The European Human Rights Court has confirmed the ban of Batasuna,the political wing of the terrorist group ETA. Spanish dailies are rather happy about this decision, which puts a spanner in the works of radical Basque nationalism. The Basque press, on the other hand, is more measured.

On 30 June, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) upheld a ban on the Basque nationalist political party Batasuna, which was outlawed in 2003. The court in Strasbourg took the view that the disbanding of the party, which is considered to be the political arm of the terrorist organization ETA, was a response "to a pressing social need," because Batasuna's values "contradicted the concept of 'a democratic society' and presented a major danger to Spain's democracy."

In its editorial, El País describes the ruling as "the end of the road for Batasuna," and further remarks that "the Strasbourg court has dispelled any doubts on the outlawing of the `abertzale' [patriot] party." For the centre-left Madrid daily, the outcome of the case has not only "buried any hope for the group, but also sent a strong message to certain nationalist movements who were eager to see the European authority overturn a decision of the Spanish courts, and condemn the Spanish state for violating fundamental political rights." The descision is also "a severe blow for the PNV" Basque nationalist party, which recently lost control of the Basque Autonomous Community parliament.

Euro-skeptics have plenty of reasons to celebrate. By strengthening national parliaments vis-a-vis the EU, Germany's highest court has ended the dream of a 'United States of Europe.' And that's good news for Eastern European countries, who often feel bullied by Germany, the alliance's heavyweight.

A few years ago, continental Europe was busy trying to present itself as a convincing alternative to American neoconservatives and their power-hungry worldview. And, in doing so, "Old Europe" actually experienced a completely unexpected resurgance. In the minds of its inhabitants, the European Union was the perfect alternative to an enormous United States that was drunk on power, savouring its "unipolar moment" and not giving a hoot about either its allies or enemies. To them, it was soft power against the hard US way of doing things --wanting to impose Western democracy on the entire world at any price. These were the issues that historians and political scientists were debating at American universities and at think tanks in the US capital.

Germany's highest court has literally barred Angela Merkel and any subsequent chancellor from giving up any additional powers to the European Union.

If we take a look, they said, can't we see that the EU is currently expanding democracy, freedom and prosperity -- and in a peaceful way? Of course, it's not trying to do things like they've been done in Iraq. No, in the EU, sovereign nations have relinquished part of their rights in order to attain something better for all of those concerned. A few years back, you could often hear the phrase "the European model." And Europe could have served as a model -- at least until the next regional or global crisis that proved once again that the EU's 27 member states had still not forfeited enough sovereignty or mustered the nerve to share a joint foreign policy. In other words, it was enough until everyone called on the US again to make everything all right.

A car belonging to the chairman of Greece's top administrative court was destroyed in a bomb blast on Friday while a tax office was targeted in a separate attack and another bomb went off at a government-affiliated organisation, police say.

AFP - A top Greek judge's car was destroyed in a bomb blast Friday while a tax office caught fire in a separate attack and another bombing targeted a government-affiliated migration organisation, police said.
   
The car of the chairman of the Council of States, Greece's top administrative court, was gutted in the explosion of a gas canister bomb that was planted under his service car. Nobody was injured in the attack.
   
Judge Panagiotis Pikrammenos had just been appointed the previous day in a scheduled justice ministry handover.

President Obama has scolded the Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin for failing to move on from Cold War dynamics. His remarks come on the eve of a much-anticipated trip to Moscow next week in which he aims to "hit the reset button" on relations with Russia.

The Bush Administration's relationship with Mr Putin started warmly, with George Bush gushing that he could see into the soul of Mr Putin, then Russian President, and could trust him as a man to do business with. If Mr Obama was hoping to avoid that trap he certainly did so, but was more complimentary about Mr Putin's successor, Dmitri Medvedev, whom he said was aware of the dynamics of the current world order.

Mr Obama was asked why he would meet Mr Putin at all on his three-day visit, in which he and Mr Medvedev will issue a joint pledge to cut their nuclear arsenals in half. Mr Obama said that the former President "still has a lot of sway" and needed to hear what he had to say -- an acknowledgement of his continued influence, while simultaneously sending Mr Putin a message that he regards him as yesterday's man. "It's important that even as we move forward with President Medvedev, Putin understands that the old Cold War approach to US-Russian relations is outdated; that it's time to move forward in a different direction," he said.

British calls for a mass walkout of European Union ambassadors from Tehran were shot down by more cautious nations led by Germany and Italy yesterday as the carefully constructed European consensus on responding to Iran came under intense strain.

Britain, backed by the outgoing Czech presidency of the EU, had pushed for the dramatic step of a temporary withdrawal of ambassadors to pile pressure on Tehran to free local British Embassy staff from custody.

With the release of all but two of the nine staff by yesterday afternoon, the incoming Swedish presidency of the EU, which took the reins on Wednesday, struck a less aggressive diplomatic note, more in tune with Berlin and a number of other EU capitals.

Carl Bildt, Sweden's Foreign Minister, said last night that the EU had called on Iran to release all the British Embassy employees, but added that the EU was still awaiting a response from Tehran. Suggesting that it was too early to recall the ambassadors, Mr Bildt said: "We are taking this step by step."

As US and Afghan forces launched a major offensive against Taliban insurgents in Helmand province, Germany's parliament has voted to expand Berlin's own involvement in Afghanistan.  

The German Bundestag has approved the deployment of a contingent of some 300 German support personnel to help man AWACS surveillance aircraft.  The overwhelming majority, with 461 of 557 voting in favor, came after Chancellor Angela Merkel's cabinet of Christian Democrats and Social Democrats agreed to the mission two weeks ago.

The deployment of three or four airborne surveillance aircraft was requested by NATO defense ministers at a meeting in Brussels early last month to help coordinate early warning efforts against a growing Taliban insurgency.

The European Commission says it will probe Italy's new legislation to fight illegal immigration. The controversial law has been criticised by Italy's center-left opposition and the Vatican.  

The European Commission announced it would examine the new measures to determine whether they comply with EU norms, warning that automatic expulsion rules in the legislation are not acceptable.

European Justice Commissioner Jacques Barrot said that "automatic expulsion rules for entire categories are not acceptable."

Under the new law illegal immigration becomes a criminal offence, punishable with a fine of up to 10,000 euros ($14,000). The amount of time that illegal migrants can be detained in holding centers has been increased to six months but immigrants can also be deported immediately.

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - Governments may not hinder citizens' rights to move freely in the European Union when investigating possible fake marriages between EU and non-EU citizens, new guidelines published by the European Commission on Thursday (2 July) say.

The rules were put forward following complaints by Denmark and Ireland, concerned that that the current directive covering the rights of EU citizens and their families to move to another member state does not prevent scam marriages between EU citizens and individuals from outside the union looking to gain residency.

The commission says freedom of movement must be preserved

"These guidelines should provide solutions to a number of problems without calling into question the freedom of movement and freedom to reside in another member state than one's own," said justice commissioner Jacques Barrot.

Danish concerns stem from the landmark Metock case ruling last year in which the European Court of Justice overruled an Irish government decision to deny four asylum seekers, married to EU nationals, residency.

Nearly a thousand homeless immigrants, hoping for UK passage to seek asylum there, currently live in Calais, in the north of France, in atrocious conditions. For want of showers, many have been suffering from scabies for some time now. On 1 July the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (HCR) officially opened an office in Calais to try to improve the situation.

Standing in the waist-deep water, with his head and torso covered in soap, he accepted to be photographed with a laugh. The man, an Afghan, was bathing in lukewarm discharge from the Tioxide chemicals plant, in  Calais. It was Friday afternoon, close to the wood where some of the town's 1,000 homeless migrants are camping in the hope of obtaining asylum in the UK, or sneaking across the channel inside (or underneath) one of the trucks on their way to Dover.

It has been over six months since overworked staff at the local branch of the Caritas charity suspended access to showers -- and staying clean became yet another challenge for migrants, who already had to cope with police harassment, armed traffickers and living like wild animals in the woods.

The Bavarian fondness for a glass of local beer is legendary. But brewers in the picturesque southern German state are up in arms about a leading brand of Dutch beer -- called Bavaria. After years of legal wrangling, Europe's highest court has ruled that the Dutch brand can retain its trademark name.

Sold in its shiny green glass bottles, Bavaria beer is a common sight at bars and cafes across Europe. But closer inspection of its label reveals that the hops-based beverage has no ties to the German state of Bavaria and is actually "made in Holland."

