» Certified Lies: Detecting and Defeating Government Interception Attacks Against SSL

Cloud Privacy{PDF}:

This paper introduces the compelled certificate creation attack, in which government agencies may compel a certificate authority to issue false SSL certificates that can be used by intelligence agencies to covertly intercept and
hijack individuals’ secure Web-based communications. Although we do not have direct evidence that this form of active surveillance is taking place in the wild, we show how products already on the market are geared and marketed towards this kind of use—suggesting such attacks may occur in the future, if they are not already occurring. Finally, we introduce a lightweight browser add-on that detects and thwarts such attacks.

Related:Governments Using Forged SSL Certificates for Man in the Middle Attack on“Secure” Web Sessions

Research Credit: neverwas

Source

» Utah City May Use Blimp as Anti-Crime Spy in the Sky

Reuters:

A proposed unmanned floating airship surveillance system is being hailed by city officials in Ogden, Utah as one way to fight crime in its neighborhoods.

“We believe it will be a deterrent to crime when it is out and about and will help us solve crimes more quickly when they do occur,” Ogden City Mayor Matthew Godfrey told Reuters.

The airship entails military technology now available to local law enforcement, he said.

Research Credit: T

Source

» Not The Onion: NSA Turns to Smart Phones for Recruitment

Defense Systems:

Having a smart phone may give you an advantage if you’re looking for a job with the National Security Agency. The agency on Jan. 13 announced the launch of two new smartphone applications that are part of NSA’s largest hiring effort in recent years.

The NSA Career Links Smartphone application—which is available for download through iTunes—delivers real-time NSA updates directly to the user’s iPhone. This includes information about available employment opportunities, career fairs, and agency news. Users can also view videos highlighting NSA employee experiences, according to an agency announcement.

NSA is also employing smart phone tagging on many of its print-based recruitment advertisements. That will allow smart-phone users to scan tags in the print ads, which will then show them a video connected to the ad.

Related:The CIA and NSA Want You to Be Their Friend on Facebook

Source

» JTF2 Command‘Encouraged’War crimes, Soldier Alleges

CBC:

A member of Canada’s elite special forces unit says he felt his peers were being“encouraged” by the Canadian Forces chain of command to commit war crimes in Afghanistan, according to new documents obtained by CBC News.

The documents from the military ombudsman’s office show the member of the covert unit Joint Task Force 2, or JTF2, approached the watchdog in June 2008 to report the allegations of wrongdoing he had first made to his superior officers in 2006.

The soldier told the ombudsman’s office“that although he reported what he witnessed to his chain of command, he does not believe they are investigating, and are being‘very nice to him,’” according to the documents, which CBC News obtained through access to information.

As such, the soldier alleged, the chain of command helped create an atmosphere that tolerated war crimes.

The ombudsman’s documents state the soldier was subsequently directed to the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service, CFNIS, which in turn launched its own investigation.

The CFNIS told the ombudsman the investigation was“now their No. 1 priority.”

Related:U.S. Soldier Who Felt Bad About Slaughter of Civilians in Iraq:“I was told that I needed to get the sand out of my vagina”

Source

» AIRprint Device Reads Fingerprints from Two Meters Away

Technology Review:

Over the years, fingerprinting has evolved from an inky mess to pressing fingers on sensor screens to even a few touch-free systems that work at a short distance. Now a company has developed a prototype of a device that can scan fingerprints from up to two meters away, an approach that could prove especially useful at security checkpoints in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.

The device, called AIRprint, is being developed by Advanced Optical Systems (AOS). It detects fingerprints by shining polarized light onto a person’s hand and analyzing the reflection using two cameras configured to detect different polarizations.

Joel Burcham, director for projects at the Huntsville, Alabama-based company, says AIRprint could help make authorization more efficient in lots of settings. Instead of punching a keypad code or pressing fingers to a scanner, individuals could simply hold up a hand and walk toward a security door while the device checks their identity.“We’re looking at places where the standard methods are a hassle,” says Burcham. For instance, AIRprint could be linked to a timecard system, he says, to help avoid a logjam at manufacturing plants at the start or end of the workday.

