Eeyore's News and View

So many challenges face the President of the US. He will shine or fail right now. Hopefully he will put away his childish agenda and face these new (and old) challenges as a man. The Bible is very clear about praying for those in authority so that we can lead a quite and peaceable life. All of our leaders need our prayers. From the last article i have posted, is a article put together form an interview on Cspan. It is scary because he still believes all we have to do is spend more money and every thing will be alright. We are headed down a steep hill, instead of applying the breaks, he just continues to press the accelerator. Maybe that is the plan.
Iran sends warships to Gulf of Aden - navy
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran has sent six warships to international waters, including the Gulf of Aden, to show its ability to confront any foreign threats, its naval commander said on Monday.
Admiral Habibollah Sayyari, quoted by the ISNA news agency, made the announcement five days after Iran said it test-fired a surface-to-surface missile with a range of 2,000 km (1,200 miles), putting Israel and U.S. bases in the area within reach.
Iran said on May 14 it had sent two warships to the Gulf of Aden to protect oil tankers from the world's fifth-largest crude exporter against attacks by pirates but ISNA did not make clear whether they were among the six Sayyari talked about.
Iranian waters stretch along the Gulf, the Strait of Hormuz and the Sea of Oman. Iran has threatened to block the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 40 percent of the world's traded oil is shipped, if it were attacked over its nuclear programme.
"Iran has dispatched six ... warships to international waters and the Gulf of Aden region in an historically unprecedented move by the Iranian Navy," Sayyari told a gathering of armed forces officials, IRNA reported.
Sayyari said that preserving Iran's territorial integrity in its southern waters called for the "perseverance and firmness" of the navy.
The move to dispatch the warships "is indicative of the country's high military capability in confronting any foreign threat on the country's shores," Sayyari said.
The ISNA report did not mention the threat of pirate attacks, which, fuelled by large ransoms, have continued almost unabated despite the presence of an armada of foreign warships patrolling the Indian Ocean and Gulf of Aden.
In January, pirates released an Iranian-chartered cargo ship carrying 36,000 tonnes of wheat to Iran from Germany that was seized in November. In March, a regional maritime official said Somali villagers had detained another Iranian vessel.
Nearly 20,000 ships pass through the Gulf of Aden each year, heading to and from the Suez Canal. Seven percent of world oil consumption passed through the Gulf of Aden in 2007, according to Lloyd's Marine Intelligence Unit.
On May 20, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Iran had tested a missile that defence analysts say could hit Israel and U.S. bases in the Gulf, a move likely to fuel concern about Tehran's nuclear ambitions.
The United States and its allies suspect the Islamic Republic is seeking to build nuclear bombs, a charge Tehran denies, but President Barack Obama has offered a new beginning of diplomatic engagement with Iran if it "unclenches its fist".
http://in.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idINIndia-39868320090525

North Korea tests nuclear weapon 'as powerful as Hiroshima bomb'
North Korea today risked further international isolation after it claimed to have successfully tested a nuclear weapon as powerful as the atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima.
The test comes less than two months after the North enraged the US and its allies by test firing a long-range ballistic missile.
The KNCA news agency, the regime's official mouthpiece, said: "We have successfully conducted another nuclear test on 25 May as part of the republic's measures to strengthen its nuclear deterrent."
Officials in South Korea said they had detected a tremor consistent with those caused by an underground nuclear explosion. The country's Yonhap news agency reported that the North had test fired three short-range missiles immediately after the nuclear test from a base on the east coast.
The underground atomic explosion, at 9.54am local time, created an earthquake measuring magnitude 4.5 in Kilju county in the country's north-east, reports said.
President Barack Obama called the test a matter of grave concern to all countries. "North Korea is directly and recklessly challenging the international community," Obama said in a statement. "North Korea's behaviour increases tensions and undermines stability in north-east Asia."
The UN security council will hold an emergency meeting in New York later today to discuss its response to the latest escalation in the crisis. Obama and other leaders did not offer details on the council's possible response.
China, North Korea's key ally, said it was "resolutely opposed" to the test, urging its neighbour to avoid actions that would sharpen tensions and return to six-party arms-for-disarmament talks.
Japan, which considers itself high on the North's potential hit list, said it would seek a new resolution condemning the test.
Russian defence experts estimated the explosion's yield at between 10 and 20 kilotons, many times more than the 1 kiloton measured in its first nuclear test in 2006 and about as powerful as the bombs the US used against Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of the second world war. One kiloton is equal to the force produced by 1,000 tons of TNT.
The force of the blast made the ground tremble in the Chinese border city of Yanji, 130 miles away.
The North Korean news agency said the test had been "safely conducted on a new higher level in terms of its explosive power and technology of its control. The test will contribute to defending the sovereignty of the country and the nation and socialism and ensuring peace and security on the Korean peninsula and the region."
Gordon Brown described the test as "erroneous, misguided and a danger to the world". The prime minister added: "This act will undermine prospects for peace on the Korean peninsula and will do nothing for North Korea's security.
South Korea and Japan condemned the test, North Korea's second since it exploded its first nuclear device in October 2006 in defiance of international opinion. That test prompted the UN security to pass a resolution banning Pyongyang from activities related to its ballistic missile programme.
The South Korean president, Lee Myung-bak, convened a session of the country's security council after seismologists reported earthquakes in the Kilju region, site of the North's first nuclear test.
In Tokyo, Japan's chief cabinet secretary, Takeo Kawamura, said the test was "a clear violation of the UN security council resolution and cannot be tolerated".
North Korea had warned of a second nuclear test after the UN condemned its test-launch of a ballistic missile on 5 April and agreed to tighten sanctions put in place in 2006.
Pyongyang insisted it had put a peaceful communications satellite in orbit, but experts said the technology and methods were identical to those used to launch a long-range Taepodong-2 missile.
After the UN refused to apologise for condemning the launch, North Korea expelled international inspectors, threatened to restart its Yongbyon nuclear reactor – which it had agreed to start dismantling in 2007 – and walked away from six-party nuclear talks.
Today's test will add to fears that the North is moving closer to possessing the ability to mount a nuclear warhead on long-range missiles that are capable, in theory, of reaching Hawaii and Alaska.
"This test, if confirmed, could indicate North Korea's decision to work at securing actual nuclear capabilities," Koh Yu-hwan, a professor at Dongkuk University in Seoul, told Reuters.
"North Korea had been expecting the new US administration to mark a shift from the previous administration's stance, but is realising that there are no changes. It may have decided that a second test was necessary. [It] seems to be reacting to the US and South Korean administrations' policies."
Analysts believe the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-il, hopes to use the test to shore up support from the military amid mounting speculation that he is about to name one of his three sons as his successor.
Kim, 67, appears to be re-establishing his grip on power since reportedly suffering a stroke last August. Today's test is a direct challenge to attempts by Obama to engage the North and stem the spread of nuclear weapons.
Despite promising a fresh start to bilateral relations, Obama, who denounced last month's missile launch as "a provocation," has so far failed to persuade North Korean to enter into negotiations.
Kim Myong-chol, executive director of the Centre for Korean-American Peace in Tokyo, who is close to Pyongyang, said the test was a reminder that North Korea "is going it alone as a nuclear power".
"North Korea doesn't need any talks with America. America is tricky and undesirable," he said. "It does not implement its own agreements.
"We are not going to worry about sanctions. If they sanction us, we will become more powerful. Sanctions never help America; they are counter-productive … We don't care about America and what they say."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/may/25/north-korea-hiroshima-nuclear-test

