Pirates freed 36 crew members from a Spanish trawler Tuesday after holding them for more than six weeks. A self-proclaimed pirate said the hostage-takers were paid $3.3 million in ransom, while Spain’s prime minister said the country did what it had to do.
I’m sure $3 million worth of huge win won’t encourage the “self-proclaimed pirates” to come back to the well for more. Nice work, Andalusia.
The good news: questions about how health care reform will negatively effect the budget are finally coming from a source Obama pays attention to.
The bad news: it ain’t Americans.
It turns out the Chinese are kind of curious about how President Barack Obama’s healthcare reform plans would impact America’s huge fiscal deficit. Government officials are using his Asian trip as an opportunity to ask the White House questions. Detailed questions.
In a preview of labor’s contribution to Obama’s December jobs summit, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said money from the Troubled Asset Relief Program could be lent directly to small- and medium-sized businesses at commercial rates.
All your biz are belong to us.
1989 brought a domino effect of revolutions. Timothy Garton Ash remarked: “In Poland the transition [from communism to democracy] lasted ten years, in Hungary ten months, in Czechoslovakia ten days.” Those ten eventful days fell between November 17th and 27th, 1989. After the failure of the Prague Spring, many Czechoslovaks rightfully held doubts about the possibility of revolution, but as events starting in with Solidarity in Gdansk, Poland and continuing in the other Bloc countries seemed hopeful, the revolution in Czechoslovakia became inevitable.
The Velvet Revolution would not have been possible were it not for the monumental events unfolding in the other Communist Bloc countries. The Estonian Singing Revolution was well on its way in Estonia, not to mention the election of Solidarity members to Poland’s government. On August 23rd, 1989, two million people from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania joined hands along a 600km stretch of road between Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius. Finally, November 9th, 1989 brought the fall of the infamous Berlin Wall. Also, on December 4th the border to Austria was opened, effectively ending the Iron Curtain division of East and West.
I think a hilarious thing would be to make a television sitcom of characters based on all of us and the Lympians and have everyone talk to each other exactly how we do on the internet as we go about our daily lives.........
Palin’s 413-page book, “Going Rogue,” will be released Tuesday and she begins a book tour Wednesday in Grand Rapids, Mich.
The new memoir doesn’t mention Johnston, who has sparred repeatedly with his former mother-in-law-to-be. Johnston and Palin’s daughter Bristol Palin are parents to son, Tripp.
When Winfrey asked about Johnston, Palin said she didn’t think “a national television show is the place to discuss some of the things he’s doing and saying.”
But Palin went on to say she finds it “a bit heartbreaking to see the road that he is on right now” and that “it’s not a healthy place to be.”
Bristol Palin and her son live at Palin’s home, she said, and have much family support.
“(Johnston’s) quite busy with his media tours and he hasn’t seen the baby for a while,” Palin said. “But we will let that be the discussion between Bristol and Levi as they work out their relationship.”
Palin also said Johnston remains a member of the family and that they can work out any troubles. She said she prays for him and that he has an “open invitation” to Thanksgiving dinner.
“He’s a teenager,” Palin said. “I don’t think he realizes quite yet what it is that he is being handled and orchestrated around.”
I’d call that pretty damned admirable restraint, all things considered.
This year has been a bit of a bust for meteor showers. For the normally good Perseids, back in August, a third-quarter moon hindered a mediocre shower. But what could prove to be the best meteor shower of the year comes Nov. 17 with the Leonid meteor shower.
Meteor showers occur when Earth passes through the debris baked off a comet. Comets are dirty iceballs 10 miles across or so. When a comet comes into the inner solar system, the sun’s tremendous heat vaporizes the surface layer of the comet, releasing any trapped dust and rock chunks.
When that debris trail slams into Earth’s atmosphere, it creates a meteor shower. Earth reaches the same spot in its orbit on the same day each year, so meteor showers are annual events.
