The statement today by Burr is more than inappropriate. What is he thinking?

I suppose private gun ownership is legal in the USA for private wishes of assassination? Really?

That is a very irresponsible statement.

October 31, 2016
Sen. Richard Burr (click here) privately suggested gun owners should put a “bullseye” on Hillary Clinton, according to audio obtained by CNN from the Republican’s get-out-the-vote event over the weekend. Burr, who is currently facing a tough re-election race in North Carolina, remarked that during a recent visit to a gun shop, “nothing made me feel better” than seeing a gun-related magazine with a photograph of Clinton on its cover. “I was a little bit shocked at that—it didn’t have a bullseye on it," he said, prompting audible laughter from the Mooresville, N.C., crowd made up of Republican volunteers. “But on the bottom right [of the magazine], it had everybody for federal office in this particular state that they should vote for. So let me assure you, there’s an army of support out there right now for our candidates.” Burr later apologized, telling CNN in a statement: “The comment I made was inappropriate, and I apologize for it.”

Huma Abedin states she is unaware of emails on her former spouse laptop.

I think what will come out of this is the power of computers.

I don't doubt Ms. Abedin at all. She has proven to be a great person, a great American and more than willing to cooperate with investigation.

I believe what will come out of the email investigation is the ability of computers to pull delicate information to other computers without the knowledge of the authors/owners.

We are all familiar with the ability of our own computers to draw in all the entries of a conversation, whether they are meant to be viewed or not. Certainly, my computer is not the only one that does that with Windows 8 and Windows 10.

If that is the case, then the capacity of computer software needs to be examined for such characteristics. That should not occur and is definitely an invasion of a person's privacy. If the Weiner emails prove this capacity to be true it enhances the ability of foreign governments to enter supposedly private computers. I would expect such a capacity from Russia of it's own people.

Hopefully, Michel Aoun will be a peace maker in Lebanon.

October 31, 2016

By Bassem Mroue

Beirut — Lebanon’s parliament on Monday (click here) elected Michel Aoun, an 81-year-old former army commander and strong ally of the militant group Hezbollah, as the country’s president, ending a more than two-year vacuum in the top post and a political crisis that brought state institutions perilously close to collapse.

Aoun secured a simple majority of votes in the house after a chaotic session that saw several rounds of voting because extra ballots appeared in the ballot box each time. He garnered 83 votes out of 127 lawmakers present at the session.

He also failed to get elected by a two thirds majority in the first round, as had been widely expected.

Members of parliament broke out in thunderous applause after Aoun finally was declared president by Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri. His supporters across the country erupted in cheers as they watched the proceedings on huge screens set up in the streets. Brief celebratory gunfire could also be heard in the capital....

October 15th was the last day for extensions to be filed with the IRS. The 2016 tax return for Trump can't possibly under audit.

Q: Is it true that he has no investments in Russia?

A. We don’t really know. (click here) Trump has not released the financial documents that would shed light on the issue, particularly his tax returns. Breaking a tradition dating to Richard Nixon, he says he won’t make those documents public because he is being audited by the IRS.

In honor of International Women’s Day, (click here) Russian news service Russia Beyond the Headlines (RBTH) has anointed the 12 most beautiful women in Russia. The list includes supermodel Natalia Vodianova(above), Roman Abramovich‘s gorgeous girlfriend Dasha Zhukova and tennis star Maria Sharapova (below) as well as sexy spy Anna Chapman, who was kicked out of the U.S. last summer following espionage charges. Here’s the full rundown of RBTH’s Russian beauties; it’s unclear whether they’re ranked in order of pulchritude, but if so Anna Chapman clocks in high at #3, Vodianova is #4, Sharapova is #5 and Zhukova....

April 25, 2014
By Mark Snowiss
Washington - Anyone familiar with the New York or Miami real estate markets (click here) knows the buying power of Russia’s moneyed class – from the super-rich to the merely well-off.
But two alarming trends in the Russian Federation – the steady build-up of jingoistic rhetoric from President Vladimir Putin and a sharp downturn in the economy – are significantly altering the investment decisions of Russia’s wary elite.
And with tensions over Ukraine on the rise, Russian investors are changing their strategies within the American market. That's according to U.S.-based real estate agents and lawyers who cater to clients from the former Soviet Union.
“The high times are over,” said Edward Mermelstein, a New York lawyer who represents foreign investors in the U.S., including many Russians....
In 2011, a trust linked to the eldest daughter of potash fertilizer magnate Dmitry Rybolovlev paid $88 million for a four-bedroom penthouse at 15 Central Park West – the most expensive New York City apartment purchase ever....

August 16, 2016
By Matthew Bodner

In 2012, a United States court sentenced Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout to 25 years in prison. The Russian government wants him back. 

...Precisely why Russia (click here) might think the U.S. would trade Bout and Yaroshenko for a dozen unidentified Americans and Klotsman is, at first glance, hard to understand. That is before you look deeper into Klotsman's background. There, you see a rich history of fraud and shady business dealings, much of it with another Russian-American businessman, Felix Sater.

When Sater was eight years old, his family emigrated to Brighton Beach, a popular neighborhood for Soviet expats in New York. His father is said to have Russian mafia connections, according to Dawisha. Sater himself has well-publicized links to real estate developer and presidential candidate Donald Trump. His business cards identify him as a senior advisor to Trump....

Russian sanctions get a little rough on the Trump organization.

November 12, 2013
By the Moscow Times

U.S. tycoon Donald Trump, (click here) while in Moscow for the finale of his Miss Universe pageant Saturday, announced that he was planning to build a skyscraper in the Russian capital.
"I have plans to start business in Russia," Trump said, Itar-Tass reported, "I am currently in talks with several Russian companies to build a skyscraper on the model of Trump Tower in New York." The businessman did not name his partners or the size of the investment.
Trump Tower, located on 5th Avenue, is 58 stories high and contains offices, apartments and a hotel.
Araz Agalarov, the billionaire owner of Crocus City Hall, the Miss Universe venue, said his company had "started talking about joint work in the field of real estate a few days ago" with Trump.

Ukraine's "Party of Regions" is mostly dissolved in Ukraine since the change in government, but, it was the party of Viktor Yanukovych. If a former ally, such as Donald Trump, reaches the USA presidency, the outcomes of Ukraine are in doubt.

August 19, 2016
U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump’s campaign (click here) chairman Paul Manafort has resigned amid allegations he illegally lobbied for Ukraine’s former pro-Russian government.
Ukrainian journalist and politician Serhiy Leshchenko reported Friday that he had uncovered ledgers which reveal Ukraine’s Party of Regions made undisclosed payments to Manafort.
The cash payments, made between 2007 and 2012, were worth $12.7 million, The New York Times reported.
Manafort, who has previously offered consulting services to ousted former president Viktor Yanukovych, is accused of having secretly lobbied in Washington for Yanukovych’s pro-Russian ruling party alongside his deputy Rick Gates....

Removing any Russian financial sanctions will directly benefit the Trump Organization. Changes in USA relationship with Russia and NATO can be made at the Cabinet level.

Q: What about investments from Russia in Trump’s businesses?

A. There is strong evidence that Trump’s businesses have received significant funding from Russian investors. Most notably, Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr. made that very claim at a real estate conference in New York in 2008, saying “Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets.” Donald Trump Jr. added, “we see a lot of money pouring in from Russia.”...

The emails cannot be revealed if there are laws that were broken.

The Weiner emails are now evidence.

October 30, 2016
By Pete Williams and Tim Stelloh

...The revelation (click here) ignited fierce criticism. Citing the longstanding practice of avoiding even the appearance of acting in a manner that could tip the political scales, former Justice Department spokesman Matt Miller said that "most people, when they hear that the FBI is involved, automatically assume the negative."

Clinton called the move an "unprecedented" departure from FBI policy, and on Sunday, Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid scolded Comey for potentially breaking the law....

...Reid also accused Comey of shielding Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump from scrutiny over his connections to Russia, saying "it has become clear that you possess explosive information about close ties and coordination" between Trump and his advisers and the Russian government....

What I don't understand is why hasn't the FBI also started an investigation into legal cases regarding pedophilia with Trump and a 13 year old? Are there no statues of limitations that are federal? If that is the case then there needs to be an investigation started to determine the statue of limitations through court test.

