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Press Gaggle by Press Secretary Jay Carney aboard Air Force One en route El Paso, TX
  Link to Article
  Source: White House.gov Press Office Feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 18:31
  The White House
  Office of the Press Secretary
  For Immediate Release
  August 31, 2012
  Aboard Air Force One
  En Route El Paso, Texas
  11:31 A.M. EDT
  MR. CARNEY: Thank you all for your patience. Thank you for joining us as we make our way to El Paso, Texas, where, as you know, the President will be meeting with -- first with troops and their families in a roundtable session. Then he will be addressing troops at Fort Bliss. As you know, two years ago, the President visited Fort Bliss and spoke about the commitment that he was fulfilling to end the war in Iraq. Two years ago today, the combat mission ended and full security was transferred over to Iraq security forces.
  What the President has always said, what he said then and what he has said since, and what he will say today is that our commitment to our military personnel and their families does not end when they return from war. It must continue. And we must serve our veterans at home as well as they served us abroad in Iraq and Afghanistan and elsewhere.
  As you probably are aware, this morning the President signed an executive order directing key federal departments to expand suicide prevention strategies and to take steps to meet the current and future demand for mental health and substance abuse treatment services for veterans, servicemembers, and their families. This executive order builds on steps this administration has already taken to treat the unseen wounds of war -- PTSD and Traumatic Brain Injury -- by increasing access to mental health treatment and to screening for those conditions.
  The EO strengthens suicide prevention efforts across the force and in the veteran community. It enhances access to mental health care by building partnerships between VA and community providers. It increases the number of VA mental health providers serving our veterans. It promotes mental health research and development of more effective treatment methodologies. And it will launch a government-wide collaborative effort to address these issues through a military and veterans mental health interagency task force.
  Q How much money are we talking about?
  MR. CARNEY: I will have to refer you to the VA for that. I believe this is being funded through existing resources. The priority here is to make sure that these unseen wounds of war are being diagnosed and treated, because that is our -- part of the commitment the President has made to our veterans who have served us so valiantly in Iraq and Afghanistan and elsewhere.
  Q Was this trip scheduled for the second anniversary of the announcement of the end of combat in Iraq?
  MR. CARNEY: I think it's significant that that anniversary coincides with this visit because it reinforces the point the President will make and has been making about extending our commitment to our military personnel and their families beyond their time in service. The war in Iraq is over. Members of our military have returned home to their families who served in Iraq. But our service to them cannot wane. And that's very important. And the anniversary of the end of the Iraq war is -- coincides with this as a way to reinforce that point.
  Q But it's a coincidence? It's not planned?
  MR. CARNEY: I think it's meant to reinforce that point, because we can't forget. It is -- obviously this country has been engaged in military conflicts now for more than 10 years abroad, since our first forces went into Afghanistan after September 11, 2001, and a tremendous number of men and women have served in those two countries.
  Q Has the President made any mention of the fact that Mitt Romney made no mention of Afghanistan in his acceptance speech last night?
  MR. CARNEY: He has not to me.
  If I could, I just have one more announcement. On Monday, the President will be visiting Louisiana and meeting with officials there who are dealing with --
  Q Who is he meeting with?
  MR. CARNEY: I'll have details for you later today about individuals -- but assessing the impact of hurricane and tropical storm Isaac, and making sure that unmet needs are being met and that the federal response led by FEMA is helping citizens in the affected areas, and the state and local officials who are responding to the storm.
  Q What will that mean for the Toledo and Cleveland visits?
  MR. CARNEY: I'll have a week ahead for you at the end of the briefing. But on Monday we will be going to Toledo for a campaign event, and then to Louisiana.
  Q You have seen that Governor Romney will go to Louisiana later today. Does the administration have any thoughts, and has President Obama said anything that you are aware of about whether this trip is too soon after the storm and could get in the way or be a distraction? That's something that the White House has said it is cognizant of as it plans the President's travel after disasters.
  MR. CARNEY: To answer your question about the President, no, he has not. But the broader question is one I think you would need to address to state and local officials. I just don't have any way to assess that.
  In terms of the President's travel, obviously when you're President of the United States, coordinating travel carries with it I think unique logistical challenges. And it was the assessment of the President's team, working with all the people involved in operations as well as people on the ground that Monday would be -- was a good day for the President to visit.
  Q Did he consider going today?
  MR. CARNEY: Obviously, as has been the case with previous natural disasters and other events similar to that, there are assessments being made all the time about whether the President should visit and when, and always the caveat is introduced that we want to make sure that we're not affecting response efforts.
  Q Had the decision to go to Louisiana on Monday been made before the White House learned that Mitt Romney would be going today?
  MR. CARNEY: Yes, it had.
  Q What can a private citizen do -- I mean, on his trip, Mr. Romney is going there today. What do you think a private citizen can really accomplish?
  MR. CARNEY: Well, I'm not sure how to answer that. I think that it's always important to draw attention to the fact that individuals and families and business owners are profoundly affected by storms like Isaac, and that's an important thing to do.
  Q Can you go back to Jackie's question about Afghanistan? What's the view from the White House about the fact that Governor Romney didn't mention it at all in his speech? And the only mention that I could find of the military was in the context of blaming President Obama for the fiscal cliff.
  MR. CARNEY: Well, I can simply speak for myself that I was surprised not to hear mention of the 70,000 men and women who are serving in Afghanistan, executing a mission that is profoundly important to America's national security in a conflict that was the direct result of an attack on the United States by al Qaeda.
  Q Did you say the current number on the ground is 70,000?
  MR. CARNEY: Yes, it's a rough estimate. I can get you more specifics, but I believe 70,000 is roughly the number of troops currently in Afghanistan.
  Q Jay, on Romney's speech last night, number one, did the President watch any of it at all?
  MR. CARNEY: I spoke with him this morning. He did not have an opportunity to watch any of the convention coverage last night. The only thing I would read into that is what I have been saying for the last several days that the President tends to consume his news the old-fashioned way, via print. And by that he means no disrespect to the professionals in the broadcast media business. But he's certainly aware of in general terms what was said.
  Q And can you give us a little bit of his reaction based on your talks with him this morning?
  MR. CARNEY: He's focused on the event today. There are few things he looks more forward to than meeting with troops, so an event like this is always one that he looks forward to. And he's very focused on the important work that we need to do to ensure that our veterans are being taken care of, especially, in this case, those who are suffering from the unseen wounds of war. And he's also, of course, anticipating his own opportunity next week, next Thursday, to speak at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte.
  Q Did he have any observations about Clint Eastwood's speech last night?
  MR. CARNEY: He did not. Or I have none to share with you.
  Q Can I ask a follow-up about that, and ask you whether you or the White House saw any inappropriate disrespect in some of the language and the sort of looking down at the empty chair to sort of characterize President Obama? Was that inappropriate? Did that cross the line?
  MR. CARNEY: I would refer you to the campaign, and I think some of my friends on the campaign have answered questions about this today. I caught it and I'm a huge fan and admirer of Clint Eastwood's work, both as a director and an actor. I wasn't quite sure what I was watching last night.
  Q Jay, any reaction -- oil prices are on the march again today, up, and they've been going up, as you know. Is there any assessment going on at the State Department or NSC or CEA concerning these prices and how far they need to go before the administration might do something?
  MR. CARNEY: Well, Roger, the administration is constantly monitoring the supply situation in the global oil market as well as the price movements in the global oil markets. That was something that was made clear at the G8. We do that with our international partners because this is an international economic issue.
  I don't have any announcements to make about assessments that have been made with regard to the current situation or options that may or may not be pursued.
  Q Do you happen to know how many people will be in the roundtable with the President and whether these are people who have suffered from PTSD or brain concussions or --
  MR. CARNEY: Let me get more information on that for you. I know we'll have it after, if not before. It is -- the focus of the roundtable is this issue of these unseen wounds of war, but I can't say at this point whether participants have all been affected by that or how many -- I'll have to check.
  Q In light of the visit to troops today, does the White House have any additional comment on the coverage of the autopen signatures and whether or not the President has used autopens to sign any letters for families of soldiers?
  MR. CARNEY: I think that was declaratively stated to be false yesterday. The President signs every such letter personally.
  Q Going back to Romney's speech last night -- what did the President think about his statement that he's thrown Israel under the bus?
  MR. CARNEY: I haven't spoken to the President, again, about -- or I don't have any assessments from the President to give you about any of the remarks at the convention in Tampa. I can simply say that, under President Obama, cooperation with Israel between our military and intelligence communities has never been closer, assistance provided to Israel by the United States has never been greater than it has been under President Obama. We have an extremely close relationship with Israel, which is appropriate given our unshakeable commitment to Israel's security.
  It is the President's firm commitment that we must prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. That is why in the beginning when he took office, he took steps to organize an international consensus -- a consensus of approbation directed at Iran and its refusal to abide by its international obligations, its refusal to affirmatively demonstrate that it will not pursue nuclear weapons. And that effort has resulted in the most severe sanctions regime ever levied against -- or leveled against a country in history, with greater international consensus on this issue than has ever existed.
  When President Obama took office, the world was divided on this issue, and Iran was united; the opposite is now true. The Iranian regime is under intense economic as well as political pressure, thanks to the efforts of the international community, led by the United States. It is the President's belief that the best way to ensure that Iran does not acquire a nuclear weapon is to achieve that goal through a diplomatic solution and a choice by Iran to forgo its nuclear ambition.
  The opportunity to achieve that goal remains available, that window remains open. But it is absolutely the case that that window will not remain open indefinitely.
  Q Jay, Mr. Bernanke said this morning out in Jackson Hole, he said that unless the economy grows more quickly than it has recently, unemployment is going to remain high "for some time." Do you folks at the White House share that view?
  MR. CARNEY: I have no comment on the Fed Chairman's remarks. I can tell you that this President and this administration is focused on the efforts we need to engage in to help the economy grow, to help it create more jobs. That includes the President's insistence that Congress take action to put what outside economists say would be a million or more Americans back to work -- teachers and firefighters, police officers and construction workers -- a proposal that the President put before Congress in September of last year as part of the American Jobs Act. But because of their insistence that millionaires and billionaires should have another tax cut, unfortunately, Republicans in Congress have thus far blocked that legislation.
  He will -- the President will continue to press Congress to take action. And he will continue to do everything he can administratively -- working around Congress -- to help our economy grow, to assist the middle class and provide it more security, whether it's through actions he has taken to help homeowners who have underwater mortgages refinance their homes at these historically low interest rates, actions he took by pressuring Congress to allow, I believe, more than 7 million American students to continue to enjoy low interest rates on their student loans so that they could stay in school. These are the kinds of things that the President will continue to press forward on.
  Guys got anything else? Come on, there's got to be something else. No?
  Q Week ahead?
  MR. CARNEY: The week ahead. On Monday, the President will travel to Toledo, Ohio, as Jackie Calmes noted, for a campaign event. The President will then travel to Louisiana and meet with a variety of people there as he is briefed on and updated on the impacts of hurricane and tropical storm Isaac.
  Q Will he go to New Orleans?
  MR. CARNEY: I don't -- I'll have more details about the --
  Q Will he skip Cleveland?
  MR. CARNEY: That's correct.
  On Tuesday, the will travel to -- he will return to the White House in the evening on Monday. On Tuesday, the President will travel to Norfolk, Virginia, for campaign events. The President will return to the White House that evening.
  On Wednesday, the President will travel to Charlotte, North Carolina, where he will remain overnight. On Thursday, the President will deliver remarks at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte. The President will remain overnight in Charlotte that night.
  Details about Friday's schedule will be released as they become available.
  Q Is he going to go to the convention early -- going to the actual convention itself when he's there on Wednesday?
  MR. CARNEY: I have no details on his schedule on Wednesday beyond the fact that he will travel to Charlotte.
  Q Will he go with his wife and daughters?
  MR. CARNEY: I have no other details besides that he will be traveling to Charlotte that day.
  Q Thank you, Jay.
  MR. CARNEY: You're welcome.
  END
  11:55 A.M. EDT
E.U. Pushes for Centralized Supervision of Banks
  Link to Article
  Source: NYT > Most Recent Headlines
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 18:27
  BRUSSELS '-- The European Commission insisted on Friday that the 6,000 banks in the euro area be centrally supervised to prevent future financial crises, even though leading German politicians expressed skepticism about the breadth of the plan.
  The proposal, which the commission said it would formally present on Sept. 12, is expected to hand the European Central Bank the right to withdraw banking licenses and the power to order other adjustments, representing a sharp turn away from national controls. The proposal stops short of allowing the E.C.B. to wind up problem banks, leaving that function to national regulators.
  A main objective of the policy is to curb the ability of individual countries to prop up failing banks or conceal problems, ideally improving the stability of the broader euro zone.
  The changes are an ''opportunity for euro zone leaders to show the world that they are drawing lessons from the crisis and can streamline their supervisory structures,'' Karel Lannoo, chief executive of the Center for European Policy Studies, wrote in a commentary published by his organization on Friday.
  But some Germans are highly sensitive about giving up authority over their large public banking system, which is partly controlled by states, districts and cities, and that has cast some doubts over the goal of turning the proposal into European law by the end of the year.
  Klaus-Peter Flosbach, finance policy spokesman for the parliamentary group of the ruling party in Germany, the Christian Democrats, told the daily S¼ddeutsche Zeitung that it was ''completely wrong'' for the E.C.B. to regulate the Sparkassen, the hundreds of German savings banks. Germany's Landesbanken, the regional banks, were severely hit by the financial crisis in 2008 and 2009.
  Writing in The Financial Times, the German finance minister, Wolfgang Sch¤uble, said supervision should focus only on those banks that could pose a threat to the entire European financial system, while some key policy makers at Germany's central bank, the Bundesbank, have expressed wariness about expanding the European bank's powers.
  Even so, the commission held firm on Friday. ''We have seen over the past period so-called nonsystemic banks popping up and posing systemic risks, so for the situation that we face it is important that we have a large coverage and an ambitious proposal,'' Stefaan De Rynck, a spokesman for Michel Barnier, the E.U. commissioner for the internal market, said.
  Mr. De Rynck said rules on the winding up of banks, including the sale of assets, would remain '-- for now, at least '-- the responsibility of national banking supervisors, as would other tasks like consumer protection.
  The commission plans to put most big euro area banks under E.C.B. supervision by the middle of next year and to bring in the remaining lenders by early 2014, said E.U. officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the proposal still was being finalized.
  The proposal also would modify the way an existing pan-European agency, the European Banking Authority, operates to enable countries like Britain that do not use the single currency to shape decisions, though the specifics of how that would be achieved have not yet been decided, the officials said.
  The proposals had been expected on Sept. 11, but were pushed back by a day to allow Jos(C) Manuel Barroso, the president of the commission, to present the plans in his annual State of the Union speech to the European Parliament.
  By beefing up supervision under the auspices of the E.C.B., one of the few European institutions to emerge from the crisis with its reputation intact, the commission is seeking to end the so-called doom loop, where member states rack up enormous debts by bailing out their banks.
  The commission also is responding to a call made at a summit meeting in June by the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, and other leaders to give the E.C.B. a leading role in banking supervision as a precondition for using European bailout funds to make direct injections into troubled banks, a request from Spain.
German Jews Warned to Hide After Muslim Attack
  Link to Article
  Source: FrontPage Magazine
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 18:25
  After an attack by several Muslim men on a Rabbi and his little girl in Berlin, German Jews are being told not to wear distinctive Jewish clothing to avoid trouble.
  Despite Germany's efforts to restore its Jewish community, due to the large number of Muslims there, Jews are being forced to hide their identity just as they had to do during the Holocaust.
  After an attack on a rabbi in Berlin, Gideon Joffe, the head of the Berlin Jewish community, said he would ''not recommend that any Jew go around in parts of Berlin with a kipah.''
  On Tuesday, Rabbi Daniel Alter of Berlin was violently attacked while picking up his daughter from a piano lesson. He currently is recovering from surgery for a broken cheekbone. The attackers, reportedly Arab youths, asked Alter '' who was wearing a kipah '' if he was Jewish before hitting him in the face. They then allegedly verbally threatened Alter's 6-year-old daughter.
  Many Jewish religious leaders in the country advise their congregants against openly wearing Jewish garb in public; men routinely wear baseball caps or other hats over their yarmulkes when in public.
  This is not a new situation. I spent some time in Europe during the 80s and after a Muslim terrorist attack, it was standard for Jews to avoid wearing distinguishing clothing or anything that might attract Muslim attention.
Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) Technology Expo
  Link to Article
  Source: AOL Defense
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 17:16
  In partnership with the DS (Office of the CIO), we are proud to present the Defense Intelligence Agency with the annual Technology Exposition taking place Tuesday, October 16, 2012. This is an opportunity for the Intelligence Community to see the latest in emerging technologies, network with industry experts, and share ideas and future goals. At...Read More'; if(''!=''){ locBubble+=', '; if(''=='') mapZoom=14; } if(''!='') mapZoom=''; locBubble+='Washington, DC'; if('National Conference Services, Inc. (NCSI)'!='') locBubble+='Organized by: National Conference Services, Inc. (NCSI)
  '; var mapType='map'; if(''!='') mapType=''; console.log(point.y+' '+point.x); var options={ elt:'locationMap', zoom:mapZoom, latLng:{lat:point.y, lng:point.x}, mtype:mapType, bestFitMargin:0, zoomOnDoubleClick:true }; window.map = new MQA.TileMap(options); var basic=new MQA.Poi( {lat:point.y, lng:point.x} ); basic.setRolloverContent(decodeURIComponent(locBubble)); window.map.addShape(basic); if($('#media-event-post').length==1){ var hotel=new MQA.Poi({lat:38.896156, lng:-77.031675}); var hotelText=""; hotelText+="1331 Pennsylvania Avenue NW , Washington, DC
  "; hotelText+=""; hotel.setRolloverContent(decodeURIComponent(hotelText)); //var myIcon = new MapIcon(); //myIcon.setImage(new DormImg(),22,22); //hotel.icon = myIcon; window.map.addShape(hotel); } $("#locationMap").css("display","block"); } } ); } var addr=''; if(''!='') addr+=', '; addr+='Washington, DC'; if(addr!=''){ var mapObj=getGeoCode(decodeURIComponent(addr)); }
Swedish campaign teaches that "pleading sex" is rape
  Link to Article
  Source: bertb news feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 17:13
  15 November 2007. A grand propaganda campaign is initiated by authorities in and around Stockholm. The background is the exploding figures for sex crimes. The goal of the campaign is to eradicate all sexual abuse.
  Okejsex.nu (Okaysex.now) is organized by Operation Kvinnofrid (Operation Women's Integrity), a body created by a network of eleven authorities and public organizations, whose steering committee consists of five women (and no men). The Work Group for Operation Women's Integrity consists of six other women (and no men).
  The campaign targets 15''30 year olds. The women in the work group for Okejsex.nu have commissioned well-known cartoonists to create posters with scenes in life where the sexes meet. The solution to sex problems is to teach boys self-control, since girls in reality don't want to have sex very often.
  The campaign Okejsex.nu taught girls to say ''NO!'' and report their lovers.
  One poster asks ''Been through 'pleading sex'?''. It shows a girl and a boy, sitting in a bed, almost nude, at a party with beer-cans lying around them.
  He says: ''But come on! We've fooled around! Do not be so boring!'' Her response: ''NO! I don't want to!'' He pleads: ''Don't you like me anymore? Please, please '... can't you be a little kind '...''
  One poster carries the headline: ''Been through drunk sex?'' In a sofa at a party or a club a young man and woman sit at a table, cheering with beer. She thinks: ''What a nice guy '...'' He thinks: '''... is she drunk enough?''
  One poster has the headline: ''Been through a no that didn't stay a no?'' A fabulously cute young man stands with a beer in his hand, in a dance club against a background of lights. He looks very good-hearted, longing and romantic. He tilts his head in her direction and says with closed eyes: ''But I want to.'' She is a pillar of ice with crossed arms and wide-open and alert but dismissive eyes. Her response: ''NO!''
  In the main brochure of the campaign a media celebrity tells what okay sex means for him: ''If she wishes to proceed fast I can go along, but I let her set the pace.''
  The campaign issued a 144 page booklet with questions and answers which gave a message that could not be misunderstood: Girls should always and only think of themselves. Just as the boys: They should only think of the girl and her emotions and wishes and never of themselves. Girls are encouraged to put on provocative clothing, drink, flirt, fool around, join boys from the pub, lie down in their bed, excite them '' but at the last second say no. She must never question whether this is actually ''okay sex'' to act in such ways, since it is her legal right to do it.
  If something did not feel good, girls are reassured that they must report their boyfriends, dates or lovers to the police. The campaigners stress that the legal definition of rape is wider than most people believe and that girls should indeed go to the police ten times as often as today.
  ''If sex is achieved through begging and pleading ('...) then it is rape'', says the campaign expert and psycho-therapist Monica Mardell.
  ***
  This was an excerpt from the new eBook A Brief History of Swedish Sex: How the Nation that Gave Us Free Love Redefined Rape and Declared War on Julian Assange by Oscar Swartz.
  Buy it at Apple, Amazon or Barnes & Noble.
Navy Seals Embark on a Hellish Literary Adventure
  Link to Article
  Source: NYT > Most Recent Headlines
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 17:12
  Since its announcement last week, the book ''No Easy Day: The Firsthand Account of the Mission That Killed Osama bin Laden,'' written by a pseudonymous member of that Navy SEAL team mission, has stirred up unintended controversies over its author's right to disclose the details of the operation; his identity; and any perceived political motives behind its publication.
  Meanwhile, a fictional counterpoint to that book is deliberately trying to catch hell.
  A new novel by Weston Ochse, called ''SEAL Team 666'" and being published by Thomas Dunne Books on Dec. 11, is positioning itself as ''SEAL Team Six meets Stephen King,'' according to the publisher's catalog copy, in which a cadet named Jack Walker is brought into a special-ops squad that fights ''demons, possessed humans, mass-murdering cults and evil in its most dark and ancient form.''
  Mr. Ochse, whose book ''Scarecrow Gods'' won a Bram Stoker Award in 2005 for best first novel, said that he was inspired to write ''SEAL Team 666'" last May, when he was attending a writers' convention and saw TV news reports about the raid on Bin Laden's compound.
  ''I'm a dark fiction author,'' Mr. Ochse said Friday in a telephone interview. ''That's the stuff I like to write and the kind of stuff I like to read, and I just thought to myself, What if there was a special SEAL team '' an even more special SEAL team '' that protected America against supernatural attack? And what if this was a secret? And even, what if some of the bad guys out there that we're following aren't really human?''
  In his biography for Thomas Dunne Books, Mr. Ochse identifies himself as working for the Defense Intelligence Agency. (''Just call me an intelligence officer,'' he said. ''That's the safest way to put it.'') He said he knows several members of SEAL Team 6, and was surprised to hear about the publication of ''No Easy Day.''
  ''Frankly, I didn't think anything was going to be published because getting stuff cleared is pretty hard,'' Mr. Ochse said. ''My stuff is easy because it's all purely fiction.''
