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We were invited to a church group picnic today to meet friends of our son and his wife. Amidst the fun and food, the D.I.L. trots out baby pics of my son that she had gleefully pounced on as we were still unpacking at the house. Paul's friends were amazed to see proof of his wittle, cute wittle, vulnerable self as a mere babe and toddler. One young dad said to me, "It's really something to see pics of him so little and cute, because anyone will tell you that when Paul walks into a room, the testosterone level jumps...

HAZLET, N.J. (AP) - The owner of a New Jersey pest control company has been charged with animal cruelty after a squirrel was found dead in a rooftop trap. Chief Buddy Amato says a professional complex hired Critter Ridder to help get rid of the squirrel. He says a trap was set Wednesday for the animal, and no one returned to check on it. Amato says the squirrel was found "cooked to death on the hot roof" Thursday afternoon. Buck faces four counts of animal cruelty, including one that cites her for not providing the squirrel with adequate food, water...

<p>So the Parks and Recreation department is going to use a special machine to detonate some of the 100 to 150 rodents that are tearing up the grounds.</p> <p>The machine is called the Rodenator Pro. It pumps propane and oxygen into the tunnels of squirrels, then sends an electric spark that causes an explosion. The shock waves kill the squirrels and collapse their tunnels.</p>

KABUL, Afghanistan — Insurgents used two Afghan children as shields while they attempted to emplace IEDs in a road in Farah province Oct. 18. U.S. Marines with 2nd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment were conducting counter IED operations along a route in Golestan to ensure the safe passage of civilian traffic and ground convoys when they observed four insurgents attempting to emplace an IED in the road. Initially the Marines observed four adults and two children in a truck laden with burlap sacks and shovels. The adults began digging holes. Once the burlap sacks were removed from the truck and opened,...

The teenagers weren't thinking about last-minute holiday purchases when they pulled into the Montgomery County shopping mall two days before Christmas. Instead, one of the teens later told police, the group went to the crowded mall to randomly shoot someone. All four, including a 14-year-old girl, are members of the Bloods street gang in Prince George's County, authorities said. Two of them opened fire in the parking lot of Westfield Wheaton Shopping Centre when they spotted members of a rival gang, police said. In announcing the arrests yesterday, county police said the four were being held on charges of attempted...

As Diane Guzman left home Wednesday to take her children to school, tears began streaming down her face when she saw that her Tahoe's back window was shattered. Then she and her children noticed police lights up and down her block and in the neighborhood. Guzman, who lives in the 4900 block of 59th Street, was one of about 130 vehicle owners victimized overnight by vandals who randomly shot out windows in the southwest quadrant of Lubbock. Most of the vehicles targeted were SUVs. Some blocks had vehicle after vehicle with shattered windows. Most reports were concentrated in the area...

Hundreds of anti-war protesters have demonstrated amid heavy police security in the US city of Denver where the Democratic national convention is set to kick-off on Monday. It was the first in a series of protests by the group Recreate 68, whose name echoes the anti-war protests outside the party's convention in Chicago in 1968. Al Jazeera spoke to five protesters about why they were marching, and their hopes that those attending the convention would listen. Robert Joyet, Denver, Colorado I'm here to try to give a voice to the voiceless. The Democrats are supposed to be the party that...

We heard it through the grapevine - Queens has a purple pigeon. The royal-hued bird wasn't born that way, though. Someone with a sick sense of humor - or a problem with pigeons - painted him purple. "Itwas terrible," said Joe Mora, an animal lover who rescued the birdThursday from a Long Island City playground, where onlookers were gawking at the oddly-colored columbine. "It looks like this was done intentionally...it could have been blinded," Mora said. He tried coaxing the lethargic bird to eat while asking anyone and everyone for advice on how to clean paint from its feathers and...

The Democratic National Convention's Aug. 24 interfaith service in Denver is supposed to be about unity. But to a Washington, D.C., coalition that supports nontheistic views, it's about division. The Secular Coalition Group, a lobbying organization for church-and-state separation, is pushing to get an atheist on the speaker list, and contends the service is divisive because it alienates nonreligious Democrats at a time when the party needs to unite to support the presumptive nominee, Sen. Barack Obama. "We can all hold different beliefs," said the group's executive director, Lori Lipman Brown, "but we can still come together as patriotic Americans."...

