Miami airplane shooting: Washington’s 'war on terrorism' comes home
The most chilling aspect of the brutal state killing of Rigoberto Alpizar, the 44-year-old Costa Rican immigrant gunned down while fleeing an American Airlines Boeing 757 in Miami Wednesday, is the utter absence of any statement of remorse by government officials.
Rather than publicly acknowledge that a horror and a tragedy had resulted from the use of lethal force against an unarmed and innocent man, spokesmen for the Bush administration and various state agencies praised those who killed him and virtually celebrated the spilling of blood on American soil in the so-called “global war on terrorism.”
Eyewitnesses refute official story
The central assertion that Alpizar posed a terrorist threat is based on the claim he said he had a bomb.
However, no witnesses -- including from among the more than 100 passengers and crew members on board the flight -- have come forward publicly to back up this allegation.
Instead, numerous passengers have directly contradicted it, even after hours of interrogation and prodding by police authorities in the wake of the shooting.
[The treatment of the plane’s passengers following the shooting was of a piece with the violence meted out to Alpizar. Armed federal marshals and police agents stormed the aircraft and ordered them to put their hands on their heads. Terrified passengers were told to remain motionless for more than an hour, and some reported having guns put to the backs of their heads.]
Sunday, December 11, 2005
PAPER TRAIL
Bush on the Constitution: 'It's just a goddamned piece of paper'
GOP leaders told Bush that his hardcore push to renew the more onerous provisions of the act could further alienate conservatives still mad at the President from his botched attempt to nominate White House Counsel Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court.
“I don’t give a goddamn,” Bush retorted. “I’m the President and the Commander-in-Chief. Do it my way.”
“Mr. President,” one aide in the meeting said. “There is a valid case that the provisions in this law undermine the Constitution.”
“Stop throwing the Constitution in my face,” Bush screamed back. “It’s just a goddamned piece of paper!”
[The Constitution isn't just a piece of paper or parchment. It's a contract; the original contract with America. It's the contract you yourself swore an oath to preserve, protect, and defend against all enemies both foreign and domestic. You attached your name to that promise. You swore that oath before a judge of the United States Supreme Court, with your hand on a bible. That isn't just scenery for the cameras. Swearing an oath before a judge carries legal obligations with that oath, and legal penalties for breaking that oath.]
Friday, December 09, 2005
ASSEMBLY LINE
Nanotech discovery could have radical implications
Torquato and colleagues have published a paper in the Nov. 25 issue of Physical Review Letters, the leading physics journal, outlining a mathematical approach that would enable them to produce desired configurations of nanoparticles by manipulating the manner in which the particles interact with one another.
Instead of employing the traditional trial-and-error method of self-assembly that is used by nanotechnologists and which is found in nature, scientists propose starting with an exact blueprint of the nanostructure they want to build.
[The paper appearing in Physical Review Letters is a condensed version of a more detailed paper that has been accepted for publication in Physical Review E and which will probably appear sometime before the end of the year.]
Torquato and colleagues have published a paper in the Nov. 25 issue of Physical Review Letters, the leading physics journal, outlining a mathematical approach that would enable them to produce desired configurations of nanoparticles by manipulating the manner in which the particles interact with one another.
Instead of employing the traditional trial-and-error method of self-assembly that is used by nanotechnologists and which is found in nature, scientists propose starting with an exact blueprint of the nanostructure they want to build.
[The paper appearing in Physical Review Letters is a condensed version of a more detailed paper that has been accepted for publication in Physical Review E and which will probably appear sometime before the end of the year.]
COACCIDENTS HAPPEN
Brothers die in crashes just minutes apart
Two brothers died within minutes of each other in separate traffic crashes in a rural county where their father is a sheriff's deputy.
Rory McDowell, 23, and Cory McDowell, 21, were pronounced dead a couple of miles and 20 minutes apart.
Father, Andy McDowell, was not on duty at the time but was taken to Rory's crash. He later was driven past Cory's fiery crash, not knowing his younger son was involved in it.
["You take the most unimaginable hell that a parent could be told and double that," Warren County Deputy Coroner Dwayne Lawrence said.]
Two brothers died within minutes of each other in separate traffic crashes in a rural county where their father is a sheriff's deputy.
Rory McDowell, 23, and Cory McDowell, 21, were pronounced dead a couple of miles and 20 minutes apart.
Father, Andy McDowell, was not on duty at the time but was taken to Rory's crash. He later was driven past Cory's fiery crash, not knowing his younger son was involved in it.
