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America pointed the finger of blame at the Syrian regime last night for the chemical weapons attack on civilians that has horrified the world. The US State Department said Syrian rebels did not have the means to carry out an outrage on the scale seen in the Damascus suburbs on Wednesday--lleaving tyrant Bashar Al Assad firmly in the dock. Amid signs that the West is rapidly moving closer to intervention in Syria’s bloody civil war, Barack Obama ordered US intelligence agencies to ‘urgently gather’ evidence about the attack, which killed up to 1,700 civilians, many of them women and children.

The Obama administration said Thursday it was “unable to conclusively determine” whether chemical weapons were used in an attack on civilians last week in Syria and pressed for a United Nations probe. “The president has directed the intel community here in the United States to urgently gather additional information. That is our focus on this end,” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said. “At this time, right now, we are unable to conclusively determine [chemical weapons] use, but we are focused every minute of every day since these events happened yesterday on doing everything possible within our power to nail down...

The men, women and children lying undisturbed in their beds had looked so peaceful they might have been just sleeping, Abu Nidal thought, as he and other rescuers dragged their bodies into the street. His was one of many accounts of a massive assault on the eastern suburbs of Damascus that activists say killed more than 500 people on Wednesday morning. "We would go into a house and everything was in its place, every person was in their place. They were lying where they had been. They looked like they were asleep. But they were dead," he told Reuters by...

Saudi Arabia called on Wednesday for an emergency U.N. Security Council meeting to discuss reports of a chemical attack that opposition groups say killed hundreds of people in Syria, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal said. "It is time for the Security Council to shoulder its responsibility and overcome differences between its members and restore the confidence of the international community by convening immediately to issue a clear and deterrent resolution that will put an end to this human crisis," Prince Saud said in a statement.

Chemical engineers in the United States are pulling a median salary of $120,000, a 9 percent hike since 2011, according to the American Institute of Chemical Engineers. And unemployment in the field has dropped to 2.1 percent, from 3.8 percent in 2011. Chemical engineers in the Houston/Galveston area are especially well paid, with a median salary of $144,200. The median salary for chemical engineers for the state as a whole is $140,000, according to the survey. The American Institute of Chemical Engineers has released the latest edition of its biennial salary survey, which shows the employment environment has improved considerably...

Chemical engineers are pulling a median salary of $120,000, a 9 percent hike since 2011, according to the American Institute of Chemical Engineers. And unemployment in the field has dropped to 2.1 percent, from 3.8 percent in 2011. The trade group has released the latest edition of its biennial salary survey, which shows the employment environment has improved considerably for chemical engineers in the past couple of years. In the group’s last survey, conducted in 2011, raises for chemical engineers had declined to their lowest point in two decades. Since then, the U.S. shale boom has released an abundance of...

Israeli and U.S. military officials are coordinating how to target and destroy Syrian president Bashar Assad’s arsenal of unconventional weapons under assorted scenarios, Israeli military and intelligence officials told TIME Magazine. One scenario would be the sudden removal of Assad from the scene, the magazine said. “That would prompt the allies to launch operations on the estimated 18 depots and other sites where WMDs are stored,” Israei military and intelligence officials said. “Search and destroy operations would also be launched if the weapons appeared to be about to fall into the hands of the rebels, which include Islamist extremists aligned...

In a sharp escalation of the U.S. role in Syria's bloody civil war, the White House announced late Thursday that it will provide military aid to rebels fighting to topple President Bashar al-Assad after confirming that his government used chemical weapons on the opposition. Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications Ben Rhodes told reporters on a conference call that President Barack Obama had heard pleas from Syria's rebel Supreme Military Council (SMC) for more help. "Our aim is to be responsive," Rhodes said, underlining that the new assistance would have "direct military purposes."

Exxon Mobil Corp. is launching a push to recruit and educate thousands of new workers in Houston for expanding chemical operations along the Texas coast. The nation’s largest energy company is coordinating with programs at nine Houston-area community colleges and organizations, including Houston Community College, Lee College and Lone Star College, to share expertise and curricula as it tries remedy a huge shortage of workers who are trained and ready to fill positions, said Steve Pryor, president of Exxon Mobil’s chemical division. Exxon Mobil on Friday will announce a $500,000 commitment to coordinate the programs and recruit prospective workers through...

Two women in a convenience store were burned in an assault in the early hours of Monday morning when another woman entered the store and doused them with a flammable liquid that ignited. The women were inside the Buy & Save convenience store in the 2700 block of Azle Avenue playing video games around 2:30 a.m. when the suspect entered and sprayed them with an unknown liquid, according to the Fort Worth Fire Department. [Snip] It is unclear why the women were attacked or how the liquid was ignited. One victim, whom Hilo described as 18 or 19 years...

Title has it.

Inside a Mouse's Brain Lies a Chemical Key to the Fountain of Youth By Greg Thomas Source image via Wikipedia If a scientist came to you with a plan to tweak a gland in the center of your brain so that you may live to be 140 years old, you'd probably back out of the room slowly and go to file a police report, because that's creepy. But new research shows that it's not altogether impossible. A new report from researchers at the Albert Einstein School of Medicine in the Bronx shows that scientists can tinker with the minds of...

Following this weekend's explosive escalation in Syria, the big unknown was how Russia and China would respond: the two countries have long been known to be opposed to the US-Israel axis' involvement and intervention in Syria, although they have so far kept their involvement to a minimum. Today we get the answer: "Russia said on Monday it was concerned the chances of foreign military intervention in Syria were growing following reports of Israeli air strikes around Damascus which were a source of "particular alarm". "We are seriously concerned by the signs of preparation of global public opinion for possible armed...

President Obama today defended his administration’s slow response to reports of chemical weapon use in Syria, in spite of his earlier promises that the use of such weapons would be considered ‘crossing a red line’. The President said at a press conference on Tuesday that ‘there is a whole host of steps that we´ve been taking’ but he did not specifically say whether his administration would be prepared to take military action against Bashar al-Assad’s regime. He said the war-torn country is ‘a blemish on the international community.’‘Generally when you use these kinds of weapons, you have the potential

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U.S. President Barack Obama repeated on Friday his past assertions that the use of chemical weapons in Syria would cross a line and produce an American response. At the same time, he indicated that he was not yet 100% certain that the findings by U.S. intelligence agencies are an indication that such weapons had indeed been used. “Knowing that there’s chemical weapons in Syria doesn’t tell us when they were used or how they were used,” Obama told reporters before a meeting with King Abdullah II of Jordan which focused on Syria. “We ourselves will be putting a lot of...

<p>WASHINGTON, April 25 (Reuters) - The U.S. intelligence community assesses with varying degrees of confidence that the Syrian regime used chemical weapons on a small scale, the White House said on Thursday, adding however that such assessments were not enough and that "credible and corroborated" facts were needed.</p>

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Thursday the U.S. intelligence community believes the Syrian regime used the chemical weapon sarin, a revelation that immediately raised the question of whether a "red line" had been crossed in the country's civil war. Hagel confirmed the intelligence assessment, which was detailed in a letter to select members of Congress, while speaking to reporters on a visit to Abu Dhabi. The administration swiftly released those letters, which said U.S. intelligence determined with varying degrees of confidence that "the Syrian regime has used chemical weapons on a small scale in Syria, specifically the chemical agent sarin."...

You know, with President Obama, you often get this tough guy talk that, like a wannabe schoolyard bad dude, sounds a litte hollow. Whether he says he’s trying to figure out “whose ass to kick” or vows to Iran, “I don’t bluff,” one gets the sense that, well, he does bluff. And bluffs sometimes work, and sometimes, bluffs get called. Obama looks dangerously close to having to live up to his vow that use of chemical weapons by Syria would be a “red line” and a “game changer.” What exactly does all that mean? Who knows. But if it doesn’t...

(Reuters) - The Free Syrian Army rebel command said President Bashar al-Assad's forces launched a chemical weapon attack on the northern town of Khan al-Assal near Aleppo on Tuesday using a long-range missile.