07/08 -- Iraq: Suicide bomber kills at least 30; Dow roars back above 10,000

[Thomas L. Knapp]

**************************************************
* RATIONAL REVIEW NEWS DIGEST
* The Freedom Movement's Daily Newspaper
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* Volume VIII, Issue #1,957
* Thursday, July 8th, 2010
* Email Circulation 1,892
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* Published every non-holiday weekday
* by the staff of Rational Review
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In The News:

0) RRND/FND 3rd quarter fundraiser
1) Iraq: Suicide bomber kills at least 30
2) Dow roars back above 10,000
3) Climategate: Researchers criticized for secrecy, cleared of
dishonesty
4) US DoJ charges five as al Qaeda plotters
5) Study: Pot prices would plummet if California legalizes
6) Four pistols vanish from Netanyahu entourage's luggage
7) Judge won't jail "banner" activist
8) Feds plan to detect cyber attacks
9) Kagan vote a telling test for Brown
10) TN: State GOP violated campaign finance laws
11) Report: More colon screenings, fewer breast exams
12) What do Shiite pilgrims want? A new Iraq government
13) TX: Intoxicated man shot after attempting to enter wrong home
14) European Parliament seeks ban on foods from cloned animals
15) SC: US Senate hopeful wants action figure
16) Cuba: Church says regime to free 52 political prisoners
17) Oklahoma, South Carolina, Utah may follow Arizona off Know-Nothing
cliff
18) US, Russia may be preparing for exchange of spy ring suspects
19) NV: Angle may go to court to hide campaign's history
20) Japan: Abducted anti-whaling activist released

Everybody Has An Opinion:

21) Repeal the drinking age
22) New York Times cluelessness, Part IX
23) Defending the gypsy cab driver
24) The rule of law
25) Costa Rica and drug war escalation
26) Transportation Stupid Agency
27) Beck U
28) More grade inflation for President Obama
29) Obama: "I have met Israel & it is 'us'"
30) Titans struggle with a doomed war strategy
31) For the sake of transparency
32) Beyond the occupation: Palestine & the 2-state solution
33) The grip of the old economy
34) Losing Afghanistan
35) Racist pols go straight back to disarming blacks
36) Natural reluctance
37) Chicago's Second Amendment Freedom Rally is this Friday!
38) McDonald, gun ownership, and the non-violent restoration of safer
streets
39) The ultimate currency
40) Elena Kagan's revealing commerce clause evasion
41) Gun liberty and McDonald
42) The "smart" state: Progressivism, part 2
43) Who are the three ex-Guantanamo prisoners on hunger strike in
Slovakia?
44) Good news for the LP
45) Rules of war
46) Hard truths about soda taxes
47) New rankings overrate Obama
48) A case study in local news futility
49) How Republicans raise taxes
50) America's tragic descent into empire
51) States: The new strategic defaulters
52) In the game of picking winners and losers, the government picks
losers
53) Time to let South Korea defend itself
54) How Big Corn sees the BP gusher
55) Southern belle
56) There's no recovery, just more hard times ahead
57) Has liberal interventionism run its course?
58) The case for war: The Iron Mountain Report
59) Rogernomics
60) The rout of Obamanomics

See No Evil, Hear No Evil:

61) Is America suffering an innovation gap?
62) Katrina's silver lining -- the school choice revolution in New
Orleans
63) Marc Stevens on Declare Your Independence
64) Free Talk Live, 07/06/10
65) Lawrence Wilkerson on Antiwar Radio

What's Up In The Freedom Movement:

66) Today's events

***************
* In The News
***************

0) RRND/FND 3rd quarter fundraiser

Update, 07/08/10: Thanks to CRM, whose $50 contribution brings our
total to $320 -- 15% of our $2,083 goal!

A note to those of you who are thinking "hey, it's about time that I
returned some value for value to the freedom movement's daily
newspaper ... ah, maybe later":

This fundraiser is for the third quarter of 2010, which ends on
September 30th.

