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28 Apr 2011 10:40

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U.S.: Guy behind iconic Tuscaloosa storm video speaks out

  • Actually, I was zoomed out to try to get the whole tornado, and I still couldn’t catch it, the whole thing. I mean, we were probably maybe 200 to 300 yards away from it.
  • University of Alabama employee Christopher England • Describing how he was able to get this video — you know the one, the one with the heavy breathing. England, speaking from one of the now-greatly-damaged areas he filmed, was in one of the strongest, safest buildings in the entire region — Coleman Coliseum, the campus’ men’s basketball complex — while filming the clip. England filmed for a minute and a half before things got too dangerous and he fleed for safety. Speaking of being near the destruction, he noted: “It’s kind of surreal to be down here now and kind of seeing it, because this is the first time I’ve seen it.”  source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

28 Apr 2011 10:29

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U.S.: Death toll from tornadoes, storms in South absolutely insane

  • 213+ people killed by storms throughout the South
  • 131+ were killed by severe storms in Alabama alone
  • 32+ were killed by severe storms in nearby Mississippi
  • 12+ people were killed by storms in Georgia
  • 30+ people were killed by the storms in Tennessee
  • 8+ people were killed as far north as Virginia source
  • » An unprecedented toll: In Alabama in particular, where Tuscaloosa took incredibly strong damage from the storm and many died in Birmingham, officials were still trying to wrap their heads around the disaster. “I would be pretty sure about saying we’ve never had 128 people die in one day,” said Yasamie August, the Alabama Emergency Management Agency’s information manager. (The number’s jumped since she spoke.) “It’s going to be difficult to get an accurate count of damage or injuries at this point. Many people can’t get to a hospital.”
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

27 Apr 2011 20:46

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U.S.: Barack Obama vs. Unwavering Irrationality

  • President Obama’s decision to release his long-form birth certificate is a reminder of the handicaps under which rational people labor when confronting the irrational.
  • Wendy Kaminer at The Atlantic • Giving us some perspective on this birth certificate madness. Obama has both reason and empirical evidence on his side, but those are useless against an opponent who rejects reason and empiricism. source
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink

27 Apr 2011 15:53

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U.S.: Senate GOP’s feet may be held to the fire on Ryan budget

  • [We’ll] see if Republican senators like the Ryan budget as much as their House colleagues did.
  • Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid • Speaking on a conference call to reporters about his plan to force a vote on Rep. Paul Ryan’s budget in the Senate. This is prototypical “hardball” politics, and implies a more aggressive Harry Reid than we’ve typically seen. Basically, the Ryan budget calls for Medicare privatization, an enormously unpopular idea with the American public. Having seen the boisterous reactions GOP House members have weathered since returning to their home districts, Reid now knows he can force the Republican senators either to vote for it and poison their records, or vote against it, abandoning the lockstep unity congressional Republicans showed off so well during the first two years of President Obama’s term. It’s the obvious political move, and a potent one to boot. source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

27 Apr 2011 10:22

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U.S.: Two P’s in a pod: Obama shuffles the defense end of his cabinet

  • Panetta Leon Panetta, the head of the CIA, and Bill Clinton’s former chief of staff, is on tap to replace Robert Gates, who is retiring as Defense Secretary pretty soon.
  • Petraeus Who’s gonna replace Panetta? General David Petraeus, who will leave the front lines of Afghanistan to head the Central Intelligence Agency. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

26 Apr 2011 16:26

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U.S.: Suspect arrested in last week’s Denver mall bomb plot

  • Earl Albert Moore arrested: The man, sixty-five years old, is being held as the primary suspect in last week’s frightening attempted pipe-bomb/propane explosion at a Denver area shopping mall. It’s being reported that Moore left federal prison just one week before the alleged plot, and that the FBI now considers any relation between this incident and the 12th anniversary of the Columbine High School shootings “unlikely.” source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

25 Apr 2011 23:19

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U.S.: CIA: We only burn and shred documents because it’s the green thing to do

  • The Central Intelligence Agency’s practice of shredding and burning classified papers—often referred to in movies and books as “burn after reading”—is one of several ways the CIA conserves energy, reduces its impact on the environment, and lowers costs through its sustainability efforts.
  • The CIA • In an Earth Day posting to their website. The fact that the CIA actually said this is much funnier than any joke we could hope to make, so we’ll just let it stand. source
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink
 

25 Apr 2011 22:56

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U.S.: Republicans in Mississippi ambivalent about outcome of Civil War

  • 38% of Mississippi GOPers wish the South had won source
  • » There’s more: If you include the 41% that’s undecided, you get a whopping 79% of Mississippi Republicans who aren’t quite ready to throw their support behind Abraham Lincoln circa 1861. Also, 9% of African Americans in the state aren’t sure whether they like the NAACP more than the KKK; surely, this is the result of a typo, or some sort of methodological error, or perhaps a psychoactive pollutant in the drinking water. Oh well; at least 54% of the state agrees that interracial marriage shouldn’t be illegal. That’s right, a whole 54%!
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink

25 Apr 2011 15:24

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U.S.: Amateur video shows violent Texas storms in action

  • Stormchasing across Texas: Impressive and awe-inspiring amateur video highlighting a very familiar sight of late — violent, volatile, inclement weather. The footage is always appreciated, but here’s hoping everyone stays safe! source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

25 Apr 2011 13:43

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U.S.: Parsing Wikileaks’ trove of Gitmo detainee files

  • The U.S. has a pretty low threshold for proof when it comes to tossing somebody in Guantanamo Bay, at least that’s what seems true when you read the latest files revealed by Wikileaks. As reported by The Guardian, the U.S. government targeted people wearing a certain type of Casio wristwatch (the F-91W) for detention, because that model of wristwatch was known for its use and distribution by al-Qaeda for training in bomb-making. More than fifty of the released detainee files list the cheap, digital timepiece as a point of interest.
  • No exception for age Two early detainees, an 89-year-old and 70-year-old, sound like they never should’ve been there. U.S. doctors described the former as suffering from major depression, senility and dementia, while the latter authorities internally assessed had no real reason for their detainment at Guantanamo Bay.
  • No exception for youth Naqib Ullah was one of the youngest detainees, at just 14 when he spent a year in confinement. Authorities ultimately decided he was telling the truth when he insisted he’d been kidnapped by the Taliban — his file claims to want to “afford him an opportunity to ‘grow out’ of the radical extremism he has been subject to.” source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
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