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Last Update: Thursday, July 09, 2009 |
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World Headlines
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Updates from Iran as of July 5 Click here Updates from Honduras as of July 5 Kyrgyzstan weighs opium as industry As an election nears, a presidential candidate promotes the idea that the opium trade could bring cash to the impoverished Central Asian republic. Muslim minority riots erupt in China's west Protesters from a Muslim ethnic group clashed with police in China's far west Sunday, with activists saying police fired shots in the air and used batons to disperse a crowd that had swelled to nearly 1,000 Spending $102 Billion a Year on 800 Worldwide Military Bases Is Bankrupting the Country |
16 U.N. deminers kidnapped in Afghanistan Gunmen abducted 16
mine-clearing personnel working for the United Nations in eastern
Afghanistan, a provincial police chief said Sunday Saddam Hussein Talks to the FBITwenty Interviews and Five Conversations with "High Value Detainee # 1" in 2004 Glut of oil could push gasoline prices back down below $2 a gallon Energy experts say oil supply is outstripping demand. Eventually suppliers will tire of paying to store all of the surplus oil and flood the market, they predict. |
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US Headlines |
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[Obama] Administration plans for end of ‘too big to fail’ They
are the biggest of the big — the Citigroups, the Goldman Sachses,
the AIGs and other financial behemoths. The Obama administration
doesn't want so many around anymore. Financial regulations proposed
by the president would result in leaner and simpler institutions
that don't carry the weight of the system on their marble columns The Results Are In: A Public Health Plan Saves Big Money The arguments by obstructionists are dead -- the math shows health care costs will drop while achieving near universal coverage. Military backing algae-based fuel research Somewhere among the beakers and the bubbling green-tinged tanks in this Utah State University lab, Jeff Muhs is searching for champion pond scum for the U.S. government. Can government be trusted as the NSA begins to screen private ... The Washington Post today broke a story regarding a plan by the Obama administration to use the NSA to monitor computer traffic on private networks in order to catch security threats. In something that seems to come straight out of a James Bond movie or good conspiracy theory novel the NSA will be launching a program called Einstein 3 that will monitor civilian internet traffic in order to screen for potential threats to security breaches. |
Fact
Sheet: The F/A-22 “Raptor” Fighter The F-22, known as the
“Raptor,” is an air-superiority fighter intended to replace a
portion of the Air Force’s fleet of F-15s. The aircraft utilizes
“stealth” technologies, and is able to cruise at supersonic speed
without afterburners, thus saving fuel. Lockheed-Martin is the prime
contractor, while Boeing (airframes) and Pratt & Whitney (engines)
are major subcontractors.
SARAH PALIN
RESIGNING AS GOVERNOR
Study: Employer mandate could create jobs A study commissioned by liberal think tanks disputes claims that a “pay or play” employer mandate in a national healthcare plan would cause massive job loss, and says it could actually create jobs. FBI chief defended Saudis The pro-Saudi bias of former FBI director Louis Freeh during the investigation of the 1996 Khobar Towers terror bombing in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 United States airmen shut down a probe in which Osama bin Laden was clearly implicated. Had the case run its course, the US may not have been so brutally blindsided by 9/11 |
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Connecticut |
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Blue Cross asked to pull rate request State Healthcare Advocate
Kevin Lembo Tuesday asked Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield of
Connecticut to withdraw a proposal to boost rates by an average
of 23 percent for customers with individual insurance policies.
Tomato, potato blight hits eastern US; experts say it's spurred by rain, big-box distribution Tomato plants have been removed from stores in half a dozen states as a destructive and infectious plant disease makes its earliest and most widespread appearance ever in the eastern United States. Like AT & T, Other Conn. Corporations Using Tax Loopholes
AT&T was singled out last month for
avoiding state income taxes on millions
of dollars of earnings by sending the
money out of Connecticut to a subsidiary
in another state.
