Palin's Obama Claims 'Offensive'

The gloves have well and truly come off in the US presidential race after Sarah Palin accused Barack Obama of associating with terrorists.

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin

The Democrat's campaign team described the comments as "offensive" but said they were not surprising.

Mrs Palin, the Republican vice presidential nominee, made the remarks during a speech to supporters at a fundraiser in Colorado.

She said Obama "is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect that he's palling around with terrorists who would target their own country".

The Alaska Governor was referring to William Ayers, a member of the radical 1960s group the Weathermen who placed bombs at the Pentagon and the Capitol.

He reportedly supported Mr Obama's first run for public office in 1995.

The Obama campaign described Mrs Palin's guilt-by-association attack as "desperate and false".

Campaign spokesman Hari Sevugan said the accusation was part of the McCain/Palin ticket's newly aggressive "come-from-behind" strategy with only a month left before the vote.

Democrat supporters display their disdain for Sarah Palin

He said:"Governor Palin's comments, while offensive, are not surprising, given the McCain campaign's statement this morning that they would be launching Swiftboat-like attacks in hopes of deflecting attention from the nation's economic ills."

Republicans have promised to ramp up the rhetoric ahead of the November 4 election in a bid to arrest Senator McCain's recent dip in the polls following his role in delays to the $700bn economic bail-out.

On Friday, his top adviser Greg Strimple promised a "very aggressive last 30 days" of campaigning.

"We are looking forward to turning a page on this financial crisis and getting back to discussing Mr Obama's aggressively liberal record and how he will be too risky for Americans," he told reporters.

Genesis 2:24 (New International Version)

Arizona is yet another state that will attempt to amend its constitution to protect the traditional view of marriage.

For the second time in two years, Arizona voters have been asked to approve a constitutional definition of marriage. Kathy Herrod of the Center for Arizona Policy was asked about the need, since there is already a state law declaring the same thing.
 
"We all know there's a difference between a state law and a constitutional amendment. A state law can easily be changed, either by the politicians or by the judges," Herrod contends. "A constitutional amendment in Arizona is necessary to prevent what we just saw happen in California, where the people approved a state law defining marriage and the judges overturned it."
 
Homosexual groups are getting a large amount of out-of-state money to finance their campaign to vote against an amendment, according to Herrod. "Certainly all or most of our funding is coming from Arizonans who simply want to stand for marriage and define marriage as a union between one man and one woman," she says.
 
Herrod expects a tough battle in the coming weeks because activists are gaining strength, but she believes traditional marriage will be victorious this time.

GRAND BLANC TOWNSHIP, Mich. -- A massive pumpkin has gone missing from a front yard of a home in suburban Flint, Mich. -- and its owner suspects some mighty strong thieves.

The Flint Journal reports Thursday the 450-pound pumpkin had been on display for only a day at the Grand Blanc Township home of Bill Teer. He spent five months growing the Atlantic Giant.

Teer is offering $200 for the pumpkin's return. He figures someone must have seen it -- or at least the small team required to steal the colossal squash.

Exodus International, the largest Christian outreach to those affected by unwanted same-sex attraction, has launched a new Web site for youth.

ExodusYouth.net is designed to meet the needs of a new generation seeking biblical answers about sexuality. 

Mike Ensley, a youth analyst for Exodus, said young people are eager to discuss issues surrounding sexuality and faith but don’t feel they have a safe outlet to ask questions.

"It's no secret that young people today are more confused than ever about issues surrounding sexuality and faith," he said. "This Web site is a place where they can find an alternative response to the culture's dead-beat message that sex is shallow and gender is meaningless."

The Web site features articles, resources and testimonials, and also provides a section for youth workers and parents.

FOR MORE INFORMATION
Visit ExodusYouth.net.

— Devon Williams

By Drew Zahn
© 2008 WorldNetDaily

Philip J. Berg

The man suing Sen. Barack Obama and the Democratic National Committee for proof of Obama's American citizenship is outraged that his own party – rather than just providing the birth certificate he seeks – would step in to silence him by filing a motion to dismiss his lawsuit.

As WND reported, prominent Pennsylvania Democrat and attorney Philip J. Berg filed suit in U.S. District Court two months ago claiming Obama is not a natural-born U.S. citizen and therefore not eligible to be elected president. Berg has since challenged Obama publicly that if the candidate will simply produce authorized proof of citizenship, he'll drop the suit.

