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World-class radio telescopes face closure
00:46 04 November 2006
NewScientist.com news service
Jeff Hecht
The 305-metre Arecibo dish is the world's most sensitive radio telescope (Image: NAIC/Arecibo Obs/NSF)
The VLBA is a network of 10 radio dishes that stretches from Hawaii to the Virgin Islands. It provides the highest resolution views of the universe at radio wavelengths (Illustration: NRAO/AUI)
Two of the world's best-known radio observatories – the 305-metre Arecibo dish in Puerto Rico and a widespread collection of telescopes called the Very Long Baseline Array – face the budgetary axe.
Despite rising budgets, the astronomy division of the US National Science Foundation realised it could not afford to continue operating all its existing instruments while also building the new cutting-edge telescopes requested by astronomers, division director Wayne Van Citters said at a press conference on Friday.
So the agency commissioned a committee of leading astronomers headed by Roger Blandford of California's Stanford Linear Accelerator Center to slash $30 million from its annual operations budget, amounting to about a quarter of the budget now spent on facilities. Their proposals cut across all of astronomy, and Blandford told the press conference "they were all extremely painful". But those in radio astronomy are likely to be the most controversial.
The panel told the NSF it should shut down Arecibo and the VLBA by 2011 if it cannot get other organisations to share their operating budgets of about $8 million and $10 million, respectively.
"We're quite disappointed in that recommendation," says Joe Burns, a professor at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, US, who helps manage Arecibo. He says astronomers ask for four times more observing time than Arecibo can offer, making it the most oversubscribed telescope supported by the NSF.
Unique capabilities
Built in the 1960s and upgraded in the 1970s and in 1997, Arecibo is the world's most sensitive radio telescope. The giant antenna is fixed in place, but the Earth's rotation on its axis and movement of a receiver suspended above the reflective dish allow it to scan about 40% of the sky over the course of a year.
It is famed for discoveries including the first binary pulsar. It also offers unique capabilities for radar observations of near-Earth asteroids, which Van Citters said could not be done elsewhere because of Arecibo's sensitivity.
But funding for its operation has been a political football – a few years ago NASA pushed the NSF into paying about $500,000 a year for the asteroid radar observations requested by Congress (see NASA budget fiasco reaches new depths).
Finding outside support for the telescope is expected to be difficult. But because Arecibo does research on the Earth's ionosphere, Burns hopes to garner support from the NSF's atmospheric sciences division.
The VLBA is a network of 10 radio dishes, each 25 metres wide. Stretching more than 8000 kilometres from Hawaii to the Virgin Islands in the Caribbean, it offers unmatched resolution at radio wavelengths.
First operated in 1993, it is famed for discoveries of cosmic jets and studies of bright galaxies powered by colossal black holes. Fred Lo, director of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO), which manages the VLBA, said in a written statement that the NRAO would "aggressively pursue international assistance" to save the telescopes. The statement also quoted the new report's observation that "if the VLBA is closed, a unique capability would likely be lost for decades."
Related Articles
Risk of asteroid smashing into Earth reduced
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn9203
22 May 2006
Spiral arm of Milky Way looms closer than thought
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8436
08 December 2005
NASA budget fiasco reaches new depths
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn1727
21 December 2001
Weblinks
NSF Senior Review report (PDF)
http://www.nsf.gov/mps/ast/seniorreview/sr-report.pdf
NRAO response
http://www.nrao.edu/pr/2006/seniorreview/
Arecibo Observatory
http://www.naic.edu/
...george on the wagon for our principles?
He's stopped drinking?
He's stopped drinking?
i don't think so with all the roasting they do to introduce a subject or for him as the entertainer for oval parties , etc.
probably a pantry drinker now. a little sip or two of wine or scotch.
Uh-oh Mick. Be very careful what you say here, or you're gonna be in deep doo-doo like me. #msg-14527298
BTW, your queens feeling better?
Not so. In my jurisdiction a paper ballot is used. After it is marked it is put into a sleeve to protect privacy, then handed to a poll worker who puts it into a locked and numbered ballot box in your presence. An electronic machine could also print a (coded) receipt showing your vote, and could be handled in a similar way as to our non-electronic system. In the even of discrepancies in the electronic vote, the paper votes could be examined. Duh!
or george on the wagon for our principles?
He's stopped drinking?
Please define "national/official language", and how this would or would not change anything. You do realize Canada is not "English only". Also, what does "gone the way of Yugoslavia" have to do with your point?
...seems almost a shame i have no liberlas to spar with
Liberlas: Spanish for Libra?
Iraq news: rr is this good or bad? Or is it the handwriting on the wall for our troops?
===============================
Engineering firm ends Iraq building effort
SAN FRANCISCO, Nov. 1 (UPI) -- Bechtel Corp., a U.S. engineering firm that has spent the past three years working on rebuilding war-torn Iraq, is going home.
The San Francisco company's last government contract to rebuild power, water and sewage plants across Iraq expired Tuesday, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
Over the past three years, 52 Bechtel employees were killed, 49 were injured and much of the company's work was sabotaged as Iraq dissolved into insurgency and sectarian violence.
The newspaper said Bechtel's contracts were part of an enormous U.S. rebuilding campaign that was supposed to "win the hearts of skeptical Iraqis" by giving them clean water, dependable power and modern sanitation.
The newspaper said Bechtel "found it tough to keep its engineers and workers alive, much less make progress in piecing Iraq back together."
http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/view.php?StoryID=20061101-112419-2959r
Heres one of the best interpitations of the TOU I've seen,...
Reading one line of someone's speech misses context. Could you post the whole series of "jokes" Kerry made that that line was a part of?
Re "the Google", two year old article here:
==========================================
CIA Asks Bush To Discontinue Blog
August 4, 2004 | Issue 40•31
WASHINGTON, DC—In the interest of national security, President Bush has been asked to stop posting entries on his three-month-old personal web log, acting CIA director John E. McLaughlin said Monday.
Bush adds an entry to his blog.
According to McLaughlin, several recent entries on PrezGeorgeW. typepad.com have compromised military operations, while other posts may have seriously undercut the PR efforts of White House press secretary Scott McClellan.
A July 24 posting read, "Just got back from a lunch with Colin and Adil Moussa (one of Prince Saud al-Faisal's guys). Colin wants the Saudis to send some troops to Najaf—so some of the soldiers are Arab, I guess. This Moussa guy sure wears a lot of jewelry. A golden chain, a golden ring with his initials or something, and some other sparkling stuff—kinda effeminate. Anyway, best of luck in Iraq, Iyad."
McLaughlin, normally hesitant to express public disapproval of the president, said the blog was "ill-advised."
"I would hate for the president to inadvertently put American soldiers at risk," McLaughlin said. "We work hard to maintain the integrity of state secrets. When we see the president posting details of troop movements, international counter-terrorism negotiations, and even the nuclear launch codes, as he did on Monday, we have to step up and say something."
Bush said he could not understand McLaughlin's anger, characterizing his blog as a "personal thing written for friends and family or whoever" and therefore "none of the CIA's business."
Nevertheless, U.S. Secret Service director W. Ralph Basham objected to the blog, as well.
"He is compromising his safety and the safety of those in my department," Basham said, citing a post from last Thursday in which Bush revealed that he "had to go to some secret meeting with Norquist at some Marriot [sic] over in Virginia." "Someone could uncover some serious state secrets, if they took the time to wade through all of those photos he posted after he got that digital camera in June."
The controversial Bush blog.
On Saturday, Basham asked to pre-screen all blog activity before Bush posts it online.
Bush rejected Basham's request and later that day wrote in his blog that "Some people who shall remain nameless apparently do not know there is such a thing as free speech in this country."
Members of Bush's re-election team have urged the president to exercise caution with his blog, perhaps because of posts like the one dated July 8, 2004: "Another long day of speeches and fundraisers. Met with all these phony media company execs. Had to promise them some bill next term and shake a lot of stupid hands, but they did bring in two or three million or so. Whatever. Karl keeps a list. I got big laughs during my speech, so I'm happy."
Republican National Committee chairman Ed Gillespie said he spoke to Bush about the blog last month.
"After he mentioned our Monday message-of-the-day in a Saturday post, we've really been pushing him to not talk about campaign strategy," Gillespie said. "He's not that involved in the planning anyway, so it shouldn't be too much to ask."
"We're not trying to stifle the president's creativity," Gillespie added. "We think it's great he's taking an interest in writing."
Bush maintained that he's doing nothing wrong.
"I know so many people, but I'm way too busy to keep in touch with all of them," Bush said. "Whether I'm talking about our strategies in Gitmo or my dogs down in Crawford, the blog is an easy way to let everyone know what's been up with me. If I've just had a really good lunch at a new restaurant, or something funny happens in a briefing from the NSA, I want to let my friends and family know about it."
McLaughlin said it's likely that Bush will eventually agree to submit his blog for review by the Secret Service.
"Right now, the president insists it's his right to have it, as long as he doesn't work on it during White House work hours," McLaughlin said. "But I believe we'll be able to convince him, if we let him calm down. And even if we don't, frankly, I can't see the blog holding his interest for too long."
© Copyright 2006, Onion, Inc. All rights reserved
Is that a joke? I feel more blonde than I am
No more a joke than this:
There was a blonde woman who was having financial troubles so she decided to
kidnap a child and demand a ransom. She went to a local park, grabbed a little boy, took him behind a tree and wrote this note. "I have kidnapped your child. Leave $10,000 in a plain brown bag behind the big oak tree in the park tomorrow at 7 AM. Signed, The Blonde" She pinned the note inside the little boy's jacket and told him to go straight home. The next morning, she returned to the park to find the $10,000 in a brown bag, behind the big oak tree, just as she had instructed. Inside the bag was the following note..."Here is your money. I cannot believe that one blonde would do this to another!"
Wrong. See #msg-13331126
Events Leading Up To N. Korea Nuclear Test
October 25, 2006 | Issue 42•43
Two weeks ago, North Korea detonated a nuclear bomb. Here is the series of developments that led up to this test:
1986: Kim Jong-Il tells thugs in a local bar he'll "show them all"
1993: North Korea realizes they have all the components needed to build nuclear bombs just lying around
1996: Kim Jong-Il decides individual murders take too long
1998: Military begins digging really big holes
2002: Fact that Bush includes North Korea in "Axis Of Evil" encourages them to act accordingly
2003: Nation starts ducking all of CIA's phone calls
2005: Prior to U.N. weapons inspections, Kim Jong-Il orders all bombs to be hidden behind his various portraits throughout country
2006: Government conducts experiments to determine how long an entire nation can go without
Daylight Saving Time Yields Massive Daylight Surplus
October 25, 2006 | Issue 42•43
WASHINGTON, DC—Energy Secretary Samuel W. Bodman announced Monday that the country's seven-month-long effort to conserve sunshine has resulted in the largest national daylight surplus since October 2005.
"We have built up over 200 hours of this precious, life-giving resource," said Bodman, noting that "the sun's rays are not going to last forever." "We have decided it would be most prudent not to squander this valuable daylight by distributing it to Americans, instead suggesting that they all just wake up a little earlier."
Bodman said the surplus will be stored in the Strategic Daylight Reserve—a system of opaque, sealed-off underground tanks located in Arizona—and only tapped in the case of the sun burning out or a particularly rainy afternoon.
© Copyright 2006, Onion, Inc. All rights reserved.
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/54363
My toenail can tudor you, maybe you will learn something...
Some bare talk, or, were they just growling?
New iHub flame style...
Hey, somebody wants him...
http://www.fbi.gov/wanted/terrorists/terbinladen.htm
PM - Climate change to cut global growth: report
[This is the print version of story http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2006/s1777031.htm]
PM - Monday, 30 October , 2006 18:15:00
Reporter: David Mark
MARK COLVIN: A report by a highly respected economics professor on the effects of climate change will be released officially in Britain in the next few hours, but already extensive briefings on its contents have politicians talking about massive change.
The report by the former Chief Economist of the World Bank, Sir Nicholas Stern, says the world's growth could be cut by one-fifth unless drastic action is taken now.
The UK Treasury commissioned the report, which has ended up in suggesting, in effect, spending billions now to avoid losing trillions later.
Sir Nicholas Stern says spending just one per cent of global gross domestic product would be enough to tackle the problem. Failure would cost up to $9-trillion.
Millions of people could lose their homes and livelihoods because of drought and rising waters. There would be water shortages for one billion people, and 40 per cent of the world's animals could be wiped out.
In a short time I'll be speaking to Australia's Environment Minister, Ian Campbell. But first, this preview of the Stern Report from David Mark.
DAVID MARK: The UK produces just two per cent of the world's greenhouse emissions, but clearly it's hoped the report by Sir Nicholas Stern will give it the ammunition to lead an international debate about climate change.
What's different about this report is that it's one of the first, and certainly most the significant government report to discuss the economics impacts of climate change.
Sir Nicholas Stern argues climate change could cut global gross domestic product by up to 20 per cent. But the solutions could cost as little as 1 per cent.
FRANK MULLER: It's a big turnaround in thinking from economists.
DAVID MARK: Frank Muller is the Adjunct Professor at the Institute of Environmental Studies at the University of New South Wales and formerly headed greenhouse policy for the New South Wales Government.
FRANK MULLER: Because many of us have been arguing for a long time, the costs of doing something are likely to be a lot less than has been conventionally claimed because of the innovation and the benefits of the investments that would flow from solving the problem.
And that the costs are really quite high if we don't act, and I think Katrina, Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans brought that home to many people.
DAVID MARK: Federal Labor's Treasury spokesman, Wayne Swan, was briefed on the report last week.
WAYNE SWAN: Three fundamental facts stand out from the personal briefing I received from Sir Nicholas Stern. Number one, the world and Australia has a narrow window for action against climate change.
It's what we do in the next 10 to 15 years that will count, because if we don't act during that period, what will occur in 50 years is economic and environmental devastation.
Secondly, that we must set ambitious targets to reduce carbon emissions, and at the core of that is a national and international emission-trading scheme that puts a price on carbon.
DAVID MARK: Frank Muller explains how a carbon-trading scheme might work.
FRANK MULLER: Well the key thing is that we put a price on emissions, a price on using the atmosphere to dump carbo dioxide and other greenhouse gases.
And when people say carbon trading, what they're talking about is what's called a cap and trade scheme. We cap the total amount of emissions that are allowed in a country, for example, and everyone who emits or at least, the big emitters, are required to have a permit.
And the number of permits that are available equals that total cap. And if you need more permits, you have to buy them. If you have excess permits, well then you can sell them.
The other way of course is to have a tax on carbon. They both raise prices, they both affect consumers the same way.
DAVID MARK: And there's the rub as far as the Australian Government is concerned.
