Eideard

Their vacation trip to Los Angeles came to a screeching halt

Holidaymakers have been warned to watch their words after two friends were refused entry to the US on security grounds after a tweet.

Before his trip, Leigh Van Bryan wrote that he was going to “destroy America”. He insisted he was referring to simply having a good time – but was sent home…

Trade association ABTA told the BBC that the case highlighted that holidaymakers should never do anything to raise “concern or suspicion in any way”. Don’t even fart out loud if you’re passing through the TSA.

The US Department for Homeland Security picked up Mr Bryan’s messages ahead of his holiday in Los Angeles.

The 26-year-old bar manager wrote a message to a friend on the micro-blogging service, saying: “Free this week, for quick gossip/prep before I go and destroy America.”

The Irish national told the Sun newspaper that he and his friend Emily Bunting were apprehended on arrival at Los Angeles International Airport before being sent home. “The Homeland Security agents were treating me like some kind of terrorist,” Mr Bryan said…

In another tweet, Mr Bryan made reference to comedy show Family Guy saying that he would be in LA in three weeks, annoying people “and diggin’ Marilyn Monroe up”…

After the interview, Homeland Security’s reported: “Mr Bryan confirmed that he had posted on his Tweeter website account that he was coming to the United States to dig up the grave of Marilyn Monroe.

The fact remains that TSA and Homeland InSecurity not only are missing a sense of humor – they have few if any brains. The same people who learn to read and write based solely on phonics appear to have learned what they know of civil liberties at the white American Legion bar on a Friday night.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta cautioned global rivals on Sunday not to misjudge U.S. plans to slash military spending over the next decade, saying America would still field the world’s strongest military and nobody should “mess with that…”

Pressed on whether the United States could take out Iran’s nuclear sites without using nuclear weapons, Dempsey would only say: “I absolutely want them to believe that that’s the case…”

The tough talk comes days after President Barack Obama unveiled a new military strategy that calls for a smaller force as the United States cuts $487 billion in projected defense spending over the next decade in an effort to deal with the nation’s $14 trillion debt…

Dempsey said he worried that some countries might misunderstand the debate Americans are having over changing strategy and the need to cut defense spending…”There may be some around the world who see us as a nation in decline, and worse, as a military in decline. And nothing could be further from the truth,” Dempsey said…

Panetta said U.S. rivals should not misunderstand the situation…”I think the message that the world needs to understand is: America is the strongest military power and we intend to remain the strongest military power and nobody ought to mess with that,” he said…

Congress missed a deadline for reaching a compromise that could have stopped the new defense cuts, but it could still take action to override the spending reductions before they are due to go into force next year.

Obama, in unveiling the new defense strategy at a Pentagon news conference on Thursday, noted that even with the $487 trillion in cuts to projected spending, the defense budget would continue to grow in nominal terms.

He also said the U.S. defense budget would still be by far the world’s largest – roughly the size of the 10 next-biggest defense budgets combined.

Phew. I was worried the retired generals and admirals infesting the infrastructure of the military-industrial complex might be forced to make do on their pensions.

BTW – don’t you love it when the “peacemakers” we elected can’t help but brag to the rest of the world how easily we can kill and destroy everyone?

Daylife/Getty Images used by permission

Pharmaceutical company Novartis on Sunday voluntarily recalled a number of over-the-counter drugs — including certain bottles of Excedrin and Bufferin — because of complaints about mislabeled and broken pills…it urged U.S. consumers to “either destroy or return unused” products that are part of the recall.

The items involved in the voluntary recall include Excedrin and NoDoz products with expiration dates of December 20, 2014, or earlier, as well as Bufferin and Gas-X Prevention products with December 20, 2013, or earlier expiration dates.

“(Novartis) is taking this action as a precautionary measure, because the products may contain stray tablets, capsules or caplets from other Novartis products, or contain broken or chipped pills,” the company said.

The moves follows Novartis’ decision to suspend operations at, and shipments from, its Lincoln, Nebraska, facility. The company said this was done “to accelerate maintenance” and make other improvements, adding that it currently “is not possible” to determine when the plant will reopen…

While Novartis announced Sunday’s recall, it said that it did so “with the knowledge of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.” This came about after an internal review and assessment of complaints identifying “issues such as broken gelcaps, chipped tablets and inconsistent bottle packaging.”

If you want to see a detailed list – and I really recommend you do so – of products associated with the recall, please click on the link and go here.

Whatever you do, don’t smoke the seeds!
Daylife/AP Photo used by permission

Thousands of copies of a new book about the Catholic Church’s teachings will have to be pulped after a translation error suggested that the Vatican had radically changed its views on contraception.

The book was officially launched on Wednesday at the Vatican, but the event was overshadowed by the embarrassing error, which will mean that around 30,000 copies will have to be scrapped.

The book, called YouCat – short for Youth Catechism – was originally written in German and contains a question and answer format about whether Catholic couples are entitled to plan the size of their families by “regulating conception”.

The answer provided was yes, because the Church sanctions ‘natural family planning’, in which married couples chart a woman’s menstrual cycle to determine when she might be capable of conceiving.

But in the Italian edition of the book, the question was translated as whether married couples could “use contraceptive methods.”

Again the answer was yes, implying that the Church had overturned its entrenched opposition to condoms, the pill and all other forms of contraception…

The translation mistake is just the latest in a series of public relations debacles to hit the Holy See.

In November, ambiguities in the translation of a book about the Pope, Light of the World, suggested that he believed that condoms were morally justifiable in some circumstances, for instance in preventing the transmission of a deadly disease such as Aids between a prostitute and a client.

Of course, the Holy Roman Catholic isn’t about to open the door to modern knowledge, ethics or understanding. Leaving the 14th Century behind might be too much of a shock. Might even lose a few gold bars along the way.

