Dr. Egon Spengler: I'm worried, Ray. It's getting crowded in there and all my data points to something big on the horizon.
Winston Zeddemore: What do you mean, big?
Dr. Egon Spengler: Well, let's say this Twinkie represents the normal amount of psychokinetic energy in the New York area. Based on this morning's sample, it would be a Twinkie... thirty-five feet long, weighing approximately six hundred pounds...
Dr. Egon Spengler: There's something very important I forgot to tell you.
Dr. Peter Venkman: What?
Dr. Egon Spengler: Don't cross the streams.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Why?
Dr. Egon Spengler: It would be bad.
Dr. Peter Venkman: I'm fuzzy on the whole good/bad thing. What do you mean, "bad"?
Dr. Egon Spengler: Try to imagine all life as you know it stopping instantaneously and every molecule in your body exploding at the speed of light.
Dr Ray Stantz: Total protonic reversal.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Right. That's bad. Okay. All right. Important safety tip. Thanks, Egon...
Dr. Egon Spengler: Oh good, you're here!
Dr. Peter Venkman: Yeah, what have you got?
Dr. Egon Spengler: This is big, Peter, this is very big. There is definitely something here.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Egon, this reminds me of the time you tried to drill a hole through your head. Remember that?
Dr. Egon Spengler: That would have worked if you hadn't stopped me...
Janine Melnitz: You're very handy, I can tell. I bet you like to read a lot, too.
Dr. Egon Spengler: Print is dead.
Janine Melnitz: Oh, that's very fascinating to me. I read a lot myself. Some people think I'm too intellectual but I think it's a fabulous way to spend your spare time. I also play raquetball. Do you have any hobbies?
Dr. Egon Spengler: I collect spores, molds, and fungus...
Dr. Peter Venkman: [as the Ghostbusters approach Gozer] Grab your stick!
[the Ghostbusters draw their handsets]
Dr Ray Stantz, Dr. Egon Spengler, Winston Zeddemore: HOLDIN'!
Dr. Peter Venkman: Heat 'em up!
[they arm their packs]
Dr Ray Stantz, Dr. Egon Spengler, Winston Zeddemore: SMOKIN'!
Dr. Peter Venkman: Make 'em hard!
[they rack their handsets]
Dr Ray Stantz, Dr. Egon Spengler, Winston Zeddemore: READY!
Dr. Peter Venkman: Let's show this prehistoric bitch how we do things downtown... THROW IT!...
Dr Ray Stantz: Are you okay?
Louis: Who are you guys?
Dr Ray Stantz: We're the Ghostbusters.
Louis: Who does your taxes?
Dr Ray Stantz: You know, Mr. Tully, you are a most fortunate individual.
Louis: I know!
Dr Ray Stantz: You have been a participant in the biggest interdimensional cross rip since the Tunguska blast of 1909!
Louis: Felt great.
Dr. Egon Spengler: We'd like to get a sample of your brain tissue.
Louis: Okay...
RIP Harold Ramius
HYPERLINKS MAY REQUIRE AN EMAIL:
USAExcept where noted courtesy STRATFOR.COM
WASHINGTON — Hardly anything is clear in Washington about what’s happening with the US Navy’s Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) program. Details are embryonic, discussions are just beginning, the whys and wherefores still unclear, memos and specific directions yet to be issued, and sensitivities still raw.
A memo issued Feb. 24 by Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel to the Navy’s leadership clarified his press conference remarks that day directing that “no new contract negotiations beyond 32 ships will go forward.” Hagel’s artfully-written dictum, however, has enough holes in every sentence to drive a battleship through, allowing for plausible deniability about a host of issues.
Navy officials, pressed for facts about a new “small surface combatant,” are offering virtually no details. Many admit they are waiting for further direction.
Out of the churn, however, several things are becoming clearer:
■- LCS is not being cancelled, despite the tenor and tone of Hagel’s press conference, numerous statements by acting deputy defense secretary Christine Fox, and dozens of media reports;
- The LCS program could continue beyond 32 ships, either with existing designs or with modified versions of one or both designs;
- The Navy will continue to build some sort of small surface combatant, whether or not it’s an LCS;
- There is no specific crisis driving these developments, other than Fox’s insistence on instigating action before she’s replaced in the permanent job by former Navy undersecretary Robert Work, a long-time champion of the LCS.
