September 12, 2013

Roma family is banished to Amsterdam's 'scum' village

A ROMA family has become the first to be forcibly evicted by Dutch authorities and moved to a "scum village" constructed out of shipping containers on the outskirts of Amsterdam.

The Dimitrovs are the first nuisance neighbours to be moved forcibly to police-supervised accommodation as crowded Amsterdam steps up measures against anti-social behaviour.

Eberhard van der Laan, Amsterdam's mayor, admitted that the removal of the family was a draconian measure but insisted that bullying and violent behaviour had left him with no choice.

"The family has been causing problems for years and has a history of vandalism, noise nuisance and threatening behaviour," he said.

http://www.independent.ie/world-news/europe/roma-family-is-banished-to-amsterdams-scum-village-29557503.html

September 12, 2013

Facebook’s Zuckerberg says government “blew it” explaining NSA spying

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who has been on the other side of criticism about whether his company adequately protects the privacy of its users, on Wednesday said the U.S. government “blew it” for not explaining how it was balancing citizen’s privacy rights with countering terrorism.

Speaking during an on-stage interview at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference in San Francisco, Zuckerberg became outspoken when asked how he felt about the NSA spying controversy and the privacy rights of Facebook’s members.

“I think it’s my job and our job to protect everyone who uses Facebook and all the information that they share with us,” Zuckerberg said. “It’s our government’s job to protect all of us and also protect our freedoms and protect the economy, and I think they did a bad job of balancing those things. So frankly, I think that the government blew it.”

Zuckerberg has previously said Facebook had not even known about the secret spy program called PRISM and denied that it gave the government access to its servers as indicated in documents leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

http://blog.sfgate.com/techchron/2013/09/12/facebooks-zuckerberg-says-government-blew-it-explaining-nsa-spying/

September 12, 2013

CUNY Students Confront War Criminal David Petraeus

September 12, 2013

Airship hovers in test flight, but wind forces quick landing

A massive experimental airship briefly lumbered into the skies in front of the former military base in Tustin, Calif., where shifting winds kept it from making its first untethered flight.

The 266-foot-long Aeroscraft was built by Worldwide Aeros with more than $50?million in funding from the Pentagon and NASA to demonstrate a novel buoyancy system that enables the airship to carry heavy loads — and to move vertically with the precision of a helicopter.

The helium-filled airship’s only cargo Tuesday was two passengers, test pilot Corky Belanger and Aeroscraft inventor Igor Pasternak.

Not long after sunrise, the airship slowly climbed to about 20 feet, kicking up clouds of dust and debris in front of one of the two 17-story wooden blimp hangars in Tustin, south of Los Angeles, where the silver airship was built.

http://seattletimes.com/html/nationworld/2021795850_blimptestxml.html

September 11, 2013

Trader Joe's To Drop Health Coverage For Part-Time Workers Under Obamacare: Memo

After extending health care coverage to many of its part-time employees for years, Trader Joe's has told workers who log fewer than 30 hours a week that they will need to find insurance on the Obamacare exchanges next year, according to a confidential memo from the grocer's chief executive.

In the memo to staff dated Aug. 30, Trader Joe's CEO Dan Bane said the company will cut part-timers a check for $500 in January and help guide them toward finding a new plan under the Affordable Care Act. The company will continue to offer health coverage to workers who carry 30 hours or more on average.

The law mandates that companies with 50 employees or more offer coverage to such full-time employees, though the Obama administration has chosen to delay that rule for a year.

Trader Joe's has won kudos for offering its health care, dental and vision plans to part-time workers at a reasonable price -- a rarity in an industry known for low pay and scant benefits. But with low-wage workers eligible for tax subsidies to buy health insurance next year, the company has apparently calculated that offering medical coverage to part-timers who work 18 hours or more is no longer worth the cost.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/11/trader-joes-obamacare_n_3902341.html

Trader Joes is owned by the same people who own aldi's the Walmart of Europe.

September 11, 2013

'2 Million Bikers' in D.C. to remember 9/11 without permit -- but with stoplights

Source: UPI

The "2 Million Bikers to D.C." demonstration announced in August is still underway to honor the anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks, despite the National Park Service denying the bikers a permit.

"It is not a crime to parade" through the city without a permit, said Ted Gest, a spokesman for the D.C. Attorney General's Office.

But, Gest said, "I don't think we can speculate on what penalties the motorcycle riders might be subjected to for traffic or other offenses because we don't know what they're going to do."

Organizers had contacted the National Park Service to request temporary closure of some city roads and intersections to allow the bikers to move through the National Mall area efficiently.

Read more: http://www.upi.com/blog/2013/09/11/2-Million-Bikers-in-DC-to-remember-911-without-permit-but-with-stoplights/3931378905660/

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Ms. Bee said the rally was planned as a way to protest the American Muslim Political Action Committee’s Million American March Against Fear, scheduled for noon.

September 10, 2013

FBI continues to investigate Hastings for 'controversial reporting'

The FBI released a heavily redacted document on Rolling Stone journalist Michael Hastings, Monday, which revealed the law-enforcement agency is continuing to investigate what it characterized as "controversial reporting" by the journalist, who died in a late-night car crash in Los Angeles in June.

The FBI turned over the three-page document to Al Jazeera and Ryan Shapiro, a doctoral candidate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who specializes in FOIA research, in response to a joint-Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed against the agency.

In a declaration released with the records, Denny Argall, the FBI'S public liaison officer, wrote that after the agency searched for responsive records it located one "cross reference" file pertaining to a pending criminal investigation. The FBI would not comment further about the nature of the probe.

The papers revealed that the FBI still considers Hastings' work highly sensitive; even the title of the case file has been withheld under a FOIA exemption that claims that the information, if disclosed, could interfere with an ongoing law-enforcement investigation.

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2013/9/9/fbi-releases-redacteddocumentonmichaelhastings.html

September 10, 2013

Hillary Clinton Syria Speech at White House

September 10, 2013

President Barack Obama on Syria and the Russian proposal.

September 10, 2013

President Barack Obama on Syria and the Russian proposal.