Crazy Facts

Like a gourmet chef who rarely eats out, Google Inc. feeds advertising services to hordes of other businesses while skimping on its own marketing.

The recipe has been extremely fruitful. While the Internet search leader has sold more than $30 billion in advertising since 2001, Google has become a household name without buying expensive ad campaigns on television or radio or in print

But the debate over the impact of birth order gained new urgency this summer when the results of a new study were announced: Firstborns IQs tend to be higher than those of their younger siblings.

Does that mean later-born kids are destined to be less accomplished and successful? Studies like this dont tell the whole story -- and neither do birth-order stereotypes. Heres how to bring out the best in each child:

Norwegian scientists analyzed test results and birth data from more than 241,000 military conscripts and found that oldest children had an average IQ of 103, second children came in at 101, and third-borns were at 100.

Will this scenario play out in your family? Not so fast. Like all studies, this one has limitations:

? The studys Norwegian -- maybe theres something special in the lingonberries over there.

? The subjects were all male -- who knows if its true for sisters?

Wäre mancher US-Spitzenpolitiker Soldat, hätte man ihn schon vor langem seines Postens enthoben oder vor ein Kriegsgericht gestellt, sagte der General am Freitag in Arlington nahe Washington. Einzelne Namen nannte er allerdings nicht.

He said investigators were trying to determine if the chunks of fried meat found in a pan in the apartment were human.

There?s no use avoiding it: our kids need to know about the global environmental crisis ? climate change, deforestation, species extinction. And as long as we?re teaching them about all that, we may as well teach them some science at the same time. Learning about evaporation can be as boring as watching a pot boil, but if it?s part of a habitat-destroying, polar-bear-killing, actually-somewhat-interesting environmental disaster, maybe that?s something kids could enjoy reading.

A consumer group says that certain popular, U.S.-made red lipsticks contain "surprisingly high levels of lead" that might be potentially dangerous, and the Food and Drug Administration said it would investigate, while cautioning that previous claims "have not generally been supported" by FDA analysis, the Associated Press says.

The lead tests were conducted on 33 brand-name lipsticks by an independent laboratory last month on red lipsticks bought in Boston, San Francisco, Minneapolis and Hartford, Conn., according to the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics. The group, which advocates for toxic-free products, said that 61% had detectable levels of lead, and that one-third exceeded the FDAs lead limit of 0.1 ppm for candy. The FDA hasnt set a level for lipstick.

Heres the organizations press release and the full report.

Wind-up Lamp

Pour yourself a silicon solar panel

Its a crystalline silicon solar cell that you pour.

Santa Clara, Calif.-based Innovalight says it has developed a somewhat contradictory-sounding process for creating crystalline silicon solar cells with liquid. If it works in mass production, it could slash the cost of making these solar cells by half or more, the company claims.

Innovalight essentially creates silicon nanoparticles, inserts them into a solvent, and pours the solvent on a substrate. The solvent is then extracted. What is left can sort of be analogized to a snowflake or a large sugar cube: a highly organized structure made up of tiny parts.

"We use this technique to make something that isnt much different from (traditional) crystalline silicon solar panels, except we get there cheaper," CEO Conrad Burke said. "They (the solar cells) end up in a pretty structured form."

Youre On Deck

Custom Printed Playing Cards

We print your image on the back of standard playing cards.

100 Greatest Cartoons

The 100 Greatest Cartoons is a documentary that features a poll conducted by the British television channel Channel 4 in 2004. 105 cartoons were nominated by Channel 4 and then ranked by public poll, with only the top 100 being shown. The ranked list was first broadcast on February 27, 2005, from 100 to number 1, featuring the reminiscences of celebrities and media pundits interlaced with clips from the shows themselves. It was hosted by Jimmy Carr.

A World War II veteran, who wants to remain anonymous, made the donation late last month after hearing McCaffrey speak in Petaluma two months ago about her vision for the Veterans Village program

NEW YORK, Oct. 14 (UPI) -- Researchers Sunday reported progress on development of a blood test that can diagnose Alzheimers disease, perhaps years before memory loss sets in.

The researchers, mainly based at Californias Stanford University, said the test was about 90 percent accurate in distinguishing the blood of people with Alzheimers from the blood of others, The New York Times reported. The scientists said the test was about 80 percent accurate in determining which patients with mild memory loss would go on to develop Alzheimers disease during the next two to six years.

The results were published online in the journal Nature Medicine.

