Just remember...

'Socilism' 

*snigger*

More @'Teabonics'

HERE

The RNC fugs up again...

The Republican National Committee sent a fundraising mail piece earlier this month with a return number that leads to a phone-sex line offering "live, one-on-one talk with a nasty girl who will do anything you want for just  $2.99 per minute."

At the bottom of a piece designed to resemble a census form, a toll-free number is listed next to the national party's address.

A voter in Minnesota received the mailer and called the number intending to complain about the attempt to raise money with a form that looks like a government document.

But the Minnesotan was instead directed to a second toll-free number that greets callers as "sexy guy" before offering them the chance to talk with "real local students, housewives and working girls from all over the country."

The individual then forwarded the mail piece to the voter's congressman, a Democrat, who shared it with the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

A spokesman for the RNC declined to say how many copies of the census-style mailer were sent out.

"The number in question was a typographical error by a vendor used on this particular mailer — using 1-800 instead of 202," said RNC Communications Director Doug Heye.

Heye e-mailed different direct-mail pieces that included the correct RNC phone number, writing: "This is an isolated incident and will not be repeated in the future."

He said the vendor responsible for the mistake "will not be used for the foreseeable future."
AUDIO: HERE

Ben Smith @'Politico' 

Information is beautiful: war games

Who really spends the most on their armed forces?

Info is beautiful: defence budgets Photograph: David McCandless

Amid confusion over the rise in defence cuts, I was surprised to learn that the UK has one of the biggest military budgets in the world - nearly £40bn ($60 bn) in 2008.

But I was less surprised to see who had the biggest.

 

Info is beautiful: war chests. Graphic: David McCandless

Yep, the United States spent a staggering $607bn (£402 bn) on defence in 2008. Currently engaged in what will likely be the longest ground war in US history in Afghanistan. Harbourer of thousands of nuclear weapons. 1.5m soldiers. Fleets of aircrafts, bombs and seemingly endless amounts of military technology.

Here's that bloated military budget in context.

 

Info is beautiful: the US military budget. Graphic: David McCandless

The defence budgets of the other top nine countries can be neatly accommodated inside the US budget.

So the US is an aggressive, war-mongeringing military machine, right? And the numbers prove it.

But is that true? Is that the whole picture?

Military units

First of all, the enormity of the US military budget is not just down to a powerful military-industrial complex. America is a rich country.

In fact, it's vastly rich. So its budget is bound to dwarf the others.

 
Info is beautiful: defence budgets compared. Graphic: David McCandless

(This is a reworking of an image from the blog ASecondHandConjecture.com)

It doesn't seem fair to not factor in the wealth of a country when assessing its military budget.

So, if you take military budgets as a proportion of each country's GDP, a very different picture emerges.

 

Info is beautiful: the biggest spenders. Graphic: David McCandless

The US is knocked down into 8th place by such nations as Jordan, Burundi and Georgia. The UK plunges to 29th.

Why are these other nations spending so much on their military?

• Myanmar (Burma) is a military dictatorship, so that must bias their budgets a little.
• Jordan occupies a critical geographic position in the Middle East and has major investment in its military from the US, UK and France. In return, it deploys large peace-keeping forces across the world.
• The former soviet republic of Georgia was invaded by Russia in 2008. Relations remain extremely tense.
• Saudi Arabia spends heavily on its air force and military capabilities. Why is not clear.

The stories behind Kyrgyzstan, Burundi and Oman's spending are also not clear. (If you have any ideas, please let us know).

Soldiers

A country's military investment is not just dollars and cents. It's also about soldiers and infantry.

When it comes to sheer number of soldiers, you can guess the result.

 

Info is beautiful: active forces. Graphic: David McCandless

But, as ever, using whole numbers creates a skewed picture. China obviously has a huge population. Their army is bound to be huge.

If you adjust the parameters to a proportional view, the image shifts dramatically.

