Hi there, !
Today Sat 10/13/2012 Fri 10/12/2012 Thu 10/11/2012 Wed 10/10/2012 Tue 10/09/2012 Mon 10/08/2012 Sun 10/07/2012 Archives
Rantburg
532764 articles and 1859304 comments are archived on Rantburg.

Today: 74 articles and 131 comments as of 16:35.
Post a news link    Post your own article   
Area: WoT Operations    WoT Background    Opinion        Politix   
Turkey Intercepts Syrian Civilian Plane
Today's Headlines
Headline Comments [Views]
Page 3: Non-WoT
0 [] 
2 19:51 European Conservative [1] 
0 [4] 
1 18:17 Angiting Snore1647 [] 
3 17:11 Pappy [1] 
0 [1] 
0 [1] 
5 12:45 swksvolFF [] 
3 22:24 trailing wife [1] 
Page 1: WoT Operations
0 [3]
0 [1]
1 15:37 Fester Clunter7205 [1]
0 []
0 []
0 []
1 11:40 mojo []
0 [2]
3 15:16 Raider []
0 [6]
0 [4]
0 [2]
0 []
0 []
0 []
0 [1]
0 []
3 16:08 49 Pan []
0 []
0 []
0 []
0 []
Page 2: WoT Background
0 [1]
1 20:10 JosephMendiola [3]
1 22:20 trailing wife [1]
1 18:36 Dale [2]
5 19:37 JosephMendiola []
3 19:58 JosephMendiola [2]
0 []
1 09:39 Frank G []
2 21:33 Barbara []
2 21:48 USN, Ret. []
4 15:02 tipper [6]
0 [1]
0 []
0 []
0 []
0 []
0 [6]
0 [6]
2 11:55 Lionel Panda6719 [4]
0 [4]
0 [4]
1 17:07 Pappy [4]
0 []
3 15:14 Redneck Jim []
16 15:22 Raider [3]
0 []
0 []
1 15:32 Fester Clunter7205 []
0 []
0 []
3 13:31 trailing wife [4]
0 []
0 []
Page 4: Opinion
0 [1]
2 10:55 Glenmore [2]
17 15:01 Redneck Jim []
2 23:21 swksvolFF []
6 14:55 tipover []
Page 6: Politix
1 00:10 JosephMendiola []
17 22:16 tipper [1]
9 20:33 lotp [3]
1 12:08 DarthVader [2]
8 18:51 Barbara [1]
Africa North
Hundreds march a year after Egypt Copt killings
Hundreds of Egyptian protesters marched Tuesday to mark one year since nearly 30 demonstrators were killed in a Coptic Christian demonstration that was violently crushed by security forces.

Demonstrators carrying posters of those who died during the violence walked solemnly down a main Cairo thoroughfare in the working class district of Shubra.

Some waved flags, others held posters of officials they want to see put on trial.

Groups of them chanted against Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, the military ruler who took charge of the country following the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak
...The former President-for-Life of Egypt, dumped by popular demand in early 2011...
, and whose forces are accused of killing the protesters.

"Either we get justice, or we die like them," they sang.

The march was organised by the Maspero Youth Union, a group of Coptic activists formed in the wake of last year's deadly protest that left Egypt's Christian community deeply scarred.

"The only political demand on this day is to seek justice for the deaders and for the criminals implicated in the massacre be tried," the group said on Facebook.

Tuesday's procession followed the route taken a year ago by the Coptic protesters.

On October 9, 2011, thousands of demonstrators marched from Shubra to Maspero in central Cairo to denounce the torching of a church in the southern province of Aswan.
Posted by: Fred || 10/10/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under: Arab Spring


Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia
Putin's birds catch jet plane home
RUSSIAN President Vladimir Putin's stunt of trying to lead endangered cranes on their winter migration has backfired.

The 60-year-old president already earned mockery last month when he took to a motorised hang glider to guide the half dozen of the Siberian cranes - all hatched in captivity - over Russia's frozen north.

Yet the news grew even worse for Mr Putin when the Rosprirodnadzor environmental oversight agency revealed that the birds he had guided on the way to Siberia's far northern Yamal region failed to fly on further south.

They were put - in an almost farcical twist - like passengers on an aeroplane and flown back home to the sanctuary in the Ryazan region of central Russia where they had been raised.

"The Siberian cranes took a flight back with the ornithologists last night," Interfax quoted an unnamed source at the Federal Service for Natural Resources Oversight (Rosprirodnadzor) as saying.

Posted by: tipper || 10/10/2012 15:06 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Reminds me of the MSM-Net Pic of Vlad staring all so intensely, eye to eye like a Jedi or Sith Lord, at a newborn baby chick.

Looks like its BIRDS 1, Vlad = Darth Rus 0.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 10/10/2012 19:43 Comments || Top||

#2  Strictly for the birds
Posted by: European Conservative || 10/10/2012 19:51 Comments || Top||


Europe
NATO approves Gen. Allen's new appointment as SACEUR
Posted by: Injun Smiter of the Jutes9909 || 10/10/2012 13:55 || Comments || Link || [4 views] Top|| File under:


Swedish lunchlady told to stop serving fresh bread and veggie buffets, unfair to kids
A talented head cook at a school in central Sweden has been told to stop baking fresh bread and to cut back on her wide-ranging veggie buffets because it was unfair that students at other schools didn't have access to the unusually tasty offerings.
I would like to point out that this menu is halal as well.
Annika Eriksson, a lunch lady at a school in Falun, was told that her cooking is just too good.

Pupils at the school have become accustomed to feasting on newly baked bread and an assortment of 15 vegetables at lunchtime, but now the good times are over.

The municipality has ordered Eriksson to bring it down a notch since other schools do not receive the same calibre of food - and that is "unfair".
Socialism. Is there any solution it can't make a problem of?
Moreover, the food on offer at the school doesn't comply with the directives of a local healthy diet scheme which was initiated in 2011, according to the municipality.

"A menu has been developed... It is about making a collective effort on quality, to improve school meals overall and to try and ensure everyone does the same," Katarina Lindberg, head of the unit responsible for the school diet scheme, told the local Falukuriren newspaper.

However, Lindberg was not aware of Eriksson's extraordinary culinary efforts and how the decision to force her to cut back had prompted outrage among students and parents.

"It has been claimed that we have been spoiled and that it's about time we do as everyone else," Eriksson said.

She insisted, however, that her creative cooking has not added to the municipality's expenses.

"I have not had any complaints," she told the paper.

Eriksson added that she sees it as her job to ensure that the pupils are offered several alternatives at meal times.
You will not be individual, you will not do anything special, you will be a cog in the machine.
The food on offer does not always suit all pupils, she explained, and therefore she makes sure there are plenty of vegetables to choose from as well as proteins in the form of chicken, shrimp, or beef patties.

From now on, the school's vegetable buffet will be halved in size and Eriksson's handmade loafs will be replaced with store-bought bread.
Excellent job, socialism. A good day's work.
Her traditional Easter and Christmas smörgåsbords may also be under threat.
Christian holidays celebrated with Swedish culture, I'm surprised she hasn't been fired before now.
Parents and pupils alike find the municipality's orders distasteful.
Posted by: gromky || 10/10/2012 00:01 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Yokay, I'll bite, IIUC she is being ordered or told to stop because her food = cooking is TOO GOOD/DELICIOUS FOR THE KIDDIES???

IIUC again, inversely the Swedish Govt is demanding that their country's kiddies be served AT BEST "FAIR", NOT GOOD OR ABOVE AVERAGE OR OUTSTANDING, FOODSTUFFS???

HHHMMMM, HMMMMM, and yet their country somehow still produces the Swedish Bikini Babes.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 10/10/2012 0:54 Comments || Top||

#2  A serious Male De-e-e-lemma iff there ever was one - to choose between GREAT-FRESH-FOOD-VS-SWEDISH-BIKINI-TEAM.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 10/10/2012 0:58 Comments || Top||

#3  As in any socialist (or union) society, one is to be dragged down to the lowest worker's quality and productivity level.
Posted by: Mullah Richard || 10/10/2012 7:31 Comments || Top||

#4  Harrison Bergeron to the white. courtesy phone, please.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 10/10/2012 8:59 Comments || Top||

#5  This sort of behavior is demoralizing for the ordinary soldiers and citizens who are trying to lead normal, simple, unexceptional lives. I think things are difficult enough as it is without these emotional people rocking the boat.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 10/10/2012 12:45 Comments || Top||


The Grand Turk
I Curse Your Implanted Mustache: Turkey's Flourishing Industry
Arab politicians come to Turkey for moustache implants to give themselves a boost of charisma...

"Due to the large demand, we have signed partnership agreements with agencies in Dubai and Iraq and have opened representative offices in Europe. Our patients book tourists packages and while they have the implants, their families are able to vacation in Turkey, thereby contributing to Turkey's tourism sector," Tulunay said.

In fact, according to Tulunay, politicians from the Arab world are now coveting moustache implants to add to their charisma during election periods. "Every month we have about 60 applications for beard and hair implants," Tulunay said.

"We have applicants from Iran, Iraq, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Germany, La Belle France and Ireland who come for hair, moustache and beard implants. Whether they are from Western Europe, the Middle East, North Africa, or South Korea, we there is serious demand for hair and moustache implants," he said.
Posted by: trailing wife || 10/10/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Uh, uh, MACHO MOUSTACHIO - ERDOGAN'S BUGALOO???

gut nuthin.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 10/10/2012 0:47 Comments || Top||

#2 
Posted by: gromky || 10/10/2012 1:01 Comments || Top||

#3  Gromky, that photo is truly distressing. Please say it's from the 70s or 80s.
Posted by: trailing wife || 10/10/2012 22:24 Comments || Top||


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Palestinians set first private sector minimum wage
[France24] The Paleostinian government on Tuesday approved a minimum wage of 1,450 shekels ($376, 290 euros) a month for the private sector, labour minister Ahmed Majdalani said.

"This is an unprecedented decision... on which we can build," Majdalani told AFP, dismissing criticism that the rate was to low.

Responding to a call by Paleostinian trade unions, scores of workers demonstrated outside the parliament building, chanting: "The poor do not agree with Fayyad."

Tuesday's vote also set a daily private sector minimum wage of 65 shekels ($16.80, 13 euros) and an hourly floor of 8.5 shekels ($2.20, 1.7 euros). It is the result of recommendations made by a committee of government and trade union officials and employers' representatives, after 18 months of discussions.

Shaher Saad, head of the Paleostine General Federation of Trade Unions, said that the low minimum would "further encourage the exodus of Paleostinian labour to Israeli settlements and abroad."
More than that, the unions threaten to strike, according to Ma'an News:
After a national committee announced the first minimum wage in Paleostine at 1450 shekels ($375), the general federation of Paleostinian trade unions has threatened to take serious steps against the decision if it is approved by the cabinet.

“We decided to boycott the wage committee meeting on Sunday because we refuse the suggested figure,” secretary-general of the federation Shahir Saad told Ma’an Sunday evening.

The federation, he said, consists of 14 trade unions and 87,000 subscribers, and is united in its opposition to the minimum wage level.

Saad said the federation had agreed to lower its original proposal of 2,400 shekels ($620), in line with the poverty line in Paleostine, to 1,750 shekels ($450).

They will never approve a lower figure, which "is too small compared to the high cost of living," he said.

He highlighted that the minimum wage in Israel is 4,300 shekels ($1,115), three times that of Paleostine, despite the fact that the cost of living is quite similar. He warned that if Paleostinian employers lower their salaries, more workers will seek better wages in Israeli settlements.

The federation will send a message to the cabinet ministers asking them not to approve the recommendations of the wage committee, according to Saad.

They are ready to organize demonstrations and strikes if the cabinet does approve the minimum wage level as it stands, he said.
Posted by: Fred || 10/10/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under: Palestinian Authority

#1  The minimum wage is a massive lie.