Truckloads of illegal timber cross the Myanmar border to sawmills in China, while markets along the Thai border openly sell bear paws, tiger skins and elephant tusks

From clothes riddled with sensors to name tags that detect our moods, computings next wave could unleash small devices that increasingly augment everyday activities with digital intelligence.

Animal welfare groups will help Puerto Rico housing project residents pursue legal action after animal control workers seized their pets and hurled them to their deaths from a bridge, an activist said Sunday

With the work week fast approaching, authorities scrambled Sunday to move traffic around a major artery out of Los Angeles that was shut down by a fiery interstate tunnel pileup. The main southbound lanes of Interstate 5 were to reopen Monday morning, authorities said, helping to alleviate some of the problem.

But on Sunday, Interstate 5 was still shut down in both directions, snarling traffic on surrounding roads, where drivers looked for alternative routes after Friday nights pileup crash left more than two dozen trucks and other vehicles in flames.

Top Ten Rejuvenating and Anti-ageing Foods

Q: What is your date of birth?
A: July 15th.
Q: What year?
A: Every year.

Q: This myasthenia gravis, does it affect your memory at all?
A: Yes.
Q: And in what ways does it affect your memory?
A: I forget.
Q: You forget? Can you give us an example of something that youve forgotten?

Q: What was the first thing your husband said to you when he woke up that morning?
A: He said, "Where am I, Cathy."
Q: And why did that upset you?
A: My name is Susan.

Q: Were you present when your picture was taken?

Q: How was your first marriage terminated?
A: By death.
Q: And by whose death was it terminated?

Q: Doctor, how many autopsies have you performed on dead people?
A: All my autopsies are performed on dead people.

Q: ALL your responses MUST be oral, OK? What school did you go to?
A: Oral.

Q: Now doctor, isnt it true that when a person dies in his sleep, he doesnt know about it until the next morning?
A: Did you actually pass the bar exam?

Q: The youngest son, the twenty-year-old, how old is he?

Scientists discovered that beauty is a very old stimulus, universal and strong, just like hunger or pain.

Researchers say beauty is just like sugar. Beauty standards are the same everywhere: round hips and breasts, thin waist, full lips, big eyes, delicate facial traits (thin nose, small jaw). All these traits are due to estrogen, the female fertility hormone. Today, fertility is manipulated through contraceptives methods.

At first sight, we are attracted by the physical beauty on a partner, but what is really important is the way he/she thinks, feels, and acts, his/her personality, intelligence, charm, and creativity. All these are ?products? of the brain. Some say our big brain evolved through sexual selection. Cultural manifestations (like music, poetry and dance) offer rich information about their creator. They are meant put a certain person in the spotlight, that is get the attention of its social group but especially that of the opposite sex.

A series of articles and multimedia examining the human toll, global impact and political challenge of China?s epic pollution crisis.

Turning the Tide on the Worlds Water Crisis

Camels walk past a ship that rests on what was once the floor of the Aral Sea. Poor water management has devastated the region.

Satellite view shows the retreating shore of the Aral Sea, formerly one of the worlds largest inland seas. Image at left was taken in 1989, at right in 2003.

Until 9/11. Like almost everyone else in America and, indeed, most people in the world, I was outraged by the 19 criminals who murdered 3,000 innocent victims. But when George Bush said, on that very same day, "Freedom itself was attacked this morning by a faceless coward ? and freedom will be defended," I smelled a rat. In saying that freedom was attacked, Bush was saying something about the motives of the attackers, even though he couldnt have known that soon what their motives were. So it seemed to me that Bush was trying to set the groundwork for a war rather than trying to go after the higher-ups behind the perpetrators. I turned out to be right. In response to 9/11, George Bush made war on Afghanistan and, depending on which audience he and Dick Cheney were speaking to, a response to 9/11 was part of their motive in attacking Iraq.

Digital Scent Technology intends to change the interactive entertainment experience. The idea is to scent-enable movies, games, music, animation, or any digital media. Create a more immersive and captivating environment for your audience. Smell reaches out into a new, visceral dimension, transporting viewers, gamers, and music fans into the realm of the senses. Atmosphere, mood, emotion and characters can all be enhanced with scent.

Have patience awhile; slanders are not long-lived. Truth is the child of time; erelong she shall appear to vindicate thee.

Immanuel Kant
German philosopher (1724 - 1804)

An existential crisis is a state of panic or feeling of intense psychological discomfort about questions of existence. It is more common in cultures where basic survival needs have been overcome.

An existential crisis can result from:

• A sense of being alone and isolated,
• The realization of ones own mortality, or the belief that there is no afterlife; or
• A realization that ones life has no destined, supernatural, or in some cases external purpose or meaning.

Sex and marriage with robots? It could happen

Robots soon will become more human-like in appearance, researcher says

Humans could marry robots within the century. And consummate those vows.

"My forecast is that around 2050, the state of Massachusetts will be the first jurisdiction to legalize marriages with robots," artificial intelligence researcher David Levy at the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands told LiveScience. Levy recently completed his Ph.D. work on the subject of human-robot relationships, covering many of the privileges and practices that generally come with marriage as well as outside of it.

At first, sex with robots might be considered geeky, "but once you have a story like I had sex with a robot, and it was great! appear someplace like Cosmo magazine, Id expect many people to jump on the bandwagon," Levy said.

When will we learn that we cant allow our politicians to bully the world without someone bullying back eventually?

President Bush has authorized continued bombing of innocent people in Iraq. President Clinton bombed innocent people in the Sudan, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Serbia. President Bush, senior, invaded Iraq and Panama. President Reagan bombed innocent people in Libya and invaded Grenada. And on and on it goes.

Feet found in suburban intersection

No further information was available about the victim. Cook County sheriffs police are investigating.

The Antimatter Calculator

A megaton is a unit of energy approximately equivalent to the energy released
in the detonation of 1,000,000 tons of TNT. Used to specify the energy output, and hence
destructive power, of nuclear weapons.

A kiloton is one-thousandth of a megaton.

There are 4.18e15 joules in a megaton, so 8.15E+16 joules equates to 19.51 megatons.

Even before its operatives opened fire on a crowded Baghdad street in mid-September, allegedly killing seventeen Iraqi civilians and wounding twenty-four others, Blackwater faced two wrongful death lawsuits in the United States stemming from its activities in Iraq and Afghanistan, a federal investigation into arms smuggling accusations and a mounting Congressional inquiry. Now the stakes have gotten even higher for the politically connected mercenary firm.

World?s Largest Outdoor Swimming Pool

Google today will announce its partnership with the University of Washington, the University of Arizona and others to create the worlds largest database -- a moving picture of the universe.

"It will be the greatest movie of all time," said UW astronomer Craig Hogan, one of the leading scientists working on the project. "It will transform how we do science."

Technically, its called the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope, or LSST, and its still mostly just a twinkle in the astronomical communitys collective eye. Planned to begin operation in 2013 on a mountaintop in Chile, the telescope will take moving digital images -- rather than the typical static snapshots -- of all space, the entire visible sky.

"This will provide an incredibly rich view of the universe," Hogan said. Once completed, he added, the movies will be publicly accessible for anyone to watch and study. "It will be the YouTube of astronomy."

Well isnt this special. Britains Daily Mail reports that so-called performance artist Stelios Arcadious, a Cypriot-born Australian, had an ear implanted into his arm. And why, pray tell, did he do that? Seems he believes that art "should be more than simply illustrating." Toward that end, the newspaper says, Arcadious, 61, a former research fellow at Nottingham Trent Universitys Digital Research Unit, had a surgeon implant a human ear (grown from cells in a lab) into his left forearm. The next step in his living exhibit? "I hope to have a tiny microphone implanted [in]to it that will connect with a Bluetooth transmitter," he said. "That way, you can listen to what my ear is hearing."

Alzheimers experts are optimistic that a new type of blood test could one day allow doctors to accurately predict ones risk of developing the degenerative disease.

While prior research has suggested that imaging techniques and tests on spinal fluid could also be used to predict the risk of Alzheimers, a study in published in the current issue of the journal Nature Medicine suggests that this goal could be accomplished with a simple blood draw.

Such a test, if proven effective, would be less costly than imaging techniques and less invasive than a spinal tap.

What is it about Mr. Gore that drives right-wingers insane?

Partly it?s a reaction to what happened in 2000, when the American people chose Mr. Gore but his opponent somehow ended up in the White House. Both the personality cult the right tried to build around President Bush and the often hysterical denigration of Mr. Gore were, I believe, largely motivated by the desire to expunge the stain of illegitimacy from the Bush administration.

And now that Mr. Bush has proved himself utterly the wrong man for the job ? to be, in fact, the best president Al Qaeda?s recruiters could have hoped for ? the symptoms of Gore derangement syndrome have grown even more extreme.