If necessary, we'll keep the fundraiser going for that long, and then
launch the next one.

BUT! The sooner we make the goal, the sooner you stop seeing that
ChipIn meter and my pathetic impression of Billy Mays every time you
drop in for your daily dose of libertarian news and commentary. If we
reach the goal tomorrow, that means nearly 2 1/2 months of fundraising-
free RRND/FND. So, better late than never, but better earlier than
later - TLK

http://www.rationalreview.com/content/83890

-----

1) Iraq: Suicide bomber kills at least 30
Voice of America

"Iraqi security officials say a suicide bomber killed at least 30
people and wounded more than 60 Wednesday after detonating an
explosives-filled belt near a crowd of Shi'ite pilgrims. Officials say
the attack took place in Adhamiyah, a Sunni district of Baghdad.
Investigators say at least five other people were killed in separate
bombings in the city, including two other pilgrims." (07/07/10)

http://tinyurl.com/24ato8f

-----

2) Dow roars back above 10,000
Chicago Tribune

"The Dow Jones industrial average climbed 274 points, to 10,018,
Wednesday, for its first close above that benchmark since June 28. It
also was the biggest one-day gain in some six weeks, thanks to
investors encouraged by retail sales in the U.S. and stress tests
planned for European banks." (07/07/10)

http://tinyurl.com/24wbqe3

-----

3) Climategate: Researchers criticized for secrecy, cleared of
dishonesty
Agence France-Presse

"Scientists at a top British climate research unit embroiled in a row
over their work were cleared of dishonesty by an independent probe on
Wednesday, although their lack of openness was criticised. Climate
change sceptics claimed hacked emails from the University of East
Anglia's climatic research unit (CRU) showed the scientists had
manipulated and suppressed key data to support a theory of man-made
global warming. The row was sparked when hundreds of emails were
hacked from the servers of the university in eastern England and
posted online. But the concerns were largely dismissed by an
independent review published Wednesday, and the university said it
hoped the 'conspiracy theories, untruths and misunderstandings' would
now finally be laid to rest." (07/07/10)

http://tinyurl.com/2crfq28

-----

4) US DoJ charges five as al Qaeda plotters
CNN

"The Justice Department announced charges Wednesday against five
people who prosecutors say are members of an al Qaeda plot to stage
attacks in the United States and the United Kingdom. The charges link
a plot against targets in New York to a scheme to attack a target in
the United Kingdom, and say both were directed by 'senior al Qaeda
leadership in Pakistan.'" (07/07/10)

http://edition.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/07/07/us.al.qaeda.indictments/

-----

5) Study: Pot prices would plummet if California legalizes
Associated Press

"Legalizing the recreational use of marijuana in California would
sharply drive down prices for the drug, causing more people to use pot
while possibly undercutting the tax windfall that supporters have
touted, according to a study published Wednesday. The study by the
nonpartisan RAND Drug Policy Research Center predicts that retail
prices for high-grade marijuana could drop from $375 an ounce under
the state's current medical marijuana law to as little as $38 per
ounce if voters approve a November ballot initiative authorizing
counties to license and tax commercial pot sales to
adults." (07/07/10)

http://tinyurl.com/24ofxmp

-----

6) Four pistols vanish from Netanyahu entourage's luggage
USA Today

"In what's being called 'an incredible comedy of errors' that has
embarrassed U.S. officials, four semiautomatic pistols belonging to
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's bodyguards vanished after
arriving at New York's JFK Airport, the New York Post reports. A
source characterized the hunt for the 9mm Glock 17s as 'priority No. 1
in American law enforcement.' The paper says the pistols were among
seven guns in the bodyguards' luggage that arrived at dawn Sunday on
an El Al flight from Israel." (07/07/10)

