Maxtor drives contain password-stealing Trojans

Seagate Technology LLC has shipped Maxtor disk drives that contain Trojan horses that upload data to a pair of Chinese Web sites, the Taiwanese government's security service warned this weekend.

The Investigation Bureau, a part of the Ministry of Justice that's responsible for both internal security and foreign threats, said it suspected mainland China's authorities were responsible for planting the malware on the drives at the factory. "The bureau said that the method of attack was unusual, adding that it suspected Chinese authorities were involved," a story posted by the English-language Taipei Times reported Sunday. "Sensitive information may have already been intercepted by Beijing through the two Web sites, the bureau said."

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Colorado SC Affirms "Egg-as-Person"

In a terse 7-0 decision today, the Colorado Supreme Court affirmed the decision of the state Title Board's approval of a 2008 proposed ballot measure to bestow constitutional rights on fertilized human eggs.

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Ron Paul Collecting Fans, Big Money

Paul remains a very long shot for the nomination. But as the only Republican candidate backing a prompt troop withdrawal from Iraq - and an airing of possible impeachment charges against Vice President Dick Cheney - he appeals to a mix of liberals and conservatives who feel alienated and deeply distrustful of the government.

That "long shot" gets smaller each day.

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MRSA faces defeat from wild flower

Researchers at Cork Institute of Technology (CIT) have revealed the bright yellow flower known as inula helenium kills the lethal bug, which is resistant to some of the strongest antibiotics on the market.

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Virulent form of cold virus spreads in U.S.

Two of the 10 people who have died from the new strain were infants, Su said. The CDC report said about 140 people have been sickened by the virus and more than 50 hospitalized, including 24 admitted to intensive care units.

...

"What makes this particular adenovirus a little different is that it has the capability of making healthy young adults severely ill. And that's unusual for an adenovirus, and that's why it's got our attention," Su added.

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Saudi punishes gang rape victim with 200 lashes

A court in the ultra-conservative kingdom of Saudi Arabia is punishing a female victim of gang rape with 200 lashes and six months in jail, a newspaper reported on Thursday.

The 19-year-old woman -- whose six armed attackers have been sentenced to jail terms -- was initially ordered to undergo 90 lashes for "being in the car of an unrelated male at the time of the rape," the Arab News reported.

But in a new verdict issued after Saudi Arabia's Higher Judicial Council ordered a retrial, the court in the eastern town of Al-Qatif more than doubled the number of lashes to 200.

A court source told the English-language Arab News that the judges had decided to punish the woman further for "her attempt to aggravate and influence the judiciary through the media."

This is the world we humans have created.

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GPS Helps Cities Catch Goof-Offs

GPS tracking devices installed on government-issue vehicles are helping communities around the country reduce waste and abuse, in part by catching employees shopping, working out at the gym or otherwise loafing while on the clock.

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Decision time for US over Iran threat

The installation of 3,000 fully-functioning centrifuges at Iran's enrichment plant at Natanz is a "red line" drawn by the US across which Washington had said it would not let Iran pass. When spinning at full speed they are capable of producing sufficient weapons-grade uranium (enriched to over 90% purity) for a nuclear weapon within a year.

The IAEA says the uranium being produced is only fuel grade (enriched to 4%) but the confirmation that Iran has reached the 3,000 centrifuge benchmark brings closer a moment of truth for the Bush administration, when it will have to choose between taking military action or abandoning its red line, and accepting Iran's technical mastery of uranium enrichment.

US generals are reported to have warned the White House that military action would trigger a devastating Iranian backlash in the Middle East and beyond.

Since when did the Bush administration care what US generals had to say?

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Could the next President be even scarier?

But by the time the meetings end — be they with advisers to Democrats like Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards, or Republicans such as Rudolph Giuliani and Mitt Romney — the visitors usually have the same reaction, says Smith, the director of the Europe Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "The response is usually a little bit of shock and awe and disappointment. They say, 'What do you mean? We thought this would be a new era!' "

Read more and don't vote for any of the "leading" politicians.

The Foolishness and Immorality of Gun Control

“I’m sure there were a lot of Rwandans who wish they’d had a gun — especially a good weapon like the Kalashnikov — to protect themselves, their families, and their communities from rampaging Hutus. Cutting off firearms ‘at the manufacturers’ level’ — or more accurately, at the level where only the government could legally import weapons and only government soldiers could legally have one — left literally hundreds of thousands — some estimates say upwards of a million — at the mercy of machete-wielding thugs who chopped them and their families and their communities to bits. The absence of firearms did not save anyone, did not deter anyone. Instead, it cost about a million lives. And it only took about three months.”

In the 20th century, tyrannical governments were responsible for approximately 170,000,000 nonmilitary deaths: Armenian Christians in Turkey, “undesirables” of all sorts in Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany, political dissenters in Nationalist and later Communist China, Mayan aboriginals in Guatemala, Ugandans, Cambodians, and the ethnic Tutsis of Rwanda. In every single case, the victims were first subjected to mass disarmament.

