| Puppet Masters |
|
David Stockman
ContraCorner 2015-02-21 22:06:00
The trouble with the money printing madness in the Eccles Building is that it generates huge deformations, misallocations and speculative excesses in the financial markets. Eventually these bubbles splatter, as they have twice this century. The resulting carnage, needless to say, is not small. Combined financial and real estate asset markdowns totaled about $7 trillion after the dotcom bust and $15 trillion during the 2008-2009 financial crisis. Yes, the Fed has managed to reflate this cheap money bubble for the third time now, but the certainty that it will splatter once again is not the issue at hand. What gets lost in the serial bubble-making process of modern central banking is that vast real resources - labor, capital and materials - are misallocated owing to mispricing of stock, bonds and real estate during the bubble inflation phase. | |
Comment: Crony capitalism at its best no doubt.
| |
 |
|
Mike Whitney
Information Clearing House 2015-02-21 17:18:00
In less than a year, the United States has toppled the democratically-elected government of Ukraine, installed a Washington-backed stooge in Kiev, launched a bloody and costly war of annihilation on Russian-speaking people in the East, thrust the economy into a downward death spiral, and reduced the nation to an anarchic, failed state destined to endure a vicious fratricidal civil war for as far as the eye can see. Last week, Washington suffered its greatest military defeat in more than a decade when Ukraine's US-backed army was soundly routed in the major railway hub of Debaltsevo. Roughly, 8,000 Ukrainian regulars along with untold numbers of tanks and armored units were surrounded in what-came-to-be-known-as "the cauldron." The army of the Donetsk Peoples Republic led by DPR commander Alexander Zakharchenko, encircled the invading army and gradually tightened the cordon, eventually killing or capturing most of the troops within the pocket. The Ukrainian Armed Forces suffered major casualties ranging between 3,000 to 3,500 while a vast amount of lethal military hardware was left behind. According to Zakharchenko, "The amount of equipment Ukrainian units have lost here is beyond description." | |
Comment: This is the picture of Washington's blind pursuit of its undeclared war on Russia.
| |
|
|
RT
2015-02-20 18:47:00
A new IAEA report has sparked a war of words ahead of key Geneva negotiations, with Israel claiming it proves that Iran is "preparing for the production of nuclear weapons," and Tehran insisting that it shows its "transparency." "The agency remains concerned about the possible existence in Iran of undisclosed nuclear-related activities involving military-related organizations, including activities related to the development of a nuclear payload for a missile," said a copy of a confidential document compiled by the International Atomic Energy Agency, obtained by the media in several countries late on Thursday. Israel was more emphatic. | |
Comment: Next he'll say the Iranians have invisibility cloaks around their nuclear program. What the IAEA and the rest of the civilized world don't understand is that if Netanyahu says Iran has a nuclear weapons program, it does. How hard is that to understand? No need for evidence. Just take Bibi's word for it.
| |
|
|
Jon Queally
Common Dreams 2015-02-20 18:16:00
The newly-elected Syriza government of Greece and its creditors from the 19-nation Eurozone have reportedly reached a draft deal for a loan extension to the country for another four months. The specifics of the agreement, and the conditions imposed on Greece, have not yet been fully revealed to the public, but according to Mark Weisbrot, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) in Washington, DC, the deal represents a "significant retreat" by the so-called troika and "shows that their austerity program, which has failed miserably, is no longer politically enforceable." According to CEPR's preliminary analysis, the agreement gives Greece fiscal flexibility, lowering previous fiscal surplus constraints and forestalls the immediate threat of Greece being forced out of the eurozone through a loss of support from the European Central Bank (ECB). Media reports citing Greek officials familiar with the deal indicated that additional tax increases and cuts to pensions were not part of the agreement. "European officials had a gun to the head of the Greek government, and they just pulled it away - at least for now," Weisbrot said. | |
Comment: For more background on the negotiations, see:
| |
|
|
Times of India
2015-02-21 17:29:00
The steep decline in Ebola case numbers has leveled off over the past month and the development is a cause for concern, the official leading the World Health Organization's response to the outbreak said on Friday. Dr. Bruce Aylward told reporters "today is the first time we have the data to demonstrate this" flattening of the curve. The United Nations has said 10 times fewer people are being diagnosed with Ebola each week than in September. Over the past four weeks, however, the line of the graph has flattened out, with the rate around 120 to 150 new cases a week. "It's what keeps me up at night right now," Aylward said. "This is not what you want to see with Ebola." Health officials have expressed optimism in recent weeks that the tide seems to be turning in the fight against the deadliest Ebola outbreak in history. The presidents of the three worst affected countries, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, this week said they hope to reduce the number of new cases to zero by April 15. But Aylward said that goal will be difficult to achieve. | |
|
|
Prof. John McMurtry
Global Research 2015-02-20 17:15:00
War party bigotry and hate may be enough to drive neo-Nazis leading Kiev in the Ukraine civil war. But the reverse blame of Putin and Russia by corporate media and states has a deeper interest. It propels the geostrategic economic and military war of movement through East Europe to Russia. It is the indispensible big lie to mask their set up for foreign financial predation. A big pay-off matrix looms in Ukraine for US-led arms corporations and military services, agribusiness and GMO's, speculator funds on debts and currency, monopoly providers of privatized social services, Big Oil frackers for newly discovered rich deposits, junk food suppliers like Poroshenko in US-frankenfood alliance, and - last but not least - the IMF money party waging a war of dispossession by financial means. The IMF enforces the global money-sequence cancer system by its defining policy commands on debt-impoverished countries to open them up to foreign feeding on their domestic markets and fire-sale enterprises, drastically reduced workers' wages and benefits, stripped public pensions, healthcare and education, sell-off of historic infrastructures to pay ever more bank-created debts, and - in general- multiplying transnational money demand and profit invading their life functions at all levels. The IMF and Wall Street have been cumulatively hollowing out Africa, Latin America, South-East Asia, South Europe and the US itself in these ways over 35 years. Now it is the turn of the once social democratic Europe, state by state, beginning with the most indebted and helpless. Ukraine on the outskirts of Europe next to Russia is where the military option has been required to strip it and its former Slavic economic union with Russia. This historic relationship has been the last line of life defence in the way, a conservative but sharing ethos of resource-rich societies with Putin as a superior leader facing the US-EU's many-times more powerful economic levers and lethal arms to bully him and Russia into submission. To take the naturally rich Ukraine for transnational bank and corporate looting, the public must be sold the story of Putin as the villain. Only then can debt screws be applied and the country opened to long-term and full-spectrum financial, foreign and oligarch control beneath the people's notice. The IMF is already in motion to ensure that the Kiev coup state provides all of this. Few observe the underlying fact that the crushing bank debt eating societies alive across the world is all debt money created by big private banks with no legal tender to back 97% of it. Ukraine is the latest nation to fall into the deadly trap without a sound. Here public money for public need is ended, although it created the US itself. As Ben Franklin has testified, to regain public money issue was the prime reason for the American Revolution. Public banking was also what made modern Canada from 1938 to 1974 by public investment money without private debt-servicing loaned by the public Bank of Canada for construction of Canada's material and social infrastructures from the St Lawrence Seaway to public pensions and universal healthcare. | |
|
|
Jeremy Scahill and Josh Begley
American and Brittish spies hacked into the internal computer network of the largest manufacturer of SIM cards in the world, stealing encryption keys used to protect the privacy of cellphone communications across the globe, according to top-secret documents provided toThe Intercept by National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden.The Intercept 2015-02-19 01:23:00 The hack was perpetrated by a joint unit consisting of operatives from the NSA and its British counterpart Government Communications Headquarters, or GCHQ. The breach, detailed in a secret 2010 GCHQdocument, gave the surveillance agencies the potential to secretly monitor a large portion of the world's cellular communications, including both voice and data. The company targeted by the intelligence agencies, Gemalto, is a multinational firm incorporated in the Netherlands that makes the chips used in mobile phones and next-generation credit cards. Among its clients are AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, Sprint and some 450 wireless network providers around the world. The company operates in 85 countries and has more than 40 manufacturing facilities. One of its three global headquarters is in Austin, Texas and it has a large factory in Pennsylvania.
