Breaking News Wed July 20, 2011

First off,  I'd like to thank SH for the generous donation this morning. It is sincerely appreciated and helps more than you know.

This is from the Ozarker, I love this story! LOL
AZCentral: TSA agent groped: No charges against woman
Prosecutors said Tuesday that they won't file felony charges against a Colorado woman who is accused of groping a female Transportation Security Administration agent at Phoenix's airport.
You can keep up with the goin's on of the Ozarker over at Conflicted Doomer.

and I really liked this one from our good friend RJ who I hear hangs out over at Global Glass Onion! LOL
Mish: Larry Summers on How to Save the Rich: "No Big Financial Institution in Any Country Should be Allowed to Fail"; Pure Idiocy at its Finest


The following story was posted at Tinfoil Palace by Emeline and it seems like it's really important and also seems like it's going to be swept under the carpet.
'Someone's coming to get me': Terrified phone-hacking whistleblower feared for his life before he was found dead

Japan
NDReport: Tepco Will Start Removing Spent Fuel From Fukushima in 3 Years
EnergyBulletin: Fukushima - July 20 
ClimateChangePsychology: Must see Arne Gundersen video: Fukushima reactors to have tents over them to hold back radioactive steam (thanks for this story RJ!)
Pay close attention at minute 1 when the animation shows the radiation traveling across the Pacific. While many radioactive cattle have been discovered large distances from Fukushima, what is more important is where their feed is coming from. "It's not only about the radioactive cattle in Fukushima Prefecture; its also about the radioactive straw the cattle eat that was grown elsewhere." Straw found 45 miles from Fukushima is highly contaminated with radioactive cesium, which is an indication that radiation has contaminated large portions of Northern Japan. More than half a million disintegrations per second in a kilogram of straw are comparable to Chernobyl levels. This proves that the American Nuclear Regulatory Commission was correct when it told Americans to evacuate beyond 50 miles and that the Japanese should have done the same.

Global Conflict
MSNBC: Reports: US drone shot down over Iran nuke siteLawmaker claims unmanned spy plane was gathering information about the plant 

SHTFPlan: Pentagon Warning Order: ‘Prepare for War’ (By September?)
LAT: Syrian security forces accused of killing 16 in Homs
Shootings take place at a funeral procession amid allegations that President Bashar Assad's embattled regime is trying to heighten sectarian tensions in a bid to bolster its rule.
Aljazeera: CIA veteran: Israel to attack Iran in fall
The Israeli security establishment is increasingly worried by Netanyahu's bellicose stance towards Iran.
CNN: Taliban spokesman disputes claim that leader Mullah Omar is dead
Atlantic: Egypt's Silent, Poor MajorityOn the margins during the revolution, the millions of impoverished Egyptians could play a larger role in the country's future
SeattleTimes: FBI: Pakistani spies spent millions lobbying US
For years, the Pakistani spy agency funneled millions of dollars to a Washington nonprofit group in a secret effort to influence Congress and the White House, the Justice Department said Tuesday in court documents that are certain to complicate already strained relations between the U.S. and Pakistan.
SOTT: Canadian Citizen Tortured in Bahrain... But Harper Government Keeps Silent
A young Canadian man suffering from a serious heart condition has been abducted and tortured by the Bahraini regime, yet the government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper has maintained a steadfast silence over his plight.

Hacker News
ARSTechnica: FBI arrests 16 Anons across US; UK police pick up LulzSec member
TheTelegraph: Teenager arrested in UK as FBI raids Anonymous hacking groupA 16-year-old boy has been arrested in Britain as part of an FBI crackdown on the vigilante internet hacking group Anonymous.

