In WTF News: October 22, 2010

• The age of robots being used in everyday homes has come a step nearer with the development of a new creepy-ass humanoid named HRP-4C aka The Diva Bot. (via Daily Mail)

• Soldiers in an American Army platoon accused of murdering Afghan civilians for sport say they took orders from a ringleader (aptly named Sgt. Stoner) who collected body parts as war trophies, were threatened with death if they spoke up and smoked hashish on their base almost daily. (via NY Times)

• In a Bush-like move the Obama Administration is pushing to overhaul a federal law that requires phone and broadband carriers to ensure that their networks can be wiretapped, federal officials say. (via NY Times)

• In another lame move the Obama administration “strongly opposes” a California ballot measure to legalize marijuana, and vow to bust people even if it passes. (via Wall Street Journal)

• Founders of  the deadly Mexican drug gang Zetas learned special forces techniques at Ft. Bragg before waging a campaign of carnage. So that’s why they’re so good, they learned from the best. (via Al Jazeera)

• Another Facebook privacy fail: life-wasting apps like Farmville share private info with marketers, even if you have the strictest privacy settings. (via AP)

• Google gets away with  a whooping 2.4% tax rate by using oddly sexualized accounting tactics the “Double Irish” and the “Dutch Sandwich”, while the current corporate tax rate in the U.S. is 35%. Over the last three years Google has avoided $3.1 billion in taxes. (via Bloomberg)

• A Detroit prosecutor  is pushing for a law that calls for jail time for parents who skip parent-teacher conferences, a plan some call inspired and others consider the nanny state run amok. Count my vote for the latter of the two. (via The Detroit News)

• Drug addicts across the UK are being offered £200 to be sterilized by an American charity. 3,500 addicts in the U.S. have already taken this deal. And I was hoping eugenics died with the Nazis. (via BBC News)

• Did the White House “muzzle own scientists over oil spill fears”? (via The Independent)

• 20-year-old college student named police chief in Mexico because no one else applied. At least she’s a criminology major. (via Yahoo! News)

Mexican Police Chief Marisol Valles

In WTF News: Pentagon Burns Thousands of Copies of Army Officer’s Memoirs

According to Fox News (published September 25, 2010):

The Pentagon  has burned 9,500 copies of Army Reserve Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer’s memoir Operation Dark Heart, his book about going undercover in Afghanistan.

A Department of Defense official tells Fox News that the department purchased copies of the first printing because they contained information which could cause damage to national security.

The U.S. Army originally cleared the book for release.

The U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency attempted to block the book about the tipping point in Afghanistan and a controversial pre-9/11 data mining project called “Able Danger.”

In a letter obtained by Fox News, the DIA says national security could be breached if “Operation Dark Heart” is published in its current form. The agency also attempted to block key portions of the book that claim “Able Danger” successfully identified hijacker Mohammed Atta as a threat to the United States before the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.

Specifically, the DIA wanted references to a meeting between Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer, the book’s author, and the executive director of the 9/11 Commission, Philip Zelikow, removed. In that meeting, which took place in Afghanistan, Shaffer alleges the commission was told about “Able Danger” and the identification of Atta before the attacks. No mention of this was made in the final 9/11 report.

“Dr. Philip Zelikow approached me in the corner of the room. ‘What you said today is very important. I need you to get in touch with me as soon as you return from your deployment here in Afghanistan’,” Shaffer said.

Once back in the U.S., Shaffer says he contacted the commission. Without explanation, the commission was no longer interested. An inspector general report by the Department of Defense concluded there was no evidence to support the claims of Shaffer and others. But Fox News has obtained an unredacted copy of the IG report containing the names of witnesses, who backed up Shaffer’s story when contacted for comment…

Read the full Fox News article here

Just in case you refuse to read anything from Fox News, read CNN’s version of the story here.

Update: The Department of Defense spent more than $47,000 to have 9,500 copies of Dark Heart burned.

Update: A kindle version of the book is available but it has already been redacted.

Our two cents: The Pentagon loves the smell of censorship in the morning.

Watch: Jon Stewart vs. Tony Blair

In part one of this unedited interview with Jon Stewart, Tony Blair explains why he’s worried about Iran with a nuclear weapon but not so worried about China, Pakistan or Israel. In part two Blair explains why the fight against extremism isn’t a battle between the West and Islam, even though every nation under attack from the West happens to be mostly Muslim.

You know American journalism is in a sad state when a comedian does a better job of holding world leaders accountable than nearly all of the mainstream media outlets.

