Posted: June 20, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Caryl Matrisciana © 2003 <a href=worldnetdaily.com>WorldNetDaily.com

Shattering news from my homeland England came over the BBC News Online service recently, reporting the theft of 8,000 Harry Potter books despite the "unprecedented security around the launch" of book No. 5 in the seven-part Harry Potter series.

The new books, "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" were stolen on Sunday and "anyone caught trying to sell – or even buy" these books "could face criminal charges" reports Stephen Dowling of the BBC World Edition News.

Earlier this month another theft took place when a forklift driver stole pages of the new book and offered them to national newspapers.

The astonishing news does nothing but further hype the worldwide release on the Summer Solstice, June 21, of author J.K. Rowling's latest smash hit. Never before in publishing history has a book had these strict embargoes that prohibit any type of pre-glimpse before it goes on sale at 0001 British Standard Time on Saturday, June 21.

Britain's Amazon.com, the Internet booksellers, have 300,000 copies securely tucked away in a dedicated warehouse in the English countryside ready to send to U.K. buyers on its Saturday due date. U.K. book chain Waterstones children's book buyer said, the "books are arriving in sealed boxes. We need to keep them locked off from the shop floor until 12 o'clock. We have to make sure the customers can't get to them, and staff can't get to them, apart from the one person who has the key."

Even review copies are under strict supervision curtailing media attempts to pass judgment before Sunday, though BBC News Online boasts they aim to publish one of the U.K.'s first reviews on Saturday. Good luck to those having to speed-read the almost 900 pages to meet publishers' deadlines. Translators were hoping to get pre-release copies to translate it into 55 languages for global distribution into over 200 countries, but they too must wait along with the rest of us.

The wait for a new book has been 3 years for Potter fans since the July 2000 release of book No. 4. Fans did however get their Harry-fix through the Warner Brothers blockbuster movies based on the first two books. Warner Bros. proudly flaunted that film No. 1 based on book No. 1 was "an accurate portrayal of witchcraft."

The young Wiccan, Harry Potter, then only 11 years old, has taken the world by storm. According to the Pagan Federation of England, the interest of thousands of teens to learn more about witchcraft has been stimulated through Harry Potter and television programs like "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Sabrina The Teenage Witch."

Pacific News Service reports that the Spanish speaking world, where Harry's sales top the best-seller lists in Mexico, Argentina, Chile and Venezuela, have Latin American critics complaining "that the world of magic through which Harry Potter travels is a metaphor for the New Age philosophy that is hostile to the Christian faith, and thus Harry Potter is an assault on Latin American values."

In the Siberian City of Novosibirsk, after the release of book No. 4, Harry Potter fans were believed to have been poisoned after drinking a "magic potion" inspired by the Potter books. Local police suspected older children had stolen copper sulfate from a school lab and fed it to 23 young children, who were taken to hospital, after a Potter initiation ceremony.

While critics accuse me of failing to realize that Rowling's use of witchcraft in the Potter series is only a literary device, these examples show only too well that children believe the so-called "fantasy" magic of Harry's world to be real and, in a craving to control their lives, long for Harry's power to be real to them.

Harry's author, J.K. Rowling, now richer than the queen and the wealthiest woman in show business, told Malcolm Jones in a Newsweek interview, "I get letters from children addressed to Professor Dumbledore (headmaster at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, the book setting), and it's not a joke, begging to be let into Hogwarts, and some of them are really sad. Because they want it to be true so badly they've convinced themselves it's true."

J.K. Rowling promised "the books are getting darker ... Harry's going to have quite a bit to deal with as he gets older. Sorry if they get too scary!" In a Newsnight interview on BBC2 TV last week, she told how she "cried after killing off a 'significant' character" in her new fifth book.

The first three books were heavily promoted through the American school system by the American publisher Scholastic Inc., which has also provided school-curriculum materials for over 80 years. It seems interesting that while the teaching of traditional values based on Christian ethos has been removed from schools through reading the Bible in class, saying prayers or posting the Ten Commandments, Harry Potter, based on the religious teachings of occult professors and Wiccan students at a school of witchcraft and wizardry can be read aloud in American classrooms.

J.K. Rowling admits her books teach "morality," but many argue it is an anti-Christian morality that encourages children to lie, cheat and steal in Harry fashion. In the books, when Harry gets caught, he gets rewarded for his dishonest behavior. This worldview of shifting morality supports much of the content of Outcome Based Education and Goals 2000 taught in public schools today. Perhaps that's why the Potter books based on relativism, reincarnation type life after death, and other pagan values are endorsed by educators and mainstream society. It appears paganism is mainstream and mainstream has gone pagan.

