... the country is a mess. The world is worse. I never thought Bush would turn out to be a complete idiot. He is grossly imcompetent. All he does is practice a 'party line for profit.' A montra that effects global stability, human rights and world peace.
...'til then.
Friday, April 27, 2007
Russian helicopter is 'shot down'
This is a Russian Mi-8 helicopter. They are used for search and rescue as well as lifting cargo. This is the 'type' of helicopter reported as shot down over Chechnya.
If Russian forensics links the USA/CIA to any of the deaths including the munitions to crash the helicopter, this might be some of the first deaths of note in the USA v. Russia war. The manner in which the deaths occurred very much reflects the type of incident commonly occurring with the USA military. Although sometimes it's jets. With the change in posture of Russia and President Putin in his last Presidential Address to Russia it is a good estimate possible terrorists are escalating the many fronts that Russia might face in their new direction of taking control away from them.
A British Lynx helicopter which crashed in Basra, southern Iraq, last May was shot down by a surface-to-air missile, an investigation has found.
Five service personnel died when the aircraft plunged into a two-storey house in the centre of the city.
The incident sparked violent clashes between local people and British forces.
Among the dead was Flight Lieutenant Sarah Mulvihill, the first British servicewoman to die in action in Iraq.
If Bush can be traced to this, he can easily be impeached. The American people need to remove him from office. He and Cheney are far too imflammatory a president and vice. The circumstances of increasing international instability are directly related to their outrageous rankor.
Morning Papers - continued...
Michael Moore Today
http://www.michaelmoore.com/
April 26th, 2007 11:29 pm
Congress challenges Bush to veto pullout
By Richard Cowan / Reuters
WASHINGTON - In an unprecedented slap at President George W. Bush's war policy, the U.S. Congress on Thursday approved legislation that links withdrawal of combat troops from Iraq to paying for the war, ensuring a veto.
By a vote of 51-46, the Senate joined the House of Representatives in backing the bill that would provide about $100 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan this year while setting a deadline to withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq over the next 11 months.
It was the first time that the entire Congress, controlled by Democrats since January, has defied the president. Bush has repeatedly said he will not accept "surrender" dates.
"The president will veto this legislation," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said. "The president is determined to win in Iraq. The bill they sent us today is mission defeated."
Democrats might arrange to deliver their bill to the White House on Tuesday, the fourth anniversary of Bush declaring aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln: "Major combat operations in Iraq have ended."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9697
Bush holds ground on Iraq
By Deb Riechmann / Associated Press
CAMP DAVID, Md. - President Bush warned Congress Friday that he will continue vetoing war spending bills as long as they contain a timetable for the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq.
Speaking a day after the Democratic-controlled Congress approved legislation that requires that a troop drawdown begin by Oct. 1, Bush said — as expected — he will veto it because of that demand. He invited congressional leaders to come to the White House to discuss a new piece of legislation that does not include a timetable, and expressed hope a deal could be reached.
But he made clear that if Democrats insist on including timetables again, he will not hesitate to bring out his veto pen.
"If they want to try again that which I've said is unacceptable, of course I won't accept it," the president said during a news conference here with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. "I hope it won't come to that."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9700
Young soldier takes on freedom of speech, National Guard
By Jessica Bruni / Carlisle Sentinel
CARLISLE, PA -- Growing up in a conservative military family with a father who is a decorated "full-bird" colonel, Zach Keasling said the importance of freedom of speech is ingrained.
"I was raised to speak my mind as long as it's justified," said Keasling, 20, of North Middleton Township.
The self-confessed Army brat's commitment to the First Amendment is about to be tested.
After writing on his personal MySpace page that " ... being in the national guard SUCKS... ya" and other comments about the military, Keasling — a private 1st class in the 1st Battalion 108th Field Artillery Unit in the Pennsylvania National Guard — said he was informed he could be in trouble. MySpace is a popular Web site that offers an interactive, user-submitted network of friends, personal profiles, blogs, photos, music and videos.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9703
14 arrested in Senate anti-war protest (14 arrested in Hart Senate Office Building)
http://www.michaelmoore.com/
Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Fourteen anti-war protesters were arrested in a Senate office building Thursday after unfurling a banner calling for the impeachment of President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.
U.S. Capitol Police spokeswoman Kimberly Schneider said the 14 were arrested for unlawful assembly in the Hart Senate Office Building just north of the Capitol.
The Senate voted 51-46 on Thursday to approve a funding bill that calls for the U.S. to begin withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq by Oct. 1 with a goal of a complete pullout six months later. Bush has promised to veto the bill.
Gael Murphy, co-founder of the women-initiated peace group Codepink, said members of her group and other peace activists participated in the demonstration, which included unfurling two banners, one listing articles of impeachment and another saying that "your silence is your legacy." They also conducted a mock military funeral.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9698
DO SOMETHING Saturday in the U.S.A.:
http://www.michaelmoore.com/
APRIL 28 NATIONWIDE IMPEACHMENT ACTIONS
http://www.a28.org/
Tales of the Freewayblogger
http://freewayblogger.blogspot.com/2007/03/public-punditry-contest.html
Getting Ready for A28...
http://freewayblogger.blogspot.com/2007/04/getting-ready-for-a28.html
One Man Revolution
http://www.amazon.com/One-Man-Revolution-Nightwatchman/dp/B000NVJRBO/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-0385660-4148723?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1176416274&sr=8-1
April 24th, 2007 9:13 pm
Michael Moore: The Camera Is Mightier Than a Gun
Rolling Stone
[Check out the following audio clips from a Rolling Stone feature profiling Mike.]
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9686
April 25th, 2007 2:29 am
As life fades away, Baghdad becomes a memory
By Ahmed Rasheed and Ibon Villelabeitia / Reuters
BAGHDAD - Baghdad tastes of pistachio ice-cream on a summer night for Ahmed Baqi.
Evoking happier times, Baqi reminisced about the days when families and lovers crowded Baghdad's famed al-Faqma ice-cream parlor before bombs and shootings emptied the place.
"I had a girlfriend and we used to go to al-Faqma. It is a special place in my life. Now I drive by and look the other way. It is only a memory," the 30-year-old lawyer said.
One by one, the old places where Baghdad's residents loved life are disappearing under violence.
Parks, book markets, cafes -- where many played as children, browsed bookshelves as students or whiled away afternoons smoking water pipes -- have been erased, leaving a city many residents say they no longer recognize.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9688
Tuesday, April 24th, 2007
'The Yellow Badge of Cowardice' ...by Cindy Sheehan
There was an unbelievable story in The Cove Herald last week that comes from near where George Bush and I own property: Copperas Cove, Texas. Apparently two residents: Bill and Georgia Thomas decided that the Resident in Chief deserved one of the three Purple Hearts that Bill earned in Vietnam for: "emotional wounds and scars" because people all over the world talk so badly about poor George.
This story stunned me on a day when nine US soldiers and 20 were wounded in a car bomb attack in the Iraqi province of Diyala. Over 500 Iraqis were killed or found decomposing in Baghdad last week and April '07 is shaping up to be one of the deadliest months for US troop fatalities. This is also a day when there is a hearing into the Army's exploitation of Pat Tillman's death to use him as a poster boy for patriotic fervor and unfounded hero worship. Why can't we talk about our soldier's heroic lives and not their tragic deaths as victims of the military industrial complex.
At the funeral of my son, Casey, a one-star General presented me with a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star for bravery awarded to Casey posthumously. The Thomas' can do whatever they want with Bill's medals, but I believe giving one to George Bush demeans Casey's brave and honorable sacrifice. Little Georgie used his Daddy's (the Congressman) connections to avoid serving in Vietnam and George even went so far as to go AWOL from the Alabama Air National Guard.
Casey didn't want to go and kill people and die in his commander in chief's war of aggression. Like the vice-commander in chief, Doomsday Dick, he had "other priorities" besides dying. Casey's Man-Scout Badges are sitting in my grandmother's cedar chest right next to his baby book and hand-print from pre-school.
For George, the Vietnam War Resister cum Iraqi occupation War Criminal, to say that he didn't "deserve" the medal is an under-statement. Bush doesn't feel emotional scars or pain, he deals them. There are many soldiers who are missing arms, legs, eyes, and souls who actually had to earn their medals under a corrupt regime that used their honor and bravery to pump up the bottom line of such companies as Doomsday Dick's Halliburton. There are mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, grandmas and grandpas, sons and daughters who are emotionally scarred because their loved one won't be coming home alive from a war that never had to happen. Our arms will be aching forever because we can't hug our loved ones. Our hearts are scarred with the pain of burying someone too early and our lives are empty with the longing to see our dear one just one more time.
The Thomas' belong to the Fox News generation that still condones and supports a murderous regime. Mr. Thomas belongs to a generation that was scarred, maimed and killed with a genocidal fever by its corrupt regimes and he still thinks that George deserves a medal for his incompetence and callousness?
What do we do in a world where black is white? War is peace? Two and two equals five and cowardice is bravery?
We rise up and become more powerful than the special interests which use both parties to keep this nation on a constant war footing. We use our voices to be mouthpieces for peace and accountability. We march on the Capitol on May 14th to demand that there is no more business as usual and that Congress realizes that every single one of them (Democrat or Republican) who voted to fund George's war are complicit in the bottomless pain that accompanies each death, dismemberment, or disability; without sharing in one iota of the same pain.
If George likes to receive medals that he didn't earn, Gold Star Families for Peace is going to present him with one on April 25th, (or try to) that he does deserve and has earned abundantly: the Yellow Badge of Cowardice. It doesn't take any courage to march other people's children off to war. George didn't exhibit any courage when he was put to the top of the Texas Air National Guard line by his family's friends. George puts on his smiley photo-op face to take something from a good-hearted, yet deluded couple, that he stridently avoided earning. It doesn't take any courage to meet with a bereaved mother, but he also refuses to do that. He travels in America with more armor and fire power than a banana republic dictator, and if he is not stopped by impeachment or other peaceful means, then we will descend into that tyranny of empire...if we aren't already there.
Join Cindy, Gold Star Families for Peace, The Camp Casey Peace Institute, CODEPINK, Congress Reps John Conyers (D-Mi) and Lynn Woolsey (D-Ca) as we march on the Capitol on May 14th to demand our country back!
Cindy Sheehan is the mother of Spc. Casey Sheehan who was killed in Bush's war of terror on 04/04/04.
She is the co-founder and president of Gold Star Families for Peace and The Camp Casey Peace Institute.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/mustread/index.php?id=867
The American Death Toll in Iraq is now 3337.
What's that coming to, about 3 to 4 soldiers per day.
http://icasualties.org/oif/
What bothers me more than anything about Pat Tillman is that the USA military set out to place him apart from all others. They wanted to glamorize a war that needed to be fought to capture or kill Osama bin Laden in order to seek out recruits that would find identity with a hero. I personally find the antics of the USA Government completely deplorable in this incident. I can understand from the beginning how someone might want to keep the truth from Pat Tillman's brother initially until they were off the battlefield. It was hard enough losing him, but, to learn he was killed by friendly fire would be a complete surprise and might disable him emotionally to handle his assignment. I would hold back as well, but, I wouldn't have covered it up. Breaking the news to family is a serious issue. But, to lie and extort the truth for the sake of advertising propaganda to deceive a nation is quite something else. Everyone involved should be criminally held for minimally fraud and possibly treason.
April 25th, 2007 8:27 pm
McCain Jumps Into Presidential Race
By Liz Sidoti / Associated Press
PORTSMOUTH, N.H. - Republican John McCain officially entered the 2008 presidential race Wednesday, stressing his experience honed in war and Washington as he sought to revive his struggling campaign.
"We face formidable challenges, but I'm not afraid of them. I'm prepared for them," said the four-term Arizona senator, ex-Navy pilot and former Vietnam captive.
In a speech in the first-in-the-nation primary state, McCain stressed the wisdom he's acquired over time rather than the decades as he sought to make the case that he's the most qualified to succeed President Bush amid challenges at home and abroad.
"I'm not the youngest candidate. But I am the most experienced," said the 70-year-old who could be the oldest first-term president. "I know how to fight and how to make peace. I know who I am and what I want to do."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9691
This without a doubt. You know the Republicans keep superimposing 9/11 over Iraq. They are separate issues. If Giuliani can't provide a comprehensive platform based in reality without seeking to 'ride the tide' of the old Bush strategy, what good is he? He was mayor of a city. He didn't lead any assault against al Qaeda or legislate any anti-terrorist initiative. The last thing this country needs is antoher opportunist with corrupt connections.
Tell Rudy Giuliani to Stop Politicizing 9/11
While campaigning in New Hampshire last night, Rudy Giuliani resorted to hurling desperate attacks about Democrats while trying to tout his national security credentials. Here's what he said:
"If a Democrat is elected president in 2008, America will be at risk for another terrorist attack on the scale of Sept. 11, 2001… Never ever again will this country ever be on defense waiting for (terrorists) to attack us if I have anything to say about it. And make no mistake, the Democrats want to put us back on defense!"
Send a message to Rudy Giuliani's campaign headquarters and tell him to stop the fearmongering. Our country deserves better from a presidential candidate:
http://www.democrats.org/page/petition/TellGiuliani/
Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army
by Jeremy Scahill
March 2007 - ISBN: 15602597
Meet Blackwater USA, the powerful private army that the U.S. government has quietly hired to operate in international war zones and on American soil. With its own military base, a fleet of twenty aircraft, and twenty-thousand troops at the ready, Blackwater is the elite Praetorian Guard for the "global war on terror"--yet most people have never heard of it.