 Bavarian beer fights back against its Dutch namesake. And that is hard to swallow for brewers in Bavaria. They have long argued that the Dutch firm is profiting from their region's beer-making reputation. But the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg ruled on Thursday that the Dutch brewer can continue to use the "Bavaria" name, despite the European Union law that gives brewers in the German state exclusive rights to the term Bavarian beer.

That extends an enduring legal spat. The Bavarian Brewers Federation has challenged the second-biggest Dutch brewery in German, Italian and Spanish courts. The beer-making group, which represents 650 small brewers, wants the Bavaria brand to operate under a different name, given that the "Bayerisches Bier" or Bavarian beer is considered a protected geographical indication (PGI) by the EU, putting it in the same elite group as Greek feta cheese, Italian Parmesan cheese or French champagne.

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - Member states on Friday (4 July) admitted they did not have enough support for a mid-July European Parliament vote on Jose Manuel Barroso's bid to become European Commission president for a second time.

The vote is now likely to be postponed until September with the Swedish EU presidency hoping to get it wrapped up by the middle of that month.

The Barroso vote now looks set to take place in September

"We have spoken to several party group leaders and no decision is going to be taken on Mr Barroso in July within the European Parliament. I hope, however, that we will be able to decide within the near future on when that decision will be adopted," said Swedish prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt.

"We have to show all respect due to this independent institution. We shouldn't lay the basis for open dispute or argument between the institutions," he added, after his officials spent the last days sounding out opinions in the EU assembly.

Sociable, safe, gentle, relatively uncluttered by commercial development, and with very good beer. In just a short trip, we did begin to understand a little of the Danish secret of happiness.

Spain's spy chief, Alberto Saiz, has been forced to resign after his own agents turned on him, employing the tricks of the trade to overthrow their boss at the country's National Intelligence Centre (CNI).

In a constant flow of black propaganda over several months, disgruntled agents leaked photographs of Saiz's exotic fishing and hunting outings during business trips abroad and claimed that he even used the agency's divers to clean his swimming pool.

"Every time he goes abroad to work he takes his rifle or shotgun and takes days off to go hunting at the taxpayers' expense. Everything is free," an anonymous agency source told El Mundo newspaper.

Sources within the agency also alleged that night-time hunts for African pigs in Mali, fishing expeditions off Senegal, and underwater fishing in Mexico were all paid for with taxpayers' money. El Mundo reported Saiz used government funds to pay for at least six trips and sometimes flew in an air force jet.

As fresh statistics in both Europe and the US dash hopes for an early economic recovery, Brussels is proposing micro loans to small firms in a bid to help them keep local jobs.

According to data published by Eurostat, the EU's statistical office, on Thursday (2 July), the jobless rate in the eurozone was 9.5 percent in May, up from 9.3 percent in April. It is the highest rate since May 1999 and it involves around 15 million men and women.

Fresh EU job figures show the recession has struck hard at the bloc's labour market

Meanwhile, the unemployment rate across the bloc was 8.9 percent in May, a four year high. The number of jobless persons increased by 385,000 compared to the previous month and by 5.1 million since May 2008.

Altogether, it is expected that some 3.5 million jobs will be lost this year across the EU.

Spain continues to feature as the member state with the highest unemployment rate, while the Netherlands recorded the lowest rates (3.2%) and, along with Germany, the lowest surge of the number of unemployed compared to last year.

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The European Commission announced on Thursday (2 July) its intention to release the second tranche of an EU loan agreed with Latvia last year, while at the same time calling on the small Baltic state to put its public finances in order by 2012.

The disbursement of the €1.2 billion sum will come later this month once the commission has had time to raise the funding on international markets, something it can do at a much lower rate than Latvia due to its higher credit standing.

Riga has cut back public spending three times this year

The loan is part of a wider €7.5 billion package agreed between Latvia and the EU, the International Monetary Fund and other lenders last December.

"Latvia is going though a very painful adjustment, but the EU is providing considerable support with a balance of payments loan that is the biggest part of the international financial assistance," said economy commissioner Joaquin Almunia.

