JERUSALEM DIVISION HALTED MID TRACK

EHESIANS 6:10-13
10 Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.
11 Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.
12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities,(DEMONIC ANGELS IN HIGH PLACES) against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.(SPIRTIUAL DEMONIC PERSONS)
13 Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.

LUKE 4:5-7(BECAUSE SATAN OFFERS WORLD POWER BILDERBERGS HAVE ACCEPTED SATANS GIFT)
5 And the devil, taking him (JESUS) up into an high mountain, shewed unto him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time.
6 And the devil said unto him, All this power will I give thee, and the glory of them: for that is delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will I give it.
7 If thou therefore wilt worship me, all shall be thine.

BILDERBERG TO BUILD UP ECONOMY SO PEOPLE GET A FALSE UPSWING,THEN DESTROY THE STOCK MARKET.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjjaGPMrK90&feature=player_embedded

Bilderberg Fears Losing Control In Chaos-Plagued World
Paul Joseph Watson Prison Planet.com Monday, May 18, 2009

Investigative journalist Daniel Estulin, whose information from inside Bilderberg has routinely proven accurate, states that the global elite’s plan to completely destroy the economy and ultimately lower global population by two thirds has stoked fears even within Bilderberg itself that the fallout from such chaos could ultimately result in the globalists losing their control over the world.In a telephone interview, Estulin re-iterated his original points about Bilderberg’s 2009 agenda, which were released in a pre-meeting booklet to members. These include the notion that investors, whipped up into a false state of euphoria by the belief that the economy is recovering, are being suckered into ploughing their money back into the system as a set up for massive losses and searing financial pain in the months ahead as the stock market reverses its uptrend and plummets to new lows.One of Bilderberg’s main topics of conversation at this year’s meeting was whether to oversee a long period of economic stagnation or to quickly sink the economy with a rapid depression.

Estulin called the bank stress tests recently conducted as being little more than a shameless hoax based on the irrational assumption that the economy wont get as bad as it already is.Bilderberg are also intent in pushing through the Lisbon Treaty despite it being rejected by countries in Europe who allowed their population to vote on the issue, and are prepared to manufacture demonization campaigns against anti-EU pressure groups, namely the Libertas organization fronted by Declan Ganley.One of Bilderberg’s primary concerns according to Estulin is the danger that their zeal to reshape the world by engineering chaos in order to implement their long term agenda could cause the situation to spiral out of control and eventually lead to a scenario where Bilderberg and the global elite in general are overwhelmed by events and end up losing their control over the planet.Estulin said that the economic crisis is a vastly greater threat than a mere recession and that, as long as the present structure of the global economy remains the same, it will ultimately lead to a massive population reduction of two thirds within a generation or two.Estulin said that such a massive crisis would bring many unknowns that Scare and frighten some of the more savvy members of the Bilderberg inner circle who are wondering how far they have actually gone not only to destroy the world but perhaps even destroy themselves, adding that this subject was a topic of conversation at this year’s meeting.Estulin highlighted a phrase that he first ran across in Bilderberg documents many years ago but only came to understand more recently following the 2002 meeting in Chantilly Virginia, the term demand destruction.Estulin said that a source connected to the World Bank explained to him that, You destroy demand by destroying the world economy on purpose - which is what we’re witnessing right now,added Estulin, destruction of the world economy on purpose.

FROM WND'S JERUSALEM BUREAU Jerusalem division halted in mid-track
Controversial barrier would have isolated Jewish neighborhood May 17, 2009
8:11 pm Eastern By Aaron Klein 2009 WorldNetDaily

Barrier construction earlier this month (WND photo)

JERUSALEM – A Knesset inquiry following a WND exposé earlier this month has halted construction of the country's security barrier along a controversial route that would effectively have blocked off Jewish property and an important Jewish neighborhood from the rest of Jerusalem. The episode began two weeks ago involving an area important to the Jewish neighborhood of Maale Adumim in eastern Jerusalem. The Palestinians want the area as part of a state. During his candidacy, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke about the importance of maintaining and developing the Jerusalem region called E1, which encompasses Maale Adumim. Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, however, personally visited the Jerusalem areas in question and unilaterally ordered the defense ministry to construct a barrier through the neighborhood of Anatot, which would block off Jewish land. The new barrier route will essentially isolate the so-called Palestinian side of Maale Adumim, as well cordon off local Jewish property. Since 2002, the security barrier has created a de facto border between Jerusalem and the West Bank. The new route ordered by Barak threads along Anata, leaving eight acres of property owned by Jews on the Palestinian side.

The previous governments of Ehud Olmert and Ariel Sharon delayed construction of the barrier in the area, largely because the route was being contested by local Jewish landowners, but also because it would disconnect Maale Adumim from greater Jerusalem. A Supreme Court case on the subject is pending. Following WND's article on the subject and a petition from a private group, Otonell Schneller, a Knesset member for Israel's Kadima party, visited Anatot to see the fence construction for himself. Last week, during a Knesset session regarding yearly funding for Barak's defense ministry, Schneller brought up the issue of the Anatot fence and accused Barak of wasting his ministry's money, arguing the Supreme Court could rule against the fence's construction and require the removal of the barrier. Immediately following that Knesset session, Barak ordered the halting of the Anatot fence construction. Aryeh King, chairman of the Land of Israel Forum, which promotes Jewish construction in Jerusalem, told WND he was concerned Arabs will begin squatting on the Jewish-owned property now that it's been quarantined from Jewish sections of Jerusalem. More dangerous, King argued, was blocking off Maale Adumim. After the barrier is finished, there won't be any other chance to connect the rest of Jerusalem with Maale Adumim, he said.The vision will become a nightmare.Sources in Prime Minister Netanyahu's office said Barak acted on his own and did not coordinate the fence's construction with Netanyahu's permission.

Israel has already forfeited Jerusalem

The barrier construction in the Anatot area is not an isolated incident. A WND investigation recently discovered that sections of Jerusalem essentially have been forfeited on the ground to the Palestinian Authority, while Jews, including local landowners, are barred from entering parts of Israel's capital. The probe further determined the U.S. has been aiding the Palestinians in developing infrastructure in Jerusalem. Also, it has emerged that the Israeli government has failed to stop Arabs from illegally building thousands of housing projects on Jerusalem land purchased and owned by a U.S. Jewish group for the express purpose of Jewish settlement, culminating in an Arab majority in the neighborhoods. The situation has been unfolding in the northern Jerusalem neighborhoods of Kfar Akeb, Qalandiya and Samir Amis, which are close to the Jewish neighborhoods of Neve Yaacov and Pisgat Zeev in Israel's capital. Kfar Akeb, Qalandiya and Samir Amis are located entirely within the Jerusalem municipality. A tour of the three Jerusalem neighborhoods finds some surprising developments. Official PA logos and placards abound, including one glaring red street sign at the entrance to the neighborhoods warning Israelis to keep out.

Another official sign, this one in Kfar Akeb in Jerusalem, reads in English, Ramallah-Jerusalem Road. This project is a gift form (sic) the American people to the Palestinian people in cooperation with the Palestinian Authority and PECDAR. 2007. The sign bears the emblems of the American and PA governments and of the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID. The displays were not present during a previous WND tour of the neighborhoods in 2006. Some local schools in the Jerusalem neighborhoods are officially run by the PA – some in conjunction with the U.N. – with many teachers drawing PA salaries. Civil disputes are usually settled not in Israeli courts but by the PA judicial system, although at times Israeli courts are used, depending on the matter. Councils governed by PA President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah organization oversee some municipal matters. USAID provides the PA funds for road and infrastructure projects.Israeli security officials said the local Jerusalem police rarely operate in Kfar Akeb, Qalandiya and Samir Amis; instead security has been turned over to the Israel Defense Forces and Border Police, who work almost daily with PA security forces. The PA police operate in the Jerusalem neighborhoods in coordination with Israel.Shmulik Ben Ruby, spokesman for the Jerusalem police, confirmed the arrangement.If there are fights between some local families, sometimes we involve the PA police to make peace between the families, he told WND.Yes, the PA police can operate in these neighborhoods in coordination with the IDF and Border Police.

Jews barred from sections of Jerusalem

In another recent development, Israeli Jews, including local property owners, have been almost entirely barred from entering Kfar Akeb, Qalandiya and Samir Amis, while Israeli Arabs can freely enter. Aryeh King, a nationalist activist who holds the power of attorney to some Kfar Akeb land owned by an Israeli Jew, told WND he was barred several times during the past few months from entering the neighborhood to administer to the land, upon which local Arabs illegally constructed apartments.

Police spokesman Ben Ruby explained the new arrangement is due to security concerns.

It's quite dangerous to be there alone, so if they don't have to be there it's not allowed, because they might find themselves in danger if they go in,said Ben Ruby. In 2002, in response to the outbreak one year earlier of the Palestinian intifada, or terrorist war against the Jewish state, the Israeli government constructed its security barrier blocking off the West Bank from Jewish population zones. The route of the fence also cut into northern and eastern Jerusalem, incorporating Kfar Akeb, Qalandiya and Samir Amis on the so-called Palestinian side. Israel recaptured northern and eastern Jerusalem, including the Old City and the Temple Mount – Judaism's holiest site – during the 1967 Six-Day War. The Palestinians, however, have claimed eastern Jerusalem as a future capital. About 244,000 Arabs live in Jerusalem, mostly in eastern neighborhoods, out of a total population of 724,000, the majority Jewish.Jews lived in Kfar Akeb, Qalandiya and Samir Amis years before the establishment of Israel in 1948, but they were violently expelled during deadly Arab riots in 1929.Jordan, together with other Arab countries, attacked Israel after its founding in 1948 and administered the three Jerusalem neighborhoods as well as all of eastern Jerusalem following an armistice agreement. In 1967, Jordan attacked again, and Israel liberated the entire city of Jerusalem in the Six-Day War. During the period of Jordanian control, some new construction took place, including in areas previously purchased by Jews.The recent barring of Jews from northern Jerusalem sections apparently coincides with an Israeli government decision the past year to allow the PA some presence in Jerusalem.

Last June, WND exclusively reported then-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert allowed the PA to hold an official meeting in Jerusalem to discuss dealing with expected Palestinian sovereignty over key sections of the city. Dmitri Ziliani, a spokesman for the Jerusalem section of PA President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party, confirmed to WND the meeting was related to the activities and structure of Fatah's local command in some neighborhoods of Jerusalem.We were covering the best ways to improve our performance on the street and how we can be of service to the community,Ziliani said. Ziliani said the regular PA meetings in Jerusalem are, in part, held in anticipation of a future Palestinian state encompassing all of eastern Jerusalem. Our political program as Fatah dictates there will be no Palestinian state if these areas – all of east Jerusalem – are not included,Ziliani told WND. According to Israeli law, the PA cannot officially meet in Jerusalem. The PA previously maintained a de facto headquarters in Jerusalem, called Orient House, but the building was closed down by Israel in 2001 following a series of suicide bombings in Jerusalem. Israel said it had information indicating the House was used to plan and fund terrorism. Thousands of documents and copies of bank certificates and checks captured by Israel from Orient House – including many documents obtained by WND – showed the offices were used to finance terrorism, including direct payments to the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terror group

U.S. Jewish group to blame for 'division' of Jerusalem?

Key land in Qalandiya and Kfar Akeb is owned by a U.S. Jewish group that over the years has allowed tens of thousands of Arabs to illegally squat on its land, resulting in the current Arab majority. The Jewish National Fund, or JNF, purchased the land in the early 1920s using Jewish donor funds for the specific purpose of Jewish settlement.The JNF lands have been utilized for the illegal construction of dozens of Arab apartment buildings, a refugee camp and a U.N. school. A previous tour of Qalandiya and Kfar Akeb found dozens of Arab apartment complexes, a Palestinian refugee camp and a U.N. school for Palestinians constructed on the land. According to officials in Israel's Housing Ministry, Arabs first constructed facilities illegally in Qalandiya and Kfar Akeb between 1948 and 1967, prior to the 1967 Six-Day War during which Israel retook control of the entire city of Jerusalem. Qalandiya, still owned by JNF, came under the management of the Israeli government's Land Authority in the late 1960s. Ministry officials say the bulk of illegal Arab construction in Qalandiya occurred in the past 20 years, with construction of several new Arab apartment complexes taking place in just the past two years. Neither the Israeli government nor JNF took any concrete measures to stop the illegal building, which continues today with at least one apartment complex in Qalandiya under construction.

Land in another Jerusalem' neighborhood, Shoafat, which has an estimated value of $3 million, was also purchased by JNF in the early 1900s and fell under the management of the Israel Land Authority about 40 years ago. Much of the illegal Arab construction in Shoafat took place in the past 15 years, with some apartment complexes built as late as 2004. In Qalandiya and Shoafat, Israel's security fence cordons off the Arab sections of the JNF lands from the rest of Jewish Jerusalem.

Internal JNF documents obtained by WND outline illegal Arab construction on the Jewish-owned land. A December 2000 survey of Qalandiya summarized on JNF stationery and signed by a JNF worker, states, In a lot of the plots I find Arabs are living and building illegally and also working the JNF land without permission.The JNF survey goes on to document illegal construction of Arab apartment complexes and the U.N. school under the property management of Israel's Land Authority.

THE RADICAL SODOMITE RAINBOW GROUP INFILTRATE GIRL SCOUTS.

NOT YOUR MOTHER'S AMERICA Girl Scouts exposed: Lessons in lesbianism
Communists, radical feminists cited as role models for troops May 17, 2009
7:57 pm Eastern By Chelsea Schilling 2009 WorldNetDaily

When many parents think of Girl Scouts, they imagine young girls in uniform selling Thin Mints and Tagalong cookies – not learning about stone labyrinths, world peace, global warming, yoga, avatars, smudging incense, Zen gardens and feminist, communist and lesbian role models.But that's exactly what many of 2.7 million Girl Scouts will learn about with a new curriculum called Journeys released last year. Patti Garibay spent nearly two decades in Girl Scouts – six years as a girl member and 13 years as a volunteer. She was also a recruiter, camp coordinator and area delegate winning outstanding leader and volunteer in both councils in which she served. In Garibay's words, she bled green.But in 1993 when Girl Scouts USA decided to make God optional in its program at the national convention in Minneapolis, an idea known as Proposal 3: Flexibility in Spiritual Wording,Garibay chose to leave the organization. I had always used Girl Scouts as part of my life's ministry, modeling my faith while serving girls,she told WND.However as this change became policy, mandates were made against Christmas caroling, praying at meetings and singing hymns. I had a true moral dilemma and felt that I could not uphold the GSUSA's rules and remain a Christian never denying my Lord.In the Girl Scout curriculum, the organization's promise now includes an asterisk with the following disclaimer: Girl Scouts of the USA makes no attempt to define or interpret the word God in the Girl Scout Promise. It looks to individual members to establish for themselves the nature of their spiritual beliefs. When making the Girl Scout Promise, individuals may substitute wording appropriate to their own spiritual beliefs for the word God.Garibay said it appears that Girl Scouts has taken a stance toward religion – the religion of the New Age – despite its proclaimed secular scouting program. WND asked Girl Scouts USA spokeswoman Michelle Tompkins if the organization is shifting its focus toward a New Age agenda. Read how America is being sold unwittingly on embracing moral decline in The Marketing of Evil: How Radicals, Elitists, and Pseudo-Experts Sell Us Corruption Disguised as Freedom.

