bananas
bananas's JournalJoe Biden Defends Pope Francis On Economics "As A Practicing Catholic"
Source: Buzz Feed
Vice President Biden went out of his way at a speech to the United Auto Workers union Wednesday to take on one of Pope Francis’ strongest critics.
“A couple weeks ago Ken Langone, who I don’t know, a billionaire founder of Home Depot, predicted that the pope — Pope Francis’ critique of income inequity will be, quote, ‘a ‘hurdle’ for very wealthy Catholic donors, who seem to think hurt feelings trump the teachings of the Bible,” Biden said, referring to a December interview with the Home Depot founder.
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Biden appeared amazed by the comments as a Democrat pushing the Obama administration’s income equality message. As the most prominent Catholic on the president’s team, Biden seemed to be personally offended by the comments.
“As practicing Catholic, bless me, Father, for he has sinned,” Biden said. He paused. “I mean, come on. Come on! What are we talking about today?”
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Read more: http://www.buzzfeed.com/evanmcsan/joe-biden-defends-pope-francis-on-economics-as-a-practicing
Woman executed in Texas for 1998 torture killing
Source: Associated Press
A woman convicted of torturing and killing a mentally impaired man she lured to Texas with the promise of marriage was put to death Wednesday evening in a rare execution of a female prisoner.
The lethal injection of Suzanne Basso, 59, made the New York native only the 14th woman executed in the U.S. since the Supreme Court in 1976 allowed capital punishment to resume. Almost 1,400 men have been put to death during that time.
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Basso was sentenced to die for the 1998 slaying of 59-year-old Louis "Buddy" Musso, whose battered and lacerated body, washed with bleach and scoured with a wire brush, was found in a ditch outside Houston. Prosecutors said Basso had made herself the beneficiary of Musso's insurance policies and took over his Social Security benefits after luring him from New Jersey.
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Among witnesses testifying at Basso's punishment trial was her daughter, who told of emotional, physical and sexual abuse at the hands of her mother.
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Read more: http://bigstory.ap.org/article/woman-set-be-executed-texas-1998-killing
Feds blame 6 groups for 2011 blackout
"In 2012, a federal inquiry found a lack of effective contingency planning and coordination, describing the outage as largely a consequence of human failures, and not hardware."
Pilots know that almost every crash will be ruled a result of pilot error.
It's a way of making sure that pilots (a) have the authority to say fuck you I ain't gonna fly this piece of crap, and (b) say fuck you you fucking asshole I'm not going to risk my license for your fucking petit power games to any asshole bureaucrat who tries to push them around.
Feds blame 6 groups for 2011 blackout
By Morgan Lee 3:06 P.M.FEB. 4, 2014
Federal energy regulators have issued notices to several organizations they say violated electric reliability standards during the September 2011 blackout that left more than 7 million residents without electricity, from San Diego County to western Arizona and Tijuana.
UPDATE ON 2011 BLACKOUT
The Office of Enforcement at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission issued a notice for alleged violations and corresponding investigations against six utilities and grid managers in California and Arizona, a commission spokesman confirmed Tuesday.
Possible outcomes of enforcement actions for reliability violations include orders to pay penalties and to take corrective action. The notices have led to at least one settlement offer.
A botched maintenance procedure at a transmission switch yard outside Yuma touched off the blackout amid a heatwave and heavy power demands on the afternoon of Sept. 8, 2011. Over an 11 minute period, the power failure cascaded to the California coast, leaving the entire San Diego Gas & Electric service area without power as night fell.
In 2012, a federal inquiry found a lack of effective contingency planning and coordination, describing the outage as largely a consequence of human failures, and not hardware. As the power failure had spread, various grid operators were left unaware of many rapid-fire events outside their territories.
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Resisting Abe’s Sales Pitch
Resisting Abe’s Sales Pitch
M. V. Ramana
JAN 27 2014
After all the build-up over the last few weeks, it seems that the best that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh could come up with after meeting Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was: “Our negotiations towards an agreement for cooperation in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy have gained momentum in the last few months”. The blandness of the statement suggests that the momentum cannot be all that great and the pace of movement on the agreement is quite slow.
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The primary motivation for a nuclear agreement between Japan and India dates back to the US India nuclear deal. In 2008, William Burns, a senior U.S. diplomat, told the U.S. senate that as its part of the bargain, the Manmohan Singh government had “provided the United States with a strong Letter of Intent, stating its intention to purchase reactors with at least 10,000 megawatts (MW) worth of new power generation capacity from U.S. firms (and) has committed to devote at least two sites to U.S. firms” . Those sites are Mithi Virdi in Gujarat and Kovvada in Andhra Pradesh. We also know thanks to Wikileaks that in 2007, former Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, Anil Kakodkar told a nuclear trade delegation from the US-India Business Council that “the Jaitapur site in southern Maharashtra would go to the French”. All of these reactors need key components produced in Japan and the Japanese government has to formally allow these exports.
There is a confluence of interests here. Exports “of nuclear components and technology, as well as conventional arms” are said to be a key element in Prime Minister Abe economic program, dubbed “Abenomics” by many. This is somewhat reminiscent of the Soviet Union after the Chernobyl disaster, when the Soviet nuclear industry was desperate to improve its image and Soviet leaders were willing to sell nuclear reactors at concessional prices. The result of that drive was the 1988 agreement to buy the Koodankulam reactor. We do not know what the Soviet population then thought of that idea, but we do know that the majority of Japanese do not support the export of Japan’s nuclear technologies. A public poll found that a mere 24 percent are in favour of such sales.
Abe’s democratic credentials are evident from his various attempts at peddling reactors despite this overwhelming opposition. In October of last year, Abe reached an agreement with Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan, another head of state who doesn’t seem to be particularly concerned about democratic sentiment, to sell two nuclear reactors. The majority of the Turkish public too opposes the construction of nuclear power plants [See here and here].
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Abe’s visit provoked widespread protests against the proposed agreement and for a change these were actually covered by the mainstream press. As most of those in protest presumably realize, the primary goal should be to have the idea of reactors at Jaitapur and Mithi Virdi and Kovvada abandoned. And there is some hope for that. Recently even the nuclear establishment seems to have realized that the cost of imported reactors is prohibitively high and the secretive “negotiations” they have been involved in for several years now don’t seem to be making the price come down to anywhere close what they think they can get away with. One hopes that the opposition that developed before the Abe visit will, like the negotiations of the would-be Indo-Japanese agreement, gain momentum and force the government to call off the entire idea of importing nuclear reactors.
via http://nuclear-news.net/2014/02/05/shinzo-abes-nuclear-marketing-trip-to-india-not-a-success/
League of Women Voters Shines Light on Nuclear S.C.
League of Women Voters Shines Light on Nuclear S.C.
By Porter Barron Jr.
Wednesday, February 5, 2014
Back in 1997, when Mary Kelly, chemist and stalwart of the League of Women Voters of South Carolina, wrote her first report on the Palmetto State’s nuclear affairs, states across the country were sending their low-level radioactive sludge to the nuke dump in Barnwell County, and residents of Columbia’s low-income, predominantly black Edisto Court were speaking out against a nuclear-waste laundry that had quietly arrived in their neighborhood.
Kelly’s watchdog report, published by the League, provided many South Carolinians with their first understanding of exactly what was happening behind the high fences and security checkpoints at the seven major facilities in one of the most nuclearized states in the nation.
The League recently issued a follow-up report — dedicated to Kelly, who died in November — which offers a new overview of nuclear activities in South Carolina. It also airs concerns about the transportation of nuclear waste, such as spent nuclear fuels from overseas destined for reprocessing at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site; the protracted political battles over where to store mounting nuclear waste; and “dispelling the notion that reprocessing wastes would lessen the need for geologic storage,” such as the abandoned subterranean facility at Yucca Mountain, Nev.
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For Tom Clements, a long-time nuclear watchdog and policy expert based in Columbia, South Carolina’s nuclear situation has deteriorated since Kelly’s first report. As evidence, he points to numbers from a 2012 report by the U.S. Congressional Research Service showing that, when Kelly’s report came out in 1997, South Carolina was home to approximately 2,100 metric tons of commercial spent fuel waste. As of today, he says, that number is closer to 4,300 metric tons.
“There’s still no plan for disposal,” Clements says. “The only thing that’s changed is the waste has doubled.”
Nuclear Waste in South Carolina: An Issue Brief for Citizens
Read the full report at http://lwvsc.org/files/nuclearwaste20140116.pdf
Hundreds of scientists sign letter urging EPA to act against Pebble
Source: Anchorage Daily News
A group of 360 scientists, researchers and university professors signed a letter hand-delivered Tuesday that urges the Environmental Protection Agency to protect Bristol Bay from the proposed Pebble mine.
The letter was given to Dennis McLerran, the Seattle-based administrator of EPA's region 10, before his morning talk at an environmental conference in Anchorage.
The scientists' names fill more than 12 pages, starting with Peter Abrams, a University of Toronto professor emeritus in ecology and evolutionary biology, and ending with Roman Zurek, an associate professor at the Institute of Nature Conservation at the Polish Academy of Science. In between are scientists from all over the country and world, including Alaska.
The group praised the EPA for its study, released last month, that concluded a big mine posed serious risks to Bristol Bay's massive sockeye salmon runs -- the biggest in the world. Pebble Ltd. Partnership proposes developing a copper and gold mine at the headwaters of two Bristol Bay salmon-producing rivers. A coalition of tribes and Alaska Native groups had petitioned the EPA to veto the mine through the Clean Water Act even before developers seek major permits. Instead the agency undertook the watershed study.
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Read more: http://www.adn.com/2014/02/04/3306863/hundreds-of-scientists-sign-onto.html
RadioShack to Close About 500 Stores Within Months
Source: Wall Street Journal
On Sunday, RadioShack Corp. RSH -4.84% used comedy, in the form of a Super Bowl ad, to show its stores being dismantled and rebuilt. On Tuesday, the news broke that some of the stores will be dismantled, period.
According to people familiar with the matter, RadioShack is planning to close around 500 locations in the coming months. It isn't clear which of RadioShack's roughly 4,300 stores will be closed and when exactly the closings will begin. The people familiar with the matter noted that it isn't unusual for companies to close stores when going through a restructuring.
The news was a cold dose of reality after the upbeat feeling generated by the commercial, which was widely considered one of the best that aired during the big game Sunday night. In the commercial, RadioShack poked fun at its outdated image by bringing in a crowd of throwback characters from the 1980s, including Hulk Hogan, Erik Estrada and Alf, who purport to want their store back and proceed to tear out the shelves and haul away products.
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The Fort Worth, Texas, retail chain has been working on transforming its image from an old-school electronics store into a destination for shoppers looking for entertainment gadgets, like headphones and smartphone cases. In October, RadioShack secured $835 million in loans to refinance about $625 million of debt. Those funds, from a group led by GE Capital, also freed up cash for RadioShack's overhaul.
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Read more: http://online.wsj.com/news/article_email/SB10001424052702303442704579362870830018510-lMyQjAxMTA0MDAwNDEwNDQyWj
Via http://slickdeals.net/news/6675276/radioshack-to-close-500-stores-in-coming-months
Branson hosts renewable energy summit in Caribbean
Source: Associated Press
Caribbean politicians and renewable power experts gathered Tuesday on British billionaire Richard Branson's private isle to discuss ways of transitioning to clean energy in an effort to spur small island nations to slash their dependence on fossil fuels and prepare for the impacts of climate change.
Branson, the CEO and founder of the Virgin Group of companies, is hosting a three-day meeting of political and business leaders at Necker Island, his home in the British Virgin Islands where he has developed an exclusive eco-resort showcasing renewable energy technology.
The event is organized by the Carbon War Room, a nonprofit company Branson co-founded to promote cutbacks in greenhouse-gas emissions through smart private enterprise. It hopes to help small islands become carbon-neutral by accelerating commercial investment. Political delegations from 13 countries and territories, including several heads of state, are attending along with representatives from dozens of companies and multinational organizations.
Branson said he believes the sun-splashed, wind-swept Caribbean can set a global example by embracing renewable power and energy self-reliance. The region with deep renewable resources and scant energy security now derives nearly all of its electricity from plants that burn imported oil and diesel.
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Read more: http://www.chron.com/business/energy/article/Branson-hosts-renewable-energy-summit-in-Caribbean-5203519.php?cmpid=usworldhcat
Via http://nuclear-news.net/2014/02/05/is-richard-branson-switching-allegiance-from-nuclear-power-to-renewable-energy/
Patients Will Soon Have Direct Access To Their Medical Lab Test Results
Source: Think Progress
American patients will soon be able to get their medical test results directly from the laboratories that perform them under new regulations issued by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
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The so-called Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA) of 1988 govern the rules for accessing laboratory test information. Under the original law, labs in 39 states didn’t have to directly provide patients with requested information or were exempt from HIPAA rules granting patients the right to access test results. Instead, patients would have to obtain the information through the doctor or medical provider who ordered the test.
But the new rule, which takes effect in 60 days, would require labs to give patients copies of their test results within a month of the request. Officials say that the change is necessary in a medical landscape where providers are attempting to give Americans more information about their health care through technological advancements such as electronic health records.
According to Modern Healthcare, diagnostic companies are already praising the decision. “HHS’ final rule means millions of Americans who previously could not access their laboratory and other healthcare data from clinical laboratory companies like Quest can now do so without first requiring the approval of their healthcare provider,” said Dr. Jon Cohen, senior vice president of Quest Diagnostics.
Read more: http://thinkprogress.org/health/2014/02/04/3243711/hhs-rule-lab-tests/
Vermont Removed From 'Star Wars' Missile Defense List
VERMONT REMOVED FROM ‘STAR WARS’ MISSILE DEFENSE LIST
VTD STAFF JAN. 31, 2014
Vermont has been dropped from a list of states considered for an East Coast missile defense site.
The Defense Department in September said it was considering sites in Vermont, New York, Maine, Ohio and Michigan for the anti-missile bases often referred to as Star Wars defense bases.
The Vermont site, the Camp Ethan Allen training facility in Jericho, was removed from the list Friday, Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said in a news release.
“The ground-based interceptors being contemplated for an East Coast missile defense site cost huge sums of money, without delivering reliable capability,” Leahy said in a statement. “I welcome the news that Vermont’s Camp Ethan Allen will not be considered as a site, and I continue to pursue redirecting those funds toward projects that have more proven and cost-effective success in keeping Americans safe.”
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