Stealing a US Election? Nothing’s Easier!

Stealing a US Election? Nothing’s Easier!

The US prides itself on a free and fair election system. It’s the main hallmark of democracy. But as RT’s Anastasia Churkina reports, stealing an election in America is easier than 1,2,3.

The U.S. – a beacon of democracy, and an example to be followed by the rest of the world. One big source of pride is its' fundamental concept of free and fair elections.

“American elections are a disgrace. It's like looking into a kitchen of a world-class restaurant and losing your appetite at what you see, because we have an election system, a voting system that is completely non-transparent,” said Mark Crispin Miller, Professor at NYU and author of “Fooled Again, How the Right Stole the 2004 Elections.”

This is an opinion shared by many political experts and educators.

“If you were to hand your vote to a man in a magician's suit who then went behind a curtain and came out having first shredded the ballots, to tell you who won – would you trust that process?” said the co-founder and director of the Election Defense Alliance Jonathan, Simon.

The process largely to blame is the out-dated electronic voting system.

“In the states where all they have is electronic voting – it could be a real problem. If you don't have some kind of back up source to verify the vote count – it could be a problem,”said Jeanne Mirer of the National Lawyers Guild.

Brad Friedman is an independent award-winning blogger who has covered the U.S. election system for years. Speaking to RT, he said the problem is actually a pandemic, and change is long overdue.

“Every single state in the union uses electronic voting. A third of the voters this year will vote on 100 percent unverifiable touch screen voting systems. The rest of the country, by and large, will vote on paper ballots, but those paper ballots are also counted by electronic systems. Unless you can see inside a computer, there is no way to know if those computers have tallied those ballots correctly,” said Friedman.

Several experiments conducted on electronic voting machines have proven that simple key strokes and some knowledge of science and computers could flip results. Experts say the accuracy of the vote count – even with paper trail – is a myth.

“In 99 plus percent of the cases, those ballots never see the light of day – they are never examined, never recounted. Basically American elections at this point have virtually zero claim on public confidence and legitimacy,” said Jonathan Simon.

The rules and specifications of how elections are held vary locally, and state by state.

“Four-thousand different counties, each of them use a different system, a different type of voting system, each of them have different flaws, different vulnerabilities,” said Brad Friedman.

One particular company that makes electronic voting machines in the U.S. has earned a dubious reputation for unverifiable results, as records vanish into thin air.

“I go to an ATM, and there is a Diebold machine, I get a confirmation slip – and I go around the corner to vote – and there is no record,” said author, social critic and political activist Naomi Wolf.

Meantime, Diebold and other voter machine production companies are known to have strong partisan affiliations.

“They are not accountable to any voters. They are not just private, but private and extreme in their political sympathies. Democrats don't actually win that many elections. To be precise, democrats almost never win close elections. And the trick there, is to see to it, that a race looks or is close,” said Mark Crispin Miller.

Improving the election process in this digital age doesn’t appear to be on anyone’s agenda, including Barack Obama’s.

“Our President…who won't ever talk about election fraud and denies that it has ever happened, even when members of his own party have been the victims of it,” said Miller.

While the number of reported flaws grows with each passing election.

“Over the past decade, since 2000, when Congress was pretending to want to make things better, what has happened is things have gotten much, much worse,” said Brad Friedman.

It appears stealing an election in the U.S. may be a candidate’s certain way to secure a win.

In this digital age of smart phones, tablets and satellite navigation systems, American voters will head to the polls this November to cast their ballots using antiquated and unreliable voting machines, machines that will ultimately determine who will lead this nation in much need of its own repairs.

Courtesy of rt.com

Court Ruling: Anti-Jihad Posters to Come to Washington...

Court Ruling: Anti-Jihad Posters to Come to Washington...

Washington will become the next American city to display a notorious anti-Jihad public advert, after a district judge declined a local Metro injunction asking for it to be delayed.

Washington Metro argued that the posters, which were scheduled to be displayed on trains throughout the city from late September, should be delayed indefinitely in the wake of the fallout from the Innocence of Muslims online film, that provoked riots and demonstrations throughout the Islamic world.

