Kazakhstani ancestors seize control of Clipmarks

Ladies and gentlemen,

We have taken control of the Clipiverse. We will not release founders of Clipmarks until all demands are met. In their place you will now see real men of honor where their images appear.

Our demands are as follows:

1. All Uzbeki clippers must wear red hats in profile pictures
2. Dashboard topics will be changed to: goats, sexy time, fermented horse urine and freddie mercury
3. Emperor Mike Arrington must review Clipmarks without them sponsoring one of his events
4. Clipmarks must be renamed Clipmarkistan. We are offering 1,000 goats and one color television (remote control included) to the owner of www.clipmarkistan.com (currently unavailable).

Worlds first observation wheel built on a bridge

Failing to curb the impact of climate change could damage the global economy on the scale of the Great Depression or either world war, according to a report issued today by the British government. The environmental devastation could cost between 5 and 20 percent of the worlds gross domestic product, the report found.

The report by Nicholas Stern, who heads Britains Government Economic Service, calls for a new round of international collaboration to cut greenhouse gas emissions linked to global warming.

However, some economic experts questioned the British studys projections, noting that other analyses suggest developed countries will only suffer a modest economic hit.

"Theres just a very small part of GDP [in industrialized nations] thats affected by weather in a direct or indirect way," said Jerry Taylor, a senior fellow at the libertarian Cato Institute, which accepts contributions from fossil-fuel companies. "Its very difficult to sketch out this disaster scenario."

The issue of how to approach global warming has been a sticking point between the United States and some of its European allies since the Bush administration disavowed the Kyoto Protocol in 2001, saying it opposed requiring limits on carbon dioxide produced by burning fossil fuels.

The Koran

Translated by J.M. Rodwell

[1876]

The arrangement of the Suras in this translation is based partly upon the traditions of the Muhammadans themselves, with reference especially to the ancient chronological list printed by Weil in his Mohammed der Prophet, as well as upon a careful consideration of the subject matter of each separate Sura and its probable connection with the sequence of events in the life of Muhammad. Great attention has been paid to this subject by Dr. Weil in the work just mentioned; by Mr. Muir in his Life of Mahomet, who also publishes a chronological list of Suras, 21 however of which he admits have "not yet been carefully fixed;" and especially by N�ldeke, in his Geschichte des Q�rans, a work to which public honours were awarded in 1859 by the Paris Academy of Inscriptions. From the arrangement of this author I see no reason to depart in regard to the later Suras. It is based upon a searching criticism and minute analysis of the component verses of each, and may be safely taken as a standard, which ought not to be departed from without weighty reasons. I have, however, placed the earlier and more fragmentary Suras, after the two first, in an order which has reference rather to their subject matter than to points of historical allusion, which in these Suras are very few; whilst on the other hand, they are mainly couched in the language of self-communion, of aspirations after truth, and of mental struggle, are vivid pictures of Heaven and Hell, or descriptions of natural objects, and refer also largely to the opposition met with by Muhammad from his townsmen of Mecca at the outset of his public career. This remark applies to what N�ldeke terms "the Suras of the First Period."

Man Says Tight Shoes Made Him Lose 3 Toes

A Lorain man is suing Discount Drug Mart after three of his toes had to be amputated.

Leo Williams, 56, said he lost his toes because he wore tight orothopedic shoes that a Drug Mart employee mis-sized and said just needed breaking in. His attorney said Williams is now in a wheelchair.

Williams went to the Sheffield store to get fitted twice, the suit said. He accused the employees of lacking the state license needed to sell orthopedic shoes.

His attorney said that William will need more surgery and could lose more of his foot.

Drug Mart officials refused to comment.

NEW YORK (CNN) -- Internal BP documents reveal the oil corporations knowledge of "significant safety problems at the Texas City refinery," months or years prior to the March 2005 explosion that killed 15 workers and injured more than 170 others, according to preliminary findings released Monday by the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB).

BP (Charts) has accepted full responsibility for the disaster at its plant and has settled more than 1,000 lawsuits related to claims made by those directly injured on site, by family members of those who died, and by people who suffered shock.

Inside one of Ukraines biggest sports halls a band pumps out deafening music surrounded by pom pom-waving dancers in shiny blue outfits.

The Orthodox Church feels threatened. It says Embassy of God is a cult.

Mozilla said that downloads for the second version of its Firefox browser reached two million in the first 24 hours, or more than 30 downloads per second. The rate of downloads compare to one million in the first 24 hours with the first version of Firefox, and 1.5 million with Firefox 1.5. The latest version of Firefox adds enhancements such as a phishing filter, a retooled user interface, and performance improvements.

Mozilla user experience lead Mike Beltzner says Firefoxs "less is more" philosophy is what makes the browser so popular. He even compared it to a Honda Civic, a car popular with auto enthusiasts due to its easily upgradable design. "By default, Firefox is a simple, sleek, efficient, reliable and effective web browser," he said. "If youre the type of person who tinkers, though ... well, the sky is the limit."

The move comes amid pressure from major studios and record labels against popular online sites like MySpace and YouTube, which they accuse of infringing the copyrights of their artists music and videos.

News Corp.s MySpace, a social-networking hub and one of the most popular sites on the Internet, licensed technology from privately held Gracenote allowing it to review music recordings uploaded by community members to their profiles.

Popular sites like MySpace and YouTube are littered with copyright music and video posted by their legions of users, who hope to share them with friends and strangers alike.

Both say they remove unauthorized copyright material when notified.

Publication of the Stern Review on the Economics of Climate change

?The conclusion of the Review is essentially optimistic. There is still time to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, if we act now and act internationally. Governments, businesses and individuals all need to work together to respond to the challenge. Strong, deliberate policy choices by governments are essential to motivate change.

