You are currently browsing the daily archive for November 16th, 2006.
I nearly forgot. Al-Jazeera’s new English language news service started today.
I’ve just been watching Darren Jordon read the news…
The wife always gets to the heart of any matter with a minimum of wasted verbiage. So, when I told her a little while ago, “Hey, another blogger says Darren Jordon has jumped [the BBC] ship and is reading the news on Al-Jazeera now!”, her response was concise and straightforward as usual:
“Oh, really? Well, they must be paying him a fortune.”
French customs officers are inspecting a North Korean ship at an Indian Ocean island off the coast of Africa as part of U.N. measures prompted by the communist nation’s nuclear test, but they found nothing illegal so far, officials said Thursday…
I guess we can safely assume they have thus far also discovered no gambling going on either.
The BBC reports:
A British man sentenced to death by hanging in Pakistan has had his punishment commuted to a life sentence, Pakistani officials have said.
The move follows intervention in the case of Mirza Tahir Hussain, 36, of Leeds, by President Pervez Musharraf.
Hussain, who was convicted in 1989 of murdering taxi driver Jamshed Khan, could now be eligible for release…
And an MEP has been working towards that:
…Yorkshire and Humber MEP Edward McMillan-Scott said he planned to go to Pakistan in December to try to ensure Hussain was home before Christmas…
While it’s reassuring that an MEP would use the word Christmas, that the use of the word Christmas in this context is first class weird apparently never dawned on Mr McMillan-Scott. For also worth noting is what the BBC finally tells us in the second to last paragraph. Mr Hussain . . .
…had been cleared by a high court in 1996 but an Islamic Sharia court took the case over and imposed the death penalty…
In European countries, one tends not to see “Christian courts” issuing death penalties. Still, Israel is probably at the root of all this. For, as we all well-know, the fount of all difference is the Israel-Palestinian conflict.
Calls To Tackle Illegal Loan Sharks
Hmm. And just what exactly constitutes a “legal” loan shark? A bank?
Two self-styled Jedi Knights are stepping up an intergalactic campaign for formal recognition.
Umada and Yunyun, also known as John Wilkinson and Charlotte Law, want the UN to acknowledge “The Force” is worthy of being called a religion.
The couple claim to be part of the UK’s fourth largest religious group, after 400,000 people recorded their faith as “Jedi” in the 2001 Census.
They say that as a religion, they deserve tolerance and respect. November the 16th is the annual International Day for Tolerance.
And as part of a global battle worthy of Luke Skywalker’s efforts against the Empire, the band of self-styled Jedis want the UN to re-name the day as Interstellar Day of Tolerance…
In Britain at least (and in yet still another challenge to England’s established church), they seem to have numbers on their side:
…More people claim their religion to be Jedi in England and Wales than those who follow Sikhism, Judaism and Buddhism. And the cause has global support.
There are also 70,000 Jedi knights in Australia, 53,000 in New Zealand, and 20,000 in Canada…
Yet, for some unfathomable reason, while other new faiths in England have their “purpose built” places of worship, there appear to be as of yet no “purpose built” Jedi temples anywhere on the entire planet. If that’s true, it’s a shocking example of Jedi marginalization that the UN surely also needs to address.
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