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Father Federico Lombardi. Credit: CNA. Vatican City, Apr 24, 2014 / 05:14 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Media frenzy over an alleged phone call Pope Francis made to a divorced and remarried woman allowing her to receive Communion has seen a rise in conflicting details – and has been lamented by the Vatican as causing “confusion.” Spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said today that the Holy See will not officially comment on the alleged phone call Pope Francis made to an Argentinean woman this week, as the pontiff's “personal pastoral” relationships “do not in any way form part of the Pope's public activities.”...

The former hedge fund of one of the Democratic Party’s most important donors was involved in a scheme to defraud foreign investors out of tens of millions of dollars, according to documents filed in a Texas court. Farallon Capital Partners L.P., a fund run by Farallon Capital Management, the multibillion-dollar hedge fund founded by Democratic donor Tom Steyer, became a limited partner in a project to build a large shopping mall near Seattle, Wash., in the mid-1990s after it guaranteed a line of credit for the project.

What Caused Argentina's Mystery Craters? By Ben Harder for National Geographic News May 9, 2002 For more than a decade, planetary scientists have been puzzling over a mixed bag of meteorite evidence scarring Argentina's plains. They gradually pieced together clues to reconstruct what seemed to be a rough-hewn but generally accurate account of a prehistoric meteorite impact. A mere 10,000 years ago, scientists deduced in the original theory, a sizable meteorite came hurtling through the atmosphere at a bizarrely low angle, smacked the ground with a glancing blow, and broke into numerous pieces that gouged separate, miles-long scars in the...

Buenos Aires (AFP) - Argentine President Cristina Kirchner claimed Wednesday that the Falkland Islands serve as a nuclear base for the NATO alliance in the South Atlantic. Argentina, which calls the archipelago the Malvinas, claims the British overseas possession as its own, and fought a brief but bloody war for it in 1982. The islands, she said, "constitute a NATO military nuclear base in the South Atlantic -- this is the truth that they can't continue to hide." She alleged the archipelago is "among the most militarized areas in the world," saying some 1,500 soldiers and 2,000 civilian military personnel...

It’s no surprise that Wences Casares, the CEO of Xapo, a bitcoin startup, is a big bull on the digital currency. His company, which specializes in insured Bitcoin vaults, just raised $20 million in a funding round led by Benchmark. But Mr. Casares belives that other bitcoin bulls, especially those in the U.S., do not fully appreciate the value of the currency, which has proved especially sticky in emerging markets prone to wild currency fluctuations, such as Mr. Casares’ home country Argentina. In a video interview with the Wall Street Journal, Mr. Casares says he’s not worried about bitcoin’s own...

Venezuela is closer geographically than, and at least as important to the United States as, Ukraine. Yet the persistently blurred focus of the Obama Administration has been far less on violent Cuban inspired repression in Venezuela than on Russian repression in Ukraine. Here's a new presentation by Senator Rubio on the continuing mess in Venezuela: [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8Uz-9HvRgw] Video linkThe constitutional crisis in Venezuela has apparently been far less disturbing to the Obama Administration, and to the "legitimate" media, than the less violent mess in Ukraine. It has drawn far less media attention than the disappearance of Malaysian flight 370, coverage of which has been extensive and continuous but abysmally uninformed. Here's the best...

- FrontPage Magazine - http://www.frontpagemag.com - Russia’s Threat in the AmericasPosted By Joseph Klein On March 28, 2014 @ 12:08 am In Daily Mailer,FrontPage | No Comments President Obama dismissed Russia as no more than a “regional power” in remarks he made to the press in The Hague on March 25th, where he was attending a summit meeting on nuclear security. “Russia is a regional power that is threatening some of its immediate neighbors not out of strength, but out of weakness,” he said.True, the Russian Federation is a shadow of the Soviet empire in its heyday. And Russia is...

Indian officials searched for Rolotti for six days after he jumped into the Ganges River to help a woman who fell over.The body of Hector Rolotti, co-founder of popular Brickell restaurant Novecento, has been found in the Ganges River after six days of searching, according to a press release from the Novecento Group. Rolotti's body was found at 2 a.m. EST in the Ganges by a group of locals who alerted authorities and a search team, the press release said. The 47-year-old had jumped into the river to save a woman who had fallen in. Rolotti was on a spiritual...

Virtue has gone forth, It seeks its source , The holy and true, But will it be found on you ?! Those faithful to abide, In My presence and not hide, Those with the abilty, To drink from My cup and see, Clearly the Father's Will, To stand near My Voice and Quill, Those with the abilty to know, The understanding of the coals that glow, My pure and Holy Testimony, For these coals represent Me, And now this harvest that is mine, Is about to see and witness the Outpouring of My Spirit Divine, For all of Heaven and...

