Syria has bluntly alleged that the US manipulates its veto power at the UN Security Council (UNSC) chiefly to protect the Israeli regime, prompting the American UN envoy to lead a walkout from the chamber.

The incident took place Tuesday, following the opposition of UNSC permanent members Russia and China to the US-led anti-Syria draft resolution, which triggered the openly-displayed US outrage.

Officially, the anti-Damascus resolution was drafted by US and Israeli allies, France, Britain and Germany, threatening sanctions against Syria over an alleged crackdown on protesters within the country.

The nine affirmative votes for the anti-Syria move were cast by the US, Britain, France, Germany, Portugal, Bosnia, Gabon, Nigeria and Colombia. While permanent UNSC members China and Russia opposed the motion, effectively vetoing it, South Africa, Brazil, Lebanon and India abstained from voting.

Following the vote, Syrian Ambassador to the UN Bashar Ja'afari accused the Western countries that perpetrated the UNSC effort of turning a blind eye on Israeli crimes in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Oil from controversial and environmentally destructive tar sands is likely to be all but banned from Europe after a decision on Tuesday. The move also casts doubt on the future of other controversial energy sources such as shale gas.

Tar sands (also known as oil sands) have been a target of green campaigners for several years, as the extraction of low quality oil from sands - chiefly in Canada to date - produces far greater greenhouse gas emissions than conventional oil drilling operations, and requires vast quantities of water. The exploitation of tar sands has also led to the destruction of swaths of forest and is blamed for water and air pollution.

In a victory for Connie Hedegaard, the EU's climate change commissioner, the commission has decided to back a new directive on fuel quality. This will set minimum environmental standards for a range of fuels, including tar sands, coal converted to liquid and oil from shale rock.

In 1931 Andrew Mellon, then the secretary of the US treasury, advised President Herbert Hoover thus: "Liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate farmers, liquidate real estate ... it will purge the rottenness out of the system."

To our ears that sounds both callous and wrong. But that's partly hindsight - Mellon was speaking before Keynes wrote The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money. David Cameron has no such excuse. He is set to tell us today in his conference speech that "the only way out of a debt crisis is to deal with your debts. That means households - all of us - paying off the credit card and store card bills".

But with fiscal policy set on what Martin Wolf has rightly described in the Financial Times as "kamikaze tightening", the UK needs the private sector to pick up the slack. If all sectors - the government, firms and households - increase saving simultaneously, in an effort to reduce debt, it will further depress domestic demand, reduce output and jobs, and we will end up in a downward spiral. This is what Keynes described as the paradox of thrift.

International organization founded in name of peace and security is also a hotbed of clandestine operations

When Iran's president accused the U.S. at the United Nations General Assembly last year of orchestrating the 9/11 attacks, American diplomats were not caught flat-footed by the tirade.

Even before President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad finished his incendiary rant, U.S. diplomats marched out of the cavernous U.N. hall in protest and were ready with a written statement condemning his comments.

It was as if the U.S. knew exactly what Ahmadinejad intended to say.

The walkout hinted at one of the well-known but seldom spoken truths about the United Nations: The international organization, which was founded in the name of peace and security, is also a hotbed of spying and clandestine operations, where someone might very well be listening to your conversations and monitoring your emails - or perhaps reading your speeches in advance.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told lawmakers Tuesday that the economic recovery is close to faltering and recent economic indicators point to "the likelihood of more sluggish job growth" ahead.

Appearing before the Joint Economic Committee in Washington, D.C., Tuesday to deliver his outlook for the U.S. economy, Bernanke said recent data on jobless claims and surveys of hiring plans suggest job growth will continue to be weak.


The Fed chief also said the economy is growing more slowly than the Fed had expected and that the most significant factor depressing consumer confidence is poor job growth.

"The recovery is close to faltering," Bernanke told lawmakers, adding that the Fed is prepared to take further steps to prop up the recovery. "We need to make sure that the recovery continues and doesn't drop back and that the unemployment rate continues to fall downward."

Dog Poet Transmitting.......

May your noses always be cold and wet.

