During a Hanukkah dinner speech delivered in December of 2005 hosted by Yeshiva University, Clinton prattled:

"I held a series of meetings with Israeli officials [last summer], including the prime minister and the foreign minister and the head of the [Israeli Defense Force] to discuss such challenges we confront.

"In each of these meetings, we talked at length about the dire threat posed by the potential of a nuclear-armed Iran, not only to Israel, but also to Europe and Russia.

"Just this week, the new president of Iran made further outrageous comments that attacked Israel's right to exist that are simply beyond the pale of international discourse and acceptability.

"During my meeting with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, I was reminded vividly of the threats that Israel faces every hour of every day ... It became even more clear how important it is for the United States to stand with Israel...”   more »

A Chinese-made computer desk that can be bought for 40 or 50 dollars at a U.S. or European retail store is likely to be the product of illegal clear-cutting in Indonesian rainforests.

Such clear-cutting not only fuels crime syndicates, it results in the loss of biodiversity, releases huge amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and drives indigenous people off their lands.

"We need to shift people to become environmentally and socially conscious consumers," said Tilford.

That means buying less stuff, and also being willing to spend more on products that are better for the environment or societies in other countries.   more »

On the cover of last week's issue of Newsweek you'll find the image of a young Middle Eastern boy with an automatic weapon. Above him are the words: "The Next Jihadists."

Inside, the article begins: "Ammar will tell you he's proud to be carrying a gun. His father was a brigadier in Saddam Hussein's Army, a man who saw combat in his country's several wars, and from an early age Ammar had accompanied him to the shooting range. 'I got used to the sound of guns then,' Ammar says."

Most Americans won't bother reading this or any other article. However, the cover image will be more than enough to provoke knee-jerk reactions about towelheads raising their kids to wage war.

Anyone who makes time to actually read the NewsWeak article might encounter this quote from Hassan Ali, a sociologist at the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs:

"These children will come to believe in the principles of force and violence. There's no question that society as a whole is going to feel the effects in the future."   more »

These news items - a random sample from the last few days - reflect a silly but increasingly common practice of referring to God as "Allah" when talking about Muslims.

There is no logical reason for this. Why use an Arabic word in English-language news reports when there is a perfectly good English word that means exactly the same thing?

Various Arabic words - "jihad" and "sheikh", for example - have crept into everyday usage because no precise equivalent exists in English, but "Allah" is not of that type.

It is simply is the normal word that Arabic speakers use for "God" - whether they are Muslims or not. Arab Christians worship "Allah" too, and the first verse of the Arabic Bible informs us that "In the beginning Allah created heaven and earth."   more »

As the war continues, the US military is finding it increasingly hard to meet enlistment targets. Spending on recruitment has risen several times to more than $1bn in the last twelve months.

Standards have been lowered too. The army is now enlisting men aged 40, paying recruitment bonuses of up to $40,000 and has lowered the mental threshold to "category three" which, according to Mr Wilkerson, is "one level above imbecility".

Some, including Charlie Rangel, a Democratic representative from Harlem, have even argued for a reinstatement of the draft to make recruitment fairer. Others argue for much larger incentives for graduates to enlist.

Cindy Sheehan, the celebrity anti-war activist whose son Casey was killed in Baghdad in 2004, says she is receiving a huge volume of emails from mothers worried their sons should not sign up.

"People are joining the military for economic reasons," said Mrs Sheehan, who is from Vacaville, California. "I call it the poverty draft."   more »

If one has ever looked at right-wing web sites or even American armed forces web sites, you may have come across a common epithet for Muslims that is routinely coined — ragheads.

This is akin to calling Native ‘Americans’ godless savages, African ‘Americans’ black as evil slaves, or Jewish ‘Americans’ Christ-killers; it demonizes the other making them readily susceptible targets for the young ignorant masses that comprise our Army and Marine recruits.

And once young minds are imbued with such racism, that is reinforced daily, there is never ever a time when they can be deprogrammed.

It took Hollywood and the general media, and a generation of Scofeld raised Bible-thumpers, generations to deprogram the American masses from anti-Semitic thinking, and outside a couple of extremist right-wing groups, if anyone so much as even questions American support of Israel they are tar and feathered (Mel Gibson), labeled anti-Semitic (John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt), and effectively ostracized (Judith Regan).   more »