Pre-Order copies of Blackwater here.
It was the moment the war turned: On March 31, 2004, four Americans were ambushed and burned near their jeeps by an angry mob in the Sunni stronghold of Falluja. Their charred corpses were hung from a bridge over the Euphrates River. The ensuing slaughter by U.S. troops would fuel the fierce Iraqi resistance that haunts occupation forces to this day. But these men were neither American military nor civilians. They were highly trained private soldiers sent to Iraq by a secretive mercenary company based in the wilderness of North Carolina.
Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army is the unauthorized story of the epic rise of one of the most powerful and secretive forces to emerge from the U.S. military-industrial complex, hailed by the Bush administration as a revolution in military affairs, but considered by others as a dire threat to American democracy.
"Jeremy Scahill's exposé of the Blackwater mercenary firm forcefully demonstrates the grave dangers of outsourcing the government's monopoly on the use of force."
--Joseph Wilson, former U.S. ambassador to Iraq
http://www.nationbooks.org/book.mhtml?t=scahill
Blackwater: Shadow Army
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqM4tKPDlR8
Blackwater USA (Bush's Private Contractors) The Bush/Cheney War Machine would not care if there wasn't a USA military. It would make it easier to privatize an military making is stronger than any 'militia' in the USA. The 'trend' for the people of the USA is to create militias of neighborhood watch while he turns over the 'power over them' to a private military that can in turn destroy and kill within the USA when it is realized the country is riddled with "Home Grown Terrorists." Sound familiar? A term coined by the FBI's Mueller. Starting to get the picture? The USA could never turn into an armed camp whereby citizens are marched to death camps. No. Not in the USA.
The best place to begin a 'parallel' military is outside the country until it's power can exceed the strength of National Guard forces in any and all states of the USA.
Currently the Governor of North Carolina is disturbed about the new regulations governing the National Guard. It gives the President of the USA more power than any governor to access the National Guard. Governor Easley knows the prowess all too well of private militias/mercenaries such as Blackwater USA. I am sure he and the SBI has kept a close eye on their practices to measure their ability against the strength of the National Guard in North Carolina.
The articles about Governor Easley isn't from Mike's cite. I also hear Governor Corzine is recovering. He should be able to render interesting perspectives post run in with death.
Easley to Congress: Ditch Guard law
Raleigh A federal law adopted last year should be changed so that governors can better command their National Guard units in times of emergency, Gov. Mike Easley said Tuesday.
Easley testified at a U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in Washington, D.C., on state control of the National Guard and whether lawmakers should repeal the new law that passed with little debate.
Governors share control of their state chapters of the National Guard with the president, but governors lose formal say when the president federalizes the troops for overseas duty. The president can also now federalize the troops during a serious natural or manmade disaster, accident or catastrophe.
"There is unanimous support, and you know how hard that is to find among the nation's governors, to repeal these dangerous provisions," Easley said.
http://www.wilmingtonstar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070425/NEWS/704250469/-1/State
North Carolina is a study all by itself. It not only has National Guard and Private Mercenaries but large military instillations by every branch of the service. That is due to the long standing chairmanship of former Senator Jessie Helms. There is a lot of fire power in North Carolina including Cherry Point a munitions depot. So to keep all of them 'in check' while protecting citizens, from a Governor's perspective must be interesting.
Easley to testify before Senate on National Guard powers
by From staff reports
published April 24, 2007 7:24 am
RALEIGH - Gov. Mike Easley will testify at 2:30 p.m. today before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee in Washington on legislation to clarify the authority of governors over the National Guard.
Easley will represent the state of North Carolina and the nation’s governors, as the National Governors Association’s co-lead on the National Guard.
http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=200770424002
SAY NO TO TO BLACKWATER USA'S PLAN TO BUILD A MERCENARY TRAINING FACILITY
Governor Easley needs to be backed by every Governor in the nation. For those that oppose his objections to the rollback of laws proving to be a burden to State National Guards should be considered under suspicion. It is the responsibility to safeguard the public. That's why they have a National Guard and are NOT a division of the DOD. The law enforcement in the USA and the National Guard have special privilege to be among citizens. The DOD is the Defense Department for all emergencies arising outside the USA. Bush and Cheney are crossing that line for a very real reason. They are crossing a lot of constitutional lines for a lot of reasons. All of them undermine the USA Constitution. I am more grateful everyday we have a majority Democratic Party in the House and Senate for Bush's two remaining years.
Gitmo.
Yeah.
I am sure Blackwater USA helped with rendition flights as well. All that was conducted out of North Carolina. There was an article about that in The New York Times a while ago.
ORANGE ALERT: Set the Captives Free!!!
No Mo' Gitmo
A coalition of attorneys representing those detained at Guantánamo Bay have selected May 1st as the launch date of a major lobbying push to restore habeas corpus and close the U.S. prison camp once and for all.
For more than five years, hundreds of men and boys have languished at Guantánamo. Only a small minority was captured by U.S. forces "on the battlefield," fewer still have been formally charged with a crime. Isolation and despair have fueled gruesome hunger strikes and attempted (and successful) suicides. It is time for the madness to end.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/mustread/index.php?id=869
Eyes Wide Open - the film (trailer)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJBtXRVN768
Camp Casey Peace Institute
MOTHER OF A MARCH
The time for being polite to our war-mongering politicians and organizations which support them is over.
We mothers have to stand up and put our bodies on the line for peace and humanity. We must look into the best parts of ourselves that make us mothers willing to care for and protect all children of the world, not just our own. We need to access our hearts and souls to lead from a place of compassion and love not from war/fear mongering, hatred and disgraceful threats and use of bullying force.
http://www.gsfp.org/article.php?id=320
'Sacrifice' ...by Cindy Sheehan
Keynote Speech for the Omaha Peace and Justice Expo
If you have much, give of your wealth;
if you have little, give of your heart.
-- Arabian Proverb
I recently discovered an incredible woman: Jeannette Rankin. She was the first Congress woman, in 1916…she was from the state of Montana and besides beginning the debate on the 19th Amendment to finally give women our long overdue right to vote, she was an uncompromising and sassy peace activist (like me) for her entire life. In her Congressional roles, she voted “Nay” on World War I and II.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/mustread/index.php?id=861
Every peace movement is important. Every expression of contempt for corruption leading to war unending is correct. Every action of peace is the right action. Never stop. Never give up. Never. Through his love for the USA, Michael Moore has galvanized a Peace Movement that literally can live forever. It is correct and necessary. As more people of the USA learn the pitfalls of exploitive powerful men there will be more and more momentum to a Peace Movement. It needs to be maintained until the USA has contained it's power. I would go so far as to say as the movement grows globally to disarm nuclear capacities of every country, the people of the USA will find 'neutrality' a safer haven than the methodology of overwhelming force. It's a healthy debate and one worth pursuing forever. The peace that come to Earth will result from generations of commitment and not just one lifetime. Vigilance, now and forever. Containment of firearms on the streets of the USA and containment of it's exports. A global initiative to take small arms out of the hands of militias while governments seek more and more benevolent leadership with their strength in economic development and disarmament. Every peace movement is vital to it's purpose and the simple statement it exists is more important than a fatigued peace monger can imagine.
Public Punditry Contest!
http://freewayblogger.blogspot.com/2007/03/public-punditry-contest.html
100th Day Walking
April 23: We enjoyed more of Wes and Deb's hospitality today and were able to relax a bit and soak up some sunshine. Deb took us around earlier in the day to introduce us to some people in the North Newton peace community, then we went to Bret's class at Bethel college where we rattled on for a bit over an hour and were well received by the students. I find that as the walk progresses I have less and less difficulty holding forth for a considerable period of time - and with Jonna there to take over on occasion we don't seem to readily run out of things to say. It is possible - and we certainly hope it comes to pass - that this will lead to more opportunities to speak at colleges and churches as we continue east.
http://www.wtetw.com/page9.html
The route shown below is not set in stone. I'm certain there will be changes along the way, but we will reflect any changes as soon as we possibly can. I doubt that there will be much in the way of major changes - that is to say that you can be fairly certain that I will be passing within a maximum of about 40-50 miles of any town currently shown on the route. As I reach each location I will update this page so that you may be able to find me anywhere along the route.
April 20
MILES WALKED TODAY: 20.3
TOTAL MILES WALKED TO DATE: 1,768.6
NEXT START: About 5 miles south of El Dorado
Coordinates - N 37 44.250 W 96 50.632
Actual Walking Days To Date - 104
Average miles per walking day: 17.00
http://www.wtetw.com/page3.html
continued...
http://www.michaelmoore.com/
April 26th, 2007 11:29 pm
Congress challenges Bush to veto pullout
By Richard Cowan / Reuters
WASHINGTON - In an unprecedented slap at President George W. Bush's war policy, the U.S. Congress on Thursday approved legislation that links withdrawal of combat troops from Iraq to paying for the war, ensuring a veto.
By a vote of 51-46, the Senate joined the House of Representatives in backing the bill that would provide about $100 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan this year while setting a deadline to withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq over the next 11 months.
It was the first time that the entire Congress, controlled by Democrats since January, has defied the president. Bush has repeatedly said he will not accept "surrender" dates.
"The president will veto this legislation," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said. "The president is determined to win in Iraq. The bill they sent us today is mission defeated."
Democrats might arrange to deliver their bill to the White House on Tuesday, the fourth anniversary of Bush declaring aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln: "Major combat operations in Iraq have ended."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9697
Bush holds ground on Iraq
By Deb Riechmann / Associated Press
CAMP DAVID, Md. - President Bush warned Congress Friday that he will continue vetoing war spending bills as long as they contain a timetable for the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq.
Speaking a day after the Democratic-controlled Congress approved legislation that requires that a troop drawdown begin by Oct. 1, Bush said — as expected — he will veto it because of that demand. He invited congressional leaders to come to the White House to discuss a new piece of legislation that does not include a timetable, and expressed hope a deal could be reached.
But he made clear that if Democrats insist on including timetables again, he will not hesitate to bring out his veto pen.
"If they want to try again that which I've said is unacceptable, of course I won't accept it," the president said during a news conference here with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. "I hope it won't come to that."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9700
Young soldier takes on freedom of speech, National Guard
By Jessica Bruni / Carlisle Sentinel
CARLISLE, PA -- Growing up in a conservative military family with a father who is a decorated "full-bird" colonel, Zach Keasling said the importance of freedom of speech is ingrained.
"I was raised to speak my mind as long as it's justified," said Keasling, 20, of North Middleton Township.
The self-confessed Army brat's commitment to the First Amendment is about to be tested.
After writing on his personal MySpace page that " ... being in the national guard SUCKS... ya" and other comments about the military, Keasling — a private 1st class in the 1st Battalion 108th Field Artillery Unit in the Pennsylvania National Guard — said he was informed he could be in trouble. MySpace is a popular Web site that offers an interactive, user-submitted network of friends, personal profiles, blogs, photos, music and videos.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9703
14 arrested in Senate anti-war protest (14 arrested in Hart Senate Office Building)
http://www.michaelmoore.com/
Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Fourteen anti-war protesters were arrested in a Senate office building Thursday after unfurling a banner calling for the impeachment of President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.
U.S. Capitol Police spokeswoman Kimberly Schneider said the 14 were arrested for unlawful assembly in the Hart Senate Office Building just north of the Capitol.
The Senate voted 51-46 on Thursday to approve a funding bill that calls for the U.S. to begin withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq by Oct. 1 with a goal of a complete pullout six months later. Bush has promised to veto the bill.
Gael Murphy, co-founder of the women-initiated peace group Codepink, said members of her group and other peace activists participated in the demonstration, which included unfurling two banners, one listing articles of impeachment and another saying that "your silence is your legacy." They also conducted a mock military funeral.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9698
DO SOMETHING Saturday in the U.S.A.:
http://www.michaelmoore.com/
APRIL 28 NATIONWIDE IMPEACHMENT ACTIONS
http://www.a28.org/
Tales of the Freewayblogger
http://freewayblogger.blogspot.com/2007/03/public-punditry-contest.html
Getting Ready for A28...
http://freewayblogger.blogspot.com/2007/04/getting-ready-for-a28.html
One Man Revolution
http://www.amazon.com/One-Man-Revolution-Nightwatchman/dp/B000NVJRBO/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-0385660-4148723?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1176416274&sr=8-1
April 24th, 2007 9:13 pm
Michael Moore: The Camera Is Mightier Than a Gun
Rolling Stone
[Check out the following audio clips from a Rolling Stone feature profiling Mike.]
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9686
April 25th, 2007 2:29 am
As life fades away, Baghdad becomes a memory
By Ahmed Rasheed and Ibon Villelabeitia / Reuters
BAGHDAD - Baghdad tastes of pistachio ice-cream on a summer night for Ahmed Baqi.
Evoking happier times, Baqi reminisced about the days when families and lovers crowded Baghdad's famed al-Faqma ice-cream parlor before bombs and shootings emptied the place.
"I had a girlfriend and we used to go to al-Faqma. It is a special place in my life. Now I drive by and look the other way. It is only a memory," the 30-year-old lawyer said.
One by one, the old places where Baghdad's residents loved life are disappearing under violence.
