Syrian moderates fear being edged out of uprising

Abdul Rahman, a quiet, even-tempered man, leads a collection of moderate Free Syrian Army battalions in Aleppo. He says groups like his are becoming harder to find as the 21-month uprising drags on and more groups lean either secular or Islamist extremist.
At a time when opposition fighters live and die by their ability to get equipment, Mr. Rahman says it’s become more difficult for those in the middle ideologically to get supplies, with most donors choosing to support hardened secularists or Islamists.
Recently, Rahman had to break with some of the battalions he formerly commanded, in part because some were involved in criminal activity and there were disagreements among leaders, but also because of shortages of equipment.
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“The moderates are the majority of people here in Syria, but now they are decreasing without any support,” he says. “If it continues like it is now, extremist groups will have a lot of influence after the Assad government falls.”
'PEOPLE ARE DESPERATE'
Abu Karam, the leader of the opposition’s Abu Bakar al Sadeq battalion, says that a number of well-funded, hardline groups are using their resources to enlarge their base of support. “People are desperate and they will take assistance from whoever is giving it,” he says.
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Many Syrians are worried about what Rahman and other moderates describe as an increasingly polarized political landscape among the Syrian opposition. Hardline groups exist among both the Islamists and secularists, but many Syrians say that conservative Islamist groups are gaining the most ground inside Syria right now. Throughout Aleppo, a number of civilians are also calling for a post-Assad government to be based on sharia, or Islamic law.
Despite moderates' fears, many Syrians, regardless of their affiliations and beliefs, say the trend toward conservative Islam is largely a response to decades of secular rule under the Assad regime and does not necessarily indicate the desire for an ultra-conservative regime in Syria.
“Wherever the extremists go, they try to impose themselves on the population. This is a civilian revolution, and it contains all the elements of our society,” says Abu Karam, the battalion leader.
CONFLICTED FEELINGS
Among the groups that have caused the greatest concern is Jabhat al-Nusra, a conservative Islamist group now fighting among the Syrian opposition. Last week, the US State Department classified the group as a terrorist organization, saying it had ties to Al Qaeda in Iraq, which was a major force within the anti-US Sunni insurgency.
Many Syrians do not agree with the classification of Jabhat al-Nusra as a terrorist organization and harbor conflicted feelings about the group. Its fighters, many of whom are foreign, have experience fighting in Iraq and Libya, among other places, and provide expertise to less experienced fighters. The group is also well equipped. Both aspects make the militant organization critical to the opposition’s ability to effectively challenge the army of President Bashar al-Assad.
Ideologically though, the group represents a marked departure from Syria’s longstanding moderate tradition. Opposition fighter Abu Osama started fighting with Jabhat al-Nusra before the group had fully formed, but decided to leave when they asked him to pledge a loyalty oath that could require him to fight for Jabhat al-Nusra in other countries when the war ended. He’d also grown concerned about some of the group's ultra-conservative practices.
“They’re always accusing people of being infidels,” he says. “They consider [Egyptian President and Muslim Brotherhood member Mohamed] Morsi to be an infidel because he’s not applying the sharia law in Egypt.”
AFTER ASSAD?
A number of opposition fighters now say that they fear an eventual battle with the group if and when Assad is no longer in power. Among those moderates who doubt such an extreme scenario, they still say they worry about the influence such a group could have on a new government in Syria.
“Jabhat al-Nusra is not going to accept someone saying, ‘Thanks for your help, now please go.’” says Abu Mohammad, commander of the opposition’s Dar al Wafa Battalion and a member of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood. “We’re really betting on the awareness of the young people” to know better than to support Jabhat al-Nusra’s political agenda.

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Tunisia seeks gold in former dictator's assets

