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Arctic char is now on the bears' menu at the Polar Bear Habitat and Heritage Village in Cochrane. The recent change was prompted by a university study of the polar bears' adaptability to various diets. Arctic char is part of the bears' natural diet in the wild. Markus Dyke, who lived in Nunavut for 11 years and taught science at the Arctic College in Iqaluit, has been conducting the study for a PhD he's working on through the Department of Biology at Queen's University in Kingston. Dyke said the idea for the study was triggered by environmentalists who suggest global...

A U.S. human rights activist trying to raise global attention about the suffering of the North Korean people has crossed into the reclusive state, other activists and South Korean media said on Saturday. Park told to Reuters in Seoul earlier this week that he saw it as his duty as a Christian to make the journey and did not want the U.S. government to try to free him. "I don't want President Obama to come and pay to get me out. But I want the North Korean people to be free," Park said on Wednesday before departing for China. "Until...

Conservative bloggers are calling for a boycott of the company. Executives say the series, in which Santa is warned the North Pole could melt before Christmas, was intended to inspire children.St. Louis - First, Chicken Little warned children that the sky was falling. And now Build-a-Bear Workshop has warned children that the North Pole could disappear before Christmas. The Missouri-based company has found itself in hot water, defending an animated series on its website featuring polar bears, penguins and Mrs. Claus, as Santa is warned that global warming is "a serious situation." Conservative bloggers reposted the videos online and called...

As President Obama arrives in Copenhagen hoping to seal an elusive deal on climate change, his approval rating on dealing with global warming has crumbled at home and there is broad opposition to spending taxpayer money to encourage developing nations to curtail their energy use, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll. .... At the same time, there's growing negativity toward the president's handling of the broader global warming issue. Around the 100-day mark of Obama's presidency, 61 percent approved of the way he was dealing with the issue. Approval slumped to 54 percent in June and to 45...

An attempted terrorist attack on a Christmas Day flight began with a pop and a puff of smoke - sending passengers scrambling to subdue a Nigerian man who claimed to be acting on orders from al Qaeda to blow up the airliner, officials and travelers said. -snip- Mutallab has been in the U.S. before, having received a visa in June 2008. His listed residence was in Houston, Texas. Authorities had placed him on a preliminary watch list, meaning they wanted to gather more information about him, but law enforcement subsequently lost track of him.

Aside from ideologues, hydrocarbon haters, Gaia worshipers, profiteers and power-grabbing politicians, most of the sentient world now realizes that the hysteria over global warming disasters is based on dubious to fraudulent temperature data, analyses, models, reports and peer reviews. Climate Research Unit emails, HARRY_READ_ME.txt computer memos, and blatant tampering with Australian, Russian, UK and US temperature data make the scandal impossible to ignore or explain away. They certainly helped Copenhagen descend into an expensive, carbon-emitting gabfest, and cause China and India to reject any deal that would force them to curtail their energy generation, economic growth and poverty reduction programs....

The Metropolitan Police are carrying out searches in the UK after a suspected al Qaeda operative allegedly attempted to blow up a US passenger jet. The man, said to be a student at a British university, is accused of trying to blow up a transatlantic aeroplane with explosives strapped to his leg on Christmas Day. The Nigerian man caused panic as the jet was about to land at Detroit with 278 people aboard when he apparently tried to detonate some sort of bomb. He was overpowered by passengers and crew after the device failed to ignite properly. Sources have since...

Journalists make a hash of the decade that was.Journalists, long on confidence but chronically short of knowledge, have been lately offering end-of-decade summations. The fact that the first decade of the 21st century doesn't actually end until this time next year hasn't slowed them down; and there's universal agreement that this was, as Andy Serwer wrote in Time, "the decade from hell." No doubt, deep in the bowels of the Time-Life Building in Manhattan, where neither Life nor Time exists in the form they did when the building was constructed--and where neither may survive once the decade really does end--the...

