The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. – Benjamin Franklin
See also: David de Rothschild Shocked By Amount Of Plastic In Ocean
David de Rothschild (front right), Plastiki’s skipper, shakes hands with Ian Kiernan, founder and chair of Clean Up Australia and Clean Up the World. Source: Philly.com
Bonus:
Pope Benedict XVI and Tony Blair
See also: GLOBE MAGAZINE: OBAMA BORN IN AFRICA! WHY HIS PRESIDENCY IS ILLEGAL
With BP having poured nearly two million gallons of the dispersant known as Corexit into the Gulf of Mexico, many lawmakers and advocacy groups say the Obama administration is not being candid about the lethal effects of dispersants. We speak with Hugh Kaufman, a senior policy analyst at the EPA’s Office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response and a leading critic of the decision to use Corexit. [includes rush transcript]
SHARIF ADBEL KOUDDOUS: The Obama administration has given BP the go-ahead to keep its ruptured well sealed for another day despite worries about the well leaking some oil and methane gas. National Incident Commander Thad Allen said the seep was not cause for alarm. Meanwhile, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA, has released its analysis of BP’s data on the exposure of cleanup workers to the chemical dispersants being used in the Gulf. OSHA chief David Michaels told the environmental website Greenwire that, quote, “I think you can say exposures are low for workers. Exposures of workers on shore are virtually nonexistent. There are significant exposures near the source, and that’s to be expected given the work being done there. Those workers are given respiratory protection,” he said. But with BP having poured nearly two million gallons of the dispersant known as Corexit into the Gulf, many lawmakers and advocacy groups say the Obama administration is not being candid about the lethal effects of dispersants. At a Senate subcommittee hearing last week, Maryland Democrat Barbara Mikulski grilled administrators from the EPA about Corexit and said she didn’t want dispersants to be the Agent Orange of this oil spill.
AMY GOODMAN: Maryland Senator Barbara Mikulski. While concerns over the impact of chemical dispersants continue to grow, Gulf Coast residents are outraged by a recent announcement that the $20 billion government-administered claim fund will subtract money cleanup workers earn by working for the cleanup effort from any future claims. Fund administrator Kenneth Feinberg says the ruling will apply to anyone who participates in the Vessels of Opportunity program, which has employed hundreds of Gulf Coast residents left out of work because of the spill. It’s seen as an effort to limit the number of lawsuits against BP. We’re joined now by two guests on these two issues, on Corexit and the workers. Independent journalist Dahr Jamail is joining us from Tampa, Florida. He’s been reporting from the Gulf Coast for three weeks. His latest article at Truthout is called “BP’s Scheme to Swindle the ‘Small People.'” And from Washington, DC, we’re joined by Hugh Kaufman, a senior policy analyst at the EPA’s Office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response. He’s been a leading critic of the decision to use Corexit. We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Let’s begin with Hugh Kaufman. First of all, explain what Corexit is, the company that makes it, what’s in it, and your concerns.
HUGH KAUFMAN: Well, Corexit is one of a number of dispersants, that are toxic, that are used to atomize the oil and force it down the water column so that it’s invisible to the eye. In this case, these dispersants were used in massive quantities, almost two million gallons so far, to hide the magnitude of the spill and save BP money. And the government-both EPA, NOAA, etc.-have been sock puppets for BP in this cover-up. Now, by hiding the amount of spill, BP is saving hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars in fines, and so, from day one, there was tremendous economic incentive to use these dispersants to hide the magnitude of the gusher that’s been going on for almost three months.
Congressman Markey and Nadler, as well as Senator Mikulski, have been heroes in this respect. Congressman Markey made the BP and government put a camera down there to show the public the gusher. And when they did that, experts saw that the amount of material, oil being released, is orders of magnitudes greater than what BP and NOAA and EPA were saying. And the cover-up started to evaporate. But the use of dispersants has not. Consequently, we have people, wildlife-we have dolphins that are hemorrhaging.
People who work near it are hemorrhaging internally. And that’s what dispersants are supposed to do. EPA now is taking the position that they really don’t know how dangerous it is, even though if you read the label, it tells you how dangerous it is. And, for example, in the Exxon Valdez case, people who worked with dispersants, most of them are dead now. The average death age is around fifty. It’s very dangerous, and it’s an economic-it’s an economic protector of BP, not an environmental protector of the public.
