Link: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25956.htm

Only a week after CNN's Octavia Nasr and the British ambassador to Beirut, Frances Guy, dared to suggest that Sayyed Hassan Fadlallah of Lebanon was a nice old chap rather than the super-terrorist the Americans have always claimed him to be, the grovelling began.

Link: http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-07-17/private-equity-group-buys-three-banks-as-u-s-failures-hit-96.html

North American Financial Holdings Inc., run by former Bank of America Corp. investment-banking head Gene Taylor, bought three lenders as U.S. failures this year rose to 96.

Link: http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/article.asp?ID=13068

The wider implications of this emptiness are only just starting to become clear. A Murdoch and Fleet Street veteran with whom I've been corresponding about the paywall reported to me on his recent conversation with an A-list entertainment publicist: "What was really interesting to me was that this person volunteered a blinding realization. 'Why would I get any of my clients to talk to the Times or the Sunday Times if they are behind a paywall? Who can see it? I can't even share a link and they aren't on search. It's as though their writers don't exist anymore.'"

Link: http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=300147

Hebron – Ma'an – Israeli forces fired percussion grenades directly at two journalists on Saturday, hitting them in the face and back during a Beit Ummar protest against continued land confiscations by a nearby Israeli settlement. A third photojournalist was physically assaulted by armed Israeli personnel, and was taken to hospital for treatment by Red Crescent Paramedics.

Link: http://www.meetup.com/WeSurroundThemGathering/messages/boards/thread/9437542

On Friday, the corporate media heralded the capping of BP’s Macondo well after 88 days of environmental disaster. “But after nearly three months of wall-to-wall coverage of top kills, junk shots, oiled plovers, and incinerated sea turtles, much of America outside the Gulf Coast has become less than riveted, offering up more an exhausted sigh of relief than a whoop of joy amid signs that cap on the undersea well is holding steady,” reports the Christian Science Monitor.

Link: http://dissidentvoice.org/2010/07/us-timber-demand-threatens-uncontacted-peruvian-tribe/

Illegal mahogany loggers are plundering uncontacted Indians’ land in the depths of the Peruvian Amazon, according to a new report by the Upper Amazon Conservancy (UAC). The report says the logging ‘provides evidence that Peru is failing to uphold the environmental and forestry obligations of its 2009

Link: http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/0717/cashstrapped-california-public-university-paid-75000-palin-speech/

Capping a long-running dispute, a cash-strapped California public university revealed Friday its foundation arm paid Sarah Palin $75,000 to give a 40-minute speech at a recent anniversary dinner for the campus.

Link: http://wsws.org/articles/2010/jul2010/econ-j17.shtml

US stocks plunged Friday after a spate of negative economic reports fueled fears of a sharp slowdown in economic growth. Stock prices were broadly lower in Asia and Europe, mainly in response to signs of renewed recession in the US, but American markets fell more dramatically.

Link: http://wsws.org/articles/2010/jul2010/stew-j17.shtml

In a new and vicious attack on Lynne Stewart, on July 15, Federal District Judge John G. Koeltl resentenced the disbarred civil liberties attorney to 10 years in prison on trumped-up charges of assisting terrorism. The charges arise out of her representation of a client in a terror-related case that dates back to 1995.

Link: http://www.alternet.org/media/147585/10_of_the_con_artists%27_favorite_ways_to_scam_the_elderly/

The older we get, the more attractive we become -- to fraudsters. Preying on those breakdowns that come with age, from hearing loss to loneliness, criminals tailor special scams with seniors in mind.

Link: http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/07/2010716153616990995.html

Chavez, the Venezuelan president, accuses the US of plotting with Colombia to ferment unrest... Venezuela has recalled its ambassador to Colombia, after Colombian officials accused Venezuela of hosting rebels on its territory. Nicolas Maduro, Venezuela's foreign minister, said on Friday that the ambassador was brought home for "consultations", in the most recent diplomatic spat between the two neighbors. Fourteen U.S. ships and seven thousand marines, are cruising from the Gulf and a postponed Israeli war with Iran, to Belize, a defenseless country without a military, supposedly to help in drug interdiction efforts? The real reason could be to threaten or attack Venezuela, which has the richest oil deposits on earth. Yesterday it was reported: Venezuela 'hosting Farc rebels' Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez cut ties with Colombia two years ago. Colombia's government says it has proof that Marxist fighters are hiding out in neighbouring Venezuela, a claim Venezuela strongly denied." Under America’s tutelage Colombia may be manufacturing the pretext for war with Venezuela as the U.S. military arrives just in time to help.