Looking for His glorious appearing! Titus 2:13

UN Sees Syrian War Spilling Into Israel
Mar 28th, 2013
Daily NewsIsrael Today Staff
Categories: Today's Headlines;The Nation Of Israel;War

It's no longer only Israel that is concerned that the Syrian civil war could cross borders. Now UN officials, too, are warning that the bloody conflict might spill into the Jewish state sooner rather than later.

"The members of the [UN] Security Council expressed grave concern at all violations of the Disengagement of Forces Agreement" that created the demilitarized buffer zone between Israel and Syria following the Yom Kippur War in 1973.

The council further noted that both Syrian army forces and rebel fighters have been entering the buffer zone with no regard for signed agreements.

Finally, the council took both sides in the Syrian conflict to task for endangering the lives of the 1,000 UN peace keepers stationed in the buffer zone to monitor the disengagement.

Already cross-border fire from Syria has forced Israel to retaliate. Until now such incidents have remained contained. But all feel it is only a matter of time before an explosion occurs.

It should also be noted that both sides in the Syrian civil war are enemies of the Jewish state, and would presumably have no problem bloodying Israel's nose as part of their conflict with one another.

The regime of embattled dictator Bashar Assad is still officially at war with Israel, and has for decades sheltered and aided anti-Israel terrorist organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah.

The Syrian rebels are composed largely of Islamist groups, many affiliated or allied with the likes of the Muslim Brotherhood and Al Qaeda, both of which ultimately seek the destruction of the "Zionist regime."

As the fighting inches ever closer to the border, the situation is understandably very tense, and a cause for great concern in Israel.

Rush: Churches Could be Forced to Marry 'gays'
Mar 28th, 2013
Daily NewsWND - Joe Kovacks
Categories: Today's Headlines;Moral Decline

That’s according to radio host Rush Limbaugh, who thinks there’s a good chance of it happening.

“The Catholic Church can be forced to give away abortifacients and birth-control pills. Why can’t the Church be forced to marry gay couples who want the sacrament? Any church,” Limbaugh said on his top-rated program Wednesday afternoon.

“I think it’s a pretty safe bet that that kind of thing will happen. Among militant leftists, attacking organized religion is part of the political agenda, whether gay or not.”

Limbaugh continued: “If you had to roll the dice on it, you say, ‘Yeah that’ll be the next phase.’ When it becomes legal and a church refuses to do it, don’t go some place that will, sue the people that won’t. That’s just a political philosophy of people on the left.”

“You know, organized religion is morality,” he added. “Organized religion is definite black and white, there are no gray areas, other than churches who have decided to replicate the Republican Party and try to be all things to all people.

“But some churches do not change to match the whims of a floating culture, and those churches are under assault, and will continue to be, independent of gay marriage.”

The issue of homosexual marriage was also discussed Tuesday night on the Fox News Channel’s “O’Reilly Factor,” which Limbaugh jokingly called “Ted Baxter’s Show, ” a reference to the buffoonish news character played by actor Ted Knight on “The Mary Tyler Moore Show.”

Anchor Bill O’Reilly said during the program, “The compelling argument is on the side of homosexuals. That’s where the compelling argument is. ‘We’re Americans. We just want to be treated like everybody else.’ That is a compelling argument, and to deny that, you gotta have a very strong argument on the other side. And the other side hasn’t been able to do anything but thump the Bible.”

Let the Headlines Speak
Mar 28th, 2013
Daily NewsFrom the Internet
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Putin orders large-scale military exercises in Black Sea
Vladimir Putin ordered the launch of military exercises in the Black Sea region on Thursday, his spokesman said, in a move that may create tensions with Russia's post-Soviet neighbors Ukraine and Georgia.

U.S. Flies Stealth Bombers in S. Korea
the U.S. military announced it had run two nuclear-capable B-2 stealth bombers over the country as a “practice bombing sortie” Thursday. The bombs were allegedly used to demonstrate the U.S.’s ability to both protect the Asia-Pacific region and “conduct long range precision strikes quickly and at will.”

Australia’s Carbon Tax Contributing to Record Business Failures
The doomsayers, however, now have real-world evidence to back up their contentions. Australia instituted a carbon tax in the middle of 2012, and already it “is contributing to a record number of firms going to the wall with thousands of employees being laid off and companies forced to close factories that have stood for generations,”

Special Report: Behind the charm, a political pope
"Jorge is a political man with a keen nose for politics," says Rafael Velasco, a Jesuit priest and former colleague who is now rector of the Catholic University of Cordoba, in central Argentina. "It's not an act, the humility. But it's part of his great capacity to intuitively know and read people." The first pope from Latin America is also the first Jesuit pope. Like priests from other orders, Jesuits take vows of poverty, chastity and obedience, as well as a fourth special vow of obedience to the pope. They also make a promise to refrain from seeking high Church offices.

