Blackout Stretches from Orange County Down Into Mexico
September 9th, 2011Via: NBC San Diego:
As night fell in San Diego County, millions of residents were left in the dark, wondering when power would return after a failure in the system created a cascade effect, knocking electricity out all the way to Orange County and down into Mexio.
A glimmer of hope came in the darkness when San Diego Gas & Electric officials announced power was slowly returning, with some customers’ service restored Thursday night. They said they hoped the majority of county resident would be back up by Friday afternoon. In the interim, they urged everyone to turn off whatever appliances they could so the system would not be overtaxed when power came back online.
By 8 p.m., officials were reporting that power had been restored to parts of Oceanside, Eastlake and the Chula Vista community of Bonita.
San Diego Mayor Jerry Sander held a media conference at 8 p.m., saying that as a precautionary measure prompted by problem with water pumps, city residents living in the communities of Otay Mesa, Scripps Ranch, La Jolla, Mount Soledad, Tierresanta and Scripps Ranch were under a mandatory boil-water order.
Officials said late in the day that no serious injuries had been attributed to the outage.
33 Percent of Americans Raised Middle Class Move Downward as Adults
September 9th, 2011The report doesn’t mention people who were raised in middle class households and consciously, voluntarily moved downward. *wink*
My family of four is severely poor, according to the definitions in the report (and by New Zealand definitions), but we’re far better off than some people we know who are making several multiples of what we make each year.
It’s interesting how the report paints the picture of a low income lifestyle as something that happens to people because of unfortunate choices and circumstances. After all, it’s unthinkable that people would consciously choose to live debt free, stay home with their children, own their property and vehicles outright and legally avoid income tax rape by the vampire state…
Via: NPR:
The idea that children will grow up to be better off than their parents is a central component of the American Dream, and sustains American optimism. However, Downward Mobility from the Middle Class: Waking up from the American Dream finds that a middle-class upbringing does not guarantee the same status over the course of a lifetime.
Mall of America: Identifying “The Terrorists”
September 8th, 2011Via: NPR:
The report tells how the Bloomington police officers took Van Asten to a police substation in the basement in the Mall of America after mall security questioned him. They frisked him. They seized his camera. They detained him in that room for one more hour. The police called the Joint Terrorism Task Force. And an FBI agent told them: Seize the memory card in Van Asten’s camera and delete all his videos.
After two hours they let him go. Van Asten says he loves this country. Back when he was in the Army, he worked at a nuclear missile site. But he says that afternoon at the Mall of America shook him.
“When I was finally released, I couldn’t find my way to my own car for over a half-hour. I sat down in my car and I cried and I was shaking like a leaf.”
Terrahawk’s M.U.S.T. Is a Mobile Guard Tower in a Shady-Looking Van
September 8th, 2011Via: TechCrunch:
National Security isn’t always about the flashy solutions. Not everything can be rail guns and one-winged drones. Sometimes you just need a sort of seedy-looking van that slowly, slowly turns into a climate-controlled guard tower.
Research Credit: noncompliant
And Now… A 50-Year Bond?
September 8th, 2011Check kiting is the illegal act of taking advantage of the float to make use of non-existent funds in a checking or other bank account; it is a form of check fraud. It is commonly defined as intentionally writing a check for a value greater than the account balance from an account in one bank, then writing a check from another account in another bank, also with non-sufficient funds, with the second check serving to cover the non-existent funds from the first account. The purpose of check kiting is to falsely inflate the balance of a checking account in order to allow written checks that would otherwise bounce to clear.
Via: CNBC:
With the Federal Reserve widely expected later this month to unveil the latest weapon in its easing arsenal, expectations are ranging from Operation Twist, a variation called Operation Torque, and to a 50-year Treasury bond.
A 50-year bond? While the idea seems radical even for a central bank carrying a $2.8 trillion balance sheet, the idea of the Fed going that far out on the yield curve in a desire to stimulate the economy is drawing market chatter.
The purpose of the bond would be to extend the duration of the Fed’s otherwise short-term debt portfolio. In theory it would take the pressure off the central bank from having to roll over its debt on a continual basis.
Police Called After Man Butchers Cow in His Driveway
September 8th, 2011A man takes sane action and hordes of bureaucrats deliberate the many “possibilities” of charges he should face.
Disclosure: We have our cows slaughtered in our driveway.
Via: Standard Examiner:
Charges may ensue for an Ogden man who startled the neighbors by butchering a cow in his driveway over the weekend.
Police were called to the scene at 1:44 p.m. Sunday after the cow’s owner began harvesting the animal. A patrolman was responding to a caller who saw a cow being trailered to the home in the 2700 block of Gramercy Avenue.
The caller then reported hearing the cow’s audible mooing, followed by what sounded like a gunshot, said Police Lt. Troy Burnett. Then the mooing stopped.
The patrolman’s report said when he arrived at the scene a half-block above Monroe Boulevard, “the cow was in the process of losing its head,” Burnett said.
The man sawing at the animal’s neck, the owner of the beef, denied shooting the cow on the premises, telling the officer the animal had been dispatched outside the city limits.
