Obama to Seal US-UN Relationship

From the Financial Times
By Harvey Morris

Barack Obama will cement the new co-operative relationship between the US and the United Nations this month when he becomes the first American president to chair its 15-member Security Council.

The topic for the summit-level session of the council on September 24 is nuclear non-proliferation and nuclear disarmament – one of several global challenges that the US now wants to see addressed at a multinational level.

“The council has a very important role to play in preventing the spread and use of nuclear weapons, and it’s the world’s principal body for dealing with global security cooperation,” Susan Rice, US envoy to the UN, said last week.

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Listening to a Liar

From OneNewsNow
By Thomas Sowell

The most important thing about what anyone says are not the words themselves but the credibility of the person who says them.

The words of convicted swindler Bernie Madoff were apparently quite convincing to many people who were regarded as knowledgeable and sophisticated. If you go by words, you can be led into anything.

No doubt millions of people will be listening to the words of President Barack Obama Wednesday night when he makes a televised address to a joint session of Congress on his medical care plans. But, if they think that the words he says are what matters, they can be led into something much worse than being swindled out of their money.

One plain fact should outweigh all the words of Barack Obama and all the impressive trappings of the setting in which he says them: He tried to rush Congress into passing a massive government takeover of the nation's medical care before the August recess -- for a program that would not take effect until 2013!

Whatever President Obama is, he is not stupid. If the urgency to pass the medical care legislation was to deal with a problem immediately, then why postpone the date when the legislation goes into effect for years -- more specifically, until the year after the next presidential election?

If this is such an urgently needed program, why wait for years to put it into effect? And if the public is going to benefit from this, why not let them experience those benefits before the next presidential election?

If it is not urgent that the legislation goes into effect immediately, then why don't we have time to go through the normal process of holding congressional hearings on the pros and cons, accompanied by public discussions of its innumerable provisions? What sense does it make to "hurry up and wait" on something that is literally a matter of life and death?

If we do not believe that the president is stupid, then what do we believe? The only reasonable alternative seems to be that he wanted to get this massive government takeover of medical care passed into law before the public understood what was in it. Moreover, he wanted to get re-elected in 2012 before the public experienced what its actual consequences would be.

Unfortunately, this way of doing things is all too typical of the way this administration has acted on a wide range of issues.

Consider the "stimulus" legislation. Here the administration was successful in rushing a massive spending bill through Congress in just two days -- after which it sat on the president's desk for three days, while he was away on vacation. But, like the medical care legislation, the "stimulus" legislation takes effect slowly.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that it will be September 2010 before even three-quarters of the money will be spent. Some economists expect that it will not all be spent by the end of 2010.

What was the rush to pass it, then? It was not to get that money out into the economy as fast as possible. It was to get that money -- and the power that goes with it -- into the hands of the government. Power is what politics is all about.

The worst thing that could happen, from the standpoint of those seeking more government power over the economy, would be for the economy to begin recovering on its own while months were being spent debating the need for a "stimulus" bill. As the president's chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, said, you can't let a crisis "go to waste" when "it's an opportunity to do things you could not do before."

There are lots of people in the Obama administration who want to do things that have not been done before -- and to do them before the public realizes what is happening.

The proliferation of White House "czars" in charge of everything from financial issues to media issues is more of the same circumvention of the public and of the Constitution. Czars don't have to be confirmed by the Senate, the way Cabinet members must be, even though czars may wield more power, so you may never know what these people are like, until it is too late.

What Barack Obama says Wednesday night is not nearly as important as what he has been doing -- and how he has been doing it.

Dramatic Standoff at U.S. Department of Education as Six D.C. School Voucher Backers Block Doorway-Demand Obama Action on School Choice

In a dramatic act of civil disobedience today, six national education leaders blocked the main entrance of the U.S. Department of Education in an effort to protect the endangered Washington, D.C. school voucher program. The protesters refused to leave the premises for nearly an hour, leading to a standoff with police. Apparently on orders from federal officials, no arrests were made.

The individuals blocking entrance to the building were: former Democratic D.C. Councilman Kevin P. Chavous, longtime D.C. education activist and executive director of DC Parents for School Choice Virginia Walden Ford, the Rev. Anthony Motley, Black Alliance for Educational (BAEO) Board Chair Dr. Howard Fuller, BAEO President Gerard Robinson, and education reform leader Darrell Allison.

The protesters-who sought to block the entrance of the Department because "the President and the Secretary have blocked low-income parents from accessing the schools of their parents` choice"-were cheered on by 50 families and supporters.

Hailed by reformers across the country, the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program serves 1,700 low-income, mostly African American, students in Washington, D.C. Two hundred and sixteen students who were offered scholarships last year had them revoked by Secretary Duncan in the Spring, leaving parents in the lurch.

"Two weeks ago, it became painfully clear that the Obama administration was not going to allow 216 previously accepted children to enroll in schools of their choice through the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program (OSP)," Chavous said. "As much as I support our President and Education Secretary Arne Duncan, this action reeks with hypocrisy. As a result, we decided to engage in an act of civil disobedience. For years, many of us in the education reform movement have
been saying that the right to a quality education is the social justice and civil rights issue of our time. I believe that we need to match that rhetoric with direct action."

"President Obama and Secretary Duncan must stop ducking this issue and answer immediately why it makes sense to deprive low-income kids of the opportunity to go to better schools. As a product himself of private school scholarships, the president`s actions are bizarre and misguided," said Walden Ford. "The bottom line is that it is morally wrong to block low-income children from attending great schools, and this Administration knows it."

"I am proud to stand in solidarity with low-income D.C. parents and their children who are being disenfranchised by this Administration`s failure to fully support the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program," said Dr. Fuller. "If the President and Secretary Duncan want to keep their promise of `funding what works, regardless of ideology,` it`s time to walk the talk and stand up for a program that gives low income students in D.C. a way to seek a viable educational future."

Israeli Pro-Life Organization Warns of Demographic Threat to Nation's Survival

From LifeSiteNews
By Thaddeus M. Baklinski

EFRAT, an Israeli pro-life organization that works with women contemplating abortion by providing emotional and material support, is warning that the demographic implications of abortion in the nation are the greatest danger to Israel today.

"Israel has lost more than one and a half million Jewish children to abortion since 1948. In a country of about 5.5 million Jews this number has great demographic significance. Imagine how much stronger Israel would have been today with one million more Jews," a statement from Efrat says.

Over 50,000 abortions are performed yearly in Israel, according to Dr. Eli Schussheim, director of Efrat.

"The Arab birthrate is about double the Jewish birth rate of 2.3. It is forecasted that the Arabs will be the majority in Israel by the year 2020," Dr. Schussheim said.

An article in the Jerusalem Post says that the demographic threat is both an external and internal problem: "nearly four million Palestinians over whom we have no wish to rule, and a rapidly growing and increasingly irredentist Israeli Arab population."

"Arabs constitute 20 percent of the population," the article explains, "and the Arab population is much younger than the Jewish population - half of the Israeli Arabs are under 18; only one-third of the Jews are - and has a birthrate twice that of the Jewish population."

Pointing to the demographic collapse of ethnic Europeans in the face of rising growth rates of Muslin families in the EU, the Jerusalem Post warns, "Demographically, Israel's situation is even worse than that of Western Europe, which, at current rates of growth, will have a Muslim majority by the end of the 21-century."

An interesting comparison is made by Efrat that in an average week in Israel, nine people are killed in road accidents, one Israeli is murdered by terrorists, but over 900 babies are lost to abortion, mainly due to economic concerns.

Dr. Schussheim says that over 25,000 mothers have been helped to bring their children to birth by Efrat over the years by the simple method of providing economic and emotional support to women considering abortion because of financial reasons.

Mothers are offered infant equipment and necessities, grocery vouchers for six months prior to birth and six months thereafter, and personal social and emotional support by one of 3000 Efrat volunteers.

"In the over 25,000 cases Efrat has supported over the past 30 years, I have yet to meet the first mother who told me she is sorry to have her child alive and well in her home," Dr. Schussheim said.