It requested that the earliest date the posters should be put up, be moved to November 1, providing there is no “verifiable” terrorist threat. Instead Judge Rosemary Collyer ordered the ads to be displayed no later than 5 p.m. on Monday.

“It’s a victory for everyone,” said Robert Muise, the attorney for the advertiser. “It’s a victory for all freedom-loving Americans.”

The posters were devised by the controversial American Freedom Defense Initiative (AFDI) – which was behind the campaign against an Islamic community center being built within two blocks of the destroyed World Trade Center.  The posters have already appeared in New York and San Fransisco.

“In Any War Between the Civilized Man and the Savage, Support the Civilized Man. Support Israel. Defeat Jihad,”reads the text of the advert.

Judge Collyer openly described the posters as “hate speech”, but said the message was protected under the First Amendment as “core political speech” and did not accept the Metro’s argument that it incited violence and constitutes “a gamble with public safety”.

AFDI, whose poster has been condemned by over 200 public organizations, had to fight a similar legal battle in New York, again winning the right to place the ads.

Different strategies have emerged from those who find the campaign objectionable.

In San Francisco SMFTA, the local transport authority, ran an ad of its own on every bus where the anti-Jihad was displayed, saying “SFMTA policy prohibits discrimination based on national origin, religion, and other characteristics and condemns any statements that describe any group as 'savages.'"

Many of the posters in have been defaced, or graffitied with counter messages.

Another public advocacy group, Rabbis for Human Rights, have even paid for an alternative poster campaign to run at the same time. "In the choice between love and hate, choose love. Help stop bigotry against our Muslim neighbors,”reads their ad.

But despite the outcry, Pamela Geller, the AFDI co-founder has not voiced any regrets about the poster.

"There's nothing either hateful or false about my ad.”

Courtesy of rt.com

Democrats Revolt Against Obama Over TPP...

Democrats Revolt Against Obama Over TPP...

A leading Senate Democrat has called out US President Barack Obama over his alleged unwillingness to keep Congress updated on negotiations over a treaty that might be potentially disastrous for America.

Senator Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) introduced legislation on Wednesday that specifically targets the Obama administration by demanding that the White House open up on details about the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership, a massive, international trade agreement that, if passed, would greatly affect consumers from coast-to-coast. The lawmaker isn’t alone in his opposition against the administration, either — more than 60 House Democrats and at least one Republican have objected to provisions of the TPP, and more are expected to line up as details are made public.

According to the senator, President Obama and his cabinet have gone out of their way to keep Congress uninformed on the details surrounding the TPP, including even members of his own political party, such as Sen. Wyden. What’s more, argues the senator, is that if anyone should be kept update on the issue, it’s him — as chair of the United States Senate Finance Subcommittee on International Trade, Customs, and Global Competitiveness, it is his job to be up to snuff on proposals such as this.

On the contrary, Sen. Wyden and his office have been largely kept out of the picture. The massive corporations with personal stock in the TPP, however, have been all too informed though, he says.

“The majority of Congress is being kept in the dark as to the substance of the TPP negotiations, while representatives of U.S. corporations – like Halliburton, Chevron, PHRMA, Comcast, and the Motion Picture Association of America – are being consulted and made privy to details of the agreement,” claims the senator.

That isn’t to say that Big Businesses and their Washington lobbyists are invested without reason, though. If passed in its current form, the TPP includes some seriously scary provisions that would, among other things, ban “Buy American” preference for US manufacturers and change intellectual property standards that are almost certain to cause for an increase in prescription drug costs and thus have a major impact on the American health insurance industry and all groups linked to it.

The senator claims that his office has continuously sought out more information about the proposed legislation, only to be time and time again told that his staffers lack the necessary clearance to be kept privy on the policies. Sen. Wyden says in a statement this week that he then attempted to get his office cleared to be informed of the legislation, only to be continuously left out of the picture.

“As the Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee’s Subcommittee on International Trade, Customs, and Global Competitiveness, my office is responsible for conducting oversight over the USTR [United States Trade Representative] and trade negotiations,” says the senator.

“More than two months after receiving the proper security credentials, my staff is still barred from viewing the details of the proposals that USTR is advancing,” he adds.

