Free Internet Press Newsletter - Friday December 29 2006 - (813)

Friday December 29 2006 edition
Free Internet Press is operated on your donations. Donate Today
The 'Untouchables' Of U.S. Science 2006-12-29 03:40:38 A bridge next to Kevin Eggan's laboratory overlooks one of the most concentrated square miles of scientific fire power in the world: North Yard, the science hub of Harvard. The bridge, a recent construction in glass and steel, was intended to facilitate collaboration between two research teams. On one side is the lab run by Dr. Eggan, an assistant professor of molecular and cellular biology who specializes in human embryonic stem cell research; on the other is the Bauer Center for Genome Research, which focuses on genes. Working together, the teams started devising projects to analyse the genetics of human embryonic stem cells, with Dr. Eggan's team generating the cells on one side of the bridge and their DNA being analyzed on the other side. Then, on August 9, 2001, a metaphorical shutter came down that closed the bridge as effectively as if it had been bricked up. George Bush issued a presidential decree banning the use of federal funds for research on new human embryonic stem cell lines. Read The Full Story FDA Meat, Milk Cloning Ruling Damned By Food Safety Experts 2006-12-29 03:39:49 The sale of milk and meat from cloned animals moved a step closer Thursday after the U.S. government ruled that the products were safe to eat and could be sold in supermarkets without labelling. The landmark draft decision, taken by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, was condemned by consumer groups and food safety experts, who gave warning of the implications for food consumption throughout the world. FDA officials said that they saw little problem with the controversial technology, which could result in cloned food being sold in the U.S. within months without any labels identifying its origins. They added that cloned food products, if approved, could also be exported. Read The Full Story Mystery Man Caught On Airport T.V. May Hold Key To Litvinenko Poison Plot 2006-12-29 03:38:32 Detectives investigating the murder of Alexander Litvinenko are trying to trace a Russian businessman who flew to Britain at the same time as a consignment of deadly polonium-210 was allegedly smuggled into London. The man was spotted on a flight from Hamburg sitting beside Dimtri Kovtun, another Russian whom German police are investigating for trafficking the radioactive material used to poison the former KGB spy. Officers have studied CCTV (closed-circuit t.v.) footage from airports at Hamburg, Germany, and London, England, and are understood to believe that the two men were travelling together. However, the mystery figure disappeared after leaving Heathrow with Kovtun. The name he used on the lfight and the passport presented to British immigration officials does not show up on any hotel register in London. It is believed that he met up again with Kovtun in London on Novembere 1, the Litvinenko fell ill. Read The Full Story Ethiopian And Somali Government Forces Seize Mogadishu 2006-12-28 16:00:32 Just hours after the Islamist forces abandoned Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, militias loyal to the transitional government seized the city today in a stunning reversal of fortunes. According to residents, troops from the transitional government, along with Ethiopian soldiers who had been backing them up, poured into the capital from the outskirts of the city while militiamen within Mogadishu occupied key positions, like the port, airport and dilapidated presidential palace. "The government has taken over Mogadishu," a transitional government leader, Jama Fuuruh, told Reuters by telephone from Mogadishu's port. "We are now in charge." Read The Full Story Israel Confirms Arms Shipment To Abbas 2006-12-28 15:59:25 After coordination with Israel and the United States, Egypt has sent a shipment of weapons and ammunition into the Gaza Strip to forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, of Fatah, Israeli officials said Thursday. Senior Palestinian officials denied the report, including the spokesman for Abbas, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, calling the story "Israeli propaganda aimed at aggravating the situation between Fatah and Hamas." Israeli officials confirmed a report in the Haaretz newspaper that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert approved the shipment in his meeting Saturday evening with Abbas. Four trucks with some 2,000 automatic rifles, 20,000 ammo clips and some 2 million bullets passed from Egypt through the Israeli-controlled Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza, they confirmed, and were handed to Abbas' Presidential Guard at the Karni crossing. Read The Full Story Former President Ford 'Very Strongly' Disagreed With Bush Iraq Strategy 2006-12-28 03:47:45 Former president Gerald R. Ford said in an embargoed interview in July 2004 that the Iraq war was not justified. "I don't think I would have gone to war," he said a little more than a year after President Bush launched the invasion advocated and carried out by prominent veterans of Ford's own administration. In a four-hour conversation at his house in Beaver Creek, Colorado, Ford "very strongly" disagreed with the current president's justifications for invading Iraq and said he would have pushed alternatives, such as sanctions, much more vigorously. In the tape-recorded interview, Ford was critical not only of Bush but also of Vice President Cheney - Ford's White House chief of staff - and then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who served as Ford's chief of staff and then his Pentagon chief. "Rumsfeld and Cheney and the president made a big mistake in justifying going into the war in Iraq. They put the emphasis on weapons of mass destruction," said Ford. "And now, I've never publicly said I thought they made a mistake, but I felt very strongly it was an error in how they should justify what they were going to