Sunday, September 27, 2009
Latin American Herald Tribune | Headline News - September 27, 2009
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| 9/17/2009 | Three Tons of Cocaine Seized from Panama-Flagged Vessel |
| 8/26/2009 | Panama Canal Forecasts Revenue of More than $2 Billion in 2010 |
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UPI | At least 75 dead in Philippines floods caused by rainfall that broke all records for a 24-hour period.
Motorists drive by vehicles lined up along a road after flash floods caused by Typhoon Ondoy hit Provident Village in Marikina City, Metro Manila September 27, 2009. The Philippines appealed for international aid to help tens of thousands marooned by flashfloods, and apologised for the delays in rescue efforts to avoid potential political fallout from the crisis. REUTERS/John Javellana (PHILIPPINES DISASTER SOCIETY ENVIRONMENT)
A Filipino boy is carried to safety through floodwaters brought by Tropical Storm Ketsana in the Quezon City suburb of Manila. At least 73 people have been killed and more than a quarter of a million displaced after the heaviest rain in more than four decades plunged the Philippine capital into turmoil, officials said. (AFP/Jay Directo)
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Cave's Headlines | September 27, 2009
GoldSeek.com | Robbed Blind
Schneier.com | KMart and Sears Spies on its Customers
It's not just hackers who steal financial and medical information:
Between April 2007 and January 2008, visitors to the Kmart and Sears web sites were invited to join an "online community" for which they would be paid $10 with the idea they would be helping the company learn more about their customers. It turned out they learned a lot more than participants realized or that the feds thought was reasonable.To join the "My SHC Community," users downloaded software that ended up grabbing some members' prescription information, emails, bank account data and purchases on other sites. FULL STORY
AllGov.com | Congress Set to Allow EPA to Evacuate Polluted Kansas Town
Sunday, September 27, 2009 Treece, Kansas, may soon be no more. The tiny community near the Oklahoma border is so polluted with chat—mining waste filled with lead and zinc—that the Environmental Protection Agency wants to buy out those left in Treece and level it in an effort to decontaminate the area. But first EPA officials are seeking permission from Congress. Republican Senators Pat Roberts and Sam Brownback, of Kansas, and James Inhofe of Oklahoma are supporting the plan, which has cleared the Senate and is awaiting resolution in a conference committee with House members. Roberts said he does not anticipate any trouble getting the Treece amendment approved by Congress.
2.5 magnitude earthquake hit 16 mi East of Jackson, Kentucky on Saturday September 26, 2009
MAG DATE LOCAL-TIME LAT LON DEPTH LOCATION
y/m/d h:m:s deg deg km
map 2.5 2009/09/26 22:35:37 37.521N 83.082W 7.3 26 km (16 mi) E of Jackson, KY
GILLETTE, Wyo. (AP) | Second Burlington Northern Santa Fe freight train derails within 24 hours
A Burlington Northern Santa Fe train hauling coal in Wyoming derailed Sunday morning, marking the second time within 24 hours that trains belonging to the railway company went off the tracks.
Spokesman Gus Melonas says investigators at the derailments in Wyoming and Montana have ruled out sabotage but have not determined an exact cause.
The Sunday derailment on a side connection near Gillette involved 21 coal cars. Melonas says all the cars remained upright with no spillage, and that crews are working to put the cars back on the track.
He says the main line for hauling coal out of the Powder River Basin is still operating.
On Saturday afternoon, 13 freight cars on the Montana Hi-Line derailed 57 miles east of Glasgow. One was carrying metam sodium, a corrosive liquid and pesticide. Melonas says the car remained intact, but is off the track and its contents will be transferred to another car.
That line reopened Sunday morning.
Boston.com | On Nantasket Beach in Hull, MA the summer of 2009 will always be the summer of seaweed - lots and lots of seaweed
On Nantasket Beach in Hull, state workers removed 300 tons of seaweed this season.(Tom Herde for The Boston Globe)
Scituate, public works director Albert Bangert was philosophical about the seaweed glut, though, noting that Irish immigrants came to Scituate in the mid-1800s to make a living harvesting seaweed. The “moss’’ industry flourished for about 100 years, with seaweed hauled from the ocean, dried, and shipped out for use in such things as fertilizer, beer, cough syrup, toothpaste, and pudding.