Slightly smaller than a square tissue box, AIRprint houses two 1.3 megapixel cameras and a source of polarized light. One camera receives horizontally polarized light, while the other receives vertically polarized light. When light hits a finger, the ridges of the fingerprint reflect one polarization of light, while the valleys reflect another.“That’s where the real kicker is, because if you look at an image without any polarization, you can kind of see fingerprints, but not really well,” says Burcham. By separating the vertical and the horizontal polarization, the device can overlap those images to produce an accurate fingerprint, which is fed to a computer for verification.

Source

» Blackwater’s Prince Building Mercenary Force with Apartheid-Era‘Hit Squad’Officer

Raw Story:

According to news reports published Thursday, Prince has partnered with an African-based security company, Saracen International, to win security contracts from the Somali government that would see the mercenaries fight the on-land part of the war against Somali high-seas pirates, and would also go after al-Shabab, the Islamist militant group that has the Somali government cornered in parts of Mogadishu, the capital.

According to the New York Times’ Mark Mazzetti and Eric Schmitt, Saracen’s head is Lafras Luitingh, a former officer in South Africa’s Civil Cooperation Bureau. During the apartheid era, the CCB acted as a hit squad, killing or attempting to kill anti-apartheid dissidents.

After apartheid ended, South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission found the CCB guilty of numerous killings. It has also been alleged that the CCB poisoned the water supply at a Namibian refugee camp, bombed a South African kindergarten, and even attempted to bewitch Bishop Desmond Tutu with a baboon fetus.

Luitingh was evidently a major in the CCB, and was in charge of its Zimbabwe operations.

Source

» Bankruptcy Considered for States

New York Times:

Policy makers are working behind the scenes to come up with a way to let states declare bankruptcy and get out from under crushing debts, including the pensions they have promised to retired public workers.

Unlike cities, the states are barred from seeking protection in federal bankruptcy court. Any effort to change that status would have to clear high constitutional hurdles because the states are considered sovereign.

But proponents say some states are so burdened that the only feasible way out may be bankruptcy, giving Illinois, for example, the opportunity to do what General Motors did with the federal government’s aid.

Beyond their short-term budget gaps, some states have deep structural problems, like insolvent pension funds, that are diverting money from essential public services like education and health care. Some members of Congress fear that it is just a matter of time before a state seeks a bailout, say bankruptcy lawyers who have been consulted by Congressional aides.

Bankruptcy could permit a state to alter its contractual promises to retirees, which are often protected by state constitutions, and it could provide an alternative to a no-strings bailout.Along with retirees, however, investors in a state’s bonds could suffer, possibly ending up at the back of the line as unsecured creditors.

Source

» Atrocities at Philadelphia Abortion Clinic

MSNBC:

A doctor whose abortion clinic was a filthy, foul-smelling“house of horrors” that was overlooked by regulators for years was charged Wednesday with murder, accused of delivering seven babies alive and then using scissors to kill them.

Hundreds of other babies likely died in the squalid clinic that Dr. Kermit Gosnell ran from 1979 to 2010, Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams said at a news conference.

“My comprehension of the English language can’t adequately describe the barbaric nature of Dr. Gosnell,” he added.

Williams said he might seek the death penalty for Gosnell, who with nine of his associates, including his wife, was arrested on Wednesday.

Gosnell was charged with murder, infanticide, conspiracy, abortion at 24 or more weeks and other charges.

Pennsylvania law prohibits abortion after 24 weeks except to save the life of the mother or avoid serious health risk to her.

In a nearly 300-page grand jury report filled with ghastly, stomach-turning detail, prosecutors saidPennsylvania regulators ignored complaints of barbaric conditions at Gosnell’s clinic, which catered to poor, immigrant and minority women in the city’s impoverished West Philadelphia section.