Now, the one thing that I did want to mention to you, Amy, that’s occurred in most investigations, back even in the Watergate days, people said, “follow the money.” And that’s correct. In this case, you’ve got to follow the money. Who saves money by using these toxic dispersants? Well, it’s BP. But then the next question-I’ve only seen one article that describes it-who owns BP? And I think when you look and see who owns BP, you find that it’s the majority ownership, a billion shares, is a company called BlackRock that was created, owned and run by a gentleman named Larry Fink. And Vanity Fair just did recently an article about Mr. Fink and his connections with Mr. Geithner, Mr. Summers and others in the administration. So I think what’s needed, we now know that there’s a cover-up. Dispersants are being used. Congress, at least three Congress folks-Congressman Markey, Congressman Nadler and Senator Mikulski-are on the case. And I think the media now has to follow the money, just as they did in Watergate, and tell the American people who’s getting money for poisoning the millions of people in the Gulf.
If you run a website like Wikileaks, then you cannot possibly be that ignorant, unless you are highly paid to be that ignorant.
What about 9/11?
“I’m constantly annoyed that people are distracted by false conspiracies such as 9/11, when all around we provide evidence of real conspiracies, for war or mass financial fraud.”
What about the Bilderberg conference?
“That is vaguely conspiratorial, in a networking sense. We have published their meeting notes.”
Read moreWikileaks Founder Julian Assange on 9/11 and Bilderberg
Retired NASA Senior Executive Dwain Deets published his concerns on the matter at the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) as follows:
A Responsibility to Explain an Aeronautical Improbability
Dwain Deets
NASA Dryden Flight Research Center (Senior Executive Service – retired)
AIAA Associate FellowThe airplane was UA175, a Boeing 767-200, shortly before crashing into World Trade Center Tower 2. Based on analysis of radar data, the National Transportation and Safety Board reported the groundspeed just before impact as 510 knots. This is well beyond the maximum operating velocity of 360 knots, and maximum dive velocity of 410 knots. The possibilities as I see them are: (1) this wasn’t a standard 767-200; (2) the radar data was compromised in some manner; (3) the NTSB analysis was erroneous; or (4) the 767 flew well beyond its flight envelope, was controllable, and managed to hit a relatively small target. Which organization has the greater responsibility for acknowledging the elephant in the room? The NTSB, NASA, Boeing, or the AIAA? Have engineers authored papers, but the AIAA or NASA won’t publish them? Or, does the ethical responsibility lie not with organizations, but with individual aeronautical engineers? Have engineers just looked the other way?
The above entry remained at the moderated AIAA Aerospace America Forum for approximately two weeks before being removed without explanation. Click “Who is Ethically Responsible” submitted by Dwain Deets at the Pilots For 9/11 Truth Forum for discussion on this entry at AIAA.
Dwain Deets credentials and experience are as follows:
Dwain Deets
MS Physics, MS Eng
Former Director, Aerospace Projects, NASA Dryden Flight Research Center
Served as Director, Research Engineering Division at Dryden
Recipient of the NASA Exceptional Service Award
Presidential Meritorious Rank Award in the Senior Executive Service (1988)
Selected presenter of the Wright Brothers Lectureship in Aeronautics
Associate Fellow – American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA)
Included in “Who’s Who in Science and Engineering” 1993 – 2000
Former Chairman of the Aerospace Control and Guidance Systems
– Committee of the Society of Automotive Engineers
Former Member, AIAA Committee on Society and Aerospace Technology
37 year NASA career
Read moreNASA Flight Director: 9/11 Aircraft Speed Is The ‘Elephant In The Room’
Wikileaks and Julian Assange get way to much attention in the corporate media, that is controlled and censored by the elite.
I am not saying that Julian Assange is an agent, but I am 100% sure that these news are allowed to be published for a reason, otherwise the mass media would not cover the Afghanistan war logs like that.
See also:
– Afghanistan war logs: live blog (Guardian)
– Afghanistan war logs: US covered up fatal Taliban missile strike on Chinook (Guardian):
The US military covered up a reported surface-to-air missile strike by the Taliban that shot down a Chinook helicopter over Helmand in 2007 and killed seven soldiers, including a British military photographer, the war logs show.
The strike on the twin-rotor helicopter shows the Taliban enjoyed sophisticated anti-aircraft capabilities earlier than previously thought, casting new light on the battle for the skies over Afghanistan.
Hundreds of files detail the efforts of insurgents, who have no aircraft, to shoot down western warplanes. The war logs detail at least 10 near-misses by missiles in four years against coalition aircraft, one while refuelling at 11,000ft and another involving a suspected Stinger missile of the kind supplied by the CIA to Afghan rebels in the 1980s.
– Afghanistan war logs: Massive leak of secret files exposes truth of occupation (Guardian):
• Hundreds of civilians killed by coalition troops
• Covert unit hunts leaders for ‘kill or capture’
• Steep rise in Taliban bomb attacks on Nato
– Afghan war logs: inquiry launched into source of leaks (Telegraph)
– Pakistani spy agency denounces US intel docs (Guardian)
– Tens of thousands of alleged Afghan war documents go online (CNN):
“It is the total history of the Afghan war from 2004 to 2010, with some important exceptions — U.S. Special Forces, CIA activity and most of the activity of other non-U.S. groups,” Assange said.
