[Kofi] Annan was "deeply concerned over reports of widespread violence, injuries suffered by the civilian population and looting," said his spokesman, Fred Eckhardt, who also reiterated Mr. Annan's "firm condemnation of any attempt to change the government of any country by force or by other unconstitutional means." [June 10, 2003, NY Sun]
Any country?
Howard Marks, Freeman's attorney, said the ruling would be appealed. The ACLU of Florida said it was disappointed in Thorpe's statement that while Freeman "most likely poses no threat to national security," others may take advantage of a ruling in her favor to threaten lives. "So we have to infringe on Freeman's religious beliefs because of what someone else might do," ACLU legal director Randall C. Marshall said. "It seems to be a funny kind of interpretation on how the law should apply."
What if her beliefs involved beating up children?
Freeman, a convert to Islam previously known as Sandra Kellar, started wearing a veil in 1997. She had a mug shot taken without the veil after her arrest in Illinois in 1998 on a domestic battery charge involving one of twin 3-year-old sisters who were in her foster care. Child welfare workers told investigators that Freeman and her husband had used their concerns about religious modesty to hinder them from looking for bruises on the girls, according to the police records. The girls were removed from the home.
Sultaana Freeman should not feel too bad--in Saudi Arabia she would not be able to wear a veil to cover her face for a photo ID--in fact, she in Saudi Arabia women are not even permitted to drive. (Postscript: In Muslim countries where women are allowed to drive, such as Iran, Egypt, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and Jordan, women do not cover their faces for a photo ID.)
...Martha Stewart says the Web site she started just days ago to defend her name against a federal indictment has been swamped by more than 6 million visitors, with thousands offering e-mails of praise and support.
... The e-mails have been roughly 98 percent positive, Stewart spokeswoman Anna Cordasco said. She would not disclose specific plans for the site's future but said it would be kept "fresh and up to date."
Paul Levinson, chair of Fordham University's media studies department, said Stewart's campaign is designed to sway potential jurors who might assume she is guilty simply because she has been indicted. "I've heard people talk cynically about the juror point [--] trying to soften up the jurors," he said. "But that's exactly what the government is doing by holding a press conference, by making it a big public issue."
..."She doesn't have a whole variety of options to make people who dislike her like her," he said. "What she can do is put a press on the Justice Department by having her supporters hammer the narrative that this is a witchhunt." [Newsday]
Or as one astute Marth fan writes on a letter posted to Martha Stewart's site:
We can't think of ANYONE in this country or abroad who has worked harder than you. We admire your vision, energy, imagination and the way you reach high goals for yourself and your businesses. The range of your interests and knowledge is astounding. You are an inspiring example to millions of people of someone who aimed for...and reached..."the great American dream."
We support you in thoughts and prayers in this unfortunate situation/court battle. We are saddened by this attack on you and we feel you are the target of people who are jealous and lack common sense. We can't understand why our courts waste so much time and money persecuting our highest achievers, like you and Bill Gates. It is counter-productive, to say the least.
The reason is simple: it is hatred of the good for being the good. For details see Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. (Hat Tip: V. Bray)
Related Story: "Insider Trading" Charges Against Martha Stewart.
President Bush's meeting with Mahmoud Abbas in Jordan last week was a huge mistake and a betrayal of the principle that terrorists should not be negotiated with but eradicated.
Negotiations are proper only between individuals who are open to reason, who respect each other's rights, and whose purpose is to exchange values for mutual benefit, without coercion. But the Palestinian leadership--religious and secular--is rabidly irrational, has no respect for the rights of Israelis (or Palestinians) to their lives and property, and seeks, by means of terrorism, to blackmail Israel into surrendering its land for nothing but empty promises to stop the violence.
The Palestinian regime under Arafat has always been and still is a terrorist regime. Arafat's appointment of Mahmoud Abbas as "prime minister" changed nothing.
President Bush's push for the creation of a Palestinian state is a big setback in America's own war against terrorism, since a Palestinian state would be another terrorist state to deal with. Moreover, the president's move sends our enemies the message that terrorism pays. If President Bush is serious about keeping his promise to "rid the world of terror," he should abandon the idea of creating a Palestinian state and start supporting the eradication of the Palestinian regime.
