Bomb Kills Tehran Professor

Target is seen as a longtime regime insider who veered toward supporting the opposition Read the full story

The initial reports of a disturbance on a flight landing in Detroit were all over Twitter news feeds on Christmas: Read the full story

Dec. 18, 2009 – Autism disorders increased by 57% in just four years, the CDC today reported.

By the end of 2006, one in 110 U.S. kids had an autism disorder diagnosed by age 8: one in 70 boys and one in 315 girls, reflecting a nearly fivefold higher risk for males.

The new CDC estimate of autism prevalence, obtained from analysis of child evaluation records in 11 states, is virtually identical to autism numbers reported for 2007 from a huge telephone survey reported last October. Read the full story

CUERNAVACA, Mexico – Two hundred Mexican Navy marines stormed an upscale apartment complex and killed a reputed drug cartel chief in a two-hour gunbattle, one of the biggest victories yet in President Felipe Calderon’s drug war.

Arturo Beltran Leyva, the “boss of bosses,” and six members of his cartel died in the shootout Wednesday in Cuernavaca, just south of Mexico City, according to a navy statement Thursday. Read the full story

The latest calculation of the National Debt as posted by the Treasury Department has – at least numerically – exceeded the statutory Debt Limit approved by Congress last February as part of the Recovery Act stimulus bill.

The ceiling was set at $12.104 trillion dollars. The latest posting by Treasury shows the National Debt at nearly $12.135 trillion.

A senior Treasury official told CBS News that the department has some “extraordinary accounting tools” it can use to give the government breathing room in the range of $150-billion when the Debt exceeds the Debt Ceiling. Read the full story

The Federal Government will introduce compulsory internet filtering to block overseas sites which contain criminal content, including child sex abuse and sexual violence.

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy announced the changes today following a controversial trial to filter the internet which was conducted earlier this year.

Senator Conroy says some internet content is simply not suitable in a civilised society.

“It is important that all Australians, particularly young children, are protected from this material,” he said. Read the full story

I found this to be quite the interesting (and somewhat surprising) choice for 2009’s Person of the Year. What are your thoughts and opinions on TIME’s choice?

Ben Bernanke named Time Person of the Year Read the full story

What are your thoughts on this one? Fox News aired a segment suggesting the federal government lower the minimum wage to help workers and the economy. I’m not too sure this is something that would be called for during the economic times we are currently in.

Credit f0r the video to RawStory.com

Dubai said on Monday that it has received $10 billion from Abu Dhabi, another member of the United Arab Emirates, sparing the city state from defaulting on a $3.52 billion bond maturing that day.

The announcement ends weeks of speculation about whether Dubai would make good on the most immediately pressing of the obligations it incurred during years of freewheeling spending. The Islamic bond maturing Monday was issued by Nakheel, the property development arm of Dubai’s main investment vehicle, Dubai World. Read the full story

Feds reject Army snub of Texas plant

GAO decision buoys Sealy plant’s effort to keep truck contract Read the full story

CAIRO, Egypt — An award-winning Iranian nuclear scientist traveled to Saudi Arabia earlier this year to perform a religious pilgrimage. He never returned.

Shahram Amiri’s mysterious disappearance is turning into a Middle Eastern whodunit involving nuclear secrets and political intrigue, with a new round of accusations emerging this week and the U.S. government still refusing to comment. Read the full story

A medical marijuana dispensary in Denver has decided to get creative and make the business into a full-service restaurant that caters to those who need to use medicinal marijuana to ease physical ailments.

The owner of Ganja Gourmet located at 1810 South Broadway Avenue said the restaurant will “aim to help distribute medicinal marijuana to those licensed to have it and provide an atmosphere where patients can visit with one another in a safe environment.” Read the full story

Cash from organized crime ‘rescued’ banks during crisis: UN official

The vast majority of an estimated $352 billion in proceeds of organized crime, mostly from the drug trade, was funneled through the global banking system during the financial crisis of the past two years, and in some cases, the money rescued banks from collapse, says the head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime.

Antonio Maria Costa told the UK Observer that intelligence agencies and prosecutors alerted him 18 months ago to evidence that drug money was being “absorbed into the financial system.”

“In many instances, the money from drugs was the only liquid investment capital,” Costa said. “In the second half of 2008, liquidity was the banking system’s main problem and hence liquid capital became an important factor.”

The Observer reports:

Some of the evidence put before his office indicated that gang money was used to save some banks from collapse when lending seized up, [Costa] said.

