Ummmmmmmm...I think ya doing it wrong.
Dec. 5 (Bloomberg) -- A Danish warship, the Absalon, rescued seven alleged Somali pirates before sinking their vessel in the Gulf of Aden. The Absalon responded yesterday to a distress signal and found the men in the boat, which also contained weapons used in pirate attacks, the Royal Danish Navy said today on its Web site."Under international law, ships are obligated to help people who are distressed at sea," the navy said. "Because the people on board couldn't be directly connected with a criminal act, they were treated only as distressed." Distressed...and well armed.
"Because of the weather in the area, it wasn't possible to tow the distressed vessel," the navy said. "For the safety of sea transport in the area, the vessel was therefore destroyed." Coming up next: Somali pirates sue Danish navy for sinking their boat.
I'd be happy to apply that rule. Yes, the sun is out, the waves are only a foot high and the air temperature is 20C, but no matter, Mahmoud, we can't take your boat in tow [KABOOM!] ...
The alleged pirate vessel had been adrift in Yemen waters, and the crew has now been turned over to Yemeni authorities, the navy said.
They'll be wishing shortly that they were in a Turkish prison ...
The Absalon's crew confiscated the weapons found on board. The weapons included anti-tank rockets and machine guns, according to broadcaster TV2. The pirates had been adrift at sea for seven days, the last three days without food or water, TV2 said. Fishing trip gone bad, I'll bet...
#1
Good to see western dhimmis paying for the Somali pirates' benevolence society. Probably had hot cocoa and a koran waiting for them.
Posted by: ed ||
12/05/2008 11:58 Comments ||
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#2
Fishing trip gone bad, I'll bet...
Quoting James Bond after wrecking Q's "Fishing boat "What on earth is he fishing for"?
An aide replied, "I'll give you a hint, he lives in Inverness".
Bond (Grinning and Chuckling) "Nessie?"
Posted by: Rednek Jim ||
12/05/2008 12:43 Comments ||
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#3
."Under international law, ships are obligated to help people who are distressed at sea,"
Obviously you never heard deferring action till you get an OK on proceeding by kicking it up the chain and getting clarification from the JAG. That could take hours, days, in some instances. We dealing with the EU here, something like that might even take months.
Zimbabwe has declared a cholera outbreak that has killed more than 560 people a national emergency and appealed for international help to deal with the crisis.
Neighbouring South Africa said it was extremely concerned about deteriorating conditions in Zimbabwe. Economic meltdown in Zimbabwe, isolated by Western countries under President Robert Mugabe's rule, has left the health system ill prepared to cope with an epidemic that it would once have been able to prevent or treat easily. "Our central hospitals are literally not functioning. Our staff is demotivated and we need your support to ensure that they start coming to work and our health system is revived," Health Minister David Parirenyatwa was quoted as saying in an appeal to donors.
Aid: Parirenyatwa said Zimbabwe needed medicine, medical equipment and food for patients and for child supplementary feeding programmes, according to the state-run Herald newspaper. "The emergency appeal will help us reduce the morbidity and mortality associated with the current socio-economic environment by December 2009," Parirenyatwa said. The United Nations humanitarian office estimates the death toll from a deadly cholera outbreak at 565 people, with the capital Harare the worst affected. Zimbabwe's health sector is collapsing with not enough money to pay for essential resources and doctors and nurses often striking over pay. The water system is in disarray, forcing residents to drink from contaminated wells and streams. Any hopes of rescuing Zimbabwe from economic collapse are on hold because of deadlock between Mugabe and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai over how to implement a power-sharing pact. Analysts said worsening conditions may force Mugabe's government to mend relations with donors and other governments.
