is a very hard choice,” she said. “But the price–we think the price is worth it.” Samantha Power, that great cheerleader for humanitarian intervention, also has Obama’s ear and may even entice him to put U.S. forces in Darfur. “With very few exceptions, the Save Darfur campaign has drawn a single lesson from Rwanda: the problem was the US failure to intervene to stop the genocide. Rwanda is the guilt that America must expiate, and to do so it must be ready to intervene, for good and against evil, even globally. That lesson is inscribed at the heart of Samantha of Power’s book, A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide. But it is the wrong lesson,” writes author Mahmood Mamdani in the London Review of Books. As Mamdani continues: “What the humanitarian intervention lobby fails to see is that the US did intervene in Rwanda, through a proxy … Instead of using its resources and influence to bring about a political solution to the civil war, and then strengthen it, the US signalled to one of the parties that it could pursue victory with impunity. This unilateralism was part of what led to the disaster, and that is the real lesson of Rwanda … Applied to Darfur and Sudan, it is sobering. It means recognising that Darfur is not yet another Rwanda. Nurturing hopes of an external military intervention among those in the insurgency who aspire to victory and reinforcing the fears of those in the counter-insurgency who see it as a prelude to defeat are precisely the ways to ensure that it becomes a Rwanda.” Other names in the running include John Kerry, who as many know, ran an antiwar campaign for president in 2004. A full supporter of the War on Terror, with a hard-line on Iran, will certainly not alter the U.S. relationship in the Middle East. Regarding the Department of Defense, it looks as if Robert Gates will still control the top spot, with no alterations made to the DoD or its inflated budget. The Next Step While the election of Barack Obama is a blow to George W. Bush-Republicanism and a gain for racial equality in this country, it is in many ways only a symbolic victory. The future of the U.S.’s foreign and economic agenda will continue to be saturated with ideologies and individuals that are directly responsible for our current predicament, both in the Middle East and domestically. Celebrating the end of the ugly Bush era is one thing. Celebrating the continuation of their policies with a different administration in the White House is quite another. With these prospective appointments, Obama seems to be moving backwards to Clintontime. This may be sufficient change for some, but it far from a progressive push toward social, economic, and environmental justice. For significant change to happen, the kind that is needed in order to mend the wounds of the Bush years, we have to put down our Obama signs and force Congress and the new administration to end the wars in the Middle East, and push for regulating the financial industry while providing true universal health-care and economic safety-nets for all Americans. Given the make up of his potential advisors, we’re in for a long uphill battle. So let’s drop our illusions and start organizing, beginning with a discussion of what “organizing” even means in today’s political climate. Joshua Frank is co-editor of Dissident Voice and author of Left Out! How Liberals Helped Reelect George W. Bush (Common Courage Press, 2005), and along with Jeffrey St. Clair, the editor of the new book Red State Rebels: Tales of Grassroots Resistance in the Heartland, published by AK Press in June 2008. Check out the new Red State Rebels site at www.RedStateRebels.org Read other articles by Joshua, or visit Joshua's website

B G Before we answer the big question of this thread, an examination of your terms may faciliate understanding the question of "legitimacy". State of Failure or a Failed State? State of Failure is quite different from a Failing State! State of Failure is serious, its when humans, individually fail to worship their maker, ascribe partners to their maker, or go about their daily lives in manifest contempt to their maker's eternal sovereign laws. On the other hand, A failed State, ( modern nation state), like Somalia is a collective failure of people to agree on a single form of governance system, worldly that is, in which basic services and security is provided by a competent government to its constituency. Now, applying the above definitions to Somalia, we ask ourselves. 1. Are Somalis in a State of Failure? To answer this question, we ask another question: "have Somali individuals failed their covenant with their maker?". Sate of failure is an individual measure of failure, its the only metric that Allah will judge mankind in the day of judgement. That day, Somalis or Ethiopians will not have a clearly demarcated gates to enter paradise or hell, to each individual will be his/ her beliefs, actions and results that will spell their final state in which success and failure will be measured according to Allah's yardstic, not human. There will be no nationalism, tribalism nor political parties. 2. Is Somalia a failed Nation? Well, collectively, it is, thanks to the "International Community", IGAD, UN, USA and Ethiopia, to have destroyed the Islamic Courts Union, who briefly provided governance not seen over a decade, and to this day, the "international Community, Palau included" is maintaining the chaos in Somalia with the force of illegal occupation of Ethiopian Troops. The Ethiopian occupation force's mandate to occupy Somalia is a franchise license of the Bush Doctrine of Pre-emptive strike at one's enemies before they are strong enough to attack them. In other words, this illegal pretext which is not recognized by the United Nations is what is keeping Ethiopian troops in Somalia. Because Ethiopia is an American Ally in the phony war on "Terrror" (aka Islam), the UN which is run by salaried employees whose salaries are paid mostly by the US with borrowed foreign Sovereign Funds, soon to dry up, can not stomach to stand up for justice by calling a spade a spade. The anlogy of this awkward political situation Somalia finds itself in, is that of a rapist who broke into a house, got into one of the rooms and raped a woman, and the family is being asked by its neighbors to negotiate with this rapist ( who they sympathize with). The rapist is asking 5 more hours to rape the woman as he is having good time, and some of the family members think it's wise and acceptable offer instead of endangering the woman and the family further if they engage the rapist and make his sympatizers angry. So, this begs another question, was Somalia's classification as failed State an internal drive, external drive, or a hybrid? Clearly it was hybrid, in my opinion, it was external motives that drove and exploited internal weakness to dismantle, divide and destroy the Somali people's capacity for self governance. The external players have not reached their objectives as of yet. Internally, more reshuffling is going on, between allies as well between adversaries, the final formation for a modern governance will greatly depend on the choice of the people of Somalia, who if left alone to self correct their internal dispute, may regain the semblance of self governing similar to that of 2006 when the courts have empowered the public to rule their neigborhoods and to kick the CIA funded warlords out. That state of Self Governance calls for the end of intervention from US and Ethiopia, short of that, I do not foresee that a version of peace painted on a western influenced canvas to be attractive to war weary Somalis. Now, who has the legitimacy to implement Islamic Law in Somalia? Not the mobs for sure! That leaves the stage for two more competing groups in Somalia's political landcsape. 1. Secular Politicians 2. Islamists The first group is against the Islamic Law altogether, they prefer man made laws, and western codes. So they are disqualified. The Second group, all agree on the importance of the implemetation of the Islamic Law, but they differ on interpretation. Solution: Creation of The Highest Academy Of Somali Islamic Scholars. ( HASIS) Such an Academy does not exist today, but it would be the only viable alternative to implement the Islamic Law in Somalia. So, I kindly ask all eNuri readers to seriously work for the creation of this Academy. Please communicate this need to your local Imaams, Sheikhs and Caaqils, knowing that there is already a functioning Somali Scholars Organization ( Alhamdulillah), but what is needed is a specialized Scholars Academy for the Implementation of the Islamic Law in Somalia and the issuance of fatwa. The central requirement for eligibility for its membership should be the unwavering desire to Serve Allah with Ikhlas, by upholding Justice in the land. We need the Islamic Scholars to guide the legislative aspect of Somali Self Governance. Without such an organization, no peace will prevail in Somalia as everyone will interpret the law from their own narrow point of view. Nur

