If you need to get somewhere on time, try not to fly through Newark. The Newark International Airport “has been the worst of the worst,” the Wall Street Journal reports, with a whopping 40 of America’s 100 most-delayed flights taking off or landing there, according to data compiled by the…
Continue reading …It’s the end of an era: He’s been the Muscular Dystrophy Association’s national chairman since the early 1950s and the host of its Labor Day telethon since 1966. But as of this year, Jerry Lewis is neither—and he won’t even be appearing on this year’s telethon. The comedian announced…
Continue reading …Want to appear on MTV’s Real World ? First you might want to take a look at the contract, an “amusingly specific … 30-page spectacular” the Village Voice got its hands on. Highlights, as interpreted by Camille Dodero: “You may die, lose limbs, and suffer nervous breakdowns.” “If you undergo any…
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Motion based on Portuguese reforms said to have reduced problematic drug use expected to be passed at party conference Liberal Democrats are expected to call for an independent inquiry into the decriminalisation of possession of all drugs. A motion to be put at the party’s annual conference next month is likely to be passed, officials said. It would be the first government-sponsored inquiry into decriminalisation, but is unlikely to have the support of David Cameron who has hardened his approach to drugs after being a past advocate of more liberal legislation as a member of the home affairs select committee. Ministerial sources point out that the government published a review of drugs strategy in 2010 and does not yet see any need for a rethink. Senior Liberal Democrats believe Cameron and the home secretary, Theresa May, could be persuaded to hold an open-minded inquiry into a controversy which divides public, political and medical opinion. The inquiry, the Liberal Democrats said, would look at reforms in Portugal which are said to have reduced problematic drug use through decriminalisation for personal use and investing in treatment centres. The conference motion also calls for the inquiry to “examine heroin maintenance clinics in Switzerland and the Netherlands which have delivered great health benefits for addicts and considerable reductions in drug-related crime”. Apart from Cameron, support for the inquiry would be needed from the Home Office, the Ministry of Justice and possibly the Department of Health. The inquiry call follows a statement by the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs which said: “People found to be in possession of drugs for any personal use and involved in no other criminal offences should not be processed through the criminal justice system, but diverted into drug education awareness courses, or possibly other more creative civil punishment.” The call for the inquiry serves a wider purpose for the Liberal Democrats who need to restore their radical credentials with younger voters alienated by the party’s support for trebling of tuition fees. The motion states: “Individuals, especially young people, can be damaged both by the imposition of criminal records and a drug habit and that the priority for those addicted to all substances must be health, education and rehabilitation”. The motion also claims the proposal might also produce financial savings to stressed budgets in the Ministry of Justice and act as a return to evidence based policy in the field of drugs, a stance the Liberal Democrats claim Labour rejected by its persistent refusal to take on board official scientific advice to government. The proposed inquiry would look at: • Whether possession for personal use should not be a criminal offence. • Whether possession should still be prohibited but police could only summon individuals to appear before panels tasked with determining education, health or social interventions. • Potential frameworks for a strictly regulated cannabis market and the potential impacts on organised crime and the health of the public, especially children. The motion also proposes the widespread availability of heroin maintenance clinics for the most problematic and vulnerable heroin users. In the last extended parliamentary debate on the issue in March Lady Neville-Jones, then the drugs minister, said the review needed further time. She challenged suggestions that Portugal had been a success story saying: “Some of the picture in Portugal is not so good. It is the country in Europe that has the second highest level of HIV.” Drugs policy Drugs Liberal Democrats Drugs Portugal Europe Patrick Wintour guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Motion based on Portuguese reforms said to have reduced problematic drug use expected to be passed at party conference Liberal Democrats are expected to call for an independent inquiry into the decriminalisation of possession of all drugs. A motion to be put at the party’s annual conference next month is likely to be passed, officials said. It would be the first government-sponsored inquiry into decriminalisation, but is unlikely to have the support of David Cameron who has hardened his approach to drugs after being a past advocate of more liberal legislation as a member of the home affairs select committee. Ministerial sources point out that the government published a review of drugs strategy in 2010 and does not yet see any need for a rethink. Senior Liberal Democrats believe Cameron and the home secretary, Theresa May, could be persuaded to hold an open-minded inquiry into a controversy which divides public, political and medical opinion. The inquiry, the Liberal Democrats said, would look at reforms in Portugal which are said to have reduced problematic drug use through decriminalisation for personal use and investing in treatment centres. The conference motion also calls for the inquiry to “examine heroin maintenance clinics in Switzerland and the Netherlands which have delivered great health benefits for addicts and considerable reductions in drug-related crime”. Apart from Cameron, support for the inquiry would be needed from the Home Office, the Ministry of Justice and possibly the Department of Health. The inquiry call follows a statement by the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs which said: “People found to be in possession of drugs for any personal use and involved in no other criminal offences should not be processed through the criminal justice system, but diverted into drug education awareness courses, or possibly other more creative civil punishment.” The call for the inquiry serves a wider purpose for the Liberal Democrats who need to restore their radical credentials with younger voters alienated by the party’s support for trebling of tuition fees. The motion states: “Individuals, especially young people, can be damaged both by the imposition of criminal records and a drug habit and that the priority for those addicted to all substances must be health, education and rehabilitation”. The motion also claims the proposal might also produce financial savings to stressed budgets in the Ministry of Justice and act as a return to evidence based policy in the field of drugs, a stance the Liberal Democrats claim Labour rejected by its persistent