No, Girl Scouts isn't headed into a New Age direction,she said.We're just looking for new ways to get through to girls.WND reviewed the following books in the Girl Scouts' new Journeys curriculum: Amaze: The Twists and Turns of Getting Along. In Amaze: The Twists and Turns of Getting Along, girls from the sixth to the eighth grade will read a quote from Buddha and be encouraged to explore mazes and stone or dirt labyrinths – symbols rooted in pagan mythology and popular within the New Age movement as meditation tools.They will be briefly introduced to Polish poet Anna Swir, known for her feminist and erotic poems, and Jane Addams, an ardent feminist and pacifist who received a Nobel Peace Prize. The text features a quote from Harriet Woods, former president of the National Women's Political Caucus – a bipartisan group that endorses pro-abortion female candidates who run for public office.To cope with bullying, girls as young as 11 are encouraged to take a peace break, make a Zen garden, take martial arts, do yoga and visit a website to learn the sun salutation poses. The book features a strong emphasis on feminism and world peace, concluding with the following message: Life is a maze. Navigate its twists and turns and you'll find true friendships, meaningful relationships, and lots of confidence to boot. So, go ahead, enter the maze. The goal is peace – for you, your world, and the planet, too. Garibay said,Placing an asterisk by the word God in the Girl Scout promise in an effort to be tolerant, yet promoting Eastern mysticism through Zen gardens and Buddha writings hardly seems tolerant to those who believe in Christianity.

Girltopia

In the next age group, for teens in the ninth and tenth grades, girls are taught about wage disparities between the sexes, and a lack of assets and senior management positions held by women.Girltopia poses the questions,When women don't earn enough, what happens to their children? and How could everyone help create a Girltopia?

Asked what the purpose of including a message of inequality served in the Girl Scout curriculum, Tompkins explained:It's to show girls what's going on in the country and have them be part of the dialogue. A lot of girls just aren't aware of what's going on. I think that specific topic might be new this year, but in the broader scheme of things, it's not that new. I'm sure it's something that came up in the 1920s as well. Girls Scouting has been around since before women had the right to vote, so I'm sure these discussions were always part of this. The text praises Renaissance author Sir Thomas More for his book Utopia,Mary Cavendish for her book A New World: The Blazing World about a utopian kingdom and 24-year Executive Director of Rocky Mountain Planned Parenthood and feminist author Sheri S. Tepper for her novel,The Gate to Women's Country.Girltopia encourages girls to let songs inspire you, and as some examples, it provides lyrics to songs such as Independent Women, part 1 by Destiny's Child; Hammer and a Nail by the Indigo Girls – an out lesbian rock band; and Imagine by John Lennon. The curriculum also asks girls to create an avatar to represent the ideal you in Girltopia and features Wild Geese,a short poem by lesbian poet Mary Oliver.

This book was so depressing that I don't know what I would have done as a teen reading it,Garibay said.The sense of hopelessness abounds in Girltopia.The positivity, the enthusiasm and the vigor of youth is completely destroyed by data found to further the Girl Scout USA's feminist agenda. It plants seeds of despair and hopelessness in today's girls.Girltopia also features a section on ethics and asks, What are your ethical standards based on? Girls must check all of the following answers that apply: Whatever does the most good and least harm ,Whatever treats everyone as fairly and equally as possible ,Whatever is best for most people in the community,Whatever is consistent with your character,Although not everyone shares the same sense of personal ethics, most people in the world have many ethical principles in common,it states.The hollow toll of moral relativism is throughout these books, Garibay said.The girls are left up to their own feelings in making decisions. This is not age appropriate for girls, nor is it what girls want to be forced to do. They want to know right from wrong.Your Voice Your World: The Power of Advocacy.When teens reach their junior and senior years in high school, they begin a Girl Scouts curriculum called Your Voice Your World: The Power of Advocacy. It encourages young women to begin raising their voices as advocates and follow the examples of other young people who are speaking out on causes such as global warming, universal health care, racism and child poverty.One question asks,What policies is our city putting in place to combat global warming? Teens are then asked to generate a list of causes they are passionate about. One example suggests girls propose new environmental protection laws for waterways in your state.The text encourages Girl Scouts to take their ideas and list steps necessary to accomplish goals on advocacy charts. It provides the following suggestion for a cause:

I worry about all the waste in using plastic bags and how their use in my community contributes to global warming. One example is the supermarket – do we really need to be using all those plastic bags? Girls are encouraged to read the bottom of each page to discover a Voice for Good,or female advocates who are meant to be role models. Of more than 50 women listed, only three are women who are known for their faith: Sojourner Truth, Harriet Tubman and Mother Teresa. Their religions are only briefly mentioned, if at all.Many of the female role models mentioned are feminists, lesbians, existentialists, communists and Marxists. Examples include: Elizabeth Gurley Flynn .Elizabeth Gurley Flynn: labor leader, activist, feminist, founding member of ACLU and chairwoman of the American Communist Party Luisa Moreno: labor leader, social activist, member of the Communist Party, married to delegate of the Socialist Party of America Simone de Beauvoir: existentialist, French author of feminist books including The Second Sex,key player in France's women's liberation movement ,Rigoberta Menchu: Guatemalan activist and Nobel Peace Prize winner who joined Marxist guerrilla movement ,Emily Greene Balch: writer, feminist, recipient of Nobel Peace Prize, pacifist who campaigned against U.S. involvement in World War I, former editor of The Nation Billie Jean King: retired tennis champion, sued for palimony by lesbian girlfriend while she was still married, first prominent professional athlete to come out as homosexual Billy Jean King (photo: Stanford University)Ethel Mary Smyth: English composer, lesbian, leader of the women's suffrage movement, member of Women's Social and Political Union Ethel Mary Smyth

Jeanette Rankin: first woman elected to the House of Representatives, R-Montana, pacifist who voted against U.S. entry into World War I and World War II, founding vice-president of American Civil Liberties Union and founding member of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom ,Carrie Chapman Catt: feminist politician, president of the National American Woman Suffrage Association, founded the League of Women Voters, anti-war activist ,Frances Perkins: teacher and U.S. secretary of labor from 1933 to 1945, first woman appointed to the U.S. Cabinet, helped write New Deal legislation including minimum-wage laws, allegedly had lesbian relationship with Mary Harriman Rumsey ,Rachel Carson: marine biologist and nature writer, author of Silent Spring (1962), spurring a nationwide ban on DDT, inspiration from book led to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency, reported to have had lesbian relationship with Dorothy Freeman ,Barbara Jordan: member of House of Representatives from 1973 to 1979, first black woman to deliver keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in 1976, supported Community Reinvestment Act of 1977 requiring banks to lend to poor and minority communities. The Houston Chronicle reported Jordan had lesbian partner of more than 20 years named Nancy Earl Martina Navratilova

Martina Navratilova: former World No. 1 women's tennis champion from Czechoslovakia who fled communism, came out openly as a lesbian and admitted to having crushes on other female tennis players, spoke before the National March on Washington for Gay and Lesbian Rights, was 2000 recipient of National Equality Award from the Human Rights Campaign ,Shirley Chisholm: member of the House of Representatives from 1969 to 1983, feminist, first black woman elected to Congress, first major-party black candidate for president of the United States, founding member of the National Organization of Women, helped pass Title IX, homosexual advocate ,Pauli Murray: feminist, lawyer, writer, poet, teacher, ordained priest, author of the 1950 book States' Laws on Race and Color,founder of the Women's Rights Law Reporter, co-founder of the National Organization for Women.Betty Friedan,Betty Friedan: feminist writer on Girl Scouts' board of directors, best remembered for 1963 book The Feminine Mystique,primary founder and first president of the National Organization for Women, founder of the National Women's Political Caucus, strong opponent of abortion laws, founder of the National Abortion Rights Action League, or NARAL, active in Marxist circles, spoke in favor of homosexual rights.Dolores Huerta: co-founder of the United Farm Workers of America, co-founder of the National Farm Workers Association with Cesar Chávez, directed the UFW's national grape boycott, serves on boards of People for the American Way and Feminist Majority Foundation, spoke in favor of gay and lesbian rights, marched in GLBT parades, served as Human Rights Campaign board member

Bette Midler: singer, actress, self-proclaimed advocate for gay liberation movement

Other Voices for Good include Secretary of State Hillary Clinton – a former Brownie and Girl Scout – and TV talk show host Oprah Winfrey. WND asked Tompkins why Girl Scouts USA has chosen to focus on lesbians, radical feminists and controversial figures as role models instead of other significant female pioneers. There was a council of people who worked on the Journeys.They tried to figure out who would be profiled,she said.It came out from lots of discussions. I think the change the world message has been part of Girl Scouts since the beginning. It's not a radical agenda at all.Secretary of State Hillary Clinton – former Girl Scout.She continued, I think the concept of change is incredibly radical, but it's about making the world better and being conscious and respecting authority. There was a wide cross-section of women mentioned in the Journeys' that came about from the discussions.Readers will find very few men in the book, with the exception of a brief mention of Kofi Annan, former secretary-general of the United Nations. Men are not seen favorably but, rather a force to diminish and avoid,Garibay said. It alarmed me that women of faith were only mentioned in these few cases despite their many contributions. Not one pro-life woman was mentioned, nor was a missionary or conservative public figure.Tompkins said she doesn't know why there are only three women of faith mentioned, but she said, Girl Scouts isn't a religious organization, so that could be part of it.She continued,I would imagine we keep everything open when it comes to faith. I know no doors are ever shut with us. It's sort of like the way that God can never be taken out of the Girl Scout promise and law – in writing.Your Voice Your World finishes by encouraging teens who are bitten by the advocacy bug to pursue some of the following careers:

ambassador, congressperson, artist, filmmaker, labor union organizer, fund raiser/grant writer, lawyer, lobbyist, mediator, professor, public affairs officer, researcher, religious leader, senator, web master, blogger, journalist …
Tompkins told WND a new Journeys book will be arriving this month called It's Your Planet, Love It.She said the text has a strong environmental focus.

Other controversy

As WND columnist Jane Chastain reported, at the 51st Girl Scout National Council Session and Convention last year, the organization did away with its traditional flag ceremony and the playing of the National Anthem. Flags of all nations were brought in to the tune of September by Earth, Wind and Fire. The Girl Scouts also made headlines in recent years after it refused to adopt what it called a discrimination policy against homosexual leaders. In a 2000 National Review Online editorial titled The Cookie Crumbles, author Kathryn Jean Lopez cites the 1997 book On My Honor: Lesbians Reflect on Their Scouting Experience. She said it is filled with coming-of-age stories sparked by gay encounters in the Girl Scouts.On My Honor includes an essay titled All I Really Need to Know About Being a Lesbian I Learned at Girl Scout Camp. Lopez reported that staffers writing in the book claim that roughly one in three of the Girls Scouts' paid professional staff is lesbian.Kathy Cloninger.According to news reports, Planned Parenthood has also had some involvement with Girl Scouts in recent years. In Waco, Texas in 2004, a Girl Scout council cosponsored a sex education program with Planned Parenthood and honored PP Executive Director Pam Smallwood. On NBC's Today Show in 2004, Kathy Cloninger, CEO of Girls Scouts USA, admitted that it partners with Planned Parenthood across the country to bring information based sex education programs to girls.In response to the interview, American Life League's STOPP International surveyed 350 councils to ask if they had any involvement with Planned Parenthood. While 80 percent refused to answer, 17 councils reportedly admitted to associating with Planned Parenthood, and 49 said they don't.Garibay told WND Girl Scouts USA is not the same program most women remember.

Originally scouting was about citizenship, service and life skills,she said. The founder, Juliette Lowe, wanted girls to do their duty to God and their country. She encouraged girls to activate, not meditate. Now the Girl Scouts want to move into self-discovery and lobbyist training.An alternative to Girl Scouts,Garibay said she had enough after she heard about sexuality camps for Girl Scouts.I realized it was no longer my mom's Girl Scouts,she said.We thought we would have a little alternate scouting group for our daughters here in Cincinnati, Ohio. Word got out, and we started getting calls from across the nation from people asking to be a part of it.

Garibay founded a group called American Heritage Girls in 1995, and she has encouraging news for families who do not want to participate in the Girl Scouts' new direction:Do not despair. There are still some scouting organizations holding onto traditional values, she said.Now the organization has 8,000 members and is growing rapidly – by more than 20 percent in the last year. American Heritage Girls has also started a Trailblazer program that allows girls who are not in troop areas to be members and work on establishing their own troops. American Heritage Girls has expanded internationally, with troops in Japan, Germany and Italy.American Heritage Girls' mission is to build women of integrity through dedication to service, spiritual growth, servant leadership, goal setting through merit badge and advancement opportunities and teamwork through its outdoor program.American Heritage Girls.Parents won't find an emphasis on New Age spirituality, radical feminism, homosexual role models and combatting global warming at American Heritage Girls. Garibay said she has a higher goal for her troops.Instead, she said, Girls in AHG learn about their God-given gifts, their identity in Christ and the importance of seeking His will for their life.

DOCTOR DOCTORIAN FROM ANGEL OF GOD
then the angel said, Financial crisis will come to Asia. I will shake the world.

JAMES 5:1-3
1 Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you.
2 Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten.
3 Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.

REVELATION 18:10,17,19
10 Standing afar off for the fear of her torment, saying, Alas, alas that great city Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour is thy judgment come.
17 For in one hour so great riches is come to nought. And every shipmaster, and all the company in ships, and sailors, and as many as trade by sea, stood afar off,
19 And they cast dust on their heads, and cried, weeping and wailing, saying, Alas, alas that great city, wherein were made rich all that had ships in the sea by reason of her costliness! for in one hour is she made desolate.

EZEKIEL 7:19
19 They shall cast their silver in the streets, and their gold shall be removed: their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the wrath of the LORD: they shall not satisfy their souls, neither fill their bowels: because it is the stumblingblock of their iniquity.

REVELATION 13:16-18
16 And he(FALSE POPE) causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:(CHIP IMPLANT)
17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.(6-6-6) A NUMBER SYSTEM

WORLD MARKET RESULTS
http://money.cnn.com/data/world_markets/

HALF HOUR DOW RESULTS MON MAY 18,2009

09:30 AM +10.25
10:00 AM +107.76
10:30 AM +130.78
11:00 AM +159.45
11:30 AM +151.49
12:00 PM +165.43
12:30 PM +164.55
01:00 PM +187.65
01:30 PM +175.30
02:00 PM +176.98
02:30 PM +167.66
03:00 PM +207.48
03:30 PM +194.74
04:00 PM +235.44 8504.08

S&P 500 909.71 +26.83

NASDAQ 1732.36 +52.22

GOLD 922.50 -8.80

OIL 59.23 +2.89

TSE 300 HOLIDAY

CDNX HOLIDAY

S&P/TSX/60 HOLIDAY

MORNING,NEWS,STATS

YEAR TO DATE PERFORMANCE
Dow -5.79%
S&P -2.26%
Nasdaq +6.54%
TSX Advances 695,declines 810,unchanged 272,Volume 1,773,238,177.
TSX Venture Exchange Advances 363,Declines 408,Unchanged 326,Volume 262,331,039.

Dow +101 points at 4 minutes of trading today.
Dow +10 points at low today.
Dow +159 points at high today so far.
GOLD opens at $930.70.OIL opens at $57.76 today.

AFTERNOON,NEWS,STATS
Dow +10 points at low today so far.
Dow +188 points at high today so far.

