Obama’s Real Actual Birth Certificate is A Forgery Fake (A Collection of Critiques)

So apparently Obama finally released his birth cert:

Closer look from CBC News:

Obama’s Certificate of Live Birth. Click for different, larger version.

I guess all those birther conspiracy nuts have been shown their folly!

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BUT WAIT! UPDATES!!!

Uh oh! On a tip from wits0, it may be a forgery!

Via Atlas Shrugs and Gateway Pundit:

Free Republic: I thought there was something wrong with my computer when I tried to import the .gov’s PDF file into Photoshop. But now that I see what you got when you put it in Word, it’s the same thing that Photoshop does to it when I import it! It’s DEFINITELY a Layered image that has been cobbled together!

Photoshop expert and author of more than 17 books on computer graphics Mara Z: if you open the PDF in Illustrator (instead of Photoshop) – Select the entire document and go to the Object menu and choose Clipping Mask > Release. Repeat as necessary until all clipping masks are released. Also open the Layer and turn off the visibility of each clipping group and you can see all the numerous places in which information was added (edited) into the form.

Doug Welch:it is not a forgery. It is scanned using OCR that adds layers to a scanned document. Anyone that works with OCR scanners knows this.

Jeff responds to Welch: If it was scanned using OCR then the layers would have searchable text. They do not. The different objects are images and not text. Doug should maybe get a little better acquainted with OCR technology.

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Hahahaha! On a tip from TED at Moonbattery, from iOwnTheWorld:

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Via iOwnTheWorld from Obambi, a comparison against a real Hawaii birth cert shows how shoddy the forgery is.

Look at the placement of the typed-in words.

Real Hawaii birth cert:

Obama’s alleged Hawaii birth cert, transposed onto the above real Hawaii cert:

Click on either of the following two images to open an animated gif comparison.

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Via iOwnTheWorld, from The Market Ticker:

Only one of the numbers that was printed on that page had the background not only bleed through but also aliased pixels in the background itself?

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More in depth tipped by wits0 from Google docs (not blockquoted due to the amount cited, much more at the link):

The use of anti-aliasing. When computer-generating a font or image, Windows programs use a graphics algorithm called “anti-aliasing” that makes an image smoother and look better to the eye when displayed to the screen or to print. Take a look at the stamped dept of health number at the
top right corner, greatly magnified:

Notice the pixelation of the last number “1”. Look how uniform and smooth the pixel blocks are. Look at how level it is. Look at the different shade of color. What you are seeing in the last number “1” is known as “anti-aliasing.” This image was computer-generated on to this space with a graphics
program. It was not printed with ink on paper, and then copied. This occurs many times in this document. Here are more examples:

The “R” in the word “BARACK” in line 1a:

The “K” in the word “Kenya” in line 10:

The “S” in the word “STANLEY” in line 13:

Also, block text was not the only thing computer-generated in this document. Anti-aliasing in freehand cursive text is harder to spot. But, look at the “D” in the word “Dunham” in line 18a:

Now that you know what anti-aliasing looks like in free graphics, take a look at the entire signature of the attendant in line 19a:

By all accounts, this man died in 2003.

…

Interestingly enough, in that same word “Kapiolani” the “iol” are not kerned, but are block spaced letters that do not kern into themselves, or the adjoining letters:

So, now we have a magic typewriter that changes from kerned proportional fonts to block fonts in the same word on the fly?

…

And, as a side note, the first IBM Selectric typewriters that were introduced in July 31, 1961, were fixed pitch font
typewriters. Proportionately spaced print typewriters didn’t hit the market until much later with a special machine from IBM in 1966, and then the IBM Selectric III in 1980. And, even then, they were not capable of kerned printing.

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On a tip from wits0, from Examiner.com:

A post at godlikeproductions.com: The pattern on both certificates are different. I’ve looked closely and Obama’s certificate has a different background that was printed out when it was requested. The patterns are not static. The certificate is old, but the pattern is new.

According to Gotham Resistance: I did notice that Obama’s supposed birth certificate still has the father’s race listed as “African” as it was on the COLB that was released during his campaign. Like many in the blogosphere, I have serious doubts that this term was ever used to describe a person’s race. Once again, African is not a race! That would be the equivalent of stating that my race was European. I’m sure that it wouldn’t be too difficult finding another person born in Hawaii to a black farther around the same time of Obama’s birth and compare the father’s race box to Obama’s. Either Obama’s forgery team is handicapped by political correctness of the brain, or the Hawaiian Department of Health was run by morons at the time of Obama’s supposed birth.

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Further to that, tipped by hutchrun from Canade Free Press:

On the Certification of Live Birth (COLB), now widely available on the internet, Obama’s father’s race is listed as “African”.

First, “African” usually defines a location not a race.

Second, the common usage for the race of black Africans in 1961 would have been “Negro” or “Negroid”.

Third, “African” is not listed as a race in the federal Office of Management and Budget policy documents (1977, 1997).

…

In Appendix B “Hawaii Model – Standard for Clustering Race/Ethnicity Categories” contained in an article published in 2003 by employees of the Hawaii Department of Health, the word “African” appears as an “Aggregated Ethnic Group” under the race category “Black (non-Hispanic)”. That differs from the categories in Appendix A, which apparently represented an earlier version and did not contain the word “African”.

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Tipped from wits0 and iOwnTheWorld:

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Obambi discovers:

The birth certificate released today CANNOT be an exact copy of the original – the named hospital DID NOT EXIST in 1961. See the hospital’s own website if you don’t believe that!!! http://www.kapiolani.org/women-and-children/about-us/default.aspx.

ie., At the time of Obama’s birth, the maternity hospital was apparently called “Kapi‘olani Maternity Home”. . . – it merged with the Kauikeolani Children’s Hospital in 1978. “The two hospitals joined in 1978 to become Kapi‘olani Medical Center for Women & Children.” So why is the latter name listed on the birth certificate?

Actually, when I look closely at the PDF released, it says ‘Kapiolani Maternity & Gynecological Hospital’ which is neither the old nor the new name! What gives???

