The latest chapter in the complex and sordid saga of Bernard Madoff began recently as the bankruptcy trustee in the case took steps aimed at recovering over $400 million withdrawn by investors prior to the scheme becoming public.
That action is called a clawback, and, if successful, could result in the investors being forced to return the money to the trustee who would eventually distribute it among all those who were cheated by Madoff. The action -- filing suits to recover a total of $405 million -- was taken by Irving Picard, acting as trustee for Madoff's firm.
"It seems likely those are the first of many suits that will follow," observed Allan R. Lipman, an attorney who practices in both New York and Florida and who has written widely about issues confronting those with residences in both of those states. A published list of Madoff investors reveals a concentration in Palm Beach, Broward and Dade Counties in Florida and in Manhattan, Long Island and Westchester in New York State.
Lipman predicts that many such investors with dual residences may be faced with similar clawback efforts. He believes they will be better able to resist those efforts if they can claim domicile in Florida rather than New York.
Why? Because of different provisions governing Florida law, including statute of limitations and homestead rights, some Florida domiciliaries may be better able to defend their positions and retain some of the money, Lipman explains.
Madoff sometimes refused to accept investments of less than $1 million, according to Lipman, and investors would pool their funds to meet his minimum requirements with only one of them dealing directly with Madoff. A successful clawback of that single investor may in turn result in attempted clawbacks by that investor from the other investors some of whom may have dual residences, Lipman believes, resulting in litigation that could last years.
Bet she's a peach
A Mississippi woman who was shot in the head not only survived but made herself tea and offered an astonished deputy something to drink, authorities said Friday. Tammy Sexton, 47, remained hospitalized three days after being wounded by her husband, who killed himself after he shot his wife. A bullet struck her squarely in the forehead, passed through her skull and exited through the back of her head, authorities said. She is expected to fully recover.
"There's no way she should be alive other than a miracle from God," said Sheriff Mike Byrd of Jackson County, Miss.
Byrd said deputies were looking for Sexton's husband, Donald Ray Sexton, earlier in the week to give him a document ordering him to stay away from his wife. Court records show he was put on probation for six months on April 9 for domestic violence.
He showed up at their home in rural Jackson County in Southeast Mississippi about 12:10 a.m. Tuesday and confronted his wife as a relative ran next door to call police, the sheriff said.
"She was at her bed, and he shot her right in the head," Byrd said. "Then he went out on the back porch and shot himself."
A deputy was greeted by the woman when he arrived minutes after she was shot with the slug from a .380-caliber handgun.
"When the officer got there she said, `What's going on?' She was holding a rag on her head and talking. She was conscious, but she was confused about what had happened," he said. "She had made herself some tea and offered the officer something to drink."
Byrd said the bullet apparently passed through the lobes of the woman's brain without causing major damage. She was rushed to a Mobile hospital by a helicopter. God moves in mysterious ways?
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/23/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
That's all you need to keep murderous husbands away, right?
Right?
**crickets**
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/23/2009 16:07 Comments ||
Top||
#5
I just read a story about a woman in Detroit (natch) who was shot at and docs say her life was saved when the bullet hit the wire in her underwire BRA!
So, a restraining order and GOOD bra seem to be the order of the day LOL.
Staff Sergeant Jimmie Doyle, USAAF, lost his life on Sept. 1, 1944 at the age of 25 in the islands of Palau. Funeral services for SSgt. Doyle will be 1:30 p.m. Saturday, April 25, 2009, at First United Methodist Church of Lamesa, with Army Chaplain Colonel Michael Lembke of Ft. Hood officiating. Burial will follow in Lamesa Memorial Park under the direction of Branon Funeral Home. A visitation will be 10 - 12 a.m. Saturday, April 25, 2009, at Branon Funeral Home. Family and friends will gather for a visitation at the FUMC Fellowship Hall following the graveside service.
