AO Weekly News Roundup for 6-15-8
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The A-O Weekly
News Round Up
For
Week-ending
6-15-8
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- Editor's Note: At midweek, Associated Press Newswire services has initiated new policies regarding linkage to their news stories. For this reason, to avoid any legals hassles, this week's edition of the Weekly News Roundup is now showing some dead links to articles that were AP Newswire stories. Word is circulating around the internet that Reuter's Newswire services are to soon follow AP's policies. This all seems to be part of an effort to stop Alternative News Media Outlets that oppose the New World Order under the guise of copyright laws, squelching the "Fair Use" standards that have been the cornerstone of the Internet's Alternative Media outlets.
It may well be that The A-O Report will be forced to review it's approach to providing news services. Perhaps, we'll turn more towards only news commentary. If we do that, it would leave more time to research, write and publish Biblical Studies articles.
A-O Intelligence Digest
Special Report
The Bilderberg 2008 Conference
"Stunning Prophetic Implications"
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A special report in this week's issue of the A-O Intelligence Digest awaits those who are donors to The Alpha-Omega Report. For more details, donors should log in to through their account on The Alpha-Omega Insider Report private pages for donors only. If you're not a donor to The Alpha-Omega Report, you can learn more about this latest Digest edition and the Bilderberg Conference. Go to this LINK HERE.
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Bilderberg Gets More
Alternate Media Coverage
Here's another alternative media outlet raising questions about the Bilderberg Group. LINK
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More Speculation About
Obama & Hillary At
Bilderberg Conference
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RED ALERT
Calls For 1-World Currency!
In the Aftermath of Bilderberg
Moving to 6-6-6 Technology Quickly
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Sen Obama Sponsored...
New Law Creates A
US Fingerprint Registry
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EU Central Banker Warns of Oil Shock
The president of the European Central Bank, Jean-Claude Trichet, on Monday called on oil producers and consumers to learn from past mistakes if Western economies were to avoid a repeat of the high inflation and unemployment that followed the first global oil shock in 1973. Full story details - LINK HERE.
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Expert Predicts...
$200 Oil & $5.75 Gas
In Next 6-24 Months?
The Goldman Sachs energy analyst whose predictions have fueled worldwide oil price speculation now foresees oil peaking at $200 a barrel, with gasoline rising to $5.75 a gallon before consumption cools enough to lower fuel prices.
In an rare interview published today in Barron's, Arjun N. Murti, Goldman Sachs' 39-year-old top energy analyst, said energy is in the later stages of a worldwide "super spike," with the possibility of $150 to $200 a barrel oil likely over the next six to 24 months."
Murti noted oil analysts have shifted from a 1990s attitude of, "It is easy to grow supply," to today's pessimism, "It is going to be more difficult to grow supply." The change is in part because oil-producing areas, including Mexico and the North Sea, are declining, while growth areas such as Brazil and Angola are just coming online.
In the interview with Barron's, Murti stressed he does not believe the world is running out of oil, and he does not subscribe to peak oil theories that worldwide oil production rates are necessarily declining. Read full story details, LINK HERE.
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OPEC Oil Chief Appeals For Calm
Amid Continuing Price Spike
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Saudis Hike Output
Additional Information LINK
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OPEC Cartel Rift Concerns
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Wall Street Journal Guest Editorial
A Weak Dollar Threatens World Order
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Pentagon Opposes Iran Strikes
Battles Cheney Over Strategy
Pentagon officials firmly opposed a proposal by Vice President Dick Cheney last summer for airstrikes against Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) bases by insisting that the administration would have to make clear decisions about how far the United States would go in escalating the conflict with Iran, according to a former George W. Bush administration official.
J. Scott Carpenter, who was then deputy assistant secretary of state in the State Department's Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, recalled in an interview that senior Defence Department (DoD) officials and the Joint Chiefs used the escalation issue as the main argument against the Cheney proposal. According to Carpenter, who is now at the Washington Institute on Near East Policy, a strongly pro-Israel think tank, Pentagon officials argued that no decision should be made about the limited airstrike on Iran without a thorough discussion of the sequence of events that would follow an Iranian retaliation for such an attack. Carpenter said the DoD officials insisted that the Bush administration had to make "a policy decision about how far the administration would go -- what would happen after the Iranians would go after our folks."
The question of escalation posed by DoD officials involved not only the potential of the Mahdi Army in Iraq to attack, Carpenter said, but possible responses by Hezbollah and by Iran itself across the Middle East.
