~the Russians are wise!!!…cars/trucks make for a better shield than human bodies loll~jude
MOSCOW | Sun Jan 29, 2012 3:32pm EST
(Reuters) – Critics of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin drove in their hundreds around central Moscow on Sunday in cars trailing white ribbons, a symbol of Russia’s protest movement, staging a mobile demonstration to demand fair elections.
Opposition leaders are trying to maintain momentum after tens of thousands of people angry over alleged election fraud and Putin’s plan to return to the Kremlin in a March vote turned out last month for the biggest protests of his 12-year rule.
“This has an important symbolic meaning. We have arrived at the stage when we don’t want to be vassals any more,” said opposition activist Ilya Ponomaryov, who picked up hitchhikers with white ribbons in his purple sedan.
Organizers said the demonstration also aimed to advertise protest marches planned for next Saturday, exactly one month before the March 4 presidential election.
“We want to show our unity. This is very visible. This is preparatory work for February 4, when there will be even more people than on Sakharov Avenue,” Ponomaryov said, referring to the site of a December 24 rally that drew tens of thousands.
Polls indicated Putin will regain the presidency, extending his rule for at least six more years. He was president from 2000-2008 and is widely believed to have been holding Russia’s reins for his protégé, President Dmitry Medvedev.
Some drivers resorted to white construction tape, printer paper, grocery bags and even white lace as they cruised around Moscow’s Garden Ring road. Organizers said more than 3,000 motorists took part, while police put the number at about 300.
In the minus 15 C (5 F) chill, many pedestrians applauded or waved white handkerchiefs from the sidewalks in solidarity. One vehicle had a life-sized straw figure with a picture of Putin’s face strapped to its hood.
Cars are a strong symbol not only of status but of personal freedom in Russia and the right to choice in a country where even ownership of a tiny Soviet-made Lada was a luxury in the communist era and foreign cars were virtually non-existent.
The protests, provoked by widespread suspicions of fraud favouring Putin’s ruling party in a December 4 parliamentary election, have revealed dismay among Russians.
Middle-class city dwellers in particular feel they have no say in politics and that Putin’s decision to return to the Kremlin was thrust upon them.
“We have to fight for our rights… We have to show our strength so that maybe people will see us and come to the February 4th protest,” said Nadezhda, 26, who works for a state TV station. Nadezhda, who declined to give her last name, said her station had told employees not to take part in Sunday’s protest.
“I feel cheated by the vote,” Yevgeny Starshov, 23, a student at a state school of public administration, said of the parliamentary election.
“We have to do something to change the country for the better, not through riots or some kind of revolution but through such peaceful demonstrations to fight for more fair elections.”
Thousands of Putin’s supporters rallied on Saturday in Yekaterinburg, Russia’s fourth-largest city, to back his election bid.
(Writing by Steve Gutterman; editing by David Stamp)
TEHRAN | Sun Jan 29, 2012 2:22pm EST (Reuters) – Iran sent conflicting signals in a dispute with the West over its nuclear ambitions on Sunday, vowing to stop oil exports soon to “some” countries but postponing a parliamentary debate on a proposed halt to such sales to the European Union.
The Islamic Republic declared itself optimistic about a visit by U.N. nuclear experts that began on Sunday but also warned the inspectors to be “professional” or see Tehran reducing cooperation with the world body on atomic matters.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspection delegation will seek to advance efforts to resolve a row about nuclear work which Iran says is for making electricity but the West suspects is aimed at seeking a nuclear weapon.
Tensions with the West rose this month when Washington and the European Union (EU) imposed the toughest sanctions yet in a drive to force Tehran to provide more information on its nuclear program. The measures take direct aim at the ability of OPEC’s second biggest oil exporter to sell its crude.
In a remark suggesting Iran would fight sanctions with sanctions, Iran’s oil minister said the Islamic state would soon stop exporting crude to “some” countries.
Rostam Qasemi did not identify the countries but was speaking less than a week after the EU’s 27 member states agreed to stop importing crude from Iran from July 1.
“Soon we will cut exporting oil to some countries,” the state news agency IRNA quoted Qasemi as saying.
