Ten years ago next week, one of the strangest events in county history exploded into the public’s consciousness. For several days, it was the biggest news story in the world.It began unfolding the afternoon of Wednesday, March 26, 1997, during a period when the Hale-Bopp comet could be seen in the night sky.
Inside a mansion in Rancho Santa Fe, 39 members of the Heaven’s Gate cult lay dead. Convinced that a spaceship was traveling behind the comet and that they would be transported to the vessel to begin a new life “beyond human,” they had poisoned themselves. Twenty-one women and 18 men died by eating pudding and applesauce laced with phenobarbital and other drugs – the largest mass suicide on U.S. soil.
Archive for March, 2007
It’s been 10 years since Do and the Away Team took their exit
Monday, March 19th, 2007Dog criminal arrested
Monday, March 19th, 2007A hungry bull terrier with a sweet tooth left his home to make a night raid on a gas station. The Statoil outlet’s security cameras recorded the dog’s stealthy hunt for his favorite type of chocolate, and a security guard busted the pooch without incident, newspaper Adressavisen reports.Terrier Conan, aged 7, ended up behind bars and according to his owner the dog is a repeat offender.
“He is incredibly fond of food in general and sweets in particular. He has run off a few times before, and he always heads for food stores,” owner Liss-Hege Jeremiassen told Adresseavisen.
Basketball riots in Madison Square Garden
Monday, March 19th, 2007There’s March Madness, and then there’s March Badness.A wild melee broke out at a high school basketball game inside Madison Square Garden on Sunday night between high school students, police officers, and others in attendance. The fight then spilled into the streets, and at one point shots were fired, police said.
CBS 2 has exclusive video of hundreds of fans fighting in the stands and of NYPD officers racing through the streets in response to continued violence. Cops reportedly made 21 arrests, though that number could still grow as the details of the melee are finally sorted out.
Meanwhile in N. Korea
Sunday, March 18th, 2007Bean Paste full of National Flavor:
March is most opportune for making bean paste in Korea.Housewives made balls of steamed soybean in the beginning of the winter. Now they are making tasty bean paste with the fermented soybean balls with all sincerity.
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The Korean people are proud of bean paste. The folk method of making bean paste, along with the industrial method, is encouraged in the DPRK where the folk traditions are valued.
Nazi Sheep in Germany
Sunday, March 18th, 2007Youths probed for daubing swastikas on sheep
German police said on Thursday they were investigating four youths for spraying sheep with swastikas, the cross-like symbol used by the Nazis. The youths, between the ages of 15 and 18, painted swastikas on several sheep out of a herd of around 30 near the northwestern town of Etzenborn, police said.
Germans de-Germanizing
Sunday, March 18th, 2007Most Germans want speed limit on autobahn?
Nearly two in three Germans believe a speed limit should be introduced on the car-loving nation’s notoriously fast autobahns, according to a new poll.The European Union’s environment commissioner Stavros Dimas and environmental activists in Germany have said speeding on the autobahn wastes energy and called for a speed limit. German Transport Minister Wolfgang Tiefensee has rejected the idea.
The poll for ZDF television published on Friday showed 54 percent of Germans favor a speed limit of 130 kph (80 mph) while another 10 percent would like a limit below that level. Some 35 percent said they did not want any speed limit.
Mud Volcano Update
Sunday, March 18th, 2007Concrete balls slow Java mud volcano
The use of concrete balls to reduce the force of a mud volcano that has swamped villages on Indonesia’s Java island appears to be working.The mud has displaced about 15,000 people following an oil-drilling accident in May in Sidoarjo, an industrial suburb near Surabaya city in the east of Java island. It has also swamped roads, railway tracks and factories.
The flow has decreased by about 20 percent after 374 clusters of concrete balls linked by steel cables were dropped into the volcano, said Endar Bagus, one of three scientists who initiated the experiment. “We’re seeing a decrease in the mud debit,” Bagis said, “but our observation is relative, not absolute.”
Wolf Civil War in Yellowstone
Sunday, March 18th, 2007Fighting among wolves over food and habitat in Yellowstone National Park caused increased “social strife” and was the leading cause of death for the animals in 2006, according to a report released by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.Wolves killing other wolves accounted for 44 percent of adult mortality for radio- collared animals in Yellowstone last year. Nine collared wolves died in 2006. Further, competition between packs likely accounted for the majority of pup deaths in Slough Creek and Hellroaring Creek packs, two of three wolf packs that failed to reproduce successfully.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service released the information in the Rocky Mountain Wolf Recovery 2006 Interagency Annual Report, a document detailing wolf packs in Wyoming, Idaho, and Montana.
The Caves of Mars
Sunday, March 18th, 2007‘Cave entrances’ spotted on Mars:
Scientists studying pictures from Nasa’s Odyssey spacecraft have spotted what they think may be seven caves on the surface of Mars. The candidate caves are on the flanks of the Arsia Mons volcano and are of sufficient depth their floors mostly cannot be seen through the opening.
…The caves may be the only natural structures capable of protecting primitive life forms from micrometeoroids, UV radiation, solar flares and high energy particles that bombard the planet’s surface.
The spacecraft spotted what seemed to be vertical “skylight” entrances to caves below the surface.
There is a sheer drop of between about 80m and 130m or more to the cave floors below.
She got too close to the secret!
Sunday, March 18th, 2007The Da Vinci victim: obsessed art expert took deadly overdose
A painter fascinated with best-selling conspiracy thriller The Da Vinci Code committed suicide after becoming convinced she was the subject of a real-life murder plot.Caroline Eldridge, 38, moved to Italy to pursue her interest in Leonardo Da Vinci, but her mind became “muddled” by the mysteries surrounding his work, her father said.