On a crisp December morning in Tunis, a finance ministry official named Mohamed Hamaied was demonstrating the horsepower of maroon V-12 BMW on the runway of a national guard airfield. Beside him sat an agent for a potential buyer.
“You know, this is the same runway that Ben Ali fled from,” remarked another passenger, automotive expert Mourad Bouzidi, from the back seat.
The BMW is among the seized possessions of deposed Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and his inner circle that the government is selling to help fill depleted treasury coffers. But the sale of regime assets, which are often hard to track down and obtain, is not going to be enough. Long-term prosperity needs real reforms.
In Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, the fall of dictators has triggered a scramble for cash as new governments struggle to restore stability amid high expectations and damaged economies.
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In Tunisia, high unemployment has fueled labor strikes and rioting, which in turn provoke political squabbling. Last month, clashes in the rural town of Siliana between stone-throwing protestors and police – who fired birdshot – prompted some opposition politicians to demand Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali’s resignation.
Economic woes stem partly from last year’s revolution, which spooked tourists and foreign investors while the eurozone crisis hobbled key trading partners. But the roots of trouble go deeper, to a regime that spent years neglecting rural regions and letting unemployment rise while amassing great wealth for itself.
“Seemingly half of the Tunisian business community can claim a Ben Ali connection through marriage,” wrote then-US Ambassador Robert F. Godec in a June 2008 diplomatic cable published by WikiLeaks, describing an extended family seen as “the nexus of Tunisian corruption.”
TIGERS AND FRENCH ICE CREAM
A year later, Mr. Godec got a taste of regime opulence when Ben Ali’s son-in-law and heir-apparent, Sakher El Materi, invited him for dinner at his seaside villa. Godec’s July 2009 cable notes an infinity pool, ice cream flown in from St. Tropez, and a pet tiger named Pasha.
Ben Ali and most of his family fled Tunisia in January 2011 as protests brought down his regime. Two months later, then-interim president Fouad Embazaa ordered the seizure of assets belonging to 114 top regime figures, including Ben Ali and his wife, Leila Trabelsi.
It’s unclear how much the assets – from cars, yachts, and palaces to major stakes in Tunisian companies – are worth. One estimate last September by a government commission put their total value at around $13 billion.
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Ben Ali’s personal wealth is even harder to gauge, with most of his assets believed to be stashed abroad, says acting finance minister Slim Besbes. Many countries that froze his assets last year have been slow to unfreeze them – the European Union only did so last month – while other legal challenges remain.
The two largest known concentrations of Ben Ali wealth outside Tunisia are around $65 million in Switzerland and $28 million in an account under Mrs. Trabelsi’s name at Lebanon’s central bank, says Mr. Besbes. But while governments are cooperating, Ben Ali and his family's lawyers are fighting back.
Ben Ali’s Beirut-based lawyer, Akram Azoury, argues that a March 2011 seizure of his client's assets was illegal and says Ben Ali has no assets in his name outside Tunisia. Those in the country “are limited, to my knowledge, to his personal residence and a bank account whose value I cannot estimate, contrary to what Tunisian authorities have told the public,” he said by e-mail.
BIG NEEDS
Meanwhile, Tunisia relies heavily on foreign money. Last month it borrowed $500 million each from the World Bank and African Development Bank.
The government has also begun liquidating regime assets: 1.2 billion dinar ($776 million) generated from asset sales helped pay for a 2.5 billion dinar ($1.6 billion) increase in this year’s budget.
Latest on the block are thousands of personal items, including cars, jewelry, and fine art, which went on sale this week at a ritzy hotel near Tunis. To oversee things, the finance ministry tapped Mr. Hamaied, an old hand in commerce.
One morning earlier this month, Hamaied and Mr. Bouzidi, the car expert, were at the national guard facility in Tunisia, giving a preview of cars to the buyer’s agent. There was Ben Ali’s Maybach town car, with massage seats in back, a mini-fridge stocked with Evian, and a yard of leg room. Nearby was a black Aston Martin bearing a small plaque that read, “Handbuilt in England for Sakher El Materi.”
The scout was drawn to the BMW, seized from a Trabelsi. Hamaied popped the hood so he could photograph the big V-12 engine. The odometer showed 2,587 kilometers (about 1,600 miles).
“They’re all like that; these cars didn’t roll much – just between La Marsa and Hammamet,” Hamaied said, naming chic beachside towns near Tunis. Then he proposed a test drive. The men got in, Hamaied gunned the engine, and the BMW tore down the runway as the needle shot to 100 kilometers per hour (about 60 miles per hour).
Authorities hope the sale, which will last at least a month, will generate about $13 million. The government says the proceeds will be spent on development projects.
Ultimately, however, Tunisia has more work ahead to revitalize the economy, says Antonio Nucifora, lead economist on Tunisia for the World Bank. It must reform laws such as those governing foreign investment and labor, cut red tape, and combat a lingering penchant for cronyism.
“At present it is connections that make the system work,” he says. “They need to change from a system based on privileges and connections to one based on merit and competition.

