In one area, however, she holds the superior position – security. More than once, I’ve caught her smirking as I go through the weekly security checks on my PC. Have I downloaded all the latest antivirus updates? What about my spyware protection? Is my firewall working properly?
But if recent news of Mac worms and vulnerabilities are any indication, my wife, and other Mac users, soon will be going through the same weekly security checks employed by PC users.
Several computer security experts are predicting that the security “honeymoon” enjoyed by Macs will end this year. They argue that the profile of the company that makes Macintosh computers, Apple, is on the rise, thanks to the iPod. And the more visible a computer is, the more attractive it becomes to hackers.
I was never silly enough to think that my Mac — or my life partner, for that matter — was perfect, so it’s not disillusioning to find out otherwise. So I still like my Macs after several years … and I’m still googly-eyed in love with my life partner after rather longer than that.
Mac: 2 worms & 1 vulnerability
PC: 100,000+
Macs are not absolutely invulnerable. Um, no duh. But some of the coverage of the latest news sounds a little like efforts to paint Dems as being just as corrupt as Repubs.
While it’s always a good idea to have security software on your computer and to practice safe computing, the threat of virii overcoming Macs may be greatly overblown by the security software companies…either to increase their potential markets by marketing to Mac users, or by dissuading people from switching to Macs (depending on the thickness of your tinfoil hat).
The Supreme Court dealt a setback Tuesday to abortion clinics in a two-decade-old legal fight over abortion protests, ruling that federal extortion and racketeering laws cannot be used to ban demonstrations.
Anti-abortion groups brought the appeal after the 7th Circuit had asked a trial judge to determine whether a nationwide injunction could be supported by charges that protesters had made threats of violence absent a connection with robbery or extortion
The 8-0 decision ends a case that the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had kept alive despite a 2003 decision by the high court that lifted a nationwide injunction on anti-abortion groups led by Joseph Scheidler and others.
This is a huge loss for women and choice, even if it is largely symbolic. From Salon:
“[The] ruling will likely do little to change the situation on the ground. But it is the symbolic victory — coupled with South Dakota’s recent anti-abortion vote — that may further embolden a pro-life movement eager to test the country’s more conservative Supreme Court.”
While I understand what you’re saying about emboldening (& there’s plenty to encourage them these days) in terms of the general zeitgeist, this doesn’t change the legal status of choice in any way.
Using RICO to combat clinic violence was always a controversial strategy. Simply to say that there were other laws on the books that could have been used, & that using RICO in this instance would inevitably lead to its being used against social justice movements like environmentalists & peace activists. The problem has always been what will there was within the FBI & DOJ to go after violent anti-choice groups. Now that they have the Patriot Act, I’m not sure any of these old arguments matter much . . .
The article discusses the new book “Sisters in Science: Conversations with Black Women Scientists on Race, Gender and Their Passion for Science,” by Diann Jordan to be released in March by Purdue University Press as well as the advances and concerns of black women in the sciences.
Jordan said her goal was to “open up the story” of black women in science by talking to some of the pioneers. Jordan is a professor of biology at Alabama State University. “If we want to keep the pipeline of doctorates flowing we have to somehow let our stories be heard.”
“Sisters in Science” include Dolores Cooper Shockley, who in 1955, the same year Rosa Parks sparked the civil rights movement, became the first black woman to receive a doctorate in pharmacology from Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind. There’s also Yvonne Young Clark, a trailblazer in the field of mechanical engineering and Evelyn Boyd Granville, one of the first black women to receive a doctorate in mathematics.
Most of the women in Jordan’s book describe how the double whammy of being black and female in a predominantly white, male field was as much a part of their academic experience and careers as lab reports, problem sets and experiments. Jordan says that after black women make it through the gates, they often feel steady pressure to prove themselves.
STRASBOURG, France (Reuters) – European states need tougher laws to guarantee oversight of their spy services and better controls over foreign agents operating on their territory, a European human rights watchdog said on Wednesday.
But the report by the Council of Europe produced no “smoking gun” evidence that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency had run secret jails in Europe for al Qaeda suspects.
