[EAGNEWS.ORG] KYLE, Texas – Emotions are on a hair trigger in schools these days. So much so, just hearing the word “gum” can cause a school-wide freak-out, as evidenced by an episode Wednesday. "Look out! He's got a gum!"
A student at Lehman High School student reportedly asked for some chewing gum, but another student thought the student said “gun,” KCEN reports. "No, no! I meant chewing gun! I like to gnaw .38 caliber or better!"
No gun was found and Hays County, Texas school district spokesman Tim Savoy insists the school was never in “lock down,” though school administrators did “hold students in their extended class periods to investigate the concern with little to no disruption to their schedule.” Did they find any Juicy Fruit?
Posted by: Fred ||
10/16/2015 00:00 ||
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#2
They're getting a little jumpy in these liberal gun-free zones? They need to start rifle clubs in schools to calm people down. Alas, I guess rifle clubs are a thing of the past in high schools.
#4
When my dad was in high school in the '30s, he and his buddy used to take their rifles to school so they could go hunting on their way home. They just put the guns in the closet and picked them up at the end of the day.
These days they would have locked down the entire county. Dad and his buddy would have been expelled and sent to counseling.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
10/16/2015 13:53 Comments ||
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[NYDAILYNEWS] Two-time NBA champ Lamar Odom, a star on the court and basic cable, had only a 50-50 chance of surviving after a three-day drug binge left the helpless hoopster in a coma. murmurmurmurmur ridin'themotorcycle andendahookers andascotchanmountaindew murmurmurmur [barf!]
The Queens kid who married a Kardashian remained unconscious Wednesday, a day after he was found facedown and nonresponsive inside a Nevada brothel, with a ventilator now keeping the 6-foot-10 player alive, officials said. "It's either a subdural haematoma or he's pickled his brain!"
"My God, doctor!"
"Please don't go," read a terse and touching tweet sent Wednesday morning from Odom's 19-year-old sister-in-law Kendall Jenner. Sounds like he went.
His daughter Destiny also tweeted her affection for her father. "Oh, daddy! I love you! You didn't piss all of it away on booze, drugs, and hookers, didja? You left some for me, din'tja?"
"Soon I'll be by your side and I'll never let go," wrote the devastated 17-year-old. "I love you daddy. Please don't leave us." "Tell me what the passwords are!"
The 14-year NBA veteran was foaming at the mouth and apparently gagging on his own mucus after ingesting "every drug imaginable," a Sunrise Hospital & Medical Center source told E! "murmurmurmurmurmurgagretchpukequiver"
Posted by: Fred ||
10/16/2015 00:00 ||
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#7
"Please don't go," read a terse and touching tweet sent Wednesday morning from Odom's 19-year-old sister-in-law Kendall Jenner.
touching?
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/16/2015 8:49 Comments ||
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#8
Having a daughter disqualifies him for the Darwin Award.
Posted by: Sven the pelter ||
10/16/2015 10:03 Comments ||
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#9
I'm pulling for him. And I'm a life-long Celtics fan. I know he pissed away more chances than any of the rest of us will ever get, but I'm pulling for him nonetheless.
I couldn't find a "boodle detector", so this will have to do.
The Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor and the Boeing F/A-18E/F are both aging platforms and will need to be replaced in the mid-2030s. Moreover, for the U.S. Air Force, it needs to replace the venerable F-15C Eagle--which was supposed to have been replaced by the Raptor until that program was prematurely terminated.
The two services are set to start a joint analysis of alternatives next year. The Navy and the Air Force are still working to determine what kind of capability gaps the new F/A-XX and Next Gen Air Dominance (NGAD)--formerly known as the F-X--will need to address. But it is already becoming apparent that the Pentagon has learnt from the $400 billion F-35 Joint Strike Fighter debacle--the F/A-XX and the NGAD are likely to be separate programs that share common technologies.
