In a historic vote for gay rights, the Senate agreed on Saturday to do away with the military’s 17-year ban on openly gay troops and sent President Barack Obama legislation to overturn the Clinton-era policy known as “don’t ask, don’t tell.” (Dec. 18)
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With Gingerbread freely distributed to the open-source masses, it probably won’t surprise you to hear there already a hacked ROM for Google’s darling Nexus One . But what if we told you Android 2.3 is now available for the HTC HD2 as well? That’s right, the Windows Mobile 6.5 powerhouse can now snap off a sugary piece of the same Android code, and from what we hear in the XDA-developers forums, it works pretty decently, too. Like the Samsung Galaxy S we saw getting the green tie treatment this morning, the HTC HD2 and Nexus One don’t exactly have stable, fully functional builds, but as long as you know what you’re doing and don’t need petty luxuries like cameras, GPS receivers and official Google apps, you’ll probably be just fine. Find files and a modicum of instruction at our source links below. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in] HTC HD2 and Nexus One get some Gingerbread crumbs originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Dec 2010 22:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …Shep Smith Asks How Senators Sleep at Night After Filibustering 9-11 First Responders Bill
December 19, 2010 No Comment
Click here to view this media Looks like at least one person over at Fox News watched Jon Stewart’s segment with 9-11 first responders reacting to the Senate filibuster and decided to let everyone know how they felt about it. Via Mediaite : A wonderful moment of pure outrage–and classic television–from Shepard Smith on Fox News Friday afternoon as he and Chris Wallace waited for President Obama’s tax cut signing ceremony. Discussing the amount of money on “tax cuts for billionaires who don’t need them,” Smith railed against the very same lawmakers who somehow couldn’t get relief passed for 9/11 first responders. How do they sleep at night after this vote on Ground Zero first responders from 9/11? Are they going to get that done, or are we going to leave these American heroes out there to twist in the wind? Who’s going to hold these people’s feet to the fire? We’re able to put a 52 story building so far down there at Ground Zero, we’re able to pay for tax cuts for billionaires who don’t need them and it’s not going to stimulate the economy. But we can’t give health care to Ground Zero first responders who ran right into the fire? Went down there to save people? Do people know what this city was like that day? People were walking over bridges they were covered in ash they were running for their lives they were crying their family members were dead. And these people ran to Ground Zero to save people’s lives. And we’re not going to even give them medicine for the illnesses they got down there? It’s disgusting, it’s a national disgrace, it’s a shame and everybody who voted against should have to stand up and account for himself or herself. I’m glad Smith pointed out what an outrage this is, but like his cohort Peter Johnson Jr. , Smith didn’t bother to let the viewers know that it’s the Republicans blocking the bill.
Continue reading …FNC’s Fox Newswatch Highlights Winner in MRC’s Online Voting for Worst Bias of 2010
December 19, 2010 No Comment
FNC’s Fox Newswatch on Saturday highlighted a winner in the MRC’s online balloting, in which many NewsBusters readers took part ( Friday NB post announcing who you picked for Quote of the Year ), for the annual awards for the year’s worst reporting. Host Jon Scott announced: The results are in. The Media Research Center conducted an online poll asking the public to vote on the worst biased reporting. First up, the winner of the Poison Teapot Award for Smearing the Anti-Obama Rabble , goes to PBS's Tavis Smiley for this: read more
Continue reading …NPR : On the same day that President Obama and his advisors declared that the United States is “on track” in Afghanistan , hundreds of anti-war protesters gathered outside the White House to voice their dissent. Among the protesters was Daniel Ellsberg, the former military analyst who in 1971 leaked the Pentagon’s secret history of the Vietnam War to the press. At the rally today he spoke in support of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and Bradley Manning , the Army private suspected of leaking U.S. documents , for shining a light on U.S. policy and actions in Afghanistan. “I think they provided a very valuable service. To call them terrorists is not only mistaken, it’s absurd.” I talked to Daniel Ellsberg on the phone the day before he got arrested at the White House for protesting against the wars and he’s very interested in coming on C&L to do a Live Chat. I have to contact him soon and we’ll see. He’s a real American hero for not only helping end the Vietnam War, but also brought down Richard Nixon. That was an added bonus. Anyway, I’ll let you know…
