Willard Romney, onetime dauphin prince of the Mexican outback and current presumptive nominee of the only Republican party we have, has been having a rough week there up at his lakeside retreat in the small town of Silly Rich Bastard, New Hampshire. He's gotten himself tangled up (again) with his previous incarnations, particularly the Self that once deigned to govern Massachusetts for about 11 minutes back in the early Aughts. That one put in place a mandate requiring that all citizens of the Commonwealth (God Save It!) buy health insurance, or else pay a penalty that would be collected by the state revenoo'ers. The current Willard, of course, is opposed to mandates because he is the nominee of a party full of crazy people. He and his campaign have spent a week trying to decide if the crazy people are less likely to disembowel them if they call such a mandate a "penalty" or a "tax" in relation to the Obama administration's success at bringing Romney's original Massachusetts plan to the masses. He's also being sniped at by various allegedly non-crazy leaders of his party for not being the candidate of their dreams. All of which seems to be harshing the general mellow up in the piney woods.

Once again, I put upon my head my speechwriter's hat - it is a lovely green fedora with a red feather in the band - and offer the Romney campaign my services in this strange, floundering hour of its discontent. I believe it doesn't have to be this way. I believe in addressing the problems head-on, as you will see.

In the you-can't-make-up-this-stuff department, here's what the Republican Party of Texas wrote into its 2012 platform as part of the section on education:

Knowledge-Based Education - We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs that are simply a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) (mastery learning) which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the student's fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.

Yes, you read that right. The party opposes the teaching of "higher order thinking skills" because it believes the purpose is to challenge a student's "fixed beliefs" and undermine "parental authority."

It opposes, among other things, early childhood education, sex education, and multicultural education, but supports "school subjects with emphasis on the Judeo-Christian principles upon which America was founded."

Now we know he was poisoned - but by whom?

Yasser Arafat died on November 11, 2004, of a mysterious ailment. His enemies spread the rumor he had AIDS: David Frum, with typical classiness, claimed he had contracted AIDS as a consequence of having sex with his bodyguards. Now, however, it has been revealed Arafat was poisoned: the cause of his death was exposure to very high levels of polonium-210 [pdf], a rare radioactive substance. An investigation conducted by Al Jazeera showed Arafat's personal items, released to the media organization by his widow, contained several times the normal level of polonium that would normally be detected on such items. The Palestinian leader's terminal symptoms were similar to those experienced by victims of polonium poisoning: the substance targets the gastrointestinal tract and the subject wastes away.

Arafat's Ramallah compound had been bombed several times by the Israelis, and they had the place surrounded - yet still he persisted. They couldn't get him out. Worse, his plight was becoming a metaphor for the condition of his people, who were - and still are - prisoners in their own land. A former adviser claimed he was poisoned by the Israelis, who detained the Palestinian ambulance used to deliver Arafat's medications to the Ramallah compound. At the time, one tended to write this off as a purely polemical exercise: in light of the new evidence, however, the question has to be asked.

Video released by Lebanese media apparently shows Palestinian prisoner in Ketziot prison saying he was recruited by Israeli security forces to infiltrate Yasser Arafat's compound in 2004 and put poison in his food - Israeli expert denies allegations that Arafat died from polonium poisoning.

Recent speculation that the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was poisoned to death continued over the weekend when Lebanese television released a video apparently showing a Palestinian prisoner in Israel confessing that he was recruited by Israeli security forces to poison Arafat.

In the video released Friday, which appears to have been filmed in 2006, a Palestinian prisoner in the Ketziot prison is seen "interrogating" another Palestinian inmate who confesses that he was sent by Israel to kill the late Palestinian leader.

The prisoner claims in the video that, together with a group of Palestinian collaborators, he poisoned Arafat by putting toxic substances in his food while the Palestinian leader was barricaded in his Ramallah compound in 2004.

After the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, the US has come under intense scrutiny for its use of 'enhanced interrogation techniques' that many experts have called torture. Now there are calls to bring those responsible in the US government to justice.


Philippe Sands is a Professor of Law at University College, London. In his new book Torture Team, Sands explores the legality and ramifications of the US program of state-sponsored torture behind closed doors at Guantanamo Bay. In an RT interview, Sands discusses the possibility of one day bringing those responsible to justice.

Professor Francis A. Boyle has made a proposal to the Government of Iran that it sue the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Israel and other European States over the current crisis in the Persian Gulf that creates an imminent threat of igniting World War III.

Professor Boyle said, "If Obama attacks Iran, he could set off World War III. I want to stop that."

