Saturday March 28, 2009

Police identify 200 children as potential terrorists

Mark Hughes
Independent

Drastic new tactics to prevent school pupils as young as 13 falling into extremism

Two hundred schoolchildren in Britain, some as young as 13, have been identified as potential terrorists by a police scheme that aims to spot youngsters who are "vulnerable" to Islamic radicalisation.

The number was revealed to The Independent by Sir Norman Bettison, the chief constable of West Yorkshire Police and Britain's most senior officer in charge of terror prevention.
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Saturday March 28, 2009

Apple sizes iPhone for dog's nose

Rik Myslewski
The Register

Scent of a fanboi

Apple has filed a patent application for a set of techniques to enhance security of iPhones and laptops using biometric sensing and other technologies.

Some of the identification methods described in the filing would automatically sense your unique personal attributes without you needing to perform a separate device-unlocking action - or even being aware of their operation.
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Saturday March 28, 2009

China’s hi-tech ‘death van’ where criminals are executed and then their organs are sold on black market

Andrew Malone
Daily Mail

Death will come soon for Jiang Yong. A corrupt local planning official with a taste for the high life, Yong solicited money from businessmen eager to expand in China’s economic boom.

Showering gifts on his mistress, known as Madam Tang, the unmarried official took more than £1 million in bribes from entrepreneurs wanting permission to build skyscrapers on land which had previously been protected from development.
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Saturday March 28, 2009

Soros warns of global meltdown, says UK may have to seek IMF rescue

Alice Thomson and Rachel Sylvester
Times

George Soros was 13 when the Nazis invaded his homeland of Hungary. As a Jew, he was forced to adopt a false identity and live separately from his parents in Budapest. Instead of being traumatised by the experience, though, he found the danger exhilarating. “It was high adventure,” he says, “like living through Raiders of the Lost Ark.”

Sixty-five years later, he still thrives on danger. He famously made $1 billion on Black Wednesday by shorting the pound, earning him the label of “the man who broke the Bank of England”.
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Saturday March 28, 2009

How the Scam Works

Michael Hudson
Counterpunch

The Free Market, Financial Style

Newspaper reports seem surprised at how high banks are bidding for the junk mortgages that Treasury Secretary Geithner is now bidding for, having mobilized the FDIC and Fed to transfer yet more public funds to the banks. Bank stocks are soaring – thereby bidding up the Dow Jones Industrial Average, as if the “financial industry” really were part of the industrial economy.

Why are the very worst offenders – Bank of America (now owner of the Countrywide crooks) and Citibank the largest buyers?
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Saturday March 28, 2009

The Weight Loss Hype: Why Counting Calories Never Works

Kathy Freston
Huffington Post

We've known for more than a decade that the key to weight-loss is to consume fewer calories than you're burning--in other words, eat less, exercise more, or both. That dietary adage was confirmed last week by researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health, with a widely reported study in the New England Journal of Medicine.

In the study, researchers put 811 overweight adults on one of four weight loss plans, which were supposed to vary widely in fat, protein, and carbohydrate content.
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Saturday March 28, 2009

Outrage at UN Human Rights Council resolution on defamation of religions

Reporters Without Borders

In the resolution it adopted yesterday on the defamation of religions, the United Nations Human Rights Council has yet again demonstrated its inability to defend the values enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Reporters Without Borders said.

“The Council had just dealt a severe blow to the freedom of expression it is supposed to defend,” the press freedom organisation said. “By approving a resolution that seeks to suppress criticism of Islam, this UN body has once again shown that it is incapable of defending human rights effectively.
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Saturday March 28, 2009

More Banking Stupidity: Phished by Visa

Links
Ben Laurie

Not content with destroying the world’s economies, the banking industry is also bent on ruining us individually, it seems. Take a look at Verified By Visa.

Allegedly this protects cardholders - by training them to expect a process in which there’s absolutely no way to know whether you are being phished or not. Even more astonishing is that this seen as a benefit!
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Saturday March 28, 2009

Major Oil Companies Are Circling Iraq

Spiegel International

With stability returning, Oil Minister al-Shahristani has big plans to make his country the fourth-largest oil producer.

With security in Iraq improving, international oil companies are quickly moving in, often with little or no fanfare. Hanter Gasser, Royal Dutch Shell's (RDS) top executive for Iraq, recently spent a week in Basra, site of the country's biggest fields, checking on a joint venture Shell is starting with the Iraqis to find commercial uses for the gas that is flared off during oil production. Gasser says Iraq burns off enough gas to power two countries the size of Jordan.
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Saturday March 28, 2009

That's No Angry Mob, It's a Movement

Michael Winship
Truthout

A college friend of mine, after much quaffing from the keg, so to speak, would start singing a faux hymn that began, "We are sliding into sin - whee!"

I've thought of his bleary tune from time to time as we all watched our financial institutions slide from thoughtless, wretched excess into calamity, aided and abetted by deregulation and bailouts, dragging the rest of us along on their speed bump-free ride.
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Saturday March 28, 2009

Reform Is Needed. Reform Is in the Air. We Can't Afford to Fail.

Joseph Stiglitz
The Guardian

The task is to build a new financial architecture. If we flunk it, the pain will strike most cruelly in the world's poorest countries.

The financial crisis that began in America's sub-prime mortgage market has now become a global recession - with growth projected to be a negative 1.5%, the worst performance since the Great Depression. Even countries that had done everything right are seeing marked declines in growth rates, and even deep recessions. And much of the most acute pain will be felt by developing countries.
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Saturday March 28, 2009

The Market Wizards Were Exposed as Frauds -- Too Bad Obama's Team Still Believes in Their Magic

Paul Krugman
The New York Times

The Obama administration thinks a little regulatory tinkering will take Wall Street back to its glory days of fraudulent finance.

On Monday, Lawrence Summers, the head of the National Economic Council, responded to criticisms of the Obama administration’s plan to subsidize private purchases of toxic assets. “I don’t know of any economist,” he declared, “who doesn’t believe that better functioning capital markets in which assets can be traded are a good idea.”
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Saturday March 28, 2009

Detox Demystified: Fad, Fact, Or Fiction?

Dr Patricia Fitzgerald
Huffington Post

I just finished reading the latest about how celebrities "detox,"--pretty much by starving themselves. I cringe when I see these articles. What other group of people could make deprivation seem attractive?

Seriously, what really concerns me is that these extreme programs are misleading. You simply cannot "detox your body" in seven days--or even seventy --no matter what you do.
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Saturday March 28, 2009

Trouble in Paradise

Laura Norton
Foreign Policy in Focus

Madagascar, a tourist paradise of beaches and exotic animals, is home to one of the most uninterrupted cycles of coups and crises in Africa.

Democracy hasn't settled easily on the world's fourth largest island. Like so many other African nations still struggling still with their colonial past, Madagascar was left by France in 1960 ill-equipped for free and fair elections.
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Saturday March 28, 2009

'What happens in Vegas doesn't stay in Vegas'

Joseph Romm
Grist

Drinking water: Toilet to tap -- get used to it!

In the future, your drinking water is going to be recycled from your toilet -- believe it.

As the population grows and global warming drives desertification and the loss of the inland glaciers (see here), fresh water will become increasingly in short supply. As the AFP reported recently:
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Friday March 27, 2009

Councils used 'snooper's charter' more than 10,000 times

Philippe Naughton
TimesonLine

Surveillance powers originally designed to counter the threat of terrorism and safeguard national security have been used by local councils more than 10,000 times over the past five years - often for “crimes” as minor as littering, it emerged today.

Details disclosed under the Freedom of Information Act showed that councils in England and Wales used powers under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (Ripa) to investigate offences ranging from dog fouling to taxi overcharging.
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Friday March 27, 2009

ZIMBABWE: Researchers Developing New Ways to Purify Water

Busani Bafana and Zahira Kharsany
Inter Press Service

Scientists at Bulawayo's National University of Science and Technology (NUST) have embarked on research to develop simple and affordable water purification methods, as more than a billion people live without safe drinking water in developing countries.

Water and sanitation experts are currently investigating if a powder made from the seeds of the Moringa Oleifera, commonly known as the drumstick or horseradish tree, can be used as a filter to purify water.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Anti-cancer benefits of fruit and veg are underlined

Chris Green
Independent

The salicylates in fruit and vegetables may in fact play a bigger role in protecting against cancer than the antioxidants on which research has focused until now

A diet high in fruit and vegetables, especially organically grown ones, may protect against cancer and heart disease and could be equivalent in this respect to taking a low dose of aspirin every day, scientists say.
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Friday March 27, 2009

New Species of Ice Invading Arctic

Julia Whitty
Mother Jones

A different kind of ice is replacing ancient Arctic ice. The new stuff is qualitatively different. It's thinner, darker, wetter. Worse, it may already be changing the local weather and the ability to grow new ice. It could even alter the oceanic circulation that mediates global climate, reports Nature. Oh, it's bad for polar bears too.

Until recently, the Arctic maintained a lot of multiyear sea ice that takes years to grow and thicken and survives from one year to the next. Some melts each summer. But only in small areas.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Pentagon exploring robot killers that can fire on their own

Robert S. Boyd
McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON — The unmanned bombers that frequently cause unintended civilian casualties in Pakistan are a step toward an even more lethal generation of robotic hunters-killers that operate with limited, if any, human control.

The Defense Department is financing studies of autonomous, or self-governing, armed robots that could find and destroy targets on their own. On-board computer programs, not flesh-and-blood people, would decide whether to fire their weapons.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Climate changes Europe's borders – and the world's

Michael Marshall
New Scientist

Italy and Switzerland are planning to redraw their shared alpine border, as global warming is melting the glaciers that originally guided the line. Although peaceful, the move raises fears of future conflicts over shifting borders and resources.

Glaciers and ice fields around the world are melting as temperatures rise, with Europe's high mountains particularly hard hit.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Europe, aided by safety nets, resists stimulus push

Nicholas Kulish
International Herald Tribune

Last month Frank Koppe gathered together all 50 of his employees at Koppe-Apparatebau for coffee, cake and the kind of bad news that has lately become all too familiar. He told them the small company's business, designing and manufacturing custom equipment for industrial plants, had been sliced nearly in half.

But rather than resorting to layoffs, Mr. Koppe asked half his employees to come in every other week. The government would make up roughly two-thirds of their lost wages out of a fund filled in good times through payroll deductions and company contributions.
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Friday March 27, 2009

How much "war on terror" training for "tens of thousands" of people is the Labour government providing ? As little as 3 hours (including a coffee break)

wtwu
Spyblog

Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown's article in The Observer yesterday, managed to use the headline "war on terror", even though, only a few months ago, the consensus seemed to have been, that this phrase is actually counterproductive.

We are about to take the war against terror to a new level

"Gordon Brown
The Observer, Sunday 22 March 2009

[...]

Tens of thousands of men and women throughout Britain - from security guards to store managers - have now been trained and equipped to deal with an incident and know what to watch for as people go about their daily business in crowded places such as stations, airports, shopping centres and sports grounds."
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Friday March 27, 2009

Boffins: Atlantic temperature ruled by dust, not CO2

Lewis Page
The Register

Warm ocean, hurricane increases down to clean skies

American scientists say that variations in atmospheric dust levels affect the temperature of the Atlantic ocean far more than global warming. Research indicates that 70 per cent of the change in Atlantic temperature over recent decades has resulted from reduced dust, rather than climate change.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Nature’s vital circles

Alain de Botton
NewStatesman

Work dominates our lives, yet its places and processes are ignored by artists. Now, more than ever, we must learn to appreciate the world in which we labour

If a Martian came to earth and tried to understand what human beings do from just reading most literature published today, he would come away with the extraordinary impression that what we mostly spend our time doing is falling in love and, occasionally, murdering one another.
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Friday March 27, 2009

UK Scientists Grow A Living Human ‘Brain’

Sky News

Scientists in Birmingham have grown a living human ‘brain’.

The team at Aston University created tiny bundles of cells which act like a mini nervous system.
They believe it could help find a cure for degenerative conditions like Alzheimer’s, motor neurone or Parkinson’s disease.

Professor Michael Coleman is leading the research.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Mercury Found in High-Fructose Corn Syrup

Reuben Chow
Natural News

High-fructose corn syrup has taken our food shelves by storm. It is present in many different types of bread, cereals, breakfast bars, yogurts, soups and sugary beverages. It is estimated that, on a typical day, an American consumes an average of 12 teaspoons of such syrup.

Further, teenagers and others with high consumption may even be taking in up to 80% more than average. Recently, two separate studies, one published in the journal Environmental Health and the other conducted by the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), have revealed a further danger of high-fructose corn syrup, having found that it may contain mercury.
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Friday March 27, 2009

G20 rioters to hang banker effigies from lampposts as city staff are told to wear disguises

Daily Mail

City workers are being urged to stay at home or to dress down during next week’s G20 summit to avoid being targeted by anti-capitalist protesters.

Unprecedented measures are being put in place to prepare for thousands of demonstrators targeting the City and Canary Wharf.

About 3,000 anti-capitalist protesters are expected, with groups next Wednesday marching to the Bank of England, holding ‘flashcamps’ outside the European Climate Exchange in Bishopsgate, and marching on the US Embassy.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Swiss banks ban top executive travel

Richard Milne
Financial Times

Switzerland’s private banks have started to ban their top executives from travelling abroad, even to neighbouring France and Germany, because of fears they will be detained as part of a global crackdown on bank secrecy.

The head of one leading private bank in Geneva said the growing determination of countries such as the US and Germany to tackle tax evasion and secrecy meant banks felt they had to take extra measures to protect employees.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Who Is Arming the Mexican Drug Cartels?

Michael Gaddy
Lew Rockwell.com

The state, Mexican authorities and their US propaganda arm, known in most circles as the Mainstream Media, have recently embarked on a huge disinformation campaign to demonize the American gun owner as the supplier of weapons to the Mexican drug cartels. Everyone in the media, with the possible exception of Lou Dobbs, has joined in the campaign of lies.

Shown here, on a CBS special, is video proof of the lies and disinformation by CBS, US and Mexican authorities. Anderson Cooper and Janet Napolitano are either ignorant or complicit in the myth that M-203s, RPGs and hand grenades are readily available to the American gun consumer. Most intelligent folks, and those without a state sponsored agenda, realize these weapons are usually only available to the military.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Will the Cellphone Please Take the Stand?

Keith Newell
Counterpunch

Police misconduct has always been a serious problem in the United States, and the police typically receive the benefit of the doubt in the justice system. The claims that officers make are taken seriously, even if they don’t add up.

But in the era of camera phones and video sharing Web sites like YouTube, civil rights advocates are gaining ground. It is now easier to document crimes, including unlawful police activity, and to share the video clips with millions of viewers on the Internet.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Facebook Users to Flood Vatican with Condoms

Jas
Spiegel International

Pope Benedict XVI triggered yet another scandal when he criticized the use of condoms in the fight against AIDS in Africa. Now the protests are taking an unusual form: The pontiff is about to receive a deluge of condoms by post -- gifts from international members of a Facebook group.

When Benedict XVI travelled to Africa, the continent worst-hit by AIDS, he stumbled, once again, head first into an international controversy.
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Friday March 27, 2009

London calls the street rebels

Paul Kingsnorth
NewStatesman

The global justice movement is back in town – and planning the biggest rally since the Iraq War march. The difference this time is that the politicians may have to listen.

As the heads of government of the G20 nations prepare to convene for the crisis summit in London’s Docklands on Thursday 2 April, a political movement which ten years ago seemed to be sweeping all before it, yet hit a brick wall a few years later, may once again make the political running. The global justice movement is back in town.
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Friday March 27, 2009

UK teenagers among heaviest drinkers in EU

Rebecca Smithers
The Guardian

The government yesterday faced fresh calls to increase the price of alcohol, after research showed young people in the UK reported some of the highest levels of teenage binge drinking, drunkenness and alcohol-related problems in Europe.

British girls aged 15 and 16 are binge drinking more than their male classmates, with fresh evidence that their behaviour is contributing towards high rates of teenage alcohol-related accidents and unprotected sex.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Why we should learn to love rats

Jonathan Brown
Independent

In a corner of Yorkshire, there's a plague of biblical proportions. Across the nation, there's an infestation. We may love to hate them, says Jonathan Brown – but have we got them all wrong?

The old village of Flamborough, buttressed against the elements by high chalk cliffs that crumble perilously towards the North Sea below, is justifiably proud of its wildlife heritage. Above can be heard the shriek of seagulls as they patrol the skies on the look-out for a stray chip or sandwich left behind by a careless picnicker.
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Friday March 27, 2009

The Fierce Urgency of Peace

Roger Cohen
The New York Times

Pressure on President Obama to recast the failed American approach to Israel-Palestine is building from former senior officials whose counsel he respects.

Following up on a letter dated Nov. 6, 2008, that was handed to Obama late last year by Paul Volcker, now a senior economic adviser to the president, these foreign policy mandarins have concluded a "Bipartisan Statement on U.S. Middle East Peacemaking" that should become an essential template.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Iran, NATO in First Talks in 30 Years

Agence France-Presse

Iran and NATO have held their first talks since the Iranian revolution 30 years ago, officials at the military alliance said Thursday, in a new sign of a thaw in Tehran's ties with the West.

At allied headquarters in Brussels last week, an Iranian diplomat and a senior NATO official had an "informal contact" focused on Iran's neighbour Afghanistan, where the alliance is battling a stiff Taliban-led insurgency.
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Friday March 27, 2009

No-one rules the world

Martin Jacques
Newstatesman

US economic power is crumbling, but China is not yet ready to take over the reins. Martin Jacques reflects on the potential impact of the G20 ahead of world leaders arriving in London. Part of the NS's unrivalled coverage of the global crisis.

The G20 meeting on 2 April will deliver little but, like the first G20 meeting in Washington last November, its symbolism will be enormous. The very fact that it is taking place at all is an admission of the momentous shift in the global balance of economic power from the rich countries to the developing world.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Barclays tax documents: how Matthew Oakeshott told their lordships what we couldn't

Felicity Lawrence and David Leigh
The Guardian

For the last week they have been one of the internet's worst kept secrets. They have been blogged about, debated on bulletin boards, twittered over and even published in their entirety on a whistleblowers website.

Until now, however, the Guardian has been banned from telling you as much. Under the terms of an injunction obtained by Barclays, newspapers have been prevented doing anything to "incite" or even "encourage" viewing a set of documents which appear to detail massive tax avoidance deals by the bank.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Cell Phone Scare: What Do We Really Know About the Health Risks?

Elisa Batista
Terrain

Given the confusing studies and the fact that cell phones are a part of modern life, what is a concerned person to do?

Last July, renowned cancer expert Dr. Ronald Herberman sent off a rather alarming note to the 3,000 faculty and staff members at the University of Pittsburgh warning that children should limit their use of cell phones to decrease their risk of cancer.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Microsoft renews hunt for counterfeit Windows XP

Gregg Keizer
Computerworld (US)

In a move which tacitly acknowledges the continued popularity of Windows XP over Vista, Microsoft is updating the operating system's anti-piracy technology to detect illegal copies installed with newly-stolen or faked product keys, or with new activation cracks.

In an entry to a company blog, Alex Kochis, senior product manager for Microsoft's Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) program, spelled out the update to WGA Notifications.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Artificial cartilage performs better than the real thing

Colin Barras
New Scientist

The smooth cartilage that covers the ends of long bones provides a level of lubrication that artificial alternatives haven't been able to rival – until now. Researchers say their lubricating layers of "molecular brushes" can outperform nature under the highest pressures encountered within joints, with potentially important implications for joint replacement surgery.

With every step we take, bones at the knee and hip rub against each other. That would quickly wear them away if it wasn't for the protection afforded by the thick layer of smooth and slippery cartilage that covers their ends.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Pharmaceuticals Found in Fish Across US

The Associated Press

Residue of allergy, cholesterol, other meds were in fish near five major cities.

