NOT EXACTLY THE TALES OF BRAVE ULYSSES, READER, especially when you consider that, for starters, a three-mile stretch of I-95 in Philadelphia is closed for emergency maintenance after a substantial crack was found in a concrete support beam thereof between Girard Avenue and the Betsy Ross Bridge, the stretch in question.
Said crack is 4' long by 2" wide, and parts of the metal rebar have reportedly shown up in the crack.
Not to mention brick-sized chunks of concrete having been discerned from street level.
In any case, such should serve (along with the I-35W bridge collapse) as clear-cut examples of how far His Fraudulency's Great Within has allowed American infrastructure to deteriorate for the sake of his misadventures otherwise known as ur-RAHOWA Against Terrorism--and I feel qualified to call same "misadventures" because such was provoked based on flimsy and misleading intelligence serving to cover the "real" reasons thereof: Viz., the maintenance of continued dependency on oil imports in the face of stateside oil fields (especially so those in Texas, Oklahoma and California) close to reaching the end of their productive lives and "undue and unnecessary regulatory burden" seen as "preventing" further stateside exploration and development which could tend to the wasteful and counterproductive.
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MEANWHILE, IN NIGERIA, GOVERNMENT INVESTIGATORS HAVE UNCOVERED EVIDENCE OF WHERE 34 SHAM COMPANIES controlled or owned by former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo or his droogs were awarded some US$2.25 billion in contracts related to modernisation of the Nigerian power grid and related infrastructure as failed to be carried out.
As the BBC explains:
The BBC's Ahmed Idris in the capital, Abuja, says this week's parliamentary hearings, which are being aired on television, are causing a stir with their revelations.
He says many parts of the country go for days without electricity and businesses and many homes rely on their generators.
When President Umaru Yar'Adua came to power last year he announced he would declare a "state of emergency" on the country's energy crisis.
Nigeria currently has 10 power stations - they are all between 20 and 30 years old.
Last month, Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan said power cuts were an "embarrassment" to Nigeria - after black-outs affected a meeting he was attending.
Testimonies
The House of Representatives committee is investigating why six power stations - already paid for by the government - are yet to be completed years after they were begun.
It has called all the contractors to give testimony about their progress.
Two witnesses told the hearings, which began on Tuesday, that bushes from the the site where a South African company, Pivot, had been contracted to build a station in the oil-rich Niger Delta have yet to be cleared.
Expect plenty of "419" scam letters related to the aforementioned mess in your junk mail folder before too long....
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OOOHHH, THOSE AUSSIES!!!
From our Australian brethren comes word of where new mothers entitled to a special A$5,000 new-mothers allowance as turn up being "chronic and habitual" alcoholics, drug addicts or gamblers on welfare records will receive the bonus in question as vouchers for diapers, infant formula and infant-care medications; the better to "encourage responsibility" on the part of vulnerable mothers.
And, for those of you still desperate for Miracle Weapons in the Greater War Against International Terrorism (especially where biohazards are real or suspected), The Sydney Morning Herald reports on Australia's latest contribution to the Holy and Noble Cause (or so the Zealots and True Believers want you and me seeing the same):
AUSTRALIAN scientists have developed what is believed to be the world's first hand-held device that can almost instantly tell the difference between a biological terrorist attack and a hoax.
Developed by the CSIRO and the Defence Science and Technology Organisation, it has already shown it can quickly spot anthrax and the deadly poison ricin. It can also identify avian and equine influenza.
However, the research team's leader, Tim Davis, from the CSIRO's material science and engineering division, believes the technology's biggest future could be as a device to instantly diagnose diseases, including some cancers.
"We are interested in using it for medical screening," said Dr Davis.
In the short term the device, publicly demonstrated for the first time yesterday, could be used to thwart hoaxers who create havoc by posting packages containing harmless powder to businesses and government buildings, including Parliament.
Dr Davis said his team set out in 2005 to create a device so cheap and easy to use that all emergency workers investigating suspicious chemicals could carry one: "People want to know how dangerous it is and whether they have to evacuate."
Such testing now requires suspect substances to be sent to laboratories.
Dr Davis said the US had developed "suitcase-sized" kits but they were expensive and still too large.
Someone using the new biosensor, little bigger than a video tape, would dab a swab over the suspicious substance and then wet it with a liquid solution. The swab would then be wiped over a sensor, a thin gold strip with a chemical coating.
By monitoring any changes in the way the gold strip absorbed light, the device would make a positive or negative reading.
"A result would usually take a couple of minutes. If it was highly concentrated you could get it in 10 seconds."
The prototype tests only for one biochemical at a time. A user must change the chemical coating, depending on what counter-terrorist agents think they are looking for.
However, with about $300,000 in newly announced funding from the Federal Government, the Federal Police, Emergency Management Australia and the CSIRO, Dr Davis said the next version would simultaneously test for at least 10 substances.
So much for the Aussies being known only for Vegemite (which, in case any of you ask, is a brewers' yeast extract you spread on toast, which is also good for soups, gravies and roasts), kangaroos, rugby and a beach-mad lifestyle, among other things....
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LIFE IMITATES CHOWDER DEPARTMENT: Nong Shim prawn crackers, a popular South Korean snack, have been recalled after a woman found what the BBC described as "a piece of oily, skin-like material" including teeth and an eye in a jumbo-size packet last month.
Plants in South Korea and China are being investigated by health authorities to determine how the rat could have come into a packet of the finished product. In the meantime, the Nong Shim company has issued this apology:
From the bottom of our heart we apologise to clients who have been supporting us for 40 years.
glitter-graphics.com
