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Harrison Koehli
Sott.net 2012-08-23 16:14:00
A controversial paper questioning the 'Out of Africa' theory of human origins was recently published in the journal Advances in Anthropology. There are quite a lot of references to the origins of humanity in the Cs transcripts, so that's what I want to discuss in this installment of the Hit List series. I'll get to the paper in question a bit further on, but before I do, there's a bunch of background material to cover. The references from the Cs are given in a certain context and concern ideas and possibilities that probably won't make much sense without covering certain ground first. That said, there's way too much material to cover in one article, so I suggest checking out the books I'll be referencing and reading them in full if anything here strikes the reader's interest. Pop culture has conveniently provided a starting point from which to take off on these topics. In June, Ridley Scott released the much-anticipated prequel of sorts to his blockbuster film, Alien, titled Prometheus. Leaving aside any discussion of the artistic merits of the film, it does cover some themes relevant to the subject at hand. The plot revolves around the idea that life on planet earth, and presumably other planets in the galaxy, was not a chance happening. In the film, a race of pale-skinned, muscular and hairless humanoids 'seeds' life on planets through acts of sacrifice. An 'engineer', as they're called in the film, gives his body to be broken down into its constituent parts, providing the source DNA from which life will take root. The human characters in the film fund a space mission to 'meet their makers' at a location indicated in ancient artwork found all over the world. The film leaves the question of the ultimate origins of life open, allowing conventional evolutionary theories (i.e., neo-Darwinism) and so-called 'intelligent design' (or biogenetic engineering) to coexist as compatible options. In other words, the engineers 'intelligently' seeded life on earth, after which evolution took its natural course (with a possible 'tweak' here and there over the course of history), resulting in the wealth of DNA-based life forms that characterize our planet. The origin of the engineers is left untouched - a further mystery to be pondered. Back in the real world, the fact of the matter is that no one knows how life actually started on planet earth. Let me repeat that: no one knows. All we have are various theories, none of which has been scientifically demonstrated to have actually occurred. At best, most scientists will say it must have occurred a certain way, simply because they have excluded other options as not worth considering. In fact, we may have a pretty good idea of some of the evolutionary mechanisms that have been in effect since the hypothetical first single-celled organism, but how that organism got there in the first place is a mystery, and open to speculation. Historically, there have been five or so categories under which various theories have been proposed. First, of course, there's creationism: the idea that 'God' created all the forms of life in one way or another. Then there are the various theories of 'spontaneous abiogenesis'. This is the idea that somehow ordinary chemistry spontaneously resulted in the formation of primitive biological materials, which somehow acquired the ability to self-replicate and evolve all on their own, whether on crystals, or by some other mathematically improbable and as-yet-unobserved natural process. Panspermia, popularized by scientists Sir Fred Hoyle and Chandra Wickramasinghe, is another option whereby organic materials are said to exist throughout the universe and are carried by cosmic wanderers like asteroids and meteoroids, to then be deposited on some lucky planet, et voila! The fourth option, directed panspermia, promoted by Francis Crick (co-discoverer of the DNA molecule), posits that life was deliberately seeded by an already existing intelligent race somewhere in the galaxy. As in Prometheus, that leaves open the question as to their own origin. |
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Paul Craig Roberts
Information Clearing House 2012-08-25 04:53:00
The United States has collapsed economically, socially, politically, legally, constitutionally, and environmentally. The country that exists today is not even a shell of the country into which I was born. In this article I will deal with America's economic collapse. In subsequent articles, I will deal with other aspects of American collapse. Economically, America has descended into poverty. As Peter Edelman says, "Low-wage work is pandemic." Today in "freedom and democracy" America, "the world's only superpower," one fourth of the work force is employed in jobs that pay less than $22,000, the poverty line for a family of four. Some of these lowly-paid persons are young college graduates, burdened by education loans, who share housing with three or four others in the same desperate situation. Other of these persons are single parents only one medical problem or lost job away from homelessness. Others might be Ph.D.s teaching at universities as adjunct professors for $10,000 per year or less. Education is still touted as the way out of poverty, but increasingly is a path into poverty or into enlistments into the military services. Edelman, who studies these issues, reports that 20.5 million Americans have incomes less than $9,500 per year, which is half of the poverty definition for a family of three. |
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Stephen Lendman
sjlendman.blogspot.com 2012-08-24 04:34:00
A new Tax Justice Network (TJN) USA report reveals an estimated $21 - $32 trillion of hidden and stolen wealth stashed largely tax-free secretly. Titled "The Price of Offshore Revisited," it explains what financial insiders know but won't discuss. Many of them have their own hidden wealth. TJN describes a "subterranean" systemic "economic equivalent of an astrophysical black hole." The higher estimate above exceeds US GDP twofold. It's mind-boggling. It's hard imagining a tiny percent of privileged elites control this much wealth secretly. It's worse knowing it's largely tax free. It's appalling that governments let them get away with it. |
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Shirin Sadeghi
Truthout 2012-08-25 20:57:00
In the American media, the news from Iran, Pakistan, Egypt, Afghanistan and elsewhere generally runs along the same themes: scary, violent and religious nutsos. But isn't it time the US media and the American public agreed that America isn't much different? America has just as many religious fundamentalists and nut jobs, and they are making public statements just as often - if not more often - than the religious fundies elsewhere. Are we to believe that a fundamentalist in a suit is less scary than a fundamentalist in a beard, even if both are spouting hatred against women? Missouri Republican Congressman Todd Akin's recent comments about how women can't become pregnant from what he called "legitimate rape" was just the latest in a long line of pronouncements from American leaders with strong religious backgrounds who believe they are an authority on women's needs and health. Akin is no different than the numerous Iranian clerics who've said such ridiculous things as women who have extramarital sex "cause earthquakes," or the Egyptian cleric who first said that a husband and wife cannot be completely naked while having sex. (This was then modified by scholars, and it was agreed that the most important thing is that no one look at the vagina at the scene of the sex act.) Or the fatwa after fatwa about men and women working together, schooling together and all the rest (sounds a lot like segregation, doesn't it America?). |
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David Ariosto
koat.com 2012-08-25 11:56:00
Gunman who fatally shot former co-worker killed in gun battle with police All nine people injured in Friday's shooting in front of the Empire State Building were wounded by police gunfire, New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly told reporters Saturday. The officers unloaded a total of 16 rounds at a disgruntled former apparel designer, killing him after he shot and killed a co-worker and engaged in a gunbattle with police, authorities have said. Authorities said an investigation is under way after one officer shot nine rounds and another shot seven. Three victims suffered gunshot wounds, while the remaining six were hit by fragments. Police identified the gunman as Jeffrey Johnson, 58, who was apparently laid off from his job as a designer of women's accessories at Hazan Import Co. last year. |
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| Puppet Masters |
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Glenn Greenwald
Indie film Compliance recalls notions that the past decade's worst events are explained by failures to oppose authorityThe Guardian 2012-08-26 17:04:00
One can object to some of its particulars, but Frank Bruni has a quite interesting and incisive New York Times column today about a new independent film called Compliance, which explores the human desire to follow and obey authority. Based on real-life events that took place in 2004 at a McDonalds in Kentucky, the film dramatizes a prank telephone call in which a man posing as a police officer manipulates a supervisor to abuse an employee with increasing amounts of cruelty and sadism, ultimately culminating in sexual assault - all by insisting that the abuse is necessary to aid an official police investigation into petty crimes. |
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Fars News Agency
2012-08-27 03:56:00
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will visit Iran's Natanz uranium enrichment facility on the sidelines of his presence at a summit meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) in Tehran, sources said on Monday. Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for International Affairs Mehdi Akhoundzadeh told FNA that "the UN secretary-general will visit Isfahan province during his stay in Iran", while other sources said his presence in Isfahan will be aimed at a visit to the Natanz facility. Ban is due to arrive in Iran later this week to attend the 16th NAM Summit in Tehran on Thursday and Friday. Deputy foreign ministers and experts from the NAM member states started a meeting here in the Iranian capital on Sunday. The two-day experts meeting which ends this evening and will be followed by the NAM's foreign ministerial meeting on August 28 and 29 is drawing up the agenda for the 16th heads-of-state summit meeting of the bloc to be held in Tehran on Thursday and Friday. Iran assumed the rotating presidency of the movement from Egypt for three years during the Sunday meeting. |
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McKay Coppins
The Daily Beast 2012-08-19 02:09:00
He once campaigned for Romney; now he calls him a "political prostitute." Former Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson tells McKay Coppins why he turned on the GOP frontrunner. One evening, years before Rocky Anderson was elected mayor of Salt Lake City - where he would eventually make a name for himself as Utah's liberal lion - he was invited to a dinner party where he was told Mitt Romney would be attending. "I had no idea who he was," Anderson recalls. "I had to Google him." The search results revealed an impressive resume, but little hope for sparkling dinner conversation: a mega-rich private-equity wizard who had tried (and failed) to run Ted Kennedy out of the Senate? Anderson expected a Republican stiff. "So, I get up there and I'm greeted by this young, vivacious, friendly guy," Anderson says. "I'm looking around to find the stodgy person I thought I would meet, but no, that was Mitt. That's the kind of person he is..." he pauses briefly, and then adds, "Or at least was. Who knows now?" |
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Reuters
2012-08-26 14:52:00
Syrian opposition activists accused President Bashar al-Assad's army on Sunday of massacring hundreds of people in a town close to the capital that government forces recaptured from rebels. In the town of Daraya, southwest of Damascus, some 320 bodies, including women and children, were found in houses and basements, according to activists who said most had been killed "execution-style" by troops in house-to-house raids. Activists uploaded several videos to the Internet showing rows of bloodied bodies wrapped in sheets. Most of the dead appeared to be young men of fighting age, but at least one video showed several children who appeared to have been shot in the head. The body of one toddler was soaked in blood. Due to restrictions on non-state media in Syria, it was impossible to independently verify the accounts. Clashes are raging across Syria as the 17-month-old rebellion grows increasingly bloody, particularly in the northern city of Aleppo, where the army and rebels appear stuck in a war of attrition. | |
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Comment: To understand what is really going on behind this propaganda war campaign, check out the following:
'Free Syrian Army' aka 'al-Qaeda' aka US, Israel and British Mercenaries, Use Syrian Man as 'Suicide Bomber' State-Sponsored Terrorism - Western Journalists Embedded With 'al-Qaeda' in Syria |
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Fars News Agency
2012-08-26 10:22:00
