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12 Sep 2011 19:56

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Politics: Three things we’re watching for during tonight’s Tea Party debate

  • CNN The network’s previous debate coverage has been atrocious, so tonight is a great opportunity for them to redeem themselves. They probably won’t.
  • Michele The once-triumphant Michele Bachmann is facing difficulties now that Rick Perry is in the race, quickly killing her momentum. She’s got to do well tonight.
  • Tea Tonight is a coming out party for Tea Party Express. We’ll see if they can prove to be a true force with tonight’s debate. Our guess: Possibly. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

12 Sep 2011 17:12

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World: 24-year-old Libyan woman, “Nomidia,” provided key info to NATO

  • I was not on the radar. They were concentrating more on the guys and it was almost impossible to think that a girl was doing all of this.
  • Libyan NATO informant “Nomidia” • Speaking on the cover her gender gave her in providing information, much about the location of weaponry and tank storage in Tripoli, to the NATO alliance in Libya. Nomidia, 24, eventually developed contacts that gave her insider information about the conflict — the false-alarm capture of Saif al-Gaddafi, for example, she knew to be untrue well before news broke. In an interview with Reuters, Nomidia claims she provided NATO with three locations that were bombed — an arms storage site, a military camp, and an intelligence building. She spoke on condition of anonymity, saying that while Gaddafi’s regime is largely deposed, she still fears a “fifth column” of supporters who might target her or her family. source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

12 Sep 2011 14:20

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Biz: S&P parent and textbook maven McGraw-Hill to split in two

  • what McGraw-Hill, a company best-known for two things, school textbooks and credit ratings, will be splitting these incongruent halves into two public companies. They’re the parent company of S&P, whose president recently announced his resignation.
  • why The company has taken heat from a couple of activist shareholders in recent months, on top of the heat S&P has taken for lowering the U.S. credit rating and their role in the financial crisis. The company says this plan was already in the cards, though. Suuuure. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

12 Sep 2011 11:12

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Biz: Peace out, Ann Arbor: Borders to close its original location today

  • Borders used to be chockablock with books. It has increasingly looked less like a bookstore than a bowling alley, with its wide-open spaces. Now they’re selling children’s dolls on the front counter. It’s really pretty grim.
  • University of Michigan history professor Jonathan Marwil • Discussing the fate of Borders, the Ann Arbor-based bookstore chain which will close its first Ann Arbor-based location Monday. We’ve been saddened by the fate of Borders, an iconically-great example of the bookstore where you get sucked in for hours, but one whose fate was sealed by being extremely late to the game with the Internet. *SOB* We’ll miss you. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

12 Sep 2011 10:31

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U.S.: More details on the explosion at a French nuclear plant

  • what On Monday, an explosion of a furnace at at French nuclear plant killed one and injured four others, one seriously. Officials are investigating.
  • where The Marcoule plant, located near the French city of Avignon, is one of the oldest nuclear plants in the country. It doesn’t have any reactors.
  • why The furnace, which handles radioactive waste, exploded. It was an industrial accident in nature, not a nuclear one, officials say. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

12 Sep 2011 08:26

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Biz: The Boston Globe starts up its own Web site — wait, didn’t they have one?

  • We’ve never had The Boston Globe have its own front door in the digital space. It’s always been integrated with Boston.com. This was an opportunity to build something brand-new and to have it front and center and really do justice to the brand promise The Boston Globe offers to its readers.
  • Boston Globe publisher Christopher M. Mayer • On the paper’s launch of its own Web site this morning — a paywall-laden one that smartly separates the company’s newspaper content from Boston.com content that might work better on the Web. Boston.com is paywall-free and still serves breaking news, blogs and the whole bit. Bostonglobe.com focuses on the newspaper itself. It’s an interesting separation and we’re curious to see how it works out for them. The Boston Globe’s parent, the New York Times Company, famously started up a successful paywall experiment for the mothership paper. (Quote from a paywall-laden article, but there’s free registration for the next couple weeks; the source article links to the free Boston.com piece.) source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

11 Sep 2011 21:51

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World: Al Jazeera sister network raided by Egyptian officials; network defiant

  • If broadcasting the truth is considered endangering stability, then it is an honor for any media outlet to be endangering stability.
  • Ahmed Zein, manager of Al Jazeera Live Egypt • Sounding defiant amidst a raid that took the network off the air on Sunday. The raid was not without warning — a couple of weeks before, the country’s minister of media, Osama Heikal, said that it would take actions against media outlets that “endanger the stability and security” of the country — which one could argue the happened with last week’s attack on the Israeli embassy. Al Jazeera Live Egypt is a fairly new sister network that cropped up in reaction to the Egyptian revolution, seen in the West as a coming out party for the Qatar-based network. The affiliate focuses on street protests. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 

11 Sep 2011 21:11

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World: General: Afghan attack near 9/11 anniversary shows Taliban weakness

  • two Afghan citizens were killed in an attack on a coalition base on the eve of the 9/11 anniversary
  • 25 Afghan citizens were wounded in the attack, which the Taliban took credit for
  • 77 NATO forces were wounded; all of them were Americans, officials say source
  • » “A high-profile attack”: That’s how U.S. coalition leader Gen. John R. Allen described the vehicle bomb attack that injured over 100 people. But Allen sees the silver lining from a logistical perspective: “They have been ejected from the population in so many places around the country that their only ability to influence the battlefield on many occasions is simply to go for a high-profile attack,” he explained, “And that’s how we view this particular attack.”
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

11 Sep 2011 10:12

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World: Bloomberg, Obama, Bush reflect during September 11 memorial

  • Ten years have passed since a perfect blue sky morning turned into the blackest of nights. Since then, we have lived in sunshine, and in shadow. And although we can never ‘unsee’ what happened here … we can also see that children who lost their parents have grown into young adults, grandchildren have been born, and good works and public service have taken root to honor those we loved and lost.
  • New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg • Reflecting on the lives lost on Sept. 11, 2001 during this morning’s memorial at Ground Zero. Obama and George W. Bush — the two presidents whose legacies were most affected by the events of the day — also reflected on the moment in their own ways. Obama read Psalm 46 from the Bible, while Bush read a letter that Abraham Lincoln sent to a mother who lost five sons in the Civil War. A reflective morning, with equally reflective words.  source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

10 Sep 2011 14:40

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U.S., World: Rwanda: Ex-presidential hopeful, “Hotel Rwanda” inspiration face scrutiny

  • She was aiming at inciting the people she calls the Hutus, to make them get conscious that there is something going against them.
  • A Rwandan prosecutor • Speaking during the trial of Victoire Ingabire, a Hutu woman who attempted to run for president in the country last year, only to get arrested on charges of attempting to incite terrorism and denying the infamous genocide (along ethnic lines) that destabilized the country nearly two decades ago. Ingabire’s trial began Friday, and prosecutors — surprisingly — have claimed that there is evidence that links her and Paul Rusesabagina, the man who was the inspiration for Don Cheadle’s character in “Hotel Rwanda,” to a terrorist group. And they’re considering bringing charges against Rusesabagina, now considered a international hero (albeit one who has feuded with the current Tutsi government), as well. Two decades after the fact, politics in Rwanda remain complicated and emotionally charged. (h/t @JohnNess) source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
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