Parks, book markets, cafes -- where many played as children, browsed bookshelves as students or whiled away afternoons smoking water pipes -- have been erased, leaving a city many residents say they no longer recognize.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9688
Tuesday, April 24th, 2007
'The Yellow Badge of Cowardice' ...by Cindy Sheehan
There was an unbelievable story in The Cove Herald last week that comes from near where George Bush and I own property: Copperas Cove, Texas. Apparently two residents: Bill and Georgia Thomas decided that the Resident in Chief deserved one of the three Purple Hearts that Bill earned in Vietnam for: "emotional wounds and scars" because people all over the world talk so badly about poor George.
This story stunned me on a day when nine US soldiers and 20 were wounded in a car bomb attack in the Iraqi province of Diyala. Over 500 Iraqis were killed or found decomposing in Baghdad last week and April '07 is shaping up to be one of the deadliest months for US troop fatalities. This is also a day when there is a hearing into the Army's exploitation of Pat Tillman's death to use him as a poster boy for patriotic fervor and unfounded hero worship. Why can't we talk about our soldier's heroic lives and not their tragic deaths as victims of the military industrial complex.
At the funeral of my son, Casey, a one-star General presented me with a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star for bravery awarded to Casey posthumously. The Thomas' can do whatever they want with Bill's medals, but I believe giving one to George Bush demeans Casey's brave and honorable sacrifice. Little Georgie used his Daddy's (the Congressman) connections to avoid serving in Vietnam and George even went so far as to go AWOL from the Alabama Air National Guard.
Casey didn't want to go and kill people and die in his commander in chief's war of aggression. Like the vice-commander in chief, Doomsday Dick, he had "other priorities" besides dying. Casey's Man-Scout Badges are sitting in my grandmother's cedar chest right next to his baby book and hand-print from pre-school.
For George, the Vietnam War Resister cum Iraqi occupation War Criminal, to say that he didn't "deserve" the medal is an under-statement. Bush doesn't feel emotional scars or pain, he deals them. There are many soldiers who are missing arms, legs, eyes, and souls who actually had to earn their medals under a corrupt regime that used their honor and bravery to pump up the bottom line of such companies as Doomsday Dick's Halliburton. There are mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, grandmas and grandpas, sons and daughters who are emotionally scarred because their loved one won't be coming home alive from a war that never had to happen. Our arms will be aching forever because we can't hug our loved ones. Our hearts are scarred with the pain of burying someone too early and our lives are empty with the longing to see our dear one just one more time.
The Thomas' belong to the Fox News generation that still condones and supports a murderous regime. Mr. Thomas belongs to a generation that was scarred, maimed and killed with a genocidal fever by its corrupt regimes and he still thinks that George deserves a medal for his incompetence and callousness?
What do we do in a world where black is white? War is peace? Two and two equals five and cowardice is bravery?
We rise up and become more powerful than the special interests which use both parties to keep this nation on a constant war footing. We use our voices to be mouthpieces for peace and accountability. We march on the Capitol on May 14th to demand that there is no more business as usual and that Congress realizes that every single one of them (Democrat or Republican) who voted to fund George's war are complicit in the bottomless pain that accompanies each death, dismemberment, or disability; without sharing in one iota of the same pain.
If George likes to receive medals that he didn't earn, Gold Star Families for Peace is going to present him with one on April 25th, (or try to) that he does deserve and has earned abundantly: the Yellow Badge of Cowardice. It doesn't take any courage to march other people's children off to war. George didn't exhibit any courage when he was put to the top of the Texas Air National Guard line by his family's friends. George puts on his smiley photo-op face to take something from a good-hearted, yet deluded couple, that he stridently avoided earning. It doesn't take any courage to meet with a bereaved mother, but he also refuses to do that. He travels in America with more armor and fire power than a banana republic dictator, and if he is not stopped by impeachment or other peaceful means, then we will descend into that tyranny of empire...if we aren't already there.
Join Cindy, Gold Star Families for Peace, The Camp Casey Peace Institute, CODEPINK, Congress Reps John Conyers (D-Mi) and Lynn Woolsey (D-Ca) as we march on the Capitol on May 14th to demand our country back!
Cindy Sheehan is the mother of Spc. Casey Sheehan who was killed in Bush's war of terror on 04/04/04.
She is the co-founder and president of Gold Star Families for Peace and The Camp Casey Peace Institute.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/mustread/index.php?id=867
The American Death Toll in Iraq is now 3337.
What's that coming to, about 3 to 4 soldiers per day.
http://icasualties.org/oif/
What bothers me more than anything about Pat Tillman is that the USA military set out to place him apart from all others. They wanted to glamorize a war that needed to be fought to capture or kill Osama bin Laden in order to seek out recruits that would find identity with a hero. I personally find the antics of the USA Government completely deplorable in this incident. I can understand from the beginning how someone might want to keep the truth from Pat Tillman's brother initially until they were off the battlefield. It was hard enough losing him, but, to learn he was killed by friendly fire would be a complete surprise and might disable him emotionally to handle his assignment. I would hold back as well, but, I wouldn't have covered it up. Breaking the news to family is a serious issue. But, to lie and extort the truth for the sake of advertising propaganda to deceive a nation is quite something else. Everyone involved should be criminally held for minimally fraud and possibly treason.
April 25th, 2007 8:27 pm
McCain Jumps Into Presidential Race
By Liz Sidoti / Associated Press
PORTSMOUTH, N.H. - Republican John McCain officially entered the 2008 presidential race Wednesday, stressing his experience honed in war and Washington as he sought to revive his struggling campaign.
"We face formidable challenges, but I'm not afraid of them. I'm prepared for them," said the four-term Arizona senator, ex-Navy pilot and former Vietnam captive.
In a speech in the first-in-the-nation primary state, McCain stressed the wisdom he's acquired over time rather than the decades as he sought to make the case that he's the most qualified to succeed President Bush amid challenges at home and abroad.
"I'm not the youngest candidate. But I am the most experienced," said the 70-year-old who could be the oldest first-term president. "I know how to fight and how to make peace. I know who I am and what I want to do."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9691
This without a doubt. You know the Republicans keep superimposing 9/11 over Iraq. They are separate issues. If Giuliani can't provide a comprehensive platform based in reality without seeking to 'ride the tide' of the old Bush strategy, what good is he? He was mayor of a city. He didn't lead any assault against al Qaeda or legislate any anti-terrorist initiative. The last thing this country needs is antoher opportunist with corrupt connections.
Tell Rudy Giuliani to Stop Politicizing 9/11
While campaigning in New Hampshire last night, Rudy Giuliani resorted to hurling desperate attacks about Democrats while trying to tout his national security credentials. Here's what he said:
"If a Democrat is elected president in 2008, America will be at risk for another terrorist attack on the scale of Sept. 11, 2001… Never ever again will this country ever be on defense waiting for (terrorists) to attack us if I have anything to say about it. And make no mistake, the Democrats want to put us back on defense!"
Send a message to Rudy Giuliani's campaign headquarters and tell him to stop the fearmongering. Our country deserves better from a presidential candidate:
http://www.democrats.org/page/petition/TellGiuliani/
Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army
by Jeremy Scahill
March 2007 - ISBN: 15602597
Meet Blackwater USA, the powerful private army that the U.S. government has quietly hired to operate in international war zones and on American soil. With its own military base, a fleet of twenty aircraft, and twenty-thousand troops at the ready, Blackwater is the elite Praetorian Guard for the "global war on terror"--yet most people have never heard of it.
Pre-Order copies of Blackwater here.
It was the moment the war turned: On March 31, 2004, four Americans were ambushed and burned near their jeeps by an angry mob in the Sunni stronghold of Falluja. Their charred corpses were hung from a bridge over the Euphrates River. The ensuing slaughter by U.S. troops would fuel the fierce Iraqi resistance that haunts occupation forces to this day. But these men were neither American military nor civilians. They were highly trained private soldiers sent to Iraq by a secretive mercenary company based in the wilderness of North Carolina.
Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army is the unauthorized story of the epic rise of one of the most powerful and secretive forces to emerge from the U.S. military-industrial complex, hailed by the Bush administration as a revolution in military affairs, but considered by others as a dire threat to American democracy.
"Jeremy Scahill's exposé of the Blackwater mercenary firm forcefully demonstrates the grave dangers of outsourcing the government's monopoly on the use of force."
--Joseph Wilson, former U.S. ambassador to Iraq
http://www.nationbooks.org/book.mhtml?t=scahill
Blackwater: Shadow Army
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqM4tKPDlR8
Blackwater USA (Bush's Private Contractors) The Bush/Cheney War Machine would not care if there wasn't a USA military. It would make it easier to privatize an military making is stronger than any 'militia' in the USA. The 'trend' for the people of the USA is to create militias of neighborhood watch while he turns over the 'power over them' to a private military that can in turn destroy and kill within the USA when it is realized the country is riddled with "Home Grown Terrorists." Sound familiar? A term coined by the FBI's Mueller. Starting to get the picture? The USA could never turn into an armed camp whereby citizens are marched to death camps. No. Not in the USA.
The best place to begin a 'parallel' military is outside the country until it's power can exceed the strength of National Guard forces in any and all states of the USA.
Currently the Governor of North Carolina is disturbed about the new regulations governing the National Guard. It gives the President of the USA more power than any governor to access the National Guard. Governor Easley knows the prowess all too well of private militias/mercenaries such as Blackwater USA. I am sure he and the SBI has kept a close eye on their practices to measure their ability against the strength of the National Guard in North Carolina.
The articles about Governor Easley isn't from Mike's cite. I also hear Governor Corzine is recovering. He should be able to render interesting perspectives post run in with death.
Gov. Easley wants more state control over National Guard
RALEIGH – Today Gov. Mike Easley said a federal law adopted last year with no public hearings and little debate should be changed so governors can clearly command National Guard units in their states and effectively respond to emergencies to protect their citizens.
Tuesday Easley said current law weakens the authority of governors while increasing the power of the president over the National Guard. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee in Washington, D.C., on behalf of North Carolina and as the National Governors Association’s co-lead on the National Guard.
Easley to Congress: Ditch Guard law
Raleigh A federal law adopted last year should be changed so that governors can better command their National Guard units in times of emergency, Gov. Mike Easley said Tuesday.
Easley testified at a U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in Washington, D.C., on state control of the National Guard and whether lawmakers should repeal the new law that passed with little debate.
Governors share control of their state chapters of the National Guard with the president, but governors lose formal say when the president federalizes the troops for overseas duty. The president can also now federalize the troops during a serious natural or manmade disaster, accident or catastrophe.
"There is unanimous support, and you know how hard that is to find among the nation's governors, to repeal these dangerous provisions," Easley said.
http://www.wilmingtonstar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070425/NEWS/704250469/-1/State
North Carolina is a study all by itself. It not only has National Guard and Private Mercenaries but large military instillations by every branch of the service. That is due to the long standing chairmanship of former Senator Jessie Helms. There is a lot of fire power in North Carolina including Cherry Point a munitions depot. So to keep all of them 'in check' while protecting citizens, from a Governor's perspective must be interesting.
Easley to testify before Senate on National Guard powers
by From staff reports
published April 24, 2007 7:24 am
RALEIGH - Gov. Mike Easley will testify at 2:30 p.m. today before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee in Washington on legislation to clarify the authority of governors over the National Guard.
Easley will represent the state of North Carolina and the nation’s governors, as the National Governors Association’s co-lead on the National Guard.
http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=200770424002
SAY NO TO TO BLACKWATER USA'S PLAN TO BUILD A MERCENARY TRAINING FACILITY
"BLACKWATER WEST"
IN POTRERO!!
Governor Easley needs to be backed by every Governor in the nation. For those that oppose his objections to the rollback of laws proving to be a burden to State National Guards should be considered under suspicion. It is the responsibility to safeguard the public. That's why they have a National Guard and are NOT a division of the DOD. The law enforcement in the USA and the National Guard have special privilege to be among citizens. The DOD is the Defense Department for all emergencies arising outside the USA. Bush and Cheney are crossing that line for a very real reason. They are crossing a lot of constitutional lines for a lot of reasons. All of them undermine the USA Constitution. I am more grateful everyday we have a majority Democratic Party in the House and Senate for Bush's two remaining years.
Gitmo.
Yeah.
I am sure Blackwater USA helped with rendition flights as well. All that was conducted out of North Carolina. There was an article about that in The New York Times a while ago.
ORANGE ALERT: Set the Captives Free!!!
No Mo' Gitmo
A coalition of attorneys representing those detained at Guantánamo Bay have selected May 1st as the launch date of a major lobbying push to restore habeas corpus and close the U.S. prison camp once and for all.
For more than five years, hundreds of men and boys have languished at Guantánamo. Only a small minority was captured by U.S. forces "on the battlefield," fewer still have been formally charged with a crime. Isolation and despair have fueled gruesome hunger strikes and attempted (and successful) suicides. It is time for the madness to end.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/mustread/index.php?id=869
Eyes Wide Open - the film (trailer)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJBtXRVN768
Camp Casey Peace Institute
MOTHER OF A MARCH
The time for being polite to our war-mongering politicians and organizations which support them is over.
We mothers have to stand up and put our bodies on the line for peace and humanity. We must look into the best parts of ourselves that make us mothers willing to care for and protect all children of the world, not just our own. We need to access our hearts and souls to lead from a place of compassion and love not from war/fear mongering, hatred and disgraceful threats and use of bullying force.
http://www.gsfp.org/article.php?id=320
'Sacrifice' ...by Cindy Sheehan
Keynote Speech for the Omaha Peace and Justice Expo
If you have much, give of your wealth;
if you have little, give of your heart.