Chairman of the Suez Canal Authority said that Egypt's Navy has rejected a US demand to attack an Iranian vessel in the strategic waterway. Speaking to Al Arabiya and Al-Hayat TV networks, Vice Admiral Mohab Mamish, also a former commander of the Egyptian Navy, said the US had requested the Egyptian Navy to attack an Iranian vessel passing through the Suez Canal, but his country's naval force rejected the request. He said the US had claimed that the vessel was carrying arms and heading to Syria, but it presented no proof to substantiate its allegations. The Admiral ruled out the possibility of military operations in the Suez Canal, to guarantee the security of the international waterway. In February 2012, Iranian warships made their second ever journey through the Suez Canal following Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution in line with the orders of the Supreme Leader for having a stronger presence in the high seas. While Egypt has so far allowed two Iranian flotillas to sail through the Canal, the Admiral said his country has refrained from giving permission to US warships to go on a voyage through the waterway. |
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Fars News Agency
2012-08-26 06:38:00
Thousands of Turkish people staged rallies in Antakya province at the country's border with Syria to voice their protest against Ankara's hostility towards the Syrian government and nation. The Saturday rallies were organized by Turkey's Labor Party, one of the main opposition parties in the country. During the rallies, people shouted slogans in support of the Syrian nation and leaders and lauded their resistance against the plots hatched by the West and its regional proxies. They also condemned the setting up of bases on Turkey's soil to train terrorists under the direct supervision of the US in order to support the so-called Free Syrian Army. The development came after revelations about the smuggling of arms to anti-government terrorist groups in Syria via the US Air Base in Incirlik in Southern Turkey sparked popular protests in the country. | |
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Comment: For an in depth perspective of the reality on the ground in Syria, please read the following:
'Free Syrian Army' aka 'al-Qaeda' aka US, Israel and British Mercenaries, Use Syrian Man as 'Suicide Bomber' State-Sponsored Terrorism - Western Journalists Embedded With 'al-Qaeda' in Syria NATO's 'Civil War' Machine Rolls Into Syria |
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Press TV
2012-08-26 05:38:00
Dozens of people have been killed in an attack carried out by a US assassination drone in southern Somalia, Press TV reports. The attack, which took place in the strategically important port city of Kismayo on Friday, claimed over 37 lives and injured dozens. Further details regarding the incident have not yet been released. The US military uses remote-controlled drones in Somalia for reconnaissance operations and targeted killings. Washington has been carrying out assassination attacks using the unmanned aircraft in other countries including Afghanistan, Libya, Pakistan, and Yemen. |
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Ayman al-Sahli
Ultra-conservative Islamists used bombs and a bulldozer to destroy the
tomb of a 15th century Sufi scholar in the Libyan city of Zlitan,
witnesses said on Saturday, the latest attack in the region on sites
branded idolatrous by some sects.Reuters 2012-08-26 05:35:00 The attackers reduced the revered last resting place of Abdel Salam al-Asmar to rubble on Friday and also set fire to a historic library in a nearby mosque, ruining thousands of books, witnesses and a military official added. A Reuters journalist in Zlitan, about 160 km (90 miles) west of the Libyan capital, said the mosque's dome had collapsed and a minaret was pockmarked with holes. The attackers appeared to have removed the last signs of the shrine with a bulldozer, which was abandoned nearby. |
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Gulf Times
2012-08-26 05:31:00
At least 12 people have been killed in tribal clashes in the western Libyan town of Zlitan, local media reported yesterday, the latest in a growing number of violent incidents that have gripped the North African country since an armed revolt deposed Muammar Gaddafi's regime. The fighting erupted late Thursday after a tribesman was killed by a rival tribe in the town, which is located some 120km south-east of the capital Tripoli, said the independent news agency Solidarity Press. The two tribes are also at odds over whether to keep or remove a shrine in the town, added the report, citing a local source. Around 40 people were also injured in the clashes. Libya has seen a series of deadly clashes between rival tribes and militias since last year's ouster of Gaddafi. In other developments, Libyan government forces confiscated rocket launchers and other weapons from a militia loyal to Gaddafi, the BBC reported, citing a government spokesman. |
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Bangkok Post
2012-08-25 05:27:00
The number of people killed in fighting between pro- and anti-Syrian factions in the northern Lebanese port city of Tripoli this week has risen to 15, a security official said Saturday. A 16-year-old boy died of wounds suffered during clashes on Friday night, the official told AFP, adding that a total of 112 had also been wounded since street battles first erupted in the city on Monday. The fighting has pitted residents of the Sunni-dominated Bab el-Tebbaneh district and those of adjoining Jabal Mohsen, who mainly adhere to the Alawite offshoot of Shiite Islam _ the sect of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. A ceasefire brokered by local officials was supposed to take effect Wednesday, but violence was reignited when a sniper killed a Sunni cleric on Friday. |
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Adrian Blomfield
Sydney Morning Herald 2012-08-26 05:21:00
International momentum for limited military intervention in Syria gathered pace yesterday amid opposition reports that 4000 people have been killed this month, the deadliest since the uprising began. France signalled it would be willing to participate in a limited no-fly zone and suggested for the first time that such an operation could be mounted without reference to the UN Security Council, where Russia and China wield a veto. The United States and Turkey have already discussed the possibility although Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of State, has said ''greater in-depth analysis'' was needed. But Jean-Yves Le Drian, the French Defence Minister called for the establishment of an ''international coalition'' to implement a no-fly zone - a choice of wording that suggests action outside the United Nations is being considered for the first time. Mr Le Drian ruled out a no-fly zone over the whole of the country, saying such a step would be tantamount to war. | |
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Comment: Sarkozy would be proud of Hollande leading France into illegal wars of aggression.
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Tony Cartalucci
Land Destroyer 2012-08-25 05:04:00
A vote for Obama will bring war with Syria, Iran, and eventually Russia and China. The economy will continue to suffer in order to bolster the interests of off-shore corporate-financier interests, while the collective prospects of Americans continue to whither and blow away. A vote for Romney, however, will also bring war with Syria, Iran, and eventually Russia and China. The economy will also continue to suffer in order to bolster the interests of off-shore corporate-financier interests, while the collective prospects of Americans continue to whither and blow away. Why? Because the White House is but a public relations front for the corporate-financier interests of Wall Street and London. A change of residence at the White House is no different than say, British Petroleum replacing its spokesman to superficially placate public opinion when in reality the exact same board of directors, overall agenda, and objectives remain firmly in place. Public perception then is managed by, not the primary motivation of, corporate-financier interests. It is the absolute folly to believe that multi-billion dollar corporate-financier interests would subject their collective fate to the whims of the ignorant, uninformed, and essentially powerless voting masses every four years. Instead, what plays out every four years is theater designed to give the general public the illusion that they have some means of addressing their grievances without actually ever changing the prevailing balance of power in any meaningful way. |
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Paula Slier
Israel's seizure of Palestinian land brings with it the added extra of a
harsh economic blockade. Any products made there - are not only
prevented from making their way to the outside world - but they're kept
from the Israeli market as well. RT's Paula Slier takes a closer look at
the hardships of Palestinian farmers and producers.Russia Today 2012-08-25 04:24:00
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The Guardian
2012-08-26 03:39:00
Syrian opposition activists accused President Bashar al-Assad's forces of committing a massacre of scores of people in a town close to the capital that the army had just retaken from rebels. More than 200 bodies were found in houses and basements around Daraya, a working-class Sunni town to the southwest of Damascus, according to activists who said most had been killed "execution-style" by troops on house-to-house raids. Due to restrictions on non-state media in Syria, it was impossible to independently verify the accounts. Comment: Horse Hockey! International press have always been free to travel throughout Syria, except when the terrorists sent there by the US, Israel and allies have blocked their access or killed them. The real reason they can't "independently verify the accounts" is because these accounts are completely fictional. "Assad's army has committed a massacre in Daraya," said Abu Kinan, an activist in the town, using an alias to protect himself from reprisals. | |
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Elizabeth Murray
Consortiumnews 2012-08-23 21:08:00
As Israel threatens to bomb Iran, U.S. pundits are again pontificating about the necessity of war and opining about military tactics. Left out of their frame is the certainty of mass human suffering, a reality forgotten since the days of the Vietnam War, says former U.S. intelligence analyst Elizabeth Murray. In late 2002, just prior to the launch of the U.S. "shock and awe" campaign against Iraq, I was invited to join a gathering of intelligence analysts at the U.S. Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, to participate in an Iraq "war games" exercise. We were assigned specific roles and asked to "play out" various political and diplomatic scenarios that might unfold in the wake of a U.S. attack on Iraq. A tall, heavy-set Iraqi-American, who was present as an observer and seated beside me on the final day, remarked quietly: "All these people are talking about strategic, political and military issues; no one here is talking about the hundreds of thousands of people - my people - that are going to die." His words struck me as profoundly tragic, and the tears welling up behind his dark glasses made me feel suddenly ashamed to be there, aware of the complete absence of consideration for Iraqis. I struggled to find something to say that would console the man, but found myself at a loss. All these years later, that incident has come back to haunt me as we approach the precipice of yet another deadly war. Will we allow ourselves to be blinded again? |
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| Society's Child |
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Vignesh Ramachandran
NBC News 2012-08-27 16:27:00
San Francisco's Roman Catholic archbishop-elect has been arrested for driving under the influence in San Diego, The Associated Press reported. Rev. Salvatore Cordileone, who last month was named the next archbishop of San Francisco, was arrested early Saturday morning, according to police. Authorities stopped him at a checkpoint near the San Diego State University campus, the AP reported. Cordileone, a San Diego native, posted bail after being booked into county jail on the misdemeanor DUI charge, according to The San Diego Union-Tribune. The AP reported that there was no record of him being in custody on Monday, and the San Diego city attorney's office has not gotten a report on the arrest. Cordileone, 56, is currently the bishop in the Diocese of Oakland, Calif. Previously, Cordileone was an auxiliary bishop in San Diego, the AP reported. He is expected to take over San Francisco's top spot when the current archbishop, 76-year-old George H. Niederauer, retires in October. Cordileone must make a court appearance on Oct. 9, the AP reported. Michael Ritty, a private practice canon lawyer in upstate New York, told the AP that since Catholic bishops are accountable to the pope, potential discipline would have to come from the Vatican. "If there was anything, it would be handled in Rome, most likely by the Congregation for Bishops. Depending on the question or type of criminal charge, it might go directly to the Pope or as directly as you can get," Ritty said. Cordileone is known for being a strong, public opponent of same-sex marriage, and he is expected to govern 432,000 Catholics under his new post in San Francisco. The Archdiocese of San Francisco office declined to comment. A voice mail left in the office at the Diocese of Oakland was not immediately returned Monday afternoon. The Associated Press contributed to this report. | |
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Comment: Oh come on! Did the Vatican get to the Bishop
to administer a breathalyzer in time? Now Rome will deliberate on the
rights of drinking and driving, after it did nothing about parasites
doing things to children. This is truly a bizarro-world.
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Sevil Omer
Authorities were searching Monday for a man who shot two deputies during
a traffic stop in central North Carolina, according to local media
reports.NBC News 2012-08-27 16:01:00 Law enforcement officials identified the suspect as Jamie Lee Ashley, 35, according to WXII-TV in Winston-Salem. He is suspected of shooting the deputies about 2:30 p.m. in the area of the U.S. 220 bypass and U.S. 311 in Randolph County, the station reported. There was no word on the deputies' conditions. One was taken to Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center, while the other was taken to UNC Hospitals in Chapel Hill, WXII-TV reported. The deputies' names were not released. Witnesses told WXII they heard at least six shots in the area, and did not believe the shots were fired from the deputies. One of the deputies was dressed in plainclothes, while the other deputy was in uniform, authorities said. |
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The Economic Collapse Blog
2012-08-23 16:17:00
America is becoming a very cold place. If you don't have money, you don't really matter much in our society. The ads on television aren't for you - they are directed at people that actually have good jobs and that can afford to buy the nice little "extras" in life. The politicians aren't really interested in you either - they figure that they can buy your vote with all of the money that they are getting from the wealthy people. When you don't have money, even friends and relatives start to distance themselves from you. Perhaps they are afraid that you will ask them for money or perhaps they are afraid that your "failure" will start to rub off on them. When people know that you are struggling for money, the barriers immediately go up. In the United States today, there are tens of millions of people that have been forsaken and forgotten. They mostly stay at home (if they still have a home), and for most of them quiet desperation has become a way of life. You won't ever read much about them or see them appear much on television because nobody really cares too much about them. As far as society is concerned, there are just way too many of them and they are a problem that "the government" should be able to handle anyway. Sadly, the truth is that many communities all across America want absolutely nothing to do with those that can't take care of themselves. All over the country cities are passing laws making it illegal to feed the homeless, and in other instances cities are actually making it illegal to be homeless. Unfortunately, this problem is not going away. In fact, the number of Americans living in poverty increases with each passing day. So where do we go from here? |
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NBC News
2012-08-27 11:04:00
Up to 100 Sardinian coal miners who say they see a future in clean energy have armed themselves with hundreds of pounds of explosives and barricaded themselves nearly 438 yards underground to put pressure on the Italian government to protect the mine's survival. The miners, from a 460-strong workforce, seized 772 pounds of company explosives and locked themselves inside the Carbosulcis mine -- the country's only coal mine -- west of Cagliari overnight on Monday, one of them said, ahead of a government meeting this week to discuss the pit's future. "We are worried that the mine may close. We are afraid for our jobs," Sandro Mereu, 54, a miner who has worked there for 28 years told Reuters. "We are prepared to stay here until we hear a response from the government that secures the future of the mine. We will stay here indefinitely," Mereu told Reuters by telephone. According to The Associated Press, miners at the mine told Sky TG24 TV that they wanted the government and Parliament to quickly approve funding for a project to capture and store underground carbon dioxide that otherwise would add to polluting greenhouse gases. The miners want the mine to be diversified into a combined mining and carbon capture site to protect its future. Carbosulcis was estimated to have 600 million metric tons of coal reserves in 2006 but has struggled to stay productive. It was previously occupied in 1984, 1993 and 1995, when protesting workers stayed in a tunnel for 100 days. Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report. | |
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NBC News
A student was shot Monday morning by another student on the first day of
school at a Baltimore County high school, county police said.2012-08-27 11:04:00 The wounded student was flown by helicopter to a hospital from Perry Hall High School in Maryland. Details of the student's condition were not immediately released. Another student was in custody, according to Baltimore County Emergency Management. WJZ-TV showed video of a shirtless male with his hands behind his back being put into a police cruiser. Parents told WBAL-TV they heard the shooting happened inside the cafeteria. One student told the TV station the shooter was being teased. The student said the shooter left the cafeteria, came back with a shotgun and opened fire. |
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Jonathan Lloyd
NBCLosAngeles 2012-08-27 11:06:00
A transit bus and Metro Blue line train crashed near downtown Los Angeles on Monday morning, injuring dozens of people, Los Angeles Fire Department officials say. Officials say at least 40 people were on board the bus. Medical personnel were attending to as many as eight people who were traveling on the train, according to NBCLosAngeles.com. None of the injuries was life-threatening, according to fire-rescue officials. The number of patients hospitalized was not immediately available. The Line 51 bus collided with the train at about 7 a.m.. The bus then crashed into at least two light poles, fire officials say. The intersection at Washington Boulevard and San Pedro Street remained closed. Major delays were expected, and authorities were adding more buses to the area for morning commuters. |
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Homa Khaleeli
The Iranian-American director of Circumstance, a teenage lesbian romance, knows a thing or two about causing trouble, and the link between desire and dissentThe Guardian 2012-08-23 00:00:00
"I've always had the tendency to cause trouble," says Maryam Keshavarz. The 36-year-old is speaking down the line from an idyllic-sounding writers' retreat in Portugal, but with the release of Circumstance in the UK this week, the first-time director is not far from controversy. Set in Iran, the film follows two girls: Atafeh, raised in a rich liberal home, and Shireen, an orphan whose conservative uncle cannot afford to pay for her schooling. Against a backdrop of hedonistic underground parties, the teenagers' intense friendship spills over into a passionate love affair. With homosexuality illegal in Iran (punishable by lashings or even death) their happiness is threatened by the jealousy of Atafeh's brother, an ex-drug addict who finds religion and with it the ear of the powerful morality police. Replete with illicit sex, drugs and alcohol, and furious in its criticism of the Islamic Republic, the movie's forthright style has made Keshavarz a target of death threats, she says. On the phone from Lisbon she sounds nonchalant, saying that "in the beginning I was more frightened", but insisting there have been so many, they no longer have the power to terrorise her. Yet she is cautious enough to refuse to reveal much. |
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BBC News
Police in Essex are investigating reports that a lion has been spotted in a field near St Osyth.2012-08-26 22:33:00
Residents have been advised to stay indoors after the sighting in fields off Earls Hall Drive at 19:00 BST. Essex police are working with experts from Colchester Zoo who believe the reports to be genuine after being shown a photograph by a member of the public. Local resident Che Kevlin told the BBC: "I heard a loud roar at 10pm. It sounded like the roar of a lion." Armed police have been drafted into the area and two police helicopters are searching the area where it was spotted. Essex police say about 25 officers are on the scene, including around a dozen specialist firearms officers, and experts from Colchester zoo are also on hand. A force spokesman said there had been no sightings of the lion reported to police in the last few hours but that the search would continue through the night. Police said all the animals at Colchester Zoo had been accounted for. The spokesman said a circus had been in the area, at Clacton Airfield, recently but added: "Officers have spoken to the circus and confirmed that they do not have an animal missing, nor do they have any lions." |
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Associated Press
2012-08-26 17:05:00
Dallas - Thelma Taormina keeps a pistol at her Houston-area home to protect against intruders. But one of the last times she used it, she said, was to run off a persistent utility company worker who was trying to replace her old electricity meter with a new digital unit. "This is Texas." she declared at a recent public hearing on the new meters. "We have rights to choose what appliances we want in our home." A nationwide effort to upgrade local power systems with modern equipment has run into growing resistance in Texas, where suspicion of government and fear of electronic snooping have made a humble household device the center of a politically charged showdown over personal liberty. Some angry residents are building steel cages around their electric meters, threatening installers who show up with new ones and brandishing Texas flags at boisterous hearings about the utility conversion. At a recent hearing at the state Capitol in Austin, protesters insisted everyone present recite the Pledge of Allegiance before the meeting could begin. "It's Gestapo. You can't do this," said Shar Wall of Houston, who attended the Public Utility Commission meeting wearing a large red "Texas Conservative" pin. "I'm a redneck Texas girl and I won't put up with it." Utilities began replacing old-style electricity meters across the country about seven years ago as part of an effort to better manage demand on an increasingly strained power grid. New "smart meters" transmit and receive data remotely as electricity is used. Utility officials say they can use the real-time information to help prevent grid overloads during extreme temperatures. The devices would also promote conservation, such as cycling air conditioners on and off during peak demand periods. In 2009, President Barack Obama devoted $3.5 billion in federal stimulus funds to help utility companies make the upgrade. |
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Jason Korbus
The Bent Spoon Mag 2012-08-26 14:16:00
Britt Griffith, star of Syfy's Ghost Hunters and Ghost Hunters International took the stage Saturday night at the Pasadena Playhouse to deliver a lecture on ghost hunting and to do a Q&A with excited fans. Tickets to the event, originally $30, were lowered to $5 due to poor sales. By the time Griffith took the stage, only about 1/3rd of the available seats were taken. After saying that he was a bit rushed and would only be able to talk for about an hour, Britt kicked off his performance by stating, unequivocally, that he never faked evidence on Ghost Hunters, nor did he ever see anyone he worked with fake anything. "I don't know how they do things on other shows," he said. "But we never faked anything." And if that sounds like a weird way to kick off a show to you, I would agree. But roughly 35 minutes later, these words would blow up in his face. Lou Castillo, an independent paranormal investigator in California and self-proclaimed "believer," attended the evening's festivities and reported what went on directly to me throughout the night. A longtime listener of the internet radio show and podcast, Strange Frequencies Radio, that I host along with my friend Bobby Nelson, Lou is affectionately known by us as our "West Coast Correspondent." Britt put on an entertaining show, Lou told me. He told jokes, regaled the audience with tales from behind-the-scenes of the Ghost Hunters program and showed clips of pranks the cast has pulled on each other. He also gave advice to would be paranormal investigators, explaining why the crew uses certain pieces of equipment and warning that should they ever be traipsing around in abandoned locations, it may be smart to invest in a carbon monoxide detector. Later, creating a bit of an "Us vs. Them" atmosphere, Mr. Griffith gave a few of his thoughts on skeptics, pooh-poohing "what skeptics would have you believe" as it pertained to paranormal photography and EVP recordings. What really got the audience excited, however, was Britt's buildup to a secret piece of video never before seen from one of their televised investigations. "West Coast Correspondent Lou" described it as "black and white night vision footage of a hotel where, down a hallway, what looked to be an elderly man moving right to left, then left to right" could be seen. It never made air, apparently, due to the request of the proprietors of the location itself. They felt that showing this on television would possibly scare clients away, or maybe even stir up activity at the location more. |