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Russia's adoption ban exposes political rift

Russia's upper house of parliament today unanimously approved a ban on US citizens adopting Russian children, a highly charged move that appears to have prompted an unusual public split among government officials.
The Dima Yakovlev bill, named after one of 19 Russian children to die due to abuse or negligence at the hands of adoptive US parents in the past two decades, now goes to the Kremlin for President Vladimir Putin’s consideration. In his only comments so far on the anti-adoption measure, Mr. Putin said last week that it was "emotional but adequate," which is widely seen as an indication that he will sign it into law.
The legislation was originally framed as a tit-for-tat response to the Magnitsky Act, a US measure signed into law by President Barack Obama earlier this month that aims to punish officials connected to the 2009 prison death of Russian whistle-blowing lawyer Sergei Magnitsky. But the Russian legislation has been amended beyond recognition by hardline lawmakers and now looks like a shotgun law to punish US citizens who become involved in almost any kind of non-business activity in Russia.
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Many experts think that Putin may yet act as the "voice of reason" and strip the ban on adoption out of the bill before he signs it.
"This whole discussion over the adoption ban has served the purpose of shifting public attention from the corrupt Russian officials targeted under the US Magnitsky Act to the problems of orphans and the dangers they face in foreign homes," says Nikolai Petrov, an expert with the Moscow Carnegie Center.
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"It's perfectly possible that Putin will ultimately adjust the adoption ban, but leave in place many of the other tough measures in this bill that haven't gotten much attention," Mr. Petrov says. Those measures include even harsher restrictions that would prevent any US passport holder from holding a leadership post in any Russian organization that is deemed by authorities to engage in politics.
The adoption ban has also become the focus of controversy and prompted a rare government split inside Russia. This week a liberal radio station leaked news of a memo by Deputy Prime Minister Olga Golodets warning that the proposed ban would violate Russian law and at least two treaties that Russia is party to. It would also overturn a bilateral accord on adoptions, negotiated between the United States and Russia, which came into force last month.
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Education Minister Dmitry Livanov have also spoken out against the anti-adoption bill. Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, voiced annoyance that the government’s internal disagreements were being aired in public, but still signaled support for the measure.
"Learning about official correspondence from the media is not always pleasant," Mr. Peskov told the Kommersant FM radio station yesterday. But "it would be a mistake to think that there is staunch opposition to the bill within government. On the contrary, there are many arguments in favor of it," he said.
Many Russians believe it is a national shame that thousands of children are adopted by foreigners each year. According to a public opinion survey published this week by the state-run Public Opinion Fund, 56 percent of Russians support the proposed adoption ban, while just 21 percent oppose it.
Pavel Astakhov, the Kremlin's children's rights ombudsman and a strong supporter of the ban, said in a letter to Putin published today that Russia could simply pull out of the bilateral agreement with the US and that the move would violate no Russian laws.
Meanwhile, about 130,000 Russians have signed a petition at the website of opposition newspaper Novaya Gazeta asking the Kremlin to scrap the proposed ban.
In a sign that the ill will generated by the issue might snowball further, a petition posted at the White House's website, signed by over 54,000 Russians and Americans, urges President Obama to expand the so-called Magnitsky List by adding the names of all the Russian lawmakers in the two chambers who voted for the adoption ban. About 7,000 signed a petition calling for Obama to add Putin's name to the list.
Over the past two decades, about 60,000 Russian children have been adopted by US families. Of those, at least 19 died due to parental abuse or neglect. Each one of those cases ignited a firestorm of public outrage in Russia, and led to two suspensions of all foreign adoptions.
It also led to several efforts to tighten up Russia's once-lax foreign adoption process. Today, prospective parents are no longer able to arrange an adoption on their own, but must work through heavily regulated and fully accredited agencies, says Alyona Senkevich, a representative of Hand-in-Hand, one of fewer than 40 US-based adoption agencies still accredited to work in Russia.
"It's heartbreaking to think that we just signed the bilateral adoption agreement. . .. The main impact of this law (if Putin signs it) would be to strip Russian orphans of the right to be adopted abroad,” she says. “They will become the victims of political games."
Under Russian law, a child is not eligible for foreign adoption until the child has been rejected at least three times by prospective Russian adoptive parents— which usually happens for health reasons.
Albert Likhanov, president of the non-governmental Russian Children's Fund, says that the proposed ban would result in the approximately 1,000 orphans adopted each year by US families to be institutionalized instead of ending up in loving homes.
"I fully understand the wish of many Russians that our children would all be adequately cared for in Russia. But this is not the situation today, and a child cannot wait for everything to get stabilized," he says.
Mr. Likhanov said that Putin’s predecessor, Dmitry Medvedev, once pointed out that in 2008 alone there were 130,000 cases in Russia of violence against children and over 2,000 deaths.
"There is a crisis in our system, and this debate shows that there are people who are willing to use our orphans as political footballs. . . this conflict makes clear that all is not well in own kingdom,” he says.

