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The 'dumb blonde' who excelled as a spy Helena Smith Sunday October 30, 2005 The Observer Long before Valerie Plame became America's most famous spy, she learnt Greek and moved to Athens. It was 1990, her first foreign posting and not long after graduation from Penn State University - and recruitment to the CIA - nearly everything she dreamed of. Ambitious, blonde and beautiful, Plame, then 27, took to the job with alacrity. With 'State Department Cover' at Athens' US embassy, the secrets of her trade were easy to conceal. Greece, under the unpredictable governance of Andreas Papandreou, a former...

President Jiang Zemin gets an update on China´s Terfenol-D project. The U.S. Navy spent millions of dollars to develop Terfenol-D in the early 1980s, and intelligence experts estimate that the People's Republic of China (PRC) has devoted extensive resources to try to steal it. Insight has learned that these PRC efforts have paid off. The spy target is an exotic material made up of two types of rare-earth metals called lanthanides, terbium and dysprosium, plus iron (FE). The NOL stands for Naval Ordnance Laboratory. Hence the name Terfenol-D. Those who have worked with this exotic material call it almost magical....

College Progressives at Penn State University were not happy with the steep entry price to a “Conversation with Chelsea” event featuring former First Daughter Chelsea Clinton, the least successful member of the Clinton political dynasty. The event, which took place Wednesday in State College, Pa., charged $500 just to get in the door, and $1,000 for a photo with Chelsea. For $2,700, attendees would be granted access to a special reception with the guest of honor. College Progressives at Penn State really wanted to be a part of the so-called “conversation,” but quite rightly noted that $500 was a hefty...

The U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has just completed a series of landmark reports that chronicle an update to the current state of consensus science on climate change. Its conclusion: On our current path, climate change could pose an irreversible, existential risk to civilization as we know it, but we can still fix it if we decide to work together. But in addition to the call for cooperation, the reports also shared an alarming new trend: Climate change is already destabilizing nations and leading to wars. That finding was highlighted in last week's premiere of Showtime's climate change docu-drama...