(UPDATE: See next)

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Tipped by wits0, from Conservative News and Views we find why the hospital name is a non-issue:

The best example of a Hawaiian long-form certificate available for examination is this pair of certificates for Susan and Gretchen Nordyke, born at Kapi’olani Maternity and Gynecological Hospital on August 5, 1961. (Note: earlier reports that the Obama certificate mis-named the hospital are unfounded. The Nordyke twins’ certificates name that same hospital. The original Kapi’olani Maternity Home, that Queen Kapiolani founded in 1890, carried that name in 1961 and would continue to carry it until 1978, when it merged with Kauikeolani Children’s Hospital to form the present Kapi’olani Medical Center for Women and Children.)

But we also find this:

Scanning a document and importing the image into Adobe Illustrator would still leave all the image content on a single layer.

…

One observer suggests that whoever prepared this document forgot a key step: to “flatten” the document, i.e., save the contents of all layers into one layer.

Beyond these flaws in the file, Jerome Corsi of WorldNetDaily points out that the certificate number of the Obama document is out of sequence. Specifically, the Nordyke twins have lower certificate numbers than does Obama’s certificate, this although they were born a day later.

And Aaron Klein and Brenda Elliott, authors of The Manchurian President, point out that the document states that Obama’s father was one Barack H. Obama Senior, born in Kenya in East Africa and hence a British subject. The certificate does not ask for citizenship or subject status of the parents, but no one has even alleged that Obama Senior obtained American citizenship through naturalization or even that he was present on American soil when his then wife, Stanley Ann Dunham Obama, gave birth.

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Further to the point about Obama’s father’s citizenship, tipped by wits0 from Canada Free Press:

Article II, Section I of the Constitution requires that a person be a natural born citizen to be eligible for the Presidency.

The Constitution does not say “citizen”, but specifically combines the legal concepts of jus soli (right of the soil) and of citizen parents, jus sanguinis (right of blood).

…

Anyone born on American soil whose parents are citizens of the United States is a natural born citizen.

And reiteration tipped by wits0, from The Facts, Why Barack Hussein Obama is NOT eligible for the office of President in a rather more blunt manner:

OBAMA’S LONG FORM BIRTH CERTIFICATE

ADDS PROOF THAT OBAMA IS NOT ELIGIBLE!!!

Because~ it lists his father as a “Kenyan”, and his Father was NEVER a U.S. Citizen,

To be a “Natural Born Citizen” BOTH parentS MUST be U.S. Citizens at the time of birth,

His Father was NOT! =Obama NOT eligible.

That site also has plenty of close-ups of the alleged birth cert which point out flaws in the forgery process.

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Yet more on natural born citizenship, tipped by wits0 from Atlas Shrugs:

Clearly, BHO I was never divorced from his first wife in Kenya. Further, INS suspected the BHO I/Stanley Ann Dunham marriage was a sham, arranged strictly to secure immigration status for him. But if Barack Senior was a Muslim polygamist, his “marriage” to Stanley Ann Dunham was invalid. Obama Senior was a Kenyan citizen. Kenya was still under English law at this time.

Illegitimate children had different rights — at least they certainly did in 1789. There is no way that the founders of this great nation intended for an illegitimate child of a foreign bigamist to attain the highest, most powerful position in the new land.

Further, when BHO I returned to Kenya, he apparently lived with his first Kenyan wife and his third American wife, suggesting that the Dunham “divorce” was a transitory ruse.

…

President Hussein Obama is not natural born. His father was not a US citizen; he is, by that very fact, disqualified to serve as US President. For those who believe that “natural born” is no longer relevant, you are wrong. Armaros points out in the comments, “The reason the founders have created this requirement was to prevent a British person from assuming US citizenship with the purpose of ascending to higher office and compromise the USA. To prevent a sort of sleeper spy/traitor from getting power in the new nation.” Clearly, from Obama’s performance, that is a very clear and present danger.

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Tipped by hutchrun, from The Smoking Gun:

• If the original document was in a bound volume (as reflected by the curvature of the left hand side of the certificate), how can the green patterned background of the document’s safety paper be so seamless?

• Why, if Obama was born on August 4, 1961, was the “Date Accepted by Local Reg.” four days later on August 8, 1961?

And much more at the link.

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Tipped by wits0, from Realist News which has several videos, and this:

Notice the 1963 Birth Certificate I found that looks just like Obama’s. You can clearly see the white spaces all around Obama’s every single typed letter. On Alan’s birth certificate you do not see ANY white spaces anywhere.

It seems true – I compare the images side by side below, look at the Honolulu on each:

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From Fellowship of the Minds:

Looking at the birth certificate, specifically at the signature of Obama’s mom Stanley Ann Dunham Obama

…

Does it look to you that the two signatures — the one on Obama’s birth certificate and the one on Dunham’s SS card — are made by the same person?

You don’t have to be a professional graphologist to see that the two signatures are wildly dissimilar.

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Commenter voted against carter points out:

If you want to counterfeit Documents AND have them be declared as “Authentic” the BEST way is to do it the “OLD FASHIONED” way.

Ie use analog equipment. NOT digital.

It goes on to list what old fashioned gear you would need to do the forgery right.

I concur, even I know that it would have been safer to create the Photoshop forgery, print it out, and scan it – even a lazy, half-a$$ed effort would do that to simulate scanning a 1960s document!

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Tipped by wits0, from Israel Insider:

The “Signature of the Attendant” was taken care of nicely: a local ob-gyn named David A. Sinclair who conveniently died in 2003 and whose widow happens to be a Democratic party operative and, as Aaron Klein reports today in World Net Daily, an advisor to none other than the Hawaii Health Department.

…

…it seems dubious that the person who signed Barack Obama’s wannabe birth certificate was a “local registrar” named U K L Lee.

Lee is probably a common family, but “U K L” is almost certainly not a common sequence of initials.

This improbability suggests that the one who signed as “U K L Lee” — or who modified another signature to make it pronounceable as “ukulele,” was by this act of invention or alteration taking credit for the deed with an in-joke that presumably would escape the attention of the masses and the mainstream media cowed into submission by an imperious Presidential statement that he had “more important things” to worry about.

It is also possible that the forger may have been uncomfortable with the criminal task imposed on him or her, and therefore left tell-traces, together with the artifacts of photoshopping and document assembly, as clues.

Israel Insider is familiar with all this because we encountered it before, in our detailed analysis of the original publication of the short-form “Certification of Live Birth” originally published on the White House’s behalf in the Daily Kos. There a skilled document-manipulator named Jay McKinnon produced knockoffs of that document with the whimsical signature “I B A Forgerie” in examples showing how it’s done.

…

“U K L Lee” is a slightly more subtle signature than Haye I.B Ahphorgerie, but the idea is identical. Forgers, like all artists, invariably find ways, directly or indirectly, of claiming credit for their creations.

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Tipped by hutchrun, from WorldNetDaily:

The question, therefore, is how was it possible that the Nordyke twins had their birth certificates accepted by the registrar general in Hawaii three days later than the registrar general accepted Obama’s birth certificate, when the twins’ numbers are lower than Obama’s number?

…

Eleanor Nordyke has speculated that her twins received an earlier birth certificate number because, although she gave birth later than Ann Dunham, she entered Kapi’olani earlier.

Yet, in 1961, birth certificate numbers were not assigned by the hospital, and the date the mother checked into the medical facility was irrelevant to how birth certificate numbers were assigned.

Moreover, no records for Dunham having been a patient at Kapi’olani in 1961, or of Obama having been born at the hospital on Aug. 4, 1961, have been released by the hospital.

Now that President Obama has personally vouched for the authenticity of the birth certificate the White House released today, he can reasonably be asked to authorize Kapi’olani Medical Center to release any and all medical records the hospital may hold for his mother and Barack Obama Sr., his listed father.

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Tipped by wits0, from Market Ticker.org:

This is not in the realm of probability stacking any more. The page portion here is curved as it is allegedly “scanned” from a book page. The curvature is consistent with both the margin lines and the printed word “Sex.”

The typed word Male shows no curvature in the baseline of the text; this is physically impossible if the word “Male” was originally printed upon the same page that was scanned. Worse, the entire hospital name is straight while the text of the caption is properly curved at the margin – but not elsewhere.

Everyone has tried to explain away the various “coincidences.” But for this to have happened “coincidentally” the typewriter would have had to curve the text it was typing.

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I say, the Trump can easily fork out a $1,000,000 reward (or a job, natch!) to whoever comes forward with proof that he did the editing job for Obama!

AoSHQ notes derisively (censorship mine):

Obama’s greatest victory of the entire past year — his crowning achievement for the past twelve months in the most powerful office in all the world — is his celebrated triumph in successfully producing a common form of secondary identification.

As of right now, that’s what he’s running on: That he, like 88% of all non-incarcerated adults in America, has access to his own personal records.

Look how ineffably pleased with himself he is about all this:

This is what he’s doing victory laps on right now. That’s what Chris Matthews is praising him to the heavens for. He’s grinning like King Sh*t of F*ck Mountain, and bathing in rapturous applause, because he accomplished something considerably less difficult than opening a Netflix account.

Pardon the word — are we not treating the President of the United States like a retard? Are we not, perhaps, condescending to him in indulging him like this?

This is his big initiative for the month? He showed a piece of identification?

Years from now, looking back at the “good times,” he’ll turn to a former adviser and say, “Remember — remember when I produced the sh*t out of that birth certificate? Like a Warrior-Poet I made a routine request of a petty bureaucrat for a mundane copy of a run of the mill record. Days of wine and roses that was, days of… Glory.”

And his former advisor, who I imagine in chainmail and a Scottish accent, will say, “Aye, fine days indeed, fine days indeed. How the very Heavens shook at our mighty filings and furious paperwork.”

That’s what he’s got. That’s what he’s managed for 2010-2011.

Gotta love Ace’s way of putting things! But really, he also achieved this long list of huge accomplishments.

Tipped by hutchrun, now they’re selling shirts boasting about the fact that Obama is not a foreigner. Wow… Uh, okay losers.

Tippes by hutchrun:

Sheriff Joe: ‘Tons’ more shocking Obama info

Sheriff’s investigators were able to replicate the alleged forgery by obtaining a circa 1980 pica stamp and a circa “2008″ date plug. Investigators were able to clearly demonstrate the “80″ (which should have actually read 1980) in Obama’s Selective Service Registration form resulted from cutting out the “08″ from an authentic “2008″ date plug, and inverting the “08″ to read “80″ when the cut plug was loaded into the year slot on the 1980 pica stamp.

Johor Bahru – Sin City poem

I used to call it City of Crime – because of, well, you know, its crime.

On a tip from Simon Thong, via Lim Kit Siang’s blog:

Sin City, Jay Bee – a tribute to Johor Bahru

by Azly Rahman

Where have all those memories gone
Of the city that never sleeps
Sin-filled you are
… Offering life’s panorama
A pandora box of a lushness of emotions

Jay Bee
You may be called a city of filth
Of gang wars and transvestite agalore
Of rock kapak geniuses conceived immaculately
From the womb of Papa Rock
Ahhh New Johor … New York you may want to be
Thou shall never attain that notoriety

Sweet city sin city
Celebrating the velocity of money
It is there I knew love’s inner beauty
As we walked up and down the Lido Beach
whose middle name is “filthy”
Ohh Jay Bee … you are a soul that is one with me

Jay Bee
Sin city
where politics stink
where corruption gets a nice daily wink
where the power elites are the underground kings
where the poor are hoodwinked
where the children of the working class roam the streets in motorcycles with bilng bing
where the smell of ganja filled the air like a pissed-on fermented drink
Ahh Jay Bee
City of Sins

Your hunchback of Tanjung Puteri is dead and gone
Committed sepuku at the sight of what has become
Of you sin city Jay Bee
Si Bongkok died of a death he long-willed for
As the sight of the crooked bridge broke his heart that exploded with a roar
Ahhh… thanks to the Johor Corridor
And the Disney of Nusajaya Johoreans adore
Sin city
Jay Bee
Your economy, like a Segget River , stinks till eternity

Love is gone
Of the one my heart held on
As I walked countless miles
Along the Lido beach
Time has not been kind
To this city that never sleeps
To this sin city
That weeps
The yesteryears of the loss of pride that run deep
Love is gone
The deal is sealed
Sin city you are now sold
To the forked tongued nationalists grown old like ageing Disneys

Sin city
Jay Bee
You were once mine
You will no longer be

And response from the powers that be:

Shahrir chides blogger over ‘sin city’ JB

By MOHD FARHAAN SHAH and YEE XIANG YUN

JOHOR BARU: A poem on the Net that derided Johor Baru as a “sin city” has ruffled the feathers of its MP Datuk Shahrir Samad and the state government.