"I think if this continues they are in a very, very difficult position and I think in that position they may have to start thinking about taking any friends they can get, or any help they can get," University of Johannesburg political analyst Steven Friedman said. Zimbabwe's neighbours, faced with cholera patients fleeing across their borders, moved to help the country, while the World Health Organisation said it was preparing to send a team to help deal with the cholera outbreak. South Africa said it would look to work with other regional countries to help. Western neighbour Botswana, one of Mugabe's strongest critics, has said it would donate 3 million pula ($371,000) for health and food relief in Zimbabwe. Critics blame the economic crisis on Mugabe's policies, such as seizing white-owned farms to give to black Zimbabweans. The 84-year-old leader, in power since independence in 1980, blames sanctions from Western countries.
Deputy minister for water and infrastructural development Walter Mzembi said the ministry had only enough water treatment chemicals to last about 12 weeks, and called for donor support, the Herald reported. "I am appealing for at least 40 million rand ($3.9 million) to purchase chemicals for the next two months and the money is needed between now and next Monday," the paper quoted him as saying. The Zimbabwe government also appealed for $450 million in aid to deal with food shortages.
Meanwhile, Zimbabwe police arrested 10 soldiers over violent clashes with Harare citizens. Some "rogue" soldiers, angry after not being able to withdraw money from cash-strapped banks, damaged property earlier this week.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/05/2008 00:00 ||
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Walter Mzembi said the ministry had only enough water treatment chemicals to last about 12 weeks, and called for donor support, the Herald reported. "I am appealing for at least 40 million rand ($3.9 million) to purchase chemicals for the next two months and the money is needed between now and next Monday,"
Sure thing Walt baby, the check is in the mail.
Who in their right mind would hand this dork a check for $3.9M? He'd be gone so fast you'd smell something burning. And with a four day deadline no
less. You couldn't make stuff like this up.
#2
Walter Mzembi said the ministry had only enough water treatment chemicals to last about 12 weeks, and called for donor support, the Herald reported. "I am appealing for at least 40 million rand ($3.9 million) to purchase chemicals for the next two months and the money is needed between now and next Monday,"
Sorry, I already gave all my money to that Nigerian dude. Use e-mail next time.
The sun was blazing high in the sky just before 1 p.m., five hours after Timothy opened the sparsely stocked shop he manages in a dusty slum here in Zimbabwe's capital. It was time to change the prices.
He stepped outside and tapped numbers into his orange Nokia cellphone. After many tries, he reached a black-market money dealer, who relayed an up-to-the-hour exchange rate: 1.1 million Zimbabwe dollars to one U.S. dollar, up 10 percent since morning. Within minutes, the handwritten price tags on the store's bags of cornmeal, the staple food here, had jumped from 17.6 million to 19.2 million Zimbabwe dollars.
"I'll call again in a few hours," said Timothy, 26, who did not want his last name published for fear of angering authorities.
In Zimbabwe, where historic hyperinflation is causing the value of local currency to evaporate in people's wallets, it is increasingly the greenback that rules. Many vendors and businesses now demand American currency. Others peg their prices to the U.S. dollar and charge less if payment is made with it or the South African rand, widening a buying-power divide between those with access to foreign currency and those without -- mostly people who have no relatives abroad and people in rural areas.
The black market for stable currencies has boomed in recent years as Zimbabwe's once-thriving economy has tanked. In September, the government acknowledged as much by announcing that it would license about 1,200 stores and gas stations to sell in foreign currency and then buy some of their earnings at a low exchange rate.
But as workers, suppliers and unlicensed stores shun Zimbabwe's currency, the U.S. dollar has become the de facto legal currency at nearly every level of society. Eric Bloch, a Zimbabwean economist, estimates that the market is about 90 percent dollarized.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/05/2008 00:00 ||
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Honey, I'm just going out for a cup of coffee and the morning paper.
Edited for brevity. HT: American Thinker
The Saudis have recently asked permission to build a mosque in Moscow, a city where there are only four mosques and 2 million Muslims. The Russians, however, are saying they want, in return, an Orthodox church in Saudi Arabia.
As we all know, the Saudis have a habit of constructing mosques in dozens of world capitals while forbidding houses of worship for any religion whatsoever outside its Wahabist brand of Islam.
