Days after the release of hidden-camera videos led to the firing of four ACORN workers in Baltimore and Washington who assisted an independent filmmaker posing as a pimp to apply for an illegal housing loan for a brothel, a third video has surfaced showing ACORN workers offering the same kind of assistance at the organization's office in Brooklyn, N.Y.
As in their previous undercover stings, filmmaker James O'Keefe, 25, and partner Hannah Giles, 20, who posed as a prostitute, received advice from ACORN workers on how to launder their earnings and avoid detection from law enforcement officials while running a prostitution business.
"You have to find another name for it," an ACORN employee tells the pair seeking a mortgage in the Brooklyn office. "Honesty is not going to get you the house. You can't say what you do for a living."
In the video posted on BigGovernment.com, which was shot on Aug. 4, O'Keefe tells two ACORN workers that Giles scantily dressed as a prostitute named "Eden" with partially-exposed undergarments earns up to $10,000 a month "performing tricks" and tries to obtain housing in the purportedly 18-year-old woman's name.
"This is going to be her business, it's all cash," O'Keefe says. "She's gonna have this business in the house with a bunch of girls coming and doing these things, you know, performing tricks and she's gonna give me the money so I can pay the mortgage. That's how we want to work it potentially. But no one has to know where the money is coming from."
"No," an ACORN employee responds as another shakes her head in approval.
The ACORN employees suggest that the purpose of "Eden's" business remain a secret as they seek to obtain financing.
"You know, what goes on in the house, we don't care," an ACORN worker says on the video. "We just help you with the mortgage."
#1
I'd like to ACORN offices around the country flooded with people who are asking for help to break the law. Advising people on how to break the law may or may not be a crime, but filling out a tx form that you know is bogus is against the law. In Baltimore one of the ACORN staff offered to make a false Income tax return for $50. If she had done that she would have broken the law.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
09/14/2009 14:32 Comments ||
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#2
biggovernment.com has the ongoing story with ACORN. Now Acorn has threatened legal action against FOX claiming that the video's were 'fabricated' (then why did they fire 4 (so far) Acorn people?).
I watched the MSNBC (what I could stand....) where they had the head of Acorn on and were discussion how Acorn was being victimized and FOX was being a big meanie... They showed parts of the video (but without the incriminating audio....).
#8
Best part about ACORN, they don't even have grow their nuts here. They import them, via your tax dollars, already full grown. Talk about an outsourcing revolution.
Posted by: ed ||
09/14/2009 21:04 Comments ||
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'If I could, I'd take this ******* ball and shove it down your ******* throat': What Serena Williams REALLY told line judge
When I read the headline I saw 'If I could, I'd take this ******* bIll and shove it down your ******* throat' and thought it was the Administration talking about Obamacare or Tax & Trade or Stimulus or .....
#1
Someone who makes more money in a weekend than I'll see in my entire life is going to complain and moan and cuss people out about how unfair life is.
#1
My sister in-law has voiced the similar problems. She thought medicine was all about helping people but she said she spends most of her efforts making sure she has all her ducks in a row in case someone decides to suit.
#4
I'm sure the Indian Health Service has openings for qualified OB-GYNs such as Dr. Wah. She wouldn't have to worry about being sued nor about paying malpractice premiums due to the Federal Tort Claims Act. Of course, she would have to put up with the always-limited supporting funds voted by our faithful Congress and with whatever associated conditions she meets out on the rez. I'm also sure there aren't any such openings in Florida. However, there are many temporary IHS positions available to qualified docs, for as little as a week at a time, transportation & housing are paid.
I also think each of us is born with a BS quotient. There is so much of it any one of us can endure without snapping, the amount varies a lot from one person to another, and when we get to that point, it's time to change our path.
#7
Someone needs to ask our esteemed legislative masters how they plan to deal with the doctor shortage that will result from ObamaCare.
For every doctor that quits, there are 100's of foreign docs that would kill to take his/her place.
Posted by: ed ||
09/14/2009 21:06 Comments ||
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#8
Don't think so Ed, other countries been bribing them to migrate for a long time. think Edinburg bombers. Ill bet our jee-hod doctors are in training already, ready to let us pay them good bucks to kill us.
Muslim faithfuls from Masjid Hag mosque in Morogoro are going around the town removing adverts with messages publicising entertainment activities during Eid el Fitri. The Muslims at the mosque believe that encouraging people to go to dancing halls and bars on Eid is immoral and therefore against Islamic teachings. Mr Ahamad Bawazir and Mr Idd Mtulla, who are leading the 'operation' said they were determined to bring to an end the practice of 'promoting immorality during Eid'.
