Saturday, October 27, 2007

Da Vinci's Last Supper gets scrutinized by the entire world wide web at 16 billion pixels (click here)


A high-resolution image of Da Vinci's Last Supper will soon be posted on the internet by an Italian technology firm, allowing art lovers and conspiracy theorists alike to scrutinise it from their own computers.
The digital imaging firm, called HAL9000 after the killer computer in Stanley Kubrick's film "2001: A Space Odyssey", will post the 16-17 giga pixel image on its website (
www.haltadefinizione.com) on Saturday.
Located in a former monks' dining hall adjacent to a church in Milan, the 500-year-old mural by Leonardo Da Vinci depicts Jesus Christ when he predicts that one of his apostles will betray him....


Standing for the reversal of deadly climate trends and human induced global warming IS THE MORAL STAND everyone should be taking. Those opposed it that reality are immoral and have an Anti-Life Agenda.


Linda Morris, Religious Affairs Reporter
October 25, 2007

AUSTRALIA'S most prominent religious sceptic of climate change, the Catholic Archbishop George Pell, was out of step within his church and the global Christian community on global warming, a leading Anglican environmentalist says.
The head of the Anglican Church's international body on the environment, George Browning, said Dr Pell's position on global warming defied scientific consensus and theological imperatives to protect the Earth and its future generations. It also made no sense and would be proven a mistake.
Bishop Browning's stance came as the Australian Anglican church prepared to adopt its strongest position yet on climate change, committing 23 dioceses to initiatives reducing their carbon footprint.
But Dr Pell said last night he had every right to be sceptical about extravagant claims of impending man-made climatic catastrophes. "There are many measures which are good for the environment, which we should pursue," he said.
"We need to be able talk freely about this and about the uncertainties around climate change. Invoking the authority of some scientific experts to shut down debate is not good for science, the environment, for people here and in the developing world or for the people of tomorrow.
"My task as a Christian leader is to engage with reality, to contribute to debate on important issues, to open people's minds, and to point out when the emperor is wearing few or no clothes.
"Radical environmentalists are more than up to the task of moralising their own agenda and imposing it on people through fear. They don't need church leaders to help them with this, although it is a very effective way of further muting Christian witness. Church leaders in particular should be allergic to nonsense."
Bishop Browning supported warnings that climate change refugees would, in the future, pose a bigger threat to world security than terrorism by triggering massive population shifts.
He also warned Australia had to dump the "language of drought" because it offered false hope to farmers by implying that after drought would come flood and a return to normal farming life. The warming of the planet had triggered irreversible climate changes that warranted fundamental changes in farming and investment practices.
Bishop Browning took issue with Dr Pell's Easter message this year at which the cardinal said Jesus had nothing to say on global warming. He told the Anglican synod meeting in Canberra yesterday he had written to Dr Pell after the Easter message because he found his statement "almost unbelievable".

Deadline set for Kyoto successor (click here)
October 26, 2007
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THE world's most influential environment ministers have endorsed finalising a successor to the Kyoto Protocol by 2009, laying down a plan for December's negotiations in Bali to design new measures to combat global warming.
Meeting in the Indonesian city of Bogor yesterday, more than 40 nations agreed tougher action was required to address climate change and produce a successor to the Kyoto Protocol.
Australia and the United States came under pressure during the meeting for failing to ratify the Kyoto Protocol and commit to binding emission reduction targets.
The head of the United Nations Climate Secretariat, Yvo de Boer, said both nations had indicated a willingness to negotiate and make commitments on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but the details - including if they would be legally binding - were unclear.
Australia was represented by its ambassador to the UN, Robert Hill. Canberra is lobbying to extend emission targets to developing countries not covered by the Kyoto Protocol.
Mark Forbes

Morning Papers - continued...

Sydney Morning Herald

Village cops battering as freak twister pays a visit
Trail of destruction ... the tornado blew the walls out of St Matthew's Anglican Church.
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Heath Gilmore and Manuel Mitternacht
October 28, 2007
A FREAK tornado with winds up to 150 kmh that tore through a northern NSW village was one of the rarest weather events to happen in a populated area of Australia.
Storm chaser Jimmy Deguara, who relocated from Sydney to the Far North Coast for the storm season, recorded the devastation.
The tornado rampaged through the village of Dunoon after clipping nearby Lismore, causing millions of dollars in damage.
Destructive twisters are more commonly associated with the Midwest of the United States, a Bureau of Meteorology spokesman said yesterday, and rarely seen by Australians.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/freak-tornado-hits-nsw/2007/10/27/1192941400158.html



Howard targets Afghan shirkers
Frank Walker
October 28, 2007
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PRIME Minister John Howard yesterday urged NATO countries to get more involved in fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan.
His move came after the Taliban shot and killed Australian SAS Sergeant Matthew Locke in the southern Afghan province of Oruzgan.
Nine hundred Australians are in the province, where fighting has been the most fierce, and two soldiers have been killed in two weeks.
Mr Howard made a surprisingly bitter attack against NATO countries, saying they were not involved in the "heavy lifting" in the battle against the Taliban.
He said the Taliban was targeting Australian, American, Canadian, British and Dutch troops.
"These are the countries doing the heavy lifting," Mr Howard said.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/howard-targets-taliban/2007/10/27/1192941401756.html



Fires contained but the damage is done
October 28, 2007
FIREFIGHTERS say they're making progress against California's wildfires but about 22,000 homes remain threatened by the blazes that have killed at least nine people, gutted 1800 properties and caused over $1billion of damage.
Cooler temperatures and calmer winds have allowed firefighters to contain most of the 23 fires that erupted last week.
They've triggered the evacuation of more than half a million people - the biggest mass evacuation in Californian history.
With diminished winds, an aerial armada of helicopters and tanker planes has been able to fly non-stop, dropping water and fire retardants

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/us-fires-cause-1bn-damages/2007/10/27/1192941401771.html



Cot crusader lashes Australia
Maxine Frith
October 28, 2007
AUSTRALIA'S medical establishment is under fire for its attitude towards pregnancy and labour.
British childbirth guru Sheila Kitzinger MBE will launch an attack on the nation's high caesarean rate and low levels of home birth at a conference in Sydney this week.
The author of more than 20 books - including The Complete Book Of Pregnancy And Childbirth - accuses Australian obstetricians of ignoring women's needs in favour of their own protection and profits.
In an interview with The Sun-Herald, she said Australia was lagging behind other countries, which are moving to less hospital-based models of childbirth.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/cot-crusader-lashes-australia/2007/10/27/1192941404609.html



Four year old swims with whale
2007-10-27 12:10:33
After seeing a Beluga Whale at an aquarium, a four year old Chinese boy asked his grandmother if he could swim with it.(01:16)

http://media.smh.com.au/?category=Breaking%20News&rid=32738



Timberlake donates $100,000 to Irwin zoo
October 28, 2007
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US pop star Justin Timberlake has kicked off the Australian leg of his world tour at Brisbane's Boondall Entertainment Centre by making a $100,000 donation to the Irwin family's Australia Zoo.
Performing hit singles from his latest Future Sex/Love Sounds album and his first offering Justified, the multi-award winning artist stopped the show and his screaming fans tonight to make a serious point.
He told the crowd he had taken a private tour of the world famous Queensland wildlife park during his last visit to the country and had been very impressed by Australia's love of its animals.
"And when I came here last time, it really hit me ... I said to myself 'what can I do?'
"So what I did was 50 cents from every ticket sold on the Australian tour goes to Wildlife Warriors."

http://www.smh.com.au/news/people/timberlake-donates-100k-to-irwin-zoo/2007/10/27/1192941405283.html


Motorists driving on dangerous medication
Maxine Firth
October 28, 2007
ONE-QUARTER of NSW drivers have taken prescription and over-the-counter drugs and then got behind the wheel, despite warnings that the medication could seriously impair their ability to drive, research has found.
Drivers are risking their lives and the lives of others by ignoring vital warnings on the labels of a range of common medicines, insurers say.
A survey of more than 2000 Australians - conducted by a market research company for the AAMI insurance firm - found 22 per cent of NSW drivers had driven while taking legal drugs that carried clear warnings about side effects such as drowsiness, confusion and vision changes.
Many admitted knowing the result might be dangerous, even fatal.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/motorists-driving-on-dangerous-medication/2007/10/27/1192941400188.html



We said our brave son was invincible
Heath Gilmore
October 28, 2007
THE father of Matthew Locke, the Special Air Services soldier who was killed in action in Afghanistan, left his NSW property last night to make the long journey to Perth to comfort the dead soldier's wife and son.
Norm Locke will wait with his daughter-in-law Leigh Ann and 12-year-old grandson Keegan at Perth for the arrival of Sergeant Locke's body.
The soldier died after being shot in the chest in a firefight with Taliban extremists in Oruzgan province on Thursday. He was the second Australian casualty this month. A roadside bomb killed trooper David Pearce on October 8.
Mr Locke's wife, Jan, who has never flown, will wait until the funeral arrangements are made for her son before she travels to Perth.
Speaking from Bellingen on the Mid North Coast yesterday, Mr Locke said he always thought his youngest son, who had been awarded the Medal for Gallantry for courage under fire, was invincible.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/we-said-our-brave-son-was-invincible/2007/10/27/1192941401753.html



Afghan force is insufficient, US general says
October 28, 2007
NATO is taking a risk by not sending enough troops to Afghanistan and restrictions on deployment of some countries' soldiers hampers operations, NATO's commander in Afghanistan said on Saturday.
Afghanistan has seen an increase in violence this year, with more clashes with Taliban insurgents and more suicide bombings, killing as many as 5,000 people since January.
While the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) claims significant battlefield successes against the Taliban, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has led calls for NATO nations to send more soldiers and allow them to do more.
ISAF commander General Dan McNeill said NATO countries had not even sent troops already promised.
"NATO agreed last year to a force level here ... it prescribed a minimum force ... that force has not been filled yet. On that basis alone, I think, no, I don't have enough force here," he told Reuters in an interview.
"We are taking a certain amount of risk by having an unfilled force," he said.
Many of the 37 nations contributing troops impose tight restrictions, known as caveats, barring them from offensive operations or from deployment in the more dangerous south.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/afghan-force-is-insufficient-us-general-says/2007/10/28/1192941410405.html



Duke's heart alert
October 28, 2007
PRINCE PHILIP has a heart condition and aides are on constant watch to take him to hospital if he becomes dizzy or breathless.
A senior royal official reportedly told the Evening Standard: "The Duke of Edinburgh has lived with a heart condition for years for which he takes medication.
"Those who work close to him are informed of the symptoms and if he shows any sign of them he is to be taken straight to see a specialist."
Buckingham Palace refused to comment on claims that the 86-year-old Prince has been suffering from a heart condition for 15 years.
"We never comment on the health matters of the royal family," a Palace spokeswoman said.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/dukes-heart-alert/2007/10/27/1192941401777.html



Most deadly job in world's most dangerous place
October 28, 2007
Lives on the line ... a British bomb disposal operator in Iraq.
Photo: Reuters
Chris Hunter says he sleeps well. For four months in Iraq he did what he calls "the most dangerous job in the world, in the most dangerous place in the world" but, meeting him now, you would scarcely believe he hadn't taken up his alternative career choice and become a restaurateur.
Bomb disposal experts are known in the army as "Felix" because they are like cats with nine lives, and Hunter is certainly a cool cat. He has written his memoirs, Eight Lives Down, under an assumed name and he lives under tight security for fear of reprisals from jihadists who have much to pay him back for, yet he claims that his only worry is how to pay his mortgage on the house near Hay-on-Wye, on the England-Wales border.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/deadliest-job-in-the-world/2007/10/27/1192941405279.html



A smack on the wrist
Miranda Devine
October 28, 2007
JUST as the United Nations was warning Australia to prepare for a flood of heroin after bumper poppy crops in Burma and Afghanistan, the NSW Police Force went soft on petty crime. Great timing.
NSW Premier Morris Iemma last week announced that police would start issuing on-the-spot fines for such offences as shoplifting, minor fraud or theft, possession of stolen goods, offensive conduct or unlawfully entering a vehicle.
These crimes will be treated with as much gravity as a traffic ticket, with a criminal infringement notice (CIN) carrying a fine from $150 to $350.
For former Cabramatta whistleblower and detective sergeant Tim Priest, it's a sickening case of deja vu. A similar system of on-the-spot fines, known as field court attendance notices (CANs), was used in Cabramatta in the late 1990s for drug offences.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/miranda-devine/a-smack-on-the-wrist/2007/10/27/1192941405414.html



Google algorithm tweak spooks WWW
Darren Rowse, a full-time blogger from Melbourne who also runs the b5media blog network, noticed the PageRank of a number of his sites drop significantly.
Photo: Paul Jones
Asher Moses
October 26, 2007 - 2:14PM
In the brave new world of online media, fortunes can be won and lost on the whim of Google's key search algorithm.
And when, without warning, Google tweaked that mathematical formula this week, there was panic on the world wide web.
Swarms of bloggers and webmasters of major sites like Washingtonpost.com, Forbes.com, Engadget.com and SFGate.com noticed a downgrading in their PageRank, Google's measure of a web page's value.
A site's PageRank impacts not only its ranking in Google search results but also the price it can charge advertisers. A drop in ranking can have serious financial consequences, especially for smaller operators.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/web/google-algorithm-tweak-spooks-www/2007/10/26/1192941308334.html


New Qantas chairman brands Heathrow 'appalling'
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Incoming Qantas chairman Leigh Clifford took a parting shot at London's Heathrow airport as he prepared to leave the city he has called home for the best part of a decade and return to Australia.
Reflecting on his time in London at an Australian Business lunch today, Mr Clifford added his voice to heavy criticism levelled at Heathrow, one of the world's busiest airports, which is beset by delays and congestion.
"I have to say, I think Heathrow is appalling," Mr Clifford said.
"I hope Terminal 5 will make a difference, but it's not about the physical infrastructure, it's about how you manage it."
Heathrow has come under fire for the dilapidated state of its infrastructure, overcrowding, long security queues and lost luggage.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/news/new-qantas-chairman-brands-heathrow-appalling/2007/10/26/1192941292302.html