Some 8.5 million copies of "The Order of the Phoenix" have been printed for the U.S. market, and millions will see the cover of the colorful phoenix rising above the flames of a red hot fire on Saturday, but what is its significance? In Barbara Walker's "Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets," she says, "The phoenix is part of Egyptian mythology and identified with the bennu bird, a spirit associated with the phallic obelisk. He rose to heaven in the form of the Morning Star, like Lucifer, after his fire-immolation of death and rebirth. He embodied the sacred king cremated to be reborn".

Is it a coincidence that Adolph Hitler also used the phoenix as his symbol of reincarnation and "born again" power to resurrect the Second Reicht to his Third Reicht in an attempt to bring about the New World Order? His Nazi uniform boldly emblazoned both the phoenix and another powerful occult symbol, the lightning bolt. Interestingly enough, the so-called descending phallus of heaven, the lightning bolt believed to impregnate Mother Earth, or the sea-womb with life, is the curse mark Harry's arch enemy, the Evil Lord Voldemort scarred Harry's forehead with when he murdered Harry's parents on Halloween night.

Today, millions of children take Harry's curse mark on their own foreheads to show their loyalty to Harry. The Bible teaches that at the ruling of the One World leader in the end times, the whole world will take "the mark of the beast" on their foreheads to show their allegiance to the world dictator. Are our children, and the global child, being conditioned for something much bigger than even we understand?

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Christy Espinosa / <a href=www.valleystar.com>Valley Morning Star

Jack Nelson stands in front the warehouse where the remainder of the sugar cane sits on the floor in Santa Rosa. Nelson was named Sugar Man of the Year for his contribution to the nation’s sugar industry. By TONY VINDELL tonyv@valleystar.com 956-430-6203

Working for the sugar cane industry for more than four decades has given Jack Nelson the thrill of his life.

Before retiring as president and chief executive officer of Rio Grande Sugar Growers Inc., Nelson received the Dyer Memorial Award Sugar Man of the Year for his contribution not only to the sugar cane industry in the Valley and the United States.

Nelson, who lives in Harlingen, said he was honored to get such a distinction.

He said being selected as the 2002 recipient meant competing again about 350,000 people who work for the industry nationwide.

"It’s a great honor to get this award," he said, "because you never figure you are going to get it."

This is the 45th time the award, named after B.W. Dyer, a sugar broker from New York City, has been given out since the first Sugar Man of the Year was recognized back in 1958.

"Your activities in the local community have been consistent with your steeling contribution to the sugar industry," read parts of citation Nelson received in May in New York City. "For over 43 years you have repeatedly distinguished yourself as a pioneer, scholar, innovator, agronomy expert and highly respected sugar industry leader."

Nelson, a member of the First United Methodist Church in Harlingen, has volunteered countless hours to many organizations.

Nelson’s career with the sugar industry began in 1960.

He worked for the Hawaiian Sugar Planters Association, helped developed the Amarah Cane Sugar Project in Iraq and worked at Ingenio Riopaila in Colombia.

His career in the Valley began more than 30 years ago and he has since dedicated about half f of his life working to improve the quality of sugar cane for the sugarhouse owned by Valley growers.

Nelson said the Valley sugar industry began with 25,000 acres, compared to the 48,000 acres cultivated today.

He said one of the things that makes him feel proud is the fact that he is leaving a highly productive crop and operations.

Nelson said growers produced one of the best years during the 2002-03 season, and although it was wasn’t compared to the bumper crop they harvested three years ago, this one was the best in sugar content.

He said he received the award while he was still on board at the sugarhouse and plans to retire later this year.

But he is not about to throw in the towel.

"I am going to work on a consultant basis," he said.

"I will be doing that here in Santa Rosa as well as in Guatemala, Venezuela and other places where I am needed.

"I am in pretty good shape to call it quits."

Slice of Life suggestions should be sent to City Editor Dave Ralph or Managing Editor Lucio Castillo by phoning 430-6206 or at davidr@valleystar.com.

The Washington Post, Friday, June 20, 2003; Page A25

Everyone agrees that the United States is far too dependent on imported oil. Liberals say we need to conserve more. Conservatives say we need to produce more.

It is the most ridiculous debate on the American political scene. We obviously need to do both. Every barrel added to domestic production and every barrel subtracted from consumption has the equivalent effect of reducing our dependence on unstable and unfriendly foreign producers.

Since the invasion of Kuwait 13 years ago, the U.S. military has been on active patrol in the world's oil patch. With American soldiers at risk securing our oil economy, liberals have to be willing to discomfit a few caribou and allow us to start pumping new oil from Alaska. If we'd listened to their arguments the last time around, we would today be without the million barrels a day we get from the North Slope.