– White House says Wikileaks is endangering lives (Independent)
White House national security adviser General Jim Jones stressed that the documents related to a period from January 2004 to December 2009, during the administration of President George Bush.
The White House today condemned whistleblower Wikileaks, accusing the website of putting the lives of US, UK and coalition troops in danger and threatening America’s national security of the US after it posted more than 90,000 leaked US military documents about the war in Afghanistan.
The documents have revealed unreported incidents of Afghan civilian killings and information about secret operations against Taliban leaders, as well as highlighting US fears that Pakistan’s intelligence service was aiding the Afghan uprising.
The White House “strongly” criticised the leaks in a statement, which it said, “could put the lives of Americans and our partners at risk, and threaten our national security”. It said that Wikileaks had made no effort to contact US security services, but insisted that what it called the “irresponsible leaks” would not “impact our ongoing commitment to deepen our partnerships with Afghanistan and Pakistan; to defeat our common enemies; and to support the aspirations of the Afghan and Pakistani people”.
Read moreThe Afghanistan War Logs: Wikileaks Condemned By White House Over War Documents
Taxpayer money at work!
European bureaucrats have set up a secretive fund of £400?million to pay for ‘crazy’ projects (AFP)
Researchers have unearthed a series of grants issued to schemes deemed “confidential” that have not been subject to outside scrutiny. Taxpayers’ money spent on the projects, many of which have been described as “crazy”, has increased since the onset of recession.
The schemes include £145,000 to print 736 postcards that “reflect the current problems in Europe that generate social exclusion” and £166,000 on a street circus project whose aim is to “strengthen international understanding”.
Producing the postcards in six EU countries cost nearly £200 per card.
According to a report by Open Europe, a UK-based think tank, the £400?million was allocated to projects originally deemed “confidential”. The projects have now been listed on the European Commission’s newly-created database of beneficiaries of EU funds.
Open Europe analysts said they had unearthed “some pretty outrageous stuff”.
Police officers patrol a street in Torreón, Mexico, after gunmen killed 17 people at a party on 18 July. (AP)
Guards and officials at a prison in northern Mexico allegedly let inmates out, lent them guns and sent them off in official vehicles to carry out drug-related killings, including the massacre of 17 people last week, federal prosecutors said yesterday.
After carrying out the killings the inmates would return to their cells, the office of Mexico’s attorney general said, a revelation that was shocking even for a country wearied by years of drug violence and corruption.
“According to witnesses, the inmates were allowed to leave with authorisation of the prison director … to carry out instructions for revenge attacks using official vehicles and using guards’ weapons for executions,” office spokesman Ricardo Najera said at a news conference in Mexico City.
The director of the prison in Gómez Palacio in Durango state and three other officials were placed under a form of house arrest pending further investigation. No charges have yet been filed.
Prosecutors said the prison-based hit squad is suspected in three mass shootings, including the 18 July attack on a party in the city of Torreón, which is near Gómez Palacio. In that incident, gunmen fired indiscriminately into a crowd of mainly young people in a rented hall, killing 17 people, including women.
 New powers: Police officers from European countries could soon be able to spy on and arrest Britons in the UK |
Ministers are ready to hand sweeping Big Brother powers to EU states so they can spy on British citizens.
Foreign police will be able to travel to the UK and take part in the arrest of Britons.
They will be able to place them under surveillance, bug telephone conversations, monitor bank accounts and demand fingerprints, DNA or blood samples.
Anyone who refuses to comply with a formal request for co-operation by a foreign-based force is likely to be arrested by UK officers.
The move will spark a damaging row with backbench Tory MPs opposed to giving such draconian powers to Brussels.
The Tories were opposed to the directive in opposition, saying it showed a ‘relish for surveillance and disdain for civil liberties’.
But ministers have made a dramatic U-turn since joining the pro-EU Lib Dems in government, and the wide-ranging powers are due to be approved later this week.
According to the campaign group Fair Trials International, under the new rules it would be possible, for example, for Spanish police investigating a murder in a nightclub to demand the ID of every British citizen who flew to the country in the month the offence took place.
They could also force the UK to search its DNA database – which contains nearly one million innocent people – and send samples belonging to anybody who was in Spain at the time.
Read moreUK Government Hands Over Big Brother Powers To Foreign Police
See also:
– Obama Bankster Bill Lets Banks Have US Over A Barrel Again (Telegraph)
U.S. Treasury in Washington
July 20 (Bloomberg) — U.S. taxpayers may be on the hook for as much as $23.7 trillion to bolster the economy and bail out financial companies, said Neil Barofsky, special inspector general for the Treasury’s Troubled Asset Relief Program.
