Russia Would ‘Welcome’ Indonesia in Syria Peace Talks: Putin

Jakarta Globe – AFP, October 8, 2013

Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, right, shakes hands with
 Russian President Vladimir Putin after speaking during the APEC Leaders’ News
 Conference on the final day of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC)
Summit in Nusa Dua on the Indonesian resort island of Bali on October 8, 2013 as
country leaders and representatives look on. (EPA Photo)

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that Moscow would welcome Indonesia joining Syria peace talks scheduled to take place in Geneva later this year.

“We believe it is possible to expand the number of [conference] participants by including such big Muslim states like Indonesia,” Putin said on the sidelines of an APEC summit in Indonesia.

“In my opinion, it would be quite natural and we’d welcome it,” he was quoted as saying by state news agency ITAR-Tass.

Agence France-Presse

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Iranians mock Netanyahu over jeans comment

BBC News, 7 October 2013

Jeans are readily available in Tajrish Bazaar in Tehran

Related Stories

• Netanyahu warns of 'immortal Iran'
• Will Iran loosen its grip on the internet?
• Israel urges 'red line' for Iran

Iranians have used social media to mock Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, after he suggested they were not allowed to wear jeans.

In an interview with BBC Persian TV Mr Netanyahu said that if Iranians were free they would wear blue jeans, and listen to Western music.

Hundreds of Iranians both in Iran and abroad reacted on social media sites.

Many posts showed mainly young Iranians wearing jeans and listening to Western music, some in comic poses.

Others mocked up scenes from ancient Persian history with the protagonists wearing denim.

Jeans are not banned in Iran, where an Islamic dress code requires women to cover their hair and wear modest outer clothing. Some Western music or Western-style music is tolerated.

Jeans not bombs

One picture on social media sites showed a young boy in jeans whispering into the ear of the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Another is a doctored photograph of Mr Netanyahu's address at the UN last year in which he drew a red line across a sketch of a bomb, to warn that Iran was moving closer to the metaphorical "red line" of gaining enough highly-enriched uranium for a nuclear bomb.

In the mocked-up picture, widely-shared on Twitter, the bomb has been replaced with a picture of a female figure wearing jeans, with the Israeli prime minister appearing to draw a red line across the thighs.

In the BBC Persian interview, broadcast on Friday, Mr Netanyahu said that Iranians "deserve better" than their current government:

"I think if the Iranian people had their way, they'd be wearing blue jeans, they'd have Western music, they'd have free elections."

The Israel's prime minister also said that the lives of Iranians could get worse if it gained nuclear weapons.

One Iranian response on a Facebook page that has attracted hundreds of followers read: "He thinks he saw our bomb but he hasn't seen our jeans."

Related Article:

US-Iran logjam ends not with bang but with Twitter

Former Lampedusa migrant: 'Nobody helped'

Deutsche Welle, 7 October 2013

Abu Kurke of Ethiopia is all too familiar with the dangers of trying to reach the Italian island of Lampedusa by boat from Africa. He told DW his tale of survival - and of the images he hopes to forget.

A blue, double-decker boat overflows with people of African descent as a
military-like ship sits on the water's horizon in the distance.

News of the drowning of more than 300 migrants seeking refuge in Lampedusa, Italy from Africa brought back painful memories to Abu Kurke of Ethiopia. He was one a handful of survivors in a traumatic tale of sea-crossing endurance that ultimately brought him to the Netherlands.

DW: Mr. Kurke, this week must have been very distressing for you. How did you feel when you heard the news about events near Lampedusa?

Abu Kurke: That made me very sad. It was similar to what happened in 2011 - to me and many people who had to die. It's very terrible. How can I tell you? I don't know.

You were only one of nine people to have survived a similar crossing. Where did your journey begin?

I was in Libya - I was in prison. I'd been kicked out of Italy in 2010, and I was in prison for eight months. Then, when I got out of prison, there was a war in Libya. So I was looking for somewhere to go. I took the boat with my friend from Tripoli. It was a small boat, and there were too many people on it - 72 people, with small children, also women. We were going to Italy, but we never reached Italy.

We had many problems on the sea. The wind was very bad - the captain said he couldn't steer well. We received some calls from the Italian Coast Guard, but in the end, nobody helped. A helicopter came with water, and then went away and told us he was coming back to help us. He never came back. We were waiting for that helicopter for six hours.

So there we were, without any food - children on the boat, women. When we'd first seen the helicopter, everyone was happy. We thought, "We will survive." So when it never came back, that was terrible. We were there for two weeks on the sea, without any food. A baby was crying for a week in front of me - the baby died in front of me. I watched that. I still have problems. I still have nightmares, always.

What was the feeling like on the boat? Had people given up, or were you still hopeful you would make it?

Everybody was praying. We'd also received a telephone from the coast guard, but the battery ran out. For many days we saw ships and many fishing boats, and all of them just looked at us when we got close to them - and then they'd run away. We tried to speak with them. We showed them the baby - we showed them we didn't have any oil - we needed food - also, that there were bodies of people in the boats. All the boats ran away from us. No one helped. In the two days after we saw the helicopter, we lost many people.

 An estimated 300 men, women and
 children died on October 3 trying to
reach Europe

The boat washed up in Libya after two weeks. There were 11 of us. When we saw land, we thought it was Italy. Everybody was praying that it was Italy. Only five of us could walk - the other people were exhausted. Military people helped us, but the military also took us to prison.

We were in prison for three days without medical help. One guy died in prison. Another, a woman, died one hour after coming off the sea. Afterwards we went to the Catholic Church in Libya. They helped. I want to say thanks to them, because they saved our lives.

You ultimately reached the Netherlands via Italy. What made you decide to get on another boat after that first traumatic experience?

I was not planning to go again to the sea. I was planning to go to Shousha [a UN refugee camp in Tunisia]. Military people arrested me and other people and put me on the boat. The boat finally arrived in Lampedusa.

How were you received there?

When I reached Lampedusa I was happy. The Italians helped us from the boat. But I left Italy because there are thousands of migrants there. I was looking for medical help.

Knowing all the risks, people continue getting on those boats. Why are they prepared to take this risk?

Most of the immigrants are from Eritrea, from Ethiopia - women and children, dying - families coming. It's because there are political problems. In Ethiopia, thousands of Oromo people are in prison. I am from Oromia [an ethno-political state in central Ethiopia]. Most of the people who die on the boats are from Oromia.

Africa and Europe must help these people to get out of prison and stop these people coming to sea and dying - and not just the sea, but in the Sahara Desert. The problem comes from their own country.

Now that you're in the Netherlands, what do you hope for the future?

I hope freedom will come for my people, in my country. I'm also happy here. I want to live my life in peace.

Key migrant routes to southern Europe

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Pope Francis visits Italy's migrant island of Lampedusa

Pope Francis met some of those who had survived the trip. He challenged

everyone to take responsibility for the migrants' desperation.

Dutch take legal action over Greenpeace ship seized by Russia

DutchNews.nl, Friday 04 October 2013

Premier Medvedev at platform
Lukoil (AFP)

The Netherlands is taking legal action against Russia in an effort to have the Greenpeace ship Arctic Sunrise released from Russian coastguard control.

Foreign minister Frans Timmermans said on Friday he is taking steps under the UN Convention of the Law of the Sea to have the ship released. He will fight for the crew's release through diplomatic channels.

The 30 activitists on board the ship, which sales under the Dutch flag, were arrested last month while protesting about a Gasprom rig in Russia’s northern waters. All have since been remanded in custody and charged with piracy.

According to Nos television, a tribunal in Hamburg will decide if Russia was right to take the action it did.

‘We understand that Russia wants to preserve the security of its waters but we are not in agreement with the way the Greenpeace ship has been dealt with,’ a spokesman for the minister told website nu.nl. ‘That is why we are taking this action.’

According to the BBC, the Netherlands is the first country to take action in an effort to have its nationals released. Two of the crew are Dutch.

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Saudi black op team behind Damascus chem weapons attack – diplomatic sources

RT.com, October 04, 2013

The August chemical weapons attack in the Syrian capital’s suburbs was done by a Saudi Arabian black operations team, Russian diplomatic sources have told a Russian news agency.

“Based on data from a number of sources a picture can be pieced together. The criminal provocation in Eastern Ghouta was done by a black op team that the Saudi’s sent through Jordan and which acted with support of the Liwa Al-Islam group,” a source in the diplomatic circles told Interfax.

The attack and its consequences had a huge impact on the Syrian situation, another source said.

“Syrians of various political views, including some opposition fighters, are seeking to inform diplomats and members of international organizations working in Syria what they know about the crime and the forces which inspired it,” he told the agency.

Liwa Al-Islam is an Islamist armed group operating near Damascus headed by the son of a Saudi-based Salafi cleric. The group claimed responsibility for the bombing of a secret governmental meeting in Damascus in July 2012 that killed a number of top Syrian officials, including Defense Minister Dawoud Rajiha, his deputy Asef Shawkat, and Assistant Vice President Hassan Turkmani.

The allegations mirror a number of earlier reports, which pointed to Saudi Arabia as the mastermind behind the sarin gas attack, which almost led to US military action against Syrian government. Proponents of this scenario say intelligence services in Riyadh needed a false flag operation to provoke an American attack in Syria, which would tip the balance in favor of the armed opposition supported by Saudi Arabia.

While the majority of Western countries say they are certain that the Syrian government carries the blame for the attack, Damascus maintains that the rebel forces must be behind it. Russia shares this conviction too, calling the incident a provocation.

United Nations vehicles are seen leaving the hotel in Damascus (AFP Photo /
 Louai Beshara) 

Back in March US President Barack Obama said the use of chemical weapons would be a ‘red line’ for the Syrian government, crossing which would prompt America’s intervention into the bloody Syrian conflict. After the August attack, which the US believes has claimed some 1,400 lives, the president was called on his words by many supporters of the Syrian opposition both at home and outside of the US.

Earlier a UN report concluded that nerve gas had indeed been used “on a large scale” in August. However, the consistency of the findings is under question.

According to the report, none of the environmental samples the UN collected in Western Ghouta tested positive for Sarin, while biomedical samples, taken from affected people, all tested positive.

RT’s Worlds Apart host Oksana Boyko has spoken to Angela Kane, UN high representative for disarmament affairs, who has just returned from Damascus.

“If you read the report, the report comes out and says sarin was used. It is also a matter that maybe in the environmental samples they took there was no sarin found, but that does not mean that sarin was not used,” Kane told Worlds Apart. “It was there in the human samples. If they had more time to go around they would have found different samples. It was a limited collection that they did, but the collection was conclusive. I think, it was very comprehensive, therefore, we shared all of those samples with the Syrian government.”

At the same time, there have been concerns voiced that witnesses the UN team spoke to were brought by the opposition from different regions and did not live in Western Ghouta.

“I think it is not possible to say ‘We brought them all from a different area.’ To my mind that is inconceivable. You can come up with the theory, but this does not mean the theory is correct,” Kane said.

When asked if the UN team had requested examining dead bodies to take more samples, Kane said they had not, because “there was no need to exhume dead bodies” as victims’ accounts “are much more powerful.”

“Dead body can’t tell you anything. The dead body can’t tell how the person dies, how the person was affected, how the person suffered. A living person can tell you that,”  Kane said.

After the UN team left Syria on Monday, Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) experts arrived in the country. They are currently making preparations for the disarmament.

The OPCW team will start conducting tests on October 7.

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'Iranian president' engages with Twitter's Jack Dorsey

BBC News, Joe Miller, 2 October 2013

Iran's newly elected president has been using Twitter as a diplomatic tool

Related Stories

• Will Iran loosen its grip on the internet?
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A Twitter account used by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has exchanged tweets with Twitter's chairman, fuelling speculation Iran's social media ban might be lifted.

Jack Dorsey tweeted the account on Tuesday, asking: "Are citizens of Iran able to read your tweets?"

The reply said he was working to ensure they would "comfortably b able 2 access all info globally as is their right".

Mr Dorsey replied: "Please let us know how we can help to make it a reality."

Sites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are banned in Iran, although many Iranians bypass restrictions using virtual private networks (VPNs).

The exchange of tweets between Hassan Rouhani and Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey has caused much speculation.

But does this mean that social media will be unblocked in Iran soon? The short answer is not necessarily.

Mr Rouhani's preferred language on Twitter is English, not Farsi. He seems more eager to engage with the outside world than send a message back home.

And here lies the contradiction that most observers, including Iranian citizens, seem willing to ignore.

While President Rouhani and his government ministers are using Twitter and Facebook, access to social networking sites is banned for Iranian citizens.

We will have to wait to see how much of Mr Rouhani's rhetoric results in action. He will certainly have tough days ahead if he is to prioritise his promise of free access to the internet.

Authorship debate

Iran's new administration, which came to power in August, has taken to social media, using it as a diplomatic tool to engage with the rest of the world.

Iran's Foreign Minister Javad Zarif has an active Facebook page, as does Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh.

Mr Rouhani, whose campaign slogan was "moderation and wisdom", has had a presence on Twitter since running for election.

He made headlines for apparently posting a New Year message to Iranian Jews, and for chronicling his recent groundbreaking telephone conversation with US President Barack Obama.

But there has been some confusion over who is actually operating Mr Rouhani's Twitter account.

The president's Twitter handle has not been authenticated by Twitter, which puts a blue tick on profiles it confirms are genuine.

After Mr Rouhani's Jewish New Year tweet, his office told reporters that the account was controlled by those close to the president but that he did not personally author the tweets.

The BBC's Persian service said that exclusive pictures and news alerts tweeted by Mr Rouhani's account suggested it was run by the people in close proximity to Iran's president.

Critics have claimed Iran's reformist politicians are being intentionally vague about who controls their social media accounts, so they can disavow messages that anger hardliners.

Towards reform

Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey was 

pushed out of the company in 2008,

 but returned in 2011

The Iranian president has previously voiced his opposition to Iran's internet censorship, but does not have the lone authority to lift the ban.

Iranians were briefly granted access to Facebook and Twitter last month, but authorities claimed the incident was a technical glitch.

However recent developments have indicated that Iranian authorities are easing their grip on internet censorship.

Iranians accessing a filtered website without using a VPN used to be confronted with a message notifying them that the site had been filtered for "criminal" content.

Now, all surfers get is an index page with links to domestic websites and a "no access" message.

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Herman Wallace released after 40 years in solitary

BBC News, 1 October 2013

Supporters have asked Louisiana to release Wallace on humanitarian
grounds

Related Stories 

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A judge in the US state of Louisiana has overturned the murder conviction of a terminally-ill prisoner who has spent 40 years in solitary confinement.

Judge Brian Jackson ruled Herman Wallace's 1974 conviction was unconstitutional and ordered him freed.

Wallace, 71, was diagnosed with liver cancer this year and has weeks to live.

He is one of three men convicted of the 1972 murder of a prison guard. Known as the Angola Three, they have maintained their innocence.

One of the three, Robert King, was released in 2001. Wallace and another man, Albert Woodfox, have remained incarcerated, isolated in tiny jail cells and allowed out to shower or exercise one hour a day.

The men, initially imprisoned for robbery, have been the object of a long-running international campaign arguing they were wrongly convicted of the murder because of their association with the militant Black Panther Party.

Baton Rouge, Louisiana, prosecutor Hillar Moore was quoted by the New Orleans Times-Picayune as saying he would appeal against Wallace's release.

'Tragic example'

Louisiana State Penitentiary, where the three men were held, is nicknamed Angola for the plantation that once stood on its site, worked by slaves kidnapped from Africa.

Judge Jackson ruled that Wallace's conviction was unconstitutional because women were barred from serving on his jury, a violation of Wallace's right to a fair trial.

