Monday, June 2, 2008

Today, United States Senator Ted Kennedy underwent surgery for a brain tumor at Duke University Medical Center. Kennedy, 76, was diagnosed with malignant glioma, a common but dangerous form of cancer, after suffering a seizure on May 17.

Kennedy has met repeatedly with friend and medical advisor Dr. Lawrence C. Horowitz to plan a course of treatment. The first, of the major phases of that treatment has now been completed, and it is expected that chemotherapy and radiotherapy will follow.

“I am pleased to report that Senator Kennedy’s surgery was successful and accomplished our goals,” said Dr. Allan Friedman, the chief of neurosurgery at Duke, who performed the surgery. “After a brief recuperation, he will begin targeted radiation at Massachusetts General Hospital and chemotherapy treatment,” Friedman added.

In talks with the press, the senator has focused on his future beyond surgery. In a prepared statement issued by his office, Kennedy stated, “after completing treatment, I look forward to returning to the United States Senate and to doing everything I can to help elect Barack Obama as our next president.”

Monday, February 18, 2013

Venezuela’s government has opened a granite processing plant in the state of Bolívar, with the intention of providing about 25% of the granite required nationwide.

Ricardo Menéndez, vice president of the Productive Economic Area, said Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez has yearned for the creation of this project to empower Venezuelan construction. Granito Bolívar is reportedly the most modern Venezuelan granite plant, not consuming community water or electricity, and is also the largest, with a daily capacity to supply enough material for use in construction of about 820 houses.

Menéndez said, “These granite blocks are the natural resources of our country, are the wealth we have as a country and often [some] simply decided to remove this richness from our country and take them to other countries” ^{((es))Spanish language: ?Esos bloques de granito son la riquezas naturales de nuestro país, son las riquezas que tenemos como patria y que muchas veces sencillamente esas riquezas decidieron sacarlas de nuestro territorio nacional y llevarlas a otros países}.

According to Menéndez, with the help of a state plan, Venezuela intends to exploit its 40,000 million cubic meters or more of granite reserves, generating a set of factories. “[T]he central theme is that these plants, all these factories, are for the construction of socialism; that means using our potential, develop the value chain within the country and of course that yields benefits from the point of view of the production system’s organization…. [Granito] Bolívar is not only the vision that historically we had of exposing richness, but the industries, basic industries we have, that level of our workers in the basic industries and in addition the development of the potential we have in the state” ^{((es))Spanish language: ?el tema central es que estas plantas todas estas fábricas son para la construcción del socialismo, eso significa utilizar nuestras potencialidades, dessarrollar la cadena de valor dentro del país y por supuesto que eso genere beneficios desde el punto de vista de la organización del sistema productivo … Bolívar no solamente es la visión que históricamente se tuvo de exponer las riquezas, sino que son las empresas, las empresas básicas que tenemos, ese nivel de nuestros trabajadores de la empresas básicas y adicionalmente el desarrollo del potencial que tenemos en el estado}.

For the construction of the plant, supplied by 23 quarries, the government of Bolívar provided about 30 million bolívares (US$4.7 million) and the national government €2.3 million (US$3 million). Bolívar reportedly has reserves of about 40,000 million tons of red, black, pink and white granite, sufficient for domestic demand for 200 years.

Monday, August 29, 2005

On July 18, 2005 CN Rail notified the CAW that they intend to cancel the CN-CAW previously Negotiated Health & Safety Plan. The CAW will be going to arbitration this fall to address the issue. The CAW has asked that employees notify their Health and Safety Rep about any safety concerns at the work place.

One terminal has lost 5-6 full-time positions. CN Rail used to have part-time positions filled as well, but at this time there are no part-time employees to cover work if a full-time employee is absent. Overtime is necessary to keep the trains running on time. Intermodal traffic goes up, but staff goes down. CN Rail expects the trains to go out on time, and in a safe condition, but staff is overworked, because there are not enough of them. In fact, one worker noticed that most of the rail cars that contained 40 foot overseas containers did not have their loading guides in place. Trains are not allowed to go out without these guides placed into the cars (the guides stop the loads from swaying from side to side in the cars), important for safety with double stacked containers, but it seems that in this case the lack of employees forced the train to leave without them.

Some recent derailments have come to the attention of the media and politicians.

On August 3rd 2005 there was a derailment in Wabamun Lake Alberta that spilled toxins into the lake. 2 days later there was a derailment in Cheakamus River near Squamish BC. Both derailments spilled hazardous materials into the water. Many are saying that CN took too long to notify people of the toxic spills.

The Conductor on each train carries with him the shipping manifest with him and has access to that information at all times. Almost any CN terminal that has a clerk working at it with access to the CN Intranet can get this information within minutes.

CTV news has said that this is the 5th derailment for CN this month.

Friday, May 8, 2015

An 18-year-old Victorian teen accused of plotting a terrorist attack on Anzac Day applied for bail at Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday. It is alleged that Harun Causevic and his associate, Sedvdet Besim, also 18, planned to run down and behead a police officer before stealing his gun to harm others at Anzac Day services in Melbourne.

Federal prosecutor Andrew Doyle stated the allegations made against Mr Causevic at the start of the hearing. Mr Doyle said Mr Causevic and Mr Besim had planned to carry out a terror attack in Melbourne if they weren’t able to access passports to head overseas.

Denis Scott, an Australian Federal Police agent, told the court how Mr Causevic had allegedly called AFP and the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation officers “dogs” during the process of trying to obtain a passport in March.

It was also revealed that Mr Besim had been speaking to a 14-year-old boy in the United Kingdom over the Internet. The boy had been portraying himself as an older man with experience in terrorism. Agent Scott told the court that these conversations were conducted through an online voice program, and that the two spoke about planning to carry out an attack on Anzac Day.

It was alleged that Mr Causevic was an accomplice in organising the terror plot in Melbourne. The court heard of a number of incidents where Mr Causevic’s extremist behaviours were put on show. In one instance he was involved in a car accident in which he allegedly told the driver involved that ISIS was “going to kill” Australia. It was also alleged that Mr Causevic had once spat on a police vehicle and waved an Islamic flag at officers.

During a search at Mr Causevic’s home police found weapons such as knives, a tactical vest and an Islamic flag. Agent Scott told the court that if bail was granted, Mr Causevic could put the safety of the public and police force in danger.

The defence argued that there was no evidence to show that Mr Causevic had been in contact with the boy Mr Besim had been speaking with in the UK. Evidence was given from some members of the Islamic Council of Victoria suggesting that Mr Causevic was capable of being guided away from extremist Islamic ideology if he is granted bail.

Magistrate Suzie Cameron is expected to make her decision on Mr Causevic’s bail application on Friday.

Tuesday, April 20, 2021

Wikinews extended invitations by e-mail on March 23 to multiple candidates running in the Texas’ 6th congressional district special election of May 1 to fill a vacancy left upon the death of Republican congressman Ron Wright. Of them, the office of Democrat Daryl Eddings, Sr. agreed to answer some questions by phone March 30 about their campaigns and policies. The following is the interview with Ms Chatham on behalf of Mr Eddings, Sr.

Eddings is a federal law enforcement officer and senior non-commissioned officer in the US military. His experience as operations officer of an aviation unit in the California National Guard includes working in Los Angeles to control riots sparked by the O. J. Simpson murder case and the police handling of Rodney King, working with drug interdiction teams in Panama and Central America and fighting in the Middle East. He is the founder of Operation Battle Buddy, which has under his leadership kept in touch with over 20 thousand veterans and their families. He was born in California, but moved to Midlothian, Texas. He endeavours to bring “good government, not no government”. Campaign manager Faith Chatham spoke to Wikinews on matters ranging from healthcare to housing.

An Inside Elections poll published on March 18 shows Republican candidate Susan Wright, the widow of Ron Wright, is ahead by 21% followed by Democrat Jana Sanchez with 17% and Republican Jake Ellzey with 8% with a 4.6% margin of error among 450 likely voters. The district is considered “lean Republican” by Inside Elections and voted 51% in favour of Donald Trump in last year’s US presidential election. This is down from 54% for Trump in 2016’s presidential election, the same poll stated.

Wednesday, September 25, 2013

Yesterday, World Bank released its 2012 World Development Report on Gender Equality and Development. India was mentioned over 300 times in the report, many more times than more developed countries like Spain which was mentioned 48 times, New Zealand which was mentioned 15 times, and Canada which was mentioned 22 times.

The report mentions the importance of gender equality for national development as it ties into improve productivity, improved outcomes for the next generation, and more representative decision making. Across the board for India, improved gender equality on the local level led to improvements in sanitation, water supplies, irrigation, and schools.

Nationally, the report found that a woman’s income correlated positively with the number of years her children spent in school. There is no gender gap in male/female school attendance for the richest 20% of Indian families, but males outnumber females by a ratio of 5 to 1 for the poorest 20% of Indian families. Girls in the bottom 20% on average only finish Grade 1 while males finish Grade 6. By age 15, according to Young Lives, Indian parents from Andhra Pradesh prioritize family outcomes for their male children over their female ones.