In all, Gemalto produces some 2 billion SIM cards a year. Its motto is "Security to be Free." With these stolen encryption keys, intelligence agencies can monitor mobile communications without seeking or receiving approval from telecom companies and foreign governments. Possessing the keys also sidesteps the need to get a warrant or a wiretap, while leaving no trace on the wireless provider's network that the communications were intercepted. Bulk key theft additionally enables the intelligence agencies to unlock any previously encrypted communications they had already intercepted, but did not yet have the ability to decrypt. As part of the covert operations against Gemalto, spies from GCHQ — with support from the NSA — mined the private communications of unwitting engineers and other company employees in multiple countries. Gemalto was totally oblivious to the penetration of its systems — and the spying on its employees. "I'm disturbed, quite concerned that this has happened," Paul Beverly, a Gemalto executive vice president, told The Intercept. "The most important thing for me is to understand exactly how this was done, so we can take every measure to ensure that it doesn't happen again, and also to make sure that there's no impact on the telecom operators that we have served in a very trusted manner for many years. What I want to understand is what sort of ramifications it has, or could have, on any of our customers." He added that "the most important thing for us now is to understand the degree" of the breach. Leading privacy advocates and security experts say that the theft of encryption keys from major wireless network providers is tantamount to a thief obtaining the master ring of a building superintendent who holds the keys to every apartment. "Once you have the keys, decrypting traffic is trivial," says Christopher Soghoian, the principal technologist for the American Civil Liberties Union. "The news of this key theft will send a shock wave through the security community." Beverly said that after being contacted by The Intercept, Gemalto's internal security team began on Wednesday to investigate how their system was penetrated and could find no trace of the hacks. When asked if the NSA or GCHQ had ever requested access to Gemalto-manufactured encryption keys, Beverly said, "I am totally unaware. To the best of my knowledge, no." According to one secret GCHQ slide, the British intelligence agency penetrated Gemalto's internal networks, planting malware on several computers, giving GCHQ secret access. We "believe we have their entire network," the slide's author boasted about the operation against Gemalto. Additionally, the spy agency targeted unnamed cellular companies' core networks, giving it access to "sales staff machines for customer information and network engineers machines for network maps." GCHQ also claimed the ability to manipulate the billing servers of cell companies to "suppress" charges in an effort to conceal the spy agency's secret actions against an individual's phone. Most significantly, GCHQ also penetrated "authentication servers," allowing it to decrypt data and voice communications between a targeted individual's phone and his or her telecom provider's network. A note accompanying the slide asserted that the spy agency was "very happy with the data so far and [was] working through the vast quantity of product." The Mobile Handset Exploitation Team (MHET), whose existence has never before been disclosed, was formed in April 2010 to target vulnerabilities in cellphones. One of its main missions was to covertly penetrate computer networks of corporations that manufacture SIM cards, as well as those of wireless network providers. The team included operatives from both GCHQ and the NSA. While the FBI and other U.S. agencies can obtain court orders compelling U.S.-based telecom companies to allow them to wiretap or intercept the communications of their customers, on the international front this type of data collection is much more challenging. Unless a foreign telecom or foreign government grants access to their citizens' data to a U.S. intelligence agency, the NSA or CIA would have to hack into the network or specifically target the user's device for a more risky "active" form of surveillance that could be detected by sophisticated targets. Moreover, foreign intelligence agencies would not allow U.S. or U.K. spy agencies access to the mobile communications of their heads of state or other government officials. "It's unbelievable. Unbelievable," said Gerard Schouw, a member of the Dutch Parliament, when told of the spy agencies' actions. Schouw, the intelligence spokesperson for D66, the largest opposition party in the Netherlands, told The Intercept, "We don't want to have the secret services from other countries doing things like this." Schouw added that he and other lawmakers will ask the Dutch government to provide an official explanation and to clarify whether the country's intelligence services were aware of the targeting of Gemalto, whose official headquarters is in Amsterdam. Last November, the Dutch government amended its constitution to include explicit protection for the privacy of digital communications, including those made on mobile devices. "We have, in the Netherlands, a law on the [activities] of secret services. And hacking is not allowed," Schouw said. Under Dutch law, the interior minister would have to sign off on such operations by foreign governments' intelligence agencies. "I don't believe that he has given his permission for these kind of actions." The U.S. and British intelligence agencies pulled off the encryption key heist in great stealth, giving them the ability to intercept and decrypt communications without alerting the wireless network provider, the foreign government or the individual user that they have been targeted. "Gaining access to a database of keys is pretty much game over for cellular encryption," says Matthew Green, a cryptography specialist at the Johns Hopkins Information Security Institute. The massive key theft is "bad news for phone security. Really bad news." | |
|
|
Sputnik
2015-02-21 15:02:00
Ukrainian deputy foreign minister claimed Kiev was preparing for a "full-scale" war and urged Canada to send lethal assistance to the country in a radio interview. Ukrainian Deputy Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko said in an interview with Canadian radio thatKiev was getting ready for a full-scale war. "We don't want to scare everybody, but we are preparing for full-scale war," Prystaiko claimed. Comment: War is scary no matter how you slice it. He also called on Canada to send lethal arms to Ukraine adding that the country has been training Kiev forces during the last ten years. | |
Comment: Will Canada step up its assistance to Ukraine in violation of the Minsk Agreements to help the US warhawks?