Fish caught near wastewater treatment plants serving five major U.S. cities had residues of pharmaceuticals in them, including medicines used to treat high cholesterol, allergies, high blood pressure, bipolar disorder and depression, researchers reported Wednesday.
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Friday March 27, 2009

China's giant step into nanotech

Tom Mackenzie
The Guardian

Nanotechnology is big business conducted on an atomic scale. China is a major player, using it for a speaker just 1mm thick - or super-strong armour

Seated inside one of China's most advanced science laboratories, two PhD students dressed from head to toe in protective white suits listen intently to Mariah Carey's pop classic Hero.

It is not the song, but the millimetre-thin, transparent strip making the sound that captures their attention - a nano-speaker they hope will revolutionise where, and how, we listen to music.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Clinton Admits US Blame on Drugs

BBC News

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says the US must take part of the blame for drug-related violence in Mexico.

Speaking as she arrived in Mexico, she said America's appetite for drugs and its inability to stop arms crossing the border were helping fuel the violence.

Her two-day visit comes a day after the Obama administration announced new measures to boost border security.
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Friday March 27, 2009

China's techies turn to cybercrime

Robert McMillan
IDG News Service

With China's economy cooling down, some of the country's IT professionals are turning to cybercrime, according to a Beijing-based security expert.

Speaking at the CanSecWest security conference last week, Wei Zhao, CEO of Knownsec, a Beijing security company, said that while many Chinese workers may be feeling hard times, business is still booming in the country's cybercrime industry.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Jihad Against the Abuse of Jihad

Abukar Arman
Truthout

In light of the rampant extremism and militarism around the world, nothing proves more dangerous than the manipulation of truth for political ends. This tactic facilitates the demonization process that blurs ideologies and beliefs in both the West and the Islamic world. And, no concept is more abused by both sides than the concept of Jihad.

To Muslim extremists and their cronies, Jihad is a narrowly defined license to fight their perceived enemies (including Muslims, as is the case in Somalia) even if that leads to atrocities against civilians.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Tax trap looms for the self-employed

Toby Ryland
Telegraph

Even if the recession means less income - or none at all - you will still need to pay your tax. Start planning now to ease the pain.

Unemployment surged through two million for the first time since 1997, according to figures published last week, but there has been little or no coverage of some of the worst-affected people being self-employed before their businesses went bust.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Iraq war inquiry will be held in private

Michael Savage
Independent

Findings will be more thorough if proceedings are secret, Miliband says

The Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, angered critics of the Iraq war yesterday when he indicated that a long-awaited inquiry into the planning and execution of the conflict, promised by the Prime Minister, would be held behind closed doors.

He told MPs that the inquiry would be approved "as soon as practicable" once most British combat troops had returned home at the end of July. He admitted there were "important lessons to be learnt" from how the campaign was planned and carried out.
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Friday March 27, 2009

EU to slash price of mobile roaming

Paul Meller
IDG News Service

The cost of calling, texting and accessing the Internet via mobile phones while abroad is about to get cheaper for European residents, following an agreement among lawmakers over the shape of a new mobile roaming law.

Members of the European Parliament and representatives of the 27 national governments reached an informal agreement to cut prices from 1 July.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Israel accused of indiscriminate phosphorus use in Gaza

Rory McCarthy
The Guardian

Human Rights Watch report claims Israel committed war crimes in its use of air-burst white phosphorus artillery shells

Israel's military fired white phosphorus over crowded areas of Gaza repeatedly and indiscriminately in its three-week war, killing and injuring civilians and committing war crimes, Human Rights Watch said today.

In a 71-page report, the rights group said the repeated use of air-burst white phosphorus artillery shells in populated areas of Gaza was not incidental or accidental, but revealed "a pattern or policy of conduct".
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Friday March 27, 2009

Why Secretly Funded DEA Surveillance Planes Aren't Flying

Marisa Taylor
McClatchy Newspapers

The first sign of trouble with the Drug Enforcement Administration's new surveillance planes surfaced almost immediately. On the way from the manufacturer to the agency's aviation headquarters, one of them veered off a runway during a fuel stop.

The malfunction last spring was only the beginning. A month later, the windshield unlatched in mid-flight and smashed into the engine. Then, in a third incident on the same plane, a connection between the propeller and the engine came loose and forced an emergency landing.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Ban Cluster Bombs? Yes, We Can!

Robert Naiman
Truthout

President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton are getting big praise around the world for their new Charm Offensive. As far as I'm concerned, the praise is justified.

I heard our secretary of state interviewed on BBC a few weeks ago about our diplomatic outreach to Iran on Afghanistan. And BBC was all, what makes you think Iran is going to help you on Afghanistan? And Hillary was all, you know, actually Iran helped us tremendously in Afghanistan after 2001. Our ambassador in Afghanistan and the Iranian ambassador were meeting practically every day. I just about fell off my chair. You'd have thought Hillary was applying for a job at the National Iranian American Council.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Hemp Is Not Pot: It's the Economic Stimulus and Green Jobs Solution We Need

Dara Colwell
AlterNet

We can make over 25,000 things with it. Farmers love it. Environmentalists love it. You can't get high from it. So why is it still illegal?

While Uncle Sam's scramble for new revenue sources has recently kicked up the marijuana debate -- to legalize and tax, or not? -- hemp's feasibility as a stimulus plan has received less airtime.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Judges reject mandatory-sentence Bill

Robert Verkaik
Independent

Judges have attacked ministers' controversial plans for mandatory sentences, which they claim will stop them from protecting women and young offenders from harsh punishments.

The Council of Circuit Judges, which represents 652 judges in England and Wales, said measures contained in the Coroners and Justice Bill were "unnecessary, costly and unwelcome".
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Friday March 27, 2009

Skype snatches big chunk of voice market

Mikael Ricknäs
IDG News Service

Skype carried around 33 billion minutes of international voice calls last year, or around 8 percent of all international voice traffic, according to market researcher TeleGeography.

The growth in the company's international traffic - 41 percent in 2008 - has been remarkable, according to TeleGeography analyst Stephan Beckert, and has made Skype the largest provider of cross-border voice communications in the world, he said in a statement.
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Friday March 27, 2009

A Divided G20?

Le Monde

Will the beautiful unanimity displayed at the first G20 Summit on November 15, 2008, in Washington appear again in London for the April 2 meeting? Nothing is less certain.

Less than ten days before this - undoubtedly too brief to be truly foundational - meeting, the reasons for doubt are many. The first is that, in spite of the arrival of a new administration in Washington, the crisis shows no sign of slowing down. To the contrary, it is worsening, at least insofar as employment is concerned.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Liquid War: Postcard From Pipelineistan

Pepe Escobar
TomDispatch.com

What happens on the immense battlefield for the control of Eurasia will provide the ultimate plot line in the tumultuous rush towards a new, polycentric world order, also known as the New Great Game.

Our good ol' friend the nonsensical "Global War on Terror," which the Pentagon has slyly rebranded "the Long War," sports a far more important, if half-hidden, twin -- a global energy war.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Tony McNulty row: MPs call for £40,000 pay rise

Matthew Moore
Telegraph

MPs have demanded a pay rise of up to £40,000 in return for giving up their second homes allowance, following the row over the payments claimed by employment minister Tony McNulty.

As the parliamentary sleaze watchdog launched a full inquiry into members' expenses, senior backbenchers called for the £24,000-a-year allowance to be replaced with an annual salary increase.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Red Alert

Tom Nolan
The Guardian

Many of us turn crimson when embarrassed. But some people blush so often that they avoid social contact.

Most of us go red when, for example, we receive a compliment or have to give an impromptu speech - it's perfectly normal. But what would you do if you blushed so often that you ended up avoiding people?
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Friday March 27, 2009

Now 'Big Brother' targets Facebook

Nigel Morris
Independent

Minister wants government database to monitor social networking sites

Millions of Britons who use social networking sites such as Facebook could soon have their every move monitored by the Government and saved on a "Big Brother" database.

Ministers faced a civil liberties outcry last night over the plans, with accusations of excessive snooping on the private lives of law-abiding citizens.
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Friday March 27, 2009

City-dwellers emit less CO2 than countryfolk: study

Michael Szabo
Reuters

Major cities are getting a bad rap for the disproportionately high greenhouse gases they emit even though their per capita emissions are often a fraction of the national average, a new report said on Monday.

Published by the International Institute for Environment and Development, the report found that urban residents generate substantially lower greenhouse gas emissions, which scientists blame for global warming, than people elsewhere in the country.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Half of women survive cancer

Rebecca Smith
Telegraph

Half of women and a third of men in England who suffer from cancer beat the disease, according to a comprehensive new study.

An analysis of millions of cases estimated the proportion of cancer patients who, following treatment, had the same life expectancy as someone who had never had the disease.

The Europe-wide study suggested that about 40,000 men and 60,000 women a year in England effectively beat their cancer and would be considered as healthy as anyone else.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Border Plants to Be Killed to Reveal Smugglers

Dane Schiller
The Houston Chronicle

The U.S. Border Patrol plans to poison the plant life along a 1.1-mile stretch of the Rio Grande riverbank as soon as Wednesday to get rid of the hiding places used by smugglers, robbers and illegal immigrants.

If successful, the $2.1 million pilot project could later be duplicated along as many as 130 miles of river in the patrol's Laredo Sector, as well as other parts of the U.S.-Mexico border.
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Friday March 27, 2009

DMGT ad revenue plunges as 1,000 jobs go at regional arm

Mark Sweney
The Guardian

Daily Mail and General Trust media group is doubling the number of job cuts as advertising revenue for the first quarter of this year fell by 24% across its national newspaper division and 37% across its regional titles.

The publisher confirmed today it expected 1,000 staff to go across its regional newspaper division Northcliffe Media, bringing the headcount down by about 20% to 3,500, double the number of cuts it officially announced in November.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Canada Bans Anti-War MP George Galloway

Joshua Holland
AlterNet

Whatever one thinks of his views, free speech is a vital principle.

Last year, the Right had one of its ubiquitous little rage-gasms over a complaint filed by the Canadian Islamic Council against lunatic columnist Mark Steyn.

CIC characterized one of Steyn's columns as "flagrantly Islamophobic" blather -- a point that's difficult to dispute, but doesn't make it a violation of the law -- and Steyn was, fortunately, acquitted of the charge by Canada's Human Rights Commission. It all turned out to be a tempest in a teapot.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Deflation expected to return to UK for first time in 50 years

Caroline Gammell
Telegraph

Deflation is expected to return to the UK for the first time in nearly 50 years with the announcement that prices are falling nationwide rather than increasing.

The retail price index (RPI) - which measures the average month-to-month change of the prices of goods and services - is thought to have slid into negative figures.

The last time the UK experienced deflation was in 1960 when Harold Macmillan was prime minister.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Why spending money is like a drug

Steve Connor
Independent

Parts of the brain are stimulated by higher salaries, even when prices rise and purchasing power drops

Money works like a drug on the human brain – and even just the thought of earning a higher salary gives us a physical buzz, a study has found.

Scientists have discovered that thinking about cash stimulates the reward centres involved in pleasure and the higher the salary – even if it is just imagined – the greater the pleasure generated in the brain.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Do the Secret Bush Memos Amount to Treason? Top Constitutional Scholar Says Yes

Naomi Wolf
AlterNet

Legal expert Michael Ratner calls the legal arguments made in the infamous Yoo memos, "Fuhrer's law."

In early March, more shocking details emerged about George W. Bush legal counsel John Yoo's memos outlining the destruction of the republic.

The memos lay the legal groundwork for the president to send the military to wage war against U.S. citizens; take them from their homes to Navy brigs without trial and keep them forever; close down the First Amendment; and invade whatever country he chooses without regard to any treaty or objection by Congress.
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Friday March 27, 2009

New 'scareware' Trojan holds users to ransom

John E. Dunn
Techworld

A Trojan that normally peddles bogus anti-virus ‘scareware' has hit on a new way of persuading users to part with money for a worthless license - it encrypts their data first.

The concept of encrypting data on an infected PC has been seen several times since 2005, but the new version of the Vundo Trojan reported to be doing the rounds by security company FireEye is the first to tie straight extortion to a conventional rogue anti-virus software scam.
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Friday March 27, 2009

How an Animal Advocate Explains Her Decision to Take Animal-Tested Drugs

Simon Chaitowitz
AlterNet

Some people may call me a hypocrite for taking advantage of the benefits of animal research. Let me explain.

One of my doctors has told me to get my affairs in order, which is why I'm writing this column. I want to explain why someone who takes so many animal-tested drugs is opposed to animal research.

I have full-blown leukemia and the chemotherapy I'm taking doesn't seem to be working all that well.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Komodo dragons maul man to death

Stephen Bates
The Guardian

Fruit picker attacked after he fell from tree in Indonesia

Two Komodo dragons have mauled a fruit picker to death after he fell out of a tree in an orchard in eastern Indonesia, in a rare attack on humans by the world's largest lizard.

The man, Muhamad Anwar, 31, was found bleeding from bites to his hands, body, legs and neck within minutes of falling out of a sugar-apple tree on the island of Komodo and died later at a clinic on neighbouring Flores.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Great Tech Innovation: Find Food Health and Safety Info From Your Phone

Tim Kingston
AlterNet

Use your phone to access Goodguide.com and check product information on a free, socially conscious, ethical-shopping Web site.

The price of a dysfunctional food system is a potentially dangerous dinner. To put it bluntly, in our profit-driven food system, the very nutrients needed to stay alive could kill you. If it's not Chinese melamine in your milk, it's American E.coli in your spinach.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Quarter of UK's databases are 'illegal'

Ben Russell
independent

Little thought given to privacy, study warns

One in four of the major government databases is almost certainly illegal and should be scrapped, a report says. The national DNA database, the proposed national identity database and the ContactPoint system, which will hold records of all children in England, are among the systems singled out for fundamental reform or abolition.
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Friday March 27, 2009

20th Birthday of the Exxon Valdez Lie

Greg Palast
OpEdNews

"Gail, Please! Stick your hand in it!"

The petite Eskimo-Chugach woman gave me that you-dumb-ass-white-boy look.

"Gail, Gail. STICK YOUR DAMN HAND IN IT!"

She stuck it in, under the gravel of the beach at Sleepy Bay, her village's fishing ground. Gail's hand came up dripping with black, sickening goo. It could make you vomit. Oil from the Exxon Valdez.

It was already two years after the spill and Exxon had crowed that Mother Nature had happily cleaned up their stinking oil mess for them.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Graphic artists condemn plans to ban erotic comics

Jerome Taylor
Independent

A coalition of graphic artists, publishers and MPs have condemned Government plans to introduce a new set of laws policing cartoons of children, arguing that the current broad wording of the legislation could lead to the banning of hundreds of mainstream comic books.

This week Parliament will discuss a new Bill which will make it a criminal offence to possess cartoons depicting certain forms of child abuse.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Stop Subsidizing Mexican Drug Gangs

Bruce Mirken
AlterNet

The horrifying drug-war violence south of our border with Mexico continues to worsen, and we're the ones subsidizing it.

The horrifying drug-war violence south of our border with Mexico continues to worsen: beheadings, killings that now number several thousand at least, honest officials in fear for their lives. It's time to put an end to U.S. policies that subsidize these murderous drug gangs.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Unknown Afghanistan

Pratap Chatterjee
Tomdispatch.com

Want a billion dollars in development aid? If you happen to live in Afghanistan, the two quickest ways to attract attention and so aid from the U.S. authorities are: Taliban attacks or a flourishing opium trade. For those with neither, the future could be bleak.

In November 2008, during the U.S. presidential elections, I traveled around Afghanistan asking people what they wanted from the United States. From Mazar in the north to Bamiyan in central Afghanistan to the capital city of Kabul, I came away with three very different pictures of the country.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Nearly all firms suffer losses after cyber attacks

Joan Goodchild
CSO (US)

Nearly all organisations have been hit by cybercrime with some 98 percent reporting tangible loss after being hit by criminals. In addition, 46 percent have experienced downtime as a result of attacks.

That's according to new research from security company Symantec, which surveyed 1,000 IT managers in the US and Europe.
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Friday March 27, 2009

Slump forces medical charities to cut back life-saving research

Chris Green
Independent

Reduced values of investments and property legacies hit charities' funding

Four of the UK's largest medical charities have been badly hit by the recession and are considering cutting the amount of money they put towards lifesaving research.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Steak and hot dogs linked to early death

Ewen Callaway
New Scientist

It gives a new meaning to the phrase "meat is murder": a study of more than half a million Americans has found that consuming steaks, hot dogs and other red and processed meats significantly increased participants' chances of dying during the decade in which they were tracked.

Women who consumed the most red meat – 66 grams (2.3 ounces) per 1000 calories – were roughly 36% more likely to die than women who ate the least red meat – 9.1 grams (0.3 ounces). For men, a similar difference in red meat consumption, upped death rates by 31%.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill: On Its 20th Anniversary, We Can't Afford to Forget

Meg White
Buzzflash

This week you may catch the sliver of media coverage regarding the 20th anniversary of the Exxon Valdez oil spill -- and, regretfully, there will only be a sliver, for a variety of reasons. Unfortunately, a lot of the people telling the story have spoken to Big Oil before talking to small town Alaska, and the meager amount of anniversary coverage that the public will receive will be damaged because of that.

Riki Ott, a marine biologist living in Cordova, AK who has studied the ecological, social, and economic effects of the spill from day one, told BuzzFlash what she, as an unofficial spokesperson for those hurt by the spill, learned about the game of "media capture" in her spars with Exxon:
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

South Africa bars Dalai Lama from peace conference

Donna Bryson
Associated Press

South Africa barred the Dalai Lama from a peace conference in Johannesburg this week, hoping to keep good relations with trading partner China but instead generating a storm of criticism.

Friday's peace conference was organized by South African soccer officials to highlight the first World Cup to be held in Africa, which South Africa will host in 2010.

But because the Dalai Lama isn't being allowed to attend, it is now being boycotted by fellow Nobel Peace prize winners retired Cape Town Archbishop Desmond Tutu and former president F.W. de Klerk as well as members of the Nobel Committee.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

British scientists to create 'synthetic' blood

Steve Connor
Independent

Human embryos will be used to make an unlimited supply for infection-free transfusions

Scientists in Britain plan to become the first in the world to produce unlimited amounts of synthetic human blood from embryonic stem cells for emergency infection-free transfusions.

A major research project is to be announced this week that will culminate in three years with the first transfusions into human volunteers of "synthetic" blood made from the stem cells of spare IVF embryos. It could help to save the lives of anyone from victims of traffic accidents to soldiers on a battlefield by revolutionising the vital blood transfusion services, which have to rely on a network of human donors to provide a constant supply of fresh blood.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

US Will Appoint Afghan "Prime Minister" to Bypass Hamid Karzai

Julian Borger and Ewen MacAskill
The Guardian

White House plans new executive role to challenge corrupt government in Kabul.

The US and its European allies are preparing to plant a high-profile figure in the heart of the Kabul government in a direct challenge to the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, the Guardian has learned.

The creation of a new chief executive or prime ministerial role is aimed at bypassing Karzai. In a further dilution of his power, it is proposed that money be diverted from the Kabul government to the provinces.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

The Long and Sadistic History Behind the CIA's Torture Techniques

Darius Rejali
Slate

Sleep deprivation, extremes of temperature, noise, and beatings are some of the nastier methods the U.S. employed in the Bush era.

