The Caspian Sea

The Caspian Sea

Credit: Jeff Schmaltz; MODIS team; NASA
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This image, captured by the MODIS on the Terra satellite was captured on May 21, 2007. It shows the Caspian Sea, a large, landlocked, saltwater body of water. It is considered the largest on Earth, by area. At the edges of it, swirling clouds of greenish sediment and phytoplankton are visble.

The Caspian sea has no natural outflows, and is supplied with water from the Ural and Volga rivers. Since evaporation is the only way in which it loses water, the level of the sea rises and falls independently of the rest of the world's oceans and other water bodies.

The Caspian is renowned for rich natural resources, namely sturgeon, oil, and natural gas. Because five nations share its waters - Russia, Azerbaijan, Iran, Turkmenistan, and Kazakhstan - the competition for these resources is fierce.

In the top right corner of the image, the bottom half of the Aral Sea is just visible. The red dots are locations of active fires in the region. Black lines denote country borders.

$3.50+ at the Pump While Bush helps Oil Companies Hide Billions from Government at Taxpayer Expense

BushCo Spreads Terrorism Far and Wide Making the World Safe For Defense Contractors and Military Privatizers

Iran Plans Retaliation Should it be Attacked by Imperial Western Powers

Man Arrested for Using Free Wireless

Each day around lunch time, Sam Peterson would drive to the Union Street Cafe, park his car and--without actually entering the coffee shop--check his e-mail and surf the Net. His ritual raised the suspicions of Police Chief Andrew Milanowski, who approached him and asked what he was doing. Peterson, probably not realizing that his actions constituted a crime, freely admitted what he was doing.

"I knew that the Union Street had Wi-Fi. I just went down and checked my e-mail and didn't see a problem with that," Peterson told a WOOD reporter.

Milanowski didn't immediately cite or arrest Peterson, mostly because he wasn't certain a crime had been committed. "I had a feeling a law was being broken," the chief said. Milanowski did some research and found Michigan's "Fraudulent access to computers, computer systems, and computer networks" law, a felony punishable by five years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

U.S. to let START nuclear treaty expire

The United States plans to let a landmark nuclear arms reduction treaty with Russia expire in 2009 and replace it with a less formal agreement that eliminates strict verification requirements and weapons limits, a senior U.S. official says.
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START obligated Moscow and Washington to slash deployed strategic nuclear forces from approximately 10,000 warheads each to no more than 6,000 apiece by December 5, 2001. The accord also limits each side to 1,600 delivery vehicles, like intercontinental ballistic missiles.

As of January 1, Russia reported 4,162 warheads under START, and the United States claimed 5,866 warheads but these figures are not exact because of unique treaty counting rules.

Another pact, the May 2002 Strategic Offensive Reduction Treaty (SORT), commits the two sides to reduce forces to 1,700-2,200 operationally deployed warheads by the end of 2012.

After that, neither side's forces will be limited and Russia is afraid the United States, which can afford a larger arsenal, will expand its cache, experts say.

Daryl Kimball of the Arms Control Association said the two sides should have less than 1,500 warheads each. Asked if Washington could accept such a target, DeSutter said: "Not at this point."

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Shout Outs From Voting Privatization or How the Right Wing Fixes Elections

Between 40 and 50 people showed up at the board meeting to protest the county's recent decisions to hire Deborah Seiler and Michael Vu as the county's top two elections officials, registrar and assistant registrar of voters.

The protests also included sharp criticisms of electronic voting in general, and devolved into shouts from audience members, rebukes from supervisors, and a declaration from county Chief Administrative Officer Walt Ekard that Seiler, Vu and electronic voting were here to stay.

Seiler, who most recently served as the assistant registrar of voters in Solano County, also worked as a sales representative with Ohio-based Diebold Elections Systems, and was directly involved in the company's sale of 10,200 "touch screen" election machines to San Diego County.

Protesters said Seiler had a conflict of interest because as a Diebold employee, she benefited financially from the sale of the machines to the county, and because she, as a former Diebold employee, supported a system that could rig elections.