AFRICA
Al Shabaab's Adaptability
ASIA
NOTHING SIGNIFICANT TO REPORT
EUROPE
Conversation: Ukraine's Divisions and Russia's Next Moves
Ukraine's New Government Faces Myriad Crises
Conditions Are Ripe for Radical Groups to Grow in Ukraine
Ukraine: Officials Will Meet With NATO March 3, 2014
NATO and Ukrainian officials will meet March 4 to discuss Article IV of the North Atlantic Treaty, according to a post on Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski's Twitter feed, RT reported March 3. Article IV states that involved parties will convene when the independence or territorial integrity of one of the parties is threatened.
MEXICO/LATIN AMERICA
Regional Leaders Attempt to Mediate Venezuela's Crisis
Conversation: The Implications of El Chapo's Arrest
AFGHANISTAN
NOTHING SIGNIFICANT TO REPORT
CHINA
China's Uighur Militants Make a Strategic Shift
New Investment Platforms Raise Questions for China's Banking System
IRAN
No Iran report with new bomb research information: IAEA
(Reuters) - The U.N. nuclear watchdog said on Friday it had not prepared a report with new information about suspected atomic bomb research in Iran, after Israel urged it to go public with all information it has regarding such suspicions.
Israel's statement followed a Reuters report on Thursday that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had planned a major report on Iran last year that might have revealed more of its alleged activities that could be used for designing a nuclear warhead, but had held off as Tehran's relations with the outside world thawed.
Sources familiar with the matter said the IAEA apparently had not gone ahead with writing the report and that there was no way of knowing what extra information might have been included in such a document, although one source said it could have added to worries about Iran.
According to the sources, the IAEA was believed to have dropped the idea of a new report, at least for the time being.
In 2011, the IAEA issued a landmark report with a trove of intelligence indicating past activity in Iran which could be relevant for developing nuclear weapons, some of which it said might still be continuing. Iran rejected the allegations as fabricated and baseless.
Since then, the U.N. watchdog has said it has obtained more information that "has further corroborated" its analysis in the 2011 document, but has not given details.
"The IAEA has not prepared any report containing new information relating to possible military dimensions of Iran's nuclear program," spokeswoman Gill Tudor said in an email on Friday, in response to a question.
"The agency's reports on Iran to its Board of Governors are factual and impartial. Their content is not influenced by political considerations," Tudor said, giving no other details....
Iran cutting sensitive nuclear stocks, much work remains: IAEA
(Reuters) - Iran is reducing its most proliferation-prone nuclear stockpile as required by its landmark deal with world powers but much work remains to be done to resolve all concerns about Tehran's activities, the U.N. atomic watchdog chief said on Monday.
Among measures Iran is taking since the interim agreement took effect on January 20 is the dilution of its stock of higher-enriched uranium to a fissile concentration less suitable for any attempt to fuel an atomic bomb.
Yukiya Amano, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), indicated that Iran had made sufficient progress in this regard to receive a scheduled March 1 installment of $450 million out of a total of $4.2 billion in previously blocked overseas funds.
The IAEA has a pivotal role in checking that Iran is living up to its part of the six-month accord in curbing its disputed nuclear program in exchange for some easing of sanctions that have impaired its oil-dependent economy.
"As of today, measures agreed under the Joint Plan of Action are being implemented as planned," Amano said, referring to the November 24 agreement struck in Geneva between Iran and the United States, Germany, France, Russia, China and Britain.
These included "the dilution of a proportion of Iran's inventory" of 20 percent uranium gas to a lower enrichment level, which "has reached the halfway mark", he told the IAEA's 35-nation board, according to a copy of his speech.
Under the accord, Iran suspended enrichment of uranium to 20 percent fissile concentration - a relatively short technical step away from the level required for nuclear bombs - and is taking action to neutralize its holding of the material.
In return, Iran is gradually winning access to $4.2 billion of its oil revenues frozen abroad and some other sanctions relief. The funds will be paid out in eight transfers on a schedule that started with a $550 million payment by Japan on February 1.
Last month, banking sources said South Korea was set to make two payments in March totaling $1 billion.
The March 1 installment depended on Iran following a schedule for diluting part of its stockpile, which Amano's comment suggested it now had. But it was not immediately clear if the funds had already been transferred to Iran.
The Geneva deal was designed to buy time for negotiations on a final settlement of the decade-old stand-off over nuclear activity that Iran says is peaceful but the West fears may be latently aimed at developing a nuclear bomb capability.
