The World We Live In !!

The claim that no Arab names appeared on the flight manifests for the planes hijacked on the morning of September 11, 2001 arose shortly after the terrorist attacks, and variations on the theme have persisted to this day. The claim initially arose when lists of passengers published by CNN, The Guardian, and the Associated Press contained no names of hijack suspects.

But to draw the conclusion from this that therefore no Arab names were on the manifest was a clear example of misinformation, as these lists were clearly reported as lists of victims, and partial lists at that. Furthermore, none of those lists were sourced to the manifests themselves. The Associated Press, for instance, noted that its lists were compiled not from any of the manifests, but from information obtained from “family members, friends, co-workers and law enforcement.”[1]

Flight 11 manifest information (Boston Globe)

The only list sourced to an actual manifest was from a graphic created by the staff of the Boston Globe that showed a complete list of names and seating locations for passengers on American Airlines Flight 11. That list did indeed include the names of the suspected hijackers, although it is not clear whether the Globe obtained the information independently from the airline or from investigators. Although acknowledging receipt of an inquiry into this question and initially expressing a willingness to investigate, the Globe ultimately declined to comment for this report.[2]

A review of available information

by Jeremy R. Hammond

Read more…

UNITED NATIONS: A United Nations agency UNFPA has said in its report that India lags behind Pakistan in literacy rate as the literacy rate here in Pakistan is much more higher than that of its rival neighbor.

According to report, total 32.3 percent male while 60.4 percent female aged above 15 years are literate in Pakistan,

But however, on the contrary to aforementioned calculation, there are only 23.1 percent male and 45.5 percent female aged over 15 years enjoy education in India.

via Pakistan ahead of India in literacy rate: UN.

The tragic case of Saad Khan, a 32-year old contestant on a Pakistani game show being filmed in Thailand who died while taking part in one of the show’s stunts, highlights the serious issue of safety and regulation in the Pakistani media.

The days of one state-controlled channel informing the obedient nation of what the president did today or which foreign dignitaries the prime minister entertained are long gone. Pakistan’s media scene has transformed over the past decade – and generally for the better. It’s a good thing that there are now dozens of television channels all competing for our attention. With just a few clicks of your remote, you can flick between the latest Bollywood blockbuster, a stern sermonising maulvi, fiery political pundits railing against the government, and all manner of foreign content.

There’s a mass of programming out there and every channel executive is eager for your viewing loyalty – more viewers mean more revenue generated from advertisers. For the most part, advertising is the primary source of income for channels and thus they are exploring ever more sensational ways to secure that money along with their survival in an increasingly ruthless market. Read more…

Every individual, every society and every nation has its own particular destiny. Even before the first human being had been created, all the details of what each person would experience in the future, the events to be witnessed by every nation, the stages every society would go through, and the like, had all been established in the sight of Allah. Yet, people do not know any of these details that have been established, lived through, or done with in the sight of Allah. They only see and come to know them as they experience them. The future is thus unknown to us.

However, Allah has also revealed that He has granted some of His servants information about the unknown in the Qur’an. One such factor was that about the Prophet Yusuf (as). In his dungeon, he told two of his companions of the proofs of the existence of Allah:

He said, “No meal to feed you will arrive before I have informed you what they mean. That is part of what my Lord taught me. For I have left the religion of a people who clearly have no belief in Allah and are disbelievers in the hereafter.” (Surah Yusuf: 37)

As we see from this verse, Yusuf (as) is saying that he knew something that had not yet occured. That is knowledge, and a miracle, imparted to him by Allah. Allah also gave him the knowledge to interpret dreams. As long as Allah so wished, he could see certain events in the future.

Similar knowledge to that given to Yusuf (as) was also given to other prophets. In some verses, Allah states that He will reveal aspects of the unknown to those He chooses to be His messengers:

He is the Knower of the Unseen, and does not divulge His Unseen to anyone-except a Messenger with whom He is well pleased, and then He posts sentinels before him and behind him. (Surat al-Jinn: 26-27)

What the Prophet MUHAMMAD (saas) Said of the Future « Tiigerr’s Blog.

Recently, I started using an old family friend as a travel agent. Before then, we’d never had occasion to email one another. From the start, I was shocked to find that she regularly wrote her emails exclusively in all uppercase letters. I politely mentioned that using all caps in an email is the equivalent of screaming in voice conversations and she said she appreciated the tip. Still, I couldn’t help wondering how a professional could get by today without mastering one of the most basic tenets of email manners.

And that’s not the only email etiquette breach that makes me scratch my head. Every time I have to scroll through 50 email addresses before reading a message from a colleague who used the cc rather than bcc function, I find myself wishing that some kind of licensing or training were required before people were allowed to get on email.

