Ohio: Teenager Held Down by Two Sheriff’s Deputies and Force Vaccinated

November 13th, 2009

It seems like the mom wanted her son vaccinated, but it’s not entirely clear. Anyway… So it goes.

Via: The Intelligencer:

It took the strength of two sheriff’s deputies to keep a middle schooler still enough to receive a shot of the swine flu, or H1N1, vaccine at a recent clinic.

During a regular Wheeling-Ohio County Health Board meeting Tuesday, health department Administrator Howard Gamble told board members about the student’s attempt to flee Wheeling Middle School during a vaccination clinic held there last Friday.

He noted the boy’s mother could not bear to watch the scene and left the gymnasium. Out of apparent fear of receiving the injection, the student ran out of the building. The school’s resource officer, Ohio County Sheriff’s Deputy John Haglock, coaxed the boy back inside. Once at the shot station, however, Haglock apparently needed some help keeping the boy still, and another deputy assisted.

“He tried to run. I looked over and saw two sheriff’s deputies holding a kid down,” Gamble said. “Mom took off, she couldn’t take it. You had one nurse with the needle, two deputies holding him, one nurse is grabbing hands – because that’s what they want to do, to go after the needle. And that’s the last thing you want.”

Gamble said as soon as the nurse gave the boy his injection and told him he was done, he hopped up like nothing had happened.

“For the most part they go very easy. As far as the shots, every once in awhile you have to hold down one or two – but that’s why mom is there or dad is there,” Gamble said.


Justice Department Asked For News Site’s Visitor Lists

November 12th, 2009

Via: CBS News:

In a case that raises questions about online journalism and privacy rights, the U.S. Department of Justice sent a formal request to an independent news site ordering it to provide details of all reader visits on a certain day.

The grand jury subpoena also required the Philadelphia-based Indymedia.us Web site “not to disclose the existence of this request” unless authorized by the Justice Department, a gag order that presents an unusual quandary for any news organization.

Kristina Clair, a 34-year old Linux administrator living in Philadelphia who provides free server space for Indymedia.us, said she was shocked to receive the Justice Department’s subpoena. (The Independent Media Center is a left-of-center amalgamation of journalists and advocates that – according to their principles of unity and mission statement – work toward “promoting social and economic justice” and “social change.”)

The subpoena (PDF) from U.S. Attorney Tim Morrison in Indianapolis demanded “all IP traffic to and from www.indymedia.us” on June 25, 2008. It instructed Clair to “include IP addresses, times, and any other identifying information,” including e-mail addresses, physical addresses, registered accounts, and Indymedia readers’ Social Security Numbers, bank account numbers, credit card numbers, and so on.

“I didn’t think anything we were doing was worthy of any (federal) attention,” Clair said in a telephone interview with CBSNews.com on Monday. After talking to other Indymedia volunteers, Clair ended up calling the Electronic Frontier Foundation in San Francisco, which represented her at no cost.

Under long-standing Justice Department guidelines, subpoenas to members of the news media are supposed to receive special treatment. One portion of the guidelines, for instance, says that “no subpoena may be issued to any member of the news media” without “the express authorization of the attorney general” – that would be current attorney general Eric Holder – and subpoenas should be “directed at material information regarding a limited subject matter.”

Still unclear is what criminal investigation U.S. Attorney Morrison was pursuing. Last Friday, a spokeswoman initially promised a response, but Morrison sent e-mail on Monday evening saying: “We have no comment.” The Justice Department in Washington, D.C. also declined to respond.


Russia’s Whistleblower Cop is a YouTube Sensation

November 12th, 2009

Via: Global Post:

Alexei Dymovsky sits in full uniform and stares at the camera with tired eyes.

“Maybe you don’t know about us, about simple cops, who live and work and love their work. I’m ready to tell you everything. I’m not scared of my own death,” Dymovsky says in a YouTube message addressed to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

“I will show you the life of cops in Russia, how it is lived, with all the corruption and all the rest – with ignorance, rudeness, recklessness, with honest officers killed because they have stupid bosses.”