Born Oct. 29, 1918 in McKinney to Tom and Mamie Doyle, Jimmie married Myrle Wells on Sept. 21, 1940 in Lamesa and she died in 1992. They had one child, Tommy Doyle, who was only 15 mo. old when his father left to go overseas.
SSgt. Doyle proudly served with the 307th Bombardment Group, 424th Squadron in the Pacific Theater during WWII. While serving as the nose gunner aboard a B-24J Liberator, SSgt. Doyle, along with ten fellow crewmembers, was lost during a bombing mission to the Palau Islands. In 2004, the BentProp Project located the plane wreckage. In 2008, SSgt. Doyle's remains were recovered and identified.
SSgt. Doyle is survived by his son, Tommy Doyle and wife, Nancy, of Snyder; grandchildren, Casey Doyle of Corpus Christi and Brandi Doyle of Portales, N.M.; and sister, Pat Presfield of Springdale, Ark.
SSgt. Doyle's grandson, Capt. Casey Doyle, USMC, will serve as military escort bringing his grandfather's remains from the Central Identification Lab in Hawaii to Lamesa, where he will be laid to rest next to his wife, Myrle. Full military honors will be accorded SSgt. Doyle.
In lieu of flowers, the family suggests memorials to the charity arm of the BentProp Project for the discovery of other MIA's in Palau. Online at www.bentstarproject.org, or The BentStar Project, Limited, 443 First St., Woodland, CA 95695-4023.
When a Florida flight instructor was forced to land a home-built plane on a three-lane highway, the whole emergency landing was caught on tape -- from the cockpit of the disabled plane.
Pilot Kyle Davis was on his way to the Sun 'n Fun annual "fly-in" and convention Sunday morning when his engine cut out, MyFOXTampaBay.com reported.
Professional videographer Gilbert Field was riding along at the time because, with so many other planes flying to the event, they thought "it would be cool" to video the trip, Field told MyFOXTampaBay.com.
But what he ended up capturing was the engine failing and Davis successfully landing the powerless plane on one of Winter Haven's busiest streets.
"I was incredibly lucky," Davis told MyFOXTampaBay.com. "It was a whole bunch of luck and a little bit of experience."
That luck has earned Davis a whole bunch of fame: By Tuesday, the video had gotten thousands of hits on YouTube, MyFOXTampaBay reported.
Google is giving people influence over what information turns up during online searches on their names. The California Internet search king began on Tuesday featuring voluntarily created Google profiles at the bottoms of US "name-query" pages.
"It's no secret that from time to time many of us have searched on Google for our name or someone else's," Google software engineer Brian Stoler wrote in a posting at the Internet firm's website. "When searching for yourself to see what others would find, results can be varied and aren't always what you want people to see. We want to make that better and give you more of a voice."
Google profiles contain basic information and pictures that people don't mind sharing. Concise profiles are displayed along with results of searches on people's names to allow a little control of one's online image.
Information about setting up profiles is available at google.com/profiles.
You mean there's no free lunch? I'm shocked.
The National Park Service is worried about environmental consequences of solar proposals on government lands that are administered by the Bureau of Land Management. It says it supports the solar push but is warning against water drawdowns, especially in southern Nevada. In the Amargosa Valley, the endangered, electric-blue pupfish lives in a hot water, aquifer-fed limestone cavern called Devil's Hole.
"It is not in the public interest for BLM to approve plans of development for water-cooled solar energy projects in the arid basins of southern Nevada, some of which are already over-appropriated," Jon Jarvis, director of the Park Service's Pacific West Region, wrote to the BLM director in Nevada.
Jarvis' e-mail from February, obtained by The Associated Press, noted that the rare pupfish's dwindling numbers prompted Nevada to ban new groundwater allocations within 25 miles of the pool.
Jarvis urged the BLM to promote technologies that use less water and hold off on permits until it finishes its assessment of the solar program next year. The BLM tried suspending new applications last year but relented under pressure from industry and advocates of renewable energy.
