Jack's Newswatch

Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick announced Monday that the special election to fill the Sen. Edward Kennedy’s seat will be held in January, but said he wants to make an interim appointment before then. 

Patrick set the general election for Jan. 19. A source close to the proceeding said the primary will be held Dec. 8. Under state law, the election must be 145 to 160 days after a vacancy. 

But Patrick said he will also push to change state law so that he can name an interim senator in the run-up to the election. Lawmakers have scheduled a public hearing for Sept. 9 on the proposed change, requested by Kennedy before his death last week. 

Possible contenders include Kennedy’s widow Vicki Kennedy, nephew and former Rep. Joseph Kennedy, Attorney General Martha Coakley and several members of the state’s congressional delegation. 

[Source]

More info:

Massachusetts Sets Jan. 19 Vote for Kennedy Successor

Notes:

I watched Patrick live as he gave the news conference (just ended).  Vicky Kennedy is out — she’s not interested. 

Popularity: 24% [?]

EXCLUSIVE: LOS ANGELES — Three Americans “tourists” are on their way home from Cambodia Monday after being arrested in an ongoing federal sex tourism investigation.

The arrests are part of “Operation Twisted Traveler,” an effort by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to identify and prosecute American sex tourists in Cambodia.

The suspects — Jack Sporich, 74, Erik Peeters, 41, and Ronald “John” Boyajian, 59 — are all convicted child sex offenders who have served time in U.S. prisons.

After their release, investigators say, the three headed to the most destitute neighborhoods in Cambodia, itself one of the poorest nations in Southeast Asia, where it is believed they once again sexually assaulted young boys and girls.

FOX News was given exclusive access to the suspects and video of their arrest.

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Notes:

Read it all.  These clowns are looking at life in a US jail.

Popularity: 25% [?]

Damning reports are emerging from Germany’s military forces in Afghanistan, claiming that cooperation with civilian agencies is abysmal, equipment is lacking and training is insufficient. With the US preparing to pressure Berlin to send more troops, there are now increasing calls for “urgent improvements.”

German Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung is not a big fan of change. When he speaks about the Bundeswehr, Germany’s military forces, and their missions abroad, he has a tendency to always use the same expressions. They seem to somehow keep him grounded.

For example, one of his favorite ways to describe the German soldiers operating in Afghanistan is to say that they are “well-trained and well-equipped.” He also likes to say that the Bundeswehr’s collaboration with elements of the Foreign Ministry, the Interior Ministry and the Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) stationed in Afghanistan has been so successful that Germany’s “networked approach” has even been “adopted in its entirety by NATO.”

The problem with these standardized expressions is not that they have been learned by heart. The problem is that they have so little to do with reality.

For once, Jung should be forced to read his military’s confidential reports. Some of the internal documents written by troops serving in Afghanistan, which were viewed by SPIEGEL, describe the situation as “critical.” They complain about the severe lack of vehicles, weapons and aircraft as well as about the paucity of supplies and replacement parts. They lament the “deficiencies” in the training of the soldiers and bemoan the fact that the much-praised collaboration between the military and civilian agencies in reconstruction efforts is actually functioning pretty terribly.

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See Also:

Yon: Precision Voting

Popularity: 24% [?]

CBS — Usually, late August is time a when Chicagoans are thinking of hitting the beaches or lounging in the sidewalk cafes one last time, but this year, the temperatures have seemed more appropriate for Halloween.

The record low for Aug. 31 is 47 degrees, set in 1872. As of 5 a.m. Monday, the nippy readings were close, and in some areas even lower.

CBS 2′s Ed Curran reported that at O’Hare International Airport, it was 50 degrees at 5 a.m. It was 49 at Midway International Airport, 48 in Waukegan, and a mere 41 degrees in Aurora.

Skies were clear across most of the Midwest Monday morning, but the sun will do little to warm the temperatures.

Overall in Chicago, this August has hardly been what one would call the dog days of summer. There was only one weekend where the temperatures reached the 90s. On the weekend of Aug. 8 and 9, temperatures climbed into the mid-90s.

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Popularity: 26% [?]

Barely a week ago Lord Mandelson pompously declared that it was ‘completely implausible’ and ‘offensive’ to suggest the Government had connived in the release of the Lockerbie bomber, Abdelbaset Al Megrahi, for commercial reasons.

Now leaked letters show that this is precisely what the Government did. It moved heaven and earth to secure the release of Megrahi from a Scottish jail, seemingly to facilitate a multi-billion-pound deal between Libya and BP that might otherwise have been in jeopardy.

And then it watched smugly and silently while the Scottish Nationalist government in Edinburgh took the flak for freeing the terrorist. President Obama, the head of the FBI, and relatives of his victims have united in outrage and protest, and there have been wild threats of sanctions against Scotland.

Even by the often duplicitous and deceitful standards of New Labour over the past 12 years, this has been an incredible performance. Megrahi was tried and convicted of the murder of 270 people, who died when the exploded Pan Am aircraft plunged to earth in December 1988.