The Joint Chiefs were fully supportive of the position taken by Secretary of Defence Robert Gates on the Cheney proposal, according to Carpenter. "It's clear that the military leadership was being very conservative on this issue," he said.
Former Bush speechwriter and senior policy adviser Michael Gerson, who had left the administration in 2006, wrote a column in the Washington Post Jul. 20, 2007 in which he gave no hint of Cheney's proposal, but referred to "options" for striking Iranian targets based on the Cheney line that Iran "smuggles in the advanced explosive devices that kill and maim American soldiers".
Gerson cited two possibilities: "Engaging in hot pursuit against weapon supply lines over the Iranian border or striking explosives factories and staging areas within Iran." But the Pentagon and the military leadership were opposing such options, he reported, because of the fear that Iran has "escalation dominance" in its conflict with the United States.
That meant, according to Gerson that, "in a broadened conflict, the Iranians could complicate our lives in Iraq and the region more than we complicate theirs."
Carpenter's account of the Pentagon's position on the Cheney proposal suggests, however, that civilian and military opponents were saying that Iran's ability to escalate posed the question of whether the United States was going to go to a full-scale air war against Iran.
Pentagon civilian and military opposition to such a strategic attack on Iran had become well-known during 2007. But this is the first evidence from an insider that Cheney's proposal was perceived as a ploy to provoke Iranian retaliation that could used to justify a strategic attack on Iran.
The option of attacking nuclear sites had been raised by President Bush with the Joint Chiefs at a meeting in "the tank" at the Pentagon on Dec. 13, 2006 and had been opposed by the Joint Chiefs, according a report by Time magazine's Joe Klein last June. After he become head of the Central Command in March 2007, Adm. William Fallon also made his opposition to such a massive attack on Iran known to the White House, according Middle East specialist Hillary Mann, who had developed close working relationships with Pentagon officials when she worked on the National Security Council staff.
It appeared in early 2007, therefore, that a strike at Iran's nuclear programme and military power had been blocked by opposition from the Pentagon. Cheney's proposal for an attack on IRGC bases in June 2007, tied to the alleged Iranian role in providing both weapons -- especially the highly lethal explosively formed projectiles (EFPs) -- and training to Shiite militias appears to have been a strategy for getting around the firm resistance of military leaders to such an unprovoked attack.
Although the Pentagon bottled up the Cheney proposal in inter-agency discussions, Cheney had a strategic asset which could he could use to try to overcome that obstacle: his alliance with Gen. David Petraeus.
Petraeus was also a supporter of Cheney's proposal for striking IRGC targets in Iran, going so far as to hint in an interview with Fox News last September that he had passed on to the White House his desire to do something about alleged Iranian assistance to Shiites that would require U.S. forces beyond his control.
At that point, Adm. Fallon was in a position to deter any effort to go around DoD and military opposition to such a strike because he controlled all military access to the region as a whole. But Fallon's forced resignation in March and the subsequent promotion of Petraeus to become CENTCOM chief later this year gives Cheney a possible option to ignore the position of his opponents in Washington once more in the final months of the administration. LINK HERE for full story.
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Israeli Leaders Downplay
Deputy Prime Minister's Remarks
For Military Action Against Iran
Israel yesterday attempted to play down a warning from a senior government minister that an attack on Iran was "unavoidable" if Tehran continued to develop nuclear weapons. More details - LINK HERE.
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Israeli Military Strike on Iran
Still A Possibility
Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert reiterated earlier in the week that there remains the possibility of a military strike against Iran. The Prime Minister's comments were made in regards to statements made by Deputy Prime Minister (and Transport Minister) Shaul Mofaz who had stated that Israel would attack Iran if it continued its nuclear program.
The remarks by Mofaz sparked an international outcry over the previous weekend after Mofaz's comments were made while Olmert was flying back to Israel from Washington after meeting with President Bush. The Deputy Prime Minister's warnings sparked a record rise in oil prices on Friday, June 6 as oil traders feared an interruption in oil supplies should war break out with Iran. For more details on Olmert's response, LINK HERE.
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Keeping His Powder Dry...
Bush: Iran Air Strikes
Still An Option
President Bush stated on Wednesday that military action against Iran is still "on the table." The President made his remarks while conducting his final tour of Europe as President.
