topernic

« Posted December 30, 2010 by topernic

Chilean Police Vio­lently Dis­lodg­ing the Rapanui Par­lia­ment: Today, Decem­ber 29th just before 7 PM, an con­tin­gency of 200 armed police began vio­lently dis­lodg­ing the Rapanui Par­lia­ment from their head­quar­ters in the cen­ter of the town of Hanga Roa, Rapa Nui. The police have beaten dozens of Rapa Nui with clubs, includ­ing chil­dren and women. They have arrested at least two dozen people. This action was a uni­lat­eral deci­sion made by the Regional Inden­dent, Raul Celis. The oper­a­tion was directed by the Police Com­man­der, Oscar Salazar who con­firmed, “Celis gave the order.” Lola Tuki, who was there said that it was “unbe­liev­able to see the degree of vio­lence and inhu­man treat­ment and prej­u­dice. The police were curs­ing at the women call­ing them, “God­damn indian bitches”, and grab­bing them violently. Many of the peo­ple taken from the Tuki and HIto clan were defend­ing the Pres­i­dent of the Rapa Nui Par­lia­ment, Leviante Araki. This is a devel­op­ing story.

DuPont to pay $3.3 million for toxic reporting violations   - News - The Charleston Gazette - West Virginia News and Sports -:

“DuPont failed to comply with the law and notify EPA that it had information on chemicals that could pose a risk to human health and the environment,” said Cynthia Giles, assistant administrator for the Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance. “EPA is serious about making companies follow our nation’s laws and protecting public health.”

But in settling the case, EPA officials allowed DuPont to keep secret the names of the chemicals involved in many of the tests.

EPA said only that the materials involved were chemicals DuPont was testing “for possible use as surface protection, masonry protection, water repellants, sealants and paints.” All of the studies involved testing the potential dangers of inhalation of the chemicals on rats, the settlement document said.

The violations stemmed from a DuPont disclosure in May 2006 that the company had failed to report the study results on the rat testing.

That DuPont report to EPA came just six months after DuPont had agreed to what EPA said at the time was the largest civil administrative penalty — meaning in a case that had not gone to court — the agency had ever obtained under any federal environmental statute. In that deal, DuPont agreed to pay $10.25 million in fines for covering up studies about the potential dangers of the toxic chemical C8.

Specifically, the December 2005 settlement involved allegations that DuPont never told the government that it had water tests that showed C8 in residential supplies in the Parkersburg area in concentrations greater than the company’s internal limit. Also, EPA alleged that DuPont withheld for more than 20 years the results of a test that showed that at least one pregnant worker from the Parkersburg plant had transferred the chemical from her body to her fetus.

Original Article

Sig­nal­fire » Rapa Nui peo­ple under attack from Chilean police:

Chilean police recently attacked Rapa Nui activists on Easter Island, wound­ing 24 peo­ple as part of an effort to dis­lodge indige­nous fam­i­lies from a dis­puted area. Police have shot at pro­tes­tors and beaten some with batons; one pro­tes­tor lost an eye accord­ing to recent accounts.

 Accord­ing to a press state­ment from the Indian Law Resource Cen­ter in Wash­ing­ton, D.C. – which is rep­re­sent­ing the fam­i­lies at an inter­na­tional court – this lat­est inci­dent comes after a “long his­tory of dis­pute over indige­nous rights and unre­solved land issues” between the Chilean gov­ern­ment and the Rapa Nui, the indige­nous peo­ple of the island that is famous for its giant stone stat­ues known as Moai (which are sacred sites for the Rapa Nui).

Sig­nal­fire » 24,000 Viet­nam work­ers strike at S.Korean plants:

HANOI — Around 24,000 work­ers at two South Korean plants in Viet­nam have gone on strike over pay, bonuses and lunar new year hol­i­days, com­pany staff and news reports said Friday.

At the Tae Kwang Vina foot­ware com­pany in south­ern Dong Nai province, almost 20,000 employ­ees refused to work Thurs­day and Fri­day, a com­pany employee told AFP, declin­ing to be named.

She said man­age­ment had agreed that the Tet lunar new year hol­i­days could last eight days “but have not said any­thing regard­ing the requests for an increase in basic salary and Tet bonus”.

Tet falls on Feb­ru­ary 3 in 2011 and is the most impor­tant hol­i­day for Viet­namese people.

The employee said basic salary at the South Korean owned plant is now 1.3 mil­lion dong a month (65 dol­lars). This is roughly in line with what the gov­ern­ment says is the country’s aver­age monthly income of 1.365 mil­lion dong.

