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Slaughterhouse video prompts unprecedented beef recall - Times Online : "This undercover video of sick and crippled cows being brought to slaughter in an abattoir in southern California has prompted the largest recall of beef in US history, (writes Will Pavia). The US Department of Agriculture yesterday ordered that 143 million lb of beef from the slaughterhouse be recalled. Officials estimate that some 37 million lbs of the recalled meat had been heading to schools across America though they fear that most of it will have already been eaten."

Just Words. Just not Obama's. - Democratic Underground

AlterNet: Blogs: PEEK: Why Do Republicans Always Steal Music to Push Their Hateful Ideology? : "Two weeks ago we reported how dishonest Republican Senator John McCain was caught stealing 2 songs from John Mellencamp for use in his campaign to personify a third Bush term. It isn't uncommon for Republican political hacks to steal popular music from Democratic songwriters and singers. They never pay for the usage-- which is ironic since it is the Congress that sets the rates and conditions and McCain has voted on the legislation dozens of times and is certainly aware that it is a crime to just use people's music without paying royalties. Bush was caught over and over again using popular songs from Democrats in his campaigns and he was repeatedly asked to cease and desist. Even back in 1984 Reagan was caught using Bruce Springsteen's 'Born in the U.S.A.,' an anti-Vietnam War anthem for his campaign, although he eventually stopped when Springsteen said he would sue ...

BBC NEWS | Technology | Whistle-blower site taken offline : "A controversial website that allows whistle-blowers to anonymously post government and corporate documents has been taken offline in the US. Wikileaks.org, as it is known, was cut off from the internet following a California court ruling, the site says. The case was brought by a Swiss bank after 'several hundred' documents were posted about its offshore activities."

blackagendareport.com - Freedom Rider: Democrats Target Kucinich for Defeat : "The corporate rulers of the United States are determined to have their revenge against Dennis Kucinich, the heroic Ohio congressman who held high the progressive banner in the last two Democratic presidential primary seasons. Not content with having banned Kucinich from a succession of debates and erased his name and platform from the daily media discourse - finally forcing him to withdraw for lack of funds - corporate Democrats now conspire to oust him from his Cleveland congressional seat. Kucinich has been targeted by the same forces, and for the same fate as befell Georgia's Cynthia McKinney and Alabama's Earl Hilliard: exile from the Big Business-infested Democratic Party."

blackagendareport.com - Holding Barack Obama Accountable : "The presidential campaign of Barack Obama has become a media parade on its way to a coronation. Journalists and leading Democrats have done shockingly little to pin Obama down, to hold him specifically responsible for anything beyond his slogans of 'yes we can' and 'change we can believe in'. Prominent Black Democrats, many ministers and the traditional Black leadership class are doing less than anybody to hold Obama accountable, peddling instead a supposed racial obligation among African Americans to support this second coming of Joshua and his campaign as 'the movement' itself. What would holding Barack Obama accountable on war and peace, on social security, health care and other issues look like, and is it possible to hold a political 'rock star' accountable at all?"

African Press Agency - Item : "APA-Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) Investors from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on Thursday launched in Addis Ababa a $1.2 billion investment bid to build a tourist resort in Ethiopia, APA learns here. The investors have signed an agreement with the Ethiopian Oromia State administration to establish the tourist resort, to be located about 175 kilometres east of Addis Ababa. The Oromoia Regional Commissioner Alemu Semi told journalists on Thursday that the investors have been making preparations to start construction. He said the Enjaz Business group of companies signed the agreement with the Oromia administration since 2007 to establish the resort around the lakes of Abayata and Shala in West Arssi Zone. According to the agreement, the investors were allocated 38,000 hectares of land to construct the resort. “Currently, a master plan is being prepared for the resort. Soil research and selection of sites was carried out to start the construction,” Semi said....

shabait.com - Eritrean News Source - The Broken Promises of February and “Dedebit” : "Next Monday, the people of Tigray will commemorate the 33rd anniversary of the beginning of their armed struggle. The people of Tigray had waged a bitter armed struggle against Emperor Haile Selassie and the tyrannical regime of Mengistu Hailemariam so as to secure their rights. However, Tigrayans everywhere will be unable to remember the day with joy because the TPLF regime that had seized power as a result of the martyrdom of thousands of Tigrayans has turned its back on the aspirations for the realization of which the people of Tigray had paid their lives, and forged alliance with the criminals of the Hawzen Massacre. The TPLF regime has developed into a far worse oppressor than its predecessors and gravely exacerbates the plight of the Tigrayans, in particular, and the Ethiopian people as a whole, in general. It is only natural then for the people of Tigray to grieve as they recall all the as...

SudanTribune article : Over 4 mln candidates to contest on the coming Ethiopia’s election : "Despite to some opposition parties raised voice over unfair and non constitutional Election procedures, 25 political parties have field over 4 million election candidates to take part in the up coming national by-election and local election to be run in April this year, the national electoral board disclosed."

SudanTribune article : Egypt police kill Eritrean woman on Israel border : "February 17, 2008 (ISMAILIA, Egypt) — Egyptian police shot and killed an Eritrean women trying to sneak across Egypt’s border into Israel on Saturday after she disobeyed orders to stop, security sources said. Murfit Meery, 37, was trying to cross into Israel in the El Kuntilla region in the eastern part of the Sinai peninsula, the sources said on condition of anonymity. Her daughters aged 8 and 10, travelling with her, were taken into custody. Sinai is the main route for traffickers trying to take mainly African migrants into the Jewish state for work or asylum."

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essays & effluvia: Politics The Hurricane Katrina Room, which is still under construction. The Alberto Gonzales Room, where you can't remember anything. The Texas Air National Guard Room, where you don't even have to show up. The Walter Reed Hospital Room, where they don't let you in. The Guantanamo Bay Room, where they don't let you out. The Weapons of Mass Destruction Room (which no one has been able to find). The Iraq War Room. After you complete your first tour, they make you to go back for a second, third, fourth, and sometimes fifth tour. The Dick Cheney Room, in the famous undisclosed location, complete with shooting gallery.

CIA's ambitious post-9/11 spy plan crumbles WASHINGTON — The CIA set up a network of front companies in Europe and elsewhere after the Sept. 11 attacks as part of a constellation of "black stations" for a new generation of spies, according to current and former agency officials. But after spending hundreds of millions of dollars setting up as many as 12 of the companies, the agency shut down all but two after concluding they were ill-conceived and poorly positioned for gathering intelligence on the CIA's principal targets: terrorist groups and unconventional weapons proliferation networks. The closures were a blow to two of the CIA's most pressing priorities after the 2001 terrorist attacks: expanding its overseas presence and changing the way it deploys spies. The companies were the centerpiece of an ambitious plan to increase the number of case officers sent overseas under what is known as "nonofficial cover," meaning they would pose as employees of in...