"As you'll see over the coming years, the differences between the primary mission and the likely threats will drive significant differences between the F/A-XX and F-X programs as well as legacy systems like the F-22 and F-35," one senior defense official recently told me.
While the F/A-XX and F-X are still years away, here are five broad stroke guidelines that a "sixth-generation" fighter could follow.
The Navy and the Air Force Need Separate Airframe Designs:
One of the fundamental failures of the F-35 program stemmed from the Pentagon's stipulation that one size would fit all. Even in 1994 the Pentagon knew that the concept of a one-size-fits-all fighter was fundamentally flawed.
As RAND Corps' Mark Lorell wrote earlier this year, an "independent Defense Science Board (DSB) Task Force review of the BUR's findings, while generally positive, strongly warned against developing a single joint airframe aimed at maximum commonality. The DSB was aware that a common airframe, while in theory capable of achieving savings, could not cost-effectively meet both Navy and Air Force requirements. Thus, the DSB specifically recommended that the Pentagon 'consider two different airframes, with a common engine (or engine core), common avionics architecture, common weapons and a manufacturing process to facilitate efficient production of two different airframes.'"
Thus, the Navy and the Air Force must develop separate aircraft this time around while leveraging as much common technology as possible. This is especially true of the engines, which are by far the most difficult and expensive component of any new aircraft design. Particularly, the Navy and the Air Force need to fully leverage the advantages of adaptive-cycle engine technology.
Both the F-X and F/A-XX Need to be Optimized for the Vast Distances Over the Pacific:
Adaptive or variable cycle engines are crucial to extending the range of a fighter-sized aircraft. This is particularly important as the United States shifts to a future where the Pacific theatre will be of paramount importance.
For a similar-sized motor, an adaptive-cycle engine would be able to deliver ten percent higher thrust, twenty-five percent better fuel consumption and thirty percent longer range--assuming the technology pans out. Air Force and industry sources say it looks like it will, but there are dissenters within the Naval Air Systems Command.
Adaptive-cycle jet engines adjust modes of operation to maximize fuel efficiency in varied flight conditions. For example, at cruise speeds, an adaptive-cycle engine would operate as a high-propulsive-efficiency, high-bypass-ratio turbofan. But the engine would act as a turbojet when high specific thrust is required for high speeds. The Air Force is already working on developing a 45,000-lbs-class adaptive-cycle engine that will one day power operational combat aircraft like the F-X.
An adaptive-cycle engine will greatly help with improving in power, thermal, range and fuel efficiency. It will also afford designers the option to have a smaller platform because they will not need to carry as much fuel onboard. Or for the same size aircraft, they can elect to increase its range.
Adaptive cycle engines might also give the new jets the ability to supercruise even if that's not requirement. While it's a great talking point for Lockheed Martin and Air Force public affairs--even on the Raptor--it's a seldom-used extravagance. Fighters just don't carry enough fuel for supercruise to be practical.
Broadband All-Aspect Stealth Combined with Electronic Attack:
A future sixth-generation fighter will need to have potent electronic and cyber attack capabilities--stealth alone will not cut it going into the future. Air Force officials admit that privately and Navy officials are adamant about it.
But stealth is not going away. The F-X and F/A-XX will need to have broadband all-aspect stealth--which means that it can't have protruding empennage surfaces like tail fins. Broadband stealth all but mandates a flying-wing design--but industry sources say that will be extremely challenging and--very possibly--impossible even with thrust vectoring.
While a flying-wing bomber is relatively simple to design without tail fins, a fighter is a different matter. A fighter does not have the wingspan to use differential control surface movement for low speed control. Nor is thrust vectoring a viable solution, particularly during landing when the engines are at a low power settings. Industry officials say it's a vexing problem to solve--thus the Air Force and Navy might be forced to rely on electronic and cyber warfare to counter low-frequency radars that can detect and track tactical fighter-sized stealth aircraft.
"There are other ways to survive, and we will look at the best combination of ways to survive in the future," a senior Air Force official told me last year. "I wouldn't say it is going to be 100 percent stealth, and I wouldn't say it's going to be zero percent stealth."
Open Architecture and Upgradeable:
The F/A-XX and F-X will likely be in service for decades. The jets need to be easily and rapidly upgradeable without the Defense Department and the American taxpayer being held hostage by the contractor. That's perhaps the biggest lesson learnt from the Pentagon's F-35 nightmare.
The F-22 uses an antiquated proprietary avionics architecture that is a nightmarishly difficult and costly to upgrade. The F-35 is better--but the Pentagon is forced to rely on Lockheed to modify the jet.
A completely open-architecture design would allow the Defense Department to easily upgrade the F/A-XX and F-X. Moreover, if the Pentagon owned the data-rights, it would allow the Defense Department to force contractors to compete for upgrade work. Competition should drive down upgrade costs while speeding up the process. The Air Force is heading down that path, according to service officials.
Both the F/A-XX and F-X need to be designed so that they can incorporate advanced technologies like directed-energy weapons such as lasers as they become available.
Designed for Air Superiority:
While the Air Force's F-X is geared toward the air superiority role, the Navy's F/A-XX is being geared toward a multirole platform. However, as industry officials have pointed out, it is much easier to adapt an air superiority platform into a strike platform than the other way around.
Both jets should be designed first and foremost for the air superiority role and then adapted for strike. That way the F-X can eventually not only replace the F-22 and F-15C, but it would also be able to replace the F-15E Strike Eagle. There is no projected replacement for that jet--so that could kill two birds with one stone.
The Navy too should consider developing the F/A-XX with a bias toward the fighter role. The service should make sure it can support future operations in a high-threat environment in the Western Pacific where it is certain to encounter Chinese fifth-generation fighters like the J-20.
Conclusion:
This is just the 50,000ft overview of what the Pentagon might do for its next-generation fighter. Until the Navy and Air Force conclude their analysis, no one knows for sure what the specific capability gaps are--or what the optimal solution might be.
Mods: We NEED this pic of Michelle at the link in the archive!
Montana's Bozeman High School is proving schools can serve students nutritious meals they'll love without Michelle Obama's guiding hand.
Last year, Bozeman school board members voted 5-3 to pull the high school out of the National School Lunch Program because federal regulations on calories, fat, sugar, sodium, whole grains and other nutritional elements championed by the first lady were driving students off campus for lunch, the Bozeman Daily Chronicle reports.
Instead of forking over their lunch money on the government-mandated goods, students instead opted to visit local fast food restaurants and gobble down gas station fare -- severely impacting the district's food service budget.
School officials realized it was financially advantageous to forgo $117,000 in federal food subsidies tied to the National School Lunch Program to draw students back into the cafeteria, and it seems they were correct.
Michelle Obama huh"We're off to a good start," Bob Burrows, Bozeman's food service director, told board members Monday, according to the news site.
For September, "Our traffic is way up -- over 1,000 (customers a day) regularly," he said, adding that last year "that wasn't the case."
Burrows attributed much of the increase traffic to a sharp spike in "extra food" sales, or anything less than the government's definition of a full meal. Districtwide, schools took in more than $54,000 in extra food sales, mostly at the high school, equating to a 48 percent jump from the $37,000 in goods sold last year, he said.
Across the district, the food service program is $1,441 in the black so far for the 2015-16 school year. The food service budget ended last school year $16,000 in the red, which is unacceptable in a school district that relies on the program to be self-supporting, deputy superintendent Steve Johnson told the Chronicle.
And school food service workers told board members students are now getting high quality food from local sources, rather than pre-packaged meals promoted by the government.
"Burrows and Brittany Bennett, school district nutritionist, told the School Board that to replace federal commodity beef, the district is buying local beef from the B-Bar Ranch in Emigrant," according to the news site.
"Some 55 percent of foods are made from scratch in Bozeman school kitchens, which is 'crazy' in an industry that relies heavily on pre-packaged food, they said. Burrows said they make their own honey mustard, using 25 gallons of local honey in every batch."