Meanwhile his boss, the Ukrainian Foreign Minister, wants weapons in order to maintain peace! | |
|
|
RT
2015-02-21 14:32:00
Doctored blueprints for nuclear weapon components supplied to Iran by the CIA 15 years ago could force the IAEA to review its conclusions on Iran's atomic program, which was potentially based on misleading intelligence, Bloomberg reports. The details of the Central Intelligence Agency operation back in 2000 were made public as part of a judicial hearing into a case involving Jeffrey Sterling, an agent convicted of leaking classified information on CIA spying against Iran. "The goal is to plant this substantial piece of deception information on the Iranian nuclear-weapons program, sending them down blind alleys, wasting their time and money," a May 1997 CIA cable submitted to the court reads. The intelligence in question pertains to fake designs of atomic components that were transferred to Iran in February 2000. | |
Comment: Smoke and mirrors courtesy of the intelligence agencies pursuing an agenda to produce certain outcomes.
| |
|
|
DeSmogBlog.com
2015-02-21 05:52:00
A major dispute is brewing over transporting wastewater from shale gas wells by barge in the Ohio River, the source of drinking water for millions of Americans. On January 26, GreenHunter Water announced that it had been granted approval by the U.S. Coast Guard to haul tens of thousands of barrels from its shipping terminal and 70,000-barrel wastewater storage facility on the Ohio River in New Matamoras, Ohio. "The U.S. Coast Guard approval is a significant 'win' for both GreenHunter Resources and our valued clients," Kirk Trosclair, Chief Operating Officer at GreenHunter Resources, Inc., said in a statement announcing the Coast Guard's approval. "Our ability to transport disposal volumes via barge will significantly reduce our costs, improve our margins and allow us to pass along savings to our clients." Outraged environmental advocates immediately objected to the news. "Despite the thousands of comments from residents along the Ohio River opposing the risk of allowing toxic, radioactive fracking waste to be barged along the Ohio River, the Coast Guard quietly approved the plan at the end of 2014," said Food & Water Watch Ohio Organizer Alison Auciello. "The Coast Guard is risking man-made earthquakes, drinking water contamination, leaks and spills. This approval compromises not only the health and safety of the millions who get their drinking water from the Ohio River but will increase the amount of toxic fracking waste that will be injected underground in Southeast Ohio." But the company's announcement was in fact made before the Coast Guard completed its review of the hazards of hauling shale gas wastewater via the nation's waterways - a process so controversial given the difficulty of controlling mid-river spills and the unique challenges of handling the radioactivity in Marcellus shale brine that proposed Coast Guard rules have drawn almost 70,000 public comments. | |
|
|
Moon of Alabama
2015-02-20 14:32:00
The Ukrainian puppet president Poroshenko should have delivered a similar speech. Indeed the war situation in Ukraine has developed not necessarily to his governments advantage. But the speech Proshenko gave (see below) was even more delusional than Hirohito's whitewashing. Since six days ago several thousand Ukrainian government troops were surrounded in the Debaltsevo pocket. The only road out towards friendly lines was mined and under direct and indirect opposition fire. Several attempts to break out and also into the pocket were defeated with lots of lives and material lost. | |
Comment: One would imagine that, with all the Right Sector and neo-Nazi goons in Kiev, it would not be difficult for the State Department to replace Poroshenko. These Washington-backed goons have been dreaming up ways to replace him for a while now. A perverse desire for total domination doesn't just shake hands and call it quits.
Also see: | |
|
|
Philip Weiss
Mondoweiss 2015-02-20 00:40:00
Throwing down the gauntlet, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu says that he knows the details of the proposed deal with Iran. On Wednesday, he had this to say, with Republican Senator David Perdue:
Perdue was just elected in Georgia; this is his first trip as a sitting senator. He's been boning up on foreign policy:
| |
|
|
Pepe Escobar
RT 2015-02-20 11:01:00
The world's leading economy is on a roll as it enters a new year in the Chinese zodiac. Welcome to the Year of the Sheep. Or Goat. Or Ram. Or, technically, the Green Wooden Sheep (or Goat). Even the best Chinese linguists can't agree on how to translate it into English. Who cares? The hyper-connected average Chinese - juggling among his five smart devices (smartphones, tablets, e-readers) - is bravely advancing a real commercial revolution. In China (and the rest of Asia) online transactions are now worth twice the combined value of transactions in the US and Europe. As for the Middle Kingdom as a whole, it has ventured much further than the initial proposition of producing cheap goods and selling them to the rest of the planet, virtually dictating the global supply chain. Now Made in China is going global. No less than 87 Chinese enterprises are among the Fortune Global 500 - their global business booming as they take stakes in an array of overseas assets. | |
|
|
RT
2015-02-20 00:26:00
Comment: The former military officers are absolutely correct. Russia would wipe the floor with the UK, but they would only do so after the UK/EU/U.S. had initiated fighting against them, not the other way around, despite this article focusing entirely on Putin choosing to attack the UK. Britain could not withstand a military attack from Russia, according to the former head of the Royal Air Force (RAF) Sir Michael Graydon. Another senior RAF officer claimed if Putin decided to attack the UK he would "saturate our defenses." The warnings follow an incident on Thursday when RAF Typhoon fighter jets were scrambled to intercept two Russian long-range bombers in international airspace off the coast of Cornwall. Russia's Defense Ministry said the flight was a planned air patrol conducted in accordance with international law. While Prime Minister David Cameron rebuffed the incident as Russia "trying to make some sort of point," Graydon believes the threat is more serious. Speaking to the Daily Mail, he said: "I very much doubt whether the UK could sustain a shooting war against Russia. We are at half the capabilities we had previously." "They fly in these regions to check our air defenses and have probably worked out we are not as sharp as we were. | |
|
|
Willem Middelkoop
BullionStar.com 2015-02-17 00:00:00
"Putin is the biggest gold bug", was the title of a recent Bloomberg op-ed by Leonid Bershidsky the founding editor of Vedomosti, Russia's top business daily. He explains why the Russian central bank has accumulated almost 100 tons of gold in the last four months of 2014. It is an acceleration of the gold buying program which started in 2007, a year before the Lehman collapse. | |
Comment: There is little doubt that a major reset is coming and that this reset will involve gold - and the death of the US Dollar is virtually guaranteed.
| |
|
| Society's Child |
|
Rory
The Daily Coin 2015-02-18 18:58:00
Recently I interviewed Rob Richardson from Off Grid Survival. One of the main topics we explored was the out-of-control police state in this country and the impact it is having on our neighborhoods and psyche. In doing the research for that interview I came across several very disturbing articles regarding SWAT attacks perpetrated against citizens. Most of the situations did not call for a SWAT attack. Believe it or not a lot of the alarms were sounded by disgruntled gamers! Yes, one person sitting at home playing a video game and calling the police, telling them a story that may or may not be true and the police's response is to send out a SWAT team to investigate! It appears the police officers in this country should be held up as the reason for gun control. On the one hand we have Moms demanding gun control like it's the ordinary law abiding citizen that is the problem when they should be, in fact, looking at the local police department and demanding action. The police, as the awake and aware have known for some time, are completely out of control. No need to revisit any of the recent high-profile murders at the hands of the local police. Instead lets review what other criminal, murderous activities the gangs in blue have been conducting. | |
Comment: Who's the real danger?
| |
|
|
Ivan Karogodin
Fort Russ 2015-02-18 19:29:00
Translator's note: The columnist leaves the letter-writer anonymous, for obvious reasons, and thus gives us the point of view that any one of the thousands of men aged 25 to 60 might have, who have been given their notification. The jail time prescribed for draft-evasion is five years. On January 24, 2015, the Ukrainian Defense Ministry revealed that 7,500 were facing criminal charges. The author might be one of them -- if they caught him. I'm just an ordinary Kievan. No draft dodger, and I'm no fan of Putin. A call has come from the War Commissariat. Here is a simple question for the president of Ukraine: Why should I go to war? Have we declared war? No. Are we at war with Russia? No. Are we in an undeclared war with Russia? But then, why are Poroshenko and Putin shaking hands? That is, between the two, all is super, but I, I should sort out it with the separatists, about who gets to come back home, and who doesn't? Maybe it's a civil war? But then, why is there no declaration? Why no state of war? No state of emergency? Is it because then the IMF wouldn't give any loans? Well screw this! What is it to me if the loans come in or not? 90% of them will just go to cover the interest on loans already taken. As far as I'm concerned, screw it! Maybe they'll use the loans to buy natural gas? No. Meaning my family is going to freeze this winter while I have to go fight? | |
Comment: There has been a groundswell of refusal building in Ukraine since this article was originally published.
