support the news - visit our advertisers
Home » March 31st, 2011
Entries posted on “March, 2011”
LOS ANGELES (AP & staff) — So now Japan’s radioactive fallout is showing up in milk on the U.S. West Coast. Not to worry, though. It turns out that traces of radioactivity are in many foods we eat, the air we breathe and the water we swim in. Based on current radiation levels leaking from the stricken Japanese nuclear plant, experts say it’s very unlikely that health problems will develop in the United States and other places far from Japan. “This amount of radiation is tiny, tiny, tiny compared to what you get from natural sources every day,” said John Moulder, a professor of radiation oncology at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee who studies the effects of radiation exposure. That radioactive fallout is turning up in food and water is hardly a surprise. Very low levels of radiation in the air connected to the Japanese plant have shown up coast to coast in the U.S., as well as in Iceland, Britain and Germany. Most of the radioactive material disperses in the atmosphere, but some falls to the ground. Radioactive iodine was found in the milk in California and Washington state, most likely after a cow ate tainted grass or drank puddles of rainwater containing it. Iodine-131, the type that was found, is short-lived and decays fairly quickly, becoming harmless. Moulder said he wouldn’t be surprised if leafy vegetables like spinach are next to show contamination, the source being rainwater. Again, the health risk “is about as close to zero as you can get,” he said. Since this type of iodine is manmade, it isn’t normally found in the environment. But we’re exposed to natural sources of radiation every day — most of it from radon in the air and, to a lesser extent, from cosmic rays. Foods we eat also contain low levels of naturally occurring radioactivity, including bananas, carrots and red meat. Even beer has it. “Once you understand that we swim in this low-level sea of radiation, then it’s just a numbers game,” said Mike Payne of the Western Institute for Food Safety and Security at the University of California, Davis. The Environmental Protection Agency normally tests milk, rainfall and drinking water every three months for radiation. Since the March 11 tsunami that devastated parts of Japan and crippled the nuclear plant, the EPA began testing more frequently and screened samples from milk producers this week. [...]
Read More » | Comment »
SAN FRANCISCO (AP & staff) — When Twitter turned five years old on March 21, co-founder Isaac “Biz” Stone was on the road celebrating with some of the popular short messaging service’s famous users. In the past two weeks, he has appeared on the shows of Conan O’Brien, Howard Stern and Martha Stewart among others. He also made a special stop in Chicago just to take out Twitter’s employees there for drinks — a pastime he calls “beersonbiz.” It’s a variation on Twitter’s weekly employee meetings at its San Francisco headquarters. Although those gatherings are called “Tea Time,” Stone told in a recent interview that everyone mostly consumes beer, salsa and chips. He also revealed another Twitter co-founder, Jack Dorsey, had become a regular Tea Time attendee in recent months, even though he technically wasn’t working at the company. Dorsey’s job status changed Monday when Twitter announced he is coming back to work as the company’s executive chairman in charge of product development. As Dorsey returned, Twitter’s third founder, Evan Williams, confirmed he was moving on to explore new business ideas. Williams had stepped down as CEO six months ago and turned the job over to Dick Costolo. Through it all, Stone has remained a constant, serving as the main face and social conscious of Twitter. Here are excerpts from the interview with Stone the morning after his night on the town in Chicago. Q: So you obviously think you can learn a lot about people over a few beers? I think it’s a really big deal to be able to meet people outside the context of something like a conference room or someplace where everything feels like it’s formal talk. (Last night) I found out there is a dog named Twitter in a shelter in Chicago that needs adoption so we are going to try to work on that. Q: You are a big dog lover, right? Has that been a lifelong thing? Both my wife and I have a lot of compassion for animals in general. We had two rescue dogs for the past five or six years. One of them, Pedro, recently passed but we still have Maggie. We are always trying to get people to adopt a pet rather than buy a pet from a store. Q: Any other pets? We have two cats, we have a rescue tortoise. At any given point in time, my [...]
Read More » | Comment »
TRIPOLI, Libya (AP & staff) — The extent of sincere popular support for Gadhafi is hard to measure. Moammar Gadhafi struck a defiant stance Thursday after two high-profile defections from his regime, saying he’s not the one who should go — it’s the Western leaders who have decimated his military with airstrikes who should resign immediately. Gadhafi’s message was undercut by its delivery — a scroll across the bottom of state TV as he remained out of sight. The White House said the strongman’s inner circle was clearly crumbling with the loss of Foreign Minister Moussa Koussa, who flew from Tunisia to England on Wednesday. Ali Abdessalam Treki, a former foreign minister and U.N. General Assembly president, announced his departure on several opposition websites the next day, saying “It is our nation’s right to live in freedom and democracy and enjoy a good life.” Gadhafi accused the leaders of the countries attacking his forces of being “affected by power madness.” “The solution for this problem is that they resign immediately and their peoples find alternatives to them,” the Libya state news agency quoted him as saying. His government’s forces have regained momentum on the rapidly moving front line of the battle with opposition forces, retaking the town of Brega after pushing the rebels miles back toward the territory they hold in eastern Libya. The rebels said they were undaunted, taking heart from the departures in Gadhafi’s inner circle. “We believe that the regime is crumbling from within,” opposition spokesman Mustafa Gheriani said in Benghazi, the rebels’ de facto capital. He compared Gadhafi to a wounded animal. “An injured wolf is much more dangerous than a healthy wolf. But we hope the defections continue and I think he’ll find himself with no one around him,” Gheriani said. Most high-level Libyan officials are trying to defect but are under tight security and having difficulty leaving the country, said Ibrahim Dabbashi, the deputy ambassador in Libya’s U.N. mission, which now backs the opposition. Koussa is privy to all the inner workings of the regime, so his departure could open the door for some hard intelligence, though Britain refused to offer him immunity from prosecution. “Koussa is one of the pillars of Gadhafi’s regime since the 1970s,” said Abdel Moneim al-Houni, a former Libyan Arab League representative who was among the first wave of Libyan diplomats to defect this month. “His defection means that he [...]
Read More » | Comment »
TRIPOLI, Libya (AP & staff) — The biggest danger to Moammar Gadhafi is not the rebel forces struggling to march on his capital. It’s more likely to be the crumbling of the remaining, fragile support for his regime. That is what makes the defection of Foreign Minister Moussa Koussa a heavy blow. He was part of a small circle of key insiders and family who have the most to lose if Gadhafi loses power. As those figures peel away, it makes the majority of his supporters, who have much looser ties, less certain that Gadhafi is capable of staying in power. The Libyan leader relies most on his immediate family and his tribe, the Gadhadhfa. But his tribe is a relatively small one among the estimated 140 tribes that predominate life in the North African nation of about 6 million. So he vitally needs the support of others, whose allegiance he has bought over the years by handing their members top political and security posts. Their loyalty is already fraying. International airstrikes hitting Gadhafi’s forces — where these tribes make up much of the manpower — are designed in part to convince them that Gadhafi has to go. Gadhafi’s most important alliances have been with the Warfalla and Magarha tribes, thought to be among the biggest in the country, with some estimates of around 1 million members each. One of his right-hand men, military intelligence chief Abdullah Senoussi, is a Magarha (he’s also Gadhafi’s brother-in-law). Members of both tribes have filled the upper ranks of the security forces and government. Warfalla and Magarha also largely fill out the militias led by Gadhafi’s sons, Khamis, Muatassim and al-Saadi. The regime has relied on those forces to battle the rebels and besiege opposition-held cities because the Libyan leader feels assured of their loyalty. That means they have been main targets of the air campaign and are bearing the brunt of the punishment. Some leaders in both tribes have announced their support for the anti-Gadhafi uprising since it erupted on Feb. 15, and numerous individual Warfalla and Magarha have joined the revolt, either as fighters or politicians. Mahmoud Jibril, the head of the opposition’s eastern-based leadership council, is a Warfalla. The rest in these tribes and others have remained with Gadhafi for the moment, whether out of fear of reprisals or because they hope to hold onto the perks and salaries the positions [...]
Read More » | Comment »
LONDON (AP & staff) — Moussa Koussa is the ultimate Libyan insider, a one-time intelligence chief and the keeper of Moammar Gadhafi’s darkest secrets. Now that the ex-foreign minister has fled Tripoli and landed in Britain, Western diplomats and intelligence officials were pressing him Thursday for the details that could help oust Gadhafi from power. Koussa, 62, is the highest ranking member of the secretive regime to quit so far. He had been a longtime aide throughout Gadhafi’s 42-year rule and his apparent defection raised hopes among some in the West that he could hold key details that could be used to bring down Libya’s leader. In Washington, National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor said Koussa could likely “provide critical intelligence about Gadhafi’s current state of mind and military plans.” A second senior Libyan official also announced he had quit Thursday in a statement posted on several opposition websites. Ali Abdel Salam al-Treki — Libya’s former envoy to the U.N. and also a former foreign minister — confirmed his defection as rumors swirled that other key aides were also preparing to abandon Gadhafi. British Prime Minister David Cameron urged those who he termed “Gadhafi’s henchmen” to follow the example of Koussa, who flew into Britain from Tunisia late Wednesday and announced he had quit his post. Cameron declined to offer details of initial talks between British officials and Koussa, but said his decision to abandon Tripoli was telling. “I think it does show a huge amount of decay, distrust and breakdown at the heart of the Gadhafi regime,” Cameron told reporters in London. Abdel Moneim al-Houni, Libya’s former Arab League representative and among the first wave of Libyan diplomats who defected, said Koussa’s exit hinted that Gadhafi’s inner circle is close to collapse. “Koussa is one of the pillars of Gadhafi’s regime since the 1970s. His defection means that he knew that the end of Gadhafi is coming and he wanted to jump from the sinking boat,” al-Houni said. Cameron insisted that whatever information Koussa does offer, he won’t be granted immunity from prosecution for past crimes. “There is no deal of that kind,” Cameron said. Scottish prosecutors confirmed they hope Koussa can shed light on the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, which killed 270 people — most of them Americans. Libya acknowledged responsibility for the terrorist attack in 2003, and opposition leaders have long [...]
Read More » | Comment »
Warning: opendir(/home/dailypos/public_html/wp-content/uploads/2011/03) [
function.opendir]: failed to open dir: No such file or directory in
/home/dailypos/public_html/wp-content/themes/Transcript/includes/theme-functions.php on line
288
Warning: readdir(): supplied argument is not a valid Directory resource in
/home/dailypos/public_html/wp-content/themes/Transcript/includes/theme-functions.php on line
291
Warning: closedir(): supplied argument is not a valid Directory resource in
/home/dailypos/public_html/wp-content/themes/Transcript/includes/theme-functions.php on line
303
MEXICO CITY (AP & staff) — President Felipe Calderon announced the resignation of his attorney general on Thursday and nominated the assistant in charge of organized crime as his successor, the first woman to hold the post if she is approved. Calderon gave no reason for the departure of Arturo Chavez Chavez, the second attorney general to resign since Calderon was elected president in 2006. He nominated Marisela Morales, who heads the organized crime unit of the Attorney General’s Office, to replace Chavez. She must be approved by the Mexican Senate. Chavez was appointed in 2009 after the departure of Eduardo Medina Mora, one of the main architects of Calderon’s crackdown on drug trafficking and organized crime. More than 34,600 people have been killed since Calderon’s administration launched the campaign shortly after he became president. While Medina Mora was constantly in the public eye, Chavez had maintained a low profile as the country’s chief prosecutor. U.S. Embassy officials in Mexico City found Chavez’s appointment to be “totally unexpected and politically inexplicable,” according to a diplomatic cable from September 2009 posted by WikiLeaks three weeks ago. The dispatch noted that Chavez, former top prosecutor in the border state of Chihuahua, “has strong detractors within the Mexican human rights community” because he oversaw botched investigations into the murders of women in the 1990s in Ciudad Juarez, a violent city across the border from El Paso, Texas. Medina Mora had been unable to work with the head of federal police, Genaro Garcia Luna, according to a leaked cable from October 2009. The September cable suggested Chavez “is a less capable political operator, who will be overshadowed by Garcia Luna and stymied by his considerable human rights baggage.”
Read More » | Comment »
PARIS (AP & staff) — A French prosecutor wants to drop a decade-long investigation into the fallout in France from the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident, citing lack of proof that it caused health problems. The prosecutor argued in a Paris hearing Thursday that the probe has been inconclusive and should be abandoned, according to a judicial official. The official was not authorized to be named because the hearing was closed to the public. The hearing came amid global worries about the risks of fallout from Japan’s nuclear disaster, as Japanese authorities struggle to contain radiation from reactors destroyed by the earthquake and tsunami earlier this month. Investigators said that the head of the French radiation safety agency at the time of the Chernobyl accident deliberately misled the public by minimizing the health risks in France from the radioactive cloud it produced. The safety agency chief, Pierre Pellerin, is the only person who has been handed preliminary charges in the case. He has insisted on his innocence, and the prosecutor said there was no evidence he misled the public on purpose. Researchers and cancer victims accuse the government of downplaying the effects of the Chernobyl explosion, partly to protect France’s powerful nuclear industry. A few dozen people, including thyroid disease victims, staged a protest Thursday near the courthouse. French authorities have been widely ridiculed for insisting after the Chernobyl accident that the radiation did not reach France, though neighboring countries all said it passed through their skies. Other European countries pulled milk from shelves or recommended that children take iodine tablets to reduce radiation risks, while France took none of these steps. French government agencies have adjusted some of their initial radiation estimates since the accident, but deny any intentional deception. The Paris appeals court will decide Sept. 7 whether to abandon the investigation. Until that decision is made, the probe is effectively frozen. Since the Japanese nuclear troubles began, French nuclear safety authorities have taken pains to soothe the French public about potential risks, holding daily press conferences for two weeks after the tsunami. The court hearing comes amid renewed questions about the safety of nuclear plants, and second thoughts by many countries about re-investing in nuclear energy. France is the world’s most nuclear energy-dependent country, with more than 70 percent of its electricity coming from nuclear reactors and has been at the forefront of a recent so-called nuclear renaissance.
Read More » | Comment »
LARAMIE, Wyo. (AP & staff) — Ann Coulter was bringing her edgy brand of conservatism to the University of Wyoming Thursday, a year after the school drew widespread criticism for its handling of an appearance by Bill Ayers, a Vietnam-era radical who is now a professor. Coulter is known for her biting criticism of liberals through her television appearances. Her speech topic Thursday night: “Why the liberals are wrong about everything!” An anonymous donor upset with Ayers’ April 2011 appearance in Laramie paid for half of Coulter’s $20,000 speaking fee. UW’s College Republicans and the Young America’s Foundation, a Virginia-based group that promotes conservative ideas on college campuses, were paying the remainder and other expenses. The university’s handling of the visit by Ayers, a professor at the University of Illinois-Chicago, generated criticism from all sides. The university invited him, then canceled his speech because many residents and UW alumni threatened to withhold contributions to the school. Ayers co-founded the Weather Underground, an anti-war group that claimed responsibility for a series of bombings, including nonfatal explosions at the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol. He was a fugitive for years but surrendered in 1980. Charges were dropped because of prosecutorial misconduct. In Casper, U.S. District Chief Judge William Downes ordered the university to let Ayers speak. As a Vietnam veteran, Downes said he could “scarcely swallow the bile” of his contempt for the Weather Underground, but added a free society must guarantee free speech. Ayers ultimately dealt mostly with education issues in his speech. His past briefly became an issue during the 2008 presidential race because he once served with Barack Obama on the board of a Chicago charity. Former Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin accused Obama of “palling around with terrorists.” UW students opposed to Coulter’s views were holding a fundraiser Thursday for gays, lesbians and advocates of people with alternative lifestyles. Pledge amounts were being taken on a per-minute basis based on the length of Coulter’s talk.