The cleanliness of most NHS hospitals in England is threatened by frequent invasions of rats, fleas, bedbugs, flies and cockroaches, a report claims.

MARSHALL, Texas (AP) - An animal protection group on Friday rescued more than 200 animals, including 26 hissing cockroaches and two bearded dragons, from an eastern Texas home. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals said the animals were still being counted Friday night. The group was acting under the authority of the Harrison County Sheriff's Department and had gone to the property on a warrant regarding medical neglect. Besides the cockroaches and bearded dragons, the animals included 68 dogs, 16 rabbits, 15 guinea pigs, 13 gerbils, seven doves, two dwarf hamsters, two hedgehogs, an opossum and a...

'Cockroaches on operating tables during surgery' at RNS A parliamentary inquiry into Sydney's Royal North Shore (RNS) hospital has heard a claim of live cockroaches being killed on operating theatre tables during surgeries. A submission from retired RNS doctor Henry Sleye Hughes also claims some of the hospital's operating tables are so old, one broke in two while a patient was anaesthetised. New South Wales Health Minister Reba Meagher was the first witness to front the inquiry, set up after 32-year-old Jana Horska miscarried in the hospital's emergency room toilets after waiting two hours for treatment. Ms Meagher has told...

Along a gritty stretch of Harrison Street just west of the Dan Ryan Expressway, cars and trucks zoom past in a whoosh of hot air and and blowing dust. Horns blare, sirens scream and every few minutes a city bus rumbles past, belching exhaust. In the background, the skyline rises like a mountain range of glass and steel. This is the urban jungle -- teeming with crowds, booming to a cacophony of sound, alive in a whirl of motion. But look closely. There -- along the sidewalk -- an Eastern cottontail rabbit hops down the cracked concrete. It perks its...

Pigeon Fans Charged in Deaths of Raptors ASSOCIATED PRESS May 25, 2007 LOS ANGELES – Pigeon fanciers in California and two other states were accused of shooting, clubbing and gassing federally protected hawks and falcons, authorities said yesterday. A 14-month undercover investigation by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service led to charges being filed against a Texas man on Wednesday, three Oregon men on Monday and seven Southern California men earlier this month. The men were accused of violating the Migratory Bird Treaty Act by taking or attempting to take a protected bird. Each charge carries a maximum penalty of...

New Orleans, La. -- Today, after learning that New Orleans plans to poison rats living in the city as part of its "Rat Busters" program, PETA fired off a letter to Mayor Ray Nagin urging him to work with PETA to develop a humane, effective program to permanently reduce the rat population instead. PETA points out that poisoning rats is not only cruel but also ineffective. Rats from surrounding areas will simply move in to fill the void left by those who were killed, and as long as habitats such as abandoned buildings and food sources such as garbage are...

A new textbook is teaching Palestinian kids to hate Israel and think of fighting Israelis as a holy Islamic duty, according to an Israeli media monitoring group. The textbooks, published in December and distributed in the West Bank and Gaza to Palestinian students, deny Israel's existence and teach kids — many as young as 11 — that Palestinians are in the midst of a holy war between Muslims and their enemies, according to a Palestinian Media Watch report entitled "From nationalist battle to religious conflict."

Seattle Times Eastside bureau Neighbors in the Kirkland area had complained to public-health officials for years that one reclusive homeowner was living in a filthy home infested with rodents, which the man sometimes fed. On Monday, a King County deputy found the decomposing body of a man at the home on Finn Hill, an unincorporated area near Kirkland. The house was filled with rodents, feces and garbage. The medical examiner has not identified the man, but the health department and neighbors believe he is Thomas H. Stone, 67, who had lived in the home with his mother for some time...

An aggressive squirrel pounced on a 4-year-old boy in an attack last week in Cuesta Park in Mountain View. The attack happened as the boy's mother unwrapped a muffin during a picnic. Ironically, efforts to curb the behavior may have exacerbated the squirrels' aggressive tendencies, Muela said. This summer, the city installed new trash receptacles featuring metal tops with a latch that makes it nearly impossible for an animal to rummage through the can in search of food. Increased park ranger patrols and flier distributions cautioning against feeding the animals might have further cut the squirrels' food supply, prompting them...

