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Thomas Paine

To argue with a person who has renounced the use of reason is like administering medicine to the dead.

Saturday, November 7, 2009

RSS Review

Pour Toi FraGile <3Image by ""Alia"" (busy) via Flickr
RSS SnapShot! is delayed by problems resolving the Server at My Opera : something that caused me to start this blog 
While things are sorting themselves out, I'll post some updates from other aggregators...of which I have a bunch

As to the unavailable indexes, the list below should cover most  material...except, of course, those to the affected server won't work




SideBar Search

To Do

renewable recycling conservation
Schumer Vows to Block Stimulus-Funded Wind Project That Would Create Jobs in China
HeatingOil.com
- Nov 06, 2009
- 20 hours ago
Adding more fuel to the fire of this debate are China's domestic policies concerning renewable energy projects and job development. ...
Related Articles »
clipped from Google - 11/2009
Turkey Unsure to Look East or West for Renewable Energy Development
Green Prophet (blog)
- Nov 07, 2009
- 1 hour ago
Should Turkey look east to oil-rich countries, or west to renewables? Turkey seems to be becoming more interested in renewable energy these days, ...
Related Articles »
clipped from Google - 11/2009
Compressed Air Storage Is Possible Next Step in Renewable Energy
Kansas City infoZine
- Nov 06, 2009
- Nov 06, 2009
Some electric companies even pay customers to use energy from wind farms at night because the companies are still compensated by renewable energy tax ...
Related Articles »
clipped from Google - 11/2009
Green Plains Renewable Energy, Inc. Announces Management Changes
CNNMoney.com (press release)
- Nov 06, 2009
- 19 hours ago
Green Plains Renewable Energy, Inc. (NASDAQ: GPRE) announced the appointment of Michelle S. Mapes as Executive Vice President - General Counsel and ...
clipped from Google - 11/2009
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Human Habitat

ecology water energy
Air Quality Is Now an Inside Job
New York Times
- Nov 06, 2009
- 12 hours ago
By KIRK SEAMAN WHEN the Ecology Center, a nonprofit environmental advocacy group, released its 2009 guide to toxic chemicals in cars in September, ...
clipped from Google - 11/2009
Zacks Sell List Highlights: Winn-Dixie Stores, Inc., American Ecology Corp ...
Reuters
- Nov 05, 2009
- Nov 05, 2009
American Ecology Corp. (Nasdaq: ECOL) revised its full-year earnings forecast downward to between 77 cents and 83 cents per share. It had previously guided ...
clipped from Google - 11/2009
Navy: 500 gallons of jet fuel spill from carrier
Seattle Post Intelligencer
- Nov 05, 2009
- Nov 05, 2009
The Navy and the Washington state Ecology Department say about 500 gallons of jet fuel spilled from the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln into ...
Related Articles »
clipped from Google - 11/2009
Taiwan releases first documentary featuring honey buzzard ecology
eTaiwan News
- Nov 07, 2009
- 1 hour ago
... regions in Europe and Asia, has been observed every year flying through southern Taiwan toward the south for wintering, the expert in avian ecology said.
clipped from Google - 11/2009
powered by

Water Power

water floods pollution
Backers of Malibu septic ban rode wave of surfers' testimony
Los Angeles Times
- Nov 06, 2009
- 13 hours ago
Malibu board riders' tales of illness due to pollution helped spur regional water officials to prohibit new tanks. By Martha Groves One after another, ...
Related Articles »
clipped from Google - 11/2009
Schwarzenegger signs part of water package
Los Angeles Times
- Nov 06, 2009
- 13 hours ago
The other adds 25 state enforcement officers to track down illegal water diversions. By Bettina Boxall Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger went to a scruffy field in ...
Related Articles »
clipped from Google - 11/2009
Venezuelans struggling with water shortages
The Associated Press
- Nov 07, 2009
- 10 hours ago
FILAS DE MARICHES, Venezuela — While a drought has put Caracas under widespread water rationing for the first time in years, for Venezuelans in this ...
Related Articles »
clipped from Google - 11/2009
A water deal at long last
San Francisco Chronicle
- Nov 05, 2009
- Nov 05, 2009
For decades, California's water wars have flared unabated - cities versus farms, north against south - while half measures left the Sacramento-San Joaquin ...
Related Articles »
clipped from Google - 11/2009



Campaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran - Working for Inter

Working for International Dialogue and Peace

 
  • Updated: Sat, Nov 7 2009 10:48 AM
By http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii on News and Editorials
Amid speculation that Israel’s threats to attack Iran, which have persisted for years, are just a bluff, Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon insisted that the threat of an attack is very real.

source: Anti Warread more

  • Posted on: Sat, Nov 7 2009 1:07 AM
By http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii on News and Editorials
United Nations inspectors found “nothing to be worried about” during their inspection of an underground uranium enrichment site in Iran, according to the head of the organisation’s atomic watchdog.

source: Times-on-lineread more

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 4:35 AM
By http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii on News and Editorials
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Iran's nuclear program, which Tehran says is only intended to generate electricity, is an attempt to force the world to acknowledge it as a regional power, U.N. nuclear chief Mohamed ElBaradei said on Wednesday.

source: Reutersread more

  • Posted on: Thu, Nov 5 2009 2:19 AM
By http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii on News and Editorials
Gareth Porter, independent historian and journalist for Inter Press Service, discusses Iran’s counter-proposal to the IAEA enrichment deal, the ambiguous meaning and political sensitivity of nuclear “breakout capability,” continued defense of the 2007 Iran NIE by U.S. intelligence agencies, a new generation of efficient uranium centrifuges intended for use at the Qom facility and how the ever-increasing sanctions imposed on Iran by Congress are tantamount to declaring war.

source: Anti War.Comread more

  • Posted on: Tue, Nov 3 2009 10:58 PM
By http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii on News and Editorials
Having for decades successfully steered policymaking in Washington in a pro-Israel direction, Israel’s American Lobby has more recently turned its attention to Europe. Despite its brief presence in Brussels, it appears to have already had marked success in influencing the nascent foreign policy of the European Union.

source: Intifada-Palestineread more

  • Posted on: Tue, Nov 3 2009 12:36 PM
By http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii on News and Editorials
SoltaniehSoltaniehVienna - Iran would rather purchase the nuclear fuel for its Tehran research reactor, Tehran's UN ambassador in Vienna said Monday - indicating that Iran is reluctant to let go of its uranium stock.

source: Monsters and Criticsread more

  • Posted on: Tue, Nov 3 2009 12:13 AM
By http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii on News and Editorials
Though Iran has expressed interest in a draft proposal for third party uranium enrichment, they have also sought additional talks and a handful of clarifications before finalizing the pact. The US appears to be ruling out any additional talks however.

source: Anti-War.com read more

  • Posted on: Tue, Nov 3 2009 12:09 AM
By http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii on News and Editorials
ChomskyChomskyAs civilised people across the world breathed a sigh of relief to see the back of former US president George W. Bush, top American intellectual Noam Chomsky warned against assuming or expecting significant changes in the basis of Washington's foreign policy under President Barack Obama.

source: MWCread more

  • Posted on: Mon, Nov 2 2009 11:01 AM
By http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii on News and Editorials
If Western leaders were still puzzling over Iran's approach to nuclear talks, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad offered a timely tutorial.

source: APread more

  • Posted on: Mon, Nov 2 2009 6:40 AM
By http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii on News and Editorials
Obama in TurkeyObama in TurkeyTurkey’s prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, was expected to come to the White House on Thursday for a meeting with President Barack Obama. Erdogan’s visit has now been postponed, and the decision to postpone comes on the heels of the Turkish leader’s high-profile visit to Iran this week.