In the 20th century, there were two main traditions of clean torture -- the kind that doesn't leave marks, as modern torturers prefer. The first is French modern, a combination of water- and electro-torture. The second is Anglo-Saxon modern, a classic list of sleep deprivation, positional and restraint tortures, extremes of temperature, noise, and beatings.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

India's Tata rolls out world's cheapest car

Google News

India's Tata Motors on Monday launched the world's cheapest car, the Nano, hoping to revolutionise travel for millions and buck a slump in auto sales caused by the global economic crisis.

Company boss Ratan Tata said the no-frills car, slated to cost just 100,000 rupees (2,000 dollars) for the basic model, will get India's middle-class urban population off motorcycles and into safer, affordable four-wheelers.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

UFO: Secret records show there were almost 1,200 mysterious sightings between 1987 and 1993

Richard Osley
Independent

The Ministry of Defence abandoned plans for a secret computer database of UFO sightings for fear they would be mocked if its existence was ever revealed to the public, once-classified documents reveal.

The idea was scrapped because officials did not want people to believe they were taking the idea of visitors from outer space seriously. Instead, the MoD continued to keep only paper records of almost 1,200 sightings reported between 1987 and 1993.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

This Week in God: Religion Costs Counties Cash, 'I Believe' License Plates, and Evolution

Steve Benen
Washington Monthly

A round up of what went down in religious right circles this week.

First up from the God Machine this week is an unfortunate situation in which public officials with a religious agenda have cost their communities dearly. (thanks to Joanne for the tip)

A federal judge has ordered a pair of southern Kentucky counties to pay $393,798 in attorneys fees stemming from their defense of posting the Ten Commandments in courthouses.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Electricity grids could be at risk from hackers

Robert McMillan
IDG News Service

An emerging network of intelligent power switches, called the Smart Grid, could be taken down by a cyberattack, according to researchers with IOActive, a Seattle security consultancy.

IOActive researchers have spent the past year testing Smart Grid devices for security vulnerabilities and have discovered a number of flaws that could allow hackers to access the network and cut power, according to Joshua Pennell, IOActive's CEO.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Google Street View forced to remove images

Jane Merrick
Independent

Major public safety fears after US internet giant's cameras take photograph of a naked child

Google was forced to remove a photograph of a naked child from its Street View service last night as a row over internet privacy escalated into one about public safety.

The Independent on Sunday alerted the internet search giant after finding the image of the toddler, playing at a family summer picnic in a garden square in north London, captured permanently on the revolutionary mapping system.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Top 10 Aphrodisiac Foods

Sanela
Session Magazine

You are what you eat, because what you eat directly influences your body and your body functions. The food you consume can have a direct impact on your sex life, affecting your hormones, brain chemistry, and energy and stress levels.

Some foods have psychoactive properties, others arouse because they are psychologically suggestive, and some can actually increase blood flow to the genitals. And if it does not have all that aphrodisiac affect, at least it’s healthy and it will do you good!
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

The French Nuclear Industry Is Bad Enough in France; Let's Not Expand It to the U.S.

Linda Gunter
AlterNet

Areva, France's nuclear industry, has a solid reputation, but a trail of radioactive waste and deaths in Africa follow its wake.

"Why can't the Americans be more like the French?" It's the prevailing pro-nuclear refrain, the latest in the nuclear industry's efforts at fictional reinvention.

And until the collapse of his ill-fated and poorly orchestrated presidential run, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., was the choirmaster, saying: "If France can produce 80 percent of its electricity with nuclear power, why can't we?"
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

The Big Takeover

Matt Taibbi
Rolling Stone

The global economic crisis isn't about money - it's about power. How Wall Street insiders are using the bailout to stage a revolution

It's over — we're officially, royally fucked. no empire can survive being rendered a permanent laughingstock, which is what happened as of a few weeks ago, when the buffoons who have been running things in this country finally went one step too far.

It happened when Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was forced to admit that he was once again going to have to stuff billions of taxpayer dollars into a dying insurance giant called AIG, itself a profound symbol of our national decline — a corporation that got rich insuring the concrete and steel of American industry in the country's heyday, only to destroy itself chasing phantom fortunes at the Wall Street card tables, like a dissolute nobleman gambling away the family estate in the waning days of the British Empire.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

The President Needs to Hear Millions of Second Opinions on His Economic Plans

William Greider
The Washington Post

Obama is trapped between the governing elites who decide things and the people who are governed. Which side is he on?

"This is part of a special AlterNet series on Obama's latest plans for a rescue of the bankers and Wall Street's toxic assets."

The president is getting what he asked for, but perhaps not what he had in mind. During the campaign, Barack Obama beckoned Americans to put aside their cynicism about politics and re-engage as active citizens. They are now doing so with red-hot anger. They are outraged by events and forcing their way into congressional affairs and behind closed doors where policy wonks discuss issues with cerebral civility.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

UN Panel Says World Should Ditch Dollar

Jeremy Gaunt
Reuters

A U.N. panel will next week recommend that the world ditch the dollar as its reserve currency in favor of a shared basket of currencies, a member of the panel said on Wednesday, adding to pressure on the dollar.

Currency specialist Avinash Persaud, a member of the panel of experts, told a Reuters Funds Summit in Luxembourg that the proposal was to create something like the old Ecu, or European currency unit, that was a hard-traded, weighted basket.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Scores of complaints against police in terror suspect assault

Wesley Johnson
Press Association

Police officers who subjected a British Muslim to a "prolonged and violent series of gratuitous assaults" were involved in dozens of other complaints involving black or Asian men.

The Metropolitan Police agreed to pay terror suspect Babar Ahmad £60,000 damages after admitting in the High Court this week that the arresting officers from the territorial support group subjected him to "gross brutality"
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

The Secret War Against American Workers

Robert S. Eshelman
Tomdispatch.com

Bosses are using minor transgressions of work-place rules as the trigger for firings -- putting the fear of god into those who remain.

Juanita Borden, 39 and jobless, patiently waits as her résumé methodically works its way, line by line, through a fax machine at a state-run job center in downtown Philadelphia. Lying open before her on a round conference table is a neatly organized folder.

"This is my résumé and everywhere I've been faxing to. This is how I keep track of what day I've sent them on, so I can call and check back," she says, leafing through pages of fax cover sheets. "I usually give five business days before I inquire whether or not they've received it and whether or not they're interested."
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Wall Street's Economic Crimes Against Humanity

Shoshana Zuboff
Business Week

By refusing to consider the consequences of their actions, those who created the financial crisis exemplify the banality of evil, writes Shoshana Zuboff.

The financiers at AIG were awarded millions in bonuses because their contracts were based on the transactions they completed, not the consequences of those transactions. A 32-year-old mortgage broker told me: "I figured my job was to get the transaction done ... Whatever came after the transaction - that was on him, not me."
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Iran Sets Terms for US Ties

Fredrik Dahl
Reuters

Iran has responded to U.S. President Barack Obama's offer of better relations by demanding policy changes from Washington, but the Islamic state is not closing the door to a possible thaw in ties with its old foe.

Iran wants the United States to show concrete change in its behavior toward it, for example by handing back frozen assets, but Tehran is not pursuing "eternal hostility," said Professor Mohammad Marandi at Tehran University.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Leading climate scientist: 'democratic process isn't working'

David Adam
The Guardian

Protest and direct action could be the only way to tackle soaring carbon emissions, a leading climate scientist has said.

James Hansen, a climate modeller with Nasa, told the Guardian today that corporate lobbying has undermined democratic attempts to curb carbon pollution. "The democratic process doesn't quite seem to be working," he said.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

We Have a Golden Opportunity to End the War on Drugs: Can You Help?

Don Hazen
AlterNet

We can't end the despicable "war on drugs" without an effective media that can mobilize our citizenry and spread the word.

Day in and day out, AlterNet reaches more people with powerful and convincing drug reform messages than any other media in America. That's right. We produce, gather and distribute the most articles to the biggest audiences, and we reach people far beyond the established drug reform crowd.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

'Miracle rice' gives Uganda hope of its own green revolution

Daniel Howden
Independent

Early success in team's attempt to double rice production to end food crisis

In the fertile fields of Uganda there are the first green shoots of a possible answer to the food crisis. The green revolution of the 1960s which saw food production catch and outstrip population growth for the first time left Africa behind.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Water Crisis Could Affect Billions

Thalif Deen
Inter Press Service

The United Nations has warned that about half the world's population - over three billion people by today's count - may suffer water shortages by the year 2025.

If current trends continue - including drought, rising population, increased urbanisation, climate change, and indiscriminate waste and mismanagement of existing resources - the world may be heading for a catastrophe.

These growing new problems will on the agenda of a major international water conference - the Fifth World Water Forum - scheduled to take place in Istanbul, Turkey, Mar. 16-22.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Israel's dirty secrets in Gaza

Donald Macintyre
Independent

Army veterans reveal how they gunned down innocent Palestinian families and destroyed homes and farms

Israel was last night confronting a major challenge over the conduct of its 22-day military offensive in Gaza after testimonies by its own soldiers revealed that troops were allowed and, in some cases, even ordered to shoot unarmed Palestinian civilians.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Intelligence Made It Clear Saddam Was Not a Threat, Diplomat Tells MPs

David Hencke
The Guardian

Government left "paper trail" in build-up to war.

More facts still to come to light, says former envoy.

A former diplomat at the centre of events in the run-up to the Iraq war revealed yesterday that the government has a "paper trail" that could reveal new information about the legality of the invasion.

Carne Ross, who was a first secretary at the United Nations in New York for the Foreign Office until 2004, told MPs: "A lot of facts about the run-up to this war have yet to come to light which should come to light and which the public deserves to know."
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Deported From the World Water Forum

Ann Kathrin Schneider
International Rivers

Payal and I traveled to the World Water Forum in Istanbul to inform the world about the risks of building large dams.

Back home in Berlin, I am overwhelmed by the show of support for our message that dams are a risky business. In India alone, one hundred activists and organizations signed a petition denouncing our deportation from the World Water Forum and thanking International Rivers for saying no to risky dams.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

The Scavenger's Manifesto: Why Dumpster Diving Can Save You from Going Off the Deep End

Anneli Rufus
AlterNet

While consumer culture drowns us in debt, you can count every cent you save while liberating would-be trash.

"The following is an adapted excerpt from The Scavenger's Manifesto (Tarcher Press, 2009) by Anneli Rufus and Kristan Lawson"

My eyes are lighthouse beacons. Enroute to a family gathering, I spot a box marked FREE on a curb. This, right here, is the meaning of life. Swim goggles: Yes. Pink T-shirt: Yes. Blender: I already have one, so no. "Kiss Me, I'm Irish" apron: No. Six bars of hotel soap, sealed in their wrappers: Yoink. Into the backpack pops the salad fork, the crocheted scarf. Assess each in a nanosecond. Do I want this? Do I need it? Does my friend?
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Unleash the Bloodhound: How to design a 1,000mph car

John Piper
The Guardian

If they get their calculations even slightly wrong, Bloodhound SSC could spin out of control or become airborne.

Right now, working on Bloodhound SSC, our supersonic car, feels like being in a never-ending episode of CSI.

We're investigating our design in forensic detail, hunting for the minute problems that supersonic speeds could magnify into major disasters. Every time we find and fix one, four more pop up. This is normal in the world of engineering.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

The rise of the quangocracy

Nigel Morris
Independent

The Tories are targeting the soaring cost of public bodies

The amount of taxpayers' money spent on quangos – short for quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisations – soared last year by an inflation-busting 12 per cent. Almost 800 such groups, mostly funded by handouts from the state or from levies, have a central role in the administration of the country.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Venezuelans Protest Bid to Arrest Opposition Leader

Reuters

Thousands of Venezuelans protested on Friday against an attempt to arrest opposition leader Manuel Rosales on corruption charges, in a march that swelled a main avenue of the oil city of Maracaibo.

In a rare show of unity, opposition leaders from different political parties joined the march and spoke out against the bid to detain Rosales, which they said was a case of political persecution by socialist President Hugo Chavez.
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Tuesday March 24, 2009

Some Truths About Guantanamo Bay

Lawrence Wilkerson
The Washington Note

There are several dimensions to the debate over the U.S. prison facilities at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba that the media have largely missed and, thus, of which the American people are almost completely unaware. For that matter, few within the government who were not directly involved are aware either.

The first of these is the utter incompetence of the battlefield vetting in Afghanistan during the early stages of the U.S. operations there. Simply stated, no meaningful attempt at discrimination was made in-country by competent officials, civilian or military, as to who we were transporting to Cuba for detention and interrogation.
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Friday March 20, 2009

French Workers Return to Streets in Protest

Edward Cody
The Washington Post

More than a million French workers staged a general strike and marched in demonstrations across the country Thursday in a second round of protests against the government's response to the world economic crisis.

The protests, which drew substantially more people into the streets than a similar outpouring Jan. 29, were depicted by union leaders as part of a sustained campaign to pressure President Nicolas Sarkozy to do more to defend French people against the economic upheaval that has unfurled across the planet since the fall. In particular, they called on him to raise low-end wages and unemployment benefits and to make it harder for business leaders to fire employees when profits sink.
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Friday March 20, 2009

The lure of treehouses

Charlotte Philby
Independent

If you go down to the woods you'll see an array of arboreal abodes.

I'm not much of a Star Wars fan, but there was one aspect of George Lucas's vision that left a lasting impression: the Ewok village. Nestled high in the trees of the forest moon of Endor, the Ewoks formed their own private world, safe from the perils of life on land.

The Ewoks aren't the only fictional characters to have made a world for themselves high in the canopies. What better home for Tarzan or Peter Pan?
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Friday March 20, 2009

EU doubles funding for fragile eastern European economies

Ian Traynor
The Guardian

Leaders take steps to safeguard economies of struggling member states ahead of next month's G20 summit

European leaders today doubled the emergency funding for the fragile economies of central and eastern Europe and pledged to deliver another doubling of International Monetary Fund lending facilities by putting up €75bn (£70bn).
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Friday March 20, 2009

Recession squeezes recycling programs

Valerie Streit
CNN

When Lynn Heinisch and her neighbors in Atlanta's Lake Claire neighborhood take their recycling to the curb for pickup each Thursday, they cross their fingers and hope for the best.

Accusing city collectors of unreliable pickups, Heinisch and the others have resorted to stockpiling recyclable materials in their garages.

"It's frustrating," Heinisch said. "People are trying to recycle, and it's not easy. I wish it was easy to do what we all feel strongly about."
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Friday March 20, 2009

Balkans: Fallout of Bombing 'Continues to Kill'

Vesna Peric Zimonjic
Inter Press Service

Ten years after the NATO bombing of Serbia, concern is rising over a rise in the number of reported cases of cancer.

Some 15 tonnes of ammunition fortified with depleted uranium was dropped by way of more than 50,000 bombs and missiles in the 11 weeks of bombing of Serbia in 1999. The targets of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) bombing were 116 locations, mostly in southern part of Serbia and the Kosovo region.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Obama Puts Up $2.4 Billion for Electric Vehicles

Agence France-Presse

President Barack Obama Thursday unveiled a 2.4 billion dollar boost for electric vehicle development, vowing to compete with foreign nations in the race to be world leader on renewable energy.

"We can let the jobs of tomorrow be created abroad or we can create them here in America and lay the foundation for lasting prosperity," Obama said on the second day of a campaign-style swing in California.
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Friday March 20, 2009

New whistleblower claims over £1bn Barclays tax deals

Felicity Lawrence and David Leigh
The Guardian

Further detailed allegations about tax avoidance schemes set up by Barclays Bank emerged tonight from whistleblowers who said the bank made close to £1bn profit a year from a series of elaborate deals.

The schemes are similar to those detailed in documents published by the Guardian this week which have been the centre of a three-day hearing at the high court, and are the subject of a gagging order.
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Friday March 20, 2009

The Big Question: Does working at night cause cancer, and should shift patterns be changed?

Jeremy Laurance
Independent

Why are we asking this now?

It emerged yesterday that the Danish government has begun paying compensation to women who developed breast cancer after long spells working at night. They are believed to be the first compensation payments by a Government for cancer attributed to shift work. Almost 40 women have so far received the payments.

Does night work cause cancer?

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Friday March 20, 2009

There's no free lunch on your browser's menu

Stan Cox
Prairie Writers

The recently passed federal stimulus package contains $18 billion to stimulate the Internet. Technology fans are looking to that planetwide digital organism to help revive our economy.

But it's an organism nourished by electricity, and lots of it. The Internet's escalating power consumption stands as a warning that the engines of economic growth can't run without depleting resources and cranking out wastes.

The servers and large data computing centers that run the Internet and other computer networks doubled their energy use between 2000 and 2006, the Environmental Protection Agency estimates.
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Friday March 20, 2009

The Coming Evangelical Collapse

Michael Spencer
Christian Science Monitor

A "postevangelical" predicts the coming of an anti-Christian era that will fundamentally alter the religious and cultural environment.

We are on the verge -- within 10 years -- of a major collapse of evangelical Christianity. This breakdown will follow the deterioration of the mainline Protestant world and it will fundamentally alter the religious and cultural environment in the West.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Will Our Economic Collapse Cause the Death of Millions Abroad?

Michael T. Klare
Foreign Policy in Focus

As the wealthier nations cease investing in the developing world or acquiring its exports, the crisis is hitting them with a vengeance.

While the economic contraction is apparently slowing in the advanced industrial countries and may reach bottom in the not-too-distant future, it's only beginning to gain momentum in the developing world, which was spared the earliest effects of the global meltdown.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Australia slashes immigration as recession looms

Reuters

Australia will cut its intake of migrants for the first time in a decade, the government said today, amid concern that skilled foreign workers could stoke resentment by taking jobs at a time of rising unemployment.

With a recession looming and the centre-left government expecting unemployment to reach 7 per cent by mid-2010, Immigration Minister Chris Evans said the intake of skilled migrants would be reduced by about 14 per cent.
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Friday March 20, 2009

IE8 and Safari flaws exposed at hacker contest

Robert McMillan
IDG News Service

Researchers concentrated on exposing security flaws of the leading web browsers, after one hacker took just ten second to crack Safari during a popular hacking contest at the CanSecWest security conference.

Conference organisers had invited attendees to display attacks that targeted previously unknown flaws in browsers or mobile devices in the show's annual Pwn2Own contest.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Robots could flex muscles that are stronger than steel

Kurt Kleiner
New Scientist

A new material that is weight for weight stronger than steel and stiffer than diamond, and weighs little more than its volume in air, could be the perfect artificial muscle for robots.

"We've made a totally new type of artificial muscle that is able to provide performance characteristics that have not previously been obtained," says Ray Baughman, a materials scientist at the University of Texas, Dallas, and co-developer of the new muscle.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Privacy campaigner vows legal challenge to Street View

OUT-LAW

A privacy campaigner will launch a legal challenge to Google's Street View service, which was launched today. Simon Davies of Privacy International says that he will pursue "a test case" against Google.

Street View comprises 360 degree photographs of a town's streets, and is already live in the US and some European countries. It was launched today in the UK with coverage of 25 towns and cities.

People can be seen and sometimes identified in the photos as they originally appeared, but Google has implemented automatic image blurring technology for faces and car number plates.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Ireland's Blast From the Past

Harry Browne
Counterpunch

Dublin.

This year, the snakes are back.

The Irish national holiday on St Patrick’s Day may be a chance to wear the green and drain a few beers elsewhere in the world, but around here it’s a moment to take stock, if we dare. The cupboard has rarely looked so bare, and the dangers so real.

Unemployment in the Republic of Ireland has been growing at a rate of about 1 per cent of the workforce every month.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Germany: Headscarf Bans Violate Rights

Human Rights Watch

State Restrictions on Religious Dress for Teachers Target Muslim Women

German state bans on religious symbols and clothing for teachers and other civil servants discriminate against Muslim women who wear the headscarf, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today.

