Of the war, Hatch said the U.S. must “hang in there and do what’s right.” He also praised the Utah soldiers who are fighting for freedom.
“It’s about bringing effective changes and establishing principles of democracy,” Hatch said following his speech. “If we can be successful (in Iraq), that will put pressure on all of the Arab states. It will be a rise in freedom and a demand for liberty that has never existed in some of those states.
“And, more importantly, we’ve stopped a mass murderer in Saddam Hussein. Nobody denies that he was supporting al-Qaida.”
In a clear attack on Democrats, Hatch added, “Well, I shouldn’t say nobody. Nobody with brains.”
In its first religious freedom decision under Chief Justice John Roberts, the court said the government cannot hinder religious practices without proof of a “compelling” need to do so.
“This is a very important decision for minority religious freedom in this country,” said lawyer John Boyd, who represents about 130 U.S. members of O Centro Espirita Beneficiente Uniao do Vegetal who live in New Mexico, California and Colorado.
The tea, which contains an illegal drug known as DMT, is considered sacred to members of the sect, which has a blend of Christian beliefs and South American traditions. Members believe they can understand God only by drinking the tea, which is consumed twice a month at four-hour ceremonies.
A trial judge found the government’s evidence that the drug is harmful was equal in weight to information provided by the sect that said its method of use in tea is not. Roberts, in writing the opinion for the court, said the government had failed to prove that federal drug laws should outweigh the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which Congress passed in 1993 to prohibit burdening a person’s exercise of religion.
Canadian sports fans can’t seem to get over an impulsive display of sportsmanship by a Norwegian coach last week, which helped two Canadian skiers win silver medals. Now both Norwegian athletes and the Norwegian Olympic Committee can expect a very sweet “thank-you” to arrive soon.
(snip)
Page is among the thousands of Canadians, many of whom have been writing to Aftenposten’s English news service, who were mightily impressed when Norwegian coach Bjørnar Håkensmoen handed Canadian skier Sara Renner a ski pole after her own broke during a sprint relay last week.
Renner and her teammate Beckie Scott went on to win the event’s silver medal, while the Norwegian duo placed fourth.
SAMARRA, Iraq – A large explosion destroyed the golden dome of one of Iraq’s most famous Shiite shrines Wednesday, spawning mass protests and triggering reprisal attacks against Sunni mosques. It was the third major attack against Shiite targets this week and threatened to enflame sectarian tensions.
Shiite leaders called for calm, but at least five Sunni mosques in the capital and two in Basra were attacked. About 500 Iraqi soldiers were sent to Sunni neighborhoods in Baghdad to prevent clashes between Shiites and Sunnis, army Capt. Jassim al-Wahash said.
No group claimed responsibility for the early morning attack on the Askariya shrine in this city 60 miles north of Baghdad, but suspicion fell on Sunni extremist groups such as al-Qaida in Iraq led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
The Interior Ministry said four men, one wearing a military uniform and three in black, entered the mosque early Wednesday and detonated two bombs, one of which collapsed the dome into a crumbly mess and damaged part of the northern wall of the shrine.
I’m going to be on the road for the next two days, so science will have to go on without me… 🙁
Now with “Question of the Day” – see boxed text!
This is interesting… Radiation levels in Britain increased fourfold around the time of the start of the “shock and awe” bombing campaign in Iraq in March 2003, according to a study cited by the Sunday Times. Chris Busby, from Liverpool University, and a founder of environmental consultancy Green Audit, told the newspaper he believed “uranium aerosols” from Iraq were released into the atmosphere and blown across Europe. “This research shows that rather than remaining near the target as claimed by the military, depleted uranium weapons contaminate both locals and whole populations hundreds to thousands of miles away,” he said. The Ministry of Defence in London and experts from Britain’s leading science body, the Royal Academy, disputed the claims that depleted uranium could be the reason behind the temporary increase in radiation levels, according to the newspaper.
From Grist this morning: What’s the best way to get people to recycle? Same way you get them to do anything: pay them for it. Patrick FitzGerald and Ron Gonen founded RecycleBank in 2004 on the notion that economic incentives would motivate recycling more effectively than green principles. Their system rewards households with up to $400 a year in credits to national chain stores based on the weight of the recyclables they generate — tracked when sanitation crews scan “smart waste” tags in specially supplied recycling bins. In a six-month Philadelphia pilot project involving 2,500 households, recycling rates jumped from 35 to 90 percent in well-off Chestnut Hill, and from 7 to 90 percent in more moderate West Oak Lane. Now RecycleBank has sold its services to several mid-Atlantic and New England municipalities, guaranteeing clients they’ll make back the $24 paid per household — or better — by averting trash-disposal fees. Slightly cynical, maybe, but hey, we’ll take it. Story in NY Times here.
