Khalf bro. You wite: "and Nur is unable to come to terms that not every somali sees the ICU as he does." Brother, That statement is not accurate, no where have i denied the deep division of Somali people on the ICU and the TFG. My whole point was that te ICU and the TFG to be different, not the same thing as my brother Bixi suggested. And I have given examples to show their difference, unfortunately, Bixi is not convinced, in part, my argument was unconvincing, and in part we may be on different pages when it comes to the metrics of measurement, in my case, Islam, Tawheed, and loyalty to Allah's law and Deen comes as the unmovable pillar on which to lean on, however, I failed bringing this fact clearly to my brother's attention. But I sincerely love him for his heartly welcome of Islam as the only solution, what remains to be done is agreeing on how Islam can bring us al together under Allah's deen. ( Next Discussion inshAllah) Geel Jire and Abu Salman Good analyses brothers, Brother Bix has never said anywhere that Dahir Aweis is like Geeddi or Abdullahi Yusuf. He has only said the two groups, because they INCLUDE similar criminal warlords are in essence the same. The logical point of discussion was, if there are two groups fighting over a principle, ( ICU for Islamic Sharia, Blessed BY Quraan and Sunnah, and the TFG for Tribal Governance System blessed by Ethiopia and America) does it matter if they include members who have past history contrary to the present principle under which they are currently serving? For example, does it matter if the TFG includes a Sheikh who used to support the Sharia, but now his pocket is full of cash and suppots secularism? or if the ICU includes a clan warlord who agreed to work under the leadership of the Islamic courts and accepts Islam and Sharia to be the onl solution?) Everyone knows Abdullahi Yusuf was the first warlord in our History, " According to his own words in his presidnetial inauguration speech in Nairobi", later, it bacame a trend among major clans to create factions along clan lines all vying for power in our country, from SSDF, SNM and the USC, resulting devastation of our nation and country. The years that followed, a lot of attrocities were committed by these very criminal warlords, innocent civilians on all sides were killed and raped for their clan afiliation if they were caught in the wrong region, which continued all the way to the advent of the rise of Islamic Courts Union, whose first internationally recognized achievement was law and order never seen in our country, eviction of Moriyyans from homes they illigally seized and occupied, teh Courts gave stolen properties back to its orginal owners and victims. In their quest for peace, the courts have even invited Abdullahi Yusuf to come to Mogadishu as teh President of Somalia, to lead the Nation accodring to teh Sharia, as a compromise to avoid further bloodshed, but because the system that was firmly in place in Mogadishu was Islamic Sharia, not secular Clan system, which is the only language Abdullahi Yususf fluently understands, he rejected the offer, partially because he is not a free man, instead , he opted to come to Mogadishu mounted on Ethiopian Tanks. To this day, as a result of that fateful decision of his, hundreds of thousands have been displaced, thousands killed or maimed Ethiopians he "invited " to make "peace" in a peaceful city, enjoying peace for a good six months, without even securing any international mandate for the invasion. According to the UN, The Presence of the Ethipian Troops is illegal occupation, which gives the Somali people right to resist. I am not a blind supporter of the Courts, my angle of view is different, I see the Sharia law as the only legitimate governance mechanism that can save Somalis in this life and the next, anyone who declares to be dedicated to apply Sharia and make peace in our country has my full support, Why can't the TFG even claim to be ready to uphold the Sharia Law to steal the show from the ICU? They cant! Their masters would not let them, they are not free, how can they free the nation? Nur

Geel Jire bro. In my opinion, the lack of highly qualified Khateebs has many factors foremost of which is the New World Order ( N.W.O). 1. Khateebs have no longer an immunity. You see brother, the USA reached the peak of its world moral dominance in 1979, when the Iranian students captivated American Diplomats as hostage for 444 days in Tehran, ( ironically its said that President Ahmedinejadi was one of them) while at the same time over 100,000 Iranian students were studying in the US colleges and Universities convening daily on Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House with slogans that read " Death to America, Great Satan" " Long Live Khomeini" under safe protection of the horse mounting US Park Police, unaffected by the hate chanting and focusing on upholding the law and order which made America at that distant time stand as an example of tolerance and freedoms. Many Muslim scholars at the time admired America so much that they have envisoned that a true Islamic State should be modeled as the USA. After three decades from that incidence, America has lost much of the lustre of its moral high ground, today, its down in the same mud ditch with the worst of dictators, warlords, criminals and Generals. Suppressing freedom of speech, freedom to protest, instead busy organizing international renditions of suspects to countries that abuse human rights, working outside of the international law, waterboarding and torture, invading counries with flimsy pretexts, causing the deaths of millions of civilians from Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine with illogical policies. Khrushchev, the Soviet Leader, if he was alive today, would be amused. In the Old Soviet Union, in the Kremlin, Khruschev, the Party Chief was delivering a speech in which he criticised the policies of his predecessor Stalin who was known for his murderous iron fist. One of the delegates in the Kremlin asked him why he did not protest these policies at the time , Khruschev asked " please raise your hand", to everyones laughter, he quipped " You have answered your question by your silence" Today, no one dare ask in the USA what is happening, for that same reason, so it goes without saying that Bin Laden has finally won the war, if it was for preseving for morals America stood for written on the walls of the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials. Now no one can speak publicly to air one's opinion on political policies affecting Islam and Muslims without being followed by 15 intelligence organizations who are mandated to stop "Terror crimes" before one contemplates committing it. A Friday Khutbah should be delivered with only two big brothers on the Khateeb's shoulders, Angels Raqiib, and Catiid, a third one, a human big brother, spoils the Khutbah sermon. " I am Afraid from Allah If I tell a Lie, and I am equally Afraid from Emperor Bush If I Tell The Truth" Is the rational answer of any Muslim public Speaker today to your question! So, what is the value of Khutbah anyomore? Nur

Brother Bixi I have been busy with other threads, Just opened this thread, I am really disappointed that it ended because I have enjoyed evey bit of it. Anyway, respect goes both ways, but, I go farther brother, I pray we meet in Jannah, if we cant meet here, our devotion to Allah alone is more than enouh to overcome our difference in views Nur.

Sinking Currency, Sinking Country By Patrick J. Buchanan 11/04/07 -- -- - The euro, worth 83 cents in the early George W. Bush years, is at $1.45. The British pound is back up over $2, the highest level since the Carter era. The Canadian dollar, which used to be worth 65 cents, is worth more than the U.S. dollar for the first time in half a century. Oil is over $90 a barrel. Gold, down to $260 an ounce not so long ago, has hit $800. Have gold, silver, oil, the euro, the pound and the Canadian dollar all suddenly soared in value in just a few years? Nope. The dollar has plummeted in value, more so in Bush's term than during any comparable period of U.S. history. Indeed, Bush is presiding over a worldwide abandonment of the American dollar. Is it all Bush's fault? Nope. The dollar is plunging because America has been living beyond her means, borrowing $2 billion a day from foreign nations to maintain her standard of living and to sustain the American Imperium. The prime suspect in the death of the dollar is the massive trade deficits America has run up, some $5 trillion in total since the passage of NAFTA and the creation of the World Trade Organization in 1994. In 2006, that U.S. trade deficit hit $764 billion. The current account deficit, which includes the trade deficit, plus the net outflow of interest, dividends, capital gains and foreign aid, hit $857 billion, 6.5 percent of GDP. As some of us have been writing for years, such deficits are unsustainable and must lead to a decline of the dollar. A sinking dollar means a poorer nation, and a sinking currency has historically been the mark of a sinking country. And a superpower with a sinking currency is a contradiction in terms. What does this mean for America and Americans? As nations realize that the dollars they are being paid for their products cannot buy in the world markets what they once did, they will demand more dollars for those goods. This will mean rising prices for the imports on which America has become more dependent than we have been since before the Civil War. U.S. tourists traveling to the countries whence their ancestors came will find that the money they saved up does not go as far as they thought. U.S. soldiers stationed overseas will find the cost of rent, gasoline, food, clothing and dining out takes larger and larger bites out of their paychecks. The people those U.S. soldiers defend will be demanding more and more of their money. U.S. diplomats stationed overseas, students and businessmen are already facing tougher times. U.S. foreign aid does not go as far as it did. And there is an element of comedy in seeing the United States going to Beijing to borrow dollars, thus putting our children deeper in debt, to send still more foreign aid to African despots who routinely vote the Chinese line at the United Nations. The Chinese, whose currency is tied to the dollar, and Japan will continue, as long as they can, to keep their currencies low against the dollar. For the Asians think long term, and their goals are strategic. China -- growing at 10 percent a year for two decades and now growing at close to 12 percent -- is willing to take losses in the value of the dollars it holds to keep the U.S. technology, factories and jobs pouring in, as their exports capture America's markets from U.S. producers. The Japanese will take some loss in the value of their dollar hoard to take down Chrysler, Ford and GM, and capture the U.S. auto market as they captured our TV, camera and computer chip markets. Asians understand that what is important is not who consumes the apples, but who owns the orchard. Other nations that have kept cash reserves in U.S. Treasury bonds and T-bills are watching the value of these assets sink. Not fools, they will begin, as many already have, to divest and diversify, taking in fewer dollars and more euros and yen. As more nations abandon the dollar, its decline will continue. The oil-producing and exporting nations, with trade surpluses, like China, have also begun to take the stash of dollars they have and stuff them into sovereign wealth funds, and use these immense and growing funds to buy up real assets in the United States -- investment banks and American companies. Nor is there any end in sight to the sinking of the dollar. For, as foreigners demand more dollars for the oil and goods they sell us, the trade deficit will not fall. And as the U.S. government prints more and more dollars to cover the budget deficits that stretch out -- with the coming retirement of the baby boomers -- all the way to the horizon, the value of the dollar will fall. And as Ben Bernanke at the Fed tries to keep interest rates low, to keep the U.S. economy from sputtering out in the credit crunch, the value of the dollar will fall. The chickens of free trade are coming home to roost. Mr. Buchanan is a nationally syndicated columnist and author of "The Death of the West," "The Great Betrayal," "A Republic, Not an Empire" and "Where the Right Went Wrong."

