EFL
During the last three decades, the resort community on Florida's Gulf Coast has been overrun by the black, spiny-tailed, nonnative lizards that demolish gardens, nest in attics and weaken beach dunes with burrows. Last month, Lee County Democrat commissioners agreed to create a special tax for Boca Grande to cover costs of studying the infestation on the barrier island of Gasparilla, where scientists estimate there are up to 12,000 iguanas on the loose, more than 10 for every year-round resident. Note they are going to study them. There will be an additional tax if they decide to do anything about them.
I'm available if they need to spend more research grant dollars.
The frustration here has led to frenzy. Bonnie McGee keeps a pellet gun by her door ready to take on the slithering enemy. "They eat your flowers and their feces is everywhere," she said, adding that she's killed dozens. "Some people toss them in the canal and the hermit crabs feed on them."
Iguana: it's what's for lunch.
Aaron Diaz, owner of Boca Grande's Barnichol hardware store, said he has sold 75 traps in the past three weeks alone. "For some people, they've really taken over, climbing into attics, into vents and even into their toilets," he said.
"Mo-o-m-m-m! It keeps staring at me when I tinkle!"
County Commissioner Bob Janes doesn't know how much eradication will cost, so he's not sure how much the tax will be. He said the issue has finally come to a head. "In 1988, there was talk of a program but people at that time thought they were kind of cute," Janes said. "They're no longer cute little guys. They're very pesky insurance salesmen."
Kevin Enge, an exotic species expert with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, said he believes the iguana was introduced to Boca Grande in the 1970s by a boat captain who brought a few from Mexico for his kids but released them when they grew too large. More problems caused by illegal immigrants. Though they just tunnel into the sand dunes that American lizards won't.
The county hired Florida Gulf Coast University biologist Jerry Jackson to study the problem. He is worried the lizards aren't just a nuisance, but are destroying native habitat, spreading other invasive species through their droppings and endangering the town in the event of a hurricane. "The majority of their burrows are in the dunes along the beaches," Jackson said. "We're threatening the human population on Gasparilla Island to the extent that the dunes are in danger of just disappearing with a storm surge."
Which the storm surge might do anyways ...
The lizards also carry salmonella. "The disease organism alone could be a problem for native species, even for humans," Jackson said. "It's a zoo out there. It's an ecosystem gone crazy."
Even the local weekly paper, the Boca Beacon, gets flooded with letters about iguanas. "Iguanas are not human. They do not deserve humane treatment," resident Richard Zellner wrote. "As far as I am concerned, they can be burned, shot and mutilated." Kind of like Al Queda.
Some have made catching iguanas into a family outing. Boston resident Michael Mavilia, 49, who owns a house on the island, spent a recent day with his family casting a fishing rod with a tiny green rubber worm toward the foundations of beach homes. "Crikey! Ain't he a beaut! This is a nice one," Mavilia said, pulling a writhing, two-foot iguana from a cage in his car trunk. "You should have seen us wrestling him in. It was like catching the big one." Iguanas, why do they... Oh, forget it.
#2
Don't tell Muck4doo but I think the Lizard People might be taking over.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
04/14/2006 18:40 Comments ||
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#3
cross breed with kudzu and we're all history
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/14/2006 19:03 Comments ||
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#4
You know this is really bogus. There are the same iguanas down in Miami. So the problem in Lee county is either a lack of "island folk" to consume them or they have registered as democrats in Miami-Dade. Any sunny day you can see them sunning off Old Culter Road. Just remember one organism, one vote!
Posted by: bruce ||
04/14/2006 19:38 Comments ||
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#5
GUess I'll have to go wid Monty Python's HOLY GRAIL and armed knights running away from the giant killer rabbit.
Cheeta the chimp, star of a dozen ''Tarzan'' movies in the 1930s and 1940s, celebrated his 74th birthday with sugar-free cake. Although healthy and active, Cheeta is diabetic. ''He had a good time. The party went real good,'' said keeper Dan Westfall, operator of the primate sanctuary Creative Habitats and Enrichment for Endangered and Threatened Apes or CHEETA.
Representatives from a Spanish film festival also showed up for Sunday's party to present Cheeta with the first award of his career an International Comedy Film Festival of Peniscola prize. Cheeta has been recognized by the Guinness Book of World Records as the world's oldest chimp. Chimps rarely live past the age of 40 in the wild, but can reach 60 in captivity. The graying, 150-pound Cheeta, one of six primates at the desert sanctuary 110 miles east of Los Angeles, is very active and ''he still has every tooth in his head,'' Westfall said Monday.
Westfall said one of Cheeta's favorite activities is riding around with him in the car. He also likes to paint, what Westfall calls ''ape-stract'' pieces that are sold to raise money for the nonprofit sanctuary. Westfall adopted Cheeta in 1992 from his uncle Tony Gentry, an animal trainer who worked in Hollywood and obtained Cheeta from Africa in the 1930s.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
04/14/2006 09:55 ||
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#1
Cheeta the chimp celebrated his 74th birthday with sugar-free cake
Did you here the one about the penguin who ate ice cream
#7
OMG, CHEETAH, T-H-E CHEETAH, IS STILL ALIVE - here in Guam we kids loved her and Tarzan, movies and series, to death. Several of us boys got our first scars trying to swing like Cheetah and Tarzan from trees, laundry posts, and anything at a height. * GENTLE BEN THE BEAR and CLARENCE THE CROSS-EYED LION from the series DAKTARI. CHEETAH, ETC. WE STILL LOVE AND REMEMBER YA!
It is a "factual reality" that beans make you break wind, says South Africa's advertising watchdog.
No! Reeeeeeally?
A TV advert for sweet onions showed a rugby player eating beans that made him smell "stinky". The advert claims that "with sweet onions there are no tears, no burn and definitely no stink".
I kinda like chopped onions in my pinto beans, though I wouldn't ruin them with sweet onions. So where's the conflict?
The country's Dry Bean Producers Organisation complained about the advert on the basis that the "stinky" charge was untrue.
Did they use the same ad agency Phillip Morris used to use?
However, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) farted them off has thrown out the charge, saying it is widely known that beans produce gas. "It plays on an objectively determinable factual reality which cannot be denied..." the ASA said on its website.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/14/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
Beans and franks farts have an empirical provenance for every bean eater, and are traditionally passed around back and forth between one generation and the next. This can verified in a long history of legume reports dating back to the pre-petard epoch.
#2
The Tale of Abu Hassan, from the unexpurgated Arabian Nights, by Sir Richard Burton.
They recount that in the city of Kaukaban in Yemen there was a man named Abu Hasan of the Fadhli tribe who left the Bedouin life and became a townsman and the wealthiest of merchants. His wife died while both were young, and his friends pressed him to marry again.
Weary of their pressure, Abu Hasan entered into negotiations with the old women who procure matches, and married a woman as beautiful as the moon shining over the sea. To the wedding banquet he invited kith and kin, ulema and fakirs, friends and foes, and all of his acquaintances.
The whole house was thrown open to feasting: There were five different colors of rice, and sherbets of as many more; kid goats stuffed with walnuts, almonds, and pistachios; and a young camel roasted whole. So they ate and drank and made merry.
The bride was displayed in her seven dresses -- and one more -- to the women, who could not take their eyes off her. At last the bridegroom was summoned to the chamber where she sat enthroned. He rose slowly and with dignity from his divan; but in do doing, for he was over full of meat and drink, he let fly a great and terrible fart.
In fear for their lives, all the guests immediately turned to their neighbors and talked aloud, pretending to have heard nothing.
Mortified, Abu Hasan turned away from the bridal chamber and as if to answer a call of nature. He went down to the courtyard, saddled his mare, and rode off, weeping bitterly through the night.
In time he reached Lahej where he found a ship ready to sail for India; so he boarded, arriving ultimately at Calicut on the Malabar coast. Here he met with many Arabs, especially from Hadramaut, who recommended him to the King. This King (who was a Kafir) trusted him and advanced him to the captaincy of his bodyguard. He remained there ten years, in peace and happiness, but finally was overcome with homesickness. His longing to behold his native land was like that of a lover pining for his beloved; and it nearly cost him his life.
Finally he sneaked away without taking leave and made his way to Makalla in Hadramaut. Here he donned the rags of a dervish. Keeping his name and circumstances a secret, he set forth on foot for Kaukaban. He endured a thousand hardships of hunger, thirst, and fatigue; and braved a thousand dangers from lions, snakes, and ghouls.