Union settles with 10 Conn. nursing homes Unionized nursing home workers say they’ve settled new contracts with 10 facilities, more than three months after their labor agreements expired. |
Report: U.S., Connecticut reliance on
fossil fuels over next two decades will be
costly
Blumenthal: Connecticut can't enforce lobbying law Connecticut's attorney general said Tuesday that the state's lobbying laws cannot be used to require the Roman Catholic Diocese of Bridgeport to register as a lobbyist to hold rallies and use its Web site to oppose legislation. Scientists using weevils to combat state's invasive plants Connecticut scientists have called upon an unlikely champion in their war on invasive plants, releasing 1,000 tiny, weed-eating weevils in a section of Quinnipiac River State Park Connecticut Construction Workers To Start Statewide Labor Protest Against Mizzy Construction The Connecticut Laborers’ District Council announced today that Connecticut construction workers will begin a statewide labor protest this Friday against Mizzy Construction, Inc., Plainville, CT, due to the construction site development company’s lack of compliance with area standard policies which include adherence to prevailing wage laws, assurance of quality .. |
| United States | |
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Security Issues America to remove HIV visa ban after protest FBI chief defended Saudis The pro-Saudi bias of former FBI director Louis Freeh during the investigation of the 1996 Khobar Towers terror bombing in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 United States airmen shut down a probe in which Osama bin Laden was clearly implicated. Had the case run its course, the US may not have been so brutally blindsided by 9/11 Noam Chomsky on “Crisis and Hope: Theirs and Ours” Noam Chomsky, the MIT professor, author and dissident intellectual, just turned eighty years old this past December. He has written over 100 books, but despite being called “the most important intellectual alive” by the New York Times, he is rarely heard in the corporate media. We spend the hour with Noam Chomsky. He spoke recently here in New York at an event sponsored by the Brecht Forum. More than 2,000 people packed into Riverside Church in Harlem to hear his address, titled “Crisis and Hope: Theirs and Ours.” In his talk, Chomsky discussed the global economic crisis, the environment, wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, resistance to American empire and much more Spending $102 Billion a Year on 800 Worldwide Military Bases Is Bankrupting the Country Jailers let Tiller shooting suspect mail pamphlets justifying murder Can government be trusted as the NSA begins to screen private ... The Washington Post today broke a story regarding a plan by the Obama administration to use the NSA to monitor computer traffic on private networks in order to catch security threats. In something that seems to come straight out of a James Bond movie or good conspiracy theory novel the NSA will be launching a program called Einstein 3 that will monitor civilian internet traffic in order to screen for potential threats to security breaches. Courts Web hoax conviction tossed federal judge in Los Angeles on Thursday tentatively threw out the conviction of a Missouri mother for her role in an Internet hoax on a vulnerable teenage girl who committed suicide. SCOTUS to allow unlimited corporate campaign funds? Scientist may be forced to NYC terror ties hearing A U.S.-trained Pakistani scientist accused of helping al-Qaida and shooting at FBI agents may be forced to appear in a New York City court against her will. Group Sotomayor advised fought job tests A civil rights group on whose board Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor served filed racial bias lawsuits over employment examinations that resemble a Connecticut case in which she ruled against white firefighters, documents released by the Senate show. |
Greed Rich buying up poor nations' farmland 'Land-grabbing' by wealthy countries to feed own people at expense of poor. (South Carolina) Televangelist (Cerullo) Building $4 Million Home Despite Layoffs At His Ministry Media Cheney discussed media inquiries into Plame leak Little People Call For FCC To Ban 'Midget' Little people are calling on the Federal Communications Commission to ban the use of the word "midget" on broadcast TV. Are big media empires 'obsolete'? Industry leaders meet amid fears digital age will leave 'old media' behind.
Civil Rights
"America's
Toughest
Sheriff" Agrees
To Stop
Requiring Court
Orders For
Abortions But
Creates New
Obstacle
The American
Civil Liberties
Union late
yesterday asked
an Arizona court
to prevent
Maricopa County
Sheriff Joseph
Arpaio from
requiring
inmates to
prepay
transportation
costs before
they can obtain
an abortion
Veterans,
Unions
Rally
for
Employee
Free
Choice
Act
Black freemason divides US lodges 26-year-old African American admitted to Atlanta lodge. Issue headed for Masonic trial and state courts. There is much about Freemasonry that remains shrouded in mystery to the outside world. But a group of members in the US state of Georgia appear to have clarified one thing - the supreme being in which all Masons are required to believe is not likely to be black. Drug War Drug raids reveal 'sobering' mass of arms Federal agents busted a drug-trafficking ring that distributed methamphetamine and cocaine from Mexico in Washington state and carried unusually powerful weaponry. Drug bust nets heroin stuffed in Build-A-Bear toys A dozen people have been arrested, and 33 pounds of heroin worth $30 million and stuffed inside Build-A-Bear toys has been seized in a drug bust in the Bronx. War on drugs to get test in election Sunday President Felipe Calderon and his drug war will get their biggest test of support yet when Mexico holds midterm elections Sunday amid growing frustration over rampant cartel violence and a shrinking economy. Police Teen recovering after being shot (in the head) with Taser dart (14 yr old) Authorities say a teenage girl is recovering at an Albuquerque hospital after being shot in the head with a Taser dart by Tucumcari's police chief. |
| Science | |
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Phoenix Lander discovers snowfall on Mars Military backing algae-based fuel research Somewhere among the beakers and the bubbling green-tinged tanks in this Utah State University lab, Jeff Muhs is searching for champion pond scum for the U.S. government. |
America's healthiest beach and lake getaways New form of El Niño may increase storms in the Atlantic Sheep getting smaller in Scotland due to climate change, study says |
| Politics | |
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Senate
No OK Yet on Kerry-Produced Film The Federal Election Commission
failed to reach a decision Thursday on the Massachusetts Democrat's
request to use $300,000 from his campaign funds to invest in a
documentary about injured Iraq war veterans Maxine Waters job-training center caught in funding ban The Maxine Waters Employment Preparation Center, a job-training facility in one of Los Angeles' poorest neighborhoods, is threatened with receiving no federal money at a time of high unemployment -- simply because of its name. State Politics
SARAH PALIN RESIGNING AS GOVERNOR Feds' corruption probe looks at top Florida officials The U.S. Justice Department is investigating corruption allegations made by an indicted Fort Lauderdale insurance executive who, in a bid for a favorable plea deal, has named lawyers, lobbyists and fundraisers he claims plotted with him to thwart a state crackdown on him and his industry Federal Reserve/Bailouts |
Health Insurance The Results Are In: A Public Health Plan Saves Big Money The arguments by obstructionists are dead -- the math shows health care costs will drop while achieving near universal coverage. Chuck Grassley: If You Want Good Health Insurance, Work For The Government Study: Employer mandate could create jobs A study commissioned by liberal think tanks disputes claims that a “pay or play” employer mandate in a national healthcare plan would cause massive job loss, and says it could actually create jobs. GITMO/Abu Ghraib/Bahgram
U.S. Says It Will Preserve Secret Jails for
Terror Case The government will agree
to preserve the secret overseas sites where Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani,
a defendant in a terror case involving the deaths of 224 people, was
once held.
AG: 50 or More Guantanamo Trials Possible Defense Spending Fact Sheet: The F/A-22 “Raptor” Fighter The F-22, known as the “Raptor,” is an air-superiority fighter intended to replace a portion of the Air Force’s fleet of F-15s. The aircraft utilizes “stealth” technologies, and is able to cruise at supersonic speed without afterburners, thus saving fuel. Lockheed-Martin is the prime contractor, while Boeing (airframes) and Pratt & Whitney (engines) are major subcontractors. |
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Obama |
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Obama Cybersecurity Plan To Involve NSA, Probably AT&T
-Report Colin Powell worries Obama has taken on too much Colin Powell worries that President Obama is trying to tackle too many big issues at one time and he offers this advice: take ... |
[Obama] Administration plans for end of
‘too big to fail’ They are the
biggest of the big — the Citigroups, the
Goldman Sachses, the AIGs and other
financial behemoths. The Obama
administration doesn't want so many
around anymore. Financial regulations
proposed by the president would result
in leaner and simpler institutions that
don't carry the weight of the system on
their marble columns
|
| Economy | NEW Click for Economic Statistics |
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Private-Equity Firms Say FDIC Rules Will Thwart Takeovers of Failed
Banks Private-equity firms said the Federal Deposit Insurance
Corp. may be diminishing the appetite for future bank takeovers by
demanding buyout groups put more capital at risk. Stocks Fall for Third Week, Longest Drop Since March, on Recession Concern U.S. stocks fell for a third straight week, the longest losing streak since March, on concern deeper- than-estimated job cuts and a drop in consumer confidence will prolong the recession. Glut of oil could push gasoline prices back down below $2 a gallon Energy experts say oil supply is outstripping demand. Eventually suppliers will tire of paying to store all of the surplus oil and flood the market, they predict. Bankruptcies low in states that don't seize wages States that allow debt collectors to seize consumers' wages have sharply higher bankruptcy rates than neighboring states that prohibit or strictly limit the practice, an Associated Press analysis has found. |
Johnny comes marching home — to no job
National Guardsmen are coming home from Iraq
to face a new enemy – a swooning economy
that has landed like a KO’d heavyweight on
the canvas of their home towns.