"Water is a big concern and the desert tortoise is a major concern, and the amount of site preparation is a concern," said Linda Resseguie, a BLM project manager. The government in reviewing each project wants to make careful decisions over what it considers "a potentially irreversible commitment of lands," she said.
Water is among the complications in deserts where more than 150 solar applications have been submitted for hot spots in Nevada, California, and Arizona, plus a few in New Mexico.
Rest at the link.
Gotta look out for those pupfish, boys!
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/23/2009 14:37 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[8 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
I hope this makes at least one environmentalist say "that damn pupfish!" It might open their minds just a teensy little bit.
#2
The National Park Service is worried about environmental consequences...
NPS is not worried about the pending government economic consequences when the debt hits with the SS/Medicare entitlements destroying the national budget. Priorities probably will mean the pupfish might survive but the NPS will be looking at its own version of the desert. The pupfish can eventually be cloned. Bureaucratic offices will likely be lopped off whole.
That sound you heard was the greenies' heads exploding....
Plants absorbed carbon dioxide more efficiently under polluted skies than they would have done in a cleaner atmosphere, according to new findings published this week in Nature magazine. So we need to pollute more, right? I drive a Buick so I'm helping out ...
The results of the study have important implications for efforts to combat future climate change which are likely to take place alongside attempts to lower air pollution levels.
The research team included scientists from the Center for Ecology & Hydrology, the Met Office Hadley Centre, ETH Zurich and the University of Exeter.
"Surprisingly, It's surprising only because humans really don't understand the earth and its atmosphere on a large scale; they just pretend they do.
the effects of atmospheric pollution seem to have enhanced global plant productivity by as much as a quarter from 1960 to 1999. This resulted in a net 10 percent increase in the amount of carbon stored by the land once other effects were taken into account," said lead author Dr Lina Mercado, from the Center for Ecology & Hydrology in a press statement.
Reductions in sunlight reduce photosynthesis, but clouds and atmospheric particles scatter sunlight, meaning plants are then able to convert more of the available sunlight into growth because fewer leaves are in the shade.
"As we continue to clean up the air in the lower atmosphere, which we must do for the sake of human health, the challenge of avoiding dangerous climate change through reductions in CO2 emissions will be even harder," said co-author Professor Peter Cox of the University of Exeter in a press statement.
Under an environmentally friendly scenario in which sulphate aerosols decline rapidly in the 21st century, the researchers found that by cleaning up the atmosphere, even steeper cuts in global CO2 emissions would be required to stabilize carbon dioxide concentrations below 450 parts per million by volume.
"Different climate changing pollutants have very different direct effects on plants, and these need to be taken into account if we are to make good decisions about how to deal with climate change," said Cox. You want a good decision. Mr. Cox? Leave the climate the hell alone. You can't do anything about it anyway - though you and your leftie politicians can use it as am excuse to impoverish everyone but yourselves.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/23/2009 13:41 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[5 views]
Top|| File under:
The Public Health Agency of Canada has told quarantine services to be on alert for travellers returning from Mexico after a number of severe respiratory illnesses (SRI) were reported in some regions of the country.
PHAC, in an April 20 report, said Mexican officials informed the Canadian health agency that the "case-fatality rate was relatively high" and that most cases involved healthy adults between the ages of 25 and 44. A number of health-care workers were also affected.
Although no cause has been confirmed, some samples were positive for influenza A and B...
The above comments on an alert issued by Canada offer some insight into the situation in Mexico. The reports out of Mexico are decidedly mixed. Some reports describe an increase in influenza cases which is attributed to a late spike in influenza B, which when combined with influenza A, gives an abnormally high number of cases this late in the season. Other reports discuss revaccinating at risk groups with the current trivalent vaccine.
#1
Yeah, the quantity of lead inside the lungs was a dead giveaway.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
04/23/2009 11:34 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Follow-up: Rough translation:
500 cases reported in Mexico City
Thursday, April 23, 2009
The contagion has affected workers and employees of major public hospitals in the Capital, such as the Juarez Hospital, General Hospital, National Institute of Respiratory Diseases, and hospitals in the area of Tlalpan
MEXICO CITY .- At least 500 employees of the Health sector in Mexico City are infected with influenza virus, reported Antonio Sanchez Arriaga, general secretary of the National Independent Union of Health Workers.
The contagion has affected workers and employees of major public hospitals in the Capital, such as the Juarez Hospital, General Hospital, National Institute of Respiratory Diseases, and hospitals in the area of Tlalpan, where the National Institute Cardiology, the National Nutrition Institute and the Hospital Manuel Gea González, in addition to the Red Cross Polanco.
[Mail and Globe] Zimbabwe's Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai said on Wednesday he had given President Robert Mugabe a deadline on the resolution of issues threatening to derail the country's unity government.
Tsvangirai was speaking ahead of a third meeting between the two leaders on Thursday over the unilateral claw-back by Mugabe of the telecommunications dossier from Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).
"The outstanding issues cannot go on and on hanging over our hands," said Tsvangirai, while refusing to reveal what sort of ultimatum he had issued 85-year-old Mugabe.
Mugabe earlier this month took telecommunications off MDC Information Minister Nelson Chamisa and gave it to Transport Minister Nicholas Goche -- a member of the Zanu-PF party. The move outraged the MDC, given that telecommunications covers spying.
The ongoing invasion of white-owned farms by Zanu-PF loyalists and Mugabe's refusal to review his unilateral appointments of the central bank governor and attorney general are other issues
threatening to scupper the deal and putting the skids on foreign aid and investment.
Finance Minister Tendai Biti has appealed for 10 billion dollars to rebuild the tattered economy but Western donors are waiting for proof of real reforms before committing to anything more than emergency relief for the millions of Zimbabweans, who cannot feed themselves.
So far, two meetings between Mugabe, Tsvangirai and deputy prime minister Arthur Mutambara, leader of a breakaway faction of Tsvangirai's MDC and the third signatory to September's power-sharing agreement, have failed to resolve the issues.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/23/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Tsvangirai appears to be looking for another lorry. I would suggest he not bother with the green bananas at Pick'Pay. Just say'n.
[Bangla Daily Star] Government would invite instability in the country if BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia is evicted from her cantonment house, said BNP leaders yesterday in a protest programme at Muktangon.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/23/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
[Bangla Daily Star] At least 14 Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL) activists were injured in separate factional clashes in Pabna and Chittagong yesterday.
Two factions of BCL clashed over admission in Pabna Edward College in the small hours of Wednesday leaving at least 10 BCL men injured including BCL Pabna district secretary, reports our Pabna correspondent. The feuding groups ransacked dormitories of the college. The admission procedure was postponed following the clash. Additional police forces were deployed in the college.
The clash ensued as two factions of BCL -- one led by Mostafizur Rahman Sweet, BCL district unit president and the other led by its secretary Mostak Azad-- went to the college campus at around 1:30am with lists of admission seekers.
Both district unit president and secretary blamed each other for the attack.
Our Chittagong correspondent adds: At least four BCL activists of Chittagong Medical College (CMC) unit were injured in a factional clash early yesterday. Sources said the clash ensued centering a cricket match between third-year and fourth-year students on the CMC play ground on Tuesday afternoon.
After the match was over an altercation occurred between supporters of two teams and as a sequel to the brawl both groups backed by two factions of BCL CMC unit clashed on Wednesday in the city's Chatteswary Road at around 2:00pm. Later police rushed there and charged batons to disperse the feuding students.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/23/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
[Al Arabiya Latest] Turkey has recalled its ambassador to Canada for consultation, said a Foreign Ministry source on Wednesday, after Canada's prime minister spoke at a vigil to commemorate the 1915 killing of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire.
