Threat Assessment: September 5-9, 2011
WITH US
Dem senator hopes greens will sue Obama
Sen. Barbara Boxer, chairwoman of the Senate Environmental and Public Works Committee, is none too pleased with President Obama's decision to push a law to curb energy emissions until 2013 – and she is betting that environmental groups will feel the same. Boxer told reporters this week that she disagrees "strongly" with Obama's decision, and would support environmental groups in any litigation to issue a final emissions ruling. "I hope they'll be sued in court," Boxer said, "and I hope the court can stand by the Clean Air Act." [Politico]
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AGAINST US
Intel chiefs say counterterror efforts lagging
A survey of intelligence commanders in America's biggest cities paints a grim picture of their counterterror efforts in the last ten years. The Homeland Security Policy Institute found that the chiefs feel the nation's intelligence enterprise is less robust than it could be, and that 62 percent of the chiefs felt "unable to develop a complete understanding of their local threat." [ABC News]
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Man makes off with live lobsters in pants
Thirty-five -year-old Nathan Mark Hardy, was arrested Saturday after attempting to smuggle some groceries out of a local Winn Dixie grocery store. Which wouldn't be newsworthy, if not for the fact that he stuffed his cargo shorts full of live lobsters and two bags of jumbo shrimp; and that Hardy threw a pork loin at employees who tried to chase him down. He faces misdemeanor charges. [MSNBC]
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AGAINST US
Average American Can't Afford to Retire
Many Americans in their 60s, still working to pay off debts, are unable to retire as planned, according to the Wall Street Journal. The average American household nearing retirement with a 401(k) retirement account has less than one-quarter of what it needs to maintain its standard of living. Moreover, 39 percent of households with members aged 60 to 64 still have primary mortgages, and 20 percent of that age group still has secondary mortgages. In 1994, these figures were 22 and 12 percent, respectively. [Wall Street Journal]
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Scientists create entire town to test green technology
D.C.-based Pegasus Global Holdings is creating a brand new city in the middle of the New Mexico desert in which the company can test out green technologies in a real-life setting. Pegasus's head honcho says the $200 million facility – a complex of streets, office blocks, and residential buildings – "was born out of our own company's challenges in trying to test new and emerging technologies beyond the confines of a sterile lab environment." [New Scientist]
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Goldman rewards Senator for anti-regulation op-ed
The day after Senator Richard Shelby published a Wall Street Journal op-ed railing against the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the Alabama Republican received a thank you, from Goldman Sachs' PAC, in the form of a $5,000 donation. Shelby wrote in the op-ed that it's “only a matter of time before [the Bureau's] concentration of power is abused or misused to the detriment of American businesses and consumers.” It seems as though Goldman agreed. [ThinkProgress]
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Nation's first marijuana street fair
The country's first weed-themed street fest took place over the weekend in the Bay Area. The International Cannabis & Hemp Expo covered a five-block stretch of downtown Oakland, and booths arranged along a five-block stretch offered everything from paraphernalia to pot-infused snacks, as well as a designated area at the Expo allowed card-carrying medical patients to smoke outside (in fact, right outside City Hall). "I was a child of the 60s," 64-year-old Maryfrancis Wasson, an attendee from Texas, told reporters. "This reminds me of what we used to do back then in parks – except we didn’t advertise." [Huffington Post]
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Somalia famine could kill 750,000
A record drought in East Africa could cause up to three-quarters of a million Somalians to die in the coming months, according to a new report by the U.N. The drought is said to be the worst in over 60 years, and has already caused tens of thousands of deaths in the region, more than half of them children. Some 4 million Somalians are in need of food aid. [BBC]
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Boston Tree Party cultivates community
The Boston Tree Party launched in April 2011, organizes the planting of apple trees throughout the city of Boston, with the goal of uniting communities through care of the trees and use of the fruit. Founder Lisa Gross (motto: "civic fruit"), an artist and urban food activist, provides churches, businesses, schools and other organizations with planting kits and info about caring for the trees, and plans on holding events and workshops "on how to use the apples, because there are so many fun, exciting things you can do with them!" [Grist]
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Researchers create molecule-sized motor
Tufts University scientists have created what they say is the world's smallest electric motor: a single molecule that, with an electrical charge, rotates as fast as 120 revolutions per second. Scientists used the tip of a microscope to send a current through a single molecule, and were able to make it spin. Possible applications of this innovation include targeted delivery of drugs and other medical uses; for now, however, the researchers are focusing on getting their mini-motor certified by the Guinness Book of World Records as the smallest ever. [Atlantic Wire https://www.theatlanticwire.com/technology/2011/09/electric-motor-single-molecule/42102/]
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Teen pretends to be physician's assistant in Florida hospital
Matthew Scheidt, a 17-year-old from Florida, was arrested last week for impersonating a physician's assistant at Orlando's Osceola Regional Medical Center emergency room – for a week! He told hospital staffers that he was 23 years old and affiliated with a local university program, and that he was waiting for a new ID badge. Scheidt interviewed patients, cleaned wounds and performed physicals. When confronted by a suspicious hospital worker, the teen claimed he was an undercover cop working on an investigation. Scheidt now faces five counts of impersonation. [TIME]
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Anti-nicotine vaccine could hit shelves soon
NicVAX, an anti-nicotine vaccine, aims to make quitting smoking much easier: it stimulates the body's immune system to produce antibodies against nicotine, possibly producing a lifelong immune response. "Phase III" trials of the vaccine shots, which will utilize over 1,000 subjects, are expected to begin in September and, if the results are as encouraging as previous tests, NicVAX could be helping smokers quit soon after. [Scientific American]
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AGAINST US
Koch brothers compare Obama to Saddam at secret conference
Mother Jones has obtained audio from a strategy session put on by right-wing mega-funders Charles and David Koch, in which the former is heard comparing Obama to (obviously) Saddam Hussein. Koch goes on to predict that the 2012 elections will be "the mother of all wars" and "a battle for the life and death of this country." [Mother Jones]
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Despite munchies, pot smokers less likely to be obese
A French study has discovered, to universal amazement, that marijuana smokers actually have lower obesity rates than non-smoking compatriots. The reasons for this counterintuitive finding are unclear, and so, says the lead researcher, disappointingly, "the take-home message is certainly not 'smoke cannabis, it will help you lose weight." [The Week]
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38 percent of Europeans have mental disorder, study finds
Some 165 million Europeans – 38 percent of the population – suffer from some mental illness, ranging from depression and anxiety to dementia and Alzheimer's, according to a new study. (The best estimate for the U.S. is 26 percent.) Experts say that only about one-third of people are receiving treatment. "Although the figure seems shockingly high, this is the most rigorous study done in Europe," psychiatrist Graham Thornicroft told reporters. [Washington Post]
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Cali prisons practicing "indefinite" solitary confinement
Prisoners in California jails for gang-related crimes can be held in solitary confinement indefinitely, even if their jail records are otherwise clean. State figures show that some 78 prisoners have been kept in 8-by-10-foot cells for almost 20 years, with another 300 locked up for over a decade. Administrators say that gang culture is so rampant in the California's jails that isolation, long abandoned by many states, is the only way to protect staff and other inmates. Critics call it nothing short of torture. "It's worse than prisoners in any civilized nation anywhere else in the world are treated," said USC psychology professor Craig Haney during a recent hearing on the policy. [LA Times]
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Giuliani says he won't pander on social issues
He has his flaws, for sure, but Rudy Guiliani deserves props for bringing a glimmer of sanity (and honesty) to the GOP presidential circus. During a press conference on the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, the former NYC Mayor (who may or may not be mulling a 2012 bid), noting that two of the first three Republican primary states have large numbers of social conservatives, said, "I'm simply not that conservative on social issues, and I'm not willing to change just to become president." [The Hill]
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Al Jazeera journalist kicked out of Texas HS football game
Al Jazeera correspondent Gabriel Elizondo has been traveling across the U.S., talking to Americans about the effects of the 9/11 attacks on American life. "Ten miles," he wrote in a blog post. "That's how deep I got into Texas before being asked to leave." Elizondo had decided to stop at a high school game in Booker, Texas, and received less than a warm welcome from the school's principal and superintendent, who forbade him from filming, taking pictures or interviewing people. The superintendent, Michael Lee, told Elizondo, "I think it was damn rotten what they did," leaving the journalist to wonder whether he was "calling me rotten, the terrorists rotten, Al Jazeera rotten, or all of the above." Lee later apologized on the school's website. [Yahoo]