- Mountain City, Tennessee: Incredible irony lives here. Mountain City wasn’t all that different from any other small, remote Tennessee mountain town before Thursday. Its 2,400 residents were living a prototypical small town existence and they even had the small town staple of a volunteer fire department and station to keep their homes safe from fire. They are still living that small town existence today, but their fire station isn't a part of that existence any longer because it burned down early Thursday morning - seriously. The fire station went up in flames and other area fire departments were not able to respond in time to save the building. Station #2 of District Two responded to the fire along with the Trade Volunteer Fire Department, Neva Volunteer Fire Department, Mountain City Fire Department and Doe Valley Volunteer Fire Department, but their combined efforts were not enough. Former Mountain City volunteer firefighter and current Tennessee State Representative Scotty Campbell is now with the Neva Volunteer Fire Department and was one of those who responded to the scene. “When my pager went off this morning I went out to the car, got on my mobile radio and asked the fire members on scene 'what exactly is on fire?'" Campbell recalled.
The fire was accelerated by the presence of piles of fiberglass installation stacked outside. Six fire trucks rushed to the scene, but they were unable to stop the blaze in time to save the station or the three trucks stored inside its three-door garage. But one of those trucks may be to blame. In another dose of heavy irony, fire investigators believe the fire started from an electrical problem in the water tanker truck. The very truck that provides water to put out fires was apparently the source of the problem. Local residents are already concerned about their fire-station-free town landscape and some have expressed concern that their home insurance could go up without a fire station nearby in case of a fire. There is hope for a relatively quick rebound by the Mountain City Fire Department, according to Campbell. "I know a local resident offered some land here at no charge to the fire department. The Volunteer State is already proving itself," Campbell declared.
Volunteer assistance or not, the fire department will still need grants to bridge the gap remaining after the insurance company pays up. Still, the situation could have been much worse, as the Second District Volunteer Fire Department Station #1's firework stand was in a building just a few feet away from the garage where the fire broke out and a propane tank was also just a few feet away. Thankfully, the day wasn’t as explosive as it could have been…………
- Broncos quarterback Tim Richard Tebow is hurt, angry and lashing back at all the haters. The first week of training camp has not gone well for TRT, who entered camp as the odds-on favorite to be the starting QB in Denver for reasons that still aren’t totally clear. After the Broncos used a first-round pick on him in the 2010 draft, he started only three games last season and only then because starter Kyle Orton was injured. Orton is now healthy and still with the team, yet the cult of Tebow’s personality and his immense fan support had made him the people’s choice to start. The consensus was that the Broncos would trade Orton, likely to Miami, to pave the way for Tebow to open the season under center. For a number of reasons, that deal fell through and as he remained in camp in Denver, Orton was vastly outperofming Tebow. The competition wasn’t close and Tebow performed poorly enough that some observers felt third-string QB Brady Quinn looked better than TRT. Resigned to not trading Orton, the Broncos kept him with the first string in practice and declared that he, not Tebow, would be the starter. A spurned Tebow expressed frustration over the decision in an interview with the Denver Post. "My dream, since I was a young boy, of being a starting quarterback in the NFL seemed to be coming true," Tebow said. "Then, I felt like it was grabbed back away." Pressed about his struggles in camp, he admitted to playing poorly but defended his overall effort. "I didn't have a good day on the field (last) Saturday, but I think in the other practices I've thrown well and improved each day," he stated. His tenor was hurt and angry during the interview and part of that anger came from scathing criticism of his game from media members like ESPN NFL analyst Merril Hoge. Hoge tweeted that "it's embarrassing to think the broncos could win with tebow." Hoge has since made it clear that he is not attacking TRT personally but sees major flaws in his game and specifically in his throwing mechanics. That wasn’t enough to placate a defiant Tebow, who turned his anger on his critics. "I'm trying to insulate myself from what people in the media are saying, but I've seen some of it, and it hurts because it's coming from people who haven't seen me practice, haven't seen me play, haven't seen what I can do," Tebow told the newspaper. "I did an interview the other day with someone on the NFL Network who said last year I'd never play a down in the NFL. He was wrong. Others who say I won't make it are wrong. They don't know what I'm capable of and what's inside me. My family and my friends have been bothered by what's gone on, and I tell them to pay no attention to it. I'm relying as always on my faith." Faith is fine, Timbo, but faith doesn’t fix a long, looping throwing motion that takes too long to unfold and inaccurate passing that leads to you overthrowing or underthrowing your receivers on a consistent basis. Believing in yourself is good, but whining and showing an unwarranted sense of entitlement is not. Keep your head down, work on your mechanics and stop acting like you had your gig taken from you when it has been clear all along that Orton is the better quarterback right now………….
- If a nation is truly fortunate, it will some day have the privilege of seeing its former political leader put on trial, held in contempt of court and dragged away to jail by a slow-moving police van driving up its capital city’s main avenue while hundreds of police officers on foot surround the van to keep away the leader’s angry supporters. Ukrainians lived that dream Friday when ex-prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko was placed under arrest for contempt of court during her abuse of power trial which her allies denounce as politically motivated. A truly amazing scene then unfolded in which police drove Tymoshenko away from the courthouse in a police van as her angry supporters filled central Kiev's main Kreshchatyk avenue, chanting and causing a scene. Their anger would have been better directed at judge Rodion Kireyev of Kiev's Pechersk district court , who approved a prosecution request to arrest Tymoshenko due to repeated order violations. Up to that point, she had been free but required to stay in Kiev. Her freedom ended when she was fitted for a pair of the silver bracelets outside the courtroom and led away to the Lukyanovsky detention centre, where she was reunited with some ex-allies, including former interior minister Yuriy Lutsenko and was placed in a special cell for VIP prisoners. As Tymoshenko was driven O.J.-style to her temporary new home, her supporters shouted "Shame!" and pro-Tymoshenko lawmakers brawled with police outside the entrance to the tiny courthouse. "This is a completely unprecedented and illegal action which has no basis," said Sergei Vlasenko, one of Tymoshenko's lawyers. Her top lieutenant Olexander Turchinov went even further, vowing to rally "hundreds, thousands" out on the streets "to fight not only for Yulia but for Ukraine." It is not difficult to see why Tymoshenko has such great support; she was one of the leaders of the pro-Western Orange Revolution in 2004 and nearly won the country’s presidential the next year but lost by a narrow margin to old rival Viktor Yanukovych. Tymoshenko and her rabid followers have suggested that the trial is a vendetta pursued by the new head of state. Vendetta or not, Tymoshenko would have been wise to follow orders from the court - assuming she didn’t want to be arrested for "systematic violations by the accused, including impeding the questioning of witnesses." Tymoshenko went technological with her trial-disrupting hijinks, mocking witnesses and even the judge via Twitter. Oh, and in case you’re wondering what Tymoshenko is on trial for specifically, she is accused of sustaining a loss to Ukraine's budget of 1.5 billion hryvnias ($190 million) when she signed a new energy contract with Russia after a brief interruption of gas deliveries in 2009. Her arrest has upset many Western powers and their anger would likely grow substantially if Tymoshenko is convicted and receives the prescribed sentence of between seven and 10 years in prison. Even without jail time, any guilty verdict would disqualify her from parliamentary polls next year and the next presidential elections in 2015. But in all honesty, is that not a small price to pay for a dream (debacle of a) day come true…………
- Not to bag on one of the longest-running prime time network dramas in television history, but "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation" is quickly becoming the aging rock band that has switched out its lead singer twice, swapped drummers and changed guitarists over its long run together but is still going by the same band name. The revolving door at the Las Vegas Police Department’s crime lab will continue in the show’s 12th season as Marg Helgenberger, who has played crime-scene investigator supervisor Catherine Willows on for 11 seasons, is set to leave the series in January. Her departure comes as the show is re-casting its leading man role for the second time, adding veteran actor Ted Danson to replace Laurence Fishburne, who lasted a solid couple of years after taking the place of original leading man William Peterson. Danson has been tabbed as the new face of the show and series creator Carol Mendelsohn seems fired up about the move. "You can create a new character on the page, but until the perfect actor comes along and breathes life into it, it's just words," Mendelsohn said in a press release. "We're very excited Ted Danson came along." Even with the regular cast changes, “CSI” is still somehow the most-watched TV series in the world. Perhaps the return of original cast member Jorja Fox to reprise her role as Sara Sidle will help offset the buzzkill of Helgenberger’s exodus. Fox was a regular on the show for the first seven seasons of the series before leaving at the beginning of season 8, but has remained popular with fans and returned to the series periodically for guest appearances since then. Helgenberger originally planned to leave the show at the end of last season, but Mendelsohn convinced her to come back for the proverbial proper send-off for her character. "The combination of that info and me having a hard time letting go of this show and this group of people, I said, 'Yeah, I'm not done playing this character; I'm not done letting go of this group of people," Helgenberger said on Wednesday. That group of people and a nice, FAT paycheck would probably do the trick…………
- Now that most of the world has gone wireless, it’s about time someone invented something to wreak havoc with those wireless networks. Two intrepid souls have accepted this challenge and we can now report that Mike Tassey and Richard Perkins have succeeded where others have failed. The two security researchers have designed a drone capable of sniffing WiFi networks, intercepting phone calls and launching DDoS attacks with jamming signals. Dubbed WASP, or Wireless Aerial Surveillance Platform. Their aircraft cost some $6,000 and was built from various hobby materials, including a Styrofoam plane body, plastic propeller, foam tires, as well as standard circuit boards and wires. Yes, you read that list correctly: Styrofoam, plastic, foam and standard wiring. Not exactly military-grade supplies, eh? The WASP also features an IMSI catcher and antennae to spoof a GSM cell tower and intercept calls, along with a network-sniffing tool and 340 million word dictionary to brute-force network passwords. Tassey and Perkins debuted their new toy at the Black Hat 2011 technical security conference, mecca for tech dorks, hackers and imaginary CIA agents in training. The WASP does have the advantage of being programmable with GPS coordinates and Google maps to fly a predetermined course, but it still requires a human controller to take off and land. "It's hard to keep something that's flying from getting over your facility," said Tassey. "[Because] in Starbucks, no one can hear your laptop scream." By the way, both Tassey and Perkins have day jobs as security experts for the federal government and claim they only designed the WASP to demonstrate just how cheap and it easy it is to intercept data transmissions. Point made, fellas…………
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