S.O.S bro. You write: "In other words, "steady state economy" is (read equals) only possible in an interest-free economy" Precisely! Steady State Growth saves the planets wealth for future generations, it conserves the wilderness, energy and keeps the planet clean from pollution. Which implies the Islamic Vision of Economy or Iqtisaad is the best course for humanity, as well as the spiritual dimension of this great faith. Iqtisaad is an Arabic word which means to conserve. The Prophet SAWS is reported to have said " Conserve water even if you have a river/ ocean" Nur

Silence on War Crimes By Andy Worthington November 04, 2008 "fff" --- November 3, 2008 -- - Last week, Bill Kovach, former Washington Bureau Chief of the New York Times and the founding chairman of the Committee of Concerned Journalists, blasted the U.S. media for its failure to ask tough questions of both presidential candidates regarding their opinions of the Bush administration’s unprecedented adherence to the controversial “unitary executive theory” of government. The theory, which became prominent in the Reagan administration, but has peppered U.S. history, contends that, when he wishes, the president is entitled to act unilaterally, without interference from Congress or the judiciary. This is in direct contravention of the separation of powers on which the United States was founded, and critics have long contended that it is nothing less than an attempt by the executive to seize the dictatorial powers that the Constitution was designed to prevent. Under the cover of the wartime powers granted in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, and with encouragement from lawyers including, in particular, Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff (and former legal counsel) David Addington, President Bush has pursued the theory relentlessly, issuing a record number of “signing statements” to laws passed by Congress, designed to prevent the nation’s politicians from interfering in the executive’s quest for unchecked power. He has also approved a number of secret memos, which, in conjunction with various “signing statements,” have authorized what numerous critics of the administration regard as war crimes. These include detaining prisoners seized in the “war on terror” as “illegal enemy combatants” and holding them without charge or trial, dismissing the protections of the Geneva Conventions, redefining torture and approving its use by the U.S. military and the CIA, and authorizing “extraordinary rendition” and the use of secret prisons. As if to prove what he was saying, Bill Kovach’s speech to a meeting of international journalists in Washington, D.C., went unreported in the U.S. media (and I located it only on the website of a Jamaican newspaper). And yet in many ways Kovach could have gone further, and could also have asked why the presidential candidates themselves have been silent about the current administration’s crimes. The answer, sadly, is that the executive’s thirst for unfettered executive power is not a priority for voters, even when it spills out of foreign wars and offshore prisons and onto the U.S. mainland. Too many Americans, it seems, are unconcerned or unaware that the president can even hold U.S. citizens and legal residents as “enemy combatants” and can imprison them indefinitely on the U.S. mainland without charge or trial, as the cases of Jose Padilla and Ali al-Marri reveal in horrific detail. As a result, gross abuses of power in the name of the “war on terror,” and the dictatorial theory that underpins them, have largely been ignored on the campaign trail. Over the past two years, Senator Barack Obama repeatedly declared his support for habeas corpus, a cornerstone of American law, inherited from the English, which prohibits arbitrary imprisonment and grants all prisoners the right to know why they are being held. He defended habeas corpus while resisting the Military Commissions Act of 2006, a poisonous piece of legislation, which not only stripped the Guantánamo prisoners of their habeas rights, but also reinforced the president’s right to seize and detain indefinitely anyone he regarded as an “illegal enemy combatant,” and attempted to grant immunity to the president and his minions for any actions that might one day be regarded as war crimes. Senator Obama has also stated that he will “reject torture without exception,” and last August delivered a speech in which, touching on all the administration’s law-shredding excesses, he declared, As President, I will close Guantánamo, reject the Military Commissions Act, and adhere to the Geneva Conventions. Our Constitution and our Uniform Code of Military Justice provide a framework for dealing with the terrorists … The separation of powers works. Our Constitution works. We will again set an example to the world that the law is not subject to the whims of stubborn rulers, and that justice is not arbitrary. In June this year, when the Supreme Court (which had granted the Guantánamo prisoners statutory habeas corpus rights in June 2004) rejected the habeas-stripping