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Press TV
2012-08-26 03:49:00
housands of opposition activists have held a demonstration in the Togolese capital, Lome, to protest against President Faure Gnassingbe's government. The demonstration started in Lome's Be Kpota neighborhood and ended peacefully near a city beach on Saturday. However, the opposition coalition Let's Save Togo said over 100 protesters were wounded and 125 others were detained during similar demonstrations on Tuesday and Wednesday, when security forces fired tear gas canisters to disperse the crowd. In response, the demonstrators threw rocks at the security forces and burnt tires. Protesters have been campaigning for a delay in parliamentary elections to allow reforms to first take place in the West African nation. |
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Press TV
Thousands of immigrants have held a demonstration in Greece's
capital city of Athens to protest against racism in the country, Press
TV reports. 2012-08-25 09:45:00
On Friday, more than 5,000 demonstrators marched to parliament, carrying banners reading "No Islamophobia" and "Neo Nazis out!" in one of the biggest anti-racism demonstrations in Athens in recent years. Greece is a main entrance for Asian and African migrant workers trying to enter the European Union. They face increasing hostility as the country, which has been at the epicenter of the eurozone debt crisis, is experiencing its fifth year of recession, while harsh austerity measures have left about half a million people without jobs. In recent months, there has been a sharp rise in tensions between immigrants and Greek citizens. On Thursday, police arrested hundreds of undocumented migrant workers in the western city of Corinth and put them in a former army camp. |
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Google
2012-08-24 00:00:00
Washington Park, Illinois - A teenage girl reported missing more than two years ago escaped from a home in southwestern Illinois where she said she was held captive and repeatedly sexually assaulted, police said Thursday. Police in Washington Park, a village next to East St. Louis, said the girl reported that she was raped by her captor, got pregnant and had a baby. In April 2010, St. Louis, Mo., police listed the girl as a missing or runaway juvenile. She was 15 when she disappeared. She escaped from the home in Washington Park earlier this week and went to police, saying her child was still in the house. About two dozen members of a SWAT team wearing helmets and body armor swarmed the home Thursday afternoon with their assault rifles drawn. They recovered the child and arrested a 24-year-old man. |
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RT
2012-08-25 00:00:00
Several Orthodox Christian crosses have been chopped down in different parts of Russia. The incidents come after the Femen movement attacked a cross in Kiev to protest the sentence of the punk band Pussy Riot, who received two years in prison. The incidents occurred overnight. Crosses have been taken down in the Chelyabinsk region, Urals and Archangelsk region, northern Russia. By the time police arrived at the scenes the vandals had already left. Authorities have launched an investigation into both cases. The Arkhangelsk cross was erected in the memory of the victims of political repressions, said a local priest, Hegumen Feodosy. He also said that in recent years the monastery, situated across the street from the cross, has seen two arson attacks and a number of other acts of vandalism. |
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CBS News New York
2012-08-25 11:24:00
Prospect, Connecticut - Connecticut police said that a seven-year-old boy accidentally shot his adult neighbor in the chest using the man's own handgun. The homeowner, identified as Joseph Delucia, was taken to St. Mary's Hospital in Waterbury for treatment. Police said that his gunshot wound is non-life threatening and his condition appears to be stable. Authorities did not immediately release information on how the boy got hold of the gun and circumstances related to the shooting at the Summit Road home. State police continue to investigate the incident. Source: The Associated Press |
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| Secret History |
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Zeenews.com
Washington: Human skeletons estimated to be about 850-years-old have
been found by a group of excavators at an archaeological site in Mexico.2012-08-25 13:27:00 The skeletons were found at an archaeological site at Sierra Gorda in the central state of Queretaro during consolidation work of a pre-Hispanic structure - Building 17 of Huastec complex. Jorge Quiroz, head of the excavation project, said the skeletons can be as old as 1150 DC, about two centuries after Tancama had been vacated by pre-historic locals. "People who already lived in other places, came back to this city to deposit their dead in some of its structures (necropolis). This hypothesis might only be corroborated with further studies," Quiroz was quoted saying by Artdaily. |
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Helen Lawson
English is descended from a language that emerged in Turkey 8,000 and 9,500 years ago, new research suggests.The Daily Mail 2012-08-23 04:11:00 Scientists traced the origin of languages classed as Indo-European to Anatolia, an ancient region of western Asia which covers most of modern Turkey. English is part of the Indo-European language family, which includes more than 400 languages and dialects such as German, French, Spanish, Russian, Polish, Persian, Hindi and ancient Greek.
It is believed that these languages evolved from a common ancestor. Experts think Indo-European languages spread out from the Middle East along with agriculture. Scientists led by Remco Bouckaert, from the University of Auckland in New Zealand, traced the origins of Indo-European languages using a method borrowed from evolutionary biologists. Instead of comparing DNA from different species, the researchers looked at 'cognates' - which are words with a common origin. |
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| Science & Technology |
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Tammy Plotner
Universe Today 2012-08-27 13:07:00
When you hear someone say "Once in a Blue Moon" you know what they mean. They're usually talking about something rare, silly, and even absurd. After all, when was the last time you saw the Moon turn blue? Well, rare or not, we're having one this week, and according to astronomer David Reneke writer and publicist for Australasian Science magazine, a Blue Moon is slated for the last day of this month, Friday, August 31. It's not at all clear where the term 'Blue Moon' comes from. According to modern folklore it dates back at least 400 years. A Blue Moon is the second Full Moon in a calendar month. "Usually months have only one Full Moon, but occasionally a second one sneaks in, David said. "Ancient cultures around the world considered the second Full Moon to be spiritually significant." Full Moons are separated by 29 days, while most months are 30 or 31 days long, so it is possible to fit two Full Moons in a single month. This happens every two and a half years, on average. By the way, February is the only month that can never have a Blue Moon by this definition. We had one Full Moon on August 2 this year and the second will be Friday night. |
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Jason Major
Universe Today 2012-08-27 13:00:00
Although they have been used as the "standard candles" of cosmic distance measurement for decades, Type Ia supernovae can result from different kinds of star systems, according to recent observations conducted by the Palomar Transient Factory team at California's Berkeley Lab. Judging distances across intergalactic space from here on Earth isn't easy. Within the Milky Way - and even nearby galaxies - the light emitted by regularly pulsating stars (called Cepheid variables) can be used to determine how far away a region in space is. Outside of our own local group of galaxies, however, individual stars can't be resolved, and so in order to figure out how far away distant galaxies are astronomers have learned to use the light from much brighter objects: Type Ia supernovae, which can flare up with a brilliance equivalent to 5 billion Suns. Type Ia supernovae are created from a special pairing of two stars orbiting each other: one super-dense white dwarf drawing material in from a companion until a critical mass - about 40% more massive than the Sun - is reached. The overpacked white dwarf suddenly undergoes a rapid series of thermonuclear reactions, exploding in an incredibly bright outburst of material and energy... a beacon visible across the Universe. Because the energy and luminance of Type Ia supernovae have been found to be so consistently alike, distance can be gauged by their apparent brightness as seen from Earth. The dimmer one is when observed, the farther away its galaxy is. Based on this seemingly universal similarity it's been thought that these supernovae must be created under very similar situations... especially since none have been directly observed - until now. |
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Stephanie Pappas
LiveScience 2012-08-27 12:00:00
A new look at a fossil mammal with powerful front legs for digging is clearing up questions about the origin of a group of strange and scaly modern-day creatures called pangolins. First excavated in Mongolia in the 1970s, the fossil sat in storage for decades until researchers for the Russian Academy of Sciences rediscovered and analyzed it, reporting their results today (Aug. 27) in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. What they found was a dog-size, strong-shouldered digger called Ernanodon. This mammal lived about 57 million years ago, after dinosaurs had died out and our furry ancestors had taken over. Ernanodon was known from one other fossil found in China, but that specimen is warped, and some archaeologists even thought it might be a fake. The new discovery puts those accusations to rest, said study researcher Peter Kondrashov, an anatomist at Kirksville College of Osteopathic Medicine in Missouri. "It's the real deal," Kondrashov told LiveScience. |
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Fox News
2012-08-24 00:00:00
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Sebastian Anthony
ExtremeTech 2012-08-17 02:44:00
A bioengineer and geneticist at Harvard's Wyss Institute have successfully stored 5.5 petabits of data - around 700 terabytes - in a single gram of DNA, smashing the previous DNA data density record by a thousand times. The work, carried out by George Church and Sri Kosuri, basically treats DNA as just another digital storage device. Instead of binary data being encoded as magnetic regions on a hard drive platter, strands of DNA that store 96 bits are synthesized, with each of the bases (TGAC) representing a binary value (T and G = 1, A and C = 0). To read the data stored in DNA, you simply sequence it - just as if you were sequencing the human genome - and convert each of the TGAC bases back into binary. To aid with sequencing, each strand of DNA has a 19-bit address block at the start (the red bits in the image below) - so a whole vat of DNA can be sequenced out of order, and then sorted into usable data using the addresses. |