A group of faithfuls from the mosque went around removing billboards and placards containing messages linking any entertainment activity with Eid. They complained about the on-going practice, where people use Muslim's holy day to promote 'immoral business.'
Mr Bawazir said celebrating Eid el Fitri by going to a dance hall or a place where taarab is played was not acceptable in Islam. He said they had decided to take matters into their own hands after the town authorities refused to act despite being asked to intervene. Mr Bawazir said they had written to the municipal director twice but he did not take any action. Efforts to reach him proved futile.
#1
ION AFRICA PAKISTANI DEFENCE FORUM > [Economic]SIEGE OF AFRICA: CHINA AND INDIA BATTLE IT OUT. Curr dominating State/Govt-led CHINA, versus up-n-commer Private Sector-led INDIA. India leading the way in important anti-HIV/AIDS pharmaceutical drugs.
* SAME > FEARING THE TALIBAN, PAKISTANI HINDUS TAKE THE EXPRESS BACK TO INDIA.
(Xinhua) -- Supporters of former Madagascan president Marc Ravalomanana were arrested by the police here on Saturday for disturbance in the city center since Friday.
Madagascan police had to arrest over two dozens of Ravalomanana supporters, including Eliane Rosa Naika, a member of the parliament upper house. Six others were injured.
Naika, a 54-year-old woman member of Ravalomanana's party, Tiako i Madagasikara or I love Madagascar party in English, was arrested by the police in NALUGARO Hotel in a downtown area around 12:40 local time (0940 GMT). The other leaders of the party staying with her in the hotel had run away five minutes before.
Ravalomanana's supporters on Saturday staged an anti-High Transitional Authority (HTA) demonstration in the May-13-square without permission from local authorities, insulting the armed troops who received order to seal off the place.
Ravalomanana's supporters destroyed billboards of VIVA television and advertising company INJET, both owned to HTA President Andry Rajoelina, after failing to hold their scheduled demonstration at the city center of Antananarivo.
Road signs, public payphones and some cars inside the Ministry of Youth and Culture were destroyed by demonstrators. A French citizen was smashed at his head with a big stone and nearly all goods in his car were robbed except a bible.
Three people had to be rushed to a public hospital in the city center due to injuries they had, while some others were asphyxiated by tear gas launched by the police.
A police commander, who asked not to be identified, told Xinhua on the scene on Saturday that the armed forces tried to hunt those who spread chaos to prevent possible robbery and looting in the capital city like on Jan. 26, when dozens of public buildings, private shops and stores were looted.
The police commander said that the armed troops had sealed off, since Friday morning two places, including the May-13-square and a garden park, named "Place of Democracy" by Rajoelina in December, when he was the mayor of Antananarivo.
Ravalomanana's supporters intensified their anti-Rajoelina demonstration and wanted to move into the may-13-square and the Place of Democracy in the city center to express their opposition to the announcement of a new government by Rajoelina and his Prime Minister Monja Roindefo on Tuesday.
The formation of the transitional government was denounced by Rajoelina's rivals, who said the move violated the transitional charter and other related documents signed by the four political leaders on Aug. 9 in Maputo, Mozambique.
Zafy called the four political camps on Friday to resume talks within 72 hours and threatened to set up an opposite government against the lineup announced on Tuesday.
The transitional prime minister, Roindefo, announced late Friday that Rajoelina accepted Zafy's invitation, but changed his idea at the last minute due to the disturbance made by Ravalomanana's supporters.
Roindefo called all victims of the robbery and destruction, which took place here on Friday and Saturday to claim it to the special investigation committee set up by the transitional government on Saturday.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/14/2009 00:00 ||
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[Al Arabiya Latest] A 12-year-old Yemeni girl, who was forced into marriage, has died during a difficult delivery in which her baby also died, a children's rights organization said on Sunday.
"The child, Fawziya Abdullah Youssef, died on Friday Sept. 11 in western Yemen at the age of 12 due to a complicated delivery," the Yemeni Organization for Childhood Protection (Seyaj) said.
" The lack of a statutory minimum age for marriage makes it impossible for local officials to ban child marriages, especially among girls, or to punish their parents or spouses for the disastrous consequences of such marriages "
Seyaj
The organization said its volunteers had confirmed that doctors had been unable to save Fawziya's life when she began to bleed severely after struggling to give birth for three days.
Raised in an impoverished family with a father suffering from kidney failure, Fawziya was forced to drop out of school and married off to a 24-year-old man at the age of 11. She got pregnant a year later, the group said.
