Ladywriter

Automakers say delaying implementation of new standards will cost them WASHINGTON - The Bush administration said Wednesday it won't finish implementing new vehicle fuel-efficiency rules, leaving the issue to the incoming Obama administration.The Transportation Department said in a statement that the recent financial problems of automakers will require the next administration "to conduct a thorough review of matters affecting the industry." The auto industry was swift to criticize the decision, saying any delay could cost them money. "I think that all along manufacturers have said we need certainty. .... Anything that delays that makes it more difficult," said Charles Territo, a spokesman for the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers. "We had expected that these rules would have been finalized last year." The department is required under a law enacted in 2007 to set rules by April 1, 2009 for how automakers are to meet new fuel economy standards. Last spring, the current administration said the next generation of new cars and trucks should be required to meet a fleet average of 31.6 miles per gallon by 2015. The requires that by 2020 new cars and trucks meet 35 mpg, a 40 percent increase over current standards. Territo said it will cost the industry an estimated $47 billion to comply with the standards. "There's no question that this rule will come with a significant cost to manufacturers," Territo said. General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC are struggling to survive and have received a federal bailout. The implementation plan proposed by President Bush was expected to save nearly 55 billion gallons of oil and reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 521 million metric tons over the life of the new vehicles built between 2011-2015. It would add an average cost of $650 per passenger car and $979 per truck by 2015. Environmental groups and their allies in Congress, who had been critical of Bush's past opposition to higher fuel economy standards, had responded favorably to the administration's plan. In the past, automakers have fiercely opposed increases in fuel economy standards, but in 2007 they supported a compromise that helped lead to the passage of a massive energy bill. The law requires the auto industry to implement more than half of the fuel-efficiency requirements by 2015 and pushes them to build more gas-electric hybrid cars and diesel-powered trucks and SUVs.

Activists praise president, but also want to expand Marianas monument WASHINGTON - Announcing the largest marine conservation effort in history, President George W. Bush on Tuesday designated three remote Pacific island areas as national monuments to protect them from energy extraction and commercial fishing."For sea birds and marine life, they will be sanctuaries to grow and thrive. For scientists, they will be places to extend the frontiers of discovery. And for the American people, they will be places that honor our duty to be good stewards of the Almighty's creation," Bush said at a White House ceremony. The three areas — totaling some 195,280 square miles — include the Mariana Trench, the deepest spot on earth at 36,000 feet below the sea. Each location harbors unique species and some of the rarest geological formations on Earth — from the world's largest land crab to a bird that incubates its eggs in the heat of underwater volcanoes. All will be protected as national monuments — the same status afforded to statues and cultural sites — under the 1906 Antiquities Act. The law allows the government to immediately phase out commercial fishing and other extractive uses. However, recreational fishing, tourism and scientific research could still occur inside the three areas. "These locations are truly among the last pristine areas in the marine environment on Earth," said James Connaughton, chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. Ceremony Tuesday at White House The president plans to make the designation official on Tuesday at a ceremony at the White House. The three marine areas — totaling 195,280 square miles — are: In the northern Pacific, waters at the northern end of the Northern Mariana Islands, including the Mariana Trench. In American Samoa, the Rose Atoll — the world’s smallest coral atoll and one of the most remote. In the central Pacific, coral reefs, pinnacles, sea mounts, islands and surrounding waters of Johnston Atoll, Howland, Baker and Jarvis Islands, Kingman Reef, Palmyra Atoll and Wake Island. These areas harbor some of the most pristine coral reefs in the world. The Marianas monument is especially significant given the scientific value of the trench and underwater volcanoes that form part of the Pacific Rim's "Ring of Fire." "Here, the oldest species on Earth thrive amidst monstrous active mud volcanoes, and strange new species push life beyond all extremes," noted the Pew Environment Group in a report on the proposed monument's scientific value. The area offers "the greatest diversity of seamount (underwater volcano) and hydrothermal vent life yet discovered," the conservation group stated. "The world's first discovery of hydrothermal vent fish was made in a boiling undersea lake of liquid sulfur" in this area. Size scaled back The protected areas will extend 50 nautical miles off the coral reefs and atolls at the three monuments, which will be officially called the Marianas Marine National Monument, Rose Atoll Marine National Monument, and the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument. Advocacy groups were pushing for 200 nautical miles, the full extent of the U.S. exclusive economic zone. Commercial fishing will also still be allowed in the waters over the Mariana Trench. The monument will only protect the rim of the canyon and its depths. The canyon is deeper than Mt. Everest is tall and five times the size of the Grand Canyon. "Commercial fishing was not relevant to the resource we wanted to protect," Connaughton said, referring to the deep trench itself. He also said the science did not support protecting the full 200 nautical miles. A group seeking a wider Marianas designation praised Bush but said it would continue working for more protection. "We still applaud President Bush for taking the first step," Agnes McPhetres, vice chair of The Friends of the Monument, said in a statement. "The Marianas will still get a visitors center, an enforcement boat, co-management, an advisory council to the monument, federal jobs, and loads of media attention." CONTINUED Appeal to Obama1 | 2 | Next >