The Treasury’s $700 billion bank-investment program represents a fraction of all federal support to resuscitate the U.S. financial system, including $6.8 trillion in aid offered by the Federal Reserve, Barofsky said in a report released today.
“TARP has evolved into a program of unprecedented scope, scale and complexity,” Barofsky said in testimony prepared for a hearing tomorrow before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
Treasury spokesman Andrew Williams said the U.S. has spent less than $2 trillion so far and that Barofsky’s estimates are flawed because they don’t take into account assets that back those programs or fees charged to recoup some costs shouldered by taxpayers.
“These estimates of potential exposures do not provide a useful framework for evaluating the potential cost of these programs,” Williams said. “This estimate includes programs at their hypothetical maximum size, and it was never likely that the programs would be maxed out at the same time.”
Barofsky’s estimates include $2.3 trillion in programs offered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., $7.4 trillion in TARP and other aid from the Treasury and $7.2 trillion in federal money for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, credit unions, Veterans Affairs and other federal programs.
Read moreTARP Watchdog Neil Barofsky: US Taxpayers On The Hook For $23.7 Trillion
The NHS faces extensive cuts
Some of the most common operations — including hip replacements and cataract surgery — will be rationed as part of attempts to save billions of pounds, despite government promises that front-line services would be protected.
Patients’ groups have described the measures as “astonishingly brutal”.
An investigation by The Sunday Telegraph has uncovered widespread cuts planned across the NHS, many of which have already been agreed by senior health service officials. They include:
* Restrictions on some of the most basic and common operations, including hip and knee replacements, cataract surgery and orthodontic procedures.
* Plans to cut hundreds of thousands of pounds from budgets for the terminally ill, with dying cancer patients to be told to manage their own symptoms if their condition worsens at evenings or weekends.
* The closure of nursing homes for the elderly.
* A reduction in acute hospital beds, including those for the mentally ill, with targets to discourage GPs from sending patients to hospitals and reduce the number of people using accident and emergency departments.
* Tighter rationing of NHS funding for IVF treatment, and for surgery for obesity.
* Thousands of job losses at NHS hospitals, including 500 staff to go at a trust where cancer patients recently suffered delays in diagnosis and treatment because of staff shortages.
* Cost-cutting programmes in paediatric and maternity services, care of the elderly and services that provide respite breaks to long-term carers.
The Sunday Telegraph found the details of hundreds of cuts buried in obscure appendices to lengthy policy and strategy documents published by trusts. In most cases, local communities appear to be unaware of the plans.
Dr Peter Carter, the head of the Royal College of Nursing, said he was “incredibly worried” about the disclosures.
Read moreUK: Gigantic Health Cuts Despite Government Promises
The New World Order is not a conspiracy …
– President Dmitry Medvedev Calls For ‘New World Economic Order’
– ECB President Jean-Claude Trichet calls for ‘Global Governance’ at the Council on Foreign Relations
– EU Draws Up Plans For Single ‘Economic Government’
– Gordon Brown Praises New World Order (19 Feb 2010)
… and it is now that we have to create another reality …
– UK Government Hands Over Big Brother Powers To Foreign Police
– Obama Administration Plans Secret Big Brother ‘Perfect Citizen’ Net Surveillance
– Obama Internet ‘Kill Switch’ Approved By Senate Committee
– Big Brother DHS And DOD Want To Open US Skies To Spy Drones
– EUROPOL: New EU Gestapo Spies on Britons
– Big Brother: UK Police Plan to Use Military-Style Spy Drones
… or live like slaves.
Added: 13. July 2010
Read moreDavid Icke: Message For The Uniforms And The Dark Suits
Don’t miss: Al Gore’s Enormous Carbon Footprint
Herding cattle in Chile as South America suffers one of its coldest winters for years (Reuters)
Ever more risibly desperate become the efforts of the believers in global warming to hold the line for their religion, after the battering it was given last winter by all those scandals surrounding the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
One familiar technique they use is to attribute to global warming almost any unusual weather event anywhere in the world. Last week, for instance, it was reported that Russia has recently been experiencing its hottest temperatures and longest drought for 130 years. The head of the Russian branch of WWF, the environmental pressure group, was inevitably quick to cite this as evidence of climate change, claiming that in future “such climate abnormalities will only become more frequent”. He didn’t explain what might have caused the similar hot weather 130 years ago.
Meanwhile, notably little attention has been paid to the disastrous chill which has been sweeping South America thanks to an inrush of air from the Antarctic, killing hundreds in the continent’s coldest winter for years.
Goldman Sachs received a $12.9 billion payout from the government’s bailout of AIG, which was at one time the world’s largest insurance company.
Goldman Sachs sent $4.3 billion in federal tax money to 32 entities, including many overseas banks, hedge funds and pensions, according to information made public Friday night.
Goldman Sachs disclosed the list of companies to the Senate Finance Committee after a threat of subpoena from Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Ia.
Asked the significance of the list, Grassley said, “I hope it’s as simple as taxpayers deserve to know what happened to their money.”
He added, “We thought originally we were bailing out AIG. Then later on … we learned that the money flowed through AIG to a few big banks, and now we know that the money went from these few big banks to dozens of financial institutions all around the world.”
Read moreGoldman Sachs Reveals That Bailout Cash Went Overseas
“Because of this law, the American people will never again be asked to foot the bill for Wall Street’s mistakes,” Obama boomed at the schmaltzy signing ceremony, amid bursts of applause.
“These reforms will put a stop to a lot of the bad loans that fuelled this debt-based bubble,” the President gushed to America and the rest of the world. “This bill also empowers consumerse_SLpsdelivering the strongest consumer financial protections in history.”
It would be reassuring if we could agree with Obama, concluding that Dodd-Frank will help to prevent the next systemic crisis and associated bail-out of “too-big-to-fail” banks. Reassuring, but wrong.
For despite some marginal regulatory improvements, this is no Rooseveltian legislative milestone. Amid the hype and back-slapping of last week’s launch, the sad reality is that Dodd-Frank fails to address the fundamental problems that resulted in the sub-prime fiasco and the related damage to not just America, but the entire global economy.
The inherent feebleness of this door-stopping bundle of statute and its lack of desperately needed substance, was brilliantly captured by Laurence Kotlikoff, a highly-respected professor of economics at Boston University. “This law is like being invited to dinner and served pictures of food,” Kotlikoff remarked.
It would be tempting to smile at such a wry observation if the situation it described wasn’t so depressing. For what the US political establishment’s non-response to the credit crunch illustrates is this: such is the lobbying power of the big Wall Street institutions that they not only caused a global economic crisis and then forced the US government to pay for a massive bail-out, but then used a slice of that bail-out cash to bribe politicians with campaign donations in order to block rule changes that might prevent a repeat performance.
That leaves the politicians and high-flying bankers happy, of course, while regular citizens – and their children and grandchildren – foot the multi-billion dollar bill.
Read moreObama Bankster Bill Lets Banks Have US Over A Barrel Again
Update:
– Hawaii Official Now Swears: No Obama Birth Certificate Exists
Can’t view the Globe article here:
“The content of this website is not available in your area.”
Please leave a comment in which countries you can or cannot view the Globe article.
Not sure why Globe is just now running this story. The Obama Kenyan Registration of Birth that is now running on the front page of Globe appears to be the one Attorney Orly Taitz released last year. It is important to note that when Atty Taitz first posted that online the Obot’s quickly photoshopped one of their own with false info to put disinformation out that it was fake. It must also be noted that no Court or any Legal Body deemed that document or the Lucas Smith document real or fake.
Posted below the Globe snippet is the purported ‘Coast Province Certified Copy of Registration of Birth’ for Barack Obama which was obtained by Attorney Taitz. Below that is the purported Kenyan Certificate of Birth obtained by Lucas Smith.
Via the Globe; – Obama African Birth Certificate! –
Barack Obama’s presidency is illegal! That’s what political insiders are saying after a shocking birth certificate from a hospital in Kenya reveals America’s Commander-in-Chief was born in Africa! GLOBE has all the explosive details you can’t afford to miss! Source; http://www.globemagazine.com/story/529
(Click on image to enlarge.)
Obama Kenyan Birth Certificate, Hospital Version, From Lucas Smith –
Official Hawaii Certificate of Live Birth vs Obama’s Certification of Live Birth
Read moreGLOBE MAGAZINE: OBAMA BORN IN AFRICA! WHY HIS PRESIDENCY IS ILLEGAL
The Active Denial System will soon be needed in the US.
Related article:
– The ‘Active Denial System’: The ‘Pain Ray’ Weapon That’s A Hot Topic
Pulled out: The Active Denial System, or ‘Pain Ray’ has been withdrawn from Afghanistan by the US military
A ‘pain ray’ that blasts the enemy with unbearable heat waves hasbeen pulled out of Afghanistan by the US military.
The Active Denial System (ADS), which cost about £42?million to develop, was on the brink of being deployed to disperse members of the Taliban as they attacked US forces.
The weapon, which causes immense pain to subjects but no lasting physical damage, was pulled from the war zone last week but US army chiefs in Afghanistan have stayed silent about the reason for the U-turn.
