The following articles are compiled by:

Leo Wong

Leo@WatchmenWatching.com

 

 

 

Wal-Mart to launch payments card: Branded Visa prepaid card aimed at low-income shoppers

Source: USA Today

 

June 7, 2007 -- Wal-Mart plans to launch a payments card aimed at the estimated 80 million U.S. residents who do not have access to a bank account.

 

Called the Wal-Mart MoneyCard, the prepaid product would be launched with GE Money, the retailer's financial partner, and branded a Visa card, Wal-Mart officials said. An official announcement of the pilot programme could come as soon as this month.

 

The venture represents a significant expansion of Wal-Mart's financial services offered to mostly low-income customers, which include low-cost check-cashing and money-transfer services.

 

Prepaid gift cards are popular in the U.S., generating a market worth $76 billion last year. But Wal-Mart hopes customers will use the cards as quasi-bank accounts to access a range of financial services.

 

The card would be modeled on the existing Visa Prepaid card, which lets holders have their weekly wages credited to the card, or to top it up at a range of locations, including supermarkets and convenience stores. The card would have a $3,000 limit, with the balance covered by federal deposit insurance through GE Money Bank.

 

Reloadable cards, purchased without paperwork, are also seen as potentially attractive to the estimated 12 million undocumented workers in the U.S.

 

Visa's Prepaid cards are used by more than 30 states, including California, to pay child and unemployment benefits.

 

Visa estimates 80 million people in the U.S. lack a traditional banking relationship. It believes a worker without a bank account spends more than $300 a year in fees, a sum which can be reduced to $130 using a prepaid card.

 

Card users can be charged for services such as paying bills and ATM withdrawals.

 

Comments:  The greedy just got greedier.  Not content to be the No. 1 retailer in the entire world, Wal-Mart kicked more sand in the face of its competition.  Realizing that there are millions (including illegal Mexican immigrants) of people who hate dealing with banks and credit unions due to their unconsciousable fees, Wal-Mart is taking steps to corner this market as well.  This is one more scheme aimed at eliminating the need to carry around cash to make financial transactions.  The movers and shakers of the global cashless system can send a card of Thank You to the Wal-Mart head honchos at Bentonville, Arkansas.  Cash’s days are indeed numbered.  Traditionalists such as elderly people have embraced the use of debit cards over personal checks.  The poor and those who have something personal to hide can now avail themselves of business transactions that we middle class consumers take for granted.

 

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"Deranged" man tries to jump on popemobile

Source: Reuters/news.scotsman.com

 

June 7, 2007 -- A 27-year-old German man described by the Vatican as "clearly deranged" leaped over a barricade on Wednesday and tried to jump on to Pope Benedict's open-topped jeep.

 

The man took the German Pope's bodyguards by surprise in St Peter's Square, coming within a metre of the pontiff in an episode that brought back memories of the assassination attempt against his predecessor Pope John Paul in 1981.

 

Television pictures showed the man, wearing a baseball cap, jump out of the crowd and over a wooden barricade as the Pope passed by to start his weekly audience for some 40,000 people.

 

Hurtling from the Pope's right, he tried to jump on the back of the moving "popemobile" but managed only to touch it before being wrestled to the ground by Vatican security guards.

 

"He was clearly deranged but did not want to kill or harm the Pope, he only wanted to draw attention to himself," the spokesman said.

 

After questioning by a Vatican judge the man, who was unarmed, was taken to a psychiatric institution in Italy for testing. His identity was not disclosed.

 

The episode lasted about 15 seconds. John Paul was shot and nearly killed in the same square by Turkish gunman Mehmet Ali Agca on May 13, 1981.

 

Comments:  How is it that the wealthiest institution in the world has such lax security?  If this “deranged” man had been carrying a pistol, it was quite likely that Pope Benedict would have been wounded or worse, killed.  The popemobile was designed and manufactured after Benedict’s predecessor was nearly murdered.  This just shows how vulnerable popes are that almost anyone from off the street can simply run up to the pope and calmly say to him with his best Clint Eastwood imitation, “Padre, make my day.”

 

I have said in the past that Pope Benedict is an interim ‘caretaker’ pope.  He’s not in the post for the long term.  His brief tenure allows time for the cardinals to groom a younger pope wannabe whom secular sources have speculated would the final pope prior to Jesus’ physical return to Earth.  The next pope could conceivably be the False Prophet of the book of Revelation.  Mystery Babylon is the Church of Rome because in the days of the apostles, Babylon was the code name for Rome.

 

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Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bundchen blasts Roman Catholic Church's opposition to condom use and abortion

Source: Associated Press/Winnipeg Free Press Online

 

June 7, 2007 -- Gisele Bundchen is the biggest international star on the runway during Rio's Fashion Week, but she's also making headlines for criticizing the Roman Catholic Church's opposition to condom use and abortion.

 

Bundchen, who paraded Tuesday night for the Colcci label, told the Folha de S. Paulo newspaper that the church's take on contraception is hopelessly outdated because it was adopted when "the women were virgins, the guys were virgins."

 

"Today, no one is a virgin when they get married," Bundchen said. She made the comments less than a month after Pope Benedict XVI criticized government-sanctioned abortion laws and birth control during a five-day visit to Brazil, the world's most populous Roman Catholic nation. While most abortions are banned in Brazil, the government hands out more than 300 million free condoms each year to prevent AIDS and unwanted pregnancies. "To prohibit condoms is ridiculous, just think of all the diseases transmitted without them," the 26-year-old supermodel.

