“Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it?”
(Isaiah 43:19)

Shall Ye Not Know It?

Dear Friends,

Greetings! Our first article this week entitled, “SHOCKER FOR SCIENTISTS: INDIAN QUAKE TRIGGERS MORE”, brings up some very interesting points concerning earthquakes. Earthquakes are a sign of the End Times (Matthew 24), but what we feel is even more interesting is the hydroplate theory put forth by Walt Brown, a former atheist scientist who became a creationist scientist.

Walt Brown brings up some ideas with regards to 'The Flood' and its continued effects upon the earth today which are definitely worth reading.

We have also included a forty-four minute 'You Tube' video entitled “Third Reich – Operation UFO”.

Although we do not normally include this length of video on 'People Of The Keys', we felt in light of many current events this could be of interest. The video was produced in Russia and has English subtitles.

If you choose to watch it, we are asking folks themselves to decide on its validity.

There is also an inspirational clip by Tom Horn. We just wanted to mention that in his talk he does allude to pre-tribulation rapture, which we at 'People of the Keys' do not agree with, as we feel all scriptures on the subject point to the church going through the Tribulation.

Almost everyday or week now, something new or unusual is happening. Even the Lord spoke through Isaiah, in Isaiah, chapter 43; “Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it?”

Please do keep watching for those signs of the times!

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WND

SHOCKER FOR SCIENTISTS: INDIAN QUAKE TRIGGERS MORE

Surprising USGS study suggests new definition for aftershocks

Published: 10.09.12

By Michael F. Haverluck

Controversial results from a new study by the United States Geological Survey have provided a shocker to scientists by indicating seismic waves from the 8.6 East Indian Ocean earthquake on April 11 circled the earth multiple times, triggering more than a dozen major earthquakes around the globe within a week.

(For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places. Matthew 24:7 One of the signs of the end.)

The evidence could change the definition of "aftershocks" as scientists have known them for generations.

According to the USGS report, there was a "100-fold increase in seismicity" on the other side of the earth in Baja, Calif., which experienced "13 events in the following two days," including 6.0 and 7.0 shakers. Japan was another location thousands of miles away from the original temblor where large quakes were triggered.

And what is so shocking to the scientific community?

"While aftershocks have traditionally been defined as those smaller earthquakes that happen after and nearby the main fault rupture, scientists now recognize that this definition is wrong," a statement by the USGS reads. "Instead, aftershocks are simply earthquakes of any size and location that would not have taken place had the main shock not struck."

The 8.6 quake, which took place on a strike-slip fault similar to the San Andreas Fault running through California, was called "unprecedented" by the USGS.

"No other recorded earthquake triggered as many large earthquakes elsewhere around the world as this one," said USGS seismologist Fred Pollitz, who led the team of geologists conducting the study. "The research has helped change the very definition of 'aftershock.'"

Within six days after the 8.6 quake, 16 earthquakes registering 5.5 or higher on the Richter scale were triggered around the earth. Coincidence? Only one similarly sized shaker occurred during the six days before the major East Indian Ocean quake.

"I didn't think this could happen," expressed Menlo Park-based USGS geophysicist Ross Stein, who co-authored the USGS study that was published in the science journal "Nature," where the quake's massive trigger effect is explained. "I think most of my colleagues will be skeptical; I would be, too."

One such skeptic is Stein's colleague, Susan Hough, who works out of the USGS lab in Pasadena, Calif.

"If the less quakes before are a fluke, are we sure the increase afterward isn't as well?" questioned Hough.

Stein disagrees.

"We don't have a smoking gun," asserted Stein. "We have to build a statistical case, and we have a strong one."

"The whole earth was vibrating like a bell," (Hollow?) Stein visualized, noting that this atypical type of earthquake has a higher probability of destabilizing other spots ripe for quakes. He went on to explain that the majority of the 16 subsequent major quakes were located inside the tracks of the seismic waves.

But what makes the transference of these seismic waves - traveling around the earth multiple times - possible?

According to creationist and former atheist, Walt Brown, director of the Center for Scientific Creation, oceans of water trapped miles underneath the earth's crust are just the vehicle that transmits earthquake shockwaves thousands of miles.

(In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened. Genesis 7:1. This was known about 4,500 years ago according to the Bible.)

