22 Dec - RSS SnapShot!

Feeds Update From Opit's LinkFest!* at My Opera Community
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IPS - Inter Press Services

• DR CONGO: Access To Credit Hampers Farmers in the ...
  BUKAVU, Dec 22 (IPS) - The hundreds of savings and loan cooperatives operating in South Kivu should be providing an opportunity to develop agriculture and fight food insecurity in the province, but few farmers have been able to take advantage.
  
• DR CONGO: Small-scale Farmers Say They Just Need ...
  KINSHASA, Dec 22 (IPS) - The more than 800 small-scale farmers belonging to co-operatives around the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) capital, Kinshasa, could produce enough rice and vegetables for the capital's estimated eight million inhabitants, according to the country's agriculture minist ...
  
• EDUCATION-INDONESIA: Students Learn Science the ...
  JAKARTA, Dec 22 (Asia Media Forum/IPS) - Students in Indonesia are learning science the fun way via a monthly comic magazine that also prepares them for the highly debated national examination.
  
• EGYPT: Cheap Bread Frees Women to Work
  CAIRO, Dec 22 (IPS) - At a small bakery in Cairo's Boulaq district, dozens of hands thrust through a barred window waving coins and small banknotes. The clerk inside deftly takes the money and deals loaves of round flatbread into plastic bags.
  
• DEVELOPMENT: Women Chiefs Change Indian Villages
  RANMALA, India, Dec 22 (IPS) - The villages of Ranmala, Nandagane, Shirgaon and Mengdewadi, in Pune, Sangli and Satara districts, western India, have one thing in common.
  

Scoop - NZ

Image via Wikipedia

• Copenhagen - Historic failure that will live in in ...
  The most progressive US president in a generation comes to the most important international meeting since the Second World War and delivers a speech so devoid of substance that he might as well have made it on speaker-phone from a beach in Hawaii. His aides argue in private that he had no choice, su ...
  
• Artists and politicians gather to save Canterburya ...
  Canterbury's water management needs a serious overhaul, according to artists and activists who gathered for an art exhibition at Christchurch's COCA on Saturday.  »  PLIGG_Visual_RSS_OriginalNews
  
• The smoking gun at Copenhagen
  This is big news. A confidential UN analysis obtained by the Guardian reveals that the emissions cuts offered so far at the Copenhagen climate change summit will lead to global temperatures rising by an average of 3C.  »  PLIGG_Visual_RSS_OriginalNews
  
• Planet A +
  "If you will it, it is no dream" So said climate scientist and Jim Salinger to the 2,000 people gathered in Wellington's Civic Square, ready to march to Parliament in support of climate action. Meanwhile a crowd nearly twice that size had assembled in Auckland's Albert Park for a march up Queen Stre ...
  
• A few emails vs global scientific consensus: guess ...
  Like a bad smell, the theft of emails from the Climate Research Unit (CRU) hangs around the Copenhagen conference and threatens to distract people from what really needs to be discussed. Suddenly, everyone seems to be a scientific expert ready to denounce a global conspiracy but you don't have to di ...
  

Independent ( London )

• Roman Polanski's plea rejected in court
  In a case that has polarised public passions, director Roman Polanski did not win his freedom yesterday for a 32-year-old sex offence, but an appeals court said in a strongly worded opinion there was probable judicial and prosecutorial misconduct in his case.
  
• Jorge Munoz: The Angel of Queens
  Anyone speeding down Roosevelt Avenue in the Jackson Heights section of Queens, under the elevated tracks of the Number 7 line, could be forgiven for not even seeing the shuffling gaggle of men at 74th Street. It is night-time and the intense cold means nearly everyone is in heavy black coats and ho ...
  
• Israel close to prisoner swap
  Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held marathon talks with cabinet ministers yesterday but without any announcement for a prisoner swap with Gaza's Hamas rulers to secure the release of a captured soldier.
  
• Independent Appeal: Processing power gets a new st ...
  One item that may feature on a lot of Christmas lists this year is the latest Microsoft operating system, Windows 7. If you upgrade to it you may also decide to treat yourself to a new computer while you are at it. If so, I know a man who would be very happy to take your old machine off your hands. ...
  
• Auschwitz sign was 'stolen for trophy hunters'
  Police and Holocaust experts have said that Nazi memorabilia collectors were behind the theft of the infamous "Arbeit Macht Frei" sign that has been recovered three days after it was stolen from the entrance of the former Auschwitz death camp.
  

CASMII - Campaign against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran

• Iran Sanctions are Precursor to War
  Summary: Ron Paul This policy is pure isolationism. It is designed to foment war by cutting off trade and diplomacy. Too many forget that the quagmire in Iraq began with an embargo. Sanctions are not diplomacy. They are a precursor to war and an embarrassment to a country that pays lip serv ...
  
• Military force remains option on Iran: top U.S. of ...
  Summary: While saying he will "fully support the effort to focus on diplomatic solutions to existing tensions" on the issue, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mike Mullen said in a memo that the United States must have the military option on the table. At another point, he conceded that "pol ...
  
• Iran nuclear negotiator calls for atomic arms ban
  Summary: TOKYO — Iran's chief nuclear negotiator called for a global nuclear weapons ban on Monday but insisted all nations — including his own — have the right to develop nuclear energy. source: AP read more
  
• Iran army withdrawsfrom Iraqi oil field after talk ...
  Summary: Together, the events highlight the economic and diplomatic challenges facing Iraq as it tries to expand its reach in the global oil market. In Iraq's southern Maysan province, soldiers escorted about a dozen oil workers back to well number four on the al-Fakkah oil field after Iranian f ...
  
• Obama Administration: Iran to Face 'Consequences' ...
  Summary: A senior advisor to U.S. President Barack Obama, David Axelrod, says Iran's actions belie its long-standing insistence that its nuclear program is intended solely for peaceful purposes. "Nobody has any illusions about what the intent of the Iranian government is. And the international c ...
  

The Daily Galaxy

• Mapping the Last "White Space" on Earth: The 'Ghos ...
  The last unmapped white space of the map of the planet is Antarctica’s Gamburtsev mountains, a subglacial mountain range discovered by the 3rd Soviet Antarctic Expedition in 1958 and is named for Soviet geophysicist Grigoriy A. Gamburtsev. "These are mountain...
  
• New NASA Discovery Mission: To Sail the Foggy Seas ...
  Setting sail has always been the image of a new undertakings, of exploration, of adventuring beyond the known lands and into history. Simply running out of Earth oceans is no reason to stop. A new research proposal would put a...
  
• Has Missing Dark Matter of the Universe Finally Be ...
  A scientific system buried deep below the Earth, constructed of ultrapure materials held hovering over absolute zero, has finally stirred. This isn't an attack by misbegotten monsters but an encouraging clue to the main mystery of the universe: dark matter....
  
• Apophis -the Asteroid That Will NOT Almost Hit Ear ...
  Apophis is a 900-foot asteroid that according to JPL calculations released on Christmas Eve 2004 appeared to show that there was a greater than 2 percent chance the asteroid would hit the Earth in 2029, judged a 4 on the...
  
• Image of the Day: Prague Panorama
   
  

Natural News

• Former head of CDC lands lucrative job as presiden ...
  (NaturalNews) You've heard it before, how the pharmaceutical industry has a giant "revolving door" through which corporations and government agencies frequently exchange key employees. That reality was driven home in a huge way today when news broke that Dr. Julie Gerberding, who headed the CDC from ...
  
• Nearly 100 percent of women reject tamoxifen drug ...
  (NaturalNews) A study published in the journal Breast Cancer Research and Treatment has found that women overwhelmingly reject the breast cancer prevention drug tamoxifen even when given a thorough, personalized analysis of its risks and benefits. University of Michigan researchers administered the ...
  
• High-sugar diet alters intestinal bacteria, making ...
  (NaturalNews) A report published in the new journal Science Translational Medicine has made an interesting discovery concerning the relationship between sugar intake and the balance of intestinal flora. Researchers have discovered that a diet high in sugar and fat substantially alters the bacterial ...
  
• Big Pharma kills yet another celebrity: Brittany M ...
  (NaturalNews) It's not normal to die at age 32 of a heart attack. To make that happen, you normally have to be taking chemical substances of some kind, either recreational drugs or prescription drugs. Actress Brittany Murphy, who died this last weekend from a heart attack, was reportedly taking pres ...
  
• New research: natural exposure to everyday germs m ...
  (NaturalNews) Gone are the days when play time for kids often meant getting dirty making mud "pies", splashing in mud puddles and creeks, and climbing trees -- and when children washed their hands, mostly just before a meal, it was with plain soap and water. Modern day parents often take pride in ke ...
  

TheGallopingBeaver

• the naughty list
  Via Macleans Nice list: Richard Colvin, Progressive Bloggers, the usual suspects from the blogroll Naughty list: Stephen Harper and the Conservative Party of Canada , Joe Lieberman, Kate McVillain and commenters at Small Dead Animals, Blogging Tories
  
• Panty Hose and Christmas Stockings
  AS A JOKE, MY BROTHER used to hang a pair of panty hose over his fireplace before Christmas.  He said all he wanted was for Santa to fill them.  What they say about Santa checking the list twice must be true because every Christmas morning, although Jay's kids' stockings overflowed, his poor pan ...
  
• Quite an Indictment . . . .
  A friend vacationing in Paris - France, that is - sent me this link he found while surfing the "InterTubes." The Huffington Post contributor, Drew Westen, is a professor of Psychology and Psychiatry at a university just down the road from where I lived for many years. It appears he has hit the pro ...
  
• My favorite Christmas song and story
  In all the list making the other day about best and worst Christmas songs , I completely forgot about my real favorite. Excuse me, I seem to have something in my eye.
  
• And you wonder why reporters drink
  It's not enough that most of us work long, hard hours for crap wages in a dying industry that is constantly criticized by people who don't know what they are talking about most of the time, or that we are constantly being pushed to lower our professional standards, dumb down coverage or devote time ...
  

Media Matters for America

• Krauthammer falsely suggests Senate bill won't red ...
  Echoing a false Republican talking point about the Senate health care reform bill, Charles Krauthammer stated on Fox News that if "you start in 2014 when the benefits kick in and you go out ten years, then the cost is not slightly under $1 trillion. It's $1.8 trillion or $2.5 trillion, which means ...
  
• Media conservatives return to ACORN funding bogey ...
  Media conservatives, including The Weekly Standard and Andrew Breitbart's Big Government, are attacking the Senate health care reform bill by citing a general provision in the legislation to raise the possibility that ACORN would receive funding under the bill. Conservatives similarly attack ...
  
• Most outrageous comments of 2009
  Outrageous comments are nothing new to the conservative media -- one might even call them a defining characteristic. The Most Outrageous Comment of the 2009 came when Fox News host Glenn Beck asserted that Obama is a "racist" who has "exposed himself as a guy" with "a deep-seated hatred for wh ...
  
• Perino's "convoluted" attack on health care bill i ...
  On Fox & Friends , Dana Perino used an apples-to-oranges comparison to raise doubts about reports that the Senate health care bill would reduce the number of uninsured people by 31 million. In fact, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has stated that under current law, 54 million people will be u ...
  
• Fox doesn't disclose health care opponent Donatel ...
  Continuing its pattern of failure to disclose the conflicts of interest of health care reform opponents who appear on its programs, Fox News hosted Frank Donatelli -- identified only as chairman of the "Republican advocacy organization" GOPAC - who claimed that Democrats "don't really want th ...
  

Global Research.ca

• Colombia Beefs Up Forces on Border With Venezuela
  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.
  
• The Climate Summit: No One is Talking About: Ratio ...
  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.
  
• September 11, 2001: America and NATO Declare War o ...
  NATO's Doctrine of Collective Security
  
• The Credit Crisis is Not Over
  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.
  
• Pentagon's Role in Global Catastrophe: Add Climat ...
  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.
  

TPM Cafe

• Do It
  I luv Jane Hamsher. I'd totally marry her, given half a chance. But there are some reasons to disagree with her on the Dems' health care reform. So here's a point-by-point response to her "10 Reasons" post. Some of these... Health care - Health - Health Policy - House and Senate - Anti-Regulati ...
  
• AIG E-Mails: Let the Sunshine In
  Yes, it is the darkest day of the year. What better time to talk about sunshine. In this spirit, we have a column calling for shining some daylight on the internal memos and e-mails from AIG. The idea is that... Business - Financial services - AIG - Mortgage - Fannie and Freddie
  
• Presented By:
• Clayton Swisher Reports From Kandahar
  My friend, Clay Swisher at Al Jazeerah, , reports on choices American military personnel must make in Afghanistan. Check it out. Anyone who think Afpak choices are easy especially need to see this. PS Clayton, be careful. At least, for... Afghanistan - United States - Military - Asia - Warfare ...
  
• What Did You Learn In School Today?
  The thing about a social experiment, no matter how successful, is that it tells you only what might be. In a way, this only increases the pathos of what is. A few days ago, I paid a visit to an... Israel - Jerusalem - Middle East - Greater Israel - Judaism
  

TruthOut

• Modern-Day Slavery in Mexico and the United States
  On December 3, Mexico City police freed 107 human trafficking victims who were forced to manufacture shopping bags and clothespins under “slave-like” circumstances. Officials reported that the victims exhibited signs of physical and sexual abuse, and were also malnourished, as they had been given on ...
  
• Democratic Senator: GOP on Desperate Mission of Pr ...
  In his Senate floor speech on the health-care bill, the Rhode Island senator accused the GOP of fomenting the kind of paranoia that led to Kristallnacht and lynchings. read more
  
• Ford Offers Buyouts to 41,000 UAW Workers
  Ford Motor Co.  said on Monday it is offering its 41,000 U.S. factory workers buyouts and early retirement offers in a bid to reduce its payroll costs as it aims to return to profit by 2011. The buyouts mark the second round of such offers for Ford workers represented by the United Auto Workers u ...
  
• Mexico City Assembly Legalizes Same-Sex Marriage
  Mexico City lawmakers on Monday made the city the first in Latin America to legalize same-sex marriage, a change that will give homosexual couples more rights, including allowing them to adopt children. read more
  
• E.J. Dionne Jr. | Progressives: Don't Scream, ORGA ...
  Washington - For progressives, the question on the health care battle going forward is not whether they have a right to be angry but whether they can direct their fury toward constructive ends. The alternative is to pursue a temporarily satisfying and ultimately self-defeating politics of protest. ...
  

Planetsave

• Friendship between LION, TIGER and BEAR
  This post contains additional media. Click here to view the full post . . If we could all just get along like these three unusual friends, we would live in a much different world. In human society, people often do not like others simply because they are different. Humans kill over this matter. In ...
  
• Coalition Says MN Climate Solution Includes Nukes
  The Prairie Island nuclear plant at Red Wing, Minnesota, on the Mississippi River.  Nuclear power advocates want to repeal the state’s 15-year-old ban on new nuclear plants. The state that enacted one of the nation’s most farsighted clean energy laws in 2007 may be a battleground over nuclear p ...
  
• Curbside Vs. Deposit and GHG Reduction
  The beverage container industry continues to fight state and national container legislation despite evidence that such laws could contribute significantly to greenhouse gas reduction while providing energy, recycling and litter control benefits. The industry says community recycling programs, which ...
  
• Gender-Bending Chemicals in Minnesota Waters
  The discovery of malformed frogs in the Minnesota River watershed in the 1990s touched off field and lab research on endocrine disrupters that is continuing to yield findings. Minnesota, the state that made national headlines with the discovery of malformed frogs in the 1990s, has found endocrine ...
  
• Big Fish in the Great Lakes
  The ancient lake sturgeon, a threatened species, is making a modest comeback in the Great Lakes after more than a century of overharvest and habitat destruction. Even as news spreads of the possible imminent invasion of giant Asian carp in the Great Lakes, there’s also good news — the mammoth, na ...
  

Water Quality - WordPress

• Gwinnett: Do You Know What's In Your Drinking Wate ...
  Since 2004, testing by water utilities has found 316 pollutants in the tap water Americans drink, ac
  
• Water, Oxygen, and Ecological Shifting
  The Nobel Prize winning chemist Otto Warburg studied the metabolic processes of cells.  He made the
  
• Three Fronts-Working Toward Being Green
  Working toward being Green By Michael Hughes    December 22, 2009 The First Push: Conservation Start
  
• Greenlines - Climate Diplomacy is Dead, Go Rent a ...
  Greetings, this post-blizzard, pre-holiday Monday! It almost feels like a Sunday since so many offic
  
• A caption worth a thousand words?
  Okay, just take a look at this Irfan Khan photograph that ran with Charles Duhigg’s New York T
  

Public Citizen in Texas

• 60 Seconds to Save the Earth
  Sixty seconds doesn’t seem like a lot of time; however, there are lots of things that can be done in sixty seconds or less.  For instance, an average adult can type 38 to 40 words and blink between ten and 30 times every sixty seconds (sometimes simultaneously).  Furthermore, an elite distance runne ...
  
• Texas Progressive Alliance Weekly Round Up
  The Texas Progressive Alliance brings you the highlights from the blogs. As the deadline to file for a place on the 2010 March primary ballot drew near, there was lots of activity on the Democratic side: Kinky Friedman followed Hank Gilbert over to the race for agriculture commissioner, Linda Chave ...
  
• Green-up Your Life! Holiday Edition
  By Kirsten Bokenkamp Happy Holidays! Just saying those words is enough to evoke joyful images of families gathered in the kitchen preparing a succulent holiday meal to be enjoyed together, or excited and wide-eyed children opening gifts next to a beautifully decorated Christmas tree. When I close ...
  
• Another Texas Wind Project Up and Running
  Congratulations to San Angelo, Texas, where a new 150 MW wind farm is up, spinning, and on with commercial operations.  According to North American Wind Power, The project’s 100 General Electric 1.5 MW turbine generators are expected to generate more than 525,000 MWh of wind energy per year, which ...
  
• Jim Boston: Living in the West with Tenaska
  I’m very impressed with this op-ed from Jim Boston, which refers to the Tenaska coal plant proposed near Sweetwater, Texas.  It was originally published Monday, December 13th in the Abilene Reporter News. Why live in West Texas when it is somewhat a hostile environment? Faced with frequent droughts ...
  

Press TV

• Japan to decide on US base pact by May
  Japan's Defense Minister Toshimi Kitazawa sets May as the deadline to decide where to relocate a controversial US military air base currently in Okinawa.
  
• 'Radical' cuts expected in new START treaty
  The United States and Russia plan to sign a new nuclear arms reduction deal, which would bring "radical and unprecedented cuts" to their nuclear weapons arsenals.
  
• Iran's Jalili urges global nuclear disarmament
  Iran's top nuclear chief has called for the implementation of the UN nuclear watchdog regulations and the NPT Safeguards Agreement to bring about global disarmament.
  
• Ahmadinejad: US bound to fail in ME
  Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says the US will definitely fail in the Middle East, as the regional nations will not allow it to dominate the region.
  
• Drug violence kills 23 in Mexico
  At least 23 people have been killed recently in drug-related violence in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua, according to police.
  

Axis of Logic

• The Truth of What Happened at the Summit
  
  
• Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on How to Tackle ...
  
  
• Bended Knees: Zionist Power in American Politics
  
  
• My Christmas and New Year Present
  
  
• US Military Aggression against Venezuela escalatin ...
  
  

They Gave Us a Republic

• Have a Very Atheist Christmas
  Shamelessly stolen from PZ Myers.
  
• The Nightowl Newswrap
  For a one-year revolution, this appears right on schedule. "Iranian reformists have clashed with police after the funeral of a dissident cleric, opposition websites say. Earlier, tens of thousands took part in a procession for Grand Ayatollah Hoseyn Ali Montazeri in the holy city of Qom. Clashes rep ...
  
• Name Change Suggestion of the Year
  Honors to Betty Cracker, for this: I've never paid much attention to Sheldon Whitehouse, D-Rhode Island. He seems like a mild-mannered pol with a mild-mannered name to match. But dayum-Sheldon Whitehouse, ladies and gentlemen: He needs to change his name to Stakedriver Wingerhammerer Von Dethhaus or ...
  
• The Reason for the Season: Light
  Since the dawn of homo sapiens sapiens , human beings have celebrated in mid-winter for a simple reason: Light. The day of the winter solstice is the shortest day of the year, with the longest night. With the next dawn, the days begin to lengthen.  Light returns. Even after we figured out why the su ...
  
• A day without DSL is like a day without the interw ...
  I only have access intermittently, and trying to get anything done and follow the breaking news is just frustrating. I am going to go bake more cookies. Some of you - and you know who you are - are doomed to some extra exercise in January. Tough. Deal with it. The cookies are that fucking good.   ...
  

Care 2

• Record number of manatee deaths in Florida in 2009
  Biologists with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission's (FWC) Fish and Wildlife Research Institute documented 419 manatee carcasses in state waters up until Dec. 11. This preliminary data indicates that the total number of manatee deaths Submitted by Cher C. to Animals  |   Note-it! ...
  
• 3 tribal members charged in beating to remain in j ...
  SALT LAKE CITY — Three Navajo tribe members charged with a vicious beating and sexual assault were ordered Monday to remain in custody because they pose a danger to the community Submitted by Lone Wolf to Society & Culture  |   Note-it!  |   Add a Comment
  
• African leaf-eating primates are ‘likely to be wip ...
  Monkey species will become ‘increasingly at risk of extinction' because of global warming, according to new research. It reveals that populations of monkeys and apes in Africa that depend largely on a diet of leaves may be wiped out by a rise in annual Submitted by Cher C. to Animals  |   Note-it! ...
  
• No to Military Base YES to Dugong Protection Area ...
  On October 14th, the 4th International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Congress in Barcelona, Spain overwhelmingly adopted a motion, %u201CPromotion of Dugong during the UN 2010 International Year for Biodiversity (the Japanese government abstain Submitted by Cher C. to Animals  |   Note-it ...
  
• The Nelson "Compromise:" What It Will Cost Us
  The weeks-long soap opera of finding 60 votes for the Senate health reform bill came to an end yesterday when Democrats "compromised" with Senator Ben Nelson (D-NE) on language regarding abortion coverage. After catering first to Senator Joe Lieberman, Submitted by Tierney G. to US Politics & Gov't ...
  

GreenBiz

• The Advent of a New 'Oil War' after Copenhagen
  Critics of George Bush say he has led us into a quagmire in Iraq during the last decade from which we will never emerge. They say his way of doing business led to all the disagreements visible in the Copenhagen climate talks. They're wrong.
  
• Ford To Roll Out Plug-Ins, Battery Electric Vehicl ...
  From now until 2012, Ford will introduce a range of electric vehicles, from continuing its work with hybrids to releasing plug-in and battery electric vehicles.
  
• GE Lands $1.4B Contract for Turbines to Create 845 ...
  Independent power producer Caithness Energy has awarded GE a $1.4 billion contract for 338 of the company’s most advanced wind turbines to build a 845-megawatt wind farm in Oregon -- a size that outstrips all others currently operating worldwide. 
  
• As Panels Get Better and Cheaper, PVs are Poised f ...
  In both Europe and North America, the discussion about solar power is very quickly going from “Is this possible?” to “What's coming next?”
  
• Scotland Quaker Oats Plant Sends Zero Waste to Lan ...
  A Quaker Oats production facility in Scotland has stopped sending waste to landfill, instead diverting all waste either to be recycled or become animal feed.
  

Reuters Global

• Pakistan: Through the eye of a needle
  A court ruling overturning a 2007 amnesty has given Pakistan an opportunity to remodel its civilian democracy based on the rule of law. But the way forward is narrow and fraught with difficulties
  
• Parallel worlds at U.N. climate talks
  Parallel universe at UN climate talks
  
• Sudan: Preparing for a peaceful southern secession
  Four years ago, the Sudanese people were promised a brighter future. A peace deal had finally ended the two-decades-long civil war between north and south, which killed more than two million people and devastated the south. But today, that bright future is looking decidedly tarnished, and Sudan is s ...
  
• Sarkozy’s tough message on climate – d ...
  Sarkozy puts on an inspirational display at UN climate talks
  
• Comparing Pakistan’s Islamists to India&#821 ...
  Comparing Pakistan's Islamist militants and India's Maoists is tricky: the differencies between the two are obvious. But the similarities also highlight the potential risks from insurgencies going into an age of climate change and falling resources.
  

Ezra Klein

• Tab dump
  1) James Cameron seems like a difficult human being. 2) My point wasn't that people shouldn't be mad about health-care reform because the final product is fairly similar to what Obama campaigned on, but that the biggest compromises happened long ago. The degree of outrage over the changes in the bi ...
  
• A picture is worth a thousand blog posts
  And Igor Volsky has a picture :
  
• Mailbag: The Social Security theory
  A reader e-mails: It might be helpful to compare this bill to the Social Security Act of 1935, which, when passed, had some really bad elements. Most significantly, the bill excluded domestic and agricultural workers, which meant a large number of poor workers, especially African Americans, were no ...
  
• The inside game
  I'm not of the camp that believes Barack Obama could have gotten Joe Lieberman to vote for a public option. Lieberman has the 60th vote in the Senate and Obama has nothing, really, that Lieberman wants. Being chairman of the Committee on Homeland Security and Government Oversight does not compare to ...
  