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Dominatrix who claimed to have S&M sex with Bush said to be missing

Leola McConnell, the former dominatrice and militant for civil equality for people of all sexual orientations — who claimed in her memoir, “Lustful Utterances,” to have had S&M sex with George Bush in the 1980s — is feared by friends to be missing, according to this report:

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Terror crackdown: Passengers forced to answer 53 questions BEFORE they travel

Travellers face price hikes and confusion after the Government unveiled plans to take up to 53 pieces of information from anyone entering or leaving Britain.

For every journey, security officials will want credit card details, holiday contact numbers, travel plans, email addresses, car numbers and even any previous missed flights.

Make...note: ... Never...visit...Britain.

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Tree man 'who grew roots' may be cured

An Indonesian fisherman who feared that he would be killed by tree-like growths covering his body has been given hope of recovery by an American doctor - and Vitamin A.

...

Dede's problem is that he has a rare genetic fault that impedes his immune system, meaning his body is unable to contain the warts.

The virus was therefore able to "hijack the cellular machinery of his skin cells", ordering them to produce massive amounts of the substance that caused the tree-like growths known as "cutaneous horns" on his hands and feet.

...

"I've never seen anything like this in my entire career."

You have to see the pictures.

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Gordon Brown reveals 'Fortress Britain' plan

He conjured up visions of ''Fortress Britain" as he unveiled a succession of security measures at airports, railway stations, sports venues and other public places.

There is also to be a huge "hearts and minds" drive aimed at diverting young Muslims away from the influence of fanatics.

Religious fanatics are not limited to Muslims.

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Russia sect holes up in cave to await end of world

At least 30 members of a Russian doomsday cult have barricaded themselves in a remote cave to await the end of the world and are threatening to commit suicide if police intervene, officials and media said on Thursday.

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"They are simple Christians," a local priest, Father Georgy, told NTV television station. "They say: 'The church is doing a bad job, the end of the world is coming soon and we are all saving ourselves'."

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Most at NYU say their vote has a price

Two-thirds say they'll do it for a year's tuition. And for a few, even an iPod touch will do.

That's what NYU students said they'd take in exchange for their right to vote in the next presidential election, a recent survey by an NYU journalism class found.

Only 20 percent said they'd exchange their vote for an iPod touch.

But 66 percent said they'd forfeit their vote for a free ride to NYU. And half said they'd give up the right to vote forever for $1 million.

The future gets bleaker every day.

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Scientists create first cloned embryo from primate

Scientists said Wednesday they had created the world's first cloned embryo from a monkey, in work that could spur cloning of human cells for use in medical research.

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Sensitive Guantánamo Bay Manual Leaked Through Wiki Site

The manual shows how the military coded each prisoner according to the level of access the Red Cross would have. The four levels are:

...

The No Access level troubles Dakwar.

"That actually raises a lot of concerns about the administration's genuineness in terms of allowing ICRC full access, as was promised to the world," Dakwar says. "They are the only organization that has access to the detainees, and this raises a lot of questions."

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Perversions of Power

There are a few things in life that one can count on: death, taxes, and people wanting to rewrite your play. And, for our purposes today, the famous dictum from the noted British historian Lord Acton (1834-1902):

"...Where you have a concentration of power in a few hands, all too frequently men with the mentality of gangsters get control. History has proven that. ... Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely."

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Mass. governor wants to jail online poker players while building 3 casinos

Simply put: Patrick wants to put online poker players in prison - in prison, right there along with the mother rapers and father stabbers - at the exact same moment he's mustering all of his newly won political muscle to build three giant poker rooms in our little state.

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Polar bears in danger? Is this some kind of joke?

To claim, however, that they are facing imminent doom is stretching the truth. In 1950, let us not forget, there were about 5,000 polar bears. Now there are 25,000.

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If Our Friends Do It, It Is Not Genocide

“It sounds as if you are both [Albright and Cohen] saying – if our friends do it, it is not genocide,” said another reporter. “And if our enemies do it, it is genocide. A professor at the University of Haifa, Ilan Pappe, has written recently that he believes there is genocide ongoing in Gaza and ethnic cleansing in the West Bank. But you folks wouldn’t agree with that because Israel is our friend and we couldn’t say that about Israel. Secretary Cohen, you say – we can’t say that about Turkey and the Armenian genocide because our boys and girls are in harm’s way. If you are going to define genocide by who does it, not by what it is, your task force is in trouble.”

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Get Kids Vaccinated Or Else, Parents Told

The parents of more than 2,300 Prince George's County students who failed to get needed vaccinations could face fines of $50 a day and up to 10 days in jail if their children do not meet the state's immunization requirements, county officials said yesterday.

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Israel's fight against sex trafficking

Last year, the United Nations named Israel as one of the main destinations in the world for trafficked women; it has also consistently appeared as an offender in the annual US State Department's Trafficking in Persons (Tip) report.

While this year's report said Israel was making "significant efforts" to eliminate trafficking, it said it still does not "fully comply with the minimum standards" to do so.

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Study Debunks Theory On Teen Sex, Delinquency

Researchers at Ohio State University garnered little attention in February when they found that youngsters who lose their virginity earlier than their peers are more likely to become juvenile delinquents. So obvious and well established was the contribution of early sex to later delinquency that the idea was already part of the required curriculum for federal "abstinence only" programs.

There was just one problem: It is probably not true. Other things being equal, a more probing study has found, youngsters who have consensual sex in their early-teen or even preteen years are, if anything, less likely to engage in delinquent behavior later on.