IRAQ
EXCLUSIVE-Iraq signs deal to buy arms, ammunition from Iran - documents
* Deal includes eight contracts worth $195 million in total
* Contracts signed weeks after Iraq PM Maliki visited U.S.
* Deal violates U.N. arms embargo on Iran (Updates with U.S. State Department spokeswoman, paragraphs 7-9 and 11-14)
By Ahmed Rasheed
BAGHDAD, Feb 24 (Reuters) - Iran has signed a deal to sell Iraq arms and ammunition worth $195 million, according to documents seen by Reuters - a move that would break a U.N. embargo on weapons sales by Tehran.
The agreement was reached at the end of November, the documents showed, just weeks after Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki returned from lobbying the Obama administration in Washington for extra weapons to fight al Qaeda-linked militants.
Some in Washington are nervous about providing sensitive U.S. military equipment to a country they worry is becoming too close to Iran. Several Iraqi lawmakers said Maliki had made the deal because he was fed up with delays in U.S. arms deliveries.
A spokesman for the Iraqi prime minister would not confirm or deny the sale, but said such a deal would be understandable given Iraq's current security troubles.
"We are launching a war against terrorism and we want to win this war. Nothing prevents us from buying arms and ammunition from any party and it's only ammunition helping us to fight terrorists," said the spokesman, Ali Mussawi.
The Iranian government denied any knowledge of a deal to sell arms to Iraq. It would be the first official arms deal between Shi'ite Iran and Iraq's Shi'ite-led government and would highlight the growing bond between them in the two years since the departure of U.S. troops from Iraq....
ISRAEL
Ultra-Orthodox Jews Clog Jerusalem Streets to Protest a Draft Bill
JERUSALEM — In a formidable show of force, at least 300,000 ultra-Orthodox Jewish men flooded the streets around the main entrance to Jerusalem on Sunday, bringing much of the city to a standstill with a protest against a government plan that aims to conscript more of their numbers for military service and holds out the threat of arrest for religious draft dodgers.
The rally, described as a mass prayer gathering by ultra-Orthodox leaders, was a largely peaceful expression of what many here are calling a culture war over one of the most significant challenges facing Israeli society.
For decades, the ultra-Orthodox, known as Haredim, or those who fear God, have been exempted from military service as long as they were registered in a yeshiva, or religious seminary, and engaged in full-time Torah study. Mainstream Israelis, who are conscripted at 18, have come to view the enlistment of the fast-growing Haredi minority and its subsequent integration into the work force as imperative for the viability of the country and its economy.
The law would subject yeshiva students to conscription and possible imprisonment. Credit Thomas Coex/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
But for the disciplined ranks of ultra-Orthodox men who answered the call of their rabbis on Sunday, the proposed draft bill, and in particular, the call for criminal sanctions, is an abomination...
RUSSIA
Ukraine Finds its Military Options Limited
Russia Consolidates Control Over Crimea's Future
Military Exercises in Russia
SYRIA
Saudi Arabia Overhauls Its Strategy for Syria
MIDDLE EAST GENERAL
Libya vows to stick to democratic path after MPs shot | News , Middle East | THE DAILY STAR
TRIPOLI: Libyan authorities vowed Monday to pursue a democratic transition in the face of mounting lawlessness after two MPs were shot when protesters stormed the country's transitional parliament.
On Sunday, two members of the General National Congress (GNC) were shot and wounded as armed protesters stormed their building in Tripoli. In a separate incident, a French engineer was killed in the restive eastern city of Benghazi.
"I assure you we are committed to the path of the February 17 revolution and to pursue the democratic process," GNC president Nuri Abu Sahmein said in a televised address, referring to the uprising that ended Moamer Kadhafi's four-decade rule.
Abu Sahmein said the MPs' wounds were not life-threatening but condemned what he termed a "flagrant aggression on the seat of legitimate sovereignty."
He urged former rebel fighters who ousted Kadhafi to protect the capital and state institutions.
On Monday, ex-rebels equipped with pick-up trucks mounted with anti-aircraft guns were posted around the GNC building, where at least five burnt-out cars testified to the previous day's violence.
Abu Sahmein said the GNC was examining a roadmap for the handover of power "as quickly as possible" to an elected body.
The GNC, elected after the 2011 uprising, has stirred popular anger by extending its mandate from early February until the end of December....
MISC
Geopolitical Calendar: Week of March 3, 2014
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