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Post by ninathedog on Mar 15, 2011 22:49:37 GMT 4
TSA to retest airport body scanners for radiationBy Alison Young and Blake Morrison, USA TODAY March 11, 2011The Transportation Security Administration announced Friday that it would retest every full-body X-ray scanner that emits ionizing radiation — 247 machines at 38 airports — after maintenance records on some of the devices showed radiation levels 10 times higher than expected. (As it's explained below, this appears to be a record-keeping error, not a mechanical error.)The TSA says that the records reflect math mistakes and that all the machines are safe. Indeed, even the highest readings listed on some of the records — the numbers that the TSA says were mistakes — appear to be many times less than what the agency says a person absorbs through one day of natural background radiation. Even so, the TSA has ordered the new tests out of "an abundance of caution to reassure the public," spokesman Nicholas Kimball says. The tests will be finished by the end of the month, and the results will be released "as they are completed," the agency said on its website. TSA officials have repeatedly assured the public and lawmakers that the machines have passed all inspections. The agency's review of maintenance reports, launched Dec. 10, came only after USA TODAY and lawmakers called for the release of the records late last year. The agency posted reports Friday from 127 X-ray-emitting devices on its website and said it would continue to release results from maintenance tests for the approximately 4,500 X-ray devices at airports nationwide. Those devices include machines that examine checked luggage. Of the reports posted, about a third showed some sort of error, Kimball said. The TSA announced steps to require its maintenance contractors to "retrain personnel involved in conducting and overseeing the radiation survey process." Some lawmakers remain concerned, however. The TSA "has repeatedly assured me that the machines that emit radiation do not pose a health risk," Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said in a written statement Friday. "Nonetheless, if TSA contractors reporting on the radiation levels have done such a poor job, how can airline passengers and crew have confidence in the data used by the TSA to reassure the public?"
She said the records released Friday "included gross errors about radiation emissions. That is completely unacceptable when it comes to monitoring radiation."U.S. Rep. Jason Chaffetz also was troubled by the information posted by the TSA. Chaffetz, R-Utah, chairs a House oversight subcommittee on national security and has sponsored legislation to limit the use of full-body scans. He has been pushing the TSA to release the maintenance records. At best, Chaffetz said, the radiation reports generated by TSA contractors reveal haphazard oversight and record-keeping in the critical inspection system the agency relies upon to ensure millions of travelers aren't subjected to excessive doses of radiation. "It is totally unacceptable to be bumbling such critical tasks," Chaffetz said. "These people are supposed to be protecting us against terrorists." In the past, the TSA has failed to properly monitor and ensure the safety of X-ray devices used on luggage. A 2008 report by the worker safety arm of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that the TSA and its maintenance contractors had failed to detect when baggage X-ray machines emitted radiation beyond what regulations allowed. They also failed to take action when some machines had missing or disabled safety features, the report shows. Chaffetz said the TSA's characterization of the maintenance mistakes "sounds like an excuse rather than the real facts." "I'm tired of excuses," Chaffetz said. "The public has a right and deserves to know. It begs the question, 'What are they still not sharing with us?' These are things you cannot make mistakes with." Chaffetz said he expects to address some of his concerns during a hearing Wednesday. The full-body scanners, called backscatter devices, are supposed to deliver only a tiny amount of radiation — about as much as an airplane passenger gets during two minutes of a typical flight. Peter Rez, a physics professor at Arizona State University, said Friday he wanted to scrutinize the 2,000 pages of reports the TSA posted. He has expressed concerns about the potential for the scanners to break and the importance of proper maintenance and monitoring."Mechanical things break down," Rez told USA TODAY in December. Rez also has voiced fears about the potential for a passenger to get an excessive dose of radiation or even a radiation burn if the X-ray scanning beam were to malfunction and stop on one part of a person's body for an extended period of time. He said Friday that the contractor mistakes TSA identified only heighten his concerns. "What happens in times of failure, when they can give very, very high radiation doses. I'm totally unconvinced they have thought that through," Rez said of the TSA. "I just see a large, bumbling bureaucracy. Of course it's not very reassuring."The TSA's Kimball disputed such characterizations. "Numerous independent tests have confirmed that these technologies are safe, but these record-keeping errors are not acceptable," he said. For instance, "the testing procedure calls for the technician to take 10 separate scans" for radiation levels, "add them up and then divide by 10 to take an average. They didn't divide by 10," Kimball said. "We're taking a number of steps to ensure the mistakes aren't repeated," he said, "and the public will be able to see for themselves by reviewing all future reports online." The TSA is responsible for the safety of its own X-ray devices. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has said it does not routinely inspect airport X-ray machines because they are not considered medical devices. The TSA's airport scanners are exempt from state radiation inspections because they belong to a federal agency.Some of the records were written by employees of the machines' maker: Rapiscan Systems. In a written statement, the company's executive vice president, Peter Kant, said, "The mistakes were the result of calculating and procedural errors that were identified by Rapiscan management and have been corrected. In actuality, the systems in these airports have always been well below acceptable exposure limits." Rapiscan Systems said in a Dec. 15 letter to the TSA that company engineers who tested the backscatter machines were confused by inspection forms and instructions, leading them to make mistakes on the forms that vastly inflated the radiation emitted by the machines.Rapiscan vowed to redesign its inspection forms and retrain its engineers. The TSA released inspection reports from 40 backscatter machines, and reports for 19 of those machines had errors, including six that were deemed "considerable." In a written statement sent to USA TODAY, TSA Administrator John Pistole said the equipment is safe. "Independent third-party testing has confirmed that all TSA technology is safe," Pistole said. "We are also taking additional steps to build on existing safety measures in an open and transparent way, including commissioning an additional independent entity to evaluate these protocols." Contributing: Thomas Frank and Brad Heathwww.usatoday.com/news/washington/2011-03-11-tsa-scans_N.htmsource: redicecreations.com
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Post by ninathedog on Mar 16, 2011 0:46:48 GMT 4