Brown, who holds a doctorate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Mechanical Engineering, was by no means surprised by the recent USGS study. He asserts it does not corroborate evolutionists' plate tectonic theory, but compliments his own hydroplate theory.

"All research on earthquakes that I am aware of, including [the recent USGS study] is consistent with the hydroplate theory," Brown, a former National Science Foundation Fellow, told WND. "What [the USGS study] points out is a problem for plate tectonics, but [it] is easily understood by the hydroplate theory."

Brown argues that earthquakes can provide hard evidence that subterranean water exists miles beneath the earth's surface, insisting that only channels of underground water could conduct shockwaves rapidly over thousands miles, as did the 7.9-magnitude Alaskan Denali quake of 2002, which generated a "seiche" 4,000 miles away in Lake Pontchartrain, La., sloshing the lake back and forth enough to break boat moorings.

The West Point graduate's theory maintains that approximately half the water currently in the oceans came from interconnected chambers some 10 miles under the entire surface of the earth before exploding forth during the flood of Noah through what is now the 46,000-mile mid-oceanic ridge. He says the forces of tidal pumping increased the water's pressure before bursting ─ described as the fountains of the great deep in the flood account of Genesis 7:11 ─ to produce the global deluge some 5,000 years ago.

According to Brown's theory, "the 10-mile-thick crust opened like a rip in a tightly stretched cloth," racing around the earth. "Pressure in the subterranean chamber directly beneath the rupture suddenly dropped [and] caused supercritical water to explode with great violence out of the 10-mile-deep 'slit' that wrapped around the earth."

The force of such a rupture? Brown compares it with the detonation of 1,800 trillion hydrogen bombs and indicates the remnants of the rip are visible still through satellite imagery of the ocean's floor. Scars of the catastrophic tear are known today as the mid oceanic ridge, which runs through the center of the Atlantic, curves to the south of Africa and Australia, veers north a couple thousand miles off South America's west coast, dips beneath North America off Mexico's west coast to Alaska, resurfaces in the Arctic Circle and continues down through Iceland.

Ejected water turned into torrents of rain, while "other jetting water rose above the atmosphere, where it froze and then fell on various regions of earth as huge masses of extreme cold, muddy 'hail,'" Brown stated, noting that the most forcefully jettisoned water and rock produced comets, asteroids and meteoroids. "That hail buried, suffocated and froze many animals, including some mammoths."

Brown said the ejected water caused great instability that the earth is still trying rectify.

"Deep folds, up to thousands of miles long and several miles deep, lie at the floor of the western Pacific Ocean in an area centered directly opposite of the Atlantic Ocean," Brown explained. "As the flood increasingly altered the earth's balanced, spherical shape, growing gravitational forces tended to squeeze the earth back toward a more spherical shape."

He said, "Once a 'tipping point' was reached, the portion of the subterranean chamber floor - with the most overlying rock removed - rose at least eight miles to become today's Atlantic floor," Brown continued. "This caused the Pacific floor - the region inside the 'Ring of Fire' - to sink and buckle inward, producing folds called ocean trenches."

Brown contends the release on the Atlantic side caused suction on the opposite side of the globe to pull down the area where the world's deepest ocean trenches (around the Pacific Rim) are concentrated today. He also states that tens of thousands of volcanoes formed inside the 'Ring of Fire' (Pacific Rim) - where 90 percent of the world's earthquakes originate - which he says provides evidence that a massive pressure release and drop (of the Pacific Rim) formed this volcanic zone during the flood.

Brown maintains that this flood buried and formed the fossil record and notes that when the fountains of the great deep ceased after 40 days, "the hydroplates slid down and away from the inclining Mid-Atlantic Ridge," with the water underneath the plates acting as a lubricant to propel them - giving the imagery of Europe and Africa separating from North and South America. "Once the gradually advancing plates reached speeds of about 45 miles per hour, they would collide, compress and buckle. The plates that buckled downward became ocean trenches and those that buckled upward became mountains."

(Something to think about. 2nd Esdras 6:42: Upon the third day thou didst command that the waters should be gathered in the seventh part of the earth: six parts hast thou dried up, and kept them, to the intent that of these some being planted of God and tilled might serve thee.)

But Brown said the key to the current revelations about earthquakes is that there still are large pockets and channels of water underneath the earth's crust that can quickly transmit shockwaves.

