Germans warned against eating raw lettuce, cucumbers and tomatoes as cause of outbreak centred on Hamburg remains a mystery The mysterious German E coli outbreak that has killed 16 people shows no sight of abating, with 365 new cases confirmed on Wednesday. The source of the outbreak remains unknown, though the majority of those affected either live in Germany – particularly in or around the northern city of Hamburg – or have travelled there recently. The German disease control agency, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), reported 365 new E coli cases today, a quarter of them involving the hemolytic-uremic syndrome (HUS), a serious complication resulting from E coli infection that affects the blood and kidneys. European Union officials said three cases had also been reported in the US, adding that most infections reported outside Germany involved German nationals or people who had recently travelled to the country. On Tuesday, a Swedish woman became the first person to die outside Germany after returning from a trip there. On Wednesday, the northern state of Mecklenburg Western Pomerania issued a plea for blood donations in case the number of victims continues to rise. German authorities initially identified cucumbers imported from Spain as the likely source of the outbreak but they admitted on Tuesday that further tests on the cucumbers showedthat, while contaminated, they did not carry the bacterium strain responsible for the deaths. They have still not identified the cause, but raw lettuce, tomatoes and cucumbers remain prime suspects, with authorities recommending that consumers in northern Germany avoid all three. Spain said it was considering legal action after the false alarm. “We do not rule out taking action against authorities which have cast doubt on the quality of our produce, so action may be taken against the authorities, in this case, of Hamburg,” the deputy prime minister, Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba, told Cadena Ser radio. Spanish farmers say lost sales resulting from the crisis are costing them €200m (£176m) a week, and could cost 70,000 jobs in a country that already has the EU’s highest unemployment rate. Several European countrieshave reportedly blocked entry of Spanish cucumbers, but EU health commissioner John Dalli said the commission had received no official confirmation of any import bans. Russia’s consumer protection watchdog repeated a threat to outlaw all vegetable imports from the EU, having already banned raw vegetable imports from Germany and Spain. “Despite repeated requests, Russia’s consumer protection watchdog has not received information from the European Union about the source of the infection, about dangerous produce or about measures being taken to localise and combat the outbreak,” it said in a statement on Tuesday. French government spokesman François Baroin said the country had taken the precaution of setting up a crisis unit to deal with a possible outbreak in the country, with health officials across France on alert for signs of new cases. E coli Germany Food Food & drink industry Spain Farming Europe Agriculture European Union Helen Pidd guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Rahm Emanuel for President in 2016? ABC’s Stephanopoulos Boosts Clinton White House Buddy
June 1, 2011 No Comment
Continuing his cozy relationship with powerful Democrats, George Stephanopoulos on Wednesday interviewed his good friend, and newly elected mayor of Chicago, Rahm Emanuel. The Good Morning America host hyped Emanuel, going so far as to seriously tout him as a successor to President Obama. [See video below. MP 3 audio here .] Stephanopoulos enthused, ” But, you know, if you do a good job here, a lot of Democrats are going to be talking about you to run for President in 2016 .” At no time in the interview did the GMA host mention what Politico revealed in February of 2009: While serving as Barack Obama's chief of staff, Emanuel and Stephanopoulos engaged in daily phone conversations with
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Click here to view this media Rachel Maddow talked about the influence and insular nature of right-wing talk radio started by Rush Limbaugh that has now been adopted by Fox News where they sell their audience “grievance, resentment and belonging” and how that made it inevitable that we would end up with someone like Palin using avoidance of the “mainstream” media as part of a political platform. Personally, I don’t think it’s a political platform but a let’s make some money for Sarah Palin platform and there are differences of agreement on that one, so time will tell whether I’m right or not. On Chris Matthews’ weekend show a couple of weeks ago, Maddow made this prediction: MADDOW: I predict that there will be a candidate from the right side out of the Republican Party, it may be Sarah Palin or somebody else, but they will establish a new litmus test for Republican candidates, which is that they do not do mainstream media interviews; that doing a mainstream media interview is itself a capitulation, that only conservative media should be engaged with… MATTHEWS: You mean Fox and Limbaugh, radio? MADDOW: That’s right. I really cannot picture another candidate being allowed to only talk to conservative media outlets other than Sarah Palin and that’s another reason I do not think she’s actually running besides the fact that she has not quit working for Fox News. No presidential candidate that’s actually running and not just drumming up media interest like I believe Palin is, is going to be allowed to run an entire campaign and not talk to all of the media without being eventually savaged by the press as a whole whether it be print or television. And no candidate is going to win without participating in debates, which she’s not up to. The press is chasing her around right now because they love lazy tabloid “journalism” and that’s exactly what Palin is giving them to cover. So I disagree with Rachel that this will be a new litmus