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Lawrence LeBlond
RedOrbit 2012-08-26 14:31:00
The next time you leave your DNA behind be forewarned that you are now not only leaving your biological fingerprint behind for prying eyes, but also leaving evidence of what color your hair and eyes are. Until the mid-1980s, DNA at a crime scene went largely unchecked due to lack of technology to search it out. And for the last two decades, in order for a crime scene detective to match DNA to a suspect, samples had to be taken from possible matches. But now, according to a team of researchers, led by professor Manfred Kayser of Erasmus University Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, a new forensic test can predict both the hair and eye color of a possible suspect using DNA at a crime scene. The team said it could provide valuable leads in cases where suspects cannot be identified through DNA profiling. The test, called the Hirisplex system, could allow crime scene investigators to narrow down a large group of possible suspects, making it easier to pinpoint the perpetrator. Details of the research appear in the journal Forensic Science International: Genetics. Predicting phenotypes is quickly becoming an emerging field in forensics. The current approach, genetic profiling, involves comparing crime scene DNA to possible suspects or to a database of stored profiles. Genetic profiling relies on the person either being among a pool of suspects identified by police or having their profile previously stored. The Hirisplex approach could be very useful in cases where a perpetrator is completely unknown to the authorities, said Kayser. |
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Charles Q. Choi
CBS News 2012-08-24 09:32:00
The most powerful exploding stars in the universe are still cloaked in mystery, but some are now yielding the secrets of their origins, scientists say. Research is also shedding light on gamma-ray bursts, the most powerful explosions in the universe, up to a million times brighter than a supernova,scientists added. The most powerful star explosions are supernovas, which are bright enough to briefly outshine all the stars in their galaxies. There are two known ways supernovas occur -- a Type Ia supernova arises when one star piles fuel onto a dying star known as a white dwarf, and a Type II supernova happens when the core of a massive star runs out of fuel, collapses to an extraordinarily dense nugget in a fraction of a second and then bounces and blasts its material outward. In the past 12 years, scientists have detected a new class of supernovas, ones about two to 100 times brighter than all the others. These so-called super-luminous supernovas apparently come in three different flavors, only one of which is well-understood. The rarest but seemingly best-understood of these super-luminous, or super-bright, supernovas are the radioactively powered SLSN-R. These supernovas seem to arise from the collapses of stellar cores, and apparently also each involve huge amounts of a radioactive isotope of nickel in those dying stars, enough to equal several times the mass of the sun. As this radioactive material decays, it releases energy in the form of gamma rays and antimatter that makes the expanding material from the supernova glow. |
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Robert F. Service
ScienceNow 2012-08-24 17:55:00
Multitasking has a price: Your computer is sucking up a lot of electricity keeping track of work you haven't yet saved to the hard drive. Americans spend $6 billion a year on electricity to keep that data stored in a computer's memory during operation. But that figure could drop sharply, scientists report this week, thanks to a new type of material than can permanently store such data - without needing a continuous trickle of electricity to do it. Standard desktop computers rely on two types of memory technology to store streams of 1s and 0s that make up binary data. The computer's hard disk stores data as strips of magnetic orientation recorded on a magnetic disk: Imagine billions of patches of compass needles pointing either north or south, each representing a 1 or a 0. Because this magnetic orientation endures until it's deliberately switched, this type of memory is stable - it doesn't require any added electricity to maintain it. The second type of memory, however, does. This is Random Access Memory (RAM), or working memory, which the computer uses to perform tasks. Conventional RAM is made by linking several transistors together in a circuit; this type of memory is "volatile," meaning that it needs to be fed electricity continually to retain each bit of information. Turn off your computer without saving your data to your hard disk and you've lost that information forever. Computers suck up billions of dollars worth of power every year to ensure that doesn't happen. Alternatives to conventional RAM do exist, some of which are nonvolatile memories. But these have drawbacks: They may be more expensive, heavier, or simply take up too much computer-chip real estate. |
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David Hambling
PopSci 2012-08-01 05:05:00
In the 1930s, U.S. Navy researchers stumbled upon the concept of radar when they noticed that a plane flying past a radio tower reflected radio waves. Scientists have now applied that same principle to make the first device that tracks existing Wi-Fi signals to spy on people through walls. Commentaire : The article is a little odd on this point. As early as 1886 the German Heinrich Hertz showed that radio waves could be reflected from solid objects (Wikipedia). Wi-Fi radio signals are found in 61 percent of homes in the U.S. and 25 percent worldwide, so Karl Woodbridge and Kevin Chetty, researchers at University College London, designed their detector to use these ubiquitous signals. When a radio wave reflects off a moving object, its frequency changes - a phenomenon called the Doppler effect. Their radar prototype identifies frequency changes to detect moving objects. It's about the size of a suitcase and contains a radio receiver composed of two antennas and a signal-processing unit. In tests, they have used it to determine a person's location, speed and direction - even through a one-foot-thick brick wall. Because the device itself doesn't emit any radio waves, it can't be detected. Wi-Fi radar could have domestic applications ranging from spotting intruders to unobtrusively monitoring children or the elderly. It could also have military uses: The U.K. Ministry of Defence has funded a study to determine whether it could be used to scan buildings during urban warfare. With improvements, Woodbridge says, the device could become sensitive enough to pick up on subtle motions the ribcage makes during breathing, which would allow the radar to detect people who are standing or sitting still. |
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| Earth Changes |
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iafrica.com
2012-08-27 16:53:00
Cyclone Beatrice struck northern Italy on Sunday, causing light flooding, storms and a mini-tornado but also providing much needed cooling after a weeks-long heatwave. Farmers and vintners hampered by the drought looked forward to Beatrice, which succeeded Lucifer, an anticyclone with winds that spiral out from a high-pressure centre, which had brought hot air from the Sahara Desert. The cyclone is expected to move slowly toward the south of Italy, lowering temperatures and causing storms next weekend. Some roads and highways were flooded in the centre-north of the country, causing delays for Italians returning home from summer holidays. A mini-tornado also ravaged the renowned botanical gardens of Villa Taranto on the shore of Lake Maggiore, uprooting 250 plants and destroying others at the arboretum visited by 150 000 people each year. |
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Seattle Times
Officials say a strong earthquake has shaken a remote area of eastern
Indonesia. The quake was located fairly deep below the northern Molucca
Sea and no tsunami warning was issued.2012-08-26 16:50:00 The U.S. Geological Survey says the earthquake measured magnitude 6.4 and struck late Sunday. It says it was centered 138 kilometers (85 miles) west-northwest of the town of Tobelo at a depth of 70 kilometers (43 miles). The area is also south of the southern Philippines. There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries from the remote area. Indonesia straddles a series of fault lines that make it prone to volcanic and seismic activity. A giant quake on Dec. 26, 2004, triggered a tsunami in the Indian Ocean that killed 230,000 people, half of them in Indonesia's Aceh province. |
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Comment: August 19th 2012: Strong quake hits northern Indonesia, killing at least 4
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baltimore.cbslocal.com
2012-08-26 16:41:00
Parts of Maryland are still getting drenched. Thunderstorms dumped up to five to six inches of rain, making it one of the wettest days of 2012. Derek Valcourt has more on the serious damage it caused. The storm caused lots of localized flooding, some road closures, even some power outages, and one sinkhole in Baltimore just got a lot worse. Cell phone cameras captured this funnel in the water off Cobb Island in Charles County during a tornado warning that set of sirens, but it was severe rains that did the real damage. |
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Planet Ark
Scientists say Arctic sea ice is likely to shrink to its smallest
recorded size sometime next week. The ongoing thaw has opened new sea
lanes to shipping, with a Chinese icebreaker recently becoming the first
ship to cross the Arctic Ocean from China to Iceland. Matt Stock
reports.2012-08-24 15:55:00
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Comment: The massive influx of freshwater from arctic
sea ice melt flooding into the North Atlantic will likely cause the gulf
streamand North Atlantic drift to stall even further, which will
contribute greatly to the possibility of an imminent ice age across the
Northern Hemisphere.
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Aleksandar Vasovic
Planet Ark 2012-08-27 15:05:00
Serbia evacuated thousands of villagers on Saturday and called in the army to help fight wildfires raging through the drought-hit western Balkans. Fires near the southwestern Serbian town of Cacak swept through hillsides and cornfields dried to a crisp by scorching temperatures, forcing the evacuation of three villages, a Reuters correspondent reported. "I've lost everything," said Mileta Cajic, from the village of Srezojevci. "An entire orchard, woods, raspberries, and now my house is about to go up in flames. This is the worst disaster one could imagine." Russia sent a Beriev Be-200 fire-fighting plane, with a capacity of 12 tonnes, to join a Russian helicopter that has been in action for days trying to douse the fires. |
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Daily Mail
Tens of thousands of Louisiana residents have been ordered to evacuate
as Tropical Storm Isaac picks up strength in the Gulf of Mexico - and it
may strike seven years to the day after Hurricane Katrina devastated
the same area. More than 50,000 residents of the St. Charles Parish in
southeast Louisiana have been told to leave ahead of Isaac, which is
churning in the Gulf.2012-08-27 10:41:00 Governor Bobby Jindal suggested anyone in low-lying parts of the state's coastal parishes leave their homes, while evacuations were also enforced in the lower areas of the Alabama coast, which is likely to be lashed by rain, wind and flooding. Isaac is expected to crescendo to a Category 2 hurricane before striking land along the Gulf Coast by Tuesday night or Wednesday - the anniversary of Katrina - according to the National Hurricane Center.
