CJE Tuesday News Briefs

Canada’s ‘war on science’

WS – It’s not a “war on science”. It’s political corruption benefiting Multinational Corporations. Period!

Environmental groups say recent measures show that Harper’s government is stepping up its attack on climate scientists.
Canadian campaigners are calling it a “war on science” – a slow and systematic unravelling of environmental and climate research budgets under the Conservative government of Stephen Harper.

Hundreds of researchers have lost their jobs, with those remaining reportedly forbidden from talking to the media without a government minder.

The government says the cuts are part of a wider, deficit-reducing austerity programme.

But green groups instead accuse Harper of trying to stifle criticism of Canada’s development of its oil sands fields in Alberta which hold huge reserves.
Environmental groups say the government has stepped up its attack on climate scientists in recent months, as seen by some of the measures taken so far:

The elimination of the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy, a body that for years urged the government to take more action on climate change
Slashing funding for more than a dozen research stations that monitor greenhouse gas and other pollutants
The non-profit Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences lost all its government funding since Harper took office in 2006; several other climate study bodies also suffered budget cuts
Nature magazine reported that 12,000 government jobs, including thousands of scientists, will be affected by the latest cuts More…

It’s Raining!

WS – What was the real reason for Facebook and Googles down time?

The NSA Is Building the Country’s Biggest Spy Center (Watch What You Say)

Facebook Blackout
According to our own tests, as well as reports on Twitter, Facebook is down for a vast number of users.  Facebook experienced some downtime on November 30, making this the second time in two weeks that the site has had reliability issues. More…

Google’s Gmail service suffers disruption(Reuters) – Several Google Inc Web products, including the popular Gmail service, appeared to go dark for users on several continents on Monday. Google confirmed that “service disruptions” had affected Gmail and Google Drive, its online storage service. The two products are part of Google’s Apps suite, a Microsoft Office rival that caters to both consumers and businesses. More…

Today is “The First Day of the End Of Your Life!  Wow… Debbie Downer!

HSBC TO PAY $1.9B TO SETTLE MONEY-LAUNDERING CASE

WS – Eric Holder lets another one go. The media reports this is as a big deal. A triumph of Justice. Guess who the media is owned by? Corruption at the Department of Justice is so endemic it’s the norm and it’s in our faces. What can you do… call a cop?

WASHINGTON (AP) — HSBC, the British banking giant, said Tuesday it will pay $1.9 billion to settle a money-laundering probe by federal and state authorities in the United States.

The probe of the bank – Europe’s largest by market value – has focused on the transfer of funds through the U.S. financial system from Mexican drug cartels and on behalf of nations like Iran that are under international sanctions.

Stuart Gulliver, Group Chief Executive of HSBC, released a statement Tuesday saying: “We accept responsibility for our past mistakes. We have said we are profoundly sorry for them, and we do so again.”

The bank also said it has reached agreements over investigations by other U.S. government agencies. It also expects to sign an agreement with British regulators shortly. More…

NEW TESTS COULD HAMPER FOOD OUTBREAK DETECTION

WS – Helllooo… Just give both tests!

WASHINGTON (AP) — It’s about to get faster and easier to diagnose food poisoning, but that progress for individual patients comes with a downside: It could hurt the nation’s ability to spot and solve dangerous outbreaks.

Next-generation tests that promise to shave a few days off the time needed to tell whether E. coli, salmonella or other foodborne bacteria caused a patient’s illness could reach medical laboratories as early as next year. That could allow doctors to treat sometimes deadly diseases much more quickly – an exciting development.

The problem: These new tests can’t detect crucial differences between different subtypes of bacteria, as current tests can. And that fingerprint is what states and the federal government use to match sick people to a contaminated food. The older tests might be replaced by the new, more efficient ones. More…

Supreme Court takes up case on generic drugs

WS – If you think these Corporate owned corrupted ‘Kings’ haven’t decided this already at the club ,on weekends, while playing golf with the “Big Pharma” boys…  This IS America after-all! Wake the F$ck Up!