Our right-minded friends storm the exits
Mike Carlton
October 27, 2007
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The Prime Minister's curious facial twitch during the not-so-great debate on Sunday evening set the radio talkback phone lines ringing on Monday. Some people called it a spasm. Others thought he'd been about to drop from a heart attack.
If you missed it, you can catch a replay on YouTube. Type in "John Howard spasm" and up it comes. His face contorts in a weird grimace, eyelids batting, lips chomping furiously. His hands grip the lectern for support. One contributor has unkindly added some rap music.
To me, it looked as if he'd swallowed a blowfly, although it might have been a nervous reaction to a prickly question he was being asked about al-Qaeda and Iraq. Or perhaps it was the sudden realisation that the Channel Nine Worm, manipulated by the treacherous Ray Martin's hand-picked studio audience of trade union thugs, was almost certainly nose-diving towards the carpet in lounge rooms around the nation. It was not a good look.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/our-rightminded-friends-storm-the-exits/2007/10/26/1192941334031.html



You Tube Video


http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3445956553847641929&q=John+Howard+spasm%22&total=5&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=2


Howard's 'Old Man' Face Twitch
Mon, 10/22/2007 - 16:09 — Mr. Speaker
John Howard lost control of his face during the great debate against Kevin Rudd. Medical advisors to the PM have come to the consensus that his brain is deteriorating at an alarming rate; mainly due to his extremely old age. Watch for yourself as a question about Iraq sends Old Man Howard into a brain-face spasm:

http://www.john-howard-is-too-old.com/



Warning: focus groups are addictive - just ask them
Annabel Crabb
October 27, 2007
All politicians rely to some extent on focus groups. Why not? It's the simplest and most effective way to gauge popular opinion; you get your pollster to pay a bunch of folk 50 bucks each to sit in a room with some limp sandwiches and say what they think of you. You never have to meet them and they never know it's you who's asking.
At first it's an experimental thing; you might convene a series of focus groups to help sharpen your plans for transport reform, or health care. After a while, though, focus groups can get addictive. When things are going well they're like an organised series of overheard compliments, and who doesn't like to hear that stuff?
When tough times come, the urge gets worse; it becomes a nasty, scratching compulsion as you comb through them over and over, desperately scanning the transcripts for the seeds of salvation.
The Prime Minister had some strong words to say about focus groups on Tuesday, during an interview with 2GB's Ray Hadley.
"There's one thing I will not do is, I'm not going to sit down with a focus group and work out what I've got to say," John Howard said. "I've always said what I believe. Sometimes your listeners have agreed with me, sometimes they've violently disagreed with me. But they know what I stand for, they know what I believe in, they know what kind of Australia I want and I'm not going to muck around with focus groups and body language experts and gurus and all these other things …"
Now there are many nice things that can be said about the Prime Minister. He is courteous, in the main. He is an excellent father, by all accounts. He knows how to hug.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/warning-focus-groups-are-addictive--just-ask-them/2007/10/26/1192941334038.html



Facebook security loophole warning

Daniel Dasey
October 28, 2007 - 12:24AM
USERS of the networking website Facebook are exposing themselves to identity theft and embarrassment because of security loopholes that allow personal information to be accessed, experts warn.
Facebook profile holders are helping the thieves by posting sensitive information such as phone numbers online, then allowing strangers to join their online friendship networks.
A Sydney conference last week advised users of the networking site - which is regularly visited by 1.5 million Australians - to reconsider their approach.
"If someone is motivated to launch an [identity theft] attack against an individual, it's been made easier by these networking sites and aggregating sites," said Keith B. White, security services director for the global computer firm Alcatel-Lucent.

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/10/28/1192941408684.html


New Zealand Herald

'Swirly' winds before fatal crash - survivor
5:00AM Sunday October 28, 2007
By Michelle Coursey and Nicola Shepheard
Aleisha O'Reilly dreamed of being a top pilot.
At just 21, Aleisha O'Reilly was destined to become one of New Zealand's top female pilots - but her love of flying has cost the flight instructor her life.
The aviation community has been left to mourn one of its brightest young stars after O'Reilly's Cessna 152 crashed in the Urewera National Park during a routine training flight on Friday.
Her co-pilot, 19-year-old student Chris Slee, miraculously survived the impact and indicated "swirly" winds may have contributed to the crash.
The plane, nicknamed Kid, with O'Reilly at the controls, plunged into dense bush in a gully near Ruatahuna, north-west of Lake Waikaremoana, around 5pm. Slee sustained injuries to his ankle, a broken finger and a swollen eye, but managed to stumble across 500m of steep terrain to a nearby road, where he was taken by car to the Papuera Marae. He was later airlifted to Rotorua Hospital, where he remained yesterday.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10472534



Charred bodies bring California wildfire toll to 12

3:50PM Friday October 26, 2007
California fires have now killed 10. Photo / Reuters
Los Angeles - Border patrol agents have discovered four charred bodies in rugged mountains near the Mexican border, bringing the probable death toll from California's wildfires to 12, even as firefighters gained the upper hand in their five-day battle.
Agents found the badly burned remains, thought to be three males and a female, at the bottom of a rocky ravine in the mountains east of San Diego, about 5km from the Mexican border.
Together with two other burned bodies found earlier Thursday in a house in San Diego county, the discovery doubled the probable death toll from the fires. At least 60 people have been injured.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10472241



Congo floods kill 30
8:50AM Saturday October 27, 2007
KINSHASA - Floods, landslides and falling power lines killed 30 people during a night of heavy rain in Democratic Republic of Congo's sprawling and dilapidated capital Kinshasa, a government ministry said.
Rains started late on Thursday local time and continued into Friday, causing floods that cut off roads, destroyed bridges and triggered landslides in the city of at least six million people.
"Until now, the toll is at 30 identified dead. Others are wounded. Some houses are damaged. Many were completely destroyed," said Saleh Kinyongo, spokesman for Congo's Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs.
He said some victims were electrocuted when power cables fell into standing water during the storm. Others were crushed when their homes collapsed during landslides.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10472449



Killer bug sweeps Auckland Hospital
5:00AM Sunday October 28, 2007
By Rebecca Milne
Auckland Hospital is on high alert. Photo / James Madelin
Patients have been infected and hundreds more could be at risk from a killer superbug that has swept through Auckland Hospital.
Anxious hospital bosses were last night trying to downplay the threat, saying no one had died as "a direct result" of contracting the extremely rare superbug. But the Herald on Sunday can confirm a 62-year-old female patient who died last week from what has been described as "excess bleeding" had been infected with the bug. However, it is unlikely the bug was the reason she died.
In a statement, Auckland District Health Board chief medical officer David Sage said patients who had been treated for Vancomycin-resistant Enterococci (VRE) had died, but VRE "had no real part to play in their death".