Egypt dissolves notorious internal security agency 15 March 2011 Last updated at 12:54 ET BBC.comEgypt's Interior Minister Mansour al-Issawi has dissolved its internal security agency, which had been blamed for decades of human rights abuses. The State Security Investigation Service (SSIS) will be replaced with a new "National Security Force". The new agency would be tasked with "protecting the domestic front and combating terrorism", Mr Issawi said. The actions of the SSIS helped ignite the popular uprising that overthrew President Hosni Mubarak last month. Its agents were accused of using violence to try to stop the protests in Cairo's Tahrir Square. At least 365 people died in the 18 days of unrest. Earlier this month, protesters raided the agency's main headquarters and offices in several cities, including Cairo and Alexandria, after reports that documents were being destroyed. They found piles of shredded paper. The head of the SSIS has been arrested and is facing investigation for ordering the killing of anti-government demonstrators. Another 47 of its personnel have been detained on suspicion of destroying evidence.TortureOn Tuesday, Mr Issawi announced that all administrative branches and offices of the State Security Investigation Service in all provinces had been dissolved. The new National Security Force would "serve the nation without interfering in the lives of citizens or their right to exercise their political rights", the official Mena news agency quoted Mr Issawi as saying. The force would be tasked with "protecting the domestic front and combating terrorism" in line with the constitution and the principles of human rights, it added. It said officers for the new agency were to be selected in the next few days. The SSIS, which had at least 100,000 employees, was notorious for using any means to maintain Mr Mubarak's grip on power over three decades. Human rights groups have documented hundreds of cases of torture and abuse by SSIS agents, as well as arbitrary arrests and detentions. Their torture methods included suspending victims by the wrists and ankles; beatings with metal rods; using electric shocks; and sexual assault, including sodomy. Egypt's new Prime Minister, Issam Sharaf, vowed to reform the SSIS when he addressed thousands of people in Tahrir Square. "I pray that Egypt will be a free country and that its security apparatus will serve the citizens," he told the crowd. The Muslim Brotherhood, the opposition Islamist movement banned under Mr Mubarak and many of whose members suffered at the hands of the SSIS, said the agency's dissolution was a "step in the right direction". www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12751234
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Post by ninathedog on Mar 17, 2011 0:17:02 GMT 4
American Who Worked for C.I.A. Freed in PakistanPublished: March 16, 2011 The New York TimesLAHORE, Pakistan — An American working as a contractor for the C.I.A. who had been jailed for the killing of two Pakistanis on a crowded Lahore street was freed on Wednesday and immediately flown out of the country, removing a major irritant in relations between the United States and Pakistan. The case of Raymond A. Davis, 36, who shot dead two Pakistanis who he said tried to rob him on a motorbike in broad daylight, ignited a furor here and became of focal point of resentment among Pakistanis who say the growing American security contingent here — some of them covert operatives — roam the country with relative impunity. At the time of his arrest, Pakistani police said Mr. Davis was carrying a Glock handgun, a flashlight that attached to a headband and a pocket telescope. American officials initially refused to specify what kind of work Mr. Davis was involved in. After a British newspaper reported his ties to the C.I.A., however, they confirmed that Mr. Davis, a retired Special Forces soldier, was part of a covert, C.I.A.-led team that collected intelligence and conducted surveillance on militant groups deep inside the country. All along, American officials insisted that Mr. Davis had diplomatic immunity and should turned over to the embassy and freed. Pakistani officials said the case should work its way through the country’s notoriously unpredictable courts. On Wednesday, in a six hour session at the jail where Mr. Davis was held, the families of the victims dropped the prosecution in return for compensation, which Pakistani officials and lawyers for the families said amounted to about $2.3 million.Shortly after his release, Mr. Davis was flown to Kabul, Afghanistan, where he was to undergo a medical examination and be interviewed by American officials. In remarks to reporters in Cairo, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton thanked Pakistani officials and the families of the two men for agreeing to release Mr. Davis. “We appreciate the actions they took that enabled Mr. Davis to leave Pakistan and head back home,” she said. Asked about reports of compensation, she replied, “The United States did not pay any compensation.” Asked if someone else paid compensation at the United States request, she repeated that and said you should ask the families and the Pakistani government. The Pakistani government seems to have intervened in the last few days to take charge of the victims’ families and arrange the compensation agreement before Wednesday’s court hearing, when an indictment was looming. A lawyer attached to the Supreme Court in Islamabad, Raja Irshad Kiyani, said he was engaged by the families just two days ago to negotiate the agreement for them and represent them in court. At the same time, the lawyer who had been representing the families until then, Asad Manzoor Butt, could no longer reach the families by phone. When he arrived with a colleague to attend the hearing at the jail Wednesday morning, he said, he was held in a room for four hours and not permitted to enter the courtroom, or meet with his clients. Meanwhile, Mr. Irshad arrived from Islamabad just in time, as the court judge was beginning proceedings to indict Mr. Davis, and presented the judge with a signed agreement under which both families accepted the payment of what is known here as “blood money” and pardoned Mr. Davis. Even his defense counsel, Zahid Hussein Bukhari, was not expecting it. “It was a surprise for me,” Mr. Bukhari said later. Nineteen family members who represent the legal heirs of the two dead men attended the court hearing and each answered that they would pardon Mr. Davis and confirmed that they had already received their share of the blood money, he said. “The families wanted this and they gave their statements voluntarily,” he said. Mr. Irshad said in an interview afterward that he had had no dealings with American officials and that the Pakistani government had paid the compensation to the families in Lahore. It remains unclear whether the families were coerced into accepting the deal, but the government clearly maneuvered to separate them from Mr. Butt, and the religious parties, which have been demonstrating against the release of Mr. Davis. Mr. Butt said he had offered his services to the families gratis at the request of members of the religious party, Jamaat-e-Islami. The judge accepted the documents presented by Mr. Irshad and said that since the families had accepted this solution the state had no case against Mr. Davis regarding the killing of the two men. (one was seventeen and was therefore a boy)He did however find Mr. Davis guilty of possession of an unlicensed weapon and gave him a three-month sentence and fined him the equivalent of about $350. The sentence was immediately commuted to time served and he ordered Mr. Davis to be released, Mr. Bukhari said. “I think justice has been done,” Mr. Bukhari said. The American Consul General for Lahore was present for the proceedings, as was Mr. Davis who was sitting on a bench inside an iron bar cage, his hands cuffed in front of him, the lawyers said. A line of policemen stood in front of the cage to block to prevent Mr. Davis and the families seeing each other, Mr. Bukhari, Mr. Davis’s defense counsel, said. The families, which included women and children, were emotional and wept each time they heard the names of the deceased read out but there was no interaction between them and Mr. Davis, he said. The families could not be found Wednesday evening. Their houses were locked up and empty, local television channels reported, and none of the members of the family were responding to phone calls. The “blood money” agreement is an accepted part of Islamic Law in Pakistan and early reactions to the news of Mr. Davis’s release were muted. Several dozen demonstrators tussled with police at barricades near the American consulate in Lahore Wednesday evening in protest at the release of Mr. Davis. Yet religious parties and anti-American groups, which have been demanding the death sentence for Mr. Davis, are expected to continue to press the government on the killing of a third man, who was knocked from his motorcycle by a U.S. consulate car that was rushing to the rescue of Mr. Davis at the time of the killings. Mr. Davis may have narrowly escaped and long and difficult trial. By his own account Mr. Davis admits he killed the men and says he did it in self defense. He was driving in the city, familiarizing himself with the city and the way to CooCoo’s restaurant on Jan. 27 when two men on a motorbike pulled up beside and then in front of him at an intersection. The one riding on the back “c.ocked his pistol and began to point it at me,” Mr. Davis’s handwritten statement says according to an official involved in the case. “I shot in self defense,” Mr. Davis wrote. He fired ten bullets from his gun, five into each of the motorcyclists, killing one immediately and mortally wounding the other, the investigation summary states, which interviews 47 witnesses, including two traffic wardens who saw the incident and helped detain Mr. Davis.
The two motorcyclists, Faizan Haider, 22, and Muhammad Faheem, 17, were both carrying loaded pistols, although neither were c.ocked, according to the police investigation.
