The first comment will explain the title. Seriously, a big thank you to Markos, without DailyKos we'd have never been blessed with this day.
Overnight News Digest, aka OND, is a community feature here at Daily Kos. Each editor selects news stories on a wide range of topics.
The OND community was founded by, Magnifico,who had no idea when he started the positive impact he'd have on so many.
Welcome to all, join us in the comment section to share a news articles and jump into the community chat. News is not required to pull up a chair and chat, just be kind to ceiling cat.
Punxsutawney Phil predicts an early spring on Groundhog Day 2011
Lindsay Barnett
Punxsutawney Phil, America's favorite groundhog, predicted an early spring when he failed to see his shadow Wednesday morning at Gobbler's Knob in Punxsutawney, Pa.
Early spring predictions are rare for Phil. But Mike Johnston, vice president of the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club's Inner Circle, insisted that the groundhog's failure to see his shadow was based solely on his accurate foreknowledge of weather trends. Reuters reported Wednesday:
Johnston said the latest prognostication will be entirely accurate, and does not reflect any desire on Phil's part to cheer up Americans who are suffering through a grueling winter.
"There is no question that Phil is capable of feeling empathy," Johnston said in an interview. "But he is absolutely incapable of error."
Others doubt Phil's infallibility, however. And his record of accuracy isn't the only controversy that has surrounded the groundhog in recent years: In 2010, PETA protested the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club's continued reliance on Phil as a weather predictor/tourist attraction and asked the group to move him to a sanctuary and replace him with an animatronic groundhog replica. |
Gunfire in battle for Cairo's Tahrir Square
Witness: Supporters loyal to president open fire against protesters NBC, msnbc.com and news services NBC, msnbc.com and news services
CAIRO — Heavy gunfire resounded around Cairo's Tahrir Square early Thursday as the battle between allies and foes of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak entered a second day.
At least three people were killed when supporters of the beleaguered leader opened fire, witnesses said, but reports varied and could not be confirmed.
Late Wednesday, the U.S. State Department issued a statement telling any Americans remaining in Egypt who wish to leave on a government flight to "report to airport immediately" and that "further delay is not advisable." It said government flights after Thursday "are unlikely." |
WikiLeaks Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize
Infamous Anti-Secrecy Organization Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize by Norwegian Lawmaker for Promoting Freedom of Speech
(AP) OSLO, Norway (AP) — A Norwegian lawmaker has nominated WikiLeaks for the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize, saying Wednesday that its disclosures of classified documents promote world peace by holding governments accountable for their actions.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee keeps candidates secret for 50 years, but those with nomination rights sometimes make their picks known.
Snorre Valen, a 26-year-old legislator from Norway's Socialist Left Party, told The Associated Press he handed in his nomination in person on Tuesday, the last day to put forth candidates.
"I think it is important to raise a debate about freedom of expression and that truth is always the first casualty in war," Valen said. "WikiLeaks wants to make governments accountable for their actions and that contributes to peace." |
Suicide by Bear? Fugitive in Yellowstone Apparently Considered It
Posted by Edecio Martinez
(CBS/AP) A convicted killer who escaped from an Arizona prison said after his capture that he had planned to overdose on heroin at Yellowstone National Park and let bears eat him, to end the fear and panic he was experiencing while on the run.
Tracy Province told Mohave County sheriff's detective Larry Matthews that he had wanted to go up on a mountain, inject a gram of heroin and "be bear food." As he was preparing the drug, he claims a voice told him not to go through with the plan, and he changed course in favor of trying to hitchhike to Indiana to see family.
"He called it divine intervention," Matthews wrote in an August report.
Al Nash, a spokesman at Yellowstone National Park, said it's certainly possible that Province's plan would have worked, but it struck him as improbable. |
Why Women Who Pick and Process Your Food Face Daily Threats of Rape, Harassment and Wage Theft
We all benefit from a hugely exploitative system, in which our dinner is now directly linked to violence against women. By Jill Richardson
Chances are, you've never connected your dinner to violence against women. And yet, a new report published by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) makes that link.
The report, "Injustice on Our Plates: Immigrant Women in the U.S. Food Industry," compiles the experiences of 150 immigrant women who came from Mexico or other Latin American countries to work in the food industry, both in fields and in factories, across the United States. The picture it paints is grim. Women, who make up nearly a quarter of U.S. farmworkers, face the same indignities that immigrant men face -- and then some.
Mary Bauer, SPLC legal director, noted that after years of advocacy on behalf of immigrant women, there was a "glaring absence in the literature," a gap the new report is intended to fill. The findings of the report are intimately connected to the food Americans eat, as it is virtually impossible to eat in the United States without consuming some food that was grown, harvested or processed by immigrants. As Bauer says, "There is no one in the U.S. who is not benefiting from this deeply exploitative system." |
Historic storm passes but cleanup remains
by The Gazette Staff
DES MOINES (AP) — A blizzard that closed highways, schools and businesses moved out of Iowa on Wednesday after dropping nearly 2 feet of snow on parts of the state, and at least one mayor considered seeking help from the National Guard in efforts to clear the roads.
State transportation officials said gusty winds persisted on Wednesday, causing many roads to remain closed in eastern Iowa. Road crews, which were pulled off the highways late Tuesday, were back at work, but clearing drifts and abandoned cars could take several days.
The Iowa Department of Public Safety said during the storm from Tuesday to Wednesday morning, the Iowa State Patrol assisted nearly 300 stranded motorists, including one of their own troopers whose squad car was stuck in the snow. |
Egypt: CNN's Anderson Cooper beat up by pro-Mubarak thugs
Xeni Jardin
Link to details at Huffington Post, and CNN has posted this video. Shortly after the incident, Cooper tweeted, "Its getting really bad in front of Egyptian museum"—all of the Twitter feeds I'm following from folks on the ground there point in the same direction. The protests are now being flooded by pro-Mubarak thugs, and various state employees paid to be present, and there are very high counts of injuries today. The situation sounds increasingly dangerous.
As an aside, I have plenty of complaints about CNN, but I have nothing but respect for Anderson Cooper's work. Dude is for real. From the tweets, sounds like he and his crew have been awake for four days solid since landing in Egypt. I think they're doing solid reporting under extremely difficult conditions. |
AT&T to offer Wi-Fi tethering for iPhone
Announces 2GB allowance, multi-device Wi-Fi tethering for Android, says 'working on bringing it to the iPhone' By Gregg Keizer
Computerworld - AT&T said on Wednesday that it will allow tethering of multiple devices to Apple's iPhone, and add a 2GB data allowance to the $20-per-month service.
The carrier declined to spell out a timetable for the move, however.
"We are working on bringing it to the iPhone," an AT&T spokesman said by e-mail. "[But we have] nothing else to share at this time."
The move is a counter to rival Verizon, which will let iPhone owners use their smartphone to create a personal Wi-Fi hotspot, which can connect up to five other devices, including tablets and notebooks, to the Internet. |
Couple's wedding goes on despite blizzard
Many guests can't make it, but snow doesn't deter nuptials By Susan Berger, Special to the Tribune
The Wednesday evening nuptials of Sarah Finkel and Shmulie Schochet gave new meaning to the term "white wedding."
The bride, a Skokie native, and the groom, who hails from Toronto, had decided to hold their marriage ceremony midweek so that out-of-town guests could then enjoy a long weekend in Chicago, explained Phil Finkel, the father of the bride.
Many of the out-of-towners — and even some of the Chicago-area guests — never made it because of the history-making snowstorm. But Phil Finkel said most of the "main players" managed to be on hand. Luckily, that included the groom's grandfather, Rabbi Dovid Schochet of Toronto, who performed the marriage ceremony.
The couple, both 21, even followed the Jewish tradition of setting up their wedding altar, or chuppah, outside under the stars — though the guests watched from the warm confines of the Westin O'Hare hotel in Rosemont. |
World Bank chief urges action on rising food prices
By Lesley Wroughton
The world faces a broader trend of increasing food and commodity prices and more countries should wake up to the need to curb price volatility, World Bank President Robert Zoellick said on Wednesday.
In a phone interview from Berlin, Zoellick called on G20 global leaders to "put food first" to tackle the surge in prices and increased volatility threatening the poor and driving up inflation in developing countries, mainly in Asia.
"We are going to be facing a broader trend of increasing commodity prices, including food commodity prices," Zoellick told Reuters. |
Strapped States Look To Alcohol For Shot Of Cash
By Corey Dade
Most states are confronting budget deficits big enough to drive a person to drink. Now, some of them are turning to a good, stiff drink to help generate new tax revenue.
Fiscally strapped states and local jurisdictions have been beating back entrenched political opposition and moral objections to permit Sunday alcohol sales as a generator of new tax revenue.
As state legislatures were gaveled into session in January, Connecticut, Indiana and Texas became the latest to take up legislation that would lift bans on Sunday sales at "package" stores, which sell alcohol that must be consumed off site. (Proposed legislation doesn't affect restaurants, because most are licensed to sell alcohol for consumption on site every day of the week.)
Across the country, more elected officials are targeting so-called vices, such as cigarettes, for tax hikes as a politically safer alternative to raising property and income taxes. |
NASA Identifies 54 Potentially Habitable Alien Planets
NASA unveiled a wealth of new data from its planet-seeking Kepler space telescope today (Feb. 2) - observations that significantly increase the number of possible alien planets and identify potential Earth-size worlds, including 54 planets that could be habitable.
To date, more than 500 alien planets outside of our solar system have been discovered, but that number could more than double if all the candidate exoplanets from the new Kepler data are confirmed. Amid the 1,200 possible alien worlds, Kepler has already found 68 potentially Earth-size planets. |