Nomads I must admit my utter disppointment of the results of the Nobel Peace Prize: It did not go o my candidate: Sheikh Sharif of the Islamic Courts Union. For six months, Mogadishu under the ICU leved the most peaceful days in our history, even the Pirates in the news these days playing hide and seek with their bigge Country Pirates ( US Navy), were afraid to commit crimes of the high seas. Well, the march must go on for a just world, in which the right people get recongnied fr the right causes. Nur

Xiin and Viking bros. Scenario 1: Imagine coming to a traffic light that is red, everyone is stopping and waiting for green light to go. Common sense predicts that you would also stop like anyone else. Scenario 2: Imagine you come to the same light another day, and this time around its also red, but all the motorists cautiously look right and left, then go thru the red signal. What would you do? Answer: The absence of VISIBLE law and order makes it very tempting to break the law even for some who believe the importance of law and order. Now, as the planet finally melts together, different races, beliefs, cultures and faiths find themselves in a close proximity due to diminishing resources and enabling technologies and the 19th century political formations known as the nation state, in which the common factor is the geographical enclosure, not the binding fiber of faith. This new reality creates numbness of sensitivity to uphold the law of Allah on earth, as secular international organizations ( acting on bealf the powerful nations) dictate secular systems to "Muslims" who hardly know the meaning of what the Shahada stands for in relation to this new reality. The conflict between belief and practice, also known as hypocracy is well imbedded in the daily actions of many Muslims, which is the core reason of redicule of Non-Muslims about Islam. Fortunately, this phenomena is not a plight for Muslims alone, we have partially inherited this trait from our Christian and Jewish cousins (of Abrahimic faiths). But they have perfected the hypocracy, and institutionalized it. For example the Papacy in Rome is where Christians who live contrary to all what Jesus taught, go to be forgiven for a fee, only to go back to continue the same sin evr again. Jews, on the other hand feel that they are unconditionally Allah's people , thus breaking the commandments, specially against gentiles does not hurt. Its that remorseless feeling of hypocracy that makes an Israeli soldider shoot a stone throwing Palestinian boy, and the same logic that drive Bush to indirectly cause the death of Million Iraqis ( He started the Domino effect of the civil war that is ongoing with a wrong pretext that strongman Saddam had WMD, which are late found not to be there). As Muslims, we can proudly say then, that we have learned a lot of hypocracy from our cousin religions, Christians and Jews, but at times, I get the feeling that we are getting too good, too quickly at it, may be, we even are beating them in their hypocracy game ( That is when you see Bush's eys crossed in the news! out of astonishment of what Musharraf is doing) An example Joke goes like this: Bush in the middle of night wakes up, his Rolex watch missing, he alerts homeland security, and after an hour, hundred Muslims are caught in 20 Muslim countries all confessing to have stolen the Rolex watch. Meanwhile, Rolex watch is found on his desk, Bush orders their release after they admit the crime, to be tried in their respective countries. That is what I call result driven hypocracy. Nur

Brother Bixi The beginning you claimed that the ICU and the TFG are the same! Meaning, both groups are criminals, no one group is better than the other, both are warlords with the same bloddy history? Reason I have taken you back is to show you that what you claimed that I have said was not true. And I have even resorted to Dictionary to prove it. If our discussion is not going to address the beginning claims you made, where do you suggest the discussion should address saaxib? Nur

Hegemony’s Cost By Paul Craig Roberts “See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda." ( Bush, at the Athena Performing Arts Center at Greece Athena Middle and High School Tuesday, May 24, 2005 in Rochester, NY) http://www.prisonplanet.com/audio/260505bushism.mp3 ) 11/02/07 "ICH" --- - When he departs the White House on 20 January, 2009, the current resident will bequeath to the American people and the next administration an interminable war in the Middle East and a depreciated currency. And that’s the good news. It assumes there is a successor administration and that no Cheney-contrived “national emergency” will make it possible for Bush to test drive National Security Presidential Directive/NSPD-51 and Homeland Security Presidential Directive/HSPD-20 to cancel the 2008 election. Neoconservatives led by vice president Dick Cheney remain determined to effect “regime change” in Iran. The allegation of weapons of mass destruction falsely brought against Iraq is now being deployed against Iran. The International Atomic Energy Agency says that there is no evidence that Iran has a nuclear weapons program. The IAEA is the institution that polices the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty by inspecting the nuclear facilities of the signatories to the treaty of which Iran is one. However, the neocon/Cheney/Bush regime is prepared to bomb Iran on the basis of fibs alone. Faithfully repeated by the propaganda ministry that masquerades as the “mainstream media,” those fibs have been trotted out so many times in recent months that significant numbers of Americans now believe themselves to be in peril from nonexistent Iranian nukes. In this way the regime gains the complicity of the American people and their representatives in Congress for what will be unprovoked aggression against a third Middle Eastern country, a third war crime under the Nuremberg standard. The “war on terror” is a hoax. It serves as a cover for the drive for US and Israeli hegemony in the Middle East. Iraq, Iran, and Syria became neoconservative targets, because they were the only Middle Eastern countries that are not American puppet states or dependencies. Afghanistan was attacked, because the Taliban were uniting the country under the banner of Islam, a development that, if successful, could lead to the overthrow of the governments in America’s puppet states and dependencies. The war rhetoric against Iran ratcheted up when the White House belatedly realized that the result of “bringing democracy to Iraq” was to empower the majority Shi’ites, thereby creating a Shi’ite crescent from Iran to southern Lebanon and alarming America’s Sunni Saudi Arabian dependent. Israel’s goal is to have the Americans eliminate the Muslim states that support Hamas and Hezbollah’s opposition to Israel’s theft of the remainder of Palestine and southern Lebanon, whose water resources Israel covets. Israel’s goal thus precisely coincides with that of the Cheney regime. The “Cakewalk War” in Iraq was supposed to be over in a few weeks and to pay for itself out of Iraqi oil revenues. The war is now five years old and has cost American taxpayers, and those left dependent on government programs by decades of a welfare state, $1 trillion in out-of-pocket and already incurred future costs. As large and troublesome as this cost is, it pales in comparison to the damage the war has done to the value of the dollar and its role as reserve currency. Since 2001, the Euro has risen 60 percent against the dollar. This means much more to Americans than the higher cost of a European vacation and status symbol German cars. The US dollar is losing its reserve currency role when the Euro, the currency of a nonexistent country--Europe--becomes so much more desirable than the dollar that it rises 60 percent in value. The Euro is a monetary unit that has run far ahead of the political entity whose currency it is. Europe still consists of separate sovereign states, and many of them are unhappy with the Euro. Yet, since 2001 people throughout the world have been shifting from dollars to Euros. It is not normal for people to flee from the reserve currency. It only happens when people believe it cannot continue to fill that role. The US dollar is under double assault. One assault is from the offshoring of American jobs, which turns US GDP into foreign GDP and worsens the US trade deficit. It is not possible to achieve a trade balance when the production of goods and services for the US market is being moved offshore by US corporations. The other assault is from the US budget deficit. Americans have become so hard pressed that their savings rate is negligible. The US government has to rely on foreigners to lend it money for its annual expenditures. Washington’s two biggest bankers are China and Japan, the countries with the largest trade surpluses with the US. The transformation of the Iraq “cakewalk” into an interminable war has run up a one trillion dollar price tag, and an even larger war with Iran is looming. US generals and neoconservative ideologues predict a decade or multi-decade long war in the Middle East. Washington’s bankers are waking up to the reality that they will not be repaid. The only reason the dollar has not already lost its reserve currency role is that the only alternative is the currency of a non-existent political entity. Yet, even the Euro, a virtual currency, may have taken the dollar’s role by the end of 2008. Full of hegemonic hubris, the US government does not understand that US power and hegemony have always depended, not on missiles and military force, but on the financial power conveyed by the dollar’s role as reserve currency. The reserve currency is world money, good in any country to pay any bill. The reserve currency country is not a debtor in the usual sense. As the reserve currency can be used to settle international accounts, the reserve currency country can borrow at will until lenders lose confidence in the currency. There is abundant evidence that the loss of confidence in the dollar is underway. When it is complete, the US will no longer be a superpower. The decline in American power and influence could be dramatic. Part of America’s power results from European countries going along with Washington. However, the sharp rise in the Euro’s value has hurt European exports, squeezing profit margins, wages, and encouraging offshore production. Fights over monetary policy between European capitals could doom both the EU and the Euro, leaving the world with no reserve currency and America with embittered former allies. By going to war for hegemony, the Bush Regime has brought about American decline. While the neocons have spent two administrations trying to deracinate Islam, real threats to America’s power have been neglected. Offshoring, which turns US GDP into imports and larger trade deficits, together with war debts, has eroded the dollar’s status as reserve currency, undermining the foundation of American power. Paul Craig Roberts wrote the Kemp-Roth bill and was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. He was Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of National Review. He is author or coauthor of eight books, including The Supply-Side Revolution (Harvard University Press). He has held numerous academic appointments, including the William E. Simon Chair in Political Economy, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Georgetown University and Senior Research Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He has contributed to numerous scholarly journals and testified before Congress on 30 occasions. He has been awarded the U.S. Treasury's Meritorious Service Award and the French Legion of Honor. He was a reviewer for the Journal of Political Economy under editor Robert Mundell. He is the co-author of The Tyranny of Good Intentions. He is also coauthor with Karen Araujo of Chile: Dos Visiones – La Era Allende-Pinochet (Santiago: Universidad Andres Bello, 2000).

The American Police State By Chris Hedges 10/29/07 "Truthdig" -- -- A Dallas jury, a week ago, deadlocked in its deliberations and caused a mistrial in the government case against this country’s largest Islamic charity. The action raises a defiant fist on the sinking ship of American democracy. If we lived in a state where due process and the rule of law could curb the despotism of the Bush administration, this mistrial might be counted a victory. But we do not. The jury may have rejected the federal government’s claim that the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development funneled millions of dollars to Middle Eastern terrorists. It may have acquitted Mohammad el-Mezain, the former chairman of the foundation, of virtually all criminal charges related to funding terrorism (the jury deadlocked on one of the 32 charges against el-Mezain), and it may have deadlocked on the charges that had been lodged against four other former leaders of the charity, but don’t be fooled. This mistrial will do nothing to impede the administration’s ongoing contempt for the rule of law. It will do nothing to stop the curtailment of our civil liberties and rights. The grim march toward a police state continues. Constitutional rights are minor inconveniences, noisome chatter, flies to be batted away on the steady road to despotism. And no one, not the courts, not the press, not the gutless Democratic opposition, not a compliant and passive citizenry hypnotized by tawdry television spectacles and celebrity gossip, seems capable of stopping the process. Those in power know this. We, too, might as well know it. The Bush administration, which froze the foundation’s finances three months after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and indicted its officials three years later on charges that they provided funds for the militant group Hamas, has ensured that the foundation and all other Palestinian charities will never reopen in the United States. Any organized support for Palestinians from within the U.S. has been rendered impossible. The goal of the Israeli government and the Bush administration—despite the charade of peace negotiations to be held at Annapolis—is to grind defiant Palestinians into the dirt. Israel, which has plunged the Gaza Strip into one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, has now begun to ban fuel supplies and sever electrical service. The severe deprivation, the Israelis hope, will see the overthrow of the Hamas government in Gaza and the reinstatement of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who has become the Marshal Pétain of the Palestinian people. The Dallas trial—like all of the major terrorism trials conducted by this administration, from the Florida case against the Palestinian activist Dr. Sami al-Arian, which also ended in a mistrial, to the recent decision by a jury in Chicago to acquit two men of charges of financing Hamas—has been a judicial failure. William Neal, a juror in the Dallas trial, told the Associated Press that the case “was strung together with macaroni noodles. There was so little evidence.” Such trials, however, have been politically expedient. The accusations, true or untrue, serve the aims of the administration. A jury in Tampa, Chicago or Dallas can dismiss the government’s assaults on individual rights, but the draconian restrictions put in place because of the mendacious charges remain firmly implanted within the system. It is the charges, not the facts, which matter. Dr. al-Arian, who was supposed to have been released and deported in April, is still in a Virginia prison because he will not testify in a separate case before a grand jury. The professor, broken by the long ordeal of his trial and unable to raise another million dollars in legal fees for a retrial, pleaded guilty to a minor charge in the hopes that his persecution would end. It has not. Or take the case of Canadian citizen Maher Arar, who in 2002 was spirited away by Homeland Security from JFK Airport to Syria, where he spent 10 months being tortured in a coffin-like cell. He was, upon his release, exonerated of terrorism. Arar testified before a House panel this month about how he was abducted by the U.S. and interrogated, stripped of his legal rights and tortured. But he couldn’t testify in person. He spoke to the House members on a video link from Canada. He is forbidden by Homeland Security to enter the United States because he allegedly poses a threat to national security. Those accused of being involved in conspiracies and terrorism plots, as in all police states, become nonpersons. There is no rehabilitation. There is no justice. "He was never given a hearing nor did the Canadian consulate, his lawyer, or his family know of his fate,” Amnesty International wrote of Arar. “Expulsion in such circumstances, without a fair hearing, and to a country known for regularly torturing their prisoners, violates the U.S. Government’s obligations under international law, specifically the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.” You can almost hear Dick Cheney yawn. The Bush administration shut down the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development six years ago and froze its assets. There was no hearing or trial. It became a crime for anyone to engage in transactions with the foundation. The administration never produced evidence to support the charges. It did not have any. In the “war on terror,” evidence is unnecessary. An executive order is enough. The foundation sued the government in a federal court in the District of Columbia. Behind closed doors, the government presented secret evidence that the charity had no opportunity to see or rebut. The charity’s case was dismissed. The government has closed seven Muslim charities in the United States and frozen their assets. Not one of them, or any person associated with them, has been found guilty of financing terrorism. They will remain shut. George W. Bush can tar any organization or individual, here or abroad, as being part of a terrorist conspiracy and by fiat render them powerless. He does not need to make formal charges. He does not need to wait for a trial verdict. Secret evidence, which these court cases have exposed as a sham, is enough. The juries in Tampa, Chicago and Dallas did their duty. They spoke for the rights of citizens. They spoke for the protection of due process and the rule of law. They threw small hurdles in front of the emergent police state. But the abuse rolls on. I fear terrorism. I know it is real. I am sure terrorists will strike again on American soil. But while terrorists can wound and disrupt our democracy, only we can kill it.

On Track for U.S. Collapse By Michael S. Rozeff 10/29/07 "LewRockwell" -- -- Bush and Cheney are steering the U.S. into a collapse. Only strong public voices by influential people can prevent the coming disaster. We desperately need for men and women who are known to the public and have credibility to speak up in the critical period ahead to avoid catastrophe. A few weeks ago, Israel bombed a alleged nuclear facility in Syria. This is a warm-up for an attack on Iran. In the last few days, the U.S. unilaterally tightened sanctions on Iran. Russia and China do not support this move. A week ago Bush warned Iran that its attainment of nuclear arms would lead to World War III. Russia, which has been assisting Iran in its nuclear construction program for decades, regards Western military action against Iran as unacceptable. China has been arming Iran with missiles. Its relations with Iran have been improving for years. We know that Bush and Cheney are capable of pre-emptive attack. We know that Bush will act if he believes he is right no matter what the costs are. In his distorted worldview, Iran with nuclear weapons is a scenario worth any cost to avoid. We know that Bush, Cheney, and Rice have repeatedly warned Iran of meaningful consequences if Iran arms itself with nuclear weapons. We know that their terms in office end in 15 months. These are the critical months. But it is by no means clear that the front-running candidates for office who may replace them hold substantially different views. Hillary Clinton has publicly called for sanctions against Iran and has called Iran a threat to Israel. Why may an unprovoked attack on Iran lead to WWIII and why may it lead to the collapse of the U.S.? Imagine this scenario. The U.S. encourages Israel to bomb the Natanz nuclear facility in Iran. Russia attempts to restrain an Iranian response but fails. Iran responds in any of many ways, such as launching missiles on Israel, firing on shipping in the Straits of Hormuz, mining the Straits of Hormuz, sending troops into Iraq, or allying its military with Hezbollah and attacking Israel from Lebanon. The U.S., citing Iran’s aggressions (that will be the story), launches a full-scale attack on Iran designed to devastate the country. This attack has actually been planned by the U.S. for years. Syria is unable to maintain neutrality and quickly becomes a battleground between Iran and Israel. The price of oil by this point has already soared to $200 a barrel. The U.S. begins to use its strategic reserve and to divert Iraqi production. Russia responds by taking steps to prevent its oil production from reaching the U.S. China responds by cutting off its support of the U.S. Treasury market. Venezuela halts oil shipments to the U.S. The first stages of WWIII are economic warfare designed to cripple the U.S. and halt its war-making capacity. The U.S., unable to finance its deficits and fund its sovereign debt, is forced into raising interest rates drastically in order to borrow. The Fed is forced to print money. An inflationary spiral occurs. Meanwhile the high interest rates and high oil prices, not to mention the shock of a spreading conflict, drive the U.S. economy into severe decline. The U.S. attempts to raise taxes in order to fund itself, further crippling the economy. Gold soars to $1,500–$2,000 an ounce. The U.S. attempts to bolster its military forces. The draft is reinstated. The severity of the emergency allows Bush and Cheney to assume emergency powers and begin a dictatorship. Elections are postponed. The U.S. collapses. Unfortunately, even if this scenario does not occur, the position of the U.S. is so precarious that any number of other scenarios equally disastrous lie in wait. This house needs urgently to be put in order or it will fall, and especially if it does not terminate its imperial adventures. The very fact that Bush and Cheney (or any major U.S. political officials) gain by starting WWIII is a terrible indictment of our entire political system. Who can stop this? Who can prevent this? It will only take a few well-placed people to prevent this catastrophe. My guess is 5–20 people could sway public opinion against war or provide enough cover for Congressional dissenters to screw up their courage. Maybe even as few as 3 or 4 influential people could derail the Bush-Cheney train to disaster. They need to speak out at the right times and they must be heard. Previously mute or muted voices simply must speak out. They know who they are. They know that their silence will mean silent approval of a U.S. collapse. October 27, 2007 Michael S. Rozeff is a retired Professor of Finance living in East Amherst, New York.

Destroyed Homes, The Media and Public Knowledge Liberty can not be preserved without general knowledge among people' John Adams 1775 By David Halpin FRCS 11/02/087 "ICH" -- -- The fires in California are dying now. Eighteen hundred homes and businesses have been consumed. Many thousands are homeless and a quarter of a million people were evacuated. About one dozen people lost their lives but charred bodies of Mexican immigrants who were camping in the canyons are being discovered. The Federal Emergency Management Agency - FEMA had its faked press conference with employees posing as reporters and then ate humble American pie. But then Hollywood was down the road. A resident star, John Travolta, 'admits he was forced to fly his helicopter over the region to ensure his family were safe'. Arnie, the Governor, visited the fires several times; most recently he raised the likelihood of arson. He promised the forces for right would hunt the perpetrators down. 'Smoking them out' might have seemed tasteless. This element of nature has been known in these hills for millennia during drought and the sprawl of building into them has risked this disaster. There was a time perhaps when fire was used by the white colonist to drive the North American Indians from their tepees and their caves. Gunfire, fire, smallpox and other imported disease erased twenty million natives from the land of open sky and prairie. The colonist's descendants and the many late comers would not have dwelt on the justice of these acts of God but instead heat gave rise to hyperbole. Firefighters described scenes of devastation, with one pilot battling fires in San Diego telling his commanders: "It looks like an atom bomb is going off over there," the Los Angeles Times reported. Another firefighter, Mitch Mendler, said the area "was like Armageddon. It looked like the end of the world." Good that a US citizen has had a glimpse of both. The President, George W Bush, flew in and promised the wretched ' a better day'. Anyone whose building was not insured was promised a low interest loan by him. Such magnanimity is yet to be shown to the fifty million without health insurance but they are poor and often black. Another element carried by a storm surge breached the levees of New Orleans as forecast. Homes and people were submerged in filthy water and many drowned. At least several thousands died. People in a nursing home were abandoned by its staff. It was a difficult tragedy of the greatest proportions but FEMA was slow and inadequate in its response. Guests who were stranded in a luxury hotel were whisked away it was said. Unusually, BBC reporters like Peter Marshall gave it straight. So straight that Bush asked Blair to get the message blunted on the box. Many felt that if the low lying areas had been occupied by the white bourgeosie then the responses would have been quicker and more competent. The social distress has been terrible with poor families separated and re-building slow; some have returned to their homes to find security firms barring entry. The US can demolish Iraq from 4000 miles and install a 'missile defence system' but capital reacts like capital where there is no clout. Consider how the socialist country of Cuba responds as a nation to the hurricanes which batter it. In Palestine, peoples homes – in this case tin shacks belonging to Bedouin – are being bulldozed right now in the Negev (Gush Shalom) Altogether eighteen thousand Palestinian homes have been demolished since 1967. Fire or water are not the agents. Instead D9 bulldozers, swing shovels with demolition picks or engineers of the Israeli Occupation Force are the tools. The latter set high explosive charges in the base of these temples of the family. The main pretexts are the absence of a building permit or a connection between the house and a resistance fighter. Whilst he is tried in summary fashion in a military prison and often tortured, collective punishment is meted out to a grieving bitter family.1 The family is charged for the cost of demolition whilst the Red Cross generously provides a tent if there is no room in a relative's house. Not too many 'advanced democracies' are demolishing houses with such abandon except for the two main allies of Israel, those being the US and the UK. These crimes are fully documented but there is almost total silence amongst the nations of the world. Just hand out the tents. The strategy if one can call it such, is to break the spirit of the Palestinian and to drive him from his land. Mr Olmert has recorded his vision. 2 If approximately 120,000 Druze and Arabs were expelled from the Syrian Golan Heights in 1967 and their villages (134 in number) were completely demolished, that makes about 20,000 more demolished homes, assuming six people per family unit. 3 Then add the many thousands of homes demolished during el nakba – the catastrophe of 1948 – or the War of Independence as the Israelis call it. Symbolic of this lawlessness and deepest cruelty is the case of Salim Shawamreh of Anata. His home did not have a building permit. It has been demolished thrice and rebuilt yet again by ICAHD volunteers and money. How many people have seen the fires in southern California on TV? At least a billion. How many know that Palestinian homes have been demolished in very large numbers in '48 and since '67 as at Emmaus. A few percent of the European and US populations, and some of those remain mute. Self-obsession and greater tolerance of the other's pain might be barriers to awareness of such cruelty but the conscientious human is bound to rely on the broadcast and print media. And that is the rub. The media are determined to shield the populations from the grotesque excesses of the Israeli state (and the 'coalition of the willing in Iraq and Afghanistan'), whilst they fill the screens and thus the minds with loss by fire of eighteen hundred homes – by act of God. Evil is the act of demolishing one home in the remnants of Palestine. Is it the lesser evil for the western media to hide that?

Nomads It has been a while since I have contributed softwaano articles on this board, which were my specialty topics, reason being the fast paced political events that are targeting to dismantle the fiber of our faith. However, the soul and its softening remains my forte, as I believe rescuing sick hearts are as importnat as blowing the wistle on political blunder that are being committed by our politicians who are abusing power and blatantly disobeying their maker. Love of Allah is such heart-softening topic, the more we think about love of Allah SWT, the more we are pulled to do what Allah loves, of kindness to others, telling truth even against ourselves, helping the less fortunate, and standing up for what is right even when phyisically threatened. Nur

Fresh News from Somalia indicate that the depopulation of Somalia is taking a new twist, Ethiopian troops, proxies for the USA are indiscriminately shooting-to-kill civilians and kids to cause unprecedened exodes of more than 100 thousand residents of Mogadishu this past weekend. The UN, OAU and EU meanwhile, can't see the plight of the Somalis under the Ethiopian mercenary guns, they are all preoccupied and concerned with Darfour (politically correct cause), while Somalis are rotting in the streets. More people have been displaced in Somalia than Darfour, and much more killed, but the Media moguls decide which hungry crying baby is going to be on the nightly news, a Darfur baby or a Somali baby? well the US prefers, a Darfur baby. Nur

The Point, We should care about what had happened o Jews in Germany, if Ann Coulter, the Spokeswoman for the Republican Party had her way, she would drop couple of Atomic Bombs on the Muslim World to " Tame them" like the US "tamed Japan" according to her own words. Read the complete article. Ann Coulter: Nuke Them! By Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich 10/26/007 "ICH" -- -- Although her arrival had been anticipated with mixed emotions on campus, I was surprised that more people did not turn up to protest that USC, a research university, should give platform to Ann Coulter as guest speaker during the ‘Islamo-facism’ awareness week. Guest of the college Republicans, she walked on stage dressed in a short, black cocktail dress that revealed her mid-rift. Either she had the occasion wrong or the dress; perhaps she had plans after the event. Regardless, on center stage, talking about Islam and fascism among a bunch of university kids in jeans, she looked out of place. Given that she was introduced as being one of the top 100 intellectuals of the country and a few other accompanying remarks, I was surprised to hear her insistence at wanting to divide the country, albeit that the invitation was extended to her on behalf of the Republicans. I had never heard so much liberal/Democrat bashing. In her eyes, they were on the same footing as the terrorists. Coulter did not believe that the Democrats wanted to defeat the ‘savages’. As with the Bush Administration, she continued to link Iraq to 9/11, glorified the successes, and claimed that the Democrats deliberately wanted to lose to the ‘camel-riding Nomads’ by “rooting against their own country” She colorfully compared Guantanamo Bay to ‘freshman dorms’ where one eats well and gains 20 pounds, not foregoing the damning reports from the neutral Swiss-based Red Cross, and as her hatred of Muslims spewed out, she exclaimed: “ “they are savage, and I want to kill them.” It is this hatred, this desire for ‘going for the kill’ that made her give the advice which shocked me. During Q & A, a ‘college Republican’ asked her opinion about what should be done to the ‘Moslems who go around take out their swords and want to kill and convert every one’ (seriously, in the 21st century, do they even make swords any more?) After delivering a few words here and there about pain, Coulter remarked; “We dropped a couple of bombs on Japan and they are as tame as sheep, a few well placed bombs should do it”. My friends gasped. She was inciting genocide on a large scale. The young Republican seemed pleased. I took a mental pause to save my sanity. Ann Coulter is known for her controversial remarks. She makes her living by being hateful. My apprehension comes from the fact that so many follow her blindly and are in total agreement with her. They buy her books, seek her autograph, and cling to every word, considering her to be an absolute authority. The effect that she has on so many minds is a sad reflection of our society today. Ann Coulter not only influences young minds, but older people are intrigued by her and one man who was recording me hoping to catch me saying something ‘unpatriotic’ as we were discussing Coulter said: “I would like the 14th Amendment repealed”. His wife was standing next to him. Ann Coulter is their heroin; she is not a heroine by any stretch of the imagination. She is a fix that makes them high so they can feel good about who they are, about themselves and how they really feel, but it is all a temporary illusion, induced. When they come down, they need a stronger fix, and the time will come when such hateful discourse, the fix, will have to turn into action in order for it to be effective. Herein lies the danger, and this is why she is dangerous. I have always been able to separate the ordinary Americans from the government. This was the first time that the two became inseparable. For the first time in 21 years I witnessed hate in America – and what an ugly spectacle it was. Thankfully, I was rescued by a more familiar America, the one I cherish. As I was leaving, I saw more protestors. I joined them and we started chanting. Rabbis, priests, and practicing Moslems were among many who held signs reading: “Thanks Ann, you have united Moslems, Jews, and Christians”. She had. Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich has lived and studied in Iran, the UK, France, Australia and the US. She obtained her Bachelors Degree in International Relations from the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, and she is currently pursuing a Masters Degree in Middle East Studies concentrating in Political Science. She has done extensive research on US foreign policy towards Iran and Iran’s nuclear program

THE PROPAGANDA MODEL: AN OVERVIEW In their 1988 book 'Manufacturing Consent - The Political Economy of the Mass Media', Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky introduced their 'propaganda model' of the media. The propaganda model argues that there are 5 classes of 'filters' in society which determine what is 'news'; in other words, what gets printed in newspapers or broadcast by radio and television. Herman and Chomsky's model also explains how dissent from the mainstream is given little, or zero, coverage, while governments and big business gain easy access to the public in order to convey their state-corporate messages - for example, 'free trade is beneficial, 'globalisation is unstoppable' and 'our policies are tackling poverty'. We have already touched upon the fact that corporate ownership of the media can - and does - shape editorial content. The sheer size, concentrated ownership, immense owner wealth, and profit-seeking imperative of the dominant media corporations could hardly yield any other result. It was not always thus. In the early nineteenth century, a radical British press had emerged which addressed the concerns of workers. But excessive stamp duties, designed to restrict newspaper ownership to the 'respectable' wealthy, began to change the face of the press. Nevertheless there remained a degree of diversity. In postwar Britain, radical or worker-friendly newspapers such as the Daily Herald, News Chronicle, Sunday Citizen (all since failed or absorbed into other publications) and the Daily Mirror (at least until the late 1970s) regularly published articles questioning the capitalist system. The well-known journalist John Pilger joined the Mirror in 1963, and worked there for over 20 years. Pilger later claimed that 'The Mirror was the first popular paper to encourage working-class people to express themselves, for whatever reason, to their newspaper'. Luckily for him, 'Irreverence and a certain anarchy were encouraged'. Later, when Robert Maxwell took over ownership of the newspaper, Pilger was personally assured that his job was secure: 'Eighteen months later, after relentless interference from Maxwell, I was sacked.' The media typically comprise large conglomerates - News International, CBS (now merged with Westinghouse), Turner Broadcasting (now merged with Time-Warner) - which may belong to even larger parent corporations such as General Electric (owners of NBC). All are tied into the stock market. Wealthy people sit on the boards of these major corporations, many with extensive personal and business contacts in other corporations. Herman and Chomsky point out, for instance, that: 'GE [General Electric] and Westinghouse are both huge, diversified multinational companies heavily involved in the controversial areas of weapons production and nuclear power.' It is difficult to conceive that press neutrality would not be compromised in these areas. But more widely, press freedom is limited by the simple fact that the owners of the media corporations are driven by free market ideology. How likely is it, then, that such owners would happily allow their own newspaper, radio or TV station to criticise systematically the 'free market' capitalism which is the source of his material wealth? The second filter of the propaganda model is advertising. Newspapers have to attract and maintain a high proportion of advertising in order to cover the costs of production; without it, the price of any newspaper would be many times what it is now, which would soon spell its demise in the marketplace. There is fierce competition throughout the media to attract advertisers; a newspaper which gets less advertising than its competitors is put at a serious disadvantage. Lack of success in raising advertising revenue was another factor in the demise of 'people's newspapers' in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It is clear, therefore, that for any publication or commercial radio or TV station to survive, it has to hone itself into an advertiser-friendly medium. In other words, the media has to be sympathetic to business interests, such as the travel, automobile and petrochemical industries. Even the threat of withdrawal of advertising can affect editorial content. A letter sent to the editorial offices of a hundred magazines by a major car producer stated: 'In an effort to avoid potential conflicts, it is required that Chrysler corporation be alerted in advance of any and all editorial content that encompasses sexual, political, social issues or any editorial content that could be construed as provocative or offensive.' In 1999, British Telecom threatened to withdraw advertising from The Daily Telegraph following a number of critical articles. The journalist responsible was suspended. A 1992 US study of 150 news editors found that 90 per cent said that advertisers tried to interfere with newspaper content, and 70 per cent tried to stop news stories altogether. 40 per cent admitted that advertisers had in fact influenced a story. In the UK, £3.2 billion is spent on newspaper ads annually and another £2.6 billion on TV and radio commercials, out of a total advertising budget of £9.2 billion. In the US, the figure is tens of billions of dollars a year on TV advertising alone. An advertising-based system makes survival extremely difficult for radical publications that depend on revenue from sales alone. Even if such publications survive, they are relegated to the margins of society, receiving little notice from the public at large. Advertising, just like media ownership, therefore acts as a news filter. The third of Herman and Chomsky's 5 filters relates to the sourcing of mass media news: 'The mass media are drawn into a symbiotic relationship with powerful sources of information by economic necessity and reciprocity of interest.' Even large media corporations such as the BBC cannot afford to place reporters everywhere. They therefore concentrate their resources where major news stories are likely to happen: the White House, the Pentagon, No 10 Downing Street, and other centralised news 'terminals'. Although British newspapers may occasionally object to the 'spin-doctoring' of New Labour, for example, they are in fact highly dependent upon the pronouncements of 'the Prime Minister's personal spokesperson' for government-related news. Business corporations and trade organisations are also trusted sources of stories considered newsworthy. Editors and journalists who offend these powerful news sources, perhaps by questioning the veracity or bias of the furnished material, can be threatened with the denial of access to their media life-blood - fresh news. Robert McChesney, a professor of communications at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, points out that 'Professional journalism relies heavily on official sources. Reporters have to talk to the PM's official spokesperson, the White House press secretary, the business association, the army general. What those people say is news. Their perspectives are automatically legitimate.' Whereas, according to McChesney, 'if you talk to prisoners, strikers, the homeless, or protesters, you have to paint their perspectives as unreliable, or else you've become an advocate and are no longer a "neutral" professional journalist.' Such reliance on official sources gives the news an inherently conservative cast and gives those in power tremendous influence over defining what is or isn't 'news'. McChesney, author of Rich Media, Poor Democracy, warns: 'This is precisely the opposite of what a functioning democracy needs, which is a ruthless accounting of the powers that be.' The fourth filter is 'flak', described by Herman and Chomsky as 'negative responses to a media statement or [TV or radio] program. It may take the form of letters, telegrams, phone calls, petitions, law-suits, speeches and Bills before Congress, and other modes of complaint, threat and punitive action'. Business organisations regularly come together to form flak machines. Perhaps one of the most well-known of these is the US-based Global Climate Coalition (GCC) - comprising fossil fuel and automobile companies such as Exxon, Texaco and Ford. The GCC was started up by Burson-Marsteller, one of the world's largest public relations companies, to rubbish the credibility of climate scientists and 'scare stories' about global warming (see Chapter 4). In her 1997 book Global Spin, Sharon Beder documented at great length the operations of corporations and their hired PR firms in establishing grassroots 'front movements' to counter the gains made by environmentalists. One such coalition, the Foundation for Clean Air Progress, is 'in reality a front for transportation, energy, manufacturing and agricultural groups'. The Foundation was established to challenge the US Clean Air Act by 'educating' the public about the progress made in air quality over the previous twenty-five years. As Beder notes, the Foundation's 'focus is on individual responsibility for pollution, as opposed to the regulation of industry to achieve further improvements.' The threat - real or imagined - of law-suits can be a powerful deterrent to media investigation. In the UK, environmental journalist Andrew Rowell notes that, 'Britain's archaic libel laws prevent much of the real truth about the destructive nature of many of [the] UK's leading companies from ever being published or broadcast. Very few people within the media will take on the likes of Shell, BP or [mining company] RTZ'. The fifth and final news filter that Herman and Chomsky identified was 'anti-communism'. Manufacturing Consent was written during the Cold War. A more apt version of this filter is the customary western identification of 'the enemy' or an 'evil dictator' - Colonel Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein, or Slobodan Milosevic (recall the British tabloid headlines of 'Smash Saddam!' and 'Clobba Slobba!'). The same extends to mainstream reporting of environmentalists as 'eco-terrorists'. The Sunday Times ran a particularly nasty series of articles in 1999 accusing activists from the non-violent direct action group Reclaim The Streets of stocking up on CS gas and stun guns. The demonisation of enemies is useful, essential even, in justifying strategic geopolitical manoeuvring and the defence of corporate interests around the world, while mollifying home-based critics of such behaviour. The creation of an 'evil empire' of some kind, as in postwar western scaremongering about the 'Soviet Menace' or earlier talk of the 'Evil Hun', has been a standard device for terrifying the population into supporting arms production and military adventurism abroad - both major sources of profit for big business. Iraq's Saddam Hussein has been a useful bogeyman for US arms manufacturers who have notched up sales of over $100bn to Saddam's neighbours in the Middle East. The fifth filter also applies to media demonisation of anti-globalisation protesters - often described as 'rioters' - and anyone else perceived as a threat to free-market ideology. This brief description of the propaganda model hardly does justice to the sophisticated and cogent analysis presented by Herman and Chomsky. The interested reader is urged to consult their book directly. Its particular relevance here is that it explains how and why the status quo of corporate power is maintained in modern society, the dominance of the neoliberal agenda of free trade with its automatic rejection of alternatives (Margaret Thatcher's 'There Is No Alternative'), and the emasculation of dissident viewpoints which are variously labelled as 'biased', 'ideological' or 'extreme'. How likely is it that anyone calling for radical change in society - whether environmentalists, human-rights activists or opponents of the arms trade - will be consistently and fairly reported by corporate news organisations? How much more likely is it that their arguments will be vilified, marginalised or simply ignored? [The above is an extract from the 'Spotlight on the Media': Chapter 3 of 'Private Planet' (Jon Carpenter Publishing). See www.private-planet.com for more about the book.]