She suffered paranoid delusions that she and her family were in danger “because of the knowledge that she had” of Leonardo after working on an exhibition about his paintings.
After repeatedly telling her family, “I’m not going to let them take me alive,” she took an overdose of paracetamol.
“The man said he was just taking his due, but I don’t think his wife was too pleased”
Sunday, March 18th, 2007Man saws house in two in divorce split
A 43-year-old German decided to settle his imminent divorce by chain sawing a family home in two and making off with his half in a forklift truck.Police in the eastern town of Sonneberg said on Friday the trained mason measured the single-story summer house — which was some 8 meters (26 feet) long and 6 meters wide — before chain sawing through the wooden roof and walls.
Hat tip to Kara!
Whales hate do-gooders
Sunday, March 18th, 2007Whale kills would-be rescuer in Japan
A Japanese fisherman drowned Tuesday after a whale he was trying to rescue capsized his small fishing boat, a coast guard official said.Three fishermen tried to rescue the sperm whale, about 30 feet long, after it strayed into a bay off the southwestern island of Shikoku, about 500 miles southwest of Tokyo.
Cannibal Frogs Terrorizing Golden Gate Park
Sunday, March 18th, 2007It’s like something out of an animal horror movie — killer frogs take over peaceful pond, then after terrorizing and eating everything alive, start eating each other.Only it’s no movie. It’s really happening in Golden Gate Park’s Lily Pond, near the California Academy of Sciences. And after watching the frogs chew through everything in sight over the past several years, the city finally wants to do something about it.
No one knows for sure when the African clawed frogs got into the pond or who put them there. But there they are, and the Toad Warriors have pretty much taken care of the native turtles, frogs and fish.
Hat tip to Kara!
PLEASE Don’t Feed the Animals!
Sunday, March 18th, 2007Tiger Bites Off Woman’s Arm at Zoo in Montenegro
A Siberian tiger at a private zoo in Montenegro bit off an arm of a woman who tried to feed the animal. Slavka Sekulovic, 58, had put her arm into the cage with two Siberian tigers when one of them grabbed it and bit it off, said doctor Zoran Srzentic who admitted the woman at a nearby hospital.
Hat tip to Kara!
Meth millions seized in Mexico
Sunday, March 18th, 2007Mexico meth raid yields $205 million in U.S. cash
Authorities confiscated more than $200 million in U.S. currency from methamphetamine producers in one of this city’s ritziest neighborhoods, they said Friday, calling it the largest drug cash seizure in history.The seizure reflected the vast scope of an illegal drug trade linking Asia, Mexico and the United States, officials said. Two of the seven people arrested Thursday at a faux Mediterranean villa in the Lomas de Chapultepec neighborhood were Chinese nationals.
The group was part of a larger drug-trafficking organization that imports “precursor chemicals” from companies in India and China for processing into methamphetamine in Mexican “super labs,” authorities said. The methamphetamine is eventually sold in the United States.
Smallpox vaccination infects soldier’s child!
Sunday, March 18th, 2007Toddler critical after dad’s smallpox shot:
The 2-year-old son of a soldier deployed to Iraq is in critical condition after developing a reaction to his father’s smallpox vaccination, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Saturday.The child, being treated in a Chicago hospital, has a rare but very serious reaction to the vaccination site called Eczema vaccinatum, the CDC said. It is the first such case since vaccination against smallpox resumed in 2002, said CDC pox virus expert Dr. Inger Damon.
The toddler’s father is a soldier vaccinated while on deployment to Iraq. The father was unexpectedly furloughed and evidently his wife and son touched the vaccine site and became infected, the CDC said.
Politically Incorrect in Poland
Saturday, March 17th, 2007Polish Teachers Promoting ‘Homosexual Culture’ to Be Fired, Official Says
Teachers deemed to be promoting “homosexual culture” in Polish schools will be fired, the deputy education minister said Thursday. But the minister, Miroslaw Orzechowski, also insisted that homosexual teachers would not be targeted. “There is no place for the promotion of homosexual culture” in Polish schools, Orzechowski, who has a key role in drawing up a new education law aimed at banning what his party called “homosexual propaganda” in schools, told the all-news station TVN24. He said the ministry still has not defined what it means by homosexual propaganda.
The danger of being drunk on a cruise ship
Saturday, March 17th, 2007After 8 hours, overboard cruise ship passenger rescued
A man who jumped from a cruise ship off Florida’s coast early Friday was rescued about eight hours later by the Coast Guard, officials said.Michael Mankamyer, 35, waved his arms at crews when he was found at about 8:45 a.m., Coast Guard Petty Officer Jennifer Johnson said. He was airlifted to a hospital and the Coast Guard reported that he suffered from mild hypothermia but was otherwise in good condition.
The ship reported that Mankamyer had jumped from the balcony in his room and into the water around 12:45 a.m., a Coast Guard statement said.
Skinhead Riots in Budapest
Saturday, March 17th, 2007Hungary police teargas extremists
Hungarian police used water cannon and tear gas to repel around 1,000 skinheads and extremists in Budapest as anti-government protests marred celebrations of the country’s 1848 revolution.As night fell Thursday, rightwing protesters hurling cobblestones and bottles confronted hundreds of police in riot gear after authorities announced the detention of Gyorgy Budahazy, a man suspected of being a key figure in riots last year and who had been in hiding for months.
About 500-800 protesters tried to break through police lines to reach Budhazy, who was being held at the nearby National Investigations Office.
Police drove the protesters away from the national investigations office, where rioters initially gathered in the early evening, back into the capital’s Heroes Square.
