Israel Proposes Work Camps for Illegal Migrants

November 9th, 2009

Via: Haaretz:

The government is considering establishing work camps in the south of the country, where illegal migrant workers will receive shelter, food and medical care, Army Radio reported Wednesday. In exchange, illegal migrants would perform manual labor outside the camps, but would not earn a salary.

They would stay at the camp until their asylum claims are decided, which could take months or years.


U.S. Citizens Are Joining Immigrants in Store Parking Lots Seeking Day Labor Jobs

November 9th, 2009

Via: Las Vegas Sun:

It sounds like a George Lopez joke.

“Times are so bad that I saw an Anglo day laborer standing outside Home Depot the other day.”

Except it’s true.

In the latest sign of the Las Vegas Valley’s economic free fall, U.S. citizens are starting to show up in the early mornings outside home improvement stores and plant nurseries across the Las Vegas Valley, jostling with illegal immigrants for a shot at a few hours of work.

Experts say the slow-starting but seemingly inexorable trend is occurring nationwide.

“It’s the equivalent of selling apples in the Great Depression,” said Harley Shaiken, chairman of the Center for Latin American studies at the University of California, Berkeley.


And Now… Texas Army Killer Linked to September 11 Terrorists

November 8th, 2009

Via: Telegraph:

Major Nidal Malik Hasan worshipped at a mosque led by a radical imam said to be a “spiritual adviser” to three of the hijackers who attacked America on Sept 11, 2001.

Hasan, the sole suspect in the massacre of 13 fellow US soldiers in Texas, attended the controversial Dar al-Hijrah mosque in Great Falls, Virginia, in 2001 at the same time as two of the September 11 terrorists, The Sunday Telegraph has learnt. His mother’s funeral was held there in May that year.

The preacher at the time was Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born Yemeni scholar who was banned from addressing a meeting in London by video link in August because he is accused of supporting attacks on British troops and backing terrorist organisations.


Mexico: Three Doctors and a Nurse Sold Newborns, Told Mothers Their Babies had Died

November 8th, 2009

Via: Telegraph:

Police uncovered the scheme after one of the women learned her baby was alive and had been sold to another woman for 15,000 pesos, said Luis Genaro, the capital’s deputy attorney general.

The woman gave birth to a girl through cesarean section at the Central West Hospital in a working-class district in October 2008, Mr Genaro said at a news conference.

He said she told authorities she heard her baby cry but when she asked to see the child, doctors told her she had to wait until the effects of the anesthetics wore off. Later, doctors told her the baby had been taken to another hospital. A day later, the woman was told her baby died and had been cremated, he said.

The woman learned the truth from an-email sent to her by a man believed to be the son of the hospital director, Mr Genaro said.

The woman accused of buying the newborn has been arrested. Three doctors, a nurse and a receptionist from the hospital are also in custody.

Mr Genaro said police believe the group sold several newborn babies but have not yet determined how many. They face charges of trafficking in minors, organised crime and falsifying documents.

He said a married couple has also been arrested for allegedly paying the hospital to falsify a birth certificate for a baby that the pair had been given.

In a report this year, the US State Department described Mexico as “a large source, transit and destination country” for human trafficking. The majority of victims are undocumented migrants and women and children trafficked for sexual exploitation, according to the 2009 Trafficking in Persons report, which studied the problem worldwide.

The report said that although Mexico was stepping up efforts to crack down, convictions against human traffickers remain rare. The report said no trafficking offenders were convicted in Mexico in 2008.


Profit ‘Not Satanic,’ Barclays Says, After Goldman Invokes Jesus

November 8th, 2009

Via: Bloomberg:

Barclays Plc Chief Executive Officer John Varley stood at the wooden lectern in St. Martin-in-the- Fields on London’s Trafalgar Square last night and told the packed pews of the church that “profit is not satanic.”

The 53-year-old head of Britain’s second-biggest bank said banks are the “backbone” of the economy. Rewarding high- performing bankers with more pay doesn’t conflict with Christian values, he said. Varley was paid 1.08 million pounds ($1.77 million) and no bonus in 2008.

“Talent is highly mobile,” Varley, a Catholic, said. “If we fail to pay or are constrained from paying competitive rates then that talent will move to another employer.”

“Is Christianity and banking compatible? Yes,” he said in an interview after the speech in the 283-year-old church. “And is Christianity and fair reward compatible? Yes.”

Varley joins Goldman Sachs International adviser Brian Griffiths and Lazard International Chairman Ken Costa as London bankers who’ve gone into London churches in recent weeks and invoked Christianity to defend a banking system that critics say has created wealth and inequality in the U.K.

“The injunction of Jesus to love others as ourselves is an endorsement of self-interest,” Goldman’s Griffiths said Oct. 20, his voice echoing around the gold-mosaic walls of St. Paul’s Cathedral, whose 365-feet-high dome towers over the City, London’s financial district. “We have to tolerate the inequality as a way to achieving greater prosperity and opportunity for all.”


Official U.S. Jobless Rate: 10.2 Percent

November 6th, 2009

Via: AP:

The U.S. jobless rate unexpectedly jumped to a 26-1/2-year high of 10.2 percent last month, adding to pressure on the Obama administration to do more to tackle unemployment even as signs of recovery mount.

The Labor Department said on Friday that employers cut 190,000 jobs in October, more than the 175,000 markets had expected but fewer than the 219,000 lost in September.


U.S. Army Psychiatrist Allegedly Carried Out Massacre at Fort Hood

November 6th, 2009

Update: And Now… “Men in Suits” Take Another Suspect Away

Via: CNN:

Surviving Fort Hood shooting suspect arrested at golf course, officer says
November 5, 2009 — Updated 2334 GMT (0734 HKT)

(CNN) — A senior officer who was playing golf Thursday near Fort Hood, Texas, told CNN he witnessed the arrest of one of the two surviving suspects of the shooting at the Army installation.

