Photo, above: The Syrian-Catholic Archbishop of Mosul, Yohanna Petros Mouche (Ongoing Killings of Christians in Iraq) (Christians in Iraq) . See Hour 2, Block A, Seb Gorka, FDD, Natl Defense University, & Breitbart.com, in re:  ARCHBISHOP'S LAST STAND IN IRAQ    

Peu à peu, Noël aussi disparaît d'Irak. Pour la deuxième année consécutive, les chrétiens de Bagdad ne fêteront pas vraiment l'anniversaire de la naissance du Christ. Pas de guirlandes dans les vitrines, pas d'illumination des églises, pas de soirée au club ni de fête dans les hôtels. Il y aura bien une messe samedi 24, pas à minuit pour raisons de sécurité, puis chacun rentrera chez soi. L'année dernière, la communauté était en deuil après l'attaque, . . .

Bit by bit, Christmas also disappeared from Iraq. For the second year in a row, Christians in Baghdad didn’t really celebrate the birthday of Jesus. No garlands in shop windows, no bright lights in churches, no festivals in clubs or hotels. There was a midnight Mass on December 24, but everyone returned home right away out of concern for physical security. The previous year, the community was in mourning after the attack . . .

JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW

Hour One

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 1, Block A: Michael Vlahos, Naval War College, in re:

Major-General Charles George Gordon, CB (28 January 1833 – 26 January 1885), also known as Chinese Gordon, Gordon Pasha, and Gordon of Khartoum, was a British army officer and administrator.  He saw action in the Crimean War as an officer in the British Army. For this service he was appointed a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour by the Government of France on 16 July 1856. But he made his military reputation in China, where he was placed in command of the "Ever Victorious Army," a force of Chinese soldiers led by European officers. In the early 1860s, Gordon and his men were instrumental in putting down the Taiping Rebellion, regularly defeating much larger forces. For these accomplishments, he was given the nickname "Chinese" Gordon and honours from both the Emperor of China and the British.  He entered the service of the Khedive in 1873 . . . [more]   . ..  "a small mountain of ironies here . . ."

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 1, Block B: Michael Vlahos, Naval War College, in re:  Similarities between circumstances and events of China at the turn of the Twentieth Century and the layered problems today in the region called the Middle East are clear-cut. Important to consider the outcome of the Boxer Rebellion [Britannica: officially supported peasant uprising of 1900 that attempted to drive all foreigners from China. “Boxers” was a name that foreigners gave to a Chinese secret society known as the Yi-he-ch`üan {“Righteous and Harmonious Fists”}. The group practiced certain boxing and calisthenic rituals in the belief that this made them invulnerable. It was thought to be an offshoot of the Eight Trigrams Society {Ba-gua-jiao}, which had fomented rebellions against the Ch`ing dynasty in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Their original aim was the destruction of the dynasty and also of the Westerners who had a privileged position in China.]

55 Days at Peking is a 1963 historical epic film starring Charlton Heston, Ava Gardner, and David Niven, made by Samuel Bronston Productions, and released by Allied Artists. . . .  [Wikipedia: The film] is a dramatization of the siege of the foreign legations' compounds in Peking (now Beijing) during the Boxer Rebellion which took place in 1900 China. It is based on the book by Noel Gerson.

Fed up with foreign encroachment, the Dowager Empress Tzu-Hsi uses the Boxer secret societies to attack foreigners within China, leading to the siege and subsequent direct intervention by foreign expeditionary forces which were dispatched to put down the rebellion. The film concentrates on the defense of the legations from the point of view of the foreign powers, and the title refers to the length of the defense by the colonial powers of the legations district of Peking.

The foreign embassies in Peking are being held in a grip of terror as the Boxers set about killing Christians in an anti-Christian nationalistic fever. United States Marine Corps Major Matt Lewis heads a contingent of multinational soldiers and Marines defending the foreign compound in Peking.  Inside the besieged compound, . . . [more]

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 1, Block C:  N R Kleinfeld, NYT, in re:   Baptism by Fire -- about the first fire and rescue of a new NYFD firefighter. The online story invites other firefighters to share the story of their first fires.  Sullivan is an older black firefighter, who got a second shot with the department only after lawsuits maintained minorities were discriminated against in entrance exams.  The story captures an inside look of the NYFD, its Academy, the relationships between the seasoned firefighters and probies, and a tick-tock of the rescue of two children in Brooklyn. 

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 1, Block D: N R Kleinfeld, NYT, in re:   Baptism by Fire (2 of 2)

Hour Two

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 2, Block A:   Seb Gorka, FDD, Natl Defense University,  & Breitbart.com, in re:  ARCHBISHOP'S LAST STAND IN IRAQ  One archbishop and twenty priests are alleged to be the only people remaining in the northern Iraqi town of Qaraqosh. Two days ago, fighting broke out between Kurdish peshmerga and ISIS fighters in this Christian town of 50,000. All inhabitants of the town are reported to have fled.

The Syrian Catholic Archbishop of Mosul, Yohanna Petros Mouche, has been working to negotiate between the Kurds and the Sunni ISIS fighters. But according to Bishop Yousif Habash of the Syriac Catholic Church in Union City, New Jersey, who spoke with the Archbishop earlier today, all efforts at negotiation have been rebuffed. Archbishop Mouche was told by ISIS there is only one solution, and that is that the Peshmerga must leave. The Archbishop has stayed in the town with twenty priests. The Assyrian International News Agency reports that ISIS issued an ultimatum to the Kurdish forces that they must leave by 7:00 P.M. or face an attack. Archbishop Mouche told Bishop Habash by phone that the only thing that can save them now is help from the Americans.  Katie Gorka is the president of the Council on Global Security.

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 2, Block B:  Jillian Kay Melchior, National Review Online, in re: Fracking and Property  Landowners oppose fracking bans in Colorado. Last September, Roni Bell Sylvester experienced the worst Friday the 13th ever. Floods coursed through Colorado, causing extraordinary damage to her farm, which has been in her husband’s family since 1869. The waters not only flooded the Sylvesters’ basement, causing massive damage to their home, but also knocked down other structures on their property, causing an additional $70,000 in damage to their vehicles. “There was an actual current, an actual raging river, between five and, at some points, eight feet above ground that just raged through here,” Sylvester recalls. “We have a 55-inch watermark on the side of our house. It was such an incredible force that it picked up buildings that were here 110 years and threw them like they were just toothpicks.”

The Sylvester family has been able to restore their farm only because they are mineral-rights owners. Royalty payments from the energy companies leasing their property have helped cover the expense — already more than $200,000. Without royalties as a source of income, there would have been “no way,” Sylvester says.  The Sylvesters aren’t alone. Energy exploration has created a job boom in Weld County, which saw 6 percent job growth — one of the highest rates in the nation — last year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Sylvester proudly . .  .  [more]

Fracking Fracas in Loveland  Democrats in Colorado are battling over whether or not to regulate fracking through local-ballot measures. [more]

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 2, Block C:  Liz Peek, The Fiscal Times & Fox, in re:  In 2019, consumers around the globe will be burning over 100 mb/d of oil, for the first time in history. In another first, demand from developed countries will be topped by usage in countries like China and India that are growing more rapidly.  Where will that new oil come from? Oil producers will lift capacity over the next several years by 9 mb/d; Canada and the U.S. combined will increase output by about 4 mb/d, contributing the lion’s share. Iraq will add an extra 1.2 mb/d, or some 60 percent of the OPEC total. More consequential to President Obama, and to the U.S., Iraq’s government is targeting production of more than 9 mb/d by 2020. 

That forecast is undoubtedly overly optimistic because of political and security issues, but reflects the enormous potential of Iraq’s giant oilfields. Oilfields that the rest of the world hopes will help keep prices from skyrocketing as demand continues to build and older fields in places like the North Sea and Mexico go into decline.

Related: The Need for U.S. Special Forces in Iraq   We need to protect Iraq’s oil. Analysts at International Strategy & Investment Group forecast that oil will reach $115-120/bbl at the end of this year “even without a supply disruption from Iraq.” Heaven knows where oil will go if Iraq collapses. Despite the popular view that it won’t matter which government is in power, someone will want to produce the oil – the truth is that continued conflict in the country will delay new fields being brought on stream and prevent oil companies from undertaking needed investment. (In Libya, for example, production continues to run at about 10 percent of historical levels due to widespread upheaval.)

Even the recent Iraqi elections produced enough uncertainty that oil companies delayed concluding new service contracts. A major pipeline carrying crude oil to Turkey, located in the violence-torn Anbar Province, has been out of commission for some time; getting it back in operation remains uncertain. Also, if an unfriendly pro-Iran government takes over, the west might move to impose sanctions – like those that have affected Tehran’s oil exports. Iraq has President Obama is over a barrel. To secure long-term oil supplies – and to prevent Americans paying a lot more at the pump -- he will need to either step more firmly into the political bear-trap, or commit to much more aggressive oil and gas development in the U.S. and Canada.