 
Info is beautiful: proportional forces. Graphic: David McCandless

North Korea tops the league with the most militarised population, while China plummets to a staggering 164th in the world league table.

The US barely scrapes the top 50. The UK's armed forces look tiny.

This re-ordering creates some surprises too. Israel and Iraq you could perhaps predict. But Eritrea and Djibouti?

All soldiers

To give the fullest picture of armed forces, reservists, civilian and paramilitary should also be included.

This again gives a different picture and perhaps a more revealing one. One that suggests combat readiness, primed forces and perhaps paranoia too? Who's expecting to be invaded?

 

Info is beautiful: total armed forces. Graphic: David McCandless

Here again, when all the numbers are added up, the US infantry is ranked a lowly 61st for size in the world.

So is the US an "aggressive, war-mongering military machine" obsessed with spending on defence and plumping up its armed forces? Perhaps, the numbers say, not. 

David McCandless @'The Guardian'

Our only 'lanaguage' is English LOL!

Teabonics

REpost - As some people can't be bothered shaving again...

International Workers of the World

The eight hour working day is the fault of these grizzled veterans of union organizing. The Haymarket bombing of May 4th, 1886, was the first inauguration by fire for many into the ideas which coalesced into the charter for the International Workers of the World, bringing union solidarity and the fight for the worker to Chicago. A bomb was thrown at police breaking up the convention and no clear fugitive has materialized for the incident; still 7 men hung from the gallows for the crime of fighting for the working class. Their names were Albert Parsons, August Spies, Samuel Fielden, Michael Schwab, George Engel, Adolph Fischer and Louis Lingg. The belief in solidarity and anarchism alone was enough to convict and execute these men.

There is a rich and storied history to the IWW, and though it is a shadow of the organization it once was. Red-card carrying Wobblies like myself still walk our concrete jungle, fighting toward a general strike to place the means of production in the hands of the worker.

I'd like to draw your attention to a folk singer and nearly life long wobblie, Utah Phillips. Only two shows may be found up at sugarmegs for the fellow, but Mystic Theater is worth a listen. Comedy and folk songs mixed in with the poetry of resistance.

Now, more than ever, is the time to rise up in solidarity with your fellow workers across the globe. Newer mechanisms for control are developed everyday, with the battle of "net neutrality" heating up, the government making attempts at shutting down Wiki-Leaks, and media outlets consolidated into independent or multinational corporate blocs.

Don't forget to celebrate the sacrifices made by our fellow workers this coming May Day, May 1st. Have an on the job slow down if you can't get the day off. Talk to your fellow workers about what you can do to improve conditions in your place of employment. Educate yourself about the varied struggles of the working class world wide. Remember your history; don't forget there's always another day, and another fight.

I'll leave you with the words of Lucy Parsons, an early member of the IWW and the wife of one of the Haymarket martyrs, "Never be deceived that the rich will permit you to vote away their wealth."

@'IWW'

Moscow blames US for 'heroin tsunami' sweeping Russia

Production in Afghanistan has risen nearly 50 fold and in Russia the result is an epidemic of heroin abuse.

Russia now has around 2.5m heroin addicts and at least 30,000 of them will die this year.

The Russian authorities accuse the United States of helping the drug suppliers by refusing to destroy opium crops in Afghanistan.

Rupert Wingfield-Hayes reports from the Siberian city of Novo-kusnetsk.
@'BBC'

Forget Taxing Marijuana; The Real Money's In Cocaine

A Harvard economist has estimated how much money states would raise by legalizing and taxing marijuana and cocaine.

In a podcast a while back, Harvard's Jeffrey Miron told us that his estimates for what California would bring in from taxing marijuana are much smaller than some of the numbers that are floating around out there (including a $1.4 billion estimate from state officials).

Since that interview, Miron has come out with a paper estimating, among other things, potential tax revenues from cocaine and marijuana.

