Axis of Evil Tour Photos: Penn and Chavez Rock On!

A picture is worth a thousand words. Here’s a few thousand words!

Aug. 4, 2007 – TheScroogeReport.com Post

- Associated Press, Reuters

Greg Laurie: ‘This is not a product…This is not toothpaste, folks’

INTO THE MUSIC: Thousands of people gathered at Anaheim Stadium to celebrate the Harvest Crusade with music and prayer Friday night. (Rose Palmisano, Orange County Register)

August harvest
By ERIK ORTIZ
The Orange County Register

ANAHEIM – In a fitting venue, Angel Stadium of Anaheim played host to thousands of Christians on Friday night, eager to hear an energetic pastor reaffirm their faith.

“You can leave Angel Stadium knowing that you’re going to heaven,” said pastor Greg Laurie, wearing a button-down black shirt and standing on a makeshift stage stretching around the infield.

In his keynote sermon at Southern California Harvest Crusade 2007, Laurie didn’t mind name-dropping pop-culture icons such as George Clooney, Larry King and Keith Urban to get his point across: It’s time to accept the tenets of Christianity.

“This is not a product,” he said. “This is not toothpaste, folks.”

Read Full Story

South Korean hostages: Breaking News Headlines

Aug. 3, 2007

Taliban may delay direct talks with S. Korea until after U.S. summit
Yonhap News Agency

Taliban kidnappers holding South Korean hostages may be deliberately delaying direct talks with South Korea until after key meetings in the U.S. and with Pakistan, legislators from Seoul said Friday, quoting the Afghan envoy here.

Amb. Said Jawad said the kidnappers may wait and see the results of the U.S.-Afghanistan summit this weekend and the upcoming Islamic Council meeting before sitting down with South Korean officials, according to the legislators. More than 700 tribal leaders from Afghanistan and Pakistan will attend the council meeting….

Taliban, S Korean team to hold talks
Tapei Times

A Taliban spokesman said it had been assured by South Korean officials that Islamist fighters would be released in exchange for the kidnapped aid workers.

South Korean officials scrambled yesterday to free 21 aid workers held by the Taliban, who said they had been told their key demand for the release of jailed fighters would be met….

Shim Jin-pyo, second from left, mourned with relatives and friends at the coffin of his son Shim Sung-min at a hospital in Sungnam, South Korea. Mr. Shim was one of two hostages killed in Afghanistan. (NY Times Pool)

Anger Is Tempering Sympathy for South Korean Hostages
New York Times

As the South Korean hostage crisis entered its third week, sympathy here for the 21 people remaining in Taliban captivity in Afghanistan has been tempered by anger over their decision to travel to such a dangerous region.

“My friends and I first wondered, ‘Why did the church send those people to a place the government had advised them not to travel?’ ” said Shim Sae-rom, a political science major at Ewha Womans University in Seoul. “What were they thinking?” ….