Category: Crime

Germ Warfare experiments return under our fake president

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” Research at a secretive Army germ warfare lab about 50 miles from Washington, D.C. that works with tularemia, which spreads more easily than anthrax, has been partially restarted after a federal inspection found two failures in containing unnamed germs or toxins.

No one was exposed to any germs or toxins at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick in Maryland, according to the institute commander…

” “Our concept is to start with a small group of people, secure approval for a limited number of studies, and then gradually expand,” said Col. E. Darrin Cox, the new commander of the institute…

” In 2009, research was suspended after the discovery that more than 9,200 vials, about one-eighth of its stock, wasn’t listed in the institute’s database.

They’re back! Of course, a sinister creep like Trump would OK resumption of this slimy research. Warms the cockles of every heartless rightwing fanatic, acquiring another illegal means to kill lots of people.

Exactly, the sort of war crime potential that makes Trump voters giggle and fart.

Meatless Monday comes to Riker’s Island

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” The NYC Department of Correction has introduced Meatless Mondays for inmates, correctional officers, and jail staff.

On Mondays, everyone at the Department of Correction, which jails around 7,000 inmates in 11 correctional facilities across the five boroughs, will be served a variety of meat-free foods throughout the day. Dishes include veggie chili, fresh fruit, cereals, and veggie burgers.

” The department’s normal everyday menu features a number of plant-based foods, including steamed vegetables and fresh fruit, however, it also features meat-based items, like chicken patties…

” The Department of Correction follows in the footsteps of New York City’s public school system, and its public hospitals. In January 2019, the latter introduced vegan Meatless Monday meals. The president and CEO of Health + Hospitals Dr. Mitchell Katz said the initiative is about empowering patients to live healthy lives after they leave the hospital.

In March, Meatless Mondays arrived at all New York City Schools — the largest public school system in the world…

No doubt you all have access to many sensible science-based studies on the healthful aspects of decisions like this one. While it may be a pitiful comment on American culture — needing administrative instruction to adopt moderate dietary changes even for the incarcerated — hey, every little bit helps.

ICE set up a fake university, then arrested 250 who got student visas

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” It has been 10 months since unsealed federal court documents revealed that U.S. immigration officials created a fake university to lure foreign-born college students who were trying to stay in the country on student visas that might not have been legal.

The University of Farmington, a fictitious school that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement marketed as a hub for STEM students who wanted to enroll and not “interrupt their careers,” had a fake name, a fake website and a fake motto on its fake seal. “Scientia et Labor,” the seal said, which means “Knowledge and Work.”

Then, ICE rolled out deportation for the students, busted the “recruiters” they hired for the fictitious university – for fraud.

Truly a unique chapter added to the Book of Creepy US Government Hustles.

When your DNA says you aren’t you, not from anywhere around here

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Tiffany Brown Anderson/NY Times

” Three months after his bone marrow transplant, Chris Long of Reno, Nev., learned that the DNA in his blood had changed. It had all been replaced by the DNA of his donor, a German man he had exchanged just a handful of messages with…

But four years after his lifesaving procedure, it was not only Mr. Long’s blood that was affected. Swabs of his lips and cheeks contained his DNA — but also that of his donor. Even more surprising to Mr. Long and other colleagues at the crime lab, all of the DNA in his semen belonged to his donor. “I thought that it was pretty incredible that I can disappear and someone else can appear,” he said.

” Mr. Long had become a chimera, the technical term for the rare person with two sets of DNA. The word takes its name from a fire-breathing creature in Greek mythology composed of lion, goat and serpent parts. Doctors and forensic scientists have long known that certain medical procedures turn people into chimeras, but where exactly a donor’s DNA shows up — beyond blood — has rarely been studied with criminal applications in mind.

I can see a B-Movie already glazing over the eyes of someone in Hollywood.

How anti-vax nutballs measure success: 140,000 dead in 2018

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” Measles infected nearly 10 million people in 2018 and killed 140,000, mostly children, as devastating outbreaks of the viral disease hit every region of the world, the World Health Organization said on Thursday.

In figures described by its director general as “an outrage”, the WHO said most of last year’s measles deaths were in children under five years old who had not been vaccinated.

“The fact that any child dies from a vaccine-preventable disease like measles is frankly an outrage and a collective failure to protect the world’s most vulnerable children,” said the WHO’s director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreysus…

” Measles is one of the most contagious known diseases, more so than Ebola, tuberculosis or flu. It can linger in the air or on surfaces for several hours after an infected person has been and gone, putting anyone not vaccinated at risk…

” Among wealthier nations, vaccination rates have been hurt by some parents shunning them for what they say are religious or philosophical reasons. Mistrust of authority and debunked myths about links to autism also weaken vaccine confidence and lead some parents to delay protecting their children.

Research published in October showed that measles infection not only carries a risk of death or severe complications including pneumonia, brain damage, blindness and deafness, but can also damage the victim’s immune memory for months or years – leaving those who survive measles vulnerable to other dangerous diseases such as flu or severe diarrhea.

Passing the blame off on dieties and other myths predates health and science studies in the modern era. It was a useless copout centuries ago. Nowadays, in my mind, it is criminal.

Prevent 1/3 of young gun deaths without taking away a single gun

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❝ In 2015, more than 1,100 young people died by suicide or by accident because of a gun. New research suggests that almost one-third of those deaths could be prevented by simply locking up guns in the home.

“The take-home message from the findings of the study is that even a relatively modest increase in the practice of safe storage by parents could result in substantial reductions in firearm suicides and unintentional fatalities among youth,” says Michael Monuteaux, a Harvard Medical School professor of pediatrics and epidemiologist who is the first author of the new study…

❝ To make that estimate, the researchers designed a model based on the only existing American case study to specifically look at the effect gun storage has on young people, which is from 2005. Using that study’s conclusions on how effective gun storage can be, they estimated how many fewer injuries and deaths by suicide or accident in youths would have occurred in 2015, had more parents followed safe gun storage procedures.

They ran the simulation more than a thousand times in order to get a sense of the range of protectiveness that would be offered by different levels of buy-in from parents…

They had to hunt carefully for data on gun violence that didn’t violate the 1996 Dickey Dickhead Amendment, which states that no government funding for injury prevention can be used to “advocate for gun control.”

Credit Card Fraud = Bombs on Wheels!

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❝ These criminals lug huge amounts of stolen gas across South Florida’s roadways, hiding hundreds of gallons in modified trucks and SUVs.

Authorities refer to the gas thieves’ converted trucks as moving bombs because of the hazard they pose if one were to crash and explode. “They’re out there, they’re so common — trying to blend with people who go to work every day,” said Florida Highway Patrol Trooper Alexis Otano. “God forbid one of these vehicles gets into an accident…”

❝ Since pulling over his first bladder truck in 2017, Trooper Otano has become an expert in identifying the modified trucks as they trundle down South Florida’s roads, laden with stolen diesel fuel.

According to him, the trucks function like “mobile gas stations,” their drivers using stolen credit card numbers to siphon off gas for free and then resell it to truckers in depots or to construction companies and tradesmen.

RTFA. Alas, such was part of my misspent youth. I recall – not fondly – driving a souped-up 1938 Ford Pickup from Western Massachusetts down to Danbury, Connecticut, with 200 gallons of high test in the hollow bed of the truck.

Pay was great…for a sixteen-year-old. A hundred buck$ in 1954. Still, good sense prevailed and I only did it one time. [That truck up top is only for illustration BTW.]