The self-imposed president of Ukraine Aleksandr Turchinov will be considered a "war criminal" in case he uses military force against the population of south-eastern part of Ukraine, Russia's lower house Speaker Sergey Naryshkin reportedly warned.

Naryshkin held a phone conversation with Aleksandr Turchinov from the Batkivshchyna (Fatherland) party, who is leading a self-proclaimed government in Kiev. During the conversation Naryshkin reportedly warned Turchinov against deploying forces against Ukrainians resisting Kiev, a source told RIA Novosti.

The Ukrainian side has stated that it has no plans to resort to use of force against citizens.

Russia's Federation Council unanimously approved on Saturday President Vladimir Putin's request to use Russian military forces in Ukraine to protect ethnic Russians following a request from authorities in Crimea.

Turchinov has ordered a full mobilization of Ukraine's armed forces and ordered to boost security at nuclear power plants, airports and other sites citing threat of "potential aggression" from Russia.

It is unlikely that the interim government in Kiev will send troops to Crimea, believes political commentator Aleksandr Nekrasov, but even their rhetoric is enough to escalate tensions.

"Ever since they have seized power in Kiev, I think they were getting desperate by the day because they have suddenly realized that they are not getting that money which they hoped to get at once," Nekrasov told RT. "And this desperation showed the fact that they have repeated all those warnings about Russian invasion, Russian aggression and so on and so forth and now we see them desperate enough to make all sorts of provocative statements and basically implying that the danger of war is rising."

It was supposed to be a straightforward new postage stamp to mark François Hollande's presidency: a more youthful depiction of Marianne, the feminine symbol of the French Republic, reflecting the Socialist president's promise to help the younger generation.

Instead, the portrait has sparked a spat on the political right after one of its designers said it was partially inspired by Inna Shevchenko, a leading member of the feminist activist group Femen.

The designers, David Kawena and Olivier Ciappa, had previously said their inspirations ran from the Renaissance to French comic strips and Japanese manga. But after the stamp's launch on Sunday, Ciappa tweeted: "For all those who are asking who the model was for Marianne, it's a mix of several women, but above all Inna Shevchenko, founder of Femen."

Christine Boutin, a former minister under Nicolas Sarkozy and founder of the Christian Democrat party, tweeted her disgust and her party called for a boycott of "this outrageous stamp", saying it was an attack "on the dignity of women and the sovereignty of France" and should immediately be withdrawn.

Israeli defense electronics company Elbit Systems has announced that its US subsidiary has been awarded a $145 million contract by the United States Department of Homeland Security Customs and Border Protection (CBP).

The contract calls for the deployment of border surveillance technology in southern Arizona. According to Reuters, the contract is "known as the Integrated Fixed Tower".

It includes a base period quantity and options that CBP may exercise over a multi-year period. The contract is to be implemented over an approximately 12-month period.

Elbit Systems Ltd. is Israel's largest arms manufacturer.

According to Bloomberg, the Israeli company managed to beat some of the top US government contractors, including Lockheed Martin (LMT) Corp., General Dynamics Corp. (GD) and Raython Co. (RTN).

The contract calls for the delivery of surveillance equipment, such as radars and cameras, mounted on fixed towers to help agents detect and track "items of interest" along the border.

Lockheed Martin has confirmed that it bid on the project and that it was "disappointed with the award decision" adding that it will "seek an opportunity to understand" the agency's decision.

There has been a growing call for divesting from Elbit Systems Ltd.

Contained in an absolutely outstanding report from the Pew Research Center "Russians Back Protests, Political Freedoms, and Putin, Too," a report I would strongly encourage everyone to read in full, was some fascinating information about popular attitudes towards protest leader and increasingly prominent anti-Kremlin activist Alexey Navalny.

While I knew that Navalny's internet celebrity hadn't spread to all Russians (even though internet penetration is growing rapidly in Russia, it's still barely past 50%), I figured that those people who had heard of him would tend view him very positively. This is because you would reasonably expect that people knowledgeable about Navalny would younger, more liberal, more opposed to Putin, and more attuned to social media and the internet than the average Russian. In short, I expected that popular attitudes towards Navalny would match the Western media narrative about him: a budding political celebrity who, while not quite ready for primetime, was successfully building substantial grassroots support (see here or here for standard Western media accounts of Navalny).

Well it turns out that's not at all true. Not even a little bit. Among Russians who have actually heard of him (about 47% of the population) Navalny is viewed negatively by almost twice as many people (31%) as view him positively (16%). Think about that for a second. The hero of the opposition, the man who is supposedly going to displace Putin in the very near future, can, right now, count on the support of something like 20% of the population. Meanwhile Vladimir Putin, supposedly a political has-been, is viewed positively by more than 70% of Russians.

Rear admiral Denis Berezovsky, appointed as head of Ukraine's Navy forces just two days ago, has sworn allegiance to the people of Crimea. Taking his oath, regional Prime Minister Sergey Aksyonov announced creating Crimea's Navy.

"I, Berezovsky Denis, swear allegiance to the Crimean people and pledge to protect it, as required by the [army] regulations. I swear to take orders of Crimea and Sevastopol's Supreme Commander," Berezovsky said as seen in video footage.