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This RED EPIC belongs to Mark Pederson — the head of studio OffHollywood — who was apparently the very first one to drop $58,000 for the pre-production 5K camera , not to mention the first to lay down money for the original one . In case you’ve arranged to find yourself with a similarly jawdropping Christmas present in the mail, you can find pictures of what to expect at our source links below. The links will also do quite nicely if you haven’t experienced that feeling called “jealousy” in a while and would like a refresher course. [Thanks, Charlie and Patrick] First hand-machined RED EPIC ships, gets lovingly toyed with originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Dec 2010 20:51:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …Here are two stories from this past week: 1. “A [newly released] General Accountability Office (GAO) investigation has found that people with histories of sexual misconduct are still getting hired by school systems across the [United States] … The biggest problem may be 'passing the trash.' These were cases GAO found in which school systems just let suspected sexual offenders resign, and even wrote them glowing letters of recommendation, so they could find teaching jobs elsewhere.” 2. “The Dublin (Ireland) Archdiocese should have taken action years earlier against Tony Walsh , probably the most notorious child sexual abuser among its priests, according to [a] commission investigating clerical child sex allegations in the archdiocese.” The Church laicized Walsh (removed him as a priest) in 1995. read more
Continue reading …WikiLeaks Cables: Pfizer Targeted Nigerian Attorney General to Undermine Suit over Fatal Drug Tests
December 19, 2010 No Comment
Click here to view this media From Democracy Now, it looks like sadly we’ve got a real life scenario with the plot of the movie The Constant Gardener in Nigeria, made known due to a recent WikiLeaks cable. WikiLeaks Cables: Pfizer Targeted Nigerian Attorney General to Undermine Suit over Fatal Drug Tests : Diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks show the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer hired investigators to find evidence of corruption against the Nigerian attorney general to pressure him to drop a $6 billion lawsuit over fraudulent drug tests on Nigerian children. Researchers did not obtain signed consent forms, and medical personnel said Pfizer did not tell parents their children were getting the experimental drug. Eleven children died, and others suffered disabling injuries including deafness, muteness, paralysis, brain damage, loss of sight, slurred speech. We speak to Washington Post reporter Joe Stephens, who helped break the story in 2000, and Musikilu Mojeed, a Nigerian journalist who has worked on this story for the NEXT newspaper in Lagos. Transcript and the rest of the interview can be found at Democracy Now’s site . The Guardian UK has more on the WikiLeaks cables — US embassy cables: Pfizer nears $75m Nigeria settlement . And here’s more from The Washington Post and their coverage of this issue . h/t Kathy
Continue reading …Samsung pulls Froyo update for Bell’s Vibrant after reports of fried internal storage
December 18, 2010 No Comment
We have no idea why Samsung’s having such a hard time delivering its overdue promised Froyo upgrades worldwide for the Galaxy S series, but it’s not looking any easier for them this weekend: the only Canadian Galaxy S to get upgraded so far, Bell’s Vibrant, has just had its update pulled. Seems a healthy number of users attempting the upgrade using Sammy’s Kies desktop software ended up with inaccessible internal storage, which sucks for a variety of obvious reasons — and that would be the apparent reason for the removal of the update. Here’s the official statement: ” There have been intermittent issues reported during the firmware upgrade process with Kies for the Samsung Galaxy S i9000M series of phones. Samsung’s development team is currently aware of this issue and working towards a solution. Accordingly, The firmware update feature, which affects the ability to upgrade to Android 2.2, is temporarily disabled until a solution is released. We apologize for the inconvenience.” Maybe we can just go straight to Gingerbread or Honeycomb at this point? [Thanks to everyone who sent this in] Samsung pulls Froyo update for Bell’s Vibrant after reports of fried internal storage originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Dec 2010 19:47:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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By Michael Voss BBC News, Havana President Castro said Cubans were “on the edge of the abyss” Continue reading the main story Related stories Cuba gives space to small businesses Cuba launches debate on economy Castro calls Cuban party congress Cuban President Raul Castro has warned that the island’s revolution is at stake if his proposed economic reforms are not…
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