"Cock-A-Doodle-Do"
"Okeydoke"
Monday, January 09, 2006
Morning Papers - continued ...
The Guardian Unlimited
Turkey reports five new bird flu cases
Staff and agencies
Monday January 9, 2006
Fears of human bird flu in Turkey grew today as five more cases were reported across the country and 21 patients in an Istanbul hospital waited for test results.
A Turkish health ministry official told the Anatolian news agency that laboratories had identified the virus in the Black Sea provinces of Kastamonu, Corum and Samsun and in the eastern province of Van.
If any of the 21 people under observation in Istanbul are found to be infected with the disease, they would be the first human cases of bird flu in Europe.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/birdflu/story/0,14207,1682515,00.html
Special Report
http://www.guardian.co.uk/birdflu/0,14207,1131431,00.html
Iran to resume nuclear fuel research
Staff and agencies
Monday January 9, 2006
Diplomatic efforts to resolve international concern over Iran's nuclear programme were today thrown into doubt when Tehran said it was to resume fuel research.
Gholamhossein Elham, an Iranian government spokesman, made the announcement at a press conference.
The European Union and United States earlier warned that if Iran went ahead with nuclear fuel research it could lead to Tehran being referred to the UN security council for possible sanctions.
Mohamed ElBaradei, Nobel peace prize winner and head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, told Sky News in an interview broadcast today that the world was "running out of patience with Iran".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,12858,1682625,00.html
Special Report
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/0,12858,889981,00.html
US blunder aided Iran's atomic aims, book claims
The CIA may have helped Iran to design a nuclear bomb through a botched attempt to channel flawed blueprints to Tehran's weapon designers, according to a new book on the US "war on terror".
In an excerpt from State of War, printed today in G2, the author and New York Times intelligence correspondent, James Risen, writes that the abortive operation misfired when a Russian defector on the CIA payroll, chosen to deliver the deliberately flawed nuclear warhead blueprints to Iranian officials in February 2000, tipped them off about the defects.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,12858,1678133,00.html
Secret services say Iran is trying to assemble a nuclear missile
Document seen by Guardian details web of front companies and middlemen
Ian Cobain and Ian Traynor
Wednesday January 4, 2006
The Guardian
The Iranian government has been successfully scouring Europe for the sophisticated equipment needed to develop a nuclear bomb, according to the latest western intelligence assessment of the country's weapons programmes.
Scientists in Tehran are also shopping for parts for a ballistic missile capable of reaching Europe, with "import requests and acquisitions ... registered almost daily", the report seen by the Guardian concludes.
The warning came as Iran raised the stakes in its dispute with the United States and the European Union yesterday by notifying the International Atomic Energy Authority that it intended to resume nuclear fuel research next week. Tehran has refused to rule out a return to attempts at uranium enrichment, the key to the development of a nuclear weapon.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,12858,1677542,00.html
New call to impeach Blair over Iraq
Matthew Tempest and agencies
Monday January 9, 2006
Tony Blair should be impeached over the Iraq war, according to one of Britain's most senior former soldiers.
General Sir Michael Rose, who commanded UN forces in Bosnia, accused the prime minister of taking the country to war on what turned out to be "false grounds", saying it is something "no one should be allowed to walk away from".
Despite publicly insisting that his aim was to rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, Mr Blair "probably had some other strategy in mind", said Gen Rose.
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/iraq/story/0,12956,1682466,00.html
The insurance coverage is a bit odd.
Covering cancer
Virgin Money has launched an insurance policy designed to cover against the financial costs of a cancer diagnosis. Hilary Osborne looks at how the policy works and whom it might be suitable for
Monday January 9, 2006
A new policy offering financial cover against a cancer diagnosis went on sale this morning. The first of its kind in the UK, Virgin Money's policy also claims to offer the most comprehensive cover against the disease and is being sold as a low-cost alternative to critical illness insurance.
"It will potentially form a top-up for someone who already has critical illness cover or income protection policies, but we think it will be an alternative for many people who don't have those types of cover," says Scott Mowbray, spokesman for Virgin Money. He points out that sales of critical illness cover have been falling, with many consumers citing the high cost as a reason not to buy that type of cover, and argues that a cheaper policy offering cover just against cancer could therefore prove attractive.
http://money.guardian.co.uk/insurance_/lifeandhealth/story/0,1456,1682696,00.html
The Boston Globe
Marine water invaders on Most Wanted list
State aims to stop non-native species
By Beth Daley, Globe Staff January 9, 2006
The sea slime alarm was sounded in 2002. Scientists discovered small, dense mats of a strange gooey creature on the ocean floor more than 100 miles offshore. A year later, the sea squirts had carpeted more than 6 square miles there and kept going. Soon, the bizarre, stringy squirts were showing up in enormous colonies in new places along the shoreline and fishermen began complaining they were smothering shellfish beds.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2006/01/09/marine_water_invaders_on_most_wanted_list/
US copter crash kills 12 in Iraq
Five more Marines die in separate action
By Chris Kraul and Borzou Daragahi, Los Angeles Times January 9, 2006
BAGHDAD -- A US helicopter with 12 passengers and crew members crashed in northern Iraq, killing all on board, the military command said yesterday. In addition, five Marines were reported killed in action, bringing to as many as 28 the number of American troops slain in Iraq since Thursday.
The crash of the UH-60 Black Hawk military copter late Saturday was the deadliest in Iraq since a Chinook transport helicopter went down last January near the Jordanian border, killing 30 Marines and a sailor.
A spokesman for US-led forces would not confirm the nationality or identity of those killed in the Black Hawk pending notification of next of kin. ''At this time we believe all the victims were US citizens," a spokesman said.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/middleeast/articles/2006/01/09/us_copter_crash_kills_12_in_iraq/
Vatican official called to deposition
January 9, 2006
SAN FRANCISCO -- A high-ranking Vatican official is expected at a deposition today, at which lawyers plan to ask him how the Portland diocese handled priest sex abuse allegations during his tenure there. Former Portland archbishop William Levada was served with a subpoena before he became prefect of the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The deposition is to help a bankruptcy judge decide on the validity of plantiffs' claims against the diocese. (AP)
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2006/01/09/vatican_official_called_to_deposition/
Alito's fantasy world
By Kate Michelman January 9, 2006
IN THE 1998 movie ''Pleasantville," Tobey Maguire and Reese Witherspoon play typical '90s kids who are inadvertently transported into the unreal reality of a 1950s sitcom. They use their '90s values to teach the sitcom world some lessons about diversity and tolerance.
Today many people have a stylized, ''Pleasantville" vision of the pre-Roe era in which I grew up. They imagine fondly that almost all families had a Daddy at the office and a Mommy in the kitchen; that almost all family relations were well-ordered and unthreatening; in short, that life looked like ''Leave It to Beaver" -- and that, with a few legal adjustments, it could do so again.
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2006/01/09/alitos_fantasy_world/
The arc of Ariel
By James Carroll January 9, 2006
WHAT IF Europe were so determined to be rid of its Jews that, once Hitler's program fell short, it arranged to settle the surviving Jews into a ''camp" where they could readily be targeted and eliminated? Call that camp Israel. Call the instrument of elimination the aggrieved Muslim population for whom the presence of Jews seems an act of blasphemous ''occupation" of holy places. And now imagine that such a population arms itself with a weapon that will make the completion of the anti-Jewish genocide real.
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2006/01/09/the_arc_of_ariel/
Taipei Times
Environmentalists deride global warming meeting led by the US
Environmentalists yesterday slammed this week's inaugural meeting of a US-led partnership that aims to develop cleaner energy technologies to combat global warming, with one group calling it a "trade show" for business interests.
The two-day meeting of the Asia Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate begins on Wednesday and brings together government and business representatives from the US, Australia, China, India, South Korea and Japan.
It aims to spur more private investment in the region, while also slowing global warming.
But environmentalists were skeptical that a meeting led in part by the two industrialized nations that rejected the Kyoto Protocol on global warming -- Australia and the US -- can yield any meaningful results.
"The record of both the Australian and US governments on this issue on the international stages has been appalling," said Erwin Jackson of the Australian Conservation Foundation.
"This is an opportunity, their second opportunity, to show that they are serious about tackling the climate change problem. Our hope would be that they don't miss that opportunity again," he said.
Several private companies were expected to attend the meeting, the Australian newspaper reported in its weekend edition. Among those were mining and energy giants Rio Tinto, Chevron Australia, Xstrata Coal and BP Solar, along with a number of US, Chinese, Korean and Indian power and steel interests.
"It's becoming clear that it is really just a trade show," Greenpeace campaigner Danny Kennedy said. "It's about how big business and bureaucrats can best ensure that the climate change agenda and the politics of confronting ... global warming doesn't derail their profit taking."
Repeated calls to Australian Environment Minister Ian Campbell's office seeking comment went unanswered yesterday.
The 1997 Kyoto treaty mandates specific cutbacks in emissions of carbon dioxide and five other gases by 2012 in 35 industrialized countries.
The US and Australia rejected it, in part, because of its mandatory cuts in gases believed to be warming Earth's atmosphere.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was scheduled to attend the meeting but canceled amid concerns over the health of ailing Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
Rice will be replaced by US Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman.
Kennedy said Rice's absence from the summit, along with its lack of emphasis on mandatory emissions reductions targets, would seriously "undercut" its effectiveness.
Jackson said he too was "not very optimistic" about the meeting's outcome.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288187
Cold spell kills dozens across South Asia
AP , NEW DELHI
Monday, Jan 09, 2006,Page 4
Millions of people in the Indian capital woke yesterday to the coldest weather in 70 years, as the death toll from northern India's cold spell rose to 116, a police spokesman and the Meteorology Department said.
The toll included nine people who froze to death overnight in Uttar Pradesh state, Mahendra Verma, a spokesman for the state police, said in Lucknow, the state capital.
Most of the state's 101 victims have been poor people forced to sleep outside in parks or in public places such as railway stations, protecting themselves with plastic sheets and jute bags, Verma said.
Another 15 people have died of cold in northern Punjab and Haryana states since November, Press Trust of India said, bringing India's death toll from this year's cold snap to 116.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288175
Third toxic spill in three months hits China's rivers
AFP , BEIJING
Monday, Jan 09, 2006,Page 1
A third major toxic spill in China in as many months has threatened water supplies to millions of residents of two central cities, officials and state media said yesterday.
A clean-up accident allowed the chemical cadmium, which can cause neurological disorders and cancer, to flood out of a smelting works and into the Xiangjiang River in Hunan Province on Jan. 4, Xinhua news agency said.
The river supplies tap water to residents in the provincial capital Changsha, which has about 6 million people, and nearby Xiangtan city, which has 700,000 inhabitants.
Officials said they have taken emergency measures and residents were not in danger.
Local authorities have blocked off the spill and are trying to neutralize the cadmium slick with different chemicals and dilute it by releasing water from a dam.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2006/01/09/2003288147
China to put billions into 5-year river clean up campaign
AP , BEIJING
Monday, Jan 09, 2006,Page 4
China will invest 26.6 billion yuan (US$3.28 billion) over the next five years to clean up the Songhua River, a key source of drinking water for tens of millions of people that was polluted in November by a toxic spill that reached into Russia, reports said yesterday.
The effort will cover the entire river valley in four provinces that are home to more than 62 million people, with drinking water sources in large and medium-sized cities given priority, the Beijing Youth Daily reported.
By 2010, more than 90 percent of the people living in the four provinces should have access to clean drinking water, the paper quoted environmental officials meeting in Harbin, capital of Heilongjiang Province, as saying. The percentage of those with access to clean drinking water now wasn't given.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288173
Foreign minister in secret visit to UAE
DIPLOMACY: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed that Mark Chen left on Thursday on a trip to offer condolences to the UAE on the death of its prime minister
Minister of Foreign Affairs Mark Chen (陳唐山) left for a secret visit to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on Thursday to extend condolences on the death of the country's vice president and prime minister, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) confirmed yesterday.
Unusual
Chen's visit was unusual due to the absence of diplomatic relations between Taiwan and the UAE. The foreign minister paid several visits to the UAE last year to discuss an ongoing project to open a new representative office in Abu Dhabi, the UAE's capital.