Student Discovers Fragment of World's Oldest Bible

From Catholic World News

Nikolas Sarris, a 30-year-old doctoral student, has discovered an additional fragment of the world’s oldest Bible in the binding of an eighteenth-century book at St. Catherine’s Monastery at Mount Sinai. The bulk of the Codex Sinaiticus, which dates from A.D. 350, was discovered at the monastery in the nineteenth century.

Source(s): these links will take you to other sites, in a new window.

• Fragment from world's oldest Bible found hidden in Egyptian monastery (The Independent)
• Codex Sinaiticus (Official website)
• Codex Sinaiticus (Wikipedia)

Swiss Topple U.S. As Most Competitive Economy: WEF

From Reuters

Switzerland knocked the United States off the position as the world's most competitive economy as the crash of the U.S. banking system left it more exposed to some long-standing weaknesses, a report said on Tuesday.

The World Economic Forum's global competitiveness report 2009/2010 showed economies with a large focus on financial services such as the U.S., Britain or Iceland were the losers of the crisis.

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Obama's Speech to Children is a Seriously Flawed Civics Lesson

Whether done by Democrats or Republicans, it is inappropriate for the President of the United States to use the nation's schoolchildren as political props or junior lobbyists.

It is not surprising that millions of Americans are suspicious of the President's intent in the address he will deliver today from Wakefield High School in Arlington, Virginia. Americans resent this intrusion into their children's education because the teaching materials prepared by the U. S. Department of Education, withdrawn or not, reveal the President's intent. Those materials do not ask students how they might improve their grades, they ask how each student might help Obama. That this administration has undertaken one of the largest, unconstitutional power-grabs in U.S. history, only adds to the suspicion.

Certainly, government has an interest in a well-formed, educated citizenry. Government has an interest in a safe, high quality, and secure food supply also; but they don't (at least not yet) propose to collectivize the farms. The ultimate authorities over schooling in the United States are known as "chief state school officers," and those are state officials. But even that degree of government involvement in education is a recent phenomenon. The Cato Institute describes how schooling in the United States has evolved from a responsibility of families, churches, and local communities:

"Many people do not realize that for most of American history— from the early Colonial period through the end of the Civil War— not only was there no federal involvement in education, there was comparatively little state or local government involvement, either.

One sign of centralization is the migration of school financing from the local to the state and federal levels. In 1930 only 0.4 percent of funding for education came from the federal government, 17 percent from state governments, and 83 percent from local sources. By 1997 the federal government provided 7 percent of all funding, state governments’ contributions had ballooned to 48 percent, and the local government share had shrunk to 45 percent. Also by 1997, schools in 35 states received less than half of their revenues from local taxes.

In 1930 there were 262,000 government schools in America— one for every 470 people. Today those schools have been reduced to only 90,000 for a population more than twice as large— roughly one school for every 3,055 people. With the closing of small schools came the opening of large school districts. In 1932 there were 127,531 school districts nationwide. By 1994 only 14,881 school districts remained.

But long before the federal government got heavily involved in education, young America had waged a successful revolution against a titanic empire and founded a unique republic based on individual rights and responsibility. Alexis de Tocqueville would describe the ordinary citizens as the best educated in history."

As government's role has increased in education, schools and districts have become fewer and larger, and government regulation has made them more uniform, less personal, "one-size-fits-all " institutions. They have become less accountable to families for success, and more accountable to government for compliance, and everywhere throughout the nation, in rich districts and poor, the literacy and student achievement that awed de Tocqueville, has seriously declined. Today, government schools are mediocre at best. In many cities and states, including South Carolina, more than half of all students entering high school fail to graduate.

Americans would rightly resist government ownership of the nation's news media. We would not want politicians to control our access to information and be able to influence what Americans think. And yet we allow government to form the nation's children during the twelve most important years of their lives.

Socialized education has not worked any better than socialized health care will work. The President's address to the nation's schoolchildren starts the academic year with a seriously wrong civics lesson -- that the federal government, much less the President of the United States, has a role in education. America does not need more government involvement in education; it needs far less.