U.S. Plays Role
In Banks Talks
On Rescue Fund

The U.S. Treasury is playing a central role in helping banks avoid losses on mortgage securities, hosting weekend negotiations to help some of the nations largest financial institutions set up a $100 billion fund to buy troubled assets, and sounding out investors about their support for the plan.

The proposed rescue plan, which could be announced as early as this morning, was cobbled together over the past three weeks. It reflects concern that the credit crunch that has roiled global markets since the summer might get worse and damage the broader U.S. economy.

Among the worries triggering the talks, which involve roughly 10 banks: Citigroup Inc.s affiliates owned $80 billion in assets backed by mortgages and other securities. The worlds biggest bank, by market value, held the assets off its balance sheet and was facing the prospect of either having to unload them in a disorderly fire-sale fashion or moving them onto its books.

No.

Is "bald" a hair color?

Is "not collecting stamps" a hobby?

If you no longer believe in Santa Claus, do you call yourself an "Anti-Santa-Clausian?"

Is there some doctrine you follow pursuant with your non-belief in the existence of the tooth fairy?

Atheism is a lack of belief in god(s).

It takes no faith to not believe in something. Do you know what the definition of faith is? It is believing in something in the absence of evidence. In other words, its the opposite of coming to a conclusion based on something real and tangible. The non-existence of something is not a belief. Its merely a base or fallback position one naturally comes to in the absence of contrary evidence.

The $25 million monument to creationism offers Hams view that God created the world in six, 24-hour days on a planet just 6,000 years old. The largest museum of its kind in the world, it hopes to draw 600,000 people from the Midwest and beyond in its first year.

Ham, 53, isnt bothered that his literal interpretation of the Bible runs counter to accepted scientific theory, which says Earth and its life forms evolved over billions of years.

In fact, your appendix is more likely to kill you than al-Qaida is.

So Oscar Wilde would probably not have been surprised to be named as Britains greatest-ever wit.

Youll be doing just enough to get rid of that flab around your belly

Whats wrong with Microsoft Windows Vista?

Microsofts new Windows Vista operating system is a giant step backward for your freedoms.

Usually, new software enables you to do more with your computer. Vista, though, is designed to restrict what you can do.

Vista enforces new forms of ?Digital Rights Management (DRM)?. DRM is more accurately called Digital Restrictions Management, because it is a technology that Big Media and computer companies try to impose on us all, in order to have control over how our computers are used.

Even when you legally buy Vista, you dont own it.

Windows Vista, like previous versions of Windows, is proprietary software: leased to you under a license that severely restricts how you can use it, and without source code, so nobody but Microsoft can change it or even verify what it really does.

Catalina Estrada

My name is Catalina Estrada and was born and raised in Medellín, Colombia, where I graduated with a degree in Graphic Design. In 1999 I moved to Barcelona and earned a degree in Plastic Arts. I work as a freelance illustrator and graphic designer in Barcelona.

Catalinas work is simply breathtaking. Her trademark is the use of symmetrical compositions which add extra balance in her art, together with a very bright, sometimes flashy color palette and swirly elegant decorative forms. Animals and flowers are her favorite subjects and she draws them with real elegance. She also has a way of making colors glow, just to add this extra fantasy touch to it. I always get sucked into her work. Its pure, its brilliant.

Nicole noted the first few minutes of Fox News Sunday yesterday, and just how angry the conservative Republicans were about Al Gore winning the Nobel Peace Prize. Bill Kristol disparaged Gore and the Nobel prize itself, saying ?it?s a prize given by bloviators to a bloviator.? Charles Krauthammer insisted the award goes to ?people whose politics are either anti-American or anti-Bush, and that?s why [Gore] won it.?

These pundits were obviously bitter, much the same way National Review?s Iain Murray was late last week, when he suggested Gore share his award with Osama bin Laden, ?who implicitly endorsed Gore?s stance? in a September video harangue. (Apparently, to accept global warming is to embrace a terrorist philosophy.)

It led Paul Krugman to ask a good question: ?What is it about Mr. Gore that drives right-wingers insane??

Forget HomeworkIts a waste of time for elementary-school students.

Over the last decade, Japanese schools have been scrapping homework while American elementary schools have been assigning more of it. What gives?arent they supposed to be the model achievers while were the slackers? No doubt our eagerness to shed the slacker mantle has helped feed the American homework maw. But it may be the Japanese, once again, who know what theyre doing.

Steve Krug argues in his book Dont Make Me Think! that a good program or product should let users accomplish their intended tasks as easily and directly as possible. The less time it takes a person to complete a desired task (even if only by a few seconds), the more satisfying it becomes. When that happens, people are more likely to use a product in greater frequency and return for more. So in the spirit of improved usability, here are ten standard features every videogame designer should embrace.

Pint-Size Preachers

Young Preachers Say They Save Souls, but Should Someone Save Their Childhoods?

Randall Balmer, an Episcopal priest and preacher and a professor of religion at Barnard College, wondered if Samuels words truly come from divine inspiration. "Is he merely parroting some line?that he gets from a parent, or from a minister, or is it something that comes from the wellspring of the soul?" Balmer asked.

The Crips

The Crips are a primarily, but not exclusively, African American gang founded in Los Angeles, California in 1969 by 15 year old Raymond Washington.

IRA

The Provisional IRA (Irish Republican Army) or PIRA, are commonly referred to as the IRA and have existed in one form or another since around 1916

none? they are much more at home in the darkness?

The film?s theme of dehumanization has also been sharpened. What has been a matter of speculation and debate is now a certainty: Deckard, the replicant-hunting cop, is himself a replicant. Mr. Scott confirmed this: ?Yes, he?s a replicant. He was always a replicant.?

On November 19, 2006, according to a September 7th complaint obtained from the WisPolitics Courtwatch Blog, the boy in question was found hiding in a bedroom closet, and a pipe was found in the house, which tested positive for THC. Shortly after, on December 8, 2006, Fleischman said he was trying to convince the boy, discovered again in the home, to turn himself in as a runaway.

The smaller head can read greater densities of data stored on the disk.

Will the sanctions make any difference?

Probably not. Sanctions have been in force for years with no apparent impact on the reclusive military regime in Burma, which seems impervious to outside pressure. It has benefited from close trade ties with China and India, who vie for influence with the regime and need Burma?s energy and other resources for their growing economies.

Is China the key?

Yes, China is Burma?s biggest trading partner and has most influence on the regime. It has consistently resisted action against Rangoon, in part because of its own human rights record. But with next year?s Olympics looming in Beijing, there are indications that the Chinese may become more co-operative. They have recently taken a tougher stand with allies such as North Korea, Sudan and Zimbabwe. They may be persuaded to harden their position towards Burma.

I ... recommend my Soul to that Almighty Being who gave it, and my body I commit to the dust, relying upon the merits of Jesus Christ for a pardon of all my sins.

This is all the inheritance I can give to my dear family. The religion of Christ can give them one which will make them rich indeed.

My only hope of salvation is in the infinite, transcendent love of God manifested to the world by the death of His Son upon the cross. Nothing but His blood will wash away my sins. I rely exclusively upon it. Come, Lord Jesus! Come quickly!

I desire to bless and praise the name of God most high for appointing me my birth in a land of Gospel Light where the glorious tidings of a Savior and of pardon and salvation through Him have been continually sounding in mine ears.

In the name of God, Amen. I, Daniel of Saint Thomas Jenifer . . . of dispossing mind and memory, commend my soul to my blessed Redeemer . . .

Three children and a woman were killed when their boat capsized in Honduras, officials said Sunday, raising to 21 the death toll from days of torrential rains that have driven thousands from their homes across Central America

Prosecutors continue to squeeze O.J. Simpson. A co-defendant in the armed robbery case just told a Las Vegas judge that hell plead guilty and testify against the former football star, according to the Associated Press.

Vimanas, Ancient Flying Vehicles

I took these images while visiting Egypt in December 2000.

Mr. Putin?s surprise suggestion last month that he might yet remain in power ? possibly as a newly empowered prime minister, possibly as the eminence atop the ?party of power? ? has left the White House stumped. The administration is uncertain how to deal with a man who has consolidated power almost exclusively in his own hands, even as Mr. Bush continues to call Mr. Putin ?my friend.?

That is why a certain discomfort regarding Mr. Putin?s future hovered over two days of talks here attended by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates.

The administration?s occasional scoldings have accomplished little except to harden anti-American views at the Kremlin and in the state news media. (A swaggering Mr. Putin opened the discussions on Friday with a sarcastic harangue over the American plans for missile defense.)

Oil prices rice on concerns over supplies and politics

Is your cat is scatty but loveable, just like you? Or maybe your Rottweiler also likes to eat a little bit too much? Then Professor Richard Wiseman would like to hear from you.

	One third say their cat has a sense of humour

Prof Wiseman of the University of Hertfordshire has launched an online study at www.petpersonality.co.uk to investigate a subject close to the heart of pet lover: are their pets like them in terms of personality?

"We are seeing whether owners think that their pets have the same personality as them, whether their pets are grumpy, cheerful and so on," he said.

Reporting in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology the researchers found that the owners and strangers agreed on an individual dogs personality, suggesting that the dog personalities are real.

"Similar work has been carried out, with the same results, on other animals including cats, cows, horses and goats," said Prof Wiseman.

How to Take Notes like Thomas Edison

Famous inventor Thomas Edison is probably the most experienced note-taker in the world. His diary which is still maintained as an important part of the United States historical record contains five million (5,000,000) pages. Important developments such as his work on perfecting the light bulb and electric lighting systems are captured in great detail. He never met a sheet of paper he didn?t like.
What lessons can we take from his work today, a century later? How did his note-taking help him to become the world?s most famous inventor with over a thousand (1093) U.S. patents in his name for a wide range of technologies from movie cameras and phonographs to cement making and electric lighting? In short, what made his note-taking and filing system so great?
Edison?s system was developed to support his life work and was very successful in doing so. The main elements of his system are as follows:

Your Technorati authority rating is simple, it is the number of unique blogs that have linked to you. The authority rating for this site is 94; this means that 94 different blogs have linked to me so far. As my authority rating goes up, my Technorati ranking goes down. Remember that down is good for your Technorati ranking.

Some U.S. military commanders are declaring victory over al-Qaeda in Iraq after coalition forces "dealt devastating and perhaps irreversible blows" to the terrorist group, according to The Washington Post.

"There is widespread agreement that AQI has suffered major blows over the past three months," the Post reports. "Among the indicators cited is a sharp drop in suicide bombings, the groups signature attack, from more than 60 in January to around 30 a month since July. Captures and interrogations of AQI leaders over the summer had what a senior military intelligence official called a "cascade effect," leading to other killings and captures. The flow of foreign fighters through Syria into Iraq has also diminished, although officials are unsure of the reason and are concerned that the broader al-Qaeda network may be diverting new recruits to Afghanistan and elsewhere."

What a pleasure it is to learn that Doris Lessing is finally awarded the 2007 Nobel prize for literature! The honour, announced two weeks before her 88th birthday, comes after repeated nominations and short-listings for the prize over the last forty years. It is indeed well-deserved: for a lifetimes work of unmatched range and surprise, and especially for her pathbreaking treatment of womens inner lives and sexual identity in The Golden Notebook (1962).

It is a relatively neglected theme in Doris Lessings [5] work - mysticism - that I would like to highlight amid the torrent of tributes that have followed the Nobel award.

Frank Rich: The Good Germans among us

NEW YORK: Bush lies" doesnt cut it anymore. Its time to confront the darker reality that we Americans are lying to ourselves.

There will be no trial. We will never find out what happened. A new bill passed by the House to regulate contractor behavior will have little effect, even if it becomes law in its current form.

As the war has dragged on, it is hard to give Americans en masse a pass. We are too slow to notice, let alone protest, the calamities that have followed the original sin.

The Argument from improbability can seem very convincing at first. It involves suggesting that the likelihood of complex things being created by chance is so infinitesimally small, there must be some supernatural, Intelligent Design at work.

The ultimate irony of the Way of the Master video is that the banana Ray Comfort is holding was created by man. Naturally occurring bananas dont really look like that.

The documents that were released as part of the criminal prosecution of Joseph Nacchio, the former Qwest CEO who refused to participate in what he believed to be illegal government surveillance programs (and was then prosecuted for insider trading by the Bush administration), are revealing in numerous important respects.

(1) The cooperation between the various military/intelligence branches of the Federal Government -- particularly the Pentagon and the NSA -- and the private telecommunications corporations is extraordinary and endless. They really are, in every respect, virtually indistinguishable. The Federal Government has its hands dug deeply into the entire ostensibly "private" telecommunications infrastructure and, in return, the nations telecoms are recipients of enormous amounts of revenues by virtue of turning themselves into branches of the Federal Government.

LONDON, England (AP) -- Some of the assertions in Al Gores Oscar-winning environmental documentary are not supported by scientific evidence, a British judge said in ruling on a challenge from a school official who did not want the film shown to students.

This week, Congress plans to vote on a bill that leaves in place the legal hurdles in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act - problems that were highlighted during the May search for a group of kidnapped U.S. soldiers.