SUPERPOWER is a comprehensive film that asks tough questions and goes behind the scenes of America’s national security apparatus and military actions. Far from a conspiracy film about the dangers of government secrets and regime change, this well-balanced film straddles the philosophical divide and allows viewers to understand the US quest for global dominance through economic and military strategy that is exposed through review of historical events, personal interviews, and analysis of US foreign policy.
Featuring interviews with Michel Chossudovsky, Bill Blum, Chalmers Johnson and Noam Chomsky, among many others.
SUPERPOWER has won a number of awards, including the 5th Annual Hollywood F.A.M.E. Award for Documentary of the Year 2011 as well as the 2011 32nd Annual People’s Choice Bronze Telly Award.
~so this would mean that everyone would be double taxed…taxed on earned money and then taxed again when it is invested…So nice for the MSM to uphold this stance~jude
~there is quite a bit of concern when reading comments about this story, I’ll leave it at that…missions seem to always coincide with political agenda, the danger we put our brave, young men in, and the cost factor when looking at our destroyed country~
Navy SEALs succeed in saving Jessica Buchanan, 32, from Somali pirates.
Jessica Buchanan, the woman rescued from Somalia bandits by U.S. special forces, is so dedicated to helping others that she sold all of her belongings to become a missionary in Somalia.
Buchanan, 32, was born in Cincinnati, Ohio. She graduated from Valley Forge University, a Christian college in Phoenixville, Pa., in 2007. She was a student teacher in Africa before graduating and her romance with the continent began.
“She fell in love with Africa,” Rev. Don Meyer, dean of Valley Forge University told the Associated Press. “She could hardly talk about Africa without tears in her eyes.”
Her home church, the York Cavalry Temple Assembly of God, put out a message during her captivity that combined her devotion and determination.
“Please pray for Jessica and her family. She is a former student at Valley Forge Christian college and she sold all she owned to become a missionary in Somalia. Pray for her safe keeping and safe return,” the church said.
Buchanan’s family also appears to be deeply devoted to their religion. In a statement of gratitude today to the SEALs, the State Department and President Obama, they said, “We knew that God would set our sister free.”
Madeline Mathe, Buchanan’s sister’s mother-in-law, told ABC affiliate WSYR Buchanan is “a wonderful Christian girl.”
Others attested to Buchanan’s grit.
“She’s up for a challenge, and it didn’t surprise me that she would do something like this,” John Hravatic, who worked as a teacher with Buchanan at the Rosslyn Academy in Nairobi, Kenya, told ABC News. He called Buchanan “adventurous” and vivacious.”
Jessica Buchanan Is a Missionary Who Loves Africa
Buchanan started as a student teacher at Nairobi’s Rosslyn Academy in 2007 because of “God’s call on her life to teach overseas,” according to her biography on the school’s web site. She student taught first and sixth graders before being hired as a fourth grade teacher in 2008.
“She was an awesome teacher. Kids loved her,” Hravatic said. “[The] kids are excited she is free.”
Buchanan left the school in 2009. She moved to Hargeisa, Somalia with her Swedish husband, Erik Landemalm, who she met in Africa.
Landemalm did aid work for the Association of European Parliamentarians With Africa and served as a Project Officer in the group’s Somalia office, according to its annual report.
Buchanan, 32, was kidnapped on Oct. 25, 2011, along with her Danish co-worker Poul Hagen Thisted, 60, in Galkayo, Somalia. The two worked together for the Danish Demining Group, a division of the Danish Regugee Council, Buchanan served as a regional education adviser, according to her LinkedIn profile.
Over the three months of her captivity, concern grew about Buchanan’s deteriorating health, which was described as possibly “life-threatening” and a “window of opportunity for mission success” presented itself, according to Pentagon spokesperson George Little.
Meyer told ABC News he heard something was wrong with Buchanan’s liver, but that she seems to be in good health now.
The two were rescued today by the Navy’s elite SEAL Team 6, the same covert group that successfully carried out the mission to kill Osama bin Laden.
Buchanan is doing “as well as you would expect given what she has gone through,” a military official told ABC News.
Buchanan is currently at U.S. Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti.
According to her family, she will be reunited with her father in Italy.