Drawing near to his old home, he looked down upon it from the hills with brimming eyes, and said to himself, "They might recognize me, so I will wander about the outskirts and listen to what people are saying. May Allah grant that they do not remember what happened."
He listened carefully for seven nights and seven days, until it happened that, as he was sitting at the door of a hut, he heard the voice of a young girl saying, "Mother, tell me what day was I born on, for one of my companions wants to tell my fortune."
The mother answered, "My daughter, you were born on the very night when Abu Hasan farted."
No sooner had the listener heard these words than he rose up from the bench and fled, saying to himself, "Verily my fart has become a date! It will be remembered for ever and ever.
He continued on his way, returning finally to India, where he remained in self exile until he died. May the mercy of Allah be upon him!
#3
McGinty was a man of dignity. His entire family was noted for its dignity, and had been for hundreds of years in their native town.
One day McGinty was standing in the town square speaking with the bishop, the mayor and five silver-haired fellows from Parliament about the new town hall they wanted to build. Most of his friends and neighbors were standing around them, listening as he spoke, for McGinty was also a fine speaker.
And then, as McGinty stretched forth his hand to point to the site, suddenly, without warning, he cut the loudest, smelliest fart anyone had ever encountered. The cheese was so ripe, the bishop's eyes rolled up in his head. The mayor gagged. Several women and one member of Parliament swooned on the spot.
That very afternoon, McGinty packed a single bag and left town, left Ireland entirely. He joined the French Foreign Legion, changing his name to Nadir. He spent 16 years in North Africa, tromping the desert, seldom saying a word. From there, he went to the Yukon, where he lived for eight years in the wilderness, panning for gold. He spent six years in Central America, running guns to the rebels, then went to Katmandu, where he lived on top of a mountain for ten years. Finally he went to India, where he worked with the nuns for ten more years, feeding the hungry and caring for the sick.
Full fifty years went by before McGinty set foot in the land of his birth again. McGinty's plane landed in Dublin and he took his breath of fresh Eire. The old man, now in his nineties, hired a driver to take him home, so that he might see his boyhood home once more before he died.
The cabman stopped in the town square and McGinty got out and looked around. They had built the town hall, and the church now had a fine stone facade. There were a few different names on the signs over the shops, but the town looked much as it had when he left.
"Do y'know this town?" McGinty asked the cabman.
"Aye," said the man. "Been here several times."
"And would y'be knowin' when they put that facade on the church over there?"
"Ah, that's been many years now," the cabman said, thinking hard to recall. "It was before my time. In fact, it couldn'ta been more'n ten, fifteen years after McGinty cut that big fart in the town square!"
Posted by: Fred ||
04/14/2006 11:26 Comments ||
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#5
I once had a bowl of white raisins on my kitchen table. Every morning on my way out to work, I'd grab a handful and drop them into my mouth. My son would do the same before going to school. One day, the white raisins got small dark spots on them. That day, I could empty a room silently, secretly with a warm sulfer dioxide bomb. When I got home, I asked, and sure enough, my son emptied the study hall with a silent SDB. This is highly classified info, so don't try it at home.
An Egyptian prosecutor yesterday froze the assets of the businessman who owned the ferry which sank in the Red Sea in February with the loss of more than 1,000 lives, the state news agency MENA said. Socialist Prosecutor Gaber Reihan, whose post dates from the nationalization period of the 1960s, said he was freezing the assets of Mamdouh Ismail because a report on the ferry disaster showed he committed serious violations of safety regulations.
Ismail, owner of the ferry Salam 98 and a fleet of other Red Sea ferries, has already been stripped of his immunity as a member of the Shoura Council or upper house of Parliament. The report on the disaster said that the ferry had forged safety certificates, the life rafts and fire extinguishers were unfit for use and the ship did not have enough winches to lower the rafts into the sea in an emergency, MENA said. The vessel was originally licensed in Italy to carry 1,187 people but the owners obtained an Egyptian license to carry 2,890 people, in violation of international standards, it said. It was carrying about 1,400 people when it sank.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/14/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
Isn't it strange that _right after_ this accident happened, all we were hearing about were those darn infidel cartoons?