It requested that he be charged with two counts of murder in view of the large number of witnesses, the fact that the motorcyclists had not c.ocked their weapons, and that Mr. Davis had not sought to disable them by wounding them but had instead used what the investigation concluded was excessive force.Religious parties and anti-American groups, which have been demanding the death sentence for Mr. Davis, are expected to continue to press the government on the death of a third man, who was knocked from his motorcycle by a United States consulate car that was rushing to the rescue of Mr. Davis at the time of the killings. Reporting was contributed by Waqar Gillani in Lahore, Pakistan, and Mark Mazzetti in Washington.www.nytimes.com/2011/03/17/world/asia/17pakistan.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&hp(Clandestine organizations: Please either train your people better to deal with their fear of their surroundings and their fear of the people they live amongst, or recruit psychologically stronger personnel -- including those working as contractors. I have other suggestions but this is not the time nor the place. Thank you. )
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Post by ninathedog on Mar 17, 2011 1:27:23 GMT 4
U.S. Calls Radiation ‘Extremely High’ and Urges Deeper Caution in JapanBy DAVID E. SANGER and MATTHEW L. WALD Published: March 16, 2011 The New York TimesWASHINGTON — The chairman of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission gave a significantly bleaker appraisal of the threat posed by Japan’s nuclear crisis than the Japanese government, saying on Wednesday that the damage at one crippled reactor was much more serious than Japanese officials had acknowledged and advising to Americans to evacuate a wider area around the plant than the perimeter established by Japan. The announcement marked a new and ominous chapter in the five-day long effort by Japanese engineers to bring four side-by-side reactors under control after their cooling systems were knocked out by an earthquake and tsunami last Friday. It also suggested a serious split between Washington and Tokyo, after American officials concluded that the Japanese warnings were insufficient, and that, deliberately or not, they had understated the potential threat of what is taking place inside the nuclear facility.Gregory Jaczko, the chairman of the commission, said in Congressional testimony that the commission believed that all the water in the spent fuel pool at the No. 4 reactor of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station had boiled dry, leaving fuel rods stored there exposed and bleeding radiation. As a result, he said, “We believe that radiation levels are extremely high, which could possibly impact the ability to take corrective measures.” If his analysis is accurate and Japanese workers have been unable to keep the spent fuel at that inoperative reactor properly cooled — it needs to remain covered with water at all times — radiation levels could make it difficult not only to fix the problem at reactor No. 4, but to keep workers at the Daiichi complex from servicing any of the other problem reactors at the plant.Mr. Jaczko (the name is pronounced YAZZ-koe) said radiation levels may make it impossible to continue what he called the “backup backup” cooling functions that have so far helped check the fuel melting at the other reactors. Those efforts consist of using fire hoses to dump water on overheated fuel and then letting the radioactive steam vent into the atmosphere. Those emergency measures, implemented by a small squad of workers and firemen, are the main steps Japan is taking at Daiichi to forestall a full blown fuel meltdown that would lead to much higher releases of radioactive material. Mr. Jaczko’s testimony came as the American Embassy in Tokyo, on advice from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, told Americans to evacuate a radius of “approximately 50 miles” from the Fukushima plant.The advice represents a graver assessment of the risk in the immediate vicinity of Daiichi than the warnings made by the Japanese themselves, who have told everyone within 20 kilometers, about 12 miles, to evacuate, and those between 20 and 30 kilometers to take shelter. Mr. Jaczko’s testimony, the most extended comments by a senior American official on Japan’s nuclear disaster, described what amounts to an agonizing choice for Japanese authorities: Send a small number of workers into an increasingly radioactive area in a last-ditch effort to cover the spent fuel, and the fuel in other reactors, — with water, or do more to protect the workers but risk letting the pools of water protecting the fuel boil away — and thus risk a broader meltdown. The Japanese authorities have never been as specific as Mr. Jascko was in his testimony about the situation at reactor No. 4, where they have been battling fires for more than 24 hours. It is possible the authorities there disagree with Mr. Jascko’s conclusion about the exposure of the spent fuel, or that they have chosen not to discuss the matter for fear of panicking people.Experts say workers at the plant probably could not approach a fuel pool that was dry, because radiation levels would be so high. In a normally operating pool, the water provides not only cooling but also shields workers from gamma radiation. A plan to dump water into the pool, and others like it, from helicopters was suspended because the crews would be flying right into a radioactive plume. Mr. Jaczko’s analysis suggests that a potentially dangerous chain of events could unfold, as workers trying to cool the adjacent reactors at the facility could also be exposed to intolerable levels of radiation. If they, too, had to withdraw, the problem could worsen, as reactor cores were go uncooled and spent fuel pools run dry. Earlier in the day, Japanese authorities announced a different escalation of the crisis at Daiichi when they said that a second reactor unit at the plant may have suffered damage to its primary containment structure and appeared to be releasing radioactive steam.
The break, at the No. 3 reactor unit, worsened the already perilous conditions at the plant, a day after officials said the containment vessel in the No. 2 reactor had also cracked.The possibility of high radiation levels above the plant prompted the Japanese military to put off a highly unusual plan to dump water from helicopters — a tactic normally used to combat forest fires — to lower temperatures in a pool containing spent fuel rods that was dangerously overheating at the No. 4 reactor. The operation would have meant flying a helicopter into the steam rising from the plant. But in one of a series of rapid and at times confusing pronouncements on the crisis, the authorities insisted that damage to the containment vessel at the No. 3 reactor — the main focus of concern earlier on Wednesday — was unlikely to be severe. Yukio Edano, the chief cabinet secretary, said the possibility that the No. 3 reactor had “suffered severe damage to its containment vessel is low.” Earlier he said only that the vessel might have been damaged; columns of steam were seen rising from it in live television coverage. The reactor’s operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company, said it had been able to double the number of people battling the crisis at the plant to 100 from 50, but that was before the clouds of radioactive steam began billowing from the plant. On Tuesday, 750 workers were evacuated, leaving a skeleton crew of 50 struggling to reduce temperatures in the damaged facility. An increasing proportion of the people at the plant are soldiers, but the exact number is not known. The Pentagon said Wednesday that American military forces in Japan were not allowed within 50 miles of the plant and that some flight crews who might take part in relief missions were being given potassium iodide to protect against the effects of radiation. Tokyo Electric said Wednesday that some of those at the plant had taken cover for 45 minutes on site, and left water pumps running at reactors Nos. 1, 2 and 3. There was no suspension of cooling operations, said Kazuo Yamanaka, an official at Tokyo Electric. The vessel that possibly ruptured on Wednesday had been seen as the last fully intact line of defense against large-scale releases of radioactive material from the stricken reactor, but it was not clear how serious the possible breach might be. The possible rupture, five days after a devastating earthquake and tsunami crippled the plant, followed a series of explosions and other problems there that have resulted in the world’s worst nuclear crisis since the Chernobyl accident in 1986. The head of the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, Yukiya Amano, who is Japanese, said he would leave for Japan as soon as possible to assess the situation. The revised official assessment of the severity of the damage at the No. 3 reactor may have been intended to reduce some concerns about the containment vessel, which encloses the core, but the implications of overheating in the fuel rod pool at No. 4 seemed potentially dire.
