From the Trenches World Report

Think Progress – by ARI PHILLIPS

On Wednesday, California Gov. Jerry Brown and state Democratic leaders announced a $687 million drought-relief bill that addresses a variety of causes and concerns the state has in confronting one of the worst droughts on record. The bill aims to help conserve water, clean up drinking water supplies, expand use of recycled water, and provide money for housing and food to those impacted by the drought and increase penalties for illegal diversions, amongst other measures. About $550 million worth of the money will come from existing bonds approved by voters, with no new taxes or fees proposed.   Continue reading “California Lawmakers Pushing Bills Addressing Drought And Climate Change”

Impact Lab

You won’t necessarily sacrifice comfort by living in a tiny house,  at least not according to work-at-home husband and wife team Andrew and Gabriella Morrison. They live in a 221 square foot home, which is dubbed hOMe. The tiny hose is designed in a way that maximizes each part of the living space, giving the appearance of being a much larger house than it is. The home greatly resembles a shipping container from the outside due to its shape, and is only 8 feet and 6 inches wide.   Continue reading “A tiny home that appears much larger than it actually is”

Tech Eye – by Edward Berridge

The Optical Fibre Communications Conference (OFC) has revealed details of a new approach to chip-to-chip communications based on silicon photonics.

The paper explains how to develop a modulator and a tuneable filter created using IBM’s CMOS process that the paper’s presenters believe could make inter-chip communications ten times more energy efficient.   Continue reading “Researchers come up with new chip to chip communications”

Guns and Freedom – by Jonathan S.

Connecticut anti-gun politicians have a problem.  After passing laws last year that require every gun owner who has a “high capacity” magazine or so called “assault weapon” to register those items with the state many refused to do so.

It has been estimated that anywhere from 20,000 to 100,000 gun owners refused to register their guns with their anti-gun government and many think those numbers could even be higher.  This mass refusal to obey unconstitutional gun laws has surprised Connecticut officials.  Perhaps they were expecting law abiding gun owners to willingly forfeit their rights while criminals did whatever they wanted.   Continue reading “Newspaper Writer in CT Calls for the 100,000 Residents Who Refused to Register their Guns to be Arrested”

Stuff

Fearing that a call for a truce was a ruse, protesters have tossed firebombs and advanced upon police lines in Ukraine’s embattled capital.

Government snipers shot back and the almost-medieval melee that ensued left at least 70 people dead and hundreds injured, according to a protest doctor.   Continue reading “Kiev protesters killed, police held hostage”

RT News

The termination of a safety manager from a Washington state nuclear facility this week marks the second time in four months that a whistleblower was fired from there after speaking out.

Donna Busche, 50, was fired Tuesday morning by URS Corp, a federal subcontractor hired by the United States government to build a $12.3 billion plant that will make glass from the waste being held at the old Department of Energy-owned Hanford Nuclear Reservation in the southeastern part of the state. Construction of the plant is currently on hold because of safety concerns, and the facility has been previously referred to as the most-polluted nuclear weapons production site in the US.   Continue reading “Nuclear site whistleblower fired after complaining about safety conditions”

Disinfo – by Jacob Sloan

Two weeks ago we noted that in a span of six days, a former Federal Reserve economist was found dead in an apparent suicide, a former senior manager for Deutsche Bank was discovered hanging from a noose in his home, and a JPMorgan Chase vice president seemingly jumped to death in London. The Financial Post reports that the string of sudden fatalities among masters-of-the-universe continues:   Continue reading “37-Year-Old JPMorgan Executive Is The Latest Leading Banker To Die Strangely Over The Past Three Weeks”

Bloomberg – by Masumi Suga, Yuji Okada and Jacob Adelman

Tokyo Electric Power Co. (9501), operator of the crisis-ridden Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant, said it found a new leak near the tanks holding contaminated water at the disaster site.

The utility, which serves 29 million customers in the Tokyo metropolitan area, is collecting soil where the leak occurred and doesn’t believe any water reached the ocean, company executives said at a briefing in Tokyo. About 100 metric tons (26,400 gallons) of water may have escaped a concrete barrier, the company said.   Continue reading “Tepco Finds New Leak of Radioactive Water at Fukushima Site”

Carlsbad Current-Argus – by Zack Ponce

CARLSBAD — Traces of radiation have been found approximately half a mile northwest of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, a federal nuclear waste repository approximately 26 miles east of Carlsbad.

Tests by the Carlsbad Environmental Monitoring and Research Center, a division of the College of Engineering at New Mexico State University, showed evidence of trace amounts of americium and plutonium on an air filter Wednesday afternoon at a sampling station off the WIPP Access Road.   Continue reading “Lab: Radiation detected above ground near WIPP site east of Carlsbad”

CNN – by Phil Black, Nick Paton Walsh and Michael Pearson

Kiev, Ukraine (CNN) — [Breaking news alert, 12:01 p.m.]

Asset freezes on people in Ukraine believed to be involved in the crackdown are being “fast-tracked” by the Obama administration, a senior administration official said Thursday.   Continue reading “Truce crumbles amid gunfire in Ukraine, protesters claim 100 dead”

Bloomberg – by Paul M. Barrett

Huffington Post – by Ryan J. Reilly

WASHINGTON — A suspect in a terrorism sting pleaded guilty on Wednesday in a case that federal prosecutors and the FBI had turned down, setting up a rare situation in which local prosecutors in New York handled a terrorism case.

Jose Pimentel, 29, was arrested in November 2011 and charged with trying to construct a bomb. While terrorism cases are typically handled by the FBI, federal authorities washed their hands of the case, citing the actions of a New York City Police Department informant.   Continue reading “Victory For NY Police Pursuing Rare Terrorism Case”

Natural News – by Elizabeth Renter

Although we don’t know exactly why, there is no question that sleep is crucial for brain and overall health. Without proper sleep, the chance of disease and stress increases notably. Now, researchers at the University of Rochester Medical Center (URMC) Center for Translational Neuromedicine have found that sleeping actually helps detoxify the brain, potentially offering clues into dementia and Alzheimer’s disease.   Continue reading “Study Reveals How Sleep Removes Toxic Waste from the Brain”

The Daily Caller – by Vince Coglianese

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters Thursday that the Obama administration will not be releasing any more information about the controversial use of drones to kill American citizens.

Carney’s remarks, via the White House’s transcript of the off-camera press gaggle:   Continue reading “White House: No more information about drone killings will be released to public”