Up to 1,000 exiled Tibetans are moving to Canada as part of federal program

The first group of Tibetans to relocate to Canada under a new federal program arrived by plane in Ottawa and Toronto on Friday.

When they met in 2007, Tibet's spiritual leader in exile, the Dalai Lama, appealed to Prime Minister Stephen Harper for Canada to invite in more Tibetan exiles. That meeting prompted a rebuke from the Chinese Embassy in Ottawa.

Three years later, Jason Kenney, the immigration minister at the time, announced that Canada would take in as many as 1,000 Tibetans living in exile in the northern Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh.

There are 17 people in the initial group that was to arrive on Friday, said Nima Dorjee, president of the Project Tibet Society, which is managing the five-year project.

By mid-2014, about 200 Tibetans will have moved to Canada under the plan, Dorjee said. Most will settle in the Toronto area, Ottawa, Calgary, B.C's Lower Mainland or on Vancouver Island.

The World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE) released an interview with Noam Chomsky recently in which the noted linguist discussed, among other things, how high student tuition indoctrinates students into corporate culture.

"There's no economic basis for high tuitions," Chomsky said. "One of the very negative aspects of this sharp tuition rise is that it entraps students. It deprives them of their freedom."

Chomsky explained that "if you're going to come out of college with $50,000 of debt, you're stuck. You couldn't do the things you wanted to do, like maybe you wanted to become a public interest lawyer, helping poor people. You can't do it - you have to go to a corporate law firm, pay off your debt. Then you get trapped in that."

A 27-year-old woman in England who was in training to be a psychologist and had already published articles in a medical journal, died of a drug overdose while she was celebrating her new job - working with drug users.

A coroner's inquest in South Manchester found this week that in July, Jennifer Whiteley had nine different drugs in her system, including a so-called "legal high" known as Benzo Fury, when she broke into profuse sweats and collapsed with a rapid heartbeat at her parents' home in Greater Manchester while partying with her 29-year-old boyfriend, Andrew Tunnah.

In addition to ingesting Benzo Fury - and amphetamine-like "designer drug" which Whiteley reportedly purchased over the internet before it was outlawed in the U.K. - she had been drinking vodka and snorting cocaine.

The day before, she was offered a job with a division of Britain's National Health Service - the country's government-run health care system - where she would help patients who abused drugs and also those who suffered from depression.

Dozens of children and adults who are in Las Vegas for the National Youth Football Championships have been hospitalized after coming down with a mystery illness.

The mystery disease shows flu-like symptoms, including vomiting. ABC News Chief Health and Medical Editor Dr. Richard Besser says "norovirus" may be the cause.

"Norovirus is the largest cause of outbreaks of gastroenteritis stomach flu in the United States-- 20 million cases a year," Dr. Besser said. "This is the peak season."

"It's one of the nastiest germs around, 'cause it spreads from person to person through contact. It spreads through food, and also spreads from contaminated surfaces, so it's one of the most contagious ones we see," Besser said.

We talked with insurance agents across the country to hear how Obamacare is affecting their areas. Click a city to see which insurance companies, doctors and hospitals agents say are in and out of the Obamacare exchange in their areas. Insurance companies who have chosen not to be part of the exchanges are highlighted in red

Obamacare applicants across the country are finding their premiums are tripling, their favorite doctors aren't available, the physicians they can see are often far away and many prestigious hospitals offering specialized care are off-limits to them, according to a Washington Examiner survey of health insurance agents and brokers across the country.

Agents associated with the National Association of Health Underwriters were contacted in 16 cites across the country.

The agents were all certified by state insurance regulators to sell health insurance policies within and without the Obamacare exchanges.

Their responses provide an alarming picture of the profound changes Obamacare is forcing on patients and health care providers.

In parts of California, for example, low reimbursement rates have resulted in a doctor rebellion, as nearly seven out of 10 doctors refuse to participate in the exchanges.

San Diego broker Neil Crosby told the Examiner that "65 to 70 percent of the providers have declined the reimbursement schedules the carriers are offering. They will not be providers in the exchange marketplace."

Similarly, agent David Fear in Sacramento said, "Roughly a third of the doctors are going to be accepted in the networks. I'm finding very few specialists in either the Anthem or Blue Shield networks."