Could subterranean water have played a role in the rapid transmission of the 8.6 quake's seismic waves that circled the earth several times, as Brown claims it did in the Denali quake that reached Louisiana? Two years ago in 2010, an 8.8-magnitude Chilean quake caused a similar seiche at Louisiana's Lake Pontchartrain, more than 4,700 miles to the north.

Yet many geologists don't acknowledge water existing miles beneath the earth's surface.

Evolutionists contend that earthquakes can be explained by plate tectonics, which say the earth's crust is divided into roughly 12 large plates and several small ones that float on and travel independently over the upper mantle. The theory contends that continental drift and seafloor spreading are responsible for creating the earth's geologic features. The theory postulates that each plate is made of rigid rock formed by upwelling magma at oceanic ridges, where plates move apart. It also alleges that a subduction zone forms when plates come together, in which one plate is forced under another and into the earth's mantle. According to the theory, a majority of earthquakes and volcanoes take place on tectonic plate boundaries

But Brown says plate tectonics cannot work for a variety of theoretic and technical reasons, including that a plate of 30 miles or more thick physically could not dive under an adjacent plate, because that would create mountains of 150,000 feet in elevation.

Brown says all earthquakes today are simply aftershocks from what convulsed the earth during the flood of Noah, and the activity is just part of the earth returning to its pre-flood form.

("And the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament: and there were lightnings, and voices, and thunderings, and an earthquake, and great hail." Revelations 11:19)

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Yahoo! News

Heaven is real, says neurosurgeon who claims to have visited the afterlife

By Eric Pfeiffer,

Reporter

Dr. Eben Alexander claims to have visited the afterlife (Twitter)

Dr. Eben Alexander has taught at Harvard Medical School and has earned a strong reputation as a neurosurgeon. And while Alexander says he's long called himself a Christian, he never held deeply religious beliefs or a pronounced faith in the afterlife.

But after a week in a coma during the fall of 2008, during which his neocortex ceased to function, Alexander claims he experienced a life-changing visit to the afterlife, specifically heaven.

"According to current medical understanding of the brain and mind, there is absolutely no way that I could have experienced even a dim and limited consciousness during my time in the coma, much less the hyper-vivid and completely coherent odyssey I underwent," Alexander writes in the cover story of this week's edition of Newsweek.

So what exactly does heaven look like?

Alexander says he first found himself floating above clouds before witnessing, "transparent, shimmering beings arced across the sky, leaving long, streamer like lines behind them."

He claims to have been escorted by an unknown female companion and says he communicated with these beings through a method of correspondence that transcended language. Alexander says the messages he received from those beings loosely translated as:

"You are loved and cherished, dearly, forever."

"You have nothing to fear."

"There is nothing you can do wrong."

From there, Alexander claims to have traveled to "an immense void, completely dark, infinite in size, yet also infinitely comforting." He believes this void was the home of God.

After recovering from his meningitis-induced coma, Alexander says he was reluctant to share his experience with his colleagues but found comfort inside the walls of his church. He's chronicled his experience in a new book, "Proof of Heaven: A neurosurgeon's journey into the afterlife," which will be published in late October.

"I'm still a doctor, and still a man of science every bit as much as I was before I had my experience," Alexander writes. "But on a deep level I'm very different from the person I was before, because I've caught a glimpse of this emerging picture of reality. And you can believe me when I tell you that it will be worth every bit of the work it will take us, and those who come after us, to get it right."

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LifeSiteNews.com

Megachuch pastor Joel Osteen dodges CNN questions on homosexuality

BY SUSANNA ROSE

Sep 27, 2012

September 27, 2012 - Texas Megachurch Pastor Joel Osteen squirmed under a barrage of question about his beliefs on homosexuality during a discussion on CNN's "Talking points with Soledad O'Brien" last Thursday. 

The conversation began as a discussion between Osteen and New Age self-help guru Deepak Chopra about the importance of positive thinking, but then abruptly turned to homosexuality.

Osteen struggles to answer questions about his beliefs on homosexuality during a recent CNN appearance.

"Almost every time we have a pastor on, it's a conversation we have," CNN host O'Brien explained to Osteen.

