A judge told a jury yesterday of his horror at discovering that a Brazilian cleaner he was sleeping with had stolen his home-made sex videos and was blackmailing him. The immigration judge, who nicknamed Roselane Driza, an immigrant who was his former lover, real chilli-hot stuff, said he was absolutely petrified that she would send Lord Falconer of Thoroton, the Lord Chancellor, recordings of him having intimate relations with two women, including another Asylum and Immigration Tribunal judge.
Miss Driza, 37, is accused of blackmailing the male judge to live rent-free at his home, and of extorting £20,000 from the female judge, who had employed her illegally.
Giving evidence on the third day of the trial, the male judge, named only as Mr I for legal reasons, said that he returned from a trip abroad and discovered that two sex videos had vanished from the home he was sharing with Miss Driza. I was absolutely petrified, he told the Old Bailey. She told me about scenes from the video. She was saying something about my having slept with other women on the video cassettes.
I told her I wanted the videos. Her reaction at that stage was that she had taken them and they were her defence. She said she had wrapped them up and left them with a friend with instructions of what to do if anything happened to her. The tapes had not been recovered, he added.
In case you don't know, this is the SEAL that is featured in the SEAL training series on the Military Channel
About six weeks ago, Matt from Blackfive.net called about a Navy SEAL named Justin who had been diagnosed with leukemia. Justins life likely could be saved with a bone marrow transplant, and with a giant database of willing donors, Justins chances might have looked promising. Yet when Justin was tested, it turned out he carried an uncommon trait called the Philadelphia chromosome. Doctors said his chances of finding a match were about 1 in 25,000, and therefore his chances of survival were grim. That is until groups like Soldiers Angels and Blackfive got involved and called for a blogstorm.
I recall talking with Matt about six weeks ago when one of us said, If anybody can save him, its us, meaning the blogosphere. Matt got tested, but it turns out Ive been to too many malarial countries to qualify. Fortunately, many others did, and just the other night, Matt phoned with fantastic news. A donor had been found. A perfect match. But not just one donor, there were three perfect matches! Interestingly, when Justin fell sick and his condition radiated into a blogstorm, raising awareness of the marrow-donor issue, he may have saved many lives. All those donor-drives that were initiated on his behalf have the potential to save many lives.
The primary donor is a 30 year-old German woman. Over the past couple of years, I have heard countless stories about Germans who visit our wounded service members as they pass through the U.S. Armys Regional Medical Center in Landstuhl. The United States and Germany may have exchanged sharp words over the course of this war, but it is important to take public notice of the many Germans who help Americans regardless what they think of our government, including this German woman who will donate some of her life-force to save Justin. (Wir bedanken uns bie Deutschland.)
DUBAI - Dubais flagship airline Emirates said on Thursday its multi-billion-dollar deal for Airbus A380s superjumbos stands despite an announced further delay in delivery. Emirates has not received any official notification from Airbus about a further delay in delivery apart from what we heard in the news, the airlines spokesman Boutros Boutros told AFP.
The Middle Easts fastest growing carrier is not considering cancelling the deal at the moment, he said after European aerospace group EADS admitted Thursday that its Airbus superjumbo airliner was set for further delays.
Boutros said Emirates is waiting for the final schedule of deliveries to be announced within four weeks to see how it affects the expected delivery of 43 aircraft ordered by the carrier -- the largest single order of the double-decker plane that is designed to carry between 555 and 840 passengers. In its statement, EADS said it had not finalized the schedule of deliveries nor the financial impact of any delays, but it said it would provide more information within four weeks.
Emirates had said in June that a further delay in the delivery of the A380 superjumbo would hurt expansion plans and future revenue.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/22/2006 00:00 ||
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#2
Why do I imagine that this plane is capable of hauling "either 100 first class and 700 coach passengers" or 1400 "guest workers" who have to surrender their passports before even boarding the plane?
ANNAPOLIS -- Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. said yesterday that he would like to scrap electronic voter databases to avoid an Election Day debacle similar to last week's problems in the primaries -- and he threatened to reconvene the Democrat-controlled legislature to make paper ballots an alternative. "Potentially we need to convene a special session. That's one option here," said Mr. Ehrlich, a Republican seeking re-election.
Bob hasn't had good luck with the special session idea in the past, however. And he's noticed.
One of the governor's top aides downplayed the likelihood of such a move, because the governor would not be allowed to campaign during a special session. State Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr., Prince George's Democrat, said a special session is unnecessary.
"Tut tut! Totally unnecessary!"
In addition, House Speaker Michael E. Busch, Anne Arundel Democrat, said current election law allows paper ballots to be used.
"Nope. Nope. No need to do anything at all!"
But Mr. Ehrlich maintained that a special session is on the table after hearing testimony from state elections Administrator Linda H. Lamone. The governor summoned Mrs. Lamone to testify at yesterday's Board of Public Works meeting to account for problems that prevented some voters from casting primary ballots in Baltimore and in Montgomery and Prince George's counties. "The bottom line to this whole thing is in 48 days we're going to have a general election, and we literally cannot afford to see take place the events that took place [last week]," Mr. Ehrlich told Mrs. Lamone.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/22/2006 00:00 ||
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Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
09/22/2006 18:08 Comments ||
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#2
Man. Back to paper ballots and ink-stained fingers.
This reminds me of one of the earliest computer shows I attended, 1976 or 77, IIRC, where Peter Norton went around handing out pencils which were inscribed with "Word Processor".
Greenleaf, Idaho -- All Americans have the right to bear arms. Some towns have even gone as far as to require each household to have a gun. Now a small Idaho town is contemplating a similar idea-- it's called the Civil Emergencies Ordinance. And although gun ownership is just one piece of this ordinance, it's the part that's getting the most attention.
"We've blessed to be a fairly rural area of the state, so we don't have a lot of crime and I think we'd like to keep it that way," said Lee Belt, Greenleaf city clerk.
Drive about 10 minutes west of Caldwell and you'll run into Greenleaf, Idaho, population 860. If city council member Steve Jett has his way, each head of household that can legally own a gun, will. Along with that they're encouraged to have ammunition and appropriate training.
"I think the city council is hoping it will happen and that it will be a deterrent to crime as the city and region increases in population," said Belt.
The proposed ordinance is modeled after a similar plan that went into place in 1982 in Kennesaw, Ga. In that instance there was a dramatic decrease in criminal activity. Although crime isn't a huge problem for residents of Greenleaf, the growth in neighboring counties leads them to believe they too are in for some changes.
"There's not a lot of crime here, but I think it's coming, it's getting worse everyday," said Art Bailey, owner of the Greenleaf Store.
While the plan does encourages firearm ownership, the ordinance goes beyond that.
"The largest part itself deals with emergency capabilities," said Belt.
The plan will establish an emergency response plan, and promote its citizen response teams and neighborhood watch volunteer groups, a proactive approach to keep the crime rate to a minimum. So how have residents responded? According to almost everyone we spoke to, they already owned a gun or multiple guns, so this would have no effect on them either way.
"I don't know if it is good for every household, but we being hunters have always had guns," said Bonnie Cagle, a Greenleaf resident.
"I think it is an excellent idea," said Bailey. "If the citizens are armed were not at a disadvantage."
We did ask to speak with the city council member who proposed the ordinance but he was out of town. In November, the council will decide whether or not to adopt the ordinance.
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) - A trooper who police believe was shot by former fugitive Ralph ``Bucky'' Phillips was semiconscious Thursday after being in a medically induced coma since last month, state police said. Trooper Donald Baker Jr., 38, was not talking, but he opened his eyes and moved his head for the first time since the Aug. 31 shooting, state police spokeswoman Rebecca Gibbons said. The doctors took Baker off of sedation and anticipated the semiconscious state, Gibbons said.
Baker and Trooper Joseph Longobardo, 32, were ambushed by a sniper hiding in the woods outside the home of Phillips' former girlfriend. Baker was shot in the back.
Baker's family issued a statement thanking the public for continued support while he recovers. ``Donny's condition was recently upgraded from critical to ``serious but stable'' and he continues to show progress and improvement,'' the statement said. ``On today's date, Donny opened his eyes and recognized his wife, Tracy (and) his parents.''
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/22/2006 00:00 ||
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I smell schadenfreude!
The New York Times Co. on Thursday forecast sharply lower third-quarter earnings because of a "challenging" print advertising market, sending shares down nearly 5 percent in after-hours trading. The publisher of The New York Times newspaper and the Boston Globe forecast earnings of 8 cents to 10 cents per share, compared with 16 cents in the same quarter last year. "The print advertising market has been very challenging during July and August and remains so in September," Chief Executive Janet Robinson said in a statement.
On Monday, Dow Jones & Co. cut its third-quarter earnings forecast because of disappointing revenue at The Wall Street Journal. Yahoo warned on Tuesday that auto and financial advertising would be weaker than expected. The forecast includes an estimated charge of 1 cent to 2 cents per share for staff reduction costs.
It also includes an estimated charge of 2 cents to 3 cents for the loss on the company's sale of its investment in the Discovery Times Channel, which it said it would sell for $100 million. Leaving out those items, the earnings forecast range would be 11 cents to 15 cents a share. Analysts polled by Reuters Estimates were expecting earnings of 18 cents a share, excluding items.
It is not immediately clear whether those estimates exclude the same items.
Posted by: Frank G ||
09/22/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
Well, even if the management there doesn't understand morals, sedition, or treason, then perhaps they'll understand it when their bonuses take a nosedive, they get fired, and nobody but Hugo Chavez will hire them.
Chrichton predicted all of this 13 years ago in a speech he made at some press club. The reactionary, imagination-less tranzi mandarins in the industry laughed hard, but aren't laughing now.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
09/22/2006 5:46 Comments ||
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#3
I like it, they'll understand getting hit in the wallet.
Now the second part of their education is to understand just why they got hit in the wallet, this is still beyond their comprehension.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
09/22/2006 6:25 Comments ||
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Still, if that's the only way you can get the message....