The ADS, which has been in development for almost 20 years, works by firing a beam of high-frequency waves at the speed of light.
Read moreUS Military Withdraws ‘Pain Ray’ From Afghan War Zone
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Photo: EPA
Legally binding measures to be agreed on Monday will go far beyond existing United Nations measures against Iran’s nuclear programme.
Officials said the impact of the measure would be to starve key companies and banks of access to the European market. Significant levels of trade with Germany and Italian would be cut off.
The measures reinforces a United Nations sanctions resolution passed in June
“I think the Iranians will be surprised by the extent of the measures,” another diplomat said. “These measures go significantly beyond the scope of the resolution.”
Iran’s important energy industry will be “hit hard” by a total European prohibition on all investment, sale of equipment and investment in refining and liquid natural gas production.
New banking measures will require all Iranian banks, or financial institutions connected with Iran, to get prior notification of all transactions over £8,400 and authorisation for any transfers over £33,600.
Additionally, a “very significant” extended travel ban and asset freeze list, covering over 40 Iranian firms and officials, will be published on Tuesday. All Iranian air cargo flights, in and out of the EU, will also be banned.
Read moreEU Plans ‘Toughest Ever’ Package Of Sanctions Against Iran
See also:
– And Now: BP Plans Deep-Water Drilling Off Libya
– Rachel Maddow: The Gulf Of Mexico Déjà Vu (Must See!)
The oil rig Deepwater Horizon catches fire, Port of Venice, Gulf of Mexico Photo: REX
Michael Williams told a US government investigation that the alarm – which could have detected a build-up in natural gas and closed parts of the rig – was disarmed so it would not wake people up at night.
The BP rig exploded in April, killing 11 people and triggering a leak that released tens of thousands of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico.
Speculation was mounting on Friday that Tony Hayward, BP’s chief excutive, would stand down on Tuesday after facing increasing pressure from the board as a result of the spill.
Sky News reported that the British oil giant – which has seen £46bn wiped from its market value since the Deepwater Horizon rig explosion on April 20 which triggered the spill – may announce its chief executive’s exit as early as Tuesday, when the company is due to publish its interim results.
Mr Williams, who is suing the owners of the rig, claims that he raised his concerns about the alarm and other alleged safety failings with his managers.
“The general alarm was inhibited,” said Mr Williams, who worked for Transocean, the Geneva-based company that owned the rig. He claimed that the system had been disabled because rig managers “did not want people woken up at 3am with false alarms”.
The alarm was designed to automatically shut air vents into engine rooms. During the accident, natural gas is believed to have been sucked into the engines, causing them to speed up and explode.
Mr Williams alleged the system was a “wreck” when he started working on the rig in 2009, with many faulty detectors. He said he tried to repair it, but faced problems with malfunctioning equipment.
Read moreGulf of Mexico BP Oil Rig Blast: Safety Alarm Was Off
BP drilling in Libya comes amid international concerns about Lockerbie (AP)
The plans, reported in the Financial Times, come in the shadow of controversy, as the oil giant faces new scrutiny of its 2007 deal to acquire gas and oil fields off the Libyan coast at a cost of $900 million.
At a depth of more than 1700 metres below sea level, the new site in Libya’s Gulf of Sirte will be 200 metres deeper than the Gulf of Mexico well that exploded on April 20, killing 11 oil workers and causing immeasurable environmental damage.
The 2007 agreement has since come under fire from American politicians, after BP revealed that it lobbied the UK government over a prisoner transfer agreement between Britain and Libya.
Despite increased pressure from senior officials, including US President Barack Obama, the UK oil group has vigorously denied any involvement in the release of Libyan terrorist Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, after the Lockerbie bomber was freed by the Scottish government on compassionate grounds.
The issue was raised last week when British Prime Minister David Cameron met President Obama for talks in Washington. Mr Cameron has indicated there could be an inquiry into the release.
BP maintains it was “not involved in any discussions with the UK government or the Scottish government about the release of Mr al-Megrahi”.
A US senator has begged Alex Salmond, Scotland’s First Minister, to assist a hearing into the release of the Lockerbie bomber.
In a letter, Frank Lautenberg said he was “pleading” with the Scottish government to reconsider its decision not to send officials to a hearing into the release of Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi.
The company’s Chief Executive, Tony Hayward, is expected to appear before US Senators on Thursday to deny the claims.
A spokesman for BP confirmed the Libya drilling, saying: “Drilling at the new site will start within a few weeks”.
A man poses by St Peter’s Basilica in Rome while reading a magazine story about gay priests. (AFP/Getty Images)
The Catholic church, already reeling from a string of clerical sex abuse scandals, is facing new embarrassment after an Italian magazine published an investigation into what it termed the double life of gay priests in Rome.