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Italians, backed by the Catholic Church, aim to stop Sunday shopping

Italians are fighting a government lift of regulations on business operation hours, insisting that the move will eventually hurt the small shops and values that have long been the foundation of the Italian business community.
The deregulation, put into effect January 2012, removes restrictions on business operating hours, including Sundays and holidays. It is intended to stimulate competition in what has traditionally been a highly regulated market. However, it has been vehemently criticized by many shop owners, and the campaign against it has received a boost from the powerful Catholic Church.
Campaign organizers argue that working on Sunday has forced employees to sacrifice "important values" and benefited big companies at the expense of small businesses.
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Headed by Confesercenti, a leading retailers’ business association, and backed by the powerful Italian Bishops Conference, the campaign began at the end of November. Its organizers are hoping to collect the 50,000 signatures required to submit a bill to Parliament by April. The bill would give regions – rather than the national Parliament – the power to regulate Sunday openings. The goal of the bill isn’t to outlaw opening on Sundays but to eliminate “the excesses” brought by deregulation, say organizers.
If it gets the signatures, the bill would most likely be examined after the February election.
“People say: ‘It’s nice to have shops open on Sunday.’ But I don’t make extra sales on Sunday,” says Aldina Orlandini, who has run a clothing shop in a busy downtown street in Reggio Emilia, an affluent town near Bologna, since 1978.
Ms. Orlandini says deregulation hasn't hurt her business, since her store can count on a steady pool of customers. Still, she says, the measure is just wrong.
“People have the right to rest one day per week. Am I not a human being? Don’t I have a family?” Orlandini says. “The law should mandate a day off.”
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But for Mauro Bussoni, the vice director of Confesercenti and the coordinator of the “Free Sunday” campaign, the problem is more systemic. “This measure favors certain retailers,” he says.
Deregulation hasn’t increased sales, and it has only increased costs for small businesses, since putting together shifts during the holidays is easier for big stores, which are more able to pay the extra costs, including overtime, Mr. Bussoni argues.
Bussoni says he fears that without regulation of the days and hours stores can operate, a competition will emerge in which only the fittest survive at the expense of mom-and-pop operations, which are already being hit hard by the recession. Istat, Italy’s statistics bureau, recently reported that retail sales for October 2012 were 3.8 percent lower than in October 2011. The process, he says, would change the face of Italian cities, threatening the quality of life of people, such as senior citizens, who rely on neighborhood stores.
The campaign’s organizers argue it’s more than a matter of competing business models, but defending the right of workers and shop owners to spend time with their families.
“On Sunday, leave us alone,” says Mina Giannandrea, a shop owner and the president of FEDERstrade, a Rome retailers’ association that’s also participating in the campaign. “People who shop on Sunday are selfish; they don’t think about those who have to work on Sunday,” Ms. Giannandrea says.
The importance of family time is the message that has perhaps resonated the most with the Catholic Church, which has thrown its support behind the campaign.
“Freedom without truth, without a higher end is mere caprice,” said Archbishop Giancarlo Bregantini, stressing the importance of a day of rest as mandated by the Bible in an interview with Vatican Radio.
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Supporters of deregulation emphasize the freedom it gives consumers – a different notion of freedom than that embraced by the Confesercenti campaign. Deregulation has given customers the ability to make purchases whenever it suits them, and stores should take advantage of this during the economic downturn, says Giovanni Cobolli Gigli, the president of Federdistribuzione, an association of Italian retail chains.
“It’s not a matter of staying open 24/7, as some have self-interestedly suggested,” Mr. Cobolli Gigli says, adding that in many cases Sunday shifts are covered by workers who volunteer to get overtime, and that the increased store hours could eventually create a demand for new, part-time weekend jobs.
To think that small shops must stay open as much as chains at all costs is a mistake, says Serena Sileoni, a fellow at the pro-market think tank Istituto Bruno Leoni. Deregulation could be an opportunity for shop owners to design a schedule based on their customers’ needs and to find a profitable niche. This could ultimately lead to changes in the way Italian cities look, she argues.
“Cities are already different from how they used to be,” Ms. Sileoni says.
Andrea Moro, a professor of economics at Vanderbilt University, says markets are always working to respond to innovation, which often comes hand-in-hand with the destruction of old ideas or traditions.
While Mr. Moro is sympathetic to the challenges faced by retail workers, he says he can think of only one path for them: “In the modern economic structure, workers must reinvent themselves, no one excluded. Thankfully, these people still have jobs and they must adapt to the new working conditions,” he says.