A PREVIOUSLY unknown group called the Mahdi Army today threatened to target Christians in the Gaza Strip unless the Vatican apologised for comments made by Pope Benedict XVI. "All the crusaders in the Gaza Strip will be targets, all crusader meeting places will be targets, including churches, institutions and their homes" until the "cursed and unholy Vatican apologises to Muslims", it said. "We will strike all those who protect them with an iron fist," said the group in a statement handed out in Gaza City, alluding to an increased security force presence around Palestinian churches. In a traditional blessing on...

The Non-Aligned Movement demanded at a summit in Havana that Israel withdraw its troops from Gaza, release jailed Palestinian officials and repair damage caused by its military operations. A draft declaration to be adopted by leaders of the NAM countries also expresses "grave concern about the deterioration of the situation ... in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, as a result of the unlawful policies and practices being carried out by Israel." Ministers preparing the full summit, which starts on Friday, agreed late Wednesday on a document that condemned Israel for what they called "the continuing killing and injury...

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Democratic senators will try to present a no-confidence measure on Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to the full Senate on Wednesday in an effort to persuade President Bush to sack the outspoken Pentagon chief, Democratic aides said. Sen. Barbara Boxer of California was the first to move publicly on the measure, which will be attached to a defense appropriation bill, but Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada is expected to offer the proposal. Democrats in the House of Representatives are likely to offer a similar proposal, a senior Democratic aide said. The Senate's Republican leadership may prevent...

LONDON (Reuters) - Muslims criticised the government on Friday for publishing the names of 19 men who police sources say are under arrest for allegedly plotting to blow up passenger planes bound for the United States. The government instructed the Bank of England to publish the names on its Web site on Thursday, just hours after police arrested 24 people in connection with the suspected plot. Police have not named the 24 but a police source confirmed they include the 19 named by the central bank. Although the bank did not give the addresses of the 19, it listed their...

Organic food consumers are as careless of the environment as the drivers piloting those massive Humvees around our city streets. Both are wasting money and natural resources to gain snob appeal–with no other benefits

Top Hizbullah official: Group didn't expect Israel to react so strongly A senior Hizbullah official has said the group did not expect Israel to react so strongly to the capture of two Israeli soldiers. (AP)

The needle of suspicion points to the involvement of Islamist organizations in the savage acts of terrorism in Mumbai on Tuesday. But no matter the pan-Islamist links of these organizations, the inescapable reality is that political Islam can only thrive on fertile native soil. The specter of political Islam haunting India is no exception. A starting point, therefore, will be an attempt to define "Islamism" or "political Islam". Islamism, like other ideologies in modern history intensely focuses on the issues and problems of contemporary governance, society and politics. Islamists draw meaning out of Islam and transmute their interpretations into an...

Gettin' ready!!!!

The stop-snitching movement has spread across the United States, worrying police and prosecutors who often use informants to win convictions, a report said. The movement got its start two years ago in Baltimore in an underground DVD featuring armed drug dealers. Since then, the movement and T-shirts that say "Stop Snitching" have gone nationwide -- being worn by a diverse group ranging from rap artists to college professors, USA Today reported. The code of silence, David Kennedy of New York's John Jay College of Criminal Justice told the newspaper, "is breaking out in a way we've never seen before."

Hunting monsters We're great at catching child-porn criminals -- and terrible at punishing them By Linda Williamson Child pornography is, by definition, a world of dirty little secrets. The vilest of worlds, the most horrifying of secrets. Most of us will never have to glimpse this world, unlike the iron-willed police officers we dispatch to plumb its depths. But every one of us is in on the most distasteful secret of all -- the open secret of a Canadian justice system that treats the pornmongers' crime like, pardon the expression, child's play. Last week's astonishing announcement of the breakup of...

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) - A New Jersey man who recently returned from a trip to Liberia has died of an illness that had not been detected in the United States since 1989 but is common in West Africa, state health officials said Thursday. The man died of Lassa fever, a virus spread through rat droppings or urine that can be passed to other people through bodily fluids but not through causal contact, officials said. The 38-year-old man from the Trenton area was not identified by authorities. It is unlikely that other passengers on the man's flight back from Africa or...

KABUL, Afghanistan - Terror convicts and hundreds of other inmates clashed with guards and took control of parts of a high-security prison in Afghanistan's capital, officials said Sunday. Police and soldiers surrounded the Policharki Prison on Sunday as government officials attempted to negotiate with the inmates, who include al-Qaida and Taliban militants. An Associated Press reporter heard two bursts of gunfire about two hours apart from inside the prison Sunday. A few minutes after the first gunfire, an ambulance carrying an unidentified patient drove out of the prison. The trouble began Saturday night when prisoners forced guards out of a...

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Following their resounding election victory, the Islamic militants of Hamas met the question of whether they will change their stripes with a loud "no": no recognition of Israel, no negotiations, no renunciation of terror.

Publicity about a pair of ‘affluent’ Ashland panhandlers has cut handouts for some others who say they’re lucky to get enough for food Jenah Dodge panhandled in downtown Ashland Sunday carrying a cardboard sign that declared she was pregnant. A passerby cried out, "I’ve heard that one before." Dodge, who showed her swollen stomach to prove she was pregnant, just shrugged the comment off, saying, "I never lie when I get money. I believe in karma." While the 20-year-old, who says she gets $20 to $30 a day, hasn’t noticed a drop-off in donations, other panhandlers say the publicity about...

Couple fend off public ire following news article ASHLAND — Sudden notoriety and public condemnation have surprised an Ashland couple who make a living as panhandlers and refer to themselves as "affluent beggars." Jason Pancoast and Elizabeth Johnson, who have three children, think the public has been taken aback by their unconventional image of a well-fed, well-dressed family that lives off the streets. "What has happened is that we’re going along with a lifestyle that you couldn’t imagine we should have," said 34-year-old Pancoast. A story in Sunday’s Mail Tribune about the couple, who sometimes make up to $300 a...

The first time 30-year-old Elizabeth Johnson stopped a stranger on the street to ask for money, she was really nervous. She was six months pregnant and desperate, having just spent seven days in jail for shoplifting books... Now Johnson and her 34-year-old partner, Jason Pancoast, who have been together for 14 years, support themselves and their three children, 6-year-old Seth, 3-year-old Adrianne and 3-month-old Synclair, by panhandling...

THE peace process in the Middle East was in turmoil last night as Ariel Sharon, the Israeli Prime Minister who sought accommodation with the Palestinians, was in a critical condition after suffering a massive stroke. Doctors at the Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem, where Mr Sharon was rushed from his ranch in the Negev Desert, said that the Prime Minister was on a respirator. There were reports that he had suffered some paralysis. Prime ministerial powers were transferred to Ehud Olmert, the deputy leader, while Mr Sharon, 77, was undergoing surgery to alleviate pressure on the brain after a cerebral haemorrhage,...

Hours after a suicide bomber murdered five Israelis outside a Netanya mall, security forces were instructed to wage an intensified crack down on the Islamic Jihad terror organization concentrated in northern Samaria. Reinforced IDF units are expected to reoccupy villages where Islamic Jihad terrorists are hiding. The army will also severely restrict travel in the West Bank and Israel has clamped a nearly complete closure on the territories. Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz issued the instructions following a situation assessment with top IDF and Shin Bet commanders in Tel Aviv. Following the meeting, Mofaz said he would seek permission from the...

The Police Department has alerted us to a large anti-Bush protest march scheduled from noon to 5:30 p.m. on Wednesday, November 2nd. Organized by a group called “The World Can’t Wait, Drive out the Bush Regime!” the march anticipates 10,000 protesters. The parade will gather at some point on Market Street and from there it will turn north onto Kearny, then westward on Geary Street , turning south on Stockton and back to Market Street en route to Civic Center for a rally. Police expect the parade to be noisy and disruptive. The Police Department denied the parade permit, but...

Two pet pigeons were hanged and six others decapitated in two separate incidents at the same home, town police said. A Clark Street family called police at 6 p.m. Friday to report that someone had broken into a pigeon coop and decapitated one pigeon and hung another with a burlap rope. The family called again at 6 p.m. Saturday to report that five pigeons had been decapitated and a sixth hanged with a wire. South Windsor police said they have a lead in the eight bird deaths, but did not provide details.

http://inside.c-spanarchives.org:8080/cspan/cspan.csp?command=dprogram&record=546705734 Rally Anti-War Rally Act Now to Stop War & End Racism (A.N.S.W.E.R.) Washington, District of Columbia (United States) ID: 189011 - 09/24/2005 - 2:30 - $39.95 Clark, Ramsey, Attorney General (1967-1969), Department of Justice Lange, Jessica, Actress Sheehan, Cindy, Founder, Gold Star Families for Peace McKinney, Cynthia, U.S. Representative, D, Georgia (State)