From CBS Marketwatch:
Sam Waksal, the former ImClone Systems executive whose insider trading has put Martha Stewart in prosecutors' crosshairs, is expected to learn his fate in federal court on Tuesday...
"The number of years Waksal will get would depend on how cooperative he has been," said Larry Soderquist, a law professor at Vanderbilt University. Soderquist said he believes Waksal will get three years jail time. The former ImClone executive hasn't appeared to be cooperating with prosecutors.
What does such "non-cooperation" consist of not doing?
Waksal also likely did not provide any information to government attorneys on Martha Stewart, according to Mintz. ...
Last week, Stewart was indicted for allegedly receiving insider information for her sale of ImClone shares in December 2001. Stewart, a friend of Sam Waksal's, pleaded not guilty to allegations of obstruction, false statements and securities fraud. Stewart also resigned as chairman and chief executive of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia.The public, after the Enron and WorldCom scandals, is not likely to accept hand slaps of white-collar criminals, even though Waksal did not engage in an Enron type of situation, said Soderquist. "This is not a good time to be sentenced." ["Waksal's fate to be decided Tuesday", June 9, 2003, CBSMW]
Related News: ImClone Vindicated?, "Insider Trading" Charges Against Martha Stewart
Related Articles: The SEC's "Insider Trading" Witch Hunt Against ImClone's Sam Waksal: Scapegoat for the Sins of the FDA, Martha and the Tall Poppies
For years, anti-Castro activist Ramon Saul Sanchez has claimed his right to return to his Cuban homeland in defiance of the U.S. government's attempts to stop him. Now the same country that prosecuted Sanchez to keep him out of Cuban territorial waters is going to court to determine if he should be sent back to Cuba...This fall, an immigration judge will determine whether he has a right to stay in the United States.
...when he showed up at the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services, Sanchez said immigration officials arrested him on suspicion of being in the country illegally and told him to appear before an immigration judge to sort out his status. He was released on his own recognizance.
Sanchez doesn't think he'll be deported to Cuba, but says it's up to the conscience of U.S. officials. "When I wanted to exercise my right to return home, you detained me and you wanted to put me in prison for 10 years," he said. "Now you're coming back and saying 'I'm going to deport you, handcuffed, and return you to Fidel Castro.' I'm not going to encourage you to do that but I'm not going to resist you." ["Cuban activist faces immigration hearing", Sun Sentinel, June 7, 2003]
Hat Tip: Jim Woods.
Islamic activists in Multan, in the Pakistani province of Punjab, have threatened to burn down posters featuring images of women if city officials do not remove them within two days. On Friday, the activists smeared three billboards put up by multinational companies in the city with black paint...
...Mr Babar said: "These multinational companies want to promote obscenity, lewdness and vulgarity by showing women in different poses. "We will not let them do so." He denied the group was vandalising private property. "It is they who are acting contrary to Islamic law by promoting vulgarity," Mr Babar said. ["Pakistan Islamists in posters threat", BBC, June 6, 2003]
...Martha Stewart resigned as head of her company, shortly after she was charged with securities fraud in a long-running insider trading scandal. "I love this company, its people, and everything it stands for and I am stepping aside as chairman and CEO because it is the right thing to do," Stewart said in a statement...The nine charges levelled at Stewart, 61, and her Merrill Lynch broker, Peter Bacanovic, included conspiracy to obstruct justice and making false statements to prosecutors and the FBI. She pleaded not guilty to all charges.
...There was no criminal insider trading charge, which analysts had suggested would be difficult to prove...the Securities and Exchange Commission filed civil charges of "illegal insider trading" in connection with her sale in December, 2001 of shares in biotech firm ImClone Systems, Inc...The SEC said it was also seeking a court order barring Stewart from being a director of any publicly traded company.
...The company share price has been cut in half since Stewart was first implicated in the insider trading scandal a year ago...If convicted on all charges, Stewart would "certainly be facing jail time," [US Attorney James Comey] said....Stewart has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing, saying her trade was based on an agreement with her broker to sell the ImClone shares once they fell below a certain level.
Related: Martha and the Tall Poppies
How did Palestinian terrorists react to the recent release of the "road map" to peace? With dozens of terrorist attacks against Israel, including five suicide bombings.