In a statement offered to the Huffington Post, Wyden spokesperson Jennifer Hoelzer claims that the Obama administration in interpreting a decade-old law to say that only members of the Congressional Oversight Group or staffers involved with the COG office are allowed to see the agreements.

“If that is in fact their interpretation, it means that neither Senator Wyden nor his trade subcommittee staff are allowed to review documents pertaining to trade agreements,” says Hoelzer.

Now in order to deal with this grievance, Sen. Wyden has proposed legislation this week that would require the USTR“to provide documents related to trade negotiations to members of Congress and their staff upon request.” Bloomberg News reports that the USTR office has yet to offer an official response.

This is but the second time this week that Sen. Wyden has made headlines for outspoken views delivered before Congress. On Monday, he attacked the supporters of the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, or CISPA, by calling it “an overreaction to a legitimate fear” that would only create “a Cyber Industrial Complex.”

Courtesy of rt.com

TPP Secrets: Obama Covertly Granting More Power to Multinational Corporations...

TPP Secrets: Obama Covertly Granting More Power to Multinational Corporations...

Despite the White House’s efforts to keep a proposed free trade agreement concealed from the public — and even Congress — an excerpt from the TPP leaked Wednesday reveals that President Obama is prepared to bow to multinational corporations.

The United States has been engaged in discussion with eight Pacific nations to come to agreement on the terms of the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership, a free trade contract that would allow for a more open system of exchange between the US and less developed nations. Critics have been concerned, however, over how provisions of the project could drive up the price of medications and other goods across the world. The White House’s reluctance to provide details to even leading lawmakers responsible for America’s trade plans has caused a rift within the president’s own political party as his administration remains adamant about protecting the items being heard.

A section of the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership was leaked to the Web early Wednesday, and its contents suggest that US President Barack Obama was perhaps not so genuine with promises made while campaigning in 2008 and even offers some insight into why his administration has been eerily secretive about the TPP.

Details about negotiations determined during meetings between White House officials and leaders from the eight Pacific nations involved in the TPP have been so hidden from the public that even some members of the US Congress have called on the president to come forth with information. In a leak published this week by the advocacy website Public Citizen, though, it’s made clear that the Obama administration has every intention of backpedaling on previous promises that could largely impact regulations that will directly affect the safety and financial security of millions of Americans and international citizens.

According to the leaked excerpt, the Obama administration has been considering TPP provisions that would allow foreign corporations operating within the United States to appeal regulations on the environment and banking that would be forced on American-owned businesses with no chance of reprieve. While the United States could be sanctioned for failing to impose regulations on American-run businesses, multinational corporations are practically encouraged to do as much because the TPP outlines a clear avenue to file an appeal. If one of the eight Pacific nations chooses to do as much, their plea would be heard by an international tribunal that could overrule US law.

Such key components of the leaked TPP document conflict directly with campaign promises harped by then-candidate President Obama while vying for the White House. Huffington Post reports that during the 2008 campaign, Barack Obama was clear in emphasizing, "We will not negotiate bilateral trade agreements that stop the government from protecting the environment, food safety or the health of its citizens; give greater rights to foreign investors than to US investors; require the privatization of our vital public services; or prevent developing country governments from adopting humanitarian licensing policies to improve access to life-saving medications.”

On the contrary, President Obama is reportedly not so concerned today. Condemning the president over how the TPP could alter intellectual property standards are many critics who fear that the agreement would lead to the monopolization of life-saving drugs and thus propel the prices to an unaffordable amount.

"Bush was better than Obama on this," Judit Rius of Doctors Without Borders Access to Medicines Campaign tells HuffPo. "It's pathetic, but it is what it is. The world's upside-down."

Last month, Senator Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) introduced legislation that specifically targets the Obama administration by demanding that the White House open up on details about the proposed TPP. Despite serving as chair of the United States Senate Finance Subcommittee on International Trade, Customs, and Global Competitiveness, Sen. Wyden has been largely left uninformed about the details of the TPP all while the White House has opened up to the multinational corporations expected to profit through the proposal.

