Afghan Diplomats Defect as Western Withdrawal Nears

By Hasnain Kazim, Der Spiegel, June 24, 2013

A total of 105 Afghani diplomats were meant to report for duty at the Foreign Ministry in Kabul on Saturday. They were being rotated out of their foreign postings as scheduled, and it was time to return to headquarters. Yet just five of them have resurfaced. The others have apparently remained in the countries where they had been posted, among them several employees of the Afghan Embassy in Berlin.

Sources at the Afghan Foreign Ministry have informed SPIEGEL ONLINE that embassy staff members have said they would apply for asylum in their respective host countries or at least apply for an extension of their service until the presidential election in spring 2014. “They are hoping that there is more clarity about the future of our country by that point," said an employee of the ministry. “I feel as though there has been an exodus. No one wants to return to Afghanistan," said the employee, who added that they couldn’t be faulted for wanting to stay away from “the situation in the country."

According to recent surveys, most Afghans believe the country will sink into chaos and violence and expect that civil war will break out once Western forces withdraw at the end of 2014. For months, the Taliban and various other ethnic groups have been arming themselves in preparation for a fight for power in the country.

Many Afghan diplomats are the sons and daughters of high-ranking politicians who are also trying to go abroad as soon as possible and stay there until the situation in Afghanistan becomes clearer.

International foundations and organizations that organize educational trips and conferences for Afghans abroad have also become more cautious recently. They know that more and more trip participants will disappear. It is said in Kabul that several Afghan teachers never returned from a trip organized recently by the German government. And a high-ranking official from the Afghan Foreign Ministry called home during a trip to Canada to say that he wouldn’t be coming back.

"I can confirm this trend," says Tinko Weibezahl, the head of the Kabul office of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation. “In recent months some of our most qualified contacts have left the country. The refugees are above all “the highly educated, who were much more optimistic about the future a year ago," Weibezahl says. Government ministers, lawmakers and senior military officials are also attempting to get their families out of the country.

The story of the hopeful future of an Afghanistan that stands on its own two feet, that is safe and peaceful and democratically governed, “is just a story that the West likes to tell us," says a senior official from the presidential palace in Kabul. “This story has just one catch: Most Afghans don’t believe it."

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Pope 'snub' of concert stuns cardinals, sends signal

By Philip Pullella, Reuters, June 24, 2013

VATICAN CITY (Reuters)—A last-minute no-show by Pope Francis at a concert where he was to have been the guest of honor has sent another clear signal that he is going to do things his way and does not like the Vatican high life.

The gala classical concert on Saturday was scheduled before his election in March. But the white papal armchair set up in the presumption that he would be there remained empty.

Minutes before the concert was due to start, an archbishop told the crowd of cardinals and Italian dignitaries that an “urgent commitment that cannot be postponed" would prevent Francis from attending.

The prelates, assured that health was not the reason for the no-show, looked disoriented, realizing that the message he wanted to send was that, with the Church in crisis, he—and perhaps they—had too much pastoral work to do to attend social events.

"It took us by surprise," said one Vatican source on Monday. “We are still in a period of growing pains. He is still learning how to be pope and we are still learning how he wants to do it."

"In Argentina, they probably knew not to arrange social events like concerts for him because he probably wouldn’t go," said the source, who spoke anonymously because he is not authorized to discuss the issue.

Since his election on March 13, Francis, the former cardinal Jorge Bergoglio of Argentina, has not spent a single night in the opulent and spacious papal apartments.

He has preferred to live in a small suite in a busy Vatican guest house, where he takes most meals in a communal dining room and says Mass every morning in the house chapel rather than the private papal chapel in the Apostolic Palace.

The day before the concert, Francis said bishops should be “close to the people" and not have “the mentality of a prince".

On Saturday, while the concert was in progress in an auditorium just meters (yards) away, Francis was believed to be working on new appointments for the Curia, the Vatican’s troubled central administration.

The administration was held responsible for some of the mishaps and scandals that plagued the eight-year reign of Pope Benedict before he resigned in February.

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Habit Mastery: Creating the New Normal

By Leo Babauta, ETR, June 25, 2013

Changing habits, at its core, is simply a process of changing what’s normal for you.

This is something I’ve done myself many times over the last decade. Here’s just a sample of the new normal I’ve achieved in my life:

• Not smoking became my new normal (lots of pain for a month or so)
• Running became normal
• Writing every day became normal
• Not having sugar in my coffee became normal
• Eating whole foods (instead of junk foods) became normal
• Meditating every morning became normal
• Having less stuff and a simpler home became my new normal
• Reducing and eventually (mostly) eliminating sugar became normal
• And so on: no car, walk and ride mass transit, do less, becoming content with myself, working for myself, etc.

In fact, you could say the last 8 years of my life has been a constant adjusting of what’s normal. Adjusting normal is my normal now.