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=204&objectid=10472538



1000 march on jail over police raids
5:00AM Sunday October 28, 2007
Police attempts to gather evidence under the Terrorism Suppression Act have angered Maori. Photo / Michael Craig
Up to 1000 people, including politicians, joined activists yesterday in a march to Auckland's Mt Eden Prison to protest against recent police raids.
A bus filled with people from Tuhoe arrived especially for the march, one of 13 organised in centres around the country.
Seventeen people were arrested under the Firearms Act and the Terrorism Suppression Act on October 15 following raids in Auckland, Wellington, Palmerston North, Hamilton, Christchurch, Whakatane and Ruatoki, 20km south of Whakatane.
The raids were the culmination of a year-long investigation into weapons training camps alleged to have been held in the Urewera country, and netted a haul of weapons.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10472511



Lack of sleep may trigger fight mode
5:00AM Saturday October 27, 2007
A few nights without sleep can not only make people tired and emotional, but may actually put the brain into a primitive "fight or flight" state, researchers say.
Brain images of otherwise healthy men and women showed two full days without sleep seemed to rewire their brains, redirecting activity from the calming and rational prefrontal cortex to the "fear centre" - the amygdala.
"It's almost as though, without sleep, the brain had reverted back to more primitive patterns of activity, in that it was unable to put emotional experiences into context and produce controlled, appropriate responses," said Dr Matthew Walker of the University of California, Berkeley, who led the study.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=204&objectid=10472308



Standing by my man was the right move: Hillary

5:00AM Sunday October 28, 2007
Applause from Bill Clinton as wife Hillary hugs daughter Chelsea at Hillary's 60th birthday bash. Photo / Reuters
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton says it has been worth it to stand by her man, Bill Clinton, despite the marital challenges they have faced.
Their marriage was rocked in 1998 when it was revealed President Bill Clinton had had an affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky, which set off an extended drama that led to his impeachment and a failed attempt to remove him from office.
New York senator Hillary Clinton, 60 last Friday, talked about life with Bill in an interview with Essence magazine.
Many have wondered why she stood by Clinton, who has also been accused of sexual improprieties by other women.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10472503



Chad catches French adoption group
5:15AM Saturday October 27, 2007
Police in Chad arrested nine French people as they prepared to fly more than 100 children to France to have them adopted.
They included the head of a group called Zoe's Ark, which said this year that it intended to bring orphans from the Darfur region for adoption.
Chad's Interior Minister said Chadian children were among the 103 infants, aged between 3 and 8. He said not all of them were orphans.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10472337



Bad weather and sequels keep cinemas buzzing
5:00AM Saturday October 27, 2007
Daniel Radcliffe as Harry Potter.
It was the summer of'69, as the Bryan Adams song goes. Dustin Hoffman and Jon Voight paced the streets of New York in Midnight Cowboy, Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda took to the road in Easy Rider, and cinema audiences lapped it up in droves.
Fast forward to the summer of 2007 and, for the first time in nearly 40 years, British cinema attendance has returned to the same level.
A combination of bad weather and blockbuster sequels - from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix to The Bourne Ultimatum - has lured people back to the movies.
Figures from the trade body, the Film Distributors' Association, show 50.8 million visits to UK cinemas between June and August - an increase of 27 per cent from the same period in 2006 and an increase of 44 per cent compared with 2000.
The last time British cinemas saw such a high attendance was in 1969, when 50.4 million people visited in the summer months and 215 million over the whole year.
British film-going reached a peak in 1946, with 1.6 billion cinema visits.
- Independent

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10472302



Cool weather brings relief to California (+video)
9:10AM Saturday October 27, 2007
By Adam Tanner
SAN DIEGO - Cool, damp weather has moved into Southern California from the Pacific Ocean, boosting efforts to beat down stubborn wildfires, while weary families return to hundreds of homes burned to rubble.
After six days of relentless blazes from Los Angeles to the Mexican border, most of the raging fires had either been doused or brought under relative control as the emergency turned to the long business of recovery.
At the height of the fires, some 500,000 people were evacuated from their homes. But on Friday, the few hundred remaining in the largest emergency shelter - San Diego's Qualcomm sports stadium - were being moved to several smaller centres. The stadium, which at one time had housed and fed more than 10,000 people, was due to close Friday.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10472453



G-strings out of favour with Kiwi women
5:00AM Sunday October 28, 2007
By
Alice Hudson
G-strings like the one held by Carly Holland have lost popularity. Photo / Getty Images
Hate to break it to you guys, but the Kiwi gal's obsession with the G-string appears to be well and truly over.
Where five years ago G-strings produced by major brands Jockey Woman, Holeproof, Bonds and Berlei had a 35 per cent share of the lucrative women's underwear market, that figure has now fallen to just 5 per cent.
And, according to at least one underwear firm, it's a downward trend that's set to continue - at least in the short term.
So if G-strings are out, what's the new fad in women's briefs?
According to top New Zealand underwear retailers, sleek and seamless boy-shorts - made of innovative and eco-friendly fabrics - are now replacing the once well-loved "gee".

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/6/story.cfm?c_id=6&objectid=10472525


continued...

Turkey pounds Kurdish positions


Oh, yeah, Bush and Cheney have everything under control in the Middle East alright. Cheney says there will be a full scale invasion into Iran AFTER Israel drops the first bombs. And Bush can't insure Iraq's sovereignty from his own coalition members. This is complete and absolute incompetency, but, is there impeachment? No, why should there be?

9:40AM Saturday October 27, 2007
By Evren Mesci and Selcuk Gokoluk
Turkey has massed up to 100,000 troops on the border.

ANKARA - Turkish helicopters and fighter jets pounded Kurdish rebel positions overnight as diplomatic efforts got off to a rocky start in Ankara to avert a major offensive against the guerrillas based in northern Iraq.
Turkey described as unsatisfactory a series of proposals offered by a high-level Iraqi delegation to Ankara to prevent a major military operation against Kurdish rebels in Iraq.
Ankara had given Iraq a list of members of the outlawed PKK (Kurdish Workers Party) in northern Iraq and demanded that Baghdad hand over all separatist rebels there.
"Everyone there is guilty. They are criminals at least for being a member of a terrorist organisation," Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek said, referring to the PKK. "We want all of them to be handed over."...


http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10472456

The Cheney Observer
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Morning Papers - continued...

Cheney Observer

Iraq Hearing with Secretary Rice: Waxman on Closed Hearings
Condi Rice admits that corrupt money, funnelled through Iraq, is funding 'militias' in the south of Iraq - because if the US dooesn't fund the militias in the south of Iraq, then Iran will.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=op5XJEByJfk



The politics of hypocrisy
UK business interests in Burma are more important to this government than justice
John Pilger
Saturday October 27, 2007
The news is no more from Burma. The young monks are quiet in their cells, or they are dead. But words have escaped: the defiant, beautiful poetry of Aung Than and Zeya Aung; and we know of the unbroken will of the journalist U Win Tin, who makes ink out of brick powder on the walls of his prison cell and writes with a pen made from a bamboo mat - at the age of 77. These are the bravest of the brave. What shame they bring to those in the west whose hypocrisy and silence helps to feed the monster that rules Burma.
Condoleezza Rice comes to mind. "The United States," she said, "is determined to keep an international focus on the travesty that is taking place in Burma." What she is less keen to keep a focus on is that the huge American company, Chevron, on whose board of directors she sat, is part of a consortium with the junta and the French company, Total, that operates in Burma's offshore oilfields. The gas from these fields is exported through a pipeline that was built with forced labour and whose construction involved Halliburton, of which Vice-President Cheney was chief executive.
For many years, the Foreign Office in London promoted business as usual in Burma. When I interviewed Aung San Suu Kyi a decade ago I read her a Foreign Office press release that said, "Through commercial contacts with democratic nations such as Britain, the Burmese people will gain experience of democratic principles." She smiled sardonically and said, "Not a bit of it."

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2200311,00.html



Russian Missiles (at 18:40 - 22:15)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/player/nol/newsid_4670000/newsid_4679900/4679986.stm?bw=nb&mp=wm&news=1&ms3=6


That Old Time Religion
Published: October 27, 2007
President Bush was back in campaign mode this week, resurrecting two tried-and-true red-meat issues to rally the cadres in his dispirited Republican Party — fervent supporters of missile defense and of squeezing Fidel Castro’s Cuba. Seven years in the White House have done nothing to change his views. Campaigning now for his legacy, he is still wrong on both issues.
Mr. Bush has brought his 1960s Cuba policy into the Internet age by allowing private organizations to send computers to Cuban youths — if the government does not control their use. That is unlikely. And he proposed an international fund to provide grants, loans and debt relief to the Cuban government — but only after it allows free speech and open elections. Until then, Mr. Bush will cling stubbornly to the half-century-old economic embargo that has failed to unseat Mr. Castro while giving him an ever ready excuse for his government’s economic failings and repression.
No one knows what will happen when Mr. Castro, who is ailing, dies. The United States is denying itself any chance to help influence Cuba’s future by sticking to the failed policies of the past. Its overriding interest should be in a peaceful transition to the democratic and economically dynamic society that Cubans have dreamed of for decades.
Easing the embargo could strengthen Cuba’s battered middle class and help it play a more active role in whatever comes next. Mr. Bush’s call for the Cuban people to rise up is more likely to persuade the government’s supporters — the only ones with guns — to hang on even more stubbornly or brutally.
Mr. Bush’s blind faith in missile defense is equally disquieting. The president has already wasted billions on a small and unproven system in Alaska. Now he wants to build one in Europe to guard against a possible attack on American allies by Iran.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/opinion/27sat1.html?ref=opinion



Corporate corruption of the Average American to invest them in destroying their own planet

http://www.energytomorrow.org/


It's not who you think. As Congress debates national energy policy,
a new study finds that ownership of oil and natural gas company shares is made up of a broad cross section of Americans.

http://www.energytomorrow.org/



The Distrubution of Ownership of U.S. Oil and Natural Gas Companies

http://www.energytomorrow.org/media_center/Shapiro_Pham_Study.pdf


The more there are Bush Cronies involved in acquisitions of USA companies the less chance of ridding the country of immoral agendas of war while running skyhigh deficits.

Allison Transmission excited about new ownership
By: James Menzies
TORONTO, Ont. -- Allison Transmission has announced its change of ownership signals a positive change for the company.
The company issued a release saying it plans significant business growth under its new owners, The Carlyle Group and Onex Corporation. Formerly, the manufacturer of fully-automatic transmissions was owned by General Motors. The transaction has now been completed.
“Under our new owners, Allison remains committed to the fulfillment of its brand promise of providing an unrivalled combination of quality, reliability, durability, vocational value and customer service,” said Larry Dewey, CEO, Allison Transmission.
The company said it is coming off a record year for global transmission sales in 2006, generating revenue of more than US$2.3 billion. The company plans to expand into new vocations under its new ownership group, said Dewey.

http://www.trucknews.com/issues/ISArticle.asp?id=74293&issue=09282007




FCC’s Secret Studies — Reading Between the Lines
From
StopBigMedia.com, October 7, 2007
By Craig Aaron
On Friday, the FCC’s Inspector General released a report on two studies reportedly deep-sixed by the agency because they didn’t support former Chairman Michael Powell’s views on media consolidation.
The IG’s conclusion:
Move along, nothing to see here.
Not so fast.
History of the Hidden Research
The first secret study surfaced after a whistleblower contacted California Sen. Barbara Boxer — who grilled FCC Chairman Kevin Martin about the missing report at his September 2006 reconfirmation hearing. (
You can watch him squirm here.)
That
spiked study showed that locally owned stations do more local news. Since the conclusions contradicted Powell’s pro-consolidation agenda, they were shelved.
As Adam Candeub, who worked as a lawyer in the FCC’s Media Bureau,
explained to the Associated Press:
Senior managers at the agency ordered that “every last piece” of the report be destroyed. “The whole project was just stopped — end of discussion.”
Soon a
second secret study turned up. This one tackled the negative impacts of radio consolidation, showing that the 1996 Telecom Act had diminished the number of radio station owners — even as the actual number of commercial stations increased.

http://www.freepress.net/news/26838



Brevard police to enforce mask ban
Brevard robberies revive 1951 law used against KKK
BY JEFF SCHWEERS
FLORIDA TODAY
As Halloween nears, police departments throughout Brevard County are dusting off a law regulating the use of masks by adults that was drafted in 1951 in part to combat Ku Klux Klan members.
According to sections of the Florida statute titled "Criminal Anarchy, Treason and Other Crimes Against Public Order," wearing a mask in public if you are 16 or older is a misdemeanor and makes the wearer subject to arrest.
In Cocoa, where masked culprits have robbed several hotels recently, enforcing the law is a matter of public safety -- not a plan to rid Halloween of its spooky fun, police say.

http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071025/NEWS01/710250337/1006



Air Force Arranged No-Work Contract
Experts Question Official's Deal With Nonprofit
By
Robert O'Harrow Jr.
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, October 1, 2007; Page A01
While waiting to be confirmed by the
White House for a top civilian post at the Air Force last year, Charles D. Riechers was out of work and wanted a paycheck. So the Air Force helped arrange a job through an intelligence contractor that required him to do no work for the company, according to documents and interviews.
For two months, Riechers held the title of senior technical adviser and received about $13,400 a month at Commonwealth Research Institute, or CRI, a nonprofit firm in Johnstown, Pa., according to his resume. But during that time he actually worked for Sue C. Payton, assistant Air Force secretary for acquisition, on projects that had nothing to do with CRI, he said.
Charles Riechers, an Air Force procurement official, says he had no problem with his interim contract. (U.s. Air Force Photo - U.s. Air Force Photo)
TOOLBOXRiechers said in an interview that his interactions with Commonwealth Research were limited largely to a Christmas party, where he said he met company officials for the first time.
"I really didn't do anything for CRI," said Riechers, now principal deputy assistant secretary for acquisition. "I got a paycheck from them."
Riechers's job highlights
the Pentagon's ties with Commonwealth Research and its corporate parent, which has in recent years received hundreds of millions of dollars worth of grants and contracts from the military, and more than $100 million in earmarks from lawmakers.
Commonwealth Research and its parent company, Concurrent Technologies, are registered with the
Internal Revenue Service as tax-exempt charities, even though their primary work is for the Pentagon and other government agencies. In a recent report Concurrent, also based in Johnstown, Pa., said it was among the Defense Department's top 200 contractors, with a focus on intelligence, surveillance, force readiness and advanced materials.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/30/AR2007093001402.html




Suicide Is Not Painless
By FRANK RICH
Published: October 21, 2007
IT was one of those stories lost in the newspaper’s
inside pages. Last week a man you’ve never heard of — Charles D. Riechers, 47, the second-highest-ranking procurement officer in the United States Air Force — killed himself by running his car’s engine in his suburban Virginia garage.
Mr. Riechers’s suicide occurred just two weeks after his appearance in a front-page
exposé in The Washington Post. The Post reported that the Air Force had asked a defense contractor, Commonwealth Research Institute, to give him a job with no known duties while he waited for official clearance for his new Pentagon assignment. Mr. Riechers, a decorated Air Force officer earlier in his career, told The Post: “I really didn’t do anything for C.R.I. I got a paycheck from them.” The question, of course, was whether the contractor might expect favors in return once he arrived at the Pentagon last January.
Set against the epic corruption that has defined the war in Iraq, Mr. Riechers’s tragic tale is but a passing anecdote, his infraction at most a misdemeanor. The $26,788 he received for two months in a non-job doesn’t rise even to a rounding error in the Iraq-Afghanistan money pit. So far some $6 billion worth of contracts are
being investigated for waste and fraud, however slowly, by the Pentagon and the Justice Department. That doesn’t include the unaccounted-for piles of cash, some $9 billion in Iraqi funds, that vanished during L. Paul Bremer’s short but disastrous reign in the Green Zone. Yet Mr. Riechers, not the first suicide connected to the war’s corruption scandals, is a window into the culture of the whole debacle.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/21/opinion/21rich.html?hp



Preschoolers? Come on, knock it off !

