Breaking Egyptian News

Story credit Al Jazeera

Opposition leader Mohamed ElBaradei has been appointed as Egypt's new prime minister, the state news agency MENA reported, after bloodshed followed the ouster of the country's first freely elected president.

The Tamarod (rebellion) movement, which engineered mass protests culminating in the overthrow of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi on Wednesday, made the announcement on Saturday after talks with Adly Mansour, Egypt's new interim leader.

The news of the appointment was greeted with cheers outside Cairo's Ittihadiya presidential palace, where opponents of Morsi frantically waved Egyptian flags and honked car horns.

It came as the Muslim Brotherhood staged a new show of force in Cairo's Nasr City district to demand that the military restore Morsi, after dozens of people died and hundreds more were injured in 24 hours of violence.

'Rejection and anger'

Al Jazeera's Jamal Elshayyal, reporting from Nasr City, said the reaction from the Morsi's camp to the appointment of Elbaradei was one of complete rejection and anger.

"One of the protesters here said that the appointment of ElBaradei is a move directed at appeasing the United States and that he served them well, allowing for the invasion of Iraq when he was in the IAEA and will now be their puppet again - we all know he is a puppet.

"Another person said that ElBaradei was even too scared to nominate himself in the elections. That's how little support he has - he needed the army to put him in office. So to sum up the mood here: it is rejection, anger and dismissal," Elshayyal said.

Egypt's second largest Islamist group, the Al Nour party also opposed the installment of ElBaradei. A senior party official threatened that his group would leave the army-backed political road map over the appointment.

ElBaradei, who won the Nobel peace prize in 2005 for his work with International Atomic Energy Agency, returned to Egypt in 2010 and became a prominent opponent of former president Hosni Mubarak in the lead-up to the 2011 uprising that overthrew him.

Al Jazeera's Sherine Tadros, reporting from Cairo, said the main question is how much power ElBaradei will have in his new role as interim prime minister.

"[ElBaradei's appointment] is not really a surprise. He was sitting next toGeneral Abdel Fattah al-Sisi when he announced the ouster of President Morsi, which already indicated that ElBaradei was to take up an important role in the new government," Tadros said.

"Many people are asking 'why now' has he taken this post when he was offered it before under the military and said it was a sham democracy and that he didn't want to be part of the process. And now that he is taking up the post, people are asking what sort of guarantees has the military given ElBaradei for him agree on this role," she added.

ElBaradei, who resigned from his political party Al Dostour to focus on new role, was scheduled to be sworn in at 8pm (18:00 GMT).

Independence Day Series #1: Is America the Greatest Country in the World?

"And I'm proud to be an American, where at least I know I'm free. And I won't forget the men who died, who gave that right to me. And I gladly stand up next to you and defend her still today. ‘Cause there ain't no doubt I love this land, God bless the USA."

Those über-patriotic lyrics from country singer Lee Greenwood clearly sum up the "Yes, of course, you Godless Red" point of view. A March, 2011 study from Pew Research shows that 53% of Americans have the highest opinion of the United States, while, to be fair, a Fox New poll showed 84%.

Explanations for this opinion range from "Freedom!! USA, USA, USA!" to "In this sense, as someone who used to take pride in being called a revolutionary...Where's the Russian Revolution now? It's gone.  Where's the Chinese Revolution now? It's mutated into something completely opposite, different to itself. Cuban Revolution is more [sic] at the best. The French Revolution, well, it did have a great effect on the world, and I wouldn't denigrate it, but the American Revolution, the one that says 'Build your republic individual rights, not group rights. Have a bill of rights that inscribed these and makes them available and legible to everybody. Separate the Church from the State. Separate the executive, judicial, and political [legislative] branch. Do all these things,' it doesn't sound like much, but it's a very revolutionary idea."

The latter response was by Christopher Hitchens, the late, great writer and famous quick wit. The former was from the Akron, Ohio 30-something, directly after the USA scored their only  World Cup goal, and directly before he passed out. 

I would have to agree with Hitch, that while the American Revolution did not immediately gain freedom for most Americans, the backing ideas were a giant leap for mankind in the realm of human rights. Acknowledging the self-evident truth the all are equal, with certain unalienable rights, including life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness cannot be easily overstated. 

Some would call that, liberty and justice for all, the American Dream. Some would say that it's called a dream for a reason.  

How long, in American history, have all been equal? Go ahead; take your time and think about it...

