A Pentagon task force established in 2006 to help lure private businesses first to Iraq and then Afghanistan allegedly blew as much as $150 million on lavish villas in Afghanistan for a few lucky members of its staff—instead of lodging them cheaply, or for free, at the U.S. embassy or any one of numerous large American military bases in the war-torn country.
The alleged waste by the Task Force for Business and Stability Operations, first described in a five-page Nov. 25 letter to U.S. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter from John Sopko, from the military’s special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, or SIGAR, should come as no surprise. TFBSO, as it’s known inside the Pentagon, has long attracted criticism for apparently wasteful spending and other abuses.
Pentagon Crew Lived Large in $150 Million Afghan Villas
Bob Alexander: Bad Horror Movie
A bunch of teens decide to go up to The Old Dark House on the night of the full moon. As they mount the creaking stairs up to the front porch the nerdy guy of the group says, “I don't think this is a very good idea guys.”
Of course it's not.
What the teens don't know … but what everybody in the theater audience knows … is that somewhere in The Old Dark House is:
An escaped lunatic from a nearby insane asylum who has returned to the house where he committed terrible unspeakable murders. It was, in fact, This Very Night 20 years ago when he took an axe and chopped up his entire family.
Or …
NYers fear gas pipeline near nuclear reactor could spell disaster
.The school is just 400 feet from the path of a massive new pipeline expansion project that’s being carried out by Spectra Energy, an oil and gas infrastructure company based in Houston. The Algonquin pipeline expansion is one of at least 22 pipeline projects designed in recent years to transport natural gas from shale fields across the U.S. to distribution points in the Northeast.
But the noise isn’t the only thing troubling local residents like Williams. The pipeline will run within several dozen feet of electrical infrastructure necessary to operate Indian Point, an aging nuclear plant on the Hudson River. Residents worry that if the pipeline were to rupture, it could trigger a chain of events that might end in a nuclear meltdown, devastating their communities and turning New York City into a radioactive evacuation zone.
Gitmo detainee held for 13 years is victim of mistaken identity, says US
A Yemeni prisoner at the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay appears to have been the victim of mistaken identity, suspected of being a significant member of Al-Qaeda when he was in reality just a lowly foot soldier, officials said in documents released Tuesday.
Mustafa al-Aziz al-Shamini has been held at the U.S. base as an enemy combatant without charge for over 13 years after his capture in Afghanistan.
Researchers: Greenland is melting away
Greenland ice sheet. Brandon Overstreet, a doctoral candidate in hydrology at the University of Wyoming, picked his way across the frozen landscape, clipped his climbing harness to an anchor in the ice and crept towards the edge of a river that rushed downstream towards an enormous sinkhole.
If he fell in, “the death rate is 100 per cent,” said Overstreet’s friend and fellow researcher, Lincoln Pitcher.
But Overstreet’s task, to collect critical data from the river, is essential to understanding one of the most consequential impacts of global warming. The scientific data he and a team of six other researchers collect here could yield groundbreaking information on the rate at which the melting of Greenland ice sheet, one of the biggest and fastest-melting chunks of ice on Earth, will drive up sea levels in the coming decades. The full melting of Greenland’s ice sheet could increase sea levels by about 20 feet.
Russia warns of retaliatory action as NATO defies Moscow and expands east
Russia warned of retaliatory measures Wednesday after NATO invited the tiny Balkan state of Montenegro to join the military alliance in its bloc’s first expansion since 2009. The move defies previous warnings from Moscow that enlargement of the U.S.-led alliance further into the region would be seen as a provocation.
In a scripted session at NATO's headquarters in Brussels, Montenegro's Foreign Minister Igor Luksic strode into the imposing conference hall to loud applause from his peers as NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg declared: “This is the beginning of a very beautiful alliance.”
Israel indicts senior politician over corruption offenses
Israel has indicted a former senior politician on charges that include taking bribes and money laundering.
Binyamin Ben-Eliezer was running to become Israel's ceremonial president last year when he dropped out over the accusations.
According to Wednesday's indictment, Ben-Eliezer allegedly received bribes from businessmen while he was a member of the Knesset to push through deals.
The National Women's Studies Association Backs Israeli Boycott
The National Women’s Studies Association is the newest scholarly group to back the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement against Israel.
In a vote that involved 35 percent of the association’s total membership, 88.4 percent, or 653 individuals, voted in favor of a boycott measure. Members of the NWSA’s executive committee then took their own vote on Friday to approve the membership’s recommendation that the association support BDS.
Unearthing America's Deep Network of Climate Change Deniers
The American public has turned away from outright denial of climate change. Sixty-three percent of adults describe the problem as "serious" in the latest opinion poll from the Washington Post and ABC News, a dip from the 69 percent who held that view in June. The minority who remain skeptical of climate science—a group that includes presidential hopefuls and powerful lawmakers—can count on a dedicated network of several thousand professional supporters.
New research for the first time has put a precise count on the people and groups working to dispute the scientific consensus on climate change. A loose network of 4,556 individuals with overlapping ties to 164 organizations do the most to dispute climate change in the U.S., according to a paper published today in Nature Climate Change. ExxonMobil and the family foundations controlled by Charles and David Koch emerge as the most significant sources of funding for these skeptics. As a two-week United Nations climate summit begins today in Paris, it's striking to notice that a similarly vast infrastructure of denial isn't found in any other nation.
Page 195 of 1140