Shahrir accused United States-based blogger Dr Azly Rahman of degrading and tarnishing the city through Sin City, Jay Bee a Tribute to Johor Baru that has appeared in several anti-establishment portals, including DAP stalwart Lim Kit Siang’s blog.

He dared Dr Azly to return home and see how the city had progressed.

“Johor Baru is not trying to emulate New York. The crime rate there is much higher than it is here,” he told The Star, when asked to comment on the poem.

Shahrir chided the blogger for living in the past.

“Sorry to disappoint him, but Johor Baru is not like what he had in mind when he wrote the poem,” he said.

Johor Tourism and Environment committee chairman Hoo Seong Chang said such negative poems would not affect the state’s tourism.

“We have proven ourselves with attractive packages that pull in visitors all-year long,” he said.

“I understand the state’s cleanliness has been an issue but we are working on it.”

Hoo said about 16.5 million tourists visited the state last year.

“For the first three months of this year alone we have already attracted 3.9 million tourists an increase of 455,672 when compared with the same period last year,” he said.

Dr Azly, who lives in New Jersey, said he was born in Singapore but grew up in Kampung Melayu Majidee here. He studied at a boarding school in Kuantan and continued his studies in New York.

In his poem, he portrayed Johor Baru as a drug-ridden, corrupted and eco-unfriendly city with a poor economy.

One of the stanzas in the long poem, reads:

Jay Bee

You may be called a city of filth

Of gang wars and transvestite galore

Of rock kapak geniuses conceived immaculately

From the womb of Papa Rock

Ahhh New Johor New York you may want to be

Thou shall never attain that notoriety.

In the final stanza, Dr Azly wrote: “You were once mine, you will no longer be.”

Not being in JB since a long time, I can’t comment on whether it’s crime prone anymore, or nice and safe as Datuk Shahrir says.

Anyone care to update?

Obama’s Economic Successes: A Roundup

From Moonbattery:

And looking at reality vs hype, doesn’t the following show that the Stimulus made unemployment worse?

More from Moonbattery:

More from Moonbattery:

Via Moonbattery, from Common Cents:

Via Gateway Pundit:

Via Moonbattery:

From Moonbattery:

We estimate the Act created/saved 450 thousand government-sector jobs and destroyed/forestalled one million private sector jobs.

…

Notice the nosedive the manufacture of goods went into right after the Manchurian Moonbat took office.

Via Gateway Pundit, home ownership has reversed 23 years and counting:

Via Gateway Pundit, home prices have fallen as steeply as the Great Depression:

Via Moonbattery, this graph shows how many months the Obama Depression is lasting – it will takes more than 35 months to get back to pre-Obama employment numbers!

From Investors.com, note the inverse relation between government wasteful spending and jobs:

Via AoSHQ:

Via Gateway Pundit (click for full size):

Via AoSHQ:

Via Gateway Pundit, some hockey stick graphs:

Via UrbanGrounds:

Via Gateway Pundit:

From Weekly Standard:

Via AoSHQ, via The Enterprise Blog:

An excellent, large infographic detailing Obama’s empty promises/campaign talk versus his actual economic results, via AoSHQ:

Via AoSHQ, the video version:

From The Fiscal Times:

Via MISH’S Global Economic Trend Analysis:

Via PJ Media:

By Michael Ramirez:

Via The American:

3.8 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009, 3.9 percent in the first quarter of 2010, and 3.8 percent in the second quarter of 2010. But no 3 percent-plus quarters since then.

The first nine quarters of the Reagan Recovery, by contrast, looked like this: 5.1 percent, 9.3 percent, 8.1 percent, 8.5 percent, 8.0 percent, 7.1 percent, 3.9 percent, 3.3 percent, 3.8, percent, 3.4 percent. In fact, the Reagan Boom went from the first quarter of 1983 until the second quarter of 1986 without notching a sub-3 percent GDP quarter.

So, while the Reagan Recovery quickly made up for lost years of growth, not so much for the Obama Recovery

More on Obama vs Reagan from Economics One, the following three images:

From MJ Behind the Curtain:

Via The Enterprise Blog:

From Innocent Bystanders via AosHQ:

Via Moonbattery:

Via AoSHQ, from The Foundry which has a huge list of how Obama has been jacking up gas prices:

Immediately after taking office in 2009, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, canceled 77 leases for oil and gas drilling in Utah.

The EPA announced new rules mandating the use of 36 billion gallons worth of renewable fuels (like ethanol) by 2020.

This summer President Obama needlessly instituted, not one, but two outright drilling bans in the Gulf of Mexico.

After rescinding his outright offshore drilling ban, President Obama has refused to issue any new drilling permits in the Gulf, a policy that the Energy Information Administration estimates will cut domestic offshore oil production by 13% this year

Interior Secretary Salazar announced that the eastern Gulf of Mexico, the Atlantic coast, and the Pacific coast will not be developed, effectively banning drilling in those areas for the next seven years;

The Environmental Protection Agency has announced new global warming regulations for oil refineries;
Interior Secretary Salazar announced new rules making it more difficult to develop energy resources on federal land.

From The Enterprise Blog via AoSHQ:

Via AoSHQ:

Via AoSHQ:

Via AoSHQ, US Presidential rate-of-debt:

Via AoSHQ:

Via Doug Ross:

Via AoSHQ (via my own post:

Via Hot Air via AoSHQ:

Via AoSHQ:

Via AoSHQ:

Via AoSHQ, the labor force is shrinking, and has been for a while, but not this rapidly – watch it drop precipitously under Obama:

Via Moonbattery:

Via AoSHQ:

Via AoSHQ, some excerpts from Obama By The Numbers:

$15.7 Trillion: Current National Debt ($ 15,724,907,364,995.04 ). (U.S. Treasury Department, Accessed 6/2/12)

$10.3 Trillion: Amount Obama’s FY2012 Budget Would Add To The Debt Through FY2022. (OMB, 2/13/12)

$5.10 Trillion: Added To The National Debt Since Obama Took Office. (U.S. Treasury Department, Accessed 6/2/12)

Via AoSHQ via Doug Ross from The Foundry:

Via AoSHQ from Washington Post:

The Federal Reserve said the median net worth of families plunged by 39 percent in just three years, from $126,400 in 2007 to $77,300 in 2010. That puts Americans roughly on par with where they were in 1992.

