Virginia gives Goode spot on state election ballot
(it's so nice to see a third party candidate having some success,even if he is a conservative. the idea that there can only be two effective political parties seems wrong for a nation of our size,look at India there are many parties there flourishing in the competitive free market of ideas. our third parties just don't get the press they deserve,sure some of them are lunatic fringe extremists but they deserve their place in the  sun as well during the election process,how else can the public make a truly informed choice? there's more sodas under the sun than Coke and Pepsi)
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By BOB LEWIS, AP
3 hours ago
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FILE - In this Nov. 7, 2008 file photo, former Va. Rep. Virgil Goode speaks ...
Virginia's State Board of Elections acted Tuesday after the state GOP challenged Goode's qualifying petitions and sought an independent review.
But the Republican-dominated board also asked Republican Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (koo-chih-NEHL'-ee) and the state police to investigate.
The former congressman is the nominee of the conservative Constitution Party, and has held office as a Democrat, independent and Republican. He lost the seat to Democrat Tom Perriello in 2008.
Nigeria uncovers cocaine-stuffed roasted chicken
(mmmm spicy mmmm.... apparently the Nigerian authorities are unfamiliar with traditional spicy coke chicken a delicious ethnic south american dish. those weren't drugs officer those were flavor packets full of spicy coke goodness.)
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By YINKA IBUKUN, AP
23 hours ago
A Nigerian mechanic who struggled in Brazil for more than six years had hoped the drugs would buy him a life of luxury in his native land, Nigerian authorities said Monday.
"This was like a retirement plan for him," said Mitchell Ofoyeju, spokesman for the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency.
The accused was arrested over the weekend at the airport in Lagos after he came in from Sao Paulo with 2.6 kilograms (5.7 pounds) of cocaine, Ofoyeju said. Photos from the agency showed egg-shaped packages wrapped in gold aluminum foil and tucked into the browned chickens.
The suspect, Vincent Chegini Chinweuwa, could not immediately be reached for comment as he remained in custody Monday.
Nigeria is a major transit point for drugs coming from Latin America and going to Europe or the United States but recent security improvements are cutting into that dubious distinction.
After a Nigerian man allegedly attempted to blow up a Detroit-bound airliner in 2009, Nigeria started installing airport scanners and sought training for its agents. Ofoyeju says the scanners helped authorities identify more than 100 drug carriers last year, leading to the seizure of about 410 kilograms (904 pounds) of cocaine, among other illicit drugs.
Authorities have found drugs sandwiched inside the fabric of suitcases, sewn into wigs worn by female passengers, tucked into underwear or hidden in phone chargers and even in a stethoscope, Ofoyeju said.
"The list is endless," he said.
The weekend seizure may even redeem the agency's image after the controversial arrest last year of a popular Nigerian comedian known as Baba Suwe. The agency held him for more than three weeks to monitor his bowel movements after a scanner detected what investigators believed to be drugs — but no drugs were ever found.
UMass students nosh on 6,700-pound seafood stew
(oh Massachusetts and your ginormous food )
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4 hours ago
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This Monday, Sept. 3, 2012 photo released by the University of Massachusetts...
A year after starting the semester with a two-ton stir fry, staff and students at the Amherst campus on Monday made and chowed down on a nearly 6,700-pound seafood stew.
The stew was prepared in the same custom-built, 14-foot pan used to make the stir fry last year. The stew included 1,000 pounds of mussels, lobster, clams, haddock and salmon from sustainable sources in New England and Alaska.
It also contained 1,725 pounds of half and half, 1,137 pounds of potatoes, 575 pounds of onions and 145 pounds of bacon, among other ingredients.
Police: Buffalo man tried to eat bogus $50 bills
(really people who buys fries with a fifty? use twenties next time no one will notice)
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5 hours ago
The Genesee (JEN'-uh-see) County Sheriff's Office says deputies were called to Darien Lake Theme Park and Resort on Sunday night after Larry Jones, of Buffalo, bought french fries with a $50 bill.
Deputies say a park employee determined the bill was counterfeit and called security. While being taken away, deputies say Jones stuffed five counterfeit bills into his mouth and tried to eat them.
Security officers retrieved the bills before Jones swallowed them.
Judge grants sex change for Mass. murder convict
(not sure how I feel about this one, on the one hand it is a victory for humane treatment of our prisoners which is rare for American land of the free home of the incarcerated,  but on the other hand this makes this lady the only female inmate among the thousands of male inmates, many of whom are convicted rapists the risks here are astronomical. I suppose we should take heart that a judge was even willing to hear this case at all let alone act on it.)
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By DENISE LAVOIE, AP
2 hours ago
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FILE - In this Jan. 15, 1993 file photo, Robert Kosilek sits in Bristol Coun...
Michelle Kosilek was born male but has received hormone treatments and now lives as a woman in an all-male prison. Robert Kosilek was convicted of murder in the killing of his wife in 1990.
U.S. District Judge Mark Wolf is believed to be the first federal judge to order prison officials to provide sex-reassignment surgery for a transgender inmate.
Kosilek first sued the Massachusetts Department of Correction 12 years ago. Two years later, Wolf ruled that Kosilek was entitled to treatment for gender-identity disorder but stopped short of ordering surgery. Kosilek sued again in 2005, arguing that the surgery is a medical necessity.
In his ruling Tuesday, Wolf found that surgery is the "only adequate treatment" for Kosilek's "serious medical need."
"The court finds that there is no less intrusive means to correct the prolonged violation of Kosilek's Eighth Amendment right to adequate medical care," Wolf wrote in his 126-page ruling.
Prison officials have repeatedly cited security risks in the case, saying that allowing Kosilek to have the surgery would make her a target for sexual assaults by other inmates.
But Wolf, who was appointed to the federal bench by President Ronald Reagan in 1985, found that the security concerns are "either pretextual or can be dealt with." He said it would be up to prison officials to decide how and where to house Kosilek after the surgery.
Diane Wiffin, a spokeswoman for the prisons department, said the agency would have no immediate comment on the ruling.
"We are reviewing the decision and exploring our appellate options," Wiffin said.
In a telephone interview last year with The Associated Press, Kosilek said the surgery is a medical necessity, not a frivolous desire to change her appearance.
"Everybody has the right to have their health care needs met, whether they are in prison or out on the streets," Kosilek said. "People in the prisons who have bad hearts, hips or knees have surgery to repair those things. My medical needs are no less important or more important than the person in the cell next to me."
Wolf noted in his ruling that the Department of Correction's own medical experts testified that they believe surgery was the only adequate treatment for Kosilek.
The department's ex-commissioner Kathleen Dennehy testified that providing Kosilek the surgery would present insurmountable security concerns, but Wolf said Kosilek had proven that those purported concerns masked the real reason for denying surgery: "a fear of controversy, criticism, ridicule and scorn."
Kosilek's lawsuit has become fodder for radio talk shows and lawmakers who say the state should not be forced to pay for a convicted murderer's sex-change operation — which can cost up to $20,000 — especially since many insurance companies reject the surgery as elective.
Inmates in Colorado, California, Idaho and Wisconsin have sued unsuccessfully to try to get the surgery, making similar arguments that denying it violates the U.S. Constitution's protection against cruel and unusual punishment.
Wolf noted that Kosilek's gender-identity disorder has caused Kosilek such anguish that she has tried to castrate herself and twice tried to commit suicide, including once while on Prozac.
Kosilek's lead attorney, Frances Cohen, called the decision courageous and thoughtful.
SAfrican buffalo sells for record $3.25 million
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By MICHELLE FAUL, AP
6 hours ago
Owner Jacques Malan said the 4 years and 10-month-old bull called Horizon has horns measuring 51 and three-eighth inches (130.5 centimeters) long and a boss, or horn base, 16 inches (nearly 41 centimeters) wide — a South African record for an animal that age.
"My main purpose is to breed back the old giants of the bush of Africa which have been hunted out over past centuries," Malan told The Associated Press from his Lumarie Game Farm in Bela Bela, north of the administrative capital of Pretoria.
Malan said he applies a knowledge of genetics garnered from his father since childhood and uses the same method in producing flowers. "Genetics (selection) stay the same, the principles stay the same, and I have applied it to wildlife as well as cattle and the flowers I produce," he said.
Horizon, who will be used for breeding, is a disease-free stud and so can also be used on a cattle farm without threat of contamination. The new owner
The association, which did not identify the new owner, said the buffalo is the most expensive wild animal ever sold in South Africa, the leading breeder on the continent.
Horizon was sold at a weekend auction, fetching 8 million rand ($1 million) more than the buffalo Senatla, which was sold last year.
"We knew that it's a special, special buffalo bull and we believed that it should have been the new record, price-wise. But you never know, so we are very delighted at this outcome," Malan said.