Hey folks,
Just spent an absolutely boring evening playing around on the GIMP and stuff. Consider yourself warned if you decide to check out the attachment ;-)
Current Events
November 29, 2010
November 20, 2010
Reading
Bipartisan Experts Agree that Social Security Shortfall Exists; Congress Should Act Soon To Fix It
Social Security faces a significant shortfall, which policy makers would be better off addressing sooner rather than later, according to a new paper, Social Security Shortfall Warrants Action Soon, released by the Pew Economic Policy Group. Robert Greenstein, executive director of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, and Charles Blahous, public trustee for Social Security and Medicare and former economic adviser to President George W. Bush, coauthored Social Security Shortfall Warrants Action Soon. They agree that the shortfall is real and that policymakers should act soon to fix it. Although favoring different strategies to close the gap, they agree on the reality and scope of the problem.
Public Spending on Transportation and Water Infrastructure
In fiscal year 2007—the most recent year for which data on combined spending by the federal government and by state and local governments are available—total public spending for transportation and water infrastructure was $356 billion, or 2.4 percent of the nation’s economic output as measured by its gross domestic product. Between 2003 and 2007, real (inflation-adjusted) public spending on transportation and water infrastructure declined by $23 billion, or 6 percent. That decline, which reflects a decrease in real capital spending, especially by the federal government, stands in contrast to the fairly steady increase in spending for such infrastructure during the previous two decades. In particular, real capital spending on highways, mass transit, and aviation fell markedly even as capital spending on other types of infrastructure—such as rail and water transportation, water resources, and water supply and wastewater treatment—remained stable or rose. The drop in real capital spending for highways, mass transit, and aviation between 2003 and 2007 was primarily the result of a sharp increase in prices for materials used to build such infrastructure—an increase that outpaced the growth of nominal (current-dollar) spending on those types of infrastructure.
300,000 affected by New Orleans boil-water order
Robert Jackson, director of community and intergovernmental relations for the Sewerage and Water Board of New Orleans, told The Associated Press on Saturday that the order was issued after a mechanical and electrical failure at a water treatment plant caused pressure to drop. He said the order is precautionary, but residents should be prepared to boil all water for cooking and other uses until at least Sunday night. He says no one has been sickened by the water, but officials are still testing the water to ensure no bacteria formed while the pressure was down.
the newest member of the exoplanet club, dubbed HIP 13044b, was found in a stream of vagrant stars that loop around the Milky Way. Astronomers think this stellar stream is all that remains of a dwarf galaxy that once orbited the Milky Way. About six billion years ago the Milky Way collided with and mostly absorbed this unnamed galaxy, leaving a trail of stars that now zips around our galaxy at more than 600,000 miles (965,600 kilometers) an hour. The newfound planet "likely formed when the star was not yet a part of the Milky Way. It's traveled with the star all this time," said study leader Johny Setiawan, an astronomer at the Max-Planck Institute for Astronomy in Germany.
When the Mind Wanders, Happiness Also Strays
A quick experiment. Before proceeding to the next paragraph, let your mind wander wherever it wants to go. Close your eyes for a few seconds, starting ... now. And now, welcome back for the hypothesis of our experiment: Wherever your mind went — the South Seas, your job, your lunch, your unpaid bills — that daydreaming is not likely to make you as happy as focusing intensely on the rest of this column will. I’m not sure I believe this prediction, but I can assure you it is based on an enormous amount of daydreaming cataloged in the current issue of Science. Using an iPhone app called trackyourhappiness, psychologists at Harvard contacted people around the world at random intervals to ask how they were feeling, what they were doing and what they were thinking. The least surprising finding, based on a quarter-million responses from more than 2,200 people, was that the happiest people in the world were the ones in the midst of enjoying sex. Or at least they were enjoying it until the iPhone interrupted. The researchers are not sure how many of them stopped to pick up the phone and how many waited until afterward to respond. Nor, unfortunately, is there any way to gauge what thoughts — happy, unhappy, murderous — went through their partners’ minds when they tried to resume.
