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Insider Report: Kennedy Targets Katherine Harris, bin Laden's 'Truce', More Special From NewsMax's Most Informed Sources
Headlines (Scroll down for complete stories): 1. Pakistan: bin Laden 'Truce' a Prelude to New Attacks Osama bin-Laden's offer of a "truce" with the U.S. was bogus and instead was intended to justify new attacks - so we should be bracing ourselves for another round of conflict. That's the view expressed in the Daily Times, an English-language newspaper in Pakistan, the nation where bin-Laden is thought to be hiding. As the Times points out, bin-Laden - identified as OBL in the paper - made the offer of a truce on a recently released audiotape knowing full well that the United States has a no negotiations policy with terrorists.
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"Why then would OBL deem fit to offer a truce? The classical Islamic tradition of warfare is to offer a truce to the adversary before an armed conflict," the Times reports. "This was meant to give the adversary a chance to avoid a conflict. If the other side accepted it, there would be no war; if it rejected the offer, the Muslim armies would have a reason to fight. "Could it be that the operative part of al-Qaida's message is not the truce offer but the warning that more attacks are forthcoming? Evidently, if al-Qaida knows that it cannot engage the United States because the latter will not talk to it then it is merely fulfilling a legal obligation before launching the next series of attacks." Editor's Note:
2. Annan's Son Comes Clean With Mercedes
Former Oil for Food investigator Paul Volcker raised questions about Kojo's purchase of a Mercedes several years ago. Volcker had concerns about the younger Annan using his father's diplomatic status to purchase and import a Mercedes 300 series sedan into Ghana. The U.N. investigation indicated that Kojo might have obtained the car in his father's name, which enabled him to receive a diplomatic discount (about 15 percent) and to import the vehicle duty free. Volcker also raised concerns about the car's financing. It is believed that almost $20,000 of the approximately $40,000 cost of the car may have been financed by the Swiss firm Cotecna, according to NewsMax's U.N. correspondent Stewart Stogel. Kojo Annan was briefly employed by Cotecna, which is also one of several companies at the heart of the Oil for Food investigation. The issue of Kojo's car had been the subject of repeated questions to the U.N. secretary-general by the New York press corps since the Volcker report was issued last summer. Recently, Annan slammed a reporter, James Bone of the Times of London, for his repeated grilling on the issue. Now an attorney for the younger Annan has confirmed to the New York Sun that his client had used his father's diplomatic status to avoid taxes on the Mercedes purchase. The attorney also claimed the government of Ghana had been informed of the issue and any back taxes owed would be paid. As to the status of the controversial car - it was said to have been "totaled" in a car accident last November. Papa Annan, who is traveling in Europe, was "unavailable" for comment on Kojo's latest revelations.
3. Kennedy Says Santorum, Katherine Harris TargetsSen. Ted Kennedy is at it again - he's sent out another shrill fund-raising letter accusing President Bush and his allies of posing an "imminent danger" to the nation. NewsMax revealed back in September that Kennedy had sent out a fund-raising letter claiming that George Bush and Dick Cheney "had poisoned our air and water" by repealing key provisions of environmental protection laws. He's repeated that allegation again, too. The new letter, which seeks contributions for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, begins: "The reckless abuse of power by George Bush and his right-wing allies is an imminent danger to the nation and must be stopped."
The letter singles out for defeat Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania and Katherine Harris, "the notorious GOP state official who gave George Bush the presidency in 2000." Harris is running for Senate in Florida.
The letter sent out under the letterhead of the longtime senator from Massachusetts ratchets up the rhetoric by asking: "Will [Bush and allies] deny opportunities for college education for all but the wealthy? "Will they destroy the Supreme Court as the last great bastion of equal justice under law?" "Will they bring back the shame of senior citizens living in poverty?" Then Kennedy declares: "George Bush and his allies don't believe they have to answer to anyone except their hard-core supporters on the Neanderthal right fringe." The letter seeks contributions of "$50, $75 or even more," which will "help elect enough Democrats to the Senate in November to stop George Bush and his rubber stamp GOP Congress." Editor's Note:
4. Author Not 'Repulsed' by Osama's Praise Author Bill Blum is hardly perturbed that his latest book was mentioned favorably by Osama bin-Laden in his recently released audiotape. Blum's book "Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower" is a sharp attack on U.S. foreign policy and predicts the war on terror will fail. On bin-Laden's tape the terrorist mastermind states: "If Bush carries on with his lies and oppression, it would be useful for you to read the book 'Rogue State.'" Bin-Laden also approvingly cites Blum's statement that if he were president, he would stop the United States from interfering in other nation's affairs. Has bin-Laden been catching up on his reading while hiding out in a cave? In the wake of the audiotape's release, Blum's interviews with the media have been "a mixed bunch," the 72-year-old former State Department staffer told the Village Voice in New York. "They want to push me to say I am repulsed by bin-Laden's endorsement. I don't say so. I am not really repulsed." But he added: "My opinion of him is pretty low. I have no regard for him." Since the audiotape's release, Blum said, he has been getting outraged e-mail calling him a "traitor" and saying: "Death to you and your family." He also told the Voice that he worries he could be put on a no-fly list.