Premier Stephen Harper gave support on Tuesday to claims that the 1915 killings by Ottoman Turks amounted to genocide, the source said, a term fiercely rejected by Ankara, which says many were killed on both sides.
"The ambassador has been called back is currently going through consultations over what to do. We don't know how long he will be here," the source said.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/23/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
TOPIX > RUSSIA, TURKEY VIE FOR DOMINATION OF AZERBAIJAN.
#2
here's what then-candidate Obama said in his campaign website
As a U.S. Senator, I have stood with the Armenian American community in calling for Turkey's acknowledgement of the Armenian Genocide. Two years ago [in 2006], I criticized the Secretary of State for the firing of U.S. Ambassador to Armenia, John Evans, after he properly used the term "genocide" to describe Turkey's slaughter of thousands of Armenians starting in 1915. I shared with Secretary Rice my firmly held conviction that the Armenian Genocide is not an allegation, a personal opinion, or a point of view, but rather a widely documented fact supported by an overwhelming body of historical evidence. The facts are undeniable. An official policy that calls on diplomats to distort the historical facts is an untenable policy. As a senator, I strongly support passage of the Armenian Genocide Resolution (H.Res.106 and S.Res.106), and as President I will recognize the Armenian Genocide."
and here is what he said about the Armenian Genocide in Turkey
#3
You know, if you count the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943, there was "blood shed" on both sides of the Shoah, too. But claiming that that made things *even* is just foul.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
04/23/2009 12:03 Comments ||
Top||
#4
If the Candadian ambassador committed genocide, then he definitely should be recalled; diplomatic immunity or not.
Moscow: Russia will ask India to pay far more that originally agreed for a refurbished Soviet-era aircraft carrier that is already a year overdue, the firm overhauling the ship said on Tuesday.
I keep thinking we're going to be reading about this in 2015; the Russians will need another billion to finish the carrier and the Indians will fork it over ...
India, a key buyer of Russian arms such as tanks and fighter jets, in 2004 signed a $1.6 billion deal with Russia for the delivery of the modernised Admiral Gorshkov carrier by 2008. The carrier may now cost between $2.5 and $4 billion depending on "tough" negotiations with New Delhi, Interfax news agency quoted Nikolai Kalistratov, the head of Sevmash Shipyard, as saying.
"According to our calculations, verified by (Russia's) Federal Tariffs Service, all in all at least $2.5 billion is needed," he said. "All of us should make efforts to convince the Indian side that our calculations are absolutely objective," Kalistratov said.
"A new aircraft carrier of this class costs around $4 billion." Sevmash Shipyard was not immediately available for comment.
The Admiral Gorshkov, already renamed INS Vikramaditya, was first launched in 1982 and was decommissioned in 1996. The ship, smaller than US carriers and powered by steam engines rather than nuclear reactors originally carried helicopters and vertical take-off and landing aircraft. Russian engineers have had to lengthen the runway and build up a proper springboard to allow conventional warplanes to reach take-off speed.
Still say we should sell them the Kitty Hawk for $1 plus the cost of refurbishing to be done in an American shipyard.
One factor that may have added to the cost and delay is Russia lacks expertise in building aircraft carriers. Soviet-era carriers were built in Mykolayiv which is now part of Ukraine. The Northern Fleet's Admiral Kuznetsov, powered by steam turbines, is currently Russia's only aircraft carrier.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/23/2009 12:30 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[15 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
"All of us should make efforts to convince the Indian side that our calculations are absolutely objective,"
#2
The USS Ronald Reagan only cost $4.5b. If the Gorshkov ultimately ends up costing $4b, I can fully appreciate why the Indians might be upset - they would be getting a small carrier for the price of a super carrier.
It could be the best Xbox 360 game ever, and a real kick in the ARSS.
The U.S. Army is testing the Autonomous Rotorcraft Sniper System (ARSS) a remote-controlled unmanned Vigilante robot helicopter equipped with a high-velocity sniper rifle.