Global warming religous walk struck by winter snow storm
Saturday, March 17th, 2007Interfaith group braves storm in climate change trek
As the world’s warmest winter on record draws to an end with a weekend snow storm, a group of religious leaders started walking across the state Friday to bring attention to global warming.”People have been asking me what happens if it snows,” said the Rev. Fred Small of the First Church Unitarian in Littleton. “I tell them: ‘we walk.’” The nine-day haul from downtown Northampton to Copley Square in Boston was planned far before forecasts called for a weekend of snow and sleet just a few days before the start of spring.
Big Brother Knocking on Europe’s Door
Saturday, March 17th, 2007Central fingerprint database plan draws fire from all over EU
Proposals for a centralised database of fingerprints from across the Continent were revealed yesterday, fuelling fears on all sides of a Big Brother Europe.The scheme for a computerised collection of personal details drawn from all 27 countries in the EU is the latest in a raft of anticrime measures in the wake of the 9/11 attacks in the United States.
Britain would be expected to contribute all the details held by police. These include fingerprints of suspects and people released without charge, as well as those convicted of crimes. The plan coincides with the Home Office preparing to expand the range of people fingerprinted to include those caught speeding or dropping litter.
Mock Trial for Hamlet
Saturday, March 17th, 2007Is He to Be Guilty, Or Not to Be Guilty?
Poetic justice is not so easily meted out, as a distinguished gaggle of lawyers and psychiatrists found out when gathered on Thursday night to consider the sanity of Hamlet.After two hours of mock-trial arguments at the Kennedy Center — presided over by no less a jurist than Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy — a jury of Washingtonians deliberated over whether Hamlet was in his right mind when he stabbed Polonius to death. In elegant tribute to Shakespeare’s enigmatic masterpiece, the jurors deadlocked, 6 to 6.
Bad Intern!
Saturday, March 17th, 2007Intern Sold Civil War Items on eBay
An intern with the National Archives stole about 165 Civil War documents – including the War Department’s announcement of President Lincoln’s death – and sold most of them on eBay, prosecutors charged Thursday.Denning McTague, who runs a Web site that sells rare books, worked at a National Archives and Records Administration site in Philadelphia last summer, prosecutors said.
McTague, 40, of Philadelphia, has helped officials recover most of the missing items and plans to plead guilty, his lawyer said.
This weekend’s Smoking Gun classic
Friday, March 16th, 2007Comedian Carol Burnett, angered by her portrayal as a janitor in an adult film store in the animated TV show “The Family Guy,” has filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Twentieth Century Fox, the program’s distributor. According to Burnett, 73, she was approached by Fox in mid-2005 for permission to use the theme song from “The Carol Burnett Show” in a “Family Guy” episode. She declined the request. It was then, Burnett alleges in a lawsuit filed yesterday in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, that she became a target of the raunchy Fox show.
‘An act of human sabotage’
Friday, March 16th, 2007The day the news turned hardcore
And here is the news: the news has been replaced by porn.Television viewers in Phoenix, Arizona were intrigued to notice that a health news show – fronted by hyper-respectable anchor Tom Brokaw – cut out during the broadcast, to be replaced by scenes of hardcore pornography.
The porn, which appeared on local station KPPX-TV on Monday night, prompted a spurt of calls to the station, local media, and to the cable provider (who, amusingly, are called Cox Communications).
Yet another reason to avoid liposuction
Friday, March 16th, 2007A German belly dancer has been given twice as much compensation as she asked for – after a plastic surgeon accidentally sucked away one of her buttocks instead of reducing the size of her thighs.Belly dancer Julia ‘Cleopatra’ Meyer, 38, from Munich, wanted slimmer thighs – but instead ended up with half her bottom missing.
Yet another reason not to be a court stenographer!
Friday, March 16th, 2007Court stenographer jailed for slow work
A court stenographer was sent to jail when she didn’t finish a trial transcript needed for the appeal of a convicted rapist.Ann Margaret Smith was jailed Friday for contempt of court. Circuit Judge Charles Greene noted that Smith failed for months to finish the transcript and missed a final deadline in February. She also failed to produce the transcript at her contempt hearing.
Feline home-invasion!
Friday, March 16th, 2007Stray cats invade home, injure 3
Two stray cats got into a house and attacked three people inside, then were euthanized and checked for rabies, authorities said. The cats entered Melissa Breva’s house through an open front door on Monday, and attacked two women visitors and a boy, authorities said.
Yet another reason not to swim with humpback whales
Friday, March 16th, 2007Diver Says Whale’s Tail Broke His Leg
A 50-year-old man said his femur broke “like a twig” when a humpback whale whipped her tail during an excursion in the Dominican Republic. “I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Randy Thornton said at HealthSouth Rehabilitation Hospital in Sandy.
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But there was nothing playful about a mother who had a calf on her back.“The calf woke up and got spooked and that startled the mother, who swished her big tail twice,” Thornton said.
Midget gang nabbed
Friday, March 16th, 2007Malaysian Police Detain ‘Midget’ Gang
Malaysian police detained an eight-member gang of small-sized robbers dubbed the “midget gang,” who allegedly confessed to committing 14 break-ins over the past three months, a news report said Thursday. All the gang members, aged between 14 and 23 years, were diminutive, The Star newspaper said without saying whether they were dwarfs or just small.