The 67-page report, "Discrimination in the Name of Neutrality: Headscarf Bans for Teachers and Civil Servants in Germany," is based on extensive research over an eight-month period.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Marijuana Legalisation Creates Buzz

Matthew Cardinale
Inter press Service

Due perhaps in part to the country's economic woes, but also a major shift in political culture, discussion of marijuana legalisation has risen to a level of openness and prominence previously unseen in the United States.

When the Kellogg Corporation cancelled the publicity contract for Olympic superstar swimmer Michael Phelps over a photograph of Phelps appearing to be smoking from a "bong," or water pipe, over 14,000 people joined a Facebook group vowing to boycott Kellogg.
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Friday March 20, 2009

The Real 'Slumdog Millionaire'

Fiona Ehlers
Spiegel International

Hope for Bombay's Children

The film "Slumdog Millionaire," in which a poor Indian boy wins a quiz show, won eight Oscars. The country is home to a man with a similar story -- Harsh Nawathe, who became a millionaire in 2000 as a TV contestant. Today he is helping to educate the children of the slums.

Harshvardhan Nawathe is sitting in front of a small television set in his tiny apartment in the northern part of the city. It is a Sunday evening in early March, one week after the Oscar awards ceremony, and Nawathe is watching a talk show called "We the People.
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Friday March 20, 2009

The Most Pervasive Combat Injury Among U.S. Soldiers is Invisible -- and the Pentagon Has Tried to Keep it That Way

Nora Eisenberg
AlterNet

The DoD finally admits that 360,000 Iraq and Afghanistan vets may have suffered serious brain injuries they previously dismissed as mild concussions.

March is Brain Injury Awareness Month and to observe it, the Pentagon did something special: it told the truth.

In a news conference on March 4th, Brig. Gen. Loree Sutton estimated that as many as 360,000 veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan may have suffered service-related brain injuries. Until now the Pentagon estimated that some 10,000 veterans of the Afghanistan and Iraq war had suffered brain traumas.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Handful of 20-year HIV survivors hold key to discovering vaccine

Steve Connor
Independent

Researchers are looking into the antibodies that provide natural immunity

In a desperate attempt to reverse 25 years of failure to develop an Aids vaccine, scientists have a new approach: studying people who have been infected with HIV for many years without any signs of ill-health. The patients' secret? Natural immunity.

The researchers have investigated the virus-fighting antibodies found in the blood of six long-term survivors of HIV whose own immune systems appear to be capable of shrugging off the virus.
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Friday March 20, 2009

The Joys of Not Being European (They're Not What Conservatives Think)

Eli Epstein-Deutsch
Truthout

David Brooks is a perpetually interesting commentator to observe, in that he often channels a popular sentiment just as it is coming to a head, then proceeds to spin it into a completely backwards conclusion.

A case in point is his recent New York Times op-ed, "A Commercial Republic" (March 17, 2009), in which he reminds us Americans that we are not (capitalism-shunning) Europeans (phew!), but a nation of "manic" strivers, who have an inbred need to work feverishly, to believe in a gospel of wealth, and to take risks. This "elemental" identity may seem threatened during a downtime, but is sure to manifest again stronger than ever, he assures us
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Friday March 20, 2009

Row Over Tibet Escalates

Antoaneta Bezlova
Inter Press Service

China has sealed off Tibet with troops and demanded that the international community recognise the legitimacy of Beijing's historical claims over the Himalayan plateau, escalating a row over its policies there.

"It is impossible for any western country to not interact with China. However, it is [also] impossible for the West to cooperate with China unless it develops an objective and unbiased stance on Tibet," said an editorial in the Communist party’s flagship publication, the ‘People’s Daily,’ this week.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Attorney General Signals Shift in Marijuana Policy

Devlin Barrett
The Associated Press

Attorney General Eric Holder signaled a change on medical marijuana policy Wednesday, saying federal agents will target marijuana distributors only when they violate both federal and state law.

That would be a departure from the Bush administration, which targeted medical marijuana dispensaries in California even if they complied with that state's law.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Chimps R Us: How Much Longer Are We Going to Keep Our Cousins as Pets?

G. Pascal Zachary
AlterNet

A life of captivity is too cruel for chimpanzees and dangerous for their owners. We should give them the freedoms we grant ourselves.

Nobody should own a chimpanzee. Not in America. Not even in Africa, home of all chimpanzees not born in captivity.

The gruesome attack by an adult chimpanzee on its Connecticut owner last month provided a vivid reminder of why Congress should impose a complete ban on keeping chimps as pets.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Water scarcity 'now bigger threat than financial crisis'

Geoffrey Lean
Independent

By 2030, more than half the world's population will live in high-risk areas

Humanity is facing "water bankruptcy" as a result of a crisis even greater than the financial meltdown now destabilising the global economy, two authoritative new reports show. They add that it is already beginning to take effect, and there will be no way of bailing the earth out of water scarcity.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Brits stuff mobiles with risky ID data

Tom Jowitt
Techworld

The data stored by Brits on their personal mobile phones can be easily used for ID theft purposes, especially because of the minimal security measures they take to guard the data, warned Credant Technologies.

The endpoint data protection vendor conducted a survey three weeks ago by questioning 600 commuters at London railway stations (mainly London Liverpool Street) about their mobile phones, typical usage, and the types of sensitive information stored on their handsets.
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Friday March 20, 2009

The Nobodies Known as Former Enemy Combatants

Andy Worthington
The Future of Freedom Foundation

Changing the names of things was a ploy that was used by the Bush administration in an attempt to justify some of its least palatable activities. In response to the 9/11 attacks, for instance, the nation was not involved in a limited pursuit of a group of criminals responsible for the attacks, but instead embarked on an open-ended “war on terror.”

In keeping with this “new paradigm,” prisoners seized in this “war” were referred to as “detainees” and held neither as criminal suspects nor as prisoners of war, protected by the Geneva Conventions, but as illegal “enemy combatants,” without any rights whatsoever.
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Friday March 20, 2009

10 Reasons Why Facebook Now Sucks

Matt
Philalethistimania

The Facebook staff really have no idea what they are doing, where they are taking the site, and what branding means.

The new "redesign" of Facebook, which was released earlier today to a "select" group of users (sadly, me included) was clearly designed by a 5-year-old -- oh wait, no, I take that back ... my daughter could design a better front end than they did.

They took a lot of functionality, customization and filtering capability out of the home page and replaced it with Twitter-like features, which is to say, they dumbed it down for children.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Beware the Madoff Diversion!

Richard Grossman
Truthout

Sure, there are crooks out there. But the overwhelming majority of actions by corporate directors and managers that have created today's messes have been legal.

Not only legal, but also widely regarded as necessary and essential to sustain the American Way of Life. To put food on our tables. To heat our homes. To provide jobs. To defend liberty and freedom ...

Simply put: Giant business and financial corporations govern.
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Friday March 20, 2009

iPhone users offered 100 new features

Jonathan Seff
Macworld.com

iPhone users and app developers have been given a brief glimpse of the future after Apple previewed iPhone 3.0, the latest version of the phone software, due to come out this summer.

Users have been promised more than a 100 new features including the ability to copy and paste information-including text, blocks of HTML, and photos -in the iPhone's built-in apps. Users will also be able to copy and paste between applications. Third-party developers will have the ability to add copy-and-paste functionality to their apps as well.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Obama abandons term 'enemy combatant'

Nedra Pickler
Independent

The Obama administration said yesterday that it is abandoning one of President George W. Bush's key phrases in his war on terror: enemy combatant.

The Justice Department said in legal filings that it will no longer use the term to justify holding prisoners at Guantanamo Bay.

That will not change much for the detainees at the jail in the US naval base in Cuba; Obama still asserts the military's authority to hold them. Human rights attorneys said they were disappointed that Obama did not take a new position on that as well.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Anger as Shell reduces renewables investment

Robin Pagnamenta
Timesonline

Royal Dutch Shell provoked a furious backlash from campaigners yesterday when it announced plans to scale back its renewable energy business and focus purely on oil, gas and biofuels.

Jeroen van der Veer, the chief executive, said that Shell, the world's second-largest non-state-controlled oil company, was planning to drop all new investment in wind, solar and hydrogen energy.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Mexico's Drug War Bloodbath: Guns from the U.S. Are Destabilizing the Country

Silja J.A. Talvi
AlterNet

Mexican drug cartels have easy access to thousands of American gun dealers just on the other side of the border.

A minute is all the time that it takes for an employee in one of almost 7,000 gun shops dotting the U.S./Mexico border to accept a wad of cash from an eager customer, fill out a triplicate sales slip, and slide a nice, new Taurus .45 caliber pistol across the counter. Or two, or three, or twenty, as the case may be.

Add those handguns to the countless tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of pistols, sniper and assault rifles, semi-automatic machine guns, shield-piercing bullets, grenades, plastic explosives, as well as anti-tank weapons outfitted with self-propelling rockets passing illegally through the hands of drug cartel foot soldiers and assassins. Throw in the array of weapons favored by DEA and CIA agents, Mexican federal police and military units, and other 'drug warriors,' of one sort or another.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Browser plugin blocks ad-tracking cookies

Jeremy Kirk
IDG News Service

A researcher has developed a browser extension that stops advertising networks from tracking a person's surfing habits, such as search queries and content they view on the web.

The extension, called Targeted Advertising Cookie Opt-Out (TACO), enables its users to opt out of 27 advertising networks that are employing behavioural advertising systems, wrote Christopher Soghoian, who developed it, on his website.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Why the Slow Food Movement Needs to Help Stop America's Slave Labor

Ari LeVaux
AlterNet

Faced with a fast food system that's bad for people and bad for the planet, we still need to be in solidarity with those who grow our food.

If you eat tomatoes, in America, between the months of December and May, chances are some were picked by slaves.

Immokalee, Florida, is where 90 percent of the nation's winter tomatoes are grown. The farm workers are mostly migrant Latinos, like Lucas Domingo, a Guatemalan in the country illegally, who slept in the back of a locked truck for two and a half years, often shackled and sometimes beaten, while his captors kept his salary.
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Friday March 20, 2009

Robert Fisk’s World: The West should feel shame over its collusion with torturers

Robert Fisk
Independent

I want to know why those complicit in Almalki’s ordeal are not tried in court

I invited Abdullah Almalki to breakfast in Ottawa but he only took coffee. And while I wolfed down my all-English breakfast in the Chateau Laurier Hotel (beloved of Churchill and Karsh of Ottawa fame), he sipped gingerly at his cup with much on his mind.

Snooped on by the Canadian secret service and then tortured in Syria while the Canadian authorities did nothing for him – save supplying his perverted torturers with questions – he had much to think about. A carbon copy of Binyam Mohamed, the British resident who had his penis cut up while the Brits sent questions to his perverted Moroccan torturers.
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Friday March 20, 2009

US Moves to Replace Contractors in Iraq

Karen DeYoung
The Washington Post

Blackwater losing security role; other jobs being converted to public sector.

The decision not to renew Blackwater Worldwide's security contract in Iraq when it expires in early May has left the State Department scrambling to fill a protection gap for U.S. diplomats and civilian officials there.

Two other U.S. security contractors with a far smaller presence in Iraq - DynCorp International and Triple Canopy - have been asked to replace the ousted company, according to State Department and company officials.
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Tuesday March 17, 2009

China's warning to the US: Honour your commitments

Sean O'Grady
Independent

Beijing comments fuel fears China could offload its dollar reserves

Worries that China may be about to jettison some of its vast reserves of US Treasury bills depressed the American credit markets yesterday, as China's premier, Wen Jiabao, expressed concerns about their integrity.

However, markets globally were threatened by comments from Mr Wen that Beijing is ready to expand its fiscal stimulus if the economic situation worsens.
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Tuesday March 17, 2009

Top US Officials Urge Dialogue With Hamas

Bryan Bender and Farah Stockman
The Boston Globe

Washington - Nine former senior US officials and one current adviser are urging the Obama administration to talk with leaders of Hamas to determine whether the militant group can be persuaded to disarm and join a peaceful Palestinian government, a major departure from current US policy.

The bipartisan group, which includes economic recovery adviser Paul A. Volcker and former national security advisers Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinski, made the recommendation in a letter handed to Obama days before he took office, according to Scowcroft.
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Tuesday March 17, 2009

Burt's Bees, Tom's of Maine, Naked Juice: Your Favorite Brands? Take Another Look -- They May Not Be What They Seem

Andrea Whitfill
AlterNet

Confident that you are buying good, socially conscious brands? Find out the real story behind all that marketing money and store visibility.

My first introduction to natural, organic and eco-friendly products stems back to the early '90s, when I stumbled upon Burt’s Bees lip balm at an independently owned health food store in the heart of Westport, Kansas City, Mo.

Before the eyesore invasion of ’98, when Starbucks frothed its way into the neighborhood, leading to its ultimate demise, Westport was the kind of 'hood I still yearn for.
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Tuesday March 17, 2009

HP to offer batteries that last a lifetime

Martyn Williams
IDG News Service

HP is to begin selling laptop batteries that are guaranteed to last three years. The batteries use Sonata cells from Boston Power, a startup battery maker that has developed a Lithium Ion battery that can last for a thousand charging cycles without degrading - about two to three times more than a typical lithium ion battery.

In addition, the Sonata batteries will charge to 80 percent of their capacity in 30 minutes, which is faster than most other lithium ion batteries.
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Tuesday March 17, 2009

How to protest at work the French way – take the boss hostage

John Lichfield
Independent

Head of Sony France released after night locked in factory by sacked workers

In industrial disputes in other countries, the bosses lock the workers out. In France, disgruntled workers lock their bosses in.

The head of the Sony corporation in France was held overnight in an electronics plant in south-west France yesterday by workers protesting against their redundancy terms.
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Tuesday March 17, 2009

Low-Level Ozone Exposure Found to Be Lethal Over Time

Thomas H. Maugh II
The Los Angeles Times

An 18-year study shows an increased annual risk of death from respiratory illnesses, depending on the pollution level. It goes beyond studies that linked brief ozone spikes to short-term effects.

Ozone pollution is a killer, increasing the yearly risk of death from respiratory diseases by 40% to 50% in heavily polluted cities like Los Angeles and Riverside and by about 25% throughout the rest of the country, researchers reported today.
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Tuesday March 17, 2009

Parks That Can Move When the Animals Do

Moises Velasquez-Manoff
The Christian Science Monitor

When scientist Dee Boersma first arrived to Punta Tombo, Argentina, in the early 1980s, the colony of Magellanic penguins there was 300,000 breeding pairs strong. Since then, they've declined by more than 20 percent. Dr. Boersma faults competition from fishermen, pollution in the form of oil dumped at sea, and climate change for the decline.

But while the Punta Tombo colony is shrinking, others farther north are growing. The penguins' shifting range underscores how climate change isn't always a drop-dead-from-the-heat affair. And it raises questions about how to protect threatened - and mobile - marine species as they adjust.
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Tuesday March 17, 2009

G20's Real Agenda Should Be Saving Europe From Itself

Simon Johnson
The Telegraph

The media coverage of the G20 finance ministers meeting this weekend was dominated by the apparent battle between those who support more fiscal stimulus and those who want to impose more regulations on the financial system.

This, we are led to believe, is the big debate facing the full G20 heads of government summit early next month: the US is pushing for a bigger global fiscal stimulus (2 percent extra government spending from everyone, to be monitored by the IMF), while the continental Europeans are holding out for greater regulation. Gordon Brown is trying hard to cast himself as the broker for any apparent deal.
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Tuesday March 17, 2009

Red Cross Described "Torture" at CIA Jails

Joby Warrick, Peter Finn and Julie Tate
The Washington Post

Secret report implies that US violated international law.

The International Committee of the Red Cross concluded in a secret report that the Bush administration's treatment of al-Qaeda captives "constituted torture," a finding that strongly implied that CIA interrogation methods violated international law, according to newly published excerpts from the long-concealed 2007 document.
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Tuesday March 17, 2009

Pakistan's Tribal Areas Provide Haven for Militants

Jackie Northam
NPR News

Over the past several months, the U.S. has intensified a campaign of aerial attacks on Taliban and al-Qaida militants in northwest Pakistan.

The missile strikes are launched from unmanned aircraft, known as drones, in the region along the border with Afghanistan, which is effectively outside the control of the Pakistani government. Not surprisingly, this militant stronghold has become a major concern for the U.S. military.
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Tuesday March 17, 2009

Bailout money is flowing abroad

Sean O'Grady
Independent

Study casts doubt on the effectiveness of Bank of England’s ‘quantitative easing’ policy

Much of the new money the Bank of England has "printed" to stimulate the UK economy is ending up abroad where it will be of no benefit to UK households and businesses, according to an analysis of the Bank's "quantitative easing" programme.

The Bank is in the process of purchasing about £75bn of government securities, or gilts, over a three-month period, the first instalment of a massive £150bn programme. The Bank is effectively converting these government securities or gilts into cash and bank balances which, it is hoped, will be used to support lending and spending in the UK and boost the economy.
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Monday March 16, 2009

The Godfather Wars

Mark Seal
Vanity Fair

In many ways, the men who made The Godfather—director Francis Ford Coppola, producer Al Ruddy, Paramount executives Robert Evans and Peter Bart, and Gulf & Western boss Charles Bluhdorn—were as ruthless as the gangsters in Mario Puzo’s blockbuster. After violent disputes over the casting of Marlon Brando and Al Pacino, they tangled with the real-life Mob, which didn’t want the movie made at all. The author recalls how the clash of Hollywood sharks, Mafia kingpins, and cinematic geniuses shaped a Hollywood masterpiece.

During the 1960s, a dirty, loaded word came into currency: Mafia. It signified one of the most terrifying forces on earth, the Italian-American faction of organized crime, and naturally the men who headed this force wanted to keep the word from being spoken, if not obliterate it altogether. When it became the basis of a best-selling book, and the book was sold to the movies, those men decided that they had to take action.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Labour 'double standards' as smoking ban is lifted for G20 world leaders

Ryan Kisiel and Claire Ellicott
Daily Mail

Labour has been accused of double standards for amending legislation to allow world leaders to use smoking rooms during the G20 economic conference.

Dozens of heads of state, politicians and diplomats will be meeting at the Excel Exhibition Centre in Docklands, London, next month.

It is believed that laws have been changed to get around the smoking ban and provide specialist rooms that the visiting dignitaries can use.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Baby I Like It Raw

Anne Dailey
Last Exit Magazine

Beyond the tales of back-alley hand-offs and whispered exchanges is rising movement of people who prefer their milk straight from the source.

There’s a new flashpoint for controversy in the food world, and it’s not peanut butter or spinach or melamine-tainted caramels. Hint: It’s creamy, white, and comes straight from a cow.

If you’ve read about raw milk at any point over the past two to three years, you’ve probably read of dark alley hand-offs, whispered exchanges and early morning farm raids, of obsessive consumers on either side of the issue, and health officials confiscating thousands of pounds of contraband dairy.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Do You Know What Your Children Are Doing?

Claus Christian Malzahn
Spiegel International

Following last week's school shooting in Winnenden, the political debate has centered on gun control and video games. But the real answer could lie elsewhere: with parents.

The school shooters from Erfurt, Emsdetten and Winnenden all have one thing in common: they come from the very heart of the German society. It is a fact which makes the abyss that Germany is currently peering into that much more sinister.
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Monday March 16, 2009

US: Cluster Bomb Exports Banned

Human Rights Watch

Obama Should Initiate Review of US Stance on Treaty

Legislation signed into law on March 11, 2009 by President Obama will make permanent a ban on nearly all cluster bomb exports by the United States, Human Rights Watch said today. The United States should review its stance on joining the international treaty prohibiting cluster munitions in light of this action, Human Rights Watch said.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Scientists able to read people's minds

Steve Connor
Independent

Brain scanner translates thoughts of participants in maze experiment

Having the ability to read someone's mind with a "thought machine" has come a step closer after scientists showed that they could guess a person's memory simply by looking at the electrical activity of their brain.