Bible comes to life as locusts swarm Israel
Locusts have descended on Israel this week, just in time for Passover. As millions of Jews commemorate the story of the children of Israel’s exodus from Egypt, including the 10 plagues that afflicted Pharaoh and his people, millions of the crunchy buggers are creeping all over Israel’s southern deserts.

North Korea to cut all channels with South as "war may break out any time"
Reclusive North Korea is to cut the last channel of communications with the South because war could break out at "any moment", it said on Wednesday, days of after warning the United States and South Korea of nuclear attack.

Landslide on Washington Island Forces Evacuation of 34 Homes
A chunk of Whidbey Island off the coast of Washington slid into water early this morning, forcing the evacuation of 34 homes.

Electronic Health Records: Doctors Want to Keep Patients Out
According to a new Harris Poll survey, conducted on behalf of the management consulting firm Accenture, less than one-third of U.S. doctors think patients should have full access to their own electronic health records. ...So it may come as a surprise that 65 percent of docs believe their patients should have only limited access to their electronic health records, and 4 percent believe patients should have no access at all.

Collision Course? A Comet Heads for Mars
Over the years, the spacefaring nations of Earth have sent dozens of probes and rovers to explore Mars. Today there are three active satellites circling the red planet while two rovers, Opportunity and Curiosity, wheel across the red sands below. Mars is dry, barren, and apparently lifeless. Soon, those assets could find themselves exploring a very different kind of world.

Cyprus banks re-open; limits on transactions   Banks in Cyprus reopened to customers for the first time in nearly two weeks Thursday, albeit with strict restrictions on transactions, after being closed to prevent people withdrawing all their savings during the country's acute financial crisis. Large lines had formed outside the banks ahead of the opening of banks for six hours from noon.

Thailand begins peace talks with southern rebel group
Thailand is holding peace talks with Muslim insurgents aimed at curbing violence in the south. Government officials are meeting representatives of the Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN) rebel group in the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur. The talks follow a deal reached in February with the group, which is one of several operating in the area.

Madagascar hit by 'severe' plague of locusts
A severe plague of locusts has infested about half of Madagascar, threatening crops and raising concerns about food shortages, a UN agency says. The UN's Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) said billions of the plant-devouring insects could cause hunger for 60% of the population. About $22m (£14.5m) was urgently needed to fight the plague in a country where many people are poor, the FAO added.

Biden: Gun Control Votes 'Only the Beginning'
Vice President Joe Biden says the expected Senate votes on gun control are only the beginning of the White House's fight on the issue. The fate of gun control legislation is unclear. A vote on a Senate bill, including expanded background checks and harsher penalties for gun trafficking, is expected next month.

Gay marriage: Supreme Court justices criticise Doma
A US law that defines marriage as between a man and a woman only has been sharply criticised by Supreme Court justices at a landmark hearing. A judge considered the court's swing vote joined four liberal colleagues in questioning the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act (Doma). Legal analysts speculated that the law, which denies various federal benefits to gay couples, may be struck down.

MARC FABER: Not Even Gold Will Be Able To Save You From What Is Coming
"Despite the continued reverberations regarding the Cyprus bailout and its involvement of bank deposits, gold struggled to maintain the positive momentum created in the first two weeks of March and instead now looks very likely to move lower, towards $1580/oz," wrote Deutsche Bank commodities analyst Xiao Fu in a note this morning.

World Bank to hold project in West Bank, Gaza
The World Bank wants to help provide 55,000 new part-time job opportunities over the next five years for Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza through an emerging online phenomenon called microwork. The sophisticated web-based assembly lines allow people anywhere in the world to work from home for global companies by completing micro tasks on the Internet.

UN concerned Syria war spilling over into Golan
The UN Security Council voiced concern on Wednesday about repeated violations of the ceasefire line between Syria and the Golan Heights and the danger to UN peacekeepers there due to the escalating Syrian civil war. The armed struggle between rebels and forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar Assad has posed increasing difficulties for the 1,000-strong UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF).