Read More » | Comment »
LISBON, Portugal (AP & staff) — Portugal’s financial plight deepened Thursday when official figures showed the debt-stressed country’s budget deficit last year was 8.6 percent of gross domestic product — way above the government target of 7.3 percent that was intended to allay market fears. The estimate by the National Statistics Institute was another setback for Portugal’s struggle to avoid taking a bailout, like those Greece and Ireland accepted last year, as it faces two months without a government before a June 5 general election and debt repayments it can’t afford. The deficit figure is far above the eurozone’s limit of 3 percent, though the statistics institute noted its measurements were based on new EU accounting rules which include the cost of helping banks and state companies. Outgoing finance minister Fernando Teixeira dos Santos said that without the accounting changes the deficit last year would have been 6.8 percent, showing that his austerity measures are paying off. He also complained about the accounting alterations, saying it was “like changing the score after the game has ended.” Though Portugal’s economy represents less than 2 percent of the eurozone’s GDP, its troubles could wreck European efforts to shake off a debt crisis that has dogged the continent for more than a year. European leaders had hoped that the rescue of Greece and Ireland would ease investor concerns and spare banks across the continent that are exposed to eurozone debt. But Portugal’s political uncertainty and crushing debt load have conspired to stoke the crisis. Its financial difficulties over the past year have pushed the yield on its 10-year bond to a euro-era record of 8.4 percent — an unsustainable level for the ailing country which is expected to enter a double-dip recession this year. It is also roughly the same level that eventually forced reluctant Athens and Dublin to accept help. Despite that, Portugal continued to defy predictions it will be shut out of financial markets, announcing the sale of up to euro1.5 billion ($2.13 billion) in bonds on Friday and up to euro1 billion ($1.42 billion) in short-term Treasury bills next week. The government quit last week in a dispute with opposition parties over a new batch of measures to restore the country’s fiscal health. President Anibal Cavaco Silva announced Thursday in a televised address to the nation that a national ballot for a new administration will be held on the first [...]
Read More » | Comment »
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP & staff) — Space shuttle commander Mark Kelly said Thursday he’s still awaiting doctors’ blessing to bring his wounded congresswoman wife to his launch in just under three weeks. NASA, meanwhile, took stock of minor damage to Kelly’s shuttle on the launch pad as severe thunderstorms swept through Kennedy Space Center. Lightning struck early Wednesday evening, and there were reports of hail. Gusts reached 90 mph. On Thursday morning, two funnel clouds were reported as the severe weather continued. Shuttle Endeavour’s external fuel tank sustained minor damage to some of its insulating foam, said NASA spokesman Allard Beutel. Launch pad workers were waiting for the latest storm to pass, before carrying out a full inspection. The space center was under a tornado watch Thursday morning, and Kelly and his crew had to skip some of their practice countdown drills. Kelly, the husband of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who was shot in the head 2½ months ago in Tucson, Ariz., said he’s still working out all the plans with NASA, in case his wife attends his launch. He’s still debating what to do about the traditional prelaunch party for his guests. Each shuttle crew member arranges a party for family and friends who descend on Cape Canaveral for the launch. The astronauts themselves are in quarantine and cannot attend; spouses stand in as hosts. In Kelly’s case, his identical twin astronaut brother, Scott, could fill in. Scott is just back from a five-month stay at the International Space Station. “I’ve been asked that a number of times, and I’ve been pretty busy,” Kelly said at a news conference. “I haven’t put it together yet. So if you’re willing to organize it for me, I think we might have a volunteer,” he joking told an Associated Press journalist. “I don’t know. We’ll see.” Kelly told reporters he’s “pretty hopeful” Giffords will make it to his April 19 liftoff. It will be Endeavour’s final flight and the next-to-last shuttle mission, and will feature the delivery of a $2 billion physics experiment to the International Space Station. As he did last week at a press conference at Johnson Space Center in Houston, Kelly asked that questions be about the two-week mission. He gave a brief update on his wife — “don’t have final approval from her doctors yet, but we are pretty hopeful that she may be able to get down [...]
Read More » | Comment »