source: Politicoread more

  • Posted on: Sun, Nov 1 2009 9:39 AM
By http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii on News and Editorials
ErdoganErdoganTurkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday that countries opposed to Iran's atomic programme should give up their own nuclear weapons and described the sanctions imposed on his neighbour as arrogant.

source: World bulletinread more

  • Posted on: Sun, Nov 1 2009 1:37 AM
By http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii on News and Editorials
Though officials in the Obama Administration have been publicly neutral about the new round of sanctions against Iran moving its may through the House and Senate, the administration is quietly supporting the efforts, despite the deleterious affect they may have on negotiations.

source: Anti War.Comread more

The Galloping Beaver

A tail dragging romp through the swamps of the world

By Edstock

WIRED'S DANGER ROOM covers all sorts of stuff that is of interest to those of us concerned about security. David Hambling has a very interesting report titled "Inside the Army’s Far-Out Acid Tests" that almost defies belief, if you aren't already acquainted with programs like MK Ultra.

The CIA sure jumped in with both feet: apparently, they acquired some forty pounds of LSD — a couple of hundred million doses.

Who knows where the massive supply went? Certainly the CIA had something of an obsession with LSD, at one point believing it was an effective truth drug. In the infamous Operation Midnight Climax, unwitting clients at CIA brothels in New York and San Francisco were slipped LSD and then monitored through one-way mirrors to see how they reacted. They even killed an elephant with LSD. Colleagues were also considered fair game for secret testing, to the point where a memo was issued instructing that the punch bowls at office Christmas parties were not to be spiked.

Anyway, worth the read, with all sorts of entertaining links.  Wiki's LSD entry has interesting background, too.

LSD (d-lysergic acid diethylamide), commonly called "acid," is the most powerful known hallucinogen - a drug that radically changes a person's mental state by distorting the perception of reality to the point where, at high doses, hallucinations occur. Even in very minute doses 0.05g LSD can significantly alter one's perceptions to the point of hallucination. Although it is derived from a fungus that grows on rye and other grains, LSD is semi-synthetic and has to be chemically manufactured in illicit laboratories.

Pure LSD is a white, odorless crystalline powder that dissolves in water. Because an effective dose of the pure drug is almost invisible, it is mixed with other substances, such as sugar, and packaged in capsules, tablets, or solutions, or spotted on to gelatin sheets or most commonly on pieces of blotting paper.

LSD is ingested orally. A microdot tablet or square of the perforated LSD paper is placed in the user's mouth, chewed or swallowed. Paper squares are most common because their small size makes them easy to conceal and ingest. Also, because LSD is not injected or smoked, paraphernalia are not required.

Formal Chemical Name (IUPAC)
(6aR,9R)-N,N-diethyl-7-methyl-4,6,6a,7,8,9-hexahydroindolo[4,3-fg]quinoline-9-carboxamide

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 6:06 AM
  • Updated: Fri, Nov 6 2009 6:27 AM
By Edstock
THE TELEGRAPH IN THE UK has an article by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, titled "It is Japan we should be worrying about, not America", that is worthy of your consideration.
Japan is drifting helplessly towards a dramatic fiscal crisis. For 20 years the world's second-largest economy has been able to borrow cheaply from a captive bond market, feeding its addiction to Keynesian deficit spending – and allowing it to push public debt beyond the point of no return.
• • • • •
Simon Johnson, former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), told the US Congress last week that the debt path was out of control and raised "a real risk that Japan could end up in a major default".
• • • • •
The savings rate has crashed from 15pc in 1990 to near 2pc today, half America's rate. Japan's $1.5 trillion state pension fund (the world's biggest) has become a net seller of government bonds this year, as it must to meet pay-out obligations. The demographic crunch has hit. The workforce been contracting since 2005.
Like Count Floyd used to say, "Scary stuff, kids"

  • Posted on: Thu, Nov 5 2009 2:40 AM
  • Updated: Thu, Nov 5 2009 2:59 AM
By Dave

You click on the link. You ask your friends to do the same thing every day. Dogs, cats and other abandoned pets get the food they need to survive in the hands of the SPCA until adoptive humans rescue them.