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A year after being literally wiped out, a Russian hockey team flourishes

Wooden hockey sticks smack into rubber pucks as the metal blades of skates slice through the ice. The sounds echo through an empty arena in the Czech capital Prague in late November as a visiting hockey team prepares for another game in the Kontinental Hockey League.
But this is no ordinary squad. This is Lokomotiv Yaroslavl, a Russian team that was literally wiped out last year in an air tragedy that shocked the hockey world.
On Sept. 7, 2011, the team was set to fly to Minsk to play their first game of the new season amid high hopes of adding to its league titles from the 1990s. But the team’s plane, a Yak-42, never gained proper altitude and slammed into a tower. It went down in flames about a mile from Tunoshna Airport in Yaroslavl, Russia.
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Forty-five people on board died, among them some of the greats of the game, including Slovakia’s Pavol Demitra; Ruslan Salei, a hero back home in Belarus; and three Czech players with world championship medals. Only the flight engineer survived.
A government investigation found one of the pilots had literally stepped on the brakes, dragging the plane down when it should have been going up. It later emerged the pilot and co-pilot were not properly trained to fly the Yak-42, and had forged documents to prove otherwise.
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The crash provoked much soul-searching in Russia with then-President Dmitry Medvedev calling for an urgent upgrade of the country’s passenger jets.
More immediately for Lokomotiv, it left the club without its senior players or coaches. Of the entire senior roster, only one coach and one player, both of whom had stayed behind, were left.
REBUILDING
But now, just a year on, Lokomotiv is not only playing, but winning as well, sitting near the top of the Western Conference of the mostly Russian Kontinental Hockey League.
Tim Rowe, their American coach, credits Lokomotiv President Yuri Yakovlev with assembling a squad from scratch that can compete in the KHL, considered by hockey cognoscenti to be the world’s top league currently playing, as the NHL remains mired in a labor dispute between owners and players.
After the crash, Mr. Yakovlev rejected a KHL offer to craft a replacement team assembled with players from other KHL teams, along with some of Lokomotiv’s junior players. Instead, the junior team played last year in Russia’s Major Hockey League – the country’s top minor league, all with the hope of returning to the top flight this season.
And return they did, bouncing back even stronger than management had hoped.
“I knew we would have a good team; Mr. Yakovlev has been active signing good players. But even I’m surprised how quickly this team has gelled,” explains Mr. Rowe.
'A SEASON DEDICATED TO THOSE GUYS'
Rowe cites a form of divine intervention for the team’s success. "I'm not being strange when I say this, I think we're getting some help from up above in the type of season we're having."
They're definitely looking out over us, and it's a good feeling," he says. "There's a calmness over this team every night that I haven't been around too often, and it's an awful lot of fun to be a part of it.”
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Rowe was particularly impacted by the tragedy, being a friend of Brad McCrimmon, the team's Canadian coach who died in the crash. Mr. McCrimmon was set to start his first season with the team.
Russian Viktor Kozlov was playing for another team, Salavat Yulaev, last year when league commissioner Alexander Medvedev interrupted its first game to announce to disbelieving fans and players alike what had happened just a bit earlier in the day in Yaroslavl.
“I was shocked by the news. We all were. We couldn’t believe it,” says Mr. Kozlov, who plied his skills for years in the NHL.
Now, a year later, Kozlov is with Lokomotiv. Kozlov says he joined the team, partly for the chance to be part of the team’s rebirth. He says although life goes on, the former team must not be forgotten.
He points to a charity match played earlier in the year in Zlin, in the Czech Republic. That was the hometown of Karel Rachunek, one of three Czech players to die in the crash. "Yeah, of course, we remember the guys, like Karel Rachunek, with the game with Zlin."
Canadian Mark Flood says the constant reminders – including the ringing of a bell before each home game to honor the fallen players – are all part of what motivates the team.
"Every home game we have a little ceremony for the team that passed away last year. So, we're reminded of it every day," explains Mr. Flood. "Definitely our season is dedicated to those guys.

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KWANZAA: HOLIDAY BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE FBI