“It would appear that most of Europe is a happy hunting ground for foreign security services,” Council of Europe Secretary General Terry Davis told a news conference after the report’s release at the body’s headquarters in the French city of Strasbourg.
“Hardly any country, with the clear exception of Hungary, has any legal provisions to ensure an effective oversight over the activities of foreign security services on their territory.”
(more)
MOSCOW (Reuters) – Iranian nuclear negotiators arrived in Moscow on Wednesday for a fresh attempt to reach a compromise that might defuse Tehran’s stand-off with the West over its atomic programme.
Iranian officials, headed by top nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani, were to meet a Russian delegation for a third round of talks on Moscow’s proposal to carry out uranium enrichment for the Islamic Republic on Russian soil.
Larijani’s presence, matched by that of Russian Security Council chief Igor Ivanov, put the new round of talks on a higher footing and raised hopes Iran was taking the Russian proposal seriously, something the West at times has doubted.
“We are optimistic we can agree with our Iranian partners … we think we can come to an agreement that a joint venture on the soil of the Russian Federation will be able to meet Iran’s needs fully,” Russian President Vladimir Putin told a news conference during a visit to Hungary.
Thousands march on Washington in support of Anna Nicole Smith…
The National Association of Golddiggers and Gigolos, an organization that boasts a membership of over 50,000, organized a rally to demonstrate their solidarity with one of their most celebrated peers.
Smith’s quest for her fair share of Marshall’s billions might not seem like a popular cause, but to the hundreds of golddiggers and gigolos who appeared on the steps of the nation’s highest court today, it is a matter of survival.
Cristall Klujian, a former stripper who now works as a full-time golddigger, says that the Smith case “could very well determine whether golddigging is a viable occupation in the United States of America. To the outside world, being a golddigger may seem like easy money,” Klujian said. “I can tell you, as someone who has gone on vacations with wealthy boyfriends and laughed at their lame jokes, this is hard work.”
Who’s their press agent, anyway? – Another report on the South African pebble-bed nuclear reactor, this time in the March issue of Environmental Science and Technology. The report notes that the Bush administration is watching closely – not so much because they’re worried the technology might lead to nuclear proliferation (there are plans to develop perhaps 75 more such reactors in the developed and developing world) as because they’re a good source for the heat and electricity needed to split water into oxygen and hydrogen, vital to the administration’s vision of a future hydrogen-based economy. And South Africans will be waiting anxiously for new power plants to go on-line: Last week technical problems at Koeberg, the continent’s only nuclear-fired facility, exposed holes in the system and subjected Cape Town to eight days of rolling blackouts, while Johannesburg has been hit by intermittent outages for the past two years as the nation attempts to modernize an energy infrastructure frayed from years of neglect and running at capacity as their economy grows rapidly. Currently, almost 90 percent of South Africa’s power comes from coal, with 6 percent from Koeberg.
With even Republican governors pushing for solar power, why might this not be a dream come true? Sam Jaffe in Slate magazine is worried because it’s coming on top of an already-tight silicon solar cell market, and he fears a bubble. And an editorial at http://www.solaraccess.com worries that the developing world is being priced out of the solar market. The reader comments to this latter piece provide an interesting look inside the world of the folks actually working to grow the solar-power industry. And for a look at what’s up with wind power, check out the home page of the European Wind Energy Association’s website. The European Wind Energy Conference kicks off this week in Athens…
Oh, those pesky dominoes – Another South American nation makes the news, as Ecuadorians challenge their government’s management of the people’s natural resources [Gasp! What a Socialistic idea!!] – in this case oil [Double gasp!].
In the 1970s, there used to be about 1,300 beluga whales in Cook Inlet, delighting locals and tourists alike in the body of water around Anchorage. Last year, the number was estimated at just 278. Why their numbers are dwindling has scientists puzzled — and scared. The National Marine Fisheries Service is determining if the belugas need protection under the Endangered Species Act, and Native American harvesting has been curtailed to the point that the population should be growing – but it’s not. Noise pollution and water pollution from Anchorage are suspected. In contrast to the isolated belugas whales of Cook Inlet, considered a biologically distinct population, belugas overall are thriving in Alaska, with at least 35,000 to 40,000 animals in four Arctic stocks.