Dungeons & Castrations
Friday, March 16th, 20073 Sentenced in Castration ‘Dungeon’
Three men accused of operating what police described as a sadomasochistic “dungeon” that included castrations have been sentenced to jail time. Richard Peter “Master Rick” Sciara, his partner of 20 years Michael Mendez, and the man they called their slave, Danny Carroll Reeves, pleaded guilty to felony castration and maiming. Superior Court Judge Dennis Winner said it was difficult to call the dungeon’s willing patients “victims,” but he said six castrations performed there were certainly a crime.
Sonic Nerves
Friday, March 16th, 2007Scientists say nerves use sound, not electricity:
The common view that nerves transmit impulses through electricity is wrong and they really transmit sound, according to a team of Danish scientists.The Copenhagen University researchers argue that biology and medical textbooks that say nerves relay electrical impulses from the brain to the rest of the body are incorrect.
“For us as physicists, this cannot be the explanation,” said Thomas Heimburg, an associate professor at the university’s Niels Bohr Institute. “The physical laws of thermodynamics tell us that electrical impulses must produce heat as they travel along the nerve, but experiments find that no such heat is produced.”
Eugenics Update
Friday, March 16th, 2007Exhibit considers Nazis’ deadly medicine
Adolf Hitler used the theory of eugenics in his quest to create a master race, legitimizing the murder of thousands deemed unfit for the German race and culminating in the genocide of 6 million Jews.But the idea behind eugenics — improving a population’s health through genetics — was hardly unique to Germany, as shown by a traveling exhibit developed by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., and on display at The Andy Warhol Museum.
Hiccup horror returns!
Friday, March 16th, 2007Florida teenager’s hiccups return:
A Florida teenager’s intractable hiccups are back, just when she thought it was safe to return to school after the almost uninterrupted diaphragm spasm that had plagued her for five weeks subsided.On her second day back at school since the unusual condition started on January 15, Jennifer Mee had to leave class again, as her nose started to bleed and the almost non-stop hiccups set in again, the St Petersburg Times newspaper reported on Friday.
”I’m at my wit’s end,” said Rachel Robidoux, the girl’s mother, adding that her daughter is upset, discouraged and in pain.
Unicorn menace update
Thursday, March 15th, 2007Man Tells Police Unicorn Caused Crash
A man told police not to blame him for crashing his truck into a light post – it was that unicorn behind the wheel. Prosecutor Ingrid Rosenquist said Phillip C. Holliday Jr. initially denied driving the truck involved in the March 7 crash in Billings. He told officers at the scene that a unicorn was driving, she said.
Idiot Criminal of the Week
Thursday, March 15th, 2007Suspect Leaves ID at Burglary Scene
Authorities in Iowa say a burglar left a calling card behind when he broke into an apartment. They found a Corrections Department identification card they think the burglar used to jimmy a lock.
Mars: the murdered planet
Thursday, March 15th, 2007Did a giant impact create the two faces of Mars?
The impact of a giant asteroid could explain why Mars has two very different faces – but only if it struck the planet with a glancing blow, computer simulations suggest.A longstanding puzzle about Mars is why its northern and southern hemispheres are so different. The northern hemisphere is much flatter and lies lower than the southern hemisphere, with a difference in elevation between the two of about 5 kilometres.
In the 1980s, scientists suggested a giant impact by an asteroid about 300 kilometres across in Mars’s early history could have led to a permanent depression in the planet’s northern hemisphere.
Now, two teams of scientists have created the first computer simulations testing whether such an impact could have produced the observed differences.
Mars: the dust-covered frozen-ocean planet
Thursday, March 15th, 2007Huge Reservoir of Frozen Water Found on Mars
Mars is unlikely to sport beachfront property any time soon, but the planet has enough water ice at its south pole to blanket the entire planet in more than 30 feet of water if everything thawed out. With a radar technique, astronomers have penetrated for the first time about 2.5 miles (nearly four kilometers) beneath the south pole’s frozen surface. The data showed that nearly pure water ice lies beneath.
If it happened to Mars, it could happen to us. Count your blessings that we are neither frozen solid nor submerged!
Yet another reason to avoid hedge fund managers
Thursday, March 15th, 2007A renowned hedge-fund honcho hatched a heinous revenge plot against his former mistress by posing as her on the Internet – saying she wanted to be kidnapped and raped as part of a sicko sex fantasy, officials said yesterday.Albert Hsu, 43, a wealthy, married dad of two and former Cub Scout leader, posted his fiendish ad on a hardcore, S&M Web site, Connecticut authorities said.
He allegedly included the woman’s name, photo, address, license-plate number, train schedule to and from work and even the rail car she usually sits in.
Career Limiting Move Update
Wednesday, March 14th, 2007WABC anchor snoozes and loses his job
Steve Bartelstein has run out of second chances at WABC/Ch. 7. The anchor, who has messed up several times on the job only to get another shot, was fired after sleeping through a newsbreak he was to anchor last Thursday morning on the horrific Bronx house fire. He was in his Ch. 7 office at the time.
Banana Terror Republic
Wednesday, March 14th, 2007Chiquita to Pay $25M in Terror Case
Banana company Chiquita Brands International said Wednesday it has agreed to a $25 million fine after admitting it paid terrorists for protection in a volatile farming region of Colombia.The settlement resolves a lengthy Justice Department investigation into the company’s financial dealings with right-wing paramilitaries and leftist rebels the U.S. government deems terrorist groups.
In court documents filed Wednesday, federal prosecutors said the Cincinnati-based company and several unnamed high-ranking corporate officers paid about $1.7 million between 1997 and 2004 to the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, known as AUC for its Spanish initials.
Sorry for the light blogging
Monday, March 12th, 2007My apologies, but I am away on a business trip and probably won’t have much time to blog until Wednesday. Things should go back to normal then.
