"Latin Bishops Launch Broadside against Free Trade Area"

Raul Pierri, Inter Press Service (IPS)

MONTEVIDEO, Sep 4 (IPS) -- The Free Trade Area of the Americas
(FTAA) looks less like a true regional integration project than
a ''neo-colonialist'' plan that will make poor communities even
poorer and will not respect national sovereignty, said the Catholic
bishops of the members of South America's largest trade bloc.
''What we condemn is that the only aim of the project is to increase
trade flows, regardless of whether or not it devastates everything
and everyone in its path,'' the secretary-general of the bishops'
conference of Uruguay, Bishop Pablo Galimberti of the southern
Uruguayan city of San Jos, told IPS on Thursday.

jim submits "Prompted by a discussion on lbo-talk about Tom Delay, the 'Christian Zionist,' and American public opinion polls appearing to demonstrate support for the 'cretinous' Alabama Ten Commandments judge recently all over the American news, C. G. Estabrook offers some statistics and categorical clarity."

"American Apocalyptics"

C. G. Estabrook

It's surprisingly difficult to get good statistics about Americans'
theological views, in part because, as the Census Bureau explains at its
site,

"The Bureau of the Census collected information in the Census of Religious
Bodies from 1906-1936. This information was obtained from religious
organizations. Public Law 94-521 prohibits us from asking a question on
religious affiliation on a mandatory basis; therefore, the Bureau of the
Census is not the source for information on religion."

The Statistical Abstract of the United States has some information, but
not much beyond denominational membership. The standard reference work is
David Barrett's massive two-volume World Christian Encyclopedia (Oxford
UP, 2001); an excellent web-site, Adherents, draws together
information from a variety of studies.

"Dangerously High Levels of Radiation Measured Around Baghdad"

London Express, Monday Sep 01, 2003 15:05:42 ET

Soldiers and civilians in Iraq face a health timebomb
after dangerously high levels of radiation were
measured around Baghdad. Levels between 1,000 and 1,900 times higher than
normal were recorded at four sites around the Iraqi
capital where depleted uranium (DU) munitions have
been used across wide areas.

Experts estimate that Britain and the US used 1,100 to
2,200 tons of armour-piercing shells made of DU during
attacks on Iraqi forces.

"Unless The White House Abandons Its Fantasies, Civil War Will Consume The Iraqi Nation"

Robert Fisk, 08/30/03

In Iraq, they go for the jugular: two weeks ago, the UN's
top man, yesterday one of the most influential Shia Muslim clerics.
As they used to say in the Lebanese war, if enough people want you dead,
you'll die.

So who wanted Ayatollah Mohamed Bakr al-Hakim dead? Or, more to the
point, who would not care if he died?