Of course we all know the Saudis aren't about ready to let Bibles or other religious literature, let alone a church, anywhere near their homeland, but all the same, it's amusing to see the Russians give the Saudis a taste of their own medicine.
Posted by: Dar ||
12/05/2008 00:00 ||
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It was basic common sense, of which Americanos apparently have none of. In fact, go further, if no structures are allowed in the desert within one year, all structures (armories) in Russsia come tumbling down.
For example, India only sends a Muslim male as ambassador.
To her credit, Condi Rice refuses to wear a headscarf when she visits.
But Putin takes the prize for this...
Posted by: john frum ||
12/05/2008 13:57 Comments ||
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I take it that russia is the only country that dare stand up to them because they are one of the few on this planet that do not import saudi oil?
We should joint this elite group.
AN Australian traveller insists pirates did attack a cruise ship carrying 400 Aussies off Somalia, and that the cruise company is trying to cover up the incident. The Melbourne woman, who remains on board the MV Athena and does not want to be named, said passengers who informed relatives back home of the attack had been given "a real dressing down'' by the ship's crew.
Classic International Cruises Australia, which owns the Athena, has said there was no substance to reports that dozens of pirate boats attacked the ship and tried to board it on Tuesday. A spokeswoman for the company said the boats turned out to be fishing vessels whose crew were "very friendly''.
But the Melbourne woman who contacted wire service AAP said there was no doubt the ship was the target of a co-ordinated pirate attack as it passed through the Gulf of Aden, separating Yemen and Somalia. The Athena's Captain Antonio Morais had even used the public address system to tell passengers "that two attacks by pirates had taken place,'' she said.
She said the crew had ordered passengers to stay indoors after small motorboats surrounded the vessel.
Observers using binoculars on the bridge reportedly counted between 30 and 40 small boats to the port side and 12 to starboard at the height of the incident, she said. "Less than an hour later the master of the vessel, Captain Antonio Morais of Portugal, confirmed to listeners that two attacks by pirates had taken place.''
Crew members used blasts from high-powered water cannon to drive back the pirates who clearly wanted to board the Athena, the woman said.
She said the official line now being put around the ship was that "as no shots were fired by the assailants it was merely a reconnaissance mission by those in the motorboats rather than an attack as such''.
"This insistence is merely splitting hairs,'' the Melbourne traveller said. She said passengers who had alerted family members about the attack had been scolded for spreading misinformation that had caused widespread alarm.
And yesterday, two days after the attack, Captain Morais again addressed passengers to stress that "no attack'' had occurred.
While Athena officers had denied their ship had been the target of an attack, they had admitted pirates fired shots at three other vessels following the Athena on the same day, she said.
The Athena is making its maiden voyage to Australia and is due to dock in Fremantle in Western Australia on December 20.
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/05/2008 8:29 Comments ||
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So friendly it took water cannons to drive them off.
Rriiighht.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
12/05/2008 9:37 Comments ||
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#5
Hate to say it but it might have been best if the Athena had been taken by the pirates.
Why?
Because the SAS would get it back, and wouldn't that be a lesson to all ...
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/05/2008 9:46 Comments ||
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>"...said passengers who informed relatives back home of the attack had been given "a real dressing down'' by the ship's crew."
Yeah that'll really do a lot for customers to return to your scurvvy vessel. Ever hear of word of mouth advertising dickweed? Who do you think pays your salary dipshit?
this ranks right up there with Israel opening the gates to allow fuel into Paleo-land and then wondering why they got shot at, again.....
(AKI) - The speedy deployment of the European Union's police and judicial mission throughout Kosovo is an urgent priority, NATO foreign ministers said on Wednesday. "Allies welcomed the fact that the security situation remains stable and acknowledged that NATO and KFOR, bearing in mind its operational mandate, would continue to support the development of a stable, democratic, multi-ethnic and peaceful country," said a NATO statement.
The European Union mission in Kosovo is due to be deployed on 9 December, EU officials announced. Nearly 2,000 EU police, justice and customs officials, will take over UN duties there, although the current UN mission (UNMIK) will retain a political role.
The NATO ministers urged Kosovo and Serb authorities to fully cooperate with "all relevant actors" during the transition period.
According to Serbian press agency Beta, EULEX's communication director Victor Reuter has stated the mission will take over duties for the whole territory of Kosovo, including Serb-controlled areas in the north.
EULEX is expected to closely cooperate with the UN mission for safety reasons and to avoid a security vacuum. EULEX will consist of 1,900 international police, judges, prosecutors, customs and prison officers and 1,100 local employees by earlier next year when the mission is to be fully operative.
Vice-president of Serbia Bozidar Djelic said on Wednesday that the EULEX deployment would be a "positive development".
Kosovo has been recognised by 52 countries including the US and many EU countries since it declared independence from Serbia in February.
Djelic said he was confident the EULEX mission would no longer be a source of tension between Belgrade and the European Union.
Under UN Resolution 1244, the NATO-led KFOR force - currently numbering around 16,000 troops- is due to remain in Kosovo to ensure security.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/05/2008 00:00 ||
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And I urge the prompt removal of all NATO troops from that bastion of religious oppression. The Kosovo tyranny has disallowed renovations to Christian buildings and churches ever since the Clintons gave them an Islamofascist base in Europe.
Yah, I know what Michael Totten writes. He is a fraud.
Empire Building, the Clinton way...
WASHINGTON Preparing for her new role as secretary of state, Hillary Rodham Clinton is moving to surround herself with a cast of die-hard loyalists and veterans of her husband's administration to help her cope with world crises and backstage Washington power plays.
For her team of foreign policy experts, the nation's third female secretary of state is expected to draw heavily from the staff of the first, Madeleine Albright, who was an early supporter of Clinton's unsuccessful bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. Oh, goody...
And to deal with internal Obama administration affairs, State Department bureaucratic politics and media pressures, the former first lady appears set to tap current Senate aides and former White House "Hillaryland" stalwarts, whose reputation for insularity and staunch protectiveness has already set off anxiety among career foreign service officers.
State Department officials say they have been told to expect visits as early as next week from Clinton advisers who are working with President-elect Barack Obama's incoming transition team. Members of the new administration's team have been at State since mid-November, getting briefings and visiting officials there. Neither the transition team nor Clinton's office would comment. Those officials and people familiar with the transition say most, if not all of Clinton's growing team of advisers will be tapped for senior State Department positions.
James Steinberg, President Bill Clinton's former deputy national security adviser, who was once thought a prospect to become Obama's national security adviser, is now "a lock" to become deputy secretary of state under Clinton, according to people close to the transition who spoke on condition of anonymity because no announcements have yet been made.
On the policy side, there is strong speculation that Clinton's Senate foreign policy adviser, Andrew Shapiro, will play a leading role as will Lee Feinstein, who was her national security adviser during the campaign. Feinstein is a member of the State Department transition team and served as deputy policy planning director under Albright.
For Clinton's personal staff, names already floated include longtime confidante and 2008 Clinton presidential campaign manager Maggie Williams, attorney Cheryl Mills, personal assistant Huma Abedin, current senior adviser and spokesman Philippe Reines and Clinton's chief of staff when she was first lady, Melanne Verveer. Where's the good looking Palestinian chick? Or will she be "behind the scene"?
All are known to be fiercely loyal. The prospect of their imminent arrival in Foggy Bottom has been a hot topic of nervous corridor conversation among many in the professional diplomatic corps who fear they will be frozen out of positions of influence.
Doug Hattaway, a former spokesman for Al Gore's 2000 presidential bid who also worked for Clinton during the primaries, has been mentioned as a favorite to become the next State Department spokesman.