Prosecutors called the gruesome case a“complete regulatory collapse.”

“Pennsylvania is not a third-world country,” the district attorney’s office declared in the report.“There were several oversight agencies that stumbled upon and should have shut down Kermit Gosnell long ago.”

Gosnell, 69, was arrested and charged with eight counts of murder altogether in the alleged killings of seven babies and the death of a woman from an overdose of painkillers. Nine of Gosnell’s employees— including his wife, a cosmetologist — also were charged.

Prosecutors said Gosnell made millions of dollars over three decades performing thousands of dangerous abortions, many of them illegal late-term procedures. His clinic had no trained nurses or medical staff other than Gosnell, a family physician not certified in obstetrics or gynecology, prosecutors said.

At least two women died from the procedures, while scores more were injured from perforated bowels, cervixes and uteruses, authorities said.

In a typical late-term abortion, the fetus is dismembered in the uterus and then removed in pieces. That is more common than the procedure opponents call“partial-birth abortion,” in which the fetus is only partially extracted before being destroyed. Prosecutors said Gosnell instead delivered many of the babies alive.

He“induced labor, forced the live birth of viable babies in the sixth, seventh, eighth month of pregnancy and then killed those babies by cutting into the back of the neck with scissors and severing their spinal cord,” District Attorney Seth Williams said.

Gosnell referred to the practice as“snipping,” prosecutors said.

Prosecutors estimated Gosnell ended hundreds of pregnancies by cutting the spinal cords, but they said couldn’t prosecute more cases because he destroyed files.

“These killings became so routine that no one could put an exact number on them,” the grand jury report said.“They were considered‘standard procedure.’”

Defense attorney William J. Brennan, who represented Gosnell during the investigation, said:“Obviously, these allegations are very, very serious.”

Authorities raided Gosnell’s clinic early last year in search of controlled drug violations and stumbled upon“a house of horrors,” Williams said. Bags and bottles holding aborted fetuses“were scattered throughout the building,” the district attorney said.“There were jars, lining shelves, with severed feet that he kept for no medical purpose.”

Prosecutors said the place reeked of cat urine because of the animals that were allowed to roam freely, instruments were not properly sterilized, and disposable medical supplied were used over and over.

Gosnell didn’t advertise, but word got around. Women came from across the city, state and region for illegal late-term abortions, authorities said. They paid $325 for first-trimester abortions and $1,600 to $3,000 for abortions up to 30 weeks. The clinic took in $10,000 to $15,000 a day, authorities said.

“People knew near and far that if you needed a late-term abortion you could go see Dr. Gosnell,” Williams said.

White women from the suburbs were ushered into a separate, slightly cleaner area because Gosnell believed they were more likely to file complaints, Williams said.

Source

» Largest Ever West Coat Rocket Launch Carried National Reconnaissance Office Satellite Into Space

AP:

The largest rocket ever launched from the West Coast blasted off Thursday with a classified defense satellite on board.

The 235-foot-tall Delta IV Heavy Launch Vehicle lifted off at 1:10 p.m. carrying a payload for the National Reconnaissance Office.

…

United Launch Alliance, the joint venture of rocket builders Lockheed Martin Corp. and Boeing Co., said in a statement that the launch was a success.

…

No payload details were released. The NRO operates satellites that provide information to the Central Intelligence Agency and Department of Defense.

Research Credit: eo

Source

» Winning Over Hearts and Minds: U.S. Turns Afghan Town to Dust with 49,200 Pounds of Ordnance

Foreign Policy:

On October 6, Flynn’s unit approved use of HIMARS, B-1, and A-10s to drop 49,200 lbs. of ordnance on the Taliban tactical base of Tarok Kalache, resulting in NO CIVCAS. Their clearance of Babur, Khosrow Sofla, Charqolba Sofla, and other villages commenced October 7, aided by USSF, ABP, and an additional infantry company from B/1-22 IN. Not long after, Flynn shared one insight into the burden of command:“I literally cringed when we dropped bombs on these places— not because I cared about the enemy we were killing or the HME destroyed, but I knew the reconstruction would consume the remainder of my deployed life.”

