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Red Flag

Mayan documentary filmmaker breached contract, committed fraud

Jason McClellan
openminds.tv
Thu, 10 Jan 2013 11:33 UTC
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© Credit: The Wrap
Raul Julia-Levy
In September 2011, we reported on a documentary film titled Revelations of the Mayans 2012 and Beyond that was scheduled for release sometime in 2012. The film's producer, Raul Julia-Levy, made the incredible claim that the documentary would provide evidence that the Mayans had contact with extraterrestrials. But in April 2012, Julia-Levy suddenly stopped production, fired the crew, terminated an agreement with a post-production company, and ran off with the footage. And now, an arbitrator has reportedly concluded that Julia-Levy is guilty of breached contracts and fraud.

Julia-Levy's partner on the documentary, Elizabeth Theriot, took him to arbitration at the Independent Film & Television Alliance. And as the Hollywood Reporter states, "The resulting decision wasn't very kind to Julia-Levy." The arbitrator, Gerald F. Phillips, concluded that termination of production required the mutual agreement of both Julia-Levy and Theriot. Because Julia-Levy acted without the consent of Theriot, the arbitrator found for Theriot on her breach of contract claims.
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Heart - Black

Suspect in shocking Ohio rape case allowed to go on Californian vacation while under 'house arrest'

Laura Collins In Steubenville, Ohio
Daily Mail
Thu, 10 Jan 2013 09:26 UTC
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Holiday: Ma'lik Richmond was freed from house arrest to go on vacation even though he was charged with the horrific rape of a 16-year-old girl after film emerged of him carrying her with his co-accused Trent Mays (above)
One of the accused in the Ohio rape case that has outraged America enjoyed a six day vacation in California and watch a football game while supposedly under house arrest, it emerged today. MailOnline has learned that Steubenville High School Football star Ma'lik Richmond was granted permission to travel between December 31 and January 5. Along with team-mate Trent Mays, Richmond is charged with raping a 16-year-old girl at a series of back to back High School parties last August.

Mays is also charged with disseminating photographs of a nude minor as images of the unconscious teenage girl were circulated on Instagram and in text messages.

Richmond, 16, travelled with his former legal guardians Greg and Jennifer Aggresta - with whom he continues to live - to watch their biological son, Johnny, compete in the prestigious All American Academic Football Bowl.

The decision has enraged members of this community in a case where many have alleged that football players in the economically deprived town operate according to different rules.

Speaking to MailOnline Fred Abdalla Jr, Chief Probation Officer at Jefferson County Juvenile Court said: 'Ma'lik Richmond's attorney asked the judge if Ma'lik could have permission to travel with the Agresta family between the dates of December 31 through January 5.'
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House

Squatter lived under 73-year-old woman's home

Alyssa Newcomb
ABC News
Wed, 09 Jan 2013 08:48 UTC
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© Image Credit: KOMO/ABC News
Velma Kellen thought her furnace was broken, and got the shock of her life when a repairman told her a squatter had been living under her house and stealing her heat.

"I said, 'You've got to be kidding me!'" Kellen, 73, told ABCNews.com.

For months, there were mysterious signs - an unlatched gate and the inexplicable odor of smoke inside Kellen's three-bedroom home in Yelm, Wash., about an hour's drive south of Seattle.

"It was worse than cigarettes," Kellen said.

Kellen, a retired caregiver, said her home was cold before Christmas, so she bought a new furnace, but still had the problem.
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Health

Study: Even wealthy Americans in worse health than western Europeans


Raw Story
Thu, 10 Jan 2013 08:43 UTC
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Americans are in worse health, die earlier and suffer from more disease than residents of other wealthy nations, according to a new study out Wednesday.

The disadvantage spans all ages from birth to 75, said the report, conducted jointly by the National Research Council and the Institute of Medicine.

Some details were surprising: even wealthier Americans and those with health insurance were not as healthy as counterparts in other prosperous nations, it found.

"We were struck by the gravity of these findings," said Steven Woolf, professor of family medicine at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond and chair of the panel that wrote the report.

"Americans are dying and suffering at rates that we know are unnecessary because people in other high-income countries are living longer lives and enjoying better health. What concerns our panel is why, for decades, we have been slipping behind," Woolf stressed.
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Attention

U.S. infant mortality rate higher than developed world's

Katie McDonough
Salon
Wed, 09 Jan 2013 08:38 UTC
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A new report from the Institute of Medicine took a long, hard look at the American healthcare system and found that we lead on healthcare spending but lag on patient outcomes.

But we knew this already. Many other reports have found the exact same thing.

There is, however, some striking - and troubling - new research in the report: Our infant mortality rate is nearly double the rate in countries like Japan and Sweden.
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Dollar

High hay prices encourage more thefts from farms

Jack Healy
NY Times
Wed, 09 Jan 2013 08:29 UTC
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© Matthew Staver for The New York Times
Conrad Swanson has had bales of hay stolen from his field in Wellington, Colo.
Across the heartland, ranchers, farmers and county sheriffs are grappling with a new scourge: hay rustling.

Months of punishing drought and grass fires have pushed the price of hay, grain and other animal feed to near records, making the golden bales an increasingly irresistible target for thieves. Some steal them for profit. Others are fellow farmers acting out of desperation, their fields too brown to graze animals and their finances too wrecked to afford enough feed for their cattle.

"It's the economics of the times," said Jack McGrath, the undersheriff in Colorado's Weld County, where hay thefts rose to 15 last year from 7 in 2011.

