WASHINGTON (The Blaze/AP) — Targeting Iran’s economy, the U.S. ordered tough new penalties Monday to further pinch the country’s financial system and encourage Israel to give sanctions more time before any military action against Iran’s nuclear program. The new, stricter sanctions, authorized in legislation that President Barack Obama signed in December, will be enforced under an order he signed only now. They give U.S. banks new powers to freeze assets linked to the Iranian government and close loopholes that officials say Iran has used to move money despite earlier restrictions imposed by the U.S. and Europe. The action against the Central Bank of Iran is more significant for its timing than its immediate effect. It comes as the United States and its allies are arguing that tough sanctions can still persuade Iran to back off what the West contends is a drive to build a nuclear bomb. The U.S. and Europe want to deprive Iran of the oil income it needs to run its government and pay for the nuclear program. But many experts believe Iran will be able to find other buyers outside Europe. The European Union announced last month it would ban the import of Iranian crude oil starting in July. The U.S. doesn’t buy Iranian oil, but last month it placed sanctions on Iran’s banks to make it harder for the nation to sell crude. The U.S., however, has delayed implementing those sanctions for at least six months because it is worried about sending oil prices higher at a time when the world economy is struggling. Iran exports about 3 percent of the world’s oil The faster and more painfully sanctions can be seen to work, the better the case to shelve any plan by Israel to bomb Iran, a pre-emptory move that could ignite a new Mideast war. Taking this initial step against the Central Bank, the first time the U.S. has directly gone after that major institution, is one way the Obama administration can show momentum now. Israel, meanwhile, has been increasingly open about its worry that Iran could be on the brink of a bomb by this summer and that this spring offers the last window to destroy bomb-related facilities. Many Israeli officials believe that sanctions only give time for Iran to move its nuclear program underground, out of reach of Israeli military strikes. White House spokesman Jay Carney denied that Monday’s unexpected announcement of new banking sanctions was a sign of heightened worry about an Israeli attack. “There has been a steady increase in our sanctions activity and this is part of that escalation,” he said. Carney said U.S. sanctions on Iran are already squeezing Iran’s economy and have exacerbated tensions within the Iranian leadership. “There is no question that the impact of the isolation on Iran and the economic sanctions on Iran have caused added turmoil within Iran,” he said. Iran is the world’s third-largest exporter of crude oil, giving its leaders financial resources and leverage to withstand outside pressure. Last year, Iran generated $100 billion in revenue from oil, up from $20 billion a decade ago, according to IHS CERA, an energy consulting firm. If Iranian oil is prevented from getting to market, other suppliers could make up the difference. The U.S. has been pressuring other Middle East and African nations to step up production for sale to Europe. Saudi Arabia has said it could increase production to make up for any lost Iranian crude. Iran’s disputed nuclear program became a global concern more than five years ago, when the extent of the country’s research and uranium enrichment began to be known. Since then a web of international economic and other sanctions have failed to stop Iran’s progress toward a point when it could build one or more nuclear devices. U.S. intelligence agencies say Iran is indeed close to that ability but has not yet decided to go ahead. Iran says its nuclear program is peaceful and denounces sanctions as aggression. The new U.S. penalties were unexpected now. The sanctions were included as an amendment in the wide-ranging defense bill the president signed in late December, though when and how they were to be levied on Iran was unclear. The White House had previously said it would take months to evaluate the likely effect on the fragile global economy before taking the next large steps, including new penalties on the Central Bank. Now, U.S. institutions are required to seize Iranian state assets they come across, rather than rejecting the transaction involved. The value of Iranian assets affected by the new order was not clear. Iran does almost no direct business with the United States after three decades of enmity, but its money moves through the world financial system and its oil is sold in dollars. In a letter to Congress, Obama said more sanctions were warranted, “particularly in light of the deceptive practices of the Central Bank of Iran and other Iranian banks.” He cited the hiding of transactions of people or institutions and other loopholes. In an interview Sunday with NBC, Obama said the U.S. has “a very good estimate” of when Iran could complete a nuclear weapon, and he spoke favorably of the effect of sanctions and diplomacy to resolve the impasse. Obama addressed the concern about Israel but suggested there is still time. “I don’t think Israel has made a decision on what they need to do,” Obama said. He did not answer a question about whether Israel has promised to notify the United States before any pre-emptory strike. Republican presidential candidates have accused Obama of being too timid in his dealings with Iran, and while U.S. officials reject that characterization they acknowledge they are stepping cautiously because of fear of upsetting the global economy.
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U.S. Imposes Tougher Sanctions on Iran, But Will it Ease Israeli Fears?