President Bush raised the possibility of a military strike to thwart Tehran's presumed nuclear weapons ambitions, speaking aggressively even as he admitted having been unwise to have done so previously about Iraq. LINK DEAD
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Bush Pushes For Tougher Stance
By Europe on Iran's Nukes
LINK Dead
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Iran Warns of Painful Response
IF Israel Attacks
LINK Dead
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Iran Nuke Reactor
To Startup In Fall
LINK Dead
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EU Mulls Asset Freeze On Iranian Banks
LINK Dead
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Iran Banks Pull Assets
From EU Banks
The president of Iran has ordered the country's leading banks to transfer billions of dollars of assets from Europe to the Central Bank to prevent them being frozen by international sanctions, according to Western diplomats. The funds are being moved to Tehran through a secret network of "front" companies set up in Gulf states such as Dubai.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ordered the move amid growing concern that Iranian banks would soon be subject to strengthened European Union-level sanctions. But his action has caused friction with Tahmaseb Mazaheri, the governor of the Central Bank. The Iranian press has reported that he may resign over the issue.
This would constitute a serious blow to Mr Ahmadinejad's already battered reputation for economic competence. Mr Mazaheri has only been in the job nine months after he replaced Ibrahim Sheibani, who resigned over the Iranian president's attempts to control the activities of the state's banks. As The A-O Intelligence Digest has reported in previous issues, there appears to be a growing struggle for political power inside Iran as opponents attempt to weaken or remove President Ahmadinejad for gross incompetence and mismanagement. For more on the latest financial moves, LINK DEAD
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Russia's Prez Blames US
For Global Economic Crisis
LINK Dead
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US Midwest Flooding
Catastrophic if not Apocalyptic
ABC News Coverage
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Midwest Flooding Catastrophe
For Midwest Farmers
LINK
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Historic Flooding
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Flooding's Mass Evacuations Evoke
Hurricane Katrina Memories
LINK Dead
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Indiana Flooded
Twisters Hit Southside Chicago
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Lastes Flood Update
At Press Time
6-15-8
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Here's How Flooding Affects You
Anywhere in the World
THINK FOOD
America's Midwest is the food basket to the world. America supplies more food than any other nation to the rest of the world, especially from its "Midwest regions" and now much of the American Midwest is either soaked to the brim or over flowing with rainwater. This is bound to have an impact on not ony food supplies for the next year, but also on skyrocketing prices for food. For more on this aspect of America's flooding crisis see the next reports shown below and think of the Biblical prophetic implications and how these events might well line up for the Tribulation period. Already, we're seeing a worldwide impact as you'll see in these next stories.
According to my Midwest farmer contacts, many farmers had already planned to switch from corn to soybeans due to various issues involved in raising corn for ethanol. Many farmers had concluded that soybeans would be a better return on yield. Other's were avoiding planting corn again, prefering to maintain regular crop rotation strategies that shift a particular field every year to a different crop in order to maintain soil nutrient balances. Now with major flooding problems, there may be more of a forced shift to soybeans, which can be planted at a much later date - assuming the rain does finally stop and fields dry out for new planting.
It should be noted that with food shortages, riots become a factor. Riots create chaos, which is an essential ingredient for the NWO take-over plans. Remember their motto - "Out of Chaos - Order." No doubt, the globalists are secretly rubbing their hands with glee at the opportunities being presented with major food crop shortages related to bad weather.
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Corn Hits Record Price
On USA Flood Woes
Corn jumped to a record on speculation rain in the U.S. Midwest will cut supply and as rising oil costs and the dollar's decline boosted demand for a hedge against inflation. Soybeans, wheat and rice also gained.
Thunderstorms affected areas from the central Plains to the Midwest yesterday, bringing more than four inches (10 centimeters) of rain to parts of Iowa, Massachusetts-based Meteorlogix LLC said in a report. Further storms are forecast for the next five days. Corn and soybeans planted in wet, cool soils develop shallow roots, increasing the threat of damage from dry weather in July and August.
``With concerns about weather-related production losses, surging oil prices and the weaker dollar have fueled speculative demand for agricultural products that are fundamentally strong because of tight supplies,'' Daisuke Yamaguchi, an analyst at futures broker Yutaka Shoji Co. in Tokyo, said today.
Corn for July delivery rose as much as 22.25 cents, or 3.4 percent, to $6.73 in after-hours trading on the Chicago Board of Trade and stood at $6.675 as of 11:59 a.m. London time. The contract gained 8.6 percent last week, the biggest gain in 10 weeks. New-crop December corn traded as high as $6.985 a bushel.
Prices for the cereal have gained 69 percent in a year, fueled by growing demand for grain-fed meat in Asia, market speculation and the push to grow corn for ethanol. Wheat, soybeans and palm oil also reached records this year, sparking food riots from Haiti to Ivory Coast.