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Bush vetoes health and education bill

President Bush on Tuesday vetoed a spending measure for health and education programs prized by congressional Democrats. He also signed a big increase in the Pentagon's non-war budget.

This is the world we created.

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Church row evolves over fossil boy

However, the collection, to be show-cased for the first time at the Nairobi National Museum after a £5 million renovation financed by the European Union, has drawn sharp criticism from evangelical Christians who deny the theory of evolution.

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The Dinosaur Conspiracy Theory

The extinction of the dinosaurs has long been considered a crime committed by a lone gunman: an incoming asteroid that struck the earth 65 million years ago, filling the air with sun-blocking dust. Now, however, controversy is being stirred anew as evidence suggests that the asteroid might have had a partner in crime: volcanoes, massive ones, blasting clouds of toxic gas from the bowels of the earth and poisoning much of the planet's life.

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More pain at the pump may be ahead

A top U.S. forecaster expects gas prices to jump another 20 cents a gallon by December, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.

Guy Caruso, head of the Energy Information Administration, said gas prices will keep climbing even if crude prices don't because oil refiners haven't passed the recent rise in crude prices on to gas consumers, according to the newspaper.

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Anti-P2P bill gets warm welcome from Ruckus.com

The chief executive of Ruckus.com, which offers advertising-supported music at no cost to college students, said Monday that he backs a bill introduced Friday by Democrats that requires universities to agree to offer "alternatives" to peer-to-peer infringement--upon pain of all their students losing federal financial aid.

Ruckus would probably be the largest single beneficiary of that requirement. And its CEO, Mike Bebel, is enthusiastic about the legislation.

And that's what this is all really about.

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Sign Of Times: NJ School Cameras Fed Live To Cops

It's an expensive, but effective tool that could be a sign of the times with an increase in school shootings over the years.

Softening up the youth for perpetual surveillance.

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Experts: Danger of nuclear-armed Iran may be hyped

But the White House and its partisans may be inflating the dangers of a nuclear-armed Iran, say experts on the Persian Gulf and nuclear deterrence. While there are dangers, they acknowledge, Iran appears to want a nuclear weapon for the same reason other countries do: to protect itself.

Any country without nuclear weapons is at the mercy of those countries that have nuclear weapons. This is not brain surgery here.

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Don't Take a Chemical Bath

We live in a chemical-infused world. Although there are some benefits -- clean drinking water, for example -- when it comes to beauty products, chemicals are thought by many to cause adverse health effects. That's because chemicals from beauty products don't pass through your digestive system where they might be filtered; instead, they head right into your bloodstream.

It's important for consumers to understand that the cosmetic industry is not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Companies are required to list all the ingredients in order of use, but they're not required (by federal law) to test products for safety. The FDA can only act if they have strong scientific knowledge that a product is dangerous. That doesn't mean that companies don't have safety standards, but it does mean that claims like "natural," "botanical" or "organic" are basically useless.

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Suitcase Nuclear Bomb Unlikely to Exist

But government experts and intelligence officials say such a threat gets vastly more attention than it deserves. These officials said a true suitcase nuke would be highly complex to produce, require significant upkeep and cost a small fortune.

Counterproliferation authorities do not completely rule out the possibility that these portable devices once existed. But they do not think the threat remains.

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FCC chief aims to relax media ownership ban

The head of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission said on Tuesday the agency should relax its ban on the cross-ownership of newspapers in the biggest U.S. cities and allow them to buy a broadcast television or radio station in the same market.

Because the public doesn't need opposing viewpoints. They are to believe what we tell them!

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Democrats zero for 40 on Iraq

Since taking the majority, they have forced 40 votes on bills limiting President Bush’s war policy.

Only one of those has passed both chambers, even though both are run by Democrats. That one was vetoed by Bush.

Indeed, the only war legislation enacted during this Congress has been to give the president exactly what he wants, and exactly what he has had for the past five years: more money, with no limitations.

And they wonder why we think they are doing a shitty job.

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Troubled young pupils may turn out well, too, studies say

Educators and psychologists have long feared that kindergartners with behavior problems were doomed to fall behind in the upper grades. But two new studies suggest that many young children who are identified as troubled or given diagnoses of mental disorders settle down in time and do as well in school as their peers.

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GEORGE BUSH HAS ALWAYS LIKED TORTURE

"'We are terrible to animals,' recalled [Bush childhood pal Terry] Throckmorton, laughing. A dip behind the Bush borne turned into a small lake after a good rain, and thousands of frogs would come out. `Everybody would get BB guns and shoot them,' Throckmorton said. `Or we'd put firecrackers in the frogs and throw them and blow them up.'"

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World should ban human cloning, except medical: U.N.

The world should quickly ban cloning of humans and only allow exceptions for strictly controlled research to help treat diseases such as diabetes or Alzheimer's, a U.N. study said on Sunday.

Without a ban, experts at the U.N. University's Institute of Advanced Studies said that governments would have to prepare legal measures to protect clones from "potential abuse, prejudice and discrimination".

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Intel Official: Say Goodbye to Privacy

A top intelligence official says it is time people in the United States changed their definition of privacy.