Almost one year ago this week Americans surveyed in a Gallup poll ranked Ronald Reagan the “greatest” United States President . Today a new poll released by Young America’s Foundation/TPC reveals that our nation’s university professors dont even rank the Gipper in the top 10. “In a recent survey, 60 percent of college professors did not even rank President Reagan among the top ten Presidents. Begrudgingly, these educators admitted that Reagan’s Presidency was successful, but they rate him far lower than most Americans. ” [..] “In the YAF poll, not one of the 284 professors surveyed listed him as their top choice—60 percent didn’t even list President Reagan in their top ten. They did, however, rate him as marginally more successful than President Obama. 61 percent of college professors rated President Reagan’s Presidency as ‘mostly a success,’ while 59 percent gave Obama the same mark. When asked to grade the last five Presidents, President Reagan received a C+ on average. President George W. Bush received a D, underscoring just how much the Left still despises our 43 rd President. As a whole, 57 percent of professors identified themselves as ‘liberal’ and 16 percent as ‘conservative.’” The Young America’s Foundation commissioned the survey in honor of Reagan’s 101st birthday, which is today. In reaction to the poll, Reagan Ranch Board of Governors Chairman Frank Donatelli said, “The leftist tilt of college professors is well known. However, the fact that President Reagan is now viewed as ‘successful’ by 61% of this group is testament to the lasting accomplishments of our 40 th President. The exceptional work of Young America’s Foundation in celebrating the 100 th anniversary of Ronald Reagan’s birth has been important in educating all Americans about President Reagan’s accomplishments.” The Young America’s Foundation is a principal outreach organization to the Conservative Movement, committed to ensuring that increasing numbers of young Americans understand and are inspired by the ideas of individual freedom, a strong national defense, free enterprise, and traditional values. The organization owns and preserves the Reagan Ranch.
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Poll finds that most college professors don’t rank Reagan among their top 10 presidents
At Washington Post , ” Gingrich vows to fight on to the convention .” And at New York Times , ” Gingrich Pledges Bitter Battle Until Convention “: Newt Gingrich vowed again to stay in the Republican presidential contest until the convention in August and said he will spend the next several months engaged in a bitter battle with Mitt Romney. Speaking to the press after the Nevada caucuses Saturday, Mr. Gingrich repeatedly hammered Mr. Romney as a pro-abortion, pro-gun control, pro-taxes candidate who has the backing of the Republican establishment. “I am a candidate for president of the United States,” he said. “I will be a candidate for president of the United States. I will go to Tampa.” Mr. Romney ignored Mr. Gingrich in his victory speech tonight. But Mr. Gingrich seemed insistent on making sure that his rival cannot simply look the other way. He accused Mr. Romney of purposely leaking false information about Mr. Gingrich’s plans to drop out of the presidential race, calling that Mr. Romney’s “greatest fantasy” in the race. And Mr. Gingrich said that recent meetings he held with donors were meant to map out a plan to continue getting his message out despite Mr. Romney’s superior fund-raising. “The entire establishment will be against us,” he predicted. But he said that by appearing on national television and doing interviews in newspapers, he will spread his agenda. “The American people want somebody who is genuinely conservative, who is prepared to change Washington,” Mr. Gingrich said. The question, really, is where can Newt win? Where will he do well in upcoming states? And when? He needs to do something fast. I don’t have the answers right now, but I’ll check and update. It’s one thing to pledge a campaign all the way to the GOP convention in Tampa. It’s another thing to do so without making yourself look like a sore loser and a fool. More from Jonathan Tobin, at Commentary , ” New Newt? Same Sore Loser Strategy .”
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Defiant Gingrich Vows to Stay in Race
Concerns are growing over the safety of a Pakistani doctor who might have played an unwitting yet heroic role in the U.S. take-down of Osama bin Laden. According to Fox News , Dr. Shikal Afridi may be in the custody of Pakistan’s clandestine Inter-Services Intelligence agency after it discovered the doctor’s participation in a fake Hepatitis B vaccination program that attempted to gain DNA samples from those within bin Laden’s Abbottabad compound — including several followers and their families. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta this week questioned the charges against the doctor. “I’m very concerned about what the Pakistanis did with this individual,” he told CBS News. “This was an individual who, in fact, helped provide intelligence on — that was very helpful with regards to this operation. And he was not in any way treasonous towards Pakistan. He was not in any way doing anything that would have undermined Pakistan.” Panetta reminded thst the U.S. and Pakistan “have a common cause here against terrorism.” “And for them to take this kind of action against somebody who was helping to go after terrorism, I just think it’s a real mistake on their part,” said Panetta. Fox reports that Panetta’s comments are the first to publicly acknowledge Afridi’s involvement in the operation. Fox provides some of the background: Afridi was arrested shortly after the raid and is thought to still be in custody despite not formally being charged with a crime. His detention has widened the rift between the U.S. and Pakistan, with Washington until now quietly pressing for his release so Afridi and his family can resettle in the U.S., according to The Guardian newspaper, which first reported on the doctor’s role in the operation last July. Reports suggest that Afridi rang the bell of the bin Laden compound during the vaccination drive, and the nurse who was with him was able to get inside but was ultimately unsuccessful in getting any DNA samples. Reports have also suggested that Afridi may not have even been aware that he was working for the CIA and instead may have been recruited by other Pakistanis to carry out the fake house-to-house vaccination program. Now, lawmakers are coming to Afridi’s aid. Republican Congressman Dana Rohrabacher introduced legislation to grant U.S. citizenship to Afridi as Pakistan’s Inquiry Commission on the Abbottabad Operation has recommended the doctor be tried for treason. If convicted, Afridi could be executed. An official press release from Rohrabacher’s office stated: “It is shameful and unforgivable that our supposed allies in Pakistan have charged Dr. Afridi, who contributed to the operation that killed Bin Laden, with treason,” said Rohrabacher. “The United States needs to stand with those who help us. We have not forgotten about Dr. Afridi.” “By granting him American citizenship we will send a direct and powerful message to those in the Pakistani government and military who protected the mastermind of 9/11 for all those years and who are now seeking retribution on those who helped to bring Bin Laden to justice,” Rohrabacher continued. “We must assume the obvious and conclude that Pakistan’s leaders have plotted for years to kill Americas.” Panetta also told CBS News that there was no actual evidence of Pakistani involvement in bin Laden’s presence in Pakistan, but suspicions must have been raised. “I personally have always felt that somebody must have had some sense of what was happening at this compound,” Panetta said of Pakistan’s alleged involvement in harboring bin Laden. “Don’t forget, this compound had 18-foot walls around it — 12-foot walls in some areas, 18-foot walls elsewhere, a seven-foot wall on the third balcony of the house. It was the largest compound in the area,” he said. “So you would have thought that somebody would have asked the question, ‘What the hell’s going on there?’
Scroll down for an update to this story: Last Sunday, Catholic priests across the country read an open letter to their parishioners. The letter condemned the Department of Health and Human Services’ decision to force religious employers to cover the cost of contraception and abortion-inducing drugs in its employees’ health-care coverage. The letter argued that the faithful could not and must not in good conscience comply with the HHS’ “unjust law.” However, Catholic chaplains in the U.S. military were “forbidden” from reading this letter. After Archbishop Timothy Broglio, who is in charge of Catholic military chaplains, sent out the letter to be read at Sunday masses, the Army’s Office of the Chief of Chaplains sent out another communication “forbidding Catholic priests to read the letter, in part because it seemed to encourage civil disobedience, and could be read as seditious against the Commander-in-Chief,” Business Insider ‘s Michael Dougherty reports. Military officials felt that “the letter contained language that might be misunderstood in a military setting,” according to Kathryn Jean Lopez of National Review Online , and the Army asked that the letter not be read from the pulpit. “Instead, the letter would have been referenced in announcements and made available in the back of the chapel for the faithful, if they wished, as they departed after the Mass,” Lopez writes. Despite these instructions, some chaplains read the letter anyway. Business Insider reports: More than one Catholic chaplain who spoke to us off the record confirmed that many chaplains disobeyed this instruction and read the letter anyway. Others sought further instructions from their Archbishop. Some reasoned that because the letter was not “politically driven,” and that it only sought to reaffirm Catholic teachings on sexual ethics and the “sanctity of life,” they would risk punishment and disobey instructions, one source involved told The Blaze. Anticipating repercussions for reading the letter, a confidential letter was sent to the chaplains instructing them to contact the Military Archdiocesan lawyer in case of more interference or any punishment (via BI): The Archdiocese believes that any attempt to keep a chaplain from freely teaching and preaching the Catholic faith, for which you were endorsed, is a violation of the First Amendment of the Constitution. If any of you are in any way punished or slated for punitive action, I ask that you kindly call our Archdiocesan Attorney, John L. Schlageter, Esq….he will immediately place you into contact with a Religious Freedom Law