Indian women earn $0.64 for every $1 earned by their male counterparts. They fare better proportionally than their female German counterparts who earn $0.62 and Georgia who earn $0.60. In the developing world, they lag behind Malawi where women earn $0.90 for every $1 earned by men, Egypt where women earn $0.82, and Benin and Mexico at $0.80. A fifth of married Indian women, including those with their own income, do not make decisions on household spending. The 18% average puts Indian female control of their earnings equal to their counterparts in Mozambique. India is between Nigeria at 14%, and Zambia and Rwanda at 20%.

Indian women are having fewer children. The report found that while it took 100 years for the average woman in the United States to go from having six children to having three, it took India only 35 years. Women still have high maternal mortality rates, especially when compared to neighboring Sri Lanka. India’s rate is six times as high. Very young females still die at very high rates in India, especially in North India, because of gender preferences for male children. While according to the report this trend is spreading nationally, the overall number of excess females deaths dropped by 8,000 from 265,000 in 1990 to 257,000 in 2008. In China, the total excess female deaths grew by 202,000. The report cites improved access to ultra-sound and similar technologies as a cause for the very high rates in both India and China because it allows parents to select the sex of their child.

In a national exception, the height of North Indian women increased more slowly and they had worse anthropometric outcomes proportional to their male counterparts.

Estimates by the World Bank report writers based on Demographic and Health Surveys suggest 15% of Indian women think it is acceptable for a husband to beat his wife if she refuses to have sex with him, 20% if she burns food and 30% if she argues with him.

Economic well being plays a role in the number of children a woman has. The richest 20% of women average around 1.5 total children. The poorest 20% average about 4 children. India’s poorest 20% is comparable to Colombia and the Dominican Republic. The number is much lower than many Afrian countries including Niger, Mali, Zambia, Malawi, Liberia, Nigeria, Tanzania and Kenya where the poorest 20% average over 7 children.

The Indian gains highlighted include several local ones. This includes using women’s self-help groups focused on taking best practices from research and applying them in farming in the state of Orissa. The Self Employed Women’s Association has assisted women in Gujarat by providing childcare. Quotas for women elected in local governments led to changes in underlying beliefs about the effectiveness of women in government. The creation of an all-women’s police force in Tamil Nadu led to increased reporting of crimes against women and general comfort in going to the police to report a problem.

The report offers several pieces of advice for Indian policy makers, including trying to change current role models to include more women who do not follow social norms. It advises laws be created and enforced to prevent sex selection of children. The report also encourages strengthening ownership and land rights, which should also address the agricultural productivity gender-gap.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

The President of the Swiss Confederation, Mrs. Micheline Calmy-Rey, has begun a 2-day visit to Ghana.

The trip is part of an African tour which includes Senegal, Chad, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Rwanda and Burundi. She has already been in Benin.

She held talks with John Kufuor her host. Mrs. Calmy-Rey praised Ghana’s successful democracy and said Ghana has a special role to play in Africa and is partners with Switzerland in that role. She is also keen to see more Swiss investment in Ghana.

They also discussed issues such as trade, taxation relief to help boost Swiss investments in Ghana and Swiss support for Ghana’s cocoa and pineapple industry. Also discussed was possible increased budgetary support as well as assistance to the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre in Accra.

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Former Salt Lake City mayor and human rights activist Rocky Anderson took some time to discuss his 2012 U.S. presidential campaign and the newly-created Justice Party with Wikinews reporter William S. Saturn.

Anderson served as mayor of Salt Lake City for eight years (2000–2008) as a member of the Democratic Party. During his tenure, he enacted proposals to reduce the city’s carbon emissions, reformed its criminal justice system, and positioned it as a leading sanctuary for refugees. After leaving office, Anderson grew critical of the Democratic Party’s failure to push for impeachment against President George W. Bush, and for not reversing policies on torture, taxes, and defense spending. He left the party earlier this year and announced that he would form a Third party.

Anderson officially established the Justice Party last week during a press conference in Washington D.C.. He proclaimed “We the people are powerful enough to end the perverse government-to-the-highest-bidder system sustained by the two dominant parties…We are here today for the sake of justice — social justice, environmental justice and economic justice.” The party promotes campaign finance reform and is attempting to appeal to the Occupy Wall Street movement. It is currently working on ballot access efforts, and will hold a Founding Convention in February 2012 in Salt Lake City.

Among other issues, Anderson discussed climate change, health care, education, and civil liberties. He detailed his successes as mayor of Salt Lake City, stressed the importance of executive experience, and expressed his views on President Barack Obama and some of the Republican Party presidential candidates. He spoke in depth about former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, with whom he worked during the 2002 Winter Olympics, and fellow Utahan, former governor and U.S. ambassador to China Jon Huntsman, Jr..