In my column this week, which has caused rather a lot of debate among our readers, I posited the idea that this whole spending debate was rather missing the point. My argument is that the massive fiscal slug that has been taken out of the UK budget is a consequence largely of a sudden dive in tax revenue - not a massive surge in spending. The evidence can be seen in the chart below, which is from the OECD's Economic Outlook report last week (and keen-eyed readers may recognise for having made a cameo in this blog back then).

Chancellor says return of the bonus culture threatens to undermine global economy again

Alistair Darling has warned bankers to stop backsliding into their bad old ways as he promised a much tougher regulatory system to prevent a repeat of last autumn's financial crisis.

Amid signs that the bonus culture blamed for excessive risk-taking is creeping back in the City of London, the Chancellor declared in an interview with The Independent: "There are people who are too complacent in my view. They need to be brought back to earth."

Mr Darling disclosed that he will try to end a damaging turf war between the Bank of England and the Financial Services Authority (FSA) by giving them both more powers in a White Paper on banking unveiled next week.

July 3 (Bloomberg) -- Six banks in Illinois and one in Texas were seized by regulators as the deepening financial crisis pushed the toll of failed U.S. lenders this year to 52, the most since 1992.

Twelve banks have failed this year in Illinois, the most of any state. The seven lenders seized yesterday, with total assets of $1.49 billion and deposits of $1.34 billion, were closed by state or federal regulators and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. was named receiver, according to statements from the FDIC. Buyers were named for each of the closed institutions.

The Illinois banks are affiliates of Peotone Bank & Trust Co., in Peotone, Illinois, about 45 miles (72 kilometers) south of Chicago. The failures resulted primarily because of soured loans and losses on investments in collateralized debt obligations, the FDIC said. Illinois, with an unemployment rate above the national average, was one of seven states to begin the fiscal year without a spending plan.

Germany's lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, has passed a bill for the creation of "bad banks" to absorb toxic assets and clean up balance sheets at financial institutions caught up in the financial crisis. 

The bill is essentially aimed at unfreezing credit markets and freeing commercial and state-owned banks of their risky and non-core assets.

This will be achieved by shifting as much as 230 billion euros ($322 billion) worth of toxic assets held by banks to the so-called bad banks.

The plan will involve exchanging items such as asset-backed securities and collateralized-debt obligations for state-guaranteed bonds, for which banks will be charged a fee.

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - Turkey will host the signing of an inter-governmental agreement on the EU-backed Nabucco gas pipeline on 13 July, in a major breakthrough for the long-delayed project aimed at reducing Europe's gas reliance on Russia.

"I can confirm that the European Commission has received an invitation to the signing ceremony of the inter-governmental agreement on the Nabucco pipeline on 13 July in Ankara," commission spokesman Ferran Tarradellas said at a press conference on Friday (3 July).

Bosphorus bridge: Turkey has so far blocked the signing of a legal agreement on Nabucco

The 13 July transit deal will secure the legal basis and conditions for the use of the pipeline crossing EU candidate country Turkey and member states Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary and Austria. The 3,300 km long pipe is designed to bring natural gas to Europe from Azerbaijan and potentially Turkmenistan, Iraq or even Iran at a later stage. Currently, several eastern and central European countries import up to 100 percent of their gas consumption from Russia.

The project, first put forward in 2002, has so far developed at a steady pace, amid strong criticism from Russia, who wants to protect its monopoly on the transport and trading of Caspian gas from its former Soviet republics.

CONCLUSION:

Pushing on a string is difficult.  Pushing a zombie on a string is even harder. Pushing a zombie bank on a string is impossible. Unless the balance sheets of the banks are strengthened sufficiently, through massive further injections of capital, the removal of toxic assets and much lower leverage, unconventional monetary policy will not work. The banking system in the north-Atlantic region is not facing a liquidity shortage - it has got liquidity coming out of its ears.  It is facing a capital shortage.  Much of it still totters on the edge of insolvency.  Recapitalising banks slowly through large spreads on low business volumes and through quasi-fiscal subsidies extended by the central banks in their financial support operations will take years - years of impaired intermediation and abysmally restricted external finance for households and non-financial corporations.

Recapitalising the banks and paying off private household debt through high unanticipated inflation would be possible, but undesirable.  I propose a combination of mandatory recapitalisation of the banks and a debt Jubilee for the household sector to remove the two key obstacles to an economic revival.  The mandatory recapitalisation would be first through new equity issuance in the market, then though mandatory debt-to-equity conversion and similar haircuts for unsecured bank creditors, and last through increased government equity stakes.  All these capital injections should take the form of tangible common equity.  Anything else would be cosmetic.