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon last week said the world needed to invest as much as $20 billion a year on agriculture to tackle soaring food prices. More details - LINK HERE.
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Britain Faces Food Crisis
The phrase 'nine meals from anarchy' sounds more like the title of a bad Hollywood movie than any genuine threat.
But that was the expression coined by Lord Cameron of Dillington, a farmer who was the first head of the Countryside Agency - the quango set up by Tony Blair in the days when he pretended to care about the countryside - to describe just how perilous Britain's food supply actually is.
Long before many others, Cameron saw the potential of a real food crisis striking not just the poor of the Third World, but us, here in Britain, in the 21st Century.
The scenario goes like this. Imagine a sudden shutdown of oil supplies; a sudden collapse in the petrol that streams steadily through the pumps and so into the engines of the lorries which deliver our food around the country, stocking up the supermarket shelves as soon as any item runs out.
If the trucks stopped moving, we'd start to worry and we'd head out to the shops, cking up our larders. By the end of Day One, if there was still no petrol, the shelves would be looking pretty thin. Imagine, then, Day Two: your fourth, fifth and sixth meal. We'd be in a panic. Day three: still no petrol.
What then? With hunger pangs kicking in, and no notion of how long it might take for the supermarkets to restock, how long before those who hadn't stocked up began stealing from their neighbours? Or looting what they could get their hands on?
There might be 11 million gardeners in Britain, but your delicious summer peas won't go far when your kids are hungry and the baked beans have run out.
It was Lord Cameron's estimation that it would take just nine meals - three full days without food on supermarket shelves - before law and order started to break down, and British streets descended into chaos.
A far-fetched warning for a First World nation like Britain? Hardly. Because that's exactly what happened in the U.S. in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. People looted in order to feed themselves and their families.
If a similar tragedy was to befall Britain, we are fooling ourselves if we imagine we would not witness similar scenes of crime and disorder. Much more to this story - read on at the LINK Dead.
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Egyptians Riot Over Bread Shortages
Thousands of demonstrators fought with police after a protest over flour rations in a town on Egypt's Mediterranean coast, a security official and state media said Sunday.
The state-owned daily Al-Ahram said some 8,000 protesters sealed off the main Cairo-Mediterranean highway for seven hours Saturday and burnt tires to stop traffic. Police fired tear gas and arrested dozens to disperse the crowd,
A security official said police were questioning 87 suspects.
The protesters were angered by the decision of authorities in Burullus to stop distributing subsidized flour directly to residents and instead deliver it exclusively to bakeries, the official said on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to give statements.
Fishermen in Burullus prefer to bake a type of bread suited to long fishing voyages instead of buying the standard subsidized bread from bakeries. More details, LINK HERE.
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Food Crisis Grows
From Spam Sales To Rice Riots
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Kansas Wheat Crop Soaked
Harvests Delayed In Many Areas
The American state of Kansas, famous for the story of the Wizard of Oz and tornadoes has not escaped the monsoon like rains gripping much of Middle America. What is most important about Kansas though is its wheat crop. Kansas is ideal for growing Number 2, Hard-Red Winter Wheat, which is the grain used to make most breads around the world. Other states producing this grain include portions of Texas, Oklahoma, Nebraska, the Dakotas and eastern parts of Colorada. Kansas however is the primary bellweather state for the condition of America's overall crop of this particular kind of wheat.
This year, the wheat crop harvest has been delayed somewhat because of wet field conditions. Harvesting just began two days ago so it remains to be seen just what kind of condition America's overall harvest will be for this particular food crop. To read more about this developing story, I refer you to The Hays, Kansas daily newspaper. The city of Hays is directly in the middle of the Kansas wheat growing country. LINK Dead. More details at this TV news page - LINK HERE. This next link gives you a more broad picture of the entire wheat growing region including other states - LINK HERE. Overall, US Government officials are optimistic for a bumper crop this year, but with rainy weather conditions persisting this past weekend over Kansas and points northward, such optimism may be premature.
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Corn Harvest May Be 53% Less in 2008
As Floods Threaten All Food Crops
Source: Bloomberg Business News
Corn advanced to a record, extending its rally to a ninth session, as floods damaged crops in the U.S., the world's largest producer and exporter, threatening global food supplies.
Soybeans rose to a three-month high. The Midwest floods were some of the worst since Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans in 2005, according to David Paulison, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. U.S. corn stockpiles may fall 53 percent to a 13-year low before next year's harvest, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said June 10.