  Mr. Ochse said any extra attention (or blog posts) that ''SEAL Team 666'" might enjoy because of ''No Easy Day'' was coincidental, though he prided himself on the attention to detail in his novel.
  ''The military parts are absolutely accurate,'' he said. ''The techniques, the modalities, the weapon systems '' everything else is accurate. The only thing that's not quite true is who they actually go after, which is the supernatural enemies.''
  That hasn't stopped readers from asking Mr. Ochse if Team 666 exists in real life. ''I just tell them that if there was, we'd never know,'' he said.
Clint Eastwood speaks to an invisible Obama: Twitter mocks 'gran turdito'
  Link to Article
  Source: Culture | guardian.co.uk
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 15:43
  It was something no one ever needed to see. An aged and frail-looking Clint Eastwood '' the symbolic definition of American masculinity '' rambling often incoherently to an empty chair on stage, in front of millions of TV viewers at the Republican national convention.
  On Thursday afternoon, RNC organizers announced that the esteemed 24-time Academy Award nominee would deliver a speech on the final night of the convention.
  Regardless of your political affiliations, it should have been a spine-tingling moment. Eastwood is a hero of American cinema, a titan of the tough-guy genre. What could go wrong?
  A chair.
  For almost 12 cringeworthy minutes, Eastwood engaged in a clunky, awkward and depressing debate with "Invisible Obama," who viewers were encouraged to believe was sitting on a cheap stool stage left.
  Eastwood mocked Obama for going to law school. (You know, the same law school Mitt Romney attended.) He criticized Obama for driving a "gas-guzzler" in front of a room full of people for whom guzzling gas is a minor concern. And he made an off-color joke that had the convention organizers wincing.
  This majestic failure of oratory provoked a number of elder statesmen of American culture to express their disappointment in under 140 characters:
  Naturally, the speech lit up the social media world and its snarky, unforgiving hand:
  A few short hours after the speech, a Twitter @InvisibleObama emerged, tweeting "...". That was retweeted more than 4,200 times. Dirty Harry is responsible for getting an ellipses retweeted more than 4,200 times.
  Also, #Eastwooding? That's now a thing and it looks like this:
  Just after midnight, actual Obama chimed in:
Supermarket employee with AK-47 kills two co-workers and self at Pathmark in Old Bridge, New Jersey - NY Daily News
  Link to Article
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 15:42
  Norman Y. Lono for New York Daily NewsA heavily armed ex-Marine gunned down two co-workers in an unprovoked New Jersey supermarket rampage before killing himself early Friday, officials said.
  A heavily armed ex-Marine in camouflage gear gunned down two co-workers in a New Jersey supermarket rampage before killing himself early Friday, officials said.
  The disgruntled worker returned to the Pathmark store around 4 a.m. and began blasting away with an AK-47 assault rifle at the skeleton staff, said Middlesex County Prosecutor Bruce Kaplan.
  The irate employee squeezed off 16 shots from the rifle, killing an 18-year-old woman and a 24-year-old man '-- both of Old Bridge, said Kaplan.
  He was carrying extra magazines of ammunition and a handgun when the unprovoked killings began, Kaplan said. The shooter worked the midnight shift stocking shelves in the store on Route 9, according to another employee.
  The shooter and his two victims were all at work when the gunman left the building around 3:30 a.m., returning about 30 minutes later with murderous intent.
  About a dozen other workers escaped the pre-dawn assault uninjured. The store was not yet open for business at the time of the bloody attack.
  When police arrived, the killer was already dead of a self-inflicted gunshot, officials said.
  Kaplan said the motive for the double murder-suicide remained unclear. Authorities withheld the 23-year-old shooter's name, but a friend told the Daily News that he was stunned by the attack.
  ''He was a normal kid,'' said Manase Acheampong, 25, who last saw the killer down the Jersey shore on the Fourth of July. ''That's why I'm shocked. I never would have guessed it in a million years.''
  Pathmark worker Mike Pizoto, 17, said he recently shared a cigarette with the shooter.
  ''He seemed nice,'' Pizoto told the News. ''He didn't seem like he would kill people. I'm shocked. I can't believe this happened.''
  The suburban New Jersey store, about 30 miles south of Manhattan, wasn't due to open for another two hours when the man arrived toting the AK-47 and an automatic pistol arrived, officials said.
  The armed worker started working at the supermarket about two weeks ago, said Old Bridge Mayor Owen Henry. Two smashed windows were visible in the front of the store, and a pair of police cars were parked by its entrance.
  ''This is the worst phone call a mayor can receive,'' Henry told the Newark Star-Ledger. ''You can prepare for these things, but you can't prevent them.''
  Commuters were steered away from a nearby NJ Transit park-and-ride lot as law enforcement shut down the area around the store.
  Store workers who survived the unprovoked attack huddled outside a nearby restaurant.
  lmcshane@nydailynews.com
Power & Knowledge for the People in the Internet Age
  Link to Article
  Source: Jacky Jasper's Diary of a Hollywood Street King
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 15:35
  by Jacky Jasper
  Where were you when news of the tsunami hit Japan in 2011? How about when Michael Jackson died? Probably online, according to many experts who claim that social media has become the main media source for hundreds of millions of people. Not just in the U.S., either; Facebook alone has more than 900 million users spread across the globe as of 2012.
  Other social media giants like Twitter have facilitated revolution against unjust leaders and warned people of impending natural disaster. In fact, so many people regularly interact online that if the Internet were a nation, it would exceed the Americas, Europe and the Middle East combined in population. No wonder more than 13 million members of the online community used Reddit and other media platforms to protest SOPA, a proposed Internet censorship bill.
  Keep this graphic in mind next time you log on, because knowledge is power '-- and a little knowledge goes a long way in the Internet Age.
  Title: Power to the Internet PeopleGraphic/Video: http://open-site.org/blog/power-to-the-online-people/
Many Don't Understand The Google/Apple/Microsoft Business Model Dynamic Nor How Dangerous This Apple Legal Win Can Be For Consum
  Link to Article
  Source: Untitled Feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 15:21
  In continuing my rant on the Apple v. Samsung verdict, I wish to make clear once again that the vast majority of consumers of Google's and Apple's products are absolutely oblivious to the business model of Google, the business practices of Apple and the shadowy aggressive survival tactics of the behemoth that is Microsoft. If I am correct in this assertion then the potential ramifications of Apple actually defeating Samsung in the patent case decided last week is also lost on most. That is dangerous. Since it has been explained at least as good as I could have done already, let's peruse one of my favorite legal sites, Groklaw, on why understanding Apple's grand objectives in patent litigation matters:
  To explain why I think it matters, I need to remind you of other things that have been going on, trying to exclude FOSS from the market. Because that really is what I think this is about.
  Remember how Oracle tried to expand copyright law to cover the structure, sequence, and organization of Java APIs? It failed (subject to appeals). But it tried hard. Had it succeeded, it would have upended how any open source software could be built and used, and it would have excluded individual developers like Linus Torvalds in his student days creating Linux in his bedroom, because only those with money to pay royalties would be able to do any coding for the marketplace, if moves like that had succeeded. One of Michael A. Jacobs' law students volunteered to help cover the trial for Groklaw, and she told me that this is what she had learned about the case in class. I take it that means it was its purpose. Do you want a world where only the present incumbents are allowed to create anything meaningful? How does that benefit you or me?
  Remember when Microsoft did its patent deal with Nokia and then they both did patent deals with MOSAID, a nonpracticing entity that presumably will be using the patents those two lovebirds provided to sue Android vendors and who knows who else? Patents exclude. That is their purpose. Android is the target. Did you notice how Microsoft crowed in public about the Apple verdict, predicting it would be beneficial to Microsoft?
  Remember back when Microsoft helped SCO afford lawyers in the very early days of the SCO saga? What was the goal there? To slap royalties on Linux and get rid of the GPL, so as to block Open Source's free development model, and make it so expensive no one would want to use Linux on servers any more. Remember when SCO even offered to help Linux-using companies move not to SCO's UNIX products but to Microsoft servers?
  Now, it's Apple and Microsoft on a jihad against Android and hence Google. That's why you see attacks on Google in an endless stream in the media and even in regulatory bodies, where Microsoft friends who take Microsoft money complain about Google. Android is eating Apple's and Microsoft's lunch in the marketplace, because people love it and OEMs love it, so the proprietary world has apparentely decided o use the legal system give them a win there, since they can't win fair and square in the marketplace. Actually, they could, but they'd rather not.
  What are the weapons? IP law. They have copyright, they have patents, and now they have a new weapon of choice -- trade dress and design patents -- thanks to Apple. And that is why this case is so appalling, because Apple has now opened up a new area for litigation and exclusion. That's what the L.A. Times noticed:
  Nevertheless, it's worth remembering that Apple made its name building successful, even iconic products based on ideas that other companies pioneered. The iPhone, for example, was a significantly better version of the smartphones Nokia introduced more than a decade earlier. Innovation is by its nature an iterative process, and good patent policy creates an incentive to innovate more. Bad policy just makes it easier for patent holders to extract royalties from anyone venturing within reach of their claims.
  The risk is especially great in the area of patents on design, such as the ones that covered the look and feel of Apple's iPhones. There's a fine line between designs that are purely decorative (which, oddly enough, are the ones eligible for patents) and those that serve a function (which aren't). For example, do rounded corners on a phone simply help set it apart, or do they make the device slip more easily in and out of a pocket? ...
  If Apple's win slows the wonderfully frenetic pace of product development in mobile devices and leads companies to battle in courts instead of the marketplace, consumers will be the ultimate losers.
  There's no if about it. It certainly will have that effect. My point is, it's all about the same thing -- to make it impossible for Android to survive as it is, and now we will see litigation after litigation -- Apple has already filed another lawsuit against Samsung -- and the end result is to make Android cost more because of encrusting it with high royalty obligations, so it cuts into the vendors' profits sufficiently that it will end up making it undesirable to use. That's why, I believe, Apple offered licenses to Samsung on its first visit to discuss matters at such a high price. It would have cut Samsung's profits so radically, it would no longer make much sense to use Android. I think they had to know Samsung couldn't agree to that price. Apple itself is complaining about a much, much lower price for FRAND patents, after all, saying it can't afford to build its products with that price added. Did Microsoft pay that high price?
  But, I hear you say, that's anticompetive behavior. Isn't that patent misuse? Misuse of the courts? I think it is. But I'm not a lawyer. And antitrust law is complicated, and thanks to folks who think business should be unregulated, it's a little bit toothless at the moment.
  Time will tell how others view it, but I despise the strategy. The purpose of both copyright and patents is to encourage innovation and progress. The purpose of trade dress protection is to make sure consumers are not confused as to origin of goods and products. Design patents are supposed to protect only ornamental features, not functionality. None of it is supposed to be for the purpose of killing off newcomers to the market. Is it even Constitutional to use them that way? You tell me.
  Remember too that Apple itself reaps benefits from Open Source software. It switched from its own software to OSX, which is BSD code. Why? Because it was better than what it had done itself. So it surely knows what FOSS can do. Now, it wants to make sure no one else can offer what it offers, even in such basic elements as rectangles with rounded corners and rows of brightly colored icons or ways to touch a tablet that are simply intuitive. Intuitive is just another word for obvious.
  The reason Apple has gone scorched earth on the litigation front is because it is sorely losing the battle on the technology front and rapidly losing market share in an industry that's currently growing like a weed. Why should Apple even care if the industry is growing like a weed? Well, for starters, once that growth slows, Apple's growth slowdown will be amplified and levered several times. Think of growth using margin or gearing. If the market growth stagnates to near 0% growth, then Apple's growth could drastically reverse and go negative!!! Apple had better knock the upcoming iPhone 5 out of the ballpark, because if they don't Android will have captured nearly the entire smartphone market within a year. There will be no extra-normal profits stemming from network effects for iOS if there is no network! Just think about that. They are already at 64% global market share and growing faster than all of their competitors combined.
  Back the Gartner data...
  ,
  Here's one of the reasons why...
  Many people are still totally oblivious to exactly what it is that Google does. Here's a tutorial.
  Industry Leading, Subscription Based Google ResearchAll paying subscribers should download the Google Q1-2012 Valuation Summary, wherein we have updated the valuation numbers for Google using a variety of metrics. Click here to subscribe or upgrade.
  Google still exhibits the likelihood that they will control mobile computing for the balance of the decade.
  Subscription research:
  A couple of bits from our archives...
  There are currently 7 Google reports available. Select the "Google Final Report" and click the "Download" button. You will receive a 63 page analysis that looks like this on the cover...
  The table of contents outlines how we have broken Google down into distinct businesses and identified both the individual business models and the potential revenue streams, as well as valuation for each business line.
  Page 57 of the analysis shows a sensitivity table which outlines the various scenarios that can come into play and how it will change our outlook and valuation opinion.
  Professional/institutional subscribers can actually access a subset of the model that we used to create the sensitivity analysis above to plug in their own assumptions in case they somehow disagree with our assumptions or view points. Click here for the model: Google Valuation Model (pro and institutional). Click here to subscribe or upgrade.
  Unique, Indpendent and Accurate Apple Research Apple Margin & Valuation Note
  As excerpted:
  It is worth noting that the key assumptions that underline the above valuations '' (1) iPhone continuing to witness stupendous growth ******* in 2012 and ****** 2013 over a larger base and (2) iPhone margins continue to remain healthy off stable prices and despite increase in material cost '' should be keenly watched over the next couple of quarters.
  Then ask them bout the logical argument behind the concern with Apple and the extremely volatile price action of the last few weeks. As stated many times in the past, The BoomBustBlog argument and analysis is solid.
  What else is there to the earnings announcement? Well we were absolutely correct in terms of the oncoming margin compression of the the product lines, something that was actually easy to see coming but many refused to admit. Of course, there will be those select few that say, "But wait, the company reported an INCREASE in margins while you said there will be a decrease!". Yes, that's true and both can exist simultaneously.
  Apple_2Q2012_results_analysis_Final_Page_2Apple_2Q2012_results_analysis_Final_Page_2
  Apple_2Q2012_results_analysis_Final_Page_3Apple_2Q2012_results_analysis_Final_Page_3
  Apple_2Q2012_results_analysis_Final_Page_4Apple_2Q2012_results_analysis_Final_Page_4
  Comments are always welcome.
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De Boer: 'Nooit meer 16 miljoen voor een speler'
  Link to Article
  Source: VK: Home
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 15:16
  31/08/12, 16:45
  (C) ANP. Ajax-trainer Frank de Boer.
  Ajax zal nooit meer 16 miljoen euro neertellen voor een speler. Dat zegt trainer Frank de Boer in een interview met RTV Noord-Holland. 'Die tijden zijn voorbij. Vijf of zes miljoen euro is het maximale.'
  Vier jaar geleden betaalde de Amsterdamse voetbalclub maar liefst 16,25 miljoen euro voor voetballer Miralem Sulejmani. De Boer zegt nooit meer in dergelijke situaties terecht te willen komen.
  Toentertijd werd de transfer van Sulejmani overigens niet als fout bestempeld. 'Daar stond iedereen achter. Maar het is anders nu', verduidelijkt De Boer in het interview.
Houses to go on sale for £1 each
  Link to Article
  Source: BBC News - Home
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 15:14
  31 August 2012Last updated at 06:17 ET Dozens of empty homes in Stoke-on-Trent are to be sold for £1 each.
  As part of a trial scheme, 35 homes on Portland Street, Cobridge, owned by Stoke-on-Trent City Council, will be sold to people willing to revamp them.
  The houses were due to be demolished and the area redeveloped until a government scheme was withdrawn.
  The Labour-led council, which approved the plans at a meeting on Thursday, said bringing homes back into use would help to regenerate communities.
  The city has almost 5,000 empty houses, about half of which have been empty for more than six months.
  Continue reading the main storyWe're going to re-plumb them, refurbish them, rewire them, but they will be a shell essentially''
  End QuoteCouncillor Janine BridgesSteve Pritchard, from the residents' association in Cobridge, said: "We have people living next door to boarded-up properties and it's an area that's declined significantly as a result of it.
  "Anti-social behaviour has increased, there's been an awful lot of fly-tipping.
  "Anything that gives people a stake in the community and something to be proud of has got to be encouraged."
  'Left in limbo'The local authority said buyers would have to live in the properties for at least five years, but would be eligible for a low-interest £30,000 loan to help improve the homes.
  The £3m scheme has been part-funded through a government grant to bring properties back into use.
  Many of the houses owned by the local authority were bought from private owners and were due to be demolished under the government's £1bn national Pathfinder programme, which was scrapped in 2010.
  Councillor Janine Bridges, responsible for housing in the city, said the decision had left the local authority "in limbo".
  She said the new scheme would benefit both communities and people wanting to take a step onto the housing ladder.
  "We're going to re-plumb them, refurbish them, rewire them, but they will be a shell essentially," she said.
  Stoke-on-Trent City Council said it would also be investing money to improve the area around Portland Street to help tempt people into the area.
  Ms Bridges said: "We hope people will stay, take pride in the area and as they pay-off the loan, that money is going to be recycled to let us do this in other properties in the city."
Spike Lee sings Michael Jackson's praises at Venice film festival
  Link to Article
  Source: Culture | guardian.co.uk
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 15:08
  Spike Lee wears a Bad T-shirt at the press conference for his new film about Michael Jackson. Photograph: Joel Ryan/AP
  In the days before establishing himself as the swaggering firebrand of African-American cinema, targeting racial tensions in films such as Malcolm X and Do the Right Thing, Spike Lee nursed an unlikely ambition. He longed to sing ABC on primetime TV, just like his childhood idol.
  "You could say I grew up with Michael Jackson," the director told journalists at the Venice film festival. "I was born in 1957, he was born in '58. And when I saw the Jackson Five on the Ed Sullivan Show I wanted to be Michael Jackson. I had the Afro, the whole Jackson look. But the singing and dancing '' that's where it stopped."
  Four decades later, Lee pays a belated tribute to his hero on Bad 25 '' an exhaustive, track-by-track tour through the recording of Jackson's 1987 album and the world tour that followed. Bad was the record that saw Jackson setting out to redefine his image. The promotional videos cast him in the role of lethal jungle cat, facing down heavyweight hoodlums or tracking leggy vixens down ghetto streets. On finally catching the girl, for instance, the cripplingly shy Jackson couldn't bring himself to kiss her and opted for a chaste embrace instead. Elsewhere, director Martin Scorsese recalls the singer's horror at shooting the flagship Bad video in the projects of Harlem: "He looked around and said, 'Do people really live here?'."
  Lee described Bad 25 as his "love letter" to Michael Jackson '' a chance to accentuate the positive. "There's been a lot of focus on the personal stuff," he said. "I wanted this film to concentrate on the music. It was a chance to dig into his creative process. The film shows that Michael did not just sit on his ass. He was out there watching Bob Fosse, Gene Kelly, James Brown and Fred Astaire. He studied the greats and then made himself greater."
Mayor Bloomberg to Reporter: SHUT UP SLAVE!
  Link to Article
  Source: Uploads by ARSONomics
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 14:54
Benzineprijs naar nieuw record
  Link to Article
  Source: VK: Home
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 14:50
  31/08/12, 16:21 '' bron: ANP
  (C) ANP.
  De prijs van benzine gaat mogelijk volgende week het record van april verbreken. Dat voorziet het consumentencollectief UnitedConsumers op basis van de huidige markt- en politieke ontwikkelingen.
  Een liter euro 95 kost vrijdag aan de pomp gemiddeld 1,873 euro. Dat is 0,2 cent meer dan de dag ervoor en nog maar ruim een cent minder dan de recordprijs van 11 april (1,886 euro). 'Als deze groei doorzet, zitten we over enkele dagen op een nieuw record', voorspelt UnitedConsumers-directeur Paul van Selms. De prijs van diesel bereikte eerder deze week al het hoogste niveau ooit met een bedrag van 1,529 euro.
  Wanneer het orkaanseizoen over is en de spanningen in het Midden-Oosten afnemen, zullen de brandstofprijzen volgens Van Selms wel weer iets gaan zakken. 'Maar met de geplande btw-verhoging per 1 oktober zal het record naar verwachting hoe dan ook overschreden worden. Dan wordt de richtprijs in een klap zo'n 3 cent hoger', aldus de marktanalist.
Who Made That Flip-Flop?
  Link to Article
  Source: NYT > Most Recent Headlines
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 14:49
  Jens Mortensen for The New York Times
  ''I do not know how you feel about the Japanese,'' wrote a journalist named Elliott Chaze in 1952, ''but I do like their feet.'' Seven years after World War II, many Americans still regarded the Japanese as enemies '-- and distrusted anything to do with the country. Yet a rubber version of a Japanese sandal called the zori had become a popular item in U.S. drugstores. ''Our women have commenced wearing thonged sandals,'' Chaze announced, noting that ''obscene picture-books'' from Asia eroticized the feet. Japanese women, he believed, revealed themselves in the curl of their toes. And now, thanks to the rubber zoris, American women would too.
  Elizabeth Semmelhack, senior curator at the Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto, says that the flip-flop probably originated in the factories of Japan. ''The rubber industry was in full swing,'' she said, and local designers would have experimented with synthetic zoris. The Hiroshima Rubber Company made the sandals for export in the 1950s '-- supersizing the zoris to accommodate Westerners' feet.
  ''All us well-dressed Lake Tahoe summer residents are wearing thongs this year,'' reported the humorist Frank Johnson in 1960, adding, with what now seems shocking racism, that ''we pad around in floppy hunks of rubber a sensible coolie wouldn't wear into a rice paddy.'' According to Semmelhack, the term ''flip-flop'' arose spontaneously in the 1960s, inspired by the slap-slap of rubber as it hit the foot. That year the thongs spread to beaches everywhere and soon Americans began to believe that the rubber thong had been our idea all along.
  SPACE ODDITY
  Chris Laverty reports on costume design for his blog clothesonfilm.com.
  In the recent movie ''Prometheus,'' the spaceship's crew wears flip-flops. Are flip-flops proper footwear for space exploration?
  They are worn as recreational footwear onboard the spacecraft. When the crew venture outside, they wear calf-length space boots.
  Can you describe these ''space flip-flops,'' just so we know what's in store for us in the future?
  They are just flip-flops: traditional open-toe thong with a foam sole. The future for space travel looks comfortable.
  What's your favorite sci-fi footwear?
  Onscreen? I'd say the spandex wedge boots worn by Quorra (Olivia Wilde) in ''Tron: Legacy.'' Sci-fi is inherently sexy because it explores the unknown. These boots are not remotely practical. In fact, the wedges make it almost impossible to turn and run, but look very stylish. Glowing blue light strips that follow the lines of the body do not hurt, either.
Britney Spears Bares Banging Bikini Body
  Link to Article
  Source: Radar Online
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 14:30
  Twitter
  By Radar Staff
  Five years ago, she was a hot mess; now, she's just hot.
  The resurgent Britney Spears showed off her super-sexy body in a tweet Thursday, writing, "Having some fun in the sun'... don't want summer to be over!"