Pretty simple really.

H/T Dana

  • Posted on: Wed, Nov 4 2009 11:46 PM
  • Updated: Wed, Nov 4 2009 11:56 PM
By Alison

.
As noted by PR Watch : "According to a 2008 report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, firearms are the second most common cause of violent deaths of women, accounting for 29.2% of all violent deaths among females in the U.S. in 2008."

  • Posted on: Wed, Nov 4 2009 1:35 PM
  • Updated: Wed, Nov 4 2009 2:19 PM
By West End Bob

Today's BBC notes the Italians are a bit miffed at the European Court of Human Rights:

Italy school crucifixes 'barred'
BBC News | Tuesday, 3 November 2009

The European Court of Human Rights has ruled against the use of crucifixes in classrooms in Italy.

It said the practice violated the right of parents to educate their children as they saw fit, and ran counter to the child's right to freedom of religion.

The case was brought by an Italian mother, Soile Lautsi, who wants to give her children a secular education.

The Vatican said it was shocked by the ruling, calling it "wrong and myopic" to exclude the crucifix from education.

The ruling has sparked anger in the largely Catholic country, with one politician calling the move "shameful".

The Strasbourg court found that: "The compulsory display of a symbol of a given confession in premises used by the public authorities... restricted the right of parents to educate their children in conformity with their convictions."

It also restricted the "right of children to believe or not to believe", the seven judges ruling on the case said in a statement quoted by AFP news agency

________________


Vatican spokesman the Rev Federico Lombardi said the European court had no right intervening in such a profoundly Italian matter, the Associated Press reported.

"It seems as if the court wanted to ignore the role of Christianity in forming Europe's identity, which was and remains essential."

He told Italian TV: "The crucifix has always been a sign of God's love, unity and hospitality to all humanity.

"It is unpleasant that it is considered a sign of division, exclusion or a restriction of freedom."

_______________


The government says it will appeal against the decision.

Well, at least little Jewish and Muslim kiddies won't have to stare at "the sign of God's love, unity and hospitality" represented by a guy dying nailed to a couple of boards all day.

Good grief . . . .

H/T Penny

  • Posted on: Tue, Nov 3 2009 4:24 PM
  • Updated: Tue, Nov 3 2009 4:27 PM
By Boris

  • Posted on: Tue, Nov 3 2009 4:19 AM
  • Updated: Tue, Nov 3 2009 4:22 AM
 

IPS Inter Press Service - Politics

IPS, civil society's leading news agency, is an independent voice from the South and for development, delving into globalisation for the stories underneath.

By Matthew Berger
WASHINGTON, Nov 6 (IPS) - The momentum that U.S. climate change legislation has picked up in recent weeks will not be enough to get it through prior to the Copenhagen climate talks that kick off Dec. 7. It has also come at a steep price for those most committed to seeing such legislation pass.

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 9:09 PM
By Thelma Mej�a*
TEGUCIGALPA, Nov 6 (IPS) - Ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya said Friday that the agreement reached last week to solve the four-month crisis triggered by a coup d'etat was "dead."

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 6:38 PM
By Jos� Adán Silva
MANAGUA, Nov 6 (IPS) - Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega has been accused before the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights of responsibility for a series of violent incidents, which in the view of some analysts and civil society organisations have harmed democracy in the country.

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 6:38 PM
By Analysis by Marsha B. Cohen
WASHINGTON, Nov 6 (IPS) - As Israeli Defence Forces munitions experts sorted through 300 tonnes of weapons found on a German-owned, Cypriot-operated cargo ship flying the Antiguan flag, Israeli politicians were sifting through the various talking points that could be offloaded from the vessel.

