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OAKLAND -- A group of people working at a Habitat for Humanity construction site in East Oakland that former President Jimmy Carter will visit next week were robbed at gunpoint, police said. The incident happened at the site of a 12-home development at 9507 Edes Ave. about 1:40 p.m. Tuesday. Habitat for Humanity staff members and AmeriCorps workers were accosted by four men who robbed them of cell phones, wallets and tools, police said. One of the robbers fired a shot into the air and pistol-whipped a man, who declined medical attention, authorities said.

SALEKHARD, Russia, Sept 25 (Reuters) – President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday Greenpeace activists arrested for staging a protest at Russia’s first offshore oil platform had violated international law but signalled they should not face charges of piracy. The activists’ ship was seized and towed to shore on Tuesday after two tried to scale the platform to protest against Russian plans to drill for oil in the Arctic which they say pose a threat to the fragile eco-system. The 30 activists, who were onboard the ship, were due to be questioned on Wednesday, Greenpeace said, a day after Russian investigators...

They had lain undiscovered under an Oklahoma lake for fifty years. And now the discovery of two rusting vintage cars containing five bodies has reignited the mystery of how three teenagers and one couple vanished more than five decades ago. Highway patrol officers testing their sonar equipment Foss Lake near Elk City, Oklahoma on Friday stumbled upon the rusting 1969 Camaro and a Chevrolet dating from the 1950s. Inside the Camaro were three bodies believed to be of local teenagers who vanished after going out for a drive in 1970. Inside the Chevrolet were two bodies – thought to be...

A 23-year-old man killed two San Francisco jewelry store clerks and critically wounded the shop owner because he believed he had been overcharged when he bought an item a few weeks earlier, prosecutors said Tuesday. The motive in Friday's slayings in the South of Market area had been a mystery until Barry White Jr. of Antioch appeared in court to face 16 charges, including murder and attempted murder. He did not enter a plea. Assistant District Attorney Scot Clark said White committed a "cold and deliberate" attack when he returned to Victoga in the Gift Center and Jewelry Mart on...

AFP's "Common Sense": Around the World on $69 Million in Welfare Funds http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wElqMl5TJM&feature=player_embedded

As he begins his second term, President Obama is barreling toward what one Bay Area activist predicts could be "all out warfare" with environmentalists who want him to stop the Keystone XL Pipeline, the transcontinental conduit for tar sands fuel from Canada that many scientists say could expedite climate change. Obama's political dilemma lies in the pipeline's potential upside: The State Department projects that it could deliver 6,000 temporary jobs to the U.S., where 12.2 million people are unemployed. Bay Area liberals leading the Keystone opposition say Obama has only one choice. "If he doesn't reject it," said Piedmont attorney...

There's a politically awkward but intriguing link between a former Caltrans employee accused of trying to smuggle U.S. satellite technology to China and the Chinese company making the new Bay Bridge eastern span. At the center of the case is ex-Caltrans engineer Philip Chaohui He, also known as Philip Hope, who was indicted in Colorado this month for allegedly trying to smuggle high-tech parts out of the country in boxes marked "milk powder."

An intense manhunt that stretched into Wednesday evening failed to turn up any sign of a truck driver at a Cupertino quarry suspected of methodically shooting nine co-workers before dawn, three fatally, then shooting a woman whose car he was trying to steal. Police from numerous agencies, the FBI and the U.S. Marshal's Service combed a neighborhood on the Cupertino-Sunnyvale border looking for Shareef Allman, 15-year employee of the Lehigh Southwest Cement Permanente Plant who authorities say opened fire during a routine workplace safety meeting at 4:15 a.m. Allman, 49, of San Jose, came into the meeting, "said 'hi' to...

The biggest threat to California's historic olive industry isn't the bad weather, disease, prohibitive harvesting costs and fierce competition already taking their toll, growers say: It's the federal government. The United States has promised Morocco - one of California's main competitors - hundreds of millions of dollars in aid to stimulate agriculture in that country, including rehabilitating its more than 1 million acres of existing olive trees and planting 150,000 additional acres. This while California, the only state to commercially produce olives, has been battling Morocco and Spain for the black table-olive and olive-oil markets in this country for more...

The European dream of a continent without borders appeared dead last night. A majority of EU countries voted to reimpose passport controls between countries – in response to fears they would be deluged by refugees from the revolutions in the Arab world. Fifteen out of the 22 EU countries who currently operate the Schengen Agreement said they would be in favour of its demise at a meeting of home affairs ministers in Brussels. The treaty, signed in 1985 in the Dutch town of Schengen, created a European area with no internal borders which covers more than 400million people in most...

At approximately 8:36 a.m. a male identified as Cody Nathaniel Willcoxon was seen at the entrance gate at Fort Leonard Wood with an AK-47. After being questioned by FLW Military Police the suspect fled the scene, and was pursued by members of the Pulaski County Sheriff's Dept. and St. Robert Police Department in a silver passenger car. The suspect then began to shoot at the pursuing officers, and he headed east on I-44. Spike strips were set up on I-44 which resulted in the suspect exiting at the Rolla 184 Exit. The Suspect then began shooting at Rolla Police Officers...

BART General Manager Dorothy Dugger has resigned and will be paid $958,000 in severance to leave the transit district. Her resignation been expected since February when the transit agency's board voted in an illegal closed session meeting to fire Dugger before being forced to rescind the vote.

The SUV from hell or just plain unlucky - either way, the state-owned, 2007 Toyota Highlander that's been assigned to two of San Francisco's state senators over the past four years has cost Californians well over $400,000. This costly taxpayer ride began four years ago when then-state Sen. Carole Migden traded in her state-leased, $53,000 Cadillac STS for the greener Highlander hybrid. The new wheels, which came complete with leather seats and moon roof, cost $41,078. A few months later, Migden made motor news when she went on a wild 30-mile ride through Marin and Solano counties, sideswiping a guard...

The California Air Resources Board violated state environmental law in 2008 when it adopted a comprehensive plan to reduce greenhouse gases and again last year when it passed cap-and-trade regulations, a San Francisco Superior Court judge has ruled in a tentative decision. If the decision is made final, California would be barred from implementing its ambitious plan to combat global warming until it complies with portions of the California Environmental Quality Act, though it is not yet clear what the air board would have to do to be in compliance. The state's plan, which implements AB32, the Global Warming Solutions...

As a kid, crossing the border into Mexico and back was part of Ernesto Yerena Montejano's daily life. His grandmother lived in Mexico, and so did many other relatives. What Yerena never got used to, though, were the hours upon hours spent waiting in the car to pass through immigration. It was during these moments that the young Yerena began to sense that something was particularly wrong. "Because I was always super hyper, I hated just sitting in the car. 'Why do we have to wait?' I started thinking. That's why I have to wait - it's people imposing borders...

For the real information on what is happening in Mexico http://www.blogdelnarco.com/ hit the English translation button

The Schwarzenegger administration is cutting off use of state-issued welfare debit cards at casinos across the country and on cruise ships, following a Times report that the aid cards have been used to spend or withdraw millions of dollars in benefits at popular vacation spots. More than $69 million meant to help the needy pay their rent and clothe their children was accessed in 49 other states, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Guam between January 2007 and May 2010, according to data from the California Department of Social Services. Department Director John Wagner instructed the vendor that administers the debit...

In a big boost for biofuels, Solazyme is expected to announce today that the U.S. Navy has ordered an additional 150,000 gallons of its algae-based fuel.

For Kening Ma of Ontario, bail was set at $150 million. His wife Shirley Ji got a slightly better deal – a mere $75 million. These are, to say the least, extraordinary figures. The previous highest bail on record appears to be the $100 million set in the indictment of Raj Rajaratnam, who was arrested last year in New York for allegedly masterminding a $20 million insider-trading scheme. “I’ve never seen bail set that high, and I’m a bail bondsman by trade,” Assemblyman Curt Hagman, R-Chino Hills, said. “I’ve been in the business 25 years, and the highest bail I’ve...

Hundreds of Bay Area Muslims cheered San Francisco Police Chief George Gascón as he publicly apologized Friday for comments he made a week earlier referring to the susceptibility of the Hall of Justice to a terrorist attack by local Middle Eastern residents.