test. I think it’s a Palin gimmick and ultimately it falls from under its own weight of being ridiculous if someone wants to be taken seriously as a presidential candidate. I do agree with what Rachel then went on to discuss with Media Matters founder David Brock and that is how Fox News has helped Palin to advance that strategy and get as far as she has with being taken seriously as a potential candidate for president in 2012 and how they have successfully manipulted their audiences into believing that they are the only place that can be trusted to hear the truth and to distrust other media outlets. Click here to view this media As Brock explained, sadly this is nothing new and goes back twenty years before Rush Limbaugh came on the air with the founding of organizations like Accuracy in Media designed to stigmatize the press as “liberal” and tell their conservative base that they can’t trust outlets like the New York Times. As he noted, by the time Limbaugh came on the air, there was already a push for fake “balance” in the media which “allowed the flat earth society into the conversation” and the right for years has been very good at building an alternative media which allowed conservatives to dismiss news stories they didn’t like. And sadly as Brock pointed out that alternative media simply ended up being a way to push misinformation rather than inform their viewers and listeners. When asked why the right has been so much more successful at this than the left, Brock pointed out what the organization on the right goes back to the days of Richard Nixon, so they’ve been at this a lot longer than any alternative media organizations on the left. When asked how Fox might be abiding the double standard with Palin if she is actually running compared to how they have treated their other contributors that are now candidates, Brock said he doesn’t think Fox takes their standards seriously and as he pointed out that they don’t have the same concerns for continuing to allow Karl Rove on the air who is running “the biggest and most important political enterprise in the right-wing now” and he’s still on their payroll. Brock seemed to think that Palin would continue this strategy of dissing the “mainstream” media if she does get in all the way though a general election because she thinks it works for her. Frankly as I’ve said already, I don’t see how she could manage to get away with it and I really don’t think she’s running. All I can say is I don’t even want to think about the consequences if she does actually run or if heaven forbid the public in this country would be stupid enough to elect her. She’d be George Bush on steroids with an even bigger bunch of neocons pulling her strings and telling her what to do.
Continue reading …Bill O’Reilly claims Sarah Palin ran Alaska ‘Pretty Well’. Ummm, Bill, She Quit
June 1, 2011 No CommentBill O’Reilly opened his show by discussing Sarah Palin’s possible presidential run and how voters and the GOP establishment feel about her. He highlighted that 59% of Americans have a negative opinion of her and said she’s a long, long shot to win, but Conservatives would vote for her anyway and hey guys, she ran Alaska pretty well. O’Reilly: … the rap against her is she’s not smart enough to be president, but millions of Conservatives like her and believe she is qualified to run the country. As Talking Points has pointed out in the past, the Governor did a pretty good job running Alaska, did she not? She did not. I’d say at least the person would have to actually serve out their term. She quit her job as Alaskan Governor with about eighteen months left when she was elected in 2006 after Alska kicked out a crook. She also missed a ton of time on the job while campaigning with John McCain as his VP choice in the 2008 election. That disqualifies her immediately as having a successful tenure as leader of the Alaska. Her reasons for leaving were also quite dubious and not worthy of any serious political leader . Palin offered few clues about her ambitions but said she arrived at her decision in part to protect her family, which has faced withering criticism and occasional mockery, and to escape ethics probes that have drained her family’s finances and hampered her ability to govern. She said leaving office is in the best interest of the state and will allow her to more effectively advocate for issues of importance to her, including energy independence and national security. “I love my job and I love Alaska, and it hurts to make this choice, but I’m doing what’s best for them,” Palin said, the sun glinting off a seaplane on Lake Lucille behind her. if protecting her family from the media is really a concern, running for president then would be totally out of the question. “As I thought about this announcement that I would not seek reelection, I thought about how much fun other governors have as lame ducks: They maybe travel around their state, travel to other states, maybe take their overseas international trade missions,” she said. She could have stayed on and tried to help her home state after she won the Republican primary because of the many sleazy things Gov. Frank Murkowski did that had incensed all of Alaska: Popular opinion turned on Murkowski after missteps that constantly thrust him into battle with his political opponents and his own Republican-led Legislature, including: appointing his daughter to his U.S. Senate seat, unpopular budget cuts his first year and a highly publicized fight to buy a state jet. The more Alaskans got to see of Murkowski the less they liked him. Critics have questioned Murkowski’s leadership skills, his endless ethical lapses, and his secret pipeline proposal with the three largest oil companies in Alaska behind the backs of state legislators. Palin wanted to make millions of dollars and avoid the annoyance that comes with serving in a high office. I’d say she was an absolute failure, Bill. This post isn’t about Palin, but about the spin machine created to help Conservatives win stardom and elections.