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LA Now
2012-08-27 09:55:00
More earthquakes shook Imperial County overnight, part of a swarm of hundreds of temblors that has the region on edge. More damage was uncovered Sunday night, including about 20 mobile homes that suffered damage to their foundations. Photos show merchandise shaken from store shelves, and part of a home's terra-cotta roof collapsed. A number of families were displaced and hospital patients evacuated as a result of a swarm of hundreds of earthquakes. No deaths or critical injuries were reported as a result of the quakes, the largest of which measured magnitudes 5.3 and 5.5. There appeared to be fewer quakes overnight Monday compared with Sunday. Some buildings were damaged by the earlier quakes, including 20 mobile homes that shifted from their foundations, according to the Imperial County Office of Emergency Services. The office was working with the American Red Cross to set up a shelter for displaced families at the Imperial Valley College gymnasium. The quakes cause scattered power outages, including at Pioneers Memorial Hospital in Brawley, which lost power for about three hours. Assistant hospital administrator Art Mejia said generators immediately kicked in, but officials decided to evacuate patients as a precautionary measure in case the facility had suffered structural damage. "We decided to err on the side of caution," he said. |
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Harold Heckle
Montreal Gazette 2012-08-26 03:34:00
Two wildfires in the south forced the evacuation of around 1,000 residents, making this the worst summer in a decade for countryside devoured by flames, authorities said Sunday. A fire started near Bedar, 85 kilometres (about 50 miles) north of Almeria, where residents spent the night in a sports centre, regional officials said. Residents and army personnel have collaborated with firefighters in combating the flames, Bedar Mayor Maria Gonzalez said. Another fire was being brought under control late Sunday near the Mediterranean beach resort of Estepona, about 35 kilometres (20 miles) west of Marbella. This year, Spain has lost 149,300 hectares (577 square miles) of forest and countryside in more than 11,650 wildfires, compared to around 107,000 hectares (415 square miles) for the whole of 2002, according to official statistics. | |
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Comment: Arson or not, they need a scapegoat to
distract people from realising that the enormous cutbacks in public
services are largely to blame:
Cuts blamed for deaths caused by devastating Spanish wildfires |
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Richard Luscombe
The Guardian 2012-08-27 00:00:00
Millions of residents in four vulnerable Gulf Coast states were bracing for the arrival of a powerful tropical storm that has already claimed several lives on its path through the Caribbean. The governor of Florida, Rick Scott, declared a state of emergency ahead of tropical storm Isaac's expected landfall Sunday night in the Florida Keys, with the storm then expected to intensify into a 105mph hurricane as it moves north into the Gulf of Mexico and towards the Alabama-Mississippi-Louisiana coastline. But with tropical storm-force winds extending up to 200 miles from Isaac's centre, the area under threat for moderate to substantial damage covered much of southern and western Florida and along the Gulf Coast to Louisiana. |
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The Washington Post
2012-08-26 00:00:00
The airports in Miami and Fort Lauderdale were hit the hardest, cancelling 589 flights - the vast majority of the 742 U.S. flights grounded overall because of the storm as of Sunday afternoon, according to the flight-tracking service FlightAware. American Airlines and its American Eagle affiliate cancelled 486 flights. The last American flight left Miami at noon Sunday. The airline expects to be fully operational out of Miami by noon Eastern time on Monday, said airline spokesman Matt Miller. American runs a hub in Miami, a jumping-off point for flights to the Caribbean and Latin America. Overall, airlines have cancelled 184 flights for Monday but expect to be operating normally by late Monday, according to FlightAware. Isaac, already carrying winds of more than 60 miles an hour, was expected to cross the Keys by late afternoon. The storm will likely pick up strength from the warm, open waters of the Gulf of Mexico and strike as a dangerous Category 2 hurricane somewhere between New Orleans and the Florida Panhandle on Wednesday, the seventh anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal declared a state of emergency ahead of Isaac late Sunday and urged voluntary evacuations for coastal parishes in the state. |
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US Geological Survey
2012-08-26 23:55:00
Date-Time: Monday, August 27, 2012 at 04:37:22 UTC Sunday, August 26, 2012 at 10:37:22 PM at epicenter Location: 12.279°N, 88.530°W Depth: 52.9 km (32.9 miles) Region: OFF THE COAST OF EL SALVADOR Distances: 125 km (78 miles) S (184°) from Usulután, Usulután, El Salvador 144 km (90 miles) SSW (195°) from San Miguel, San Miguel, El Salvador 145 km (90 miles) SSW (211°) from La Unión, La Unión, El Salvador 175 km (109 miles) SSE (157°) from SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador |
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Erika Angulo
NBC News 2012-08-26 21:35:00
Haiti - Since Isaac stormed through this island country, streams of dirty water run through many of the tent camps earthquake refugees call home. Floods represent the main threat, aid workers say. They not only destroy the fragile tents, but also bring with them a range of diseases, from stomach illnesses, to skin infections, to parasites, doctors here fear. At the Marassa tent city in Port au Prince, residents feared what the storm would do to La Riviere Grise, or the gray river, named for its dirty color. After more than more than 24 hours of rain Saturday, La Rivere Grise became a fierce current that flooded part of the camp. Refugees who had been able to accumulate key survival belongings since the earth shook on Jan. 12, 2010 -- a tarp, a cooking pan, some clothes -- lost all again, in a few minutes. The situation is similar in post-earthquake camps outside Port au Prince. Some tents survived the storms, others were blown away, shredded or buried under mud. |
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Lawrence LeBlond
RedOrbit 2012-08-26 17:49:00
A swarm of moderately-sized earthquakes struck Imperial County, north of El Centro, California late Sunday morning and early Sunday afternoon, according to the US Geological Survey. The series of temblors, some magnitude 5.0 and above, have been felt as far away as Orange County, and into Arizona and Baja California. The USGS has so far recorded more than four dozen quakes in Imperial County, many near the city of Brawley. The first quake, a magnitude 3.9 event, struck at 10:02 a.m. (PST) northwest of Brawley and was followed by a series (swarm) of other quakes in the same general area, the USGS said in a statement. As of 3 p.m. (PST), there have been no reports of serious damage or injuries, according to authorities in the region. Some buildings in downtown Brawley did receive minor damage, however. Captain Jesse Zendejas of the Brawley Fire Department described the damage as "cosmetic" and said it occurred in at least three older buildings. Assessments were still ongoing as of press time. Earthquake swarms are events where a local area experiences sequences of many earthquakes occurring over a relatively short period of time. The length of time used to define a swarm varies, but the USGS points out that an event may be on the order of days, weeks, or months, depending on circumstances. Swarms are differentiated from aftershocks by the observation that no single earthquake can be attributed as the main shock. Earthquake swarms are generally grouped as events that precede volcanic eruptions in areas where volcanoes exist. |
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John Vidal
The Guardian 2012-08-26 13:53:00
Food shortages could force world into vegetarianism, warn scientists Water scarcity's effect on food production means radical steps will be needed to feed population expected to reach 9bn by 2050 Leading water scientists have issued one of the sternest warnings yet about global food supplies, saying that the world's population may have to switch almost completely to a vegetarian diet over the next 40 years to avoid catastrophic shortages. Humans derive about 20% of their protein from animal-based products now, but this may need to drop to just 5% to feed the extra 2 billion people expected to be alive by 2050, according to research by some of the world's leading water scientists. "There will not be enough water available on current croplands to produce food for the expected 9 billion population in 2050 if we follow current trends and changes towards diets common in western nations," the report by Malik Falkenmark and colleagues at the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI) said. | |
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Comment: Forget vegetarianism as a long-term solution;
this crisis will be all over long before 2050. No miraculous
technologies are going to "increase yields by 300%". Food is likely to
become extremely scarce within the next year or two. Start canning while
it remains reasonably affordable.
Rising food prices and social unrest: New report shows that all hell will break loose in one to two years |
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Yahoo! Screen
2012-08-20 00:00:00
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| Fire in the Sky |
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OmegaUfoChannel
YouTube 2012-08-21 06:02:00
Footage of a fireball, allegedly filmed from Berlin, Germany on 20th August 2012:
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atoRozneroL
A fireball meteorite is seen at 0:15 during the SF Giants/CO Rockies
game at Coors Field in Denver, CO on 8/3/12. Dave Flemming is announcing
on Comcast Sports Bay Area channel. Giants won 16-4! This must have
been an extremly bright fireball as it is visible from behind cloud
cover!YouTube 2012-08-03 05:49:00
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Cristina Rojas/Hunterdon County Democrat
nj.com 2012-08-25 05:49:00
Early Thursday morning Jason Sarabia saw a bright meteor shoot across the sky. The Frenchtown resident and his wife, Maria, were driving to the Clinton park-and-ride lot shortly before 6 a.m. when, after passing the Clinton A&P supermarket, he saw a green-tinged white ball of light burst across the sky in an easterly direction. The flash, which lasted between four and six seconds, was as bright as a full moon, he said. "If you were outside, you were going to see this," he said. |
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| Health & Wellness |
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Jamie Ann Montiel, RN
PreventDisease 2012-08-27 13:31:00
The connections between the rising rates of chronic disease and the production and consumption of modern foods can no longer be ignored. Our food supply is not healthy, nor is it sustainable. It has changed so dramatically that we have yet to adapt to the changes. Our food supply has been completely adulterated over the past few decades alone, more drastically than during any other time in history. In an article by Eaton et al., it states that "although our genes have hardly changed, our culture has been transformed almost beyond recognition during the past 10,000 years, especially since the Industrial Revolution."1 We have strayed so far from our ancestral diets and lifestyles. Ancient peoples and even isolated hunter-gatherer cultures that still exist today ate wild, fresh foods in their natural state with minimal processing and certainly without synthetic chemicals. Their lifestyles were also very different from ours. According to another article by Eaton et al., "groups whose way of life tends to continue the Stone Age pattern have low rates of complex degenerative diseases."2 They did not suffer the same rates of degenerative diseases that plague modern society. The majority of food Americans spend their money on is processed food. It may resemble food, but it certainly is not real food. Food that has been overly processed and packaged into a container is not food for it is virtually devoid of nutrients. Food manufacturers oftentimes must add vitamins and minerals that have been lost during the processing back into the food. These synthetic vitamins and minerals, usually isolated from their natural forms, act more like anti-nutrients than nutrients in these foods, adding to the body's chemical burden. Modern methods of food preparation and processing have effectively depleted many nutrients and co-factors necessary for the absorption and utilization of foods that in order for the body to process these modern foods, it must use its own store of nutrients. Consider the stress that your body undergoes, the vast amounts of energy that is required for digestion, only to be left short-changed and worse off than before you had that food in the first place. |
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RedOrbit
2012-08-27 13:23:00
Scientists at the Beijing University of Agriculture have genetically modified a pair of calves in an attempt to make their meat more tender, tastier, and more appealing to discerning palates. Professor Ni Minhong and colleagues at the school's department of advanced science and technology produced a pair of cloned cows, named Jing Qin 1 and Jing Qin 2, that had been implanted with an extra gene, Telegraph Science Correspondent Richard Gray reported on Sunday. That gene is designed to increase the amount of fat contained in their muscles, and the scientists hope that it will lead to the development of a high-quality cut of beef that can rival gourmet wagyu or Kobe beef, Gray said. To date, Ni's team has spent three years on their research, though they will have to wait until the calves mature and are slaughtered before they can truly discover whether or not they have succeeded or failed. "Through this project we will be the first in the world to successfully create transgenic cows with fatty acid binding protein," the professor told The Telegraph. "Unlike pork where leaner is better, a good amount of muscle fat content is one of the key elements when it comes to characterizing beef quality... After more research it may be possible to achieve ideal marbling of meat in domestic cattle and provide an alternative to imported high-grade meat." The cows at the center of the study are a Chinese-exclusive breed known as Qinchuan, and they were born at the Comprehensive Experimental Base of Beijing University of Agriculture in Daxing district, according to Yin Yeping of the Global Times. Two hundred female cows had been implanted with genetically modified embryos, and seven became pregnant, but only two were born alive - the first on July 19 and the second on August 1 - Yeping added. |
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Reuters
Canadian health officials say eight people have died in a rare outbreak
of Legionnaires' disease in the province of Quebec, having identified
more than 100 cases of the dangerous strain of pneumonia since July.2012-08-27 10:24:00 Aiming to stop the outbreak, public health workers have inspected and disinfected about 89 cooling towers in Quebec City, the provincial government said in a release on Sunday. All told, 104 cases have been identified so far. Legionnaires' disease is caused by bacteria that can grow in cooling towers, showers and other water sources. It mostly affects people already in poor health, spreading as they inhale small droplets of contaminated water suspended in the air . The illness, named for a 1976 outbreak at an American Legion convention in Philadelphia, is rare in Canada, with only about 75 cases reported each year, according to a fact sheet from the federal public health agency. |
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Rebekah Wilce
PR Watch 2012-08-22 14:43:00
Did you know that genetic engineering (GE) "is helping to improve the health of the Earth and the people who call it home"? A trade group funded by Monsanto wants your kids to believe it. The Council for Biotechnology Information (CBI) has published a kids' book on genetically modified organisms (GMOs) that purports to give kids "a closer look at biotechnology. You will see that biotechnology is being used to figure out how to: 1) grow more food; 2) help the environment; and 3) grow more nutritious food that improves our health." If that book doesn't appeal to you, you could try a nanotechnology coloring book made by a company that produces such things as "colloidal silver nanoparticles" used in antibacterial products that find their way into the water supply and can be poisonous to the human system. It compares nanotechnologies like these silvers to "the smell of baking cookies." Or perhaps a "biosolids" workbook made by wastewater treatment facilities? It directs kids to grow sunflowers in toxic sewage sludge to see how they grow. | |
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Comment: Monsanto and these others understand a basic tenet of propaganda. Get the children early and you have them forever.