| |
|
|
The Hindu
2015-02-21 19:16:00
Kandhar: Staff at a branch of Afghanistan's central bank in southern Kandahar province may have got away with as much as 81 million Afghanis ($1.4 million) when they robbed their own bank and ran, an official said on Saturday. Security cameras showed the bank's vault had been cleaned out, but investigators were waiting to gain access before confirming the total missing, he said. "Yesterday we could only open one of the treasury's doors. We hope to open the next one today," the central bank director for Afghanistan's southwestern region, Fazel Ahmad Azimi, said. Weak regulation undermines confidence in Afghanistan's fragile banking system, which has yet to fully recover from a 2010 scandal over a bank that collapsed triggering a financial crisis. An international financial watchdog last year threatened to place Afghanistan on a blacklist and has since warned it needs to do more to enforce laws to regulate its banking sector. The Kandahar raid is believed to have been carried out by a senior official at the bank, an employee of nine years, with the help of his son and brother-in-law who were also on staff, according to Azimi. The robbery at the branch in Spin Boldak near the border with Pakistan was discovered on Thursday and investigators believed the group has escaped to Pakistan. The group had removed CCTV recordings before fleeing to Pakistan, Azimi said, but investigators were hopeful that footage might be recovered from the memory chip of the security cameras. Source: Reuters | |
|
|
Ellen Brown
Web of Debt 2015-02-20 00:00:00
Remember when Goldman Sachs - dubbed by Matt Taibbi the Vampire Squid - sold derivatives to Greece so the government could conceal its debt, then bet against that debt, driving it up? It seems that the ubiquitous investment bank has also put the squeeze on California and its school districts. Not that Goldman was alone in this; but the unscrupulous practices of the bank once called theundisputed king of the municipal bond business epitomize the culture of greed that has ensnared students and future generations in unrepayable debt. In 2008, after collecting millions of dollars in fees to help California sell its bonds, Goldman urged its bigger clients to place investment bets against those bonds, in order to profit from a financial crisis that was sparked in the first place by irresponsible Wall Street speculation. Alarmed California officials warned that these short sales would jeopardize the state's bond rating and drive up interest rates. But that result also served Goldman, which had sold credit default swaps on the bonds, since the price of the swaps rose along with the risk of default. | |
Comment: The predatory tactics of these investment bankers and their clients have reduced millions to debt servitude, as there is no way for many to repay. Generations are being impoverished and due to the highly profitable prison industrial complex, a system of debtors prisons has arisen aspoverty has become a crime.
| |
|
|
Sputnik
2015-02-21 17:03:00
Belgian weekly Le Vif spoke with Serbian filmmaker Emir Kusturica who said that the Ukrainian conflict was staged by the United States and it reminds him of the war in his native Bosnia. On the occasion of the release of his new collection of short films, Emir Kusturica, a celebrated Serbian filmmaker internationally recognized for a number of acclaimed films, spoke with Belgian weekly Le Vif about the situation in Ukraine, which reminds him of the wars in the former Yugoslavia. Kusturica blamed the United States for not only breaking the promise given to Mikhail Gorbachev about not expanding NATO to Eastern Europe, but also for staging the conflict in Ukraine by helping to start demonstrations on the Maidan Square. Kusturica said the beginning of the Ukrainian conflict was similar to the start of the Bosnian War, which started in Kusturica's hometown of Sarajevo. In Kiev, demonstrations turned violent when snipers started shooting at the crowd. Initially, the government of Viktor Yanukovych was blamed for shooting at the crowd; however, soon the story became murky, after reports appeared that foreign mercenaries may have been hired to shoot at the crowd on the Maidan. Similar events took place in Bosnia: unknown snipers killed several protesters and everyone accused the Serbs, but in the end nobody really knew who had sent the snipers, Kusturica said. | |
|
|
RT
2015-02-21 14:44:00
A massive blaze has engulfed the 'Marina Torch' skyscraper in Dubai, forcing hundreds of people to flee the 336-meter-high tower - one of the tallest residential buildings in the world. It took firefighters over two hours to bring the fire under control. The fire initially started in the middle of the tower, rapidly spreading across some 15 floors, intensifying and reigniting with each gust of wind, according to photos and videos from the scene.
| ||
Comment: What, the building didn't collapse into its own footprint at freefall speed?
| ||
|
|
Joshua Krause
Strange Danger 2015-02-15 23:55:00
If you take a look through history, you'll see the rise and fall of numerous civilizations. Many armchair historians are quick to point to these examples, and say their decline was caused by drought, or war, or economic collapse. But the truth is, it's never just one disaster that causes their collapse. It's often a series of problems that compound and feed each other, begetting more calamities until the system buckles. It's easy to notice these sorts of conditions being inflicted on America today, but I think the best example in the Western Hemisphere is probably Brazil. Right now they're going through one of the worst droughts in history, and if current rates of consumption continue, cities like Sao Paulo may be out of water in 4-6 months. After three straight years of drought, there's even talk of rationing the water to such an extreme degree, that they'll have to shut off the municipal supply to the public for 5 days a week. | |
|
|
ITAR-TASS
2015-02-20 23:50:00
The death toll from the current Ebola outbreak has reached 9,442. As many as 23,371 are infected, the World Health Organization (WHO) said in a statement on Friday. These cases were reported from Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. In line with statistics, the maximum number of Ebola-related deaths and cases has been registered in Liberia — 3,947 cumulative deaths and 9,096 cumulative cases. Liberia is followed by Sierra Leone (3,423 deaths and 11,155 cases) and Guinea (2,072 deaths and 3,120 cases). The number of Ebola deaths in these three countries rose by 189 and the number of cases rose by 372 since February 13. Separate cases have also been registered in Mali, Nigeria, Senegal, Spain, Great Britain and the United States. In most of these countries the number of Ebola-related cases does not exceed ten, with the only exception of Nigeria, where 20 people are infected by Ebola virus and eight have died. The World Health Organization describes Ebola virus disease (formerly known as Ebola haemorrhagic fever) as "a severe, often fatal illness, with a case fatality rate of up to 90%." Symptoms include sudden onset of fever, intense weakness, muscle pain, headache and sore throat. This is followed by vomiting, diarrhoea, rash, impaired kidney and liver function, and in some cases, both internal and external bleeding. The infection is transmitted by direct contact with the blood, body fluids and tissues of infected animals or people. People are infectious as long as their blood and secretions contain the virus. The incubation period is 2 to 21 days. There is no known cure or vaccine for the disease. The only treatment offered is "supportive intensive care." | |
|
| Secret History |
In 1999, the U.S. national security state — which has been involved throughout the world in subversion, sabotage, terrorism, torture, drug trafficking, and death squads — launched round-the-clock aerial attacks against Yugoslavia for 78 days, dropping 20,000 tons of bombs and killing thousands of women, children, and men. All this was done out of humanitarian concern for Albanians in Kosovo. Or so we were asked to believe. In the span of a few months, President Clinton bombed four countries: Sudan, Afghanistan, Iraq repeatedly, and Yugoslavia massively. At the same time, the U.S. was involved in proxy wars in Angola, Mexico (Chiapas), Colombia, East Timor, and various other places. And U.S. forces are deployed on every continent and ocean, with some 300 major overseas support bases — all in the name of peace, democracy, national security, and humanitarianism. While showing themselves ready and willing to bomb Yugoslavia on behalf of an ostensibly oppressed minority in Kosovo, U.S. leaders have made no moves against the Czech Republic for its mistreatment of the Romany people (gypsies), or Britain for oppressing the Catholic minority in Northern Ireland, or the Hutu for the mass murder of a half million Tutsi in Rwanda — not to mention the French who were complicit in that massacre. Nor have U.S. leaders considered launching "humanitarian bombings" against the Turkish people for what their leaders have done to the Kurds, or the Indonesian people because their generals killed over 200,000 East Timorese and were continuing such slaughter through the summer of 1999, or the Guatemalans for the Guatemalan military's systematic extermination of tens of thousands of Mayan villagers. In such cases, U.S. leaders not only tolerated such atrocities but were actively complicit with the perpetrators — who usually happened to be faithful client-state allies dedicated to helping Washington make the world safe for the Fortune 500. Why then did U.S. leaders wage an unrestrainedly murderous assault upon Yugoslavia? | |
|
|
Owen Jarus
LiveScience 2015-02-19 13:14:00
Three shrines, dating back about 3,300 years, have been discovered within a hilltop fortress at Gegharot, in Armenia. Local rulers at the time likely used the shrines for divination, a practice aimed at predicting the future, the archaeologists involved in the discovery say. Each of the three shrines consists of a single room holding a clay basin filled with ash and ceramic vessels. A wide variety of artifacts were discovered including clay idols with horns, stamp seals, censers used to burn substances and a vast amount of animal bones with markings on them. During divination practices, the rulers and diviners may have burnt some form of substances and drank wine, allowing them to experience "altered" states of mind, the archaeologists say. | |
|
|
Aaron Deter-Wolf
RedOrbit 2015-02-20 01:53:00
A new study examining Neanderthal teeth from Western Europe suggests that there was a division of labor between males and females. The study was conducted by members of the Department of Paleobiology at the Spanish Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales and published online this month in the Journal of Human Evolution. Although Neanderthals were once thought to be less intelligent, adaptable, and creative than modern humans, recent studies have significantly changed the understanding of our Ice Age cousins. We now know that Neanderthals had the capability for complex speech, controlled fire, created a variety of sophisticated bone and stone tools, wore clothing, decorated their bodies with shells and pigment, and may have created art. In addition, they were culturally and physically similar enough to the first modern humans in Europe that the two groups exchanged genetic material on multiple occasions beginning around 50,000 - 60,0000 years ago. | |
|
| Science & Technology |
|
Tim Cushing
techdirt 2015-02-19 18:23:00
Nothing's driving the acquisition of data faster than, well, driving. As new technology makes its way into vehicles, so does the apparent desire to harvest information about the vehicle itself. Between the outside harvesting (automatic plate readers that gather plate/location data, as well as photos of vehicle occupants) and the "inside" transmissions, there's very little any number of unknown entities won't know about a person's driving habits. And that's not even including what's transmitted and collected by drivers' omnipresent smartphones and their installed apps. Sen. Edward Markey has expressed some alarm at the amount of data being collected (and distributed) by vehicle manufacturers. His office has produced a report [pdf link] showing that while many manufacturers are involved in collecting data, very few of them seem concerned about the attendant risks. Even worse, many respondents to his office's questionnaire seem to show very little understanding of the underlying technology and most have not made an effort to fully inform customers as to how much is being collected or how it's being distributed. Drivers of today's connected cars aren't going to like the report's findings. Nearly 100% of cars on the market include wireless technologies that could pose vulnerabilities to hacking or privacy intrusions. | |
Comment: Smart cars. Smart phones. Smart meters. Smart homes. Too bad we're so dumb about our privacy.
| |
|
|
Gary Boyle
Sott.net 2015-02-21 14:50:00
On February 2nd, an explosion at an substation in Michigan caused widespread power outages across the city. A lot of attention was given to the subsequent light beam. Although quite spectacular to observe, such light pillars or crepuscular rays have a rational explanation. Yet could there be something more to the story? In Earth Changes and the Human-Cosmic Connection, Pierre Lescaudron presents the possibility that certain types of buildings or factories can act as attractors for dramatic electrical discharges, possibly 'sparked' - via electrical discharges 'at a distance' - by incoming comet fragments or meteors, or unusual atmospheric conditions producing strong lightning strikes and even 'invisible' discharges. If you're following SOTT.net, you'll know just how common meteor fireballs are these days, and how strong the likelihood is that they are starting to cause serious damage... 'Was the West Texas explosion a meteorite impact?' Perhaps such 'sparking' is also responsible for some other recent infrastructure explosions, which seem to be occurring with increased regularity, such as the 200 manhole explosions in New York, oil refinery explosions in California and Ohio, a fuel truck explosion in Mexico, the West Virginiapipeline explosion and household gas explosions. Probably most of these incidents, but not necessarily all, have a conventional cause of ignition. | |
|
|
RT
2015-02-21 17:41:00
Researchers have found out it is possible to track someone's mobile phone by looking at how much battery has been used. The data does not need the users' permission to be shared, while it can help track a phone with up to 90 percent accuracy. The findings were carried out by a group of researchers at Stanford University and the Israeli defense company Rafael. They created a technique, which they have named PowerSpy and can gather information concerning the location of Android phones. It does this by simply tracking how much power has been used over a certain time. How much power is used depends on a number of factors. For example, the further away the phone is from a transmitter, the more power is needed to get a signal. Physical objects such as mountains or buildings also have an impact on the amount of battery needed as these obstacles can block the phone's signal, meaning there are temporary 'power drains' on the devices. "A sufficiently long power measurement (several minutes) enables the learning algorithm to 'see' through the noise," the researchers said, which was reported by Wired. "We show that measuring the phone's aggregate power consumption over time completely reveals the phone's location and movement." | |
Comment: There just seems to be no way around it; use a cell phone and know that you can be tracked.
| |
|
|
SpaceWeather
2015-02-20 01:31:00
Astronomers are puzzling over a comet that passed "insanely close" to the sun on Feb. 19th. At first glance it appeared to be a small object, not much bigger than a comet-boulder, doomed to disintegrate in the fierce heat. Instead, it has emerged apparently intact and is actually brightening as it recedes from the sun. Unofficially, the icy visitor is being called "SOHO-2875," because it is SOHO's 2,875th comet discovery. Karl Battams of the Naval Research Lab explains what's odd about SOHO-2875: "It's a 'non-group comet,' meaning that it does not appear to be related to any other comet or comet family that we have on record." | |
Comment: How many more times do they have to witness this before they realize the electric nature of ROCKY comets???