"I always wonder when you say homosexuality is a sin and there's a bunch of people who clearly are gay who are in your church," she continued. "You're calling them sinners. I mean, that is the opposite of uplifting, I would think."

"Well, Soledad, I don't necessarily focus on that. I only talk about that in the interviews," Osteen replied.

When asked if he thought he had an important voice to lend to the public debate about homosexuality, Osteen answered, "I think part of my, if you want to call it success, I've stayed in my lane and my lane is lifting people's spirits and there are issues that good, Bible-believing people see on both sides of the fence."

However, when O'Brien suggested point blank that Osteen would say Scripture condemns homosexuality as a sin, Osteen responded, "exactly."

"When I read the scripture, that's what I believe, that the scripture condemns it or says it's a sin," Osteen said. "It also says, you know, lying it and being prideful is."

Osteen was then asked by panelist and gay rights activist Richard Socarides whether he had chosen to be heterosexual.  Osteen replied that he had not, adding, "I don't understand all those issues and so, you know, I try to stick on the issues that I do understand. I know this. I'm for everybody. I'm not for pushing people down."

Osteen's performance earned him the ire of Albert Mohler Jr., president of Southern Baptist Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, who wrote that while O'Brien had "established the perfect platform for Osteen to respond with the gospel of Jesus Christ," Osteen "did not."

"Viewers of CNN saw a display of confusion, evasion, and equivocation coming from one presented as a Christian pastor," charged Mohler. "What they were really seeing is the total theological bankruptcy of the word of faith movement and the gospel of positive thinking.

"Osteen cannot, or at least will not, speak even the simplest word of biblical conviction. He states his intention to stay in his 'lane' of glib affirmation."

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Associated Press

Congressman calls evolution lie from 'pit of hell'

Published October 06, 2012

- July 2, 2008: In this file photo, 10th Congressional District Republican candidate Rep. Paul Broun speaks on the set of Georgia Public television in Atlanta. (AP) -

ATHENS, Georgia -  A Republican lawmaker said in videotaped remarks that evolution, embryology and the Big Bang theory are "lies straight from the pit of hell" meant to convince people that they do not need a savior.

Georgia Rep. Paul Broun made those comments during a speech Sept. 27 at a sportsman's banquet at Liberty Baptist Church in Hartwell. Broun, a medical doctor, is running for re-election in November unopposed by Democrats.

"God's word is true," Broun said, according to a video posted on the church's website. "I've come to understand that. All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and Big Bang theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of hell. And it's lies to try to keep me and all the folks who are taught that from understanding that they need a savior."

Broun also said that he believes the Earth is about 9,000 years old and that it was made in six days. Those beliefs are held by fundamentalist Christians who believe the creation accounts in the Bible are literally true.

Broun spokeswoman Meredith Griffanti told the Athens Banner-Herald that Broun was recorded speaking off-the-record to a church group about his religious beliefs. He sits on the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology.

 It seems unlikely that Broun's remarks were supposed to be kept private. The banquet was advertised, Broun spoke before an audience and the video of his remarks was posted on the church's website.

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Creation Moments

GUESS WHO STILL BELIEVES IN A FLAT EARTH...

Though evolutionists get a kick out of calling Bible-believing Christians "flat-earthers," hardly anyone throughout history has believed the Earth to be flat. The truth is, the Bible says our planet is round, so the flat-earth myth is kept alive to this day only by evolutionists!

WHO SAID THE EARTH WAS FLAT?!

Many of us have heard the old legend about why Christopher Columbus was told he could not sail too far west. According to the legend, Columbus was repeatedly told that he could not sail west to India because the Earth was flat. If he sailed too far, he would fall off the edge. That story was a piece of fiction cooked up by Washington Irving in the 1830s.

Only one writer can be found in Western history who believed the Earth was flat - that writer was Lactantius in the third century AD. All the others - for example, Pythagoras, still noted today for his mathematical proofs - simply assumed the Earth was spherical. Two hundred years later, the Greek mathematician Eratosthenes, also assuming that the Earth was round, calculated that the Earth was 25,000 miles in circumference. He was off by only 200 miles. A century later, using Eratosthenes' figure for the Earth's diameter, Hipparchus calculated that the moon was 240,000 miles away from the Earth. He was off by only 100 miles - less than half a percent!

Nor does the Bible teach that the Earth is flat. Isaiah 40:22 tells us how God looks down on the inhabitants of a round Earth. Job 26:7 talks about the Earth floating in space, hung on nothing.

Today we have exposed two myths. One is the myth that most people used to think the Earth was flat. The other myth is that the Bible is not accurate when it describes the same creation that modern science talks about.

JTA

Brussels mayor: Muslims, Jews and 'even Christians' have too many babies

October 2, 2012

THE HAGUE (JTA) -- The mayor of Brussels has said that families with many children were "a problem found among Muslims, Jews and even Christians."

Speaking at a debate in Brussels on Sept. 27, Mayor Freddy Thielemans added that the city was incapable of providing housing solutions that match the demands of families with many children and that bringing into the world "so many children is irresponsible."

Methods to reduce population growth "should be a matter for discussion," he also said. 

His statements have caused an uproar among fellow politicians and even members of Thielemans' own Socialist Party.

Philippe Moureaux, the Socialist mayor of Molenbeek, reacted by writing on Twitter: "In a free society, having children is a right which cannot be up for negotiation."

Brussels has a population of 1.1 million people, according to official statistics from 2011. Research by Jan Hertogen, a well-known Belgian sociologist, showed 22 percent of the city's population comes from Muslim homes. Approximately 20,000 to 30,000 Jews live in Brussels, according to CCOJB, the organization representing French-speaking Jews.

Economic Collapse

Police: "Enter Detroit At Your Own Risk"

Michael Snyder - -

Oct 8, 2012

If you plan on visiting Detroit any time soon, the police have a message for you: "Enter Detroit at your own risk".  That ominous message was actually emblazoned across the top of a flyer that the Detroit Police Officer Association was passing out prior to a rally on Saturday.  The flyer pointed out that Detroit is the most violent city in the nation and that more homicides are committed in Detroit than anywhere else.  Meanwhile, the number of police officers in Detroit has been steadily decreasing.  There are more murders in Detroit today than there were a decade ago, but the number of police officers in the city has decreased by about 1,000 over that time period.  The remaining police officers are overworked and incredibly frustrated.  But Detroit is far from alone.  All over the nation there are major cities that are reporting a spike in crime even as police budgets are being slashed.  Sadly, this is just the beginning.  As the economy gets even worse, budget cuts will become even more severe and crime will become an even bigger problem.

In many areas of the country, police have become little more than report takers.  If you report a crime that is not considered "high priority", you will be lucky to get an officer to come out a few hours later to fill out a report.

In cities such as Detroit, criminals are becoming much bolder and are openly mocking the police.  For example, according to a recent WND article, one gang has literally taken over a convenience store in Detroit and the police literally seem powerless to do anything about it....

Even the old-timers in Detroit never have seen anything like this: A mob of 40 black people moved into a convenience store and will not leave.

They say they now own it. They eat. Smoke. Cuss. Threaten. Spit. Rob. Sell drugs. All on video.

Police, ministers, neighbors, the store owner and just about everyone else seems powerless to stop them.

"It's a Bad Crew gas station," said one of the mob to the local Fox affiliate. "If you don't know what that is, I can't even tell you."

The owner calls police, but nothing happens. The police "come here and then they leave. Two minutes later they (the mob) are back."

What in the world has happened to Detroit?

Once upon a time it was one of the greatest cities in the entire world.

Now it has become a war zone.

As I wrote about a while back, justifiable homicide in the city of Detroit rose by 79 percent in 2011, and the rate of self-defense killings in Detroit is now about 2200 percent above the national average.

But like I said, Detroit is far from alone.

In some ways, what is happening in Chicago is even more frightening.

Many areas of Chicago have essentially been completely taken over by the gangs.  Violent crime has dramatically increased in Chicago so far this year, and nobody seems to know what to do about it.

A USA Today article from last week entitled "Murders in Chicago: What can stop the bloodbath?" painted a very grim picture about what is going on in the city right now....

Driven by gangs, drugs and guns, the bloodshed in President Obama's adopted hometown has resulted in a body count that exceeds the 312 murders this year in New York and 212 in Los Angeles, cities with populations dwarfing that of the Windy City. The toll here is up 25% from 2011: 391 through Sept. 23.