However, for most people, changing is tough because there’s some pain in changing. When you have a problem, there is the pain it causes in your life, but there’s also a pain of trying to change it. When the payoff of trying to change is outweighed by the payoff of continuing the old way, people stick with what they’re comfortable with.

How do we overcome this problem of the pain of change? Start small, start with one thing at a time, and make the change easier. You want to make changing the path of least resistance, because change usually isn’t for most people.

If you make a drastic change, it feels really hard and really different, and not something you can stick to for very long.

But when you make a change easier, it makes it easier to take that all-important first step. Once you take that first step, you have a bit of forward momentum. And it’s much easier to be consistent and stick with something for a long time.

Let’s take an example: I used to drink coffee with lots of added sugar. I used to think there was nothing wrong with that, but eventually I realized I was making an excuse for putting crap in my body. So I started by putting half a teaspoon less in my coffee. At first, it was slightly less good. But after a few days, it tasted exactly like normal, like what I was used to. And then I took out another half a teaspoon, and it was slightly less good for a while, and then after a while it was exactly what I was used to.

Our minds tend to adjust over time. That’s my change process—I gradually adjust what’s normal to me. Eventually I didn’t need any sugar in my coffee, and it was just as good for me, I didn’t have all that crap, and I enjoyed it the same.

You can do this with anything—exercise, meditation, procrastination. Gradually adjust what feels like normal to you.

Here’s the process:
1. Start small. What’s the smallest increment you can do? Do this for at least 3 days, preferably 4-5.

2. Get started. Starting the change each day is the most important thing. Want to run? Just get out the door. Want to meditate? Just get on the cushion.

3. Enjoy the change. Don’t look at this as a sacrifice. It’s fun, it’s learning, it’s a challenge.

4. Stick to the change. Notice your urge to quit. Don’t act on it. Keep going.

5. Adjust again. When the change becomes normal, make another small adjustment.

This is the process of creating a new normal. It’s beautiful and simple

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Rob Bell- Covered in the Dust of your Rabbi!

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His Gifts, His Rewards

Words from Jesus

Download Audio (10.4MB)
A perfect fit

He makes the whole body fit together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.—Ephesians 4:16 NLT



I have gifted all My children, but many do not see or perceive My gifts because they look or perceive with the eyes of man instead of the eyes of the Spirit. They judge according to outward appearance, according to that which is great in their own minds, instead of judging righteous judgment.

I have gifted all My children differently so that they can be as a body fitly joined together, each one doing his part to make My kingdom strong. I have gifted some with many gifts, some with fewer gifts. The important point is not whether there are many or fewer gifts, but that those gifts come from My hand.

You must trust Me to know that I have made you what you need to be and what I want you to be. Your rewards in this life and in the life to come will not be according to the number of gifts you have, nor according to the greatness of the gifts. Your rewards will be according to your faithfulness and what you do with the gifts that I have given you.

*

Taste and see that the Lord is good. Oh, the joys of those who take refuge in him! … Those who trust in the Lord will lack no good thing.—Psalm 34:8, 10 NLT



Come unto Me and find rest in My arms. Be filled to overflowing with My love, for I have so much to give! I promise you that I will not fail you. I will be a faithful Husband and a faithful provider. For I am the giver of gifts, I am the supplier of needs, and I am your Husband.

So stay close to Me. Be filled with Me, and I will pour out My Spirit upon you in great measure, that you may be filled, that you may be strengthened, and that you may accomplish My purpose through the gifts and the blessings that I pour upon you.


Faithful servant

To those who use well what they are given, even more will be given, and they will have an abundance. But from those who do nothing, even what little they have will be taken away.—Matthew 25:29 NLT



In My kingdom, in the life to come, you will not be rewarded according to the gifts that you were given, but according to your faithfulness and your yieldedness. Each person will be rewarded according to that which he received from My hand, and that which he returned unto My hand in the way of diligence, faithfulness, fruitfulness, and obedience.

The gifts and talents that a man has are gifts from My hand. Therefore glory not in your gifts and talents, but give Me the glory. Seek diligently and wholeheartedly to do your best with what you have been given, knowing that I will reward you accordingly for a job well done.

I will reward you in this life, and in the life to come I will crown you with a crown of glory!

*

Yours, O Lord, is the greatness, the power, the glory, the victory, and the majesty. Everything in the heavens and on earth is yours, O Lord, and this is your kingdom. We adore you as the one who is over all things. Wealth and honor come from you alone, for you rule over everything. Power and might are in your hand, and at your discretion people are made great and given strength. O our God, we thank you and praise your glorious name! But who am I, and who are my people, that we could give anything to you? Everything we have has come from you, and we give you only what you first gave us!—1 Chronicles 29:11–14 NLT



Your rewards are not a result of what your gifts and talents are or how many you have, but the rewards are a result of what you do with such gifts. I seek not those who are strong and great in themselves but those who are willing to glorify Me. I seek those who are willing to acknowledge that all that they have and all that they are comes from Me—that it is My gift, My blessing, My anointing, My power in their lives.

