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European parliament refuses to release expenses report

Bruno Waterfield
Telegraph UK
Fri, 10 Jun 2011 21:21 UTC
Image
© European Press Association
Parliament lawyers argued that publicising the report 'could be used to derail' decision-making in the EU assembly
The European Parliament is refusing to release a secret report detailing widespread abuse of MEPs expenses despite an EU court ruling that there is "overriding public interest in disclosure".

The existence of the document, written by Robert Galvin, a senior EU official who is the parliament's chief internal auditor, was first disclosed by The Daily Telegraph in 2008.

Despite public controversy across Europe over misuse of generous allowances paid to MEPs, parliament officials have fought tooth and nail to keep the Galvin report, number 06/02, secret.

During an internal investigation, Mr Galvin discovered large scale abuse of £185 million in MEP staffing allowances and general expenditure expenses, paid without receipts.

Parliament lawyers argued that publicising the report "could be used to derail" decision-making in the EU assembly.

"The use members make of the allowances available to them is a sensitive matter followed with great interest by the media," said a legal submission.

EU judges threw out the special pleading in a judgement on Tuesday but parliament officials yesterday continued to refuse to disclose the report until an administration decision on whether to appeal in August.
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People

TSA Considering Banning Photography Of Checkpoints

Carlos Miller
pixiq
Fri, 10 Jun 2011 21:01 UTC
The Transportation Security Administration is considering changing its policy on photographing security checkpoints after several videos depicting questionable incidents between passengers and TSA screeners were posted on Youtube.

News of the possible changes in policy was posted Friday on the TSA Blog, the same blog that posted that it is permissible to photograph checkpoints, even though most screeners act as if it has always been illegal.

The reason it is considering changing its policy stems from a Youtube video that was recorded in Phoenix when a woman opted-out of the metal detectors and chose to get patted down by a TSA screener.

The woman began yelling hysterically that she had been molested by the screener.

Meanwhile, the woman's son was recording the incident and continued to do so, even though several TSA screeners told him he was breaking the law.
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Family

You have too many housewives! Brussels sends memo to Germany, Austria and Holland ordering women to get jobs

Allan Hall
Daily Mail
Fri, 10 Jun 2011 20:42 UTC
Image
© Alamy
Back to work: Germany are encouraging mothers to head back to the office (posed picture)

The EU wants Europe's biggest economy to avoid looming labour shortages in future by dismantling barriers to women entering the workforce.

'Germany must better integrate women into the labour market," said the EU Commission, in a report on the German economy.

'Germany, but also Austria and the Netherlands, should look at the example of the northern countries," said President José Manuel Barroso, in a reference to Scandinavia.

'That means removing obstacles for women, older workers, foreigners and low-skilled job-seekers to get into the workforce. Excessive early retirement regulations need to be abolished.'
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Rocket

Nato warplanes bombard Tripoli after Gaddafi vows fight to the death

Xan Rice
Guardian UK
Fri, 10 Jun 2011 20:30 UTC
Image
© Ahmed Jadallah/Reuters
A truck damaged by coalition air strikes on Tripoli, according to the Libyan government.
Coalition forces carry out attacks within hours of Libyan leader's defiant television speech

Nato's intensified aerial bombardment of Tripoli continued early on Wednesday, hours after Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi made a rare speech on state television vowing to fight to the death.

Loud explosions rocked the city before dawn, marking the heaviest 24 hours of air strikes in the capital since Nato's operation began in March. The alliance said it conducted 66 strike sorties on Tuesday, with many of them in daylight hours. Previously, most airstrikes have taken place at night.

The targets struck in and around Tripoli included six command and control centres, two anti-aircraft guns, a radar system and a vehicle storage facility, according to Nato. The heaviest damage occurred at Gaddafi's Bab al-Aziziya compound, where several buildings were destroyed, sending giant plumes of smoke into the sky.
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Stormtrooper

Blair demands more allied military action

Andrew Grice
Independent UK
Fri, 10 Jun 2011 19:34 UTC
Image
© Arrow Books
Tony Blair
Britain and its allies should be ready to mount Libya-style interventions in other Arab countries, Tony Blair declares today.

The former Prime Minister, who committed British troops to military action in Afghanistan and Iraq, says that Europe and the United States must draw up a proper plan to support the so-called Arab Spring.

In a new introduction to the paperback version of his memoirs published today, Mr Blair says: "We need to have an active policy, be players and not spectators sitting in the sands, applauding or condemning as we watch. Like it or not, we have to participate."

He argues that a Libya-style operation should take place only when regimes have "excluded a path to evolutionary change". But he does raise the prospect of intervention in some circumstances in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iran and Jordan.
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Chess

Why TSA, wars, state defined diets, seat-belt laws, the war on drugs, police brutality, and efforts to control the internet, are essential to the state

Butler Shaffer
LewRockwell
Fri, 10 Jun 2011 12:17 UTC
Whenever justice is uncertain and police spying and terror are at work, human beings fall into isolation, which, of course, is the aim and purpose of the dictator state, since it is based on the greatest accumulation of depotentiated social units.