["You take the most unimaginable hell that a parent could be told and double that," Warren County Deputy Coroner Dwayne Lawrence said.]
QUANTUM ENTANGLEMENT
Quantum Entanglement Between Remote Ensembles of Atoms Achieved
Reporting in the December 8 issue of the journal Nature, California Institute of Technology physicist H. Jeff Kimble and his colleagues announce the first realization of entanglement for one "spin excitation" stored jointly between two samples of atoms. In the Caltech experiment, the atomic ensembles are located in a pair of apparatuses 2.8 meters apart, with each ensemble composed of about 100,000 individual atoms.
According to Kimble, who is the Valentine Professor and professor of physics at Caltech, this research significantly extends laboratory capabilities for entanglement generation, with now-entangled "quantum bits" of matter stored with separation several thousand times greater than was heretofore possible.
[In the Caltech experiment, the entanglement involves "collective atomic spin excitations." To generate such excitations, an ensemble of cold atoms initially all in level "a" of two possible ground levels is addressed with a suitable "writing" laser pulse. For weak excitation with the write laser, one atom in the sample is sometimes transferred to ground level "b," thereby emitting a photon.]
Reporting in the December 8 issue of the journal Nature, California Institute of Technology physicist H. Jeff Kimble and his colleagues announce the first realization of entanglement for one "spin excitation" stored jointly between two samples of atoms. In the Caltech experiment, the atomic ensembles are located in a pair of apparatuses 2.8 meters apart, with each ensemble composed of about 100,000 individual atoms.
According to Kimble, who is the Valentine Professor and professor of physics at Caltech, this research significantly extends laboratory capabilities for entanglement generation, with now-entangled "quantum bits" of matter stored with separation several thousand times greater than was heretofore possible.
[In the Caltech experiment, the entanglement involves "collective atomic spin excitations." To generate such excitations, an ensemble of cold atoms initially all in level "a" of two possible ground levels is addressed with a suitable "writing" laser pulse. For weak excitation with the write laser, one atom in the sample is sometimes transferred to ground level "b," thereby emitting a photon.]
POWER AND PASSION
Bush and Blair slated by Pinter
Most politicians "are interested not in truth but in power and the maintenance of that power", the 75-year-old writer Harold Pinter said in his lecture as winner of this year's Nobel Prize for Literature.
His lecture, entitled Art, Truth and Politics, studied the importance of truth in art before decrying its perceived absence in politics.
He said politicians feel it is "essential that people remain in ignorance, that they live in ignorance of the truth, even the truth of their own lives".
"You have to hand it to America. It has exercised a quite clinical manipulation of power worldwide while masquerading as a force for universal good."
[Pinter, whose plays include The Birthday Party and Betrayal, was announced the winner of the $1.3m (£740,000) cash prize in October.]
Most politicians "are interested not in truth but in power and the maintenance of that power", the 75-year-old writer Harold Pinter said in his lecture as winner of this year's Nobel Prize for Literature.
His lecture, entitled Art, Truth and Politics, studied the importance of truth in art before decrying its perceived absence in politics.
He said politicians feel it is "essential that people remain in ignorance, that they live in ignorance of the truth, even the truth of their own lives".
"You have to hand it to America. It has exercised a quite clinical manipulation of power worldwide while masquerading as a force for universal good."
[Pinter, whose plays include The Birthday Party and Betrayal, was announced the winner of the $1.3m (£740,000) cash prize in October.]
EARTH CHANGES
Greenland glacier races to ocean
Scientists have been monitoring what they say may be the fastest moving glacier on the planet.
Kangerdlugssuaq Glacier on the east coast of Greenland has been clocked using GPS equipment and satellites to be flowing at a rate of 14km per year.
It is also losing mass extremely fast, with its front end retreating 5km back up its fjord this year alone.
The glacier "drains" about 4 per cent of the ice sheet, dumping tens of cubic kilometres of fresh water in the North Atlantic.
This gives it significant influence not just on global sea level rise but on the system of ocean circulation which drives through the Arctic.
[]
SEDITION BITES
Australian bloggers muzzled
Australian blogs will never be as hard-hitting as their overseas counterparts because of our restrictive laws.
Many local bloggers are unaware that they may be liable for everything they write on their sites, not to mention all of the colourful comments made by contributors.
Our new sedition laws will make this worse.
Blogs fall under the same defamation and other laws that regulate all media organisations in the country.