Liberals also need to get over their allergy to the cleanest form of energy, nuclear power. The administration has proposed support for a new generation of safer nuclear reactors. You'd think environmentalists would be enthusiastic. Nuclear energy is remarkably benign: no greenhouse gases or other pollutants strewn in the air, the water and your lungs. Of course, like all energy, nuclear has its pollutant -- there is no free lunch -- but in this case you can find it, concentrate it, put it in box cars and ship it off to some Godforsaken mountain in the desert.

Yes, it will be a hazard to humans or whatever species succeeds us in 10,000 years or so. That is a pity. But we do have more immediate problems. Like today's terrorists, who are fueled by Saudi and other oil money.

Conservatives, too, will have to give up some cherished positions to encourage reductions in consumption. One of the reasons they have resisted consumption controls is our history of heavy-handed regulatory schemes. Mileage standards (CAFE, for corporate average fuel economy) on automobile fleets hugely distort the economics of the auto industry and indeed helped create the entire sport utility vehicle explosion (an unforeseen consequence of CAFE standards that treated SUVs as trucks and thus subject to less-stringent mileage requirements).

We must reduce oil consumption. The easiest way to do it is simply to artificially raise the price of oil -- i.e., tax it.

Oil is currently selling at about $30 a barrel. Slap, say, a $5 (or $10 -- the bazaar is open) tax on every imported barrel. And most important, keep the new price -- let's say $35 -- as a floor. The world market price is likely to fall as Iraqi oil comes online, as Venezuela stabilizes and as Russian and Caspian producers ramp up production.

This presents a wonderful opportunity to capture the fall in oil prices in the form of taxes. Say oil drops to $20 a barrel. Raise the import fee to $15 a barrel, so the consumer keeps paying $35 a barrel net. The windfall goes to the U.S. Treasury.

The benefits of such a scheme are enormous. Fixed and fairly expensive oil prices will induce consumers to cut oil consumption. It won't happen overnight. People are not going to junk their SUVs, but they will begin to make choices favoring greater fuel efficiency over time, as they did when oil prices rose in the 1970s.

The windfall to the Treasury can also be beneficial if the scheme is kept strictly revenue-neutral: Every penny of the import fee should be returned to the private economy in the form of (1) lower taxes (my choice: lower payroll taxes) and (2) a government check to poor folks to compensate for their higher fuel costs.

If the oil import fee is high enough, consumption will be depressed, which will further reduce the world price and further increase federal oil tax revenue (and thus reduce payroll or other taxes), creating a virtuous cycle whose most important effect is a reduction in our dependence on foreign oil.

You can play with the numbers. You can alter the tax to create the desired reduction. You can debate whether it should be slapped just on gasoline or on all imported hydrocarbon energy. (Economist Irwin Stelzer of the Hudson Institute is fleshing out this idea.)

But what is important is the principle: Increase production -- Alaskan oil and nuclear energy, for starters -- and decrease consumption by taxing imported oil.

It is a simple solution. It requires only that each side recognize the virtue of the other's argument. Which is why in today's Washington it doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell of passage.

Taipei Times, Friday, Jun 20, 2003,Page 12

°?Electronics AAFES to buy Chinese TVs The US military will buy 45,000 high-definition televisions from Xiamen Overseas Chinese Electronics Co, one of China's biggest appliance makers, China's state-owned Xinhua News Agency said, citing the Xiamen Daily newspaper. The Army and Air Force Exchange Service, a purchasing agency, will take delivery now of 5,000 of the sets, capable of delivering sharper pictures than conventional TVs, Xinhua said. Xiamen Overseas will deliver the balance within a year. The report didn't give a value for the contract. Chinese appliance makers including Xiamen Overseas, Sichuan Changhong Electric Co and Konka Group Co may be assessed anti-dumping tariffs by the US after the US International Trade Commission ruled on Tuesday that cheap Chinese and Malaysian sets are hurting American producers.

°? Policy Mercosur pledges effort South American leaders agreed Wednesday to keep working toward greater regional integration by strengthening their countries' political and economic ties through the Mercosur trade bloc. The presidents of the Mercosur trading nations issued a communique at the end of a two-day summit here and expressed support for the group, whose members have been battered by economic crises over the last year. The leaders voiced their commitment to "the strengthening of Mercosur, with the aim of sustainable development of its member countries and their competitive insertion into the global economy." Mercosur members Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay held their biannual meeting at a riverside resort in the Paraguayan capital. Chile and Bolivia are associate members and Venezuela's president Hugo Chavez attended as a guest.

°? Computers Microsoft defends actions Microsoft Corp and the Bush administration defended their antitrust settlement, and the world's largest software maker urged a US appeals court to reject Massachusetts's call for tighter restrictions on its business practices. Micro-soft, which negotiated the settlement after the appeals court ruled the company illegally protected its Windows monopoly, said the agreement was approved by a trial judge who "considered but rejected" more restrictions. "The relief that Massachusetts seeks is so extreme that its own economist would not support several key aspects of it," Microsoft said in a brief filed with the appeals court in Washington. The settlement requires Microsoft to give computer makers freedom to promote rival software on personal computers powered by the Windows operating system. Windows runs 95 percent of the world's PCs.

