December 6, 2010 archive

Pique the Geek 20101205: The Food Safety Modernization Act

After the food contamination incidents over the past couple of years, the Congress has put forth a revamp of food safety law in the United States.  This bill bass the House back in 2009 and was tied up in the Senate until last week.  The Senate passed its version (with amendments) and so it has gone back to the House for either passage of the Senate version or to head for a conference committee for resolution.

This act (S. 510) has created an outcry from both the extreme right and some “back to nature” types on the left.  Herein we shall examine some of the key provisions of the proposed law and make some judgments.  My personal feeling is that it will die before the Congress completes action on other, critical legislation like the tax issue, unemployment benefits, the federal debt ceiling, and funding the government, but who knows?

State Dept. Attempts to Censor Students

There goes my opportunity to work for the State Department. Well, I must admit most former Greenpeace employees and Direct Action activists would have a pretty slim chance of working for the State Department in the first place.  Anyway, as a full time student at Ellis University, I pay attention to student news. I’m working on an English degree with a concentration in professional writing. And so, when this week the Office of Career Services warned students at Columbia’s University’s School of International and Public Affairs not to talk about Wikileaks on social media sites like Facebook and Tweeter, I just had to talk about the Wikileaks story on social media sites. Here is the full memo, obtained by the Huffington Post:

Assange: Obama should resign if he approved UN spy ring.

Hork!

“The whole chain of command who was aware of this order, and approved it, must resign if the US is to be seen to be a credible nation that obeys the rule of law. The order is so serious it may well have been put to the president for approval,” Julian Assange told Spanish daily El Pais.

“Obama must answer what he knew about this illegal order and when. If he refuses to answer or there is evidence he approved of these actions, he must resign,” he added during an Internet chat interview published online.

“…if the US is to be seen to be a credible nation that obeys the rule of law.”

This guy has a very dark sense of humor.  He’ll be found dead in a fishing net before the US even feigns credibility on the rule of law.

In 1953 the CIA distributed to its agents and operatives a killer’s training manual (made public in 1997) full of hands-on advice:

 

“The most efficient accident, in simple assassination, is a fall of 75 feet or more onto a hard surface. Elevator shafts, stair wells, unscreened windows and bridges will serve… The act may be executed by sudden, vigorous [excised] of the ankles, tipping the subject over the edge. If the assassin immediately sets up an outcry, playing the ‘horrified witness’, no alibi or surreptitious withdrawal is necessary.”

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