• What Obama did, and didn't do, on health-care refo ...
  Mark Schmitt is tired of reading columns about how Obama should have done this or that differently. Those things may be true, he says, but they are also, quite frequently, a cop-out: The work underlying the current health-reform effort began years before Obama even announced his campaign for the ...
  

Booman Tribune

• Mexico City Passes Gay Marriage Law
  Mexico City showed more bravery then many North of the Border States this year when it came to gay rights, and just in time for Christmas, too: Mexico City has become the first city in Latin America to legalise same-sex marriage, giving gay couples more rights, including allowing them to adopt ch ...
  
• Froggy Bottom Cafe
  
  
• Killing Christmas
  All this Republican delay is killing Christmas on the Hill. But I don't care too much about that (except for the staff and police officers). What I care about is that people down there are threatening to stop reading blogs. The marathon debate on health-care legislation has become the "era of ...
  
• Casual Observation
  But I thought it was the hallucinogenic drugs that turned us into liberals in the first place. Or maybe it was just the patchouli. But, seriously, I don't really disagree with Harwood. Did I just say that?
  
• If Only...
  If only this were more true. “We are now functioning under a parliamentary form of government,” says Sen. Judd Gregg (R., N.H.) in a conversation with NRO. “An ideological supermajority in Congress, along with a government run by community organizers, has taken over.” Imagine what the Senat ...
  

European Tribune

• European Salon de News, Discussion et Klatsch - 22 ...
   A Daily Review Of International Online Media Europeans on this date in history:1858 – Birth of...
  
• Solstice Open Thread
  ...
  
• European Salon de News, Discussion et Klatsch - 21 ...
   A Daily Review Of International Online Media Europeans on this date in history:1892 – Birth of...
  
• Sunday Open Thread
  OK, say something...
  
• European Salon de News, Discussion et Klatsch - 20 ...
   A Daily Review Of International Online Media Europeans on this date in history:1861 – Birth of...
  

Futurismic

• The legislation of fabrication – should 3D printin ...
  Here’s another sf-nal thought experiment to keep your brain occupied. We frequently mention 3D printing and fabbing here at Futurismic, but usually in the context of its positive disruptive potential – a potential sea-change in capitalist economic systems, for example. But here’s a negative response ...
  
• Potential outcomes of pervasive surveillance
  Sometimes it really feels like science-fictional thinking is becoming a much more mainstream thing to do. Following on from yesterday’s mention of CCTV control software that can learn to recognise suspicious behaviour (as defined by operator feedback, natch), out-bound BoingBoing guest blogger Paul ...
  
• Mercurial cartography
  With the cold weather really digging in for those of us in the Northern hemisphere, you may well be thinking of taking a holiday somewhere hot. Courtesy the US Geological Survey, you can now scout out the lay of the land on the hottest destination in the entire solar system, as their near-global map ...
  
• What Are The Animals Becoming?
  Since I went for things made of metal skins and electrical guts last month when I wrote about weird robots, I decided to opt for warm-blooded carbon-based life forms this time around – so welcome to the December column on smart animals! Now, we’re a dog family, and we have a golden retriever [. ...
  
• The real history of science fiction
  Just in case you missed it, this little gem from webcomic Hark, a Vagrant was doing the rounds on Twitter the other day. Click through for the whole thing, then feel free to argue about the need for hard scientific veracity in speculative fiction in the comments. Project Wonderful - Your ad here ...
  

Therapy News

• Companies Move to Increase EAPs for Workers’ Menta ...
  A GoodTherapy.org News Headline Increasing pushes and regulations for companies to include mental health coverage in their medical plans may prove promising for employees across a wide range of industries, but the costs associated with the change are troubling some employers, who hope to reduce rath ...
  
• Men who Get Cultural and Creative may Experience B ...
  A GoodTherapy.org News Headline There are many positive steps that people can take to encourage optimal mental health, but some may be less obvious than others in their precise relationships. While industry professionals have long associated community involvement and artistic expression with positiv ...
  
• Emotions as Spirit
  By Anne Ream, ATR-BC, LPC Click here to contact Anne and/or see her GoodTherapy.org Profile For the past 64 years I have been asking, “What is soul? What is spirit?” During my middle adult years I began to realize that, because I have spent my life working empathetically with people, I had become ...
  
• Home for the Holidays
  GoodTherapy.org Featured Column written by Judith Barr, MA, LMHC Click here to contact Judith and/or see her GoodTherapy.org Profile The lyrics of the song say, “There’s no place like home for the holidays.”* Is this true for you? It goes on to say, “If you want to be happy in a million ways, for th ...
  
• Hakomi Therapy: Frequently Asked Questions (and An ...
  By Jaffy Phillips, MA, Hakomi Topic Expert Contributor Click here to contact Jaffy and/or see her GoodTherapy.org Profile 1. What does the name “Hakomi” mean? Early in the development of the work, one of Ron Kurtz’ colleagues had a dream in which Kurtz handed him a slip of paper with the words “Hako ...
  

Mountaintop Removal

• Byrd Asks EPA for Clarity - West Virginia MetroNew ...
  Byrd Asks EPA for Clarity West Virginia MetroNews ... was surprised by Byrd's comments and called for the Senator to clarify his position on mountaintop removal during an appearance on MetroNews Talkline. ... Byrd meets with EPA to discuss mining Charleston Gazette all 11 news articles »
  
• W.Va. Sen. Byrd meets with EPA to discuss mining - ...
  W.Va. Sen. Byrd meets with EPA to discuss mining Charleston Gazette EPA contends the fills may violate the federal Clean Water Act. The fills are used in a mining process called mountaintop removal , where ridges are blown ... and more »
  
• Blizzard-like storm slams East Coast - Burlington ...
  Blizzard-like storm slams East Coast Burlington Hawk Eye ... strode past West Virginia state troopers and into a stream of marchers protesting mountaintop removal mining to deliver an audible smack. ... and more »
  
• Ashley L. Slupski '11 - DePauw University
  DePauw University Ashley L. Slupski '11 DePauw University People who live in areas where there is mountain top removal or nuclear waste dumps are usually the most marginalized people (women, people of color, ...
  
• Cordelia Ruth Tucker: Working-class hero — hard ha ...
  Cordelia Ruth Tucker: Working-class hero — hard hats v. hippies The Hill (blog) ... strode past West Virginia state troopers and into a stream of marchers protesting mountaintop removal mining to deliver an audible smack. ... and more »
  

Memeorandum

• Seeing Public Subsidy (Not Public Option) Investor ...
  The Huffington Post : Seeing Public Subsidy (Not Public Option) Investors Flock to Health Insurers   —  Investors are seeing the Senate's version of health care reform as a massive public subsidy for insurance companies — and as a result, are sending the sector's stock prices shooting up, up, up.
  
• Reid asks Senate to remain civil as chamber edges ...
  Jeffrey Young / The Hill : Reid asks Senate to remain civil as chamber edges toward final vote   —  The Senate early Tuesday morning edged closer to approving a massive healthcare bill.  —  Senators approved a series of procedural votes Tuesday morning that brings them closer to a Christmas Eve vot ...
  
• U.S. Voters Oppose Health Care Plan By Wide Margin ...
  Quinnipiac University : U.S. Voters Oppose Health Care Plan By Wide Margin , Quinnipiac University National Poll Finds; Voters Say 3-1, Plan Should Not Pay For Abortions  —  As the Senate prepares to vote on health care reform, American voters “mostly disapprove” of the plan 53 - 36 percent and dis ...
  
• MSNBC Libtalker: 'Morning Joe' Team Takes Directio ...
  Brian Maloney / The Radio Equalizer : MSNBC Libtalker: ‘Morning Joe’ Team Takes Direction From WH   —  STATE CONTROL?  —  Schultz: WH Contacts Team ‘Joe’ Directly During Program!  —  For anyone wondering why an increasing number of conservatives now use the term “state-controlled media” (which ori ...
  
• The Protocol Society - In the 19th and 20th centur ...
  David Brooks / New York Times : The Protocol Society   —  In the 19th and 20th centuries we made stuff: corn and steel and trucks.  Now, we make protocols: sets of instructions.  A software program is a protocol for organizing information.  A new drug is a protocol for organizing chemicals.  Wal-Ma ...
  

Energy & Environment News

• OPEC Focuses on Compliance With Output Limits
  OPEC held its output quotas unchanged and called for greater compliance from some members whose overproduction could undercut efforts to support prices.
  
• G.E. to Focus on Energy and Health Care
  General Electric plans to reduce risky investments and cut the size of its troubled financial unit, GE Capital.
  
• Climate Talks Near Deal to Save Forests
  Negotiators were closing in on a sweeping deal that would compensate countries for preserving forests and other natural landscapes.
  
• Reporter’s Notebook: In Copenhagen, &#x2018 ...
  The top United Nations climate official said the many disputes at the climate conference reflected the challenge of finding common ground among 193 countries.
  
• Desert Vistas vs. Solar Power
  Senator Dianne Feinstein introduced legislation to protect a million acres of the Mojave Desert in California by scuttling planned solar plants and wind farms.
  

5+ quakes - 7 days

• M 5.1, Halmahera, Indonesia
  Tuesday, December 22, 2009 12:21:03 UTC Tuesday, December 22, 2009 09:21:03 PM at epicenter Depth : 142.20 km (88.36 mi)
  
• M 5.1, Simeulue, Indonesia
  Saturday, December 19, 2009 13:43:57 UTC Saturday, December 19, 2009 08:43:57 PM at epicenter Depth : 39.00 km (24.23 mi)
  
• M 6.4, Taiwan
  Saturday, December 19, 2009 13:02:16 UTC Saturday, December 19, 2009 09:02:16 PM at epicenter Depth : 44.60 km (27.71 mi)
  
• M 5.0, Rota region, Northern Mariana Islands
  Saturday, December 19, 2009 11:14:28 UTC Saturday, December 19, 2009 09:14:28 PM at epicenter Depth : 55.00 km (34.18 mi)
  
• M 5.2, West Chile Rise
  Tuesday, December 15, 2009 11:34:43 UTC Tuesday, December 15, 2009 06:34:43 AM at epicenter Depth : 10.00 km (6.21 mi)
  

China Dialogue

• Solving the incinerator uproar
  China faces difficult decisions over waste disposal, as local residents vent their opposition to garbage-burning plants. Ma Jun suggests a way forward. China has seen fierce debate over the building of garbage incinerators in recent months. City authorities believe increasing quantities of urban was ...
  
• Down to the wire
  chinadialogue follows the climate talks as they reach their conclusion. Read the full text of the Chinese premier’s speech, breaking news, blogs and analysis. chinadialogue is blogging the climate talks from Copenhagen on "the daily planet". Click here to read the full text of the Chinese premier’s ...
  
• To seal a deal, we need justice
  An agreement seems beyond reach at Copenhagen. Ma Jun blames an inability to balance the need for efficiency with the principle of equity. Climate change is one of the most complex challenges that faces the world today. The fact that international society has come together to negotiate a plan to red ...
  
• A political ill wind blows
  Governments meeting in Copenhagen have taken the wrong approach to climate change, says Tim Harford. They should be working to increase the price that polluters pay for emissions. My sunny disposition wavered as the Copenhagen summit on climate change approached. I believe that the governments of th ...
  
• Is China ready for cap-and-trade?
  Can countries without national curbs on greenhouse gases adopt emissions trading schemes? It’s a debate that splits China’s environmental entrepreneurs. Cao Haili reports. China’s policymakers are beginning to accept the use of market mechanisms to achieve goals on addressing climate change and redu ...
  

AlterNet Top Stories

• How Wall Street Bought Barney Frank
  Barney Frank takes pride in being the Left's darling, but he's almost entirely funded by Wall Street and his votes show it.
  
• The "Slow Money" Movement May Revolution ...
  In an economy structured around industrial agriculture, sustaining small farms can be a challenge. 'Slow money' economics could be the answer.
  
• Glenn Beck's Year of Wild Conspiracies, Paranoid D ...
  Beck's unbridled ignorance and confidence in his own manipulative half-truths and lies make him the most dangerously effective misinformer of 2009.
  
• 10 Greediest People of 2009
  As ordinary Americans reel from the Great Recession, these gluttonous all-stars continue to claw in absurd amounts of money.
  
• The Senate Health Care Bill: Flawed Necessity or I ...
  We can all agree that the Senate health care bill is far from perfect. What now?
  

Threat Level

• 7-Eleven Hack From Russia Led to ATM Looting in Ne ...
  Flashback, early 2008. Citibank officials are witnessing a huge spike in fraudulent withdrawals from New York area ATMs — $180,000 is stolen from cash machines on the Upper East Side in just three days.  After a stakeout, police arrest one man walking out of a bank with thousands of dollars in cas ...
  
• Albert Gonzalez Enters Plea Agreement in Heartland ...
  Albert Gonzalez, who has admitted hacking into TJX and other companies, has filed a plea agreement in charges that he breached Heartland Payment Systems, Hannaford, 7-Eleven and two other companies. Under the terms of the agreement, Gonzalez, a former Secret Service informant, will plead guilty to ...
  
• TJX Hacker ‘Will Never Commit Any Crime Again’
  Confessed hacker Albert Gonzalez’s turn as a Secret Service informant led him down a dark path of obsession, culminating in the largest identity-theft spree in history. Frances Gonzalez Lago, Gonzalez’s sister wrote his sentencing judge that her brother’s work as an informant between 2003 and and 2 ...
  
• FBI Linguist Guilty of Leaking Classified Document ...
  An Israeli-American lawyer who worked as an FBI linguist pleaded guilty Thursday to providing an unidentified blogger with classified documents derived from U.S. communications intelligence. Shamai Kedem Leibowitz, 39, of Silver Spring, Maryland, pleaded to one felony count of disclosing to an unaut ...
  
• Internal Twitter Credentials Used in DNS Hack, Red ...
  Twitter’s website went offline for about an hour Thursday, with many tweeters redirected to a defacement page boasting “This site has been hacked by Iranian Cyber Army.” Twitter acknowledged the 10 p.m. takeover, one in a series of security lapses to hit the popular microblogging service. Twitter s ...
  

Reuters - Most Popular Articles

• Iran nuclear trigger report a U.S. forgery: Ahmadi ...
  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A leaked memo appearing to show Tehran's efforts to design an atomic bomb trigger was forged by the United States, Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told a U.S. news program.
  
• Healthcare bill clears second Senate hurdle
  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Senate Democrats cleared the second of three 60-vote hurdles on President Barack Obama's healthcare overhaul on Tuesday, moving the landmark legislation one step closer to passage by Christmas.
  
• Banks with political ties got bailouts, study show ...
  * Banks with influence got access to bailouts, more money
  
• "Avatar" debut box office raised to $77 million
  LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Director James Cameron's new movie "Avatar," considered one of the most expensive movies ever made, on Monday saw its initial weekend ticket sales raised to $77 million in the United States and Canada.
  
• Obama picks Schmidt as cyber-security chief -repor ...
  WASHINGTON, Dec 21 (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama has picked former Bush administration adviser Howard Schmidt to serve as national cybersecurity coordinator, The Washington Post reported on Monday.
  

Pine River World News

• Why a Strong U.S. Dollar Foreshadows Economic Doom ...
  The following column is reprinted with permission from Stanislav Mishin. Why a Strong U.S. Dollar Foreshadows Economic Doom in 2010 ©  Stanislav Mishin Source:   Mat Rodina December 21, 2009 Normally, in what passes for orthodox economics, a strong currency for a consumer nation is a good thing, a ...
  
• Afghanistan: The Perfect Storm of Drugs and Terror ...
  The following commentary is reprinted with permission from Pravda, Moscow. Afghanistan:  The Perfect Storm of Drugs and Terrorism ©   Pravda.ru By Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey December 20, 2009 So far the war in Afghanistan has cost 234,384,981,000 dollars, rising by approximately one thousand USD a s ...
  
• Eva Golinger: U.S. Military Aggression against Ven ...
  [The following article is reprinted with permission from Eva Golinger. She is the author of "The Chávez Code: Cracking U.S. Intervention in Venezuela" (2006 Olive Branch Press) and "Bush vs. Chávez: Washington's War on Venezuela" (2007, Monthly Review Press).] U.S. Military Aggression against Venezuela ...
  
• A note to readers and subscribers...
  Please note that articles that would have previously appeared on this blog under the tag "IntelTrends" are now being posted almost exclusively on my IntelTrends site. This includes mujahideen statements and other specialized news that may not be of interest to the general readership. There is a sep ...
  
• USA Loses Its Face. Its White Face
  The following article is reprinted with permission from Pravda, Moscow. USA Loses Its Face. Its White Face ©   Pravda.ru By Sergey Balmasov December 18, 2009 The United States of America will lose its white face by the middle of the 21st century. The population of the USA will grow from 308 to 399 ...
  

  PDA AMERICA

• Tiny Tim and health care reform in U.S.
  By Breck England | The Salt Lake Tribune The views expressed in this article not necessarily the views of Progressive Democrats of America. The most popular movie this holiday season is about health care reform. “A Christmas Carol” ...
  
• The Health Care Bill Sucks–and What to Do About It
  Cross-posted from Fire Dog Lake The public option was always a fig leaf. Thus, its demise will not really change the fundamental nature of the health care bill, in my opinion. It merely pushes the bill ...
  
• Payoffs for states get Reid to 60
  From the Politico.com Ben Nelson’s “Cornhusker Kickback,” as the GOP is calling it, got all the attention Saturday, but other senators lined up for deals as Majority Leader Harry Reid corralled the last few votes for ...
  
• PDA South & East Regional Call
  PDA members, long term and new, shared news about actions and campaigns in their states. Strategies for actions around Healthcare NOT Warfare—especially the upcoming Brown Bag Lunch Vigils—dominated the discussion, as well as possibilities for ...
  
• IOT: Healthcare NOT Warfare Dec 15th Call
  The California Nurses Association's Donna Smith, PDA's Healthcare NOT Warfare co-chair, brought up-to-the-minute news about the Sanders Amendment in the Senate, answering questions about the process and backroom deals that go into passing legislation. PDA ...
  

Marler Blog

• Harrington and Sons Recalls E. coli O157:H7 Hambur ...
  According to an FSIS release, Harrington and Sons, a Williston, Vt., establishment, is recalling approximately 68 pounds of fresh ground beef products that may be contaminated with E. coli O157:H7, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) announced today. The pr ...
  
• It Could Only Happen at a Marler Clark Holiday Par ...
  It is pretty rare that we are able to get the whole Marler Clark and Food Safety News staff together in one city, much less one room.  Today, in Seattle we were able to pull most people together at one Seattle high-class restaurant - some 26 people coming in from as far away from Washington DC and D ...
  
• Simple Good and Tasty - Bill Marler: Taking on E. ...
  I had a great time chatting with Shari for her post today - "Simple Good and Tasty - Bill Marler: Taking on E. coli, Big Ag, Raw Milk, Conspiracy Theorists, and the USDA - Continued."  I wish we all had more opportunity to talk about the issues of food safety and sustainability.  I encourage you to ...
  
• Tiger Woods, Golf and Food Poisoning
  Seems like everyone is dumping on Tiger - for good reason I might add.  I, however, am not a golfer and frankly do not care much about golfers.  So, trying to get into the act myself, I have been attempting to make Tiger relevant (somewhat) to what I do daily or is that Daly?  So, as I puttered arou ...
  
• A Conversation with Bill Marler: Taking on E. coli ...
  I had a great time chatting with Shari Danielson of the blog, Simple Good and Tasty, for what is going to be a two-part expose into the inner workings of the mind of trial lawyer/wannabe politician/food safety advocate/blogger – “A Conversation with Bill Marler: Taking on E. coli, Big Ag, Raw Milk, ...
  

AutoblogGreen

• AutoblogGreen for 12.22.09
  Better Place's Renault Fluence EV to sell for under $20,000 Could be quite the bargain. Free Electric Car! Read the fine print. ...
  
• AutoblogGreen for 12.21.09
  Zombie meme alert: electric cars cause cancer Or so they say. Coda shares low-life battery plan You have 15 miles left on your charge. This is how your car will react. ...
  
• AutoblogGreen for 12.18.09
  Video: Watch the Volt battery go shake-shake-shake Rumble, rumble. Ford sends 10 Focus fuel cell vehicles to Iceland for continued testing These cars are getting a work out. ...
  
• Detroit 2010 Preview: Volvo C30 EV evolves for roa ...
  Filed under: Detroit Auto Show , Coupe , Volvo , Electric Volvo C30 BEV prototype - Click above for high-res image gallery Volvo has built versions of its C30 hatchback with efficient diesel engines , plug-in hybrid powerplants , flex-fuel ICEs , and pure electric drivetrains . It's the all-elec ...
  
• AutoblogGreen for 12.17.09
  A little piece of history: Toyota's first hybrid [w/VIDEO] It's got a gas turbine, of all things. Audi to U.S. politicians: Diesels > hybrids and EVs We're not surprised. ...
  

Rafe's Radar

• Valley VC learns to embrace government
  Famous venture capitalist Steve Jurvetson avoided politics--as long as he could. Now dealing with the feds is a job skill.
  
• Reporters' Roundtable Podcast: Biggest tech storie ...
  This week on the Roundtable: The biggest tech stories of 2009! With my boss, CNET Editor in Chief Scott Ard , and Buzz Out Loud host (and my co-conspirator on Real Deal ) Tom Merritt . Listen now: Download today's podcast Subscribe with iTunes (audio) Subscribe with iTunes (video) Subsc ...
  
• Dear newspapers: I will pay for your content, once
  Asking subscribers to pay for the same content twice will not work.
  
• Blippy launches the Twitter of personal finance
  There's more to this service that sharing spending data with friends, thank goodness.
  
• Reporters' Roundtable Podcast: Google Chrome OS
  What's behind the Google Chrome OS, technologically and from a business perspective? This week on the Roundtable, I discuss the pending operating system with CNET writers Stephen Shankland ( Deep Tech ) and Gordon Haff ( Pervasive Data Center ). Listen now: Download today's podcast Subs ...
  

Camera Obscura

• Pathos and pathology: the cinema of Todd Haynes.
  http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-126935025/pathos-and-pathology-cinema.html September 1, 2004... Because infinity--for the eye--begins just a few meters away from the retina.... --Roger Caillois, "The Image" There are at least two shots in Todd Haynes's work that recur so frequ ...
  
• The incredible shrinking star: Todd Haynes and the ...
  http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-126935026/incredible-shrinking-star-todd.html September 1, 2004... Critics have consistently characterized the films of Todd Haynes within the terms of what B. Ruby Rich described in 1992 as the "new queer cinema"--films whose style displayed traces of ...
  
• Written on the screen: mediation and immersion in ...
  http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-126935031/written-screen-mediation-and.html September 1, 2004... Recently, while engaging in one of my favorite forms of procrastination--using my computer to search for mid-century modern bargains on eBay rather than using it to engage in more rigorous ...
  
• Traumatic postmodern histories: Velvet Goldmine's ...
  http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-126935030/traumatic-postmodern-histories-velvet.html September 1, 2004... If modernity was characterized by and imagined itself in terms of a particular awareness of time and history--the unfolding of social, political, and technological projects of pro ...
  
• Dangerous spaces: Safe.
  http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-126935029/dangerous-spaces-safe.html September 1, 2004... For me, the problem is always in content; we want to define the perspective of a film solely through its content, and not through its form. --Todd Haynes No matter how much we desire, wit ...
  

Democracy Now!

• Take Me to Your Climate Leader
  COPENHAGEN—“Politicians talk, leaders act” read the sign outside the Bella Center in Copenhagen on the opening day of the United Nations climate summit. Inside the convention center, the official delegations from 192 countries, hundreds of NGOs (nongovernmental organizations)—an estimated 15,000 pe ...
  
• TARIQ ALI: “Obama’s Afghan-Pak Syndrom ...
  Tariq Ali is author of more than 20 books, including history, politics, and fiction. His most recent books are Protocols of the Elders of Sodom (2009) and The Duel: Pakistan on the Flight Path of American Power (2008). He is a regular contributor to The Guardian, New Left Review, and the London Rev ...
  
• The Globe and Mail: Amy Goodman's border woes has ...
  The Globe and Mail: Canada Border Services Agency won’t comment on why the host of the widely syndicated radio and TV program Democracy Now had her speech checked at border Read more
  
• Vancouver Observer: Amy Goodman Gets Brilliant Sto ...
  Read the Vancouver Observer article about Amy Goodman’s detention at the Canadian border: “Well, it’s official. Suspicion of criticizing the 2010 Olympics gets you on a watch list at the Canadian border. Want to come to Canada and discuss the environmental shame that is the tar sands? Go ahead. W ...
  
• Tavis Smiley interviews Amy Goodman
  Check out Tavis Smiley’s interview with Amy Goodman Watch / Listen / Read transcript
  

Farming Pathogens

• Pigs Do Fly! Implications for Influenza
  The influenza genome is segmented. Eight pieces of single-stranded RNA encode for 11 proteins: PB2, PB1, PB1-F2, PA, HA, NP, NA, M1, M2, NS1, and NS2. The segmentation allows influenza of different subtypes infecting the same host to trade segments like card players on a Friday night. Most of the re ...
  
• Breeding Influenza: The Political Virology of Offs ...
  What better way to medicate against a holiday’s genocidal origins and the hunger now swelling worldwide in the wake of a related banker-brought recession than with a bellyful of turkey, stuffing, yams, and pumpkin pie? Despite its rotten ambiguities Thanksgiving remains my favorite American holiday. ...
  