-- Arabian Proverb
I recently discovered an incredible woman: Jeannette Rankin. She was the first Congress woman, in 1916…she was from the state of Montana and besides beginning the debate on the 19th Amendment to finally give women our long overdue right to vote, she was an uncompromising and sassy peace activist (like me) for her entire life. In her Congressional roles, she voted “Nay” on World War I and II.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/mustread/index.php?id=861
Every peace movement is important. Every expression of contempt for corruption leading to war unending is correct. Every action of peace is the right action. Never stop. Never give up. Never. Through his love for the USA, Michael Moore has galvanized a Peace Movement that literally can live forever. It is correct and necessary. As more people of the USA learn the pitfalls of exploitive powerful men there will be more and more momentum to a Peace Movement. It needs to be maintained until the USA has contained it's power. I would go so far as to say as the movement grows globally to disarm nuclear capacities of every country, the people of the USA will find 'neutrality' a safer haven than the methodology of overwhelming force. It's a healthy debate and one worth pursuing forever. The peace that come to Earth will result from generations of commitment and not just one lifetime. Vigilance, now and forever. Containment of firearms on the streets of the USA and containment of it's exports. A global initiative to take small arms out of the hands of militias while governments seek more and more benevolent leadership with their strength in economic development and disarmament. Every peace movement is vital to it's purpose and the simple statement it exists is more important than a fatigued peace monger can imagine.
Public Punditry Contest!
http://freewayblogger.blogspot.com/2007/03/public-punditry-contest.html
100th Day Walking
April 23: We enjoyed more of Wes and Deb's hospitality today and were able to relax a bit and soak up some sunshine. Deb took us around earlier in the day to introduce us to some people in the North Newton peace community, then we went to Bret's class at Bethel college where we rattled on for a bit over an hour and were well received by the students. I find that as the walk progresses I have less and less difficulty holding forth for a considerable period of time - and with Jonna there to take over on occasion we don't seem to readily run out of things to say. It is possible - and we certainly hope it comes to pass - that this will lead to more opportunities to speak at colleges and churches as we continue east.
http://www.wtetw.com/page9.html
The route shown below is not set in stone. I'm certain there will be changes along the way, but we will reflect any changes as soon as we possibly can. I doubt that there will be much in the way of major changes - that is to say that you can be fairly certain that I will be passing within a maximum of about 40-50 miles of any town currently shown on the route. As I reach each location I will update this page so that you may be able to find me anywhere along the route.
April 20
MILES WALKED TODAY: 20.3
TOTAL MILES WALKED TO DATE: 1,768.6
NEXT START: About 5 miles south of El Dorado
Coordinates - N 37 44.250 W 96 50.632
Actual Walking Days To Date - 104
Average miles per walking day: 17.00
http://www.wtetw.com/page3.html
Walk To End The Wars
My name is Bill McDannell. I am a father of five and grandfather of four. I am a Vietnam era veteran and a former pastor of the United Methodist Church. Despite considerable evidence to the contrary, I still firmly believe that, as a citizen of the United States of America, I have a voice in the activities of our country, and that my voice can be heard and can have an impact.
On Saturday, November 4th, 2006 I began to put that belief to the test. Mindful of my constitutional right to petition my government, on that date I left my home in Lakeside, California to begin a walk that will end in Washington, D.C. I am carrying with me a petition I intend to present to both the executive and legislative branches of our government requesting that we, as a nation, declare an immediate end to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
http://www.wtetw.com/
Activism the way you want it….
www.michaelmoore.com
… now and forever.
continued...
Thursday, April 26, 2007
Photos: Eight-storey building collapses in Istanbul
There wasn't anything substantial in the way of natural disasters. These weren't even in the vacinity. It looks like a 'lift-slab' construction problem. The USA tackled that awhile ago.
Asia:
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 07:59:33 AM - Ankara, Damascus, Riyadh
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 08:29:33 AM - Tehran, Mashhad
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 08:59:33 AM - Baghdad, Muscat
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 09:29:33 AM - Kabul
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 09:59:33 AM - Samara, Baku, Tashkent, Karachi
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 10:29:33 AM - Delhi, Bombay, Calcutta
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 10:59:33 AM - Yekaterinburg, Almaty, Dhaka
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 11:59:33 AM - Novosibirsk, Bangkok, Jakarta
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 12:59:33 PM - Krasnoyarsk, Beijing, Manila, Singapore
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 01:59:33 PM - Irkutsk, Seoul, Tokyo
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 02:59:33 PM - Chita, Guam
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 03:59:33 PM - Vladivostok
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 04:59:33 PM - Magadan
Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 05:59:33 PM - Petropavlovsk-Kamchatskiy
The worst was in Iran. There were a few minor quakes in Europe, but, nothing that would cause this:
There was this though on April 20th.
More or less construction issues. I don't believe Turkey has strict building codes.
New Zealand Herald
US invests $4.7m in NZ firm's gas-to-ethanol process
Auckland-based LanzaTech says a Silicon Valley investor has given it money to make ethanol from an untapped source: carbon monoxide gas.
In a statement from New York the company said it had developed a fermentation process in which bacteria consume carbon monoxide and produce ethanol.
Ethanol can be used as an alternative fuel or an octane-enhancing, pollution-reducing additive to petrol.
Sean Simpson, LanzaTech's co-founder and chief scientific officer, said the company would use the US$3.5 million ($4.7 million) investment from the venture firm, Khosla Ventures, to establish a pilot plant and do the engineering work to prepare for commercial-scale ethanol production.
Vinod Khosla, a co-founder of Sun Microsystems who formed Khosla Ventures in 2004, has invested in more than a dozen start-ups involved in "clean fuel" technologies.
He told the International Herald Tribune that LanzaTech stood out from the scores of proposals he sees each day for its ability to scale up to industrial proportions and the credibility of its founding scientists.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10436171
Lost trade opportunities for NZ in the Pacific
7:00AM Friday April 27, 2007
New Zealand is missing out on lucrative trade deals in the "American Pacific" according to the New Zealand-Pacific Business Council.
Gilbert Ullrich, council chairman, said New Zealand businesses were not taking enough advantage of the markets in places like Hawaii and Guam.
American Samoa and the Federated States of Micronesia were also markets that could be better tapped into, Mr Ullrich said, adding that Australia had, by comparison, done very well in such markets.
"The increased dialogue and expansion of business between our country and the Pacific area can only lead to greater opportunities into the US," he said.
Mr Ullrich made the comments ahead of a Pacific Futures conference in Auckland next week.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436372
Pharmac playing 'Russian roulette' with allergies
5:00AM Friday April 27, 2007By Martin Johnston
Pharmac is gambling with the lives of allergy sufferers by refusing to buy them automatic adrenalin injectors, says an Auckland man who nearly died from his food allergy.
Paul Martin, who buys his own single-use EpiPen auto-injectors - and has been saved by them - spoke out yesterday after the death of Aucklander Grant Freeman.
The Herald reported yesterday that Mr Freeman, aged 38, died last Thursday after his hospital life-support was switched off. He had severe brain damage. His heart had stopped beating for several minutes two days earlier before being treated at the cafe where he had collapsed.
His sister Donna Whittle wonders if his meal was inadvertently contaminated with a trace of one of the foods he was allergic to - peanuts, tree nuts, eggs, seafood and chicken.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436359
Lost spirit returns to arson church
Rangiatea Church was rebuilt after it burned to the ground in 1995, and yesterday it had some of its soul restored.
An arsonist destroyed the historic Kapiti Coast church, but its spirit was not destroyed.
Elders set about building a replica of the oldest surviving Anglican Maori Church, a building commissioned by Te Rauparaha and completed in 1851.
Prayer kneelers, orders of service, papers and a precious kiwi feather kete were among fire and water-damaged objects recovered from the ashes and preserved in freezers.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436355
'Fagin' mother taught four daughters how to shoplift
A judge has likened a woman who coached her daughters in shoplifting to Fagin, the character in Charles Dickens' novel Oliver Twist, who recruits and trains children to steal.
In Tauranga District Court, Judge Thomas Ingram told Maria Ruhia Milina, 32, that he took a dim view of her "bringing her children up to act in a criminal way".
The Katikati woman, whose occupation was given as shop assistant, was accused of getting her four daughters aged 14, 12, 11 and 9 to put on up to three layers of clothing under what they were already wearing, after removing the price tags.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436354
Tip-offs on missing Kiwi after appeals by US police
Florida police have received tips from the public after appealing for information on New Zealand teacher Leonard Taku, 45, who has been missing since Christmas Day.
Fox News yesterday reported Florida police had received tips in the wake of their appeal.
Mr Taku was holidaying in Florida, and was last seen at a car rental counter at Tampa Airport on December 25. He was extending for the third time his contract for a luxury Chrysler Crossfire convertible.
The car has since been found abandoned, undamaged, in the Ocala National Forest, but Tampa Airport Police Sergeant Peter Bright told Fox no clues were recovered because the area around the car had been cleared with a controlled burn.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436381
Boat tragedy father: 'How will I ever get over it?'
The grief-stricken father of two children who died in a boating tragedy has told how their mother battled to save them as the family launch sank quickly in the Hauraki Gulf.
Lindsay Rowles, 53, said his wife Tania rushed to their children - Erina, 8, and Travis, 5 - who were sleeping in the cabin when their 7.3m boat started taking on water early on Anzac Day.
Realising they were sinking, Mr Rowles and two family friends who were on the fishing trip lifted the anchor so they could motor to a rocky outcrop 200m away.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436392
The wickedest experience of my life, says roadside dad
Tim Church got more involved with the birth of his first child than he had expected after a traffic jam meant he delivered his son by the side of the road.
After being held up by half an hour on the way to Tauranga Hospital on Tuesday, Mr Church said he had no option but to pull over in Greerton and deliver the baby himself after his partner, Jodie White, said they would not make it in time.
The couple had left their Mt Maunganui home at 8.30am after Ms White went into labour.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436327
Preschool plan 'dangerous'
The biggest early childhood group in the country is calling for a boycott of the Government's plan for free childcare, saying it is dangerous and "the biggest threat to the quality of early childhood education in our generation".
The Early Childhood Council - whose 1000 centres make up nearly half of the country's preschool facilities - has sent a memo to its members urging a blanket rejection of the policy, under which 3- and 4-year-olds will get 20 hours of free childcare a week.
It says the policy leaves centres reliant on "optional charges" and donations to make up the shortfall between what the funding provided and what they charged.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436368
Child watching cartoons surrounded by weapons
An eight-year-old girl was found watching cartoons with a loaded pistol beneath her and a stun gun and sawn-off shotgun nearby during a police raid on drug dealers in Wellington.
Her father was one of more than 30 people in Wellington city, Kapiti Mana and Upper Hutt arrested during a five-day sting on mid and low-level cannabis dealers this week.
Detective Senior Sergeant Darrin Thomson, head of Wellington metro crime unit, told the Dominion Post the girl was watching television with a loaded pistol beneath the mattress she was sitting on when police arrived to search her father's house.
A pump-action .22 shotgun, a sawn-off shotgun, a semi-automatic pistol, a stun gun and ammunition, as well as methamphetamine, LSD, and cannabis were also found at the house.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=30&objectid=10436406
Government faces defeat over personal records bill
The Government appears headed for an embarrassing defeat over its proposal to tightly restrict access to birth, death and marriage certificates.
An outcry from historians, genealogists and researchers has prompted several of Parliament's smaller parties to revisit their stances on the Government's Births, Deaths, Marriages and Relationships Amendment Bill.
It now seems that the group of smaller parties demanding significant change to the access provisions is large enough, with the National Party, to scuttle the Government bill.
United Future leader Peter Dunne yesterday said he felt that the Government bill in its present form was "sledgehammer to crack a nut stuff".
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=30&objectid=10436389
Curriculum plans bring warnings
Education groups caution against giving schools too much independence over the curriculum, saying it could result in wide variations in what students learn at different schools.
Submissions on the draft schools curriculum - due to be introduced in schools next year, were predominantly supportive of it.
However, groups ranging from the teacher unions, the Education Forum and the Office of the Childrens' Commissioner all warned that it was vague and could result in wide disparities.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=35&objectid=10436110
Asthma a factor for pupils with behaviour problems
Children with asthma may be at increased risk of behavioural, emotional and developmental problems, particularly if the asthma is severe, the results of a new study suggest.
Using data from a national health survey, researchers found that of more than 100,000 US children and teenagers, those with asthma were more likely to be diagnosed with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), depression, anxiety and learning disabilities.
More severe asthma increased the risk, as did living in a disadvantaged social or economic environment, according to the study, published in the Journal of Developmental & Behavioural Paediatrics.
Compared with children whose parents described their asthma as mild, those with severe asthma were three to four times more likely to have ADHD, depression or a behavioural or learning disorder.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436326
Word of God on CDs - with a British accent
A star-studded cast has been assembled to bring the Bible's stories to a digital listening audience
The history of casting Hollywood stars in epic stories from the biblical world has been chequered.
There have been some successes, such as Charlton Heston's towering 1956 portrayal of Moses in The Ten Commandments, but many more performances have had an appeal that is chiefly kitsch - from Liz Hurley's recent Delilah to Dennis Hopper's Samson in Turner Home Entertainment's The Bible Collection.