Truth Matters By Charles Sullivan 10/27/07 "ICH" -- -- I have been writing political essays for a few years now. I do so as a reluctant enthusiast, not because I wanted to write on these themes; but because, it seemed to me, that professional journalists were not telling the whole story; that significant parts that would allow people to connect the dots and understand what is happening from a historical perspective, was being deliberately omitted from the official version of current events, and from history. As propaganda, the elements that are deliberately left out of media are as important as those that are retained. It is propaganda by omission, as much as by content. What people are not told shapes their world view and influences their behavior, as surely as what they are told. Imposed ignorance and selective knowledge go hand in hand to forge public opinion and to shape cultural identity. These conditions set the stage for belligerent government and aggressive nationalism. It is not coincidental that professional journalists, those who write for profit in the mainstream media, are the least likely to tell us the truth, the whole truth; whereas, free-lance writers, who operate under a different set of rules and out of the mainstream, are more likely to serve the public interest, and tell us what we need to know in order to be a free people, and good world citizens. Professional journalists are beholden to a code of ethics and personal conduct that free-lance writers are not. Namely, they are part of a fraternity, a part of the cultural orthodoxy, with an incentive in maintaining the established order. The incentive is always financial and professional, and involves creating the acceptance and trust of those in power, which may, when properly executed, even result in the celebrity status of the journalist. Journalists who have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo or advancing their careers do not operate in the public interest. Their purpose is not to inform but to deceive. When a major news anchor reports upon the invasion and occupation of sovereign nations, uncritically putting forth pentagon propaganda as justification for the attack, he or she is in essence acting in the manner of a celebrity athlete endorsing a product. The basketball star may endorse Nike sneakers, manufactured by indentured servants in foreign sweatshops; while the news anchor is endorsing war and disaster capitalism projected around the world by Lockheed Martin and the Carlyle Group. Both are prostitutes. Mainstream corporate journalism is not about speaking truth to power, it is about selling products and perceptions. It is about creating a culture of ignorant consumers incapable of distinguishing between propaganda and news, fact and fiction. This is marketing and perception management masquerading as unbiased, objecting reporting. I call it the big lie. If the mainstream journalist wants to prosper, if they want to have access to the inner circles of power, they must play the game according to the established rules. They must toe the corporate line, and provide cover for the corporate assault on human freedoms, and the conquest of nature, while keeping hidden agendas concealed from public view. Journalists must be able to sell widely objectionable concepts to the people, packaged in the garments of seductive—often patriotic language, in order to make them palatable. How many soldiers, outside of those under the private contracts of firms like Blackwater, would voluntarily stake their lives for corporate profits, and the subjugation of a sovereign people, if they knew that is what they are really fighting for, rather than the more popular and desirable goal of freedom or democracy? Freedom, liberation, and democracy have never been corporate objectives; nor can they ever be the objective of corporate governance. They are only selling points that conceal hidden corporate agendas; the attractive packaging for war, occupation, and privatization, obtained at pubic expense. If news stories are not believable to the multitudes, if they fail to garner popular support by masking corporate agendas behind deceptive language, the majority of governmental polices and private agendas could not be enacted. If the people knew what was being done in their name, and who is profiting from those policies, there might be widespread opposition and even social upheaval. It would be difficult to field a voluntary military that knows it is fighting for the bottom line of Halliburton, Bechtel, and Lockheed Martin, rather than for freedom and democracy, as they are told. Thus those who would serve in the military as self-ordained patriots are sold a bill of goods. By invading and occupying Iraq, they are, in effect, undermining the very principles they claim to hold sacred, including those set forth in the Constitution and the preamble to the Declaration of Independence. Likewise, the average US citizen is sold a similar bill of goods in order to garner support for policies they would, presumably, never voluntarily sustain, if they understood them better. That is the genius of modern capitalism and its impressive marketing apparatus. The results have been breathtaking. Skillful perception management always precedes empire. Well presented propaganda allows history to be presented as a kind of fairy tale that ignores the horrible things the government has always done in our name, at the behest of corporate America and our wealthiest citizens, which should be too well known to bear reiteration here. In our capitalist culture, journalism must not be thought of as a reporting of facts, but as marketing propaganda—the selling of ideas that might not otherwise be embraced by those who must carry out hidden agendas, or the people on the receiving end of them. Seen in this way, the US soldier and the Iraqi citizen are both pawns in a rich man’s game: the former as the implementer of unjust war and occupation, the other as the unwilling recipient of them. The end result for both soldier and Iraqi citizen is tragic: the soldier is told that he or she is protecting their country from foreign threats, something that is patently false; while the innocent Iraqi citizen, defending his or her home from foreign occupation, knows that she or he is not a terrorist, but is treated like one, nevertheless. Both occupier and the occupied share a common foe, but it is not each other; it is the criminals, aided and abetted by the corporate media, who put them in formal opposition to one another for financial gain. Our recent history would have been impossible without the consolidation of the media that occurred during the Clinton presidency, and has continued ever since. The entire spectra of mainstream media are now under the control of only four or five corporations. We no longer have reporting on local issues stemming from diverse perspectives rooted in local communities, but a monoculture of state and corporate propaganda that betrays the public trust in its pursuit of corporate profits. Aided by the president and congress, the public owned airwaves were hijacked and are being used against the people by giant multinational corporations. The result of this media monoculture, as purveyed by the likes of Judith Miller and Tom Brokaw, and countless others, is tragic. And they represent only the tip of the mainstream iceberg. Think of the horrible and shameless lies, the baseless fear and hate that are continuously voiced by the likes of Rush Limbaugh, and the hateful broadcasts that emanate from Bob Jones University, masquerading as Christian theology. Corporate media is the vanguard of empire and environmental destruction on a global scale. Unlike its corporate counterpart, reporting truth requires people of unassailable integrity. It requires a thirst for justice with the strength of character to oppose the powerful undertow of manufactured perception and conformity, and the seductive language created to execute the hidden agendas of corrupt governments. Uncovering truth requires commitment to the people, rather than to profit driven corporate agendas. Only a handful of professional journalists have attained the kind of stature that makes such reportage possible in the United States. Their names are not at all well known, with the possible exception of Seymour Hersch, Robert Fisk, Bill Moyers and Greg Palast. More often than not, that responsibility falls on the shoulders of independent journalists and unpaid free-lancers. The professional journalist must answer to his/her boss, and portray the corporation that employs them in a favorable light, even if they are profiting from unprovoked war and occupation. In contrast, the free-lancer is bound only by the constraints of conscience, imagination, and ability. Occasionally, an astonished responder to one of my more poignant essays will tell me that I should forward the piece to the New York Times: to NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox News, or even the BBC. I never have. It would be hard for me to imagine any corporation undermining its own profitability by exposing its hidden agendas, and denouncing itself as a commissioner of murder and mayhem, motivated by insatiable greed and a lust for wealth and power that would astonish even the staunchest mafia don. Don’t hold your breath waiting for it to happen! Snowballs in hell have a better chance. Its not that free-lancers like me wouldn’t like to get paid for what we do; it’s that our views do not enhance the bottom line of corporate giants and, in many cases, actually undermine them. Thus it behooves the professional journalist and the corporate media to ignore or discredit us as purveyors of truth and seekers of justice. Soon it will be an act of sedition to speak truth in this country. Yet, truth will continue to exist, despite all attempts to destroy it. Whether they admit it or not, virtually all of the best known journalists in the US subscribe to the racist and sexist ideologies of American exceptionalism and manifest destiny, and they go to great lengths to advance these ideas, by presenting them as something other than what they really are. Slight of hand is the rule of mainstream journalism, not the exception. Conversely, by serving the people, free-lance journalists are, of necessity, undermining the corporate agenda. Thus they are treated as enemies of the state, which has become indistinguishable from the corporation itself. We live in a culture where one cannot value truth and carry forth corporate agendas. Truth is the enemy of empire. This might also explain why so many unembedded journalists have been deliberately killed in Iraq and the Gaza strip by US and Israeli snipers. The world must not know what the occupiers do, or the propaganda veneer may no longer have its intended effect on the consumers of media. Speaking truth to power, especially corrupt power, is dangerous business— particularly in war zones and fascist states, like the one evolving in the US. Corporate media is the vanguard of colonialism and imperialist policy. It plays a key role in preparing the public mind for imperialist wars and occupations and their subsequent puppet governments; it also serves the emerging police state at home that erodes our freedoms, until there is nothing left of them. Yet, occasionally, even in this artificially constructed myth loving culture, truth wins out simply because someone cares enough to tell it like it is, without sugar coating. Truth matters; and that is—and always will be—of primal importance to some people. Let future historical records show that there was opposition to what was being done in our name, that there were people willing to speak truth to power, to stem the evil tide by standing up for justice, cost what it may. Future historians of the dominant culture are likely to cast these accounts into the memory hole and pretend that they never existed, carrying forth the myth that the people were always united behind the injustice and tyranny of our time. We saw this in Nazi Germany in the buildup to World War Two, and we are seeing it now in the US. But a culture that does not value truth and justice is not worth preserving. Such cultures will self destruct and implode upon themselves; the world will eventually unite against them and bring them down. All of the military might in the world, all the subterfuge, is not powerful enough to overcome simple truth. Any individual who values truth more than lies, who keeps truth alive in his or her heart, despite all efforts to dislodge it from its ethical moorings, is more powerful than even the most advanced weapons systems. Truth emerges unscathed from the rubble of fallen empire as immutable as an inviolable law of nature. Nothing can bring it down because it is real. If we are to evolve into a justice loving people, truth must become our moral foundation, the basis of our existence as a people. Truth and justice are inseparable partners on the road to liberation from tyranny and fascism. Concord’s greatest citizen, the poet-philosopher, Henry D. Thoreau, summed it up well: “The one great rule of composition…is to speak the truth. This first, this second, this third; pebbles in your mouth or not.” Perhaps more than anything, that simplistic ability to speak plain truth, and in all languages, is what I most admire about Thoreau. There is much to admire and respect in a man who spoke in those terms, and lived by that simple credo. Truth is simple and uncomplicated, whereas lies and distortions are complex. Truth stands strong and unwavering without artificial support; lies and propaganda require elaborate schemes and constant propping up, the mask of deception. More of us must learn the language of truth; we must be its faithful guardians, if we are to be valuable citizens in this world, rather than the useful ****** of empire. By holding truth and justice in the highest regard, we demonstrate that another world is not only possible, but highly probable. As voracious consumers of media, we must be as careful about what we admit into our minds, as the food we put into our bodies. Food can nourish and sustain us, or it can produce disease and decay. And so it is with media. To date, we have not been very discriminate, and the result is that we have become a culture of the mentally obese, fed on junk media. Our minds, our souls, have been deliberately poisoned; our perceptions twisted and distorted, our humanity abandoned to the quest for profits and power. We must purge our minds of junk media and replace it with something more nutritious, if we favor health over disease. Peace is not possible without two essential ingredients: truth and justice. Neither is possible in the absence of the other. We must live as if truth still matters. Charles Sullivan is a nature photographer, free-lance writer, and community activist residing in the Ridge and Valley Province of geopolitical West Virginia.