Al-Qaeda Court: We Will Kill Anyone Who Makes Himself Partner to Allah and Drafts a Constitution On August 11, 2005, the Shari'a Court of Al-Qaeda in Iraq issued a communiqué threatening to kill the drafters of the Iraqi constitution, and those who promote it, and to strike at the polling places of the referendum on the constitution, which is scheduled for October 2005. "The Shari'a Court of Al-Qaeda in Iraq will act in accordance with Allah's decree, and will kill anyone who appoints himself partner to Allah and drafts a constitution of falsehood by whose laws people will act in...

Many argue that communism will never be possible because of "human nature". The essence of this false argument is the belief that a communist society would consist of an all-powerful central government that would tell everybody what to do--and would therefore undermine the creative initiative of individuals and the search for happiness. • This argument is based on two false assumptions: (1) It assumes that a communist society will look like the former Soviet Union, or the current China, North Korea, etc (ie: corrupt police states with a feudal-style ruling class) (2) It assumes that people will only work in...

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/cmp/20050715/tc_cmp/165702500 UN Panel: No Single Nation Should Control Internet Addresses Aoife White Thu Jul 14, 9:38 PM ET BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP)--A U.N. panel created to recommend how the Internet should be run in the future has failed to reach consensus but did agree that no single country should dominate. The United States stated two weeks ago that it intended to maintain control over the computers that serve as the Internet's principal traffic cops. In a report released Thursday, the U.N. panel outlined four possible options for the future of Internet governance for world leaders to consider at a November "Information...

Here is the list so far for sponcers to this hate America fest: ANSWER Code Pink UFPJ NION Al Awda World Workers Party Ruckas Revolutionary Communist party Moveon.org ACORN Campus Antiwar Network International Socialist Org Greens Party Muslim Student Association CPUSA

Vandals Attack, Cause Tanker To Overturn In Atlanta The driver of a tanker carrying 7,500 gallons diesel fuel inadvertently flipped his truck trying to avoid a hail of rocks and lit fireworks, police said. Apparently, people were throwing chunks of concrete at and setting off fireworks toward the truck as it traveled eastbound along Donald Lee Holloway Parkway, the former Bankhead Highway, just a mile west of Interstate 285, witnesses said. The driver – whose name has not been released – swerved out of harm’s way, but ended up flipping the tanker. The tanker flipped completely over while careening down...

You know, we complain a lot about the war in Iraq yet here we are just sitting here and complaining. Why don't we do something and go enlist, or go encourage like-minded family members to do so?

The man accused of stabbing to death his 8-year-old daughter and her best friend hunted his child down in a park in a fit of rage because she was supposed to be confined to the house for stealing money, prosecutors said Wednesday. A judge denied bail for 34-year-old ex-convict Jerry Hobbs after prosecutors said he admitted in videotaped and written statements to beating and stabbing his daughter Laura Hobbs and 9-year-old Krystal Tobias on Mother's Day. He claimed the older girl pulled a knife on him, but prosecutors said they doubt that. The girls were found dead Monday in a...

ATTLEBORO, Mass. (AP) A man who allegedly stomped a Canada goose and its five goslings to death in Massachusetts this weekend is in court Monday on animal cruelty charges. John Sanders says he’s “heartbroken” over the incident. He tells The Boston Globe he felt threatened because the geese were acting aggressively and moving toward him, hissing and beating their wings. Police say Sanders, an industrial engineer from Rhode Island, slipped and fell in mud after an adult goose hissed at him. According to the police report, Sanders got up angry and went into a rampage, chasing and kicking the geese....

Are you a hater? Do you consider yourself to be superior based on your race, religion, sexual orientation? Are you a self-righteous blowhard? If you are reading this, then you most likely are one. What makes you so superior? Because of your religion? What about all the Islams who are acting just as self-righteous and oppressive and "RIGHT" as you?? Moslems and Homosexuals aren't the scourge of the world. Intolerance, judgmentalism, and vice-pointing (i.e. You're going to hell because you do this or that, or don't believe exactly what I believe). You've got it all wrong as far as I'm...