1776: That all men are created equal, but some are more equal than others.

1868: No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States. Lol, jk.

1920: Honey, make me a sandwich. Then, let's go vote. 

1963: You know what? I had the weirdest dream last night.

1966: The person in custody must, prior to interrogation, be clearly informed that he has rights, those pesky old things.

2000: Yeah, sorry. The most people elected Al to be president, but we live in a democracy, so George II now reigns. 

2013: OK, fine. We'll take out the anti-gay laws, but most states still won't let you guys marry. 

So, what was that, Tommy? Maybe we can try this again in ten years. Maybe twenty. Maybe seventy. When will there be equal sign  style equality?

So, to review, I believe that the best explanation for the "Yes, of course, you Godless Red" answer is that the ideals of America are the greatest in the world, and therefore, America itself follows suit.

Many outside of the "Yes" camp might not disagree with that principle. Instead, it is commonly stated that in practice, not principle, America lags behind. Is that true? Yes.

"And with a straight face, you're going to tell students that America is so star-spangled awesome that we're the only ones in the world who have freedom? Canada has freedom, Japan has freedom, the UK, France, Italy, Germany, Spain, Australia, BELGIUM has freedom! Two hundred and seven sovereign states in the world, like 180 of them have freedom. And yeah, you... sorority girl. Just in case you accidentally wander into a voting booth one day, there are some things you should know, and one of them is: There is absolutely no evidence to support the statement that we're the greatest country in the world..."

As the "Yes" side, which is represented by the Greenwood quote is called "Yes, of course, you Godless Red", the side represented by the above quote shall be called "Meh, I put my money on Japan". 

That long rant above is a monologue from the Newsroom's, of HBO, Will McAvoy. The "Sorority Girl" asks a panel if they can describe what makes America the greatest country in the world. The resident liberal says, "diversity and opportunity," while the conservative says, "Freedom and freedom, so let's keep it that way." 

When McAvoy is pressed to answer, he says that it is not the greatest country in the world. He says what is written in the quote, and then goes on to rattle off a plethora of statistics to back himself up. Statistics like:

The USA is 17th in the world in literacy

 27th in math education

22nd in science education

49th in life expectancy

178th in infant survival

3rd in median household income

1st in obesity rate (looking at you, southern states)

1st in prison population and incarceration rate  

It is simple to wrap up the "Meh, I put my money on Japan" side by asking, if the USA is the best, what is it the best in? 

Hmm.....

War.

There is no doubt that the United States, being "back-to-back-world-war-champs" and having military conflicts in 217 of our 233 years as a nation, is pretty good at killing all sorts of other people pretty effectively.

 The USA has 2150 active nuclear weapons, more than any other nation by an order of about 300. Russia comes in second, having around 1800 active and 8500 total. In contrast, the United States has approximately 7700. Both countries have been reducing their stockpiles, to the sigh of relief from the collective lifeforms on the planet. Russia has much more dramatically reduced their stockpiles, however, hitting its peak stockpile in the 1980's with 45,000 nukes.  I give all this information about nuclear weapons because it is pretty much the only instance where another military is close to the ability of the US military. It is pretty uncontested in all other categories. Countries such as China may have more man-power total in their military, but that is becoming less and less important as technology advances. 

Ok, so the USA is definitely best at war. Does that make it great?

Of course not! Who would even pose such a question, not rhetorically? You know there will always be someone. 

And plus, there is at least one obvious way that our gargantuan obsession with war makes America a less great nation. It's so expensive.

The military accounts for 47¢ out of every tax dollar in the federal budget. The military budget is bloated beyond common sense. For example, should president Obama keep hundreds of troops at Fort Sumpter, just in case the South should rise again?  It seems completely unrealistic, until you realize that we still have approximately 52,692 troops in Japan. 52,692! We're invading our allies. There are 45,596 just in case Hitler pieces together his head and rises from the grave.  There are around 10,000 troops in Italy, and around 10,000 troops in the UK.  One should read that last stat with a sigh, a sigh of despair. 

I recognize that there are logistical incentives for an empire to have troops posted at strategic points overseas.  But why on earth would the USA need 119,000 troops in the WWII countries. I can only think of one practical use, off the top of my head for any of these troops at all, and that is North Korea. But with 28,000 troops in South Korea, why are 52,000 needed in Japan.

Obviously we spend an exorbitant amount of money on military expenses like this, but just how much do we spend?

In 2012, the U.S. approved $645.7 billion in defense budget. This figure includes funding for the Pentagon base budget, Department of Energy-administered nuclear weapons activities, and the war in Afghanistan.

That number is six times the war budget of China. It's 11 times Russia. That figure accounts for 41% of the total military spending for the entire world. 

In fact, we spend more on our military than the next 15 countries combined. And Congress cuts NASA. Please. 

I think that is enough of a war tangent. Now I can relate it to the original topic. We are number one in the world for war capability. But this is not good. We are number one in many bad things, such as incarceration rates and obesity rates. Practically, there is not one major category to speak of in which America performs the best. 

I don't enjoy writing the last several paragraphs. I want the United States, my homeland, to be the greatest, just as a patriot from anywhere would. Often times, when Americans do not find the USA to be the greatest, freest, most star-spangled awesome country to ever exist in the Milky Way galaxy, they are called unpatriotic. I say nothing could be further from the truth. I am a patriot because I want America to be the greatest, I acknowledge that it currently isn't, and I am ready to fix the problem. Those who aren't patriots are the ones who refuse to accept that America has problems, and therefore, refuse to fix it. 

Steven Crowder is an Imbecile

That guy is an imbecile. If you've been lucky enough to not stumble past him and his antics, Steven Crowder is a conservative comedian and, not surprisingly, a Fox News contributor. He got some attention a few months ago when he was "pushed" by someone at a union workers' protest. I'll get to that later though.

I was on the YouTube homepage the other day, and I saw his video called "Jesus vs. Muhammad!! (Qur'an Challenge II). It is a follow up of his first Qur'an challenge video, in which he picked verses out of the Quran to show that his religion is better than their religion, etc. In the second video, he compares the goodness of Jesus with the goodness of Muhammad.

Here is the video:

I'll rebut this video point by point. But it should be noted that Crowder only uses Jesus as a Biblical example. Because the whole Qu'ran is about Muhammad and only a small portion of the Bible is about Jesus, I will use other verses as well as Gospel verses.

Crowder starts with an aside at 0:59, saying that he can portray Jesus as much as he wants, but "in the Muslim faith, not believing in free speech does not allow for equal portrayals of Muhammad." It is true that this part of Islam is against free speech, but there are also plenty of parts of the Bible that are against free speech. They include:

Exodus 20:7
“You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain."

James 5:12
"But above all, my brothers, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or by any other oath, but let your “yes” be yes and your “no” be no, so that you may not fall under condemnation."

Ephesians 4:9
"Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear."

Leviticus 19:12
"You shall not swear by my name falsely, and so profane the name of your God: I am the Lord."

And the very portrayal of the Christian God is prohibited in Exodus 20:4
"You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth."

Therefore, criticizing Islam for denying free speech and saying Christianity is better makes Crowder a hypocrite. 

Next he goes on for quite a while about the mistreatment of women in the Qu'ran. Women are mistreat terribly in the Qu'ran. And, women are mistreated terribly in the Bible.

1 Corithians 11:3 
"But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man"

1 Corinthians 11:9
"Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man."

Judges 19:24, 25
" ^'Look, here is my virgin daughter, and his concubine. I will bring them out to you now, and you can use them and do to them whatever you wish. But as for this man, don’t do such an outrageous thing.' But the men would not listen to him. So the man took his concubine and sent her outside to them, and they raped her and abused her throughout the night, and at dawn they let her go."

1 Timothy 2:11-14
"Let the women learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression."

Hosea 13:16
"Samaria shall become desolate; for she hath rebelled against her God: they shall fall by the sword: their infants shall be dashed in pieces, and their women with child shall be ripped up"


Crowder then gets to the actual teachings of the Bible versus the Qu'ran Get it? Bible versus? Crowder first says," Mohammad taught his followers to kill, convert, or subjugate Christians."

The whole entire books of Numbers, Joshua, and Deuteronomy are about God commanding the Israelites to go and kill  other tribes. 1 Samuel 15:3 has God saying, "Now go and smite Amalek and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass." The prophet Samuel actually gets mad at the general Saul for leaving a person alive. 

Next Crowder says more stuff about violence. He cherry-picks good and bad verses from both books, but he leaves out good verses from the Qu'ran, such as, "“If anyone slays a person, it would be as if he slew the whole people: and if any one saved a life, it would be as if he saved the life of the whole people.”

The thing Crowder got the most attention for recently was that he was "assaulted by union thugs." 

This is how Crowder had the video on his YouTube channel:

\

Here he is getting debunked by The Young Turks:

To see more ridiculousness and lies, Crowder has his very own YouTube channel.

To play us out, here is TheAmazingAtheist and his take on Steven Crowder.

Drone Wars: Now, In A Desert Far, Far Away

You've most likely heard of it by now, unless you get all your news from Dora the  Explorer. I don't think she's been covering foreign policy much lately, unless you include 

the immigration reform. 

The US use of drones seems to be a strictly B-List political issue. It's not as prominent as gun control, but it's also not off to the wayside like education, for instance. 

Drones are unmanned aircraft used by the Air Force. Surveillance drones are used for taking photos and videos and aiding in reconnaissance. Predator drones are the ones frequently shown in pictures, like the one above. They can see people from the sky while people can't see them. They are equipped with missiles to remotely take out targets. 

The political issue of drones is about predator drones and specifically the use of drone against US citizens, and civilian deaths and the "double tap" policy. 

It's likely that you remember the thirteen-hour filibuster by Kentucky Senator Rand Paul. Rand was trying to prevent the confirmation of John Brennan as CIA director and, more importantly, call attention to the president's ability to use drone strikes against US citizens on US territory. After thirteen straight hours of talking by Rand, the administration gave its answer. While it is clearly against the Fifth Amendment for a president to just go out and declare the death penalty on someone, Eric Holder answered in typical lawyer fashion.

"It is possible, I suppose, to imagine an extraordinary circumstance I which it would be necessary and appropriate u der the constitution and applicable laws of the US for the president to authorize the military to use lethal force within the territory of the US." Holder said, though, that such a circumstance is unlikely. 

All this use of the words "US territory" is an effect of one terrible incident that happened in 2011. Anwar al Awlaki was a radical Muslim Imam and clearly linked to Al Qaeda. His son, however, was not. Abdulrahman al Awlaki was a 16 year old US citizen. Without any charges or trial, or anything that would cause anyone to think he had done anything wrong, this 16 year old Boy from Denver was killed by a drone strike in Yemen. The circumstances around the death are unclear, but surely they were "unlikely".

Another thing talked about in the drone debate is civilian deaths. Under the Obama administration, 22 terrorists have been killed by drones. For that 22 terrorists, 800 civilians have been killed. What's worse is that sometimes, the children deaths aren't a mistake.  Army Lt. Col. Marion Carrington, quoted in a Marine Times article, said that “It kind of opens our aperture” that children are being used in the conflict. “In addition to looking for military-age males, it’s looking for children with potential hostile intent."

On December 3rd, it was reported that three children were targeted for a drone strike for digging a hole in the ground. That is absolutely disgusting to anyone with the smallest sense of morality. A full list of children killed ideone strikes in Pakistan and Yemen can be found at http://www.policymic.com/articles/24164/a-list-of-children-killed-by-drone-strikes-in-Pakistan-and-yemen

However, what may be even more disgusting is the "double tap" policy. In a double tap, a drone strike happens on a target, and then soon after, after first responders and other people have come to help, a second strike happens on the same target. Can you imagine if this happened in America? Can you imagine if an enemy bombed a target in the United States and ten bombed the same place soon afterward? We would be livid, and rightfully so. 

Lastly, even if you don't have a heart or soul, you still must be against drone strikes. They are, in the end, counterproductive. Recent polls show that 74% of Pakistanis consider the United States an enemy. All that a lot of Pakistanis know about the United States is this: they are the country that sent a missile at the house next to mine to kill a terrorist, it he process they hit my house and killed my family. We wonder why they don't like us so much. 

What chance does Rand stand?

It's no secret that the Republican Party needs a face-lift. If they go on just like 2012 without changing, they will be the perpetual minority party, ironically. I say that because it is the demographics that are the Republicans' real problem. They've lost Hispanics, Blacks, Asians, Women, Jewish people, young people, religions other than Christianity, and white people in cities. People are just tired of the sly, filthy-stinking-rich Republican party of Mitt Romney, too.

(People are tired of the party because it's as rich and white as a cheesecake.)

Is Rand Paul the answer? For those of you who have been living in the Sahara desert for the past year, Rand Paul is a Republican senator from Kentucky. While the mainstream republicans are fiscally conservative, socially conservative (but changing), and generally work toward a larger government, Rand Paul is socially conservative, fiscally conservative, and works toward a smaller government. That small-government, libertarian streak in him makes him appealing to more demographics than the establishment Republicans like Romney. 

