 |
|||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
||
|
|
Joe Quinn
Sott.net 2013-09-03 16:43:00
Psycho war monger John Kerry has been trying to con the world, yet again, into supporting an attack on some dark-skinned people 'oceans away'. As I watched his speech a few days ago, I had lots of things I wanted to say in response. Sadly however, I wasn't invited to attend the event. So I've written my responses here, for the only people who actually matter in this world, i.e. not John Kerry or his coterie of psychopathic masters and servants. Of which there are many. Too many. Yeah good point Johnny boy, "fixing the facts around the policy" in 2002/3 didn't work out too well huh? And it's creating a bit of a problem for the effort to fool the rabble yet again with the same old unimaginative, emotionally-charged lies. |
|
|
|
No new articles. |
| Puppet Masters |
|
Raf Sanchez
The first cell of Syrian rebels trained and armed by the CIA is
making its way to the battlefield, President Barack Obama has reportedly
told senators. The Telegraph 2013-09-03 17:48:00
During a meeting at the White House, the president assured Senator John McCain that after months of delay the US was meeting its commitment to back moderate elements of the opposition. Mr Obama said that a 50-man cell, believed to have been trained by US special forces in Jordan, was making its way across the border into Syria, according to the New York Times. The deployment of the rebel unit seems to be the first tangible measure of support since Mr Obama announced in June that the US would begin providing the opposition with small arms. Congressional opposition delayed the plan for several weeks and rebel commanders publicly complained the US was still doing nothing to match the Russian-made firepower of the Assad regime. Mr McCain has been a chief critic of the White House's reluctance to become involved in Syria and has long demanded that Mr Obama provide the rebels with arms needed to overthrow the regime. |
|
|
|
|
Source
2013-09-01 16:47:00
The US Defence Minister Chuck Hagel, the Secretary of State John Kerry, the National Security counsellor Susan Rice and the National Intelligence director James Clapper, held a closed meeting regarding Syria with leaders of Congres, on Thursday August 2013. According to representative Elliot Engel, who is the Democratic minority leader on the Foreign Affairs Commission, the Obama administration confirmed the interception of a Syrian government communication attesting to it's responsibility in the chemical attack of August 21st, as revealed by Foreign Policy. Yet, these ''interceptions'' are in fact of Israeli origin [1]. Elliot Engel is a militant Zionist. Member of the US Committee for a Free Lebanon, which organized the ''Cedar Revolution'' [2], he drafted, in 2002, the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act, authorizing the US president to go to war against Syria without having to pass before Congress. This text, adopted by the Congress itself and signed by George W. Bush, is still in force. |
|
|
|
|
Mike
I've been watching the progressive erosion of civil liberties in Vietnam
with a watchful eye for some time now. The country first appeared on my
radar due to its particularly aggressive measures against the citizenry's gold buying.Liberty Blitzkrieg 2013-09-03 16:15:00 As the progression usually goes, first a country will lash out against its own people for buying protection against the leadership's mismanagement of the economy by blaming gold. Once that fails, a country will usually then start cracking down on civil liberties. Shortly after that we usually see the cracking of heads. It appears Vietnam has taken a frightening and dangerous step forward in the progression with Decree 72. From the BBC: Oh please. The rogue leadership in the USA is one financial crisis away from trying to do the exact same thing. Full article here. In Liberty, Mike |
|
|
|
Eric W. Dolan
The Raw Story 2013-09-03 16:12:00
MIT professor Noam Chomsky has warned that an attack on Syria without United Nations support would be a war crime. "As international support for Obama's decision to attack Syria has collapsed, along with the credibility of government claims, the administration has fallen back on a standard pretext for war crimes when all else fails: the credibility of the threats of the self-designated policeman of the world," Chomsky told The Huffington Post in an article published Monday. He added that a U.S. strike against Syria without approval from the United Nations would be a "very serious" war crime. |
|
|
|
|
Cahal Milmo , Andy McSmith , Nikhil Kumar
The Independent 2013-09-02 15:26:00
UK accused of 'breath-taking laxity' over export licence for potassium fluoride and sodium fluoride The Government was accused of "breathtaking laxity" in its arms controls last night after it emerged that officials authorised the export to Syria of two chemicals capable of being used to make a nerve agent such as sarin a year ago. The Business Secretary, Vince Cable, will today be asked by MPs to explain why a British company was granted export licences for the dual-use substances for six months in 2012 while Syria's civil war was raging and concern was rife that the regime could use chemical weapons on its own people. The disclosure of the licences for potassium fluoride and sodium fluoride, which can both be used as precursor chemicals in the manufacture of nerve gas, came as the US Secretary of State John Kerry said the United States had evidence that sarin gas was used in last month's atrocity in Damascus. Comment: A misleading story aimed at firmly fixing in the reader's mind the notion the Syria is actively seeking to manufacture and use chemical weapons, while the largely ignoring the fact that no chemicals were actually exported. But, never mind that nothing happened and that such 'dual-use chemicals' are used the world over (for treating water, or in this case for finishing aluminium shower enclosures and window frames as we read below), this non-event can still be used to ramp up the war propaganda. |
|
|
|
|
PressTV
2013-09-03 14:43:00
The US denies reports that it has carried out a joint missile test with Israel in the Mediterranean Sea. The US Navy announced that it did not fire any missiles from ships in the region. "No missiles were fired from US ships in the Mediterranean," a spokesman for the US Navy's European headquarters was quoted as saying by Reuters on Tuesday. The spokesman did not give further details about the incident. The rejection comes although Israel said on Tuesday that it carried out a joint missile test with the United States in the Mediterranean. Pentagon spokesman Navy Commander William Speaks also said, "I have nothing to confirm those reports whatsoever." |
|
|
|
|
Scott Clement
The Fix 2013-09-03 00:00:00
Americans widely oppose launching missile strikes against the Syrian government for its alleged use of chemical weapons, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll that finds little appetite for military action across the country despite a growing drumbeat in Washington. Nearly six in 10 oppose missile strikes in light of the U.S. government's determination that Syria used chemical weapons against its own people. Democrats and Republicans alike oppose strikes by double digit margins, and there is deep opposition among every political and demographic group in the survey. Political independents are among the most clearly opposed, with 66 percent saying they are against military action. Broad opposition in the new poll contrasts with a December Post-ABC poll that found most Americans saying they would be supportive of U.S. action if Syria used chemical weapons. At that time, 63 percent supported U.S. military involvement when it was a hypothetical situation, while 30 percent were opposed. Such possible support for action has yet to materialize in the weeks after an August 21 gassing that reportedly killed 1,429 people outside of Damascus. The survey was conducted Wednesday through Sunday, as the Obama administration made its public case for military strikes and presented intelligence claiming "high certainty" that Syria's government is the culprit in attacks.
