ExxonMobil's new "Hebron" rig will look similar to the "Hibernia" rig, pictured here. (Wikipedia)
LASSO THAT ICEBERG, COWBOY!
Exxon Mobil prepares massive oil drilling off the coast of Newfoundland, ironically near the point at which the Titanic was sunk by an iceberg. To ally any fears that another iceberg could produce an even larger environmental disaster, the company plans to construct concrete towers taller than the Eiffel Tower and heavier than the Empire State Building to help in the process of “lasso-ing” any wayward icebergs and pushing them aside by giant propellers. We aren’t making up this stuff!
(Common Dreams)
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JANUARY 17, 1991: ‘ACTS COMMITTED WITH INTENT TO DESTROY, IN WHOLE OR IN PART, NATIONAL, ETHNIC, RACIAL OR RELIGIOUS GROUPS.”
Such acts violate the UN Genocide Convention, but they started 21 years and a day ago with the bombing of Baghdad and the rest of Iraq in the Gulf “War.” The people and the facilities of their lives were systematically and catastrophically destroyed by this “war” and the “Operation Iraqi Freedom” invasion of 2003, wreaking losses of millions of lives that are still being tabulated. Is there an International Court of Criminal Justice—or not?
(Dissident Voice)
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BUILDING AN OBAMA “LEGACY”: WHO IS GOING TO PAY FOR THAT?
Apparently it will be mostly the corporate cash cows that contributed so heavily to his having been elected and re-elected. Presidential “legacies” are built largely through the construction of presidential libraries, and the festivities for celebration of the second inaugural are expected to raise mega-funds from corporate sponsors which will be used for such “legacy-making” purposes. Is there room on Rushmore to carve the image of one more American president-idol?
(Alternet)
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WILL “COMPLETE HEALTH CHECKS” OF ITS LITHIUM ION BATTERIES BE ENOUGH TO GET BOEING 787 DREAM-LINERS BACK IN THE AIR?
The company hopes that the FAA will agree that both emergency and routine checks of the accident-producing batteries will get the planes flying again. Skeptics think this is something of a band-aid remedy for a “health” condition that may demand intensive surgery.
(Seattle Times)
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SWEETBAY TURNING SOUR IN TAMPA BAY.
The Dutch-based grocery retailer is closing 35 of its 105 stores in Florida, including 20 in the Tampa Bay area. Some of these stores, a slightly upscale version of Publix supermarkets, are located with other stores in affluent areas but others, like that of the Ybor City location in Tampa, are in low income neighborhoods where they are the only available grocery supermarkets.
(Tampa Tribune)
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Quote of the day…
Greece, which has long been a hub of immigration from Asia, Middle East and Africa, has become a cesspool of bigotry. According to a December report by Amnesty International, “Asylum-seekers, migrants, community centres, shops and mosques have been the target of such attacks which have been reported on an almost daily basis since the summer.”
Michelle Chen, on xenophobic treatment of immigrants in Greece.
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