Puppet MastersS


USA

US: GOP Blocks Obama Nominee to Head Financial Agency


ABC News
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 21:05 UTC
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© UPI/Kevin DietschPresident Barack Obama annouces Richard Cordray (R) as his nominee to be the Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington on July 18, 2011.
The battle over the future of a new financial watchdog office escalated Thursday with Senate Republicans blocking confirmation of the man President Barack Obama named to head the office and Obama countering by holding out the possibility of appointing the nominee when Congress is on recess.

Senate Republicans were near unanimous in voting to stop a former Ohio attorney general, Richard Cordray, from becoming director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, an agency they said had too much power and too little accountability.

The vote had immediate consequences. Without a director, the agency designed to shield consumers from the excesses behind the 2008 financial crisis is unable to operate at full strength.

Republicans said that until the Obama administration agrees to changes at the agency, they will keep blocking the president's pick from taking charge.

Obama said immediately after the vote that there was no reason to deny Cordray the top spot. He did not rule out a recess appointment, whereby a president makes a temporary appointment to a government post when Congress is not in session. Under such a move, an appointee can serve until the close of the next session of Congress, which would be the end of 2012.
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Star of David

Palestinian health official says Israeli airstrike kills 1 civilian, wounds 25 people


The Washington Post
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 05:08 UTC
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© The Associated Press/Hatem MoussaPalestinians gather around the wreckage of a car after an explosion in Gaza City, Thursday, Dec. 8, 2011.
Israeli aircraft fired missiles at militant facilities in the Gaza Strip early Friday, killing a Palestinian civilian and wounding 25 other people, Gaza officials said, as a new round of violence in the area threatened to escalate into a wider confrontation.

The airstrikes, confirmed by the Israeli military, followed Israeli air attacks a day earlier that killed two Islamic militants and touched off rocket fire from Gaza on southern Israel. The rockets caused no casualties but further ratcheted up frictions.

Gaza rescue officials said three separate airstrikes took place in Gaza City against training facilities of the militant Hamas group that rules the densely populated seaside territory. One set a nearby house on fire, destroying it and killing a 42-year-old civilian man, identified by health official Adham Abu Salmia as Bahajat Zaalan. Seven members of Zaalan's family - his 65-year-old father, wife and five of his children - were wounded, Abu Salmia said.

Fire also erupted in other houses and some were hit by shrapnel. In all, 25 people, including an infant, were wounded, seven of them critically, Abu Salmia said.
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Play

Iran shows intercepted CIA drone unscathed


RT
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 16:41 UTC

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© Revolutionary Guards, via Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesPhoto shows Brigadier General Amir-Ali Hajizadeh, right, looking at what Iranian officials say is an American RQ-170 Sentinel high-altitude reconnaissance drone that crashed in Iran.
Days after the Pentagon first denied and then admitted that it lost touch with a high-tech drone aircraft, authorities in Iran are now saying that they have the plane - and its condition is pristine.

The unmanned, robotic aircraft - a RQ170 Sentinel drone plane - disappeared last week. American authorities quickly dismissed claims that they lost the plane over Iran, only to later admit that the CIA was flying a reconnaissance mission over Afghanistan when they lost touch with the top-secret stealth drone. Soon after it was believed that communication was cut once the plane waded through the air in Iranian territory. American officials then claimed that satellite imagery showed that the drone had crashed and was beyond repair.

Officials out of Tehran, however, now say that they intercepted the craft and have it in perfect shape. For proof, Iran television has even broadcast footage of the craft.
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Chess

Eurozone crisis: Late night summit talks to save euro


BBC News
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 18:22 UTC
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© The Associated PressFrance and Germany are the main driving force behind the plan to change EU treaties
European Union leaders are locked in late night talks at a summit called to tackle the eurozone debt crisis and save the single currency.

The key item on the agenda in Brussels is a Franco-German plan on budgetary discipline, with automatic penalties for eurozone nations that overspend.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said the euro has "lost credibility".

Meanwhile, world shares fell after the European Central Bank ruled out any substantial aid for indebted nations.

The US Dow Jones index closed down 1.6%. French and Italian shares ended down 2.5% and 4.3% respectively. Shares on Asian markets opened lower on Friday.
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Whistle

Council of Europe issues free speech alert over cyber attacks and political pressure

Dean Wilson
The Inquirer
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 14:05 UTC
cyber attack
© Alamy
Raises concerns over access to online content

The council of Europe has issued an alert to European countries about the risk to free speech by cyber attacks and political pressure on internet platforms, internet service providers (ISPs), independent media, whistleblowers, human rights defenders and political dissidents.

The Council's Committee of Ministers issued a Declaration expressing concern over pressure being exerted on internet companies and ISPs to tighten controls on internet content, which supports a recent EU Court of Justice ruling that ISP filters are prohibited under European law.

The Council is also worried about the impact of cyber attacks, particularly Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks, on advocates of free speech, which it sees as a relatively new way that this right is being violated.

