Author: Sunfire

North Jersey.com – by ABBOTT KOLOFF

A New Milford man faces a weapons charge for carrying a loaded weapon to the Westfield Garden State Plaza mall on Monday night after telling police he wanted to help them apprehend the gunman who fired shots inside the Paramus shopping center, authorities said Wednesday.

Cody J. Donovan, 22, was charged with unlawful possession of a weapon after a Bergen County detective arrested him at the mall around 11 p.m. Monday, as SWAT teams searched for a man who fired random shots from a rifle shortly before the mall was due to close at 9:30 p.m.   Continue reading “New Milford man allegedly carried loaded gun to Garden State Plaza during shooting”

RT News

US authorities have presented a plan for the mass use of drones in American airspace. Though there have been few objections to the move so far, a global government surveillance drone program is likely to raise privacy concerns later on.

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has presented a detailed plan for drones to roam across American skies within the next two years.    Continue reading “FAA proposes widespread civilian drone use in US airspace by 2015”

RT News

As the US Department of Agriculture considers whether to authorize the unrestricted planting of genetically engineered Eucalyptus trees experts are warning that such a policy would not only be unnatural, but negatively impact the environment.

The GE tree is primarily developed by ArborGen, a biotechnology corporation that has been met with protests in recent months, to provide materials to create paper and the wood pellets that fuel power plants around the world. Despite the trees’ propensity for cooler climates, ArborGen has sought to promote the trees’ growth in the south eastern US under the notion that they will help the environment sustain itself.    Continue reading “Genetically engineered trees under USDA consideration could harm environment – report”

Mail.com

MIAMI (AP) — After raising a shackled right hand and swearing to tell the truth, U.S.-to-Cuba airline hijacker William Potts told a judge Thursday he had an objection at his first federal court appearance to face decades-old air piracy charges.

“I would like to — I’m new at this stuff,” Potts told U.S. Magistrate Judge Alicia Otazo-Reyes. “With total respect — I have to protest these proceedings.” But Otazo-Reyes cut Potts off before he could explain, saying all she wanted to know was whether he could afford a lawyer. Potts said he had earned about 200 Cuban pesos a month as a farmer outside Havana and had no other appreciable assets or income.   Continue reading “Cuba hijacker makes 1st US court appearance”

USA Today – by Roger Yu

It’s the last picture show for Blockbuster.

The retail company that introduced millions of Americans to stay-home movie nights said Wednesday it will close its 300 remaining U.S. stores by early January next year. Its DVD-by-mail business, introduced as a competitor to Netflix, also will be shut down by mid-December.   Continue reading “Blockbuster to close U.S. retail stores, mail DVD operation”

RT News

The killing of a TSA officer at the Los Angeles International Airport last week has reignited the debate over whether the agency’s staff should be given the ability to make arrests, as well as carry firearms.

On Friday a gunman opened fire at LAX’s Terminal 3, fatally shooting 39-year-old TSA officer Gerardo Hernandez, marking the first such incident for the TSA where one of its screeners was killed on the job.   Continue reading “Los Angeles airport shooting reignites calls to arm the TSA”

RT News

Onlookers say the odds of it happening are unlikely, but voters in several counties throughout Colorado could decide to secede from the rest of the state this Election Day.

A measure that would set in motion a plan for North Colorado to become the fifty-first state is on the ballot in 11 counties there this Tuesday, but even passing that initiative won’t mean there’ll be a new star added to the American flag anytime soon.   Continue reading “North Colorado votes on secession”

RT News

The citizens of Washington State have voted against a bill that would have required the labeling of genetically altered foods, according to preliminary ballot results.

Tuesday’s ballots saw 35 counties out of 39 vote against the legislation backed by environmentalists. Counties Whatcom, King, Jefferson and San Juan were the only ones to vote for the labeling of GMO products.    Continue reading “Washington votes against GMO labeling – preliminary results”

RT News

There’s a chance of ending the Syrian crisis in two weeks if there’s political will on all sides, according to Dr. Bouthaina Shaaban, political and media advisor to the Syrian president.