Its RND Edge semi-automatic gun is mounted on a self-stabilizing turret with built-in zoom camera, and fires 7 to 10 precisely aimed .338-caliber rounds per second.
Back on the ground, a human directs it using a modified Xbox 360 controller, which plugs into a laptop so that the operator can see what the drone sees.
"Having the ability to accurately engage single point man sized targets with an airborne UAV will give the ground based soldier the ability to have a high-point survivable sniper at their disposal when needed," stated the Army solicitation notice when the project was announced in 2005.
The Space Dynamics Laboratory at Utah State University developed the Precision Weapons Platform guided turret and rifle system.
The system is intended for the urban battlefield an eye in the sky that can stare down concrete canyons, and blink out targets with extreme precision. Attempting to return fire against the ARSS is liable to be a near-suicidal act: ARSS is described as being able to fire seven to 10 aimed shots per minute, and it's unlikely to miss.
Recent events off Somalia, however, may have suggested other uses for this technology. Last week's standoff between pirates and the U.S. Navy in the Indian Ocean ended famously with three sniper shots, as a drone watched overhead. In 2008, French special forces captured six pirates on land after ransom had been paid. "There were four helicopters involved," The Independent reported at the time. "A sniper [in a Puma helicopter] shot out the motor of the pirates' four-wheel drive vehicle. A second helicopter [a Gazelle] then landed nearby, allowing the six pirates to be arrested" without any casualties.
The U.S. Coast Guard's Helicopter Interdiction Tactical Squadron (HITRON) uses helicopter-borne snipers to take out drug-running boats. They are accurate enough to knock out engines without harming the crew or damaging fuel tanks. "The driver just threw his hands up," concludes the description of one such action in Men's Vogue, after all three engines were disabled with three shots.
And because the Vigilante is smaller, lighter and cheaper than a manned combat helicopter, it can be supplied in greater numbers, and without the need for those elite, highly-trained snipers.
Sniping from a chopper currently takes tons of skill and training. But ARSS is literally point-and-shoot for the operator on the ground, using a videogame-type controller. The software makes all the necessary corrections, and the system should ensure first-round kills at several hundred yards. The secret is in the control system and stabilized turret (on the right in the picture above), which is currently fitted with a powerful RND Manufacturing Edge 2000 rifle specifically designed for sniping work, using the heavyweight .338 Lapua Magnum cartridge.
The stabilized turret could be fitted to a variety of other vehicles including a a small blimp, or a fixed-wing unmanned plane, like the Predator. Compared to the Predator's array of Hellfire missiles, the ARSS' lone gun would be much less likely to hit civilians. It would also give a far deeper magazine: dozens of shots instead of a handful of missiles, and at a cost of around $4 per trigger pull rather than about $100,000 for a Hellfire. But the turret doesn't need such a big craft to carry it, as the complete turret assembly weighs less than a single Hellfire.
#10
Kofi makes this thing sound irrestible. It costs $4 a pop and there is a prize every time. Better than Cracker Jacks! Maybe not as healthy, though.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
04/23/2009 12:53 Comments ||
Top||
#11
Just don't connect it to Skynet. Nothing good comes from that.
It's all automated. Computer control, and all that. Nothing to worry about.
#13
The military has been extremely reluctant to deploy weaponized unmanned ground vehicles...UGV's mounted with an M240 or M249. I wonder if they'll have the same reticence about deploying this system. One of the key issues is fratricide, since you'd expect this to be used near front-line troops. But the other is collateral damage. If they shoot the wrong person is it going to be a CNN moment? Again, that seems to be a major issue with the weaponized UGV's.
I'll place a standing order to buy 25 pulls. Target(s) of the Army's choice. :-D
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/23/2009 18:30 Comments ||
Top||
#16
Remember the movie "Blue Thunder"? How about "The Running Man"? In both movies, the gist was the use of a helicopter to hose riots and demonstrations.