Vu, meanwhile, resigned in February as executive director of Ohio's Cuyahoga County election board, where two elections workers were convicted of rigging a 2004 presidential election recount.

US Ally Pakistani UN peacekeeping troops have traded in gold and sold weapons to Congolese militia groups they were meant to disarm, BBC has learned

These events took place in and around the mining town of Mongbwalu, in north-eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

The Pakistani battalion of the UN peacekeeping mission deployed there two years ago and helped bring peace to an area that had previously seen bitter fighting between the Lendu and Hema ethnic groups.

Locals welcomed them, but the lure of the rich alluvial gold mines proved too much to resist for some, recalls the head of the miners' association, Liki Likambo.

"I saw a UN Pakistani soldier who came to buy gold from one of the gold negotiators here in Mongbwalu. I was there in the shop. I saw it with my own eyes."

Israeli Murderers hit Gaza targets

Israel killed 650 Palestinians in 2006

Israeli troops killed more than 650 Palestinians last year — half of them unarmed civilians including some 120 children — a threefold increase from 2005, a leading human rights group said Wednesday.

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The number of Israelis killed by Palestinian armed groups diminished by half last year, to 27, including 20 civilian adults and one child, the report said.

By The Associated Press' count, 580 people were killed on the Palestinian side and 34 on the Israeli side in 2006.

SF Chronicle called Edwards' speech fee "whopping" but ignored Giuliani's much larger fees

In a May 21 entry to the San Francisco Chronicle's Politics Blog, Chronicle political reporter Carla Marinucci wrote, "Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, who recently proposed an educational policy that urged 'every financial barrier' be removed for American kids who want to go to college, has been going to college himself -- as a high paid speaker, his financial records show." According to Marinucci, Edwards "charged a whopping $55,000 to speak to a crowd of 1,787 [at] the taxpayer-funded University of California at Davis on Jan. 9, 2006," before Edwards declared his intention to seek the presidency. However, Marinucci made no mention of Republican presidential contender Rudy Giuliani, who reportedly charged Oklahoma State University $100,000 for a speech he delivered in 2006 and an additional $47,000 for the use of a private jet.

U.S. checking all toothpaste imports from China

U.S. health officials are beginning to check all shipments of toothpaste coming from China, following reports of tainted products in other countries, a government spokesman said Wednesday.

The Food and Drug Administration has no evidence that contaminated toothpaste has made its way into the United States but is taking the step as a precaution, agency spokesman Doug Arbesfeld said.

China is the second-largest exporter of toothpaste to the United States behind Canada, according to the FDA.

The FDA's action comes after the lethal chemical diethylene glycol was found in toothpaste sold in the Dominican Republic and Panama.

It follows a wave of concern over pet food from China containing another toxic chemical, melamine, thought to have sickened thousands of U.S. cats and dogs and made its way into livestock feed.

"We are going to be sampling and testing all shipments of toothpaste that come from China," Arbesfeld said. "We're doing this as a precautionary measure. We have no evidence that toothpaste containing diethylene glycol has entered the country."

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t was not immediately clear which brands of toothpaste sold in the Unites States are made in China.

A representative of Johnson & Johnson's McNeil-PPC Inc., which makes Rembrandt toothpaste, could not be immediately reached.

A spokeswoman for Colgate-Palmolive, maker of Colgate toothpaste, said the company did not import toothpaste into the United States from China.

A Procter & Gamble spokeswoman said Crest brand toothpaste was American-made. A spokeswoman for GlaxoSmithKline Plc's consumer unit, which makes Aquafresh, had no immediate comment.

Chinese officials have said they plan to strengthen domestic food safety even as worries grow about its manufacturers' use of toxins and fake ingredients.

Earlier Wednesday, China called for an investigative team to probe the toothpaste incidents.

Bush Threatens Veto of Gas Gouging Bill

American men make 12.5 percent less than their fathers 30 years ago, report on mobility says

That's a 12.5 percent drop between 1974 and 2004, according to data from the Pew Charitable Trusts' Economic Mobility Project.