KUWAIT CITY - Kuwaiti police have arrested a member of the ruling Al Sabah family with a large drugs haul, including at least 10 kilogrammes (22 pounds) of cocaine, newspapers reported on Friday. Al Qabas newspaper quoted unnamed security sources as saying the prince, whose name was not revealed, also had 120 kilogrammes (264 pounds) of hashish.
Sounds like he was planning one hell of a party
His arrest came at the orders of Interior and Defence Minister, Sheikh Jaber Al Mubarak Al Sabah, who is a leading figure in the ruling family.
The Al-Rai Al Aam daily gave a different breakdown of the drugs seized, saying they consisted of 18 kilogrammes (40 pounds) of cocaine, five kilogrammes (11 pounds) of heroin and 30 kilograms (66 pounds) of hashish. The drugs were found at the royals house, the paper added.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/14/2006 09:30 ||
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A windsurfer who went for a quick sail off the south Wales coast had the wind put up him when a gust blew him way off course and across dangerous shipping lanes. Adam Cowles, 24, was blown 68 kilometres from Swansea across the busy Bristol Channel to south-west England, dodging cargo ships as he breezed by.
Stunned locals near Lynton, on the north Devon coast, rushed to the aid of the exhausted windsurfer after his three-hour, death-defying ordeal - by taking him straight down the pub.
"I had decided to venture just a little further than usual after setting off from close to County Hall," Cowles told the South Wales Evening Post newspaper.
"But I knew something was not quite right when I noticed it was just a speck in the far distance. I then went past a cargo ship. "I had a moment of inspiration. I just thought I would carry on and head towards Devon."
He emerged from the sea at Woody Bay asking baffled passers-by where he was.
"Even though I did not have any money, a couple took me off to a pub and bought me some beer. "There I was sitting in a pub, completely soaking and in my wetsuit but no-one batted an eyelid." Hardly in the mood for a return journey, he then had the tricky task of phoning his wife Sarah to come and collect him 450-kilometre round trip.
The sea temperature was just nine degrees centigrade and one slip could have proved fatal. "Turning round would have meant going into the wind and dodging the ships at slow speed - and I didn't like the look of them," The Sun newspaper quoted him as saying. "I was too tired to hang on any more and was afraid of getting into even more trouble. "I was very cold and if I fell off I might not have survived."
The local coastguard were not impressed. A spokesman said: "It was a completely foolish thing to do without proper planning. "If he had got into trouble we would have no idea whatsoever where to search."
#3
And, how the heck does that translate to a 400+ km round trip for his wife to pick him up, unless England has a lot fewer coastal roads than we do? I'm not sure...just truly asking.
Posted by: BA ||
04/14/2006 8:41 Comments ||
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#4
It's complicated, BA. You'd best leave the calculations to the professionals.
#10
#1 - well put "6", and pithily correct. Couple this bloke with the former Royal paratrooper walking around the world, and things don't look so bad. I wonder which Sura covers necessity, mothers, and invention?
Stunned locals near Lynton, on the north Devon coast, rushed to the aid of the exhausted windsurfer after his three-hour, death-defying ordeal - by taking him straight down the pub.
Ya' gotta love the English! :-D
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/14/2006 12:55 Comments ||
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#13
"Stunned locals near Lynton, on the north Devon coast, rushed to the aid of the exhausted windsurfer after his three-hour, death-defying ordeal - by taking him straight down the pub."
Now there's people who know proper first aid! Perfect treatment for the condition. Spot on!
THE Federal Government has indicated its tough new asylum policy is aimed squarely at appeasing Indonesia, despite the prime minister denying he is pandering to Jakarta.
Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone has admitted a key aim of the hardline decision to turn away boat people to offshore processing is to prevent Australia being used as a protest platform to create unrest in other countries.
Australia's decision to grant refugee status to 42 asylum seekers from the Indonesian province of Papua, a group which included pro-independence supporters, has sparked one of Canberra's biggest diplomatic crises with its northern neighbour.
Senator Vanstone's comments have put her at odds with Prime Minister John Howard, who insisted the policy change was "not done as a concession to Indonesia".
"We can make it a great disincentive for people to use Australia, seek to use the Australian mainland, as a protest point to stir up civil unrest in other countries and interfere in the domestic issues of other countries, and use us as a staging facility to do that," Senator Vanstone said on ABC television.
Jakarta also appeared certain that the policy was a reaction to its protests.