The FISA law applies even to a cellphone conversation between two people in Iraq, because those communications zip along wires through U.S. hubs, which is where the taps are typically applied.

Blood Test Might Spot Alzheimers Early

MONDAY, Oct. 15 (HealthDay News) -- An international team of scientists has developed a blood test that could reveal which patients with mild cognitive impairment will go on to develop Alzheimers disease.

If replicated and validated -- and assuming the development of effective treatments against Alzheimers in the future -- such a test could open the door to medicating at-risk patients earlier and slowing or limiting neurological damage, explained Dr. Allan Levey, chair of neurology at Emory University, Atlanta.

According to the Alzheimers Association, Alzheimers is a progressive, fatal brain disease that affects almost one in eight individuals over the age of 65.

Calling the study "very interesting," Levey nevertheless noted two caveats. The first was its relatively small sample size. The other was its use of proteins that have no obvious relationship to Alzheimers.

Since Friday morning, there have been 1,378 reports about Al Gore, including fourteen by the New York Times (h/t Newsbusters)

In fact, according to LexisNexis, outside of New Yorks local papers such as Newsday (pictured above), the Daily News, and the New York Post, no major daily bothered reporting Lt. Murphy receiving the Medal of Honor.

And, other than Fox News, which did six reports about Murphy, not one television news organization mentioned it. Not one. (h/t Newsbusters)

Not that this needs mentioning really, but this is yet one more nail in the coffin of Pinch Sulzbergers quickly dying legacy and another black eye on a rag that many Americans line bird cages with.  Please Pinch, continue your march toward bankruptcy and irrelevance by ignoring real stories about real Americans, and especially anything good related to the War against Islamofascism.

I hope to see them in Chapter 11 in my lifetime.....

Strafuntersuchung wegen SVP-Plakats eingestellt

Das umstrittene SVP-Plakat richte sich gegen kriminelle Ausländer, die ausgeschafft werden sollen, begründete Maurer seinen Entscheid. Ausländer seien jedoch keine Gruppe, die mit dem Rassendiskriminierungsartikel 261bis des Strafgesetzbuchs geschützt sei, weil dieser Artikel einzig die drei Bereiche Religion, Rasse und Ethnie umfasse. Die Ausschaffungsinitiative tendiere dazu, das Ausländergesetz zu verschärfen. Dies sei jedoch keine rassistische Stossrichtung; fremdenfeindlich sei nicht gleich rassistisch, so Maurer weiter.

Virgin Atlantic 747 to test biofuel in early 2008

BOSTON (Reuters) - British billionaire Richard Branson said on Monday his Virgin Group hopes to produce clean biofuels by around the start of the next decade and early next year will test a jet plane on renewable fuel.

Virgin hopes to provide clean fuel for buses, trains and cars within three or four years, Branson told a Mortgage Bankers Association meeting in Boston.

Branson pledged last year to spend all the profit over the next 10 years from his 51 percent stake in Virgins airline and rail businesses on fighting global warming.

He also created Virgin Fuels, which is investing $400 million over three years in renewable energy initiatives, as part of the pledge.

Separately, Branson said Virgin would name one of its Galactic crafts -- planned for use in space tourism -- after his friend Steve Fossett, the millionaire adventurer who disappeared in a small private plane in the U.S. West early last month.

Todays news that Al Gore has won the Nobel Peace Prize is being met with some of the usual political and scientific debating. But heres another question: What does global warming have to do with world peace?

The Nobel committee said in its announcement that it was "seeking to contribute to a sharper focus on the processes and decisions that appear to be necessary to protect the world?s future climate, and thereby to reduce the threat to the security of mankind."

The Price of Gas Around the World

From our Humor files

Author Unknown

• The Ten Commandments
• Love thy neighbor
• Be fruitful and multiply

• Do not wear clothes of mixed fibers.
• Do not shave your beard
• Stone adulterers

What we concluded, in fact, is that this extraordinary video has the potential to break the TWA Flight 800 case wide open.

Wife sickened to her soul over improper conduct allegations

(CNN) -- The wife of the president of Oral Roberts University is denying allegations of improper behavior, saying the claims "sicken" her.

Lindsay Roberts, in a statement on the universitys Web site, said the allegations against her "sicken me to my soul. ... I live my life in a morally upright manner and throughout my marriage have never, ever engaged in any sexual behavior with any man outside of my marriage as the accusations imply."