Via AoSHQ:

Via AoSHQ:

one key economic data component has been quite good at predicting presidential elections, and that is consumer confidence. If the consumer confidence index is at 100 or higher, then the incumbent party is likely to win. If not, then the opposition party wins

Via AoSHQ:

Via AoSHQ via Economists’ Outlook Blog:

The table above shows that consumer confidence levels correctly predicted the outcome in 9 of the past 11 presidential elections… The near-perfect predictive power of the consumer confidence index essentially says that at the time of voting, the single most important issue comes down to the economy. As James Carville once said, “it’s the economy, stupid!” Forget the tough talks on terrorism or the flowery talks of hope; voters are rewarding or punishing the incumbent on the economy.

Via Moonbattery:

Via AoSHQ via Instapundit from Greg Mankiw:

via AoSHQ, Obama ‘recovery is worse than all other nations which also recently faced recession worst in world since 1970:

Above fleshed by by AP via AoSHQ.

From Political Math via WaPo (even they are turning on Obama!), via AoSHQ:

From AEIdeas via AoSHQ, Obama Only Needs 11 Million More Jobs To Get Back To Pre-Recession Levels:

From Powerline via AoSHQ:

From Washington Post via AoSHQ:

Incomes have dropped more since the beginning of the recovery than they did during the recession itself

Via AoSHQ from Innocent Bystanders:

Yes, folks, the economy had already started to turn around in the quarter before President Obama took office. The healing had begun before the Stimulus package, and before he started propping the economy up with huge deficit spending.

Via AoSHQ from Zero Hedge:

Via I Bet Recall Obama Can Get More Likes Than The Barack Obama Page Facebook page:

Via AoSHQ, TRUE unemployment is 4 million fewer with jobs since he was sworn in:

Via AoSHQ from Zero Hedge, see the spike at 2008 onwards:

Via AoSHQ via Instapundit, from Zero Hedge, look at the fall from 2008:

Via AoSHQ from Reason.com:

Via Zero Hedge:

Via Investors.com:

Via CNS News:

The number of Americans age 16 or older who decided not to work or even to seek a job increased by 8,332,000 to a record 88,839,000 in President Barack Obama’s first term, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Via AoSHQ from Wonkblog:

At this pace, the U.S. won’t get back to full employment until 2022

From IBD, way to go Obamacare:

From Forbes:

In the 10 previous recessions since the Great Depression, prior to this last recession, the economy recovered all jobs lost during the recession after an average of 25 months after the prior jobs peak (when the recession began), according to the records kept by the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. So the job effects of prior post Depression recessions have lasted an average of about 2 years. But under President Obama, by April, 2013, 64 months after the prior jobs peak, almost 5½ years, we still have not recovered all of the recession’s job losses. In April, 2013, there were an estimated 135.474 million American workers employed, still down about 2.6 million jobs from the prior peak of 138.056 million in January, 2008.

…

In the 10 post depression recessions before President Obama, the economy recovered the lost GDP during the recession within an average of 4.5 quarters after the recession started. But it took Obama’s recovery 16 quarters, or 4 years, to reach that point. Today, 21 quarters, or 5 plus years, after the recession started, the economy (real GDP) has grown just 3.2% above where it was when the recession started. By sharp contrast, at this point in the Reagan recovery, the economy had boomed by 18.6%, almost one fifth.

…real GDP growth under Obama has been the worst of any President in the last 60 years!

But it’s even worse than that. Obama’s real GDP growth has actually been less than half as much as the worst of any President in the last 60 years. In other words, even if you doubled actual GDP growth under President Obama, it would still be the worst record of any President in the last 60 years!

…the Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey show that real median household income declined by more than $4,500 during Obama’s first term, about 8%, meaning effectively that the middle class has lost annually the equivalent of one month’s pay under Obama.

…Poverty has soared under Obama, with the number of Americans in poverty increasing to the highest level in the more than 50 years that the Census Bureau has been tracking poverty. Over the last 5 years, the number in poverty has increased by nearly 31%, to 49.7 million, with the poverty rate climbing by over 30% to 16.1%.

From The Wall Street Journal:

From Zero Hedge:

For the entire U.S. workforce, employers have added far more part-time employees in 2013—averaging 93,000 a month, seasonally adjusted—than full-time workers, which have averaged 22,000. Last year the reverse was true, with employers adding 31,000 part-time workers monthly, compared with 171,000 full-time ones.

Via AoSHQ:

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke acknowledged that Obamacare regulations have caused employers to hire part-time workers, rather than full-time employees, but refused to say if Congress should delay the law’s mandates.

Via Washington Post:

And a bunch of graphs of of 11 via Washington Post:

.

Via Fox News:

Stunningly, 96 percent of the net jobs added this year have been part-time jobs.

Via Dan Mitchell:

Via Dan Mitchell:

Via Dan Micthell:

Via Dan Mitchell:

Via Dan Mitchell:

Via International Journal Review:

Via Independent Journal Review:

For the first time since the Carter presidency, more businesses are failing in America than are being created, according to the Brookings Institution. Moreover, the contrast between “firm entry” and “firm exit” during the Obama “recovery” is even more stark than during the Great Depression.

Via Dan Mitchell:

An unprecedented number of men–one in six–between the ages of 25 and 54, what should be their prime earning years, are either unemployed or out of the work force entirely.

…

One in eight, the highest proportion since record-keeping began in 1955, are out of the labor force… Another 2.9 million men in the 25-54 age group haven’t given up–they are still in the labor force–but are currently unemployed.

Via Dan Mitchell:

The employment-to-population ratio is lower than it was at the official end of the Great Recession in mid-2009. The labor-force participation rate dropped to 62.8%, the lowest since the late 1970s. …from 2010 to 2013 median family income corrected for inflation declined by 5%, even as average family income rose by 4%. Only families at the very top of the income distribution saw gains during this period. Family incomes between the 40th and 90th percentiles stagnated, while families at the bottom experienced substantial declines.

Via The Federalist:

Via Business Insider:

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See also more scary chart-fu (borrowed that term from AoSHQ) and etc, click on each of the linked titles for so much more:

The economic case against Obamanomics in 13 charts.