At Mark Reifenrath's farm in northern Colorado, the thieves struck at night. Two men driving a stolen pickup opened an unguarded farm gate by the side of the road, rolled into Mr. Reifenrath's alfalfa field and headed toward their quarry: 800-pound square bundles of freshly cut hay.
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Apple Green

Insanity: Seven million tons of food thrown away every year

Nick McDermott
Daily Mail
Wed, 09 Jan 2013 19:01 UTC
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© Alamy
Waste: Seven million tons of food, worth more than £10billion, is wasted in the UK every year, according to a report by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers
  • Seven million tons of food worth £10billion is thrown away every year
  • Of the wasted food £1billion is still within sell-by date and good to eat
  • Three quarters of vegetables grown in Britain never get eaten
  • Report by Institution of Mechanical Engineers blames supermarkets
  • Says average household wastes £24,000 worth of food in lifetime
    • Up to half the food we buy from supermarkets goes in the bin despite much of it being perfectly edible, a report reveals today.

    Experts say a throwaway consumer culture that undervalues food is behind the colossal waste.

    They blame confusion over sell-by dates and retailers' 'buy one, get one free' offers that tempt shoppers into buying more than they need.

    Across the country seven million tons of food, worth more than £10billion, is thrown away annually - costing the average household £480 each year.

    Of the food binned by families, from fresh fruit and veg to tinned and packet produce, £1billion worth is still within its sell-by date and good to eat.

    The report, by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, says that up to three quarters of vegetables grown in Britain ends up never being eaten, with large amounts being left in the field or rejected by supermarkets for being too ugly.

    Comment: This is particularly concerning given the global rise in food prices and the potential for a global food crisis:
    British food store chain tycoon: Food prices are going to rocket in 2013
    World food prices near crisis levels
    Fear of food scarcity hits U.S. capital in Washington DC's outlying suburbs
    Why China's explosive economic growth could trigger a global food crisis

          Read More...
    Eye 1

    Drone-proof anti-surveillance garments in design by New York artist


    RT.com
    Wed, 09 Jan 2013 19:55 UTC
    Image
    © primitivelondon.co.uk
    Some fashonistas strive for sexy when it comes to clothes, but one artist from New York is taking a rather utilitarian approach with outfits - he's about to unveil a whole line of garments designed to make the wearer nearly invisible to drones.

    Brooklyn-based artist Adam Harvey used to work primarily with photography, but he undertakes an entirely different medium with his newest project. He says that in the years since the United States post-9/11 PATRIOT Act has been in place, cameras have stopped becoming "art making tools" and have instead become "enablers of surveillance societies."

    That was Harvey's explanation last year when he discussed his projects with the website Rhizome. At the time, Harvey was experimenting with how household make-up could render it harder for computers to use facial recognition programs to pluck people out of crowds. And while the practice of examining facial features using biometrics and sophisticated surveillance cameras has certainly intensified in the months since, Harvey has found another type of evasive practice that is a bit harder to avoid: the drone.

    The United States currently has a modest arsenal of unmanned aerial vehicles - UAVS, or drones - that it uses in surveillance missions on its border with Mexico and in war zones overseas. By the year 2020, however, the Federal Aviation Administration expects the number of domestic drones in American airspace to be as large as 30,000.
          Read More...
    People 2

    Child population in California in unprecedented decline

    Mark Hughes
    The Telegraph
    Wed, 09 Jan 2013 15:47 UTC
    Image
    © ALAMY
    The report says that 90 per cent of children under the age of 10 living in California today were born in the state
    California is in the midst of an unprecedented decline in its child population. Falling birth rates, a decrease in migration and the retirement of the 'baby boom' generation are threatening the future prosperity of America's most populous state, a new report has revealed.

    The report, by the University of Southern California (USC), shows that in 1970 children made up one third of the state's population. By 2030 that number is expected to have declined to one fifth.

    "After decades of burgeoning population and economic growth the state now faces a very different prospect," the report, titled California's Diminishing Resource: Children, said.

    Its author Dowell Myers, a USC demographer, said: "We have a massive replacement problem statewide." He added: "These trends are not yet widely recognised, but they should be a wake-up call for policymakers.

    "We will be increasingly dependent economically and socially on a smaller number of children. They are more important to the state's future success than ever before."

    The report, which analyses census data, shows that the percentage of children making up the population in the state, which is home to 38 million people, has steadily decreased since the baby boomer years of the 1960s.

    Comment: The health and well-being of children and their quality of life issues will need to be addressed before they can thrive anywhere:
    One in five American children now living in poverty according to new report
    Are Seattle-area babies dying because of Fukushima radiation?
    Flu Shot Coverage, Vaccine-Related Miscarriage Rates Rise Exponentially
    Child abuse hospitalizations increased 5% over 12-year period

          Read More...
    Padlock

    San Antonio deputy police chief wants to establish permanent DWI checkpoints

    Kolten Parker
    mysanantonio.com
    Tue, 04 Dec 2012 18:47 UTC
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    Citing a troubled culture that fuels drunken driving, a San Antonio Police Department deputy chief urged legislators Monday to consider establishing permanent sobriety checkpoints across Texas.

    "We really do need to make a cultural change in the state of Texas when it comes to driving under the influence of alcohol," Deputy Chief Anthony Treviño told the Texas House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee.

    In asking that law enforcement agencies be able to stop drivers and conduct routine sobriety tests near drinking-and-driving "hot spots," Treviño said local data could be used to identify areas where such behavior is prevalent.

    About two dozen people have been charged with intoxication manslaughter in alcohol-related wrecks over the past two years. And, Treviño said, more than 7,000 arrests for driving while intoxicated were made in San Antonio this year, through November.
          Read More...
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