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Joining us to get to the heart of the matter, Israeli embassy spokesman Mark Regev and Clovis Maksoud the former Arab League Ambassador to the United Nations. Gentlemen, welcome to MAKING SENSE. MARK REGEV, ISRAELI EMBASSY SPOKESMAN: Thank you. KEYES: I want to thank you both for joining me tonight. I want to start, Ambassador Maksoud, with a question that‘s been kind of aching in my heart as I have watched the developments in this bombing today, particularly because of the gruesome nature of the bomb, the shrapnel, the children that were involved, the terrible wounds inflicted even on those...

The United States has renounced its right to seize Bermuda in the event of an emergency, in a Washington DC ceremony that laid to rest a bargain forged by Sir Winston Churchill in the Second World War.Under the 1941 Lend-Lease deal, the United States - then still a neutral power in the war - loaned 50 destroyers to Britain in exchange for 99-year leases on military bases in Bermuda, the West Indies, Newfoundland and the then British Guiana.The agreement included a clause giving America emergency powers to seize the colonies' entire land mass, as well as sea and air territories,...

Asteroid detected in a close call with Earth Thu Jun 20, 4:22 PM ETBy THOMAS WAGNER, Associated Press Writer LONDON - An asteroid the size of a soccer field narrowly missed the Earth by 75,000 miles (120,000 kms) last week, in the closest known approach by objects of this size in decades, scientists said Thursday. "In the unlikely event the asteroid had struck Earth in a populated area, it would have caused considerable loss of life," said Grant Stokes, the principal investigator for the Lincoln Laboratory Near Earth Asteroid Research Project, whose New Mexico observatory spotted the object. "The energy...

The turbulent love life of Henry VIII, which led to the Reformation and dissolution of the monasteries, may also have postponed the industrial revolution by 200 years.Archaeologists have found evidence that the Cistercian monks of Rievaulx Abbey, Yorkshire, were developing a prototype blast furnace for the large-scale production of cast iron when they were evicted by the king in 1538.   Click to enlarge Without the Reformation, it is possible that the seeds of industrial Britain could have been sown in the tranquil cloisters of North Yorkshire.In an attempt to discover more about the industrious monks of Rievaulx, researchers will...

Saudi imports of American goods have fallen by more than a third since September 11 in a sign of the growing estrangement of the kingdom and the West.Campaigners, in what is traditionally America's staunchest ally in the region, have called on countrymen to boycott anything with an American connection, from cars to fast-food outlets.Economists say the recent strength of the US dollar, as well as a drop in large government orders, is partly to blame.But few doubt the major impact of the boycott promoted by activists who wear Palestinian chequered headscarves and hand out leaflets at mosques, schools and shopping...

A British banker was killed by a booby-trap bomb placed in his Land Rover in the Saudi Arabian capital Riyadh yesterday. Friends of Simon Veness blamed the attack on Islamic militants. But the Saudi authorities said it was the work of illegal expatriate alcohol traders.Mr Veness, a middle manager at the Saudi French Bank in Riyadh, was alone as he drove away from his home in the al-Nakheel Westerners' residential compound when the car exploded at about 8.45am. He died instantly.Mr Veness, 35, who had a two-year-old son and whose South African wife is pregnant, was due to return to...

w w w . h a a r e t z d a i l y . c o m Arafat to Ha'aretz: I accept Clinton's plan; peace is possible Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat yesterday issued a call for "no more war," declaring that he accepts the proposal first made by former U.S. president Bill Clinton as a framework for a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians. In an interview with Ha'aretz, Arafat used the same phrase that U.S. President George W. Bush recently used - "Enough is enough" - and said he supports the initiative of...

<p>I think we're all convinced by now that George W. Bush has the cross hairs on Saddam Hussein.</p> <p>And it's clear from the latest Fox News Opinion Dynamics poll that the American public supports action against Saddam by a huge, huge margin: 75 percent for — 14 percent against. In electoral politics that's a landslide.</p>

They came from small schools such as Ferrum College in Virginia and Assumption College in Massachusetts and from large schools including Yale and Emory universities. Many were independent scholars. What they all shared was disapproval of the left-liberal culture that dominates American campuses and a hope that this culture might be turned around. The occasion was the 10th National Conference of the National Association of Scholars (NAS), the first following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. The theme, "Higher Education and Democracy in Peace and War," sounded fittingly academic and a bit abstract, but the often eloquent talks and...

