ASSOCIATED PRESS: The suicide bomber who killed eight people inside a CIA base in Afghanistan was a Jordan-born terrorist double agent who was invited to the base because he claimed to have information targeting Osama bin Laden’s second-in-command, a former senior U.S. intelligence official and a foreign government official confirmed MondayThe bombing killed seven CIA employees – four officers and three contracted security guards – and a Jordanian intelligence officer, Ali bin Zaid, according to a second former U.S. intelligence official. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the incident. The former senior […]
Philly Clout’s Top 215 Political Stories Of The Decade
PHILLY CLOUT: Yes, we know this is a time of year for lists, but at least we’re pretty sure you won’t see this one anywhere else. This is the one and only PhillyClout Top 10 Local Political Stories of the Decade. Our thanks to Dave Davies, Bob Warner and John Baer for their help. Happy reading. 1) Fumo goes down – This is the biggie. Longtime state Sen. Vince Fumo, viewed as the most powerful politician in the city, is convicted on 137 of 137 corruption counts. He ended the decade in prison. 2) Bug found in Mayor John Street’s […]
WORTH REPEATING: How To Make Dick Cheney STFU
HARRY SHEARER: As is well known by now, [Dick Cheney] uses the case of the failed Detroit underpants bomb attempt to accuse President Obama of “pretending that the United States is not at war,” thereby making us less safe. He can engage in this kind of rhetoric safe in two comforting assumptions: that the Republican base, and a certain percentage of independents, will eat this stuff up, and that the Democrats, in and out of power, will continue to not know how to respond. The latter is because they, willingly or not, allowed themselves to be co-opted into the “war […]
Taliban Suicide Bomber Kills Eight CIA Agents
LOS ANGELES TIMES: Reporting from Kabul — A bomber slipped into a U.S. base in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday and detonated a suicide vest, killing eight CIA officers in one of the deadliest days in the agency’s history, current and former U.S. officials said. The attack took place at Forward Operating Base Chapman in Khowst province, an area near the border with Pakistan that is a hotbed of insurgent activity. An undisclosed number of civilians were wounded, the officials said. No military personnel with the U.S. or North Atlantic Treaty Organization forces were killed or injured, they said. A U.S. […]
HELP WANTED: Join The Rebel Alliance
[via TEEFURY] RELATED: Meanwhile, Back In Iran Pretty astonishing footage: an angry crowd storms a public hanging and rescues the two condemned men at the very last minute as they dangle from nooses, only to be peppered with gunfire from the authorities. Nobody said freedom was free.
Police Uncharacteristically Mum About Predator Cop
DAILY NEWS: He met the girl whom he is accused of later victimizing in 1995 at the Olney Recreation Center, where he was teaching karate to youngsters. She was 10. He spent the next two years befriending her and her family, gaining their trust and, quietly, laying a trap, court documents allege. After the first two alleged assaults in the van in 1997, Wiggins began routinely taking his young victim out for car rides, court documents indicate. Some ended back in Fairmount Park, others at his house on Chew Avenue near Front Street in Olney. But all of the trips […]
O DEATH: Kill The Bill
Sign our petition to Congress and President Obama: The Senate health care bill must be killed. Click here to sign our petition. Hi Jonathan – The Senate’s health care bill must be killed. It is an ungodly mess of errors, loopholes, and massive giveaways. When the American people find out what’s actually in this bill, they will revolt. Congress and President Obama have no choice but to do better for health care than this bill. Sign the petition: the Senate health care bill must be killed. How bad is the bill? Forces you to pay up to 8% of your income to […]
RUSS FEINGOLD: Obama Killed The Public Option
RUSS FEINGOLD: I’ve been fighting all year for a strong public option to compete with the insurance industry and bring health care spending down. I continued that fight during recent negotiations, and I refused to sign onto a deal to drop the public option from the Senate bill. Unfortunately, the lack of support from the administration made keeping the public option in the bill an uphill struggle. Removing the public option from the Senate bill is the wrong move, and eliminates $25 billion in savings. I will be urging members of the House and Senate who draft the final bill […]
NOPENHAGEN: Obama Brings Nothing To The Table
ASSOCIATED PRESS: “We are running short on time,” he said. “We are ready to get this done today. But there has to be movement on all sides.” And yet Obama arrived in snow-covered Copenhagen with no new proposal from the U.S. side. Some had hoped he might increase Washington’s emissions-cut pledge, now only a fraction of those from other developed countries, or put a specific dollar amount on America’s expected contributions to short- or long-term aid funds to help poorer nations deal with the effects of climate change. Obama planned to spend only about nine hours at the summit. He […]
CHINA: Earth Not Too Big To Fail
NEW YORK TIMES: COPENHAGEN — With just two days remaining in historic and contentious climate talks here, China signaled overnight that it sees virtually no possibility that the nearly 200 nations gathered would find agreement by Friday. An official in the American delegation said that China would agree only to a brief political declaration that left unresolved virtually all the major issues. The conference has deadlocked over emissions cuts by, and financing for, developing nations, including China, who say they will bear the brunt of a planetary problem they did little to create. Leaders had hoped to conclude an interim […]
NPR FOR THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When You Can’t
FRESH AIR There’s an abundance of journalist coverage of U.S. involvement in the Iraq war, but Jeremy Scahill has found a niche investigating Blackwater, a military contractor with a long involvement in the war. He’s broken many stories in The Nation, and his latest, published Nov. 23, uncovers the contractor’s involvement in a covert program run by the U.S. Joint Special Command (JSOC). Scahill says that even though tax payers are funding this shadow army, their operations are shrouded in secrecy. In his article, Scahill reports that Blackwater (which has officially changed its name to Xe Services LLC) is operating […]
BLAZE ON: Cali Pot Legalization On The Ballot For 2010; Ex-Seattle Police Chief Says ‘Legalize It”
ALTERNET: The Tax & Regulate Cannabis 2010 campaign has just achieved a major victory in its efforts to legalize marijuana for all adults in California — they have gathered the signatures necessary for inclusion on the state’s November ballot. “This is the next step to sane cannabis policies and the end to the hypocrisy and unjust prohibition of cannabis,” pot entrepreneur Richard Lee told me Monday morning. He is the co-proponent and a major sponsor of the Tax Cannabis initiative and the force — and money — behind Oaksterdam, the successful marijuana-friendly section of Oakland. This win means that Californians will be […]
YOU’VE GOT MAIL: 22 Million Bush Administration Emails Miraculously Found Alive And Well
MSNBC: Computer technicians have found 22 million missing White House e-mails from the administration of President George W. Bush and the Obama administration is searching for dozens more days’ worth of potentially lost e-mail from the Bush years, according to two groups that filed suit over the failure by the Bush White House to install an electronic record keeping system. The two private groups — Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and the National Security Archive — said Monday they were settling the lawsuits they filed against the Executive Office of the President in 2007. It will be years […]