Giant pumpkins don't make the best racing boats but they do have one advantage over wood and carbon-fiber-- they can be turned into gallons of soup.
It's Still the One
Oil's very future is being seriously questioned, debated, and challenged. The author of an acclaimed history explains why, just as we need more oil than ever, it is changing faster than we can keep up with.
By Daniel Yergin
All smiles: German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeir at their only televised political debate on Sunday before the election on Sept. 27.
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Talk about a seesaw! German polls indicate that the upcoming federal election is going to be a nail-biter.
That the result will lead to another cobbling together of an unwieldy coalition of uncomfortable bedmates seems a foregone conclusion. But who will ally with whom remains an open question.
Chancellor Merkel has gone public with her intentions to dump Germany’s left-of-center Social Democrats in favor of the business-oriented Free Democratic Party (fdp). The fdp’s East German orientation may be more within her comfort zone, as she hails from Germany’s east herself.
The real question is, if more of the vote on polling day goes to the Social Democratic Party (sdp) leader, Frank Walter Steinmeier, which parties he will choose to engage with in coalition. If he looks further left and engages the Green Party and the current opposition Left Party (at present a seemingly unlikely proposition), then the most recent polls indicate the combined vote would marginally exceed that of a Christian Democrat/Christian Socialist/fdp alliance.
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By David Crossland
German voters had hoped that Sunday's much-hyped television debate between Chancellor Angela Merkel and her Social Democratic Party (SPD) challenger Frank-Walter Steinmeier would breathe life into the tepid election campaign that has been likened to a cotton wool fight.
Solana, Medvedev and Barroso agreed on agreeing, but little else
David Brooks's Op-Ed column in The New York Times started in September 2003. He has been a senior editor at The Weekly Standard, a contributing editor at Newsweek and the Atlantic Monthly, and he is currently a commentator on "The Newshour with Jim Lehrer." He is the author of "Bobos In Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There" and “On Paradise Drive : How We Live Now (And Always Have) in the Future Tense,” both published by Simon & Schuster.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Let me first of all thank Giles Merritt and the SDA for organising this event. Brussels these days does not lack think tanks, policy institutes or political foundations. But the SDA has always had a particular place in my affections. I appreciate all the work that the SDA has done, under your leadership Giles, to raise interest in, and improve our knowledge of, defence and security issues, not just in this city but well beyond. As those issues become more diverse and more complex, the creative policy thinking and bridge-building roles of the SDA become ever more necessary. NATO will continue to support you, and work closely with you.
Friday, January 30, 2009 
HOUSTON — DEVELOPING: Exxon Mobil shatters the U.S. record with a $45.2 billion annual profit, despite a year-end oil plunge.
By Matthias Schepp and Gerald Traufetter
In a new national directive, Russia has asserted claims on large sections of the Arctic Ocean. The tone of the document is openly aggressive, prompting fears of increasing international tension over who has the right to exploit the mineral-rich territory.
Cold temperatures and boredom are normally the order of the day at Russia's northernmost border post on the Arctic Ocean island of Alexandra Land. Icebergs as big as houses drift past, while old diesel drums stand silent in the dry air.
Within days of Russia’s invasion of Georgia in early August, our editor in chief, Gerald Flurry, told students at Herbert W. Armstrong College that he believed Moscow had struck a deal with Germany over Georgia before it attacked. After delivering that message to the students, Mr. Flurry wrote in the October issue of the Trumpet, “I believe Germany may well have been complicit in Russia’s plan to attack Georgia!”
That analysis was bold and unique. At the time, there were no media reports suggesting behind-the-scenes dealings between Moscow and Berlin. Since then, however, a pile of evidence has emerged (read this, for example) pointing to a growing cooperation between Russia and Germany.
Image: Bakir Rahmanovic, ISNA New Transformed NATO is likely to be unveiled at the NATO Summit 2009 celebrating its sixtieth anniversary. This transformation is being created out of necessity to deal with Islamic extremism. NATO needs to form “partnerships” with other like-minded democracies to deal with Islamic extremism. Especially in regards to energy, NATO has to be a part of new designed collective in response to Russia. NATO has to change to adapt to the future and frame a new objective “Strategic Concept”. The creation for “A New Consensus” is the primary reason for this new “Strategic Concept” that is slated for the NATO Summit 2009.
But NATO faces two problems: The European view on the US War on Terror and the lack of European military might and will. An iron and clay military sums up its EU members despite the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP). France wants NATO to be a “joint defense force FOR Europe but France would accept an equal NATO to EU military". NATO has to start the transformation process in Afghanistan. NATO could succeed in Afghanistan if a 9-11 event occurred in Afghanistan. A new “Strategic Concept” for NATO should begin at the latest in Spring 2008 but The NATO Summit 2009 new “Strategic Concept” deadline may be hampered. Timing is everything.
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