"The record in this case makes clear that Mr Wallace's grand jury was improperly chosen… and that the Louisiana courts, when presented with the opportunity to correct this error, failed to do so," Judge Jackson wrote in his decision.

"The case of Herman Wallace is a tragic example of 'justice' gone wrong in the USA," Tessa Murphy of Amnesty International said in a statement.

"Finally a federal court has acknowledged some of the unfairness surrounding this case. However this sadly comes too late for lasting benefit as he is at death's door with terminal cancer."

US health reform launches despite shutdown

Google – AFP, Kerry Sheridan (AFP), 1 October 2013

A woman looks at the HealthCare.gov insurance exchange Internet site

on October 1, 2013 in Washington, DC (AFP, Karen Bleier)

Washington (AFP) - A key stage of President Barack Obama's drive to offer cheaper health insurance to millions of Americans opened Tuesday despite a government shutdown but technical glitches blocked many users from signing up.

Republican opposition to the plan forced the US government to close its doors and kept hundreds of thousands of workers home without pay, but administration officials vowed health reform would forge ahead.

Known widely as "Obamacare," the Affordable Care Act was passed by Congress and signed by Obama in 2010, on the promise of helping 30 million uninsured people get health care coverage.

Despite its ambitions to revolutionize American health care, the plan is not free and will not be able to cover tens of millions of people in America who lack full insurance coverage for health care.

A woman looks at the HealthCare.gov

 insurance exchange Internet site

 on October 1, 2013 in Washington,

 DC (AFP, Karen Bleier)

Advocates have touted it as a major step forward, while opponents like Republican House speaker John Boehner have insisted the law "is not ready for prime-time."

Indeed, in the first few hours of Tuesday, the new health insurance exchanges that were to begin enrolling people via the website healthcare.gov were jammed.

Frustrated users flocked to Twitter to complain that healthcare.gov and others linked to the exchanges were not working.

An attempt by an AFP reporter to check the prices offered in Virginia resulted in the message: "Important: Your account couldnt [sic] be created at this time. The system is unavailable."

The NY State of Health site said that "overwhelming interest" had led to two million visits in the first two hours of the launch, and asked people to come back later if they had been unable to log in.

"Today is launch day for Obamacare and so far it's like a giant online traffic jam on the first day of summer vacation," said analyst Jeff Kagan.

"No one knew what to expect, but chaos is what we have."

US Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius had pleaded for patience in the run-up to October 1.

She expressed the hope that consumers would give the government "the same slack as they give Apple" when the computer giant releases new technologies.

"Today’s launch begins a new day when health care coverage will be more accessible and affordable than ever before,” Sebelius said in a statement issued early Tuesday.

About seven million Americans are expected to seek coverage by 2014, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

The policies available on the health exchanges range in price according to a person's income, location, family size and the level of coverage on a scale of bronze, silver, gold or platinum.

All Americans must sign up for some kind of health insurance by January 1 or face a fine.

The government said last week there will be around 53 plans to choose from in the federally-facilitated marketplace.

"The vast majority will have a choice of at least two different health insurance companies -- usually more," said a statement from Health and Human Services.

"Nearly six in ten uninsured Americans could get insurance for $100 or less, with financial assistance and expanded access to Medicaid."

Most Americans have health insurance -- 82.6 percent according a July report from the Department of Commerce based on data from the 2010 Census.

About half get it through their employer, and about 30 percent are enrolled in government programs like Medicare, mainly for seniors, and Medicaid, which covers the poor and disabled.

That leaves 17.4 percent of Americans uninsured, or about 53 million people.

An analysis in the journal Health Affairs earlier this year projected that around 30 million Americans will still not get health insurance through the Affordable Care Act.

Those gaps are due in part to the Supreme Court's decision to allow some states to opt out of expanding Medicaid programs, coupled with a cut in funding under the reform plan to safety-net hospitals.

The Affordable Care Act "will leave tens of millions uncovered. It will do little to alter racial disparities in coverage," said the Health Affairs report published in June.

