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January 31, 2006
Canadian Miners Rescued Thanks to Responsible "Refuge" Regulation
TORONTO (AP) - Seventy-two Canadian potash miners Monday walked away from an underground fire and toxic smoke on Monday after being locked down overnight in airtight chambers packed with enough oxygen, food and water for several days. (go to article).
Too bad their counterparts in West Virginia weren't so lucky.
Er, but it wasn't luck. In fact, Canada's trapped miners are alive and well because their government has regulations designed to protect miners from dying horrible deaths by requiring "refuge rooms" (see below)
Here in America, we know that business doesn't need to be told what to do by the government. So a few miners die here and there. There's always someone looking for a job in West Virginia.
Below are Canada's the "refuge room" regulations, (source: Canadian Legal Information Institute).
Refuge stations required
146 (1) An employer must construct, inspect, and maintain a refuge station every 300 m underground in an active working if a person has to travel more than 500 m to reach
(a) the mine exit; or
(b) if a shaft conveyance is used to reach the surface, a shaft station.
(2) Subsection (1) does not apply to those parts of a mine being developed by an adit or slope or during shaft development operations.
Construction and location of refuge stations
147 (1) An employer must ensure that a refuge station can be sealed to prevent the entry of gases and is constructed
(a) in competent, non-combustible rock;
(b) if it is a non-portable refuge station in a coal mine, of competent rock that may be coal, if there is an adequate non-combustible sealed barrier between the coal and the occupied space; or
(c) if it is a portable refuge station, of non-combustible material.
(2) An employer must ensure that a refuge station has adequate drainage for liquid and gaseous waste.
(3) An employer must ensure that all parts of any compressed air lines, or water lines supplying the refuge station are made of non-combustible materials.
(4) An employer must ensure that a refuge station is located
(a) at least 100 m from a magazine, diesel fuel storage area, fuelling station or battery charging station; and
(b) where reasonably practicable, in intake air.
(5) An employer must ensure that a refuge station has on the outside of the refuge station, an audible signaling device and a sign identifying it as a refuge station.
Air supply in refuge station
148 An employer must ensure that a refuge station has an air supply that is adequate to sustain, for a minimum of 8 hours, the life of the maximum number of mine workers intended to be sheltered there, by ensuring that the refuge station is
(a) large enough to contain the required air supply; or
(b) equipped with a means of supplying the required air supply by way of compressed air or oxygen.
Equipment in refuge station
149 An employer must ensure that a refuge station is equipped with
(a) an oxygen and flammable gas detector;
(b) a manometer with a scale, mounted on the wall of the refuge station, capable of measuring the pressure difference between the inside and outside of the refuge station;
(c) an adequate supply of potable water that, if supplied in containers, is exchanged for fresh water at least once a month, or is kept until its expiry date if the supply is sealed and date- stamped by a water supplier.
(d) adequate toilet facilities, tables and benches;
(e) an adequate means of voice communication with the surface;
(f) adequate emergency lighting
(g) a Number 2 First Aid Kit as defined by the Occupational Health and Safety First Aid Regulations made under the Act;
(h) a basket-shaped stretcher with restraining straps;
(i) 2 blankets; and
(j) razors for shaving facial hair.
Requirement for refuge station procedures
150 An employer must ensure that procedures are prepared for the use of a refuge station during an emergency that include
(a) instructions for the conduct of persons in the refuge station;
(b) instructions for entering the refuge station in a manner that protects the health and safety of persons sheltered inside the refuge station; and
(c) a prohibition on smoking.
Procedures posted at refuge stations
151 An employer must ensure that the procedures required by Section 150 are posted in a conspicuous place on the inside and on the outside of each refuge station.
Permitted uses of refuge stations
152 An employer must ensure that a refuge station is not used for any purpose other than as a lunchroom, office, or storage area for first aid supplies and equipment, for the delivery of first aid, or as a place of refuge during an emergency.
Monthly inspection of refuge stations
153 At least once a month, an employer must ensure that a designated person at the mine inspects, maintains and re-supplies the refuge stations and prepares a report of the inspection and any maintenance performed.
Posted by MJuhre at 12:45 PM | Comments (0)
January 30, 2006
Your Cookies Contain Crushed Critters
Who knew? Many juices, snacks, cosmetics, and other products contain red dye derived from crushed insects. Christmas cookies! Yum.
FDA: You're eating crushed bug juice
WASHINGTON (AP) -- That ice cream you're eating or the lipstick you're wearing just might contain extract from crushed bugs. On purpose. (continue)
FDA May Require Food Labels To List Insect-Derived Red Dye
Agency Receives Reports About Allergic Reactions To Cochineal Extract, Carmine
(Go to original)
WASHINGTON -- Federal regulators are considering making changes to food and cosmetic labels that would require that the presence of widely used red colorings made from insects be listed, but not the dyes' origins.
The Food and Drug Administration has proposed requiring that manufacturers flag the presence of cochineal extract and carmine. The red colorings are extracted from the ground bodies of an insect used to make dye since the time of the Aztecs.
The coloring is used in juice drinks, yogurts and candies. The proposed rule is in response to reports of severe allergic reactions to the colorings.
The coloring is used in everything from yogurt to lipstick but hasn't exactly been well disclosed. The FDA said the ingredients typically are listed as "color added" or "E120."
But Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer advocacy group, said the FDA's proposal doesn't go far enough. The group wants the insect product disclosed, suggesting that the FDA require the phrase "insect-based" follow carmine or cochineal extract on ingredients lists.
"Why not use a word that people can understand?" asked CSPI executive director Michael Jacobson. "Sending people scurrying to the dictionary or to Google to figure out what 'carmine' or 'cochineal' means is just plain sneaky. Call these colorings what they are-insect-based."
Members of the public and food companies have 60 days to file comments with the FDA before the rule is finalized. The rule would not go into effect until 2009.
Posted by MJuhre at 03:45 PM | Comments (0)
January 29, 2006
Dancing Dubya
Learn about my singing, dancing George W. Bush doll in the Cabinet of Curiosities
Posted by MJuhre at 11:40 PM | Comments (0)
January 27, 2006
Democracy on the March
George Bush and his merry band of Neocons should be proud.
Not only is democracy really taking hold in the Middle East (or "Southwest Asia, as the Pentagon would call it), but the newly empowered People of the region look set to vote in radical, right-wing theocracies that would make Pat Robertson proud (that is, of course, if that voting bloc weren't going to Hell for failing to recognize Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior).
Posted by MJuhre at 09:30 AM | Comments (0)
This is Why New York's Transit Workers Struck
--I aint got time to make this one pretty--
A speech by Republican NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg has vindicated suspicions raised by the Transit Workers Union Local 100.
" 'We must rein in health care and pension costs that have spiraled out of control,' said Bloomberg, calling on municipal unions to share the burden." (The New York Post)
The mayor says New York City's firefighters and policemen should have their healthcare benefits reduced to save the city money. Yes, those who the City and the Nation held up as heros during 9/11, many of whom now suffer serious illnesses from their exposure to burning toxins at the World Trade Center, are apparently a financial burden to the city. So now the Republicans say it's time to alleviate that burden (though perhaps not quite as drastically as Ford Motor Company did).
This is exactly what the TWU 100 said would happen. They knew that if the city reduced their pension and medical benefits, it would set a precedent that would leak into the lives of other city workers.
In addition, the union remembered, that the poor-mouthing Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) that wanted to reduce their benefits, is the same MTA that announced both a $1 billion-plus budget surplus and higher fare prices less than one year after it agreed to sell its Brooklyn real estate to the New York developer darling Forest City Ratner for $50 million, when other developers were offering three times as much.
I was silent last month on the transit strike, because I genuinely had mixed feelings about it. On the one hand, it totally sucked for me and many others who live or work in New York to suddenly have no transit service in the week leading up to Christmas. On the other, I grow weary of American corporations, and governments that are increasingly run by corporations, roll back the clock on employee rights. It's the nineteenth century again friends. More and more, employees are being squeezed to the poor house and the grave by billionaire Bloombergs, well-paid MTA managers, and filthy rich Fords.
The full reasons behind the strike were too complicated to get into here, and too complicated for me to say I fully supported TWU 100, or fully supported. Right or wrong, the TWU definitely lost the PR battle, as many New Yorkers screamed for their heads.
But to those who whine "those city workers have better benefits than me -- fuck them! -- I say this: so just because your job sucks, and you have to suck it up and eat it every day, so should everyone else? Should we all just suck it up and take it without a peep, until we're back to 14-hour days, 6 or 7 day weeks, and have no pension, no health benefits, and no job security? (Besides. Go land yourself a government job and then tell me you still whistle the same tune.)
Posted by MJuhre at 08:38 AM | Comments (0)
January 25, 2006
Pentagon Rule Change Suggests Executions at Guantanamo
RULES COULD ALLOW GUANTÁNAMO EXECUTIONS (buried, but present in the Jan. 25, 2006 New York Times)
The Army has issued new regulations for carrying out military executions that could allow the death penalty to be administered at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, where more than 500 foreign terrorism suspects are being held. The regulations, issued last week, give the secretary of the Army authority to designate locations for military executions, replacing old rules that required them to take place at Fort Leavenworth, Kan. That could open the way for executions of detainees at Guantánamo, although none of the 10 prisoners there who have been charged with war crimes are facing capital punishment. A law signed by President Bush in December bars federal courts from hearing habeas corpus petitions from Guantánamo detainees challenging their confinement. Eugene Fidell, a Washington specialist in military law, said the Bush administration might have feared that bringing detainees to the United States for execution would allow them to challenge their sentences in federal court once they were no longer at Guantánamo. DAVID S. CLOUD (NYT)
Army may be preparing for execution (Houston Chronicle)
US army changes execution rules (BBC)
New US Army code hints executions at Guantanamo (Xinhua)
Posted by MJuhre at 03:09 PM | Comments (0)
January 24, 2006
The Other Big Brother
It ain't just the NSA. Donald Rumsfeld's own Pentagon is spying on Americans, including a group exercising their Constitutional right of free assembly by protesting in front of Halliburton's headquarters.
Newsweek has the scoop.
Posted by MJuhre at 10:17 AM | Comments (0)
Canceled Reality Show Revealed Bigots can be "Queer-Eyed"
Some time ago, my fiancee posited that the popularity of "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" might truly strike a blow for American bigotry by 'introducing' real, regular gay people to otherwise ignorant American audiences. That the Fab Five have given makeovers to a frat house in Texas and a Moose Lodge on Long Island, led me to believe she might be right.
Back in June, we posted a piece on ABC's canceled reality show, "Welcome To the Neighborhood."
This interesting update on that series, from Towerload, submitted to us by Matt Lavine, hints that Americans' bigotry really can be lessened by such 'introductions.'
****
The ill-fated ABC series Welcome to the Neighborhood is back in the news again. If you'll remember, the realtiy show featured a cul-de-sac of conservative Christian families in Austin, Texas who were to choose a family to live on their street from among a pool of "alternative" contestants — African-American, Hispanic, Korean, Wiccan, tattooed, gay, and a strip-tease artist.
While the show was cancelled because it was said to be too controversial, the real-life drama...revealed how bigoted attitudes can be turned around by lifting the veil of ignorance...[T]he cul-de-sac's most virulently homophobic resident tossed his bigotry aside and became close friends with the gay couple, made amends with his gay son, and spoke at a vigil against an anti-gay amendment that would ban gay marriage. (continue)
Posted by MJuhre at 09:20 AM | Comments (0)
January 23, 2006
Hot Dog!
Since I've no time or quarter of late to post new entries, I decided to post some internal links to crap on my site you may have missed (a backlog of yet-to-be-posted stuff will, one day, return -- I promise).
I never imagined that one day I'd see an alligator with a hot dog on its back. And yet, that's what I saw on a trip to Orlando, Fla. (where else? a year ago.
Posted by MJuhre at 05:23 PM | Comments (0)
January 20, 2006
Warm Fuzzy Terrorists Indicted
Part of me wouild like to put this in our "Crazy New Order" category, but its just too damn silly. The American ALF and ELF are pretty much jokes by today's terrorist standards. Their acronyms don't help. Alf was a silly puppet on an 80s TV show who recently made a comeback as a commercial spokesman (somehow). And an elf, well...
To the hardliners: I know a crime is a crime, but uh, let's concentrate on Al Qaeda and those who seek to kill Americans and not worry so much about our scruffy, silly little lefty friends in the American West as they vandalize power plants. Can't local authorities deal with them?
To the puppet people and fuzzy left: I know the ALF and ELF mean well, but so did the muppets, so far as I could ever see.
11 People Indicted in Ecoterrorism Plot
By MARK SHERMAN, Associated Press Writer 49 minutes ago
Eleven people were indicted in a series of arsons, claimed by the radical groups Earth Liberation Front and Animal Liberation Front, in five Western states, the Justice Department said Friday.
The 65-count indictment said the suspects are responsible for 17 incidents in California, Colorado, Oregon, Washington and Wyoming, including sabotaging a high-tension power line, in a conspiracy that dates back to 1996. The indictment was returned Thursday by a federal grand jury in Eugene, Ore., and unsealed Friday.
"The indictment tells a story of four-and-a-half years of arson, vandalism, violence and destruction claimed to have been executed on behalf of the Animal Liberation Front or Earth Liberation Front, extremist movements known to support acts of domestic terrorism," Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said at a news conference Friday.
Appearing with Gonzales, FBI Director Robert Mueller declared, "Terrorism is terrorism, no matter what the motive."
"There is a clear difference between constitutionally protected advocacy ... and violent criminal activity," Mueller added.
"It is one thing to write concerned letters or to hold peaceful demonstrations," Mueller said. "It is another thing entirely to construct and use improvised explosives to harass and intimidate victims by destroying property and to cause millions of dollars in losses by acts or threats of violence."
Eight defendants have been arrested. Three people remain at large, and are believed to be outside the United States, according to a statement from the Justice Department.
In Eugene, two defendants, Jonathan Christopher Mark Paul, 39, and Suzanne Nicole "India" Savoie, 28, were both ordered held without bail, pending further hearings.
A criminal complaint filed in federal court in Eugene accused Paul, a firefighter, of setting firebombs that burned down a horse slaughterhouse in 1997. The ALF claimed responsibility for that fire, which caused an estimated $1 million in damage.
Savoie, who works in a group home for the developmentally disabled, is accused of serving as a lookout for a fire in 2001 that destroyed offices of a lumber mill. The ELF claimed responsibility for that fire.
The other defendants are Joseph Dibee, Chelsea Dawn Gerlach, Sarah Kendall Harvey, Daniel McGowan, Stanislas Meyerhoff, Josephine Overaker, Rebecca Rubin, Darren Todd Thurston and Kevin Tubbs.
Dibee, Overaker and Rubin have not been arrested. The other six were arrested in December.
Using improvised incendiary devices made from milk jugs, petroleum products and homemade timers, they carried out attacks between 1996 and 2001, the indictment alleged. Targets included U.S. Forest Service ranger stations, U.S. Bureau of Land Management wild horse facilities, lumber companies, meat processing companies, a ski area and the power line, the indictment said.
Posted by MJuhre at 05:09 PM | Comments (0)
Feds Seek to Snoop on Google Searches
I still no time or quarter for real blogging, but if you missed this elsewhere, you won't miss it now. I can't even stop to consider the implications (except perhaps to say that maybe the Libertarians will finally abandon the GOP altogether?):
Google refuses White House search request
(The Guardian)
Google is resisting a White House subpoena to hand over the records of the searches internet users are asking it to perform, it has emerged. (continued)
More Articles:
BBC: Google data request fuels fears
San Jose Mercury News: Google is right to fight Justice Department
Americablog.com: Bush Justice Dept demands Google give feds EVERY search made in June and July 2005 on Google
Washington Post: Google Refuses Demand for Search Information
Posted by MJuhre at 10:26 AM | Comments (0)
January 05, 2006
Terror Probe Shutters Culture Freak Blog
Okay. It's not quite that sexy. But what a title.
Sadly, for information security reasons at the place I spend most of my weekdays, blogging from my daytime terminal must cease temporarily. So, it is likely this blog will contain far fewer entries than normal over the next several weeks...or longer. We shall see.
In the meantime, it's always a good idea to visit Crooks and Liars.
Posted by MJuhre at 01:27 PM | Comments (0)
January 04, 2006
Trench Coat Mafia
or singing canary...
NEXT!
Posted by MJuhre at 03:05 PM | Comments (0)