And as recent years have proven, there are plenty of people out there who would have no problem wiping out an entire tea party.
#17
Just don't connect it to Skynet. Nothing good comes from that.
It's all automated. Computer control, and all that. Nothing to worry about.
Yup
"Thie ie the first completely automated flight............. absolutely Nothing can co wrong, go wrong, go wrong Etc.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
04/23/2009 21:36 Comments ||
Top||
#18
This thing, and other cool weapon systems will eventually be used against Americans trying to save their country from the godless Liberals hellbent on your destruction.
You are running out of time.
Posted by: New Delhi Don ||
04/23/2009 21:43 Comments ||
Top||
[Straits Times] MALAYSIAŽS government said on Wednesday it will immediately remove a 30 per cent requirement for ethnic Malay ownership of investments in parts of the services sector as it tries to boost the countryŽs flagging economy. Prime Minister Najib Razak said the areas that will be freed up are in health, tourism, transport, business services and computer related businesses and cover 27 subsectors of the services economy.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/23/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
[Straits Times] THAILAND'S top diplomat on Tuesday linked exiled Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra to last week's violent attack on a prominent Thai protest leader.
In a speech to the Asia Society, Thai Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya accused Mr Thaksin of playing a role in Friday's shooting of Sondhi Limthongkul. Mr Sondhi was the leader of a movement that helped topple Mr Thaksin's goverment in 2006 and paralyzed the capital last year.
Mr Sondhi, whose 'yellow shirt' movement helped install the current government, 'was supposed to have lunch with me at noon, but he was shot before. But I think he is recovering quite well,' Mr Kasit said.
Mr Kasit said that 'it's been survival for a few of us. ... Thaksin failed on the populist movement and now I think he has resorted to some sort of assassination attempt.'
He did not elaborate or provide any evidence. But he made clear he believed that he and four other of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva's Cabinet ministers also were targets.
Mr Sondhi was shot and wounded, in the shoulder and near his eyebrow, as he was being driven to work before dawn. At least two men in a pickup truck ambushed his car and opened fire with an M-16 and an AK-47, first aiming to shoot out the tires and then spraying the vehicle with bullets, police said. Sondhi's driver was also wounded.
The shooting occurred just days after troops cracked down on rioting protesters from the rival, anti-government 'red shirt' movement.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/23/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
The hostility between Fox News Channel and MSNBC reached a fever pitch Wednesday when a Fox producer infiltrated the GE shareholders meeting. Just before GE re-elected board members, company brass were hit with questions from shareholders critical of an alleged leftward political slant at MSNBC.
But one of those questions came from Jesse Waters, a producer on "The O'Reilly Factor" whose criticisms were cut short when his microphone was cut off, according to several attendees. Waters apparently did not publicly identify himself as a Fox employee.
Waters has built a reputation as an ambush interviewer, specializing in on-the-street confrontations. But this is arguably the boldest move by a Fox newsie to utilize the tactic inside their chief rival's tent, as it were.
O'Reilly and MSNBC anchor Keith Olbermann have been involved in a running feud for several years, but the pissing match between the two has of late started to envelope other parts of the News Corp. and GE empires.
GE pointed out that Waters had Fox News cameras waiting outside the Orlando meeting.
Attendees who spoke to THR said shareholders asked about 10 politically charged questions concerning MSNBC as well as one about CNBC.
First up was a woman asking about a reported meeting in which Immelt and NBC Uni CEO Jeff Zucker supposedly told top CNBC executives and talent to be less critical of President Obama and his policies. Immelt acknowledged a meeting took place but said no one at CNBC was told what to say or not to say about politics.
During the woman's follow-up question, her microphone was apparently cut off. A short time later, Waters asked a question and his mic was cut, too.
"The crowd was very upset with MSNBC because of its leftward tilt," one attendee said. "Some former employees said they were embarrassed by it."
When he got the floor, Waters focused his question about MSNBC on Olbermann's interview of actress Janeane Garofalo, who likened conservatives to racists and spoke of "the limbic brain inside a right-winger."