The Declaration asserted the usefulness of social networks, blogs, and other online communities for their role as social watchdogs that have the power to cause positive real-life change. This is likely a reference to the recent uprisings in several countries against oppressive regimes, including Egypt and Libya.
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Attention

NATO fuel tankers attacked in Pakistan


The Associated Press
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 00:00 UTC
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© The Associated PressFirefighters extinguish burning NATO supply oil tankers and goods trucks at a terminal following an attack by gunmen in Quetta on December 8, 2011.
Assailants torched more than 20 tankers in Pakistan carrying fuel for U.S. and NATO troops in neighboring Afghanistan on Thursday, the first reported attack since Islamabad closed the border to protest coalition airstrikes that killed 24 Pakistani troops last month.

The attack highlighted the vulnerability of the supply trucks that are waiting for the country's two border crossings into Afghanistan to reopen. Around 40 percent of the non-lethal supplies for U.S.-led troops in landlocked Afghanistan travel across Pakistani soil.

Islamabad temporarily closed one of its Afghan crossings to NATO supplies last year after U.S. helicopters accidentally killed two Pakistani soldiers. Suspected militants or criminals took advantage of the impasse to launch many attacks against stranded or rerouted trucks carrying NATO supplies.
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Target

Putin accuses Clinton of encouraging protesters


The Associated Press
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 00:00 UTC

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© The Associated Press/Dmitry LovetskyRiot police detain a protester during a rally in downtown St.Petersburg, Russia, Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2011. More than a thousand people have protested in St.Petersburg against Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and his party, which won the largest share of a parliamentary election that observers said was rigged.
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin blasted U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Thursday for encouraging and supporting the election protesters and warned of a wider Russian crackdown on unrest.

By describing Russia's parliamentary election as rigged, Putin said Clinton "gave a signal" to his opponents.

"They heard this signal and with the support of the U.S. State Department began their active work," Putin said in televised remarks.

Russian protesters have taken to the streets in Moscow and St. Petersburg for three straight nights despite heavy police presence, outraged over observers' reports of widespread ballot box stuffing and manipulations of the vote count in Sunday's parliamentary election. The demonstrations have been some of the biggest and most sustained protests Russia has seen in years, and police have detained hundreds of protesters.
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Handcuffs

US- Federal judge: Montana blogger is not journalist

Jeff Barnard
Associated Press
Wed, 07 Dec 2011 19:55 UTC
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© Kamorek
A federal judge in Oregon has ruled that a Montana woman sued for defamation was not a journalist when she posted online that an Oregon lawyer acted criminally during a bankruptcy case, a decision with implications for bloggers around the country.

Crystal L. Cox, a blogger from Eureka, Mont., was sued for defamation by attorney Kevin Padrick when she posted online that he was a thug and a thief during the handling of bankruptcy proceedings by him and Obsidian Finance Group LLC.

U.S. District Judge Marco Hernandez found last week that as a blogger, Cox was not a journalist and cannot claim the protections afforded to mainstream reporters and news outlets.

Although media experts said Wednesday that the ruling would have little effect on the definition of journalism, it casts a shadow on those who work in nontraditional media since it highlights the lack of case law that could protect them and the fact that current state shield laws for journalists are not covering recent developments in online media.

"My advice to bloggers operating in the state of Oregon is lobby to get your shield law improved so bloggers are covered," said Lucy Dalglish, executive director of The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. "But do not expect the shield law to provide you a defense in a libel case where you want to rely on an anonymous source for that information."
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Attention

Patented Gene Sequences Make up Over 20 Percent of the Human Genome

Mike Barrett
Natural Society
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 13:10 UTC
Gene Patents
© Natural Society

Gene patenting has been going on for over 100 years while science and technology has been continually allowing for greater advancements. Over the past 30 years alone, there has been over 40,000 patents created and accepted on genes alone. As genes continue to be acquired and patented, it is only a matter of time before large corporations own patents on a large number of human genes and tissues. What may seem staggering, though, is that the more than 20 percent of the human genome is already patented.

The Fears Alongside with Gene Pattenting

To create a patentable gene sequences an individual must find something in nature, isolate it, and alter it in order to create something deemed 'useful'. Much of the debate in favor of creating gene sequences revolves around society and corporate driven company ownership issues. As a creator of a gene sequence, individuals or companies expect ownership of the creation as well as protection from anyone else stealing the idea. If companies were not able to patent gene sequences, then other companies could exploit the original creators' ideas and ultimately profit themselves. Of course the patents in question revolve around the human genome, which no corporation rightfully owns. In addition, corporations use the argument that many of these gene sequences correlate with diseases like breast cancer and Alzheimer's disease. The creation of such gene sequences give merit to the idea of gene manipulation as the created gene sequence could lead to increased protection against bodily invaders.
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Vader

Why Obama Wants to Veto S.1867

Dr. Eowyn
Fellowship of the Minds
Wed, 07 Dec 2011 10:14 UTC
Obama
© unknown
Some among us are puzzled as to why Obama has made known he plans to veto the recently passed Senate bill 1867, that will give him (and future Presidents) immense power.

The now infamous Section 1031 of S. 1867 does not exclude U.S. citizens from those "covered persons" whom the President can have the military arrest and detain without charge or trial. In effect, S. 1867 suspends and removes the protection of the U.S. Constitution from American citizens if they/we are deemed to be "at war" with the United States, whatever "at war" means.

Obama's opposition to S. 1867 is not due to his passion to preserve our civil liberties.
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