One thing is for certain: Blum doesn't expect any windfall sales thanks to the bin-Laden praise. Only 2,000 copies of "Rogue State" were printed in November by Common Courage Press, and according to the Voice, "if there is a rush to buy the book, he says, the publisher is too poor to take advantage of the heightened demand." 5. Liberal Backer Gives Princeton Largest-Ever Gift Peter Lewis, chairman of auto insurer Progressive Corp. and a major backer of Democratic causes, has pledged $101 million to Princeton University - the largest single gift in the school's history. The donation by Princeton alumnus Lewis, 72, is the culmination of 23 years of giving by Lewis to the university, according to Cass Cliatt, a Princeton spokeswoman. Lewis has pledged a total of $233 million to the school.
The new donation will be used to build a performing arts center, expand the undergraduate arts faculty, bring in at least six artists to teach at the university and increase space for art exhibitions, according to a statement on the university's Web site. In the 2004 election cycle Lewis donated almost $23 million to liberal causes, including America Coming Together and MoveOn.org, the Web site opensecrets.org reports. Lewis's gift would rank among the largest to a university in the past year. Bush-bashing billionaire George Soros last year gave $206 million to Central European University, while Oracle Corp. Chief Executive Officer Larry Ellison pledged $115 million to the Harvard University School of Public Health, the Chronicle of Philanthropy reported. Editor's Note:
6. Report: Chinese Internet Control 'Surprisingly Effective' Back in the 1990s when the Internet was first getting established in China, President Clinton said that trying to control and censor the Internet would be like trying to nail Jell-O to the wall. Today China has more than 100 million Internet users - but the Chinese government's control of online content has been surprisingly effective, according to a report in Business Week.
Beijing has a vast infrastructure to monitor any potential online dissent. The agencies that perform that task employ more than 30,000 people to prowl Web sites, blogs and chat rooms on the lookout for offensive content and scammers. By contrast, the entire CIA employs an estimated 16,000. Almost all Internet entities in mainland China are provided with a list of hundreds of banned terms to watch out for. Foreign companies that host their sites on servers in China are pressured into signing an agreement not to disseminate information that "may jeopardize state security and disrupt social stability," according to the U.S. State Department. The individuals who manage a Web site are held responsible for its content. That leads companies to err on the side of caution and self-censorship, said Nicholas Bequelin, a researcher for Human Rights Watch in Hong Kong. All Internet traffic entering and leaving China must pass through government-controlled gateways - a bank of computers - where e-mail and Web site requests are examined, Business Week reports. E-mail with such offending terms as "Taiwan independence" or "democracy" can be blocked. Postings critical of the Communist Party occasionally appear during a crisis, but censors remove them from Web site archives within months or even weeks, according to Bequelin. Internet cafes, where many Chinese go online, must use software that records data on each user, making anonymity close to impossible. And bloggers must register with authorities. Chinese control of the Internet recently made headlines when Google announced that to avoid potential conflicts with government censorship efforts, it would introduce a search engine in China that excludes e-mail messaging and the ability to create blogs. The Paris-based group Reporters Without Borders condemned the Google move as "hypocrisy" and called it "a black day for freedom of expression in China. "The firm defends the rights of U.S. Internet users before the U.S. government, but fails to defend its Chinese users against theirs." Editor's Note:
7. We Heard ... THAT liberals have launched an attack on conservative author Kate O'Beirne's new book, posting dozens of negative "reviews" on Amazon.com. According to Kathryn Jean Lopez of National Review, an untold number of customer reviews on the popular Web site show that the reviewer hasn't even read O'Beirne's "Women Who Make the World Worse - and How our Assault on Truth and Justice Is Ruining the Hopes of Women in our Schools, Families, Military, and Sports." Among the claims made by reviewers is that O'Beirne - Washington editor of National Review - reveals she "slept with Ted Kennedy," that the book frequently attacks the show "Sex and the City," and promotes the "existence of lesbianism." None of these are actually in the book, Lopez writes. "I've never seen such a cynical attempt by liberals to torpedo a book's Amazon ratings," said O'Beirne's editor at Sentinel, Bernadette Malone. Liberals have also reportedly gone after Fred Barnes' new book about President Bush, "Rebel in Chief," posting a mock book cover that changes the title to "Felon in Chief" - and shows Bush in handcuffs. THAT if Sen. John McCain's positions on abortion and gays kill his GOP primary chances, he could enter the 2008 presidential race as an independent. Paul Bedard's "Washington Whispers" column in U.S. News & World Report also suggests that his Democratic opponent might not be Hillary Clinton, but Al Gore. "Seems a lot of pols still believe that Al Gore will enter the race as the 'anti Hillary,'" Bedard writes. "But don't dismiss another Democrat, former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner." Editor's Note:
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