If we take no action to control emissions, each tonne of CO2 that we emit now is causing damage worth at least $85 ? but these costs are not included when investors and consumers make decisions about how to spend their money.� Emerging schemes that allow people to trade reductions in CO2 have demonstrated that there are many opportunities to cut emissions for less than $25 a tonne.�� In other words, reducing emissions will make us better off. According to one measure, the benefits over time of actions to shift the world onto a low-carbon path could be in the order of $2.5 trillion each year.

Climate change is the greatest market failure the world has seen.� Three elements of policy are required for an effective response.

The first is carbon pricing, through taxation, emissions trading or regulation, so that people are faced with the full social costs of their actions. The aim should be to build a common global carbon price across countries and sectors.

Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.

"Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo." is a grammatically correct sentence used as an example of how homonyms and homophones can be used to create complicated constructs. It has been known to exist since 1972 when the sentence was used by William J. Rapaport, currently an associate professor at the University at Buffalo.^[1] It was posted to Linguist List by Rapaport in 1992.^[2] It was also featured in Steven Pinkers 1994 book The Language Instinct.

Sentences of this type, although not in such a refined form, have been known for a long time. A classical example is a proverb "Dont trouble trouble until trouble troubles you".

The sentence is unpunctuated and uses three different readings of the word "buffalo". In order of their first use, these are:

Last week the list of ills attributable to obesity grew: fat people cause global warming.

This latest contribution to the obesity debate comes in an article by Sheldon H. Jacobson of the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana and his doctoral student, Laura McLay. Their paper, published in the current issue of The Engineering Economist, calculates how much extra gasoline is used to transport Americans now that they have grown fatter. The answer, they said, is a billion gallons a year.

Their conclusion is in the same vein as a letter published last year in The American Journal of Public Health. Its authors, from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, did a sort of back-of-the-envelope calculation of how much extra fuel airlines spend hauling around fatter Americans. The answer, they wrote, based on the extra 10 pounds the average American gained in the 1990?s, is 350 million gallons, which means an extra 3.8 million tons of carbon dioxide.

?People are out scouring the landscape for things that make obese people look bad,? said Kelly Brownell, director of the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale.

HassleMe Because sometimes in life,
you just need to be nagged...

Not eating enough fruit? Forgot to feed the fish again? Need a little help keeping your New Years resolutions?
Tell us what to hassle you about, and well nag you via email at semi-unpredictable intervals.

Top 25 Bush Videos

Funny Videos Mocking President Bush

Scientist Finds 100 Million-Year-Old Bee

---

The head of the British Army has spoken of his belief that God saved his life three times, prompting him to become a Christian.

"Finally, I had to be stopped so that the lesson could be learned. . . God had no choice but to take a stick and beat me over the head."

British scientists have grown the worlds first artificial liver from stem cells in a breakthrough that will one day provide entire organs for transplant.

The liver tissue is created from stem cells - blank cells capable of developing into different types of tissue - found in blood from the umbilical cord.

Working in collaboration with experts from the US, the Newcastle scientists succeeded in separating out the stem cells from blood removed from the umbilical cord minutes after birth.

While other researchers have created liver cells from stem cells from embryos, the Newcastle team are the first to create sizeable sections of tissue from stem cells from the umbilical cord.

They believe their technique is better suited to growing larger sections of tissue.

Use of cord stem cells is also more ethically acceptable than the use of embryonic stem cells - a process that leads to the death of the embryo.

"While I am writing, I am far away;
and when I come back, I have already left."
Pablo Neruda

jo bhaje hari ko sada - bhajni/teentaal

Mr. ONeill is a Houston attorney who clerked for Chief Justice William Rehnquist during the Supreme Courts October 1974 term. He authored the New York Times No. 1 bestseller, "Unfit for Command" in 2004.

He wants us to join his mighty project. Thats a main reason we need thoroughgoing transformation. He wants people like us to become fit enough to follow Jesus inside "the infinite rule of God," becoming searchers for his kingdom, agents within it, witnesses to it, and models of it. We now have little kingdoms of our own, just as God intended. Depending on our age and level of responsibility, we have a small realm "where our choice determines what happens." God wants us "to mesh our kingdoms with the kingdoms of others," all inside his master kingdom, "which pervades and governs the whole of the physical universe."

1. Put on the full armor of God.
2. Seek his kingdom first.
3. Fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion.
4. Heal the sick.
5. Stir one another up to good works.
6. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me.
7. Teach everybody to obey everything I have commanded you.
8. Let your light shine before others.

The Value of a New York Dollar

(And why it?s worth only 76.2 cents)

If you are a fan of pop art then youre probably already well acquainted with the work Roy Lichtenstein. Roy Lichtenstein became one of the leading pop artists of the sixties with his comic-strip paintings. Drowning Girl 1963, shown left, is one of his better known works and is a good example of the design features in his most famous pieces. Notice the thick lines, bold colors, and thought bubble. His work also often included boxed captions and words such as "WHAAM!", commonly found in comic books.

Benday dots were Lichtensteins trademark. Benday dots are a printing process which combines two (or more) different small, coloured dots to create a third colour. Back in the day, pulp comic books used benday dots in primary colours to inexpensively create the secondary colours such as flesh tone.

You can create the benday dot effect by using the Colour Halftone filter found in Photoshop, however in this tutorial Im going to show you a way to create a fantastic looking black and white Halftone Pattern. "Why?", because I like the look of it better.

Due to the vivid colors, the pop art that you will create using this tutorial will look fantastic if you get it printed at your local print shop. If you are going to get it printed, in the beginning change the resolution to 300dpi (Image >> Image Size) and at the end of the tutorial change the mode to CMYK (adjust colours if necessary).

Australian scientists unveiled three test-tube koala cubs today as part of an artificial insemination programme to preserve the vulnerable mammal.

They said the programme would lead to the creation of the worlds first koala sperm bank, letting researchers screen out koala diseases.

Stern by numbers

Published:�31 October 2006

"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons." --Popular Mechanics, forecasting the relentless march of science, 1949

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." --Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943

"I have traveled the length and breadth of this country and talked with the best people, and I can assure you that data processing is a fad that wont last out the year." --The editor in charge of business books for Prentice Hall, 1957

"But what ... is it good for?" --Engineer at the Advanced Computing Systems Division of IBM, 1968, commenting on the microchip.

"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." --Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977

"This telephone has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." --Western Union internal memo, 1876.

"The concept is interesting and well-formed, but in order to earn better than a C, the idea must be feasible." --A Yale University management professor in response to Fred Smiths paper proposing reliable overnight delivery service. (Smith went on to found Federal Express Corp.)

"Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?" --H.M. Warner, Warner Brothers, 1927.

"Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find oil? Youre crazy." --Drillers who Edwin L. Drake tried to enlist to his project to drill for oil in 1859.

"Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau." --Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics, Yale University, 1929.

"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value." --Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre.

"Everything that can be invented has been invented." --Charles H. Duel

"Louis Pasteurs theory of germs is ridiculous fiction". --Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse, 1872

(And of course, the most famous one...)

"640K ought to be enough for anybody." -- Bill Gates, 1981

Doing The Cube

����������� The infamous Rubik?s cube is solvable from any mixed up position.� In fact, there are mathematical theorems that say the cube can be solved from any mixed up position in 22 turns.� However, no one has been able to prove this theorem?yet.� So we will approach a much simpler method to solving the cube.� But first, we need to get a few things understood first.�

The moves are fairly simple.� Each move consists of a quarter turn and a single slice (a slice being one row or column of the cube).� They are as follows.

The 37 Signals book Getting Real has been released for free viewing on the companys web site. Previously, you had to pay $29 for the paperback or $19 for the e-book.

37 Signals is best known for popular web apps like Backpack, Basecamp, and Campfire (which Lifehacker editors use for online powwows). Getting Real offers insights, advice, and ideas for web developers and anyone interested in business, design, programming, and marketing. ? Rick Broida

Who has controlled the Middle East over the course of history? Pretty much everyone. Egyptians, Turks, Jews, Romans, Arabs, Greeks, Persians, Europeans...the list goes on. Who will control the Middle East today? That is a much bigger question.

? Buy AOL. Swallowing AOL wont transform Yahoo, but would give it increased traffic and a shot in the arm for its search-advertising business. The real question is whether Time Warner wants to sell. "Time Warner has a new strategy for AOL and is not contemplating any deals," says a company spokesman. Citigroup analyst Jason Bazinet estimates AOL is worth about $13 billion. Of course, Time Warner might demand more.

? Sell to Microsoft. If Semel cant buy AOL, the best move for his shareholders may be to sell the company. Both Yahoo and Microsofts MSN have struggled against Google to cash in on search advertising. Integrating Microsofts codehead culture with Yahoos Internet vibe would be problematic. But buying Yahoo would be a triumph for Microsoft, giving it a major beachhead in Silicon Valley. If such a merger were to occur, the combined Yahoo and MSN would have 2006 net revenues nearly equal to Googles expected $7 billion.

? Merge with eBay. The two sites occupy different corners of the web, so theyd be complementary. Indeed, eBay (Charts) and Yahoo already are stitching together a comprehensive cross-selling initiative in the U.S., and each is wary of Google. The two have discussed mergers over the years, so theres a long history there. But however appealing it may be, an eBay-Yahoo merger appears unlikely, say people close to the two companies, precisely because of their vastly different focuses.

? Stay the course. This is Yahoos party line. Semel says that if Yahoo can do better at monetizing search ads and exploit new areas like ads on cellphones, videos, and social-networking sites, it will do just fine. "With the landscape changing, I am very, very excited about the opportunities for Yahoo," he told investors in mid-October, when Yahoo reported its disappointing third-quarter results. Lets see if Yahoos board is as patient as Semel.

Looking for tools to help teach your patrons how to use Google more effectively?

By popular demand, we?re now offering free downloadable teaching tools. While we?ve started small, we?re planning on making more materials available soon, including additional posters, cheat sheets, tent cards ? even trainings.

Feel free to download and distribute these materials as widely as youd like.

Difference between Men and Women

Published October 15, 2006 by Zohaib

Quakes jolt Three Gorges area as huge reservoir fills
by Kelly Haggart

Woman is eaten by soldier lover

Google shares ad wealth with videographers

The search company has agreed to turn over most advertising revenue generated by the latest video from Fritz Grobe and Stephen Voltz, creators of "The Diet Coke & Mentos Experiment," according to Peter Chane, a senior product manager for Google Video.

In exchange, Grobe and Voltz, who saw their original offering--which shows a version of Vegas Bellagio Fountains made of 101 2-liter bottles of Diet Coke and 523 Mentos--catch fire with video-sharing fans last summer, have agreed to let Google host their latest video, "The Diet Coke & Mentos Experiment II."

Until now, most amateur-made material that appears on video-sharing sites was made for fun. But inviting talented videographers to share in the ad revenue generated by their clips is the way of the video-sharing future, analysts say. Metacafe, one of the top 10 video-sharing sites, also announced on Monday that it will pay $5 to video creators for every 1,000 times their video is watched.

How long will it be before YouTube, which sees more than 50,000 videos uploaded to its site daily, begins writing checks to its content creators? Google acquired YouTube, the sectors largest company, earlier this month for $1.65 billion.

Grobe and Voltz, for instance, pocketed $35,000, their share of the ad revenue paid to them by Revver, for their first Coke-and-Mentos video back in July. Now, the pair could earn big bucks from Google if the latest video is a hit. The two are also hosting a video-making contest sponsored by Coca-Cola, which paid them an undisclosed amount.

STEVE Irwin outfits, complete with a bloody stingray barb attached to a khaki shirt, are among the top Halloween costumes in the US this year.

While some have found the Crocodile Hunter outfits amusing, others in the US are outraged at what they say is an insult to the late conservationist.

Scroll through Firefox tabs

Heres a nice Firefox gem: if youve opened a lot of tabs (so many that the scrolling arrow appears on the right), put your mouse on the row of tabs and try to scroll with the mousewheel: youll see the tabs move from left to right, making it very easy to find the one you need.

WASHINGTON, Oct. 30 ? Across the world, the Pentagon has thousands of garages, hangars and sprawling lots to store all its jets, tanks and other weaponry. But, like most American households, it is cluttered with old, unused and unwanted things.

And so the Pentagon runs a little-publicized giveaway and tag sale program to clean out its overstuffed attics and closets, bulging with the greatest weapons buildup since the Reagan era. The Pentagon also uses the Excess Defense Articles program, as it is called, to reward government friends and allies across the globe.

The program is not without its critics, who say it contributes to a global arms race and may be a short-sighted way of winning friends.

?Aren?t there more constructive ways for the United States to make friends?? asked Danielle Brian, executive director of the Project on Government Oversight, a watchdog group that studies Pentagon spending. ?We are arming countries that otherwise would not afford to be armed. If we want to make friends, we should have something better to offer.?

TRICKS Seemingly innocuous characters have a sexy edge in costumes, which evoke male fantasies and reinforce a larger cultural message: younger is hotter.

Anyone who has watched the evolution of women?s Halloween costumes in the last several years will not be surprised that these images ? culled from the Web sites of some of the largest Halloween costume retailers ? are more strip club than storybook. Or that these and other costumes of questionable taste will be barely covering thousands of women who consider them escapist, harmless fun on Halloween.

?It?s a night when even a nice girl can dress like a dominatrix and still hold her head up the next morning,? said Linda M. Scott, the author of ?Fresh Lipstick: Redressing Fashion and Feminism? (Palgrave Macmillan) and a professor of marketing at the University of Oxford in England.

The trend is so pervasive it has been written about by college students in campus newspapers, and Carlos Mencia, the comedian, jokes that Halloween should now be called Dress-Like-a-Whore Day.

But the abundance of risqu� costumes that will be shrink-wrapped around legions of women come Oct. 31 prompts a larger question: Why have so many girls grown up to trade in Wonder Woman costumes for little more than Wonderbras?

POST-POST-POST-FEMINISM? Halloween is a day to flaunt your inner vixen.

Dr. Nelson, a professor of sociology at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, said the trend toward overtly sexualized costumes actually begins with little girls. ?Heroic figures for women or considered icons of femininity are very much anchored in the femme fatale imagery,? she said, adding that those include an assortment of Disney heroines, witches, cocktail waitresses, French maids and an ?interchangeable variety of beauty queens.?

Obviously, however, many women see nothing wrong with making Halloween less about Snickers bars and SweeTarts and more about eye candy.

The art of listening is very important in life and essential in any relationship. Being able to listen carefully assures that valuable communication is passed between two people. Some communication is so riveting that we cant help but pay attention and listen to every word.

But what about the communications that do not capture our attention fully. These are slower communications that do not pull you right in and perhaps are harder to keep your focus. It is during these times when you can "listen-plus."

Fought in 1863, the Battle of Vicksburg was the final significant battle of the Civil War, or as is it often referredto "The War of Northern Agression," so it is fitting that this weekends battle at the Mississippi State Fair will be the final chance to qualify for the Krystal Square Off World Championship.

The Battle of Vicksburg was won by the Union Army, and Competitive Eating fans around the world are anxious to find out if a Southern Eater will be able to rise up and keep the Yankees from winning again in the state of Mississippi.

WASHINGTON - When it comes to global warming, scientists and the American public arent talking on the same wavelength.

Most scientists believe that humans and their machines are mainly responsible for the 1.4 degree Fahrenheit rise in the worlds average temperature in the last 100 years. Most Americans think otherwise.

Last Wednesday, a group of 18 climate scientists, including two Nobel Prize winners, submitted an affidavit to the Supreme Court declaring that theyre 99 percent certain that "greenhouse gas emissions from human activities cause global climate change, endangering human health and welfare."

Only 41 percent of those polled last summer by the Washington-based Pew Research Center, however, accepted the argument that climate change is due primarily to human activities, such as burning fossil fuels in cars, trucks and factories.

The rest of the 1,501 adults in the survey either said theres no solid evidence that the Earth is warming, or that if there is, the extra heat is the result of natural climate patterns, such as fluctuations in the suns radiation.

This public skepticism flies in the face of the most widely accepted scientific assessment of the cause of global warming, which lays the blame primarily on "greenhouse gases" generated by humans.

A teenager who decided to get her breasts pierced for her 18th birthday faces reconstructive surgery after a flesh-destroying infection forced doctors to remove her left breast.

Stephanie Edington of Crawfordsville, who had the piercings done at Neon Novelty as "a spontaneous thing", experienced redness and tenderness in the affected area, along with some leakage, a few weeks afterwards.

She contacted the person who did the piercings, who suggested she wash the area with soap and water.

However the pain worsened, and she was taken to the emergency room at St Clare Medical Centre in Indianapolis�with an infection.