It is shameful that the Government should have ever contemplated freeing him, and disgraceful that it should have then lied to cover up its role.

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Popularity: 23% [?]

By the time this year’s tally for gay service members discharged under the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy had hit 250, Rep. Alcee L. Hastings said he could wait no longer.

The Florida Democrat decided in June to send a letter to President Obama demanding that the policy be repealed. Mr. Hastings said he was surprised when 76 other members – most of them fellow Democrats – agreed to add their signatures, and even more surprised when the letter went unanswered for the next two months.

“We’re being ignored,” he said.

The president won’t be able to ignore the simmering discontent within his own party much longer, the congressman said, not on this military policy or on a range of other issues on which the president appears to be charting a course that veers away from his political base.

Evidence of this has been abundant in the health care debate, where a core group of Democrats reacted angrily to signs that the White House was getting ready to abandon a public insurance plan as part of its health care bill. But anxiety is growing in other areas, too. Environmentalists dislike the watering down of climate change legislation in the House. Anti-war activists are unhappy with the president’s escalation in Afghanistan. This list goes on.

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Updates:

3:12 pm EDT, August 31st, 2009 — Obama Faces Calls to Grab Health Care Reins

3:15 pm EDT, August 31st, 2009 — “Tea Party Express” news

Popularity: 25% [?]

After pledging during last year’s presidential campaign, and as recently as the spring, not to revisit the past, the Obama administration, in the person of Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., has named a special prosecutor to go after CIA interrogators who pried information from terrorist suspects, preventing more deadly assaults on the country.

Before the hard left assumed power, anyone engaged in protecting America by interrupting terrorist plans might have expected a commendation. Now that person could face jail time. Somewhere in a cave in Pakistan, Obama bin Laden rejoices. By any objective standard, releasing terrorists from prison and prosecuting their interrogators is nuts. How can these actions fulfill the president’s oath to defend the country?

The Justice Department wants to apply new interrogation rules to methods that were used and approved during the George W. Bush administration. This is like lowering the highway speed limit to 55 mph and giving speeding tickets to people who drove 65 mph when the higher speed was legal.

What is to be gained from going after CIA interrogators who thought they were operating within the law and defending the country? Doesn’t the white-wine-and-Brie set understand that a terrorist won’t discriminate between people with jelly for a backbone and those with backbones of steel? Do they really think they will escape death by being nice to killers who use our laws against us in order to replace those laws with theirs? Islamic terrorists repeatedly say this is their goal, and they have demonstrated it enough by their actions that only a fool would doubt them.

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Popularity: 21% [?]

#1 — NP | Cheney says he may not cooperate with CIA probe

WASHINGTON — Former Vice President Dick Cheney said he might refuse to speak with a prosecutor investigating suspected CIA prisoner abuses, a probe he branded as political and bad for national security.

[...]

Fox | Cheney Slams Obama’s ‘Politicized’ Probe of CIA Interrogations

#2 — CNN | 2 firefighters die battling blaze in Los Angeles County

LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) — Fire officials late Sunday identified two firefighters who died accidentally while battling a fast-spreading wildfire in Los Angeles County.

[...]

#3 — CNN | Hurricane Jimena takes aim at Baja California

(CNN) — Packing winds of 140 mph, Hurricane Jimena was approaching Baja California on Sunday as a Category 4 storm, forecasters said.

[...]

#4 — BBC | US Afghan strategy ‘not working’

A report by the top US general in Afghanistan is expected to say that the current military strategy is not working, the BBC understands.

[...]

#5 — BBC | Police to wrap up Dugard search

Police in California say they will soon end the search of the property where Jaycee Lee Dugard was held for 18 years, along with a neighbouring house.

[...]

#6 — Fox | Boy, 10, Faces Murder Charge in Dad’s Death

BELEN, N.M. —  A 10-year-old New Mexico boy is facing a murder charge in the shooting death of his father.

[...]

#7 — Fox | Burmese Rebels Surrender Weapons, Flee to China

MENG PENG, China —  Hundreds of ethnic rebels have fled clashes in northeastern Burma, surrendering their weapons and uniforms to Chinese border police and crossing to safety after several days of skirmishes with Burma government troops.

[...]

#8 — DM | Workers losing their final salary pensions

One in six of the most generous pension schemes has now been closed to existing members, according to research.

[...]

#9 — Times | Scottish referendum Bill heads for defeat as parties close ranks

A Bill on an independence referendum will form the centrepiece of the SNP’s legislative programme to be unveiled later this week, but the flagship policy stands little or no chance of becoming law.

[...]

#10 — NY Times | As Big Banks Repay Bailout Money, U.S. Sees a Profit

Nearly a year after the federal rescue of the nation’s biggest banks, taxpayers have begun seeing profits from the hundreds of billions of dollars in aid that many critics thought might never be seen again.