provisions of the Military Commissions Act and its predecessor, the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005, and ruled that the prisoners’ habeas corpus rights were constitutional, Senator Obama was swift to congratulate the justices, calling the ruling “an important step toward reestablishing our credibility as a nation committed to the rule of law, and rejecting a false choice between fighting terrorism and respecting habeas corpus.” Since then, however, the Obama campaign has gone silent on executive power and the administration’s war crimes, and Senator Obama has only spoken out publicly on one occasion in September, in response to an assertion by Sarah Palin, at the Republican conference, that “Al-Qaeda terrorists still plot to inflict catastrophic harm on America and he's worried that someone won't read them their rights.” Senator Obama responded by telling supporters in Michigan that habeas corpus was “the foundation of Anglo-American law,” which “says very simply: If the government grabs you, then you have the right to at least ask, ‘Why was I grabbed?’ And say, ‘Maybe you've got the wrong person.’” He explained that it was an essential safeguard, “because we don't always have the right person. We may think it's Mohammed the terrorist, but it might be Mohammed the cab driver. You might think it's Barack the bomb-thrower, but it might be Barack the guy running for president.” His conclusion drove the argument back to where it should have been, but it has sadly not been repeated since: “Don't mock the Constitution. Don't make fun of it. Don't suggest that it's not American to abide by what the founding fathers set up. It's worked pretty well for over 200 years.” Another reason for disappointment is that, by refusing to raise these issues, Senator Obama has allowed John McCain to comfortably maintain the Republicans’ “traditional” role as protectors of national security, without having the basis of that assumption challenged, and has also failed to exploit Senator McCain’s shameful hypocrisy, as he has drifted to the right to appeal to the Republican base. Even before the campaign became all-consuming, Senator McCain (an outspoken opponent of torture, as the result of his own experiences in Vietnam) had a spotty record on the abuse of executive power — and even on the prevention of torture by U.S. forces. Although he attempted to introduce a ban on torture by all U.S. personnel in the Detainee Treatment Act, he allowed himself to be bullied by Dick Cheney into excluding the CIA from the act’s provisions, and the following year he willingly endorsed the Military Commissions Act. This year, however, Senator McCain’s flight from his own convictions has accelerated alarmingly. In February, he conveniently shelved his lifelong opposition to torture by voting against a bill banning the use of torture by the CIA, and after the Supreme Court’s habeas ruling in June, he declared that it was “one of the worst decisions in the history of this country,” even though, in 2005, he had told NBC’s Meet the Press that the problem with Guantánamo was that the prisoners continued to be held without “any adjudication of their cases.” However, the main reasons for being disappointed that the crimes of a rogue administration have barely been mentioned as the election approaches are these: firstly, that I can only wonder, in spite of Senator Obama’s fine words, whether the Democrats in general, who famously ruled impeachment “off the table” when they gained a political majority two years ago, would in fact be unwilling to cede power if it was theirs to wield; and secondly (and most significantly), because it allows those responsible for the long list of egregious crimes that have soiled America’s name to leave office unchallenged. Donald Rumsfeld may be long gone, and George W. Bush nothing more than a shadow, but in the office of the vice president, Dick Cheney and David Addington, the architects of this unprecedented assault on the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the UN Convention Against Torture, the War Crimes Act and the Geneva Conventions have been allowed to maintain their dangerous delusions, nurtured through decades of support for executive overreach in the administrations of Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, and George H. W. Bush. As law professor Scott Horton explained to the New Yorker’s Jane Mayer for an in-depth analysis of Addington in 2006, the mission of the vice president’s closest adviser “and a small group of administration lawyers who share his views” has been to “overturn two centuries of jurisprudence defining the limits of the executive branch. They’ve made war a matter of dictatorial power.” In conclusion, then, I can only note that it’s a sad indictment of a country’s state of mind when the ruling administration has been devoted to dictatorial powers and war crimes, but an election campaign comes and goes as though it had never happened. Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press). Visit his website at: www.andyworthington.co.uk.