Using hidden cameras, the weekly Panorama, owned by Italy’s prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, captured priests visiting gay clubs and bars and having sex. The Vatican does not condemn homosexuals, but it teaches that gay sex is “intrinsically disordered”. In one of his earliest moves, pope Benedict barred actively gay men from studying for the priesthood.
The diocese of Rome lashed out at the prime minister’s magazine, saying its aim was “to create scandal [and] defame all priests”. But it also urged gay clerics to leave both the closet and the priesthood.
South Koreans take a look at the US nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS George Washington at Busan. the ship is about to take part in large-scale military exercises in the Sea of Japan (AP)
North Korea has threatened to use its “nuclear deterrent” in response to planned military exercises by the US and South Korea this weekend.
The regime promised a “retaliatory sacred war” amid increased tensions on the Korean peninsula over the March sinking of a South Korean navy vessel, which Seoul and Washington blame on Pyongyang.
North Korea’s National Defence Commission (NDC), headed by leader Kim Jong-il, issued the threat today for what it called a second “unpardonable” provocation for again being blamed for the incident in which 46 sailors died.
“The army and people of the [North] will legitimately counter with their powerful nuclear deterrence the largest-ever nuclear war exercises,” the commission said in a statement run on the state-run Korean Central News Agency.
Pyongyang routinely threatens war when its southern neighbour and the US hold joint military exercises. South Korea’s defence ministry said no unusual North Korean military movements were detected.
Operation Invincible Spirit, which begins tomorrow, will involve 8,000 US and South Korean troops, 200 aircraft and 20 ships, including the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier the USS George Washington.
“The more desperately the US imperialists brandish their nukes and the more zealously their lackeys follow them, the more rapidly the [North’s] nuclear deterrence will be bolstered up along the orbit of self-defence and the more remote the prospect for the denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula will be become,” the NDC statement said.
Read moreNorth Korea Threatens ‘Nuclear War’ Over US-South Korean Wargames
Related article:
– FDIC: ‘Problem’ Banks at 775, or 10 Percent of All US Banks
The FDIC is broke … and of course your money is safe and insured up to $250,000.
Sure! Trust the government!
* Seven small banks closed
* Faster pace of failures than 2009
WASHINGTON, July 23 (Reuters) – U.S. bank failures reached 103 so far in 2010 on Friday as regulators seized seven small banks, a faster pace of closures than last year when the century mark was not reached until October.
Bank failures are expected to peak this quarter, with the industry slowly recovering from large portfolios of bad loans, many tied to commercial real estate.
The banks seized on Friday were Sterling Bank of Lantana, Florida; Crescent Bank and Trust Company of Jasper, Georgia; Williamsburg First National Bank of Kingstree, South Carolina; Thunder Bank of Sylvan Grove, Kansas; Community Security Bank of New Prague, Minnesota; SouthwestUSA Bank of Las Vegas, Nevada and Home Valley Bank of Cave Junction, Oregon, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.
The largest of the seven banks was Crescent Bank and Trust with 11 branches and about $1.01 billion in total assets and $965.7 million in total deposits. The smallest was Thunder Bank with just two branches and $32.6 million in total assets and $28.5 million in deposits.
The FDIC estimated the seven failures would add about $431 million to the tab for its deposit insurance fund.
Read moreFDIC Seizes 7 More Banks; US Bank Failures In 2010 Rise To 103
HARTFORD, Conn.—National Weather Service officials have confirmed that tornadoes touched down in four Connecticut towns during severe storms on Wednesday that knocked over scores of trees and wires across the state.
Meteorologists surveyed the damage Thursday and determined that tornadoes touched down in Litchfield, Thomaston, Bristol and the Terryville section of Plymouth. No injuries were reported.
Added: 11. July 2010
See also:
– Iraq: Fallujah Doctors Report Dramatic Rise In Birth Defects (BBC)
– The curse of Fallujah: Women warned not to have babies because of rise in birth defects since U.S. assault (Daily Mail)
I am repeating myself here, but …
Don’t tell me that DU can be shielded by a piece of paper and is therefore no danger to health.
How long can you hold your breath or live without food and water?
– What Depleted Uranium Does to Children in Iraq: Japanese Journalist
– Depleted Uranium Shells Worse Than Nuclear Weapons:
Inhaled or ingested DU particles are highly toxic, and DU has been classified as an illegal weapon of mass destruction by the United Nations.
“More than ten times the amount of radiation released during atmospheric testing [of nuclear bombs] has been released from DU weaponry since 1991,” said Leuren Moret, a U.S. nuclear scientist. “The genetic future of the Iraqi people, for the most part, is destroyed. The environment now is completely radioactive.”
