“A new breed of genetically modified crops could provide cheap drugs and vaccines for the developing world. Only one problem: what if they get into the food chain?
[A]s with GM food crops, there are fears about whether pharmed plants could breed with wild relatives and disturb the natural gene pool. They could find their way into the food chain – potentially exposing people to uncontrolled doses of potent drugs.
And then there is the yuk factor, because the experiments often mingle plant and human genes. The Daily Mail says there are “serious ethical concerns about such a fundamental interference.”[.]
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel’s Lebanon war inquiry commission levelled scathing criticism against Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in an interim report on Monday that cast doubt on the unpopular leader’s political future.
The government-appointed Winograd panel found Olmert did not have a “well-processed plan” when he launched the air, sea and land campaign last July after Hezbollah guerrillas abducted two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid, according to a segment of the report read out on Israeli television channels.
The commission criticised what it called Olmert’s severe failures in judgment in going to war. It was not immediately clear, as the panel’s chairman made a statement on the report at a news conference whether it included a call for Olmert to quit.
(snip)
A rally calling for Olmert and his government to quit was planned for Thursday in Tel Aviv. The demonstration was being organised by a former general, military reservists who fought in the war and parents of soldiers killed in the conflict.
Israeli political analysts, however, were divided over whether such protests would gather steam in a country where years of corruption scandals at the top seem to have led many to believe no worthy leaders wait in the wings to take charge.
“Secondly, allegedly on June 1st, Wolfowitz becomes eligible for some large financial bonus — for performance and time on the job. One estimate puts this figure at about $400,000. Wolfowitz wants to make sure those funds are credited to his private bank account before saying farewell to an institution that has come to despise him.
Both sides have threatened each other with slow, painful, drip-drip approach to the release of damaging information that each side has about the other.
One blast in the battle are revelations that it costs the Bank a whopping $5 million per year to pay for Wolfowitz’s security detail. Others have told me of Wolfowitz’s failure to discipline aide Kevin Kellems for equally whopping violations of Bank protocol — particularly while traveling on Bank business..[.]
Wolfowitz is angry at the Bank at all those other than his closest spear-carriers. At one level, he does not want to resign and wants to tear the World Bank apart by forcing escalation in this war. But others — particularly Secretary of the Treasury Hank Paulson — have made it clear behind the scenes that a negotiated outcome that saves some face for Wolfowitz will give all sides an opportunity to push what one Paulson insider calls “the reset button.”
Nine high-tech towers will soon loom over the desert southwest of Tucson in the first stage of an effort to put up a virtual border wall.
The 98-foot towers, to be equipped with cameras, radars and sensors, represent a long-overdue and much-needed tool to Border Patrol officials, who say the structures will slow illegal border crossings in the nation’s busiest corridor.
But to residents of Arivaca, the towers are million-dollar eyesores that will blemish their countryside and infringe on their freedom and privacy. They scoff at the government’s notion of a “virtual wall” and say it’s more likely the towers will have virtually no impact – linkage
A rare moment where the local opposition to creating a war-zone is given some press. It’s galling that people who live so far away from the border get to decide what’s best for us. [/rant]
BANGKOK (Reuters) – After two gloomy U.N. reports on global warming, scientists and governments began on Monday looking at how to fight climate change, with green groups saying the world has the means to cut emissions at little cost.
“Science certainly provides a lot of compelling reasons for action,” Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPPC) said as experts from more than 100 nations gathered in Bangkok to debate a raft of solutions.
“The IPCC doesn’t have any muscle, it has grey matter. The muscle will have to come from somewhere else,” he said when asked how its third report of the year to be issued on Friday could be converted into government action.
Delegates will wade through 140 pages of nearly 1,000 proposed amendments to the draft 24-page report, which says time for inexpensive fixes is running out because of a surge in greenhouse gas emissions.
Major polluters such as United States, China and top oil producer Saudi Arabia are expected to seek to water down the report, wary of language that prescribes targets to cut emissions or threatens their oil and gas industries.
Protests took place around the world on Sunday to demand that world leaders act to prevent further bloodshed in Darfur on the fourth anniversary of the conflict’s start.
The Global Day for Darfur, organised by a coalition of rights groups including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, saw activists around the world turn over more than 10,000 hourglasses filled with fake blood.
These are designed to convey the message that delaying intervention will cost even more lives in the troubled western region of Sudan. – linkage
go take a read… “There’s a funny kind of transfer of energy and ideas that’s almost–not random, but unstructured. It’s as though they’re Siamese twins joined at the frontal lobe.”
The first British soldier ever to be convicted of a war crime was today jailed for a year and dismissed from the army.
Corporal Donald Payne brutally mistreated Iraqi hotel worker Baha Mousa, who died of his injuries at the hands of British soldiers, and other civilians held at a detention centre in Basra.
He punched and kicked the civilians when they were hooded and handcuffed and conducted what he called “the choir” striking the prisoners in sequence, their groans or shrieks making up the “music”.
President Bush and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe demanded on Friday that North Korea live up to its promises and abandon its nuclear weapons program.
The two leaders threatened more sanctions against Pyongyang.
“There’s a price to pay,” Bush said, standing alongside Abe at the presidential retreat in the Maryland mountains. – linkage
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — The governor on Monday closed the loophole in state law that allowed the Virginia Tech gunman to pass a federal background check and buy the weapons used in the massacre.
Gov. Timothy M. Kaine issued an executive order requiring that a database of people banned from buying guns include anyone who is found to be dangerous and ordered to undergo involuntary mental health treatment. – linkage
to top off the day. OMG. you can’t make up this stuff.
Atrios’ link to Murray Waas
JUSTICE DEPARTMENT Secret Order By Gonzales Delegated Extraordinary Powers To Aides
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales signed a highly confidential order in March 2006 delegating to two of his top aides — who have since resigned because of their central roles in the firings of eight U.S. attorneys — extraordinary authority over the hiring and firing of most non-civil-service employees of the Justice Department. A copy of the order and other Justice Department records related to the conception and implementation of the order were provided to National Journal.
In the order, Gonzales delegated to his then-chief of staff, D. Kyle Sampson, and his White House liaison “the authority, with the approval of the Attorney General, to take final action in matters pertaining to the appointment, employment, pay, separation, and general administration” of virtually all non-civil-service employees of the Justice Department, including all of the department’s political appointees who do not require Senate confirmation. Monica Goodling became White House liaison in April 2006, the month after Gonzales signed the order.
The existence of the order suggests that a broad effort was under way by the White House to place politically and ideologically loyal appointees throughout the Justice Department, not just at the U.S.-attorney level. Department records show that the personnel authority was delegated to the two aides at about the same time they were working with the White House in planning the firings of a dozen U.S. attorneys, eight of whom were, in fact, later dismissed.[.]
Down on the pharm, they’re pharming: it’s the new GM frontline in the war over genetic modifcation
Truthdig’s pick: Cartoon of the Week: Anniversary Mission Accomplished;
Bin There, Done That
Israeli inquiry into Lebanon war criticises Olmert
The Israeli public is becoming very cynical…
this should erase his last 2%, if we factor out the margin of error.
COMINGs and GOINGs ON:
Wolfowitz, architect of the Iraq war, pleads today but the [World bank] VP’s letter reveals…he tried to cover his tracks over lover’s job. It is reported he is being given not just a blue ribbon but time to GO QUIETLY
L’affaire: France elects new leader … but Oops…whichever candidate wins the French presidential election a week today, …. will almost certainly move into his, or her, official residence alone-without his, or her, significant other.
Tony Blair should say when.
She has a date with Waxman. Lots of time for hopping the Sunday talks, but no time for Waxman’s committee. Will Condi’s next stop be ..?
Watergate reporter Bernstein demolishes Hillary’s career story
So how about the two Georges? One George is AWOL and the other just launched his book on 60 minutes? Ray McGovern notes, Poor George. He still Does not Get it.
GOING, GOING, GO.. already
According to a report Wolifie’s pleadings today will find no terms of endearment…only terms for departure.
Steve Clemons has it.
A rare moment where the local opposition to creating a war-zone is given some press. It’s galling that people who live so far away from the border get to decide what’s best for us. [/rant]
Ugly. Billboards and radio towers are bad enough.
This reminds me of a friend’s trip to West Berlin. He said it was the most depressing place in the world. It was like living in a cage.
Experts meet on U.N. report but time running out
(See my diary entry from yesterday.)
Thinkprogress directs us to an excerpt from a Newsweek piece:
Condi’s Rescue Mission: The price of Condi’s Loyalty to Bush
go take a read… “There’s a funny kind of transfer of energy and ideas that’s almost–not random, but unstructured. It’s as though they’re Siamese twins joined at the frontal lobe.”
She’s pathetic.
Britain’s first war criminal jailed
‘brutally mistreated’ must be the new euphemism for murder. And that line about ‘the choir’ is really stomach churningly sick isn’t it.
More sabre-rattling from The Decider™
(emphasis mine)
to top off the day. OMG. you can’t make up this stuff.
Atrios’ link to Murray Waas
JUSTICE DEPARTMENT
Secret Order By Gonzales Delegated Extraordinary Powers To Aides
GOING, GOING, GO … GONZO, Say when already.