link CARACAS, Venezuela - Venezuela ordered Israel's ambassador expelled from the country on Tuesday in protest over the Israeli military offensive in the Gaza Strip.The decision by President Hugo Chavez to kick out the diplomat appeared to be the strongest reaction yet to the Gaza offensive by any country with ties to Israel. The Venezuelan Foreign Ministry announced the move in a statement, saying it "has decided to expel the Israeli ambassador and part of the Israeli Embassy's personnel." The Israeli offensive in Gaza has killed nearly 600 Palestinians in ground and air strikes. Israel launched the attacks Dec. 27 to stop Palestinian militants from firing rockets into southern Israel. "How far will this barbarism go?" Chavez asked on state television before the ambassador's expulsion was announced. "The president of Israel should be taken before an international court together with the president of the United States, if the world had any conscience." Venezuela's Foreign Ministry said its U.N. mission is joining with other countries in demanding the Security Council "apply urgent and necessary measures to stop this invasion." Israeli diplomats could not immediately be reached for comment. The embassy in Caracas was closed, and it was unclear how the Israeli government would respond. Jewish community leader Abraham Levy, president of the Venezuelan Confederation of Israelite Associations, called the government's decision "taking the side of a terrorist group" by backing Gaza's Hamas leaders while ignoring Israel's perspective. "I deeply lament that decision made by the government, which cuts off an enormous and long tradition of friendship between the people of Israel and the people of Venezuela," Levy told The Associated Press. He said the decision leaves Venezuela's Jewish community — which numbers nearly 15,000 — "not only worried but also deeply battered" because it "attempts to demonize the state of Israel." While many countries have protested Israel's offensive, none besides Venezuela so far have expelled the ambassador. Mauritania, which established relations with Israel in 1999, called home its ambassador from the Jewish state on Monday. Jordan and Egypt, the other two Arab nations with relations with Israel, summoned their Israeli ambassadors to protest the Gaza attacks, but they have resisted popular calls to expel them. Chavez has long been critical of the Israeli government's policies in the Middle East and has supported the Palestinians' stance in the conflict. During Israel's 2006 conflict in Lebanon, Chavez withdrew his top envoy from Israel, calling the bombings there "a new Holocaust." Relations have remained at a scaled-back level since. Chavez's condemnations of Israel's offensive in Gaza have grown gradually more severe in recent days. On Monday he called the Jewish state a "genocidal government," and on Tuesday urged Jews in Venezuela to take a stand against the Israeli government. In spite of harsh criticisms of Israel, Chavez's government has insisted it is friendly toward Jewish people. Chavez met with Jewish leaders in August, pledging to work against anti-Semitism despite strong differences on Mideast politics. Top Venezuelan officials explained Tuesday's decision speaking to cheering supporters at a Caracas mosque. Some in the crowd chanted "Gaza, hold on. The people are rising up!" Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro said Venezuela declared the Israeli ambassador "persona non grata" and decided to "reduce to a minimum the representation of this embassy in Venezuela." Justice Minister Tarek El Aissami, who is of Arab descent, said "our revolution is also a revolution for a free Palestine!" Chavez accuses Israel of acting on behalf of the United States in the Mideast, and he has forged close ties with Israel's top enemies — Iran and Syria. Chavez also has used the tool of expelling an ambassador before. Last September, he kicked out U.S. envoy Patrick Duddy saying it was in solidarity with Bolivia, which also booted its U.S. ambassador, accusing him of aiding violent protests. Demonstrations against the offensive have been held in various Latin American countries in recent days. In Argentina, which has the third-largest Jewish population outside Israel, hundreds of people marched to the Israeli Embassy to call for an end to the offensive. Brazil's government, like Venezuela, has said it is sending food and medical aid to the Gaza Strip. And in Bolivia, about a hundred Palestinians and Arabs marched to protest the violence.