Subsequent regulation of the banking sector (broadly defined to include all highly-leveraged entities with serious maturity and/or liquidity mismatch on their balance sheets) will then be necessary to prevent a recurrence of the disaster we are now struggling through.

In preparation for the Jubilee, I am going long in ram's horns.  In good Torah/Biblical tradition, we should have one of these every 49 or 50 years.  We skipped a few.  Let's have a big one now.

At least one FT columnist is telling it straight.

If sanity be culturally normative, then by the norms of this culture I claim insanity.

"Bob Chapman's influential International Forecaster is reporting on the possibility of a so-called "bank holiday" planned for late August or early September. According to Chapman's sources, U.S. embassies around the world are selling dollars and stockpiling money from respective countries where they operate.

FDR imposed a "bank holiday" soon after taking office. It resulted in the government stealing gold from the American people and giving them useless fiat paper money in return.

"Some US embassies worldwide are being advised to purchase massive amounts of local currencies," writes Harry Schultz, "enough to last them a year." Schultz publishes the Harry Schultz Letter, an international investment, financial, economic, and geopolitical newsletter named as "Newsletter of the Year" by Peter Brimelow of Market Watch in 2005 and 2008."

"...Mr. Schultz believes a "bank holiday" would suit the burning desires of the international bankster elite. It will lead to "nationalization," which is a polite word for brazen thievery. It will allow the government -- owned lock, stock and barrel by the global elite and run by their corrupt whores and cronies -- to rape secured creditors and bondholders. Nationalization is the unfettered process of grabbing up of insurance companies, mortgage companies, banks, medical care, and car companies and handing them over to the monopoly men.

During the FDR "bank holiday," Schulz notes, "thousands of banks never reopened; it was a face-saving way of shutting them down. I would guess the same would occur today; thousands have little or no net value, loaded with debt, bad mortgages."

In order soften the nation up for the coming pillage, the Obama administration has proposed a plan to give the privately-owned and unaccountable Federal Reserve complete regulatory oversight across the entire U.S. economy. The new rules would see the Fed given the authority to "regulate" any company whose activity it believes could threaten the economy and the markets -- that is to say if it "threatens" the monopolistic interests of the bankers.

Ready to give your soul for a loan in these difficult economic times? In Latvia, where the crisis has raged more than in the rest of the European Union, you can.

Such a deal is being offered by the Kontora loan company, whose public face is Viktor Mirosiichenko, 34.

Clients have to sign a contract, with the words "Agreement" in bold letters at the top. The client agrees to the collateral, "that is, my immortal soul".

Mirosiichenko said his company would not employ debt collectors to get its money back if people refused to repay, and promised no physical violence.

Signatories only have to give their first name and do not show any documents.

"If they don't give it back, what can you do? They won't have a soul, that's all," he told Reuters in a basement office, with one desk, a computer and three chairs.

Health concerns are raised over the imported building material. Some drywall made with radioactive phosphogypsum, a waste byproduct, was shipped to the U.S. by at least four Chinese-based firms.

Reporting from Los Angeles and Wuhan, China -- The final years of the U.S. housing boom and a disastrous series of Gulf Coast hurricanes created a golden opportunity for Chinese drywall manufacturers. With domestic suppliers unable to keep up with demand, imports of Chinese drywall to the U.S. jumped 17-fold in 2006 from the year before.

That imported drywall is now at the center of complaints of foul odors seeping from walls. Hundreds of homeowners, most in Florida, have also reported corrosion to their air conditioners, mirrors, electrical outlets and even jewelry.

State and federal authorities have traced the problems to Chinese-made drywall but haven't yet fully determined the causes. Some Chinese experts, however, suspect that the culprit is a radioactive phosphorus substance -- phosphogypsum -- that is banned for construction use in the U.S. but has been used by Chinese manufacturers for almost a decade.

Copies of Chinese customs reports obtained by The Times, along with interviews, indicate that drywall made with phosphogypsum was shipped to the U.S. in 2006 by at least four Chinese-based manufacturers and trading firms.