The cabinet chief has sent a clear message to unionized teachers. “Discerning involves the compliance of duties as well,” Jorge Capitanich said following yesterday’s failure in salary talks in which Buenos Aires province teachers rejected a 30.9-percent wage hike, vowing to continue with a walkout that has left more than 4 million students without classes since last week.

Argentina is preparing for a war either against Britain or Argentines. No one is sure as the country acquires military hardware that includes, jet fighters, anti-aircraft guns and specialized radar. The news came late Saturday night, just a few months before oil drilling begins in the Falkland Islands area. Besieged by runaway inflation, corruption and inefficiency in government as well as being impotent to stop rampant crime, Argentina’s failing President, Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, seems to be taking a page from history’s playbook. In January she created a new cabinet position, Secretary for the Malvinas, Argentina’s name for the Falklands....

My substance is your makeup but do not look for it to be anatomical and my atomic number is eternal never wasting away for truly I AM Wonderful in ALL aspects of this one word "ETERNAL". I AM thus an eternal constant and there is no slide rule that can measure my kingdom for I have no beginning or end to measure yet I have storehouses ,does my Word not proclaim this ?! So tell me my children is there really a need to be earthbound when even now you carry this makeup within you ?! Let me allow you...

Cabinet Chief Jorge Capitanich revealed in a press conference that the Government offered teachers unions a 22 percent salary rise during today’s bargain negotiations. The offer included a “perfect attendance” plus that could raise the increment to reach 26.8% if respected. “Teachers unions claimed 61% and 35% salary increments. This is impossible,” said the Cabinet Chief, and added that the Government “hopes to near positions with the unions and close a deal next Monday or Tuesday”.

Snippet: "Iran and its terrorist proxy groups’ influence in Latin America remains a troubling security threat to the region and world, experts said at a congressional hearing on Tuesday."

President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner is going down to Chavezville by repeating the same errors as Venezuela. The only way that she could mess up Argentina any further would be by actually starting a war with the UK. Last month, retailers agreed to freeze the prices of around 200 basic goods–ranging from detergent to milk to condoms–to fight inflation that economists say likely surpasses 30% annually. Obviously there’s a problem here. Passing price controls doesn’t mean that the products will actually be available. At the time, retailers said the agreement could lead to supply problems if manufacturers of certain goods...

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Why dwell on a single national tragedy? When people consider the worst that could happen to their country, they think of totalitarianism. Given communism’s failure, that fate no longer seems likely. If Indonesia were to boil over, its citizens would hardly turn to North Korea as a model; the governments in Madrid or Athens are not citing Lenin as the answer to their euro travails. The real danger is inadvertently becoming the Argentina of the 21st century. Slipping casually into steady decline would not be hard. Extremism is not a necessary ingredient, at least not much of it: weak institutions,...

Virtual currency bitcoin lost nearly twenty percent of its value on Thursday evening, after major exchange Mt Gox halted trading to try to resolve ongoing technical issues. The digital currency — which is known for its wild price fluctuations — was trading at $680.52 on Friday morning, having traded around $850 for most of the week, according to CoinDesk, which tracks the price of bitcoin.

Argentinia's Ketchup Crisis must not go to waste. It requires immediate Senate confirmation of President Obama's appointment of Noah Bryson Mamet as U.S. Ambassador to Argentina. It has not been a good start of the year for Argentineans [sic.]: a collapsing currency value, rampant inflation, Lionel Messi losing out on his fourth straight FIFA Ballon d'Or and, maybe worst of all, the great McDonald’s ketchup shortage of 2014. The fast food giant sent a message out via Twitter earlier this week apologizing for the inconvenience that Argentineans [sic.] will have to suffer through their Big Mac and French fries without the pre-requisite...

Presidents often award diplomatic posts to campaign donors and fundraisers, but Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., suspects that Obama´s choice of ambassador to Argentina -- a man who bundled more than $500,000 for President Obama´s 2012 re-election campaign, but who has never been to the country -- is in over his head. "Have you been to Argentina?" Rubio asked Noah Mamet during a Senate.gov/hearings/nomination-02-06-2014">Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing Thursday. "I haven´t had the opportunity yet to be there," Mamet replied. "I´ve traveled pretty extensively around the world, but I haven´t yet had chance [to visit Argentina]." Rubio implied that Argentina is