Agents for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) said they found more than 1,000 rifles, handguns and pistols at a Mesa home Monday morning.
Agents served a search warrant at the house of Robert Daly, 59, near the Loop 202 Red Mountain Freeway and Power Road.
"That's a lot of weapons," said neighbor Sheri Booth. "I was really shocked at first, because this is a pretty quiet neighborhood."
Daly is a former licensed gun dealer who let his license expire, agents said. By letting his license expire, he could sell to more people because he didn't have to do background checks, according to investigators.
"These individuals were motivated by greed to make a buck, " said ATF Special Agent Tom Mangan. "They don't care about the responsibility they should have, and certainly from his previous experience as a gun dealer, he knew very well he was violating the law."
Investigators said that Daly would sell his guns at flea markets and gun shows across Arizona.
According to Mangan, at least 20 undercover officers purchased guns from Daly during an eight-month investigation.
Neighbor William Ramsey said he was aware that Daly collected weapons, but he did not see any signs of anything illegal going on.
"He wasn't secretly hoarding anything and there was nothing sinister, the way I see it," Ramsey said. "He was a very nice guy."
Dalywas not arrested, was still at home, but could face indictment on the charges, ATF officials said. For operating a home business? It sort of helps to explain exactly what crime may have been involved.
#2
A lot of firearms dealers have gone out of the business over the past 15 years as the costs and regulations have become too extreme to be worthwhile. People who used to collect firearms would buy and sell a few along the way to support their hobby, but gave that up.
As a collector, he would be able to sell guns either from home or a gun show (depending on local rules) without background check (the so-called gun show loophole), as long as it was incidental and not commercial.
#3
Sounds like he was selling his existing invent--, I mean collection, a few at a time as a private party. If he was not buying as a dealer, through the distributor system, I think they may have a problem proving this one.
#1
...Mr. Steinbrenner also owned American Shipbuilding and Drydock of Cleveland, for almost a century the biggest shipbuilder on the Great Lakes - my dad worked for him for almost 20 years. Met him once, very briefly, at a ship christening - he enjoyed being larger than life. For all his success with the Yankees, he was never able to get the unions at AmShip under control and they killed the yards in the early 80s.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
07/13/2010 11:36 Comments ||
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It has been established for some time that the folks at Facebook are not overly fond of nipples. Or, at least, of their public display. Or, at least, of their public display on Facebook.
Some time ago, there was much consternation over the absurdity of removing breastfeeding pictures that were displayed on Facebook pages. It seemed this week that the anti-nipple (female nipple) policy continued to be exercised with ruthless precision.
Ask Victoria Buckley. Buckley is an Australian jewelry designer who seems to be quite successful. She has her own, rather active, Facebook fan page upon which she features her wares, her ads, and, occasionally, her feelings.
Last year, Buckley launched her Ophelia Collection. The Ophelia in question is a creature specially created by artist Marina Bychova of Enchanted Doll. She "lives in a tiny enchanted world of beauty, surrounded by treasures of platinum and rose gold," says Buckley's Web site. In case I hadn't made it clear, Ophelia is a doll. No, literally.
However, she also happens to be a naked doll.
A promotional picture of her with Buckley's jewelry sat happily on her Facebook page for months until, one fair morning last weekend, she told the Sydney Morning Herald that she received six e-mails from Facebook telling her that the nipples were "inappropriate content."
Buckley told the Herald that she had the same pictures, and even the doll itself, in her Sydney store for months and no one minded.
I should add that Buckley's jewelry is not cheap tat. And if you wanted to buy an Ophelia doll, even a naked one, this might cost you some 40,000 Australian dollars. However, as last week wore on, Buckley claimed on her Facebook fan page that Facebook continued to remove images, even though they were already censored.
"The images they are removing are already censored, but they are doing it to IMPLY I am breaking their guidelines. I suspect their next move may be to close this group even though I have been very careful to toe the Facebook line from the very moment I got a complaint," she wrote.
While a "Save Ophelia" Facebook group was quickly created, that was reportedly taken down too. Buckley believes that this whole Nipplegate affair may have been caused by just one sole, misguided complaint.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2010 09:33 ||
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Facebook has had a 'Promotion of virtue and prevention of vice' dept. for a long time.
I love a good pr0n page as well as anyone, but If left unattended, I believe Facebook would be a filthy wreck within days.
A 21-year-old Oakland man is in police custody after he threw his baby daughter into the path of a moving car, according to cops. NAACP probably thinks this is OK.
Police say an off-duty officer saw the man, later identified as John Taylor, shake the 18-month girl and throw her into oncoming traffic on Fifth Avenue near East 15th Street around 5:39 p.m. Saturday. A Volkswagen Jetta almost hit the toddler, police say, and the car's undercarriage burned and scraped the girl. Heck, give the guy a Nobel Peace Prize!
The girl, Jayla, lives with her mother and had been visiting with her father that day. After Taylor allegedly threw his baby daughter into the lane of traffic, he took off running, pounding on and kicking cars along the way, police said.
While a neighbor pulled the baby girl out from underneath the Jetta, police chased Taylor down.
The girl's mother, Alena Bartholemew, doesn't believe the story. She says Taylor was under attack and did what he could to protect their baby. Mother of the Year Award goes to Alena Bartholemew!
"I'm hurting now because I know my baby's father is in jail facing charges and I don't feel that it is reasonable," Bartholemew told NBC Bay Area. "Anybody who feels that they think that John had thrown the baby out, please get that out your mind -- there is no reason to believe that. He is a great father to her." When he's not practicing how to be a politician with his kids.
Drivers in the neighborhood tried to stop Taylor as he ran from cops. When officers caught up with him, they found him in a violent scuffle with those motorists. Police hit Taylor with a Taser and arrested him. I hope they zapped him with it, too.
Taylor was arrested on suspicion of of willful cruelty to a child, vandalism, resisting arrest and battery on a police officer. Err, attempted murder, anyone?
#3
On the plus side, policemen around the world just love adult men who try to murder children. It can be extra fun to be arrested by a cop who has "righteous indignation".
BP has successfully lowered a new containment cap onto its leaking well, its latest attempt to control the gushing oil since the start of the disaster in the Gulf of Mexico 84 days ago.
Underwater video of the well showed the new 18-foot, 150,000-pound cap being placed onto the wellhead. The company will soon begin the process of testing the fit that could finally contain all of the leaking oil.
But even with that sign of success, anger continued to bubble across the Gulf Coast today over unfulfilled damage claims.
Gulf residents say they've been required to fill out mountains of detailed paperwork, but all the forms could amount to nothing if they forget one little thing and BP refuses to pay. "I done gave them this paperwork three times," one frustrated resident told ABC News today.
Some frustrated fishermen, who haven't been able to work since the start of the spill, said today that BP is doing everything to try to refuse to pay their claims.
Fisherman Darrell Moreaux went to the BP claims office today for a fourth time, with a fistful of receipts trying to prove his claim to a $5,000 check. "Everyone's dependent on these people now, and we don't know what's the holdup," Moreaux said. Moreaux said he left broke and broken, his claim rejected once again. "Where am I gonna go? Who do I need to talk to to pay my electric bill this month? My water bill for this month?" Moreaux said. "I'm gonna be two months behind now. It's disgusting."
BP said that it is swamped by more than 100,000 claims and admits it has yet to approve half of them. In most cases, the company says, they are waiting for more proof of lost income.
But elected officials say that all the proof they need is at the quiet marinas. "Give them $25,000, give them $50,000 while you work out his claim," said Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser.
Ass. BP has a legal, fiduciary responsibility to the stockholders. They can't just hand out large sums of money to everybody who walks through the door, wanting some.
Today, Kenneith Feinberg, the man charged by the Obama administration to administer BP's $20 billion claims fund, said that he'll be able to help. Feinberg will get control of the money next month, once funds are finalized. "I will do everything I can to accelerate the payments," Feinberg said. "Not emergency payments of one month but emergency payments for six months at a time."
At a hearing in New Orleans today before the president's commission investigating the spill, residents aired their anger at federal officials, BP, and the entire oil industry. "We don't need any more cheap energy, no matter how much our politicians will beg for it," said one man who identified himself as Christopher. "Recognize that the ills that exist here in Louisiana are of [the oil industry's] own making."
What odds Mr. Christopher ___ is a member of International ANSWER or somesuch thing, and isn't a local at all? How fortunate the ABC News reporter neglected to obtain Mr. __'s last name, so we can't research him for ourselves.
Today, the Obama administration issued a new, revised moratorium on offshore drilling, after its previous attempt to cut off approval of deep-water projects was rejected by a federal appeals court as too heavy-handed.
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced that the new moratorium, in effect through November 30, will not be based on the water depth of the platform.
Offshore at the site of the disaster, BP hopes that its latest bid to control the leak will finally pay off, three months into the disaster.
Today, an armada of deep-sea robots moved around a new containment cap as it was lowered onto the site. The cap, it is hoped, will form a tighter seal with the well and allow BP to capture all of the oil that is being released from the well.
"This certainly is an important day in the evolution of this response," National Incident Cmdr. Thad Allen told ABC's Diane Sawyer today. "If all goes according to plan, we could initiate a well test tomorrow morning that could tell us where we need to go from here."
Oil will continue to gush until the robots shut off three valves, a step that could happen by Tuesday. BP will conduct pressure tests for a 6-to-48 hour period before they know whether the new cap has been a success.
In preparation for this maneuver, the original, leaky cap was removed from the broken wellhead over the weekend, allowing 2.5 million gallons of oil to spew per day. Some fear that the new cap could buckle under the extreme pressures spewing out of the ocean floor and spawn new leaks in the pipe.
"This may actually work. We're hoping so," said Dr. Michio Kaku, author of "Physics of the Impossible." "But this is a science experiment at 5,000-feet of water. High pressure is the single reason why we're having so much difficulty, because the basic science of working at high pressure was not done years ago."
If all goes according to plan, the oil will be funneled to the Helix Producer, a ship that recently arrived at the site that could soon contain roughly a million gallons of oil per day.
Drilling of the relief wells that BP says offer a permanent fix to the leak could be completed by the end of the month, the company said. Though the relief wells are now 5 feet away from the target, it would take another few weeks to fill them with cement.
"We don't need any more cheap energy, no matter how much our politicians will beg for it," said one man who identified himself as Christopher. "Recognize that the ills that exist here in Louisiana are of [the oil industry's] own making."
agenda much?
Posted by: Mike Hunt ||
07/13/2010 2:39 Comments ||
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#2
"BP will conduct pressure tests for a 6-to-48 hour period before they know whether the new cap has been a success."
48 hour rule? Pun definitely intended. Also, why are they quoting Dr. Kaku? I do understand the Physics aspect of this operation, but quoting him reeks of nerd name dropping for the discovery channel crowd.
#4
Anyone notice how the MSM is now renewing the allegation of BP's alleged pressuring of Whitehall to release the cancer stricken Lockerbie bomber? I suppose it's time to smear evil big business and heap exaltation upon off-shore oil engineer and fix it man Barry Soetoro. Take a bow will you Barry, we know you know how!
The ArcLight program will design, build, and flight test a long range (> 2,000 nm) vehicle that carries a 100-200 lb payload(s). ArcLight is based on an SM-3 Block II booster stack, a hypersonic glider and is capable of being launched from a Mark 41 Vertical Launch System (VLS) tube. The development of the ArcLight system will enable high speed, long range weapons capable of engaging time critical targets and can be launched from Naval surface and sub-surface assets, and Naval/Air Force air assets. LCTF. Now bring back the Arsenal ship.
#1
PAKISTANI DEFENCE FORUM > GIANT AIRSHIPS TO PATROL AFGHANISTAN'S SKIES.
INDIA also repor is interested in buying two UCAV Airships from ISRAEL to patrol J & K.
* ION STRATEGYPAGE > CHINESE WARSHIPS FILL INDIAN OCEAN PORTS [Oman, Djibouti; + Yemen] + THIN AIR RAVAGES THE CHINESE ARMY [high- altitude air sickness in TIBET],
and
BHARAT RAKSHAK > CHINA TO BUILD OXYGEN-RICH BARRACKS [modern living] FOR TIBET PLA TROOPS.
#2
hey joseph playing toy soldier at your age is pathetic. who give a shit about your "soldier "way of expression,are you senile ? Or some arab ass rape you? You are fake as the bull shit on this indian and jew scum irrelevant blog with no readers
Posted by: [some dipshit in a brown shirt] ||
07/13/2010 2:58 Comments ||
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#4
Stupid troll #2, why do you obsess so, on a site that has no readers? You've been spewing boringly unimaginative filth since last night. What is it about Los Angeles that produces so many dribbling idiots? Enjoy being banned by a mommy -- you aren't even clever enough to be a chew toy.
#7
COVAD in San Jose. But now it's pointing to the bit bucket.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2010 10:18 Comments ||
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#8
Crappy speller and grammar. Either a transplant or a child who is in the process of being indoctrinated. Either way, I sort of wonder what the local muslim community would have to say about his comments.
#9
Joe's posts look a little intimidating but if you take the time to parse through them you can find some good links. I guess that would be asking too much of an adolescent goat boinker.
#10
It ain't ARCLIGHT unless it includes several large, manned bombers dropping 80,000-100,000 pounds of iron bombs on a single target.
Wow, TW, you really put THAT dweeb in his place. Am I being a "corrupting" influence?
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
07/13/2010 13:14 Comments ||
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#11
Am I being a "corrupting" influence?
You are such a gentleman that I find the thought inconceivable, Old Patriot. You can see some of the troll's vomitus from last night in the Sinktrap, if you can figure out how to make it go back in time -- not very different than what he posted this morning. Had he any redeeming value I would have left him as a chew toy, but he didn't.
#13
I knew a guy sent to do a ground survey in Vietnam after an ArcLight mission. He described what had been dense jungle that was now a field of craters, with not so much as a blade of grass. Some crater might have some water, another might have a larger than usual rock.
PORTLAND, Ore. -- A car full of people dressed as zombies crashed on Interstate 84 near downtown Portland on Friday, causing initial confusion by people who witnessed the crash. Portland Police said the car was swerving in the eastbound lanes of the freeway just east of the Lloyd District just after 9:30 p.m. when it rolled over and crashed onto its top....
Police said that in their investigation they learned that the people inside the car were dressed as zombie costumes and they were looking for brains to eat headed to a party at the time of the crash. Sgt. Greg Stewart said people who witnessed the crash initially thought the victims' injuries were much more serious, because of the zombie costumes.
"We're glad that everyone is alive, despite being 'undead'," Sgt. Stewart said, referring to the costumes....
Posted by: Mike ||
07/13/2010 06:15 ||
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"We're glad that everyone is alive, despite being 'undead'," Sgt. Stewart said, referring to the costumes....
Hopefully the next officer I run into has Sgt. Stewart's sense of humor re: the radar gun.
The Imperial Valley Press is being criticized by some readers who believe a political cartoon mocked the injuries of a decorated Iraq war veteran who is running for Congress. The cartoon, published Saturday, shows a poster of candidate Nick Popaditch, who has a patch over his right eye. Two youths with skateboards seem perplexed by the poster
"What does that remind you of?" one says.
The other answers: "A James Bond super villain? A bald pirate? Uncle Fester with an eye patch."
Popaditch, a Marine gunnery sergeant, lost the sight in his right eye during the battle for Fallouja in Iraq in 2004. He received the Silver Star and Purple Heart and now is the Republican candidate in the 51st Congressional District, facing Democratic incumbent Bob Filner.
Among those criticizing the cartoon is Cheryl Perez, president of the Ladies Auxiliary, Military Order of the Purple Heart, unit 49, San Diego. "I realize Nick is running for a political office and political cartoons are the norm," Perez wrote. "Attack him on his political views, not on injuries he sustained while fighting for other people's freedom and liberties. ... This is not just an insult to Nick, but an affront to every Purple Heart recipient."
Editor Brad Jennings, an Air Force veteran whose son is serving in the Air Force, said he has apologized to Popaditch and plans an apology and explanation in his column to be published Tuesday. "Our intent was never to besmirch the service of a veteran, never to personally attack Mr. Popaditch," he said. "To me, the cartoon was meant as a comment on our locally ill-informed voters." "Being criticized" is an understatement. "Torches and pitchforks" would be more accurate. On the plus side, that newspaper may have just won him the election.
Sometimes humour is too subtle for its intended audience... Or, it never does to insult one's slacker/skateboarder readership.
Or ... the editors never expected the blowback they got and are pedalling hard to look innocent. I know I sent them a polite but pointed email.
Giving the editors the benefit of the doubt, it's hard to give them the benefit of the doubt ...
Here's the cartoon. Judge for yourselves. But do note that the editor in question is an Air Force vet whose son is currently serving, not some ignorant, lefty MSM hack.
#2
If a moderator would be kind enough to put a couple of returns in the list of emails to eliminate the stretching of the page, I would be greatly indebted to you. Semper Fidelis.
#5
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say 'To-morrow is Saint Crispian:' Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars.
And say 'These wounds I had on Crispin's day.'
Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day: then shall our names.
Familiar in his mouth as household words
Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember'd.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember'd; We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.
- W.Shakespeare, Henry V, Act 4
#6
My first thought was that the cartoon was deploring the predictable ignorance and self-absorption of the general population.
You could put a picture of George Washington in the cartoon and get the same response from The Kids.
Not a slam on Pop.
Overreaction.
Posted by: Richard Aubrey ||
07/13/2010 9:50 Comments ||
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#7
The Man, the Candidate.
H/T: Michelle Malkin who says this will help him to "take the Hill".
#8
To me, skateboarding youths do not know the JB cat wielding super-villians or uncle fester; artistically flawed to begin with IMHO...any other examples of mr. retired air force's work?
#9
"To me, the cartoon was meant as a comment on our locally ill-informed voters."
Someone please get the flamethrower out if Mr. Jennings' hands. He apparently doesn't know how to turn it off.
And if you want to make fun of local voters' ignorance, then do so. Don't poke fun at kids' ignorance, and don't use a caricature of a Marine who is running for Congress. Use some other object to help highlight their ignorance. Like Mr. Clean or something. In fact, if the locals are so ignorant, how are they supposed to understand this cartoon in the first place? No, they get it. And Jennings is playing on people's natural desire to either agree out of ignorance or to want to accept a BS apology just so the tensions will go away.
Jennings should just issue a forthright apology, not some BS excuse.
And that paper should get back to reporting the news and not herding the sheeple.
It is not "an absolute disaster" if schools contain bad teachers, the chairman of the Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted) has told the BBC. It's not an absolute disaster if the roads contain bad drivers, either... Oh. Wait. Maybe it is.
It depends -- are these bad teachers merely disorganized, or are they the kind that destroy a child's spirit?
Do the drivers just run red lights or are they drunk and on the wrong side of the road?
Zenna Atkins, stressing these were her personal views, earlier told the Sunday Times "every school should have a useless teacher". ... and every village should have an idiot. And every town should have a drunk.
She later said she did not mean schools should tolerate bad teachers.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2010 11:36 ||
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"every school should have a useless teacher"
just like every Office for Standards in Education should have a useless chairman?
Taking a leap forward in developing strategic unmanned aerial systems, Britain has unveiled the prototype of its futuristic autonomous combat aerial vehicle 'Taranis'.
The prototype aircraft which was unveiled by the UK Ministry of Defence on Monday will test the possibility of developing the first ever autonomous stealthy Unmanned Combat Air Vehicle (UCAV) for Britain.
The new warfighter, named after the Celtic god of thunder, has been designed to take on long range targets, even in another continent.
The Taranis project, which is a part of the UK MoD's Strategic Unmanned Air Vehicle (Experimental) [SUAV(E)] programme, is being jointly developed by BAE Systems, Rolls Royce, QinetiQ and GE Aviation.
The UK MoD had awarded a £124 million contract in 2006 to a team led by BAE Systems to design and build a demonstrator aircraft for the British armed forces. BAE takes the lead in the overall designing as well as providing stealth technology, flight testing and control equipment for the futuristic UCAV.
Once fully developed, the new long-range Taranis would be able deliver weapons even in another continent by flying a faster speed. The stealth fighter would also be able to carry out test deployment of a range of munitions over a number of targets, and also able to defend itself against manned and other unmanned enemy aircraft.
The Taranis prototype will provide the UK MoD with critical knowledge on the technical and manufacturing challenges and the potential capabilities of Unmanned Combat Air Systems, BAE said.
The new aircraft is scheduled to be flight tested in 2011.
Opposition leaders in Costa Rica are up in arms over an agreement between the country and the United States that reportedly allows 46 US warships and 7,000 US Marines to enter the country as part of an anti-drug effort.
46 warships is nearly 20% of the entire fleet ...
According to several Costa Rican news sources, the government there signed an agreement with the US last week to extend an 11-year-old cooperative program aimed at eradicating the maritime drug trade.
But opponents say this year's deal differs from previous ones in that it allows US warships to enter the country. Previously, opponents say, only US Coast Guard vessels were allowed to enter Costa Rican territory. The new agreement expires on December 31 of this year.
A committee of the People's Movement political party said the deal turns Costa Rica into a "US protectorate" and brings the country into "a new phase of military occupation," according to the Costa Rican newspaper El Pais.
Costa Rica's Nacion newspaper reported last week that the new agreement will see 7,000 US Marines, supported by 200 helicopters and 46 warships, "enter and leave the country at will." The paper also cited a June 2 letter from Costa Rica to the US declaring that US troops will have "the right to carry out the activities it deems necessary in carrying out its mission."
Inside Costa Rica reports that opposition leaders see the US military force as disproportionately large compared to the problem of Central American drug-running.
Luis Fishman, head of the Christian Social Unity Party, said the deal amounts to a "blank check" for US forces in Costa Rica. "We cannot support the illegal; we cannot allow our Constitution to be trampled," he said.
SOUTH Korea deployed a sentry robot capable of detecting and killing intruders along the heavily fortified border with North Korea, officials said overnight.
"Our military has been testing such robots along the border," a defence ministry spokesman said.
Two robots with surveillance, tracking, firing and voice recognition systems were integrated into a single unit, he said, declining to give details.
The robot unit costing 400 million won ($US330,000) was installed last month at a guard post in the central section of the Demilitarized Zone which bisects the peninsula, Yonhap news agency said.
It quoted an unidentified military official as saying the ministry would deploy sentry robots along the world's last Cold War frontier if the test is successful.
The robot uses heat and motion detectors to sense possible threats, and alerts command centres, Yonhap said.
If the command centre operator cannot identify possible intruders through the robot's audio or video communications system, the operator can order it to fire its gun or automatic grenade launcher.
South Korea is also developing highly sophisticated combat robots armed with weapons and sensors that could complement human soldiers on battlefields.
It has a largely conscripted military of 655,000 against Pyongyang's 1.2 million-strong force, but a falling birth rate means Seoul will struggle in the future to maintain troop numbers.
A DRUNK man climbed into a crocodile enclosure at a wildlife park after being kicked out of his local pub and is lucky to be alive to tell the tale. The ABC reports Broome Police Sergeant Roger Haynes as saying the 36-year-old was bitten on the leg before escaping.
"For some reason he's made a decision to climb the fence into the crocodile park, where an almost five-metre male crocodile was living," he told the ABC. He appears to have wanted to touch that crocodile and sit on its back, and the crocodile has taken offence to that and bitten him on the right leg. He's absolutely lucky to be alive, this is a large male saltwater crocodile, who aren't renowned for letting people escape once they've got hold of them," Sergeant Haynes said.
The man underwent surgery for severe lacerations to his leg at the Broome Regional Hospital. No charges were laid, the ABC said.
A new financial study suggests that the UK's public sector debt is more than a trillion pounds higher than official government figures.
'Unexpectedly' ...
With the inclusion of pensions and off-balance sheet investments, up to 1.13 trillion pounds may be added to the current estimated public sector net debt of 932 billion pounds, says a report published on Monday.
Researchers from the Centre for Economics and Business Research, and the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICEAEW) note that while the report calculates the total debt figure using publicly available data, there is uncertainty surrounding many of the figures.
"Our research draws upon existing publicly available data and previously undertaken analysis to illustrate that the liabilities that are not included in the official public sector net debt figure are large but, in many cases, uncertain," the report's author and managing economist for CEBR, Charles Davis, told The Telegraph.
The bulk of the hefty sum comes from unfunded pensions for public-sector workers like civil servants and teachers, Reuters reported.
Researchers also urged transparency in the public finances sector and called on the Office for Budget Responsibility to raise awareness about the liabilities which are currently omitted from the public sector debt assessments.
"While there are important debates to be had about specific spending cuts, I believe that meaningful reform is necessary to underpin sustainable public finances over the long term and create a culture of fiscal responsibility," the Times quoted ICAEW Chief Executive Michael Izza as saying.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2010 00:00 ||
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Uh, uh, the UK L$2.0TRILYUHN doesn't matter because QUEEN LIZ has to bail out FERGIE [which Liz did]???
[Al Arabiya Latest] Immigration to rich countries dropped during the global economic crisis, reversing five years of annual increases as the demand for labor fell, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said Monday.
A report showed that 4.4 million people migrated to the OECD's 31 member countries -- the world's most developed economies -- in 2008. That is a drop of about 6 percent from the year before.
The fall reverses five years of annual increases of 11 percent, the OECD said in its International Migration Outlook 2010.
National data suggest that international migration fell again in 2009.
Unemployment among male immigrants has risen more than among native counterparts because many immigrants worked in industries badly hit by the crisis, such as construction, hotels and restaurants, the OECD said.
Still, few are returning home, it said.
In some countries, employment of female immigrants has risen as women take jobs to make up for lost income of their unemployed spouses, it said.
But OECD chief Angel Gurria warned governments against toughening immigration policies because migrant labor will be needed to fill shortages as the economy cranks back up.
"Current economic difficulties will not change long-term demographic trends and should not be used as an excuse to overly restrict immigration," he said in a statement.
Without an increase in current migration rates, the working-age population in OECD countries will increase by only 1.9 percent in the next 10 years, according to the Paris-based institution's calculations. That compares with an 8.6 percent increase between 2000 and 2010.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2010 00:00 ||
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Wouldn't it be easier to increase the standard of living in third-world toilets?
I'd like to think the standard of living has gone up in Iraq in the last 6-7 years.
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/13/2010 13:10 Comments ||
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#2
Wouldn't it be easier to increase the standard of living in third-world toilets?
Yes, yes it would. However, it would likely involve some long very messy programs of offing all the kleptocrats and Kimmies and the cronies they put between themselves and us that operate their own game preserves, usually referred to as sovereign countries. That requires 'will', not the absorption of self doubt.
#3
Most universities in 3rd world countries generate lawyers and bureaucrats, not entrepreneurs. This is partly because one can make money in getting into a gov't position. where one can force people to pay "sma' sma' dash" to get anything accomplished. It is also because most of these universities don't have a lot of resources to produce real scholarship. One African university that a member of our family visited had a library the size of my kitchen. Middle Daughter helped the tech maven from another African university scrounge foreign language educational software for free, because the school had zero budget for it.
Also see this:
The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else
Two people have died and over 100 people have been injured during celebrations marking the first World Cup win of Spain.
A man died in Algesiras in southwestern Spain when he fell off a veranda while watching the World Cup final match with his friends.
Spain beat the Netherlands 1-0 on Sunday to claim the World Cup title for the first time.
"After Spain scored... they found him on the ground after falling from the balcony," said a spokeswoman for the representative of Spain's central government in Cadiz.
Another accident occurred in Herguijuela in the western province of Extremadura when a man drowned when diving into a municipal swimming pool after Spain's victory.
Some 20 people were arrested and more than 100 people were injured, including 74 in Barcelona, when unrest broke near the site of outdoor screens that broadcast the match.
Several hundred thousand fans greeted the Spanish squad when they arrived in the Madrid airport Monday after winning the World Cup for the first time in their history.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2010 00:00 ||
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"After Spain scored... they found him on the ground after falling from the balcony," said a spokeswoman for the representative of Spain's central government in Cadiz.
Several attendees were quoted as saying, "It was the most exciting thing that happened all night."
#2
That "unrest" in Barcelona was caused by catalanist brownshirts unhappy about the gazillion people wrapped in Spanish flags assaulting people who had become isolated. Of course only when they were five to one at the very least. How brave .
A Tea Party group in Missouri, reacting to the NAACP's plan to take up a resolution branding the conservative movement as "racist," has drafted a resolution of its own condemning the civil rights group for reducing itself to a "bigoted" and "partisan attack dog organization."
The St. Louis Tea Party had an all-hands-on-deck response to the NAACP's plan to denounce the nationwide network of activists at its annual convention across the state in Kansas City. The NAACP as early as Tuesday could take up language to "repudiate the racism of the Tea Parties" and stand against the movement's attempt to "push our country back to the pre-civil rights era."
In a matter of hours, the St. Louis group drafted and fired off to the NAACP a resolution demanding the organization withdraw its "bigoted, false and inflammatory" statement. The missive accused the NAACP of resorting to political tactics and urged the IRS to reconsider whether it can continue to qualify for tax-exempt status.
Oh my.
Tea Party organizers routinely defend themselves against charges of racism, disavowing racially charged signs that appear in their protest crowds and provide fodder for Tea Party critics. The NAACP resolution, first reported by the Kansas City Star, was expected to make reference to an incident in March when Tea Party protesters allegedly hurled racial epithets at black lawmakers on Capitol Hill ahead of a health care vote. Tea Party members afterward challenged that account and no evidence was produced to show any racist attacks.
St. Louis Tea Party organizer Bill Hennessy wrote on the group's website Tuesday that the Tea Party stands for smaller government and fiscal responsibility, and accused the NAACP of abandoning black America.
"When you look at the crime and poverty and family breakdown of the African-American community ... you see a half-century of failure by the NAACP," he wrote. "None of those persistent problems was caused by the Tea Party movement, yet the principles of the Tea Party are exactly what's needed to wind down the multi-generational destruction in the African-American community.
"The NAACP was once a vital weapon in the war against segregation and oppression. All that's left is a bigoted and malicious shell that does far more harm than good for people who need a break," he wrote.
Fellow St. Louis Tea Party organizer Dana Loesch accused the NAACP of morphing into a political organization.
#2
"The NAACP was once a vital weapon in the war against segregation and oppression. All that's left is a bigoted and malicious shell that does far more harm than good for people who need a break," he wrote.
Well, yeah, but nobody actually says that.
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/13/2010 15:51 Comments ||
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Good for them. The Left has been getting away with making baseless accusations for far too long.
First Lady Michelle Obama brought renewed energy to the NAACP today, delivering the keynote speech at the annual convention one day before the nation's largest civil rights group is expected to condemn what it calls racist elements in the Tea Party movement.
The nation's largest and oldest civil rights organization will vote on the resolution Tuesday during its annual convention in Kansas City, Mo.
In her speech, the first lady focused on the issue of childhood obesity and her "Let's Move" initiative, but outside of her remarks, anti-Tea Party activism has been a key focus of the gathering, which conservative leaders say is driven solely by a political agenda.
Continued on Page 49
#1
The script that M. Obama was going by was that now that many of the people in the African American community is hurting (caused by the her party) that it is important for the Tea Party not interfere with "spreading the wealth", in other words, steeling from the middle class and giving their posessions to the "poor".
Yet they can't produce even one 'racist' incident by Tea Party member.
Voting this November should be mandatory for all patriots. Very important election.
This might just be our last chance to 'get handcuffs' on these guys and stop them from wrecking America.
Posted by: Mike Hunt ||
07/13/2010 2:27 Comments ||
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#3
Last chance indeed for the ballot box. After that, we've only one box left and we'd all rather not go there. Drag yourself and everyone you know to the polls as if your life depends on it. It does.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
07/13/2010 2:54 Comments ||
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They are going to set back the civil rights gains about 45 years. Which is probably where they should be. Maybe we'll be able to get that RESET button back from Pooty.
#5
100% of black people polled say that the term "colored people" is moderately to blatantly racist. Ergo the NAACP is racist. I wish there were a monetary prize for that evidence. I guess I'd have to split that litigation lottery 6.8 billion ways.
#6
pretty rich: an affirmative action socialist who got jobs and education based on her skin color and husband's Senate position, who attended Rev. Wright's church for years, branding someone else raaaacciist
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/13/2010 8:35 Comments ||
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who got jobs and education based on her skin color
Considering the quality of said education, do you deny her right to resent?
The greatest determent to the 'advancement' of their own self identified community has been the imposition of the failed monopolistic unionized school systems. The teachers unions are just another auxiliary of the Party. The blank check the NAACP gives the Donks is the greatest betrayal of their own than any racist de jure or de facto act by any other part of the American population in the last two generations. The inner circle of hell is reserved for those who betray.
#9
Not to mention her husband is the first Affirmative Action President (since most voters (of all races) based their vote on his skin color (and not any qualifications).
The sad part here is that with the NAACP, and the Black Congressional Caucus whoring out the race card at every opportunity makes it that much harder when there is real, actual, racism - the victim is more likely to be ignored as 'just another play of the race card... move along..."
#10
Considering the quality of said education, do you deny her right to resent?
Princeton has one heck of a physics department, it's associated with the Institute for Advanced Studies, during her time studying at Princeton potential physics professors there included G. K. O'Neill, inventor of the particle storage ring, and Freeman Dyson, who should need no introduction, among many other people.
Her poor choice in majors is her own damn problem.
#11
Got nothing to brag about in reason, so it is an all-in for emotion. People deserve better than to be talked to like this, I don't care who you are. Rabble rousing, low low low road.
#12
Buy Rabble Rousing is what Community Organizers do best - actually its the only thing they do. (not, you note, actually solve problems....
I think that pretty much sums up the Obama's Administration record so far. Stimulus didn't stimulate anything (except unions), Healthcare reform will do much more harm than good. Same with Crap and Tax.
#14
As a proud Tea Party member I can admit that Ms. Obama is correct about one (and probably only one) thing: posters intended to degrade people of color generally and President Barack Obama specifically Actually, we tend to use his own words, which are quite sufficient to degrade him.
They may call it the "Land of the Pure," but Pakistan turns out to be anything but. The Muslim country, which has banned content on at least 17 websites to block offensive and blasphemous material, is the world's leader in online searches for pornographic material, FoxNews.com has learned.
"You won't find strip clubs in Islamic countries. Most Islamic countries have certain dress codes," said Gabriel Said Reynolds, professor of Islamic Studies at the University of Notre Dame. "It would be an irony if they haven't shown the same vigilance to pornography."
So here's the irony: Google ranks Pakistan No. 1 in the world in searches for pornographic terms, outranking every other country in the world in searches per person for certain sex-related content.
Pakistan is top dog in searches per-person for "horse sex" since 2004, "donkey sex" since 2007, "rape pictures" between 2004 and 2009, "rape sex" since 2004, "child sex" between 2004 and 2007 and since 2009, "animal sex" since 2004 and "dog sex" since 2005, according to Google Trends and Google Insights, features of Google that generate data based on popular search terms.
The country also is tops -- or has been No. 1 -- in searches for "sex," "camel sex," "rape video," "child sex video" and some other searches that can't be printed here.
Google Trends generates data of popular search terms in geographic locations during specific time frames. Google Insights is a more advanced version that allows users to filter a search to geographic locations, time frames and the nature of a search, including web, images, products and news.
Pakistan ranked No. 1 in all the searches listed above on Google Trends, but on only some of them in Google Insights.
"We do our best to provide accurate data and to provide insights into broad search patterns, but the results for a given query may contain inaccuracies due to data sampling issues, approximations, or incomplete data for the terms entered," Google said in a statement, when asked about the accuracy of its reports.
The Embassy of Islamic Republic of Pakistan did not reply to a request for an interview.
In addition to banning content on 17 websites, including islamexposed.blogspot.com, Pakistan is monitoring seven other sites -- Google, Yahoo, Bing, YouTube, Amazon, MSN and Hotmail -- for anti-Islamic content, the Associated Press reported in June.
But it's not to censor the Pakistani people, Reynolds said. It's to shut out the rest of the world.
"[It] could lead to conversion, which would undermine the very order of the state," he said. "Part of protecting the society is making sure that there is no way it could be undermined in terms of foreign influences."
Pakistan temporarily banned Facebook in May when Muslim groups protested the "Everybody Draw Muhammad Day" page, where users were encouraged to upload pictures of the Prophet Muhammad. The page remains on Facebook, but Pakistani users are unable to view it, said Andrew Noyes, manager of Facebook's Public Policy Communication.
And while Pakistan is taking measures to prevent blasphemous material from being viewed by its citizens, pornographic material is "certainly" contradictory to Islam, too, Reynolds said.
The country's punishment for those charged with blasphemy is execution, but the question remains what -- if anything -- can be done about people who search for porn on the Web.
[Iran Press TV Latest] The rapidly increasing population of India is expected to surpass China's population by 2050, official figures show. China has stringent birth control in force. India doesn't.
Over the past 100 years, India has witnessed a five-fold increase in population, and experts say this will hamper the sustainable development of the country, which is already grappling with rampant hunger and poverty. I remember being told to eat all my glop when I was a child. It was told to think of the starving children in India and force it down. Since dumping the Congress Party platform India's been growing into a beacon of prosperity, especially in comparison to Pakistain. Given time, the "rampant hunger and poverty" will become the exception rather than the rule, which I suspect it is now.
A recent report by the National Population Stabilization Fund, which is affiliated with the Indian Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, said that while India's population grew by 1.4 percent over the past five years, China has witnessed only a 0.6 percent rise during the same period. If this trend continues, India will have an additional 371 million people by 2026, the report added.
In the space of one hundred and seventy-six years the Lower Mississippi has shortened itself two hundred and forty-two miles. That is an average of a trifle over one mile and a third per year. Therefore, any calm person, who is not blind or idiotic, can see that in the Old Oolitic Silurian Period, just a million years ago next November, the Lower Mississippi River was upwards of one million three hundred thousand miles long, and stuck out over the Gulf of Mexico like a fishing-rod. And by the same token any person can see that seven hundred and forty-two years from now the Lower Mississippi will be only a mile and three-quarters long, and Cairo and New Orleans will have joined their streets together, and be plodding comfortably along under a single mayor and a mutual board of aldermen.
--Mark Twain
In 2009, India's total population was 1.198 billion and China's population was 1.345 billion.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2010 00:00 ||
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And the demographic imbalance just keeps getting worse.
"Any young man who is unmarried at the age of twenty-one is a menace to the community." -- Brigham Young
Multiply that by 50 million, and you have a problem. Especially if led by a charismatic leader.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Xiuquan
Then, the end result was between 20-50 million dead. Today, that number could be much, much larger.
The future of spycraft looks pretty heavy, if this new Boeing plane is any indication. Adding to today's parade of pretty new planes, Boeing unveiled a hydrogen-powered unmanned aircraft system Monday that will stay aloft at 65,000 feet for four days.
The Phantom Eye is not exactly sleek, but it's one of the greenest aircraft out there -- its only byproduct is water.
The aircraft heralds a potential new market in data and communications collection, Boeing says. Later this summer, it will be shipped from Boeing's Phantom Works facility in St. Louis to NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center for ground and taxi testing. The debut flight will likely take place next year and should last four to eight hours, a mere preview of the aircraft's apparent capabilities.
In terms of power, Phantom Eye is a lightweight -- it has two 2.3 liter, four-cylinder engines that provide 150 hp each, not much more than your average car. This makes sense, because Ford provided the engines, according to a Boeing news release.
The plane has a 150-foot wingspan and can carry up to a 450-pound payload, Boeing says. It will cruise at 150 knots, or 170 miles per hour.
The prototype of a high-tech British roboplane capable of attacking targets as far away as Afghanistan was unveiled by defense contractor BAE Systems in the U.K. Monday.
It's the latest effort by Boeing to build aircraft powered by hydrogen. The firm claimed firsties on a hydrogen fuel cell aircraft back in 2008 when a different Phantom Works division flew a manned aircraft powered by hydrogen fuel cells.
Phantom Eye evolved from Boeing's Condor aircraft, also powered by a piston engine, which made history by reaching a top altitude of 67, 028 feet. Its likely descendants include the Phantom Ray drone, which looks like a slim B-2.
#1
Boeing is using a motor from the Ford Focus when they could have used one from the F-150?
What time is it?
Posted by: Mike N. ||
07/13/2010 14:41 Comments ||
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I had a Thunderbird Turbo Coupe with a 2.3L Inter-cooled turbo engine.
It was impressive for a four cylinder, to say the least. And that was before all the after market computer manipulation stuff was widely available.
#3
Californians Advocating Responsible Rail Design, a watchdog group that supports a rail project in principle but is critical of the Authority.
Put me in that group. Part of the "magic" is the expectation that the train will make money. All transportation is subsidized. Let me say that again. All of it. Even toll roads would die without the network of crumbling city street and highways leading up to them.
But they can make money, eventually. Many freight railroads were subsidized with worthless land 130 years ago, and got reduced rates from the Feds for 80+ years thereafter. But our privately-owned freight railways make more money that anywhere else in this solar system.
The Northeast Corridor (DC to NYC) has made money on a cash basis and competes favorably with the airlines, carrying about the same number of passengers as planes. But it is still subsidized.
I love the high-speed trains in France and Germany, but they ain't cheap. This ain't Eurpope (yet) and our transportation infrastructure was not been demolished by WW II. So more high-speed rail is going to be a long time coming, in the USA.
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/13/2010 13:07 Comments ||
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[Straits Times] THE Philippines may turn to nuclear energy to solve power shortages in the impoverished nation, President Benigno Aquino said on Monday.
'We are studying the possibility of using nuclear energy as a source of power,' Mr Aquino, who took office on June 30, told reporters. 'I'm awaiting the department of energy secretary's recommendations.' He said the technology could come from South Korea, without elaborating.
But he said he was reluctant to rebuild a plant completed a quarter of a century ago under the Marcos regime but never used.
Mr Aquino's statement came four months after a cousin, House of Representatives member Mark Cojuangco, inspected a turbine generator and other nuclear equipment being auctioned by South Korea.
Mr Cojuangco has also said the government should seriously consider reviving the Bataan nuclear power plant, which was completed in 1984 after eight years of construction by the government of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos.
Built 100 kilometres north of Manila at a cost of US$2.3 billion (S$3.2billion), the plant was hounded by controversy and has never produced power.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2010 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.
It has been established for some time that the folks at Facebook are not overly fond of nipples. Or, at least, of their public display. Or, at least, of their public display on Facebook.
BP has successfully lowered a new containment cap onto its leaking well, its latest attempt to control the gushing oil since the start of the disaster in the Gulf of Mexico 84 days ago. 
PORTLAND, Ore. -- A car full of people dressed as zombies crashed on Interstate 84 near downtown Portland on Friday, causing initial confusion by people who witnessed the crash. Portland Police said the car was swerving in the eastbound lanes of the freeway just east of the Lloyd District just after 9:30 p.m. when it rolled over and crashed onto its top....
It is not "an absolute disaster" if schools contain bad teachers, the chairman of the Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted) has told the BBC.
[Al Arabiya Latest] Immigration to rich countries dropped during the global economic crisis, reversing five years of annual increases as the demand for labor fell, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said Monday.
First Lady Michelle Obama brought renewed energy to the NAACP today, delivering the keynote speech at the annual convention one day before the nation's largest civil rights group is expected to condemn what it calls racist elements in the Tea Party movement. 
The future of spycraft looks pretty heavy, if this new Boeing plane is any indication. Adding to today's parade of pretty new planes, Boeing unveiled a hydrogen-powered unmanned aircraft system Monday that will stay aloft at 65,000 feet for four days.
[Straits Times] THE Philippines may turn to nuclear energy to solve power shortages in the impoverished nation, President Benigno Aquino said on Monday.
