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Tuesday, December 6, 2016

Media reports indicate Brian Loncar, a prominent attorney based in Dallas, Texas was found unresponsive in a car outside his office Sunday morning.

Loncar was transported to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead a short time later. He was found in the front seat of his Rolls Royce Wraith. Loncar’s death occurred just two days following his teenage daughter’s memorial service. His daughter took her own life in late November.

Police are still investigating Loncar’s cause of death. Medical personnel surmised heart attack was the likely cause, according to Loncar’s son. In 2008 Loncar’s car was struck by a fire-rescue truck, seriously injuring him.

Loncar maintained eleven law offices stretching across Texas and his TV commercials featured an illustrated ‘strong arm’ pounding against steel, promising potential clients he’d help them gain compensation if they’d been injured in an accident. The law firm’s web site indicates they specialize in all types of vehicle accidents and various types of wrongful death cases.

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Opinions rooted in racism, sexism, homophobia are commonly unacceptable to express in public or in polite company. Michael Richards shouted down a black heckler by yelling, “Shut up!” followed by “He’s a nigger!” and gave his already dormant career less of a chance of ever reviving. When Isiah Washington called a co-star on Grey’s Anatomy a “fag,” his contract was not renewed.

None of this would have happened to either actor if instead of racist or homophobic terminology they had said, “Shut up, fattie!” or “Fat ass!” It’s not an easy time to be fat in America. A fat person is seen as weak-willed, as suffering from an addiction to food, as unhealthy and deserving of ridicule. It goes without saying that people who are overweight are, indeed, people with a full range of emotions and feelings that are as easily hurt as a thin person’s.

Wikinews reporter David Shankbone met Kira Nerusskaya, a documentary filmmaker, at this year’s Tribeca Film Festival. Her film The BBW World: Under the FAT! is in production and post-production. She is a self-described Big Beautiful Woman (BBW) and she hosts the website TheBBWWorld.com; she is also one of the leading voices that has recently emerged for fat acceptance. In researching her film she has traveled to Russia, London, Paris, Ireland and all over the United States to interview fat women about their obesity and their place in their respective societies.

Below is an interview with Nerusskaya about the health, issues, public reactions to and sexuality of a BBW.

Robin Cook, the former British foreign secretary and current Member of Parliament, has died of a suspected heart attack after collapsing during a walk on Ben Stack hill in Scotland. Cook, aged 59, was airlifted to a hospital 90 minutes after the collapse. He was reported dead five minutes later.

Friday, June 16, 2006

Documents found at the hideout of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi revealed al-Qaeda‘s desire to force a war between the U.S. and Iran. The document was translated by Iraqi National Security Adviser Mouwafak al-Rubaie, but the authenticity of the information could not be confirmed to be from al-Qaeda.

The documents reveal that al-Zarqawi was planning to destroy the relationship between the Shi’ite Iraqis and the United States. The document also said the U.S. military was hurting the insurgency by seizure of weapons, disrupting their financial outlets, massive arrests, and training Iraqi security forces.

The translated document said, “Generally speaking and despite the gloomy present situation, we find that the best solution in order to get out of this crisis is to involve the U.S. forces in waging a war against another country or any hostile groups.”

Mowaffaq al-Rubaie said, “These documents have given us the edge over al-Qaeda and (they) also gave us the whereabouts of their network, of their leaders, of their weapons and the way they lead the organization and the whereabouts of their meetings.”

Tuesday, September 27, 2005

Sun Microsystems has released StarOffice 8 today. StarOffice 8 is a commercial office suite that includes word-processing, spreadsheet, presentation, drawing and database applications.

According to Sun, StarOffice 8 “provides excellent compatibility with Microsoft Office”. This new version improves Word, Excel and PowerPoint import and export filters, improving support for password-protected Word and Excel files and presentations with complex animations, autoshapes and slide transitions. StarOffice 8 also includes a Microsoft Office macro converter allowing many Microsoft Office macros to work in StarOffice.

StarOffice 8 is also the first commercial office suite to support the OASIS Open Document Format for Office Applications (OpenDocument). OpenDocument is an XML based file format created by the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards. Massachusetts has recently announced the plan to switch to OpenDocument format. Microsoft has said it will not support the OpenDocument format.

StarOffice 8 is based on the open source OpenOffice.org project. OpenOffice.org was founded July 2000, by Sun with the release of StarOffice code under two open source licenses.

StarOffice 8 is available as a download from Sun’s Web site for $69.95, or packaged product can be ordered for $99.95. Enterprise customers can purchase StarOffice 8 for $35 (£20) per user. OpenOffice.org is available for free from openoffice.org.

Friday, July 29, 2005

Two days of ministerial talks have ended without agreement and evidence of a possible deadlock between developing and developed countries.

148 member countries are trying to reach a consensus on how to proceed with the Doha round of talks which are scheduled to be agreed in 2006. However, they are now behind the deadlines they set and the Geneva meeting saw no progress.

Richer countries are being accused of demanding too many concessions in return for opening up trade and reducing subsidies while they say that the poorer countries are holding them to ransom by blocking progress.

Friday, May 26, 2006

After approximately 150 Australian troops from 4 Royal Australian Regiment (Commandos) secured Comoro airport in Dili yesterday, the total number of Australian troops in East Timor has risen to 600, with a further 1200 in transit or directly supporting Operation Astute. Malaysia, New Zealand and Portugal have also begun their deployments. Malaysia has now sent 25 military officers ahead of its 500 strong commitment of military and police personnel; New Zealand has committed two C-130s, and an infantry company is on standby pending negotiations over rules of engagement; Portugal’s 120-strong commitment has commenced preparations, but is not expected to arrive for a matter of weeks. The Australian contingent involved in Operation Astute has been placed under the command of Brigadier Michael Slater, who arrived in Dili this morning.

Currently, the Australian Department of Defence states Operation Astute’s tasks are:

1. to facilitate the evacuation of Australian and other foreign nationals as is appropriate and necessary;
2. to stabilise the situation and facilitate the concentration of the various conflicting groups into safe and secure locations;
3. to audit and account for the location of weapons that belong to each group; and
4. to create a secure environment for the conduct of a successful dialogue to resolve the current crisis.

Australian forces are already actively operating in Dili; Infantry patrols are operating in the area, supported by the four Blackhawks from the 5th Aviation Regiment that have arrived so far. Blackhawks have also been operating missions above the hills around Dili to seek out rebel positions and communicate a strong presence to the rebel soldiers. Two Armoured Personnel Carriers and an infantry platoon have set up position in and around the UN Headquarters and Dili police station, which came under attack earlier today, and was the location of considerable violence yesterday when East Timorese army soldiers killed 12 East Timorese police and wounded numerous others, including 2 UN personnel. “At the moment things are relatively stable, the troops are arriving and we are establishing good control throughout the Dili area” BRIG Slater said of the situation.

Yesterday 80 Australian nationals were evacuated by RAAF C-130, a number that is rising as flights in and out of East Timor have been unhampered since the securing of Comoro airport. Approximately 800 Australian nationals were in East Timor at the beginning of conflict.

Events involving East Timor’s government are complicating the situation. Reports state that Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri is reluctant to allow foreign troops to independently operate in the country and arguing with President Xanana Gusmao over who should control the small nation’s still loyal military of 800 troops. After President Gusmao declared he had taken over command of the military and ordered all East Timorese military personnel to barracks, Alkatiri stated that he believed the President does not have a constitutional right to take control of the military, as that depends on a ‘situation of emergency’ being declared, which is itself dependent on the parliament.

According to Mark Thompson, a military budgeting specialist from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, Operation Astute would cost a similar amount to Australia’s earlier peacekeeping operation in East Timor – approximately $200 million.

Wednesday, January 12, 2005

Nine people have died in bush-fires in the region of the Eyre Peninsula in South Australia. The fire has spread over 40,000 hectares of scrub, bushland and farmland so far and is still burning out of control. Hundreds of firemen have been fighting the fire, but conditions have been difficult because of strong winds and temperatures soaring well over 40 degrees Celsius. Of the nine who have died, eight were attempting to escape the advancing fire in their cars. Four children were among the dead. Locals of some rural towns fled to the ocean to escape the fires. Thousands of sheep and cattle have also been killed in the fires.

Separate fires have also been burning around Mount Osmond and Cleland National Park in the Adelaide hills. No fatalities have been recorded in this region. Fires also burn in country Victoria.

Bush-fires are annual occurrences in Australia, but these fires have been the worst in terms of deaths since the Ash Wednesday fires that killed 28 people in South Australia. Two years ago, over 400 houses were burnt down in a bush fire in the Australian capital city, Canberra.