CBS News reporter Walter Jacobson recently sat down with some young gang members in Chicago and asked them some direct questions.  Many of the answers that he got to those questions were quite frightening....

"There's no solution to the violence," one gang member tells him. "Killing, killing is the solution."

When Jacobson asked them how they survive, the following was one of the responses that he received....

"Rob, steal and kill. That's the only way. We didn't grow up in Beverly Hills. We don't get it handed to us"

But what are the police supposed to do about it?

As I noted in another article, there are approximately 200 police officers assigned to Chicago's Gang Enforcement Unit to deal with an estimated 100,000 gang members.

How would you like to be outnumbered 500 to 1?

And the number of gang members in Chicago grows with each passing day.

The violence in Chicago has gotten so bad that it is making headlines all over the globe.  For example, the following is a brief excerpt from an article about the violence in Chicago that appeared in the Telegraph....

"This is a block-to-block war here, a different dynasty on every street," said a dreadlocked young man heavily inked in gang tattoos who calls himself "Killer".

"All the black brothers just want to get rich, but we got no jobs and no hope. We want the violence to stop but you ain't safe if you ain't got your pistol with you. Too many friends, too many men are being killed. We don't even cry at funerals no -more. Nobody expects to live past 21 here."

When young people lose all hope for a better future they become very desperate.

And very desperate people are capable of just about anything.

Sadly, this is just the beginning.

The other day we learned that the number of Americans on food stamps has hit another brand new record high.

Nearly 47 million Americans are on food stamps at this point, and overall more than 100 million Americans are enrolled in at least one welfare program run by the federal government.

But what happens someday if the federal government is forced to cut back significantly on those programs or if food prices increase so much that people can't buy nearly enough food to eat with their food stamps?

When people get really hungry they will do some crazy things.

But the mayor of Costa Mesa, California says that he has an answer to this problem.  He has proposed reducing the homeless population of Costa Mesa by putting all soup kitchens in the city out of business....

The mayor of Costa Mesa proposed to get rid of soup kitchens to deal with the area's homeless problem at a city council meeting on Tuesday.

"My belief is that if we manage to put the soup kitchen out of business that will go a long way to addressing the attractiveness in our city that's creating a huge negative impact," Eric Bever said.

Unfortunately, we are going to see a lot more of this kind of thing in the years ahead.  The number of people that are really hurting is going to continue to increase, and the efforts to remove them from "respectable" areas is going to become more forceful.

Already we have seen feeding the homeless being banned in major cities all over the country.

But no rules, regulations or laws are going to be able to prevent what is coming in the years ahead.  I believe that eventually we are going to see "flash mobs" of poor Americans storm into wealthy neighborhoods and take whatever they want.

Those doing the looting will justify it by saying that they are just taking from the rich and giving to the poor like "'Robin Hood" did, but most other Americans will see it as more evidence that society is breaking down.

And without a doubt our society is starting to break down.  What we are seeing in Detroit and Chicago right now is just the tip of the iceberg.

Things are going to become much, much worse.

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ENENews

Legal Expert on Sinkhole: "Incredibly dangerous situation" -- Local officials very concerned gas could burst through ground with explosive force

Source: Stuart H. Smith, Esq.

Published: October 8th, 2012

Title: Fears of methane explosion rise in sinkhole-ravaged La. town -

Local officials have told the Advocate they're very concerned that the odorless and colorless gas is accumulating to the point where it could burst through the ground with explosive force [...]

This alarming news comes amid news reports that tremors are now being felt in a wide area across the bayou. This happened late last week, roughly 45 miles from Bayou Corne [...]

This is an incredibly dangerous situation in the Louisiana bayou. [...]

In Bayou Corne, workers began this weekend drilling three vent wells. [...] Let's pray that the efforts to reduce the pressure are not too little -- or too late.

Atlas Society

Rep. Paul Ryan as Romney's vice presidential running mate. At an Atlas Society meeting celebrating Ayn Rand's life in 2005, Ryan said that "The reason I got involved in public service, by and large, if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand", and "I grew up reading Ayn Rand and it taught me quite a bit about who I am and what my value systems are, and what my beliefs are. It's inspired me so much that it's required reading in my office for all my interns and my staff."