Scientists have found that spatial memories can be "read" by a brain scanner so that it is possible to predict automatically where someone imagines themselves to be (the exact location in a maze, for instance) without actually asking them.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Beat that ... cook an omelette without breaking an egg

Beth Hale
Daily Mail

If pressed for time, whipping up a nice omelette is always a good option as a quick and easy meal.

It would appear, however, that for some people cracking a couple of eggs means the process is just not quick or easy enough.

So one farm has made it even more simple – by doing the cracking and beating itself. Egg In An Instant, which comes in a carton, is designed to appeal to the student market.
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Monday March 16, 2009

BBC in hot water for hiring botnet

John E. Dunn
Techworld

The BBC has been come in for sharp criticism over the decision by its Click computing show to hire a live botnet to demonstrate the ease with which spam can bombard email users.

The botnet in question had a relatively small 22,000 ‘zombie' PCs in its control, but the experiment undertaken by the programme makers and software security company Prevx was able to use these systems to send out 500 test messages to two BBC email accounts, one Gmail and one Hotmail.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Bolivia Passes Land From Rich to Poor

Reuters

La Paz - Emboldened by a new leftist constitution, Bolivia President Evo Morales on Saturday handed over ownership of farmland seized by the state from wealthy estate holders to poor indigenous people.

Morales handed out around 94,000 acres of lands recently confiscated from five big ranches in Bolivia's wealthy eastern lowlands, a stronghold of his conservative political opponents. The ranchers have been accused of employing workers in conditions of semi-slavery.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Secret emails show Iraq dossier was 'sexed up'

Nigel Morris
Independent

Intelligence chiefs criticised 'iffy drafting' of key document

Secret Whitehall emails released yesterday provide damning new evidence that the notorious dossier making the case for invading Iraq was "sexed up".

They disclose that the intelligence services were sceptical over the "iffy drafting" of government claims that Saddam Hussein could mount a missile strike on his neighbours within 45 minutes of ordering an attack.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Should Hard Times Permit High Times?

Marcelo Ballvé
New America Media

Recession Spotlights Rationale for Decriminalizing Marijuana

In 1977, President Jimmy Carter asked Congress to decriminalize marijuana possession (it never did). The next year, the Ladies Home Journal described a summer jazz festival on the White House's South Lawn where "a haze of marijuana smoke hung heavy under the low-bending branches of a magnolia tree."

The late 1970's may have been the high-water mark for permissiveness regarding marijuana. But advocates of decriminalized pot believe a confluence of factors, especially the country's economic malaise, are leading to another countrywide reappraisal of the drug.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Who Is America to Judge?

Mark Weisbrot
The Guardian

After Abu Ghraib, Gitmo and extraordinary renditions, other countries now challenge America's standing on human rights.

The US state department's annual human rights report got an unusual amount of criticism this year. This time the centre-left coalition government of Chile was notable in joining other countries such as Bolivia, Venezuela and China - who have had more rocky relations with Washington - in questioning the moral authority of the US government's judging other countries' human rights practices.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Web set to come under more government-led attacks

Fred O'Connor
IDG News Service

It's not just hackers that we should be looking out for. Governments around the world are increasingly using DDoS (distributed denial of service) attacks to silence critics and stymie opposition, according to a security expert speaking at the Source Boston Security Showcase.

As the use of DDOS for political gains increases, expect the Internet to become more militarised said Jose Nazario, senior security researcher at Arbor Networks.
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Monday March 16, 2009

YouTube removes clips in music royalties row

Beverley Rouse
Press Association

Music fans will no longer be able to watch their favourite videos on YouTube after Google blocked viewings during a dispute over licensing.

Google started to block UK viewers from watching "premium music videos" from last night but said it will take several days until all professional music videos are covered by the restriction.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Workplace Massacre in Alabama: Did Endless Downsizing and Slashed Benefits Cause the Rampage?

Mark Ames
AlterNet

If you keep squeezing workers to fatten filthy-rich executives' already-obscene bonuses, there can be very violent consequences.

The killing spree in Alabama fits a well-worn pattern of workplace-driven massacres that we've seen since the "going postal" phenomenon exploded in the middle of the Reagan revolution.

In spite of the fact that these killings have gone on unabated for over 20 years, most of the country doesn't want to know why they're happening -- least of all the people in power.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Facebook worm's comeback tackled by Microsoft

Gregg Keizer
Computerworld (US online)

Microsoft is looking to stamp outa worm that has hit social networking sites and has spread aggressively. Definitions for the Koobface worm had been added to Microsoft's Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT) according to a post on the company's malware protection centre blog from researcher Scott Molenkamp.

Koobface, which first appeared in May 2008, struck Facebook again just last week when researchers at Trend Micro tracked its romp through the service.
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Monday March 16, 2009

Nations Should Reject UN Drug Policy

Human Rights watch

New 10-Year Plan Omits Critical Protections on HIV and Human Rights

The new UN Political Declaration on Drugs, designed to guide drug policy for the next 10 years, lacks critically important measures for treating and stemming the spread of HIV, Human Rights Watch, the International AIDS Society, and the International Harm Reduction Association said today.

The groups said that respect for human rights and HIV prevention should be at the heart of the policy, but that critical elements had been stripped from the final declaration.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Freediving: Sport taken to a new extreme

Amol Rajan
Independent

Competitors dive to 50m in freezing waters without oxygen

Not many extreme sports demand as much from the bodies of competitors as freediving, but that hasn't stopped the world's elite taking it to a further level than ever before.

The sport, in which athletes descend under water on a single breath and without the aid of oxygen, has just taken a dive deeper in Norway. There, divers have foregone warm seas and plummeted below lakes of barely melting ice.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Investigative reporter Seymour Hersh describes 'executive assassination ring'

Eric Black
MinnPost.com

At a “Great Conversations” event (MP3) at the University of Minnesota last night, legendary investigative reporter Seymour Hersh may have made a little more news than he intended by talking about new alleged instances of domestic spying by the CIA, and about an ongoing covert military operation that he called an “executive assassination ring.”

Hersh spoke with great confidence about these findings from his current reporting, which he hasn’t written about yet.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

The Financial Crisis Pushes Europe to the Brink of Disaster

Danny Schechter
AlterNet

What is happening there will make things worse for us here.

Obsessed as we are about our own crumbling economy, it's hard for most Americans to see and appreciate the global nature of the crisis and how it is impacting, and will impact, others throughout the world. We don't recognize how many in other countries blame the fall of their own economies on a kind of "financial AIDS" born in the USA.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Mexico and the US: As Guns Go South, Drugs - and Violence - Go North

Dan Glaister
The Guardian

For the Obama White House, pondering how to reshape the Bush administration's war on drugs, the concerns presented by the deepening crisis in Mexico are twofold.

The first was highlighted by the chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, talking about US-Mexican counter-narcotics co-operation. "They want to clearly stop the guns from the United States going south. We want to stop the drugs coming north," he said.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Mystery solved as tests prove Tsar's entire family was murdered

Steve Connor
Independent

DNA analysis of bone shards shows no one escaped 1918 slaughter in the cellar

In the early hours of a July day in 1918, one of history's most infamous murders was perpetrated on parents, their five children and their loyal servants in a cellar in the city of Yekaterinburg, central Russia.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Ten million PCs infected by Trojans, vendor reports

Robert McMillan
IDG News Service

Perhaps as many as ten million PCs are infected with sneaky programs designed to steal sensitive financial information, anti-virus vendor Panda Security reports.

The company found that just over one percent of the 67 million people who tried out its free ActiveScan test site last year were infected with malicious software designed to help thieves steal sensitive information about victims.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Breaking the Taboo on Israel's Spying Efforts on the United States

Christopher Ketcham
AlterNet

Israel runs one of the most aggressive and damaging espionage networks targeting the U.S., yet public discussion about it is almost nil.

Scratch a counterintelligence officer in the U.S. government and they'll tell you that Israel is not a friend to the United States.

This is because Israel runs one of the most aggressive and damaging espionage networks targeting the U.S. The fact of Israeli penetration into the country is not a subject oft-discussed in the media or in the circles of governance, due to the extreme sensitivity of the U.S.-Israel relationship coupled with the burden of the Israel lobby, which punishes legislators who dare to criticize the Jewish state.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

A Falcon of Peace

Tom Engelhardt
Tomdispatch.com

Who Wants to Be a Dove? (They Always Lose.)

How come they get to be the hawks? And we get to be the doves? A hawk is a noble bird. A dove. Well, basically it's a pigeon. The sort of bird that, in New York City anyway, messes your building's window sills, is always underfoot, and, along with the city's rats, makes a hearty lunch for the red-tailed hawks which now populate our parks.

Even a turkey would be less of a turkey than a dove. We get to carry that olive twig -- okay, they call it a "branch" -- around in our beaks, but you can bet your bippy that they get the olives, or, more likely, the opportunity to trample the olive groves into oil.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

UN Report Says US Rendition Policy Broke International Law

Julie Sell
McClatchy Newspapers

A U.N. expert is accusing the United States and some of its allies of breaching international law for the so-called extraordinary renditions and subsequent alleged torture of terrorism suspects during the Bush administration's global war on terrorism, and is launching a probe into the detention of suspects.

Martin Scheinin, a U.N. special rapporteur and expert on international law, issued his annual report to the U.N. Human Rights Council on Tuesday.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Officials: Iran Does Not Have Key Nuclear Material

Pamela Hess
The Associated Press

Washington - Iran does not yet have any highly enriched uranium, the fuel needed to make a nuclear warhead, two top U.S. intelligence officials told Congress Tuesday, disputing a claim by an Israeli official.

U.S. National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair and Defense Intelligence Agency Director Lt. Gen. Michael Maples said Tuesday that Iran has only low-enriched uranium - which would need to be refined into highly enriched uranium before it can fuel a warhead. Neither officials said there were indications that refining has occurred.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

We Are Breeding Ourselves to Extinction

Chris Hedges
Truthdig

All measures to thwart the degradation and destruction of our ecosystem will be useless if we do not cut population growth. By 2050, if we continue to reproduce at the current rate, the planet will have between 8 billion and 10 billion people, according to a recent U.N. forecast.

This is a 50 percent increase. And yet government-commissioned reviews, such as the Stern report in Britain, do not mention the word population. Books and documentaries that deal with the climate crisis, including Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth,” fail to discuss the danger of population growth.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Russia finally admits to its hidden heroin epidemic

Shaun Walker
Independent

Surge in abuse blamed on West's failings in Afghanistan, but addicts go untreated

At a playground just off the busy Prospekt Mira thoroughfare in central Moscow, there aren't any children playing on the swings. The slide is covered in dirty snow, the sandpit is strewn with empty vodka bottles and, on close inspection, a few used syringes. Mothers whisper to each other that the playground is the home of narkomany – drug addicts – and wheel their pushchairs swiftly past.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Six Firms Stop Sales of Hard-Plastic Baby Bottles

Jane Kay
The San Francisco Chronicle

Bending to growing public and legal pressure that began in San Francisco, six major companies have agreed to stop selling hard-plastic baby bottles containing bisphenol A, an industrial chemical suspected of harming human development.

The purveyors of baby-care products - Playtex Products Inc., Gerber, Evenflo Co., Avent America Inc., Dr. Brown and Disney First Years - said they no longer will market the shatter-proof polycarbonate bottles and some other baby products in the United States.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Researchers discover way to 'fingerprint' paper

Robert McMillan
IDG News Service

Think two blank sheets of paper are the same? Look closer.

Researchers at Princeton University and University College London say they can identify unique information, essentially like a fingerprint, from any sheet of paper using any reasonably good scanner. The technique could be used to crack down on counterfeiting or even keep track of confidential documents.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Children come with a high carbon cost

New Scientist

What is your carbon legacy - not the emissions you are personally liable for, but those of your descendants? Ask Paul Murtaugh, a statistician at Oregon State University in Corvallis.

If you have a child, he says, you and you partner are each responsible for half its emissions. If that child has kids, one-quarter of their emissions are down to you, and so on.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Can Humans Cause Earthquakes and Use Them As Weapons? We'll Probably Find Out Soon Enough

Scott Thill
AlterNet

Once the topic of arcane science, defense research and conspiracy theories, wider questions emerge on the role humans played in recent earthquakes.

Last year, one of the most deadly earthquakes on record devastated China, killing over 80,000 people and rendering millions homeless. Yet last month, reports surfaced stating that the 8.0 magnitude Great Sichuan Earthquake could have possibly been induced not by Earth but its people. Particularly, the ones that decided to build the 4-year-old Zipingpu reservoir, which held 320 million tons of water, near a major fault line.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Sea levels rising twice as fast as predicted

Michael McCarthy
Independent

Melting ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica force UN scientists to issue dramatic warning

Sea levels are predicted to rise twice as fast as was forecast by the United Nations only two years ago, threatening hundreds of millions of people with catastrophe, scientists said yesterday in a dramatic new warning about climate change.

Rapidly melting ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are likely to push up sea levels by a metre or more by 2100, swamping coastal cities and obliterating the living space of 600 million people who live in deltas, low-lying areas and small island states.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Can We "Reset" Relations With Colombia?

Robert Naiman
Truthout

President Obama wants, quite reasonably, to "reset" relations with Russia. He also said, quite reasonably, he would "go through the federal budget line by line, programs that don't work, we cut."

Our relations with Colombia also need to be reset. "Plan Colombia," which was supposedly going to cut the flow of Colombian cocaine into the US, doesn't work, either to reduce the flow of illegal drugs, or to promote human rights, democracy and the rule of law in Colombia. Since Plan Colombia doesn't work, it should be cut.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

Half of Asda's price cuts 'worth just 1p an item'

Ashley Seager
The Guardian

More than half of the 5,000 price cuts promised by the supermarket group Asda are only worth a penny an item, according to research by the Grocer magazine.

The retailer announced last week that it would cut a further 5,000 prices by Easter, bringing to 12,500 the number of items that have been reduced. It said this was part of a new transparency in its pricing policy that would give customers "value they can trust".
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Sunday March 15, 2009

US Downturn Dragging World Into Recession

Anthony Faiola
The Washington Post

Report says global economy will shrink for first time since 1940s.

The world is falling into the first global recession since World War II as the crisis that started in the United States engulfs once-booming developing nations, confronting them with massive financial shortfalls that could turn back the clock on poverty reduction by years, the World Bank warned yesterday.
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Sunday March 15, 2009

How to get smart with electricity

Martyn Williams
IDG News Service

A new breed of meter is set to change the way that users monitor household electrcity use by prov real-time updates that give you an instant indication of the cost of running a house full of gadgets.

U.S. President Barack Obama has pledged to put 40 million of the so-called "smart meters" into American homes as part of the economic stimulus package but in some European homes the devices are already a reality and helping users to save month.
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Friday March 13, 2009

Eating ourselves to death: Britain's fat epidemic

Nina Lakhani
Independent

Obesity was cited as cause of death in 1,200 cases in 2007, an increase of more than a third in just five years. Experts say the true number is much higher

The number of people whose deaths are directly related to obesity has leapt by 35 per cent since 2003, according to new figures obtained by The Independent on Sunday.

Obesity was cited on death certificates as a contributing factor in 1,203 deaths in England and Wales in 2007, highlighting how the incidence of related diseases such as diabetes, heart disease and blood clots continues to rise alarmingly. The outlook is believed to be as serious in Scotland.
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Friday March 13, 2009

Ending the War on Drugs

Silja J.A. Talvi
In These Times

Will the Obama administration put justice back in the criminal justice system?

President Obama faces a heap of crises: a major economic recession, crumbling national infrastructure, and ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Buried in that heap is another war, one less present in public discourse but no less toxic: the drug war. The concentrated battleground of the drug war has been on domestic soil, with America’s so-called interdiction efforts spreading the fight across the world, from poppy-rich Afghanistan to the coca-nurturing Andes to the most brutal battlefield of them all, Mexico, which saw more than 5,600 drug-related murders last year, including several that involved publicly displayed decapitations.
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Friday March 13, 2009

Why Did The New York Times Kill This Image of Henry Kissinger? (Not for His Naked Butt Cheeks!)

Steve Brown
AlterNet

This Kissinger image by David Levine is one of 320 cartoons that the NYT commissioned and paid $1 million in "kill fees" after getting cold feet.

The Kissinger image below (by David Levine) is one of 320 illustrations – by 142 of the world's most acclaimed contemporary artists – that The New York Times itself originally commissioned for its Op-Ed Pages, but then got cold feet about running, and eventually paid more than $1 million in “kill fees” to hide from public view (sometimes for as long as 38 years).
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Monday March 09, 2009

Kill the inflammation, kill the HIV?

Debora MacKenzie
New Scientist

We don't yet know why HIV spreads to women so much more readily in Africa than elsewhere, but African women desperately need protection from the virus during sex. Now a cheap and relatively safe chemical that damps down vaginal inflammation may do just that.

Ashley Haase and colleagues at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis have discovered that a few epithelial cells on the cervix of female macaques are the first point of entry for SIV, the monkey equivalent of HIV.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Carbon cuts 'only give 50/50 chance of saving planet'

Michael McCarthy
Independent

As states negotiate Kyoto's successor, simulations show catastrophe just years away.

The world's best efforts at combating climate change are likely to offer no more than a 50-50 chance of keeping temperature rises below the threshold of disaster, according to research from the UK Met Office.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Planet Overload

David Nicholson-Lord
New Statesman

The world’s population is 6.8 billion. That figure will rise to 9.2 billion by 2050. Meanwhile, climate change is speeding up alarmingly. So are there too many of us? If so, how long before our planet becomes unfit for purpose?

If you write about the environment you become used to a measure of unfriendly criticism. In the main, it’s pretty innocuous stuff – charges of miserabilism and so on. But since concentrating on the issue of human population growth, I have found the criticism noticeably darkening.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Britain 'nation of form fillers watched by quarter of world's CCTV cameras'

Christopher Hope
Telegraph

Britain has become a bureacratic and authoritarian state watched over by a quarter of the world's CCTV cameras, a study of Labour's decade in power claims.

National debt is running at £175,000 per household, five times more than thought, while each year the Government has passed 3,500 regulations, along with 100,000 pages of rules and explanation.

'The Rotten State of Britain' claims to be the first "deeply researched factual account" of Tony Blair's and Gordon Brown's time in office.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Enzyme behind cancer spread found

BBC News

Scientists say they have identified an enzyme that helps cancer spread around the body

Cancer metastasis, where the cancer spreads from its original location, is known to be responsible for 90% of cancer-related deaths.

Institute of Cancer Research scientists have found that an enzyme called LOX is crucial in promoting metastasis, Cancer Cell journal reports.
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Monday March 09, 2009

China crisis as economy crumbles

Clifford Coonan
Independent

An 8 per cent growth rate sounds impressive, but the Beijing leadership fears social unrest in the countryside as it struggles to create jobs/

With China facing its worst financial crisis in a century, Premier Wen Jiabao assured comrades that the economy would still grow by 8 per cent this year, the level that the Communist Party believes is necessary to hold down the jobless rate and stave off wider social unrest.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Health Canada finds bisphenol A in soft drinks

CBC News

A Health Canada study of canned pop has found the vast majority of the drinks contain the chemical bisphenol A, a substance that imitates the female hormone estrogen and is banned in baby bottles.

Out of 72 drinks tested, 69 were found to contain BPA at levels below what Health Canada says is the safe upper limit. However, studies in peer-reviewed science journals have indicated that even at very low doses, BPA can increase breast and ovarian cancer cell growth and the growth of some prostate cancer cells in animals.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Ex-UN prosecutor: Bush may be next up for International Criminal Court

Stephen C. Webster
Raw Story

An ex-UN prosecutor has said that following the issuance of an arrest warrant for the president of Sudan, former US President George W. Bush could — and should — be next on the International Criminal Court’s list.