“The majority of Congress is being kept in the dark as to the substance of the TPP negotiations, while representatives of U.S. corporations – like Halliburton, Chevron, PHRMA, Comcast, and the Motion Picture Association of America – are being consulted and made privy to details of the agreement,” said Wyden. The senator’s legislation would require the United States Trade Representative office “to provide documents related to trade negotiations to members of Congress and their staff upon request.”

Courtesy of rt.com

Walmart and Monsanto - the Power of Money in Food...

Walmart and Monsanto - the Power of Money in Food...

A new report by Food and Water Watch shows that more than 1,000 outside interests and more than $170 million went into the 2008 Farm Bill. With the newest law up for debate, what will Congress and lobbyists do to see their interests met?

For those facing hard times, even the most basic needs are not always met. In Washington DC, the need for food assistance has grown exponentially.

“Since 2008 there has been a 25 percent increase in the number of families, children, senior citizens who need our food assistance,” said Shamia Holloway of the Capital Area Food Bank.

The Capital Area Food Bank provides food to organizations who distribute it to those in need. Many of them are part of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, formerly known as food stamps. It’s one of several programs facing extreme cuts in the upcoming farm bill.

“If SNAP is cut, a person who is getting $100 in SNAP could have their benefits reduced to maybe 50 to 60 dollars a month,” said Brian Banks, the Capital Area Food Bank’s director of public policy “And if this is a person that maybe has a family of three or four people and $50 or $60 doesn’t go a long way.”

The future of food stamps is determined in a large and complex piece of legislation known as the Farm Bill which is renewed every five years. The last one passed in 2008 and although the debate in Congress for the new one should have already begun, it’s been pushed to the side time and time again.

One reason for this is that there are simply too many cooks in the kitchen.

In their newly released report, Cultivating Influence: The 2008 Farm Bill Lobbying Frenzy , the group Food and Water Watch breaks down the forces behind the ingredients of the bill.

“Over the course of the debate of the 2008 Farm Bill, over a thousand entitles - companies, trade associations, groups – lobbied,” said Patti Lovera with Food and Water Watch. “They spent $173 million, according to our calculations.”

Major lobbying influences include Monsanto, Kraft Foods, The American Sugar Alliance and The National Restaurant Association. But perhaps the company with the greatest influence is Walmart. They’ve got 4,000 stores across this country – many of them SuperCenters- and just in the last 15 years have gone from having 6 percent to a full quarter of nationwide grocery sales. And that means not just more profit, but much more power as well.

These are companies and organizations with money that often speaks louder than anything. It’s money that dictates profits for farmers and grocers, and determines how much money will go to the SNAP Program.

With greater need facing deeper cuts, it could be a recipe for hardship for more and more Americans.

Courtesy of rt.com

Pakistan Forces Halt Anti-US Drone March to S. Waziristan...

Media reports suggest the march failed to enter South Waziristan on Sunday as Pakistani security forces Sunday stopped thousands of anti-US drone strikes marchers over security concerns.

After consultations with the organizers, army officials convinced them to drop the plan in view of the security situation in the area.

The marchers returned to Tank, a major city near South Waziristan, where the organizer of the rally, former cricket superstar-turned-politician Imran Khan, addressed the ten thousand-strong rally. 

"The drones are inhumane," Khan said, surrounded by thousands of protesters.

"We want to give a message to America that the more you carry out drone attacks, the more people will hate you.”

About 30 Americans traveled to Pakistan to take part in the protest and apologize for the strikes to men and women who had been maimed or lost family members. 

"We have to put pressure on the United States government," said Billy Kelly, a 69-year-old Vietnam veteran from New York. Earlier, a group of US and British anti-war activists have already marched through the Pakistani capital Islamabad in protest against US drone strikes in the northwest territory.

They chanted “Stop, stop drone attacks!" and sang "We are marching to Waziristan." One placard read "Drones fly, Children die."

The group then boarded around 150 cars and the motorcade proceeded through the route, stopping in major urban centers to rally more supporters.

The Western activists, including the US-based peace and social justice movement CODEPINK and Clive Stafford Smith, founder of the London-based legal advocacy organization Reprieve, have also met with relatives of people said to have been killed in drone attacks.

"We have learned here from victims' families how innocent people, children and women, are being killed. Enough is enough. We should stop these attacks," AP quotes CODEPINK activist Linda Wenning as saying.

