From the Trenches World Report
Enforce our Bill of Rights
WASHINGTON (AP) — Police in the nation’s capital say they believe that a body found in a park is believed to be that of a murder suspect who was the last person seen with a missing 8-year-old girl.
Police Chief Cathy Lanier said the body found Monday has been tentatively identified as that of 51-year-old Kahlil Tatum. Tatum was a janitor at the city homeless shelter where 8-year-old Relisha Rudd had been living with her family. Continue reading “Body in DC park believed to be murder suspect’s”
Norse money-god Niord was famed for being able to give riches to anybody he wanted. In modern Iceland newly-minted money is falling from the digital heavens.
Once upon a time during the financial crisis, there was talk of distributing Quantitative Easing as‘helicopter money’. A scattergun drop of cash would result in delighted citizens catching falling notes. The economy would recover as citizens rushed to spend their windfall. Continue reading “Money from the gods: Iceland’s auroracoin & a new kind of independence”
A US court dismissed a lawsuit against a Chinese internet giant Baidu, which the plaintiff argued blocks material critical of China’s democratic credentials, a decision that could have far-reaching impact on how US search engines sift information.
The lawsuit was brought forward by a group of New York content editors who alleged that Baidu’s search engine was programmed to filter out material in the United States that touches upon the Chinese government’s harsh censorship laws, calling this a violation of the US Constitution. Continue reading “‘China’s Google’ invokes 1st Amendment to beat US anti-censorship lawsuit”
A 5.1-magnitude quake struck near the city of La Habra, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) southeast of downtown Los Angeles. The tremor was felt across California on Friday, along with more than 20 aftershocks.
The earthquake took place at 9:09 PM (04:09 GMT am on Saturday) nearly 1,6 km of the city of La Habra, or 6,4 km north of the city of Fullerton, Orange county, said the United States Geological Survey (USGS). According to the local media, the shakes lasted from 10 to 15 seconds. Continue reading “5.1 quake hits California, 20 miles southeast of Los Angeles”
The Pentagon’s research arm is launching a program to unite existing and future drones into hives, where individual autonomous aircraft will share data and operate together against targets on a battlefield – all while being controlled by one human.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) recently announced that, on April 11, it will hold a “proposer’s day” for its Collaborative Operations in Denied Environments (CODE) program. CODE’s objective is to expand capacity of unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, to include “autonomy and inter-platform collaboration.” Continue reading “DARPA project seeks hive mind for drones”
The student loan industry is booming, saddling over 37 million college students and graduates with $1.08 trillion in loans in 2013, even as President Barack Obama and lawmakers work to rein in the crippling debt young people face in the US.
The average cost of a Bachelor’s degree at a private college or university is $45,000, according to The College Board’s Trends in Higher Education. Students attending public schools in their home state pay just under $23,000 on average, while those paying out-of-state tuition can expect to pay more than $36,000 a year. In 2012, The College Board says the average student carried over $6,000 student loans for the academic year. Continue reading “Student loan debts top $1 trln in US”
Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick declared a public health emergency in the state concerning the rising numbers of heroin overdoses and opioid addiction – even moving to ban a controversial new painkiller.
In an announcement Thursday, Gov. Patrick directed the Department of Public Health to take several steps to lower the number of deadly incidents. According to the governor’s statement, the number of unintentional opioid overdoses increased 90 percent between 2000 and 2012, and at least 140 people have died from suspected heroin overdoses in the last few months. Continue reading “Massachusetts declares public health emergency over heroin overdoses and opioids addiction”
Facebook has announced an ambitious plan to use drone, satellite and laser technology “to deliver the internet to everyone” via the preeminent social media site’s Connectivity Lab project.
Facebook Inc’s Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said Thursday that the effort – dubbed Internet.org – to offer web access throughout the world will be led by aerospace and communications experts from the likes of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab and its Ames Research Center. Continue reading “Facebook plans to spread web access with ‘drones, satellites and lasers’”
The United States Air Force says it has taken unprecedented action by firing nine nuclear missile base commanders on Thursday amid an ongoing and exhaustive investigation surrounding allegations of cheating.
Dozens of additional employees described as junior officers at those bases will be disciplined as well, the Associated Press reported first on Thursday afternoon, and will join an ever-expanding list of Air Force personnel who have been reprimanded in recent months as part of an embarrassing scandal that has increasingly generated criticism directed at the Pentagon’s nuke program. Continue reading “Nine nuclear base commanders fired from US Air Force over cheating scandal”
The US Transportation Security Administration has asked for armed law enforcement officers to guard airport security checkpoints at busy times, a proposal that comes months after a shooter opened fire at a crowded California airport checkpoint.
The TSA released a 25-page report to Congress on Wednesday, making 14 recommendations on how to best prepare for and respond to an emergency, such as when a gunman killed a TSA officer and injured three others at Los Angeles International Airport in November. Continue reading “TSA aims to install armed guards at airport security checkpoints”
NEW YORK (AP) — A malfunctioning damper diverted heat to the top level of a two-tier observation unit where a city official told The Associated Press a mentally ill, homeless veteran inmate “basically baked to death” in a cell that was at least 100 degrees last month, the head of New York City’s jails system told lawmakers Thursday.
Acting Department of Correction Commissioner Mark Cranston, testifying before the City Council’s committee on fire and criminal justice, said outside consultants found that a gauge on the lower level, which was calling for the heat, failed to register the high temperature on the upper level. Continue reading “NYC jail boss details heating problems after death”
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Beneath the strings of red paper lanterns and narrow alleyways of the nation’s oldest Chinatown lies a sinister underworld, according to an FBI criminal complaint that has stunned even those familiar with the neighborhood’s history of gambling houses, opium dens and occasional gangland-style murders.
The federal charges, which allege a California lawmaker accepted money and campaign donations in exchange for providing official favors and helping broker an arms deal, cast harsh light on Chinatown’s tight-knit network of fraternal organizations and one of its most shadowy characters, Raymond “Shrimp Boy” Chow. Continue reading “FBI sting shows San Francisco Chinatown underworld”
MISSOULA, Mont. (AP) — The defendant’s tears notwithstanding, a federal judge cited a lack of remorse as he sentenced a Montana woman to more than three decades in prison for pushing her newlywed husband to his death in Glacier National Park.
Twenty-two-year-old Jordan Linn Graham took the stand Thursday during her sentencing hearing to offer a tearful apology to the family of Cody Johnson, 25, who died just eight days after their marriage last summer. But U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy appeared unmoved. Continue reading “Judge cites lack of remorse, gives bride 30 years”
OREM, Utah (AP) — A conservative Utah city that decided it likely would lose a legal battle over a national clothing store’s “offensive” mall display of T-shirts has instead sent the company a scathing letter.
The letter from city officials in Orem, about 40 miles south of Salt Lake City, was a show of support for a mother who was so upset about the shirts at a local PacSun store that she bought them all to remove them from a window display. The T-shirts featured pictures of scantily dressed models in provocative poses. Continue reading “City leaders chide store for risque shirt display”
Access to YouTube has been cut off in Turkey after an explosive leak of audiotapes that appeared to show ministers talking about provoking military intervention in Syria. Other social media have already been blocked ahead of tumultuous local elections.
The latest leaked audio recording, which reportedly led to the ban, appears to show top government officials discussing a potential attack on the tomb of Suleyman Shah, the grandfather of the founder of the Ottoman Empire. Continue reading “Turkey shuts off YouTube after ‘Syria invasion plan’ leak”
Alaska is poised to become the third US state to ban use of unmanned aircraft, or drones, by hunters, as several other states have taken steps to curb use of the technology when in pursuit of wild game.
On March 17, the Alaska Board of Game approved a regulatory proposal that would prohibit hunters from using unmanned aerial vehicles to locate and track game. The state’s Department of Law is expected to approve the rule on July 1, the Anchorage Daily News reported. Continue reading “Alaska latest state to seek ban on drone use by hunters”
While admitting he is not fully briefed on the repercussions, a former US president has admitted that he would be open to pardoning Edward Snowden if the former NSA contractor returned to the states and was convicted of leaking classified agency secrets.
President Jimmy Carter, a Georgia Democrat who sat in the Oval Office from 1977 to 1981, has been outspoken in his criticism of the NSA surveillance programs Snowden revealed last year. Touching on a number of topics during an interview with the Washington Post, Carter, 89, said he does not have “the information President Obama has about what has been done to our security apparatus,” but that absolving Snowden of his crimes should be an option. Continue reading “Fmr US President Carter open to pardoning Snowden”
President Obama’s key speech in Brussels on Ukraine and attempts to isolate Russia appears to be an exercise of omission, mutually-exclusive statements and unveiled double standards.
Here’s a quick look at what Obama told an audience of some 2,000 people in his damning 30-minute speech. Continue reading “Obama says ‘bigger nations cannot simply bully smaller ones’. Wait… what?”
Scientists have scored a breakthrough in high-energy biofuels by producing a bacterium that synthesizes highly-efficient pinene, a hydrocarbon made by trees. It could soon replace existing alternatives and usher in a new era of rocket engines.
Researchers have struggled for years with the problem of cheaper options to the JP-10, the very expensive petroleum-based fuel used in aerospace applications. What was underneath their nose the whole time isn’t a petroleum alternative, but a biological one – one that has just been made six times more efficient than previous attempts – synthesized by a Georgia Tech graduate who inserted enzymes from trees into the new bacterium and boosted pinene production dramatically. Continue reading “Highly powerful new biofuel could change rocket engines forever”
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