The former prosecutor’s assessment was echoed in some respect by United Nations General Assembly chief Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann of Nicaragua, who said America’s military occupation of Iraq has caused over a million deaths and should be probed by the United Nations.
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Monday March 09, 2009

U.S. Military Aid to Israel

Kathleen and Bill Christison
Counterpunch

The Ultimate Earmark

In these days of economic crisis, budget overruns, earmarks, and multi-billion dollar bailouts, when Americans are being forced to tighten their own belts, one of the most automatic earmarks—a bailout by any measure—goes to a foreign government but is little understood by most Americans. U.S. military aid to Israel is doled out in annual increments of billions of dollars but remains virtually unchallenged while other fiscal outlays are drastically cut.

The United States and Israel signed a Memorandum of Understanding in August 2007 committing the U.S. to give Israel $30 billion in military aid over the next decade.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Bank licensed to print money as it cuts rates

Sean O'Grady
Independent

Plan to pump £150bn into financial system as interest rates slashed to historic low of 0.5%

The Bank of England has tacitly admitted that its past strategies of aggressively cutting interest rates and recapitalising the banks have failed to lift the economy out of recession.
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Monday March 09, 2009

One-eyed man creates prosthetic 'surveillance' eye

James Sherwood
The Register

The aptly named Eyeborg Project

A one-eyed man has taken advantage of some of the world’s smallest imaging and data transmission technologies to help him create documentaries filmed from the first-person perspective.

Rob Spence, a 36-year-old film maker from Canada, finally had his eye surgically removed some 13 years ago - and a further 13 years after the organ was badly damaged in a shotgun accident.

However, he and a team of ocularists, inventors and engineering specialists are now working on the Eyeborg Project – the development of a prosthetic eye that captures and transmits video.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Revealed: police databank on thousands of protesters

Paul Lewis and Marc Vallée
The Guardian

Police are targeting thousands of political campaigners in surveillance operations and storing their details on a database for at least seven years, an investigation by the Guardian can reveal.

Photographs, names and video footage of people attending protests are routinely obtained by surveillance units and stored on an "intelligence system".
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Monday March 09, 2009

Britain returns to thrifty domesticity

Natalie Curant
Independent

A revival of 1950s style domesticity has swept Britain due to the economic downturn. Consumers are applying a do-it-yourself attitude to all areas of daily life by making clothes, growing vegetables and dying their own hair

Sales of knitting and dressmaking equipment are powering ahead - knitting needles are up by 7 per cent and sewing machines by 34 per cent according to the department store chain John Lewis.

Meanwhile garden centres are reporting strong demand for fruit bushes - up 68 per cent last year - and hardware stores have brought out budget gardening tool ranges.
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Monday March 09, 2009

CIA Confirms 12 Destroyed Videotapes Depicted "Enhanced Interrogation Methods"

Daphne Eviatar
The Washington Independent

The CIA has reportedly just confirmed - conveniently late on a Friday afternoon - that 12 of the videotapes it destroyed while its interrogation methods were under investigation and the subject of a pending lawsuit depicted the "enhanced interrogation methods" that detainees' advocates were worried about.

The American Civil Liberties Union reports that as part of its lawsuit seeking information on detainee abuse, the government today provided new details about the content of interrogation videotapes destroyed by the CIA - specifically, that 12 depict so-called "enhanced interrogation techniques."
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Monday March 09, 2009

The Manhattan Project of Marijuana

David Downs
East Bay Express

If pot is truly medicine, shouldn't it be standardized? A lab has big plans to test the potency of Cali cannabis sold in dispensaries.

At downtown Oakland's Harborside Health Center, the hairy green buds have numbers. The new nomenclature beckons viewers from within seven gleaming glass display cases. Antiseptic white placards boast authoritative black digits. Each stands erect next to a Petri dish of high-octane "White Rhino" or "Afgooey Super Melt." They read: 7 percent, 11 percent, 18 percent, or 21 percent. Even 80 percent.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Families Keep Homeschooling Despite Tough Times

David Crary
The Associated Press

When hard times reached the Schneider household in central Oregon, the longtime stay-at-home mom took action - getting a job at Subway to offset a drop in her husband's earnings. What she didn't do was also notable: She didn't stop homeschooling her three teenage children.

Colleen Schneider works evenings so she's home for her favored morning teaching hours. The family scrimps - more frozen pizza, less eating out. But an inflexible 9-to-5 job that would force her to quit homeschooling was not an option.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Amazon Drain Forest

Grist

Drought threatens Amazon, speeds global warming: study

Drought is killing off trees in Brazil's fragile Amazon rain forest and depleting the region's carbon reservoirs -- an ecological double-whammy with devastating implications, according to a study published Thursday.

The Amazon's lush vegetation in a typical year absorbs nearly two billion tonnes of carbon dioxide, one of the chief culprits causing climate change.
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Monday March 09, 2009

One third of children admit to carrying a gun or knife

Ben Russell
Independent

Survey results fuel Conservative claims of Britain's 'broken society'

Nearly one in three children admit to having carried a knife or a gun, a Youth Justice Board survey has found.

Seventeen per cent of 11- to 16-year-olds reported carrying a penknife and 15 per cent said they had carried a ball-bearing gun in the past year. One in 20 boasted of having carried a flick knife.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Cocaine production surge unleashes wave of violence in Latin America

Rory Carroll
The Guardian

Cocaine production has surged across Latin America and unleashed a wave of violence, population displacements and corruption, prompting urgent calls to rethink the drug war.

More than 750 tonnes of cocaine are shipped annually from the Andes in a multi-billion pound industry which has forced peasants off land, triggered gang wars and perverted state institutions.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Vatican vetoes 'dot god' domain

Kevin Murphy
The Register

More ICANN namespace squabbling

The Pope has called on ICANN to keep religion out of the domain name system.

The Vatican warned the internet address-making body of the “perils” of allowing new internet domains such as “.catholic, .anglican, .orthodox, .hindu, .islam, .muslim, [and] .buddhist”.

ICANN, frequently accused of mission creep, could find itself having to decide who gets to represent an entire religion on the internet, His Holiness pointed out, in a letter from Monsignor Carlo Maria Polvani.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Kiss the Banks Goodbye

Dave Lindorff
Counterpunch

It's Time to Put a Stop to This Farce!

The futility and stupidity of the Fed’s and the Obama administration’s policy of pumping ever more money into failing banks and insurance companies in a vain effort to get them lending again was demonstrated—if anyone was paying attention—by the collapse in auto sales this past month, with all the leading companies, Ford, GM and Toyota, reporting sales down by about 40%.

This fall off in car buying was despite record discounting by the auto industry, and offers of 0% financing.
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Monday March 09, 2009

French Vintners Ward Off Attack on Wine Culture

Spiegel International

Storm In a Wine Glass

It was a close call. A draft law proposed by the French Health Ministry threatened to put a stop to wine tastings. But a massive protest by the country's vintners managed to torpedo the law at the last moment.

It is certainly not difficult to get the French to take part in protests. But the coup landed by Roselyne Bachelot, France's minister of health, is nevertheless rare. In a proposal she wrote regarding the reform of France's hospital system, she also inserted an article meant to combat alcoholism. The result was a public outcry on two fronts.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Revenge of the rainforest

Steve Connor
Independent

The Amazon has long been the lungs of the world. But now comes dramatic evidence that we cannot rely on it in the fight against climate change

It covers an area 25 times bigger than Britain, is home to a bewildering concentration of flora and fauna and is often described as the "lungs of the world" for its ability to absorb vast amounts of carbon dioxide through its immense photosynthetic network of trees and leaves.

The Amazon rainforest is one of the biggest and most important living stores of carbon on the planet through its ability to convert atmospheric carbon dioxide into solid carbon, kept locked in the trunks of rainforest trees for centuries.
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Monday March 09, 2009

NATO to Resume Ties With Russia

BBC News

Nato has agreed to resume high-level contacts with Russia, working with what US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called a "greater unity of purpose".

Russia welcomed the move, six months after Nato froze contacts over the conflict between Russia and Georgia.

Mrs Clinton stressed Afghanistan, which she called "Nato's biggest military challenge", was a mutual concern.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Challenging Economic Dogma

Mark Weisbrot
Truthout

On spending, debts and currency, the recession forces a re-think of some cherished American policies.

A serious economic crisis can force some rethinking of economic and political dogma. The current crisis is serious for most of the world: the IMF is projecting world economic growth of just 0.5 percent this year - the worst since the Second World War - and this number could easily be revised downward.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Catholic Church Excommunicates Doctors Who Helped 9-Year-Old Rape Victim

Tana Ganeva
AlterNet

This is probably the most repugnant thing you'll read in a while.

Here’s the most repugnant thing you’ll read all day, week, month, or ever ...

A 9-year-old girl in Brazil was impregnated with twins after being repeatedly raped by her stepfather. Doctors decided the child’s uterus was too small to safely carry a baby, let alone two, and with the mother’s permission performed an abortion.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Macs really do cost more than PCs

Eric Lai
Computerworld (US)

It's a long-standing bar argument: "Which hardware gives you more bang for the buck, Mac or PC?"

A decade ago, it would've been hard for anyone but loyalists to argue in favor of the Mac. The PowerPC's clock speed lagged the Pentium and other x86 CPUs. Meanwhile, components and peripherals for the Mac such as graphics cards and CD drives were limited and pricey because of Apple's proprietary designs.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Building a Portrait of a Lie in the Brain

Matthias Gamer
Scientific American

In search of a better lie detector, scientists are peering into the brain to probe the origins of deception

A young man steals across the hallway, slips through a door and scans the room. He opens a drawer, snatches a wristwatch inside and puts it in his pocket. Then he hurries out the door.

Sixty more people perform the same drill, half of them filching a watch and the others, a ring. Psychiatrist F. Andrew Kozel, now at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, and his colleagues promised to give a bonus payment to anyone who could conceal the deed from the scientists, who planned to look into their brains for signs of a cover-up.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Report: Diebold Voting System Has "Delete" Button for Erasing Audit Logs

Kim Zetter
Wired

After three months of investigation, California's secretary of state has released a report examining why a voting system made by Premier Election Solutions (formerly known as Diebold) lost about 200 ballots in Humboldt County during November's presidential election.

But the most startling information in the state's 13-page report is not why the system lost votes, which Wired.com previously covered in detail, but that some versions of Diebold's vote tabulation system, known as the Global Election Management System (Gems), include a button that allows someone to delete audit logs from the system.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Peace Deal With Taliban Setback For Women

Zofeen Ebrahim
Inter Press Service

The ceasefire agreement reached by the provincial government in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP) and the Taliban on Feb.16, involving implementation of shariah (Islamic law), is being seen as a setback for women’s rights in the area bordering Afghanistan.

Going by what the Taliban have in mind for women in Swat, the worries are well placed. Women are already not allowed to work except in totally segregated environments as the Taliban considers it ‘’un-Islamic for a woman’s voice to be heard in public’’.
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Monday March 09, 2009

The Big Question: Is Tesco now too powerful in Britain, and can its growth ever be checked?

Ed Howker
Independent

Why are we asking this now?

An unprecedented ruling in favour of Tesco – the world's third-largest food retailer – by the Competition Appeals Tribunal yesterday halted plans to place new limits on the expansion of supermarkets.

Last April, the Competition Commission – the Government's retail regulator – completed a two-year investigation into the supermarket sector and found much tougher rules needed to be introduced to limit the growth of so-called "Tesco towns" – communities where one supermarket chain comes to dominate, forcing out large competitors and small shops.
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Monday March 09, 2009

India Flips Switch on Energy, Pollution

OneWorld US

The second most populous country in the world is phasing out incandescent light bulbs in favor of energy-saving fluorescent bulbs, reports an environmental protection group, calling the move an important step toward a cleaner energy future.

The government-orchestrated Bachat Lamp Yojana program will replace 400 million traditional incandescent light bulbs across India with compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs), which use significantly less energy and have a longer life span than regular bulbs.
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Monday March 09, 2009

It’s the Pot Economy, Stupid

Stephen Gutwillig
AlterNet

Marijuana already plays a huge role in the California and national economies. It’s a revenue opportunity we literally can’t afford to ignore.

It looks like the pot debate just got real. As the nation faces its worst economic crisis in generations, California Assemblyman Tom Ammiano has introduced a trailblazing bill to tax and regulate marijuana like alcohol. Hard on the heels of Michael Phelps’ nationally-resonant bong demo, Ammiano’s gesture is a whole lot more intentional.
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Monday March 09, 2009

High-Protein Pea Ideal for Drought-Hit Farmers

Jim Lobe
Inter Press Service

Agricultural researchers are reporting a major breakthrough in the development of a new, high-yielding variety of pigeonpea, a protein-rich legume that can be grown in marginal lands and is highly resistant to drought.

Pigeonpea is particularly important in areas where high-protein foods are scarce, including India, where it is often cooked as dal, eastern and southern Africa, the Caribbean and Burma. It currently provides between 20 and 22 percent of the protein in most countries where it is grown extensively.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Europe scraps Microsoft scrutiny

Paul Meller
IDG News Service

The European Commission is to cease to monitor Microsoft's compliance to the EC's anti-trust ruling, five years after it was first imposed. The EU-appointed watchdog has been told that he is no longer needed.

In addition to fining the company €497 million for monopoly abuse, Europe's top anti-trust authority imposed remedies including the order to share interoperability information so that rivals could build software that works smoothly with the near ubiquitous Windows OS.
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Monday March 09, 2009

The Polish dream turns sour

Jonathan Brown
Independent

When Thomas and Zibi came to Britain, jobs were easy to come by. Now they are sleeping in a tent, victims of a recession that has destroyed the livelihoods of thousands of migrant workers.

Thomas and his brother Zibi were trying to keep themselves warm at their riverbank home yesterday by huddling round a small, smoky fire built from green sticks. A pot of water bubbled away and all around the trees and undergrowth, which only partially concealed their makeshift shelters from curious passers-by, were festooned with clothes and plastic bags.
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Monday March 09, 2009

Why Being Smart Won't Get You Laid

Dr. Alex Benzer
Huffington Post

Your impressive mental prowess won't necessarily get you a date, much less bring you lasting love and fulfillment.

I have a mini-confession to make: I wrote the Tao of Dating books specifically for really smart people. The writing of the books was precipitated by the endemic dating woes on the Harvard campus, as I observed them as an advisor and earlier, indulged in them as a student.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

US lawmakers attempt new patent curbs

Robert McMillan
IDG News Service

US lawmakers have reintroduced legislation that would mark the first major overhaul of US patent law in more than 50 years.

The legislation, introduced in the US Senate on Tuesday, is very similar to the Patent Reform Act of 2007, which died on the Senate floor last year. If passed, the 2009 version would change the way the US Patent and Trademark Office works, bring US patent law in line with global laws, and introduce so-called "reasonable royalty" provisions, which change the way damages are calculated and would reduce the likelihood of massive payouts for some patent holders.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

50 years after revolt, clampdown on Tibetans

Edward Wong
International Herald Tribune

Enraged nomads swooped into this windswept town on the Tibetan plateau a year ago this month, storming a Chinese police compound, setting fire to police cars and forcing security forces to flee. To the north, Tibetans on horseback galloped into a schoolyard, ripped down a Chinese flag and hoisted a Tibetan one, shouting "Free Tibet!"

Now, the authorities have imposed an unofficial state of martial law on the vast highlands where ethnic Tibetans live, with thousands of troops occupying areas they fear could erupt in renewed rioting on a momentous anniversary next week.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

Thou shalt not text, nor listen to thy iPod: Bishops set new rules for Lent

Paul Bompard
Independent

Catholic Church offers modern alternatives to age-old tradition of fasting

Chocolate, cigarettes and alcohol may be the predictable vices to give up for the 40 days of Lent but Italians are being urged to abstain from more contemporary pleasures, like texting, Facebook and iPods.

The Bishop of Modena, in northern Italy, has called on young Italians to give up on Fridays their addiction to sending text messages, in the run-up to Easter Sunday. Archbishop Benito Cocchi said that this would help them to "cleanse themselves from the virtual world and get back into touch with themselves".
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Thursday March 05, 2009

US court urged to block warrantless GPS tracking

Dan Goodin
The Register

Surveillance in the digital age

The Electronic Frontier Foundation and the American Civil Liberties Union are waging a legal challenge against what they say is law enforcement’s growing use of global positioning system location-tracking devices often without first seeking a warrant.

In a friend-of-the-court brief filed Tuesday, EFF attorneys argued that FBI agents should have obtained a court order before secretly planting GPS technology on the vehicle of a drug trafficking suspect. The device allowed agents to know the suspect’s whereabouts 24 hours a day for a full month, was accurate to within 100 feet and yielded more than 3,100 pages worth of data, according to the filing.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

Russian Scholar Says U.S. Will Collapse Next Year

Associated Press

If you’re inclined to believe Igor Panarin, and the Kremlin wouldn’t mind if you did, then President Barack Obama will order martial law this year, the U.S. will split into six rump-states before 2011, and Russia and China will become the backbones of a new world order.

Panarin might be easy to ignore but for the fact that he is a dean at the Foreign Ministry’s school for future diplomats and a regular on Russia’s state-guided TV channels. And his predictions fit into the anti-American story line of the Kremlin leadership.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

Scientists make HIV strain that can infect monkeys

Will Dunham
Reuters

Scientists have created a strain of the human AIDS virus able to infect and multiply in monkeys in a step toward testing future vaccines in monkeys before trying them in people, according to a new study.

This strain of HIV, the human immunodeficiency virus, was developed by altering a single gene in the human version to allow it to infect a type of monkey called a pig-tailed macaque, the researchers said on Monday.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

At least 20 dead in Mexican prison riot

Jo Tuckman
The Guardian

Massacre in border city the latest of a series of bloodbaths in jails that have killed 83 prisoners in six months

At least 20 inmates died inside the high security area of a prison in the border city of Ciudad Juarez yesterday in what looks to have been a massacre carried out by members of one gang against rivals.

This is the latest of a series of bloodbaths in Mexican jails that have killed 83 prisoners in six months. They are associated with the drug wars outside which killed over 6,000 in 2008 and well over 1,000 so far this year.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

The Prehistory of Adidas and Puma

Robert Kuhn and Thomas Thiel
Spiegel International

Shoes And Nazi Bazookas

During World War II, industries big and small all over Germany became part of Hitler's massive war machine. The change even affected the predecessor of footwear legends Adidas and Puma, which -- oddly enough -- manufactured Germany's version of the bazooka.

When the starting shot rang out, the athletes surged forward. Jesse Owens dug his spikes deep into the racing track of Berlin's Olympic Stadium -- and the best sprinter of his day dominated the 100 meters race to win a gold medal at the 1936 Olympic Games.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

Memos Provide Blueprint for Police State

Marjorie Cohn
Truthout

Seven newly released memos from the Bush Justice Department reveal a concerted strategy to cloak the president with power to override the Constitution. The memos provide "legal" rationales for the president to suspend freedom of speech and press; order warrantless searches and seizures, including wiretaps of US citizens; lock up US citizens indefinitely in the United States without criminal charges; send suspected terrorists to other countries where they will likely be tortured; and unilaterally abrogate treaties.

According to the reasoning in the memos, Congress has no role to check and balance the executive. That is the definition of a police state.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

Scotland to end 'pocket money' prices for drink

Jerome Taylor
Independent

SNP plans crackdown on happy hours and new minimum price for alcohol

Scotland will enter a new age of temperance under radical plans aimed at curbing endemic drinking in a country with some of the worst alcohol abuse rates in the world.