Flashback:“‘It became necessary to destroy the town to save it.’”

Source

» IRELAND: FIVE MINISTERS QUIT IN TWO DAYS

BBC:

There has been uproar in the Irish parliament after five ministers quit the cabinet inside two days, with a sixth expected to join them.

It was confirmed overnight that four had tendered their resignations, joining Foreign Minister Micheal Martin, who stood down on Tuesday.

The enterprise minister is said to be also planning to resign.

Prime Minister Brian Cowen, faced with a general election this spring, is expected to name a new cabinet.

His government has seen its support rapidly dwindle since negotiating an international rescue for the debt-ridden economy last year.
‘Call elections now’

The Dail (parliament) was suspended for 15 minutes during rowdy scenes after the opposition demanded the taoiseach (prime minister) come into the House and clarify who was in charge of the six ministries affected.

Labour leader Eamon Gilmore said that in 20 years he had never been in a situation where“we don’t know if we have a government, who’s in the government”.

Source

» What Is Plan B if China Dumps Its U.S. Debt? Try to Get Americans to Buy More

Reuters:

When borrowing money it’s always good to have a Plan B in case a big creditor pulls the plug. That should be true whether the sum is a few thousand dollars or about a trillion, the size of the United States government’s debt to China.

With Chinese President Hu Jintao due to arrive in Washington on Tuesday, it is worth asking about U.S. officials’ Plan B just in case one day relations take a surprise turn for the worse and Beijing dumps its holdings of U.S. treasuries.

China is officially the United States’ biggest foreign creditor, with roughly $900 billion in Treasury holdings— or over $1 trillion with Hong Kong’s holdings included.

That means it could do severe damage to U.S. debt markets if it suddenly started selling large amounts.

Most experts say if there were signs of this happening, the U.S. government would go for a combination of persuading Americans to buy more U.S. debt, the same way they did in World War II, and finding friendly foreign governments to make additional purchases.

Banks could be called on to increase their holdings of treasuries, and as a last resort, the Federal Reserve could also be called on to fill the gap, though this could risk turning any dollar weakness into a slump.

“The U.S. government should have and maybe still could call on the people of the U.S. to invest in U.S. debt,” said David Walker, a former U.S. comptroller general who heads an advocacy group calling on the government to curb the U.S. budget deficit and borrowings.

Source

» ECB Allows Irish Central Bank to Counterfeit 51 Billion Euros

Mish:

Ireland central bank counterfeited 51 billion Euros out of thin air. The amount is not backed by government bonds. Nor was it a loan from the ECB or anyone else. The money is counterfeit in every sense of the word.

Please consider the facts as depicted inCentral Bank steps up its cash support to Irish banks financed by institution printing own money.

The Irish Independent learnt last night that the Central Bank of Ireland is financing€51bn of an emergency loan programme by printing its own money.

The figures also provide the latest evidence that responsibility for funding Ireland’s broken banks is being pushed increasingly back on to Irish taxpayers. The loans are recorded by the Irish Central Bank under the heading“other assets”.

A spokesman for the ECB said the Irish Central Bank is itself creating the money it is lending to banks, not borrowing cash from the ECB to fund the payments. The ECB spokesman said the Irish Central Bank can create its own funds if it deems it appropriate, as long as the ECB is notified.

Research Credit: eo

Source

» Former Dictator‘Baby Doc’Duvalier Back in Haiti

Time:

In the past 12 months, Haiti— already the western hemisphere’s economic basket case— has suffered an epic earthquake that according to latest estimates killed more than 250,000 people and leveled the country’s infrastructure, a cholera epidemic that has claimed thousands more lives and a powder-keg political crisis tied to the fraud-tainted Nov. 28 presidential election.