"We appreciate this step from Australia, which is in response to our reaction on 42 Papuans already granted temporary protection visas," Foreign Ministry spokesman Desra Percaya said.
Indonesia wanted more details, he said, including whether the policy could change the status of the Papuans granted visas.
There also appears to be confusion in Howard government ranks over whether or not, under the new policy, Australia constitutes a third country where those who successfully claim asylum would be resettled.
Under the proposed changes, anyone entering Australia illegally - whether they make it to the mainland or not - would be sent to one of three offshore immigration detention centres for processing.
Senator Vanstone has said the Government will be looking to resettle asylum seekers in countries other than Australia.
"Well, we'll be looking to place them in other countries," she told the ABC.
Asked if it would be the Government's first preference to resettle asylum seekers in a third country, or in Australia, she replied: "No, the press release says what it means, they'll be resettled to a third country, that's clearly the first preference."
However, the prime minister said Australia would be considered a third country.
"People who are found to be refugees will remain offshore until resettlement in a third country is arranged. And in that description Australia, of course, is a third country because the offshore processing will in most cases not occur in Australian territory," Mr Howard told reporters yesterday.
Labor has said the announcement will invite other nations to pressure Australia to change domestic policies.
Asylum seeker advocates have also lashed out at the policy, with the Refugee and Immigration legal centre saying it would turn Australia into a "dehumanised" zone.
The Papuans, who landed on Cape York in January, would have been caught out under the new policy.
While Australia had excised thousands of island from its migration zone in 2001 as part of the Pacific Solution, Senator Vanstone said the mainland would not be excised under the new policy.
Dozens of refugee activists are shaking the gates and fences of Sydney's Holsworthy Army Barracks in a bid to gain access to 160 asylum seekers moved to the facility from Villawood detention centre. About 80 activists gathered outside the barracks say they want to visit the detainees, who were temporarily relocated from Villawood this week due to asbestos fears. A moderate police presence is also at the site, including PolAir, the dog squad and officers on foot.
New South Wales Refugee Action Coalition spokesman Ian Rintoul said activists planned to ask for permission to visit the asylum seekers. Some of the protesters were also considering jumping the barracks' fences if they are not allowed in, he said. "We'll see how we go," Mr Rintoul said of attempts to enter the facility. "We're here to make the point that the fences should not be here." None of the detainees sent to Holsworthy have been allowed visits since being transferred from Villawood this week, Mr Rintoul said.
Dozens of refugee activists are shaking the gates and fences of Sydney's Holsworthy Army Barracks in a bid to gain access to 160 asylum seekers moved to the facility from Villawood detention centre. Liverpool Local Area Commander Mick Plotecki later told the activists they would not be allowed through the gates. "My understanding is that while there is a protest on, visiting has ceased," Superintendent Plotecki told the demonstrators.
The group gathered without shade in 30C heat, frequently shaking the flimsy front gates while chanting slogans and making speeches. About 20 operational support group officers were standing in a line on the other side of the gate.
The hour-long protest at the Holsworthy gate broke up about 2pm as the group made plans to continue the protest at the empty Villawood detention centre.
A small section of the group was nominated to formally seek permisison to enter the Holsworthy facility to visit the detainees. But an Immigration Department spokesman said visits at Holsworthy had been cancelled for the rest of today.
He said there had been visits earlier today and yesterday but that they were halted at 11am on police advice concerning the protest.
#2
Its a bit more complex - some of these are issues from the families due to the fathers being put in one detention center, the mothers and children in antoher - hundreds of miles apart. And these are Chinese, Pacific Islanders, even an Iranian who are asking to be allowed to stay. Complicating things further, some of the children are legally Australian citizens. The seperations and resuling anger are simply the results of the typical big-statist government bureaucracy - the kindthat tend to blindly follow rules - but at random, and without regard to consequence or circumstance.
Its a big mess, and its due to lax enforcement of immigration laws.
Of course, the protester organizers could give a rats ass - they are there mainly to make political hay against the Howard government, and to try to provoke a reaction so there's even more political crap they can fling against Howard.
Florida Italian officials are checking more than 80,000 contested ballots not included in the election results that gave George Bush Romano Prodi a narrow victory. Vice President Al Gore Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has refused to admit defeat until the last checks have been made. But his allies are starting to distance themselves from his claims of fraud.