Greenspan was born and educated in New York City, where he earned a BA, MA and, 27 years later in 1977, a PhD in economics. After earning his MA in 1950, Greenspan became a 20-year associate of famed philosopher Ayn Rand, author of books "The Virtue of Selfishness,""Atlas Shrugged" and more. Greenspan wrote for Rand's newsletters and authored a chapter for a Rand book. As legend has it, Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan was once a member of Ayn Rand's 1960's salon. He was invited guest at Rand's apartment and apparently was close enough to have read her epic Atlas Shrugged as it came off her typewriter.

With his selection of Representative Paul Ryan as a running mate, Mitt Romney has told us exactly who he would be as President: a selfish capitalist. A Romney-Ryan White House would elevate selfishness above all else. To understand the values of Mr. Romney and Mr. Ryan, it is necessary to understand their intellectual forebear, Ayn Rand. Ms. Rand was one of the most extreme public intellectuals of the twentieth century. As her central creed, she rejected the idea that people in a community should approach each other with charity, compassion, and altruism.

Ted Rudow III, MA

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IrishTimes.com

Skipper defends giving away free fish

October 5, 2012
The public collect monkfish left at Kilmore Quay, Co Wexford, by the owners of the Saltees Quest, Séamus and John O'Flaherty.Photograph: Mary Browne
ÁINE McMAHON

FISHERIES AUTHORITY officers have prepared a file for submission to the Director of Public Prosecution after a Wexford trawler owner gave away fish rather than discard them at sea.

Séamus O'Flaherty, who owns the Saltees Quest, gave away fish at Kilmore Quay in Wexford yesterday morning after the vessel exceeded its EU quota of monkfish. The vessel's skipper, Jimmy Byrne, said he took the action to oppose the EU rule that requires over-quota fish to be thrown back in the sea.

The crew, which returned to harbour on Wednesday night, were monitored by a member of an Garda Síochána at Kilmore Quay before officers from the Sea Fisheries Protection Authority arrived yesterday morning to investigate the activity.

The authority, the statutory body that enforces fishing regulations, condemned the actions of the crew. Fisheries officers counted the catch of the Saltees Quest and prepared files for submission to the Director of Public Prosecutions.

The fisheries authority said it found a substantial quantity of fish retained onboard at Kilmore Quay, which the skipper logged as having been discarded. It said all catches landed, including the fish caught by the Saltees Quest that were undeclared as "discards", are counted against the national quota. By bringing the fish ashore, this detracts from the quota available for allocation.

The authority said it would continue to deter similar actions, to prevent damage to the livelihoods of legitimate fishermen.

In a statement, the Sea Fisheries Protection Authority said: "A fishing operation that results in large quantities of fish for which the vessel does not have a quota is undesirable for everyone. A prudent response would be to alter that operation - change fishing grounds or fishing techniques to try to avoid unwanted catches in the first instance. The quantities brought ashore as 'discards' in this morning's landing are not consistent with this type of responsible fishing."

Mr Byrne told The Irish Times he took the action of giving away the fish to draw attention to what he describes as the crazy system of dumping dead fish back into the water while thousands of people go hungry in Ireland.

"Four hundred thousand people are unemployed and people are ashamed to admit they don't have enough money to feed themselves. Children are going to school without breakfast or coming home to no dinner while we are encouraged by the Government to throw these fish back into the sea. I personally know people who are going hungry - this is why I had to take a stand."

Mr Byrne and his crew collected the fish, sorted them into 130 boxes and left them on Kilmore Quay to give them away free to the public.

Mr Byrne said he had always complied with EU fishing regulations but became increasingly frustrated as his crew were told to dump tons of dead fish into the sea when they had exceeded their quotas.

"I have a certain quota of fish to catch and the monkfish end up getting caught. There's more monkfish in Ireland than ever before. I can't tell the monkfish not to go into the net. Plaice and cod land in the net too but we have to throw them back.

"The Irish Government wants me to dump all these perfectly good fish into the sea but it's pure madness," he said.

Mr Byrne said there was an overwhelming response to the free monkfish and that people in Wexford were supportive of his action.

He said that Irish waters are becoming a graveyard because of the EU fishing regulations.

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Until next week...keep on believing.

Almondtree Productions

"He that hath pity upon the poor lendeth unto the LORD; and that which he hath given will he pay him again."

(Proverbs 19:17)