The Tennessee Coal Sludge Spill was not a natural disaster, this was a man-made disaster, directly tied to our reliance on fossil fuels. The disaster is 48 times larger than the Exxon Valdez oil spill. There is no such thing as a clean cigarette, or clean cancer, and there is no such thing as clean coal. Yet last year alone, the Coal industry spent over $45 million trying to convince the American people that the dirtiest fuel on the planet is in fact, clean. It's simply not true. In the face of this tragedy, the coal industry still wants to build more pollution-belching coal plants, and we cannot let that happen. Tell Congress to support a federal moratorium on new coal-fired power plants that emit global warming pollution! Send the letter below now. We'll automatically send it to the members of Congress that represent the physical address you give us, and their name will automatically appear at the top. You don't need to do anything except enter your information and click submit!

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As raw sewage flows through the streets, access to clean water dries up, and food supplies run low, the humanitarian crisis unfolding in Gaza cannot be ignored. Civilians under siege in Gaza are facing desperate conditions as mounting casualties swamp a hospital system that is close to collapse. We need your help today to call for an immediate ceasefire from both the Israeli government and from Hamas, to allow lifesaving aid through to people who need it. Urge an immediate and comprehensive ceasefire - click below now. (http://act.oxfamamerica.org/site/R?i=3J4UkH4GPprsFPZiACJOrQ.. ) Over 80 percent of Gaza's 1.5 million residents relied upon humanitarian aid before the crisis began; now the situation in Gaza has grown even worse as families have little or no access to clean water, food, or power. Medical and sanitation systems are in a state of failure. Residents of Southern Israel have also lived in fear of rocket attacks. Oxfam is joining thousands of other organizations and individuals around the world in demanding that our leaders use their influence to secure an immediate ceasefire by both parties, so that vital humanitarian assistance can be delivered and negotiations for a long-term solution can restart. Join us today - call for an immediate and comprehensive ceasefire and protect civilians on both sides. (http://act.oxfamamerica.org/site/R?i=_50TzT6_GP5k9xhMHxlyZQ.. ) And after you've taken action, please click here (http://act.oxfamamerica.org/site/R?i=kCR0ZsniZXdifDup_DqFBA.. ) to send this message on to your friends and family. It's vitally important that we get as many voices as possible calling for a ceasefire. Sincerely, Tim Fullerton Oxfam America

By Max Blumenthal, Huffington Post. Posted January 6, 2009. Almost as soon as the first Israeli missile struck the Gaza Strip, a veteran cheering squad suited up to support the home team. "Israel is so scrupulous about civilian life," Charles Krauthammer claimed in the Washington Post. Echoing Krauthammer, Alan Dershowitz called the Israeli attack on Gaza, "Perfectly 'Proportionate.'" And in the New York Times, Israeli historian Benny Morris described his country's airstrikes as "highly efficient." While the cheerleaders testified to the superior moral fiber of their team, the Palestinian civilian death toll mounted. Israeli missiles tore at least fifteen Palestinian police cadets to shreds at a graduation ceremony, blew twelve worshipers to pieces (including six children) while they left evening prayers at a mosque, flattened the elite American International School, killed five sisters while they slept in their beds, and liquidated 9 women and children in order to kill a single Hamas leader. So far, Israeli forces have killed at least 500 Gazans and wounded some two thousand, including hundreds of children. Yesterday, the IDF blanketed parts of Gaza with white phosphorus, a chemical weapon Saddam Hussein once deployed against Kurdish rebels. "It was Israel at its best," Yossi Klein Halevi declared in the New Republic. By New Year's Day, Israel's cheering squad had turned the opinion pages of major American newspapers into their own personal romper room. Of all the editorial contributions published by the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and the New York Times since the Israel's war on Gaza began, to my knowledge only one offered a skeptical view of the assault. But that editorial, by Israeli novelist David Grossman, contained not a single word about the Palestinian casualties of IDF attacks. Even while calling for a cease fire, Grossman promised, "We can always start shooting again." 1 2 Next page » as usual the comments can keep ya reading for a long time

in truth it would be next door to impossible to destroy all life on earth unless the planet was hit by another celestial body and vaporized from the depths of the oceans to miles under ice bacteria and other micro organisms flourish in extreme environments. A TZ broken glasses ending would be sweet. That was one of the best TZ eps ever!!! That one and Kirk seeing the thing on the wing of the plane X'D and I'm talking Tina and I'm going to kill you X'D

I don't have any of those name brands but I'm checkin my store brand cold meds.

greed self absorbed pressure to live up to what you say you are to your peers sick

link A man who initially told police gunmen kidnapped his 2 1/2-year-old son was arrested Saturday, accused of committing an “extremely hideous” murder because he was ordered to pay child support, Police Superintendent Warren Riley said. Danny Platt confessed, told police where to find the child’s body and will be booked with first-degree murder of Ja’ Shawn Powell, Riley said at a news conference. “He had said he would kill either his wife or his child before he paid child support,” which he recently had been ordered to do, Riley said. Riley said he did not know the amount of child support and would not describe how the boy was killed, saying the coroner would do that after the autopsy was complete. The coroner’s spokesman did not immediately return a call. “The mother is in a safe place,” Riley said. Although he had visiting rights, Platt, 22, of New Orleans, had never visited the boy until he picked him up Friday, Riley said. Police put out a notice Saturday asking people to look for the boy and saying his father had told them three men with dreadlocks and AK-47 rifles had piled out of an SUV and kidnapped Ja’ Shawn shortly before midnight Friday. “His story never really added up,” Riley said. “He was a suspect from the very beginning.” Riley said Platt eventually confessed and told officers where to find the body. Platt had only a couple of “very minor” previous arrests, he said.

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By Robert Parry, Consortium News. Posted January 5, 2009. srael, a nation that was born out of Zionist terrorism, has launched massive airstrikes against targets in Gaza using high-tech weapons produced by the United States, a country that often has aided and abetted terrorism by its client military forces, such as Chile’s Operation Condor and the Nicaraguan contras, and even today harbors right-wing Cuban terrorists implicated in blowing up a civilian airliner.Yet, with that moral ambiguity excluded from the debate, the justification for the Israeli attacks, which have killed at least 364 people, is the righteous fight against “terrorism,” since Gaza is ruled by the militant Palestinian group, Hamas. Hamas rose to power in January 2006 through Palestinian elections, which ironically the Bush administration had demanded. However, after Hamas won a parliamentary majority, Israel and the United States denounced the outcome because they deem Hamas a “terrorist organization.” Hamas then wrested control of Gaza from Fatah, a rival group that once was considered “terrorist” but is now viewed as a U.S.-Israeli partner, so it has been cleansed of the “terrorist” label. Unwilling to negotiate seriously with Hamas because of its acts of terrorism -- which have included firing indiscriminate short-range missiles into southern Israel -- the United States and Israel sat back as the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza worsened, with 1.5 million impoverished Palestinians packed into what amounts to a giant open-air prison. When Hamas ended a temporary cease-fire on Dec. 19 because of a lack of progress in those negotiations and began lobbing its little missiles into Israel once more, the Israeli government reacted on Saturday with its lethal “shock and awe” firepower -- even though no Israelis had been killed by the post-cease-fire missiles launched from Gaza. [since Saturday, four Israelis have died in more intensive Hamas missile attacks.] Israel claimed that its smart bombs targeted sites related to the Hamas security forces, including a school for police cadets and even regular policemen walking down the street. But it soon became clear that Israel was taking an expansive view of what was part of the Hamas military infrastructure, with Israeli bombs taking out a television station and a university building as well as killing a significant number of civilians. As the slaughter continued on Monday, Israeli officials confided to Western journalists that the war plan was to destroy the vast support network of social and other programs that undergird Hamas’s political clout. “There are many aspects of Hamas, and we are trying to hit the whole spectrum, because everything is connected and everything supports terrorism against Israel,” a senior Israeli military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told the Washington Post. “Hamas’s civilian infrastructure is a very, very sensitive target,” added Matti Steinberg, a former top adviser to Israel’s domestic security service. “If you want to put pressure on them, this is how.” [Washington Post, Dec. 30, 2008] Since the classic definition of “terrorism” is the use of violence against civilians to achieve a political goal, Israel would seem to be inviting an objective analysis that it has chosen its own terrorist path. But it is clearly counting on the U.S. news media to continue wearing the blinders that effectively limit condemnations about terrorism to people and groups that are regarded as Washington’s enemies. Whose Terrorism? As a Washington-based reporter for the Associated Press in the 1980s, I once questioned the seeming bias that the U.S.-based wire service applied to its use of the word “terrorist” when covering Middle East issues. A senior AP executive responded to my concerns with a quip. “Terrorist is the word that follows Arab,” he said. Though meant as a lighthearted riposte, the comment clearly had a great deal of truth to it. It was easy to attach “terrorist” to any Arab attack -- even against a military target such as the bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Lebanon in 1983 after the Reagan administration had joined hostilities against Muslim forces by having U.S. warships lob shells into Lebanese villages. 1 2 3 Next page »

January 4th, 2009 2:00 pm Israeli Troops Advance, Bisecting Gaza January 4th, 2009 1:56 pm Israeli forces bisect Gaza, surround biggest city January 3rd, 2009 11:01 pm U.S. thwarts Libyan push for Gaza truce demand at U.N. January 3rd, 2009 10:54 pm Did the IAF bomb a Gazan welding truck or a Hamas Grad transport? January 3rd, 2009 2:40 pm Israeli Ground Forces Push Into Gaza January 3rd, 2009 1:05 pm Israel bombs Gaza mosque, kills 10 January 3rd, 2009 12:55 pm Israeli Arabs protest against Gaza offensive destabilize the middle east and the price of oil climbs gee its no wonder the Bush admin is doing fucking nothing

Friday, December 12th, 2008 Senate to Middle Class: Drop Dead ...a message from Michael Moore Friends, They could have given the loan on the condition that the automakers start building only cars and mass transit that reduce our dependency on oil. They could have given the loan on the condition that the automakers build cars that reduce global warming. They could have given the loan on the condition that the automakers withdraw their many lawsuits against state governments in their attempts to not comply with our environmental laws. They could have given the loan on the condition that the management team which drove these once-great manufacturers into the ground resign and be replaced with a team who understands the transportation needs of the 21st century. Yes, they could have given the loan for any of these reasons because, in the end, to lose our manufacturing infrastructure and throw 3 million people out of work would be a catastrophe. But instead, the Senate said, we'll give you the loan only if the factory workers take a $20 an hour cut in wages, pension and health care. That's right. After giving BILLIONS to Wall Street hucksters and criminal investment bankers -- billions with no strings attached and, as we have since learned, no oversight whatsoever -- the Senate decided it is more important to break a union, more important to throw middle class wage earners into the ranks of the working poor than to prevent the total collapse of industrial America. We have a little more than a month to go of this madness. As I sit here in Michigan today, tens of thousands of hard working, honest, decent Americans do not believe they can make it to January 20th. The malaise here is astounding. Why must they suffer because of the mistakes of every CEO from Roger Smith to Rick Wagoner? Make management and the boards of directors and the shareholders pay for this. Of course that is heresy to the 31 Republicans who decided to blame the poor, miserable autoworkers for this mess. And our wonderful media complied with their spin on the morning news shows: "UAW Refuses to Give Concessions Killing Auto Bailout Bill." In fact the UAW has given concession after concession, reduced their benefits, agreed to get rid of the Jobs Bank and agreed to make it harder for their retirees to live from week to week. Yes! That's what we need to do! It's the Jobs Bank and the old people who have led the nation to economic ruin! But even doing all that wasn't enough to satisfy the bastard Republicans. These Senate vampires wanted blood. Blue collar blood. You see, they weren't opposed to the bailout because they believed in the free market or capitalism. No, they were opposed to the bailout because they're opposed to workers making a decent wage. In their rage, they were driven to destroy the backbone of this country, not because the UAW hadn't given back enough, but because the UAW hadn't given up. It appears that the sitting President has been looking for a way to end his reign by one magnanimous act, just like a warlord on his feast day. He will put his finger in the dyke, and the fragile mess of an auto industry will eke through the next few months. That will give the Senate enough time to demand that the bankers and investment sharks who've already swiped nearly half of the $700 billion gift a chance to make the offer of cutting their pay. Fat chance. Yours, Michael Moore MMFlint@aol.com MichaelMoore.com

