The federal government’s largest housing construction program for the poor has squandered hundreds of millions of dollars on stalled or abandoned projects and routinely failed to crack down on derelict developers or the local housing agencies that funded them.
Nationwide, nearly 700 projects awarded $400 million have been idling for years, a Washington Post investigation found. Some have languished for a decade or longer even as much of the country struggles with record-high foreclosures and a dramatic loss of affordable housing.
HUD funding reveals million-dollar wasteland
Secret Desert Force Set Up by Blackwater’s Founder
Late one night last November, a plane carrying dozens of Colombian men touched down in this glittering seaside capital. Whisked through customs by an Emirati intelligence officer, the group boarded an unmarked bus and drove roughly 20 miles to a windswept military complex in the desert sand.
The Colombians had entered the United Arab Emirates posing as construction workers. In fact, they were soldiers for a secret American-led mercenary army being built by Erik Prince, the billionaire founder of Blackwater Worldwide, with $529 million from the oil-soaked sheikdom.
Swiss vote to keep assisted suicide, projections suggest
Voters in Zurich, Switzerland, have rejected proposed bans on assisted suicide and "suicide tourism", early projections suggest. The projections showed voters had heavily turned down both initiatives, Swiss news agency SDA reported.
About 200 people commit assisted suicide each year in Zurich, including many foreign visitors. It has been legal in Switzerland since 1941 if performed by a non-physician with no vested interest in the death.
Texas Taxpayers Finance Formula One Auto Races as Schools Dismiss Teachers
Texas, which may balance its budget by firing thousands of teachers, plans to commit $25 million in state funds to Formula One auto racing each year for a decade.
As many as 100,000 teachers in Texas may be fired because of spending cuts to cope with the state’s budget crisis, according to Moak Casey & Associates, an Austin-based education consultant. For $25 million a year, the state could pay more than 500 teachers an average salary of $48,000.
UK torture inquiry will 'not cover US rendition'
An inquiry into Britain's involvement in torture during the "war on terror" will not investigate whether UK forces handed over suspects to be transported to other countries for interrogation by the Americans – despite David Cameron's assurance that it would probe all aspects of the controversy.
The head of the Detainee Inquiry ordered by Mr Cameron has confirmed that he will not consider the issue of detainees transferred between forces fighting in Iraq and elsewhere, which has been identified by many critics as one of the murkiest elements of the "extraordinary rendition" saga.
MI6 plotted with No10 to oust Saddam in bid to win 'prize' of secure oil supplies
MI6 plotted the toppling of Saddam Hussein nearly 18 months before the invasion of Iraq in 2003, secret papers revealed.
Spy chiefs discussed with Downing Street a plan that was layered ‘like an onion’, with ministers openly supporting ‘regime change’ while behind the scenes working closely with those carrying out a coup.
The intelligence service also made clear in newly declassified papers that the ‘prize’ for removing the Iraqi dictator was ‘new security to oil supplies’.
Worse Than China? U.S. Government Wants To Censor Search Engines And Browsers
We knew that members of Congress and their business allies were gearing up to pass a revised Internet Blacklist Bill -- which more than 325,000 Demand Progress members helped block last winter -- but we never expected it to be this atrocious. Last year's bill has been renamed the "PROTECT IP" Act and it is far worse than its predecessor. A summary of it is posted below.
Senators Leahy and Hatch pretended to weigh free speech concerns as they revised the bill. Instead, the new legislation would institute a China-like censorship regime in the United States, whereby the Department of Justice could force search engines, browsers, and service providers to block users' access to websites, and scrub the American Internet clean of any trace of their existence.
UK worried about hydrofracking 'boom' on coastline
"The potential is catastrophic," he said. "We don't know the science of this or how it will affect people. We are introducing something that we do not know the full dangers of."
Greens claim that there is the risk of explosive well blow-outs, fire, traffic disruption and noise. They fear that, so significant are the deposits and so huge the rewards, the industry could be on the verge of major expansion not just across Lancashire but the whole of the UK.
FDA approves boceprevir, the first new hepatitis C drug in 20 years
The Food and Drug Administration on Friday approved marketing of the Merck drug boceprevir, the first new drug for hepatitis C in 20 years. The agency is still considering approval of a similar drug, telaprevir, and is expected to approve it soon as well. Both drugs are members of a new class of hepatitis drugs called protease inhibitors, which block a key enzyme required by the virus to replicate.
They are expected to convert hepatitis C from a debilitating disease into a manageable condition for the majority of people infected with the virus. Boceprevir, which will be marketed by Merck under the brand name Victrelis, is approved only for use in conjunction with the current hepatitis C drugs, peginterferon-alpha and ribavirin.
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