All the country needed now was the return of a brutal exiled dictator.

This being Haiti, whose chronic tragedy is so often served with a helping of banana-republic bizarreness, that’s what it got Sunday afternoon when Jean-Claude“Baby Doc” Duvalier landed in Port-au-Prince for the first time since being thrown out of the country and packed off to France almost 25 years ago.“I came to help my country,” the 59-year-old former despot declared as some 2,000 of his supporters met him at the airport. But it’s hard to imagine how Duvalier’s reappearance, which Haitian officials insist took them by surprise, could do anything more than throw Haiti into even deeper turmoil as it tries to rebuild after last year’s disaster.

Source

» Venezuela Oil Reserves Surpass Saudi Arabia’s?

Reuters / CNBC:

Venezuela has overtaken Saudi Arabia as the world leader in oil reserves with certified deposits leaping to 297 billion barrels at the end of 2010, President Hugo Chavez’s government said Saturday.

Energy Minister Rafael Ramirez told Reuters that the new reserves, which pushed the total 41 percent higher than the previous year, were booked in the South American OPEC member’s vast Orinoco extra heavy crude belt.

A jubilant Chavez told parliament that Venezuela’s reserves now surpassed those of Saudi Arabia.

Source

» Blogger Who Opposed Congressman Gets Visit from FBI and Sheriff

KSPR:

A local blogger who was critical of Rep. Billy Long during last year’s congressional campaign has been interviewed by the FBI about his encounters with the congressman.

Clay Bowler, who lives in Christian County, says he was shocked to find an agent from the Federal Bureau of Investigation at his doorstep. Accompanying the agent was Greene County Sheriff Jim Arnott.

The agent asked Bowler if he was a threat to Long, a notion Bowler finds laughable.

“I’m not a threat to Billy Long,” Bowler said Thursday.“I find the whole thought very funny, because I’m such an advocate for constitutional rights that I would never do anything that would put in jeopardy those constitutional rights like the Second Amendment.”

Bowler published a blog in 2010— Long Is Wrong— and said he campaigned against Long because he didn’t think the Springfield businessman would be a good representative for southwest Missouri. Bowler took down the site after the November election, when Long defeated Democrat Scott Eckersley to replace outgoing Rep. Roy Blunt.

Bowler acknowledges confronting Long at some campaign events, but says he did not threaten Long.

Source

» Mitre/JASONs Advise Pentagon to Collect DNA and Complete Human Genome Sequences for All Military Personnel

Federation of American Scientists:

The technology for sequencing human DNA is advancing so rapidly and the cost is dropping so quickly that the number of individuals whose DNA has been mapped is expected to grow“from hundreds of people (current) to millions of people (probably within three years),” according toa new report to the Pentagon(pdf) from the JASON defense science advisory panel. The Defense Department should begin to take advantage of the advances in“personal genomics technology” by collecting genetic information on all military personnel, the panel advised.

…

For military purposes, it will be up to the Department of Defense“to determine which phenotypes… have special relevance to military performance and medical cost containment” and then presumably to select for those. “These phenotypes might pertain to short- and long-term medical readiness, physical and medical performance, and response to drugs, vaccines, and various environmental exposures…. More specifically, one might wish to know about phenotypic responses to battlefield stress, including post-traumatic stress disorder, the ability to tolerate conditions of sleep deprivation, dehydration, or prolonged exposure to heat, cold, orhigh altitude, or the susceptibility to traumatic bone fracture, prolonged bleeding, or slow wound healing.”

“Both offensive and defensive military operations may be impacted by the applications of personal genomics technologies through enhancement of the health, readiness, and performance of military personnel. It may be beneficial to know the genetic identities of an adversary and, conversely, to prevent an adversary from accessing the genetic identities of U.S. military personnel.”

