Haroldson's Journal

Well it's been quite a day, I went to a funeral today and it has a way of getting one's attention that life is short even if you die at 90 like the old veteran that passed over.

But I won't lay that on you, since this is the first of what I hope will become place where everyone knows your name, only figurative of course.

One of the things I like to do is capture a glimpse of the current events. So this is what the world is up to today.

We do not spy on US, says Israel
Guardian - 55 minutes ago
Israel's government has rejected allegations of espionage within the Pentagon, insisting it maintains a ban on spying in the US.

Muslims Appeal to Iraqi Captors
Arab News - 17 minutes ago
BAGHDAD, 30 August 2004 - Muslim leaders in Iraq and France yesterday appealed for the release of two kidnapped French journalists facing death.

Terrorists blamed for Russian plane crashes
China Daily - 26 minutes ago
Evidence of the explosive hexogen was found on a Tu-134 jetliner that crashed in the Tula region south of Moscow, said Sergei Ignatchenko, spokesman for the Federal Security Service. Terrorists.

Gloria's strong voice falls silent
Melbourne Herald Sun - 2 hours ago
He would not disclose the cause, though her official website listed it as a brain aneurism. Gloria stayed on top of the pop charts for 36 weeks and earned Branigan a Grammy nomination for best female pop vocalist.

For Greece, the Games Leave Pride, Relief and a Huge Bill
New York Times - 23 minutes ago
The last heart-pounding race of the Summer Games ended Sunday in a white marble arena in the heart of Athens, bringing the modern Olympics full circle - back to the precise spot where they were revived 108 years ago.

Tens of thousands denounce Bush in New York

Tens of thousands of demonstrators in New York City marched past the Madison Square Garden, on the eve of the Republican National Convention.

For almost 20 blocks, the demonstrators packed the street, as they slowly filed past the landmark stadium in Manhattan.

"Hope is in the air, help is on the way," civil rights leader Jesse Jackson said through a bullhorn.

Under bright late summer sunshine and sweltering heat, the protesters carried a variety of signs, many denouncing either U.S. President George W. Bush or the war in Iraq, or both.

The vocal and high-spirited crowd was cheered on by filmmaker, and prominent Bush critic, Michael Moore.

"The majority of this country wants the Bush administration out of office," Moore said.

Up to 250,000 demonstrators were expected to march up Seventh Avenue past the convention site.

"Today we send our message," said Leslie Cagan, leader of United for Peace and Justice, the march's organizer.

One handmade sign read, "Iraq and Vietnam. So many deliberate lies. So many wasted lives."

A large banner said, "Save America. Defeat Bush." People poked their heads out of apartment windows to watch the marchers.

Moore, the director of Fahrenheit 9/11, told fellow protesters that "the majority never voted for the Bush administration, and the majority are here to say, `It's time to have our country back in our hands.'"

At mid-afternoon, a small fire erupted along the protest route a half block from Madison Square Garden. Police quickly doused the flames, then handcuffed two people and led them away.

Meanwhile, on the other side of New York Harbor, U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney told a rally on Ellis Island that Bush was "exactly the leader we need for these times, and we need him for the next four years."

With the New York skyline as the background, Cheney said it was "a special honor to kick things off here on this island, the gateway to America for so many people."

But one of the leading lights of the U.S. Democratic Party, New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, said that Bush's re-election "would be a disaster."

Interviewed on NBC's "Meet the Press," Clinton accused the president of "four years of unaccountable use of power" and of a failed economic policy.

The convention site is several miles north of Ground Zero, where two hijacked planes destroyed both towers of the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. Nearly 3,000 people died there, at the Pentagon and at a crash site in Pennsylvania.

Thousands of police guarded New York roadways, bridges, tunnels and ports, while vehicle restrictions in an 18-square-block area around the Garden snarled traffic in a city already congested.

Well... that and the fact that the Olympics 2004 just ended safely today. Shows what 1 Billion Dollars of security can provide for Greece.

Nine heart attack risks for everyone
From correspondents in Toronto
30aug04

CANADIAN doctors behind a major global study today said it should be possible to prevent most premature heart attacks after they found risk factors transcended ethnic and racial divides.

Their research found that heart attacks could be predicted by nine factors - common to Europeans, Asians, Africans, Arabs and other ethnic groups and races.

Salim Yusuf, of McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, said conventional wisdom had previously suggested that only half of the risks of premature heart attack could be foreseen.

But the survey of 29,000 people in 52 countries proved that almost all risk factors were similar, could be detected, and therefore prevented, he said.

"This suggests that the message of preventing cardiovascular disease can be quite simple and, generally, similar across the world, after taking into account economic and cultural differences.

"Since these risk factors may all be modified, this is remarkable and will change the way we look at heart attack prevention. It means we should be able to prevent the majority of premature heart attacks in the world."

The highest of the nine risk factors for premature heart disease identified by the study were cigarette smoking and an abnormal ratio of blood lipids.

Also included were high blood pressure, diabetes, abdominal obesity, stress, a lack of daily consumption of fruits and vegetables and a lack of daily exercise.

The ninth factor centred on a finding that people who had a moderate and regular intake of alcohol gained modest protection from heart disease.

The study known as INTERHEART, assessed 15,152 people who had had a first heart attack and 14,820 others who had not, but were from the same age group, gender and the same city as a counterpart who had fallen ill.

It was the first study into whether risk factors for heart disease were the same across ethnic groups and different areas of the world.

It evaluated 7000 Europeans, 2000 people from Latin America, 6000 Chinese, 4000 South Asians, 2000 other Asians, 3500 Arabs and 1400 Africans.

Also included were 450 Canadians.

The Canadian Institutes of Health Research said there was a growing global epidemic of cardiovascular disease, with more than 15 million deaths from heart attacks in 1998 alone.

The study, presented at a European cardiologists' convention in Germany, will be published in the medical journal The Lancet next month.

http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/printpage/0,5481,10613184,00.html