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#11 — Telegraph | Dual-screen laptop on sale by Christmas

The world’s first truly dual-screen laptop, which will allow computer users to multi-task while on the move, is due to go on sale by the end of the year.

[...]

Popularity: 21% [?]

#1 — CBC | Flaherty endorses HST despite criticism

Federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty on Sunday endorsed a harmonized sales tax while at the same time distancing his government from criticism at the provincial level, particularly in British Columbia.

[...]

#2 — CBC | Search for missing Alberta woman in B.C. wraps up

The RCMP say they have finished searching two sites in northern B.C. for the remains of a missing tree planter from Alberta but they aren’t saying what, if anything, they found.

[...]

#3 — CBC | Pair arrested after Nelson House teen beaten to death

Police have arrested two teenagers after a teen was beaten to death on Saturday in the remote northern Manitoba community of Nelson House First Nation.

[...]

#4 — CBC | Former CFL star Etcheverry dies of cancer

Former Montreal Alouettes quarterback Sam Etcheverry has died at age 79 following a lengthy battle with cancer.

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#5 — CTV | Danny brings big winds, big mess to Maritimes

Many residents in the Maritimes spent Sunday cleaning up after tropical storm Danny brought heavy rain and stiff winds to the region.

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#6 — CTV | How Canada escaped the worst of the recession

OTTAWA — Canada’s version of the Great Global Recession may have seemed brutish, but — if economists are right about new output numbers being released Monday — it will also have turned out to be mercifully short and relatively mild.

[...]

#7 — CTV | Proposals for float-plane safety ignored: experts

VANCOUVER, B.C. — Though he has climbed aboard small planes thousands of times, forestry worker Bob Pomponio always feared he was sitting on a flying gas tank that might one day cause trouble.

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#8 — Globe | Premier to overhaul OLG as spending scandal brews

The chairman of the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corp. plans to resign as early as today in a pre-emptive strike by the McGuinty government aimed at heading off a potential scandal over lavish spending on travel and entertaining, sources say

[...]

#9 — Globe | Yukon minister’s resignation threatens to collapse government

Yukon Premier Dennis Fentie’s government is at risk of collapse after the resignation of the territory’s energy minister, who says the Premier “lied” to the public in denying that private talks took place regarding selling off the government’s energy assets.

[...]

#10 — NP | Liberals gathering to prepare for upcoming session

Federal Liberals will gather in Sudbury, Ont., on Monday to plot strategy for a parliamentary session that could plunge Canadians into a fall or winter election campaign.

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#11 — NP | Give excess flu vaccine to developing world: experts

OTTAWA — The Canadian government should donate any surplus swine flu vaccine to poorer countries, say ethicists and medical specialists who are warning that a “me-first” mentality among rich countries will doom efforts to combat the global pandemic.

[...]

#12 — Star | Cop corruption case revived

Seven years before Toronto drug squad officers were charged with shaking down suspects, a senior member of the Montreal Police force sent a “red flag” complaint about the behaviour of two squad members.

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#13 — Star | Accused in boy’s sex attack declared dangerous in 1990

A 50-year-old man declared a dangerous offender in 1990 after more than a decade of sexually assaulting children has been arrested in Toronto, accused of attacking a friend’s 5-year-old son.

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#14 — Star | Taking a shot at online gun sales

When Dennis Hingsberg’s website, GunAddicts.com, launches tomorrow, firearm lovers from across Canada will be able to buy and auction off guns to their fellow enthusiasts.

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Popularity: 25% [?]

The state “should not stifle incentive, opportunity, responsibility”, wrote Sir William Beveridge in the 1942 report that inspired the post-war welfare state. “In establishing a national minimum it should leave room and encouragement for voluntary action by each individual to provide more than that minimum for himself and his family.”

Those cautionary words haunt us now as we discover that 5m adults have not worked since Labour came to power 12 years ago. Even excluding those who are in education or have only recently completed it, and discounting those who have left the labour market through age or ill health, 2.5m have been jobless since 1997 at least. There are now 3.3m households — one in six — with no one over the age of 16 in employment and 1.9m children living in families without a parent in work.

While the recession is increasing the numbers, it clearly did not cause the problem. Those millions remained idle during 10 years of boom when the economy created many jobs that immigrants happily filled. The workless have been immune to programmes of training and mentoring. No reform in our education system has dented their numbers and repeated efforts to tighten the criteria for invalidity benefits or “sharpen” claimants’ contact with the labour market have failed.

Beveridge was not the first to spot the risk that providing benefits for people out of work could encourage dependency. In 1834 followers of Jeremy Bentham, the philosophical radical, succeeded in shaping the poor law to discourage idleness. The reform offered relief only in workhouses whose conditions would be worse than existing on even the most meagre wage. Such stony-hearted attitudes could not survive into the more democratic 20th century.

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Notes:

Michael Portillo served in Margaret Thatcher’s government as well as others in a number of different positions.  I don’t agree 100% with him but his words are worth reading.

Popularity: 23% [?]