The shape of things to come? Sure looks like it. And this incident happened before Gov. Jan Brewer signed the SB1070 into law on Friday. Video and story from AzFamily.com. PHOENIX – A Valley man says he was pulled over Wednesday morning and questioned when he arrived at a weigh station for his commercial vehicle along Val Vista and the 202 freeway. Abdon, who did not want to use his last name, says he provided several key pieces of information but what he provided apparently was not what was needed. He tells 3TV, “I don't think it's correct, if I have to take my birth certificate with me all the time.” Think Progress: Even Tancredo worries AZ immigration law may go too far: People shouldn’t be pulled over for how they look.

After killing a record 700 civilians last year in at least 44 distinct drone strikes against Pakistan in 2009, the Obama Administration looks to be escalating the rate even further in 2010, to the point that drone strikes have become a decidedly ordinary occurrence. Less than four months into the new year, the US has already launched 40 attacks and killed at least 268 people. The most recent strike yesteray in North Waziristan killed at least nine people. The identities of the victims are never particularly easy to ascertain, but the number of named militants killed so far this year is trivial, as it was last year, when most of the “suspects” turned out to have no discernible relation to any militant faction.

STATE TERROR: US drone attack kills 5 PEOPLE in Pakistan: At least five people have been killed in a US drone attack in the troubled North Waziristan tribal region of Pakistan on the Afghan border. Several more people were injured when two missiles hit a nearby compound in Boya village, located about 20 kilometers (12 miles) west of Miranshah. Since last year, the US has carried out many such attacks on Pakistan's tribal areas. Washington claims its airstrikes target militants. Most of the attacks, however, have killed civilians. AWIP: 11th Drone Strike of 2010: Latest US Attack Kills Six in North Waziristan: AFP: 11 killed in US missile strikes in NW Pakistan: officials. AntiWar: US Drone Fired Missile Into a Crowd of "Suspects," Killing 13 Afghans. TANSW: Pakistan Taliban deny US drone strike killed top leader. This comes on top of this Nobel Peace Prize winner Kills at Least 15 in North Waziristan and this Civilians Slain as Latest US Drone Strike on North Waziristan, Kills Five and this US Drones Kill 12 in North Waziristan: Third TERROR Strike in 24 Hours in Tribal Area and this U.S. Drones Kill 15 People Near Border in Pakistan and summing up all of 2009, this: 44 US drone hits in Pakistan killed 700 civilians in 2009. + AWIP: No assent given to US drone attacks: Pakistan. The Guardian: The 'Obama doctrine': kill, don't detain -George Bush left a big problem in the shape of Guantánamo. The solution? Don't capture bad guys, assassinate by drone. PressTV: Suspected US drone strikes kill eight in north-west Pakistan. PressTV: In Pakistan, death toll from US drone attack hits 8 Yahoo: US drone kills seven PEOPLE in NW Pakistan: security officials.

Proposed deal would see incumbent and rival split prime ministerial term. The United States is trying to resolve the growing crisis over the formation of a new Iraqi government, with a deal between current prime minister Nouri al-Maliki and his main rival Iyad Allawi under which each man would hold the post of prime minister for two years at the head of a coalition government, The Independent has learned. Fearful of growing political turmoil that would make it difficult or embarrassing to withdraw its remaining combat troops by August this year [They will not be withdrawn. Thousands of them will remain.], as President Barack Obama has pledged, Washington has arranged talks about a joint government. The proposal is for Mr Maliki and Mr Allawi to split the four-year prime ministerial term, according to Dr Mahmoud Othman, who is a veteran member of the Baghdad parliament.

Washington says “all options are on the table” in dealing with Tehran, in a veiled threat, which refers to a new US nuclear policy. During a Sunday address to attendees of a Pentagon briefing, US Defense Secretary Robert Gates touched on the newly-crafted Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), under which the Obama administration promises not to use nuclear weapons against states that do not possess nuclear warheads, with the exception of Iran. Gates asserted that the 22,000-word Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) does not apply to countries such as Iran and North Korea because they belong to a certain category of states that Washington will never limit its options against.

More than 90,000 Okinawans rallied Sunday to oppose the relocation of an American air base on their island, adding to the pressure on Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama to resolve an issue that has divided Tokyo and Washington.

Elite U.S. Units Step Up Effort in Afghan City Before Attack: Small bands of elite American Special Operations forces death squads have been operating with increased intensity for several weeks in Kandahar, southern Afghanistan’s largest city, picking up or picking off arresting or killing insurgent leaders to weaken the Taliban in advance of major operations, senior administration and military officials say. It will follow a first offensive, into the hamlet of Marja, that is showing mixed results a waste of time and $$$. As in Iraq, officials said, the strategy will include monetary incentives bribes in the form of economic development money US taxpayer-backed contractor bl*jobs for local leaders and tribal officials who support the government’s security efforts protection of gas and opium pipelines. [I'm really tired of the 'massaging' of the news by the New York Times. 'Monetary incentives.' Come the f*ck on. It's *bribes.* --LRP]

Top executives at Goldman Sachs boasted that they were making 'some serious money' as millions of homeowners around the world were plunged into misery by the housing crash. Chief executive Lloyd Blankfein admitted in one email that the bank gambled on the market going down. 'Of course we didn't dodge the mortgage mess,' Mr Blankfein wrote on November 18, 2007. 'We lost money, then made more than we lost because of the shorts,' he added, referring to the practice of 'shorting', or betting against an investment. In another email written as the credit crunch began to bite in October, 2007, senior Goldman executive Michael Swenson said: 'Sounds like we will make some serious money.'

One of Spain's top matadors has been seriously injured in Mexico when a 1,100-pound bull gored him in the groin and hoisted him into the air, causing major blood loss. Jose Tomas received a transfusion of 17 pints of blood after being gored Saturday by a beast named Navegante in the Mexican city of Aguascalientes. The bull's horn penetrated 4 inches into Tomas' groin and punctured a vein and an artery, manager Salvador Boix told Spanish radio station Cadena Ser from Aguascalientes. Tomas, one of Spain's most popular matadors, has a relatively rare blood type – A negative – and bled so profusely that bullring officials appealed over the arena loudspeakers for compatible donors to come forward for transfusions, Boix said.

Police in the east Indian state of Chhattisgarh are “exploring” laying charges under the state’s draconian anti-terrorism law against Arundhati Roy, a Booker Prize-winning novelist, essayist and human rights campaigner. The police initiated their investigation of Roy in response to a complaint filed by one Viswajit Mitra that accused Roy of “glorifying Maoists” in an article published in the March 29 issue of Outlook India. Titled “Walking with the Comrades,” Roy’s 33-page magazine article reports on a clandestine visit she made to Dandakaranya, a forest highland area largely inhabited by tribal people or adivasi, so that she could speak with, and bear witness to, the activities of Maoist guerrillas.

Roy is threatened with prosecution under Chhattisgarh’s notorious Special Public Security Act (2005) or CPSA. The law, which was authored by the Hindu supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), provides a sweeping definition of “unlawful activities.” Under its provisions, an act or even a written or verbal communication that “poses a danger or fear thereof” to “public order,” or that “has a tendency to pose an obstacle” to “the administration of law,” or that “encourages” disobedience to any law or institutions “set up by law” is unlawful and could result in a seven-year prison term.

Former Austrian Ambassador to Tehran Helmuth Werner Ehrlich lashed out at the US President, Barack Obama, for his recent nuclear threat against Iran, underlining that Obama has made the remarks in full violation of human rights principles and international laws. "Obama's nuclear threat against Iran fully violate the human rights and international laws. I believe that use of nuclear weapons should be totally banned," the Austrian diplomat said in an interview with FNA on Sunday. Obama, in an interview with The New York Times, threatened Iran and North Korea with nuclear weapons.

Tim Phillips, lobbyist and chairman of Americans for Prosperity (AFP) is in Europe and Oslo to endorse and teach the Norwegian right wing party (Fremskrittspartiet) how to organize so-called grassroots campaigns. But the grass root campaigns such as those the Tea Party Movement and AFP holds aren't bottom-up crowds, but pure lobbying campaigns financed by billionaires with a clear political agenda.

A homeless man who was stabbed when he rushed to assist a woman being attacked on a New York City street died on the sidewalk as pedestrians strolled by, apparently unaware or uncaring that he needed. NYP: Stabbed hero dies as more than 20 people stroll past him.

Amid mounting frustration over taxation and banking problems, small but growing numbers of overseas Americans are taking the weighty step of renouncing their citizenship. “What we have seen is a substantial change in mentality among the overseas community in the past two years,” said Jackie Bugnion, director of American Citizens Abroad, an advocacy group based in Geneva. “Before, no one would dare mention to other Americans that they were even thinking of renouncing their U.S. nationality. Now, it is an openly discussed issue.”

A convicted killer will be executed by firing squad in the U.S. state of Utah after a judge last night agreed to the inmate's request. Ronnie Lee Gardner, 49, was given the choice of being killed by lethal injection or shot by a five-man team of executioners firing from a set of matched rifles - a rarely used method of execution that harkens back to to the Wild West. 'I would like the firing squad, please,' Gardner told state court Judge Robin Reese after hearing his avenues for appeal appear to be exhausted.

Ben Smith points out that Sarah Palin has come out in defense of evangelist Franklin Graham, Billy Graham’s son, who was disinvited by the Army from an official ceremony because of his history of anti-Islam remarks. For once, this counts as Palin making real news: She’s siding with someone who unequivocally said Islam is a “very evil and wicked religion” in 2001. In defending Graham, Palin claimed that Graham’s remarks were directed only at radical and violent Jihadists. Actually, no, his comments weren’t aimed only at those radical enough to kill and subjugate women. They were directed at all of Islam. Here, according to the Charlotte Observer on November 19th, 2001, is what Graham said:

“We’re not attacking Islam but Islam has attacked us. The God of Islam is not the same God. He’s not the son of God of the Christian or Judeo-Christian faith. It’s a different God and I believe it is a very evil and wicked religion.”

Aliens almost certainly exist but humans should avoid making contact, Professor Stephen Hawking has warned. In a series for the Discovery Channel the renowned astrophysicist said it was "perfectly rational" to assume intelligent life exists elsewhere. But he warned that aliens might simply raid Earth for resources, then move on. "If aliens visit us, the outcome would be much as when Columbus landed in America, which didn't turn out well for the Native Americans," he said. Prof Hawking thinks that, rather than actively trying to communicate with extra-terrestrials, humans should do everything possible to avoid contact. He explained: "We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn't want to meet." "The real challenge is to work out what aliens might actually be like." The programme envisages numerous alien species including two-legged herbivores and yellow, lizard-like predators. But Prof Hawking conceded most life elsewhere in the universe is likely to consist of simple microbes.

More than 30 logistical vehicles of U.S-NATO cowardly invaders consisting of oil tankers and container-filled trucks were torched Sunday morning (April 25) by angry civilians in a protest against the martyrdom of 4 non-combatant civilians by American cowardly evils yesterday night near the provincial capital of Logar province. According to the details, the American evil forces invaded civilian homes in the night hours of Saturday, martyring four non-combative civilians and taking 2 others as captives in Kamal Khel village near the provincial capital of this province. Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan: Blast hits logistical convoy of U.S-NATO in Zabul.

Taliban militants say they have shot down a NATO helicopter in the troubled western Afghanistan amid rising causalities aging the US-led foreign forces there. The incident took place in Farah Province on Saturday. The Taliban say at least 13 foreign soldiers were killed in the incident. Afghan officials have confirmed the crash and launched an investigation into the event. They say it is still not clear what exactly caused the helicopter to go down.

While on a speaking engagement in Malaysia organized by "Success Resources Company", former British Prime Minister Tony Blair was the object of an articulate protest movement demanding his indictment for war crimes. This was no ordinary protest. Tony Blair has been accused of war crimes in a legal initiative led by the country's former Prime Minister, Dr. Mahathir Mohamad. Having arrogantly told the Chilcot Inquiry in London that he had no regrets for invading Iraq notwithstanding there were no WMDs, Blair displayed cowardice in the face of only seven delegates. While these unfolding events have been acknowledged by the Malaysian press, Tony Blair's visit to Malaysia has passed virtually unnoticed in the United Kingdom. In fact, outside of Malaysia, the issue has not received press coverage.

A dad who shot dead a judge and a senior politician because they molested his three-year old daughter has become a national hero after going on the run in Lithuania, Austrian Times reported.

Palestinian protesters and Israeli police have clashed after Jewish settlers marched in the Arab neighbourhood of Silwan in occupied East Jerusalem. The hardline settlers, who live in illegal housing units on occupied Palestinian land, want Arabs removed from the area and their homes demolished to make way for Israeli construction projects.

Bianca Zammit [was] shot in her outer thigh (leg) by armed Israeli soldiers as she filmed, unarmed, at a Palestinian demonstration against the Israeli-imposed "buffer zone". Bianca, about 3 metres to my left, was standing stationary, filming the IOF soldiers shooting on unarmed Palestinians between us and the border fence. As she was stationary, it is very unlikely that Bianca's shooting was an accident.