She was transferred two days later to the Indiana University Medical Centre, where surgeons also removed lymph nodes and infected skin up to her collarbone.

Dr Robert Goulet Jnr, a professor at the Indiana University Cancer Centre, said the piercing created an entry point for the bacteria, but the procedure itself was not likely to have caused the infection. Edington is diabetic, which left her susceptible to infection, he said.

Doctors diagnosed Ms Edington, who had the piercings on August 29, with necrotising fasciitis, or gas gangrene - a rare condition that results from rapid bacteria growth and leads to tissue destruction. It is only the third documented case in the world of gas gangrene in the breast area, Dr Goulet told US newspaper The Paper.

Green teas benefits stem from a substance called epigallocatechin gallate, or EGCG. EGCG is a flavonoid, a compound that gives green tea its color, and has anti-cancer, anti-microbial and anti-inflammatory properties. EGCG-based cancer drugs already are in clinical trials.

It also holds some promise in fighting HIV -- though nobodys recommending it yet for AIDS prevention or treatment.

For at least a decade, researchers have known the EGCG molecule inhibits the progression of HIV in lab experiments -- but they didnt understand precisely why.

Now, new work by Baylor College of Medicine and University of Sheffield, UK, scientists shows how the EGCG molecule binds to the exact spot HIV needs to infect a healthy T-cell, a type of white blood cell critical to fighting infections. Their report is online in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.

Under normal circumstances, HIV does its dirty work via an "envelope" or surface protein called gp120. GP120 locks into a special "pocket" on the surface of susceptible host cells called CD4 T-cells. After that fusion, HIV releases its genetic material into the healthy cell. The infected cell then begins churning out the next generation of viruses.

But not if the green tea-derived molecule plugs up that pocket, leaving HIV no way to get inside.

Secret Service agents turned away British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, in character as the boorish, anti-Semitic journalist, when he tried to invite "Premier George Walter Bush" to a screening of his upcoming movie, "Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan."

Shortly after Nazarbayev dedicated a statue in front of the Kazakh embassy, Borat denounced an official Kazakh publicity campaign running in U.S. magazines as "disgusting fabrications" orchestrated by neighboring Uzbekistan.

"If there is one more item of Uzbek propaganda claiming that we do not drink fermented horse urine, give death penalty for baking bagels, or export over 300 tonnes of human pubis per year, then we will be left with no alternative but to commence bombardment of their cities with our catapults," Borat said. � Continued...

Ive now gotten about twenty emails pointing out the accompanying graphic from the Times of London and this New Scientist story on how long it would take for humanitys impacts to vanish from the Earth:

The WordPress Flickr Photo Album plugin will pull in your Flickr photosets and display them as albums on your WordPress site. There is a pretty simple template provided, but you can customize the templates 100% to match the look and feel of your own site.

This plugin will also add a new Photos tab (next to the existing Upload tab) in your WordPress edit screen which will allow you to easily insert your Flickr photos into your blog posts with just a couple clicks (much like the Flickr Post Bar plugin). Your inserted photos will then be linked back to your WordPress Flickr photo album.

Im no dietician, but if you have a personal deep fryer sitting at your desk you might have a problem. While I can see the appeal to frying food that normally isnt fried, such as candy bars, tomatoes, or cuts of veal, it seems like something you shouldnt be doing so much that you need one next to your keyboard. Well, its your funeral. This snack-size deep fryer holds about 5 cups of delicious, fattening oil and can hold about a pound and a quarter of sizzling food. It heats up to 375 degrees at its hottest, which should be hot enough to kill any bacteria in the clearance-rack ham youre shoving in it. If you use this on a regular basis its safe to say youll see a pretty solid upward line over time on your USB scale. The snack-sized deep fryer is available online now for a mere $40, a fraction of the cost of a triple bypass. ? Adam Frucci

Start the brainwashing early with the iCrib

Its never too early to get your new infant interested in shiny gadgets and Metallica, and this predictably-named iCrib is just the thing to do both. Hooking onto the edge of Juniors crib, the iCrib will brainwash your newborn with whatever music you want, turning itself off after a specified time if youre using Master of Puppets as a lullabye. It also can do a little light show to keep the kid engaged visually while his tender little eardrums are damaged before he has a chance to damage them himself. Its the perfect first step to getting your kid a wallet-emptying gadget addiction, and will lead nicely into his master of the iTod before he finally graduates to whatever fancy video version of the iPod is out by the time he hits six or seven years old. The iCrib is available now for $30.
? Adam Frucci

Katherine Harris, who is trying to become a U.S. senator, says she is writing a tell-all about the many people who have wronged her. This includes, but is not necessarily limited to: the Republican leaders who didnt want her to run, the press that has covered her troubled campaign, and the many staffers who have quit her employ, whom she accuses of colluding with her opponent.

She is vague about what, precisely, makes her a victim, but she says she has it all documented.

"Ive been writing it all year," she says in that kittenish voice. She often smiles and cocks her head as if shes letting you in on a secret. "Its going to be a great book."

If it is, it may be one of very few things that go well for the two-term Republican congresswoman. Once beloved by the Republican leadership for her role in overseeing the 2000 recount that delivered the presidency to George Bush, Harris was snubbed by those old friends before the primary. Republican chieftains, considering her too polarizing to win a statewide race, tried to recruit others, and Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) said publicly that she could not win. Fundraising has been poor. She has come under scrutiny for her role in a bribery scandal. She has caught flak for a series of bizarre statements, including a comment in August: "If youre not electing Christians, then in essence you are going to legislate sin."

The way Harris sees it, a vast left- and right-wing conspiracy, encompassing both the "liberal media" and the Republican "elite," is attempting to keep her out of the Senate. She says anyone could see the way the panel of questioners coddled Nelson at their debate last week. Her voice gets all high and mocking as she imitates them.

