American Buddhist Net

by Max Blumenthal

CNN and other major news outlets have reported that Sarah Palin has abruptly resigned as governor of Alaska. The suddenness of her announcement raises the question about whether Palin resigned to avert a major scandal. One logical place to start looking is the affair that has Alaska political circles buzzing: an alleged scandal centered around a building contractor, Spenard Building Supplies, with close ties to Palin and her husband, Todd.

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By JOE NOCERA

The victims of Bernard L. Madoff, who was sentenced to 150 years in prison on Monday for his heinous financial crimes, deserve our sympathies. Given where this column is headed, I should probably make that point right up front.

You can say, as I have previously, that they ought to have seen all the red flags, starting with his too-steady-to-be-true returns. But would you have seen them?

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Full Interview here

Somebody wanted Larry Franklin out of the way.

In court documents filed last week, a sketchy tale surfaced suggesting that someone wanted Franklin, the former Pentagon analyst who had agreed to testify against two pro-Israel activists on charges of espionage, dead.

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In an about face, the United Nations on Wednesday lavishly praised drug decriminalization in its annual report on the state of global drug policy. In previous years, the UN drug czar had expressed skepticism about Portugal's decriminalization, which removed criminal penalties in 2001 for personal drug possession and emphasized treatment over incarceration. The UN had suggested the policy was in violation of international drug treaties and would encourage "drug tourism."

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BANGKOK (AP) - Police said Friday they will investigate a criminal complaint against the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand for allegedly insulting the country's monarchy by distributing copies of remarks made by a Thai politician on the club's premises.

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LOS ANGELES (AP) — A federal judge has tentatively thrown out the convictions of a Missouri mother for her role in a MySpace hoax directed at a 13-year-old neighbor girl who ended up committing suicide.

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MUMBAI: Maharashtra’s criminal investigation department (CID) meant to probe high-profile cases will now investigate love affairs that have
resulted in marriages between Hindu girls and Muslim boys.

CID has been told to check whether Muslim boys are enticing Hindu girls as part of a ‘conspiracy’. Minister of state for home (rural) Nitin Raut had announced this in the assembly on the last day of Maharashtra’s budget session a fortnight back.

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At least three people have been killed in violent clashes in the city of Mysore in the southern Indian state of Karnataka.

Riots broke out between mobs of Hindus and Muslims after the carcass of a pig was allegedly thrown into a mosque.

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WEBSTER, Texas — Police used a Taser on a pastor and pepper spray to disperse his congregants Wednesday after the pastor allegedly interfered with a traffic stop in the church parking lot.

Congregants say they were in the Iglesia Profetica Peniel church for an early morning prayer when pastor Jose Elias Moran went to assist the stopped driver, a church member, by asking the police what had happened.

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BANGKOK, July 3 (Reuters) - Five years after a violent rebellion erupted in Thailand's southern Muslim provinces, the conflict remains shrouded in mystery.

No credible group has claimed responsibility for the near-daily attacks or made their demands public.

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JEFFERSON CITY | After coming as close as they’ve been in a decade, Missouri bikers won’t be feeling the wind in their hair any time soon, after all.

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I am no fan of the nanny state and can understand someone occasionally wanting to ride without a helmet. But the stats are there--no helmet laws equal more deaths and serious injuries, for which everyone pays, especially young riders with little experience. Even the best riders crash once every five years or so. No one wants to hit the street, which is very hard, but if you do your helmet, a good jacket, and body armor suddenly become worth millions of dollars. I have gone through many motorcycles and many tens of thousands of miles and I know lots of riders. The consensus among the best of them is the sport is way more fun if you are safe, wear the right clothes, take excellent care of your machine, and stay well within your skill limit. Good gear is not cheap, but it is worth every penny. Spring for a first-rate full-face helmet--you will get to like it and it may very well save your life. Don't even think about getting one of those ridiculous Prussian cheapo get-ups that only make you look like an idiot. ABN

Ruth Madoff got the boot from her Upper East Side penthouse today - and walked out with "just the clothes on her back," authorities said.

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Possession of pornography is now a criminal offense in Ukraine, Lenta.ru reports, after Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko signed a law to that effect today. Human rights activists and members of the Ukrainian artistic community had asked the president to veto the law.

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A knife-wielding burglar had a shock when he attacked a pensioner in his home - and discovered his victim was a retired boxer.

Senior citizen Frank Corti, 72, a former junior boxing champion is still a bit handy with his dukes.

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NEW DELHI (AFP) – A top Indian court issued a landmark ruling Thursday that decriminalised gay sex between consenting adults by declaring a colonial-era ban on homosexuality unconstitutional.

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Street drug–related deaths from overdoses drop and the rate of HIV cases crashes

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The Thai government is banning alcohol during Buddhist holidays from next week, if a proposed decree is enforced.

The Federation on Alcohol Control of Thailand (FACT) is concerned that the order for alcohol-free religious holidays will damage local tourism and related businesses, such as hotels, pubs and restaurants.

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Karen Mulder was arrested in Paris on Tuesday for repeated verbal telephone assaults on her plastic surgeon.

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SULLIVAN — A former Sullivan pastor and his sons now face 10 separate felony counts in violation of the Indiana Securities Act for an elaborate fraud that allegedly bilked millions from investors.

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New Delhi - An Indian court sentenced a man to two years in jail for the first conviction in the anti-Christian violence in the eastern state of Orissa, media reports said Wednesday.

A special court at Phulbani, seat of the communally sensitive Kandhamal district, sentenced a 58-year-old man for setting fire to a house and threatening to murder a man from the minority Christian community, the NDTV network reported.

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Glenn Greenwald

...The interrogation and detention regime implemented by the U.S. resulted in the deaths of over 100 detainees in U.S. custody -- at least. While some of those deaths were the result of "rogue" interrogators and agents, many were caused by the methods authorized at the highest levels of the Bush White House, including extreme stress positions, hypothermia, sleep deprivation and others.

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MORELIA (Mexico) - MEXICAN police on Tuesday found the remains of six people tortured and shot to death in a western state that is a focus of the government's war against drug cartels.

Police found the bodies of five men in a hole on a remote dirt road near the city of Apatzingan, Michoacan, the state prosecutor's office said in a statement. The bodies were blindfolded, gagged and showed signs of torture and multiple gunshot wounds - trademarks of drug-related homicides.

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The Central Intelligence Agency crucified a prisoner in Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad, according to a report published in The New Yorker magazine.

“A forensic examiner found that he (the prisoner) had essentially been crucified; he died from asphyxiation after having been hung by his arms, in a hood, and suffering broken ribs,” the magazine’s Jane Mayer writes in the magazine’s June 22nd issue. “Military pathologists classified the case a homicide.” The date of the murder was not given.

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A person familiar with the investigation said 10 more people would face federal charges by the time the probe into the multibillion-dollar fraud is complete. So far, only Madoff and an accountant accused of failing to make basic auditing checks have been criminally charged.

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ENCINITAS — Francine Busby says she will demand an explanation from the Sheriff's Department about deputies breaking up a fundraising party held for her in Cardiff and arresting the host.

The party was Friday night in the 1300 block of Rubenstein Avenue, the home of Shari Barman, a Busby supporter.

It ended with Barman, 60, being arrested and jailed on suspicion of battery on a peace officer, and resisting, delaying and obstructing a peace officer.

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Well-described. Sounds ludicrous. A side note--cops are trained to always be in in total control of the situation before them. When people threaten their control in any way, they all too often respond with pepper spray, Tasers, punches, etc. From the large number of police overreaction incidents we have seen in the past few years, it does appear that police training is missing a practical procedure for dealing with people who are merely upset and may fail to appreciate the immediate needs of the police officer and/or respond quickly to their demands. If police themselves can overreact in a situation like this one, they ought to be able to understand that many people will overreact to them. Seems that with better police training, this middle area (between instant citizen obedience and actual dangerous resistance) could be handled much better. Similarly, we see a fair number of police chases turning into fatal crashes and/or beatings/shootings of the person who either ran or drove away. We are usually expected to understand the emotions of the police officers who get pumped up during the chase and are made to feel angry at the person being chased. The problem here is similar to the Encinitas incident in that all of us are equipped with a basic fight/flight instinct. If someone pulled over for a traffic violation loses control of their instincts and drives away, this does not always mean that the person is a violent felon or that they deserve to be beaten or shot when caught. On many levels, it is quite normal to run when we feel threatened--by the police or anyone else. I am sure than many police officers understand this, but it does not seem that all of them do. Cops have a tough job dealing with the worst sides of people day in and day out, but that does not mean they should pepper spray people for small acts of defiance or for becoming emotional in situations like the one in Encinitas. I am sure that there are many occasions where a softer or slower approach will gain control of the situation much more quickly and effectively than a violent one. ABN

Another example of an overreaction: Deputy accused of beating teen was offered plea deal.

U.S. District Court Judge Denny Chin sentenced Bernard Madoff to the maximum 150 years in prison today for running the biggest Ponzi scheme in history, calling the crime: “extraordinarily evil.”

“Symbolism is important, (and your) breach of trust was massive,” Chin told Madoff at a New York hearing as the judge condemned the 71-year-old to spend the rest of his life in jail.

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Good photo here: Bye, Bye Bernie: Ponzi king Madoff sentenced to 150 years

From tech stocks to high gas prices, Goldman Sachs has engineered every major market manipulation since the Great Depression - and they're about to do it again

By MATT TAIBBI
ROLLING STONE MAGAZINE. JULY 9-23, 2009

The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it's everywhere. The world's most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money. In fact, the history of the recent financial crisis, which doubles as a history of the rapid decline and fall of the suddenly swindled-dry American empire, reads like a Who's Who of Goldman Sachs graduates.

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In his excellent new essay arguing that "Goldman Sachs has engineered every major market manipulation since the Great Depression", Matt Taibbi writes:

In a society governed passively by free markets and free elections, organized greed always defeats disorganized democracy.

I agree.

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A French Guiana court has jailed four church members for up to 12 years for the exorcism of an epileptic teenager who was found dead attached to a cross.

The members of the Celestial Church of Christ were jailed on Wednesday for terms of three to 12 years for "wilful violence that caused death" for 15-year-old Roger Bosse in 2005 in the South American territory.

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