Rand Paul made national noise a few weeks ago when he spoke for 13 hours to filibuster Obama's CIA director nomination and drone policy. He's been making what seem to be pre-election work lately, and many are whispering of a 2016 Paul-Clinton showdown. I can confirm that Rand Paul will make a presidential bid in 2016, because since his filibuster, he has been to South Carolina, New Hampshire, and Iowa. What would Rand run on?

The Issues

Abortion

Rand has historically been against all abortion, everywhere at any time, but now he has revised his stance to permitting it when the mother's life is threatened and things of that nature. 

Drones

Of course Rand is against droning of US citizens, he has said that droning is sometimes necessary.

The Economy

Rand is most upset about the debt. He repeatedly states that borrowing $50,000 per second is not sustainable. He advocates rolling spending back to 2008 levels. Rand wants to lower taxes and end the Federal Reserve.

Marriage Equality

Rand supports a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. This goes against his "liberty" mantra, obviously.

Energy/Environment

In 2010, Rand said that the EPA should not regulate carbon emissions.

Foreign Policy

Rand thinks that the US should exit the UN and stay out of wars.

Gun Control

For Rand Paul, gun control is not an option.

"Come at me, Chris. Come at me."

In my opinion, Rand Paul is not electable as it stands. His positions are just too extreme for the moderates and liberals to even ponder.He has already started to appear on news networks and reel himself in, though. Recently, he changed his positions on drones and abortion from absolute to more reasonable.

Margaret Thatcher Dies

At eighty-seven years old, the former prime minister of the UK died on Monday after a series of strokes. She was the UK's longest serving prime minister in the last 100 years, serving more than twelve years. She revitalized a sickly economy for her country and forged a strong partnership and friendship with Ronald Reagan, especially when standing strong against the Soviet Union. 

There will be a funeral ceremony, with full military honors, will take place at London's St Paul's Cathedral, following a procession from Westminster.

The Queen, accompanied by the Duke of Edinburgh, will attend the service, Buckingham Palace said.

Segregated Prom 2013,

Ah, the American South. You never know what they'll do next down there. The state of Georgia has been making quite a fool of itself in the past week or so. I wrote an article a couple days ago about a town in Georgia mandating gun ownership, and now, another town in Georgia is making national noise because it still has segregated dances. Yes, that's right. Their dances are s-e-g-r-e-g-a-t-e-d. 

Wilcox County's (which coincidentally, was where Jefferson Davis was captured after the Civil  War) public High School has had segregated proms and homecomings for the last 30 years. Every year they have two proms, one for white students, and one for everybody else. Last year, a mixed-race student showed up at the white prom, and they were actually apprehended by the police. Last year was te first year the Wilcox County High School actually had only one homecoming dance. The homecoming king and queen were of different races, one black and one white, so they weren't allowed to take a picture together for the year book. Some students at the school, invluding the ones pictured abovehave been pushing for one, integrated prom. They put posters up around the school trying to gain support, and the posters were torn down. 

Some paces never cease to amaze me. Many a time, the rest of the United States has had to pull the South, kicking and screaming, into whatever century it happened to be. We obviously saw this with slavery. These states broke away from the country, and fought a war over the right to keep slaves. That wasn't the end of it though. Mississippi  didn't ratify the 13th amenendment, which abolished slavery, until 1995. It took 130 years for the Hospitality State to accept abolition. And still, all over the region, there are still fights going on when elected officials want to fly the Confederate battle flag, the symbol of their treachery, in their courthouses and Capitol buildings. 

Then there was Women's Suffrage. The South, of course, was lagging behind on this issue of fundamental rights.

And forget same-sex marriage. It took the South until 1967 to legalize interacial marriage. It just wasn't traditional!

(Interracial marriage legalized: Before 1887, 1948-1967, 12 June 1967)

But wait; there's more! The North Carolina legislature was working earlier this week on legislation that said that the 1st amendment, the most crucial law in American history, did not apply to North Carolina. The bill said each state "is sovereign" and courts cannot block a state "from making laws respecting an establishment of religion."  

But back to prom. I have confidence that next year, Wilcox County High school will hold a non-bigoted prom. The press they've gotten over this is just too bad. But like I said, you never know what they'll do next down there.