Islamists claim killing of Russian priest (AFP) – 7 hours ago MOSCOW — An Islamist militant group based in Russia's North Caucases has claimed the killing last month of an Orthodox priest who was an outspoken critic of Islam. "One of our brothers who has never been to the Caucases took up the oath of (former independent Chechen president Doku Umarov) and expressed his desire to execute the damned Sysoyev," said a statement on the Kavkazcenter.com website. Daniil Sysoyev, 35, was killed on November 20 when masked gunman walked into Saint Thomas's church in southern Moscow and shot him four...

WASHINGTON | By brokering a climate deal last week in Copenhagen, President Barack Obama has committed himself to a more daunting task: passing comprehensive climate legislation in the Senate next year. Although many senators — especially key Republicans — have shown little appetite for backing another ambitious bill after the polarizing health care debate, it is clear that enacting legislation to cap the U.S. carbon dioxide output and allow polluters to trade emission permits is essential to delivering on the pledges that Obama made to other world leaders.

"Climategate" has been discovered by the News Sentinel - about two weeks after other news organizations. But it responded with poo-poo articles, reporting the "consensus" via quotes from well known proponents of man-caused global warming. Some years ago, maybe 30, I heard a lecture during which was shown a plot of carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere versus the average earth's temperature. There was obviously a strong correlation. But teachers of courses about statistics always caution care in cause-effect conclusions from interesting correlations. More than 60 years ago, my statistics professor told the class that the most perfect natural correlation...

PHOENIX — A 5-year-old girl abducted by a man as she played outside her Phoenix home Friday was rescued hours later after police chased down the suspect's pickup and found her "alive and well" inside, officials said. Natalie Flores was located around 9 p.m. after a patrol officer spotted the truck of the man accused of kidnapping her, Sgt. Andy Hill said. "We have had our Christmas miracle," Hill said. "She is alive and well."

Environmental advocates and lawyers in Washington were wildly enthusiastic over the recent announcement by Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson that carbon dioxide is dangerous to the health and welfare of Americans. The timing came just before the global warming conference in Copenhagen. Green groups were heartened because they believe they finally have manufacturers right where they've always wanted them: vulnerable to piecemeal regulation by an activist EPA without deliberation by Congress. Lawyers were rubbing their hands together in anticipation of all the litigation that will come their way as companies fight for their lives to be free of burdensome...

Be careful where and what you eat when traveling during the holidays — a recent inspection of nearly 800 restaurants at 10 airports found dangerous food conditions, USA Today reported. The newspaper, conducting its own study, found tuna salad and turkey sandwiches stored in warm temperatures, raw meat cross-contaminating ready-to-eat items, rat droppings, and kitchens without soap. — From October 2008 through March 2009, inspectors found rat droppings or other rodent issues at least 12 times at the Atlanta Airport. JFK International Airport in New York was cited at least 11 times for mice between October 2008 and August 2009.

AGJ comment: we spilt the Motion up into the key parts so our readers could quickly see what Orly is asking Judge Carter to agree to. AGJ comment: The US Attorneys representing Obama said Carter could not hear the case BECAUSE of Jurisdiction. They maintained that only a court in Washington DC could hear the case because Obama resided in Washington. Orly agreed! — Wow! AGJ comment: Bottom line, Orly made a brilliant move. By agreeing to what Obama’s Attorneys argued for they cannot now go back on their request. Orly in effect called their bluff. Now the case should...

Seconds after passengers spotted flames climbing above the back of a window seat midway down the left side of Northwest Flight 253, Friday's routine descent toward Detroit's main airport turned into horror, mayhem and instant heroism. Just as the widebody Airbus A330 made a rumbling sound as the landing gear started down, horrified travelers in seats around the young Nigerian later detained as a terrorism suspect started screaming, according to eyewitness reports by passengers. Flight attendants quickly joined the hubbub around the man in seat 19A, repeatedly screaming "What are you doing?" There was a pop and then smoke wafted...

Yes, of course, brave young Americans are in those far off lands defending our country. God bless them. But the war's front is here at home – the war we are having with ourselves. After the horrendous attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, a few Christian pastors stepped up to say that the unprecedented violation of America's homeland was a sign of weakness within our nation. They weren't talking about how we gather intelligence or how we check travelers at the airport. The management best-seller from the 1960s, "The Peter Principle," points out that one sign of an organization or an...

WASHINGTON -- * The Senate voted yesterday to raise the ceiling on the government debt to $12.4 trillion, a massive increase over the current limit and a political problem that President Obama has promised to address next year. The Senate's rare Christmas Eve vote, 60-39, follows House passage last week and raises the debt ceiling by $290 billion. The vote split completely along party lines, with Democrats voting to raise the limit and Republicans voting against doing so. There was one defection on each side, by senators up for re-election next year: GOP Sen. George Voinovich of Ohio and Democratic...

WASHINGTON — - In what was described as an act of terrorism, a Nigerian passenger attempted to ignite an incendiary device Friday aboard a Northwest Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Detroit as the plane began its approach for landing, federal officials said. The plane landed safely shortly before noon. The suspected would-be bomber suffered burns as the result of his attempt, and two of the other 277 passengers reported minor injuries, authorities said. FBI agents were investigating the incident, which a White House official said was thought to be an attempted act of terrorism. "He was trying to ignite some...

On his own terms, President Obama is a failure. During the presidential campaign, he fought hammer and tongs with Hillary Clinton over the best way to govern. Clinton, casting herself as a battle-scarred political veteran, argued that diligence, dedicated detail work and working the system were essential for success. Obama, donning the mantle of a redeemer descending from divine heights, argued that his soaring rhetoric was more than "just words"; it was a way out of the poisonous, partisan gridlock of yesteryear. Early on, in New Hampshire, he proclaimed that his "rival in this race is not other candidates. It's...

U.S. rights activist crosses into North Korea - reports Jon Herskovitz, Reuters December 26, 2009, 4:00 pm Send SEOUL (Reuters) - A U.S. human rights activist trying to raise global attention about the suffering of the North Korean people has crossed into the reclusive state, other activists and South Korean media said on Saturday. There has been no comment from North Korea, which usually arrests foreign border crossers on site, or from U.S. officials. Activists told Reuters that Robert Park, 28, had crossed into North Korea from China on Friday, while South Korea's Yonhap news agency and the Kukmin Ilbo...

Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, a Nigerian national, is attending engineering school at the University College of London (UCL), according to federal officials.

The Climate change in the world including the Middle East has become something actual. It's hard to stop it, but it could be decrease as much as possible . . . These destructive changes are going to be active until the year of 2050, when the temperature is going to rise between 2.7 and 3.7 C. This, as a result, will melt the ice around the world and will increase sea level. The population will multiply in the Middle East, at the same time, the demand on underground water sources will hike up, the water on the surface such as,...

SNIPPET: "It may have been one of the coldest days this season, but that did not deter angry protesters from gathering at the residence of Youssef Al-Khattab, a Jewish convert to Islam who has been tagged as an Al-Qaida sympathizer." SNIPPET: "Sunday’s protest came after Al-Khattab posted comments on his website, revolutionmuslim.com, supporting the Fort Hood attacks and other violent acts of radical Muslims. He also has made several anti-Semitic comments on his site, including saying he wants liquid drain cleaner to be thrown in Jews’ faces, and calling for the outdoor huts some build during the holiday of Sukkot...

Envoy decries illegal migration to Holland From Laolu Akande (New York) and Abiodun Fagbemi (Ilorin) POUNDED at home and desperate to keep hope alive, Nigerians are among the top nationalities fleeing their own country and seeking asylum in industrialized nations, according to the United Nations (UN). Meanwhile, the Ambassador Plenipotentiary of Nigeria to The Netherlands, Dr. Nimota Akanbi, has deplored illegal movement of many Nigerians into The Netherlands. Although Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia were three most affected countries, Nigeria was still grouped among the other "main countries of origin of asylum seekers" in mostly western nations as at the second...

Note: The following text is a quote: Ringleader of International Truck Theft Conspiracy Sentenced to Prison HOUSTON—A Houston man who recruited others to steal and transport millions of dollars of truck tractors, trailers and other heavy equipment to Central America has been sentenced to prison, United States Attorney Tim Johnson announced today. United States District Judge David Hittner sentenced Yuri David Melendez, 43, to a total of nine years in federal prison for his leadership role in the truck theft scheme and in an unrelated narcotics charge during a hearing today. Melendez, who was convicted of conspiracy to export and...

Romulus, Michigan (CNN) -- A passenger on an international flight bound for the United States Friday ignited a small explosive device shortly before landing in a move the White House called an attempted terrorist attack, a senior administration official said. Another passenger on the Northwest flight from Amsterdam, Netherlands, to Detroit, Michigan, quickly helped subdue and isolate the young male suspect with the aid of the cabin crew, passenger Syed Jafry said. The suspect, identified by a U.S. government official as 23-year-old Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, was placed in custody and is being treated for second- and third-degree burns on his...

Thai authorities' high-profile inspection of 35 tons of North Korean weapons was nearing completion Friday, as clues emerging around the world shed light on the business of arms trafficking — and the lengths smugglers take to hide their identities. Two weeks after Thai authorities impounded the aircraft and arrested its five-man crew, the key questions of who organized the shipment and where it was headed remain unanswered. But a trail of companies and fake addresses from New Zealand to Barcelona has illustrated how the traffickers bounced around the globe to lightly regulated countries to disguise their movements. Over the past...

Mariah Jordat, 8, was reading her Bible during quiet time at Madison Park Elementary School in Oldbridge, N.J., when her teacher told her to put the book away. Mariah put her Bible under her desk, but that wasn't away enough. The teacher banished the book to the student's backpack. The persecution hurt her feelings and confused her, said Michelle Jordat, the little girl's mother. "Why would my teacher say that I can't read the Bible when I'm not bothering anybody else?" It's ridiculous for a school to forbid a child, let alone one at such an impressionable age, to read...

Extending Federal Benefits to Same-Sex Couples Will Cost $898M, CBO Says Extending federal benefits to same-sex couples will cost taxpayers $898 million over the next nine years, according to an analysis of "domestic partnership" legislation released by the Congressional Budget Office. FILE: U.S. Rep. Tammy Baldwin, center, and U.S. Rep. Jared Polis, right, both openly gay members of Congress. Extending federal benefits to same-sex couples will cost taxpayers $898 million over the next nine years, according to an analysis of "domestic partnership" legislation released last by the Congressional Budget Office. The CBO said in its Dec. 17 report that the...

The U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency has signaled its intent to consider a rash of foreign military sales to Egypt, including the transfer of anti-tank missiles. The government of Egypt has also requested anti-ship missiles, engine upgrades for its fleet of F-16 jet fighters and Fast Missile Crafts worth an estimated $1.18 billion. The proposed sale is expected to "contribute to the foreign police and national security objectives of the United States by helping to improve the security of a friendly country which has been and continues to be an important force for political stability and economic progress in the...

Hilarious news items from the future such as Hillary Captured and Barack Claims To Be Lost Imam fill the future news section of the game that this article reviews. With real T.V. Interviews and Radio clips of the founders, one by Breitbart TV, the man who exposed ACORN, the game is decidedly anti-Obama and anti-government and was created by a combination of Liberty loving Ron Paul Supporters and Conservatives.

The HMAS Melbourne has demonstrated the navy's updated naval air defense capability with the firing of a Standard Missile (SM-2) off Jervis Bay. Minister for Defense Personnel, Materiel and Science Greg Combet said in a written statement that the SM-2 would be further enhanced throughout 2010. "This missile firing was the first time an SM-2 has been fired from an Adelaide-class frigate," Combet said. "The missile was prepared, launched and supported in flight before engaging a target." Combet said Melbourne is now equipped with two modern missile systems to combat anti-ship missiles and aircraft. "HMAS Melbourne is an Adelaide-class guided-missile...

Last week, during a bit of banter on Fox News, my colleague Jonah Goldberg reminded me of something I’d all but forgotten. Last September, during his address to Congress on health care, Barack Obama declared: “I am not the first president to take up this cause, but I am determined to be the last.” Dream on. The monstrous mountain of toxic pustules sprouting from greasy boils metastasizing from malign carbuncles that passed the Senate on Christmas Eve is not the last word in “health” “care” but the first. It ensures that this is all we’ll be talking about, now and...

Catholic Group Supports Senate on Abortion Aid By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK December 25, 2009 WASHINGTON — In an apparent split with Roman Catholic bishops over the abortion-financing provisions of the proposed health care overhaul, the nation’s Catholic hospitals have signaled that they back the Senate’s compromise on the issue, raising hopes of breaking an impasse in Congress and stirring controversy within the church. The Senate bill, approved Thursday morning, allows any state to bar the use of federal subsidies for insurance plans that cover abortion and requires insurers in other states to divide subsidy money into separate accounts so that...

Check this entry: Naughty: Sen. James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.), a vacuum for oil industry political contributions whose nonsensical denials of climate-change science in the face of vanishing ice sheets and decaying coral reefs make him Earth's Public Enemy No. 1. Nice: Sens. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), who are working diligently to craft a bipartisan climate bill despite obstructionism from the likes of Inhofe.

There is no denying the breathtaking visual beauty of the $400 million 3-D sci-fi epic Avatar. It is already a global box office smash, taking in more than $200 million worldwide in its opening weekend. The special effects are simply stunning, and some of the action sequences are spectacular. But Avatar is also a distinctly political work of art, with a strong anti-American and anti-Western message. It can be read on several levels – a critique of the Iraq War, an assault on the US-led War on Terror, a slick morality tale about the ‘evils’ of Western imperialism, a futuristic...

Fannie / Freddie - What Does Treasury Know? by: Karl DenningerDecember 25, 2009 On Christmas Eve one would think you could have a nice evening with your family. Little did I know what Timmy Geithner had up his sleeve: The two companies, the largest sources of mortgage financing in the U.S., are currently under government conservatorship and have caps of $200 billion each on backstop capital from the Treasury. Under the new agreement announced today, these limits can rise as needed to cover net worth losses through 2012. I see. But I thought housing was getting better? That's what I...

An al Qaida-linked suspect who allegedly tried to blow up a transatlantic plane is studying at a UK university, it has been reported. The Nigerian is accused of trying to detonate a powdery substance on a plane from Amsterdam as it prepared to land at Detroit with 278 people on board. US sources said he was subdued by passengers and has since claimed to have been acting for al Qaida. He has been named by ABC News as Abdul Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, an engineering student at University College London, with the broadcaster citing US government documents. The suspect, who has...

December 26, 2009 Iranian Student Protester Neda Soltan Is Times Person of the Year Neda Soltan did not vote in her country's election, but was appalled by the rigging of the result. Since she was shot in a democracy protest, her face has become an opposition symbol Neda Soltan was not political. She did not vote in the Iranian presidential election on June 12. The young student was appalled, however, by the way that the regime shamelessly rigged the result and reinstalled Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Ignoring the pleas of her family, she went with her music teacher eight days later to...

When I first encountered the Persian word mofangi, I struggled to grasp its meaning. It implies a certain timidity, physical weakness, and awkwardness. Seeking to put some flesh on that definition, my language tutor told me to envision Grand Ayatollah Hosein Ali Montazeri. "He's more than a little mofangi," remarked the tutor, expressing the condescension that well-educated, leftwing Iranians often have for the clergy who stole their revolution. That was in the mid 1980s, and Montazeri was the number two cleric in Iran, a mullah who once passionately believed in exporting Iran's revolutionary tumult and was instrumental in building the...

