Somebody turned the fans off on 300,000 chickens to suffocate them—somebody who knows exactly how the industry works.

The chicken farm on Brewer Road, just south of the small town of Manning in South Carolina, is hidden away down a series of winding country highways, between a patch of forest and an empty farm field. On the morning of Feb. 17 the farm's owner, a Vietnamese immigrant named Hoangson Nguyen, was awakened by a frantic phone call. Nguyen, who goes by "Sonny," raises birds under contract for Pilgrim's Pride, the nation's second-largest poultry company. An employee who checks the chicken houses each morning was shouting over the phone. Something was terribly wrong.

Nguyen sped to the farm. That morning, when the farmhand opened the door to the first building, a sophisticated warehouse designed to hold about 20,000 birds, a column of steam had billowed out. Nguyen went into the control room and saw that the temperature inside was 122F. He entered the cavernous building. It was like a sauna: The giant circular fans used to cool the chicken house had been switched off. A set of electronic alarms had also been disabled. There were thousands of dead chickens on the ground, pressed up against the walls as if they'd tried to escape. They'd been smothered to death overnight in the intense heat. Nguyen knew immediately that this wasn't an accident. Someone had killed his flock.

Seventy years ago, there were between 3 million and 5 million elephants in Africa. Today, as the number of African bush elephants has dropped to nearly half a million, this magnificent animal faces extinction in some parts of the continent.

"If conservation action is not forthcoming, elephants may become locally extinct in some parts of Africa within 50 years," warns the World Wildlife Fund.

Others have said that elephants could be extinct in Africa within our lifetime.

Recent news about elephant populations has been heartbreaking. These wonderful animals are being slaughtered on a truly horrific scale.

Last week, it was reported that the elephant population of Mozambique has almost halved since 2009, due to poaching. There were over 20,000 elephants in the southeast African state in 2009, but last year the total was down to 10,300.

This comes on the back of news that half of the elephants in Tanzania's Ruaha National Park - one of the largest national parks in the whole of Africa - have been lost to poachers in just one year.

Worrying statistics have emerged, placing meth - the Asia-Pacific's most popular drug - at the top of its grocery list. Police seizures have quadrupled in five years, as production skyrockets in tandem with increasing economic integration into the world.

And it's a vicious cycle: the more economic opportunities increase for the region as a whole, the more the drug and its various derivatives are produced, which, in turn, leads to plummeting prices, according to a recent report by the UN Office for Drugs and Crime (UNODC).

Asian drug cartels are only too happy with this, as their profits soar, despite the price reductions.

Due to Governor Paul LePage launching direct political and environmental attacks against the Penobscot and Passamaquoddy tribes of Maine, leaders of those tribes have recalled their representatives from the state legislature and are asserting their sovereignty from the State of Maine. "The Maine Indian Land claims Settlement act has failed and we cannot allow ourselves to continue down the path," Chief Francis said. "We're saying it's a failed social experiment."

In August of 2011, Governor LePage signed an Executive Order recognizing a "special relationship" between the sovereign State of Maine, and the sovereign tribes within the State. In this order, the Governor instructed all State agencies to include a tribal liaison, whose role would be to facilitate communication and direct policy in all areas of State jurisdiction in such a way as to include the voice and interest of native peoples. The Order instructs that "the State and Tribes should work together as one," and Tribal interests should be heeded when developing policies and procedures "on matters that significantly or uniquely affect those tribes."

In April of this year, LePage rescinded that Order. The new Order maintains that native tribes in Maine retain their sovereignty, but holds that they now have a "relationship between equals with its own set of responsibilities," yet declares that tribal lands, forms of tribal governance and natural resources controlled by the native tribes are subject to the laws and jurisdiction of the State of Maine. The takeover of lands was prompted by an EPA letter to the State, and claims that lack of Tribal participation in "the State's interests" required the usurpation of Tribal sovereignty. The Letter, in fact, actually supports the Tribal position, as the Tribal standards of environmental protection are much stricter than those of the EPA or the State of Maine. Those close to the Penobscot Tribe tell The Fifth Column that LePage threatened to sue the EPA over the proposed new regulations, leading the Agency to back down. LePage's Order, then, becomes a direct political attack against the Tribes in affront to their sovereignty and an effort to exact more control over the land by the State of Maine.

You wouldn't normally think of industrial bleach as being a miracle cure. Or any kind of cure for that matter. But that didn't stop Louis Daniel Smith from selling many gallons of the stuff by labeling it "Miracle Mineral Solution."

A federal jury in Washington state sat through seven days of testimony, alleging that Smith, 45, of Spokane, sold the toxic liquid as a miracle cure for numerous diseases and illnesses, including cancer, AIDS, malaria, hepatitis, lyme disease, asthma and the common cold.

It then convicted him of conspiracy, smuggling, selling misbranded drugs and defrauding the United States. He faces up to 34 years in prison.