“Inter-bank loans were funded by money that originated from the drugs trade and other illegal activities… There were signs that some banks were rescued that way.” Costa declined to identify countries or banks that may have received any drugs money, saying that would be inappropriate because his office is supposed to address the problem, not apportion blame. But he said the money is now a part of the official system and had been effectively laundered.

Gangs are now believed to make most of their profits from the drugs trade and are estimated to be worth £352bn, the UN says. They have traditionally kept proceeds in cash or moved it offshore to hide it from the authorities. It is understood that evidence that drug money has flowed into banks came from officials in Britain, Switzerland, Italy and the US.

Read the complete Observer article here.

Costa has been head of the UN’s drug and crime office since 2002, and is known for his tough stance on illicit drugs, including marijuana. He recently warned that Africa is becoming a major drug hub, following an investigation into the crash of a Boeing 727 in Mali that had flown in from Venezuela carrying 10 tons of cocaine.

ARTICLE FROM The Observer:

Drug money saved banks in global crisis, claims UN advisor

Drugs and crime chief says $352bn in criminal proceeds was effectively laundered by financial institutions

Drugs money worth billions of dollars kept the financial system afloat at the height of the global crisis, the United Nations‘ drugs and crime tsar has told the Observer.

Antonio Maria Costa, head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, said he has seen evidence that the proceeds of organised crime were “the only liquid investment capital” available to some banks on the brink of collapse last year. He said that a majority of the $352bn (£216bn) of drugs profits was absorbed into the economic system as a result.

This will raise questions about crime’s influence on the economic system at times of crisis. It will also prompt further examination of the banking sector as world leaders, including Barack Obama and Gordon Brown, call for new International Monetary Fund regulations. Speaking from his office in Vienna, Costa said evidence that illegal money was being absorbed into the financial system was first drawn to his attention by intelligence agencies and prosecutors around 18 months ago. “In many instances, the money from drugs was the only liquid investment capital. In the second half of 2008, liquidity was the banking system’s main problem and hence liquid capital became an important factor,” he said.

Some of the evidence put before his office indicated that gang money was used to save some banks from collapse when lending seized up, he said.

“Inter-bank loans were funded by money that originated from the drugs trade and other illegal activities… There were signs that some banks were rescued that way.” Costa declined to identify countries or banks that may have received any drugs money, saying that would be inappropriate because his office is supposed to address the problem, not apportion blame. But he said the money is now a part of the official system and had been effectively laundered.

“That was the moment [last year] when the system was basically paralysed because of the unwillingness of banks to lend money to one another. The progressive liquidisation to the system and the progressive improvement by some banks of their share values [has meant that] the problem [of illegal money] has become much less serious than it was,” he said.

The IMF estimated that large US and European banks lost more than $1tn on toxic assets and from bad loans from January 2007 to September 2009 and more than 200 mortgage lenders went bankrupt. Many major institutions either failed, were acquired under duress, or were subject to government takeover.

Gangs are now believed to make most of their profits from the drugs trade and are estimated to be worth £352bn, the UN says. They have traditionally kept proceeds in cash or moved it offshore to hide it from the authorities. It is understood that evidence that drug money has flowed into banks came from officials in Britain, Switzerland, Italy and the US.

British bankers would want to see any evidence that Costa has to back his claims. A British Bankers’ Association spokesman said: “We have not been party to any regulatory dialogue that would support a theory of this kind. There was clearly a lack of liquidity in the system and to a large degree this was filled by the intervention of central banks.”

Signs of what could be a previously unknown ancient civilisation are emerging from beneath the felled trees of the Amazon. Some 260 giant avenues, ditches and enclosures have been spotted from the air in a region straddling Brazil’s border with Bolivia.

The traditional view is that before the arrival of the Spanish and Portuguese in the 15th century there were no complex societies in the Amazon basin – in contrast to the Andes further west where the Incas built their cities. Now deforestation, increased air travel and satellite imagery are telling a different story. Read the full story

Using sophisticated smuggling networks, the traffickers have transported a portion of the pilfered petroleum across the border to sell to U.S. companies, some of which knew that it was stolen, according to court documents and interviews with American officials involved in an expanding investigation of oil services firms in Texas.

The widespread theft of Mexico’s most vital national resource by criminal organizations represents a costly new front in President Felipe Calderón’s war against the drug cartels, and it shows how the traffickers are rapidly evolving from traditional narcotics smuggling to activities as diverse as oil theft, transport and sales. Read the full story

Jesse Ventura recently went on Howard Stern’s radio show, and discussed many interesting topics. The two touched on everything from Jesse Ventura’s new television show ‘Conspiracy Theory’, September 11th conspiracies, life as a former governor, and Jesse’s claim that he can prove who really killed J.F.K.