New Chart Proves Obamanomics Creates Jobs:

Great Work on That Economy Obama:

CHANGE: Obama’s Massive Failures:

Republican Led Economy VS Democrat Led Economy:

American Stock Exchange ‘Celebrates’ Obama With Record CRASHES – Repeatedly!:

Obama Speaketh, Stock Market Crasheth:

Run the above video and watch the Dow Jones Index fall as a direct result of Obama opening his mouth and sharing his plans for America. Down 50 points by the end of the video!

Obama Sued Bank to Force It to Give Out Risky Housing Loans – Precursor to Subprime Crisis:

Info Video: How the Democrats Caused the US Economic Crisis:

Which Candidate Do Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Donate Most To?:

In 20 years history of donations, Senator Barack Hussein Obama with just 4 years in the Senate managed to reach the top three biggest recipients of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac!!!

And Obama and his cronies on energy prices:

Obama: High energy prices and sacrifice…

Obama’s Stephen Chu: Not a goal to get gas prices down

Obama: Electricity prices skyrocket

Stephen Chu: Boost gas prices to levels of Europe ($8 a gallon)

With list of gas price upping actions here.

And via Moonbattery:

The market-clearing price for new 2015 capacity — almost all natural gas — was $136 per megawatt. That’s eight times higher than the price for 2012, which was just $16 per megawatt. In the mid-Atlantic area covering New Jersey, Delaware, Pennsylvania, and DC the new price is $167 per megawatt. For the northern Ohio territory served by FirstEnergy, the price is a shocking $357 per megawatt.

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I don’t understand… With all his successes above, why do 57% disapprove of his handling of the economy?

They must be racists.

NUJ President Found Guilty of Breaking the Laws of Reality and Logic

Malaysian Insider headline: NUJ president found guilty of tarnishing Utusan.

Seeing as ‘tarnish’ means ‘to make people think that someone or something is less good‘, I contend that this is an impossibility on the scale of 1 = and = 1 simultaneously.

From Malaysian Insider, via Malaysia Today:

NUJ president found guilty of tarnishing Utusan

By Melissa Chi, The Malaysian Insider

KUALA LUMPUR, April 14 — National Union of Journalists (NUJ) president Hata Wahari was found guilty today of all eight counts of tarnishing the image of his employer Utusan Malaysia.

He told The Malaysian Insider that the “punishment” will be decided by the Umno-owned newspaper’s top management and he will be informed in a fortnight.

“I am prepared for the worst,” he said, referring to the possibility he might be sacked.

“I will leave it to the top management to decide but I don’t know what to say,” he said when asked what he thinks the punishment might be.

The senior journalist said he was still an Utusan Malaysia employee until notified otherwise, although he has been suspended since January 11 pending the disposal of the domestic inquiry.

The decision on the inquiry was read out this morning by committee chairman Mohd Basir Abdul Rahim, with NUJ-Utusan chairman Taufik Razak and its executive councillor, Hayat Sueet, present as well.

Hata had been accused of insulting Utusan’s management and tarnishing Utusan’s image through statements he issued to various news portals between September 21 and October 14 last year.

He had caused a stir when he urged the authorities to act against Utusan’s editors for stoking racial sentiment in its reports.

He had also blamed the drop in the national daily’s sales on the editors for pushing what he called racial rhetoric.

Hata was issued with a notice on December 27 last year, ordering him to appear before the domestic inquiry, which was scheduled to begin on January 6 at the company’s headquarters in Cheras, Kuala Lumpur.

He was later issued a suspension letter on January 11, stating that the senior reporter would be denied entry into any Utusan office throughout the course of the inquiry unless given permission from the company management.

The inquiry was first postponed from January 19 to January 25, and was postponed again because Hata was hospitalised for chest pains.

It was postponed yet again from February 9 because of his medical check-up and finally held on March 1 and March 10.

The Malaysian Insider reported that Hata had announced he would start a new newspaper if he was sacked by his current employer.

Hata said he had presented the newspaper called Utusan Rakyat to both PKR and Umno, adding that the newspaper would be non-partisan.

However, PKR vice-president Nurul Izzah Anwar had also come up with the same name for a similar project of her own, naming Hata as its chief editor.

Hata said he then decided to rename his project Harian Malaysia and turn it into an online paper.

He said he was working on it with his brother, a graphic designer, but said that it was still in its infancy.

Utusan Malaysia had also dismissed in 2009 its NUJ branch head Amran Ahmad, who said the newspaper had accused him of being a DAP agent.

Umno took over ownership of the Malay-language broadsheet in 1961. Hata said that before that, it was still credible and objective.

The Obumpmas Walk Into Mordor

Inspired by Comixed.

Reference for panel one:

Panel four:

First Quarter 2011: Signs of the End Times Checklist

The signs of the End Times are described in Matthew 24, Mark 13, Luke 21, Daniel 10, 11 and 12, and various parts of Revelation and Old Testament prophets.

Although people throughout history have believed that so-and-so happenings mean that the End Times are upon us, recent events have piqued my curiosity regarding this subject.

This is not really a serious attempt to predict when we’re all doomed / gonna be raptured, but here goes:

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Earthquakes

There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of birth pains. – Matthew 24:7-8

Earthquakes have been extra plenty in recent months.

The first, big one in Japan this year was tied to…

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Roaring and tossing sea

On the earth, nations will be in anguish and perplexity at the roaring and tossing of the sea – Luke 21:25

Tsunami!

Which caused…

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Fear and signs from heaven

There will be great earthquakes, famines and pestilences in various places, and fearful events and great signs from heaven. – Luke 21:11

Someone had suggested global warming as the ‘fearful events and great signs from heaven’, which is unfounded since global warming is unfactual. Even so, it still has the fear, whether rational or not.

Anyway, running on the same concept, the Fukushima reactors problem (thanks to the earthquake shutting down outside power and the tsunami shutting down the backup generators) has led to radiation being found everywhere around.

For a while there was a fear that a radioactive plume would float over mainland USA, which though now disproven, still counts – as only the fear is needed.

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Famines

There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of birth pains. – Matthew 24:7-8

Famine has always been a looming fear due to ‘overpopulation’ (which has taken its own sweet time to come to pass, sorry Mathusians). However, green idiocy in the form of food-based biofuels which caused food price spikes and riots in 2008 certainly doesn’t help.

And hey, if Japan-sourced food being banned can tie this is to the earthquakes again, why not?

