2 Triple attacks kill 19 in western Iraqi city
by Bassim al-Anbari, AFP
2 hrs 42 mins ago
| RAMADI, Iraq (AFP) - Twin car bombs and an apparently coordinated suicide attack killed 19 people in Iraq's western city of Ramadi on Sunday, in an explosion of violence blamed on police collusion.
Officials said more than 80 people were injured in the blasts, which shattered a relative lull in Iraqi violence.
The two car bombs exploded in quick succession in Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province, near the offices of the provincial governor while a meeting was in progress, a police official said.
"The attacks killed 19 people, including nine police," an interior ministry official told AFP. "Eighty-one other people are wounded and 30 cars are completely burned." |
3 Afghan vote fraud 'significant': UN special envoy
by Lynne O'Donnell, AFP
1 hr 26 mins ago
| KABUL (AFP) - The UN's special representative to Afghanistan acknowledged Sunday for the first time that the country's presidential election had been tainted by "significant" and "widespread" fraud.
Kai Eide called a news conference to counter allegations by his sacked deputy, Peter Galbraith, that he had concealed evidence of vote fraud.
Eide said the United Nations supported vote fraud investigations which are under way and due to be completed, and a final result announced, in days. |
4 Pakistan nukes safe despite militant threat: Clinton
by Lachlan Carmichael, AFP
2 hrs 50 mins ago
| LONDON (AFP) - US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Sunday the latest militant attack in Pakistan shows an "increasing" threat to the state, but voiced confidence Islamabad was in control of its nuclear arsenal.
Clinton told reporters in London that the militants' brazen bid to storm the Pakistani military headquarters in Rawalpindi on Saturday highlighted the scale of the threat.
The attack brought renewed US focus on Pakistan, which has won praise from Washington for its new crackdown on militants, just as the Obama administration tries to revise its strategy in neighboring Afghanistan. |
5 Killer earthquakes shake scientific thought
by Talek Harris, AFP
Sun Oct 11, 2:13 am ET
| SYDNEY (AFP) - A sudden cluster of massive earthquakes which has shaken Asia-Pacific communities and likely left thousands dead has also jolted some scientists, who are starting to question conventional thought.
Experts who dismissed notions that far-away quakes could be linked are beginning to think again after huge tremors rocked Samoa and Indonesia on the same day, followed by another major convulsion in Vanuatu.
Some 184 people died in the terrifying tsunami which smashed Samoa, American Samoa and Tonga on September 30, while thousands are feared dead after parts of Indonesia's Padang city were reduced to rubble just hours later. |
6 Lohan's celebrity catwalk dismays fashion world
by Paula Bustamante, AFP
Sun Oct 11, 3:30 am ET
| LOS ANGELES (AFP) - Lindsay Lohan's widely panned appearance on Paris catwalks for luxury label Ungaro could signal a shift away from high end brands seeking creative input from celebrities, analysts say.
Lohan was hired by Ungaro in September as an "artistic advisor" to the fashion house's new chief designer Estrella Archs, with a brief to give the label a "cooler" look, according to president Mounir Moufarrige.
But the alliance got off to a catastrophic start with global critics trashing the brightly colored collection unveiled at Paris Fashion Week as a gaudy series of sartorial faux pas. |
7 French culture minister in new scandal after 'boy sex' row
AFP
Sat Oct 10, 4:02 pm ET
| BORDEAUX, France (AFP) - French Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand was back in the spotlight Saturday for standing as character reference for two rapists after a row over his admission of paying "boys" for sex.
Mitterrand, an urbane television personality and a nephew of former Socialist president Francois Mitterrand, adopted a pugnacious tone and threatened legal action over what he said was a "new orchestrated campaign of insensitive calumny."
Mitterrand told a news conference in Bordeaux, southwestern France, that he "will launch legal action against those who are complicit in the latest ignominy." |
8 Commandos storm Pakistan army HQ, freeing 39 hostages
by Masroor Gilani, AFP
Sun Oct 11, 7:53 am ET
| RAWALPINDI, Pakistan (AFP) - Commandos stormed Pakistan's army headquarters Sunday ending a day-long hostage drama and freeing 39 people held by militants who brazenly struck at the heart of the military establishment.
Three hostages, two soldiers and four suspected Taliban militants were killed in a rescue operation hailed by the military as "highly successful", despite a total of 19 people dead since the start of the assault.
Six soldiers and four other militants had already been killed in the nearly 24-hour siege, which began Saturday in the garrison city of Rawalpindi and was the third dramatic militant strike in the nuclear-armed nation in a week. |
9 Coup amnesty off the table as Honduras talks pause
by Isabel Sanchez, AFP
Sun Oct 11, 5:51 am ET
| TEGUCIGALPA (AFP) - Deposed Honduran President Manuel Zelaya and the interim government have agreed to create a joint cabinet and ditch an amnesty for coup leaders, one of the negotiators announced.
But the de facto government imposed new restrictions on the media aimed at controlling the flow of information about the country's political crisis.
A government decree published in the official Gazette Saturday gave authorities the right to "revoke and cancel" licenses of radio and television stations considered to be a threat to "national security" and accused of spreading "hatred." |
10 High hurdles for IMF on road to new world order
by Veronica Smith, AFP
Sun Oct 11, 12:44 am ET
| WASHINGTON (AFP) - The International Monetary Fund, rising from villain to saviour through the fires of the global economic crisis, faces steep hurdles in trying to transform into the champion of the new world order.