Berg told WND the longer the DNC tries to ignore his lawsuit or make it go away – instead of just providing the documents – the more convinced he is that his accusations are correct.

Despite assertions by the Washington Post, FactChecker.org and other organizations that Obama has produced a certified Hawaiian birth certificate, Berg told WND he remains "99.99 percent sure" that the certificate is a fake and he wants a court, not a website, to determine its validity.

Earlier last week, lawyers for Obama and the DNC filed a joint motion to dismiss Berg's lawsuit. The fact that the DNC joined in the dismissal request has Berg fuming, believing his party's leaders have ignored his pleas for proof in order to favor their chosen candidate over a rank-and-file constituent.

"I think it's outrageous," Berg said. "The Democratic National Committee should be ensuring the Democratic Party and the public that they have a qualified candidate up there. To file a joint motion is like they're in cahoots.

"Since then, I have asked by way of press release that Howard Dean resign, because (the DNC members) are not fulfilling their duties," Berg said.

"The DNC has a responsibility to all Democrats in this country to make sure that all of their candidates are properly vetted and properly qualified," Berg added. "I think it's really an outrage to the 18-plus million people who voted for Obama and the people who donated more than $425 million to him under false pretenses."

Berg is frustrated, not only with his own party's leadership for allegedly not investigating Obama's background, but also with the major news outlets for failing as well.

"I should also be suing the national media and their disgrace for not properly vetting, inspecting or checking on Barack Obama.

"Look what they're doing to Governor Palin: They're opening up her closet doors, they're going through everything personal, but no one has ever gone after Obama. It doesn't make sense," Berg said.

Obama's website counters Berg's claims with links to articles that affirm the validity of his citizenship and an image of a Hawaiian birth certificate for Barack Hussein Obama, born in Honolulu, Aug. 4, 1961. The webpage is part of the Obama campaign website's "Fight the Smears" section, an effort to prevent reports that Obama claims are false from disseminating as damaging rumors.

Berg acknowledges that as long as his lawsuit remains outstanding, the public will talk, and he told WND he wants Obama to quickly prove him wrong or the court to quickly prove him right.

"I've been on about 50 radio shows around the country," Berg said, "and on every one I've put out a challenge: Barack Obama, if I'm wrong, just come forth with certified copies of these documents and I'll close down the case."

Berg told WND, "I've had 19 million hits on my website. …Those people talk to other people, now we're up to 20, 30, 40 million people who are aware of this controversy, and it's going to drastically affect the entire election."

When asked what he would do if the DNC succeeded in getting his case dismissed, Berg said he would "immediately file an appeal to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, and if we don't get a fair ruling there, immediately to the U.S. Supreme Court."

"We're dealing with the U.S. Constitution and it must be followed," Berg explained. "I want the Constitution enforced; that's my main reason for doing this.

"The real outrage is that there's nothing in our system that provides that a candidate must provide that his qualifications are true and correct before he or she runs, and that safeguard should be put into our system by law," Berg said.

Women who took on the Taliban – and lost

AFP

Safia Amajan, who fought for education for women. Murdered in Kandahar

It was another murder among so many in the bloody conflict in Afghanistan – a senior police officer gunned down by the Taliban. But the death of Malalai Kakar this week has removed a brave and dedicated champion of oppressed women; it has raised the fears of other women in public life that they too have, in effect, been sentenced to death.

Of five prominent women interviewed three years ago by The Independent for an article on post-Taliban female emancipation, three, including Ms Kakar, are dead and a fourth has had to flee after narrowly escaping assassination in an ambush in which her husband was killed.

Religious fundamentalists are waging a ruthless campaign to eliminate women who have taken up high-profile jobs. Parliamentarians, schoolteachers, civil servants, security officials and women journalists have been selected for attacks by the jihadists. Countless others have been maimed and murdered in villages where the vengeful Taliban have returned to impose the old order.

In the case of Malalai Kakar, the most prominent policewoman in Afghanistan, an additional "crime" which sealed her fate was that she was a determined and effective campaigner for women's rights. Commander Kakar, 40, knew her work made her a Taliban target. She led a unit of 10 policewomen specialising in domestic violence cases. She was uncompromising with suspected abusers, men who in the past had relied on male police officers to turn a blind eye.