BELLEVUE, Wash., Dec. 21 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A ten percent drop in murders during the first six months of this year at a time when gun sales were up dramatically is more proof that there is no correlation between gun ownership and violent crime, the Second Amendment Foundation said today. The FBI released data Monday that shows murders dropped by 10 percent from the same period in 2008. Meanwhile, according to data released by the FBI's National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) shows that during the first six months of this year, gun sales were up. January 2009 background checks...

JENNINGS, La. — A South Carolina family passing through Jennings on their way to Texas was pulled over, hauled off to a church, "tried" for not stopping to enjoy local hospitality and "sentenced" to gumbo, presents and a tour."We do this every year at Christmastime to some unsuspecting out-of-town person," said Gayle Jones, a member of the Jennings Optimist Club, which has made it part of a more than 30-year holiday tradition. Neither Leonard nor Lori Pavia of Greer, S.C., could figure out why the deputy had pulled them over as they headed to see friends in McAllen, Texas. "I...

SCIENCE is one of the great achievements of the human mind and the biggest reason why we live not only longer but more vigorously in our old age, in addition to all the ways in which it provides us with things that make life easier and more enjoyable. Like anything valuable, science has been seized upon by politicians and ideologues, and used to forward their own agendas. This started long ago, as far back as the 18th century, when the Marquis de Condorcet coined the term "social science" to describe various theories he favored. In the 19th century, Karl Marx...

The Cardinal who broke his leg during Christmas attack on Pope: Who is Card. Etchegaray? 87 year old Roger Marie Élie Cardinal Etchegaray was born September 25, 1922 and ordained a Priest July 13, 1947. He is Cardinal-Bishop of the Porto-Santa Rufina Diocese in Italy and serves as President Emeritus of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, which was established in January 1967 and "promotes justice and peace in the world in accordance with the Gospel and the social teaching of the Church." After the attack on Pope Benedict XVI last night during Midnight Mass at the Vatican, it...

In January 2009, retired Gen. Mauro Tello Quiñones took command of a police unit charged with combating drug-related violence in the popular Mexican tourist destination of Cancún. The assignment lasted just one week. In early February, Tello and two aides were kidnapped and killed. Before murdering Tello, the assailants broke his arms and legs and tortured him for hours. The incident provoked shock across Mexico, with the governor of Quintana Roo state calling it "truly horrible." Even by the standards of the violent drug war that has consumed Mexico of late, this crime stood out for its brazenness and brutality....

A White House official said the incident was an attempted act of terrorism. The FBI is investigating and President Obama, celebrating Christmas in Hawaii, was told of the incident about three hours after the plane landed, officials said. Obama has told White House officials that all appropriate measures be taken to increase security for air travel, a spokesman said. Nevertheless, officials said, they are not prepared to raise the terrorism alert level, currently at orange -- or the second-highest of five levels -- for domestic and international air travel.

(Is Obama a star for the ages, or is he fading fast?) In February 2007, Barack Obama announced he would stand for the presidency of the United States in 2008. One year into that far-from-inevitable presidency, no figure has ever so thoroughly pulled toward himself the nation's political energy. He's a star alright. One of his most eager admirers, Bruce Springsteen, sang at the dawn of his own emergence years back: "I burst just like a supernova." But here's NASA's definition of a supernova: It's a stellar explosion, an incredibly luminous star, able to outshine a whole galaxy . ....

BookTV discussion scheduled for tonight at 8:00 CT on CSPAN 2.

Sprott Asset Management has "pulled forward" something I intended to cover in my "year end review" Ticker but since he's put it out there I think I need to cover it now: As a thought experiment, we separated all the various US Treasury owners and asked our readers whether each group could afford to increase their 2009 treasury purchases by 200%. In the end, we surmised that most groups couldn’t, and prepared our readers for the worst. Almost seven months later, however, nothing particularly bad has happened on the US debt front. There have been no failed auctions, no sovereign...