Some readers may remember the Leonid meteor storms in 1999 and 2001. A meteor storm is defined as 1,000 or more meteors per hour.
“On Nov. 17, we expect the Leonids to produce upward of 500 meteors per hour,” says Bill Cooke of the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center. “That’s a very strong display.”
At the same federal lockup where Mohammed and the others are to be held, federal prison guard Louis Pepe was attacked in late 2000 by Mamdouh Mahmud Salim, a former top aide to Osama bin Laden who was awaiting trial in the embassies case.
Salim surprised Pepe by using a squeezable plastic honey bear container filled with hot sauce
as a kind of homemade pepper spray that temporarily blinded the guard.
The inmate then took a plastic comb ground into the shape of a dagger and plunged it into Pepe’s left eye. The point pierced deep into his brain, causing severe permanent injury to his sight, speech, and movement.After the attack, prosecutors say papers found in the cell showed Salim’s plan had been to take hostages inside the prison and free his co-defendants. While such a “breakout” plot may sound far-fetched given the security of the federal buildings, in Salim’s case the very attempt nearly killed someone.
Salim’s lawyer in that case, Richard Lind, said he had “mixed feelings” about Holder’s decision, because while he believes the suspects should be tried in civilian court, he has security concerns.
“The prison is not very secure,” Lind said. “Maybe things have improved since then, but I think it would be very difficult to manage.”
Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman has “unconceded” in New York’s special House election after reports that the vote margin between him and Rep. Bill Owens (D) has narrowed…
This satellite file image provided by GeoEye shows a facility under construction inside a mountain located about 20 miles north northeast of Qom, Iran. A senior official says, Monday, Nov. 16, 2009, the U.N nuclear agency believes Iran plans to start enriching uranium at a previously secret facility in 2011. A senior international official familiar with a new IAEA report said Monday that number could allow Iran to enrich enough material to be able to arm one nuclear warhead a year…
*
A CNN correspondent said Monday she was detained byChinese security guards in Shanghai for two hours for displaying a T-shirt on camera depicting US President Barack Obama as Mao Zedong.
Emily Chang, a Beijing-based correspondent for the US television network, said in a blog post on CNN.com that she hunted down the shirt after hearing they had been banned amid fears they ”may offend the American president.”
Here’s a stimulus success story: In Arizona’s 9th Congressional District, 30 jobs have been saved or created with just $761,420 in federal stimulus spending. At least that’s what the website set up by the Obama Administration to track the $787 billion stimulus says.
There’s one problem, though: There is no 9th Congressional District in Arizona; the state has only eight Congressional Districts.
There’s no 86th Congressional District in Arizona either, but the government’s recovery.gov Web site says $34 million in stimulus money has been spent there.
In fact, Recovery.gov lists hundreds of millions spent and hundreds of jobs created in Congressional districts that don’t exist.
In Oklahoma, for example, the site lists more than $19 million in spending—and 15 jobs created—on Congressional districts that don’t exist. In Iowa, it shows $10.6 million spent – and 39 jobs created—in non-existent districts.
In Connecticut’s 42nd District (which also does not exist), the website claims 25 jobs created with zero stimulus dollars. ...
Paint Visitor Center, Campground Comfort Stations, Ranger Station and Maintenance Facilities
* Project Number: 120124
* Bureau: National Park Service
* Unit: Organ Pipe Cactus
* State: AZ
* Congressional District: 9
* Type of Project: Deferred Maintenance
~ * ~
~ * ~
Just a head’s up as I hammer out the details…
I’m working on putting together our Christmas troop support endeavor.... it involves SSG Chris Rudzinki’s squad over in Afghanistan and I have been told they really appreciate those hand warmers in the plastic packages. Costco has boxes of 40 for @ $15. I’m waiting to hear back from a contact to see what he might be able to do to help us get them over there.
Regardless, I’ll be hitting you all up real soon to get this started. I am not going to make it complicated....we’ll raise the funds, buy what we can and get them over there by Christmas.