To be sure, household incomes rose during the same period although the main reason is because there are more full-time working women, a new report on the project said.

While income is not the only measure of economic mobility, the findings challenge the historical presumption that each successive generation will be wealthier, said John E. Morton, the report's co-author.

“Today's data suggest that during a 30-year period of economic expansion, a rising tide did not lift all boats,” Morton said in a release accompanying the report, “Economic Mobility: Is the American Dream Alive and Well?”

Of course, the men who run American companies don't have too much to complain about. CEO pay increased to 262 times the average worker's pay in 2005 from 35 times in 1978, according to the report's analysis of Congressional Budget Office statistics.

Medical experiments to be done without patients' consent

The federal government is undertaking the most ambitious set of studies ever mounted under a controversial arrangement that allows researchers to conduct some kinds of medical experiments without first getting the patients' permission.

The $50 million, five-year project, which will involve more than 20,000 patients in 11 sites in the United States and Canada, is designed to improve treatment after car accidents, shootings, cardiac arrest and other emergencies.

Creationist Wacko Museum says Dinosaurs were on Noah's Ark

We're No. 1! America Leads the World in War Profits

Boeing wins $30M B-52 contract

The U.S. Air Force awarded a $30 million contract to the Boeing Co. to upgrade the weapons systems on the B-52 Stratofortress.

Nigerian militant group says plans to free Chevron hostages soon

Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction to Audit Blackwater

Blackwater, based at a sprawling compound in the tiny town of Moyock, has won more than $700 million in federal contracts since 2004 to protect American diplomatic personnel in Iraq.

Gay linguists Fired from US Military ( Must work too cheaply)

[...]
Around 40 Congressmen and women signed a letter to the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, that the continued loss of such "capable, highly skilled Arabic linguists continues to compromise our national security during time of war."

Representative Marty Meehan, a Democrat from Massachusetts, serves on the House Armed Services Committee and has led the fight for repeal of the current policy towards gays in the military.

He organised the written request after it emerged that 58 Arab speakers had been dismissed under "Don't Ask Don't Tell."
[...]

Offense Contractor General Dynamics Awarded $19 Million Taxpayer Dollars Contract to Establish National Corps of Language Professionals

General Dynamics, headquartered in Falls Church, Virginia, employs approximately 82,600 people worldwide and had 2006 revenues of $24.1 billion. The company is a market leader in business aviation; land and expeditionary combat systems, armaments and munitions; shipbuilding and marine systems; and information systems and technologies. More information about the company is available online at http://www.generaldynamics.com/ .

Republikkkan Rip offs of American Taxpayers 35 billion and counting

The government watchdog that monitors Iraq reconstruction programs will conduct the most sweeping review of contractors since the war began, auditing four companies with combined contracts worth $3.3 billion. The audits come amid complaints of lax oversight of the $35 billion in taxpayer money spent so far to rebuild Iraq.
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Parsons Corp., a construction company with more than $2 billion in Iraq work. Previous SIGIR audits found problems with mismanagement and shoddy workmanship by the California-based company, including on a contract to build 151 health clinics. Parsons delivered 20 completed facilities after spending more than $200 million. Parsons spokeswoman Erin Kuhlman said the company did the best it could in a war zone and is cooperating with the latest probe. "In Iraq, things cost more than originally anticipated. Security costs added to a lot of that," Kuhlman said.

•Blackwater USA, a North Carolina-based security firm paid about $766 million to protect diplomats and contractors in Iraq. A 2005 audit for the State Department said the firm's time-keeping procedures were inadequate and Blackwater had improperly inflated its proposed profits on the contract. Blackwater spokeswoman Anne Tyrrell did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

•Aegis Defence Services, a London-based security firm with a nearly $300 million contract to protect Army workers and gather intelligence for other contractors. A 2005 audit found some lapses in record-keeping but said the problems were fixed before the audit was completed. Aegis spokeswoman Kristi Clemens said SIGIR had not yet contacted the company about the audit. "We welcome the audit," she said. "We think we've served the U.S. government very well."