The terrorists' reaction demonstrates once again that they--and their supporters--have no desire for peace with Israel. Their attacks also demonstrate the futility of trying to end terrorism through negotiations. Terrorists--and the regimes that nurture them--can't be dealt with through reason and appeals to their self-interest. They have no self-interest. Their purpose is not to gain any values but to destroy the lives and values of others.
The Israelis, as the victims of terrorism, have the moral responsibility to hunt down the terrorists wherever they may be, and do whatever it takes to capture or kill them. This is exactly the principle the United States must follow in its own war against Islamic terrorism. The alternative is another September 11.
"It's a little difficult to give tax relief to people who don't pay any taxes..."
[Hat Tip: T. Potts]
Software giant Microsoft has agreed to pay $750m (£454m) to settle a lawsuit claiming it used its dominance to crush competition....The case involved Netscape Communications which now belongs to the AOL group. As part of the agreement, Microsoft will give a new royalty-free, seven-year licence of its browsing technology to AOL...AOL alleged in the lawsuit that Microsoft used anti-competitive business practices to ensure the dominance of its Internet Explorer browsing software over Netscape's software. AOL also argued that Microsoft made deals with computer manufacturers and other companies to shut out Netscape and stifle competition. [May 29, 2003]
Making voluntary deals with computer manufacturers is entirely competitive, as no guns are used--free-competition only forbids the initiation of force. For the government to forbid such exclusive deals is socialism. Fact is Internet Explorer was just a better product, and Microsoft offered Internet Explorer for free, when Netscape wanted to charge consumers for their browser.
See Capitalism Magazine's Microsoft Antitrust Coverage.
Shares of ImClone Systems jumped 15 percent in early dealings Friday after a published report said soon-to-be-released clinical results show that the Erbitux anti-cancer drug is effective. ImClone shares surged $3.46 to $26.92. The Wall Street Journal reported that a clinical trial in colon-cancer patients confirmed earlier studies that showed ImClone's Erbitux is a promising cancer therapy. ImClone's European pharmaceutical partner, Merck KGaA, is scheduled to present details of the testing Sunday at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology in Chicago. German-based Merck has already said that it believes the data support European regulatory approval for Erbitux....
...ImClone and its experimental anti-cancer drug have been at the center of controversy since late 2001. At the end of that year, the Food and Drug Administration refused to accept the application to market Erbitux because of deficiencies in data submitted by ImClone. The FDA rejection triggered a collapse in ImClone's stock and led to a major Wall Street scandal. Sam Waksal, ImClone's founder, has been accused of tipping off relatives about the FDA setback so that they could unload ImClone stock before the news became public.
For the full story behind the government's assault on ImClone see The SEC's "Insider Trading" Witch Hunt Against ImClone's Sam Waksal: Scapegoat for the Sins of the FDA.
Fox News reports: Sharon-Abbas Summit Postponed. Excerpt: "Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat stepped in to assert Tuesday that he -- not his prime minister -- is in charge of the Palestinian side in negotiations with Israel, throwing plans for an Israeli-Palestinian summit into confusion. The dispute underlined the power struggle between Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas, the prime minister he grudgingly appointed under international pressure, as efforts to move forward on a new peace plan intensified. Arafat since then has been fighting a rear-guard action to limit Abbas' powers, objecting to the makeup of his Cabinet and inserting many of his stalwarts, retaining control of most of the Palestinian security forces and keeping for himself the final word over peace moves. This counters the Israeli and U.S. intention to sideline Arafat, charging that he is tainted with terrorism and had led his Palestinian Authority into corruption and inefficiency."
Arafat is "tainted with terrorism" yet the U.S. and Israel are still willing to negotiate with Abbas, a man who defends Arafat's leadership role in the Palestinian Authority. Peace for Israel cannot be achieved through negotiations with the puppet of their enemy, a power-grubbing, Israel-hating terrorist.
Of course the ACLU Asks Court to Reinstate Suspended Driver's License.
Sultanna Freeman, 35, says Florida's insistence on photographing her face violates her religious rights. "I don't unveil ... because it would be disobeying my Lord," Freeman testified Tuesday at the start of her non-jury trial. [Muslim Woman Sues to Wear Veil for License, AP, May 23, 2003]