The district is still focused on closely tracking the nutritional content of student meals, and even posts the calories, salt, and fat in each on a smart phone app so parents and students can reference the menus each week.
School food service officials told board members about 70 percent of school snacks comply with federal regulations, but about 30 percent -- mostly drinks -- do not. They said they plan to soon request the board's permission to again sell carbonated drinks in the high school's vending machines to boost sales, though officials said they were hoping to sell sparking water and other carbonated beverages, rather than pop.
#3
Lived there a short spell in the last century. Good to see they're still a bit ornery. Kinda scary that 3 outta 8 school board members can't do simple math, though.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The recent death of a UAE-based child while on a "hoverboard" has sparked safety concerns over the self-balancing scooter which is growing in popularity worldwide. I want one. It'll probably lead to a broken hip, the nursing home, and death within a year, but I want one.
The new toy scooter, popular with adults and children alike, is said to pose a risk to public safety, which has led to the enforcement of laws regulating the use of the boards in different parts of the world.
The smart balance wheels are battery-powered boards which can travel at a maximum speed of 16km/h. That's 10 mph, if you're old fashioned.
To control the vehicle, users lean forward and backward to alter the direction it travels and to maintain their balance on the electric skateboard.
This week, a six-year-old boy on a hoverboard was reportedly run over by a car in the UAE capital of Abu Dhabi. Didn't his Mom ever tell him not to play in the street? Mine did.
The incident prompted local police to warn people of safety concerns when allowing children to ride their electric scooters on roads, warning they could cause accidents.
They also urged parents to ensure that their children only use them in designated areas, such as parks, as they have been banned in some shopping malls across the UAE, according to a report by the UAE-based Ahlan Live.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/16/2015 00:00 ||
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[TELEGRAPH.CO.UK] It is said that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, but a new study suggests that when it comes to sex, food is the last thing on his mind. Horny trumps hungry? Who knew?
Researchers have found that the male brain is hardwired to seek out sex, even at the expense of a good meal, with specific neurons firing up to over-ride the desire to eat. Primitive male trekking across the savannah... boobies ahead to the left... pomegranates to the right... boobies win every time.
Intriguingly, women do not have the same neurons, suggesting that sex for females comes secondary to sustenance. Female trekking across the fruited plain... male to the left... chocolates to the right... bon bons win every time.
Although the neurons have only been found in the brains of nematode worms,
...that's a heck of an extrapolation there...
scientists at University College London say that it is likely that similar mechanisms are at work in humans. Woman can always get man, can't always get bon bons. Man can always get pomegranate, can't always get woman.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/16/2015 00:00 ||
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#4
I say bullshit also. There are many important variables in this equation. For example, how hungry are the males? For another, the attractiveness of the woman to a particular man. For example, the Hildabeest might be attractive to some man (I know, that is a stretch for many) whereas not so much to others.
#6
A smart man knows he has a much better chance of getting some nooki if he can offer the lady a fine dining experience before hand. A little wine helps too.
#7
And then there are those who have evolved past the 'nematode worms' and will go, get the pomegranates, share some with the boobies in hopes that said boobies would share something in return.
#8
Or you could combine the two. Nookie while eating.
Or other activities as well. My wife always laughs during sex, no matter what book she is reading.
[Tolo News] Officials from orphanages housing girls have raised concerns over the lack of housing for them once they turn 18.
Head of Allauddin Kabul ...the capital of Afghanistan. Home to continuous fighting from 1992 to 1996 between the forces of would-be strongman and Pak ISI/Jamaat-e-Islami sock puppet Gulbuddin Hekmayar and the Northern Alliance, a period which won Hek the title Most Evil Man in the World and didn't do much for the reputations of the Northern Alliance guys either.... city orphanage said with Afghanistan being a traditional society, girls leaving the safety of orphanages may not live alone -- which is a serious problem for officials.
"When the girls graduate from orphanages, the girls don't have a place to live after 18. It would be really good if there could be housing provided for them," said Mawa, the head of Allauddin Kabul city orphanage.
Meanwhile Shahla, a young girl who has been living in the Allauddin orphanage for 11 years says she can stay for only one more year before she has to leave.
"Once I finish school and leave the orphanage I don't have any place to live. I just ask that someone can provide me with a place to live once I graduate from the orphanage," said Shahla.
Officials said that all orphanages across the country face similar problems, but that those in the provinces were below standard.
In addition, the head of Afghanistan orphanages admitted that corruption within the administration systems at orphanages is a serious problem and said this was having an impact on the facilities.
"More than fifty percent of the problem is due to nepotism and corruption and other issues -- this results in orphanages, outside of Kabul, being below standard," said Sayed Abdullah Hashimi general director for Afghanistan orphanages.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/16/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
Okay, do they allow women to have jobs? Is the problem that they haven't been married off yet?
#2
Afghan traditions require dowry (provided by the bride's family to the groom's family) and sometimes bride price (paid by the groom's family to the bride's). Without a family to negotiate for her, and with only whatever resources she might have acquired while in the orphanage, who would want her?
Nigeria's government has vowed to shut down an illegal radio station operated by people sympathetic to the breakaway state of Biafra. It's the return of Jock Ojukwu.
The ministry of information said it has "successfully jammed the signals" of the station. However, the BBC's Abdussalam Ahmed in Enugu says Radio Biafara is still broadcasting. He left in '68 "to get help." Guess he found some.
It is not clear where it is based but it mainly broadcasts to the Igbo-speaking south-east of the country. The station hosts phone-in programmes with listeners calling to talk about issues affecting their region and their desire to break away from Nigeria. It also attacks and ridicules President Muhammadu Buhari and other government officials.
The first republic of Biafra declared its independence from Nigeria in May 1967, but was eventually defeated after a three-year civil war that cost more than one million lives. Although the Biafra uprising was quelled by the military, a group called the Movement for the Actualisation of a Sovereign State of Biafra (Massob) has attracted the support many young people in the region. Several of their leaders and sympathisers have been detained by authorities and accused of treason.
[DAWN] Pilgrims regularly visiting the holy places for Haj have demanded of the Saudi government to expand the Mina corridor for safe passage of the faithful to avoid incidents like the Mina tragedy which claimed the lives of hundreds of Muslims including Paks.
Talking to media persons here on Wednesday, Mufti Raeesur Rahman, Haji Osman, Mukhtiar Ahmad and Abdullah, who are associated with the Al-Jamia Al-Islamic Al-Farooqia, Beautiful Downtown Peshawar ...capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (formerly known as the North-West Frontier Province), administrative and economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. Peshawar is situated near the eastern end of the Khyber Pass, convenient to the Pak-Afghan border. Peshawar has evolved into one of Pakistan's most ethnically and linguistically diverse cities, which means lots of gunfire. , urged the custodian of Haramain-Sharifain for revision of arrangements particularly at Mina to manage the ever-increasing crowd and minimise risk to the lives of pilgrims.
They said the lone Mina corridor through which hundreds of thousands of pilgrims passed in a packed manner, lacked capacity to provide passage to such a large number of people. They said on both sides of the corridor separated by iron bars were tents of the pilgrims, adding the flow of people could be streamlined if these tents were removed to make the passage wide open.
They explained that in normal circumstances, among Haj rituals the passage of pilgrims from Muzdalifah through Mina was a daunting task due to extraordinary procession of people who suffered from perspiration, thirst and suffocation resulting in stampedes as every pilgrim was in a rush to cross the limited space as soon as possible.
"The walking distance of minutes through Mina route up to Al-Khaif Mosque consumes more than four hours because of the great rush of people," they said.
The Learned Elders of Islam suggested that for droves of people to pass smoothly through the corridor it was imperative to create space for multiple entries for pilgrims. They pointed out that owing to the cycle of the Islamic calendar, the month of Haj (Zil Haj) was further progressing towards intense summer and in coming years the task of crossing Mina towards Jamarat could aggravate the situation if preventative measures were not taken ahead of the pilgrimage.
They asked the custodian of the Haramain-Sharifain to establish more outlets through Mina into Jamarat ground to ensure safety of pilgrims during Haj.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/16/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
Some people have no respect for tradition. In the same way that it's not a sport if you can't get hurt, it's just not a Haj without a fatal stampede.
Besides, we're talking Will of Allan here, dude. Don't be second-guessing the Big Guy.
[THEEAGLE] A new tally shows at least 1,621 pilgrims were killed in last month's crush and stampede during the hajj in Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... The News Agency that Dare Not be Named count on Wednesday is based on totals provided by officials and state media in 19 of the over 180 countries that sent pilgrims.
The AP count is more than double Saudi Arabia's official tally of 769 killed and 934 injured in the Sept. 24 disaster in Mina, a few miles from the holy city of Mecca.
Saudi officials previously have said their tally remains accurate, although an investigation into the causes of the tragedy is ongoing. They have not updated their casualty toll since Sept. 26.
The previous deadliest-ever incident at the hajj happened in 1990, when a stampede killed 1,426 people.
[NewScientist] Point a telescope at the moon, and you might just see one looking back. Chinese researchers have reported that their robotic telescope, the first of its kind, has been operating flawlessly ever since it landed on the moon in 2013.
The 15-centimetre telescope is mounted on the Chang'e 3 lander, which touched down on the lunar surface in December 2013. Chang'e 3 (pictured above) carried the Yutu rover, which repeatedly struggled to survive the lunar night and ceased working in March this year -- but the lander is still going strong.
The telescope sees in ultraviolet light, making it particularly suited for observations that aren't possible here on Earth. "There is no atmosphere on the moon, so unlike Earth, the ultraviolet light from celestial objects can be detected on the moon," says Jing Wang of the National Astronomical Observatories in Beijing, China, who is in charge of the telescope. And since the moon rotates 27 times more slowly than the Earth, the scope can stay fixed on the same star for a dozen days without interruption, he says.
In a paper published this week, Wang and his colleagues detail the first 18 months of the telescope's operation, during which it has observed for 2000 hours and monitored 40 stars. The team also captured a picture of the Pinwheel galaxy, shown below.
Astronauts on the Apollo 16 mission had a manually operated UV telescope, which they used to take pictures of Earth, stars and the Large Magellanic Cloud. But the Chinese telescope is the first to be operated remotely from Earth.
That's a challenge, because the moon is a hostile environment, full of charged and abrasive lunar dust that can get into equipment and destroy electronics, as Yutu's troubles demonstrate. To counter this, the telescope is stowed within Chang'e 3 during sunrise and sunset on the moon, when dust is thought to be at its worst, and has survived much longer than its expected one year life. Wang says the scope is still working today, and the team are awaiting a decision to continue its mission past the end of this year.
Theory indicates that UV and X-ray radiation from the sun is sufficiently energetic to knock electrons out of the dust particles on the moon's surface. The charge imbalance builds up enough to loft some dust off the ground. I.e., like magnetic poles repel.
Posted by: Sven the pelter ||
10/16/2015 15:37 Comments ||
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[CNBC] New foreclosures may be back to nearly normal, but the mess from the epic housing disaster in the last decade is far from gone. Bank repossessions, the final stage of the foreclosure process, jumped 66 percent year over year in the third quarter of this year, according to RealtyTrac, a foreclosure sales and analytics company. It's the largest annual rise ever recorded in bank repossessions by RealtyTrac. More than 123,000 homes went back to the bank in just three months.
"In states such as New Jersey, Massachusetts and New York, a flood of deferred distress from the last housing crisis is finally spilling over the legislative and legal dams that have held back some foreclosure activity for years," said Daren Blomquist, vice president at RealtyTrac. "That deferred distress often represents properties with deferred maintenance that will sell at more deeply discounted prices, creating a drag on overall home values."
Posted by: Fred ||
10/16/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
Governments robbed anyone they could to stop land affordability from recovering.
[AA.TR] Thailand has cleared the brother of its junta leader of corruption, putting discrepancies in a compulsory assets declaration down to a "technical mistake".
Sansern Poljeak, the secretary-general of the country's anti-corruption commission, said that the general had been found not guilty of trying to conceal his and his wife's assets in a declaration amounting to $2.5 million.
"All ten saving accounts owned by Gen. Preecha Chan-ocha and his wife were correctly included in the assets declarations, although they were listed on different pages," the Bangkok Post reported Poljeak as saying.
"There could have been just a technical mistake."
Media had been left puzzled by apparent discrepancies when Chan-ocha - the military's chief in northern Thailand - declared his assets when he became a member of the junta-appointed National Assembly last year.
In particular, journalists wondered why Chan-ocha had mentioned a bank account owned by a military cooperative.
On Thursday, the Post reported Poljeak as saying that the brother of junta leader-cum-prime minister Gen. Prayuth Chan-ocha technically had the authority to withdraw funds from the account, but "this does not mean that the funds were in his possession or in his wife's possession".
Instead, Poljeak praised Preecha's honesty for including the account, underlining that he had done so without owning the funds stored in it.
Preecha - who was a strong competitor to become army chief at the beginning of the month, but lost a last minute contest to Gen. Theerachai Nakvanich -- and his wife declared assets amounting to $2.5 million.
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10/16/2015 00:00 ||
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[IN.REUTERS] Myanmar's government and eight armed ethnic groups signed a ceasefire agreement on Thursday, the culmination of more than two years of negotiations aimed at bringing an end to the majority of the country's long-running conflicts.
The deal fell short of its nationwide billing, with seven of the 15 gangs invited declining to sign due to disagreements over who the process should include and ongoing distrust of Myanmar's semi-civilian government and its still-powerful military.
President Thein Sein, a former general, made the nationwide ceasefire a key platform for his reformist agenda after taking power in 2011 and ending nearly 50 years of military rule.
While the absentees were a blow to the president, who pushed for the deal to be signed ahead of a Nov. 8 general election, he described the deal on Thursday as historic.
"The nationwide ceasefire agreement (NCA) is a historic gift from us to our generations of the future," Thein Sein said at a signing ceremony attended by hundreds of diplomats, officials and rebel group representatives in the country's capital.
"This is our heritage. The road to future peace in Myanmar is now open."
Thein Sein said he would continue with efforts to convince other groups to join the ceasefire later.
Among those that signed was the Karen National Union (KNU), Myanmar's oldest gang. The KNU has fought one of the world's longest-running conflicts with the Myanmar military spanning nearly 70 years.
"The NCA is a new page in history and a product of brave and energetic negotiations," Saw Mutu Say Poe, the chairman of the KNU, said at the ceremony.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/16/2015 00:00 ||
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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.
[EAGNEWS.ORG] KYLE, Texas – Emotions are on a hair trigger in schools these days. So much so, just hearing the word “gum” can cause a school-wide freak-out, as evidenced by an episode Wednesday.
[NYDAILYNEWS] Two-time NBA champ Lamar Odom, a star on the court and basic cable, had only a 50-50 chance of surviving after a three-day drug binge left the helpless hoopster in a coma.
[TELEGRAPH.CO.UK] It is said that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, but a new study suggests that when it comes to sex, food is the last thing on his mind.
[CNBC] New foreclosures may be back to nearly normal, but the mess from the epic housing disaster in the last decade is far from gone. Bank repossessions, the final stage of the foreclosure process, jumped 66 percent year over year in the third quarter of this year, according to RealtyTrac, a foreclosure sales and analytics company. It's the largest annual rise ever recorded in bank repossessions by RealtyTrac. More than 123,000 homes went back to the bank in just three months.
