The Nightowl Newswrap

by: BG & YD bring you the news

Sat Jan 01, 2011 at 23:15:00 PM CST

• Attention Hotmail Users "Some users of Microsoft Hotmail are starting off the new year scrambling to get back e-mails of old. A chorus of frantic users has posted complaints on Microsoft's online forum that all of their messages have disappeared. ... "Please help me get them back," wrote one user under the moniker 'Zacgore' in a post dated Saturday. "All my kids' info and pictures are in there!" ... Others complain that the majority of the e-mail in their inboxes was sent to their deleted mail folders instead. It is unclear from the posts how widespread the problem is. The free Web-based e-mail service is the world's most used with about 360 million users globally, according to comScore Inc. ... Windows Live support technicians have said in numerous threads that the Hotmail team is aware of the problem and working on a fix. ... "At this point it appears to be a limited issue, and Microsoft is working with individual users who are impacted. We apologize for any inconvenience to our customers," Microsoft spokeswoman Catherine Brooker said in statement Saturday. She declined to disclose what caused the glitch."

• Everybody panic and freak out! Again today the fighters were scrambled when a Piedmont flight from Hilton Head, S.C. to National Airport in D.C. briefly lost radio contact with the tower when one of the pilots switched off the wrong frequency in the airspace around the capitol. Contact was reestablished, the plane landed safely and the pilots were questioned after landing -- but not before the Capitol was evacuated.

• The Kansification Continues Outgoing Kansas Congressman Todd Tiahrt, who represented the KS 04 for 16 years but lost a Senate Primary to Jerry Moran wants to replace his replacement. Mike Pompeo was elected to represent the 4th C.D. and so he is stepping down from his seat on the RNC. But Tiahrt isn't the only one who wants the job. So does Kris Van Meteren, the guy who was behind some of the more vicious Moran mailings that attacked Tiahrt during the primary. Now the two are slugging it out again.

• That was fast The New Year was only a few hours old in Kansas City, Kansas when homicide detectives were called out to a crime scene after someone collecting cans discovered the body of a Hispanic male and flagged down a motorist who called police from a cell phone.

• Death toll from New Years Eve tornadoes grows "Shaken residents spent New Year's Day sifting through the wreckage wrought by tornadoes that touched down in several states in the final hours of 2010, killing seven people in two states and injuring dozens of others. ... Six of the victims - three in Missouri and three in Arkansas - died Friday as tornadoes fueled by unusually warm air pummeled the South and Midwest. A seventh victim who was injured Friday near the south-central Missouri town of Rolla died Saturday at a hospital in Columbia, said Bruce Southard, the chief of the Rolla Rural Fire Department." (Still not a peep about the unseasonably warm air that caused it from the crowd that thinks snowstorms negate global warming.)

• Probation?!?!? "A Chicago-area man who killed a neighbor whose dog urinated on his lawn was sentenced today to four years probation. ... "This is not justice," said Gail Williams, the slain man's aunt. ... Charles Clements, 69, a great-grandfather, former Marine and retired truck driver who took great pride in his lawn's appearance, could have been sentenced to as much as 20 years. ... A Will County jury convicted Clements of second-degree murder in October. ... Joshua Funches, 23, was walking his fox terrier puppy when Clements confronted him after the dog urinated on his manicured lawn. ... After Funches cursed at him, Clements pulled out a .45-caliber handgun and put it back in his pocket. Soon after, Funches punched Clements once in the face. Clements said Funches was standing still when he pulled out his gun and fatally shot him. ... Funches had three small children, including a boy born after his death."

• Gas leak causes 900 homes to be evacuated on Long Island "Workers have fixed a propane gas leak that prompted authorities to evacuate 900 homes and shut down roads and railroad service on New York's Long Island. ... Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy (LEE'-vee) says authorities will take propane readings at each home to make sure it's safe before letting residents return. ... Residents were told to leave around 1:30 a.m. Saturday after a propane delivery driver discovered the leak in a 30,000-gallon tank near a Kohl's department store in Shirley, about 50 miles east of New York City. ... No injuries from the leak have been reported."