Berserk Cat on the Attack
Sunday, March 11th, 2007Berserk house cat sends Idaho woman to hospital with more than 20 bite wounds:
A house cat attacked its owner, sending her to the hospital with more than 20 bite wounds. The cat, a black and white domestic male, went on the rampage Wednesday when a neighbour showed up at the door with a different cat, mistakenly thinking it belonged to the woman.
He was on a mission from God
Saturday, March 10th, 2007Driver Crashes Through Augusta Mall And His Journey Doesn’t Stop There:
A man drives his SUV through the Augusta Mall like he was driving on the street!That driver is in jail tonight charged with several serious crimes, including DUI.
”He drove through locked glass doors. Continued through the mall and made a left turn and proceeded toward where the new food court is. When he gets to the new food court, the vehicle turns right. The vehicle then drives through those glass doors and exits the mall,” Lt. Tony Walden of the Richmond County Sheriff’s Office said.
World’s most expensive car crash
Saturday, March 10th, 2007Bugatti Veyron in world’s most expensive crash
An as yet unnamed driver crashed a rented Bugatti Veyron on Sunday in what is being described as “the world’s costliest road accident”.The £830,000 supercar, which Times columnist Jeremy Clarkson memorably described last year as being “as fast as a Hawker Hurricane” was travelling in the wet at speeds in the region of 100mph along a 40mph stretch of the B375 near Chertsey, Surrey when the driver lost control and collided with a Vauxhall Astra before ploughing into a 3ft bank.
The passenger of the Vauxhall was a pregnant woman who has since been released from hospital after tests.
Don King- Answer your phone!
Saturday, March 10th, 2007Maine man, 91, challenges fitness guru Jack LaLanne, 92 to a boxing bout:
All of that Florida sun must be getting to Maine snowbird Roland Fortin. The 91-year-old has laid down a challenge to box fitness guru Jack LaLanne, who’s 92. Fortin, former “cut man” for retired boxing champ Joey Gamache, said the idea for the four-round bout was hatched at the Tropical Gym in Pompano Beach, where Fortin works out during the winter in Florida.The South Florida Sun-Sentinel in Fort Lauderdale ran the challenge in a half-page ad that gym owner Troy Eckonen took out for Super Bowl Sunday. The purpose, he said, was to let seniors know it’s not too late to get in great shape like Fortin. “Florida is like the waiting room to the casket,” Ecknonen said.
And Ye Verily – All Things Shall Pass!
Saturday, March 10th, 2007Stolen Diamond Found in Prison Shower
A $25,000 diamond was found stuck in a shower drain at the prison housing the man accused of stealing it two years ago. Bret Allen Langford, 39, allegedly asked the owner of a Jewelry Express store to show him a 2-carat colorless diamond in April 2005. Langford then grabbed the diamond and sped away, said sheriff’s spokesman Jim Amormino.
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Since he stole the diamond, Langford apparently swallowed and regurgitated the rock each time he was transferred. But 14 months ago, just as Langford was about to be searched he threw the diamond into a shower stall and it fell down the drain.
Child insurrectionists undermine balloon race
Saturday, March 10th, 2007Pupils’ green protest stops balloon race fundraiser:
SCHOOLCHILDREN staged a revolt after the teachers and parents planned a balloon race to help raise funds for playground equipment. The young eco-warriors dug their heels in and said they would not take part because of the damage balloons can do to marine life. The pupils also insisted that a ban on balloon races is written into the school’s green constitution. The children discovered that balloons can be eaten by dolphins, turtles and other wildlife, causing death in many cases.
Meanwhile in N. Korea…
Saturday, March 10th, 2007Conferment of “International Kim Il Sung Prize” on Kim Jong Il Supported:
The news that the “International Kim Il Sung Prize” Council awarded the “International Kim Il Sung Prize” to Kim Jong Il on the occasion of his birthday has stirred up the hearts of the progressive humankind.
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The chairman of the Executive Committee of the African Party for the Solidarity and Justice of Mali, the general secretary of the Central Committee of the People’s Socialist Party of Mexico, the vice-chairman of the National Democratic Party of Egypt, the chairman of the Supreme Council of the Socialist Party of Romania and many other figures and political parties and organizations made public statements supporting it one after another.They were unanimous in saying that the conferment was an expression of the absolute trust and deep respect of the world progressive people for Kim Jong Il and it would be recorded in history as an eternal auspicious event.
Meetings held in India, Mongolia, South Africa, Ethiopia, Nigeria and other countries with the attendance of prominent personages, Juche idea followers and people from all walks of life adopted messages of greetings and congratulatory letters to Kim Jong Il.
Things are heating up in DC
Saturday, March 10th, 2007Suspected ‘D.C. Madam’ Pleads Not Guilty
A former escort service owner who has threatened to sell a list of 15,000 phone numbers from her client list to help her defense pleaded not guilty Friday to racketeering. Deborah Jean Palfrey, 50, of Vallejo, Calif., entered the plea in U.S. District Court. She was released but ordered to wear an electronic monitoring device.
Guns Guns Guns!
Saturday, March 10th, 2007Court Rejects Strict Gun Law as Unconstitutional
Interpreting the Second Amendment broadly, a federal appeals court in Washington yesterday struck down a gun control law in the District of Columbia that bars residents from keeping handguns in their homes. The decision was the first from a federal appeals court to hold a gun control law unconstitutional on the ground that the Second Amendment protects the rights of individuals, as opposed to the collective rights of state militias. Nine other federal appeals courts around the nation have rejected that interpretation.