Source

» The Chinese Eco-Disaster

Slate:

When Jonathan Watts was a child, he was warned:“If everyone in China jumps at exactly the same time, it will shake the earth off its axis and kill us all.” Three decades later, he stood in the gray sickly smog of Beijing, wheezing and hacking uncontrollably after a short run, and thought: The Chinese jump has begun. He had traveled 100,000 miles crisscrossing China, from Tibet to the deserts of Inner Mongolia, and everywhere he went, he discovered that the Chinese state had embarked on a massive program of ecological destruction. It has turned whole rivers poisonous to the touch, rendered entire areas cancer-ridden, transformed a fertile area almost twice the size of Britain into desert—and perhaps even triggered the worst earthquake in living memory.

Related:When A Billion Chinese Jump: How China Will Save Mankind— Or Destroy It by Jonathan Watts

Source

» Massacre of Civilians in Tunisia

AFP:

Anger over a crackdown on protesters in Tunisia grew Tuesday as a union official said 50 were killed in three days of unrest while artists and hospital staff joined demonstrations.

Locals reported looting in the town of Kasserine overnight and said demonstrators were fired upon from rooftops.

Meanwhile schools and universities across the country were shut as the government tried to quell weeks of protests centred on unemployment.

A union official told AFP that at least 50 people were killed over three days in Kasserine, one of three remote, farming areas with high rates of youth unemployment that have seen the worst of the violence.

“The number killed has passed 50,” said Sadok Mahmoudi from the regional branch of the Tunisian General Union of Labour (UGTT), citing tolls issued by medical staff in the regional hospital.

The Paris-based International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) said at least 35 people were killed in the weekend unrest.

“We have a list of the names of the 35,” FIDH president Souhayr Belhassen told AFP.“The total figure is higher. It’s somewhere around 50, but that’s an estimate.”

Source

» Portugal Might Be Next

AP:

Europe’s debt crisis flared up once again Monday, as Portugal’s borrowing rates briefly spiked to euro-era highs amid reports Germany and France are pushing it to accept outside help to avoid contagion to other countries.

The yield on Portuguese 10-year bonds— a key gauge of investor sentiment — touched a potentially unsustainable 7.18 percent at one stage Monday. It then fell back to 6.94 percent on speculation that the European Central Bank was intervening by buying bonds — yields drop as prices rise.

Source

» The Uncomfortable Truth About Mind Control: Is Free Will Simply a Myth?

Independent:

We have vain brains; we see ourselves as better than we really are. We like to think that we exercise free will, that put into a situation where we were challenged to do something we thought unacceptable then we’d refuse. But, if you believe that, then you are probably deluded.

I make this claim, based partly on the work of psychologist Stanley Milgram. Milgram devised and carried out ingenious experiments that exposed the frailty and self-delusion that are central to our lives. He showed how easy it is to make ordinary people do terrible things, that“evil” often happens for the most mundane of reasons.

Related:Human Resources

Research Credit: latincognito

Source

» Arizona: U.S. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords Shot in the Head

NPR:

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and six others died after a gunman opened fire at a public event on Saturday, the Pima County, Ariz., sheriff’s office confirms. The 40-year-old Democrat was outside a Tucson grocery store when a gunman ran up and began firing indiscriminately. The suspect was taken into police custody.

—End Update—

Via:NPR:

U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona was shot in the head outside a grocery store in Tucson while holding a public event, Arizona Public Media reported Saturday.

The Democrat, who was re-elected to her third term in November, was hosting a“Congress on Your Corner” event at the Safeway in northwest Tucson when a gunman ran up and started shooting, according to Peter Michaels, news director of Arizona Public Media.

At least nine other people, including members of her staff, were hurt. Giffords was transported to University Medical Center in Tucson. Her condition was not immediately known.

Giffords was talking to a couple when the suspect ran up firing indiscriminately and then ran off, Michaels said.

The suspect was tackled by a bystander and taken into custody. He was not injured.

Giffords was first elected to represent Arizona’s 8th District in 2006. The“Congress on Your Corner” events allow constituents to present their concerns directly to her.

Source

» Four Previously Abundant Species of Bumblebee Close to Disappearing in U.S.

Reuters / ABC:

Four previously abundant species of bumblebee are close to disappearing in the United States, researchers reported on Monday in a study confirming that the agriculturally important bees are being affected worldwide.

They documented a 96 percent decline in the numbers of the four species, and said their range had shrunk by as much as 87 percent.As with honeybees, a pathogen is partly involved, but the researchers also found evidence the bees are vulnerable to inbreeding caused by habitat loss.

“We provide incontrovertible evidence that multiple Bombus species have experienced sharp population declines at the national level,” the researchers reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, calling the findings“alarming.”

“These are one of the most important pollinators of native plants,” Sydney Cameron of the University of Illinois, Urbana, who led the study, said in a telephone interview.

Source

» Women: In Collapse, Be Ready to Use Lethal Force

AFP:

An Amnesty report laid bare Wednesday horrific accounts of rape in Haiti’s squalid refugee camps a year after a devastating quake left many struggling to rebuild their shattered lives.

They are women like Guerline, who two months after losing her husband when their home crumbled to the ground in the devastating quake, had to watch as her teenage daughter was raped in a makeshift tarpaulin camp in Port-au-Prince.

“Four men raped her. She is 13 years old,” Guerline told Amnesty International researchers, who compiled the report after interviewing more than 50 women and girls in Haiti’s post-quake camps.

“They told me that if I talked about it, they would kill me. They said that if I went to the police, they would shoot me dead.

“I’m scared. There is nowhere safe where I can live, so I had to keep quiet,” said Guerline, who, like all the women interviewed for the report, was given a false name to protect her from reprisals.

Guerline was raped on the same night as her daughter by hooded men in the tent city. She can’t get the events of that terrible night out of her head.

Amnesty said little is being done to help her and other victims of rape and sexual violence, old woes for Haiti that worsened after the earthquake killed over 230,000 people, injured 300,000 others and flattened large tracts of the capital.

Source

» Almost 60% of New Zealanders Are Maintaining Vegetable Gardens

New Zealand Herald:

Almost 60 per cent of New Zealanders say they have taken up vegetable gardening in the past 12 months.

A Herald-DigiPoll survey of 750 people found benefits in growing your own food during a tough economic year.

As the price of fruit and vegetables rose 12 per cent in the year to November in Statistics New Zealand figures, 57.6 per cent of people said they had started vegetable gardening.

Women were more likely to have taken it up, at 62.1 per cent, but the majority of men also answered that they had.

In Tauranga, a community garden with 57 plots was formally opened in November and the spaces were taken up within a month.

John Goldstone had no experience growing vegetables, but now tends his plot every day, usually after his work in engineering.

He has corn, lettuce, capsicum, spinach, onions, broccoli, silverbeet, strawberries, tomatoes, basil, rhubarb, radishes, jalapeno peppers and potatoes sprouting.

The garden charges $5 a week for enough space to feed a family of four all year round.

“I take a lot of pride in my garden,” Mr Goldstone said.“It’s great. It’s stress-free. It’s a really peaceful time.”

A $2 punnet of capsicum seedlings yielded 100 vegetables– at the supermarket it would have cost at least $200, he said.

There were solo mums at the gardens who had children with allergies. By growing their own vegetables, they knew exactly what had gone into them and could be assured they were safe.

The garden had three experienced gardeners who helped the rest with their plots, Mr Goldstone said.

It had been fresh fruit and vegetable prices that had pushed him to start gardening, but since he started, the joy of it had taken over, he said.

“I’m absolutely consumed by it,” Mr Goldstone said.

“The word’s out there. Everyone now knows. It’s amazing how many people are talking about growing your own vegetables.”