Americans express more support for action if Britain and France were to join the cause, a prospect that became far less likely after the British parliament shot down a proposal for military action in Syria. In the United States, support for missile strikes in Syria rises by 10 percentage points, to 46 percent, if Britain and France participate, including a 14 point jump among independents. Still, 51 percent remain opposed even if such a coalition materialized. |
||
|
|
|
The Daily Star
2013-09-02 00:00:00
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad scorned allegations that his forces were behind the chemical attack in Damascus last month and warned that any French military action against his government would lead to "negative repercussions". President Francois Hollande, along with U.S. President Barack Obama, has said Assad should be punished for the Aug. 21 attack in which Washington says more than 1,400 people, many of them children, were killed. The Syrian government says it was carried out by rebels - who it often refers to as "terrorists". Assad said it would have made no sense to use chemical weapons in an area where his troops were also fighting. "Those who make accusations must show evidence. We have challenged the United States and France to come up with a single piece of proof. Obama and Hollande have been incapable of doing so," he said in an interview with French daily Le Figaro. "Anybody who contributes to the financial and military reinforcement of terrorists is the enemy of the Syrian people. If the policies of the French state are hostile to the Syrian people, the state will be their enemy," he said. "There will be repercussions, negative ones obviously, on French interests." |
|
|
|
|
Mike Adams
Natural News can now reveal that the Syria chemical weapons narrative being pushed by the White House is an outlandish hoax.Natural News 2013-09-03 00:00:00 To understand why, you have to start with the story published in The Independent entitled Revealed: Government let British company export nerve gas chemicals to Syria. Sounds scary, right? As The Independent reports: The Government was accused of "breathtaking laxity" in its arms controls last night after it emerged that officials authorised the export to Syria of two chemicals capable of being used to make a nerve agent such as sarin a year ago.What, exactly, are those two dangerous chemicals that need to be controlled via "arms control" regulations? You won't believe me when I tell you. They are: - sodium fluoride - potassium fluoride You can see this yourself in the screen capture of The Independent breaking news story. Note the headline and the subhead. The headline describes "nerve gas chemicals" and the subhead explains them as "sodium fluoride" and "potassium fluoride."
. U.S. water fluoridation chemical is Syria's "chemical weapon" If these chemical names sound familiar, that's because sodium fluoride is the same toxic chemical that's routinely dumped into municipal water supplies all across the USA under the guise of "water fluoridation." In fact, the forced feeding of sodium fluoride to the U.S. population is called a "public health" victory by the CDC, FDA and dentists everywhere. Yet this same chemical, when sold to Syria, is openly and repeatedly referred to as a "chemical weapon." This is true across the BBC, the Guardian, Daily Record and Sunday Mail, France24.com and literally thousands of other news websites. According to U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, any government "regime" that uses chemical weapons against its own people should be bombed / invaded / overthrown by a coalition of other United Nations members. By his own definition, then, the United States of America should now be invaded by the UN because the government uses a deadly chemical weapon -- sodium fluoride -- on its own people. |
|
|
|
|
Pepe Escobar
Asia Times Online 2013-09-03 13:35:00
Yes We Scan. Yes We Drone. And Yes We Bomb. The White House's propaganda blitzkrieg to sell the Tomahawking of Syria to the US Congress is already reaching pre-bombing maximum spin - gleefully reproduced by US corporate media. And yes, all parallels to Iraq 2.0 duly came to fruition when US Secretary of State John Kerry pontificated that Bashar al-Assad "now joins the list of Adolf Hitler and Saddam Hussein" as an evil monster. Why is Cambodia's Pol Pot never mentioned? Oh yes, because the US supported him. Every single tumbleweed in the Nevada desert knows who's itching for war on Syria; vast sectors of the industrial-military complex; Israel; the House of Saud; the "socialist" Francois Hollande in France, who has wet dreams with Sykes-Picot. Virtually nobody is lobbying Congress NOT to go to war. And all the frantic war lobbying may even be superfluous; Nobel Peace Prize winner and prospective bomber Barack Obama has already implied - via hardcore hedging of the "I have decided that the United States should take military action" kind - that he's bent on attacking Syria no matter what Congress says. Obama's self-inflicted "red line" is a mutant virus; from "a shot across the bow" it morphed into a "slap on the wrist" and now seems to be "I'm the Bomb Decider". Speculation about his real motives is idle. His Hail Mary pass of resorting to an extremely unpopular Congress packed with certified morons may be a cry for help (save me from my stupid "red line"); or - considering the humanitarian imperialists of the Susan Rice kind who surround him - he's hell bent on entering another war for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and the House of Saud lobby under the cover of "moral high ground". Part of the spin is that "Israel must be protected". But the fact is Israel is already over-protected by an AIPAC remote-controlled United States Congress. [1] |
|
|
|
|
Press TV
2013-09-03 11:36:00