In reality all it does is guarantee unemployment to those with low productivity.
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 10/10/2012 6:58 Comments || Top||

#2  Given that the PA hasn't paid September wages yet, the new minimum wage is even more than that, Bright Pebbles.
Posted by: trailing wife || 10/10/2012 13:26 Comments || Top||

#3  In reality all it does is guarantee unemployment to those with low productivity

Many union contracts are set with the minimum wage as a factor; when the minimum wage rises, so will the union wage.
Posted by: Pappy || 10/10/2012 17:11 Comments || Top||


Israel PM calls early elections
[France24] Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday called early parliamentary elections after his coalition could not agree on a budget, in a campaign move that will likely win him re-election.
Posted by: Fred || 10/10/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:


Science & Technology
French and American Scientists Win Nobel Physics Prize
[An Nahar] Serge Haroche of La Belle France and David Wineland of the U.S. won the Nobel Prize on Tuesday for work in quantum physics that could one day open the way to revolutionary computers.

The pair were honored for pioneering optical experiments in "measuring and manipulation of individual quantum systems," the Nobel Physics jury said in its citation.

"Their groundbreaking methods have enabled this field of research to take the very first steps towards building a new type of super-fast computer based on quantum physics," it said.

"Perhaps the quantum computer will change our everyday lives in this century in the same radical way as the classical computer did in the last century."

The research has also led to the construction of extremely precise clocks that could become the future basis for a new standard of time, with more than hundred-fold greater precision than present-day caesium clocks, it said.
Posted by: Fred || 10/10/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  BUILT A BRAIN FOR OUR GOVERNMENT PEOPLE HAVE THEY?
Posted by: Angiting Snore1647 || 10/10/2012 18:17 Comments || Top||


Southeast Asia
Govt criticized for inaction on rampant oil theft
Posted by: American Delight || 10/10/2012 20:41 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:



Who's in the News
40[untagged]
7Govt of Pakistan
6Govt of Syria
3al-Shabaab
2Arab Spring
2Govt of Iran
2Ansar Dine
2Govt of Sudan
1Palestinian Authority
1Taliban
1Thai Insurgency
1al-Qaeda in Arabia
1TTP
1al-Qaeda in Pakistan
1Commies
1al-Qaeda
1Hezbollah
1Narcos

Bookmark
E-Mail Me

The Classics
The O Club
Rantburg Store
The Bloids
The Never-ending Story
Thugburg
Gulf War I
The Way We Were
Bio

Merry-Go-Blog











On Sale now!


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.
Click here for more information

Meet the Mods
In no particular order...
Steve White
Seafarious
tu3031
badanov
sherry
ryuge
GolfBravoUSMC
Bright Pebbles
trailing wife
Gloria
Fred
Besoeker
Glenmore
Frank G
3dc
Skidmark

Two weeks of WOT
Wed 2012-10-10
  Turkey Intercepts Syrian Civilian Plane
Tue 2012-10-09
  Taliban bravely shoot Pakistani schoolgirl campaigning for peace
Mon 2012-10-08
  Syria Rebels Advance in North, Pushed Back in South
Sun 2012-10-07
  1 dead, 10 arrested in anti-terror sweep in France
Sat 2012-10-06
  US suspected drone kills five persons in Shabwa
Fri 2012-10-05
  18 Republican Guards killed in Damascus province
Thu 2012-10-04
  Violence and Protest in Iran as Currency Drops in Value
Wed 2012-10-03
  Syria shells kill five inside Turkey
Tue 2012-10-02
  More Than 130 Dead in Syria amid Clashes in Aleppo Souk
Mon 2012-10-01
  Children killed in Kenya church attack
Sun 2012-09-30
  Thousands rally in Karachi against anti-Islam film
Sat 2012-09-29
  Kenyan Army Claims Fall of Kismayo
Fri 2012-09-28
  Iraq militants attack Tikrit prison, freeing 90 inmates
Thu 2012-09-27
  Clinton Sees Link to Qaeda Offshoot in Deadly Libya Attack
Wed 2012-09-26
  Damascus bombers 'hit Syria military HQ'


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.
18.189.2.122
Help keep the Burg running! Paypal:
WoT Operations (22)    WoT Background (33)    Opinion (5)    (0)    Politix (5)