There are six reactors at the plant, all of which have pools holding spent fuel rods at the top level of the reactor building. Reactors 4, 5 and 6 were out of service when the earthquake and tsunami struck, and there were concerns about the pools at 5 and 6 as well, and possibly those at the other reactors.
At a hearing in Washington on Wednesday held by two subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Energy Secretary Steven Chu said, “We think there is a partial meltdown” at the plant.
“We are trying to monitor it very closely,” he said. “We hear conflicting reports about exactly what is happening in the several reactors now at risk. I would not want to speculate about what is happening.”
He said that his agency had sent 39 people to the American Embassy and to United States consulates in Japan “with the skills, expertise and equipment to help assess, survey and monitor areas.” The department has also shipped survey equipment that can measure radiation levels from the air, he said.The developments were the latest in Japan’s swirling tragedy since the quake and tsunami struck the country with unbridled ferocity last Friday. Emperor Akihito made his first ever televised appearance on Wednesday to tell the nation he was “deeply worried” about the nuclear crisis. International alarm about the nuclear crisis appeared to be growing, as several nations urged their citizens in Japan to head to safer areas in the south or leave the country. Prior advisories had largely been limited to simply avoiding nonessential travel. Germany urged its citizens to move to areas farther away from the stricken nuclear plant. Earlier Wednesday morning, Tokyo Electric reported that a fire was burning at the No. 4 reactor building, just hours after officials said flames that erupted Tuesday had been doused. A government official at Japan’s nuclear regulatory agency soon after said that flames and smoke were no longer visible, but he cautioned that it was unclear if the fire had died out. He also was not clear if it was a new fire or if the fire Tuesday had never gone out. www.nytimes.com/2011/03/17/world/asia/17nuclear.html?_r=1&hp
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Post by ninathedog on Mar 17, 2011 1:33:52 GMT 4
Clinton: No interest in job if Obama wins in 2012Associated Press – 1 min agoWASHINGTON – Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Wednesday she does not want to stay in her job if President Barack Obama wins a second term in 2012. The nation's top diplomat also firmly said she neither has plans to mount another White House bid nor interest in other posts, such as vice president or defense secretary. Clinton, visiting Cairo, was asked whether she would stay on in a second Obama term. She also was asked if she would like the jobs of president, vice president or defense secretary. She offered single word responses to each: "No." Speculation about Clinton's future is always high and she has been mentioned as a possible successor to Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who has told Obama he is stepping down. In an interview with CNN, Clinton made clear she has no interest in running the Pentagon or repeating her 2008 presidential run. "You know, I had a wonderful experience running and I am very proud of the support I had and very grateful for the opportunity, but I'm going to be, you know, moving on," Clinton said. "I am doing what I want to do right now and I have no intention or any idea even of running again. I'm going to do the best I can at this job for the next two years," she said. Clinton and Obama competed in 2008 for the Democratic presidential nomination. Obama bested her, won the White House and then named his one-time rival his top diplomat. Clinton immediately became one of the highest profile members of Obama's Cabinet. She has kept a busy international schedule and has been mentioned as a possibly candidate in 2016. "There isn't anything that I can imagine doing after this that would be as demanding, as challenging or rewarding," Clinton said. news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110316/ap_on_re_us/us_clinton2nd_term
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Post by ninathedog on Mar 18, 2011 3:14:39 GMT 4
Japan's nuke-plant battle may take weeks, US saysBy Eric Talmadge And Mari Yamaguchi, Associated Press – 45 mins agoYAMAGATA, Japan – Emergency workers seemed to try everything they could think of Thursday to douse one of Japan's dangerously overheated nuclear reactors: helicopters, heavy-duty fire trucks, even water cannons normally used to quell rioters. But they couldn't be sure any of it was easing the peril at the tsunami-ravaged facility. Three reactors have had at least partial meltdowns, but an even greater danger has emerged. Japanese and U.S. concerns were increasingly focusing on the pools used to store spent nuclear fuel: Some of the pools are dry or nearly empty and the rods could heat up and spew radiation.It could take days and "possibly weeks" to get the complex under control, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Gregory Jazcko said. He defended the U.S. decision to recommend a 50-mile evacuation zone for its citizens, a much stronger measure than Japan has taken. A senior official with the U.N.'s nuclear safety agency said there had been "no significant worsening" at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant but that the situation remained "very serious." Graham Andrew told reporters in Vienna that nuclear fuel rods in two reactors were only about half covered with water, and in a third they were also not completely submerged. If the fuel is not fully covered, rising temperatures and pressure will increase the chances of complete meltdowns that would release much larger amounts of radioactive material than the failing plant has emitted so far. Low levels of radiation have been detected well beyond Tokyo, which is 140 miles (220 kilometers) south of the plant, but hazardous levels have been limited to the plant itself. Still, the crisis triggered by last week's earthquake and tsunami has forced thousands to evacuate and drained Tokyo's normally vibrant streets of life, its residents either leaving town or holing up in their homes. President Barack Obama appeared on television to assure Americans that officials do not expect harmful amounts of radiation to reach the U.S. or its territories. He also said the U.S. was offering Japan any help it could provide, and said he was asking for a comprehensive review of U.S. nuclear plant safety. Japanese and American assessments of the crisis have differed, with the plant's owner denying Jazcko's report Wednesday that Unit 4's spent fuel pool was dry and that anyone who gets close to the plant could face potentially lethal doses of radiation. But a Tokyo Electric Power Co. executive moved closer to the U.S. position Thursday. "Considering the amount of radiation released in the area, the fuel rods are more likely to be exposed than to be covered," Yuichi Sato said. Workers have been dumping seawater when possible to control temperatures at the plant since the quake and tsunami knocked out power to its cooling systems, but they tried even more desperate measures on Unit 3's reactor and cooling pool. Two Japanese military CH-47 Chinook helicopters began dumping seawater on Unit 3 on Thursday morning, defense ministry spokeswoman Kazumi Toyama said. The choppers doused the reactor with at least four loads of water in just the first 10 minutes, though television footage showed much of it appearing to disperse in the wind. Chopper crews flew missions of about 40 minutes each to limit their radiation exposure, passing over the reactor with loads of about 2,000 gallons (7,500 liters) of water. Another 9,000 gallons (35,000 liters) of water were blasted from military trucks with high-pressure sprayers used to extinguish fires at plane crashes, though the vehicles had to stay safely back from areas deemed to have too much radiation. Special police units with water cannons were also tried, but they could not reach the targets from safe distances and had to pull back, said Yasuhiro Hashimoto, a spokesman for Japan's nuclear safety agency. Unit 3's reactor uses a fuel that combines plutonium, better known as an ingredient in nuclear weapons, and reprocessed uranium. The presence of this mixed oxide fuel, or MOX, means potentially that two very harmful radioactive products could be released into the environment. Tokyo Electric Power said it believed workers were making headway in staving off a catastrophe both with the spraying and, especially, with efforts to complete an emergency power line to restart the plant's own electric cooling systems. "This is a first step toward recovery," said Teruaki Kobayashi, a facilities management official at the power company. He said radiation levels "have somewhat stabilized at their lows" and that some of the spraying had reached its target, with one reactor emitting steam. "We are doing all we can as we pray for the situation to improve," Kobayashi said. Authorities planned to spray again Friday, and Kobayashi said: "Choices are limited. We just have to stick to what we can do most quickly and efficiently." Work on connecting the new power line to the plant was expected to begin Friday and take 10 to 15 hours, said Nuclear Safety Agency spokesman Minoru Ohgoda. But the utility is not sure the cooling systems will still function. If they don't, electricity won't help. Four of the plant's six reactors have seen fires, explosions, damage to the structures housing reactor cores, partial meltdowns or rising temperatures. Officials also recently said temperatures are rising even in the spent fuel pools of the other two reactors.The troubles at the nuclear complex were set in motion by last Friday's 9.0-magnitude earthquake and tsunami, which knocked out power and destroyed backup generators needed for the reactors' cooling systems. That added a nuclear crisis on top of twin natural disasters that likely killed well more than 10,000 people and left hundreds of thousands homeless. Mario V. Bonaca, a physicist (who) sits on an advisory committee to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said he believes the focus of the effort has shifted to the spent fuel pools. "I understand that they've controlled the cooling of the cores," said Bonaca, who said he was basing his understanding on NRC and industry sources. The storage pools need a constant source of cooling water. Even when removed from reactors, uranium rods are still extremely hot and must be cooled for months, possibly longer, to prevent them from heating up again and emitting radioactivity.While a core team of 180 emergency workers has been rotating in and out of the complex to avoid exposure, experts said that anyone working close to the reactors was almost certainly being exposed to radiation levels that could, at least, give them much higher cancer risks. Experts note, though, that radiation levels drop quickly with distance from the complex. While elevated radiation has been detected well outside the evacuation zone, experts say those levels are not dangerous. U.S. officials were taking no chances. In Washington, the State Department warned U.S. citizens to consider leaving the country and offered voluntary evacuation to family members and dependents of U.S. personnel in the cities of Tokyo, Yokohama and Nagoya.The first flight left Thursday, with fewer than 100 people onboard, Undersecretary of State Patrick Kennedy said. Plans also call for airlifting several thousand family members of U.S. armed forces personnel as well as nonessential staff stationed in Japan in the coming days. The U.S. evacuation zone is far bigger than that established by Japan, which has called for a 12-mile zone and has told those within 20 miles to stay indoors. Daniel B. Poneman, U.S. deputy secretary of energy, said at the briefing that his agency agreed with the 50-mile zone — but said Japan's measures were also prudent. Nearly a week after the earthquake and tsunami, police said more than 452,000 people were staying in schools and other shelters, as supplies of fuel, medicine and other necessities ran short. Both victims and aid workers appealed for more help, as the chances of finding more survivors dwindled. Noriko Sawaki lives in a battered neighborhood in Sendai that is still without running water and food or gasoline supplies and that, she said, makes life exhausting. "It's frustrating, because we don't have a goal, something to strive for. This just keeps on going," said the 48-year-old. In the town of Kesennuma, people lined up to get into a supermarket after a delivery of key supplies, such as instant rice packets and diapers. Each person was only allowed to buy 10 items, NHK television reported. With diapers hard to find in many areas, an NHK program broadcast a how-to session on fashioning a diaper from a plastic shopping bag and a towel. ___ Yamaguchi reported from Tokyo. Associated Press writers George Jahn in Vienna, Elaine Kurtenbach, Shino Yuasa, Jeff Donn and Tim Sullivan in Tokyo contributed to this report.news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110317/ap_on_bi_ge/as_japan_earthquake
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Post by ninathedog on Mar 18, 2011 3:25:40 GMT 4
Obama reassures: Japan's radiation won't reach USAssociated Press – 11 mins agoWASHINGTON – President Barack Obama, trying to reassure a worried nation, declared Thursday that "harmful levels" of radiation from the Japanese nuclear disaster are not expected to reach the U.S., even as other officials conceded it could take weeks to bring the crippled nuclear complex under control. The situation remains dangerous and complicated at the damaged Fukushima Dai-ichi reactors in northeastern Japan, U.S. officials said."We've seen an earthquake and tsunami render an unimaginable toll of death and destruction on one of our closest friends and allies in the world," Obama said in brief remarks at the White House after a visit to the Japanese Embassy to offer his condolences. Obama said he had asked the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to conduct a "comprehensive review" of the safety of all U.S. nuclear plants."When we see a crisis like the one in Japan, we have a responsibility to learn from this event and to draw from those lessons to ensure the safety and security of our people," Obama said. There are 104 nuclear reactors in the United States, providing roughly 20 percent of the nation's electricity. "Nuclear energy is an important part of our own energy future," Obama said. Meanwhile, the first evacuation flight of U.S. citizens left Japan, the State Department said. In the U.S., Customs and Border Protection said there had been reports of radiation being detected from some cargo arriving from Japan at several airports, including ones in Chicago, Dallas and Seattle.
Radiation had not been detected in passengers or luggage. And none of the reported incidents involved harmful amounts.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said the agency was screening passengers and cargo for "even a blip of radiation." (oh, the irony. You send passengers through those machines and now...)Obama said he knows that Americans are worried about potential risks from airborne radiation that could drift across the Pacific. "So I want to be very clear," he said. "We do not expect harmful levels of radiation to reach the United States, whether it's the West Coast, Hawaii, Alaska or U.S. territories." Obama defended the recommendation of federal nuclear safety officials for a 50-mile evacuation zone around the crippled nuclear power plant for American troops and citizens in Japan, even though that is far larger than the zone spelled out by Japanese officials. "This decision was based on a careful scientific evaluation," Obama said. "Beyond this 50-mile radius, the risks do not currently call for an evacuation." At the same time, he said it was important to evacuate Americans "who may be endangered by exposure to radiation if the situation deteriorates." Japanese officials have established a 12-mile evacuation zone and have said that people living 12 to 20 miles from the plant should stay inside. Gregory Jaczko, chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, told reporters at a White House briefing it could be some time before the crisis is brought under control as crews work to cool spent-fuel rods and get the damaged Japanese reactors under control. The activity could continue for days and "possibly weeks," Jaczko said.He said the U.S. recommendation that American troops and citizens stay 50 miles away from the nuclear complex was "a prudent and precautionary measure to take." But he also said "basic physics" suggested there was little risk to anyone in the United States or its Pacific territories. Daniel B. Poneman, deputy secretary of energy, told the briefing that a "very dangerous situation" remains in Japan. Information at the nuclear plant is "genuinely complex and genuinely confusing," he said. As the officials spoke, Japanese emergency workers sought to regain control of the dangerously overheated nuclear complex, dousing it with water from police cannons, fire trucks and helicopters to cool nuclear fuel rods that were threatening to spray out more radiation. The U.S. Energy Department said it had conducted two separate aerial tests to measure how much radioactive material had been deposited in Japan. Those data, Poneman said, were consistent with the recommendation for Americans to evacuate a 50-mile radius around the plant. The U.S. officials declined to criticize the Japanese call for a smaller evacuation zone. "We're analyzing the information, and we're sharing it with the Japanese," said Poneman. "The preliminary look has indicated that the