“Now we see it as an inconvenience,’’ he said. Attitudes have “changed; nature hasn’t.’’ Full Story
FireRescue1.com | Responding to Africanized honey bee attacks (video) and BeeAlert Aerosol Spray
Click here to view video on web site:
RELATED: 18oz can $8.99
http://www.beealert.com/spraycan.htm
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The Aerosol Spray is specially designed to be lightweight and compact. When sprayed properly, the BeeAlert protective formula forms a halo of protection. Ideal for use by weekend homeowners, campers, hikers, survey crews, hunters, horse riders, or anyone in need of emergency protection from swarms of stinging insects.
BusinessDailyAfrica.com | Global rebalancing may weaken dollar
The dollar. “Countries like China are now challenging the dollar’s long-term roleas the world’s top reserve currency.”
Posted Monday, September 28 2009
Twenty-four years ago, major nations called for depreciation of the dollar to rebalance the global economy. Now, as another effort at rebalancing looms, the dollar will again bear the brunt — though officials will try to ensure its fall is less dramatic this time.
That’s the implication of President Barack Obama’s announcement this week that he will push world leaders for a new global “framework” in which the United States would cut its huge trade and budget deficits.
Agreeing on this framework would be politically difficult, since it would require policy changes by many countries — China, for example, would probably have to rein in its explosive export-led growth.
But as the euro’s climb to a new one-year high versus the dollar this morning shows, markets are starting to think the rebalancing process may start as soon as this week’s Pittsburgh summit of leaders from the Group of 20 nations.
The Plaza Accord of 1985 called for “orderly appreciation of the main non-dollar currencies against the dollar”; it was followed by central banks’ coordinated intervention to ensure that happened.
This time, with the world shakily emerging from a financial crisis, policymakers are likely to try to manage the dollar’s drop in a more low-key fashion.
They are unlikely to issue an explicit call for the dollar to fall. In fact, the US Treasury may continue proclaiming its “strong dollar policy” in an attempt to keep the markets calm.
No one in the G20 wants to risk a freefall of the dollar that could disrupt global trade as it recovers from recession. And in contrast to the 1980s, developing nations such as China are now challenging the dollar’s long-term role as the world’s top reserve currency. Full Story
Australia | Boom and Bust, Australia Next?
http://www.energyefficienthomedesign.com.au/2009/09/boom-and-bust-australia-next/
Previously I’ve commented on the crash of the US$; where America started as a world saviour (or was it just our first taste of spin-doctoring) when they entered the second world war.
September 27, 2009 - Americans (and for that matter the rest of the world) were warned by USA President Eisenhower that corporations and the military were positioning themselves to take over, however, the relief of the war ending probably made people less concerned, the lessor of to evils.
But ‘world hegemony’ is not new, where tribes expanded and took over new territories.
The way the Americans did it was by a) disbanding the League of Nations and funding the United Nations, which basically was a group who drew new lines and divided the world up amongst themselves and as the USA was the major funder, the US% became the world’s reserve currency, the measuring stick and for every transaction, they took their cut.
However, greed being what it is, the new found wealth meant they could ‘afford’ more (usually at other people’s and countries expense as the USA has less than 5% of the world’s population yet uses over 25% of the world’s resources); as the population grew, so too did the need for more income to pay for the additional hangers-on.
But reality is that everything is finite; there is only so much potable water on the planet, arable soil and the energy and materials to make fertilizers; growth or more importantly population growth is required to drive demand and as more money was created by various schemes in America, this soon outstripped the real money; people no longer are able or willing to borrow from their future to buy stuff today.
So what does someone do if they can’t get the money they need to keep the system going … well in the USA’s situation, they just borrow more and if they can’t borrow it, they just print more and of course others looked away, but the doubt is there.