I’ll let you know real soon......
A DEADLY plague could sweep across Europe, doctors fear, after an outbreak of a virus in Ukraine plunged the country and its neighbours into a state of panic.
A cocktail of three flu viruses are reported to have mutated into a single pneumonic plague, which it is believed may be far more dangerous than swine flu. The death toll has reached 189 and more than 1 million people have been infected, most of them in the nine regions of Western Ukraine.
President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko has called in the World Health Organisation and a team of nine specialists are carrying out tests in Kiev and Lviv to identify the virus. Samples have been sent to London for analysis.
President Yushchenko said: “People are dying. The epidemic is killing doctors. This is absolutely inconceivable in the 21st Century.”
In a TV interview, the President added: “Unlike similar epidemics in other countries, three causes of serious viral infections came together simultaneously in Ukraine – two seasonal flus and the Californian flu
“Virologists conclude that this combination of infections may produce an even more aggressive new virus as a result of mutation.”
Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko has been touring hospitals where victims are being treated and presidential elections in January could be cancelled ...
I just spent a sleepless sweaty nightmarey night after reaching page 318 of Oryx and Crake. Just sayin’.
MitchM
Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Monday the “enemies” of his country’s nuclear programme had been defeated ahead of the release of the latest UN report on the atomic drive.
International attention focused on the report as US President Barack Obama said “time is running out” for Iran to respond to a UN plan aiming to ease international fears that the Islamic Republic is working on a nuclear bomb.
Ahmadinejad said
“OOOOOOooo, I’m SOOOOOOO SCAAAAAARED”the West would have to come to terms with Iran’s nuclear progress
OK, so they don’t fear the US. That’s to be expected, I mean look at the guy in charge. But the petty little dictator dares not stand against the awesome power of the INTERNATIONAL SUPERFRIENDS!
The IAEA sent its new report, having stated several times that Iran is not cooperating with UN Security Council demands, backed by three rounds of sanctions, that it halt uranium enrichment.
...shit.
Meet Michele Bachmann, a Republican congresswoman from Minnesota who is being hailed as a new and increasingly powerful voice in American politics.
[...]
She is part of an increasingly visible “female brand” of conservatism that is rising in America in the wake of the election of Obama. They include notable syndicated commentators such as Michelle Malkin and Ann Coulter, whose dislike for liberals has grown ever more shrill in recent months. And, of course, Palin herself.
[...]
All these women express a mood of conservative discontent that is becoming increasingly vocal and, some experts warn, extreme. The Republicans have been kicked out of power in the White House and Congress. The party is becoming more white and southern at the same time as national demographic changes give power to other regions and minorities. Many Americans are also suffering in the recession. That is a grim picture but one that also makes many voters vulnerable to a talented rabble-rouser.
IS THAT SUBTLE ENOUGH FOR YA, YOU RABBLE OF EASILY-LED SOUTHERN RACIST SHEEP?
I, for one, welcome our new estrogen overlords.
That’s what happens when you lack backbone.
wee-bidoo-wee-bidoo-wee-bidoo…
NYT 1994
It wasn’t a bow, exactly. But Mr. Clinton came close. He inclined his head and shoulders forward, he pressed his hands together. It lasted no longer than a snapshot, but the image on the South Lawn was indelible: an obsequent President, and the Emperor of Japan.
Canadians still bow to England’s Queen; so do Australians. Americans shake hands. If not to stand eye-to-eye with royalty, what else were 1776 and all that about? …
Guests invited to a white-tie state dinner at the White House (a Clinton Administration first) were instructed to address the Emperor as “Your Majesty,” not “Your Highness” or, worse, “King.” And in what one Administration aide called “some emperor thing,” an Army general was cautioned that he should not address the Emperor Akihito at all as he escorted him to the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery.
But the “thou need not bow” commandment from the State Department’s protocol office maintained a constancy of more than 200 years. Administration officials scurried to insist that the eager-to-please President had not really done the unthinkable...
