Link: http://news.yahoo.com/chinas-hu-urges-navy-prepare-combat-160509787.html%CA

Chinese President Hu Jintao on Tuesday urged the navy to prepare for military combat, amid growing regional tensions over maritime disputes and a US campaign to assert itself as a Pacific power. Chinese President Hu Jintao on Tuesday urged the navy to prepare for military combat, amid growing regional tensions over maritime disputes and a US campaign to assert itself as a Pacific power.

Link: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article29907.htm

The first thing to note about the Gutman affair – which has now prompted Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich, as well as pundits at Commentary and elsewhere to call for his firing – is that the initial reaction was based on a woefully inaccurate account of his remarks. Gutman was paraphrased by the Israeli news outlet Ynet as saying, “A distinction should be made between traditional anti-Semitism, which should be condemned, and Muslim hatred for Jews, which stems from the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.”

Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail/214086.html

Interview with Phillip Giraldi, former CIA officer, in Washington. A former CIA officer believes the White House has no interest in a war with Iran and so Israel is now marketing a 'mindset change' to the American people.

Link: http://www.alternet.org/teaparty/153289/the_sick_social_darwinism_driving_modern_republicans/

They say they want a smaller government but that can’t be it. Most seek a larger national defense and more muscular homeland security. Almost all want to widen the government’s powers of search and surveillance inside the United States – eradicating possible terrorists, expunging undocumented immigrants, “securing” the nation’s borders. They want stiffer criminal sentences, including broader application of the death penalty. Many also want government to intrude on the most intimate aspects of private life. They call themselves conservatives but that’s not it, either.

Link: http://www.alternet.org/story/153332/seven_diseases_big_pharma_hopes_you_get_in_2012/

Supply-driven marketing not only turns the nation into pill-popping hypochondriacs, it distracts from Pharma's drought of real drugs for real medical problems. It used to be joked that a consultant is someone who borrows your watch to tell you what time it is. These days, the opportunist is Big Pharma, which raises your insurance premiums and taxes while providing you "low-priced" drugs that you paid for.