The color of the sky as far as I can see is coal grey.
Lift my head from the pillow and then fall again.
I get a shiver in my bones just thinking about the weather.
A quiver in my lip as if I might cry…
“What a cold and rainy day. Where on earth is the sun hid away?”
– Natalie Merchant
Lift my head from the pillow and then fall again.
I get a shiver in my bones just thinking about the weather.
A quiver in my lip as if I might cry…
“What a cold and rainy day. Where on earth is the sun hid away?”
– Natalie Merchant
Fistfight on the set: NY Daily News
Now back to our regularly scheduled news bucket…
so here’s an interesting article on elephants and PTSD: NYT
A long article, but worth the read.
(Hat tip to Liz for mentioning this the other night and sending me the link!)
Allow me to also recommend this article. I saw it the other day – fascinating, and lots of food for thought.
Link
Encouraging Japan to build nuclear weapons, shipping food aid via submarines, and running secret sabotage operations inside North Korea’s borders are among a raft of policy prescriptions pushed by prominent U.S. neo-conservatives in the wake of Pyongyang’s nuclear test.
Writing in publications from National Review Online (NRO) to the New York Times, neo-conservatives claim, contrary to the lessons drawn by “realist” and other critics of the George W. Bush administration, that Monday’s test vindicates their long-held view that negotiations with “rogue” states like North Korea are useless and that “regime change” — by military means, if necessary — is the only answer.
No, that’s what happens when you refuse to engage your enemies in productive discussion. It’s called diplomacy and it’s not just a precursor to preemptive war. No matter how you twist it, IT WORKED during the Clinton years.
The more the American people wake up, hopefully the more the neocon narrative will sound like the mindless babble it is.
W.R. Grace & Co. must pay $54.5 million to remove asbestos-contaminated soil from the mining town of Libby, Mont., the Supreme Court has decided. The U.S. EPA sued the company five years ago to recover cleanup costs; a lower court ruled in the agency’s favor and Grace appealed, but the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals and now the U.S. Supreme Court have both upheld that lower-court ruling. Libby is among the most contaminated Superfund sites in the U.S., thanks to Grace’s nearly-30-year operation of a mine for asbestos-tainted vermiculite. The Libby mine once produced about 80 percent of the world’s supply of vermiculite, which was used as insulation in hundreds of thousands of buildings. In its ruling, the 9th Circuit Court wrote that about 12,000 residents of Libby and nearby communities “face ongoing, pervasive exposure to asbestos particles … We cannot escape the fact that people are sick and dying as a result of this continuing exposure.” Several former Grace bigwigs are being investigated in a separate criminal case for allegedly concealing health risks at the mine.
Astronomers believe that “super-Earths” (worlds orbiting other starts that weigh between 5 and 15 times Earth) are rocky ice balls rather than gas giants like Jupiter. While theorists can explain how such worlds form around Sun-like stars, the discovery of super-Earths around tiny red dwarf stars was surprising. New research suggests that some super-Earths build up rapidly when local temperatures drop and ices condense out of the surrounding gas. And in a related story, astronomers are seeking the public’s help to find and understand planets outside our solar system. But you don’t need an advanced degree or even a telescope to participate–just a computer, access to the Internet, and an interest in astronomy.
A new species of mouse, long thought extinct, has been discovered on Cyprus, a species of extinct giant camel has been found in Syria, and a colorful bird new to science has been discovered in a previously unexplored Andean cloud forest, spurring efforts to protect the area, conservation groups have announced.
Hopefully this is more than just “greenwashing”: Reuters reports (via Grist) that chemical giant DuPont will undertake a major sustainability program that it expects will put an extra $6 billion in its coffers by 2015. “We see sustainable growth as the biggest market opportunity on the horizon for the next two or three decades,” said CEO Charles Holliday Jr. In the next decade, the company plans to double spending on R&D into eco-friendlier products and services, introducing at least 1,000 easier-on-the-earth alternatives such as synthetic fibers with biological instead of petrochemical components, less greenhouse-gassy refrigerants, and lower-toxin automotive finishes. The company also plans to double its annual revenue from non-depletable resources such as biofuels to $8 billion by 2015. Since 1990, DuPont has reduced its emissions of air carcinogens by more than 90 percent and greenhouse-gas emissions by 72 percent; in the next decade it aims to further reduce both, as well as water consumption in areas with stressed supplies. “All these goals we think are good for the shareholder, not just the right thing for the environment,” Holliday says.
Insects could be frighteningly large if only there was a greater concentration of oxygen in the air, a new study concludes. The study adds support to the theory that some insects were much larger during the late Paleozoic period because they had a much richer oxygen supply. The Paleozoic period, about 300 million years ago, was a time of huge and abundant plant life and large insects — dragonflies had two-and-a-half-foot wingspans, for example. The air’s oxygen content was 35% during this period, compared to the 21% we breathe now.
Thick clouds of dust rising up from the Sahara Desert are linked to less frequent Atlantic hurricanes, says a new study. Studying satellite data from 1981 to the present, researchers noted that dust clouds were scarce in years with intense hurricane activity, while years with strong dust storms coincided with fewer hurricanes. “While a great deal of work has focused on the links between [hurricanes] and warming ocean temperatures, this research adds another piece to the puzzle,” says study coauthor Jonathan Foley. When Saharan dust storms form, particularly in the summer and winter, millions of tons of sand can travel across the Atlantic Ocean at up to 50 miles an hour, reaching the Caribbean and Florida in as little as five days. Unfortunately, note the researchers, while dust storms may dampen brewing hurricanes, they may also shift them farther to the west, increasing the chance of contact with Caribbean islands and the U.S.
As ranch hand W knows, knocking down mesquite hasn’t been a problem in the past. Picking it up and getting it off the land has, said a Texas Agricultural Experiment Station researcher. That will change with a new mesquite harvester for use in wood-to-ethanol production. A prototype machine was demonstrated recently, but it won’t be the only one for long – commercial production is expected soon.
Talks on extending a UN-led fight against global warming beyond 2012 may last until 2010 to allow a wider US role after President George W. Bush steps down, a UN expert said on Wednesday.
Natural climate change, induced by tiny shifts in Earth’s rotational axis and orbit, periodically wipes out species of mammals, a study published on Thursday says. Paleontologists have long puzzled over fossil records that, remarkably, suggest mammal species tend to last around two and a half million years before becoming extinct. Climate experts and biologists overlaid a picture of species emergence and extinction with changes that occur in Earth’s orbit and axis.
I love the article about DuPont. Companies don’t understand that pollution is not part of doing business, it is WASTE. I read a study that said that US coal fired power plants WASTE enough energy in a year to power all of Japan.
I read a brilliant book that talked about shifting taxation away from income. Instead, tax a company for creating pollution and having a low-wage workforce. If you don’t pollute and you pay your workers high wages and provide things like health coverage, you reduce your tax burden. If we prevent companies from creating these negative situations, society wins because government doesn’t have to solve problems, the problems aren’t created in the first place.
Click for larger image.
I just heard a good joke that I just have to share:
Why do Republicans not use bookmarks?
They just bend over pages.
LOL…this had our whole office busting up this a.m. :>)