Random Politics & Religion #00

Oh, you musta missed that whole conversation I had a week or so ago in here about it.

Plenty were.

"The question of why Germany can't get its gold back is perhaps the biggest mystery in the financial world today," he told CNBC via email. "I think the Netherlands (and some Swiss voters) are entirely correct in wanting to make sure that their gold is someplace where their own representatives can count it."

Switzerland is holding an important referendum on its gold holdings this weekend, with its citizens set to decide whether the Swiss National Bank (SNB) should refrain from selling any more of its gold and instead boost its gold holdings from 7 to 20 percent.

I don't often read NBC, MSNBC, but here's a great article from CNBC:

Will the US give the Dutch their gold back?

Last week, when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu approved draft legislation to amend the country's Basic Law to declare that Israel is "the national homeland of the Jewish people" instead of a "Jewish and democratic state," as it had been since the state's founding in 1948, he had to tamp down criticism that the law codifies discrimination against Palestinian citizens of Israel—20 percent of the country's population.

"There are those who would like the democratic to prevail over the Jewish and there are those who would like the Jewish to prevail over the democratic," said Netanyahu. "Both of these values are equal and both must be considered to the same degree."

However, if there are any questions as to whether or not some within the Israeli government do not want Arab citizens of Israel to remain within the country's borders, one need not look further than Netanyahu's cabinet. Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman on Friday published an updated platform for his ultranationalist party, Yisrael Beiteinu, which includes a "peace plan" that calls on the government to encourage Israeli Arabs to leave the country by offering them "economic incentives" when—and, indeed, if—a Palestinian state becomes a reality.

Lieberman repeated his proposal for land and population swaps between Israel and a future Palestinian state, but took it a step further by encouraging Israel to pay Arab citizens of Israel to move—those "who feel that they are part of the Palestinian people, to resolve this issue of duality and divided loyalties from which they are suffering," adding, "Israel should even encourage them with economic incentives."

"As for Israeli Arabs, any agreement must include a plan for territorial and population exchange," wrote Lieberman in the new platform. "An arrangement of this kind with the Palestinian state will allow Israeli Arabs who do not identify with the State of Israel to become part of the Palestinian state."

Some in Israeli politics say this is nothing more than political tactics ahead of anticipated forthcoming elections. Zahava Gal-On, chairwoman of the left-wing Meretz party, responded to Lieberman's platform change, saying that election panic had driven the foreign minister to a "populist, shady and irresponsible plan that encourages the transfer [of Israeli Arabs] and only fans flames on the ground."

However, Lieberman has routinely made similar comments since coming into the public spotlight in a variety of ministerial roles more than a decade ago. He regularly calls for the requirement of Israeli Arabs to sign a "loyalty oath" or lose their right to vote. In 2006, he described Arab members of the Knesset who met with Hamas members of the Palestinian Authority as "terror collaborators" and called for their execution: "World War II ended with the Nuremberg Trials. The heads of the Nazi regime, along with their collaborators, were executed. I hope this will be the fate of the collaborators in [the Knesset]."

"I’ve always been controversial because I offer new ideas," Lieberman once told The New York Times. "For me to be controversial, I think this is positive."

President Barack Obama on Tuesday will press Congress to approve $6.18 billion in emergency funding to help fight the Ebola outbreak in West Africa and prepare U.S. hospitals to handle future cases.

Most of the request is aimed at the immediate response to the disease at home and abroad. But the package also includes $1.5 billion in contingency funds - money that could become a target if lawmakers decide to trim the bill.

"That is the part of the package that is most at risk," said Sam Worthington, president of InterAction, an alliance of U.S. non-governmental aid groups.

While lawmakers recognize that the United States had to take action to arrest the deadly disease, some are wary of giving the administration leeway in investing money in public health systems in West Africa.

"I think there is less understanding of the need to stay in it for the long run and to build the capacity of countries to ensure this doesn't happen in the future," Worthington said in an interview.

The worst Ebola outbreak on record has killed at least 5,987 people since March, mainly in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

The Obama administration came under fire in September after a series of missteps with a man who traveled to Dallas from Liberia and later died of Ebola. Two nurses contracted the disease while caring for the man.

Screening and treatment procedures have since been tightened. There are no current U.S. cases, and stories about the outbreak have faded from headlines.

"My hope is that we're not getting Ebola fatigue setting in," said Bruce Johnson, president of SIM USA, a Christian missionary group helps treat Ebola patients in Liberia. "There continues to be a huge need for this funding."

On Tuesday, Obama will tour and speak at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, where a team of researchers last week published promising results from the first phase of a research trial for an Ebola vaccine.

The vaccine could go into testing in West Africa in the next few weeks - a sign of progress Obama will praise in his remarks, a senior administration official said in an interview.

The contingency funds requested from Congress could be used to help manufacture and distribute a successful vaccine, the official said.

"They're having questions about the contingency fund, but we think as we answer those questions, people understand why it's necessary," the official said.

Lol. Whoever wrote that headline needs to work on their paraphrasing. And it's not amnesty.

They came here illegally and they get to stay right, sure sounds like they aren't being punished for the crime.

LOL!

It's not illegal to come to the united states if you're mexican nausi

Who said anything about being a mexican?

alright, here you go.

So sneaking in undocumented and/or overstaying your visa doesn't violate US immigration law?