Japan defense minister has called for an increase in military spending in face of what has been called significant security issues in the volatile Asia-Pacific region. Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera said Japan needs to boost its army to counter a potential threat from China's rising military power and North Korea's long-range missiles. "There are various tensions ongoing in Asia, and in some cases, there are countries that even use threats," media outlets quoted Onodera as saying on Tuesday.The Defense Ministry is after a three-percent rise for its spending in the coming year that would be the biggest request in 22 years. The ministry believes the funding is needed to meet growing personnel costs and the price of weapons imports. The developments come as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has been also a strong advocate of strengthening Japan's military despite the country's other economic pressures. |
|
|
|
|
Press TV
2013-09-03 11:21:00
Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico says fair talks with Iranian officials have led to the release of six out of eight Slovak nationals arrested on charges of possessing illegal equipment and violating the Islamic Republic's law. "Negotiations were fair and their result is the release of six out of eight detainees," Fico said on Tuesday. He added that the Slovakian government was working to secure the release of the two citizens who are still held in custody. The premier noted that his country made no "financial commitments" for the release of the Slovaks. Iran's Foreign Ministry issued a statement on Monday saying following a decision by relevant authorities based on investigations carried out into the case, the six Slovak nationals were released and handed over to Slovakia's Embassy in Tehran on Sunday. |
|
|
|
|
RT.com
2013-09-03 05:31:00
Russia's early warning radars detected the launch of two ballistic rockets in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, Russia's Defense Ministry stated. Israel later claimed responsibility for firing the target test rockets. The launch took place at 06:16 GMT Tuesday, according to Russia's Ministry of Defense. The trajectory of the missiles is reported to have been from the central part of the Mediterranean Sea towards the eastern landmass. Both rockets have allegedly fallen into the sea, RIA Novosti news agency reported. Russia's President Putin has already been informed about the incident by Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu. The Syrian embassy in Moscow currently has no information on the incident. There were no rocket attack signals or blasts in Damascus, the Russian embassy in Syria noted. Comment: Are the usual suspects getting trigger happy or are they testing the Russian and Syrian detection systems? Or is it something of an entirely different nature? |
|
|
|
|
Washingtons Blog
2013-09-03 05:06:00
Congressman with top-secret briefing isn't impressed with Syrian war claims. Antiwar argues: The only reason the whole allegation [that the Syrian government used chemical weapons] hasn't been dismissed out of hand is the administration's repeated claims that they have better, secret intelligence that they're just not showing anyone, or occasionally are letting already pro-war Congressmen get a glimpse of.But - as the Weekly Standard reports - some Congressmen who have gotten a classified briefing aren't impressed:
|
|
|
|
|
Washingtons Blog
2013-09-03 04:51:00
One of the U.S. government's main justifications for its claim that the Syrian government carried out a chemical weapons attack is that the rebels don't have chemical weapons. However, multiple lines of evidence show that the rebels do have chemical weapons. |
|
|
|
| Society's Child |
|
David Edwards
The Raw Story 2013-09-03 16:44:00
A disgraced former Navy chaplain is calling on all photographers to print Bible scripture that says homosexuals are "worthy of death" on the back of photos taken at weddings of gay and lesbian couples. On his Monday Pray in Jesus Name Internet show, Chaplain Gordon James "Chaps" Klingenschmitt expressed outrage that the New Mexico Supreme Court had unanimously ruled against a Christian photographer for discriminating against a same sex couple. "Well, this is not the first place and it may not be, sadly, the last place that Christians are punished by law for exercising their religious conscience objections," he warned. |
|
|
|
|
David Ferguson
The Raw Story 2013-09-03 16:38:00
A 27-year-old man named Richard Thomas collapsed in terror when police informed him that the woman he admitted to raping was HIV-positive. According to a BBC report, Thomas is currently waiting for his own test results to return. Thomas had by his own admission taken alcohol, Ecstasy and cocaine on the night when he broke into the Greater Manchester, U.K. home of his victim. The woman had taken a sleeping pill and only woke up when Thomas had already penetrated her from behind. Prosecutor Harry Pepper told the BBC, "She froze and no words were exchanged. He pulled up his shorts and left." Judge Mark Brown called the attack "dreadful" and sentenced Thomas to five years and four months for the crime. |
|
|
|
|
Scott Kaufman
The Raw Story 2013-09-03 16:19:00
Three Muslim teens and one would-be documentarian in New York City were arrested by NYPD officers last Thursday night. Two of the teen girls, Lamis Chapman, 12, and Khalia Wilson, 14, were playing handball in their neighborhood at 9:30 p.m. when police asked them for identification. "They said they asked for ID," Wilson told the Daily News. "But I didn't hear them." When the teens didn't respond, one of the officers put Wilson in a chokehold, while his female partner threw Chapman to the ground. Once the pair were restrained, police allegedly removed their hijabs, or Muslim headscarves. Wilson told the Daily News that she implored the officers to stop: "I kept saying, 'I'm 14! What are you doing? We're not bad kids.'" |
|
|
|
|
Associated Press
2013-09-03 15:26:00
Toledo woman, Melodi Dushane, loves McNuggets. According to a Toledo police report, she loves them so much that when she found out a local McDonald's was not serving them at 6:30 AM (that's breakfast menu time, sister), she became outraged and punched the drive-thru attendant, her manager and then the closed window!
| ||
|
Comment: Let's see, we have a global 'cultural' zombie
craze, McNuggets and other fast food that is rumored to contain human
flesh, and people eating other people...
