Russia's parliament voted unanimously Monday to urge the president to recognize the independence of Georgia's two breakaway regions, stoking further tensions between Moscow and the small Caucasus nation's Western allies.
Russian lawmakers recognize Georgia separatists
Russia threatens sale of offensive weapons to Israel's enemies
Russian security officials threatened retaliation against Israel for its weapons exports to Georgia including eight different aerial drones.
Russian Deputy Chief of Staff Col. Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn said Israel supplied at least eight different models of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to Georgia. Nogovitsyn said Israel has also sold a range of weapons and sought to export main battle tanks to Georgia.
"We asked Israel not to sell offensive weapons to a hostile neighboring state, but they said they're a sovereign state," a diplomatic source said.
"Well, Israel shouldn't be surprised if we sell offensive weapons to Israel's neighbors."
Nuclear waste containers likely to fail, warns 'devastating' report
Thousands of containers of lethal nuclear waste are likely to fail before being safely sealed away underground, a devastating official report concludes.
The unpublicised report is by the Environment Agency, which has to approve any proposals for getting rid of the waste that remains deadly for tens of thousands of years.
The document effectively destroys Britain's already shaky disposal plans just as ministers are preparing an expansion of nuclear power.
It shows that many containers used to store the waste are made of second-rate materials, are handled carelessly, and are liable to corrode.
The report concludes: "It is cautious to assume a significant proportion will fail." It says computer models suggest up to 40 per cent of them could be at risk.
TVNL Comment: And John McCain wants to bring more nuclear power plants to America.
Lone accountant takes on IRS and wins
Not only that, but tax experts say potentially millions of other taxpayers could benefit from his victory.
The accountant from Baxter, Minn., challenged the method the IRS has used for more than 20 years to tax shares and cash distributed by mutual life insurance firms to their policyholders when they reorganize as public companies.
A federal court recently agreed with his interpretation.
If a company distributed shares worth $30 and a recipient subsequently sold them at $32, under the IRS' view they would pay taxes on all $32. Under Ulrich's interpretation, they would owe taxes only on the $2 per share gain.
Biden in 2007 interview: I am a Zionist
Senator Joe Biden, who was chosen by Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama to be his running mate in the upcoming US elections, has previously declared himself to be a Zionist. Calling Israel "the single greatest strength America has in the Middle East," he also revealed a Jewish connection in an interview last year.
TVNL Comment: Actually he was chosen by the power brokers, and one of the requirements was that he had to blindly support Israel, above and beyond the interests of Americans. That's the only way to be placed in office in America.
Drug giants accused over doctors' perks
Drug companies are spending millions of pounds every year on all-expenses-paid trips to conferences around the world for doctors and other hospital staff, in what critics say is a massive marketing exercise dressed up as medical education.
Consumers International (CI) said the lack of transparency was unacceptable. "When a medical professional speaks on a health issue, we assume that they are putting patients' interests first. If that person has a conflict of interest because they or their organisation are receiving funding from a drug company the least we should demand is the right to know about it," said Justin Macmullan, head of campaigns. "Pharmaceutical companies will tell you that what they are funding is medical education. But our concern is that this is really highly effective, well-targeted marketing. This throws any notion of impartiality out of the window and jeopardises a doctor's ability to make an informed, balanced decision about the most appropriate treatments."
'Tennessean' reporter has background check by THP
A list of 182 people believed to have been subjects of background checks from a Tennessee Highway Patrol officer includes the Tennessean reporter who revealed the Highway Patrol's probe into the officer's unauthorized activities.
Brad Schrade, who has reported on the Highway Patrol for years and first reported the probe earlier this month, received a call Saturday morning from a Highway Patrol special agent who said that Lt. Ronnie Shirley, the subject of the probe, had accessed Schrade's background information.
"For a state police agency or one of its agents to investigate a reporter who has produced legitimate and critically important coverage of the agency smacks of the intimidation and retribution you would expect to find in a totalitarian state," Silverman said.
Vaccines Found to Cause Diabetes in Children
Two new studies showing that vaccines increase the risk of diabetes have been published in the Open Pediatric Medicine Journal.
"Our results conclusively prove there is a causal relationship between immunization schedules and diabetes," J. Bartholomew Classen said at the time.
"The recent data shows that common childhood vaccines are especially dangerous to children with a strong family history of diabetes," Classen said. "Parents of a child with a strong family history of insulin-dependent diabetes ... should know that the administration of a full series of vaccines may have a greater than 5 percent chance of causing their child to develop diabetes."
Another study, published in the same issue of the Open Pediatric Medicine Journal, demonstrated a connection between the hepatitis B vaccine and Type 2 diabetes.
The Veep’s Pipeline Push
A two-year-old letter by Vice President Dick Cheney that pushed a controversial Alaska natural-gas pipeline bill is getting renewed scrutiny because of recently disclosed evidence in the Justice Department's corruption case against Sen. Ted Stevens. In a conversation secretly tape-recorded by the FBI on June 25, 2006, Stevens discussed ways to get a pipeline bill through the Alaska Legislature with Bill Allen, an oil-services executive accused of providing the senator with about $250,000 in undisclosed financial benefits. According to a Justice motion, Stevens told Allen, "I'm gonna try to see if I can get some bigwigs from back here and say, 'Look … you gotta get this done'." Two days later, Cheney wrote a letter to the Alaska Legislature urging members to "promptly enact" a bill to build the pipeline. The letter was considered unusual because the White House rarely contacts state lawmakers about pending legislative matters. It also angered state Democrats, who accused Cheney of pushing oil-company interests. The former executive director of Cheney's energy task force had gone to work as a lobbyist for British Petroleum, one of three firms slated to build the pipeline.
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