Continue reading …NPR Host Decries ‘Fairness Bias’ – When Media Overcompensate to Conservatives
June 1, 2011 No Comment
NPR host Brooke Gladstone admits that journalists are generally more liberal than regular Americans, but she thinks they overcompensate for their bias by giving too much of a voice to conservatives. For instance, Gladstone believes conservatives do not deserve an equal voice with liberals in the global warming debate. Gladstone, whose interview appeared on the blog of CNN's In the Arena, has voiced in the past that the media have a “tendency to bend over backwards to prove they aren't liberal.” In the interview she clarified the media's over-reaction as “fairness bias.” Aren't those two words contradictory? Apparently not for Gladstone, who thinks the press can be “too fair” to conservatives in giving them more air-time than liberals, or granting them an equal voice when their argument doesn't warrant such a pedestal. According to her, this is the product of conservatives “hammering” the liberal bias of the media since the days of Nixon. “I do not for a second advocate banning any voices from the air, but to give equal time to those who dispute say, global warming, merely muddies the water,” Gladstone claimed. “The public is not served by hearing prolonged presentations of a nonsensical debate. Give them a voice, but not an equal voice. That's the same as lying in order to appear fair.” For the full interview on CNN's In the Arena blog, click here .
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Environmental agency grants license to begin building on the Amazon dam, which will be the third biggest in world Brazil’s environment agency gave its definitive approval on Wednesday for construction of the Belo Monte hydroelectric dam, a controversial $17bn (£10bn) project in the Amazon that has drawn criticism from native Indians and conservationists . The regulator, Ibama, issued licenses to the consortium in charge of Belo Monte to build the massive dam on the Xingu river, a tributary of the Amazon. The government has said the 11,200-megawatt project, due to start producing electricity in 2015, is crucial to provide power to Brazil’s fast-growing economy. It will be the world’s third biggest hydroelectric dam after China’s Three Gorges and Itaipu on the border of Brazil and Paraguay. In January, Ibama had issued a preliminary license allowing the construction site to be set up. Since then the project has been halted and resumed several times owing to court injunctions obtained by environmentalists and native Indians opposing the dam. Norte Energia, the consortium that won the auction to build and operate Belo Monte, is made up of state-run utility holding company Eletrobras ELET6.SA, Brazil’s second-largest pension fund Petros and local construction companies. Originally conceived 30 years ago, progress on Belo Monte has been slowed over the years by protests, including an incident in 2009 in which Kayapo Indians armed with clubs and machetes attacked a state electricity official. Critics from singer Sting to Hollywood director James Cameron and environmental group Greenpeace have said the dam will damage the environment and harm thousands of people living in the region. The 3.75-mile dam will displace 30,000 river dwellers, partially dry up a 62-mile stretch of the Xingu river, and flood large areas of forest and grass land. Wave, tidal and hydropower Energy Renewable energy Rivers Amazon rainforest Forests Deforestation guardian.co.uk
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Head of Crown Prosecution Service says he would like to see TV cameras allowed in court rooms ‘in principal’ The head of the Crown Prosecution Service has said he would like to see TV cameras allowed into court rooms “in principal” and that the idea could be implemented quickly if it was approved by the government. Keir Starmer, the director of public prosecutions, added that allowing cameras into the courts would improve the public’s perception of the judicial system. “I would be in favour [of cameras] in criminal courts,” he told BBC Radio 4′s The Media Show on Wednesday. “In principal I would be in favour [of cameras in court] in both sets of proceedings [criminal and civil].” He claimed that the majority of solicitors now favoured such a move in the belief that opening up the court system to greater public scrutiny would restore faith in the way they operate. Starmer said: “The principal of open justice has been there for a very long time.” Broadcasters have been lobbying for some time to be allowed to film court proceedings, with Sky News particularly vocal on the subject . Sky News wants to film parts of court hearings initially, such as judges’ verdicts, but is open about the fact it would like full access eventually. Starmer added that witness intimidation was a potential problem, but said measures could be put in place to guard against this and to protect “vulnerable” people including children and those with mental health issues. “The