“Because DU has a half-life of 4.5 billion years, the Middle East will, for all practical purposes, be radioactive forever.”
The elite criminals that control the US have destroyed Iraq forever. Even Hitler, Stalin and Mao begin to pale against such a crime against humanity.
An infant born with just one eye battling to stay alive in the Fallujah clinic
The Iraqi city of Fallujah continues to suffer the ghastly consequences of a US military onslaught in late 2004.
According to the authors of a new study, “Cancer, Infant Mortality and Birth Sex-Ratio in Fallujah, Iraq 2005–2009,” the people of Fallujah are experiencing higher rates of cancer, leukemia, infant mortality, and sexual mutations than those recorded among survivors in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the years after those Japanese cities were incinerated by US atomic bomb strikes in 1945.
The epidemiological study, published in the International Journal of Environmental Studies and Public Health (IJERPH), also finds the prevalence of these conditions in Fallujah to be many times greater than in nearby nations.
The assault on Fallujah, a city located 43 miles west of Baghdad, was one of the most horrific war crimes of our time. After the population resisted the US-led occupation of Iraq—a war of neo-colonial plunder launched on the basis of lies—Washington determined to make an example of the largely Sunni city. This is called “exemplary” or “collective” punishment and is, according to the laws of war, illegal.
The new public health study of the city now all but proves what has long been suspected: that a high proportion of the weaponry used in the assault contained depleted uranium, a radioactive substance used in shells to increase their effectiveness.
In a study of 711 houses and 4,843 individuals carried out in January and February 2010, authors Chris Busby, Malak Hamdan, Entesar Ariabi and a team of researchers found that the cancer rate had increased fourfold since before the US attack five years ago, and that the forms of cancer in Fallujah are similar to those found among the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bomb survivors, who were exposed to intense fallout radiation.
In Fallujah the rate of leukemia is 38 times higher, the childhood cancer rate is 12 times higher, and breast cancer is 10 times more common than in populations in Egypt, Jordan, and Kuwait. Heightened levels of adult lymphoma and brain tumors were also reported. At 80 deaths out of every 1,000 births, the infant mortality rate in Fallujah is more than five times higher than in Egypt and Jordan, and eight times higher than in Kuwait.
Strikingly, after 2005 the proportion of girls born in Fallujah has increased sharply. In normal populations, 1050 boys are born for every 1000 girls. But among those born in Fallujah in the four years after the US assault, the ratio was reduced to 860 boys for every 1000 female births. This alteration is similar to gender ratios found in Hiroshima after the US atomic attack of 1945.
The most likely reason for the change in the sex ratio, according to the researchers, is the impact of a major mutagenic event—likely the use of depleted uranium in US weapons. While boys have one X-chromosome, girls have a redundant X-chromosome and can therefore absorb the loss of one chromosome through genetic damage.
“This is an extraordinary and alarming result,” said Busby, a professor of molecular biosciences at the University of Ulster and director of scientific research for Green Audit, an independent environmental research group. “To produce an effect like this, some very major mutagenic exposure must have occurred in 2004 when the attacks happened. We need urgently to find out what the agent was. Although many suspect uranium, we cannot be certain without further research and independent analysis of samples from the area.”
Busby told an Italian television news station, RAI 24, that the “extraordinary” increase in radiation-related maladies in Fallujah is higher than that found in the populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki after the US atomic strikes of 1945. “My guess is that this was caused by depleted uranium,” he said. “They must be connected.”
The US military uses depleted uranium, also known as spent nuclear fuel, in armor-piercing shells and bullets because it is twice as dense as lead. Once these shells hit their target, however, as much as 40 percent of the uranium is released in the form of tiny particles in the area of the explosion. It can remain there for years, easily entering the human bloodstream, where it lodges itself in lymph glands and attacks the DNA produced in the sperm and eggs of affected adults, causing, in turn, serious birth defects in the next generation.
The research is the first systematic scientific substantiation of a body of evidence showing a sharp increase in infant mortality, birth defects, and cancer in Fallujah.
In October of 2009, several Iraqi and British doctors wrote a letter to the United Nations demanding an inquiry into the proliferation of radiation-related sickness in the city:
“Young women in Fallujah in Iraq are terrified of having children because of the increasing number of babies born grotesquely deformed, with no heads, two heads, a single eye in their foreheads, scaly bodies or missing limbs. In addition, young children in Fallujah are now experiencing hideous cancers and leukemias.…
“In September 2009, Fallujah General Hospital had 170 newborn babies, 24 percent of whom were dead within the first seven days, a staggering 75 percent of the dead babies were classified as deformed.…
Read moreU.S. War Crimes: Cancer rate in Fallujah worse than Hiroshima