Someone who has fewer gifts and talents, who acknowledges his weakness and depends upon Me and gives Me all the glory will be more greatly rewarded than one who is strong and mighty and greatly gifted with many talents and skills, yet who leans to his own strength and takes the glory to himself. No matter what your gifts and talents, whether they be many or few, if you give them all to Me and invest them well and are diligent, careful, prayerful, faithful, and do your very best for Me, this will be rewarded.


Called and chosen

God never changes his mind when he gives gifts or when he calls someone.—Romans 11:29 GW



I have ordained you from the very foundation of the world. I have called you, and you have been faithful to heed My call. I appreciate your yieldedness and your sacrifice in giving your time and strength to do My will to serve others. Every deed of kindness, every loving word, every stooping to lift the burden of another is noticed by Me.

I have given you many gifts—strength of body, strength of mind, strength of character—and I will use these gifts even more greatly as you continue to commit your life to Me and to love others. As you continue to look steadfastly to Me and listen to My whispers, I won’t fail to instruct you and guide you in all your ways. Your faithfulness to love others and shower tender raindrops of love and care and diligence are so beautiful to Me. You are very precious and dear to Me.


Returns on the investment

My rewards are not meted out according to the number of gifts and the strength of a man, but according to your faithfulness, yieldedness, and humility. So you see, the rewards do not gauge how much or how little I love a person, for once again, My love is unchanging and constant. I love each person equally, whether they are great or small.

The rewards I pour forth depend upon you and how you live, what you do for Me and others. I have made an original investment in you as an individual, and the returns that you will receive on that investment depend on what you do with it—whether you take the investment and you hide it away and bury it, or whether you use it wisely, consistently, and faithfully.

You are responsible for the rewards, for the returns, and for the blessings that you receive from Me.

*

May all the gifts and benefits that come from God our Father, and the Master, Jesus Christ, be yours.Every time I think of you—and I think of you often!—I thank God for your lives of free and open access to God, given by Jesus. … Just think—you don’t need a thing, you’ve got it all! All God’s gifts are right in front of you as you wait expectantly for our Master Jesus to arrive on the scene for the Finale. And not only that, but God himself is right alongside to keep you steady and on track until things are all wrapped up by Jesus. God, who got you started in this spiritual adventure, shares with us the life of his Son and our Master Jesus. He will never give up on you. Never forget that.—1 Corinthians 1:3–9 MSG



Imagine that there is a scale before you. It is a balance, and I took My own Son, the one who is dearest to Me, My one and only Son, and I laid Him on one side of the scale. It tipped so far to that side! Then I took you, with all your weaknesses and your shortcomings and your failings, and all the things about yourself that bother you so much and that you think make you of so little value and that make you so hard to love and unworthy of My love, and I put you—just you—on the other side of the scale. And the scale was perfectly balanced!

I saw that it was a good trade, to put My Son on one side, and you—just you—on the other side. I saw that it was worth it to trade the life of My Son for you, that I might redeem you forever. It was worth it to give My Son just for you. This is how great My love is for you.

Originally published 1997. Updated and republished June 2013. Read by Jon Marc.
Music by Michael Dooley.

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Hatred between Sunnis, Shiites abounds in Mideast

By Lee Keath, AP, Jun 23, 2013

CAIRO (AP)—It’s not hard to find stereotypes, caricatures and outright bigotry when talk in the Middle East turns to the tensions between Islam’s two main sects.

Shiites are described as devious, power-hungry corruptors of Islam. Sunnis are called extremist, intolerant oppressors.

Hatreds between the two are now more virulent than ever in the Arab world because of Syria’s civil war. Hard-line clerics and politicians on both sides in the region have added fuel, depicting the fight as essentially a war of survival for their sect.

But among the public, views are complex. Some sincerely see the other side as wrong—whether on matters of faith or politics. Others see the divisions as purely political, created for cynical aims. Even some who view the other sect negatively fear sectarian flames are burning dangerously out of control. There are those who wish for a return to the days, only a decade or two ago, when the differences did not seem so important and the sects got along better, even intermarried.

And some are simply frustrated that there is so much turmoil over a dispute that dates back to the death of the Prophet Muhammad in the 7th century.

“Fourteen centuries after the death of the prophet, in a region full of destruction, killing, occupation, ignorance and disease, you are telling me about Sunnis and Shiites?” scoffs Ismail al-Hamami, a 67-year-old Sunni Palestinian refugee in Gaza. “We are all Muslims.”

Associated Press correspondents spoke to Shiites and Sunnis across the region. Amid the variety of viewpoints, they found a public struggling with anger that is increasingly curdling into hatred.

BACKGROUND. The Sunni-Shiite split is rooted in the question of who should succeed Muhammad in leading Muslims after his death in 632. Shiites say the prophet’s cousin and son-in-law Ali was his rightful successor but was cheated when authority went to those the Sunnis call the four “Rightfully Guided Caliphs”—Abu Bakr, Omar and Othman and, finally, Ali.

Sunnis are the majority across the Islamic world. In the Middle East, Shiites have strong majorities in Iran, Iraq and Bahrain, with significant communities in Lebanon, Yemen, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and other parts of the Gulf.

Both consider the Quran the word of God. But there are distinctions in theology and religious practice between the two sects.

Some are minor: Shiites pray with their hands by their sides, Sunnis with their hands crossed at their chest or stomach.

Others are significant. Shiites, for example, believe Ali and a string of his descendants, the Imams, had not only rightful political authority after Muhammad but also held a special religious wisdom. Most Shiites believe there were 12 Imams—many of them “martyred” by Sunnis—and the 12th vanished, to one day return and restore justice. Sunnis accuse the Shiites of elevating Ali to the level of Muhammad himself—incorrectly, since Shiites agree that Muhammad was the last of the prophets, a central tenet of Islam.

The bitter disputes of early Islam still resonate. But only the most hard-core would say those differences are reason enough to hate each other. For that, politics is needed.

IRAQ: If Syria’s war has raised the region’s sectarian hatreds, the war in Iraq played a big role in unleashing them. After the U.S.-led invasion toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003, the long-oppressed Shiite majority there saw a chance to take power. Sunnis feared the repression would flip onto them. The result was vicious sectarian fighting that lasted until 2008: Sunni extremists pulled Shiite pilgrims from buses and gunned them down; Shiite militiamen kidnapped Sunnis, dumping their tortured bodies later.

ABDUL-SATTAR ABDUL-JABAR, 56, is a Sunni cleric who occasionally preaches at the prominent Abu Hanifa mosque in the Sunni-dominated Azamiyah neighborhood of Baghdad. Two of his sons were killed by Shiite militiamen. He blames the United States and Iran for Iraq’s strife.

“Right from the beginning, the Americans were trying to create sectarian rifts,” he said. “Iran is a country of regional ambitions. It isn’t a Shiite country. It’s a country with specific schemes and agendas.”

Now he fears the strife is returning, and he blames the Shiite-dominated government.

“We feel the government does not consider us part of the Iraqi nation,” he said. “There is no magical solution for this. If the Shiites are convinced to change their politicians, that would be a big help.”

HUSSEIN AL-RUBAIE, 46, a Shiite, was jailed for two years under Saddam. His Shiite-majority Sadriya district in Baghdad saw considerable bloodshed during the worst of the strife, and he fears it’s returning.

“The whole region is in flames and we are all about to be burnt,” he said. “We have a lot of people who are ignorant and easily driven by sectarian feelings.”

He sees it among his friends, who include Sunnis. “My friends only whisper about sectarian things because they think it is a shame to talk about such matters,” al-Rubaie said, “but I am afraid that the day might come when this soft talking would turn to fighting in the street.”

LEBANON. Among some of Lebanon’s Shiites, it’s fashionable to wear a necklace with a medallion in the shape of the fabled double-bladed sword of Ali. It’s a mark of community pride at a time when the Shiite group Hezbollah says the sect is endangered by Sunni extremists in the Syrian uprising.

During Lebanon’s 1975-1990 civil war, the main fight was between Christians and Muslims. But in the past decade, the most dangerous divide has been between Shiites and Sunnis.

For much of Lebanon’s existence, Shiites, who make up about a third of the population, were an impoverished underclass beneath the Christians and Sunnis, each roughly a third also. The Shiite resentment helped the rise of the guerrilla force Hezbollah, on whose might the community won greater power. Now, many Sunnis resent Hezbollah’s political domination of the government. The 2005 assassination of Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, a Sunni, increased Sunni anger after Hezbollah members were blamed. Since then, both sides have clashed in the streets.

Syria’s civil war has fueled those tensions. Lebanon’s Sunnis largely back the mainly Sunni rebellion, while Shiites support President Bashar Assad’s regime, which is dominated by his Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shiism. Hezbollah sent fighters to help Assad fight the rebels, enraging Sunnis region-wide.

RANIA, 51, is a Shiite Lebanese banking executive, married to a Sunni and living in Ras Beirut, one of the capital’s few mixed neighborhoods.

When she married, at age 22, “I didn’t even know what the difference between Sunnis and Shiites is.”

Now she’s inclined to support Hezbollah. While not a fan of the hard-line group, she believes that Hezbollah and Syria are targeted because of their stances against Israel. She said her husband is anti-Hezbollah and supports Syria’s rebels.

Rania, who gave only her first name because she doesn’t want to be stigmatized about her social, religious or marital status, said she doesn’t talk politics with her husband to avoid arguments.

“I support one (political) side and he supports the other, but we’ve found a way to live with it,” added Rania, who has a 22-year-old daughter.