EU DATA PROTECTION OVERHAUL TO IMPOSE NEW BURDENS ON BANKS
Financial services firms and credit card processors will be obliged to report incidents of lost or stolen data within 24 hours of a breach, according to new EU rules set to be introduced Wednesday. Full story: http://www.finextra.com/news/fullstory.aspx?newsitemid=23347
EUROPEAN EXCHANGES AND VENDORS DEVELOP POST-TRADE STANDARDS
A consortium of exchanges and technology suppliers have developed a set of common standards designed to restore post-trade transparency in the European equity markets.
Full story:http://www.finextra.com/news/fullstory.aspx?newsitemid=23348
COMMERZBANK AND CAPCO BID TO MODEL IT COMPLEXITY
Commerzbank has embarked on a project with consultancy Capco to develop an ‘IT complexity model’ that can be used by CIOs to measure and then master their organisation’s technology.
Full story: http://www.finextra.com/news/fullstory.aspx?newsitemid=23346
MASTERCARD MOBILE APP LETS AUSSIE MOVIE-GOERS ORDER FOOD FROM THEIR SEAT
MasterCard has teamed up with Commonwealth Bank and cinema group Hoyts to pilot a mobile payments application that lets movie-goers order food and drinks directly from their seats.
Full story: http://www.finextra.com/news/fullstory.aspx?newsitemid=23345
~it was a bit of a weird week, because a number of the stories which garnered the most press & posting fell out of the purview of what i’d normally cover; namely the saber rattling with iran, the internet protest against the “stop online piracy act”(SOPA), and election year politics, & most specifically the tax situation of mitt romney, who admitted that only he paid around 15% taxes on proceeds from his vulture capital ventures, which precipitated a feeding frenzy in the left econ blogosphere as dozens of posts were produced showing how the wealthiest americans only paid a maximum of 15% tax on capital gains (paul krugman mustve had a half dozen posts on it all by himself), or less tax than those making $34,000; sadly, its all been said before, several times, in several contexts, ie, bywarren buffett, who noted that his secretary was taxed at a higher rate, and by others in regards to the top 25 hedge fund earners who garnered $22.07 billion in 2010, and by virtue of the special treatment of their earnings, paid taxes at a lower rate than the typical middle class household…anyhow, all of this rehashing did bring back an old graph of interest, which is included here to the right, showing effective tax rates for certain ranges of income, from those below $34,390, who average a 6.7% tax rate, to the 4 high bars of incomes between $74,700 and $345 million who all pay an average around 21% of their income in taxes, to the 400 richest households, who all take in more than $345,000,000 yet pay only 16.6%, less that the rest of the high brackets…even if you werent online wednesday, i imagine you heard something about the protest against SOPA & its senate sister PIPA, as most news outlets at least gave mention to the fact that wikipedia had shut down (you can read the Wikimedia press release here)… the two bills had their origins with the music & movie industies, who wanted to stop pirated downloading of their works…but the bill was so all inclusive that it would also hold liable not only those who copy copywritten material (like yours truly), but also website owners such as facebook & wikipedia where the public might post such material, & even anyone who linked to such a site, and also would effectively require every blog administrator to police his comment section for such material posted by anonymous outsiders…those in violation could have their ISP addresses blocked, or would no longer be recognized by their domain name servers (ie, www.google.comwould no longer get to google)…as a result of the protest over 100 websites shut down (list here), most linking users to a petition to be sent to congresscritters & the administration…by thursday key congressional sponsors of SOPA abandoned the bill, and at least 18 senators withdrew their support from PIPA…but dont be surprised if it comes back in another form, as most in congress still believe in possession of ideas & ownership of thoughts, and the independent power of the internet runs counter to the ongoing attempts to impose a police state in this country…over a dozen links to this story are in the section at the end of this package, with OWS & other news not included in my blog…
Jesse storms Congress to find out if the government is conducting bio-warfare experiments at the mysterious Plum Island Animal Research Center off the coast of Long Island. The center began as a bio-warfare lab run by former Nazi scientists, and it has been blamed for spreading diseases and viruses throughout the mainland, including African swine flu and Lyme disease.