From the “Duck and Cover” department of Emmanuel Velikovsky University: Observations by astronomers tracking near-Earth asteroids have raised a new object to the top of the Earth-threat list. The asteroid could strike the Earth in 2102. However, Don Yeomans, manager of NASA’s Near Earth Object Program at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, said “The most likely situation, by far, is that additional observations will bring it back down to a zero.” He adds: “We’re more likely to be hit between now and then by an object that we don’t know about.” [Oh, that’s reassuring.]
China has declared a small but important victory in its efforts to halt rampant desertification in that nation. It is being hailed as a sign of a budding ecological consciousness in a country that is trying to move away from a growth-at-all-costs industrial model. Yesterday, the government also announced plans to build 32 nuclear power stations; part of a scheme to reduce dependence on fossil fuels.
More than 100,000 people died when Mount Tambora erupted on the Indonesian island of Sumbawa in 1815 and caused “the year without a summer” due to the huge levels of volcanic ash sent skyward. Now, archeologists have discovered “the Pompeii of the East,” the town of Tambora wiped out by the eruption, but now found intact beneath ten feet of ash.
DNA barcoding, a scheme by which some researchers hope to quickly catalogue vast numbers of species, has run into a glitch when tried out on the the Karner blue butterfly, famously first identified by the novelist Vladimir Nabokov in the 1940s and now down to 1% of its previous abundance in the Northeastern US. The DNA test failed to identify the species, due to cross-breeding among subspecies “blurring” the “fingerprints.” Proponents of the method aver it is still valuable, but needs fine-tuning for such cases.
I seem to be finding a lot of archeological stories this week – here’s another: The Archimedian spiral, a geometrical figure commonly attributed to Archimedes in 300 BC, has been identified in Minoan wall paintings dated to over 1,000 years earlier. The mathematical features of the paintings suggest that the Minoans of the Late Bronze Age, around 1650 BC, had a much more advanced working knowledge of geometry than has previously been recognized…
Food for thought: Over at Grist, Mitch Friedman says it’s time for environmentalists to call a truce with the US Forest Service; the “folks in the trenches” need all the friends they can get under this administration.
The global scientific body on climate change is expected to report soon that emissions from humankind are the only explanation for major changes on Earth. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) formerly said greenhouse gases were “probably” to blame. Its next draft report will be sent to governments next month. The BBC has learnt the report will state that greenhouse gas emissions are the only explanation for changing patterns of weather across the world.
Scientists have now accurately modeled the climate changes resulting from a massive flood of cold fresh water into the north Atlantic 8,200 years ago from retreating North American glaciers. This caused a “shutdown” of the Gulf Stream, but the details of the effects are now known for the first time. According to the new model, temperatures in the North Atlantic and Greenland showed the largest decrease, with slightly less cooling over parts of North America and Europe. The rest of the northern hemisphere, however, showed very little effect, and temperatures in the southern hemisphere remained largely unchanged. Moreover, ocean circulation, which initially dropped by half after simulated flood, appeared to rebound within 50 to 150 years. Modeling this event is important for understanding potential effects on ocean currents from melting ice in Greenland under global warming.
Warning – gratuitous editorial micro-rant du jour: It makes me want to Shout!: I said this would happen if the Democrats didn’t their s#$% together and bring a comprehensive energy policy forward: The Republicans are figuring out what needs to be done, and are going to run with the issue. The latest warning sign: Rep Roscoe G. Bartlett (R), says pResident Bush got it only half right in his recent speech on energy – “Two words conservatives should champion were missing from his speech: conservation and efficiency.” Hello? Earth to Democrats? Anybody home? The train is leaving without you dummies.
Blood makes the world go round: Carnivores are essential to maintaining plant biodiversity and overall ecosystem health, according to a study of ecological impacts from the damming and flooding of a Venezuelan valley 20 years ago for a hydroelectric project, which created numerous islands. Islands without predators lost biodiversity as herbivores went wild, while islands with predators maintained a comparatively normal ecology. This has been theorized for 50 years, but conclusive experimental proof was lacking until now.