Now Terence Stamp is to take on the challenging role of God in an epic 20-CD verbatim version of the New Testament being put together in Chicago.
Luke Perry and Marisa Tomei will also be joining a 100-member cast, playing Judas and Mary Magdalene respectively. Former adolescent heart-throb Lou Diamond Phillips will be Mark, and John Heard is cast as Matthew.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436305
Maori groups in High Court challenge to Te Arawa deal
The multimillion-dollar Te Arawa Treaty of Waitangi settlement reached last year headed to the High Court yesterday as several Maori groups argued for the transfer of 50,000ha of land to the iwi to be blocked.
The estimated $200 million settlement the Government reached with Rotorua's Te Arawa involved the return of more than 50,000ha of Crown forest land at Kaingaroa as well as $36 million in cash.
Three Maori groups, supported by several others, asked the High Court in Wellington to block the transfer of the land and strike it from the deed of settlement with Te Arawa.
They are also asking for a declaration the Government had breached a contractual undertaking, breached trust, breached a duty of loyalty, trust and confidence to the groups, and breached a statutory duty.
The groups - the New Zealand Maori Council, the Federation of Maori Authorities, and Ngati Tuwharetoa - began the two-day challenge yesterday, which Justice Warwick Gendall said he would decide by June.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436323
Petrol price up four cents
Like interest rates, petrol and diesel prices were also on the rise today with a four cent per litre price hike across the major oil companies.
The increase takes the price of unleaded 91 octane to 155.9c a litre, 96 octane to 160.9c and diesel to 101.9c.
BP spokeswoman Diana Stretch said the price rise was due to increases in the international cost of refined petrol and diesel.
Caltex and Shell confirmed they had also raised prices by four cents.
Photos: Eight-storey building collapses in Istanbul
ISTANBUL - An eight-storey building collapsed in Istanbul on Thursday and one man was rescued but authorities said they did not expect many casualties as people ran away when they heard the building start to crack.
It was not clear how many people were inside the building in the Sirinevler district on the European side of Istanbul, but most people had left the building before the collapse, Istanbul's governor Muammer Guler said.
A 32-year-old man was rescued from the rubble as teams worked into the night.
"Most of the people left the building when they heard cracking sounds, but a few people re-entered to get their things," Guler said.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436401
Taleban video of boy beheading man angers Afghans
SPIN BOLDAK, Afghanistan - A Taleban video of a 12-year-old boy beheading a man accused of spying has angered many Afghans, drawing condemnation from tribal and religious leaders.
"It's very wrong for the Taleban to use a small boy to behead a man," religious teacher Mullah Attullah told Reuters on Thursday.
"I appeal to the Taleban to please stop this because non-Muslims will think Islam is a cruel and terrorist religion.
"The Taleban do not follow the laws of Islam. They are taking advice from foreigners."
The video released this week shows the boy in a camouflage jacket and a white headband using a knife to behead a blindfolded man accused of being a spy for foreign forces as men cry "Allahu Akbar! (God is Great)".
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436402
Military denies banning Iraq combat for Prince Harry
LONDON - The military denied newspaper reports that it was banning Prince Harry from serving in combat in Iraq, but acknowledged his deployment was under review.
A decision to cancel his mission would be an embarrassing reversal that could hand a propaganda victory to insurgents, undermine US and British assertions that southern Iraq is becoming safe and anger the prince himself.
Harry, third in line to the throne, is due to head to Iraq with his "A" Squadron of the Blues and Royals regiment in the coming weeks as part of the latest British troop rotation. He would patrol the desert in a Scimitar light reconnaissance tank.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436397
Physicist Hawking gets taste of zero-gravity
APE CANAVERAL, Florida, - British physicist Stephen Hawking took a flight on Thursday that gave the renowned scientist, who is confined to a wheelchair, a taste of the weightlessness of space.
Hawking, 65, and an entourage of caretakers and other thrill-seekers took off from the space shuttle's runway at the Kennedy Space Centre in a specially modified jet that dives through the sky to give passengers an experience of zero gravity.
They returned to the space centre in Florida about two hours later.
Hawking acknowledged before the flight that experiencing weightlessness, even for a few seconds, would be sweet relief from the bondage of a daily life immobilised by a debilitating and irreversible neuromuscular disorder.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436405
It's 20 lightyears away - but still close to Earth
Scientists have discovered a planet not much bigger than Earth that could be covered in oceans and has the right temperature to support life - and it is only 20.5 lightyears away.
By 2020, it should be possible for a telescope to take a close enough look at the discovery, which has yet to be named, to see if there is any sign of life.
The newly found planet is older than our solar system. It is revolving around the star known as Gliese 581, a "red dwarf" in the Libra constellation.
Its "year" lasts only 13 days because it is 14 times closer to its star than the Earth is to the sun.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10436085
US military commander detained
The commander of Camp Cropper, the United States military prison in Iraq, has been detained by military police and is under investigation.
Lieutenant Colonel William Steele will face a hearing before a panel of officers to decide whether he should face a court martial, a spokeswoman said last night.
NBC said Steele could be prosecuted for "aiding the enemy" and having improper relationships with his translator and another Iraqi woman.
The Sarkozy political story the French aren't allowed to read
PARIS - The French media is crammed with election coverage but has published, or broadcast, hardly a word on the topic that most obsesses the Paris media-political village.
Just over a week before the second round of the presidential election, a legally-enforced code of silence surrounds the state of relations between the frontrunner, Nicolas Sarkozy, and his wife, Cecilia.
Cecilia Sarkozy, 49, briefly split with her husband two years ago and then returned amid great public fanfare. She voted with Sarkozy - and presumably for Sarkozy - in the first round of the election.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436346
House sets timeline for Iraqi pullout by March
WASHINGTON - Defying President George W. Bush's veto threat, the House of Representatives yesterday approved a bill providing new war funds while setting a target timeline for the withdrawal of all United States combat troops from Iraq by March 31 next year.
By a mostly partisan vote of 218-208, the Democratic-led House narrowly approved the US$124 billion ($168 billion) emergency spending bill, ignoring Bush's promise to veto any bill that sets deadlines for withdrawing the troops.
The Senate is expected to approve the legislation today, sending it to Bush for what will be only his second veto in more than six years as President.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436341
Hugh Grant arrested over 'baked beans attack'
LONDON - Hugh Grant has been arrested and questioned by police after a photographer accused the British actor of attacking him with a tub of baked beans.
Photographer Ian Whittaker told the Daily Star tabloid that he and Grant, 46, clashed near the home of the Four Weddings and a Funeral star.
Whittaker said Grant abused and kicked him on Tuesday before lobbing the beans. The paper printed photos of Grant with a plastic tub of food raised over his head.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436307
India court orders Gere's arrest for 'obscene' kiss
JAIPUR - An Indian court ordered the arrest of Hollywood star Richard Gere on Thursday for repeatedly kissing Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty at an AIDS campaign event, saying it was an obscene act committed in public.
Gere's kisses on Shetty's cheeks at an event to promote AIDS awareness in New Delhi sparked protests in some parts of India, mostly by Hindu vigilante groups, who saw it as an outrage against her modesty and an affront to Indian culture.
The order by a court in the northern city of Jaipur came in response to a complaint by a local lawyer.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436400
Fire closes trains into south London, 200 evacuated
LONDON - Trains were shut and more than 200 people evacuated today because of a large fire near railway tracks in south London, the fire brigade and Southeastern trains said.
"A range of buildings of one or two floors in an area of 150 by 50 metres, 60 per cent of buildings are alight," a fire brigade spokeswoman said.
The fire took place on Canal Approach, near Deptford Park in Lewisham.
The spokeswoman said a 200 metre exclusion zone had been thrown up around the area and about 200 people evacuated by police. No one was hurt and about 40 firefighting trucks were on the scene.
Southeastern said all trains had been cancelled into busy London Bridge, Cannon Street and Waterloo East stations.
Some services were being diverted to Blackfriars and Victoria, but passengers were advised to delay travel.
EU and Iran report progress in nuclear talks
ANKARA - The EU and Iran said they had made progress at talks designed to end a standoff over Tehran's uranium enrichment programme that the West fears could be used for the manufacture of nuclear weapons.
EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and Iran's top negotiator Ali Larijani plan to hold a joint news conference on Thursday but have already agreed to meet again in two weeks' time. No details of the progress were immediately known.
Wednesday's talks between Solana and Larijani in the Turkish capital Ankara were extended into a dinner where they huddled together without aides for more than an hour, with the Iranian taking copious notes.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436253
Navy's frigates break down at sea
The navy's two warships, the Anzac frigates Te Kaha and Te Mana, both broke down at sea earlier this year, it has been revealed.
Both ships had engine problems and it is also believed the navy's supply ship, the tanker HMNZS Endeavour, had an engine breakdown which left it drifting briefly in the Hauraki Gulf last month.
Te Mana had problems with its diesel engines during exercises as it crossed the Tasman to Sydney with its sister ship.
The navy said Te Mana could not use its diesel engines, designed to allow the ship to cruise at a lower economical speed, and had to run its gas turbine.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436414
Safer Down syndrome tests on way
The Government is expected to announce a full-scale screening programme for Down syndrome testing because the current tests put unborn babies' lives at risk.
An announcement on the project is expected in or before next month's Budget.
The head of a group set up to advise the Ministry of Health on Down syndrome screening said yesterday that the current form of screening, without a blood test from the woman, was "unsafe, inequitable and should not continue".
The screening now relies mainly on maternal age and an ultra-sound check at 11-14 weeks of pregnancy of the depth of fluid in part of the fetal neck - called nuchal translucency testing.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=204&objectid=10436387
New Zealanders keen on frequent internet use
A study released today shows New Zealanders have taken to the world wide web in a big way.
If you're an "average" user, according to the survey by comScore, you went online about every other day, spending a total of 20 and a half hours on the internet during the month.
In March, 1.9 million New Zealanders aged 15 or older used the internet, viewing 3.6 billion pages of content.
The survey indicated that the sites most frequently being visited are:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10436211
China plans online marriage list to tackle bigamy
Worried your husband-to-be is already married?
In China you will soon be able to check on a nationwide registry of marriage details, designed to stamp out bigamy, the official Xinhua agency reported.
The system, recording the date, place and names of every marriage, should be up and running by 2010, Xinhua quoted the Civil Affairs Ministry as saying.
Simplified marriage procedures have led to a rise in bigamy in recent years, Xinhua said.
China is in the middle of a crackdown on official corruption, with those who take extra wives and mistresses being targeted.
You Tube attack leads to expulsion
Four pupils from a Hastings high school have been expelled in the wake of an attack on a schoolmate that was filmed and posted on the internet.
Two boys aged 14 and 16 were charged with assault after the victim was lured to a park and attacked on March 30.
Their principal confirmed yesterday the boys would not be returning to the school.
A board of trustees meeting decided the two accused, a 15-year-old who filmed the attack and a fourth pupil would be expelled.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10436075
Campus shooting puts focus on Facebook
At a moment of great trauma, the students of Virginia Tech - and a wider world of horrified onlookers - have turned to the social networks of the internet to connect, to share their grief, to remember victims, to offer prayers and to debate.
Responses to the massacre by a generation of youngsters have underscored, as if it needed it, how communications have been revolutionised by websites such as Facebook and MySpace, and how quickly these operations have woven themselves into the lives of people on campus and further afield.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10435341
Twisted propaganda tales of US heroes in Iraq
WASHINGTON - Truth, it is famously said, is the first casualty of war.
And thus it has been for two of the most celebrated official heroes of America's campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan.
One was Pat Tillman, the pro-football star who gave up the NFL's riches to serve, and ultimately die for, his country.
The other was a blonde teenage girl from West Virginia whose capture and rescue in the early days of the Iraq conflict inspired the TV drama-documentary 'Saving Jessica Lynch.' Now however the two stories have returned to haunt the Pentagon.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436206
Former US spy chief defends controversial interrogation
NEW YORK - A former US spy chief said tough US interrogation of terrorist suspects had proven more valuable than any of the other intelligence gathered by US authorities, according to the 60 Minutes television show.
In an interview to be broadcast on the CBS network show on Sunday, former CIA director George Tenet defended the agency's interrogation techniques, which human rights groups say border on torture.
"I know that this programme has saved lives. I know we've disrupted plots," Tenet told the programme. "I know this programme alone is worth more than the FBI, the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency put together, have been able to tell us."
Tenet, who was CIA director between 1997 and 2004, would not talk about the techniques used, but said that "enhanced interrogation" was not torture.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436218
April bloodiest month for UK troops in Iraq
BAGHDAD - British troops in Iraq passed a bloody milestone this week with the killing of soldier Alan Joseph Jones, 20, a gunner on a Warrior fighting vehicle, who was shot dead by gunmen in the southern city of Basra.
A total of 11 British soldiers have been killed in Iraq so far this month, the highest number of casualties suffered by British forces in a single month since March 2003, when 27 were killed in the opening days of the US-led invasion.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436222
Executed in US may be awake as they suffocate
MIAMI - Some prisoners executed by lethal injection in the United States may die of suffocation while they are still conscious and in pain, University of Miami researchers have said in a study that concluded the drugs do not work as intended.