An unusually smooth and crater-free surface on Saturn’s moonlet Telesto may indicate it is a collection of loosely held together pile of rubble. Story and cool photo here with links to other photos as well.
New infectious diseases are now emerging at an exceptional rate, scientists have told a leading conference in St Louis, US. Humans are accumulating new pathogens at a rate of one per year, they said. This meant that agencies and governments would have to work harder than ever before to keep on top of the threat, one expert told the BBC. Most of these new infectious diseases, such as avian influenza and HIV/Aids, are coming from other animals. The difference today, say researchers, is the way humans are interacting with other animals in their environment. Changes in land use through, for example, deforestation can bring humans into contact with new pathogens; and, likewise, agricultural changes, such as the use of exotic livestock. Other important drivers include global travel, global trade and hospitalization. Related story: Scientists uncover clues why some new diseases have only limited outbreaks and others go on to become pandemics. Details here
In the fifth episode of the original Star Trek series, the transporter malfunctioned and beamed up to the Starship Enterprise two copies of Captain Kirk, which looked identical but behaved differently. A new experiment has now demonstrated “quantum telecloning” – transporting a whole laser beam to two separate places. However, like the two Captains Kirk, the two new beams differed slightly from each other and the original – an inherent difference arising from quantum mechanics, says Sam Braunstein at the University of York, UK, one of the researchers. Full story here. Full story here.
Explanation proposed for New Madrid earthquake. The New Madrid earthquake of 1811-12 was one of the worst ever in North America. It is unusual in that it occurred in the middle of a continental plate (where KY, MO, TN, and AR meet), rather than where plate edges meet, like California. A theory proposes that the quake was due to the earth’s crust rebounding from the weight released as the ice sheets from the last ice age melted.
Your morning wouldn’t be complete without some eco-gloom, so here you go: Research shows increased carbon dioxide emissions in the atmosphere are rapidly making the world’s oceans so acidic they could cause a mass extinction of marine life similar to one that occurred 65 million years ago when the dinosaurs disappeared. “The geologic record tells us the chemical effects of ocean acidification would last tens of thousands of years,” said Ken Caldeira, of the Carnegie Institution in Washington, D.C. “But biological recovery could take millions of years. Ocean acidification has the potential to cause extinction of many marine species.”
Question of the day:
Space Adventures, Ltd. is building a spaceport in Singapore to offer suborbital space flights (altitude 64 miles) to five tourists per flight, including five minutes of weightlessness. They estimate the market at $1 billion annually. Sounds like a lot of “blue skies,” while we’re here waiting for the collapse of civilization after peak oil. Who do you think is right? Please comment.
High Tech Weapons Could Minimize Casualties In Urban War
High-tech weapons could minimize casualties in urban warfare, a form of battle that has increasingly become unavoidable in the age of terrorism, defence experts say.
Fears of high casualty rates from old-fashioned bloody hand-to-hand combat have made military commanders dread urban combat.
But high-tech weaponry including precision guided bombs, unmanned vehicles and powerful armoured tanks have reduced troops’ exposure to life-threatening situations, military experts said at an Asian security conference Monday.
The US is also planning to send robot soldiers — called the Special Weapons Observation Reconnaissance Detection Systems (SWORDS) into the field in Iraq, said John Parmentola, director for research and laboratory management for the US Army.
Oh, great, just what we need… robot soldiers. This will remove the morality factor of waging war completely for leaders who value only American lives and consider “collateral damage” as they would consider a dead bug on a Humvee windshield.
WASHINGTON, Feb 21 (IPS) – Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld has signaled that he plans to intensify a campaign to influence global media coverage of the United States, a move that is likely to heighten the debate over press freedom and propaganda-free reporting.
Speaking at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York last week, Rumsfeld said that Washington will launch a new drive to spread and defend U.S. views, especially in the so-called war on terror.
He cited the Cold War-era initiatives of the U.S. Information Agency and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, widely viewed outside the United States as sophisticated propaganda outlets, as a model for the new offensive.
If similar efforts over the past five years are any example, the campaign is likely to take place in two main areas — the U.S. media and the press in the Arab and Muslim worlds, where Washington sees its strategic influence as pivotal.
On Tuesday, Rumsfeld also said that the Pentagon is “reviewing” its practice of paying to plant good news stories in the Iraqi news media, contradicting a previous assertion that the controversial propaganda programme had been halted.
(more)
Groundbreaking Study Documents Lack of Accountability and Command FailureDespite Homicides, Torture, Harsh Conditions of Detention
NEW YORK – FEB. 22 – Human Rights First’s new report, “Command’s Responsibility: Deaths in U.S. Custody in Iraq and Afghanistan,” provides the first comprehensive accounting of the U.S. government’s handling of the nearly 100 cases of detainees who have died in U.S. custody since 2002.