The health risk of phosphogypsum is uncertain, but industry specialists say they are troubled by its widespread use and the possibility it was exported, especially in light of recent incidents in which other Chinese imports such as pet food, toys and candy were found to be contaminated with toxic or unsafe substances.

The consumer is 70% of our economy, give or take a few points. The consumer's "savings rate" (which government blithely declares as income minus spending), which was in fact negative (that is, consumers were spending more than they made through taking on more and more debt), but is now solidly positive at 6.9%.

The impact of this (6.9% X 70%) is an immediate 4.83 decrease in real GDP. Fudge the numbers all you want (and government will), but this is the math, and the math is never, ever wrong.

The truly bad news however is that most of the time saving in fact turns into capital formation - that is, it becomes investment. But government doesn't differentiate between actual savings and debt repayment - their formula is simply "income less spending = savings rate."

You had one guest on this evening who "got it", but you wouldn't let him explain it, so I will.

Consumers are not saving, they are paying down debt in a furious attempt to avoid defaulting on nearly $1 trillion in outstanding credit card balances that have gone from 11% interest to 29.6% along with OptionARMs that are experiencing a tripling of payments while the home's value is underwater and precludes refinance, all while consumers are being laid off by the hundreds of thousands monthly.

BT has proposed that employees take up to a year off, in return for taking a 75 per cent pay cut. To encourage as many workers to take up of the offer, the company will pay their reduced salary as an upfront cash payment.

It is also offering staff a one-off payment of £1,000 if they switch from full-time to part-time work.

Parents are also being offered the opportunity to work only in school term times, so they can spend the summer holidays with their children. ...

"It's already a widespread phenomenon in smaller companies, where there is a feeling that everyone is a family and needs to pull together. But more larger companies will follow suit," he said. Experts believe that cutting workers' hours and pay - rather than outright sacking them - is masking the true extent of the jobs crisis. ...

Unions, however, support BT's initiative. Andy Kerr, deputy general secretary of the Communication Workers Union, said: "We recognise that there are falling work volumes at BT and have been focused on staff retention and avoiding any need for compulsory redundancies." He said the "summer sabbaticals" are a "great opportunity for staff to pursue travel, study pursue travel, study or other activities while knowing they have a job to return to". ...

A senior manager in BT said the scheme is designed so that staff can go off on the "long holiday they've always wanted without having to quit their jobs".

A spokesman for the telecoms company said: "These are innovative ways to help keep employees during these tough economic times."

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- The three parties competing in Indonesia's presidential election next week have plastered this city with campaign billboards and posters depicting, predictably, their presidential and vice presidential choices looking self-confident.

But one party, Golkar, has also put up posters of the candidates' wives next to their husbands, posing demurely and wearing Muslim head scarves known here as jilbabs. The wives recently went on a jilbab shopping spree in one of Jakarta's largest markets, and published a book together titled "Devout Wives of Future Leaders."

Most polls suggest that President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono of the Democratic Party will be re-elected in next Wednesday's vote, after running a smooth campaign based on his economic policies and a popular anticorruption drive. Despite television debates, the personality-driven campaigns have focused little on differences over policies or ideas, except regarding the wearing of the jilbab.

United States Marines storming into southern Afghanistan are facing a "hell of a fight" in some districts while others are "suspiciously" quiet, their commander has said.

After meeting little resistance in the first day of Operation Khanjar, or 'sword strike', he said units south of Garmsir were involved in heavy fighting.

American marines lost a single soldier during the first 24 hours of the 4,000-strong assault on the Taliban heartlands of southern Helmand province.

The operation is the first big push of President Barack Obama's surge strategy which has seen 21,000 reinforcements ordered to the country this year.

There is much about Freemasonry that remains shrouded in mystery to the outside world. But a group of members in the US state of Georgia appear to have clarified one thing - the supreme being in which all Masons are required to believe is not likely to be black.

Freemasonry lodges in Georgia are at loggerheads over the admission of a "non-white" member to an organisation that was founded on the principles of the Enlightenment but which is apparently still struggling to catch up with the latter part of the 20th century.

Now the issue is headed for a Masonic trial and the state courts after some lodges in Georgia sought to revoke the charter of one in Atlanta for admitting Victor Marshall, a 26-year-old African-American army reservist, last autumn.