°? Airlines NZ warns air carriers New Zealand's consumer watchdog, the Commerce Commission, has warned airlines to stop hiding extra charges that can add up to 44 percent to the price of cheap advertised fares, a news-paper reported yesterday. It said burying extra charges such as levies, taxes and insurance in the small print of advertise-ments misrepresented the price of fares, The New Zealand Herald said. Director of fair trading Deborah Battell said the commission was concerned about inadequate disclosure in advertisements. "When businesses are advertising, they should be advertising the price people have to pay," she said.

June 19, 2003, 11:26PM By MICHAEL DAVIS Copyright 2003 Houston Chronicle

Unocal Corp. will soon decide if it will build a $500 million deep-water offshore port that would move crude oil through underwater pipelines to Texas refineries.

This could allow refiners to avoid transferring oil from supertankers to smaller ships to get it onshore, reducing the risk of spills in Galveston Bay or sensitive areas near shore.

But Unocal still has to convince refiners by showing the savings on fees.

"We've been working on the project for about two years," said Michael Wilems, vice president of the Unocal subsidiary doing the project, BOOTS LLC.

"We looked at the supertankers that were coming into the Gulf of Mexico and what we could do to relieve the cost, based on lightering fees and ports fees."

The facility would be similar to an existing one named the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port, or LOOP. Located 18 miles south of Grand Isle, La., LOOP receives oil from tankers and moves it onshore through a pipeline.

The proposed Unocal facility would have its own catchy acronym -- BOOTS -- which stands for Bulk Oil Offshore Transfer System.

Because Texas ports are not deep enough to accommodate supertankers, oil arriving from places like the Middle East and Venezuela must be lightered. Crude is transferred from the supertankers, holding up to 2 million barrels, to smaller ships that take the oil to the refineries.

Environmentalists tend to favor moving oil onshore via pipelines as opposed to a tanker.

"Shipping petroleum products by a pipeline is often the safest route as long as the pipeline is monitored and any releases are immediately detected," said Chuck Wemple, executive director of the Galveston Bay Foundation.

"Pipelines aren't perfect, but as far as loss of life or damage to the environment, they are better than tankers or barges."

BOOTS would be a deep-water port 100 miles south of Beaumont, capable of offloading tankers at rates up to 1.2 million barrels per day.

The port would be capable of receiving vessels transporting crude oil from domestic Gulf of Mexico deep-water production fields.

The offshore port would be in a depth of 100 feet, deep enough it could berth a Very Large Crude Carrier class tanker, the largest that carries oil.

Before building it, Unocal has to prove the demand is there to justify the expense. It's doing that by asking for commitments from shippers to use the facility, in a process known as an open season.

Unocal said it has received expressions of interest for 500,000 barrels per day of the facility's capacity and is seeking further commitments for 700,000 barrels per day.

The open season ends July 3, and the company will make a decision in a few weeks, based on the commitments it receives, said Wilems.

The system could be in operation by 2007, assuming the company receives sufficient commitments and the necessary permits. Unocal plans to seek project financing.

Unocal has deep-water production that will be coming on line in a few years, Wilems said, and the port could be an alternative to shuttle tankers for that oil, although the economic feasibility is being judged on third-party users initially.

The offshore port would never replace the use of tankers to move oil into the area refineries.

Oil and petroleum products are the largest imports into the Port of Houston every year.

In 2001, about 670 million barrels of oil and petroleum products came into the port.

Valero Energy Corp., the nation's largest independent refiner, has not committed to using the facility, but the company would be interested if it could lower its transportation costs, a company spokeswoman said.

BOOTS and the LOOP would not be competing for customers because they serve different areas, Wilems said.

"We are addressing a completely separate market from the LOOP," said Wilems.

"We would be serving the Texas Gulf Coast, so there would be very little competition with the LOOP."

A spokeswoman for LOOP agreed that the facility would not be competing for its customers along the Louisiana coast.

The LOOP has a design capacity of 1.4 million barrels per day but usually handles 1 million barrels per day.

"It will be more complimentary to our operations," said Barb Hestermann, a spokeswoman for LOOP. "It's going to replace lightering."

The company estimates the facility would save users up to 60 cents per barrel in transportation costs.

"A new deep-water port and related pipelines will provide a more-efficient crude oil offloading facility that would result in reduced handling requirements, port calls and transit times, thus reducing costs and risks associated with the movement of crude to Gulf Coast refineries," said Joe Blount, president of Unocal's midstream and trade unit.