The study, published in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS Medicine, raised new questions about whether the lethal cocktail violates the US constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
Lethal injection is the primary method of execution for 37 US states and the federal government, though more than a dozen states have halted or suspended the procedure because of legal or ethical questions.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436201
Obama lays siege to Clinton's black support on home patch
NEW YORK - When a cellphone started to ring on the podium as Senator Barack Obama was addressing members of the National Action Network in New York a few days ago, he quickly improvised. "There's something humming down here. Is that Hillary calling?"
The network is mostly black-based and was founded by the Rev Al Sharpton, who was also on the stage. The joke brought the house down because of the truth behind it. Obama is laying siege to the black support in New York state that Hillary Clinton used to be able to take for granted.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436156
Video: Bush shows off his dance moves
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436260
The New Zealand Herald had this listed under “Terrorism”
Bush ready to veto Democrat bill that calls for Iraq pull-out
WASHINGTON - President George Bush is poised to veto a bill that would require the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq by next spring, after the powerfully symbolic measure was passed yesterday by the Democrat-controlled Congress.
The move came as the US commander in Iraq, referring to the war, said: "This effort may get harder before it gets easier".
The Senate voted 51-46 to pass a funding bill that came with an attachment demanding the start of a troop withdrawal in October.
The House of Representatives passed a similar measure the previous day.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=340&objectid=10436409
Oldest tree a palm with crown of fronds
5:00AM Friday April 20, 2007
The branches of Earth's oldest tree probably waved in the breeze like a modern palm, scientists say, based on two intact tree fossils that help explain the evolution of forests and their influence on climate.
The 385-million-year-old fossils, which scientists believe are evidence of Earth's earliest forest trees, put to rest speculation about fossilised tree stumps discovered in Gilboa, New York, in 1870. Scientists believe these early forests absorbed carbon dioxide, cooling the Earth's surface.
Linda VanAller Hernick, a palaeontologist at the New York State Museum, and colleague Frank Mannolini found a crown and part of a trunk in 2004 and a 8.5m trunk portion of the same species in 2005. They represent Wattieza, a tree that looked like a palm with a crown of fronds that grew up to 9m-high and reproduced through spores.
- REUTERS
'Kryptonite' unearthed
5:00AM Wednesday April 25, 2007
Kryptonite, which robbed Superman of his powers, is no longer the stuff of comic books and films. A mineral found by geologists in Serbia has virtually the same chemical composition as the fictional kryptonite from outer space, used by the superhero's nemesis Lex Luthor to weaken him.
The mineral will be called jadarite.
Dyslexia about which side of the brain you use to read
Auckland University psychologist Karen Waldie has been carrying out a brain-mapping study that shows dyslexics try to read with the right side of their brains, not the left. Using a new magnetic resonance imaging machine, or MRI, she has mapped the brains of dyslexics and non-dyslexics as they perform verbal and non-verbal tasks.
In the non-verbal tasks, dyslexic brains work in exactly the same way as others, however, the verbal tasks show increased blood flow to the right hemisphere of the dyslexic brain, proving that dyslexics try to read the wrong way with the right side.
Dr Waldie's work is physical proof that dyslexia is a neurological condition and may help us to understand the best way forward in remediation. Her results indicate that the brain may be more flexible than we originally thought.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10435774
Chaos reigns in the star nursery and Nasa has pictures to prove it
A dazzlingly detailed image released by Nasa scientists shows the chaotic conditions in which stars are born and die - in this case in a huge nebula in of our Milky Way galaxy.
The image, made from a series of 48 shots taken by the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope in 2005, depicts star birth in a new level of detail.
It provides a view spanning 50 lightyears across the Carina Nebula. A nebula is an immense cloud of hot interstellar gas and dust.
This messy and chaotic region includes at least a dozen brilliant stars estimated to be 50 to 100 times the mass of the sun, astronomers said.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/story.cfm?c_id=325&objectid=10436084
Chickens related to T-Rex
CHICAGO - Tiny bits of protein extracted from a 68-million-year-old dinosaur bone have given scientists the first genetic proof that the mighty Tyrannosaurus rex is a distant cousin to the modern chicken.
"It's the first molecular evidence of this link between birds and dinosaurs," said John Asara, a Harvard Medical School researcher, whose results were published in last week's edition of the journal Science.
Scientists have long suspected that birds evolved from dinosaurs based on a study of dinosaur bones, but until recently, no soft tissue had survived to confirm the link.
That all changed in 2005 when Mary Higby Schweitzer of North Carolina State University reported finding soft tissue, including blood vessels and cells, in a T-Rex bone dug out of sandstone from the fossil-rich Hell Creek Formation in Montana.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10434893
Pig cell transplants bring new hope for sick Kiwis
Experimental pig cell transplants into humans with type-1 diabetes are to resume in New Zealand after an 11-year break - raising hopes of better treatment for people with the incurable disease.
"Scientific approval has been given, which is a major breakthrough," the Auckland pioneer of the treatment, Professor Bob Elliott, told the Herald yesterday.
Nicola Zimmerman, a 25-year-old architect and former Elliott patient with diabetes, was ecstatic that the treatment was a step closer to possibly being an option for her.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10434607
Broccoli's anti-cancer trait found
Eating foods like broccoli and soy has been linked to lower cancer rates, and California researchers say they may have discovered the biological mechanism behind the protective effect.
Using cells in a lab dish, researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, found that a compound resulting from digesting vegetables like broccoli, and genistein, which is found in soy, reduce the production of two proteins needed for breast and ovarian cancers to spread. They will next test the theory in mice.
The findings highlight "an entirely unique mechanism ... Preventing the invasion and metastasis of cancer cells is crucial," said Dr Alan Kristal, associate head of the cancer prevention programme at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Centre in Seattle.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10434565
Happy rats give a clue to drug addiction
A surprise finding in rats has given scientists a clue to understanding drug addiction in people.
A single dose of morphine was found to lower the rats' inhibitions, even after the drug left their systems.
The painkiller blocked the brain's ability to strengthen connections, or synapses, that reduce reward or pleasure, researchers from Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, reported in the journal Nature.
"What we have found is that the inhibitory synapses can no longer be strengthened 24 hours after treatment with morphine, which suggests that a natural brake has been removed," said Julie Kauer, a professor of molecular pharmacology, physiology and biotechnology at Brown.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10436321
Leatherback turtles in an online race for species survival
Researchers who have made their life's work the study of the Pacific leatherback turtle have come up with a novel way to save it from extinction.
The leatherback, which is as old as the dinosaurs to which it is closely related, and which sailed blithely through the cataclysmic event that wiped out all its earthbound cousins 65 million years ago, is now on the verge of disappearing.
In 1980 there were more than 115,000 adult female leatherback turtles, but today there are fewer than 25,000 worldwide. In 1988, 1367 female leatherbacks came to nest on Playa Grande in Las Baulas, the national park on the coast of Costa Rica, which is their last bolt-hole on that coast. In 2001 there were only 67.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10435099
Massive twist and stretch as Einstein proved right about universe
For decades physicists have been asking the question: did Albert Einstein get it wrong? After half a century, seven cancellations and US$700 million ($927 million), a mission to test his theory about the universe has finally confirmed he was a mastermind - or at least half proved it.
The early results from Gravity Probe B, one of Nasa's most complicated satellites, has confirmed "to a precision of better than 1 per cent" the assertion Einstein made 90 years ago - that an object such as the Earth distorts the fabric of space and time.
But this - what is referred to as the "geodetic" effect - is only half of the theory. The other, "frame-dragging", stated that as the world spins it drags the fabric of the universe behind it.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10435281
John Duder: More power in our rivers
Much importance is being put on developing renewable energy sources in New Zealand, almost invariably referring to wind, geothermal and even solar.
What is usually overlooked is that New Zealand's electricity supply is predominantly renewable and sustainable in broad terms, principally from hydroelectric plants.
In an average rainfall-snow melt year, about 65 per cent of generation comes from the big dam stations in the South Island and along the Tongariro-Waikato system in the North Island, together with a number of smaller stations run by local power generators such as TrustPower.
It is evident that hydro is often damned because of the "dam" syndrome, with its attendant adverse perceptions of drowned lands and scenic rivers. What appears to be incorrectly presumed is that hydro is fully exploited and cannot be increased.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=39&objectid=10436078
Michael Richardson: China eases hostility over climate crisis
China is rapidly emerging as a key player in climate change politics, both as a major cause of the greenhouse gas emissions that are warming the planet and as a partner in international efforts to curb emissions.
China's role as a leading contributor to global warming was underscored by the recent spurt in growth recorded by its already supercharged economy.
The unexpected rise of just over 11 per cent in gross domestic product for the first quarter means that the world's most populous nation could overtake the United States as the largest emitter of greenhouse gases this year or next - at least a year earlier than the International Energy Agency predicted five months ago.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/story.cfm?c_id=244&objectid=10436077
Clean cars on agenda for automotive industry
More stringent vehicle-emissions legislation, plus proper incentives, will play a major role in pushing the introduction of new powertrains and fuels, say automotive industry experts.
"If it hadn't been for US emission regulations in the early 1960s, we would still have carburetors on our cars," said Rinaldo Rinolfi, executive vice president at Fiat Powertrain Technology.
Experts at a powertrain technologies conference in Amsterdam agreed that carmakers, legislators and consumers all have a role to play in moving toward cleaner cars.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/story.cfm?c_id=281&objectid=10435246
continued ...
US invests $4.7m in NZ firm's gas-to-ethanol process
Auckland-based LanzaTech says a Silicon Valley investor has given it money to make ethanol from an untapped source: carbon monoxide gas.
In a statement from New York the company said it had developed a fermentation process in which bacteria consume carbon monoxide and produce ethanol.
Ethanol can be used as an alternative fuel or an octane-enhancing, pollution-reducing additive to petrol.
Sean Simpson, LanzaTech's co-founder and chief scientific officer, said the company would use the US$3.5 million ($4.7 million) investment from the venture firm, Khosla Ventures, to establish a pilot plant and do the engineering work to prepare for commercial-scale ethanol production.
Vinod Khosla, a co-founder of Sun Microsystems who formed Khosla Ventures in 2004, has invested in more than a dozen start-ups involved in "clean fuel" technologies.
He told the International Herald Tribune that LanzaTech stood out from the scores of proposals he sees each day for its ability to scale up to industrial proportions and the credibility of its founding scientists.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10436171
Lost trade opportunities for NZ in the Pacific
7:00AM Friday April 27, 2007
New Zealand is missing out on lucrative trade deals in the "American Pacific" according to the New Zealand-Pacific Business Council.
Gilbert Ullrich, council chairman, said New Zealand businesses were not taking enough advantage of the markets in places like Hawaii and Guam.
American Samoa and the Federated States of Micronesia were also markets that could be better tapped into, Mr Ullrich said, adding that Australia had, by comparison, done very well in such markets.
"The increased dialogue and expansion of business between our country and the Pacific area can only lead to greater opportunities into the US," he said.
Mr Ullrich made the comments ahead of a Pacific Futures conference in Auckland next week.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436372
Pharmac playing 'Russian roulette' with allergies
5:00AM Friday April 27, 2007By Martin Johnston
Pharmac is gambling with the lives of allergy sufferers by refusing to buy them automatic adrenalin injectors, says an Auckland man who nearly died from his food allergy.
Paul Martin, who buys his own single-use EpiPen auto-injectors - and has been saved by them - spoke out yesterday after the death of Aucklander Grant Freeman.
The Herald reported yesterday that Mr Freeman, aged 38, died last Thursday after his hospital life-support was switched off. He had severe brain damage. His heart had stopped beating for several minutes two days earlier before being treated at the cafe where he had collapsed.
His sister Donna Whittle wonders if his meal was inadvertently contaminated with a trace of one of the foods he was allergic to - peanuts, tree nuts, eggs, seafood and chicken.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436359
Lost spirit returns to arson church
Rangiatea Church was rebuilt after it burned to the ground in 1995, and yesterday it had some of its soul restored.
An arsonist destroyed the historic Kapiti Coast church, but its spirit was not destroyed.
Elders set about building a replica of the oldest surviving Anglican Maori Church, a building commissioned by Te Rauparaha and completed in 1851.
Prayer kneelers, orders of service, papers and a precious kiwi feather kete were among fire and water-damaged objects recovered from the ashes and preserved in freezers.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436355
'Fagin' mother taught four daughters how to shoplift
A judge has likened a woman who coached her daughters in shoplifting to Fagin, the character in Charles Dickens' novel Oliver Twist, who recruits and trains children to steal.
In Tauranga District Court, Judge Thomas Ingram told Maria Ruhia Milina, 32, that he took a dim view of her "bringing her children up to act in a criminal way".
The Katikati woman, whose occupation was given as shop assistant, was accused of getting her four daughters aged 14, 12, 11 and 9 to put on up to three layers of clothing under what they were already wearing, after removing the price tags.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436354
Tip-offs on missing Kiwi after appeals by US police
Florida police have received tips from the public after appealing for information on New Zealand teacher Leonard Taku, 45, who has been missing since Christmas Day.
Fox News yesterday reported Florida police had received tips in the wake of their appeal.
Mr Taku was holidaying in Florida, and was last seen at a car rental counter at Tampa Airport on December 25. He was extending for the third time his contract for a luxury Chrysler Crossfire convertible.
The car has since been found abandoned, undamaged, in the Ocala National Forest, but Tampa Airport Police Sergeant Peter Bright told Fox no clues were recovered because the area around the car had been cleared with a controlled burn.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436381
Boat tragedy father: 'How will I ever get over it?'
