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Revealed: Texas officials covered up dangerously radioactive tap water for years Disgusting excerpts in italics:Texas officials charged with protecting the environment and public health have for years made arbitrary subtractions to the measured levels of radiation delivered by water utilities across the state, according to a series of investigative reports out of Houston.Those subtractions, based on the test results' margin of error, made all the difference for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ): without the reduction, demonstrated levels of dangerous radiation would have been in excess of federal limits for years.This was being done in direct contravention of an order by the US Environmental Protection Agency, which told state regulators in 2000 to stop subtracting the margin of error.This is nice..Confronted by reporter Mark Greenblatt, TCEQ staffer Linda Brookins claimed that the radiation was "natural" and people shouldn't be concerned. She also refused to read on camera the EPA's order to stop subtracting margins of error from radiation test results.andThanks to the TCEQ's under-reporting of radioactive content, one particular water provider in Harris County was able to skirt needed maintenance for years, even though uncensored tests showed radiation was almost always above legal limits.What did we learn today? Regulation with corrupt Oversight is worse than no Regulation at all. Sleep well, my Texan friends.. It's probably not a tumor..
Or essentially carrying on with the same policies of your predecessor.. ‘I’d have endorsed Obama if they’d asked me,’ Bush reportedly said.After this week of Bush's return to the world's stage, I really wish he would have shown up October 1st. People would have "remembered," and the election would have been waaaay different.
Silver $27.58
Gold $1396.90
Kitco chart from Urban Survival. Silver and Gold both dipped after new highs($29.38/Silver, and $1425.50/Gold), but are recovering losses from today's bottom($26.43/$1381.70).
Tomorrow is another day..
Town in ‘Erin Brockovich’ suffers as groundwater grows even more toxic. Excerpts:A tiny desert town whose plight was made famous by the movie "Erin Brockovich" has seen a dramatic increase in the size of a toxic plume of chromium as it has spread to multiple groundwater wells.Water regulators earlier this year discovered a well with increasing concentrations of the cancer-causing pollutant and now even more wells have been uncovered with elevated levels, said Lauri Kemper, assistant executive officer of the Lahontan Regional Water Quality Control board.The water board on Monday ordered Pacific Gas & Electric to do additional groundwater monitoring at the site near Hinkley, about 120 miles northeast of Los Angeles."The more dispersed chromium continues to move," Kemper told The Associated Press on Tuesday. "Because of the widespread nature of the lower concentration chromium, it's difficult to capture the contamination."The contamination was first publicized during a 1996 court case in which PG&E settled with more than 600 Hinkley residents for $333 million. Many sick residents blamed the contaminated water for their crippling health problems that included Hodgkin's disease and breast cancer.No mention of prosecution for this most recent contamination.. PG&E to Hinkley, California? Screw you; Maybe we'll do some more testing.. Doesn't really matter, though, does it? After all, it's not YOUR little town in peril..
Rich Vail Fund Manager Hits Cyclist And Runs, Gets Off Because Charges Might "Jeopardize His Job" With "Are you f/n kidding me?" excerpts in italics..The rich are different from you and me; they get to hit and run, almost killing a cyclist, but get off without serious charges because it is hard to be money manager for Smith Barney if you have a record. District Attorney Mark Hurlbert is not charging Martin Joel Erzinger with a felony, because "Felony convictions have some pretty serious job implications for someone in Mr. Erzinger's profession," which is managing billions for rich people.Dr. Steven Milo, the victim, is not impressed. Mr. Erzinger struck me, fled and left me for dead on the highway," Milo wrote. "Neither his financial prominence nor my financial situation should be factors in your prosecution of this case."Milo was bicycling eastbound on Highway 6 just east of Miller Ranch Road, when Erzinger allegedly hit him with the black 2010 Mercedes Benz sedan he was driving. Erzinger fled the scene and was arrested later, police say. Erzinger allegedly veered onto the side of the road and hit Milo from behind. Milo was thrown to the pavement, while Erzinger struck a culvert and kept driving, according to court documents.Erzinger drove all the way through Avon, the town's roundabouts, under I-70 and stopped in the Pizza Hut parking lot where he called the Mercedes auto assistance service to report damage to his vehicle, and asked that his car be towed, records show. He did not ask for law enforcement assistance, according to court records.Vomitous, or Goddamned disgusting, if you prefer..Xymphora(Thanks for the link!) says it perfectly.."Back in the day, there was one law which governed the royals and the nobility (which is to say no law at all), and another law for everybody else. Then there were some revolutions and stuff, and there was supposed to be one law for all. With the victory of the counter-revolution of the plutocrats, American prosecutors are no longer even pretending that the rich are subject to the law."And the "Haves" wonder why the "Have Nots" are angry..