• A Visitation of the Influenza
  In seeping through the world’s every nook and cranny, pandemics have a way of forcing themselves into our lives as a lurking presence. Even the most insular of functionaries, who typically makes his living solving problems by ignoring them, straightens up and takes notice.    As an epidemic wave a ...
  
• I Do Like Green Eggs and Ham
  Much of what we’ve addressed on this blog has focused on the epidemiological failures of industrial farming. But what of the alternatives? Can we farm in another way? Is another world possible?    It’s only since I’ve moved to the Midwest that I’ve learned that not only is that world possible, it’ ...
  
• Heart of Modeling
  Greed is often mistaken for humanity’s heart of darkness. Look instead to the rationalization that transforms the most rapacious pillaging into an act of benevolence. A one-ton bomb dropped on a peasant wedding party is dissembled into regret without responsibility or, baser yet, a tough love offere ...
  

Digg Green

• Another Reason Not To F*ck With Nature (Pic)
  -
  
• Lightning Vs Landmarks (PICS)
  Who’s going to win in a battle between the landmarks we humans have built over recent centuries and the electrical power of lightning, one of nature’s most powerful forces?
  
• LED Traffic Lights Can't Melt Snow, Cause Accident ...
  New-fangled LED traffic lights last longer, pierce the darkness more effectively and consume 90% less energy than incandescent bulbs. That's also their drawback. They're not hot enough to melt snow that sticks to their lenses, causing dozens of accidents.
  
• How Social Networks Can save the World
  You can pretty much do everything else via social media outlets, so why not try saving the world. Websites like Facebook and YouTube provide a great opportunity for people to share green innovation ideas that can change the world, here's how...
  
• The 5 Cleanest (and Dirtiest) U.S. Tap Waters
  Even though water comes out of the faucet looking clean and clear, there is a good chance it has some pretty nasty stuff in it. A new study has cataloged all the pollutants and chemicals that appear in our tap water, and they include things like arsenic and fuel additives. This is a look at the five ...
  

Invisible Opportunity

• Play 24 Hour Miniature Golf at Auschwitz
  I don’t know why we don’t hear about the Bolshevik murders of tens of millions and the holocaust in the Ukraine. I’m not sure why we are not notified about who the membership of The Young Turks were and their impact on the Armenian holocaust. For some reason we never get informed about who the [...]
  
• Out of the Darkness and into the Light
  By Les Visible Let us all assume that there is only one force that expresses itself as ‘what we call’ good and evil and also as much of what we cannot define or understand. Let us assume that the purpose of life is to lead us through experience to Self Realization, when we know ourselves to [...]
  
• How do They do It? It Baffles the Mind
  By Les Visible I must say that it astounds me when I watch these people lie and press on with their lies and evil deeds, even when their lies are exposed all around them. I try to understand what it must be like to be capable of this but I cannot. I think about the men [...]
  
• Why Switzerland Has The Lowest Crime Rate In The W ...
  
  
• Video – David Wilcock on Norway Spiral, DNA ...

  Insurgency Watch - Posts

• InsurgencyWatch moving to True/Slant
  In the coming days, InsurgencyWatch will be moving to True/Slant, “an original content news network tailored to both the ‘Entrepreneurial Journalist’ and marketers who want a more effective way to engage with digital audiences.” (That’s what the official about page says.) It’s not a decision I’ve ma ...
  
• Kerry-Lugar’s First Victim
  If true, this is total bullshit: After strong criticism on the Kerry-Lugar bill in Pakistan, the government has decided to replace Pakistan’s ambassador to the US Hussain Haqqani and the announcement in this respect is expected within the next two days. There’s nothing in the bill reasonable Pakist ...
  
• Pakistan’s Civil War Heating Up
  In the aftermath of this weekend’s assault on the Pakistani General Headquarters in Rawalpindi, the Taliban hit again in Alpuri, in the Shangla district east of Mingora in Swat. According to military sources who asked to remain anonymous because they weren’t authorized to talk to the press, a 13- or ...
  
• At Home with a Swat Lashkar
  I just finished up a few days in Swat and while I’m working on a story about it, I thought you might like to see a few pictures I took while there. Enjoy. Share/Save
  
• FACTBOX: Uzbek militant leader killed in Pakistan ...
  Washington PostFACTBOX: Uzbek militant leader killed in PakistanReutersBy this time he is thought to have fled the region for the safe haven of Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. * Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and Taliban leader ...Pakistan to Target Taliba...
  

AlterNet - DrugReporter

• Congress Gets Its Act Together: Repeals Ban on Syr ...
  Washington, D.C. finally seems to be getting the message that the war on drugs has failed.
  
• Former Police Chief Norm Stamper: 'Let's Not Stop ...
  A new poll shows that most Americans are ready to legalize marijuana, but not drugs like cocaine or heroin. A 34-year police vet says it's time to legalize them all.
  
• Medical Marijuana Apartheid: Different Rules Apply ...
  A California hipster can hit the vaporizer without fear of harassment, but a lower-class person smoking a blunt may not be so lucky.
  
• L.A. City Council Votes to Reduce Pot Dispensaries ...
  The vote to cap dispensaries is the latest in a twisted four-year effort to regulate the city's booming medical marijuana retail industry.
  
• DEA Forced to Scrub Misleading Info on the America ...
  Activists get the DEA to remove obsolete information from its website claiming that the American Medical Association (AMA) still opposes medical marijuana
  

Twilight Earth

• Photo Sunday: Winter Wonderland – East Coast Blizz ...
  In what will be forever known as the "East Coast Blizzard of 09", the northern east coast got over 20 inches of snow in 24 hours. Related posts: Photo Sunday – Haystack Rock, Oregon Coast Photo Sunday – Sunday Morning Coming Down. A Tribute to Everytown USA Photo Sunday-The Appalachian Trails 100 ...
  
• What to Read and Watch on the Last Day of Cop15
  What to read and watch on the last day of Cop15, as the press encamps for a long wait. Related posts: Cop15 Clip Reel Videos – Watch Them Here Before they Go to Copenhagen Fair Trade Chocolate at Keeps a Diplomat Happy – Report from Cop15 Twilight Earth Exclusive Cop15 Video – China Youth in Cop ...
  
• One Question for the World (Video)
  On the streets of Copenhagen, we asked 20 people from around the world one simple question and got very different answers... Related posts: Climate Protest in Copenhagen – Video Spains Exhibit in Copenhagen Invites Citizens to Record Messages About Climate Change Cop15 – On The Streets – Day One ...
  
• Will China Teach the Developed Countries a Well De ...
  Today’s post is Twexpert sourced, from some excellent and insightful Tweeps living in China. Related posts: Cop15 Climate Express Dispatch – You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet Twilight Earth Exclusive Cop15 Video – China Youth in Copenhagen Fair Trade Chocolate at Keeps a Diplomat Happy – Report fr ...
  
• Health Care Practices and Climate Change – Dr Bert ...
  The World Health Organisation’s environment expert, Dr Roberto Bertollini, has called for a revolution in health care practice in order to deal with climate change. Related posts: Spains Exhibit in Copenhagen Invites Citizens to Record Messages About Climate Change 2009 Global Climate Change Imp ...
  

Inhabitat

• SAKO Architects’ Jenga-Like Building Provides Opti ...
  What’s black and white and sunny all over? It’s the BUMPS housing complex in Beijing, created by SAKO Architects. Typical buildings in China face north and south, but SAKO’s design rotates the buildings 45 degrees from the north-south axis to provide maximum exposure to sunlight. The designers also ...
  
• Original Sound Track: Toy Train Runs on Musical Ra ...
  Musician and designer Ricardo Seola’s ‘Original Sound Track‘ is a toy train that is filled with a lot of soul! The train assumes the role of a musician as it plays its track by plucking metal keys, just like the wind-up music boxes of yesteryear. Ten-piece sets of varying rails could be sold separat ...
  
• LED-Equipped Gown Monitors Carbon Dioxide in the A ...
  Danish design company Diffus has created a stunning LED-studded dress that lights up when it detects carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. The luminous ensemble is laced with conductive embroidery that links a CO2 sensor to an Arduino Lilypad microprocessor. When the presence of CO2 is detected the ligh ...
  
• GREEN GIFT GUIDE: Gifts of Time
  If you’re tired of giving material gifts for the holidays or have just plain run out of time to buy anything online, it’s our Gifts of Time Guide to the rescue! With our hectic schedules, giving your time and effort to a loved one is priceless, and it’s a lot greener than conventional gifts too. [.. ...
  
• Singapore’s Largest Garden Project Unveiled
  Designs have just been released for Bay South, an incredible botanical preserve topped with super-tall solar trees that is set to be Singapore’s largest garden project. Conceived by Grant Associates, the 101-hectare expanse of lush green space will be situated right next to the Marina Bay resort and ...
  

Pogue's Posts

• Verizon Responds to Consumer Complaints
  The wireless carrier addresses two issues raised by consumers and this blog.
  
• Should e-Books Be Copy Protected?
  The issues involved with copy protection haven't changed. They're the same on e-books as they are with everything else.
  
• Free Speech (Recognition)
  This week, I tried out Dragon Dictation, a new, free, very real app for the iPhone from Nuance.
  
• What I Bought This Year
  People seem to be interested in what the consumer-tech columnist would buy for himself and his own family, so it seemed like a slam-dunk.
  
• Who Pays When an iPhone Is Stolen?
  Why AT&T is - surprisingly - not in the wrong when it comes to iPhone-replacement fees.
  

Open Your Eyes News

• Clashes reported at funeral of Iranian dissident c ...
  BBC – Iranian reformists have clashed with police after the funeral of a dissident cleric, opposition websites say. Earlier, tens of thousands took part in a procession for Grand Ayatollah Hoseyn Ali Montazeri in the holy city of Qom. Clashes reportedly broke out, but the scale of the confrontation ...
  
• Turning children into Orwellian eco-spies
  Spiked Magazine – Frank Furedi recalls being educated through fear in Stalinist Hungary, and is disturbed that the same tactics are now used by environmentalists. There is a long and sordid tradition of trying to socialise children by scaring them. The aim of such socialisation-through-fear is twofo ...
  
• Goldman Sachs Threatens UK Government Over Bonuses
  Business Week – Goldman Sachs (GS) has threatened the UK Treasury with plans to move up to 20 per cent of its London-based staff to Spain in a standoff over tax and bonuses. It’s believed that the Wall Street investment bank, which paid more than £2bn to the Exchequer’s ailing coffers in corporatio ...
  
• Beyond Fluoride: Pharmaceuticals, Drinking Water a ...
  Huffington Post – This week’s New York Times Magazine draws attention to an article in The British Journal of Psychiatry that has been the talk of bioethical circles since May, when researchers at Japan’s Oita University reported that communities with increased levels of lithium in their drinking wa ...
  
• Saudi jets kill 18 civilians in Yemen
  Press TV – Fresh Saudi air strikes on northern villages of Yemen have claimed the lives of 18 civilians, all women and children, the Houthi fighters say. According to a statement released by the fighters, Saudi forces carried out more than 40 air raids on al-Razih, al-Nazir, al -Malaheet, and the di ...
  

Monkey Smashes Heaven

• Zionist Ghouls harvest the bodies of their Arab vi ...
  Zionist Ghouls harvest the bodies of their Arab victims. (monkeysmashesheaven.wordporess.com) Even the most hardened anti-imperialists can be shocked once in a while by the brutality of the Zionist regime. Israel has now admitted to harvesting organs from Palestinians without the permission of thei ...
  
• People honor Stalin around the world on the day of ...
  People honor Stalin around the world on the day of his birth (monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com) December 21st is observed as the 130 anniversary of Stalin’s birth. Across the ex-Soviet Union, people gathered to honor his role as a great proletarian leader. In Moscow, at the Kremlin, wall flowers w ...
  
• Venezuela, Bolivia, Iran, Africans denounce US and ...
  Venezuela, Bolivia, Iran, Africans denounce US and other First World countries at Copenhagen (monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com) World leaders are meeting at a United Nations conference in Copenhagen to discuss the problem of climate change. The conference has caused widespread demonstrations in th ...
  
• West puts more pressure on Iran and allies as Amer ...
  West puts more pressure on Iran and allies as Amerikans, First Worldist “left,” and lackeys cheer (monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com) Recently, the US and its allies are turing up the pressure on Iran. Imperialists, Zionists, Iranian comprador forces, First Worldist and social-imperialist “leftists ...
  
• PAO: Self-Defense, it makes sense
  from Politics Are Over Posted in ..Politics Are Over, Black Nation, Communism, Maoism, Maoism Third Worldism, Maoisme, Maoismo, North America, Occupied Mexico aka Aztlán
  

PakAlert

• PSYCHOLOGICAL OPERATIONS: Close Down GEO TV and Ev ...
  Honestly, if you don’t watch GEO Television aka Jew TV, everything seems so routine and normal in the country and you don’t get bouts of frustration and agony and you don’t shudder that Pakistan will be no more in coming some weeks or the country won’t be engulfed in the civil war and we will [...] ...
  
• 2010 Food Crisis for Dummies – Are We Ready?
  There is no precedence for the panic and chaos will occur next year. The global food supply/demand picture has NEVER been so out of balance. The 2010 food crisis will rearrange economic, financial, and political order of the world, and those who aren’t prepared will suffer terrible losses… by Eric d ...
  
• Stunning Statistics About the War Every American S ...
  Contrary to popular belief, the US actually has 189,000 personnel on the ground in Afghanistan right now—and that number is quickly rising. By Jeremy Scahill A hearing in Sen. Claire McCaskill’s Contract Oversight subcommittee on contracting in Afghanistan has highlighted some important statistics ...
  
• Russia, NATO, Afghanistan – High Stakes Great Game
  What did Medvedev have up his sleeve when he welcomed Obama’s new surge in Afghanistan, wonders Eric Walberg By Eric Walberg US President Barack Obama’s now expanding war against the Taliban is garnering support from liberals and neocons alike, from leaders around the world, even from Russia. “We ...
  
• Video: Gog and Magog in the Modern Age – by Imran ...
  An Islamic View of Gog and Magog in the Modern Age By Imran N. Hosein I began my study of Gog and Magog more than fifteen years ago in the early 90’s while resident in New York. My subsequent public lectures on the subject never failed to provoke keen interest from my Muslim audiences in se ...
  

ecogeek

• Map of Countries' Emissions, Pledges
  The AP Climate Pool kept us well informed over the course of the COP15 negotiations.  Part of that great coverage is contained in this interactive map of the participating nations' current emissions and the reductions they've pledged to make. You can find plenty of articles analyzing what was accom ...
  
• NASA Unveils Amazing GHG Models
  NASA's Aqua spacecraft has been taking daily CO2 measurements with its Atmospheric Infrared Sounder instrument (AIRS) for the past seven years and now all that information gathering has led to beautiful and frightening maps and models of the concentration and movement of greenhouse gases in ou ...
  
• OK Residents Can Buy an Electric Car for Less than ...
  If you live in Oklahoma, you have until December 31, 2009 to buy an electric car for about $900.  Through a combination of federal and state tax credits, the Kandi Coco drops from its retail price of $10,600 to a cool $865.  The federal tax credit amounts to $4,435 while the state is offering a 50 ...
  
• EcoGeek Q&A: Graciela Chichilnisky
  Graciela Chichilnisky was extensively involved in the creation of the Kyoto Protocol, designing the global carbon market that became international law in 2005.  She has been a lead author of the IPCC and is a professor of economics and mathematical statistics at Columbia University. She's written a ...
  
• Nanotech Breakthrough: Self-Cleaning Solar Panels
  Solar panels may have just become more low maintenance.  While conducting research on a cure forl Alzheimer's, scientists at Tel Aviv University ended up with a nanotech breakthrough that could mean no more worrying about keeping solar panels clean - they can clean themselves! The researchers were ...
  

Times Online - Science

• 'We are possibly the luckiest Eurostar customers o ...
  Sitting quietly on the 7.10am Eurostar from Paris to London, Terry Karydas’s family were under strict instructions not to mention how easy their journey had been.
  
• Passengers' fury at airports as snow steals Christ ...
  The budget airline easyJet cancelled more than 150 flights due to the bad weather today as travellers across the UK finally gave up on their Christmas holidays.
  
• Gritting row after thousands forced to abandon car ...
  There was no end in sight to Britain's Christmas travel nightmare today as a row broke out the failure of local councils to keep key roads clear of ice.
  
• Thousands abandon cars in Christmas travel nightma ...
  The Christmas travel nightmare was grinding on today with more snow and ice causing havoc on the roads and further disruption for rail and air services.
  
• Tens of thousands stranded as Eurostar resumes par ...
  Tens of thousands of passengers will be unable to make planned journeys on Eurostar over Christmas despite the partial resumption today of services through the Channel Tunnel.
  

Environment _ National Geographic

• Czech Zoo Sends Four Rare White Rhinos to Kenya
  Four of the world's eight remaining northern white rhinoceroses have been flown to Kenya in a last-ditch effort to save the critically endangered subspecies.
  
• Presented By:
• Winter Solstice 2009: Facts on Shortest Day of the ...
  Today is the 2009 winter solstice, the first day of winter and the shortest day of the year. Find out why and how the year's darkest day has been celebrated for centuries.
  
• Winter Solstice Monday: Facts on First Day of Wint ...
  Monday, the 2009 winter solstice, is the first day of winter. Find out why it's also the year's darkest day—and yet has been celebrated for centuries.
  
• Amazon Losing "Flying Rivers," Ability to Curb War ...
  The Amazon's flying rivers"—humid air currents that deliver water to the vast rainforest—may be ebbing, and in turn drying out the region's trees and ability to curb globalwarming, according to experts.
  

drinking liberally in new milford ( with beersphere feeds )

• Who the heck is Barry Cafero?
  Via ctblogger : I know it's early to be making this call but I'm almost certain no one topping this comment today: It's ok that Larry Cafero doesn't know my name. Over the course of the next year, he'll quickly realize that Connecticut voters don't know his, either. -Connecticut Democratic Party C ...
  
• Monday Morning Peak
  Image Taken From National Geographic Forget about Wednesday being hump day this week. The peak was already hit this morning, if you are among today's sleepy heads that stayed up to watch the Gemenids meteor showers : Coming fast on the heels of its more famous cousin the Leonid meteor shower —which ...
  
• Jon Stewart on Healthcare
  The Daily Show's Jon Stewart takes a look at the healthcare successes of the Democrats: The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c Democratic Super Majority www.thedailyshow.com Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Ron Paul Interview (h/t GottaLaff :)
  
• Score One For The Working Families Party in NYC
  Score two, actually... Via The Gotham Gazette, The Working Families Party , a political party that has made significant contributions to Connecticut's political landscape, has taken over New York city : Both Liu and de Blasio had the endorsement of the Working Families Party , yesterday and in th ...
  
• That's Alright Obama
  A little northern humour on the bailouts in the key of "eh?" The banks may not all be solvent but the comment threads are. Deposit your thoughts below.
  

SPL Center

• Potential Jurors Being Interviewed for the Bill Wh ...
  ROANOKE, VA. — After sitting through his own threat trial in Brooklyn, hate blogger Hal Turner may find himself back in a federal courtroom sooner than expected — this time as a witness in a similar case. Turner was on the list of dozens of potential witnesses that a government prosecutor read durin ...
  
• Uganda’s Harsh Anti-Gay Legislation Has Amer ...
  While activists around the world criticize pending legislation in Uganda they call the “kill the gays” bill, some Americans are being outed for their connections to those involved in the proposed statute. The latest is Richard Cohen, who claims he has successfully counseled thousands of gays to beco ...
  
• Columnist Describes Barrage of Threats from Nazi L ...
  ROANOKE, VA. — Pulitzer-prize winning columnist Leonard Pitts told the jury this afternoon that his “blood ran cold” when he received an E-mail from white supremacist Bill White with his home address, telephone number and a reference to his wife. When he clicked a link in the E-mail and saw that Whi ...
  
• Revealed! David Irving Can Be a Jerk
  So secretive is Holocaust denier David Irving that he often doesn’t reveal the locations of his lectures until hours before they’re scheduled to begin — and even then, he only tells vetted guests. It must have been a blow, therefore, when his private E-mails appeared on the Internet, courtesy of sel ...
  
• Indictments Detail Alleged Police Cover-up in Beat ...
  At about 11:30 on the night of July 12, 2008, six teenagers brutally assaulted a Latino man in a Shenandoah, Pa., park while yelling “Fucking spic, “Go back to Mexico” and “Tell your fucking Mexican friends to get the fuck out of Shenandoah.” As they gathered at one of their homes after the attack, ...
  

change: org.

• How to Do the Right Thing this Winter
  January 21st is the first day of winter and the longest night of the year. It's also the most dangerous time of year to be without a home. Each year, the lives of hundreds of people without a home are lost due to extreme weather conditions. Today, you can be a part of the solution by learning how to ...
  
• Government Abstains from Abstinence-Only "Educatio ...
  After the addition of a last-minute reproductive rights fail , the Senate health care bill passed today. Sigh. Health reform that thumbs its nose at women's rights and has no public option to be found doesn't exactly inspire me to put on my dancing shoes. But it's been a tough year, and we deserve a ...
  
• 26 Years of Solitary Confinement Is Torture
  Tommy Silverstein isn't fighting to convince anyone that he's an innocent man who should be set free. He's admitted to the murder of two fellow inmates and a guard, and knows his sentence will keep him in prison until 2095 -- that is, if he lives to be well past 100. He did the crime, and he's doing ...
  
• USA TODAY Changes Gears in Reference to Immigrant ...
  Alas, the largest newspaper in the United States and much of the mainstream media is still on the same old road of calling people 'illegal.' Background: On December 15, USA TODAY ran an article titled "Groups try to delay deportations of illegal students," in which they called young immigrant studen ...
  
• Help My Dog Heal!: The Anatomy of A Social Media F ...
  The density of the social web has created incredible opportunities for people to identify and leverage the assets their friends and contacts offer them. Yet as we're seeing with the controversy around the Chase Community Giving contest, the norms of what is and isn't appropriate, and best practices ...
  

Common Dreams -News

• US Warns Japan over Relocation of Futenma Airbase
  by Justin McCurry in Tokyo The US yesterday told Japan the planned relocation of a US marine airbase and thousands of troops based on the southern Japanese island of Okinawa was not up for negotiation in a further sign of growing tensions over the future of the US military footprint in east Asia. Re ...
  
• Union Sues LA School District over Charter Plan
  LOS ANGELES-A teachers union has sued the Los Angeles Unified School District over a plan to allow a new campus to be run as a charter school. The lawsuit was filed Monday by United Teachers Los Angeles on behalf of a group of instructors at the chronically overcrowded Garfield High School. The suit ...
  
• Obama: Public Option Too 'Symbolic'
  by Carol E. Lee President Obama told American Urban Radio Networks's April Ryan Monday that he stayed up to watch the Senate's early-morning vote on a health care bill and said he's confident Congress can work out the "five percent" difference between the House and Senate bills. "I was up because I ...
  
• Yasuni Park Trust Fund Will Keep Ecuador's Oil Und ...
  COPENHAGEN, Denmark - Ecuador's initiative to protect the climate and the rainforest of Yasuni National Park by leaving its largest oil reserve in the ground will be supported by a new multi-donor trust fund to offset lost oil revenue, Ecuadorian and United Nations officials announced last week in C ...
  
• States' Jobless Funds are Being Drained in Recessi ...
  by Peter Whoriskey The recession's jobless toll is draining unemployment-compensation funds so fast that according to federal projections, 40 state programs will go broke within two years and need $90 billion in loans to keep issuing the benefit checks. The shortfalls are putting pressure on governm ...
  

Lifehacker

• Step-by-Step Guide to Getting Thousands of Pictur ...
  If you're a long-time user of photo site Flickr looking to move your files elsewhere, it's not a one-click export. Blogger John Saddington explains his process for moving roughly 21,000 pictures and videos from Flickr to Picasa Web Albums. Lured away from Flickr by what he describes as stagnant inte ...
  
• Ribbit App Delivers Voicemail Transcripts to Your ...
  Ribbit Mobile , the voicemail and call-routing service that looks like a serious Google Voice rival , has launched an iPhone app to deliver voicemail transcripts with convenient call-back and SMS links, along with to-call list generation and other features. Because Ribbit knows exactly why Google Vo ...
  
• Last-Minute, Delivery-Guaranteed Deals Still Avai ...
  You thought it was over. The idea of getting that last-minute gift online, having it arrive guaranteed , and not paying through the nose, had passed. Actually, you've still got a few options for buying online and receiving before Friday. Amazon.com is still offering discounted or regular-cost shippi ...
  
• Impress The DIYers on Your Christmas List with a ...
  If you want to impress a DIYer on your holiday shopping list with an extremely useful addition to their toolbox, you'll score big by giving them a gimlet set. What's a gimlet? Gimlets are an old-fashioned, but extremely practical, hand tool. You use them to make pilot holes for screws without having ...
  
• Firefox 3.5 Inches Past IE7 As World's Most Popul ...
  According to global analytics web site StatCounter, Firefox 3.5 has edged past Internet Explorer 7 as the most popular browser on the market today. Keep in mind that the stats in question are differentiating by version, so it's actually kind of a lucky swing for Firefox at the moment, as Internet Ex ...
  

