| Spring items, wet cleanup stood out at Wal-Mart debut
I wandered through the new Wal-Mart Superstore in Belleville on opening day Wednesday. It's laid out pretty much like the store in O'Fallon. I liked all the skylights, though for such a sunny day, the store seemed a bit dim. I expect the staff will get the self-checkout lanes open soon. Spring has definitely sprung, because I saw lots of bathing suits, beachy purses and lawn furniture. Chester Cheetah, the mascot for Cheetos, was near the electronics section, all 7-foot or so of him in an inflatable costume. He was having a hard time attracting children for photos (looks of terror and back-pedaling) while I was there, but adults were stepping right up. As I was checking out the pet supplies at the other end of the store, I couldn't help but laugh when the public address system announced: "We need a wet cleanup by the Cheetos guy." ...
Universal's American Gangster to be next big HD DVD exclusive
One of the first rumors from Daily Variety to hit following Warner's move was that Universal and Paramount were both poised to make the switch to Blu-ray Disc, but Graffeo refutes such reports. "I want to say that none of those rumors were substantiated. Nobody ever talked to us. I know nobody talked to Paramount ... This is business as usual for us and there are no plans to make any changes." One part of HD DVD's new strategy is on lower prices and selling the hardware's ability to upscale regular DVD movies. Graffeo explained the logic behind the new push, "Consumers right now are buying upconverting players – they are outselling the next-gen players combined by 10 to 1 every month. They are affordable because they are under $200 – the average price is $85 – and consumers want to see their movies better.
Bell Resources Reports La Balsa NI 43-101 Technical Report
On September 4, 2007, Bell Resources announced it had entered into a proposed business combination with Rogue River Resources Corp., a non-reporting company ("Rogue River") and Grandcru Resources Corporation ("Grandcru") (TSX VENTURE:GR) whereby the three companies will complete a business combination to form one company and collectively benefit from the exploration potential of Bell and Grandcru's copper exploration assets and near term production potential of Rogue River's La Balsa Project.
Bell Resources is focused on the exploration and development of a diversified portfolio of base metal projects in the America's most prolific copper producing regions. Bell's corporate strategy concentrates on advancing assets toward production, while continuing to target new acquisitions with geological potential and economic viability.
Detainee file was overseen by 'Tiger Team'
A specially created team of military officers played a key role in severely limiting what the Canadian public was allowed to know about the country's role in Afghanistan. Originally created to assist an investigation into the treatment of detainees in Afghanistan, the new team – codenamed Tiger Team – quickly came to scrutinize virtually every public access to information request dealing with the Afghan mission, according to documents obtained by The Globe and Mail. In effect, the team added an extra layer of scrutiny to the access to information process, making it so complicated that an access to information official eventually described it as "convoluted." The added scrutiny also caused many delays in responding to requests, as access to information officers struggled to understand the new system at a time when the government faced harsh criticism over the treatment of detainees.
Coming Soon: SR to Release E-mail Exchanges ... (Not so fast...)
Update: After reviewing the messages and our options (none good), we've decided not to post the messages. Here's the situation: Of the 50 messages, a few have explicit photos embedded in the message. We can't publish those photos (one shows a toddler's penis). We also have a strong ethical policy against blurring or otherwise manipulating photos. Some of the messages are completely innocuous. The rest of the messages only refer to attachments. Those attachments are explicit, so we can't publish them. We've also gone through each message to blur e-mail addresses for privacy reasons. So, if we don't publish any of the explicit images, and we refuse to blur, crop or otherwise alter them, all we're left with is a bunch of forwarded messages that say things like "take a look at this!" We decided that did not advance the story in any significant way.
Bilingualism issue still a hot potato
Reeve Earl Zotter set a special meeting for February 7 to deal with third reading of motion to rescind the bylaw. The transformation of St. Laurent into a bilingual municipality has been a bone of contention for residents of the small municipality. In 1996, council of the day decided to correspond with the Association of Manitoba Bilingual Municipalities AMBM). In August that year, a delegation came out and explained that as a member of the AMBM, projects initiated would qualify for four-way funding from the federal and provincial governments, the AMBM and the municipality. Council agreed in principle to join the AMBM. Council indicated at the time that the public would be consulted. By September of that year, a bylaw was drawn up and passed first reading. A special meeting was held later that month at which delegations and letters of concern cautioning council of their decision were heard.
Mandan residents ask for noise ordinance
It's just too bad so many ordinarily pleasant people are getting so worked up over such a silly thing. Life is about more than fighting a bar and restaurant over a zoning permit. That's just the chance you take when you buy next to undeveloped land. " .
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