  It's clear the mother-of-two has been hitting the gym regularly, as in the new pic, she shows off a flat tummy and well-toned legs in her two-piece green floral bikini.
  PHOTOS: Take a Peek Inside Britney Spears Melt Down Mansion
  The 30-year-old Toxic singer will serve as a judge on Simon Cowell's The X Factor this fall alongside Demi Lovato and L.A. Reid.
  The X Factor's new season debuts on Fox September 12 at 8/7c.
  RELATED STORIES:
  Britney Spears Insists She Is Ready For The X Factor, Despite Fears To The Contrary
  Get A Manicure! Britney Spears Has Bitten Bloody Nail Blunder
  X Factor Fashion Flop! Britney Spears Wears Unflattering Mini Dress
  Britney Spears & Demi Lovato Officially Join X Factor
  Robin Roberts' Mother Dies At 88Celebs React To Clint Eastwood's 'Invisible Obama' RNC Speech
Yikes, Gawker on Rand Paul (It Ain't Pretty)
  Link to Article
  Source: EconomicPolicyJournal.com
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 14:29
  In a recap of the tragic results for the Ron Paul contingent in Mitt Romney controlled Tampa, Gawker explained Rand Paul this way:The Ron Paul delegate rÅ�nin clamored for a floor vote Tuesday, but were gaveled into irrelevancy by his bronze eminence, House Speaker John Boehner Steve Reeves. Then, last night, the RNC attempted to placate them with a video about Ron Paul and a speech from his son. Both options were insipid even to people who loathe the good doctor. The video ignored Paul's foreign policy, which not only comprises a significant part of his appeal but also is an area in which his command of history and context far outpaces his former GOP primary opponents.Then there's his son, Rand, twerpy dipshit, peddler of endless appeals to his own victimization and all-around shameless whore'--who campaigned on his father's ideological legacy (and his Randroid first name), only to spend the last two years nuzzling lovingly under the throat wattle of Kentucky's own Futuristic Hyperturtle Mitch McConnell.No wonder the Paulbots had enough. These token gifts of appreciation from the RNC sound like being kicked in the balls in Hell's own Hallmark store, forever. So when the videos ended, the Paulbots walked. Loudly.
New Microsoft Windows 7 Mobile Phone Ad - "Really"
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 14:27
FILMPJE! Zimra naakt op de PSP-poster
  Link to Article
  Source: GeenStijl
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 14:24
  Tom Staal voert campagne voor de PSP. Nee, niet de weergaloze en niet te overtreffen handheld gameconsole voor coole mensen, de PlayStation Portable. Tom Staal voert campagne voor de Pacifistisch Socialistische Partij. De PSP dus. Ontstaan als goddamn hippie bolwerk in de jaren babyboom, in 1991 opgegaan in GroenLinks en nog veel meer van zulke sensationeel saaie feitjes die u maar gewoon leest op Wikipedia. Partij bestaat dus niet meer. Maar voor Tom Staal is dat geen bezwaar om desondanks de Mensen van het Buikslotermeerplein te vragen wat ze tot dusver van de PSP-campagne en fractievoorzitter vinden. En van de PSP-poster. De nieuwe. Met Zimra. Onze Zimra. Naakt. Plus koe. Ook naakt. Die u in OMG-groot formaat kunt downloaden als PDF. En waarvan wij al een versie met spatscherm op HQ hebben hangen. U begrijpt wel waarom. De PSP, daarom. Geniet er van, wij zijn zuipen van het SONY-geld. FILMPJE!
  Johnny Quid | 31-08-12 | 15:09 | Link |
Britain had coldest August evening for almost 40 years on Thursday
  Link to Article
  Source: The Guardian World News
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 14:20
  People shelter at a bus stop in Heather, Leicestershire. The wettest summer in 100 years has achieved another unwelcome record. Photograph: Rui Vieira/PA
  Britons love lamenting the weather but now we really have something to complain about. Not only is this summer the soggiest for a century, but Thursday night was the coldest August evening for nearly 40 years.
  Record lows were recorded across the country. Braemar in Scotland was the chilliest spot as it dropped to -2.4C (28F), followed by Aviemore near Loch Ness at -1.8C and -0.7C in north-east England. But there was one piece of good news: the all-time record low UK temperature for August has yet to be broken. The Met Office said the frostiest evening was on 21 August 1973, when Lagganlia in the Highlands dropped to -4.5C.
  As observation sites have been in operation for different lengths of time, some records are more startling than others. But people living in Bradford will perhaps feel they have little to celebrate after learning this morning that they experienced their coldest August night since records began in 1908, at 2.8C.
  So why is it so bracing? A spokeswoman for the Met Office said on Friday: "Last night saw northerly winds drag cold air from quite a long way north over the UK. This air was also dry, which meant there was very little moisture to help retain heat from the day."
  This, combined with clear skies caused by the high pressure sitting over the country, meant all the heat radiated into the sky '' leaving very cold temperatures for the time of year.
  Figures released this week by the Met Office painted a bleak picture. While the season is not quite over, forecasters said the UK had experienced just 399 hours of sunshine this summer. The mean temperature was 14C, some 0.4C below the long-term average.
  The Met Office does not expect summer rainfall (at 366.8mm) to exceed the 384.4mm seen in the summer of 1912, and Scotland has escaped relatively lightly with 357mm.
  England and Wales will be largely dry on Saturday, although the north and west may see the odd patch of drizzle.
Obama: Election will pop 'the blister' of polarization '' USA TODAY
  Link to Article
  Source: News 1 Stop
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 13:52
  President Obama says Republicans will be more cooperative after he is re-elected, and he used a vivid metaphor to explain it.
  "My expectation is that there will be some popping of the blister after this election, because it will have been such a stark choice," Obama told Time magazine in an interview.
  The election provides "a very clear choice," Obama said, and a Democratic victory will persuade Republicans to see things his way on such items as higher taxes on the wealthy, Medicare and investments in energy.
  In recent years, the president said, congressional Republicans like Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., have been more interested in defeating him that in legislating.
  "I believe that in a second term, where Mitch McConnell's imperative of making me a one-term president is no longer relevant, they recognize that what the American people are looking for is for us to get things done," Obama said.
  Republicans instead said they will defeat Obama and win control of Congress because voters will reject Obama's lack of leadership.
  "President Obama believes that he hasn't communicated enough and would use a second term to focus on becoming a better storyteller," said Romney campaign spokesman Ryan Williams. "America doesn't need a storyteller-in-chief. We need a leader who will work to create jobs, strengthen the middle class and turn around our economy."
There's so much to hate in Romney
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 13:43
  I watched the Republican convention last night. I've watched many of them, dating back to Nixon. I've voted Republican, always holding my nose, because I found the Democratic alternative so abhorrent. But last night was over the top. Here's a guy who presents himself as a honest and honorable man who helps people, but the lies he tells, oh man. I just don't know. His campaign is like a wish list. I wish the current President had gone on an "apology tour" so I'll just say he did. I'll say we lost jobs under his watch, when actually under any reasonable view of things he created jobs, a lot of them. He failed to lead, he says, without saying that the Republicans were willing to be lead. They weren't. Openly.
  Our credit rating suffered a downgrade under this President because, unfortunately, the Republicans, who control one chamber of Congress openly toyed with the possibility of the United States not paying creditors. We had the money. Of course our credit rating went down. They must have had a meeting where they came up with the line they would use now, in the campaign, to make it sound like this was President Obama's idea! These are seriously depraved non-America-loving people, who choose their words very carefully and know that most people aren't listening carefully enough to understand what they're saying, if there's any truth to it, which lately there hasn't. Why bother, these are just stories. Why not say Obama started World War III with our closest allies, Poland, Israel and England. Threw them under the bus! Great line Mitt.
  It is so disgusting. To think the purpose of Republican obstructionism of the last three years was only to give this guy a better chance of winning. It's such a bad punchline. How much suffering there was for this end. It tells us that net-net the United States can't find its ass with both hands. All the grand talk about how great we are is belied by the evidence, starting us in the face, in the being of Mitt Romney. Is this the best we can do? Is this it? A venture capitalist is to be our new leader? I've worked at companies that were run by people like Mitt Romney. I've seen many more of them flushed down the toilet, dying a premature death, because the people at the top were tone-deaf to the actual people who made up the businesses they somehow accidentally ended up running. Usually into the ground. Fast.
  On Twitter last night I said some things that, if I were a Republican, would sound horrible, and probably would cause me to unfollow. So be it. I should say them here too. I hate Romney. I want to see that stupid grin wiped off his face. I think he's a condescending superior sumbitch, to steal a line from the Republican presidential candidate played by James Brolin in The West Wing television show. And, as on the West Wing, I seriously hope our current President mops up his ass in the debates. An America run by Mitt Romney is a disaster. And we just can't afford any more disasters.
  To Republicans who follow me, I would be a hypocrite if I didn't use my communication channel to say what I think about an election in my country. Some years I have totally pissed off Democrats. If you have to go, I'm sorry to see that. But I'm not going to sacrifice my principles and become an equivocating floppy noodle like Mitt Romney. That doesn't mean the technology I create is only useful to one political persuasion. It is agnostic. I wish there were a way to create tech that Karl Rove or the Koch brothers couldn't profit from, but I haven't figured out how to do that and be open at the same time. If you figure that one out let me know.
Eddie van Halen undergoes emergency surgery
  Link to Article
  Source: Culture | guardian.co.uk
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 13:33
  Recovering from surgery '... Eddie van Halen. Photograph: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images
  Eddie van Halen has undergone emergency surgery. Van Halen have postponed the remainder of their 2012 tour dates as their guitarist recovers from treatment for "a severe bout of diverticulitis", a disorder of the digestive system.
  The 57-year-old is expected to recover within four to six months, they said, and no further surgery is necessary. The band's three scheduled concerts, all in Japan, are currently being rescheduled and they "[look] forward to seeing and playing for their fans in 2013".
  While the guitarist has experienced health issues, he has not previously suffered from abdominal problems: Van Halen had a hip replacement in 1999 and was diagnosed with tongue cancer the following year. He has been in remission since 2002.
  In February, the band released their long-anticipated 12th album, A Different Kind of Truth. Reuniting with David Lee Roth, their original singer, it reached No 6 in the UK.
Randy Jackson Officially Cut as American Idol Judge
  Link to Article
  Source: Jacky Jasper's Diary of a Hollywood Street King
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 13:32
  by Jacky Jasper Randy Jackson will not be returning as a judge on the next season of American Idol. According to various reports this morning; Randy Jackson is officially leaving the judge's table, but will still remain a part of the show in a role as ''mentor''.
  With the exception of Ryan Seacrest, Randy is the last of the cast who has appeared on the show since it's debut, to leave. This follows several months after Idol executives decided NOT to renew the contracts of Jennifer Lopez and Steven Tyler, in an effort to revamp and modernize the stale format.
  A replacement has not been confirmed. Thus far, only Mariah Carey is confirmed as one of the four judges, with Nicki Minaj, Diddy, Kanye and Keith Urban being considered but not yet confirmed.
  Do these changes appear to be just a whole lot more of the same? Of course it does! Don't believe me.. Ask Simon Cowell.
Race for Gas by Cypriot Rivals Adds to Tensions
  Link to Article
  Source: StratRisks
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 13:30
  S ource: NYT
  The island of Cyprus, split by one of Europe's most intractable ethnic conflicts, is now the focus of another contest, over who will control the significant natural gas wealth found in nearby waters. The question is whether the gas discovery will become an incentive for the two sides to cooperate, or yet another obstacle to reunification of the island.
  The early indications are not promising. The two halves of the island '-- the mainly Turkish-speaking north, occupied by Turkey since an invasion 38 years ago, and the internationally recognized, mainly Greek-speaking Republic of Cyprus in the south '-- are racing this summer to see who can tap the gas first.
  This competition adds a new layer of potential instability along Europe's southern fringe, where the euro crisis has sown political and economic turmoil and relations between Greece and Turkey, and Turkey and Israel, are already fraught with tensions.
  A lot of energy is at stake. Beneath the seabed of the Levant Basin near Cyprus is an estimated 122 trillion cubic feet of gas, about as much as the world consumes in a year, according to the United States Geological Survey. The northern part of the basin lies in Cypriot waters, with much of the rest in Israeli or Lebanese waters.
  An American company, Noble Energy, based in Houston, is leading the offshore drilling in the region and has announced finds of 35 trillion cubic feet, with about 20 percent of it in Cypriot waters. Noble is working with Israeli partners under license from Greek Cypriot leaders, many of whom regard the undersea area as theirs to exploit as they please, at least for now.
  But the northern Cypriots say the drilling is illegal because it does not take into account their competing claims to the island and its surrounding waters. They have called on energy companies to halt drilling, and on Cyprus to stop issuing licenses.
  Turkey, too, is unhappy with the drilling and has threatened to send its navy if necessary. To underscore their displeasure, the Turks have erected a large oil and gas exploration rig on a hill above Sinirustu, a village near the north coast of Cyprus, and have festooned it with flags.
  ''Maybe war could explode again here,'' said Fikret Akan, 29, a Turkish-speaking resident of the village who works at a fuel depot in a nearby town. ''Turkey, Israel and the United States all could start fighting over these resources.''
  The United Nations, which supervises a buffer zone between the north and south, has hailed the gas discoveries as a way of generating wealth that could finance a reunification of Cyprus. But Mr. Akan's fears about a greater conflict may not be entirely unfounded.
  Even before any gas has been produced, the discoveries have created ''risks, big risks, as well as a myriad of legal issues,'' Richard L. Morningstar said in March when he was the United States special envoy for Eurasian energy, adding that the issues ''go beyond Cyprus, they go beyond Israel, they go beyond Greece '-- they affect the whole region.''
  This year, the United States established its first regional headquarters for a new Bureau of Energy Resources in Cyprus. Although it, too, has urged a fair distribution of resources between the halves, Washington has strongly supported the right of the recognized government of Cyprus, a member of the European Union, to drill in its waters.
  That forceful backing may have reinforced the Greek Cypriot leaders' unwillingness to divide oil and gas wealth with the Turkish Cypriots, at least for now. ''Don't speak about sharing,'' Neoklis Sylikiotis, the Cypriot commerce minister, said during a recent interview. Only after the division of the island is resolved can the revenue be shared, he said.
  As attitudes harden, the northerners have mapped out blocks of the eastern Mediterranean for licensing that roughly overlap waters claimed by the Cyprus government. The Turkish government has acknowledged that one vessel chartered by the Turkish Petroleum Corporation had made seismic surveys on behalf of northern Cyprus in waters that overlap Cypriot claims. And the northerners have begun their own onshore explorations, starting in Sinirustu.
  Greek Cypriot officials like Mr. Sylikiotis dismiss the exploratory drilling in Sinirustu '-- which they call by its Greek name, Syngrasis '-- as nothing more than a theatrical stunt. But the drilling work has gone ahead at full speed this summer. A heady, sulfurous odor created by the mixture of drilling fluids and mud hung in the air over the village despite a warm breeze.
  Clad in red overalls bearing the logo of Turkish Petroleum, Ekrem Akyuz, 29, one of the Turkish engineers overseeing the site, shared a watermelon with colleagues in one of the dozens of air-conditioned trailers that surround the drilling rig. Mr. Akyuz said the geological data from the site were being kept unusually secure, making it hard to judge whether the area was promising. But he said the project was technically similar to wells he had drilled in other parts of the world.
  ''Maybe Turkey can produce first, or maybe Cyprus can produce first,'' Mr. Akyuz said. ''We just don't know yet.''
  Cyprus could produce enough gas to earn $2.2 billion to $3.1 billion a year at current prices by the early 2020s, according to Sohbet Karbuz, the director of hydrocarbons at the Observatoire M(C)diterran(C)en de l'Energie, an association of Mediterranean energy companies. The closest natural customer is Turkey, which imports most of its oil and gas.
  Despite the saber rattling by the Turkish government over the Cypriots' offshore exploration, 15 companies and consortia, including Marathon Oil of the United States and Enel of Italy, submitted bids this year on nine additional blocks of seabed. Turkey has since warned those bidders they ''will in no way be allowed to take part in Turkey's future energy projects.'' It also pledged to ''give every support'' to maritime territorial claims by northern Cyprus, which it alone recognizes as an independent state.
  The drilling has also become entangled in the rupture between Turkey and Israel, whose friendly relations soured after Israeli commandos raided a ship in 2010 when it was sailing to Gaza in defiance of the Israeli naval blockade; nine activists, most of them Turkish citizens, died in the raid.
  Israel has since turned to Cyprus as a regional partner, signing defense and cooperation agreements this year partly aimed at protecting their neighboring gas fields.
  In May the tensions between Turkey and Israel spread to the skies above the island, when the Turkish Army command said its fighter jets chased an Israeli plane out of northern Cypriot airspace. That same month, Cyprus denied a report that Israel planned to deploy 20,000 troops in Cyprus to protect Israelis working on energy projects.
  The fickle politics of the Middle East are another potential obstacle for Cypriot ambitions.
  ''What if Turkey and Israel find some face-saving way for Israel to apologize for the Marmara incident, and Israel pipes gas direct to Turkey?'' asked Fiona Mullen, an analyst at Sapienta Economics in Nicosia, the Cypriot capital, referring to the raided ship. ''Cyprus could be left high and dry.''
  Tags: Cyprus, Ekrem Akyuz, euro, Europe, Fiona Mullen, Greece, Greek, Greek Cypriot, island, Israel, Levant Basin, Neoklis Sylikiotis, relations, Republic, Sohbet Karbuz, Turkey, United States, United States Geological Survey
North Korea makes "significant" nuclear reactor progress: IAEA
  Link to Article
  Source: Reuters: World News
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 13:29
  By Fredrik Dahl
  VIENNA | Fri Aug 31, 2012 9:21am EDT
  VIENNA (Reuters) - North Korea has made significant progress in the construction of a light water atomic reactor over the past year, a U.N. watchdog report said, a facility that may extend Pyongyang's capacity to produce material for nuclear weapons.
  The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), citing satellite images, also said "certain activities" had been observed at locations where the reclusive Asian state "reportedly" conducted nuclear tests in 2006 and 2009.
  But "without access to the locations the agency is unable to provide a technical assessment of the purpose of these activities or of whether nuclear material is being used," the annual report, issued to IAEA member states on Thursday, said.
  North Korea's nuclear program is a "matter of serious concern", it said, adding that the country's statements about uranium enrichment activities and the construction of the reactor "continue to be deeply troubling".
  North Korea says it needs nuclear power to provide electricity, but has also boasted of its nuclear deterrence capability and has traded nuclear technology with Syria, Libya and probably Myanmar and Pakistan. It is believed to be pushing ahead with plans for a third nuclear test. {ID:nL4E8JO284]
  It became the first country to withdraw from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 2003 and has denied IAEA access to its atomic sites, reneging on a February deal to do so after it announced plans to launch a long-range rocket, in defiance of United Nations Security Council resolutions.
  In May, website 38North said North Korea had resumed construction work on an experimental light water reactor (ELWR) after stopping in December.
  REACTOR WORK "PROGRESSING APACE"
  38North - run by the U.S.-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University and former U.S. State Department official Joel Wit - said the ELWR, when operational, could produce enough material for an additional nuclear bomb each year.
  U.S. expert David Albright estimated a higher potential production of about 20 kg of weapon-grade plutonium a year, enough material for four nuclear weapons or more. But he said it could also produce electricity.
  "I think they do want to pursue this as an electricity route too, so it is really a question of dual use, and we don't know what they are going to do. North Korea would be able to do both," Albright told Reuters.
  A highly enriched uranium program running alongside this could allow North Korea significantly to increase the number of nuclear devices it could produce, giving it a dual track to nuclear weapons as it has big reserves of uranium.
  The IAEA said "significant progress" had been made in the reactor's construction since its previous report a year ago.
  Progress included placing a dome on the reactor containment building and indications that some components may have been installed inside the building.
  A system for pumping water from a river to the reactor for cooling purposes has also been built, the IAEA report said.
  "However, without access to the site, the agency is unable to assess either the design features of the LWR or the likely date for its completion," the Vienna-based agency said.
  Earlier in August Albright's think-tank, the Institute for Science and International Security, said satellite imagery from May and June showed construction "progressing apace". It said the reactor could be completed in the second half of 2013.
  (Editing by Tim Pearce)
Update: Details Surrounding Chris Lighty's Death
  Link to Article
  Source: Jacky Jasper's Diary of a Hollywood Street King
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 13:23
  by Jacky Jasper
  HSK Exclusive - The streets of New York are saying that con-man Bernie Madoff ripped off Chris Lighty for more than $20 million. Don't believe me.. Ask P. Diddy.
  Hip-hop mogul Chris Lighty was killed from what is alleged to be a self inflicted gunshot wound on Thursday immediately after a heated argument with his ex-wife Veronica. Cops found Lighty, 44, the founder and chief of Violator Management, lying faceup on the basement patio in a pool of blood and a 9-mm. pistol at his side.
  Here's the drop:
  ''There's more to this, but I don't know, he committed suicide.
  Chris lost a lot of money fucking with Bernie Madoff. He lost more than $20 million. Bernie took his legs off. Why didn't mainstream media report that? Quick to talk about IRS problems like Chris was starving.
  Chris has three kids. Why would he eat a bullet? I'll talk to his family and back to you Jacky.''
Limbaugh: It's Now Racist to Say ''Chicago, PGA, Birth Certificate''
  Link to Article
  Source: Infowars » Featured Stories
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 13:23
  MSNBC characterizes all criticism of Obama as racist
  Paul Joseph WatsonInfowars.comFriday, August 31, 2012
  Radio host Rush Limbaugh slammed the ''racism'' and bigotry'' of MSNBC during his show yesterday, pointing out that the network has embarked on a ''hysterical'' campaign to label any criticism of Obama whatsoever as a racist slur.
  The primary target of Limbaugh's ire was MSNBC host Lawrence O'Donnell, who reacted to Mitch McConnell's speech in which the Kentucky Senator joked that Obama had spent so much time playing golf he should try for the PGA tour, by claiming the jibe was a racist effort to connect Obama with Tiger Woods and his notorious lifestyle.
  ''Now these people have lost it. I mean, they're worse than in the tank. Their minds have been corrupted. They have actually become perverted. It's as though there's a poison eating away brain cells. They're becoming hysterical, nonsensical,'' said Limbaugh, adding that Obama's cheerleaders in the media have abandoned attempting to defend Obama's record and instead resorted to framing his every political adversary as a racist.
  ''They're going to find a link between whatever any speaker says, to racism. They are a political operation. MSNBC is not a news network. They're not a cable network. They are a political network,'' remarked Limbaugh.
  Limbaugh's next example was a recent panel discussion on MSNBC during which the participants, notably Tour(C) Neblett, claimed that using the word ''angry'' in a negative context when criticizing Obama was also racist.
  A d v e r t i s e m e n tLimbaugh also made reference to a segment on Hardball where Christ Matthews and his guests attempted to claim that merely using the word ''Chicago'' to describe the President's roots was also a racist slur.