Record crude oil, wheat, rice and soybean prices this year have driven global inflation, forcing governments to increase interest rates as the world economy slows and raising costs at companies such as Kirin Holdings Co., Japan's largest beverage maker. Soaring food costs have spurred riots from Haiti to Egypt.
``Inflation pressures are building around the world,'' David Cohen, director of Asian economic forecasting at Action Economics in Singapore, said today. ``It is squeezing household budgets, especially the poorest, and company profits.''
Corn gained as much as 3.5 percent to $7.9150 a bushel in Chicago and has advanced 33 percent in the past two weeks. It's up 86 percent in the past year on record demand for biofuels and livestock feed as rising Asian incomes increase meat consumption.
Spiraling food and fuel costs present a ``serious'' threat to the global economy, eclipsing the credit squeeze, finance ministers from the Group of Eight nations said in a statement released after a June 14 meeting in Osaka, Japan. More details, LINK HERE.
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Water A National Security Issue
For America
It is hard to believe that with all of the current flooding in America's Midwest that water has become a key strategic security issue for the U.S. government and that has some very concerned. Read the full story, LINK HERE.
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Tyson Food's Chickens
Have Bird Flu Symptoms
Russia & Japan Imports Halted
Japanese and Russian importation of chickens from America's giant chicken processor, Tyson Foods of Arkansas has been halted. The halt is for a 90 day period while authorities investigate preliminary tests revealing that some 15,000 birds tested positive for low pathogenic avian influenza. The strain H7N3 is alleged to pose no danger to humans according to the USDA but by treaty law and with bilateral agreements with Japan and Russia, the US is required to report findings of avaian influenza strains H5 or H7. The law recquires suspension of exports to Russia while Japan voluntarily chose to ban the chicken imports for 90 days.
The ban itself covers not just chickens from Tyson Foods or its chicken plants in Arkansas - but rather all chickens from the state of Arkansas, regardless of the company. For more details, LINK HERE.
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Tomato Salmonella Scare in US
LINK Dead
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Something's Shaking in Antarctica
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Red Chinese Hack Into
US Capitol Computers
The A-O Report has provided previous news stories and reports highlight the daring and skill of Red Chinese computer hackers. One particular investigative journalist, internationally acclaimed for professional journalism has reported that Red China has manufactured computer chips with a secret access that makes US computers vulnerable to hacker attacks.
Now comes word from US lawmakers on Capitol Hill, alleging that Federal government computers on Capitol Hill have been hacked by the Chinese. For more on this story, LINK Dead.
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Attempt to Impeach Bush Fails
LINK Dead
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British Leader Proposes
Favoring Islam Over Christianity
To Make Up For Past Discrimination
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Israel-Syria Peace Talks Resume
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US Secretury of State Condi Rice
RIPS Israel
Over Jerusalem Home Building
Says It Threatens Failure of Peace Process
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Canada Wages War
on Biblical Christianity
For Anti-homosexual Speech
The Canadian government has ordered a Christian pastor to renounce his faith and never again express moral opposition to homosexuality, according to a new report.
In a decision handed down just days ago in the penalty phase of the quasi-judicial proceedings run by the Alberta Human Rights Tribunal, evangelical pastor Stephen Boisson was banned from expressing his biblical perspective of homosexuality and ordered to pay $5,000 for "damages for pain and suffering" as well as apologize to the activist who complained of being hurt. Full story, LINK HERE.
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Cellphones & Brain Tumors
Important Info For A-O Readers Who Use Cell Phones
LINK To PDF File Report
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World's First "Church" Found?
Jordanian archaeologists claim they have found what might be what they think is the world's first church building. The head of Jordan's Rihab Centre for Archaeological Studies, Abdul Qader al-Husan told reporters:
"We have uncovered what we believe to be the first church in the world, dating from 33 AD to 70 AD. We have evidence to believe this church sheltered the early Christians -- the 70 disciples of Jesus Christ."
The remains of the church were found under Saint Georgueous Church which itself dates back to 230 A.D. The church is located in Rihab in northern Jordan near the Syrian border.
The basis for the claim that it dates to the earliest church era is tied to mosaic artwork which describes "the 70 beloved by God and Divine" who are said to have fled the persecution in Jerusalemand founded churches in northern Jordan. Researchers also cite other sources which suggest that they both lived and practiced religious rituals in the underground church and only left it after Christianity was embraced by Roman rulers.
The original church was inside a cave with the later church built over the entrance. Apparently local legend has it that Jesus and his mother, Mary are believed to have passed through the area. For more on this story, LINK HERE.
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