Currently, Taipei maintains a commercial office in Dubai.
Quiet departure
A foreign ministry official who spoke on condition of anonymity said that Chen left for the UAE on Thursday afternoon, one day after the UAE's prime minister Sheikh Maktoum bin Rashid Al-Maktoum died.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2006/01/09/2003288164
UN quake aid may resume
AP , ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN
Monday, Jan 09, 2006,Page 4
UN flights to two areas of Pakistan's quake-hit Kashmir region could resume next week, the UN said yesterday, a day after suspending air deliveries because dozens of survivors stormed two helicopters.
UN spokesman Ben Malor said both the world body and Pakistani authorities were investigating Friday's incident, and flights could resume in the next few days. The UN said on Saturday it canceled flights to Bana Mula and Leepa, both more than 120km southwest of Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistan-controlled Kashmir.
More than 50 survivors forced the pilots of two UN helicopters to take them to Muzaffarabad and Abbottabad, a hub for quake relief activities.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288178
Gas spat has Japan and China worried over energy
SUPPLY CONCERNS: Moscow's decision to turn off Ukraine's gas supply last week has raised fears in Asian countries heavily dependant on Russia for their energy supplies
As Russia wielded its energy weapon against Ukraine to devastating effect last week, China and Japan were wary observers, worrying that one day the same might happen to them, observers said.
Neither Asian power has ever felt entirely comfortable with the Kremlin, and its decision to drastically raise the price of the gas it sells to Ukraine has done nothing to boost their confidence in the Russian bear.
"To control a nation's energy is to control the nation's activities," said Hiroshi Watanabe, a Tokyo-based economist at the Daiwa Institute of Research.
"Russia seems to have lost some trust by making threats through a reduction of supplies," he said.
Unfortunately for both China and Japan, Russia has the world's largest natural gas reserves and is the second largest exporter of crude oil, making it too big an actor to be ignored in Asia's great energy game.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288179
China punishes 1,248 health workers
AFP , BEIJING
Monday, Jan 09, 2006,Page 4
China last year punished 1,248 health workers for corrupt practices including taking commissions from drug companies to ply their drugs, and vowed to step up a crackdown this year, reports said yesterday.
The punishments were imposed after the Communist Party's Central Commission for Discipline Inspection asked the health ministry to investigate illegal deals by hospital staff, Xinhua news agency said.
Among their findings, health officials uncovered 216 cases of medical workers illegally buying and selling medicine for personal profit.
Of those, 179 cases which involved 10.99 million yuan (US$1.34 million) were handed over to judiciary departments, with 282 people punished, Xinhua quoted the head of the investigation team as saying.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288177
Iraqi leaders may form new government
Iraq's fractious political groups are moving ahead to a shape a national unity government, progress that should help stop the carnage seen around Iraq over the past several days, the country's prime minister and other leaders said on Saturday.
Iraq's Kurdish president predicted that a new government could be formed within weeks and said the country's main political groups had agreed in principle on a coalition of national unity.
Jalal Talabani made the comments after meeting with visiting British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, who said Iraqis remain optimistic about their future despite suffering through a violent week that saw nearly 200 people killed in two days, including 11 US troops.
In an effort to help draw Sunni Arabs into the country's political process as a way to dampen insurgent activity, US officials for months have been communicating directly or through channels with Sunni Arabs once or currently involved in the insurgency. A Western diplomat on Saturday said there had been a recent "uptick" in those contacts.
Those insurgents "sense that the political process does protect the Sunni community's interest," the diplomat said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288194
Down with multimedia monopolies
On Jan. 3, the legislature finally passed the Statute Regarding the Disposition of Government Shareholdings in the Terrestrial Television Industry (無線電視事業公股處理條例). This legislation is vital to eliminate partisan, political and military control of the media. The dispute over media ownership -- a relic of the party-state era -- was thus resolved. However, does this signal a rejuvenation of Taiwan's media?
In accordance with the provisions for the disposition of government shareholdings and the policies of the related agencies, the withdrawal of government and military capital from the Taiwan Television Enterprise (TTV) and the Chinese Television System in the near future will see the former becoming a private station, and the latter a public one. Meanwhile, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) recently sold China Television Company, the Broadcasting Corporation of China and the Central Motion Pictures Corp to the China Times Group. As a result of these moves, commercial interests are likely to be preponderant in Taiwan's media. The establishment of the proposed public media group still awaits the drawing up of government policy and the necessary legislative amendments before it can come into existence, so it is certainly worth asking whether there is any danger of Taiwan's media environment becoming the monopoly of a small number of private interests.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2006/01/09/2003288210
continued ...
Turkey reports five new bird flu cases
Staff and agencies
Monday January 9, 2006
Fears of human bird flu in Turkey grew today as five more cases were reported across the country and 21 patients in an Istanbul hospital waited for test results.
A Turkish health ministry official told the Anatolian news agency that laboratories had identified the virus in the Black Sea provinces of Kastamonu, Corum and Samsun and in the eastern province of Van.
If any of the 21 people under observation in Istanbul are found to be infected with the disease, they would be the first human cases of bird flu in Europe.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/birdflu/story/0,14207,1682515,00.html
Special Report
http://www.guardian.co.uk/birdflu/0,14207,1131431,00.html
Iran to resume nuclear fuel research
Staff and agencies
Monday January 9, 2006
Diplomatic efforts to resolve international concern over Iran's nuclear programme were today thrown into doubt when Tehran said it was to resume fuel research.
Gholamhossein Elham, an Iranian government spokesman, made the announcement at a press conference.
The European Union and United States earlier warned that if Iran went ahead with nuclear fuel research it could lead to Tehran being referred to the UN security council for possible sanctions.
Mohamed ElBaradei, Nobel peace prize winner and head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, told Sky News in an interview broadcast today that the world was "running out of patience with Iran".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,12858,1682625,00.html
Special Report
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/0,12858,889981,00.html
US blunder aided Iran's atomic aims, book claims
The CIA may have helped Iran to design a nuclear bomb through a botched attempt to channel flawed blueprints to Tehran's weapon designers, according to a new book on the US "war on terror".
In an excerpt from State of War, printed today in G2, the author and New York Times intelligence correspondent, James Risen, writes that the abortive operation misfired when a Russian defector on the CIA payroll, chosen to deliver the deliberately flawed nuclear warhead blueprints to Iranian officials in February 2000, tipped them off about the defects.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,12858,1678133,00.html
Secret services say Iran is trying to assemble a nuclear missile
Document seen by Guardian details web of front companies and middlemen
Ian Cobain and Ian Traynor
Wednesday January 4, 2006
The Guardian
The Iranian government has been successfully scouring Europe for the sophisticated equipment needed to develop a nuclear bomb, according to the latest western intelligence assessment of the country's weapons programmes.
Scientists in Tehran are also shopping for parts for a ballistic missile capable of reaching Europe, with "import requests and acquisitions ... registered almost daily", the report seen by the Guardian concludes.
The warning came as Iran raised the stakes in its dispute with the United States and the European Union yesterday by notifying the International Atomic Energy Authority that it intended to resume nuclear fuel research next week. Tehran has refused to rule out a return to attempts at uranium enrichment, the key to the development of a nuclear weapon.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,12858,1677542,00.html
New call to impeach Blair over Iraq
Matthew Tempest and agencies
Monday January 9, 2006
Tony Blair should be impeached over the Iraq war, according to one of Britain's most senior former soldiers.
General Sir Michael Rose, who commanded UN forces in Bosnia, accused the prime minister of taking the country to war on what turned out to be "false grounds", saying it is something "no one should be allowed to walk away from".
Despite publicly insisting that his aim was to rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, Mr Blair "probably had some other strategy in mind", said Gen Rose.
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/iraq/story/0,12956,1682466,00.html
The insurance coverage is a bit odd.
Covering cancer
Virgin Money has launched an insurance policy designed to cover against the financial costs of a cancer diagnosis. Hilary Osborne looks at how the policy works and whom it might be suitable for
Monday January 9, 2006
A new policy offering financial cover against a cancer diagnosis went on sale this morning. The first of its kind in the UK, Virgin Money's policy also claims to offer the most comprehensive cover against the disease and is being sold as a low-cost alternative to critical illness insurance.
"It will potentially form a top-up for someone who already has critical illness cover or income protection policies, but we think it will be an alternative for many people who don't have those types of cover," says Scott Mowbray, spokesman for Virgin Money. He points out that sales of critical illness cover have been falling, with many consumers citing the high cost as a reason not to buy that type of cover, and argues that a cheaper policy offering cover just against cancer could therefore prove attractive.
http://money.guardian.co.uk/insurance_/lifeandhealth/story/0,1456,1682696,00.html
The Boston Globe
Marine water invaders on Most Wanted list
State aims to stop non-native species
By Beth Daley, Globe Staff January 9, 2006
The sea slime alarm was sounded in 2002. Scientists discovered small, dense mats of a strange gooey creature on the ocean floor more than 100 miles offshore. A year later, the sea squirts had carpeted more than 6 square miles there and kept going. Soon, the bizarre, stringy squirts were showing up in enormous colonies in new places along the shoreline and fishermen began complaining they were smothering shellfish beds.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2006/01/09/marine_water_invaders_on_most_wanted_list/
US copter crash kills 12 in Iraq
Five more Marines die in separate action
By Chris Kraul and Borzou Daragahi, Los Angeles Times January 9, 2006
BAGHDAD -- A US helicopter with 12 passengers and crew members crashed in northern Iraq, killing all on board, the military command said yesterday. In addition, five Marines were reported killed in action, bringing to as many as 28 the number of American troops slain in Iraq since Thursday.
The crash of the UH-60 Black Hawk military copter late Saturday was the deadliest in Iraq since a Chinook transport helicopter went down last January near the Jordanian border, killing 30 Marines and a sailor.
A spokesman for US-led forces would not confirm the nationality or identity of those killed in the Black Hawk pending notification of next of kin. ''At this time we believe all the victims were US citizens," a spokesman said.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/middleeast/articles/2006/01/09/us_copter_crash_kills_12_in_iraq/
Vatican official called to deposition
January 9, 2006
SAN FRANCISCO -- A high-ranking Vatican official is expected at a deposition today, at which lawyers plan to ask him how the Portland diocese handled priest sex abuse allegations during his tenure there. Former Portland archbishop William Levada was served with a subpoena before he became prefect of the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The deposition is to help a bankruptcy judge decide on the validity of plantiffs' claims against the diocese. (AP)
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2006/01/09/vatican_official_called_to_deposition/
Alito's fantasy world
By Kate Michelman January 9, 2006
IN THE 1998 movie ''Pleasantville," Tobey Maguire and Reese Witherspoon play typical '90s kids who are inadvertently transported into the unreal reality of a 1950s sitcom. They use their '90s values to teach the sitcom world some lessons about diversity and tolerance.
Today many people have a stylized, ''Pleasantville" vision of the pre-Roe era in which I grew up. They imagine fondly that almost all families had a Daddy at the office and a Mommy in the kitchen; that almost all family relations were well-ordered and unthreatening; in short, that life looked like ''Leave It to Beaver" -- and that, with a few legal adjustments, it could do so again.
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2006/01/09/alitos_fantasy_world/
The arc of Ariel
By James Carroll January 9, 2006
WHAT IF Europe were so determined to be rid of its Jews that, once Hitler's program fell short, it arranged to settle the surviving Jews into a ''camp" where they could readily be targeted and eliminated? Call that camp Israel. Call the instrument of elimination the aggrieved Muslim population for whom the presence of Jews seems an act of blasphemous ''occupation" of holy places. And now imagine that such a population arms itself with a weapon that will make the completion of the anti-Jewish genocide real.
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2006/01/09/the_arc_of_ariel/
Taipei Times
Environmentalists deride global warming meeting led by the US
Environmentalists yesterday slammed this week's inaugural meeting of a US-led partnership that aims to develop cleaner energy technologies to combat global warming, with one group calling it a "trade show" for business interests.