  ''We can't say ''Hussein,'' can't say ''birth certificate,'' can't say ''Barack,'' can't say ''Obama,'' can't say ''Chicago,'' can't say ''PGA,'' can't say ''golf.'' It's all racist,'' chided Limbaugh.
  ''Not even I thought it would get that bad. I mean, I knew that with the election of Obama, every bit of criticism of him would be said to be racist. I never thought it'd get this insane, which is what it is. It really is pathetic,'' Limbaugh concluded.
  As we have previously highlighted, MSNBC has been the primary culprit in attempting to chill free speech by characterizing legitimate criticism of Obama as a racist thought crime.
  Last year, MSNBC regular Richard Wolffe mused that Republican opposition to Obama making a speech on a date that clashed with a presidential debate was down to ''the color of his skin''.
  MSNBC also ludicrously accused the Associated Press of indulging in racism by accurately transcribing an Obama speech in front of the Congressional Black Caucus.
  During his speech, Obama attempted to fool the black audience into thinking he was one of them and not a paid teleprompter reader for Wall Street by dropping the g's at the end of his words.
  ''Take off your bedroom slippers. Put on your marching shoes,'' Obama lectured the audience. ''Shake it off. Stop complainin'. Stop grumblin'. Stop cryin'. We are going to press on. We have work to do.''
  However, after the Associated Press accurately transcribed Obama's dropped g's, MSNBC aired a debate segmentasking whether the decision not to ''clean up'' Obama's words was ''racist''.
  ''On MSNBC, the African-American author Karen Hunter complained the news service transcribed Obama's speech without cleaning it up as other outlets did''specifically including the ''dropped g's,'' reported Yahoo News.
  ''Hunter called the AP's version ''inherently racist,'' sparring with New Republic contributing editor and noted linguistics expert John McWhorter, who argued the g-less version ''is actually the correct one,'' noting that the president's victory in the 2008 election was due, in part, to how effortlessly ''he can switch into that [black] dialect.''
  Back during the Obama Joker poster era, when depictions of the President as the fictional character out of Batman were deemed racist by the establishment media despite identical images being produced of Bush as the Joker for years before, MSNBC host Carlos Watson insinuated that calling Obama a ''socialist'' was secret code for a racist slur.
  Responding to those questioning Obama's big government agenda by labeling him a socialist, Watson wondered whether the term was ''becoming a code word, whether or not socialist is becoming the new n-word for some angry upset birthers and others.''
  MSNBC is part-owned (49% to Comcast's 51%) by one of Obama's biggest campaign contributors, General Electric, which itself received $16 billion in federal bailout money, a story MSNBC's hosts were keen to avoid.
  MSNBC hosts who do dare to challenge the status quo are quickly dispatched. Young Turks presenter Cenk Uygur was forced to leave the network despite excellent ratings after he was told by company bosses to ''tone it down'' because ''we are the establishment.''
  *********************
  Paul Joseph Watson is the editor and writer for Prison Planet.com. He is the author of Order Out Of Chaos. Watson is also a regular fill-in host for The Alex Jones Show and Infowars Nightly News.
  Tags: Domestic News, Mainstream Media
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Fox News's Carl Cameron shows compassion, offers needy CNN anchor a Coke
  Link to Article
  Source: TheBlaze.com - Blog
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 13:23
  A profile in the New York Times looks at Fox News' chief political correspondent Carl Cameron. The story says Cameron has interviewed Mitt Romney no less than nine times in the past year.
  ''I often get criticized for having more access, but there's a reason for that,'' Cameron told the Times. ''These are Campaign Carl's rules for winning the nomination: Get out early and get out often. And how do you win the story? Get out early and get out often. I am out there in Iowa and New Hampshire before any of the national press.''
  And he's always there for those truly in need.
  Despite the fierce competitiveness of his network, his rivals describe him as collegial. John Berman of CNN recalled an interaction with him this week in which Mr. Cameron committed a mortal sin: aiding the enemy.
  Mr. Berman said he needed a Coke, but his network's cooler was empty. Mr. Cameron offered him one of Fox's.
  ''It didn't matter what letters were on my microphone,'' Mr. Berman said. ''What mattered is that I was thirsty. That's more than fair and balanced. That's awesome.''
Eyewitness: Burning Man festival, Nevada
  Link to Article
  Source: Culture | guardian.co.uk
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 12:59
  Eyewitness: Burning Man festival, Nevada | Culture | guardian.co.uk Photographs from the Guardian Eyewitness series
  guardian.co.uk, Friday 31 August 2012 07.59 EDTArt installation El Pulpo Mecanico warms up night-time revellers at Burning Man, the madcap arts and music festival staged each year in Nevada's Black Rock desert
  Photograph: Jim Urquhart/ Reuters
  ;
Bristol Radio Station spills the beans
  Link to Article
  Source: the tap
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 12:54
  Man gets paid GBP 1000 a day to fix elections.Psychological warfare movie mentioned called 'Don't shoot the messenger'. How the masses are manipulated.Dropped off in comments.South African nuclear weapons story. Where did the weapons all go? Three were sold for cash to the British Government. Conservatives were paid 17.5 million in 1992 (in Hansard). Michael Heseltine got a pay-off. Dr David Kelly was involved, as was David Cameron. Weapons were moved to Oman, a British puppet state.The weapons were lost when a middleman sold them on to someone else.In 1991 the USA lost 8 nuclear bombs in the sea off Africa. The same middleman got hold of these bombs.Peter Lillie gave Tara Andrea Davison a sexually transmitted disease. She was also involved in the GBP 17.5 million pay-off to the Conservatives, and has a lot of knowledge as to who got what.This guy talks on a Bristol Radio Station each week. Whistleblower extraordinaire. Is this the same?Try tony gosling on bcfm
  http://bcfm.org.uk/category/shows/friday-drivetime
'Internet is voor mensen die broodje-aapverhalen de wereld inkatapulteren het best denkbare medium'
  Link to Article
  Source: VK: Home
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 12:42
  OPINIE - Lucas Maillette de Buy Wenniger ''31/08/12, 13:07
  (C) ANP. Vliegtuigstrepen bij ondergaande zon. Foto uit 2009.
  opinieComplotdenken is wijdverbreider dan ooit tevoren, waarbij de onzintheoretici het in twijfel trekken van algemeen aanvaarde wetenschap vaak niet schuwen. Wie begrijpt hoe een perfecte complottheorie eruit ziet kan zich er als bonafide wetenschapper beter mee omgaan, schrijft Lucas Maillette de Buy Wenniger.
  De migrante die onze afdeling schoonmaakt vertelde me gisteren voor de derde keer over haar angst voor de door vliegtuigen gemaakte strepen aan het hemelgewelf. Op internet had ze gelezen dat hogere overheden vanuit vliegtuigen deze zogenaamde 'chemtrails' spuiten, vol stoffen die mensen onvruchtbaarder maken en ziekten van de luchtwegen veroorzaken om ons afhankelijk te houden van de gezondheidszorg. Ze vroeg mij als onderzoeker wat ik ervan dacht.
  Het internet is voor mensen die broodje-aapverhalen de wereld inkatapulteren het best denkbare medium. Met nog minder redactionele controle dan in de inmiddels vaak ook al niet meer zo waterdichte reguliere journalistiek en vrijwel ontraceerbare bronnen is enige kennis van website-programmeren en een vlotte pen voldoende om een complottheorie te publiceren.
  Een succesvolle complottheorie bespeelt onze angsten en frustraties perfect. In een continu¼m met religie kanaliseren dit soort ideenstelsels gevoelens van onmacht over de negatieve gebeurtenissen van het leven, waarbij de verantwoordelijkheid voor ellende bij een hogere macht wordt geplaatst. In het geval van de chemtrails-complottheorie krijgt een vaag omschreven groep elitaire samenzweerders op die manier de schuld van onder andere diverse ziekten en de afnemende vruchtbaarheid, afhankelijk van welke website u over dit fenomeen raadpleegt.
  SlechterikenNaast overheden, buitenaardse mogendheden en de Russen kunnen ook wetenschappers in de ogen van complottheoretici als slechteriken figuren. De doorgaans te goeder trouw handelende wetenschappers moeten vervolgens de keuze maken hoe ze met zo'n complottheorie willen omgaan.
  Negeren sterkt de complotdenkers in hun idee dat informatie wordt achtergehouden, maar pogingen om met wetenschappelijk bewijs zo'n onzintheorie te ontkrachten zijn minstens even vruchteloos, omdat dit voor complotgelovigen bewijst dat zelfs de data worden gemanipuleerd. Een goede wetenschapscomplottheorie laat zich kortom per definitie niet met wetenschappelijk bewijs ontzenuwen.
  De complotdenkers zullen bovendien iedere marge van onzekerheid, die toch inherent is aan wetenschap, uitvergroten, uiteraard zonder dat ze zich genoodzaakt zien zelf harde bewijzen voor hun complottheorie te verzamelen. Matige media presenteren vervolgens de theorie in een voor- en tegenformat, waarbij de echte wetenschapper per definitie in de ongunstige verdedigende positie gedwongen wordt, en de - soms wetenschappelijk geschoolde - complotdenker tot gelijkwaardige gesprekspartner wordt gepromoveerd.
  Wetenschappers moeten het niet accepteren dat complottheorien de status krijgen van 'alternatieve wetenschappelijke zienswijze'. Anders dan complotdenkers vaak impliceren bestaat er een groot verschil tussen complottheorien enerzijds, en wetenschappelijke gedachten anderzijds.
  Galileo's onorthodoxe hypothese over de vorm van de aarde ging weliswaar tegen het wetenschappelijk establishment in, maar hij produceerde vervolgens ook de experimentele data om zijn idee te staven. Complottheoretici doen dit nooit: hoewel bijvoorbeeld de chemtrail-hypothese met eenvoudige experimenten te ontkrachten zou zijn is er geen complotgelovige die de moeite neemt zo'n test uit te voeren. Bij het ontzenuwen van zijn theorie heeft geen enkele gelovige belang, want het ondergraaft zijn eigen zekerheden.
  OnethischHelaas zijn diverse complotten waarin wetenschappelijke kennis in twijfel wordt getrokken in potentie zo schadelijk dat het voor wetenschappers onethisch zou zijn ze volledig te negeren. De kletskoek dat er geen verband zou zijn tussen HIV-besmetting en AIDS droeg er bijvoorbeeld aan bij dat het anti-HIV-beleid van de Zuid-Afrikaanse regering volkomen ontoereikend was, wat naar schatting 330.000 mensen onnodig het leven heeft gekost. De door klimaatpiraten gepropageerde ontkenning van het verband tussen onze activiteiten en de aardopwarming heeft door het remmen van positieve politieke besluitvorming niet alleen impact voor de mens, maar raakt ook vele andere dier- en plantensoorten.
  Met dit alles in gedachten - en het risico definitief tot de samenzweerders te worden gerekend - heb ik een poging gewaagd mijn collega wat betreft de vermeende chemische lading van de condensstrepen boven de Amsterdamse Bijlmer gerust te stellen. Dat die vliegtuigstrepen wel degelijk een symbool zijn van het gevaar dat we als mensheid op dit moment voor de aarde vormen, en dat het gebrek aan daadkracht om die roofbouw op de draagkracht van het ecosysteem te beperken me welhaast doet geloven dat de oliemaatschappijen en multinationals daar een vuile rol in spelen, dat heb ik maar niet verteld.
  Lucas Maillette de Buy Wenniger is verbonden aan Sciencepalooza.
U LIEGT!
  Link to Article
  Source: GeenStijl
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 12:40
  En zo werd ik gisteren gebeld door Nieuwe Revu. Of Revu, geen idee hoe het tegenwoordig heet maar whatever. Ik werd dus gebeld door dat blaadje waar Willem Holleeder een column in heeft, tegen een bedrag dat ik nog moet uitonderhandelen met GeenStijl. Onderhandelen kan 'ie wel, die Holleeder. Of ik een stemadvies wilde geven. Aan de Revu lezer. Nu geef ik regelmatig advies, over nagellak en autokleuren '' dat eerste moet rood zijn en dat andere in ieder geval niet wit - maar een stemadvies was de eerste keer. Een fractie van een seconde vraag je je dan af of Frans Bauer je belt maar de nummerherkenning gaf duidelijk aan dat het telefoontje uit Hoofddorp kwam. Een stemadvies. Alsof er iemand in dit land nog zin heeft om te stemmen. Alsof er iemand in dit land nog gelooft dat stemmen zin heeft. Alsof er iemand in dit land nog denkt dat politici het beste met ons en Nederland voor hebben.
  Politici doen alles om onze stem af te troggelen. Hun nieuwste wapen is toegeven wat wij al jaren weten: dat ze liegen. U liegt! Alsof ze het ei van Columbus hebben ontdekt, vertellen ze elkaar te pas en te onpas dat ze liegen. Ontkennen lijkt krachtig, maar na een week van ontkennen is de lol er ook wel vanaf. ''Nee!''. Hoezo nee?! Gaat de economie opeens beter na 12 september? Komen er opeens 500.000 banen bij na 12 september? Gaan de banken opeens doen waar ze voor zijn opgericht ipv financile producten verzinnen die bestuurders spekken na 12 september? Stroomt de woningmarkt opeens door na 12 september? Krijgen jongeren opeens w(C)l een hypotheek na 12 september? Wordt het onderwijs beter, krijgt Griekenland geen *nood*steun meer, negeren we Itali, Spanje en Portugals' roep om geld, doen we niet meer mee aan de monetaire unie, weigeren we de politieke unie, rijdt het ov en gaan multinationals die in Nederland zitten 'ns belasting betalen na 12 september?
  Politici liegen.
  De oude Grieken wisten al dat politici liegen.
  Dat staat in hun functieomschrijving.
  Die de oude Grieken geschreven hebben.
  Ik was redelijk goed in Grieks... Dus dat stemadvies? Ik heb maar (C)(C)n advies: koop mijn stem. Richtprijs: BMW 335 i touring. Ik heb een nieuwe auto nodig. And that's no lie.
  Ebru Umar | 31-08-12 | 12:59 | Link |
What Is The Best Place To Live In America? Pros And Cons For All 50 States
  Link to Article
  Source: BlackListedNews.com
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 12:34
  If you could live in any state in America, where would you go? During troubled times like these, what is the best place in the United States to live? A lot of people are asking these kinds of questions these days.
  Our economy is on the verge of collapse, natural disasters are becoming more frequent and more intense, the U.S. population is becoming angrier and more frustrated by the day, our government has become incredibly oppressive and controlling, war could break out at any time and evidence that society is breaking down is all around us. As our world becomes increasingly unstable, many families are considering moving somewhere else. But what areas are best and what areas should be avoided? Is there really a ''best place to live'' in America? Well, the truth is that each family is facing a different set of circumstances. If you have a great support system where you live, it can be really tough to pick up and move 3000 miles away from that support system. If you have a great job where you live now, it can be really tough to move some place where there may be no job at all for you. But without a doubt there are some areas of the country that will be far better off than others in the event of a major economic collapse. This article will take a look at each of the 50 U.S. states and will list some of the pros and cons for moving to each one.
  Not all of the factors listed below will be important to you, and a few have even been thrown in for humor. But if you are thinking of moving in the near future hopefully this list will give you some food for thought.
  A few years ago when my wife and I were living near Washington D.C. we knew that we wanted a change and we went through this kind of a process. We literally evaluated areas from coast to coast. In the end, we found a place that is absolutely perfect for us. But different things are important to different people.
  And if I gave your particular state a low rating, please don't think that I am trashing the entire state or all of the people who live there.
  For example, there are some absolutely wonderful people that live in the state of California, and there are some areas of California that I would not mind visiting at all. But for the times that are coming I am convinced that it is going to be a really bad place to live.
  Not that I have all the answers either. Hopefully this article can get some debates started, and hopefully those debates will help people that are thinking of moving to another state to be more informed.
  The following are some pros and cons for all 50 states'....
  Alabama
  Pros: warm weather, southern hospitality, relatively low population density
  Cons: hurricanes, tornadoes, crime, not enough jobs, multiple nuclear power plants, rampant poverty
  Overall Rating: C+
  Alaska
  Pros: great fishing, lots of empty space, low population density, great for rugged individualists
  Cons: very high cost of living, earthquakes, volcanoes, extremely cold, short growing season, too much snow, potentially cut off from supplies from the lower 48 states during an emergency situation
  Overall Rating: B
  Arizona
  Pros: warm weather
  Cons: illegal immigration, wildfires, return of dust bowl conditions, not enough jobs, not enough rain, multiple nuclear power plants, crime, gang violence, Phoenix
  Overall Rating: D+
  Arkansas
  Pros: southern hospitality, warm weather, Ozark National Forest
  Cons: tornadoes, Clintons, New Madrid fault zone, multiple nuclear power plants, crime, rampant poverty
  Overall Rating: C
  California
  Pros: Disneyland, warm weather, Malibu
  Cons: high taxes, Jerry Brown, earthquakes, mudslides, wildfires, gang violence, crime, traffic, rampant poverty, insane politicians, ridiculous regulations, bad schools, political correctness, illegal immigration, not enough jobs, air pollution, multiple nuclear power plants, possible tsunami threat along the coast, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Oakland, Stockton, Sacramento, huge drug problem, high population density, the state government is broke, many more reasons to leave California right here
  Overall Rating: F
  Colorado
  Pros: Rocky Mountains, Colorado Springs
  Cons: wildfires, illegal immigration, short growing season, not enough rain, too much snow, huge drug problem
  Overall Rating: B
  Connecticut
  Pros: beautiful homes
  Cons: high taxes, insane politicians, ridiculous regulations, political correctness, short growing season, multiple nuclear power plants, high population density
  Overall Rating: C-
  Delaware
  Pros: good fishing
  Cons: Joe Biden, political correctness, ridiculous regulations, insane politicians, crime, high population density
  Overall Rating: D
  Florida
  Pros: University of Florida Gators, oranges, low taxes, southern hospitality, Disneyworld, Gainesville, warm weather, beautiful beaches, Daytona
  Cons: hurricanes, most of the state is barely above sea level, high population density, not enough jobs, multiple nuclear power plants, crime, gang violence, illegal immigration
  Overall Rating: C
  Georgia
  Pros: peaches, southern hospitality, warm weather
  Cons: not enough jobs, multiple nuclear power plants, crime, gang violence, flesh eating disease, Atlanta
  Overall Rating: B-
  Hawaii
  Pros: awesome beaches, warm weather, great vacation destination
  Cons: vulnerable to tsunamis, very high cost of living, volcanoes, traffic, high population density, high taxes
  Overall Rating: C-
  Idaho
  Pros: awesome people live there, great potatoes, low population density, high concentration of liberty-minded individuals, low crime, Sandpoint, Coeur d'Alene, north Idaho has plenty of water compared to the rest of the interior West, beautiful scenery
  Cons: cold in the winter, wildfires, short growing season, not enough jobs
  Overall Rating: A
  Illinois
  Pros: once you get away from Chicago things are not quite so bad
  Cons: Barack Obama, drought, New Madrid fault zone, high population density, political correctness, ridiculous regulations, insane politicians, crime, gang violence, Chicago, East St. Louis, not enough jobs, multiple nuclear power plants, mob robberies, the state government is drowning in debt
  Overall Rating: D-
  Indiana
  Pros: it is in better shape than Illinois, good farming, high Amish population
  Cons: drought, tornadoes, the city of Gary, relatively high population density, near the New Madrid fault zone, a ''rust belt'' state
  Overall Rating: C-
  Iowa
  Pros: low population density, low crime, good farming
  Cons: drought, tornadoes, cold in the winter, multiple nuclear power plants, too much snow, very flat
  Overall Rating: B-
  Kansas
  Pros: low population density, low crime, good farming
  Cons: drought, tornadoes, return of dust bowl conditions, very flat
  Overall Rating: B
  Kentucky
  Pros: southern hospitality, great horses, Lexington
  Cons: New Madrid fault zone, not enough jobs, rampant poverty, Louisville
  Overall Rating: C
  Louisiana
  Pros: southern hospitality, warm weather
  Cons: hurricanes, New Orleans, not enough jobs, tornadoes, multiple nuclear power plants, oil spills, crime, gang violence, rampant poverty
  Overall Rating: D
  Maine
  Pros: low population density, low crime, polite people
  Cons: extremely cold, short growing season, political correctness, ridiculous regulations, insane politicians, too much snow
  Overall Rating: B-
  Maryland
  Pros: the Washington Redskins play there
  Cons: Baltimore, borders Washington D.C., high population density, really bad traffic, political correctness, ridiculous regulations, insane politicians, multiple nuclear power plants, crime, gang violence
  Overall Rating: C-
  Massachusetts
  Pros: beautiful homes
  Cons: high taxes, political correctness, ridiculous regulations, insane politicians, high population density, short growing season, almost everything is illegal in Massachusetts
  Overall Rating: D+
  Michigan
  Pros: once you get away from Detroit and Flint things get better
  Cons: Detroit, Flint, Dearborn, extremely cold, short growing season, political correctness, ridiculous regulations, insane politicians, not enough jobs, multiple nuclear power plants, too much snow, a ''rust belt'' state
  Overall Rating: D-
  Minnesota
  Pros: land of 10,000 lakes
  Cons: extremely cold, short growing season, multiple nuclear power plants, too much snow, high taxes
  Overall Rating: C
  Mississippi
  Pros: southern hospitality, relatively low population density, warm weather
  Cons: hurricanes, tornadoes, not enough jobs, rampant poverty, crime
  Overall Rating: C+
  Missouri
  Pros: good farming, Branson
  Cons: drought, tornadoes, New Madrid fault zone, not enough jobs, crime
  Overall Rating: C
  Montana
  Pros: low population density, low taxes, high concentration of liberty-minded individuals, Missoula, Kalispell
  Cons: extremely cold in the winter, wildfires, short growing season, not enough rain, near Yellowstone super volcano, rampant poverty, too much snow
  Overall Rating: B+
  Nebraska
  Pros: low population density, good farming
  Cons: tornadoes, drought, multiple nuclear power plants, cold in the winter, very flat
  Overall Rating: B
  Nevada
  Pros: low population density, lots of empty space, low taxes, warm weather
  Cons: Harry Reid, Las Vegas, Reno, not enough water, not enough rain, wildfires, hard to grow food, not enough jobs, crime, gang violence, huge drug problem, Yucca Mountain
  Overall Rating: D+
  New Hampshire
  Pros: low crime, beautiful homes
  Cons: extremely cold, short growing season, political correctness, ridiculous regulations, insane politicians, too much snow
  Overall Rating: C
  New Jersey
  Pros: anyone got something?