Albright's high-profile former spokesman, James Rubin, along with top Albright assistant Suzy George, have already been seen at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations. They are working with a group that will smooth the way for the next U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Albright protege Susan Rice, whose defection to the Obama camp during the 2008 campaign caused a stir among Clinton loyalists. Rubin, based in New York, is advising the transition team.
A look at the Obama camp's agency review team for the State Department and its national security policy working group provides hints as to other potential appointments. Among those who served in the Albright State Department are former counselor Wendy Sherman, counterterrorism coordinator Michael Sheehan, law enforcement chief Rand Beers, arms control expert Robert Einhorn, former ambassador to Indonesia Robert Gelbard and Mideast hands Daniel Kurtzer, Dennis Ross and Toni Verstandig. All are potential candidates for top slots.
One notable name on the list is Michael Guest, one of only two openly gay ambassadors ever to represent the United States overseas. Guest resigned from the foreign service in mid-career last December to protest the State Department's treatment of same-sex partners of diplomats. Can you say "Ambassador to Pakistan"? Heh heh heh...
#1
The Hildabeast is infiltrating the Obama presidency. The Big O is like the king on a chessboard with few moves available to him, while events start their acceleration against him. His cabinet and other high posts are being packed with Clintonistas. He owes everything to his backers, and I mean his big money backers, not the hope and change rubes still waiting for hope and change. Hillary will become the power behind the throne for this puppet. Good Machiavellian tactics, got to hand that to her.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
12/05/2008 15:48 Comments ||
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She wasn't able to stab him in the back earlier as she needed his $10 mil (which I don't know if she ever received). This way is cleaner. No visible wounds, only the cancer.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
12/05/2008 16:34 Comments ||
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#4
Quick somebody, start taking notes for the book.... William J. and Hillary Clinton, the Shawdow Presidents.
#5
Rounding up the usual suspects. Yawn. The last Sec. of State who actually had power and accomplished things was Kissinger (not that he accomplished the right things, though). Other than that you'd probably have to go back to George Marshall. Recent SoS's have been pretty much window dressing. Rice has been very disappointing - clueless and ineffective.
WASHINGTON The Defense Department said Friday it shot down a missile in a simulated attack designed to test a proposed shield against strikes by long-range ballistic missiles from nations such as North Korea.
The Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency used an interceptor missile launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California to knock down a missile meant to simulate the speed and trajectory of a North Korean attack. It struck the target missile around 3:30 p.m., shortly after the target was launched from a military base in Alaska, according to Cheryl Witte, a Pentagon spokeswoman.
The military has conducted a series of tests in the past several years of the different components of the defensive shield, which is slated to include Patriot air defense batteries, anti-ballistic missiles launched from Navy ships and lasers mounted in planes designed to shoot down incoming missiles.
Roughly $10 billion is spent per year on the program, which is run by defense contractor Boeing Co. but includes work by most of the nation's largest weapons makers. It is spread across three branches of the military and is composed of missiles, radar and satellites designed to intercept missiles during different stages of flight.
The military argues the network is needed to protect the United States and its allies against growing threats from nations such as Iran and North Korea, both of which have tested long-range missiles. But President-elect Barack Obama expressed skepticism about the capabilities of the system during his campaign, leading to speculation he may reduce the program's scope. Russia has strongly objected to plans to install missile interceptors in Eastern Europe. Send him the video.
Friday's test covered ground-based missile interceptors located at military bases located in California and Alaska meant to shoot down incoming missiles mid-flight. A ground-based missile successfully shot down a target during a similar test in 2007, but the Pentagon was forced to scale back plans for a test this summer because of a technical glitch.
Gasoline? It's 36 cents a gallon. Laundry detergent? Fifty cents for a standard-size box. Milk? About 20 cents a quart. These prices are so low because Iran's government spends half its national budget to subsidize many of life's necessities. Not for long.
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has launched a sweeping economic restructuring plan that would end many of these subsidies within a couple of months. To blunt the blow of gasoline prices quadrupling and similar increases for other goods, he also proposes to give as much as $70 a month to poor Iranians.
Ahmadinejad, a populist leader with a working-class background who came to power three years ago, is staking his political future on his ambitious plan, which threatens to alienate Iranians who have benefited from the subsidies. Known abroad for incendiary rhetoric and his defense of Iran's nuclear program, Ahmadinejad's domestic political standing relies more on his largely unfulfilled promises to use Iran's oil wealth to improve the lives of poor people.
Some aspects of the plan, such as a sales tax, have provoked unrest, forcing Ahmadinejad to slow its implementation. The president had said he would present a bill on subsidies to parliament on Wednesday, but the introduction of the legislation was postponed without explanation.
Many members of Iran's urban middle class fear that the plan will ruin them. "If the subsidies are stopped, my family will be pushed into poverty. What the president plans to pay us in return will be far too little," said Payman Vatandoust, a technical manager at a battery factory in Tehran who like many highly educated Iranians did not support Ahmadinejad in 2005.
Vatandoust's worries are shared by several Iranian leaders, many of them adversaries of Ahmadinejad who accuse the president of proposing the cash handouts to boost his popularity in advance of presidential elections set for June.
Ahmadinejad says his "economic evolution" plan will narrow the gap between rich and poor and eventually will help bring down inflation, which has risen to an annual rate of 24 percent, according to Iran's Central Bank.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/05/2008 00:00 ||
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#1
Gasoline? It's 36 cents a gallon. Gas line, Iranian style.
#3
Gasoline? It's 36 cents a gallon. Gas line, Iranian style.
Iran has problems domestically producing its own gasoline because refineries can't afford to produce it. They don't even break even on it. Hence the supply issues.
The current rumor is that the Chinese are so furious about US banks selling them bad securities while watching the US government bail themout, they will be devaluing their currency by the end of the year.
Right now all this means is that the Federal Reserve's plan to reflate the economy just took a coupla torpedoes amidships
Now for TFA:
SHANGHAI (AFP) A sudden drop in the value of the Chinese currency may signal a policy shift to prop up exports during the financial crisis, experts said Tuesday.
The yuan fell by its maximum daily trading limit for a second consecutive day Tuesday.
The fall in its value comes just before the United States and China hold high level economic talks in Beijing at the end of the week.
The yuan's value has been a sensitive issue in the past between China and the United States, which has accused Beijing of deliberately keeping its currency low to protect the competitiveness of Chinese export prices.
"It is the best timing for the yuan to start depreciating," Lu Zhengwei, a Shanghai-based economist with Industrial Bank, told AFP.
"The slowdown in China's economy is clearly intensifying, the export sector is suffering the coldest winter in the past five years."
#1
The current rumor is that the Chinese are so furious about US banks selling them bad securities while watching the US government bail themout, they will be devaluing their currency by the end of the year.
I think it's worry about the state of the Chinese economy more than fury at the US. They're in deep doo-doo and sinking.
#2
This is a tyoical emerging market tactic: protect exports through currency manipulation. They pursue it in good times and bad.
The good news is that to make their policy effective the Chinese cannot sell dollars, which means they are stuck with their current paper and need to keep buying more with their export earnings.
#4
HOld on a sec, I thought they were supposed to be angry at us if we didn't do the bailout? Now they're angry at us that we did?
I think Hu Jintao is worried about keeping his position at the top of the greasy pole. And the guys around him are eyeing his perks and prestige hungrily, while casting worried glances at the Chinese populace, which may (or may not) become less worshipful of the Communist Party if unemployment skyrockets, and the standard of living drops.
Pressured by the economic turmoil and the mounting loss of traditional phone customers, AT&T Inc. is cutting 12,000 jobs, about 4 percent of its work force. The Dallas-based telecommunications company, the nation's largest, said the job cuts will begin this month and run throughout 2009. The company also plans to lower its capital spending next year, and one analyst estimates that reduction could be as much as $2 billion.