Those who believe the “Pro-Choice” movement is a good thing might want to consider another point of view called “Black Genocide”.  There’s a movie called “Maafa 21”. Here’s a link.

If you ever get called for jury duty please remember this and go to their web site for more info.  It’s time to stop putting people in jail for unjust laws.

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Original Article

The Largest Prison Strike In Amer­i­can His­tory Goes Ignored By US Media — Big Brother — Sott.net:

Today marks the end of a seven-day strike where tens of thou­sands of inmates in Geor­gia refused to work or leave their cells until their demands had been met. The odd thing is, that until today, no one had ever heard about this strike.

Inmates in ten Geor­gia pris­ons, Bald­win, Han­cock, Hays, Macon, Smith and Telfair State Pris­ons, to name a few, went on strike last Thurs­day to protest their treat­ment and demand their human rights.

Accord­ing to an arti­cle by Fac­ing South, Depart­ment of Cor­rec­tions have been ner­vous about dete­ri­o­rat­ing con­di­tions in Georgia’s pris­ons since early 2010. War­dens started triple bunk­ing pris­on­ers in response to bud­get cuts — squeez­ing three pris­on­ers into cells intended for one. Prison offi­cials have kept a watch­ful eye out for pris­on­ers to mean­ing riot, for pris­on­ers’ rights lawyers to lit­i­gate, or both.

Poor con­di­tions and sub­stan­dard med­ical care are also on the inmates’ list of demands. How­ever, the jailed’s main gripe seems to cen­ter on land­ing recog­ni­tion as work­ers enti­tled to fair pay.

As it goes, pris­on­ers in Geor­gia are forced to work with­out pay for their labor — seem­ingly a vio­la­tion of the 13th Amend­ment, which pro­hibits slav­ery and invol­un­tary servitude.

The Largest Prison Strike In American History Goes Ignored By US Media — Big Brother — Sott.net:

Today marks the end of a seven-day strike where tens of thousands of inmates in Georgia refused to work or leave their cells until their demands had been met. The odd thing is, that until today, no one had ever heard about this strike.

Inmates in ten Georgia prisons, Baldwin, Hancock, Hays, Macon, Smith and Telfair State Prisons, to name a few, went on strike last Thursday to protest their treatment and demand their human rights.

According to an article by Facing South, Department of Corrections have been nervous about deteriorating conditions in Georgia’s prisons since early 2010. Wardens started triple bunking prisoners in response to budget cuts - squeezing three prisoners into cells intended for one. Prison officials have kept a watchful eye out for prisoners to meaning riot, for prisoners’ rights lawyers to litigate, or both.

Poor conditions and substandard medical care are also on the inmates’ list of demands. However, the jailed’s main gripe seems to center on landing recognition as workers entitled to fair pay.

As it goes, prisoners in Georgia are forced to work without pay for their labor - seemingly a violation of the 13th Amendment, which prohibits slavery and involuntary servitude.

Original Article

Pen­ta­gon Plan Won’t Cover Brain-Damage Ther­apy : NPR

Dur­ing the past few decades, sci­en­tists have become increas­ingly per­suaded that peo­ple who suf­fer brain injuries ben­e­fit from what is called cog­ni­tive reha­bil­i­ta­tion ther­apy — a lengthy, painstak­ing process in which patients relearn basic life tasks such as count­ing, cook­ing or remem­ber­ing direc­tions to get home.

Many neu­rol­o­gists, sev­eral major insur­ance com­pa­nies and even some med­ical facil­i­ties run by the Pen­ta­gon agree that the ther­apy can help peo­ple whose func­tion­ing has been dimin­ished by blows to the head.

But despite pres­sure from Con­gress and the rec­om­men­da­tions of mil­i­tary and civil­ian experts, the Pentagon’s health plan for troops and many vet­er­ans refuses to cover the treat­ment — a deci­sion that could affect the tens of thou­sands of ser­vice mem­bers who have suf­fered brain dam­age while fight­ing in Iraq and Afghanistan.

12/22/2010: EPA Pro­vides Pub­lic with Eas­ier Access to Chem­i­cal Infor­ma­tion:

Under TSCA, com­pa­nies are required to sub­mit health and safety stud­ies to the agency when they show there may be a sub­stan­tial risk, when chem­i­cal test­ing is required, or to facil­i­tate EPA’s review of new chem­i­cals. The pub­lic now will be able to have easy access to these stud­ies sim­ply by search­ing for the name of a chem­i­cal or for a par­tic­u­lar word or phrase, such as a health or safety con­cern addressed in a study.