Two Illinois Banks Seized, Bringing U.S. Tally This Year to 36
May 22 (Bloomberg) -- Two Illinois banks with combined assets of almost $1 billion were closed by regulators, pushing the toll of failed U.S. lenders to 36 this year amid the longest recession since the 1930s.
Strategic Capital Bank in Champaign and Citizens National Bank in Macomb were closed and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. was named receiver of both, the FDIC said. Strategic Capital’s deposits were assumed by Midland States Bank of Effingham, Illinois, and deposits at Citizens National were purchased by Morton Community Bank.
“Deposits will continue to be insured by the FDIC, so there is no need for customers to change their banking relationship to retain their deposit insurance coverage,” the FDIC said.
Regulators are closing banks at the fastest pace in 15 years, including BankUnited Financial Corp. in Florida yesterday, and pumped $200 billion into the biggest banks in a Treasury rescue program. Costs from closing banks in the second quarter climbed to more than $8 billion, including $4.9 billion for BankUnited, from $2.28 billion in the first, FDIC data show.
Midland States will buy $536 million of Strategic Capital’s $537 million in assets, with the FDIC sharing losses on about $420 million of them, the regulator said. Midland States will assume all of the failed bank’s $471 million in deposits. Strategic Capital’s lone office will open on May 26 as a branch of Midland States.
Morton Community Bank
Morton Community will buy $240 million of Citizens National’s $437 million in assets and signed a loss-sharing agreement with the FDIC on $200 million. Half of Citizens National’s $400 million in deposits will go to Morton Community, with the other $200 million in brokered deposits being paid directly to the brokers, the FDIC said.
Citizens National has offices in four Illinois cities, according to its Web site. The FDIC said they will open tomorrow as branches of Morton Community.
The failures are the fourth and fifth in Illinois this year. The FDIC estimates the seizures will cost the federal government’s deposit insurance fund a combined $279 million.
U.S. regulators are signaling that economic conditions are improving. FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair said May 12 that banks have “moved beyond the liquidity crisis” of last year.
“We are now in the cleanup phase,” Bair said in a speech in Washington. “But to be honest, there’s still more pain to go.”
Recession
The Commerce Department on April 30 said personal incomes fell in March for the fifth time in the past six months. The S&P/Case-Shiller Index of home prices in 20 major U.S. cities dropped in February, extending a decline that began in January 2007. The Labor Department May 8 reported employers shed 539,000 jobs in April, extending the decline to 5.7 million jobs since December 2007
The FDIC insurance fund is down 64 percent from its peak at the start of the second quarter last year, reflecting the shutdown of 22 lenders from April through December. The agency voted 4-1 today to impose a fee of 5 cents per $100 of assets, excluding Tier 1 capital, backing away from a proposal of 20 cents per $100 of insured deposits. The FDIC estimates the fee will raise $5.6 billion, lifting the fund from its lowest level since 1994.
U.S. regulators conducted unprecedented stress tests on 19 of the biggest banks, concluding on May 7 that losses could reach $599.2 billion in the next two years under economic conditions that are worse than economists forecast. The FDIC will report first-quarter bank earnings May 27.
FDIC-insured banks lost $32.1 billion from October through December, the first aggregate quarterly loss since 1990. The agency insures deposits at 8,305 institutions with $13.9 trillion in assets.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=a42Xg57jVTzM

Half of Israelis back immediate strike on Iran
Just over half of Israelis back an immediate attack on the nuclear facilities of arch-foe Iran but the rest want to wait and see the results of US diplomacy, according to a poll released on Sunday.
Fifty-one percent support an immediate Israeli strike on Iran's nuclear sites, while 49 percent believe the Jewish state should await the outcome of efforts by the US administration to engage with the Islamic republic, said the survey published by Tel Aviv University.
But 74 percent of those questioned said they believe that new US President Barack Obama's efforts will not stop the Islamic republic from acquiring atomic weapons.
Israel, widely considered to be the Middle East's sole if undeclared nuclear armed state, considers Iran its arch-foe after repeated statements by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for the Jewish state to be "wiped off the map."
Israel and Washington accuse Iran of trying to develop atomic weapons under the guise of a civilian nuclear programme, a charge Tehran has repeatedly denied.
Opinion is split among left- and right-wingers about whether to attack Iran's nuclear sites, with 63 percent of those leaning to the right favouring a strike, compared with 38 percent of those leaning to the left, the poll said.
It was carried out by Tel Aviv University's Centre for Iranian Studies among 509 Israeli adults and had a 4.5-percent margin of error.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.278ae37b736a0478b7223156a3bcf18a.401&show_article=1

