What price for justice? Scotland plumbs the dustbin over Lockerbie

From the Stratfor Intelligence newsletter: On Aug. 24, 2009 Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill addressed a special session of the Scottish Parliament. The session was called so that MacAskill could explain why he had decided to release Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi, the former Libyan intelligence officer convicted of terrorism charges in connection with the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103, and who had been expected to spend the rest of his life in prison. MacAskill said he granted al-Megrahi a compassionate release because al-Megrahi suffers from terminal prostate cancer and is expected to live only a few months. The Aug. 20 release of al-Megrahi ignited outrage in both the United Kingdom and the United States and FBI Director Robert Mueller released to the press contents of an uncharacteristically blunt and critical letter he had written to MacAskill in which Mueller characterized al-Megrahi’s release as inexplicable and “detrimental to the cause of justice.” Mueller told MacAskill in the letter that the release “makes a mockery of the rule of law.”

Al-Megrahi received a hero’s welcome upon his arrival in Tripoli, Libya with global broadcast footage of him being welcomed and embraced by Libyan leader Moammar Gadaffi (pictured left above ).

The Scottish Government should never have released this intelligence agent regardless of the compassionate grounds stated relating to a terminal health diagnosis or the concern about martydom. The total loss of life involved from the terrorism act was 243 passengers, 16 flight crew from the aircraft and 11 people on the ground in the small town of Lockerbie, Scotland (who were killed by parts of the falling aircraft). From the forensic investigation it was found that a number of people had survived the initial breakup of the aircraft in flight until impact on the ground below. Libya continues to deny responsibility for the action although its agent was convicted and the country itself paid compensation to the families of those affected.

Chocolate's magic properties...

According to news reports from the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm
" Heart attack survivors who eat chocolate two or more times per week cut their risk of dying from heart disease about three fold compared to those who never touch the stuff, scientists have reported. Smaller quantities confer less protection, but are still better than none, according to the study, which appears in the September issue of the Journal of Internal Medicine. Earlier research had established a strong link between cocoa-based confections and lowered blood pressure or improvement in blood flow. It had also shown that chocolate cuts the rate of heart-related mortality in healthy older men, along with post-menopausal women".

Apparently this new study, led by Imre Janszky (Karolinska Institute) is the first to demonstrate that consuming chocolate can help ward off mortality if one has suffered a heart attack.

Really?

Who's Your Momma? Mahmoud Ahmadinejad continues on in Iran

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (pictured at left, the short man) was sworn-in as Iranian president this week with the continuing cloud of the disputed elections still overshadowing his alleged election. Against the backdrop of a divided clerical establishment in Iran, widespread dissatisfaction in the Iranian population and powerful figures in Iran's political elite challenging his position (particularly former presidents Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, Mohammad Khatami and former Prime Minister Mir Hossein Mousavi), Ahmadinejad continues on.The question which arises is how long can Iran continue with the policies of the current president which are more provocative than constructive.

With a poor economic outlook, a suspect nuclear weapons policy and a repressive regime which discourages debate, Iran remains a disadvantaged nation and almost a pariah internationally. Iranian politics is tough and full of complexity with a myriad of interlocking bodies, interests (both religious and secular) and key figures yet increasingly most of these groups are finding common ground in their mutual concern with and distrust of, the Iranian president.

Online community supported data sources - How reliable is Wikipedia?

Recent research reported by New Scientist (25 July 2009) has commented on the wide variability of health information on the internet and the influence of the all pervasive Wikipedia. This is no surprise as a significant volume of websites providing health information are either commercial interests, copied articles from other unchecked sources, heresay or outright quackery. Of interest is the high ranking of Wikipedia in search engine queries whereby the website appears in the top 10 results for more than 70% of medical qeries in four different search engines.

How reliable is Wikipedia? Universities have regularly warned tertiary-level students not to rely on Wikipedia as a source for their assignments. However US healthcare consultancy, Manhattan Research, has reported that 50% of doctors in its research had turned to Wikipedia for information. Of note, New Scientist quotes several studies which have examined information on surgery, drugs and other health information and found the online resource to be entirely free of factual and free of error. The US National Institutes of Health hosted an event on 16 July 2009 with the aim of training health professionals how to edit Wikipedia's health pages.

Wikipedia has considerable value as a layman's tool and for providing an overview of health information. For the health professional the key data sources though will remain ones such as Medline, PubMed, BMJ, the New England Journal of Medicine, the Cochrane Collaboration and other peer reviewed journals.