Larry Harrison, an agent in Las Vegas, said the "lion's share" of doctors there are staying away from the exchanges.

Seeking to increase pressure on McDonald's, Wendy's and other fast-food restaurants, organizers of a movement demanding a $15-an-hour wage for fast-food workers say they will sponsor one-day strikes in 100 cities on Thursday and protest activities in 100 additional cities.

As the movement struggles to find pressure points in its quest for substantially higher wages for workers, organizers said strikes were planned for the first time in cities like Charleston, S.C.; Providence, R.I.; and Pittsburgh.

The protests have expanded greatly since November 2012, when 200 fast-food workers engaged in a one-day strike at more than 20 restaurants in New York City, the first such walkout in the history of the nation's fast-food industry.

Congress' response to all this? They would like SNAP and Social Security recipients to go find a job.

We already pay dearly for energy, medicine, banking, and telecommunications services. But a little research reveals that we're paying more -- much more -- in a variety of ways that our business-friendly mainstream media won't talk about.


1. Drug Companies: The Body Snatchers

A report by Battelle Memorial Institute determined that the $4 billion government-funded Human Genome Project (HGP) will generate economic activity of about $140 for every dollar spent. Although that estimate iscontroversial, drug industry executives say it's just a matter of time before the profits roll in.

Big business is quickly making its move. Celera Genomics was first, as the company initiated a private version of the genome project, incorporating the public data into their work, but forbidding the public effort to use Celera data. Abbott Labs is developing products based on the HGP. Merck's automated biotechnology facility was made possible by the HGP. Two-thirds of the products at Bristol-Myers Squibb have been impacted by the HGP. Pfizer is starting to make big profits from its genome-based cancer treatments.

But the industry is going beyond profits, to the actual privatization of our bodies. One-fifth of the human genome is privately owned through patents. Strains of influenza and hepatitis have been claimed by corporate and university labs, preventing researchers from using the patented life forms to perform cancer research.

As if to mock us while taking over our public research, some of the largest drug companies haven't been paying much in taxes. Pfizer had 40% of its 2011-12 revenues in the U.S., but declared almost $7 billion in U.S. losses to go along with $31 billion in foreign profits. Abbott Labs had 42% of its sales in the U.S., but declared a loss in the U.S. along with $12 billion in foreign profits.

An overnight explosion at the Panhandle Eastern Pipeline Company near Hughesville, Mo., in Pettis County lit up the sky for miles early Friday morning. Fox 4 viewers from more than 30 miles away reported seeing the fireball in the sky.

A spokesperson from Panhandle Eastern says a 30-inch pipeline ruptured just before midnight, causing the explosion. Panhandle Eastern Pipeline Co. is about 90 miles from Kansas City.

No injuries were reported. Three homes were evacuated, but by mid-morning on Friday, the residents had been allowed back in.

Ryanair is getting rid of some of its most annoying practices with a pledge to be more flexible on cabin baggage, stop excessive charges for fixing minor spelling mistakes and reissuing boarding cards, halve late baggage fees and junk noisy adverts during early-morning and late-evening flights.

The low-cost champion says it has reacted to customer complaints as it aims to increase its passenger number from the 80million this year to 110m in five years.

Boss Michael O'Leary said: "We are actively listening and responding to our customers so that they can continue to expect low fares and on-time flights on Ryanair, but will now enjoy easier website access, 24 hour grace periods, a 2nd small carry-on bag, reduced airport bag fees and quiet flights.

"We hope that our passengers will enjoy these service improvements, while still enjoying Ryanair's low fares and on-time flights."

'I think the community is standing up for the environment, and the police are protecting the company, and that's not right.'

A snowy standoff took place in New Brunswick between Canada's Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and anti-fracking protesters on Sunday as Elsipogtog community members and their allies continue the fight to protect their land from shale gas exploration.

Twitter users captured a lineup of "protectors" facing police along Highway 11 where energy company SWN Resources has trucks conducting seismic testing for shale gas.

A similar protest on Highway 11 on Friday blocked the road for hours, and several protesters were arrested for breaching a court injunction by SWN. CBC reports: