Look out MSNBC. The market for “vicious, inaccurate, and inexcusable” cable news just got more crowded in New York. The New York Times reported August 1 that Al Jazeera English will begin appearing in New York for the first time, “subletting air space from a channel owner.” This marks a victory in AJE’s campaign to gain widespread access to the U.S. cable market. It’s also a victory for the network’s liberal media supporters, including several at the New York Times. “Al Jazeera English was lauded by the United States government and even by a few competitors for its broadcasts from Egypt and other Middle Eastern countries earlier this year,” the Times noted. Yes, and it was called “balanced and thorough.” But as the Culture and Media Institute has reported , the praise was overblown and stemmed more from a decidedly non-journalistic admiration for the network’s activism than the quality of AJE’s reporting. In fact, AJE willfully ignored the horrible sexual attack on CBS’ Lara Logan in Cairo’s Tahrir Square on Feb. 11. Nor did it report on the murder of a Jewish family (including toddler and infant) in an Israeli settlement the next month. AJE did report on related events that occurred later, portraying Palestinians as victims of the Israeli thirst for vengeance. But it’s par for the course for a network that threw a birthday party for a child-murdering terrorist, whose Iraq War coverage was called “vicious, inaccurate, and inexcusable” by the U.S. Secretary of Defense, and who’s website after the killing of Osama bin Laden ran a long list of editorials suggesting the moral equivalence of the terrorist and his killers. Al Jazeera English is little better than an anti-Western propaganda outlet. It says a lot about the debasement of our own “journalists” that they can call it “balanced and thorough.”
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Court hears that Richard Kwakye flagged down a bus en route to King’s College hospital while bleeding from a head wound A man shot in the head flagged down a bus which took him to hospital, the Old Bailey heard on Monday. The driver, whose route took him past King’s College hospital, south London, stopped to let him off outside the accident and emergency department. “He was bleeding from a wound to his head and was evidently in considerable pain,” said Oliver Glasgow, prosecuting. “To the shock and amazement of the triage nurses, this man explained that he had just been shot in the head and had caught a bus to the hospital. He was rushed into theatre where the surgeons who operated upon him duly removed a bullet from his brain.” Richard Kwakye survived but the incident had made him “mortal enemies” with Rilwan Bankole, the man accused of shooting him. Bankole, 31, of Thornton Heath, south London, denies attempting to murder Kwakye in October 2003. Glasgow said Kwakye, who was 20 at the time, had refused to tell police who shot him until six years later. He said he had been driven to Goose Green park in East Dulwich where he alleged Bankole pointed the gun at his head and shot him as they sat in a car as fireworks were set off. Glasgow added: “When he came to, no one was there. Whilst he knew that he was hurt he had no idea how seriously he had been wounded. He managed to get to his feet and staggered into the road where he flagged down a passing bus. The driver, who fortuitously was en route to King’s College hospital, dropped Richard Kwakye at A&E.” Doctors then removed the .22 air pellet, fired from a modified blank firing gun. Kwakye would not have survived if the bullet had been larger, the court heard. Bankole, who was said to have suspected his former friend of stealing his property, later told police Kwakye had lied about who shot him because the two were involved in a custody battle over a child. But the “seven years of hatred” had led to more serious matters, said Glasgow. Kwakye was convicted last week of the murder of Bankole’s 19-month-old daughter Siariah Letang in an arson attack at the home of her mother in September last year. Glasgow told the jurors they would find it hard to warm to Kwakye, now a convicted murderer who, like Bankole, had previous convictions for robbery and drugs. The trial continues. Crime Gun crime London guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Sen. John Barrasso: Debt Ceiling Hostage Taking Round One in Fifteen Round Fight
August 1, 2011 No Comment
Click here to view this media After telling Fox’s Neil Cavuto how much the “American people” really want to see the deficit cut by reducing spending and pretended that he and his party have in any way been acting in the interests of everyday working Americans, he reminded everyone of just what we’re in for in the near future — more hostage taking and demands to slash our social safety nets. I’m awaiting their new excuse after these budget cuts they’ve demanded start tanking our economy and putting us into another recession. I’m sure they’ll be telling us that the confidence fairies out there just can’t create any jobs for fear that the Bush tax cuts might not be extended.
Continue reading …Sen. John Barrasso: Debt Ceiling Hostage Taking Round One in Fifteen Round Fight
August 1, 2011 No Comment
Click here to view this media After telling Fox’s Neil Cavuto how much the “American people” really want to see the deficit cut by reducing spending and pretended that he and his party have in any way been acting in the interests of everyday working Americans, he reminded everyone of just what we’re in for in the near future — more hostage taking and demands to slash our social safety nets. I’m awaiting their new excuse after these budget cuts they’ve demanded start tanking our economy and putting us into another recession. I’m sure they’ll be telling us that the confidence fairies out there just can’t create any jobs for fear that the Bush tax cuts might not be extended.
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Mitch Winehouse meets Home Office minister to discuss gap in residential treatment services for young drug addicts Amy Winehouse’s father, Mitch, is meeting the Home Office minister James Brokenshire to discuss plans to set up a drug rehabilitation centre in his daughter’s name. Winehouse is being joined by his daughter’s managers, Raye Cosbert and Trenton Harrison-Lee, and Sarah Graham, a former cocaine user and addiction expert, to highlight a gap in residential treatment services for young people who cannot afford private treatment. A family spokesman said Mitch Winehouse felt strongly about the fact that addicts can face a wait of up to two years for NHS treatment. “He realised that if the family didn’t have money for Priory-style treatment it would be difficult to get help,” the spokesman said. Graham said: “We didn’t know it [Amy's death] was going to happen but we hope it will show people that addiction is something that can kill people when they are very young and that we should not wait until it is too late.” She said most treatment was not residential but accessed in the community. “Rehabilitation is more expensive than treatment in the community but in reality most desperate young people cannot access it,” she said. “It might be because their dealer meets them at the school gates or it could be that they are getting abused at home.” Mitch Winehouse met Graham when they both gave evidence to the Commons home affairs committee in October 2009. Graham said Britain’s only NHS rehabilitation centre for young people – at Middlegate in Nettleton, Lincolnshire – closed last year. Winehouse said in his eulogy at his daughter’s funeral last week that Amy had just completed three weeks of abstinence and may have struggled to deal with the sudden withdrawal. A postmortem examination proved inconclusive and an inquest was open and adjourned with no cause of death given. Keith Vaz, chairman of the Commons home affairs committee, who is also meeting Winehouse on Monday, said: “Mitch Winehouse gave powerful evidence to the home affairs select committee during our inquiry into drugs in 2009. Drawing on his personal experience he highlighted the long delay in accessing treatment for those with addiction. Two years on we need to revisit this issue to see if anything has improved. I am very happy to help Mitch in any way I can with his important campaign to help rehabilitate those most vulnerable in our society.” Paul Hayes, chief executive of the National Treatment Agency, has said the popular image of luxury rehab, beloved of celebrities and the tabloids, is not representative of the mainstream treatment and recovery services provided in Britain by the NHS and charities. “These services are widely available and for some years now official statistics have confirmed that more than nine out of 10 patients wait less than three weeks for treatment in England. There is an ongoing challenge for the system to respond flexibly to patient choice and ensure that people with drug problems are helped to become free of addiction in the most clinically appropriate way as quickly as they might wish,” said Hayes. He insisted there was a clear trend towards fewer young people needing treatment. But Simon Antrobus, of the treatment provider Addaction, said his organisation’s ability to provide support was at risk as funding for some community-based services had been cut by as much as 50%. “While it is good to see that fewer young people are using drugs and alcohol, we cannot become complacent. We need to ensure that specialist support remains available for everyone who encounters problems, whether it is the person themselves or the family around them,” Antrobus said. Amy Winehouse Drugs policy Drugs Alan Travis guardian.co.uk
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Jake Davis, allegedly known online as ‘Topiary’, released on bail after being charged with five offences Jake Davis, an 18-year-old from the Shetland Islands, was released on bail on Monday after being charged with five offences relating to computer attacks and break-ins by the LulzSec and Anonymous hacking groups earlier this year. The black-haired Davis, wearing a black T-shirt under a blue denim shirt and holding a copy of a book called Free radicals: The Secret Anarchy of Science, showed little reaction as the charges were read out at the City of Westminster magistrates’ court in Horseferry Road, London. Davis was granted bail to stay with his mother at their new home in Spalding, Lincolnshire, on condition that he does not access the internet either directly or through anyone else. He also has to wear a tag to ensure a 10pm to 7am curfew. Davis, whom police believe used the online nickname “Topiary” and was a member of the LulzSec and Anonymous hacking groups, was arrested at 2.10pm last Wednesday in Mid Yell, an northern island of the Shetlands. He was charged on Sunday night with offences under the Computer Misuse Act, the Serious Crime Act, and the Criminal Law Act. Davis is accused of gathering data from National Health Service computers, being involved with attacks on News International and being part of an attack that caused the website for the Serious Organised Crime Agency to collapse. It is claimed that the hacking attacks compromised personal data for hundreds of thousands of people via the NHS, and the bank details of a large number of people when Sony Pictures Entertainment was hacked. LulzSec Hacking Anonymous Charles Arthur guardian.co.uk
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HCL reveals News International’s various requests for deletion but tells MPs it knew of nothing untoward The technology firm HCL has told the home affairs select committee it was aware of the deletion of hundreds of thousands of emails at the request of News International between April 2010 and July 2011, but said it did not know of anything untoward behind the requests to delete them. HCL has sent the letter to the home affairs select committee chairman, Keith Vaz , revealing it had been involved in nine separate episodes of email deletion. HCL says it is not the company responsible for emails on the News International system that are older than a couple of weeks. It says another unnamed vendor is responsible, but confirms it has co-operated with this vendor in deleting material. Through a letter from HCL’s solicitors Stuart Benson, the firm says: “My client is aware of nothing which appeared abnormal, untoward or inconsistent with its contractual role.” It adds: “It is entirely for News International, the police and your committee as to whether there was any other agenda or subtext when issues of deletion arose and that is a matter on which my client cannot comment and something you will no doubt wish to explore direct with News International.” It stressed that since it was not the company that stored News International’s data “any suggestion or allegation that it has deleted material held on behalf of News International is without foundation”. HCL identified three sets of email deletions in April 2010, including a deletion of a public folder of a live email system that “was owned by a user who no longer needed the emails”. A further 200,000 emails stuck in an outbox were deleted in May 2010 to restore email functionality. In September 2010 a further pruning of historic emails occurred to help stabilise the email archival system, which had been having “frequent outages” since November 2009. In January 2011 HCL was asked about its ability to truncate a particular database in the email archival systems. HCL “answered in the negative and suggested assistance from the third party vendor”. HCL stated no reason as to why it was unable to assist. In February 2011 emails were deleted in an older version of Microsoft. Finally, in July 2011 HCL helped delete emails from the live system as relocation errors had occurred during migration from one system to the other. HCL said it did not have the resources to review every set of deletions. Separately, a firm of solicitors drawn into the News International phone-hacking scandal is expected to reply shortly to the home affairs select committee as to how it came to write a key letter to the newspaper group that was then used by the company to contend that phone hacking had not been widespread. The firm, Harbottle and Lewis, is consulting the Metropolitan police before deciding how to reply to requests from the select committee to spell out how it came to write a letter taken to mean that only one reporter was aware of phone hacking at the paper. The New York Times reported at the weekend that the letter sent by Harbottle and Lewis to the culture, media and sport select committee was redrafted more than once. The firm had been hired to review the email of the tabloid’s royal reporter, Clive Goodman, who had pleaded guilty to hacking the mobile phone messages of royal household staff members. The letter said “no reasonable evidence” had been found that senior editors knew about the reporter’s “illegal actions”. The New York Times alleges that the letter sent to the culture select committee in May 2007 was constructed to give the company a clean bill of health over phone hacking, but was silent on the issue of payments to the police. The home affairs select committee asked: • “What was the exact remit given to Harbottle and Lewis when it was instructed by News International in 2007?” • “The contents of emails and information held in the file you mentioned in your letter.” • “What advice was provided from Harbottle and Lewis to News International in 2007 following examination of the emails and information?” • “Why the evidence you had in 2007 that was later examined by Lord McDonald in 2011 was not acted upon sooner?” Phone hacking News International Newspapers & magazines News of the World Newspapers Computing Email Media business Patrick Wintour guardian.co.uk
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Agreement criticised on both sides of the political divide, amid concern it may fail to be approved by Congress America has moved away from the brink of a catastrophic default after a deal was reached overnight to raise its debt ceiling. Stock markets around the world rallied on Monday, in relief that the world’s largest economy would probably avoid running out of cash this week. But the agreement, which includes around $2.5 trillion of spending cuts over the next decade, has been criticised by some on both sides of the political divide, and will probably not save America’s triple-A credit rating. There is also concern that the deal could still fail to be approved by Congress, which is due to vote on the package on Monday night. Some liberals are angry that the plan, which has been hailed as a triumph for the Tea Party movement, relies on spending reductions rather than tax rises to reduce the US budget deficit. The Democratic leader in the House, Nancy Pelosi, has already warned that some Democrats may be unwilling to support the deal. Under the plan, announced by Barack Obama late on Sunday, the US debt ceiling will be raised by about $2.4tn, in two stages. In return, the US government deficit will be reduced by a similar amount over the next decade. “This process has been messy and taken too long,” said Obama, who also admitted that the weeks of frustratingly slow negotiations in Washington had not delivered the deal he wanted . “This compromise does make a serious down-payment on the deficit reduction we need, and gives each party a strong incentive to get a balanced plan done before the end of the year,” Obama said. The Democratic leader in the Senate, Harry Reid, and his Republican counterpart, Mitch McConnell, both indicated they were optimistic that Congress will approve the deal. McConnell, who will meet with Republican senators on Monday, said: “We can assure the American people … that the United States of America will not for the first time in our history default on its obligations.” The full details of the plan have not been released. However, a fact sheet released by the White House showed that spending would be capped by $900bn over the next ten years. A bi-partisan committee will then be set up to agree a further $1.5tn of deficit reduction measures, which could include tax rises. If this committee cannot agree a deal, then an “enforcement mechanism” will trigger around $1.3tn of spending reductions beginning in 2013. Paul Krugman, the Nobel prizewinning US economist, accused Obama of surrendering to Republican opponents. “The deal itself, given the available information, is a disaster, and not just for President Obama and his party. It will damage an already depressed economy; it will probably make America’s long-term deficit problem worse, not better; and most important, by demonstrating that raw extortion works and carries no political cost, it will take America a long way down the road to banana republic status.” Markets rally, but AAA rating under threat Many economists believe that America could soon lose its triple-A credit rating, despite a deal being agreed. Standard & Poor’s, the rating agency, recently said that a credible fiscal plan would need to include $4tn of deficit reduction measures. “Avoiding the worst case scenario of a default on US Treasury obligations will not prevent a downgrade of the triple-A sovereign rating,” predicted Kevin Daly, emerging market debt portfolio manager at Aberdeen Asset Management. “So it’s time for us all to figure out just what it means when the US gets downgraded.” Stuart Gulliver, chief executive of HSBC, said the progress made over the US debt ceiling was “very welcome”, but also warned that America could see its credit rating cut. Wall Street is expected to open around 1% higher when trading begins on Monday. In London the FTSE 100 rallied by almost 1.5%, jumping 83 points to 5898, as traders welcomed the news that the US would probably not run out of cash. “Investors have breathed a collective sigh of relief that the risk of default has been avoided – albeit a few weeks ago nobody would have expected it to go down to the wire like this,” said David Jones, chief market strategist at IG Index. “It still has to be approved by Congress, so there is always the potential for a stumble here, but market reaction today seems confident that it will pass.” Most major commodities gained ground, pushing the cost of a barrel of Brent crude oil up by $2 to $119.40. Gold, which has benefited from the crisis as investors looked for safe havens, fell by 1%. Overnight, Asian stock markets rose strongly on the news. The Japanese Nikkei was up more than 2% at one stage, closing up 1.34% at 9,965 having broken through the 10,000 barrier earlier. United States Barack Obama US economy Republicans Democrats US politics Tea Party movement US economic growth and recession Ewen MacAskill Alex Hawkes guardian.co.uk
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Former Labour MP who was jailed for 16 months for submitting false invoices is released after serving a quarter of his sentence Expenses cheat MP Jim Devine has been released from prison after serving just a quarter of his sentence, sources said. The former Labour MP for Livingston, who was jailed for 16 months in March after being branded a liar by his trial judge, was released from Standford Hill prison in Kent on Monday morning. He spent four months behind bars after submitting false invoices totalling £8,385 between 2008 and 2009 – after politicians’ claims had already become front-page news. It is understood that Devine, 58, was freed under the home detention curfew scheme, which allows prisoners who pose a low risk to be tagged and released early after serving at least a quarter of their sentence. He is the third former MP jailed over the parliamentary expenses scandal to be released. Eric Illsley and David Chaytor have already been tagged and released under the same scheme after serving part of their sentences. Devine told his Southwark crown court trial that he was acting on advice given with a “nod and a wink” by a fellow MP in a House of Commons bar. But his defence was rejected by the jury and the trial judge Mr Justice Saunders said he had been “lying in significant parts of the evidence he gave”. Devine “set about defrauding the public purse in a calculated and deliberate way”, the judge said. “Mr Devine made his false claims at a time when he well knew the damage that was being caused to Parliament by the expenses scandal, but he carried on regardless.” He also tried to pin the blame on his former office manager, Marion Kinley, claiming she had paid herself more than £5,000 from his staffing allowance without his knowledge. Devine will be on the home detention curfew scheme for the next four months before spending the last eight months of his sentence on probation. A Labour party spokesman said: “Jim Devine was excluded from the Labour party some time ago and is no longer a member.” Illsley, 56, who was jailed for 12 months in February for fiddling £14,500 in expenses, was released in May after three months behind bars. He dishonestly obtained an average of £100 a week more than he was entitled to over a three-year period. And Chaytor spent four and a half months behind bars after admitting he fiddled his parliamentary expenses to falsely claim more than £22,000 of taxpayers’ money. Chaytor, 61, became the first former MP to be jailed since Tory peer Lord Archer when he was sentenced to 18 months in January. In March, the court of appeal rejected an attempt by the former lecturer and ex-Labour MP for Bury North to have his prison sentence reduced , ruling that his offences were “a grave breach of trust” that contributed to “serious damage” to parliament’s reputation. A Prison Service spokeswoman said: “A home detention curfew [HDC] is available to low-risk prisoners serving sentences of more than three months and less than four years, who are deemed appropriate for early release. “To be placed on HDC, a prisoner must have served a quarter of their sentence and have spent a minimum of 30 days in prison.” But Emma Boon, campaign director of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said that releasing Devine early “makes his sentence look like a hollow gesture and will do nothing to help restore public faith in parliament”. MPs’ expenses House of Commons guardian.co.uk
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Father of one, 50, dies at Bous al Carrer fiesta near Valencia after taunting half-tonne bull with pink umbrella A Spanish man was gored to death at a fiesta after waving a pink umbrella at a charging half-tonne bull. The 50-year-old father of one taunted the animal as it came rampaging out of a pen but the prank backfired horribly when the bull charged straight at him, trampled him to the floor and gored him with its horns. The Bous al Carrer (“Bulls in the Street”) festival, similar to the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona, took place in the small town of Rafelbunyol, 16 miles north of Valencia on the east coast of Spain, on Saturday evening. The town’s narrow streets are sealed off on weekends between July and October as volunteers are chased by a bull, cheered on from overlooking windows and balconies. Bous al Carrer events have become increasingly popular in towns and villages in the Valencia region in recent years, with 486 people injured last year. A video posted on the ABC newspaper website [WARNING: graphic content] showed the man standing in the sand-covered street holding a pink umbrella in the air as the bull was released from the pen. An onlooker shouted “Olé” as the animal began to charge, and then it gored the man, piercing his chest and armpit. An eyewitness told the local newspaper Las Provincias: “Everything happened very quickly. The animal turned and went for him. The man sidestepped once but then he couldn’t get away. He fell to the floor and was charged.” A fellow bull runner tried to distract the animal by waving his hands in the air, but could do nothing to prevent the man’s death. The victim was certified dead on arrival at hospital, the emergency services in Valencia said. A second bull run, scheduled for later on Saturday night, was cancelled. Bullfighting Animals Spain Europe guardian.co.uk
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