How can a sane person deny the Holocaust? And why would a Muslim deny it of all faiths? Its the glaring example that the Christian world alone bears the responsibility of the most attrocious crime ever committed by human race anytime anywhere. Six Million Jews along with many other low life ethnic groups were burned alive in furnances in Germany by Hitler, and His Nazi nation fully supportted him in this crime. American Indians and American Negroes have also been systematically killed, burned, enslaved and abused by European settlers who brought their culture to the new world. How can these crimes be denied? Nur

SOLeNuri Presents: The Silent Super Power "And every nation has its appointed term; when their term is reached, neither can they delay it nor can they advance it an hour (or a moment)". Holy Quran, Al Acraaf Verse 34. There is no a single day that goes by without being reminded of the omnipresence of a sole remaining superpower after the collapse of the former Soviet Union, defeated in part by the Ragtag guerrillas of the Afghan Mujahideen assisted by the CIA with stinger missiles and military advice. Once the Soviet Union was brought down as a result of its own uncontrolled weight, You know what happens to overweight people if they don't watch out for their weight as a result of their insatiable appetite? The USA, as the "sole" remaining energy hungry Superpower went on a spending spree of its treasury to sharpen its claws and spread its wings widely on the whole globe due to absence of any formidable force in its way to accomplish all of its global aspirations of hegemony and control of the remaining planets resources The US representing 5% of world population, consumes 80% of world energy resources Enter the new world order, when the remaining Superpower of Judeo-Christian denomination takes on the planet, challenging the entire world Cowboy style to " Bring em on!" so that it can fashion the world according to its own vision, this is also known as "War On Terror", just like it says in the Bible that God Created man in His own image The New World order practically began with September "Plane Accident, since its not supposed to be a "conspiracy". Story according to officially released records goes that some 19 Fanatics who hate freedom, who were having an all night drinking and dancing party at a Florida Night Club just the night before their attack( Not a good way to meet God, I guess), have succeeded in penetrating the most complex defense system of the remaining Superpower, armed only with box cutters and flawlessly crashed three large body planes on very low targets Trained for few months on light Cessna aircraft. The attack infuriated the Superpower Lion who vowed to capture these bad boys and their leaders to bring them to justice, and to raise the funds that would pay for the expensive cost of their capture with convenient Oil resources coincidentally available near their hideouts. This unfortunate accident would later provide a blank check for all of the wishes of the remaining Superpower as most nations sympathized by helping the lone Superpower to chase away the bearded bad boys from the global neighborhood, and the caves, the biggest wish of the Superpower being Oil, with proven energy resources such as Iraq's oil fields or the planned Caspian Sea pipelines that go through Afghanistan's rugged terrain to India. Its amazing how, whenever the sole Superpower goes after the domination of the energy rich areas of the globe, the Superpower discovers that with every barrel of oil, comes a bearded guy shouting Allahu Akbar! What a frightening scene! That is Terror! So, A global war on terror is in order! Which brings us to the topic of discussion, the Silent Super Power. Just Who is this Silent Super Power? You see, my dear Paesano, the present US administration saw a great opportunity in securing energy for its people by invading Iraq and other energy promising countries (at times through proxy, like in the case for Somalia) all the while brandishing the sword of " War o Terror", which in Iraq alone has costs the USA so far $463,652,557,974. But while this arrogant Super Power is busy chasing the bearded bad boys around the global block, a silent Super has been quietly undermining his efforts, possibly for greed driven crimes. But like Great Kings of History like Pharaoh of Egypt, King George Bush seems to be oblivious to the signs being sent by the silent Super Power. He cant read the signs, and some of his people are still following him out of curiosity. Call it Mother Nature, if you don't subscribe to any faith, but in Islam, nothing happens out of the control of Allah. So, for a moment, think along the line that Allah, as a Silent Super Power, is pulling the strings that are shaping current events to the disadvantage of the official "Sole" remaining Superpower! The combined cost of natural disasters in the USA to date is close to 400 Billion since the unfortunate 911 disasters, add to the above war, the cost in Iraq war to get close to One Trillion Dollars, enough to build 10 Million houses for the poor Americans, or hire additional 16 Million public school teachers for a year, or to upgrade dwindling education quality, or provide 40 Million college students with scholarships for one year, or insuring every child's health for 6 years. Now, when the USA indirectly causes 1 Million of Iraqi civilian deaths for Oil due to false pretext of invasion to stop Saddam's bogey Nuclear WMD Now , the cost rises to 200 Billion more (if cost of Iraqi life is valued as that of Lockerbee victims). So, Does all the above mishaps seem to be somehow related? Well, Pharaoh in his downward spiraling did not suspect it either, great nations collapsed in the past because they were in the wrong lane of a hidden highway policed by a silent Superpower! Allah, the Silent Superpower, had seen nations rise and nations go down in shame, but was Allah just a monitoring God or an active manipulator of events to turn it to His right way without appearing to be in the picture? To get the real answer for this question, we have to connect with the Quraan's accounts of the past stories of arrogant nations, nations that Allah SWT blessed with plenty of resources, who then ungratefully used it against the design of the Silent Super Power. If Power corrupts as the saying goes, then, according to the Quraan, Pride Blinds. When you combine the two ailments, you have a Corrupt and Blind nation that spirals down while its citizenry are oblivious of where the trend will lead, simply because, those in command cant see, and those following them are kept in the dark of what is important to them by those wielding Media power. Allah, the silent Super Power tells us in Surah Fussilat: He said: " As for 'Ad, they were arrogant in the land without right, and they said: "Who is mightier than US in strength?" , See they not that Allah, Who created them was mightier in strength than them. And they used to deny Our Ayat (proofs, evidences, verses, lessons, revelations, etc.)! 16 . So We sent upon them furious wind in days of evil omen (for them) that We might give them a taste of disgracing torment in this present worldly life, but surely the torment of the Hereafter will be more disgracing, and they will never be helped. 17. And as for Thamud, We showed and made clear to them the Path of Allah (Monotheism) through Our Messenger, (i.e. showed them the way of success), but they preferred blindness to guidance, so the Sa'iqah (a destructive awful cry, torment, hit, a thunderbolt) of disgracing torment seized them, because of what they used to earn ( Crimes). As can be seen from the above verses, when Allah causes blindness to those intoxicated with power, "Sh.. Happens" Donald Rumsfeld's words So, we have Sh.. everywhere on the globe, from Afghanistan to Somalia. and no end in sight! Al Haqq, meaning Righteousness which is also one of Allah's 99 attributes, was once asked by a poet: (Arabic Transliteration): Su ila al Xaqu Yawman " Ayna kunta fii sawlatil baatil"? Fa Ajaab : " Kuntu Ajtathu Juduurah" Translation: "Where have you been in the face of Evil's arrogant defiance and challenge? The Haqq answered: I was buried deep under it, to permanently remove its (evil) roots" The Silent Super continues trimming the evil-doing power of this "Superpower", in many stealthy ways, just like He reduced Pharaoh's power to a tourist attraction in Cairo's Museums, cutting evil to size, because, if all the pieces falls in right place for evils advantage, then the Divine wisdom in the Holy scriptures will be lost forever. The Silent Super Power tells us in the Quraan, that those intoxicated with power are driven to commit heinous crimes by their perceived supremacy, which they fail to realize that Allah provided them in the first place, and if He so wills, can pull the plug to release natural disasters the size of Katrina and the California Fires gulping entire neighborhoods in a matter of days, while the phony Super Power looks on helplessly except for consoling the victims with a federal emergency aid that is in turn is in the form of printing more Dollars by the US Mint, a Currency that does not have enough gold to cover it's rear end, which is fast becoming like the German Mark after the second world war. To Be continued........... .................... . 2007 SOLeNuri Political Spirituality Connecting Faith to Policies

Brother Bixi You write: "Durbaanka ha ii garaacdee maa naga qaleesid lol." Waa kaa qalleeyay, laakin, Carabta wexey ku maahmaahdaa: "Ida kaana rabbul beiti bi-duffi daaribun, Fa Shiimatu Ahlul Beiti, Al Raqsu" Markaad bogataan, ii yeera aan shaah ku sheekeysannee, Loooooooooool. By the way, have you heard the Somali word " Tumasho" ,, " wuu tuntaa, wey tumataa etc.' Wexey ka timid Durbaanka iyo Saarka. Nur

Biixi Brother I kindly ask you to prove that I have said that the ICU is a PRODUCT, I repeat , A PRODUCT, of USC. You quote me as wroting : 1.ICU is product of USC. Your agreement from previous writings “ there is no doubt that the present formation of the Islamic courts includes recycled old guards from the USC, just like their opponenents (TFG) have within their ranks “ Brother, the word "INCLUDES" Does not Mean " PRODUCT" The Wesbsters Dictionary defines: 1. PRODUCT, Produce as: to cause to have existence or to happen : bring about. 2. INCLUDE: include suggests the containment of something as a constituent, component, or subordinate part of a larger whole So, when I said that some recycled old guard INCLUDE, I meant they have JOINED and EXISTING ORGANIZATION THAT WAS ESTABLISHED BY GOOD PEOPLE WITH NO BAD PAST HISTORY IN THE CIVIL WAR. Your logic is like saying: If a Munafiq INCLUDES the Government of the Prophet Mohammad SAWS in Madina, That the Islamic Government is a FACTOR of Munafiqs! ( By the way I am in no way claiming that the Courts are like the Governmnet of the Rasuul, but they have declared openly they follow the Prophet's Sunnah and Sharia) My brother, When the Islamic Courts were originated by Tribal Sheikhs ( Each tribe has Waranle and Wadaad), The Waranlayaal has lead Somalia to misery for 16 years, both the former SSDF and USC Anarchists were later discovered that they had the same boss, ETHIOPIA, which has used them both to dismantle Somalia to its present state. So, The Wadaads in each tribe turned the table on the Anarchits, and the ICU was born, not from Anarchists, as you have claimed, but from pure Wadaads like Sheikh Shareef. Once they have beaten all the anarchists, Ethiopia and America came to their rescue and installed them back to maintain the slavery of Ethiopia. Stragely you suggest that we should work for the stooge Ethiopian Installed government? Brother Bixi Sorry if I have said something that does NOT befit you, you are dear to me, and your happiness in this life and the next is the reason I am debating you at this forum, it beats my purpose to insult you, what I meant by current logic, can be answered by my following question: Brother, Are you suggesting that if a warlord accepts to follow Islam and abide by Sharia, under leadership of Ulima scholars , that the organization he joins ( ICU) is permanently as bad as an organization that is LED by His former Criminal Warlord friends (TFG)? Brother, Alhamdulillah, that you hold Islam very high, so do I, what needs to be done is for us to unify our stand regarding the political establishment that is c reated to destry Islam as a viable political governance in a country where the people staunchly declare that they are Muslims. If we agree on the following statments: 1. Allah, represented by Quran Is the ONLY and ABSOLUTE SOVEREIGN, by virtue of creation of the universe and everything in it including people, He is above all, thus any law, agreement, settlement that conflicts with Allah's teachings are absolutely and eternally ILLEGAL. 2. Allah is the ONLY Ally for us whose protection we should seek, any Somali who seeks other than Allah as protector, specially, from those who are against Islam, has declared war on Islam, and proves his departure away from Islam. 3. Allah is the only RIGHTFUL LAW MAKER and LAW GIVER to His creatures, any organization in Somalia that makes laws contradictory to those of Allah are in Contempt of Allah, the Soveregin, thus, by this action of blatant disrespect of Allah rule over their lives, they have chosen to be non Muslims. Then, what follows is to evaluate present political formation in Somalia in light of Islam, not the converse, because the more you understand what the present political tribal fromation is doing in the fovor of Ethiopians, the clearer the picture of what type of laws they want to implement: 1. ( Pursuit of Happiness)Legalize Alcohol and Qat 2. ( Womens Liberation) Legalize Prostitution and Adultry 3. ( Tolerance) Remove Islamic Studies from Curriculum. 4. ( Fighting Fundementalism) Shut Quranic Dugis. Nur

Brother Bixi This proverb is a southern proverb, where locals dance to the beats of a drum, the proverb illustrates that if one wishes to hear the right beats of a drum, for the right dance, then, one must either keep his drum on his shoulder, or keep it near him, with his close freinds/family who will beat the drums to his taste. The proverb has been in circulation in Somalia from the perspective of political division of power based, clan politics which is based on the theory that the only way a clan can secure fair share of power and representation in Somaalia is through its own clan members. This, clan mentality has led to the collapse of Somalia and continues to fuel its division along clan loyalties. The only remaining hope for Somalia is not more of Clan loyalties, but a loyalty for Allah and His Sharia law that will guarantee that every Somali will get their fair share under Sharia. Gacal as you said, could be anything you hold dear to yourself, but the rightful GACAL is Allah who said in Quraan: If Your Fathers, sons, your Clan, your wealth, your businesses, are your GACL, more than Allah, and His Messenger and a struggle in His cause, then expect and wait, until Allah delivers (His promise, Day of Judgement). Nur

Brother Bixi You said that I ave agreed to the following statements that you claimed. 1.ICU is product of USC. My COMPLETE previous answer IN CONTEXT was : That may be correct brother, the way you see things depends on where you stand on Aqeedah issues on one hand, and the very nature of those you are looking at ( The ICU) on the other. The first dependecy is about you, the second dependency is about the object (ICU). The word "MAY", in ENGLISH Language does NOT mean agreement, it means a possibility, a probability, secondly, you have taken it completely out of context which was that that how you see events about ICU and TFG greately depends your Aeedah in Islam which concerns me more than the dispute which is secondary to my job here to help you in issues of Islamic Aqeedah 2.There are warlords in the ICU. YES, who accepted leadership of ICU Islamic Agenda of application of Sharia. While their oppnenets are LED by Warlords and COMPLETELY REJECT SHARIA APPLICATION. 3.ICU’s members are above the Sharia while the rest of Somalis are not. Brother, Allah Ka cabso, Allah made lies Haram, never have I agreed to this statement anywhere, if you fail to proove this, it shows you have a problem with Allah, not with me. So you need to repent make TAWBAH. 4. ICU members still occupy homes, farms etc from Afgoi to Kismaio. I have never agreed to this statment wholesale either, so substantiate this too my brother. 5. ICU said one thing and did another I dont know where you are reading, but our statements that you claim that I have agreed to are either out of context ot a blatant disinformation, please substantiate this too. Brother: Let us for once forget the ICU and the TFG, they are temporal political formations that did exist before, and will not exist forever, so arguing about their ISLAMNESS at this point with your currnet logic will not help us get to the most important point in this discusssion. If we agree on the following points, we will solve this dilemma: 1. Allah, represented by Quran Is the ONLY SOVEREIGN, by virtue of creation of the universe and everything in it including people, He is above all, thus any law, agreement, settlement that conflicts with Allah's teachings are absolutely and eternally ILLEGAL. 2. Allah is the ONLY Ally for us whose protection we should seek, any Somali who seeks other than Allah as protector, specially, from those who are against Islam, has declared war on Islam, and proves his departure away from Islam. 3. Allah is the only RIGHTFUL LAW MAKER and LAW GIVER to His creatures, any organization in Somalia that makes laws contradictory to those of Allah are in Contempt of Allah, the Soveregin, thus, by this action of blatant disrespect of Allah rule over their lives, they have chosen to be non Muslims. Your answers to these statements will steer this discussion to the right direction. Do you agree to these statments? Nur

Bixi bro. Your tagline: Gurbaan garabkaaga ha kuugu jiro ama gacalkaa hakuu hayo. Is contrary to the article which emphasiezes unity and shuns division along any interest based grouping except Islam. In Somalia, this quote stands for tribalsim, most clan strongmen beleieve that the only way to guarantee their rights in Somalia is for them to rule the country. But, If Islam is the governing systmem of our country, everyone is represented, Allah made sure that this system includes everyone. Nur

Bixi bro. I am sure that you understand that whenever we Muslims mention that the Prophet SAWS used to do such and such it is meant to follow his Sunnah, not that we are equating anyone with thr prophet, I hope that we are both sincere to understand this, because only Allah knows what is in my mind and yours. So, the qustion is still unanswered, If the Prophet forgave his opponenents in the war, why shouldnt the ICU forgive their opponents as they follow the Prophets Sunnah ( his example) ? Let us assume your theory that the ICU is as bad as the Warlords. Here is my question: If two factions of warlords, one calling itself the ICU, and the other calling itself TFG have a conflict, and one faction declares that it will implement the Sharia and succeeds in a short time to make large portion of the country peaceful as witnessed by international observers, and the other faction resorts to seek military support from the enemy of the nation, Ethiopia. You have three choices: 1. Support ICU because they claim Islam and Somali unity, so someone who at least claims Islam is better than someone who is against Islam. 2. Support Ethiopian backed TFG because they are tribal organization, which is in the best interest of Ethiopia, otherwise it would not support it, and tribalism is better than Islam. 3. Dont support either group, just wait out and see who wins. Brother, you say that most of the warlord criminals are part of the ICU, please show me the following math: Total number of criminal warlords = X Number of warlords affiliated with ICU =Y Number of warlords affiliated with TFG = Z Y > Z Meaning Criminal warlords of ICU are greater than Criminal warlords of the TFG. You say that ICU leadership are not Islamically more eduacted, ethical and religious than the leadership of the TFG. If it is only my perception, could you please enlighten me with glaring examples of the contrary, I would be very thankful. I wrote: 3. The ICU stood for a principle, Islam, and refused to compromise, refused to sell Somalia to the Ethiopians. Can you say the same about the warlords? You answered: When did ICU do that? Didn’t they give Ethiopia the justification for coming into Somalia? I remember when of the ICU warlords declared Jihad on Ethiopia My answer: Brother cant you see how you contradict yourself? First you ask when did they do that? then you answer " They Declared Jihad on Ethiopia" Isnt Jihad an Islamic Principle to be declared when an enemy is in your country? Was the ICU who gave justification when they recognized the warlord governmenmt and asked the TFG presidnet to come to Mogadishu under their protection? didnt he refuse and insisted to come to Mogadishu aboard Ethiopian Helicopter protected by Ethiopian Army? You write: They ( ICU) displaced thousands from their homes, farms etc, just like those warlords. How are they different? Answer: That is correct, according to your History books, when the ICU came to power, thousands of people ran away from Mogadishu and the south, Mogadishu became unsafe to the point where the kind government of the TFG and the benevolent Ethiopian Army came to help the Somali people, gave many Somalians food and shelter and moved them to safe areas of the northeast, thanks, today, Mogadishu is so safe after the ICU were chased away by the heros of the TFG and the Ethiopians. You write: ICU is what it is -- USC with beard and every body know that. Answer: All of them? If indeed I was the ICU, I would have worked with the TFG, you see all of the warlords , both southerners and the Northeasterners are now working hand in hand. Why would ICU "warlords" risk fighting the mighty Ethiopian and American war machine without a principle that is much more powerful like a faith in Allah, when they can easily share the pie with their brother warlords? Like a faith? Nur

Umm Zakaria sis. I was having tea with an English brother who converted to Islam just an hour ago, the story of his conversion to Islam was indeed interesting, but to get to the point, what got him to accept Islam was his insisting to read the Quraan, no pamphlets, no visiting of Mosque, no dialogues, just the plain word of Allah. The brother confessed that the Quraan hit him hard, "I felt like God was talking to me without any intermediaries, I felt God was reading my inner thoughts and the verses were answering my questions, in eight days, I was ready to take my shahaada" he confided on me. Lesson learned in that story is to simply ask the sister to read the Quraan for a week and then get together for discussion of what she understood, chances are if she was trying to win you over to Christianity that she will be won over for Islam, so by all means continue your relationship with the woman, if Allah guides her through your efforts, it will be the best gift from Allah for the both of you. Her curiosity about your hair should not become an issue to divert her keen interest about Islam. in Islamic jurisprudence, the matter may have a way out, without violation from your part, as the protection of the soul ( her soul) has priority than the protection of modesty (yours). InshaAllah I will look this issue up and communicate with you my findings at the earliest time possible. Nur