Swine Flu Is Spreading Wider Than Official Data Show
Swine flu is spreading more widely than official figures indicate, with outbreaks in Europe and Asia showing it’s gained a foothold in at least three regions.
One in 20 cases is being officially reported in the U.S., meaning more than 100,000 people have probably been infected nationwide with the new H1N1 flu strain, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In the U.K., the virus may be 300 times more widespread than health authorities have said, the Independent on Sunday reported yesterday.
Japan, which has reported the most cases in Asia, began reopening schools at the weekend after health officials said serious medical complications had not emerged in those infected. The virus is now spreading in the community in Australia, Jim Bishop, the nation’s chief medical officer, said yesterday.
"I think we will see the number rise,” Bishop told Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio today after confirming the nation’s 17th case and saying test results are pending on 41 others. “This is going to be a marathon rather than a sprint.”
Forty-six countries have confirmed 12,515 cases, including 91 deaths, according to the World Health Organization’s latest tally. Almost four of every five cases were in Mexico and the U.S., where the pig-derived strain was discovered last month. Most of those infected experience an illness similar to that of seasonal flu. The main difference is that the new H1N1 strain is persisting outside the Northern Hemisphere winter.
Summer Disease?
“While we are seeing activities decline in some areas, we should expect to see more cases, more hospitalizations and perhaps more deaths over the weeks ahead and possibly into the summer,” Anne Schuchat, CDC’s interim deputy director for science and public health program, told reporters on a May 22 conference call.
The U.S. has officially reported 6,552 probable and confirmed cases, Schuchat said. “These are just the tip of the iceberg. We are estimating more than 100,000 people probably have this virus now in the U.S.”
There have been nine deaths and more than 300 known hospitalizations, she said. The fatalities exclude a woman in her 50s who died in New York over the weekend.
China reported cases today in Shanghai and the eastern province of Zhejiang, taking its tally of confirmed infections to 12. Taiwan confirmed the island’s first domestically transmitted case and reported two imported infections, giving it nine. South Korea confirmed 12 more cases, bringing its total to 22, while the Philippines confirmed a second infection today.
Caribbean Honeymoon
Russia’s health ministry confirmed the country’s second case, in a man who honeymooned in the Dominican Republic. He returned from the Caribbean May 18 and was hospitalized two days later in the Kaluga region southwest of Moscow, Gennady Onishchenko, head of the ministry’s public health department, said on state television today. His wife wasn’t infected.
Japan has the most cases outside North America, with 345 as of today, according to the health ministry. Chile’s tally reached 74 after 19 cases were recorded yesterday, while Argentina’s total increased by three to five.
Eighteen European countries have confirmed 349 cases, a third of whom were probably infected in their home country, the Stockholm-based European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control said in a report yesterday. The U.K. and Spain have the most reported cases, with 133 each. About 60 percent of cases in the U.K. are linked to “in-country transmission,” ECDC said.
Thousands of people have caught the virus in the U.K. and suffered mild symptoms, or none at all, over the past weeks, John Oxford, professor of virology at the University of London, told the Independent.
Already a Pandemic
Community spread of the new virus in a second region means WHO’s criteria for a pandemic has been met, said Michael T. Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy of the University of Minneapolis.
Britain’s Health Secretary Alan Johnson told WHO Director- General Margaret Chan at the organization’s annual meeting last week that disease severity and other determinants besides geographic spread need to be considered before the pandemic alert is raised to the highest of WHO’s 6-level scale.
“The move to phase 6 means that emergency plans are instantly triggered around the globe, and in the U.K. this would mean increased vigilance and activation of the UK’s own ‘inter- pandemic’ phases,” the U.K.’s Department of Health said in a May 18 statement.
At phase 6, many pharmaceutical companies would switch from making seasonal flu shots to pandemic-specific vaccine, potentially creating shortages of an immunization to counter the normal winter flu season, the department said.
‘Risk of Harm’
WHO is reviewing its pandemic response plans, including the prerequisites for a pandemic, in the wake of the swine flu threat, said Keiji Fukuda, the agency’s assistant director- general of health security and environment. A move to phase 6 would “signify a really substantial increase in risk of harm to people,” Fukuda told reporters during a May 22 briefing.
Some of the guidelines were prepared in anticipation of a pandemic sparked by the H5N1 strain of avian flu, which killed 61 percent of 429 people confirmed to have contracted that virus, Chan told the World Health Assembly on May 18. “This has left our world better prepared, but also very scared,” she said.
Rather than redefine what constitutes a pandemic, health officials should help people understand the current threat may resemble the 1957 or 1968 pandemics, in which fewer than 4 million people died, rather than the 1918 Spanish flu, blamed for killing about 50 million, said Osterholm at the University of Minneapolis.
“The bigger problem is scientific integrity,” he said. “If they want to change the definition, then go ahead. But don’t say that we are not in phase 6 right now because we don’t want to go there.”
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=agHVPFaC5R.M&refer=worldwide