Privacy no longer can mean anonymity, says Donald Kerr, the principal deputy director of national intelligence. Instead, it should mean that government and businesses properly safeguards people's private communications and financial information.

Disturbing.

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Study: Anti-Smoking Shot Holds Promise

A shot that robs smokers of the nicotine buzz from cigarettes showed promise in midstage testing and may someday offer a radically new way to kick a dangerous habit.

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Oil discovery rocks Brazil

A huge offshore oil discovery could raise Brazil's petroleum reserves by a whopping 40 percent and boost this country into the ranks of the world's major exporters, officials said.

The government-run oil company Petroleo Brasileiro SA, or Petrobras, said the new "ultra-deep" Tupi field could hold as much as 8 billion barrels of recoverable light crude, sending Petrobras shares soaring and prompting predictions that Brazil could join the world's "top 10" oil producers.

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Should YouTube play the censor and sentinel?

The world's most popular video-sharing site now finds itself in the middle of a very heated debate over issues of free speech, censorship, and whether the site is responsible for spotting criminals.

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OMG!!! The end of online stupidity?

But there's still hope for intelligent life on the Internet. A team of software developers is hard at work on a "stupid filter" that promises to do to idiotic online comments what a spam filter does to junk and unwanted e-mail: put it in a place where it can't hurt anyone anymore.

Learn more.

FBI Calls on Universities to Guard Against Spies

The FBI's relationship with university students and academics has never been one of wine and roses -- see the agency's covert campaign to discredit Albert Einstein. Therefore, it might be a bit surprising to know that some university presidents are now embracing the agency and are perhaps even willing to become its eyes and ears on campus.

...

Speaking this week at Penn State University, FBI Director Robert Mueller told an audience that universities need to guard against spies who are out to acquire bits and pieces of technology and research and said he's worried that "pre-classified and pre-patented" technologies could fall into the wrong hands.

The NPR report doesn't say how universities would accomplish this without clamping down on their ordinarily open, information-sharing nature. Presumably, one possible way, not discussed in the NPR piece, would be to simply bar some foreign students and academics from entering the U.S. Another possible solution, used in the past, would be to bar U.S. academics from publishing or otherwise publicly presenting research that the government deems sensitive.

Mueller says, however, that the FBI isn't trying to impose its will on campuses; it simply wants to make academics cognizant of these issues.

Mmmm, hmmm.

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Sunbathing 'slows ageing process'

Sunbathing can slow the ageing process by up to five years, according to new research.

Scientists have found that people who avoid the sun, or have inadequate vitamin D in their diet, are subject to genetic damage associated with ageing and age-related illnesses.

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Dolphins save surfer from becoming shark’s bait

Surfer Todd Endris needed a miracle. The shark — a monster great white that came out of nowhere — had hit him three times, peeling the skin off his back and mauling his right leg to the bone.

That’s when a pod of bottlenose dolphins intervened, forming a protective ring around Endris, allowing him to get to shore, where quick first aid provided by a friend saved his life.

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Yellowstone Is Rising on Swollen "Supervolcano"

Yellowstone National Park is rising. Its central region, called the Yellowstone caldera, has been moving upward since mid-2004 at a rate of up to three inches (seven centimeters) a year—more than three times faster than has ever been measured.

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Boys walk free over DVD sex assault

Eight Victorian teenage boys who took part in the filming of a sexual assault on a 17-year-old girl have avoided youth detention.

The girl was filmed performing oral sex on two boys, had her hair set alight, was spat at and urinated on during the incident at a park at Werribee, in Melbourne's outer-west, in June last year.

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A DVD of the attack - which was titled 'C**t the Movie' - was distributed throughout the community, the court heard.

Read more.

The End of Oil is Upon Us. We Must Move On - Quickly.

If there are any lingering doubts as to whether the age of oil is nearing its end, the International Energy Agency has put them to rest and made it clear that only a massive and immediate investment in sustainable energy will prevent a global crisis.

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Sen. Hagel says U.S. draft may be unavoidable

Sen. Chuck Hagel, speaking to an audience of Lincoln High School students, warned Tuesday that the nation may need to turn to compulsory military service "or some kind of draft" to support the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

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Is This 20-Year CIA Vet Crazy For Saying 9/11 Is a Probable Inside Job?

Debunkers can scoff and chuckle all day long when a celebrity uses their public prominence to talk about 9/11 truth, but when a 20-year decorated CIA veteran says that the evidence points to 9/11 being an inside job, dismissive hand waving and off-the-cuff ad hominem attacks on credibility aren't so easy to justify.

...

So when Baer told a radio host that "the evidence points at" 9/11 having had aspects of being an inside job, the noisy negativists and the trolls were notable by their absence.

Read more.

Credit Card Debt a $915 Billion Disaster-in-Waiting for Banks

Think the estimated subprime debt load carried by the big international banks is big, at $1 trillion?

How about this: Americans now owe nearly as much – a record $915 billion – on their credit cards alone.

And defaults and delinquencies in the credit card sector are piling up – which means big banks are on the hook, again. More sand in the gears for the global economy.

Read more.

The Era Of Free Music Is Upon Us

Highly successful artists have started abandoning albums as a way to make money. They are now giving away their music for free. Instead of selling albums, they are concentrating on building their fan bases, putting out quality art, and making their bread through touring and merchandising.