•BearingPoint, a Virginia-based consulting firm hired by the U.S. Agency for International Development on a $240 million contract to help Iraq build a private-sector economy. BearingPoint spokesman Steve Lunceford said the company hasn't been contacted about the audit but would cooperate fully. "We're confident of our performance," he said.

Trigger Happy, Taxpayer Funded Amerikkkan Mercenaries Shoot it up In Baghdad

A Blackwater guard shot and killed an Iraqi driver Thursday near the Interior Ministry, according to three U.S. officials and one Iraqi official who were briefed on the incident but spoke on condition of anonymity because of a pending investigation. On Wednesday, a Blackwater-protected convoy was ambushed in downtown Baghdad, triggering a furious battle in which the security contractors, U.S. and Iraqi troops and AH-64 Apache attack helicopters were firing in a congested area.
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Since Blackwater Security Thugs, and other private army members employed by the US government and paid by taxpayer dollars that ought to be going to education and health care (to name just 2 neglected priorities), are not subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice they may murder how many ever they see fit and experience no consequence.

Blackwater's security consulting division holds at least $109 million worth of State Department contracts in Iraq, and its employees operate in a perilous environment that sometimes requires the use of deadly force. But last week's incidents underscored how deeply these hired guns have been drawn into the war, their murky legal status and the grave consequences that can ensue when they take aggressive action.
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Washington Post coverage is so polite as to obfuscate the facts. BushCo has been busy privatizing the US military along with the rest of government functions. Rummy's war plans were far more focused on how to feed tax payer dollars to private mercenaries than how to establish peace in Iraq after the overthrow of Saddam. Make no mistake though - it is damn hard to plan the details of a war of aggression and choice like the Bushites threw here, like Hitler threw in Europe.

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The Iraqi official said the driver encountered the Blackwater convoy after leaving a gas station just outside the Interior Ministry. Some witnesses said the shooting was unprovoked, the official said. He said the driver had wounds in his shoulder, chest and head.

The Blackwater employees refused to divulge their names or details of the incident to Iraqi authorities, according to two of the U.S. officials and the Iraqi official. The officials described a tense standoff that ensued between the Blackwater guards and Interior Ministry forces -- both sides armed with assault rifles -- until a passing U.S. military convoy intervened.

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If the Bullshit democrat controlled (by however slim a margin) congress, elected to stop Bush, cannot hold these private murderers who were also deployed on the streets on New Orleans post Katrina accountable is time to storm Washington.

As if the Gene Pool isn't filthy enough already

U.S Drought: Conditions Worsen In The Upper Midwest With Higher Temperatures

Region set to spend over AED 441 billion on water investments over the next 10 years

What Does The Bush Crime Family Know about the Future of America that is causing them to purchase 98,840 acres of land in Chaco in Paraguay?

[...]

Luis D'Elia, Argentina´s undersecretary for Land for Social Habitat, says the matter raises regional concern because it threatens local natural resources.

He termed it "surprising" that the Bush family is trying to settle a few short miles from the US Mariscal Estigarribia Military Base.

Argentinean Adolfo Perez Esquivel warned that the real war will be fought not for oil, but for water, and recalled that Acuifero Guaraní is one of the largest underground water reserves in South America, running beneath Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay (larger than Texas and California together).

"The southern U.S. states are already struggling with water shortages," asserted the 1980 Nobel Peace Prizewinner.

[...]

Female Sharks Fertilize Own Eggs

Female sharks can fertilize their own eggs and give birth without sperm from males, according to a new study of the asexual reproduction of a hammerhead in a U.S. zoo.

Evo Morales Speaks the Truth

The transnational corporations always provoke conflicts to accumulate capital, and the accumulation of capital in a few hands is no solution for humanity," Morales said at forum in Cochabamba. "And so I have arrived at the conclusion that capitalism is the worst enemy of humanity."