Comets are just electrically-glowing asteroids!!! In addition, a cometary body's size is a relatively insignificant factor in determining how brightly it will shine, and when and where it will shine. | |
|
|
RT
2015-02-19 22:47:00
Russia is entering the post-Snowden world with style. Its own anti-surveillance smartphone prototype, equipped with the latest in cutting-edge cybersecurity and intended for corporate users, is currently being tested. This is not Russia's first foray into smartphones, with the dual-screen YotaPhone making headlines recently with its second incarnation. However, the new project will offer unparalleled, corporate-level securit, when ready. The current version is a prototype and any photos are kept in strict secret. Called the TaigaPhone, the phone will be manufactured by Taiga Systems, 99 percent of which belongs to Natalya Kasperskaya, owner of the InfoWatch group. The device will synergize with other tools provided by the company to its high-profile clients. According to Izvestia daily, things like photos and work-related files, as well as phone conversations and metadata will not "leak" without the user's consent, according to Taiga Systems co-owner Aleksey Nagorny. "The device is entirely our own - the design, the schematics and circuitry. The phone will be manufactured in China," he said. The company used Android's base for the creation of its own Taiga operating system. Inventing one from scratch was too costly and cumbersome. But the system will also contain several levels of cyber defense, chief among them the ability to completely disable or enable select parts of the system. Nagorny mentioned the camera, as well as location services. | |
|
| Earth Changes |
|
Sean O'Kane
The Verge 2015-02-21 22:45:00
If you're reading this from anywhere in the United States right now, there's a pretty good chance it's cold outside. We're in the middle of a massive freeze that could last until March, the breadth of which NASA's Terra satellite just captured in the remarkable view you see above. See all that territory blanketed in white? That's snow. It's not cloud patterns, or a representation of wind currents, just a bunch of frozen water atop even colder ground. | |
|
|
Chris Dolce and Nick Witgen
Hundreds of daily record lows and at least three all-time record lows have been set as a frigid air mass with a connection to Siberia grips the central and eastern United States with dangerously cold conditions. Friday morning brought the most widespread and intense cold of the winter to many areas, sending temperatures into the 30s below zero as far south as Kentucky.Weather.com 2015-02-21 09:41:00
The cities plotted on this map have recently recorded their lowest temperatures for any date in at least 10 years. Lynchburg, Virginia, plummeted to 11 below zero Friday morning, setting a new all-time record low for any day of the year. The previous record was 10 below zero on Jan. 21, 1985, and Feb. 5, 1996. Impressively, Lynchburg's temperature records go all the way back to 1893. Flint, Michigan, tied its all-time record low of 25 below zero, originally set Jan. 18, 1976. Weather records in Flint began in 1921. Earlier this week Erie, Pennsylvania, had tied its all-time record low when it reached 18 below zero Monday. That tied the record set Jan. 19, 1994. Not far away, Jamestown, New York, set an all-time record low of 31 below zero Tuesday, though its records only go back to 1960. At least 72 daily record lows were set Friday morning from Connecticut to Florida to as far west as Indiana, including major cities such as New York, Baltimore, Washington, Pittsburgh, Atlanta, Charlotte, Miami, Detroit and Cincinnati. According to NOAA's National Climatic Data Center, 647 record lows were tied or broken Sunday through Thursday. This figure includes not only major airport reporting stations, but also smaller cooperative observation sites in rural areas. More Friday Morning Records All-time February record lows: Cleveland has broken its all-time record low for the month of February, reaching 17 below zero. The previous February record was minus 16 on Feb. 10, 1899, in the nation's worst arctic outbreak in modern memory. It is also Cleveland's coldest day since Jan. 19, 1994, when the city set its all-time record of 20 below zero. | |
|
Animal rescue workers in southern Ontario are struggling to keep up with an influx of injured grebes, a species of waterbird that's fast running out of splashdown spots as the Great Lakes freeze over. Grebes are smaller cousins to the loon, and spend their entire lives in the air or on the water. But with more than 80 per cent of the Great Lakes covered in ice, grebes are having a tough time finding open water to land in during Ontario's deep freeze. That's forced some grebes to touch down on solid ground, where they lack the ability to walk or take flight again. "If the grebes land on land, they're dead," said Gail Lenters, who operates the Shades of Hope Wildlife Refuge, located north of Toronto, near Lake Simcoe.
| ||
Comment: It appears to shaping up to be a re-run of last years' mass avian die-off (due to the extreme cold and extensive ice cover), see these March, 2014 reports:
Hundreds of ducks found dead around Great Lakes due to ice cover 10 Fold increase in the number of dying water birds rescued in Toronto due to extreme cold Death toll of waterbirds on frozen Lake Erie likely to number tens of thousands | ||
|
A pair of Michigan photographers captured photos and video of intricate sand structures created by the wind eroding frozen sand at a beach. Joshua Nowicki, 35, said he spotted the 12-inch-tall structures on Silver Beach in St. Joseph on Valentine's Day and decided to photograph the "sand towers" to make up for missing an opportunity to capture images of similar structures he discovered on a beach about three years ago. Nowicki captured several images and a short video showing off the structures.
| ||
|
|
BBC
2015-02-20 18:57:00
A rare cold front swept through the middle east on Thursday and Friday, blanketing parts of Israel, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon with snow. Roads in and out of Jerusalem were closed and streets deserted in the Jordanian capital of Amman. The snow covered large swathes of desert, and Jerusalem's famous western wall and Bethlehem's nativity church were sprinkled with white. The Syrian capital Damascus and surrounding mountains also got snow, while a snowstorm in neighbouring Lebanon closed most mountain roads, isolating villages.
| ||
|
|
cbslocal.com
2015-02-20 18:13:00
A Costa Mesa couple was attacked by their own pit bull Friday evening, authorities said. The couple was driving their pit bull through a shopping center in Costa Mesa on their way to Huntington Beach when the dog turned on them. Authorities said the couple both sustained serious injuries. Witnesses said both were bitten repeatedly in the arms. The attack occurred just before 7 p.m. in the 1100 block of Victoria Street. The husband was driving, his wife was a passenger. They said the dog attacked inexplicably. | |
|
|
Brian Kahn
Discovery News 2015-02-20 22:45:00
It may have felt too cold on Friday in much of the East to even think of walking outside. But since drones don't feel cold, why not fly one over a mostly frozen Niagara Falls? That's exactly what Canadian videographer Brent Foster did on Friday. The results were spectacular. Raise your cup of hot chocolate (or iced tea, if you're out West) to Foster, who told Slate's Eric Holthaus about stepping into the frozen icescape to guide his drone and film the video. | |
|
|
Sam Webb
Daily Mirror, UK 2015-02-20 15:35:00
These incredible pictures show New York's iconic Hudson river frozen over as a cold snap continues to grip the U.S. east coast. In some places the 120-mile long river is coated in ice 1.5ft thick, forcing the authorities to deploy icebreakers. But while these pictures may be beautiful, behind these images is a stark reality.