And so Dymovsky continues, in a series of three 2-to-7-minute long videos released over the past week that have together garnered 1 million hits on YouTube, and caused a firestorm across Russia.


Boy Diagnosed with Guillain-Barre Syndrome After Swine Flu Shot

November 12th, 2009

Via: MSNBC:

A 14-year-old Virginia boy is weak and struggling to walk after coming down with a reported case of Guillain-Barre syndrome within hours after receiving the H1N1 vaccine for swine flu.

Jordan McFarland, a high school athlete from Alexandria, Va., left Inova Fairfax Hospital for Children Tuesday night in a wheelchair nearly a week after developing severe headaches, muscle spasms and weakness in his legs following a swine flu shot. He will likely need the assistance of a walker for four to six weeks, plus extensive physical therapy.

“The doctor said I’ll recover fully, but it’s going to take some time,” the teenager said.
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Jordan is among the first people in the nation to report developing the potentially life-threatening muscle disorder after receiving the H1N1 vaccine this fall. His alarming reaction was submitted via msnbc.com’s reader reporting tool, First Person, by his stepmother, Arlene Connin.

Increased cases of GBS were found in patients who received a 1976 swine flu vaccine, but government health officials say they’ve seen no rise in the condition associated with the current outbreak.

So far, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have received five reports of GBS in people who received the H1N1 vaccine since Oct. 6, not including Jordan’s case, said Dr. Claudia J. Vellozzi, deputy director for immunization safety.

Out of about 40 million doses of H1N1 vaccine available to date, that’s a far lower rate of GBS than the 1 case that develops in every 1 million people who receive the regular flu vaccine.

“It’s much less than we’d expect,” she said, adding that many cases go unreported.


The Dow Priced in Gold

November 12th, 2009

Via: Reuters:

The Dow Priced in Gold

The Dow Priced in Gold


Cuba Orders Extreme Measures to Cut Energy Use

November 12th, 2009

Via: Reuters:

Cuba has ordered all state enterprises to adopt “extreme measures” to cut energy usage through the end of the year in hopes of avoiding the dreaded blackouts that plagued the country following the 1991 collapse of its then-top ally, the Soviet Union.

In documents seen by Reuters, government officials have been warned that the island is facing a “critical” energy shortage that requires the closing of non-essential factories and workshops and the shutting down of air conditioners and refrigerators not needed to preserve food and medicine.

Cuba has cut government spending and slashed imports after being hit hard by the global financial crisis and the cost of recovering from three hurricanes that struck last year.

“The energy situation we face is critical and if we do not adopt extreme measures we will have to revert to planned blackouts affecting the population,” said a recently circulated message from the Council of Ministers.

“Company directors will analyze the activities that will be stopped and others reduced, leaving only those that guarantee exports, substitution of imports and basic services for the population,” according to another distributed by the light industry sector.

President Raul Castro is said to be intent on not repeating the experience of the 1990s, when the demise of the Soviet Union and the loss of its steady oil supply caused frequent electricity blackouts and hardship for the Cuban public.

The directives follow government warnings in the summer that too much energy was being used and blackouts would follow if consumption was not reduced.

All provincial governments and most state-run offices and factories, which encompasses 90 percent of Cuba’s economic activity, were ordered in June to reduce energy use by a minimum of 12 percent or face mandatory electricity cuts.

The measures appeared to resolve the crisis as state-run press published stories about the amount of energy that had been saved and the dire warnings died down. The only explanation given for the earlier warnings was that Cuba was consuming more fuel than the government had money to pay for.

The situation is not as dire as in the 1990s because Cuba receives 93,000 barrels per day of crude oil, almost two-thirds of what it consumes, from Venezuela. It pays for the oil by providing its energy-rich ally with medical personnel and other professionals.

Cuba has been grappling with the global economic downturn, which has slashed revenues from key exports, dried up credit and reduced foreign investment.

The communist-run Caribbean nation also faces stiff U.S. sanctions that include cutting access to international lending institutions, and it is still rebuilding from last year’s trio of hurricanes that caused an estimated $10 billion in damages.