CSMonitor: Murdoch scandal: How are his big US media outlets covering it?
Although the media baron has adopted a contrite tone in Britain, his flagship holdings in the US have so far taken different approaches to the Murdoch scandal.
MSNBC: U.S. arrests 16 for roles in PayPal cyber attack
Arrests made in several states, including California, Florida and New Jersey 
MailOnline: Murdoch staff 'deliberately thwarted' police phone hacking inquiry, say MPs as Cameron faces Commons grilling
Slate: Who Framed the Murdochs?
Rupert Murdoch and James Murdoch pretend they're the victims of unscrupulous employees.
DemocracyNow: Murdoch’s Denials Are Tough to Believe, Former Wall Street Journal Reporter Sarah Ellison Says

Financial News
Grist: Our economy is hungry for food stamps
With House Republicans voting to decimate the USDA's various food programs by cutting over $2 billion, along comes The Economist with an excellent reminder of the effectiveness and scope of America's main anti-hunger program: food stamps.
RawReplay: Elizabeth Warren: We will not let Republicans ‘rip arms and legs off’ of consumer agency
"Turkey Talk" Could Start Today on Debt Deal

Reuters: UPDATE 1-US Senate group offers $3.75 trillion deficit cuts
DailyBail: Rick Santelli Goes On A Deficit Rampage: "Gov't Must Live Within Its Means! Now, Now, Now! Stop Spending Now!" 
MyBudget360: The rise of the dollar store  Catering to a disappearing middle class with shrinking incomes has made dollar stores prosper in the last decade. In last decade Family Dollar grew by 62 percent in store count while U.S. population only went up by 8 percent.
CNNMoney: IMF: Debt threatens to engulf Europe 
ZeroHedge: Guest Post: Has Housing Bottomed? Here's How To Tell  
IPA: Public on Budget: Tax the Rich, Cut Military Spending

“When a representative sample of the American public was presented the federal budget, they proposed changes far different from those the Obama administration or the Republican-led House have proposed. The biggest difference in spending is that the public favored deep cuts in defense spending, while the administration and the House propose modest increases. However, the public also favored more spending on job training, education, and pollution control than did either the administration or the House. On average the public made a net reduction of $146 billion — far more than either the administration or the House called for. …
“On average respondents increased revenues by $292 billion. The largest portion was from income taxes: majorities increased taxes on incomes over $100,000 by 5 percent or more and increased them by 10 percent or more for incomes over $500,000. Majorities also increased corporate taxes and other excise taxes.”

IBTimes: Existing Home Sales Fall in June? That's Bad 
ZeroHedge: Presenting The Complete Generic Fluff That Is The "Gang of Six Plan To Reduce Our Nation's Deficit"
BlackListedNews: Bank of America has over $8 billion loss for the quarter
ABCNews: Debt Hope: Obama Praises 'Gang of Six' Plan
President Barack Obama and a startling number of Republican senators lauded a bipartisan deficit-reduction plan Tuesday that includes $1 trillion in higher taxes, raising hopes of a last-minute compromise to repair the nation's finances while averting a government default. Wall Street saluted as well.
CapitalGainsAndGames: The Gang Of Six Deal Is Now The Gang Of 50 Or More Deal
DeclineOfTheEmpire: The Real Significance Of The Debt Ceiling Debate 
TulsaWorld: $3.7 trillion cut proposed 
Reuters: COLUMN-5 questions about Social Security and the debt ceiling Social Security is a pawn in the negotiations to avoid a federal debt default, and that has stirred fear and confusion among current and future beneficiaries. President Obama has threatened not to make August benefit payments in the event of a default, and signaled that he is open to cutting Social Security if it helps him secure a big deficit-reduction deal with Republicans.
GlobeAndMail: U.S. social security shouldn't be cut: poll 
BBC: Goldman Sachs profits 'disappoint'Second-quarter profits at Goldman Sachs have missed expectations as the Wall Street bank's revenues from fixed income trading dropped sharply.
CNBC: Fed's Hoenig: Growth to Continue at Modest Pace
HarvardBusinessReview: What Kind of Country Reneges on Its Contracts? 
WSJ: Obama Backs Latest Bargain  
NPR: American Airlines Places 'Largest Aircraft Order In Aviation History' 
BusinessInsider: GOLDMAN: The Debt Ceiling Fight Is Already Hurting The Economy 
Salon: Why can't we dump the debt ceiling? The arbitrary limit to how much the U.S. government can borrow doesn't work and isn't necessary  
BusinessInsider: Giant Dollar Stores Are Among The Only Businesses That Could Take Over Borders Retail Space
YahooFinance: Huge deficit-cutting bill sails through GOP House Huge deficit-cutting bill races through Republican House; bipartisan effort picks up support
Spiegel: The World from Berlin
'News Corp Can Only Survive if Murdoch Goes'
Slate: Peas in Our Time: Republican senators want to cut a debt deal, if the House can finish its tantrum.
TheTelegraph: Family spending power falls by £360 High inflation putting the squeeze on family finances and most are around £40 a month worse off than they were a year ago. 
BusinessInsider: George Soros Is 75% In Cash
USAToday: Foreign investment begins to pour into Iraq 
MSNBC: Did U.S. firm use bribery to land fuel contract for U.S. forces in Iraq? 
MarginalRevolution: “Pick Your Poison: Do Politicians Regulate When They Canʼt Spend?” 
FiscalTimes: Why Taxpayers Are So Angry—and So Wrong About Spending  Republicans, emboldened by public support for spending cuts, have taken the country to the brink of default as they fight to dial back government programs and vehemently oppose any tax increases to attack the deficit. But is the fight over the debt ceiling really an ideological battle between the two parties over the size and role of government? Or is a lot of the public support for GOP positions driven by myopia about entitlement spending and misplaced public anger? 