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Small bands have never made money off albums because they can’t get signed or get a distribution deal. Now, the big guys are foregoing the album as well, giving up what was once their major source of income. The fans aren’t moaning the loss either, being happy to download content piecemeal. In short, nobody has a use for albums anymore besides the record companies. It’s pretty clear to anyone following musical trends that the era of the album is over. The file sharers have won and the era of free music is upon us.

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The Problems with Voting

Here's a problem: rich career politicians from both parties run campaigns in the primaries, bought and paid for by corporations and special interest lobbies, the corporate media decides who are the front runners, weeding out the undesirables and narrowing our choices, then each "Party" chooses a nominee that you are allowed to vote for. That structure in itself invalidates our vote. How can I vote for Kucinich or Paul, or McKinney if they are not chosen by thier "Party" to be the nominee? These names will not be on the ballot.

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A Story of Surveillance

A year or so later, he stumbled upon documents that, he said, nearly caused him to fall out of his chair. The documents, he said, show that the NSA gained access to massive amounts of e-mail and search and other Internet records of more than a dozen global and regional telecommunications providers. AT&T allowed the agency to hook into its network at a facility in San Francisco and, according to Klein, many of the other telecom companies probably knew nothing about it.

Klein is in Washington this week to share his story in the hope that it will persuade lawmakers not to grant legal immunity to telecommunications firms that helped the government in its anti-terrorism efforts.

...

In an interview yesterday, he alleged that the NSA set up a system that vacuumed up Internet and phone-call data from ordinary Americans with the cooperation of AT&T . Contrary to the government's depiction of its surveillance program as aimed at overseas terrorists, Klein said, much of the data sent through AT&T to the NSA was purely domestic. Klein said he believes that the NSA was analyzing the records for usage patterns as well as for content.

Read more.

Fla. Companies Forbidding Smoking In Private Lives

A growing number of companies in Florida are forbidding their workers from smoking not only at work, but also in their private lives.

Read more.

National Debt at Record $9 Trillion

Last month, Congress passed and President Bush signed into law an increase in the government's borrowing ceiling to $9.815 trillion. It was the fifth debt limit increase since Bush took office in January 2001. Those increases have totaled $3.865 trillion.

Read more.

The science of love: look into the eyes

It may seem obvious to every starry-eyed lover but psychologists have now proved it to be true – if you want someone to find you attractive, look them in the face and smile. A strong jaw for men, high cheek-bones in women, a perfectly-shaped nose or unblemished skin may be the physical signs of sexual attractiveness, but it is the gaze of the eyes that really counts.

Read more.

Military may ease standards for recruits

Faced with higher recruiting goals, the Pentagon is quietly looking for ways to make it easier for people with minor criminal records to join the military, The Associated Press has learned.

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The Shocking Video Hillary Does NOT Want You To See!

Part 1





Part 2

Paul's Money Draws Attention

Ron Paul's head-snapping fundraising puts a new face on a campaign that the media, politicians and much of the public had relegated to the sidelines.

The Texas congressman is now the presidential candidate tugging at the establishment's coat.

Give 'em hell, Ron.

Read more.

Most Fans Paid $0 for Radiohead Album

Some 62 percent of the people who downloaded "In Rainbows" in a four- week period last month opted not to pay the British alt-rockers a cent. But the remaining 38 percent voluntarily paid an average of $6, according to the study by comScore Inc.

Read more.

Prince threatens to sue his fans over online images

His lawyers have forced his three biggest internet fansites to remove all photographs, images, lyrics, album covers and anything linked to the artist's likeness. A legal letter asks the fansites to provide "substantive details of the means by which you propose to compensate our clients [Paisley Park Entertainment Group, NPG Records and AEG] for damages".

...

A spokeswoman for the fans' campaign said the sites had always tried to work with Prince's management. But it appeared that Prince wanted to edit his past and there was "no sign" of his lawyers backing down, she said. "He's trying to control the internet 100% and you can't do that without infringing people's freedom of speech," she added.

Nice way to treat your fans.

Read more.

No email privacy rights under Constitution, US gov claims

What is important in this case is not the ultimate resolution of that narrow issue, but the position that the United States government is taking on the entire issue of electronic privacy. That position, if accepted, may mean that the government can read anybody's email at any time without a warrant.

Read more, but don't email it.

Top US legal adviser refuses to rule out 'torture' technique

The top legal adviser within the US state department, who counsels the secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, on international law, has declined to rule out the use of the interrogation technique known as waterboarding even if it were applied by foreign intelligence services on US citizens.

You read that correctly.

Read more.

A Brief on the Use of Water Torture by American Officials in the War on Terrorism

During water torture, the body and head of a victim are typically strapped to an inclined board with the head lower than the feet. The victim's jaws are forced open and a cloth is forced deep into the mouth and over the nose. Water is continuously poured over and into the cloth forcing the victim to stop breathing until forced to either swallow water and/or aspirate it into the lungs, triggering the gag reflex.

