?The epidemic has killed nine babies so far and babies are by far the most vulnerable to the disease, also known as pertussis, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says. The best way to protect them is to vaccinate the adults around them, and to vaccinate pregnant women so their babies are born with some immunity.

A train company has been criticised for producing an Olympics security poster which reads as "gibberish" in Arabic.
First Capital Connect sent posters to 13 stations printed in English and seven other languages. But the Council for Arab-British Understanding called the Arabic lettering "ridiculous" and unreadable since the characters are not joined up and are back to front.

Every country has, along with its core civilities and traditions, some kind of inner madness, a belief so irrational that even death and destruction cannot alter it. In Europe not long ago it was the belief that “honor” of the nation was so important that any insult to it had to be avenged by millions of lives. In America, it has been, for so long now, the belief that guns designed to kill people indifferently and in great numbers can be widely available and not have it end with people being killed, indifferently and in great numbers. The argument has gotten dully repetitive: How does one argue with someone convinced that the routine massacre of our children is the price we must pay for our freedom to have guns, or rather to have guns that make us feel free? You can only shake your head and maybe cry a little. “Gun Crazy” is the title of one the best films about the American romance with violence. And gun-crazy we remain.

These tough bikers have a soft spot: aiding child-abuse victims. Anytime, anywhere, for as long as it takes the child to feel safe, these leather-clad guardians will stand tall and strong against the dark, and the fear, and those who seek to harm.

A newly discovered water source in Namibia could have a major impact on development in the driest country in sub-Saharan Africa.

It was one of the biggest secrets of the post-9/11 era: soon after the attacks, President Bush gave the CIA permission to create a top secret assassination unit to find and kill Al Qaeda operatives. The program was kept from Congress for seven years. And when Leon Panetta told legislators about it in 2009, he revealed that the CIA had hired the private security firm Blackwater to help run it. "The move was historic," says Evan Wright, the two-time National Magazine Award-winning journalist who wrote Generation Kill. "It seems to have marked the first time the U.S. government outsourced a covert assassination service to private enterprise."

FAIRFAX, Va. -- Saying it was “high time to take action against the number one cause of violence in America,” the National Rifle Association issued a statement today urging a sweeping ban on movies.
Tracy Klugian, an official spokesperson for the gun-lobbying organization, said that the N.R.A. had taken this extraordinary step because it “could not stand idly by and watch movies tear apart the fabric of our civil society.”

...“because our message finally seems to be getting through: Guns don’t kill people. Movies kill people.”

The gay dating app Grindr crashed due to a massive increase in demand, which some believe has something to do with the first Olympic athletes arriving in London.
Technical experts believe the arrival of the teams on Monday (16 July) crashed the service in East London, the place where many athletes and tourists are staying during the event.

Sally Ride, the first American woman to travel into space, died Monday at the age of 61, the Associated Press reported.

The cause of death was pancreatic cancer, according to a statement posted on the website of Sally Ride Science, a science education company she founded in 2001. She had been battling the disease for 17 months.

On June 18, 1983, Ride became the first American woman to fly in space when she blasted off on the Challenger as part of the STS-7 crew, according to NASA.

A fishing trip in Russia's Urals ended with cries of horror as a man found canisters filled with human embryos, some already shaped to baby bodies.
Lids on the bright blue containers apparently unlocked as the canisters hit the ground, and many embryos spilled out. The little bodies, no longer than 15 centimeters, shrank, turning into mummies.

A computer malware has allegedly attacked computer systems in Iran forcing them to play AC/DC's Thunderstruck at full volume in the middle of the night, according to a computer security researcher.

Mikko Hypponen, lead researcher at the Finnish computer security firm F-Secure, reported in his blog that a scientist working at the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran (AEOI) sent him an e-mail about his systems getting hit by a cyber-attack.

"I am writing you to inform you that our nuclear program has once again been compromised and attacked by a new worm with exploits which have shut down our automation network at Natanz and another facility Fordo near Qom," reads the email.

"According to the email our cyber experts sent to our teams, they believe a hacker tool Metasploit was used," it continued.

Metasploit, an open-source project used to find vulnerabilities in software, is reportedly very easy and cheap to develop.