By Rob Larson, AlterNet Instead of making loans to help the economy, they're shoring up their own finances and buying up their competitors. http://www.alternet.org/workplace/116859/ The country's financial markets have collapsed, as they tend to do when left without adult supervision, and they're taking our economy with them. With the large banks refusing to make loans after losing billions on worthless subprime derivatives, the government stepped in and agreed to October's financial bailout package. The $700 billion legislation was meant to buy banks' "troubled assets" for cash, and thus improve banks' balance sheets to the point that they would lend again. This would mean credit for struggling businesses and households and could encourage expansion and hiring, thus pulling us out of recession. But it turns out the banks haven't held up their end of the bargain. All they're holding up is a glass to a government that would rather shovel cash into the largest banks than take the edge off the recession. The bailout was highly unpopular, despite a heavy push by the U.S. political leadership. Most citizens apparently couldn't figure why we should give money to the banks that caused this crisis by buying deeply into the housing bubble. Especially when foreclosures and bankruptcies among regular homeowners are out of control -- the Mortgage Bankers Association reports that "a record 1 in 10 American homeowners with a mortgage was either at least one month behind on their payments or in foreclosure at the end of September." But the plan has not been carried out as advertised -- rather than buying the subprime securities from the banks, the government has instead decided to "recapitalize" them. Meaning, invest money in the big banks for some equity, money which the banks could then loan to the staggering economy. Well, at least the part where we give them money went well. The fact is that the banks are not making loans -- the "credit crunch" goes on, and the economy is the worse for it. After so many of Wall Street's great investment banks went bankrupt, or were bailed out by the government, or were bought by competitors, the banks want to "hoard cash" to avoid a similar fate. But besides shoring up their own finances, the banks are putting our public bailout money to another purpose -- buying up their smaller competitors. Mergers and acquisitions have been a major part of the government's strategy to deal with the crisis since its beginning. Bear Stearns, the first respectable Wall Street powerhouse to approach bankruptcy, was sold to the larger bank Chase in a shotgun marriage arranged by the Federal Reserve. Since then, the government has arranged for a tanking Merrill Lynch to be sold to Bank of America, a heavily leveraged Wachovia to Wells Fargo, and a failing Washington Mutual to Chase, again. The Treasury Department would say that the damage to the economy can be limited if larger, more stable banks buy their struggling rivals. Of course, some of these largest banks, such as Citigroup, are not so secure themselves. But more than that, the money used by the larger banks to acquire the others is capital that could have been used to make the loans our economy is desperate for -- and of course, that's what they were supposed to do with the public money in the first place. But most importantly, remember that the reason we're paying to bail out these banks at all is that they are "too big to fail," in the language of the business press -- in other words, if these huge banks go under, the loss of employment, lending and tax revenue could do profound damage to the greater economy. So if these banks were too enormous to allow to die in the first place, why in God's name would we be paying them to get even larger? The mergers are large-scale -- the Financial Times calls them a "wave of consolidation as banks scramble to use the cash on takeovers and bolt-on acquisitions." BusinessWeek reports "what could emerge is a barbell-shaped system with megabanks, small banks and little in between." The business reporters for the New York Times describe the Treasury Department as "using the bailout bill to turn the banking system into the oligopoly of giant national institutions." An oligopoly is a market, such as banking, dominated by a few very large companies. 1 2 Next page » OBAMA'S PERILOUS COMPROMISE WITH WALL STREET LOOTERS By Jeffrey Klein, Huffington Post President Obama has made a bad mistake: Instead of cracking down on serial looters and complicit regulators, he plans to reward them. http://www.alternet.org/workplace/117219/ Perhaps the old saying should be reworked: In America, those who can, loot. Those who can't, teach wealth-friendly philosophies masquerading as hard science.

By MEAD GRUVER – 6 days ago CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) — Yellowstone National Park was jostled by a host of small earthquakes for a third straight day Monday, and scientists watched closely to see whether the more than 250 tremors were a sign of something bigger to come. Swarms of small earthquakes happen frequently in Yellowstone, but it's very unusual for so many earthquakes to happen over several days, said Robert Smith, a professor of geophysics at the University of Utah. "They're certainly not normal," Smith said. "We haven't had earthquakes in this energy or extent in many years." Smith directs the Yellowstone Seismic Network, which operates seismic stations around the park. He said the quakes have ranged in strength from barely detectable to one of magnitude 3.8 that happened Saturday. A magnitude 4 quake is capable of producing moderate damage. "This is an active volcanic and tectonic area, and these are the kinds of things we have to pay attention to," Smith said. "We might be seeing something precursory. "Could it develop into a bigger fault or something related to hydrothermal activity? We don't know. That's what we're there to do, to monitor it for public safety." The strongest of dozens of tremors Monday was a magnitude 3.3 quake shortly after noon. All the quakes were centered beneath the northwest end of Yellowstone Lake. A park ranger based at the north end of the lake reported feeling nine quakes over a 24-hour period over the weekend, according to park spokeswoman Stacy Vallie. No damage was reported. "There doesn't seem to be anything to be alarmed about," Vallie said. Smith said it's difficult to say what might be causing the tremors. He pointed out that Yellowstone is the caldera of a volcano that last erupted 70,000 years ago. He said Yellowstone remains very geologically active — and its famous geysers and hot springs are a reminder that a pool of magma still exists five to 10 miles underground. "That's just the surface manifestation of the enormous amount of heat that's being released through the system," he said. Yellowstone has had significant earthquakes as well as minor ones in recent decades. In 1959, a magnitude 7.5 quake near Hebgen Lake just west of the park triggered a landslide that killed 28 people. Small Earthquakes Rattle Yellowstone and Its Volcano ...scientists wonder when Yellowstone will blow again. According to LiveScience, the caldera last blew up about 600,000 years ago. Projections suggest that such an eruption would be catastrophic to most of the United States, with half the country being “covered in ash up to 3 feet deep,” LiveScience says, adding, “But those same researchers say nothing suggests such an eruption is imminent. They point out, however, that Yellowstone seems to blow its top about every 600,000 years.” The Cascades Volcano Observatory calls the Yellowstone caldera “one of the largest and most active in the world.” The United States has other, smaller calderas throughout the west.

CAN AMERICA CLEAN UP FROM ITS WORST ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER? [CONTAINS PHOTO SLIDESHOW] By Antrim Caskey, AlterNet With the breaking of a coal waste dam in Tennessee, environmental and human health is threatened by millions of pounds of toxic chemicals. http://www.alternet.org/water/116933/ ... But there may be good reason for alarm. Activists representing United Mountain Defense, River Keepers and Citizen Coal Council distributed information about coal ash and its dangers at the meeting. Stephen Smith of CleanEnergy.org demanded that Kilgore tell the crowd what is in the coal ash. Kilgore refused to answer saying only that, "we are concentrating our efforts on clean up." Chris Irwin, with United Mountain Defense, spoke to the crowd warning them that this community meeting was "nothing more than a public relations snow job." As reported in the New York Times, December 30, TVA finally revealed an inventory of the Kingston Fossil Plant waste generation in detail "In just one year, the plant's byproducts included 45,000 pounds of arsenic, 49,000 pounds of lead, 1.4 million pounds of barium, 91,000 pounds of chromium and 140,000 pounds of manganese. Those metals can cause cancer, liver damage and neurological complications, among other health problems. And the holding pond ... contained many decades' worth of these deposits." Subsequently, independent tests of the water quality at the spill site and downstream, in coordination with Appalachian Voices and the Waterkeeper Alliance's Upper Watauga Riverkeeper Program, were conducted and analyzed this week. The results are frightening. Tests were conducted at the Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry labs at Appalachian State University in Boone, NC. At the Kingston plant's canal intake, the tests revealed arsenic levels 300 times what federal laws allow; all samples contained "elevated levels of arsenic, barium, cadmium, chromium, lead, mercury , nickel and thallium," according to Appalachian Voices' website. Dr. Shea Tuberty, Associate Professor of Biology, one of the scientists conducting the tests concluded, "The ecosystems around Kingston and Harriman are going to be in trouble, the aquatic ones for some time, until nature is able to bury these compounds in the environment," said Tuberty. "I don't know how long that will take, maybe generations." The coal disaster at Kingston has clued Americans in to the real consequences of coal. We use coal-fired power for almost half of our daily electricity use; when you turn on your lights, your plasma TV or laptop computer, you are probably using coal. The coal industry, which has come under sustained attack, especially in the wake of global climate change, is spending tens of millions of dollars on a public relations war to convince Americans that coal is good and clean. But many residents of Appalachia who live with the daily effects are strenuously opposed. Long before this latest disaster, citizens in the Coal River valley in southern West Virginia have pointed to the threats of massive sludge ponds in their neighborhood: Brushy Fork, which contains 9 billion gallons of sludge and the 2.8 billion gallons that sit above Marsh Fork Elementary School, which according to reports written between 1998 and 2005 by the Mine Safety and Health Administration, is at risk for failure which could fatally impact 1,000 people downstream. From the Coal River Valley -- and across the nation -- the people cry for Marsh Fork Elementary to be moved away from the toxic waste dump which has accrued hundreds of repeated violations. But West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin, III has refused this community's requests. Massey Energy, which runs the operation, assures West Virginians that their dam is safe and inspected regularly. But that is also what TVA assured the people of Kingston. Clearly corporate responsibility is an issue when it comes to the threats posed by coal. In the case of Kingston, environmental organizations like Greenpeace are calling for criminal charges against TVA. The Southern Alliance for Clean Energy is planning to sue TVA under the Federal Clean Water Act. Additionally, Roane County land developers are suing TVA for $165 million. And many are hoping that the Kingston spill will be the impetus to help Americans commit to the immediate transition away from coal to clean, renewable energy. ... I hope the entire gig is sued right out from under them and the mutherfuckers gotta close up shop. There is NO such thing as CLEAN COAL. It does not exist and it will NEVER exist.