Mr Gore Berlusconi, heading a centre-left right coalition, has voiced concern over more than a million spoilt and blank ballots. He said there had been "much fraud" in the poll, held on Sunday and Monday.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/14/2006 08:55 ||
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#1
But his allies are starting to distance themselves from his claims of fraud.
Maybe. But this is the BBC and I notice they don't name any "allies" who are distancing them from him. The MSM couldn't get enough of making sure every vote counted in Floriduh, but since their guy won, they just announce the election is over, nothing to see and move on.
It may be that Berlusconi has lost - but the US and Britain have not congratulated Prodi yet - and I think that says volumes.
#3
heh, I didn't know that. It's tough to prove fraud - and Prodi's probably gonna get to sit in the big chair - but I'm not counting Berlusconi out just yet.
STOCKHOLM - Sweden has told the United Nations that its current legal framework does not enable it to imprison Liberias ex-president Charles Taylor if he is convicted of crimes against humanity, the foreign ministry said on Thursday.
The UN had asked Sweden and several other countries whether they would consider the possibility of imprisoning Taylor if he is convicted. We cant make any commitments at this point... We dont have the appropriate legal framework, Swedish foreign ministry spokesman John Zanchi told AFP.
"And he's ucky."
However, Swedens parliament is due to consider new legislation this summer that would enable the Scandinavian country to take in Taylor, Zanchi said. Under current Swedish law, the country can only assist the International Criminal Court (ICC), and the UN non-permanent courts the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR).
The former Liberian leader and ex-warlord has been indicted by the UN-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone on charges stemming from atrocities committed during Sierra Leones brutal civil war. If the Swedish law is changed, Sweden may at that point reconsider a new request from the UN, Zanchi said.
They'll get around to it, you betcha.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/14/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
So he gets to stay in a Swedish prison?
Send Taylor to the filthiest prison in Africa. Let him share a cell with ten other men, sleeping on a concrete floor, all fighting to use the single bucket in the corner that is the toilet.
Maybe then he will think about what he has done, all the children he kidnapped for his army, as soldiers and sex slaves, all those whose hands were cut off, who were forced to bash in the heads of their own parents.
Posted by: john ||
04/14/2006 9:43 Comments ||
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#2
For some reason, unlike "Turkish prison", "Swedish prison" dosen't exactly send chills down my spine...
#7
However, Swedens parliament is due to consider new legislation this summer that would enable the Scandinavian country to take in Taylor
sounds like he's not there...yet. He needs to fall down the stairs. Or use Benin Savan's elevator
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/14/2006 17:12 Comments ||
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#8
Yes John, you're right, unfortunately. Article 19 Article 8 seems a bit odd...
I can't blame the Swedes for not wanting him: I'm trying to imagine somebody offering us a maximum security prisoner to hang onto for life.
Posted by: James ||
04/14/2006 19:42 Comments ||
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Romano Prodi has said he is confident of forming a new Italian government despite allegations from his rival, Silvio Berlusconi, of widespread fraud in the recent general election. "There is nothing to worry about, we are serene," the centre-left leader, who won a razor-thin majority in the elections, was quoted as saying.
Meanwhile Berlusconi, the incument prime minister, who initially demanded a recount of 43,000 contested votes after Prodi won, has called for a wider check of returns from all 60,000 polling stations, as well as more than one million votes deemed invalid. "The result must, and will, change because there has been endless vote rigging in different places, all over Italy," Berlusconi said late on Wednesday after visiting Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, the Italian president. "Did you think you'd got rid of me?" he asked reporters.
Responding to the call, Prodi accused the prime minister of delaying tactics and told supporters at a victory rally in his home city of Bologna that the media magnate politician should "go home".
Posted by: Fred ||
04/14/2006 00:00 ||
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has said he is confident of forming a new Italian government despite allegations from his rival, Silvio Berlusconi, of widespread fraud in the recent general election.
so shouldn't the headline read, Prodi can't form new goverment until fruad investigation complete?
Ukraine's estranged "orange revolution" allies have signed an agreement in principle to reunite in a coalition following parliamentary elections. The key question of who will become the next prime minister is still undecided. "We declare our intention to create a coalition of democratic forces," read the framework agreement penned by President Viktor Yushchenko's Our Ukraine, the bloc of Yulia Tymoshenko and the Socialists.