Part One

Part Two

WTF News Roundup: August 11, 2010

COCA-COLA: “NO CONSUMER COULD REASONABLY BE MISLED INTO THINKING VITAMINWATER WAS A HEALTHY BEVERAGE”

Now here’s something you wouldn’t expect. Coca-Cola is being sued by a non-profit public interest group, on the grounds that the company’s vitaminwater products make unwarranted health claims. No surprise there. But how do you think the company is defending itself?

In a staggering feat of twisted logic, lawyers for Coca-Cola are defending the lawsuit by asserting that “no consumer could reasonably be misled into thinking vitaminwater was a healthy beverage.”

Does this mean that you’d have to be an unreasonable person to think that a product named “vitaminwater,” a product that has been heavily and aggressively marketed as a healthy beverage, actually had health benefits?

Or does it mean that it’s okay for a corporation to lie about its products, as long as they can then turn around and claim that no one actually believes their lies?

In fact, the product is basically sugar-water, to which about a penny’s worth of synthetic vitamins have been added. And the amount of sugar is not trivial. A bottle of vitaminwater contains 33 grams of sugar, making it more akin to a soft drink than to a healthy beverage…

Read the full article via The Huffington Post (published August 5, 2010)

Our two cents: vitamin=good, water=good, vitaminwater=bad

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GROOM ACCIDENTALLY KILLS WEDDING GUESTS

Three family members at a wedding in Turkey have been accidentally shot dead by the groom firing an AK-47 rifle in celebration.

The groom, Tevfik Altin, lost control of his rifle, spraying the guests with bullets and killing his father and two aunts and injuring six others, according to CNN Turk.

It reported that Altin had been arrested after the incident in the village of Akcagoze in southeastern Turkey. Guns are often fired into the air in celebration in some parts of Turkey…

Read the full article via CNN (published August 9, 2010)

Our two cents: In name of good taste, no comment…

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OHIO WOMAN DENIED McNUGGETS GOES ON RAMPAGE

A security video from a McDonald’s in Ohio shows a woman punching two restaurant employees and smashing a drive-thru window because she couldn’t get Chicken McNuggets.

The tantrum caught on tape in Toledo earlier this year shows the customer reaching through the drive-thru window, slugging one worker and then another. She then grabs a bottle out of her car and tosses it through the glass window before speeding off.

It happened early on New Year’s Day. Police say Melodi Dushane was angry that McNuggets weren’t being served, because it was breakfast time. Dushane says she was drunk. She was sentenced to 60 days in jail last month and ordered to pay for the broken window. via AP News on Google (published August 10, 2010)

Our two cents: Baby wants her bottle…

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MAN DIES IN FINAL OF SAUNA CHAMPIONSHIP

A Russian man died in the finals of the world sauna championships in Finland after spending some six minutes sweltering in temperatures of 110 degrees Celsius (230.00F), organizers said Sunday.

“After this incident we decided that this game is over and done,” Saija Jappinen, cultural secretary at Heinola city told Reuters, announcing the end of the event.

The world sauna championships, where competitors try to outlast others in the heat and steam, have been held 12 times in Heinola, some 138 km (86 miles) northeast of Finland’s capital Helsinki.

Dozens of competitors were whittled down to just two, but six minutes into the final judges noticed something was wrong with Russian champion Vladimir Lazyzhenskiy and dragged him and Finnish finalist Timo Kaukonen from the sauna…

Read the full article via Reuters (published August 9, 2010)

Our two cents: If you can’t stand the heat get out of the kitchen sauna.

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JENNY “WHITEBOARD” AKA HPOA GIRL IS A HOAX

Read more about the hoax via Boing Boing

Our two cents: We posted Jenny’s photos so they obviously fooled us. Stupid internet…

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MERCENARIES  TO FILL VOID LEFT BY U.S. ARMY IN IRAQ

As the U.S. military continues to draw down its forces in Iraq later this month and complete a full exit by the end of next year, analysts say the withdrawal will be a boon for the private security industry, whose employees will likely undertake more quasi-military functions such as defusing explosives and providing armed response teams. “They [private security contractors] are going to have to do everything that we expect soldiers to do without going out on patrols to engage the enemy,” says one former industry insider. “There are some pretty smart number crunchers in all the major contractors who are figuring out how much of this increasing pie we’re going to be able to get…”

These tasks—which include clearing travel routes and driving armored combat vehicles—do not involve attacking, and thus are not military functions, Kennedy argues. But they do potentially increase the chances that “people acting in the name of the U.S.…can get the U.S. involved in perceptions of misconduct,” says a spokesman for the Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Read the full article via Newsweek (published August 10, 2010)

Our two cents: To me, adding 7,000 armed contractors with little oversight sounds more like a “troop substitution” than a “troop withdrawal”.  I like what Jeremy Scahill of The Nation recently wrote on his blog, “Under the terms of the Status of Forces agreement, all US forces are supposed to be out of Iraq by the end of 2011. Using private forces is a backdoor way of continuing a substantial US presence under the cover of ‘diplomatic security.’”

WTF News Roundup: July 28, 2010

WAL-MART RADIO TAGS TO TRACK CLOTHING

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. plans to roll out sophisticated electronic ID tags to track individual pairs of jeans and underwear, the first step in a system that advocates say better controls inventory but some critics say raises privacy concerns.

Starting next month, the retailer will place removable “smart tags” on individual garments that can be read by a hand-held scanner. Wal-Mart workers will be able to quickly learn, for instance, which size of Wrangler jeans is missing, with the aim of ensuring shelves are optimally stocked and inventory tightly watched. If successful, the radio-frequency ID tags will be rolled out on other products at Wal-Mart’s more than 3,750 U.S. stores…

But the company’s latest attempt to use its influence—executives call it the start of a “next-generation Wal-Mart”—has privacy advocates raising questions.

While the tags can be removed from clothing and packages, they can’t be turned off, and they are trackable. Some privacy advocates hypothesize that unscrupulous marketers or criminals will be able to drive by consumers’ homes and scan their garbage to discover what they have recently bought.

They also worry that retailers will be able to scan customers who carry new types of personal ID cards as they walk through a store, without their knowledge. Several states, including Washington and New York, have begun issuing enhanced driver’s licenses that contain radio- frequency tags with unique ID numbers, to make border crossings easier for frequent travelers. Some privacy advocates contend that retailers could theoretically scan people with such licenses as they make purchases, combine the info with their credit card data, and then know the person’s identity the next time they stepped into the store….

Wal-Mart won’t say how much it expects to benefit from the endeavor. But a similar pilot program at American Apparel Inc. in 2007 found that stores with the technology saw sales rise 14.3% compared to stores without the technology, according to Avery Dennison Corp., a maker of RFID equipment…

Read the full article via The Wall Street Journal (published July 23, 2010)

Our two cents: Like I need another reason not to shop at Wal-Mart…

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WIKILEAKS RELEASES SECRET FILES EXPOSING THE TRUTH ABOUT THE AFGHAN WAR, AS THE WAR MACHINE KEEPS ROLLING ANYWAY

Undoubtedly most of our readers don’t have the time nor the inclination to read through the 91,000 pages released by Wikileaks, so you may be wondering what exactly was revealed by the leak that’s such a big deal. Some of the biggest revelations include:

Pakistani Intelligence Possibly Helping Taliban Kill Americans
“Americans fighting the war in Afghanistan have long harbored strong suspicions that Pakistan’s military spy service has guided the Afghan insurgency with a hidden hand, even as Pakistan receives more than $1 billion a year from Washington for its help combating the militants, according to a trove of secret military field reports made public Sunday.” (via NY Times and The Times of India)

U.S. and Afghan Officials Covering Up Civilian Deaths
The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder finds “at least 144 separate incidents” of civilian casualties “and subsequent cover-ups.” He writes, “The failed special forces attempt to kill Abu Layth Ali Libi, which resulted in the deaths of civilians, suggests the willingness of some provisional governors to collude with the official storyline. … There is a reference to a CIA paramilitary operative shooting at 30 yards a blind woman, something that was duly reported back to headquarters.”

Drones Much Less Effective Than Claimed
Der Spiegel reports, “the secret memos reveal the drawbacks of a weapon that has been lauded by the US military as a panacea, a view shared by the president. In his short time in office, Barack Obama has unleashed double the number of drone missions ordered by his seemingly trigger-happy predecessor, George W. Bush. … But they are not always reliable. According to official reports, 38 Predator and Reaper drones have crashed while on combat missions in both Afghanistan and Iraq. … each drone crash necessitates elaborate — and dangerous — salvage operations.”

30 Years Later, Taliban Still Have The Stingers We Gave Them
During the anti-Soviet Afghan War of the 1980s, the U.S. helped the Afghan insurgents secure stinger missiles. After the Soviet military withdrew and during the civil war of the 1990s, which is when the Taliban first emerged, the U.S. attempted to recover all of the missiles. But the New York Times reports, “The Taliban have used portable heat-seeking missiles against allied aircraft, a fact that has not been publicly disclosed by the military. This type of weapon helped the Afghan mujahedeen defeat the Soviet occupation in the 1980s.”

So what happened in the aftermath of this rather bleak information being revealed? Not much, 48 hours later The House of Representatives approved a $59 billion emergency war bill, most of which will go toward troop buildup in Afghanistan.

Our two cents: What will it take to end this war we have no chance of winning? Seriously, what the F is the end game in this scenario?

