Wednesday, March 02, 2005

Bits & PiecesFrom headlines at Raw Story

Suicides outnumber homicides in the United States

[...]

Charles Curie, who heads the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, said suicides in the United States run at about 80 a day, or more than 29,000 a year, three for each two homicides.
  Seattle Times article

I find that a very interesting statistic. And I also find it interesting that in my surfing for information about going to and living in Mexico, the government websites (and corporate media) seem to consistently warn U.S. citizens about the dangers of travel to Mexico - in particular, the risk of getting murdered. Those statistics reveal a very low number (and are they mostly people involved in drug trade?). Why isn't our government issuing interstate travel warnings for us within our own country? Apparently 20,000 people are murdered in the U.S. every year.
A Republican legislative push to open Alaska's environmentally sensitive Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to oil drilling could find its way into the Senate budget, the chamber's top budget writer said on Tuesday.
  Reuters article
And if you'd just back our efforts at controlling oil in other countries, you could avoid having our own pristine country destroyed.
A mysterious new Kremlin-backed youth organisation with the working title One of Us has been set up to ensure Russia does not fall victim to a Ukrainian-style velvet revolution. The group, Nashi, is being touted as the vanguard of a political party that could usurp the pro-Kremlin United Russia Party whose usefulness as a vehicle for the establishment has been called into question.

Nashi will face off against an alliance of anti-Kremlin youth groups and is designed to "reach maturity" well ahead of presidential elections in 2008. Its leaders, whose identities remain secret, are said to want to "get 300,000 people on to the streets to defend Russia" from the threats of "external governance", "orange revolution" and "American intrusion".
  UK Independent article

The counterpart to our own College Republicans.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice deferred plans to visit Canada next month because of U.S. displeasure that Canada has opted out of a U.S.-led anti-ballistic missile shield program, a Bush administration official said.
  AP article
Aw. I bet that just breaks their hearts.
Russia will develop missiles impervious to any defense, Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said Tuesday in an apparent allusion the nascent U.S. missile defense system.
  Yahoo News article
It's apparent at this point that we are back into the arms race with Russia. History repeats. And memories are short. I wonder....this time, do you suppose the roles are reversed and it's the Russians who are forcing the U.S. into going broke with a military budget we can ill afford? We're in a pretty vulnerable position economy-wise right now.

....but hey, do what you want....you will anyway.

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