She said education plays a big role. “I find that the people who make comments about it are the people who are just ignorant, and ignorance feeds hatred and stereotyping,” she added.

KHALED CHALLAH is a 28-year-old Syrian Sunni businessman who has lived for years in Lebanon. He comes from a conservative, religious family but only occasionally goes to mosque. He said the only way he would be able to tell the difference between a Sunni mosque and a Shiite one would be if the cleric talked about Syria in the sermon.

“A Shiite imam would speak against the rebels, and call to resist them, and a Sunni sheik would talk against the government in Syria,” he said.

He said he still doesn’t understand the Shiites’ emotional fervor over the battle of Karbala, in which Ali’s son, Hussein, was killed by the armies of the Sunni Ummayad dynasty in the 7th century. Hussein’s martyrdom is a defining trauma of their faith, deepening their feeling of oppression. Every year, Shiites around the world mark the battle with processions that turn into festivals of mourning, with men lashing or cutting themselves.

“It means much more to Shiites, this battle’s memory, than to Sunnis,” Challah said.

He said Sunnis “behave sometimes like they are the only Muslims.”

Challah called this “very silly. Sunnis and Shiites come from the same root, they worship the same God.”

IRAN. The Shiite powerhouse of the Middle East is home to a government led by Shiite clerics with oil wealth and a powerful Revolutionary Guard. Tehran has extended its influence in the Arab world, mainly through its alliance with Syria, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Palestinian territories. Iran has presented that alliance not as sectarian but as the center of “resistance” against Israel.

Sunni Saudi Arabia and other Gulf allies have been trying to stem Iran’s influence, in part by warning of the spread of Shiism. Saudi Arabia’s hard-line Wahhabi interpretation of Sunni Islam views Shiism as heresy.

EGYPT. In a country where the Muslim population is overwhelmingly Sunni, many Egyptians know little about Shiites. The Shiite population is tiny and largely hidden—so secretive that its numbers are not really known. But ultraconservative Salafis, many of whom view Shiites as infidels, have become more politically powerful and more vocal since the 2011 fall of autocrat Hosni Mubarak. They often preach against Shiism, warning it will spread to Egypt.

MONA MOHAMMED FOUAD is a rarity in Egypt: Her mother is an Iranian Shiite, her father an Egyptian Sunni. She considers herself Sunni.

“People are always surprised and shocked” when they find out her mother is Shiite, said Fouad, 23, who works for a digital marketing company. “But usually as soon as they know, they are very interested and they ask me many questions.”

Fouad said her sister has heard work colleagues criticizing Shiites. In her fiance’s office they distributed leaflets “telling people to beware of Shiite indoctrination,” she added.

“People should read about Shiism. We make fun of foreigners who believe all Muslims are terrorists and we say they are ignorant, but we do the same thing to ourselves,” Fouad said. “There is a difference in interpretation, a difference in opinion, but at the end of the day, we believe in the same things.”

She told her Sunni fiance from the start that her mother is Shiite. “I told him to tell his family, so if they have any problem with that, we end it immediately.”

PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES. Palestinian Muslims are also almost all Sunnis. Their main connection to the Shiite world has Hamas’ alliance with Iran. But those ties were strained when Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, broke its connections with Syria because of the civil war.

AHMED MESLEH, a 28-year-old blogger from the West Bank town of Ramallah, says he met Shiites on a trip to Lebanon and encounters them via Facebook. But some have de-friended him because of his online comments.

“If we take Shiites from a religious point of view, then we can describe Shiites as a sect that has gone astray from the true doctrine of Islam. I consider them a bigger threat to Muslims and Islam than Jews and Israel,” Mesleh said.

He cited the Shiites’ processions mourning Hussein’s death, saying: “The way they whip themselves, it’s irrational.”

The Middle East conflict “is in its core a religious conflict. The Shiites want to destroy Islam. In Lebanon, they are the ones controlling the situation, and the ones who are causing the sectarian conflict.”

ISMAIL AL-HAMAMI, a 67-year-old Palestinian refugee in Gaza’s Shati camp, said politics not religion is driving sectarian tensions.

“In Gaza, Iran used to support the resistance with weapons. Now they support Assad. … In Iraq, they (Shiites) executed Saddam Hussein, who was a Sunni, and they took over the country with the help of the Americans. Now they are working against America in Iran and Syria.”

“So is that related to religion? It’s all about politics.”

The beneficiaries of sectarianism, he said, are “those who want to sell arms to both sides … those who want to keep Arab and Muslim countries living in the dark. The beneficiaries are the occupation (Israel) and the people who sell us religious slogans.”

“God knows who is right or wrong.”

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China Said to Have Made Call to Let Leaker Depart

By Jane Perlez and Keith Bradsher, NY Times, June 23, 2013

BEIJING—The Chinese government made the final decision to allow Edward J. Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor, to leave Hong Kong on Sunday, a move that Beijing believed resolved a tough diplomatic problem even as it reaped a publicity windfall from Mr. Snowden’s disclosures, according to people familiar with the situation.

