GAZA CITY — Seventy Palestinians were killed Sunday in a heavy bombardment of a Gaza neighborhood and 13 Israeli soldiers were slain in the most intense day of fighting in Israel’s current offensive against Hamas fighters, officials said. The Hamas military also announced that its fighters had captured an Israeli soldier.

Abu Obaida, a spokesman for the Al Qassam Brigades, appeared on Hamas TV to announce the soldier had been taken prisoner. Minutes later, there were fireworks and shouts of “God is great!” from loud speakers.

An Israeli military spokeswoman said the army was investigating the claim.

A kidnapped Israeli soldier would represent a victory for Hamas and a difficult new challenge for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

(CNN) -- A Florida jury awarded a widow $23.6 billion in punitive damages in her lawsuit against tobacco giant R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, her lawyer said.

Cynthia Robinson claimed that smoking killed her husband, Michael Johnson, in 1996. She argued R.J. Reynolds was negligent in not informing him that nicotine is addictive and smoking can cause lung cancer. Johnson started smoking when he was 13 and died of lung cancer when he was 36.

The jury award Friday evening is "courageous," said Robinson's lawyer, Christopher Chestnut.
"If anyone saw the documents that this jury saw, I believe that person would have awarded a similar or greater verdict amount," he said.

here's some pertinent info between rand paul and cryptocurrencies. apparently he wants a walmart coin called WalCoin, backed by walmart stock.


http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2014/07/rand-paul-wants-to-see-walcoin-money.html

MALAYSIAN FLIGHT FALSE FLAG EVIDENCE REVEALED
Neocons and their state-run media would have us believe the case is closed

Less than 24 hours after the devastating attack that downed Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17, Neocons and their state-run media would have us believe the case is closed…before an investigation has even been launched. We break down the repetitive false-flag narrative.

Really not surprising at all. I'm more surprised that the NK regime has managed to keep the people suppressed for this long. They're going to fall apart some time in the near future, and it is NOT going to be pretty when it happens.

We don't know if that his real age. I know a man in my town, he looks the oldest on our town. I asked him what is your secret. He tells me he smoke two packs of cigarette a day, he drink hard liquor almost everyday, he fuck as many prostitute as he can everyday. He also tried as many drugs he can fine. I ask him if how old he was, I was amazed by his answer his age is 46 years old.

I think this reflects on the US - Germany relationship that has resulted in our current president's spy policies with our allies. It also shows how good our foreign relations policies are that major countries are willing to openly mock the US like this

I'm bullish on the future of BTC, but I still think it is far more likely that we see $10 before we see $100,000

A Brazilian man whose parents were African slaves could be the oldest living person ever documented after receiving a birth cerficate showing he turned 126 last week, it was reported on Tuesday.

Jose Aguinelo dos Santos was born on July 7 1888, just two months after slavery was abolished in Brazil - the last country in the world to outlaw the trade.

Yet the batchelor, who never married or had children, still walks without a stick, eats four meals a day and has no health problems - despite smoking a packet of cigarettes a day for the last 50 years.

Jose - known simply as Ze - was 26 when World War I broke out, and already a pensioner at 65 when Queen Elizabeth II ascended to the British throne.

He was 52 when Brazil football legend Pele was born - and 62 when Brazil last hosted the World Cup, in 1950.

One of five children, Jose was born in a slave compound in the town of Pedra Branca in the state of Ceara, northeast Brazil.

He was among hundreds of slave families who continued to live there, even after being granted their freedom.

He later travelled south to the state of Sao Paulo, where he spent most of his life working on a coffee plantation in the town of Bauru.

Now a resident of an old people's home in the same town, Jose likes to tell jokes and sing, hates having a bath, and never misses his daily plate of rice and beans.

And he told Brazil's G1 website there is no secret to living a long life: "The truth is that you just keep getting older. You take each stage at a time.

"If I got to this age it's because I've lived a lot, that's all."

Mariana Silva, psychologist at the Vila Vicentina home, said Jose has no health problems and is so lucid he still amuses other residents by cracking one-liners.

She said: "He's one of our most with-it residents.

"He doesn't have high cholesterol, diabetes or high blood pressure. The only medicine he takes are vitamins and a tablet to give him an appetite, which you can lose with old age.

"When he's on his own he likes to sing. None of us know the songs he sings. They're from a time no-one else remembers.

"He doesn't like to take a bath every day and it's sometimes impossible to get him to the shower. When he puts his foot down, that's it. No-one can get him in there."

Jose, who arrived at the home in 2001, received his birth certificate last month after living his entire life without any documents.

A team of experts arrived on his birth date after researching his past and interviewing him about his earliest memories, during which he was able to describe the slave compound perfectly.

The old people's home now hopes to provide conclusive evidence that he is the world's oldest man through 'Carbon-14' dating.

Jose Roberto Pires, the president of the retirement home, said they are determined to do the test even though it costs around £13,000.

But he added: "We are trying to find a way to do it without having to pay. This is very important. We believe the world's oldest ever person is living here with us, and this is the only way we can really prove it."

North Korea has been taking propaganda pictures of their leader at missile launches. They launch missiles in the water all the time, but now they are doing it with their leader at the launch to watch it happen. Probably to add national pride to the equation.

And if Russia knows about the North Korean camps in Siberia that means they are teamed up. And Russia alone could cause Commie Nostalgia and get everyone in a war frenzy, but if we find out North Korea and Russia are working together, there is no question America will have red in its eyes.

“Huckabee/Paul.” Say it aloud. Go on.

It sounds like music, doesn’t it?

Seriously, though, I’m surprised. Not by Huck’s standing, but by Rand’s:



Huckabee’s well known because he’s a former candidate and he’s been on Fox News for years. Paul Ryan’s well known because he was on the Republican ticket in 2012. Rick Perry’s well known because he ran in 2012 and has been ubiquitous on TV lately thanks to the border crisis. But how did Rand Paul get that sort of name recognition? This would kinda sorta make sense to me if it was a poll of all adults or all registered voters because Paul’s been trying so hard this year to get the attention of independents and disaffected Democrats. But it’s a poll of Republicans and leaners, and yet Rand’s “familiarity” score is 10 points higher than his Senate contemporary Rubio’s — and Rubio had plenty of air time last year from conservative media because of the Gang of Eight bill. I can only assume that libertarians are the difference. If you’re a fan of the Pauls but ignore mainstream Republican politics, you might (grudgingly) identify as “lean Republican” for a poll like this even though Rand’s the only guy on your radar screen. That means you’re largely unfamiliar with Rubio, Cruz, and Walker but very familiar with, and supportive of, Paul. Good news for him, if true — these are the voters he’s counting on to give him an edge in Iowa and New Hampshire while the rest of the field divvies up mainstream Republicans and tea partiers.

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Many of them, however, are already trawling Iowa and New Hampshire, the first states up in the primary season. "I will be back a lot," Christie ominously declared during a visit to Iowa last week. But if there is a front runner at this absurdly early stage of proceedings, it's probably Rand Paul.

It's not so much that he holds wafer-thin leads in both states, according to recent, near-meaningless polls. Nor that he's the son of Ron Paul, who made quixotic bids for the White House in both 2008 and 2012, acquiring along the way a modest but ferociously dedicated following. Nor even that he's a born opportunist, supremely quick to spot and exploit an opening. The simple fact is that Paul Jnr has an appeal that extends into odd corners of his own party, and beyond.

Up to a point, he's a conventional low-tax, small-government Republican, much loved by the Tea Party. He's for guns and against gay marriage. What sets him apart, though, is the libertarianism he inherited from his father. Paul is pro-privacy and a sworn foe of the blanket NSA snooping revealed by Edward Snowden. He opposed renewal of the post 9/11 Patriot Act – an article of faith for most Republicans – on the grounds that it infringed individual liberties. He even did a real, 12-hour filibuster on the Senate floor in protest against the use of drones. And not least, he has a libertarian's distaste for foreign entanglements.

All of this allows him to venture into places where most Republicans don't. In March, he got a standing ovation after a speech to students at the liberal redoubt of UC-Berkeley. Now he's reportedly making tracks back to California to tap the tech moguls of Democrat-leaning Silicon Valley for money, and enlist young digital whizzes to help to hone a 2016 campaign.

Above all, though, the Paul siren song extends to foreign policy, on which his party is deeply divided. The differences in part reflect the eternal American clash between isolationism and interventionism, the former personified in GOP presidential races as recent as 1992 and 1996 by the old bruiser Pat Buchanan.

In fact, Paul is not a true isolationist, of the "stop the world, I want to get off" variety. He admits that America's armed forces have a role abroad, a role that includes permanent foreign military bases. But he's profoundly sceptical of the use of military force and of the US ability, trumpeted by Bush and the neocons, to create a democratic garden in the stony deserts of sectarianism and authoritarianism.
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Recently word came out that the NSA was targeting individuals for deep surveillance and placing them on a watch list if they use a Linux OS like Tails or even go to websites related to it. Guess being computer savvy is a crime now and I would not be surprised if its the same list and I am on it.

The crash site of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, which went down yesterday afternoon after being shot with a missile, is now being looted. This is not only causing issues for the investigation, but also for the families of the victims on board, who will now not be able to recover the lost property of the 298 dead passengers and crew.

After the crash, investigators were unable to get to the site quickly and rope it off to preserve evidence. This allowed armed separatists and locals to essentially raid the scene. Suitcases were removed from the wreckage and pillaged. The coldhearted looters stole a variety of personal possessions, but left behind some apparent undesirables: a Minnie Mouse lunchbox, a Winnie the Pooh stuffed animal, family photographs, and intact passports.

As for what they took, wallets and credit cards were a favorite. A photojournalist at the scene said, "There isn't a single cellphone, wallet with money or camera to be found in any handbag or on the bodies. It's like they all mysteriously disappeared overnight."

A Norwegian doctor in the besieged Gaza Strip has strongly criticized Israel for using cancer-inducing bombs against Palestinian civilians.

Dr. Erik Fosse told Press TV that the majority of patients hospitalized in Gaza are civilians injured in attacks on their homes and about thirty percent of them are children.

Dense Inert Metal Explosive, known as DIME, is an explosive device developed to minimize collateral damage in warfare.

Experts say it has a relatively small but effective blast radius and is believed to have strong biological effects on those who are hit by the bomb’s micro-shrapnel.

Fosse, a department head at a university hospital in Oslo, also says some Palestinian in the besieged enclave have been wounded by a new type of weapon that even doctors with previous experience in war zones do not recognize.

Israel also used depleted-uranium and white phosphorus shells in the besieged region during their previous assaults.