The officer took the information and filed a report that will be screened by the city attorney’s office for possible charges, Burnett said.
“I assume the patrolman had them make arrangements to do the butchering out of plain view,” he said.
“It boggles my mind,” Burnett said. “It’s not illegal, but it’s absurd that people would think slaughtering a cow in their driveway is OK. Maybe on the west side of the county on one of the farms. But in the middle of a high density residential area?”
If evidence confirms the person shot the cow on-site, a charge could be filed of discharging a firearm within the city limits, he said.
Other possible violations could include disorderly conduct or health code violations, he said, the latter question which will be referred to the Weber-Morgan Health Department.
The family reporting the unusual bovine demise called their children indoors before calling police, suspecting something unusual taking place, Burnett said.
If any children had witnessed the butchering, and become upset, that could possibly constitute disorderly conduct, said Burnett and Mike Junk, Ogden city’s senior prosecutor.
Junk said disorderly conduct includes language of behavior creating “public inconvenience, annoyance or alarm.”
Junk said he hadn’t been forwarded the case yet as of Tuesday, but said his review would also include the state’s animal cruelty statute. “There are a lot of possibilities.”
Ikea Used East German Political Prisoners as Slave Labor to Manufacture Furniture
September 7th, 2011Via: Telegraph:
Swedish retail giant Ikea used political prisoners in East Germany as “slave labour” to make furniture, secret police files unearthed by a German broadcaster appear to show.
Ikea developed strong links with the communist state in the 1970s, opening a number of manufacturing facilities, one of which, according to Stasi records discovered by German television company WDR, used political prisoners to construct sofas.
The factory in Waldheim stood next to a prison, and inmates were used as unpaid labour, it is claimed. Gaols in the Democratic Republic housed significant numbers of political prisoners, with some estimates indicating they made up at least 20 per cent of the entire prison population.
Quoted in a Stasi file, Ingvar Kamprad, Ikea’s founder, said while he had no official knowledge of the use of prison labour, if it did indeed exist “in the opinion of Ikea it would be in society’s interests”.
Research Credit: db
The DOJ’s Escalating Criminalization of Speech
September 7th, 2011Via: Salon:
Over the past several years, the Justice Department has increasingly attempted to criminalize what is clearly protected political speech by prosecuting numerous individuals (Muslims, needless to say) for disseminating political views the government dislikes or considers threatening. The latest episode emerged on Friday, when the FBI announced the arrest and indictment of Jubair Ahmad, a 24-year-old Pakistani legal resident living in Virginia, charged with “providing material support” to a designated Terrorist organization (Lashkar-e-Tayyiba (LeT)).
What is the “material support” he allegedly gave? He produced and uploaded a 5-minute video to YouTube featuring photographs of U.S. abuses in Abu Ghraib, video of armored trucks exploding after being hit by IEDs, prayer messages about “jihad” from LeT’s leader, and — according to the FBI’s Affidavit — “a number of terrorist logos.” That, in turn, led the FBI agent who signed the affidavit to assert that “based on [his] training and experience, it is evident that the video . . . is designed as propaganda to develop support for LeT and to recruit jihadists to LeT.” The FBI also claims Ahmad spoke with the son of an LeT leader about the contents of the video and had attended an LeT camp when he was a teenager in Pakistan. For the act of uploading that single YouTube video (and for denying that he did so when asked by the FBI agents who came to his home to interrogate him), he faces 23 years in prison.
Research Credit: noncompliant
FedEx and Pepsi Are Top Defense Contractors? 5 Corporate Brands Making a Killing on America’s Wars
September 7th, 2011Via: AlterNet:
Chances are, if you’ve ever sent a package overnight, bought a PC or a can of soda, you’ve paid your hard-earned money to a major Pentagon contractor. While large defense corporations that make fighter jets and armored vehicles garner the most attention, tens of thousands of “civilian” companies, from multi-national corporations hawking toothpaste and shampoo to big oil behemoths and even local restaurants scattered across the United States, all supply the Pentagon with the necessities used to carry on day-to-day operations and wage America’s wars. And they’ve made a killing doing it since 9/11.
Related: The Complex: How the Military Invades Our Everyday Lives by Nick Turse
U.S. Man Caught Smuggling Grenade Parts to Mexico Cartel
September 7th, 2011Fast and Furious We-Like-Things-That-Go-Boom Edition?
Via: Reuters:
Mexican police arrested a U.S. man accused of trafficking grenade and gun parts to one of the country’s deadliest drug cartels in a sign the gangs could now be making their own weapons, authorities said on Tuesday.
Federal police captured Jean Baptiste Kingery last week at a house in the Pacific tourist town of Mazatlan in Sinaloa state, where they seized a small cache of guns and found a Hummer sports utility vehicle parked outside.
Law enforcement officials accuse Kingery of delivering parts used to make grenades and firearms, some bought at stores and online in the United States, to the Sinaloa cartel, headed by Mexico’s most wanted man Joaquin “Shorty” Guzman.
…
The arrest is part of an ongoing operation with U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agents which led to the arrest of another American gun runner last month.