Hong Kong authorities have insisted that their judicial process remained independent of China, but these observers—who like many in this article spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk freely about confidential discussions—said that matters of foreign policy are the domain of the Chinese government, and Beijing exercised that authority in allowing Mr. Snowden to go.

From China’s point of view, analysts said, the departure of Mr. Snowden solved two concerns: how to prevent Beijing’s relationship with the United States from being ensnared in a long legal wrangle in Hong Kong over Mr. Snowden, and how to deal with a Chinese public that widely regards the American computer expert as a hero.

“Behind the door there was definitely some coordination between Hong Kong and Beijing,” said Jin Canrong, professor of international relations at Renmin University in Beijing.

Beijing’s chief concern was the stability of the relationship with the United States, which the Chinese believed had been placed on a surer footing during the meeting between President Xi Jinping and President Obama at the Sunnylands estate in California this month, said Mr. Jin and a person knowledgeable about the Hong Kong government’s handling of Mr. Snowden.

The Chinese government was pleased that Mr. Snowden disclosed the extent of American surveillance of Internet and telephone conversations around the world, giving the Chinese people a chance to talk about what they describe as American hypocrisy regarding surveillance practices, said Mr. Jin and the person familiar with the consultations between Hong Kong and China.

But in the longer term, China’s overall relationship with the United States, which spans global economic, military and security issues, was more important than the feelings of the public in China and Hong Kong, who felt that the contractor should be protected from the reach of the United States, analysts said.

Mainland Chinese officials “will be relieved he’s gone—the popular sentiment in Hong Kong and China is to protect him because he revealed United States surveillance here, but the governments don’t want trouble in the relationship,” said the person familiar with the consultations between Beijing and Hong Kong.

Two Western intelligence experts, who worked for major government spy agencies, said they believed that the Chinese government had managed to drain the contents of the four laptops that Mr. Snowden said he brought to Hong Kong, and that he said were with him during his stay at a Hong Kong hotel.

If that were the case, they said, China would no longer need or want to have Mr. Snowden remain in Hong Kong.

The disclosures by Mr. Snowden set off a surge of commentary against American “double faced” and “arrogant” behavior by many users of China’s version of Twitter.

In some instances, the Chinese news media made snide references to what it called the gap between how the United States portrayed itself, and what the United States practiced. “Washington must be grinding its teeth because Snowden’s revelations have almost overturned the image of the U.S. as the defender of a free Internet,” Global Times, which often reflects the official point of view, wrote in an editorial.

The precise details of how the Chinese government dealt with Hong Kong authorities were not immediately known.

But Beijing appears to have decided that weeks of focus on Mr. Snowden in Hong Kong and his disclosures about the American government’s global surveillance practices were enough, and that he could turn into a liability, said a second person familiar with the handling of Mr. Snowden. “Beijing has gotten the most they can out of the Snowden situation,” that person said.

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Portugal's birthrate plummeting, a sign of more economic trouble ahead

By Anthony Faiola, Washington Post, June 23, 2013

LISBON—For an enterprise in the business of welcoming life, the birthing ward in Portugal’s largest maternity hospital is eerily quiet. On a recent morning, not a single expectant father nervously paced the orange laminated floors. Unhurried nurses pass rows of darkened rooms with empty beds, busying themselves with paperwork and a mere three women in labor.

Elsewhere in the hospital, signs of Europe’s crisis within a crisis are everywhere. Serving a country that was battling a low birthrate even before the region’s economy fell off a cliff, Alfredo da Costa Maternity Hospital delivered about 7,000 babies a year until recently. But with economic uncertainty causing young couples to rethink family plans or leave these shores for other countries, the number of births crashed last year to 4,500, leading the hospital to mothball an entire wing and slash 20 percent of the staff.

The recent fall in births across Portugal—to 89,841 babies in 2012, a 14 percent drop since 2008—has been so acute that the national government is moving to close a slew of maternity wards nationwide. In an increasingly childless country, 239 schools are closing this year and sales of products such as baby diapers and children’s shampoos are plummeting.

At the same time, in the fast-graying interior, gas stations and motels are being converted into nursing homes even as stores selling toys and baby clothes shut their doors. Here in Lisbon, Alfredo da Costa—founded in 1932 when this once-great maritime nation still commanded a global empire—is on the chopping block, set for closure this year.

“We used to hear the best kind of cries in these halls, of babies,” said Teresa Tome, Alfredo da Costa’s head pediatrician, as she strode down the quiet birthing ward. She later added, “The recent decrease in births has been dramatic. This is because of the economic crisis, all the unemployment, all the uncertainty about the future. It is making a bad problem for the country worse.”

Portugal is at the forefront of Europe’s latest baby bust, one that is shorting the fuse on a time bomb of social costs in some of the world’s most rapidly aging societies.