"The ACA, whatever its merits, will fall well short of its stated goal of providing affordable care for all Americans."

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Opinions turn favorable on health care plan 

President Obama reaches for a pen to sign the health care bill Tuesday.
A poll finds increased support for the measure. (March 23, 2010,
Photo: Charles Dharapak, AP)

Opposition to President Obama and the Transition to Uncorrupted Governments - New  

goldenageofgaia.com, Steve Beckow, An Hour with an Angel, September 30, 2013, with Archangel Michael

SB: All right. Maybe I can squeeze in one or two questions just before we go.

At this moment it seems as if in the American political spectrum the same blind opposition to President Obama is still apparent. When and how will the governments of the world emerge as uncorrupted institutions, given that there will now be a wholesale move towards new administrations? I don’t mean a toppling of administrations, but a reformation throughout the world.

AAM: The political landscape, not only in the United States but in many places, is going to shift rather dramatically in the coming year, and particularly within the next several months. Do not be overly concerned about opposition to Obama. What it is doing is bringing to the forefront — and making it very public — those who do not wish this energy [Obama] to be in a leadership position. That is not going to change. It will come to the forefront and the light will win.

SB: Oh, that’s very reassuring.

AAM: We are very present in the White House.

SB: Oh! Very good! Okay.  I think I recall you mentioning Medicare in Canada. Canada has a wonderful system of universal medicare. When will the United States enjoy the same quality of medicare? Or other nations, for that matter.

AAM: You see, this is one of the fundamental rights, and your United Nations has just begun to peek at this.  All of your — yes, all — of your medical systems have been based on false grids that you are eligible for disease. Many, many industries have grown up around this belief system.

Now, we would not dismantle this in a day, because the displacement would be very large, but you have already begun to see the shift to wellness, to healing centers, to alternative methods of energy healing. And with the arrival of your star brothers and sisters this will become even more so.

So not only universal medical care, but universal healthcare and the right to wellness is going to become the simple stand-alone fact over the next year to two years. Oh, and it will happen much more quickly in the United States.

SB: Oh, that’s good to hear. So many people are bankrupted by a sudden illness. And it never should be that way.

AAM: It is an atrocity that one may suffer and die because one does not have adequate money. That is absurd.

"THE BRIDGE OF SWORDS" – Sep 29, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: ... I'm in Canada and I know it, but I will tell those listening and reading in the American audience the following: Get ready! Because there are some institutions that are yet to fall, ones that don't have integrity and that could never be helped with a bail out. Again, we tell you the biggest one is big pharma, and we told you that before. It's inevitable. If not now, then in a decade. It's inevitable and they will fight to stay alive and they will not be crossing the bridge. For on the other side of the bridge is a new way, not just for medicine but for care. ....) - (Text Version)

US government begins shutdown after Congress debates end in stalemate

Recriminations fly as Republican rancour over Obamacare leads to first federal shutdown in two decades

theguardian.com, Dan Roberts, Tuesday 1 October 2013

The US Capitol in Washington, where Congress and Senate failed to agree
 a deal to prevent the US federal government shutting down. Photograph:
Jim Bourg/Reuters

The US government was forced to begin closing swaths of non-essential services on Tuesday morning after frantic rounds of late night political sparring failed to avert the first federal shutdown in nearly two decades.

As a midnight deadline to extend Congressional spending authority ticked ever closer, Republicans staged a series of last-ditch efforts to use a once-routine budget procedure to force Democrats to abandon their efforts to extend US health insurance.

Three separate attacks on the Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare, were staged by the House of Representatives, only to be rejected in turn by the Democrat-controlled Senate, which accused Republicans of holding the country to ransom.

Shortly before midnight, Senate majority leader Harry Reid marked the end of the process by rejecting House calls for formal talks to reconcile their conflicting positions, arguing it was impossible to negotiate with a “gun to our heads”.

“This is a very serious time in the history of our country,” Reid said. “Millions of people are going to be affected tomorrow and the Republicans are still playing games”

An estimated 800,000 federal workers will be forced to stay at home from Tuesday under a stalemate that could drag on for days and disrupt services as varied as national parks and the US space programme.