http://tinyurl.com/2fevwm8

-----

7) Judge won't jail "banner" activist
Raw Story

"Environmentalist Ted Glick narrowly escaped a jail sentence today for
misdemeanor convictions related to hanging banners in the atrium of
the Hart Senate Office Building .... 'I'm overwhelmingly surprised,'
Glick told Raw Story. 'I fully expected to go to jail.' The 60 year-
old Bloomfield, NJ resident was convicted May 13 of two misdemeanors:
disorderly conduct and unlawfully assembling on Capitol Grounds. He
was facing up to three years in prison in today's sentencing for
unfurling two banners saying 'Green Jobs Now' and 'Get to Work' from
the Hart Senate Office Building's 7th floor into the atrium on Sept.
8, 2009, the day the Senate returned from its summer
recess." (07/07/10)

http://tinyurl.com/25hmvzt

-----

8) Feds plan to detect cyber attacks
Wall Street Journal

"The U.S. Government is launching an expansive program dubbed 'Perfect
Citizen' to detect cyber assaults on private companies and government
agencies running critical infrastructure such as the electricity grid
and nuclear-power plants. U.S. intelligence officials have grown
increasingly alarmed about what they believe to be Chinese and Russian
surveillance of computer systems that control the electric grid and
other U.S. infrastructure. Officials are unable to describe the full
scope of the problem, however, because they have had limited ability
to pull together all the private data. Perfect Citizen will look at
large, typically older computer control systems that were often
designed without internet connectivity or security in mind. Many of
those systems -- which run everything from subway systems to air-
traffic control networks -- have since been linked to the internet,
making them more efficient but also exposing them to cyber
attack." (07/07/10)

http://tinyurl.com/25v25zt

-----

9) Kagan vote a telling test for Brown
Boston Globe

"The upcoming vote on the Supreme Court nomination of former Harvard
Law School dean Elena Kagan will present Republican Scott Brown with
the most defining ideological test yet of his young Senate career,
forcing him into a stark choice that is bound to anger some of his
supporters no matter how he decides. Kagan's solid performance during
committee hearings last week all but assures her confirmation by a
comfortable margin, so Brown is not in a position to affect the
outcome. But analysts say the political stakes are high for Brown
personally. If he supports her, Brown risks angering conservative
activists across the country, an important source of campaign
contributions. If he opposes such a highly accomplished woman with
strong Massachusetts ties, the state's independents, particularly
women, may question his assertion that being a 'Scott Brown
Republican' does not automatically mean toeing the GOP
line." [editor's note: How sad it must be to belong to a political
party (one of many, unfortunately) driven by survey results instead of
principles - SAT] (07/07/10)

http://tinyurl.com/383tqe9

-----

10) TN: State GOP violated campaign finance laws
Tennessean

"The Tennessee Republican Party failed to report thousands of dollars
in campaign donations and spending in 2005 and 2006 and violated other
campaign finance laws, the Federal Election Commission has determined.
The FEC last week voted to approve the findings of a staff audit that
was initiated in 2007. The commission could begin an enforcement
action related to the audit's findings. The audit found that the
party's federal election account misstated financial activity, took
contributions from unregistered political organizations, and may have
improperly coordinated its activities with then Senate candidate Bob
Corker's campaign." (07/07/10)

http://tinyurl.com/3xyfnzw

-----

11) Report: More colon screenings, fewer breast exams
Associated Press

"More older Americans are getting tested for colon cancer, with nearly
two out of three getting recommended screenings. Meanwhile, rates for
breast cancer screening remain stuck, but at a higher rate, according
to a government report released yesterday. Health officials estimate
that at least 10,000 lives could be saved each year if more people
were checked. 'We have further to go,' said Dr. Thomas Frieden,
director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC
report comes from a 2008 national telephone survey. About 200,000
people ages 50 to 75 answered questions about colon cancer screening.
About 63 percent said they'd had a recommended test to look for
colorectal cancer." (07/07/10)

http://tinyurl.com/3ys57vh

-----

12) What do Shiite pilgrims want? A new Iraq government
Christian Science Monitor

"Shiite pilgrims streaming for days toward a Baghdad shrine on
Wednesday found themselves talking as much about politics