DAY TODAY PERFORMANCE - 12:30PM STATS
NYSE Advances 2,885,declines 694,unchanged 73,New Highs 14,New Lows 40.
Volume 2,622,312,245.
NASDAQ Advances 1,940,declines 659,unchanged 94,New highs 18,New Lows 13.
Volume 758,229,036.
TSX Advances ,declines ,unchanged ,Volume .(HOLIDAY)
TSX Venture Exchange Advances ,Declines ,Unchanged ,Volume .(HOLIDAY)

WRAPUP,NEWS,STATS
Dow +10 points at low today.
Dow +235 points at high today.
Dow +2.85% today Volume 288,276,433.
Nasdaq +3.11% today Volume 1,881,611,418.
S&P 500 +3.04% today Volume N/A

RECORD LOWS DOW
-Sept 30,1996 5,882.17
-Oct 30,1996 5,993.23
-Nov 6,1996 6,177.71
-Dec 16,1996 6,268.35
-Apr 15,1997 6,587.16
-Apr 21,1997 6,660.21
-Apr 28,1997 6,783.02
-May 1,1997 6,976.48
-May 7,1997 7,085.65

RECORD LOWS S&P 500
-Sept 5,1996 649.44
-Sept 6,1996 655.68
-Sept 11,1996 667.28
-Sept 12,1996 671.13
-Oct 1,1996 689.08
-Oct 28,1996 697.26
-Nov 4,1996 706.73
-Nov 5,1996 714.14
-Dec 17,1996 726.04

PHOENIX TV REPORTS ON ILLUMINATI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Tk-dSxwah8&feature=player_embedded

AMERICORPS PROPAGANDA AD
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fhUMDFMf1fQ&feature=player_embedded

LIFE WITH BIG BROTHER Google joins Bilderberg cabal,Rich, powerful meet secretly in Greece May 17, 2009 10:04 pm Eastern 2009 WorldNetDaily

Astir Palace Hotel Resort, reported site of this year's Bilderberg Group meeting

WASHINGTON – The latest meeting of the secretive, half-century-old Bilderberg Group concluded yesterday outside of Athens with a few arrests, but little news.

Demonstrators from the political left and right shouted outside the Astir Palace hotel letting some of the wealthiest and most powerful people in the world know they weren't entirely welcome. A photographer for the London Guardian was briefly taken into custody while police insisted he delete pictures he took outside the hotel, which was closed to the public during the three-day meeting. A police officer told the Associated Press the resort was being protected by hundreds of police, navy commandos, coast guard speedboats and two F-16 fighter planes. The officer spoke on condition of anonymity, in keeping with his department's regulations. Attendees this year reportedly included U.S. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner; Larry Summers, the director of the U.S. National Economic Council; Richard Holbrooke, the Obama administration's special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan; World Bank President Robert Zoellick; European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet and European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso. Get the inside story of the super-secret group of globalist insiders. Learn from author who penetrated Bilderbergers

Bilderberg attendance is by invitation only. And if you want an invitation, you'd better be extremely rich or extremely powerful. New invitees reportedly include the nouveau riche Google Chief Executive Officer Eric Schmidt. Henry Kissinger, a lynchpin of continuity with other secretive internationalist groups including the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission, is a regular attendee, as is Wall Street Journal Editor Paul Gigot. Former British cabinet minister, Lord Denis Healey, one of the founders of the group, explained the purpose of the group to Jon Ronson of the Guardian: Those of us in Bilderberg felt we couldn't go on forever fighting one another for nothing and killing people and rendering millions homeless. So we felt that a single community throughout the world would be a good thing.

Meanwhile, Daniel Estulin, author of The True Story of the Bilderberg Group, said before the confab the main topic of the agenda for this meeting was the world economy. He said his sources inside the group told him the movers and shakers would be discussing two options – either a prolonged, agonizing depression that dooms the world to decades of stagnation, decline, and poverty ... or an intense-but-shorter depression that paves the way for a new sustainable economic world order, with less sovereignty but more efficiency.As WND has reported, The Bilderberg Group meets at luxury hotels and resorts throughout the world. Last year's conference was held at the Westfields Marriott in Chantilly, Va. WND made an effort to gain entry, but was denied. Every four years the conference is held in the U.S. or Canada. The group has an office located in Leiden, South Holland, Netherlands. The highly secretive meeting is off limits to press, but past reports from sources that have managed to penetrate the high-security meetings have stated that the meetings emphasize a globalist agenda and dismiss national sovereignty as regressive. The BBC declared it to be one of the most influential organizations in the world. It's officially described as a private gathering,BBC reported,but with a guest list including the heads of European and American corporations, political leaders and a few intellectuals, it's one of the most influential organizations on the planet.Attendees of the Bilderberg conference are not allowed to speak a word of what is discussed in the meeting outside of the group. The group has no website and no minutes are kept of the meetings to ensure secrecy.Last year, however, the Bilderberg Group made a press release available listing topics of discussion and providing a general overview of the gathering.

Approximately 140 participants will attend, of whom about two-thirds come from Europe and the balance from North America,the release stated.About one-third is from government and politics, and two-thirds are from finance, industry, labor, education and communications. The meeting is private in order to encourage frank and open discussion.This year's event was the 57th annual gathering of the Bilderberg Group, which began meeting in 1954. A scheduled meeting in 1976 was canceled, but if added to the tally, leads some to count this year's gathering as the 58th.

AmeriCorps Paramilitary Propaganda Ad Infowars May 17, 2009

In the distinctly militaristic propaganda here, the AmeriCorps organization City Year adopts Obama’s change mantra and remixes it with clips of Mohandas Gandhi, the Rev. Martin Luther King, César Chávez, and Mother Teresa. City Year’s militaristic propaganda PSA.City Year’s pitch is obviously directed at middle school and high school students. In the ad, young people are assembled on a parade ground in bright red jackets. According to a Wikipedia write-up on the organization, corps members start their day in an event called unity rally. One aspect of unity rally is PT or physical training. Some of the exercises may include jumping jacks and lunges. When PT is completed, Corps members read their sites official newspaper, called Daily or Weekly Briefings.Comparisons to the Jungsturm Adolf Hitler and Stalin’s Komsomol are unmistakable, especially in regard to the regimented physical training aspects of City Year.It should be noted that AmeriCorps is fully integrated into the homeland security apparatus. AmeriCorps VISTA (Volunteers in Service to America) is part of the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS).

Frank Morales writes (Homeland Defense: The Pentagon Declares War on America):

In the wake of 9/11, CNCS was fully integrated into homeland defense efforts. In March 2002, the Corporation issued a notice of availability of funds to strengthen communities and organizations in using service and volunteers to support homeland security.With an emphasis on public safety and freeing up police time, the grants offered under the announcement are to assist communities in getting involved in the war against terrorism on the home front.In the area of public safety the grants will help provide members to support police departments… in tasks and other functions that can be performed by non-sworn officers.Now mind you, the volunteers are not armed, nor can they make arrests, but they carry out vital tasks including organizing neighborhood watch groups…They also organize communities to identify and respond to crime and disorder problems…Obama has proposed arming these cadres. Recall his speech on July 2, 2008, when he said: We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded as the U.S. military. Since the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the Corporation has made funding available to organizations whose focus includes homeland security,declares the Virginia Commission for National and Community Service. AmeriCorps engages more than 70,000 Americans each year in intensive service to meet community needs in education, the environment, public safety, homeland security, and other areas,the IN.gov site states.

AmeriCorps NCCC (National Civilian Community Corps) is specifically tasked with homeland security, according to The United States Conference of Mayors.AmeriCorps NCCC, a residential, team-based program, offers approximately 1,300 young people between the ages of 18 to 24 the opportunity to serve their country for ten months on various projects. The primary focus of these are assisting in responding disaster relief and homeland security,reports Shannon Holmes. The NCCC are well positioned to leverage existing community efforts,according to the Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, and can make significant contributions to homeland security activities in American communities.NCCC programs may also meet homeland security needs, which the Corporation for National Service defines as engaging citizens and communities in preparedness and response to acts of terrorism and other disasters, explains the AmeriCorps State Concept Paper Guidelines. According to reports issued by the Department of Homeland Security, terrorism now stems from domestic rightwing extremists,not a far-flung al-Qaeda, and activities such as advocacy of the Second Amendment, pro-life activism, and the growing states’ rights movement threaten the fatherland.As noted on Alex Jones’ Infowars and Prison Planet websites last week, Homeland Security has captured the heretofore non-political Boy Scouts and turned it into a paramilitary organization. As the New York Times notes, Boy Scouts are now training to disarm military veterans. On April 21, Obama signed the Serve America Act,which will use $1.1 billion in earmarks from the 2010 budget to reauthorize and expand programs offered by the Corporation for National and Community Service. The Serve America Act,co-sponsored by Massachusetts Senator Edward Kennedy, intends to extend AmeriCorps membership from 75,000 to 250,000 by 2017. Although it’s likely that the recession and citizen goodwill have contributed to soaring numbers in national and international service organizations, it’s also just as likely that most people are just supporting a summoning from America’s new favorite man,writes the OhMyGov website.

The Nature of the Current Financial Crisis: The System is designed to exert Total Control over the Lives of Individuals,The Report from Iron Mountain Revisited
by Richard C. Cook Global Research, May 9, 2009

What impresses me in the current financial crisis is the near-total failure of so-called progressives to appreciate the magnitude of what is going on or the level of intelligence behind it. How many will say, for instance, that the crash was deliberately engineered by the creation, then destruction, of the investment bubbles of the last decade? When the financial system creates bubbles it drives up the cost of assets far beyond their true value in producing or storing wealth. When the bubbles burst the value of the assets plummets. Those with ready cash then buy them up on the cheap. When the dust settles more wealth has been concentrated in fewer hands. The rich get richer, and ordinary people are left in a deeper condition of indebtedness, poverty, and pressure to perform to the liking of the financial masters.

Progressives think the system needs to be reformed.Maybe the banking system needs to be re-regulated or even nationalized. Maybe it should be possible for families facing loss of their homes to get a lower monthly payment from a bankruptcy court. Maybe the government instead of the private sector should administer student loans.What we fail to acknowledge is that the system itself is totalitarian. This means that it is designed to exert total control over the lives of individuals. We are accustomed to use this label when thinking of anachronisms of history like communism or fascism. We do not understand that globalist finance capitalism and the government which protects, enables, or even regulates it are also totalitarian.What has happened in the last year as the financial system has seemingly gone belly-up, and is coming back only through massive government bailouts, is part of a pattern that has been around for decades if not centuries. How the controllers work was laid out in 1967 when Dial Press published a leaked copy of The Report from Iron Mountain. This was a study put together by a team of academics and analysts who met at the underground facility in New York that was home to the Hudson Institute.The report began by identifying war as the central organizing principle of society. It stated, War itself is the basic social system, within which other secondary modes of social organization conflict or conspire. It is the system which has governed most human societies of record, as it is today.The report said that,The basic authority of a modern state over its people resides in its war powers. It said that any failure of will by the ruling class could lead to actual disestablishment of military institutions.The effect on the system would be, the report said,catastrophic.The appearance of the report caused a sensation when it came out at the onset of the Vietnam War. Officials within the government had no comment, and the report faded into history. But certain of its sections fit the situation in 2009 precisely.

This is because the report outlined the ways the civilian population of a developed nation could be controlled even in the absence of a large-scale war that disrupted their daily lives. One of these ways was defined as follows: A…possible surrogate for the control of potential enemies of society is the reintroduction, in some form consistent with modern technology and political process, of slavery….The development of a sophisticated form of slavery may be an absolute prerequisite for social control….(Cited in Rule by Secrecy by Jim Marrs, 2000.)We see the development of such a sophisticated form of slavery today. What else can a system be called that subjects the population to skyrocketing personal and household debt, a widening gap between the rich and everyone else, constant warfare justified as necessary to fight terrorism,erosion of personal freedoms, constantly expanding power allocated to the military and police, pervasive electronic eavesdropping, complete lack of accountability by politicians for their dishonesty and crimes, a mass media devoted solely to establishment propaganda, etc.None of this seems to be diminishing under the Barack Obama administration. Even the economic recovery Obama is attempting to engineer through massive Keynesian deficit spending is expected by economists to be another jobless one like that of 2002-2005. Of course the unemployed or those who fear unemployment are easy to control. And the permanent series of Asian land wars George W. Bush instigated for control of resources and geopolitical leverage against Russia and China continue unabated.None of this is accidental. As The Report from Iron Mountain made clear four decades ago, it’s what has been planned all along.

Richard C. Cook is a former federal analyst who writes on public policy issues. His book We Hold These Truths: the Hope of Monetary Reform is now available at www.tendrilpress.com. His website is www.richardccook.com.

MR FALSE CHRISTIAN OBAMA TRYS TO PUT ON A CHRISTIAN FACE IN HIS HIPPOCRITICAL SHEEPS CLOTHING.

Text of Obama's Notre Dame speech By The Associated Press – Sun May 17, 5:10 pm ET

Text of President Barack Obama's commencement address Sunday as the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Ind., as delivered, as transcribed by the White House. The Rev. John Jenkins is the school's president. The Rev. Theodore Hesburgh is Jenkins' predecessor. Brennan Bollman is the class valedictorian.

Well, first of all, congratulations, Class of 2009. Congratulations to all the parents, the cousins — the aunts, the uncles — all the people who helped to bring you to the point that you are here today. Thank you so much to Father Jenkins for that extraordinary introduction, even though you said what I want to say much more elegantly. You are doing an extraordinary job as president of this extraordinary institution. Your continued and courageous — and contagious — commitment to honest, thoughtful dialogue is an inspiration to us all.Good afternoon. To Father Hesburgh, to Notre Dame trustees, to faculty, to family: I am honored to be here today. And I am grateful to all of you for allowing me to be a part of your graduation.And I also want to thank you for the honorary degree that I received. I know it has not been without controversy. I dont know if youre aware of this, but these honorary degrees are apparently pretty hard to come by. So far I'm only 1 for 2 as President. Father Hesburgh is 150 for 150. I guess that's better. So, Father Ted, after the ceremony, maybe you can give me some pointers to boost my average.I also want to congratulate the Class of 2009 for all your accomplishments. And since this is Notre Dame ...

(Speech is interrupted by anti-abortion protesters.)

We're fine, everybody. We're following Brennans adage that we dont do things easily. We're not going to shy away from things that are uncomfortable sometimes.Now, since this is Notre Dame I think we should talk not only about your accomplishments in the classroom, but also in the competitive arena. No, dont worry, I'm not going to talk about that. We all know about this university's proud and storied football team, but I also hear that Notre Dame holds the largest outdoor 5-on-5 basketball tournament in the world — Bookstore Basketball.Now this excites me. I want to congratulate the winners of this year's tournament, a team by the name of Hallelujah Holla Back. Congratulations. Well done. Though I have to say, I am personally disappointed that the Barack OBallers did not pull it out this year. So next year, if you need a 6-2 forward with a decent jumper, you know where I live.Every one of you should be proud of what you have achieved at this institution. One hundred and sixty-three classes of Notre Dame graduates have sat where you sit today. Some were here during years that simply rolled into the next without much notice or fanfare — periods of relative peace and prosperity that required little by way of sacrifice or struggle.You, however, are not getting off that easy. You have a different deal. Your class has come of age at a moment of great consequence for our nation and for the world — a rare inflection point in history where the size and scope of the challenges before us require that we remake our world to renew its promise; that we align our deepest values and commitments to the demands of a new age. It's a privilege and a responsibility afforded to few generations — and a task that youre now called to fulfill.This generation, your generation is the one that must find a path back to prosperity and decide how we respond to a global economy that left millions behind even before the most recent crisis hit — an economy where greed and short-term thinking were too often rewarded at the expense of fairness, and diligence, and an honest day's work.