The Arab states were looking to the ‘Gulf’ as a new / replacement currency similar to the Euro; China – now the most affluent country – is looking for ways to have the Yuan as a more stable reserve currency and we see various fluctuations where we compare the AUS$ to the US$ but more importantly the Yen and the Euro; the English £ will soon follow the US$. Full Story
The hunt is on in Custer State Park, both for trophy elk and for a disease that might be causing a 50 percent decline in elk-calf numbers.
http://www.rapidcityjournal.com/articles/2009/09/27/news/top/doc4abec1c08965a791165989.txtSunday, September 27, 2009 - Park officials are getting help from hunters in the elk seasons that began in the park this fall. Along with the regular requirement that bagged elk must be checked in with Game, Fish & Parks officers, elk hunters in the park are also being given needles and vials to use to take blood samples immediately after they shoot an elk.
The blood is then tested for a variety of diseases that could be affecting reproductive rates and calf survival.
"We've had a couple years of poor calf production, so we're going to look first at the bulls and later on at the cows," park resources program manager Gary Brundige said. "We don't have an idea that we have a disease issue, other than the fact that we've had poor calf production. We want some idea of why that production is down."
The herd in the park is down dramatically from a high of more than 1,100 elk a decade ago to about 450, based on a survey last February. The 1,100 level was considered to be too many elk, based on the management plan for the herd and carrying capacity of the habitat in the park.
Current.com | GMO whistleblower on trial in Germany
A well known critic of GM in Germany and a whistleblower on the corruption and sleaze surrounding its introduction there is facing two major court cases and a possible prison sentence.The first case involves a court appearance at Giessen on September 30th as a result of the decontamination of some GM barley in Giessen in 2007 - a field trial of the University there. This could lead to a lengthy prison sentence, as two of the 'field liberators' were previously sentenced to 6 months in prison and the prosecutor appealed against this sentence on the grounds that it was too lenient! Full Story
SeekingAlpha.com | House Agriculture Chairman Eager to Regulate Derivatives
September 27, 2009 - Cargill and the National Rural Electric Cooperatives Association (NRN) said Sept. 18 that proposed regulation of financial derivatives could make it harder for them to do business, but House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson, D-Minn., said he thinks the issues for “end users” can be resolved and that he is determined to tighten up on derivatives because their misuse was a key element in last year’s financial crisis. . . .
Peterson said at the hearing he wants to make changes in the proposal to avoid higher costs, but he added, “We are not going back to the system we had before. I want to make sure the risk out there is going to be borne by the people doing the business, not by the government.” Peterson also told reporters he fears the “big players” — big banks that sell derivatives — are trying to get exemptions. . . .Full Story
BusinessWeek.com | Goldman Sachs investment lifts Chinese carmaker Geely
Similar to Warren Buffett's bet on BYD last year, Goldman Sachs' play likely will make Geely stand out among Chinese car companiesFull Story
Examiner.com | Tornadoes in 2009: Well below average through September
With the El Nino effect expected to increase, the number of tornadoes will probably be a bit above average during the fall, but so far 2009 has shaped up to be a year with 15% fewer than average tornadoes.
In fact, looking at all years from 1954-2007, the year 2009 is just above the 10% line for this point in the season. This means only 5 or 6 years during this period have had equal or lower tornado counts. So far there have been just over 1000 tornadoes reported nationally (adjusted for duplicate reports).
US MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX COMES UP WITH EXPENSIVE NEW BOMB | Drone crashes into office building - do we need drone alerts?
"We can confirm that an unmanned aerial reconnaissance vehicle crashed" on Saturday, a military statement said, adding that there had been no reported injuries. An American aerial surveillance drone crashed into the offices of an Iraqi political party in the northern city of Mosul, the US military said on Sunday.
It said there was currently no indication that the aircraft, which hit the offices of the Iraqi Islamic Party, had crashed as a result of "enemy action," but added that the incident was under investigation. American soldiers recovered the drone and were discussing repairs to the building with local officials. Full Story
Real news from Aspen, Colorado would confront the corporate-government media's baloney of green shoots and happy days are just about here again!
Officials Tell Colorado Residents to Be "Mean" to the Bears ABC News - September 27, 2009 - 21 hours ago. Residents fight back as scarce food causes bears to disrupt community. ""Bears are emblematic of the Aspen community,"," said Aspen resident Mark Goodman. ...
Colorado Struggles to Run Bears Out of Town Wall Street Journal - - Sep 1, 2009
In Aspen, the hardest-hit town, police have received more than 460 calls for help dealing with bears since July 1, including 15 during one 24-hour period ...Bear Territory: One wild night in Aspen Fox 31 KDVR.comBear injures sleeping Aspen woman Aspen Daily NewsAspen digs deep for green marketing; local bears largely unimpressed The Colorado Independent
City of Aspen lays off 12, cuts 4 jobs Grand Junction Free Press
ASPEN, Colo. (AP) — The city of Aspen has laid off 12 employees, and it is eliminating four other positions to cope with plunging tax revenue. The cuts Thursday are expected to save $1.36 million.
The city previously cut $2.4 million in its 2009 general fund budget, which included eliminating or freezing 20 positions and laying off nine employees.
In February, the city froze employee salaries and eliminated or reduced some benefits and bonuses to save about $1.4 million. Salaries also are being frozen for 2010.
Through July, sales tax collections were down 18 percent from the same time last year, while lodging taxes were down 27 percent. Building and planning fees were down 46 percent through August compared with last year.
Burlington Northern Sante Fee proposed KC Intermodal Facility (KCIMF) requires stimulus fund $50 Million Tiger Grant
BNSF Railway Company (BNSF) today said that the state of Kansas' application for a $50 million Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) grant to help launch the construction of a new intermodal facility near Kansas City will have a significant impact on improving freight mobility and the economy in Kansas.
BNSF's proposed Kansas City Intermodal Facility (KCIMF), located southwest of Kansas City near Edgerton, would help to cumulatively generate thousands of jobs; enhance the region's economic development; and reduce Kansas' congestion and emissions by shifting more goods movement to rail.
The proposed intermodal facility would feature LEED certified buildings, innovative green technology such as wide-span electric cranes that produce zero emissions on site, and automated gate systems that improve truck throughput and reduce idling.
If the state's request for TIGER funds for this project is granted, construction of the facility could begin in 2010.
Taken down by YouTube???? YouTube | Camp Fema Movie - Produced by William Lewis and Gary Franchi documenting the FEMA Camps (11 videos)
In a country born out of political dissent, we watch our leaders in Washington slowly pass bills that label ordinary Americans as thought criminals and potential domestic terrorists for simply questioning the actions of their government. We see third party candidates and their impassioned supporters listed in secret government reports that call their allegiance into question and brand them as fanatics and extremists.
Senate committee hearings and official FBI documents further illustrate the mindset of our elected officials as they classify homeschoolers, gun rights activists and anti-abortionists as threats against the existing social and political order; by default creating an entire nation of radicals and revolutionaries - where everyone is a suspect equally guilty until proven otherwise.
How has our government shown that they will deal with these people? The same way as every other totalitarian regime throughout history - marginalize their activities then lock them up. Prisons are being built; internment camps constructed and laws passed that deal severely with anyone who dares to step out of line or ask too many questions.
Who are the potential domestic terrorists that will end up in these camps? Read the documentation for yourself and hear what our experts have to say. States rights take a front row seat in this new political thriller that is guaranteed to send shivers up your spine. Find out where the true power of the people rests in halting these treasonous activities NOW!
AMEinfo.com | Dubai set to become world's fourth biggest aviation hub
RELATED
AMEinfo.com | Services begin into Gulf Air's second destination in Iraq, Najaf
The packed Gulf Air flight, operated by an Airbus 320 aircraft, carried a delegation of senior officials from Gulf Air as well as government, business, religious, diplomatic and media representatives and a number of guests.
FULL STORY