It turns out the big tax money is in cocaine.

Sure, legalizing marijuana is highly unlikely and legalizing cocaine isn't even on the table in mainstream politics. Still, it's interesting to know what the numbers would be -- particularly when they're coming from a Harvard economist.

Here's a table that shows Miron's estimates for the annual tax revenues each state would get from marijuana and cocaine. (The figures are in millions; for more details, see the explanation and links after the table.)

State	Marijuana	Cocaine
Alabama	25.59	80.54
Alaska	6.53	16.28
Arizona	41.91	177.67
Arkansas	19.87	54.49
California	201.74	767.73
Colorado	46.97	133.74
Connecticut	22.57	72.53
Delaware	6.07	18.76
Florida	142.05	362.34
Georgia	86.75	213.96
Hawaii	10.09	21.59
Idaho	11.73	22.66
Illinois	83.98	263.93
Indiana	43.44	120.04
Iowa	18.72	45.94
Kansas	16.69	53.95
Kentucky	28.05	77.79
Louisiana	30.02	97.43
Maine	6.64	25.46
Maryland	37.68	113.79
Massachusetts	44.94	167
Michigan	69.04	174.55
Minnesota	45.43	102.31
Mississippi	19.67	41.17
Missouri	54.99	111.28
Montana	7.94	19.29
Nebraska	13.87	29.13
Nevada	13.97	53.19
New Hampshire	9.03	29.18
New Jersey	74.6	140.31
New Mexico	11.92	47.42
New York	136.81	464.05
North Carolina	87.88	191.04
North Dakota	4.02	9.54
Ohio	88.7	248.79
Oklahoma	29.23	58.23
Oregon	24.09	76.88
Pennsylvania	73.73	211.85
Rhode Island	7.75	37.12
South Carolina	26.29	79.71
South Dakota	7.28	11.96
Tennessee	39.94	146.9
Texas	270.39	483.02
Utah	16.34	53.16
Vermont	3.67	15.86
Virginia	53.35	175.63
Washington	35.76	143.55
West Virginia	8.97	36.65
Wisconsin	61.12	114.16
Wyoming	3.72	11.26
DC	4.82	25.94
Total	2,138.47	6,234.11

On top of state revenues, Miron estimates that a federal taxes would amount to $4.28 billion for marijuana and $12.47 billion for cocaine.

Miron figures taxes on the drugs would be comparable to taxes on alcohol and tobacco. His estimates for how many people in each state use marijuana and cocaine are based on a government survey. (He notes that the number of users would likely rise if the drugs were legalized, but his estimates don't account for this.) He estimates that if marijuana and cocaine were legalized, their prices would fall by 50% and 80%, respectively. The research was funded by the Criminal Justice Policy Foundation; here's the foundation's take on drug policy.

@'NPR'

As my Spanish friend Ana says:

Senator Conroy: the Internet is not special

"Why is the internet special?,” he asked, saying the net was “just a communication and distribution platform”...but it is not HIS (or another politicians) communication and distribution platform. This is the key, not ethical issues.

My childhood...

 

Cheeky little bast'rd!

Because...

Public Enemy

The Enemy Assault Vehicle Mixx

I first heard this on The Ghost's show on 3RRR here in Melbourne way back and Stephen very kindly put it on a tape for me back then...was probably my most played track on my Walkman over the years!

Get it

HERE

OOPS - I did it again!

As far as "national security threats" go, real or imagined, it's likely that few Americans lose much sleep over Wilkileaks, the website that publishes anonymously sourced documents which governments, corporations, and other private or powerful organisations would rather you not see. It would appear the US security apparatus does not feel the same way.
On Friday of last week, editor and co-founder Julian Assange posted a letter to the site detailing a laundry list of rather Keystone Kop-like instances of surveillance of himself and other members of the Wikileaks team, likely carried out at least in part by members of the US intelligence or law enforcement community:

"We have discovered half a dozen attempts at covert surveillance in Reykjavik both by native English speakers and Icelanders. On the occasions where these individuals were approached, they ran away."