  Cons: high population density, Camden, Newark, not enough jobs, multiple nuclear power plants, Atlantic City, crime, gang violence
  Overall Rating: D-
  New Mexico
  Pros: low population density, warm weather
  Cons: illegal immigration, wildfires, return of dust bowl conditions, not enough jobs, not enough rain, crime, gang violence, huge drug problem
  Overall Rating: C-
  New York
  Pros: the entire state is not like New York City
  Cons: New York City, Mayor Bloomberg, high taxes, cold in the winter, high population density, political correctness, ridiculous regulations, insane politicians, not enough jobs, multiple nuclear power plants, the ''too big to fail'' banks
  Overall Rating: D
  North Carolina
  Pros: southern hospitality, warm weather, Great Smoky Mountains National Park
  Cons: hurricanes, not enough jobs, multiple nuclear power plants
  Overall Rating: B
  North Dakota
  Pros: low crime, lots of oil-related jobs, low population density
  Cons: extremely cold, short growing season, too much snow
  Overall Rating: B
  Ohio
  Pros: the Cincinnati Reds, the Pro Football Hall of Fame, high Amish population
  Cons: not enough jobs, cold in the winter, multiple nuclear power plants, high population density, Toledo, Cleveland, a ''rust belt'' state
  Overall Rating: C
  Oklahoma
  Pros: warm weather, good farming
  Cons: drought, tornadoes, wildfires, return of dust bowl conditions, not enough rain, crime, Oklahoma City, rampant poverty
  Overall Rating: C
  Oregon
  Pros: tremendous natural beauty
  Cons: high taxes, Portland, political correctness, ridiculous regulations, insane politicians, not enough jobs, huge drug problem, possible tsunami threat along the coast
  Overall Rating: C-
  Pennsylvania
  Pros: high Amish population
  Cons: high population density, Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh, not enough jobs, multiple nuclear power plants, a ''rust belt'' state
  Overall Rating: C
  Rhode Island
  Pros: so small that most people don't notice their problems
  Cons: the state is flat broke, short growing season, political correctness, ridiculous regulations, insane politicians, not enough jobs, high population density
  Overall Rating: D+
  South Carolina
  Pros: southern hospitality, warm weather, Myrtle Beach
  Cons: hurricanes, not enough jobs, multiple nuclear power plants, crime, gang violence, rampant poverty
  Overall Rating: B
  South Dakota
  Pros: low population density, fun tourist traps, the Badlands, Mount Rushmore
  Cons: extremely cold, short growing season, very flat, too much snow
  Overall Rating: B
  Tennessee
  Pros: Nashville, Michael W. Smith, southern hospitality, warm weather, Gatlinburg
  Cons: Memphis, New Madrid fault zone, multiple nuclear power plants, crime, gang violence, rampant poverty
  Overall Rating: B-
  Texas
  Pros: low taxes, warm weather, Austin
  Cons: drought, illegal immigration, tornadoes, wildfires, West Nile Virus, the Dallas Cowboys, return of dust bowl conditions, speed traps, not enough rain, multiple nuclear power plants, George W. Bush, crime
  Overall Rating: B-
  Utah
  Pros: beautiful mountains, low crime, low population density
  Cons: cold in the winter, wildfires, Salt Lake City, short growing season, not enough rain, illegal to collect rain
  Overall Rating: B-
  Vermont
  Pros: low crime, beautiful homes
  Cons: cold in the winter, insane politicians, ridiculous regulations, short growing season, political correctness, not enough jobs, too much snow
  Overall Rating: C
  Virginia
  Pros: the University of Virginia, southern hospitality, Charlottesville
  Cons: borders Washington D.C., high population density, multiple nuclear power plants, Richmond, really bad traffic in northern Virginia
  Overall Rating: B-
  Washington
  Pros: the eastern half of the state is quite nice and much different from the coast
  Cons: way too much rain along the coast, volcanoes, wildfires, insane politicians, ridiculous regulations, political correctness, not enough jobs, possible tsunami threat along the coast, Seattle
  Overall Rating: C
  West Virginia
  Pros: beautiful mountains
  Cons: not enough jobs, rampant poverty
  Overall Rating: B
  Wisconsin
  Pros: cheese, the Green Bay Packers
  Cons: extremely cold, short growing season, multiple nuclear power plants, too much snow,
  Overall Rating: B-
  Wyoming
  Pros: low population density, lots of empty space, low taxes
  Cons: extremely cold, too windy, too flat, wildfires, short growing season, not enough rain, Yellowstone super volcano
  Overall Rating: B-
  What do you think of these rankings?
  What do you think is the best place to live in America?
  Do you have any additional pros and cons that should be added to this list?
  Please feel free to post a comment with your thoughts below'....
  >>
Insurgents launch rare multiple attacks in Thai south
  Link to Article
  Source: Reuters: World News
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 12:24
  BANGKOK | Fri Aug 31, 2012 7:30am EDT
  BANGKOK (Reuters) - Suspected Muslim separatists launched a wave of bomb attacks in Thailand's south on Friday in a rare show of coordination in a usually low-level insurgency in the predominantly Buddhist country.
  Police say "bomb-like" devices were found in at least 60 locations in Narathiwat and Pattani, two of three mainly Muslim provinces bordering mainly Muslim Malaysia, along with scores of Malaysian flags.
  Most of the devices were fake, but at least a dozen exploded and wounded two soldiers.
  A shadowy separatist insurgency by ethnic Malays resurfaced in January 2004, after simmering for decades. Since then, 5,206 people have been killed and 9,137 wounded, according to Deep South Watch, an organization that monitors the violence.
  The placing of the flags with the devices was aimed at souring relations between Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur, an analyst and a security official said.
  "The operation was designed as a show of solidarity with Malaysia, which will have a secondary effect of straining relations between Thailand and Malaysia," said Anthony Davis, an analyst at IHS-Jane's, a global security consulting firm.
  The coordination and scale of Friday's action were "extremely rare" and intended as a rebuttal of the government's handling of the eight-year conflict, said Srisompop Jitpiromsri of Deep South Watch, who is also a lecturer at Prince of Songkla University in Pattani.
  Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat have seen almost daily gun fights and bomb attacks since January 2004. The three provinces were once part of an independent Malay Muslim sultanate until annexed by Thailand in 1909.
  The placing of Malaysian flags was intended to antagonize the Thai government and cause friction with Malaysia, Pramote Prom-in, an official at the Southern Internal Security Operations Command told a news conference in Narathiwat.
  He asked authorities to be vigilant and said the attacks would not affect Thai-Malaysian relations.
  The attacks came on the anniversary of Malaysia's independence from British rule.
  Leaked television footage of a fatal roadside ambush by militants on four Thai soldiers a month ago triggered widespread public scrutiny of the government's handling of the long-neglected south.
  The government had ruled out peace talks but the government had a change of heart and said this month talks were under way.
  Successive governments have spent more than 160 billion baht ($5 billion) over the past eight years to quell the violence.
  The use of the Malaysian flags should not be taken as signaling the insurgents' wish to be part of Malaysia, said Davis.
  "They're reiterating their own need for independence," he said.
  (Reporting by Surapan Boonthanom; Writing by Amy Sawitta Lefevre; Editing by Robert Birsel)
Spanish wildfire reaches edge of Marbella
  Link to Article
  Source: The Guardian World News
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 12:23
  A wildfire rages on the edge of Marbella after breaking out near Malaga on Thursday. Photograph: EPA
  Several thousand people have been evacuated after a huge wildfire raging out of control in southern Spain reached the edge of the tourist resort of Marbella on the Costa del Sol, Spanish authorities say.
  The fire broke out near the port city of Malaga late on Thursday and raced westward, fanned by strong winds and high temperatures.
  Two people suffered minor burns when the blaze threatened a housing estate in northern Marbella, forcing the evacuation of thousands of people to a sports centre.
  Millions of tourists visit the Costa del Sol, famed for its beaches and nightlife, every year and hundreds of thousands of expatriates from northern Europe live in the coastal belt.
  The fire has defied the efforts of Spanish firefighters backed by aircraft and helicopters dumping water on the flames.
  "The fire is horrific, with flames 10 to 15 metres high," Angel Nozal, the mayor of Mijas, an inland town between Marbella and Malaga, told the national daily El Pa­s.
  "This is without a doubt the worst fire we've had in Malaga," Elias Bendodo, president of Malaga council, told Spanish national radio.
  "Thousands of people have been evacuated '... Two people are definitely injured and '... lots of houses have suffered damage," he said.
  Local authorities do not know how the fire started, but said they hoped to bring it under control later on Friday because the wind had dropped.
  Unusually dry weather in Spain has resulted in wildfires burning thousands of hectares of land this summer, and temperatures have hit record highs in some regions.
  Thousands of people were evacuated earlier this month in the Canary Islands, while four people died in fires in the border area between France and Catalonia, in north-east Spain, in July.
US election: Barack Obama responds to Clint Eastwood's bizarre attack '' Telegraph.co.uk
  Link to Article
  Source: News 1 Stop
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 12:20
  Mr Eastwood, 82, has today come in for a multitude of criticism for his strange performance.
  Roger Ebert, an influential American film critic, tweeted "Clint, my hero, is coming across as sad and pathetic. He didn't need to do this to himself. It's unworthy of him."
  Scheduled to speak for five minutes, Mr Eastwood held the stage for nearly 12 minutes, at one point asking the empty chair: "Mr President, how do you handle promises that you have made when you were running for election, and how do you handle them? I mean, what do you say to people?"
  He continued his imagined conversation with Mr Obama, telling him that he had failed to deliver on his promises and that it was now time for Mr Romney and his running-mate, Paul Ryan, to take over.
  Twitter was immediately flooded with messages questioning the Oscar-winning director's performance.
  Minutes after the speech a Twitter account @InvisibleObama was created. The account has already gained more than 36,000 followers and counting.
  Last night Mr Romney's aides backstage were wincing as Eastwood's speech stretched on, provoking fears his speech may have eclipsed that of Mr Romney's.
  Gail Gitcho, a Romney spokesman, said: ''He's an American icon. You can't look at him through the same political lens that you would other politicians. He's Clint Eastwood.''
  Eastwood is a long-time Republic supporter. In 1986 he ran successfully as the Republican candidate for mayor in Carmel, the wealthy Californian town where he lived. However, he has attracted questions over his idiosyncratic political directions, which have included support for same-sex marriage and abortion rights.
  In Mr Romney's speech last night, the candidate finally opened up to the American people, admitting: "You need to know more about me".
  The former Massachusetts governor pledged to the party gathering in Florida that he would ''restore the promise of America'' by replacing Barack Obama's hollow message of ''hope and change'' with job-creation and economic competence.
  ''President Obama promised to slow the rise of the oceans and to heal the planet,'' Mr Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, said. ''My promise is to help you and your family''.
  However, after being urged for months to shed his wooden style and make a personal connection with voters, he overshadowed his sweeping political critique of Mr Obama's record with rare visible displays of emotion as he spoke about his family's ''unconditional love''.
  ''All the laws and legislation in the world will never heal this world like the loving hearts and arms of mothers and fathers,'' said Mr Romney.
Climate change deniers 'are ... conspiracy theorists'?
  Link to Article
  Source: ZapLog - externe links
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 12:16
  ''We find that endorsement of a laissez-faire conception of free-market economics predicts rejection of climate science,'' the paper says. ''We additionally show that endorsement of a cluster of conspiracy theories (e.g., that the CIA killed Martin Luther King or that NASA faked the moon landing) predicts rejection of climate science as well as the rejection of other scientific findings.''
  The lead researcher, Professor Stephan Lewandowsky, from the University of Western Australia, said conspiracy theories are the ''antithesis to scientific thinking'' and those who believe them are more likely to reject the scientific consensus that humans contribute to climate change.
  ''Science is about weeding out bad ideas,'' he told The Daily Telegraph. ''With conspiracy theories, you start out with a theory and stick to it no matter what the evidence. So it is not that surprising that conspiracy theorists would not accept scientific propositions ... If the scientific evidence is overwhelming and you don't like the conclusion, you have to find a way to reject those findings.''
  Professor Lewandowsky said those who responded to the survey came from countries across the world, including many from the US, Australia and Britain.
  ''Blogs have a huge impact on society and so it's important that we understand the motivations and the reasoning of those who visit blogs to contribute to the discussion,'' he said. ''There has been much research pointing to the role of free-market ideology in rejecting climate science, but this is the first time it's been shown that other scientific facts, such as the link between HIV and Aids, are also subject to ideological rejection.''
Dirty tricks: Bill Gates to target anti-vaccine advocates with smear campaign
  Link to Article
  Source: Infowars » Featured Stories
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 12:10
  Jon RappoportInfowars.comAug 31, 2012
  Here is the direct quote from Bill Gates' grant-award machine:
  An anti-vaccine surveillance and alert system
  Seth Kalichman of the http://www.uconn.edu/ in the USA will establish an Internet-based global monitoring and rapid alert system for finding, analysing, and counteracting communication campaigns containing misinformation regarding vaccines to support global immunization efforts.
  http://www.technet21.org
  This means the attack is on. Gates intends to do a surveillance operation across the Internet and locate anti-vaccine advocates. His minions will then undertake a counter-insurgency campaign to neutralize them.
  How does such an operation work? I'll tell you how it works: ''This writer has no medical credentials.'' ''This writer is spreading dangerous information that will harm children.'' ''This filmmaker tells lies about the most important medical technology the world has ever seen.'' ''The evidence for vaccination is overwhelming, and this writer is operating out of the Dark Ages.''
  And that's just the nice stuff.
  A d v e r t i s e m e n t''This writer was once an MD, but it's been said he gave up his practice after several patients made complaints to the medical board. Now he spends all his time attacking vaccines. He's a criminal menace.''
  ''Don't read anything by this writer. He's obviously mentally ill. He wants you to stop vaccinating your children, so they can catch life-threatening diseases.''
  And it will go downhill and get nastier from there.
  This is Nixon's dirty-tricks war all over again. But instead of having a few million dollars in a slush fund, Gates has billions at his disposal.
  He's going to use surrogates to do his work for him, so it will be difficult, in many cases, to know where the attacks are coming from. That's how cowards operate. They slink around behind the scenes and let other people do the heavy lifting.
  The last thing they want is an honest and open debate about the issue itself. That would expose them. The truth would expose them.
  Gates is obviously out to create an atmosphere and set a tone for legislation that would make vaccination mandatory everywhere, with no exemptions allowed. That's what he's shooting for. That's his wet dream, the one that goes hand in glove with depopulation, his mountaintop desire.
  The press, as always, will be on his side. They were on his side by giving short shrift to the explosive story out of India, where 47,000 cases of paralysis were caused by his polio vaccine.
  He intends to create his very own Surveillance State, in which the targets are all Internet reporters and groups that have dug up the real facts about vaccines. The facts the medical cartel wants to hide in their vaults: vaccine deaths, paralysis, maiming, brain damage, autism, immune dysfunction'...
  He wants to create a chilling effect, for those who are thinking about covering the vaccine issue honestly.
  Well, here's a newsflash. Those facts are already out there, on thousands and thousands of sites. The horse left the barn years ago.
  He's late to the party, but he's going to throw a lot of money at the problem. Essentially, he's opting for suppression of accurate journalism. Like so many before him, once he wrangled his fortune in the free market (?), he turned around and realized he didn't want a semblance of freedom anymore. He only wanted control.
  Those of us who have been writing and speaking about vaccines for years would love to go up against Gates' medical doctors in an open debate. Nothing would please us more. But Bill doesn't want that. People like him are terrified of openness. So be it.
  He can take the low road. He'll only induce more opposition. That's the way his style of attack works. People who were asleep will wake up, once they realize he's just another puffy Marmaduke who, when he doesn't like the game, decides to take his bat and ball and go home.
  And he will go home.
  His money against our freedom is a game in which many of us like the odds.
  Go ahead, Bill. Deal your first greasy card from the bottom of the deck. We've got eyeballs on you, too.
  Jon RappoportThe author of an explosive collection, THE MATRIX REVEALED, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District of California. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world.www.nomorefakenews.com
  About the author:The author of an explosive new collection, THE MATRIX REVEALED, Jonwas a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District ofCalifornia. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as aninvestigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics,medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine,Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jonhas delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic,and creative power to audiences around the world.www.nomorefakenews.com
  Tags: Vaccines
  Share this article:
the reflecting pool
  Link to Article
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 07:47
  Please with James Holmes the Joker, being charged with murder and attempted murder, let us not forget the really important things.He drove a high gas mileage car and not an evil SUV.
  He no doubt voted for Barack Hussein Obama and enjoyed the political rape of Sarah Palin.
  As a student of higher education, his tuition helped fund all the professors who hate America and turned out B. Hussein Obama.
  He helped rid the world of too many evil people as Bill Gates and the globalists want to crop a few billion.
  By not shooting cops, the police union is still gaining dues from living members to donate to Barack Obama.
  He lived in an apartment and was not wasting space with a high energy consuming suburban home.
  He was not a homophobe in targeting gays.
  He was not a racist in targeting blacks, in he shot white people.
  He helped the Obama recovery by buying 15,000 dollars worth of weapons and explosives.
  James Holmes did not harm any chickens like Col. Sanders in he only shot humans.
  If James Holmes had done this procedure on these people while in the womb, he would have made enough for a second BMW. The survivors would have just been killed and thrown in the trash.
  The Joker did not show up Eric Holder or Barack Obama in murdering more people than Fast and Furious did.
  James Holmes loved the cinema of Hollywood who are Barack Obama's biggest liberal and homosexual donors.
  This Obama voter did not quote Bible verses, read the Bible, like Billy Graham, go to Church, wear a cross or bother with praying.
  So you must see the good things of James Holmes from the Democratic perspective. Obviously, he not being convicted will still be able to vote for Barack Obama and all democrats in the upcoming elections and if convicted, he will still probably get to vote a hundred times for B. Hussein.
  Literally, one can see it now in James Holmes addressing the DNC or even sitting with Muchelle at the next State of the Union, for all the heroic things he has done.
  Perhaps, even he can be a psycho ward mate with Jesse Jackson jr. who is another victim of B. Hussein Obama AKA Barry Chin, for the reality that Mr. Jackson was going to be the first black President, and not Bill Clinton or foreign Chinese Barack Obama
  Poor JJ, all his hopes and dreams shattered by B. Hussein, who not only stole the Jackson White House destiny, but stole the Jackson Illinois Senate seat. It should have been all Jesse Jackson jr in another 40 years as the first Democrat black US President as the Repbulicans first black US President would not have counted elected 30 years before.
  Say.........was it not interesting that Jeb Bush wanted Marco Rubio to be VP and soon as Jebby said that, Rubio's plane almost crashed. That is one clever way to cover the bases in being pro latin and bbq'ing the competition for the VP spot.......
  Oh well this was about the good of James Holmes and not all this other stuff in politics and crimes.
  What was it about all that good about Wade Page and all that good about the Southern Policy Law Center too?
  So much good news on the liberal left.
  Oh that is right we have forgotten all about the Joker as other things have come along......
  There is a good little puppy. Let Master Barack pet you on the head.agtG
AADS: Acqired Asian Death Syndrome
  Link to Article
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 07:43
  Turn your head and......vaccinateThe Age of Obama really is historical in the Age of the Neo Plague, as there is the Neo West Nile Plague after Obama starts bombing Saddam Hussein biological weapons repositories in Syrian and now a new mystery Obama disease......
  Oh that is right, you remember that Obama Flu which Janet Naps Napolitano was terrorizing Americans with in telling them to wipe snot on their sleeves, in an influenza which this blog exclusively noted that medical experts in Kansas City, KS were treating effectively and the CDC new it as people were dying from it, in all that needed to be done was keep the patient hydrated and then TURN THEM PERIODICALLY as people we drowning in their own fluids, so no one needed to die, but this information was withheld from the public deliberately by the Obama regime for their terror agenda.
  So there are patterns in these Obama Plagues, these Obama Pandemics, in a great deal of hype when Obama's cronies are making money, faux stories covering up how West Nile suddenly mutated into a daytime mosquito disease when it had not done so in 6000 years, and then.....well there is that Asians AIDS infection that really is getting no attention at all, except from creep CDC pathologists who are treating Asians like some damned guinea pigs to examine.
  ''This is absolutely fascinating. I've seen probably at least three patients in the last 10 years or so'' who might have had this, said Dr. Dennis Maki, an infectious disease specialist at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.Yes nothing like being excited on government grants to study plagues which appear throughout Asia as numbers of these "new diseases appear" which all look like they came out of bio weapons labs.You do remember creepy Bill Gates in that speech stating "they" were going to use vaccines to crop something like 1 billion people now do you not?
  MS ADDS computer generated viral agent of the humanicide orderThis blog in it's early manifestation, covered the SAARS origins correctly in highlighting the link between the weapons labs of communist China and numerous outbreaks when plagues were let loose from unsecure labs. This blog was scoffed at by nitwits who could not apparently operate a search engine and keyboard.This blog was exclusive in covering thee exact same areas in China which the Imperial Japanese and the Americans launched plague viruses, were having more odd epidemics occurring in China.
  Now we have on our hands a viral agent, exactly like SAARS is killing Asians. This AADS disease affects 50 plus year old Asians, and it destroys their immune system, which starts the process of a lingering horrid death worse than AIDS, but with lengthy hospital stays it can be checked.
  Kim Nguyen, 62, a seamstress from Vietnam who has lived in Tennessee since 1975, was gravely ill when she sought help for a persistent fever, infections throughout her bones and other bizarre symptoms in 2009. She had been sick off and on for several years and had visited Vietnam in 1995 and again in early 2009.''She was wasting away from this systemic infection'' that at first seemed like tuberculosis but wasn't, said Dr. Carlton Hays Jr., a family physician at the Jackson Clinic in Jackson, Tenn. ''She's a small woman to begin with, but when I first saw her, her weight was 91 pounds, and she lost down to 69 pounds.''The key checks in this, are Asians are becoming sick in Asia and in traveling to Asia around the time Barack Hussein Obama evolved into the 1600 Penn Avenue occupancy.
  Notice what this disease seems to mimic in tuberculosis, but is auto immune and in the wasting condition of the body, it is almost cancerous in consuming the body's energy reserves.
  The protocols of this indicate it is Asian centered, as in Asian genus in the human race. It does not appear to be rhino born as in spread through sneezes at this point, but seems like these other plagues of recent order, to be showing up in wide locations, so the protocol would be to ingest, inoculate or a more intimate body fluid exchange as in transfusion or a sexual act.
  Potential Bioterrorism Agents - Department of Molecular Virology ...BCM has 25 departments and more than 90 research and patient-care centers. ... attractive alternative to conventional weapons because of their relatively low costs, ... on the Category B and C agents - noroviruses, influenza, and tuberculosis.Most interesting is it not that the things affecting these Asians are the exact pandemics which were being looked at in lesser categories to use in biological warfare?When TB is a known emerging infectious disease, meaning it is a dynamic disease which would be attractive to bio weapons labs as anthrax, then it stands to reason TB would be a viral agent which biolabs would be looking at as a weapon or population reducer. Chemical and Biological Weapons: Prospects and Priorities after ...www.brookings.edu/research/articles/2002/06/summer-defense-harrisAbsent assistance from a national chemical or biological weapons program, most ... bin Laden has pursued a sophisticated biological weapons research program. .... collaborative research on global diseases such as HIV and tuberculosis, Oh my there is Sheik bin Laden's name coming up in biological weapons, sophisticated biological weapons, it is a good thing that chest thumper B. Hussein Obama, AKA Barry Chin, killed bin Laden's corpse to save the world, but then has anyone asked Mr. Obama if bin Laden's biological weapons have been secured?You know important questions and not questions about if Mr. Obama likes red or green.