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Wars & rumours of wars

You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. – Matthew 24:6-7

The Middle East at present. Although wars are always happening throughout human civilization, it’s especially poignant because the Arab and African states are currently either already in civil war (e.g. Libya), or have a good chance to end up in revolution (e.g. Bahrain, Saudi Arabia). Hence the ‘rumours’ part is very strong.

Additionally, Biblical prophecy mostly focuses on Israel and her neighboring nations, i.e. the Arab states.

This unrest may likely lead to…

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Nations attack Israel

Too many passages to list, but for an example, see this slightly outdated page and just one from Jesus:

When you see Jerusalem being surrounded by armies, you will know that its desolation is near. – Luke 21:20

Once the abovementioned revolutions are through, most likely the government will either be Islamist or else be friendly/non-hostile towards Islamists. Cases in point: Egypt, Ivory Coast.

Another:

Israel fears that Islamic militants who have joined the rebel ranks in trying to oust President Bashar Assad will turn their guns toward Israel if they topple the Syrian leader.

These states, whose former governments were wisely cowed by Israel’s military superiority, will either wage proxy war (e.g. support terrorist actions like this) or outright war on Israel (as they have already declared and seem to be trying to start).

This will happened either immediately (ref the preceding link above) or when the hopeless lack of administrative skill and leadership cause the regimes to fail epicly, whereupon they will go the usual “It’s the Jews’ fault!!!” route and use them as a bogeyman to deflect public anger outwards.

It might even be due to UN involvement siding against Israel… Especially since Obama is the US President least supportive towards Israel ever, and thus will not be likely to side Israel in the UN or veto measures against them.

When this happens, Israel will stand alone due to the UN’s bias and America’s non-involvement (see next point). This is especially if Obama is still President at that time… He has a well known and overt anti-Israel streak and won’t be assisting Israel anytime soon. See also next point.

UPDATE OCT 2015: Obama gets even more pushed around by Putin while the latter stakes his iron-fisted claim on the Middle East.

UPDATE MAY 2011: Further to Obama’s fervent demands that Israel return to the 1967 borders (while by contrast hoping only vague wishes at the Palestinians), this would split Jerusalem back into East and West halves (despite him promising not to do just that – but hey, it’s classic Obama), with the West half under Israeli control…

A day of the LORD is coming, Jerusalem, when your possessions will be plundered and divided up within your very walls. I will gather all the nations to Jerusalem to fight against it; the city will be captured, the houses ransacked, and the women raped. Half of the city will go into exile, but the rest of the people will not be taken from the city. Then the LORD will go out and fight against those nations, as he fights on a day of battle. – Zechariah 14:1-3

And on a related note, I associate this attack that signals the coming of the 7 years of the tribulation with that scene in Left Behind: The Movie.

Meanwhile, East Asian nations like China and India will likely side with the Arabs over Israel for the sake of expediency.

Another sign that points to the End Times coming soon is John’s description of ‘locusts and horses‘ of war in Revelation 9:

And out of the smoke locusts came down on the earth and were given power like that of scorpions of the earth. They were told not to harm the grass of the earth or any plant or tree, but only those people who did not have the seal of God on their foreheads. They were not allowed to kill them but only to torture them for five months. And the agony they suffered was like that of the sting of a scorpion when it strikes. During those days people will seek death but will not find it; they will long to die, but death will elude them.

The locusts looked like horses prepared for battle. On their heads they wore something like crowns of gold, and their faces resembled human faces. Their hair was like women’s hair, and their teeth were like lions’ teeth. They had breastplates like breastplates of iron, and the sound of their wings was like the thundering of many horses and chariots rushing into battle. They had tails with stingers, like scorpions, and in their tails they had power to torment people for five months.

…

The horses and riders I saw in my vision looked like this: Their breastplates were fiery red, dark blue, and yellow as sulfur. The heads of the horses resembled the heads of lions, and out of their mouths came fire, smoke and sulfur. A third of mankind was killed by the three plagues of fire, smoke and sulfur that came out of their mouths. The power of the horses was in their mouths and in their tails; for their tails were like snakes, having heads with which they inflict injury.

Pretty weird sounding, like some chimeras out of Greek mythology. But a pretty accurate rendering of the below by a 1st-Century person seeing them in action:

And as I said, this points to a pretty close coming of the End Times… Combat vehicles of the future may not fit the description the way that modern and choppers and tanks do.

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Russia (Gog & Magog) is mentioned in prophecy, but America is absent

This is odd, because if America is the world’s foremost power and a close ally of Israel, surely it will take part in the End Times?

I’ve read a post about how as Iran heads towards nukes, and American under Obama is weak-kneed about stopping them – and completely unfeared these days as its deteriorating credibility crumbles further under John Kerry and vanishes all together as Obama prattles on – Russia is once again the patron and strong horse that the Arab states look to for maintaining stability in the region. See an example here.

From Tablet Mag:

All of the administration’s Middle East policies pointed to the same thing: America wants out of the Middle East… If the administration’s press surrogates, Washington insiders, and the Europeans think the American commander-in-chief pulled off a diplomatic masterstroke when he signed on to the Russian initiative to get Bashar al-Assad to relinquish his chemical weapons arsenal, this is simply not how it looks in the Middle East. From that perspective, Obama is a bluffer. And a guy who won’t back up his own words with actions is not likely to back up his allies with actions when the going gets tough

America is not in prophecy simply because they shirk from taking part in it. Well, unless America is the beast as some conjecture!

UPDATE: With the USA now no longer reliant on Arab oil, perhaps they have no interest left in the region? And the oil price crash certainly would be driver causing oil-exporters to externalize discontent!

Btw, if everyone is so up in arms about ending the use of nuclear energy ref: Fukushima, why is there no objection to Iran’s pursuit of allegedly peaceful nuclear power? As this DEBKAfile report tipped by wits0 warns, and as cartoon by Michael Ramirez points out:

Or look at how US allies are not bothering to inform Obama before they launch airstrikes!

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Babylon as a player

There I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was covered with blasphemous names and had seven heads and ten horns. The woman was dressed in purple and scarlet, and was glittering with gold, precious stones and pearls. She held a golden cup in her hand, filled with abominable things and the filth of her adulteries. The name written on her forehead was a mystery: babylon the great the mother of prostitutes and of the abominations of the earth. I saw that the woman was drunk with the blood of God’s holy people, the blood of those who bore testimony to Jesus. – Revelation 17:3-6

Babylon is rich and powerful in the End Times. While it can be interpreted symbolically (wealth, power, corruption), from 1990-2010 who would have thought that Iraq would amount to anything?