" Ooooh, Senator Nelson," she says. "I mean, come on."

A Song of Gods Children (Romans 8:2,14,15b-19)

The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus

Creating a realistic water surface in Photoshop is quite a challenge because it is the distorted reflection of the surroundings that makes the water look liquid. The displace filter is an excellent tool for making this distortion.

Fake Progress Bar

A Fake Progress dialog for your desktop. Ever wanted your computer to look busy so that you could do something else? Read the paper perhaps? Stare into space? Features include fully cutomizable titles, icons, speed and progress messages. It can also disable your screensaver. Freeware.

Amnesty International is launching a campaign on behalf of a whole new category of prisoners of conscience - internet bloggers and chatroom visitors arrested by repressive governments for expressing unwelcome views or disseminating sensitive information online.

10 Windows Explorer alternatives compared and reviewed

Windows Explorer, the default file manager for Microsoft Windows, hasn?t really changed all that much over the years. Below you?ll find reviews, screenshots and links to download 10 11 12 different alternatives.

If I haven?t included your favorite file manager (for Windows..) in this list, by all means please leave a comment below or feel free to contact me. I?d be more than happy to include it.

Indian tribes wanted their casinos protected from competition, such as state lotteries and casinos on other tribes land. So the lobbyists decided to mobilize Christians against the proposals to expand local gambling.

Consider one memo highlighted in a Capitol Hill hearing Wednesday that Scanlon, a former aide to Rep. Tom DeLay, R-Texas, sent the Coushatta Tribe of Louisiana to describe his strategy for protecting the tribes gambling business. In plain terms, Scanlon confessed the source code of recent Republican electoral victories: Target religious conservatives, distract everyone else, and then railroad through complex initiatives. ?

The brilliance of this strategy was twofold: Not only would most voters not know about an initiative to protect Coushatta gambling revenues, but religious "wackos" could be tricked into supporting gambling at the Coushatta casino even as they thought they were opposing it.

We plan to use three forms of communications to mobilize and win these battles. ? Our mission is to get specifically selected groups of individuals to the polls to speak out AGAINST something. To that end, your money is best spent finding them and communicating with them on using the modes that they are most likely to respond to. Simply put, we want to bring out the wackos to vote against something and make sure the rest of the public lets the whole thing slip past them. The wackos get their information form [sic] the Christian right, Christian radio, mail, the internet, and telephone trees. [bold added]

If you feel bad being called a wacko, remember: Abramoff called the Indians "monkeys," "troglodytes," and "idiots."

Words and Language in a Humorous Vein
on the Web Since 1995

Topless sandals - also called "down unders" - simulate walking barefoot while protecting your feet. Topless sandals stick to the bottom of your feet, but leave no residue on your feet when you take them off. The "stick" is guaranteed for a year, which is the typical life span of a flip flop. Topless sandals are basically topless flip flops, but so much cooler. Youll be amazed at how many heads you turn while wearing your topless sandals. People will literally think you are barefoot and so will your feet. Available in a variety sizes, design and colors. Prices start from $ 14.50 at Topless-sandal.com.

HOME PRICES POST BIGGEST DROP ON RECORD

BAGHDAD, Iraq ? U.S. troops on Tuesday abandoned checkpoints around the Shiite militia stronghold of Sadr City on orders from Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, the latest in a series of moves by the Iraqi leader to assert his authority with the U.S. administration.

"Halloween spending is expected to grow to 5 billion this year. ? Thats up from about 3.3 billion last year," said Scott Krugman, spokesman for the National Retail Federation.

The average Halloween consumer will spend roughly $60 this year, as compared to $48 last year.

The words for poop are endless, but the Miami Metrozoo has another term to add to the list: educational.

Now on display is a 5,000-square-foot exhibit on excrement titled "The Scoop on Poop," which invites visitors to explore the science of scat. The exhibit is filled with photos of animals in some of their most indelicate moments. Stool sample models abound: haylike football-sized balls (elephant), kidney-bean-looking pellets (porcupine) and coallike lumps coated with fur (black bear).

Beyond the "ick" factor, however, zoo officials and the exhibits creators say there is a lot of information being imparted. Visitors can smell the stench of flowers that mimic dung to attract flies for pollination. Videos include one of a hippo spreading its droppings around to mark its territory. Simple games include "Who Dung It?"

The exhibit is not the first to feature feces, however. An exhibit called "All the Poop" toured Japan in 2001 and another in England showcased scat samples.

On a recent afternoon one woman cheered "go, go, go" as two children raced model dung beetles at a station in the Miami exhibit. Students on a class trip posed in a cutout of a person sitting in an outhouse. Others examined slides of parasites found in dung using a microscope, while classmates weighed themselves on a scale designed to tell them how long it takes an elephant to poop their weight.

Adults have had fun with material, too. Some volunteers and zoo employees have started wearing plastic poop pins that look like the real thing. Zoo personnel have also brought out a bowl of chocolate-covered candy, inviting visitors to take one if they dare.

Elephant keepers, meanwhile, were charged with weighing the amount of elephant poop one of the zoos Asian male elephants, Dahlip, produces in a 24-hour period. The total: 540 pounds. Meanwhile, a commercial for the exhibit, which will begin running shortly, has already shown up on YouTube.

The TRUE MIRROR!

A True Mirror does not reverse images. That is, if you hold writing up to it, you can read what the writing says. In it, you see yourself as you really are. It is something few people have ever seen before.

Weve discovered some fascinating aspects of human nature that arise when people see their true appearance. Because it is very challenging to confront new information about ones self, the responses are usually very dramatic...some love it, some hate it, and some will not even look! But we feel its just a matter of time to become familiar with the new image, and most people will begin to prefer the new look. Its natural, after all.