"The lack of a statutory minimum age for marriage makes it impossible for local officials to ban child marriages, especially among girls, or to punish their parents or spouses for the disastrous consequences of such marriages," Seyaj said, adding that such marriages are widespread on Yemen's Red Sea coast.
Last year, a Yemeni court granted a divorce to an eight-year-old girl whose unemployed father forced her into an arranged marriage with a man 20 years her senior, saying he feared she might otherwise be kidnapped by the would-be spouse.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/14/2009 00:00 ||
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Posted by: Whiskey Mike ||
09/14/2009 4:47 Comments ||
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#3
OK, I'm furious
I'd take a machete to her "husband's" crotch.
And when I got through he'd never need any woman ever again. even to watch him pee, he'd need to sit to pee for the rest of his life.
And NEVER EVER father a child again.
Consider it "Cleansing the Gene pool".
HE is ruly an animal, not a human.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
09/14/2009 16:38 Comments ||
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#4
Hey! Take it easy on the Orc insults ok? Sure I twisted elves to create the Orc race - but even I wouldn't stoop to pedophilia... That would be just plain sick!
Posted by: Morgoth the Dark Lord ||
09/14/2009 17:12 Comments ||
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The tropical waters that lap the jungle shores of southern Malaysia could not be described as a paradisical shimmering turquoise. They are more of a dark, soupy green. They also carry a suspicious smell. Not that this is of any concern to the lone Indian face that has just peeped anxiously down at me from the rusting deck of a towering container ship; he is more disturbed by the fact that I may be a pirate, which, right now, on top of everything else, is the last thing he needs.
His appearance, in a peaked cap and uniform, seems rather odd; an o fficer without a crew. But there is something slightly odder about the vast distance between my jolly boat and his lofty position, which I can't immediately put my finger on.
Then I have it - his 750ft-long merchant vessel is standing absurdly high in the water. The low waves don't even bother the lowest mark on its Plimsoll line. It's the same with all the ships parked here, and there are a lot of them. Close to 500. An armada of freighters with no cargo, no crew, and without a destination between them....
Here, on a sleepy stretch of shoreline at the far end of Asia, is surely the biggest and most secretive gathering of ships in maritime history. Their numbers are equivalent to the entire British and American navies combined; their tonnage is far greater. Container ships, bulk carriers, oil tankers - all should be steaming fully laden between China, Britain, Europe and the US, stocking camera shops, PC Worlds and Argos depots ahead of the retail pandemonium of 2009. But their water has been stolen....
The Aframax-class oil tanker is the camel of the world's high seas. By definition, it is smaller than 132,000 tons deadweight and with a breadth above 106ft. It is used in the basins of the Black Sea, the North Sea, the Caribbean Sea, the China Sea and the Mediterranean - or anywhere where non-OPEC exporting countries have harbours and canals too small to accommodate very large crude carriers (VLCC) or ultra-large crude carriers (ULCCs). The term is based on the Average Freight Rate Assessment (AFRA) tanker rate system and is an industry standard.
You may wish to know this because, if ever you had an irrational desire to charter one, now would be the time. This time last year, an Aframax tanker capable of carrying 80,000 tons of cargo would cost £31,000 a day ($50,000). Now it is about £3,400 ($5,500)....
Posted by: Mike ||
09/14/2009 12:12 ||
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#1
I did some looking around. There are several of these "ghost fleets" around the world, including off the coast of southwest Africa, several places off the South/Central American coast, and in the Pacific. Even without the economic collapse, there would have been (and has been) an excess of ships for the amount of trade. A full third of the worldwide tanker fleet is used to store excess oil production, to keep the price even partially stabilized.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
09/14/2009 23:53 Comments ||
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Take it with a fair helping of salt. But if it's true, or if we manage to get commercial small, safe nuclear reactor power generators on the market, or if nanotech really takes off ... if we manage one or more of these before the barbarians bring down civilization, things could get interesting indeed.
Researchers at the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) in Stockholm have managed to prove that fossils from animals and plants are not necessary for crude oil and natural gas to be generated. The findings are revolutionary since this means, on the one hand, that it will be much easier to find these sources of energy and, on the other hand, that they can be found all over the globe.
Using our research we can even say where oil could be found in Sweden, says Vladimir Kutcherov, a professor at the Division of Energy Technology at KTH.
Together with two research colleagues, Vladimir Kutcherov has simulated the process involving pressure and heat that occurs naturally in the inner layers of the earth, the process that generates hydrocarbon, the primary component in oil and natural gas.
According to Vladimir Kutcherov, the findings are a clear indication that the oil supply is not about to end, which researchers and experts in the field have long feared.