Water torture results in controlled drowning, the degree of which depends upon the ability of an individual to resist and the will of the torturer. The punishment ranges from psychological torment and physical suffocation to death. At the least, water torture represents a mock execution. The primeval fear of asphyxiation leads to overwhelming panic in even the most disciplined individuals who may be trained and psychologically conditioned to die rather than submit.

Water torture can lead to serious injury to the victim. A lack of oxygen can quickly result in permanent brain damage, and the aspiration of even small amounts of water can lead to lung disease, including pneumonia. Struggles by the victim against the restraints can produce severe sprains and broken bones. Significantly, the intense fear of imminent death and the victim's helplessness to prevent it produces devastating and long lasting psychological damage.

Disgusting.

Read more.

Plan 9 from outer space

But this year a raft of newly unclassified CIA documents revealed that the remote possibility of alien invasion elicited greater fear than the threat of a Soviet nuclear attack.

More interesting still, the CIA documents show that despite decades of repeated public denials, behind the scenes there raged a series of inter-agency feuds that involved the highest levels of the US government.

The subject of UFOs - and dabbling in psychological warfare techniques - not only focused the attention of the US government elite for 50 years, but of some of the greatest scientific and military minds of the era.

Read more.

Devices Enforce Silence of Cellphones, Illegally

As cellphone use has skyrocketed, making it hard to avoid hearing half a conversation in many public places, a small but growing band of rebels is turning to a blunt countermeasure: the cellphone jammer, a gadget that renders nearby mobile devices impotent.

...

“If anything characterizes the 21st century, it’s our inability to restrain ourselves for the benefit of other people,” said James Katz, director of the Center for Mobile Communication Studies at Rutgers University. “The cellphone talker thinks his rights go above that of people around him, and the jammer thinks his are the more important rights.”

Read more.

The deceit behind global warming

No one can deny that in recent years the need to "save the planet" from global warming has become one of the most pervasive issues of our time. As Tony Blair's chief scientific adviser, Sir David King, claimed in 2004, it poses "a far greater threat to the world than international terrorism", warning that by the end of this century the only habitable continent left will be Antarctica.

Inevitably, many people have been bemused by this somewhat one-sided debate, imagining that if so many experts are agreed, then there must be something in it. But if we set the story of how this fear was promoted in the context of other scares before it, the parallels which emerge might leave any honest believer in global warming feeling uncomfortable.

Read it all.

Senators warn Bush has no authority on Iran

Thirty US senators wrote to President George W. Bush Thursday, warning he had no authority to launch military action against Iran, and expressing concern about the administration's "provocative" rhetoric.

Read more.

Climate wars threaten billions

A total of 46 nations and 2.7 billion people are now at high risk of being overwhelmed by armed conflict and war because of climate change. A further 56 countries face political destabilisation, affecting another 1.2 billion individuals.

This stark warning will be outlined by the peace group International Alert in a report, A Climate of Conflict, this week. Much of Africa, Asia and South America will suffer outbreaks of war and social disruption as climate change erodes land, raises seas, melts glaciers and increases storms, it concludes. Even Europe is at risk.

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Snowflakes and scare-mongering

Fear-mongering, arrogance and bureaucratic bullying. By such tools, Donald Rumsfeld became one of the most powerful, most unpopular and ultimately most unsuccessful Pentagon chiefs in history. Any doubts about that judgement have been removed by the publication this week in The Washington Post of a selection of his "snow-flakes" – the short memos the former defence secretary was wont to fire off daily in scores to his staff. They pestered, they irritated, and on occasion they terrorised their recipients. Together, they give a depressing snapshot of the modus operandi of their boss, as he presided over the debacle in Iraq.

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The Gap: New Frontiers in Child Abuse

It was enough to make you vomit all over your new denim jacket. The Gap has been caught using child labor in an Indian sweatshop, and not just child labor--child slaves. As extensively reported on the news, the children, some as young as ten, were worked sixteen-hour days, fed bowls of mosquito-covered rice, and forced to sleep on a roof and use over-flowing latrines. Those who slowed down were beaten with rubber pipes and the ones who cried had oily cloths stuffed in their mouths.

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Robert Fisk

And what, one wonders, were Bush's toughs doing sending Arar off to Syria, a country that they themselves claim to be a "terrorist" state which supports "terrorist" organisations like Hizbollah. President Bush, it seems, wants to threaten Damascus, but is happy to rely on his brutal Syrian chums if they'll be obliging enough to plug in the electricity and attach the wires in an underground prison on Washington's behalf.

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World's First Nanoradio Could Lead to Subcellular Remote-Control Interfaces

The radio opens the possibility of creating radio-controlled interfaces on the subcellular scale, which may have applications in the areas of medical and sensor technology.

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GodTube competes with YouTube

GodTube is among religion-based Web sites that closely copy popular secular models. MyChurch.org is similar to the social networking site MySpace, and Conservapedia.com is the religious right's response to the online encyclopedia Wikipedia. Similar sites target Muslim and Jewish audiences.

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Peace of mind when they ask to borrow the car

Proponents say the devices help teenagers become more aware and therefore become more responsible drivers. But most teenagers understandably are not thrilled at more parental control.

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While no statistics show that monitoring prevents youthful driver injury and death, some parents are convinced that knowing what their teenagers are up to is far better than not knowing.