Chimpy McFlightsuit says we are not giving enough tax payer money to our plas in the "defense" Industry

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates -- Ships packed with 17,000 sailors and Marines moved into the Persian Gulf on Wednesday as the U.S. Navy staged another show of force off Iran's coast just days before U.S.-Iran talks in Baghdad.

The carrier strike groups led by the USS John C. Stennis and USS Nimitz were joined by the amphibious assault ship USS Bonhomme Richard and its own strike group, which includes two landing ships carrying 2,100 members of the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit.
Aircraft aboard the two carriers and the Bonhomme Richard were to conduct air training while the ships ran submarine, mine and other exercises.

The war games -- which culminate in an amphibious landing exercise in Kuwait, just a few miles from Iran -- appear to be a clear warning to Tehran, coming just ahead of the Baghdad talks and as the United Nations contemplates tightening sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program.

"There's a link to both events," said Mustafa Alani of the Dubai-based Gulf Research Center. "The Americans are sending a message to Iran that they are not coming to the negotiating table weak, but with their military at Tehran's doorstep."
[...]

Fred Thompson: Typical Uneithcal Repiglikkkan Swine

[...]

Federal Election Commission records analyzed by the Blotter on ABCNews.com show Thompson's committee paid $178,000 to his son's political consulting firm, Daniel Thompson Associates, since 2003.

In contrast, the committee made only $66,700 in contributions to other campaigns and political committees in the four years since Thompson retired from the Senate.

[...]

Hersh: Bush administration arranged support for militants attacking Lebanon

Hersh points out that the current situation is much like that during the conflict in Afghanistan in the 1980's – which gave rise to al Qaeda – with the same people involved in both the US and Saudi Arabia and the "same pattern" of the US using jihadists that the Saudis assure us they can control.

When asked why the administration would be acting in a way that appears to run counter to US interests, Hersh says that, since the Israelis lost to them last summer, "the fear of Hezbollah in Washington, particularly in the White House, is acute."

Exodus from Lebanon camp continues

Obstacles to peace: Water

US To Set Up Military Command In Africa

Nigeria has overtaken Saudi Arabia in the ranking of crude oil exporters to the United States

India was the world's sixth-largest oil importer in 2004

India's economic growth is driving increasing energy ties with the Middle East, at a time when China, the United States, and Japan are all ramping up efforts to lock in access to oil and natural gas in the region.

Kenya to issue acreage as Africa Oil exploration booms

Who's Been Donating to Mitt Romeny?

Stephen Bechtel Federal Campaign Contribution- $271,900 to Republicans

Other Republican Concerns listed as "Special Interest" $155,000

Bechtel named top contractor again in 2006

Nigeria: Ugborodo Community Set for Showdown With Chevron

Halliburton to target $80b projects from Dubai base

The U.S. now imports more oil from African

Israeli missiles pound Gaza

Grand Old Perverts at it Again

Former Republican Rep. Ted Klaudt could spend the rest of his life in prison after turning himself in to authorities Friday on felony charges that include eight counts of rape involving foster children and former legislative pages.

Five girls told authorities they were assaulted by Klaudt, court documents state, although charges filed Friday involve only two of the girls.

Hurricane chief: NOAA wasted millions

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is spending up to $4 million to publicize a 200th anniversary celebration while the agency has cut $700,000 from hurricane research, Bill Proenza said. The hurricane center is part of the National Weather Service, which is a NOAA agency.

2007: Hottest year ever thus far.

Corporate Welfare Recipient ExxonMobil Lied, Continues to Lavishly Fund Prominent Global Warming Deniers

Americans go Hungry while Chimpy McBush gives Tax Cuts to wealthy

[...]
That is why more people should demand to know why—in a year in which we are projected to give the wealthiest 1 percent of the nation some $56.5 billion in tax breaks, just to cite one example of the national priorities set by President Bush—we can’t do better than an average of $21 a week to ensure that our fellow Americans can have three decent meals a day.
[...]

