U.S., China to work on potential Iran sanctions: (NBC) Presidents Barack Obama and Hu Jintao of China are instructing their diplomats to work on potential sanctions to make clear to Iran the cost of continued nuclear defiance, the White House said Monday.
The two leaders met on the sidelines of a U.S.-hosted summit on nuclear proliferation.
White House national security aide Jeff Bader sought to find common ground at their hour-long meeting. Bader said the Chinese were “prepared to work with us.”
He called it another sign of international unity on the issue.
Obama optimistically opened the 47-nation nuclear summit, boosted by Ukraine’s announcement that it will give up its weapons-grade uranium. More sobering: Obama’s counterterrorism chief pointedly warned that al-Qaida is vigorously pursuing material and expertise for a bomb.
Ukraine’s decision dovetailed with Obama’s goal of securing all vulnerable nuclear materials worldwide within four years — an objective that the White House hopes will be endorsed by all summit countries at a closing session Tuesday, even if the means to accomplish it are unclear...
Under NYC, police patrol subways for terrorists: (NBC) Moscow bombings, Zazi plot keep NYPD adjusting to potential threats.
...Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, officials at the nation's largest police department insist the city remains the nation's No. 1 terror target, devoting extra resources to protecting Wall Street, the Empire State Building, Brooklyn Bridge and other high-profile potential targets.
But perhaps the biggest worry — spurred by the recent bombing in Moscow and a foiled plot in New York — is the subway, a porous, 24-hour-a-day system with 468 stations and an average of 5 million riders a day.
Authorities have employed bomb-sniffing dogs, high-tech explosive detection devices and security cameras to protect the sprawling subway system...
The NYPD's counterterrorism division has sought to defend the subway by studying mass transit attacks in Madrid, London, Bombay and, most recently, Moscow to learn about the latest terror tactics...
Among the adjustments the NYPD has made in recent years:
Deploying roving teams of officers with heavy arms and dogs to sweep subway stations and trains;
Outfitting officers with pager-size radiation detectors to guard against a 'dirty bomb' nuclear device;
Conducting tens of thousands of random bag searches each year;
Training officers in "hostile surveillance detection" — the ability to spot suspects casing the subway system...
This is a long article. Click on the link to read more.
Pakistan's Prime Minister simply was not convincing in his CNN interview, claiming he does not know where Bin Laden is located or about the safety of his country's nuke stockpile will not fall - or be sold - into the hands of the terrorists.
Pakistan’s nuke materials at risk: (NBC)
Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani said Monday that his country's nuclear weapons are well-guarded, rebutting misgivings by nuclear experts about the safety of the small but growing arsenal.
"Islamabad has taken effective steps for nuclear safety, security and nonproliferation through extensive legislative, regulatory and administrative framework," said Gilani, who was in Washington for a historic 47-nation nuclear security summit.
A new report from a Harvard nonproliferation expert, released Monday, finds that Pakistan's stockpile faces "immense" threats and is the world's least secure from theft or attack.
President Barack Obama is hosting the summit, which he hopes will help him reach his goal of ensuring that all nuclear materials worldwide are secured from diversion within four years.
Obama is trying to persuade world leaders to confront the threat that nuclear arms might fall into the hands of terrorists, a possibility he describes as the biggest threat to global security...
The study, commissioned by the Nuclear Threat Initiative and released by Harvard University's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, found that Pakistan faces formidable risks in safeguarding its nuclear warheads...
New name emerges for Supreme short list: (NBC) White House: Montana judge is under consideration, Hillary Clinton is not.
President Barack Obama's candidates for the Supreme Court include a new name, federal appeals court Judge Sidney Thomas of Montana, and at least six others who were contenders when Obama chose his first high court nominee last year, The Associated Press has learned.
Among the others under consideration are former Georgia Chief Justice Leah Ward Sears, federal appeals court judges Diane Wood and Merrick Garland, Solicitor General Elena Kagan, Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano.
The president is seriously reviewing about 10 people as a potential nominee to replace Justice John Paul Stevens, who is retiring this summer...
So far, most of the known candidates under Obama's review are familiar within Washington's political and legal circles:
Wood, an appeals court judge in Chicago who has worked at the State Department, the Justice Department and in private practice. Like Obama, she taught at the University of Chicago Law School.
Kagan, who stepped down as dean of Harvard Law School to become the nation's first female solicitor general. Like Obama, she has her law degree from Harvard and taught at the University of Chicago Law School.
Granholm, the Michigan governor and former federal prosecutor and Michigan attorney general.
Napolitano, the homeland security chief who is a former Arizona governor and a former federal prosecutor.
Garland, of the federal appeals court in Washington, a former high-ranking Justice Department official.
Sears, the first black female to serve as the chief justice of the Georgia Supreme Court, who is now in private practice after a long career on the bench...
How lying can earn you millions for your wallet. Just imitate the hate speech and bizarre ramblings of Glenn Beck and you won't need some success guru. There really is a rot in America that people like this are well paid to destroy America from within. Who needs terrorists when you have Palin, Beck and Limbaugh working for Bin Laden?
Glenn Beck Inc.: (NBC) Entertainer or revolutionary? Either way, what he does earns millions.