refusal to take on board official scientific advice to government. The proposed inquiry would look at: • Whether possession for personal use should not be a criminal offence. • Whether possession should still be prohibited but police could only summon individuals to appear before panels tasked with determining education, health or social interventions. • Potential frameworks for a strictly regulated cannabis market and the potential impacts on organised crime and the health of the public, especially children. The motion also proposes the widespread availability of heroin maintenance clinics for the most problematic and vulnerable heroin users. In the last extended parliamentary debate on the issue in March Lady Neville-Jones, then the drugs minister, said the review needed further time. She challenged suggestions that Portugal had been a success story saying: “Some of the picture in Portugal is not so good. It is the country in Europe that has the second highest level of HIV.” Drugs policy Drugs Liberal Democrats Drugs Portugal Europe Patrick Wintour guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Glenn Beck seems to think the new half-black, half-Hispanic Ultimate Spider-Man is part of some kind of conspiracy to change America. On his radio show yesterday, Beck groused about the change. “The new Spider-Man is really quite great, he looks just like President Obama,” he deadpanned, in a moment spotted…
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Islamic punk was just an idea in a novel by a disaffected Muslim convert – but for the bands he inspired around the world the scene became real. Now, as The Taqwacores is about to be released, has the scene has already betrayed its ideals? There was a time when the words “Muslim radical” painted a clear enough picture – a young man strapped with explosives, perhaps, or a bearded cleric calling for Sharia law from Land’s End to John O’Groats. But things have changed. The protestors of the Arab Spring are both Muslim and radical, as
Continue reading …Islamic punk was just an idea in a novel by a disaffected Muslim convert – but for the bands he inspired around the world the scene became real. Now, as The Taqwacores is about to be released, has the scene has already betrayed its ideals? There was a time when the words “Muslim radical” painted a clear enough picture – a young man strapped with explosives, perhaps, or a bearded cleric calling for Sharia law from Land’s End to John O’Groats. But things have changed. The protestors of the Arab Spring are both Muslim and radical, as
Continue reading …Islamic punk was just an idea in a novel by a disaffected Muslim convert – but for the bands he inspired around the world the scene became real. Now, as The Taqwacores is about to be released, has the scene has already betrayed its ideals? There was a time when the words “Muslim radical” painted a clear enough picture – a young man strapped with explosives, perhaps, or a bearded cleric calling for Sharia law from Land’s End to John O’Groats. But things have changed. The protestors of the Arab Spring are both Muslim and radical, as
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MPs say ex-Daily Mirror editor must face questions after phone hacking allegations made on Newsnight Piers Morgan is facing calls to return to the UK to answer questions about phone hacking as the controversy over how much he knew about the practice showed no signs of abating. John Whittingdale, the Conservative MP who chairs the Commons culture, media and sport committee, said it was right that the former Daily Mirror editor should return from the United States, where he hosts a CNN chatshow. Whittingdale said: “Therese Coffey [a Tory member of the committee] said he should come back to this country to answer questions and I think that is absolutely right. He certainly should.” Harriet Harman, Labour’s deputy leader, said Morgan had questions to answer, citing a column he wrote five years ago in which he wrote that he had once been played a message left on a mobile phone belonging to Heather Mills. Harman said: “Hacking is a criminal offence and … every allegation has got to be thoroughly investigated by the police. We started off with just the News of the World … it’s clearly been much more widespread than people have been prepared to admit.” Morgan, who edited the Daily Mirror for nearly 10 years until 2004, said in a Daily Mail column in 2006 that he had heard the message, which was left by Sir Paul McCartney on Mills’s phone after the couple had an argument. He said the former Beatle sounded “lonely, miserable and desperate”. Mills told the BBC’s Newsnight this week that a senior journalist on a paper owned by Trinity Mirror, the Daily Mirror’s parent company, conceded to her in 2001 that he had obtained information about an apology left by McCartney by listening to her phone messages. According to Mills, the journalist rang her and “started quoting verbatim the messages from my machine”. She said she challenged him, saying: “You’ve obviously hacked my phone and if you do anything with this story … I’ll go to the police.” Mills said he responded: “OK, OK, yeah, we did hear it on your voice messages, I won’t run it.” Morgan has consistently denied he has ever hacked a phone, ordered any of his journalists to do so, or published any story obtained from the hacking of a phone. He issued a statement through CNN, for whom he records Tonight with Piers Morgan, in response to Mills’s claims pointing out that a high-court judge had described her as a unreliable witness. “No doubt everyone will take this and other instances of somewhat extravagant claims by Ms Mills into account in assessing what credibility and platform her assertions are given,” he said. Morgan used Twitter to ridicule the prominence of the story on Thursday, posting: “Morning all, lovely day in LA. Anything going on back home in UK? Seems a bit quiet over there … so heart-warming that everyone in UK’s missing me so much they want me to come home.” Trinity Mirror, which also owns the Sunday Mirror and the People, said on Thursday: “All our journalists work within the criminal law and the PCC code of conduct and we have seen no evidence to suggest otherwise.” Meanwhile the FBI is widening its investigation of News Corporation’s activities within the US to look at whether allegations of computer hacking by one of its subsidiaries was an isolated case or part of a “larger pattern of behaviour”, Time magazine is reporting. Time suggests that the FBI inquiry has been extended from a relatively narrow look at alleged malpractices by News Corp in America into a more general inquiry into whether the company used possibly illegal strongarm tactics to browbeat rival firms, following allegations of computer hacking made by retail advertising company Floorgraphics. In a civil lawsuit against News Corp in 2004 Floorgraphics told a court that its website had been breached 11 times over four months without authorisation. The source of the alleged hacking was traced back to an IP address registered to News America in Connecticut . Piers Morgan Phone hacking Newspapers & magazines National newspapers Newspapers United States James Robinson guardian.co.uk
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