Fish body/face-art

Looking back, 2006

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The Magic People

I recently heard an articulate, polished, well-educated minister at a prosperous suburban mega-church mention almost casually that he had no idea whether a demon was sitting in his Sunday school class. Millions of American children, whose parents where raised in devout Christian families that never questioned whether they could trick or treat, won?t be trick-or-treating this Halloween because their parents have become so convinced that witchcraft is a real danger that they resist anything having to do with Halloween. Paradoxically, perhaps, these Christians? fear of the occult has given new validity to magical ideas that were once dismissed out of hand.

Well, I think we have our answer as to who is behind the Progressive Policy Council, the phony group behind a mailer thats gone out to an untold number of Pennsylvania voters in an apparent attempt to sour liberal voters on Democrat Bob Casey.

Records with the Virginia State Corporation Commission show that the groups charter was filed by a man named Jason Torchinsky of Holtzman Vogel. And who is he?

His bio at his law firm gives a good idea:

Jason Torchinsky recently joined Holtzman Vogel PLLC with a primary focus on campaign finance and election law. During the 2004 election cycle, Jason served as Deputy General Counsel to Bush-Cheney 04 and Deputy General Counsel to the 2005 Presidential Inaugural Committee.

Immediately before joining the firm, Jason was Counsel to the Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division at the United States Department of Justice. Jason has also served in other positions at the White House and at the United States Department of Justice. At the White House, he worked for now-Attorney General Alberto Gonzales in the Counsels Office. At the Department of Justice, Jason served as a Special Assistant to the Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division and in the Eastern District of Wisconsin as a Special Assistant United States Attorney....

Jasons prior political experience includes the Republican National Committee Counsels Office, the Dole-Kemp campaign, the 1996 Republican National Convention, and Congressman Herb Batemans re-election campaign.

Actually, it turns out that diminishing voter turnout is somewhat of a hobby for Torchinsky. Torchinsky is also affiliated with the American Center for Voting Rights, a conservative organization working to pass Voter ID laws in several states.

JERSEYVILLE, Ill. - A teenager carrying a Bible and shouting "I want Jesus" was shot twice with a police stun gun and later died at a St. Louis hospital, authorities said.

In a statement obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press, police in Jerseyville, about 40 miles north of St. Louis, said 17-year-old Roger Holyfield would not acknowledge officers who approached him and he continued yelling, "I want Jesus."

Police tried to calm the teen, but Holyfield became combative, according to the statement. Officers fired the stun gun at him after he ignored their warnings, then fired again when he continued struggling, police said.

With technology totally updating and changing our doors and mirrors, it was only a matter of time before the common lock got its big upgrade. The MyKey 2300 RFID Door Lock will unlock not with a key but an RFID tag waved in front of it. Because theres no lock to pick, its a lot more secure than your standard deadbolt, and theres a slide-out keypad for when you forget the tag in the house. The lock runs on four AA batteries, and if those batteries die simply press a 9-volt battery up to the terminal and you should be inside in no time. The MyKey 2300 comes with six RFID tags that can be put on your keychain or in your wallet, providing access with a wave. Its available online now for $300.
? Adam Frucci

This is a list of the most annoying and common logic flaws and stereotypes found in movies. Comments, additions and suggestions welcome! See notes for submission guidelines.
To submit a new cliche, use this submission form.
Main contributors are listed here.

New data and analysis shed some light on how big oil companies may have driven down the price of gasoline in the run up to the election in order to maintain the status quo.

The Foundation For Taxpayer and Consumer Rights has found that the recent sharp drop in gasoline prices from this years record highs is steeper than the drop in the price of crude oil, indicating that refiners are taking less profit in order to push the retail price lower as the election approaches.

In essence the analysis shows oil companies may have shrunk their profit margins in the short term on refining operations in order to pump up the electoral hopes of Republicans who receive more than 80% of the campaign contributions from oil companies. A GOP government is much more likely to keep oil company profits high in the long run.

Americans should trust their gut. Not only about the recent drop in gasoline prices being linked to Big Oils political agenda, but also about what will happen to gasoline prices after election day if the status quo in Washington DC doesnt change.

The Earth has been warming at a rate of 0.36 degree Fahrenheit per decade for the last 30 years, according to the research team led by James Hansen of NASAs Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York.

That brings the overall temperature to the warmest in the current interglacial period, which began about 12,000 years ago.

This web page is designed to give everyone an idea of what our universe actually looks like. There are nine main maps on this web page, each one approximately ten times the scale of the previous one. The first map shows the nearest stars and then the other maps slowly expand out until we have reached the scale of the entire visible universe.

This fellows argument for a female publishing conspiracy against men is founded on an ignorance of the publishing industry and a clutch of logical fallacies, so its not terribly surprising that every published author who has come across it seems to get a giggle out of it; its almost charming how clueless it is. But the argument does serve to illustrate a point, which we might as well call the Occams Razor Theory of Literary Rejection, which is: All things being equal, the simplest reason that your work has been rejected is usually the correct one.

For example, lets say I am an unpublished male writer whose work is continually rejected by publishers. Which of these two reasons is more likely?

1. There is a vast and grand conspiracy within the publishing industry, engineered by women, to keep men from being published;

2. My work isnt worth being published.

But if the GOP is to lose control of both the House and Senate next month, one certainly cannot pin its entire misfortune on the top-rated radio talk show host.��The War in Iraq, the Abramoff scandal and the Mark Foley affair have taken their cumulative toll on the GOP in the polls.��However, with his cheap shot towards actor Michael J. Fox, Limbaugh might have hammered the final nail into their coffin.