McZombies, anyone?! |
||
|
|
|
Michelle Kretzer
PETA Org 2013-08-15 15:56:00
HBO and the American Humane Association (AHA) wanted to keep animal injuries and deaths on the set of the show Luck and other productions quiet, but one former AHA staffer is blowing their cover - and saying that animal injuries and deaths on sets happen too frequently. And allegedly, she has the grisly photos to prove it. Barbara Casey is a former AHA employee who worked on the set of HBO's now-canceled horseracing drama, Luck. According to the wrongful termination lawsuit that she has filed, Casey was terminated after she balked at her employer's instructions to ignore animal safety standards in order to save time and money. Casey is suing the AHA, HBO, and the show's production company, Stewart Productions, alleging that they all willfully allowed horses to be abused and attempted to cover it up. HBO tried to get itself released from the lawsuit, but it was about as lucky as the horses on set. Casey's lawsuit states that the companies' negligence led to the deaths of four horses - one more than previously reported. |
|
|
|
|
David Edwards
Raw Story 2013-09-03 14:49:00
Police in Florida are investigating a Sunday shooting that left a 35-year-old woman and her 1-year-old daughter dead. The Herald-Tribune reported that Sarasota police responded to a 911 call at around 9:45 a.m. on Sunday morning and discovered that 35-year-old Sarah Harnish had died of a gunshot wound. The woman's 17-month-old daughter, Josephine Boice, later died at All Children's Hospital in St. Petersburg. Police said that the child's father had gone for a ride on his scooter and returned to the sound of gunfire. Detectives concluded that the mother shot the child and then herself. |
|
|
|
|
Nina Kate
Opposing Views 2013-09-02 14:03:00
The 23-year-old man who beat his daughter's rapist to death near the rural town of Shriner, Texas, will not be prosecuted for the incident. A grand jury in Lavaca County decided against pressing charges on the father, who killed Jesus Mora Flores, 47, when he caught him molesting the 5-year-old in a secluded shack on the family farm in June. Said District Attorney Heather McMinn shortly after the incident, "Under the law in the state of Texas, deadly force is authorized and justified in order to stop an aggravated sexual assault or sexual assault." Before the attack, the girl and her brother went out to the feed the chickens. When Flores, a farmhand, picked up the girl and carried her to an out-of-the-way area, her brother ran back to tell his father what was happening. Once the man heard the news, he rushed toward the shack, reportedly guided by his daughter's screams. |
|
|
|
|
Sarah Rae Fruchtnicht
Opposing Views 2013-09-02 13:57:00
The owners of an Oregon bakery are shutting down amid threats from the public after they refused to make a wedding cake for a lesbian couple in January. Aaron and Melissa Klein are shutting down Sweet Cakes by Melissa after receiving angry emails and phone calls. "You stupid bible-thumping, hypocritical b**ch. I hope your kids get really, really, sick and you go out of business," read one email the couple received. "Here's hoping you go out of business, you bigot. Enjoy hell," said another. The Kleins said wedding planners and venues were badgered and harassed until they dropped their bakery from their vendor's list. | |
|
Comment: Meanwhile the world burns.
It's not unique to the U.S. though. On the day a 'leftist' French government announced (in January this year) that it was invading Mali to prop up its client regime against the local popular uprising and secure access to natural resources on behalf of its corporate clients (a military excursion that eventually saw French troops land in 4 African countries), hundreds of thousands of French men and women took to the streets of Paris... to protest gay marriage. What happened to the student protest movements of old? Where are the cries for liberté, égalité, fraternité? Instead France has apparently gone into complete submission with hardly a word spoken in public about anything of worth anymore. |
|
|
|
|
BBC News
2013-09-02 13:27:00
A new London skyscraper dubbed the "Walkie-Talkie" has been blamed for reflecting light which melted parts of a car parked on a nearby street. Martin Lindsay parked his Jaguar on Eastcheap, in the City of London, on Thursday afternoon. When he returned about two hours later, he found parts of his car - including the wing mirror and badge - had melted. Mr Lindsay said he "could not believe" the damage. The developers have apologised and paid for repairs. The 37-storey skyscraper at 20 Fenchurch Street, which has been nicknamed the "Walkie-Talkie" because of its shape, is currently under construction. |
|
|
|
|
Andrew Nguyen
Police believe the snake may be someone's pet that got loosethestar.com 2013-09-03 13:21:00
A roughly metre-long snake was discovered slithering Tuesday near Port Royal Public School in the Midland Ave. and Steeles Ave. E. area. Toronto Police officer Stephane St. George tweeted a picture of the spotted snake at around 6 a.m. "Pets are a responsibility. Prevent lost or escaped pets and contact the right agencies for unwanted pets," he wrote on Twitter. Police said they believe the snake is not native to the area, is nonvenomous and that it may be someone's pet that got loose. They said they "very rarely" deal with these types of calls. Toronto Animal Services was called in to remove the creature. |
|
|
|
|
Davy V.
Copblock.org 2013-09-02 00:00:00
"My suggestion to you is don't get in my way, shut your mouth, and go that way... you're on my sidewalk!"
