Today's HOT Topic in Tucson - Archives

This is the Table of Contents for archived Tucson Arizona HOT TOPIC issues featured on Dotcomtucson in the past. The subjects dealt with herein, which come from numerous sources, are not always specific to Tucson Arizona. The topics are chosen out of available items first from Tucson, then from the Sonoran Desert region, and finally from Arizona. If no worthy subject matter presents itself for the day, then other issues are considered. Some subjects, while national or international in scope, are of great interest to the people of Tucson, and therefore are dealt with and discussed.

Please feel free to peruse any of the articles, some of which were linked to opinion polls done by Dotcomtucson in Tucson Arizona.

The views and opinions presented herein do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of Dotcomtucson or any of its staff or employees.

Increase in Tucson Water Costs
Preliminary approval was given by the Tucson City Council for a 4.6% increase in water rates for fiscal year 2007. Additional increases would be sought every year through 2011. The new rates, if approved, will go into effect on August 7, 2006.

Prior to the Tucson City Council vote on the issue, a public hearing on the proposed water rate increases will be held on July 6, 2006. This will be your opportunity to speak out regarding the proposal.

N. Korea proposes direct talks with U.S.
Washington says long-range missile test by Pyongyang would be 'violation'

TOKYO - North Korea said Wednesday it wants direct talks with the United States over its apparent plans to test-fire a long-range missile, a day after the country issued a bristling statement in which it declared its right to carry out the launch.

Al-Qaida No. 2 calls on Afghans to rise up
Al-Zawahri message comes after U.S. warned of ‘significant fighting’ ahead

CAIRO, Egypt - Al-Qaida’s No. 2 leader issued a new videotape Thursday calling on Afghans to rise up against U.S.-led forces in Afghanistan in the wake of rioting last month in Kabul.

The video by Ayman al-Zawahri — which would be his sixth this year — was posted on an Islamic Web site known as a clearing house for al-Qaida and other militants’ statements.

“I am calling upon the Muslims in Kabul in particular and in all Afghanistan in general and for the sake of God to stand up in an honest stand in the face of the infidel forces that are invading Muslim lands,” said al-Zawahri, wearing a white turban and sitting in front of a black backdrop with an automatic rifle next to him.

RABBITS SUE TO KEEP THEIR FEET ON THE GROUND
. . . And Off Key Chains!

By PAUL KUPPS

RABBIT HASH, Ky. -- They are a familiar sight in animal shelters and pet shops across the nation: Rabbit amputees, their limbs sacrificed by the millions every year in the name of good luck.

"Bad luck for their poor little missing hindquarters," sneered Harvey P. Dowd, an attorney representing Help Outlaw Paw Pruning Sadists, an organization devoted to ending the barbaric human practice of cutting off rabbit's feet and carrying them for good luck.

"The foot of the Leporidae -- which is the Latin name for rabbits -- has been used as a good luck charm since before 600 B.C. These trinkets grew from ancient superstitions about fertility and pacifism. But there is nothing peaceful about this grisly practice."

US fears home-grown terror threat

The US Attorney-General, Alberto Gonzales has warned that home-grown terrorists could pose as much danger to the US as foreign al-Qaeda operatives.

Seven men have been charged with plotting to blow up the Sears Towers in Chicago, and attack FBI offices.

The men, five from the US and two from Haiti, hoped to wage a "full ground war" against the US, according to the charges brought against them.

Officials said the men were foiled at an early stage and posed no danger.

Mr. Gonzales said the group of "home-grown terrorists" were inspired by "a violent Jihadist message".

Cannibal study suggests human toll from mad-cow disease could be huge

The ultimate death toll among humans from mad-cow disease could be massively under-estimated, according to an innovative study conducted among a cannibal tribe in Papua New Guinea.

Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) is linked to eating meat infected with bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), the term for mad-cow disease. Both entail a rogue prion protein that proliferates unchecked in the brain, turning it spongey.

Both diseases have a close relative in kuru, which was spotted in the 20th century among the Fore people of Papua New Guinea who ate the corpses of family members as a sign of respect for the dead. …

British doctors have hit on the idea of seeing whether people there fell sick long after the practice died out, the aim being to determine how long it takes for this BSE-like disease to incubate.

Their suspicions were confirmed, for they identified 11 people who were diagnosed with kuru between July 1996 to June 2004. …

The paper, which appears in Saturday’s issue of ‘The Lancet’, has important implications.

At present, there are 161 known cases of vCJD in Britain, where the BSE epidemic erupted, along with 17 in France and a handful of other cases in Canada, Ireland, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands and the United States.

As vCJD only surfaced as a disease little more than a decade ago, this relatively tiny toll has eased initial worries that tens of thousands of people could die, given that millions of people ate BSE-infected beef. …

But the big unknown about vCJD is how long it takes to incubate and whether, as genetic analysis is tentatively starting to suggest, some people are more vulnerable or more resistant than others.

The authors of the new study, led by Professor John Collinge [UCL Institute of Neurology], say they fear that vCJD patients identified so far may be a “distinct genetic sub-population” which made them easy targets for the rogue protein.

In other words, people who are otherwise healthy today may fall sick with the lethal disease a few years or more than half a century down the road.

”A human BSE epidemic may be multiphasic,” says Collinge. “Recent estimates of the size of the vCJD based on uniform genetic susceptibility could be substantial under-estimations.”

Agence France Presse

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