U.S. News
Bill Hutchinson
New York Daily News
Wed, 18 Nov 2009 02:22 EST
© Mariant/AP
The father of a boy who accused Michael Jackson of molestation in 1993 blew out his brains in his luxury New Jersey apartment, cops said Tuesday.
Evan Chandler, 65, whose son received a multimillion-dollar settlement from the King of Pop, was discovered in his 16th- floor waterfront pad in Jersey City with his gun still in his hand.
Chandler took his own life Nov. 5, Jersey City police spokesman Stan Eason said. The concierge of Chandler's building found the body.
"He [Chandler] was on his bed still holding the weapon with a single gunshot wound to the head," Eason said. "It's straightforward. Case closed. It's suicide."
Daniel Tencer
Raw Story
Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:51 EST
'Birther' lawyer: Fort Hood proves soldiers should be allowed to disobey orders
Conservative commentators are ratcheting up anti-Muslim rhetoric in the wake of last week's Fort Hood massacre, with televangelist Pat Robertson leading the way with a declaration that Islam is "not a religion," but a "political system" bent on destroying all the world's governments.
In a commentary on his show,
The 700 Club, Robertson noted that the alleged shooter in the Fort Hood massacre, Nidal Malik Hasan, had
come to the attention of authorities prior to the rampage by emailing a radical cleric and trying to contact Al Qaeda.
Associated Press
Wed, 18 Nov 2009 22:51 EST
Teen accused of strangling, stabbing 9-year-old neighbor
Jefferson City, Missouri. - Blessed with a Friday off school, 15-year-old Alyssa Bustamante dug two holes in the ground to be used as a grave, authorities said. For the next week, she attended classes, all the while plotting the right time for a murder, they said.
That time arrived the evening of Oct. 21, when Bustamante strangled 9-year-old neighbor Elizabeth Olten without provocation, cut the girl's throat and stabbed her, prosecutors said.
Why?
"Ultimately, she stated she wanted to know what it felt like," Missouri State Highway Patrol Sgt. David Rice testified Wednesday during a court hearing over the slaying.
Allen McDuffee
Truthout
Wed, 18 Nov 2009 16:35 EST
About 25,000 children in on-base Air Force daycare centers will be forced to receive the H1N1 vaccine or face being barred from school, Truthout has learned following reports from concerned parents.
When a number of Air Force parents opened the November Child Development Center newsletter, they were outraged to learn that their children must receive the H1N1 vaccine. The newsletter article indicates that the Air Force is considering the H1N1 vaccine as part of the required seasonal flu vaccination.
David Edwards and Muriel Kane
Raw Story
Wed, 18 Nov 2009 16:30 EST
This video is from MSNBC's
The Rachel Maddow Show, broadcast Nov. 17, 2009.
Democracy Now
Tue, 17 Nov 2009 13:41 EST
AMY GOODMAN: More than 49 million Americans, or one in seven, struggled to find enough to eat last year, according to a report from the US Department of Agriculture released on Monday. That's the highest total since the federal government began keeping track of what they call food insecurity. The numbers for 2008 shot up by three-and-a-half percent, or nearly 13 million people, from 2007, marking the greatest deterioration in access to food in a single year. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack called the numbers a, quote, "wake-up call," and President Obama described the report as, quote, "unsettling and troubling."
Miriam Jordan
Wall Street Journal
Tue, 17 Nov 2009 13:25 EST
© U.S. Census Bureau
First graders at Union Avenue Elementary, near downtown Los Angeles, read a story last week about who should be counted for the Census
Los Angeles -- The U.S. Census Bureau is recruiting a new set of volunteers: kids.
Seeking to ensure strong participation in the decennial population count, especially in so-called hard-to-count neighborhoods, the bureau has decided children are key.
That has led it to settings like Arlene Paynes's first-grade class at Union Avenue Elementary School in this immigrant enclave on the edge of downtown. Last Thursday, the class gathered to read aloud a story titled
Who Counts?
They learned about a boy named Joey who helps his grandmother, an Italian immigrant, fill out the Census form that arrives in the mail. The grandmother and grandchild decide that those who "count" in their household are Grandma, Mom, Dad, Joey, little sister Mary -- and even Mr. Macintosh, who occupies a spare room "until he finds a job." The only one who doesn't count: their cat Clover.
Phil Stewart
Reuters
Wed, 18 Nov 2009 08:52 EST
© Reuters/Goran Tomasevic
U.S. soldiers stand in front of a base before they start a night mission in Baquba early June 28 , 2007.
Suicides in the U.S. Army will hit a new high this year, a top general said on Tuesday in a disclosure likely to increase concerns about stress on U.S. forces ahead of an expected buildup in Afghanistan.
The findings, released as President Barack Obama inches toward a decision to send up to 40,000 additional troops to Afghanistan, show the number of active-duty suicides so far in 2009 has already matched last year's record of 140 deaths.
"We are almost certainly going to end the year higher than last year," General Peter Chiarelli, the Army's vice chief of staff, told a Pentagon briefing.
"This is horrible, and I do not want to downplay the significance of these numbers in any way."
Carey Gillam
Reuters
Tue, 17 Nov 2009 10:13 EST
Kansas City - The rapid adoption by U.S. farmers of genetically engineered corn, soybeans and cotton has promoted increased use of pesticides, an epidemic of herbicide-resistant weeds and more chemical residues in foods, according to a report issued Tuesday by health and environmental protection groups.
The groups said research showed that herbicide use grew by 383 million pounds from 1996 to 2008, with 46 percent of the total increase occurring in 2007 and 2008.
The report was released by nonprofits The Organic Center (TOC), the Union for Concerned Scientists (UCS) and the Center for Food Safety (CFS).
The groups said that while herbicide use has climbed, insecticide use has dropped because of biotech crops. They said adoption of genetically engineered corn and cotton that carry traits resistant to insects has led to a reduction in insecticide use by 64 million pounds since 1996.
Still, that leaves a net overall increase on U.S. farm fields of 318 million pounds of pesticides, which includes insecticides and herbicides, over the first 13 years of commercial use.
Joseph Rhee, Mary-Rose Abraham, Anna Schecter, and Brian Ross
ABC News
Mon, 16 Nov 2009 20:51 EST
Major Nidal Malik Hasan's military superiors repeatedly ignored or rebuffed his efforts to open criminal prosecutions of soldiers he claimed had confessed to "war crimes" during psychiatric counseling, according to investigative reports circulated among federal law enforcement officials.
On Nov. 4, the day after his last attempt to raise the issue, he took extra target practice at Stan's shooting range in nearby Florence, Texas and then closed a safe deposit box he had at a Bank of America branch in Killeen, according to the reports. A bank employee told investigators Hasan appeared nervous and said, "You'll never see me again."
Diane Wagner, Bank of America's senior vice president of media relations, said that her company does not "comment or discuss customer relationships" but is "cooperating fully with law enforcement officials."
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