Newshoggers - AfPak

• Yet Another Picture of the Week Plus A Rant
  Commentary By Ron Beasley Blue Monday - Click on Picture for larger image. My partner here at Hoggers, John Ballard, sent me this link to a piece by Robert Parry: Why Obama Is Failing. Faced with a dire financial crisis and two foreign wars – not to mention a host of long-festering problems like hea ...
  
• Clinton II
  Commentary By Ron Beasley With apologies to Pastor Niemöller: First they came for the banksters, and showered them with money and put them in the Administration in a way that was not change we could believe in. Then they came for the military industrial complex, and sent more and more of our childre ...
  
• Contemplation of Drone Strikes in Quetta Belies Ob ...
  By Derrick Crowe Once again, the United States is rattling a saber about killing people in Quetta, despite all the inevitable civilian death and mass outrage. Such a move would show the shallowness of the "just war" talk in President Obama's disgraceful Nobel paean to Mars. Quetta is a city of 850,0 ...
  
• "Flooding The Zone" - How McChrystal Bulldozed Oba ...
  By Steve Hynd The best piece you're likley to read on how the Obama administration came to the decision to surge 40,000 extra US and allied troops in Afghanistan is by Mark Perry, writing for the Asia Times (h/t Russ Wellen). Unlike the stenographed versions in the Washington Post or New York Times, ...
  
• Great Losers
  By Dave Anderson: The Security Crank points out claims that a significant portion of the entire Chechan population is supposedly in Warizistan: At some point, this kind of thing moves beyond parody. According to the reports Haji Akbar Ali Mehsud, a 55-year-old resident of Zinda village in District S ...
  

Water Wars

• 'Eureka!' yields to 'hmm' - Tue, 22 Dec 2009 PST ( ...
  The junkyard dogs among us are yapping loudly at the efforts of science to understand what is going on with our atmosphere.
  
• Water: We must row hard to fix this problem (Atlan ...
  Water: We must row hard to fix this problem
  
• South Africa : The Poverty of Ideas (AllAfrica.com ...
  'Now, it is a fact that an intellectual is someone who fails to mind his own business.' Jean-Paul Sartre[1]
  
• Two Cents Worth: Clean water legislation biggest f ...
  NOTE: The Nevada System of Higher Education is working to transfer the 10 water right options acquired under the Walker River Basin Project to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation.
  
• Two Cents Worth: Clean water legislation biggest f ...
  NOTE: The Nevada System of Higher Education is working to transfer the 10 water right options acquired under the Walker River Basin Project to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation.
  

WordPress | Economics

• The Cramdown Continues
  “I’m tired of this Congress thinking it knows better than me and my family how to provid
  
• 3rd Quarter GDP Revised Down, Underlying Economy S ...
  This morning the Bureau of Economic Analysis issued its 3rd estimate of 3rd quarter GDP, revising it
  
• Why giving you dad socks for Christmas is bad for ...
  Jumpers that make you cry There is nothing worse that getting a Christmas present like the one in th
  
• Some positives to consider in the new year
  In the Economist’s year end issue, they have a lead article on progress and how people’s
  
• Environment: if North Korea were to stall the Clim ...
  Suppose that some rogue state, such as North Korea, entered the Copenhagen Climate Change Summit and
  

Electronic Intifada

• Grassroots activist and human rights defender Jama ...
  The arrest of Jamal Juma' is the most high-profile case within an intensifying campaign of repression of grassroots mobilization against the wall and the settlements. Initially only arresting l ...
  
• Audio: "For us, olive trees are a matter of resist ...
  Planting olive trees is a matter of resistance for the Arab Group for the Protection of Nature, a non-profit organization based in Amman, Jordan. The organization began in 2003 with the goal of replan ...
  
• EU remains cozy with Israel, despite the headlines ...
  BRUSSELS (IPS) - Israel's relations with the European Union were tense for most of 2009 -- if newspaper headlines are to be believed. In the past week, a British court drew fierce criticism from Israe ...
  
• "It is time for us to put an end to this occupatio ...
  Situated just west of Ramallah, the Palestinian village of Nilin has lost huge swathes of land to Israel's settlements and its wall in the occupied West Bank. In a year and a half of resisting ...
  
• Net around Israeli war crimes suspects tightens
  Efforts by human rights organizations, lawyers and activists in Palestine and Europe to hold Israeli war crimes suspects to account have gained momentum over the past few years. Last week, form ...
  

CS Monitor - News

• podcast091204
  Fewer US jobs lost in November and impact on economy.
  
• October 16, 2009
  The UN Human Rights Council votes to adopt the Goldstone Report on Israel's military incursion into Gaza.
  
• October 19, 2009
  Saudi Arabia is wary of terrorists, especially from neighboring states.
  
• October 20, 2009
  How some TV insiders view parents and children on reality television.
  
• October 21, 2009
  How African Anglicans might respond to the Vatican's offer.
  

The Wonk Room

• Lieberman: ‘I Believe President Obama Never ...
  This evening, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) took to the Senate floor to “declare” his support for the health care bill and explain his opposition to the public option and the Medicare buy-in. Lieberman, who has previously insisted that the White House never pressured him to support the public plan, argu ...
  
• FLASHBACK: Bernanke Scoffed At Subprime Warnings, ...
  In today’s Washington Post, Binyam Applebaum and David Cho took a long look at the Federal Reserve’s complete failure to take note of the subprime housing bubble. “The Fed’s failure to foresee the crisis or to require adequate safeguards happened in part because it did not understand the risks that ...
  
• Bolton Contradicted By Cheney On ‘Aim’ ...
  Hailing Dick Cheney as “Conservative of the Year” in the current issue of Human Events, former ambassador John Bolton makes this transparently false claim in reference to Cheney’s speech at the American Enterprise Institute last May: So, a major Cheney speech at AEI shortly after leaving the vice pr ...
  
• Reasons Not To Kill The Senate Bill
  Over at Firedoglake, Jane Hamsher outlines 10 reasons to kill the Senate health care bill. The comprehensive list relies on the competent work of FDL’s team of health care bloggers and some of the critique is not without merit; other points are overstated. For instance, the claim that “many will be ...
  
• Texas Terrorism And Crime-Prevention Intelligence ...
  A North Central Texas Fusion Center which provides homeland security intelligence is warning local officials about the dangers associated with the presence of foreign soccer teams at a local stadium. The threat assessment warns, “foreign soccer teams from all over the world play at Pizza Hut Park. ...
  

thwap's schoolyard

• Rick Hillier and Second-Hand Information ...
  Private Mann:"General Hillier, 'Amnesty International' has a scathing report about Afghan prison conditions." Hillier: "Those detestable peacenicks and bleeding-hearts! Why should I care about such second-hand information!!" Private Mann: "The PMO just called. Prime Minister Harper wants us conf ...
  
• Canadian Self-Satisfaction
  Generations of Canadians have sewn little Canadian flags onto their backpacks when travelling abroad, in order to avoid being taken for US-Americans. At its most vapid, this tradition is probably inspired by nothing more than a vague, self-satisfied notion that Canadians are great and US-Americans a ...
  
• Building On What Pogge Said:
  Here : I'm sure the Conservatives would love to see this whole issue of torture turn into a partisan free-for-all that the general public will then tune out as being simply more of the same nonsense that they've come to expect from the overgrown children in Ottawa. You're now helping them and making ...
  
• Is stephen harper a Snivelling Coward?
  Where was he while the intellectually unequipped Peter MacKay was casting apsersions at Richard Colvin's "third-hand information" from people MacKay knows are bad because he's read " third-hand information " about them? There he was. Taking a cheap photo-op with the National Men's Lacrosse Team. ...
  
• Peter MacKay: Imperialist Stooge for a Rapist Gove ...
  Here's the ever-moronic Peter MacKay: Under fire from all parties, MacKay dismissed testimony from Richard Colvin as second- and third-hand information from enemy sources. “What we’re talking about here is not only hearsay, we’re talking about basing much of his evidence on what the Taliban have b ...
  

Financial Sense Editorials

• Market Observation: Trading, Investing and Specula ...
  by Tony Allison. "Today’s culture seems to have a very short-term perspective on the just about everything. Wall Street focuses on this quarter’s results; Washington’s vision extends only to the next election cycle. The average Joe looks to the coming weekend, or perhaps his next paycheck. As the na ...
  
• Th*nk*ng (Presentations)
  by Fred Cederholm. "I’ve been thinking about presentation. Actually I’ve been thinking about 2009, Obama, the economy, jobs, bailouts, Bernanke, and St. Johns Lutheran Church. The year 2009 will always hold a special place in my memory."
  
• Silent Night, Silent Market
  by Paul Nolte. "Two very quiet weeks now confront investors, as the Christmas and New Year’s holidays cut the trading for the week to but a whisper. Amid the quiet and solitude however are some rumblings from last year’s financial earthquake."
  
• Caught In A Lie
  by Captain Hook. "It’s no secret governments and our ruling elite (the bureaucracy) lie for their own benefit, and this has been increasingly prevalent for years now. Perhaps the most well known statistics in this respect center on the Employment Report"
  
• Coppertunities
  by Ray Long. "Today let's discuss copper opportunities, from the other side of the coin. In past weeks I've touted the advantage gained by those first to explore a new investment niche. Specifically copper. Copper pennies, to be even more precise. "
  

on Government Oversight

• Morning Smoke: More Tales of Moneyed Military Ment ...
  Military mentors hired, fired in discreet fashion [Federal Times] Defense Bill Earmarks Total $4 Billion [The Wall Street Journal] Inadequate Oversight Cited in Weatherization Program [The New York Times] White House seeks input on federal research info sharing program [Federal...
  
• California Courts to Whistleblower: 'You're Out of ...
  Accountable California, a project of SEIU Local 721's Center for Public Accountability, has posted a story about Michael Paul, an employee of the California Administrative Office of the Courts. Paul thought he saw misconduct occurring on multimillion dollar contracts and...
  
• Pressure Mounts on Obama's NRC Pick
  We were pleased to see William Lynn and William Magwood featured on the list of five of “Obama’s Worst Nominees,” in Mother Jones’ January/February 2010 issue. While we have nothing against these men personally, we welcome scrutiny of Obama’s decisions...
  
• Not a TRACE of Transparency for Troubled Assets
  POGO sent a letter to Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Mary Schapiro on Friday raising concerns that a proposed rule for increasing price transparency in the market for troubled assets has been undermined by significant loopholes. POGO’s letter describes...
  
• Morning Smoke: Agencies Halfway to Goal for Cuttin ...
  Contracting cost cuts on target, OMB says [The Washington Post] Show Us the E-Mail [The New York Times] Delays, costs threaten fighter-plane program [The Washington Times] Citigroup ‘Lottery Ticket’ Warrants May Pay U.S. Lowest Return [Bloomberg] Senators introduce bills to...
  

Science Express

• Chronic infection now clearly tied to immune-syste ...
  A new study finds the cross-talk between 'killer T-cells' and 'helper T-cells' can only happen in the presence of interleukin-21, a powerful immune-system protein. UAB researchers say if interleukin-21 is missing, the immune system's anti-viral efforts fail. The study mice were treated for lymphocyt ...
  
• German 'science train': next stop Shanghai 2010?
  How will we feed nine billion people in the future? Can we ever have a disease-free world? Can robots play football?
  
• New mechanisms of action found for drugs used to t ...
  (PhysOrg.com) -- In the course of his or her life, every seventh German will develop an anxiety disorder that will require treatment. Standard anti-anxiety medications (anxiolytics) are based on the benzodiazepine class of drugs. These calm the patient and quickly diminish feelings of anxiety.
  
• Milky Way's super-efficient particle accelerators ...
  Thanks to a unique "ballistic study" that combines data from ESO's Very Large Telescope and NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, astronomers have now solved a long-standing mystery of the Milky Way's particle accelerators. They show in a paper published today on Science Express that cosmic rays from ou ...
  
• Physical reality of string theory demonstrated
  String theory has come under fire in recent years. Promises have been made that have not been lived up to. Leiden (The Netherlands) theoretical physicists have now for the first time used string theory to describe a physical phenomenon. Their discovery has been reported in Science Express.
  

TechDirt

• Justice Department May Unwind Diebold E-voting Sal ...
  After getting hammered publicly for having e-voting machines that didn't work well and had serious security problems, Diebold tried sell off its e-voting division for years with no luck . It then tried to change its name to Premier, hoping people wouldn't realize it was Diebold. In the end, Diebol ...
  
• Oh Look, People Are Already Looking At Expanding H ...
  For quite some time we've been covering how the MPAA has been pushing to get the FCC to allow them to use "Selectable Output Control" (SOC) to stop you from being able to record certain movies. In theory, the Hollywood studios claim that this will let them put movies out on video-on-demand offering ...
  
• US Declares Victory Again In WTO Fight Over US Con ...
  Back in January, the WTO ruled against the US in an intellectual property dispute with China. Well, to be specific, there were three issues being discussed, and on the two important ones, the US lost. On the final, not particularly important one, the US won. But, as it has done before, the US too ...
  
• Do Robots Need A Section 230-Style Safe Harbor?
  Forget Asimov's three laws of robotics . These days, there are questions about what human laws robots may need to follow. Michael Scott points us to an interesting, if highly speculative, article questioning legal issues related to robots , questioning whether or not a new arena of law will need t ...
  
• China Raises The Great Firewall Even Higher, Claim ...
  The NY Times is reporting that the Chinese government appears to be raising the walls on the Great Firewall of China even higher , shutting down a bunch of sites, limiting the ability to let individuals put up their own websites, and completely restricting the ability to offer third party mobile con ...
  

VacTruth

• 70 Heartbreaking Stories From People Who Have Had ...
  . . . Source: OrganicHealthAdviser.com While a few stories about adverse reactions to the H1N1 swine flu vaccine have gotten into the mainstream media, the reality is that most mainstream media outlets are extremely hesitant to publish such stories.  The general belief in the media seems to be tha ...
  
• URGENT: Health Care Bill Creates Peek-A-Boo Squads ...
  The latest health care bill creates Peek-A-Boo squads for in-home vaccinations. The task force created by the bill has no congressional oversight!
  
• The Desperation of Pharma: Get a Flu Shot, Get a P ...
  Would you like some extra pepperoni with that H1N1?
  
• New York Times Article Shows H1N1 Influenza Vaccin ...
  Some things just never change.
  
• Child Assaulted by His Teacher for Giving Out Vacc ...
  . . . Christina England vactruth.com 12/18/09 (vactruth.com) Robert, a young student from Breckenridge, says that he was physically assaulted by his Principle when he tried to give other students vaccine information fliers at school. He says that all he tried to do was give out information to stud ...
  

BroadSnark

• Snowball War Update
  The agro cop that pulled out his gun at the snowball fight might actually be in a tiny bit of trouble here. Yesterday, when I wrote about this, there were only a few articles around.  Now there are so many that I can’t even begin to give you all the links.  It’s being covered everywhere from [...]
  
• Bad Cops, Lying Media, and Anarchist Scapegoats
  I’m having a really hard time deciding who are worse – police or media. As you may have already heard.  There was a giant snowball fight at the corner of U and 14th in Washington, DC.  I was there from about 2:30 to 3:00 and it was fun as hell.  Maybe 100 or 150 people were [...]
  
• Anarchy as Responsibility
  Conservatives like to talk about personal responsibility.  By that they mean taking responsibility for your own well being and perhaps that of your family and community.  But if you are not within the circle, what that comes down to is “fend for yourself.” Liberals talk about taking responsibility ...
  
• Things You May Have Missed
  I can’t remember how I came to this post about Gandhi’s letters to Hitler, but it’s fascinating. Every once in a blue moon I think about going to grad school for about half a second.  Then some wise person comes along to remind me why academia is not for me.  This post is written by just [...]
  
• White America’s Existential Crisis
  People have, apparently, lost their minds.  There seems to be a panic that we have lost the fabric of our society and I’m having trouble getting a handle on what has happened that is so drastic that people would think its tyranny or fascism or hitleresque or stalinesque (Jon Stewart) That quote is ...
  

Executive Intelligence Review

• Europe Must Reject Empire, Choose National Soverei ...
  By Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr. Reprinted from Executive Intelligence Review, December 11, 2009, Vol. 36, No. 48
  
• Agreement Among Four Powers Can Avert Total Collap ...
  By Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr. Reprinted from Executive Intelligence Review, December 11, 2009, Vol. 36, No. 48
  
• LaRouches Address Moscow Anti-Globalist Conference
  Reprinted from Executive Intelligence Review, December 11, 2009, Vol. 36, No. 48
  
• Prince Philip Wants To Kill You
  By Nancy Spannaus Reprinted from Executive Intelligence Review, December 4, 2009, Vol. 36, No. 47
  
• The Problem Ain't Dubai: It's London!
  By John Hoefle Reprinted from Executive Intelligence Review, December 4, 2009, Vol. 36, No. 47
  

Armies of Liberation

• US Sanctions Iran Based al Qaeda, Zawahiri Promise ...
  The US Treasury Department placed financial sanctions on Saad bin Laden, thought to be in Pakistan, and three alleged al Qaeda operatives in Iran including a Yemeni. The terrorist designation Friday froze their assets within US jurisdictions and prohibits Americans from financial dealings with the ...
  
• Arabian Peninsula al Qaeda groups merge
  In the face of Saudi Arabia’s success against the al Qaeda organization, many Saudi operatives have fled to the more hospitable climate in Yemen, joining others who recently arrived from Iraq, Somalia, and Pakistan. Al Qaeda in Yemen announced its merger with Saudi Arabia’s al Qaeda organization to ...
  
• Yemen strikes multi-faceted deals with al Qaeda
  Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh recently struck a deal with Ayman Zawahiri, and Yemen is in the process of emptying its jails of known jihadists. The Yemeni government is recruiting these established jihadists to attack its domestic enemies as it refrains from serious counter-terror measures aga ...
  
• Yemen’s Multi Faceted Deals with Al Qaeda (A ...
  اليمن تعقد صفقات متعددة الوجوه مع القاعدة كتبت: جين نوفاك – فبراير/ 2009 عبدالله عبدالوهاب ناجي- ترجمة خاصة بالمستقلة عقد الرئيس اليمني علي عبدا لله صالح مؤخرا صفقة مع ...
  
• Yemen’s three terror fronts
  By Jane Novak March 28, 2009 3:18 PM Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula took credit in an internet statement Friday for a pair of suicide attacks that targeted South Koreans in Yemen. A teen-aged suicide bomber killed four South Korean tourists in Shibam, Hadramout on March 15. A second terror att ...
  

Dark Politricks

• Report: Nearly 50 percent of Detroit’s working-age ...
  Jonathan Oosting MLive.com Tuesday, Dec 22nd, 2009 The unemployment rate in Detroit fell slightly last month to 27 percent, according to preliminary data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. But that official figure may not tell the whole story. The Detroit News, using a broader defini ...
  
• Banks with political ties got bailouts, study show ...
  Steve Eder Reuters Tuesday, Dec 22nd, 2009 U.S. banks that spent more money on lobbying were more likely to get government bailout money, according to a study released on Monday. Banks whose executives served on Federal Reserve boards were more likely to receive government bailout funds from the Tr ...
  
• Update: Cop Behind Desk After Waving Gun at Snowba ...
  NBC Tuesday, Dec 22nd, 2009 “It is very obvious to me that the officer pulled his service weapon in response to the snowballs hitting his vehicle,” Police Chief Cathy Lanier said. “I have no doubt about this, nor has the officer denied the accusations.” View the original article at Prison Planet
  
• WH Correspondent: Left-Wing Critics of Health Bill ...
  MSNBC Tuesday, Dec 22nd, 2009 “I’ve got to say Contessa, just because so much of the commentary I’ve heard has been really idiotic. Liberals who want universal health care ought to be thanking Harry Reid for getting this thing done rather than talking about what’s inadequate in the bill. I’m ...
  
• Over 50% of the USA is now covered in snow
  Watts Up With That? Tuesday, Dec 22nd, 2009 UPDATE: The East coast snowstorm seen from space Image: NASA Earth Observatory – click for hi-res version  The Mid-Atlantic states were completely white on Sunday, December 20, 2009, in the wake of a record-breaking snow storm. The storm deposited betwe ...
  

food and water watch

• Day 1 in Rome
  Hello from Roma, viva Roma. I am Dave Andrews, Senior Representative for Food & Water Watch. I am in Rome for the World Food Summit which is taking up the issue of one billion hungry people in the world, most of them farmers and most of them women. The solution of the US is high [...]
  
• Day 4 in Rome
  The official FAO meeting began on the 16th of November with the Pope followed by Libya’s Gaddafi, an interesting pairing! The Kings and Presidents (but not Obama) had the roads of Rome closed off for them, getting near the FAO was a big challenge so I waited until things calmed down later in the day ...
  
• Pangasius Pandemonium
  Last week, the state of Alabama instituted a stop sale order on imported catfish and pangasius, a catfish-like fish (pangasius is frequently mislabeled as catfish) after discovering that high numbers of the samples that had been inspected were contaminated with illegal antibiotics called flouroquino ...
  
• Day 3 in Rome
  Today, a group of us from Agribusiness Action Initiative and other NGOs went to the Civil Society Forum early in the morning and visited the farmers market that was set up there. We visited other NGO representatives from Via Campesina, International Federation of Agriculture Producers, Greenpeace, P ...
  
• Day 2 in Rome
  Today, we began the official Civil Society Forum on the Peoples’ Food Sovereignty. The morning started with an opening by the Mayor of Rome and by Jacques Diouf, the Secretary General of FAO (the Food and Agriculture Organization).  He encouraged us to insist on our rights and told of how he has wo ...
  

treehugger

• Pets Pollute More Than Cars, Scientists Say
  He's sad because he just found out. Who would have guessed that behind those big, doughy eyes and that fluffy, wagging tail your cat or dog produced twice as much pollution as your car? How could that be? You've never seen the dog leave the shower running, pour motor-oil down the storm drain, or w ...
  
• Pliocene Era Heat Wave Suggests Greater Climate Se ...
  Image credit: akeg /Flickr Scientists studying the last major period of intense global warming have more bad news : The atmosphere, it seems, is even more sensitive of carbon emissions than previously thought. According to geologists at Yale University, a relatively small increase in atmospheric ...
  
• The Copenhagen Accord: A Beginning
  This guest post was written by Dan Shepard, United Nations Information Officer. It took two years of intense negotiations and the full engagement of world leaders, but the deal reached in Copenhagen represents a marked break with the deadlocked political landscape that has prevented action on cli ...
  
• Sensitile Terrazzo Tiles Integrate Fiber Optics an ...
  With fiber optics and LEDs, lighting is becoming part of the fabric of our buildings. Sensitile isn't particularly green, but it is an interesting demonstration of where things are going. The fibers can be lit from any source, even solar. ... Read the full story on TreeHugger
  
• Mayon Volcano Ready to Erupt, May Cause a Little C ...
  Mayon is the largest of the Philippines' 22 active volcanoes, at 8,070 feet. The plumes of smoke and flows of lava make it seem like it is already erupting, yet scientists say the big fireworks could be still to come, and more than 40,000 people have been evacuated. An eruption might create someth ...
  

Biosingularity

• Nervy Repair Job
  In a lab at the University of Pennsylvania, a plastic dish holds two rows of tiny black dots, pairs of them connected by dozens of thin, hairlike filaments. Each dot is a cluster of thousands of neurons, explains Douglas Smith, who is a professor of neurosurgery and the director of Penns Center for ...
  
• Technology Review: Making Drugs Survive Longer in ...
  Taking a hint from natural antibiotics, a startup spun out of Stanford University is developing a way to chemically alter existing drugs to dramatically improve their half-life By sequestering the drugs within cells, the researchers hope to protect them from the bodys efforts to destroy them. So far ...
  
• Artificial Red Blood Cells for Drug Delivery
  Since the 1950s, researchers have been trying to mimic the abilities of red blood cells. These flexible discs carry oxygen throughout the body, squeezing through the smallest capillaries to do so. But the physical characteristics of red blood cells, including their doubly concave shape, have made th ...
  
• Coffee, Tea May Stall Diabetes
  Every cup of coffee a person drinks per day may lower the risk of diabetes by 7%. A new review of research on the link between lifestyle factors, like coffee and tea consumption, and diabetes risk suggests that drinking regular or decaffeinated coffee and tea all lower the risk of type 2 diabetes. v ...
  
• New evidence links sirtuins and life extension
  Ever since he first discovered the lifespan-extending effects of proteins called sirtuins 15 years ago, MIT Professor Leonard Guarente has been accumulating evidence to demonstrate a link between sirtuins and the effects of calorie restriction on lifespan. For decades, it has been known that cutting ...
  

CFACT

• A virtual extinction crisis debunked
• Environmental refugees: a growing concern?
• A continuing boon for biotech
• Site of Teapot Dome Scandal holds promise for CO2
• Interview: Kenneth Green on emissions and asthma

Essential Dissent

• Marcellus Shale Gas Drilling and Water (2)
  Tweet this video! Click button at top of right column.   Subscribe to Essential Dissent See all 4 parts of Marcellus Shale Gas Drilling and Water. See all Gas Drilling videos on Essential Dissent. Bath, NY; June 22, 2009 A Public Forum on the Effects of Marcellus Shale Gas Drilling ...
  
• Marcellus Shale Gas Drilling and Water (1)
  Tweet this video! Click button at top of right column.   Subscribe to Essential Dissent See all 4 parts of Marcellus Shale Gas Drilling and Water. See all Gas Drilling videos on Essential Dissent. Bath, NY; June 22, 2009 A Public Forum on the Effects of Marcellus Shale Gas Drilling ...
  
• Edwin Black: IBM and the Holocaust, Part 2 of 2
  Tweet this video! Click button at top of right column.   Subscribe to Essential Dissent See Part 1 of Edwin Black: IBM and the Holocaust. View this and related videos at http://essentialdissent.blogspot.com
  
• Edwin Black: IBM & the Holocaust, Part 1 of 2
  Tweet this video! Click button at top of right column.   Subscribe to Essential Dissent Edwin Black spoke in Endicott, NY, the birthplace and for many years the headquarters of IBM, on September 15, 2009. See Part 2 of Edwin Black: IBM & the Holocaust. Related Website: www.edwinblack ...
  
• Edwin Black: The Truth about Oil Addiction and a P ...
  Tweet this video! Click button at top of right column.   Subscribe to Essential Dissent See Part 1 of Edwin Black: The Truth about Oil Addiction and a Plan for the Future. View this and related videos at http://essentialdissent.blogspot.com
  

  Blacklisted News

• Depressionary Science: Engineering Food With Aroma ...
  Usually the enticing smell of food is associated with hunger pangs, but researchers in the Netherlands think that foods can be engineered to release satiating aromas during chewing. This would help combat obesity by stimulating areas of the brain that signal fullness. In a paper published in the Jou ...
  
• Israel harvested organs in '90s without permission
  Israel has admitted that in the 1990s, its forensic pathologists harvested organs from dead bodies, including Palestinians, without permission of their families.
  
• RAND Corporation Blueprint for Militarized “Stabil ...
  The RAND Corporation, one of the most fecund research arms of the Military-Industrial-Homeland Security Complex, has released a study entitled A Stability Police Force for the United States: Justification and Creating U.S. Capabilities.
  
• Selling Drugs to Fund Terror: al-Qaeda Linked to C ...
  Three men linked to al Qaeda and arrested in Africa by Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents following a cocaine sting operation have been extradited to New York and are slated to appear in federal court in Manhattan today, according to federal sources.
  
• Deadly Intentions: The Truth Behind The Iran Rumor ...
  For the past several days, the spin behind the headlines surrounding Iran's activities have been enough to send any one looking for cover -- or declare war. After all, nuclear bombs, missiles, and the stealing of a neighbor's oil fields is what prompted the "international community" to declare war o ...
  

The Intelligence Daily

• Video: The Known Universe
  For more details, please click on the link to read the article
  
• The Organ Trade: Israel stripped body organs off P ...
  For more details, please click on the link to read the article
  
• Iranian jail employees charged over prisoners' dea ...
  For more details, please click on the link to read the article
  
• Taliban for sale: Are American taxpayers are indir ...
  For more details, please click on the link to read the article
  
• Plight of contractor (Jamie Leigh Jones) raped and ...
  For more details, please click on the link to read the article
  

My AntiWar

• Iran Sanctions are Precursor to War
  Summary: Ron PaulThis policy is pure isolationism. It is designed to foment war by cutting off trade and diplomacy. Too many forget that the quagmire in Iraq began with an embargo. Sanctions are not diplomacy. They are a precursor to war and an embarrassment to a country that pays lip service to fr ...
  
• Military force remains option on Iran: top U.S. of ...
  Summary: While saying he will “fully support the effort to focus on diplomatic solutions to existing tensions” on the issue, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mike Mullen said in a memo that the United States must have the military option on the table. At another point, he conceded that “politi ...
  
• Report: Guinea Massacre ‘Crime Against Human ...
• Billions in Earmarks Inflate Defense Bill’s ...
• Zimbabwe Politicians Reach Breakthrough

  Rogue Government.com

• Traffic wardens get head cameras
  Several authorities across the country are using the technology amid fears that the wardens – known as civil enforcement officers – are under threat.
  
• CIA Links To The Torture Of Palestinians
  
  
• Black Jesus Obama Praises Senate For Advancing He ...
  
  
• Iran's President: U.S. Smoking Gun Documents Are ...
  
  
• Gordon Brown Calls For New Group To Police Global ...
  
  

Innovation Canada

• Model scientists
  When hurricane season officially blew to a close in the Atlantic basin at the end of November, two Quebec researchers did not exhale in relief. That’s because René Laprise and Louis-philippe Caron were still looking for hurricane data from the past to help create a tool to predict future storm patte ...
  
• i2eye with Andrew Weaver
  As a child growing up in Victoria, if Andrew Weaver had to choose between watching a hockey game or a Jacques Cousteau program, the ocean explorer won out every time. Now a professor and Canada Research Chair in Climate Modelling and Analysis at the University of Victoria, Weaver has joined a crew o ...
  
• Extreme exposure
  It’s about 5°C in the chamber, and Geoff Hartley, wearing a burlap tunic and sandals, is trying with numb fingers to put small pegs in small holes. It’s just another day of chillin’ out at the Brock University lab of Stephen Cheung, a world-renowned scientist who studies the impacts of extreme tempe ...
  
• Green Growers
  Deborah Henderson likes to think about the Cuban capital of Havana when she goes in to work. Not the music or the beaches, per se, but the vegetables and the gardens. “Over 75 percent or more of the vegetables consumed in Havana are produced within the city,” claims Henderson. As the director of the ...
  
• Building better bridges
  (Reprinted with permission from ResearchLife, Summer 2009 issue, University of Manitoba, umanitoba.ca/research) It was 1952 when Aftab Mufti, a 12-year-old boy living in Karachi, Pakistan, began building bridges. His mother planted a vegetable garden that summer and to help her water it Aftab and hi ...
  

Signs of the times

• US forces mounted secret Pakistan raids in hunt fo ...
  Former Nato officer reveals secret night operations in border region which America kept quiet American special forces have conducted multiple clandestine raids into Pakistan's tribal areas as part of a secret war in the border region where Washington is pressing to expand its drone assassinatio ...
  
• The West has helped to create in Somalia the very ...
  The red lines on the intelligence agency's map plotting phone calls of known al-Qaeda operatives converged in one thick swath on Mogadishu, the capital of war-wracked Somalia. The lines arched across Africa from Zanzibar in the east; Sudan, Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, to Djibouti in the north, even ac ...
  
• Does Biased News Have a 'Time Bomb' Effect?
  There's nobody more cynical about the media than your average European. Only 12 percent of Europeans claim to trust the media, compared to 15 percent of North Americans, 29 percent of Pacific Asians and 48 percent of Africans, the BBC has found. Yet new research out of the London School of Economi ...
  
• Rigged enterprise: Former head of CDC lands lucrat ...
  You've heard it before, how the pharmaceutical industry has a giant "revolving door" through which corporations and government agencies frequently exchange key employees. That reality was driven home in a huge way today when news broke that Dr. Julie Gerberding, who headed the CDC from 2002 through ...
  
• Xe aims for a piece of expanding Afghan military c ...
  As the United States builds up its military presence in Afghanistan, private contractors are flocking there in even greater numbers. And Xe, the company formerly known as Blackwater, is in the hunt to get a share of the new work. According to a report last week from the Congressional Research Servi ...
  

Threat Level

• 7-Eleven Hack From Russia Led to ATM Looting in Ne ...
  Flashback, early 2008. Citibank officials are witnessing a huge spike in fraudulent withdrawals from New York area ATMs — $180,000 is stolen from cash machines on the Upper East Side in just three days.  After a stakeout, police arrest one man walking out of a bank with thousands of dollars in cas ...
  
• Albert Gonzalez Enters Plea Agreement in Heartland ...
  Albert Gonzalez, who has admitted hacking into TJX and other companies, has filed a plea agreement in charges that he breached Heartland Payment Systems, Hannaford, 7-Eleven and two other companies. Under the terms of the agreement, Gonzalez, a former Secret Service informant, will plead guilty to ...
  
• TJX Hacker ‘Will Never Commit Any Crime Again’
  Confessed hacker Albert Gonzalez’s turn as a Secret Service informant led him down a dark path of obsession, culminating in the largest identity-theft spree in history. Frances Gonzalez Lago, Gonzalez’s sister wrote his sentencing judge that her brother’s work as an informant between 2003 and and 2 ...
  
• FBI Linguist Guilty of Leaking Classified Document ...
  An Israeli-American lawyer who worked as an FBI linguist pleaded guilty Thursday to providing an unidentified blogger with classified documents derived from U.S. communications intelligence. Shamai Kedem Leibowitz, 39, of Silver Spring, Maryland, pleaded to one felony count of disclosing to an unaut ...
  
• Internal Twitter Credentials Used in DNS Hack, Red ...
  Twitter’s website went offline for about an hour Thursday, with many tweeters redirected to a defacement page boasting “This site has been hacked by Iranian Cyber Army.” Twitter acknowledged the 10 p.m. takeover, one in a series of security lapses to hit the popular microblogging service. Twitter s ...
  

PERRspectives : Blog

• God's Own Party Turns to Him to Block Health Care
  The first Republican Abraham Lincoln famously proclaimed, "My concern is not whether God is on our side; my greatest concern is to be on God's side." And as Matthew 4:23-24 tells us, Jesus never refused treatment to those with preexisting...
  
• Six Degrees of John McCain
  Last week, Politico ran yet another fawning profile of John McCain, declaring him "critic-in-chief." But whether the ersatz Maverick's motivation runs the gamut from "unresolved anger to concern for his right flank as he seeks re-election to genuine dismay about...
  
• Cokie Roberts Silent on Palin's "Exotic" Hawaiian ...
  Back in August 2008, ABC analyst Cokie Roberts echoed the McCain campaign's talking points which painted Barack Obama as an out-of-touch elitist and a foreign sounding one at that. As the Obamas vacationed in his home state of Hawaii, Roberts...
  
• GOP Gives Wealthy One Year Estate Tax Windfall
  For a handful of the very richest Americans, 2010 will be an excellent year to die. Thanks to Republican obstructionism on their behalf, the estate tax, which in 2009 will impact only 1 in 500 estates while generating tens of...
  
• Alan Greenspan, Born-Again Deficit Hawk
  In October 2008, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan famously admitted during testimony before Congress that he was wrong about regulation of the U.S. financial system. Asked by Henry Waxman (D-CA) if "your ideology was not right, it was not...
  

Blackspot News Feed

• American fascism: by political definition the US i ...
  Dandelion SaladBy Carl HermanICH – December 15, 2009Examiner – December 14, 2009Look in any textbook or encyclopedia and compare US policy (not rhetoric) to the definitions of fascism and constitutional republic. Ill explain it here, but check my work. If at the end of your consideration, you agree ...
  
• Will Copenhagen Lead to Radical Climate Experiment ...
  If the summit fails, controversial geo-engineering projects may get a boost.
  
• Howard Zinn and Bill Moyers on Right-Wing Demagogu ...
  Zinn: "Democracy doesn't come from the top. It comes from the bottom. Democracy is not what governments do. It's what people do."
  
• 12 Hilarious Corporate Attempts to Look Green
  Don't be fooled. Hummers and McDonald's aren't "green." Neither are fossil fuels or Fox News, for that matter.
  
• Too Fat to Serve: How Our Unhealthy Food System Is ...
  Americans have become so overweight that a large percentage of young people no longer qualify for military service. How did we get here?
  

Consortium News

• How Myths Can Kill
  Myths -- whether ancient or modern -- have the capacity to get people killed for no good reason, writes Robert Parry. December 21, 2009
  
• Winning War -- and Losing
  The easy patriotism of cheering one's nation off to war can wreak disaster even for the winner, says Lawrence S. Wittner. December 21, 2009
  
• Merry Christmas from America's Banks
  Big U.S. banks have lots of reasons for holiday cheer as they count their bonuses and block reform, notes Michael Winship. December 19, 2009
  
• Why Obama Is Failing
  A year ago, Barack Obama made some fateful choices about his presidency that have led to a political crisis, says Robert Parry. December 19, 2009
  
• Sorting Through the Jesus Myths
  A historical look at the New Testament offers clues to the enduring mystery of who was Jesus, writes Rev. Howard Bess. December 18, 2009
  

CounterPunch

• John Ross : Tragicomedy in Ixtapalapa
• Danny Weil : Race to the Slop
• Franklin Lamb : Life in Lebanon
• Steve Early : Green Mountain Mustering for the War ...
• Alan Farago : Destroying the Everglades at 25 Cent ...

Institute for Middle East Understanding

• Gaza's Christians pray they'll reach Bethlehem (M ...
  As pilgrims from across the world descend on the West Bank city of Bethlehem for Christmas, Palestinian Christians trapped in Gaza are left to pray that they will be allowed to attend this year's celebration ...
  
• Beit Ommar night arrests (Palestine Solidarity Pr ...
• Graphic novel on IDF massacres in Gaza set to hit ...
  Fans say graphic novelist Joe Sacco has set new standards for the use of the comic book as a documentary medium. Detractors say his portrayals of the Palestinian conflict are filled with distortion, bias and ...
  
• Gaza underground on schedule to beat Egypt's wall ...
  Ismail Atallah could not hide his disgust. With both hands he squeezed an imaginary throat in front of him. "This is what they are trying to do," he said. "They want to strangle us. The blood of 1.5 million ...
  
• JORDAN: Palestinian refugees live out lives in li ...
  Music enlivens the yellow taxi as it traverses the Jordanian capital. A small Palestinian flag hangs from the rearview mirror. Jihad, the cab driver, says his father fled here from the Palestinian West Bank ...
  

Water - AlterNet

• NASA Report Highlights Need to Retire Drainage Imp ...
  The retirement of drainage impaired land on the San Joaquin's west side should be a priority if we want to preserve California's limited water supply and fisheries.
  
• Stealing Water from the Future: California's Massi ...
  California is heading for a catastrophe of huge proportions if the overdraft of groundwater continues at the same rate as the last few years.
  
• Underused Drilling Practices Could Avoid Pollution
  The energy industry has developed innovative ways to make it easier to exploit the nation's natural gas reserves without polluting air and drinking water.
  
• Canadian Cities Leading the Charge Against Bottled ...
  Seventy-two municipalities from 8 provinces and 2 territories have implemented restrictions on bottled water.
  
• The Latest in the Bottled Water Mania: Water From ...
  Now you can down a beverage originating in one of the most guarded and protected areas on earth. So, what?
  

TruthHugger

• Texas Progressive Alliance Weekly Round Up Dec 14, ...
  TXsharon at Bluedaze: DRILLING REFORM FOR TEXAS helps you follow the money to see why Governor Perry and others want Texans to keep breathing toxic air. BossKitty at TruthHugger is proud to give a Hat Tip to Houston – Annise Parker inherits a City of Progress. The Stonewall Democrats of Denton Coun ...
  
• Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Coney Islands of the Mind: ...
  Christ Climbed Down Lawrence Ferlinghetti Lawrence Ferlinghetti, famous for running the City Lights bookstore in San Francisco, wrote this poem in the 1950s and published it in his book: A Coney Island of the Mind, Poems by Lawrence Ferlinghetti, A New Directions Book, Copyright 1958 by Lawrence Fer ...
  
• Hat Tip to Houston – Annise Parker inherits a City ...
  Houston, Texas has become an island of hope in a sea of doom and gloom.  Progress is measured with attention paid to the real issues facing any population, as opposed to a narrowly defined image of “normalcy”.  In a state where normal is defined vigorously as anything outside the envelope, as long ...
  
• Texas Progressive Alliance Weekly Round Up Dec 7, ...
  Once again it’s time for the Texas Progressive Alliance to bring you the highlights from the blogs. Power to the People! Head over to Texas Vox to learn more about the Fair Elections Now Act. Xanthippas at Three Wise Men airs out some thoughts on the escalation of the war in Afghanistan, and some pa ...
  
• I’m Sick Of War
  As I listen to Obama’s speech to increase troops in Afghanistan, all I can think of is, the US has been in some kind of war my entire life. Just so you know, I was born between the Korean War and the Vietnam War.  Afghanistan and Iraq are similar; expensive, causing unnecessary loss of life [...]
  

Dandelion Salad - Featured Writers' Posts

• Serious Problems With Obama’s Plan To Move Guantán ...
  by Andy Worthington Featured Writer Dandelion Salad www.andyworthington.co.uk 22 December 2009 Last
  
• Ripped from the Headlines: Greed, Corruption, and ...
  by Walter Brasch Featured Writer Dandelion Salad www.walterbrasch.com December 22, 2009 Dick Wolf, w
  
• Anti-Dean Salvo Fuels War on Progressives – “Bush ...
  By Robert S. Becker Featured Writer Dandelion Salad rbecker@cal.net Dec. 22, 2009 Headline from the
  
• COPOUT15: It’s the poor wot gets the blame By Will ...
  By William Bowles Featured Writer Dandelion Salad Creative-i 21 December 2009 It seems the ruling cl
  
• Another Sorry Episode in American History: Agent O ...
  by Sibel Edmonds Featured Writer Dandelion Salad originally published by Boiling Frogs Post 21 Decem
  

Unexplained Mysteries

• Scientists claim dark matter discovery
  Dark matter is thought to account for three-quarters of the matter in the universe but to date has never been directly observed. Now scientists ar...
  
• Exposing Antarctica's "ghost mountains"
  Under the vast ice sheets of Antarctica there exists an extensive mountain range entirely encompassed in the ice. Now an international team of sci...
  
• First Jesus-era house found in Nazareth
  Archaeologists have unveiled the discovery of the first-known house in Nazareth that can be dated back to the time of Jesus. The find provides a t...
  
• Europe's Mars missions get final go-ahead
  The European Space Agency has been given the final go-ahead to undertake new missions to explore Mars including an orbiter to be launched in 2016 ...
  
• Research disputes Maya collapse belief
  New research on the Maya civilization which is believed to have collapsed due to its overuse of natural resources and slash-and-burn farming may h...
  

Grassroots

• Money’s Coming to Cool the Planet
  Subheadline:  What’s the Winning Spending Plan? Outside Author:  Daniel Moss Previous publication:  Foreign Policy in Focus ...
  
• Cooling the Earth with Food Sovereignty
  Outside Author:  Loie Hayes Previous publication:  Insights, Vol. 23 #2 (Fall 2009) brazil200907-332.jpg   read mor ...
  
• We can’t change the climate, but we can change the ...
  logoforblog.png   read more
  
• The Story of Cap and Trade
  As the Climate Summit in Copenhagen plods onward, various so-called solutions to global warming are being tossed around: Alternative energy, Cap and Trade, adaptation and mitigation, and many more. It can be hard to make sense of them, and even more difficult to unpack the myths from the realities. ...
  
• Why We Left Our Farms to Come to Copenhagen
  Henry_Saragih-un-org.jpg As dignitaries and politicians meet in Copenhagen to discuss ways to curtail climate change, some of the people most affected by the crisis are also present, including the Via Campesina. One of Grassroots International ...
  

Climate

• December 22, 2009
  China Considers Compulsory Green Energy Purchases by Grid Operators (Xinhua) China's top legislature today discussed a legal amendment that would require electricity grid companies to buy all the power produced by renewable energy generators. Some Climate Experts Seek Alternative to UN Proces ...
  
• December 21, 2009
  Miliband: China Tried to Hijack Copenhagen Climate Talks (Guardian) The UK’s climate secretary, Ed Miliband, accused China, Sudan and leftwing Latin American countries of trying to hijack the UN climate summit and "hold the world to ransom" to prevent a global warming agreement from being reach ...
  
• December 19-20, 2009
  Obama, Denied Full Victory, Takes Validation (New York Times) From Copenhagen to Capitol Hill, the president determined the outer limits of what he could accomplish on climate change and health care and decided that was enough, at least for now. Climate Reality: Voluntary Efforts Not Enough t ...
  
• December 18, 2009
  Draft Would Halve Emissions, But Drop Goal to Be Legally Binding by 2010 (Reuters) World leaders worked today toward a target of halving greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, but a draft text abandoned ambitions for a legally binding climate treaty next year in a sign divisions remain. U.S., Chinese ...
  
• December 17, 2009
  China: We’re Not Giving Up on Climate Deal Yet (Reuters) China's climate ambassador said today that China had not given up hope of reaching a strong climate agreement at Copenhagen talks. He rejected comments from other delegations that it had. Clinton: $100B Possible, but Transparency a Deal ...
  

TomDispatch

• Tomgram: 'This Administration Ended, Rather Than ...
  [ Note for TomDispatch Readers: On Friday evening, TomDispatch will be switching to an updated version of this site. It's possible that you might not be able to reach TD for some hours. If so, we expect to be back up on Saturday morning. Tom ] The Afghan Speech Obama Should Give (But Won't) ...
  
• Tomgram: Pratap Chatterjee, Afghanistan as a Patr ...
  It's now a commonplace of the Afghan War. Western leaders in London , Berlin, Amsterdam , and Washington , as well as on flying visits to Kabul or even Kandahar , excoriate Afghan President Hamid Karzai for the "corruption" of his government. In return for their ongoing support, they repeatedly ...
  
• Tomgram: Max Blumenthal, How Palin Became a Rogue
  It can't get better than this, can it? A first printing of 1.5 million copies sent out into an otherwise dead book market. Possibly as much as $7 million dollars going to the author, who already has interviews lined up with Oprah Winfrey and Barbara Walters. A bus tour of the "real America" tha ...
  
• Tomgram: Alfred McCoy, Surveillance State, U.S.A.
  Wars come home in strange, unnerving ways -- as Americans have just discovered at Fort Hood. Even before Major Nidal Malik Hasan went on his killing spree, that base, a major military embarkation point for our war zones, was already experiencing the after-effects of eight years of war and repeate ...
  
• Tomgram: Droning On
  [ Note for TomDispatch Readers : A number of you have recently written in for clarification on contributing to this site through your purchases at Amazon.com. Here's my best shot at a useful explanation: If you click on any book image at this site -- like the book-cover image of The End of Vict ...
  

Smirking Chimp

• "A Visit from St. Obama"
  (apologies to Clement Clark Moore) 'Twas the night before Christmas and all through the land Not a creature was stirring in Afghanistan. The bedrooms were bunkered with piles of hard stones To protect from attacks by the Predator drones. The children were huddled, afraid, in their beds While vi ...
  
• The Long-Term Value of Insisting The Health Bill I ...
  In my piece yesterday about the rigged assumptions confining our health care debate, I might have added one more assumption that seems to be at work here: The assumption that "after this bill is passed, we will later come back and fix the things in the bill that are not good." This assumption, of c ...
  
• Obama's Af-Pak War is Illegal
  President Obama accepted the Nobel Peace Prize nine days after he announced he would send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan. His escalation of that war is not what the Nobel committee envisioned when it sought to encourage him to make peace, not war. In 1945, in the wake of two wars that claimed ...
  
• Tomgram: Rebecca Solnit Asks, Is the Earth Too Big ...
  — from TomDispatch read more
  
• The Decade in Review: A Tweet
  Between now and New Year's, gas-bags of every stripe will be offering their bloated reviews of the decade about to end. Since I believe that all human thought can be compressed into 140 characters or less, I offer instead this tweet: The decade began with Bush fucking the voters and ended with Tiger ...
  

Ten Percent

• I Got My Orange Crush
  But critics believe the U.S. is playing a grim waiting game: waiting for people to die in order to avoid potentially costly lawsuits. For a country currently engaged in two wars, accepting comprehensive responsibility for wartime damages could set an expensive precedent. “They know what the problem ...
  
• UN & Amnesty International Say Trafigura Toxic Was ...
  So why did the BBC back down? United Nations- On the basis of the above considerations and taking into account the immediate impact on public health and the proximity of some of the dumping sites to areas where affected populations reside, the Special Rapporteur considers that there seems to be stro ...
  
• Military & Families Against The War
  Military families and former soldiers will travel from across the country on Monday to demand that Gordon Brown brings the troops home from Afghanistan. They will deliver a petition signed by tens of thousands who believe that the war in Afghanistan is futile to the Prime Minister at Downing Street ...
  
• Bad Biology & Its Adherents
  Worth a read, how neoliberals’ ignorance of science allows them to wilfully misinterpret it to support their selfish pathologies, how social Darwinists are a fraud and chimps like to hug, (the author is rather too rosy in his views of some historic leaders but those are tangental items anyway to hi ...
  
• Earth Is Saved!
  The human infestation will soon be over!
  

Paul Krugman

• Down memory lane
  What five years have wrought.
  
• What has health care reform ever done for us?
  Aside from all the good things, that is.
  
• Coverage and costs
  The pain caucus hates, just hates, the idea that social justice and responsible policy can ever go hand in hand. But that's exactly what's happening now.
  
• The WYSIWYG president
  What you're getting is what you should have seen.
  
• Heroes of health reform
  Giving thanks to the Club for Growth.
  

No Quarter

• Senator Sheldon “If I’m Talking, I’m Lying” Whiteh ...
  * Bumped up * Pity the poor souls of Delaware Rhode Island. They have an uber moron for Senator. Sheldon Whitehouse. Hatemonger. Someone tell this clueless clown that there is this magical device called a video recorder. Not only does it capture images of people–Senator Nitwit Whitehouse for ex ...
  
• Happy Winter Solstice
  As we embrace this shortest day of the year, I found this very interesting piece about the Winter Solstice in Newgrange, Ireland. Our ancestors designed this incredible place there to honor this day, this countdown to the year to come: As we celebrate the Solstice, we remember that growth takes p ...
  
• Celebrate the Last 20 Years of The Onion * Open Th ...
  I did not know that The Onion’s contributions to the Fourth Estate stretch back to the days of our Founding Fathers: Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy Here’s the book if you’d like to order it: Our Front Pages: 21 Years of Greatness, Virtue, and Moral Re ...
  
• Support The Wounded Troops
  If you are looking for a gift that will mean something to the brave warriors wounded while serving their country then I would like you to consider making a donation to Combat Soldier’s Recovery Fund. Combat Soldier’s Recovery is the brain child of a good friend of mine who, five years ago, went [. ...
  
• Senator Sheldon “If I’m Talking, I’m Lying” Whiteh ...
  Pity the poor souls of Delaware Rhode Island. They have an uber moron for Senator. Sheldon Whitehouse. Hatemonger. Someone tell this clueless clown that there is this magical device called a video recorder. Not only does it capture images of people–Senator Nitwit Whitehouse for example–but it a ...
  

Environmental Graffiti

• The Weirdest Competition on Earth
• Lightning Vs Landmarks
• Scenes of Heated Conflict from the COP15 Climate C ...
• Al Hajjara: The City That Hangs Over A Precipice
• Giant Mushrooms!!!

Foreign Policy in Focus

• Obama's Surge and Pakistan
  U.S. military strategy in Afghanistan is built on two coups, one in Kabul and the other in Islamabad.
  
• Honduran Elections a Parody of Democracy
  The recent elections are the latest act in the Honduran theater of the absurd, reports columnist Laura Carlsen.
  
• Crapshoot in Copenhagen
  FPIF's weekly update.
  
• The AfPak Train Wreck
  The president's goals in escalating the war in Afghanistan are deeply flawed. Just ask the Russians.
  
• Africa and the Economic Crisis
  While the world focuses on Afghanistan, Africa is addressing the global economic crisis in new ways.
  

Global Elite

• Fear, Intimidation & Media Disinformation: U.K Gov ...
  Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, August 20, 2009 An official UK government report –quoted extensively in Britain’s tabloid media– is warning the British public that there will be c ...
  
• President European Commission Advocated World Gove ...
  Jurriaan Maessen. Infowars. July 24th, 2009 On September 7, 1992, two term President of the European Commission Jacques Delors gave a speech to the Royal Institute of International Affa ...
  
• Billions of People Expected to Die Under Current C ...
  Barbara Minton, Natural News, July 21st, 2009 Your right to eat healthy food and use supplements of your choice is rapidly vanishing, but every effort has been made to keep you in the d ...
  
• Bioweapons, Dangerous Vaccines, and Threats of a G ...
  Stephen Lendman, Global Research, July 7th, 2009 Although international law prohibits the use of chemical and bacteriological weapons, America has had an active biological warfare progr ...
  
• Today we’re all prisoners in the USA
  Papers, Please! June 2, 2009 As of today, June 1, 2009, even U.S. citizens are officially prisoners in the USA, or exiles barred from entering our own country without the government’s p ...
  

Al Jazeera

• Al-Qaeda speak out at Yemen rally
  Fighters tell assembled crowd their group's battle is with "God's enemies".
  
• Bitter weather continues in Europe
  Travel delays and deaths feared, although Eurostar trains restart partial service.
  
• Opec agrees to keep oil quotas
  Petroleum producers meeting in Angola hope restrictions will maintain prices.
  
• Philippines volcano alert 'high'
  Scientists say explosive eruption of Mayon volcano could happen at any time.
  
• Israel edges towards prisoner swap
  Response to Hamas proposal passed to German mediator following cabinet deabate.
  

Green Inc. - NYT

• Help for Green-Minded Shoppers
  An advocacy group scores companies on their environmental track record.
  
• Feed-In Tariff 2.0
  A more lucrative version of Ontario's feed-in-tariff program has attracted thousands of renewable energy investors.
  
• L.E.D. Holiday Light Sales Boom
  Energy-saving L.E.D. holiday lights appear to be catching on around the country -- including at the White House and Rockefeller Center.
  
• Time to Scrap the White Pages?
  A campaign is underway to limit the automatic distribution of white pages, which some people see as wasteful in the Internet age, but phone-directory publishers are pushing back.
  
• Headway in Copenhagen on Agriculture
  Though still in draft form, an agreement in Copenhagen on agriculture may turn out to be one of the more significant achievements of the climate-change summit.
  

Dot Earth News

• My Second Half
  Andy Revkin describes his shift to academia and focus on making the Web a tool fostering "one-planet living."
  
• Climate Talks Make Way for a Design Show
  In the wake of talks over a new climate treaty, an empty hall and enduring questions.
  
• Scenes from a Climate Floor Fight
  Minutes describe the tumultuous eruption of protests over a proposed climate accord.
  
• A 'First Step' Climate Deal
  The Obama administration says a flawed climate agreement -- "an important first step" -- has been reached.
  
• Following the Drafts
  Searching for significance in drafts of a climate agreement.
  

Doug Feith : Hong Pong

• The Monckton climate battle rap; I want to specula ...
  What could possibly go wrong?! Analysis: Climate summit showcases new world order - thestar.com Tripod operations block coal train - tripods are super funny: Copenhagen failure sparks coal terminal blockade | Rising Tide Australia . Earlier: Indymedia Danmark - If you're in, you're in, if you're ...
  
• Gotta get Guinea goodies: Aluminum pursuit sparks ...
  A strange NBC series called E-Ring, which produced 22 episodes that aired in 2005, exalted narratives of American military adventurism and featured Dennis Hopper. I only saw episode #5, "Weekend Pass," in which as Wikipedia says, "Two US Marines are accused of raping a young local woman in Suriname ...
  
• UN crime chief Costa says it again: banks bailed o ...
  There was a quip about this a while ago, now it is more established. Posted in full cause it's a big deal.... via Agonist . These people are criminals! Drug money saved banks in global crisis, claims UN advisor Drugs and crime chief says $352bn in criminal proceeds was effectively laundered by f ...
  
• The Great Climate Clusterf**k: Good times in Copen ...
  All you ever wanted to know about Copenhagen but didn't care to ask! The only good news so far is that the Yes Men pranked Coke for their voracious consumption of limited water around the world. Soon all of us can live in a utopia of robotic flying machines and carbon-free giant underground fac ...
  
• Mike Connell's mysterious plane crash via 'jackals ...
  Damn straight - those are the chips they are gonna track you with. CHIPS CARRIED BY BIG FRICKIN ANTS. Via the too-speculative ATS thread RFID Microchips In The Swine Flu Vaccine? It's time to push out some links and see if they lead somewhere....This weekend I've been building up a sweet new InfoSp ...
  

Daily Censored

• Health Care Reform: The Ideal vs. the Real—Do We R ...
  Health Care Reform: The Ideal vs. the Real—Do We Reject? By Will Shonbrun Between the idea And the reality Between the motion And the Act Falls the Shadow [...]
  
• How we killed health care, and how we can bring it ...
  We've killed health care. This is how we can bring it back to life, like a zombie, but less scary.
  
• Laws of Nature Meet the “Free” Market (Again)
  Once again, the representatives of the “free” market have sought to defy the laws of nature. This time, the venue was Copenhagen, Denmark, and the “free” marketeers think they have prevailed, but this is only round one. In the end, the laws of nature will dominate, one way or another. Both the direc ...
  
• Leave No Child’s Behind: No Child Left Behind and ...
  Meanwhile, the richly funded and well-oiled juggernaut of privatization continues to move forward, carving out increasingly large pieces of the public system. If those of us who profess to value public schools and the principle of democratic access they uphold cannot find the courage or the motivati ...
  
• Americans’ Belief in Global Warming Declining
  Americans’ Belief in Global Warming Declining By Joey Parigi The number of people in the U.S. who believe in global warming is declining. The republican party has had the most drastic decrease in members who believe that climate change is actually happening, going from 76 to 54 percent in the last 3 ...
  

AlterNet's Breaking News

• Shaq's back a winner as LeBron lifts NBA Cavs past ...
• From Brooklyn kitchen table to first lady's outfit ...
• NFL Giants rout Redskins to boost playoff hopes
• Brodeur sets NHL career shutout mark
• Holmgren takes charge of NFL Browns

Institute for Policy Studies

• Stephen King Meets the Estate Tax
• The Struggle of Electrical Workers in Mexico Goes ...
• A Lesson on Nonviolence for the President
• Swiss Minarets: Only the Tip of the Iceberg
• Exceptional or Exceptionalism?

Godspace

• Advent Waiting on the Cancer Journey
  This evening’s Advent reflection comes from Jill Aylard Young. Jill serves on the board of Mustard Seeds Associates. A recent Princeton Theological Seminary graduate and originally from Covina, California, she now lives with her husband Matthew and daughter Grace in Elysburg, PA where Matthew is pa ...
  
• What Are We Waiting for – Summary for Third ...
  Christmas is rapidly approaching and the daily scriptures are building in anticipation.  But for many of us the longing of Advent is still a very present reality.  Perhaps in these days of Advent you would appreciate the reflections and struggles of others during this season.  Here are the posts tha ...
  
• On the threshold of Christmas
  Christmas is definitely in the air.  Last night we attended a performance of the Messiah – part of our yearly pre-Christmas tradition and this morning I have been baking furiously getting ready for our Open House this evening at which event I will ignore Advent tradition and light all the Christmas ...
  
• Habbakkuk Revisited – An Advent Reflection b ...
  The end of the third week of Advent and am still waiting in anticipation, savouring the Advent reflections and readings that are coming.  I am delighted that I still have enough to see us through to the end of Advent next week.  From the comments and emails it looks as though many of you are [...]
  
• Amazing Grace Christmas Lights
  As I said earlier today – this is the time when most of us are thinking more about Christmas than we are about Advent.  And I must admit that as we race towards the shortest day of the year (at least in the northern hemisphere) I am definitely craving the coming of the light.  Anyhow [...]
  

Equality Trust

• Call for fundamental rethink of the value of work
  Hospital cleaners are worth more to society than city bankers, according to a new method of calculating the value of different jobs published today. The new economics foundation (nef) called for a "fundamental rethink" of how the value of work was recognised and rewarded. The think tank said its s ...
  
• The Spirit Level - New Statesman book of the decad ...
  Wilkinson and Pickett's study gave scientific weight to a long-held claim of the left: that people are happier and healthier when they live in societies where wealth is distributed more equally. But the book's influence stretches across party lines and its findings are likely to shape political deba ...
  
• Levelling the bankers' bonuses
  Read a letter by Malcolm Clark, Director of the One Society Campaign in today's Guardian, about the positives for bankers of losing their bonuses. Peter Preston (The rewards of banking, 7 December) has a point: bankers are human too. Most of them want exactly the same as us: a decent quality of life ...
  
• Dr Lynne Friedli on the impact of inequality on me ...
  Dr Lynne Friedli talks about the impact of inequality on mental health, in a discussion with John Humphrys on the Today Programme - scroll down to 07.33 Listen to the discussion
  
• Plans to force banks to reveal millionaire staff
  Banks will be forced to reveal how many of their staff earn more than one million pounds a year, under recommended reforms of the financial sector to be released today. Read more
  

IntelNews

• US media under-report US missile attack on Yemen
  Last Friday, a handful of US websites reported “an airstrike” in Yemen against “a leading al Qaeda figure there”. The incident, which made headline news along the Arab peninsular, was quickly forgotten in the US. But it now turns out that there were two airstrikes, not one; and they were not carried ...
  
• News you may have missed #0228
  Irish nationalists planting honey traps on British troops? Egyptian spy chief meets Israeli defense minister. Mumbai terror suspect David Headley was ‘rogue US secret agent’.
  
• Protestant alleges links between N. Ireland loyali ...
  On November 9, 1997, Royal Air Force officer Raymond McCord Jr. was beaten to death in Belfast, Northern Ireland, by members of the Mount Vernon branch of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF). McCord’s beating was one of many instances in which Northern Ireland’s most violent loyalist gang targeted memb ...
  
• News you may have missed #0227
  British politicians sue CIA over rendition flights. US DHS broke domestic spying rules. Expert says UK ex-spy chief misled Iraq War probe.
  
• News you may have missed #0226
  CIA denies employing David Headley. Taiwan wants to swap jailed spies with China. CIA tries to increase numbers of women leaders.
  

After Downing Street.org

• U.S. Chamber of Commerce Elected 2009 Scrooge of t ...
  U.S. Chamber of Commerce Elected 2009 Scrooge of the Year | Press Release The Chamber’s narrow, radical agenda advocating for anti-worker, profit-focused solutions to the broken health care, labor, and environmental systems garnered them the most votes for the national Jobs with Justice “Scrooge o ...
  
• Urgent Update on Gaza Freedom March
  Gaza Freedom March URGENT UPDATE December 21, 2009 We are determined to break the siege. We all will continue to do whatever we can to make it happen. Using the pretext of escalating tensions on the Gaza-Egypt border, the Egyptian Foreign Ministry informed us yesterday that the Rafah border will ...
  
• Courts Free Faraj Hassan, Government’s Case Falls ...
  Courts Free Faraj Hassan, Government’s Case Falls Through | Press Release Today the Courts ruled that the control order imposed by the government on Faraj Hassan (also known as prisoner AS) was illegal in nature. His case was bought before the courts after the Law Lords ruled in June that the use o ...
  
• NY: Tasini Says He Would Vote “No” On Senate Healt ...
  Tasini Says He Would Vote “No” On Senate Health Care Reform Bill | Press Release New York, NY—Democratic Candidate for U.S. Senate in New York, Jonathan Tasini, released the following statement today, concerning the Senate version of the health care reform bill: “If I were a member of t ...
  
• Chavez Says U.S. Drone Planes Entered Venezuela
  Chavez Says U.S. Drone Planes Entered Venezuela By Daniel Cancel | Bloomberg Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said that U.S. pilotless planes have crossed the border recently from Colombia, and he’s ordered his military to shoot down the drones if they appear in Venezuelan airspace again. A drone ...
  

Grist - News

• Global warming hike may be steeper
  by Agence France-Presse PARIS -- Global temperatures could rise substantially more because of increases in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere than previously thought, according to a new study by U.S. and Chinese scientists released Sunday. The researchers used a long-term model for assessing climate ...
  
• Brown blames China for ‘farcical’ clim ...
  by Agence France-Presse LONDON -- British Prime Minister Gordon Brown on Monday accused countries of holding the U.N. climate summit to ransom as bitter recriminations swirled over the outcome of the negotiations. British Prime Minister Gordan Brown. While China's Premier Wen Jiabao insisted his go ...
  
• Copenhagen outcome: a real climate catastrophe
  by David Roberts President Barack Obama negotiating with, from left, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Danish Foreign Minister Per Stig Møller, and Israeli President Shimon Peres, at the Copenhagen climate conference.Photo: White House/Pete Souza This piece appeared first in The Daily Beast .Sa ...
  
• Climate scientists underwhelmed by Copenhagen Acco ...
  by Agence France-Presse COPENHAGEN -- Top climate scientists said Saturday that the 11th-hour political deal hammered out at U.N. talks in Copenhagen falls perilously short of what is needed to stave off catastrophic global warming. What many had hoped would be a planet-saving treaty locking major ...
  
• Copenhagen deal pushed through amid condemnation, ...
  by Agence France-Presse Delegates listen to Barack Obama deliver his speech at the Copenhagen climate talks on Friday.Photo: whitehouse.govCOPENHAGEN -- A U.N. conference on Saturday rammed through a battle plan against climate change forged by U.S. President Barack Obama and other top leaders, sid ...
  

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Technorati - What's Hot in Blogs

• Jeannie Weaver on Clearwire's 4G Service - The Fut ...
  Clearwire speaks to Technorati about CLEAR, WiMAX, and the emerging mobile broadband market
  
• Connecticut Quadruplets Accepted to Yale
  The Crouch Quads each have been accepted to Yale's Class of 2014
  
• Android 2.1 Coming to the UK in 2010?
  UK users are still stuck with Android 1.5; will that change in 2010?
  
• Detroit Auto Show Previews
  Detroit Auto Show to showcase two highly anticipated, green concept cars
  
• Ford to Support Wi-Fi USB Mobile Broadband Modems ...
  Ford attempts to recover its "cool" with Microsoft and it's Sync technology
  

Time - Top Stories

• Obama's Falling Poll Ratings: Why He Has To Worry
  As Obama approaches the first year mark of his presidency, Democratic and Republican strategists are beginning to look more closely at the polls, and see troubling signs for the President
  
• Forcing Insurers to Spend Enough on Health Care
  To restrain insurance company profits, the Senate's health reform bill would set stiffer requirements on what percentage of premiums must be spent on health care
  
• Dear President Obama: What North Korea Might Say
  President Obama has written a secret letter to Kim Jong-il urging him 
to change his ways. Here's a look at how the 'Dear 
Leader' might respond
  
• In Cleveland, Worker Co-Ops Look to a Spanish Mode ...
  American workers, from bakers to the United Steelworkers, are taking a leaf from Mondragon, a huge Spanish cooperative, as they look to build jobs that are not vulnerable to investor demands for big profits
  
• Rage Against Simon Cowell? A British Pop Charts Up ...
  Tired of the Christmas dominance of the British pop charts by CowellprotÉgÉs, a couple launched a Facebook campaign to drive a single by RageAgainst the Machine to the top -- and won
  

Washington Independent

• Untested Military Commissions Face Challenges
  "These are all still open issues," said Lachelier. "There are so many moving parts."
  
• Peter Galbraith vs. The New York Times
  Speaking of ousted United Nations deputy representative to Afghanistan Peter Galbraith, Galbraith was recently accused in a New York Times piece of promoting the ouster of Afghan President Hamid Karzai. It’s a really serious accusation. And now Galbraith says, at great length, that there’s no truth ...
  
• Tea Party: The Book
  Way back in February, conservative activist John O’Hara helped put together one of the very first Tea Party rallies — a Washington, D.C., party across the street from the White House. Next month, O’Hara’s publishing the first Tea Party book with a major publisher (Wiley) on the movement: “A New Amer ...
  
• Blackwater to U.S. Gov’t: It’s So Hard ...
  Blackwater/Xe: an unkillable contracting force, a permanent fixture on the landscape. It can barely lose a contract after killing Iraqi civilians. And now Justin Elliott at TPM has this catch: A Xe official told the Commission on Wartime Contracting Friday that the company has contracts for security ...
  
• Who Wants to Be UN Chief in Afghanistan?
  After the August electoral impasse destroyed the partnership of Kai Eide and Peter Galbraith, the United Nations’ top diplomats in Afghanistan, it’s been unclear who wants to step into the morass that is the UN mission to Kabul. But Laura Rozen has some answers: Word on the Hill and at European emba ...
  

CowBoss' Brain Food

• Tax those carbon gluttons
  LEMME TELL YOU about a carbon tax you’re gonna love. Two such taxes, actually. I tell you, kid, Stephane Dion had the right idea, but the wrong sales pitch. The fun starts with the government giving you maybe $2,000 as a carbon dividend. Submitted by cowboss Left CareII to Society & Culture  |  ...
  
• Why do we hate? Academics seek answer in new field
  Hate is everywhere, but the fundamental question of why one person can hate another has never been adequately studied, contends Jim Mohr of Gonzaga University, who is developing a new academic field of hate studies. Submitted by cowboss Left CareII to Society & Culture  |   Note-it!  |   Add a Comm ...
  
• 'Fat for cosmetics' murder suspects arrested in Pe ...
  Four people have been arrested in Peru on suspicion of killing dozens of people in order to sell their fat and tissue for cosmetic uses in Europe. Submitted by cowboss Left CareII to Society & Culture  |   Note-it!  |   Add a Comment
  
• 6 Ways Agriculture Impacts Global Warming
  Sure, agriculture provides us with the food we all eat every day. But do you know how those agricultural practices impact global warming? Turns out there's some pretty big impacts, on both the sustainable and industrial sides of the equation; employing su Submitted by cowboss Left CareII to Society ...
  
• We love Butchers
  Former chef Josh Applestone and his wife, Jessica Applestone, are typical of the new butcher breed. He was a vegan, she was a one-time vegetarian when they founded Fleisher’s Grass-fed and Organic Meats in Kingston, N.Y., in 2004 Submitted by cowboss Left CareII to Society & Culture  |   Note-it!   ...
  

Suzie-Q

• British govt. grovelling at the feet of war crimin ...
  John Haylett, Morning Star Online, Dec 18, 2009 The British government’s grovelling apology to Israel after an arrest warrant was issued against former foreign minister Tzipi Livni was compounded by its promise to change the law to allow war criminals to roam freely. Livni was up to her neck in t ...
  
• Senate Passes Health Care Bill
  Senate Passes Health Care Bill With 60 Votes Crooks and Liars By Heather Monday Dec 21, 2009 10:00am From The New York Times–Health Bill Passes Key Test in the Senate With 60 Votes: After a long day of acid, partisan debate, Senate Democrats held ranks early Monday in a dead-of-night procedural ...
  
• Israel admits stealing Palestinian organs
  Ian Black, Middle East editor, The Guradian/UK, Dec 20, 2009 Israel has admitted that pathologists harvested organs from dead Palestinians, and others without the consent of their families – a practice that it said ended in the 1990s, it emerged at the weekend. The admission, by the former head of ...
  
• US Attack Kills 120 In Yemen
  President Obama ordered U.S. Military Strike on Suspected “Terrorists” By BRIAN ROSS, RICHARD ESPOSITO, MATTHEW COLE, LUIS MARTINEZ and KIRIT RADIA, “ABC News“, December 18, 2009 On orders from President Barack Obama, the U.S. military launched cruise missiles early Thursday against two sus ...
  
• Seasons Greetings!
  Dear Justice Bloggers, I would like to take this moment to wish each and every one of you a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! I will be spending this special time with those whom I cherish most, my family and friends.   Please don’t forget our troops and our neighbors who are homeless, hun ...
  

Solari

• Precious Metals - Week of 12.20.09
  Russia Transfers $1 Bln Worth Gold To Central Bank Yahoo Finance(21 Dec 09) Royal Canadian Mint Reveals How It Lost Gold Ottawa Citizen (21 Dec 09)
  
• Mortgage Markets - Week of 12.20.09
  Looking a Little Deeper at Bernanke’s Floating Rate Mortgage The Wall Street Journal (18 Dec 09)
  
• A Solari Report on New Zealand Banking
  New Zealand Banking System Overview New Zealand banks and non-bank deposit-taking institutions are registered, supervised and monitored for compliance with New Zealand banking supervision policies by the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (“Reserve Bank”). - The Reserve Bank’s supervisory authority over b ...
  
• Carnacchi v. Citibank
  By Suzanne Daly On a warm October morning, Michael Carnacchi stands respectfully in the Sonoma County Civil Court as his case, Carnacchi v. Citibank, is called. A boot maker by trade, on this day he sports a black suit and tie, and his hair is neatly kept back into a waist-length ponytail. The pres ...
  
• Community Call to Prayer
  by Vincent van Gogh And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, be ...
  

Global Insights

• Less Than a Week Away
  We encourage you to register for Awake and Aware. George Green will be a featured speaker. September 19th & 20th • Burbank, CA Click here for Tickets & Reservations  
  
• The Georgia Guidestones
  On one of the highest hilltops in Elbert County, Georgia stands a huge granite monument. Engraved in eight different languages on the four giant stones that support the common capstone are 10 Guides, or commandments. That monument is alternately referred to as The Georgia Guidestones, or the Ame ...
  
• The Creation
  THE CREATION (A recent message given to George Green from the "guys upstairs") We are pleased to bring understanding and clarification on what is the Creation. This is a challenge because your language of communication has not the words for describing this conception of Creation. So as not to put an ...
  
• The Long Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catas ...
  In his previous books, James Kunstler focused on the shortsighted vision of suburban planning; now he expands that view to the country's urban growth challenges and the need to drastically change our current course of auto and oil dependency. The Long Emergency is filled with history plus eye-openin ...
  
• About George Green
  Dear Friends, Thank you for your interest in our catalog of unusual and informative materials. The knowledge gained will give you choices in the days ahead and lessons of discernment as the chaos increases. It is necessary for those of you who are now in the "know" so to speak, to begin to focus ...
  

Insurgency Watch - Newswire

• Obama, us leaders should contemplate future of Afg ...
  BBC News Obama, us leaders should contemplate future of Afghan women Chicago Tribune Would nuclear-armed Pakistan become even more vulnerable to its own Taliban insurgency ? Will a defeat embolden America's enemies? That line of thinking must ... Vietnam syndrome has begun in Afghanistan Sri Lanka ...
  
• Officials: Campus blasts perplexing - United Press ...
  Officials: Campus blasts perplexing United Press International ISLAMABAD, Pakistan , Oct. 21 (UPI) -- The International Islamic University, where bomb blasts killed at least six people, is a unique Pakistani institution ... and more »
  
• Schools closed in Pakistan after bombing - GMA new ...
  Schools closed in Pakistan after bombing GMA news.tv An Associated Press reporter met three Taliban fighters Tuesday traveling in a car with darkened windows at Shaktoi, a town close to the border between ... and more »
  
• An Evolving Afghan Policy - American Chronicle
  An Evolving Afghan Policy American Chronicle ... triumph for the forces of Islamic extremism, al-Qaeda would once again gain a foothold, and the return of the Taliban would likely destabilize Pakistan . ...
  