Ironic if it were not so creepy, much of the observable surveillance took place while Assange and others were in Iceland advising the parliament on a groundbreaking set of laws … designed to protect investigative journalists and web service providers from spying and censorship. Assange also described being tailed on a flight en route to an investigative journalism conference in Norway, by "two individuals, recorded as brandishing diplomatic credentials ... under the name of US State Department".

So why are US tax dollars being spent spying on a bunch of volunteer journalists, human rights activists and web geeks, as appears to be the case? There are a few obvious motives, but the smoking gun might be a classified film Wikileaks claims to have in its possession that shows evidence of a US massacre of civilians. Images have power – think Abu Ghraib, think Mi Lai – and efforts at "perception management" by the department of defence will be much complicated by documentary evidence that leaves little to interpretation or "perception" of a human rights crime committed by US forces. Wikileaks plans to show the video at the National Press Club in Washington, DC on 5 April.

"In my opinion, the operation points not to the CIA, but to the US Diplomatic Security Service (DSS), which (among other things) is tasked with tracing information leaks believed to be originating from US diplomatic staff," Dr Joseph Fitsanakis tells me, founder of Intelnews.org and an expert in the politics and history of intelligence and espionage. "If the US suspected that Wikileaks acquired restricted or classified documents through a US embassy official or staff member (which Julian alludes to in his editorial), then the DSS would get involved."

As a target for surveillance Wikileaks is hardly the Kremlin – the mostly volunteer run site was temporarily shut down a few months ago due to lack of funds. Yet it has provided all manner of scoops in its short life – documented corruption in Kenya, evidence of potentially criminal bank fraud in Iceland, and classified US army documents about the treatment of Guantánamo detainees. And while its list of critics is long, openness and transparency are not chief characteristics regularly attributed to them. North Korea, China, Russia, and Zimbabwe have all blocked access to the site at one time or another in response to controversial leaks.

It's not a very heartening sign that the US government has joined such an illustrious roster. Yet in an ironic twist one of the conclusions of a report prepared by the department of defence intelligence analysis programme (DIAP), and published by Wikileaks earlier this month contains a surprising defence of the workings of a functioning, responsive democracy:

"It must be presumed that Wikileaks.org has or will receive sensitive or classified DoD documents in the future. This information will be published and analysed over time by a variety of personnel and organisations with the goal of influencing US policy."

If the video Wikileaks plans to screen at the National Press Club on April 5 does indeed include scenes of a US massacre of civilians in Iraq or Afghanistan, as is purported, perhaps the "goal of influencing US policy" becomes a little easier to identify. National security is better served by promoting a just and accountable foreign policy. For starters, stop massacring civilians in the never-ending wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and investigate and prosecute those responsible for past massacres and cover-ups when and where the burden of proof calls for it.

If the US army and the defence apparatus still need help from the muckrakers at Wikileaks to remind them of this fact, then let the leaks continue. And if you think the work that Wikileaks is doing is important, then consider leaking them some money.

Joseph Huff-Hannon @'The Guardian'

And of course you can add Australia to that illustrious list of countries...
More here.

I think...

...that there is a stoner working as a sub-editor at The Economist LOL!

John Cusack takes us down the rabbit hole (80s style)

"As you can see in this video now, watching the performance was like diving into an ocean of bad fashion and forced smiles. Dr. Pepper dancing and Mom Jeans from shore to shore... pre-Prozac in motion.... military ballet... Mandatory cheers and quasi-religious cult patriotics... the glory of the empire. A choreographed tribute to the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King. A celebration of diversity, unity, and fluorescent leggings.

Meanwhile, Reagan was dumping all the mentally ill and vets out on the streets to die, as a direct result of his policies."
@'BoingBoing'

Feeling like a little kraut-blip today...

Punk & The Pistols - The London Weekend Show 1976

Unfortunately you have to put up with the truly awful Janet Street-Porter...

(Thanx Fifi for finding this one!)

Magnets mess minds, morality

Talk about messing with your mind. A new study by neuroscientist Liane Young and colleagues at Harvard University does exactly that: the researchers used magnetic signals applied to subjects’ craniums to alter their judgements of moral culpability. The magnetic stimulus made people less likely to condemn others for attempting but failing to inflict harm, they report in PNAS.

Most people make moral judgements of others’ actions based not just on their consequences but also on some view of what the intentions were. That makes us prepared to attribute diminished responsibility to children or people with severe mental illness who commit serious offences: it’s not just a matter of what they did, but how much they understood what they were doing.

Neuroimaging studies have shown that the attribution of beliefs to other people seems to involve a part of the brain called the right temporoparietal junction (RTPJ). So Young and colleagues figured that, if they disrupted how well the RTPJ functions, this might alter moral judgements of someone’s action that rely on assumptions about their intention.

To do that, they applied an oscillating magnetic signal at 1 Hz to the part of the skull close to the RTPJ for 25 minutes in test subjects, and then asked them to read and respond to an account of an attempted misdemeanour. They also conducted tests while delivering the signal in regular short bursts. In one scenario, ‘Grace’ intentionally puts a white powder from a jar marked ‘toxic’ into her friend’s coffee, but the powder is in fact just sugar and the friend is fine. Was Grace acting rightly or wrongly?

Obvious? You might think differently with a magnetic oscillator fixed to your head. With the stimulation applied, subjects were more likely to judge the morality based on the outcome, as young children do (the friend was fine, so it’s OK), than on the intention (Grace believed the stuff was toxic).

That’s scary. The researchers present this as evidence of the role of the RTPJ in moral reasoning, with implications for how children do it (there is some evidence that the RTPJ is late in maturing) and for conditions such as autism that seem to involve a lack of ability to identify motives in other people. Fair enough. But to most of us it is news – and alarming news – that morality-related brain functions can be disrupted or suspended with a simple electromagnetic coil.

If ever a piece of research were destined to incite paranoid fantasies about dictators inserting chips in our heads to alter and control our behaviour, this is it.

Phillip Ball @'The Great Beyond'

Guided By Voices - AOL Session 2002

Bootsy's basic funk formula

Dr. Eddzherton's Apple Macbook vinyl decal

HERE
Other designs here and here.
(Thanx son #2!)

Wine cask inventor dead at 92

The inventor of the wine cask, South Australian Riverland grape grower Thomas Angove, has died in Renmark, aged 92.

Mr Angove revolutionised wine packaging in the 1960s when he created the resealable plastic bag in a cardboard box.

His son, managing director of Angove Wines John Angove, says his father was a great contributor to the wine industry.

"I remember dad coming home with this sort of prototype of a plastic bag inside a cardboard box and I remember thinking to myself and I probably said it to dad 'That's crazy, nobody will buy wine in a plastic bag stuck inside a cardboard box', but in his usual manner he persisted," he said.

"He thought he was onto a good thing and history certainly indicates that he was.

"His commitment and involvement in industry matters and industry bodies and the welfare of the industry overall, as opposed to just Angove family winemakers, was very significant and I think reflects his very broad vision of what the world and life was all about."

@'ABC'

Thomas Angrove - I raise a glass of fruity lexia in your honour...(hic!)

Policing for profit!

Whatever you do, make sure not to hurt the dog.

Worst case of being at the wrong spot at the wrong time. And you know, I live in a rowdy street, so I know about being in the wrong place at the wrong time. But at least, if something happened to me here, it's very unlikely I'd be the victim of our local police since they deserted my area some years back. It was a sad story when I read about it last year, and it's sadder still today.