Malika sis I think that the two processes should coexist, in other words, our efforts to change the mindset of Somalis should not become a pretext to leave the platform for the warlords alone to appoint a clown as a leader which we are expected to follow. Allah says in Quraan to Moses and his brother Aaron: " Your wish has been gratnted, so ( be grateful to Allah and) do not follow the way of those who know not " Clan affiliation is good only if the clan is ruled by elders who accept Allah as their guide and Islam as the only way of life for their clan. Ha wareerin yaa ukhti, please read my past posts on Democracy and Sharia, I am sure it will help. Nur

eNuri Nomads! Obama Is President against all odds! As predicted by eNuri back in the summer, July 05, 2008. The first part of my prediction, the Good news, has been realized! Obama is President! The second part of my dream, is a warning to President Obama, unless he falls back in line to uphold Justice for the oppressed people of the world, from Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, I am afraid that the curse of the poor and the oppressed under the Bush Administration will kick him out of office. The choice is for Obama to make. Americans have finally voted Bush out of Office, A clear message was sent to the world, that this nation is distancing itself from Bush and his bad Company, however, Bush's legacy is not over, its tentacles are deeply ingrained in the new administration which is powered by big business and the "AIPAC Lobby". The world watched this election like no other, simply, because its outcome can either kill goat herders in Somalia or can build schools for them instead, it can also bancrupt the world wih fiscal irresponsibility, sending world markets to chaos, or can go on fiscal diet, to consume what it rightfully earns alone and not what it steals from other nations in blackmail or fraud. International Law as the world has known it and has been depicted by eNuri in the past seven years, has transformed to the law of the powerful, in which might makes right. The entire world is hoping American hegemony and interventionism to go away with Bush. Its about time America respected the conscience of the planet, from Environment to justice as was in optimistic eyes of Berliner's and Kenyans alike. The removal of Ethiopian troops from Somalia should be the first foreign policy for the Obama administration as far as Somalis are concerned. The End of International Law? By Robert Dreyfuss November 04, 2008 - -"The Nation" -- -10/28/2008 -- A parallel new Bush doctrine is emerging, in the last days of the soon-to-be-ancien regime, and it needs to be strangled in its crib. Like the original Bush doctrine -- the one that Sarah Palin couldn't name, which called for preventive military action against emerging threats -- this one also casts international law aside by insisting that the United States has an inherent right to cross international borders in "hot pursuit" of anyone it doesn't like. They're already applying it to Pakistan, and this week Syria was the target. Is Iran next? Let's take Pakistan first. Though a nominal ally, Pakistan has been the subject of at least nineteen aerial attacks by CIA-controlled drone aircraft, killing scores of Pakistanis and some Afghans in tribal areas controlled by pro-Taliban forces. The New York Times listed, and mapped, all nineteen such attacks in a recent piece describing Predator attacks across the Afghan border, all since August. The Times notes that inside the government, the U.S.Special Operations command and other advocates are pushing for a more aggressive use of such units, including efforts to kidnap and interrogate suspected Taliban and Al Qaeda leaders. Though President Bush signed an order in July allowing U.S. commando teams to move into Pakistan itself, with or without Islamabad's permission, such raids have occurred only once, on September 3. The U.S. raid into Syria on October 26 similarly trampled on Syria's sovereignty without so much as a fare-thee-well. Though the Pentagon initially denied that the raid involved helicopters and on-the-ground commando presence, that's exactly what happened. The attack reportedly killed Badran Turki Hishan al-Mazidih, an Iraqi facilitator who smuggled foreign fighters into Iraq through Syria. The Washington Post was ecstatic, writing in an editorial: "If Sunday's raid, which targeted a senior al-Qaeda operative, serves only to put Mr. Assad on notice that the United States, too, is no longer prepared to respect the sovereignty of a criminal regime, it will have been worthwhile." Is it really that easy? To say: We declare your regime criminal, and so we will attack you anytime we care to? In its news report of the attack into Syria, the Post suggests, in a report by Ann Scott Tyson and Ellen Knickmeyer, that the attack is raising cross-border hot pursuit to the level of a doctrine: "The military's argument is that 'you can only claim sovereignty if you enforce it,' said Anthony Cordesman, a military analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. 'When you are dealing with states that do not maintain their sovereignty and become a de facto sanctuary, the only way you have to deal with them is this kind of operation,' he said." The Times broadens the possible targets from Pakistan and Syria to Iran, writing (in a page one story by Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker): "Administration officials declined to say whether the emerging application of self-defense could lead to strikes against camps inside Iran that have been used to train Shiite 'special groups' that have fought with the American military and Iraqi security forces." That, of course, has been a live option, especially since the start of the surge in January, 2007, when President Bush promised to strike at Iranian supply lines in Iraq and other U.S. officials, including Vice President Cheney, pressed hard to attack sites within Iran, regardless of the consequences. On October 24, I went to hear Mike Vickers, the assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict, speaking at the Washington Institiute for Near East Policy (WINEP), a pro-Israeli thinktank in Washington. He spoke with pride about the vast and growing presence of these commando forces within the U.S. military, noting that their budget has doubled under the Bush administration and that, by the end of the decade, their will more than 60,000 U.S. forces in this shadowy effort. Here are some excerpts of Vickers' remarks: "If you look at the operational core of our Special Operations Forces, and focus on the ground operators, there are some 15,000 or so of those -- give or take how you count them -- these range from our Army Special Forces or our Green Berets, our Rangers, our Seals, some classified units we have, and we recently added a Marine Corps Special Operations Command to this arsenal as well. In addition to adding the Marine component, each of these elements since 2006 and out to about 2012 or 2013 has been increasing their capacity as well as their capabilities, but their capacity by a third. This is the largest growth in Special Operations Force history. By the time we're done with that, there will be some things, some gaps we need to fix undoubtedly, but we will have the elements in place for what we believe is the Special Operations component of the global war on terrorism. "Special Operations Forces, I think through this decade and into the next one, have been and will remain a decisive strategic instrument. ... "There's been a very significant -- about a 40 or 50 percent increase in operational tempo and of course more intense in terms of the action since the 9/11 attacks. On any given day that we wake up, our Special Operations Forces are in some sixty countries around the world. But more than 80 percent or so of those right now are concentrated in the greater Middle East or the United States Central Command area of responsibility -- the bulk of those of course in Iraq and Afghanistan." Notice what he said: operating in 60 countries. Of course, the very invasion of Iraq was illegal in 2003, and it flouted international law. So some may say, these cross-border raids are small potatoes. But they're not. This is a big deal. If it becomes a standard part of U.S. military doctrine that any country can be declared "criminal" and thus lose its sovereignty, then there is no such thing as international law anymore. When Defense Secretary Robert Gates was asked about this, here's what he said, as quoted in the Post article cited earlier: "'We will do what is necessary to protect our troops,' Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said in Senate testimony last month, when asked about the cross-border operations. Under questioning, Gates said that he was not an expert in international law but that he assumed the State Department had consulted such laws before the U.S. military was granted authority to make such strikes." Not an expert in international law? He'll leave it to the State Department? And this is the guy that Barack Obama's advisers say ought to stay on at the Pentagon under an Obama administration?