Your generation must decide how to save God's creation from a changing climate that threatens to destroy it. Your generation must seek peace at a time when there are those who will stop at nothing to do us harm, and when weapons in the hands of a few can destroy the many. And we must find a way to reconcile our ever-shrinking world with its ever-growing diversity — diversity of thought, diversity of culture, and diversity of belief.In short, we must find a way to live together as one human family. And it's this last challenge that Id like to talk about today, despite the fact that Father John stole all my best lines. For the major threats we face in the 21st century — whether it's global recession or violent extremism; the spread of nuclear weapons or pandemic disease — these things do not discriminate. They do not recognize borders. They do not see color. They do not target specific ethnic groups.

Moreover, no one person, or religion, or nation can meet these challenges alone. Our very survival has never required greater cooperation and greater understanding among all people from all places than at this moment in history.Unfortunately, finding that common ground — recognizing that our fates are tied up, as Dr. King said, in a single garment of destiny — is not easy. And part of the problem, of course, lies in the imperfections of man — our selfishness, our pride, our stubbornness, our acquisitiveness, our insecurities, our egos; all the cruelties large and small that those of us in the Christian tradition understand to be rooted in original sin. We too often seek advantage over others. We cling to outworn prejudice and fear those who are unfamiliar. Too many of us view life only through the lens of immediate self-interest and crass materialism; in which the world is necessarily a zero-sum game. The strong too often dominate the weak, and too many of those with wealth and with power find all manner of justification for their own privilege in the face of poverty and injustice. And so, for all our technology and scientific advances, we see here in this country and around the globe violence and want and strife that would seem sadly familiar to those in ancient times.We know these things; and hopefully one of the benefits of the wonderful education that you've received here at Notre Dame is that you've had time to consider these wrongs in the world; perhaps recognized impulses in yourself that you want to leave behind. You've grown determined, each in your own way, to right them. And yet, one of the vexing things for those of us interested in promoting greater understanding and cooperation among people is the discovery that even bringing together persons of good will, bringing together men and women of principle and purpose — even accomplishing that can be difficult. The soldier and the lawyer may both love this country with equal passion, and yet reach very different conclusions on the specific steps needed to protect us from harm. The gay activist and the evangelical pastor may both deplore the ravages of HIV/AIDS, but find themselves unable to bridge the cultural divide that might unite their efforts. Those who speak out against stem cell research may be rooted in an admirable conviction about the sacredness of life, but so are the parents of a child with juvenile diabetes who are convinced that their son's or daughter's hardships can be relieved.

The question, then — the question then is how do we work through these conflicts? Is it possible for us to join hands in common effort? As citizens of a vibrant and varied democracy, how do we engage in vigorous debate? How does each of us remain firm in our principles, and fight for what we consider right, without, as Father John said, demonizing those with just as strongly held convictions on the other side? And of course, nowhere do these questions come up more powerfully than on the issue of abortion.As I considered the controversy surrounding my visit here, I was reminded of an encounter I had during my Senate campaign, one that I describe in a book I wrote called The Audacity of Hope. A few days after I won the Democratic nomination, I received an e-mail from a doctor who told me that while he voted for me in the Illinois primary, he had a serious concern that might prevent him from voting for me in the general election. He described himself as a Christian who was strongly pro-life — but that was not what was preventing him potentially from voting for me. What bothered the doctor was an entry that my campaign staff had posted on my Web site — an entry that said I would fight right-wing ideologues who want to take away a woman's right to choose.The doctor said he had assumed I was a reasonable person, he supported my policy initiatives to help the poor and to lift up our educational system, but that if I truly believed that every pro-life individual was simply an ideologue who wanted to inflict suffering on women, then I was not very reasonable. He wrote, I do not ask at this point that you oppose abortion, only that you speak about this issue in fair-minded words.Fair-minded words. After I read the doctor's letter, I wrote back to him and I thanked him. And I didn't change my underlying position, but I did tell my staff to change the words on my Web site. And I said a prayer that night that I might extend the same presumption of good faith to others that the doctor had extended to me. Because when we do that — when we open up our hearts and our minds to those who may not think precisely like we do or believe precisely what we believe — that's when we discover at least the possibility of common ground.That's when we begin to say, Maybe we won't agree on abortion, but we can still agree that this heart-wrenching decision for any woman is not made casually, it has both moral and spiritual dimensions.

So let us work together to reduce the number of women seeking abortions, let's reduce unintended pregnancies. Let's make adoption more available. Let's provide care and support for women who do carry their children to term. Let's honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health care policies are grounded not only in sound science, but also in clear ethics, as well as respect for the equality of women.Those are things we can do. Now, understand — understand, Class of 2009, I do not suggest that the debate surrounding abortion can or should go away. Because no matter how much we may want to fudge it — indeed, while we know that the views of most Americans on the subject are complex and even contradictory — the fact is that at some level, the views of the two camps are irreconcilable. Each side will continue to make its case to the public with passion and conviction. But surely we can do so without reducing those with differing views to caricature. Open hearts. Open minds. Fair-minded words. It's a way of life that has always been the Notre Dame tradition. Father Hesburgh has long spoken of this institution as both a lighthouse and a crossroads. A lighthouse that stands apart, shining with the wisdom of the Catholic tradition, while the crossroads is where differences of culture and religion and conviction can coexist with friendship, civility, hospitality, and especially love.And I want to join him and Father John in saying how inspired I am by the maturity and responsibility with which this class has approached the debate surrounding today's ceremony. You are an example of what Notre Dame is about. This tradition of cooperation and understanding is one that I learned in my own life many years ago — also with the help of the Catholic Church.You see, I was not raised in a particularly religious household, but my mother instilled in me a sense of service and empathy that eventually led me to become a community organizer after I graduated college. And a group of Catholic churches in Chicago helped fund an organization known as the Developing Communities Project, and we worked to lift up South Side neighborhoods that had been devastated when the local steel plant closed. And it was quite an eclectic crew — Catholic and Protestant churches, Jewish and African American organizers, working-class black, white, and Hispanic residents — all of us with different experiences, all of us with different beliefs. But all of us learned to work side by side because all of us saw in these neighborhoods other human beings who needed our help — to find jobs and improve schools. We were bound together in the service of others.

And something else happened during the time I spent in these neighborhoods — perhaps because the church folks I worked with were so welcoming and understanding; perhaps because they invited me to their services and sang with me from their hymnals; perhaps because I was really broke and they fed me. Perhaps because I witnessed all of the good works their faith inspired them to perform, I found myself drawn not just to the work with the church; I was drawn to be in the church. It was through this service that I was brought to Christ. And at the time, Cardinal Joseph Bernardin was the Archbishop of Chicago. For those of you too young to have known him or known of him, he was a kind and good and wise man. A saintly man. I can still remember him speaking at one of the first organizing meetings I attended on the South Side. He stood as both a lighthouse and a crossroads — unafraid to speak his mind on moral issues ranging from poverty and AIDS and abortion to the death penalty and nuclear war. And yet, he was congenial and gentle in his persuasion, always trying to bring people together, always trying to find common ground. Just before he died, a reporter asked Cardinal Bernardin about this approach to his ministry. And he said,You can't really get on with preaching the Gospel until you've touched hearts and minds.My heart and mind were touched by him. They were touched by the words and deeds of the men and women I worked alongside in parishes across Chicago. And Id like to think that we touched the hearts and minds of the neighborhood families whose lives we helped change. For this, I believe, is our highest calling. Now, you, Class of 2009, are about to enter the next phase of your life at a time of great uncertainty. You'll be called to help restore a free market that's also fair to all who are willing to work. You'll be called to seek new sources of energy that can save our planet; to give future generations the same chance that you had to receive an extraordinary education. And whether as a person drawn to public service, or simply someone who insists on being an active citizen, you will be exposed to more opinions and ideas broadcast through more means of communication than ever existed before. You'll hear talking heads scream on cable, and you'll read blogs that claim definitive knowledge, and you will watch politicians pretend they know what they're talking about. Occasionally, you may have the great fortune of actually seeing important issues debated by people who do know what they're talking about — by well-intentioned people with brilliant minds and mastery of the facts. In fact, I suspect that some of you will be among those brightest stars. And in this world of competing claims about what is right and what is true, have confidence in the values with which you've been raised and educated. Be unafraid to speak your mind when those values are at stake. Hold firm to your faith and allow it to guide you on your journey. In other words, stand as a lighthouse.But remember, too, that you can be a crossroads. Remember, too, that the ultimate irony of faith is that it necessarily admits doubt. It's the belief in things not seen. It's beyond our capacity as human beings to know with certainty what God has planned for us or what He asks of us. And those of us who believe must trust that His wisdom is greater than our own.

And this doubt should not push us away our faith. But it should humble us. It should temper our passions, cause us to be wary of too much self-righteousness. It should compel us to remain open and curious and eager to continue the spiritual and moral debate that began for so many of you within the walls of Notre Dame. And within our vast democracy, this doubt should remind us even as we cling to our faith to persuade through reason, through an appeal whenever we can to universal rather than parochial principles, and most of all through an abiding example of good works and charity and kindness and service that moves hearts and minds. For if there is one law that we can be most certain of, it is the law that binds people of all faiths and no faith together. It's no coincidence that it exists in Christianity and Judaism; in Islam and Hinduism; in Buddhism and humanism. It is, of course, the Golden Rule — the call to treat one another as we wish to be treated. The call to love. The call to serve. To do what we can to make a difference in the lives of those with whom we share the same brief moment on this Earth. So many of you at Notre Dame — by the last count, upwards of 80 percent — have lived this law of love through the service you've performed at schools and hospitals; international relief agencies and local charities. Brennan is just one example of what your class has accomplished. That's incredibly impressive, a powerful testament to this institution. Now you must carry the tradition forward. Make it a way of life. Because when you serve, it doesn't just improve your community, it makes you a part of your community. It breaks down walls. It fosters cooperation. And when that happens — when people set aside their differences, even for a moment, to work in common effort toward a common goal; when they struggle together, and sacrifice together, and learn from one another — then all things are possible.After all, I stand here today, as President and as an African American, on the 55th anniversary of the day that the Supreme Court handed down the decision in Brown v. Board of Education. Now, Brown was of course the first major step in dismantling the separate but equal doctrine, but it would take a number of years and a nationwide movement to fully realize the dream of civil rights for all of God's children. There were freedom rides and lunch counters and Billy clubs, and there was also a Civil Rights Commission appointed by President Eisenhower. It was the 12 resolutions recommended by this commission that would ultimately become law in the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

There were six members of this commission. It included five whites and one African American; Democrats and Republicans; two Southern governors, the dean of a Southern law school, a Midwestern university president, and your own Father Ted Hesburgh, President of Notre Dame. So they worked for two years, and at times, President Eisenhower had to intervene personally since no hotel or restaurant in the South would serve the black and white members of the commission together. And finally, when they reached an impasse in Louisiana, Father Ted flew them all to Notre Dame's retreat in Land OLakes, Wisconsin — where they eventually overcame their differences and hammered out a final deal. And years later, President Eisenhower asked Father Ted how on Earth he was able to broker an agreement between men of such different backgrounds and beliefs. And Father Ted simply said that during their first dinner in Wisconsin, they discovered they were all fishermen. And so he quickly readied a boat for a twilight trip out on the lake. They fished, and they talked, and they changed the course of history.I will not pretend that the challenges we face will be easy, or that the answers will come quickly, or that all our differences and divisions will fade happily away — because life is not that simple. It never has been. But as you leave here today, remember the lessons of Cardinal Bernardin, of Father Hesburgh, of movements for change both large and small. Remember that each of us, endowed with the dignity possessed by all children of God, has the grace to recognize ourselves in one another; to understand that we all seek the same love of family, the same fulfillment of a life well lived. Remember that in the end, in some way we are all fishermen.

If nothing else, that knowledge should give us faith that through our collective labor, and God's providence, and our willingness to shoulder each other's burdens, America will continue on its precious journey towards that more perfect union. Congratulations, Class of 2009. May God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America.

Empire Falls by Robert A. Pape
01.22.2009

AMERICA IS in unprecedented decline. The self-inflicted wounds of the Iraq War, growing government debt, increasingly negative current-account balances and other internal economic weaknesses have cost the United States real power in today’s world of rapidly spreading knowledge and technology. If present trends continue, we will look back at the Bush administration years as the death knell for American hegemony.

Since the cold war, the United States has maintained a vast array of overseas commitments, seeking to ensure peace and stability not just in its own neighborhood—the Americas—but also in Europe and Asia, along with the oil-rich Persian Gulf (as well as other parts of the world). Simply maintaining these commitments requires enormous resources, but in recent years American leaders have pursued far more ambitious goals than merely maintaining the status quo. The Bush administration has not just continued America’s traditional grand strategy, but pursued ambitious objectives in all three major regions at the same time—waging wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, seeking to denuclearize North Korea and expanding America’s military allies in Europe up to the borders of Russia itself.

For nearly two decades, those convinced of U.S. dominance in the international system have encouraged American policy makers to act unilaterally and seize almost any opportunity to advance American interests no matter the costs to others, virtually discounting the possibility that Germany, France, Russia, China and other major powers could seriously oppose American military power. From public intellectuals like Charles Krauthammer and Niall Ferguson to neoconservatives like Paul Wolfowitz and Robert Kagan, even to academicians like Dartmouth’s William Wohlforth and Stephen Brooks, all believe the principal feature of the post-cold-war world is the unchallengeable dominance of American power. The United States is not just the sole superpower in the unipolar-dominance school’s world, but is so relatively more powerful than any other country that it can reshape the international order according to American interests. This is simply no longer realistic.

For the past eight years, our policies have been based on these flawed arguments, while the ultimate foundation of American power—the relative superiority of the U.S. economy in the world—has been in decline since early on in the Bush administration. There is also good reason to think that, without deliberate action, the fall of American power will be more precipitous with the passage of time. To be sure, the period of U.S. relative decline has been, thus far, fairly short. A healthy appreciation of our situation by American leaders may lead to policies that could mitigate, if not rectify, further decline in the foreseeable future. Still, America’s shrinking share of world economic production is a fact of life and important changes in U.S. grand strategy are necessary to prevent the decline in America’s global position from accelerating.

Although the immediate problems of war in Iraq and Afghanistan, al-Qaeda’s new sanctuary in western Pakistan, Iran’s continued nuclear program and Russia’s recent military adventure in Georgia are high-priority issues, solutions to each of them individually and all of them collectively will be heavily influenced by America’s reduced power position in the world. Most important, America’s declining power means that the unipolar world is indeed coming to an end, that major powers will increasingly have the strength to balance against U.S. policies they oppose and that the United States will increasingly face harsh foreign-policy choices. Like so many great powers that have come and gone before, our own hubris may be our downfall.

FROM ROME, Imperial China, Venice, Spain, France, Great Britain and the Soviet Union to the United States today, the rise and fall of great nations has been driven primarily by relative economic strength. As Paul Kennedy so ably describes in his classic The Rise and Fall of Great Powers, the more international commitments a state has, the more its power matters and hence the more relative economic strength it needs.

Although scholars have long debated its nuances, the basic definition of power in international politics is simple: power is the aggregate resources a state has at its disposal to achieve its aims, the most important of which are to defend its national interests, both at home and abroad.1 But it is not only how much power a state has that matters. It is also how much power a state has relative to other states. This is true in any rough-and-tumble environment. A Ford Explorer is a powerful vehicle—unless it collides with a Mack Truck. In international politics, power does not ensure success. But, power certainly helps.