Insurance companies are beginning to agree, with some offering discounts for families with tracking technology in their cars. Starting October 4, Safeco began offering up to a 15 percent discount on policies for customers in 39 states who opt for "Teensurance," which includes roadside assistance and the installation of a free GPS device.

The device allows the parent to set a vehicle's maximum speed, how far it can travel and a curfew--at which time the car can no longer be driven. If the curfew is violated, for example, parents receive a cell phone or e-mail notification--for a monthly service fee.

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"If you realize you are being monitored, it keeps you constantly aware," she said.

Getting the next generation accustomed to constant surveillance.

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A Washington official dares to tell the truth

Washington is bankrupting future generations. The longer we wait to address the $9 trillion national debt and ongoing annual budget deficits, the more taxes our children and grandchildren will have to pay, says David M. Walker, comptroller general of the United States, head of the General Accountability Office and just about the only public official in Washington these days telling the truth about the country's fiscal situation. We're basically taxing future generations without representation (because they can't vote or haven't been born), which he says is immoral.

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Does what happens in the Facebook stay in the Facebook?

It sure doesn't look like it.

Check out the video.

Déjà vu all over again

When it comes to Iran's nuclear capabilities, whose word would you rather take: that of a Nobel prize-winning head of an international agency specializing in nuclear issues who was proved triumphantly right about Iraq, or that of a bunch of belligerent neocons who make no secret of their desire to whack Iran at the earliest opportunity and who made such a pigs ear of Iraq?

That is the stark choice facing the sane people of the world, given the smearing of IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei for not joining the hysterical lynch mob building up against Iran. Criticised by Condoleezza Rice and others in the Bush administration, it is uncannily reminiscent of the slurs against him and UN weapons inspector Hans Blix in the run up to the invasion of Iraq - and we should remember that the US vindictively tried to unseat him afterwards for not joining in the lying game.

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House passes the "Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act"

The U.S. House of Representatives recently passed HR 1955 titled the Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007. This bill is one of the most blatant attacks against the Constitution yet and actually defines thought crimes as homegrown terrorism. If passed into law, it will also establish a commission and a Center of Excellence to study and defeat so called thought criminals. Unlike previous anti-terror legislation, this bill specifically targets the civilian population of the United States and uses vague language to define homegrown terrorism. Amazingly, 404 of our elected representatives from both the Democrat and Republican parties voted in favor of this bill. There is little doubt that this bill is specifically targeting the growing patriot community that is demanding the restoration of the Constitution.

Read the rest.

When rockers cut ties from labels

In the future, these musicians may find themselves being forced to make decisions about technology, customer service, and marketing. That's where companies like Musicane, Indie911, Fuzz, Snocap, TuneCore, and dozens of others come in. They offer to free artists from the music-label yoke by helping them manage the chores that come with selling music online.

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Orders from the top

When military investigators questioned Erie County Judge Michael E. Dunlavey about reported prisoner abuse during his tenure at the Guantanamo Bay camp for suspected terrorists, Dunlavey told them he got his "marching orders" from President Bush, according to a new book about U.S. policies regarding torture.

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"The Bush administration has professed a commitment to democracy and human rights and claimed solidarity with those who struggle against tyranny. But these documents show unambiguously that the administration has adopted some of the methods of the most tyrannical regimes," the authors write.

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The tortured logic of the torturers

Isn't it interesting that folks who can calculate when life begins down to the mysterious movement of the zygote in utero aren't able to say with assurance what torture is even when someone is choking in front of them?

It is especially fascinating to note that in this ostensibly "Christian" nation, personal security has become such an idol that 90 percent of us would approve the waterboarding of suspects to avert another 9/11, according to Mr. Scarborough.

Never mind that waterboarding was the preferred method of torture used by agents of the Dutch East India Company during the 1600s. Never mind that both the Gestapo and Japanese officers used it during the darkest days of World War II to humiliate their victims and flout international law.

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As long as the hearts of the torturers were pure and their actions sanctioned by God and country, the torture of others was an acceptable price to pay for security. Despite our technological advances, very little has changed since the "heresy" trials of old Europe. We're still lying to ourselves about torture.

Humans are such a sad lot.

Read the rest.

Global Warming: Man-Made or Natural?

IN THE PAST few years there has been increasing concern about global climate change on the part of the media, politicians, and the public. It has been stimulated by the idea that human activities may influence global climate adversely and that therefore corrective action is required on the part of governments. Recent evidence suggests that this concern is misplaced. Human activities are not influencing the global climate in a perceptible way. Climate will continue to change, as it always has in the past, warming and cooling on different time scales and for different reasons, regardless of human action. I would also argue that—should it occur—a modest warming would be on the whole beneficial.

This is not to say that we don’t face a serious problem. But the problem is political. Because of the mistaken idea that governments can and must do something about climate, pressures are building that have the potential of distorting energy policies in a way that will severely damage national economies, decrease standards of living, and increase poverty. This misdi-rection of resources will adversely affect human health and welfare in industrialized nations, and even more in developing nations. Thus it could well lead to increased social tensions within nations and conflict between them.

If not for this economic and political damage, one might consider the present concern about climate change nothing more than just another environmentalist fad, like the Alar apple scare or the global cooling fears of the 1970s. Given that so much is at stake, how-ever, it is essential that people better understand the issue.