The Hudson transports 70 per cent of the home heating oil in the north-east of the country - a concern when large swathes of that area are dealing with sub zero temperatures. In New York City, 2C was recorded in Central Park today, but wind gusts made it feel like -15.
| |||
|
|
myfoxny.com
2015-02-21 15:31:00
The arctic conditions have turned a fountain at a state park in western New York into a five-story-tall "ice volcano." The pressure-fed fountain is in a pond near the Glen Iris Inn at Letchworth State Park, which straddles the Wyoming-Livingston county line 40 miles south of Rochester. Days of subzero temperatures have formed a solid cone of ice several feet thick with water still spouting out of the top. Park officials tell local media that the formation dubbed an ice volcano is at least 50 feet high. | |
|
|
USGS
2015-02-21 15:22:00
Event Time
| |
|
|
The Shields Gazette, UK
2015-02-20 18:37:00
A loud noise heard over South Shields has caused mystery and worry among residents. The noise heard in Jarrow has been likened to a jet aeroplane flying over head but it is not known what it is or where it is coming from. Mary Finnigan, of Beverley Court, Jarrow, said lots of people have been talking about the strange sound since it started to be heard from lunchtime on Friday. Mrs Finnigan said: "It reaches a crescendo and is quite frightening really. "I've tried to get information from various people but no-one seems to know what it is. "Many people have been looking to the skies. It sounds as though a plane suddenly flies over. "It has caused some anxiety." Mrs Finnigan has contacted Rohm & Haas chemical factory, and Tedco enterprise agency to try and find out what it may be but to no avail. She added: "I've never experienced this level of noise having lived here for over 30 years." Do you know what the noise is? | |
|
| Fire in the Sky |
No new articles.
|
| Health & Wellness |
|
Christopher Wanjek
Live Science 2015-02-17 04:02:00
Your mother's DNA may have determined your eye color, but some traits that you thought came from her may instead have come from the DNA of bacteria she passed on to you soon after birth, a new study finds. The study found that a mother mouse can pass along to her offspring a susceptibility to intestinal disorders, such as inflammatory bowel disease, by way of a gut-residing bacterium calledSutterella, the researchers reported in the journal Nature. Scientists have long speculated that a mother can transfer beneficial bacteria to her offspring through the birthing process and then through breast-feeding and kissing. These myriad bacteria species quickly spread and cover an infant's skin, mouth and digestive tract.
This new finding, however, is the first identification of a specific trait that an offspring can inherit — in this case, a deficiency of a blood protein called immunoglobulin A, or IgA, which is the source of the bowel condition — caused by a specific bacterium that can be transferred from the mother to her offspring. IgA helps the body fight infection. "The implications for mouse experiments are profound, and could help us cut through some persistent sources of confusion," in genetic research, said Dr. Thaddeus Stappenbeck, an immunologist at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and a co-author of the new study. Until now, most doctors have thought that IgA deficiency, seen in people with diseases such as chronic diarrhea, Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis, is primarily hereditary, meaning the deficiency is inherited through one's genes. The new finding suggests that bacterial forces transmitted from mother to infant also are at play, perhaps to a significant extent. | ||
Comment: The colon harbors one of the densest microbial communities on the planet. For every human cell in your body, there are roughly 10 single-celled microbes, most of which live in the digestive tract. There are upwards of 5,600 separate species or strains feeding off the food we send to our stomachs, fine-tuning our immune systems, producing nutrients such as vitamin K and eating up our waste to prevent pathogens from taking over. When we take antibiotics, we reduce the resident beneficial bacterial population and increase out chances of gaining antibiotic-resistant strains of harmful bacteria.
| ||
|
|
Jenny Hope
Daily Mail 2015-02-21 13:40:00
The benefits of taking statins have been exaggerated, two leading experts claim. They say the cholesterol-lowering medicines - hailed as miracle drugs when they hit the market 20 years ago - are not as safe or effective at preventing heart attacks as patients have been led to believe. Although they can dramatically cut cholesterol levels, they have 'failed to substantially improve cardiovascular outcomes', says an analysis of data in clinical trials. It was carried out by Dr David Diamond, a professor of molecular pharmacology at the University of South Florida, and expert in cardiovascular disease Dr Uffe Ravnskov. They say many studies touting statins' efficacy have failed to note serious side effects. They also claim 'statistical deception' has been used to make inflated claims about their effectiveness, which has misled the public. The two authors say in the analysis, published in the Expert Review of Clinical Pharmacology: 'The adverse effects suffered by people taking statins are more common than reported in the media and at medical conferences. | |
Comment: It is encouraging that more doctors are exposing this fraud and that the information is finally getting traction in the mainstream press. This coupled with the recent acknowledgements that the demonization of cholesterol has been completely unjustified, may finally dispel the myths that have persisted for decades. However, don't expect BigPharma to roll over without a fight. As with thevaccine madness, the industry will use every tactic necessary to protect their profits. Don't be fooled:
| |
|
|
Anneta Konstantinides
Daily Mail 2015-02-21 00:09:00
A Kansas man who fell sick after a tick bite and died 11 days later was killed by a newly discovered virus that has never before been seen in America. The man, who was previously healthy and in his 50s, became ill after receiving a tick bite while doing work on his property outdoors. Although he was treated with antibiotics, his organs eventually failed and he lost the ability to breathe on his own. Researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention investigated the man's blood and found he had been infected by a previously unidentified virus that belonged to the thogotoviruses group, which had never before caused human illness in the U.S. The CDC has named the virus 'Bourbon', after the man's county, according to USA Today. Before the Kansas man, there had only been eight incidents in which a strain of the thogotovirus had caused symptoms in humans - and they all occurred in Europe, Asia or Africa. This is the first time the CDC has seen a thogotovirus affect blood cells. When he was initially tested, the Kansas man's symptoms were similar to a bacterial illness transmitted by ticks. His white blood cells and platelets, which respectively fight infections and help the blood clot, were in decline. In contrast, thogotoviruses are known to cause meningitis. | |
|
|
Erin Parke
ABC News 2015-02-18 07:54:00
A spike in cases of a deadly bat virus in some parts of Australia's north has sparked concern, with dying animals being found in the streets close to schools and childcare centres. Australian bat lyssavirus is similar to rabies, causing a rapid death if passed from an animal to a human. In recent months, it has been detected in 11 bats in the West Australian town of Broome in the Kimberley region. Prior to that, there had been only two cases identified in Western Australia in a decade. There has also been an increase in sick bats being found in Queensland.
Comment: The Lyssavirus is classified as a zoonotic infection. Zoonnoses are diseases that normally exist in animals but have the potential to transmit to humans. They can be caused by many different infectious agents including bacteria, fungi and viruses. Examples include anthrax, tuberculosis, plague, yellow fever and influenza. SARS virus, Hendra virus, Ebola and Marburg viruses and the SARI virus emerged from bats to humans. For viruses like Rabies and West Nile virus, humans are "dead-end" hosts (no human-to human transmission). Senior Public Health nurse Ashley Eastwood is based in Broome and has been monitoring the numbers. "In 2014, we became aware that something was happening in the bat colony with these cases popping up," she said. "We don't know exactly what's caused it. There are investigations going on through the Department of Parks and Wildlife, and the Department of Agriculture, wondering what's actually going on in the colony. There's been speculation perhaps lots of fires around last year, there's a particularly hot season, and that could be disturbing that colony." Human infections occurred in Australia in 1996, 1998, and 2013 and proved fatal. | ||
Comment: The newly emerging Australian Bat Lyssavirus in a captive juvenile black flying fox exhibited progressive neurologic signs, including sudden aggression, vocalization, dysphagia, and paresis over 9 days and then died. This virus is considered endemic in Australian bat populations and causes a neurological disease in people indistinguishable from clinical rabies. There are two distant variants of ABLV, one that circulates in frugivorous bats (genus Pteropus) and the other in insectivorous microbats (genus Saccolaimus). Three fatal human cases of ABLV infection have been reported and each manifested as acute encephalitis but with variable incubation periods. Importantly, two equine cases arose in 2013, the first occurrence of ABLV in a species other than bats or humans.
| ||
|
|
Christopher Byron
The Fix 2015-02-09 00:58:00
Doctors are doling Klonopin out like candy, causing a surge of hellish withdrawals, overdoses and deaths. You could argue that the deadliest "drug" in the world is the venom from a jellyfish known as the Sea Wasp, whose sting can kill a human being in four minutes—up to 100 humans at a time. Potassium chloride, which is used to trigger cardiac arrest and death in the 38 states of the U.S. that enforce the death penalty is also pretty deadly . But when it comes to prescription drugs that are not only able to kill you but can drag out the final reckoning for years on end, with worsening misery at every step of the way, it is hard to top the benzodiazepines. And no "benzo" has been more lethal to millions of Americans than a popular prescription drug called Klonopin. Klonopin is the brand name for the pill known as clonazepam, which was originally brought to market in 1975 as a medication for epileptic seizures. Since then, Klonopin, along with the other drugs in this class, has become a prescription of choice for drug abusers from Hollywood to Wall Street. In the process, these Schedule III and IV substances have also earned the dubious distinction of being second only to opioid painkillers like OxyContin as our nation's most widely abused class of drug. | |
|
|
Ethan Huff
Global Research 2015-02-16 00:26:00
Hell hath no fury like a vaccine zealot during a disease outbreak, with this latest Disneyland measles fiasco a perfect case-in-point. While the corporate media foams violently at the mouth over a few children, some vaccinated, who allegedly contracted measles at Disneyland because not everyone chooses to vaccinate — one hate-filled report from a major news outlet has actually called for parents who oppose vaccinations to be jailed — the level-headed, rational segments of society will recall that many earlier measles outbreaks occurred among fully vaccinated groups of people, debunking the official myth that vaccines provide protection against disease. In 1987, for example, a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) documented a measles outbreak that occurred in Corpus Christi, Texas, in the spring of 1985. Fourteen adolescent-age students, all of whom had been vaccinated for measles, contracted the disease despite having been injected with the MMR vaccine. Researchers noted that more than 99 percent of students at the school — basically all of them — had also been vaccinated, with more than 95 percent of them showing detectable antibodies to measles. | |
Comment: More documentation on the 'measles hysteria'
| |
|
|
Melissa Kravitz
Alternet 2015-02-11 23:02:00
Fat does not make you fat, and other interesting facts about long-vilified foods. Fat is back! Non-fat, low-fat and quasi-fat products have been substituted in our food for so long, it's sometimes hard to remember what fat actually tastes like. Studies have shown that eating fat does not in fact, make a person fat. In her 2014 book The Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat and Cheese belong in a Healthy Diet, journalist Nina Teicholz argues that carbohydrates and sugar are the most dangerous ingredients in the modern American diet, causing obesity. Think you're a fat expert? Here are five things you should know about fat. | |
Comment: The author clearly left out the best source of Saturated Fats: Animal Fats! Read the following articles to learn more:
| |
|
| Science of the Spirit |
|
Scott Bonn, Ph.D.
Psychology Today 2015-01-22 23:50:00
Many forensic psychologists, psychiatrists and criminologists use the terms sociopathy and psychopathy interchangeably. Leading experts disagree on whether there are meaningful differences between the two conditions. I contend that there are clear and significant distinctions between them. The fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), released by the American Psychiatric Association in 2013, lists both sociopathy and psychopathy under the heading of Antisocial Personality Disorders (ASPD). These disorders share many common behavioral traits which lead to the confusion between them. Key traits that sociopaths and psychopaths share include: In addition to their commonalities, sociopaths and psychopaths also have their own unique behavioral characteristics, as well. Sociopaths tend to be nervous and easily agitated. They are volatile and prone to emotional outbursts, including fits of rage. They are likely to be uneducated and live on the fringes of society, unable to hold down a steady job or stay in one place for very long. It is difficult but not impossible for sociopaths to form attachments with others. Many sociopaths are able to form an attachment to a particular individual or group, although they have no regard for society in general or its rules. In the eyes of others, sociopaths will appear to be very disturbed. Any crimes committed by a sociopath, including murder, will tend to be haphazard, disorganized and spontaneous rather than planned. Psychopaths, on the other hand, are unable to form emotional attachments or feel real empathy with others, although they often have disarming or even charming personalities. Psychopaths are very manipulative and can easily gain people's trust. They learn to mimic emotions, despite their inability to actually feel them, and will appear normal to unsuspecting people.Psychopaths are often well educated and hold steady jobs. Some are so good at manipulation and mimicry that they have families and other long-term relationships without those around them ever suspecting their true nature. | |
Comment: Psychopathy is untreatable. According to the experts, they are politicians, judges, church leaders, doctors, even teachers. To understand the suffering caused worldwide by these human-like beings, see:
| |
|
|
Joshua Krause
Ready Nutrition 2015-02-18 14:34:00
They always know how to get what they want from you. They know your weaknesses better than anyone, even yourself. They can always turn a no into a yes, and they don't seem particularly concerned with laws, safety, or right and wrong. They're the most predatory members of our society, and they'll take what they want, and hang you out to dry. They're also a bit more complicated than all that. In recent years, the term "sociopath" has become a loaded word. Uttering it creates an immediate knee jerk response in the listener, and for anyone who doesn't have any real world experience with a sociopath, hearing that word probably brings to mind a barrage of Hollywood villains, cop shows, and serial killers. Unfortunately, the media's portrayal of this mental condition couldn't be further from the truth. | |
Comment: It's best to cut off all contact with the psychopath, but first one must know how to identify them. For more on sociopaths and psychopaths see:
| |
|
| High Strangeness |
No new articles.
|
| Don't Panic! Lighten Up! |
|
The Onion
2015-02-17 19:12:00
IRVING, TX—Hailing it as a rapidly replenishable and easily accessible fuel source, ExxonMobil revealed a lucrative new oil extraction method Friday that involves drilling directly into gas stations. "We've found nearly unlimited reserves of highly refined petroleum mere meters beneath thousands of service stations across the country," said ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson, noting that the company had already erected oil extraction rigs alongside pump islands in all 50 states. "As I speak, we're yielding 3 million barrels per day just by boring through a few thin layers of asphalt, concrete, and metal. And, amazingly enough, the supply seems to somehow refill itself every week." Tillerson went on to say that the company was exploring the possibility that there were still massive untapped sources of oil already in Americans' cars, as well as in their homes |