While US bloggers are protected by a freedom of speech clause in the US Bill of Rights, new sedition laws passed by Australian authorities may make life even tougher for bloggers.
[Hey evil pundit, don't complain when a Labor Government locks you up because it doesn't like the way you look at them.]
Australian blogs will never be as hard-hitting as their overseas counterparts because of our restrictive laws.
Many local bloggers are unaware that they may be liable for everything they write on their sites, not to mention all of the colourful comments made by contributors.
Our new sedition laws will make this worse.
Blogs fall under the same defamation and other laws that regulate all media organisations in the country.
While US bloggers are protected by a freedom of speech clause in the US Bill of Rights, new sedition laws passed by Australian authorities may make life even tougher for bloggers.
[Hey evil pundit, don't complain when a Labor Government locks you up because it doesn't like the way you look at them.]
Sunday, December 04, 2005
WATER WARS
Choking on Chemicals in China
Most of the country's air and waterways are hopelessly polluted and the government has done little to address the problem. Instead, officials prefer to lie.
In the northeast Chinese city of Harbin, hundreds of people wait for a water truck. They have been waiting in the bitter cold since early morning -- though the water delivery isn't scheduled until 11 am.
"We are now frugal with water," says a woman in a red woolen cap. "First we use it to clean vegetables, then to wash our hands and finally to flush the toilet."
The emergency came about when 100 tons of toxic chemicals from Chemical Factory 101 floated down the Songhua River afer an explosion 400 kilometers upstream which released highly toxic benzene compounds.
[The slick, slowly traveling down river toward Russia, threatens the drinking water supply for more than 10 million people between the northeast Chinese city of Harbin and Khabarovsk in Siberia.]
POWER POINT
Bullet Points over Baghdad
The National Security Council document released under the grandiose title "National Strategy for Victory in Iraq" is neither an analytical report nor a policy statement. It's simply the same old talking points repackaged in the style of a slide presentation for a business meeting.
Refuting some of the upbeat assertions about Iraq requires specialized knowledge, but many of them can be quickly debunked by anyone with an Internet connection.
The point isn't just that the administration is trying, yet again, to deceive the public. It's the fact that this attempt at deception shows such contempt - contempt for the public, and especially contempt for the news media.
And why not? The truth is that the level of misrepresentation in this new document is no worse than that in a typical speech by President Bush or Vice President Dick Cheney. Yet for much of the past five years, many major news organizations failed to provide the public with effective fact-checking.
[NY Times original]
The National Security Council document released under the grandiose title "National Strategy for Victory in Iraq" is neither an analytical report nor a policy statement. It's simply the same old talking points repackaged in the style of a slide presentation for a business meeting.
Refuting some of the upbeat assertions about Iraq requires specialized knowledge, but many of them can be quickly debunked by anyone with an Internet connection.
The point isn't just that the administration is trying, yet again, to deceive the public. It's the fact that this attempt at deception shows such contempt - contempt for the public, and especially contempt for the news media.
And why not? The truth is that the level of misrepresentation in this new document is no worse than that in a typical speech by President Bush or Vice President Dick Cheney. Yet for much of the past five years, many major news organizations failed to provide the public with effective fact-checking.
[NY Times original]
Friday, November 25, 2005
PROJECT PAPERCLIP
Dark side of the Moon
Sixty years ago the US hired Nazi scientists to lead pioneering projects, such as the race to conquer space. These men provided the US with cutting-edge technology which still leads the way today, but at a cost.
[Added to this, the large number of still-secret Paperclip documents has led many people, including Nick Cook, Aerospace Consultant at Jane's Defence Weekly, to speculate that the US may have developed even more advanced Nazi technology, including anti-gravity devices, a potential source of vast amounts of free energy.]
Wednesday, November 23, 2005
SONIC WEAPON
Armed pirates approach the Seabourn Spirit, in a photo taken by British passenger Norman Fisher.
Pirates shoot at Britons' cruise liner
Terrified Britons came under fire from machine-guns and rocket-propelled grenades yesterday when pirates tried to hijack one of the world's most luxurious cruise liners.
Holidaymakers on the Seabourn Spirit watched in disbelief as the armed bandits blew a hole in the side of the vast ship and hit a passenger cabin during their failed attempt to board.
The ship was carrying 161 crew members and 151 passengers who had paid up to £6,000 each to enjoy the 16-day cruise in the height of luxury.