BusinessInsider: Why The Drop In Foreclosures Is Not Good News
CNBC: If Levy Imposed to Save Greece, Banks May Sue 
WSJ: Lockheed Looks For More Job Cuts 
Reuters: Mortgage applications see biggest increase in 4 months Applications for home mortgages surged last week, racking up the biggest increase in four months on a flood of refinancing demand as interest rates remained low, an industry group said on Wednesday.
MoneyWatch: 4 Things You Should Never Share With HR


Peak oil and Energy News
Platts: Libya crisis could see Brent hit $175/b in 2012: BofA Merrill Lynch
ThinkProgress: The Real Lessons of Carmageddon: How Small Behavior Changes Come with Big Payouts

Commodities/Metals
ZeroHedge: Gold, Silver Surge After John Taylor Predicts Gold To Hit $1,900 By October
Cryptogon: India Reveals World’s Biggest Uranium Discovery
A new mine in south India could contain the largest reserves of uranium in the world, a government official said in remarks reported Tuesday, signalling a major boost for the energy-hungry nation.

Environmental News
Reuters: Powerful earthquake hits Central Asian valley A powerful earthquake struck Central Asia's densely populated Ferghana valley on Wednesday, shaking houses and sending residents of several Uzbek and Kyrgyz cities onto the streets in panic.
Time: Mounting Trash Emergency Encircles Beijing China's capital has grown so huge that it now has seven peripheral roads. It is also becoming encircled by garbage. This is both a poignant metaphor and serious dilemma.
NewScientist: Where did the Gulf’s spilt oil and gas go? 
The puzzle over what happened to the oil and gas released during the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico last year has been partially solved. Oil is composed of many thousands of different chemicals but the plume that stretched through the Gulf contained relatively few. Now chemists have worked out what happened to the rest. Christopher Reddy, an environmental chemist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, and colleagues, used a remotely operated submarine to collect samples directly from the leaking well in June 2010 and compared these with samples taken from elsewhere in the oil plume. The team found that water-soluble compounds dissolved in neutrally buoyant seawater about 400 metres above the wellhead. These included benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene – a toxic suite collectively referred to as BTEX. And in this layer they stayed. By contrast, the compounds that reached the surface were mainly insoluble.
Reuters: No relief from heat for central United States
SOTT: Thirteen Dead and 86 injured in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan 6.1 Earthquake
WashingtonPost: Shock forecast: NOAA predicts heat index of 116 in Washington, D.C. Friday

MSNBC: How's 120-plus degrees feel? Iowa towns know Felt like 131 in one town; worse set for state through Wednesday
Iowans were dead center in the heat wave gripping the central U.S. on Tuesday, with warnings that it will get worse before it gets cooler. And that's after 11 Iowa towns on Monday posted heat indices that made it feel between 114 and 131 degrees.
CSMonitor: Drought and wildfire threaten America's cattle capital
Ranchers face the risk of starving cattle after drought, wildfire, and prolonged high temperatures scorch parts of the heartland. Water reserves were used to fight fires, leaving little for farmers.
MSNBC: No relief as deadly heat wave expands east
Temperatures in Washington, D.C., Philadelphia and New York expected to feel like 110 degrees
BBC: Waterfalls flow upwards in extreme winds
Winds battering southern Australia over the last 24 hours have been so strong  that spray from waterfalls south of Sydney has billowed up into the air. (beautiful video!)
MaxKeiser: Instead of making up some frickin silly s*** like ‘heat dome’ why not just call it what it is; AGW
TreeHugger: The Aftermath of the Yellowstone River Oil Spill
WSJ: Secondary Sources: Creditor Nations, Anti-Keynesian, European Crisis
UPI: EPA sued over Los Angeles smog
GlobeAndMail: Destroying our only home
TreeHugger: Arctic Sea Ice Melt On Track To Set New Record Low in 2011

New images from the National Snow and Ice Data Center show the Arctic Sea Ice extent in the first half of July continues to rapidly decline, to the extent that it is tracking below what was seen in 2007, when the record minimum summer record was set. Persistent above average temperatures and an early start to seasonal melting were cited as causing the rapid melting.
SOTT: U.S.: Florida Fish & Wildlife researchers say 'pretty large' fish kill warrants investigation
Time: The Dead Sea: Deader than Ever and Getting More So

here is dead and there is dying. The Dead Sea manages both.
It's dead because the water in it contains way, way too much salt — eight times as much as the oceans — for virtually any living thing to survive. With a shoreline at the lowest land point on the globe — 1,388 ft. (423 m) below sea level — and no outlet, millennia of evaporation has left the seabed so caked with minerals the freshwater that flows in turns immediately lethal.
ClimateProgress: NSIDC: Early Sea Ice Melt Onset, Soaring North Pole Temperatures, Presage Rapid 2011 Summer Decline

America in Decline
WashingtonPost: How much geography do kids know? Not so much
AmericanProspect: Wal-Mart, Why?
"No company has done more to reduce the wages and benefits of American workers than WalMart."
USAToday: Death toll for police officers is rising despite decline in violent crime
MSNBC: 24 small towns may lose air service
Delta Air Lines says it's losing $14 million a year serving the small airports
MSNBC: Internet rallies around flier accused of groping TSA agent
(in decline but fighting back! Grope the TSA! LOL)
The flying public has chosen its new folk hero and it is Yukari Miyamae, a 61-year-old Colorado woman who was arrested for allegedly groping a female Transportation Security Administration agent at Phoenix's international airport.
Miyamae is accused of grabbing the left breast of an agent at a security checkpoint last Thursday and was facing a felony count of sexual abuse. After reviewing the case, prosecutors for the county declined to file felony charges against Miyamae, according to the Associated Press.


Food and Water
BigPictureAgriculture: Weather and Corn Crop Conditions
Guardian: Biofuel demand in US driving higher food prices, says report
Government support for ethanol has led to an increase in corn production and a steep rise in soybean imports
CircleOfBlue: FOIA Lawsuit Seeks Release of U.S. Department of Energy’s ‘Water-Energy Roadmap’
A lawsuit filed this week in Federal District Court in Massachusetts accuses the U.S. Department of Energy of withholding a crucial study on how to solve the national confrontation between water supply and energy demand that was ordered up by Congress in 2005 and never made public.
PBS: Record Drought Threatens Millions in Eastern Africa


Science and Technology
CSMonitor: Shuttle Atlantis releases tiny satellite before returning to Earth Shuttle Atlantis put PicoSat, a US military satellite, into orbit Wednesday morning. See video below of space shuttle Atlantis leaving the International Space Station for the last time. 

ScientificAmerican: Mars Landing Site Chosen for Next Rover
After years of debate, NASA will unveil its choice on July 22--nearly 35 years to the day after the space agency's storied Viking 1 probe touched down on Mars
NYT: U.S. to Close 800 Computer Data Centers
The federal government plans to shut 40 percent of its computer centers over the next four years to reduce its hefty technology budget and modernize the way it uses computers to manage data and provide services to citizens.
ArchaeologyNewsnetwork: Genetic research confirms that non-Africans are part Neanderthal
NASA: NASA's Hubble Discovers Another Moon Around Pluto
Statesman: After shuttle lands, Mission Control to go quiet
UniverseToday: Herschel Telescope Sees a Twisted Ring at Our Galaxy’s Center


Medical and Health
M&C: Vegetables are good for you, EU insists in post-E coli campaign
TechReview: Alzheimer's Detected 20 Years before Symptoms Show People with rare, inherited forms of the neurological disease have early markers—which researchers can use to test preventive treatments.
LAT: New Jersey becomes 16th state to approve medical marijuana use
MSNBC: US panel: Cover birth control for free Institute of Medicine recommends insurers be required to cover birth control without copays
MSNBC: C-section rates hit all-time high, study finds More than 1 in 3 women undergo surgery to deliver their babies
TruthOut: Are Chemicals Making Us Fat?
BeforeItsNews: Fingernails Can Tell Secrets Of Your Health

Doomsteading, Gardening, Urban Farming
PermacultureUK: Preparing for an economic debt crisis
It may sound a tall order, but with the growing uncertainty over economic stability there is a real need to ask ourselves what can we do to prepare for a debt crisis.
Grist: How to stay cool for next to nothing (really "cool" article!)
ActivistPost: Food Considerations in Times of Crises: Immediate Nutrition-No Preps

Other News
CNN: Killing of infants on the rise in Pakistan (this is a monstrous story) 
Reuters: Analysis: Is Britain more corrupt than it thinks? Britons love to lecture the world about integrity and the rule of law, but the News of the World phone hacking scandal has laid bare a web of collusion between money, power, media and the police.
BlackListedNews: Walter Reed Army hospital to close its doors
Reuters: Bachmann denies her migraines are incapacitating
ScienceDaily: New Sexting Laws Put College Students at Risk: More Than Half of All College Students Have Been 'Sexted'
ScienceDaily (July 20, 2011) — More than half of all college students have received sexually suggestive images via text messaging, and nearly 80 percent have received suggestive messages, according to research by University of Rhode Island faculty in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies.
SOTT: 'Israeli spies among New Zealand earthquake casualties'
Krugman: The Glenn Beck / DeBeers Connection 
Atlantic: Stopping Wartime Sexual Abuse -- of Men The world has made progress against the abuses of women, but sexual violence often targets men, who still have little recourse
BBC: Americanisms: 50 of your most noted examples The Magazine's recent piece on Americanisms entering the language in the UK prompted thousands of you to e-mail examples.
NewAmerican: Indians the Latest Illegals Coming to U.S. Through Mexico A new mass of humanity is moving across the U.S. border with Mexico. Illegal-alien Indians, many of them Sikhs, are coming to the the United States, the Associated Press reported on Sunday, because it elevates their social status back home. They will account for 33 percent of the illegals caught trying to cross the border.
BlackListedNews: Ariz. now can build border fence with private donations
CNN: Feds investigate Minn. school district after civil rights complaint
RawStory: Discovery Channel plans marijuana reality show

The Forums
TinfoilPalace:'Someone's coming to get me': Terrified phone-hacking whistleblower feared for his life before he was found dead
TinfoilPalace:Algae Turns Sea Green in China
TheOilAge:Weird eggplant relatives
TheOilAge:that crucial conversation... sound general quarters...
Hubberts-Arms:Only Germany can save EMU as contagion turns systemic
Hubberts-Arms:C-Realm Podcast: Heinberg & Orlov interview
SilentCountry:Last Warning Before the Autumn 2011 Shock
SilentCountry:Feet first into the meat grinder: Gruesome death for sausage