• Schools close in Pakistan following university bom ...
  Schools close in Pakistan following university bombings Emirates Business 24/7 ... in Pakistan after suspected militants bombed a university close to the capital, sowing fear across the country as the army presses a major anti- Taliban ... and more »
  

AlterNet - Rights and Liberties

• Guantanamo Was "Hell On Earth": Former G ...
  "Some of my colleagues in the prison lost their sight, some lost their limbs and others ended up mentally disturbed," recalls Mohamed Saleban Bare. "I'm OK compared to them."
  
• A Rogue Sheriff in One Arizona County Is a Nationa ...
  What happens when one county in a nation of thousands is crippled by hatred?
  
• "We Can Make Him Disappear": Immigration ...
  In addition to publicly listed field offices and detention sites, ICE is holding prisoners in 186 unlisted, unmarked locations, many in suburban office parks or commercial spaces.
  
• Pockets of White America Are in the Throes of an E ...
  As the Census "time bomb" ticks, fear mounts over a perceived loss of whites' raw power - demographic, social, economic, and political.
  
• Immigration Police Are Keeping Secret Jails on U.S ...
  Immigration agents are holding US residents in unlisted and unmarked subfield offices, turning our legal system upside down.
  

Sideways News

• AdapCC boosts tea and coffee growers
  Cafedirect is working to help tea and coffee growers in Latin America and Africa cope with the impact of climate change and improve their access to financial and technical support.
  
• Avatar's Pandora possible within years?
  The concept of life on the moon may currently be limited to sci-fi blockbusters such as James Cameron's Avatar , but a leading astronomer has suggested it could become a reality in just a few years.
  
• Art museums aid 'visual literacy'
  The role art galleries play in developing visual literacy is an increasingly important one in the context of our media-saturated society where people are constantly subjected to advertising, says Hugh Davies, the director of the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego .
  
• Battery recycling 'too difficult'
  The European Recycling Platform (ERP) reports that while only a third of households at present recycle batteries, four out of five said they would do so if it was made easier.
  
• Ecotopia sees green gift surge
  Concerns about the environment and money worries are prompting an increasing number of Brits to think green this Christmas. Research by Friends Provident highlights that 27% of people are opting for environmentally-friendly gifts this year, while over a third of consumers are willing to shop around ...
  

Fabius Maximus

• FM newswire for 22 December, hot articles for your ...
  This is what I found interesting, so it’s today’s broadsheet from the FM website pressroom, with several sections of hot news.  Lot’s happening in the world today, mostly either overlooked or misinterpreted by the mainstream media.   “Threats and Degradation“, Tucson Weekly, 10 Dec ...
  
• Gift ideas – Books to or give
  I like books that challenge my views, as in the saying attributed to Mark Twain “What gets us into trouble is not what we don’t know. It’s what we know for sure that just ain’t so.” So here are two recommendations of books that challenge our views, esp about the things we know for sure. The Culture ...
  
• Re-envisioning the FM website, becoming soldiers i ...
  Summary:  The FM website has changed in recent months.  This is an annoucement of that change.  This is what they call in serial fiction (e.g., TV,  comic books) a retroactive continuity (retcon). This site was born as one providing analysis.  It’s readers were not satisfied, demanding solution ...
  
• About Wikipedia’s handling of controversial ...
  Summary:  This is a hat trick.  About effective propaganda.  And climate science.  And more evidence that Wikipedia cannot be relied upon as an information source regarding controversial matters — or any work of importance.  (It’s always useful as a first place to look and source of links.) C ...
  
• Campaign finance reform = incumbent protection
  As our ruling elites become more confident in our docility, they become bolder.  They know the bit is secure in our mouth, so they can pulling on the reins.  For today’s example see “Grayson wants to send critic to jail for 5 years”, Orlando Sentinel, 18 December 2009 — Excerpt (red emphasis a ...
  

sibeledmonds - tweets

• sibeledmonds: Cycles of atrocities, Cycles of Sham ...
  sibeledmonds: Cycles of atrocities, Cycles of Shame & Regret, and Cycles of more atrocities…Read at Boiling Frogs Post: http://boilingfrogspost.com
  
• sibeledmonds: Agent Orange Victims Video at Boilin ...
  sibeledmonds: Agent Orange Victims Video at Boiling Frogs Post: http://boilingfrogspost.com
  
• sibeledmonds: Boiling Frogs Post on Agent Orange - ...
  sibeledmonds: Boiling Frogs Post on Agent Orange - Another Sorry Episode in American History: Watch the Video: http://boilingfrogspost.com
  
• sibeledmonds: Boiling Frogs Post Round Up- Obama: ...
  sibeledmonds: Boiling Frogs Post Round Up- Obama: Armed & Dangerous with States Secrets Privilege: http://boilingfrogspost.com
  
• sibeledmonds: Boiling Frogs Weekly Round Up- Drone ...
  sibeledmonds: Boiling Frogs Weekly Round Up- Drones: Obama’s Preferred Killing Machines & More http://boilingfrogspost.com
  

WIRED Magazine | Science

• Feathered Dinosaurs Were Venomous Predators
  Early dinosaurs weren’t just covered in feathers. They were also poisonous. Analysis of skulls belonging to different species of Sinornithosaurus, a group of feathered predatory theropods that lived 125 million years ago in what is now northeast China, shows skeletal features reminiscent of modern ...
  
• East Coast Blizzard Seen From Space
  The snowstorm that blanketed the East Coast this weekend was so big, it is even impressive from space. NASA’s Aqua satellite took this image centered on Washington, D.C., on Sunday with its MODIS instrument. digg_url ="http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/12/east-coast-blizzard-from-space/"; The ...
  
• DIY Bed-Bug Detector
  INDIANAPOLIS — After trying some 50 arrangements of household objects, researchers have come up with a new low-cost, homemade bed-bug detector. To lure the bugs out of hiding, Wan-Tien Tsai of Rutgers University in New Brunswick put dry ice into an insulated, one-third-gallon jug, the kind availabl ...
  
• Dark Liquor Makes For Worse Hangovers
  A new study may help drinkers pick their poison. In a head-to-head comparison, bourbon gave drinkers a more severe hangover than vodka, report Damaris Rohsenow of Brown University and colleagues in an upcoming issue of Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research. But vodka drinkers aren’t off th ...
  
• Video: The Asteroid That Will Almost Hit Earth
  SAN FRANCISCO — Any number of undiscovered near-Earth objects could one day careen into the Earth, and there is a lot of talk here at the American Geophysical Union meeting about tracking them. So far, though, only one discovered object has seemed even mildly likely to hit our planet. That aster ...
  

The Progressive Realist

• South Korean Waters Labeled "Firing Zone" by North
  North Korea continues to act like the regional bully . While this is the typical hype almost always followed by no substance, it is possible they are looking for a way to get back at the south for the humiliation given to the North at sea last month. North Korea threatened South Korean ships with p ...
  
• Obama's Bold New Approach to Free Trade
  It was all but unnoticed in the U.S. press, but a recent free trade agreement between the European Union and South Korea is a development worth pondering. In the current environment– with the US Congress reluctant to pursue new trade deals (or for that matter, even ratify the FTAs already concluded ...
  
• A Seat at the Table
  In a scathing analysis of the Copenhagen summit, The Financial Times published the following side-bar vignette: Barack Obama’s meeting on Friday evening with the leaders of the major developing economies was perhaps the most farcical event in two weeks of mayhem. At 7pm, the leader of the world’s b ...
  
• Airstrikes in Yemen: Proceed with Caution
  On Friday , President Obama authorized the use of military strikes in Yemen targeting al-Qaeda operatives active in that nation.  My reactions on this action are mixed (more below).  Gregory Johnsen at Waq al-Waq provides a nice summation, and the blog he co-authors is an invaluable resource on a ...
  
• Leading Indicators: Off the Radar News Roundup
  - France's prime minister is in China, where today he inked 14 bilateral cooperation deals , including two on aviation cooperation and another on nuclear energy. What a difference a year makes .- China expects its foreign trade to take a hit in 2010 due to protectionist measures directed against it. ...
  

TAPPED - The American Prospect

• The Health-Care Ultimatum.
  Paul Waldman on progressive antipathy to the health-care compromise: There is a classic economics experiment called the "ultimatum game", which demonstrates how our decision-making process isn't solely determined by rational calculations. In the experiment, one subject is usually given a small sum ...
  
• The Failures of the Fed.
  Yesterday's excellent Washington Post piece on the failures of the Fed has inspired a number of responses ( Felix Salmon , Noam Scheiber , Kevin Drum , Ezra Klein ), and it's certainly a must read. The Fed's sheer inability to fulfill its regulatory responsibilities was caused in large part by an ...
  
• Lightning Round: Soldiering on Amidst Disappointme ...
  President Obama signed the 2010 Defense Appropriations Act into law today, which included Sen. Al Franken 's amendment barring defense contractors from preventing rape victims from suing their employer in court. Rachel Slajda has the backstory on how the Obama administration, which at one point was ...
  
• Afternoon Viewing: Health Care Has Consequences.
  Pivoting off of this morning's Robert Samuelson bashing , the Senate's successful cloture vote on health reform legislation this weekend is paving the way for some positive real world consequences -- near-universal coverage, cost and deficit cutting, and a framework for future reform. Last week, ...
  
• The Little Picture: Happy Holidays from Tom Harkin ...
  In the morning's early hours, the Senate voted for cloture on health-care reform. Prior to the vote, Sen. Tom Harkin delivered a statement on the bill's merits and the necessity of its -- LOOK AT THAT SWEATER VEST . Just wow. (C-SPAN)
  

Andy Worthington

• Serious Problems With Obama’s Plan To Move Guantán ...
  Last Tuesday, in a letter to Illinois governor Pat Quinn, five senior Obama administration officials — Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Attorney General Eric Holder, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair, and Secretary of the Department of Homeland Securit ...
  
• The Stories Of The Two Somalis Freed From Guantána ...
  Carol Rosenberg at the Miami Herald broke the news on Saturday that 12 prisoners have been released from Guantánamo. The news followed hints in the Washington Post on Friday that six Yemenis and four Afghans were set to leave, but Rosenberg — and the East African media — reported that the men had a ...
  
• Shaker Aamer: UK Government Drops Opposition To Re ...
  Last week, as I explained in a recent article, Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in Guantánamo, who was seized in Afghanistan in 2001 after traveling to Afghanistan with his friend Moazzam Begg (and their families) to establish a girls’ school in Kabul, won a significant victory in the British ...
  
• Stranded In Chad: Mohammed El-Gharani, Once Guantá ...
  Dismal news from Chad, where Reprieve, the legal action charity whose lawyers represent dozens of Guantánamo prisoners, reports that the Chadian government is failing to provide any support whatsoever to Mohammed El-Gharani, who was released from the prison in June this year. Once Guantánamo’s young ...
  
• Judge Orders Release From Guantánamo Of Unwilling ...
  On Monday, as I explained in a previous article, Judge Thomas Hogan refused the habeas corpus petition of Musa’ab al-Madhwani, a Yemeni who had been tortured in the CIA’s “Dark Prison” near Kabul, and who was described by the judge as a “model prisoner” who was not dangerous. Judge Hogan made his ru ...
  

Buzzflash

• Tom Coburn's other prayer
  Body It's true that Rep. Joe Wilson's undignified outburst of "You lie!" didn't quite rise to the level of fellow-South Carolinian Preston Brooks' antebellum pummeling of Sen. Charles Sumner, but the sheer frequency of today's Republican vulgarities, it seems, more than compensates for t ...
  
• BuzzFlash Mailbag for December 18, 2009
  BUZZFLASH MAILBAG Want to join the conversation? Share your thoughts with other Mailbag readers by clicking here . You also may comment below; post articles yourself at BuzzFlash.net ; or send urls for BuzzFlash to post to: www.buzzflash.com/contact/newstip.html . Subject: Letter sent to The Nation ...
  
• Why The Rush For Fools Gold?
  MS. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON Buzz Flash, "Gold, which leads [us] everywhere, has become our national God. There is only one vice, poverty; one virtue, wealth. If you are not rich, you are scorned. Diderot, Conversation of a Father with His Children, 1772. The above makes sense when we know that this ...
  
• Jesse 'The Body' Ventura Hands His Bullhorn to Cli ...
  BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS by Meg White The Body does not like what the hands are doing. Let me just start by saying I genuinely like Jesse Ventura. Of course, I was a bit embarrassed when my fellow Minnesotans elected the former wrestler to the governor's office. I worried that Ventura was only electe ...
  
• Amy Branham: Where We Are So Far with President Ob ...
  BUZZFLASH GUEST COMMENTARY by Amy Branham Dear Mr. President: My husband and I voted for you in the 2008 general election. We also campaigned hard for you locally and on the state level here in Texas, as my husband was a delegate to the Texas Democrat Convention in June 2008. Before that, we voted i ...
  

Glenn Greenwald - Salon

• Health care industry stocks explode as bill progre ...
  The Senate passed its health care bill "by standing up to the special interests who prevented reform for decades and who are furiously lobbying against it now" --  Barack Obama, December 21, 2009 . ____________ "'Healthcare shares rose on Monday as a bill to reform healthcare passed the first cr ...
  
• U.S. aid to Al Qaeda
  Following up on what I wrote yesterday about our missile attacks in Southern Yemen strengthening Al Qaeda, there is an unusually informative article in Time -- written by Abigail Hauslohner and based on her interview with Yemen expert Gregory Johnson of Princeton University -- that provides substan ...
  
• Cruise missile attacks in Yemen
  Given what a prominent role "Terrorism" plays in our political discourse, it's striking how little attention is paid to American actions which have the most significant impact on that problem.  In addition to our occupation of Iraq, war escalation in Afghanistan, and secret bombings in Pakistan, Pr ...
  
• The underlying divisions in the health care debate
  Ed Kilgore has a very perceptive analysis in The New Republic about the underlying (and largely unexamined) ideological and strategic differences among progressives that are at least partially driving the rift over the health care bill.  He argues -- correctly -- that the current debate "displays a ...
  
• Tom Friedman, museum exhibit
  This might be one of the most self-contradictory episodes in the annals of American punditry: Tom Friedman, The New York Times , yesterday : A corrosive mind-set has taken hold since 9/11. It says that Arabs and Muslims are only objects, never responsible for anything in their world, and we are ...
  

The BiPartisan Report

• Sheldon Whitehouse brings truth to the Senate floo ...
• Pesky facts spoil GOP’s mammogram arguments
• Those holier than thou Conservatives
• Dennis Kucinich: Enemy of the good, pursuer of the ...
• Betsy’s Bullshit, Round 2

Sciencebase

• Happy Solstice Event
  Wishing all readers, commenters, contacts, fellow tweeps and scientwists, Facebook fans, and friends everywhere a happy mid-seasonal, solstice feast event from sciencebase.com… …I couldn’t just say Happy Christmas could I? It’s not as if it’s scientifically possible to reconcile a belief in any arc ...
  
• Religious science and other science books
  Having posted about atheism recently on the SciScoop science forum, it seems quite apt to have received for review a couple of books with a religious theme at this time of year. The first is The Faith Instinct by Nicholas Wade. Wade is a well-known New York Times writer who presents the case for an ...
  
• Myrrh, bones, and medical waste
  Hepatic epiphany for myrrh – A statistical analysis of experimental data on laboratory animals shows that the resin of the middle-eastern tree Commiphora, better known as “myrrh” can act as a protective antioxidant against liver damage caused by organic lead compounds. Myrrh is a rust-coloured resi ...
  
• 25 Scientific musos or 25 musical scientists
  Science is fun, but there are times when even the most dedicated begoggled labcoat wearing bench monkey has to relax and lots of science types seem particularly drawn to playing music. Now, I’m not saying any of these people are bench monkeys, but they do all play music, as far as I know: harp ...
  
• Thinking about electric vehicles
  Electric vehicles reduce noise and local air pollution, such as nitrogen oxides, particulate matter and ground-level ozone, but do they simply relocate the carbon tire-tracks to fossil-fired power stations or are there benefits on the global scale? Fundamentally, an electric engine can achieve 85 t ...
  

Common Dreams-Progressive Newswire

• Chicago Activists to Join the Gaza Freedom March
  FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE December 22, 2009 Voices for Creative Non-Violence Joshua Brollier, a Co-Coordinator for Voices for Creative Non-Violence in Chicago, will spend his Christmas vacation in the Gaza Strip, participating in the Gaza Freedom March along with other Chicago area activists, author A ...
  
• Gaza’s Civilians, Still Unable to Rebuild One Year ...
  FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE December 22, 2009 Oxfam International The international community has betrayed the people of Gaza by failing to back their words with effective action to secure the ending of the Israeli blockade which is preventing reconstruction and recovery, say a group of 16 leading humanit ...
  
• Sham Deal Requires Nothing, Accomplishes Nothing
  FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE December 18, 2009 Friends of the Earth U.S. Statement of Erich Pica, president of Friends of the Earth U.S., on tonight's announcement by President Obama: read more
  
• Statement on “Deal” at Copenhagen
  FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE December 18, 2009 Center for Biological Diversity Upon news of a non-legally binding accord today in Copenhagen, Kassie Siegel, director of the Climate Law Institute at the Center for Biological Diversity, had the following response: read more
  
• Copenhagen: A Disaster for World's Poorest
  FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE December 18, 2009 Friends of the Earth - International Commenting on the failure of rich country governments to secure a strong and fair UN agreement to tackle climate change in Copenhagen, Nnimmo Bassey, Chair of Friends of the Earth International, said: “Copenhagen has been ...
  

Common Dreams-Views

• Modern Day Slavery in Mexico and the United States
  by Megan McAdams On December 3, Mexico City police freed 107 human trafficking victims who were forced to manufacture shopping bags and clothespins under “slave-like” circumstances. Officials reported that the victims exhibited signs of physical and sexual abuse, and were also malnourished, as they ...
  
• Who You Callin’ Moderate?
  by Laura Flanders The Senate held a historic vote on health care reform last night at 1 AM. Splitting exactly along party lines-that is, if you call Joe Lieberman a Democrat-the health care bill made it through a cloture vote and is one step away from final passage and the conference committee. To g ...
  
• On Health Care, Women Compromise
  by Derrick Z. Jackson Male privilige in health care reform deepens with each line drawn in the sand. Senate Democrats got their 60th vote to close debate and move reform toward a Christmas Eve vote by succumbing to Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson's demands to include abortion restrictions. The reform bi ...
  
• Wall Street’s Economic Rampage
  by Zach Carter Over the past year, Wall Street’s excess has helped push the unemployment rate to epic levels and created millions of foreclosures. Yet the rules of the financial road remain unchanged. As 2009 draws to a close, it’s astonishing that so little progress towards financial reform has bee ...
  
• Flares in the Political Dark
  by Norman Solomon The winter solstice of 2009 arrived as a grim metaphor for the current politics of healthcare, war and a lot more. “In a dark time,” wrote the poet Theodore Roethke, “the eye begins to see.” After a year of escalation in Afghanistan, solicitude toward Wall Street and the inc ...
  

Karl Burkart

• Boy discovers microbe that eats plastic
  PhDs have been searching for a solution to the plastic waste problem, and this 16-year-old finds the answer.
  
• The bright side of 'Flopenhagen'
  My 13th and final report on the Copenhagen climate talks. What happened. What's next.
  
• Obamahagen (Day 12): ALBA lambasts 'friendly natio ...
  ALBA, the Bolivian Alliance for the Americas led an impromptu press release denouncing the closed meeting of 18 'friendly nations' led by Obama.
  
• Copenhagen Day 11: Hillary thwacks ball into China ...
  The U.S. secretary of state makes the ACES climate bill targets official and pledges to build a $100 billion fund.
  
• Al Gore's post-Copenhagen plan
  Al Gore is pushing for a climate deal in Mexico this summer.
  

Water Privatization

• City leaders push agenda (The Tuscaloosa News)
  By Stephanie Taylor Staff Writer Talk of Bryce Hospital and the future of mental health care in Alabama dominated a breakfast meeting between Tuscaloosa city leaders and members of the local legislative delegation.
  
• Saudi budget focuses on improving investment envir ...
  Saudi budget focuses on improving investment environment
  
• Apple Valley, Rosemount levies mean lower taxes fo ...
  Roughly 92 percent of Apple Valley homeowners will see their city property taxes go down in 2010, but one council member said more could be done to reduce collections.
  
• Cumberland to go it alone on child support enforce ...
  Cumberland County commissioners won't team up with other nearby counties to enforce child support orders next year. The commissioners eliminated a regional approach Monday as they decide how to take over child-support enforcement from the state.
  
• War over bottled water unresolved (The County Pres ...
  BY MEHAK BANSIL CAPITAL NEWS SERVICE LANSING — The courtroom battle between Nestle Waters North America and environmental groups looked like it was over, but environmental lawyers say the war to stop privatization of part of Michigan’s water resources isn’t done. read more
  

Guardian

• Britain mired in longest, deepest postwar recessio ...
  Revisions to official data reveal the current slump to be worse than that of the early 1980s when the decimation of manufacturing resulted in a 6% output decline Britain is officially suffering its deepest post-war recession after the Office for National Statistics revealed today a smaller-than-expe ...
  
• Snow causes travel chaos across UK
  More ice and snow caused fresh delays on the roads, railways and at airports today as transport operators struggle with a backlog of stranded passengers. Follow live travel updates 12.44pm: The chilliest place in Britain tonight should be Aviemore , Scotland, where the temperature is expected to dr ...
  
• Stem cell doctors restore man's sight
  Stem cells grown on a special membrane were used to treat the patient and seven others with sight loss A man who was partially blinded when ammonia was squirted in his eye during an attack 15 years ago has regained his sight after receiving a pioneering stem cell treatment .Russell Turnbull, 38, suf ...
  
• Fatherly advice: thou shalt steal
  Church of England priest Tim Jones preaches it's OK to shoplift, though it's best from a big retail company not family business In issuing the 10 commandments to Moses atop Mount Sinai, God was pretty unequivocal: "Thou shalt not steal." However, there's good news for anyone whose passion for pilfer ...
  
• Iran claims US fabricated nuclear papers
  Iranian president dismisses western deadline to accept deal to swap enriched uranium for nuclear fuel The Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, today dismissed a year-end deadline set by the US for Iran to accept a UN-brokered deal to swap enriched uranium for nuclear fuel. As Iran faces a renewed ...
  

McClatchey

• Health care overhaul bill raises hackles of S.C. l ...
  With the clock ticking toward a Christmas Eve Senate vote on health care reform, South Carolina Republicans lashed out Monday at the proposed legislation, and also took swipes at Democrats for the tactics used in moving the bill forward.
  
• California DOT's stimulus jobs data was inflated, ...
  Under fire for mismanaging its vehicle fleet, Caltrans was rapped anew on Monday for grossly overstating the number of jobs it created or preserved with federal stimulus money.
  
• U.S. troops in Iraq are doing detective work
  KHANDARI, Iraq — The man sat crossed-legged on a floor cushion, sipped tea and explained his woes to the soldiers from Fort Lewis. As an Iraqi policeman on the American payroll, he has killed plenty of enemy fighters — and now his enemies are taking revenge.
  
• Florida's Senate candidates agree on Cuba
  The four leading candidates for Florida's open U.S. Senate seat in 2010 were in the same room for the first time Monday at the U.S.-Cuba Democracy Political Action Committee's annual luncheon — where they staked out their positions on the future of Cuba and its relations with the United States.
  
• Some California lawmakers send holiday greetings w ...
  'Tis the season for giving, right?
  

BBC - Richard Black's Earth Watch

• COP15: (No) Hopenhagen?
  Everywhere you go in Copenhagen, you're met with two kinds of advertising poster. One sells lingerie, the morning walk to the railway station bringing a sequence of scarcely clad models smiling unfeasibly in the freezing morning air. The other sells hope. "Hopenhagen" has been the city's alterna ...
  
• COP15: Deal or no deal?
  0043 CET Saturday: Now, we are totally - totally - into uncharted territory. A US president has reached an climate change agreement with leaders of just four countries - although a few more clearly had a inkling of what was going on. The White House announced the deal - this is supposed to be a UN ...
  
• A tale of two superpowers
  1926 CET: It's supposed to be about two degrees. It appears to have come down to two men. As I write, US President Barack Obama and China's Prime Minister Wen Jiabao are locked in a room somewhere around this conference centre - a meeting that could answer the question of whether ther's a deal here ...
  
• COP15: Saving the planet or saving face?
  1641 CET: We're into a strange dark limbo-land here. The draft political agreement that leaders are supposed to sign today has gone through more changes than Eva Longoria at an awards ceremony. The latest version, we're told, sheds many of the frills. It's a jeans and t-shirt job compared with the ...
  
• COP15: 'Nothing new' in Obama's speech
  1335 CET A year ago, I sat in a news conference at the UN climate conference in Poznan and listened to Senator John Kerry pledge that an Obama administration would lead the world on combating climate change. Today, Mr Obama himself appeared at the Copenhagen summit and told the world why "we have r ...
  

Afghanistan Sun

• US troops to use 'eavesdropping spy planes&#0 ...
  Kabul, Dec. 22 : US troops stationed in Afghanistan will soon use spy planes, that will provide them crucial information about Al Qaeda and the Taliban, with the help of its technology that can captur...
  