[The ship's crew triggered a sonic weapon, which sent out ear-splitting bangs to repel the pirates. The Spirit escaped with minor damage and slight injuries to one crew member caused by shrapnel. The sonic device, known as a Long Range Acoustic Device, or LRAD, is a so-called "non-lethal weapon" developed for the military after the 2000 attack on the USS Cole in Yemen as a way to keep operators of small boats from approaching U.S. warships.]
Tuesday, November 22, 2005
FLAWED LOGIC
Bush visits China
A reporter asks why he seemed so subdued earlier at his appearance with Mr Hu. The reporter suggests he was "off his game".
"Have you ever heard of jet lag?" Mr Bush fires back. He then ends the meeting by striding purposefully away towards a door - which turns out to be locked. An aide shepherds him out.
A freer economy will yield a freer political system
This is one of the president's core beliefs, in plain view on this trip: when a state liberalises its economy, political liberalisation will inevitably follow.
This belief obviates the need to confront the Chinese leadership. Economic liberalisation is underway in China. Ergo, political liberalisation is only a matter of time. The die is cast.
[How does it follow that opening up the economy frees up the political environment?]
Monday, November 21, 2005
MONEY PIT
For sale: Oak Islands buried mystery
Oak Island, in Nova Scotia, is famous for its Money Pit, a mystery that has endured two centuries, claimed six lives and swallowed up millions in life savings.
The Pit was discovered in 1795 by a local boy named Daniel McGinnis who, spotting an unusual clearing in the earth under one of the island's oak trees, was prompted to start digging. The discovery of layered planks, mysterious stone slabs, and mats made of coconut fibers descending deep into the ground turned his casual afternoon dig into an all-out excavation.
What appears to be a complex flooding trap has thwarted efforts to reach the bottom of the Money Pit ever since. Some think the pit was purposely flooded with seawater, via a series of artificial swamps and tunnels, to hide its contents.
Through the murk, drill borings and shafts dug by the island's series of owners have detected what seem to be cement vaulting, wooden chests, and scraps of parchment paper. Radiocarbon dating of these artifacts is consistent: whoever constructed the shaft likely did so sometime in the 16th Century.
[Oak Island's current owners, Dan Blankenship and David Tobias, have worked on the island since the 1960s, sinking millions of dollars into the project and revealing some intriguing clues of their own. For many who follow Oak Island developments, their abandonment of the treasure comes as a surprise. As recently as December of 2003, Blankenship told the Halifax Herald that he would announce some new, exciting findings in the following months. The revelation never came.]
FUEL'S PARADISE?
Power source that turns physics on its head
Randell Mills, a Harvard University medic who also studied electrical engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, claims to have built a prototype power source that generates up to 1,000 times more heat than conventional fuel.
Independent scientists claim to have verified the experiments.
The problem is that according to the rules of quantum mechanics the idea is theoretically impossible.
What has much of the physics world up in arms is Dr Mills's claim that he has produced a new form of hydrogen, the simplest of all the atoms, with just a single proton circled by one electron.
In his "hydrino", the electron sits a little closer to the proton than normal, and the formation of the new atoms from traditional hydrogen releases huge amounts of energy.
This is scientific heresy. According to quantum mechanics, electrons can only exist in an atom in strictly defined orbits, and the shortest distance allowed between the proton and electron in hydrogen is fixed. The two particles are simply not allowed to get any closer.
According to Dr Mills, there can be only one explanation: quantum mechanics must be wrong. "We've done a lot of testing. We've got 50 independent validation reports, we've got 65 peer-reviewed journal articles," he said. "We ran into this theoretical resistance and there are some vested interests here. People are very strong and fervent protectors of this [quantum] theory that they use."
["Physicists are quite conservative. It's not easy to convince them to change a theory that is accepted for 50 to 60 years. I don't think [Mills's] theory should be supported," said Jan Naudts, a theoretical physicist at the University of Antwerp.]
Randell Mills, a Harvard University medic who also studied electrical engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, claims to have built a prototype power source that generates up to 1,000 times more heat than conventional fuel.
Independent scientists claim to have verified the experiments.
The problem is that according to the rules of quantum mechanics the idea is theoretically impossible.
What has much of the physics world up in arms is Dr Mills's claim that he has produced a new form of hydrogen, the simplest of all the atoms, with just a single proton circled by one electron.
In his "hydrino", the electron sits a little closer to the proton than normal, and the formation of the new atoms from traditional hydrogen releases huge amounts of energy.
This is scientific heresy. According to quantum mechanics, electrons can only exist in an atom in strictly defined orbits, and the shortest distance allowed between the proton and electron in hydrogen is fixed. The two particles are simply not allowed to get any closer.
According to Dr Mills, there can be only one explanation: quantum mechanics must be wrong. "We've done a lot of testing. We've got 50 independent validation reports, we've got 65 peer-reviewed journal articles," he said. "We ran into this theoretical resistance and there are some vested interests here. People are very strong and fervent protectors of this [quantum] theory that they use."
["Physicists are quite conservative. It's not easy to convince them to change a theory that is accepted for 50 to 60 years. I don't think [Mills's] theory should be supported," said Jan Naudts, a theoretical physicist at the University of Antwerp.]
AETHER UPDATE
Einstein's wrong, relatively speaking
In 2002, Australian Professor Reg Cahill started to question what he thought were anomalies in Einstein's theory that time and space are relative.
"They all agreed with one another and they were all indicating a huge speed difference in different directions," he said. "When you find out the speed of light differs, the whole Einstein theory starts collapsing."
Professor Cahill said that debunking the Einstein theories would lead to new discoveries in physics and greater understanding of phenomena that could not yet be fully explained.
"There are some incredible discoveries being made," he said. "We're discovering some properties about space that are awesome."
Those discoveries include the speed at which the solar system is travelling through space and the detection of gravitational waves.
Support for Professor Cahill is growing. The Australian Research Council gave a $60,000 grant for his research, and the world's largest particle physics laboratory - CERN in Switzerland - has donated $100,000 worth of optical fibres.
[Physicist Paul Davies of Macquarie University and the Australian Centre for Astrobiology said Einstein's theories of relativity had been tested, and there was no evidence to suggest they were wrong.]
In 2002, Australian Professor Reg Cahill started to question what he thought were anomalies in Einstein's theory that time and space are relative.
"They all agreed with one another and they were all indicating a huge speed difference in different directions," he said. "When you find out the speed of light differs, the whole Einstein theory starts collapsing."
Professor Cahill said that debunking the Einstein theories would lead to new discoveries in physics and greater understanding of phenomena that could not yet be fully explained.
"There are some incredible discoveries being made," he said. "We're discovering some properties about space that are awesome."
Those discoveries include the speed at which the solar system is travelling through space and the detection of gravitational waves.
Support for Professor Cahill is growing. The Australian Research Council gave a $60,000 grant for his research, and the world's largest particle physics laboratory - CERN in Switzerland - has donated $100,000 worth of optical fibres.
[Physicist Paul Davies of Macquarie University and the Australian Centre for Astrobiology said Einstein's theories of relativity had been tested, and there was no evidence to suggest they were wrong.]
MAGNETIC EARTH
New clues to make magnets more powerful
Using the Western Hemisphere's most powerful X-rays at the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne, researchers were able to see new details of rare-earth ions, a critical component of permanent magnets.
The research found that rare-earth ions in dissimilar crystalline environments compete with one another, and undermine the magnetic performance of the highest performance magnets, said Argonne scientist Daniel Haskel, who led the research team.
These findings point to the need for specialized atomic engineering of the material -- manipulating the rare-earth local atomic structure to fully utilize the rare-earth contribution in next generations of magnets.
[The findings are published in Physical Review Letter]
Using the Western Hemisphere's most powerful X-rays at the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne, researchers were able to see new details of rare-earth ions, a critical component of permanent magnets.
The research found that rare-earth ions in dissimilar crystalline environments compete with one another, and undermine the magnetic performance of the highest performance magnets, said Argonne scientist Daniel Haskel, who led the research team.
These findings point to the need for specialized atomic engineering of the material -- manipulating the rare-earth local atomic structure to fully utilize the rare-earth contribution in next generations of magnets.
[The findings are published in Physical Review Letter]
Friday, November 18, 2005
FREE SPEECH
Airports at vanguard of dissent-crushing
Dawn Hansen arrived at the checkpoint at Oakland International Airport wearing a navy blue jacket with two small American flag pins and two political buttons with writing on them. The larger one reads "Dissent is Patriotic." The smaller, red one bears a smiling portrait of President Bush, labeled "Daddy's Little War Criminal".
"When I went to show my boarding pass she looked at me, yanked it out of my hand, undid the rope, and said, 'Come over here!' No 'Please,' no ID check. Then she said, 'Give me your jacket!' They made me go through the metal detector twice even though I didn't set it off either time. Then this second woman said, 'You go sit down over there!' They wanded me, they made me put my legs out, they went up inside my back and around my boobs.