The grief-stricken father of two children who died in a boating tragedy has told how their mother battled to save them as the family launch sank quickly in the Hauraki Gulf.
Lindsay Rowles, 53, said his wife Tania rushed to their children - Erina, 8, and Travis, 5 - who were sleeping in the cabin when their 7.3m boat started taking on water early on Anzac Day.
Realising they were sinking, Mr Rowles and two family friends who were on the fishing trip lifted the anchor so they could motor to a rocky outcrop 200m away.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436392
The wickedest experience of my life, says roadside dad
Tim Church got more involved with the birth of his first child than he had expected after a traffic jam meant he delivered his son by the side of the road.
After being held up by half an hour on the way to Tauranga Hospital on Tuesday, Mr Church said he had no option but to pull over in Greerton and deliver the baby himself after his partner, Jodie White, said they would not make it in time.
The couple had left their Mt Maunganui home at 8.30am after Ms White went into labour.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436327
Preschool plan 'dangerous'
The biggest early childhood group in the country is calling for a boycott of the Government's plan for free childcare, saying it is dangerous and "the biggest threat to the quality of early childhood education in our generation".
The Early Childhood Council - whose 1000 centres make up nearly half of the country's preschool facilities - has sent a memo to its members urging a blanket rejection of the policy, under which 3- and 4-year-olds will get 20 hours of free childcare a week.
It says the policy leaves centres reliant on "optional charges" and donations to make up the shortfall between what the funding provided and what they charged.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436368
Child watching cartoons surrounded by weapons
An eight-year-old girl was found watching cartoons with a loaded pistol beneath her and a stun gun and sawn-off shotgun nearby during a police raid on drug dealers in Wellington.
Her father was one of more than 30 people in Wellington city, Kapiti Mana and Upper Hutt arrested during a five-day sting on mid and low-level cannabis dealers this week.
Detective Senior Sergeant Darrin Thomson, head of Wellington metro crime unit, told the Dominion Post the girl was watching television with a loaded pistol beneath the mattress she was sitting on when police arrived to search her father's house.
A pump-action .22 shotgun, a sawn-off shotgun, a semi-automatic pistol, a stun gun and ammunition, as well as methamphetamine, LSD, and cannabis were also found at the house.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=30&objectid=10436406
Government faces defeat over personal records bill
The Government appears headed for an embarrassing defeat over its proposal to tightly restrict access to birth, death and marriage certificates.
An outcry from historians, genealogists and researchers has prompted several of Parliament's smaller parties to revisit their stances on the Government's Births, Deaths, Marriages and Relationships Amendment Bill.
It now seems that the group of smaller parties demanding significant change to the access provisions is large enough, with the National Party, to scuttle the Government bill.
United Future leader Peter Dunne yesterday said he felt that the Government bill in its present form was "sledgehammer to crack a nut stuff".
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=30&objectid=10436389
Curriculum plans bring warnings
Education groups caution against giving schools too much independence over the curriculum, saying it could result in wide variations in what students learn at different schools.
Submissions on the draft schools curriculum - due to be introduced in schools next year, were predominantly supportive of it.
However, groups ranging from the teacher unions, the Education Forum and the Office of the Childrens' Commissioner all warned that it was vague and could result in wide disparities.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=35&objectid=10436110
Asthma a factor for pupils with behaviour problems
Children with asthma may be at increased risk of behavioural, emotional and developmental problems, particularly if the asthma is severe, the results of a new study suggest.
Using data from a national health survey, researchers found that of more than 100,000 US children and teenagers, those with asthma were more likely to be diagnosed with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), depression, anxiety and learning disabilities.
More severe asthma increased the risk, as did living in a disadvantaged social or economic environment, according to the study, published in the Journal of Developmental & Behavioural Paediatrics.
Compared with children whose parents described their asthma as mild, those with severe asthma were three to four times more likely to have ADHD, depression or a behavioural or learning disorder.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436326
Word of God on CDs - with a British accent
A star-studded cast has been assembled to bring the Bible's stories to a digital listening audience
The history of casting Hollywood stars in epic stories from the biblical world has been chequered.
There have been some successes, such as Charlton Heston's towering 1956 portrayal of Moses in The Ten Commandments, but many more performances have had an appeal that is chiefly kitsch - from Liz Hurley's recent Delilah to Dennis Hopper's Samson in Turner Home Entertainment's The Bible Collection.
Now Terence Stamp is to take on the challenging role of God in an epic 20-CD verbatim version of the New Testament being put together in Chicago.
Luke Perry and Marisa Tomei will also be joining a 100-member cast, playing Judas and Mary Magdalene respectively. Former adolescent heart-throb Lou Diamond Phillips will be Mark, and John Heard is cast as Matthew.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436305
Maori groups in High Court challenge to Te Arawa deal
The multimillion-dollar Te Arawa Treaty of Waitangi settlement reached last year headed to the High Court yesterday as several Maori groups argued for the transfer of 50,000ha of land to the iwi to be blocked.
The estimated $200 million settlement the Government reached with Rotorua's Te Arawa involved the return of more than 50,000ha of Crown forest land at Kaingaroa as well as $36 million in cash.
Three Maori groups, supported by several others, asked the High Court in Wellington to block the transfer of the land and strike it from the deed of settlement with Te Arawa.
They are also asking for a declaration the Government had breached a contractual undertaking, breached trust, breached a duty of loyalty, trust and confidence to the groups, and breached a statutory duty.
The groups - the New Zealand Maori Council, the Federation of Maori Authorities, and Ngati Tuwharetoa - began the two-day challenge yesterday, which Justice Warwick Gendall said he would decide by June.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436323
Petrol price up four cents
Like interest rates, petrol and diesel prices were also on the rise today with a four cent per litre price hike across the major oil companies.
The increase takes the price of unleaded 91 octane to 155.9c a litre, 96 octane to 160.9c and diesel to 101.9c.
BP spokeswoman Diana Stretch said the price rise was due to increases in the international cost of refined petrol and diesel.
Caltex and Shell confirmed they had also raised prices by four cents.
Photos: Eight-storey building collapses in Istanbul
ISTANBUL - An eight-storey building collapsed in Istanbul on Thursday and one man was rescued but authorities said they did not expect many casualties as people ran away when they heard the building start to crack.
It was not clear how many people were inside the building in the Sirinevler district on the European side of Istanbul, but most people had left the building before the collapse, Istanbul's governor Muammer Guler said.
A 32-year-old man was rescued from the rubble as teams worked into the night.
"Most of the people left the building when they heard cracking sounds, but a few people re-entered to get their things," Guler said.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436401
Taleban video of boy beheading man angers Afghans
SPIN BOLDAK, Afghanistan - A Taleban video of a 12-year-old boy beheading a man accused of spying has angered many Afghans, drawing condemnation from tribal and religious leaders.
"It's very wrong for the Taleban to use a small boy to behead a man," religious teacher Mullah Attullah told Reuters on Thursday.
"I appeal to the Taleban to please stop this because non-Muslims will think Islam is a cruel and terrorist religion.
"The Taleban do not follow the laws of Islam. They are taking advice from foreigners."
The video released this week shows the boy in a camouflage jacket and a white headband using a knife to behead a blindfolded man accused of being a spy for foreign forces as men cry "Allahu Akbar! (God is Great)".
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436402
Military denies banning Iraq combat for Prince Harry
LONDON - The military denied newspaper reports that it was banning Prince Harry from serving in combat in Iraq, but acknowledged his deployment was under review.
A decision to cancel his mission would be an embarrassing reversal that could hand a propaganda victory to insurgents, undermine US and British assertions that southern Iraq is becoming safe and anger the prince himself.
Harry, third in line to the throne, is due to head to Iraq with his "A" Squadron of the Blues and Royals regiment in the coming weeks as part of the latest British troop rotation. He would patrol the desert in a Scimitar light reconnaissance tank.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436397
Physicist Hawking gets taste of zero-gravity
APE CANAVERAL, Florida, - British physicist Stephen Hawking took a flight on Thursday that gave the renowned scientist, who is confined to a wheelchair, a taste of the weightlessness of space.
Hawking, 65, and an entourage of caretakers and other thrill-seekers took off from the space shuttle's runway at the Kennedy Space Centre in a specially modified jet that dives through the sky to give passengers an experience of zero gravity.
They returned to the space centre in Florida about two hours later.
Hawking acknowledged before the flight that experiencing weightlessness, even for a few seconds, would be sweet relief from the bondage of a daily life immobilised by a debilitating and irreversible neuromuscular disorder.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436405
It's 20 lightyears away - but still close to Earth
Scientists have discovered a planet not much bigger than Earth that could be covered in oceans and has the right temperature to support life - and it is only 20.5 lightyears away.
By 2020, it should be possible for a telescope to take a close enough look at the discovery, which has yet to be named, to see if there is any sign of life.
The newly found planet is older than our solar system. It is revolving around the star known as Gliese 581, a "red dwarf" in the Libra constellation.
Its "year" lasts only 13 days because it is 14 times closer to its star than the Earth is to the sun.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10436085
US military commander detained
The commander of Camp Cropper, the United States military prison in Iraq, has been detained by military police and is under investigation.
Lieutenant Colonel William Steele will face a hearing before a panel of officers to decide whether he should face a court martial, a spokeswoman said last night.
NBC said Steele could be prosecuted for "aiding the enemy" and having improper relationships with his translator and another Iraqi woman.
The Sarkozy political story the French aren't allowed to read
PARIS - The French media is crammed with election coverage but has published, or broadcast, hardly a word on the topic that most obsesses the Paris media-political village.
Just over a week before the second round of the presidential election, a legally-enforced code of silence surrounds the state of relations between the frontrunner, Nicolas Sarkozy, and his wife, Cecilia.
Cecilia Sarkozy, 49, briefly split with her husband two years ago and then returned amid great public fanfare. She voted with Sarkozy - and presumably for Sarkozy - in the first round of the election.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436346
House sets timeline for Iraqi pullout by March
WASHINGTON - Defying President George W. Bush's veto threat, the House of Representatives yesterday approved a bill providing new war funds while setting a target timeline for the withdrawal of all United States combat troops from Iraq by March 31 next year.
By a mostly partisan vote of 218-208, the Democratic-led House narrowly approved the US$124 billion ($168 billion) emergency spending bill, ignoring Bush's promise to veto any bill that sets deadlines for withdrawing the troops.
The Senate is expected to approve the legislation today, sending it to Bush for what will be only his second veto in more than six years as President.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436341
Hugh Grant arrested over 'baked beans attack'
LONDON - Hugh Grant has been arrested and questioned by police after a photographer accused the British actor of attacking him with a tub of baked beans.
Photographer Ian Whittaker told the Daily Star tabloid that he and Grant, 46, clashed near the home of the Four Weddings and a Funeral star.
Whittaker said Grant abused and kicked him on Tuesday before lobbing the beans. The paper printed photos of Grant with a plastic tub of food raised over his head.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436307
India court orders Gere's arrest for 'obscene' kiss
JAIPUR - An Indian court ordered the arrest of Hollywood star Richard Gere on Thursday for repeatedly kissing Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty at an AIDS campaign event, saying it was an obscene act committed in public.
Gere's kisses on Shetty's cheeks at an event to promote AIDS awareness in New Delhi sparked protests in some parts of India, mostly by Hindu vigilante groups, who saw it as an outrage against her modesty and an affront to Indian culture.
The order by a court in the northern city of Jaipur came in response to a complaint by a local lawyer.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436400
Fire closes trains into south London, 200 evacuated
LONDON - Trains were shut and more than 200 people evacuated today because of a large fire near railway tracks in south London, the fire brigade and Southeastern trains said.
"A range of buildings of one or two floors in an area of 150 by 50 metres, 60 per cent of buildings are alight," a fire brigade spokeswoman said.
The fire took place on Canal Approach, near Deptford Park in Lewisham.
The spokeswoman said a 200 metre exclusion zone had been thrown up around the area and about 200 people evacuated by police. No one was hurt and about 40 firefighting trucks were on the scene.
Southeastern said all trains had been cancelled into busy London Bridge, Cannon Street and Waterloo East stations.
Some services were being diverted to Blackfriars and Victoria, but passengers were advised to delay travel.
EU and Iran report progress in nuclear talks
ANKARA - The EU and Iran said they had made progress at talks designed to end a standoff over Tehran's uranium enrichment programme that the West fears could be used for the manufacture of nuclear weapons.
EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and Iran's top negotiator Ali Larijani plan to hold a joint news conference on Thursday but have already agreed to meet again in two weeks' time. No details of the progress were immediately known.
Wednesday's talks between Solana and Larijani in the Turkish capital Ankara were extended into a dinner where they huddled together without aides for more than an hour, with the Iranian taking copious notes.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436253
Navy's frigates break down at sea
The navy's two warships, the Anzac frigates Te Kaha and Te Mana, both broke down at sea earlier this year, it has been revealed.
Both ships had engine problems and it is also believed the navy's supply ship, the tanker HMNZS Endeavour, had an engine breakdown which left it drifting briefly in the Hauraki Gulf last month.
Te Mana had problems with its diesel engines during exercises as it crossed the Tasman to Sydney with its sister ship.
The navy said Te Mana could not use its diesel engines, designed to allow the ship to cruise at a lower economical speed, and had to run its gas turbine.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10436414
Safer Down syndrome tests on way
The Government is expected to announce a full-scale screening programme for Down syndrome testing because the current tests put unborn babies' lives at risk.