 

Comments:   Ms. Bundchen has just ripped a piece off the Roman Catholic Church’s (RCC’s) façade of hypocrisy.  We’ve often commented that the RCC is an expert of the double‑speak.  On the one hand, it purports to be the divine moral authority while on the other hand, quite a few numbers of its celibate priests have sexually molested young boys and the church had attempted to sweep it under the carpet.  The popes have been opposed to capital punishment (which God had ordained) for the crime of murder yet they decry abortions and birth control.  Abortion and the morning after pill are definitely immoral.  Birth control through the use of the pill or condoms is a whole different kettle of fish.  In a committed married relationship, I believe such use is sanctioned for God made sex to be enjoyed between husband and wife and if both of them don’t want any more children, that’s their decision.

 

The prevention of birth is different from the killing of a conceived fetus.  On the other hand, if the pill and condom are used in an adulterous affair or in the act of fornication, then clearly, that’s sin.  To mitigate the sinfulness by saying that condoms prevent the spread of sexually transmitted disease doesn’t jive with God.  Sin is sin and to add a heap of other sins to it still gives you sin.

 

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Poll: 2 of 3 U.S. Muslim converts left Christian roots

Source: www.christianpost.com

 

June 7, 2007 -- Two-thirds (67 percent) of all converts to Islam in the United States came from a Protestant background, according to the first nationwide survey to measure the demographics, attitudes, and experiences of Muslim Americans.

 

The new survey by the Pew Research Center found that Muslim Americans, in comparison to the rest of the world, have the unique feature of consisting of a relatively large number of converts to the religion – nearly a quarter. Almost all conversions are native-born (91 percent) and almost three-fifths (59 percent) of converts to Islam are African American.

 

Comments:  Protestantism is made up of liberal mainline denominations such as Methodist, Wesleyan, Lutheran, United Church, Anglican, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, etc. and conservative denominations such as Baptist, Assembly of God, Pentecostals, etc.  These are by-products of Martin Luther’s reformation when he broke away from the Roman Catholic Church’s tyranny.  Although they originally believed in faith only in Christ for salvation, many have left their first love (Jesus) and are teaching secular humanism from the pulpits.  Jesus has been relegated to the background in favour of the social gospel and man’s interpretation of the Scriptures overrides the literal meaning of Bible verses.  Women ministers and pastors and practising homosexuals have been accepted into the ministries.  There’s much discord within these denominations.  Yes, there’s a remnant of congregants who are saved and living their lives for Jesus, but mostly, Protestantism’s formalism has usurped the authority of the Holy Spirit in the midst of the congregations.  They have a form of godliness, but deny the power thereof (see 2 Timothy 3:5).

 

Quite a few churchgoers see the staidness and internal strife and want out.  Some are lured by cults such Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Scientology, Seventh Day Adventist, etc.  Some go into the Roman Catholic Church and some turn to Islam which, by all reports, is a vibrant religion replete with purpose.  Something that is popular and dynamic catches the attention of unsatisfied churchgoers.  A real Christian would not denounce his faith and convert to Islam.  Professors do because they were never saved to begin with.  2 Corinthians 13:[5] Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?

 

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EU’s Javier Solana: International Gaza peace force possible

Source: Jerusalem Post

 

June 17, 2007 -- It is possible that an international peacekeeping force would be stationed in the Gaza Strip, even though it would probably be difficult for Egypt to agree to its deployment, European Union Foreign Policy Chief Javier Solana said on Wednesday.

 

Solana told the European Parliament in Brussels that "for the first time in many, many years, the idea of an international force" was not out of the question.

 

Solana said two groups in the Knesset had said it may be the moment to call for such a force south of Rafah Crossing.

 

"We are working on that," he said. "The Israelis are also considering that possibility, the Palestinians are considering that possibility, the Egyptians are considering that possibility."

 

Solana said it would probably be difficult for Egypt as deployment of such a force might give the impression it was not able to control that part of the border. However, he added:

 

"I think we can still get into discussions on these issues and maybe eventually get a solution."

 

Comments:  In life, if you harp on something long enough, eventually you’ll wear down your listeners’ resistance and also, if you allow something to marinate over time and broach the topic again, your audience may be more receptive.  The possibility of stationing an international peace force between Israel and the Palestinians is not something that’s new.  In the past, Israel had been less than enthusiastic; some might say Israel was suspicious of the Palestinians’ proposal.  But, through the passage of time and the blood letting of innocent Israeli and Palestinian lives, perhaps this proposal has seen its time.  The EU in conjunction with the U.S., NATO and the U.N. might put together a multinational military force to enforce agreed to truces and to be a buffer between Hamas and the Fatah Party members wanting to kill each other in their quest to wrestle control of the Palestinian government.  It’s very apparent that the Middle East countries are unable to prevent violence.  That being the case, international troops seems to be the only viable alternative.  Naturally, this would open the door for Russia to have its own troops in the Holy Land, a prelude to the upcoming Gog-Iran invasion of Israel and subsequently to the Antichrist’s military which will guarantee Israel’s peace and security.

 

 

 

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Keep watching (Matt 24:42)!

 

Until next time,

Shalom!

 

 

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