Yakov Dubin is not likely to do anyone a good deed for a while, if ever again. Society has the New York City Police Department to thank for that. Dubin, 49, was acting more like a Good Samaritan than a petty thief when he was busted by plainclothes officers recently after taking $27 from an old purse he found lying in a local park. Police had left the money in the handbag, which Dubin described as... 

The Fitch ratings agency has downgraded Argentina five notches, saying the country could default on its obligations to US creditors. That’s after a US judge ordered Argentina to set aside $ 1.3bn for debt repayment by December 15. The rating agency cut its long-term rating for Argentina to “CC” from “B,” with the short-term rating being cut to the level one step above default – to “C”... 

In reviewing all the breaking news over the last few months and looking for the “big picture” of where America is headed, one pattern has emerged with striking regularity: America has quietly become less free in many ways than nations like Cuba, China and even Venezuela. This is especially true in California, where “justice” has become a joke, and the power of the state is unleashed in personal... 

Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi Egyptian judges have begun a nationwide strike to protest against President Mohamed Morsi’s new decree, which gives him sweeping powers and places him beyond judicial oversight. During an emergency meeting on Saturday night, the Judges’ Club, a body representing judges across Egypt, denounced Morsi’s presidential decree and announced the immediate “suspension... 

Italian police arrested four people for using a US nationalist online forum on November 16 and later banned access to the website in the entire country. The four nationalists are from Milan, Frosinone and Pescara and are accused of “inciting to racial-hatred”. The police has raided the homes of 17 other people, mostly in the north-eastern region of the country. The forum in question is... 

Just when you thought it was impossible for surveillance to get any creepier, a company has announced it has created mannequins with cameras installed inside that can be used to spy on shoppers and record their conversations – and that they’ve already been rolled out at numerous fashion stores across the world. The EyeSee mannequin, developed by Italian firm Almax, relies on technology used to... 

Egypt’s Constitutional Court is reportedly considering the possibility of impeaching President Mohamed Morsi for violating his oath and undermining the country’s constitutional foundations. ­According to a representative of the court, “the judges are prepared to exercise the right to shift the head of state after he flouted the laws and constitution,” local media reports. On Thursday,... 

A sailor from the Argentinean frigate Libertad seized in a port in Ghana in connection with a debt dispute, runs pas the frigate at Tema Port near Accra. Argentina prepared, October 21, 2012 Argentina has lost its international court battle against a US hedge fund over an impounded navy ship in Accra after a judge blocked an attempt to challenge the authority of Ghanaian courts. Accra’s Commercial... 

Human Rights Watch has called for an international ban on ‘killer robots’ – autonomous machines that independently decide their targets, Press TV reports. “They’re weapons where there is no human intervention. That is, the armed robot itself makes the decision about what its target should be and when it should pull the trigger,” Stephen Goose, the arms division director of Human Rights... 

An upcoming UN-organized conference on global communications aims to hammer out a treaty to safeguard “the free flow of information around the world.” Google is fighting back, saying the treaty threatens the “free and open Internet.” Representatives from UN member-states will gather in Dubai from December 3 through 14 with the explicit aim of working out a new universal information and... 

In India a 21 year old woman was arrested for posting a status on Facebook that was critical of a deceased politician. In addition, her friend that “liked” the status was also arrested, and the post wasn’t even threatening or violent in any way. One could only wonder why people still use Facebook after all these recent horror cases. According to CSM: “The offending post against recently deceased... 

The watch which Geoffrey McGann wore when he got arrested by the TSA TSA arrested a Southern California man for wearing an unusual watch, calling a bomb squad to inspect the gadget while the man was taken into custody. Geoffrey McGann, 49, considered his strange-looking watch a work of art. Created to look like a timer with switches, wires and fuses, security officers were alarmed and immediately detained... 

Cleaning a monument to Vladimir Lenin, Krasnoyarsk. Russian lawmakers believe it is time to remove monuments to the leader of the Bolshevik Revolution, Vladimir Lenin, from town and city squares across the country. Memorials to such “a controversial figure” should be re-located in museums or alleys with statues of other historic persons, suggested the author of the initiative, Liberal-Democratic... 

This Thursday morning in District Heights, Maryland, an FBI swat team rushed into the home of an average, innocent family and shot at an unarmed, 18 year old girl. According to RT: Members of a SWAT team opened fire on an unarmed teenage girl this week when police officers outside of Washington, DC attempted to serve an early morning search warrant. Myasia Hughley, 18, is recovering from flesh wounds... 

Six years after the White House first started running amok on the computer networks of its adversaries, US President Barack Obama has signed off on a top-secret order that finally offers blueprints for the Pentagon’s cyberwars. Pres. Obama has autographed an executive order outlining protocol and procedures for the US military to take in the name of preventing cyberattacks from foreign countries,...