Is it just me, or does Kwanzaa seem to come earlier and earlier each year? And let's face it, Kwanzaa's gotten way too commercialized.
A few years ago, I suspended my annual Kwanzaa column because my triumph over this fake holiday seemed complete. The only people still celebrating Kwanzaa were presidential-statement writers and white female public school teachers.
But it seems to be creeping back. A few weeks ago, House Minority Leader Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., complained about having to stick around Washington for fiscal cliff negotiations by accusing Republicans of not caring about "families" coming together to bond during Kwanzaa. The private schools have picked up this PC nonsense from the public schools. (Soon, no one will know anything.)
It is a fact that Kwanzaa was invented in 1966 by a black radical FBI stooge, Ron Karenga -- aka Dr. Maulana Karenga -- founder of United Slaves, a violent nationalist rival to the Black Panthers. He was also a dupe of the FBI.
In what was ultimately a foolish gamble, during the madness of the '60s, the FBI encouraged the most extreme black nationalist organizations in order to discredit and split the left. The more preposterous the group, the better.
By that criterion, Karenga's United Slaves was perfect. In the annals of the American '60s, Karenga was the Father Gapon, stooge of the czarist police.
Despite modern perceptions that blend all the black activists of the '60s, the Black Panthers did not hate whites. They did not seek armed revolution (although some of their most high-profile leaders were drug dealers and murderers). Those were the precepts of Karenga's United Slaves.
United Slaves were proto-fascists, walking around in dashikis, gunning down Black Panthers and adopting invented "African" names. (That was a big help to the black community: How many boys named "Jamal" are currently in prison?)
It's as if David Duke invented a holiday called "Anglika," which he based on the philosophy of "Mein Kampf" -- and clueless public school teachers began celebrating the made-up, racist holiday.
Whether Karenga was a willing dupe, or just a dupe, remains unclear.
Curiously, in a 1995 interview with Ethnic NewsWatch, Karenga matter-of-factly explained that the forces out to get O.J. Simpson for the "framed" murder of two whites included: "the FBI, the CIA, the State Department, Interpol, the Chicago Police Department" and so on. Karenga should know about FBI infiltration. (He further noted that the evidence against O.J. "was not strong enough to prohibit or eliminate unreasonable doubt" -- an interesting standard of proof.)
In the category of the-gentleman-doth-protest-too-much, back in the '70s, Karenga was quick to criticize rumors that black radicals were government-supported. When Nigerian newspapers claimed that some American black radicals were CIA operatives, Karenga publicly denounced the idea, saying, "Africans must stop generalizing about the loyalties and motives of Afro-Americans, including the widespread suspicion of black Americans being CIA agents."
Now we know that the FBI fueled the bloody rivalry between the Panthers and United Slaves. In one barbarous outburst, Karenga's United Slaves shot to death two Black Panthers on the UCLA campus: Al "Bunchy" Carter and John Huggins. Karenga himself served time, a useful stepping-stone for his current position as a black studies professor at California State University at Long Beach.
Karenga's invented holiday is a nutty blend of schmaltzy '60s rhetoric, black racism and Marxism. The seven principles of Kwanzaa are the very same seven principles of the Symbionese Liberation Army, another charming legacy of the Worst Generation.
In 1974, Patricia Hearst, kidnap victim-cum-SLA revolutionary, posed next to the banner of her alleged captors, a seven-headed cobra. Each snake head stood for one of the SLA's revolutionary principles: Umoja, Kujichagulia, Ujima, Ujamaa, Nia, Kuumba and Imani -- the exact same seven "principles" of Kwanzaa.
Kwanzaa praises collectivism in every possible area of life -- economics, work, personality, even litter removal. ("Kuumba: Everyone should strive to improve the community and make it more beautiful.") It takes a village to raise a police snitch.
When Karenga was asked to distinguish Kawaida, the philosophy underlying Kwanzaa, from "classical Marxism," he essentially said that, under Kawaida, we also hate whites. (Kawaida, Kwanzaa and Kuumba are also the only three Kardashian sisters not to have their own shows on the E! network.)
While taking the "best of early Chinese and Cuban socialism" -- excluding, one hopes, the forced abortions, imprisonment of homosexuals and forced labor -- Karenga said Kawaida practitioners believe one's racial identity "determines life conditions, life chances and self-understanding." There's an inclusive philosophy for you.
Kwanzaa was the result of a '60s psychosis grafted onto the black community. Liberals have become so mesmerized by multicultural nonsense that they have forgotten the real history of Kwanzaa and Karenga's United Slaves -- the violence, the Marxism, the insanity.
Most absurdly, for leftists anyway, they have forgotten the FBI's tacit encouragement of this murderous black nationalist cult founded by the father of Kwanzaa.

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Connecticut Job Shops and Contract Manufacturers Join the MFG.com Manufacturing Marketplace

Connecticut manufacturers prove to be uniquely qualified for entrance into the largest global manufacturing ecosystem.

Atlanta, GA (PRWEB) December 18, 2012
MFG.com, the world’s largest online manufacturing marketplace for made-to-order parts, announced that prominent Connecticut-based manufacturers have joined the MFG.com marketplace.
A few of the recent additions include:

Perfection Screw & Rivet Co. is an ISO 9001:2008 certified, family-owned cold heading job shop located in Wolcott, CT. With a foundation of quality customer service, cost reduction and employee education, Perfection Screw & Rivet Co. has an impeccable record of satisfying customers. Capabilities include fasteners and hardware, machining, rapid prototyping, cold forming, cold headed parts, cold head machining, cold form parts, screws, rivets and knurling.
Windmade Products is a turn-key powder coating, sheet metal fabrication and machining service provider. As the exclusive manufacturer of Neumade Products, Windmade Products is a leading provider of high quality projection room equipment for the cinema industry. Windmade Products services a wide variety of industries and customers throughout the Northeast with a simple commitment to provide quality work, at a competitive price, delivered on time and in full. Capabilities and services include in-house powder coating, sheet metal fabrication, machining, assembly, kitting, warehousing and fulfillment.
Nerjan Development Co. is a family-owned, AS 9100, ISO 9001:2000 and ISO 9001:2008 certified precision CNC milling and turning electro mechanical assembly job shop located in Stamford, CT. Established in 1967, Nerjan Development Co. provides manual and CNC milling, turning, and drilling to meet customer specifications. Nerjan machines a wide variety of metals and plastics to sensitive and accurate dimensions.
Shearwater Engineering & Manufacturing LLC (S.E.A.M.) is located in Brooklyn, CT and has been providing manufacturing valves and components for 35 years. Their experience with valve assemblies for the marine and aerospace industries has been extended to power plants, paper mills, railroads, waste management plants and hydraulic manifolds for machines. S.E.A.M. specializes in the manufacturing of complex, controlled geometric parts. By utilizing state-of-the-art programming technology, they have achieved superior results in the processing and machining of strategic materials such as Monel, Inconel, and titanium, as well as the normal alloys of steel and aluminum.
“We are proud to announce the acceptance of these quality suppliers from Connecticut into the MFG.com marketplace. By introducing companies like Perfection Screw & Rivet Co., Windmade Products, Nerjan Development Co. and Shearwater Engineering & Manufacturing into our marketplace, buyers and sourcing professionals are further reassured that they can trust the suppliers in the MFG.com marketplace,” said Mitch Free, Founder and CEO of MFG.com. “MFG.com is excited to work with these suppliers from Connecticut to help them grow their businesses and develop win-win customer relationships with our buyer members.”
About MFG.com

MFG.com is the largest online marketplace for the manufacturing industry, facilitating interaction between buyers and manufacturers. MFG.com enables sourcing professionals and engineers to quickly and easily locate quality suppliers for CNC Machining, Injection Molding, Metal Stamping, Metal Fabrication and many other processes through an easy-to-use online marketplace. With more than $115 billion in RFQs passing through the marketplace, MFG.com has helped thousands of manufacturers - ranging from small machine shops to large conglomerates - increase sales and grow profits. MFG.com is a global business, with offices in the U.S., Europe, Asia and Mexico.

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Vint Cerf, Award-Winning Computer Scientist and Chief Internet Evangelist for Google, Joins TruthMarket™ Board of Advisors

Dr. Vint Cerf, one of the true “Fathers of the Internet,” an international authority on digital communications and outspoken advocate for a free and open Internet adds global perspective to TruthMarket’s Platform for Crowd-funding Public Challenges to False Political, Commercial and Science Claims.

Atherton, California (PRWEB) December 18, 2012
Today Truth Seal Corp. announced that Vinton G. Cerf, Ph.D. has joined the TruthMarket™ Board of Advisors. TruthMarket is an online Marketplace for Truth Telling™. It provides ordinary citizens with a platform to “crowd-fund” and execute grass roots campaigns that publicly expose misrepresentations and false political, commercial and science claims, while highlighting true claims and offering cash rewards to successful campaign creators, sponsors and challengers.
Widely known as one of the "Fathers of the Internet," Dr. Cerf is the co-designer of the TCP/IP protocols and the architecture of the Internet. He is known for his pioneering insights and innovative contributions to technologies that further advance the Internet and its important role is fostering open, global dialogue. Explaining his decision to join the TruthMarket Board of Advisors, Dr. Cerf notes that, “in a world of false dichotomies and factual denial, the TruthMarket concept seems set to clear away the fog of uninformed debate."
“We’re very enthusiastic about Dr. Cerf joining our Board of Advisors. He will be adding important philosophical and technological insights to a growing cadre of reputable experts committed to challenging manipulative speech, false claims and distorted facts,” said Rick Hayes-Roth, Ph.D., Founder and CEO of Truth Seal. “Dr. Cerf’s contributions to the culture of modern communication and his insightful positions have attracted a strong following of like-minded people supportive of truth in public affairs. We look forward to having them participate in TruthMarket campaigns."
“Truth Seal has been actively recruiting reputable authorities like Dr. Cerf for the Board of Advisors,” stated Mark L. Feldman, Ph.D., Board Member and investor. “Advisors known for their high integrity are important to TruthMarket’s mission to increase truth and trust throughout the information space.” Feldman adds that "more announcements of public figures joining the TruthMarket Board of Advisors can be expected."
About Vinton G. Cerf, Ph.D.
Vinton G. Cerf is vice president and chief Internet evangelist for Google. Cerf has held positions at MCI, the Corporation for National Research Initiatives, DARPA, Stanford University, UCLA and IBM. Vint Cerf is president of ACM and served as chairman of the board of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and was founding president of the Internet Society. Widely known as one of the "Fathers of the Internet," he received the U.S. National Medal of Technology in 1997, the Marconi Fellowship in 1998 and the ACM Alan M. Turing award in 2004. In November 2005, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom and in April 2008 the Japan Prize. He is a Fellow of the IEEE, ACM, and AAAS, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, the Computer History Museum and the National Academy of Engineering. Cerf holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Mathematics from Stanford University and Master of Science and Ph.D. degrees in Computer Science from UCLA and holds over 20 honorary degrees from universities around the world.
About TruthMarket
TruthMarket is a division of Truth Seal, a California Corporation. TruthMarket is designed to be popular online platform that enables everyone to campaign for truth in public dialogue. The primary objective is to increase truth and trust throughout the public information space – online and offline – by publicly exposing false claims and highlighting true claims. TruthMarket’s ultimate goal is to predispose all public dialogue toward truth telling.