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New Apple Trojan Means Mac Hunting Season Is Open

The Mac has officially gone mainstream.

The proof? On Halloween, professional online criminals were found using Trojan-horse software to target, for the first time, computers running Apple's OS X operating system -- just as they have been doing for years on the more ubiquitous flavors of Windows.

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S.C. Democrats Say No to Colbert

But, she said, they decided he did not meet two basic requirements: that the person be generally acknowledge or recognized by the media as a viable nationwide candidate; and be actively campaigning for the South Carolina primary.

A person has to be"generally acknowledge or recognized by the media" in order to be a viable candidate for the presidency?

Huh?

Doesn't that comment state that the media really does choose who the people get to vote for?

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Will secret clubs pick next prez?

It started in 1952.

Nearly every person elected as president of the United States since then – and nearly every opponent – has belonged to a secretive, globalism-oriented organization known as the Council on Foreign Relations.

Some presidents and their challengers have belonged to additional clubs of internationalists – the Bilderberg Group and the Trilateral Commission. Running mates, too, more often than not have had ties to the groups.

That the groups exert enormous influence on public policy is indisputable. What is disputed is whether such groups are, as adherents and members argue, just discussion forums for movers and shakers, or, as critics have long alleged, secret societies shaping a new world order from behind the scenes. On that last point at least, no one could challenge the critics: All these groups operate in considerable secrecy, away from the scrutiny of the American public.

Regardless of how one characterizes them, the fact that virtually all presidents belong to the same secret clubs prompts the author of a new book to wonder if the 2008 election will also be a contest between globalist insiders. Judging from the list of frontrunners of each party, Daniel Estulin, author of "The True Story of the Bilderberg Group," may be on to something.

According to a variety of sources, the following presidential candidates are either members of one of the groups or have strong ties: Hillary Rodham Clinton, Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, Barack Obama, John McCain, John Edwards, Fred Thompson, Joe Biden, Chris Dodd and Bill Richardson.

Mike Huckabee, though not a member, spoke to the CFR in September. Since then, his political star has risen to the point that he has become a top-tier candidate.

So often throughout recent history it has been the case.

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Homeland Security Is Googling You

We’ve all undoubtedly heard the warnings about being careful about the information we put online, as well as the stories of potential employers and college admissions and coaches checking up on people online through Google and social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook. But here’s a new one for you: the U.S. Department of Homeland Security is also using this information to check up on individuals entering the country. “They” are watching you, and “they” know what you’ve been up to.

Read more, but look over your shoulder.

US supreme court calls a halt to executions

America's execution chambers fell idle yesterday after the supreme court made it clear it will allow no more prisoners to be put to death until it reviews the legality of lethal injection.

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Risking kids to sell fish

That's why it was so disturbing when a group called the National Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies Coalition released a report recently encouraging pregnant women to increase their consumption of fish despite the well-known risk of mercury and other contaminants commonly found in certain seafoods.

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The National Fisheries Institute, the main trade association for the fishing industry, paid the travel expenses of the researchers who generated the report for the National Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies Coalition and gave each of them honorariums of $1,000 to $1,500.

Read more, but don't each much fish if you're pregnant.

'Unwelcoming' US sees sharp fall in visitors since 9/11

The number of foreign visitors to the United States has plummeted since the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington because foreigners don't feel welcome, tourism professionals said Thursday.

All thanks to the US Government.

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The mouse that shook the world

It can run for hours at 20 metres per minute without getting tired. It lives longer, has more sex, and eats more without gaining weight. Could the science that created this supermouse be applied to humans?

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American scientists who created the mice – they now have a breeding colony of 500 – said that they were stunned by their abilities, especially given that the animals came about as a result of a standard genetic modification to a single metabolism gene shared with humans.

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One million people affected by Mexico floods

The oil-rich state the size of Belgium is now 80 percent underwater, officials said, adding that they expect more rain in the next days.

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Tennessee Town Has Run Out of Water

The severe drought tightening like a vise across the Southeast has threatened the water supply of cities large and small, sending politicians scrambling for solutions. But Orme, about 40 miles west of Chattanooga and 150 miles northwest of Atlanta, is a town where the worst-case scenario has already come to pass: The water has run out.

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Deployment of ray gun pushed up

There’s no doubt this oversized ray gun can deliver the heat. The question is, how soon can the weapon, which neither kills nor maims, be delivered to Iraq?

Isn't this just mass torture?

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Elephant on acid, dog head grafts and a seesaw to revive the dead

If there is a fine line between madness and genius, many of those involved firmly crossed it.

Check out the list.

Boiling planets found at edge of galaxy

Three giant planets that sizzle as they circle their suns have been discovered in a faraway corner of the galaxy by a team of British astronomers.

The alien worlds are believed to be among the hottest planets ever spotted, with surface temperatures rising to more than 2500C as they pass their parent stars.

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"These are so close to their stars that they're being boiled away by their suns, they are being frazzled," said Dr Don Pollacco, a member of the team at Queen's University.

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Big Brother horror show

The sight of a blind-drunk young woman being assaulted by a Big Brother housemate in what may be the most public rape ever has turned the stomachs of millions of television viewers.

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