Although it is not normal to have lead in the body, most people have a small amount of it in their system. High levels of lead can lead to behavioral and learning problems, hearing difficulties, and slowed growth. Prolonged exposure can harm the brain, nervous system, kidneys, and blood. Lead is all around us. We can be be exposed to it from the food we eat, the water we drink, the dust we breathe in, and the paint on our walls.
Daily Archives: 06/02/2010
‘This is radio Pakistan from New delhi’
Our source of national pride
by Sana Saleem
Courtesy: Dawn.com
Nationalism is best understood in contrast to patriotism. Patriotism is simply love for one’s country, whereas nationalism is the sense that one’s nation is the best, often because it is more sacred than other nations. For the past few months, ‘Wake Up Pakistan’ – a campaign targeting this country’s youth – has been making waves both in the mainstream and social media.
The campaign aims to bring about an ideological revolution in Pakistan:
Pakistan today is in the eyes of the world, what we do and what we don’t will decide the future of Pakistan and the generations to come. We face internal and external threats which are shaking the very foundations of our motherland. Never before were we in such a dilemma, never before did our soil need us more and never before were we called upon to unite. We are not afraid but we are in danger. We have to WAKE UP!
The youth-oriented campaign promises to revive the ideology of the Quaid-e-Azam and Allama Iqbal. Spearheaded by Zaid Hamid, and supported by fashion designer Maria B and popular rock-star Ali Azmat, the country-wide campaign has comprised lectures at various educational institutes and has gathered quite a fan following.
Hamid’s official fan page left me stunned, and not only because he has a striking 24,682 fans online. What’s really shocking is Hamid’s irresponsibility in the face of his popularity and broad-based access to Pakistani youth.
The latest update on the page reads: ”Inshallah one day you will hear this………’This is radio Pakistan from New delhi’.” Even more startling is the fact that Hamid’s fantasies of invading a neighbouring country were received with messages from young Pakistanis such as “Inshallah” and “we are eagerly waiting for that time!” Such statements contradict Hamid’s claims of reviving the ideology of Jinnah and Iqbal. Indeed, his anti-India stance makes the Wake Up Pakistan campaign delusional, provocative, and downright demagogical.
Twin blasts hit Karachi, 33 killed
by Omar Ali
My own feeling is that massacres of shias will only accelerate in the areas where a shia population coexists with salafi terrorism (meaning Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Arabian peninsula). Mainstream Muslims who are not well aware of the origins and teachings of the Saudi-inspired salafists will no doubt rant about imperialist conspiracies and so on, but the fact is, this is as inevitable as night follows day. As police forces and armies put pressure on the salafist terror networks and even the Saudi state withdraws its backing, they are going to get more desperate and in their narrative, “the enemy within” are Shias (that narrative has some similarities with the Nazi narrative about Jews in Germany: that they “betrayed us from within and conspired with our enemies”) and they are going to go after them…..they are also a soft target and killing them may incite wider sectarian violence and thus bring down the semi-secular states that are now the salafist’s enemy.
Courtesy: Omar Ali & crdp@yahoogroups.com, Feb 5, 2010
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