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Andrew Cockburn Counterpunch June 24, 2009 "If the worst, the unthinkable, were to happen," Hillary Clinton recently told Fox News, "and this advancing Taliban encouraged and supported by Al Qaeda and other extremists were to essentially topple the government … then they would have keys to the nuclear arsenal of Pakistan."  Many will note that the extremists  posing this unthinkable prospect were set up in business by the U.S. in the first place.  Very well buried is the fact that the nuclear arsenal that must not be allowed to fall into the hands of our former allies has been itself the object of U.S. encouragement over the years and is to this very day in receipt of crucial U.S. financial assistance and technical support. Back in 1979, Zbigniew Brzezinski, intent on his own jihad against the USSR, declared that  the "Afghan resistance" should be supplied with money and arms.  That, of course, required full Pakistani cooperation, which would, Brzezinski u...

By Cheryl Jensen Toyota's assembly plant in Higashi-Fuji, Japan, was awarded the Platinum Plant Quality Award by J.D. Power & Associates for making vehicles with the fewest defects and malfunctions. The plant, which builds the Lexus SC 430 and Toyota Corolla, averaged just 29 problems for every 100 vehicles built. J.D. Power released its 2009 Initial Quality Study this week, and for the sake of not repeating ourselves, you can find details on the rankings and procedures here . While the quality study ranks the 37 automakers from best to worst and ranks the top three vehicles in 10 car and eight truck categories, J.D. Power also awards Platinum, Gold, Silver and Bronze awards to assembly plants for quality. The plant awards are based on defects and malfunctions only, and the scores are expressed in terms of the number of problems per 100 vehicles. In addition to the Toyota plant in Japan, two Asia-Pacific plants and three in Europe and Africa also received awards. In Nort...

By Anwar Iqbal Tuesday, 23 Jun, 2009 | 04:59 AM PST | WASHINGTON: In an unusually harsh article published in The Washington Post on Monday, President Asif Ali Zardari blamed the United States for the present mess in Pakistan, claiming that Washington used his country as a 'blunt instrument of the Cold War.' But in the same article, he urged his American allies to send 'immediate assistance' to help him save democracy. The tone and the content of the article surprised many in Washington, causing some to speculate if relations between the two governments were still as friendly as both say. 'The West, most notably the United States, has been all too willing to dance with dictators in pursuit of perceived short-term goals,' he wrote. 'The litany of these policies and their consequences clutter the earth, from the Marcos regime in the Philippines, to the Shah in Iran, to Mohammed Ziaul Haq and Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan.' According to Mr Zardari, 'e...

By Rob Pegoraro Sunday, June 28, 2009 Two years ago, the original iPhone was the phone that changed everything. The new iPhone 3GS can't make the same difference, not when it shares the market with both predecessors and competing models that have learned some of the same tricks. In that context, the 3GS -- $199 for new or renewing AT&T Wireless customers in a version with 16 gigabytes of storage, $299 in a 32-GB version -- makes an excellent upgrade over the first iPhone. And though AT&T's voice and unlimited-data plans, starting at $69.99 a month, don't quite match other carriers' smartphone deals, the 3GS still provides a better overall value than competing devices. But the days of the iPhone mopping the floor with rivals are over. And users of last year's iPhone 3G -- now available for $99 -- need not feel awful about sticking with their current devices. As the "S" in its name suggests, the 3GS's major contribution is its speed...

The magnificent performance of the rank and file of the Army fighting the counter-insurgency in Swat is no surprise. Whether in Kashmir in 1947-48, Dir in 1958 and 1976, the Rann of Kutch, occupied Kashmir (Operation Gibraltar) and later in the full-fledged war of 1965, during the 1971 war, in the Balochistan counter-insurgency in 1973-5, Siachen continuously since 1985, in Kargil in 1998 and in FATA since 2004 (and many more small conflicts that would take many more pages), officers and men have kept their commitment. The average officer-to-soldier ratio in combat fatalities during conventional operations being 1:17 or 1:18 in most Armies represents the command structure at the field level functioning adequately, young officers (including lieutenant colonels) leading rather than sending men to their deaths. In the Pakistan Army and the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF), the superior 1:10 or 1:11 average through many conflicts means that the young officers are far more enthusiastic at leadi...

      The US state department has appointed its first special representative to Muslim communities to help carry out President Barack Obama's strategy of reaching out to the Muslim world. The choice of Farah Pandith was disclosed in an internal memo to state department employees on Saturday. Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, said Pandith would play a leading role in US efforts to "engage Muslims around the world" and to combat negative views of the United States abroad. Clinton said Pandith, who was born in Indian-administered Kashmir, would bring years of experience to the role. Muslim engagement The state department said Pandith, who is a Muslim, would be responsible for helping US efforts to "engage with Muslims around the world on a people-to-people and organisational level". The statement said Pandith was previously the senior adviser on Muslim engagement in the European and Eurasian region at the state department and had worked in the Afghan capi...

  By Jessica Mintz, AP Seattle: Microsoft Corp said on Thursday that prices for the Windows 7 computer operating system are largely in line with those for Vista, and that people who buy PCs before the new system goes on sale in October will get free upgrades. To drum up demand among people who aren't in the market for a new PC, Microsoft also said it is taking limited pre-orders for Windows 7, selling some for as little as $50 (Dh184). People who buy Windows Vista Home Premium, Business or Ultimate computers from yesterday can contact their manufacturer for a free upgrade when Windows 7 becomes available on October 22. As a result, Microsoft said it will defer recognition of an expected $200 million to $300 million in Windows revenue until later quarters.     The sale was scheduled to start yesterday in the US, Canada and Japan, and on July 15 in the UK, France and Germany. It will last for about two weeks, or as long as allotted copies of the software last. The Redmond,...