In advertising we will look at what the person we see in an ad is looking at. If they are looking out at us we will simply look back at them and not really anywhere else.

Bear Ride, who referred to O'Shaughnessy as "a member of the family," said of her sister Sally, "People did not know she had pancreatic cancer, that's going to be a huge shock. For 17 months, nobody knew -- and everyone does now. Her memorial fund is going to be in support of pancreatic cancer."

Describing her sister as a very private person, Bear also noted, "The pancreatic cancer community is going to be absolutely thrilled that there's now this advocate that they didn't know about. And I hope the GLBT community feels the same. I hope it makes it easier for kids growing up gay that they know that another one of their heroes was like them."

It’s getting harder to detect some of the newer ATM skimmers, fraud devices attached to or inserted into cash machines and designed to steal card and PIN data. Among the latest and most difficult-to-spot skimmer innovations is a wafer-thin card reading device that can be inserted directly into the ATM’s card acceptance slot.

Virtually all modern forms of extremism accuse liberal Western democratic systems of being hypocritical and, ultimately, weak. Al Qaeda portrays the West as anti-Islamic imperialists masquerading as promoters of democracy. Right wing extremism suggests the West is committing cultural suicide through its lax judicial system and naïve multiculturalism.

Both have committed horrific acts designed to bait us into betraying our values and making them martyrs. In fact, it is remarkable to see the many similarities between these two sorts of extremism in their disdain for diversity and their indiscriminate violence against civilians.

One of the key things that I got to talk about today that I didn't mention in my previous post is the way that anti-abortion laws have huge (presumably unintended) consequences for women who miscarry. Case in point: Fetal personhood. If you give a fetus all the rights of a living human from the moment of conception, how do you deal with the fact that some 50% of conceptions end in miscarriage?

Three black bear cubs were rescued from a dumpster in Ruidoso, New Mexico, by local residents Shirley and Tom Schenk. The couple heard the bears crying through the night and came to their rescue as soon as there was enough light, armed with a ladder and a pickup truck. Apparently, these bears are notorious for their mischievous conduct.

A black couple in Crystal Springs, Mississippi says that a predominantly white Baptist church refused to let them get married because of their race.

Charles and Te’Andrea Wilson told WLBT that the day before they were to be married, the pastor of First Baptist Church of Crystal Springs informed them the ceremony would have to be moved due to the reaction of some white church members — even though the couple had attended the church regularly.

“The church congregation had decided no black could be married at that church, and that if [the pastor] went on to marry her, then they would vote him out the church,” Charles Wilson explained.

This patient was not treated for three days, given no wound checks, and his dressings were soiled. He was not given any analgesics prior to his surgery, and remained conscious. U.S. military personnel in Afghanistan at the time described his surgery taking place in "semi-sterile conditions." This patient died 4 days later of paritonitis related sepsis without ever going back to operating room for care.

The first systematic look at the New York police department's response to Occupy Wall Street protests paints a damning picture of an out-of-control and aggressive organization that routinely acted beyond its powers.

In a report that followed an eight-month study (pdf), researchers at the law schools of NYU and Fordham accuse the NYPD of deploying unnecessarily aggressive force, obstructing press freedoms and making arbitrary and baseless arrests.

The NYPD practices documented in the report include:

• Aggressive, unnecessary and excessive police force against peaceful protesters, bystanders, legal observers, and journalists. This included the use of batons, pepper spray, metal barricades, scooters, and horses.

• Obstruction of press freedoms and independent legal monitoring, including arrests of at least 10 journalists, and multiple cases of preventing journalists from reporting on protests or barring and evicting them from specific sites.

• Pervasive surveillance of peaceful political activity.

• Violent late-night raids on peaceful encampments.

• Unjustified closure of public spaces, dispersal of peaceful assemblies, and trapping of protesters.

• Arbitrary and selective rule enforcement and baseless arrests.

• Failures to ensure transparency about government policies.

• Failures to ensure accountability for those allegedly responsible for abuses.

The report argues that the lack of transparency and accountability is especially troubling because the public does not know whether police actions are guided by specific written policies, or whether they are random or ad hoc.

Busting stereotypes that peg feminists as men-haters, a new study shows that having a feminist partner is linked with healthier, more romantic heterosexual relationships.