Greeks pulling down the walls in Cyprus
Saturday, March 10th, 2007Greek Cypriots dismantle barrier:
Cypriot soldiers remove parts of an outpost from a wall at the UN buffer zone in NicosiaGreek Cypriots have demolished a key section of the barrier dividing the island’s capital city, Nicosia. The Green Line has separated Cyprus’s Greeks from the Turkish population since 1974, when Turkish troops occupied the north.
“Jackass” Update
Friday, March 9th, 2007‘Jackass’ copycat lands in hospital
Attempts to duplicate a movie stunt landed one man in the hospital with burned genitals and another facing criminal charges. The men were trying to do a stunt from one of the “Jackass” movies, in which a character lights his genitals on fire. Jared W. Anderson, 20, suffered serious burns to his hands and genitals, according to the criminal complaint. Randell D. Peterson, 43, who sprayed lighter fluid on Anderson and lit him on fire, was charged with felony battery and first-degree reckless endangerment Tuesday in Eau Claire County Court.
Sex Slave Auctions in Britain
Friday, March 9th, 2007Women for sale in the Gatwick slave auctions
Women are being sold into prostitution in modern day “slave auctions” at Britain’s airports, it emerged yesterday. The illegal immigrants are sold to the highest bidder for up to £8,000 a time. They are then forced to work in brothels where they can earn up to £800 a day for their “owner”. The chilling reality of human trafficking was spelled out yesterday by senior police officers at Scotland Yard.
Jacko’s going bust!
Friday, March 9th, 2007Jacko Will Lose Beatles Catalog in ‘08
Michael Jackson had better hold on to whatever money he pocketed in Japan this week during a promotional tour.I can report today that Jackson will lose his hold on the Beatles catalog and Sony/ATV Music Publishing on May 31, 2008. That date, revealed here for the first time, is known as the “Liquidation Sale” among insiders.
And Jackson knows this. He even hired a famous law firm, White & Case, to evaluate the deal he made with Sony and Fortress Investments when he refinanced his shaky empire last year.
“It’s a hell of a time for him to go, We really need him now.”
Thursday, March 8th, 2007Comic hero Captain America dies:
Superhero Captain America has been killed off after appearing in US comic books for 66 years. The character, who appears in the Captain America comic book, was created in 1941 to build up patriotic feeling during World War II. Co-creator Joe Simon told the New York Daily News: “It’s a hell of a time for him to go, We really need him now.”
Iranian defection freaks out Hezbollah
Thursday, March 8th, 2007Elite Iranian general defects with Hezbollah’s arms secrets
An Iranian general who went missing on a visit to Turkey last month appears to have defected to America, taking with him a treasure trove of his country’s most closely guarded secrets.Ali Resa Asgari, 63, a general in the elite Revolutionary Guards and former Deputy Defence Minister, vanished on February 7 after arriving in Is-tanbul on a flight from Syria. He had reservations at the Cey-lan Intercontinental Hotel but never checked in.
Iran has notified Interpol and raised fears that General Asgari might have been kidnapped. Yesterday, however, several sources confirmed reports in America that General Asgari had fled to the West, becoming the first senior Iran official to defect since the revolution 27 years ago.
Greece vs. Anarchists, Day 1
Thursday, March 8th, 2007Rioting Breaks Out in Athens During Student Protest
Anarchist rioters clashed with police for over three hours on Thursday, hurling petrol bombs and smashing banks and stores while rampaging through central Athens. At least 20 people were hurt and 40 detained after the violence erupted outside parliament, during a rally attended by more than 20,000 students and academic staff against education reforms.
Set Phasers on Puke
Thursday, March 8th, 2007US Navy research throws up vomit ray
The US Navy is funding research into a “Star Trek phaser set on ’stun’”.At least to begin with, the kit is intended for use by Marines in ordinary urban combat rather than starship crewmen beamed down onto strange new worlds (fans of the classic series may be interested to note that the USS Enterprise happens to be preparing for an “upcoming surge deployment”, however.)
The new technology has been given an acronym, EPIC, for Electromagnetic Personnel Interdiction Control. The idea is that intense radio-frequency emissions – capable of passing through walls – would be used to temporarily disrupt the balance and coordination functions of targets’ inner ears, knocking them down relatively harmlessly.
The Navy notes that “second order effects would be extreme motion sickness,” suggesting that in fact the order given by future Captain Kirks may be “set phasers on ‘puke’”.
Wikipedia: You get what you pay for!
Thursday, March 8th, 2007Wikipedia’s Image Is Tarnished as an Editor Is Exposed as Fraud
Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia, has been plunged into controversy after one of its most prolific contributors and editors, a professor with degrees in theology and canon law, was exposed as a 24-year-old college dropout.The editor, who called himself Essjay, was recruited by staff at Wikipedia to work on the site’s arbitration committee, a team of expert administrators charged with vetting content on the “free encyclopedia that anyone can edit.”
But no one apparently vetted the credentials of Essjay, who claimed to be a professor of religion at a private university and contributed to an estimated 20,000 Wikipedia entries.
Essjay was Ryan Jordan, a 24-year-old from Kentucky with no advanced degrees who used texts such as “Catholicism for Dummies” to help him correct articles on the penitential rite or transubstantiation.
Yet another reason not to donate your body to science!
Thursday, March 8th, 2007UCLA official, associate accused of selling body parts for research
A former UCLA official and an associate were arrested Wednesday on charges that they illegally sold parts of bodies donated for research in a scheme that produced more than $1 million in profits.After years of investigation by campus police, Henry Reid, 57, former director of the Willed Body Program, was arrested at his Anaheim home. Associate Ernest Nelson, 49, was taken into custody in Rancho Cucamonga.