He adds that there is no way that fossil oil, with the help of gravity or other forces, could have seeped down to a depth of 10.5 kilometers in the state of Texas, for example, which is rich in oil deposits. As Vladimir Kutcherov sees it, this is further proof, alongside his own research findings, of the genesis of these energy sources that they can be created in other ways than via fossils. This has long been a matter of lively discussion among scientists.
#1
Very good news, anything hat break the Arab's stranglehold is to be applauded.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
09/14/2009 0:29 Comments ||
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#2
So the question is: where did the carbon and hydrogen come from to make the oil at these great depths?
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
09/14/2009 1:37 Comments ||
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#3
Methinks Vlad, Anton & Alex just finished up their dissertations and are shopping for a free ride on someone else's dime for a few years. PT Barnum would be proud but any first year student of petroleum engineering and/or geology would roll their eyes at the loud trumpeting of a well-known fact and the simultaneous attempt to draw a very invalid conclusion therefrom.
It's not news that hydrocarbons form at depth. Nor is it news that a particular hydrocarbon, the simplest stable one, methane (CH4), a primarly component of natural gas, can form without the involvement of any organic material (see e.g., the first couple of chapters of Dr. Norman Hyne's excellent Nontechnical Guide to Petroleum Geology, Exploration, Drilling & Production for an imminently readable discussion). There are numerous sources of methane: garbage dumps, a cow's ass (just attach a hose), long buried organic material exposed to high temperature & pressure and yes, even Precambrian basement rocks lacking significant amounts of organic matter. This is long-known and not in dispute.
However the ability to form methane does not at all imply that other hydrocarbons will form spontaneously at great depth as well. There's not yet any significant evidence that hydrocarbons heavier than methane can form spontaneously in the absence of organic matter, but there's a great deal of evidence to the contrary. E.g.: while methane is often found in non-sedimentary rocks oil almost never is; methane is found alone or along with helium, nitrogen, carbon dioxide and other gases thought or known to be formed in the basement rock while parafins heavier than methane are only found with or very neary oil; oil is known to form only at temperatures below about 300°F (higher temperatures produce lighter hydrocarbons) which limits the depth at which it can form to 18,000 to 20,000 feet or thereabouts, etc.
I don't imagine that the oil majors are going to be snapping these guys up any time soon though I'm sure there're a few gullible politicians in oil-poor countries who'll gladly write them a check.
#5
I can remember the crude oil scares of the 50's and 60's, "it's soon to run out, we've not much left anywhere" they would say. My late father who had worked for a subsidiary which is now BP for decades dismissed it all saying, "geologists are not even certain oil isn't still being made by this old earth." He would appreciate reading this article and the Burg I'm sure.
#6
As far as small reactors go, several corporations are in full scale production, and back ordered as far as the eye can see. Toshiba (20'x6'), Babcock & Wilcox, Western Troy Capital Resources, Hyperion Power Generation, Energy Northwest, NuScale Power, and several new Sandia labs designs, are all contending.
Right now, they are scaling off $5,000 per Megawatt, which is very competitive, and a lot of corporations and municipalities want their own reactor in case there is a severe economic downturn or a major energy crunch.
#7
Alaska Paul, hydrogen and carbon, as well as, all other occurring elements are present. The question is, are the hydrocarbons the result of extremophile organisms that exist at great depth and exude the hydrocarbons as waste products or are they the remainder of carbonaceous bodies that struck the proto-Earth during its consolidation? The first would never stop making oils and the second would run out but when?
#8
I am sure we will never run of petroleum. I am also sure there is no limit to how much it can cost. We do have a small, safe fusion reactor just 8 minutes from here, and we scarcely use it.
#9
Wehell, we have innumerable MSM-Net reports on so-called "PEAK OIL" and related - whatzabout other SCARCE/PRECIOUS COMMIDITIES or NATURAL MINERALS - Gold, Silver, Zinc, Lead, Iron, Manganese,
...............@, ENERGY versus NON-ENERGY UTILITY!?
#2
I'm reminded of an old saying from when I was a kid back on the farm. Don't bite the teats of the milk cow. CNN, The Washington Post, NYT and so many others are financially bleeding to death and they continue to slash their wrists.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
09/14/2009 14:48 Comments ||
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#3
screw CNN, they are unsalvagable now.
Let them burn in hell and go down in flames and all of that crap.
[Geo News] SIALKOT: Guards of an MPA hailing from Pakistan People's Party (PPP) manhandled a police personnel at Saddar police station here, Geo News reported on Sunday night. According to media reports, SHO Hameedullah Warraich said the police arrested some people for allegedly molesting women. On this, MPA Tahir Mehmood Handli showed up at police station to get the arrested released; however, when the police turned him down, an exchange of hot words between the parties ensued. Warraich said the MPA along with his guards manhandled the ASI and tore down his uniform shirt; later on, the minister took away the arrested three men. When contacted, MPA Tahir denied mishandling the ASI, and said, Â'ASI Mazhar ill-treated first with my guards and then with me.'