The two-day meeting of the Asia Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate begins on Wednesday and brings together government and business representatives from the US, Australia, China, India, South Korea and Japan.
It aims to spur more private investment in the region, while also slowing global warming.
But environmentalists were skeptical that a meeting led in part by the two industrialized nations that rejected the Kyoto Protocol on global warming -- Australia and the US -- can yield any meaningful results.
"The record of both the Australian and US governments on this issue on the international stages has been appalling," said Erwin Jackson of the Australian Conservation Foundation.
"This is an opportunity, their second opportunity, to show that they are serious about tackling the climate change problem. Our hope would be that they don't miss that opportunity again," he said.
Several private companies were expected to attend the meeting, the Australian newspaper reported in its weekend edition. Among those were mining and energy giants Rio Tinto, Chevron Australia, Xstrata Coal and BP Solar, along with a number of US, Chinese, Korean and Indian power and steel interests.
"It's becoming clear that it is really just a trade show," Greenpeace campaigner Danny Kennedy said. "It's about how big business and bureaucrats can best ensure that the climate change agenda and the politics of confronting ... global warming doesn't derail their profit taking."
Repeated calls to Australian Environment Minister Ian Campbell's office seeking comment went unanswered yesterday.
The 1997 Kyoto treaty mandates specific cutbacks in emissions of carbon dioxide and five other gases by 2012 in 35 industrialized countries.
The US and Australia rejected it, in part, because of its mandatory cuts in gases believed to be warming Earth's atmosphere.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was scheduled to attend the meeting but canceled amid concerns over the health of ailing Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
Rice will be replaced by US Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman.
Kennedy said Rice's absence from the summit, along with its lack of emphasis on mandatory emissions reductions targets, would seriously "undercut" its effectiveness.
Jackson said he too was "not very optimistic" about the meeting's outcome.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288187
Cold spell kills dozens across South Asia
AP , NEW DELHI
Monday, Jan 09, 2006,Page 4
Millions of people in the Indian capital woke yesterday to the coldest weather in 70 years, as the death toll from northern India's cold spell rose to 116, a police spokesman and the Meteorology Department said.
The toll included nine people who froze to death overnight in Uttar Pradesh state, Mahendra Verma, a spokesman for the state police, said in Lucknow, the state capital.
Most of the state's 101 victims have been poor people forced to sleep outside in parks or in public places such as railway stations, protecting themselves with plastic sheets and jute bags, Verma said.
Another 15 people have died of cold in northern Punjab and Haryana states since November, Press Trust of India said, bringing India's death toll from this year's cold snap to 116.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288175
Third toxic spill in three months hits China's rivers
AFP , BEIJING
Monday, Jan 09, 2006,Page 1
A third major toxic spill in China in as many months has threatened water supplies to millions of residents of two central cities, officials and state media said yesterday.
A clean-up accident allowed the chemical cadmium, which can cause neurological disorders and cancer, to flood out of a smelting works and into the Xiangjiang River in Hunan Province on Jan. 4, Xinhua news agency said.
The river supplies tap water to residents in the provincial capital Changsha, which has about 6 million people, and nearby Xiangtan city, which has 700,000 inhabitants.
Officials said they have taken emergency measures and residents were not in danger.
Local authorities have blocked off the spill and are trying to neutralize the cadmium slick with different chemicals and dilute it by releasing water from a dam.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2006/01/09/2003288147
China to put billions into 5-year river clean up campaign
AP , BEIJING
Monday, Jan 09, 2006,Page 4
China will invest 26.6 billion yuan (US$3.28 billion) over the next five years to clean up the Songhua River, a key source of drinking water for tens of millions of people that was polluted in November by a toxic spill that reached into Russia, reports said yesterday.
The effort will cover the entire river valley in four provinces that are home to more than 62 million people, with drinking water sources in large and medium-sized cities given priority, the Beijing Youth Daily reported.
By 2010, more than 90 percent of the people living in the four provinces should have access to clean drinking water, the paper quoted environmental officials meeting in Harbin, capital of Heilongjiang Province, as saying. The percentage of those with access to clean drinking water now wasn't given.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288173
Foreign minister in secret visit to UAE
DIPLOMACY: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed that Mark Chen left on Thursday on a trip to offer condolences to the UAE on the death of its prime minister
Minister of Foreign Affairs Mark Chen (陳唐山) left for a secret visit to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on Thursday to extend condolences on the death of the country's vice president and prime minister, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) confirmed yesterday.
Unusual
Chen's visit was unusual due to the absence of diplomatic relations between Taiwan and the UAE. The foreign minister paid several visits to the UAE last year to discuss an ongoing project to open a new representative office in Abu Dhabi, the UAE's capital.
Currently, Taipei maintains a commercial office in Dubai.
Quiet departure
A foreign ministry official who spoke on condition of anonymity said that Chen left for the UAE on Thursday afternoon, one day after the UAE's prime minister Sheikh Maktoum bin Rashid Al-Maktoum died.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2006/01/09/2003288164
UN quake aid may resume
AP , ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN
Monday, Jan 09, 2006,Page 4
UN flights to two areas of Pakistan's quake-hit Kashmir region could resume next week, the UN said yesterday, a day after suspending air deliveries because dozens of survivors stormed two helicopters.
UN spokesman Ben Malor said both the world body and Pakistani authorities were investigating Friday's incident, and flights could resume in the next few days. The UN said on Saturday it canceled flights to Bana Mula and Leepa, both more than 120km southwest of Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistan-controlled Kashmir.
More than 50 survivors forced the pilots of two UN helicopters to take them to Muzaffarabad and Abbottabad, a hub for quake relief activities.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288178
Gas spat has Japan and China worried over energy
SUPPLY CONCERNS: Moscow's decision to turn off Ukraine's gas supply last week has raised fears in Asian countries heavily dependant on Russia for their energy supplies
As Russia wielded its energy weapon against Ukraine to devastating effect last week, China and Japan were wary observers, worrying that one day the same might happen to them, observers said.
Neither Asian power has ever felt entirely comfortable with the Kremlin, and its decision to drastically raise the price of the gas it sells to Ukraine has done nothing to boost their confidence in the Russian bear.
"To control a nation's energy is to control the nation's activities," said Hiroshi Watanabe, a Tokyo-based economist at the Daiwa Institute of Research.
"Russia seems to have lost some trust by making threats through a reduction of supplies," he said.
Unfortunately for both China and Japan, Russia has the world's largest natural gas reserves and is the second largest exporter of crude oil, making it too big an actor to be ignored in Asia's great energy game.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288179
China punishes 1,248 health workers
AFP , BEIJING
Monday, Jan 09, 2006,Page 4
China last year punished 1,248 health workers for corrupt practices including taking commissions from drug companies to ply their drugs, and vowed to step up a crackdown this year, reports said yesterday.
The punishments were imposed after the Communist Party's Central Commission for Discipline Inspection asked the health ministry to investigate illegal deals by hospital staff, Xinhua news agency said.
Among their findings, health officials uncovered 216 cases of medical workers illegally buying and selling medicine for personal profit.
Of those, 179 cases which involved 10.99 million yuan (US$1.34 million) were handed over to judiciary departments, with 282 people punished, Xinhua quoted the head of the investigation team as saying.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288177
Iraqi leaders may form new government
Iraq's fractious political groups are moving ahead to a shape a national unity government, progress that should help stop the carnage seen around Iraq over the past several days, the country's prime minister and other leaders said on Saturday.
Iraq's Kurdish president predicted that a new government could be formed within weeks and said the country's main political groups had agreed in principle on a coalition of national unity.
Jalal Talabani made the comments after meeting with visiting British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, who said Iraqis remain optimistic about their future despite suffering through a violent week that saw nearly 200 people killed in two days, including 11 US troops.
In an effort to help draw Sunni Arabs into the country's political process as a way to dampen insurgent activity, US officials for months have been communicating directly or through channels with Sunni Arabs once or currently involved in the insurgency. A Western diplomat on Saturday said there had been a recent "uptick" in those contacts.
Those insurgents "sense that the political process does protect the Sunni community's interest," the diplomat said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/01/09/2003288194
Down with multimedia monopolies
On Jan. 3, the legislature finally passed the Statute Regarding the Disposition of Government Shareholdings in the Terrestrial Television Industry (無線電視事業公股處理條例). This legislation is vital to eliminate partisan, political and military control of the media. The dispute over media ownership -- a relic of the party-state era -- was thus resolved. However, does this signal a rejuvenation of Taiwan's media?
In accordance with the provisions for the disposition of government shareholdings and the policies of the related agencies, the withdrawal of government and military capital from the Taiwan Television Enterprise (TTV) and the Chinese Television System in the near future will see the former becoming a private station, and the latter a public one. Meanwhile, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) recently sold China Television Company, the Broadcasting Corporation of China and the Central Motion Pictures Corp to the China Times Group. As a result of these moves, commercial interests are likely to be preponderant in Taiwan's media. The establishment of the proposed public media group still awaits the drawing up of government policy and the necessary legislative amendments before it can come into existence, so it is certainly worth asking whether there is any danger of Taiwan's media environment becoming the monopoly of a small number of private interests.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2006/01/09/2003288210
continued ...
Why is here still no rain below 36N?
January 8, 2006. 1430z.
Enhanced Infrared Satellite of the hemisphere.
Approximately there was a huge 'heat' movment off the equator to the Arctic Circle. That is demonstrated here. Kindly note the 'green' color of the right upper corner. That is an indicator of heat on this satellite image. The spectrum is noted on the bottom of the image. Some of that heat was off the North American continent. Some of it was from Texas. So, then why isn't there rain in Texas? There are clouds. It is cooler. There are still 'fire warnings.'
The moisture over Texas.
January 9, 2006.
Water vapor satellite of the north and west hemisphere.
This is a more recent satellite. It is a water vapor satellite. There is moisture vapor over Texas. Why is there not rain?
Literally, it is too hot in the troposphere to rain. The condensation that forms rain around airborne particles begins high in the troposphere. No different than snow. Sleet. Hale. Any percipitation, even lake effect snow, is formed above the ground. If the 'air' between the 'falling rain' and the ground is hot enough to evaporate it on the way to the thirsty ground it will never be realized as rain.
One of the phenomina I have noted over the last year is how there is evidence picked up by 'home monitors' that state the conditions are right for rain but there is actually little or none. It is due to the severe drought/heat conditions of the 'new climate.'
January 9, 2006. 2030z.
Enhanced Infrared Image of the North American continent bounded by it's oceans.
One of the hazards I briefly wrote about before of Human Induced Global Warming was the fact that prolonged 'heat/drought' scenarios would result in long term parched scenarios whereby rain at the level of the ground will never be realized because the air vaporizes any potential for that rain.
That is what is occurring over Texas. That is somewhat a reality anyway due to the latitude of these states below 36N, however, these areas are increasing in their sparcity of percipitation. These 'climates' have every indication of increasing dryness. I don't expect that to change soon.
Great Plains States - Texas, Oklahoma, Missouri,Kansas, Iowa, Nebraska, North and South Dakota
There are several aspects to the 'Great Plains' of the USA. One is tourism. Click on above title.
The other is commercial. Farming. The drought is monitored. When the latest 'update' was filed the Fall of 2005. The drought hadn't deepened. This is profound problem as it affects the grain production as well as livestock of the Great Plains. The fact that a former governor from Texas whom was elected president continues to refuse to handle Global Warming leading to OBVIOUS "Climate Change" is not only a bit odd, but, criminal in it's negliegence.
One of the things we know about drought stricken land is that IF there is to be irrigation there will be soil erosion.
Fall 2005
The region continues to be in relatively good condition in terms of drought. The latest index (Palmer, 8/6/05) shows medium to severe drought in eastern Texas and Oklahoma, and in eastern and southern Colorado. The remainder of the region ranges from normal to extremely moist. Row-crop condition is generally not as good as last year, but is still above normal. The percent of corn rated between fair and excellent as of August 8 is 85 for KS, 88 for NE, 91 for OK, and 71 for TX. The percent of the soybean crop rated between fair and excellent is 88 for KS, 83 for NE, 94 for OK, and 66 for TX. Percent cotton rated between fair and excellent is 85 for TX, 81 for OK, and 84 for NM.