The U.S. has unexpectedly emerged as a major player, now producing over 11 million barrels of oil daily, topping Russia and Saudi Arabia. The ability of oil companies in the U.S. to tap tight shale formations has exceeded expectations (and proved an unexpected boon to the oil-unfriendly White House) by a wide margin, but forecasters expect growth to plateau by the end of the decade. The gains in U.S. production have come in spite of, not because of, the Obama administration. Between 2009 and 2013, oil production on private and state lands soared 61 percent; on federal lands, output slid 6 percent. During the same period, natural gas production actually dropped 28 percent on federally leased land; elsewhere it increased 33 percent.

Related: Iraq: We Broke It, but We Can’t Fix It  One indication of how resistant the White House has been to encourage our energy industry is that the government only approved 3,770 drilling permits last year, down from more than 7000 in 2007, for instance. If you can’t drill, you can’t find oil or gas.  Fueling global growth and forestalling a hike in oil prices will require . . .  [more]

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 2, Block D:   Harry Siegel, New York Daily News, in re: Blas ripped Bloomy for gaming exams. Now he wants to do it, too.   As a proud 1995 Stuyvesant dropout (woulda-been class of 1996), I’ve thought a lot about what’s wrong with Mayor de Blasio’s well-intentioned pledge to end the one-test admission system for our elite public high schools — which he told the Daily News creates a “rich get richer” dynamic. [more]

Hour Three

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 3, Block A:  Mike Spies, Vocative, re 

Afghan villager Mohammad Gulab saved the life of U.S. Navy SEAL Marcus Luttrell. Now Gulab is being hunted and is desperate for help

http://www.vocativ.com/world/afghanistan-world/navy-seals-savior-marked-...

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 3, Block B:  Robert Zimmerman, behindtheblack.com, in re: The competition heats up: Worldview has successfully completed the first unmanned test flight of its stratospheric passenger balloon.  The flight brought a remote-controlled, balloon-borne craft up to a height of 120,000 feet (36.5 kilometers) and back down to 50,000 feet (15 kilometers). Then the craft was cut loose from the balloon and guided to a soft landing using an innovative parafoil. The test over Roswell, New Mexico, marked a world record for the highest parafoil flight, World View said.

World View’s Tycho prototype is just one-tenth the size of the pressurized capsule that the Arizona-based company plans to build for its Voyager tours. But Tycho’s maiden voyage put the system’s aerodynamics to a valuable initial test, said Taber MacCallum, who is World View’s co-founder and chief technology officer (as well as Poynter’s husband). While these balloon tourist flights won’t go as high as the suborbital flights planned by Virgin Galactic, XCOR, and others, they will last far, far longer and cost a third the price. They have already sold out their first three flights.

China heads for the Moon and Mars.   The competition heats up: In several different news stories today China touted its future plans in space.

- At a science conference in Beijing their chief scientist announced that they plan on doing a simulated return-to-Earth landing test of their lunar sample return unmanned probe by the end of the year.

- He also announced that they plan a Mars mission by 2020 and a Mars sample return mission by 2030, as well as missions to three asteroids.

- Three astronauts also completed a 105-day occupancy of a simulated lunar base dubbed Lunar Palace 1.

The landing test described in the first story above will also be the first test flight of China’s new heavy lift rocket, Long March 5. That China is both politically and culturally serious about this effort can be seen by the nationalistic enthusiasm for this space effort that permeates these stories. They also can’t help comparing their plans to U.S. efforts.

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 3, Block C: Clifford Winston, Mercatus Center, in re:  How the Private Sector Can Improve Public Transportation Infrastructure   As growing demands on roads, bridges, and airports increase congestion and delays, policymakers are struggling to finance needed improvements in the nation's infrastructure. But Washington's long-time strategy of trying to build its way out of congestion is unlikely to become a financially sustainable means of addressing the problem. A new Mercatus Center study by Clifford Winston, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, weighs the pros and cons of three key strategies for increasing the private sector's role in infrastructure improvement. It concludes that innovations in transportation modes could significantly improve the efficiency and safety of current infrastructure, and spur improvements. [more]

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 3, Block D: Ken Croswell, Bay Area scientific community, in re:  Pluto.  Far side of the solar system.  

Hour Four

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 4, Block A: Wilson by A. Scott Berg PART 3 (9 of 12)

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 4, Block B: Wilson by A. Scott Berg PART 3 (10 of 12)

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 4, Block C: Wilson by A. Scott Berg PART 3 (11 of 12)

Friday  27 June 2014 / Hour 4, Block D: Wilson by A. Scott Berg PART 3 (12 of 12)

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