I am not making this stuff up, there are women stating they were minors when Donald Trump visited their dressing room and otherwise. The visits to women's dressing rooms is nothing short of voyeurism.

23 March 2013
By Marcia A. Hamilton

...Legions of victims of child sex abuse (click here) will tell you that when they were finally ready to talk to a prosecutor or a lawyer, the criminal and/or civil statutes of limitations (SOLs) had already expired.  Across the United States, one victim after another has been surprised by these cruel and arbitrary legal deadlines.

For decades, states have been adjusting their child sex abuse SOLs in response to fresh stories of horror.  At one time, states measured the SOL from the date of the abuse, giving victims only a few years in which to sue.  Then, they set age 18 as the moment when the clock started ticking.  Now, we have a true 50-state experiment, with a wide variety of approaches among the states....

I have to state this? It is a fact that Donald Trump not only visited dressing rooms of beauty queens, the women were told by employees to the pageants to fawn over him.

Like.

What? This is a man that is candidate for President? I don't think so.

What is truly interesting is that the Democrats are the victims of these FBI investigations with impunity to the Republicans. The Republicans standard operating procedure are lies, as exhibited by Gowdy, and they are left alone to continue to deceive the people while pandering to big money of Wall Street. Why is that accepted in the USA?

Gowdy is a moron. The Hatch Act only applies to FEDERAL EMPLOYEES .

The Hatch Act, (click here) a federal law passed in 1939, limits certain political activities of federal employees, as well as some state, D.C., and local government employees who work in connection with federally funded programs. ​The law’s purposes are to ensure that federal programs are administered in a nonpartisan fashion, to protect federal employees from political coercion in the workplace, and to ensure that federal employees are advanced based on merit and not based on political affiliation.​​​​ ​​

His accusations of President Obama and Senator Reid is typical of his lies and deceptions to the American people. He attacks Democrats with these tactics all the time. Gowdy is another example of the lack of professionalism of the Republican Party. They deceive first and apologize later.

Elected officials are NOT federal employees. 

The lives of elected officials obviously over lap their private lives as in the case with President Bill Clinton and Attorney General Lynch. President Obama has an obligation to campaign for his political party as well as do fund raising. That is also the case with President Bill Clinton. 

Gowdy is an idiot who actually believes the American people are stupid enough to believe a word he says. It speaks eons to the fact the UNDER EDUCATED and QUESTIONABLY HEALTH WHITE MEN of the 4th district of South Carolina actually do believe what he says. These statements by Gowdy regarding the Hatch Act are lies and nothing short of it, unless, he actually wants to admit he had no clue about the fact the law applies to federal employees only. 

Lies. That is his skill (stock) and trade. A lawyer? He needs to be hauled before the South Carolina attorney ethics committee for sanctions.

Morning Papers

The Rooster 

"Okeydoke"

October 29, 2016
By Autumn Crouse

On the north side of Topton (click here) some residents have not been as quick as others to welcome a new neighbor in town, a neighbor that just so happens to be an all white rooster.

Onlookers chuckled as they walked along the sidewalk.

“Is that a rooster?” a woman laughed as the rooster let out a heavy crow.

Meanwhile another woman passed by shaking her head explaining that a family member, who works the night shift, is frequently awakened by the noisy crows during the early morning hours.

In the Borough of Topton there is a local ordinance permitting no livestock in the borough and borough officials state that they have been working diligently to find a resolution to the issue....

"Good Night, Moon"

New Moon

0.3 day old Moon

0.1  percent lit

Witches will fly on their brooms and no one will see them. Wolves will not howl at the moon on Halloween. "Trick or Treaters" will have to use flash lights. Yes, indeed, Halloween of 2016 will be remembered as the darkest one of all time.

October 28, 2016
By Victoria Jaggard

Find out (click here) what a black moon is, where it will appear, and why this year’s dark orb is a celestial oddity.

Darkness will reign on the spookiest night of the year, with the arrival of a “black moon” on Halloween.

Although it’s not a term used by astronomers, black moon has become the popular moniker for the second new moon to fall in a calendar month. It’s the opposite of a blue moon, which is often defined as the second full moon in a month.

For parts of East Asia, Australia, and New Zealand, the new moon occurs on October 31 at 4:38 a.m. local time (5:38 p.m. UTC on October 30). This region already saw an October new moon on the first of the month, making the Halloween event a black moon....

This is a map of the deposits of elements along the Great Lakes. This is not secret information. The mining has occurred for a long time. This is the extent the inland lakes have contributed to the USA's economy.

Calcite and dolomite, (click here) when heated and in some cases slurried or combined with salt, are used in making many everyday products such as paper, glass, paint and varnish, soap and detergents, textiles, refractories, baking powder, and pharmaceuticals, including milk of magnesia and bicarbonate of soda. Finely ground, they are used to control coal mine dust, to collect sulfur dioxide from power plant exhaust, to sweeten soils, and as ingredients in fertilizer and stock feeds, to name a few. Limestone is used extensively in Michigan to refine beet sugar.  When burned in a kiln to drive off gases, calcite and dolomite form burnt lime. Among the uses for burnt lime, in addition to steel making, are water and sewage treatment, acid waste neutralization, and road base stabilization. Crushed calcite and dolomite are used in concrete, road construction, building materials, and as a filler in asphalt....

It is amazing to me how many uses there are for porous rock. Calcium carbonate is organic. It is very organic. Right? I talked about it's highly ionic and reactive properties in the first few entries. Right? Albert Einstein's desk and the quality of education in the USA.

It is no surprise that I am not a fan of mining. I think mining is very mismanaged. Rather than securing the mining for safety, mines are not secured because it cuts into profits. 

This is the year 2016. As a society and world we are well into the 21st century. It is time to realize we need all the water we can find and lower pollution impacts as much as we can. The innovation of the current generations are incredible. This is one more area where critical thinking can bring about streamlined and efficient operations in areas that are benevolent to life on Earth. 

Mining and producing cement consumers enormous amounts of energy in the way of heat energy. There have to be better answers to all these operations to conserve energy, maintain water quality and minimize abuse of the environment. 

CO2 in the abundance that exists today effects Earth's oceans. The scientific community calls it acidification, but, in actuality it is less alkaline. The normal pH of the oceans is 8.2 with some variations in micro-environments within the marine environment. The CO2 turns into carbonic acid and pulls the pH toward the neutral 7.0 and then if it continues it will move into the acidic side of the pH scale.

The calcium in the oceans is vital for fish, especially shellfish. Calcium is what is used to form their shells, of which they need to survive. The oceans have had a pH of 8.2 for eons. There was never a time on Earth when the oceans were acidic. This change in pH of the oceans is anthropocentric. There is no natural process that changes the pH of the oceans. I mentioned some micro-environments are slightly different, up to 0.3 pH, but, that is due to such things as local dissolving rock, etc. The issue of ocean acidification is completely man made.

I have no more patience for the idea the human path forward can continue as if what nature is telling us is a lie. The sincere problem is Earth has been warning human beings for over a century now. Leaders during the Industrial Revolution, such as Henry Ford, fore told this scenario, hence his work with the electric car. There is no reason for leaders in this world to look the other way while abusive cultures are indifferent to the problems they are causing with other peoples. 

Insensitivity is rampant in the right wing culture in the USA, including the fact tornadoes are no longer singular and in the mid range of the Fujita Scale. The tornado outbreaks in the USA are killing people. In 2016 there is a total of 12 deaths to date.

2016 Fatalities by Circumstance: (click here)
In Home:3 In Manufactured Home:7 Outside:0 In Building:0 In Vehicle:2 Unknown:0

No back sliding. The future of our children and their children is precious. The current generations need to do the hard work and insure an economy with a livable Earth. Now there is an idea. An economy based in returning the balance of Earth's troposphere. Yep. There is a definite economy in all of that. There is a panel of scientists just waiting to advise the generations on the way forward. I heard the scientists on that panel came from some of the best universities in the world. The panel's title is the much maligned IPCC; the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. It's a pretty cool name. "Intergovernmental." Yep, it sounds like the smart folks in the world. Who in this world would ever come up with such a homogeneous and communal name as that. "Intergovernmental." Yep. That's the smart folks. They are very trust worthy, too. "Believe me."