Ministers unveiled new plans yesterday which will set a minimum price for drinks, based on the number of units they contain, and a ban on promotions such as buy-one-get-one-free offers.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

Prosecuting the Bush Team?

Robert Pallitto
Foreign Policy In Focus

In the months following September 11, 2001, lawyers in the White House and the Justice Department interpreted U.S. and international law to provide legal support for the administration in its "war on terror."

With regard to interrogation of terror suspects, John Yoo, David Addington, Jay Bybee, and others justified the use of such harsh and dangerous tactics as waterboarding and stress positions. In a 2002 memo, they advised that only actions causing severe pain equivalent to "organ failure" would violate the U.S. torture law.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

Spam kingpin booted off Facebook by judge

Robert McMillan
IDG News Service

A US judge has ordered convicted spammer Sanford Wallace to stay away from Facebook.

Facebook sued Wallace and two other men last week in an effort to cut down on spam and phishing schemes on the social-networking site. On Monday, Judge Jeremy Fogel of the US District Court for the Northern District of California issued a temporary restraining order barring Wallace and two other alleged spammers, Adam Arzoomanian and Scott Shaw, from accessing Facebook's network.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

EU upholds Austria, Hungary right to ban GM crops

Pete Harrison
Reuters

Austria and Hungary reaffirmed their sovereign right on Monday to ban growing genetically modified maize after EU environment ministers squashed more attempts by the European Commission to lift the restrictions.

In a stinging rebuff to the EU's executive arm, an overwhelming majority of countries -- at least 21 out of the bloc's 27 member states -- voted against draft orders for Vienna and Budapest to end their GM crop bans within 20 days.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

Disturbing Idea of Expelling Arabs from Israeli Territory Gains Ground

Conn Hallinan
AlterNet

There is a growing consensus among Israelis that it would acceptable to expel its Arab citizens to either a Palestinian state or to Jordan and Egypt.

One of the more disturbing developments in the Middle East is a growing consensus among Israelis that it would acceptable to expel -- in the words of advocates "transfer" -- its Arab citizens to either a yet as unformed Palestinian state or the neighboring countries of Jordan and Egypt.
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Thursday March 05, 2009

The Costs of Don't Ask, Don't Tell

Lawrence J. Korb
The Center for American Progress

As the U.S. military seeks to expand by an additional 48,000 ground troops over the next four fiscal years, the armed services - and the Army in particular - are faced with the challenge of enlisting highly qualified and motivated men and women.

Several recent developments have created an opportunity for increased recruitment, including the reduction in causalities from the Iraq war, the election of Barack Obama - who has pledged to withdraw the bulk of American troops from Iraq - and rising unemployment among today's youth.
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Wednesday March 04, 2009

So Karl Marx was right after all

Mark Steel
Independent

Maybe the Mail will be yelling, ‘Smash the bosses, get the worker’s Mail’

The sudden change is disconcerting. For years I might suggest society would be improved if we sacked these vastly overpaid bankers, and the response would be some variety of "Here he goes again".

Now if you say the same thing the response is "SACK them? I'll tell you what we should do, we should cover them in marmalade and lock them in a greenhouse full of wasps, then scour the stings with a Brillo pad.

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Tuesday March 03, 2009

Companies are Designed for Destruction

Robert Larson
Counterpunch

External Damnation

3.6 million jobs into this recession, insult has been added to injury. The Peanut Corporation of America, nut supplier to Kellogg and the lower-rent peanut butters, deliberately sold peanuts contaminated with the salmonella bacterium. Twelve times in the last two years. The current headline-grabbing salmonella outbreak is the most recent result of these knowingly–tainted shipments. Now, the FDA could have been on top of this, but companies aren’t obliged to inform the food regulator of the results of their own tests.

And then, even after the contaminated plant was found by the FDA, the full recall couldn’t be announced for almost three more weeks because the FDA has to obtain corporate approval of the wording of product recall announcements. While a few hundred more people enjoy nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea.
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Tuesday March 03, 2009

Vatican recognizes 'scientific realities'

The Associated Press

ROME:

A Vatican cardinal said Tuesday that the Catholic Church did not stand in the way of scientific realities like evolution, though he described as "absurd" the atheist notion that evolution proves there is no God.

Cardinal William Levada, head of the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, reiterated church teaching about faith and science at the start of a Vatican-sponsored conference marking the 150th anniversary of Charles Darwin's "The Origin of Species."
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Tuesday March 03, 2009

Rights - Australia: New Drive Against Racism

Stephen de Tarczynski
Inter Press Service

With new figures showing that 44 percent of Australians were either born overseas or have at least one parent who was, community organisations have welcomed a stepped-up government programme to tackle racial, cultural and religious intolerance.

The Diverse Australia Programme (DAP), as the initiative is called, was launched earlier this year by Laurie Ferguson, federal parliamentary secretary for multicultural affairs and settlement services.
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Tuesday March 03, 2009

Ukraine: Nation on the brink of bankruptcy

Mary Dejevsky
Independent

Ukraine is so broke the nation is expecting to be cut off this week for failing to pay the gas bill

When the United States sneezed, Old Europe's banks caught a heavy cold, and New Europe's mini-tiger economies have succumbed, one by one, to a nasty bout of flu. But in the so-called neighbourhood states immediately to the east, chief among them Ukraine, pneumonia threatens – and the experts' prognosis is not good.
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Tuesday March 03, 2009

Websites brace for Conficker worm attack

Gregg Keizer
Computerworld (US)

Computers infected by the Downadup worm will "phone home" to several legitimate URLs this month, including one owned by Southwest Airlines, potentially disrupting those sites, a security researcher has said.

According to a researcher at Sophos, the Downadup worm - also known as Conficker - will try to contact wnsux.com on 13 March for further instructions. That URL, however, is owned by Southwest Airlines, and redirects visitors to the airline's primary southwest.com address.
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Tuesday March 03, 2009

Secret Anti-Terror Bush Memos Made Public by Obama

Devlin Barrett
The Associated Press

The Justice Department on Monday released a long-secret legal document from 2001 in which the Bush administration claimed the military could search and seize terror suspects in the United States without warrants.

The legal memo was written about a month after the Sept. 11 terror attacks. It says constitutional protections against unlawful search and seizure would not apply to terror suspects in the U.S., as long as the president or another high official authorized the action.
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Tuesday March 03, 2009

Taliban rivals unite to fight US troop surge

Saeed Shah
The Guardian

Taliban rivals unite to fight US troop surge
Move by Pakistani militants prompts fears of escalation in Afghan violence

Three rival Pakistani Taliban groups have agreed to form a united front against international forces in Afghanistan in a move likely to intensify the insurgency just as thousands of extra US soldiers begin pouring into the country as part of Barack Obama's surge plan.
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Tuesday March 03, 2009

Flying people to torture and death

Corporate Watch

A Brighton family was forcibly deported to Algeria last week on an Air Algérie flight from Heathrow. The first attempt to deport them on a British Airways flight three days before had failed, allegedly because there was 'a problem with their tickets.'

Both times campaigners from Brighton and London gathered at the airport and leafleted crew members and passengers to try and get them to protest on board, which may explain why the deportation was cancelled the first time. Earlier that week, about 50 Iraqi refugees refused asylum were not so lucky to have 'tickets with problems' or protesters leafleting at the airport. Instead, they were surreptitiously taken through the VIP entrance at Stansted airport and put on a special 'ethnic charter flight' operated by a Czech airline, which carried them to Erbil in northern Iraq.

A few deportees were taken off the plane, just before it took off, after last-minute interventions by solicitors and MPs. One deportee was flown back to London after winning a High Court injunction.
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Tuesday March 03, 2009

Ethical stem cells stripped of 'cancer' genes

Peter Aldhous
New Scientist

Through a neat genetic trick, it is now possible to create "reprogrammed" stem cells that have been stripped of potentially cancer-causing genes. This latest advance boosts hopes of one day using these cells to treat devastating human diseases.

The reprogramming technique was originally developed by Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University in Japan, who used retroviruses to insert four genes into the chromosomes of mouse and human skin cells.
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Tuesday March 03, 2009

CIA Destroyed 92 Interrogation Tapes

Devlin Barrett
The Associated Press

New documents show the CIA destroyed nearly 100 tapes of terror interrogations, far more than has previously been acknowledged.

The revelation Monday comes as a criminal prosecutor is wrapping up his investigation in the matter.

The acknowledgment of dozens of destroyed tapes came in a letter filed by government lawyers in New York, where the American Civil Liberties Union has filed a lawsuit seeking more details of terror interrogation programs.
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Tuesday March 03, 2009

Science Museum accused over links to Israel

Arifa Akbar
Independent

Protesters claim it is promoting universities that aided recent military assault on Gaza

The Science Museum, one of Britain's most prestigious public institutions, was embroiled in a row last night after being accused of promoting Israeli universities whose research was used in the country's military campaign in Gaza.

More than 400 academics, a Nobel laureate and the former chair of the Science Select Committee called on the museum to cancel workshops due to be held this week that promote Israeli scientific achievements to schoolchildren.
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Tuesday March 03, 2009

Sex Is Natural. So Why Are So Many People So Bad at It?

Liz Langley
AlterNet

The truth is, everyone can use some adult sex education.

Leave it to me to bogart the pussy.

The pussy isn't mine, it isn't real and it isn't the only one I'll be seeing in the next few days. It is a luxuriant, anatomically correct pillow about the size of a large cat (no kidding).

It belongs to Sheri Winston, sex educator, counselor, former nurse practitioner/midwife and founder of the Center for the Intimate Arts, who is here in Orlando, Fla., to teach classes on Wholistic Sexuality.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Capitalism in Ruins

André Pratte
La Presse

The fall of the Berlin Wall consecrated the triumph of free market neoliberalism over its toughest ideological rival. The whole world was to become capitalist, in one way or another, from Dallas to Shanghai.

The capitalists were bad winners. They pushed their system to the extreme, that is to say, to excess. Outrageous risks, gargantuan appetites, crass incompetence and arrogance, brazen frauds have marked the last decade - until the temple's columns collapsed.
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Monday March 02, 2009

How to spot a hidden religious agenda

Amanda Gefter
New Scientist

Aa a book reviews editor at New Scientist, I often come across so-called science books which after a few pages reveal themselves to be harbouring ulterior motives. I have learned to recognise clues that the author is pushing a religious agenda. As creationists in the US continue to lose court battles over attempts to have intelligent design taught as science in federally funded schools, their strategy has been forced to... well, evolve.

That means ensuring that references to pseudoscientific concepts like ID are more heavily veiled. So I thought I'd share a few tips for spotting what may be religion in science's clothing.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Blair says Gaza crossings must be opened to assist rebuilding

Donald Macintyre
Independent

Former Prime Minister makes first visit to territory since becoming envoy

Tony Blair has called for Gaza's crossings to be opened for basic building and other commercial goods, adding to international pressure on Israel likely to be exerted at today's Egypt-hosted post-war reconstruction summit.

On his long-awaited first visit to the Palestinian territory as Middle East envoy from the international quartet – the UN, US, EU and Russia – Mr Blair said that the 20-month blockade inflicted on the territory's 1.5 million inhabitants "does not work".
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Monday March 02, 2009

Worldwide PC sales set to crash

Oliver Garnham
PC Advisor

The worldwide PC market is set to experience its sharpest unit decline in history, as more and more customers opt to hold onto their existing kit for longer thanks to the economic downturn.

So says analyst house Gartner, which said that PC shipments will hit 257 million units in 2009, an 11.9 percent drop since last year. The drop will be nearly four times that experienced in 2001, when PC shipments fell by 3.2 percent.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Gates: Iran "Not Close" to Nuclear Weapon

Deborah Zabarenko
Reuters

Washington - Iran is not close to having a nuclear weapon, which gives the United States and others time to try to persuade Tehran to abandon its suspected atomic arms program, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Sunday.

"They're not close to a stockpile, they're not close to a weapon at this point, and so there is some time," Gates said on NBC television's "Meet The Press."
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Monday March 02, 2009

Future TV screens seen in coffee stains

Anil Ananthaswamy
New Scientist

THE rings left behind by spilled coffee have inspired a new way to make ultrathin coatings for LCD and plasma flat-screens.

In LCDs, transparent conductive coatings are used to form an electrode on the surface of the screen, while in plasma TVs they provide a shield that prevents electromagnetic fields from straying.

The traditional techniques for making such coatings include sputtering a fine layer of indium tin oxide onto the surface. ITO is highly conductive and transparent to visible light, but the process is expensive, requiring clean rooms and vacuum chambers.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Boris jumps on board France's 'hire an electric car' scheme

Michael McCarthy
independent

Mayor may bring green travel scheme to London

First it was public bicycles he was bringing to the streets of London. Now Mayor Boris Johnson is looking at pinching another green travel idea from the French – a public electric car hire scheme.

The project would allow casual car users to pick up a publicly-owned, battery-powered, zero-carbon vehicle in one part of the city and easily drop it off in another.
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Monday March 02, 2009

The secret to a low carbon diet

Graeme Stemp-Morlock
Green Living Online

New Canadian research shows that eating local isn’t the only important ingredient.

In recent years, many environmentalists have heralded local food as the greenest way to eat. But new research, including some from Canadian researchers, is showing that that’s not the whole story.

Nathan Pelletier, a researcher at Dalhousie University’s School for Resource and Environmental Studies, in Halifax, has found that the real recipe for a low carbon diet is to consider not just how far food is transported but also how it is produced.
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Monday March 02, 2009

The 6 Strangest Objects People Were Caught Having Sex With

Daniel Barton
Cracked.com

Have you ever walked past a piece of furniture or some other inanimate object and thought, "Hey, that's got a hole in it. I wonder if I can stick my dick in there..."

If you have, you're not alone. Either due to bizarre sexual fetishes or just plain boredom, men have gotten caught screwing anything and everything. Some of which don't even seem possible. Take for instance...
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Monday March 02, 2009

World of Warcraft: 'the crack cocaine of the computer world'

Austin Modine in Lightinghoof
The Register

Swedes finger WoW as dangerous addiction

Is World of Warcraft as addictive as crack cocaine?

Some say yes. Others are too busy playing World of Warcraft to answer.

The former opinion is given by a Swedish youth organization that works with addictions. The org says it's releasing a new report labeling the online swords n' sorcery excursion as "the most dangerous game on the market."
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Monday March 02, 2009

Fluoride in the water - even if you don’t want it

Jenny Hope
Daily Mail

Flashback: Scientific Study Finds Fluoride Horror Stories Factual

A health trust has become the first to force through a move to add fluoride to tap water to fight tooth decay in children.

The decision was made using new laws to introduce fluoridation, although three in four members of the public and a county council opposed it.

Adding fluoride to water has been described by critics as ‘mass medication’ of the population because, unlike chlorine, it is not added to make supplies safe.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Couple Charged By NY Drug Police For Having Organic Chocolate

David Silverberg
Now Magazine

Feel like a little nip of organic chocolate while you’re heading to the Big Apple, Chicago or San Fran? Careful now. If you’re crossing the border with a fair trade sweet, you may get busted for drugs.

That’s what happened to Nadine Artemis and Ron Obadia, owners of Haliburton-?based alternative health company Living Libations. Sure, the New York State Police dropped charges of trafficking a controlled substance late last month – thousands in lawyer’s fees later.
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Monday March 02, 2009

American taste for soft toilet roll 'worse than driving Hummers'

Suzanne Goldenberg
The Guardian

Extra-soft, quilted and multi-ply toilet roll made from virgin forest causes more damage than gas-guzzlers, fast food or McMansions, say campaigners

The tenderness of the delicate American buttock is causing more environmental devastation than the country's love of gas-guzzling cars, fast food or McMansions, according to green campaigners. At fault, they say, is the US public's insistence on extra-soft, quilted and multi-ply products when they use the bathroom.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Mugabe: Last white farmer should leave

Raymond Whitaker
Independent

Speaking at a rally to celebrate his 85th birthday, Zimbabwe's President says that the farm seizures will go on.

A defiant President Robert Mugabe used his 85th birthday celebrations yesterday to insist that land seizures would continue, and called for the country's last white farmers to leave. "Land distribution will continue. It will not stop," Mr Mugabe told a rally in his home area of Chinhoyi, north-west of the capital, Harare. "The few remaining white farmers should quickly vacate their farms as they have no place there.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Chavez says Obama same as Bush on drug war

AFP

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on Saturday condemned a US report on global counternarcotics, saying President Barack Obama is continuing the policies of his predecessor, George W. Bush.

“Is there a new government in the United States or is it Bush still in power? Obama seems to be a continuation of the Bush era. But it doesn’t matter to me. Regardless of US imperialism, this revolution will continue its course,” Chavez said in a speech.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Fairtrade – the new gold standard

Martin Hickman
Independent

Ethical foundation targets precious metal industry to ensure fair pay for miners

We have had bananas, coffee, and tea but now the latest Fairtrade product is ethical gold. Gold miners have jobs that are among the most arduous in the world. They spend long hours underground with little or no safety equipment, working with poisons such as cyanide and hewing the precious metal out of the ground for wealthy Westerners.

Some of the 20 million artisanal, or self-employed, miners earn less than $1 (70p) a day so the foundation is backing a plan to sell gold from South American miners who are trying to improve their lives.
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Monday March 02, 2009

UN attacks Britain over torture claims

Mark Townsend
The Observer

Investigator raises 'very clear allegations' that MI5 broke international law

Britain may have broken international law on torture, ministers have been warned by the United Nations. Professor Manfred Nowak, the UN's special rapporteur on torture, has alerted ministers to a range of concerns, including claims that MI5 officers were complicit in the maltreatment of suspects.

The Austrian law professor warned that Britain has breached the UN convention on torture, and he revealed that he was organising a fact-finding mission to Pakistan, whose security services allegedly tortured terror suspects before the captives were questioned by British intelligence.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Where the Cheats Have No Shame

Harry Browne
Counterpunch

Entries have already been pouring in to the ‘rewrite a U2 song’ competition in honour of the group’s Irish tax-exile status, as described here on Counterpunch by Eamonn McCann. ‘Where the Streets Have No Name’ has been recast as ‘Where the Cheats Have No Shame’, ‘Angel of Harlem’ as ‘Arrangement in Holland’ -- and those are just the entries from my house.

But CounterPunchers are rarely less than fair, so we just had to read more when we saw this news intro on page-one of today’s Irish Times: “U2 singer Bono says he was ‘stung’ and ‘hurt’ by criticism of the band moving part of its business to the Netherlands to lessen its tax burden.”
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Monday March 02, 2009

On Being a Sandy Blonde

Sasha Costello
Last Exit Magazine

What it means to have yellow hair in the Middle East.

Over the course of a lifetime of studying peoples’ interactions with me I had figured out when and how to play my blonde card. But that was in the West. When I moved to Abu Dhabi six months ago the game changed dramatically. Today, I’m still adjusting to the fixation people, specifically men, in this corner of the Earth have with my hair.

Anywhere in the world, being born blonde comes with a whole set of assumptions people have about you that are not necessarily easy to deal with. Blondes have more fun, for example. Well, sure we do – to a point.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Celebrating 90 Years of Bauhaus

Ulrike Knöfel
Spiegel International

The legendary Bauhaus movement turns 90 this year and the anniversary is being marked by exhibitions from Tokyo to New York. The school was founded by a young architect, Walter Gropius, who wanted to shape products for the future and create a more just society.

In times of gloom and doom, there is often a need for the charismatic energy of great ideas. Back in 1919 German architect Walter Gropius regarded the miserable period following the end of the World War I as a "catastrophe of world history.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Court Rejects Obama Bid to Stop Wiretapping Suit

Devlin Barrett
The Associated Press

Washington - The Obama administration has lost its argument that a potential threat to national security should stop a lawsuit challenging the government's warrantless wiretapping program.

