Stomach flu outbreak hits hundreds on QE2

Stomach flu sickened hundreds of passengers on Queen Elizabeth

A highly contagious form of stomach flu sickened hundreds of passengers during a worldwide voyage on the famed Queen Elizabeth 2 cruise ship in what health officials called an unusually large outbreak.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported 276 passengers and 28 crew members had come down with norovirus by the time the ship docked Wednesday in San Francisco for a regularly scheduled stop, though only four passengers remained sick.



-Hundreds on QE 2 sick with suspected stomach flu

SAN FRANCISCO, Jan 24 (Reuters) - More than 300 passengers and crew aboard the Queen Elizabeth 2 were struck by a suspected stomach flu in recent days, U.S. health officials said on Wednesday after the world famous cruise ship docked in San Francisco.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said it was notified by Cunard Line, owner of the Queen Elizabeth 2, on Jan. 11 that some passengers had fallen ill with symptoms associated with norovirus, a virus responsible for gastroenteritis marked by stomach cramps, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea that last two to three days.
The number of sick passengers climbed to 276, from a total 1,652, and 28 of the ship's 1,002 crew also became ill, said Lisa Beaumier, public health analyst with the CDC

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Cheerleaders Gone Wild - Part Two

Arrests of 2 school officials stun S.C. town

WARE SHOALS, S.C. - Although the massive Riegel Textile Mill closed two decades ago, there's still the mill village feel in the community -- a close-knit town where everyone knows practically everyone.
Folks took it hard when they learned the principal of the local high school was charged with hindering police who were investigating reports of a cheerleading coach giving alcohol to students.
"Everybody here has gone to Ware Shoals High School, and we're all proud of the school, naturally," David Higgins said Tuesday at Edna's County Kitchen. "It's a bad reflection on the school and on the town."

Principal Jane Blackwell, in her third year at the school, was arrested Monday, charged with obstruction of justice.
Investigators say they think Blackwell, 59, knew cheerleading coach Jill Moore -- the daughter of a local pastor and school board member -- was giving alcohol to students but did not report it, said Mike Frederick, chief deputy of the Greenwood sheriff's office.

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Cheerleading Coach Charged With Giving Students Beer

WARE SHOALS, SC -- An employee of Ware Shoals High School has been charged with Contributing to the Delinquency of a Minor after police say she gave beer to cheerleaders.

Officers say 28-year-old Jill Moore works as a clerk in the Guidance Office, and she also serves as the Varsity Cheerleading Coach.
An investigation began a week ago after a parent complained to police regarding Moore's activities with members of her cheerleading squad.

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Ware Shoals High



Only 2 cheerleaders in scandal

Only two Ware Shoals High School cheerleaders are “directly involved” in an alcohol-fueled sex scandal that has rocked this small town, local law enforcement said Wednesday.
Chief Deputy Mike Frederick, of the Greenwood County Sheriff’s Office, told The Index-Journal that only two girls, then 16 years old, have been tied to allegations of receiving alcohol from the school’s former guidance clerk, Jill Moore, 28, and then participating in an “incredibly inappropriate situation” involving a sexual relationship Moore was having with a member of the National Guard.
Moore was arrested last week by the Greenwood County Sheriff’s Office, and resigned from her post in the wake of the scandal.


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Hillary Clinton - Say No In 08 !!!

SENATOR Hillary Rodham Clinton, in her first public appearance since joining the 2008 White House race, said today she wanted to become US president because she was "worried about the future of our country".
The former first lady, appearing at a health clinic in Manhattan to promote expanded health insurance for children, faced a mob of journalists eager to quiz her on her historic campaign to become the first female US president.
Senator Clinton, 59, announced her widely anticipated bid to seek the Democratic Party's presidential nomination yesterday with a statement on her website declaring: "I'm in. And I'm in to win."
"I'm worried about the future of our country, and I want to help put it back on the right course so that we can work together to meet the challenges that confront us at home and abroad," she said.
"I am best-positioned to be able to do that, and that's why I'm running."

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Hillary: No intention to run in 2008

As her massive media book tour kicks off, Hillary Clinton is denying that she's looking to run for the White House five years from now.

"I have no intention of running for president," is how the New York Democrat responded to a question from Time magazine which asked, "Do you want to be president in 2008?"
She answered similarly when asked about 2008 by Barbara Walters in an interview on ABC-TV.
It's not known if the senator's outlook comes in reaction to a poll last week showing most New Yorkers don't want her to make a bid for the White House � ever.
The survey by Marist College Institute for Public Opinion in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., found 58 percent of registered New York state voters opposing her presidential candidacy at anytime in the future.
Nevertheless, Mrs. Clinton is going on the attack against President George W. Bush, telling Time his policies are "radical," and that he's trying to "dismantle the federal government."

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On Monday, July 17, 2006, at Fox News headquarters in New York City, Rupert Murdoch hosted a fundraiser breakfast for Hillary Clinton. Then he rushed off to a fundraiser lunch for John McCain, and Hillary rushed off to announce her unqualified support for Israel's and Bush's war policies.
Hillarupert Murdoclinton strikes some people as an unusual combination. I'm sure someone could create a funny cartoon out of that name and a merger of their two smirking masks.
Murdoch's interest is in money, however, and not necessarily in an Oil Empire or a Second Coming – unless some really cool weapon or a blue dress is involved. He likes laws that allow monopolization of media outlets, and he likes high ratings. Hillary's husband gave us the Telecom Act that drove monopolization forward. And nothing would create better ratings for Fox than lots of Hillary hating and Hillary scandals with her as the Democratic nominee for president.

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Record labels rethink digital rights management at Midem

CANNES: With the falloff in CD sales persisting and even digital revenue growth now faltering in the face of rampant music sharing by consumers, the major record labels appear to be closer than ever to releasing music on the Internet with no copying restrictions.
Executives of several technology companies meeting here at Midem, the annual global trade fair for the music industry, said this weekend that a move toward the sale of unrestricted digital files in the MP3 format from at least one of the four major record companies could come within months.
Music executives, however, said Sunday that the idea was self-serving on the part of technology companies.
"Each of the majors is wrestling with the question of whether to go unrestricted," said John Kennedy, head of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry. "I think this is an experimental year."
Most independent record labels already sell tracks digitally compressed in MP3 format, which can be downloaded, e-mailed or copied to computers, cellphones, portable music players and compact discs without limit

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An industry that hates its customers

Imagine an industry that was so hostile to its customers that it regularly sued them; that resisted all new technologies for distributing its products, even as their best customers were embracing them; and that lobbies in Washington to try to take away its customers' legal rights to use its products.
Sounds insane, right? I agree; the industry in question is the recording industry, whose trade association seems intent on alienating every music purchases in the United States.
The latest story: the RIAA is challenging the established legal right to "time-shift," to record programming off the air and listen to it later. In other words, what you do every time you use a DVR or VCR.
Under attack right now are satellite radio company XM's combination receivers/MP3 players, which can record what XM is broadcasting so you can listen later.


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Congress wants to DRM your podcast

Sen. Dianne Feinstein has re-introduced the PERFORM Act, a backdoor assault on your right to record off the radio. Satellite and digital radio stations as well as Internet webcasters would have to adopt digital rights management (DRM) restrictions or lose the statutory license for broadcasting music. Letters from constituents like you helped beat this dangerous proposal last year — take action now to block it again.
This bill aims to hobble TiVo-like devices for satellite and digital radio. Such devices would be able to include “reasonable recording” features, but that excludes choosing and playing back selections based on song title, artist, or genre. Want to freely move recordings around your home network or copy them to the portable player of your choice? You’ll be out of luck if PERFORM passes.
This bill would also mess with Internet radio. Today, Live365, Shoutcast, streaming radio stations included in iTunes, and myriad other smaller webcasters rely on MP3 streaming. PERFORM would in effect force them to use DRM-laden, proprietary formats, so you can say goodbye to software tools like Streamripper that let you record programming to listen to it later.
Tell your representatives to reject this bill now.

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Mexico extradites drug kingpins to U.S.

MEXICO CITY - Mexico extradited drug kingpins Osiel Cardenas and Hector “El Guero” Palma along with several other major traffickers to the United States on Friday as part of a major crackdown against warring cartels.
President Felipe Calderon took office in December and quickly sent troops and elite police units to tackle Mexico’s main drug cartels, in an attempt to halt a gruesome surge in violence that claimed more than 2,000 lives last year.
A total of fifteen men arrived in the United States aboard flights from Mexico on Friday.

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The illegal drug trade is a global black market consisting of production, distribution, packaging and sale of illegal psychoactive substances. The illegality of the black markets purveying the drug trade is relative to geographic location, and the producing countries of the drug markets (many South American, Far East, and Middle East countries) are not as inclined to have "zero-tolerance" policies, as the consuming countries of the drug trade (mostly United States and Europe) are. The economic reality of the massive profiteering inherent to the drug trade serve to extend its reach despite the best efforts of enforcement agencies worldwide. In the wake of the economic reality, the social consequences (crime, violence, imprisonment, social unrest) of the drug trade are undeniably problematic.

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