The document lays out steps the trio will take on their way to formally creating a majority coalition in parliament after the newly-elected chamber convenes for its first session. The three blocs together will control 243 seats in the 450-member Upper Rada legislature following a March 26 parliamentary ballot. But it remains unclear whether Ms Tymoshenko will return to head the government. "Let's not name any names... everything in due course," Roman Bezsmertnyi, a top Our Ukraine official, said.
The fiery "orange revolution" heroine split with the Ukrainian President after he fired her as premier last September. She has demanded a return to the premiership in any union after she drubbed Mr Yushchenko's party in the March ballot. Analysts say Mr Yushchenko opposes Ms Tymoshenko's premiership because he does not trust the ambitious and charismatic politician.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/14/2006 00:00 ||
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The indvidual in this story first gained national notariaty on ABCs Good Morning America. The narrative, at that time, was about the plight of a young mexican boy struggling to survive and the outpouring of support from the local community.
BOSTON (AP) - A young illegal immigrant who became a cause celebre in Minnesota after secretly living in a high school for weeks has been arrested here on home invasion charges, months after he was supposed to have left the country.
Francisco Javier Serrano, 22, had waved goodbye to supporters and journalists who saw him off at the Minneapolis airport in January, but he apparently never boarded his plane for his home country of Mexico.
Two weeks ago, police arrested him after finding him with a knife in an apartment in Boston's North End, struggling with the tenant, who was unharmed, The Boston Globe reported Thursday. He remained in Suffolk County Jail facing home invasion charges and eventual deportation.
Serrano, who overstayed a 2002 tourist visa to live with his father and attend high school in suburban Minneapolis, was embraced by Minnesotans after he was discovered sleeping in the school's auditorium in January 2005 and told how he had spent weeks hiding there, foraging for cafeteria food and showering in the locker room. Apparently the AP couldnt find any faculty, parent or student to quote that was concerned about lax security at a school that would allow an adult to freely roam their school.
Students handed out "Free Francisco'' T-shirts, and a developer gave him a place to live and hired an immigration lawyer for him. Ahhh Doesnt that just tug at the ole heart strings?
Last fall, a federal judge ruled that Serrano must leave the country but gave him until Jan. 5 to do so. That day Serrano went to Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, but his plane ticket was never used. Forced back into the shadows.
Serrano's mother said he had fallen in love with the U.S. and wanted to go to college and get a job that would let him send money to his family in Mexico. When his father moved from Minnesota to Connecticut, Serrano followed, but the two had a falling out, Guadalupe Flores told the Globe from her home in Mexico City.
"He decided to live his life on his own,'' she said, crying. "But he did it very badly.''
A pretrial hearing was set for April 28. The charges against Serrano probably will be reduced to breaking and entering because he has no history of violence and did not hurt the tenant, said David Procopio, spokesman for the Suffolk district attorney.
Oddly enough, in the first AP report, the fact that an adult illegal alien had broken into the place where parents send their children for 8 hours a day, five days a week, didnt have as much impact as the human intrest angle. Apparently this time the AP didnt find it necessary to add Serrano was quoted as saying "I'm not here to steal, I'm here to kill."
#2
and I love this line: The charges against Serrano probably will be reduced to breaking and entering because he has no history of violence and did not hurt the tenant
So, ya see, it wasn't like a home invasion or anything...the police just happened to walk in while he was struggling with some guy whose appartment he illegally entered. Can you blame the Francisco for his confusion? It's clearly not a problem to illegally enter our country and feel entitled to all our taxpaid stuff - so how was he to know it would be a problem if illegally enter some guy's homes and demanded that stuff too?
And sure, they "found him with a knife" but hey it wasn't like the reporter said he was "using the knife" in a threatening way or anything. It was probably just in his pocket. And afterall, he didn't hurt the guy, he just struggled with him until the police got there.
#3
Maybe he (Francisco) was holding the tenant until the police got there so they can arrest him (the tenant) for the high crime of defending his own life.