  What this appears like is a sneak preview of something the Chinese communists and Indonesians would be interested in, in a viral agent, introduced into mass society which as of yet has not shown an ability to spread by influenza type means, meaning it is controllable.It would produce a great deal of revenue in treatment as 1 billion cropping Asians, would at 10,000 dollars in treatment produce 10 trillion dollars in profits before they closed the coffin lid, as this is the poor part of the world.
  These cropped Asians would then not rise up and hang the Peking girls which is what everyone wants as Zbigniew Brzezinski stated China was too big to manage and needed to be broken up.....and well cartel computer whiz Bill Gates blurted out the cartel was going to crop a billion people using vaccines in the next 10 years.
  We know HIV was laboratory engineered. We know for certain that SAARS was lab created and genus specific to Asians, in exact research which was conducted in Israeli and American labs in the infamous "Arab bomb" attacking specific genetic traits Arab DNA held. We know TB exists as a dynamic disease.
  How difficult would it be to take TB, infuse it with HIV strains to make it auto immune oriented, and place the genetic marker in it so SAARS would be the protocol in it only killing Asians? Thee only difficult part would be to make certain it was HIV in orientation, meaning not spread by influenza or TB means, and that is not that difficult as HIV already has that marker in it.
  Adult polio boosterTetanus / diphtheriaHepatitis ATyphoid Yellow Fever (required for all South America trips)Malaria One must have vaccinations to travel in Asia, and that might be how this is being introduced for display and blackmail purposes for final solutions. This is another one of those Obama, walks, talks, and runs like a duck, and how liberal it would be to have this Logan's Run type disease in getting rid of Asians after age 50 in not being a drain on world resources the cartels are so fixated with, and the Peking girls would be so in favor of in redistributing resources to the stronger children who could be worked to death for greater profits.
  Acquired Asian Death Syndrome has all the properties which have been proven in testing and abilities of those lab rats who create such things.
  It was later claimed that around 6,000 Japanese soldiers in the Shangai area died of cholera disseminated by the Russians. In 1937, the research was moved to Pingfan, forty miles south of Harbin. This establishment was to become known as Unit 731. It was here that a wide range of biological agents were produced and tested, these included anthrax, botulism, brucellosis, cholera, encephalitis, gangrene, glanders, plague, salmonella, smallpox, tetanus, tuberculosis, tularemia, typhoid and typhus.I guess bio weapons testing articles will only become sexy after a billion white people are dead, as Michael Savage is quite mongolphobic like most as those Asians are just in the way except for profits.
  Is that a viral disease or are you just happy to see me?Those sexy Asians germs, no will notice, and if they do no one will care as there are so many of them to experiment on.Those sexy Asian germs.
  So many gods of death to decide the few who live and the many who die.Lame CherryNIH awards OHSU $4 million biodefense contract to study tuberculosisscienceblog.com/community/older/2004/7/20046156.shtmlPortland, Ore - Oregon Health & Science University's research team is one of ... that will help the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part ... OHSU's team will focus on tuberculosis and will use cells from TB patients ... with TB as a model of the type of immune response they want to mimic in a vaccine.The pertinent question in this Asian epidemic being spread like AIDS was in the sodomite community, is Barack Hussein Obama Osseiran, AKA, Barry Chin in immenent danger of contracting these Asian labratory pandemics, as one can ask any black and they will inform you that Obama has ASIAN LIPS and features, and this blog has conclusively proven Mr. Obama is Asian in origin.
  So is B. Hussein Obama in danger of going tits up from all these Bill Gates vaccinated diseases in Obama being a Chinoid or is it only the 2.5 billion other Asians who are in danger of being cropped?
  Keep watching the girl.
  agtG 260
  AADS
Morgan Stanley is Insolvent -- Only a Matter of Time Before Total Financial Collapse.
  Link to Article
  Source: WT news feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 07:40
  Susanne Posel, ContributorActivist PostThe fall of the House of Morgan has begun as stock prices on the global market at Morgan Stanley (MS) begin to fall on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).
  According to Rick Wiles: ''I'm hearing rumors that another major financial house is going to implode. In fact, the name I've been given is Morgan Stanley . . . It's going to be put on the sacrificial alter by the financial elite.''
  MS, technically speaking, is classified as insolvent based on mark-to-market valuation. By selling off non-core assets, MS has been able to ''reduce its European exposure'' through the manipulation of hedge funds and allocation of funds to failing financial corporations. Some mainstream media outlets tout that the Federal Reserve Bank will come in and assist MS in their insolvency and that MS ''just isn't going out of business anytime soon.''
  However, on the bond market, MS is being treated like ''a junk-rated company.'' Moody's, the rating agency that sells their ratings to whomever will pay for a triple A score, have announced they will downgradge MS' ratings which would put all US banks at risk.
  Otis Caset, director of credit research at Markit confirms: ''What has driven that, obviously, is Europe. The perception is '-- correctly or incorrectly '-- that Morgan Stanley is one of the U.S. banks most exposed to Europe's problems.''
  In 2008, with the first pre-meditated financial explosion, the cause for the bailout of the banks was a large sum of cash needed quickly to repay China who had purchased large quantities of mortgage-backed securities that went belly-up when the global scam was realized. When China realized that they had been duped into buying worthless securitized loans which would never be repaid, they demanded the actual property instead. The Chinese were prepared to send their ''people'' to American shores to seize property as allocated to them through the securitized loan contracts.To stave this off, the American taxpayers were coerced by former President Bush and former US Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson. During that incident, the US Senate was told emphatically that they had to approve a $700 billion bailout or else martial law would be implemented immediately. That money was funneled through the Federal Reserve Bank and wired to China, as well as other countries that were demanding repayment for the fraudulent securitizations.
  To further avert financial catastrophe, as well as more debt or property seizure threats by the Chinese, the Euro was imploded there by plunging most of the European countries into an insurmountable free-fall for which they were never intended to recover.
  MS exposure to mortgage-backed securities and derivatives fraud may have finally brought the financial implosion to America. As Otis points out, it is the exposure to the Eurozone that was the nail in the coffin at MS. This only furthers the fact that financial collapse is imminent in America and the repercussions are already laid out.However, this planned implosion of the mega-banks only serves to fit the global Elite's plans.
  John Paulson recently traded in his stocks for 4.53 million shares in SPDR Gold Trust (GLD) while investing deeper into NovaGold Resources.
  George Soros has also sold his shares and interest in JPMorgan (701,400 shares), Goldman Sachs (120,000 shares), and Citigroup (420,000). He has reallocated these funds to gold.
  The insolvency of MS means that the customer funds that are held in MS can be hypothecated (or co-mingled) by the bank into their funds to be used to pay off any loans or debts owed by the bank.
  Earlier this month, on August 9th, the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals (CCA) ruled that BNYM can be moved to first in line of creditors over the customers that had their funds stolen by Sentinel Management Group (SMG).
  Before SMG collapsed in 2007, Eric Bloom, former chief executive, and Charles Mosely, head trader of SMG stole $500 million in customer secured funds and were indicted because they exposed customer segregated funds to ''highly risky derivatives.''
  The SMG ruling means that the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) and Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SPIC) regulatory systems will not insure customer funds, investments, depositors and retirees who hold accounts in banks.
  In fact, the banking institution is now legally allowed to use those customer funds deposited as collateral, payment on debts for loans made, or free use on the stock market to purchase investments as the bank sees fit.
  When a customer deposits money into a bank, the bank issues a promise to have those funds available when the customer returns to withdraw the deposited amount.
  With the SMG ruling, those funds become property of the bank once they are deposited. If the bank is insolvent, under duress or filed bankruptcy, those customer deposited funds can be co-mingled with the bank's funds and used for the purposes of the bank without recourse to the customer.
  As explained in Readiness Exercise 1984 (Rex84) the end of the US dollar combined with civil unrest would cause the US government to declare martial law in order to preserve continuity of government.
  Since 2010, all the mega-banks in the US have filed resolution plans with the Fed describing how to liquidate banking assets without causing further damage to a failing financial system. By selling ''non-core assets'' without upsetting shareholders while protecting the monetary system, taxpayers and creditors is the work of the mega-banks who have contributed solely to the destruction of the global financial markets.
  Both Bank of America and Citibank have already begun liquidity with the sale of their non-core assets proving that these two financial institutions are insolvent. Add to this list MS.
  While mega-banks are unloading their assets under duress, they are acquiring smaller banks and keeping their names to fool the American public into thinking they are banking with an independent as they consolidate financial power in the US.
  In response to the coming implosion, the Federal Reserve Bank is inventing electronic fiat currency. This keeps the Ponzi scheme going. On the surface it all appears to ok. However, undercover and out of the general public's sight, the manipulation of insurance rates, market values, and mortgages are directly contributing to the complete banking system collapse.
  An estimated 70% of some of the mega-banks' worth is provided by the government by subsidies; meaning that without the money provided by the US government, these banks would go under tomorrow. And by watching the financial climate as it is emerging, it appears that we are witnessing just that.Combined with the solicitations of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for 1.8 billion rounds of hollow point bullets, 1400 pounds of highly dense explosives material and urban warfare drills being conducted across the nation, it is clear that this insolvency of MS is one more proof that marital law coinciding with financial collapse is dangerously close.You can support this information by voting on Reddit HERE
  Susanne Posel is the Chief Editor of Occupy Corporatism. Our alternative news site is dedicated to reporting the news as it actually happens; not as it is spun by the corporately funded mainstream media. You can find us on our Facebook page.
50 Cent's manager is found dead
  Link to Article
  Source: BBC News - Home
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 07:38
  Music manager Chris Lighty, who helped the careers of stars like 50 Cent and Mariah Carey, has been found dead at his flat in New York.
  Police say the shooting appears to be a suicide and that there were no signs of forced entry.
  Continue reading the main storyRest peacefully Chris Lighty, my prayers go out to family and loved ones! Dear God please have mercy
  RihannaThe 44-year-old had been going through a divorce and had been having financial and other personal problems.
  Stars including Rihanna, Nicki Minaj and Diddy have been paying tribute to the hip hop businessman on Twitter.
  Rihanna posted: "Rest peacefully Chris Lighty, my prayers go out to family and loved ones! Dear God please have mercy."
  Nicki Minaj said: "Another tragic & inconceivable loss for the culture. #RIPChrisLighty."
  Diddy wrote: "In shock," while Mary J. Blige said: "U never know what can send a person over the edge or make them want 2 keep living. take it easy on people."
  'Greatly missed'50 Cent issued a statement through his publicist saying that he was saddened by the loss.
  "Chris has been an important part of my business and personal growth for a decade," he said.
  Chris Lighty was behind 50 Cent as well as Diddy and Mariah Carey "He was a good friend and adviser who helped me develop as an artist and businessman.
  "My prayers are with his family. He will be greatly missed."
  Police say no suicide note was found at Chris Lighty's home in the Bronx but a 9mm handgun had been recovered.
  His body was found on Thursday morning (30 August).
  Chris Lighty, who had two children, had been a part of the hip hop scene for decades.
  During his career he worked with stars like LL Cool J, Busta Rhymes, Missy Elliott and Fat Joe and initially worked for Rush Management, Russell Simmons' first company before he founded rap record label Def Jam.
  He set up his own management company, Violator, in the late 1990s.
  In a 2007 interview for Associated Press (AP), Chris Lighty talked about how his stars could make money outside music.
  He said: "As music sales go down because kids are stealing it off the internet and trading it and MP3 sales continue to rise, you can't rely on just the income that you would make off being an artist."
Watch: Clint Eastwood's disaster at GOP convention
  Link to Article
  Source: Liberal Conspiracy
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 07:34
  >> sunny hundal posted on Watch: Clint Eastwood's disaster at GOP convention>> Jason Brickley posted on Watch: Clint Eastwood's disaster at GOP convention
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Justice Department Sued For Hiding Secret NSA Surveillance Program
  Link to Article
  Source: Dprogram.net
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 07:30
  (RussiaToday) '' The DOJ is being sued for failing to follow laws requiring information disclosure after US Senators revealed the NSA is illegally spying on US citizens.
  The US Justice Department is being sued after failing to adhere to Freedom of Information Act requests for documents on a federal surveillance program that has targeted the email and phone conversations of Americans throughout the last five years.
  The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a San Francisco-based advocacy groups that fights to protect civil liberties in the digital age, filed a lawsuit on Thursday this week that names the Department of Justice as the sole defendant.
  The EFF charges that the DoJ violated the Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, by failing to expedite previous requests filed with the government for documents relating to a 2008 amendment included in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Under that year's update to FISA, feds were awarded legal wiggle room to collect and comb through any communication originating in the United States that is sent abroad through email or phone, all under the guise of national security. The EFF and others attest that the government has extensively violated the US Constitution by doing as such, though, and is now suing the DoJ not for ongoing abuse of the Fourth Amendment's protection against unreasonable search and seizure, but for the department's failure to quickly honor the FOIA request and for wrongful withholding of agency records.
  ''The FISA Amendments Act (FAA) of 2008 gave the NSA expansive power to spy on Americans' international email and telephone calls,'' the EFF explains in an official statement to the media that was released in conjunction with this week's lawsuit. ''However, last month, in a letter to Senator Ron Wyden, a government official publicly disclosed that the NSA's surveillance had gone even further than what the law permits, with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) issuing at least one ruling calling the NSA's actions unconstitutional.''
  In the DoJ complaint filed on Thursday, the EFF quotes Kathleen Turner from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, who in July 2012 provided Sen. Wyden with a classification review of three statements concerning Section 702 of the FAA. Although the director wrote to the lawmaker by first acknowledging that her office found that some intelligence collected by the National Security Administration was ''reasonable under the Fourth Amendment,'' she added, ''It is also true that on at least one occasion the [FISC] held that some collection carried out pursuant to the Section 702 minimization procedures used by the government was unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment.''
  ''I believe that the government's implementation of Section 702 of FISA has sometimes circumvented the spirit of the law, and on at least one occasion the [FISC] has reached this same conclusion,'' Ms. Turner writes in the letter, dated July 20 of this year.
  ''This disclosure confirmed previous reports that Section 702 surveillance had 'intercepted the private e-mail messages and phone calls of Americans . . . on a scale that went beyond the broad legal limits established by Congress','' the EFF writes, referencing a 2009 article published in the New York Times that was among one of the first of few mainstream write-ups on the blanketing surveillance program.
  In a press release, EFF Open Government Legal Fellow Mark Rumold says, ''For years we've seen news reports in the New York Times and other outlets about widespread government spying going beyond the broad powers granted in the FAA, but we've yet to get any real answers about what is going on.''
  ''When law-breaking is allowed to remain secret, there's no accountability or way to monitor future abuses. It's time for the government to come clean and tell us about the NSA's unconstitutional actions,'' Rumold adds.
  On July 26, 2012, the EFF filed a FOIA request for any written opinion or order that referred to the collection of intelligence by the federal government under Section 702. The EFF notes in this week's complaint that they sought an expedited return of the requested records as allowed under the Freedom of Information Act, yet more than one month later has not received any of the requested evidence.
  ''Not only has Defendant failed to expedite the processing of Plaintiff's requests, it has also exceeded the generally applicable twenty-day deadline for the processing of any FOIA request,'' the EFF writes.
  In May of this year, Sen. Wyden signed his name to a letter sent to the NSA co-authored by Sen. Mark Udall asking for the agency to identify exactly ''how many people inside the United States have had their communications collected or reviewed under the authorities granted by section 702'' of the FISA Amendment Act. When the NSA responded one month later, Inspector General I. Charles McCullough wrote that a ''review of the sort suggested would itself violate the privacy of US persons.''
  ''All that Senator Udall and I are asking for is a ballpark estimate of how many Americans have been monitored under this law, and it is disappointing that the Inspectors General cannot provide it,'' Sen. Wyden responded to Wired's Danger Room at the time. ''If no one will even estimate how many Americans have had their communications collected under this law then it is all the more important that Congress act to close the 'back door searches' loophole, to keep the government from searching for Americans' phone calls and emails without a warrant.''
  The EFF is demanding that the Justice Department immediately process the records previously requested under FOIA and are asking for the feds to compensate them for any attorney fees incurred in their lawsuit against the government.
  ''As Congress gears up to reconsider the FAA, the American public needs to know how the law has been misused,'' EFF Senior Counsel David Sobel says. ''The DOJ should follow the law and release this information to the American public.''
  Source: RT
  Related posts:
  Total Surveillance '' Thousands Of Secret Court Orders Allow Government To Spy On AmericansStratfor emails reveal secret, widespread TrapWire surveillance systemBBC Hiding Israeli Abuse Of PalestiniansStop hiding the Facts about ''Fast and Furious''Super rich hiding up to $32 trillion offshoreThe Global Elite Are Hiding 18 Trillion Dollars In Offshore BanksDOJ Deputy Wants Warrantless Surveillance of Cellular Phone SignalsAdya Clarity co. being sued for misrepresentation, fraud, by Matt Monarch '' Raw Food World
The legal implications of changing the carbon pricing mechanism
  Link to Article
  Source: The Conversation
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 07:27
  The legal implications of changes to the carbon price mechanism are subtle, but important. Pawel LojEarlier this week the federal Government announced important changes to the carbon pricing mechanism (CPM). The political and economic consequences have been much discussed, but the less-talked-of legal issues could have a greater impact.
  Three changes were made to the CPM:
  The $15 floor price will not take effect from 2015.
  From 1 July 2015, there will be a 12.5% cap (reduced from 50%) on the amount of eligible units created under the Kyoto Protocol (CERs) that can be surrendered to meet an entity's annual liability (that is, the number of units that an entity must surrender as a result of its emissions). CERs are tradeable permits created by the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). The CDM is a project-based offset mechanism established under the Kyoto Protocol.
  From July 1 2015, Australia will start one-way linking with the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS). In 2018, this will become two-way. This will enable Australian liable entities to use European units to meet up to 50% of their annual liability (minus any CERs that an entity surrenders). From 2018, this change will also broaden the market in which Australian carbon units can be traded.
  These changes will have many implications for liable entities. The majority of these will be economic or commercial.
  There are also political and environmental implications. Leading commentators have already canvassed the most important of these.
  But what are the legal implications? Are there any?
  The answer is, of course. However, these will be more subtle '' though no less important '' than the other implications.
  Broadly speaking, the legal implications of the revised carbon price design fall into two categories. The first is the legislative amendments required to give effect to the new policy direction. The second concerns the ability for any future government to revoke the CPM.
  Legislative amendments will be required to give effect to the revised design of the CPM; they are likely to go ahead. The most prominent of these include:
  The Clean Energy Act 2011 (the Act) will need to be amended to impose a new limit on the ability for liable entities to surrender CERs from 2015.
  The Act will need to ensure that a European unit can be surrendered under the CPM from 2015. To achieve this, the Australian National Registry of Emissions Units Act 2011 and its accompanying regulation will need to be amended. These documents regulate the eligibility of international units under the CPM. Changes in the operation of the registry for carbon units will also be necessary to enable European units to be registered.
  The Act should be amended to remove all references to the existence of a floor price. Currently, the Act is drafted to impose the floor price on any Australian carbon unit sold at auction between 1 July 2015 and 30 June 2018. The floor price also applies to any international units.
  Practically it may be possible for the regulator not to impose the floor price in these circumstances. However, these amendments would provide certainty to liable entities that the floor price would not be reinstated at a later date (at least not without further legislative amendment).
  Removing the floor price and providing eligibility for European units under the CPM means that liable entities with existing accounts in the EU ETS can now purchase European units. This can be done in preparation for their surrender in 2015 when these units become eligible in Australia. It has been suggested that this operates to embed the CPM further, as companies will not readily give up their positions in European units.
  From a legal perspective this may be true if the European units held on an Australian registry are deemed to be personal property. I expect this will be the case: this is the approach that applies to all other eligible units. In this instance, any attempts to terminate the CPM could lead to a potential claim for compensation by the holders of these units. This is not to mention the potential political backlash.
  In the end, companies, liable entities and politicians will be most concerned with the political, economic and environmental implications of the changes to the CPM that were announced by the Government earlier this week. However, it is important to remember that these changes need to be underpinned by the law, which itself can have profound implications for the long-term operation of the scheme.
  4 Comments TagsEnvironmental law, Carbon price, European Union, Carbon markets
  Related articles31 August 2012 Do we really want to hand control of our carbon price to Europe?29 August 2012 Carbon price shift to tie Australian govt to European policy28 August 2012 Carbon price floor axed, but EU market links a good substitute24 August 2012 On Alpha coal approval, Burke clearly right in battle with Newman21 August 2012 Climate Commission: global climate action gathers momentum
The Bad Faith of Andrew Delbanco
  Link to Article
  Source: FrontPage Magazine
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 07:24
  A conservative complaint against Left-liberal intellectuals, commentators, and journalists is that in their zeal to discredit those with whom they disagree, they tend to dismiss, belittle, and misrepresent conservative ideas rather than engage fairly with their substance.
  I recently reviewed Bruce Bawer's The Victims' Revolution: The Rise of Identity Studies and the Closing of the Liberal Mind for Front Page Magazine, commending it as an important analysis of the virulently anti-American gobbledygook that passes for high-level scholarship at American universities today. Bawer shows how the brand of theory that focuses on ethnic and gender experience (Women's Studies, Chicano Studies, and so on) teaches young people to see themselves as victims and to hate America for its putatively oppressive history. In preparing my review, I had read Professor Andrew Delbanco's damning assessment of the book in the New York Times and quoted from it briefly in my concluding paragraph.
  Delbanco's review has remained in my thoughts for its glib disingenuousness. It struck me as an exemplary instance of the leftist refusal to treat conservative ideas responsibly. From the progressivist rectitude of his opening compliment on Bawer's contribution to gay studies (could he not have found a less stereotypical word than ''sensitive'' to praise it?) to the distancing quotation marks he uses for ''radical Islam'' in mentioning Bawer's political work, Delbanco's review is a showcase of leftist rhetorical maneuvers and a dishonest document from first to last, deserving of a more detailed analysis than I was able to give it previously.
  Delbanco's attack on The Victims' Revolution has two essential planks: that Bawer's is an ''intemperate'' ''caricature'' rather than an informed and informative analysis, and that it is ''out of date,'' a ''rear-guard action against an enemy who has largely ceded the field.'' In the course of the review, he also accuses Bawer of various other intellectual failings, in particular lack of ''balance'' and accuracy.
  These are serious charges, serious enough to dissuade a reader from taking time to look into the book. What is remarkable about Delbanco's review is not only that the charges are demonstrably false but also that Delbanco does not even attempt to substantiate them. Employing instead the time-honored tactics of leftist attack, he is content to malign the book falsely rather than to demonstrate specifically where and how its argument is incorrect.
