Thousands of everyday products and materials containing radioactive metals are surfacing across the United States and around the world.
Common kitchen cheese graters, reclining chairs, women's handbags and tableware manufactured with contaminated metals have been identified, some after having been in circulation for as long as a decade. So have fencing wire and fence posts, shovel blades, elevator buttons, airline parts and steel used in construction.
A Scripps Howard News Service investigation has found that -- because of haphazard screening, an absence of oversight and substantial disincentives for businesses to report contamination -- no one knows how many tainted goods are in circulation in the United States.
But thousands of consumer goods and millions of pounds of unfinished metal and its byproducts have been found to contain low levels of radiation, and experts think the true amount could be much higher, perhaps by a factor of 10.
Recycled radioactive metal contaminates consumer products
Mike Malloy: Air France flight 447 - Collateral Damage?
More bodies were pulled from the mid-Atlantic over the weekend near what is presumed to be the crash site of Air France flight 447.
As reported in today’s New York Times: But the answer to why the Airbus 330 jet carrying 228 people from Rio de Janeiro to Paris crashed into the Atlantic eight days ago remained elusive as an armada of French and Brazilian ships and planes continued to scour the ocean for debris and the flight data and cockpit voice recorders lying perhaps miles below the surface.
Shell to Pay $15.5 Million to Settle Nigerian Human Rights Abuses Case
Shell, the big oil company, agreed to pay $15.5 million to settle a case alleging that it took part in human right abuses in the Niger Delta in the mid 1990s, a striking sum given that the company denied any wrongdoing.
The settlement, announced late Monday, came days before the start of a trial in New York that was expected to reveal extensive details of Shell’s activities in the Niger Delta.
TVNL Comment: Corporations can settle criminal charges with huge payoffs. Could you?
Lakhdar Boumediene: I Was Tortured At Guantanamo
For 7½ years, Lakhdar Boumediene was known simply by a number: "10005.
"These were the digits assigned to him when he arrived at the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, swept up in a post-Sept. 11 dragnet and accused of plotting to blow up the U.S. and British Embassies in Sarajevo.
AP IMPACT: Alternative medicine goes mainstream
People turn to unconventional therapies and herbal remedies for everything from hot flashes and trouble sleeping to cancer and heart disease. They crave more "care" in their health care. They distrust drug companies and the government. They want natural, safer remedies.
But often, that is not what they get. Government actions and powerful interest groups have left consumers vulnerable to flawed products and misleading marketing.
The Privatization of "Obama's War"
According to new Pentagon statistics, in the second quarter of this year, there has been a 23% increase in the number of private security contractors working for the Pentagon in Iraq and a 29% hike in Afghanistan. In fact, outside contractors now make up approximately half of our forces fighting in the two countries. "This means," according to Jeremy Scahill, author of the book, Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army, "there are a whopping 242,647 contractors working on these two U.S. wars."
European elections 2009: far-Right makes gains across Europe
Far-Right parties and extremists made gains across Europe on Sunday night as protest votes and low turnouts marked elections for the European parliament.
Angry voters punished governments in Spain, Bulgaria, Hungary, Latvia, Greece and Ireland - all countries hit hard by the economic crisis.
LIBERTY DOLLAR ALERT: FBI Arrests Bernard, Kevin, Sarah & Rachelle
And so it came to pass, 2009 years after the birth of Christ, that four regular Americans have taken a stand to defend the People's right to protect themselves from a government currency that has a long and unforgiving history of stealing the people's purchasing power. This is a test of individual rights, as protected by the Tenth Amendment. It is the deciding moment that a private voluntary barter currency (PVBC) is legal in the great United States of America. This is a test that the Liberty Dollar must and will pass, for that I have no doubt. But it will not be easy or cheap. Please, if you support our efforts, support us with any kind of money you have, including pro bono services. Now that the Liberty Dollar faces a federal criminal trial, it is the US Government v Liberty Dollar ala Bernard, Kevin, Sarah & Rachelle. Please help us win. Please help yourself win. Please help American win.
A High-Priced Media Campaign That Iraqis Aren't Buying
"The millions spent on this is wasted money," Ziyad al-Aajeely, director of Iraq's nonprofit Journalistic Freedom Observatory, said as he flipped through a recent edition of Baghdad Now. "Nobody reads this."
U.S. military officials and contractors have spent hundreds of millions of dollars on billboards, pamphlets and TV and radio airtime in Iraq over the past six years to burnish the U.S. military's image, marginalize extremists, promote democracy and foster reconciliation.
Page 925 of 1154
