110-year-old Pa. widow gets WWI benefits boost

(better late than never I suppose, a salute to their representative who took some initiative here, may he have all the photo ops he deserves )

EBENSBURG, Pa. — A 110-year-old Pennsylvania widow is getting a benefits boost because of her husband's World War I service.

Family members say Alda Collins is now getting about $1,000 a month to assist with her stay at a nursing home near Ebensburg. She had been getting $36 a month.

Her son tells the Daily American of Somerset ( http://bit.ly/OURXLU) that Collins lived by herself in a trailer until she was 106. She can use a walker, feeds herself and knows the Pirates are in second place.

For years, she taught in a one-room schoolhouse.

Her husband, William, served in the Army in World War I. He died in 1976 at age 81.

The family had been asking the Veterans Administration for the benefits adjustment since 2008 and recently got help from U.S. Rep. Mark Critz.

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Information from: Daily American, http://www.dailyamerican.com/

Animal escape in Germany: Kangaroo on the lam

( somebody clearly let the kangaroo watch Madagascar too many times and gave the erstwhile marsupial ideas)

BERLIN — A kangaroo is on the lam in Germany after breaking out of a wildlife park, with a fox and a wild boar his suspected accomplices.

Michael Hoffmann, assistant head of the Hochwildschutzpark Hunsrueck west of Frankfurt, said Monday the male kangaroo was one of three that escaped overnight Saturday with the inadvertent help of the menagerie that lives in the area woods.

Hoffmann says the kangaroos got out of their enclosure after a young fox snuck into the park and dug a hole next to the cage's fencing. Two of the three were then able to get out of the park entirely through another hole dug by a wild boar under the exterior fence.

Hoffmann says "we've got two of them back; now we're just looking for the third."

Norway: Report criticizes police massacre response

( ah this guy what a piece of work, shot up a whole buncha folks because he felt his country was being ”invaded by Muslim forces”, and that his government had “gone soft” , hot and spicy racism at its foulest. The part of it all that I found most interesting was his stalwart insistence against an insanity defense trying to make himself out as a political prisoner. At some level I have to agree his actions were evil not insane. He slew his fellow citizens with malice aforethought  and no amount of flag waving will cleanse the wrong of it. Now if he really wanted to go kill foreigners I’m sure  any number of mercenaries or even armies would be willing to supply and deploy him to kill him up all the less white folks his cold and soulless little heart could desire. But instead with cowardice and treachery he struck down innocent children whose only crime was being in the wrong place at the wrong time, a similar fate to those cut down in war but at least being killed by a soldier has some dignity to it.)

By BJOERN H. AMLAND, APOSLO, Norway — Norwegian authorities could have prevented or interrupted the bomb and gun attacks by a far-right fanatic who killed 77 people last year, a government appointed commission said Monday.

The long-awaited report into the July 22 attacks also said the domestic intelligence service could have done more to track down the gunman, but stopped short of saying it could have stopped him.

Anders Behring Breivik, 33, has admitted to the bombing of the government's headquarters in Oslo, which killed eight people and the subsequent shooting spree at a youth camp that left 69 dead, more than half of them teenagers. He is currently awaiting sentencing.

While noting that the attacks "may be the most shocking and incomprehensible acts ever experienced in Norway," the 500-page report said the bombing "could have been prevented" if already adopted security measures had been implemented more effectively.

Breivik was able to park a van with a fertilizer bomb just outside the high-rise before he drove another car to the Labor Party's youth camp on Utoya, unhindered.

The report said that a car bomb "at the government complex and several coordinated attacks have been recurring scenarios in threat assessments as well as for safety analyses and exercise scenarios for many years."

Plans to close off the street in front of the government building were approved in 2010, but work on constructing physical barriers had not been completed and no temporary obstacles had been set up. A parking ban in the area was not strictly enforced.

The police response was slowed down by a series of blunders, including flaws in communication systems and the breakdown of an overloaded boat carrying a police anti-terror unit. Meanwhile, Norway's only police helicopter was left unused, its crew on vacation. Breivik's shooting spree lasted for more than one hour before he surrendered to police.

The report said that a faster police response could have stopped Breivik's shooting spree earlier, but recognized that "hardly anyone could have imagined" the secondary attack on Utoya.

"Sadly, however, after repeated school massacres in other countries, an armed desperado who shoots adolescents is indeed conceivable — also in Norway," It added.

Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said he held the ultimate responsibility for the way public authorities responded to the attacks, but he evaded reporters' questions about whether he had considered stepping down.

"It took too long to arrest the perpetrator. Police could have reached Utoya faster. These are circumstances I deeply regret," Stoltenberg said.

The justice minister and the head of the Norwegian Security Service have already been replaced since the attacks.

Though Breivik has admitted the attacks, he rejected criminal guilt during his trial, saying his victims had betrayed their country by embracing a multicultural society.

Prosecutors have said there were doubts about his sanity and suggested Breivik be committed to compulsory psychiatric care instead of prison. A ruling is set for Aug. 24.

Doom and gloom: Olympic wins trump critics

( the Olympics was an awesome display of prowess and sportsmanship in the highest ideals and traditions)

By PAISLEY DODDS, APLONDON — For skeptics, the Olympics were deliciously doomed: London's transport network would surely fail, Britain's athletes would flop, rain would prevail and terrorists would strike. But then the sun came out after months of sodden skies, vehicles moved briskly, there were no attacks and British athletes reeled in a shocking 65 medals.

On Monday, as international athletes and visitors poured out of London and the city's 8 million residents resumed their normal lives, British officials hailed the 2012 Olympics as an unqualified success. Even the naysayers predicting doom and gloom had to eat their words.

"I was moaning like everyone else before the games, thinking the roads would be packed and nothing would work," said London shopkeeper Yvette Tracton, 28. "But it's been brilliant."

Some 116,000 people were leaving Monday from Heathrow airport, London's busiest hub, compared with 95,000 for a typical August day. Gatwick Airport was handling 70,000 departing passengers, 15 percent more than usual. Airports had come under scrutiny in the months leading up to the Olympics for lacking the staff to deal with backlogs of people and luggage, but Monday's crowds moved through without a hitch.

The exodus included thousands of athletes and Prime Minister David Cameron, who was heading on vacation to the Mediterranean.

Texas A&M: Active shooter on campus apprehended

COLLEGE STATION, Texas — Texas A&M University says a shooter has been taken into custody near its campus in College Station.

College Station police spokeswoman Rhonda Seaton tells CNN multiple people have been shot, including law enforcement, but she doesn't know the extent of the injuries. Multiple calls to Seaton's cellphone from The Associated Press have gone straight to voicemail.

The university issued an alert on its website just before 12:30 p.m. Monday warning of an active shooter near the campus football stadium, Kyle Field. The warning tells residents and students to avoid the area.

Seaton says the shooting happened within a block or two of campus sometime before 12:45 p.m. She says police have one suspect in custody.

College Station lies about 90 miles northwest of Houston.

Anti-immigrant party office in Greece firebombed

(ah fascism always in style, ‘cause nothing trumps “blame the foreigner for all your problems” , honestly people the more we move forward the more we move back, the Fascist vs. Communist thing that made the world wars such a fan favorite is apparently alive and well and thriving across the globe.  Not that we have any room to point fingers after all the American Midwest with its “show me ze papers!” policies and politicians barking about building a huge wall to keep out the evil job stealing, welfare state making foreigner at bay plan is clear proof we have it here too, ‘course building huge walls although a great source of public works projects never work, just ask China or perhaps Hadrian. Now Athens has been on fire a lot recently what with protests and such over the whole EU thing.

Way to go Germany! Sure it’s not the same plan for global dominance you had the other two times, we believe you honest we do.)

ATHENS, Greece — Authorities say arsonists have firebombed an Athens office of a far-right, anti-immigrant party, a day after the suspected racist murder of an Iraqi man in the Greek capital.

The fire brigade says nobody was hurt in Monday's attack on the Golden Dawn facility in the central Pangrati area. The assailants escaped arrest.

The party, which rejects the neo-Nazi label, won 18 of the Greek Parliament's 300 seats in June elections by running on an anti-immigration, nationalist platform.

Debt-crippled Greece is the European Union's main entry point for illegal immigrants.

The government has sought to blunt Golden Dawn's rising influence by placing illegal immigrants in detention camps pending their deportation.

The party's ascendance has been coupled with growing reports of attacks on immigrants. The Iraqi's attackers remain at large and unidentified.

Capsized cruise ship won't be moved till spring

(apparently captains going down with their ships just isn’t as popular as it used to be. Although the tragedy of this event did result in the loss of human lives, the idea that the captain fled and hid in a bar while his ship tore itself apart and people were drowning and such does lend a certain cartoonish humor to it all, I’m not sure what he was thinking at that moment to be honest, “gee if I just have a drink or two nobody will notice I’m gone.” Also the whole exchange with rescuers demanding the captains return only to be answered and I quote “no you go in there!” truly such valor and grit comes by once a generation. )

ROME — Officials say the capsized Costa Concordia cruise ship will not be moved from its resting place off Italy's Tuscan coast as quickly as planned.

Giglio island Mayor Sergio Ortelli told reporters Monday that the timetable for removal of the liner, now lying on its side off the island's port, has been pushed back.

The Italian government office overseeing removal said in a statement that the Concordia should be set upright and able to float again by the end of spring 2013, ahead of Giglio's next tourist season.

Salvage experts in May had predicted towing could start in early 2013.

Thirty-two people died when the Concordia rammed a reef off Giglio in January and capsized. Its Italian captain is under investigation for alleged manslaughter and abandoning ship.