Firm that will be most willing to take your case free of charge. Here is the Archdiocese for Military Services account of what happened regarding the letter, its public reading, and a newly-edited, government-approved version to be released (via National Review Online ): On Thursday, January 26, Archbishop Broglio emailed a pastoral letter to Catholic military chaplains with instructions that it be read from the pulpit at Sunday Masses the following weekend in all military chapels. The letter calls on Catholics to resist the policy initiative, recently affirmed by the United States Department of Health and Human Services, for federally mandated health insurance covering sterilization, abortifacients and contraception, because it represents a violation of the freedom of religion recognized by the U.S. Constitution. The Army’s Office of the Chief of Chaplains subsequently sent an email to senior chaplains advising them that the Archbishop’s letter was not coordinated with that office and asked that it not be read from the pulpit. The Chief’s office directed that the letter was to be mentioned in the Mass announcements and distributed in printed form in the back of the chapel. Archbishop Broglio and the Archdiocese stand firm in the belief, based on legal precedent, that such a directive from the Army constituted a violation of his Constitutionally-protected right of free speech and the free exercise of religion, as well as those same rights of all military chaplains and their congregants. Following a discussion between Archbishop Broglio and the Secretary of the Army, The Honorable John McHugh, it was agreed that it was a mistake to stop the reading of the Archbishop’s letter. Additionally, the line: “We cannot — we will not — comply with this unjust law” was removed by Archbishop Broglio at the suggestion of Secretary McHugh over the concern that it could potentially be misunderstood as a call to civil disobedience. The AMS did not receive any objections to the reading of Archbishop Broglio’s statement from the other branches of service. Update : The decision to forbid the chaplains from reading the letter is an odd one. This is not the first time that the question of religious liberty and freedom of speech in the military has been brought up. In fact, the Pentagon was once sued by The Becket Fund for having issued gag orders against a Catholic priest and Jewish rabbi for being vocal supporters of H.R. 1122 (the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 1997). The Becket Fund argued in court that the gag order “violated their First Amendment rights under the Free Exercise Clause, the Free Speech Clause, and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, 42 U.S.C. 2000bb, et . seq ,” according to Free Preach . The court agreed with The Becket Fund that the gag order was unconstitutional: What we have here is the government’s attempt to override the Constitution and the laws of the land by a directive that clearly interferes with military chaplains’ free exercise and free speech rights, as well as those of their congregants. 962 F. Supp. at 165. Free Preach writes: In particular, the court rejected all of the arguments advanced by the government to support their censorship of speech from the pulpit. For example, the government argued that it was not an important part of the plaintiffs’ religion to urge their congregations to contact Congress about particular moral or political issues. The court soundly rejected that argument, holding that it was not the role of the government “to determine whether encouraging parishioners to contact Congress [about a particular issue like] the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act is an ‘important component’ of the [plaintiffs'] faiths.” Id . at 161. Moreover, the court held that “[e]ncouraging parishioners to contact Congress” about legislation addressing moral issues related to religious faith “appears to be no less important to the [plaintiffs' faith] than other religiously-motivated activity courts have held to be important enough to a religion such that its prohibition amounts to a substantial burden.” Id . The government then argued that the chaplains’ contemplated speech was “not religious” but merely “political.” The court rejected this argument also, holding that “it is not the role of this Court to draw fine distinctions between degrees of religious speech and to hold that religious speech is protected but religious speech with so-called political overtones is not.” Id . at 164. Finally, the court held that any interests advanced by the government for their censorship policy were “outweighed by the . . . chaplains’ right to autonomy in determining the religious content of their sermons.” Id . at 162. It is imperative to note that these same interests would likely be asserted by the government in the private freedom-to-preach context as well, and similar reasoning to reject such would apply. To summarize the holding: The State cannot interfere with the right of religious leaders to preach from the pulpit on political issues, even if those ministers are in the military [emphasis added]. Now, all that being said, and the legal and constitutional precedent having been set, the question is this: on what grounds did the U.S. military have right to forbid those chaplains from reading an open letter from the Archbishop during Sunday Mass? This is a breaking story. Updates will be added as they become available.
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U.S. Military Silences Catholic Chaplains From Speaking out Against Obama Admin Ruling
With only three days left before the team of researchers drilling into a 20-million-year-old lake under 13,000 feet of Antarctic ice, radio communication has gone silent on their end.
Lake Vostok in Antarctica is buried under 13,000 feet of ice and is about the size of Lake Ontario.
Satellite image of Lake Vostok. (Image via Daily Mail)
Supplies traveling to the Vostok Antarctic research station. (Image via Daily Mail)
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Radio Silence From Researchers Drilling Into 20-Million-Year-Old Antarctic Lake
Reuters – The White House received a letter last year purported to come directly from Mullah Omar, the reclusive leader of the Taliban, asking the United States to deliver militant prisoners whose transfer is now at the heart of the Obama administration’s bid to broker peace in Afghanistan.
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Amid peace bid, U.S. got purported letter from Taliban
(Reuters)