Authorities say the scam took place between May 7, 1999, and Feb. 26, 2004. Bodies donated to the university were supposed to be used for medical study and research. Prosecutors said that instead, Reid made $43,000 by selling remains to Nelson, who operated Empire Anatomical Co.
Putin’s boys are on a roll! Where it stops, nobody knows!
Wednesday, March 7th, 20072 Americans treated for poisoning in Moscow
An American doctor and her daughter were being treated in a Moscow hospital Tuesday after being poisoned late last month with thallium, a highly toxic metal with a history of use in both pesticides and murder, Russian officials said. Both of the women, who had emigrated from the Soviet Union in the 1980s but recently returned for a vacation, had been severely sickened but their lives were not in danger, medical officials here said. “They have positive dynamics and their condition is improving,” Viktor Kaznacheyev, chief doctor at the Sklifosovsky clinic, said in a telephone interview. The two women had been treated at the clinic since falling ill Feb. 24.
Disabled Children Farming
Tuesday, March 6th, 2007Lawyer: Prosecutors claim parents drugged child over money
Prosecutors believe the parents accused of fatally overdosing their 4-year-old daughter killed the girl because she wasn’t earning them the same amount of government money as her two older siblings, the woman’s defense lawyer said Monday.
Michael Bourbeau, Carolyn Riley’s lawyer, told The Associated Press a prosecutor outlined for him the motive, which he called “a sick theory.”
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“He said they went to this doctor in order to get the drugs and place the child on disability, and when they couldn’t and when Rebecca wasn’t bringing in any money, they killed her,” Bourbeau said.
Superbowl makes kids gay
Tuesday, March 6th, 2007FCC Complaint: Parent Thinks Super Bowl Will Turn Son Gay
As one viewer noted in an e-mail, the “pro-homosexual theme” of this year’s event, telecast on CBS, was “disgraceful.” The writer added that “just because 6% of the population is gay,” porn did not need to be included in the broadcast. Another purportedly offended viewer was concerned that the halftime show would have an unfortunate lasting effect on his son, who “hoped to be a quarterback and now he will turn out gay…Thanks CBS for turning my son GAY.”
Fed up with NYPD? Behead the chief
Tuesday, March 6th, 2007A plot to behead New York’s police commissioner in revenge for the shooting of a man on his stag do has been uncovered. Police buildings were also to be bombed over the killing of Sean Bell. The 23-year-old was shot by officers as he left a strip club with friends hours before his wedding.
Nigerians love dogs
Tuesday, March 6th, 2007Dog’s dinners prove popular in Nigeria:
“Welcome to animal kingdom where man pikin dey show dog pepper,” says Chibuzo Eze in Pidgin English, meaning: Welcome to place where the son of man is giving dogs a hard time.Mr Eze then hungrily gets back to tugging his chunk of dog meat.
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Mr Eze says he eats dog meat because “e dey protect person from all those nyama-nyama disease them” – it gives you immunity from different diseases.
Killer Asteroids: We could track ‘em, but we can’t afford it
Tuesday, March 6th, 2007NASA can’t pay for killer asteroid hunt
NASA officials say the space agency is capable of finding nearly all the asteroids that might pose a devastating hit to Earth, but there isn’t enough money to pay for the task so it won’t get done. The cost to find at least 90 percent of the 20,000 potentially hazardous asteroids and comets by 2020 would be about $1 billion, according to a report NASA will release later this week. The report was previewed Monday at a Planetary Defense Conference in Washington.
Suicide Pilot Attacks In-Laws
Monday, March 5th, 2007Pilot Crashes Into In-Laws’ House:
A pilot and his 8-year-old daughter were killed Monday when their small plane crashed into an in-laws’ house near a southern Indiana airport, authorities said. Indiana State Police spokesman 1st Sgt. Dave Bursten said a preliminary crash investigation leads “us to believe that this was an intentional act.” The crash killed Eric Johnson, 47, of Connersville, and his daughter Emily, he said. The plane crashed into the residence of one of Johnson’s in-laws, Vivian Pace, Bursten said.
Kayne West – Poster Child for Modern Narcissism
Monday, March 5th, 2007Kanye West Gets Food Delivery From U.K.:
If Kanye West were to walk into the British Raj’s dining room and order dinner, it would cost the rapper about $17.50. But since the restaurant is delivering from Wales to New York it’s going to cost a bit more. For a feast of onion bhajees, chapati breads, biryanis, pappadums, a specially prepared fish dish and vegetables on the side, the bill will top $3,900, plus travel and accommodation for the restaurant’s head chef.
8.1 mile long string of firecrackers!
Monday, March 5th, 2007Taiwanese set off 8.1-mile firecracker
Organizers lit up a 8.1-mile string of explosives in a southern Taiwanese county Sunday, hoping to create the world’s longest firecracker in a record-setting attempt expected to last two hours.TV footage of the Chinese New Year celebration in Tainan County, dubbed “Legend of the Fire Dragon,” showed rapid flashes of bright red explosions that created huge wafts of white smoke.
Ostrich Performance Anxiety
Monday, March 5th, 2007Teens Accused of Making Ostrich Impotent
Three teenagers may be on the hook for a hefty fine if a court decides that their festive firecrackers outside an eastern German farm scared the libido right out of an ostrich named Gustav.
Rico Gabel, a farmer in Lohsa, northeast of Dresden, is claiming $6,450 in damages for the alleged antics of the three youths, ages 17-18, between Dec. 27 and 29, 2005.
According to his lawsuit, the farmer claims that fireworks set off by the boys made the previously lustful Gustav both apathetic and depressed, and thus unable to perform for a half-a-year with his two female breeding partners.