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ScienceDaily
Your child goes to bed in perfect health. The next morning she wakes up
with high fever, malaise and bright red blisters erupting all over her
body. Johns Hopkins Children's Center dermatologists say the disturbing scenario has become quite common in the last few months, sending scared parents to their pediatrician's office or straight to the emergency room.2012-08-26 14:43:00 Bernard Cohen, M.D., director of pediatric dermatology at Johns Hopkins Children's Center, and colleague Kate Puttgen, M.D., have seen or consulted on close to 50 such cases in the last few months and have received countless phone calls from scared parents and concerned physicians. Cohen believes this number may be just the tip of the iceberg with primary care pediatricians seeing the bulk of new cases. Cohen and Puttgen want to reassure parents that most cases of the disease are benign and that nearly all patients recover in seven to 10 days without treatment and without serious complications. "What we are seeing is relatively common viral illness called hand-foot-and-mouth disease but with a new twist," Cohen says. The culprit is an unusual strain of the common coxsackie virus that usually causes the disease. The new strain, coxsackie A6, previously found only in Africa and Asia, is now cropping up all over the United States. |
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Dave Mihalovic
Prevent Disease 2012-08-26 14:42:00
According to researchers echoing the sentiments of conventional medical wisdom, there is no need to worry about chemotherapy drugs endangering your unborn child if you develop cancer while pregnant, it's perfectly safe. The sales people at Cancer Inc partnering with Big Pharma, Big Medicine and everybody else who generates a profit from the cancer industry, are at it again with their latest sales pitch, this time for pregnant women. It was only a few weeks ago when researchers in the United States made a "completely unexpected" finding showing that while damaging healthy cells, chemotherapy also triggers them to secrete a protein that sustains tumour growth and resistance to further treatment. Hundreds of pregnant women diagnosed with cancer each year face the agonising decision of what to do next. Some even opt for an abortion, especially if they are in the early stages of pregnancy and the cancer is very aggressive, while others refuse treatment until after the baby is born. But researchers in Germany say there is no need to interrupt the pregnancy in any way, delay treatment or use less powerful drugs because your baby will be just fine. Really? So toxic chemicals surging through a woman's body which cause infections, anemia, bleeding, nausea, vomiting, nerve changes, and problems with fertility will cause no problems for a newborn? |
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ScienceDaily
Children drinking from around half the UK's private water
supplies are almost five times more likely to pick up stomach infections -- according to research from the University of East Anglia (UEA).2012-08-26 14:37:00 Research published August 24 in the journal PLoS ONE shows children under 10 who drink from contaminated supplies are suffering around five bouts of sickness or diarrhea a year. This figure is similar to the rates of infection among children in the developing world. Around 1 per cent of the UK population are served by private supplies -- such as wells and boreholes. In Europe the number is as much as one in 10. And many more drink from such water supplies as visitors and while on holiday. But half of all private water supplies in the UK do not meet water safety regulations. And while water-borne bacteria does not appear to affect adults and older children, the under 10s are particularly at risk of picking up stomach infections. |
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ScienceDaily
A team of scientists, including faculty at the University of
Massachusetts Medical School (UMMS), have discovered a gene that
influences survival time in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS, also
known as Lou Gehrig's disease). The study, published August 26 in Nature Medicine,
describes how the loss of activity of a receptor called EphA4
substantially extends the lifespan of people with the disease. When
coupled with a UMMS study published last month in Nature
identifying a new ALS gene (profilin-1) that also works in conjunction
with EphA4, these findings point to a new molecular pathway in neurons
that is directly related to ALS susceptibility and severity.2012-08-26 14:33:00 "Taken together, these findings are particularly exciting because they suggest that suppression of EphA4 may be a new way to treat ALS," said Robert Brown, MD, DPhil, a co-author on the study and chair of neurology at UMass Medical School. ALS is a progressive, neurodegenerative disorder affecting the motor neurons in the central nervous system. As motor neurons die, the brain's ability to send signals to the body's muscles is compromised. This leads to loss of voluntary muscle movement, paralysis and eventually respiratory failure. The cause of most cases of ALS is not known. Approximately 10 percent of cases are inherited. Though investigators at UMMS and elsewhere have identified several genes shown to cause inherited or familial ALS, almost 50 percent of these cases have an unknown genetic cause. There are no significant treatments for the disease. |
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Scott Sutherland
Yahoo! News - Daily Brew 2012-08-25 20:03:00
I have no way of knowing what it's like to suffering through a miscarriage, but my heart goes out to anyone that has to go through the devastation and trauma that it can cause. A team of doctors from Princess Anne Hospital in Southampton, UK and the University Medical Center Utrecht, in the Netherlands are hopeful that they can develop a test to determine who may be at risk for recurring miscarriages - which they define as losing three or more pregnancies in a row. 'Super-fertility' is the name they're giving to the condition, which causes a woman's uterus to accept embryos too easily. This includes embryos that the body would have normally rejected automatically, due to abnormalities or other problems. According to Babycenter.ca, early miscarriages are very common and most occur without the woman even knowing that she's pregnant. After a pregnancy test has registered as positive, there is still a 1 in 5 chance that a miscarriage will occur. Miscarriages most often occur because the embryo is not developing as it should, likely due to chromosome problems. |
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Elizabeth Renter
Natural Society 2012-08-25 14:33:00
It seems as if illness and disease are always in the news, that degenerative conditions are always rising in the United States. And recent news reflects that eye disease is no different, with serious vision problems rising steadily in the U.S. Is this increase able to be reversed through diet, or is it simply something we must live with? The Scary Rise in Vision Problems and Eye-Disease A new report from the organization Prevent Blindness America says that numerous eye disorders are climbing at alarming rates - many of them with effects including blindness. Macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy, and cataracts are all included and seem to be affecting more and more people each day. According to their report, which used Census data and new research, scientists compared Americans with vision problems now with those who had vision problems in 2000. According to WebMD Health News, there has been a:
The rise in diabetic retinopathy is "scary," according to Anne Sumers, MD, a clinical correspondent for the American Academy of Ophthalmology. | |
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Comment:
Do checkout our Diet and Health section on the forum for some great info on healthy living. |
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| Science of the Spirit |
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Jeanine Ibrahim
The notion of a colleague betraying you is at least as old as the tale
of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, who famously uttered the phrase et tu as Brutus plunged a knife into his back.CNBC News 2012-08-22 15:38:00 And if you've ever encountered a co-worker who will do anything to get ahead - even if that means ruining your good name in the process - you know how calculating and callous such people can be. But did you realize that such a person could also have psychopathic tendencies? We often think of a psychopath as being a serial killer. Yet according to former criminal profiler Gregg McCrary, psychopathy runs on a continuum - with white collar criminals falling in the middle. As a former agent for the FBI for 25 years, 10 of that in the behavioral science unit, McCrary knows the pattern of psychopaths well. While they vary in degree, he says psychopaths share common traits. "They have no guilt, remorse or shame. They're deceitful and egotistical. It's all about them." Using standards developed by Dr. Robert Hare, a leader in the study of psychopathy, researchers estimated that 3 million Americans - or one percent of the general population in the U.S. - were psychopaths compared to about 20 percent of the prison population. |
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Damien Gayle
A woman's risk of anxiety may depend on how stressed out her father's life was when he was young, new research has found.The Daily Mail 2012-08-23 09:21:00 A new study suggests the stress a man experiences when he is young can contribute to genetic changes in his sperm that can result in psychiatric disorders in female offspring. And it's not only the first generation of daughters that can be affected, with the research showing the effects can last down to yet another generation.