An Open Letter to Barack Obama Between Hope and Reality By Ralph Nader Dear Senator Obama: In your nearly two-year presidential campaign, the words "hope and change," "change and hope" have been your trademark declarations. Yet there is an asymmetry between those objectives and your political character that succumbs to contrary centers of power that want not "hope and change" but the continuation of the power-entrenched status quo. Far more than Senator McCain, you have received enormous, unprecedented contributions from corporate interests, Wall Street interests and, most interestingly, big corporate law firm attorneys. Never before has a Democratic nominee for President achieved this supremacy over his Republican counterpart. Why, apart from your unconditional vote for the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, are these large corporate interests investing so much in Senator Obama? Could it be that in your state Senate record, your U.S. Senate record and your presidential campaign record (favoring nuclear power, coal plants, offshore oil drilling, corporate subsidies including the 1872 Mining Act and avoiding any comprehensive program to crack down on the corporate crime wave and the bloated, wasteful military budget, for example) you have shown that you are their man? To advance change and hope, the presidential persona requires character, courage, integrity-- not expediency, accommodation and short-range opportunism. Take, for example, your transformation from an articulate defender of Palestinian rights in Chicago before your run for the U.S. Senate to an acolyte, a dittoman for the hard-line AIPAC lobby, which bolsters the militaristic oppression, occupation, blockage, colonization and land-water seizures over the years of the Palestinian peoples and their shrunken territories in the West Bank and Gaza. Eric Alterman summarized numerous polls in a December 2007 issue of The Nation magazine showing that AIPAC policies are opposed by a majority of Jewish-Americans. You know quite well that only when the U.S. Government supports the Israeli and Palestinian peace movements, that years ago worked out a detailed two-state solution (which is supported by a majority of Israelis and Palestinians), will there be a chance for a peaceful resolution of this 60-year plus conflict. Yet you align yourself with the hard-liners, so much so that in your infamous, demeaning speech to the AIPAC convention right after you gained the nomination of the Democratic Party, you supported an "undivided Jerusalem," and opposed negotiations with Hamas-- the elected government in Gaza. Once again, you ignored the will of the Israeli people who, in a March 1, 2008 poll by the respected newspaper Haaretz, showed that 64% of Israelis favored "direct negotiations with Hamas." Siding with the AIPAC hard-liners is what one of the many leading Palestinians advocating dialogue and peace with the Israeli people was describing when he wrote "Anti-semitism today is the persecution of Palestinian society by the Israeli state." During your visit to Israel this summer, you scheduled a mere 45 minutes of your time for Palestinians with no news conference, and no visit to Palestinian refugee camps that would have focused the media on the brutalization of the Palestinians. Your trip supported the illegal, cruel blockade of Gaza in defiance of international law and the United Nations charter. You focused on southern Israeli casualties which during the past year have totaled one civilian casualty to every 400 Palestinian casualties on the Gaza side. Instead of a statesmanship that decried all violence and its replacement with acceptance of the Arab League's 2002 proposal to permit a viable Palestinian state within the 1967 borders in return for full economic and diplomatic relations between Arab countries and Israel, you played the role of a cheap politician, leaving the area and Palestinians with the feeling of much shock and little awe. David Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator, described your trip succinctly: "There was almost a willful display of indifference to the fact that there are two narratives here. This could serve him well as a candidate, but not as a President." Palestinian American commentator, Ali Abunimah, noted that Obama did not utter a single criticism of Israel, "of its relentless settlement and wall construction, of the closures that make life unlivable for millions of Palestinians. ...Even the Bush administration recently criticized Israeli's use of cluster bombs against Lebanese civilians [see www.atfl.org for elaboration]. But Obama defended Israeli's assault on Lebanon as an exercise of its 'legitimate right to defend itself.'" In numerous columns Gideon Levy, writing in Haaretz, strongly criticized the Israeli government's assault on civilians in Gaza, including attacks on "the heart of a crowded refugee camp... with horrible bloodshed" in early 2008. Israeli writer and peace advocate-- Uri Avnery-- described Obama's appearance before AIPAC as one that "broke all records for obsequiousness and fawning, adding that Obama "is prepared to sacrifice the most basic American interests. After all, the US has a vital interest in achieving an Israeli-Palestinian peace that will allow it to find ways to the hearts of the Arab masses from Iraq to Morocco. Obama has harmed his image in the Muslim world and mortgaged his future-- if and when he is elected president.," he said, adding, "Of one thing I am certain: Obama's declarations at the AIPAC conference are very, very bad for peace. And what is bad for peace is bad for Israel, bad for the world and bad for the Palestinian people." A further illustration of your deficiency of character is the way you turned your back on the Muslim-Americans in this country. You refused to send surrogates to speak to voters at their events. Having visited numerous churches and synagogues, you refused to visit a single Mosque in America. Even George W. Bush visited the Grand Mosque in Washington D.C. after 9/11 to express proper sentiments of tolerance before a frightened major religious group of innocents. Although the New York Times published a major article on June 24, 2008 titled "Muslim Voters Detect a Snub from Obama" (by Andrea Elliott), citing examples of your aversion to these Americans who come from all walks of life, who serve in the armed forces and who work to live the American dream. Three days earlier the International Herald Tribune published an article by Roger Cohen titled "Why Obama Should Visit a Mosque." None of these comments and reports change your political bigotry against Muslim-Americans-- even though your father was a Muslim from Kenya. Perhaps nothing illustrated your utter lack of political courage or even the mildest version of this trait than your surrendering to demands of the hard-liners to prohibit former president Jimmy Carter from speaking at the Democratic National Convention. This is a tradition for former presidents and one accorded in prime time to Bill Clinton this year. Here was a President who negotiated peace between Israel and Egypt, but his recent book pressing the dominant Israeli superpower to avoid Apartheid of the Palestinians and make peace was all that it took to sideline him. Instead of an important address to the nation by Jimmy Carter on this critical international problem, he was relegated to a stroll across the stage to "tumultuous applause," following a showing of a film about the Carter Center's post-Katrina work. Shame on you, Barack Obama! But then your shameful behavior has extended to many other areas of American life. (See the factual analysis by my running mate, Matt Gonzalez, on www.votenader.org). You have turned your back on the 100-million poor Americans composed of poor whites, African-Americans, and Latinos. You always mention helping the "middle class" but you omit, repeatedly, mention of the "poor" in America. Should you be elected President, it must be more than an unprecedented upward career move following a brilliantly unprincipled campaign that spoke "change" yet demonstrated actual obeisance to the concentration power of the "corporate supremacists." It must be about shifting the power from the few to the many. It must be a White House presided over by a black man who does not turn his back on the downtrodden here and abroad but challenges the forces of greed, dictatorial control of labor, consumers and taxpayers, and the militarization of foreign policy. It must be a White House that is transforming of American politics-- opening it up to the public funding of elections (through voluntary approaches)-- and allowing smaller candidates to have a chance to be heard on debates and in the fullness of their now restricted civil liberties. Call it a competitive democracy. Your presidential campaign again and again has demonstrated cowardly stands. "Hope" some say springs eternal." But not when "reality" consumes it daily. Sincerely, Ralph Nader November 3, 2008