As in many corners of the industrialized world, Europe has faced a gradual decline in birthrates since the 1960s. But in a number of the region’s hardest-hit countries, a modest rebound during the 2000s—when European governments welcomed immigrants and rolled out cash benefits for young couples starting families—has now gone into reverse.

Birthrates are falling again in several nations that are confronting massive unemployment, including Portugal, Spain, Greece, Ireland and Cyprus. The baby shortage, economists say, is set to pile on the woe for a swath of the continent that may already be facing a decade or more of economic fallout from the debt crisis that started in 2009.

By 2030, the retired population in Portugal, for instance, is expected to surge by 27.4 percent, with those older than 65 predicted to make up nearly one in every four residents. With fewer future workers and taxpayers being born, however, the Portuguese are confronting what could be an accelerated fiscal reckoning to provide for their aging population. Portugal is ahead of other nations in Europe in planning for those explosive costs. But some government officials here concede that far deeper cuts—as well as a push toward a united social security system within the European Union—may be needed to cope with what is turning out to be a worse-than-expected demographic crisis.

The diminishing number of young Portuguese could lead to a vacuum of dynamism and innovation in the years ahead, signaling what could be a long-term decline in the fortunes of nations in a region harboring some of the United States’ largest trading partners and closest political allies.

The U.S. birthrate has also come down sharply since the 1960s. But the United States is projected to witness a generous influx of immigrants in the years ahead while also maintaining a more robust birthrate than those European nations hit the hardest.

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Daredevil Nik Wallenda completes high-wire walk across Grand Canyon

By Tim Gaynor, Reuters, June 24, 2013

LITTLE COLORADO RIVER, Arizona (Reuters)—Daredevil Nik Wallenda completed a historic high-wire walk on a 2-inch (5-cm) steel cable over the Grand Canyon on Sunday and was greeted by wild cheers after his hair-raising stunt.

Wallenda, the self-described “King of the High Wire,” took 22 minutes and 54 seconds to walk 1,400 feet across the crimson-hued canyon with just a distant ribbon of the Little Colorado River beneath him. The event was broadcast live around the world.

Wallenda, the first person to cross the canyon, made the walk without a tether or safety net.

Wallenda could be heard praying almost constantly during the walk, murmuring “Thank you, Jesus.” He kissed the ground when he reached the other side.

“It took every bit of me to stay focused that entire time,” Wallenda said. “My arms are aching like you wouldn’t believe.”

He said he stopped and crouched down twice, first because of the wind, the second because the cable had picked up an unsettling rhythm.

He spat on his hands and rubbed it on the sole of his shoe for grip as the cable had gathered dust.

Wallenda said the walk was stressful. But he also said the view, from 1,500 feet above the snaking river, was “breathtaking.”

“It was a dream come true,” Wallenda said of the crossing. “This is what my family has done for 200 years, so it’s part of my legacy.”

A seventh-generation member of the “Flying Wallendas” family of acrobats, Wallenda also made history last year by becoming the only person to complete a high-wire walk over the brink of Niagara Falls. He used the same cable on Sunday.

The 34-year-old first dreamed of Sunday’s challenge during a visit to the Grand Canyon with his parents as a teenager.

There was no word on the financial benefits of Wallenda’s stunt. He was listed by the Discovery Channel as one of the executive producers of the live broadcast. A Discovery spokesman could not be reached for comment.

Viewers watching live in 217 countries were able to share Wallenda’s point of view from the cable during the crossing, through cameras rigged to his body. Wallenda held a 43-pound (20-kg) balancing pole.

Nik’s great-grandfather, Karl Wallenda, slipped and fell to his death from a high wire in Puerto Rico in 1978.

In an interview after Sunday’s walk, Nik Wallenda teared up describing how he thought of his great-grandfather.

“I knelt down and I thought of my great-grandfather and that everything I do is to honor him,” Wallenda said. “It took my mind off all this movement underneath me … and I was able to focus on him and regain composure.”

Wallenda said before the crossing that his greatest concern was the unpredictable wind gusts that are prone to buffet the site in a remote section of the Grand Canyon’s watershed on the Navajo Nation.

Wallenda trained in his Florida hometown of Sarasota as Tropical Storm Andrea barreled ashore. He also used air boats to blast him with side and updrafts of 55 miles per hour.

Wallenda talks about his Christian faith in his new book “Balance.”

“That’s really where I get my peace,” he said. “I have confidence that if something were to happen to me, I know where I’m going.”

For a future stunt, Wallenda said he dreams of walking between New York’s Chrysler Building and Empire State Building.

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Sitting Kills, Moving Heals

By Dr. Mercola, June 23, 2013

If you’re like most people, myself included, you probably spend a large portion of each day in a seated position. It’s hard to avoid these days, as computer work predominates, and most also spend many hours each week driving to and from work.

Mounting research now suggests that sitting in and of itself is an independent risk factor for poor health and premature death—even if you exercise regularly.