British banks revolt against Obama tax plan
The decision, which would make it hard for Americans in London to open bank accounts and trade shares, is being discussed by executives at Britain's banks and brokers who say it could become too expensive to service American clients. The proposals, which were unveiled as part of the president's first budget, are designed to clamp-down on American tax evaders abroad. However bank bosses say they
are being asked to take on the task of collecting American taxes at a cost and legal liability that are inexpedient.
Andy Thompson of Association of Private Client Investment Managers and Stockbrokers (APCIMS) said: "The cost and administration of the US tax regime is causing UK investment firms to consider disinvesting in US shares on behalf of their clients. This is not right and emphasises that the administration of a tax regime on a global scale without any flexibility damages the very economy it is trying to protect."
One executive at a top UK bank who didn't want to be named for fear of angering the IRS said: "It's just about manageable under the current system - and that's because we're big. The danger to us is suddenly being hauled over the coals by the IRS for a client that hasn't paid proper taxes. The audit costs will soar. We'll have to pay it but I know plenty of smaller players won't."
The British Bankers Association (BBA) and APCIMS had a meeting with European counterparts 10 days ago to discuss the crisis. A delegation is set to meet the US Treasury's Internal Revenue Service on 16th June to demand they drop the reforms.
Ahead of the meeting APCIMS, whose members manage £400bn of Britain's wealth and employ 25,000 people, has sent a letter to the IRS complaining that the "unfair" proposals represent "no benefit but... significant cost" to its members.
President Obama's proposals are built on the so-called Qualified Intermediary system which was intended to ensure Americans paid the correct tax wherever they were domiciled. Foreign financial institutions that handle American money have to fill in a US tax form on behalf of the client that has to be audited too. In return, the banks receive a QI seal of approval as a qualified intermediary.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/5374095/British-banks-revolt-against-Obama-tax-plan.html

'WE'RE OUT OF MONEY'
Sat May 23 2009 10:32:18 ET

In a sobering holiday interview with C-SPAN, President Obama boldly told Americans: "We are out of money."

C-SPAN host Steve Scully broke from a meek Washington press corps with probing questions for the new president.

SCULLY: You know the numbers, $1.7 trillion debt, a national deficit of $11 trillion. At what point do we run out of money?

OBAMA: Well, we are out of money now. We are operating in deep deficits, not caused by any decisions we've made on health care so far. This is a consequence of the crisis that we've seen and in fact our failure to make some good decisions on health care over the last several decades.

So we've got a short-term problem, which is we had to spend a lot of money to salvage our financial system, we had to deal with the auto companies, a huge recession which drains tax revenue at the same time it's putting more pressure on governments to provide unemployment insurance or make sure that food stamps are available for people who have been laid off.

So we have a short-term problem and we also have a long-term problem. The short-term problem is dwarfed by the long-term problem. And the long-term problem is Medicaid and Medicare. If we don't reduce long-term health care inflation substantially, we can't get control of the deficit.

So, one option is just to do nothing. We say, well, it's too expensive for us to make some short-term investments in health care. We can't afford it. We've got this big deficit. Let's just keep the health care system that we've got now.

Along that trajectory, we will see health care cost as an overall share of our federal spending grow and grow and grow and grow until essentially it consumes everything...

SCULLY: When you see GM though as “Government Motors,” you're reaction?

OBAMA: Well, you know – look we are trying to help an auto industry that is going through a combination of bad decision making over many years and an unprecedented crisis or at least a crisis we haven't seen since the 1930's. And you know the economy is going to bounce back and we want to get out of the business of helping auto companies as quickly as we can. I have got more enough to do without that. In the same way that I want to get out of the business of helping banks, but we have to make some strategic decisions about strategic industries...

SCULLY: States like California in desperate financial situation, will you be forced to bail out the states?

OBAMA: No. I think that what you're seeing in states is that anytime you got a severe recession like this, as I said before, their demands on services are higher. So, they are sending more money out. At the same time, they're bringing less tax revenue in. And that's a painful adjustment, what we're going end up seeing is lot of states making very difficult choices there...

SCULLY: William Howard Taft served on the court after his presidency, would you have any interest in being on the Supreme Court?

OBAMA: You know, I am not sure that I could get through Senate confirmation...

Developing...
http://www.drudgereport.com/flashocs.htm