At any given moment, U.S. power is heavily dependent on the size and quality of its military forces and other current power assets. A successful grand strategy, however, must work for the long haul and so depends on the power a state is able to produce in the future.

Over time, America’s power is fundamentally a result of its economic strength. Productive capacity—defined by indicators such as wealth, technology and population size—is a prerequisite for building and modernizing military forces. The United States, like any state, may choose to vary the degree to which its productive capacities are used to create military assets. But it is the economy as a whole that constrains the choice. And the size of the economy relative to potential rivals ultimately determines the limits of power in international politics. Major assessments of this relative position have long turned heavily on a single statistic: America’s share of world economic product.

Percentage of world product (other measures).
Advocates of extending America’s unipolar dominance are well aware of the central importance of the economic foundations of American power and routinely present detailed statistics on the U.S. share of world product. The basic notion is simple: take U.S. domestic product in any year and divide it by the aggregate total of the gross domestic product of all states in the world. To measure gross domestic product, the unipolar-dominance school prefers to compare every country’s output in current-year U.S. dollars, a method that tends to show America is much further ahead of other countries than alternative measures. Indeed, the most recent call for America to exploit its hegemonic position (published in 2008) rests on the presumption of U.S. dominance based on the current-year dollar figures.2 By this metric, in 2006 the United States had 28 percent of world product while its nearest most likely competitor, China, had 6 percent. Looks pretty good for America, right?

Alas, single-year snapshots of America’s relative power are of limited value for assessing the sustainability of its grand strategy over many years. For grand-strategic concerns—especially how well the United States can balance its resources and foreign-policy commitments—the trajectory of American power compared to other states is of seminal importance.

For the sake of argument, let us start with the unipolar-dominance school’s preferred measure of American hegemony, but look at the trajectory of the data over time. According to GDP figures in current U.S. dollars from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the United States increased its share of world production during the 1990s, reached its apogee in 2000, and then began to steadily lose ground during the eight years of the Bush administration, with its relative power ultimately falling by nearly a quarter in the first decade of the twenty-first century. At the same time, the relative power of China, the state many consider America’s most likely future rival, has grown consistently. If we look out as far as the IMF can see (2013), things get even worse—with the United States expected to continue declining and China to continue rising. The United States has been going through the first decade of the twenty-first century not stronger than before, but substantially weaker.

Uneven growth rates.
How good are the numbers? Economists commonly use two other methods to calculate GDP, constant-dollar calculations and purchasing power parity.3 Although each offers advantages and disadvantages, for our purposes what matters is that they form a lower bound of America’s relative decline. And regardless of the metric, the trend is the same. Again using IMF figures, Table 2 shows the trajectory of the share of world product for the United States and China using both alternative measures.

Simply put, the United States is now a declining power. This new reality has tremendous implications for the future of American grand strategy.

THE EROSION of the underpinnings of U.S. power is the result of uneven rates of economic growth between America, China and other states in the world. Despite all the pro-economy talk from the Bush administration, the fact is that since 2000, U.S. growth rates are down almost 50 percent from the Clinton years. This trajectory is almost sure to be revised further downward as the consequences of the financial crisis in fall 2008 become manifest.

As Table 3 shows, over the past two decades, the average rate of U.S. growth has fallen considerably, from nearly 4 percent annually during the Clinton years to just over 2 percent per year under Bush. At the same time, China has sustained a consistently high rate of growth of 10 percent per year—a truly stunning performance. Russia has also turned its economic trajectory around, from year after year of losses in the 1990s to significant annual gains since 2000.

Worse, America’s decline was well under way before the economic downturn, which is likely to only further weaken U.S. power. As the most recent growth estimates (November 2008) by the IMF make clear, although all major countries are suffering economically, China and Russia are expected to continue growing at a substantially greater rate than the United States.

True, the United States has not lost its position as the most innovative country in the world, with more patents each year than in all other countries combined. However, the ability to diffuse new technology—to turn chalkboard ideas into mass-produced applications—has been spreading rapidly across many parts of the globe, and with it the ultimate sources of state power—productive capacities.

GDP annual percent change 2007 to 2009.
America is losing its overwhelming technological dominance in the leading industries of the knowledge economy. In past eras—the age of iron and the age of steel—leading states retained their technological advantages for many decades.4 As Fareed Zakaria describes in his recent book, The Post-American World, technology and knowledge diffuse more quickly today, and their rapid global diffusion is a profound factor driving down America’s power compared to other countries. For instance, although the United States remains well ahead of China on many indicators of leading technology on a per capita basis, this grossly under-weights the size of the knowledge economy in China compared to America. Whereas in 2000, the United States had three times the computer sales, five times the internet users and forty times the broadband subscribers as China, in 2008, the Chinese have caught or nearly caught up with Americans in every category in the aggregate.5 The fact that the United States remains ahead of China on a per capita basis does matter—it means that China, with more than four times the U.S. population, can create many more knowledge workers in the future.

So, how much is U.S. decline due to the global diffusion of technology, U.S. economic weaknesses under Bush or China’s superior economic performance?

Although precise answers are not possible, one can gain a rough weighting of the factors behind America’s shrinking share of world production by asking a few simple counterfactual questions of the data. What would happen if we assumed that the United States grew during the Bush years at the same rate as during Clinton’s? What would have happened had the world continued on its same trajectory, but we assume China did not grow at such an astounding rate? Of course, these are merely thought experiments, which leave out all manner of technical problems like interaction effects. Still, these back-of-the-envelope approximations serve as useful starting points.

The answers are pretty straightforward. Had the American economy grown at the (Clinton) rate of 3.7 percent per year from 2000 to 2008 instead of the (Bush) rate of 2.2 percent, the United States would have had a bigger economy in absolute terms and would have lost less power relative to others. Assuming the rest of the world continued at its actual rate of growth, America’s share of world product in 2008 would have risen to 25.2 percent instead of its actual 23.1 percent.6 When compared to the share of gross world product lost by the United States from 2000 to 2008—7.7 percent—the assumed marginal gain of 2.1 percent of world product amounts to some 27 percent of the U.S. decline.

How much does China matter? Imagine the extreme case—that China had not grown, and the United States and the rest of the world continued along their actual path of economic growth since 2000. If so, America’s share of world product in 2008 would be 24.3 percent, or 1.2 percent more than today. When compared to the share of world product lost by the United States from 2000 to 2008—7.7 percent—the assumed marginal gain of 1.2 percent of world product accounts for about 15 percent of the U.S. decline.

Percentage of European product, 1890 to 1910, 1913 to 1938.
These estimates suggest that roughly a quarter of America’s relative decline is due to U.S. economic weaknesses (spending on the Iraq War, tax cuts, current-account deficits, etc.), a sixth to China’s superior performance and just over half to the spread of technology to the rest of the world. In other words, self-inflicted wounds of the Bush years significantly exacerbated America’s decline, both by making the decline steeper and faster and crowding out productive investment that could have stimulated innovation to improve matters.

All of this has led to one of the most significant declines of any state since the mid-nineteenth century. And when one examines past declines and their consequences, it becomes clear both that the U.S. fall is remarkable and that dangerous instability in the international system may lie ahead. If we end up believing in the wishful thinking of unipolar dominance forever, the costs could be far higher than a simple percentage drop in share of world product.

THE UNITED States has always prided itself on exceptionalism, and the U.S. downfall is indeed extraordinary. Something fundamental has changed. America’s relative decline since 2000 of some 30 percent represents a far greater loss of relative power in a shorter time than any power shift among European great powers from roughly the end of the Napoleonic Wars to World War II. It is one of the largest relative declines in modern history. Indeed, in size, it is clearly surpassed by only one other great-power decline, the unexpected internal collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Most disturbing, whenever there are major changes in the balance of power, conflict routinely ensues. Examining the historical record reveals an important pattern: the states facing the largest declines in power compared to other major powers were apt to be the target of opportunistic aggression. And this is surely not the only possible danger from relative decline; states on the power wane also have a history of launching preventive wars to strengthen their positions. All of this suggests that major relative declines are often accompanied by highly dangerous international environments. So, these declines matter not just in terms of economics, but also because of their destabilizing consequences.

Tsarist Russia presents the first case in point. Compared to other great powers on the European continent, its power declined the most during the mid-nineteenth century. And, it became the target of opportunistic aggression by the state with the greatest rising power, Great Britain, during the Crimean War (1854–1856). Indeed, the consequences of Russia’s decline were not fully recognizable until the war itself. Though Russia was still a great power and the war cost Britain and France more than expected, Russia emerged the clear loser. Russia’s inability to defend the status quo in the Crimea confirmed its grand-strategic weaknesses, and ultimately left it worse-off than had it anticipated its vulnerabilities and sought to negotiate a reduction in its military commitments to the region peacefully. Considering that the Crimea conflict left Russia with fairly gaping wounds, and that even its slow 10 percent decline in relative power over twenty years left the country bruised and battered, one might wonder how our far more rapid descent might play out.

Percentage of world product.
Meanwhile, similar destabilization occurred in the two decades before World War I and before World War II, when France and Great Britain were declining European powers. In both instances, France and Britain became targets of opportunistic aggression by one of the strongest rising powers in the region: Germany. And as a small cottage industry of scholarship suggests, Germany’s fairly modest relative declines compared to Russia prior to World War I and the Soviet Union prior to World War II encouraged German leaders to wage preventive wars. Again, these declines occurred as another power was concomitantly rising (Germany in the case of France and Britain, and Russia—later the Soviet Union—relative to Germany). Of course, this only served to increase the danger. But again, these rises and falls were less precipitous than America’s current losses, and our descent appears far trickier to navigate.

As we look to address our current fall from grace, lest we forget, the United States faced two major declines of its power during the cold war as well. Neither was without risk. The first occurred shortly after World War II, when the devastation of the Soviet, European and many Asian economies, combined with the increasingly productive American economy, left the United States with a far larger share of gross world product—41 percent in 1948—than it even possessed in the age of unipolar dominance beginning in 1991. As the war-torn economies recovered, U.S. share of world product fell 20 percent by 1961 while that of its main rival, the Soviet Union, grew by 167 percent. This relative American decline corresponds to the height of U.S.-Soviet cold-war rivalry in Europe and Asia. Eight of the nine U.S.-Soviet nuclear crises occurred from 1948–1962, all of which involved efforts by the Soviet Union or its allies to revise the political status quo in their favor7—that is, all could be reasonably interpreted as instances in which the United States or its allies became the targets of opportunistic aggression.

The second major U.S. relative decline occurred from 1970 to 1980, when the U.S. share of world product fell 27 percent. This decade brought with it challenges to America’s position in the world. This was especially true toward the end of the decade with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the Iranian Revolution, which collectively increased concern about Soviet dominance of Persian Gulf oil. However, the 1970s was mainly a period of détente between the cold-war protagonists, which corresponds to the fact that the shares of world product for both the United States and the Soviet Union were in decline. In other words, it is reasonable to think that America’s decline in the 1970s did not lead to more significant trouble for the United States because its main rival was descending even faster.

Clearly, major shifts in the balance of power in the international system often lead to instability and conflict. And America’s current predicament is far more severe. This time, our relative decline of 32 percent is accompanied, not by an even-steeper decline of our near-peer competitor, but rather by a 144 percent increase in China’s relative position. Further, the rapid spread of technology and technological breakthroughs means that one great discovery does not buoy an already-strong state to decades-long predominance. And with a rising China—with raw resources of population, landmass and increasing adoption of leading technology—a true peer competitor is looming. America’s current, rapid domestic economic decline is merely accelerating our own downfall.

The distinct quality of a system with only one superpower is that no other single state is powerful enough to balance against it. A true global hegemon is more powerful still—stronger than all second-ranked powers acting as members of a counterbalancing coalition seeking to contain the unipolar leader. By these standards, America’s relative decline is fundamentally changing international politics, and is fundamentally different from Russia circa 1850 and Great Britain circa 1910.

In current-U.S.-dollar terms—the preferred measure of the unipolar-dominance school—the United States has already fallen far from being a global hegemon and unipolarity itself is waning, since China will soon have as much economic potential to balance the United States as did the Soviet Union during the cold war.

At the beginning of the 1990s, the United States was indeed not only stronger than any other state individually, but its power relative to even the collective power of all other major states combined grew from 1990 to 2000. Although the growth was small, America almost reached the crucial threshold of 50 percent of major-power product necessary to become a true global hegemon. So it is understandable that we were lulled into a sense of security, believing we could do as we wished, whenever and wherever we wished. The instability and danger of the cold war quickly became a distant memory.

Near the time of the Iraq War, it would have required virtually every major power to actively oppose the United States in order to assemble a counterbalancing coalition that could approximate America’s potential power. Under the circumstances, hard, military balancing against the United States was not a serious possibility. So, it is not surprising that major powers opted for soft-balancing measures—relying on institutional, economic and diplomatic tools to oppose American military power. And yet we are beginning to see the conflict of history repeat itself.

Even with less relative power, in the run-up to the Iraq War, people grossly underrated the ability of Germany, France, Russia and China, along with important regional powers like Turkey, to soft balance against the United States; for instance, to use the United Nations to delay, complicate and ultimately deny the use of one-third of U.S. combat power (the Fourth Infantry Division) in the opening months of the Iraq War. This is not yet great-power war of the kind seen in centuries past, but it harkens the instability that future unilateral efforts may trigger.

The balance of world power circa 2008 and 2013 shows a disturbing trend. True, the United States remains stronger than any other state individually, but its power to stand up to the collective opposition of other major powers is falling precipitously. Though these worlds depict potential power, not active counterbalancing coalitions, and this type of alliance may never form, nonetheless, American relative power is declining to the point where even subsets of major powers acting in concert could produce sufficient military power to stand a reasonable chance of successfully opposing American military policies.

Indeed, if present trends continue to 2013 and beyond, China and Russia, along with any one of the other major powers, would have sufficient economic capacity to mount military opposition at least as serious as did the Soviet Union during the cold war. And it is worth remembering that the Soviet Union never had more than about half the world product of the United States, which China alone is likely to reach in the coming decade. The faults in the arguments of the unipolar-dominance school are being brought into sharp relief. The world is slowly coming into balance. Whether or not this will be another period of great-power transition coupled with an increasing risk of war will largely depend on how America can navigate its decline. Policy makers must act responsibly in this new era or risk international opposition that poses far greater costs and far greater dangers.

A COHERENT grand strategy seeks to balance a state’s economic resources and its foreign-policy commitments and to sustain that balance over time. For America, a coherent grand strategy also calls for rectifying the current imbalance between our means and our ends, adopting policies that enhance the former and modify the latter.

Clearly, the United States is not the first great power to suffer long-term decline—we should learn from history. Great powers in decline seem to almost instinctively spend more on military forces in order to shore up their disintegrating strategic positions, and some like Germany go even further, shoring up their security by adopting preventive military strategies, beyond defensive alliances, to actively stop a rising competitor from becoming dominant.

For declining great powers, the allure of preventive war—or lesser measures to merely firmly contain a rising power—has a more compelling logic than many might assume. Since Thucydides, scholars of international politics have famously argued that a declining hegemon and rising challenger must necessarily face such intense security competition that hegemonic war to retain dominance over the international system is almost a foregone conclusion. Robert Gilpin, one of the deans of realism who taught for decades at Princeton, believed that the first and most attractive response to a society’s decline is to eliminate the source of the problem . . . [by] what we shall call a hegemonic war.