This Thursday a year will have passed since Ian Tomlinson died after being assaulted by a policeman at the G20 protests. No charges have been brought; no one has been punished. Despite 300 official complaints about the policing of the protests on April 1st, and plenty of video and photographic evidence, no officer has faced serious disciplinary proceedings(1,2). Those who removed their identification numbers, beat up peaceful protesters and bystanders, then repeatedly lied about what had happened remain untroubled, either by the law or their superior officers. There has been no apology to Tomlinson’s family. 

Contrast this with another case, in which a Nottinghamshire police officer caused two deaths in June. As soon as it happened, the police reported themselves to the Independent Police Complaints Commission and launched their own investigation. A chief superintendent told the press that “we will certainly take any lessons we can get from this process and make sure we put them in place so this sort of thing never happens again. It has caused immense sadness and immense shock.”(3) The papers carried pictures of officers paying tribute, saluting the flowers left outside police headquarters(4). There was no cover up, no botched post-mortem, no lies about the victims or their families. The officer responsible was quickly charged and, though his victims died as a result of neglect not assault, last month he was convicted over the deaths(5).

There’s a significant difference between the two cases: the Nottinghamshire victims were dogs. The officer had left two police dogs in his car and forgot about them while he completed some paperwork. Judging by their response to these two tragedies, both police and prosecutors appear to care more about dogs than human beings.

George Monbiot @'Monbiot.com'

Hmmm!

Obama to Open Offshore Areas to Oil Drilling for First Time

Russia to open massive WWII archive

Russia plans to open the world's largest WWII archive, the size of which will "comply with the contribution of our country to the Victory."  (The Russians have always insisted that they won World War II, not us.  The real answer is that we all won it.)  This archive project will apparently entail building new buildings to house the holding which will be brought in from numerous archives around the country.  The project will also include a major digitization effort and will apparently include some sort of commercial database dealing with Soviet casualties.  The article hints that similar efforts may be undertaken to assess German and Hungarian losses on the Eastern Front.

There are significant practicality issues associated with this project.  Furthermore, the desirability of taking war records out of existing archives and putting them into a purpose-built archive designed around an event as opposed to something that organically grew as out of an agency or other organization, is eminently debatable.  (For an excellent discussion of these issues, see the fine post at The Russian Front.)  On the other hand, many archives in Russia are in lamentable condition, so if the price of survival for these records is some disorganization, perhaps that is a price worth paying.  In addition, the digitization component of the project is certainly a good thing, though one does wonder what if any political criteria will be applied to select the documents and files that will be digitized.

Interestingly, Andrei Artizov, the head of the Russian Federal Archive Agency (Federal'naia arkhivnaia sluzhba Rossii aka Rosarkhiv) says that the new archive should include substantial German records "like those of Hitler's chancellery, the Reich's Security Services and others. In compliance with the existing legislation, they are part of Russia's property."  Meanwhile, a so-far very modest U.S. Government effort to do something similar with copies of analogous Iraqi records captured in 2003 generates accusation of malfeasance.

In any case, this will be an interesting story to follow.

@'On War & Words'

New blog

Started by a very good friend of mine and dedicated only to the music and productions of the man above...

HERE

Don't forget that if you like reggae then keep an eye 

HERE

RA200 - Carl Craig

HERE

Iran executions send a chilling message

First Listen: Jonsi - 'Go'

Jonsi is the nickname of Jon Thor Birgisson, the enigmatic Sigur Ros singer. In Sigur Ros, his music is ethereal, sprawling and mysterious — it's even sung in a language of his own devising. But Jonsi also writes songs that can be upbeat, even celebratory, and often sung in English. His new solo album, Go, is where he's found a home for that music, and it's a brilliant and creative assortment of songs.

Recorded in Jonsi's studio in Iceland and in Connecticut, Go features wonderful arrangements of strings, brass and woodwinds, recorded with the help of Nico Muhly. Muhly has worked with Bjork, Philip Glass and even Bonnie "Prince" Billy; listen to "Tornado" and you'll get a good idea of the exhilaration Muhly helps bring to these songs. You can hear Go in its entirety here until its release on April 6.

Birgisson grew up in Iceland, raised by parents who weren't particularly musical; his early memories include playing The Beatles at double speed on his turntable and listening to and playing along with Iron Maiden records. You can hear him speak at length about his musical past and loves in an upcoming episode of All Songs Considered, in which Birgisson plays guest DJ. His history as Sigur Ros' singer and guitarist spans 16 years, during which time the band has released five studio albums and created a sound that's dramatic, euphoric, thoughtful, spacious and unforgettable.

HERE

Mummy - what's a CD?

Universal Music Group, one of the "Big Four" major labels, is the first to react to the years-long decline in CD sales. CD sales are down 15.4% this year, a slightly slower decline than the two years prior but still a huge drop, and though digital sales are nearing the volume of physical sales, revenues are still plummeting. Retailers and consumers alike have clamored for lower prices on CDs, and the labels have responded far too slowly, dropping from $18 to $13 in 2003.

Now, UMG is radically changing the price of the dying format, to between $6 and $10 for single-disc releases. The announcement is making the other labels quite nervous--they'll probably have to follow UMG's lead, whether the program is successful or not, and really, it doesn't matter if it's successful or not, given CDs have precious few years left anyway. But sources from the other labels say that they may simply drop the standard price to $10, which while not as drastic as UMG's strategy may still encourage more CD purchases.

After all, CDs are objectively superior to music purchased from digital retailers like iTunes, Zune, and Amazon. They come with album art and a booklet, they never have DRM, and they're encoded in high-quality lossless WAV files that can then be ripped in any format of any quality the user wants, including several other lossless formats. But on the other hand, buying a CD is certainly a bigger pain than downloading; a user has to get to a store, get home, rip the album, and then move it to a portable device, rather than simply clicking a few times in iTunes. And, of course, environmentally speaking, CDs are far more harmful. Still, if the choice is between a $6 CD or a $9.99 iTunes album, the CD is unquestionably the superior choice.

While this is an encouraging show of flexibility from the notoriously rigid major labels, it's not going to change the basic fact that the move is merely delaying the death of a format. The cut isn't going to "revitalize," "save," or "make viable" CDs: it'll just make them slightly more desirable for a couple of years until digital firmly buries physical.

HERE

Shows you how long the bastards have been overpricing though...

'Nyet' to $1 million?

 Perelman has been without work for four years and has declined all job offers. He previously worked at the Steklov Mathematics Institute.

"As far as I know, after there was so much media attention ... he did not want to be a public person and to look like an animal in the zoo," Rukshin said.
HERE

Will my Toyota reach escape velocity?

The federal probe into runaway Toyotas has resulted in enough scientific mystery that investigators have asked NASA scientists for help. 

The nation's auto-safety regulators have tapped nine experts from the space agency to answer questions involving software, hardware and other electronics issues, the Department of Transportation is expected to announce Tuesday, according to sources briefed on the plan who asked not to be identified because it is not yet public.

A separate panel from the National Academy of Sciences will be convened to work on a broad 15-month review of vehicle electronics and incidents of unintended acceleration across the industry. That probe will cover the potential for problems in electronic controls, human error and mechanical failure.

Peter Whoriskey @'TheWashingtonPost'

C-SPAN Caller Complains: Too Many Black People Call In

Meteorologists vs. Climatologists: the final confrontation...

Basically, we're back to the same old opposition: people with more education being regarded as having a private agenda by people with less education. We're doomed by our own petty behaviour.

The split between climate scientists and meteorologists is gaining attention in political and academic circles because polls show that public skepticism about global warming is increasing, and weather forecasters — especially those on television — dominate communications channels to the public. A study released this year by researchers at Yale and George Mason found that 56 percent of Americans trusted weathercasters to tell them about global warming far more than they trusted other news media or public figures like former Vice President Al Gore or Sarah Palin, the former vice-presidential candidate. 