Dr. Joan Vernikos, former director of NASA’s Life Sciences Division and author of Sitting Kills, Moving Heals, presents a simple yet powerful scientific explanation for why sitting has such a dramatic impact on your health, and how you can simply and easily counteract the ill effects of sitting.

She was one of the primary doctors responsible for ensuring the health of the astronauts as they went into space, investigating the health ramifications of space travel, and what can be done to counter them.

My primary passion is improving health which is why I’m very excited about Dr. Vernikos’ work. There have been a number of studies within the last year or two that show that even if you are very fit, exercising as much as five times a week for a half hour to an hour each time, you can fall far short of optimum fitness if you sit most of the rest of the time. You’re even at an increased risk of dying prematurely.

Dr. Vernikos’ research with astronauts has clarified why this occurs and, even more importantly, provides us with a simple regimen that could counteract those consequences.

In order to determine why regular exercise does not appear to compensate for the negative effects of prolonged sitting, some of her research focused on finding out what type of movement is withdrawn by sitting. What she discovered was as revolutionary as it was counterintuitive. Not only did she discover that the act of standing up is more effective than walking for counteracting the ill effects of sitting, the key is how many times you stand up.

It’s actually the change in posture that is the most powerful signal, in terms of having a beneficial impact on your health, not the act of standing in and of itself. Put another way, the key to counteract the ill effects of sitting is to repeatedly interrupt your sitting. The key is frequent intermittent interactions with gravity. Standing up 35 times at once will provide only a small percent of the benefit of standing up once every 20 minutes.

Astronaut John Glenn was the first man to perform an orbital flight. He eventually became a US Senator, and at the age of 77 became the oldest man in space, thanks to Dr. Vernikos, when he participated in her experiment to validate her theory of aging in the microgravity of space.

“[Glenn] happened to be chair of the Committee on Aging at the time,” she says. “It occurred to him, as he was listening to all these testimonies, that what he heard was very much like what he had experienced and what he knew his colleagues were experiencing as they flew. So, he got very excited.

One day in 1997, he walked into my office. He had done some fantastic research… comparing the aerospace medicine textbook with the PDR on the effects of aging and drew comparisons between the two. He said, ‘Well, I think if I flew again, it could provide information that could help everyone as we age’… I was concerned not because of what might happen to him during the nine days of flight, but what might happen to him in terms of recovery.”

Still, the flight took place, placing Glenn at the age of 77 in space with five other astronauts, averaging in age between 35 and 45. The results, which were double-blind, were presented before a full auditorium at the NIH.

“What they showed on the slide was that out of the seven people who flew, one was an outlier. So, we all thought to ourselves, ‘Oh, dear, they’re his. He’s an outlier. He’s older, that’s why’… This confirms that if you’re older, you will react differently.”

But when the identities of the astronauts in the data points were revealed, John Glenn was NOT the outlier. A 35-year-old astronaut was. Glenn was actually right in the middle of the cluster of astronauts, suggesting that if you’re healthy and fit, you really can do anything, regardless of your age. His recovery post-flight also turned out to be just as fast as his younger peers.

What this means for us living permanently here on Earth is that the changes that accompany aging are more likely a result of our lifestyle rather than the inevitable outcome associated with a numerical or physiological age. The good news is that you can prevent, and to a great degree delay, the damage associated with a large portion of biological aging, especially the most crippling, which is pain with movement and loss of flexibility that you had as a youth.

It also means that getting too hung up on a once-a-day exercise routine is to put the cart before the horse. FIRST you need to make sure you’re engaging in more or less perpetual non-exercise movement, as this is an independent risk factor. You then want to add structured exercise on top of that to reap all the benefits associated with exercise. Going to the gym a few times a week for an hour simply isn’t going to counteract hours upon hours of chronic uninterrupted sitting, which essentially mimics a microgravity situation, i.e. you’re not exerting your body against gravity. Only frequent non-exercise movement will do that.

“What became abundantly clear to me very quickly was that gravity plays a big role in our physiological function and in the aging process,” Dr. Vernikos says.

Fortunately, there’s nothing complicated about this. The key point is to move and shift position often, when you’re sitting down. Meaning, you want to interrupt your sitting as often as possible.

Dr. Vernikos views gravity a bit differently from the norm. She thinks of gravity as a virtual rod that runs through your body when you’re standing up; down to the center of the Earth. This virtual rod acts as a stimulus for your body, or put another way, gravity is a source of stimulation to your body. When you use it; when you challenge its downward force, you get a sense of acceleration and a sense of fun. Examples include jumping, skipping rope, cycling, downhill skiing, snow- or bodyboarding…

“I’ve come to the conclusion that all the fun activities that we indulge in are based on gravity,” she says. “All these fun activities, all these games and play that we think of, are gravity-dependent. We are using gravity every which way. The moral to the story is be a child again. Have fun. Play!”

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