Who Benefits Most From Declining Markets in an Election Year? If there was a group of people expecting huge losses in an upcoming election....and that group wanted the stock market to tank in order to diminish their opposition...How would they proceed to do that? Are there dots here to connect? I heard today that the Senate democrats average 11+ million each in net worth, as opposed to the 9+ million (Big hairy difference, I know) across the isle. Could such a group in concert with all their similar minded $upporter$, pull off something like that?

Here are some reviews. My review will be here on Saturday. Looks my kind of sci-fi but I am always prepared to be disappointed. Looks to be *out there* just like "Total Recall" and "Blade Runner" which were also taken from Philip K. Dick stories. Any other reviews and opinions are appreciated.

ALBANY - The New York State Senate is considering a bill to change the Blue Laws. For decades, the state's Blue Laws have been in place to prevent people from buying a drink in a bar before noon, or liquor and wine in a store, anytime, on Sunday. They were established years ago with the support of religious leaders to prevent drinking on what many consider a holy day. A study was recently done for the liquor industry showing if New York liquor stores were open all week, 2,000 jobs would be created and an extra $70-million in taxes would...

Despite the fanfare of a televised speech at the National Press Club in Washington, a very old and hackneyed set of proposals was unveiled as a "new vision" for the creation of "affordable housing." The speech was by Richard Ravitch, co-chairman with former Congresswoman Susan Molinari of what is called the Millennial Housing Commission, a group making recommendations to Congress on housing policy. These two members of the New York political establishment produced the kinds of proposals that such people have been turning out for years. "Affordable housing" for them means government-subsidized housing, and their report essentially spells out innumerable...

After any breakdown of a public institution, politicians feel the urge to "fix" things so it doesn't happen again. Often, however, the cure is worse than the disease. That's the case with the proposed remedies following the collapse of Enron. Why does Congress need to do anything in the first place? The Enron scandal was primarily a story of executives and auditors deceiving investors about the true state of a business. If it was "greed" that caused the deception, it was greed that uncovered it as well. James Chanos, a money manager who specializes in short-selling (speculating that a stock's...

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THE de facto wife of abortionist doctor Peter Bayliss was charged with his unlawful killing yesterday. Claudia McEwan denied the charge, which was laid after coroner Michael Halliday told the reopened inquest into Bayliss's death there were "a great number of matters" a jury should decide.McEwan had admitted she regularly doped his coffee secretly with Prozac and Valium. Mr Halliday said the "peculiar circumstances" of Ms McEwan's conduct on the night of the death of her partner of 24 years and her "particular and peculiar relationship" with him should be explored. An earlier inquest had heard that Ms McEwan found...

A divided Iowa Supreme Court last week reinstated a class action lawsuit against Microsoft brought by Joe Comes on behalf of himself and his fellow Iowans who purchased computers that came pre-installed with Windows 98. As end-user licensees of the operating system, Comes charged that he was forced to pay “a monopoly price” for the privilege of using Windows, thus he should be justly compensated for this crime against humanity. Under federal antitrust law, Comes has no case, since the U.S. Supreme Court has held that secondary—or “indirect”—consumers may not assert standing in antitrust cases, since such consumers do not...

Whom, After All, Has China Provoked? The recent incident of intrusion into the Japanese consulate general in Shenyang has triggered a moderate diplomatic disturbance between China and Japan and has startled the top leaders of the two governments. A small number of Japanese people threaten to reconsider Japan-China relationship.     Consulate intrusion in Shenyang Premeditated (2) After the occurrence of embassy (or consulate) intrusion incident, the country concerned, instead of handing the intruders over to the Chinese side for verification, blamed the Chinese armed police for adopting measures of obstruction, and even charged the Chinese side with infringing their...

Boy's death costs Modesto $2.55M Modesto will pay $2.55 million to the family of Alberto Sepulveda, the 11-year-old boy who was accidentally shot and killed during a September 2000 drug raid. Police Chief Roy Wasden also agreed to change department procedures -- at the request of the Sepulveda family -- to prevent accidental shootings in the future. Those changes include written policies directing officers: Not to point their guns at someone who complies with police orders. Not to take witnesses to the police station without their consent. Not to take children to the police station without first advising their parents....

It seems just a short time ago that the 1980 election ended the economic and political nightmare that was the Carter Presidency. Lest we forget: the four years of the Carter Presidency made everyday usage of rare words in the English language-malaise, stagflation, misery index, we'll stop there. I'm reminded of the years in which the United States economy devolved into a caldron of misery and foreign policy witnessed defeat after defeat. Carter has continued the long journey to rehabilitation after suffering one of the worst political defeats in American history and witnessed the total refutation of his failed policies...