‘Researchers who launched an experimental cyber attack caused a generator to self-destruct, alarming the government and electrical industry about what might happen if such an attack were carried out on a larger scale, CNN has learned. [..]
Sources familiar with the experiment said the same attack scenario could be used against huge generators that produce the country’s electric power.
Some experts fear bigger, coordinated attacks could cause widespread damage to electric infrastructure that could take months to fix. [..]
In a previously classified video of the test CNN obtained, the generator shakes and smokes, and then stops.
DHS acknowledged the experiment involved controlled hacking into a replica of a power plant’s control system. Sources familiar with the test said researchers changed the operating cycle of the generator, sending it out of control.’
‘Saddam Hussein offered to step down and go into exile one month before the invasion of Iraq, it was claimed last night.
Fearing defeat, Saddam was prepared to go peacefully in return for £500million ($1billion).
The extraordinary offer was revealed yesterday in a transcript of talks in February 2003 between George Bush and the then Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar at the President’s Texas ranch.
The White House refused to comment on the report last night.
But, if verified, it is certain to raise questions in Washington and London over whether the costly four-year war could have been averted.
Only yesterday, the Bush administration asked Congress for another £100billion to finance the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.’
‘British singer George Michael says he’s trying to smoke less cannabis, but says it’s not a problem in his life because he can afford it.
“I’m constantly trying to smoke less marijuana. I’d like to take less and to a degree it’s a problem,” Michael told BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs program.
“Is it a problem in my life? Is it getting in the way of my life? I really don’t think,” Michael said.
“I’m a happy man and I can afford my marijuana so that’s not a problem.”‘
‘Some soldiers in Afghanistan blow up a road block and inadvertently arouse an angry wasp nest.’
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‘Detectives are baffled by a brazen daylight attack at Newmarket, in Brisbane’s inner north on Monday, in which a woman had her underpants ripped off and bag stolen.
“It’s pretty strange. I haven’t heard anything like it before,” Det-Sen-Sgt Brad Rix said.
He said the 23-year-old was grabbed from behind as she walked home from Newmarket train station about 4.30pm (AEST).
The offender then lifted her dress up, and pulled off her underpants before grabbing her bag and taking off.
“It was absolute daylight, not far from a train station. This person must have felt sure he was going to get away with it,” Det-Sen-Sgt Rix said. He said there was no attempt to sexually assault the woman, who did not realise her bag had been stolen until some time later.
“It’s possible he may have stolen her underpants as a trophy, or perhaps he intended taking the attack further. We don’t know,” he said. ‘
‘Six Catholic nuns have been excommunicated for heresy after refusing to give up membership in a Canadian sect whose founder claims to be the reincarnation of the Virgin Mary, the Diocese of Little Rock announced Wednesday.
The Rev. J. Gaston Hebert, the diocese administrator, said he notified the nuns of the decision Tuesday night after they refused to recant the teachings of the Community of the Lady of All Nations, also known as the Army of Mary.
The Vatican has declared all members of the Army of Mary excommunicated. Hebert said the excommunication was the first in the diocese’s 165-year history.
“It is a painfully historic moment for this church,” Hebert said.’
‘Hair is a better source of ancient DNA than bone or muscle, a new study involving woolly mammoth hair suggests.
“The main problem with things like bone is that it contains real DNA from the source, but also a load of DNA that is undesirable,” said study team member Tom Gilbert of the University of Copenhagen. “For example, when a mammoth dies and the body starts putrefying, bacteria gets all throughout the body. Later, as it’s buried in the ground, soil bacteria get into it.”
Contamination from bacteria DNA generally make up 50 to more than 90 percent of the raw DNA extracted from the bone and muscles of ancient specimens, Gilbert said. In contrast, more than 90 percent of the DNA extracted from hairs taken from woolly mammoth specimens in the new study belonged to the extinct mega-mammals themselves.
“The quality of the DNA was fantastic,” Gilbert told LiveScience. “It was way better than we ever imagined. There’s both mitochondrial and nuclear DNA in there.”‘
‘The Sex Pistols will play a one-off gig in Los Angeles next month, with tickets being given away by a US radio station.
The show will take place at the Roxy on Sunset Strip, Hollywood, on 25 October – two weeks before six dates in the UK.
No tickets for the Los Angeles concert will be sold – instead, fans will have to win them through Indie 103.1FM.
The punk group have reformed for the 30th anniversary of their seminal album Never Mind The Bollocks, and recently went back into the recording studio.
They re-recorded their single Anarchy in the UK – the first time they had been in the studio together since the 1970s.’
This is just a bunch of ravers dancing down a street for no apparent reason.
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‘The head of the Catholic Church in Mozambique has told the BBC he believes some European-made condoms are infected with HIV deliberately.
Maputo Archbishop Francisco Chimoio claimed some anti-retroviral drugs were also infected “in order to finish quickly the African people”.
The Catholic Church formally opposes any use of condoms, advising fidelity within marriage or sexual abstinence.
Aids activists have been angered by the remarks, one calling them “nonsense”.’
‘A plastic surgery office discriminated against a pregnant secretary who was fired after being told to suck in her belly so she wouldn’t scare away patients, government lawyers charged in an anti-discrimination lawsuit filed Wednesday. [..]
Griggle, who worked in the company’s Cranberry office, said she was fired in December 2005, two weeks after telling her supervisors she was pregnant.’
‘One Dylan Stephen Jayne of Pennsylvania filed suit against “Google Internet Search Engine Founders” in Pennsylvania Civil court, seeking the small amount of $5 billion dollars. Jayne claims that his safety is in jeopardy because of Google releasing personal information about him.
Jayne asserts that individuals looking to perform acts of terrorism could obtain his information from Google, making it more likely that he will be detained wrongfully in the future. Jayne’s statement of claim is that, “Dylan Steven Jayne, plaintiff, has a social security number that when the social security number is turned upside down in its entirety it is a scrambled code that does spell the name Google.”‘
‘A 24-year-old Argentine man has married a woman 58 years his senior.
The groom, Reinaldo Waveqche, told reporters after the ceremony in Santa Fe, northern Argentina: “I’ve always liked mature ladies.”
Mr Waveqche added: “I don’t care what other people say.” He and bride Adelfa Volpes, 82, are planning to travel to Rio de Janeiro for their honeymoon.
Asked if the marriage was purely spiritual, Ms Volpes laughed and replied: “There is going to be more.”‘
It looks like the car ran a red light. Not the smartest thing to do.
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‘Some volunteer firefighters in Vermont have been accused of using Jaws of Life during a vandalism spree, WPTZ-TV in in Plattsburgh, N.Y., reported.
Firefighters usually use the tool to help victims of serious car crashes escape the mangled wreckage. [..]
Police said the four started the spree at the Berlin Mall and Central Vermont Hospital, pulling hubcaps and windshield wipers from cars. The four then headed to the Montpelier park and the town of Northfield, damaging pay phones and stealing street signs, police said.
Police said they got a break in the case in mid-September when someone came forward with information into the case, including that the vandalism may have been part of a dare.
Police said they aren’t sure who dared the four, and the Berlin Fire Department said it never had any involvement in the crime nor did it know the equipment had been used.’
‘A Kansas City police officer was suffering a diabetes-related reaction when he apparently shot a truck driver at a convenience store, the officer’s attorney said Wednesday.
The officer, who has not been identified by the Police Department, doesn’t remember shooting anyone on Monday night, attorney John P. O’Connor said.
“It’s obvious to me there was no intent on his part to hurt anyone,” O’Connor said. [..]
The shooting victim, who also has not been identified, did not suffer life-threatening wounds. The officer has been put on paid administrative leave while the incident is being investigated.’
‘They may have committed a high crime, but a former Dearborn cop and his wife are only going to be charged with a misdemeanor for allegedly smoking pot in Dearborn Heights.
Edward Sanchez, 30, and his wife, Stacy, 27, are expected to turn themselves in for arraignment on one charge each of using marijuana, according assistant Wayne County Prosecutor Maria Miller.
On April 21, 2006, Sanchez, who lives in Dearborn Heights, called 911 in a panic after he and his wife ate brownies laced with marijuana he said he took from criminal suspects.
Dearborn police allowed Sanchez to resign from his job on May 23, 2006, even though investigators said he admitted to taking the marijuana from his police car and using it to make the brownies. Dearborn police reports the Free Press obtained said Sanchez told investigators he planned to use the marijuana to train his police dog.’
Followup to Cop Avoids Charge for Pot Brownies.
‘School security guards in Palmdale, CA have been caught on camera assaulting a 16-year-old girl and breaking her arm after she spilled some cake during lunch and left some crumbs on the floor after cleaning it up.
The incident occurred last week at Knight High School in Palmdale and was caught on a cell phone camera by another pupil who was then also assaulted by the security guards. [..]
The girl, Pleajhai Mervin, told Fox News LA that she was bumped while queuing for lunch and dropped the cake. After being ordered to clean it up and then re-clean the spot three times, she attempted to leave the area out of embarrassment but was jumped on by security who forced her onto a table, breaking her wrist in the process.
Pleajhai also says that the security guard in the picture yelled “hold still nappy-head” at her, which at the time she did not know was a racist comment.’
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‘A laboratory technician was fired after the parents of a 3-year-old boy claimed she bit his shoulder during a blood test, a hospital spokesman said.
Faith Buntin took her son Victor to St. Vincent Hospital on Friday to have blood drawn because of recent recalls of toys involving lead. She said she saw the worker put her mouth on Victor’s shoulder as she restrained him so another lab worker could draw the blood.
“I looked at her like that was the craziest thing that I’d ever seen,” Faith Buntin said Tuesday. “She looked at me and smiled and said, ‘Oh, it was just a play bite. He’s not hurt.'”‘
‘A 4-month-old boy was found in a darkened room at a day care center with a pacifier taped into his mouth, the Tennessee Department of Human Services announced Wednesday.
The department responded Tuesday to an anonymous complaint that a caregiver at Noah’s Ark Nursery and Preschool in Jefferson City was taping babies’ mouths shut.
Upon arrival, an investigator heard muffled whining from the bathroom and found the boy’s mouth covered with two pieces of two-inch-wide clear packing tape over a pacifier, department spokeswoman Michelle Mowery Johnson said.’