In response, the government has cut spending, slashed imports, suspended many debt payments and frozen bank accounts of foreign businesses. It reported last week that trade was down 36 percent so far this year due mainly to a more than 30 percent reduction in imports.


China Signals That It May Allow Currency to Rise Against Dollar

November 11th, 2009

Via: CNBC / Reuters:

China sent its clearest signal yet that it was ready to allow yuan appreciation after an 18-month hiatus, saying on Wednesday it would consider major currencies, not just the dollar, in guiding the exchange rate.

In its third-quarter monetary policy report, the People’s Bank of China departed from well-worn language on keeping the yuan “basically stable at a reasonable and balanced level.” It hinted instead at a shift from an effective dollar peg that has been in place since the middle of last year.

“Following the principles of initiative, controllability and gradualism, with reference to international capital flows and changes in major currencies, we will improve the yuan exchange-rate formation mechanism,” the central bank said in a 46-page monetary policy report.

The comments, published just days before a visit to Shanghai and Beijing by U.S. President Barack Obama, set out the possibility of a return to exchange rate appreciation that began with a landmark July 2005 revaluation.

The yuan strengthened by nearly 20 percent against the dollar until concern over the impact of the global financial crisis prompted Beijing to hit the brakes in the middle of last year to protect exporters.

The yuan has been stuck at around 6.83 per dollar ever since, drawing increasing ire from other countries, especially as it has followed the dollar downwards against other currencies.

The dollar has dropped 13 percent against a basket of major currencies including the yen and euro since mid-February.


Brazil: The Blackout in Pictures

November 11th, 2009

Surreal pictures.

Via: Daily Mail:

Much of Brazil was plunged into darkness last night as a problem at a hydroelectric dam left millions without electricity.

As these eerie pictures show, the major cities, such as Rio de Janeiro – the home of the 2016 Olympic Games – were left looking like ghost towns, with only car headlights, candles, and the odd power generator providing tiny pools of illumination for millions.

Other cities such as Sao Paulo were also left in blackness for more than two hours, while all of neighbouring Paraguay was also without power for half an hour.


Blackwater Said to Pursue Bribes to Iraqi Officials After Murder of 17 Civilians

November 11th, 2009

Via: New York Times:

Top executives at Blackwater Worldwide authorized secret payments of about $1 million to Iraqi officials that were intended to silence their criticism and buy their support after a September 2007 episode in which Blackwater security guards fatally shot 17 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad, according to former company officials.

Blackwater approved the cash payments in December 2007, the officials said, as protests over the deadly shootings in Nisour Square stoked long-simmering anger inside Iraq about reckless practices by the security company’s employees. American and Iraqi investigators had already concluded that the shootings were unjustified, top Iraqi officials were calling for Blackwater’s ouster from the country, and company officials feared that Blackwater might be refused an operating license it would need to retain its contracts with the State Department and private clients, worth hundreds of millions of dollars annually.

Four former executives said in interviews that Gary Jackson, who was then Blackwater’s president, had approved the bribes and that the money was sent from Amman, Jordan, where the company maintains an operations hub, to a top manager in Iraq. The executives, though, said they did not know whether the cash was delivered to Iraqi officials or the identities of the potential recipients.


Britain: State to ‘Spy’ on Every Phone Call, Email and Web Search

November 11th, 2009

Via: Telegraph:

Every phone call, text message, email and website visit made by private citizens is to be stored for a year and will be available for monitoring by government bodies.

All telecoms companies and internet service providers will be required by law to keep a record of every customer’s personal communications, showing who they have contacted, when and where, as well as the websites they have visited.

Despite widespread opposition to the increasing amount of surveillance in Britain, 653 public bodies will be given access to the information, including police, local councils, the Financial Services Authority, the ambulance service, fire authorities and even prison governors.

They will not require the permission of a judge or a magistrate to obtain the information, but simply the authorisation of a senior police officer or the equivalent of a deputy head of department at a local authority.


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