And we leave you today with this food for thought: If the history of life were to play out again from the beginning, it would have a similar plot and outcomes, although with a different cast and timing, argues UC Davis paleontologist Geerat Vermeij in a new paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Evolution at this level, like the rest of history, is predictable, perhaps more predictable than people want to imagine,” Vermeij said. “Many traits are so advantageous under so many circumstances that you are likely to see the same things again and again.” Vermeij’s view contrasts with that put forward by the late Stephen Jay Gould and others, who argued that the history of life is so dependent on improbable events and includes so many possible paths that the chances of repetition are vanishingly small. Vermeij argues that some innovations, such as photosynthesis, plant seeds, mineralized bones and even human language are just such good ideas that they would reappear, although at different times and in somewhat different forms.
First Violation of McCain Torture Amendment Alleged in Emergency Injunction
NEW YORK – February 28 – The first violation of the McCain torture amendment was alleged in federal court in an emergency injunction to end further torture of Guantánamo detainees. The court made public today an injunction filed on Friday by cooperating attorneys from Sutherland, Asbill & Brennan working with the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), which won the landmark Supreme Court case establishing the Guantánamo detainees’ right to challenge their detention in U.S. court (Rasul v. Bush).
[snip]
The cruel and inhumane treatment is detailed in today’s filing, which alleges that the torture is a flagrant violation of both the McCain torture amendment, which became law as the Detainee Treatment Act, and the Constitution. The filing charges that Guantánamo personnel:
* Forcibly strapped Mr. Bawazir into a restraint chair, tying his legs, arms, head, and midsection to the chair.
* Inserted of a feeding tube that was larger than the tube that had previously been left in Mr. Bawazir’s nose, increasing the pain of the insertion and extraction.
* Poured four bottles of water into his stomach through the nasal gastric tube every time he was fed even though Mr. Bawazir has never refused to drink water by mouth.
* Restrained Mr. Bawazir in the chair for extended periods at each feeding.
* Denied Mr. Bawazir access to a toilet while he was restrained and then for an additional hour or more after he was released from the chair.
* Placed Mr. Bawazir in solitary confinement.
This is why the Bagram prison has been expanded. They don’t have to be bothered with such things as prisoners’ rights. This never ceases to disgust me.
“Merely going to Raj Ghat doesn’t make him (Bush) a votary of peace. His faith in war and weapon supremacy is to be criticised,” Tushar A. Gandhi, a great-grandson of the Indian freedom campaigner, told AFP by phone from the western city of Mumbai.
Tushar’s father Arun Gandhi, who is based in the US, called Bush a “warmonger”.
MIDDLETOWN, Ohio (AP) — Salaried employees and replacement workers ran AK Steel’s Middletown Works plant on Wednesday, hours after the steelmaker locked out 2,700 union workers when their contract expired.
(snip)
Union members recently voted overwhelmingly to authorize leadership to call a strike if negotiations on a new contract failed. The lockout began shortly after the contract expired at midnight Tuesday. Many of those gathered said they weren’t surprised by the lockout because the company had been making preparations, such as training replacement workers.
AK Steel has already eliminated 400 jobs at this plant, and the lockout suggests to me that they’re trying to put further downward pressure on wages and benefits. Watch this one.
The views of the U.S. human rights community were typified by Deborah Pearlstein, director of the U.S. Law and Security Programme for Human Rights First, a major advocacy group.
She told IPS, “Apart from the ongoing harms to human rights, one of the most remarkable features of the U.S. detentions at Bagram and elsewhere is that four and a half years after Sept. 11, the administration continues to hold nearly 15,000 detainees worldwide without rights recognised under any domestic or international legal regime, and without a plan for how it might begin detaining people legally in what the administration now calls the ‘long war’ going forward.” {snip}
“The world will always be in catch-up mode when it comes to investigating, discovering and challenging the many ways the Bush administration has undermined international legal norms. Just as they did for Guantánamo, concerned lawyers, journalists and researchers will have to figure out how to gain access to Bagram in order to bring the harsh treatment of the prisoners to the attention of the U.S. judicial system and the international community before any improvements are seen,” he added.