There is a mechanism for carbon trading; it's the Kyoto Protocol on climate change and the Europe Union has used that framework to set up a carbon-trading market.
The Stern Report argues climate change requires an international response, and that developed countries should show leadership because they bear most of the historical responsibility for the program. But the Australian Government has argued it won't do anything against Australia's economic interests.
Australia, for example, isn't a signatory to Kyoto and the Australian Government has consistently said it won't sign because the agreement doesn't place limits on developing countries like India and China.
Here's the Prime Minister John Howard in Parliament today.
JOHN HOWARD: But China and India, although being part of Kyoto, don't carry the same burden under Kyoto that Australia carries, and that is reason why until that changes, this country won't join Kyoto, Mr Speaker.
Because unless you have everybody in, you are not going to have a solution to the problem. Well, I am not going to sign up to something ...
SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: Order!
JOHN HOWARD: ... that imposes burdens on my country that are not imposed on our competitors, Mr Speaker.
DAVID MARK: The Australian Government also says it won't adopt a carbon-trading program if it damages the Australian economy. But Labor's Wayne Swan believes the Stern Report rejects that view.
WAYNE SWAN: He says we must set ambitious targets to reduce carbon emissions. This afternoon in the Parliament, Mr Macfarlane said that he would not be part of a any emissions-trading scheme.
This just shows that the Howard Government, at the highest levels, has its head in the sand.
DAVID MARK: Well, the Howard Government has said it won't sign the Kyoto Protocol. Isn't it time perhaps for the Opposition to abandon Kyoto, and look to a future plan to reduce carbon emissions?
WAYNE SWAN: What we must do is ratify Kyoto, but also we have to have an ambitious agenda for the future. You see, you've still got a situation where the Industry Minister won't admit that climate change is a substantial economic and environmental problem.
But of course, if you read this report, it says we need ambitious targets to reduce carbon emissions, otherwise we face a very uncertain economic and environmental future.
They still reject that fundamental thesis of the Stern Report.
MARK COLVIN: Labor's Treasury spokesman, Wayne Swan, ending David Mark's report.
http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2006/s1777031.htm" target="_blank">http://www.abc.net.au/cgi-bin/common/printfriendly.pl?http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2006/s1777031...
Dire prediction for world's coral reefs
CHARLOTTE AMALIE, U.S. Virgin Islands (AP) -- Researchers fear more than half the world's coral reefs could die in less than 25 years and say global warming may at least partly to blame.
Sea temperatures are rising, weakening the reefs' resistance to increased pollutants, such as runoff from construction sites and toxins from boat paints. The fragile reefs are hosts to countless marine plants and animals.
"Think of it as a high school chemistry class," said Billy Causey, the Caribbean and Gulf Mexico director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
"You mix some chemicals together and nothing happens. You crank up the Bunsen burner and all of a sudden things start bubbling around. That's what's happening. That global Bunsen burner is cranking up."
Causey was one of some 200 private and government researchers from the Caribbean, Florida and U.S. Pacific islands who gathered in St. Thomas for a meeting of the NOAA's U.S. Coral Reef Task Force.
Last year's coral loss in the Caribbean waters supports predictions that 60 percent of the world's coral could die within a quarter century, said Tyler Smith of the University of the Virgin Islands.
"Given current rates of degradation of reef habitats, this is a plausible prediction," Smith said.
More than 47 percent of the coral in underwater study sites covering 31 acres around the U.S. Virgin Islands died after sea temperatures exceeded the norm for three months in 2005, said Jeff Miller, a scientist with the Virgin Islands National Park.
The unusual warm water can stress coral, causing it to lose its pigment and making it more vulnerable to disease.
This year, Caribbean coral narrowly avoided another widespread episode of bleaching when sea temperatures briefly surpassed levels considered healthy for reefs.
Up to 30 percent of the world's coral reefs have died in the last 50 years, and another 30 percent are severely damaged, said Smith, who studies coral health in the U.S. Virgin Islands and collaborates with researchers globally.
"U.S. Virgin Islands coral today is likely at its lowest levels in recorded history," Smith said.
The researchers said global warming was a potential cause of the abnormally high sea temperatures but was not the only suspect in the reefs' demise.
What causes disease in coral can be hard to pinpoint and could be a combination of things. Other threats include silt runoff from construction sites, which prevents the coral from getting enough sunlight, and a record increase in fleshy, green algae, which competes with coral for sunlight.
"Climate change is an important factor that is influencing coral reefs worldwide," said Mark Eakin, director of NOAA's Coral Reef Watch. "It adds to the other problems that we are having."
You know what they say...
"Warm heart, cold hands."
How prophetic -- and you are watching it happen before your very eyes.
Star Trek
Oh poo....
Humble dung gets its day in the sun at Miami zoo
by Randy Nieves-Ruiz
Thu Oct 26, 1:30 PM ET
Cranes use it for courtship, hippos to mark territory, and frogs for camouflage. Humans mostly flush it as fast as they can.