"He (Waters) was complaining that Olbermann didn't bother to challenge her," another GE shareholder said.
Immelt told the assembled he takes a hands-off approach to what is reported on the company's news networks, which prompted a shareholder to criticize him for not managing NBC Uni more effectively.
"My biggest surprise was the open hostility to MSNBC," said Tom Borelli of the Free Enterprise Action Fund and a four-year critic of Immelt. "It was noticeable and loud. I don't remember any of this going on last year."
"Any time MSNBC was mentioned, there was a rumbling in the crowd of 400 people," he added. Borelli also asked a question pertaining to GE's stock performance since Immelt took the helm.
The meeting, which lasted more than two hours, was described by all four of the attendees THR talked to subsequently as variously rancorous or critical. Other than questions about MSNBC, shareholders brought up questions about executive pay and cuts to the company's dividend.
The company made available a webcast of the event, which contains prepared remarks from CEO Jeff Immelt and CFO Keith Sherin, but not their interaction with shareholders. A GE spokesman said the company traditionally doesn't broadcast the entire meeting. He also defended the right of Waters, a shareholder, to ask questions of GE brass.
In other comments about the economy, Immelt said this is the worst it's been since the Great Depression and that it would ultimately lead to changes such as greater government involvement in business and a restructuring of the financial services sector that was a root of the crisis. "We are living through history, and I don't mean that in a positive sense," Immelt said.
The CEO tried to assure shareholders that GE has positioned itself for an economic recovery, with a new focus on products that could capture some of what GE estimates is $2 trillion worth of government stimulus spending worldwide. That includes windmills and other clean energy equipment and new health care technology.
Sherin was conciliatory when discussing GE's decision to cut its dividend by 67% in March, the first reduction in the quarterly payment since 1938. GE has said the move was needed to save $9 billion per year in cash. "We feel terrible about it, but it was the right thing to do," Sherin said.
Shares of GE rose 10 cents Wednesday to close at $11.80.
#4
The CEO tried to assure shareholders that GE has positioned itself for an economic recovery, with a new focus on products that could capture some of what GE estimates is $2 trillion worth of government stimulus spending worldwide.
Perhaps, O'Reillys baffoon should have asked about that little ditty.
#5
Jeffrey Immelt is the current chairman of the board and chief executive officer of General Electric. He was selected in 2000 to replace Jack Welch following his retirement. Since Immelt took over, GE's stock has dropped from ~$58 per share to $11.80 (today). The stockholders should be pi$$ed.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Staff Sergeant Jimmie Doyle, USAAF, lost his life on Sept. 1, 1944 at the age of 25 in the islands of Palau. Funeral services for SSgt. Doyle will be 1:30 p.m. Saturday, April 25, 2009, at First United Methodist Church of Lamesa, with Army Chaplain Colonel Michael Lembke of Ft. Hood officiating. Burial will follow in Lamesa Memorial Park under the direction of Branon Funeral Home. A visitation will be 10 - 12 a.m. Saturday, April 25, 2009, at Branon Funeral Home. Family and friends will gather for a visitation at the FUMC Fellowship Hall following the graveside service.
[Al Arabiya Latest] Turkey has recalled its ambassador to Canada for consultation, said a Foreign Ministry source on Wednesday, after Canada's prime minister spoke at a vigil to commemorate the 1915 killing of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire.
Moscow: Russia will ask India to pay far more that originally agreed for a refurbished Soviet-era aircraft carrier that is already a year overdue, the firm overhauling the ship said on Tuesday.
It could be the best Xbox 360 game ever, and a real kick in the ARSS.
The hostility between Fox News Channel and MSNBC reached a fever pitch Wednesday when a Fox producer infiltrated the GE shareholders meeting. Just before GE re-elected board members, company brass were hit with questions from shareholders critical of an alleged leftward political slant at MSNBC.
