NASA building ties with Muslim world

NASA Administrator Chief Charles Bolden (YouTube)

“When I became the NASA administrator — or before I became the NASA administrator — he charged me with three things. One was he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math, he wanted me to expand our international relationships, and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science … and math and engineering,” Bolden said in the interview.

http://www.illumemag.com/zine/articleDetail.php?Obama-Tells-NASA-Not-to-Alienate-Muslim-World-13109

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/07/05/nasa-chief-frontier-better-relations-muslims/#ixzz18PtFkNAn

Inspirational Women

I just came across these two very remarkable women; both very much driven by their faith in God:

1) Sakeena Yacoobi – Afghan Institute of Learning

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkChdEQkuBw

2) Catherine Rohr – Prison Entrepreneurship Program

http://www.kauffman.org/KauffmanMultimedia.aspx?VideoId=1870898740&type=R

Corrupt Afghani officials took advantage of poor Hajjis

This is really the lowest of the low. How can people like this get away from such shameless crimes? Do they not know that they will be accountable for their actions?  The following are excepts from this article:

Sediq Chakari, former minister of Hajj, and who is thought to be in Britain has been under investigation into his alleged involvement in a kickback racket which made hundreds of thousands of pounds from poor pilgrims.

Each year Saudi Arabia offers 30,000 Afghans places on the Hajj pilgrimage and they pay the Kabul government £2,300 for transport, food and lodging.

The Ministry of Hajj and Islamic Affairs is annually hit by allegations of incompetence and fraud after pilgrims have been left stranded or failed to get what they paid for.

Prosecutors believe officials were demanding up to £100 per pilgrim from hoteliers and transport firms with contracts to take pilgrims to Mecca.

The international official said: “Here is a case involving theft of money from poor Hajj pilgrims, some people who have waited their entire lives for the opportunity to travel to Mecca, and there is no real interest in the leadership of this Islamic state in defending the rights of these citizens.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/7532867/Hamid-Karzai-accused-of-blocking-arrest-of-official.html

This American Life 383: Origin Story

Act Two. The Secret Life Of Secrets.

Ira tells the story of the 1953 U.S. Supreme Court case that formed the basis for the controversial state secret privilege—the precedent that allows the United States government to stop lawsuits by claiming that national security secrets might be revealed in court. Ira talks to Barry Siegel, author of the book Claim of Privilege, and Judy Loether, whose father’s death was at the center of the landmark Supreme Court case. (14 minutes)

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/383/origin-story

click play episode