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Alibaba Becomes Largest e-Commerce Company - Impact for Retail Brands

Simon Jackson, chief commercial officer at brand protection company NetNames, comments on the news that Alibaba has become the largest ecommerce company in the world.

(PRWEB UK) 18 December 2012
“The news that Chinese online marketplace Alibaba has become the largest ecommerce company in the world has important implications for brand owners in the retail and consumer goods industries. The fact that Alibaba’s gross merchandise volume of $157 billion, for just two if its sites, adds up to more than Amazon and eBay combined shows China’s exponential growth into the world’s biggest retail market and reveals just how much retail traffic is moving online.
However, these spectacular figures, bring in to focus the growing threat of counterfeit products available online. Netnames is working in partnership with Alibaba to tackle counterfeit products which, for NetNames customers, can be as high as 70% of products offered on global marketplaces. This is a serious issue for brand owners as these products divert revenue, particularly in retail and luxury goods sectors where replica goods are most common.
So what can brand owners do to protect against this threat? By actively monitoring those selling fake products online via auction sites, organisations are able to identify where the goods are being offered for sale and can work with the platform providers to have them removed from the internet. In the past 12 months, NetNames has worked together with Alibaba to remove thousands of listings of counterfeit items from their websites, equating to millions of dollars of potential revenue – proof that action can be taken to remove a significant proportion of this threat.”
Press Office

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Jaffe PR Restructures with Management Team to Lead Agency Following CEO’s Death

Jaffe PR (http://www.jaffepr.com), a public reputation agency devoted primarily to service law firms, legal associations and vendors to the legal marketplace, will carry on with a new executive management team as they to continue to provide high quality PR and legal marketing services.

Washington, D.C. (PRWEB) December 17, 2012
Jaffe PR announces a restructuring of the legal public reputation agency with the formation of a management committee following the death of the agency’s founder and CEO, Jay M. Jaffe, on November 21.
Vivian Hood, Terry M. Isner and Melinda Wheeler have been designated as the firm's Managing Directors and form the management committee responsible for continuing to lead the daily operations and manage the business of Jaffe PR. All had previously served on Jaffe PR’s executive committee.
Jaffe PR’s new Board of Directors are Joel S. Rothman, Esq., Edwin I. Josephson, Esq., and Jeffrey E. Ganek.
Vivian Hood, managing director, Client Services, oversees the agency’s staff as well as client relationships. She has worked at Jaffe PR for more than 15 years, managing and implementing effective senior-level legal media relations campaigns for law firm clients.
Terry M. Isner, managing director, Creative/Marketing, leads the agency’s marketing and business development. For more than 10 years at Jaffe PR, he has relied on his skills as both a business strategist and artist while using his creative vision to develop distinctive campaigns for our clients.
Melinda Wheeler, managing director, Operations/Controller, has administered the agency’s finances and has managed the business operations for Jaffe PR for more than seven years.
“The transition of Jaffe PR’s executive management is now complete, and we will continue to operate as we have been – providing high quality legal PR and marketing services to our clients,” said Hood. “We each have a long history with Jaffe PR and a deep understanding of the principles that have guided us in the past and will lead us into the future.”
Jaffe died on Nov. 21 of complications following surgery. He was known as a true visionary whose instincts and thought leadership about legal marketing and the business of law firms established him as an industry pioneer and one of the country’s foremost trusted legal advisors. He was honored to have been inducted into the PR News “PR People Hall of Fame” in 2010 and he was named to the “100 Legal Consultants You Need to Know” list by Lawdragon.

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