Hillary Clinton

WASHINGTON: It was supposed to be a charm offensive, but as the day wore on she put away her charm and went on the offensive.

US secretary of state Hillary Clinton’s public dressing down of Pakistan during a three-day visit there, including virtually accusing the country of complicity with al-Qaida, has shaken Washington as much as it stunned her hosts.

“Her inner voice became her outer voice,” Martha Raddatz, a veteran NBC correspondent said on the network. Officials in Washington were trying to keep a straight face, but there were a few gasps, she added.

A powerful car bomb ripped through a bustling marketplace in Peshawar, killing at least 57 people on Wednesday, officials said.

The blast at the Meena Bazaar injured 150 people, according to Dr. Zafar Iqbal of Lady Reading Hospital. The market is a labyrinth of shops popular with women in the Peepal Mandi section of the city.

A suicide car bombing on October 9 in Khyber Bazaar, a commercial hub in Peshawar, killed at least 49 people and injured 135 others.

Peshawar is the capital of the North West Frontier Province, where the Pakistan army has been engaged in an intense military offensive to rout militants who have launched attacks in the country and in neighboring Afghanistan.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has begun a five-day visit to India aimed at strengthening political and economic relations.

She is currently in Mumbai, where she attended a private ceremony to honour the victims of last November's attacks which left more than 170 people dead.

She is staying in the Taj Mahal Palace hotel, where many of the victims died.

I feel it a great gesture on her part for all the peace loving people of this world. What do you say?

TIME Magazine released its annual list of the 100 Most Influential People in the World.

TIME Managing Editor Rick Stengel said, “The TIME 100 is not a list of the most powerful people in the world. It’s not a list of the smartest people in the world, it’s a list of the most influential people in the world. They’re scientists, they’re thinkers, they’re philosophers, they’re leaders, they’re icons, they’re artists, they’re visionaries. People who are using their ideas, their visions, their actions to transform the world and have an effect on a multitude of people.”

Here are some of the most influential personalities:

LEADERS & REVOLUTIONARIES

Nicolas Sarkozy, Joaquín Guzmán, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton

BUILDERS & TITANS

This is the greater threat to climate change, if we don't population under control then co2 targets are meaningless. Especially in a place like Qatar.

So birth control for all nations??? No more than 2 kids per couple....

LIVING ON A CROWDED EARTH
Crowded commuter trains (AP)
Current world population - 6.8bn
Net growth per day - 218,030
Forecast made for 2040 - 9bn
Source: US Census Bureau

There are already too many people living on Planet Earth, according to one of most influential science advisors in the US government.

Nina Fedoroff told the BBC One Planet programme that humans had exceeded the Earth's "limits of sustainability".

Question: If you could live forever, would you and why? Answer: "I would not live forever, because we should not live forever, because if we were supposed to live forever, then we would live forever, but we cannot live forever, which is why I would not live forever,"
--Miss Alabama in the 1994 Miss USA contest.

"Whenever I watch TV and see those poor starving kids all over the world, I can't help but cry. I mean I'd love to be skinny like that, but not with all those flies and death and stuff,"
--Mariah Carey

"Smoking kills. If you're killed, you've lost a very important part of your life,"
--Brooke Shields, during an interview to become spokesperson for federal antismoking campaign.

"I've never had major knee surgery on any other part of my body,"

Sorry, can't post te picture :)The question is, Is there room for sexist adverts in today's enlightened society ?

The scantily-clad bottom with the slogan 'On Special Offer' has been named the most degrading advertisement of the year by the Guard Dogs, a French and Swiss feminist association.

The ad by Swiss underwear giant Sloggi was given the award for promoting pornography and prostitution.

The group gave the prize for 'gratuitous nudity that has nothing to do with the product' to Italian company Lavazza, for a picture of a naked woman on all-fours used to sell its coffee.

US to donate '$900m in Gaza aid'

The United States is preparing to donate some $900m (£621m) for Gaza, an Obama administration official said.

The aid would not go to Hamas, the group that controls the territory, but it would help the Palestinian Authority, the official added.

It comes as the US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton prepares to attend a Palestinian donors' conference.

Any US aid would have to be approved by Congress, where some are wary that funds could still end up with Hamas.

The donors' conference in Egypt next week will discuss humanitarian and reconstruction needs in the Gaza Strip after Israel's recent military offensive.

Two separate Palestinian surveys have put the cost of the damage at just under $2bn.

Without power

I thought this was an interesting read, though I'm sure some will find it insulting that I even posted this and the usual anti-Israel comments will follow. But hopefully some of you will find it interesting as well.

In yet another egregious instance of Arab men cutting off their noses to spite their faces, copies of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue featuring Israel's stunning Bar Refaeli on the cover have been removed from Dubai magazine racks.

And, after intense pressure from the Association of Tennis Professionals, Dubai has reluctantly granted an entry visa to Andy Ram to play in next week's Barclays Dubai Tennis Championships - after barring Shahar Pe'er from playing in the Women's Tennis Association tournament, affecting her earnings, if not her ranking.