  On this score, it is telling that Delbanco never takes issue with Bawer's account of the intellectual vacuity and misleading anti-Americanism at the heart of contemporary academic theory; nor does he argue with a single one of Bawer's claims about its leading figures, strategies, or effects. Instead, he simply ignores the whole lot'--every documented pronouncement, conference paper, academic discussion, interview response, course title, and reference text'--dismissing it all as a ''caricature'' with only ''a modicum of truth'' by a writer ''overwrought by his own outrage.'' If Bawer had written a different sort of piece'--perhaps, say, an impressionistic short article, heavy on personal opinion and light on evidence'--such a reviewer response might be fair. If Bawer had confined his analysis to the work of a few fringe radicals or had quoted only from marginal and largely discredited texts, then Delbanco's dismissive summation would be justified.
  But it is not. Although one would never guess it from Delbanco's account, The Victims' Revolution is a detailed chronicle in which the exact words of Identity Studies theorists are extensively quoted and analyzed. Bawer has focused on the central figures in the field'--heavyweight academic stars Judith Butler, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, and Henry Louis Gates Jr., among others'--those whose works appear, and are admiringly studied, on course lists across North America and are quoted by nearly every PhD student in the humanities who wants to show off his or her theoretical savvy. How can a work be a ''caricature'' when it quotes for hundreds of pages from the avowed leaders of the field? Such a slur by Delbanco is an attempt to distract his readers from the fact that he is unable, by any legitimate means, to defend such faux scholarship.
  Delbanco pursues his diatribe with an equally serious and similarly unsubstantiated charge. He claims that Bawer, as an American who has lived in Norway for many years, does not really know the field he writes about, that he jetted back on a brief visit as an academic tourist, and took away an erroneous impression from the ''few conferences'' he attended. According to Delbanco, the type of theory Bawer so despises has now largely faded from the scene. ''Many of my younger colleagues,'' Delbanco assures the reader, ''are returning to close readings of literary classics'' and carrying out a ''synthesis of the old political history '... with the newer social history.'' Who are these younger scholars returning to solid, traditional methods? In which acclaimed new books have the identity radicals been debunked? If it is the case that the tide has turned, it would be cause for rejoicing indeed, and for a decisive rejection of Bawer's thesis. But Delbanco fails to cite a single example of the academic return to sanity. It would have been simple enough to mention one or two titles or names (though these would not, admittedly, have been adequate to make his case for the irrelevance of Bawer's concerns); but he fails to provide even these few. Taking his page from the Leftist playbook, he chose a personal discrediting of Bawer rather than a genuine counter-argument.
More People Must Care about CAIR
  Link to Article
  Source: FrontPage Magazine
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 07:21
  It has come to my attention that I may be suffering from ''CAIRophobia.''
  Almost certainly, according to the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), I am already afflicted with ''Islamophobia,'' which they define as ''unfounded fear of and hostility towards Islam. Such fear and hostility leads to discriminations against Muslims, exclusion of Muslims from mainstream political or social process, stereotyping, the presumption of guilt by association, and finally hate crimes.'' Islamophobia is actually a term the Muslim Brotherhood '' the granddaddy of all Islamist groups '' and their cohorts may have invented to take advantage of the bleeding hearts among the politically correct. So, if I am suffering from it, I suppose it is just a short hop to also suffering from ''CAIRophobia,'' which I define as having a very rational fear of CAIR.
  I accept this phobia. In fact, I sure wish some others had CAIRophobia.
  CAIR is very busy pressure group these days. Recently, it demanded that the Pentagon drop a former CIA operative who worked inside Iran's Revolutionary Guards, known by his pseudonym of Reza Kahlili, as a lecturer at the Department of Defense's Joint Counterintelligence Training Academy. Although Kahlili is primarily known for teaching, writing and lecturing about the dangers the radical Iranian regime poses to the West, CAIR still felt the need to call for his dismissal for his supposed ''anti-Islam agenda'' as a former Muslim-turned-Christian. This is all part of CAIR'S continuing quest to purge the Defense Department and other government departments or agencies of the services of any expert who identifies radical Islam as a major threat to our nation. CAIR's public relations ''jihads'' have been waged against such people as Robert Spencer, John Guandolo, and Matthew Dooley. In Kahlili's case, the Pentagon refused to drop him, but it did go out of its way to assure CAIR that Kahlili ''does not lecture on or about Islam or any religious treatise, and his personal beliefs are his own.''
  CAIR has also recently been hard at work attempting to shame and malign Congresswoman Michele Bachmann (R-MN), and her four congressional compatriots for their letters to the Inspector Generals (IGs) of the Defense Department, the State Department, the Justice Department, the Homeland Security Department, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. These letters asked the IGs to investigate thoroughly the degree to which members of, or sympathizers with, the Muslim Brotherhood are active in our defense and intelligence communities, and what impact that possible infiltration might be having on our national security. Through its pressure, CAIR presumably hopes to force the congressional leadership to block any such investigation. Harming the political careers of these Congressmen and intimidating others from ever addressing any issue related to radical Islam is an added benefit.
  Further, CAIR, with the help of its left-wing friends at the Associated Press, along with other politically correct leftists, has also sought to embarrass and intimidate the New York Police Department (NYPD) from doing its job: protecting the public of New York City. The NYPD has found itself in CAIR's crosshairs because of its continuing surveillance of Muslim people, mosques, etc. in public areas. Even though going to Muslim-inhabited areas to surveil Muslim terrorists makes as much sense as going to an Italian-American club to surveil possible members of the Italian Mafia or going to an Irish-American bar to surveil potential IRA terrorists, CAIR believes that Muslim Americans deserve the special right not to be surveilled.
  The amazing part of all this is that CAIR has an uncanny, Teflon-like ability to avoid mainstream criticism of its own disturbing background.
Government Unions: How They Rob the Taxpayer, Terrorize Workers, and Threaten our Democracy
  Link to Article
  Source: FrontPage Magazine
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 07:16
  Frontpage is pleased to present Government Unions: How They Rob the Taxpayer, Terrorize Workers, and Threaten Our Democracy, which uncovers the shocking truth of public service unions' corruption, thuggery, and political radicalism, and their war against capitalism and the American middle class.
  Written by investigative journalist Matthew Vadum, this searing new expos(C)tells of the backroom dealings between public service union officials and venal politicians, the infiltration of these unions by neo-communists deeply hostile toward America and anxious to ''break the system,'' and the alliances they have formed with discredited groups such as ACORN and Occupy Wall Street and with Barack Obama himself. Vadum also shows how the public service workers unions are providing the muscle for the White House's effort to force America into a hard-left turn toward socialism which guarantees that they themselves will ''own'' an ever growing piece of the economy.
  Read the pamphlet below or order your copy by clicking here.
  Freedom Center pamphlets now available on Kindle: Click here.
West Wing Week: 8/31/12 or, "It's Summer Mailbag Time!"
  Link to Article
  Source: White House.gov Blog Feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 07:15
  Welcome to the West Wing Week, your guide to everything that's happening at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. It's the summer's special Mailbag Edition of West Wing Week, featuring Elizabeth Olsen, Director of Presidential Correspondence. This week we're taking a moment to pick out a few of your letters from the thousands that arrive everyday here at the White House and answer some of your questions on immigration, healthcare, and the economy. That's August 24th to August 30th or, "It's Summer Mailbag Time!"
  First, we went over to the National Economic Council to see Deputy Director, Brian Deese, who answered some of your letters about the economy.
  Then we went over to the Domestic Policy Council to talk with Cecilia Mu±oz about some of the letters she'd read about healthcare refom and the new deferred action process.
  Tuesday, August 28th:
  The President made a statement about preparedness for the arrival of Hurrican Isaac.Thursday, August 30th:
  We sat down with Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes, who spoke about the upcoming two year anniversary of the end of the war in Iraq for 'The Rhodes Ahead.'Thanks for checking out your West Wing Week.
Interesting magazine article
  Link to Article
  Source: OfficerFriendly's Feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 06:55
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IKEA-familie opent bank in Nederland
  Link to Article
  Source: VK: Home
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 06:52
  Gerard Reijn ''31/08/12, 07:33
  (C) reuters.
  Nederland krijgt er weer een bank bij, maar deze staat niet onder toezicht van De Nederlandsche Bank en valt ook niet onder het garantiestelsel dat voor andere banken geldt. Ikano Bank, een bank van de familie Kamprad, de oprichters van de IKEA-warenhuizen, valt onder het Zweedse bankentoezicht.
  Ikano Bank gaat consumentenkredieten verstrekken voor winkelketens, te beginnen bij IKEA, zo laat een woordvoerder weten. Volgens de Kamer van Koophandel zal het gaan om 'rentevrije leningen en leningen met rente tot een maximum van tienduizend euro', en om het uitgeven van debitcards (betaalkaarten). Het jaarverslag van Ikano over vorig jaar vermeldt ook het plan om creditcards uit te geven en 'een aantal uiteenlopende krediet-producten'.
  IceSaveEen niet door De Nederlandsche Bank gecontroleerde bank roept spookbeelden op van IceSave, een IJslandse bank die ten onder ging en die niet viel onder het Nederlandse garantiestelsel. Ikano valt onder het Zweedse toezicht en het Zweedse garantiestelsel, maar dat is, zegt De Nederlandsche Bank, in grote lijnen gelijk aan het Nederlandse. Bovendien zijn de afspraken tussen toezichthouders na de IceSave-affaire flink aangescherpt.
  De markt lijkt gunstig voor Ikano. De verstrekking van consumentenkrediet groeit als nooit tevoren. Volgens gegevens van het CBS stagneerde het aflopende krediet na het uitbreken van de financile crisis in 2008 op een niveau rond 1.710 miljoen. Maar in juni dit jaar bereikte de teller al 2.258 miljoen, een stijging van 16 procent ten opzichte van een jaar eerder.
  Ikano begon als de afdeling van IKEA die gebouwen beheerde en consumentenkrediet verstrekte. Pas in 1995 richtte Kamprad een heuse bank op, maar aanvankelijk met (C)(C)n kantoor in Zweden. Maar in 2009 werd de Ikano Groep gereorganiseerd en werden tal van financile activiteiten bijeengebracht.
  Ikano Bank is nu een aanzienlijke bank, met vestigingen in negen landen en bijkantoren in nog eens zeven. De bank heeft een eigen vermogen van 203 miljoen euro en heeft 2,1 miljard euro aan leningen uitstaan. De jaarinkomsten bedroegen vorig jaar 342 miljoen.
  De bank is vooral actief in Zweden en Denemarken en verder in Groot-Brittanni, Duitsland, Finland en Rusland. Nog dit voorjaar richtte de Ikano Bank samen met een Nederlandse bank van Turkse huize, de Credit Europe Bank, een joint venture op in Rusland.
How MSNBC Became Fox's Liberal Evil Twin
  Link to Article
  Source: NYT > Most Recent Headlines
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 06:46
  You can agree with everything that Rachel Maddow or Ed Schultz say on MSNBC and still oppose their right to say it.
  Especially when they and their hyped-up panelists shout that Republican claims are ''lies,'' or Chris Matthews says that Republicans view welfare recipients as ''looters.'' MSNBC panelists gave Mitt Romney his due on Thursday but mocked his audience. Mr. Matthews noted that when Mr. Romney called for Americans to give the poor a helping hand, Mr. Matthews said, ''He got zero applause,'' adding, ''I think that's so telling about tonight.''
  MSNBC has pumped up its ratings by recasting itself as a left-leaning riposte to Fox News, and that's fine. Fox long ago proved that a lot of viewers like to hear cable anchors echo what they already think; MSNBC is just playing catch-up. Fox is still well ahead, especially during a Republican convention, but on Tuesday, there were times when MSNBC drew significantly more convention viewers than CNN.
  That's because MSNBC offers counterprogramming, not coverage. All that arch sarcasm and partisan brio may rev up the cable channel's fans, but it constrains '-- and stains '-- NBC News, its corporate sibling, which is still the country's No. 1 source in the evening.
  NBC and the other broadcast networks cut their live convention coverage to an hour during prime time this year, which leaves barely time to show the main speeches, let alone analyze them. Yet NBC's chief anchor, Brian Williams, has conspicuously avoided the most fractious MSNBC discussion panels. Those anchors who do make dutiful appearances, like David Gregory and Tom Brokaw, are badly needed but don't stay long or join the fray '-- like piano players in a brothel, they don't go upstairs.
  And that leaves fewer choices for viewers who like their election coverage with informed commentary without a twist of bias. They have to D.I.Y. either on the Internet or C-Span, or turn to PBS or CNN. And, unfortunately, because CNN's ratings are so low, there is a danger it will disappear or turn to a more marketable model.
  Fox News doesn't have a network news division, and its star anchors can be as defiantly partisan as they like. They favor Republicans, but even more they like to goad Republican candidates into criticizing the liberal media and President Obama.
  Both Fox News and MSNBC have experienced reporters in the field who stay neutral even when their anchors let loose. The NBC network's anchors keep their opinions to themselves, and so do its star reporters, like Andrea Mitchell and Chuck Todd, who appear on both cable and network shows, and somehow skillfully navigate past the rockier shoals.
  Ms. Maddow made her mark by breaking with the mindless Ping-Pong between two opposing views that sometimes passes for objectivity '-- and that is routinely mocked by Jon Stewart on ''The Daily Show.'' MSNBC's stridency is certainly a reaction to the ratings success of Fox News. But it's also inspired by Mr. Stewart's satirical commentary.
  The smugness is easier to copy than the wit. MSNBC has a growing cast of anchor-bloviators '-- hosts like Martin Bashir, Tamron Hall and, of course, Al Sharpton, who rant and then invite like-minded guest commentators to assure them that they are right.
  Chris Matthews, who hosts a Sunday talk show syndicated by NBC and a daily MSNBC show, seemed determined during this convention to outflank his most outspoken rivals, including Mr. Sharpton.
  He started with a bruising harangue against Reince Priebus, the Republican National Committee Chairman, that made even his hosts on ''Morning Joe'' wince. Mr. Matthews looked almost thuggish on Wednesday night when the Arizona governor, Jan Brewer, 67, speaking from the din of the convention floor, complained she couldn't hear his question.
  ''You can't hear me?'' he said. ''Well, that's convenient.''
  On Thursday, Mr. Matthews fulminated against Paul Ryan's '-- admittedly misleading '-- assertion that Mr. Obama did nothing to prevent the closing of a GM plant in 2008. Then Fox News attacked media figures who attacked Mr. Ryan. CNN took the harder course of parsing the entire issue: The correspondent Tom Foreman gave a long, industrious analysis that explained where and how Mr. Ryan finessed the facts.
  MSNBC talk shows are to network newscasts what blogs are to newspaper columns, shaggier and often less considered. And increasingly, viewers, like readers, have a hard time distinguishing one from the other. But it's all that attitude on MSNBC that raises eyebrows.
  Virginia's governor, Bob McDonnell, who backed, then rescinded, a state bill that would require women seeking an abortion to first have an invasive ultrasound, is a favorite target. After his convention speech, the MSNBC host Melissa Harris-Perry said sarcastically that Republicans might be nervous ''standing next to a governor who represents a vision of small government that is small enough to put on the end of a transvaginal probe.''
  No wonder Brian Williams stays away.
FLASHBACK: California Democrat Attacks His Own Party For Big Government Spending: "It's All Junk, Just Stop It!"
  Link to Article
  Source: The Daily Bail
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 06:41
  This is a great clip:
  "It's all junk! Just stop it..."
  State Treasurer Democrat Bill Lockyer throws a fit about wasteful spending.
  Taking another look at this classic clip in the wake of this news yesterday.
  The former legislative leader and former attorney general is no stranger to bold speaking. Lockyer has suggested that one way to remove the effects of money in elected politics is to pick the legislature by lottery. He proposed the University of California system be cut loose from state funding and allow it to survive on foundation grants, alumni giving, tuitions and research contracts. At the Milken Institute conference earlier last week, Lockyer said the state needed a spending limit.
  California Dems Strike $30 Billion Pension Reform Deal, Public Employee Unions 'Furious'...
Clint Eastwood Delivers Bizarre Rambling Speech To Empty Chair
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 06:36
  Benjy SarlinAugust 30, 2012, 10:30 PMTAMPA, Fla. '-- Clint Eastwood opened up the primetime portion of the Republican convention with a rambling, mumbling and often incoherent address next to an empty chair that was meant to represent President Obama.
  A creaky Eastwood began by defending Hollywood's notorious liberal reputation to the crowd, claiming that there were in fact many independents and Republicans in show business.
  ''Conservatives by their nature play it close to the vest, they don't go around hot-dogging it,'' he said.
  He went on to act out an interview with the empty presidential chair that noted, among other topics, Obama's inability to close Guantanamo Bay.
  ''I thought it was because somebody had a stupid idea of trying terrorists in downtown New York City,'' Eastwood said.
  Eastwood, who did not seem to use a prepared text of any kind, went on for about 12 minutes. A Romney campaign official told CBS that Eastwood was ''ad libbing.''
  The crowd seemed alternately confused and rapturously excited by the display, cheering whenever he poked fun at Joe Biden and Obama.
  ''When somebody doesn't do the job you got to let them go,'' he said, to thundering applause.
  Obama deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter, who often brackets Republican speeches with fact checks and statements, offered a one word response to Eastwood's performance on Twitter: ''Wow.''
  2012, 2012 presidential campaign, RNCCBenjy SarlinBenjy Sarlin is a reporter for Talking Points Memo and co-writes the campaign blog, TPM2012. He previously reported for The Daily Beast/Newsweek as their Washington Correspondent and covered local politics for the New York Sun.
Mitt Romney Is Disappointed
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 06:33
  TAMPA, Fla. '' A slightly different Mitt Romney took the podium tonight to accept the Republican nomination, though not a more compassionate one, or a more forthcoming one, or a more authentic one. This was the sorrowful incarnation of Mr. Romney, who set aside the ice pick of the pre-convention campaign to announce his profound ''disappointment'' in President Obama.
  He had such high hopes for Mr. Obama, Mr. Romney said, as if admonishing a wayward child, and so did the entire country. ''Four years ago, I know that many Americans felt a fresh excitement about the possibilities of a new president,'' he said, because that's just the way optimistic Americans are. ''I wish President Obama had succeeded because I want America to succeed,'' he added. (Even Clint Eastwood, in one of the most bizarre interludes in convention history, said he cried after Mr. Obama was elected.)
  But there was only so long Mr. Romney could sustain the fiction that he or any Republican leader actually wanted Mr. Obama to succeed, or felt the slightest flush of excitement at his election. Because it simply isn't true.''That president was not the choice of our party but Americans always come together after elections,'' he said. They do? When, for one second, did Republicans ''come together'' with Democrats after Mr. Obama's election? (And neither were Democrats particularly eager to embrace George W. Bush after the disputed election of 2000.) From the moment of Mr. Obama's inauguration, Republicans fought against his policies and sneered at his background, caring nothing for the cost to the economy or the resulting divisions in the national unity Mr. Romney pretends they wanted.
  Mr. Romney set up his ostensibly more gentle critique of the Obama years by describing a set of national expectations for the president ludicrously higher than they really were. Beginning in 2009, he said, every family thought they would be able to put aside some money, save for college, help their elderly parents. Every small business hoped the election would lead to ''their best years ever.'' The nation would start paying down its deficits.
  ''Every new college graduate thought they'd have a good job by now,'' he said, ''a place of their own, and that they could start paying back some of their loans and build for the future.''
  Who were these Americans who thought that a raging recession would magically disappear with the election of a new president? There were undoubtedly some extreme idealists who thought Mr. Obama was some kind of miracle worker, but the month he was inaugurated, the country lost nearly 600,000 jobs, the worst drop in 35 years. To suggest that every college graduate thought they would get a good job under those circumstances is ridiculous.
  Mr. Romney even said Mr. Obama promised to ''slow the rise of the oceans and heal the planet.''
  For Romney, Ronald Reagan's classic question wasn't pointed enough. Instead of ''are you better off than you were four years ago,'' the standard Mr. Romney set in his speech was much higher:
  ''How many days have you woken up feeling that something really special was happening in America?'' he asked. He went on: ''If you felt that excitement when you voted for Barack Obama, shouldn't you feel that way now that he's President Obama?''
  Coming from one of the least exciting presidential candidates in modern times, it's amusing to hear Mr. Romney declare that Americans should throw Mr. Obama out of office if every day isn't special or exciting. Even as he delivered the speech, the crowd looked desperate for moments that could rouse them, and didn't find many. But Mr. Romney knows that while his opponent may be a diminished emotional force, the president is better at connecting with ordinary Americans than he is.
  The only way to unseat Mr. Obama, he seems to have decided, is to turn mere disappointment into electoral fury. For that, he will need a better argument.
Paul Ryan Stands by General Motors Claim -- Daily Intel
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 06:24
  On CNN this afternoon, Paul Ryan got a chance to respond to the complaints that his well-delivered convention speech was filled with lies and distortions. On the topic of the GM plant in Janesville, Wisconsin '-- which Ryan attacked Obama for failing to save, though it shut down under the Bush administration '-- Wolf Blitzer offered Ryan an opportunity to "revise and amend" his statements. Ryan retorted, "No, I don't want to revise," and went on to explain that it's an example of Obama "making all these grand promises and then none of them occurring."
  In his speech, Ryan noted that during a campaign event at the plant, Obama said, ''I believe that if our government is there to support you '... this plant will be here for another hundred years.'' Ryan said:
  "That's what he said in 2008. Well, as it turned out, that plant didn't last another year. It is locked up and empty to this day. And that's how it is in so many towns today, where the recovery that was promised is nowhere in sight."
  Blizter noted that the announcement that the plant was shutting down came in June of 2008, months before Obama was even elected. "Well, it's still idle," said Ryan. "This is the story of the Obama economy '-- a man running for president in 2008 making all these grand promises and then none of them occurring. He got elected. He put his policies in place and the plant still shut down."
  "I'm not saying it was his decision," Ryan continued. "I'm saying he came and made these promises, makes these commitments, sells people on the notion that he's got to do all these great achievements and then none of them occur. These are empty promises that become broken promises and that's the story of the Obama economy."
  So Ryan didn't mean to imply that the plant's closure was the president's fault, he's just upset that Obama broke a promise that would have been physically impossible to keep, thanks to circumstances beyond his control.
Pentagon threatens lawsuit over Osama bin Laden book - Philip Ewing
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 06:22
  The Defense Department is threatening to go after an ex-SEAL author and his publisher over a new book that challenges the administration's official account of last year's raid that killed Osama bin Laden.
  The Pentagon late Thursday released a letter from its top lawyer, Jeh Johnson, to publishing giant Penguin and ''Mark Owen,'' the pseudonym of an ex-SEAL special operator who has been identified as Matt Bissonnette. In the letter, Johnson said Bissonnette had breached non-disclosure agreements he signed while on active duty in 2007.