The study, published online this week in the journal Sex Roles, relied on surveys of both college students and older adults, finding that women with egalitarian attitudes do find mates and men do find them attractive. In fact, results reveal they are having a good time, maybe a better time than the non-feminists.

A Pakistani engineer has built a car that runs on water, a feat that left onlookers astounded.

Engineer Waqar Ahmad drove his car using water as fuel Thursday during a demonstration for parliamentarians, scientists and students, Dawn reported from this Pakistan capital.

He said cars could be driven by a system fuelled by water instead of petrol or CNG.

The onlookers were taken aback when they saw it and a cabinet sub-committee lauded the ‘Water Fuel Kit Project’.

The media report explained that the water fuelling system is a technology in which ‘hydrogen bonding’ with distilled water produces hydrogen gas to run the car.

Ahmad had earlier told Religious Affairs Minister Syed Khurshid Ahmad Shah about the unique project and it was taken to the federal cabinet which asked its sub—committee to discuss it.

During the demonstration, Shah himself drove the car.

The minister said that Ahmad would be given complete security and the formula would be kept secure.

“Style,” Vidal once said, “is knowing who you are, what you want to say, and not giving a damn.”

An Everglades City airboat captain who lost his hand to an alligator last month was arrested Friday.

Wallace Weatherholt, 63, is facing a misdemeanor charge of unlawful feeding of an alligator.

He has since bonded out and has a court appearance set for Aug. 22.

Weatherholt was leading an Indiana family on a tour of the Everglades on June 12 when he encountered a 9-foot alligator, which bit his hand off at the wrist.

After the attack, Florida Fish and Wildlife officers began an investigation into whether the captain had fed or provoked the alligator, leading to the attack.

In an interview shortly after the attack, FWC spokeswoman Carli Segelson said that there had been allegations of that happening.

The Associated Press reports that airboat passengers stated Weatherholt hung a fish over the side of the boat and had his hand at the water’s surface when the alligator attacked.

Feeding alligators is illegal. Those who feed an alligator face a second-degree misdemeanor, with a fine of up to $500 and possible jail time.

David Weathers, a nuisance-alligator trapper and owner of several alligators, said the reason it’s illegal to feed alligators is because once the reptiles are fed by humans, they lose their fear. If the alligator in this incident had been fed in the past — either by Weatherholt or someone else — just the sight of the airboat could bring the alligator right up next to it, he said.

"Following early successes each FSA unit now operates with one or two video activists. The activists are armed with Kalashnikovs and camera phones – the instruments of 21st-century warfare. 'When the enemy is shooting you it's very hard to get out your camera,' said Abdulrahman. 'Sometimes I put it away and reach for my gun. If the army sees anyone with a camera they try and kill him first.'

HANOI, Vietnam -- More than 100 demonstrators rode bicycles and motorbikes through Vietnam's capital Sunday in the country's first-ever gay pride parade, spurred by an unexpected government proposal to recognize same-sex couples in law.

The parade to raise awareness of Vietnam's gay and lesbian community and call for equal rights began in scorching heat at Hanoi's national stadium Sunday morning and ended about 10 kilometers (6 miles) away at a downtown park. Demonstrators trailed rainbow-colored streamers and shouted "Equal rights for gays and lesbians!" and "We support same-sex marriage!"

It was a scene that was unimaginable a few years ago, when Vietnam still labeled homosexuality a "social evil" alongside drug addiction and prostitution. The country's gay community was once so underground that few groups or meeting places existed, and it was taboo to even talk about the issue.

But Vietnam's state-controlled media now explores gay issues, and the Justice Ministry recently proposed including same-sex couples in its overhaul of the country's marriage law - positioning Vietnam to be the first country in Asia to allow same-sex couples to marry or legally register. The new law could provide rights such as owning property, inheriting and adopting children.

The fact that one of the gay men attacked happened to be the Pastor’s own son, Jerry Pittman, Jr., no doubt contributed to Pittman senior’s noxious edict. According to Pittman Jr., after hearing his Dad yell, “SICK’EM!:”

“My uncle and two other deacons came over to the car per my dad’s request. My uncle smashed me in the door as the other deacon knocked my boyfriend back so he couldn’t help me, punching him in his face and his chest. The other deacon came and hit me through my car window in my back.”