The two-day rally has been organized by Imran Khan, the sportsman-turn-politician who has become a top critic of American drone strikes in Pakistan, saying they have killed many innocent civilians.

Ahsanullah Ahsan, spokesman for the main Pakistani Taliban faction, made a statement on Friday calling Khan a"slave of the West" and saying that the militants "don't need any sympathy" from such "a secular and liberal person."

"Imran Khan's so-called Peace March is not in sympathy for drone-hit Muslims. Instead, it's an attempt by him to increase his political stature," Ahsan claimed.

Tensions are running high between Pakistan and the US over the latter’s drone attacks on the majority-Islamic nation. Washington insists that its airstrikes, part of the US “War on Terror” campaign seeking to defeat Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants crossing the Afghanistan border, are very precise. 

However the recent study at Stanford and New York University titled ‘Living Under Drones’ proves US drone strikes do little to make the US safer. The study claimed that only 2 per cent of drone strike casualties in Pakistan are top militants, and that the large number of resultant civilian deaths turn ordinary Pakistanis against the US.

The study also revealed that number of casualties among Pakistani civilians was far higher than the US acknowledged.

According to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, from June 2004 till mid-September 2012, between 2,562 and 3,325 people were killed in drone strikes Pakistan, mostly in the North Waziristan region.  Some 474 to 881 of those killed were civilians, including 176 children. Another 1,300 were wounded.

Courtesy of rt.com

'No Food, No Drugs': Libyan Troops Siege Ex-Gaddafi Stronghold...

'No Food, No Drugs': Libyan Troops Siege Ex-Gaddafi Stronghold...

Armed Libyan forces continue to surround the city of Bani Walid, Libya. As tension between government troops and opposition supporters continues to mount, residents have been left without food and other supplies – and are calling on the UN for help.

Human rights group Amnesty International has asked authorities to avoid unnecessary force, and to allow medical and other vital supplies into the city.

It comes after Libya’s General National Congress gave the Ministries of Interior and Defense permission to use force to arrest those suspected of killing Omran Shaaban – the man who is credited for capturing the country’s ex-leader, Muammar Gaddafi, last year.

Over the past week, government troops have surrounded the city.

“Right now, the armed forces are attacking our city at the eastern boundary between us and Misrata city,” Dr. Abdul-hamid Alshandoli, a member of Bani Walid’s social council who is inside the sieged city, told RT.

The government also called on the release of others being detained in Bani Walid, giving those in the city ten days to comply. The deadline came and went on Friday.

The chief of staff for Libya’s army issued a statement on Thursday, calling on residents to hand over the individuals to avoid a military assault.

According to Amnesty International, hundreds of residents in the city have been arrested by armed militias. Many continue to be detained without being charged or put on trial, and have been tortured or otherwise ill-treated, the organization said.

Human rights group Amnesty International has asked authorities to avoid unnecessary force, and to allow medical and other vital supplies into the city.

It comes after Libya’s General National Congress gave the Ministries of Interior and Defense permission to use force to arrest those suspected of killing Omran Shaaban – the man who is credited for capturing the country’s ex-leader, Muammar Gaddafi, last year.

Over the past week, government troops have surrounded the city.

“Right now, the armed forces are attacking our city at the eastern boundary between us and Misrata city,” Dr. Abdul-hamid Alshandoli, a member of Bani Walid’s social council who is inside the sieged city, told RT.

The government also called on the release of others being detained in Bani Walid, giving those in the city ten days to comply. The deadline came and went on Friday.

The chief of staff for Libya’s army issued a statement on Thursday, calling on residents to hand over the individuals to avoid a military assault.

According to Amnesty International, hundreds of residents in the city have been arrested by armed militias. Many continue to be detained without being charged or put on trial, and have been tortured or otherwise ill-treated, the organization said.

But despite calls from the army, a large number of residents have turned out to protest the demands.

“Many armed groups came to main entrance of Bani Walid and they asked the people to get out of the city. We have decided not to go because we want to defend our rights, our homes, and our families,” Alshandoli said.

As the conflict between government forces and opposition followers continues in the former Gaddafi stronghold, the city is reportedly suffering from a lack of necessary supplies.

On October 4th, local doctors said that a group of armed men prevented three vehicles carrying medical supplies, personnel, and oxygen from entering the city. The men had set up a checkpoint about 80 kilometers away from Bani Walid, according to Bikya Masr news.

“The situation is very bad. No fuel, no food, no drugs, no communication. Everything is in a very bad situation,”Alshandoli said.

A petition circulating around the city on Friday night asked the UN Security Council to convene an emergency meeting and “to immediately intervene to protect the civilians in the town.”

Signatories of the petition claimed that pro-government armed militias were trying to kill large numbers of people in Bani Walid, because of the city’s pro-Gaddafi history.

Bani Walid was one of the last cities to fall under the control of anti-Gaddafi forces last year.

Libya is still plagued with violence between pro-Gaddafi loyalists and supporters of the country’s new government – calling into question whether the fall of Gaddafi was indeed the beginning of a new Libya.

According to the UN, many pro-Gaddafi loyalists have been detained in grim conditions, abused and tortured, since last year’s uprising.

Reports of mistreatment serve as an embarrassment for Libya’s new government, as well as for western powers – which fiercely supported the rebellion.

Courtesy of rt.com

California Gas Prices Hit Record High...

California Gas Prices Hit Record High...

Courtesy of rt.com

California gas prices hit a record high of $4.655 on Sunday after rising nearly 42 cents per gallon in a year. Some stations have stopped selling gas until it becomes more affordable, while others charged more than $5 per gallon.

California prices rose nearly 13 cents overnight Saturday and an additional 4.1 cents overnight Sunday – a sharp spike that lifted the national average to $3.79 cents per gallon – the highest ever for this time of year, reported AAA.

“In most cities around the country, pump prices dropped as lower crude oil prices made their wall all the way to the pump,” Trilby Lundberg, publisher of the Lundberg Survey, which surveyed gas prices in the lower 48 states, told CNN.

But California’s prices began to surge after an Exxon Mobile refinery in Torrance suffered a power outage last Monday. As costs began to rise, state residents started to think twice about hitting the road.

“I think $5 is kind of hitting the limit,” driver Genoush Tunian told CBS Los Angeles. And that limit was surpassed at a station in Long Beach, which charged customers $6.65 per gallon of regular gasoline.

California’s average fuel price is now the most expensive in the nation, surpassing other expensive states like Hawaii ($4.412 per gallon), Alaska ($4.174) and New York ($4.130). California is among only six states were the average price of gas falls above $4.

The state’s previous record was $4.610, set in 2008.

The powerless Exxon Mobile refinery had its electricity come back on Friday, causing home among California residents that prices will go back down. Senior petroleum analyst Patrick DeHaan predicted at GasBuddy.com that the average price may peak at $4.85 before declining.

Jeffrey Spring of the Automobile Club of Southern California said that in addition to the refinery’s power outage, local refineries were also dropping production levels, exporting supplies to Mexico and other countries and allowing inventory to diminish by preparing to switch to production of winter blend gasoline.

It’s not clear how much more prices will rise, and “a lot depends on whether the perceived supply issues are quickly addressed,” he told NBC News.

In the meantime, the state is host to angry drivers whose bank accounts are suffering at the pumps.

“This is ridiculous,” taxi driver Edgar Marutyan said. “I don’t know how long we can go on like this.”

Skyrocketing Meningitis Infections Victimize 91 US Patients...

Skyrocketing Meningitis Infections Victimize 91 US Patients...

Courtesy of rt.com

A deadly meningitis outbreak has swept across parts of America, killing seven people and leaving 91 ill. The number of infections, caused by contaminated steroid injections, has more than doubled since Friday.

The Center for Disease released the updated data at 2 pm local time (ET) Sunday, which demonstrates an alarmingly high rate of infection. On Friday, the fungus had infected only 35 Americans – but within two days, an additional 56 patients began to show symptoms.

The source of the fungal infection has been traced to a compound pharmacy in Massachusetts, which mixed drugs for steroid injections. The shots were then administered by 76 health clinics in 23 US states, often to patients experiencing back pain. The New England Compounding Center, which mixed the infected drugs, sold 17,676 vials of the injection. It has now shut down its operations and issued a recall of the vials, but for some the measure came too late.

By Saturday, seven people had died from the deadly disease and 57 were showing symptoms.

One of the first victims of the October outbreak was Eddie C. Lovelace, a 78-year-old Kentucky judge who sought out steroid injections for neck pain relief after a car accident.

“This wasn’t some obscure procedure being done in some obscure hospital,” Tom Carroll, a family friend of the victim, told the New York Times. “They had sought out a respected neurosurgeon who had been referred by their family doctor, at a respected hospital.”

Many Americans who received the Depo-Medrol injections are worried they may be at risk of developing meningitis. But all they can do is wait to see if they develop symptoms.

“Sure I’m apprehensive, but there’s not a thing I can do except wait and see what happens,” 81-year-old Richard Jenkins, who received his most recent shot on Sept. 11, told the Associated Press.

The CDC is in the midst of an ongoing investigation to determine how many people received the epidural steroid injections.

Meningitis cases have so far been found in Tennessee, Virginia, Michigan, Indiana, Florida, Maryland, North Carolina, Minnesota and Ohio. Tennessee has so far seen the most cases of the disease. The state is host to 32 victims, three of which have died.

Meningitis targets the brain and spinal cord. The most common form of the disease is viral, but the nationwide outbreak is fungal – the form most difficult to treat and most devastating to patients. This type of bacterial meningitis is rare, but deadly – often leading to stroke, brain damage and death. Symptoms include fever, dizziness, nausea, headaches, and a stiff neck.

US Gives Nod to 800km-Range S. Korean Missiles...

US Gives Nod to 800km-Range S. Korean Missiles...

Courtesy of rt.com

The US has permitted its ally South Korea to develop ballistic missiles with more than double the range it was allowed earlier. The proliferation-harming move is meant as a reaction to Pyongyang’s military build-up.

The deal was announced Sunday by Chun Young-woo, top secretary to President Lee Myung-bak for foreign and security affairs of the Korean government, after weeks of expectation.

"The most important goal for our government to revise the missile guidelines is deterring North Korea's military provocations," Chun told the media.

Seoul has been seeking permission for years to expand the range limit for its ballistic missiles from the previous 300km. The limit was set by a military alliance pact with the US, which hosts some 28,500 of its troops in Korea and is obliged to intervene militarily should the country be attacked.

“This is part of a long discussion between the South Korean government and the Americans. The South Koreans have wanted to extend the range of their missiles for a long time…it’s interesting that the Americans have now agreed to it. Presumably, that has to do with the US elections,” Asia specialist Tim Beal told RT.

After the landmark revision Seoul is allowed to deploy missiles with the range of up to 800km. This is likely to give pause to North Korea, but also to China and Japan, which would be within range of 800km South Korean missiles.

The deal maintains the current limit on the payload for long-range Korean missiles at 500kg, although shorter-range versions may have bigger payloads, Chun said.

The range boost may benefit the outgoing president’s Conservative Party during the December presidential election. Lee is banned from re-election by the constitution, but a major diplomatic victory in the last months of his presidency would build voter confidence and help the party remain in power, South Korean news agency Yonhap said.

“South Korea wants to build in more capability before their elections in December which conceivably might bring in a more peaceful government,” Beal said.

Arms-control advocates are likely to be unhappy with the deal, which violates a voluntary international arms-control pact known as the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR). The pact urges its 34 members, including most major missile manufacturers, to restrict export of missile and drone aircraft technologies, which outreach 500kg payload and 300km range limits.

"Agreeing for any country to develop 800km range missiles, well outside the MTCR limits, would be a big mistake," told Reuters Greg Thielmann, who formerly took part in intelligence assessments on ballistic missile threats at the State Department's intelligence bureau and is now with the private Arms Control Association in Washington.

Proponents of the boost argue that other regional powers, including North Korea, China and Japan, have developed their missile forces well beyond the restrictions taken on itself by Seoul.

South Korea estimates that Pyongyang’s arsenal includes missiles with a range of up to 3,000 kilometers, although the exact capabilities of the weapons remain secret. Skeptics say the North’s long-range rocket science and engineering are mediocre at best, citing the failed launches over the years.