Questions for Candidate Obama, the Not progressive Liberal From Illinois

Gonzales Proposes New Thought Crime Legislation

[...]
* Add penalties for "intended" copyright crimes. Currently certain copyright crimes require someone to commit the "distribution, including by electronic means, during any 180-day period, of at least 10 copies" valued at over $2,500. The IPPA would insert a new prohibition: actions that were "intended to consist of" distribution.
[..]

American Sexuality, Falwells Greatest Hits

Jerry Falwell, the founder of the Moral Majority and significant leader in the religious right, died today at 73 in his Liberty University office.

We thought that Falwell's passing would be an appropriate time to publish a list of his best known quotes. Source: PositiveAtheism.org.

• “AIDS is not just God's punishment for homosexuals; it is God's punishment for the society that tolerates homosexuals”
• "It appears that America's anti-Biblical feminist movement is at last dying, thank God, and is possibly being replaced by a Christ-centered men's movement which may become the foundation for a desperately needed national spiritual awakening."
• "If you're not a born-again Christian, you're a failure as a human being."
• After the September 11 attacks Falwell said, “I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People For the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America. I point the finger in their face and say 'you helped this happen."
• “Christians, like slaves and soldiers, ask no questions”
• “[Homosexuals are] brute beasts...part of a vile and satanic system [that] will be utterly annihilated, and there will be a celebration in heaven."

Photographic Evidence of Narcissisitic Excess

When Authoritarian Windbag Hate Monger Closet Cases who believe in Hell die, do they go there?

Iraqi Oil Workers to Strike Over Privatization Law

The proposed hydrocarbon law, if adopted by the Iraqi parliament as proposed, would provide a backdoor opportunity for multinational oil corporations to secure long-term (as long as 30 years) control over more than 2/3 of Iraq's undeveloped oil reserves. The Bush administration and its corporate and political allies are putting tremendous pressure on the Iraqis to adopt this law. It has engaged the services of the IMF to pressure Iraq by making adoption of the law a condition of debt relief and further financing from the international community.

Guard Deployment in Wars of Choice affect local response

For months, Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius and other governors have warned that their state National Guards were ill-prepared for the next local disaster, be it a tornado or a flash flood or a terrorist's threat, because of large deployments of their soldiers and equipment in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Disfiguring skin disease plagues Afghanistan

Leishmaniasis isn't a priority for the government and its aid donors, grappling with shocking rates of infant mortality, tuberculosis, malaria and trauma. The most common form of the disease is not fatal but it causes untold misery. Victims with scarring on their faces are stigmatised: children are excluded at school and girls often won't be able to find husbands.

Monsanto tastes defeat

Star dies in monstrous explosion

A massive star about 150 times the size of the Sun exploded in what could be a long-sought new type of supernova, Nasa scientists have said.

UN warns on impacts of biofuels

Dr. Norman Finkelstein's Tenure :: Israel, Academic Freedom or Academic Censorship

Dr. Finkelstein’s courageous scholarship on the issues of the Holocaust and Israel’s brutal and illegal occupation of Palestinians for decades in direct defiance of dozens of U.N. Resolutions, the Geneva Convention, International Laws, violation of dozens of peace agreements and a contemptible record on human rights with the chutzpah to oppose and derail U.S. national interests in the Middle East (see President Jimmy Carter’s book: “Palestine—Peace or Apartheid) is in actuality a worldwide held belief (59% of Europeans rank Israel as the greatest threat to world peace)[1]; a belief supported by Israeli academicians, politicians, and journalists. On April 16 the respected Israeli newspaper, Ha’aretz, writing on Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Day, reiterated the fact that despite billions of dollars given to Israeli for Holocaust survivors, over a third of such survivors live in poverty, a fact Dr. Finkelstein writes about given his personal experience with his parents as Holocaust survivors.Scandals and “financial “mismanagement and misappropriation” of Holocaust funds led to the resignation of Rabbi Israel Singer as the Chairman of the World Jewish Congress's governing board. (New York Sun; Feb. 2, 2006)