judge can exercise that control” he said. “If there are vulnerable people that’s a good reason not to have cameras… If limited parts [of proceedings] have to be excluded from the cameras then so be it.” Starmer added that fears cameras would lead to court hearings becoming sensationalised were misplaced and that the OJ Simpson trial in the US, which ended in the former football stars’ acquittal and is often cited as a reason not to let cameras in, was now an out-of-date example to draw on. “OJ is always given as the example of sensationalism, but a lot of lessons have been learned since then,” he said. “After all, in a big case the court is always packed anyway, [and there are] cameras outside… There are plenty of examples other than OJ to show this builds confidence [in the system].” Starmer added: “If there is a decision in principal that this should happen, it should happen fairly quickly.” The former Labour Lord Chancellor Derry Irvine approved the use of cameras in the court of appeal in 2004 as part of a pilot scheme, but the coverage was never shown. • To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly “for publication”. • To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook Television industry Keir Starmer TV news James Robinson guardian.co.uk
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Owner able to gather information including pictures, Facebook account and work details leading to suspect’s eventual arrest An alleged laptop thief has been arrested after his victim used a secret application on the computer to track its whereabouts and take photographs of the perpetrator. Joshua Kaufman’s MacBook was stolen from his apartment in Oakland, California, on 21 March, but when he reported the crime to the police it was deemed a low priority – so he turned to Twitter and Tumblr to get it back. “I reported the crime to the police and even told them where it was, but they couldn’t help me due to lack of resources,” Kaufman said. Rather than give up the laptop as lost the designer had a trick up his sleeve. Kaufman had downloaded an application to his computer that tracked the machine’s location and took pictures from its inbuilt camera – unbeknown to the thief. “I’m using the awesome app, Hidden, to capture these photos of this guy who has my MacBook,” Kaufman wrote. He told the New York Daily News he had returned to his apartment on a Monday night in March to find the laptop, a Kindle and some jewellery missing. Kaufman called the police, but the case was filed as low priority. However, using Hidden he was soon garnering information about the laptop’s new owner, including pictures, his Facebook account, his place of work and business email address. Upon returning to the police, Kaufman was told they did not have the manpower to pursue the alleged thief. It was then that he decided to spread news of the theft himself, starting a Tumblr account called This Guy Has My MacBook . Kaufman promptly began uploading some of the pictures and other information that Hidden had relayed back. Readers – tens of thousands have shared the blog on Twitter and Facebook – were able to see pictures of the suspect asleep on a settee in front of the computer, lying in bed topless in front of the computer and, less conventionally, driving in front of the computer. NY Daily News reported that Oakland police finally decided to investigate when media outlets began contacting officers for comment after the saga had become an internet sensation. A mission to rescue the laptop – and perhaps to save some face – was scrambled on Tuesday night and the man in the photographs was soon detained, much to the computer owner’s delight. “ARRESTED! An Oakland police officer just called me to let me know that they arrested the guy in my photos! BOOYA!” Kaufman tweeted . “The police used my evidence (email which pointed to a cab service) that he was a driver and tricked him into picking them up. Nice work OPD!” he added . Hiddenapp.com pledges that the app will “locate your stolen computer anywhere on the planet, collect photos of the thief and screen shots of the computer in use”. It is not the first example of similar software being used to track stolen laptops. However, on Wednesday some Twitter users were sceptical as to whether there may be something more to the affair. “It seems like a pr-stunt for the app Hidden,” @Chalottn posted , while @Usman C wrote : “What i don’t understand is y this thief would sleep and drive w the screen open (pics w cam). Looks like PR-stunt to me.” Hidden, which is based in Watford, Hertfordshire, has denied it is a marketing ploy, telling one sceptic : “It’s a complete surprise to us too, no dodgy marketing here.” Last month Sean Power , an author and consultant based in New York, used Prey software to track down his MacBook , tracing it to a bar in the city while he was in his native Canada. Power posted maps of the laptop’s location and pictures of the rogue user to Twitter, inadvertently scrambling a team of followers to the bar and eventually managing to retrieve the computer. In January Erick Lounsbury used Orbicule to track his laptop to Southern California after it was stolen from his home in Bremerton, Washington state. “People need to know that you’ve gotta take care of your own stuff, because no one else is going to,” Lounsbury told the Kitsap Sun after being reunited with his machine. “You’ve gotta do your part.” Computing Apple Facebook Software Internet Twitter United States Blogging Social networking Adam Gabbatt guardian.co.uk