Researchers from the Tufts University School of Medicine subjected young male mice to a range of stresses by constantly changing the composition of their cages. They found that the stresses led the mice, particularly females, to become rather more anxious and socially disfunctional than their peers who had not been subjected to stressful treatment. The researchers then studied the offspring of these previously-stressed mice and observed that female, but not male, offspring exhibited elevated anxiety and poor social interactions. |
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Eddie Wrenn
The Daily Mail 2012-08-22 09:55:00
Most people experience social rejection at some time in their life, some of us more than others But a study by a business professor at Johns Hopkins University, Maryland, found that social rejection can inspire imaginative thinking, particularly in individuals with a strong sense of their own independence. Lead author Sharon Kim concluded that, for independent people, social rejection can be 'a form of validation' to their own beliefs - and spur them on to greater productivity. Kim said: 'Rejection confirms for independent people what they already feel about themselves, that they're not like others. 'For people who already feel separate from the crowd, social rejection can be a form of validation - that distinction is a positive one leading them to greater creativity.' However she added that social rejection has the opposite effect on people who value belonging to a group: It inhibits their cognitive ability. With her co-authors, Lynne Vincent and Jack Goncalo of Cornell University, she decided to consider the impact of rejection on people who take pride in being different from the norm. Such individuals, in a term from the study, are described as possessing an 'independent self-concept'. 'We're seeing in society a growing concern about the negative consequences of social rejection thanks largely to media reports about bullying that occurs at school, in the workplace, and online. |
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| High Strangeness |
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Robert Booth and Lizzy Davies
Reported sighting sets off frenzied search amid torrent of rumours and doctored pics before police call off the chaseThe Guardian 2012-08-27 15:39:00
A kind of August bank holiday delirium settled over Clacton-on-Sea on Monday as police and people of this seaside corner of Essex embarked on a frenzied lion hunt. Reports of sightings of a beast with a mane like Aslan prowling in a wheatfield behind the Leisure Glade caravan park just before 7pm on Sunday evening sparked a huge police operation. It involved armed officers, a helicopter with an infrared camera, and zoological experts toting tranquilliser guns. Rumour flowed. One eyewitness said the beast had no mane; another local heard "a loud roar at 10pm". The internet buzzed with unverifiable images of a big cat at night, eyes gleaming. "It has caused a bit of a stir in the village," said Jimmy Green, from St Osyth, near where the animal was spotted. "My wife didn't want to let our dog out." |
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CloudChaser1981
Filmed August 20th 2012 In Indiana. Ok I was at work and I noticed that a
thunderstorm was rolling in so I went out and took my dash camera out
of my car and put it on a work pallet outside to record the approaching
storm. I took the cam out of the car cause my car was blocked by a
building so I had no shot from the car. When I got home I was looking
over the footage and came across this "UFO" I have no clue what it is
and I did not fake anything in this video. I thought it was just
something close like in the lot next door till I saw it go through the
cloud and that is when I knew I just captured something very strange on
camera.YouTube 2012-08-20 08:57:00
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Will Stewart
Vets in Ukraine are struggling to identify a 'mutant' animal shot by hunters in a remote area of the former Soviet republic.Daily Mail, UK 2012-08-23 16:27:00 Locals say it is a mystery 'Chupacabra' - allegedly sighted a few times in recent years - that preys on rabbits, goats and house animals. Grey in colour and with 'fangs' and a longish neck, it has shorter front legs, slightly resembling a kangaroo, while also showing a likeness to a dog and a fox, say those who have seen it.
There were claims that it could be a 'mutant' fox poisoned by radiation, while another theory was that it maybe a hybrid originating from a Soviet plant conducting tests on animals relating to chemical or biological weapons development. 'A creature we were not supposed to see has escaped from a secret defence lab,' said one comment. |
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Mike Jaccarino
A California county's residents are severely stumped over the origin of a
mysterious series of loud, floor-rattling booms that have been shaking
their eardrums - and homes - several time a week for years now.The Daily Mail 2012-08-26 07:36:00 'I thought it was thunder,' one El Dorado County resident reportedly said, while another postulated, 'It's definitely not thunder; too consistent. I thought it was just mining.'
The mysterious noises will reach residents in a series of sounds. "Boom, boom, boom, boom just like that," Lorren Gonzales, who lives near Pleasant Valley, reportedly said. 'You can feel it in the ground, no question about it. But no one's been able to figure out why,' Peter O'Grady reportedly added. 'I tend to hear somewhere between four to six of these things during the weekdays usually between 11 p.m. and 2 p.m.' |
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Andrew Potts
goldcoast.com.au 2012-08-26 07:26:00
It's official -- UFO sightings on the Gold Coast have gone out of this world. The region's top alien hunters have been at the centre of a spike in reported sightings in the past 12 months, with the usually quiet cooler autumn and winter seasons becoming a hotbed of close encounters of the first kind. UFO Research Queensland chairwoman Sheryl Gottchell said the number of sightings had been "interesting". "The information we get helps us chart and record the different things people see. It shows the public is telling the truth," she said. "We are not alone in the universe and extraterrestrials are interacting with people from this planet. "Summer is generally when people are outside more at night and therefore more likely to see something in the sky." The organisation, which started in 1956, keeps a database of sightings dating back to the 1990s. Recent sightings were at Elanora in May and in July near Gold Coast Airport. A southern coast man reported seeing a crystalline-like object giving off a yellow flash on the airport's flight path about 3am on July 5. |
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lindagodfrey
Lindagodfrey's Blog 2012-08-25 07:01:00
Manwolf sightings continue to roll in. The two I'm sharing here are older but only a few months ago - while looking for something else - I found six-inch-plus canid tracks in a muddy field near Whitewater. The prints veered into the field from brush at the road shoulder, followed some deer tracks until it caught up and then the deer tracks ran off to a woods and the canine tracks were lost to drier soil. Dogman went hungry but is still around! Here is one from the area of the famous 2006 Holy Hill incident where a burly manwolf stole a small deer carcass from a DNR contractor's truck bed. There have been numerous other sightings in the vicinity (NW of Milwaukee, WI): |
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weigreg
YouTube 2012-08-23 16:35:00
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Scott McMan
Ghost Theory 2012-08-24 10:12:00
This is the type of report I look for all the time and in my opinion, this one hits the jackpot! Not just one, but several reports have surfaced in the Butler County area regarding a giant winged creature. The story comes to us from Stan Gordon's UFO Anomalies Zone and I must say, Stan has got me excited. Maybe it's my fascination with Mothman or my interest in Bigfoot, but this has both rolled into one all purpose terror. It all began in the still dark, early morning hours of March 18, 2011 on a rural road between Chicora and East Brady. A businessman was driving along when he saw something that as he says, "made the hair stand up on his neck". |
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ninemsn.com
Footage of a hairy 'creature' running through a forest in America
has sceptics and believers debating whether it could be a Bigfoot
sighting.2012-08-25 09:47:00
A video uploaded to YouTube in April shows a creature covered in dark hair running across a path in North East Ohio's Grand River area. The person filming appears to be riding a motorbike through the woods when 'Bigfoot' runs across the path. The rider then appears to crash into some nearby bushes, apparently startled by the sight. While the video was uploaded by news site HowTo101Channel, it has only gone viral in recent weeks with believers suggesting it is proof of Bigfoot's existence. The footage is drowned out by the sound of the motorbike so it is unclear if the driver screams when they see if crossing in front of them. |
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Antonio Huneeus
Open Minds 2012-08-02 12:04:00 Comment: Part Three has now been added. Scroll down. Part One The subject of UFOs spotted at missile bases and other sensitive nuclear facilities has received quite a bit of attention in recent years thanks to the great research of longtime ufologist Robert Hastings, author of the book UFOs and Nukes - Extraordinary Encounters at Nuclear Weapons Sites. Hastings was also the sponsor of a significant panel of former military witnesses of these incidents at the National Press Club (NPC) in Washington, DC on September 27, 2010. He wrote the cover story, "UFO/Nuclear Connection," for Open Minds magazine issue 7 (April/May 2011), where he discussed the media impact of his NPC event.
Long before all this I had treaded some of the same territory for a three-part series I wrote in early 1982, under the pseudonym of A. Hovni, for the supplement UFOs and other Cosmic Phenomena, published weekly by the longtime defunct New York City newspaper The News World. I did extensive research on the declassified UFO files of the CIA, FBI, USAF, U.S. Army and Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), which had then been recently released under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The files clearly showed that the military and intelligence agencies were quite worried during the early period of the flying saucer era in the late forties and early fifties by the large amount of UFO sightings over sensitive nuclear facilities. Many resulted in the scramble of fighter planes. This was the height of the Cold War and a climate of "red menace" paranoia was rampant in at least parts of the U.S. government. Many of the UFO-nuke documents come under the heading of "Protection of Vital Installations." I have transcribed the article exactly as it was published back in February of 1982, except for the correction of a few typos. However, I've added at the end some of the official documents mentioned in the original story, so you can read the full document and not just the quotes excerpted in the article. ************ |
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| Don't Panic! Lighten Up! |
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Edward D. Murphy
The Portland Press Herald 2012-08-24 00:00:00
A Maine woman bears her own grandson when pregnancy is ruled out for her daughter due to an illness. Madden Hebert is a typical week-old baby -- "eating like a champ and he doesn't fuss too much," according to his mother. But there's nothing typical about how he came about. Last week, Madden's grandmother gave birth to him. "It was all pretty simple as far as I was concerned," said Linda Sirois, 49, of Madawaska, who carried and delivered Madden because her daughter, Angel Hebert, had a heart condition that meant it would be unsafe for her to get pregnant. Sirois said she has let her daughter know for years that she would become a surrogate mother for her if a doctor suggested that she not become pregnant. Hebert, 25, of Presque Isle, said she and husband Brian Hebert, 29, got that word last summer. "It was pretty disappointing and we were pretty upset about it," Hebert said. "But we kind of had an idea that it was a possibility and, all along, my mother was saying, 'I'm here and I can carry for you.' I guess we didn't really take her seriously." So Hebert decided to find out if her mother really meant it. "I called her last summer and I'm like, 'So, you know that offer you've been offering? Is that offer still on the table?' " she said. Her mother gave her answer by immediately calling fertility clinics around the area. Most rejected Sirois because of her age, she said, but finally the Reproductive Science Center in Lexington, Mass., agreed as long as Sirois passed some tests. |