The attackers also verbally assaulted the couple continually with anti-gay verbiage which continued even after a Sheriff’s Deputy arrived on the scene. Bystanders and other congregants made no effort to stop the assault. For that matter, neither did the Deputy Sheriff. Once the barrage of punches ended, the Deputy refused to let the two victims press charges.

Jerry Pittman Jr. and his boyfriend, Dustin Lee, have since filed charges against two of the men who beat them as well as Pastor Jerry Pittman. A hearing has been scheduled in Gibson County Court for Tuesday, October 4th.

It was a cheque, made out in my name, for $95,093.35 and it came in a junk-mail letter from a get-rich-quick company. It was worthless, meant only as a financial tease, a lip-licking come-on. “This is how much money you could soon be making.” What it was never meant for was deposit. But that’s exactly what made the thought of depositing it so irresistibly funny. What could possibly be funnier than depositing a perfectly ridiculous, obviously false, fake cheque? (Did I mention it had “non-negotiable” clearly written on it?) So, as a joke, I deposited the fake cheque into my bank’s ATM. I felt like a million bucks doing so. I’d never had so much fun at my bank. Come to think of it, I’d never had any fun at my bank until the moment I endorsed the back of this “cheque” with a smiley face and slipped the Monopoly-like money into the mouth of the hungry ATM. For the first time ever, I walked away from my bank laughing.

There is no 10-day rule that protects you on a bounced cheque. It is a 24-hour rule! In the United States, when a bank receives notice that a cheque paid into your account has bounced, it has 24 hours to notify you and, if it fails to do this, you are safe to spend the money. Pretty neat, I say. Secondly, I learned that what I thought was a fake cheque was legally a real cheque. A little-known change in the 1990 Uniform Commercial Code made it so that the words “non-negotiable” printed on a cheque do not invalidate it. It may have been just a small footnote change but what I deposited was, marvellously, an accidentally real $95,093.35 cheque.

Well then, I thought – as he finished showing me through the archives – I’m not going to argue with the guy who invented the computer. After about 20 minutes of walking me through his contributions to technology, he sat down, finished his coffee, glanced at his half-eaten pastry now-cold, checked his watch and announced: Well, I have to go now.

Belarus has taken strong diplomatic action against Sweden following a stunt involving parachuted teddy bears.
Sweden says all of its diplomats have been expelled from Belarus, which has also closed its embassy in Stockholm.
Belarus was angered when a Swedish public relations firm dropped about 800 teddy bears with pro-democracy messages from a light aircraft.
President Alexander Lukashenko sacked his air defence chief and head of border guards over the 4 July incident.
He told their replacements not to hesitate to use force to stop any future air intrusions from abroad.

a picture of the bears "in training"

Sheet music. Nothing but sheet music.

The Ohio Attorney General’s office today released a report on human trafficking in Ohio which found that out of 328 self-identified human trafficking victims, more than one-third were trafficked while they were minors.

In all of Ohio, the most common buyers for victims were law enforcement. Businessmen and drug dealers were second and third, respectively.

When contacted by CityBeat, the Ohio Attorney General’s office said they have no suggestions to specifically deal with law enforcement officials, which topped the list of buyers, who are involved in human trafficking.

Utilizing neuroscience, gene therapy, and optogenetics, a pair of researchers from Cornell University have created a bionic prosthetic eye that can restore almost-normal vision to animals blinded by destroyed retinas.

First, gene therapy is used to deliver special proteins to the patient’s damaged retina (i.e. caused by degenerative diseases, such as macular degeneration or diabetic retinopathy). By using optogenetics, these proteins have been modified so that they’re sensitive to light — they’re not quite rods and cones, but they’re along the same lines.

The next step is the clever/unique bit. For years now, Nirenberg has been working on decoding the signals sent by the retina to the brain. A year ago, she cracked this code. At the time, she had only cracked the code used by the mouse retina, but now she’s cracked the monkey code too — and a monkey’s retina is very similar to ours.

That’s not the breakthrough here, though: Nirenberg and Pandarinath have now taken the mouse retina code and developed a working prosthetic, completely restoring a mouse’s vision.

The prosthetic contains a camera pointed forward, a Texas Instruments OMAP 3530 SoC (system-on-a-chip), and a tiny DLP pico projector. The SoC converts the camera’s output into encoded data that the mouse’s brain can understand, and then the projector is used to beam that data to the optogenetic proteins that were earlier placed in the retina using gene therapy. The optogenetic proteins then transmit the encoded signal to the brain, via the ganglion cells and optic nerve. Voila: restored (grayscale) vision.

Al-Meqdad family announced on Wednesday that its military wing has so far kidnapped more than 20 Free Syrian Army members in Lebanon, as well as a Turkish national, promising a “hefty catch.”

The military wing told LBCI television: “We may take escalatory measures depending on the latest developments.”

“We have a bank of targets in Lebanon and we are capable of reaching regional targets,” it warned.

“We can reach Aley, Tripoli, and Iqlim al-Kharroub,” said an unidentified masked gunman who was surrounded by a number of other gunmen of the Meqdad military wing.

Media report had earlier announced that the wing had abducted a Turkish national of the Soufan family.

Voice of Lebanon radio said that Turkish national is a diplomat called Soufan.

LBCI later broadcast images of the passport of the Turkish national who was kidnapped by the Meqdad family, identifying him as Aydin Tufan.

The Turkish Foreign Ministry demanded that the Lebanese government provide information on its abducted national, reported al-Jadeed television.

On the abduction of Syrian FSA members, Abu Ali al-Meqdad said on behalf of the family: “The family’s military wing kidnapped several Syrians. We are not afraid of anyone.”

I am not an expert on the politics of the region

International lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights advocates are crying foul after a top court ruled to uphold a ban on Pride marches in Moscow for the next 100 years.

As the BBC reports, the ruling came after Russia's best-known LGBT rights activist, Nikolai Alexeyev, had sought to overturn the city council's ban on Pride festivities. According to the ruling, the earliest that a Pride march, rally or celebration can take place in May 2112, Pink News notes.

"No business, not even one as successful as the church, has the right to attack women's rights," Shevchenko, 22, a veteran of several Femen protests, said after bringing down the cross.

With a chilling hint of the not-so-distant future, researchers at the Usenix Security conference have demonstrated a zero-day vulnerability in your brain. Using a commercial off-the-shelf brain-computer interface, the researchers have shown that it’s possible to hack your brain, forcing you to reveal information that you’d rather keep secret.

Rep. Todd Akin, the Republican nominee for Senate in Missouri who is running against Sen. Claire McCaskill, justified his opposition to abortion rights even in case of rape with a claim that victims of “legitimate rape” have unnamed biological defenses that prevent pregnancy.

“First of all, from what I understand from doctors [pregnancy from rape] is really rare,” Akin told KTVI-TV in an interview posted Sunday. “If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.”

Four minors between the ages of 13-15, including one girl, were arrested on Sunday in connection with the attack at Zion Square, in which one victim was seriously injured and three others were slightly hurt.

Earlier, the court extended by four days the detention of the 19-year-old man arrested Friday. Police believe there will be further arrests.

Sergeant First Class Shmuel Shenhav defined the attack as a lynch, and said: "The victim lost his consciousness and was thought to be dead until a Magen David Adom [emergency paramedic] crew arrived and resuscitated him. He was anesthetized and on a respirator in the hospital for days. This was an extremely severe crime. Only a miracle saved him from death."

The suspect's brother, who was also present at the scene, said outside the court that it was the four Arab youths who had provoked passersby and "made passes at Jewish girls." He added: "Why should an Arab make passes at my sister? They shouldn't be here, it's our area. For what other reason would they come here if not to make passes at Jewish girls?"

If there is something everyone can agree on, it would seem that the idea that rape can result in unwanted pregnancy would be right up there at the top of the list.

Not so in Missouri, where the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate on Sunday advanced the theory that the female reproductive system shuts down when a woman is being raped, thus preventing conception.

So it was sad that the Dandy admitted this week that it was wavering over whether to close. Sales today are a quarter of what they were in 2007. The circulation is just over 7,000 today. There are about 500 subscribers in all, enough to fit into a medium-sized playground.