Yet, waging war just to keep another state down has turned out to be one of the great losing strategies in history. The Napoleonic Wars, the Austro-Prussian War, the Franco-Prussian War, German aggression in World War I, and German and Japanese aggression in World War II were all driven by declining powers seeking to use war to improve their future security. All lost control of events they thought they could control. All suffered ugly defeats. All were worse-off than had they not attacked.

As China rises, America must avoid this great-power trap. It would be easy to think that greater American military efforts could offset the consequences of China’s increasing power and possibly even lead to the formation of a multilateral strategy to contain China in the future. Indeed, when China’s economic star began to rise in the 1990s, numerous voices called for precisely this, noting that on current trajectories China would overtake the United States as the world’s leading economic power by 2050.8 Now, as that date draws nearer—indeed, current-dollar calculations put the crossover point closer to 2040—and with Beijing evermore dependent on imported oil for continued economic growth, one might think the case for actively containing China is all the stronger.

Absent provocative military adventures by Beijing, however, U.S. military efforts to contain the rising power are most likely doomed to failure. China’s growth turns mainly on domestic issues—such as shifting the workforce from rural to urban areas—that are beyond the ability of outside powers to significantly influence. Although China’s growth also depends on external sources of oil, there is no way to exploit this vulnerability short of obviously hostile alliances (with India, Indonesia, Taiwan and Japan) and clearly aggressive military measures (controlling the sea-lanes from the Persian Gulf to Asia) that together could deny oil to China. Any efforts along these lines would likely backfire—and only exacerbate America’s problems, increasing the risk of counterbalancing.

Even more insidious is the risk of overstretch. This self-reinforcing spiral escalates current spending to maintain increasingly costly military commitments, crowding out productive investment for future growth.

Today, the cold-war framework of significant troop deployments to Europe, Asia and the Persian Gulf is coming unglued. We cannot afford to keep our previous promises. With American forces bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan and mounting troubles in Iran and Pakistan, the United States has all but gutted its military commitments to Europe, reducing our troop levels far below the one hundred thousand of the 1990s. Nearly half have been shifted to Iraq and elsewhere. Little wonder that Russia found an opportunity to demonstrate the hollowness of the Bush administration’s plan for expanding NATO to Russia’s borders by scoring a quick and decisive military victory over Georgia that America was helpless to prevent. If a large-scale conventional war between China and Taiwan broke out in the near future, one must wonder whether America would significantly shift air and naval power away from its ongoing wars in the Middle East in order to live up to its global commitments. If the United States could not readily manage wars in Iraq and Afghanistan at the same time, could it really wage a protracted struggle in Asia as well? And as the gap between America’s productive resources and global commitments grows, why will others pass up opportunities to take advantage of America’s overstretched grand strategy?

Since the end of the cold war, American leaders have consistently claimed the ability to maintain a significant forward-leaning military presence in the three major regions of the globe and, if necessary, to wage two major regional wars at the same time. The harsh reality is that the United States no longer has the economic capacity for such an ambitious grand strategy. With 30 percent of the world’s product, the United States could imagine maintaining this hope. Nearing 20 percent, it cannot.

Yet, just withdrawing American troops from Iraq is not enough to put America’s grand strategy into balance. Even assuming a fairly quick and problem-free drawdown, the risks of instability in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere in the region are likely to remain for many years to come. Further, even under the most optimistic scenarios, America is likely to remain dependent on imported oil for decades. Together, these factors point toward the Persian Gulf remaining the most important region in American grand strategy.

So, as Europe and Asia continue to be low-order priorities, Washington must think creatively and look for opportunities to make strategic trades. America needs to share the burden of regional security with its allies and continue to draw down our troop levels in Europe and Asia, even considering the attendant risks. The days when the United States could effectively solve the security problems of its allies in these regions almost on its own are coming to an end. True, spreading defense burdens more equally will not be easy and will be fraught with its own costs and risks. However, this is simply part of the price of America’s declining relative power.

The key principle is for America to gain international support among regional powers like Russia and China for its vital national-security objectives by adjusting less important U.S. policies. For instance, Russia may well do more to discourage Iran’s nuclear program in return for less U.S. pressure to expand NATO to its borders.

And of course America needs to develop a plan to reinvigorate the competitiveness of its economy. Recently, Harvard’s Michael Porter issued an economic blueprint to renew America’s environment for innovation. The heart of his plan is to remove the obstacles to increasing investment in science and technology. A combination of targeted tax, fiscal and education policies to stimulate more productive investment over the long haul is a sensible domestic component to America’s new grand strategy. But it would be misguided to assume that the United States could easily regain its previously dominant economic position, since the world will likely remain globally competitive.

To justify postponing this restructuring of its grand strategy, America would need a firm expectation of high rates of economic growth over the next several years. There is no sign of such a burst on the horizon. Misguided efforts to extract more security from a declining economic base only divert potential resources from investment in the economy, trapping the state in an ever-worsening strategic dilemma. This approach has done little for great powers in the past, and America will likely be no exception when it comes to the inevitable costs of desperate policy making.

The United States is not just declining. Unipolarity is becoming obsolete, other states are rising to counter American power and the United States is losing much of its strategic freedom. Washington must adopt more realistic foreign commitments.

SINCE 2000, a systemic change has been occurring in the economic foundations of America’s relative power, and it may fall even further in the foreseeable future. None of the dramatic consequences for U.S. grand strategy is likely to be immediate, but neither are those effects easily avoidable. For nearly two decades, the United States has experienced tremendous latitude in how it chooses to conduct itself in the world. But that latitude is now shrinking, and American policy makers must face facts. With the right grand strategy, however, America can mitigate the consequences of its relative decline, and possibly even reverse it.

Robert A. Pape is a professor of political science at the University of Chicago.

The author would like to thank Felicity Bloom, Daragh Grant, Jacob Homan, Chaim Kaufmann, Nuno Monteiro and especially Ken Feldman.
1 For excellent discussions of the concept of power, see John Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York: W. W. Norton, 2001), ch. 3; and Edward Vose Gulick, Europe’s Classical Balance of Power (New York: W. W. Norton, 1955), ch 1.
2 Stephen G. Brooks and William C. Wohlforth, World Out of Balance: International Relations and the Challenge of American Primacy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008), 32.
3 For explanations of different measures of gross domestic product, see glossaries for the International Monetary Fund, World Economic Outlook Database (October 2008) and World Bank, World Development Indicators (2008), both available online.
4 For a classic study of the diffusion of technology in past eras, see David S. Landes, The Unbound Prometheus: Technological Change and Industrial Development in Western Europe from 1750 to Present (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1969).
5 See the Global Market Information Database; CIA World Factbook for the above dates; the National Science Board’s Science and Engineering Indicators 2008; Nationmaster.com; and International Telecommunication Union’s International Communication Statistics, 2007.All were accessed online from August to October 2008.
6 This counterfactual calculation and the one in the next paragraph rely on the current-dollar method preferred by the unipolar-dominance school.
7 Richard K. Betts, Nuclear Blackmail and Nuclear Balance (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 1987).
8 For instance, Richard Bernstein and Ross H. Munro, The Coming Conflict with China (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1997).

CHARLIE MEETS BILDERBERG DICTATORSHIP POLICE STATE

WELL FOLKS AFTER READING THIS YOU WILL KNOW WHAT THE WORLD WILL BE LIKE UNDER THE FUTURE EU WORLD DICTATOR AND OBAMA IS GIVING UP AMERICA TO THE EU DICTATOR.SO HERE WE COME DICTATORSHIP GET READY AMERICA,WORLD.

ITS INTERESTING THE DICTATORSHIP IS SO STRONG ALREADY IN THE EU AS THESE WORLD GOVERNMENT,OCCULT ENVIROMENTAL,TAX GRABING ROBBERS THE BILDERBERGS WANT THE WHOLE WORLD IN THIS POLICE STATE LIKE THE LAST 4 DAYS.IT WAS IN GREECE WERE THEY HAD THIS DICTATORSHIP MEETING OF WORLD DOMINATION,PLAN DEATH AND HELL.

JIM TUCKER TOLD US THE BILDERBERGS HAD SUCH TIGHT SECURITY YOU COULD NOT GET WITHIN 2 MILES OF THESE NEW WORLD ORDER DICTATORS.THE WORST EVER SECURITY JIM SAID AT THIS MEETING.

Demonstrations against the secret meeting of the Bilderbergs in Aster Palace hotel 17 May 2009 :: 16:16:37

Demonstrations against the secret meeting of the world leaders, calling their elite club Bilderberg, took place in front of Aster Palace hotel in Athens. For the past few days the hotel has been guarded by divers, agents, and paratroops- just like in a Hollywood movie, because this has been the location of the meeting of some of the most powerful people on the planet, including kings and ministers, diplomats and businessmen, journalists and scientists.The discussions of the economical brains of the planet started with analysis of the results from the G20 meeting in Washington, and how they can be implemented. The conversations emphasized on the issue of banks’ public subsidizing and the best ways it can be used for revitalizing the market. A lot of theories were developed, and the speakers showed off knowledge and decisiveness on particular topics but a specific decision, however, was not reached, said the participants at the meeting to Vima newspaper. It is a surprising fact that one-third of the participants invited did not show up, justifying themselves with concerns about their security, despite the efforts of the hosts to make the area completely inaccessible for intruders. In the first part of the meeting the guests had the chance to get to know each other informally and share views, mainly on political subjects. The topics discussed by the closed company were related to the crisis in Afghanistan and Iraq, and what would be the consequences if American troops withdrew from Iraq. Other issues of interest for the world political leaders are the power industry, China’s strengthening and the relationships between USA and Europe, i.e. what is their condition during the current economic crisis.

According to the club rules, the members talk on one specific subject for 7 minutes, and comments, additions or questions may be introduced by the rest within 1 minute. Their only obligation is not to publish or disclose anything discussed. A record is made of the club’s discussions in which, however, the name of the speaker is never published. The official language is English, and the conversation notes are later published in a book. The most impressive fact is that at the round-table talks everybody can say whatever they want and make any suggestions they want, without facing the risk of being judged or opposed with regard to their words.
www.GRREPORTER.INFO

Welcome to the United States of Bilderberg
http://ddjango.blogspot.com/2009/05/welcome-to-united-states-of-bilderberg.html

This weekend, in an out of the way luxury hotel in Greece, some of the richest and most powerful people in the Western world are convening to decide the fate of that world. Among others, the US Secretary of the Treasury is in attendance, with one other so-far-unknown representative from our country, to receive instructions from these gods of empire and finance. On the outside, Alex Jones and some hangers-on are shouting righteous epithets through bull-horns from across the street. Alex is perspicacious, as always, but these folks are probably just mildly amused.Sticks and stones, they think. It's going to be a nasty summer, global warming, global cooling, come what may. Memorial Day is just around the corner. In the States we can use it to remember the death of the American Dream. By Labor Day, drained and exhausted from the summer, we'll know how bad our asses are on fire. Remember, it's not the heat; it's the stupidity.The following clips are from a Prison Planet report (though there have been some brief confirmations of this stuff elsewhere in reputable MSM news)...

According to a London Times report, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner will probably be in attendance at this week’s Bilderberg Group meeting, as top globalists meet to plot the financial future of the planet behind closed doors.The Times article notes that US Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner’s public schedule is mysteriously empty for the next two days,speculating that he will be in Vouliagmeni, Greece for the annual elitist confab, following in the footsteps of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, who attended last year’s conference in Washington DC just months before the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the start of the economic crisis ...Geithner’s presence at Bilderberg is noteworthy, not only because Bernanke attended immediately before the economic crisis last year, but also because Bilderberg’s agenda for 2009 is heavily weighted towards the financial crisis. According to a pre-meeting booklet handed out to members that was leaked to investigative journalist Daniel Estulin, Bilderberg is divided on whether to put into motion, Either a prolonged, agonizing depression that dooms the world to decades of stagnation, decline and poverty … or an intense-but-shorter depression that paves the way for a new sustainable economic world order, with less sovereignty but more efficiency.It isn't as if this happened overnight. These forces of international finance capitalism have been around for centuries, their power handed forward from father to son, conclave to cartel, church to cult. Wars have been fought, governments undermined, people great and small assassinated or disappeared. All in a day's work, I suppose. Or at least that of the last century, with the pace stepping up as soon as Hitler's bunker was stormed and Hiroshima and Nagasaki levelled. The pace quickened again immeasurably when the Wall was breached and the Soviet resistance to the so-called New World Order crumbled into dust. Please look at the history; make the connections.

This the end game, I think. No, the world will not end. But the Dream will, hope as you might that this economic Titanic will miraculously right itself and you will be on the sundeck watching the beautiful, glittering icebergs drift slowly to starboard and port.With the market bubble artificially reinflated (once again sucking loose change out of hope- and greed-crazed small investors), little snorts of platitude have emanated from the south ends of both DC and Wall Street: we may be bottoming out, turning the corner, they say; the pace of the crash is slowing.Less people lost their jobs last month than the month before! Hoorah!! I hope it occurs to you that there ain't that many jobs left to lose. Do you finally give up all hope only when all the McDonald's close and Netflicks goes tits up? As the saying goes, We've got em right where they want us.This is the news from Yahoo Finance (in full - so sue me):

The green shoots story took a bit of hit this week between data on April retail sales, weekly jobless claims and foreclosures. But the whole concept of the economy finding its footing was preposterous to begin with, says Howard Davidowitz, chairman of Davidowitz & Associates.We're in a complete mess and the consumer is smart enough to know it,says Davidowitz, whose firm does consulting for the retail industry.If the consumer isn't petrified, he or she is a damn fool.Davidowitz, who is nothing if not opinionated (and colorful), paints a very grim picture: The worst is yet to come with consumers and banks,he says.This country is going into a 10-year decline. Living standards will never be the same.This outlook is based on the following main points:

-With the unemployment rate rising into double digits - and that's not counting the millions of underemployed Americans - consumers are hitting the breaks, which is having a huge impact, given consumer spending accounts for about 70% of economic activity.
-Rising unemployment and the $8 trillion negative wealth effect of housing mean more Americans will default on not just mortgages but student loans and auto loans and credit card debt.
-More consumer loan defaults will hit banks, which are also threatened by what Davidowitz calls a depression in commercial real estate, noting the recent bankruptcy of General Growth Properties and distressed sales by Developers Diversified and other REITs.

As for all the hullabaloo about the stress tests, he says they were a sham and part of a con game to get private money to finance these institutions because [Treasury] can't get more money from Congress. It's the greater fool theory.We're now in Barack Obama's world where money goes into the most inefficient parts of the economy and we're bailing everyone out,says Daviowitz, who opposes bailouts for financials and automakers alike.The bailout money is in the sewer and gone.I truly hope you enjoy the summer Star Trek and Terminator flicks this season. Me, I'm looking for some Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd, and Daffy Duck reruns.Thufferin thuccotath!

Our man at Bilderberg:You are not allowed to take pictures of policemen! Charlie Skelton is scared, jumpy and hacked off at the police state built around Bilderberg. So hacked off, in fact, he has asked the police to stop following him. Bad move.guardian.co.uk, Sunday 17 May 2009 12.43 BST
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/series/charlie-skeltons-bilderberg-files

This man is following me. It's true. I'm not imagining things.Photograph: Charlie Skelton.I need to go back a day and tell you exactly how I came to be in an Athens metro station at 8am, grappling with two strange men, struggling and yelling: Help me somebody! Security! Please! Someone get security! Get the police! My voice still hurts. My brain is ready to explode.But that is today. Yesterday divides in half: the half where I flee the Bilderberg resort, too scared and strung out to remain, and the half when I have to bundle myself in a random cab and drive to the British Embassy for my own safety.I am being hounded. And all because I dared report on Bilderberg. Because I dared point my finger at them, there, in the darkness of a seaside peninsula. Ecce Bilderberg! I am not lying. I am not exaggerating. I am not imagining. I am not hysterical. If anything, I became incredibly calm when I finally stopped being the ­criminal, stopped being the hare, and grabbed one of the men who's been following me. I was turning the madness back in on itself, grabbing their wrists and plunging all of us further down the rabbit hole.So yes, to be clear, I've just been tussling with two men in the bleak marble atrium of an Athens Metro station. But that was this morning. I haven't even had breakfast yet. I need to tell you about yesterday.I wrote the words below a thousand years or so before all that's happened to me in central Athens. See me now, back in Vouliagmeni, sitting in a cafe by the sea, being watched (of course) while I sip my orange juice. It is another beautiful day on the Greek Riviera …

That's it, I'm done, I'm gone.Believe me when I say, I feel physically intimidated; I feel afraid. I've had my own little seaside dip into a police state and the water's coming over my head.If you've ever been bullied you'll know exactly what I'm feeling: the tightness in the chest, looking both ways down corridors, hating the fear, hating your mind for asking "am I safe here? Am I safe? I've been bullied out of Vougliameni, bullied away by Bilderberg for daring to be near.I am leaving the toxic orbit of Bilderberg so I can breathe freely. So I can walk down a sidestreet without being followed by plainclothes policemen. I'm tired of men in the lobby, men on the stairs, the same men in different doorways, on different corners wherever I go. Cars pulling away from the kerb when I approach. The same cars, the same feelings. I'm tired of complaining at the station. I've complained three times now, and the final time turned nasty. They denied outright I was being followed.This is an idea in your mind! I showed them a photo I took today, when I took my tail on a looping stroll through the hills, waited round a corner, and snapped him unawares. They're not very good at this, but that just makes it worse. If they were a bit more subtle I could pretend they weren't there.I have been made to feel weak, but buried in my weakness is a fury. How dare they make me feel like this. How dare they! They have turned this corner of the Greek Riviera into east Berlin (a helicopter circles above me as I type these words, I swear) and I haven't the backbone to brazen it out. Checkpoint Charlie here I come.Of all the things I am furious about, the one that rankles the most is the fact that I've become jumpy. It's crazy that I'm keeping my room door open as I pack, and the balcony door. Two exits. It's crazy that I've started checking the bathroom and the wardrobe when I enter. That I'm taking photographs of my laptop when I leave the room, and finding it moved. I want to be in the open, in the sunlight, in front of people. I crave the fresh air of Athens city centre, and that's saying something.

Nor am I imagining things - this is not an idea in my mind. And how extraordinary that I have to write that. It is shocking and upsetting that I have to justify my sanity, defend my perceptions and stand in a police station being told I am imagining things. I showed them the photo of the man I caught round the corner. An officer asks, absurdly:How from this photograph do you say he is following you? I just see a man.I take a deep breath.Well, yes, he isn't holding a sign which says I am following Charlie Skelton' so I suppose you have to take my word for it.In comes the chief. Bossios Hoggios. What the problem? I tell him that I am being followed by the police, and that I would like it to stop, or be told the reason. Why you here? he barks. I tell him I am here for the Bilderberg conference at the Astir Palace.Well, that is the reason! That is why! We are finished! And he washes his hands of me, dismissing me with a gesture, striding back to his office. Idiot,I mutter, unheard.Back to the photograph.How you know he is a policeman? I know that he is, I've seen him talking to your colleagues at the checkpoint.You are not allowed to take photos of policemen.
So I am being followed by policemen? He gestures out of the window.Where is he now, this man you say following you? Show me him.I'm standing in a police station. I don't know what to say. They tell me to ring the police if I see them again. To ring the police if I see the police following me.I shouldn't have called the officer an idiot. I shouldn't have raised my voice and derided the craziness of the situation. I'm not in a friendly room any more, so I decide to leave. I clap my hands together with as much mockery as my anger allows, and cry: We are finished!I wash my hands of the Greek police.

But I'm not done with Bilderberg.

I finish my orange juice, pick up my rucksack, and walk down the street to hail a cab. Which is when I'm detained for the third time. I'm a good half mile from Bilderberg, trying to leave the resort, sick of it all, but Checkpoint Charlie has just slammed in my face.You take photographs! I'd done no such thing. I was waiting for a cab.Show me your camera! Why you here?! They circle round. Local cops, a riot officer, two private security men. I looked at their lanyards: Avion Security. One of the Avion goons prods me with his walkie-talkie. Why you here? I tell him, wearily, that I'm a journalist. He rubs his chin and says the words that even in a 30-degree sun turn my blood to ice.Show me your papers.

Our man at Bilderberg: I'm ready to lose control, but they're not,Charlie Skelton feels a sudden need to apologise for the trouble he's caused, swiftly followed by a rush of revolutionary rage against the powers that be being so, well, powerful Charlie Skelton guardian.co.uk, Friday 15 May 2009 17.22 BST

I want to talk about Bilderberg 2009. But beyond a simple yes, it's happening, it's real, the leaders of the world are hanging out here for the weekend, what can I say? It's a private meeting.I don't know if they're discussing global financial unification or the season finale of Grey's Anatomy over their prawn cocktails. I don't even know what the vegetarian option is for starters. Butternut squash? You're going to have to forgive me for speculating, but that's all I can do. I'm not a proper reporter. I don't have the foggiest of my rights (if any) to stand on public footpaths and point cameras. I don't even have a proper camera. But what I do have is this: a sense of something rotten in the state of Greece. To my nose, there's not a healthy smell wafting down from the Astir Palace. Or maybe that was the egg and pepper roll I had for breakfast.Sorry if some of these speculations are wrongheaded, but I'm doing a lot of this thinking for the first time and I've only just shaken off my police escort. Sorry if I sound shrill or petulant, self-righteous or precious, sorry if my perceptions have been tilted by anger … sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. Sorry for bothering you Mr Bilderberg. I've spent the last three days apologising to everyone. Sorry to the staff at my hotel for having plainclothes officers loafing around in their lobby. Sorry to the plainclothes officers themselves for having to drag them around Vougliameni on a wild goose chase (I bought them some chilled water, and took it to them while they shuffled awkwardly behind a tree). Sorry then to the desk sergeant for bothering her with my predicament: I'm being followed around like a criminal, I wonder if you wouldn't mind asking them to stop? I'm not doing anything wrong, and it's getting … well … a bit annoying.

I'm going to stop apologising now. I'm going to try and make sense of my experiences. It's not easy; I don't want to sound feeble-minded, but this has been a lot to take in. I feel a bit like I've driven down the wrong alley and suddenly don't recognise anything, and people are staring at me and not simply to admire my hair. I'm jumpy. I think someone has been in my room and moved my laptop. I know this sounds bonkers, I know it does, but I took a photo of it before I left the room and it wasn't where I left it.Listen to me. I sound like a fruitcake. Three days and I've been turned into a suspect, a troublemaker, unwanted, ill at ease, tired and a bit afraid. And I haven't even walked up the road to the Bilderberg hotel since the whole get in the car! incident. I've been trying to stay out of trouble, but trouble has followed me down the hill.So – to make sense of it. I'm going to begin here: with the face of the first Bilderberg delgate I saw in the flesh. I was trying, lamely, to get a snap of some delegates as they swooshed through Vougliameni in their mirrored limos with their plainclothes motorcycle outriders and police escorts. And one of them had their window open. I was so excited I forgot to bring the camera to my face and took a photo of the hubcap. What I saw I won't forget. It was a 40-something man with his head thrown back, laughing and laughing, the perfect photograph that only my retina will ever see.And you know what: no wonder he was happy. It must be WAY COOL to be sirened through Greek streets in the back of bulletproof limo on your way to the COOLEST party in the world. You've been invited by the coolest of the cool kids to hang out for the weekend. Your cool cousin's über-cool older brother and his way cool friends have got a keg of beer and a pool in the yard, and their parents are away and you think Jessica might be going. THIS IS THE BEST PARTY EVER! Turn on the sirens! We're coming through! Woohoo!

And your life is already pretty cool. You already own a newspaper or head a thinktank, or you're the UK secretary of state for business, enterprise and regulatory reform, or you run Fiat, or you're chairman of the Federal Reserve or Queen of the Netherlands, or president of Shell Oil. You run stuff. You have big ideas. You're in control, and control is fun.Bilderberg is all about control. It's about what shall we do next? We run lots of stuff already, how about we run some more? How about we make it easier to run stuff? More efficient. Efficiency is good. It would be so much easier with a single bank, a single currency, a single market, a single government. How about a single army? That would be pretty cool. We wouldn't have any wars then. This prawn cocktail is GOOD. How about a single way of thinking? How about a controlled internet?

How about not.

I am so unbelievably backteeth sick of power being flexed by the few. I've had it flexed in my face for three days, and it's up my nose like a wasp. I don't care whether the Bilderberg Group is planning to save the world or shove it in a blender and drink the juice, I don't think politics should be done like this. This might be a facile point, but if they were organising a charity snooker league, they could do it upstairs at Starbucks. If they were trying to cure cancer they could do it with the lights on. Innocent thoughts can be minuted.Or maybe they're simply swingers. Maybe that's why the curtains are drawn. Imagine chucking your key in the tub and pulling out Ken Clarke. Sorry Timothy Geithner, that's the cost of doing business.I have a confession. (I'm not a swinger, that's not it.) My confession is that being tailed today by Greek special branch, and doubling back through a cafe and catching them out, and buying them chilled water on a hot day like in Beverley Hills Cop, when Eddie Murphy has room service sent to their car – all this was pretty exciting. It's was my own little episode of the Equaliser. (The Greequaliser? No, really no, I'm tired). Being tailed was exciting and funny and absurd and confusing and terrifying and utterly, utterly wrong. And I know this sounds pathetic but I got a bit teary in the police station when I was telling the nice desk sergeant lady that I'm not a bad person and not a threat to anyone, and it would be nice if someone could call off the goons. I don't like to be made to feel like this. I've been put in this position, and I haven't deserved it.Bilderberg is about positions of control. I get within half a mile of it, and suddenly I'm one of the controlled. I'm followed, watched, logged, detained, detained again. I'd been put in that position by the power that was up the road.

Likewise, the Bilderberg delegates occupy a position of power over the bobbing ignorance of the people patting beach balls in the sea, and me with my crappy little camera and my curiosity and my ill-formed sense of citizenship. I may not be very good at bearing witness here, but I'm doing my best. I haven't shinned over the fence and shoved a camera in David Rockefeller's face but I don't want to be shot in the forehead.A final thought for the day. In the fable, the men may have been blind but they did at least get to grope the elephant before trying to describe it. Now shove that elephant in the back of a blacked-out Mercedes S600, whisk it off into a luxury Greek resort, circle it with heavily armed guards and helicopters, hand it a Martini, and pay the local police to harass, detain and follow anyone showing even the slightest interest of grabbing a flank. That, my friend, is the beast that is Bilderberg 2009.

Our man at Bilderberg: They're watching and following me, I tell you,Charlie Skelton is now being followed by the police and still hasn't done much more than eat a club sandwich. Global secret cabals have no sense of humour.Charlie Skelton guardian.co.uk, Friday 15 May 2009 10.58 BST

Now I've got too much to report.

I'll talk later about the strange secret circus of limousines, blacked-out windows, sirens, helicopters. No time to relate being detained for a SECOND time, for the crime of being half a mile from the Bilderberg hotel gates trying to take arty photographs of limousine wheels as they whisked past. Doing so little wrong that I was doing it while standing next to three policemen who were fine about it. Until the call came through on the radio and the motorbikes and squad cars squealed around me like a bad dream. I'll tell that story later. I have to talk now about what just happened.But before I begin, please believe me when I say: I haven't gone nuts. I really haven't. Nine times seven is 63 and the capital of Italy is Rome. I know what I know. And I know that I'm being followed. I know because I've just been chatting to the plainclothes policemen I caught following me. As absurd as it sounds, I've just made my tail.They're watching me now. REALLY. They're sitting on the wall outside the cafe Oceania or whatever this is called, watching me type this sentence. I asked them in for a coffee but they declined. They laughed sheepishly when I called them Starsky and Hutch. They asked my name. I told your colleagues. Twice.They asked again. I told them. I asked back. There was an awkward pause. They're not very good at this.... ... Nick … … … … and … John.So there we were, me and my shadows. Nick and John. We're just walking up and down.That was their cover story, and they didn't bother sticking to it. They simply couldn't resist: How many days you spend here? – Where you from exactly? – You staying here alone? I was laughing. It was too bizarre. What is your job? I told John I wrote jokes for television programmes. He almost instantly forgot. It wasn't on the profile he'd just learned, clearly.So what papers you write for?

I noticed them in reception after breakfast. Like I'd noticed the similarly dressed, early-30s, bland-looking fellow the night before. He seemed to be staring at me. I turned round and caught him whispering to the receptionist and looking at me. I swear to God. I know this makes me sound like a lunatic, and if it weren't for my chat just now with Starsky and Hutch I might start assuming I've had a touch of the sun. Last night, the phone rang in my hotel room and someone hung up when I answered. The call came from inside the hotel. I assumed it was one of the other reporters ringing the wrong room. Maybe it was.I'm just remembering now. I had a shorter than usual breakfast this morning. I came out. Nick was alone in the lobby. He was on his mobile. I trotted upstairs to my room. Down the stairs comes John, also on his phone. I'm slotting together memories now, as I type. I haven't gone mad. This is happening.

Was he in my room? They knew I was in breakfast. This is crazy.

Here's what happened next: I headed out of the hotel with my laptop. And I thought to myself: you know what, if they're REALLY cops, they'll follow me. So I stopped, turned round, and waited. Ten seconds. I felt an idiot, standing there, waiting for an imaginary policeman to follow me out. Fifteen seconds. Eureka! Out comes John on his mobile phone. He looks confused to see me standing there and crosses the road. I sit down on a wall. He dawdles by a lamppost. I get up, walk to the seafront, turn left, walk a bit, cross the road (gives me a chance to look both ways – and yes, there's John).I walk into the far entrance of the cafe. I'm in an episode of The Wire. The cafe is long and thin. I double back on myself and stand, hidden, by the earlier entrance. I'm standing behind a shrub, clutching a laptop to my chest, my heart beating like a Phil Collins solo (on drums, not piano).I'm just an ordinary guy. A concerned citizen. For this week at least, a blogger. Barely a reporter. A terrible photographer. No threat to anyone. I'm nobody. But just up the hill, in a luxury hotel, there's a meeting of the most powerful somebodies in the world. Bilderberg. I've been hauled off to the police station twice. Before this week, I've never had so much as a cross word with a policeman IN MY LIFE. I once drove at night with my lights off and was pulled over and told not to drive like an idiot. And that's it. I'm not a bad person. I don't even know what I am any more. I think I write jokes for a living. I think maybe I used to. I'm a man clutching a laptop to his chest, trying to breathe quietly. Ten seconds. Fifteen. John comes round the shrub and steps back, bewildered.Hi.I'm no threat, you know that, don't you?Poor John. I felt sorry for him. He wasn't very good at this. I'm not the smartest shoe in the window but it took me all of four minutes to blow his cover.They didn't want to come for coffee. I asked them to take my photo. They did. I took one of them. No fotografia! Show me the camera! Poor Nick, he was in a real bind. He couldn't remember if he was a policeman or not.They seem nice, mostly, the police who have been harassing me for standing around and taking bad photos with a cheap digital camera. Yesterday, I got chatting with one of the motorcycle cops before I was bundled off in the squad car. I told him that I hoped tomorrow there would be protests here – not riots, but protests. He agreed.It would be nice to hear another voice,he said, sadly. A big man in leathers, caught up in something far bigger.But today I have to do my job. This is not a good situation.This is not a good situation. It would be nice to hear another voice.I'm going to pay for my coffee now and head back to the hotel. Just the three of me.Charlie Skelton will continue to file regular updates from Athens because it seems safer that way.

TORAH PORTION FROM MAY 17 - 23 2009

SINCE WHAT ISRAEL READS WILL BE FULFILLED IN THAT WEEK I WILL BE PUTTING THE WEEKLY TORAH PORTION ON FOR ALL OF US TO KEEP TRACK OF ISRAEL HAPPENINGS.

TORAH PORTION FROM MAY 17 2009 6PM - MAY 23 6PM 2009

LEVITICUS 26:3 - 27:34
3 If ye walk in my statutes, and keep my commandments, and do them;
4 Then I will give you rain in due season, and the land shall yield her increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit.
5 And your threshing shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time: and ye shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land safely.
6 And I will give peace in the land, and ye shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid: and I will rid evil beasts out of the land, neither shall the sword go through your land.
7 And ye shall chase your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword.
8 And five of you shall chase an hundred, and an hundred of you shall put ten thousand to flight: and your enemies shall fall before you by the sword.
9 For I will have respect unto you, and make you fruitful, and multiply you, and establish my covenant with you.
10 And ye shall eat old store, and bring forth the old because of the new.
11 And I will set my tabernacle among you: and my soul shall not abhor you.
12 And I will walk among you, and will be your God, and ye shall be my people.
13 I am the LORD your God, which brought you forth out of the land of Egypt, that ye should not be their bondmen; and I have broken the bands of your yoke, and made you go upright.
14 But if ye will not hearken unto me, and will not do all these commandments;
15 And if ye shall despise my statutes, or if your soul abhor my judgments, so that ye will not do all my commandments, but that ye break my covenant:
16 I also will do this unto you; I will even appoint over you terror, consumption, and the burning ague, that shall consume the eyes, and cause sorrow of heart: and ye shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it.
17 And I will set my face against you, and ye shall be slain before your enemies: they that hate you shall reign over you; and ye shall flee when none pursueth you.
18 And if ye will not yet for all this hearken unto me, then I will punish you seven times more for your sins.
19 And I will break the pride of your power; and I will make your heaven as iron, and your earth as brass:
20 And your strength shall be spent in vain: for your land shall not yield her increase, neither shall the trees of the land yield their fruits.
21 And if ye walk contrary unto me, and will not hearken unto me; I will bring seven times more plagues upon you according to your sins.
22 I will also send wild beasts among you, which shall rob you of your children, and destroy your cattle, and make you few in number; and your high ways shall be desolate.
23 And if ye will not be reformed by me by these things, but will walk contrary unto me;
24 Then will I also walk contrary unto you, and will punish you yet seven times for your sins.
25 And I will bring a sword upon you, that shall avenge the quarrel of my covenant: and when ye are gathered together within your cities, I will send the pestilence among you; and ye shall be delivered into the hand of the enemy.
26 And when I have broken the staff of your bread, ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and they shall deliver you your bread again by weight: and ye shall eat, and not be satisfied.
27 And if ye will not for all this hearken unto me, but walk contrary unto me;
28 Then I will walk contrary unto you also in fury; and I, even I, will chastise you seven times for your sins.
29 And ye shall eat the flesh of your sons, and the flesh of your daughters shall ye eat.
30 And I will destroy your high places, and cut down your images, and cast your carcases upon the carcases of your idols, and my soul shall abhor you.
31 And I will make your cities waste, and bring your sanctuaries unto desolation, and I will not smell the savour of your sweet odours.
32 And I will bring the land into desolation: and your enemies which dwell therein shall be astonished at it.
33 And I will scatter you among the heathen, and will draw out a sword after you: and your land shall be desolate, and your cities waste.
34 Then shall the land enjoy her sabbaths, as long as it lieth desolate, and ye be in your enemies' land; even then shall the land rest, and enjoy her sabbaths.
35 As long as it lieth desolate it shall rest; because it did not rest in your sabbaths, when ye dwelt upon it.
36 And upon them that are left alive of you I will send a faintness into their hearts in the lands of their enemies; and the sound of a shaken leaf shall chase them; and they shall flee, as fleeing from a sword; and they shall fall when none pursueth.
37 And they shall fall one upon another, as it were before a sword, when none pursueth: and ye shall have no power to stand before your enemies.
38 And ye shall perish among the heathen, and the land of your enemies shall eat you up.
39 And they that are left of you shall pine away in their iniquity in your enemies' lands; and also in the iniquities of their fathers shall they pine away with them.
40 If they shall confess their iniquity, and the iniquity of their fathers, with their trespass which they trespassed against me, and that also they have walked contrary unto me;
41 And that I also have walked contrary unto them, and have brought them into the land of their enemies; if then their uncircumcised hearts be humbled, and they then accept of the punishment of their iniquity:
42 Then will I remember my covenant with Jacob, and also my covenant with Isaac, and also my covenant with Abraham will I remember; and I will remember the land.
43 The land also shall be left of them, and shall enjoy her sabbaths, while she lieth desolate without them: and they shall accept of the punishment of their iniquity: because, even because they despised my judgments, and because their soul abhorred my statutes.
44 And yet for all that, when they be in the land of their enemies, I will not cast them away, neither will I abhor them, to destroy them utterly, and to break my covenant with them: for I am the LORD their God.
45 But I will for their sakes remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the heathen, that I might be their God: I am the LORD.
46 These are the statutes and judgments and laws, which the LORD made between him and the children of Israel in mount Sinai by the hand of Moses.

LEVITICUS 27:1-34
1 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
2 Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When a man shall make a singular vow, the persons shall be for the LORD by thy estimation.
3 And thy estimation shall be of the male from twenty years old even unto sixty years old, even thy estimation shall be fifty shekels of silver, after the shekel of the sanctuary.
4 And if it be a female, then thy estimation shall be thirty shekels.
5 And if it be from five years old even unto twenty years old, then thy estimation shall be of the male twenty shekels, and for the female ten shekels.
6 And if it be from a month old even unto five years old, then thy estimation shall be of the male five shekels of silver, and for the female thy estimation shall be three shekels of silver.
7 And if it be from sixty years old and above; if it be a male, then thy estimation shall be fifteen shekels, and for the female ten shekels.
8 But if he be poorer than thy estimation, then he shall present himself before the priest, and the priest shall value him; according to his ability that vowed shall the priest value him.
9 And if it be a beast, whereof men bring an offering unto the LORD, all that any man giveth of such unto the LORD shall be holy.
10 He shall not alter it, nor change it, a good for a bad, or a bad for a good: and if he shall at all change beast for beast, then it and the exchange thereof shall be holy.
11 And if it be any unclean beast, of which they do not offer a sacrifice unto the LORD, then he shall present the beast before the priest:
12 And the priest shall value it, whether it be good or bad: as thou valuest it, who art the priest, so shall it be.
13 But if he will at all redeem it, then he shall add a fifth part thereof unto thy estimation.
14 And when a man shall sanctify his house to be holy unto the LORD, then the priest shall estimate it, whether it be good or bad: as the priest shall estimate it, so shall it stand.
15 And if he that sanctified it will redeem his house, then he shall add the fifth part of the money of thy estimation unto it, and it shall be his.
16 And if a man shall sanctify unto the LORD some part of a field of his possession, then thy estimation shall be according to the seed thereof: an homer of barley seed shall be valued at fifty shekels of silver.
17 If he sanctify his field from the year of jubile, according to thy estimation it shall stand.
18 But if he sanctify his field after the jubile, then the priest shall reckon unto him the money according to the years that remain, even unto the year of the jubile, and it shall be abated from thy estimation.
19 And if he that sanctified the field will in any wise redeem it, then he shall add the fifth part of the money of thy estimation unto it, and it shall be assured to him.
20 And if he will not redeem the field, or if he have sold the field to another man, it shall not be redeemed any more.
21 But the field, when it goeth out in the jubile, shall be holy unto the LORD, as a field devoted; the possession thereof shall be the priest's.
22 And if a man sanctify unto the LORD a field which he hath bought, which is not of the fields of his possession;
23 Then the priest shall reckon unto him the worth of thy estimation, even unto the year of the jubile: and he shall give thine estimation in that day, as a holy thing unto the LORD.
24 In the year of the jubile the field shall return unto him of whom it was bought, even to him to whom the possession of the land did belong.
25 And all thy estimations shall be according to the shekel of the sanctuary: twenty gerahs shall be the shekel.
26 Only the firstling of the beasts, which should be the LORD'S firstling, no man shall sanctify it; whether it be ox, or sheep: it is the LORD'S.
27 And if it be of an unclean beast, then he shall redeem it according to thine estimation, and shall add a fifth part of it thereto: or if it be not redeemed, then it shall be sold according to thy estimation.
28 Notwithstanding no devoted thing, that a man shall devote unto the LORD of all that he hath, both of man and beast, and of the field of his possession, shall be sold or redeemed: every devoted thing is most holy unto the LORD.
29 None devoted, which shall be devoted of men, shall be redeemed; but shall surely be put to death.
30 And all the tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land, or of the fruit of the tree, is the LORD'S: it is holy unto the LORD.
31 And if a man will at all redeem ought of his tithes, he shall add thereto the fifth part thereof.
32 And concerning the tithe of the herd, or of the flock, even of whatsoever passeth under the rod, the tenth shall be holy unto the LORD.
33 He shall not search whether it be good or bad, neither shall he change it: and if he change it at all, then both it and the change thereof shall be holy; it shall not be redeemed.
34 These are the commandments, which the LORD commanded Moses for the children of Israel in mount Sinai.

PROPHETS PORTION

JEREMIAH 16:19-17:14
19 O LORD, my strength, and my fortress, and my refuge in the day of affliction, the Gentiles shall come unto thee from the ends of the earth, and shall say, Surely our fathers have inherited lies, vanity, and things wherein there is no profit.
20 Shall a man make gods unto himself, and they are no gods?
21 Therefore, behold, I will this once cause them to know, I will cause them to know mine hand and my might; and they shall know that my name is The LORD.
1 The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron, and with the point of a diamond: it is graven upon the table of their heart, and upon the horns of your altars;
2 Whilst their children remember their altars and their groves by the green trees upon the high hills.
3 O my mountain in the field, I will give thy substance and all thy treasures to the spoil, and thy high places for sin, throughout all thy borders.
4 And thou, even thyself, shalt discontinue from thine heritage that I gave thee; and I will cause thee to serve thine enemies in the land which thou knowest not: for ye have kindled a fire in mine anger, which shall burn for ever.
5 Thus saith the LORD; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the LORD.
6 For he shall be like the heath in the desert, and shall not see when good cometh; but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, in a salt land and not inhabited.
7 Blessed is the man that trusteth in the LORD, and whose hope the LORD is.
8 For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit.
9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?
10 I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.
11 As the partridge sitteth on eggs, and hatcheth them not; so he that getteth riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool.
12 A glorious high throne from the beginning is the place of our sanctuary.
13 O LORD, the hope of Israel, all that forsake thee shall be ashamed, and they that depart from me shall be written in the earth, because they have forsaken the LORD, the fountain of living waters.
14 Heal me, O LORD, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved: for thou art my praise.

NEW TESTAMENT PORTION

JOHN 14:15-21
15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.
16 And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;
17 Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.
18 I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.
19 Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also.
20 At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.
21 He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.

JOHN 15:10-12
10 If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love.
11 These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full.
12 This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you.

1 JOHN 1-10
1 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life;
2 (For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us;)
3 That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.
4 And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full.
5 This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.
6 If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth:
7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.
8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

1 JOHN 2:1-29
1 My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous:
2 And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.
3 And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments.
4 He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.
5 But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected: hereby know we that we are in him.
6 He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked.
7 Brethren, I write no new commandment unto you, but an old commandment which ye had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which ye have heard from the beginning.
8 Again, a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in him and in you: because the darkness is past, and the true light now shineth.
9 He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness even until now.
10 He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him.
11 But he that hateth his brother is in darkness, and walketh in darkness, and knoweth not whither he goeth, because that darkness hath blinded his eyes.
12 I write unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for his name’s sake.
13 I write unto you, fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning. I write unto you, young men, because ye have overcome the wicked one. I write unto you, little children, because ye have known the Father.
14 I have written unto you, fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning. I have written unto you, young men, because ye are strong, and the word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one.
15 Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.
17 And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.
18 Little children, it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time.
19 They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.
20 But ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things.
21 I have not written unto you because ye know not the truth, but because ye know it, and that no lie is of the truth.
22 Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son.
23 Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father: (but) he that acknowledgeth the Son hath the Father also.
24 Let that therefore abide in you, which ye have heard from the beginning. If that which ye have heard from the beginning shall remain in you, ye also shall continue in the Son, and in the Father.
25 And this is the promise that he hath promised us, even eternal life.
26 These things have I written unto you concerning them that seduce you.
27 But the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him.
28 And now, little children, abide in him; that, when he shall appear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before him at his coming.
29 If ye know that he is righteous, ye know that every one that doeth righteousness is born of him.

1 JOHN 3:1-24
1 Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not.
2 Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.
3 And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.
4 Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.
5 And ye know that he was manifested to take away our sins; and in him is no sin.
6 Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not: whosoever sinneth hath not seen him, neither known him.
7 Little children, let no man deceive you: he that doeth righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous.
8 He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.
9 Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.
10 In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.
11 For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another.
12 Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother. And wherefore slew he him? Because his own works were evil, and his brother’s righteous.
13 Marvel not, my brethren, if the world hate you.
14 We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death.
15 Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.
16 Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.
17 But whoso hath this world’s good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?
18 My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth.
19 And hereby we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before him.
20 For if our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things.
21 Beloved, if our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence toward God.
22 And whatsoever we ask, we receive of him, because we keep his commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in his sight.
23 And this is his commandment, That we should believe on the name of his Son Jesus Christ, and love one another, as he gave us commandment.
24 And he that keepeth his commandments dwelleth in him, and he in him. And hereby we know that he abideth in us, by the Spirit which he hath given us.

1 JOHN 4:1-21
1 Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.
2 Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God:
3 And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world.
4 Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world.
5 They are of the world: therefore speak they of the world, and the world heareth them.
6 We are of God: he that knoweth God heareth us; he that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error.
7 Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.
8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.
9 In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him.
10 Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.
12 No man hath seen God at any time. If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us.
13 Hereby know we that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given us of his Spirit.
14 And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world.
15 Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God.
16 And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.
17 Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world.
18 There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.
19 We love him, because he first loved us.
20 If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?
21 And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also.

1 JOHN 5:1-21
1 Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God: and every one that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him.
2 By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God, and keep his commandments.
3 For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.
4 For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.
5 Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?
6 This is he that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit that beareth witness, because the Spirit is truth.
7 For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.
8 And there are three that bear witness in earth, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood: and these three agree in one.
9 If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater: for this is the witness of God which he hath testified of his Son.
10 He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son.
11 And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.
12 He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.
13 These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.
14 And this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask any thing according to his will, he heareth us:
15 And if we know that he hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him.
16 If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it.
17 All unrighteousness is sin: and there is a sin not unto death.
18 We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not.
19 And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness.
20 And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.
21 Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen.