Mount Nebo is the southernmost peak of the Rocky Mountains on the western edge of the range. It anchors the big valley south of the Salt Lake Valley. Coming from the South, it is the unmistakable and welcome sight that means that you, weary traveler, are at a major milestone. For Salt Lake residents who have strayed south, it means "Welcome Almost Home."
OND is a community feature on Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing each day near 12:00AM Eastern Time.
OND Editors consist of founder Magnifico, regular editors jlms qkw, maggiejean, wader, Oke, rfall, and JML9999, alumni editors palantir, BentLiberal and ScottyUrb, guest editor annetteboardman, and current editor-in-chief Neon Vincent. We invited our readers to comment & share other news.
The news in general is a bit obsessed with a so-called New Year. Annual reviews and roundups and lists abound. It is my position that there are MANY new years in our mutual calendars, and while the media is focused on this one, I am not. I will offer one year-end list, one that only I among the editors am likely to choose.
Top 5 Utah polygamy stories of 2012
Where else but Utah will you see this list?
There were developments in the UEP trust case, at the FLDS ranch in Texas and for the polygamous families on television in 2012. Here’s a list of the top five polygamy stories of 2012. You can discuss these stories more memories from 2012 on Twitter by following the tag #sltrib2012.
Djamila Grossman | The Salt Lake Tribune
Left to right: Kody Brown and his four wives, Janelle Brown, top, Robyn Brown, Christine Brown and Meri Brown, pose for a portrait at the Downtown Mariott in Salt Lake City, on Friday, September 24, 2010. The family are the main focus of a TLC reality show, which will start airing Sunday, Sept. 26.
5. Polygamy is a non-issue on the presidential campaign trail. • OK, I’m cheating from the start. One of the top stories was a non-story. Some Mormons feared the Jon Huntsman Jr. and Mitt Romney presidential campaigns would provoke insults and misunderstandings about their faith, including the history of polygamy. While there was some confusion about the Mormon position on caffeine, there was little-to-no talk about polygamy.
Now let's get on with the actual news.
CONFLICT
Dawn.com; Syed Irfan Raza
Probe into Osama death PM likely to receive report this week
The much-awaited report of the investigation into the US attack in which Al Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden was killed has been completed and is likely to be presented to Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf this week by the Abbottabad Commission’s chairman Justice (retd) Javed Iqbal.
The report prepared in more than one and a half years is expected to generate a fresh debate on the killing of Osama in a 40-minute midnight air raid by US Navy Seals in Abbottabad on May 2 last year.
A private TV channel quoted Justice (retd) Iqbal as saying that the report had been completed and was likely to be presented to the prime minister on Monday.
However, the Prime Minister’s Press Secretary Shafqat Jalil said no meeting between Justice (retd) Iqbal and the premier was scheduled on Monday.
According to sources, the 400-page report contains the statements of more than 300 people and references to over 7,000 letters and other documents relating to Osama bin Laden.
I think of this as an Oh Dark Thirty followup. Or something.
Mail & Guardian; SAPA-AFP
AU to hold Central African Republic crisis talks as rebels advance
Their warning came as the head of the African Union preparing to launch peace negotiations.
AU chief Thomas Boni Yayi, president of Benin, is expected to travel to Bangui to try to initiate talks between the government of President Francois Bozize and the rebel coalition known as Seleka.
But a rebel spokesperson told AFP that Bozize's departure should be on the agenda, and that rebel forces have not ruled out entering the capital of the chronically instable country.
"Bozize intends to give battle in Bangui, and if the situation demands it, we will take action," Eric Massi told AFP by telephone from the Gabonese capital Libreville, while reiterating that the rebels were not currently planning to seize the capital.
Der Spiegel; Andreas Ulrich
Ineffective and Unsustainable: Failure Threatens Afghan Police Training Mission
The ambitious project of developing an Afghan police force, which was to operate at least according to the basic principles of its German counterpart, began 10 years ago and involved three phases.
Phase 1, training recruits, was completed long ago.
Phase 2, instructing the police officers in practical operations on location, was abandoned last year. German police officers -- at the time still under the protection of German soldiers -- drove through the country for hours to call on various police stations. Since they had to be back before sundown due to security concerns, there often remained very little time for training.
Phase 3 is currently underway: Afghan police officers train Afghan recruits while the Germans monitor them. They correct mistakes and give suggestions. Based on the methodology and didactics of the German police school, it is hoped that the Afghans can train uneducated men to become good officers in just eight weeks.
Like all German police officers in Mazar-e-Sharif, Alex is living at Camp Marmal, the headquarters of the coalition troops in northern Afghanistan. The ISAF military base is one of the safest places in the country -- a well-equipped artificial world with shops, cafeterias, gyms and pool tables. Private security guards stand at the gates, while soldiers patrol outside the compound. A zeppelin floats in the sky, jam-packed with cameras and surveillance electronics.
The opening of this article uses sport as metaphor.
Al-Jazeera; LiveBlog
Brahimi says Syria 'must be' solved in 2013
The international peace envoy for Syria says the situation in the country was deteriorating sharply but a solution was still possible under the terms of a peace plan agreed in Geneva in June.
Lakhdar Brahimi said on Sunday the state would collapse without a solution, reiterating warnings that the country could turn into "hell" or a new Somalia.
"I say that the solution must be this year: 2013, and, God willing, before the second anniversary of this crisis," Lakhdar Brahimi said at a news conference at the Arab League in Cairo, referring to the start of the uprising in March 2011.
"A solution is still possible but is getting more complicated every day," he added. "We have a proposal and I believe this proposal is adopted by the international community."
Brahimi is the joint UN-Arab League envoy charged with trying to mediate an end to a conflict that has killed at least
44,000 people.
"The situation in Syria is bad, very, very bad, and it is getting worse and the pace of deterioration is increasing," he said.
AROUND THE WORLD
New Zealand Herald; Joanne Brookfield
Fourth ship joins whaling protest
About 120 crew members from more than 20 countries, most of them volunteers, will join Sea Shepherd founder Paul Watson in his latest bid to halt the whaling.
In an attempted counterattack, the Japanese whalers - in the shape of the Institute of Cetacean Research and the Kyodo Senpaku company - have taken legal action.
A court order issued by the ninth circuit court of appeals in the US on December 17 enjoined Sea Shepherd, Watson and anyone "acting in concert with them" from physically attacking the Japanese vessels or coming "any closer than 500m".
Gavin Carter, the whalers' Washington-based PR representative, says the order is to "ensure safety at sea".
Watson does not see it that way. "They are saying they are trying to protect their people from us. We've never injured any of them.
"They destroyed a US$1.5 million boat and almost killed six of our people," he said, speaking from the Steve Irwin at an undisclosed location. "[Yet] they didn't have to answer for it, they didn't have to pay compensation for it, they destroyed it and got away with it."
There's a new 4th ship. And some cloak & dagger intrigue.
Attribution: The Age Staff
The Age; Jeffrey Gettleman
Notorious poacher now leads a fight to save Africa's elephants
ARCHERS POST, Kenya: Julius Lokinyi was one of the most notorious poachers in this part of Kenya, accused of single-handedly killing as many as 100 elephants and selling the tusks by the side of the road in the middle of the night.
But after being hounded by his village elders, he made a remarkable transformation. Lokinyi stopped poaching and joined a grassroots squad of rangers - essentially a conservation militia - to protect the wildlife he once slaughtered.
Now he gets up at dawn, slurps a cup of sugary tea, tightens his combat boots and marches off with other villagers, some of whom had never picked up a gun before, to fight poachers. From Tanzania to Cameroon, tens of thousands of elephants are poached each year, more than at any time in decades, because of Asia's growing demand for ivory.
Scientists say at this rate African elephants could soon go the way of the wild American bison.
But in this stretch of northern Kenya destitute villagers have seized upon an unconventional solution that, if replicated elsewhere, could be the key to saving thousands of elephants across the continent, conservationists say.
While this is certainly welcome news, I also hope for some progress on the demand side for animal products.
Delhi gang rape victim's answers to police could be a crucial dying declaration
MUMBAI: Legal experts say that the evidence left behind by the victim of the Delhi gang rape victim who lost her battle to survive the brutal crime appears to be the strongest and most crucial in the form of a dying declaration in the case to nail the accused.
With the police having invoked the murder charge on Saturday against the six accused after Nirbhaya breathed her last in a Singapore hospital less than a fortnight after her brutal gang rape on a moving bus from which she was thrown out, it is now their task to expedite the filing of the chargesheet in the case and take it to trial, said lawyers. The police must set a deadline for completing the probe so that the trial takes off soon.
I am tempted to include this story in the Conflict section.
South China; Reuters in Beijing
China manufacturing activity at 19-month high
The pace of activity in China’s vast manufacturing sector hit its fastest rate in December since May last year, a survey of private factory managers showed, with a sub-index for new orders pointing to continued strength in the new year.
The final reading for the HSBC Purchasing Managers’ Survey rose to 51.5 in December, well above the final reading of 50.5 in November and the preliminary reading of 50.9 published in the middle of the month.
November marked the first time in more than a year that the survey crossed above 50 points, the line that demarcates accelerating from slowing growth.
The survey results fit with a growing consensus that the Chinese economy revved back up in the fourth quarter, after growth slowed for the seventh consecutive quarter to 7.4 per cent in the third.
I know this seems dry - I found it interesting because it speaks to worldwide economic growth. And the use of resources.
Hürriyet Daily News; Ümit Enginsoy
Turkey to buy two logistical support ships
The Turkish Navy is scheduled to purchase two locally built logistical support ships, a senior procurement official said over the weekend.
The ships will be deployed to the southeastern Mediterranean and to the eastern Black Sea, two important regions, the significance of which is growing for Turkey.
The Undersecretariat for Defense Industries (SSM), the procurement agency, released a request for information for 12 of the country’s largest shipyards, and the reply time was delayed until Dec. 19. Now the SSM is evaluating the reply bids for the program.
The ships will have a large fuel section and communications equipment, the procurement official said. “It will be quite easy for us to manufacture the two logistical support ships.”
Syria may not be the end of Turkish military issues; The Erdogan government continues to increase capital investment.
IN THE STATES
KPBS; City Wire Services
San Diego Can Now Have Redevelopment Funds For Some Projects
The state Department of Finance has reversed previous rulings and will allow the city of San Diego to use leftover redevelopment funds to pay for construction projects benefiting homeless and low-income families, the City Attorney's office announced today.
The decision means that the city's general fund -- which covers basic government costs such as public safety and library -- won't have to bear a cost overrun on the Connections Housing project, a permanent shelter for the homeless at Sixth Avenue and A Street, or the price of building an affordable housing development at Ninth Avenue and Broadway.
The state abolished redevelopment agencies last year and now decides whether leftover funds can be spent on projects that were already in the planning stages. State finance officials had not only rejected redevelopment funding for Connections Housing and the affordable housing project, but also for paying off construction bonds for Petco Park and a previous expansion of the San Diego Convention Center -- along with a potential future stadium for the Chargers.
In the audio version, it sounded like kind of a shell game, surrounded by California budget cuts and Federal disarray. I am hopeful the homeless and poor will benefit.
HAPPENING IN UTAH
Salt Lake Tribune; Nate Carlisle
Driven by suicide, gun deaths are increasing in Utah
Guns — or people firing guns — are killing more Utahns than they used to, and injuries from bullets are costing Utah more money.
Data from the Utah Department of Health show gun deaths from 2007 to 2011 were 23 percent higher than from 2001 to 2005.
Guns are expected to kill more Americans than cars do by 2015, according to a recent report by Bloomberg News using data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but Utah is ahead of the trend.
For 2007 to 2011, the Utah Highway Patrol reported an annual average of 263 automobile fatalities. In those same years, the Utah Department of Health says Utah averaged 271 gun deaths annually.
Of those, suicides accounted for 84 percent of gun deaths, the health department says, a slight increase from the years 2001 to 2005.
That last statistic has caught the attention of the Utah Department of Health and a statewide
OTHER
Pythagorean Theorem, hands-on. I found science.
Infographic: Sleep This is kind of sciencey too.