Potentially fatal

In 2010, the FDA said it had received several reports of health injuries from consumers using the product, including severe nausea, vomiting, and life-threatening low blood pressure from dehydration. Consumers who have MMS should stop using it immediately and throw it away, the FDA said.

Evidence at trial showed that Smith operated a business called "Project GreenLife" (PGL) from 2007 to 2011. PGL sold a product called "Miracle Mineral Supplement," or MMS, over the Internet. MMS is a mixture of sodium chlorite and water.

Sodium chlorite is an industrial chemical used as a pesticide and for hydraulic fracking and wastewater treatment. Sodium chlorite cannot be sold for human consumption and suppliers of the chemical include a warning sheet stating that it can cause potentially fatal side effects if swallowed.

"This verdict demonstrates that the Department of Justice will prosecute those who sell dangerous chemicals as miracle cures to sick people and their desperate loved ones," said Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Benjamin C. Mizer of the Justice Department's Civil Division. "Consumers have the right to expect that the medicines that they purchase are safe and effective." Mizer thanked the jury for its service and its careful consideration of the evidence.

Terry Birch recalls walking cautiously into the tiny one-bedroom apartment seven months ago, like a cat exploring a box, or something wild fearful of a trap.

After two decades on the streets, he finally had a real roof over his head, a home to call his own. It was clean, private and safe, but also scary and confusing.

"I couldn't get used to the four walls. It felt like they were closing in on me," he said, sitting in the living room of unit No. 2 at the

Metro Apartments. "On the streets, I had no responsibility, other than keeping myself clean."

He paused, surveying his surroundings: "And then this."

Corporations aren't people, despite what the Supreme Court says, and they don't need or deserve handouts.

When corporations get special handouts from the government - subsidies and tax breaks - it costs you. It means you have to pay more in taxes to make up for these hidden expenses. And government has less money for good schools and roads, Medicare and national defense, and everything else you need.

You might call these special corporate handouts "corporate welfare," but at least welfare goes to real people in need. In the big picture, corporate handouts are costing tens of billions of dollars a year. Some estimates put it over $100 billion - which means it's costing you money that would otherwise go to better schools or roads, or lower taxes.

Conservatives have made a game of obscuring where federal spending actually goes. In reality, only about 12 percent of federal spending goes to individuals and families, most in dire need. An increasing portion goes to corporate welfare.

Other examples: The oil, gas, and coal industries get billions in their own special tax breaks. Big Agribusiness gets farm subsides. Big Pharma gets their own subsidy in the form of a ban on government using its bargaining power under Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices. And hedge-fund and private-equity managers get a special tax loophole that treats their income as capital gains, at a lower tax rate than ordinary income.

A commercial aircraft en route to New York's LaGuardia Airport narrowly avoided a mid-air collision with a drone on Friday morning, according to Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) official. Shuttle America flight 2708 was travelling from Washington, DC and nearing its destination when it encountered an unmanned aerial vehicle. The pilot had to swerve upwards over Brooklyn's Prospect Park to avoid a collision.

The plane later landed safely, and FAA officials have released a statement saying they will launch an investigation into the incident.

"The flight crew of Shuttle America Flight 2708 reported climbing 200 feet to avoid an unmanned aircraft while on final approach to LaGuardia Airport at 11AM today," The FAA said in a statement. "The crew...reported that the unmanned aircraft was operating in the vicinity of Prospect Park at Brooklyn at an altitude of 2,700 feet. The FAA will investigate."

The Joint Terrorism Task Force is also investigating the incident.

Many have said it for years, but now the Federal Bureau of Investigation is claiming that police departments have been deliberately infiltrated by racist, white supremacist organizations.

The claim comes after what the FBI says has been nearly a decade of federal law enforcement's confirmed and documented acts of infiltration by white supremacist groups into American police departments.

The FBI warning first came back on October 2006, but it fell on largely deaf ears. Now, the report entitled "White supremacist infiltration of law enforcement" is being revisited by many experts in fighting back against organized hate group terrorism.

In the 2006 report, the FBI found that federal court determined that members of a Los Angeles sheriffs department had organized a Neo Nazi gang. The officers involved did not keep their racist ideas to themselves either, as the FBI found that these same officers "habitually terrorized" the African American community.

The multinational telecom company Orange is trying to distance itself from its Israeli affiliate as it faces mounting pressure from a boycott called against its Egyptian subsidiary Mobinil.

But BDS Egypt, the organizers of the Mobinil boycott, have rejected company statements as "shameless deception" and an effort to mislead the Egyptian public.

The campaign has affirmed that the boycott of Mobinil will continue until Orange ends its contract with its Israeli affiliate Partner Communications over the latter's complicity in human rights abuses and war crimes against Palestinians.

Mobinil, with at least 33 million customers in Egypt, is 99 percent owned by Orange, making Egypt one of the France-based multinational's largest markets.

Meanwhile, French activists piled on the pressure, holding a rally Wednesday outside the Paris venue where Orange held its annual shareholders meeting.