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USA

Best of the Web: Video: US Cop Punches 17-Year-old Girl In Face For Jay-Walking

This is the moment a white American police officer punches a teenage black girl in the face after a dispute about how she and her friend crossed the road.

Video footage of Officer Ian Walsh lashing out at the 17-year-old in Seattle has shocked the U.S.


Sun

Best of the Web: NASA warns solar flares from 'huge space storm' will cause devastation


Britain could face widespread power blackouts and be left without critical communication signals for long periods of time, after the earth is hit by a once-in-a-generation "space storm", Nasa has warned.

National power grids could overheat and air travel severely disrupted while electronic items, navigation devices and major satellites could stop working after the Sun reaches its maximum power in a few years.

Senior space agency scientists believe the Earth will be hit with unprecedented levels of magnetic energy from solar flares after the Sun wakes "from a deep slumber" sometime around 2013.

In a new warning, Nasa said the super storm would hit like "a bolt of lightning" and could cause catastrophic consequences for the world's health, emergency services and national security unless precautions are taken.

Comment: However... see this:
What's wrong with the sun?


Bad Guys

Best of the Web: Is BP trying to cap the Gulf oil well, or keep it flowing?

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© b3ta corporate logos that tell the truth
Today, I spent my time interviewing people on the Gulf Coast from Mississippi to Louisiana. Several of those interviews were conducted on camera, and you'll be seeing those videos as early as tomorrow here on NaturalNews.

Interestingly, it turns out that a lot of the people living on the Gulf Coast have a history of working with oil companies -- and even on oil rigs. I spoke to several people who have a work history with BP, and two of them told me they are certain that British Petroleum is NOT trying to stop the oil coming out of the well. What they are trying to do, I was told, is SAVE the oil well so that they can capture the oil and sell it.

This claim stands in direct contradiction to what BP says. The company insists it's trying to stop the flow of oil from the well. But if you look at BP's actions, what they're really trying to do is siphon off the gushing oil where it can be pumped to a tanker ship and sold as crude. It is a simple matter, by the way, for oil companies to separate water from oil. They do it all the time in oil fields all across America. So if they can siphon off the oil from the Deepwater Horizon well -- even if it's mixed with water -- they can sell it for potentially billions of dollars.

It raises the question: Is the economic promise of captured oil causing BP to avoid using its best effort to cap the well?

Tapping, not capping

Notice that the new device they're lowering onto the well is designed not to close it off but to pump the oil to an awaiting ship. This is a plan to "capture" the oil, not to seal off the well.

Bizarro Earth

Best of the Web: BP Oilpocalypse Creates Underwater Nightmare

On Good Morning America, correspondent Sam Champion and Philippe Cousteau Jr. explore the toxic plumes of dispersed oil floating beneath the waves in the Gulf of Mexico.

Camera

Best of the Web: Gulf Oil Photo Essay


Evil Rays

Best of the Web: Inside The LC: The Strange but Mostly True Story of Laurel Canyon and the Birth of the Hippie Generation Part XVII

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© Sundazed Records
"[Gene] used to slip into these dream states, which I thought was really amazing. He'd go into these dream states and lay down on the couch and go, 'I'll be right back, Patrick.'"
- Pat Robinson, a friend and bandmate of Gene Clark

"[Gene] had these multiple personalities."
- John York, another friend and bandmate of Gene Clark

"[Gene] did seem like he had a lot on his mind and would often appear distracted. You'd say, 'Hey, Gene, what are you thinking?' and he would go, 'Huh? Oh,' like he was being brought back to reality."
- Bernie Leadon, yet another friend and bandmate of Gene Clark

In many ways, the Gene Clark story reads a lot like the Gram Parsons story. Both were considered by their peers to be among Laurel Canyon's brightest stars, yet both are now largely forgotten. Both of their lives were cut tragically short (though Clark lived considerably longer than Parsons). Both of their deaths were overshadowed to some extent by unusual events that occurred just after their passing. Both were considered pioneers of the country-rock genre. Both played for a time with the Byrds. Both recorded duets with Emmylou Harris, and both employed many of the same musicians on their various solo projects. Both had legions of female admirers. Both had a keen interest in UFOs and believed in alien visitations. Both were notorious drug and alcohol abusers.

Did anyone notice anything unusual, by the way, about that last sentence? Probably not, though there is an obvious redundancy on display. If I had written something slightly different, like "drug and heroin abusers" or "drug and cocaine abusers," you likely would have picked up on it right away. But because I used a phrase that everyone is accustomed to seeing and hearing, "drug and alcohol abusers," none of you batted an eye. I have no idea though what my point is here, so let's just move on.

Stormtrooper

Best of the Web: Proud to be an American

Yet another video of Brave American soldiers surrounding, then shooting to death an unarmed old Iraqi man. Notice the fear on the faces of our intrepid heroes and their vile battle cries for blood as they encircle him and then shoot him down in cold blood even though he is clearly unarmed - and poses absolutely no threat to anyone. And the coup de grace? As our heroes surround the corpse one of them shouts, "Arrest him!"


Vader

Best of the Web: The Financial Oligarchy Reigns: Democracy's Death Spiral From Greece to the United States

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New York Stock Exchange
As the Economic Elite continue their plunder, the people in Greece riot and the big banks score yet another big blow against the people of the United States.

Democracy throughout the world is under attack. Many people can make the argument that our democracy here in America is only an illusion, but even the illusion of democracy is crashing down. Tragedies are currently playing out across the world on an epic scale. Unprecedented economic and environmental catastrophes have become the norm. Billions of people, the overwhelming majority of humanity, have been sentenced to a slow death due to a concentration of wealth and resources within humanity's economic top 0.5%. Ultimately, short-sighted greed has proven to be humanity's most severe disease.

I: Democracy Vs. Oligarchy: Lessons from History

The experiment known as democracy is devolving into fascism before our eyes; the "iron law of oligarchy" is once again asserting itself. From the Founding Fathers on, we have known that you cannot have a concentration of vast wealth and Democracy at the same time - and we currently have the greatest concentration of wealth in the history of the United States. As former Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis once said, "We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both."

Better Earth

Best of the Web: President's Panel: 'Eat Organic, Ward Off Cancer'

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© EraPhernalia Vintage/flickr
Thanks to Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times ("New alarm bells about chemicals and cancer") for telling readers about a report on chemicals and cancer released last week by the President's Cancer Panel.

I had never heard of this panel - appointed during the Bush Administration, no less - and went right to its 2008-2009 annual report (PDF).

The Panel says that the "risk of environmentally induced cancer has been grossly underestimated," that "nearly 80,000 chemicals [are] on the market in the United States, many of which are ... understudied and largely unregulated," and that "the public remains unaware ... that children are far more vulnerable to environmental toxins and radiation than adults."
evidence suggests that some environmental agents may initiate or promote cancer by disrupting normal immune and endocrine system functions. The burgeoning number and complexity of known or suspected environmental carcinogens compel us to act to protect public health, even though we may lack irrefutable proof of harm.

Life Preserver

Best of the Web: What took US media so long to report this? Nashville Tennessee Flood 2010