Preparation for wheat planting is well underway. Growers and their advisors should remember that phosphorus (P) nutrition of wheat is a critical factor in achieving optimal yield. Although only small amounts of P are taken up by wheat early in the season, it nevertheless plays a major role in early plant development and determination of attainable yield potential. During the first few weeks, P supply increases the proliferation of roots as well as the initiation of tillers. An insufficient supply early in the season creates irrecoverable yield losses. Phosphorus shortages later in the season have less impact than those encountered earlier. Although higher soil fertility levels are important for season-long P nutrition, early season P supplies must be accessible to the limited root system of the young wheat plant. For this reason, P placed near the seed at planting (starter P) has proven effective, especially in cold soils. The response of wheat to low rates of starter P is often referred to as the “pop-up effect”, and is marked by improved leaf and root growth, tiller formation, and yield. Some research has indicated that starter P can provide benefits even at higher soil test levels, probably because of its superior positional availability. Bottom line… make sure wheat planted this fall has sufficient available P so that yield potential is not compromised. Also, remember that a well-managed fertility program must consider the complete nutritional needs of wheat.
There is also a discussion about fertilizer prices (Click on here).
This can be a helpful site for that area of the country (Click on here).
The other is commercial. Farming. The drought is monitored. When the latest 'update' was filed the Fall of 2005. The drought hadn't deepened. This is profound problem as it affects the grain production as well as livestock of the Great Plains. The fact that a former governor from Texas whom was elected president continues to refuse to handle Global Warming leading to OBVIOUS "Climate Change" is not only a bit odd, but, criminal in it's negliegence.
One of the things we know about drought stricken land is that IF there is to be irrigation there will be soil erosion.
Fall 2005
The region continues to be in relatively good condition in terms of drought. The latest index (Palmer, 8/6/05) shows medium to severe drought in eastern Texas and Oklahoma, and in eastern and southern Colorado. The remainder of the region ranges from normal to extremely moist. Row-crop condition is generally not as good as last year, but is still above normal. The percent of corn rated between fair and excellent as of August 8 is 85 for KS, 88 for NE, 91 for OK, and 71 for TX. The percent of the soybean crop rated between fair and excellent is 88 for KS, 83 for NE, 94 for OK, and 66 for TX. Percent cotton rated between fair and excellent is 85 for TX, 81 for OK, and 84 for NM.
Preparation for wheat planting is well underway. Growers and their advisors should remember that phosphorus (P) nutrition of wheat is a critical factor in achieving optimal yield. Although only small amounts of P are taken up by wheat early in the season, it nevertheless plays a major role in early plant development and determination of attainable yield potential. During the first few weeks, P supply increases the proliferation of roots as well as the initiation of tillers. An insufficient supply early in the season creates irrecoverable yield losses. Phosphorus shortages later in the season have less impact than those encountered earlier. Although higher soil fertility levels are important for season-long P nutrition, early season P supplies must be accessible to the limited root system of the young wheat plant. For this reason, P placed near the seed at planting (starter P) has proven effective, especially in cold soils. The response of wheat to low rates of starter P is often referred to as the “pop-up effect”, and is marked by improved leaf and root growth, tiller formation, and yield. Some research has indicated that starter P can provide benefits even at higher soil test levels, probably because of its superior positional availability. Bottom line… make sure wheat planted this fall has sufficient available P so that yield potential is not compromised. Also, remember that a well-managed fertility program must consider the complete nutritional needs of wheat.
There is also a discussion about fertilizer prices (Click on here).
This can be a helpful site for that area of the country (Click on here).
January 9, 2006.
Enhanced Infrared image of the USA of North America.
When will this stop? When will it get worse?
The vortex over the Arctic Circle that extends down to 36N is like a 'car engine.' As long as it has fuel it will continue to do exactly what it is doing now. The fuel for this huge hemispheric vortex is the ice of the 'ice ocean.' Quite literally, the ice has to be gone before this will abate. The only 'variable' is the movement of the sun in it's traverse over the planet.
January 9, 2006. 2031.
Enhanced Infrared image of the south central states.
The reduction of carbon dioxide to STOP this Geophysic Engine is vital. A perfectly reasonable scenario would be for sudden 'climate change' to take place when this engine grinds to a hault causing vast drought above 36N and spontaneous fires as well.
The Charred Remains of Cross Plains, Texas
January 9, 2006.
Cross Plains Texas.
Photographer states :: This is a photo of the Cross Plains City Limit sign and you can see in the background where the fire was. Their was a home in the background that was burned, you can kinda see the driveway.
Morning Papers - continued
Amarillo Globe News from January 6th.
Anti-litter campaign gets a flashy new look
TxDOT using star power to get message across to young people
By Michael Smith
michael.smith@amarillo.com
A Texas Department of Transportation pickup rests in an emply lot littered with trash on Thursday near Gem Lake Road and Amarillo Boulevard. On the truck's rear quarter panel is Texas' 20-year-old anti-litter slogan "Don't Mess With Texas."
Michael Lemmons / michael.lemmons@amarillo.com
"[Dalhart Cheese Factory] Not a good move. Population in Dalhart is around 7,500. How will that equate to return on investment from sales taxes? Money could be better invested by giving tax breaks on energy for the 160,000+ in Amarillo." - From dblwing1
[Join this discussion]
Star Power: Celebrities such as Lance Armstrong appear in ads for TxDOT's anti-litter campaign, aimed at the state's youngest generation.
Courtesy Photo
Texas Department of Transportation officials wrote the curriculum for statewide litter prevention 20 years ago and now think the state's youngest generation could use a refresher course.
TxDOT is reinforcing its "Don't Mess With Texas" anti-litter push with the "Real Texans Don't Litter" campaign it launched during the Cotton Bowl on New Year's Day.
Returning to its original use of star power mixed with catchy television ads and jingles, TxDOT is targeting Texans under 25 - who are twice as likely to litter than their grandparents' generation, department studies show.
Keep Amarillo Beautiful coordinator Dusty McGuire said now is the right time for a renewed push. Children aren't taught about littering in public schools like they once were, McGuire said.
"I don't like Amarillo to be littered, it bothers me," she said. "I think it's going to be fabulous."
Aided by stars such as Willie Nelson, Stevie Ray Vaughn and Jerry Jeff Walker when it began in 1986, the phrase "Don't Mess With Texas" was an instant hit, program spokeswoman Brenda Flores-Dollar said.
"People just loved the idea," Flores-Dollar said. "Not only because it means don't litter, but it's a Texas pride thing."
Other states have since copied the idea.
The newest campaign features a list of Texas celebrities including singers Erykah Badu, Los Lonely Boys and Lee Ann Womack, and seven-time Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong.
Dallas Cowboys running back Julius Jones has also joined the campaign.
On the Net:
www.dot.state.tx.us/
The lineup is more identifiable for younger Texans, which was the magic that helped the initial campaign with adults, McGuire said.
"I'm thrilled, and I'm hoping the people in Amarillo will pay attention and stop littering here because we've become real sloppy," she said.
The department's other litter campaign, the Adopt-a-Highway program, began 21 years ago.
In the 17-county Panhandle area, 159 groups are active in the program and responsible for 347 miles of state roads, said Brenda Lowe, TxDOT Amarillo Adopt-A-Highway coordinator.
Groups, families and individuals sign two-year contracts with the department promising four trash pickups per year. The program remains popular, and works as a soft deterrent, Lowe said.
"When somebody sees it clean, they want to keep it clean - hopefully," Lowe said.
A cleaner Amarillo is in the community's best interest, McGuire said.
"A clean town, you need to have pride about it," McGuire said. "People pay attention when they're passing through or coming to move here."
http://www.amarillo.com/stories/010606/new_3655183.shtml
Six new fires break out in Texas
One home destroyed
The Associated Press
Flames Return: Members of the Bulverde Volunteer Fire Department work a brush fire Thursday near San Antonio. Residents of the Fossil Ridge subdivision, south of the fire, were asked to evacuate.
AP Photo
"[Dalhart Cheese Factory] Not a good move. Population in Dalhart is around 7,500. How will that equate to return on investment from sales taxes? Money could be better invested by giving tax breaks on energy for the 160,000+ in Amarillo." - From dblwing1 [Join this discussion]
Firefighters were battling six new blazes that flared Thursday throughout Texas, destroying one home and threatening dozens of houses and buildings.
One home was lost when a fire in Hunt County scorched about 300 acres and continued growing. And a fire burning 8 miles west of Springtown, in Parker County, threatened up to 20 homes and burned 40 acres. Another blaze in Bexar County consumed some 150 acres and caused the evacuation of 30 homes, according to the Texas Forest Service.
Swirling winds of up to 20 mph spread the fire across grass and scrub land in northern Bexar County. Late Thursday afternoon, the blaze was about a mile from the nearest subdivision, said Randy Jenkins, spokesman for the San Antonio Fire Department.
Military helicopters rigged with large water buckets were dispatched to help fight the fire, which was moving southeast toward San Antonio city limits, Jenkins said.
Crews were able to control a 250-acre blaze about two miles south of Killeen in Bell County that had threatened 12 structures, said Bill Sweet, a Texas Forest Service spokesman.
Firefighters were also working small fires in Clay County and another blaze in Hale County, Sweet said.
http://www.amarillo.com/stories/010606/new_3655540.shtml
Seewald: New Orleans needs to know where it stands
By William H. Seewald
Opinion
"They put new lights in downtown. All well and good, but they screwed up the timing on one. Where you used to drive straight through, now you have to stop and wait at 8th street on Fillmore. Then, once it releases you, you catch the yellow at the next light, if you are quick..." - From James [Join this discussion]
NEW ORLEANS - New Orleans remains a city in suspended animation even though more people have filtered back into town.
As of year's end, electricity, gas and water have been largely restored to the parts of the city without significant flooding. Phones are another matter. Responding for months that they had no idea when they'd restore service, the phone company's lately taken to tentative promises of March.
The school system has just two schools open. The state has taken over most of New Orleans' dysfunctional schools. Except for the knockout punch to school buildings already reduced to little more than tenements by years of neglect and corruption, Katrina's kindest blow may have been tolling a death knell for the city's failed schools.
There's plenty of blame to go around for the inadequate, tentative and often non-existent effort to restore New Orleans to reasonable function as a city. But New Orleanians must accept primary responsibility for the abject failure of their schools.
If New Orleans is to regain its footing, the daunting list of tasks is overwhelming. But other than levees that will protect the city, there isn't much to top the need for schools if families are going to be able to return to make their homes there.
Boosterish notions of New Orleans' great opportunity to reinvent itself are surfacing. And while those of us who love it no doubt prefer it largely as it was, unquestionably the city now has an opportunity that it simply can't afford to flub. There has to be aid to repair school buildings. But New Orleans must find the political will and the leadership to make that investment yield education instead of incompetence and corruption.
Blooming here and there are hopeful tidings. A committee of the mayor's rebuilding commission appears poised to recommend significant changes in the way the city is governed, streamlining bloated, bureaucratic fiefdoms in parish government and merging the duplicative civil and criminal court systems.
Most of the city's universities will reopen this month. There's a promised contract to remove the more than 30,000 abandoned vehicles that litter medians and the shadows of freeways. They, like the ubiquitous piles of debris, are grim reminders of the devastation, with their grimy water rings encircling and demarcating the various stages of their submersion and ruination. The same striations on the sides of homes and businesses throughout the city will not be so readily dispatched.
The New Orleans Levee Board unanimously endorsed a constitutional amendment that would create a new regional levee district. With the legislature's failure to pass the consolidation legislation, and given the governor's somewhat lukewarm support for the idea, local business leaders and citizens demanded reform, gathering nearly 50,000 signatures in a month.
But there's still no commitment to levees that will protect the city from storms worse than Katrina, now estimated to actually have been a Category 3 when it hit the city. Significant rebuilding or repopulation almost certainly will stagnate until people and businesses know the levees will be adequate. Neither your insurance company nor your dry cleaner can be expected to commit to the city in the absence of protection from the Gulf, which was visited by more Category 5 storms this season than all the rest of the previous hundred years combined.