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Oil in Israel

About Asher he said: “Most blessed of sons is Asher; let him be favored by his brothers, and let him bathe his feet in oil. – Deuteronomy 33:24

Asher’s food will be rich; he will provide delicacies fit for a king. – Genesis 49:20

An interesting addition… It’s often been joked that of all the Middle East, God managed to give Israel the only part without oil to be the Promised Land!

But recently, tipped through SMS that my mother-in-law received…

From Oil in Israel:

And look which of the tribes was allotted that coastal region, from Israel-a-history-of.com:

Here’s IsraelPrayer.com another site that thinks there is a link.

And look at this ‘coincidence’ too (tipped by wits0):

The red stars represent oil shale deposits, which as you can see are scattered across sovereign Israel and Jordan. None were detected in the West Bank or Gaza.

That’s as much oil as Saudi Arabia’s proven reserves.

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Gospel preached to whole world

And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. – Matthew 24:14

Apart from the Bible already being translated into thousands of languages already, there is a school of thought that looks at the centre of strong Christianity over the centuries. From Israel it has continually moved westwards – to Turkey, to Greece, to Rome, to Germany, to England, to America, and now in the process of moving to China. Which leaves maybe a few more steps (perhaps India?) and back to Israel to complete the circle.

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Blood Moons

Modern events seem to involve Israel every Jubilee year, and when coupled with multiple-times-a-year blood moons… 2014-2015: A Tetrad of Four Blood Moons, all on Jewish Feast Days and in the Shemitah Year a once in a two millennial event!

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Persecution of Christians

You will be betrayed even by parents, brothers and sisters, relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death. Everyone will hate you because of me. – Luke 21:16-17

Just head over to Barnabas Fund – hope and aid for the persecuted church and check out the News for the latest atrocities being carried out against Christians, simply because they are Christians and refuse to denounce Christ.

Just a few examples: Nigeria; the same Ivory Coast link as earlier; and of course, Egypt (this one is really ironic on the ‘family turning on family’ part), continued and continued.

So I highly encourage you to allocate some of your tithe to Barnabas Fund donations to help those believers who don’t even have the right to live, let alone worship freely or choose their own religion. I donate online via credit card.

And lest you think this is a third world problem, here’s the hatred part as demonstrated in the first world:

• Muslim Long Sleeves and Sikh Bangles Allowed, Christian Crucifix Banned

• Separation of Church and Hate

• While Moonbat Media Fiddlesticks It to Christians, The West Burns

• Politically Correct Bathroom Etiquette in America

• American Civil Liberties Union Religious Bias

• Christian Chastity Ring Banned, Hindu Tuberculosis Bull Allowed

• BBC Execs: Okay to Throw Bible in Trash But Not Koran

And that’s just a snippet of the Faith Under Fire category.

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Afternote

Well if the End Times come soon, that clashes with my own pet theory that the Second Coming of Jesus will be sometime around the 2030s.

My reasoning is that according to the timing from Daniel’s vision (Daniel 9:24-27) the coming of the Messiah brings it not to the day Jesus was born in a manger, but to exactly the day of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. I got it from New Evidence That Demands a Verdict by Josh McDowell, here’s an excellent a roundup of those calculations – under PART FOUR.

Therefore, 1000 or 2000 years from that point is around 1030 A.D. or 2030 A.D., not the nice round turns of the millenniums that keep getting people so hysterical. We also have to factor in that Jesus’ birth made 1 B.C. become 1 A.D. without any ‘year zero’, and the ‘prophetic year’ being based on twelve 30-day months.

But remember… However good our guesses may seem, no one knows the day or hour it will come to pass (Matthew 24:36 & 42)

NST Letters: Good on NATO, America for Saving Libyan Lives

Buddy!

From NST Letters:

Libya: Action meant to save lives
2011/04/05
HASSAN TALIB, Gombak, Selangor

Should the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation be blamed for the so-called interference in Libyan affairs to save innocent lives?

MUAMMAR Gaddafi says what is happening in Libya is an internal problem and outsiders have no business to interfere in the internal affairs of Libya.

The moral question before us is this: should the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) get embroiled in the Libyan crisis ?

Libya does not exist in isolation. No country lives in isolation.

In the global village where the United Nations is the umbrella to all countries, Libya has an obligation to observe the UN charter on human rights.

A big segment of the Libyan population decided to take up arms against Gaddafi after 42 years as their titular leader. Surely, the ordinary people must have a strong reason to rise up against their own leader.

Should the world just watch and become bystanders to see innocent people being slaughtered by their own government?

A peaceful demonstration to express their frustration was met with live bullets. We are not in the age of barbarians where the rule of the jungle is supreme over human lives?

By right, what happened in Libya should be handled by the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC).

But OIC is just that: “Oh, I see!”

There is nothing much OIC can do because it is fragmented, save for the usual hard-hitting rhetoric.

Can we blame Nato for the so-called interference in Libyan affairs to save innocent lives?

Nato must have taken into account the sensitivities of Muslim countries. That is why Nato insists that Arab countries must be part of a UN-sanctioned international force against Libya.

On television, we see ordinary citizens, deemed to be rebels, displaying American flags to show gratitude to the Americans for saving their lives against the well-equipped military of Gaddafi.

Or is this American propaganda? Only those affected in Libya can tell the truth.

It is indeed sad to see Libyans fighting against Libyans. Who is to be blamed for this catastrophe?

The usual stunt is to blame external forces. Seldom does a weak leader blame himself for the mess he created. He would rather cling to power at all cost, even to the extent of seeing his country and people go down the drain.

Indeed nothing is too big a sacrifice in the name of freedom, human dignity and self-esteem. And that is what a big segment of the Libyan people are fighting for.

In Malaysia, we are blessed to have a good life although it may not be perfect.

Let us be grateful, for many people in other developing countries are not so fortunate, Libya being one of them.

See my own letters:

NST Letters – Iraq: US-led Invasion Has Saved Lives

NST Letters: Scott’s Reply to Mukhriz Mahathir on Iraq Deaths