Archive for the 'Outsourced' Category
Detroit: The Post-Apocalyptic Future of American Cities?
July 23rd, 2009Update: Is This Story Bullshit? A couple of readers from Detroit have written in and are saying that this story is bullshit and that they they haven’t seen any barbedwired burbclaves. —End Update— Burbclaves. Via: Al Martin: Here’s a glimpse of a Turn Key Approach to Urban Wasteland Management ™. Last week I had a […]
Fears for the World’s Poor Countries as the Rich Grab Land to Grow Food
July 5th, 2009A pants shitting, must read. Via: Guardian: The acquisition of farmland from the world’s poor by rich countries and international corporations is accelerating at an alarming rate, with an area half the size of Europe’s farmland targeted in the last six months, reports from UN officials and agriculture experts say. New reports from the UN […]
China Loans Zimbabwe US$950 Million
June 30th, 2009There will be something in the dirt that China wants to dig up. Or, maybe just the dirt would do. More: China arable land fears end reforestation drive Arable land shrinking fast Via: BBC: China has agreed to give Zimbabwe a loan of $950m (£573m) to help it revive its battered economy, Prime Minister Morgan […]
More Obama Lies: Signing Statement on $106B War Bill
June 28th, 2009Via: The Hill: President Obama signed the $106 billion war-spending bill into law Friday, but not without taking a page from his predecessor and ignoring a few elements in the legislation. Obama included a five-paragraph signing statement with the bill, including a final paragraph that outlined his objections to at least four areas of the […]
The Lear Jet Repo Man
June 6th, 2009Must read. Via: Slate: Nick Popovich is a repo man, but not the kind that spirits away Hyundais from suburban driveways. Popovich is a super repo man, one of a handful of specialists who get the call when a bank wants back its Gulfstream II jet from, say, a small army of neo-Nazi freaks. For […]
CIA Briefers Regularly Mislead Hill Intelligence Panels, Ex-Spy Charges
May 27th, 2009This has only been standard operating procedure for about the last 62 years. Via: Congressional Quarterly Politics: A former deep-cover CIA operative says the spy agency’s congressional briefers routinely shade the truth or hide facts altogether from congressional overseers. “They mumble, they dissemble, and there’s a lot of ‘on the one hand . . .’” […]
Allen Stanford: “May Have Been a U.S. Government Informer”
May 10th, 2009This has to get rolled up. This has to go away. —Cryptogon, 2/21/09 Allen Stanford would be very familiar with the story of how Barry Seal met his end; shot dead as he sat in his Cadillac, with George H.W. Bush’s personal phone number in a box of documents in his trunk. So, what precautions […]
Rent-A-Cops: Cash-Strapped Cities Using Private Armed Guards Instead of Police
April 21st, 2009Via: Wall Street Journal: Facing pressure to crack down on crime amid a record budget deficit, Oakland is joining other U.S. cities that are turning over more law-enforcement duties to private armed guards. The City Council recently voted to hire International Services Inc., a private security agency, to patrol crime-plagued districts. While a few Oakland […]
Obama Exempts CIA Torture Staff from Prosecution
April 17th, 2009Just following orders. Via: BBC: US President Barack Obama says CIA agents who used harsh interrogation techniques on terrorism suspects during the Bush era will not be prosecuted. Mr Obama banned the use of methods such as sleep deprivation and simulated drowning in his first week in office. He has now released four memos detailing […]
How to Get a No-Bid Contract for Russian Choppers
April 13th, 2009Via: Wired: How did a company best known for its communications gear manage to get a $322 million, no-bid contract to supply the Iraqi military with Russian helicopters? Not even the Pentagon can come up with a convincing explanation. Yesterday, I spent an hour on the phone with two Defense Department officials who tried to […]
