What can $130 million buy you?

Mr. Clinton’s charitable foundation received its own windfall: a $31.3 million donation from Mr. Giustra that had remained a secret until he acknowledged it last month. The gift, combined with Mr. Giustra’s more recent and public pledge to give the William J. Clinton Foundation an additional $100 million,

An Ex- President

Unlike more established competitors, Mr. Giustra was a newcomer to uranium mining in Kazakhstan, a former Soviet republic. But what his fledgling company lacked in experience, it made up for in connections. Accompanying Mr. Giustra on his luxuriously appointed MD-87 jet that day was a former president of the United States, Bill Clinton.

  and the overturning of US and international policy intended to pressure a small nation to improve the human rights of it's people.

Upon landing on the first stop of a three-country philanthropic tour, the two men were whisked off to share a sumptuous midnight banquet with Kazakhstan’s president, Nursultan A. Nazarbayev, whose 19-year stranglehold on the country has all but quashed political dissent.

Mr. Nazarbayev walked away from the table with a propaganda coup, after Mr. Clinton expressed enthusiastic support for the Kazakh leader’s bid to head an international organization that monitors elections and supports democracy. Mr. Clinton’s public declaration undercut both American foreign policy and sharp criticism of Kazakhstan’s poor human rights record

Hey but what's a few rights of strangers when you can make Billions.

Within two days, corporate records show that Mr. Giustra also came up a winner when his company signed preliminary agreements giving it the right to buy into three uranium projects controlled by Kazakhstan’s state-owned uranium agency, Kazatomprom.

Sunday Scan: Snow bush

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Originally uploaded by George Bentley

I really liked this picture it's just a weed growing in an empty lot.

He should not have died this way

He should have died with a bullet in his brain!!!

Like so many of his victims.

"We had our ideological differences, but Dr. Habash shared Hamas' opposition to the peace deals the Palestinian Liberation Organization signed with the Jewish state as a sell-out of Palestinian rights," Nazzal said.

A short list of  PFLP's crimes

• Hijacked four Western airliners with more than 500 people aboard in September 1970
• In 1972, murdered 24 passengers at Israel’s international airport
• In 1976 hijacked an Air France plane to Entebbe
• Assassinated Israeli minister Rehavam Zeevi in Jerusalem
• A foiled attempt to blow up a Tel Aviv skyscraper in 2002

Sergeant America

Jill Stevens is 2007’s Miss Utah and also a Sergeant in the US army. She is Going on to this weeks Miss America pageant .  Among the things she wants to do is to help the children of Afghanistan. This is a good story all around.

She has her own blog, and a flickr page. Just like me!

 

Update: She made the top 15, finished 12th.

Sunday Scan; A day at the Pantages

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Originally uploaded by George Bentley

We went to Tacoma to do a tour of the city’s theaters. The best of them by far was the Pantages.

Let me jump

Suing the Empire State

He was there to file a $30 million lawsuit against the Empire State Building Company, accusing the building’s agents of defaming his character, unlawfully imprisoning him on the observation deck and causing him emotional distress and lost income.

So why the suit? Because after he climb over the railing to base jump, security held onto him until police came and arrested him. I have to ask, can you sue someone for stopping you from doing something it is against the law to do? I guess the answer is yes, but can you win? If he does win it will be the end of reason.

Here is the story of when he first tried to jump.

Security officers at the building had received a tip that Mr. Corliss, a noted daredevil, would attempt such a jump, but he reached the 86th-floor observatory unnoticed because of his disguise, which also concealed his parachute, the police said. About 3:40 p.m., Mr. Corliss scaled the protective fence when a police officer and security guard grabbed him and handcuffed him to the railing, the police said. The police said Mr. Corliss had previously attempted such jumps.

Watch the video.

 

photo source.

Headlines to laugh at

Theo Sparks has moved to "The Last of the few" so to celebrate and to have a link to follow I'll link to this funny bit.

Man Struck By Lightning: Faces Battery Charge

Typhoon Rips Through Cemetery; Hundreds Dead

and more

Miners Refuse to Work after Death

Police Begin Campaign to Run Down Jaywalkers

I Call B.S.

 

Here is a photo of some "peace activist" belonging to the pro-terrorist International Solidarity Movement. These are the people who interfere with IDF soldiers, provide cover to homicide bombers

ISM members were also encouraged to act as human shields and stay in the family homes of terrorists, or in houses scheduled for destruction, including any used as bomb making factories. In San Francisco, one ISM leader, Paul LaRudee of El Cerrito, California, openly wrote a letter detailing how he spent the night with the family of a suicide bomber. Since such bombers usually work with organized terrorist groups, it is of interest what direct contact LaRudee makes with overseas terrorists.

And lay down in the path of bulldozers.

Sunday Scan: Resting Place

Resting Place
Originally uploaded by George Bentley

I'm having fun scanning all of my negatives but it's going to take some time.

SS Handschar-Division at prayer

SS Handschar-Division at prayer
Originally uploaded by Sárika Bizarro

A photo from WW2 of an Islamo-Nazi prayer led by a German SS officer. Just a reminder, this is not the first time we've fought Islamo-nazis.
Many Arab nations also joined up with the Germans in WW1, and sided with the communist during the cold war. We could go back to the Barbary Coast where Islamist raided shipping and held the crews hostage until US forces took action under the leadership of President Thomas Jefferson.

 

 

Update: Photo gone,

above a new photo with Hitler and the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. A very good source of the history that makes today conflict not Israel's fault.

Sunday Scan: Bloggers block edition

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Originally uploaded by George Bentley

So almost a week since my last post. Sorry I just haven't found anything I feel I could add to.
This is the ceiling light inside Tacoma's Pantages theater.

MSM Double Standard

8 years ago then candidate George W. Bush was asked if he knew the name of the president of Pakistan. When he did not have the answer it was blasted all over the news. Things were said like "he is too dumb" or "how can he lead" just based on this one question. Well now at Hot Air they have a story you may not have heard about on the news, Video: Smartest woman in the world doesn’t know the first thing about Pakistan. Not a word about it on the national news, no news papers asking if this is proof she may not be ready to lead and no one will dare ask if she is too dumb. Does that mean it doesn't matter anymore? With US troops fighting on the border and the almost sure need to someday raid Al-Qaeda camps there, and with the risk of the government failing and the nation falling to the terrorist it’s hard to make that case. So why no questions, no worries? Because they want Hillary to win, they didn’t want Bush to win. It is that simple.

 

Just for fun here is another Hot Air story about Hillary wanting to be our champion.

No. Just…no. The nation’s children may need champions and heroes, and for them we ought to hold up our troops, our police and our firefighters and people who selflessly do extraordinary things with their lives. We should tell them about people like Sergeant First Class Paul R. Smith, and we should tell them less and less about rock stars and Hollywood’s profane icons. We should hold up as heroes people who achieve great things against overwhelming odds or after long years of hard, patient work. We can even hold up fictional super heroes and the occasional sports figure as examples of what heroism can look like.

Happy New Year

Well now on the first day of the new I want to wish all of you the best to come, the best of the old and the new .