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Clara Rose Thornton |
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Barack Obama © Stephen Ferry
From BBC News, December 21, 2008:
"Earlier, UK Defence Secretary John Hutton described Saturday's vote as "a minor hiccup", but said he was confident a deal would be reached."
Essentially, the Iraqi parliament had rejected a bill allowing the 6,000 British and other non-US troops currently in Iraq to stay past December 31, 2008, the date of a UN mandate legally giving these troops permission to be in their country. And the UK Defense Minister called that sovereign nation's governing body and the decisions it makes, "a minor hiccup..."
Here I will be posting wacky videos, quotations, photos and fragments of thought--in addition to the daily BBC News feed--that may get a few ideas popping around the brain. I figure that they could either be a good way to get editors' and cultural writers' creative minds churning, or at least be a nice diversion from the office for a while. Either way, it can't be too bad, right?
BBC News - Home
The latest stories from the Home section of the BBC News web site.
2 - Vitamin B 'puts off Alzheimer's'
3 - Goldman Sachs fined £20m by FSA
4 - Capello eyes life as a pensioner
5 - Shoppers turning to card payments
6 - Rig firms hit back at BP report
7 - Obama defiant on tax cut stance
8 - Taliban chief says victory close
9 - Nutrient clue to common birth defect
10 - Empty shops highlighting 'divide'
11 - Child detention 'harm' documented
12 - Piers Morgan to replace CNN host Larry King
13 - Could music be given on prescription?
14 - Houllier named Aston Villa boss
15 - Live text - Federer v Soderling
16 - Higgins cleared of fixing claims
17 - Ferrari escape further punishment
18 - Ashes warm-up in SA for Pietersen
19 - Planes in 'near-miss' over London
20 - Shot boy's family still suffering
21 - Boundary move 'gives Tories hope'
22 - 'No guarantees' over Moray bases
23 - MP met Claudy bomb suspect priest
24 - Cuts 'must be resisted' says SF
25 - New-style device killed soldier
26 - Metal plant to be decommissioned
27 - UN seeks to placate Rwanda leader
28 - Nigeria replaces security leaders
29 - Clan 'behind Philippine massacre'
30 - Two missing in China rig accident
31 - Merkel defends Danish cartoonist
32 - Dublin to break up Anglo Irish
33 - Gunmen hit Honduras shoe factory
34 - Castro criticises Iranian leader
35 - Second Iraqi TV presenter killed
36 - Iran stands firm on stoning case
37 - Vodafone to pay India $2.6bn tax
38 - Man in court over India Pune bomb
39 - Koran bonfire 'still going ahead'
40 - Australia, NZ top 'giving' index
41 - US economic growth 'decelerating'
42 - House giant enters administration
43 - Writing off tax is 'unaffordable'
44 - Cameron's father dies in hospital
45 - MPs to probe Cameron-Clegg deal
46 - Hague: Axing embassies 'unlikely'
47 - Outbreak probe at industry sites
48 - More obesity ops 'will save cash'
49 - Inquiry to hear from HIV victims
50 - Two-tier university warning given
51 - 'Racism missed' at attack school
52 - Cambridge tops university table
53 - Google unveils 'instant' searches
54 - One in four gives fake net names
55 - European police in pirate raids
56 - Cable's plan to cut science funds
57 - Dino clue to 'earliest feathers'
58 - Secrets of good dancing uncovered
59 - 'No decisions' over World Service
60 - The xx step into the spotlight
61 - UK moviegoers Exorcised by horror
62 - Beware the 'don't know' brigade
63 - The blackmarket in cutting agents
64 - The 60s, but not as we know it
65 - PMQs: Clegg faces questions on phone hacking
66 - The science of manly dance moves
67 - Mexico rejects drug 'insurgency' analogy
68 - UN aid chief Amos visits Pakistan
69 - How BP will kill the oil spill
70 - Behind the scenes of new Strictly
71 - Pope 'looking forward' to UK visit
72 - Jolie praise for Pakistan military
73 - Trapped miners watch football match
74 - Low pay and squalor
75 - Off the dial
76 - Papal tours
77 - All for one
78 - World of difference
79 - Outreach outrage?
