The Elite & Occult

Forbes | Carlos Slim Helu takes No. 1 spot on Forbes World's Billionaires list as a record 164 10-figure titans return to the ranking amid the global economic recovery. For the third time in three years, the world has a new richest man. Riding surging prices of his various telecom holdings, including giant mobile outfit America Movil (AMX), Mexican tycoon Carlos Slim Helu has beaten out Americans Bill Gates and Warren Buffett to become the wealthiest person on earth and nab the top spot on the 2010 Forbes list of the World's Billionaires.

Alternet | The economic elite have robbed us all. The amount of suffering in the United States of America is literally a crime against humanity. American oligarchy spares no pains in promoting the belief that it does not exist, but the success of its disappearing act depends on equally strenuous efforts on the part of an American public anxious to believe in egalitarian fictions and unwilling to see what is hidden in plain sight." -- Michael

ABC | Uganda is a country so beautiful that Winston Churchill once called it "the pearl of Africa." It has world-class wildlife, fertile rolling hills and a breathtaking lakeshore.

AP | President Obama said Thursday he prays lawmakers can restore a "spirit of civility" to the U.S. capital. Speaking at the annual National Prayer breakfast, Obama said divisions in Washington are nothing new, but "there is a sense that something is different now, that something is broken, that those of us in Washington aren't serving people as well as we should."

Guardian | Swamped by court challenges and under pressure from a hostile army, Pakistan's president, Asif Ali Zardari, has found solace in an unusual form – the ritual slaughter of goats.

Infowars.com | According to a recent poll held in the Netherlands, sympathy for the royal family is in serious decline. Immediate reason for the waning of warmth for the bluebloods is a questionable building project of luxurious holiday villas undertaken by the prince of Orange in the impoverished state of Mozambique. Another reason for the decline, say the pollsters, is an increasing unease about the family’s financial ethics or, rather, lack thereof. Not only are they in the habit of paying little or no taxes, they annually scoop bucket loads of cash from the treasury.

news.com.au | Adolf Hitler may not have died in a bunker after fresh research suggests the skull thought to be the tyrant's was from a woman.

Youtube | The British Prime Minister forcefully pushes the man next to him out of the way to give what looks like a Master Mason handshake (bottom right).

Huffington Post | In a new August 17, 2009 Maddow Show segment, Rachel Maddow and Jeff Sharlet discuss, among many new revelations, the disturbing fact that the "Christian Embassy" scandal, propelled by a complaint to the Department of Defense from the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, was investigated by a Pentagon Inspector General who is in fact a Family member.

BBC | A group of freemasons have had to spend a night in jail in Fiji, after local villagers complained they were practising witchcraft. The 14 men, including eight Australians and a New Zealander, had been holding a night-time meeting on Denerau island.

CounterPunch.org | Robert McNamara, who died yesterday, July 6, served as Kennedy’s , then as Johnson’s defense secretary. He contributed more than most to the slaughter of 3.4 million Vietnamese (his own estimate). He went on to run the World Bank, where he presided over the impoverishment, eviction from their lands and death of many millions more round the world.

BBC | US officials are seeking the dismissal of a lawsuit brought against the government by descendants of Apache leader Geronimo to recover his remains.

Politico.com | Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor last year accepted an invitation the Belizean Grove, an elite but little-known women’s-only group.

Times Online | SOME of America’s leading billionaires have met secretly to consider how their wealth could be used to slow the growth of the world’s population and speed up improvements in health and education.