Warren Knight, one of the experienced gardeners, said growing vegetables had been saving many families $50 a week.

Extra produce was donated to food banks, and the community garden had also taken up a 16-year-old for community service who had become a great asset, Mr Knight said.

Elderly residents living nearby who had not grown vegetables for years had picked it up again.

“I’m amazed at the number of people who haven’t done any gardening before trying it out,” Mr Knight said.”But they’re lovingit.

“They’ll feed themselves over summer, and then feed themselves all year round.”

Related:Country Calendar: Growing Strong— Whangarei Growers Market

Source

» Recovery: Consumer Bankruptcies Highest in Five Years

Reuters:

The number of U.S. consumers who filed for bankruptcy protection in 2010 was the highest in five years, and the figure could rise as Americans struggle with excess debt in an uncertain economy, a report issued Monday said.

Roughly 1.53 million consumer bankruptcy petitions were filed in 2010, up 9 percent from 1.41 million in 2009, according to the American Bankruptcy Institute, citing data from the National Bankruptcy Research Center.

…

The full-year total is the highest since the 2.04 million recorded in 2005, when there was a rush to seek bankruptcy protection ahead of a stricter federal law taking effect in October of that year.

Source

» Weather Project in Abu Dhabi Resulted in Dozens of Man-Made Rainstorms

Telegraph:

A secret£7 million weather project in Abu Dhabi has resulted in dozens of man-made rainstorms, according to reports.

Scientists employed by Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, president of the UAE and leader of Abu Dhabi, successfully created more than 50 rainstorms in the state’s Al Ain region last year, mostly in July and August when there is virtually no rain at all. It is believed to be the first time the system has produced rain from clear skies.

They have been using giant ionisers, shaped like giant lampshades, to generate fields of negatively charged particles, which create cloud formation.

In a company video, seen by The Sunday Times, Helmut Fluhrer, the founder of Metro Systems International, the Swiss company in charge of the project, said:“We are currently operating our innovative rainfall enhancement technology, Weathertec, in the region of Al Ain in Abu Dhabid. We started in June 2010 and have achieved a number of rainfalls.”

Related:HAARP Weather

Source

»‘Crash Taxes’Are Growing in Popularity Among Cash-Strapped California Cities

Los Angeles Times:

One more good reason to drive safely in California: If you cause an accident, you may be on the hook to pay the police and firefighters who show up to help.

At least 50 cities in the state have adopted so-called crash-tax laws allowing local governments to seek reimbursement from insurance companies for the costs of sending public emergency crews to accident scenes. The fees can amount to hundreds or even thousands of dollars. If insurers don’t pay, cities can hire collection agents to seek payment from the motorists involved.

Source

» Ivory Coast on the‘Brink of Genocide’

Guardian:

Ivory Coast is on the“brink of genocide” and the world must take urgent action, the country’s new ambassador to the UN has warned. Youssoufou Bamba also claimed that some houses were being marked according to the tribe of the occupier.

The plea came as the UN accused the security forces of the incumbent president, Laurent Gbagbo, of blocking access to mass graves, saying investigators believed as many as 80 bodies may be in one building.

World leaders have stepped up pressure on Gbagbo to quit in favour of Alassane Ouattara, who is widely recognised as having won last month’s elections.

Speaking in New York, Bamba, who was appointed by Ouattara, described him as the rightful ruler of Ivory Coast.“He has been elected in a free, fair, transparent, democratic election,” he said.

“The result has been proclaimed by the independent electoral commission, certified by the UN. To me the debate is over, now you are talking about how and when Mr Gbagbo will leave office.”

Bamba alleged there had been a“massive violation of human rights”, with more than 170 people killed during street demonstrations.“One of the messages I try to get across is to tell we are on the brink of genocide. Something should be done.”

He implied that Ouattara strongholds, which are largely in the north, could be targeted by Gbagbo backers, saying:“If houses are being marked according to your tribe, what is going to be next?”

Source