Five and a half hours before showtime Glenn Beck still isn't quite sure how he'll provide tonight's entertainment, "The Future of History" — two hours of monologue (and answers to preselected questions) before a nearly sellout crowd of 1,000 or so people at the Nokia Theatre in New York City's Times Square. "But that's me — I'm the next-event guy," says Beck, flanked by two bodyguards as he walks the four blocks between the Fox News Channel studio, where he has pretaped the day's show, and the theater. He won't have to create tonight's performance from scratch, since he's left a long trail of words — millions of passionate, angry, weepy, moralizing, corny, offensive words — in his wake. "The body of work is pretty much the same," explains Beck, 46. "What I'm trying to do is get this message out about self-empowerment, entrepreneurial spirit and true Americanism — the way we were when we changed the world, when Edison was alone, failing his 2,000th time on the lightbulb..."
With a deadpan, Beck insists that he is not political: "I could give a flying crap about the political process." Making money, on the other hand, is to be taken very seriously, and controversy is its own coinage. "We're an entertainment company," Beck says. He has managed to monetize virtually everything that comes out of his mouth. He gets $13 million a year from print (books plus the ten-issue-a-year magazine Fusion). Radio brings in $10 million. Digital (including a newsletter, the ad-supported Glennbeck.com and merchandise) pulls in $4 million. Speaking and events are good for $3 million and television for $2 million. Over several days in mid-March Beck allowed a reporter to follow him through his multimedia incarnations, with one exception, his 5 p.m. daily show on Fox News, which attracts just under 3 million viewers. (FORBES has a relationship with that channel via Forbes on Fox...)
There is still more of the article if you can stomach it. Click on the title.
Here's a story that does not surprise. Yet there is Toyota: lying and deceiving and misdirecting all over the place in the current lawsuits across the country. All that customer trust really makes you want to run out and buy a Toyota now doesn't it?
The word here locally from a Toyota dealer in my part of the country, Louisiana, is that Toyota is closing plants all over the place. If that's true then how can they claim a 41% increase in sales??? Either way, the local dealer related that it's going to be increasingly difficult to get cars in the coming months. That's going to mean lower sales figures. It will be intriguing to watch if Toyota claims an increase in sales in the next month or two. So, then the big question will be: Where did they get the cars to sell? :)
Toyota’s legal tactics: Deception and evasion: (NBC) Toyota has routinely engaged in questionable, evasive and deceptive legal tactics when sued, frequently claiming it does not have information it is required to turn over and sometimes even ignoring court orders to produce key documents, an Associated Press investigation shows.
In a review of lawsuits filed around the country involving a wide range of complaints — not just the sudden acceleration problems that have led to millions of Toyotas being recalled — the automaker has hidden the existence of tests that would be harmful to its legal position and claimed key material was difficult to get at its headquarters in Japan. It has withheld potentially damaging documents and refused to release data stored electronically in its vehicles.
For example, in a Colorado product liability lawsuit filed by a man whose young daughter was killed in a 4Runner rollover crash, Toyota withheld documents about internal roof strength tests despite a federal judge's order that such information be produced, according to court records. The attorneys for Jon Kurylowicz now say such documents might have changed the outcome of the case, which ended in a 2005 jury verdict for Toyota.
"Mr. Kurylowicz went to trial without having been given all the relevant evidence and all the evidence the court ordered Toyota to produce," attorney Stuart Ollanik wrote in a new federal lawsuit accusing Toyota of fraud in the earlier case. "The Kurylowicz trial was not a fair trial."
In another case involving a Texas woman killed when her Toyota Land Cruiser lurched backward and pinned her against a garage wall, the Japanese automaker told lawyers for the woman's family it was unaware of any similar cases. Yet less than a year earlier, Toyota had settled a nearly identical lawsuit in the same state involving a Baptist minister who was severely injured after he said his Land Cruiser abruptly rolled backward over him. Under court discovery rules, Toyota had an obligation to inform the woman's attorneys about the case when formally asked.
"Automobile manufacturers, in my practice, have been the toughest to deal with when it comes to sharing information, but Toyota has no peer," said attorney Ernest Cannon, who represented the family of 35-year-old Lisa Evans, who died in 2002 in the Houston suburb of Sugar Land...
This is a long well documented article by the AP. Click on the link to read more.
Lawmakers mull the rules of cyberwarfare:(NBC/AP) Difficult questions have stalled creation of Pentagon's Cyber Command.
...As U.S. officials struggle to put together plans to defend government networks, they are faced with questions about the rippling effects of retaliation. Taking action against a hacker could affect foreign countries, private citizens or businesses — ranging from hospitals to power plants — whose computers might get caught up in the electronic battle.
Difficult questions about how and when the U.S. military conducts electronic warfare have stalled the creation of the Pentagon's Cyber Command for months as senators dig into such scenarios involving the rules of the digital battlefield, according to congressional officials...
Government leaders have grown increasingly alarmed as U.S. computer networks face constant attacks, including complex criminal schemes and suspected cyber espionage by other nations, such as China. But the nation's ability to protect its networks and respond to attacks are largely kept secret because of national security concerns and the government's slowly evolving cyber security plans...
For more details, click on the link, very good article just put up a couple of hours ago.
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