HURRICANE MARIA

Mario Tama / Staff / Getty Images

Puerto Ricans might be drinking Superfund-polluted water, the EPA says.

Three weeks after Hurricane Maria struck, 36 percent of Puerto Ricans — more than a million people — still lack access to clean water. That’s a slight improvement from 1.5 million two weeks ago, but still.

In desperation, people are getting their water from contaminated creeks,sewers, and maybe wells at Superfund sites, those polluted areas often contaminated with cancer-causing chemicals. Quietly tucked away in an EPA news release from Tuesday:

There are reports of residents obtaining, or trying to obtain, drinking water from wells at hazardous waste “Superfund” sites in Puerto Rico. EPA advises against tampering with sealed and locked wells or drinking from these wells, as it may be dangerous to people’s health.

Puerto Rico has more than its share of Superfund sites, a legacy of industrial pollution, toxic landfills, and bomb testing by the U.S. military. Eighteen such sites, to be precise.

These toxic sites aren’t the only danger. There’s also risk in getting water from rivers and streams. People are already dying from diseases caused by contaminated water, and health experts warn that Puerto Rico could see “significant epidemics.”

Keep that in mind next time you hear someone from the White House say the relief effort is going well.

Kate Yoder20 hours ago

(GRIST)

World War 3: North Korea claims Trump has 'lit the wick of WAR' – threatens 'HAIL OF FIRE'

NORTH Korea's foreign minister has accused President Donald Trump of lighting "the wick of war" with his repeated insults and threats amid growing World War 3 fears.

PUBLISHED: 12:25, Thu, Oct 12, 2017

| UPDATED: 13:26, Thu, Oct 12, 2017

Ri Yong Ho, Pyongyang's foreign minister, hit out at the US President and said the tensions will not be settled with words.

He said: "With his bellicose and insane statement at the United Nations, Trump, you can say, has lit the wick of a war against us.

"We need to settle the final score, only with a hail of fire, not words."

President Trump has repeatedly hinted at conflict and recent tweets suggest military action is still considered an option.

GETTY

World War 3? North Korea's foreign minister has said the tensions won't be reduced with words

On Saturday he tweeted: "Presidents and their administrations have been talking to North Korea for 25 years, agreements made and massive amounts of money paid hasn't worked, agreements violated before the ink was dry, makings fools of U.S. negotiators. Sorry, but only one thing will work!"

This was followed on Monday by the following tweet: "Our country has been unsuccessfully dealing with North Korea for 25 years, giving billions of dollars & getting nothing. Policy didn't work!"

Yesterday, US bombers flew over the Korean peninsula in a show of force aimed at North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

The B-1B bombers from Guam staged a simulated air-to-ground missile-firing drill with two South Korean F-15K fighters over the East Sea.

Japan also sent two military aircraft as tensions mount in the region.

Shocking North Korean cartoon shows children shooting missiles at America

Wed, September 27, 2017

The cartoon is thought to have been produced in the 1960s under Kim Il-Sung, current leader Kim Jong-Un’s grandfather, though relations have been getting steadily worse since Kim Jong-Un became leader of North Korea and Donald Trump became President of America

PLAY SLIDESHOW

MEDIADRUMWORLD.COM

1 of 8

A still from a North Korean cartoon

Earlier this week, Russia’s foreign secretary Sergey Lavrov waded into the crisis and told his US counterpart, Rex Tillerson, the escalation of tension on the Korean peninsula is “unacceptable”.

During a phone call with Secretary of State Mr Tillerson, Vladimir Putin's right hand man discussed Syria, Korea and Ukraine, the Russian foreign ministry revealed.

Mr Lavrov also told Mr Tillerson Moscow is demanding the US returns Russian diplomatic property seized in 2016 over suspected Russian interference in the general election.

The pair's phone call came just hours after Donald Trump's most senior general told the US Army to "stand ready" for war with North Korea.

GETTY

Ri Yong Ho, pictured at the UN Assembly last month, said Trump has 'lit the wick of war'

General James 'Mad dog' Mattis warned it is impossible to tell what the future holds for the crisis, but urged US troops to be prepared for a confrontation with Kim Jong-un.

He said while Mr Trump is committed to finding a diplomatic solution, the US Army must "standby ready" to fight.

General Mattis said: "It is right now a diplomatically led, economic-sanction buttressed effort to try to turn North Korea off this path.

"Now what does the future hold? Neither you nor I can say, so there is one thing the US Army can do.

"And that is you have got to be ready to ensure that we have military options that our President can employ if needed."

(express.co.uk)

THE BIGGEST DRUG MARKETS ON THE DARK WEB JUST WENT OFFLINE

ON 10/13/17 AT 8:33 AM

The most popular drug markets on the dark web have mysteriously gone offline, with no explanation given by administrators of the websites. The sites affected include the number one ranked Dream Market, as well as Trade Route, Tochka and Wall Street.

Speculation on Reddit forums dedicated to dark web drug marketplaces center around a large-scale crackdown by authorities.

Members of one forum pointed to massive distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks that took place earlier this year, which have preceded crackdowns on other dark web sites such as the Silk Road and the Silk Road 2.0.

The attacks, known as sniper attacks, allow attackers to anonymously deanonymize and disable the Tor Network, through which such sites are accessed.

“These [DDoS attacks] were probably effort to locate the server,” one Reddit user wrote. “Now look at all the DDoS attacks on the current markets. Is it not reasonable that this current [attack] is a government effort to locate the remaining unfound servers?”

Dark web sites have been exposed in the past to law enforcement through DDoS attacks.REUTERS/TIM SHAFFER

At last month’s 5th annual Europol-Interpol Cybercrime Conference in The Hague, Netherlands, the two law enforcement organisations pledged to renew their focus on cybercrime.

“The current state of cybercrime, reaching all the corners of the world and threatening to undermine the benefits brought by the new technologies, requires a global response,” said Silvino Schlickmann, Interpol’s director of cybercrime.

The dark web has a reputation for hosting sites associated with illicit activities, such as the now defunct drugs marketplace Silk Road. The dark web was originally created to improve online privacy and still serves as a vital tool for whistleblowers and others seeking to hide their identity.

The dark web is often confused with the deep web, a vast section of the surface internet that is not indexed by search engines like Google. The deep web comprises around 95 percent of the internet, while the dark web is a much smaller separate section of the internet that requires specialist software tools to access.

Earlier this year, more than 10,000 websites on the dark web were knocked offline after a hacker targeted an internet provider allegedly hosting child pornography.

“I came across several child porn sites [on the provider’s server]. That’s why I decided to search for an exploit and hack them,” the hacker, who is associated with the Anonymous hacker collective, told Newsweek.

“I didn’t plan this attack, just had the right idea and took the opportunity after finding out what they were hosting."

(Newsweek)

Washington Post Owner In Hot Water As Leaked Memo Reveals “Screw Over” Plans

Posted by Luis Orozco | Oct 13, 2017 | Liberal Corruption

While Bezos thought his day couldn’t be worse, the Huffington Post published an October 6 memo wrote by the WaPo´s union bargaining committee, where it says that Bezos could basically “screw over” the workers in the worst way possible.

Yesterday, Amazon CEO and Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos had a really rough day after actress Rose McGowan accused him of covering up her rape, this being a major issue in a moment where the world is watching a Hollywood crisis after the Harvey Weinstein scandal. While Bezos thought his day couldn’t be worse, the Huffington Post published an October 6 memo wrote by the WaPo’s union bargaining committee, where it says that Bezos could basically “screw over” the workers in the worst way possible.

According to the memo, Washington Post’s management is trying to end the paper’s long-standing practice of across-the-board percentage annual pay raises in order to develop what the union considered an “unprecedented” merit pay system and cut severance benefits. Additionally, it refuses to increase the 401 (k) match from 1 percent.

Apparently, this merit system would potentially freeze even the inflation-adjusted increases in pay for some workers for up to 30 months while some others could get up to a 4 percent increase. Management has also proposed to cut severance pay and require any worker who accepts severance to waive their legal rights.

Apparently, this is nothing more than the latest spat between Bezos and the Post union, since during the first contract negotiations back in 2014, the owner and the management cut employee retirement benefits, which sparked a huge controversy within the news outlet.

The Huffington Post reported that this would only benefit a few people, since they assured that when you do away with routine raises the greatest reporters are the employees who will wind up getting them. Apparently, this situation would leave video editors, copy editors and others who are not the face of the paper on the losing end and increase inequality within the Washington Post.

The company’s management has also offered a huge fallback proposal that will allegedly give employees a $600 payment in the first year and then a $8 raise per week in the second one. Naturally, this whole situation would put Bezos in a very uncomfortable position in the Washington Post, considering there’s nothing worse than having the company’s union against you.

The dangerous element in this situation is not only that it would harm his figure and the leadership of those who support him, but also the fact that this would open the possibility of some hit operations against Bezos from the same newspaper. Naturally, this would come in the form of some unpleasant news published by low-rank reporters who wants to execute some pressure.

According to the memo, he and the management are making the greatest efforts to gut protections and benefits for workers in the latest contract negotiations.

Of course, in case the editor support the owner’s coalition and decides to prevent any kind of toxic publication, those who want to harm Bezos could always leak some delicate information about everything that is taking place within this liberal news outlet. In fact, they could easily send the information to a conservative outlet or especially the New York Times, which is the Washington Post’s main competitor.

This move would materialize the worst nightmare of any businessman, president, CEO, and director: the internal pressure. While they could resist any kind of threat that the game contains, it´s this one the more damaging and stressful, considering that its implications and collateral damage tend to be really harmful.

Of course, when Bezos decided to become the owner of the Washington Post he knew this was a possible scenario. While he’s not exactly the greatest fan of labor unions and has fended away every effort by Amazon warehouse workers to unionize since 1994, the news outlet already had 1,200 workers unionized with the Washington-Baltimore News Guild.

The company´s management has also offered a huge fallback proposal that will allegedly give employees a $600 payment in the first year and then a $8 raise per week in the second one. Naturally, this whole situation would put Bezos in a very uncomfortable position in the Washington Post.

According to the memo, he and the management are making the greatest efforts to gut protections and benefits for workers in the latest contract negotiations. The memo said that under his ownership, workers fear a fundamental transformation is underway at the news outlet, a transformation the union described is already happening in some other workplaces around the United States.

Last month, the Post Metro section journalist and union bargaining committee member Freddy Kunkle sent an op-ed to the Huffington Post, explaining that Jeff Bezos was sticking it to his employees. Kunkle also wrote that the paper´s owner was trying to cover up his attempts to attack the union by touting his charitable giving.

(conservativedailypost.com)

Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 10/13/2017 4:27:56 PM
	BRIEFLY Stuff that matters HURRICANE MARIA Mario Tama / Staff / Getty Images Puerto Ricans might be drinking Superfund-polluted water, the EPA says. Three weeks after Hurricane Maria struck, 36 percent of Puerto Ricans — more than a million people — still lack access to clean water. That’s a slight improvement from 1.5 million two weeks ago, but still. In desperation, people are getting their water from contaminated creeks,sewers, and maybe wells at Superfund sites, those polluted areas often contaminated with cancer-causing chemicals. Quietly tucked away in an EPA news release from Tuesday: There are reports of residents obtaining, or trying to obtain, drinking water from wells at hazardous waste “Superfund” sites in Puerto Rico. EPA advises against tampering with sealed and locked wells or drinking from these wells, as it may be dangerous to people’s health. Puerto Rico has more than its share of Superfund sites, a legacy of industrial pollution, toxic landfills, and bomb testing by the U.S. military. Eighteen such sites, to be precise. These toxic sites aren’t the only danger. There’s also risk in getting water from rivers and streams. People are already dying from diseases caused by contaminated water, and health experts warn that Puerto Rico could see “significant epidemics.” Keep that in mind next time you hear someone from the White House say the relief effort is going well. Kate Yoder20 hours ago (GRIST)
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
	+2

Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 10/13/2017 5:24:43 PM
	UN: Afghan Civilian Casualties From US Strikes Up 50% October 13, 2017 at 9:25 am Written by Jason Ditz (ANTIWAR.COM) — The latest quarterly report on Afghanistan civilian casualties from the United Nations once again is bad news, unsurprising since all other reports on the Afghan War for months have been worse and worse. The UN report says civilian casualties from US and Afghan airstrikes in Afghanistan are up over 50 percent from last year, with increasing casualties not just from the US, but from the increasingly aggressive Afghan Air Force. This should be unsurprising too, as the US has been massively escalating the number of bombs dropped on Afghanistan, reaching the highest level in nearly a decade. UN officials say most of the dead are women and children. The Afghan Defense Ministry issued a statement immediately condemning the UN report as false, insisting that “it is quite obvious” the Taliban kill more civilians, even though the specific report being addressed was on air strikes, and the Taliban has no Air Force. By Jason Ditz / Republished with permission / ANTIWAR.COM This article was chosen for republication based on the interest of our readers. Anti-Media republishes stories from a number of other independent news sources. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not reflect Anti-Media editorial policy.
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
	+2

Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 10/14/2017 12:10:48 AM
	THE BIGGEST DRUG MARKETS ON THE DARK WEB JUST WENT OFFLINE BY ANTHONY CUTHBERTSON ON 10/13/17 AT 8:33 AM The most popular drug markets on the dark web have mysteriously gone offline, with no explanation given by administrators of the websites. The sites affected include the number one ranked Dream Market, as well as Trade Route, Tochka and Wall Street. Speculation on Reddit forums dedicated to dark web drug marketplaces center around a large-scale crackdown by authorities. Members of one forum pointed to massive distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks that took place earlier this year, which have preceded crackdowns on other dark web sites such as the Silk Road and the Silk Road 2.0. The attacks, known as sniper attacks, allow attackers to anonymously deanonymize and disable the Tor Network, through which such sites are accessed. “These [DDoS attacks] were probably effort to locate the server,” one Reddit user wrote. “Now look at all the DDoS attacks on the current markets. Is it not reasonable that this current [attack] is a government effort to locate the remaining unfound servers?” Dark web sites have been exposed in the past to law enforcement through DDoS attacks.REUTERS/TIM SHAFFER At last month’s 5th annual Europol-Interpol Cybercrime Conference in The Hague, Netherlands, the two law enforcement organisations pledged to renew their focus on cybercrime. “The current state of cybercrime, reaching all the corners of the world and threatening to undermine the benefits brought by the new technologies, requires a global response,” said Silvino Schlickmann, Interpol’s director of cybercrime. The dark web has a reputation for hosting sites associated with illicit activities, such as the now defunct drugs marketplace Silk Road. The dark web was originally created to improve online privacy and still serves as a vital tool for whistleblowers and others seeking to hide their identity. The dark web is often confused with the deep web, a vast section of the surface internet that is not indexed by search engines like Google. The deep web comprises around 95 percent of the internet, while the dark web is a much smaller separate section of the internet that requires specialist software tools to access. Follow Joseph Cox @josephfcox Replying to @josephfcox Confirmed that Dream Market, Trade Route, Tochka and Wall Street, the four biggest dark web markets, all unresponsivepic.twitter.com/o31IiSojCz 4:26 AM - Oct 13, 2017 10 Replies 72 Retweets 67 likes Twitter Ads info and privacy Earlier this year, more than 10,000 websites on the dark web were knocked offline after a hacker targeted an internet provider allegedly hosting child pornography. “I came across several child porn sites [on the provider’s server]. That’s why I decided to search for an exploit and hack them,” the hacker, who is associated with the Anonymous hacker collective, told Newsweek. “I didn’t plan this attack, just had the right idea and took the opportunity after finding out what they were hosting." (Newsweek)
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
	+2

Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 10/14/2017 12:50:12 AM
	Washington Post Owner In Hot Water As Leaked Memo Reveals “Screw Over” Plans Posted by Luis Orozco \| Oct 13, 2017 \| Liberal Corruption While Bezos thought his day couldn’t be worse, the Huffington Post published an October 6 memo wrote by the WaPo´s union bargaining committee, where it says that Bezos could basically “screw over” the workers in the worst way possible. Yesterday, Amazon CEO and Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos had a really rough day after actress Rose McGowan accused him of covering up her rape, this being a major issue in a moment where the world is watching a Hollywood crisis after the Harvey Weinstein scandal. While Bezos thought his day couldn’t be worse, the Huffington Post published an October 6 memo wrote by the WaPo’s union bargaining committee, where it says that Bezos could basically “screw over” the workers in the worst way possible. According to the memo, Washington Post’s management is trying to end the paper’s long-standing practice of across-the-board percentage annual pay raises in order to develop what the union considered an “unprecedented” merit pay system and cut severance benefits. Additionally, it refuses to increase the 401 (k) match from 1 percent. Apparently, this merit system would potentially freeze even the inflation-adjusted increases in pay for some workers for up to 30 months while some others could get up to a 4 percent increase. Management has also proposed to cut severance pay and require any worker who accepts severance to waive their legal rights. Apparently, this is nothing more than the latest spat between Bezos and the Post union, since during the first contract negotiations back in 2014, the owner and the management cut employee retirement benefits, which sparked a huge controversy within the news outlet. The Huffington Post reported that this would only benefit a few people, since they assured that when you do away with routine raises the greatest reporters are the employees who will wind up getting them. Apparently, this situation would leave video editors, copy editors and others who are not the face of the paper on the losing end and increase inequality within the Washington Post. The company’s management has also offered a huge fallback proposal that will allegedly give employees a $600 payment in the first year and then a $8 raise per week in the second one. Naturally, this whole situation would put Bezos in a very uncomfortable position in the Washington Post, considering there’s nothing worse than having the company’s union against you. The dangerous element in this situation is not only that it would harm his figure and the leadership of those who support him, but also the fact that this would open the possibility of some hit operations against Bezos from the same newspaper. Naturally, this would come in the form of some unpleasant news published by low-rank reporters who wants to execute some pressure. According to the memo, he and the management are making the greatest efforts to gut protections and benefits for workers in the latest contract negotiations. Of course, in case the editor support the owner’s coalition and decides to prevent any kind of toxic publication, those who want to harm Bezos could always leak some delicate information about everything that is taking place within this liberal news outlet. In fact, they could easily send the information to a conservative outlet or especially the New York Times, which is the Washington Post’s main competitor. This move would materialize the worst nightmare of any businessman, president, CEO, and director: the internal pressure. While they could resist any kind of threat that the game contains, it´s this one the more damaging and stressful, considering that its implications and collateral damage tend to be really harmful. Of course, when Bezos decided to become the owner of the Washington Post he knew this was a possible scenario. While he’s not exactly the greatest fan of labor unions and has fended away every effort by Amazon warehouse workers to unionize since 1994, the news outlet already had 1,200 workers unionized with the Washington-Baltimore News Guild. The company´s management has also offered a huge fallback proposal that will allegedly give employees a $600 payment in the first year and then a $8 raise per week in the second one. Naturally, this whole situation would put Bezos in a very uncomfortable position in the Washington Post. According to the memo, he and the management are making the greatest efforts to gut protections and benefits for workers in the latest contract negotiations. The memo said that under his ownership, workers fear a fundamental transformation is underway at the news outlet, a transformation the union described is already happening in some other workplaces around the United States. In addition, the union believes this transformation is leading to economic insecurity for working people as though they are disposable or interchangeable elements in a machine. Follow Mike Elk @MikeElk .@washingtonpost Union Chair who was threatened with firing for criticizing Jeff Bezos speaking at a rally https://www.pscp.tv/w/bJqBbzFBbVF6dkd6SmRKUWV8MVprSnpPYkFuanF4dkwkB71wqISSVHgOSuXVk6bJpSHCXCORtIFdpjFzNmBw … 12:10 PM - Sep 27, 2017 Mike Elk @MikeElk .@washingtonpost Union Chair who was threatened with firing for criticizing Jeff Bezos speaking at a rally pscp.tv Twitter Ads info and privacy Apparently, this is nothing more than the latest spat between Bezos and the Post union, since during the first contract negotiations back in 2014, the owner and the management cut employee retirement benefits, which sparked a huge controversy within the news outlet. Last month, the Post Metro section journalist and union bargaining committee member Freddy Kunkle sent an op-ed to the Huffington Post, explaining that Jeff Bezos was sticking it to his employees. Kunkle also wrote that the paper´s owner was trying to cover up his attempts to attack the union by touting his charitable giving. (conservativedailypost.com)
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
	+2

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