The AP reports that officials are saying Caroline Kennedy will be New York's next senator: Officials say the daughter of the late President John F. Kennedy will be the governor's choice to fill the New York Senate seat being vacated by Hillary Rodham Clinton. Two people close to Gov. David Paterson tell The Associated Press they believe Caroline Kennedy will be his choice, but the governor cautions he's still looking. "The AP story is incorrect," Paterson spokesman Errol Cockfield said in response. "There is no front-runner, and the governor is not on the verge of any decision." On Thursday, the governor disputed reports that he would hire a "caretaker" to keep the seat warm until the 2010 election. Speaking to reporters at the Executive Mansion Thursday, Paterson said he intends to select someone with long-term interest in the job, not someone who would simply hold the seat until a special election next year. Picking a caretaker, he said "would cause New York to lose seniority. And in the United States Senate, the most effective senators are the ones who have seniority. So I'm hoping the person I select wins the primary."

Israel's Ground Invasion of Gaza Continues The use of cluster bombs - which have a large footprint when initially dropped and then remain a threat for decades - in a location like the Gaza Strip which is so packed with people is horrifying.

Bill Richardson Withdraws From Commerce Secretary Nomination Posted by Faiz Shakir, Think Progress at 10:46 AM on January 4, 2009. New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, tapped in December by President-elect Barack Obama to serve as secretary of Commerce, has withdrawn his name for the position, citing a pending investigation into a company that has done business with his state. "Let me say unequivocally that I and my Administration have acted properly in all matters and that this investigation will bear out that fact," he said Sunday in a report by NBC News' Andrea Mitchell. "But I have concluded that the ongoing investigation also would have forced an untenable delay in the confirmation process." A federal grand jury is investigating whether a California firm, CDR Financial Products, won a lucrative $1.6 billion contract from the state of New Mexico after it contributed at least $110,000 to three political committees formed by Richardson.

Posted by Steve Benen, Washington Monthly on January 4, 2009 at 10:56 AM. Those waiting for a ceasefire in Gaza are likely to be waiting for quite a while. ABC News' George Stephanopoulos spoke to Israeli President Shimon Peres and said his government planned to ignore international calls for a pause to the violence. "The idea that Hamas will continue to fire and we will declare a ceasefire..it does not make any sense," Peres told me on "This Week." Heavy fighting continues today after thousands of Israeli ground troops moved into Gaza last night. More than 500 Palestinians have been killed and 2400 wounded since airstrikes began last week. But that has not stopped Hamas from firing rockets into Israel killing four and injuring more than 70 Israelis. [...] Peres added, "They are now beginning to feel the weight of their mistakes." But the Israeli president said the government of Israel has no intention of occupying Gaza. Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

the thing is... yeah it looks great on a little tiny screen. I want this crap on my television. Is it not for console cuz it would look uber shitty blown up? If they can't make it for everyone and just cater to those that have and can afford psp fuck em. They'd make way more money off the game if it was for console. They pull a stunt like this to sell psp, pretty desperate in this shit economy. Sorry but everyone I know is gonna pay rent n buy food not blow hundreds on a psp and game.

umm.... if the writing is lame and the cast is as sucky as SGA this show will die quick