80 - 'The Russians are here'
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says Mexican drug violence is looking increasingly like an insurgency, a comment strongly rejected by Mexico.
High doses of B vitamins may slow the rate of brain shrinkage in older people experiencing warning signs of Alzheimer's disease, a new study says.
Wall Street banking giant Goldman Sachs is fined £20m by the UK's financial watchdog, the BBC learns.
Fabio Capello is looking forward to his retirement as the Italian confirms he will stand down as England coach after Euro 2012.
The number of cash machines in the UK has fallen and withdrawals have dropped as shoppers turn to cards, figures show.
Contractors who worked for BP on the ill-fated Deepwater Horizon oil rig criticise the company's report into the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.
President Obama urges Congress to approve billions in tax breaks and spending to boost the US economy ahead of November's elections.
Taliban leader Mullah Omar says his fighters are on the verge of victory in Afghanistan and the Nato-led campaign has been "a complete failure".
Scientists begin a study to determine if an everyday vitamin supplement could help prevent a common birth defect.
The number of shops closing in Britain is slowing but a north-south divide has emerged, a survey by retail analysts the Local Data Company suggests.
A medical charity says it has documented for the first time the effects of immigration detention on children facing removal from the UK.
Former newspaper editor and Britain's Got Talent judge Piers will replace US TV presenter Larry King on the US network CNN, it is announced.
Patients could be prescribed music tailored to their needs as a result of new university research.
Former Liverpool and Lyon boss Gerard Houllier is named the new manager of Aston Villa.
Roger Federer takes on Robin Soderling in the US Open quarter-finals after earlier wins for Caroline Wozniacki and Novak Djokovic.
John Higgins is cleared of all match-fixing allegations but admits bringing snooker into disrepute, resulting in a £75,000 fine and a ban until November.
Ferrari have avoided further punishment for using banned team orders, a Formula 1 disciplinary hearing in Paris has ruled.
England batsman Kevin Pietersen hopes to play for South African franchise Kwa-Zulu Natal in two matches as a warm-up for this winter's Ashes.
A business jet and a passenger plane carrying 232 people came close to a mid-air collision over London in July, a report reveals.
Police use the anniversary of the killing of Manchester schoolboy Jessie James to once again appeal for help to catch his killer.
Boundary changes for the next Scottish Parliament elections suggest a possible boost to the Conservatives, according to experts.
The Scottish Secretary says he can give "no guarantees" about the future of two Scottish RAF bases.
The priest suspected of being involved in the 1972 Claudy bombing met Martin McGuinness shortly before he died, the deputy first minister confirms.
Sinn Fein says cuts "proposed or imposed by the British goverment must be challenged and resisted", following Peter Robinson's call for savings.
A 29-year-old soldier on foot patrol in Afghanistan was killed by a sophisticated explosive device which was hard to detect, an inquest hears.
Metal plant owners Anglesey Aluminium confirm production will not restart at their Holyhead factory which was mothballed 12 months ago.
The UN's secretary general urges Rwanda not to withdraw its peacekeepers from Sudan over a leaked report saying its troops may have committed genocide.
Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan has appointed new military and police chiefs ahead of planned January presidential election.
The first witness in the trial of a powerful clan accused of the Philippines' worst political massacre says the family plotted the killings over dinner.
At least 30 workers are rescued and at least two are missing after a storm causes an oil rig off China's north-east coast to list dangerously.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel defends the Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard, whose drawings of the Prophet Muhammad caused outrage in 2006.
The Irish government says it will break up the nationalised Anglo Irish Bank as part of the failed lender's resolution.
Men armed with automatic weapons burst into a shoe factory in northern Honduras, killing 18 people in a suspected gang attack.
Cuba's Fidel Castro criticises Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for what he called his anti-Semitic attitudes.
Gunmen in Iraq have killed an Iraqi TV journalist - the second in as many days - while four other people were killed in two attacks in the capital Baghdad.
Foreign powers should stop interfering in the case of an Iranian woman who was sentenced to death by stoning, Iran's foreign ministry says.
An Indian court tells Vodafone it has to pay $2.6bn in tax for its takeover of Hutchison Telecom's Indian phone assets.