...

Yet, climate scientists use very different scientific methods from the meteorologists. Heidi Cullen, a climatologist who straddled the two worlds when she worked at the Weather Channel, noted that meteorologists used models that were intensely sensitive to small changes in the atmosphere but had little accuracy more than seven days out. Dr. Cullen said meteorologists are often dubious about the work of climate scientists, who use complex models to estimate the effects of climate trends decades in the future.

But the cynicism, said Dr. Cullen, who now works for Climate Central, a nonprofit group that works to bring the science of climate change to the public, is in her opinion unwarranted.

“They are not trying to predict the weather for 2050, just generally say that it will be hotter,” Dr. Cullen said of climatologists. “And just like I can predict August will be warmer than January, I can predict that.”

Three years ago, Dr. Cullen found herself in a dispute with meteorologists after she posted a note on the Weather Channel’s Web site suggesting that meteorologists should perhaps not receive certification from the meteorological society if they “can’t speak to the fundamental science of climate change.”

Resentment may also play a role in the divide. Climatologists are almost always affiliated with universities or research institutions where a doctoral degree is required. Most meteorologists, however, can get jobs as weather forecasters with a college degree. 

“There is a little bit of elitist-versus-populist tensions,” Mr. Henson said. “There are meteorologists who feel, ‘Just because I have a bachelor’s degree doesn’t mean I don’t know what’s going on.’ ”

Whatever the reasons, meteorologists are far more likely to question the underlying science of climate change. A study published in the January 2009 newsletter of the American Geophysical Union, the professional association of earth scientists, found that while nearly 90 percent of some 3,000 climatologists who responded agreed that there was evidence of human-driven climate change, 80 percent of all earth scientists and 64 percent of meteorologists agreed with the statement. Only economic geologists who specialized in industrial uses of materials like oil and coal were more skeptical.

Leslie Kaufman @'NYTimes'

Are dragons gay?

"We also discuss and offer a solution to the problem of how, since dragons are invariably male, the species can be propagated."

 @'US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health'

Antony Gormley’s Naked Men Perched on NYC Buildings

British artist Antony Gormley conquers New York’s Flatiron District with his legion of naked men inhabiting pathways and sidewalks in and around Madison Square Park and perched on ledges and rooftops of buildings from 14th to 34th streets on Manhattan’s East Side. Cast from the artist’s own lean body in iron and fiberglass, the 31 anatomically correct statues, which make up the installation Event Horizon, literally swarm the park. Finding them is a bit like playing the game “Where’s Waldo” yet once spotted they bring to mind the angels watching over Berlin in Wim Wenders’ film Wings Of Desire.

Winner of the 1994 Turner Prize, Gormley is celebrated in the UK for his spectacular public art works. His massive Angel of the North sculpture extends its wings high on a hill in Gateshead, while 100 life-size, cast iron figures in Another Place stretch out into the sea on Crosby Beach. Event Horizon, which marks Gormley’s U.S. public art debut, was first installed in 2007 on bridges, rooftops and streets along the South Bank of London’s Thames River. The New York installation, which is supported by its own website with a map, photos, and a video of Gormley discussing the project while scouting locations around Madison Square Park, remains on view through August 15.

Click here to view a slideshow of photos of the installation>>

Note: Following recent controversy about whether his sculptures looked like jumpers, we asked Gormley to comment. Here’s what he had to say:

“I am confident that New Yorkers and visitors to this city will understand that the figures are works of art. The ambition of Event Horizon is to activate the skyline and to perhaps make people visually aware of their surroundings. Silhouetted against the sky these bodyforms look out into space at large asking: Where does human evolution fit in the scheme of things?”

Paul Laster @'Flavourwire'