Politically Incorrect in Cedar Rapids
Monday, March 5th, 2007Yet another reason not to pee behind a statue of Mary in a Catholic cemetary
A photographer for a Cedar Rapids television station has been fired for urinating in a cemetery while covering the funeral of an Iowa soldier killed in Iraq.Gerry Edwards of Center Point was dismissed in December by KGAN-TV, where he was a photographer for 24 years.
In November, Edwards was at a cemetery to cover the funeral procession for Sgt. James Musack, 23, of Riverside.
While waiting for the procession to arrive, Edwards urinated on the ground near a cemetery monument.
A journalist from a Kalona newspaper was nearby and photographed the incident. The editor sent the photo by e-mail to KGAN managers with a note that said, “Urinating behind a statue of Mary in a Catholic cemetery within clear view of a public road, not to mention the numerous members of the Army who were on hand for the funeral, is inexcusable.”
Yet another Russian gets Putin-ed
Monday, March 5th, 2007A military correspondent for Russia’s top business daily has died after falling out of a window, and some media alleged Monday that he might have been killed for his critical reporting. Ivan Safronov, the military affairs writer for Kommersant, died Friday after falling from a fifth-story window in the stairwell of his apartment building in Moscow, officials said. His body was found by neighbors shortly after the fall.
Now Alaskan moose are after our helicopters
Monday, March 5th, 2007Alaska Moose Brings Down Helicopter:
A helicopter is not necessarily a match for an angry moose. Instead of lying down after being shot with a tranquilizer dart, a moose charged a hovering helicopter used by a wildlife biologist, damaging the aircraft’s tail rotor and forcing it to the ground. Neither the pilot nor the biologist was injured, but the moose was maimed by the spinning rotor and had to be euthanized, wildlife officials said.
Hat tip to Kara!
Pirate Update!
Monday, March 5th, 200725.02.2007 0603 UTC in position 11:50N – 051:35E, North East Somalia. Pirates attacked a general cargo ship underway. Vessel under control of armed pirates is believed to have been hijacked. Negotiations for the vessel’s release are under way.
Denmakr vs. Communists, Day 4 – The Bulldozers Arrive
Monday, March 5th, 2007Denmark rioters’ squat demolished:
Bulldozers have begun the demolition of a building at the centre of rioting in the Danish capital Copenhagen, after the eviction of squatters last week. About 650 people have been arrested following three nights of clashes between protesters and police.
UN Infested with Rats, Vermin and Parasites – some of whom aren’t even on payroll!
Sunday, March 4th, 2007Rats stalk UN corridors of power
The United Nations headquarters in New York is infested with rats, mice, worms and even salt-water eels, according to staff members.
The crumbling 40-acre complex on Manhattan’s East River, built in the 1950s, is due to undergo a $1 billion five-year refurbishment starting next year – a renovation, it seems, that cannot come soon enough. Staff have complained to Aramark, which provides food to the thousands of delegates and assistants who work there, that some lunches served in the canteen have been nibbled by rodents.
Human-Rice Hybrids on the way!
Sunday, March 4th, 2007USDA Backs Production of Rice With Human Genes
The Agriculture Department has given a preliminary green light for the first commercial production of a food crop engineered to contain human genes, reigniting fears that biomedically potent substances in high-tech plants could escape and turn up in other foods. The plan, confirmed yesterday by the California biotechnology company leading the effort, calls for large-scale cultivation in Kansas of rice that produces human immune system proteins in its seeds.
A Definite Career Limiting Move
Sunday, March 4th, 2007DRC sacking over ‘ghost minister’:
A party leader in the Democratic Republic of Congo who proposed an apparently fictitious person for a post in the new cabinet has been sacked.The so-called case of the “phantom” government minister, Andre Kasongo Ilunga, has puzzled politicians in the war-torn African nation in recent days.
The case came to light when Prime Minister Antoine Gizenga began to appoint ministers to his new cabinet. The elusive Mr Ilunga got the post of trade but resigned before taking it up. The party’s leader, Honorius Kisimba Ngoy, leader of Unafec, a party allied to President Joseph Kabila, allegedly invented Mr Ilunga in the hope that submitting the name of an unknown along with his own would ensure he was appointed to the cabinet.
Neo-Nazi Update
Sunday, March 4th, 2007White Supremacist Gang Gaining Clout in Western U.S.
The white supremacist gang Public Enemy No. 1 began two decades ago as a group of teenage punk-rock fans from upper-middle class bedroom communities in Southern California.Now, the violent gang that deals in drugs, guns and identity theft is gaining clout across the West after forging an alliance with the notorious Aryan Brotherhood, authorities say.
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Law enforcement officials trace the gang’s rise to shifts in the power structure inside prisons.The Aryan Brotherhood has long been the dominant white supremacist gang behind bars, with the Nazi Low Riders acting as its foot soldiers on the outside for drug dealing and identity theft.
In 2000, officials reclassified the Low Riders as a prison-based gang and began sending its members to solitary confinement as soon as they were imprisoned.
Flat tax for Berlin hookers
Sunday, March 4th, 2007Berlin plans flat tax on prostitutes
Berlin plans to levy a flat rate daily tax on prostitutes from April to raise some extra revenues for its strained finances.Following a model used by Cologne, which collected over $1 million (514,000 pounds) last year with its own flat tax, the German capital plans to tax prostitutes 30 euros (20 pounds) per working day. Berlin has rising debts of more than 60 billion euros.
Prostitution is legal in most places in Germany and sex workers are required to pay income tax as well as value-added tax (VAT). However, tax collectors have long suspected their income and VAT was not being fully reported on tax returns.