~ Carl Jung
Image
© Unknown
The title of this article encompasses topics that arouse attention and criticism among persons of libertarian persuasion. The discussion of such matters usually treats each issue as though it were sui generis, independent of one another. Most of us respond as though the woman who is groped at the airport has no connection with the man who is tasered by a police officer; that the person serving time in prison for selling marijuana is unrelated to the men being held at Guantanamo. The belief that one person's maltreatment is isolated from the rest of us, is essential to the maintenance of state power.
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Dollar

Canada: Prime Minister Stephen Harper attends Game 4 of Stanley Cup final

Bruce Cheadle
The Canadian Press
Wed, 08 Jun 2011 00:00 UTC
Image
© The Canadian Press / Jonathan Hayward
Prime Minister Stephen Harper, centre, attends game 4 of NHL Stanley Cup Final hockey action between Vancouver Canucks and Boston Bruins at the TD Garden in Boston on Wednesday, June 8, 2011.
In the NHL season of the head shot, Prime Minister Stephen Harper should have seen this one coming.

The Conservative leader was at TD Garden on Wednesday night as the Bruins tried to even their best-of-seven series with the Vancouver Canucks in Boston.

But word of Harper's flight to Bean Town with his daughter Rachel and Heritage Minister James Moore on a government jet had opposition critics stepping up to the Tory blue-line to lower the boom.

Opposition MPs were incensed that Harper - who used to rail about government abuse of its executive jets - is flying to Boston on the taxpayers' dime for a hockey game even as his government is on a mission to slash some $4 billion per year in "fat" from federal programs and services.

"Excuse me, aren't we in a time of tightening our belts? Aren't we in a time of making sure that we use our money wisely?" fumed Liberal MP Jim Karygiannis.

New Democrat Charlie Angus noted "how important it is politically" for Harper to associate himself with the Stanley Cup and Canada's remaining team.

"The whole world would love to be in his shoes, but we are not and he is the man saying again and again ... we are going to do things differently," said Angus. "Well, there's two rules, there is one for Mr. Harper and his gang and one rule for everyone else."
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Bizarro Earth

Syria Prepares Response to Jisr al-Shughour 'Massacre'

Jim Muir
BBC News
Wed, 08 Jun 2011 09:13 UTC
Image
© The Associated Press
The Syrian government claims members of the security forces were killed in a rampage
The events in the north-western town of Jisr al-Shughour may turn out to be some sort of turning point in Syria's uprising, as it moves towards completing its first three months with no end in sight.

The reported killing of more than 120 security forces personnel in and around the town in recent days is by far the biggest frontal challenge to Bashar al-Assad's regime since the revolt began in March.

The authorities have made it clear they will act decisively and forcefully to restore control.

It is a challenge they cannot ignore without admitting that they have lost control of a significant chunk of territory.

Preparations are under way for what local residents fear will be "another massacre", with troops and tanks from dependably loyalist units reported to be making their way towards the area.

The current lull is clearly the calm before the storm.

Syrian state television has been preparing the way for the campaign, repeating gruesome footage of some of the dead bodies, interviewing wounded survivors and loyal citizens calling for army intervention, and declaring that there is a "popular consensus" behind a military crackdown.

Activist internet sites, in counterbalance, have been carrying footage of night-time vigils and demonstrations in many towns and villages throughout the country, declaring solidarity with Jisr al-Shughour and calling for the overthrow of the regime.
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Blackbox

Hmm...Reward? Clinton may quit State Department for World Bank

Lesley Wroughton
MSNBC / Rueters
Thu, 09 Jun 2011 17:51 UTC
Image
© Karim Sahib/AFP/Gett
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gestures speaks to the press after a meeting of the International contact group on Libya in Abu Dhabi Thursday.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has been in discussions with the White House about leaving her job next year to become head of the World Bank, sources familiar with the discussions said on Thursday.

The former first lady and onetime political rival to President Barack Obama quickly became one of the most influential members of his cabinet after she began her tenure at State in early 2009.

She has said publicly she did not plan to stay on at the State Department for more than four years. Associates say Clinton has expressed interest in having the World Bank job should the Bank's current president, Robert Zoellick, leave at the end of his term, in the middle of 2012.

"Hillary Clinton wants the job," said one source who knows the secretary well.

A second source also said Clinton wants the position.

A third source said Obama has already expressed support for the change in her role. It is unclear whether Obama has formally agreed to nominate her for the post, which would require approval by the 187 member countries of the World Bank.

The White House declined to comment.
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Bad Guys

Rift Widens in Israel over War on Iran


Press TV
Wed, 08 Jun 2011 11:57 UTC
Former Mossad chief Meir Dagan & Netanyahu
© Press TV
Former Mossad chief Meir Dagan (L) and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
Friction among Israeli spy officials and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are on the rise over the prospect of a military conflict with Iran.

Israeli Minister for the Home Front Defense Matan Vilnai and former Mossad chief Meir Dagan have both warned Netanyahu that should the regime launch an attack on Iran, more than 1,000 rockets will hit "central Israel for an undetermined period of time" on a daily basis, Haaretz reported on Tuesday.

In a series of remarks in May, the former Mossad chief said that any Israeli aerial attack against Iran's nuclear facilities would be "the stupidest thing," and warned that any such measure "could start a regional war which will include missile fire from Iran."

Earlier in the month, a source close to prominent Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's group said Israeli jet fighters had conducted drills at a military base in Iraq in order to strike targets inside Iran.
      Read More...
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