In a letter to a friend in Europe, Abdul Razaq al-Na’as, a Baghdad university professor in his 50s, grieved for his killed friends and colleagues. His letter concluded: “I wonder who is next!” He was. On January 28 al-Na’as drove from his office at Baghdad University. Two cars blocked his, and gunmen opened fire, killing him instantly. Al-Na’as is not the first academic to be killed in the mayhem of the “new Iraq”. Hundreds of academics and scientists have met this fate since the March 2003 invasion. Baghdad universities alone have mourned the killing of over 80 members of staff. The minister of education stated recently that during 2005, 296 members of education staff were killed and 133 wounded. Not one of these crimes has been investigated by the occupation forces or the interim governments. . . research shows that the victims have been men and women from all over Iraq, from different ethnic, religious and political backgrounds. Most were vocally opposed to the occupation. For the most part, they were killed in a fashion that suggests cold-blooded assassination. No one has claimed responsibility.
The first violation of the McCain torture amendment was alleged in federal court in an emergency injunction to end further torture of Guantánamo detainees . . . “If I were Senator John McCain, I would be the angriest man in America today.” said Rick Murphy, a partner with Sutherland, Asbill & Brennan, which provides pro-bono counsel to detainee Mohammed Bawazir. {snip}
The filing charges that Guantánamo personnel:
–Forcibly strapped Mr. Bawazir into a restraint chair, tying his legs, arms, head, and midsection to the chair.
–Inserted of a feeding tube that was larger than the tube that had previously been left in Mr. Bawazir’s nose, increasing the pain of the insertion and extraction.
–Poured four bottles of water into his stomach through the nasal gastric tube every time he was fed even though Mr. Bawazir has never refused to drink water by mouth.
–Restrained Mr. Bawazir in the chair for extended periods at each feeding.
–Denied Mr. Bawazir access to a toilet while he was restrained and then for an additional hour or more after he was released from the chair.
Scooter needs help. His greymail strategy didn’t fly with the judge. He’s looking to hire a hypnotist for his defense. Never mind that he’s a certified liar.
Inappropriate? An understatement. Our fears confirmed.
Sam Alito writes a thank you letter to Dobson. Jane Hamsher has it at FDL Strip Search Sammy Sends LetterScroll down to item
Dear Dr. Dobson:
This is just a short note to express my heartfelt thanks to you and the entire staff of Focus on the Family for your help and support during the past few challenging months.
[..]
and Thinkprogress provides this reaction from Americans United for Separation of Church and State
“This is grossly inappropriate,” said Lynn. “Alito sounds like a political candidate doing a victory lap and thanking his backers rather than being a fair and independent judge.”
We’ve been neo-conned and ain’t gonna take it anymore
for Mac users? Christian Science Monitor
Well, it was fun while it lasted…
I was never silly enough to think that my Mac — or my life partner, for that matter — was perfect, so it’s not disillusioning to find out otherwise. So I still like my Macs after several years … and I’m still googly-eyed in love with my life partner after rather longer than that.
Mac: 2 worms & 1 vulnerability
PC: 100,000+
Macs are not absolutely invulnerable. Um, no duh. But some of the coverage of the latest news sounds a little like efforts to paint Dems as being just as corrupt as Repubs.
a different opinion.
While it’s always a good idea to have security software on your computer and to practice safe computing, the threat of virii overcoming Macs may be greatly overblown by the security software companies…either to increase their potential markets by marketing to Mac users, or by dissuading people from switching to Macs (depending on the thickness of your tinfoil hat).
From the SCOTUS: AP
This is a huge loss for women and choice, even if it is largely symbolic. From Salon:
Yep.
I don’t see this in such a dire light.
While I understand what you’re saying about emboldening (& there’s plenty to encourage them these days) in terms of the general zeitgeist, this doesn’t change the legal status of choice in any way.
Using RICO to combat clinic violence was always a controversial strategy. Simply to say that there were other laws on the books that could have been used, & that using RICO in this instance would inevitably lead to its being used against social justice movements like environmentalists & peace activists. The problem has always been what will there was within the FBI & DOJ to go after violent anti-choice groups. Now that they have the Patriot Act, I’m not sure any of these old arguments matter much . . .