An announcement on the project is expected in or before next month's Budget.
The head of a group set up to advise the Ministry of Health on Down syndrome screening said yesterday that the current form of screening, without a blood test from the woman, was "unsafe, inequitable and should not continue".
The screening now relies mainly on maternal age and an ultra-sound check at 11-14 weeks of pregnancy of the depth of fluid in part of the fetal neck - called nuchal translucency testing.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=204&objectid=10436387
New Zealanders keen on frequent internet use
A study released today shows New Zealanders have taken to the world wide web in a big way.
If you're an "average" user, according to the survey by comScore, you went online about every other day, spending a total of 20 and a half hours on the internet during the month.
In March, 1.9 million New Zealanders aged 15 or older used the internet, viewing 3.6 billion pages of content.
The survey indicated that the sites most frequently being visited are:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10436211
China plans online marriage list to tackle bigamy
Worried your husband-to-be is already married?
In China you will soon be able to check on a nationwide registry of marriage details, designed to stamp out bigamy, the official Xinhua agency reported.
The system, recording the date, place and names of every marriage, should be up and running by 2010, Xinhua quoted the Civil Affairs Ministry as saying.
Simplified marriage procedures have led to a rise in bigamy in recent years, Xinhua said.
China is in the middle of a crackdown on official corruption, with those who take extra wives and mistresses being targeted.
You Tube attack leads to expulsion
Four pupils from a Hastings high school have been expelled in the wake of an attack on a schoolmate that was filmed and posted on the internet.
Two boys aged 14 and 16 were charged with assault after the victim was lured to a park and attacked on March 30.
Their principal confirmed yesterday the boys would not be returning to the school.
A board of trustees meeting decided the two accused, a 15-year-old who filmed the attack and a fourth pupil would be expelled.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10436075
Campus shooting puts focus on Facebook
At a moment of great trauma, the students of Virginia Tech - and a wider world of horrified onlookers - have turned to the social networks of the internet to connect, to share their grief, to remember victims, to offer prayers and to debate.
Responses to the massacre by a generation of youngsters have underscored, as if it needed it, how communications have been revolutionised by websites such as Facebook and MySpace, and how quickly these operations have woven themselves into the lives of people on campus and further afield.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10435341
Twisted propaganda tales of US heroes in Iraq
WASHINGTON - Truth, it is famously said, is the first casualty of war.
And thus it has been for two of the most celebrated official heroes of America's campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan.
One was Pat Tillman, the pro-football star who gave up the NFL's riches to serve, and ultimately die for, his country.
The other was a blonde teenage girl from West Virginia whose capture and rescue in the early days of the Iraq conflict inspired the TV drama-documentary 'Saving Jessica Lynch.' Now however the two stories have returned to haunt the Pentagon.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436206
Former US spy chief defends controversial interrogation
NEW YORK - A former US spy chief said tough US interrogation of terrorist suspects had proven more valuable than any of the other intelligence gathered by US authorities, according to the 60 Minutes television show.
In an interview to be broadcast on the CBS network show on Sunday, former CIA director George Tenet defended the agency's interrogation techniques, which human rights groups say border on torture.
"I know that this programme has saved lives. I know we've disrupted plots," Tenet told the programme. "I know this programme alone is worth more than the FBI, the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency put together, have been able to tell us."
Tenet, who was CIA director between 1997 and 2004, would not talk about the techniques used, but said that "enhanced interrogation" was not torture.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436218
April bloodiest month for UK troops in Iraq
BAGHDAD - British troops in Iraq passed a bloody milestone this week with the killing of soldier Alan Joseph Jones, 20, a gunner on a Warrior fighting vehicle, who was shot dead by gunmen in the southern city of Basra.
A total of 11 British soldiers have been killed in Iraq so far this month, the highest number of casualties suffered by British forces in a single month since March 2003, when 27 were killed in the opening days of the US-led invasion.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436222
Executed in US may be awake as they suffocate
MIAMI - Some prisoners executed by lethal injection in the United States may die of suffocation while they are still conscious and in pain, University of Miami researchers have said in a study that concluded the drugs do not work as intended.
The study, published in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS Medicine, raised new questions about whether the lethal cocktail violates the US constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
Lethal injection is the primary method of execution for 37 US states and the federal government, though more than a dozen states have halted or suspended the procedure because of legal or ethical questions.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436201
Obama lays siege to Clinton's black support on home patch
NEW YORK - When a cellphone started to ring on the podium as Senator Barack Obama was addressing members of the National Action Network in New York a few days ago, he quickly improvised. "There's something humming down here. Is that Hillary calling?"
The network is mostly black-based and was founded by the Rev Al Sharpton, who was also on the stage. The joke brought the house down because of the truth behind it. Obama is laying siege to the black support in New York state that Hillary Clinton used to be able to take for granted.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436156
Video: Bush shows off his dance moves
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10436260
The New Zealand Herald had this listed under “Terrorism”
Bush ready to veto Democrat bill that calls for Iraq pull-out
WASHINGTON - President George Bush is poised to veto a bill that would require the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq by next spring, after the powerfully symbolic measure was passed yesterday by the Democrat-controlled Congress.
The move came as the US commander in Iraq, referring to the war, said: "This effort may get harder before it gets easier".
The Senate voted 51-46 to pass a funding bill that came with an attachment demanding the start of a troop withdrawal in October.
The House of Representatives passed a similar measure the previous day.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=340&objectid=10436409
Oldest tree a palm with crown of fronds
5:00AM Friday April 20, 2007
The branches of Earth's oldest tree probably waved in the breeze like a modern palm, scientists say, based on two intact tree fossils that help explain the evolution of forests and their influence on climate.
The 385-million-year-old fossils, which scientists believe are evidence of Earth's earliest forest trees, put to rest speculation about fossilised tree stumps discovered in Gilboa, New York, in 1870. Scientists believe these early forests absorbed carbon dioxide, cooling the Earth's surface.
Linda VanAller Hernick, a palaeontologist at the New York State Museum, and colleague Frank Mannolini found a crown and part of a trunk in 2004 and a 8.5m trunk portion of the same species in 2005. They represent Wattieza, a tree that looked like a palm with a crown of fronds that grew up to 9m-high and reproduced through spores.
- REUTERS
'Kryptonite' unearthed
5:00AM Wednesday April 25, 2007
Kryptonite, which robbed Superman of his powers, is no longer the stuff of comic books and films. A mineral found by geologists in Serbia has virtually the same chemical composition as the fictional kryptonite from outer space, used by the superhero's nemesis Lex Luthor to weaken him.
The mineral will be called jadarite.
Dyslexia about which side of the brain you use to read
Auckland University psychologist Karen Waldie has been carrying out a brain-mapping study that shows dyslexics try to read with the right side of their brains, not the left. Using a new magnetic resonance imaging machine, or MRI, she has mapped the brains of dyslexics and non-dyslexics as they perform verbal and non-verbal tasks.
In the non-verbal tasks, dyslexic brains work in exactly the same way as others, however, the verbal tasks show increased blood flow to the right hemisphere of the dyslexic brain, proving that dyslexics try to read the wrong way with the right side.
Dr Waldie's work is physical proof that dyslexia is a neurological condition and may help us to understand the best way forward in remediation. Her results indicate that the brain may be more flexible than we originally thought.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10435774
Chaos reigns in the star nursery and Nasa has pictures to prove it
A dazzlingly detailed image released by Nasa scientists shows the chaotic conditions in which stars are born and die - in this case in a huge nebula in of our Milky Way galaxy.
The image, made from a series of 48 shots taken by the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope in 2005, depicts star birth in a new level of detail.
It provides a view spanning 50 lightyears across the Carina Nebula. A nebula is an immense cloud of hot interstellar gas and dust.
This messy and chaotic region includes at least a dozen brilliant stars estimated to be 50 to 100 times the mass of the sun, astronomers said.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/story.cfm?c_id=325&objectid=10436084
Chickens related to T-Rex
CHICAGO - Tiny bits of protein extracted from a 68-million-year-old dinosaur bone have given scientists the first genetic proof that the mighty Tyrannosaurus rex is a distant cousin to the modern chicken.
"It's the first molecular evidence of this link between birds and dinosaurs," said John Asara, a Harvard Medical School researcher, whose results were published in last week's edition of the journal Science.
Scientists have long suspected that birds evolved from dinosaurs based on a study of dinosaur bones, but until recently, no soft tissue had survived to confirm the link.
That all changed in 2005 when Mary Higby Schweitzer of North Carolina State University reported finding soft tissue, including blood vessels and cells, in a T-Rex bone dug out of sandstone from the fossil-rich Hell Creek Formation in Montana.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10434893
Pig cell transplants bring new hope for sick Kiwis
Experimental pig cell transplants into humans with type-1 diabetes are to resume in New Zealand after an 11-year break - raising hopes of better treatment for people with the incurable disease.
"Scientific approval has been given, which is a major breakthrough," the Auckland pioneer of the treatment, Professor Bob Elliott, told the Herald yesterday.
Nicola Zimmerman, a 25-year-old architect and former Elliott patient with diabetes, was ecstatic that the treatment was a step closer to possibly being an option for her.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10434607
Broccoli's anti-cancer trait found
Eating foods like broccoli and soy has been linked to lower cancer rates, and California researchers say they may have discovered the biological mechanism behind the protective effect.
Using cells in a lab dish, researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, found that a compound resulting from digesting vegetables like broccoli, and genistein, which is found in soy, reduce the production of two proteins needed for breast and ovarian cancers to spread. They will next test the theory in mice.
The findings highlight "an entirely unique mechanism ... Preventing the invasion and metastasis of cancer cells is crucial," said Dr Alan Kristal, associate head of the cancer prevention programme at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Centre in Seattle.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10434565
Happy rats give a clue to drug addiction
A surprise finding in rats has given scientists a clue to understanding drug addiction in people.
A single dose of morphine was found to lower the rats' inhibitions, even after the drug left their systems.
The painkiller blocked the brain's ability to strengthen connections, or synapses, that reduce reward or pleasure, researchers from Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, reported in the journal Nature.
"What we have found is that the inhibitory synapses can no longer be strengthened 24 hours after treatment with morphine, which suggests that a natural brake has been removed," said Julie Kauer, a professor of molecular pharmacology, physiology and biotechnology at Brown.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10436321
Leatherback turtles in an online race for species survival
Researchers who have made their life's work the study of the Pacific leatherback turtle have come up with a novel way to save it from extinction.
The leatherback, which is as old as the dinosaurs to which it is closely related, and which sailed blithely through the cataclysmic event that wiped out all its earthbound cousins 65 million years ago, is now on the verge of disappearing.
In 1980 there were more than 115,000 adult female leatherback turtles, but today there are fewer than 25,000 worldwide. In 1988, 1367 female leatherbacks came to nest on Playa Grande in Las Baulas, the national park on the coast of Costa Rica, which is their last bolt-hole on that coast. In 2001 there were only 67.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10435099
Massive twist and stretch as Einstein proved right about universe
For decades physicists have been asking the question: did Albert Einstein get it wrong? After half a century, seven cancellations and US$700 million ($927 million), a mission to test his theory about the universe has finally confirmed he was a mastermind - or at least half proved it.
The early results from Gravity Probe B, one of Nasa's most complicated satellites, has confirmed "to a precision of better than 1 per cent" the assertion Einstein made 90 years ago - that an object such as the Earth distorts the fabric of space and time.
But this - what is referred to as the "geodetic" effect - is only half of the theory. The other, "frame-dragging", stated that as the world spins it drags the fabric of the universe behind it.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=82&objectid=10435281
John Duder: More power in our rivers
Much importance is being put on developing renewable energy sources in New Zealand, almost invariably referring to wind, geothermal and even solar.
What is usually overlooked is that New Zealand's electricity supply is predominantly renewable and sustainable in broad terms, principally from hydroelectric plants.
In an average rainfall-snow melt year, about 65 per cent of generation comes from the big dam stations in the South Island and along the Tongariro-Waikato system in the North Island, together with a number of smaller stations run by local power generators such as TrustPower.
It is evident that hydro is often damned because of the "dam" syndrome, with its attendant adverse perceptions of drowned lands and scenic rivers. What appears to be incorrectly presumed is that hydro is fully exploited and cannot be increased.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=39&objectid=10436078
Michael Richardson: China eases hostility over climate crisis
China is rapidly emerging as a key player in climate change politics, both as a major cause of the greenhouse gas emissions that are warming the planet and as a partner in international efforts to curb emissions.
China's role as a leading contributor to global warming was underscored by the recent spurt in growth recorded by its already supercharged economy.
The unexpected rise of just over 11 per cent in gross domestic product for the first quarter means that the world's most populous nation could overtake the United States as the largest emitter of greenhouse gases this year or next - at least a year earlier than the International Energy Agency predicted five months ago.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/story.cfm?c_id=244&objectid=10436077
Clean cars on agenda for automotive industry
More stringent vehicle-emissions legislation, plus proper incentives, will play a major role in pushing the introduction of new powertrains and fuels, say automotive industry experts.
"If it hadn't been for US emission regulations in the early 1960s, we would still have carburetors on our cars," said Rinaldo Rinolfi, executive vice president at Fiat Powertrain Technology.
Experts at a powertrain technologies conference in Amsterdam agreed that carmakers, legislators and consumers all have a role to play in moving toward cleaner cars.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/story.cfm?c_id=281&objectid=10435246
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