Watch it happen in front of your eyes. The Occupy Wall Street phenom is going viral, diversifying like a stock portfolio and popping up all over the US and in other countries as well. Look at the media not covering it. Look at the media giving out false information concerning the motivation, even to the extent of saying the protestors are protesting against people making 40 to 50 thousand dollars a year, as well as global warming. Understand that the media is owned and operated by the same people who operate at and influence Wall Street. Look at the important names that are appearing in the mix and the American Marines showing up on behalf of the protest as well. In its genesis and presentations, it is about as authentic and threatening to go nova as it can get. This is the real deal.

The traders and bankers are celebrating their imagined invulnerability. In the delusion of their fevered hubris, they are drinking champagne and talking about pouring it on the protestors, in emulation of the bankers and traders at The City of London, who waved banknotes out of their windows as they jeered the protestors. Does this look like they may and should have their heads chopped off and put on display? Does this give you the impression that Hang a Banker Day might be coming to a neighborhood near you soon? This is not an argument in favor or against this. This is an observation of the anger of the vast majority coming up against the defiance, indifference and ridicule of the minority of those causing the conditions for the anger in the first place.

Tea Party backers made multimillion-dollar deals with Tehran, report claims

The leading financiers of the Tea Party movement were last night attempting to rebut claims that a portion of their wealth comes from secretly doing business with the most un-American trading partner imaginable: the hard-line government of Iran.

Charles and David Koch, the prominent billionaires who fund a string of influential conservative think-tanks, stand accused of selling tens of millions of dollars worth of petrochemicals to Tehran, despite a longstanding US trade embargo against the nation that the former President, George W Bush, dubbed a pillar of his "Axis of Evil".

It has been reported that Koch Industries used foreign subsidiaries to supply the products, in an apparent effort to stay within the letter - if not the spirit - of the law. It has been suggested that the company used dozens of lawyers to help find a way around the embargo, and was trading with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's regime as recently as 2007.

A British oil explorer today revealed a push into Libya despite ongoing uncertainty over the battle-weary country's future.

Jersey-based Heritage Oil said it had paid 19.5 million US dollars (£12.6 million) for a 51% controlling stake in Benghazi-based Sahara Oil Services, which runs onshore and offshore fields.

The announcement comes as ousted leader Muammar Gaddafi remains missing and bloodshed continues to rock the North African state.

Tony Buckingham, chief executive of London-listed Heritage, said his firm was "well placed to play a significant role in the future oil and gas industry in Libya".

Heritage, which operates in Iraq, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Pakistan, Mali, Tanzania, Malta, Pakistan and Russia, said the stake was bought through wholly-owned subsidiary Heritage Energy International.

Extensive research by the U.S. Geological Survey, the Afghan Geological Survey, and the Department of Defense has yielded volumes of information about areas of high mineral potential in Afghanistan, including rare earth elements, gold, iron, and copper. The USGS says the research will be used by the Afghan Government as they consider developing these minerals resources.

Many of these Afghan mineral priority areas, including the rare-earth rich Khanneshin, are world-class resources that could lead to significant commercial development. This research comes from a 2009-2011 USGS study funded by the DOD Task Force for Business and Stability Operations (TFBSO).

"The USGS is exceptionally pleased by the contribution we have been able to make to future development of Afghanistan's world-class mineral resources, made possible through the application of modern remote-sensing tools," said USGS Director Marcia McNutt. "There is always increased risk for commercial ventures investing in new mining facilities in frontier areas such as Afghanistan, but by making information on the locations and estimated quantities and grades of ores publicly available, we lower that risk, spurring progress."

Beijing - China stepped up its criticism Tuesday of a proposed U.S. law to punish countries with artificially low currencies, saying there would be serious repercussions for the world's two biggest economies if it is passed.

The criticism comes after U.S. senators voted Monday to open a week of debate on the bill that would allow the government to impose additional duties on products from countries that subsidize exports by undervaluing their currencies.

How worried China is about the proposed law can be seen by the fact that the Foreign Ministry, the Commerce Ministry and central bank all issued statements denouncing it.

But the legislation faces considerable hurdles before it becomes law. The Obama White House, while agreeing that China's currency, the yuan, is undervalued, has been wary of unilateral sanctions against the Beijing government.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu said the Senate move "seriously violated WTO rules and seriously disturbed China-U.S. trade and economic relations."