Nearly three decades of war and religious extremism have devastated medical libraries and crippled the educational system for doctors, nurses and other health professionals. Factions of the Taliban, which ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, singled out medical texts for destruction, military medical personnel say, because anatomical depictions of the human body were considered blasphemous.

“They not only burned the books, but they sent monitors into the classroom to make sure there were no drawings of the human body on the blackboard,” said Valerie Walker, director of the Medical Alumni Association of the University of California, Los Angeles.

Ms. Walker is helping lead an ambitious effort by American doctors and nurses, both civilian and military, to restock Afghanistan’s hospitals, clinics and universities with medical textbooks and other reference materials.

The project, called Operation Medical Libraries, began modestly in 2007 with a plea for books from a U.C.L.A. medical graduate serving in the Army. It has since been embraced by 30 universities and hospitals, more than a dozen professional organizations and scores of individual doctors and nurses…

Like most others involved in the program, Dr. Maldonado heard about it from a colleague. And word has spread among medical officers stationed in Afghanistan, who act as volunteer points of contact to shepherd books to the libraries…

By Ms. Walker’s estimate, 27,000 medical texts have reached Afghanistan through Operation Medical Libraries, but she adds that the number is probably much higher. Donors can contribute directly by visiting the project’s Web site to find a military volunteer’s address, then shipping the books on their own.

Please, join in. Collect books. Get folks to collect and ship them to the Project.

RTFA. Reflect on the “joys” that fundamentalist religions almost inevitably bring to whatever part of the world is under their subjugation.

Researchers have demonstrated a prototype device that can rid hands, feet, or even underarms of bacteria, including the hospital superbug MRSA.

The device works by creating something called a plasma, which produces a cocktail of chemicals in air that kill bacteria but are harmless to skin. A related approach could see the use of plasmas to speed the healing of wounds…

Plasmas are known as the fourth state of matter, after solid, liquid, and gas. They are a soup of atoms that have had their electrons stripped off by, for example, a high voltage.

The new research focuses on so-called cold atmospheric plasmas.

Rather than turning a whole group of atoms into plasma, a more delicate approach strips the electrons off just a few, sending them flying…

The resulting plasma is harmful to bacteria, viruses, and fungi – the approach is already used to disinfect surgical tools…

Professor Gregor Morfill said that more testing of the devices is necessary before they end up in widespread use, but he said that there is already significant interest from industry.

RTFA. The systems have been miniaturized enough to be battery-operated and portable.

Cripes, I can see them supplanting underarm deodorant sticks someday.

Last month, a small robotic plane flew into the skies over New Mexico’s White Sands Missile Range. Tracking the drone was an experimental Humvee, equipped with a laser. The real-life ray gun then took aim at the drone, and began blasting. Soon, the drone had a hole burnt through it — and was crashing down to the desert.

For decades, the Army and the Air Force have used laser prototypes to zap unmanned planes. But what makes this test, held last month, a little different is that the laser was small, and low-powered. Which makes the ray gun, at least in theory, fairly easy to fit into an existing combat vehicle.

The laser-equipped Humvee is a modified version of the Army’s Avenger air defense system. It uses more traditional means — eight missiles — to take out low-flying targets. So why use the ray gun? “Laser Avenger, unlike a conventional weapon, can fire its laser beam without creating missile exhaust or gun flashes that would reveal its position,” Boeing’s Gary Fitzmire contends. “As a result, Laser Avenger can neutralize these UAV [unmanned aerial vehicle] threats while keeping our troops safe.”

For now, the company is funding the Avenger out of its own pocket, “to demonstrate that directed energy weapons are maturing and are relevant to today’s battlefield.”

We’re doomed. Doomed! We’re all doooomed!

The recent death and destruction in Mumbai, India, brought to my mind the death and destruction in Karachi on Oct. 18, 2007, when terrorists attacked a festive homecoming rally for my wife, Benazir Bhutto. Nearly 150 Pakistanis were killed and more than 450 were injured. The terrorist attacks in Mumbai may be a news story for most of the world. For me it is a painful reality of shared experience. Having seen my wife escape death by a hairbreadth on that day in Karachi, I lost her in a second, unfortunately successful, attempt two months later.

The Mumbai attacks were directed not only at India but also at Pakistan’s new democratic government and the peace process with India that we have initiated. Supporters of authoritarianism in Pakistan and non-state actors with a vested interest in perpetuating conflict do not want change in Pakistan to take root.

To foil the designs of the terrorists, the two great nations of Pakistan and India, born together from the same revolution and mandate in 1947, must continue to move forward with the peace process. Pakistan is shocked at the terrorist attacks in Mumbai. We can identify with India’s pain. I am especially empathetic. I feel this pain every time I look into the eyes of my children.

I don’t know if President Zardari can succeed with his goals – from the Pakistan side of this issue. But, I hope he can move his nation to live up to this statement.

I hope both nations succeed at peace.

A federal judge has ordered Dick Cheney to preserve a wide range of the records from his time as vice president. Dick Cheney and the Bush administration were sued to ensure that presidential records are not destroyed…

The Bush administration’s legal position “heightens the court’s concern” that some records may not be preserved, said Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly.

A private group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, is suing Cheney and the Executive Office of the President in an effort to ensure that no presidential records are destroyed or handled in a way that makes them unavailable to the public…

This summer, Cheney chief of staff David Addington told Congress that the vice president belongs to neither the executive nor legislative branch of government but rather is attached by the Constitution to Congress. The vice president presides over the Senate.

It’s become a cliche; but, not only is this the least competent administration in the history of these United States – they raise the standard almost daily for corruption.

I sincerely hope the next administration has the courage and integrity to pursue these thugs in the courts. Wishful thinking, eh?