United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Migrants Visits U.S

Corrections Corporation of America Announces 2007 First Quarter Financial Results

Think of the BILLIONS to be had from locking up "illegal" immigrants. Much more profitable than the "war on drugs"
We can keep on pushing policies that drive people out of their homes countries to work in this thankless, racist, right wing hell then lock 'em up at every opportunity whereupon tax payer dollars can be used to pay private prisons to house them until Blackwater can drive them home in trucks paid for by taxpayers and driven by drivers supplied by Halliburton all while guarded by Blackwater thugs.
And then there's that WALL around Texas.

U.N. Independent Expert Denied Access to Hutto Detention Center

[...]
The Special Rapporteur is conducting a three-week fact finding mission at the request of the U.S. The Rapporteur is an independent expert appointed by the U.N. Human Rights Council with the mandate to monitor, advise and publicly report on human rights situations in specific countries and on human rights violations worldwide. The tour of Hutto — a converted prison that houses about 400 immigrants, including children and asylum seekers — was considered a major part of the Special Rapporteur's mission. Earlier this year, the ACLU filed federal lawsuits on behalf of 12 children detained at the Hutto facility, charging that the children are subject to inhumane treatment.

According to the official terms for fact-finding missions, the Special Rapporteur must have “access to all prisons, detention centers and places of interrogation.” The terms also mandate that the Rapporteur be given confidential and unsupervised contact with witnesses and potential victims of human rights violations.
[...]

video: Life in the Police State

First Hand Citizen Journalist Footage as Police Started Firing; Panic, Confusion Interrupt McArthur Park Immigration Rally...

Red Cross: Somalia Needs $15 Million

The usual Distortion and Lies from religious right

"When women enter CPCs, they are walking into a trap," said Ikeita Cantu Hinojosa, Planned Parenthood's assistant director of government relations. "They are expecting to receive neutral, comprehensive medical care, but they're greeted with manipulation, designed to coerce and scare them."

The centers say states have no right to interfere in their efforts to encourage alternatives to abortion. Public money helps them carry out their goals.

Millions of dollars from the Bush administration's "abstinence-only" effort goes to the centers. Many recipients have bought ultrasound equipment that lets expectant mothers see the earliest stages of fetal development.

Kuwait firm wins $100m contract with KBR

KBR - which split from the Dubai-bound Halliburton earlier this year – has been shrouded in controversy. The Pentagon's largest contractor in Iraq has so far booked more than US $20 billion worth of work in the country, including a $7 billion single no-bid contract known as 'Restore Iraqi Oil'.

Critics say that contracts were awarded due to KBR's association with US Vice President Dick Cheney, who once ran the company.

Boeing receives $69M defense order

Lockheed Martin awarded $40M Army radar contract

Nigerian oil bombings cut 150,000 bpd output

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), which has now shut down more than a quarter of Nigerian oil output, said in an e-mail it bombed the pipelines to embarrass President Olusegun Obasanjo in his last days in office. The MEND vowed to carry out more attacks in the world's eighth-largest crude exporter, where about 700,000 bpd were already being lost before the latest attacks. Raids on oil facilities and abductions have become frequent in the delta. Three South Koreans and eight Filipinos were freed on Tuesday after five days, a diplomat and security sources said, although another nine foreigners remain in captivity.
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The MEND, which demands local control of oil wealth in the impoverished delta, carried out a string of attacks in Feb. 2006 that reduced Nigerian output by 600,000 bpd. It threatened to blow up more pipelines between now and May 29, when Obasanjo is due to hand over to president-elect Umaru Yar'Adua.

Nations are racing to plant flags and claim the "new world" of islands and sea routes that are emerging as Arctic ice melts.

How the U.S. is working to secure Iraq's oil -- one of the most important sources of petrochemical energy on the planet- how the Iraqis are resisting

Republikkkan Poe Quotes Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard On House Floor. Why is anyone surprised?