Read a little. Learn a lot. • Tightly-written news, views and stuff • Follow us on Twitter • Be a Facebook Fan • Tumble us!

26 May 2011 17:30

tags

World: Ratko Mladic arrives at war crimes court in Serbia

  • Ratko Mladic arrives in court: Mladic, one of the most sought-after international figures in the world, was caught today and brought before a court in Serbia for war crimes and genocide, making this a very big day in the world of both international and Serbian justice. Mladic eluded capture for sixteen years. source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

26 May 2011 17:09

tags

U.S.: Report: John Ensign made life harder for John Ensign

  • John Ensign fouls up his legal situation: A report by Reuters today suggests that a decision by John Ensign himself may have paved the way for the charges he could be facing. Throughout the probe, investigators had wanted to get a look at a trove of Ensign’s e-mails, which he and his team claimed were protected by attorney-client confidentiality. The probe could very well have gone nowhere without them. That is, until Ensign himself handed them over as he was preparing to leave the Senate, after having refused for 18 months. Why on earth he did this is unknown, but it seems he may have scored an “own goal” here. source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

26 May 2011 16:14

tags

Politics: Disney abandons plan to trademark “Seal Team 6”

  • then In the aftermath of the killing of Osama bin Laden, when most people were either earnestly celebrating, or having thoughtful discussions about why they weren’t, Disney was trying to trademark “Seal Team 6,” the name of the unit that did the deed.
  • now With the Navy applying for trademarks on both “Navy SEAL” (nobody ever tried to trademark “Navy SEAL” before?) and “Team 6,” Disney has scrapped their plans, citing “deference to the Navy.” We think the initial idea sort of discredits that notion. source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

26 May 2011 15:51

tags

U.S.: Obama Judicial nominee Goodwin Liu asks to withdraw his name

  • Goodwin Liu says goodbye: One of the many contentious battles between the Republican Party and the Obama administration may come to a close, as judicial nominee Goodwin Liu has asked the President to withdraw his name from consideration. Obama nominated Liu on February 24th, 2010, and he’s languished in the Senate approvals process ever since. His nomination was a hit with the President’s liberal base, as Liu is rather liberal himself (and a UC Berkeley professor, to boot), but that made the political strategy for the GOP all too obvious. With the strength of the Senate filibuster still in hand, they decided to wait it out, hoping that Senate gridlock would scuttle his nomination. It seems that they were right. source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

26 May 2011 15:18

tags

World: Chinese labor camps: Where MMO games stop being fun?

  • World of Warcraft meets the world of forced labor: The Guardian has an interview up today with a 54-year-old prisoner at the Jixi labor camp in China, who makes an extremely bizarre and terrible claim; that prison bosses forced some inmates to play World of Warcraft after finishing the day’s grueling physical labor. The idea is that they’re being forced to grind out high-level characters with choice equipment and lots of gold, which are then sold by the guards to cash-rich, lazy gamers who want all the gain with none of the pain. It’s sort of like the anti-drug argument that your money might be financing terrorism or violence — don’t take the shortcut to World of Warcraft glory, or you might do it on the back of a Chinese prisoner. Bizarre story. source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

26 May 2011 12:32

tags

U.S.: Two ways Obama’s health care plan is actually working

  • Who’s getting insured? A greater number of people under 26 now get to stay on their parents’ insurance. It helps because they’re paying for it — meaning that they’re helping lower costs for the elderly. When they get older, they’ll be helped by younger generations in the same way.
  • Who’s insuring people? As small businesses are getting incentives for providing health care, insurance-providing businesses with fewer than 10 employees have grown by 46%. That’s huge; it helps people who need health care most. And the IRS has approved more incentives, too. source
Posted by Justin Jones • 0 Comments • Permalink

26 May 2011 11:40

tags

World: Ratko Mladic arrest: The most wanted man in Europe

  • A pariah of the Yugoslavian War: Missing from view since his 1995 indictment on war crimes, Mladic’s capture allows for the closure of a dark era of Europe’s post-World War II history. In leading a war that killed as many as 100,000, the Bosnian Serb saw it as a form of historic revenge against hundreds of years of Turkish-Ottoman rule. And he was something else, too. He used phrases like this one when talking to soldiers: “When I give you guarantees, it’s as if they are given by God.” Hours before leading a masacre of the town of Srebrenica, he went into the town and gave the children there candy, while reassuring them everything would be OK. Could you imagine? Mladic’s arrest finally offers the end of a dark chapter of modern history that needs closure. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 

26 May 2011 11:18

tags

U.S.: Supreme Court sides with Arizona on immigrant worker law

  • 5-3 states can take away business licenses, the SCOTUS says source
  • » Obama and the Chamber of Commerce, together at last: In a decision in a case that put two longtime adversaries on the same side of a losing battle, the Supreme Court backed an Arizona immigration law that encourages employers to verify their workers — or they could lose their business license if they knowingly hire undocumented immigrants. We don’t know if we agree with the Supreme Court’s decision on this case — especially because it could lead to a number of copycat laws as a result of this. (By the way, in case you were wondering: Justice Elena Kagan didn’t vote in the case, as it came up while she was still Solicitor General.)
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

26 May 2011 10:31

tags

Politics: Paul Ryan doesn’t care if Medicare leads to his political downfall

  • I don’t care about that. Now is not that time to be worried about political careers. Sincerely, I will be fine if I lose my House seat because you know what? I will know I did what I thought was right to save this country from fiscal ruin.
  • Rep. Paul Ryan • Saying he’s more concerned about the future of the country than his own political career. Dude … cut with the theatrics. You’re a rising star in your own party. And your district is in a conservative part of Wisconsin. The odds you’ll get voted out of office for this mess — even after it dive-bombed in the Senate for going too far/not far enough (if you’re Rand Paul)? Slim to none. So, we’re glad that you’re at least owning the consequences of your Medicare plan, even if it is controversial. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

26 May 2011 02:08

tags

Politics: Scott Walker is becoming very unpopular

  • Watch out, Walker: If a recall election were held today, you’d get booted faster than you can say “Gray Davis.” source
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
 
top tags
older >>