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 6:38 PM
By Jessie Boylan
LAGO DISTRICT, Mozambique, Nov 6 (IPS) - As if they were going to the races, Emma Musako and Monica Mhango showed up in their finest outfits to attend a meeting on the health, social and environmental impacts of uranium mining. They came because they, like the other attendees, no longer want to remain uninformed citizens.

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 6:38 PM
By Dahr Jamail
PHOENIX, Arizona, Nov 6 (IPS) - While investigators probe for a motive behind the mass shooting at the Fort Hood military base in Texas Thursday, in which an army psychiatrist is suspected of killing 13 people, military personnel at the base are in shock as the incident "brings the war home".

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 6:38 PM
By Liza Jansen interviews IMAM FEISAL ABDUL RAUF of the Cordoba Initiative
UNITED NATIONS, Nov 6 (IPS) - Since the terror attacks of Sep. 11, 2001, persistent misconceptions about Islam have contributed to a dangerous climate of mistrust and disharmony between the Muslim world and the West.

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 12:12 PM
By Gareth Porter*
WASHINGTON, Nov 6 (IPS) - The Barack Obama administration is talking tough to Afghan President Hamid Karzai about the need for decisive action on corruption and governance reform, but its main objective is to prevent particularly corrupt and incompetent warlords from getting plum ministries as rewards for helping clinch his fraudulent reelection, IPS has learned.

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 8:59 AM

( i.e. To remove Karzai from power without seeming to do so )

ENVIRONMENT-SPAIN: Improving Garbage Management

By Tito Drago
MADRID, Nov 6 (IPS) - The 60,000 tonnes of rubbish collected daily in Spain, equivalent to 1.3 kilos per person, is being managed by more green-friendly methods of recovery and treatment.

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 8:59 AM
By Vusumuzi Sifile
HARARE, Nov 6 (IPS) - Harare mayor Muchadeyi Masunda is a troubled man. When he took office in July 2008, one of his most immediate tasks was to resolve the water crisis in the capital.

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 8:59 AM
By Antoaneta Bezlova
BEIJING, Nov 6 (IPS) - For China choosing to act on climate change is not simply agreeing to effect changes in the way its robust economy is being run. Chinese leaders have to choose between two equally unattractive options—put the brakes on growth to choke off pollution and face an array of scary scenarios, from unemployment swell to social unrest.

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 8:59 AM
By Analysis by Mel Frykberg
RAMALLAH, Nov 6 (IPS) - U.S. and Israeli failure to take either Palestinian rights or Israeli settlement expansion seriously has placed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and his Palestinian Authority (PA) in an untenable situation, which could seriously damage peace prospects.

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 8:59 AM
By Wambi Michael
KAMPALA, Nov 6 (IPS) - Uganda is considering an anti-counterfeit bill which analysts say will impair the country’s ability to import and export cheap but effective generic medicines. Activists fear that the bill, once enacted, will deny Ugandans access to safe, effective, quality and affordable generic medication which currently forms the bulk of Uganda’s medicine imports.

By Mallika Aryal
KATHMANDU, Nov 6 (IPS) - As the new federal republic of Nepal forges ahead with writing a new constitution, activists are demanding that environmental rights be enshrined in this important document.

  • Posted on: Fri, Nov 6 2009 8:59 AM
By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Nov 5 (IPS) - A 575-page blistering report by Justice Richard Goldstone detailing war crimes in Gaza last December is refusing to die despite an aggressive Israeli smear campaign to kill it.

  • Posted on: Thu, Nov 5 2009 7:18 PM
By Marwaan Macan-Markar
BANGKOK, Nov 6 (IPS) - The United States government’s diplomatic foray into military-ruled Burma made early inroads into an area sealed off to United Nations envoys in recent years—meeting the country’s oppressed ethnic minorities.

  • Posted on: Thu, Nov 5 2009 7:18 PM
By Daniela Estrada
SANTIAGO, Nov 5 (IPS) - The second "Latin America and the Millennium Development Goals" Journalism Prize, sponsored by the UNDP and IPS, was awarded Thursday in the Chilean capital in a ceremony addressed by the head of the U.N. agency, Helen Clark.

  • Posted on: Thu, Nov 5 2009 7:18 PM
  • Updated: Fri, Nov 6 2009 8:59 AM
By Analysis by Ellen Massey
WASHINGTON, Nov 5 (IPS) - Four months ago, the Barack Obama administration announced that it would appoint an ambassador to Syria, ending a four-year freeze on diplomatic relations between the two countries.

  • Posted on: Thu, Nov 5 2009 4:29 PM
By Analysis by Jerrold Kessel and Pierre Klochendler
JERUSALEM, Nov 5 (IPS) - U.S. President Obama's Middle East engagement policy reverses the unsuccessful policy of his predecessor, but the U.S. is again committing faux pas aplenty.

  • Posted on: Thu, Nov 5 2009 1:43 AM
By Helen Clark
HANOI, Nov 5 (IPS) - Think of a world where rich nations did not fund what was popular but instead collaborated to solve the developing world’s most pressing health needs.

  • Posted on: Thu, Nov 5 2009 1:43 AM
By Humberto M�rquez
CARACAS, Nov 4 (IPS) - The activities of Colombian armed groups across the border in western Venezuela are aggravating the diplomatic conflict between the two governments, which are ideological opposites, and some analysts have begun to wonder just how far the tension will escalate.

  • Posted on: Wed, Nov 4 2009 8:26 PM
By Eli Clifton
WASHINGTON, Nov 4 (IPS) - The U.S. House of Representatives passed a non-binding resolution Tuesday condemning the Goldstone Report on Israeli and Hamas actions taking during the Gaza War as "irredeemably biased" against Israel and calling on U.S. President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to oppose any consideration of the report in multilateral fora, such as the United Nations.

  • Posted on: Wed, Nov 4 2009 8:26 PM
By Matthew Berger
WASHINGTON, Nov 4 (IPS) - After two years of work, 20 former presidents of Latin American countries have issued policy recommendations that they hope "will greatly improve the lives and social mobility of Latin America's poor, will produce a new dynamic for economic growth, and will strengthen Latin America's still-fragile democratic institutions".

  • Posted on: Wed, Nov 4 2009 8:26 PM
By Emilio Godoy
MEXICO CITY, Nov 4 (IPS) - A case of rights abuses allegedly committed by the Mexican armed forces is coming up for a hearing at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), where it joins a long list of accusations against the army in this Latin American country.

  • Posted on: Wed, Nov 4 2009 8:26 PM
By Danilo Valladares
GUATEMALA CITY, Nov 4 (IPS) - Juan Manuel Ardón's bones jut out and his hair is dull and thin: signs of severe malnutrition. He is so weak that he can hardly walk or talk, and the doctors say his weight and stature are those of a six-year-old, rather than 15-year-old, boy.

  • Posted on: Wed, Nov 4 2009 8:26 PM
By Humberto M�rquez
CARACAS, Nov 4 (IPS) - One Friday at around midnight, on Villaflor Street, a favourite spot for gays and lesbians in the Venezuelan capital, Yonatan Matheus and Omar Marques noticed two Caracas police patrol vans carrying about 20 detainees, most of them very young.

  • Posted on: Wed, Nov 4 2009 8:26 PM
By Milagros Salazar
CUZCO, Peru, Nov 4 (IPS) - For tourists and other visitors, Cuzco has a special fascination as the ancient capital of the Inca empire. But social scientists know it as one of the areas in the world with the highest rates of violence against women.

  • Posted on: Wed, Nov 4 2009 10:17 AM
By Amantha Perera
COLOMBO, Nov 4 (IPS) - Sudarma Senevirathana’s teenage daughter is at an age when she can already be given the ‘rubella’ vaccine, administered free of charge by government health officials at schools.
 
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