do." Read The Full Story Ethiopian Troops Take Key Somali Town Of Jowhar 2006-12-28 03:46:53 Ethiopian forces backing Somalia's interim government took control of the key Somali town of Jowhar on Wednesday and were on the verge of overrunning Balad, a village just 18 miles from the dusty, battered capital, Mogadishu. With Ethiopian troops, tanks and helicopters closing in and military planes buzzing overhead, the situation in Mogadishu appeared confused, with witnesses reporting thousands of Somalis - who have known little besides fighting for the past 15 years - fleeing the capital, and those who remained unsure who might next control the city. Militias loyal to Somalia's Islamic Courts movement, having retreated in recent days from most of the towns they had taken earlier this year, were spotted Wednesday shedding uniforms and fleeing the capital they have controlled since the summer, while other witnesses reported young men signing up with Islamic militias at several mosques around the city. Read The Full Story Sadr Adviser Dies In Najaf Raid 2006-12-28 03:45:33 A top deputy of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr was killed Wednesday during a raid by U.S. and Iraqi troops in the southern holy city of Najaf, sparking protests from Sadr's followers and complicating an already tense relationship with the powerful anti-American leader. Hurling rocks and shouting expletives, thousands of angry Sadr loyalists marched through the streets of Najaf after Sahib al-Amiri was shot and killed by a U.S. soldier during an early morning raid. "Agents and stooges!" protesters shouted at Iraqi soldiers and local authorities. U.S. military officials declined to confirm that Amiri was a Sadr aide, saying only that he had provided explosives for use against Iraqi and U.S. forces. Sadr officials said Amiri was an aide and a lawyer who ran an educational organization that helped orphans and impoverished children. They said he had no connections to illegal activity. Read The Full Story Commander Of British Troops In Iraq Says British Government Is Failing Them 2006-12-28 03:44:54 The commander of British troops in southern Iraq Wednesday called for more support for his soldiers and warned that the covenant between the U.K. and its service personnel was "seriously out of kilter". Major General Richard Shirreff warned that generations of underfunding and political neglect had taken its toll, adding it was the duty of the nation to support the armed forces. Defending the army's Christmas Day attack on Basra's Jameat police compound, he said soldiers needed to be valued by those at home. "The nation needs to understand that the quality work done by these courageous men and women out here only happens and can only continue if these people, our soldiers, are properly supported back home in terms of training, infrastructure, barracks, accommodation. Read The Full Story	5 U.S. Troops Killed In Iraq As December Edges Toward Deadliest Month In 2006 2006-12-29 03:40:18 The U.S. military death toll in Iraq this month continued to rise as officials reported Thursday that five more American service members had died. The latest deaths brought to 100 the number of service members killed in December, according to iCasualties.org, an independent Web site that tracks military fatalities. Most were killed in Iraq's western Anbar province, where Sunni Arab insurgents are aggressively fighting U.S.-led forces, and most were killed by roadside bombs, according to a Washington Post analysis of data. The deadliest month this year has been October, with 105 American military fatalities, according to data provided by the U.S. Department of Defense. The number of service members who have died since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003 is 2,979. Read The Full Story Bush Considers Economic Incentives For Iraq 2006-12-29 03:39:13 As he puts the finishing touches on his revised Iraq plan, President Bush is considering new economic initiatives to go along with a possible increase in troops to help stabilize the country, according to officials familiar with the administration's review. Among the steps being considered are short-term jobs and loan programs aimed at winning back the waning local support for the U.S. presence in Iraq, the officials said. They described the ideas as part of a classic effort to quell an insurgency through a combination of economic, political and military means. "The president is looking at a variety of ways to work with the Iraq government to provide new economic opportunities for Iraqis, which will be essential to sustaining security gains and draining the influence of extremists," said Gordon Johndroe, the spokesman for the National Security Council. Read The Full Story Happy New Year - NOT! Medicare Premiums Surge For Elderly 2006-12-28 16:01:11 When new income-based premiums for Medicare's Part B program go into effect next month, some seniors will get an unwelcome surprise: Their monthly costs will be going up considerably more than expected because of the government's method of counting their income. In addition to income from investments, pensions and wages, seniors will find that big but unusual windfalls - from house sales, for instance, or from taking cash from an individual retirement account - will also be included in government calculations. As a result, an advocacy group for seniors says, tens of thousands of people will be counted as wealthy even though their continuing yearly income is modest. Some will be paying as much as $800 more a year for Part B coverage because they are deemed to be "higher income beneficiaries." This will be on top of the $93.50 a month standard premium that all recipients will pay. Read The Full Story Edwards Announces He's Running For President 2006-12-28 15:59:49 Former North Carolina senator John Edwards this morning declared his candidacy for president in 2008, sounding a populist call for citizen action to reduce the U.S. troop presence in Iraq, combat poverty and global warming and help restore America's moral leadership in the world. Using a neighborhood devastated by Hurricane Katrina as his backdrop, Edwards said New Orleans symbolizes not only the theme of two Americas - haves and have-nots - that was the underpinning of his 2004 presidential campaign but also the power of ordinary citizens to take responsibility for their own futures. Edwards said restoration of America's leadership in the world must begin with Iraq. He said he favors withdrawing 40,000 to 50,000 U.S. troops from Iraq as the first step toward turning responsibility for the conflict over to the Iraqi government. Read The Full Story 18 Dead In Wave Of Gang Violence In Rio de Janeiro 2006-12-28 15:58:48 Heavily-armed drug gangs unleashed a wave of attacks on police stations and public roadways in Rio de Janeiro early Thursday, and at least 18 people were killed in the confrontations. Seven victims died in a single incident, a pre-dawn assault on an interstate bus bound for Sao Paulo. Survivors said that about 8 armed men stopped and boarded the bus, robbed those aboard and then set fire to the vehicle before the 28 passengers could get off. At least eight police stations and street posts were also reported to have been attacked by gangs armed with grenades and machine guns. The dead in those episodes included not only criminals and police officers involved in the shootouts, but also street vendors, pedestrians and ordinary citizens filing complaints at police stations. Read The Full Story Washington Gets Ready To Gossip As D.C. Sex Blogger Goes To Court 2006-12-28 03:47:10 The Washington Post described Jessica Cutler as "our blog slut". The National Enquirer opined that she was "beautiful, untalented and morally corrupted". Now the blogger who wrote about her attempts to juggle affairs with six men while keeping a job as an aide to a U.S. senator has a new role: as the star defendant in a case that could help define what can and cannot be published in a blog. Writing under the pseudonym Washingtonienne, Cutler described in detail the sexual intricacies of her life on the Hill. The blog, which Cutler claimed was intended to keep her friends up to date on her social life in Washington DC, achieved notoriety, and its author fame and a book contract, after it was brought to a wider public by another blog, Wonkette. Almost immediately, Washingtonienne shut down, but not before millions had read about "X = Married man who pays me for sex", "K = A sugar daddy" and "YZ = The current favorite". But YZ - aka Robert Steinbuch, a legal counsel working for the same senator - objected to the revelations about his private life. Read The Full Story Islamists Seem To Have Suddenly Vanished From Mogadishu 2006-12-28 03:46:28 The Islamist forces who have controlled much of Somalia in recent months suddenly vanished from the streets of the capital, Mogadishu, residents said Wednesday night, just as thousands of rival troops massed 15 miles away. In the past few days, Ethiopian-backed forces, with tacit approval from the United States, have unleashed tanks, helicopter gunships and jet fighters on the Islamists, decimating their military and paving the way for the internationally recognized transitional government of Somalia to assert control. Even so, the Islamists, who have been regarded as a regional menace by Ethiopia and the United States, had repeatedly vowed to fight to the death for their religion and their land, making their disappearance that much more unexpected. Read The Full Story U.S. Army Brigade Headed To Kuwait 2006-12-28 03:45:10 A brigade of U.S. Army troops is scheduled to deploy to Kuwait early next month to take over as the U.S. Central Command's theater reserve force, which means more than 3,000 additional U.S. troops will move into the region and could be used to support combat in Iraq, Pentagon officials announced Wednesday. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates approved sending the 2nd Brigade, 82nd Airborne Division overseas after Gen. John P. Abizaid, who leads Central Command, requested the forces to replace the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit, which was sent into the western province of Anbar this fall. Abizaid requested a brigade - which is significantly larger than the Marine unit - to allow for greater flexibility in the region. While defense officials have said the move is not part of an orchestrated "surge" of forces into Iraq, should such a surge become part of U.S. strategy for the war, the Army brigade could be used as the leading edge of a troop increase. Read The Full Story British Food Agency Takes On Industry Over Junk Food Labels 2006-12-28 03:44:25 British consumers are to be presented with two rival new year advertising campaigns as the Food Standards Agency (FSA) goes public in its battle with the industry over the labelling of unhealthy foods. The Guardian has learned that the FSA will launch a series of 10-second television ads in January telling shoppers how to follow a red, amber and green traffic light labelling system on the front of food packs, which is designed to tackle Britain's obesity epidemic. The FSA campaign is a direct response to a concerted attempt by leading food manufacturers and retailers, including Kellogg's and Tesco, to derail the system. The industry fears that traffic lights would demonize entire categories of foods and could seriously damage the market for those that are fatty, salty or high in sugar. Read The Full Story
Original materials on this site © Free Internet Press. Any mirrored or quoted materials © their respective authors, publications, or outlets, as shown on their publication, indicated by the link in the news story. Original Free Internet Press materials may be copied and/or republished without modification, provided a link to http://FreeInternetPress.com is given in the story, or proper credit is given. Newsletter options may be changed in your preferences on http://freeinternetpress.com Please email editor@freeinternetpress.com there are any questions. XML/RSS/RDF Newsfeed Syndication: http://freeinternetpress.com/rss.php