The White House has drawn up a list of essential staff who are legally allowed to carry on working, but President Barack Obama warned that a shutdown would have an immediate affect on the fragile US economy.

“We do not have a clear indication that Congress will act in time for the president to sign a Continuing Resolution before the end of the day tomorrow, October 1,” said a White House statement issued shortly before midnight.

“Therefore, agencies should now execute plans for an orderly shutdown due to the absence of appropriations. We urge Congress to act quickly to pass a Continuing Resolution to provide a short-term bridge that ensures sufficient time to pass a budget for the remainder of the fiscal year, and to restore the operation of critical public services and programs that will be impacted by a lapse in appropriations.”

Obama also issued a statement to military employees after signing a Republican-proposed law that exempts active-duty servicemen from the effects of the shutdown, but will not protect civilian workers.

“I know the days ahead could mean more uncertainty, including possible furloughs,” Obama said. “You and your families deserve better than the dysfunction we’re seeing in Congress.”

House speaker John Boehner denied that Republican tactics were responsible for the shutdown, insisting Democrats were to blame for refusing to negotiate over Obamacare.

“I didn't come here to shut down the government,” Boehner told one of several heated House debates.

“I came here to fight for a smaller, less costly and more accountable federal government. But here we find ourselves in this moment dealing with a law that’s causing unknown consequences and unknown damage to the American people and to our economy. And that issue is Obamacare.”

But Democrats are confident that US public opinion will continue to hold Republicans to blame for what could be days of disruption until a deal can be struck.

They argue that Republicans are using underhand methods to overturn a law that was passed four years ago, ratified by the supreme court and endorsed by voters at the last presidential election.

Senator Bernie Sanders, of Vermont, said: “If we surrender to hostage-taking tonight, these guys would be back within a couple of weeks without a shadow of a doubt. What we are dealing with tonight is an extraordinary anti-democratic act.”

Related Articles:

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Americans frustrated by government shutdown

US websites suspended after federal shutdown

Opposition to President Obama and the Transition to Uncorrupted Governments  

goldenageofgaia.com, Steve Beckow, An Hour with an Angel, September 30, 2013, with Archangel Michael

SB: All right. Maybe I can squeeze in one or two questions just before we go.

At this moment it seems as if in the American political spectrum the same blind opposition to President Obama is still apparent. When and how will the governments of the world emerge as uncorrupted institutions, given that there will now be a wholesale move towards new administrations? I don’t mean a toppling of administrations, but a reformation throughout the world.

AAM: The political landscape, not only in the United States but in many places, is going to shift rather dramatically in the coming year, and particularly within the next several months. Do not be overly concerned about opposition to Obama. What it is doing is bringing to the forefront — and making it very public — those who do not wish this energy [Obama] to be in a leadership position. That is not going to change. It will come to the forefront and the light will win.

SB: Oh, that’s very reassuring.

AAM: We are very present in the White House.

SB: Oh! Very good! Okay.  I think I recall you mentioning Medicare in Canada. Canada has a wonderful system of universal medicare. When will the United States enjoy the same quality of medicare? Or other nations, for that matter.

AAM: You see, this is one of the fundamental rights, and your United Nations has just begun to peek at this.  All of your — yes, all — of your medical systems have been based on false grids that you are eligible for disease. Many, many industries have grown up around this belief system.

Now, we would not dismantle this in a day, because the displacement would be very large, but you have already begun to see the shift to wellness, to healing centers, to alternative methods of energy healing. And with the arrival of your star brothers and sisters this will become even more so.

So not only universal medical care, but universal healthcare and the right to wellness is going to become the simple stand-alone fact over the next year to two years. Oh, and it will happen much more quickly in the United States.

SB: Oh, that’s good to hear. So many people are bankrupted by a sudden illness. And it never should be that way.

AAM: It is an atrocity that one may suffer and die because one does not have adequate money. That is absurd.