If these parties have the political will to put an end to the Syrian suffering, to the Syrian crisis, they can do it within weeks. They can only stop the financing the arming [of Syrian rebels] the smuggling of terrorists across the border from Turkey , and 50 percent of the Syrian crisis would be ended in two weeks’ time,”  Dr. Shaaban said in an exclusive interview to RT.   Continue reading “Assad advisor: With political will, Syrian crisis over in 2 weeks”

RT News

Legislation introduced Monday in the US Senate aims to add privacy controls and public transparency mandates to existing legislation that will guide the use of drones by commercial and government entities in the United States.

The Drone Aircraft Privacy and Transparency Act, offered by Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA), would amend the Federal Aviation Administration Modernization and Reform Act to require law enforcement to obtain a warrant before using surveillance drones on US soil, except in cases of emergency.   Continue reading “New Senate bill would add privacy, transparency requirements to domestic drone use”

RT News

Hackers infiltrated software used by a limousine company that frequently transports politicians, star athletes, corporate bigwigs and even some well-known celebrities, representatives from a US internet security firm have said.

Corporate Car Online is a Town Car service based out of Kirkwood, Missouri. Cyber-security journalist Brian Krebs identified a file with the same name, ‘CorporateCarOnline’, stored on the same server on which stolen information from PR Newswire and Adobe Systems Inc. was saved, leading to the possibility that the same perpetrators were behind each of the three hacks.    Continue reading “Car service hack exposes credit info of nearly 1mn celebrities, politicians”

RT News

The National Security Agency is fed internal information from Google and Yahoo’s private networks by British counterpart GCHQ, which intercepts communications traveling between company data centers based in Britain.

Documents supplied by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden and reported by The Washington Post last Wednesday showed how the NSA and GCHQ work together to intercept private links that connect Google and Yahoo global data centers. On Monday, The Post added new background and details of a program known as “MUSCULAR” to its previous report to paint a more succinct picture of how the spy agencies access these supposedly protected data links.   Continue reading “GCHQ intercepts Google, Yahoo cloud data hosted in Britain, feeds info to NSA”

RT News

A 5.0 earthquake was registered on Japan’s east cost in a prefecture neighboring Fukushima. It comes as a top Japanese politician called for acknowledgement of the fact that some Fukushima evacuees would never be able to return to the area.

Sunday’s tremors were felt as far away as Tokyo, but no casualties or damage reports were released at the time.    Continue reading “Earthquake hits close to Fukushima, tremors felt as far as Tokyo”

I am still trying to understand how a criminal act such as the “Affordable Healthcare Act” (aka Obamacare) was ever passed. The Patriot Act, the NDAA, and the rest of the treasonous acts passed by “President” (and I do use that term ever so loosely”) Obama aka Barry Soetoro are so illegal that I cannot understand how the American people have allowed such lawlessness to prevail for so long. The United States of America is going to hell in a handbasket, yet many seemed too busy with Monday night football and Walking Dead to be concerned about any of it.

If you haven’t seen how much the healthcare plans cost, go ahead and take a look, just be ready for sticker shock. If you are wondering about the prices, here is a look at the illegal penalties that will be applied starting in 2014 from FactCheck.org   Continue reading “The Anything but Affordable Healthcare Act”

RT News

The secret behind Google’s strange mystery barges in the San Francisco Bay and Portland, ME has been revealed: They are promotional party boats.

According to the local KPIX 5 CBS station, multiple sources have confirmed to the outlet that the vast majority of the barges will be composed of showrooms to promote the launch of Google Glass, the search giant’s upcoming entry into a burgeoning wearable computing field.   Continue reading “Mysterious Google barges identified as giant party boats”

RT News

Iraq has just experienced its deadliest month in five years with over 1,000 killed amid spiraling violence, a topic that will rank high in talks between Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and President Barack Obama in Washington on Friday.

The spike in deaths for October has created an atmosphere of anxiety and fear amongst the population since most of last month’s victims were civilians, according to government figures.   Continue reading “1000+ killed: October Iraq’s deadliest month since 2008”

Mail.com

GREENWOOD, S.C. (AP) — Facing problems with the law and in his personal life, 27-year-old Bryan Sweatt called a police dispatcher to vent. When she asked him what was wrong, he replied he was “stressed out” and about to kill himself.

With a woman’s voice crying in the background, the dispatcher asked if he had a gun. His reply: “a 44.” Then the phone line went dead. The chilling call was the first clue that something had gone terribly wrong inside a one-story rural home in this tight-knit community of 23,000 people where six people, including Sweatt, were found shot to death.   Continue reading “911 recording captures minutes before 6 shot dead”