Israel reopens Gaza crossings after closure due to rockets
The IDF spokesman confirmed Thursday that Israel fully reopened the border crossings into the Gaza Strip that were closed last week after Palestinian terrorists fired a barrage of rockets into the South on the second day of US President Barack Obama’s visit to Israel. One projectile hit and damaged a home in Sderot. A second fell in an open area of the neighboring Sha’ar Hanegev Regional Council.

CDC: 110,197,000 Venereal Infections in U.S.; Nation Creating New Stis Faster Than New Jobs
Mar 28th, 2013
Daily NewsCNSNews.com
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues;Moral Decline

According to new data released by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there were 19.7 million new venereal infections in the United States in 2008, bringing the total number of existing sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in the U.S. at that time to 110,197,000.

The 19.7 million new STIs in 2008 vastly outpaced the new jobs and college graduates created in the United States that year or any other year on record, according to government data. The competition was not close.

The STI study referenced by the CDC estimated that 50 percent of the new infections in 2008 occurred among people in the 15-to-24 age bracket. In fact, of the 19,738,800 total new STIs in the United States in 2008, 9,782,650 were among Americans in the 15-to-24 age bracket.

By contrast, there were 1,524,092 bachelor’s degrees awarded in the United States in the 2007-2008 school year, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. That means the total number of new STIs in 2008 outpaced the total number of new bachelor’s degrees by nearly 13 to 1, and the number of new STIs among Americans in the 15-to-24 age bracket outnumbered new bachelor’s degrees by more than 6 to 1.

While the CDC estimates that there were 19.7 million new STIs in the United States in 2008, data published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics indicated that the total number of people employed in the country actually declined by 2.9 million during that year.

The CDC said the new venereal infections contracted each year cost the nation about $16 billion.

“CDC’s new estimates show that there are about 20 million new infections in the United States each year, costing the American healthcare system nearly $16 billion in direct medical costs alone,” said a CDC fact sheet.

The CDC study—“Sexually Transmitted Infections Among U.S. Women and Men: Prevalence and Incidence Estimates, 2008”—was published in the March edition of Sexually Transmitted Diseases, the journal of the Sexually Transmitted Diseases Association.

The study distinguishes between “incidences” of a disease, which is the number of new infections in a year, and the “prevalence,” which is the total number of new and existing infections.

“In 2008, there were an estimated 110 million prevalent STIs among women and men in the United States,” said the study. “Of these, more than 20% of infections (22.1 million) were among women and men aged 15 to 24 years. Approximately 19.7 million incident infections occurred in the United States in 2008; nearly 50% (9.8 million) were acquired by young women and men aged 15 to 24 years.”

The study focused on estimating the incidences of sexual transmission of particular diseases as opposed to other forms of transmission. For example, it did not include HIV infections that were not sexually transmitted. It also counted the number of infections rather than the number of people infected--recognizing that a single individual could have multiple infections.

“When calculating the number of prevalent and incident infections, only those infections that were sexually transmitted were counted,” said the CDC fact sheet. “In general, CDC estimated the total number of infections in the calendar year, rather than the number of individuals with infection, since one person can have more than one STI at a given time (e.g., HPV and chlamydia) or more than one episode of a single STI (e.g., repeat chlamydia infection).”

The most common sexually transmitted infection in the United States in 2008 was human papillomavirus (HPV), which caused 14,100,000 estimated infections that year.

After HPV, in order of magnitude, according to the study, new STIs in the U.S. in 2008 included 2,860,000 new Chlamydia infections; 1,090,000 new Trichomoniasis infections; 820,000 new Gonorrhea infections; 776,000 new Herpes Simplex Virus Type 2 (HSV-2) infections; 55,400 new syphilis infections; 41,400 new HIV infections; and 19,000 new Hepatitis B infections.

The total of 110,197,000 existing STIs in the United States in 2008 included 79,100,000 HPV infections, 24,100,000 HSV-2 infections; 3,710,000 Trichomoniasis infections; 1,579,000 Chlamydia infections; 908,000 HIV infections; 422,000 Hepatitis B infections; 270,000 Gonorrhea infections; and 117,000 Syphilis infections.

As noted, the number of people working in the U.S. in 2008 declined by about 2.9 million (dropping from 146,273,000 in December 2007 to 143,369,000 in December 2008). The Bureau of Labor Statistics has published historical data on the number of people employed in the U.S. going back to 1948. In no year since then has the U.S. economy created anywhere near the 19.7 million new STIs estimated for 2008.

On average during that period, the U.S. has increased employment by 1.3 million per year.