Like many teenagers, 15-year old Irondequoit, NY resident Drake, whose last name I have decided not to publish, since he is a minor, and has not been charged with any crime, loves skateboarding with his friends. Unfortunately, Drake says, when it comes to skateboarding, Irondequoit, NY Police officers don't share his passion. Take, for example an incident which occurred a couple of weeks ago while Drake was skateboarding with some friends near Norton Street, and Culver Rd. Two Irondequoit, NY Police officers drove up to the teens, exited their cruisers, and approached the youths. As the video below shows, Drake, shows he obviously knows a thing or two about video recording any and all interactions with law enforcement, as he wastes no time in recording the IPD officers. The video shows the officers questioning one of Drake's friends, also a minor.. "They wanted my friend to get in the car with them", Drake tells me, after he contacted me to tell me he wanted me to have the video, because he's tired of Irondequoit Police harassing him and his friends when they're skateboarding. In the video, Drake can be heard telling his friend "They're just going to fuck you over." Then, one of the IPD officers can be seen walking right up to Drake. "How about this? The next time you say the f word, and if you don't move right now, I'm going to lock you up..." says the officer. Drake is then heard asking "For what?" The officer, seen walking back up to the teen, replies "You can't swear in public, you just said the f word, my suggestion to you is don't get in my way, shut your mouth, and go that way..." The officer then tells Drake, "You're on my sidewalk." To which the teen, again showing he knows his rights, tells the officer, "This is not your sidewalk, it's public." "Oh it's my sidewalk, trust me", the officer replies. Then, in a classic example of the intimidation tactics, law enforcement officers use, the same officer threatens to charge another teen with disorderly conduct. The teen also shows he knows his rights, and respectfully tells the officer that he has done nothing wrong. |
|
|
|
|
Rose Brown
Frosted flakes or rattlesnakes?Livingston Enterprise 2013-08-29 00:00:00 A woman on Livingston's north side was jolted by more than a cup of coffee Thursday morning when she found a rattlesnake on her neighbor's kitchen table in an apartment on West Summit Street near the Northside Park and Soccer Fields. She was checking on her neighbor's residence and reaching for a note on the table when she heard a rattle and saw the snake sitting on the table, said Animal Control Officer Judy Roy. A city worker and a Livingston police officer responded and killed the snake, Roy said. This is extremely unusual behavior for a rattlesnake, according to Michelle Becker, who has been catching and handling Western prairie rattlers in the area for more than 20 years. In all of her experiences with rattlesnakes indoors, they either look for cover or instinctively head for the door to go outside, Becker said. For a rattlesnake to enter somebody's house through an open door and go to the top of a table - "That is really crazy," she said. "I can see it going into a house to look for cover, but I can't understand why it would go onto a table," she said. "I'm glad it wasn't in the couch," she added. Becker said the only possible rational explanation she could think of for why a rattler would climb to the top of the kitchen table is that it could have been following the scent of a rodent. Becker also remarked that there have been an unusually high incidence of rattlesnake reports on the north side of Livingston this year. In July, a rattlesnake entered a back yard on North 13th Street and bit a dog. Also this summer, two residents on the north hill near the water plant came across rattlers on their property - one found a rattlesnake that had entered a garage, and another found one under a deck, she said. Here are some of Becker's tips for rattlesnake safety this time of year: |
|
|
|
Katie McCall
Marcus Forson drinks Bud Light at most of his parties, and last week was no exception.KTRK 2013-09-03 00:00:00
"I buy them either 20, 18s or 12s," he said. But a case of 18 he purchased last week held 19 items -- only 18 of which were beers. He reached for a cold one and was shocked to find a snake wrapped around the bottles. "When I first opened the box, his head was like this and his head was in between my fingers, and I didn't know what it was at first," Forson said, showing us how he reached into the 18-pack. "Then I realized now what it was." The beer bonus stowaway was a small snake which had died after apparently slinking around inside the box. "I pulled it back and I brought out the snake; brought out the snake like this," Forson said. At first, Forson thought he was the victim of a really good prank. "I thought she was playing a joke on me and she had it inside the box," he said. "Like a rubber snake." But a closer look, and the strong stench of dead snake, told him this serpent was real. "There's no way I was going to drink the beer. It stunk bad," Forson said. "The snake was dead. The snake was ice cold. It's kind of shrunk up and the eyes are missing out of it." |
|
|
|
|
Michael Rezendes
Man says informants framed him, othersBoston Globe 2013-09-03 00:00:00 A Lowell man is expected to file a federal civil rights lawsuit Tuesday against the city of Lowell and a Lowell police officer who relied on two informants suspected of planting drugs on dozens of innocent victims, a scandal that already has led prosecutors to drop charges in 17 pending drug and firearm cases and to overturn two convictions. Jonathan Santiago, a 25-year-old with no prior drug convictions whose case was among those dismissed, said an informant planted cocaine in the gas cap compartment of his car in February 2012, then alerted police, who arrested him. He said police then filed a false report that concealed the informant's role. "I just couldn't believe it - that law enforcement would actually do something like this," Santiago said in a Globe interview, adding that his arrest, jailing, and ensuing legal ordeal changed his life. "I pretty much stay home now. I don't go out anymore. I feel like I can't trust anyone."
Comment:
It's amazing how many people still believe that the Police exist to "help" them. Many people simply won't, or can't, accept that, with very few exceptions, the Police are only interested in generating revenue for the Elite, while keeping the subjugated masses in line. This is how they earn promotions and pay increases for themselves. They don't even have to prove a person is guilty of a crime to confiscate their car, house, money, etc. They just steal private property like common thieves, portion out the loot among themselves, then get away with it because they have badges. In most Departments Police Officers are specifically chosen because they're authoritarian followers with low IQ's and pathological personalities. These days, a person should think twice before calling the Police to "help" them, especially if there's a dog and/or a Person of Color in the house. Police can, and do, kill innocent dogs and Black people with complete impunity on a regular basis. Murdering an innocent White person can still get them a temporary suspension in some states, but that's changing pretty fast too. It's way past time to wake up and smell the Imperial Stormtroopers. Santiago's lawsuit says that scores of others may have suffered a similar fate, noting that one of the informants has been working with Lowell police for the last decade - the arresting officer in Santiago's case alone has testified to using the informant in more than 50 cases. The lawsuit also says that "Lowell police officers allowed [the informant] to commit crimes because he assisted them as an informant." Neither the police officer, veteran Detective Thomas Lafferty, nor a spokesman for the Lowell police would address the specific allegations in the federal lawsuit, referring questions to the city's legal department. Lowell's chief legal official, City Solicitor Christine O'Connor, was unavailable for comment. Defense lawyers said the allegations in the lawsuit echo disclosures in the case of Annie Dookhan, the state chemist whose allegedly faked drug analyses were used to obtain convictions that have now been overturned, and the trial of notorious gangster James "Whitey' Bulger, who Bulger asserts was allowed by his FBI handlers to commit crimes in exchange for providing information on other criminals. The Santiago lawsuit alleges "the widespread misuse of confidential informants in the Lowell Police Department" and a "policy or custom of tolerating violations of people's constitutional rights in order to obtain convictions." Middlesex prosecutors dropped charges or vacated convictions against Santiago and 18 other defendants earlier this year after one of the informants advertised his services to the Massachusetts State Police and "boasted about his skill and experience in planting evidence," citing specific examples of his work with the other informant on behalf of Lowell police, according to the lawsuit. |
|
|
|
Press TV
2013-09-03 11:05:00
Arrest of a controversial spiritual guru on suspicion of raping a teenage girl has sparked days of mass protest rallies across India. The demonstrations erupted in northwestern state of Rajasthan and some other regions after police detained Asaram Bapu, 72, at a retreat on Sunday. Angry demonstrators have called for tough action against him, while Bapu's supporters say there is a conspiracy to tarnish his image. His detention came after a 16-year-old girl accused the Hindu religious preacher of raping and assaulting her for an hour-and-a-half inside a locked cottage in the state of Rajasthan. |
|
|
|
| Secret History |
|
No new articles. |
| Science & Technology |
|
Susan Milius
ScienceNews 2013-09-03 15:43:00
The rogue chytrid fungus that has devastated more than 200 kinds of amphibians worldwide has an accomplice: a second species that researchers have discovered attacking fire salamanders. Populations of frogs, salamanders and their relatives have been dwindling worldwide, and in 1999 scientists identified a surprising contributing factor - the fungus now nicknamed Bd. This Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis was the first member of the phylum of fungi called chytrids found to attack, and often kill, vertebrates. Now genetic tests have identified a second vertebrate-killing chytrid, the newly named Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans. Researchers found the new fungus when volunteers reported a population crash in a yellow-and-black fire salamander, Salamandra salamandra, in the Netherlands. Numbers of salamanders fell to 4 percent of previous population levels in just three years. But genetic tests failed to find Bd, leading An Martel of Ghent University's veterinary center in Merelbeke, Belgium and her colleagues to realize that they had found another chytrid. Lab tests showed that fungus spores from a sick salamander caused the disease in another one, Martel and her colleagues report September 2 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "It looks very cruel," Martel says. Within days of infection, the fungus eats away the skin of a salamander until scientists need a microscope to see skin remnants. Martel can treat animals in captivity but what to do in the wild remains a puzzle. "You cannot treat an environment with an antifungal," she says. |
|
|
|
|
Brett Smith
RedOrbit 2013-09-03 15:39:00
In late 2002, the SARS epidemic ripped through Southeast Asia and rattled worldwide confidence in medical technology's capacity to prevent pandemics like those that have plagued human populations throughout history. It was later discovered that the novel virus had spread to humans from mammals in Southeast Asia. By 2003, scientists had isolated the SARS virus from meat samples taken from a local market in Guangdong, China. A new study published in the journal mBio attempts to get out in front of the next pandemic by estimating the total number of unknown diseases that could be found in mammals and the costs associated with identifying those viruses. Based on the work of a large international team, the report stated that there are at least 320,000 viruses in mammals awaiting discovery and collecting evidence of these viruses would cost approximately $6.3 billion. "Historically, our whole approach to discovery has been altogether too random," said lead author Simon Anthony, a scientist at the Center for Infection and Immunity (CII) at Columbia University. "What we currently know about viruses is very much biased towards those that have already spilled over into humans or animals and emerged as diseases. But the pool of all viruses in wildlife, including many potential threats to humans, is actually much deeper." "A more systematic, multidisciplinary, and One Health framework is needed if we are to understand what drives and controls viral diversity and following that, what causes viruses to emerge as disease-causing pathogens," he added. |
|
|
|
|
Culturekiosque
Perth, Australia - It's well known that the dinosaurs were wiped out 66
million years ago when a meteor hit what is now southern Mexico but
evidence is accumulating that the biggest extinction of all, 252.3m
years ago, at the end of the Permian period, was also triggered by an
impact that changed the climate.2013-09-03 15:15:00 While the idea that an impact caused the Permian extinction has been around for a while, what's been missing is a suitable crater to confirm it. Associate Professor Eric Tohver of the University of Western Australia's School of Earth and Environment believes he has found the impact crater which reveals though the trigger was the same, the details are significantly different. Last year Dr Tohver redated an impact structure that straddles the border of the states of Mato Grosso and Goiás in Brazil, called the Araguainha crater, to 254.7m years, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5m years. Previous estimates had suggested Araguainha was 10m years younger, but Dr Tohver has put it within geological distance of the extinction date. The Chicxulub crater in Mexico, is 180km in diameter while the Araguainha is 40 kilometres across and was thought to be too small to have caused the chain reaction which brought about such mass extinction. |
|
|
|
Victoria Gill
BBC 2013-09-03 14:15:00
Scientists have discovered how one of the world's smallest frogs is able to hear with its mouth. The tiny, earless Gardiner's frog was assumed to be deaf. But this study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences revealed that it uses its mouth cavity to convey sound signals to its brain. The discovery solves the mystery of why the earless frog produces loud, high-pitched squeaks. The diminutive frogs, which live in the forests of the Seychelles, have no middle ear region at all, meaning they have no resonating eardrum. Researchers had therefore assumed that the animals had no way to amplify and transmit sound waves from the environment into the inner ear and, via nerve cells, to the brain. The Gardiner's frog is one of the world's smallest But this research revealed that the species defied those assumptions. The scientists made recordings of the frogs' calls and played them back to wild frogs in order to observe their behaviour. |
|
|
|
|
Tallbloke
Tallbloke's Talkshop 2013-09-02 21:54:00
More 'baffled scientists'. Good fun isn't it? From MNN: Scientists mapping Venus's surface with the European Space Agency's Venus Express orbiter recently received a shock when features on the planet's surface appeared to have moved up to 12.4 miles from where they were expected to be, reports National Geographic. The measurements, if correct, would seem to indicate that Venus' rotation has slowed by 6.5 minutes - a dramatic decrease on a planetary level - compared to when it was last measured just 16 years ago. That last measurement was taken during NASA's Magellan mission in the 1990s, when a single rotation of Venus was calculated to take 243.015 Earth days. Magellan used the passing speed of surface features on the planet to make its calculation, and scientists have long held that measurement as the standard. "When the two maps did not align, I first thought there was a mistake in my calculations, as Magellan measured the value [of Venus's spin] very accurately," said planetary scientist Nils Müller. "But we have checked every possible error we could think of." |
|
|
|
| Earth Changes |
|
Brian Scott
K2 Radio 2013-08-29 16:50:00
More than 100 elk were found dead on an area ranch 20 miles northwest of Las Vegas earlier this week. According to to the New Mexico Game and Fish, none of the animals were shot and their investigation is leaning toward Epizootic Hemorrhagic Disease. |
|
|
|
|
Scott Kaufman
The Raw Story 2013-09-03 16:29:00
A video of Twain Harte Fire Chief Todd McNeal briefing the community on California's Rim fire surfaced online today, and in it he said that "we know [the fire]'s human-caused, as there was no lightning in the area...and we highly suspect there might be some sort of illicit grove, some sort of marijuana-type grove thing." The fire started in a remote area Stanislaus National Park known as Jawbone Ridge. The area is familiar to locals not only for the ruggedness of its terrain, but for the recent appearances of "marijuana plantations" in its more inhospitable reaches. | |
|
Comment: Yup, it's all down to 'some sort of marijuana-type grove thing'. Pay no attention to the changing weather!