• Deputy and suspect killed in Ohio shootout A deputy investigating a report of gunfire in a trailer park in Enon, Ohio was shot dead as she photographed a footprint in front of a trailer as part of the evidence she was collecting. She never had a chance to even draw her weapon, let alone take cover or return fire. The suspect died in a hail of gunfire after a standoff. In the shootout that ended it, another police officer was wounded but his injuries were not considered life-threatening. Witnesses said that the police practically begged the suspect to come out of his trailer, giving him dozens of chances, but he refused and chose suicide-by-cop instead.

• UN Peacekeepers focus on human rights abuses in Ivory Coast "U.N. peacekeepers in Ivory Coast are doing everything possible to gain access to areas of the country where human rights abuses are alleged to have occurred, the United Nations said on Saturday. ... The world's top cocoa producer was plunged into crisis after Laurent Gbagbo refused to step down as president after a disputed election in November, triggering violence in a nation still divided after a 2002-03 civil war. ... Ivory Coast's electoral commission, world leaders and the 192-nation U.N. General Assembly have recognized challenger Alassane Ouattara as the winner. ... "The Secretary-General (Ban Ki-moon) told President Ouattara that he was alarmed by the reports of egregious human rights violations," U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky said in a statement, referring to a telephone conversation between Ban and Ouattara on Saturday."

• Juarez sets a record body count in the brutal third year of a turf battle between drug cartels "The embattled border city of Ciudad Juarez had its bloodiest year ever with 3,111 people killed in drug violence, an official said Saturday. ... The city across from El Paso, Texas, has seen its homicide rate soar to one of the highest in the world since vicious turf battles broke out between gangs representing the Juarez and Sinaloa cartels in 2008. ... That year, 1,587 people were killed in drug violence, and the toll increased to 2,643 in 2009. ... Ciudad Juarez's bloodiest month last year was October, when 359 people were killed, said Arturo Sandoval, a spokesman for prosecutors in Chihuahua state, where the city is located."

• Three killed and 43 injured when Russian jet explodes on takeoff "A Russian passenger jet carrying 124 people caught fire as it taxied down a snowy runway in Siberia and then exploded on Saturday, killing three people and injuring 43, including six who were badly burned, officials said. ... Most of the passengers and crew were evacuated before the explosion, though people on board described a chaotic scene as as the burning plane filled up with thick, black smoke and panicked passengers rushed through flames to escape. ... Emergency services spokesman Vadim Grebennikov said the fire, which began in one of the engines as the plane taxied for takeoff, caused a powerful blast that destroyed the Tu-154 aircraft and spread flames across 1,000 square meters (11,000 square feet). ... Russian television showed video taken with a mobile telephone of the burning plane, its center a giant fireball. All that remained afterward was the tail section and part of a wing. ... Grebennikov said 10 people were seriously injured, including six who were badly burned and four who suffered broken bones or other trauma. Most of the other injured passengers sought treatment for poisoning after inhaling toxic fumes."

• Please, please, please, please, please...let their obstreperating* nature blow up in their faces! "Should Republicans push for the repeal of President Obama's health care reform package in the next session of Congress, a Medicare-for-all plan would be politically easier to implement, a liberal congressman recently predicted. ... "So, my Republican friends who are working very hard to demolish the bill, may, in fact, inadvertently, paradoxically be creating the opening to push single-payer forward again," Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) told FoxNews Friday."

• Because the drug war in the US worked out so very well for us, we're going to take that show on the road to Afghanistan Dumbasses. Here's the bottom line... we don't have enough opiates, so buy the fucking poppies from the farmers legally. What is so fucking hard about that???

• The next two years are going to be entertaining....but that's small comfort because we're pretty sure the band that played as the Titanic went down was, too. The "tea party" folks are already pissed off at the repuiblican leadership in Congress and making all kinds of demands.

And finally...

• You may not have noticed, but the balance of power shifted in the last 24 hours and China and Russia both gained on us "The first oil pipeline linking the world's biggest oil producer, Russia, and the world's biggest consumer of energy, China, has begun operating. ... The pipeline, running between Siberia and the northeastern Chinese city of Daqing, will allow a rapid increase in oil exports between the two countries. ... Until now, Russian oil has been transported to China by rail. ... Concentrated in western Siberia, Russia's network of pipelines for oil exports has so far run towards Europe."

*Obstreperating: A portmanteau of "obstreperous" and "frustrating" that was coined by BG's granddaughter Zoe when she was about three. BG and Mr.BG looked at one another and said "that's a perfectly cromulent word" and started using it every chance they got.