Yemeni socialist Jarralah Omar was assassinated in Sana'a shortly after giving a speech rejecting violence at a political conference. I grimace in anticipation of George W. Bush's spinning, no doubt asserting that this horrible event is yet more proof that his upcoming war is neccessary.

According to ITV News, the Chinese government shut down some 3300 cybercafes throughout the country for safety reasons, in response to a fire in one such cafe in June. 25 people died in that fire, mostly because they couldn't escape from an underground structure with locked doors and iron bars in the windows. All in all some 45,000 cafes were inspected and 12,000 were temporarily closed down pending safety improvements. The fire is said to have been intentionally set by two 12 yr old boys who were angered at not being allowed in. Much is missing from the story. Why are they reacting now, some 6 months later? Is the government reacting to the fire or, to an opportunity to shut down cafes with unregulated access to
outside news sources? To be fair it is reasonable to assume that there were, in fact, many such unsafe cafes, operating tightly locked down to avoid government scrutiny, and that they did pose a genuine safety threat to their patrons. But still...

For some reason this story appears on abcnews/Australia, but not our abc news-- wait, I'm jumping to the conclusion that they're related. It's about a New York City cop who was suspended for a month(without pay) for refusing his sergeant's order to arrest a man found sleeping in a Manhattan garage last month.
Courtesy farq.com

BIG SMILE...
Courtesy Lisa English at Ruminate This is a list of US and other companies that illegally helped Iraq develop biological and other weapons was purportedly scrubbed from the 10,000 page plus list of weapons and weapon-making facilities that Iraq turned in to the UN earlier this month.
Truthout.com is her reference. The list includes Hewlett-Packard, Bechtel, Honeywell, Eastman Kodak(!) and several others.

John Lewis's graciousness notwithstanding,
I think Lott's done for as majority leader, and one imagines the white house will be relieved.