The Supreme Court will take up “pay for delay” — the multibillion-dollar dispute over whether brand-name drug makers should be able to pay generic drug companies for agreeing to delay putting cheaper versions on the market.
The justices agreed Friday to hear the case of Federal Trade Commission v. Watson Pharmaceuticals and two other cases to resolve conflicting rulings in lower courts. Both the pharmaceutical industry and the FTC requested a Supreme Court review to resolve a long-running battle antitrust regulators have labeled “pay-for-delay” settlements.
“This is the health care reform case of 2013,” said David Balto, a former FTC policy director who helped file the first lawsuit against pay-for-delay deals back in the 1990s. “There’s no other case that can have as much impact on reducing health care costs.” More…

Berlusconi sex trial flares up as Italy election nears

WS – Just another carp, feeding off of whomever he wants, whenever he wants and the world be damned if  they see it!  Does he look worried?  - His ilk have no laws. They have inconvenient distractions, that are dealt with ruthlessly, pragmatically and as expediently as needed.

(Reuters) – Milan magistrates ordered police on Monday to search for a Moroccan nightclub dancer at the center of a sex trial involving Silvio Berlusconi, now seeking a fifth term as prime minister in an election next year, after she failed to show up in court.

The incident, two days after Berlusconi announced he was planning to run in an election expected in February, came as a reminder of the sex scandals that plagued his last government and precipitated his demise.

Karima El Mahroug, better known by her stage name of “Ruby the Heartstealer”, was due to testify on Monday but did not provide any valid justification for her absence, prosecutor Ilda Boccassini said in court.

El Mahroug’s lawyer said she did not know where her client was.

Boccassini accused Berlusconi’s lawyers of deliberately delaying the trial, where the former premier is accused of paying for sex with El Mahroug when she was under 18, to avoid a verdict in the middle of the election campaign. More…

ACLU SEEKS OAS PROBE OF PADILLA CASE

WS – Will history record this as a turning point for Justice?

The United States tortured this US citizen until his mind was completely gone. Then put HIM on trial! – No maybe with this one folks.

NEW YORK (AP) — The American Civil Liberties Union says it will ask the Organization of American States’ human rights commission to investigate the U.S. government for allegedly violating the rights of convicted terrorism plotter Jose Padilla by labeling him an “enemy combatant” a decade ago and subjecting him to interrogation that amounted to torture, including sleep and sensory deprivation in solitary confinement.

The watchdog legal group told The Associated Press that it plans to file a petition Tuesday morning to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, which serves as the human-rights investigation arm of the Washington-based OAS. The regional international organization promotes cooperation among the 35 independent countries of the Americas.

Jamil Dakwar, the ACLU’s human rights program director, said this will be the first-ever petition to be filed to the OAS commission by an American citizen against the U.S. government alleging torture and abuse. More…

Masked gunmen kill intelligence officer in south Yemen 

WS – CIA Yemen. CIA The CIA new CIA Beirut?

(Reuters) – Masked gunmen shot dead a senior intelligence officer in southern Yemen on Tuesday, local and security officials said.

Colonel Ahmed Barmadah, deputy head of the Political Security Office, the domestic intelligence service, was leaving his house in the port city of Mukalla in Hadramout province when gunmen on a motorcycle opened fire on him, the officials said.

No one claimed responsibility for the killing but a security official said he suspected that al Qaeda militants, who are battling the U.S.-backed government, were behind it. More…

More graves found at Fla. reform school
TAMPA, Fla., Dec. 11 (UPI) — Nineteen more graves have been found at a Florida reform school where one former inmate said “the devil was hiding behind every tree,” scientists said Monday.

A team from the University of South Florida in Tampa has been investigating the graveyard at the Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys in Marianna, NBC News reported. In an interim report, they said they have found at least 50 grave shafts.

The school closed in 2011, after investigators said boys had been abused and even killed at the school, which opened in 1900. Previously, officials had said 31 boys were buried on the school grounds, most of them killed in a fire and in an epidemic, both of them early in the school’s history.More…

British police employ cardboard cutouts

WS – Why not?  The people have been electing them for decades! 

If they work so well, why not replace all of the police with cutouts? Are these made in China?

SHEFFIELD, England, Dec. 10 (UPI) — A British police department said cardboard cutouts of police officers have been effective in deterring shoplifters, but they have also been targeted by thieves.

South Yorkshire Police said they spent $40 each on cardboard cutouts after the number of real-life officers shrank from 3,289 in 2008 to 2,900 last year due to budget cuts, The Mirror reported Monday. More…