This was a paleontological dig site in Florida.

This is an academic dig site. Imagine this as a commercial site. It would be a complete disaster.

Uploaded on Dec 7, 2006

Dredging goes on at a limestone quarry that is also the location of the Haile 7G paleontological dig site. The dig site is the location of the Florida Museum of Natural History's "Tapir Challenge," which I joined as a volunteer on December 6, 2006. More about the "Tapir Challenge" is at:

http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/vertpaleo/20...

Photos from my day there are at:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/30268343...

(Close up the space before "6372" -- I can't seem to do it here.)
The water shown in this video is part of the Florida aquifer.

Moist climate dictates karst topography, especially, with limestone as the basement rock.

Limestone mining can pollute water and create sinkholes. When limestone dissolves while it's still in the ground, caves and gullies form, a natural phenomenon known as karst (click here). Although this doesn't hurt the environment in its natural form, once the limestone is mined out, sinkholes can form and disrupt underground waterways. This changes the natural water table. The actual mining process also changes existing waterways, adding additional water to streams and other bodies of water that not only floods the surrounding area, but adds pollutants to it as well. At the same time, it draws water from other features such as lakes and ponds.

Limestone can be damaged by the environment through weather and water erosion. The stone absorbs water that can cause it to deteriorate over time. If the water has a high acidity content, the damage is more immediate. Wind can wear away stone detailing. Limestone is also prone to discoloration by exposure to oil, dyes or even organic material, such as bird droppings or decomposing plant matter. It can even get rust stains if exposed to oxidizing iron.

Contractors drained the swamps and built retirement communities. What were they thinking? The government states, "...sink hole deaths are rare." SO! Therefore, what?

August 19, 2015
By Jason Silverstein

The hell hole has come back. (click here)
A sinkhole in Florida that fatally swallowed a man two years ago has now reopened, police said Wednesday morning.
The second-time sinkhole in Seffner is 17 feet wide and 20 feet deep, Hillsborough County Fire Rescue spokesman Ronnie Rivera told the Daily News. It has not swallowed anything or anyone, he said.
“We’re not expecting it to get bigger,” Rivera said. “It has not spread. It just opened again.”...

The community and their supporters are correct. Mining limestone in Florida is a horrible idea.

October 27, 2016

By Cecilia Fox

Miami  County — Citing opposition to the proposed operation, (click here) Piqua Materials withdrew their application to develop a surface mine in Washington Township.

The company withdrew its application on Wednesday.

“While confident that Piqua Materials would win on the legal merits of its application, those opposed to this move have raised a number of issues which need to be addressed. Accordingly, the better course of action is for Piqua Materials to take a step back to further engage the community on its proposed move,” Piqua Materials President Dennis Garrison said....

...The conditional use permit application was filed with the Miami County Planning and Zoning Department in late September. The application sought approval to develop a 93-acre site in Washington Township for the extraction, processing, and sale of limestone products....

Florida is a karst topography. What does karst mean? Karst topography is underlain by limestone that has been eroded by dissolution, producing ridges, towers, fissures, sinkholes, and other characteristic landforms.

It is insane to put an open pit mine in Florida. 

My favorite limestone deposit in the USA is Bryce Canyon. It is a national park and it is breathtaking.

Grand Canyon (A), Chocolate Cliffs (B), Vermilion Cliffs (C), White Cliffs (D), Zion Canyon (E), Gray Cliffs (F), Pink Cliffs (G), Bryce Canyon (H)

It is called stratigraphy and is the most fascinating way to study the time scale of Earth. Statigraphy is the branch of geology concerned with the order and relative position of strata and their relationship to the geological time scale.

Yes, a geological times scale. What this cross section of USA's statigraphy shows is the rise and fall of Earth's oceans. For every layer of rock in this cross section there is a time period when Earth's ocean rose above the land and deposited rock that would become this vast and beautiful vista of color and composition. 

Sea Level Variations over Geologic Time 
By M. A. Kominz
2001

...Long-term Sea Level Change Estimates (click here) are also made from sedimentary strata deposited on the continents. This is actually an excellent place to obtain observations of sea level change not only because past sea level has been much higher than it is now, but also because in many places the continents have subsequently uplifted. That is, in the past they were below sea level, but now they are well above it. For example, studies of 500}400 million year old sedimentary rocks which are now uplifted in the Rocky Mountains and the Appalachian Mountains indicate that there was a rise and fall of sea level with an estimated magnitude of 200}400m. This example also exempliRes the main problem with using the continental sedimentary record to estimate sea level change. The continents are not Rxed and move vertically in response to tectonic driving forces. Thus, any indicator of sea level change on the continents is an indicator of relative sea level change. Obtaining a global signature from these observations remains extremely problematic. Additionally, the continental sedimentary record contains long periods of nondeposition, which results in a spotty record of Earth history. Nonetheless a great deal of information about sea level change has been obtained and is summarized here....

The Grand Canyon has the oldest EXPOSED rock in the USA.

The Grand Age of Rocks: The Numeric Ages for Rocks Exposed within Grand Canyon (click here)

Grand Canyon National Park [see Photo 1] is one of the best places in the world to gain a sense of geologic, or “deep,” time because the canyon exposes a great swath of geologic history. Rocks exposed in Grand Canyon are truly ancient, ranging from 1840 million years old (m.y.), or 1.84 billion years old (b.y.), to 270 m.y. The Grand Canyon landscape is geologically young, being carved within just the last 6 m.y. There are younger geologic deposits in Grand Canyon too, such as the Ice Age fossils found in caves, a 1000-year-old lava flow in the western canyon, and even the debris flow deposits that continue form each year....

Bryce Canyon National Park (click here) 

Some products that use limestone are not that obvious.

Adding Nutrients (click here) High quality limestone, such as found in California, is a source of calcium in foods and vitamins. Foods where limestone adds calcium include breads, granola bars, cereal, infant formula, pasta, pet food, tofu, yogurt, graham crackers, baking mixes, waffles...the uses grow daily. It also has many uses in making antacids and medicine tablets.

October 30, 2016
By Brian Thompson

No rain is in sight (click here) for most of the Southeast through the opening days of November, thanks to a persistent warm and dry pattern.

The ongoing stretch of warmth and dryness in the region will spell bad news for the worsening drought.

Cities such as Pensacola, Florida, as well as Birmingham and Mobile, Alabama, are likely to end up with no measurable precipitation during the month of October.

The dry weather has been accompanied by record-breaking warmth, which will continue for much of this week.

Atlanta will likely set a new record for the warmest September through the October period, on the heels of the city's second warmest summer....







The Southeast

 On this week’s map, (click here) most of the region saw deterioration in conditions as the dry pattern persisted. Georgia Climate Division CD 1 (Northwest), CD 3 (Northeast), and Alabama CD 2 (Northeast) all recorded their driest 60-day periods on record. Streamflow conditions continued to drop across much of the region, and drought-related impacts are being observed in the agricultural sector. Dry conditions have led to delays in the planting of winter wheat in Alabama. According to the USDA National Agricultural Statistical Service, topsoil moisture conditions (percentage rated short to very short) were as follows: Alabama - 78%, Georgia -73%, and Mississippi - 72%. On the map, areas of Moderate Drought (D1), Severe Drought (D2), Extreme Drought (D3), and Exceptional Drought (D4) expanded in both Alabama and Georgia while western portions of South Carolina saw expansion of areas of Moderate Drought (D1), Severe Drought (D2), and Extreme Drought (D3). In Upstate South Carolina, crop losses (hay) are being reported by the USDA Farm Service Agency. Overall, the region was dry, and average temperatures were one-to-eight degrees above normal with the exception of southern Georgia and Florida where temperatures were slightly below normal.

Limestone regardless of their inland location is formed by ocean waters.

Most limestones form in shallow, calm, warm marine waters. That type of environment is where organisms capable of forming calcium carbonate shells and skeletons can easily extract the needed ingredients from ocean water. When these animals die, their shell and skeletal debris accumulate as a sediment that might be lithified into limestone. Their waste products can also contribute to the sediment mass. Limestones formed from this type of sediment are biological sedimentary rocks. Their biological origin is often revealed in the rock by the presence of fossils.

One of the most famous formations of limestone are the White Cliffs of Dover in Great Britain. The rock is of very fine stone that is chalk, but, it is limestone. This is largest collapse of the cliffs known. 

Collapse: (click here) Thousands of tons of chalk fell from the white cliffs of Dover in an area known as Crab Bay. Here a woman surveys the damage

It is the warming world with David Letterman.

October 30, 2016
By Verne Gay

WHAT IT’S ABOUT (click here)

Last winter, David Letterman and a production crew went to the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh — population 204 million — to produce a story on India’s growing reliance on coal and attempts to also expand renewable energy. He interviews, among others, the prime minister of India, Narendra Modi, who says that India needs international assistance if his renewable energy mandate is to be achieved. Meanwhile, Letterman learns of a plan to bring electricity to 300 million Indians currently without power. In this second-season premiere of NatGeo’s series on climate change, Cecily Strong of “Saturday Night Live” also reports on solar energy in Nevada....

Simple principles of chemistry is the elemental beginning of understanding quantum mechanics.

Quantam mechanics is real. It is set in stone. The United States of America cannot exist without it's brain trust understanding quantum mechanics. One very important area of science that benefits from an understanding of quantum mechanics is medicine and the pharmaceutical industry.

If Americans want their country to maintain any degree of competition in the world the study of science is paramount to that end.

This picture is Albert Einstein's desk the day of his death. There is no retirement to the ordered mind. Social Security, yes, but retirement, no. Of all the shelves on that wall I like the fifth from the top on the right side. It is where he kept his subscription to a peer reviewed journal. There was no doubt in his mind it was important to keep them in an arranged order that was easy to find.

Every student should be so engaged in their studies. Football may make money for a university, but, its students should be its priority. Emotional and sexual trauma doesn't fall into those priorities.

Quantum mechanics, science
dealing with the behaviour of matter and light on the atomic and 
subatomic scale. It attempts to describe and account for the properties of molecules and atoms and their constituents—electrons, protons, neutrons, and other more esoteric particles such as quarks and gluons. These properties include the interactions of the particles with one another and with electromagnetic radiation (i.e., light, X-rays, and gamma rays).

Three revolutionary principles (click here)

Quantum mechanics (QM) developed over many decades, beginning as a set of controversial mathematical explanations of experiments that the math of classical mechanics could not explain. It began at the turn of the 20th century, around the same time that Albert Einstein published his theory of relativity, a separate mathematical revolution in physics that describes the motion of things at high speeds. Unlike relativity, however, the origins of QM cannot be attributed to any one scientist. Rather, multiple scientists contributed to a foundation of three revolutionary principles that gradually gained acceptance and experimental verification between 1900 and 1930. They are quantized properties, particles of light and waves of matter.

The forms of calcium carbonate, aka limestone.

Calcium carbonate (CaCO3) 

The compound CaC03 is the reaction between the element calcium which has a naturally occurring 2+ charge on the atom and the compound carbonate. Carbonate has a carbon atom with four electrons in it's second shell and three oxygens each with six electrons in it's second shell. 

With only four electrons in carbon's second shell there is room for four more. With six electrons in oxygen's second shell it has room for two more. The second shell of any element can take a maximum of eight electrons. The carbon atom always seeks to fill up it's second shell of electrons, that is why it is a strong organic atom. In this case it accepts an orbiting electron from oxygen and in turn oxygen gets one orbiting electron from carbon. In the case of carbonate there are three oxygens sharing electrons with carbon and there is one electron provided by carbon that is shared with the three oxygens in oscillation. 

Each oxygen started with two missing electrons in it's second shell. Carbon accepted three oxygens into it's second shell providing a total of seven electrons in carbon. That leaves one electron on carbon and one each on oxygens without permanent bonds. Since carbon oscillates it's one electron space with each of the three oxygens that leave two of the oxygens with open space on it's second shell at all times. Electrons are negative, hence, the negative 2 charge on the carbonate ion. 

The carbonate ion then bonds easily with it's two open spaces on the oxygens with calcium with 2 electrons in it's outer shell, 4s.

Aragonite is also Ca(CO3) as a percipitated crystal. Aragonite is not found anywhere on Earth as a rock. it is a process of biological organisms or as physical chemistry such as precipitation.

Aragonite is quite beautiful.