Economists point to rising debt as next crisis The Founding Fathers left one legacy not celebrated on Independence Day but which affects us all. It's the national debt, which is a staggering $11.4 trillion — about $37,000 for every American Dollar Gains as Signs Economic Recovery Faltering Spark Demand for Safety The dollar rose against the euro this week as speculation the economic recovery is faltering boosted demand for the safety of the U.S. currency. India Joins Russia, China in Questioning Dominance of U.S. Dollar Reserves Suresh Tendulkar, an economic adviser to Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, said he is urging the government to diversify its $264.6 billion foreign-exchange reserves and hold fewer dollars. |
| Iraq | Map of Iraq |
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Saddam Hussein Talks to the FBITwenty Interviews and
Five Conversations with "High Value Detainee
# 1" in 2004
Iraqi PM Denies Oil Auction Was Failure Land Mines Have Claimed 14,000 Lives in Iraq Friday: 3 Iraqis Killed, 4 Wounded...Saturday: 7 Iraqis Killed, 21 Wounded...Sunday: 6 Iraqis Killed, 23 Wounded |
Iraq's oil auction
"goes bust"?
As US forces withdraw from the urban areas in Iraq, the
government conducts an elaborate oil auction Insurgent attacks in Iraq kill 2 in Mosul, Baqouba Attackers targeted police patrols in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul on Sunday, killing a police officer with a grenade and injuring 14 people in a car bomb blast, authorities said. |
| Middle East | |
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Gaza girl may have been killed by IDF fire Army changes
assessment after initially saying she was killed by Palestinian
mortar fire. Israel denies Saudis gave IDF airspace clearance for Iran strike Israel charges Gaza man with plotting mass terror attack The Be'er Sheva District Court on Sunday charged a Palestinian man from the Gaza Strip with attempting to set up a terror network on Israeli territory with the intention of carrying out a massive bombing attack Jordan breaks up 'illegal' sit-in against Israeli imports The Jordanian government said Sunday that a sit-in against the import of Israeli agricultural products was forceably dispersed because had not obtained a proper protest license. ... |
Kurd fighter, Turkman police, two Sunnis killed in Kirkuk (AFP)
A
Kurdish militiaman, Turkman policeman and two Sunni Arab civilians
have been killed in three separate attacks by guns fitted with
silencers in the Iraqi city of Kirkuk, police said on Saturday. Turkey generals object to military court law -media Turkey's armed forces say a law under which army personnel will be tried in civilian courts in peacetime rather than military ones is unconstitutional and they have told the president so, media reported on Sunday Palestinian woman wielding toy gun wounded by IDF fire Abused 18-year-old Palestinian mother attempts suicide by walking into checkpoint carrying toy gun |
| Afghanistan | Map of Afghanistan |
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Russia allows U.S. weapons shipments to
Afghanistan
Ex-Taliban leader eyes Afghanistan presidency 2 US Troops Die In Attack On Base In Afghanistan US-funded bridge facilitates flow of Afghan opium, heroin Today, the bridge across the muddy waters of the Panj River is carrying much more than vegetables and timber: It's paved the way for drug traffickers to transport larger loads of Afghan heroin and opium to Central Asia and beyond to Russia and Western Europe. |
Taliban Test Chinese Weapons Deaths as Afghan offensive expands Two Nato-led soldiers killed in country's south
16 U.N. deminers kidnapped in Afghanistan Gunmen abducted 16 mine-clearing personnel working for the
United Nations in eastern Afghanistan, a provincial police chief
said Sunday.