"They passed my jacket from person to person, each security person in turn was looking at the buttons. They asked me, 'Why are you traveling with so much reading material?'"
Dawn says she was carrying seven or eight general circulation magazines, a biography of Ben Franklin and Bob Woodward's latest book. "I did have one subversive publication; I was carrying a copy of The New York Times. ... They asked me why I was carrying so many legal documents. I'd been in California helping my brother do some legal research on a case.
"When I got home I found out they'd taken the lids off all my creams and just left them like that so they got all over everything."
[Dawn Hansen is Nevada chairman of Mothers Against the Draft]
Dawn Hansen arrived at the checkpoint at Oakland International Airport wearing a navy blue jacket with two small American flag pins and two political buttons with writing on them. The larger one reads "Dissent is Patriotic." The smaller, red one bears a smiling portrait of President Bush, labeled "Daddy's Little War Criminal".
"When I went to show my boarding pass she looked at me, yanked it out of my hand, undid the rope, and said, 'Come over here!' No 'Please,' no ID check. Then she said, 'Give me your jacket!' They made me go through the metal detector twice even though I didn't set it off either time. Then this second woman said, 'You go sit down over there!' They wanded me, they made me put my legs out, they went up inside my back and around my boobs.
"They passed my jacket from person to person, each security person in turn was looking at the buttons. They asked me, 'Why are you traveling with so much reading material?'"
Dawn says she was carrying seven or eight general circulation magazines, a biography of Ben Franklin and Bob Woodward's latest book. "I did have one subversive publication; I was carrying a copy of The New York Times. ... They asked me why I was carrying so many legal documents. I'd been in California helping my brother do some legal research on a case.
"When I got home I found out they'd taken the lids off all my creams and just left them like that so they got all over everything."
[Dawn Hansen is Nevada chairman of Mothers Against the Draft]
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
PRIME TARGET
Red carpet for warmonger
US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld, one of the main architects of the war on Iraq, is coming to Adelaide. With the blood of as many as 100,000 Iraqi civilians on his hands, this supposed champion of democracy will be meeting with similar Australian champions behind massive police protection.
Adelaide to be locked down for Rumsfeld visit
Sections of Adelaide will be virtually locked down as part of a massive security operation to protect U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld later this month.
The two-day visit will result in areas around the Hyatt Hotel and the Town Hall declared no-go zones amid fears of ugly anti-Iraq war protests. It is likely sections of North Tce and King William St will be fenced off to keep the thousands of expected protesters away from both sites.
Although there is no intelligence to suggest a threat, SA police are well aware Mr Rumsfeld is one of the world's top terrorist targets.
[Mr Rumsfeld, deputy U.S. Secretary of State Bob Zoellick and a senior U.S. army general are visiting Adelaide for Ausmin - the Australia-United States Ministerial Meeting - on November 17 and 18.]
US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld, one of the main architects of the war on Iraq, is coming to Adelaide. With the blood of as many as 100,000 Iraqi civilians on his hands, this supposed champion of democracy will be meeting with similar Australian champions behind massive police protection.
Adelaide to be locked down for Rumsfeld visit
Sections of Adelaide will be virtually locked down as part of a massive security operation to protect U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld later this month.
The two-day visit will result in areas around the Hyatt Hotel and the Town Hall declared no-go zones amid fears of ugly anti-Iraq war protests. It is likely sections of North Tce and King William St will be fenced off to keep the thousands of expected protesters away from both sites.
Although there is no intelligence to suggest a threat, SA police are well aware Mr Rumsfeld is one of the world's top terrorist targets.
[Mr Rumsfeld, deputy U.S. Secretary of State Bob Zoellick and a senior U.S. army general are visiting Adelaide for Ausmin - the Australia-United States Ministerial Meeting - on November 17 and 18.]
Monday, November 07, 2005
ICEMAN COMETH
Death renews iceman 'curse' claim
The death of a molecular biologist has fuelled renewed speculation about a "curse" connected to an ancient corpse.
Tom Loy, 63, had analysed DNA found on "Oetzi", the Stone Age hunter whose remains were discovered in 1991.
Dr Loy died in unclear circumstances in Australia two weeks ago, it has been announced, making him the seventh person connected with Oetzi to die.
[Over the past few years many microbiologists have died in mysterious circumstances.]
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