The horrendous damage should've produced a reallocation of national priorities sufficient to pay for a sensible reconstruction plan. There's no plan. Without leadership, the dispiriting attitude of people all over the country is that somehow the problems and solutions are all up to the city.
President Bush's reconstruction czar, one-time Amarillo banker Don Powell, was shoved in front of the cameras last month. Sounding every bit the used-car salesman, Powell proclaimed the levees will be "bigger and better" than ever before, delivering few specifics, much less plans for a redesigned levee system that actually would protect the city. He offered only strengthening of the existing levees and a pittance for wetland restoration, the critical first line of defense against approaching storms.
After four months, only about a third of Congress' original Katrina appropriation has been spent. But then the people of Iraq can offer firsthand testimony about the distance between the Bush administration's rhetoric about reconstruction and the benefits that actually trickle down from the vice president's corporate cronies like Halliburton.
The list of uncompleted tasks is immense - from piles of debris that won't disappear for three years at current rates, to the tens of thousands of families huddled in motels and facing eviction.
Longer-term recovery will depend on actual progress, as well as people's perception of what's happening. There must be confidence that the recovery is being well managed and the levees will be re-engineered. Neither the reality nor the perception is too heartening right now.
http://www.amarillo.com/stories/010606/opi_3649262.shtml
11 U.S. troops killed on same day in recent barrage of violence that has swept Iraq
BAGHDAD, Iraq — The U.S. military said Friday that six more American troops died in the recent surge of violence in Iraq, bringing to 11 the number of U.S. troops slain on the same day.
Thousands of Shiites, meanwhile, rallied in Baghdad to protest the bloodshed and denounce what they said was American coddling of some Sunnis who support the insurgency in order to mollify them and bring them into a broad-based government.
In new violence Friday, a suicide car bomber struck a police patrol in Baghdad, killing one officer, Col. Noori Ashur said.
Elsewhere, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw held talks in southern Iraq with local officials on forming a broad-based coalition government.
A U.S. Marine and soldier died in Thursday's attack by a suicide bomber who infiltrated a line of police recruits in Ramadi, killing at least 58 and wounding dozens. Two soldiers were also killed in the Baghdad area when their vehicle hit a roadside bomb, the military said Friday.
http://ap.amarillonet.com/pstories/20060106/3541102.shtml
Doctor to speak about Medicare Part D
Amarillo Globe-News
Medicare Part D has some senior citizens confused and concerned, but they can find answers at the next Texas Cooperative Extension Senior Seminar.
"Medicare Part D - Is it Right for You?" will begin at 1:30 p.m. Jan. 12 in the Amarillo Senior Citizens Association Meeting Room 115.
Dr. Ted Nicklaus, medical director for Ware Memorial Care Center, Heritage Convalescent Center and Jan Werner Adult Day Care Center, and Serena Cowart, benefits counselor with Area Agency on Aging of the Panhandle, will address questions such as: "Why is Medicare Part D so confusing?" "Should I join?" and "If so, what plan should I join?"
In advance of the seminar, seniors or their caretakers are encouraged to get a packet by calling Area Agency on Aging at 331-2227.
For more information, call 373-0713.
http://amarillo.com/stories/010406/fri_3604881.shtml
Refuge needs items to keep animals warm
Amarillo Globe-News
"[Dalhart Cheese Factory] Not a good move. Population in Dalhart is around 7,500. How will that equate to return on investment from sales taxes? Money could be better invested by giving tax breaks on energy for the 160,000+ in Amarillo." - From dblwing1 [Join this discussion]
Want to help some cold animals?
The Amarillo Wildlife Refuge is looking for blankets, sheets, towels, old clothing or bedding material to help keep the animals warm through the winter.
"It is for the animals here, mostly for the primates," refuge spokeswoman Paula Reams said. "It is for their bedding and they carry them around and wear them."
The refuge also is in need of cleaning supplies, including bleach, mops and brooms.
"We are in desperate need of this," Reams said.
To donate, call 371-0011 or 679-6919 and then drop the materials by the refuge at 4401 Redding Road.
http://www.amarillo.com/stories/010606/new_3655204.shtml
Editorial: Texas not making grade
Texas didn't make the grade in public education according to a study called "Quality Counts," released last week by Education Week.
It should come as no surprise that one of the reasons for the state's below average performance was inadequate funding for school districts determined to be poor and wealthy.
Despite numerous legislative failures and court rulings, Texas still has no definitive plan to pay for public education.
The national study of public education gave grades to states in various categories.
Texas was below average in every category other than measuring standards and accountability, in which it earned a national average grade of B-minus.
Texas' neighbors fared much better.
Oklahoma ranked seventh in the nation for teacher quality and was above average in all categories except for school climate.
New Mexico received an overall B grade and a low grade of C in school climate.
How long can Texas continue to drag its feet on the future of public education before the quality of learning begins to deteriorate?
It is time the Texas Legislature did its homework and crafted a fair and reasonable public education funding plan before substandard grades in a national study are the least of the state's worries.
Sydney Morning Herald
One butt's toll: five homes, 20,000 sheep and firefighter
A fire that destroyed five houses and burnt out massive tracts of farm and bushland in south-western NSW was probably sparked by a discarded cigarette butt, investigators believe.
The blaze erupted west of Junee on New Year's Day and spread quickly, racing through paddocks towards dry bushland to the northeast of the town.
The fire raced across 25,200 hectares of land leaving it charred and killing an estimated 20,000 sheep and other livestock.
Volunteer firefighter John Heffernan, 21, suffered third-degree burns to 60 per cent of his body while battling the flames on his property near Junee.
He remains in a critical condition in Sydney's Concord Hospital.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/one-cigarette-butts-horrendous-toll/2006/01/09/1136771490273.html
Cyclone sparks evacuations
Communities in Western Australia's Pilbara region are braced for the arrival tonight of Cyclone Clare amid warnings of a flooding surge and destructive winds of up to 120kmh.
More than 1,500 people have been evacuated from low-lying areas along the state's north-west coast, with the category three storm intensifying as it heads towards land.
It is expected to hit the coast, possibly as a category four, between Dampier and Karratha tonight and has forced the closure of shipping ports, Karratha airport and some mining operations.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/cyclone-sparks-evacuations/2006/01/09/1136771484417.html
San Francisco Chronicle
Americans saving less than nothing
Spending could outstrip income in 2005, which hasn't happened since the Depression
When the Commerce Department recently tallied up consumer finances for November, it found that Americans shelled out more money than they took in. It was the seventh such month of red ink during 2005.
Kevin Lansing, an economist with the Federal Reserve Bank in San Francisco, tracks the personal savings rate -- the Commerce Department's measure of how much consumers have left after spending is subtracted from income. In November the savings rate was a negative 0.2 percent.
Given how much red ink households racked up in the first 11 months of last year, Lansing said the nation's personal savings rate could well be negative for all of 2005.
That, he added, would be "the first such occurrence since the Great Depression."
The term "savings rate" may be a misnomer. Keith Leggett, senior economist with the American Bankers Association, described the measure as a tally of all the income that isn't spent.
"Savings is the absence of consumption,'' he said.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/01/08/BUG7IGJHEK1.DTL
Schwarzenegger receives stitches after LA traffic accident
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger received 15 stitches in his lip Sunday after a traffic accident near his Los Angeles home, his spokeswoman said.
Schwarzenegger was riding a Harley Davidson motorcycle with his son Patrick, 12, when another driver backed into the street shortly after 3 p.m., spokeswoman Margita Thompson said in a statement.
"The governor was unable to avoid the vehicle in his path and collided with it at a low speed," she said.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/01/08/state/n193905S35.DTL
SPY POWERS
Can the president eavesdrop on private citizens without a judge's ok? The high court said 'no' in 1972 Wiretaps: Ruling requires warrants for spying at home
Thirty-five years ago, President Richard Nixon claimed constitutional authority to wiretap Americans' phone calls to protect national security without asking a judge -- the same assertion that President Bush is making today in the name of fighting terrorism.
The Supreme Court ruled unanimously against Nixon, saying the Constitution granted the powers he was claiming to judges, not presidents. If the current court eventually reconsiders that 1972 ruling, it may affect the fate of Bush's decision to authorize the National Security Agency to wiretap calls between Americans and alleged al Qaeda suspects in foreign countries.
Presidents have approved wiretaps without court orders since the 1940s, but the legality of the practice was thrown into doubt after the Supreme Court ruled in 1967 that electronic eavesdropping was a search, and thus covered by the prohibition on unreasonable searches in the Constitution's Fourth Amendment.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/01/08/MNGHGGK8OC1.DTL
Belafonte Calls Bush 'Greatest Terrorist'
The American singer and activist Harry Belafonte called President Bush "the greatest terrorist in the world" on Sunday and said millions of Americans support the socialist revolution of Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez.
Belafonte led a delegation of Americans including the actor Danny Glover and the Princeton University scholar Cornel West that met the Venezuelan president for more than six hours late Saturday. Some in the group attended Chavez's television and radio broadcast Sunday.
"No matter what the greatest tyrant in the world, the greatest terrorist in the world, George W. Bush says, we're here to tell you: Not hundreds, not thousands, but millions of the American people ... support your revolution," Belafonte told Chavez during the broadcast.
The 78-year-old Belafonte, famous for his calypso-inspired music, including the "Day-O" song, was a close collaborator of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and is now a UNICEF goodwill ambassador. He also has been outspoken in criticizing the U.S. embargo of Cuba.
Chavez said he believes deeply in the struggle for justice by blacks, both in the U.S. and Venezuela.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/01/08/international/i175901S16.DTL
Mouse Thrown Into Fire Sets Home Ablaze
A mouse got its revenge against a homeowner who tried to dispose of it in a pile of burning leaves. The blazing creature ran back to the man's house and set it on fire.
Luciano Mares, 81, of Fort Sumner said he caught the mouse inside his house and wanted to get rid of it.
"I had some leaves burning outside, so I threw it in the fire, and the mouse was on fire and ran back at the house," Mares said from a motel room Saturday.
Village Fire Chief Juan Chavez said the burning mouse ran to just beneath a window, and the flames spread up from there and throughout the house.
No was hurt inside, but the home and everything in it was destroyed.
Unseasonably dry and windy conditions have charred more than 53,000 acres and destroyed 10 homes in southeastern New Mexico in recent weeks.
"I've seen numerous house fires," village Fire Department Capt. Jim Lyssy said, "but nothing as unique as this one."
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/01/08/national/a131941S22.DTL
Pope John Paul's Shooter to Be Released
The man who shot Pope John Paul II in 1981 will be released from prison this week after a court decided he had completed his sentence for the attack on the pontiff and other crimes — a ruling that took the Vatican by surprise.
Mehmet Ali Agca was extradited to Turkey in 2000 after serving almost 20 years in Italy for shooting and wounding the pope in St. Peter's Square in Rome. His motive for shooting John Paul in the abdomen on May 13, 1981, remains unclear.
Agca, 47, was to be released on parole Thursday, his lawyer, Mustafa Demirbag told The Associated Press by telephone.
"He was eligible to be released on parole because he had no disciplinary problems," Demirbag said.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/01/08/international/i193950S75.DTL
SAN FRANCISCO
Jack London's lens on 1906 quake
Author's photos, never seen by public, get centennial show
It is still magic after all these years: Slowly the black and white image comes to life in the darkroom tray at the headquarters of the California Historical Society in San Francisco. The picture is from another time, but it is sharp and clear -- it is of a huge domed building, all in ruins, as if it had been bombed.
It is the wreckage of San Francisco's City Hall, destroyed in an earthquake a century ago this spring. It is a remarkable picture, but the photographer was even more remarkable. He was Jack London.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/01/06/BAGN3GI4NU1.DTL
The DNC
Corny? Perhaps. But they are making sure they are delivering on a promise
Delivering The FOIA Requests
Posted by Tim Tagaris on January 5, 2006 at 02:57 PM
Shortly after the New York Times publicized the president's domestic-spying-without-a-warrant program, over 160,000 Americans signed a Freedom of Information Act Request along with Governor Dean in an attempt to determine just why President Bush believed he had the authority to undermine the Constitution. Earlier today Joe Sandler, DNC attorney, delivered each and every one of those FOIA requests to the Department of Justice. Here are some of the photos:
http://www.democrats.org/a/2006/01/delivering_the.php
The New Zealand Herald
Iran prepares to remove nuclear seals
09.01.06 1.00pm
By Daniel Howden
Iran was last night preparing to remove United Nations seals at several nuclear research and development sites, despite warnings from nuclear watchdog Mohamed El Baradei that the international community was running out of patience with Tehran.
It would be the second time in five months that Iran, which insists its nuclear programme is peaceful, removed seals put in place by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
"We will remove the seals and we have announced that we are ready to start research from tomorrow," Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said yesterday.
"It depends on the IAEA to announce its readiness as this will take place under the agency's supervision," he added.
However, Mr El Baradei, head of the IAEA, disputed Tehran's assertion that 90 per cent of issues related to the resumption of research had been solved.
"I am running out of patience, the international community is running out patience, the credibility of the verification process is at stake and I'd like come March, which is my next report, to be able to clarify these issues," he told Sky News.
"Everybody would like to see a regime by which the international community is assured that the Iranian programme is exclusively for peaceful purposes and there are still a number of issues we are looking at.
"There is also a consensus that enrichment in Iran right now is a matter of serious concern."
Uranium enrichment is the most sensitive part of the nuclear fuel cycle since it can be used to produce bomb-grade material as well as nuclear reactor fuel.
Iran has not publicly disclosed what activities it plans to resume on Monday.
Diplomats and analysts say atomic research and development could involve some laboratory tests of uranium enrichment and the assembly of enrichment centrifuges.
"R&D activities will be under the IAEA's supervision and there is nothing to be worried about," Asefi said.
IAEA officials say an Iranian team failed to show up for talks in Vienna last week to explain what activities Iran planned to resume.
Asked why the Iranian team flew back from Vienna without meeting the IAEA, Javad Vaeedi, deputy head of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, told state television on Saturday: "Holding any meeting has to be based on the attainment of an aim and a result. The cancellation of the meeting in fact took place in this light."
On Thursday a high-ranking Iranian delegation rebuffed El Baradei, reneging on a pledge to provide full details of its plans by not showing up for a scheduled meeting with him.
Russian officials in Iran, meanwhile, continued talks about Moscow's proposal that the two countries conduct uranium enrichment, a process that can produce nuclear fuel for reactors or atomic weapons depending on the degree of enrichment, on Russian territory.
The Russian proposal, backed by the European Union and the United States, was designed ease concerns that Iran would use the fuel to build a bomb.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10362937
UN peacekeepers chief in Haiti found dead
09.01.06 1.00pm
By Phil Davison
The Brazilian general in charge of United Nations peacekeepers in Haiti has been found dead on the balcony of his hotel suite with a bullet through his head.
He was found wearing only underpants and a white vest with his pistol still in his hand.
The general had been alone in his suite and suicide is presumed, according to UN officials and Haitian police.
But in the land of voodoo spells and zombies, and more recently violent political and gang killings, the death of General Urano Texeira da Matta Bacellar, 58, has rattled the international community.
He was described by colleagues as an extremely religious, happily-married man with two children he adored, and a soldier used, in 39 years of service, to pressure far worse than he had seen in his four months in Haiti.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10362928
US House Republicans face leadership battle
09.01.06 1.00pm
WASHINGTON - With US Rep. Tom Delay having bowed out as House of Representatives majority leader under an ethical cloud, a contest quickly emerged among Republicans to replace him in the key post.
Republican Rep. John Boehner of Ohio announced his candidacy for the job, now held on an acting basis by Roy Blunt of Missouri, who has been busy lining up support of his own.
"We must come together and renew our commitment to creating a better America based on freedom, opportunity, fiscal and personal responsibility, empowered citizens, and restored trust," Boehner, 56, said in a statement announcing his candidacy.
While Blunt, 55, has not made a formal announcement, an aide said he began reaching out to fellow Republicans for support on Saturday after DeLay announced his decision not to try to get the leadership job back.
The aide, Jessica Boulanger, said: "He (Blunt) hopes to have the votes" by the time the election is held.
"He is encouraged by the support he has seen so far," she said. "He started making phone calls yesterday after a private discussion with Tom DeLay."
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10362942
Powerful quake rattles Greece
09.01.06 8.20am
ATHENS - A strong earthquake shook Greece and most of the eastern Mediterranean early today NZT but caused only minor damages and no casualties.
The quake off the southeastern tip of Greece's Peloponnese peninsula measured 6.9 on the open-ended Richter scale, with its epicentre at a depth of 70 km near the island of Kithira, the Athens Geodynamic Institute said.
"We were extremely lucky this was an underwater quake," institute chief Giorgos Stavrakakis told reporters. "If it had happened on land it would be a mess."
Police said there were no reports of casualties after the tremor, which drove people out of their homes in cities across most of the country.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10362908
The Big Chill in Delhi
09.01.06 6.20am
Millions of people in the Indian capital woke up to the coldest weather in 70 years, as the death toll from northern India's cold spell rose to 116. The temperature dipped to 0.2C in New Delhi, the lowest recorded in the past 70 years and seven degrees below normal, the Meteorology Department said. The previous lowest temperature was minus 0.6C in 1935.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10362909
New toxic spill in China
09.01.06 9.20am
China's third major toxic spill in as many months has threatened the water supplies to millions of residents of two central cities.
A clean-up accident last Wednesday allowed the industrial chemical cadmium, which can cause neurological disorders and cancer, to flood out of a smelter and into the Xiangjiang River in Hunan province.
The river supplies tap water to Changsha, which has about six million people, and Xiangtan city, with 700,000 inhabitants.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10362910
Human bird flu cases reach Turkish capital
09.01.06 1.00pm
ANKARA - Three Turks tested positive for a deadly strain of bird flu in the capital Ankara on Sunday, a new stage in the westward sweep of the disease from its east Asian origins towards major economic centres in Turkey and Europe.
The first case of the virus jumping from birds to humans outside China and southeast Asia occurred last week in rural eastern Turkey, where three children from the same family died after contracting the highly potent H5N1 strain.
As doctors confirmed that two children and a 60-year-old man were being treated in Ankara for the virus, Russia raised fears of the disease impacting Turkey's economy by warning its citizens against visiting the popular holiday destination.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10362943
Boffin sees future space travel as domain of 'adventurers'
09.01.06 1.00pm
By Steve Connor
He is Britain's top scientist.
The new president of the Royal Society is also Astronomer Royal, master of Trinity College, Cambridge and renowned cosmologist whose deep thoughts frequently turn to deep space, dark matter and the dawn of creation.
Lord Rees of Ludlow, known to the many readers of his science books as Martin Rees, is also something of a thought-provoking populariser.
He believes that a butterfly poses more daunting scientific problems than a star and that the search for extraterrestrial intelligence is well worth the effort.
He has advocated the exploration of space by a new generation of adventurers willing to take risks by travelling cheap, and is against the kind of costly manned exploration funded by risk-averse governments.
He favours fleets of miniature robotic probes to explore the planets rather than a manned mission to Mars and thinks the multibillion-dollar International Space Station is a "turkey in the sky".
Lord Rees the cosmologist has proposed our universe may be just one of zillions, each with its own set of physical laws, and that the universe we find ourselves living in may, in fact, be a mere computer simulation built by a race of super-intelligent beings.
He believes there is a 50 per cent chance that human civilisation may not survive in its present form by the end of the 21st century, and has warned that a major environmental collapse within the next hundred years carries the same sort of probability as tossing a coin.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&ObjectID=10362938
continued ...
Anti-litter campaign gets a flashy new look
TxDOT using star power to get message across to young people
By Michael Smith
michael.smith@amarillo.com
A Texas Department of Transportation pickup rests in an emply lot littered with trash on Thursday near Gem Lake Road and Amarillo Boulevard. On the truck's rear quarter panel is Texas' 20-year-old anti-litter slogan "Don't Mess With Texas."
Michael Lemmons / michael.lemmons@amarillo.com
"[Dalhart Cheese Factory] Not a good move. Population in Dalhart is around 7,500. How will that equate to return on investment from sales taxes? Money could be better invested by giving tax breaks on energy for the 160,000+ in Amarillo." - From dblwing1
[Join this discussion]
Star Power: Celebrities such as Lance Armstrong appear in ads for TxDOT's anti-litter campaign, aimed at the state's youngest generation.
Courtesy Photo
Texas Department of Transportation officials wrote the curriculum for statewide litter prevention 20 years ago and now think the state's youngest generation could use a refresher course.
TxDOT is reinforcing its "Don't Mess With Texas" anti-litter push with the "Real Texans Don't Litter" campaign it launched during the Cotton Bowl on New Year's Day.
Returning to its original use of star power mixed with catchy television ads and jingles, TxDOT is targeting Texans under 25 - who are twice as likely to litter than their grandparents' generation, department studies show.
Keep Amarillo Beautiful coordinator Dusty McGuire said now is the right time for a renewed push. Children aren't taught about littering in public schools like they once were, McGuire said.
"I don't like Amarillo to be littered, it bothers me," she said. "I think it's going to be fabulous."
Aided by stars such as Willie Nelson, Stevie Ray Vaughn and Jerry Jeff Walker when it began in 1986, the phrase "Don't Mess With Texas" was an instant hit, program spokeswoman Brenda Flores-Dollar said.
"People just loved the idea," Flores-Dollar said. "Not only because it means don't litter, but it's a Texas pride thing."
Other states have since copied the idea.
The newest campaign features a list of Texas celebrities including singers Erykah Badu, Los Lonely Boys and Lee Ann Womack, and seven-time Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong.
Dallas Cowboys running back Julius Jones has also joined the campaign.
On the Net:
www.dot.state.tx.us/
The lineup is more identifiable for younger Texans, which was the magic that helped the initial campaign with adults, McGuire said.
"I'm thrilled, and I'm hoping the people in Amarillo will pay attention and stop littering here because we've become real sloppy," she said.
The department's other litter campaign, the Adopt-a-Highway program, began 21 years ago.
In the 17-county Panhandle area, 159 groups are active in the program and responsible for 347 miles of state roads, said Brenda Lowe, TxDOT Amarillo Adopt-A-Highway coordinator.
Groups, families and individuals sign two-year contracts with the department promising four trash pickups per year. The program remains popular, and works as a soft deterrent, Lowe said.
"When somebody sees it clean, they want to keep it clean - hopefully," Lowe said.
A cleaner Amarillo is in the community's best interest, McGuire said.
"A clean town, you need to have pride about it," McGuire said. "People pay attention when they're passing through or coming to move here."
http://www.amarillo.com/stories/010606/new_3655183.shtml
Six new fires break out in Texas
One home destroyed
The Associated Press
Flames Return: Members of the Bulverde Volunteer Fire Department work a brush fire Thursday near San Antonio. Residents of the Fossil Ridge subdivision, south of the fire, were asked to evacuate.
AP Photo
"[Dalhart Cheese Factory] Not a good move. Population in Dalhart is around 7,500. How will that equate to return on investment from sales taxes? Money could be better invested by giving tax breaks on energy for the 160,000+ in Amarillo." - From dblwing1 [Join this discussion]
Firefighters were battling six new blazes that flared Thursday throughout Texas, destroying one home and threatening dozens of houses and buildings.
One home was lost when a fire in Hunt County scorched about 300 acres and continued growing. And a fire burning 8 miles west of Springtown, in Parker County, threatened up to 20 homes and burned 40 acres. Another blaze in Bexar County consumed some 150 acres and caused the evacuation of 30 homes, according to the Texas Forest Service.
Swirling winds of up to 20 mph spread the fire across grass and scrub land in northern Bexar County. Late Thursday afternoon, the blaze was about a mile from the nearest subdivision, said Randy Jenkins, spokesman for the San Antonio Fire Department.
Military helicopters rigged with large water buckets were dispatched to help fight the fire, which was moving southeast toward San Antonio city limits, Jenkins said.
Crews were able to control a 250-acre blaze about two miles south of Killeen in Bell County that had threatened 12 structures, said Bill Sweet, a Texas Forest Service spokesman.
Firefighters were also working small fires in Clay County and another blaze in Hale County, Sweet said.
http://www.amarillo.com/stories/010606/new_3655540.shtml
Seewald: New Orleans needs to know where it stands
By William H. Seewald
Opinion
"They put new lights in downtown. All well and good, but they screwed up the timing on one. Where you used to drive straight through, now you have to stop and wait at 8th street on Fillmore. Then, once it releases you, you catch the yellow at the next light, if you are quick..." - From James [Join this discussion]
NEW ORLEANS - New Orleans remains a city in suspended animation even though more people have filtered back into town.
As of year's end, electricity, gas and water have been largely restored to the parts of the city without significant flooding. Phones are another matter. Responding for months that they had no idea when they'd restore service, the phone company's lately taken to tentative promises of March.
The school system has just two schools open. The state has taken over most of New Orleans' dysfunctional schools. Except for the knockout punch to school buildings already reduced to little more than tenements by years of neglect and corruption, Katrina's kindest blow may have been tolling a death knell for the city's failed schools.
There's plenty of blame to go around for the inadequate, tentative and often non-existent effort to restore New Orleans to reasonable function as a city. But New Orleanians must accept primary responsibility for the abject failure of their schools.
If New Orleans is to regain its footing, the daunting list of tasks is overwhelming. But other than levees that will protect the city, there isn't much to top the need for schools if families are going to be able to return to make their homes there.
Boosterish notions of New Orleans' great opportunity to reinvent itself are surfacing. And while those of us who love it no doubt prefer it largely as it was, unquestionably the city now has an opportunity that it simply can't afford to flub. There has to be aid to repair school buildings. But New Orleans must find the political will and the leadership to make that investment yield education instead of incompetence and corruption.
Blooming here and there are hopeful tidings. A committee of the mayor's rebuilding commission appears poised to recommend significant changes in the way the city is governed, streamlining bloated, bureaucratic fiefdoms in parish government and merging the duplicative civil and criminal court systems.
Most of the city's universities will reopen this month. There's a promised contract to remove the more than 30,000 abandoned vehicles that litter medians and the shadows of freeways. They, like the ubiquitous piles of debris, are grim reminders of the devastation, with their grimy water rings encircling and demarcating the various stages of their submersion and ruination. The same striations on the sides of homes and businesses throughout the city will not be so readily dispatched.
The New Orleans Levee Board unanimously endorsed a constitutional amendment that would create a new regional levee district. With the legislature's failure to pass the consolidation legislation, and given the governor's somewhat lukewarm support for the idea, local business leaders and citizens demanded reform, gathering nearly 50,000 signatures in a month.
But there's still no commitment to levees that will protect the city from storms worse than Katrina, now estimated to actually have been a Category 3 when it hit the city. Significant rebuilding or repopulation almost certainly will stagnate until people and businesses know the levees will be adequate. Neither your insurance company nor your dry cleaner can be expected to commit to the city in the absence of protection from the Gulf, which was visited by more Category 5 storms this season than all the rest of the previous hundred years combined.
The horrendous damage should've produced a reallocation of national priorities sufficient to pay for a sensible reconstruction plan. There's no plan. Without leadership, the dispiriting attitude of people all over the country is that somehow the problems and solutions are all up to the city.
President Bush's reconstruction czar, one-time Amarillo banker Don Powell, was shoved in front of the cameras last month. Sounding every bit the used-car salesman, Powell proclaimed the levees will be "bigger and better" than ever before, delivering few specifics, much less plans for a redesigned levee system that actually would protect the city. He offered only strengthening of the existing levees and a pittance for wetland restoration, the critical first line of defense against approaching storms.
After four months, only about a third of Congress' original Katrina appropriation has been spent. But then the people of Iraq can offer firsthand testimony about the distance between the Bush administration's rhetoric about reconstruction and the benefits that actually trickle down from the vice president's corporate cronies like Halliburton.
The list of uncompleted tasks is immense - from piles of debris that won't disappear for three years at current rates, to the tens of thousands of families huddled in motels and facing eviction.
Longer-term recovery will depend on actual progress, as well as people's perception of what's happening. There must be confidence that the recovery is being well managed and the levees will be re-engineered. Neither the reality nor the perception is too heartening right now.
http://www.amarillo.com/stories/010606/opi_3649262.shtml
11 U.S. troops killed on same day in recent barrage of violence that has swept Iraq
BAGHDAD, Iraq — The U.S. military said Friday that six more American troops died in the recent surge of violence in Iraq, bringing to 11 the number of U.S. troops slain on the same day.
Thousands of Shiites, meanwhile, rallied in Baghdad to protest the bloodshed and denounce what they said was American coddling of some Sunnis who support the insurgency in order to mollify them and bring them into a broad-based government.
In new violence Friday, a suicide car bomber struck a police patrol in Baghdad, killing one officer, Col. Noori Ashur said.
Elsewhere, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw held talks in southern Iraq with local officials on forming a broad-based coalition government.
A U.S. Marine and soldier died in Thursday's attack by a suicide bomber who infiltrated a line of police recruits in Ramadi, killing at least 58 and wounding dozens. Two soldiers were also killed in the Baghdad area when their vehicle hit a roadside bomb, the military said Friday.
http://ap.amarillonet.com/pstories/20060106/3541102.shtml
Doctor to speak about Medicare Part D
Amarillo Globe-News
Medicare Part D has some senior citizens confused and concerned, but they can find answers at the next Texas Cooperative Extension Senior Seminar.
"Medicare Part D - Is it Right for You?" will begin at 1:30 p.m. Jan. 12 in the Amarillo Senior Citizens Association Meeting Room 115.
Dr. Ted Nicklaus, medical director for Ware Memorial Care Center, Heritage Convalescent Center and Jan Werner Adult Day Care Center, and Serena Cowart, benefits counselor with Area Agency on Aging of the Panhandle, will address questions such as: "Why is Medicare Part D so confusing?" "Should I join?" and "If so, what plan should I join?"
In advance of the seminar, seniors or their caretakers are encouraged to get a packet by calling Area Agency on Aging at 331-2227.
For more information, call 373-0713.
http://amarillo.com/stories/010406/fri_3604881.shtml
Refuge needs items to keep animals warm
Amarillo Globe-News
"[Dalhart Cheese Factory] Not a good move. Population in Dalhart is around 7,500. How will that equate to return on investment from sales taxes? Money could be better invested by giving tax breaks on energy for the 160,000+ in Amarillo." - From dblwing1 [Join this discussion]
Want to help some cold animals?
The Amarillo Wildlife Refuge is looking for blankets, sheets, towels, old clothing or bedding material to help keep the animals warm through the winter.
"It is for the animals here, mostly for the primates," refuge spokeswoman Paula Reams said. "It is for their bedding and they carry them around and wear them."
The refuge also is in need of cleaning supplies, including bleach, mops and brooms.
"We are in desperate need of this," Reams said.
To donate, call 371-0011 or 679-6919 and then drop the materials by the refuge at 4401 Redding Road.
http://www.amarillo.com/stories/010606/new_3655204.shtml
Editorial: Texas not making grade
Texas didn't make the grade in public education according to a study called "Quality Counts," released last week by Education Week.
It should come as no surprise that one of the reasons for the state's below average performance was inadequate funding for school districts determined to be poor and wealthy.
Despite numerous legislative failures and court rulings, Texas still has no definitive plan to pay for public education.
The national study of public education gave grades to states in various categories.
Texas was below average in every category other than measuring standards and accountability, in which it earned a national average grade of B-minus.
Texas' neighbors fared much better.
Oklahoma ranked seventh in the nation for teacher quality and was above average in all categories except for school climate.
New Mexico received an overall B grade and a low grade of C in school climate.
How long can Texas continue to drag its feet on the future of public education before the quality of learning begins to deteriorate?
It is time the Texas Legislature did its homework and crafted a fair and reasonable public education funding plan before substandard grades in a national study are the least of the state's worries.
Sydney Morning Herald
One butt's toll: five homes, 20,000 sheep and firefighter
A fire that destroyed five houses and burnt out massive tracts of farm and bushland in south-western NSW was probably sparked by a discarded cigarette butt, investigators believe.
The blaze erupted west of Junee on New Year's Day and spread quickly, racing through paddocks towards dry bushland to the northeast of the town.
The fire raced across 25,200 hectares of land leaving it charred and killing an estimated 20,000 sheep and other livestock.
Volunteer firefighter John Heffernan, 21, suffered third-degree burns to 60 per cent of his body while battling the flames on his property near Junee.
He remains in a critical condition in Sydney's Concord Hospital.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/one-cigarette-butts-horrendous-toll/2006/01/09/1136771490273.html
Cyclone sparks evacuations
Communities in Western Australia's Pilbara region are braced for the arrival tonight of Cyclone Clare amid warnings of a flooding surge and destructive winds of up to 120kmh.
More than 1,500 people have been evacuated from low-lying areas along the state's north-west coast, with the category three storm intensifying as it heads towards land.
It is expected to hit the coast, possibly as a category four, between Dampier and Karratha tonight and has forced the closure of shipping ports, Karratha airport and some mining operations.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/cyclone-sparks-evacuations/2006/01/09/1136771484417.html
San Francisco Chronicle
Americans saving less than nothing
Spending could outstrip income in 2005, which hasn't happened since the Depression
When the Commerce Department recently tallied up consumer finances for November, it found that Americans shelled out more money than they took in. It was the seventh such month of red ink during 2005.
Kevin Lansing, an economist with the Federal Reserve Bank in San Francisco, tracks the personal savings rate -- the Commerce Department's measure of how much consumers have left after spending is subtracted from income. In November the savings rate was a negative 0.2 percent.
Given how much red ink households racked up in the first 11 months of last year, Lansing said the nation's personal savings rate could well be negative for all of 2005.
That, he added, would be "the first such occurrence since the Great Depression."
The term "savings rate" may be a misnomer. Keith Leggett, senior economist with the American Bankers Association, described the measure as a tally of all the income that isn't spent.
"Savings is the absence of consumption,'' he said.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/01/08/BUG7IGJHEK1.DTL
Schwarzenegger receives stitches after LA traffic accident
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger received 15 stitches in his lip Sunday after a traffic accident near his Los Angeles home, his spokeswoman said.
Schwarzenegger was riding a Harley Davidson motorcycle with his son Patrick, 12, when another driver backed into the street shortly after 3 p.m., spokeswoman Margita Thompson said in a statement.
"The governor was unable to avoid the vehicle in his path and collided with it at a low speed," she said.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/01/08/state/n193905S35.DTL
SPY POWERS
Can the president eavesdrop on private citizens without a judge's ok? The high court said 'no' in 1972 Wiretaps: Ruling requires warrants for spying at home
Thirty-five years ago, President Richard Nixon claimed constitutional authority to wiretap Americans' phone calls to protect national security without asking a judge -- the same assertion that President Bush is making today in the name of fighting terrorism.
The Supreme Court ruled unanimously against Nixon, saying the Constitution granted the powers he was claiming to judges, not presidents. If the current court eventually reconsiders that 1972 ruling, it may affect the fate of Bush's decision to authorize the National Security Agency to wiretap calls between Americans and alleged al Qaeda suspects in foreign countries.
Presidents have approved wiretaps without court orders since the 1940s, but the legality of the practice was thrown into doubt after the Supreme Court ruled in 1967 that electronic eavesdropping was a search, and thus covered by the prohibition on unreasonable searches in the Constitution's Fourth Amendment.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/01/08/MNGHGGK8OC1.DTL
Belafonte Calls Bush 'Greatest Terrorist'
The American singer and activist Harry Belafonte called President Bush "the greatest terrorist in the world" on Sunday and said millions of Americans support the socialist revolution of Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez.
Belafonte led a delegation of Americans including the actor Danny Glover and the Princeton University scholar Cornel West that met the Venezuelan president for more than six hours late Saturday. Some in the group attended Chavez's television and radio broadcast Sunday.
"No matter what the greatest tyrant in the world, the greatest terrorist in the world, George W. Bush says, we're here to tell you: Not hundreds, not thousands, but millions of the American people ... support your revolution," Belafonte told Chavez during the broadcast.
The 78-year-old Belafonte, famous for his calypso-inspired music, including the "Day-O" song, was a close collaborator of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and is now a UNICEF goodwill ambassador. He also has been outspoken in criticizing the U.S. embargo of Cuba.
Chavez said he believes deeply in the struggle for justice by blacks, both in the U.S. and Venezuela.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/01/08/international/i175901S16.DTL
Mouse Thrown Into Fire Sets Home Ablaze
A mouse got its revenge against a homeowner who tried to dispose of it in a pile of burning leaves. The blazing creature ran back to the man's house and set it on fire.
Luciano Mares, 81, of Fort Sumner said he caught the mouse inside his house and wanted to get rid of it.
"I had some leaves burning outside, so I threw it in the fire, and the mouse was on fire and ran back at the house," Mares said from a motel room Saturday.
Village Fire Chief Juan Chavez said the burning mouse ran to just beneath a window, and the flames spread up from there and throughout the house.
No was hurt inside, but the home and everything in it was destroyed.
Unseasonably dry and windy conditions have charred more than 53,000 acres and destroyed 10 homes in southeastern New Mexico in recent weeks.
"I've seen numerous house fires," village Fire Department Capt. Jim Lyssy said, "but nothing as unique as this one."
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/01/08/national/a131941S22.DTL
Pope John Paul's Shooter to Be Released
The man who shot Pope John Paul II in 1981 will be released from prison this week after a court decided he had completed his sentence for the attack on the pontiff and other crimes — a ruling that took the Vatican by surprise.
Mehmet Ali Agca was extradited to Turkey in 2000 after serving almost 20 years in Italy for shooting and wounding the pope in St. Peter's Square in Rome. His motive for shooting John Paul in the abdomen on May 13, 1981, remains unclear.
Agca, 47, was to be released on parole Thursday, his lawyer, Mustafa Demirbag told The Associated Press by telephone.
"He was eligible to be released on parole because he had no disciplinary problems," Demirbag said.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/01/08/international/i193950S75.DTL
SAN FRANCISCO
Jack London's lens on 1906 quake
Author's photos, never seen by public, get centennial show
It is still magic after all these years: Slowly the black and white image comes to life in the darkroom tray at the headquarters of the California Historical Society in San Francisco. The picture is from another time, but it is sharp and clear -- it is of a huge domed building, all in ruins, as if it had been bombed.
It is the wreckage of San Francisco's City Hall, destroyed in an earthquake a century ago this spring. It is a remarkable picture, but the photographer was even more remarkable. He was Jack London.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/01/06/BAGN3GI4NU1.DTL
The DNC
Corny? Perhaps. But they are making sure they are delivering on a promise
Delivering The FOIA Requests
Posted by Tim Tagaris on January 5, 2006 at 02:57 PM
Shortly after the New York Times publicized the president's domestic-spying-without-a-warrant program, over 160,000 Americans signed a Freedom of Information Act Request along with Governor Dean in an attempt to determine just why President Bush believed he had the authority to undermine the Constitution. Earlier today Joe Sandler, DNC attorney, delivered each and every one of those FOIA requests to the Department of Justice. Here are some of the photos:
http://www.democrats.org/a/2006/01/delivering_the.php
The New Zealand Herald
Iran prepares to remove nuclear seals
09.01.06 1.00pm
By Daniel Howden
Iran was last night preparing to remove United Nations seals at several nuclear research and development sites, despite warnings from nuclear watchdog Mohamed El Baradei that the international community was running out of patience with Tehran.
It would be the second time in five months that Iran, which insists its nuclear programme is peaceful, removed seals put in place by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
"We will remove the seals and we have announced that we are ready to start research from tomorrow," Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said yesterday.
"It depends on the IAEA to announce its readiness as this will take place under the agency's supervision," he added.
However, Mr El Baradei, head of the IAEA, disputed Tehran's assertion that 90 per cent of issues related to the resumption of research had been solved.
"I am running out of patience, the international community is running out patience, the credibility of the verification process is at stake and I'd like come March, which is my next report, to be able to clarify these issues," he told Sky News.
"Everybody would like to see a regime by which the international community is assured that the Iranian programme is exclusively for peaceful purposes and there are still a number of issues we are looking at.
"There is also a consensus that enrichment in Iran right now is a matter of serious concern."
Uranium enrichment is the most sensitive part of the nuclear fuel cycle since it can be used to produce bomb-grade material as well as nuclear reactor fuel.
Iran has not publicly disclosed what activities it plans to resume on Monday.
Diplomats and analysts say atomic research and development could involve some laboratory tests of uranium enrichment and the assembly of enrichment centrifuges.
"R&D activities will be under the IAEA's supervision and there is nothing to be worried about," Asefi said.
IAEA officials say an Iranian team failed to show up for talks in Vienna last week to explain what activities Iran planned to resume.
Asked why the Iranian team flew back from Vienna without meeting the IAEA, Javad Vaeedi, deputy head of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, told state television on Saturday: "Holding any meeting has to be based on the attainment of an aim and a result. The cancellation of the meeting in fact took place in this light."
On Thursday a high-ranking Iranian delegation rebuffed El Baradei, reneging on a pledge to provide full details of its plans by not showing up for a scheduled meeting with him.
Russian officials in Iran, meanwhile, continued talks about Moscow's proposal that the two countries conduct uranium enrichment, a process that can produce nuclear fuel for reactors or atomic weapons depending on the degree of enrichment, on Russian territory.
The Russian proposal, backed by the European Union and the United States, was designed ease concerns that Iran would use the fuel to build a bomb.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10362937
UN peacekeepers chief in Haiti found dead
09.01.06 1.00pm
By Phil Davison
The Brazilian general in charge of United Nations peacekeepers in Haiti has been found dead on the balcony of his hotel suite with a bullet through his head.
He was found wearing only underpants and a white vest with his pistol still in his hand.
The general had been alone in his suite and suicide is presumed, according to UN officials and Haitian police.
But in the land of voodoo spells and zombies, and more recently violent political and gang killings, the death of General Urano Texeira da Matta Bacellar, 58, has rattled the international community.
He was described by colleagues as an extremely religious, happily-married man with two children he adored, and a soldier used, in 39 years of service, to pressure far worse than he had seen in his four months in Haiti.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10362928
US House Republicans face leadership battle
09.01.06 1.00pm
WASHINGTON - With US Rep. Tom Delay having bowed out as House of Representatives majority leader under an ethical cloud, a contest quickly emerged among Republicans to replace him in the key post.
Republican Rep. John Boehner of Ohio announced his candidacy for the job, now held on an acting basis by Roy Blunt of Missouri, who has been busy lining up support of his own.
"We must come together and renew our commitment to creating a better America based on freedom, opportunity, fiscal and personal responsibility, empowered citizens, and restored trust," Boehner, 56, said in a statement announcing his candidacy.
While Blunt, 55, has not made a formal announcement, an aide said he began reaching out to fellow Republicans for support on Saturday after DeLay announced his decision not to try to get the leadership job back.
The aide, Jessica Boulanger, said: "He (Blunt) hopes to have the votes" by the time the election is held.
"He is encouraged by the support he has seen so far," she said. "He started making phone calls yesterday after a private discussion with Tom DeLay."
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10362942
Powerful quake rattles Greece
09.01.06 8.20am
ATHENS - A strong earthquake shook Greece and most of the eastern Mediterranean early today NZT but caused only minor damages and no casualties.
The quake off the southeastern tip of Greece's Peloponnese peninsula measured 6.9 on the open-ended Richter scale, with its epicentre at a depth of 70 km near the island of Kithira, the Athens Geodynamic Institute said.
"We were extremely lucky this was an underwater quake," institute chief Giorgos Stavrakakis told reporters. "If it had happened on land it would be a mess."
Police said there were no reports of casualties after the tremor, which drove people out of their homes in cities across most of the country.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10362908
The Big Chill in Delhi
09.01.06 6.20am
Millions of people in the Indian capital woke up to the coldest weather in 70 years, as the death toll from northern India's cold spell rose to 116. The temperature dipped to 0.2C in New Delhi, the lowest recorded in the past 70 years and seven degrees below normal, the Meteorology Department said. The previous lowest temperature was minus 0.6C in 1935.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10362909
New toxic spill in China
09.01.06 9.20am
China's third major toxic spill in as many months has threatened the water supplies to millions of residents of two central cities.
A clean-up accident last Wednesday allowed the industrial chemical cadmium, which can cause neurological disorders and cancer, to flood out of a smelter and into the Xiangjiang River in Hunan province.
The river supplies tap water to Changsha, which has about six million people, and Xiangtan city, with 700,000 inhabitants.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10362910
Human bird flu cases reach Turkish capital
09.01.06 1.00pm
ANKARA - Three Turks tested positive for a deadly strain of bird flu in the capital Ankara on Sunday, a new stage in the westward sweep of the disease from its east Asian origins towards major economic centres in Turkey and Europe.
The first case of the virus jumping from birds to humans outside China and southeast Asia occurred last week in rural eastern Turkey, where three children from the same family died after contracting the highly potent H5N1 strain.
As doctors confirmed that two children and a 60-year-old man were being treated in Ankara for the virus, Russia raised fears of the disease impacting Turkey's economy by warning its citizens against visiting the popular holiday destination.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10362943
Boffin sees future space travel as domain of 'adventurers'
09.01.06 1.00pm
By Steve Connor
He is Britain's top scientist.
The new president of the Royal Society is also Astronomer Royal, master of Trinity College, Cambridge and renowned cosmologist whose deep thoughts frequently turn to deep space, dark matter and the dawn of creation.
Lord Rees of Ludlow, known to the many readers of his science books as Martin Rees, is also something of a thought-provoking populariser.
He believes that a butterfly poses more daunting scientific problems than a star and that the search for extraterrestrial intelligence is well worth the effort.
He has advocated the exploration of space by a new generation of adventurers willing to take risks by travelling cheap, and is against the kind of costly manned exploration funded by risk-averse governments.
He favours fleets of miniature robotic probes to explore the planets rather than a manned mission to Mars and thinks the multibillion-dollar International Space Station is a "turkey in the sky".
Lord Rees the cosmologist has proposed our universe may be just one of zillions, each with its own set of physical laws, and that the universe we find ourselves living in may, in fact, be a mere computer simulation built by a race of super-intelligent beings.
He believes there is a 50 per cent chance that human civilisation may not survive in its present form by the end of the 21st century, and has warned that a major environmental collapse within the next hundred years carries the same sort of probability as tossing a coin.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&ObjectID=10362938
continued ...
The temperature in Antarctica (Crystal Wind Chime. The two locations so rarely have the same chime.) is:
Scott Base
Clear
2.0°
Updated Monday 09 Jan 3:59PM
The temperature at Glacier Bay National Park (Crystal Wind Chime) is:
37 °F / 3 °C
Overcast
Windchill:
31 °F / -1 °C
Humidity:
75%
Dew Point:
30 °F / -1 °C
Wind:
9 mph / 15 km/h from the NW
Pressure:
29.14 in / 987 hPa
Visibility:
10.0 miles / 16.1 kilometers
UV:
0 out of 16
Clouds:
Overcast 4800 ft / 1463 m
(Above Ground Level)
end
Scott Base
Clear
2.0°
Updated Monday 09 Jan 3:59PM
The temperature at Glacier Bay National Park (Crystal Wind Chime) is:
37 °F / 3 °C
Overcast
Windchill:
31 °F / -1 °C
Humidity:
75%
Dew Point:
30 °F / -1 °C
Wind:
9 mph / 15 km/h from the NW
Pressure:
29.14 in / 987 hPa
Visibility:
10.0 miles / 16.1 kilometers
UV:
0 out of 16
Clouds:
Overcast 4800 ft / 1463 m
(Above Ground Level)
end
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