The IMF's annual meetings with the World Bank in Istanbul last week showcased the newfound punching weight of the major emerging economies like China and India.
Only a week earlier the largest emerging countries joined with the seven richest at the Group of 20 Pittsburgh summit in agreeing a framework for sustainable recovery and financial system reform that considerably boosted IMF responsibilities. |
11 Obama pledges to repeal military's gay ban
by Olivia Hampton, AFP
Sat Oct 10, 11:07 pm ET
| WASHINGTON (AFP) - President Barack Obama promised gay and lesbian activists he will repeal a ban on gays in the US military, rebuking complaints he has not honored his promises to fight for equal rights.
"I will end 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell.' That's my commitment to you," Obama said during a rousing speech before some 3,000 activists at an event organized by the country's biggest lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights organization.
"We should not be punishing patriotic Americans who have stepped forward to serve this country. We should be celebrating their willingness to show such courage and selflessness on behalf of their fellow citizens, especially when we're fighting two wars." |
Bullshit.
12 Where's the beef?
by John Aravosis (DC)
10/10/2009 08:40:00 PM
| Joe's reaction to Obama's gay speech is up on the gay blog.
As for my take... Barack Obama just promised us that if he becomes president, he's going to repeal Don't Ask Don't Tell, the Defense of Marriage Act, and get ENDA passed. It was a bit surreal. I'm sitting at a fundraiser for the No on 1 effort in Maine (that Obama didn't even bother to mention), and we were all just speechless (actually, hardly speechless - and I thought yelling at the TV was long since over). Obama repeated his campaign promises. That was it.
What's particularly disturbing is how President Obama contradicts himself, and his own administration, when talking to a gay crowd. The president claimed that he's for treating gay couples just like married couples. Then why is he against letting gay couples marry? The president claimed that it doesn't matter if we're at war and working on health care and lots of other important issues, we must forget ahead on gay civil rights. Then why is Obama's own administration putting out the talking point that they can't move ahead on gay rights until the wars are over, until health care is over, until Obama has less on his plate? Even General Jones last week said we can't do DADT because we're at war in Iraq and Afghanistan. But President Obama claimed today that precisely because we're at war it is important to lift the ban now.
Huh?
What did President Obama say new tonight? Absolutely nothing. What did the Human Rights Campaign get in exchange for once again giving our president cover for all of his broken promises to our community? Absolutely nothing.
I like HRC, I know a lot of people who work there, I've defended them when others in the community have been highly critical of them. But it is criminal that any gay rights organization would invite an embattled president to their dinner, giving him political cover for repeated broken promises and slaps in the face to our community (like the DOMA incest brief), and then get absolutely nothing in return. HRC's actions only feed the suspicions of critics who say that the organization is more interested in fundraisers than in advancing our rights.
All in all, the evening was a disappointment, but not unexpected. President Obama doesn't do controversy, and we, my friends, are controversy. So, the bad blood between this administration and the gay community will remain, and continue to worsen. It's unfortunate, but at some point you have to have enough dignity to say enough is enough. The Obama administration doesn't respect our community, and doesn't respect the seriousness of our cause. It's our job to hold them accountable. And we will. |
13 U.N. mission chief denies Afghan fraud cover-up
By Peter Graff and Akram Walizada, Reuters
Sun Oct 11, 9:44 am ET
| KABUL (Reuters) - The head of the United Nations mission in Afghanistan denied accusations on Sunday that he had helped cover up election fraud, and said he still believed a result could be reached that Afghans would find credible.
In strongly-worded remarks at a news conference, Kai Eide said allegations by a U.S. diplomat who was fired as his deputy were false and undermined the election process.
Eide appeared at the news conference flanked by the U.S., British and French ambassadors, which he said was an "expression of international unity in the work that we are doing." |
14 U.S. experts train Iraqis to tackle bomb scourge
By Mohammed Abbas, Reuters
Sun Oct 11, 7:14 am ET
| CAMP TAJI, Iraq (Reuters) - The robot scout and the lumbering man in a sealed helmet bring space travel to mind, but in this Iraqi desert moonscape they are part of training for one of the most dangerous jobs on Earth.
At Camp Taji, a U.S. military base near Baghdad, bomb disposal experts are teaching Iraqis to take over once they leave, their withdrawal due by 2012 under a U.S.-Iraqi pact.
Although violence has fallen sharply in Iraq since the worst of the violence after the 2003 U.S. invasion, bombings still kill scores of people each month. Two huge truck bombs in central Baghdad killed almost 100 people on August 19 alone. |
15 Gay rights advocates march on DC, divided on Obama
By BRETT ZONGKER, Associated Press Writer
37 mins ago
| WASHINGTON - Thousands of gay and lesbian activists marched Sunday from the White House to the Capitol, demanding that President Barack Obama keep his promises to allow gays to serve openly in the military and work to end discrimination against gays.