What is key in this quote is “required to sub­mit health and safety stud­ies to the agency when they show there may be a sub­stan­tial risk”. But what requires them to make a deter­mi­na­tion on whether or not there is a sub­stan­tial risk?

Well, at EPA’s site it says: “Q.2. Is there an oblig­a­tion to con­duct risk assess­ments under TSCA 8(e)? A.2. No. Prepa­ra­tion of a qual­i­ta­tive or quan­ti­ta­tive risk assess­ment based on new tox­i­c­ity or expo­sure data is not required under §8(e).”

You see what bull­shit Gov­ern­ment is?

This will start occur­ring more and more. Towns, Cities, Coun­ties, and States. When peo­ple start hit­ting the streets, then comes the mar­tial law. Be where you need to be before then please.

State Bud­get Cri­sis: Alabama Town’s Failed Pen­sion Is a Warn­ing — CNBC:

“Prichard is the future,” said Michael Aguirre, the for­mer San Diego city attor­ney, who has called for San Diego to declare bank­ruptcy and restruc­ture its own out­size pen­sion oblig­a­tions. “We’re all on the same con­veyor belt. Prichard is just a lit­tle fur­ther down the road.”

Many cities and states are strug­gling to keep their pen­sion plans ade­quately funded, with vary­ing suc­cess. New York City plans to put $8.3 bil­lion into its pen­sion fund next year, twice what it paid five years ago. Mary­land is con­sid­er­ing a pro­posal to raise the retire­ment age to 62 for all pub­lic work­ers with fewer than five years of service.

Illi­nois keeps bor­row­ing money to invest in its pen­sion funds, gam­bling that the funds’ invest­ments will earn enough to pay back the debt with inter­est. New Jer­sey sim­ply decided not to pay the $3.1 bil­lion that was due its pen­sion plan this year.

Because we allow this type of corporate attitude:

USDA Recommends “Coexistence” with Monsanto: We Say Hell No! by Ronnie Cummins:

“Monsanto should not have to vouchsafe the safety of biotech food. Our interest is in selling as much of it as possible. Assuring its safety is the FDA’s job.” - Phil Angell, Monsanto’s director of corporate communications, quoted in the New York Times, October 25, 1998

After 16 years of non-stop biotech bullying and force-feeding Genetically Engineered or Modified (GE or GM) crops to farm animals and “Frankenfoods” to unwitting consumers, Monsanto has a big problem, or rather several big problems. A growing number of published scientific studies indicate that GE foods pose serious human health threats. The American Academy of Environmental Medicine (AAEM) recently stated that “Several animal studies indicate serious health risks associated with GM food,” including infertility, immune problems, accelerated aging, faulty insulin regulation, and changes in major organs and the gastrointestinal system. The AAEM advises consumers to avoid GM foods. Before the FDA arbitrarily decided to allow Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) into food products in 1994, FDA scientists had repeatedly warned that GM foods can set off serious, hard-to-detect side effects, including allergies, toxins, new diseases, and nutritional problems. They urged long-term safety studies, but were ignored. http://www.responsibletechnology.org

Original Article

TSA has no reg­u­lar test­ing sys­tem for its pornoscan­ners — Boing Boing:

Many experts are skep­ti­cal that the TSA’s new backscat­ter pornoscan­ner machines are safe, but even the experts who endorse them are care­ful to bracket their reas­sur­ances with cer­tain caveats: the safety of the machines depends heav­ily on their being prop­erly main­tained, reg­u­larly tested, and expertly oper­ated. Whether or not you’re com­fort­able with the intended radi­a­tion emis­sions from the scan­ners, no one in their right mind would argue that a bro­ken machine that lov­ingly lingers over your repro­duc­tive organs and infuses them with 10,000 or 100,000 times the nor­mal dosage is desirable.

But when Andrew Schnei­der, AOL’s pub­lic health cor­re­spon­dent, con­tacted the TSA to find out what main­te­nance and test­ing is in place to ensure the safe oper­a­tion of the scan­ners, he dis­cov­ered that the TSA appears to have no regime at all to ensure that they are func­tion­ing within nor­mal para­me­ters. While the TSA claims that enti­ties like the FDA, the US Army and Johns Hop­kins all reg­u­larly inspect their machines, none of these groups agrees, and they all dis­avow any role in reg­u­larly main­tain­ing and test­ing the TSA’s equip­ment (the Army has tested machines in three air­ports, but has not con­ducted any fur­ther test­ing). And Johns Hop­kins denies that it has cer­ti­fied the machines as safe for oper­a­tion in the first place — let alone tak­ing on any ongo­ing test­ing and cer­ti­fi­ca­tion program.