The Atlanta lodge has fought back in the state courts by seeking to block the move on the grounds that is based on "racial animosity and hatred".

The Sears Tower in Chicago, the tallest skyscraper in the Western Hemisphere, is offering visitors a new way to push their fear of heights right over the edge.

A set of glass balconies, nicknamed "The Ledge" and suspended from the building's 103rd floor Skydeck, opened on Thursday.

The glass is three layers thick, one-and-a half inches in total, and capable of holding five tons. but it doesn't make them any less scary.

Vegetarians are generally less likely than meat eaters to develop cancer but this does not apply to all forms of the disease, a major study has found.

The study involving 60,000 people found those who followed a vegetarian diet developed notably fewer cancers of the blood, bladder and stomach.

But the apparently protective effect of vegetarian did not seem to stretch to bowel cancer, a major killer.

The study is published in the British Journal of Cancer.

Researchers from universities in the UK and New Zealand followed 61,566 British men and women. They included meat-eaters, those who ate fish but not meat, and those who ate neither meat nor fish.

British Journal of Cancer - Cancer incidence in British vegetarians

Vegetarians do not eat meat or fish. Meat has been suspected of influencing the risk for several types of cancer. For example, in the systematic review by the WCRF/AICR (World Cancer Research Fund/American Institute for Cancer Research), an expert panel concluded that both red meat and processed meat are convincing causes of colorectal cancer, and that there was some evidence suggesting that high intakes of red or processed meat increased the risk for cancers of the oesophagus, stomach, pancreas, lung, endometrium and prostate (WCRF/AICR, 2007).

Hat tip to Turkana at dKos for the above links.

New studies of plastics chemical measure effects, exposures

Women may want to reconsider that popular style accessory, certain hard plastic water bottles available in fashion-coordinating colors. New animal studies link the chemical bisphenol A, which leaches from such polycarbonate plastics and food can linings, with heart arrhythmias in females and permanent damage to a gene important for reproduction. Other recent research suggests that human exposure to BPA is much higher than previously thought.

In animals, fetal exposures to BPA can be especially risky, sometimes fostering brain, behavioral or reproductive problems (SN: 9/29/07, p. 202). Canada and some states are moving to ban polycarbonate plastic in baby bottles for that reason. But the new heart data suggest that even adult exposures to BPA might cause harm.

In one new study, researchers treated mice with BPA during the middle of their pregnancies. All female offspring of the treated mice suffered an irreversible genetic change in one of the "master regulatory genes" of fertility, Hugh Taylor of the Yale School of Medicine reported in June in Washington, D.C., at the annual meeting of the Endocrine Society.

This gene, HOXA10, orchestrates the activity of "hundreds -- if not thousands -- of downstream genes," Taylor says. Through the genes it controls, HOXA10 helps synchronize the timing of uterine changes and ovulation. Without that synchrony, "you won't get pregnancies," he explains.

The fashion industry has come to Berlin this week, with the German capital hosting four major fashion events. Millions are being made, thousands have come to take part. But it's not high fashion that's making all the money -- a trade fair is coming to the rescue of German designers.

In Berlin, a city of casual creativity and sensible civil servants, there are not too many wildly dressed women wearing high heels. But this week the central streets of the German capital have been alive with the clickety-clack of designer heels. The bold, the beautiful and the fashion-obsessed have been in town due to not one, but four fashion events taking place in the German capital this week.

This is some of the most frenetic fashion trade show activity the city has seen for years. There are three trade fairs dedicated to the garment industry running between July 1 and 4 -- Premium for the fashion industry in general, Boudoir, a lingerie trade show and Bread & Butter, a streetwear trade show. And at the same time Berlin is also putting on its bi-annual fashion week, during which local and international designers show their wares on runways around the city.

Australian palaeontologists say they have discovered three new dinosaur species after examining fossils dug up in Queensland.

Writing in the journal PLOS One, they describe one of the creatures as a fearsome predator with three large slashing claws on each hand.

The other two were herbivores: one a tall giraffe-like creature, the other of stocky build like a hippopotamus.

The fossils date back nearly 100m years to the middle of the Cretaceous period.

They were found in rocks known as the Winton Formation.

David Taylor, a business psychologist, told workers at design and marketing onebestway, in Newcastle upon Tyne, that a Naked Friday idea would boost their team spirit.

He was called in to help the firm after six staff members were forced into taking redundancies at the start of the credit crunch.

It started with Star Trek fans writing stories about a Kirk/Spock love affair, and it quickly became a craze. Fantasy fiction, or "fanfic" websites now attract contributions from large numbers of obsessive fans, and new genres are emerging at a remarkable rate: "slash" fanfic focuses on gay relationships (the Lord of the Rings characters provide particularly fertile ground), with "femslash" for lesbian characters; and then there's "real person popslash", where the unlucky subjects are celebrities in the music business.

One popslash fantasy came to public attention this week when, most unusually, its author found himself in court. Darryn Walker's writing is darker than most. The 35-year-old former civil servant's story, a 12-page article called "Girls (Scream) Aloud", depicted the kidnap, rape and murder of each member of girl band Girls Aloud by their coach driver.

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And although the impracticality of Walker's prosecution attracted outrage amongst freedom of expression experts, they are slower to defend the material itself. "One of the problems with fanfic is that it is just so appallingly bad," says Sutherland. "In previous cases, such as Lady Chatterley's Lover, you could argue there was some redeeming social merit or literary quality. This has neither - it is rather unpleasant, sadistic fantasy.

"I think when they raided Walker's house the police were expecting to find a lot of horrific stuff on his computer," he added. "It just wasn't there. He was actually a rather dull man ... with the literary sensibility of a toilet seat. It's a pity a case was fought with such an objectionable and crass piece of fiction."

This Monday, in the New Haven, Conn., firefighters case Ricci v. DeStefano, the Supreme Court held that it's unlawful race discrimination for an employer to refuse to act on the results of a promotion exam because the test eliminated a disproportionate number of minority candidates (in the New Haven case, all the black firefighters up for promotion). I've written before that this argument threatens to burn down civil rights law. Now that the fuse has been lit, I'm writing to explain just how far the fire could spread.

The plaintiffs in Ricci were undoubtedly sympathetic: hardworking public servants--17 of them white, one Hispanic--who expected that the exam they studied for and did well on would determine their eligibility for moving up the ranks. But their legal argument is the latest in a long-standing campaign to turn civil rights laws against themselves. There's a striking progression in the attacks on civil rights. In the early 1970s, affirmative action was widely considered to be a logical extension of civil rights principles: Even President Nixon--a man not known for his enlightened racial attitudes--supported it. But by the end of the decade, affirmative action was under attack as reverse discrimination. And now we see the next step in the march against civil rights with the part of federal civil rights law--Title VII--called "disparate impact" that prohibits employers from using promotional or hiring procedures that screen out minorities unless they can prove that the procedure is closely job-related.

Until this Monday, lawyers and judges thought of disparate impact law as a logical extension of the law against intentional discrimination: The premise of the discriminatory impact prohibition is that an employment practice that unnecessarily screens underrepresented groups from the work force is, in effect, just as discriminatory as a "whites only" sign. As I've argued, plaintiff Frank Ricci's case was a loser under established law until this new Supreme Court ruling, which is why the district court was right to dismiss it on summary judgment and why the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit Court was right to reject Ricci's appeal. Now the Supreme Court has changed the law, recasting disparate impact law as a kind of affirmative action--an unfair racial preference--rather than an equal-opportunity law.

Portugal's Economy Minister Manuel Pinho has resigned after making a rude cuckold gesture at an opposition MP.

Mr Pinho placed his index fingers on his head, imitating horns.

The gesture was directed at Bernandino Soares, leader of the Communist parliamentary group, who had challenged the government about a mine's future.

Mr Pinho's action came during a state-of-the-nation debate in parliament. The Socialist PM, Jose Socrates, said "nothing justifies this gesture".

"This was just an episode. One that shouldn't have happened and that affects the government's image, but which has now been corrected this way [with Mr Pinho's resignation]," he said.

Traditionally the horns signify a man whose wife is unfaithful.

!!

If'Madness is the absence of work'(Foucault), then Sanity is the presence of play..

As Jim Cornette said, Republicans drove the country in a ditch and now they are complaining about the price of the tow truck.

spot on

If'Madness is the absence of work'(Foucault), then Sanity is the presence of play..