Maybe there will be one glimmer of understanding, as the last guy turns out the lights...
Posted by: Bobby ||
09/22/2006 6:54 Comments ||
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#6
Everything rises and falls on leadership. Until the management of the NYT is swept away and replaced with folks with at least some semblance of fairness, balance and perspective, there is no hope for the Grey Lady.
I for one, would like to see the NYT establish a reputation for good solid journalistic integrity---and a few drops of patriotism mixed in wouldn't hurt. A great city needs and deserves a great newspaper. The NYT has damaged America, but especially the people of New York.
#9
It appears the family which dominates the control of the paper are trying to drive out other investors to establish a privately held corporation. One tactic is to poison the well. As the value plummets, the other bail. However, the tainting of the product means that it will continue to plummet unless radical action is take. In the NYTs case, that would mean a wholesale slaughter of the entire editorial and management staff. In either case, destruction by declining revenues with resultant staggered layoffs or la grande coup in the reshuffling, the minions who live and breath the atmosphere of hate and loathing they have feed upon for these years since 9/11 will get their justice. Im sure jobs a plenty await them in other declining dead tree venues, hmmm no. In tenured filled universities, hmmm no. In manning the battalions of hacks directly for the ever distant DNC, hmmm no. Goodbye and thanks for all the fish!
#11
The Times is also going to sell their Broadcast Media Group, which accounted for about 4% of their profits. It includes WNEP in Scranton, PA, which has dominated the ratings for local news for more than a decade. The Times paid more than $40 million just for WNEP sometime in the '80s. WNEP is immensely profitable, and I assume the other stations they're selling make money too. The fact that the Times is shedding money-making stations doesn't bode well for the company's future.
#12
It appears the family which dominates the control of the paper are trying to drive out other investors to establish a privately held corporation.
This strikes me as one of those explanations that gets repeated often enough that people accept it is true. I understand the concept of taking a hit so that you can buy back your stock at cheap prices - however this is more like sinking your ship so that you can own it. It makes no sense on any level.
More likely, they have been buying back their stock for years to keep their investors from realizing how badly it was performing and now it is so far beyond repair that it is going to freefall. JMHO.
#13
Newspapers will not become profitable by becoming "balanced". People don't get news from newspapers, they get it from radio, TV and the internet. People who read newspapers are more interested in depth and perspective regarding events. The more successful newspapers are those appealing to large target markets - NYT to culturally and political liberals nationally, WSJ to business people, etc. However, the cost structures of all papers are too high, primarily due to unionization of the entire workforce (like GM and Ford, the print industry still has defined benefit pension plans and provide medical benefits for retirees).
Eli Broad was on TV the other morning and discussed his attempt to buy the LA Times. He acknowledged that there was no money to be made, but that he wanted to buy it for "civic" reasons.
The icons of the newspaper world will probably be propped up by the Broads of the world trying to keep their perspective on events alive. They will, however, eventually have to deal with the cost side.
The remainder will probably be locally focused, but will either be restructured to reduce costs (with a cheaper workforce and reduced benefits) or will go bankrupt.
#14
hmmm. I'm not sure I agree. I've lived in several different cities and in just about all of them, the papers began to lose their market share about the time that they refused to report anything but AP propaganda. It makes all but their liberal niche readers mad and they cancel. Once they cancel - they find other sources for their news. And there are plenty of other places to go. Nobody wants to pay to get annoyed with their cup of coffee in the morning.
#16
IMO while biased reporting has hurt the NYT and similar papers, the real KILLER has been the Internet. Not only as an alternate source for news (including their own sites) but especially for advertising. Robinson is right about that.
Craig's List, eBay, online ordering ... all of these have cut deeply into print advertising, which is what really pays most of the bills at papers. And that's not going to change for them. They're dead in their current form, at least.
#17
DoDo has it - sorta. Aside from the very large newspapers, the rest may be better off ditching the syndicated and AP-stuff and concentrating on their local market.
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.
A judge told a jury yesterday of his horror at discovering that a Brazilian cleaner he was sleeping with had stolen his home-made sex videos and was blackmailing him. The immigration judge, who nicknamed Roselane Driza, an immigrant who was his former lover, real chilli-hot stuff, said he was absolutely petrified that she would send Lord Falconer of Thoroton, the Lord Chancellor, recordings of him having intimate relations with two women, including another Asylum and Immigration Tribunal judge. 
DUBAI - Dubais flagship airline Emirates said on Thursday its multi-billion-dollar deal for Airbus A380s superjumbos stands despite an announced further delay in delivery. Emirates has not received any official notification from Airbus about a further delay in delivery apart from what we heard in the news, the airlines spokesman Boutros Boutros told AFP.
ANNAPOLIS -- Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. said yesterday that he would like to scrap electronic voter databases to avoid an Election Day debacle similar to last week's problems in the primaries -- and he threatened to reconvene the Democrat-controlled legislature to make paper ballots an alternative. "Potentially we need to convene a special session. That's one option here," said Mr. Ehrlich, a Republican seeking re-election. 
