It's the Obusha holiday weekend bad news dump: Obama Signs Defense Authorization Bill 31 Dec 2011 President Barack Obama on Saturday reluctantly signed a defense authorization bill, saying he was concerned about some in Congress who want to restrict options used by counterterrorism officials. The House approved the bill on December 14, and a 86-13 vote in the Senate the next day completed the necessary congressional action. At issue was the president's authority in deciding whether people detained in terrorism investigations would be held in military or civilian custody.
Man found with explosives at Midland International Airport --Explosives were in military-grade wrapping 31 Dec 2011 One man was being held in FBI custody Saturday afternoon after security at Midland International Airport found explosives in his carry-on bag and the terminal was shut down for an hour. The suspect is active military and the explosives were found in his carry-on bag by Transportation Security Administration officers while going through the X-ray machine, Midland police said. The incident happened at 9:26 a.m. Saturday.
Appeals court OKs law giving telecom companies immunity for government's surveillance program 29 Dec 2011 A federal appeals court on Thursday said a 2008 law that granted telecommunications companies legal immunity for helping the National Security Agency with an email and telephone eavesdropping program is constitutional. A unanimous three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a lower court ruling. The appeal concerned a case that consolidated 33 different lawsuits filed against various telecom companies, including AT&T, Sprint Nextel, Verizon Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp. on behalf of these companies' customers. NY ramps up security for Times Square bash 31 Dec 2011 New York New York City police are gearing up for a massive security operation as the Big Apple prepares to usher in the New Year with a party expected to attract over one million revellers to Times Square. Thousands of police officers, including 1,550 newly minted graduates of the police academy, will take part in an operation New York police commissioner Ray Kelly said is the "biggest" of the year for the force. "Our helicopters will be up in the air and checking the 200-block area around Times Square," Kelly told the CNN television network on Friday. "Everyone that enters the area will have to go through a magnetometry check." Horse-mounted police officers, bomb-sniffing dogs and police patrol boats are also part of the security deployment. "We have heavy weapons response teams that are in, you know, appropriate locations," Kelly said.
Thousands of US soldiers to be deployed in Israel for drill --The drill, unprecedented in size, will include the establishment of US command posts in Israel and IDF command posts at EUCOM headquarters in Germany 20 Dec 2011 Israel is moving forward with plans to hold the largest-ever missile defense exercise in its history this spring amid [alleged] Iranian efforts to obtain nuclear weapons. Last week, Lt.-Gen. Frank Gorenc, commander of the US's Third Air Force based in Germany, visited Israel to finalize plans for the upcoming drill, expected to see the deployment of several thousand American soldiers in Israel.
'Iran to expand presence in int'l waters' 31 Dec 2011 Iranian Navy Commander Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayyari says the country's naval forces plan to develop their presence in international waters, Press TV reports. "Under the international law and as maintained by our leader (Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei) we have no intention to march into any country, but we are determined to make our presence felt in international waters," said Sayyari. He also spoke of the Iranian Jamaran destroyer, which has recently finished its 70-day mission to the Mediterranean Sea, saying the military ship will have future missions to the Atlantic Ocean as well.
Strait of Hormuz standoff continues as Iran films US aircraft carrier --Video played on state television 29 Dec 2011 Iran claimed to have successfully taken surveillance footage of a US aircraft carrier near the Strait of Hormuz today as both countries raised the stakes in their standoff over the critical oil route. Admiral Habibollah Sayyari's statement came as Iranian ships, helicopters and submarines continued a 10-day war game exercise designed to give credibility to the country's threat to close the Strait if the West moves ahead with sanctions. The drill is underway in international waters near the Strait and only a few hundred miles from America's Bahrain-based Fifth Fleet. British soldier killed in an explosion in Afghanistan 31 Dec 2011 A soldier has been killed in an explosion in Afghanistan, the Ministry of Defence said today. The serviceman, from 1st Battalion The Yorkshire Regiment, was killed in a blast in the Nahr-e Saraj district of Helmand Province yesterday.
MoD forced to update combat war games to cope with expectations of PlayStation generation 29 Dec 2011 The MoD has been forced to dramatically update simulated combat training to cope with the expectations of the PlayStation generation, it has been revealed. New recruits are so used to playing ultra-realistic combat games on consoles that they are losing concentration on 'dated' training simulations. Troops sent to Afghanistan have been trained on Virtual Battlespace2 - a spin-off from the commercially-available Operation Flashpoint - that can test reactions to coming under enemy fire.
Gov't request for nuclear storage facility site sends shockwaves through Fukushima 29 Dec 2011 The government's request that an interim facility to store soil and other waste contaminated with radiation be built somewhere in Futaba county near the crippled nuclear power plant sent ripples of concern through local governments and residents in Fukushima Prefecture. On Dec. 28, Environment Minister Goshi Hosono met and asked local leaders in Fukushima Prefecture for permission to build an interim storage facility somewhere in Futaba county in which two municipalities host the troubled Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant. [Store the nuclear waste at TEPCO executives' homes - problem solved!] Russia denies radiation leak in nuclear sub blaze 01 Jan 2012 Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has ordered an investigation after a nuclear submarine caught fire during repairs in the Arctic, injuring at least nine people. The blaze, believed to have been started by a welding lamp igniting rubbish and wooden scaffolding next to the craft, raged for nine hours at a shipyard in the Murmansk region. Russian officials were quick to announce there had been no radiation leak from the nuclear sub, named Yekaterinburg, after the flames were extinguished.
Daylong Fire on Russian Nuclear Submarine Took Hundreds of Workers to Extinguish 30 Dec 2011 The authorities in Russia marshaled more than 400 firefighters and 170 emergency workers to extinguish a fire on Friday that had raged for almost a day on the hull of a nuclear submarine in dry dock near the northern port of Murmansk. On Thursday, enormous plumes of smoke and flame lighted the sky above the submarine, the 550-foot Yekaterinburg, a Delta IV-class vessel commissioned in 1985. The Yekaterinburg is normally armed with 16 nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missiles, but they had been offloaded during the repairs, and its nuclear reactor was switched off, officials have said.
Tell the Obama Administration: No drilling in the Polar Bear Seas! --Protect the Polar Bear Seas [from Obusha and Big Oil] 28 Dec 2011 (Sierra Club) Big Oil wants to drill in the Polar Bear Seas of the Arctic. This would be disastrous. These seas are home to 20% of the world's polar bears, as well as wildlife... An oil spill in this area would be impossible to clean. The seas are dark two months out of the year, covered with deep sea ice and subject to hurricane-force winds. Even worse, the closest Coast Guard station is 1,000 miles away. The Obama administration is currently considering public input on this drilling proposal. Tell them that we can't take this risk! Los Angeles rocked by three dozen arson car fires --Authorities: Spate of apparently related arson fires triggered broad local and federal response 31 Dec 2011 A rash of arson fires in Los Angeles that has seen more than 30 cars torched in recent days had authorities on the lookout for at least one suspect on Saturday, amid fears more blazes could result in serious injury. Los Angeles police stepped up patrols, and the city fire department planned to maintain a command post for the New Year's weekend in an area where many of the blazes have occurred.
CLG needs your support.
http://www.legitgov.org/donate.htmlOr, please mail a check or money order to CLG:
Citizens for Legitimate Government (CLG)
P.O. Box 1142
Bristol, CT 06011-1142
Contributions to CLG are not tax deductible. Feel free -- and CLG encourages you -- to forward this newsletter to your lists and friends!
Those who wish to be added to the list can go here: http://www.legitgov.org/#subscribe_clg and add your name. Those who wish to unsubscribe can go here:http://lists.people-link.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/legitgov. Please markclg_news@legitgov.org as 'not spam' and do not delete from a spam or 'junk' folder, as such actions trigger false spam complaints against the CLG. If you have any inquiries/issues with your subscription, please write: signup at legitgov dot org.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment