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Thursday, September 20, 2007

The U.S. economy and its currency as an instrument of world trade has suffered a series of major setbacks in recent months. Some analysts say that the Federal Reserve‘s September 18^th dramatic rate cut to 4.75% from 5.25% may be a case of “too little, too late”, or that it was excessive and dooms the dollar.

Today, Saudi officials declined to cut interest rates in lockstep with the US Federal Reserve for the first time in decades. According to Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, International Business Editor for The Daily Telegraph, “it’s a signal that the oil-rich Gulf kingdom is preparing to break the dollar currency peg in a move that risks setting off a stampede out of the dollar across the Middle East.”

Hans Redeker, the Currency Chief at BNP Paribas, also stated today that Saudi Arabia’s move to not adjust their own interest rates in sync with the Fed’s cuts is a very dangerous situation for the US dollar. Redeker points out that “Saudi Arabia has $800bn (£400bn) in their future generation fund, and the entire region has $3,500bn under management. They face an inflationary threat and do not want to import an interest rate policy set for the recessionary conditions in the United States.”

Saudi central bank officials said that “appropriate measures” would be taken to stop the large capital inflows into the country. The Federal Reserve’s half-point rate cut has already caused a plunge in the world dollar index to a fifteen-year low, reaching the weakest level ever against the Euro at just under $1.40.

The Fed hopes that by making it cheaper to borrow, people will start spending and investing more. However, some analysts fear the cut will worsen inflation, making it harder to get personal loans, and further decrease confidence in the dollar around the world. There are already signs that global investors have started rejecting U.S. Treasury securities, and recent U.S. government data on foreign holdings show a decline in purchases of US securities from $97bn to just $19bn in July.

In response to Ben Bernanke‘s statements today about a potential mortgage and housing market crisis, CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer said, “If adjustable mortgage rates go up, people may not be able to afford their mortgage payments.” Former Federal Reserve chief Alan Greenspan said earlier this week that housing prices may fall by “double digits” as the subprime crisis bites harder, prompting households to cut back sharply on spending.

Jim Rogers, the economic commentator and former partner of George Soros, stated, “If Ben Bernanke starts running those printing presses even faster than he’s already doing, we are going to have a serious recession. The dollar’s going to collapse, the bond market’s going to collapse. There’s going to be a lot of problems.”

In recent months, the U.S. dollar has taken several other significant hits including Kuwait’s decision in May to also break its dollar peg, and threats by China to interfere with the U.S. economy, calling it their nation’s “nuclear option”. According to public sources, the Chinese government has begun a concerted campaign of economic threats against the United States, hinting that it may liquidate its vast holding of US treasuries if Washington imposes trade sanctions that seek to force a Yuan revaluation.

Saturday, April 17, 2010

Journalist, counselor, painter, and US 2012 Presidential candidate Joe Schriner of Cleveland, Ohio took some time to discuss his campaign with Wikinews in an interview.

Schriner previously ran for president in 2000, 2004, and 2008, but failed to gain much traction in the races. He announced his candidacy for the 2012 race immediately following the 2008 election. Schriner refers to himself as the “Average Joe” candidate, and advocates a pro-life and pro-environmentalist platform. He has been the subject of numerous newspaper articles, and has published public policy papers exploring solutions to American issues.

Wikinews reporter William Saturn? talks with Schriner and discusses his campaign.

Sunday, July 8, 2007

Since last Tuesday, following violent confrontations with Pakistan’s army, up to 1800 clerics and students are still holed up in Islamabad’s Red Mosque. Clashes began last week following mounting antagonism between the mosques hard-line leaders and the government lead by President Pervez Musharraf.

The mosque has been accused of enforcing its own Islamic law in the capital, notably the illegal detention of Chinese foreign nationals working in massage parlors.

20 people have been reported killed over the past six days, which have seen multiple gun battles and demolition of the mosques exterior walls. Currently, there seems little chance of a negotiated resolution. A delegation of Islamic leaders were refused access, and the mosques leader Abdul Rashid Ghazi has declared suicide a favourable option to surrender.

The mosques leaders follow the Hanafi school of thought, believing that the Koran is the authority by which justice should be metered. Historically the mosque has had close links with the Pakistan leadership, and members of the current administration have resisted calls for a crackdown on the mosques provocative behaviour.

The stand-off represents a decisive ideological challenge to the president who is walking a fine-line between Islamic extremists at home and foreign pressure to crack-down on militancy in the lawless tribal regions.

Saturday, March 26, 2005

Beijing’s city legislature has approved a bill, one year in the making, to safeguard the historical and cultural heritage of old Beijing. The new 41-article set of regulations will come into effect May 1, requiring the city to protect listed heritage sites and unlisted sites deemed of historical or cultural value. It also guarantees protection for the area within the city’s Second Ring Road.

Director of the Beijing Administrative Bureau of Cultural Heritage, Mei Ninghua, said “the most encouraging content of the regulations is that Beijing will pay more attention to protecting the old city’s landscape in its entirety, rather than just focussing on scattered heritage sites.” This means the old city layout, colours of buildings, and the names of houses and lanes will have legal protection.

“We took measures to protect the city’s siheyuan courtyard houses by tagging protection plates on more than 650 of them in 2003, preventing them from being demolished or damaged during the city’s massive housing reconstruction projects,” said Mei.

“Now the new regulations give legal buttress to the protection of siheyuan courtyard homes, as well as other unmovable ancient treasures, that have yet to be listed but are at risk of being demolished during urban renovation.”

Modern Beijing, capital of China for 850 years, was built by Mongul Emporer Kublai Khan in 1267 AD. In the vicinity of the current city once was Ji (?), the capital of the State of Yan (?), a power of the Warring States Period – but it has been lost in the mists of time.

Monday, December 19, 2005

A Virginia recreation and fishing boat launch on the James River near the Dominion Virginia Power plant at Dutch Gap is the scene of too many Black Vultures, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Virginia Department of Inland Game and Fisheries.

In 2002, more than 350 Black vultures were killed at Dutch Gap in an effort to reduce their numbers to a level of a couple dozen birds. But they made a quick come back in the area, and during this past week a hundred of the birds have been disposed of by a shot to their head with a pellet gun.

The USDA reports that both Black Vultures (Coragyps atratus), along with their close relatives called the Turkey Vulture (Cathartes aura), are experiencing population increases stretching well over the last 10 years.

The species is increasingly a problem by growing into being a nuisance, as well as a threat to health and safety concerns. The presence of the birds in large numbers, at places they roost, can cause damage to property as they peck and claw at construction surfaces, and cause unsanitary human health conditions from the defecation and regurgitation of the birds. Their presense at landfills, often in near proximity to airports, is a problem for airplanes during take-off and landing.

At the entrance to the Dutch Gap boat launch parking lot, a large yellow warning sign is posted that reads: “Please be aware of possible damage to vehicles and trailers due to the large Black Vulture population currently inhabiting this parking area. Because the Black Vulture is a federally protected species, Chesterfield County is working with the U.S. Deptartment of Agriculture and the Virginia Department of Inland Games and Fisheries to resolve the problem. You can help by disposing of all litter (even non-food items such as cigarette butts) in trash barrels. Thank you for your cooperation.” The vultures reportedly perch on vehicles and scratch the paint, and for some reason are going after windshield wiper blades.

Vultures have shown an ability to adapt to residential and business settings. The bird, with a 4-foot adult wing span, can be seen gliding through the air at virtually any time of day in Chesterfield and Prince George counties in central Virginia.

Wednesday, July 6, 2005

File:European-parliament-strasbourg.jpg

The European Parliament has rejected the directive on the patentability of computer-implemented inventions (software patent directive) sustained by lobbies of large software publicists such as the corporations Microsoft, Siemens, Nokia and Alcatel, grouped under the title of the European Information & Communications Technology Industry Association (EICTA, [1]). The directive involved the granting of software patents.

648 MEPs out of 680 rejected the text, 18 voted for and 14 abstained.

A rejection vote became the expected outcome when the European People’s Party, initially in favour of the directive, decided to reject it.

The European Greens, Socialist Group and European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party also voted for rejection of the directive for heterogeneous reason. Michel Rocard, author of a number of amendments to the original directive, said that the majority of the modifications were unlikely to be supported by the Commission and Council, with whom the Parliament would have had to enter a Conciliation procedure if it had voted for maintaining the directive in moditifed form. “Better have no text at all than a bad one”, he added.

Before the vote, Rocard pointed at the irritation of the Parliament towards the Commission: “There is collective anger throughout the Parliament because of the way the directive was handled by the Commission and the Council”.

During the debate on Tuesday, Commissioner Joaquín Almunia told MEPs: “Should you decide to reject the common position, the Commission will not submit a new proposal.”.

The rejection was welcomed by small and medium software companies, as well as by Free Software supporters. The Directive had been subject to an intense campaigning, within the Parliament, in the news media and on the Internet. The supporters of the Council position appear to have spent several ten millions, hiring prestigious PR agencies with at least 30-40 lobbyists who roamed the halls of the Parliament every day for 3 months, and many full-page advertisements in EU newspapers such as European Voice, EU Reporter etc. The opponents of software patentability (that is supporters of the position taken by the European Parliament in its 1st reading of 24 September 2003), coordinated under the roof of the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure (FFII), also had several lobbyists stationed in Brussels, conducted several conferences and demonstrations and published some newspaper advertisements, with a total budget of nearly 100,000 eur apart from countless unpaid working hours of a dedicated supporter base, consisting mainly of programmers and software entrepreneurs.