#5
GC8020, you say that in jest but when I was living and working in Cambridge back in 91-92 there was an incident where a former husband drove his truck around back of his formerwife's hose, climbed on to the deck, smashed the glass sliding door and was holding a gun to her neck. The woman's current husband heard all the ruckus, grabbed his pistol (legaly owned) and shot the ex. The current husband was then arrested and held for trial. He was evenyually acuitted but had to go through the whole legal process.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
04/14/2006 19:24 Comments ||
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Cyprus President Tassos Papadopoulos yesterday asserted his country's support for India's permanent membership of expanded United Nations' Security Council (UNSC). "We believe India deserves a seat in the UNSC," Papadopoulos said. "We recognize India's contribution in international affairs," he said while delivering a lecture on "Cyprus as a bridge between India and the European Union."
Posted by: Fred ||
04/14/2006 00:00 ||
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Iranian police are poised to launch a fresh pre-summer crackdown on women disrespecting the Islamic dress code, a press report said yesterday. Unfortunately we see some immodestly and inappropriately dressed women who violate the rights of others, the hardline Jomhuri Islami newspaper quoted Tehrans police chief as saying. There will be firm confrontation with these people who disrespect religious sanctities and social values, Commander Morteza Talai said, adding the clampdown will start on April 21.
Every post-pubescent female in Iran, regardless of her nationality or religion, is obliged to observe the Islamic dress code. Police crackdowns on skimpy dressers are common every summer, when many women defy the rules by wearing three-quarter length trousers, sandals showing off painted toenails, lighter coats revealing their curves and headscarves that barely cover their hair.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/14/2006 00:00 ||
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#3
Good Allen! They launch an assault on women wearing 3/4 length pants and showing painted toenails? Man, these guys need to "loosen up" a bit. Maybe after Indonesia, Hugh Hefner can start publishing in Iran.
Posted by: BA ||
04/14/2006 8:38 Comments ||
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#4
Unfortunately we see some immodestly and inappropriately dressed women who violate the rights of others,"
There is no "right" that protects you from being offended. There is no "right" to force your beliefs on other people.
The muslims have the wrong end of the stick on what "rights" are. But they sure do use the word every chance they can get to support their demand the world enforce intolerance. The "right" to be intolerant. Good gravy.
#5
That's it. I'm going to Iran and am gonna run around the public square in just a man thong. I'll show these morons what discrespecting social values really is!
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Cheeta the chimp, star of a dozen ''Tarzan'' movies in the 1930s and 1940s, celebrated his 74th birthday with sugar-free cake. Although healthy and active, Cheeta is diabetic. ''He had a good time. The party went real good,'' said keeper Dan Westfall, operator of the primate sanctuary Creative Habitats and Enrichment for Endangered and Threatened Apes or CHEETA.
It is a "factual reality" that beans make you break wind, says South Africa's advertising watchdog. 
An Egyptian prosecutor yesterday froze the assets of the businessman who owned the ferry which sank in the Red Sea in February with the loss of more than 1,000 lives, the state news agency MENA said. Socialist Prosecutor Gaber Reihan, whose post dates from the nationalization period of the 1960s, said he was freezing the assets of Mamdouh Ismail because a report on the ferry disaster showed he committed serious violations of safety regulations. 
KUWAIT CITY - Kuwaiti police have arrested a member of the ruling Al Sabah family with a large drugs haul, including at least 10 kilogrammes (22 pounds) of cocaine, newspapers reported on Friday. Al Qabas newspaper quoted unnamed security sources as saying the prince, whose name was not revealed, also had 120 kilogrammes (264 pounds) of hashish. 
STOCKHOLM - Sweden has told the United Nations that its current legal framework does not enable it to imprison Liberias ex-president Charles Taylor if he is convicted of crimes against humanity, the foreign ministry said on Thursday.
Ukraine's estranged "orange revolution" allies have signed an agreement in principle to reunite in a coalition following parliamentary elections. The key question of who will become the next prime minister is still undecided. "We declare our intention to create a coalition of democratic forces," read the framework agreement penned by President Viktor Yushchenko's Our Ukraine, the bloc of Yulia Tymoshenko and the Socialists. 
Iranian police are poised to launch a fresh pre-summer crackdown on women disrespecting the Islamic dress code, a press report said yesterday. Unfortunately we see some immodestly and inappropriately dressed women who violate the rights of others, the hardline Jomhuri Islami newspaper quoted Tehrans police chief as saying. There will be firm confrontation with these people who disrespect religious sanctities and social values, Commander Morteza Talai said, adding the clampdown will start on April 21.