In wars, soldiers commit crimes of excessive killing of non combatatnts and civilians. In Iraq, a peaceful country besieged by the Americans for 20 years with embargoes, lived harmoniously without any civil distubances and endured hardships between a rock and a hard place, between American greed of their wealth and oil, and a tyrant Dictator, under which they were kept together in peace. As soon as the Amercians invaded Iraq, with the false pretext of Weapons of Mass Distruction, WMD, the first thing the Americans have done was to create a civil war, inflaming dormant sectarian and ethnic animosities which have costed Iraq over a Million deaths and the collapse of their country. The Ethiopians ( Clients Representing the Americans) have done the same to Somalia, although they have started the inflaming of the clan hostilities as far back as in 1990, by first inflaming clan hatred, to trigger a civil war, and then, arming all sides, watching the distruction of a country by its own people from the safety of Addis Ababa. Economically speaking, to assist your enemy to kill each other is far more cheaper and safer than risking your own troops on harms way, which Ethiopia has done lately after the Islamic Courts appeared from nowhere after the party bells for the end-of-Somalia-as-a-nation and its incorporation into Ethiopia with a UN mandate was supposed to be announced in Addis Ababa. The Islamic Courts suddenly became party spoilers, they were an emergent property in the project of the planned destruction of Somalia. Consequently, Ethiopia got nod from her Superpower Masters signalling the green light to invade Somalia and to protect the Transplanted Foreign Conceived Government. ( TFG) skillfully named by Ethiopia, Transitional Federal Government ( Federal with Ethipian Empire of Course)! The Propblem with invaders throughout history has been that they recruited local traitors to spy on their own peoples, however, most traitors have low IQ, because any person with sound intelligence will never cheat his own people, so what amazes me is how the Ethiopians and their Masters trust our clowns? No matter how you train a clown, a clown will remain a clown. If they are not good enough for their people, they can not be trusted, as a matter of fact, its better to trust a wise enemy than a clown friend. Morally speaking, death of civilians and non combatants is universally unacceptable, but, Ethiopia and its western allies have come to the conclusion that Somalis are not covered by western moral sympathy, which includes animals, so wasting them is Kosher. That's why the whole world is trying to save the Congo people from an impending Civil war and why BANK KEY MOON, of the corrupt UN( who literally holds the KEY for the project approvals in the UN affiliated Banks, IMF and World Bank for helping the poor once in a blue MOON), is finding a mission in Africa. Attrocities committed by American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan is called " Collateral Damage", which in layman's language means people who should be sacrificed for a higher purpose, like catching or killing an enemy. ( Amercian pretext of Arming Ethiopian Invasion was to capture three ALLEDGED "terrorists" hiding in Somalia) In other words, when the CIA was Zeroing in on Ayro, the Somali leader alledgedly with ties to the crazy bearded cave men in Afghanistan, he was targeted by a tomahawk missile from the Indian Ocean along with 13 civilians including women and children, who were instantly burried on site, which saved the locals the costs of burial they couldn't afford. Was that attack morally justifiable?. Its precisely the same logic by those opposing the American forces are using, killing civilians as collaterals when they are in the way of high value enemy. Both justifications for the killing of the innocent are fundementally flawed logic, because every life is sanctified by its creator, Allah and should never be wasted without a sound due process that justifies their denial of their inseparable right to life, given to them by their maker, like the ruling of an impartial court to execute a murderer after clear proofs have been presented against him in a transparent court of law. Another crime soldiers commit in wars is rape. Soldiers in battle without a religious principle to restrain them can get horny, with power of guns in their hands, they can easily rape any woman of their choice. That is what happened in Somalia when Ethiopian soldiers occupied Mogadishu, and the Jubba region, as well as what they have done traditionally in the Occupied Western Somalia region, I've even heard that Ethiopian soldiers raped the wife of Member of The fake TFG Parliament in Baidoa by mistake, as they have later apologised, which means that they are very active in raping young girls in Somalia to this writing. So, its this criminal conduct, the likes of Abu Ghureib and Guantanamo that deprives invading nations the victory to rape weak nations. And Since victory represents the prevalence of Justice, how can one become a victor when the very pretext of the war is supported by lies, bribes of allies, blackmail, and all other types of unethical leverages which creates moral decay from within. That is the logic of Caliph Omar's sermon when he told Muslim fighters that they are their worst enemies if they disobey Allah and commit sins or attrocities against innocent civilians. The real battle in this world of ours is the moral battle, the battle for justice , honesty, fairness, etc. Justice has two folds, Justice with our maker, and Justice with fellow man, Anyone who genuinely cares about the plight and welfare of the public, and their safety will win any confrontation, eventhough at times their opponenets will poison the well ( using the media propoganda to confuse the poeple ) and frame the innocent as evil or plant false evidence to discredit them in the eye of the public. At the end, the good guys will prevail, and it may not always be the Muslims. Because, a Just non Muslim force may prevail against an unjust Muslim force according to Allah's laws ( sunan). Moral of Caliph Omar Ibn Khattab' s Sermon: You are as strong as your morals. Nur