A new exhibit at the Miami Metro Zoo is set to open minds about this omnipresent, versatile, little loved yet practical by-product of life on Earth.
It's called "The Scoop on Poop," and it's based on a book by Canadian author and photographer Wayne Lynch about the way animals and humans use fecal matter.
In a series of interactive exhibits, kids and adults can learn more than they ever dreamed there was to know about poop.
The Masai of Kenya and northern Tanzania, for instance, use it to cover their houses. People in parts of Asia and South America use it as fuel or fertilizer. Animals have infinite uses for it.
You can even find out how long it would take an African elephant, one of the animal kingdom's most prolific poopers, to excrete the equivalent of your body weight.
The average time for three recent visitors: 10 hours.
"This is a cool message. We're talking about something that everybody does but nobody talks about," said zoo spokesman Ron McGill.
Hopefully, the focus on feces will have health benefits.
"We shouldn't be so frightened of it. If it wasn't for our aversion to poop, we wouldn't have so many people dying from colon cancer. People are frightened to do a colorectal exam," he said.
A species of Nepalese crane impresses its mate by pitching "buffalo chips" in the air.
A type of frog camouflages itself by changing color to look like poop.
Deer are extremely careful with their scat, controlling when fawns defecate and sometimes eating the results to avoid leaving signs of their presence for predators.
The hippopotamus does the opposite, marking its territory by quickly fanning its tale while defecating to "broadcast" dung across the ground.
Rhinoceroses trample their turd to mark their trail with smelly footprints.
But not only animals benefit from the practical uses of poop.
Plants trick animals into helping them reproduce by growing appetizing fruits whose seeds are geographically disseminated when expelled in animal dung.
Scientists analyze feces fossils for clues about what prehistoric animals ate or disappeared plant species.
The exhibit even includes a touchable Coprolite, a fossilized piece of fecal matter passed by a Tyrannosaurus Rex 80 million years ago.
The scat show also makes clear that while poop can be useful, it can also be dangerous.
Rodent excrement is a vector for numerous diseases including the potentially fatal hantavirus, and human feces is toxic for certain plants.
"Fecal material can pass a lot of different diseases. That being said it's not something that we should paint with such a broad brush that people don't understand it," McGill said.
"We as adults, sometimes we tend to think, 'oh my God, this isn't something we should talk about, we don't want our kids exposed to that'," he said.
"Human poop doesn't have any use to us directly as animals do but is a huge vehicle of information for our health for anything from parasites to cancer," he said.
Don't forget to change your clock.
Don't forget to change your clock.
An-a-one, an-a-two...
Sauerkraut Capital is sweet on accordions
WISHEK, North Dakota (AP) -- A few miles off the Lawrence Welk Highway is a community where the sound of "O Du Lieber Augustin" is as common as anything by Britney Spears, Jay-Z or Garth Brooks.
Wishek calls itself the "Sauerkraut Capital of the World" and German is almost as common as English. High school music teacher Janet Wolff isn't afraid to teach the accordion.
Her teenage students don't balk at picking up the instrument or performing in an auditorium full of old-timers who take their German traditions seriously.
"It's just something different," said 17-year-old Kasandra Huber. "I thought it would be fun. And it is fun."
Wishek High School has 110 students. Huber is one of seven who play the accordion, an instrument made famous by Welk, who died in 1992, and the late Myron Floren, who both entertained generations of TV viewers on "The Lawrence Welk Show."
In Wishek, a town of about 1,100 people, the accordion players include Jason Hochhalter, 18, a muscular high school senior, and Christy Schaffer, 15, a petite, full-blooded German who has been practicing for four years.
"When I was younger, I thought it was something different to do," Schaffer said. "My grandpa did it. And I thought it would be interesting to play something different, that no other kid was playing."
Wolff, who grew up in the Minneapolis area, married a German with accordions after taking the teaching job in Wishek in 1988. She thought the accordion would be perfect for performances during Sauerkraut Day, an annual sauerkraut and sausage festival held in Wishek for eight decades.
Wolff started teaching the accordion four years ago, using instruments borrowed from people in town. "It's just another instrument to be exposed to," she said.
"I was just going to play it for a day, and then I ended up keeping it," said Hochhalter, who looks like he would be more at home in a weight-lifting room than a music room.
When other students chimed in and good-naturedly chided him for "stealing" the accordion from another student, he grinned and added, "They're just jealous."
'Wunnerful, wunnerful'
The culture of the farming region also helps, Wolff said. Welk, the bandleader whose "wunnerful, wunnerful" show of the 1950s and 1960s can still be seen in public television reruns, grew up in nearby Strasburg. Many older residents converse in German, and wedding dances still feature polkas and waltzes, Wolff said.
Lisa Horner, 17, said the student accordion players are following in their grandparents' footsteps. "It's kind of cool," she said.
The students like modern-day music but all know Lawrence Welk. "My dad watched all the time," Horner said. "He was like, 'We've got to watch Lawrence Welk."'
Helmi Harrington, who runs music studios in the Minneapolis suburb of Burnsville and in Superior, Wisconsin, is the director of A World of Accordions Museum in Duluth, Minnesota. She is not surprised to hear that teenagers in North Dakota play the accordion.
"In the 1990s there was a trend toward nostalgia, toward finding our roots in America," she said. "That always brings people back to ethnic connectors."
Harrington, who has played the accordion for more than half a century, said the instrument is unique in that it creates melody, harmony and rhythm like a piano or organ, but is more portable.
"A single person can shine in a spotlight with marvelous notes," she said.
However, with its keyboard, pushbuttons and bellows, "it is a very difficult instrument to play well," Harrington said.
Wolff said she cannot envision teaching the accordion in a big city like Minneapolis, but has never had a student in Wishek refuse to try it.
"It's part of our heritage," Huber said.
Not exactly BS...
Vermont College goes green with cow manure
NEW YORK (Reuters) -- Vermont's Green Mountain College is getting greener with a new program that uses cow manure to generate power.
The 750-student Green Mountain College in Poultney aims to cut its greenhouse gas emissions by joining Central Vermont Public Service's Cow Power program, which harvests waste from local farms.
"This initiative helps the college do its part to address global warming by reducing its carbon emissions by approximately 3500 metric tons per year," the liberal arts college said in a statement Thursday. The school equated that amount to the removal of "758 passenger cars from use for a year."
The program capitalizes on a common byproduct from one of the northeastern state's top industries, with a typical Vermont dairy cow producing around 13 gallons of manure daily, according to Cow Power spokesman Steve Costello.
Vermont boasts the highest cow-to-people ratio in the United States, with 300,000 cattle and calves and just over 600,000 people, according to state figures.
High U.S. fuel costs have spurred biofuel and other alternative energy and sustainable initiatives in the world's top oil consumer.
------------------------------------
Copyright 2006 Reuters.
Read this about the site and the response they is getting. Don't know whether to laugh or cry.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,127684-pg,1-RSS,RSS/article.html
OK, let's start all over again, from the beginning. You said:
why did fox not tell the whole story of the embryonic stem cell proposal? you know, the part where they're gonna grow babies to kill.
Then you say:
Each institution, hospital, other entity, or other person conducting human embryonic stem cell research in the state shall (i) prepare an annual report stating the nature of the human embryonic stem cells used in...
that clearly says they CAN clone humans. period.
So, it would seem you CANNOT find a source for your statement "they're gonna grow babies to kill." Not to insult you, but perhaps you can consult www.dictionary.com to find the accepted definition of a "baby".
By your thinking, you cook a chicken egg and you've KILLED a baby chicken -- is that correct?
And this talks about "growing babies to kill"? Gimme a break. Where does it say that? BTW, this has not been removed from the Missouri website. It's right here:
http://www.sos.mo.gov/elections/2006petitions/ppStemCell.asp
Here's the precise language:
2006 Ballot Measure
Constitutional Amendment 2
Stem Cell Initiative
Submitted October 11, 2005
NOTICE: You are advised that the proposed constitutional amendment may change, repeal, or modify by implication or may be construed by some persons to change, repeal or modify by implication, the following provisions of the Constitution of Missouri – Sections 2, 10, 14, and 32 of Article I; Section 1 of Article II; Sections 1, 21, 22, 23, 28, 36, 39, 40, 41, and 42 of Article III; Sections 1, 14, 36(a), 37, 37(a), 39, and 52 of Article IV; Sections 5, 14, 17, 18, and 23, and subsection 17 of Section 27 of Article V; Sections 18(b), 18(c), 18(d), 18(k), 18(m), 19(a), 20, 31, 32(a), and 32(b) of Article VI; Section 9(a) of Article IX; Sections 1, 6, 11(a), 11(d), and 11(f) of Article X; and Section 3 or Article XI.
THE PROPOSED AMENDMENT
Be it resolved by the people of the state of Missouri that the Constitution be amended:
One new section is adopted by adding one new section to be known as section 38(d) of Article III to read as follows:
Section 38(d). 1. This section shall be known as the “ Missouri Stem Cell Research and Cures Initiative.”
2. To ensure that Missouri patients have access to stem cell therapies and cures, that Missouri researchers can conduct stem cell research in the state, and that all such research is conducted safely and ethically, any stem cell research permitted under federal law may be conducted in Missouri, and any stem cell therapies and cures permitted under federal law may be provided to patients in Missouri, subject to the requirements of federal law and only the following additional limitations and requirements:
(1) No person may clone or attempt to clone a human being.
(2) No human blastocyst may be produced by fertilization solely for the purpose of stem cell research.
(3) No stem cells may be taken from a human blastocyst more than fourteen days after cell division begins; provided, however, that time during which a blastocyst is frozen does not count against the fourteen-day limit.
(4) No person may, for valuable consideration, purchase or sell human blastocysts or eggs for stem cell research or stem cell therapies and cures.
(5) Human blastocysts and eggs obtained for stem cell research or stem cell therapies and cures must have been donated with voluntary and informed consent, documented in writing.
(6) Human embryonic stem cell research may be conducted only by persons that, within 180 days of the effective date of this section or otherwise prior to commencement of such research, whichever is later, have
(a) provided oversight responsibility and approval authority for such research to an embryonic stem cell research oversight committee whose membership includes representatives of the public and medical and scientific experts;
(b) adopted ethical standards for such research that comply with the requirements of this section; and
(c) obtained a determination from an Institutional Review Board that the research complies with all applicable federal statutes and regulations that the Institutional Review Board is responsible for administering.
(7) All stem cell research and all stem cell therapies and cures must be conducted and provided in accordance with state and local laws of general applicability, including but not limited to laws concerning scientific and medical practices and patient safety and privacy, to the extent that any such laws do not (i) prevent, restrict, obstruct, or discourage any stem cell research or stem cell therapies and cures that are permitted by the provisions of this section other than this subdivision (7) to be conducted or provided, or (ii) create disincentives for any person to engage in or otherwise associate with such research or therapies and cures.
3. Any person who knowingly and willfully violates in this state subdivision (1) of subsection 2 of this section commits a crime and shall be punished by imprisonment for a period of up to fifteen years or by the imposition of a fine of up to two hundred fifty thousand dollars, or by both. Any person who knowingly and willfully violates in this state subdivisions (2) or (3) of subsection 2 of this section commits a crime and shall be punished by imprisonment for a period of up to ten years or by the imposition of a fine of up to one hundred thousand dollars, or by both. A civil action may be brought against any person who knowingly and willfully violates in this state any of subdivisions (1) through (6) of subsection 2 of this section, and the state in such action shall be entitled to a judgment recovering a civil penalty of up to fifty thousand dollars per violation, requiring disgorgement of any financial profit derived from such violation, and/or enjoining any further such violation. The attorney general shall have the exclusive right to bring a civil action for such violation. Venue for such action shall be the county in which the alleged violation occurred.
4. Each institution, hospital, other entity, or other person conducting human embryonic stem cell research in the state shall (i) prepare an annual report stating the nature of the human embryonic stem cells used in, and the purpose of, the research conducted during the prior calendar year, and certifying compliance with subdivision (6) of subsection 2 of this section; and (ii) no later than June 30 of the subsequent year, make such report available to the public and inform the Secretary of State how the public may obtain copies of or otherwise gain access to the report. The report shall not contain private or confidential medical, scientific, or other information. Individuals conducting research at an institution, hospital, or other entity that prepares and makes available a report pursuant to this subsection 4 concerning such research are not required to prepare and make available a separate report concerning that same research. A civil action may be brought against any institution, hospital, other entity, or other person that fails to prepare or make available the report or inform the Secretary of State how the public may obtain copies of or otherwise gain access to the report, and the state in such action shall be entitled as its sole remedy to an affirmative injunction requiring such institution, hospital, other entity, or other person to prepare and make available the report or inform the Secretary of State how the public may obtain or otherwise gain access to the report. The attorney general shall have the exclusive right to bring a civil action for such violation.
5. To ensure that no governmental body or official arbitrarily restricts funds designated for purposes other than stem cell research or stem cell therapies and cures as a means of inhibiting lawful stem cell research or stem cell therapies and cures, no state or local governmental body or official shall eliminate, reduce, deny, or withhold any public funds provided or eligible to be provided to a person that (i) lawfully conducts stem cell research or provides stem cell therapies and cures, allows for such research or therapies and cures to be conducted or provided on its premises, or is otherwise associated with such research or therapies and cures, but (ii) receives or is eligible to receive such public funds for purposes other than such stem cell-related activities, on account of, or otherwise for the purpose of creating disincentives for any person to engage in or otherwise associate with, or preventing, restricting, obstructing, or discouraging, such stem cell-related activities.
6. As used in this section, the following terms have the following meanings:
(1) “Blastocyst” means a small mass of cells that results from cell division, caused either by fertilization or somatic cell nuclear transfer, that has not been implanted in a uterus.
(2) “Clone or attempt to clone a human being” means to implant in a uterus or attempt to implant in a uterus anything other than the product of fertilization of an egg of a human female by a sperm of a human male for the purpose of initiating a pregnancy that could result in the creation of a human fetus, or the birth of a human being.
(3) “Donated” means donated for use in connection either with scientific or medical research or with medical treatment.
(4) “Fertilization” means the process whereby an egg of a human female and the sperm of a human male form a zygote (i.e., fertilized egg).
(5) “Human embryonic stem cell research,” also referred to as “early stem cell research,” means any scientific or medical research involving human stem cells derived from in vitro fertilization blastocysts or from somatic cell nuclear transfer. For purposes of this section, human embryonic stem cell research does not include stem cell clinical trials.
(6) “In vitro fertilization” means fertilization of an egg with a sperm outside the body.
(7) “Institutional Review Board” means a specially constituted review board established and operating in accordance with federal law as set forth in 42 U.S.C. 289, 45 C.F.R. Part 46, and any other applicable federal statutes and regulations, as amended from time to time.
