marathon06.org

Monday, September 4, 2006

A Canadian soldier, Pte. Mark Anthony Graham of Hamilton, Ontario, was killed and more than 30 were wounded, five seriously, in Afghanistan today in an incident being described as “friendly fire“.

The Canadian soldiers came under cannon fire from NATO airplanes, reported to be two U.S. A-10 Thunderbolts, also known as the Warthog.

Brigadier-General David Fraser, the Canadian commander of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in southern Afghanistan said an investigation has been ordered; “An aircraft flying in support of ISAF operations accidentally engaged a Canadian position in Panjwaii at approximately 5:30 this morning, killing one soldier and wounding a number of others. An investigation has been ordered into this event and while this event is tragic, Operation Medusa and the Canadians continue to operate in the Panjwaii district in support of Afghan government efforts to rid the area of Taliban.”

“We’ve got to find out what were the details there.” said Fraser. “We do have procedures, we do have communications, we do have training and tactics and techniques and procedures to mitigate the risk, but we can’t reduce those risks to zero.”

Four Canadian soldiers were killed in a 2002 “friendly fire” incident when they were bombed by an American F-16 fighter plane.

Saturday, August 26, 2006

Contrary to Steven Harper’s plan to put Canada’s newly created Civil Marriage Bill back on the floor of the House of Commons for a free vote, The Bloc Quebecois plans to oppose any attempts by the Conservatives to revisit the issue when Parliament returns in the fall.

“It is simply believed that the debate has taken place and it is not relevant to start it again,” said Bloc Leader Gilles Duceppe.

The same-sex marriage debate in Canada was kicked off in 2003 by a ruling of the Ontario Supreme Court which found that the constitution’s definition of marriage between one man and one woman was unconstitutional, and forced Ontario to recoginize same-sex marriage. The ruling sparked similar provincial supreme court challenges in the nine other provinces, promping then Former Prime Minister Paul Martin to introduce a bill in the House of Commons that changed the federal constitution’s definition to a union between two people. The controversial bill drew fire from Canada’s conservative and religious communities who alleged that such a change to the constitution would destroy Canadian society, and lead to churches being forced to perform same-sex marriages. The bill was later changed to exclude any religious institution from being forced to perform marriages that were contrary to church doctrine. After putting the bill to a free vote in the House of Commons in the spring of 2005, the bill received the support of the house and was drafted into law. In the election that followed, Conservative Party leader Steven Harper vowed to revisit the issue of equal marriage with another free vote, this time hoping to reverse the constitutional change.

Monday, November 9, 2009

Former Formula One McLaren designer Gordon Murray has unveiled a new all-electric car.

The car model, which is known as the T.27, is due to be developed over the course of the next 16 months with four prototypes. The process that will be used during the course of the manufacturing of the vehicle is called iStream. The technology iStream had been invented by Gordon Murray in 1999 and means that all the parts are designed using a computer.

The project has approximately received £9,000,000 (US$14,919,000) in investment. The electric car is designed for urban purposes, such as in cities or towns. The weight of the vehicle is just 600 kilograms. It has the ability to travel at speeds of up to 60 miles per hour and can go for a maximum of 100 miles between recharges.

The designer thinks that motorists will some day be travelling in vehicles like this. Murray believes that the new car will be ‘the most efficient electric vehicle on earth’.

Friday, April 21, 2006

Crude oil prices surged to a new record of over $75.00 a barrel on Tuesday closing at a price of $75.17. In Europe, Brent crude oil rose to $74.59. In less than a month, prices have risen $10, back to the record highs set after Hurricane Katrina caused refineries to shut down in August 2005. Prices are also 42% higher than a year ago.

Political instability in oil-producing countries is seen as a major cause of this rise. The standoff over Iran‘s nuclear program has led to strong words being exchanged and a possibility of sanctions being imposed on Iran, the world’s fourth largest producer of oil. Violence in Nigeria earlier this year has led to a drop the country’s production by almost a quarter. Nigeria is Africa’s largest oil exporter and is also a major supplier of gasoline-rich crude oil to the United States, where demand is set to increase as the “driving season” begins next month.

Edmund Daukoru, the president of OPEC and Nigerian oil minister said on Tuesday, “The current shoot up we are experiencing is as a result of the Iran problems and it’s not helped by the flare up between Israel and the Palestinians. But mainly it’s the threatening statements being made against Iran as a result of its nuclear program.”

Wednesday, January 9, 2008

This year Israel turns sixty and it has embarked upon a campaign to celebrate its birthday. Along with technology writers for Slate, PC Magazine, USA Today, BusinessWeek, Aviation Weekly, Wikinews was invited by the America-Israel Friendship League and the Israeli Foreign Ministry to review Israel’s technology sector. It’s part of an effort to ‘re-brand the country’ to show America that there is more to Israel than the Palestinian conflict. On this trip we saw the people who gave us the Pentium processor and Instant Messaging. The schedule was hectic: 12-14 hours a day were spent doing everything from trips to the Weizmann Institute to dinner with Yossi Vardi.

On Thursday, the fifth day of the junket, David Saranga of the foreign ministry was able to arrange an exclusive interview for David Shankbone with the President of Israel, Nobel Peace Prize recipient Shimon Peres. For over an hour they spoke about Iranian politics, whether Israel is in danger of being side-lined in Middle Eastern importance because of Arab oil wealth, and his thoughts against those who say Israeli culture is in a state of decay.

Shimon Peres spent his early days on kibbutz, a bygone socialist era of Israel. In 1953, at the age of 29, Peres became the youngest ever Director General of the Ministry of Defense. Forty years later it was Peres who secretly gave the green light for dialogue with Yassir Arafat, of the verboten Palestine Liberation Organization. It was still official Israeli policy to not speak with the PLO. Peres shares a Nobel Peace Prize with Yitzak Rabin and Arafat for orchestrating what eventually became the Oslo Accords. The “roadmap” that came out of Oslo remains the official Israeli (and American) policy for peace in the Palestinian conflict. Although the majority of Israeli people supported the plans, land for peace was met with a small but fiery resistance in Israel. For negotiating with Arafat, former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shouted at Peres, “You are worse than Chamberlain!” a reference to Hitler’s British appeaser. It was during this time of heated exchanges in the 1990s that Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by Yigal Amir, a Jew who thought it against Halakhic law to give up land given by God (Hashem).

Peres is the elder statesman of Israeli politics, but he remembers that he has not always been as popular as he is today. “Popularity is like perfume: nice to smell, dangerous to drink,” said Peres. “You don’t drink it.” The search for popularity, he goes on to say, will kill a person who has an idea against the status quo.

Below is David Shankbone’s interview with Shimon Peres, the President of Israel.