Posted by: Fred ||
09/14/2009 00:00 ||
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[Al Arabiya Latest] Israeli President Shimon Peres was discharged from the hospital on Sunday with a clean bill of health, a day after the 86-year-old Nobel peace laureate passed out briefly at a ceremony.
"I can say to everyone that we have a president who is dynamic, young at heart and physically healthy," said Dr. Zeev Rothstein, director of Sheba Medical Center near Tel Aviv where Peres was kept for observation overnight.
" He fainted for at most a dozen seconds before regaining consciousness and at first had refused to go to the hospital "
Spokeswoman Ayelet Frisch
Peres fainted at the podium during a public appearance in Tel Aviv late on Saturday. Doctors said he was apparently overcome by the heat.
"He fainted for at most a dozen seconds before regaining consciousness and at first had refused to go to the hospital," his spokeswoman Ayelet Frisch told reporters.
Peres's personal physician, Rafi Valdan, told the Ynet news website that the octogenarian was feeling fine after the incident.
"It was simply very hot and he stood up for a long time and felt dizzy. He fainted for a few seconds," his personal physician, Rafi Valdan was quoted as telling the Ynet news website.
Peres, whose role is ceremonial, was expected to resume much of his daily routine, including a planned meeting later on Sunday with U.S. President Barack Obama's Middle East peace envoy, George Mitchell, doctors and aides said.
The Polish-born former prime minister is a veteran of Israeli left-of-centre politics, with a career going back to before the founding of the Jewish state in 1948.
As foreign minister, along with Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, Peres won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994 for reaching a series of ground-breaking interim accords.
He was elected president by parliament in 2007. In that capacity, he has continued to speak out in the cause of peace with the Palestinians and other Arab neighbors, although his interim deal has yet to produce a final peace settlement.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/14/2009 00:00 ||
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IT SHOULD be the moment of truth for the Airborne Laser (ABL). In the coming months, the multibillion-dollar laser built into a customised Boeing 747 will try to shoot a ballistic missile as it rises above the clouds.
Don't expect instant reports of success, though. Instead, if all goes to plan, we're likely to hear about a series of incremental improvements.
Developed by the US Department of Defense's Missile Defense Agency (MDA), the ABL aims to focus a beam of laser energy in the megawatt range for several seconds onto a missile at a "militarily significant distance" - more than 100 kilometres.
So far, the laser has only operated at near full power on the ground. On 18 August it was fired successfully from the air, but at reduced power. That, however, was no mean feat: aircraft vibrations play havoc with the precisely aligned optical components needed to generate a laser beam.
Firing at full power poses other challenges too. At powers high enough to destroy missiles, any surface contamination or tiny flaw in the laser optics can absorb so much heat that they crack or shatter.
High-power laser beams also heat the air they pass through, creating perturbations that can disperse or divert the beam. To counteract those effects, the ABL uses an adaptive system that senses atmospheric changes along its path and makes optical adjustments to compensate.
To test that system, the MDA plans a series of increasingly powerful shots at modified ballistic missiles loaded with sensors to measure the distribution of laser power on the target. Engineers will assess each shot's performance and use the results to fine-tune the adaptive optics. Once this is done, the MDA will test the laser again in varying conditions, and attempt to destroy actual missiles. The first of these tests is planned to take place late this year, with two more to follow in early 2010, according to an MDA spokeswoman.
A sister project, the Advanced Tactical Laser, which aims to use an airborne high-powered laser to hit targets on the ground, recently completed its first successful test. With future funding dependent upon the success of these tests, the pressure is on the ABL team to prove its efficacy.
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.
Days after the release of hidden-camera videos led to the firing of four ACORN workers in Baltimore and Washington who assisted an independent filmmaker posing as a pimp to apply for an illegal housing loan for a brothel, a third video has surfaced showing ACORN workers offering the same kind of assistance at the organization's office in Brooklyn, N.Y.
Muslim faithfuls from Masjid Hag mosque in Morogoro are going around the town removing adverts with messages publicising entertainment activities during Eid el Fitri. The Muslims at the mosque believe that encouraging people to go to dancing halls and bars on Eid is immoral and therefore against Islamic teachings. Mr Ahamad Bawazir and Mr Idd Mtulla, who are leading the 'operation' said they were determined to bring to an end the practice of 'promoting immorality during Eid'.