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| Pakistan | Map of Pakistan |
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Pakistani
intelligence officials
say suspected US missile
strikes kill 11 in NW
Pakistan
Pakistan's education battleground A lack of government schools and teachers means more and more children in Pakistan are being taught at madrassas. Why Is Pak Taliban Targeting Scientists And Engineers? Nuclear Security in Pakistan: Separating Myth From Reality Air strikes kill 19 militants in NW Pakistan: officials (AFP) |
26 dead in Pakistan helicopter crash U.S. Drone Targets Taliban in Pakistan, at Least 6 Dead Pakistan seals border with Afghanistan, clamps curfew Top judge: 'use of drones intolerable'Release of 700 fishermen in India, Pak demanded |
| Asia | |
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China's NEA Targets To Achieve 2 GW Solar Power By 2011
N. Korea marks July 4 with missile barrage North Korea fired seven ballistic missiles off its eastern coast Saturday, South Korea said, a violation of U.N. resolutions and an apparent message of defiance to the United States on its Independence Day. Kyrgyzstan weighs opium as industry As an election nears, a presidential candidate promotes the idea that the opium trade could bring cash to the impoverished Central Asian republic. |
Muslim minority riots erupt in China's west
Protesters from a Muslim ethnic group
clashed with police in China's far west
Sunday, with activists saying police fired
shots in the air and used batons to disperse
a crowd that had swelled to nearly 1,000
Bomb hits Philippine church-goers The Philippine army blames Islamist militants after a bomb blast outside a cathedral in the south kills at least five people. |
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Europe |
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| Chechen police killed in Ingushetia Nine police officers die after convoy comes under attack in troubled Russian region. |
Medvedev says Iran, DPRK nuke issues
different
Khodorkovsky must confess for pardon: Medvedev (AFP) President Dmitry Medvedev rejected pardoning jailed tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky unless the former chief of the Yukos oil giant admitted he was guilty of fraud and tax evasion. |
| Africa | |
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Zimbabwe army 'to go from mines'
Zimbabwe's government
agrees to withdraw
soldiers from diamond
mines amid criticism
over human rights
abuses.
Nigerian militants claim attack on Shell facility Nigeria's main militant group says it has attacked a Royal Dutch Shell oil facility in southern Nigeria. |
Somali civilians killed by shells Twelve
civilians die in the Somali capital as
soldiers retaliate to mortars fired at the
presidential palace by insurgents.
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The Americas |
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Cartel claims divine right to push drugs The rival cartels battling for
control of Mexico's multibillion-dollar narcotics trade are as notorious for
their consumption of drugs as their use of extreme violence. But the
fastest-growing faction in the country's bloody drug wars is a quasi-religious
sect that celebrates family values and keeps its members teetotal.
Q&A: "The Elites Are Like a Huge Elephant Sitting on Haiti Haitian Prime Minister Michèle Pierre-Louis assumed office in September 2008. Born in the southern city of Jérémie in 1947, she left Haiti with her family in 1964 following a pogrom by dictator François Duvalier against his perceived enemies in her town.
Venezuelan official:
Radio licenses to be
revoked
The head of Venezuela's telecommunications
regulatory agency said Friday that 240 radio
stations will have their licenses revoked
for failing to update their registrations
with the government
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PERU: Petroleum Sullies the Amazon "Now the fish are going
to disappear," said Luis Umpunchi, an Awajún Indian, one of about 20
people gathered around a broken oil pipeline in the Jayais
community, in the northern Peruvian province of Amazonas
Brazil prison guards nab pigeon with cell phone Prison guards foiled a new attempt to smuggle a cell phone into a Brazilian prison by carrier pigeon - this one wearing a tiny backpack - and said Friday that the practice is becoming almost commonplace. Canadian police probe sixth gas pipeline bombing (Reuters) An explosion damaged a natural gas pipeline in northeast British Columbia on Saturday, the sixth attack on an energy facility in that area of the Canadian province in recent months. |