Al-Manar's website says it first began satellite broadcasts in 2000

The United States has added Hezbollah's al-Manar television station to its list of terrorist organisations, saying it incites violence in the Middle East.

The designation comes less than a week after France banned broadcasts of al-Manar's satellite channel.

The station is backed by the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, already considered by the US a "foreign terrorist organization".

Anyone linked to the station could face action, the State Department warned.

"For example, an alien would be found inadmissible ... if the alien is a member of al-Manar, if a person solicits funds or other things of value for al-Manar, if he provides material support to al-Manar or solicits any individual for membership in al-Manar," State Dept spokesman Richard Boucher said.

Mr Boucher denied the US decision had been made under Israeli pressure.

"It's not a question of freedom of speech," he said.

"It's a question of incitement to violence. And we don't see why here or anywhere else a terrorist organisation should be allowed to spread its hatred and incitement through the television airwaves." [...]

Of course, there has been no such clamour, merely a silence, and a rather eloquent one at that. Since the 1939 National Registration Act was repealed in 1951 after Clarence Willcox, the manager of a dry cleaning shop, challenged the principle that a policeman could demand to see his wartime identity card, the British have seen compulsory registration schemes as the mark of more officious and authoritarian states than ours. Over the years we've taken pride that we carried as much or as little identity as we pleased, and that as long as we were within the law, no official or policeman could demand to see proof of our name and address.

Although little essentially has changed in the condition of the country, the government wants to compel us to accept what the former home secretary called the "gold standard of identification", with large fines for non-registration and failing to renew a card or notify the authorities of a change of address.

Some 95% of Britons do not lack the means to identify themselves. We voluntarily carry driving licences, credit and bank cards, professional ID of every sort, security passes and sometimes social security numbers and medical tags. If a document needs to be signed or a large sum to be collected from the bank, it is simply a matter of producing a passport.

So the important point is not that we need to identify ourselves, but that the government wishes to identify us, which is a different matter and one that should set off alarms. That David Blunkett has been replaced by Charles Clarke, who has shown that he has some reservations about the details of the scheme, should not mean that we relax.

To be anonymous, to go privately, to move residence without telling the authorities is a fundamental liberty which is about to be taken from us. People may not choose to exercise this entitlement to privacy, or see the point of it, but once it's gone and a vast database is built, eventually to be accessed by every tentacle of the government machine, we will never be able to claw it back. We are about to surrender a right which is precious, rare even in western democracies, and profoundly emblematic of our culture and civilisation. And what for? The government advances arguments of necessity, raising the threats of terrorism, organised crime, benefit fraud and illegal immigration.

It is obvious that the members of criminal gangs will not be deterred by having to apply for identity cards, just as they are not by the need to have a passport. The possession of a legitimate national ID card does not of itself magically prevent criminal intent. It doesn't in mafia and Camorra strongholds of Italy, so why should it here?

Benefit fraud may be reduced a little, but most cases involve people making false claims about their circumstances, not their identity. A national registration scheme will do nothing to put off those bent on coming here, as has been discovered in France, Spain and Italy, which of course all have identity card schemes.

Swiss-born Prof Ramadan is one of the most respected philosophers of religion and conflict resolution; he has argued for a more moderate and modern Islam, and was named by Time magazine as one of the world's top 100 influential thinkers this year.

But in July his American visa was revoked under the Patriot Act, adopted after the terrorist attacks on September 11, prohibiting him from taking up the post at the University of Notre dame in Indiana. They have so far refused to issue a new visa.

Today he announced his resignation of two professorships at the university - professor of Islamic studies in the classics department and professor of religion, conflict, and peace building - and accused the American authorities of attacking academic freedom.[...]

Stop me if you've heard this one before...

(Re Dumbo/Clunk; Clumbo as a compromise...)

He knew what to do.

But he said questions about his integrity had been damaging the government.

Sir Alan Budd is due to unveil the findings of his inquiry into the allegations in the next few days. [...]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/4099581.stm

LIAR LIAR PANTS ON FIRE!!!

See the statue of the beast-man pulled down as the crowds cheer; this is a moment the people of the UK had...you get the picture!!!!

Oh well, there goes my new tshirt!!!!!

Caught with his pants down in an adulterous affair,
Caught abusing the system...TWICE
Eager as fire in a petrol station to force everyone into a ID card cage, but bends the rules for himself like its his God given right...

This despicable, evil, twisted, low down dirty dog is gone gone gone!!!!!

  Allons! the road is before us!
It is safe—I have tried it—my own feet have tried it well.

  Allons! be not detain'd!
Let the paper remain on the desk unwritten, and the
         book on the shelf unopen'd!
Let the tools remain in the workshop! let the money
         remain unearn'd!
Let the school stand! mind not the cry of the teacher!
Let the preacher preach in his pulpit! let the lawyer
         plead in the court, and the judge expound the
         law.

  Mon enfant! I give you my hand!
I give you my love, more precious than money,
I give you myself, before preaching or law;
Will you give me yourself? will you come travel with
         me?
Shall we stick by each other as long as we live?

                                  5

           {Kappa-Epsilon-Phi-Alpha-Lambda-Eta Epsilon}

                      THE BATTLE OF THE ANTS

        That is not which is.
        The only Word is Silence.
        The only Meaning of that Word is not.
        Thoughts are false.
        Fatherhood is unity disguised as duality.
        Peace implies war.
        Power implies war.
        Harmony implies war.
        Victory implies war.
        Glory implies war.
        Foundation implies war.
        Alas!  for the Kingdom wherein all these are at war.

He knew what to do.

"Did you choose Reuben to be in the band because he is Asian for his special effects?"

Er… there’s a law against it!

They ain’t kidding