  Continue ReadingAccording to official Navy records obtained Thursday by POLITICO, Bissonnette served in the Navy from 1998 until April of this year. Johnson wrote that the NDA he'd signed remained in effect ''even after you left the active duty Navy.''
  ''In the judgment of the Department of Defense, you are in material breach and violation of the non-disclosure agreements you signed,'' Johnson wrote to ''Owen,'' in keeping with DOD's policy not to identify some special operators. ''Further public dissemination of your book will aggravate your breach and violation of your agreements.''
  Johnson closed by informing ''Owen'' and Penguin that the Defense Department ''is considering pursuing against you, and all those acting in concert with you, all remedies legally available to us in light of this situation.''
  The Pentagon could ask the Justice Department to try to prosecute Bissonnette or seize the royalties raised by the book, which is officially due out Monday but has already gone on sale in some places. Its original release date was Sept. 11, but it was moved up in response to national hype over the first account of the bin Laden raid to come from a member of the team that staged it.
  Johnson's letter is among the first official comments from the Defense Department over the book; previously it had deferred questions to the White House. Its top spokesman, Jay Carney, told reporters on Thursday that he would not comment on Bissonnette's account other than to say that administration officials had given the most accurate information available in the days after the May, 2011 raid.
  At that time, White House and defense officials said bin Laden ''resisted'' the SEAL raiders, used his wives as a ''shield'' and that the U.S. troops had been in a ''40 minute firefight'' during their raid. But according to reports about Bissonnette's book, the SEALs shot bin Laden when he stuck his head out of a doorway and laughed about the ''firefight'' reports they saw in the news media.
  White House officials did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.
Three-fifths of Milwaukee's black voters have vanished without a trace.
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 06:20
  Sixty percent of Milwaukee's black voters have disappeared.
  Democrats have feared for years that one of the particular challenges of running campaigns in 2012 would be simply locating their voters. The party's constituencies (young people, immigrants, minorities) tend to be among the most mobile demographic groups. And as NPR speculated this week in an analysis of battleground-state foreclosure figures, the housing crisis will likely only have made things more difficult for Democrats looking for their supporters.
  New data from Milwaukee give an indication of how dire the Democrats' disappearing-voter problem already is. This spring, the League of Young Voters, which was created to mobilize young minority communities, collaborated with the liberal Wisconsin Voices coalition to dispatch teams of young canvassers. Starting in April, they spent eight weeks knocking on 120,882 doors across 208 of Milwaukee's 317 wards to raise awareness of the gubernatorial recall election scheduled for June. The doors had one thing in common: the voter file said they were all home to a registered voter whom a commercial data vendor had flagged as likely to be African-American.
  But the voter file represented a fiction, or at least a reality that had rapidly become out of date. During those eight weeks, canvassers were able to successfully find and interact with only 31 percent of their targets. Twice that number were confirmed to no longer live at the address on file '-- either because a structure was abandoned or condemned, or if a current resident reported that the targeted voter no longer lived there.
  Based on those results, the New Organizing Institute, a Washington-based best-practices lab for lefty field operations, extrapolated that nearly 160,000 African-American voters in Milwaukee were no longer reachable at their last documented address '-- representing 41 percent of the city's 2008 electorate. It is a staggering figure in a battleground state where Democratic prospects rely on turning out Milwaukee's urban population, an ever more urgent cause since Paul Ryan's presence on the ticket could help mobilize core Republican constituencies in the city's suburbs. Over half of those identified as displaced were under the age of 35, and thus also less likely to be reachable through traditional landline phones.
  The Milwaukee data will certainly be sobering to Democrats who rely on existing voter-file records when organizing walk sheets and call lists for get-out-the-vote canvasses. Now, those working in Wisconsin realize, they'll have to begin the process earlier to pinpoint residents and make sure that those who have been relocated are registered to vote at new addresses.
  "That scraps any traditional GOTV planning '-- if six in ten people that you planned on talking to are not there,'' says Biko Baker, executive director of the League of Young Voters.
Report: Pakistan Army to Invade North Waziristan Next Week
  Link to Article
  Source: News From Antiwar.com
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 02:42
  Pakistan's Daily Times, a newspaper with close ties to the ruling Zardari government, is citing anonymous reports from officials claiming that the Pakistani military is going to begin the long-demanded invasion of North Waziristan early next week.
  The report suggests that this week's invasion of a portion of South Waziristan is linked to the planned operation, and that they will likely move into North Waziristan from this portion of South Waziristan. It is claimed that it will be a ''gradual escalation.''
  The Obama Administration has been demanding attacks on North Waziristan for years, and has been using the lack of one as a justification for the repeated drone strikes against the tribal areas. Thousands of North Waziristan residents have already fled the agency based on rumors that the invasion would begin on August 26.
  Pakistan's military was said to be reluctant to launch the offensive both because of significant numbers of powerful tribal militias that they are in a tentative state of nonaggression with, and because past US-demanded offensives into South Waziristan, Khyber and Orakzai netted almost no militant leaders, with the bulk of the factions just shifting into whichever region isn't being attacked at any given time.
  Last 5 posts by Jason Ditz
Pussy Riot Slogan Found At Murder Scene
  Link to Article
  Source: WT news feed
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 00:16
  The bodies of two murdered Russian women have been found under a message scrawled in blood, reports The Guardian, calling for the freedom of jailed Pussy Riot members who were sentenced two weeks ago.
  The victims, a 38-year-old and 76-year old, were murdered in the Russian city of Kazan, last weekend. Russian tabloid Life News, who are thought to have sources within the Russian authority services, have published images of the writing, showing the words ''Free Pussy Riot'', a slogan that has decorated many banners and t-shirts of supporters since their imprisonment. The graffiti, painted onto floral wallpaper, was found in the flat in which the bodies were found.
  The news has caused conflicting opinions in Russia, with supporters of the band being quick to deny the murders as being the work of a Pussy Riot fan, claiming instead that it is an attempt to malign the band and their allies.
  Pyotr Verzilov, husband of recently convicted member Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, echoed these resentments, telling news site Gazeta.ru: ''This is an attempt to strike at all supporters of the group.''
  Pussy Riot lawyer Nikolai Polozov also defended the feminist punk band, tweeting: ''What happened in Kazan is horrible. Pussy Riot was always for nonviolent protest. This incident is either a horrendous provocation or [the work of] a psychopath.''
  Kremlin empathisers, on the other hand, have used the deaths to enforce their suggestion that the musicians were encouraging dangerous radicalism.
  These events will no doubt add to already escalating tensions in Russia between Pussy Riot supporters and the Russian authorities. In the wake of the verdict on Friday 17th August, which sentenced members Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Maria Alyokhina, and Yekaterina Samutsevich to two years in prison for hooliganism motivated by religious hatred, protesters knocked over crosses outside Orthodox churches in Russia and Ukraine, provoking a rift between Pussy Riot supporters and the countries' religious populations.
Brother Ali: Mourning in America and Dreaming in Color '' review
  Link to Article
  Source: Culture | guardian.co.uk
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 00:15
  Brother Ali: Mourning in America and Dreaming in Color '' review | Music | The Guardian While ostensibly an attempt to address contemporary social issues, this fourth album by Minnesotan white Muslim rapper Brother Ali is more clearly an exercise in nostalgia. The consequence may not be intended, but it turns out to be Mourning in America's main strength. With production by Jake One that's heavy on the drum fills, horn flares and rolling piano hooks, you can occasionially mistake a song for late-noughties Jay-Z. Ali's flow, meanwhile, is reminiscent of early Kanye or, better yet, Pharoahe Monch. It's mellifluous and clear in its delivery, but this points up Ali's limitations at the same time; the inflexibility of his style and the limits of his vocabulary. As for the politics, the subjects may be job insecurity (Work Everyday) or sub-prime property (Fajr), but there is little in the way of insight that couldn't have been gleaned from the news, while specificity is usually ignored in favour of familiar generalisations. In this, Brother Ali sounds like even older hip-hop; the golden-age days when Five Percent Nation rappers were as common as club swag MCs today.
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  ');loading_box.dialog({title:"Abuse report",draggable: false,modal:true,width:400,minHeight:320,resizable: false,beforeclose: function(event, ui) {var reason = jQ('textarea#id_reason').val();if (reason != "") {return confirm("Closing this window without pressing \"Report\" will result in your words being lost. Are you sure?");} else {return true;}}});}function recommendComment(commentId) { var guardian_domain_thing = 'foo'; var post_url = "http://www.guardian.co.uk/discussion/handlers/recommendComment"; post_url = fix_domain_for_careers(post_url); jQ.post(post_url, { comment_id: commentId }, function(data) {if (data == "OK") {var span = jQ("#recommended-count-" + commentId);span.prev('a').contents().unwrap();span.text(parseInt(span.text(), 10)+1);}else {var span = jQ("#recommended-count-" + commentId);span.prev('a').contents().unwrap();}});} Related informationAngel Haze: Reservation '' review
  12 Jul 2012
  The 20-year-old rapper fulfils the promise of her earlier mixtapes with this album, full of whipsmart lyrics and verbal dismemberments, writes Alex Macpherson
  Estelle: All of Me '' review
  22 Mar 2012
  Estelle seems split between her loyalties to London and New York on her new album, writes Caroline Sullivan
  ;
Landing on the moon: Opinion of both a TWiT & NoAgenda listener and supporter. cc @adamcurry @leolaporteI (cont) http://t.co/6N3gZv1d
  Link to Article
  Source: @adamcurry - Twitter Search
  Fri, 31 Aug 2012 00:11
  Posted Thursday 30th August 2012 from Twitlonger
  Landing on the moon: Opinion of both a TWiT & NoAgenda listener and supporter. cc
  I wanted to share my opinion on Adam Curry's statement on TWiT ep. 368 The Zombie Slayer about landing on the moon and the post-show thunderstorm that lead Leo Laporte to explain during Inside TWiT, that Adam should no longer be invited on the show because he denies technology facts.
  WHO AM I?
  Nobody to most of you. But just to lay the ground on my affection to both podcasters, I've been listening to TWiT since the first episodes, donated to the network and attended TWiT ep. 364 It's a beautiful day in the Fiberhood at the brick house, I was known during this episode as Captain Canuck. As for NoAgenda, I've been a producer since the beginning, bought a podcast license, a shirt, produced Jingle 33 heard many times on the show and gave my newly born daughter's picture as the cover art for NA episode 115 Explaining the Health Care Bill.
  THE ROLLER COASTER
  To be popular and consequently profitable, a show like TWiT needs an entertainment factor. Regular listener would agree that weekly guests are pivots to how good each individual shows are. And that is, very personal to each and everyone of us. I have my favorites, you have yours and even Leo must have his. The fact that TWiT's guests are different each week is part of what makes it interesting. Having colourful and opinionated guests is what keeps us coming back for more and gives it a roller coaster effect. Ups and downs and unanticipated curves are very personal but one sure thing, we always come back for another ride.
  This week's moon landing declaration went beyond the reach it should have gone normally. To a question, Leo got an answer. Was it bad to ask? No. Was it bad for Adam to answer candidly that he doesn't buy it? No. That's it. There was no point wasting more time on the subject. Then how come this got so much e-ink? Because the ones who shout the most, again, got primetime attention.
  FILTERING THE NOISE
  You need to visit the Brick House to realize how close Leo is with the TWiT Army through the chat room. He gets their pulse constantly. Being active on the Twitter as well, the whole TWiT crew knows in real time how listeners are reacting to the shows. But as a business owner, Leo should be prudent not to give those shouting in the megaphone an influence over the guidance of TWiT. Adam's opinion, while we may not agree with, was not offending enough to make advertisers go away. But most importantly, it would not negatively affect downloads of future TWiT episodes. It's good to have such a direct contact with your audience, but it can also make one take unnecessary business decisions for something that deserves very little attention. It's all about filtering the noise. This is why many small businesses refuse to support user groups. Those attending these groups often make way too much noise and can have decision makers change priorities and take risky directions. Focus on the core business, i.e. entertaining technology enthusiasts. This audience can be taken out of its comfort zone. And before stating that a technology show should be free of technology-deniers, Adam's comment was sitting on very pertinent technology basis. If you think about it, his belief means technology was so advanced that they smoked almost everyone on the planet thinking we landed on the moon. This is in no way incompatible with a technology audience. Our brain loves to be crammed this way, this is pure gold. We all have a good laugh, remind ourselves that he's known as the Crackpot and we go to next topic.
  I think Leo should listen to Lisa on this one, he likes to say that TWiT is run by her. In my belief, her vision of this week's moon landing catastrophe is more in tune with the global TWiT audience and the silent majority.http://tl.gd/j3lmkj· ReplyReport post (?)
Indecent Exposure! Tanning Mom Takes A Drunken Tumble And Flashes Her Panties
  Link to Article
  Source: Radar Online
  Thu, 30 Aug 2012 21:49
  Splash News
  By Radar Staff
  Someone clearly had a little too much to drink!
  After getting kicked out of her own roast at a New York City drag queen club, ''Tanning Mom'' Patricia Krentcil committed an act of indecent exposure on the red carpet when she flashed her panties after taking a fall, and RadarOnline.com has the photos.PHOTOS: Tanning Mom Patricia Krentcil Falls On Her Face And Flashes Her Panties
  The Nutley, New Jersey mother, who was arrested in May 2012 for child endangerment after allegedly taking her daughter, 5, to a stand-up tanning bed where she was badly burned, donned a bright red mini dress and silver heels as she was being escorted out of the club by a pal, but clearly couldn't stay balanced.
  After drunkenly falling down on her face, the 44-year-old began to ham it up for the cameras in a bevy of sexy poses while spreading her legs and showing off her nude colored panties.
  PHOTOS: Tanning Mom Patricia Spends The Afternoon In The Sun
  Kristen Wiig parodied Patricia on Saturday Night Live in May in a hilarious skit, and Kim Kardashianalso mocked the New Jersey mom with a hilarious Twitter photo.
  RELATED STORIES:
  'Tanning Mom' Patricia Krentcil Kicked Out Of Her Own Roast
  Tanning Mom Patricia Krentcil Spends Mother's Day With Daughter She's Accused Of Burning
  Kim Kardashian Mocks Tanning Mom In Twitter PicTan Mother Patricia Krentcil Says SNL Skit 'Hysterical'
THErealDVORAK: @MarshaCollier @heathermeeker there are some scammy aspects to it too. I'll discuss on the Sunday http://t.co/4t4Jzh71
  Link to Article
  Source: Twitter / THErealDVORAK
  Thu, 30 Aug 2012 21:48
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Another indication the bloom's coming off the Facebook rose
  Link to Article
  Source: CNET News
  Thu, 30 Aug 2012 21:43
  Add another entry to the lengthening list of reduced revenue estimates for Facebook.
  eMarketer said in a report issued earlier today that it has cut its 2012 revenue estimates on Facebook from more than $6 billion to around $5 billion.
  In February, eMarketer estimated that Facebook's total revenues would go beyond the $6 billion mark this year, but the company's underwhelming performance in the first and second quarters of 2012 has changed the opinion of analysts.
  The new estimate has Facebook's revenue at a 35.9 percent increase from 2011, according to eMarketer's forecast, but analyst expects that percentage to grow when Facebook establishes its ad exchange, and its mobile ad business.
  While advertising numbers are still rising -- eMarkerter expects revenue to hit $4.23 billion, a 34.1 percent increase from 2011 -- the climb is not as significant as last year. Revenue from Facebook payments and other sources, however, are increasing quickly. This year Facebook will see $811 million from non-advertising services -- a 45.6 percent increase from last year.
  The lackluster growth has fueled Facebook's poor showings in the stock market. The stock closed at $19.09 a share today, roughly half of its opening day price of $38.
  The poor performance may be why Facebook supporters are shedding their stock, including co-founder Dustin Moskovitz. Moskovitz continues to drop 150,000 shares a day from his trove of millions.
  Facebook's poor fiscal reputation can be traced back to a bungled opening day. The marked event just won't go away -- the Nasdaq has proposed to pay firms back in a $62 million compensation package after the stock exchange mismanaged the initial day of trading.
  Knight Capital Group, a major market maker, criticized the exchange for the losses shortly after, and now the firm has weighed in on Nasdaq's plan.
  Knight said it supported the proposal, but harped on Nasdaq's plan to make firms seeking compensation waive legal claims against the stock exchange.
Scripting News: The Republican fallacy
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Thu, 30 Aug 2012 21:37
  I watched the Republican speeches last night. There were lots of repeating themes, but one that caught my ear that I haven't heard anyone else comment on is that President Obama should not blame President Bush for his problems. He should accept responsibility for the economy as it is.
  It's a trick. And maybe it might work against the Democrats, but there's no reason that voters shouldn't be realistic about how we got into the deep hole that we're in. I don't take orders from the Republican Party, or the Democrats. I know how it happened, and can't forget just because the Repubs want us to.
  It would be stupid for voters to elect Republicans, esp when they're in denial about how the mess got created. They're going to keep doing the same things they were doing before the collapse of 2008. And they think the result would be any different? It won't.
  What we need to do is as it was before.
  1. Reform the banking system, break up the huge banks so that they aren't too big to fail. Don't accept the current situation where they privatize the profits and socialize the losses.
  2. Invest in stimulating economic activity, taking advantage of the low interest rates, to repair infrastructure, invest in education, and start building an economy around much lower energy consumption.
  3. Encourage people to have fewer children, not just in the United States but around the world. The biggest problem we have is overpopulation. It's unfortunately not a long-term problem, the problem is immediate. We have too many people. Catholics may not like it, but this isn't a Catholic country, or even a Christian country. We were founded on a strong separation of church and state, for good reasons. Freedom to worship includes a freedom not to worship, and a freedom to think and be smart rather than blindly accept the orders of someone else's church.
  4. Double-down on health reform. The Affordable Care Act was a decent start. But we're still paying too much for health care. There's much to learn from the way other economies do it. Let's be smart and steal the best ideas from them.
  5. We need to amend the Constitution to undo the Citizens United mess created by the Supreme Court.
  6. The next war won't be fought with traditional armies, guns, or even nukes. Our infrastructure is heavily computerized and networked. We don't need to spend so much money on bullets, guns, tanks and battleships. They're this generation's Maginot Line. Beyond that I don't know what to do about this, and I'm a computer expert.
  Those are just some beginning ideas. Neither party is going to talk about any of it. But it's still what we need to do, to have a fighting chance to be prosperous in the future.
Black CNN camerawoman speaks out
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Thu, 30 Aug 2012 21:34
  David TaintorAugust 30, 2012, 12:36 PMUpdated at 3:11 p.m. ET
  The black CNN camerawoman whom two Republican National Convention attendees threw nuts at earlier this week has spoken out, saying the incident did not surprise her ''at all.''
  ''This is Florida and I'm from the Deep South. You come to places like this, you can count the black people on your hand. They see us doing things they don't think I should do,'' Patricia Carroll, 34, told the Maynard Institute. An Alabama native, Carroll is now based in CNN's Washington, D.C. bureau.
  After the attendees threw nuts at her and said, ''This is how we feed animals,'' Carroll told colleagues and CNN security about the incident. In a separate interview with Witches' Brew, Carroll said the incident occurred around 3 p.m. Tuesday. She looked up and saw two men throwing peanuts at her, she said. The head of the delegation of an unidentified state told her the nut-throwers were likely not delegates, according to the Maynard Institute report.
  CNN has been ''behind me 100 percent,'' Carroll said, thanking the network. CNN was initially tight-lipped about the incident, and has declined to provide much detail since. It published a sparse report online, saying there were multiple witnesses to the exchange. Wedneday evening, Wolf Blitzer reported the story on air, calling it ''truly shocking.'' CNN political analyst Donna Brazile said during the segment that she hopes the two attendees have their convention credentials revoked.
  CNN released a statement Thursday afternoon saying it doesn't know the identity of the two people removed from the convention and neither do convention officials.
  Convention officials condemned the attendees' actions, calling the behavior ''deplorable.''
  ''This kind of behavior will not be tolerated,'' convention spokesman Kyle Downey said in a statement.
  Carroll told the Maynard Institute that no one took down the names of the attendees who pelted her. Read her interviews here and here.
  CNN, Republican National ConventionDavid TaintorDavid Taintor is the Front Page Editor at TPM, where he contributes to TPM's Livewire coverage, among other areas. David is from Chanhassen, Minnesota, where, yes, it gets very cold. Reach him at taintor [at] talkingpointsmemo.com
Drone Nation
  Link to Article
  Source: JKS's feed
  Thu, 30 Aug 2012 20:01
Last Story
  U.S. suspends Afghan police recruit training
    Link to Article
    Source: The Daily Star >> Live News
    Sun, 02 Sep 2012 14:00
    KABUL: U.S. special forces in Afghanistan have suspended training for about 1,000 Afghan police recruits to vet existing members, the military said Sunday, after a surge in insider attacks on NATO.
    There has been a sharp rise in so-called "green-on-blue" attacks in recent months, in which members of the Afghan security forces turn their weapons on their Western allies, sometimes their military trainers.
    In more than 30 such incidents this year, 45 coalition troops have been killed -- about 14 percent of the overall death toll in the war for 2012. Most have been American, though the latest to die were three Australian troops.
    "Current partnered operations have and will continue, even as we temporarily suspend training of about 1,000 new ALP (Afghan Local Police) recruits while re-vetting current members," a spokesman for the U.S. forces in Afghanistan, Colonel Thomas Collins, said.
    Taliban insurgents claim responsibility for many of the attacks, saying their fighters have infiltrated the Afghan army and police, but NATO says the majority of the incidents are due to cultural differences and personal animosities.
    Last month was the worst for insider attacks in more than 10 years of war, with nearly one in three international coalition deaths caused by Afghan allies.
    The ALP -- which has around 16,000 members according to the Afghan interior ministry -- is a U.S.-sponsored police force recruited to fight Taliban insurgents in remote areas of the Afghan countryside, though it has been accused of corruption and violence towards civilians.
    "While we have full trust and confidence in our Afghan partners, we believe this is a necessary step to validate our vetting process and ensure the quality indicative of Afghan Local Police," the U.S. spokesman said.
    The Washington Post said the re-vetting process would affect more than 27,000 Afghan troops.
    The suspension was temporary, the colonel said but gave no timeframe.
    Training for the Afghan National Police and Afghan National Army -- carried out by NATO rather than the U.S. -- will not be affected by the halt.
    Afghan interior ministry spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said: "We want all the training programmes for our police forces to continue and we are in discussion with our NATO partners about it."
    There are about 130,000 US and NATO troops in Afghanistan fighting the Taliban insurgency and training the Afghan security forces since the Taliban were ousted from power in late 2001 in a U.S.-led invasion.
    The U.S.-led NATO troops will withdraw at the end of 2014, giving all security responsibilities to the Afghan forces in a U.S.-designed programme that began earlier this year.
    According to the Post, numerous military guidelines were not followed by either Afghans or Americans because of concerns that they might slow the growth of the Afghan army and police.
    The Taliban have stepped up their attacks in recent months as part of efforts by the insurgency to undermine the transition process.
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