Full Article
The article discusses the new book “Sisters in Science: Conversations with Black Women Scientists on Race, Gender and Their Passion for Science,” by Diann Jordan to be released in March by Purdue University Press as well as the advances and concerns of black women in the sciences.
Europe rights body urges new laws to control spies
Russia, Iran make new bid to break nuclear impasse
Thinkprogress provides this link to the Bush interview with ABC News here
That the preznit, our very own nitwit, reporting for duty. And we’re tied to a irrevocable contract, 34 months remaining.
We “think the U.S. is better prepared than woefully unprepared” too. That’s the problem…
Thanks for the link.
So he didn’t turn on the tv for five days?
Nobody on his staff turned on the tv?
I don’t believe it. He wanted to keep playin that guitar and ignore the whole situation as long as he could.
Well, Bush was very, very busy brush-cutting; then he had a shower and flew to eat cake and play guitar.
Under pain of losing one’s head, when he’s busy brush-cutting or bike riding, aides cannot disturb.
To support Anna Nicole? Newsweek
</snark>
Wherever there’s a niche, parasites will become part of an ecosystem.
That was meant more in snark than in judgment, BTW, before I inadvertently start a flame war.
It’s funny either way!
your insane? I’ve got a limp.
Here is Albert’s Urinal Blog Commenting.
Is the limp connected to the urinal blog commenting? Did I miss a boxcar in the train of thought?
It’s related to “you’ve got a rash? Oh man, let me tell you, I got a rash man, I’ve got a rash.”
[paraphrased from The Big Lebowski]
Who’s their press agent, anyway? – Another report on the South African pebble-bed nuclear reactor, this time in the March issue of Environmental Science and Technology. The report notes that the Bush administration is watching closely – not so much because they’re worried the technology might lead to nuclear proliferation (there are plans to develop perhaps 75 more such reactors in the developed and developing world) as because they’re a good source for the heat and electricity needed to split water into oxygen and hydrogen, vital to the administration’s vision of a future hydrogen-based economy. And South Africans will be waiting anxiously for new power plants to go on-line: Last week technical problems at Koeberg, the continent’s only nuclear-fired facility, exposed holes in the system and subjected Cape Town to eight days of rolling blackouts, while Johannesburg has been hit by intermittent outages for the past two years as the nation attempts to modernize an energy infrastructure frayed from years of neglect and running at capacity as their economy grows rapidly. Currently, almost 90 percent of South Africa’s power comes from coal, with 6 percent from Koeberg.
With even Republican governors pushing for solar power, why might this not be a dream come true? Sam Jaffe in Slate magazine is worried because it’s coming on top of an already-tight silicon solar cell market, and he fears a bubble. And an editorial at http://www.solaraccess.com worries that the developing world is being priced out of the solar market. The reader comments to this latter piece provide an interesting look inside the world of the folks actually working to grow the solar-power industry. And for a look at what’s up with wind power, check out the home page of the European Wind Energy Association’s website. The European Wind Energy Conference kicks off this week in Athens…
Oh, those pesky dominoes – Another South American nation makes the news, as Ecuadorians challenge their government’s management of the people’s natural resources [Gasp! What a Socialistic idea!!] – in this case oil [Double gasp!].
In the 1970s, there used to be about 1,300 beluga whales in Cook Inlet, delighting locals and tourists alike in the body of water around Anchorage. Last year, the number was estimated at just 278. Why their numbers are dwindling has scientists puzzled — and scared. The National Marine Fisheries Service is determining if the belugas need protection under the Endangered Species Act, and Native American harvesting has been curtailed to the point that the population should be growing – but it’s not. Noise pollution and water pollution from Anchorage are suspected. In contrast to the isolated belugas whales of Cook Inlet, considered a biologically distinct population, belugas overall are thriving in Alaska, with at least 35,000 to 40,000 animals in four Arctic stocks.
From the “Duck and Cover” department of Emmanuel Velikovsky University: Observations by astronomers tracking near-Earth asteroids have raised a new object to the top of the Earth-threat list. The asteroid could strike the Earth in 2102. However, Don Yeomans, manager of NASA’s Near Earth Object Program at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, said “The most likely situation, by far, is that additional observations will bring it back down to a zero.” He adds: “We’re more likely to be hit between now and then by an object that we don’t know about.” [Oh, that’s reassuring.]
China has declared a small but important victory in its efforts to halt rampant desertification in that nation. It is being hailed as a sign of a budding ecological consciousness in a country that is trying to move away from a growth-at-all-costs industrial model. Yesterday, the government also announced plans to build 32 nuclear power stations; part of a scheme to reduce dependence on fossil fuels.
More than 100,000 people died when Mount Tambora erupted on the Indonesian island of Sumbawa in 1815 and caused “the year without a summer” due to the huge levels of volcanic ash sent skyward. Now, archeologists have discovered “the Pompeii of the East,” the town of Tambora wiped out by the eruption, but now found intact beneath ten feet of ash.
DNA barcoding, a scheme by which some researchers hope to quickly catalogue vast numbers of species, has run into a glitch when tried out on the the Karner blue butterfly, famously first identified by the novelist Vladimir Nabokov in the 1940s and now down to 1% of its previous abundance in the Northeastern US. The DNA test failed to identify the species, due to cross-breeding among subspecies “blurring” the “fingerprints.” Proponents of the method aver it is still valuable, but needs fine-tuning for such cases.
I seem to be finding a lot of archeological stories this week – here’s another:
The Archimedian spiral, a geometrical figure commonly attributed to Archimedes in 300 BC, has been identified in Minoan wall paintings dated to over 1,000 years earlier. The mathematical features of the paintings suggest that the Minoans of the Late Bronze Age, around 1650 BC, had a much more advanced working knowledge of geometry than has previously been recognized…
Food for thought: Over at Grist, Mitch Friedman says it’s time for environmentalists to call a truce with the US Forest Service; the “folks in the trenches” need all the friends they can get under this administration.
The Washington Post reports millions of acres of Canada’s lush green forests are turning red in spasms of death. A voracious beetle, whose population has exploded with the warming climate, is killing more trees than wildfires or logging.
The global scientific body on climate change is expected to report soon that emissions from humankind are the only explanation for major changes on Earth. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) formerly said greenhouse gases were “probably” to blame. Its next draft report will be sent to governments next month. The BBC has learnt the report will state that greenhouse gas emissions are the only explanation for changing patterns of weather across the world.
Scientists have now accurately modeled the climate changes resulting from a massive flood of cold fresh water into the north Atlantic 8,200 years ago from retreating North American glaciers. This caused a “shutdown” of the Gulf Stream, but the details of the effects are now known for the first time. According to the new model, temperatures in the North Atlantic and Greenland showed the largest decrease, with slightly less cooling over parts of North America and Europe. The rest of the northern hemisphere, however, showed very little effect, and temperatures in the southern hemisphere remained largely unchanged. Moreover, ocean circulation, which initially dropped by half after simulated flood, appeared to rebound within 50 to 150 years. Modeling this event is important for understanding potential effects on ocean currents from melting ice in Greenland under global warming.
Warning – gratuitous editorial micro-rant du jour: It makes me want to Shout!: I said this would happen if the Democrats didn’t their s#$% together and bring a comprehensive energy policy forward: The Republicans are figuring out what needs to be done, and are going to run with the issue. The latest warning sign: Rep Roscoe G. Bartlett (R), says pResident Bush got it only half right in his recent speech on energy – “Two words conservatives should champion were missing from his speech: conservation and efficiency.” Hello? Earth to Democrats? Anybody home? The train is leaving without you dummies.
Blood makes the world go round: Carnivores are essential to maintaining plant biodiversity and overall ecosystem health, according to a study of ecological impacts from the damming and flooding of a Venezuelan valley 20 years ago for a hydroelectric project, which created numerous islands. Islands without predators lost biodiversity as herbivores went wild, while islands with predators maintained a comparatively normal ecology. This has been theorized for 50 years, but conclusive experimental proof was lacking until now.
And we leave you today with this food for thought: If the history of life were to play out again from the beginning, it would have a similar plot and outcomes, although with a different cast and timing, argues UC Davis paleontologist Geerat Vermeij in a new paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Evolution at this level, like the rest of history, is predictable, perhaps more predictable than people want to imagine,” Vermeij said. “Many traits are so advantageous under so many circumstances that you are likely to see the same things again and again.” Vermeij’s view contrasts with that put forward by the late Stephen Jay Gould and others, who argued that the history of life is so dependent on improbable events and includes so many possible paths that the chances of repetition are vanishingly small. Vermeij argues that some innovations, such as photosynthesis, plant seeds, mineralized bones and even human language are just such good ideas that they would reappear, although at different times and in somewhat different forms.
link
NEW YORK – February 28 – The first violation of the McCain torture amendment was alleged in federal court in an emergency injunction to end further torture of Guantánamo detainees. The court made public today an injunction filed on Friday by cooperating attorneys from Sutherland, Asbill & Brennan working with the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), which won the landmark Supreme Court case establishing the Guantánamo detainees’ right to challenge their detention in U.S. court (Rasul v. Bush).
[snip]
The cruel and inhumane treatment is detailed in today’s filing, which alleges that the torture is a flagrant violation of both the McCain torture amendment, which became law as the Detainee Treatment Act, and the Constitution. The filing charges that Guantánamo personnel:
* Forcibly strapped Mr. Bawazir into a restraint chair, tying his legs, arms, head, and midsection to the chair.
* Inserted of a feeding tube that was larger than the tube that had previously been left in Mr. Bawazir’s nose, increasing the pain of the insertion and extraction.
* Poured four bottles of water into his stomach through the nasal gastric tube every time he was fed even though Mr. Bawazir has never refused to drink water by mouth.
* Restrained Mr. Bawazir in the chair for extended periods at each feeding.
* Denied Mr. Bawazir access to a toilet while he was restrained and then for an additional hour or more after he was released from the chair.
* Placed Mr. Bawazir in solitary confinement.
This is why the Bagram prison has been expanded. They don’t have to be bothered with such things as prisoners’ rights. This never ceases to disgust me.
Bush has shown up in Afghanistan on his way to India and Pakistan, which is presumably why he needs 5,000 personnel for security on this trip.
“Making progress of dismantling Al Qaeda” – you could have fooled me, George.
Mahatma Gandhi’s descendants called Bush’s plan to lay a memorial wreath in Gandhi’s honor a “trivial exercise.”
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060301/pl_afp/indiausbushgandhi_060301091540
“Merely going to Raj Ghat doesn’t make him (Bush) a votary of peace. His faith in war and weapon supremacy is to be criticised,” Tushar A. Gandhi, a great-grandson of the Indian freedom campaigner, told AFP by phone from the western city of Mumbai.
Tushar’s father Arun Gandhi, who is based in the US, called Bush a “warmonger”.
How is Bush being greeted in India? I just put up a bunch of photos:
http://storiesinamerica.blogspot.com/2006/03/arun-gandhi-bush-is-warmonger.html
Wow, his popularity there is underwhelming. Thanks for the link to the photos.
AK Steel locks out workers after contract expiration
AK Steel has already eliminated 400 jobs at this plant, and the lockout suggests to me that they’re trying to put further downward pressure on wages and benefits. Watch this one.
Bagram – ‘Son of Guantánamo,’ by William Fisher:
Death of a Professor, by Haifa Zangana:
First Violation of McCain Torture Amendment Alleged in Emergency Injunction:
Anyone among us with expertise in memory loss?
Scooter needs help. His greymail strategy didn’t fly with the judge. He’s looking to hire a hypnotist for his defense. Never mind that he’s a certified liar.
See commentary by FDL’s Reddhedd, link here That Memory Defense is Looking More Fuzzy
Unlike someone who remains awol, Patrick Fitzgerald is hard at work,
Inappropriate? An understatement. Our fears confirmed.
Sam Alito writes a thank you letter to Dobson. Jane Hamsher has it at FDL Strip Search Sammy Sends Letter Scroll down to item
and Thinkprogress provides this reaction from Americans United for Separation of Church and State
We’ve been neo-conned and ain’t gonna take it anymore
OOps sorry about that error.
Here’s that link to Americans United for Separation of Church and State “Alito Thank-You Letter Grossly Inappropriate”
What we feared huh?