Since that’s never going to happen, here are a few ways to ensure that your email style makes you look as smart as possible and doesn’t annoy those on the receiving end of your messages.

• by Marci Alboher, Working the New Economy, on Sun Jun 28, 2009 7:22pm PDT

How to improve your email etiquette – Manage Your Life on Shine.

Following is an article that was sent to me via E-mail by a friend of mine. I just could not go without posting it. How simple it is even to a 17 year old, Mashallah.

Its people like this who make Muslims around the world feel proud.

May God reward her for all her efforts in life. Amen !!

A lesson to be learned
By Sultana Yusufali, 17 (a Toronto high school student)

Toronto Star Young People’s Press

I probably do not fit into the preconceived notion of a “rebel.” I have no visible tattoos and minimal piercings. I do not possess a leather jacket. In fact, when most people look at me, their first thought usually is something along the lines of “oppressed female.”

The brave individuals who have mustered the courage to ask me about the way I dress usually have questions like: “Do your parents make you wear that?” or “Don’t you find that really unfair?”

A while back, a couple of girls in Montreal were kicked out of school for dressing like I do. It seems strange that a little piece of cloth would make for such controversy. Perhaps the fear is that I am harbouring an Uzi underneath it. You never can tell with those Muslim fundamentalists. Read more…

Asif Ali Zardari hails from a feudal background – what that means is his father owned land, probably around a few thousand acres somewhere in rural Sindh. The locals who live and farm on the land pay the landlord a rent, or often times rent + half the produce from the land. Generally, this is the only legal source of income for most landlords.

Asif’s family didn’t have much land as compared to the larger Sindhi landlords, and like every other Pakistani landlord, their farming practices were backwards and highly inefficient, making them in essence relatively poor, as compared to the other much larger land owning families in Sindh. While always immensely rich compared to the average Pakistani, Asif grew up with a chip on his shoulder as the class he measured himeself against was much wealthier. Perhaps thats where his innate desire to go overboard on the pursuit of wealth grew from.

Feudal landholders in Pakistan are generally not very rich, despite impressions to the contrary. Their landholdings don’t generate much income. With the spread of industry and urbanization, a number of landlords have become much richer as their lands were near growing cities, hence increasing their value many fold – which enables them to sell off bits and pieces to add to their income.

Asif Ali Zardari’s father owned a small cinema in Karachi, and Asif used to make money on the side by selling cinema tickets, trading in cars, or selling off assets belonging to his family to make money. A life less ordinary, so to speak, there was never anything about him to suggest much more… till he somehow bumped into Benazir Bhutto.

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If someone granted you one wish, what do you imagine you would want out of life that you haven’t gotten yet? For many people, it would be self-improvement and knowledge. New knowledge is the backbone of society’s progress. Great thinkers such as Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Edison, Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein, and others’ quests for knowledge have led society to many of the marvels we enjoy today. Your quest for knowledge doesn’t have to be as Earth-changing as Einstein’s, but it can be an important part of your life, leading to a new job, better pay, a new hobby, or simply knowledge for knowledge’s sake — whatever is important to you as an end goal.

Life-changing knowledge does typically require advanced learning techniques. In fact, it’s been said that the average adult only uses 10% of his/her brain. Imagine what we may be capable of with more advanced learning techniques. Here are 77 tips related to knowledge and learning to help you on your quest. A few are specifically for students in traditional learning institutions; the rest for self-starters, or those learning on their own. Happy learning. Read more…

The ointment is found to increase mucus production and inflammation, which can exacerbate breathing problems in children under 2, researchers say.

Story Via Los Angeles Times
By Thomas H. Maugh II

Many parents slather Vicks VapoRub on their sniffling, coughing kids when they’re sick — because, by gosh, that’s what their parents did to them. For children under the age of 2, the folksy remedy could be dangerous, researchers warned today.

Reporting in Chest, the journal of the American College of Chest Physicians, the researchers said that using the ointment to ease coughing and congestion in children of this age might lead to severe breathing problems by increasing mucus production and inflammation. Read more…

“Mulk khud hi chalta rehay ga” (approximate translation: the country doesn’t need our contribution to thrive) is a sentence many Pakistanis are prone to saying. I confess that till a few years ago, I myself was confident of this misleading notion. Misleading and dangerous – especially in today’s volatile climate. As Pakistanis, it is imperative that we come to terms with the fact that no heavenly Manna will alleviate our country’s plight. The job rests squarely on our own shoulders; with the destiny of a whole nation tethered to our will and to the execution of that will. And so as the clock ticks and the prophets of doom raise a foreboding murmur from East to West, it is high time for us to learn some crucial lessons. Lessons without which our collective slumber will only deepen:

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