The 300,000-person company has announced layoffs several times over the past few years, including in April, when it said it would eliminate 4,600 jobs, but it has been hiring at the same time. This is the first time since the company bought BellSouth Corp. in 2006 that it said overall staffing would decline.
The new cuts were part of a parade of layoffs tied to the recession. In addition Thursday, chemicals company DuPont announced plans to lose 2,500 jobs, Credit Suisse Group slashed 5,300 and media conglomerate Viacom Inc. jettisoned 850. Yet AT&T, which provides local phone coverage in California, Texas and 20 other states, is also being pulled by another current: the long-term trend of people defecting from landline phones to wireless services or phone service from the cable company.
In the last quarter, AT&T's basic voice lines in service dropped 11 percent. Its wireless customer base, meanwhile, grew 14 percent.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/05/2008 00:00 ||
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Its basic voice lines dropped in large part because it is pushing ip phones over dsl.
Its stock is performing fine while the rest of the market is tanking.
#3
International Brotherhood of Communications Workers members. Ironic that the tenure of The One is gonna be historically catastrophic for members of international brotherhoods of whatever, no matter what the gummint tries to do to reverse it...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
12/05/2008 12:20 Comments ||
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#4
M. Murcek - If I say "tee-hee" does that make me a bad person? ;-p
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
12/05/2008 12:30 Comments ||
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#5
Barbara---It is more appropriate to say, Bwahahahahahaha. Looked it up in the Rantburg Book of Ediquette.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
12/05/2008 15:17 Comments ||
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#6
Correction: etiquette. It has little to do with ed. No offense to ed.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
12/05/2008 15:18 Comments ||
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#7
ION, GUAM K57 RADIO NEWS > FROM JAPAN: OBAMA MAY DELAY GUAM BUILDUP. Seems Obama's diplomatic team/staff has told and agreed wid Japanese officials that the reloc of 8000 US Marines and dependents to Guam is "INFEASIBLE", AND NEEDS TO BE REVIEWED AND REEXAMINED???
Amid an ongoing debt crisis at controlling shareholder Sumner Redstone's movie theater company, Viacom Inc. plans to slash about 850 jobs -- 7 percent of its work force -- and freeze some senior-level salaries.
Viacom, which owns MTV Networks, BET Networks and Paramount Pictures, said the cuts are a response to the global economic downturn.
The company said, without specifying, that it also plans to write down the value of some programming and other assets. But it maintained it has a "strong balance sheet and substantial cash flow."
The job cuts, write-offs and suspension of some raises in 2009 are expected to generate pretax savings of $200 million to $250 million next year. The company will take a restructuring charge of $400 million to $450 million, or 42 cents to 48 cents per share, before taxes in the current quarter, which ends Dec. 31.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/05/2008 00:00 ||
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When's the last time they showed a video on MTV? One that didn't feature bitches and hos? And if BET wasn't included on every basic cable package (mine considers it "local programming") for all the right thinking PC reasons, how long do you think it would be in bsiness?
NBC Universal will be cutting up to 500 jobs in a round of layoffs which are now underway at all levels of the company -- television, film and parks. That amounts to about 3% of the workforce. An insider with knowledge of the situation says the cuts are expected to continue into next week.
The NBC News bureaus in Dallas and Los Angeles (Burbank) are already experiencing cuts, with the insider saying Dallas will experience more layoffs than in Burbank. Among those losing their jobs, NBC News correspondent Don Teague who has been with the network since 2002.
This is all part of an effort to cut $500 million from the NBCU budget announced by company president Jeff Zucker in October.
Last month, TVNewser reported the network was offering buyouts to "virtually everyone." If enough employees did not accept the offer, layoffs were to be the next step.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/05/2008 00:00 ||
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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.
Zimbabwe has declared a cholera outbreak that has killed more than 560 people a national emergency and appealed for international help to deal with the crisis. 
The sun was blazing high in the sky just before 1 p.m., five hours after Timothy opened the sparsely stocked shop he manages in a dusty slum here in Zimbabwe's capital. It was time to change the prices.
