The Raw Story

A non-profit news blog, focused on providing independent journalism.

Friday, 23 January 2015

British beach is washed away overnight... then reappears

© SWNS.comThe sand on Porthleven beach was washed away by a freaked tide then "brought back" a few hours later. A British beach which was stripped of all its sand overnight by a freak high tide for the first time in living memory, has miraculously been restored.Porthleven is a favourite holiday spot for tourists visiting Cornwall and is famed for its pristine golden sands nestled below the quaint seaside town.But during the recent bad weather so...

North Dakota pipeline leaked 3 million gallons of brine in oil drilling

Cleanup is underway after nearly 3 million gallons of brine, a salty, toxic byproduct of oil and natural gas production, leaked from a pipeline in western North Dakota, the largest spill of its kind in the state since the current energy boom began.The full environmental impact of the spill, which contaminated two creeks, might not be clear for months. Some previous saltwater spills have taken years to clean up. A contractor hired by the pipeline operator will be on site Thursday, assessing the damage.Operator Summit Midstream Partners LLC detected...

Koos Jansen: Financial system reset to gold coming soon?

Koos Jansen Anyone who has been paying attention to the global economy the past years can agree with me our central bankers have conducted miserable monetary policy and have taken the insufficient measures to fight crises. All major economies have embarked in printing unprecedented quantities of money, but the only thing they bought was time. Quantitative easing on such a scale is like kicking the can determined to reach the end of the road. The...

City of New Orleans passes sweeping smoking ban

© Rauluminate Update: Amendments added to the ordinance slightly changed the final ban to not effect parks or outdoor shopping malls, according to the . Fines will also begin at $50. A previous version of this story said fines began at $100.New Orleans passed a far-reaching smoking ban on Thursday that prohibits lighting up in bars, casinos, private clubs - even in the car while waiting in line at a drive-thru.Claiming there is no "constitutional...

'We didn't even really know who we were firing at' - former US drone operator

© Reuters/U.S. Navy/Erik Hildebrandt Former US drone sensor operator Brandon Bryant admits he "couldn't stand" himself for his participation in the country's drone program for six years - firing on targets whose identities often went unconfirmed.Since 2001, and increasingly under the Obama administration, the US has been carrying out drone strikes against targets believed to be affiliated with terrorist organizations in countries like Afghanistan,...

How the CIA made Google: Inside the secret network behind mass surveillance, endless war, and Skynet

In the wake of the Charlie Hebdo attacks in Paris, western governments are moving fast to legitimize expanded powers of mass surveillance and controls on the internet, all in the name of fighting terrorism.US and European politicians have called to protect NSA-style snooping, and to advance the capacity to intrude on internet privacy by outlawing encryption. One idea is to establish a telecoms partnership that would unilaterally delete content deemed...

The physiological benefits of hugging

© preventdisease Hugs make you feel good for a reason and it's not just the loving embrace that gives us that warm feeling in our hearts. It's much more. It affects the entire body to such an extent that many scientists claim it is equivalent to the effect of many different drugs operating on the body simultaneously. Even seemingly trivial instances of interpersonal touch can help people deal with their emotions with clarity and more effectively.1....

Woman thrown in jail for having an addiction while pregnant

Last year, Tennessee became the first state to define drug use during pregnancy as a crime. Women whose newborns test positive for narcotic drugs can be charged with assault and punished with up to 15 years of prison.When critics of the measure -- which included everyone from addiction counselors to doctors to Obama's drug czar -- pointed out that terrorizing pregnant addicts with the threat of prison would not be helpful in the treatment of their...

Britain announces new transfer of powers for Scotland, edges toward federalism

© Reuters/Luke MacGregorA Scottish Saltire flag and British Union flag fly together with the London Eye behind in London September 19, 2014. The British government began a historic transfer of powers to Scotland on Thursday, keeping a pledge it had given to persuade Scots to reject independence as renewed nationalist support surges.The draft bill, to be enacted after a general election on May 7, will further dismantle Britain's highly centralized...

New Illinois law allows school officials to demand access to students' Facebook passwords

© Adrian Wyld/Canadian PressTechnically Incorrect: Conceived to combat cyberbullying, a new law in Illinois may result in schools demanding social media passwords, even if the posting was not done at school or on school computers. Illinois can't seem to decide whether it's the home of midwestern gentlefolk or of the most draconian humans this side of Moscow.One of the state's newest laws, for example, may have goodness at its heart. However, it...

SOTT Exclusive: EU-NATO hopes latest 'Islamist' terror-mongering will draw Balkans closer to West

Is it mere coincidence that 'ISIS terror' pops up at the right time and place with respect to the long-term geostrategic interests of the Atlantic Empire? Are 'Islamic' terrorists in the Balkan region threatening the freedom of the EU?The European Union is concerned about efforts by Islamist terrorist groups to seize the western Balkans as a springboard for action in the EU. The EU is planning closer cooperation with the countries from the region...

Man arrested after forcing woman to sign "slave contract" and torturing her

© Lincoln Police DepartmentNicholas Allen Talbot A former sex offender has been taken into custody after Nebraska police discovered he had forced a woman in a long-term abusive relationship with him to sign a 'slave contract,' the Journal-Star reports.Nicholas Allen Talbot, 35, was charged with second-degree domestic assault, after the unidentified woman showed injuries she had sustained to her pastor who contacted police authorities."They were...

Scientists invent teleporter that works using 3-D printer

© Allstar/Cinetext/Paramount Teleportation has been the holy grail of transport for decades, ever since Mr Scott first beamed up Captain Kirk and his crew in the 1966 opening episode of . Now the technology may have been cracked in real life ... sort of.Scientists from the Hasso Plattner Institute in Potsdam have invented a real-life teleporter system that can scan in an object and "beam it" to another location.Not quite the dematerialisation and...

Racist California congressman: Keep minimum wage low 'for minorities' who aren't worth more than $7 an hour

California Republican Rep. Tom McClintock said on Thursday that the minimum wage should not be raised because low pay was necessary for minorities and other unskilled workers who were not worth more than $7 an hour.During an appearance on C-SPAN's , host Greta Brawner asked McClintock if he could get behind a presidential candidate like Mitt Romney, who is one of an increasing number of Republicans saying that the minimum wage should be at least...

Chris Kyle vs. Casey Sheehan - The U.S. glorifies murderers while frowning upon the real heroes who refuse to kill

Casey and his Mom Navy Seal and American Shame (Sniper), Chris Kyle"I can't kill anyone." US working-class soldier before his short deployment to Iraq, Casey SheehanThis is something that I don't want to revisit - I never want to relive the worst experience of my life. However, with the 11th anniversary of my son's death in Iraq on 04/04/04 approaching and the new "blockbuster" infecting movie screens around the world, I really must get this off...

Amazing images reveal a glowing blue sea in Hong Kong

This Thursday, Jan. 22, 2015 photo made with a long exposure shows the glow from a Noctiluca scintillans algal bloom along the seashore in Hong Kong. Eerie fluorescent blue patches of water glimmering off Hong Kong's seashore are magnificent, but disturbing and potentially toxic, marine biologists say.The glow is an indicator of a harmful algal bloom created by something called , nicknamed Sea Sparkle.It looks like algae and can act like algae,...

Which countries benefit most from Paris shootings?

Psychos pretending to care The scale of the events in France and the intensity of the ensuing panic turned out to be so massive that even the most politically unprepared people realized that the stability of EU is facing an enormous threat. And it doesn't even matter if the French authorities are successful in neutralizing the current situation - it may repeat on a much larger scale. It is impossible to stop this process within the framework of...
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