$28.09/Silver
1411.30 Gold
Source: Kitco chart via Urban Survival
Silver increased in price $1.35 in less than 24 hours. Clif said that silver first increase by a dollar a day, then to five dollars a day, and then.. Change is just around the corner..
$26.76 From Kitco.com. I don't have a screen shot, and Silver is likely to change in price once the market opens. This is just for documentation. $26.76 at the open of Monday's market..
Tucked in the second paragraph of the already politically *Major* article Lords stunned by Tory peer's IRA funding claim is this MegaBlast: Lord James of Blackheath also claims that he is in touch with a secret organisation which he called Foundation X, with vast sums of money at its disposal, which is prepared to lend billions to the British government, interest free, to help reduce the deficit, but he has been unable to get ministers to believe him. His claims were ridiculed as coming from a man who has lost touch with reality when he voiced them in the House of Lords this week, but a government minister, Lord Sassoon, said that they had been the subject of "detailed discussions".Don't get me wrong.. Admitting to laundering money for multiple terrorist organizations(the biggest being the IRA) is a pretty big revelation in itself..Lord James told peers: "I have had one of the biggest experiences in the laundering of terrorist money and funny money that anyone has had in the City. I have handled billions of pounds of terrorist money. My biggest client was the IRA and I am pleased to say that I managed to write off more than £1bn of its money. I have also had extensive connections with North African terrorists, but that was of a far nastier nature, and I do not want to talk about that because it is still a security issue. I hasten to add that it is no good getting the police in, because I shall immediately call the Bank of England as my defence witness, given that it put me in to deal with these problems."But Foundation X.. That's.. Something.He told peers that he was approached for or five months ago by a City firm, on behalf of "a strange organisation which wishes to make a great deal of money available to assist the recovery of the economy". Later, Lord James gave a figure of £75bn. He said: "I have come to the absolute conclusion that Foundation X is completely genuine and sincere and that it directly wishes to make the United Kingdom one of the principal points that it will use to disseminate its extraordinarily great wealth as part of an attempt to seek the recovery of the global economy." He said that he had arranged for a representative of Foundation X to meet the leader of the House of lords, Lord Strathclyde, but that the meeting went so badly that" neither of them ended up by inviting the other out for a coffee or drink at the end of the evening, and they did not exchange telephone numbers".Of course there are critics..Lord Strathclyde later told Lord James that the claims made about Foundation X could not be true, because all of their wealth is supposedly backed by gold bullion, which would imply they held more bullion than had been mined in the history of the world. Lord James, who is 72, said the total amount of bullion in the world may have been miscalculated, because "the total value of the Vatican bank reserves would claim to be more than the entire value of gold ever mined".Lord James' credentials:As a businessman, David James had a reputation as a "company doctor" who was called in to take over enterprises that were on the brink of failure, including the Millennium Dome. In preparation for the 2001 general election, he was a member of an exclusive club of businessmen each of whom donated at least £10,000 a year to the Conservatives. Michael Howard, David Cameron's predecessor, sent for him in 2004 to hold a review into how a Tory government might save £35bn a year by cutting Whitehall waste. The James Review of Taxpayer Value was praised by George Osborne as a "valuable exercise in identifying poor value for money". At Mr Howard's request, David Cameron arranged for James to be rewarded with a life peerage, as a working peer, in 2006.So.. Who or What is Foundation X? The nuns known as Sorcha Faal have an answer of course, and the conspiracy includes John Stewart. Awesome. Come to think of it, that might explain Tim Geithner meeting with Stewart earlier this year, which was odd.. Or, more like "weird."
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