measures that have been taken (by the Japanese) have been prudent ones. And we have no reason to question the assessment that has been made or the recommendation that has been made by the Japanese authorities." At his visit to the Japanese Embassy, Obama signed a condolence book and said: "We feel a great urgency to provide assistance to those ... who are suffering." In the book he wrote, "My heart goes out to the people of Japan during this enormous tragedy. Please know that America will always stand by one of its greatest allies during this time of need." "Because of the strength and wisdom of its people, we know that Japan will recover, and indeed will emerge stronger than ever," he wrote. The crisis has been complicated by the spare and often contradictory information issued by the Japanese government and the Tokyo Electric Power Co., heightening a sense of uncertainty about what's happening in the reactors. "It's not easy to get information from the site," said White House spokesman Jay Carney. Carney said the fact that Obama had taken the rare step of asking the NRC — an independent regulatory agency that is not under the president's control — to undertake a review of U.S. reactor safety in light of the Japanese disaster "only adds to the urgency of that mission." Representatives of the nuclear energy industry said Thursday that operators of U.S. reactors already had begun taking steps to better prepare for an emergency in this country. While it will take some time to understand the true dimensions of the nuclear disaster in Japan, "we will learn from them, we will get that operating experience, we will apply it and try to make our units even safer than they are today," said Anthony Pietrangelo, senior vice president of the Nuclear Energy Institute, a Washington-based industry lobbying group. Some lawmakers, including Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, have suggested the administration should do more to re-examine the nation's aging network of nuclear power plants with an eye toward making them more accident-proof. In other countries, China has said it would hold off on approving new nuclear plants, and Germany has said it would temporarily switch off seven aging reactors. Earlier this week, European Union energy officials agreed to apply stress tests to plants across the 27-nation bloc. Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero commissioned studies to determine how vulnerable his country's six nuclear plants are to earthquakes or flooding. Carney, when asked why the United States was not taking the more stringent measures of some other countries, said Obama had "full confidence" the NRC was doing its job. news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_us_japan
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Post by emeraldsun on Mar 19, 2011 10:28:08 GMT 4
This is a heartwarming report from Anne, located in Sendai, Japan. To be Shared... A letter from Sendai ANNE THOMAS 3/14/2011 published online @ Ode magazine Things here in Sendai have been rather surreal. But I am very blessed to have wonderful friends who are helping me a lot. Since my shack is even more worthy of that name, I am now staying at a friend's home. We share supplies like water, food and a kerosene heater. We sleep lined up in one room, eat by candlelight, share stories. It is warm, friendly, and beautiful. During the day we help each other clean up the mess in our homes. People sit in their cars, looking at news on their navigation screens, or line up to get drinking water when a source is open. If someone has water running in their home, they put out a sign so people can come to fill up their jugs and buckets. It's utterly amazingly that where I am there has been no looting, no pushing in lines. People leave their front door open, as it is safer when an earthquake strikes. People keep saying, "Oh, this is how it used to be in the old days when everyone helped one another." Quakes keep coming. Last night they struck about every 15 minutes. Sirens are constant and helicopters pass overhead often. We got water for a few hours in our homes last night, and now it is for half a day. Electricity came on this afternoon. Gas has not yet come on. But all of this is by area. Some people have these things, others do not. No one has washed for several days. We feel grubby, but there are so much more important concerns than that for us now. I love this peeling away of non-essentials. Living fully on the level of instinct, of intuition, of caring, of what is needed for survival, not just of me, but of the entire group. There are strange parallel universes happening. Houses a mess in some places, yet then a house with futons or laundry out drying in the sun. People lining up for water and food, and yet a few people out walking their dogs. All happening at the same time. Other unexpected touches of beauty are first, the silence at night. No cars. No one out on the streets. And the heavens at night are scattered with stars. I usually can see about two, but now the whole sky is filled. The mountains are Sendai are solid and with the crisp air we can see them silhouetted against the sky magnificently. And the Japanese themselves are so wonderful. I come back to my shack to check on it each day, now to send this e-mail since the electricity is on, and I find food and water left in my entranceway. I have no idea from whom, but it is there. Old men in green hats go from door to door checking to see if everyone is OK. People talk to complete strangers asking if they need help. I see no signs of fear. Resignation, yes, but fear or panic, no. They tell us we can expect aftershocks, and even other major quakes, for another month or more. And we are getting constant tremors, rolls, shaking, rumbling. I am blessed in that I live in a part of Sendai that is a bit elevated, a bit more solid than other parts. So, so far this area is better off than others. Last night my friend's husband came in from the country, bringing food and water. Blessed again. Somehow at this time I realize from direct experience that there is indeed an enormous Cosmic evolutionary step that is occurring all over the world right at this moment. And somehow as I experience the events happening now in Japan, I can feel my heart opening very wide. My brother asked me if I felt so small because of all that is happening. I don't. Rather, I feel as part of something happening that much larger than myself. This wave of birthing (worldwide) is hard, and yet magnificent. Thank you again for your care and Love of me, With Love in return, to you all, Anne Link here: www.odemagazine.com/
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Post by ninathedog on Mar 19, 2011 18:53:25 GMT 4
www.accessrx.com/charlie-consumerTry making this hand gesture and see that it is not at all a natural arrangement of the fingers. If you are reaching for something, would you naturally hold your two middle fingers together in such an awkward pose? If you were drawing an illustration for a cartoon, would you arrange the fingers in this gesture? Or would you have the fingers spread evenly, as a person naturally does when reaching for something? My independent research. Histogen, Inc. loses staff. my10online.com/2011/01/hair-styling-101/Yes, we found out who! www.newswiretoday.com/news/33940/It looks like Eagles Disobey is telling the truth! Secure Medical is partnered with Histogen, Inc. www.securemedical.com/partners.htm"Histogen’s focus is on the research, development, manufacturing.." Secure Medical, Inc. Owned by John Rao, the man who purchased the IUFOC's rights, is located in TEMPE, ARIZONA! My independent research also shows that is exactly where OPEN MINDS TV is located! That means that the dead convicted child molestor's (Wendelle Steven's) archive, who Open Minds did a story on for his funeral and allowed the IUFOC an impassioned speech about him, is the same facility where VIAGRA is being counted out by a pharmacist. www.securemedical.com/company.htmAccording to my independent research that means that Drs. Dan and Marci saw the pharmacist counting out the sex-aid pills on the same floor and within "60 feet" of where Wendelle Steven's Ufology work is stored. That's beyond bad taste, but maybe THEY don't look at it that way? www.skepticfiles.org/ufo1/sfemeier.htmFARMER'S TALES OF SPACE TRAVEL WON'T FLY WITH MANY UFO BUFFS, by Keay Davidson, EXAMINER Science Writer THE SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER June 24th, 1987 "In 1983, Stevens was convicted of child molestation in Pima County, AZ. He is now serving time in the Arizona State Prison and declined to be interviewed."Oh boy could you just see him and those like him with a handfull of accessrx.com's little blue pills! My research has found that's secure medical's storefront, and by god on their front page bottom right is says "CHARLIE CONSUMER" under "Learning Center." www.accessrx.com/charlie-consumerStop by there. Maybe that's how he sees Joe Lunchbox, you too! Yeah I can see him looking at your son or daughter and saying, 'LET ME TALK TO YOU ALONE ABOUT ALIENS!' Oh but don't worry if a man like that passes something along to your kid. accessrx, "powered by secure medical" also handles antiherpes medication. By, Anonymous
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Post by ninathedog on Mar 23, 2011 2:17:40 GMT 4
Israel admits kidnapping operations manager of Gaza's only power plantJonathan Cook Last Updated: Mar 23, 2011 The NationalMaria, 3, stands in front of a portrait of her father, Dirar Abu Sisi, during a demonstration in Gaza yesterday calling for his release. Adel Hana / AP PhotoNAZARETH // Israel admitted this week that it was behind the abduction of the operations manager of Gaza's only power plant, who disappeared more than a month ago while travelling on a train in Ukraine. Israeli officials confirmed in a statement that Mr Dirar Abu Sisi, 42, was being held in Israel's Shikma prison, near Ashkelon, after a judge partially lifted reporting restrictions late on Sunday. However, the explanation for Mr Abu Sisi's abduction and detention are still covered by the gag order, which has been extended by a judge for 30 days. The whereabouts of Mr Abu Sisi, an engineer, had been the subject of intense speculation since he disappeared on February 18 travelling on a train to the Ukrainian capital, Kiev. Suspicions that he might have been kidnapped and taken to Israel were first raised by the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees earlier this month. Mr Abu Sisi's family and the Israeli human rights group Hamoked contacted Maksim Butkevych, the Commissioner's spokesman in Ukraine, who demanded the Ukraine investigate his "violent abduction". A few days after his disappearance, Mr Abu Sisi's wife, Veronika, a Ukrainian national, in statements to the media, accused the Israeli spy agency Mossad of seizing him to extract information that could be used to disable Gaza's power station in a future confrontation with the enclave's Hamas rulers. Israel bombed the plant during its three-week assault on Gaza in the winter of 2008, causing widespread blackouts in the territory. Mr Abu Sisi's family also suggested another reason why Israeli might consider him a high-value target. They say he had recently developed methods of reducing the plant's dependency on high-grade diesel fuel, which Gaza buys from Israel. Hamas officials, in January, said the station's turbines had been modified to work on regular diesel, which is cheaper and can be smuggled in through tunnels from Egypt.The Israeli media, citing no sources, have suggested that Mr Abu Sisi is a senior Hamas activist, an allegation denied by his family. One of Mr Abu Sisi's Israeli lawyers, Smadar Ben Nathan, who met him for the first time at the court hearing on Sunday, said she believed Israel had carried out the operation based on false information. She called the abduction a "miscalculation", saying Israeli interrogators had dropped their original line of questioning. She said the gag order prevented her from further discussing the case. Ms Ben Nathan said she expected Mr Abu Sisi to be indicted in the coming weeks on some kind of security charges. Although the Mossad is suspected of carrying out many assassinations on foreign soil, including the murder of a Hamas operative, Mahmoud Mabhouh, in a Dubai hotel last year, Ms Ben Nathan could think of only two similar examples of the spy agency seizing individuals in foreign countries and bringing them to trial: Adolph Eichmann, a Nazi official and one of the main organisers of the Holocaust, and Mordechai Vanunu, a nuclear whisteblower. Eichmann was snatched in 1960 in Argentina, Mr Vanunu in Italy in 1986. Victor Kattan, an international law expert at the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London, said Israel had broken several international human rights laws in seizing him rather than following extradition procedures. Israel and Ukraine have signed an extradition treaty. According to an account by the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, three men, two of them in uniform, dragged Mr Abu Sisi, hooded and handcuffed, from his train carriage at a stop en route to Kiev, where he was due to meet his brother. He was later interrogated in an apartment by six people who identified themselves as Mossad agents, before being put on a plane. The flight took about four hours. The plane then made another flight of about an hour to Israel, the centre said in a statement, which it said was based on statements by an unnamed Israeli lawyer who it said had access to Mr Abu Sisi. Mr Abu Sisi's brother, Yousef, accused Ukraine of being "deeply involved", adding that he had spent three weeks being "kicked like a football from one office to another" as he sought help from the police and various intelligence agencies. "At one point an official even threatened to make me disappear," he said. Mr Abu Sisi was in Ukraine to apply for citizenship so the couple could emigrate with their six children, his brother said. "He was desperate to leave Gaza and take his children to Ukraine away from the Israeli bombs and attacks. How could he be a threat?" According to Veronika, her husband had encountered problems at an interior ministry office in the city of Kharkiv earlier on the day of his disappearance. Officials there had briefly refused to return his passport. So far Ukraine has kept a low profile on the incident. During an official visit to Israel last week the Ukrainian prime minister, Mykola Azarov, said the circumstances around Mr Abu Sisi's disappearance were still confusing. "We don't have clear information right now … I don't want to imagine that such things are carried out on the soil of a friendly state," the prime minister said in an interview with the Israeli daily Haaretz. foreign.desk@thenational.ae www.thenational.ae/news/worldwide/middle-east/israel-admits-kidnapping-operations-manager-of-gazas-only-power-plant?pageCount=0
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Post by satchmo on Mar 25, 2011 8:33:22 GMT 4
Millions Against Monsanto Campaign 2011
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Post by ninathedog on Mar 29, 2011 23:44:25 GMT 4
For 12-year old astrophysics prodigy, the sky’s the limitBy Zachary Roth The Lookout 2 hrs 38 mins agoIn some ways, Jacob Barnett is just like any other 12-year-old kid. He plays Guitar Hero, shoots hoops with his friends, and has a platonic girlfriend. But in other ways, he's a little different. Jake, who has an IQ of 170, began solving 5,000-piece jigsaw puzzles at the age of 3, not long after he'd been diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome, a mild form of autism. A few years later, he taught himself calculus, algebra, and geometry in two weeks. By 8, he had left high school, and is currently taking college-level advanced astrophysics classes—while tutoring his older classmates. And he's being recruited for a paid researcher job by Indiana University. Now, he's at work on a theory that challenges the Big Bang—the prevailing explanation among scientists for how the universe came about. It's not clear how developed it is, but experts say he's asking the right questions. "The theory that he's working on involves several of the toughest problems in astrophysics and theoretical physics," Scott Tremaine of Princeton University's Institute for Advanced Studies—where Einstein (pictured) himself worked—wrote in an email to Jake's family. "Anyone who solves these will be in line for a Nobel Prize." Here you can watch Jake question some of the key elements of Albert Einstein's theories on quantum physics: It's not clear where Jake got his gifts from. "Whenever I try talking about math with anyone in my family," he told the Indianapolis Star, "they just stare blankly." But his parents encouraged his interests from the start. Once, they took him to the planetarium at Butler University. "We were in the crowd, just sitting, listening to this guy ask the crowd if anyone knew why the moons going around Mars were potato-shaped and not round," Jake's mother, Kristine Barnett, told the Star. "Jacob raised his hand and said, 'Excuse me, but what are the sizes of the moons around Mars?' " After the lecturer answered, said Kristine, "Jacob looked at him and said the gravity of the planet ... is so large that (the moon's) gravity would not be able to pull it into a round shape." "That entire building ... everyone was just looking at him, like, 'Who is this 3-year-old?'" news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thelookout/20110329/ts_yblog_thelookout/for-12-year-old-astrophysics-prodigy-the-skys-the-limitwww.youtube.com/watch?v=YFmrlIEpJOE
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Post by satchmo on Mar 30, 2011 19:15:32 GMT 4
EPA Set To Increase Radioactive Release Guidelines!