Wednesday, October 24, 2007
More Preschoolers Facing Increased Academic Pressure.....
Chicago, IL-When architect Joan Wallace dropped her 3-year-old daughter Hannah off at preschool this morning, she hugged her, handed over her lunchbox, and took one more opportunity to go over a few flash cards.
"A caterpillar!" Hannah exclaimed proudly as her mother held up a card featuring a lepidoptera in its larval form. Her mother sighed. "Caterpillar won't get you into Harvard sweetheart."
"Flowers!" She excitedly yelled out, a frown formed on her mother's face. "It's only partial credit. These are Siam Roses. Come on Hannah, you know these!"

http://knudsensnews.blogspot.com/2007/10/more-preschoolers-facing-increased.html




Resistance is Futile
October 22, 2007
Resistance is futile: You will be (mis)informed.

http://www.michaelyon-online.com/wp/resistance-is-futile.htm




Islamo-Facism Week?

Writer outlines terrorist links
Journalist explains the apparent ties between American groups and Islamic fundamentalists
...The council was founded by Hamas, an Islamic militant organization. Both Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, a multinational Islamic political group, have helped start many Islamic groups across the world, according to Kaufman, including the Muslim Student Association.
Monica Rowand, a first-year communication studies student, said she came to the event to hear a different point of view from her own.
“I don’t agree with what the Bruin Republicans are saying and I want to know the logic behind their statements,” Rowand said.
Salomon Hossein, a member of MSA, said Kaufman rarely mentioned the club in his speech, and when he did, he lumped them in with Islamic radicals.
“(The speech) hardly ... was about MSA. He went on about known terrorist organizations,” which MSA is not, Hossein said.
Later in his speech, Kaufman was especially concerned with a past issue of Al-Talib, the UCLA newsmagazine geared toward the Muslim community. In a July 1999 editorial titled “Jihad in America,” the Al-Talib staff wrote, “When we hear someone refer to ... Osama bin Laden as a ‘terrorist,’ we should defend our brother and refer to him as a freedom fighter.”...

http://www.dailybruin.ucla.edu/news/2007/oct/26/writer-outlines-terrorist-links/




Saturday, October 27, 2007
Valerie Plame Wilson: The real reason to blow the cover of a CIA operative
Fair Game by Valerie Plame Wilson
The latest entry into the Newsnight Book Club is Valerie Plame's Fair Game.
Valerie Plame Wilson is the woman at the centre of the scandal that, ultimately, led to the downfall, prosecution and conviction of the former White House chief of staff, Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, for revealing her identity as a CIA spy.
In Fair Game, Valerie Plame Wilson tells her side of the story, and details her life as a spy. The following extract covers the moment her identity was revealed.
Click here to read more.

http://ledaro.blogspot.com/2007/10/valerie-plame-wilson-real-reason-to.html




Plame Fights Back Against White House in CIA-Censored Memoir
By Charles Taylor
Oct. 26 (Bloomberg) -- Reading Valerie Plame Wilson's memoir ``Fair Game'' is like trying to listen to a radio broadcast in which the signal keeps fading in and out.
The former CIA operative, whose undercover identity was revealed by the columnist Robert Novak after a carefully orchestrated campaign emanating from the office of Vice President Dick Cheney, submitted her memoir to the CIA before publication, as the agreement she signed on joining the agency required her to do. Censors there expurgated sentences, whole batches of pages, even chapter titles.
Plame and her publisher, Simon & Schuster, are suing, claiming the redactions go far beyond the terms of the agreement. But in a middle-finger gesture, the book has been published with the offending passages left in but hidden behind gray bars.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601088&sid=aV.krs0brRzI&refer=home



Fair Plame
After years of enforced silence, Valerie Plame Wilson finally tells all -- except for the stuff the CIA blacked out.
By Rebecca Traister
Reuters/Kevin Lamarque
Background photo: Valerie Plame Wilson and her husband, Joseph Wilson, hold a news conference at the National Press Club in Washington, July 14, 2006.
For four years,
Valerie Plame Wilson has existed for most Americans largely as a one-dimensional figure, a symbol at best. She was a misspelled scrawl -- "Valerie Flame" -- in New York Times reporter Judith Miller's notebook. She was a beautiful woman swathed in shades and scarf in a Vanity Fair photo spread. She was deemed "little more than a glorified secretary" by a Republican congressman, trying to defuse growing suspicion that her outing as a CIA covert operative, by someone high up in the Bush administration, had been an illegal breach of national security. By the left, she and her husband, former ambassador and weapons of mass destruction whistle-blower Joe Wilson, were lionized as martyrs to the antiwar cause.

http://www.salon.com/books/review/2007/10/24/valerie_plame/index_np.html



Plame Dares Call It Treason
Posted October 26, 2007 10:32 AM (EST)
On MSNBC last night Valerie Plame called the Bush Administration's outing of her undercover CIA status TREASON. Asked if she anticipated that Bush and Cheney would retaliate for Joe Wilson's Op-Ed article outing the Administration's case for the Iraq War by attacking her, she said that that was not on their list of contemplated consequences of speaking the truth to power. Never, she said, did she think that the Administration would compromise national security for domestic political gain.
Parenthetically, we have learned how gigantic the fraud perpetrated by the Administration was. Hans Blix, the weapons' inspector leader whose mission was cut short by the US invasion, said that IAEA knew in a day that the claimed Niger connection was a complete fraud. Blix was astounded that such an obvious fraud nonetheless made its way from Italian intelligence to the British and then to the Americans.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/paul-abrams/plame-dares-call-it-treas_b_69979.html



Rudy's Secretary of Health and Human Services


Senate approves Frist for international aid board
Date created: 10/26/2007 11:30:34 PM
Last updated: 10/26/2007 11:31:05 PM
The U.S. Senate has approved the nomination of former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist to the board of an international aid program that seeks to encourage democracy and openness in poor countries.
Frist, a Nashville Republican, was nominated by President Bush to replace former New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman on the board of the Millennium Challenge Corporation.
Bush in 2002 announced the creation of the Millennium Challenge to distribute foreign aid to poor countries committed to tackling corruption and to dedicating themselves to certain economic policies and human rights.
The idea was that little good comes from pouring aid into a country that has corrupt or unstable leadership. The program was formally launched in 2004.
Frist, a surgeon, abandoned a widely expected presidential bid last year. He is now focusing on global health issues.

http://www.wbir.com/news/regional/story.aspx?storyid=50592



Friday, October 26. 2007
NOTED: US Government states 63 Million, 20% of population!, has wagered online and other oddness
The Guardian Unlimited has an interesting article by John Sterlicchi about the aftermath of the signing of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act UIGEA.
The most surprising information was that the US Government claims that 63 Million citizens have wagered online (20% of the population!). I suspect this number is... "hokum" (see previous article about the RCMP and their interesting counterfeiting numbers). 20% of the population would probably map to around 1/3 of the total population that wagers in a casino or other legal, face-to-face venue if scaled to the 70 odd percent of the population that is online.
Now, if the government REALLY BELIEVED THIS, you'd think that they would have put more thought into a piece of legislation that was slipped into the Port Security Act by former Senator Bill Frist.
There is some other interesting, but well-known information about the several bills to legalize skill games and poker in the US and Antigua's victory in the WTO. The WTO case is very interesting as the US is one of the major advocates of free trade, but is being sued for billions in damages for restricting free trade in online gambling. And a lot of countries are looking for US blood including: the European Union, India, Antigua and Barbuda, Japan, Costa Rica, Macao, Canada and Australia.

http://playnoevil.com/serendipity/index.php?/archives/1694-NOTED-US-Government-states-63-Million,-20%25-of-population!,-has-wagered-online-and-other-oddness.html



New Jersey Prescription Drug Price Registry
By
Flexo on Friday, October 26th, 2007 in Consumer
Over 100 of the most common prescription drugs are listed in the
New Jersey Prescription Drug Price Registry, maintained by the New Jersey Division of Consumer Affairs. This website lets you search by medication name, type, and form to find the prices for these drugs by zip code.

http://www.consumerismcommentary.com/2007/10/26/new-jersey-prescription-drug-price-registry/


Nursing homes owned by private equity face U.S. inquiries
By Charles Duhigg
Published: October 24, 2007
Two U.S. congressional committees have announced that they will investigate business practices at nursing homes owned by private investment groups.
The inquiries will be led by two Democratic representatives, John Dingell of Michigan, chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, and Barney Frank of Massachusetts, head of the Financial Services Committee. The scope of the inquiries is still being determined, but will probably include hearings and proposed legislation, a committee spokeswoman said Tuesday.
The investigations are the latest scrutiny of private equity investments in nursing homes.
Last week, two senators - Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana and chairman of the Finance Committee, and Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican and the committee's ranking minority member - sent letters to five private investment firms seeking information on their ownership and management of nursing home chains.
The senators also asked the agency that is responsible for many payments to nursing homes, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, about its oversight of such homes.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/10/24/business/nursing.php



Plight of Afghan Children

http://news.bbc.co.uk/player/nol/newsid_4670000/newsid_4679900/4679986.stm?bw=nb&mp=wm&news=1&ms3=6



Supreme Court Justices Unethical Behavior?
We have all read about Jack Abramoff and how lobbying is done in Washington. Trips, dinners, campaign funding, and other perks paid for by lobbyists in return for favors the politicians can do for their clients.
But our Supreme Court Justices should be beyond reproach. They are not elected, but appointed. They are in that position for life or until they decide to retire. They also should go out of their way to be unbiased and out of the reach of special interest groups, people whose cases might come before the Supreme Court, and lobbyists.
While other Justices may walk the line of impropriety, Justice Scalia proudly struts over the ethical line and is smug about it. Remember Leona Helmsly when arrested for income tax evasion? She said "taxes are for the little people", or something to that effect. Justice Scalia has a similar attitude when questioned about his activities.
Not too long ago, the Supreme Court was hearing a case that affected the ability for the Bush administration to hold prisoners indefinitely. Just before the case was to be heard, Justice Scalia went on a hunting trip with Dick Cheney that didn't cost Scalia a dime. When asked if that might present a conflict of interest and that he should possibly recuse himself from the case, he called the idea ridiculous and stayed on the case. His vote favored the Bush Administration.
Yes, it might have been in favor of them anyway. No, the trip may not have influenced him in any way. However the appearance of impropriety, unethical behavior, or conflict of interest is enough to make going on that trip the wrong theng to do. And after doing so, thumbing his nose at people who raised the question was also the wrong thing to do.
Now, all the justices were at the swearing in of Justice Roberts, well all of them but Antonin Scalia. He was playing tennis and going fly fishing at the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Bachelor Gulch, Colo, all on the dole. All paid for by the Federalists Society.
"I was out of town with a commitment that I could not break, and that's what the public information office told you," he said.

http://cuttingedgers.blogspot.com/2007/10/supreme-court-justices-unethical.html



The Pro-War Constituents of the Right Wing can't take issue with the war so they take issue with the 'personalities' of the activists. Cindy Sheehan as well left a former life to become a leader toward peace. Perhaps Ms. Fairozz should seek the opportunity to run for office as Cindy has.

Activist group Code Pink
scored a fantastic photo with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice this week. The message is a simple one we have heard before: Condi and her President have blood on their hands from the Iraq War. The remarkable thing I think is the crazy look in that lady's eyes. (via Rob Thurman)

http://www.omgblog.com/2007/10/code_pink_and_condi_rice.php



Arlington woman nurturing Code Pink activists in D.C.
Teacher leaves job behind for role as 'den mother'
10:55 PM CDT on Friday, June 22, 2007
By CHRISTINE MacDONALD / Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning News
WASHINGTON – Desiree Fairooz has never been "a pink person," but her new home is replete with pink lampshades, pink throw pillows and pink quilts. The back yard has pink flowers.
MICHAEL TEMCHINE/Special Contributor
Desiree Fairooz quit her job as a Grand Prairie teacher and left her family in Arlington to serve as 'den mother' for Code Pink activists in Washington, D.C. She manages a house that serves as Code Pink's Washington operations base and provides lodging and meals for members in town to participate in Code Pink protests.
It's appropriate for Code Pink, an anti-war group known for using humor and outlandish costumes to publicize its views.
Stored in the basement are pink slips to suggest that President Bush and his vice president should be fired, pink police uniforms to push for the arrest of Attorney General Al Gonzales, and pink hospital scrubs and prescription pads to promote the message that the country is ailing.
And in the middle of all this pink activism is Ms. Fairooz, who quit her teaching job in Grand Prairie and left her family behind in Arlington to become den mother to the women of Code Pink.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/062307dnnatcodepink.34f0383.html




The Ban on Meatpacker Ownership should go forward as it would benefit the Small Family Farmer.

Pretty much business as usual
The Senate Ag Committee's Farm Bill
Posted by
Tom Philpott at 4:26 PM on 26 Oct 2007
No jaded observer will be surprised: The Senate Agriculture Committee yesterday
released its version of the 2007 Farm Bill, leaving the subsidy mechanisms in the 2002 bill pretty well intact. I'm still trying to chase down details of the proposal, but here are a couple of tidbits.
The big news is that the version contains a ban on meatpacker ownership of livestock. This is (potentially) huge. Currently, dominant meatpackers like Smithfield Foods and Tyson also raises hundreds of thousands of animals themselves each year. These "captive herds" give them enormous leverage over independent farmers, allowing these corporate giants to dictate price, growing conditions, etc. A so-called "packer ban" would go some way in leveling the playing field between farmers and corporate giants.

http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/10/26/82852/556




University of Minnesota graduate student searches for answers in the abduction of his nieces in Sudan
For Gabriel Solomon - who was kidnapped at age 6 in his native Sudan and forced to become a soldier - the abduction of his nieces has made his quest to defend children's rights personal.
RUBÉN ROSARIO
Article Last Updated: 10/21/2007 01:12:20 AM CDT
Gabriel Kou Solomon, one of the "Lost Boys of Sudan," has already undergone quite a schooling in his young life. The 27-year-old African refugee graduated from Oak Grove Lutheran High School in Fargo, N.D. He graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison last year with a degree in international studies and history. He is pursuing a graduate degree in a similar professional discipline at the University of Minnesota.
But it's the education he got back home that no child or adult should ever receive. Solomon was taken from his parents' village 21 years ago by roving members of the southern Sudan Liberation Army.
Solomon, then 6, and many other boys were eventually transported to Ethiopia under the thinly disguised ruse that they would be schooled in the three R's. Instead, they were taught how to shoot an AK-47, fling grenades and hopefully take lives without hesitation, conscience or remorse.

http://www.twincities.com/localnews/ci_7233502




TV Ratings for High Court Arguments Would Be Awful, Alito Says
Mark Sherman
The Associated Press
10-22-2007
Justice Samuel Alito doubts the public is clamoring for Supreme Court sessions to be televised and predicts they would battle Congress for last place in the ratings.
Alito said Friday that the same-day availability of oral argument transcripts on the Internet and extensive media coverage means the "only thing missing is pictures of the justices and the lawyers with their lips moving as they ask and answer questions."
"I am concerned that if our arguments were televised we'd be competing neck and neck with Congress ... for the lowest ratings that have ever been recorded by the Nielsen system," Alito said in an often humorous speech at the University of Virginia's Center for Politics conference on the need for major changes to the Constitution.

http://www.law.com/jsp/law/LawArticleFriendly.jsp?id=1192784613440



New Orleans DA hit with one problem after another

NEW ORLEANS -- Confidence in beleaguered District Attorney Eddie Jordan slipped further this week as city officials said they aren't inclined to pay off $3.7 million his office owes in a discrimination lawsuit, and as news broke that a robbery suspect briefly took refuge at an unsuspecting Jordan's home.
Now a pair of lawmakers are threatening to begin impeachment proceedings against Jordan.
"There is a widely held perception that the office is ineffective," said John Penny, chair of the criminal justice program at Southern University-New Orleans. "There seems to be a lack of efficiency and organization. Citizens' confidence in the office is definitely shaken, and Mr. Jordan has not done much to restore it."
That failure in confidence is one of the reasons the state Legislature should impeach Jordan, said Rep.-elect Cameron Henry, whose district includes Orleans and Jefferson parishes.

http://www.katc.com/Global/story.asp?S=7272066



The Master Liquidity Enhancement Con (duit)
In a stunning editorial leap of faith, the New York Times headlines that “3 Major Banks Offer Plan to Calm Debts in Housing.” What three major banks have actually suggested, with Secretary of Treasury Henry Paulson safely in tow, is that someone else sail in to save their considerably-at-risk bacon.
Paulson, to his credit, is able to announce the laughably named Master Liquidity Enhancement Conduit without so much as the hint of a smile. Not even a little smirk at the corner of the lip. Hank is not a fan of irony, nor does he much embrace nuance. Liquidity enhancement is, in this master-stroke of name over content, a fund to keep a bunch of banks from losing their collective asses on bad loans they made. Loans dashed off, knowing full well they weren't worth anything and had little chance of being paid. Greed was the engine of their penmanship, pure greed.

http://www.opinion-columns.com/praguewriter/2007/10/the-master-liqu.html



At Law Center Talk, Paulson Bemoans Housing Market

The picture of housing and mortgage markets nationwide isn't rosy, Secretary of the Treasury Henry M. Paulson told a Law Center audience on Oct. 16.
Sales of existing single-family homes are down 25 percent from their 2005 peak, he said, and the number of unsold homes has increased to early 1990s levels. Mortgage defaults and foreclosures are on the rise -- and with today's decentralized mortgage system, a homeowner on the verge of default may not know where to go for help.
"Buying a home today is a complex process, but that in no way excuses homebuyers from their obligation for due diligence," he said. "Just as investors in the stock market have a responsibility to understand the risks associated with their investment, homebuyers have a responsibility to understand their mortgages."

http://explore.georgetown.edu/news/?ID=28594



Treasury's Paulson wants faster China yuan rise

Tue Oct 23, 2007 9:49pm EDT
By Glenn Somerville
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson urged China on Tuesday to let its currency rise faster in value and warned that rising protectionism threatened U.S.-China relations.
"Policy-makers in both countries must resist the impulse to discard the hard-fought and long-term gains of open economies by pursuing short-term and misguided policy responses," Paulson told the George H.W. Bush U.S.-China Relations Conference.
There would be greater chances of balanced economic growth in China and the world if China let its yuan currency rise faster in value immediately and let markets set its value completely in the medium term, he said..
"Accelerating the rate of appreciation and introduction of flexibility will help China deal with the imbalances that have grown in the economy and make monetary policy much more effective in responding to inflation," Paulson said.

http://www.reuters.com/article/bondsNews/idUSN2332620920071024




Makes excuses if you want, but, Goldman Sachs as benefitted from insider information in the US Secretary of the Treasury office. It's just too obvious.


Goldman Sachs is promotion-happy
While most investment banks are struggling, Goldman Sachs is doing well enough to promote 299 employees to managing director. Amy Scott deciphers the true meaning behind the title.

http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2007/10/26/goldman_sachs_promotes_record_numbers



Goldman, Macquarie to invest in PTC Inida arm-paper

Fri Oct 26, 2007 12:30am EDT
MUMBAI, Oct 26 (Reuters) - U.S. investment bank Goldman Sachs (GS.N:
Quote, Profile, Research) and Australia's Macquarie (MBL.AX: Quote, Profile, Research) are close to buying 40 percent in the investment arm of state-run PTC India (PTCI.BO: Quote, Profile, Research) for about 1.2 billion rupees ($30 million), the Economic Times said on Friday.
"We have reached an advanced stage of negotiations. But I would not like to comment on the details at this point," the company's chairman, T.N. Thakur, told the paper.
Quoting sources close the development, the paper said the deal would be signed shortly, with Goldman Sachs and Macquarie to each take a 20 percent stake in PTC Financial Services.
Goldman Sachs spokesman Edward Naylor declined comment while a spokeswoman at Macquarie could not be reached. ($1 = 39.6 Indian rupees)

http://www.reuters.com/article/mergersNews/idUSBOM19383420071026



Goldman Sachs investing $100m in startup Mobileye
By Eran Gabay and
Raphael Fogel
Another huge deal for Israeli high-tech: Only two days after the sale of Traiana for $247 million to British firm ICAP, U.S. investment bank Goldman Sachs is investing $100 million in the Israeli company Mobileye. This reflects a valuation of $600 million.
Mobileye develops vision systems to prevent imminent accidents and assist drivers. These systems work as a "third eye" for the driver. Applications support the driver in performing several routine driving tasks, such as keeping distance between vehicles and dynamic cruise control, and provide timely warnings in dangerous situations.
Mobileye develops the chips and algorithms for the systems.
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The company was founded in 1999 by Professor Amnon Shashua and Ziv Aviram. Aviram is CEO, and Chairman Shashua is a professor of computer science at the Hebrew University, and is an expert in 3D vision and pattern recognition.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/912422.html


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