A federal appeals court in San Francisco on Friday rejected the Justice Department's request for an emergency stay in a case involving a defunct Islamic charity.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Improve mental health with neurofeedback

Blaine Greteman
Ode magazine

How you can train your brain to help reduce stress, enhance creativity and improve mental health.

As Vicki Wyatt attaches electrodes to my scalp with a generous glop of slimy goo, I'll admit I'm a little skeptical about the calming effects of the treatment I'm about to experience. With newborn twins at home, I usually have enough slime in my life and on my clothes to push anyone over the abyss. But that, says Wyatt, is precisely why I could benefit from neurofeedback, a therapeutic tool that advocates claim can reshape our brains—and our lives.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Robert Fisk’s World: Examine the Pope's words, and there's only one thing to conclude

Robert Fisk
Independent

Benedict will demean other religions to prove Christianity’s ‘superiority’

So it's all the fault of the Pope's satraps. "Vatican advisers blamed for Pope's woes," I was informed by one headline. "A self-imposed cone (sic) of silence surrounds Benedict." And now poor old Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, Benedict XVI, the solitary German who found himself manning an anti-aircraft gun at the end of the Second World War ("briefly" and "unwillingly", I know) has had some "harsh words" for his advisers because – according to the Vatican – he "had no idea of Bishop Williamson's views before lifting an excommunication order against him last month"
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Monday March 02, 2009

Obama Announces Iraq Withdrawal Plan

Anne E. Kornblut and William Branigin
The Washington Post

President Obama announced plans Friday to withdraw the bulk of U.S. forces from Iraq by Aug. 31, 2010, and to pull out all remaining troops by the end of 2011, ending the war in Iraq and launching "a new era of American leadership and engagement in the Middle East."

In a speech to Marines at this base in North Carolina, Obama announced a three-pronged strategy beginning with "the responsible removal of our combat brigades from Iraq."
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Monday March 02, 2009

Did India Win an Oscar?

J. Sri Raman
Truthout

For hours last Monday morning, India stayed glued to television sets. No, it was not a minute-by-minute account of a Mumbai-like terrorist attack that held the nation of one billion spellbound. Nor was the whole country watching a cricket match, which can often keep it away from all other occupations.

The anxious millions were watching the multi-star Oscar awards ceremony at the Kodak Theater in Hollywood. Their patience was rewarded, and their prayers were answered.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Ministers Say Yes to Mercury Treaty

Joyce Mulama
Inter Press Service

Six thousand tonnes of mercury enter the environment every year, posing a threat to human and animal health. Environment ministers meeting in Kenya have agreed to negotiate a treaty to reduce the supply and use of mercury worldwide.

The ministers from 140 countries, attending UNEP's Governing Council meeting in Nairobi Feb 16-20, reached consensus to begin negotiating a legally-binding instrument to control mercury pollution next year, leading to a treaty for signature in 2013.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Immorality really is in bad taste

John von Radowitz
Independent

Immoral behaviour really does leave a "bad taste in the mouth" by tapping into an ancient mechanism that helps us avoid poisons and disease, say scientists. Researchers who studied the facial expressions of volunteers found close similarities between their reaction to moral outrage and feelings of "disgust".

A wrinkled nose and curl of the upper lip are classic signs of disgust, an ancient response that evolved to keep people away from infection and danger.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Droughts 'may lay waste' to parts of US

Suzanne Goldenberg
The Guardian

The world's pre-eminent climate scientists produced a blunt assessment of the impact of global warming on the US yesterday, warning of droughts that could reduce the American south-west to a wasteland and heatwaves that could make life impossible even in northern cities.

In an update on the latest science on climate change, the US Congress was told that melting snow pack could lead to severe drought from California to Oklahoma. In the midwest, diminishing rains and shrinking rivers were lowering water levels in the Great Lakes, even to the extent where it could affect shipping.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Direct Action Against Israel – Part 2

Corporate Watch

Last month Corporate Watch looked at the private companies in the arms trade, agricultural produce, banks and media sectors that have been targeted by Palestine solidarity protesters and campaigns (see Part 1 here). This month we take a detailed look at supermarkets and other food chains.

5. SUPERMARKETS
All major UK retailers sell Israeli goods, and most of them sell produce from illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Some have made statements in support of Zionism and some have contracts with Israeli companies.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Britain Admits Handing Over Terrorism Suspects to US

Julie Sell
McClatchy Newspapers

Contradicting previous denials about Britain's participation in the Bush administration's global war on terrorism, Defense Minister John Hutton said Thursday that Britain had handed over two terrorism suspects it captured in Iraq to the U.S., which sent them to Afghanistan, where they're still being held after more than four years.

The men, thought to be Pakistani nationals, are members of Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistani Islamist group with links to al Qaida, and have been classified as "unlawful enemy combatants," Hutton said.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Senate to Investigate CIA's Actions Under Bush

Greg Miller
The Los Angeles Times

Washington - The Senate Intelligence Committee is preparing to launch an investigation of the CIA's detention and interrogation programs under President Bush, setting the stage for a sweeping examination of some of most secretive and controversial operations in recent agency history.

The probe is aimed at uncovering new information on the origins of the programs as well as scrutinizing how they were executed -- from the conditions at clandestine CIA prison sites to the interrogation regimens used to break Al Qaeda prisoners, according to Senate aides familiar with the inquiry plans.
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Monday March 02, 2009

UK declines to prosecute McKinnon

Jeremy Kirk
IDG News Service

The likelihood of British hacker Gary McKinnon's extradition to the United States to face hacking charges moved a step closer, after British authorities said they won't prosecute him in the United Kingdom.

McKinnon, of London, has said he would plead guilty to an offense under the UK's Computer Misuse Act if he could stay in the country rather than face trial in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, where he was indicted in November 2002
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Monday March 02, 2009

Mobiles get the crash test

Simon Usborne
Independent

Phones are always being dropped, squashed and prodded. So how on earth do they survive?

Tied down with metal clamps on steel benches, ranks of mobile phones are being technologically tortured. If they could cry out, they would – but nobody would hear, because the noise of a hundred steel pistons pummelling their fascias is so loud that people rarely visit this windowless room for more than a few minutes at a time.

And, anyway, the walls are soundproofed. "This is what I do," Kevin Smith shouts over the din. "I break mobile phones."
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Monday March 02, 2009

Salmonella in Peanut Butter, Melamine in Milk -- How Do We Know What's Safe to Eat?

Jill Richardson
AlterNet

One can go vegetarian, buy organic, or avoid processed foods, but it is hard to truly avoid all of the dangers that lurk in our food.

As the news headlines appear, one by one, about salmonella in peanut butter, antibiotics found in vegetables, melamine in milk, mercury in high fructose corn syrup and the potential of clones in the U.S. food supply, consumers have more and more reasons to be wary of our industrial food system.

One can go vegetarian, buy organic, or avoid processed foods, but it is hard to truly avoid all of the dangers that lurk in our food.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Bishops of Liverpool and London call for "carbon fast" during Lent

Adam Vaughan
The Guardian

Energy minister Ed Milliband supports clergymen's call for 40-day experiment in carbon sacrifice

The UK's energy and climate change minister Ed Miliband has joined church leaders by calling for a "carbon fast" this Lent. Along with the Right Rev James Jones, bishop of Liverpool, and the Right Rev Dr Richard Chartres, bishop of London, Miliband is encouraging the British public to cut their carbon footprints during the 40-day fast by taking steps such as removing a light bulb at home.
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Monday March 02, 2009

MIDEAST: 'EU Paying for Gaza Blockade'

David Cronin
Inter Press Service

European Union aid has been given to an Israeli oil company which has reduced the supply of fuel to Gaza as part of an economic blockade internationally recognised as illegal, Brussels officials have admitted.

Almost 97 million euros (124 million dollars) in funds managed by the European Commission, the executive arm of the EU, were handed over directly to the firm Dor Alon between February 2008 and January this year. Under orders from the Israeli authorities, Dor Alon has been rationing the amount of industrial diesel brought into Gaza in order to deprive its 1.5 million inhabitants of electricity.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Virtualisation's new frontier - the mobile phone

Maxwell Cooter
Techworld

We've had virtual storage, virtual machines and virtual data centres now VMware is looking to the next frontier: the virtual mobile phone.

The company has announced the mobile virtualisation platform (MVP) aimed at handset vendors to enable mobile users to choose between two different platforms or phone numbers on a single handset.
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Monday March 02, 2009

'Sinful' city buses stoned by ultra-Orthodox Jews

Ben Lynfield
independent

It is an all too familiar scene: the Israeli bus, travelling near predominantly Palestinian East Jerusalem, is pelted with stones that smash windows and startle passengers. Except this time the stone-throwers are not Arabs but Jews. The violence is part of an unholy war in which strident elements of the ultra-Orthodox community in Mea Shearim are trying to force Israel's leading bus company – and, by extension, Israeli society – to defer to their strict religious teachings and sensibilities.

Although Israel defines itself as a Jewish state, what that means in practice is subject to dispute, with religious and secular Jews constantly tugging for greater clout in shaping the character of the country.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Jail Sentences for Cops Who Planted Pot on 92-Year Old They Killed in Botched Drug Raid

Christopher Moraff
AlterNet

Three former Atlanta police officers were sentenced for shooting Kathryn Johnston and attempting to cover up their cruel acts.

Three former Atlanta police officers were sentenced to prison time this week for the shooting death of a 92 year-old grandmother after breaking down her door during a botched drug raid.

Jason Smith, Gregg Junnier and Arthur Tesler received sentences ranging from five to 10 years on charges of conspiracy to violate civil rights resulting in death.
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Monday March 02, 2009

My Role in the Torture of Binyam Mohamed

Barbara Ehrenreich
Barbaraehrenreich.com

I like to think that some of the things I write cause discomfort in those readers who deserve to feel it. Ideally, they should squirm, they should flinch, they might even experience fleeting gastrointestinal symptoms. But I have always drawn the line at torture. It may be unpleasant to read some of my writings, especially if they have been assigned by a professor, but it should not result in uncontrollable screaming, genital mutilation or significant blood loss.

With such stringent journalistic ethics in place, I was shocked to read in the February 14th Daily Mail Online a brief article headed "Food writer's online guide to building an H-bomb...the 'evidence' that put this man in Guantanamo." The "food writer" was identified as me, and the story began:
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Monday March 02, 2009

Fight against terror 'spells end of privacy'

Alan Travis
The Guardian

Former security chief warns searching personal data will 'break moral rules'

Privacy rights of innocent people will have to be sacrificed to give the security services access to a sweeping range of personal data, one of the architects of the government's national security strategy has warned.

Sir David Omand, the former Whitehall security and intelligence co-ordinator, sets out a blueprint for the way the state will mine data - including travel information, phone records and emails - held by public and private bodies and admits: "Finding out other people's secrets is going to involve breaking everyday moral rules."
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Monday March 02, 2009

The Dam Building Boom: Right Path to Clean Energy?

David Biello
Yale e360

Led by China, the developing world is engaged in a flurry of dam construction, touting hydropower as renewable energy in an era of global warming. But critics point out that the human and environmental costs of dams remain high.

The Jinsha River tumbles down from the highlands of the Tibetan Plateau and courses through China for more than 1,300 miles before becoming the Yangtze. Until recently, it was a free-flowing waterway that ran through the picturesque landscape of Yunnan and Sichuan Provinces, but that is changing rapidly.
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Monday March 02, 2009

War Criminals, Including Their Lawyers, Must Be Prosecuted

Marjorie Cohn
AlterNet

We need a special prosecutor to investigate and prosecute criminal lawyers like John Yoo who gave Bush et al legal cover.

Since he took office, President Obama has instituted many changes that break with the policies of the Bush administration. The new president has ordered that no government agency will be allowed to torture, that the U.S. prison at Guantánamo will be shuttered, and that the CIA's secret black sites will be closed down.

But Obama is non-committal when asked whether he will seek investigation and prosecution of Bush officials who broke the law.
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Monday March 02, 2009

'Hamas Won't Give In To Blackmail' *

Mel Frykberg
Inter Press Service

At the eleventh hour, just as a permanent ceasefire painfully mediated by the Egyptians after weeks of intensive shuttle diplomacy was about to take effect, Israel suddenly changed its preconditions for a settlement with Hamas.

This has left the Palestinians, especially Gazans, the Egyptians, the Hamas leadership and even some Israeli analysts wondering just what will happen next. The humanitarian crisis in Gaza remains unresolved and the current tentative ceasefire looks increasingly fragile as intermittent violence continues.

IPS spoke to Dr Ahmed Yousef, the Gaza-based Hamas Foreign Minister and political advisor to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh about the stalemate.
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Monday March 02, 2009

The Sun Rises in the East

Grist

Japan may force utilities to buy surplus domestic solar power

Japan plans to soon require electricity companies to buy surplus power generated by household solar panels at about twice the current price, a government official said Tuesday.

The scheme, to start as early as the fiscal year beginning in April, aims to promote solar power as part of efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions that drive global warming, an industry ministry official said.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Can Gaza Be Rebuilt Through Tunnels?

Ann Wright
Truthout

The blockade continues - no supplies, no rebuilding.

How do you rebuild 5,000 homes, businesses and government buildings when the only way supplies come into the prison called Gaza is through tunnels? Will the steel I-beams for roofs bend 90 degrees to go through the tunnels from Egypt?

Will the tons of cement, lumber, roofing materials, nails, dry wall and paint be hauled by hand, load after load, 70 feet underground, through a tunnel 500 to 900 feet long and then be pulled up a 70-foot hole and put into a waiting truck in Gaza?
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Monday March 02, 2009

Excel 2007 hit by 'zero day' attack

Jeremy Kirk
IDG News Service

Microsoft's Excel spreadsheet has a zero day (0-day) vulnerability that attackers are exploiting on the Internet, according to security vendor Symantec.

A 0-day vulnerability is one that does not have a patch and is actively being used to attack computers when it is publically revealed. The problem affects Excel 2007 and the same version of that program with Service Pack 1, according to an advisory on SecurityFocus, a website that tracks software flaws.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Psychologists find gene that helps you look on the bright side of life

Ian Sample
The Guardian

Those unfortunate enough to lack the 'brightside gene' are more likely to suffer from mental health problems such as depression

If life looks cheery in spite of the gloomy weather, mass job insecurity and the suspicion that spending hours on Facebook is mangling your mind, you might want to thank your brightside gene.

It seems that for some of us, seeing the glass as half full is hardwired into our genetic make-up, helping us shrug off the miseries of life and enjoy the positives.
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Monday March 02, 2009

One in nine people who live in UK born abroad

Ben Russell
Independent

Recession slows influx of eastern European workers

The rapidly changing face of Britain was laid bare yesterday in new figures showing that one in nine people living in Britain were born abroad.

Official statistics showed the number of people born overseas who were resident in Britain increased by 290,000 last year to a record 6.5 million.

The figures included 4.1 million foreign nationals living in the country in the year to June 2008, up from 3.8 million in the previous 12 months, according to the Office for National Statistics.
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Monday March 02, 2009

A Planet at the Brink

Michael T. Klare
Tomdispatch.com

Will Economic Brushfires Prove Too Virulent to Contain?

The global economic meltdown has already caused bank failures, bankruptcies, plant closings, and foreclosures and will, in the coming year, leave many tens of millions unemployed across the planet. But another perilous consequence of the crash of 2008 has only recently made its appearance: increased civil unrest and ethnic strife. Someday, perhaps, war may follow.

As people lose confidence in the ability of markets and governments to solve the global crisis, they are likely to erupt into violent protests or to assault others they deem responsible for their plight, including government officials, plant managers, landlords, immigrants, and ethnic minorities.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Taxing Pot Could Become a Political Toking Point

Eric Bailey
The Los Angeles Times

An assemblyman from San Francisco argues that it's time to tax and regulate the state's biggest cash crop in the same manner as alcohol. Opponents say it would create new costs for society.

Sacramento - Could Cannabis sativa be a salvation for California's fiscal misfortunes? Can the state get a better budget grip by taxing what some folks toke?

An assemblyman from San Francisco announced legislation Monday to do just that: make California the first state in the nation to tax and regulate recreational marijuana in the same manner as alcohol.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Google pledges to support EU's Microsoft case

Bobbie Johnson
The Guardian

Internet giant has said it wants to join European investigation into accusations of anti-competitive behaviour by rival

Google has become the latest company to join the chorus of voices supporting the European Commission's investigation of Microsoft over allegations of anti-competitive behaviour.

The Silicon Valley internet giant said yesterday that it was hoping to become a party to Commission's investigation into Microsoft's dominance of the internet browser market.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Judge Questions Law Giving Telecoms Immunity

Bob Egelko
The San Francisco Chronicle

A federal judge in San Francisco is raising questions about the constitutionality of a law designed to dismiss suits against telecommunications companies accused of cooperating with government wiretapping.

Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker has asked President Obama's Justice Department to present its views by Wednesday on whether the law gives the attorney general too much power to decide whether a company is immune from lawsuits. Obama supported the measure as a senator when Congress approved it last year.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Beyond Scarcity: Reinventing Wealth in a Progressive World

Joe Brewer
Truthout

We are bound to make the world in our own image. So, we had better be sure we have the right values in mind as we think about ourselves in this historic transition.

The current economic crisis is causing a massive redistribution of wealth across society. With a newfound capacity to shape our nation's destiny, progressives can take this opportunity to redefine ourselves - especially our ideas about wealth and prosperity - as we seek to build a flourishing society.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Lost in Lagos? The mystery of Jack Straw and the Nigerian scammers

Jonathan Brown
Independent

A message from 'Jack': "I misplaced my wallet on my way to the hotel where my money and other valuable things were kept..." "I would like you to assist me with a soft loan urgently to settle my hotel bills and get myself back home"

It was an astonishing plea for help. A desperate Justice Secretary Jack Straw, stranded in the steaming West African city of Lagos, with no money and nowhere to stay. His urgent demand: please send $3,000 to bring me home.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Former Guantanamo Detainee Returns to London

Kevin Sullivan
The Washington Post

London - A former British resident released after seven years in detention, more than four of them at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, arrived back in London on Monday and issued a statement alleging that the United States government had subjected him to years of "medieval" torture.

"It is still difficult for me to believe that I was abducted, hauled from one country to the next, and tortured in medieval ways - all orchestrated by the United States government," Binyam Mohamed 30, said in the statement released by his attorneys at a London news conference.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Microsoft testing new super-secure browser

Jeremy Kirk
IDG News Service

Microsoft researchers are developing a new web browser that they claim could offer a far greater degree of security than Google's Chrome, Mozilla's Firefox or Microsoft's own Internet Explorer.

The browser, called Gazelle, relies on 5,000 lines of C code called a "browser kernel" that helps enforce security rules to prevent malicious access to the PC's underlying operating system, according to a recently published paper.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Outstanding 'complexity' wins Naomi Klein £50,000 inaugural Warwick prize

Alison Flood and Lindesay Irvine
The Guardian

The complexity of Naomi Klein's portrayal of the rise of disaster capitalism, The Shock Doctrine, has won its author the inaugural £50,000 Warwick prize for writing.

The biennial prize, run by Warwick University, is promising to be one of the most unusual prizes on the books calendar, not least because it will tackle a different theme every two years, with "complexity" chosen as its initial focus.
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Monday March 02, 2009

Straw blocks Cabinet Iraq minutes

James Tapsfield
Independent

The Government will exercise veto powers to block publication of key Cabinet minutes under freedom of information laws, it was announced today.

Justice Secretary Jack Straw said he could not permit the release of records from 2003 discussions over the invasion of Iraq because it would cause too much "damage" to democracy.

He told MPs he had signed a certificate vetoing rulings by the Information Commissioner and Information Tribunal that key records should be disclosed.
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