Society's ChildS


Family

Michigan orders DPS to close half of schools

Jennifer Chambers
The Detroit News
Tue, 22 Feb 2011 19:39 UTC
Image
© Len Rubenstein/All Posters

Lansing - Swift and severe changes are coming to Detroit Public Schools.

State education officials have ordered Robert Bobb to immediately implement a financial restructuring plan that balances the district's books by closing half of its schools, swelling high school class sizes to 60 students and consolidating operations.

This week, Bobb, the district's emergency financial manager, said he is meeting with Detroit city officials and will set up a meeting with Wayne County Regional Educational Service Agency to discuss consolidation opportunities in areas such as finance, public safety, transportation and other areas.

Bobb also is preparing a list of recommended school closures and Friday said layoff discussions are under way and would be announced closer to April, when notices would be issued. "We are moving forward with the plan," he said "Right now my focus is on my transition plan and the DEP (deficit elimination plan)."
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Wolf

Bill Calls for Illegals to Be Dumped at Offices of Congressmen

Jim Forsyth
WOIA
Tue, 22 Feb 2011 19:30 UTC
congressional offices
© Unknown

This should get their attention.

A measure filed by State Rep. Lois Kolkhorst (R-Brenham) would allow any law enforcement agency that has custody of an illegal immigrant to take the illegal to 'the office of a U.S. Senator or Representative' and leave them there.

1200 WOAI news reports the measure also allows county sheriff's deputies or city police officers to 'request an agent or employee of the United States Senator or United States Representative to sign a document acknowledging the release or discharge of the illegal immigrant at the senator's or representative's office.

The measure covers individuals who are 'not a citizen or national of the United States' and who is 'unlawfully present in the United States.'

Kolkhorst concedes the measure is a 'cry for help' to convince federal officials to secure the border, but she says she is serious about getting the measure approved by the Legislature.
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Beaker

Drugmakers Shielded from Lawsuits: US Supreme Court


Raw Story
Tue, 22 Feb 2011 19:11 UTC
supreme court bldg
© AFP/Getty Images/File Win McNamee
Vaccine makers are protected from lawsuits, the Supreme Court ruled Tuesday, dashing the hopes of a US couple who had sought monetary damages after their daughter fell ill after a round of routine childhood inoculations.

By a 6-2 vote, the US high court, in an opinion by written Justice Antonin Scalia, rejected the family's argument that they should allowed to sue drug maker Wyeth for not making a safer vaccine.

The case concerned Hannah Bruesewitz, who as a six-month-old infant received a series of injections to protect her against diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis, the illness also known as whooping cough.

The family, from the northeastern state of Pennsylvania, found that after the third injection, the cognitive development of their now-teenaged daughter slowed dramatically and she developed seizures and other health problems that continue to this day.
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Che Guevara

Morocco Riots Leave Five Dead

Giles Tremlett
The Guardian, UK
Mon, 21 Feb 2011 18:37 UTC
Demonstrators in Casablanca
© Chafik/AFP/Getty ImagesDemonstrators in Casablanca on Sunday. More than 37,000 demonstrated across Morocco, according to interior ministry figures.
Sporadic outbursts of violence have continued in Morocco after Sunday's peaceful pro-democracy protests gave way to rioting, with five people killed in a fire at a bank in the northern port of Al Hoceima.

Interior ministry figures showed that the protests were far more extensive than first thought, with nearly 40,000 people turning out in 57 towns and cities.

Protest organisers condemned the rioting and looting that followed the demonstrations, blaming it on thugs and football hooligans returning from matches.

While the mostly middle-class pro-democracy protesters had pledged to remain peaceful, there were warnings before the marches that the real tinderbox in Morocco lay in the poverty-stricken outer suburbs of the cities, where many of Sunday's rioters are thought to live.

Outbreaks of violence continued on Monday in Fes, with at least three people injured, according to Morocco's Atlantic Radio.
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Family

Spill Children: The Untold Story of the BP Gulf Oil Disaster

OilFlorida
YouTube
Tue, 22 Feb 2011 18:38 UTC
Part One

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USA

Raymond Davis and America

Brig Asif Haroon Raja
Opinion Maker
Tue, 22 Feb 2011 18:31 UTC
Pakistani protest
© n/a
Davis case has thrown overboard America's rules on terrorism

As per Paul Craig Robert, hypocrisy in America is now so commonplace it is no longer noticed. While it enjoys torturing other peoples for American sins, it objects to human rights abuses of countries it despises such as Burma, Pakistan, Iran, Syria. In USA if a person tortures a dog he is sent to jail, but a government functionary indulging in torture against fellow beings is ignored.

The US has destroyed two Muslim countries and acutely lacerated the third Muslim country under the plea of curbing terrorism and making the world peaceful but its own track record shows that it is the leading terrorist state. It not only indulges in state terrorism but also foments terrorism through clandestine black operations in other countries. While the US has put the entire Muslim world on the chopping block, it considers its own executioners above law.

Hypocrisy and double standards of the US came in full spotlight when one of leading CIA's agent Raymond Allen Davis, a former green beret working for State Department, was arrested by Lahore police after he shot dead two motorcyclists Faheem and Faizan with his 9mm semi-automatic Glock pistol in broad daylight on 27 January. 47 eye-witnesses recorded their statements saying that they saw Davis continuing to shoot at the two after they had turned to flee. Both were repeatedly hit in the back; hence question of self-defence didn't arise. Davis stated that he shot them not because they had menaced him with guns but because he believed that they were armed.
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Arrow Up

Middle East Unrest Adds to Pressure on World Food Prices

Jonathan Watts
The Guardian, UK
Tue, 22 Feb 2011 18:22 UTC
wheat & sky
© Graham Turner/GuardianAs Middle East protests continue, the zigs and zags of oil prices are increasingly being followed by grain.
If the revolts in Egypt and Libya spread further, we can expect spikes not just in oil prices - but in the cost of food as well

The fate of Colonel Gaddafi in Libya and the price of a loaf of bread in Europe may not at first glance have an awful lot to do with one another. Similarly, not many people would link the fall of Hosni Mubarak with the cost of a bowl of rice in China.

But the revolts in Libya and Egypt are not just driving regime change in the Middle East, they may well add to the already intense pressure on global food prices.

The missing link is oil, which hit a has new two-and-a-half year high and today topped $108 (£67) a barrel due to the instability in Libya - which has Africa's biggest crude reserves. The price is moving closer to the record levels of more than $147 (£91), reached just before the financial crash in 2008.

That will be of little surprise to car drivers, who in recent decades have grown used to the correlation between peace and conflict in the Arab world and the troughs and peaks of the price they pay at the pumps.

But in the longer term, the impact may also be evident on the dinner table because the zigs and zags of oil prices are increasingly being followed by grain.
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Bomb

Boycott the UK census over links to Lockheed Martin, protesters say

David Sharrock
The Guardian
Tue, 22 Feb 2011 18:08 UTC
Image
© Lockheed Martin/APThe Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, the F-35C, in a test flight over the Chesapeake Bay.
We're ready to face £1,000 fine, declare anti-war protesters in row over role of US arms firm Lockheed Martin in data gathering

People are being urged to boycott next month's UK's census because the US arms manufacturer responsible for Trident is involved in gathering the information.

Protesters say they are willing to break the law and face a £1,000 fine and a criminal record by refusing to fill in the 32-page questionnaire. Resistance to the decennial census is growing as a coalition of anti-war groups, pacifists, religious organisations and digital activists begin raising public awareness about the role of Lockheed Martin, America's largest arms manufacturer.

The company, which makes Trident nuclear missiles, cluster bombs and F-16 fighter jets, won the £150m contract to run the census on behalf of the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

A spokesman for the Stop the War Coalition said: "We will certainly be calling for a boycott and telling people not co-operate with the warmongers."
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Megaphone

Key Libyan Diplomats Disown Gadhafi's Regime

Edith M. Lederer
Associated Press
Tue, 22 Feb 2011 18:05 UTC
UN General assembly
© n/aThe UN General Assembly
Key Libyan diplomats disowned Moammar Gadhafi's regime for its brutal crackdown on protesters and the country's deputy U.N. ambassador called for an urgent meeting of the U.N. Security Council that will take place Tuesday.

The Libyan ambassador to the United States urged Gadhafi to step down, the ambassador to India resigned as did the ambassador to Bangladesh who protested the killing of family members by government troops.

Almost all Libyan diplomats at the United Nations backed deputy ambassador Ibrahim Dabbashi's pleas to Gadhafi to end his 40-year rule and to the international community to intervene.

The U.N. spokesperson's office said late Monday that the Security Council had scheduled consultations on the situation in Libya for Tuesday morning. Earlier, Dabbashi had called for an urgent meeting of the council to take action to stop the bloodshed.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told reporters in Beverly Hills, California, that he hopes "the Security Council will take this matter on an urgent basis."
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Dollar

Stocks: Worst Drop of the Year Amid Libya Turmoil

Hibah Yousuf
CNN
Tue, 22 Feb 2011 17:19 UTC
stock chart
© n/a
Libya's escalating political crisis sparked a sharp sell-off in U.S. stocks Tuesday, with the three major indexes posting their biggest one-day drops of the year, as oil prices continued to skyrocket.

Ongoing weakness in the housing market also added pressure after a report showed that national home prices fell 4.1% during the fourth quarter of 2010.

The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) sank 178 points, or 1.4%. That was its worst decline since November. Wal-Mart (WMT, Fortune 500) was one of the biggest losers on the Dow, with shares down 3% after the retailer reported disappointing U.S. sales figures.

The S&P 500 (SPX) dropped 28 points, or 2.1%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq (COMP) shed 78 points, or 2.7%. Those were the biggest drops since August for both indexes.

The CBOE volatility index (VIX), which is known as the VIX and is used to gauge fear in the market,jumped almost 30% Tuesday.
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