The region's Prime Minister Sergey Aksyonov announced the creation of Crimea's Navy forces and appointed Berezovsky its head.

"The Republic will have its own navy, which will be commanded by rear admiral Berezovsky," Aksyonov told the journalists Sunday.

Citizens who flout the Internal Revenue Service face the prospect of jail, but when the IRS flouts the law, it's business as usual. The case of Christine O'Donnell, former Delaware candidate for U.S. senator, highlights the continuing abuses by the sprawling agency charged with collecting our taxes.

Before running, O'Donnell had heard that if she chose to run in 2010 for the U.S. Senate against former Delaware governor Mike Castle, the IRS and others would "F - with her head," in the words of a top Delaware political insider.

In short order, someone accessed O'Donnell's tax return information containing private financial details. A U.S. Treasury agent informed O'Donnell that a Delaware state employee may have accessed her tax information and improperly used it.

After an inquiry by Senator Chuck Grassley, the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration confirmed that unidentified persons, presumably IRS employees, had gained improper access to multiple individuals' tax information. This indicates more than what President Obama would call a "smidgen of corruption."

The IRS then wrongly attached an $11,744 tax lien to a property O'Donnell no longer owned, and political opponents speciously used the after-the-fact lien to damage O'Donnell's standing and manufacture a tax scandal just as she launched her Senate campaign.

As the fires die down from the turmoil in Kiev, a political party that has been accused of promoting anti-Semitism and xenophobia is set to reap the benefits of the new government arrangement.

The Svoboda Party will take control of not one, but three ministries in the interim government.

These posts include the deputy prime minister and the heads of the agriculture and environmental ministries. In addition to these positions, a Svoboda lawmaker was appointed the new prosecutor general in the interim government.

Svoboda's leader, Oleh Tyahnybok, is one of the leading opposition figures during the recent crisis in Ukraine and met with Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain when the former presidential candidate visited the tumultuous country last December.

Tyahnybok and other party leaders have been accused of making numerous anti-Semitic and racist remarks. In 2004, Tyahnybok urged his party in a televised speech to fight "the Moscow-Jewish mafia ruling Ukraine."

This week we'll be, once again, discussing the situation in Ukraine but this time in the context of international politics and if the pathocrats really are insane enough to push the world to the brink of all-out war.

Ukraine's population is split, roughly 50/50, between those who are "pro EU/US" and those who are "pro Russia". The recent "revolution" and change of government in Ukraine has exacerbated political, ethnic and religious divisions (as all US-inspired provocations do, and are designed to do) among the Ukrainian people. At present, the US-backed government in Kiev and its supporters in Western Ukraine are lobbying the UN security council and NATO (the US military mainly) to "look at all ways to protect its territorial integrity." At the same time, the newly declared 'independent' parliament in the Crimean peninsula has called on Russia to protect its 'integrity'. All of which appears to shape up as the opening gambit in a possible soon to come military confrontation between the USA and Russia. So, is the real war that never came during the 'cold war' about to kick off?

We'll be giving our perspective on this interesting question. We'll also be looking at recent worldwide weather and 'environmental' anomalies and bringing you a new theory of cloud formation and its link to "global warming" and a never before heard explanation of what is causing those pesky sinkholes that have been swallowing cars and people for the past several years. We'll also be explaining why, given that there has been a stark reduction in solar activity in recent years, there have been more severe storms on the planet, when, according to official science, less solar activity should mean a quieter planet, weather-wise.

Running Time: 02:04:00

Download: MP3

A Republican state lawmaker who has been criticized by the Maine Democratic Party for his past statements about homosexuality, rape and abortion, said Wednesday that he regrets the comments, the Morning Sentinel reported.

Democrats called for state Rep. Lawrence Lockman's resignation after blogger Mike Tipping chronicled Lockman's public statements since the 1980s in a blog post Tuesday.

Among other declarations and protestations concerning the IRS, HIV/AIDS and homosexuality, Lockman, then president of the Pro-Life Education Association, said in a letter sent in 1990 that he didn't see why rape shouldn't be acceptable if abortion is legal.

"If a woman has [the right to an abortion], why shouldn't a man be free to use his superior strength to force himself on a woman?" Lockman wrote. "At least the rapist's pursuit of sexual freedom doesn't [in most cases] result in anyone's death."

President Barack Obama asked Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday afternoon to return his troops to their barracks and to remove his forces from Ukraine.

However, Obama didn't threaten or promise significant retaliation if Putin continued his advance into the majority-Russian parts of the Ukraine, according to a White House statement about their 90-minute phone call.

"If Russia has concerns about the treatment of ethnic Russian and minority populations in Ukraine, the appropriate way to address them is peacefully through direct engagement with the government of Ukraine and through the dispatch of international observers under the auspices of the United Nations," Obama told Putin, according to the White House statement.

A continued advanced by Russia's T-90 tanks, Mi-24 attack helicopters, BTR-90 troop carriers and paratroop battalions would "negatively impact Russia's standing in the international community," the statement threatened.