It is his hope and expectation that such lawsuits would result in the World Court issuing temporary restraining orders against these states to cease and desist from committing all threats and aggressive military actions against Iran and to negotiate with Iran in good faith over the dispute concerning nuclear re-processing.

The LIBOR manipulation story has exploded into a major scandal overseas. The CEO of Barclays, Bob Diamond, has resigned in disgrace; his was the first of what will undoubtedly be many major banks to walk the regulatory plank for fixing the interbank exchange rate. The Labor party is demanding a sweeping criminal investigation. Mervyn King, Governor of the Bank of England, responded the way a real public official should (i.e. not like Ben Bernanke), blasting the banks:

It is time to do something about the banking system...Many people in the banking industry are hardworking and feel badly let down by some of their colleagues and leaders. It goes to the culture and the structure of banks: the excessive compensation, the shoddy treatment of customers, the deceitful manipulation of a key interest rate, and today, news of yet another mis-selling scandal.

The furor is over revelations that Barclays, the Royal Bank of Scotland, and other banks were monkeying with at least $10 trillion in loans (The Wall Street Journal is calculating that that LIBOR affects $800 trillion worth of contracts).

Police may be targeting "marginal" terror suspects in a bid to "clear the decks" ahead of the Olympics, the terrorism watchdog said on Sunday.

David Anderson QC, the independent reviewer of terror legislation, said this summer's Games are a "major target" and police may be intervening in cases earlier than they would normally.

His comments follow a series of arrests by counter-terrorism officers in recent weeks.

Last month two Muslim converts were arrested on suspicion of plotting an attack against the Olympic canoeing venue. They were later released without charge.

And last week 14 people were arrested in two separate counter-terrorism operations against suspected Islamist plots.

Whitehall and security sources have previously suggested the threshold for assessing the potential risk of suspects is likely to be lower in the run up to the Olympics.

News that that a swarm of termites deep inside the British banking system have been fiddling the interbank interest rates (LIBOR) for years in order to systematically vacuum a few billion pence off the exchange floors for themselves is the latest blow to the credibility of the global money system - and probably a fine overture to a looming climactic implosion of the gigantic, creaking, smoldering, reeking, duck-taped edifice of broken promises, booby-trapped hedge obligations, counterparty follies, central bank euchres, sovereign flim-flams, and countless chicanes too various, dark, and deep to smoke out.

Next, we'll probably hear that Lloyd Blankfein over at Goldman Sachs has been tinkering with the rotation of the earth in order to gain a few micro-milliseconds of advantage in his firm's high frequency trading rackets. After all, back in 2008 Lloyd himself claimed to be "doing God's work."

In short, world banking is now hopelessly pranged, and I am not at all sure the project of civilization (modern edition) can continue by other means. The impairments of capital formation are now so profound that no one and nothing can be trusted. Not only are all bets off, but nobody will want to make any new bets - and by that I mean venture to invest accumulated wealth (capital) in some useful project designed to sustain human well-being. What remains is just the desperate hoarding of whatever remains in assets uncontaminated by the pledges of others to pony up.

All this points to a dangerous new period of political history, a deadly Hobbesian scramble to evade the falling timber in a burning house as the rudiments of a worldwide social contract go up in flames. Such is the importance of legitimacy: the basic condition for governance, especially among supposedly free people. You can meddle in a lot of distributory issues - who gets what - but when you mess with the most basic operations of money to the extent that no one is sure what it's really worth, or what it represents, then you are deeply undermining society. This is now the condition that is set to blow up republics.

Reality dislikes fraud and accounting tricks. Reality is serious about settling scores. Reality eventually intervenes and puts an end to monkey business. What will it be this time?

One year after the euphoria of independence, South Sudan faces economic disaster that could reverse recent development gains after it shut down oil production in a dispute over pipeline fees with Sudan.

Preying on people's minds in Juba is the thought that the government is about to run out of money - shutting down vital services in an already impoverished country. A few months ago, some thought the government would run out of cash to pay teachers and health workers as early as August; now the prediction is September or the end of the year.

Khartoum is feeling the economic and political heat as well. Taking a leaf out of South Sudan's book, Sudan's president, Omar al-Bashir, is cutting the number of cabinet posts from 31 to 26. However, other austerity measures - a rise in transport costs and a doubling of fuel and food prices following cuts in subsidies - have provoked demonstrations and calls for Bashir to step down.

Analysts say the calamitous economic situation in both countries could force Juba and Khartoum - with prodding from outside, particularly the US and China - to cut a deal to start the oil flowing again.