io9.com – Dec 27 2008:

A Canadian college student majoring in chemistry built himself a home lab – and discovered that trying to do science in your own home quickly leads to accusations of drug-making and terrorism.

Lewis Casey, an 18-year-old in Saskatchewan, had built a small chemistry lab in his family’s garage near the university where he studies. Then two weeks ago, police arrived at his home with a search warrant and based on a quick survey of his lab determined that it was a meth lab. They pulled Casey out of the shower to interrogate him, and then arrested him.

A few days later, police admitted that Casey’s chemistry lab wasn’t a meth lab – but they kept him in jail, claiming that he had some of the materials necessary to produce explosives. Friends and neighbors wrote dozens of letters to the court, testifying that Casey was innocent and merely a student who is really enthusiastic about chemistry.

On December 24, Casey was finally released into his parents’ custody, pending a trial to determine whether he was building what police called “improvised explosive devices.”

What friggin’ idiots!

Maine man faces OUI charge atop Zamboni – Boston.com — How is being drunk on a Zamboni inside a building constitute “drunk driving?” This is police state BS.

A Portland man faces a drunken driving charge after police found him aboard an idling Zamboni inside the Cumberland County Civic Center.

Police and firefighters were alerted by an alarm at about 2 a.m. Tuesday that somebody was inside the arena, which is home to the Portland Pirates hockey team.

Police officers discovered 22-year-old Adam Patterson attempting to operate the Zamboni, which had crashed into a wall inside the civic center’s storage area.

Found by Tim Gilman.

Smiling for the camera, these are staff at the hospital where a dying man was not seen for six hours – posing for a calendar in which they mock waiting times. Stewart Fleming, 37, was left doubled up in agony despite arriving in casualty with a letter from his GP saying he needed immediate attention. After he was finally seen on December 15, he rapidly deteriorated. He died two days after Christmas from a viral illness.

However, she added: ‘Their main job is to be a hospital.’ The calendar was launched at Medway Maritime Hospital in Gillingham, Kent on December 17, and features doctors and nurses dressed up as stars from Fawlty Towers, Baywatch, Open All Hours and Pirates of the Caribbean. In one picture a nurse and two medics pose next to a sign that reads: ‘Waiting time 26.5 seconds!’. In another, a member of staff in a swimsuit clutches a first aid kit and pretends to help a drowning man in a hospital bath. The Medway hospital has previously come under the spotlight for a string of blunders. These include the body of a dead patient being left undiscovered on a toilet for 12 hours, and the case of 31-yearold Peter Cura, who died after Medway medics failed to spot his cancer despite 37 visits to the hospital.

So much for socialized medicine.

Unrest caused by bad economy may require military action, report says – El Paso Times — More and more of these stories keep emerging. Do these folks know something we don’t?

A U.S. Army War College report warns an economic crisis in the United States could lead to massive civil unrest and the need to call on the military to restore order.

Retired Army Lt. Col. Nathan Freir wrote the report “Known Unknowns: Unconventional Strategic Shocks in Defense Strategy Development,” which the Army think tank in Carlisle, Pa., recently released.

“Widespread civil violence inside the United States would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities … to defend basic domestic order and human security,” the report said, in case of “unforeseen economic collapse,” “pervasive public health emergencies,” and “catastrophic natural and human disasters,” among other possible crises.

The report also suggests the new (Barack Obama) administration could face a “strategic shock” within the first eight months in office.

Found by Scott Diaz.

Private firm may track all email and calls | UK news | The Guardian — It’s amazing how much the British public will tolerate. Let’s see what happens when this gets into the wrong hands.

The private sector will be asked to manage and run a communications database that will keep track of everyone’s calls, emails, texts and internet use under a key option contained in a consultation paper to be published next month by Jacqui Smith, the home secretary.

A cabinet decision to put the management of the multibillion pound database of all UK communications traffic into private hands would be accompanied by tougher legal safeguards to guarantee against leaks and accidental data losses.

But in his strongest criticism yet of the superdatabase, Sir Ken Macdonald, the former director of public prosecutions, who has firsthand experience of working with intelligence and law enforcement agencies, told the Guardian such assurances would prove worthless in the long run and warned it would prove a “hellhouse” of personal private information.

Found by Joe Carlson.