Shortly after the shooting, the officer said, military police told him to clear the course and he saw other MPs surround the building that held the golf carts, he said.

The senior officer said he ducked into a nearby house for cover as 30 to 40 cars carrying MPs approached.

He said he saw a soldier in battle-dress uniform, his hands in the air. The MPs ordered him to lie on the ground and open his uniform, presumably to ensure he was not carrying explosives, the senior officer said.

He said an MP told him that authorities considered the man to be a suspect in the shootings after having overheard the man say he was with the shooter.

The man was surrounded for 25 to 30 minutes, until a convoy of vehicles arrived, led by a Ford Crown Victoria and carrying men in suits, and he was taken away, the senior officer said.

The golf course is about 2.5 miles from Fort Hood, the officer told CNN.

—End Update—

Update: The “Gunmen” Story That Will Soon Disappear

Via: Dow Jones:

Second Gunman In Custody At Army’s Fort Hood -Report

DOW JONES NEWSWIRES

A second gunman is in custody after a shooting at the Army’s Fort Hood in Texas in which at least seven people were killed and 12 wounded, reports KCEN-TV of Waco. The report comes about two hours after a first suspect was captured, shortly after gunfire broke out.

Authorities say the gunmen were dressed in fatigues, though it’s not confirmed whether they are military personnel. It’s also not known if the victims were military personnel or civilians.

The incident reportedly began at Fort Hood’s theater and then moved to the Soldier Readiness Processing Center, Killeen City Public Information Officer Hillary Shine told Fox News. A graduation ceremony was scheduled to take place Thursday.

—End Update—

Via: ABC News:

Thirteen people died and 30 were wounded at a Texas military post in a shooting rampage that officials believe was carried out by an Army psychiatrist who was about to be deployed to Iraq.

The suspected gunman has been identified as Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan. Hasan would have been deployed to Iraq later this month, an Army official said.

It would have been his first deployment, two sources told ABC News.

Hasan is believed to be of Palestinian origin: His grandfather moved to the United States in the 1940s. One of Hasan’s two brothers recently moved to Ramallah and works in the West Bank, the sources said. Hasan’s family is said to own a number of apartments in Ramallah.

The family has refused to speak to reporters, but a person close to the family told ABC News that Hasan had told his family he was unhappy about his impending deployment abroad.

The person also said that all three brothers — a lawyer, a professor and a psychiatrist — are highly educated. They lost both parents to cancer. Hasan’s mother came from al Bireh, a Palestinian town close to Ramallah. She was traumatized by her experience in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, when she was 15, according to the source.

Hasan was initially reported to have been killed but Lt. Gen. Robert W. Cone told a late-night news conference that the suspect was wounded and in custody. Cone declined to comment on Hasan’s medical condition was but said he is expected to live.

Hasan has not spoken to authorities, Cone said.

Two other soldiers were taken into custody but were later released.

Hasan’s cousin, Nader Hasan, issued a statement late Thursday. “We are shocked and saddened by the terrible events at Fort Hood today. We send the families of the victims our most heartfelt sympathies,” the statement read.

“Nidal was an American citizen. He was born in Arlington, Va., and raised here in America. … Our family loves America. We are proud of our country, and saddened by today’s tragedy.”

Hasan allegedly opened fire and killed 13 people on the post before he was shot several times. Among the wounded was a female police officer who exchanged gunfire with Hasan.

Cone called the attack “a terrible tragedy, stunning.” He said the community was “absolutely devastated.”


Air Force: ‘Overwhelm Enemy Cognitive Abilities’ with Bioscience

November 5th, 2009

A steady diet of toxic food and World of Warcraft would work.

Via: Wired:

The Air Force is looking to harness advances in bio-science so they can “degrade enemy performance and artificially overwhelm enemy cognitive abilities.” It’s all part of a $49 million dollar bio-research effort unveiled last month by the Air Force Research Lab’s “Human Effectiveness Directorate,” and it’s the latest in a series of out-there military ideas to mess with adversaries’ heads.


Message from the Gyre

November 5th, 2009

Via: Chris Jordan:

These photographs of albatross chicks were made just a few weeks ago on Midway Atoll, a tiny stretch of sand and coral near the middle of the North Pacific. The nesting babies are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the vast polluted ocean collecting what looks to them like food to bring back to their young. On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking.

To document this phenomenon as faithfully as possible, not a single piece of plastic in any of these photographs was moved, placed, manipulated, arranged, or altered in any way. These images depict the actual stomach contents of baby birds in one of the world’s most remote marine sanctuaries, more than 2000 miles from the nearest continent.

Research Credit: dilinger


CIA Had People Raped with Broken Bottles, Boiled Alive

November 5th, 2009

Via: Raw Story:

The CIA relied on intelligence based on torture in prisons in Uzbekistan, a place where widespread torture practices include raping suspects with broken bottles and boiling them alive, says a former British ambassador to the central Asian country.

Craig Murray, the rector of the University of Dundee in Scotland and until 2004 the UK’s ambassador to Uzbekistan, said the CIA not only relied on confessions gleaned through extreme torture, it sent terror war suspects to Uzbekistan as part of its extraordinary rendition program.

“I’m talking of people being raped with broken bottles,” he said at a lecture late last month that was re-broadcast by the Real News Network. “I’m talking of people having their children tortured in front of them until they sign a confession. I’m talking of people being boiled alive. And the intelligence from these torture sessions was being received by the CIA, and was being passed on.”


« Previous Page — Next Page »