A man appears in court in Mumbai in connection with a bomb blast at a German bakery in the Indian city of Pune six months ago.
A US pastor says he is not "backing down" from plans to burn copies of the Koran on the anniversary of 9/11, despite international condemnation.
Australia and New Zealand top the table in the largest ever study into global charitable behaviour, but some poor countries also scoring high.
US economic growth showed "widespread signs of deceleration" in August, says the Federal Reserve's Beige Book.
Property giant Connaught formally enters administration, putting thousands of jobs at risk.
The country "cannot afford" to write off underpayments of income tax caused by problems with the calculation system, a minister says.
David Cameron's father Ian dies in hospital in France shortly after the Prime Minister joined other members of his family at his bedside.
MPs are to examine how the coalition was formed after the election and issues arising from the negotiations between the two parties.
Closing dozens of small embassies to save money would be a "false economy" as they do not cost much, says William Hague.
There are now 12 cases linked to a Legionnaires' outbreak, as health officials focus on south Wales industrial sites in the search for the cause.
Millions of pounds are lost in England by the failure of the NHS to provide more obesity operations, a study says.
The injury into contaminated NHS blood products in the 1980s will hear from the victims who contracted HIV and Hepatitis.
Vice-chancellors warn that the traditional university experience could become the preserve of an elite.
A school where a boy was attacked with a hammer failed to recognise a series of racist incidents prior to the assault, a serious case review finds.
Cambridge University has come top of an international university rankings table, knocking Harvard of the top spot for the first time since 2004.
Google speeds up its internet search engine by launching a new product, Google Instant, that displays results as soon as users type in queries.
A survey shows a majority of web users have suffered cybercrime, but many respondents were themselves less than honest.
Premises across Europe, including a Swedish university, have been raided by police in a piracy crackdown
Business Secretary Vince Cable has unveiled plans for a squeeze on public funding for scientific research.
Palaeontologists uncover a new dinosaur with what may be the earliest evidence of feathers.
Scientists carry out the first rigorous analysis of dance moves that make men attractive to women.
No decisions have been taken about possible funding cuts to the BBC World Service, Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt says.
The xx express surprise at their Mercury Prize win and singer-songwiter Conor J O'Brien gives the stand-out performance of the ceremony.
Horror movie The Last Exorcism debuts at the top of the UK and Ireland box office, taking £1.1m in its opening weekend.
In his regular column, Michael Blastland looks at why the people ignored by surveys could be those with the strongest opinions.
Street cocaine has long been diluted, but now the cutting agents themselves have spawned a black market.
US drama Mad Men has won praise for its recreation of the 1960s, but it's not a classic depiction of the decade.
Standing in for David Cameron, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has insisted it is for the police to decide how to proceed over the News of the World phone hacking row.
Scientists say they have carried out the first rigorous analysis of dance moves that make men attractive to women.
Mexico has rejected remarks from the US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, that drug-related violence in Mexico increasingly has the hallmarks of an insurgency.
The newly appointed head of UN humanitarian relief Lady Valerie Amos has spent her first day in office touring Pakistan.
A scale model of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill and how it is being repaired
As preparations are made for the eighth series of Strictly Come Dancing, Radio 1 Newsbeat's Natalie Jamieson has a look behind the scenes.
The Pope has said he is "very much looking forward" to his visit to the UK next week, and thanked all those involved in advance for their efforts.
Angelina Jolie has visited Nowshera in north-west Pakistan to highlight the plight of more than 20 million people affected by the country's worst ever floods.
The miners trapped underground in Chile were able to watch a football match after rescue workers provided a mini TV screen.
The plight of Commonwealth Games workers in Delhi
What happened to Mercury, as in Mercury music prize?
The UK visits of Benedict XVI and John Paul II compared
Did the Blitz really make British people tougher?
Is it bad taste to have a 'shortest man' record?
The US church threatening to burn Korans on 9/11
How John le Carre's old foe is back on British soil
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"Every word born of an inner necessity--writing must never be anything else." ~ Karol Jackowski
© Clara Rose Thornton and InkBlot Complex, 2008-2009.
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