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Post by satchmo on Mar 30, 2011 21:37:55 GMT 4
Obama administration restricts findings on Gulf’s dead dolphinsBiloxi - The Obama administration has issued a gag order on data over the recent spike of dead dolphins, including many stillborn infants, washing up on Mississippi and Alabama shorelines, and scientists say the restriction undermines the scientific process. An abnormal dolphin mortality this year along the Gulf coast has become part of a federal criminal investigation over last year’s BP oil spill disaster and as a result, has led the US government to clamp down on biologists’ findings, with orders to keep the results confidential. The dolphin die-off, labeled an “unusual mortality event (UME),” resulted in wildlife biologists being contracted by the National Marine Fisheries Service to record the recent spike in dolphin deaths by collecting tissue samples and specimens for the agency, but late last month were privately ordered to keep their results under wraps. Reuters has obtained a copy of the agency letter that states, in part: “Because of the seriousness of the legal case, no data or findings may be released, presented or discussed outside the UME investigative team without prior approval.” One biologist involved with tracking dolphin mortalities for over 20 years and speaking on the condition of anonymity, told Reuters that: “It throws accountability right out the window. We are confused and ... we are angry because they claim they want teamwork, but at the same time they are leaving the marine experts out of the loop completely.” Some scientists said they have received a personal rebuke from government officials about “speaking out of turn” to the media over attempts at determining the dolphins’ deaths. Additionally, these scientists say the collected specimens and samples are being turned over to the government for evaluation under a deal that omits independent scientists from the final results of lab tests. Almost 200 dead bottlenose dolphin bodies have been found since mid-January through this week along shorelines of Gulf coast states, including Florida, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana, Reuters notes. About half of the carcasses are newborns or stillborn infants. That number is around 14 times the average numbers recorded during the same time frame between 2002 and 2007 and has coincidentally occurred during the first calving season since the BP Deepwater Horizon debacle last year in the Gulf. Although many of the dolphin specimens recently collected show no outward signs of oil contamination, lab analysis is crucial in helping to determine their deaths. Some experts believe the recent surge of deaths is the result of dolphins inhaling or ingesting oil during the oil spill, the results of which are just now beginning to show their toll, including a possible upsurge in dolphin miscarriages. The recent spike in dolphin deaths has compounded the dolphin mortality problem, as scientists were already busy attempting to determine the deaths of nearly 90 dead dolphins, mostly adults, that washed up along the US Gulf coast during the weeks and months after the BP disaster. Some are questioning the Marine Fisheries Service, part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and its delay in providing dolphin samples to laboratories. “It is surprising that it has been almost a full year since the spill, and they still haven't selected labs for this kind of work,” said Ruth Carmichael, of the independent Dauphin Island Sea Lab, located in Alabama, according to Reuters. “I can only hope that this process is a good thing. I just don’t know. This is an unfortunate situation,” she added. Officials with the NOAA state the confidentiality measures are an integral part of the current investigation over the BP oil spill. “We are treating the evidence, which are the dolphin samples, like a murder case,” said Dr. Erin Fougeres, a Fisheries Service marine biologist, Reuters notes. “The chain of custody is being closely watched. Every dolphin sample is considered evidence in the BP case now,” she added. www.digitaljournal.com/article/305096#ixzz1HsjsqUUn
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Post by ninathedog on Mar 31, 2011 3:25:24 GMT 4
Libya's foreign minister defectsSenior official arrives in the UK as Britain gives marching orders to five Libyan diplomats citing national security.Aljazeera Last Modified: 30 Mar 2011 21:28Moussa Koussa, the Libyan foreign minister, has defected to the United Kingdom, the British foreign ministry has confirmed.The ministry said in a statement that Koussa had arrived at Farnborough Airport, in the south of England, on a flight from Tunisia on Wednesday. "He travelled here under his own free will. He has told us that he is resigning his post. We are discussing this with him and we will release further details in due course," the statement said. "We encourage those around Gaddafi to abandon him and embrace a better future for Libya that allows political transition and real reform that meets the aspirations of the Libyan people." It added that Koussa was one of the most senior officials in Gaddafi's government with a role to represent it internationally, which is "something that he is no longer willing to do". Tunisia's TAP news agency said on Monday that Koussa had crossed over into Tunisia from Libya. A government spokesman in the Libyan capital Tripoli had earlier denied speculation that he had defected. "He is on a diplomatic mission," Mussa Ibrahim, the spokesman, said. He gave no further details. Diplomats expelledEarlier on Wednesday, the British government announced the expulsion of Libya's military attache and four other diplomats in protest and for intimidating opposition groups in London.A government source quoted by Reuters said the diplomats, believed to be supporters of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, have been given seven days to leave. William Hague, the British foreign minister, told legislators the move was to "underline our grave concern at the regime's behaviour". "... we have today taken steps to expel five diplomats at the Libyan embassy in London, including the military attache," he said in parliament on Wednesday. "The government also judged that, were those individuals to remain in Britain, they could pose a threat to our security." Hague also announced that a British diplomatic mission led by senior diplomat Christopher Prentice had visited the rebel-held city of Benghazi earlier this week, and met key opposition groups including Mustafa Abdel Jalil, the head of the rebel Libyan National Council. Britain has long treated Libya as a rogue state. The 1984 shooting of a London policewoman from inside the Libyan embassy, the Libyan arming of IRA guerrillas in Northern Ireland and the 1988 Lockerbie airline bombing over Scotland, for which a Libyan was convicted, contributed to Gaddafi being branded a pariah. A foreign office spokesman, the expelled diplomats were thought to be strong Gaddafi supporters. "We won't go into details on their activities," the spokesman said. "But we believe they are among the strongest Gaddafi supporters in the embassy, that they have put pressure on Libyan opposition and student groups in the UK and that there is a risk of damage to UK national security if they remain." Arms debateBritain hosted an international conference on Tuesday that piled pressure on Gaddafi to quit and pledged to continue military action against his forces until he complies with a UN resolution to protect civilians. At the London meeting, the question of arming Libyan rebels moved up the international agenda, although both Britain and the United States said they had taken no decision to supply arms.On Wednesday, David Cameron, the British prime minister, repeated that line, adding that UN resolution 1973 allowed all necessary measures to protect civilians. "Our view is that this would not necessarily rule out the provision of assistance to those protecting civilians in certain circumstances," Cameron told parliament. "So ... we do not rule it out but we have not taken the decision to do so." Expressing his reservations, British foreign minister Hague said introducing new weapons into a conflict could have "unforeseeable and unknown consequences". "Such considerations would have to be very carefully weighed before the government changed its policy on this matter," he added. english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2011/03/2011330151017941970.html(many thanks to Tom V)
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