Rainbow flags and homemade signs dotted the crowds filling Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House as people chanted "Hey, Obama, let mama marry mama" and "We're out, we're proud, we won't back down." Many children were also among the protesters. A few counter-protesters had also joined the crowd, which stretched several blocks by the afternoon.
Jason Yanowitz, a 37-year-old computer programmer from Chicago, held his daughter, 5-year-old Amira, on his shoulders. His partner, Annie, had their 2-year-old son, Isiah, in a stroller. Yanowitz said more straight people were turning out to show their support for gay rights. |
16 Attacks demonstrate Taliban resurgence in Pakistan
By RAVI NESSMAN, Associated Press Writer
51 mins ago
| ISLAMABAD - A week of terror strikes across Pakistan, capped by a stunning assault on army headquarters, show the Taliban have rebounded and appear determined to shake the nation's resolve as the military plans for an offensive against the group's stronghold on the Afghan border.
The 22-hour attack on Pakistan's "Pentagon" in the city of Rawalpindi, which ended with 20 dead Sunday, was the third terror attack in a week to shake this nuclear-armed nation. It demonstrated the militants' renewed strength since their leader was killed by a U.S. missile strike in August and military operations against their bases.
The U.S. has long pushed Islamabad to take more action against Taliban and al-Qaida militants, who are also blamed for attacks on U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan, and the army carried out a successful campaign against the militants in the Swat Valley in the spring. |
17 UN chief acknowledges fraud in Afghan vote
By HEIDI VOGT, Associated Press Writers
2 hrs 13 mins ago
| KABUL - The top U.N. official in Afghanistan on Sunday acknowledged "widespread fraud" in the disputed presidential election and rejected allegations from a former deputy that he covered up cheating to smooth the path to victory for President Hamid Karzai.
The remarks by Norwegian diplomat Kai Eide appeared designed to win back respect for both the troubled U.N. mission and the entire election process ahead of a ruling by investigators on whether fraud was extensive enough in the Aug. 20 balloting to require a runoff.
Eide's reputation was tarnished when his deputy Peter Galbraith alleged that the U.N. mission chief downplayed allegations of widespread ballot-stuffing by Karzai's supporters. Galbraith, the top-ranking American in the U.N. mission, was fired Sept. 30 by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon after the widely publicized dispute. |
18 Series of car bombs kills 19 in western Iraq
By REBECCA SANTANA, Associated Press Writer
2 hrs 8 mins ago
| BAGHDAD - A spate of car bombings killed 19 people Sunday in Iraq's western Anbar province, once a hotbed of insurgency that later become a showcase for restoring peace.
The province was the scene of some of the most intense fighting by U.S. troops during the insurgency. Violence tapered off significantly after local tribes decided to align themselves with U.S. forces instead of al-Qaida in what is widely considered to be one of the key turning points of the Iraq war.
A reinvigorated insurgency in Anbar would pose a grave danger to Iraq's fragile stability as it prepares for crucial parliamentary elections early next year. |
19 In 2008 Afghanistan firefight, US weapons failed
By RICHARD LARDNER, Associated Press Writer
1 hr 38 mins ago
| WASHINGTON - It was chaos during the early morning assault last year on a remote U.S. outpost in Afghanistan and Staff Sgt. Erich Phillips' M4 carbine had quit firing as militant forces surrounded the base. The machine gun he grabbed after tossing the rifle aside didn't work either.
When the battle in the small village of Wanat ended, nine U.S. soldiers lay dead and 27 more were wounded. A detailed study of the attack by a military historian found that weapons failed repeatedly at a "critical moment" during the firefight on July 13, 2008, putting the outnumbered American troops at risk of being overrun by nearly 200 insurgents.
Which raises the question: Eight years into the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan, do U.S. armed forces have the best guns money can buy? |
McNamara's wonders. Failed in Vietnam and failing again 40 years later. So are the ideas.
20 2012 isn't the end of the world, Mayans insist
By MARK STEVENSON, Associated Press Writer
Sun Oct 11, 3:58 am ET
| MEXICO CITY - Apolinario Chile Pixtun is tired of being bombarded with frantic questions about the Mayan calendar supposedly "running out" on Dec. 21, 2012. After all, it's not the end of the world.
Or is it?
Definitely not, the Mayan Indian elder insists. "I came back from England last year and, man, they had me fed up with this stuff." |
Fuck you History Channel.
21 Czech president last obstacle for EU reform treaty
By KAREL JANICEK and GEORGE JAHN, Associated Press Writers
Sun Oct 11, 9:25 am ET
| PRAGUE - The Irish finally said yes, and the Poles did Saturday, but the EU reform treaty still has a huge hurdle to clear. A "no" from the lone holdout - Czech President Vaclav Klaus - could cripple plans to transform Europe into a global player.
For most European leaders the treaty is a big step toward a European Union that is more effective, more accountable and better prepared to address big issues on the world stage.
Not so for the vehemently Euro-skeptic Klaus, who has been tirelessly attacking the treaty - and now finds himself in the unique position of potentially blocking it. |
22 Turkey bars Israel from military drill
By ARON HELLER, Associated Press Writer
1 hr 24 mins ago
| JERUSALEM - Turkey has called off an international military drill because it opposed Israel's participation, Israeli defense officials said Sunday, a move that sent strained relations between the two nations to a new low.
Turkey has long been the Jewish state's best friend in the Muslim world. But ties have deteriorated dramatically since Israel's war last winter against Islamic militants in the Gaza Strip, which killed hundreds of civilians.
Turkey, a secular country ruled by an Islamic-oriented party, strongly condemned the Israeli offensive. Tensions soared after Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan stormed out of a high-profile conference where he confronted Israel's president over steep Palestinian civilian casualties. |
23 Turkey: Armenia must pull out of Nagorno-Karabakh
By SUZAN FRASER, Associated Press Writer
55 mins ago
| ANKARA, Turkey - One day after Turkey signed a deal the U.S. helped salvage to end a century of enmity with Armenia, Turkey's leader set a tough condition for normalizing ties on Sunday: Armenia must withdraw from the disputed enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh.
The statement appeared to be an effort by Turkey to appease its close ally Azerbaijan, which said the new agreement will aggravate the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Nagorno-Karabakh is an Armenian-occupied enclave in Azerbaijan.
On Sunday, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan hailed the agreement to establish diplomatic ties with Armenia and reopen their border. He called such steps with a former bitter foe an "important step" that would lead to cooperation and dialogue. |
24 Priest who lived with leprosy now a saint
By FRANCES D'EMILIO, Associated Press Writer
1 hr 6 mins ago
| VATICAN CITY - A 19th-century priest whose courageous work with leprosy patients in Hawaii has been likened to the efforts of those battling the stigma of AIDS was elevated to sainthood Sunday by Pope Benedict XVI, along with four other Catholics he hailed as heroes of holiness.
Among the 10,000 pilgrims packing St. Peter's Basilica was Hawaii resident Audrey Toguchi, an 80-year-old retired school teacher whose recovery from lung cancer a decade ago stunned her doctor and was ruled a miracle by the Vatican.
Toguchi has credited her survival to praying to Belgium-born Jozef De Veuster, also known as Father Damien, who himself died from leprosy in 1889 after contracting the disease while working with ostracized patients living on Molokai island. |
25 New Lincoln exhibit tells how NYC shaped his image
By ULA ILNYTZKY, Associated Press Writer
Sat Oct 10, 9:39 pm ET
| NEW YORK - Abraham Lincoln visited New York City only five times in his life, and only once as president, yet the growing 19th-century metropolis played a central role in burnishing his enduring public image.
That's the point of a new exhibition, "Lincoln and New York," that opened Friday at the New-York Historical Society on Manhattan's Upper West Side to celebrate the bicentennial of Lincoln's birth. The exhibition runs through March 25.
It begins with Lincoln's historic speech at Cooper Union in 1860 and the iconic Mathew Brady photograph taken the same day, more than two months before he won the Republican presidential nomination. The events led Lincoln later to state: "Brady and the Cooper Union speech made me President." |
26 Oregon thinning project tests Obama forest policy
By JEFF BARNARD, Associated Press Writer
37 mins ago
| DIAMOND LAKE, Ore. - When Sharon Karr's cabin was built on the shores of this high mountain lake in 1928, there were few neighbors and little thought given to the prospects of wildfire.
There are now 102 cabins on this land on the Umpqua National Forest, and fears of a big fire have grown. Young trees have crowded in among the big ones, and an increasing number of the pines are turning red and dying from the borings of mountain pine beetles.
The Bush administration had proposed lessening fire dangers by thinning trees around the cabins and also in the backcountry. |
27 Rusting relic faces a tight river voyage in Ohio
By JAMES HANNAH, Associated Press Writer
1 hr 32 mins ago
| DAYTON, Ohio - Steam-driven paddle wheel towboats once plied Midwestern rivers by the hundreds, pushing barges to feed the nation's industrial appetite for coal and steel.
Those days are long gone, though. And the only intact, steam-driven sternwheel towboat still on the nation's river system is in danger of sinking unless preservationists can tow the vessel to a repair yard downriver to patch up its rusting hull, limboing under low bridges along the way.
For the last 54 years, the W.P. Snyder Jr. has been moored in the southeastern Ohio city of Marietta, displacing a section of the Muskingum River half the length of a football field. |
28 Vt. health reform: manage chronically ill patients
By WILSON RING, Associated Press Writer
2 hrs 10 mins ago
| SOUTH BURLINGTON, Vt. - What could play a central role reforming the nation's health care system happens in a small conference room of the Aesculapius Medical Center - two patients learning the basics of managing their diabetes.
The pilot program begun in 2003 aims to reach patients with chronic conditions, keep them healthier and, ultimately, save money by heading off expensive hospitalizations and procedures. Already, emergency room visits are down.
It's health care at its most basic, but in some ways it's revolutionary. In a system where private insurers and the government reimburse providers for treating sick patients, the physicians who treat the two diabetes patients will get more if they stay healthy. |
29 Phase 1 of PCB removal on Hudson River completed
By MICHAEL HILL, Associated Press Writer
2 hrs 12 mins ago
| FORT EDWARD, N.Y. - Crews dredging a polluted stretch of the upper Hudson River this year battled high water, old logging debris and unexpected levels of PCB contamination that slowed progress.
But as the first phase of one of the most costliest and complex federal Superfund projects wraps up this month, regulators say results are generally positive and show dredging can work. They are already preparing for a far more expansive second phase, which would clean up 40 miles of river and likely push total project costs over $700 million.
"We took on Mother Nature. She threw everything at us but the kitchen sink, from timber, to boats that were sunk, to tree branches," said George Pavlou, acting regional administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency. "We prevailed in the end." |
30 Smart grid gets island test in Maui resort area
By MARK NIESSE, Associated Press Writer
2 hrs 47 mins ago
| HONOLULU - A 4-square-mile patch of Maui in the nation's most fossil-fuel dependent state soon will be home to a new kind of power grid, one that saves energy by turning off household appliances when electricity is expensive and makes better use of wind and solar power.
General Electric Co. recently announced it would test its "smart grid" technology in the luxury resort community of Wailea, hoping to reduce peak electricity consumption there by 15 percent by 2012.
Planners envision installing a new kind of power meter in homes - a wall-based unit that can monitor how much electricity is being used by various appliances and turn them off when it's most expensive. The project also would upgrade the utility's computer systems so that it can integrate more renewable energy. |
31 Prison time, felony charges rare for relic looters
By MIKE STARK, Associated Press Writer
2 hrs 57 mins ago
| SALT LAKE CITY - Stepping into the afternoon sun last month, Jeanne Redd and her daughter Jericca walked away from a federal courthouse with probation papers - not prison time - for their role in the theft and illegal trafficking of Indian artifacts.
Some, including one of the Salt Lake City's daily newspapers, expressed frustration that the judge didn't come down harder on the duo from southern Utah.
History however says the punishment for the Redds, who pleaded guilty to several felonies, was fairly typical. Despite high-profile arrests and indictments, most people convicted of illegally digging up, collecting and cashing in on artifacts in the United States don't go to prison. |
32 A darker side of Columbus emerges in US classrooms
By CHRISTINE ARMARIO, Associated Press Writer
Sun Oct 11, 10:43 am ET
| TAMPA, Fla. - Jeffrey Kolowith's kindergarten students read a poem about Christopher Columbus, take a journey to the New World on three paper ships and place the explorer's picture on a timeline through history.
Kolowith's students learn about the explorer's significance - though they also come away with a more nuanced picture of Columbus than the noble discoverer often portrayed in pop culture and legend.
"I talk about the situation where he didn't even realize where he was," Kolowith said. "And we talked about how he was very, very mean, very bossy." |
33 Iraqis face tough times, starting over in America
By SHARON COHEN and LISA ORKIN EMMANUEL, Associated Press Writers
Sun Oct 11, 12:02 am ET
| Her mansion in Iraq was bombed, her medical career and future in her beloved country dashed the day she found a white envelope on her car windshield. Inside was a single bullet. Wassan Yassin was marked for death.
She knew she had to flee. She eventually landed in America, far from where her life was threatened, her sister was shot and her co-worker kidnapped. Her new Florida surroundings offered a haven from the horrors of war.
But there is no happy ending. Not yet, at least. |
Vietnam, 40 years later.
34 Dam breaching celebrated on famed Rogue River
By JEFF BARNARD, AP Environmental Writer Jeff Barnard, Ap Environmental Writer - Sat Oct 10, 8:12 pm ET
| ROGUE RIVER, Ore. - The wild and scenic Rogue River has become even wilder with the demolition of a dam that had hindered passage of salmon and steelhead to their spawning grounds for 88 years.
A flotilla of some 80 people in rafts, driftboats and kayaks celebrated the breaching of the Savage Rapids Dam on Saturday by floating through the remains of the concrete structure in southwest Oregon.
Among them was Jim Martin, rowing his own driftboat. His first job as a young fisheries biologist for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife was monitoring how many salmon and steelhead were killed each year by the irrigation dam. |
35 As China's economy grows, so do mounds of garbage
By CHI-CHI ZHANG, Associated Press Writer
44 mins ago
| ZHANGLIDONG, China - Visitors can smell this village long before they see it.
More than 100 dump trucks piled high with garbage line the narrow road leading to Zhanglidong, waiting to empty their loads in a landfill as big as 20 football fields.
In less than five years, the Zhengzhou Comprehensive Waste Treatment Landfill has overwhelmed this otherwise pristine village of about 1,000 people. Peaches and cherries rot on trees, infested with insect life drawn by the smell. Fields lie unharvested, contaminated by toxic muck. Every day, another 100 or so tons of garbage arrive from nearby Zhengzhou, a provincial capital of 8 million. |
36 Nasty, or nice? New mood among UK's Conservatives
By DAVID STRINGER, Associated Press Writer
Sun Oct 11, 9:51 am ET
| LONDON - Who's nasty now?
Sipping cocktails and swapping gossip on a roof terrace decorated with pink balloons and rainbow flags at a gay-oriented disco, leading figures of Britain's once-hidebound Conservative Party mingle happily with those many in its ranks once derided.
Once described - by a senior Conservative official, no less - as the "nasty party," the traditional home of Britain's sometimes intolerant upper classes has undergone something of a transformation as it bids to win power for the first time since 1997. |
37 Opposition says Kremlin fails democracy pledge test
By Conor Humphries, Reuters
1 hr 5 mins ago
| MOSCOW (Reuters) - Opposition candidates and election observers said significant violations in regional votes across Russia on Sunday showed President Dmitry Medvedev was failing to follow through on a promise to boost democracy.
Two months ago Medvedev said "new democratic times are beginning" in Russia and promised to break the near-monopoly of the Kremlin-backed United Russia party built up during the reign of predecessor turned prime minister Vladimir Putin.
But candidates in regional elections on Sunday said prohibitive entry requirements introduced under Medvedev and shrinking access to the media damaged the opposition's chances and allowed United Russia to sweep the polls. |
38 Facing massive layoffs, Russia's 'Detroit' feels the chill
by Tom Lasseter, McClatchy Newspapers
Thu Oct 8, 4:51 pm ET
| TOGLIATTI, Russia -- A chilly wind snapped at Vasily Kurikov's face at noontime Tuesday as he walked to the employment office to find a part-time job as a street cleaner.
He'd worked for 28 years at AvtoVAZ , Russia's biggest carmaker, but the factory has him on half-shifts and, like everyone else in town, he's heard that there are 27,600 job cuts coming. Looking at the people in front of him, many of them AvtoVAZ workers left to wander this city on the banks of the Volga River , Kurikov said that things could turn bad.
"Most of Togliatti works for AvtoVAZ ," he said. Kurikov's eyes squinted as he continued: "If there are mass layoffs, then our labor unions must organize strikes, and we will come to the streets and speak about our problems." |
39 Terrorists assault center of Pakistan's military HQ
By Saeed Shah, McClatchy Newspapers
Sat Oct 10, 4:06 pm ET
| ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - The nerve center of Pakistan's vast security establishment came under bold assault Saturday, with terrorists storming the military headquarters, killing six army personnel and holding up to 15 hostages late into the night.
The drama at the sprawling headquarters complex in Rawalpindi began at 11.30a.m. local time and continued all day and into the night, watched live on TV by an appalled nation. Late Saturday, commandos were preparing to storm a building in the headquarters, where four to five gunmen were holding their captives.
It was the third major terrorist attack to hit Pakistan in six days, and likely was a warning from Pakistani Taliban of the bloodshed that will ensue from the country's planned Washington -backed military offensive in the Waziristan region, the base of country's extremism and an important refuge for insurgents fighting in neighboring Afghanistan . |
40 Terrorist attack in Pakistan shows how vulnerable it is
By Saeed Shah, McClatchy Newspapers
43 mins ago
| ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - The devastating terrorist assault on Pakistan's military headquarters, which ended early Sunday after nearly 24 hours, exposed the threat of extremist groups operating in the heart of the country and the vulnerability of its most sensitive sites, raising concerns over the security of its nuclear arsenal.
"The only thing that stands between al Qaida and nuclear weapons is the Pakistan army," said Shaun Gregory , a professor at Britain's Bradford University and an expert on Pakistan's nuclear weapons. "It is an incredible shock that terrorists can strike at the heart of GHQ (general headquarters)...Terrorists could mount this sort of assault against Pakistan's nuclear installations."
The raid and ensuing hostage crisis resulted in 11 army personnel and civilians dying inside the military complex in Rawalpindi, while nine terrorists were killed and their ringleader was captured, injured but alive. A rescue operation early Sunday brought out 39 hostages, but left three others dead. The onslaught came just before the army begins a planned U.S.-backed offensive against the Pakistani Taliban in the country's wild Waziristan region on the border with Afghanistan , the hub of extremism in Pakistan . |
41 Officials: Obama advisers are downplaying Afghan dangers
By Jonathan S. Landay, John Walcott and Nancy A. Youssef, McClatchy Newspapers
Sun Oct 11, 6:00 am ET
| WASHINGTON - As the Obama administration reconsiders its Afghanistan policy, White House officials are minimizing warnings from the intelligence community, the military and the State Department about the risks of adopting a limited strategy focused on al Qaida , U.S. intelligence, diplomatic and military officials told McClatchy .
Recent U.S. intelligence assessments have found that the Taliban and other Pakistan based groups that are fighting U.S.led forces have much closer ties to al Qaida now than they did before 9/11, would allow the terrorist network to re-establish bases in Afghanistan and would help Osama bin Laden export his radical brand of Islam to Afghanistan's neighbors and beyond, the officials said.
McClatchy interviewed more than 15 senior and mid-level U.S. intelligence, military and diplomatic officials, all of whom said they concurred with the assessments. All of them requested anonymity because the assessments are classified and the officials weren't authorized to speak publicly. |
42 Afghanistan: Taliban Attacks on NATO Convoys Increase
By TIM MCGIRK / KABUL, Time Magazine
Wed Oct 7, 11:05 pm ET
| To supply nearly 100,000 troops in Afghanistan, the U.S. and its Western allies rely on road convoys with dozens of trucks to carry in everything from jet fuel to frozen pizza. But increasingly these convoys are coming under savage attack by the Taliban. And experts say that if the ambushes get worse, it could impair NATO's efforts to keep a supply lifeline running to its troops in forts and camps scattered across the mountainous country. |
43 New Rights, and Challenges, for Saudi Women
By ANDREW LEE BUTTERS / RIYADH, Time Magazine
Sat Oct 10, 2:00 pm ET
| Like those of its competitors in New York or London, the sleek glass and steel offices of media company Rotana are filled with preening attitude and fashion-conscious staffers: assistants teeter in shoes that might have absorbed much of their monthly paycheck; executives parade the halls in power suits and pencil skirts. But Rotana isn't in New York or London; it's in Riyadh, capital of Saudi Arabia, a country in which women normally adhere to a strict dress code in public - a black cloak called an abaya, a headscarf and a veil, the niqab, which covers everything but their eyes. |
44 Costa Rica's President: It's Not Easy Staying Green
By TIM ROGERS / SAN JOSE, Time Magazine
Sat Oct 10, 3:00 pm ET
| From the ubiquitous T-shirts sporting a red-eyed tree frog clinging to an Imperial beer bottle, to the best-selling postcards featuring the flamboyant poison-dart frog holding court in the rainforest, Costa Ricans today identify with frogs the way Russians relate to bears. That's because Costa Rica over the past generation has built a reputation as one of the world's greenest countries. It so jealously guards its environment that 26% of its territory is under national park protection, its eco-tourism sector is a $2 billion-a-year cash cow and its forest cover has actually doubled since the 1980s - thanks to more trees per capita being planted there than anywhere else. "Cutting down a single tree in Costa Rica is cause for scandal," says Pedro Leon, head of the administration's Peace With Nature Initiative. |
45 The Soldier And the State
By ANDREW MARSHALL, Time Magazine
1 hr 6 mins ago
| Among Manchester United Football Club's 300 million or so supporters worldwide are two Burmese men whose love of the game spans generations. One is a stout, bespectacled, betel nut - chewing septuagenarian, the other his favorite teenage grandson, and like many of their soccer-mad compatriots they stay up late into Burma's tropical nights to watch live broadcasts from faraway England. So far, so normal. But knowing the grandfather in this touching scene is Senior General Than Shwe, the xenophobic chief of Burma's junta, makes it seem all wrong. Rabidly anti-Western, yet pro-Wayne Rooney, is this the tyrant we know and hate? |
| From Yahoo News U.S. News |
46 Ariz. undertaker seeks to revive dying Kan. town
By ROXANA HEGEMAN, Associated Press Writer
Sun Oct 11, 2:45 pm ET
| PRESTON, Kan. - Like hundreds of small towns across rural America, Preston has boarded-up storefronts lining its Main Street. The roof has fallen in at the long-abandoned high school, while peeling paint and broken windows disfigure once stately, now vacant homes. This central Kansas farming town of 170 people is dying - and an Arizona undertaker has a plan to bring it back to life.
Two massive concrete grain elevators mark this as an iconic Kansas farming community, a cluster of homes tucked among undulating fields of wheat, corn and soybeans in Pratt County. For all its simple beauty, the county has slowly hemorrhaged residents: Since 1930, nearly 30 percent have left, making it an all-too-common anecdote of a fading prairie population.
But for Arizona transplants Ken and Donna Stanton, it's the perfect place to build a mortuary and crematorium, the unlikely cornerstone of an ambitious community revitalization plan that features Old West-styled building facades, old-time street lights and faux-board sidewalks. |
47 Battle over Chrysler plays out in Wisconsin town
By Bernie Woodall, Reuters
Sun Oct 11, 2:10 pm ET
| KENOSHA, Wisconsin (Reuters) - The auto boom came fast to this harbor town on Lake Michigan where Ramblers first rolled off the line a century ago.
But the bust has been just as dramatic and decades in the making. Nash gave way to AMC, then Chrysler, then bankruptcy.
Now Kenosha finds itself at the front of a battle by auto workers and allies to persuade Fiat SpA and the Obama administration to rewrite the terms of the fast-march restructuring of Chrysler to save jobs. |
48 Emails, Wall St crisis key in Bear Stearns trial
By Grant McCool, Reuters
1 hr 43 mins ago
| NEW YORK (Reuters) - When two former Bear Stearns hedge fund managers go on trial on Tuesday on charges they misled investors over risky securities, their attorneys may have to fight a perception that Wall Street is in the dock over the financial crisis.
Big money managers Ralph Cioffi and Matthew Tannin are the first Wall Streeters from a listed company that was bailed out by the government in 2008 to be criminally charged. The bailout paved the way for JPMorgan Chase & Co to take over Bear Stearns.
The indictment neither charges the pair of causing the company's demise nor contributing to the financial crisis, but defense lawyers will be keen to weed out potential jurors who may harbor such biases. |
49 Foreclosures mark pace of enduring U.S. housing crisis
By Tom Brown, Reuters
Thu Oct 8, 11:18 am ET
| MIAMI (Reuters) - Every 13 seconds in America, there is another foreclosure filing.
That's the rhythm of a crisis that threatens to choke off hopes for a recovery in the U.S. housing market as it destroys hundreds of billions of dollars in property values a year.
There are more than 6,600 home foreclosure filings per day, according to the Center for Responsible Lending, a nonpartisan watchdog group based in Durham, North Carolina. With nearly two million already this year, the flood of foreclosures shows no sign of abating any time soon. |
50 U.S. lawmakers agree to Guantanamo prisoner transfer
By Andy Sullivan, Reuters
Wed Oct 7, 6:42 pm ET
| WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. lawmakers reached an agreement on Wednesday that would allow the Obama administration to bring more terrorism suspects from the Guantanamo Bay prison to the United States to face trial.
The agreement removes one of many roadblocks the administration faces as it tries to empty the internationally condemned prison by January.
The measure will face a tough vote in the House of Representatives, which voted last week to keep suspects held at the detention center at the U.S. naval base in Cuba off U.S. soil entirely. |
51 USOC to tap new CEO; Streeter not a candidate
By Ben Klayman, Reuters
Wed Oct 7, 5:28 pm ET
| CHICAGO (Reuters) - Five days after Chicago was eliminated in the first round of voting to determine the host city for the 2016 Summer Games, the U.S. Olympic Committee has launched a search for a new chief executive.
The USOC said it would hire a national recruiting firm by the end of the month to identify candidates, but acting CEO Stephanie Streeter had notified the board she would not be a candidate. She will remain CEO until the search is completed.
Streeter cited a desire to return to the corporate world for her decision, which will result in the USOC's sixth CEO over the last decade. |
52 Dollar facing 'power-shift': analysts
by Roland Jackson, AFP
Sun Oct 11, 3:18 pm ET
| LONDON (AFP) - The dollar's position as the world's leading reserve currency faces increased pressure as the financial crisis allows emerging economies greater influence on the world stage, analysts said.
A report last week in The Independent claiming that China, Russia and Gulf States are among nations prepared to ditch the dollar for oil trades has heightened the uncertainty surrounding the US currency's future.
The dollar slumped against rivals last week in the wake of the British daily's controversial report. |
53 Studio shake-up reflects changing Hollywood
by Romain Raynaldy, AFP
Sun Oct 11, 3:49 am ET
| LOS ANGELES (AFP) - Management shake-ups at movie giants Universal and Disney reflect the industry's difficulty in adjusting to the digital age and failure to halt sliding DVD sales, analysts say.
In the space of a few weeks, Disney has shown the door to its respected and long-serving chairman Dick Cook while Universal wielded the axe on co-chairmen Marc Shmuger and David Linde on Monday.
"These shifts expose a serious stress that is bubbling to the surface throughout the entertainment industry, and especially theatrical motion pictures," said Jason Squire, a film industry expert at the University of Southern California and editor of "The Movie Business Book." |
54 Cisco shines light on dark corners of the Web
by Glenn Chapman, AFP
Fri Oct 9, 10:09 am ET
| SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) - Cisco launched software that shines light on potentially troublesome websites hidden in what the US computer security firm dubbed the "Dark Web."
Cisco IronPort Web Usage Controls promise to identify as much as 90 percent of "egregious" content that has escaped detection by business IT managers and security applications because of its stealthy nature on the Internet.
"The Dark Web is about corporate users' inability to see how workers are using the Web," Cisco product line manager Kevin Kennedy told AFP on Thursday. |
55 Cooking by Committee.
By JOEL STEIN, Time Magazine
Sun Oct 11, 12:20 pm ET
| We shocked the academic experts by writing excellent encyclopedia entries on Wikipedia, so why can't amateurs, if we all work together, create perfect recipes? If enough of us discuss and debate our hamburger knowledge - our meat choices, cooking methods, spices, condiments, bread - then won't our collective experience create the Platonic burger? That's one of the goals of two websites - Foodista.com and the recipe section of Wikia.com - that allow users to post new recipes and revise existing ones any way they want, forming a great burger consensus. |
56 Attack of the Kindle Killers: The Boom in New E-Readers
By ADAM ROSE, Time Magazine
Sun Oct 11, 11:15 am ET
| Amazon, the online retailing giant, did more than any other company to turn the sale of digital books into a real business with the 2007 launch of the Kindle electronic reader. The company has sold an estimated 1.7 million of the handheld devices in the U.S., and it's getting ready to ship millions more. On Oct. 6, Amazon announced it would soon begin selling Kindles - complete with a key feature that allows users to wirelessly download e-books from Amazon - in more than 100 countries. |
57 Why Is UBS Whistle-Blower Birkenfeld Headed to Prison?
By KEN STIER, Time Magazine
Wed Oct 7, 4:35 pm ET
| No one, including himself, would argue that Bradley Birkenfeld, 44, is a saint. The former UBS private-banking executive hasn't hidden the fact that he once bought diamonds with illicit money in Europe and then spirited them to California stuffed in a toothpaste tube, all part of an effort to conceal $200 million in assets on which his client - the Russia-born, California-based real estate mogul Igor Olenicoff - owed $7.2 million in U.S. taxes. But at the same time, almost no one in the U.S. government would deny that Birkenfeld was absolutely essential to its landmark tax-evasion case against Swiss banking giant UBS. The former UBS employee turned whistle-blower exposed the previously hidden world of offshore tax shelters, which cheats the Treasury out of about $100 billion a year. Thanks to his insider information, UBS was fined $780 million, and it promised to "exit entirely" from the U.S. tax-shelter business and to provide the names of thousands of American tax dodgers, from which hundreds of millions of dollars still might be collected. It also led to new tax treaties with the Swiss that should provide unprecedented tax information in civil cases and better access to such data in criminal cases. |
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