“Looking closely at these cases, we found time and again badly flawed investigations, and a lack of command responsibility for what’s gone wrong – especially in cases where victims were tortured to death. The result across the board has been to create a culture of impunity, where no one, especially not command, is held fully accountable for detainee deaths,” said Deborah Pearlstein, Director of the U.S. Law and Security Program at Human Rights First. “If the United States is serious about preventing torture going forward, there must be accountability up and down the chain of command.”
Please read the whole thing.
A look at some of the numbers in “Command’s Responsibility:”
98 detainee deaths in U.S. custody.
45 suspected or confirmed homicides. Thirty-four deaths were homicides under the U.S. military’s definition; Human Rights First found 11 additional cases where the facts suggest death as a result of physical abuse or harsh conditions of detention.
In 48 cases – close to half of all the cases – the cause of death remains officially undetermined or unannounced.
Certainly 8, as many as 12, people were tortured to death.
Only 12 deaths have resulted in any kind of punishment.
The highest punishment for a torture-related death: 5 months confinement.
The fallout from two doctors refusal to participate in the ritual execution of Michael Morales Monday night continues to tear down the facade of the death penalty’s medical pardigm.
Meanwhile, the legal twists and medical ethics issues raised by the Morales case prompted Assemblyman Joe Nation, D-San Rafael, to urge Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to order a statewide moratorium on the death penalty.
In a written statement, Nation cited medical procedural complications surrounding the lethal injection of Stanley Tookie Williams, who was executed in December.
“We are talking about the state-sanctioned taking of human life, and until we have answers to the serious questions that have been raised, I believe it’s irresponsible to continue,” Nation said. link
Doctors found death duty unethical
Now, legislation is proposed to ensure physicians won’t be called to participate
As the execution of Michael Angelo Morales loomed Monday night, two anesthesiologists apparently came to grips with their potential role in ending the life of another human being.
Legislation proposed in California on Tuesday would make it so that no physician would have to face that dilemma again.
The California Medical Association announced it will sponsor a bipartisan bill that eliminates physician involvement in future executions. {snip}
To ensure that no physician has to be in a position to observe, monitor, advise or otherwise get involved in a future execution, two Assembly members agreed Tuesday to back legislation that would prevent it.
The bill, by Ted Lieu, D-Torrance, and Alan Nakanishi, R-Lodi, would strengthen a 2001 law that prohibits the state from forcing a physician to participate in an execution.
“I am a strong supporter of the death penalty, but the job of the physician is to heal, not to kill,” Nakanishi, who is a physician, said in a statement.
That role, apparently, went beyond what the anesthesiologists had in mind when they agreed to monitor the execution. {snip}
Roberta Loewy, a bioethics professor at UC Davis, said she felt reassured by their decision.
“Just being there lends legitimacy to an enterprise that traditionally physicians have avoided,” she said.
do we have to go over this? St George Daily Spectrum
Obviously, Orrin is abusing the privilege…
rituals ruled legal by SCOTUS: AP/Yahoo
please see Meagert’s diary from yesterday. oops.
Soft Olympic news:
Sweet thanks from Canada
Canadian perspective
That is real sportsmanship. Three cheers for Norwegians!
In the real news (and this is worrysome):
Explosion Destroys Dome of Shiite Shrine
San Francisco finds a use for Dog Poop?
How did I miss this yesterday?
I’m going to be on the road for the next two days, so science will have to go on without me… 🙁
Now with “Question of the Day” – see boxed text!
This is interesting… Radiation levels in Britain increased fourfold around the time of the start of the “shock and awe” bombing campaign in Iraq in March 2003, according to a study cited by the Sunday Times. Chris Busby, from Liverpool University, and a founder of environmental consultancy Green Audit, told the newspaper he believed “uranium aerosols” from Iraq were released into the atmosphere and blown across Europe. “This research shows that rather than remaining near the target as claimed by the military, depleted uranium weapons contaminate both locals and whole populations hundreds to thousands of miles away,” he said. The Ministry of Defence in London and experts from Britain’s leading science body, the Royal Academy, disputed the claims that depleted uranium could be the reason behind the temporary increase in radiation levels, according to the newspaper.
From Grist this morning: What’s the best way to get people to recycle? Same way you get them to do anything: pay them for it. Patrick FitzGerald and Ron Gonen founded RecycleBank in 2004 on the notion that economic incentives would motivate recycling more effectively than green principles. Their system rewards households with up to $400 a year in credits to national chain stores based on the weight of the recyclables they generate — tracked when sanitation crews scan “smart waste” tags in specially supplied recycling bins. In a six-month Philadelphia pilot project involving 2,500 households, recycling rates jumped from 35 to 90 percent in well-off Chestnut Hill, and from 7 to 90 percent in more moderate West Oak Lane. Now RecycleBank has sold its services to several mid-Atlantic and New England municipalities, guaranteeing clients they’ll make back the $24 paid per household — or better — by averting trash-disposal fees. Slightly cynical, maybe, but hey, we’ll take it. Story in NY Times here.
An unusually smooth and crater-free surface on Saturn’s moonlet Telesto may indicate it is a collection of loosely held together pile of rubble. Story and cool photo here with links to other photos as well.
You wouldn’t know it by current world events, but humans actually evolved to be peaceful, cooperative and social animals, not the predators modern mythology would have us believe, says an anthropologist at Washington University in St. Louis.
New infectious diseases are now emerging at an exceptional rate, scientists have told a leading conference in St Louis, US. Humans are accumulating new pathogens at a rate of one per year, they said. This meant that agencies and governments would have to work harder than ever before to keep on top of the threat, one expert told the BBC. Most of these new infectious diseases, such as avian influenza and HIV/Aids, are coming from other animals. The difference today, say researchers, is the way humans are interacting with other animals in their environment. Changes in land use through, for example, deforestation can bring humans into contact with new pathogens; and, likewise, agricultural changes, such as the use of exotic livestock. Other important drivers include global travel, global trade and hospitalization. Related story: Scientists uncover clues why some new diseases have only limited outbreaks and others go on to become pandemics. Details here
In the fifth episode of the original Star Trek series, the transporter malfunctioned and beamed up to the Starship Enterprise two copies of Captain Kirk, which looked identical but behaved differently. A new experiment has now demonstrated “quantum telecloning” – transporting a whole laser beam to two separate places. However, like the two Captains Kirk, the two new beams differed slightly from each other and the original – an inherent difference arising from quantum mechanics, says Sam Braunstein at the University of York, UK, one of the researchers. Full story here. Full story here.
Explanation proposed for New Madrid earthquake. The New Madrid earthquake of 1811-12 was one of the worst ever in North America. It is unusual in that it occurred in the middle of a continental plate (where KY, MO, TN, and AR meet), rather than where plate edges meet, like California. A theory proposes that the quake was due to the earth’s crust rebounding from the weight released as the ice sheets from the last ice age melted.
Your morning wouldn’t be complete without some eco-gloom, so here you go: Research shows increased carbon dioxide emissions in the atmosphere are rapidly making the world’s oceans so acidic they could cause a mass extinction of marine life similar to one that occurred 65 million years ago when the dinosaurs disappeared. “The geologic record tells us the chemical effects of ocean acidification would last tens of thousands of years,” said Ken Caldeira, of the Carnegie Institution in Washington, D.C. “But biological recovery could take millions of years. Ocean acidification has the potential to cause extinction of many marine species.”
Related to the above, research suggests proton radiation may be more damaging to the DNA of astronauts than previously thought, meaning engineers will have to pay more attention to the potential hazards of protons.
Captain Kirk and the New Madrid fault, all in one news bucket. Gonna be a good day.
Scary about the radiation blowing across Europe…what is happening to people in Iraq?
And why doesn’t it surprise me that you have to pay so many folks to get them to recycle?
link
High-tech weapons could minimize casualties in urban warfare, a form of battle that has increasingly become unavoidable in the age of terrorism, defence experts say.
Fears of high casualty rates from old-fashioned bloody hand-to-hand combat have made military commanders dread urban combat.
But high-tech weaponry including precision guided bombs, unmanned vehicles and powerful armoured tanks have reduced troops’ exposure to life-threatening situations, military experts said at an Asian security conference Monday.
The US is also planning to send robot soldiers — called the Special Weapons Observation Reconnaissance Detection Systems (SWORDS) into the field in Iraq, said John Parmentola, director for research and laboratory management for the US Army.
Oh, great, just what we need… robot soldiers. This will remove the morality factor of waging war completely for leaders who value only American lives and consider “collateral damage” as they would consider a dead bug on a Humvee windshield.
Rumsfeld Declares War on Bad Press
Human Rights First Releases First Comprehensive Report on Detainee Deaths in U.S. Custody
Please read the whole thing.
Bush was Unaware of Ports Deal until after decision was made
Do they ever tell this President anything? Maybe he was bushcutting and didn’t want to be disturb. Again.
The fallout from two doctors refusal to participate in the ritual execution of Michael Morales Monday night continues to tear down the facade of the death penalty’s medical pardigm.
Background