Limbaugh claimed that Fox was exaggerating the effects of his disease, calling it ?purely an act.?�As Limbaugh said this, he gesticulated wildly, mocking the effects of Fox?s illness.��He further stated that Fox was ?either off his medication or acting.?��Limbaugh justified his position by pointing out that Fox had made a deliberate point of not taking his medication when he testified before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee in 1998, and has continued to insist this is the case.��The day after he made his initial remarks, Limbaugh told a caller,�?I was right.��He was off his meds.?� Limbaugh simply cannot know this for a fact.��Fox has stated for the record in an interview with Katie Couric on the CBS Evening News that he was on his medication and could not have done the ads without taking them.� Medical experts on Parkinson?s such as Dr. Elaine Richman have said Fox was exhibiting symptoms�consistent with�being on his medication.��It must also be remembered that eight years have passed since his testimony before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee, and that the effects of Parkinson?s on Fox have advanced considerably.

Like two people, 17 and 20, who imitated Darth Vader, and made light sabres from fluorescent light tubes. Thats right, they opened them up, poured gasoline inside, and lit them. As one can imagine, a Star Wars sized explosion was not far behind. Darth Vader died, while his opponent survived to fess up to their creative, but stupid, reenactment.

Mina Brees, a Democrat, is running for a spot on the court that reviews civil and criminal cases from 24 counties in Central and West Texas. Her opponent is incumbent Republican Justice David Puryear.

The NFL quarterback and Westlake High School graduate has told Mina Brees, an Austin attorney, to stop using his picture in TV commercials as she runs for a spot on Texas 3rd Court of Appeals, saying their relationship is now "nonexistent" after souring six years ago.

"I think the major point here is that my mother is using me in a campaign, and Ive made it known many times I dont want to be involved," he said Monday.

The New Orleans Saints player said he is speaking out now because she did not acknowledge previous requests to keep him out of the campaign.

At a campaign event for California gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides at Pasadena City College on Monday, the Massachusetts Democrat and Vietnam veteran said: "You know, education, if you make the most of it, if you study hard and you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, uh, you can do well. If you don?t, you get stuck in Iraq.?

Kerry?s troop-bashing remarks belie the truth about the educational level of U.S. troops. According to figures readily available on the Internet, 99.9 percent of the enlisted forces have at least a high school education, 73.3 percent have some college, 16.2 percent have an associate?s degree or equivalent semester hours, and 4.7 have a bachelor?s degree.

What?s more, over 85 percent of field grade officers have advanced degrees ? 70.7 percent have master?s degrees, 12.1 percent have professional degrees and 2.5 percent have doctorate degrees.

Call us the power-strip generation: appliances, home theater gear, and all those gadget chargers need to be plugged in, and its gotten to the point where we just lay down cable after cable without any thought as to the drain ? until we get the bill. Recognizing the problem, an organization called Static! created the Power Aware Cord to give us a constant visual reminder of how much were taxing the grid. The PAC functions just like a regular power strip except that the more power it delivers, the brighter the cord glows and the faster the glow pulses. So if youre not home and everythings on standby, things should look pretty normal, but when youre going full tilt on your gaming PC with your Denon receiver pumping out huge amps while blow-drying your hair, your room will start to look like the engineering section of the Enterprise. As awesome as that may sound, dont get addicted to the cool blue glow ? youre supposed to be turning it down, remember? ? Peter Pachal

I found an interesting energy tip in Field and Stream magazine.� I am not normally a reader, but was waiting for an appointment and couldn?t find anything else to read.� So I picked one up and flipped almost immediately to a side bar tip The Caffeine Nap.� I have never heard of such a thing so I was immediately intrigued.

Sleep researchers at the Loughborough� University in Britain did several tests on fatigued drivers to compare the effects of different methods for a driver can use to stay awake.� They put the volunteers in driving simulators while they were sleepy and let them drive.� �Some of the tests included rolling down windows for cold exposure, blasting the radio and slapping oneself in the face to try to stay awake.� But what researchers found worked the best was a Caffeine Nap.

The Caffeine Nap is simple.� You drink a cup of coffee and immediately take a 15 minute nap.� Researchers found coffee helps clear your system of adenosine, a chemical which makes you sleepy.� So in testing, the combination of a cup of coffee with an immediate nap chaser provided the most alertness for the longest period of time.� The recommendation was to nap only 15 minutes, no more or less and you must sleep immediately after the coffee.

Considering this is something cheap and accessible to virtually anyone it?s probably a good tip to keep in your toolbag for long trips.

Computer scientists from academia and companies like I.B.M. and Google discussed topics including social networks, digital imaging, online media and the impact on work and employment. But most talks touched on two broad themes: the impact of computing will go deeper into the sciences and spread more into the social sciences, and policy issues will loom large, as the technology becomes more powerful and more pervasive.

?Algorithms are small but beautiful,? Dr. Karp observed. And algorithms are good at describing dynamic processes, while scientific formulas or equations are more suited to static phenomena. Increasingly, scientific research seeks to understand dynamic processes, and computer science, he said, is the systematic study of algorithms.

Biology, Dr. Karp said, is now understood as an information science. And scientists seek to describe biological processes, like protein production, as algorithms. ?In other words, nature is computing,? he said.

The new social-and-technology networks that can be studied include e-mail patterns, buying recommendations on commercial Web sites like Amazon, messages and postings on community sites like MySpace and Facebook, and the diffusion of news, opinions, fads, urban myths, products and services over the Internet. Why do some online communities thrive, while others decline and perish? What forces or characteristics determine success? Can they be captured in a computing algorithm?

Social networking research promises a rich trove for marketers and politicians, as well as sociologists, economists, anthropologists, psychologists and educators.

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