"I've been accused of being rough with husbands who beat up their wives" she said. "But I'm angry, we try to apply the law in the right way and the constitution is supposed to protect women's rights."

Kakar liked to cook breakfast for her husband and six children before going to work, she told me. She would spend a long time saying her farewell because, she said, she could never be sure what would happen. Her 15-year-old son was with her when she was killed last weekend. She carried a pistol under the burqa she wore to work, so as not to be recognised, before changing into uniform. But she had no chance to defend herself, or him, against the two motorcycle assassins.

Like Kakar, Shaima Rezayee was one of those who believed in a brave new world for Afghan women. After five years of burqa-wearing under Taliban rule, the bubbly 24-year-old presented a popular music show called Hop on the independent channel Tolo TV and helped run schemes to promote women in the media. When I asked for her help in preparing the article, however, she was already pessimistic. "Things are not getting better," she cautioned. "We made some gains, but there are a lot of people who want to take it all back. They are not even the Taliban, they are here in Kabul."

She was having her own problems, the station was being condemned for allowing her, a female in Western clothes and make-up to talk freely to men on the programme. Eventually she was dismissed after pressure from conservative clerics of the National Ulema Council who accused Tolo of "broadcasting music, naked dance and foreign films". In particular, they picked out Shaima's programme for criticism. There was no support from the police who declared that they may not be able to protect her.

Shaima was angry. "The bad days are coming back, we'll have to go into exile again", she said. Soon afterwards rumours began to appear that she had been killed. Tolo offered to broadcast an interview. "But they wanted to do it on radio, not TV," she laughed. "The religious people might get offended even if they saw me for five minutes."

Shaima was gunned down at her home near Kabul's diplomatic quarters. Her killers, said the police, appeared to have been people she had known as they did not have to force their way into the house.

Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban, is the scene of particular brutality towards women. "It is much worse down there than it is for us here [in Kabul], you must go down there," Shaima had said previously. One woman who worked tirelessly for women in Kandahar was Safia Amajan, 65, who stayed behind during the dark days of Taliban rule to teach girls in lessons held in secret. After the US-led invasion of 2001, she volunteered to work for the new government with great success, opening schools and workshops where at least 1,000 women learned to make and sell their goods at the market.

Amajan, or "dear aunt" as the girls she taught called her, survived the Taliban by learning the Koran by heart. But she was always independent, refusing a marriage arranged by her father and then eventually choosing her own husband, an educated and wholly supportive colonel in the army.

The couple lived on the outskirts of Kandahar, where she described, without any drama, the struggle of life for women under the Taliban. "Those of us who are around now are very lucky," she said. "There were others, very brave, who also tried to make things better for young girls through education and teaching them skills. They were caught and they suffered."

Amajan was killed in September 2006. Her husband had walked her to the main road where she was to be picked up by a taxi to be taken to work. Two young men approached on a motorcycle and one of them opened fire with a Kalashnikov. A Taliban commander, Mullah Hayat Khan, announced that she had been "executed" for defying orders to stop working.

I met the two men arrested for her murder last year at the Sarposa prison in Kandahar. They were in their early 20s, dishevelled and craven, repeatedly claiming that they were in danger from their own side as well as the authorities. They had killed Safia, they said, in return for $5,000 offered by a mullah in Pakistan. The men were caught when the mullah wanted proof that they had carried out their task and they attempted, by night, to dig up the body for a lock of hair.

Kakar had long been a friend of Amajan and threw herself into the hunt for her killers. "They would not have been caught if they had not tried to disturb Safia's body," she said at her office in the central police station. "I do not trust myself to be in the same cell as those men. They murdered someone who was old enough to be their grandmother. They murdered someone who has done so much for Kandaharis... so much for Afghanistan."

"She was this wonderful person we heard about growing up in Kandahar," she said. "I made a point of meeting her and I took guidance from her."

Amajan and Kakar used to work closely with a woman MP in Kandahar, Zarghuna Kakar (no relation). Ms Kakar, 36, has now fled her home after she and her family were attacked in a market. Her husband, Mohammed Nasir, was killed in the attack.

Before the shooting, Ms Kakar had repeatedly pleaded for security. At one point she turned in desperation to Ahmed Wali Karzai, the brother of the Afghan President and a prominent figure in Kandahar. "He told me there was nothing he could do," she recalled. "He also said that I should have thought about what may happen before I stood for election. But it was his brother, the Americans and the British who told us that we women should get involved in political life. Of course, now I wish I hadn't. If only I knew what would happen."

Ms Kakar fled to Kabul with her family. We met in a cold, dark hotel room. She worries constantly about the dangers. "I eventually managed to meet President Karzai. He told me to go back to Kandahar and he would make sure the governor provided us with bodyguards. But the governor has no men to spare." The lack of official protection for women from either the Afghan government or Western forces is a source of bitter complaint among those who now find themselves under threat from Islamist zealots.

Now, with the Taliban mounting audacious attacks just on the outskirts of Kabul and President Karzai's government engaged in negotiations with the Taliban and other Islamist groups, women who have the means to get away are planning possible escape routes. Foreign embassies report an increase in visa applications from educated, professional women.

Captain Jamilla Mujahid Barzai is staying on with Kandahar police to continue her murdered boss's work. She left the police force after witnessing an infamous Taliban execution of a woman at Kabul's football stadium, a judicial killing which was filmed and shown later around the world as an example of the savagery of the time. "I knew the prisoner, I shall never forget the way she died... There was nothing I could do, so I left the police. It is most important that now women try to get to positions of power to stop things like that happening again. It is dangerous. But we cannot go back to those days again."

A best-selling author and former political consultant has created a test that is designed to help people decide if they really should vote for Barack Obama in the upcoming election.

Bradley O'Leary is the former president of the American Association of Political Consultants and the author of 11 books. His latest work is called The Audacity of Deceit: Barack Obama's War on American Values, which he claims he wrote for personal reasons.
 
"I basically wrote this book for my six daughters and six of my grandchildren who can vote because a couple of them had told me they were going to vote for Barack Obama," O'Leary says. "When I asked them why, they said because he was good looking, his rhetoric was wonderful, [and] they liked listening to him."
 
In response, he put together a test for voters to compare their views on the issues with those of Obama. "You score one point every time you agree with Barack Obama and you subtract a point every time you disagree with him," O'Leary explains. "And if you wind up in the plus area, then you should vote for him. If you wind up in the minus area, then you should perhaps rethink about who you're going to vote for."
 
O'Leary notes there is a chapter in his book where voters can take the Obama test, and it can also be accessed at BarackObamaTest.com.

Kim Jong-Il's Public Appearance

5:39pm UK, Saturday October 04, 2008

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il has made his first public appearance in more than a month since he reportedly had a stroke.

Kim Jong-Il reportedly had a stroke in August

The communist state's official news agency said the 66-year-old had attended a football game in the capital Pyongyang.

The game was held to mark the 62nd anniversary of the founding of the university named after his late father, North Korea founder Kim Il Sung.

"There was the football match between teams of Kim Il-Sung University and Pyongyang University of Railways that day, at which the former beat the latter 4-1," KCNA said.

The report did not make clear when the match took place.

Kim, who rarely appears in public, had not been seen since mid-August.

After he failed to appear at an anniversary parade on September 9, speculation grew about his state of health.

The West feared that if Kim was ill, it would be impossible to restart stalled talks on North Korea scrapping its nuclear programme in exchange for aid.

South Korean officials claimed Kim underwent brain surgery following a stroke but was recovering well.

South lawmaker Won Hye-Young quoted an intelligence official as saying Kim endured a cerebral haemorrhage - which caused the stroke.

Vote For John McCain.

Artist James Cauty created the controversial exhibition with his 15-year-old son Harry Photo: jCauty&SON copyright out of control 2008, courtesy of THE AQUARIUM L-13 all responsibility denied, www.theaquariumonline.co.uk

Shocking and bloodthirsty images of famous children's cartoon characters being brutally killed form part of a controversial new Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck art exhibition

The gruesome pictures include children's cartoon favourite Daffy Duck having his head blown off by a gun-wielding Bugs Bunny, as blood is sprayed everywhere.

Another violent picture shows famous cartoon cat and mouse duo Tom and Jerry as never before - with Tom the cat chopping Jerry into small pieces in a pool of blood and guts.

A third brutal piece of artwork features long-suffering cartoon cat Sylvester with a mouth covered in blood, having finally taken a bite out of his bird nemesis Tweety Pie.

The controversial characters, all taken from the popular Looney Tunes series, are included in artwork described as 'unrelenting acts of blood and discomfort never previously witnessed on the Cartoon Network'.

The barbaric pictures by artist James Cauty are part of the 'Splatter' exhibition which will be shown at London's Aquarium Gallery.

Artist James, 51, said: "People have been saying since the 60's that cartoons should show the consequences of violence, or kids will get the wrong idea.

"Its very difficult to shock kids these days - you have cartoon characters being shot in the head and walking off cliffs, so we have decided to replace them with something more realistic.

"I'm a parent myself, and if I saw pictures like that I would think of something kids would really love, because it's no holds-barred violence.

"The idea actually came from my 15-year-old son, who suggested I do some artwork showing what cartoons are really like by showing their real consequences.

"I don't know why he suggested it, but he's done me a favour by giving me this idea six months ago."

The gallery say it is the first time they will have to impose a 'Parental Advisory Content' warning on one of their own exhibitions.

The Aquarium Gallery will show James's work from next Thursday, for a month.

The exhibition unveiling will also include an eight-minute film with short scenes of 'extreme cartoon violence'.

Gallery owner, Steve Lowe, said: "It's amazing work, and from the reactions we've had to it so far, children have loved it.

"I'm not sure if their parents have been too happy about their children loving it, but kids were very excited by it all, which is interesting because art is never normally aimed at children.

"It should be a very successful show, and will raise lots of questions about violence in the media and in our culture.

"We are constantly fed images of violence in this country, but we will have to see how people react when the show opens."

* The copyright in the original Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck characters is owned by Warner Brothers.

London, Oct 3 (ANI): Studies that suggested sodas such as Coke and Pepsi kill sperms and exotic lap dancers make more money when they are at peak fertility have been awarded the 2008 Ig Nobel prize.

In 1980s, when researcher Deborah Anderson of Harvard Medical School's birth- control laboratory discovered that "Coca Cola douches" were being used as a type of contraception at the all-girl Catholic boarding school she had attended in Puerto Rico, she decided to test it.

For the study, Anderson, medical student Sharee Umpierre and gynaecologist, Joe Hill mixed four different types of Coke with sperm in test tubes.

A minute later, they found that all sperm were dead in the Diet Coke, however, 41pct were still swimming in the just-introduced New Coke.

"Coca-Cola douches had become a part of contraceptive folklore during the 1950s and 1960s, when other birth-control methods were hard to come by," New Scientist quoted Anderson, as saying.

"It was believed that the carbonic acid in Coke killed sperm, and the method came with its own 'shake and shoot applicator'" - the classic Coke bottle," she added.

Another study, led by University of New Mexico psychologists proposing that lap dancers earn more money when they are at peak fertility also won the award.

During the research, psychologists Geoffrey Miller, Joshua Tybur and Brent Jordan asked women working as lap dancers to report their nightly tips, and whether they were on hormonal contraceptives or menstruating naturally.

The two groups of women received similar tips when they were in non-fertile parts of their cycle, but when the naturally menstruating women reached their fertile days, the researchers found, they earned significantly more.

A Brazilian study led by Astolfo Araujo of the University of Sao Paulo and Jose Marcelino of Sao Paolo's Department of Historical Heritage on armadillos, the burrowing animals, which showed that the pesky creatures can move the artifacts in archaeological dig sites up, down and even laterally by several meters as they dig also won the prestigious alternative prize.

Another experiment with huge implications for health policy won the Ig Nobel medicine prize for Dan Ariely of Duke University in North Carolina.

He gave two groups of volunteers identical placebos masquerading as painkillers, telling one group the pills cost 2.50 dollars each and the other that the pills had been discounted to 10 cents each.

The volunteers didn't pay for the pills, but those who took the "more costly" fake medicine felt less pain from electric shocks than those who took the cheap fakes

This showed that price affects people's expectations and thus their response to medicine, Ariely says - the more expensive the pill, the more relief they expect.

These awards, presented at Harvard University, are organised by the humorous scientific journal the Annals of Improbable Research for research achievements "that make people laugh - then think". (ANI)