Popular painkillers taken off the market
Although still in wide use more than a half-century after introduction, Darvon and Darvocet and their generic counterparts are easily replaceable, pain management experts said Friday after the Food and Drug Administration asked that the popular painkillers be removed from the U.S. marketplace. The FDA's decision, based on data showing a risk of serious heart rhythm abnormalities, caps years of controversy about the dangerous side effects of Darvon -- known generically as propoxyphene -- which was first approved by regulators in 1957.
What your e-mail address says about you
Stuff Hipsters Hate co-creator Andrea Bartz, who along with Ehrlich writes a "netiquette" column for CNN, points out a potentially surprising subset of users. Some of the very hipsters she documents, she said, camp out on a Hotmail address the same way they wear their scruffy skateboarding shoes from high school. Owning your own domain name pretty much puts you at the top of the e-savvy stack.No one will think you're a rube when they get your e-mail. They may, however, think you're self-centered. And possibly a megalomaniac.
U.S. in Vast Insider Trading Probe
The criminal and civil probes, which authorities say could eclipse the impact on the financial industry of any previous such investigation, are examining whether multiple insider-trading rings reaped illegal profits totaling tens of millions of dollars, the people say. Some charges could be brought before year-end, they say. The investigations, if they bear fruit, have the potential to expose a culture of pervasive insider trading in U.S. financial markets, including new ways non-public information is passed to traders through experts tied to specific industries or companies, federal authorities say.
Email Discovery Delays House Ethics Trial
The House ethics committee said Friday it was delaying the Nov. 29 public trial of Rep. Maxine Waters to review new "materials discovered that may have had an effect" on its investigation of the California Democrat.
'Morning Joe' can sleep in: MSNBC host gets two-day suspension
The cable news network slapped its "Morning Joe" host with a two-day suspension on Friday after he, too, was found to be in violation of a corporate policy. Political donations are forbidden for employees of MSNBC and NBC News, as Scarborough's on-air colleague, Keith Olbermann, found out two weeks ago when he was suspended for the same reason. Scarborough confessed to violating the rule after Politico.com turned up five contributions of $500 each and MSNBC found three more that he'd made to candidates in local races in Florida over the past four years. Among others, Scarborough contributed to his brother, George Scarborough, who ran unsuccessfully for a seat in Florida's legislature in 2007, and to a candidate who had served as Scarborough's chief of staff in Washington when Scarborough was a Republican congressman from Florida. Scarborough told MSNBC President Phil Griffin that he'd forgotten he'd donated the money to candidates Scarborough described in a statement as "close personal friends and family members." Griffin subsequently ordered Scarborough to sit out Monday and Tuesday's programs without pay, the same punishment the liberal Olbermann received.
Pelosi: Incoming Speaker Boehner 'Known to Cry'
Outgoing Speaker Nancy Pelosi may be giving up the gavel to Rep. John Boehner in the next Congress but she hinted this week that she still wears the pants in the House.
September 20, 2009
Random Links
Cameras keep track of all cars entering Medina Cameras installed at Medina intersections monitor every vehicle coming into the city. The cameras capture all license-plate numbers, in a crime-prevention measure that one council member says "outweighs concern over privacy. Under the "automatic license plate recognition" project, once a car enters Medina, a camera captures its license-plate number. Within seconds, the number is run through a database. If a hit comes up for a felony — say, the vehicle was reported stolen or is being driven by a homicide suspect — the information is transmitted instantaneously to police, who can "leap into action," said Police Chief Jeffrey Chen. "These cameras provide us with intelligence," Chen said. "It gets us in front of criminals. I don't like to be on a level playing field with criminals."
Stay informed about seasonal flu at flu.gov
Seattle Goes Scientific With Trash Tracking Technology The city, in conjunction with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) SENSEable City Lab, is on a quest to assess the city's waste removal system by affixing electronic tags to 3,000 items to see where they end up. The electronic tags utilize cell phone technology, which will allow MIT researchers to conduct real-time tracking of articles, like boxes, Styrofoam, bottles and metal scrap. So far, researchers have recruited hundreds of citizen volunteers -- each contributing 10-15 household items -- to participate in the study. However, interested volunteers can bring items to the Seattle Central Library to be tagged.
Global Terrorism Database (GTD) online. The database is open-source and includes information on 80,000 domestic and international terrorist events from 1970 through 2007. For each incident, information is available on the date and location, weapons used, nature of the target, number of casualties, and -- when identifiable -- the group or individual responsible. The site is the most comprehensive unclassified database on terrorist events, according to a statement on the site.
Dan Brown's latest book has taken down the Masons...seriously
Its amazing that something so absolutely destructive can have such beauty, click on the link and check out the twelfth photo
The spies who love us Canada is the world's No. 1 destination for foreign agents, who steal military and political secrets and up to $30 billion worth of research each year, according to a new book.
Pelosi on Name Calling and Divisive Rhetoric That kind of rhetoric certainly didn't up the level of debate, any more than a near-decade of Chimpy McHitler and Bushitler japes. Or, for that matter, Speaker Pelosi's consistent characterizations of people who disagree with her as "un-American," or "unpatriotic." She's famously fond of dissenters who agree with her ("It's always exciting," she told a group of anti-war hecklers in 2006), but that's too easy by half. The Democrats control the government. If they can't pass their legislation, it's not because of Rush Limbaugh or even Joe Wilson, who were never on their team. It's easy to wave the bloody shirt of potential political violence, but in the end, when it comes to health care reform or whatever, the reason Sens. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) or Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) or whomever isn't voting their way isn't because of Michael Savage or a latter-day John Brown. And it's probably not even because of incendiary rhetoric, but just plain-old unconvincing rhetoric. Like the idea that a vaguely defined "reform" that will cost $900 billion over 10 years will actually reduce government spending.
In the wake of Fox News reporting on the unfolding ACORN scandal,
ACORN is now threatening to sue the network. Now that Fox is actually
breaking news on this story by showing new videos, ACORN might just do
it. Fox News should pray that ACORN does sue, because it would blow the
doors off this story, possibly destroying ACORN and erupting into a
political scandal in Washington. As bizarre as it seems, ACORN is threatening to sue Fox for
reporting on these incriminating videotapes. Glenn Beck broke news with
a new tape on Monday, and Sean Hannity might be doing the same shortly.
Evidently, ACORN is accusing Fox of coordinating with the filmmakers,
arguing that somehow these reports make Fox legally liable. Obama's ties to ACORN date to his days as a community organizer in
Chicago. He represented ACORN in a lawsuit in 1994 and conducted two
leadership training sessions for ACORN's Chicago chapter in the late
1990s. In 1992, Obama served as director of Project Vote in Chicago,
helping to register 150,000 voters on the South Side.
The Obama campaign paid Citizens Services of New Orleans, a close ally
of ACORN, more than $800,000 for get-out-the-vote activities, and the
group's political action arm endorsed Obama. Obama told ABC's "This Week" in an interview broadcast Sunday that
what he saw on the video "was certainly inappropriate and deserves to
be investigated." But the president did not say who should investigate.
And he said it is not a major national issue he pays much attention to. "Frankly,
it's not really something I've followed closely," Obama said. "I didn't
even know that ACORN was getting a whole lot of federal money."
Did ACORN get too big for its own good? As if volunteers allegedly signing up cartoon character Mickey Mouse
to vote didn't give ACORN enough bad publicity, the public is
enthralled with new videos distributed on the Internet and aired on
television news shows showing ACORN employees in Brooklyn, N.Y.,
advising a couple posing as a hooker and pimp to lie to get housing
aid, and employees in other cities counseling the pair on tax, banking
and immigration issues. Many Democrats used to advertise their
ACORN connections. Now, however, the Democratic-led Senate has voted to
cut off its grants from the Department of Housing and Urban
Development, and the Democrat-dominated House doesn't want it to get
any federal money, period.
This is really nice...instead of focusing on the news media he should be having this dialogue internally with the DNC. But then again, the vitriol is half the reason I follow politics in the first place
Opinion: So far, Obama's failing miserably It’s not hard to recall that he ran as a transformative candidate,
promising sweeping, though somewhat fuzzy, “change” during the
campaign. For the first several months of his presidency, Obama has labored to
deliver on that pledge. He pushed a controversial stimulus bill through
Congress to help rev up the economy, turned Bush’s reluctant bailout of
Chrysler and General Motors into a giant government auto buyout and
appointed a record number of “czars” to help regulate bureaucracies in
both public and formerly private sectors. Then, Step 2. Obama is trying to fundamentally alter the American
economy by backing sweeping environmental, labor and health care
legislation. He wants to change the way Americans consume energy,
unionize and see their doctors.
So far, he’s failing miserably.
Tom DeLay, Playing Hurt on DWTS: 'I'll Dance Until the Bone Breaks'
Smart growth must not ignore drivers This agenda has been
widely promoted for decades, first by the Carter administration and,
more recently, by both environmentalists and new urbanists. The recent
concerns over global warming have provided an additional raison d’être
for a policy promoting both higher transit use and denser housing
patterns. The president himself has embraced this agenda, declaring in
February that “the days of building sprawl” were, in his words, “over.”
The
administration can expect strong support for such policies in the
mainstream media concentrated in New York and Washington. These areas
boast both the highest proportion of transit riders and the largest
percentages working in the central core. Many among the young, single
and childless couples working in media in these communities see no
reason why other Americans should not live similarly. Politically,
such a remaking of America may prove difficult to pull off. Overall
less than 6 percent of Americans ride public transit, a percentage that
has barely changed for decades. In many states, the transit share is
only 1 percent. It’s difficult to imagine a policy that disses roads,
small towns and suburbs could pass Congress, 80 percent or so of whose
constituents don’t live in the favored dense urban environments. And
what about the 95 percent or so of Americans who get around by car?
More likely, any spate of new transit and land-use regulations will be
enforced through the apparat. In one scenario, administrators at the
EPAcould simply oppose any transport project — for example, new roads —
on the basis of carbon emissions and potential pollution. States and
cities with projects not deemed “smart” enough by administrators at the
Department of Transportation or HUD might be threatened with loss of
funding.Yet even this
approach risks engendering a backlash. Once again, the administration
could be seen as imposing a true-blue policy on a largely red, or at
least purple, nation. To be successful, the administration needs to
address the needs of suburban, small-city and rural residents as well
as those of big-city denizens.
Obama says health plan 'not radical'
July 15, 2009
Alleged Iranian and Hezbollah Agents on Trial for Targeting Russian-Operated Radar Station in Azerbaijan - The Jamestown Foundation
Alleged Iranian and Hezbollah Agents on Trial for Targeting Russian-Operated Radar Station in Azerbaijan - The Jamestown Foundation.
The alleged terrorist cell planned to bomb the Israeli Embassy in Baku as well as blow up the Russian-operated Qabala radar station. According to investigation records, the group was receiving orders from Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and Lebanon’s Hezbollah.
Ending North Korea’s Nuclear Ambitions: The Need for Stronger Chinese Action
Ending North Korea’s Nuclear Ambitions: The Need for Stronger Chinese Action | Arms Control Association.
China, North Korea's most important ally and trade partner, has joined the rest of the international community in responding to the North Korean actions. Beijing has indicated, however, that it wants a balanced approach and does not want to push Pyongyang much harder. Nevertheless, China can and should do more to press its neighbor. North Korea's recent series of actions threatens China's national interests as well as those of the United States and countries in Northeast Asia.
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