Islamic Economics vindicated! Rival Communism failed! Rival Capitalism failed! What is next? Islamic Economic Vision of A Balance between Supplier side Economics and Consumers based on justice and ethics is turning heads. Islamic FEconomic Vision calls using Material Growth to fuel Spiritual growth for a peaceful world and a peaceful return to our maker. The new theory claims to be able to save our planet from greed, and from annihilation by Capitalists who want to deplete the planet of all of its resources and pollute its environment along the crazy consumerism path. At the current rate of consumption, we would need seven more planets next 2 centuries. Read on Lead Author: Brian Czech (other articles) Article Topics: Ecological economics, Environmental economics, Environmental policy, Population and Sustainable development This article has been reviewed and approved by the following Topic Editor: Tom Tietenberg (other articles) Last Updated: February 19, 2007 The phrase “steady state economy” originated from ecological economics, most notably the work of Herman Daly, but its roots are in classical economics, most notably the “stationary state” as touted by John Stuart Mill. The steady state economy is often discussed in the context of economic growth and the impacts of economic growth on ecological integrity, environmental protection, and economic sustainability. Therefore, use of the phrase “steady state economy” requires a clear definition of economic growth. Economic growth is an increase in the production and consumption of goods and services. For distinct economic or political units, economic growth is generally indicated by increasing gross domestic product (GDP). Economic growth entails increasing population times per capita consumption, higher throughput of materials and energy, and a growing ecological footprint. Economic growth is distinguished from “economic development,” which refers to qualitative change independent of quantitative growth. For example, economic development may refer to the attainment of a more equitable distribution of wealth, or a sectoral readjustment reflecting the evolution of consumer preference or newer technology. The size of an economy may undergo one of two trends: growth or recession. Otherwise it is stable, in which case it is a “steady state economy.” As with many phrases, however, different connotations may apply in different contexts. In neoclassical economics, the hyphenated phrase “steady-state economy” is used to refer to an economy with steady ratios of capital:labor. Therefore, in neoclassical economics, a steady-state economy may be growing, receding, or stable, in which case it constitutes the steady state economy of ecological economics. Sometimes, however, the hyphenated “steady-state economy” is also used in the ecologically economic sense of a non-growing, non-receding economy. (In some cases this reflects the editorial style and tradition of a particular journal.) This linguistic inconsistency is not a major communications problem in broad circles because the neoclassical “steady-state economy” is a relatively abstruse concept used primarily within the jargon of neoclassical economics, whereas the ecological “steady state economy” is a technically simpler concept and has achieved a certain amount of vernacular status. Yet regarding linguistics, the issue of hyphenation has some import. It is appropriate to use the unhyphenated phrase “steady state economy” to describe an economy of stable size because “state” (as in political state) is an adjective of “economy” (as in a state’s economy), and “steady” is an adjective of this state economy. In other words, “steady state economy” typically refers to a national economy of stable size, although it may also refer to an economy of a city, province, or other political unit. (It may also refer to a regional economy or the global economy, and in such cases political units are aggregated.) In neoclassical economics, “steady” is not an adjective of “state economy.” Rather, the conjoined “steady-state” is a heuristic tool to imply the stable ratio of capital:labor and, linguistically, is an adjective of “economy.” Theoretically and temporarily, a steady state economy may have a growing population with declining per capita consumption, or vice versa, but neither of these scenarios are sustainable in the long run. Therefore, “steady state economy” connotes constant populations of people (and, therefore, “stocks” of labor) and constant stocks of capital. It also has a constant rate of throughput; i.e., energy and materials used to produce goods and services. Within a given technological framework these constant stocks will yield constant flows of goods and services. Technological progress may yield a more efficient “digestion” of throughput, resulting in the production of more (or more highly valued) goods and services. However, as emphasized in biophysical economics (which may arguably be classified as a subset of ecological economics), there are limits to productive efficiency imposed by the laws of thermodynamics and therefore limits to the amount and value of goods and services that may be produced in a given ecosystem. In other words, there is a maximum size at which a steady state economy may exist. Conflicts with ecological integrity and environmental protection occur long before a steady state economy is maximized. “Constancy” of population and capital stocks does not imply absolutely unchanging population and capital stocks at the finest level of measurement. Rather, “constant” implies mildly fluctuating in the short run but exhibiting a stable equilibrium in the long run. Long-run changes reflect evolutionary, geological, or astronomical processes that alter the carrying capacity of the Earth for the human economy. Dramatic examples include atmosphere-altering volcanoes and massive meteorite collisions. Just as economic growth is the predominant macroeconomic policy goal identified or implied by neoclassical economics, the steady state economy is the predominant macroeconomic policy goal identified or implied by ecological economics. To the extent that ecological economics is a normative transdisciplinary endeavor rather than a purely analytical framework, its three main concerns are sustainability, equity, and efficiency, each of which may be served via public policy. Neither economic growth nor economic recession are sustainable; therefore, the steady state economy remains the only sustainable prospect and the appropriate policy goal for the sake of sustainability. The steady state economy may be pursued in the policy arena with the same policy tools that have historically been used to facilitate economic growth. These include fiscal policy tools such as government spending and taxation, and monetary policy tools such as money supplies and interest rates. Certain institutional adjustments are also entailed. For example, some have posited that a fractional reserve banking system may not be reconciled with a steady state economy and that fee-service banking is the most feasible alternative. Other public policies pertaining to ecological integrity and environmental protection may also be conducive to a steady state economy. For example, some have posited that the Endangered Species Act of 1973 was an implicit prescription for a steady state economy balanced with an economy of nature characterized by numerous threatened and endangered yet stabilized species.

Baadiyow br. How are Gramgrammarians doing? I have not visited Garamgaram since being infested with you know what! Nur Note: More Nur articles are found on Somaliaonline Islam page.

Kashaafa bro. Predicted the following: "^^ How'd the McDonald TV ad go ? I'm Luuuuvin' it Unearth more e-Nuri articles, good Nur. President Abdullah Tannenbaum !. Howsa about: Bilaal Frist, Jaabir Allen, Raa'id Guliani, Junaid McCain, and Habeebah Clinton. All rumoured to be running for President in 2008." Kashafa bro. Abdullah Tannenbaum ( is Obama, Closet Muslim Seving Zionism), Junaid Mc Cain, has not yet converted to Islam, Habeeba Clinton, lost to Abdullah Obama, who as I predict will be the next US Presindent. Nur Note: To read more eNuri Inspirationals, visit Somaliaonline Islam page.

The Bush-Obama-McCain Administration By Morton Skorodin November 01, 2008 "ICH". The period we're living in now is the Bush-Obama-McCain Administration. Bush obligingly initiated Obama's bombing campaign on Pakistan. The three of them colluded on the recent wealth transfer (about $840 billion) from the American people to Wall St. The 24 hr/7 days/wk media Wurlitzer distracts us from looking at these white elephants too closely. The circus is so loud and visually entraining that it hides the deeper structure of society. The U.S. is a military dictatorship with scientific public relations. Part of this scientific PR is the careful cultivation of and trumpeting of America’s democratic trappings. The important thing to remember is that McCain and Obama were carefully vetted by the moneyed rulers and this is not particularly a secret. It’s called “campaign contributions”. After that, we the people get to choose from two approved candidates. The fix is in. McCain's a patsy. Obama's repeatedly been anointed sovereign on the cover of Time (That's of Time-Warner, the media conglomerate he won't break up.) There's no left to speak of in the US. There are material reasons for this- weak unions, few strikes. (The reasons why unions are weak are beyond the scope of this discussion.) So left-wing stars like Ralph Nader and Amy Goodman are tethered to nothing, like bloated Macy parade balloons that have floated up and become more bloated. So their efforts, however well-intentioned, don't have force behind them and are sometimes completely ineffective. The Society of the Spectacle meets the neo-totalitarian total information awareness society. The state has technology for and has commandeered the resources to spy upon everyone with 16 or 18 “intelligence” agencies and control us as much as possible with the media of five corporations that are pretty well unified as to how and how much the populace is “informed”. On the other hand, the populace is atomized (deprived of meaningful ties to others); the only major non corporate-government institutions are the cooptable churches. The handsome prince and his foil, the wicked, but comely, queen. They're comic book superheroes- perfect for TV, the key instrument of oppression and ignorance. (Notice the immense effort to make sure everybody has digital TV by next Feb. I wish they cared that much to give water to our brethren in New Orleans.) Barack Obama and Sarah Palin are too good to be true: Barack Obama- that name is foreign beyond foreign, mother a hippy who had a black's child, an actual African (gasp). This sounds as scary to many whites as the orchestrated excesses of the police state such as the Daarth Vader outfitted police with their North Korea style truncheons at the Republican convention seem to anxious liberals and righteous activists. Sarah Palin - superhero mom, she'll serve milk and cookies for you while on the way to running and ruining the world. She’s not regular pro-gun, church, etc. She is the cartoon version- actually shoots wolves from helicopters; associates with, to put it a little too politely, “white nationalists”. This dichotomy serves only the rulers. What the vast majority on both sides need are exactly the same things: peace, economic relief, and freedom from the intrusive state. Divide and conquer. The rulers have been promoting race war as a counter to class struggle since the 1600s. They are very good at it. After the election the economy may get still worse and there will be further military adventures. As things unravel the game will be: blame the Black guy. This process has already started. As far as U.S. military planners go, the election cycle and the public’s feelings are only a factor in determining the timing and announcement of aggressive actions, kind of like taking into account the weather for an optimal time for the Normandy landing in WW2. It’s a military dictatorship with Handsome Presidents. The election is a joke, but more importantly, a waste of the people’s time (except, perhaps some local races). Get over it. Think and find effective ways to rebel. Morton Skorodin, M.D.

Baadiyow bro. Your man, friend of the Garm garam East African people , Mr. Obama Bin Palin is about to win the US Presidency ( According to eNuri Political Forecasting Service), How can Obama ( A Democrat Donkey) help the Garam Garam people and your Philanthropy programs thrive? Nur

Good and Real life feedback, Jazakellahu kheiran Umm Cuthmaan, your case shows the deep morality kids are born with, as a kid I also knew when I was upto sum sin wong, ( something Wrong in Chinese), the inner imbedded Fitra tells a child what is right and what is wrong, its adults who either reinforce that Fitra or corrupt the child by telling em that they dont have to wear it or so on. To introduce Islamic concepts ( Aqeedah), and ethics ( Akhlaaq) as games is indeed a very briliant idea, as kids, we learn playing monopoly ( Capitalist Greedy Game), and we grow up with greed, its about time Muslims created more children entertainment programs that aid their prinicples instead of destructive principles that shake their beliefs to the roots. I aso agree with you that lil spanking goes a long way in keeping a kid on track. Nur

MsDD sis I agree, some families are increasingly leaving it to the young Halimo choice, though I am of the old school, which preaches family involvement in the identification of the young Faarax, leaving the acceptance or rejection ( Chemistry) to the Halimo. The wisdom is that marriage is not a two people's business in our Somali culture and faith, its a family business, we marry a family not an independent person, tesnion caused by inlaws can make or a break a newly weds marriage, but if you involve them early, make them owners of the family expansion, they are likely to be polite and helpfully assist the couple, the earlier a family involves in the process, the lesser the surprises along the way. Again, I am n ot claiming to be right, its just my opinion, this issue is very complex. And yes again, ( Daily Double for you), men are as obsessive if not more, I should know, I am one! Nur

Nomads Recycling old issues, re-runs, as I am running out of new materials in social Islam, political Islam has taken the better part of me these days, so many politics-driven miseries, so little time to reach out for the victims. Nur

WOL Mens chastity should be very important to Somali women, reason being that in addition to the moral side of the issue which is grave, medically speaking, premiscuity has its previllages, a host of undesirable ailments, and increasingly, AIDS. So parents and family should always help the young Xalimo, when it comes to men, she should let family select for her as she can be overtaken by a fatal attraction. Nur