A tornado hit St. Louis airport. It damaged a terminal and parts of the airport’s Concourse C, which is used by American Airlines, AirTran and Cape Air.
The tornado was last seen heading towards Ferguson, Missouri.
Earlier this week a tornado hit a Virginia nuclear power plant. It’s shut down while they repair a switchyard.
A senior Pakistani intelligence official says U.S. personnel operating drones from a Pakistan base, have quietly left the country.
Officially the U.S. is not operating drones out of Pakistani bases, but Pakistani intelligence has been saying, for a while now, they the U.S. is indeed using Pakistani bases for drone attacks.
Supposedly U.S. drones use Pakistan’s Shamsi Air Base.
Carl Forsberg, research analyst at the Institute for the Study of War, says it’s possible the Pakistanis are using pressure on the United States.
Drone attacks kill more civilians than terrorists. The latest attack, last Friday, killed 25 people, including five women and three children: “Drone attacks have become a core irritant in the counter terror campaign. We have repeatedly said that such attacks are counterproductive and only contribute to strengthen the hands of the terrorists.”-Pakistan Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Perhaps the U.S. drone operators left, because they are now needed in Libya?
“So, you are coming to protest against an imaginary threat that doesn’t exist in our community. Not in our courts, not at our City Hall, not on our streets and not in any of our places of worship. Our commitment to the Constitution is unwavering, not merely convenient, which makes your hyperbole about Sharia Law being practiced in the courts or civil law of Dearborn nonsensical.”–Jack O’Reilly Jr., Mayor of Dearborn, Michigan
While being interviewed by a local newspaper, motorist drove by calling so called christian Terry Jones a terrorist: “Get out of Dearborn, you terrorist!”
Also, after an interview at a local TV station, Jones ‘accidentally’ fired his gun while leaving the station.
Jones has appeared in court, defending ‘his’ church’s decision to protest in front of the largest mosque in the U.S.: “We’ll do it today at 5 or we’ll come back next week.”
The judge told Jones he needed to pay a bond to cover police protection costs, for his demonstration. Jones refused to pay.
Dearborn Muslims, along with Christians, and Jews, are celebrating Good Friday at the mosque.
The U.S. International Trade Commission and the Department of Commerce are investigating claims by U.S. companies, that China is dumping steel wheels on the U.S. market.
The claim was filed by the U.S. wheel makers, Accuride Corp and Hayes Lemmerz International Inc.
16 Chinese companies are being investigated for selling their wheels in the United States, for far less than what it cost to make them. Dumping is a way a company can gain a foot hold in a specific market, by selling their products at huge loses, to push out their competitors. Once that is done the dumping company will increase their prices to make up the difference.
Terry Jones now has a $1 million bounty for his arrest. He’s one of the ‘christians’ that burned the Quran in March. He, and his followers (doesn’t that make it a cult?) are in Dearborn, Michigan, to launch a Good Friday protest in front of the largest mosque in the U.S.
The problem is that Terry Jones has stated, recently, that he and his followers will use guns at the protest. In a morning interview (April 22) with a Michigan TV station, Jones said they will protest, even though a judge denied their permit to do so. The judge did suggest other sites for holding the protest, but Jones refused.
At least two nuclear plants in the United States have been automatically shut down this week. A nuclear plant in Virgina, and a nuclear plant in Georgia.
In Surry, Virginia, a nuke plant was hit by tornadoes. It shut down automatically, and is now undergoing repairs to its electrical switchyard.
A nuke plant in Georgia automatically shut down, for no reason. The plant remains off line while an investigation continues to find out why the automatic systems shut it down. The plant is near Waynesboro, Georgia.
“We will not keep silent on destruction of mosques.”-joint statement by clerics
Bahrain Center for Human Rights said that 28 Mosques, and 50 mourning halls, have been destroyed by government forces, and Saudi forces. Muslim clerics have accused Bahraini and Saudi forces of sacrilege.
The Shia majority have been protesting since February 14, they want an end to the royal family rule. Some of the destroyed mosques were located in Karzakan, Salmabad, Bu Quwah, and A’ali.
Protesters plan a big rally for Friday. Husain Abdulla, human rights activist, says the United States does not want democracy in Bahrain, because the U.S. fears the people will vote the U.S. Navy out. Bahrain is the head quarters of the USN Fifth Fleet.
“The Zionists and CIA agents in the region assist drug dealers at Iran’s joint borders with Afghanistan. These [so-called] advocates of human rights have undertaken the task of investing in the production of industrial drugs from traditional ones and supplying them to Iran’s market.”-Mohammad-Najjar, Interior Minister
The drug trade from Afghanistan has resulted in more than 3,700 Iranian counter-narcotics officers their lives, since the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan.
The United Nations admits that before the U.S. invasion, the Taliban had actually reduced poppy production to some of the lowest levels in Afghanistan’s history. Now, according to a 2010 UN report, Afghanistan accounts for 90% of the world’s illicit opium and heroin production. What happened? The U.S. used to blame the Taliban for the opium production, but the Taliban are no longer in power in Afghanistan, mmmm.
The United Nations also ranks Iran as have the best anti-drug enforcement record in the world. Russia has also made claims about the U.S. being involved with the drug trade out of Afghanistan.
China’s Xinhuanet news is reporting that the Libyan government is arming civilians, to counter a possible invasion by NATO.
Most of the population in the western half of Libya supports the government. It also happens to be the half of Libya with very little oil production. The rebellion/civil war started in the oil rich eastern half.
The Libyan government accused NATO of intercepting an oil tanker that was operating for the Libyan government. That act is not authorized under UNSCR 1973.
“The U.S. economic fundamentals are not strong, plus there is expanding fiscal deficit and declining financial revenue. We are closely tracking the performance of U.S. government bonds and considering a further adjustment based on current conditions.”-Guan Jianzhong, Dagong Global Credit Rating Company
It wasn’t just S & P that reduced the credit rating of the Untied States, Dagong Global Credit Rating company also downgraded the U.S. That’s important, because it’s a Chinese company, and the Chinese hold most of the U.S. sovereign debt.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei, along with several Chinese bank officials, urged the United States to adopt “responsible policies and measures” to protect the interests of investors (mainly Chinese). The problem is that if those investors think they’re going to lose money then they’re going to start off loading their U.S. bonds in a big way (they’ve already been selling them off, slowly, for the past three months).