• Ky. airman killed in Afghanistan is honored
  FRANKFORT, Ky. -- Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear has ordered that flags at all state office buildings be lowered to half-staff on Tuesday in honor of an airman who died in Afghanistan.The Pentagon says 3...
  
• Karzai to investigate cousin's killing
  KABUL—Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Tuesday he has asked the interior ministry to investigate the killing of one of his young relatives in what was reportedly a family feud. Waheed Karzai, ...
  
• PM Has 'No Doubt' Over Afghan Strategy
  download Flash from the Adobe download website. In an interview with the British Forces Broadcasting Service, the Prime Minister acknowledged it had been a difficult year for UK troops fighting...
  
• US troops to use 'eavesdropping spy planes&#0 ...
  Kabul, Dec. 22 : US troops stationed in Afghanistan will soon use spy planes, that will provide them crucial information about Al Qaeda and the Taliban, with the help of its technology that can captur...
  

Futurismic

• The legislation of fabrication – should 3D printin ...
  Here’s another sf-nal thought experiment to keep your brain occupied. We frequently mention 3D printing and fabbing here at Futurismic, but usually in the context of its positive disruptive potential – a potential sea-change in capitalist economic systems, for example. But here’s a negative response ...
  
• Potential outcomes of pervasive surveillance
  Sometimes it really feels like science-fictional thinking is becoming a much more mainstream thing to do. Following on from yesterday’s mention of CCTV control software that can learn to recognise suspicious behaviour (as defined by operator feedback, natch), out-bound BoingBoing guest blogger Paul ...
  
• Mercurial cartography
  With the cold weather really digging in for those of us in the Northern hemisphere, you may well be thinking of taking a holiday somewhere hot. Courtesy the US Geological Survey, you can now scout out the lay of the land on the hottest destination in the entire solar system, as their near-global map ...
  
• What Are The Animals Becoming?
  Since I went for things made of metal skins and electrical guts last month when I wrote about weird robots, I decided to opt for warm-blooded carbon-based life forms this time around – so welcome to the December column on smart animals! Now, we’re a dog family, and we have a golden retriever [. ...
  
• The real history of science fiction
  Just in case you missed it, this little gem from webcomic Hark, a Vagrant was doing the rounds on Twitter the other day. Click through for the whole thing, then feel free to argue about the need for hard scientific veracity in speculative fiction in the comments. Project Wonderful - Your ad here ...
  

geopolitics | geoeconomics

• Geithner's Dirty Little Secret
• Swine Flu
• Putin and the Geopolitics of the New Cold War: Or ...
• The Fake Oil Crisis of 1973
• Fossiles Erdöl
  
  

Whistleblowers Protection Blog

• Comment on Metro safety, the STAA and the Washingt ...
  On October 14, the Washington Post ran a story on Metro drivers going " Strictly by the Book " (p. B-1). The story highlights safety issues that reach beyond Metro. That the Post's writer would be concerned about the disruption reveals a prevalent but dangerous attitude that speed is more impor ...
  
• Jury awards Colin Browne $282,000
  Mr. Colin Browne worked as a program advisor for the UDC Career Counseling and Development Center. Throughout his term, he discovered many flaws within the system. For example, Kevin Naiker, the former Director of UDC’s “Team 100” retention program, and others were purposely spinning the retenti ...
  
• Press Freedom Index 2009
    On October 20, 2009, Reporters Without Borders (RWB), a Paris-based international non-governmental journalism organization that advocates freedom of the press, published Press Freedom Index 2009, its eighth annual world press freedom catalogue. According to the report, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, ...
  
• Indonesian Anti-Corruption advocate visits NWC
  Emerson Yuntho is Deputy Coordinator of Indonesia Corruption Watch (ICW) . Today he visited the offices of the National Whistleblowers Center (NWC) to share ideas about fighting corruption and protecting witnesses from retaliation.  Pictured here are Lindsey Williams (NWC Advocacy Director), Ab ...
  
• The Next Big Thing In False Claims Act Litigation
  “Securities fraud,” said the state official and with that about 20 attorneys, all experts in False Claims Act litigation, fell off their chairs. We were in a small room, down the hall in the last break out session of the annual meeting of False Claims Act attorneys sponsored by Taxpayers Agai ...
  

Defense and the National Interest

• On War #323: Milestone
  William S. Lind 23 November 2009 One of the ongoing themes of this column has been gangs and the role they play in a Fourth Generation world. Here in the United States they already serve as an alternative primary loyalty (alternative to the state) for many urban young men. Gangs will likely be a m ...
  
• DNI to close — update
  23 November 2009 Many thanks to everyone who wrote in.  My wife and I are deeply touched. We’ll try to find someone to at least take over the site as it is and keep the links intact.  Several people have contacted me with ideas.  In the meantime, I’ll leave everything up unless we start having mo ...
  
• DNI to close
  Probably on Monday, November 23, depending on how my travels work out. Please go ahead and download any thing you’d like to keep — I’d particularly recommend Boyd’s briefings and the 4GW manuals. I have great faith in the growing number of bloggers and commentators who cover many of the same subjec ...
  
• On War #322: What Is “Political Correctness?”
  William S. Lind 18 November 2009 In response to the killing of 13 American soldiers at Ft. Hood by an Islamic U. S. Army major, a number of senior officials have expressed their fear, not of Islam, but of a possible threat to “diversity.” “Diversity” is one of the many false gods of “Political Corr ...
  
• What should we do with terrorists?
  Security guru Bruce Schneier has the right idea: We should treat terrorists like common criminals and give them all the benefits of true and open justice — not merely because it demonstrates our indomitability, but because it makes us all safer. Once a society starts circumventing its own laws, the ...
  

Digital Journal

• Third Mountie charged with impaired driving in B.C ...
  On a day when members of Vernon, B.C. RCMP were on a high profile counter-attack program, a member of the same force was caught driving while under the influence. RCMP assistant commissioner Al Macintyre says this hurts the force's reputation.
  
• Calgary airport employee falls to his death de-ici ...
  A Calgary International Airport employee died Monday morning after falling out of a cherry-picker while de-icing a plane. The man worked for Servisair.
  
• Boy Stares Down 'Endangered Species' Polar Bear an ...
  Polar bears are reported to be growing extinct, but one of them appeared recently and was stared down by a brave teen who is now being called a hero in the press.
  
• Study: 'Green' shoppers more likely to steal and c ...
  University of Toronto -- Participants in a study who were deemed "green" conscious were found to cheat and steal more in later tests. This research adds to a recent body of knowledge known as "moral licensing".
  
• Canadian Tamils vote for sovereign Tamil state wit ...
  On Saturday, thousands of Tamils across Canada voted in a referendum that would support a sovereign Tamil state within Sri Lanka.
  

End Homelessness | Change.org

• How to Do the Right Thing this Winter
  January 21st is the first day of winter and the longest night of the year. It's also the most dangerous time of year to be without a home. Each year, the lives of hundreds of people without a home are lost due to extreme weather conditions. Today, you can be a part of the solution by learning how to ...
  
• Will Twitter Transform Homeless Services in 2010?
  New media has transformed the way people communicate and stay in touch. In 2009, Twitter was dubbed one of the fastest-growing new media technologies. Is it possible that this social networking and micro-blogging platform will revolutionize the way service providers meet the emergency needs of homel ...
  
• A Homeless Fire Victim's Last Day Alive
  This weekend, a nor'easter is slamming the east coast and painting it white. For most people, a foot of snow and ice means shoveling out a car or stocking up on bread and milk. But for others, it's a matter of life or death. I came across this video today in the Vancouver Sun . It's a brief document ...
  
• Honoring the Homeless Who Died in 2009, Resolving ...
  December 21st is the longest day of the year and the coldest day of the year. So it is an appropriate day to honor and mourn those who died in the past year without a home.  But as communities gather to remember and honor those who have died, let us resolve to do whatever it takes to ensure that suc ...
  
• Lady Gaga Urges You to Support Youth Homelessness
  Lady Gaga has teamed up with Virgin Mobile to combat youth homelessness. For the past several years, Virgin Mobile has been a champion for this issue, creating several innovative promotions to encourage young people to help the homeless. This past summer, they distributed free concert tickets to tho ...
  

Ceasefire.ca

• Decal offer from Bill and Rhyl Stollery
  Dear Ceasefire.ca supporters, You might be interested in this offer from Bill and Rhyl Stollery in Edmonton. Magnetic decals 3 1/2 ” x 8″ to display on rear of vehicles $2.00 each or 10 for $15.00, plus mailing To order and receive details to promote campaign: e-mail rstoller@shaw.ca or hready@shaw. ...
  
• World leaders agree on climate change
  World leaders and their representatives attending the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen failed to achieve a binding agreement to cap and reduce greenhouse gas emissions at the close of the conference on Friday, in effect agreeing instead to continue their collective experiment i ...
  
• McChrystal in Ottawa
  The commander of U.S. and ISAF forces in Afghanistan, U.S. General Stanley McChrystal, visited Ottawa Wednesday to discuss Afghanistan strategy with Canadian Chief of Defence Staff General Walt Natynczyk and other officials. He also made a speech at an event sponsored by the Conference of Defence As ...
  
• Torture file: Colvin shoots back; government ducks
  The Canadian diplomat whose mid-November testimony to the Special Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan ignited a firestorm of controversy over Canadian transfers of Afghan detainees to probable torture by the Afghan authorities has fired back at his critics. In a 16-page letter sent to t ...
  
• ICNND urges nuclear disarmament progress
  The International Commission on Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament released its report “Eliminating Nuclear Threats: A Practical Agenda for Global Policymakers” today. Declaring that “maintaining the status quo is not an option,” the commissioners argue that the opportunity exists “to hal ...
  

Kevin Trudeau Show

• 2010 Food Crisis Means Financial Armageddon
  If you read any economic, financial, or political analysis for 2010 that doesn’t mention the food shortage looming next year, throw it in the trash, as it is worthless. There is overwhelming, undeniable evidence that the world will run out of food next year. When this happens, the resulting triple d ...
  
• Insurgents Hack Drones With $26 Dollar Software
  December 21, 2009 The Wall Street Journal By Siobahn Gorman, Yochi J. Dreazen, and August Cole Militants in Iraq have used $26 off-the-shelf software to intercept live video feeds from U.S. Predator drones, potentially providing them with information they need to evade or monitor U.S. military opera ...
  
• Children to Receive Free Pizza If They Get Swine F ...
  December 21, 2009 ABC News The Detroit Health Department is fighting swine flu with pepperoni. When kids return to school after the holiday break, each class has the opportunity to get a free pizza party – if they sign up for the shots. It’s a simple fact–kids don’t like vaccinations – even ...
  
• Germany to Get Controversial New ID Cards
  December 21, 2009 The Local By Kristin Allen “It’s smaller than the old one, but can do a lot more,” Interior Minister Thomas de Maizière said in a statement. The information on the card itself will be digitally stored on the RFID chip inside the card, in addition to two fingerprint scans that Germa ...
  
• College Refuses to Graduate Overweight Students
  December 21, 2009 Mercola By Dr. Mercola Lincoln University has introduced a unique way of tackling obesity. In 2006, the Pennsylvania university introduced its Fitness for Life program with the aim of encouraging students to lose weight. The premise was that if a student had a body mass index (BMI) ...
  

Pambazuka News

• US: System owes Troy Davis another day in court
  It is wrong to execute an innocent man. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit will now consider whether it is constitutional. Troy Anthony Davis, convicted of murder, is asking the courts to hear evidence that key government witnesses have r...
  
• Caribbean: Civil society demands Haiti debt cancel ...
  Organizations representing Caribbean civil society organizations and social movements have written to G8 finance ministers, the World Bank, and the IMF, to demand an immediate and unconditional cancellation of Haiti's external debt....
  
• USA: Uhuru movement endorses McKinney/Clemente tic ...
  The International People’s Democratic Uhuru Movement (InPDUM) has endorsed the McKinney/Clemente ticket in the U.S. presidential race. The endorsement was based on the support that Green Party V.P. candidate Rosa Clemente’s expressed for InPDUM’s “Re...
  
• Haiti: Women and girls require life-saving assista ...
  More than 800,000 people are in dire need of humanitarian assistance in Haiti in the wake of hurricanes Fay and Gustav and tropical storm Hanna. Houses, medical facilities, main roads and bridges have been destroyed, and an estimated 100,000 people h...
  
• Haiti: Lula visit prompts protests in Brazil, Mex ...
  Demonstrators in many Brazilian cities and San Francisco denounced Brazil's brutal 4-year military occupation of Haiti -- on the occasion of the May 28th visit to Haiti by Brazilian President Luiz Lula da Silva, marking the 4th anniversary of the arr...
  

War in Context

• The legacy of the people’s ayatollah: Montazeri
  The ayatollah’s inspiration By Maziar Bahari, Newsweek, December 21, 2009 “If you’re going to ask me questions about my regrets, plan to spend the next month or so in my house!” Those were the words with which Ayatollah Hussein Ali Montazeri greeted me when I interviewed him at his home in the hol ...
  
• Hamas using English law to demand arrest of Israel ...
  Hamas using English law to demand arrest of Israeli leaders for war crimes By James Hider, The Times, December 21, 2009 The Islamist group Hamas is masterminding efforts to have senior Israeli leaders arrested for alleged war crimes when they visit European countries including Britain, a top Hamas o ...
  
• Settler activist: ‘We are preparing a series of su ...
  Settler activist: ‘We are preparing a series of surprises’ for the army By Chaim Levinson and Jonathan Lis, Haaretz, December 21, 2009 ight-wing activists began preparing on Sunday for a fight against the planned demolition of structures built in contravention of the 10-month freeze on construction ...
  
• Likud MK: Annex West Bank, consider citizenship fo ...
  Likud MK: Annex West Bank, consider citizenship for Palestinians By Attila Somfalvi, Ynet, December 20, 2009 Knesset Member Tzipi Hotovely, one of the leading dissenting voices in the Likud faction opposing the policy adopted by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said Sunday that the territories sho ...
  
• Somalia is greatest victim of President Bush’s War ...
  Somalia is greatest victim of President Bush’s War on Terror By Martin Fletcher, The Times, December 21, 2009 AQfghanistan and Iraq have monopolised the headlines but Somalia is arguably an even greater victim of George W. Bush’s ill-conceived and lamentably executed War on Terror. America’s interve ...
  

Watts Up With That?

• See sunspots run
  From Spaceweather.com The sun is showing signs of life. There are no fewer than five active regions on the sun’s surface, shown here in an [...]
  
• Hansen on the surface temperature record, Climateg ...
  The Temperature of Science (PDF available here) James Hansen My experience with global temperature data over 30 years provides insight about how the science and its public perception have changed. In the late 1970s I became curious about well known analyses of global temperature change published by ...
  
• Global warming on blogs outshines MSM in interest
  From the Pew Research Center No Denying the Heat of Global Warming Debate in the Blogosphere Global warming has of late been a very hot topic in social media, and last week it was hotter than ever. Much of the added fuel came from climate change believers who engaged in the debate that had been domi ...
  
• Gaming the peer review system: IPCC scientists beh ...
  How IPCC scientists interfere with publication of inconvenient scientific results By David H. Douglass, Professor of Physics, University of Rochester, New York, and John R. Christy, Distinguished Professor, Atmospheric Science, University of Alabama at Huntsville In this article, reprinted from T ...
  
• Over 50% of the USA is now covered in snow
  From the “weather is not climate” department here’s interesting news from the National Operational Hyrdologic Remote Sensing Center. While certainly not unprecedented or unusual, it is interesting, especially when comparing years past and the snow coverage using the website date selector. Here’s tod ...
  

Dandelion Salad

• Serious Problems With Obama’s Plan To Move Guantán ...
  by Andy Worthington Featured Writer Dandelion Salad www.andyworthington.co.uk 22 December 2009 Last Tuesday, in a letter to Illinois governor Pat Quinn, five senior Obama administration officials — Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Attorney General Eric Holder, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Di ...
  
• The Lost Science of Classical Political Economy By ...
  Dandelion Salad By Michael Hudson Economic Perspectives from Kansas City December 20, 2009 There is a seeming riddle in the recent evolution of economic thought. It has become more otherworldly and abstract, more detached from the reality of how economies are running deeper into debt to a financia ...
  
• “I believe 100%, as an Afghan living among A ...
  Dandelion Salad ourjourneytosmile December 21, 2009 more about “Building human contact for peace in A…“, posted with vodpod Building human contact for peace in Afghanistan & the world http://ourjourneytosmile.com 22 Dec. 2009 The Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers organized a Youth Peace Convention a ...
  
• Richard Falk: Gaza, Afghanistan and International ...
  Dandelion Salad talkingsticktv December 20, 2009 Interview with Richard Falk, Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University and author of “Crimes of War: Iraq” and “The Costs of War: International Law, the UN, and World Order after Iraq” recorded October 17, 2009 in Seattle. mo ...
  
• US Military Aggression against Venezuela escalatin ...
  Dandelion Salad by Eva Golinger Postcards from the Revolution 20 December 2009 Caracas, 20 December – Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez revealed today on his Sunday television and radio program, Aló Presidente, that unmanned aerial vehicles UAVs, also known as drones, have illegally entered Venezu ...
  

Your New Reality

• No title
  Now BushCo. Are Gone, John Bolton Is Just Another War Mongering BobbleHead Bullshit Artist Foreign Policy gives John Bolton, full-time War On Iran activist, a well-deserved slaparound in their Top 10 Worst Predictions For 2009 list : "I think if they [Israel] are to do anything, the most likely per ...
  
• No title
  The video quality is rough as guts, but the material is absolutely killer : Imagine any stand-up comedian appearing on commercial TV today unleashing such unhinged, radical material. "I had a dream......bang!"
  
• No title
  All the details below are taken from official White House media-distributed photography. DeNiro, Springsteen, Obama : No-one can accuse Obama of blowing money on new phones for the White House. Look at this ancient beast of a thing sitting on his West Wing desk. Obama flag pin worn on la ...
  
• No title
  Get It Off Your Chest And Onto A Sign An excellent collection of The Best 50 Protest Signs From 2009 : Unfortunately, because the list was only for protest signs from 2009, one of the best protest signs of all time could not be included. But here it is anyway : .
  
• No title
  Something totally fucking bizarre spent two minutes in the night skies above Poland. According to this story , neither astronomers or meteorologists can explain this phenomenon : My first thought, after looking at the other photos and video here , is that it looks like some kind of laser projecti ...
  

Wired - Science

• Feathered Dinosaurs Were Venomous Predators
  Early dinosaurs weren’t just covered in feathers. They were also poisonous. Analysis of skulls belonging to different species of Sinornithosaurus, a group of feathered predatory theropods that lived 125 million years ago in what is now northeast China, shows skeletal features reminiscent of modern ...
  
• East Coast Blizzard Seen From Space
  The snowstorm that blanketed the East Coast this weekend was so big, it is even impressive from space. NASA’s Aqua satellite took this image centered on Washington, D.C., on Sunday with its MODIS instrument. digg_url ="http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/12/east-coast-blizzard-from-space/"; The ...
  
• DIY Bed-Bug Detector
  INDIANAPOLIS — After trying some 50 arrangements of household objects, researchers have come up with a new low-cost, homemade bed-bug detector. To lure the bugs out of hiding, Wan-Tien Tsai of Rutgers University in New Brunswick put dry ice into an insulated, one-third-gallon jug, the kind availabl ...
  
• Dark Liquor Makes For Worse Hangovers
  A new study may help drinkers pick their poison. In a head-to-head comparison, bourbon gave drinkers a more severe hangover than vodka, report Damaris Rohsenow of Brown University and colleagues in an upcoming issue of Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research. But vodka drinkers aren’t off th ...
  
• Video: The Asteroid That Will Almost Hit Earth
  SAN FRANCISCO — Any number of undiscovered near-Earth objects could one day careen into the Earth, and there is a lot of talk here at the American Geophysical Union meeting about tracking them. So far, though, only one discovered object has seemed even mildly likely to hit our planet. That aster ...
  

Israeli Occupation Archive

• Egypt’s barrier along Gaza border called ‘wall of ...
  Construction on the 100-foot-deep steel wall began a few weeks ago, but the Egyptian government didn't publicly acknowledge the project until the weekend. Officials defended the effort against... The Israeli Occupation Archive (IOA) covers Israel's military occupation of Palestinian lands, now in ...
  
• Gazans rally against Egypt wall
  Hundreds of Palestinians have rallied in the Gaza Strip near the Egyptian border to protest against Egypt's construction of a steel wall aimed at blocking smuggling tunnels to Gaza. The Israeli Occupation Archive (IOA) covers Israel's military occupation of Palestinian lands, now in its fifth dec ...
  
• CIA working with Palestinian security agents
  US agency co-operating with Palestinian counterparts who allegedly torture Hamas supporters in West Bank. The Israeli Occupation Archive (IOA) covers Israel's military occupation of Palestinian lands, now in its fifth decade. Go to the IOA website for much more...
  
• Police shoot U.S. student’s laptop upon entry to I ...
  Israeli Border Police officers determined her laptop computer was a security threat and shot it three times. Lily Sussman, 21, wrote on her blog that the police officers subjected her to two hours of... The Israeli Occupation Archive (IOA) covers Israel's military occupation of Palestinian lands, ...
  
• Abbas: Israel wants to expel Palestinians from Jer ...
  “There is no Palestine without Jerusalem no one will accept this. Without Jerusalem there will be no peace,” [Abbas] said. The Israeli Occupation Archive (IOA) covers Israel's military occupation of Palestinian lands, now in its fifth decade. Go to the IOA website for much more...
  
  
  
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  To Do

  renewable recycling conservation

  How Important Are Renewables? Feinstein Blocks Desert Solar

  BNET

  - Dec 22, 2009

  - 36 minutes ago

  Senator Dianne Feinstein has formalized her opposition to renewables in the Mojave Desert with the introduction of a bill to protect a million acres of land ...

  Related Articles »

  clipped from Google - 12/2009

  This Year In Clean Energy - What A Ride

  RenewableEnergyWorld.com

  - Dec 22, 2009

  - 2 hours ago

  by Scott Sklar, The Stella Group The year 2009 started off with a bang for the clean energy industries -- encompassing energy efficiency, renewable energy, ...

  Related Articles »

  clipped from Google - 12/2009

  Report: New Mexico's greenhouse gas emissions up

  The Associated Press

  - Dec 22, 2009

  - 3 hours ago

  State officials expect the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions to be even more significant in the next few years thanks to New Mexico's renewable energy ...

  Related Articles »

  clipped from Google - 12/2009

  Solar Renewable Energy Credits income is not exempt from tax laws

  The Star-Ledger - NJ.com

  - Dec 22, 2009

  - 3 hours ago

  My solar panels will be generating nine Solar Renewable Energy Credits (SREC). My question: Is the income from the sale of the SREC taxable? ...

  clipped from Google - 12/2009

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  Human Habitat

  ecology water energy

  Breakthrough Technology for the Paper and Packaging Industry Provided by ...

  PR Newswire (press release)

  - Dec 22, 2009

  - 1 hour ago

  Ecology will be developing strategic partnerships to develop applications for construction products, such as wall or pipe covering, to reduce harmful mold ...

  clipped from Google - 12/2009

  Bird-watchers to take snapshot of ecology's health

  Tribune Review

  - Dec 20, 2009

  - Dec 20, 2009

  The data they've accumulated — and will gather again Saturday — will be used to help measure the region's ecology and quality of life for people living here ...

  Related Articles »

  clipped from Google - 12/2009

  Pope Benedict's environmentalism concerned with the 'ecology of man,' Vatican ...

  Catholic News Agency

  - Dec 20, 2009

  - Dec 20, 2009

  While some forms of environmentalism place nature first in relation to mankind, he explains that the Pope has as his priority the “ecology of Man” in ...

  Related Articles »

  clipped from Google - 12/2009

  SANYO Becomes a Panasonic Company

  Benzinga

  - Dec 22, 2009

  - 4 hours ago

  SANYO's businesses are divided into three business domains: Energy, Ecology and Electronics. Panasonic Corporation is a worldwide leader in the development ...

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  Water Power

  water floods pollution

  Claim that Army 'water-boarded' suspect in 1970s

  BBC News

  - Dec 22, 2009

  - 3 hours ago

  The appeal of a man convicted of murdering a soldier in Northern Ireland is expected to hear that the suspect was "water-boarded" by soldiers. ...

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  clipped from Google - 12/2009

  ConocoPhillips Fined $490K For Toxic Wastewater Discharges - Update

  RTT News

  - Dec 22, 2009

  - 6 hours ago

  (RTTNews) - Energy company ConocoPhillips (COP: News ) has been ordered to pay an administrative civil liability of $490000 by the California Regional Water ...

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  clipped from Google - 12/2009

  Giving Water a Powdered, Flavored Spin

  New York Times

  - Dec 21, 2009

  - 14 hours ago

  By ANDREW ADAM NEWMAN THE phrase “just add water” is a staple on packages for convenience foods, an enticement that pancakes, ranch dressing, ...

  clipped from Google - 12/2009

  NM's Sandia lab to evaluate water power technology

  The Associated Press

  - Dec 21, 2009

  - Dec 21, 2009

  ALBUQUERQUE, NM — Sandia National Laboratories will receive more than $9 million over three years to develop advanced water power technologies under a ...

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