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DOZENS OF PENTAGON WORKERS TIED TO CHILD PORNOGRAPHY

Federal investigators have identified several dozen Pentagon officials and contractors with high-level security clearances who allegedly purchased and downloaded child pornography, including an undisclosed number who used their government computers to obtain the illegal material, according to investigative reports.

The investigations have included employees of the National Security Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency — which deal with some of the most sensitive work in intelligence and defense — among other organizations within the Defense Department.

The number of offenders is a small percentage of the thousands of people working for sensitive Pentagon-related agencies. But the fact that offenders include people with access to government secrets puts national security agencies “at risk of blackmail, bribery, and threats, especially since these individuals typically have access to military installations,’’ according to one report by the Defense Criminal Investigative Service from late 2009…

Many of those apprehended were swept up in a much broader probe initiated by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency in 2006. Operation Flicker identified an estimated 5,000 people who had paid money over the Internet to access websites operated overseas. But until now, it has not been disclosed that a sizable number of cases were referred to the Defense Department for investigation because they involved military personnel, intelligence officials, or defense contractors.

Read the full article via The Boston Globe (published July 23, 2010)

Our two cents: Apparently finding terrorists is lower on the priority list for some Pentagon officials than downloading kiddie porn to government computers provided to them by American taxpayers.

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AUDIT REVEALS U.S. CANNOT ACCOUNT FOR $8.7B IN IRAQI FUNDS

A U.S. audit has found that the Pentagon cannot account for over 95 percent of $9.1 billion in Iraq reconstruction money, spotlighting Iraqi complaints that there is little to show for the massive funds pumped into their cash-strapped, war-ravaged nation.

The $8.7 billion in question was Iraqi money managed by the Pentagon, not part of the $53 billion that Congress has allocated for rebuilding. It’s cash that Iraq, which relies on volatile oil revenues to fuel its spending, can ill afford to lose.

“Iraq should take legal action to get back this huge amount of money,” said Sabah al-Saedi, chairman of the Parliamentary Integrity Committee. The money “should be spent for rebuilding the country and providing services for this poor nation.”

The report by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction accused the Defense Department of lax oversight and weak controls, though not fraud…

Seven years after the U.S.-led invasion, electricity service is spotty, with generation capacity falling far short of demand. Fuel shortages are common and unemployment remains high, a testament to the country’s inability to create new jobs or attract foreign investors.

Read the full article via AP News on Google (published July 28, 2010)

Our two cents: Why would Iraq’s infrastructure need so much rebuilding? Oh yeah, our armed forces blew it all to shit during that whole “Shock and Awe” thing in our buildup to find those WMD’s Saddam didn’t have anyway.

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BANKS FINANCING MEXICO GANGS ADMITTED IN WELLS FARGO DEAL

Just before sunset on April 10, 2006, a DC-9 jet landed at the international airport in the port city of Ciudad del Carmen, 500 miles east of Mexico City. As soldiers on the ground approached the plane, the crew tried to shoo them away, saying there was a dangerous oil leak. So the troops grew suspicious and searched the jet.

They found 128 black suitcases, packed with 5.7 tons of cocaine, valued at $100 million. The stash was supposed to have been delivered from Caracas to drug traffickers in Toluca, near Mexico City, Mexican prosecutors later found. Law enforcement officials also discovered something else.

The smugglers had bought the DC-9 with laundered funds they transferred through two of the biggest banks in the U.S.: Wachovia Corp. and Bank of America Corp., Bloomberg Markets magazine reports in its August 2010 issue.

This was no isolated incident. Wachovia, it turns out, had made a habit of helping move money for Mexican drug smugglers. Wells Fargo & Co., which bought Wachovia in 2008, has admitted in court that its unit failed to monitor and report suspected money laundering by narcotics traffickers — including the cash used to buy four planes that shipped a total of 22 tons of cocaine….

Wachovia admitted it didn’t do enough to spot illicit funds in handling $378.4 billion for Mexican-currency-exchange houses from 2004 to 2007. That’s the largest violation of the Bank Secrecy Act, an anti-money-laundering law, in U.S. history — a sum equal to one-third of Mexico’s current gross domestic product.

Read the full article via Bloomberg (published June 28, 2010)

Our two cents: This is not surprising in the least given the amoral attitudes of our nation’s largest banks.

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Bonus: Top Secret America – A Washington Post Investigation

The Government has built a national security and intelligence system so big, so complex and so hard to manage, no one really knows if it’s fulfilling its most important purpose: keeping its citizens safe. 45 government organizations and 2,000 private companies spread over 10,000 locations within 1,000 communities across America are currently involved in top-secret operations.

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Bonus: Freedom of Photography – Police, Security Often Clamp Down Despite 1st Amendment (via Washington Post)

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posted by: Harold Johns III