Turkey Takes Step Toward Iraq Operation

ISTANBUL, Turkey ? Turkey moved closer to opening a new front in the Iraq war Monday, with the government asking parliament to approve a cross-border offensive against Kurdish rebels. Still, its leaders were reluctant to stage an incursion that could hurt Turkeys standing with Washington.

Parliament was widely expected to authorize the Cabinets motion seeking authorization for a military campaign in northern Iraq, and NTV television said a vote would happen Wednesday.

But government spokesman Cemil Cicek indicated the government would not immediately order its troops across the border, possibly to see if the United States and Iraq attempt to crack down on the rebel Kurdistan Workers Party, known by its Kurdish acronym PKK.

Cats cross pool swimmingly

Crack Dealer Only Tenant Landlord Can Depend On For Rent

CULVER CITY, CA?Despite owning 15 units in the central Los Angeles area, landlord Marceline Brown can only count on receiving on-time rent payments from one of her tenants: full-time crack dealer Nathan "Buck" Cruz, 24.

According to Brown, Cruz has never missed a rent deadline since moving into 1211 Juniette Street, Apartment 2D in October 2004, despite having no bank account, credit cards, or personal checks.

If you have love in your life it can make up for a great many things you lack. If you dont have it, no matter what else there is, its not enough.

Him that I love, I wish to be free -- even from me.

Love and kindness are never wasted. They always make a difference. They bless the one who receives them, and they bless you, the giver.

Where love rules, there is no will to power; and where power predominates, there love is lacking. The one is the shadow of the other.

The love we give away is the only love we keep.

Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It is not rude, it is not self-seeking.
It is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails.
I Corinthians 13:4-8

Mona Lisa - Humor

Rush Limbaugh Earns Big Money From Senate Letter Chastising Him

United Nations - Despite its enormous wealth and highly advanced technology, the United States lags far behind other industrialised countries ? and even some developing ones ? in providing adequate health care to women during pregnancy and childbirth.

The U.S. ranks 41st in a new analysis of maternal mortality rates in 171 countries released by a group of U.N. public health experts on Friday. The survey shows that even a developing country like South Korea is ahead of the United States.

?Women are unnecessarily dying from pregnancy and childbirth complications because the U.S. is moving in a wrong direction,? said Beneva Schulte of Women Deliver, a Washington-based group campaigning for women?s reproductive rights and access to public health care.

Smiling might seem the obvious way to catch a person?s attention, but looking terrified works more quickly.

Our brains process fearful faces more immediately than those showing other emotions, research suggests. Happy expressions take the longest for us to become aware of them.

Scientists believe that our rapid reaction to frightened faces may be an instinct that evolved as a ?threat radar? millions of years ago. The whites of the eye become particularly visible when a person is scared, possibly indicating a potential threat.

Researchers think that such cues may take a short cut through the brain to the amygdala, a centre for processing emotional reactions.

?We believe that the brain can detect certain cues even before we are aware of them, so that we can direct our attention to potentially threatening situations in our environment.?

CHICAGO?In what is being called the first conceptual terrorist attack on American soil, the landmark Sears Tower was encased in 18 million tons of strawberry gelatin early Monday morning, leaving thousands shocked, angry, and seriously confused.

The Sears Tower

Tentative speculation that the dessert enclosure was in fact an act of terrorism was quickly confirmed after a group known only as the Prophets Collective took credit for the attack in a three-hour-long video that surfaced on the Internet.

You May Sleep Less Than You Think

They reported sleeping for an average of seven hours on a typical night. But they actually slept for only six hours when they spent a night hooked up to a sleep-monitoring machine at home.

The morning after the sleep-monitoring experiment, participants still overestimated their previous nights sleep time by 16 minutes. But participants were correct in estimating that it took them 17 minutes to fall asleep, report Arizona State Universitys Graciela Silva, PhD, MPH, and colleagues.

MoveOn backs down on Google ad crackdown, but bullying of Cafe Press owners stands

The left-leaning political advocacy group, MoveOn.org, is backing down in a flap over the use of its name in online advertisements, permitting an influential Republican senator to criticize the organization in a reelection ad on Google?s search engine.

Both MoveOn.org and Google late last week faced a barrage of criticism after an internet strategist for Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine complained that Google had blocked several re-election ads from the search engine?s advertising network because the ads contained the trademarked term ?MoveOn.org? in the text.

?When we became aware of all the controversy around it, we opted out,? . ?Of course we support free speech, and the right of anyone to parody us, but what we do care about is protecting our members ? we don?t want anyone using our name or logo in a way that could harm our members and mission.?