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Paper argues ‘sunlight should be shed’ on former RBS chief’s conduct before bailout of bank The Sun has applied to partially lift the gagging order obtained by former Royal Bank of Scotland chief executive, Sir Fred Goodwin, arguing that “sunlight should be shed” on the crisis that left the bank majority-owned by UK taxpayers. Goodwin was granted a wide-ranging privacy injunction earlier this year preventing reporting of the details of his alleged extra-marital affair with a female colleague. Lawyers acting for News Group Newspapers, the News International subsidiary that publishes the Sun, appealed to the high court in London on Wednesday to relax the injunction so as to allow reporting of the details of the RBS job held by the woman involved, as well as the duration of the alleged affair. Mr Justice Tugendhat reserved judgment. Richard Spearman QC, acting on behalf of News Group, told the court the public has a right to know “what – if any – part this affair may or may not have played in the collapse of the bank” and “leading to [the public] having to put up money for this bank”. He added: “It is plainly a matter of real genuine public interest. Sunlight should be shed on dark corners of this case.” Spearman said that the paper had “no wish” to publish “salacious or intimate sexual details” about the alleged affair, but just “work-related details”. He added that the paper was not necessarily intending to name the woman involved. However, Hugh Tomlinson QC, acting for Goodwin and the woman involved, argued that if the injunction was partially lifted for a second time, the woman would be “subject to large numbers of journalists camped outside her house” and would suffer “very serious levels of intrusion into her life”. The gagging order was partially lifted by Tugendhat last month , with the injunction varied to allow publication of Goodwin’s name, but not details of the alleged relationship and the name of the woman said to be involved. “There is no cogent reason of any kind why the identification of this woman would advance any public interest debate,” he said. “It is not good enough to say that there are all kind of questions to be asked [about RBS], therefore we should be able to invade the woman’s private life. [The Sun] doesn’t need to identify this person to ask these questions.” The government owns 83% of RBS after being forced to bail out the bank when its share price slumped following losses incurred in the 2007-08 financial crash. •
Continue reading …Do-Over? Federal Judge Who Ruled That Corporations Could Make Donations Ignored SCOTUS Precedent
June 1, 2011 No CommentIn an odd turn of events, it looks like the federal judge who ruled that corporations could give directly to candidates might want to revoke his ruling. It appears that he was unaware of a Supreme Court ruling on the same issue: James C. Cacheris of the Eastern District of Virginia indicated in an order issued Tuesday that he’s considering whether his ruling ignored Supreme Court rulings in 2003 ( FEC v. Beaumont ) and 1997 ( Agostini v. Felton ) which upheld the ban on corporate donations. Cacheris requested that both federal prosecutors and lawyers representing two businessmen who allegedly reimbursed their employees’ donations to Hilary Clinton file briefings on his decision by 5 p.m. Wednesday. He wants the briefings to be less than 10-pages in length and has scheduled a court hearing for Friday morning. The judge based his 52-page ruling last week on the Supreme Court’s more recent decision in the Citizens United case. “For better or worse, Citizens United held that there is no distinction between an individual and a corporation with respect to political speech,” Cacheris had written. “Thus, if an individual can make direct contributions within [campaign finance] limits, a corporation cannot be banned from doing the same thing.”But his decision appears to have ignored a 2003 Supreme Court opinion , written by Justice David Souter, which held that “applying the prohibition to nonprofit advocacy corporations is consistent with the First Amendment.” Wrote Souter: “not only has the original ban on direct corporate contributions endured, but so have the original rationales for the law. In barring corporate earnings from conversion into political “war chests,” the ban was and is intended to “preven[t] corruption or the appearance of corruption.”
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