Why is everybody so down on rape? This is what Mike Huckabee wanted to know today, on his radio program, which also featured Rep. Todd "Legitimate Rape" Akin as a guest. For instance, did you know that Ethel Waters was conceived when her mother got raped? Do you know what a world without rape would look like? A world without Ethel Waters, that's what.

There has been a campaign in Uzbek media denouncing Western mass culture for encouraging "immorality" among the youth and for "damaging the country's national values and traditions". Rap, rock and heavy metal have been labelled "alien music" and some genres have been subsequently banned.
Recently even Russian state TV broadcast claimed that goths engage in cannibalism. Many Uzbeks watch Russian television and are influenced by such coverage.
During one punk rock concert during the last two years, masked police turned up in large numbers and began rounding up the fans, detaining some for several hours.

A couple of weeks ago, the Centro de Estudios Borjanos in Borja, Spain, received a donation from the granddaughter of 19th-century painter Elías García Martínez. At the time, the Centro knew of only one painting by Martínez in Borja — Ecce Homo, a fresco on the walls of the church of Santuario de Misericordia.

That's it above. The leftmost image is how the painting looked two years ago; the middle image is how it looked in July, when it was photographed for a catalog of regional religious art. The image on right is how it looked when the Centro went to check it out on August 6th after receiving the donation. Hmm.

The restored version is apparently the work of an octogenarian neighbor of the church, who, noticing the damage to the painting, took it upon herself to restore the painting "with good intentions" but "without asking permission," as culture councillor Juan Maria de Ojeda put it. It became clear to the amateur restorer — quickly, one imagines — that "she had gotten out of hand," and she confessed to local authorities.

Sixty-six young women took part in the study of arachnophobia and sleep, which focused on sleep’s role in reducing fear of spiders. The goal was to see how “fear extinction” is affected by sleep, wakefulness, and time of day. Fear extinction is an active process of building a new emotional memory; in this case, a memory of spiders not associated with danger or harm.

Before treatment, some of these participants wouldn't walk on grass for fear of spiders or would stay out of their home or dorm room for days if they thought a spider was present,' said lead author Katherina Hauner, whose paper is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

'But after a two or three-hour treatment, they were able to walk right up and touch or hold a tarantula. And they could still touch it after six months. They were thrilled by what they accomplished.

On Space Day, which was officially declared by California Gov. Jerry Brown, the NASA news conference started not with an update on the Mars rover, but footage of science fiction writer Ray Bradbury reciting his poem, “If only we had taller been.”
On what today would have been Bradbury’s 92nd birthday, said Michael Meyer, NASA’s lead scientists for the Mars Exploration Program, “In his honor, we declared the place that Curiosity touched down to be forever known as Bradbury Landing.” Meyer’s announcement was followed by applause for Bradbury, as requested by Pete Theisinger, Curiosity’s project manager.

"When I realised that a snake had bit me, I went home to get a torch and saw that it was a cobra. So I bit it to death," he told BBC Nepali's Bikram Niraula in Biratnagar.

On July 18 of 1969, as the world waited anxiously for Apollo 11 to land safely on the surface of the Moon, speechwriter William Safire imagined the worst case scenario as he expertly wrote the following sombre memo to President Nixon's Chief of Staff, H. R. Haldeman. Its contents: a contingency plan, in the form of a speech to be read out by Nixon should astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin become stranded on the Moon, never to return, followed by some brief instructions relating to its broadcast. Luckily for all those involved, the memo was never needed.

In a disturbing report out of Georgia, prosecutors say four U.S. soldiers plotted to overthrow the government and assassinate President Obama. Details remain slim about the case, but the AP's Russ Bynum says the soldiers allegedly bought $87,000 worth of "guns and bomb-making materials and plotted to take over Fort Stewart, bomb targets in nearby Savannah and Washington state, as well as assassinate the president." The plot was apparently uncovered in relation to a murder case surrounding the killing of former soldier Michael Roark and his girlfriend Tiffany York in December. On Monday, Pfc. Michael Burnett, one of the accused soldiers, plead guilty to manslaughter and gang charges in the murder case. "Burnett told a Long County judge that Roark, who had just left the Army, knew of the militia group's plans and was killed because he was 'a loose end,'" reports Bynum.

According to the AP's Russ Bynum, the group calls itself F.E.A.R., which stands for Forever Enduring Always Ready. While authorities don't know how many members are in the group, they did accuse it of plotting some ambitious domestic terrorist plots:

The prosecutor said the militia group had big plans. It plotted to take over Fort Stewart by seizing its ammunition control point and talked of bombing the Forsyth Park fountain in nearby Savannah, she said. In Washington state, she added, the group plotted to bomb a dam and poison the state’s apple crop. Ultimately, prosecutors said, the militia’s goal was to overthrow the government and assassinate the president.

All are charged by state authorities with malice murder, felony murder, criminal gang activity, aggravated assault and using a firearm while committing a felony. A hearing for the three soldiers was scheduled Thursday.

An Indian company has launched what it claims is the country's first vagina tightening cream, saying it will make women feel "like a virgin" again. The company says it is about empowering women, but critics say it is doing the opposite. The BBC's Rajini Vaidyanathan in Mumbai reports.
It is certainly a bold claim. As the music starts playing on the advertisement for the 18 Again cream, a sari-clad woman is singing and dancing.
It is an unusual take on Bollywood.
"I feel like a virgin," she croons, although the advert makes it clear she is not.

The Pepper Pike company that owns the Century Mine told workers that attending the Aug. 14 Romney event would be both mandatory and unpaid, a top company official said Monday morning in a West Virginia radio interview.

The radio interview is here. Moore also confirms that they bused workers to the rally, and that the mine was shut down for the day (probably because so many workers would be at this "mandatory" rally). So even if workers wanted to, you know, work, they'd be forced to take a day off without pay anyway.

The powder blue Cadillac backed slowly into the group of parents and children buying snacks from a sidewalk vendor, and the crowd banged on his windows and screamed for him to stop, but not before some of the children were trapped under the car, witnesses said.

Squatting in a residential building in England and Wales becomes a criminal offence on Saturday, meaning squatters would face jail or a fine.
Ministers said it would offer better protection for homeowners and "slam shut the door on squatters once and for all".
The maximum penalty will be six months in jail, a £5,000 fine, or both.
But campaigners warned the new law could criminalise vulnerable people and lead to an increase in rough sleeping.

Gone are the days of the all-American army hero. These days, the US military is more like a sanctuary for racists, gang members and the chronically unfit.

Some 10,000 visitors to California's Yosemite National Park could have been exposed to a deadly virus that kills one in three victims and cannot be treated, officials said Friday.

So far, six cases of the rare hantavirus pulmonary syndrome (HPS) have been confirmed -- two of whom have died -- while a "multiple" number of other suspected cases of the rodent-borne disease are being investigated.

Yosemite authorities closed down the "Signature Tent Cabins" earlier this week at Curry Village, a popular lodging area in Yosemite Valley, the tourist center of the scenic park visited by millions of people every year.

The National Park Service (NPS) has written to some 2,900 people who booked stays in the Boystown area tent lodgings between June 10 and August 24, alerting them to keep an eye out for symptoms of HPS.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimated the number of people who actually stayed in the tent cabins -- those who booked plus their guests -- at 10,000.

"On August 24, 2012, the tents were disinfected and visitors were relocated. People who stayed in the tents between June 10 and August 24 may be at risk of developing HPS in the next six weeks," it said.

A rebellion is developing in Texas against a plan by a school district in San Antonio that would monitor the exact location and activities of all students at all times through RFID chips they are being ordered to wear.

Katie Deolloz, a member of Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and Numbering, told WND today that parents and students from San Antonio’s Northside Independent School District confronted the school board last night, stating their concerns about privacy and other issues “clearly and passionately.”
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School district officials did not respond to a WND request for comment, but the developing furor comes only days after a coalition of civil rights and privacy organizations publicly stated their opposition to “spychipping” the students.

A “position paper” from groups including the American Civil Liberties Union, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Big Brother Watch, Citizens’ Council for Health Freedom, Constitutional Alliance, Freedom Force International, Friends of Privacy USA, the Identity Project and Privacy Activism said no students should be subjected to the “chipping” program “unless there is sufficient evidence of its safety and effectiveness.”