|
|
|
|
|
US Geological Survey
2013-09-03 16:10:00
Event Time 2013-09-03 20:19:06 UTC 2013-09-03 11:19:06 UTC-09:00 at epicenter Location 51.198°N 130.405°W depth=1.0km (0.6mi) Nearby Cities 191km (119mi) WSW of Bella Bella, Canada 347km (216mi) S of Prince Rupert, Canada 388km (241mi) WNW of Campbell River, Canada 388km (241mi) SSW of Terrace, Canada 592km (368mi) NW of Victoria, Canada Technical Details |
|
|
|
|
Liz Klimas
The Blaze 2013-09-03 15:56:00
Open season for alligator hunting in Mississippi began over the weekend with a few record-setting catches. First-time hunters Beth and Rob Trammell were heading back into shore after a long day of hunting Sunday when they hooked what would turn out to be a state record-setting 723.5-pound male gator, according to The Clarion-Ledger. "Oh, my gosh. It's the Loch Ness monster," Beth Trammell recalled saying when the beast surfaced after more than an hour of struggle. |
|
|
|
|
Robert Feliz
Most notably, Bettles recorded a low of 15ºF Saturday morning, by far the lowest temperature of record at Bettles in August. The
previous record at the Bettles in August was 22ºF on August 30, 1969.
At old Bettles, about four miles downriver from the current townsite, a
low of 20ºF was measured on August 24, 1948.iceagenow.info 2013-09-02 06:55:00 Other low temperatures included 17ºF at both Chandalar DOT and Coldfoot DOT and a chilly 13F at the Norutak Lake RAWS west of Bettles. These are close to, but not at the record low temperature for the month of August in the state. http://ak-wx.blogspot.de/2013/08/record-cold-in-northern-interior.html Thanks to F. Guimaraes for this link "The winter could be starting earlier!" says Guimaraes. |
|
|
|
Robert Felix
Snow expected to continue for about 60 days. Humanitarian catastrophe unfolding.iceagenow.info 2013-09-02 06:47:00 1 Sep 13 - Snowfall in parts of the southern highlands of Peru has killed more than 25,000 animals and destroyed 137 homes, according to the National Institute of Civil Defense (Indeci). The national government on Saturday declared a state of emergency in 250 localities of the country since the snow is expected to continue for about 60 days. Until Saturday, there were a total of 5,247 people injured and 739 homes declared uninhabitable in Apurimac (south), Cusco (southeast), Ayacucho (South Central), Huancavelica (center), Puno (southeast) and Junin (center) . The deputy director of humanitarian assistance and mobilization of the National Institute of Civil Defense (Indeci), Eric Cortijo, reported that this phenomenon affected more than 67,000 people. (I don't know what he meant by "affected.") |
|
|
|
Zachary Stieber
Epoch Times 2013-09-02 00:00:00
A mysterious creature has appeared on the shores of a beach in Ghana's Jomoro District. The creature, deemed a mammal weighing between six and eight tons, is decomposing after washing ashore several days ago, locals told My Joy Online, a Ghanaian news agency. The stench coming from the mammal is disturbing and makes it hard to breathe, locals said. Isaac Bentum Williams, a businessman who was at the shore, said the creature could be an endangered species and said scientists and researchers should come and study it. The head of the creature looks like a crocodile while its tail looks like a whale's tail, he said. People commenting on the article online said it should definitely be studied. |
|
|
|
| Fire in the Sky |
|
The Local, Italy
Italians in the north east are on the hunt for traces of a fireball
which raced across the sky in the early hours of Tuesday morning and
"unsettled pets".2013-09-03 15:22:00 The ball of fire, thought to be a meteorite, was spotted between 2.30am and 2.45am and accompanied by a loud bang and thunder-like roar, Il Gazzettino reported. It was spotted by locals across the north east, including people in Venice and Padua. One local resident told Il Gazzettino the event had "unsettled his pets". Perplexed residents called the fire brigade and police duly went on a hunt for the extraterrestrial, but failed to find any traces of a meteorite.
|
|
|
|
|
Ria Novosti
2013-09-03 11:14:00
Moscow - An asteroid about seven meters (23 feet) in diameter whizzed by Earth on Tuesday, only a day after it was discovered, a US-based astronomy group said. But even if the asteroid, named 2013 RG, had encountered our planet, it would likely have burned up in the atmosphere, as falling celestial bodies less than 10 meters in diameter tend to do. The meteor that exploded over Chelyabinsk, in Russia's southern Ural Mountains, in February was estimated to be more than twice as large: 17 to 20 meters in diameter. Both space rocks are believed to be part of the Apollo group of asteroids, which regularly cross into Earth's orbit. Eleven more "close approaches" are expected this month, said the US-based Minor Planet Center, which announced the newfound asteroid's flyby. The asteroid was first noticed by Arizona's Mt. Lemmon Observatory and then confirmed by astronomers in New Zealand and Bulgaria. It flew by Earth at a distance of about 220,000 kilometers (140,000 miles) around 10:30 a.m. Greenwich Mean Time. |
|
|
|
| Health & Wellness |
|
KHOU
2013-09-03 14:50:00
Experts are investigating dozens of cyclospora cases in Fort Bend County. The food-borne intestinal illness is caused by a parasite found in food and water. It's usually spread by produce tainted with feces. Thirty-six cases have been confirmed by lab tests and eight more are likely cyclospora, according to the Fort Bend County Health Department. Fort Bend County Health and Human Services experts are working with the CDC to track the source of the outbreak. CDC experts traveled to Fort Bend County recently to interview dozens of restaurants and grocery stores. They hope to have an answer in the next few weeks. At last check, at least four cases of cyclospora have been confirmed in Harris County. A nationwide outbreak of cyclospora has sickened hundreds of people nationwide. The CDC traced illnesses from Iowa and Nebraska to salad mix from a Mexican farm that was served at Olive Garden and Red Lobster restaurants. The rest of the illnesses - many of them in Texas - are still a mystery, state and federal officials say. |
|
|
|
|
Sydney Morning Herald
2013-09-02 01:02:00
Can you handle seven minutes of pain? It's the science story that many gyms may not want to hear. What if you could reap the benefits of running and weight-bearing exercise without any expensive runners or contracts and do it all in, say, seven minutes? Exercise science is a fine and intellectually fascinating thing. But sometimes you just want someone to lay out guidelines for how to put the latest fitness research into practice. An article in the American College of Sports Medicine's Health & Fitness Journal does just that. In 12 exercises deploying only body weight, a chair and a wall, it fulfills the latest mandates for high-intensity effort, which essentially combines a long run and a visit to the weight room into about seven minutes of steady discomfort - all of it based on science. ''There's very good evidence that high-intensity interval training provides many of the fitness benefits of prolonged endurance training but in much less time,'' says Chris Jordan, the director of exercise physiology at the Human Performance Institute in Orlando, Florida, and co-author of the article. Work by scientists at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, and other institutions shows, for instance, that even a few minutes of training at an intensity approaching your maximum capacity produces molecular changes within muscles comparable to those of several hours of running or bike riding. Interval training, though, requires intervals; the extremely intense activity must be intermingled with brief periods of recovery. | |
|
Comment: Resistance training is the perfect complement to the Paleo Diet or Ketogenic Diet.
|
|
|
|
|
The Age, Australia
2013-09-03 00:34:00
We all know exercise promotes health, reducing most people's risk of developing diabetes and becoming obese. Now light has been shed on how it does this at a cellular level. It seems exercise may be able to drastically alter how genes operate, studies show. Genes are not static. They turn on or off depending on the biochemical signals they receive from elsewhere in the body. When turned on, genes express various proteins that in turn prompt a range of physiological actions in the body.
One powerful means of affecting gene activity involves a process called methylation, in which methyl groups, a cluster of carbon and hydrogen atoms, attach to the outside of a gene and make it easier or harder for that gene to receive and respond to messages from the body. In this way, the behaviour of the gene is changed, but not the fundamental structure of the gene itself. Remarkably, these methylation patterns can be passed on to offspring - a phenomenon known as epigenetics. What is particularly fascinating about the methylation process is that it seems to be driven largely by lifestyle. Diet, for instance, notably affects the methylation of genes, and scientists suspect that differing genetic methylation patterns resulting from differing diets may partly determine whether someone develops diabetes or other metabolic diseases. |
|
|
|
| Science of the Spirit |
|
No new articles. |
| High Strangeness |
|
No new articles. |
| Don't Panic! Lighten Up! |
|
Lee Moran
New York Daily News 2013-09-03 09:12:00
A Swedish man was barred from entering his own home by a gang of elk drunk from eating rotten apples. Four rowdy elk and one calf blocked him from walking up to his house in Ingaro, an island in Stockholm's suburbs, after consuming one too many of the fermented fruit. He was forced to call cops to come and deal with the rowdy quintet. Luckily, the group left before officers arrived, but police then ordered the man to clear his garden of the fallen food to try and stop it from happening again. Police spokesman Albin Näverberg told the Mirror that the man was right to call in authorities. "They can be really dangerous. They become fearless," he said. "Instead of backing away when a person approaches, they move toward you. They may even take a run at you." Swedish police reportedly take dozens of calls about drunken elk each week during the fall months. "If there is a lot of fermenting fruit, then we get a lot of calls about drunken elk. But most often they're gone before officers arrive," Näverberg added. |
|
|
|
|
Paul Craig
KPTV 2013-08-23 18:10:00
Oregon - A police officer who spotted something unusual in Gresham Thursday night was given a warning not to get any closer. "The goat will charge you," he was told. That goat was on the roof of a house. Officers out on patrol spotted the goat on the 300 block of Southeast 172nd Avenue at 7:30 p.m. Thursday. When they inquired if everything was OK, seeing as how goats aren't found on rooftops every day, they were told this farm animal was not the friendly type. In fact, they were told "that goat only respects one man," according to Gresham police. That man is the owner of the goat, who arrived at the house and got the 2-year-old animal weighing in at 35 pounds off the roof without further incident. Officers suspect the goat used a ramp near the home to climb his way up to the top of the house. |
