After centuries of clandestinity, the crypto-Jews or Marranos of the US Southwest are starting to boogie in public, and there are even numerous web pages devoted to them (Marranos, The Secret Jews, Who Are the Crypto-Jews?). You know their moment has really arrived when they get a write-up in the Sunday New York Times. By Simon Romero, Oct. 29:

Jorge Noguera, the head of Colombia's Administrative Security Department (DAS) announced his resignation Oct. 25, inviting authorities to investigate accusations against him in the national press that he had cololaborated with illegal paramilitary groups. Noguera told reporters he was innocent of accusations made by DAS employees he had met with paramilitary leaders and oversaw a department in which charges against accused drug smugglers were mysteriously erased. "I ask the authorities to investigate these accusations. My conscience is clean," Noguera said. Also Oct. 254, Uribe fired DAS subdirector José Miguel Narvaez. (Reuters, Oct. 25)

On the morning of Oct. 27, authorities certified that the body of an Afro-Colombian found washed up on the banks of the Rio Leon at Bocas de Zabalo, Chocó department, dead of gunshot wounds, was that of Orlando Valencia, a peasant leader from Curvaradó who was abducted by paramilitaries Oct. 16. Valencia's wife and seven children, accompanied by rights observers, are now travelling to Chigorodó municipality, to demand his remains from the local morgue. The local Comisión Intereclesial de Justicia y Paz, an independent human rights association, is demanding that the Colombian government take measures to guarantee the safety of Valencia's family and the community of Curvaradó, charging that paramilitaries have effective control of the region in collaboration with the National Police and the army's 17th Brigade. New verbal threats from local paras against Curvaradó community leaders have been reported in recent days.

Organizers of the First International Congress on Islamic Feminism, now underway in Barcelona, are calling for a "gender jihad." Organizer Abdennur Prado Pavon of the Catalan Islamic board says the struggle for gender equality in Islamic countries involves refuting chauvinist interpretations of Muslim teachings. Prado says the conference hopes to refute the common conception in the West is that women's liberation is not possible in Muslim societies.

From Bloomberg, Oct. 27:

Spanish fishermen blocking the ports of Barcelona and Bilbao have refused to end their protest over soaring diesel fuel costs, threatening shipments to liquefied natural gas terminals in the cities.

The pending indictments in the Plame affair are providing interesting fodder for those intent on analyzing internal splits within the ruling elites. OK, all you domestic Kremlinologists out there—who is really runnning the show at the White House? Has Dubya fallen out with Poppy, as this interview with longtime Poppy buddy Brent Scowcroft might indicate? Has Dick really betrayed Poppy's crowd of old-fashioned multilateralists and sold out to the brave new neocons? Sound off...

Yeah, it makes us feel dirty, but we really didn't have any choice. WW4 Report is now carrying Google Ads. We had a hard time imagining what kinds of ads would be directed to our site by Google's mysterious algorithm—"Meet Chechen Singles"? "Learn Uzbek as a Second Language"? "Vacation Packages in Chiapas"? Instead the first ones that popped up had titles like "Stressed? Find Relief in Minutes", "How to Manage Your Stress" and "Stop Panic Attacks Before They Begin!"—which made us wonder if the algorithm didn't have psychic abilities and was somehow scanning the brainwaves of our chief blogger. Then we got a wave of do-gooder peacenik stuff—ads for peace-sign car magnets and the like—which was a little touchy-feely, but we figured we could live with. Then came a wave of policy-wonk type stuff—including an ad for Foreign Affairs, publication of the Council on Foreign Relations, notorious pillar of the permanent shadow government. Uh-oh. Then it got worse. Some outfit selling pro-war paraphernalia—yellow-ribbon car magnets and the like! "Find Your Career in Homeland Security"! A recuriting ad for Army Special Forces!

While the idiot left is busy blaming the Jews, the people who really run the planet are laughing all the way to the bank.

Big oil rakes in historic profits
While drivers have been paying up at the pump, profit has been gushing in to oil companies.

Thursday, ExxonMobil became the starkest example yet of how much big oil companies benefited from the huge run-up in oil prices in the third quarter even as two hurricanes ripped through the industry's Gulf Coast infrastructure. Exxon reported: