Tag: Docudharma Times

Sharp rise in Chinese arrests at U.S. border

At least 261 have been arrested this year trying to cross near Tucson. Illegal Chinese immigrants can be big money for smugglers.

By Sebastian Rotella

October 5, 2009

Reporting from Nogales, Ariz. – Amid an overall drop in arrests of illegal immigrants crossing the U.S-Mexico border, an intriguing anomaly has cast a new light on human smuggling: Authorities report an almost tenfold spike in the number of Chinese people caught in the southern Arizona desert, the busiest smuggling corridor on the international line.

The Border Patrol in the Tucson sector has arrested at least 261 Chinese border-crossers this year, compared with an annual average of 32 during the last four years, officials said.

“They are the main [non-Mexicans] we catch,” said field operations supervisor Juventino Pacheco of the patrol’s international liaison unit in Nogales. “Lately we have been catching more Chinese than Central Americans.”

Unifying Dutch city falls to Muslim mayor

In Rotterdam, where cultural and social divides are apparent, the burden of bridging them now belongs to Morocco-born Ahmed Aboutaleb. How he fares could matter beyond his city’s borders.

By Henry Chu

Reporting from Rotterdam, Netherlands – The veiled women clutch their children’s hands as they scurry past the liquor store, ignoring rows of vodka bottles on their way to the Muslim butcher’s next door.

Across the street, male customers emerge from the Climax sex shop with their purchases and quickly stride away without a second glance at the Turkish kebab restaurant just opening for lunch.

The conservative and liberal, religious and secular, Dutch and foreign stand side by side here in Rotterdam, in a contrasting and at times uneasy coexistence where social and cultural middle ground can be elusive.

Report Says Iran Has Data to Make a Nuclear Bomb



By WILLIAM J. BROAD and DAVID E. SANGER

Published: October 3, 2009

Senior staff members of the United Nations nuclear agency have concluded in a confidential analysis that Iran has acquired “sufficient information to be able to design and produce a workable” atom bomb.

The report by experts in the International Atomic Energy Agency stresses in its introduction that its conclusions are tentative and subject to further confirmation of the evidence, which it says came from intelligence agencies and its own investigations.

But the report’s conclusions, described by senior European officials, go well beyond the public positions taken by several governments, including the United States.

Will California become America’s first failed state?

Los Angeles, 2009: California may be the eighth largest economy in the world, but its state staff are being paid in IOUs, unemployment is at its highest in 70 years, and teachers are on hunger strike. So what has gone so catastrophically wrong?



Paul Harris

The Observer, Sunday 4 October 2009

California has a special place in the American psyche. It is the Golden State: a playground of the rich and famous with perfect weather. It symbolises a lifestyle of sunshine, swimming pools and the Hollywood dream factory.

But the state that was once held up as the epitome of the boundless opportunities of America has collapsed. From its politics to its economy to its environment and way of life, California is like a patient on life support. At the start of summer the state government was so deeply in debt that it began to issue IOUs instead of wages. Its unemployment rate has soared to more than 12%, the highest figure in 70 years. Desperate to pay off a crippling budget deficit, California is slashing spending in education and healthcare, laying off vast numbers of workers and forcing others to take unpaid leave.

McChrystal Flown to Denmark To Discuss War With Obama



By Michael D. Shear

Washington Post Staff Writer

Saturday, October 3, 2009

A brief meeting between President Obama and his top general in Afghanistan on Friday offered the commander in chief an opportunity to question directly the dire assessment of the war effort there, officials said.

The previously unannounced meeting between Obama and Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal took place aboard Air Force One after it landed in Copenhagen Friday morning. McChrystal, who had been in London for a speech, was whisked to Denmark at Obama’s request, White House aides said.

French general planned 18th-century invasion of Britain using American force

From The Times

October 3, 2009

Valentine Low

From Julius Caesar to Adolf Hitler, the invasion of Britain has been a constant theme in the history of these islands, even if the successful attempts have been heavily outnumbered by the unsuccessful ones.

Until now, however, one plan has remained unknown: an 18th-century plot to invade with an American army during that country’s War of Independence.

Drawn up by a French general, the scheme was to bring over an American force of 10,000 that would find a Britain so distracted by the war on the other side of the Atlantic, that victory would seem certain. Just to make sure, however, the general suggested that the force include a corps of Native Americans, or “sauvages”, as he termed them, who would strike such fear in British troops that any resistance would collapse immediately.

McChrystal Flown to Denmark To Discuss War With Obama



By Michael D. Shear

Washington Post Staff Writer

Saturday, October 3, 2009

A brief meeting between President Obama and his top general in Afghanistan on Friday offered the commander in chief an opportunity to question directly the dire assessment of the war effort there, officials said.

The previously unannounced meeting between Obama and Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal took place aboard Air Force One after it landed in Copenhagen Friday morning. McChrystal, who had been in London for a speech, was whisked to Denmark at Obama’s request, White House aides said.

French general planned 18th-century invasion of Britain using American force

From The Times

October 3, 2009

Valentine Low

From Julius Caesar to Adolf Hitler, the invasion of Britain has been a constant theme in the history of these islands, even if the successful attempts have been heavily outnumbered by the unsuccessful ones.

Until now, however, one plan has remained unknown: an 18th-century plot to invade with an American army during that country’s War of Independence.

Drawn up by a French general, the scheme was to bring over an American force of 10,000 that would find a Britain so distracted by the war on the other side of the Atlantic, that victory would seem certain. Just to make sure, however, the general suggested that the force include a corps of Native Americans, or “sauvages”, as he termed them, who would strike such fear in British troops that any resistance would collapse immediately.

White House Eyeing Narrower War Effort

Top Officials Challenge General’s Assessment

By Scott Wilson and Anne E. Kornblut

Washington Post Staff Writers

Friday, October 2, 2009

Senior White House officials have begun to make the case for a policy shift in Afghanistan that would send few, if any, new combat troops to the country and instead focus on faster military training of Afghan forces, continued assassinations of al-Qaeda leaders and support for the government of neighboring Pakistan in its fight against the Taliban.

In a three-hour meeting Wednesday at the White House, senior advisers challenged some of the key assumptions in Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal’s blunt assessment of the nearly eight-year-old war, which President Obama has said is being fought to destroy al-Qaeda and its allies in Afghanistan and the ungoverned border areas of Pakistan.

Herschel scans hidden Milky Way

A remarkable view of our Galaxy has been obtained by Europe’s billion-euro Herschel Space Observatory.

By Jonathan Amos

Science reporter, BBC News

The telescope was put in a special scanning mode to map a patch of sky.

The images reveal in exquisite detail the dense, contorted clouds of cold gas that are collapsing in on themselves to form new stars.

Herschel, which has the largest mirror ever put on an orbiting telescope, was launched in May as a flagship mission of the European Space Agency.

It is tuned to see far-infrared wavelengths of light and is expected to give astronomers significant insights into some of the fundamental processes that shape the cosmos.

Herschel’s great advantage is that its sensitivity allows it to see things that are beyond the vision of other space telescopes, such as Hubble.

A prime goal is to understand the mechanisms that control the earliest phases of stellar evolution.

On War, Obama Could Turn to GOP

Democrats Oppose Larger Afghan Effort

By Scott Wilson

Washington Post Staff Writer

Thursday, October 1, 2009

With much of his party largely opposed to expanding military operations in Afghanistan, President Obama could be forced into the awkward political position of turning to congressional Republicans for support if he follows the recommendations of the commanding U.S. general there.

Congressional Democrats have begun promoting a compromise package of additional resources for Afghanistan that would emphasize training for Afghan security forces but deny Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal the additional combat troops he has indicated he needs to regain the initiative against the Taliban insurgency. The emerging Democratic consensus is likely to constrain the president as he considers how best to proceed with an increasingly unpopular war.

Samoa Islands and Indonesia quake death tolls continue to rise

Two powerful earthquakes struck Sumatra, Indonesia, leaving at least 467 dead. Less than a day earlier, a quake in the South Pacific spawned a tsunami that has claimed more than 120 lives.

By David Pierson

October 1, 2009

Reporting from Beijing – The death tolls from two powerful underwater earthquakes less than a day apart continued to climb today as residents of the islands of Samoa and the Indonesian island of Sumatra began to dig out from the natural disasters that tore through their cities and villages.

An earthquake that struck western Indonesia on Wednesday killed at least 467 people, most of them in the coastal Sumatran city of Padang, according to news reports. Thousands more were believed dead, said Indonesian Health Minister Siti Fadilah Supari, including many trapped in an estimated 500 buildings that toppled or were damaged in the magnitude 7.6 quake.

Abortion Fight Complicates Debate on Health Care



By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK

Published: September 28, 2009

WASHINGTON – As if it were not complicated enough, the debate over health care in Congress is becoming a battlefield in the fight over abortion.Abortion opponents in both the House and the Senate are seeking to block the millions of middle- and lower-income people who might receive federal insurance subsidies to help them buy health coverage from using the money on plans that cover abortion. And the abortion opponents are getting enough support from moderate Democrats that both sides say the outcome is too close to call. Opponents of abortion cite as precedent a 30-year-old ban on the use of taxpayer money to pay for elective abortions.

Abortion-rights supporters say such a restriction would all but eliminate from the marketplace private plans that cover the procedure, pushing women who have such coverage to give it up. Nearly half of those with employer-sponsored health plans now have policies that cover abortion, according to a study by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Giant South African diamond worthy of crown jewels

Gem dug up at historic Cullinan mine weighs 507 carats and is believed to be 19th biggest ever discovered

Graeme Wearden

guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 29 September 2009 10.50 BST

The white diamond, which weighs in at 507.55 carats (101.5 grams), was dug up at the historic Cullinan mine. Petra Diamonds, the AIM-listed company which announced the find this morning, believes it is comparable with the previous huge diamonds that have come out of Cullinan – some of which form part of Britain’s crown jewels.

Petra said that the diamond, which has not yet been named, was found last Thursday. It is thought to be a type II diamond – indicating that it is of particularly high quality – and is currently being examined by experts.

Gates: Mistake to set Afghan withdrawal date

Defense secretary says a defeat in Afghanistan would be disastrous for U.S.

Associated Press

WASHINGTON – Defense Secretary Robert Gates is pushing back against liberal calls for withdrawal timelines from Afghanistan, saying it’s a mistake to set a deadline to end U.S. military action and a defeat would be disastrous for the U.S.

In a stern warning to critics of a continued troop presence in Afghanistan, Gates said the Islamic extremist Taliban and al-Qaida would perceive an early pullout as a victory over the United States as similar to the Soviet Union’s humiliating withdrawal in 1989 after a 10-year war.

2 Brothers’ Grim Tale Of Loyalty And Limbo

To Leave Guantanamo Means Abandoning Family

By Del Quentin Wilber

Washington Post Staff Writer

Monday, September 28, 2009

Bahtiyar Mahnut, a detainee at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, learned a few weeks ago that the Pacific island nation of Palau had invited him to settle there.

It should have been cause for celebration, especially for a man who desperately wants to be free. But, to the surprise of his attorneys, Bahtiyar has turned down the offer. He wishes to remain a prisoner, they say, so he can look after his older brother, a fellow detainee.

Diverse sources fund Afghanistan’s insurgency

Foreign donations, opium bolstered by criminal rackets, U.S. officials say

By Craig Whitlock

KABUL, Afghanistan – The Taliban-led insurgency has built a fundraising juggernaut that generates cash from such an array of criminal rackets, donations, taxes, shakedowns and other schemes that U.S. and Afghan officials say it may be impossible to choke off the movement’s money supply.

Obama administration officials say the single largest source of cash for the Taliban, once thought to rely mostly on Afghanistan’s booming opium trade to finance its operations, is not drugs but foreign donations. The CIA recently estimated that Taliban leaders and their allies received $106 million in the past year from donors outside Afghanistan.

A Burst of Technology, Helping the Blind to See



By PAM BELLUCK

Published: September 26, 2009

Blindness first began creeping up on Barbara Campbell when she was a teenager, and by her late 30s, her eye disease had stolen what was left of her sight.

Reliant on a talking computer for reading and a cane for navigating New York City, where she lives and works, Ms. Campbell, now 56, would have been thrilled to see something. Anything.

Now, as part of a striking experiment, she can. So far, she can detect burners on her stove when making a grilled cheese, her mirror frame, and whether her computer monitor is on.

She is beginning an intensive three-year research project involving electrodes surgically implanted in her eye, a camera on the bridge of her nose and a video processor strapped to her waist.

For Obama, Focus Shifts From Engagement To Pursuit of Concerted, Tough Measures



By Glenn Kessler

Washington Post Staff Writer

Saturday, September 26, 2009

The disclosure of a second uranium enrichment site in Iran has led the Obama administration to shift the emphasis in its dealings with the Islamic republic — away from engagement and toward building an international consensus for sterner action against Tehran.

The effort to directly engage Iran was a hallmark of the early months of the administration, with President Obama offering a televised greeting in honor of the Persian New Year and sending private letters to the country’s supreme leader. But the gestures went largely unreciprocated. Now, while not shutting the door on engagement entirely, the United States and its allies plan to forcefully press the case that Tehran has been caught, red-handed, in yet another violation of international rules.

The dark secrets of the trillion-dollar oil trade

Tankers full of oil its owners don’t want to sell. Shady deals with brutal regimes. Vast profits. Pollution scandals. Cahal Milmo investigates a very murky business

Saturday, 26 September 2009

With a combined capacity for 313,000 tonnes of oil, the Delta Ios and the NS Burgas supertankers were launched two months ago to criss-cross the globe in search of trade. Instead, the vast vessels were to be found yesterday lying idle off the coast of Singapore after their owners were paid by two of the world’s richest and most secretive oil companies to turn them into floating petrochemical warehouses.

At first glance, the decision by Trafigura Group and Vitol Holding BV to charter the newly built ships at an estimated cost of £47,000 a day to do nothing for up to four months in South-east Asia while laden with cargos of diesel worth at least £77m per vessel makes little economic sense.

White House Regroups on Guantanamo

Counsel Craig Replaced as Point Man on Issue as Deadline for Closing Looms

By Anne E. Kornblut and Dafna Linzer

Washington Post Staff Writer and ProPublica

Friday, September 25, 2009

With four months left to meet its self-imposed deadline for closing the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the Obama administration is working to recover from missteps that have put officials behind schedule and left them struggling to win the cooperation of Congress.

Even before the inauguration, President Obama’s top advisers settled on a course of action they were counseled against: announcing that they would close the facility within one year. Today, officials are acknowledging that they will be hard-pressed to meet that goal.

The White House has faltered in part because of the legal, political and diplomatic complexities involved in determining what to do with more than 200 terrorism suspects at the prison. But senior advisers privately acknowledge not devising a concrete plan for where to move the detainees and mishandling Congress.

L.A. independent record shop is still in a groove

Collectibles and used CDs enable Rockaway Records in Silver Lake to survive while many like it have closed.

By Randy Lewis

Don’t tell brothers Wayne and Gary Johnson the CD business is dead or that the brick-and-mortar record store has gone the way of the five-and-dime.

Or go ahead. Tell them. They’ll just smile. That’s because they run Rockaway Records in Silver Lake, one of the longest-surviving independent record stores in Los Angeles. It has successfully been trading since 1979 in various forms of music technology pronounced dead or dying in most other corners of the ailing music industry.

“I feel more confident than ever,” Wayne Johnson said during an interview in the back office lined with memorabilia that reflects his lifelong love of the Beach Boys and their music.

Taliban Widen Afghan Attacks From Base in Pakistan



By ERIC SCHMITT and MARK MAZZETTI

Published: September 23, 2009

WASHINGTON – Senior Taliban leaders, showing a surprising level of sophistication and organization, are using their sanctuary in Pakistan to stoke a widening campaign of violence in northern and western Afghanistan, senior American military and intelligence officials say.

The Taliban’s expansion into parts of Afghanistan that it once had little influence over comes as the Obama administration is struggling to settle on a new military strategy for Afghanistan, and as the White House renews its efforts to get Pakistan’s government to be more aggressive about killing or capturing Taliban leaders inside Pakistan.

Trial HIV vaccine cuts infection

An experimental HIV vaccine has for the first time cut the risk of infection, researchers say.

The BBC Thursday, 24 September 2009

The vaccine – a combination of two earlier experimental vaccines – was given to 16,000 people in Thailand, in the largest ever such vaccine trial.

Researchers found that it reduced by nearly a third the risk of contracting HIV, the virus that leads to Aids.

It has been hailed as a significant, scientific breakthrough, but a global vaccine is still some way off.

The study was carried out by the US army and the Thai government over seven years on volunteers – all HIV-negative men and women aged between 18 and 30 – in some of Thailand’s most badly-affected regions.