(8) “Permitted under federal law” means, as it relates to stem cell research and stem cell therapies and cures, any such research, therapies, and cures that are not prohibited under federal law from being conducted or provided, regardless of whether federal funds are made available for such activities.
(9) “Person” means any natural person, corporation, association, partnership, public or private institution, or other legal entity.
(10) “Private or confidential medical, scientific, or other information” means any private or confidential patient, medical, or personnel records or matters, intellectual property or work product, whether patentable or not and including but not limited to any scientific or technological innovations in which an entity or person involved in the research has a proprietary interest, prepublication scientific working papers, research, or data, and any other matter excepted from disclosure under Chapter 610, RSMo, as amended from time to time.
(11) “Solely for the purpose of stem cell research” means producing human blastocysts using in vitro fertilization exclusively for stem cell research, but does not include producing any number of human blastocysts for the purpose of treating human infertility.
(12) “Sperm” means mature spermatozoa or precursor cells such as spermatids and spermatocytes.
(13) “Stem cell” means a cell that can divide multiple times and give rise to specialized cells in the body, and includes but is not limited to the stem cells generally referred to as (i) adult stem cells that are found in some body tissues (including but not limited to adult stem cells derived from adult body tissues and from discarded umbilical cords and placentas), and (ii) embryonic stem cells (including but not limited to stem cells derived from in vitro fertilization blastocysts and from cell reprogramming techniques such as somatic cell nuclear transfer).
(14) “Stem cell clinical trials” means federally regulated clinical trials involving stem cells and human subjects designed to develop, or assess or test the efficacy or safety of, medical treatments.
(15) “Stem cell research” means any scientific or medical research involving stem cells. For purposes of this section, stem cell research does not include stem cell clinical trials.
(16) “Stem cell therapies and cures” means any medical treatment that involves or otherwise derives from the use of stem cells, and that is used to treat or cure any disease or injury. For purposes of this section, stem cell therapies and cures does include stem cell clinical trials.
(17) “Valuable consideration” means financial gain or advantage, but does not include reimbursement for reasonable costs incurred in connection with the removal, processing, disposal, preservation, quality control, storage, transfer, or donation of human eggs, sperm, or blastocysts, including lost wages of the donor. Valuable consideration also does not include the consideration paid to a donor of human eggs or sperm by a fertilization clinic or sperm bank, as well as any other consideration expressly allowed by federal law.
7. The provisions of this section and of all state and local laws, regulations, rules, charters, ordinances, and other governmental actions shall be construed in favor of the conduct of stem cell research and the provision of stem cell therapies and cures. No state or local law, regulation, rule, charter, ordinance, or other governmental action shall (i) prevent, restrict, obstruct, or discourage any stem cell research or stem cell therapies and cures that are permitted by this section to be conducted or provided, or (ii) create disincentives for any person to engage in or otherwise associate with such research or therapies and cures.
8. The provisions of this section are self-executing. All of the provisions of this section are severable. If any provision of this section is found by a court of competent jurisdiction to be unconstitutional or unconstitutionally enacted, the remaining provisions of this section shall be and remain valid.
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What Missouri website? Read your own posts. Talk about changing the subject.....
.....you ever hear the term "blowing smoke..."?
Germany wasn't all that close to a practical atom bomb because they hadn't solved the problem of separating out U235 from the "heavy water" you referred to. Here's a short article about it.
http://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1127.htm
Believe it or don't believe it makes no difference because that site does not say anything in reference to iamshazzam's post. I'm tempted to give him the link to dictionary.com.
Here's the amendment you are referring to? Where's the word "baby"? And where does it talk about "growing babies to kill"?
Fair Ballot Language for the following ballot measure certified for the November 7, 2006 general election.
Fair Ballot Language
Constitutional Amendment 2
A "yes" vote will amend the Missouri Constitution to allow and set limitations on stem cell research, therapies, and cures which will:
ensure Missouri patients have access to any therapies and cures, and allow Missouri researchers to conduct any research, permitted under federal law;
ban human cloning or attempted cloning;
require expert medical and public oversight and annual reports on the nature and purpose of any stem cell research;
impose criminal and civil penalties for any violations; and
prohibit state or local governments from preventing or discouraging lawful research, therapies and cures.
A "no" vote would not ensure that stem cell research permitted under federal law is allowed to be conducted in Missouri and that Missouri patients have access to stem cell therapies and cures permitted under federal law.
This measure will have no impact on taxes.
http://www.2tricky.org/index.htm
Read what amendment? How about posting it? And a link?
Surely you have backing for your statement of "fact".
Let's back up. You said:
why did fox not tell the whole story of the embryonic stem cell proposal? you know, the part where they're gonna grow babies to kill.
I asked you for a source. You gave me a site on cloning that never mentioned the word "baby", let along "growing babies to kill".
Care to try again to produce some facts?
She trys to keep a low profile.
Thanks, but...the word "baby" does not appear anywhere. Care to try again. It kinda looks like you make this stuff up.