Today is Sunday, June 28, the 179th day of 2009. There are 186 days left in the year. Today’s Highlights in History On June 28, 1919, the Treaty of Versailles was signed in France, ending World War I. In Independence, Mo., future president Harry S. Truman married Elizabeth Virginia Wallace. On this date: In 1389, [...]
Archive for June, 2009
Today in History – June 28
Posted in This day in history, tagged June 28 on June 28, 2009 | Comments Off
Today’s papers – June 28
Posted in Today's Papers, tagged June 28 on June 28, 2009 | Comments Off
U.S. and Russia Differ on a Treaty for Cyberspace The New York Times leads with a look at the push-and-pull between the United States and Russia over how to regulate cyberspace, an increasingly perilous frontier as governments rely more on computer networks and hackers get better at destroying them. On the cybersecurity question: Russia wants [...]
The Birds of America
Posted in Birds of America, tagged 55, 56, 57 on June 28, 2009 | Comments Off
Requlus cuvieri / Roitelet de Cuvier Cuvier’s Kinglet A mysterious and intriguing bird, Cuvier’s Kinglet was never seen again after Audubon had observed it, painted it, and named it “Cuvier’s Wren”, in honour of Baron Cuvier, French naturalist. Mystérieux et intrigant, cet oiseau n’a jamais été revu après qu’Audubon l’ait aperçu, peint et nommé « roitelet de [...]
Solved: riddle of Siberia’s flattened forest
Posted in Physical sciences on June 28, 2009 | Comments Off
Trees flattened by the explosion at Tunguska – the blast was equivalent to a 20-megaton nuclear bomb. A century on, scientists say massive explosion was caused by comet collision A massive explosion that flattened an entire forest in northern Russia over an area of 800 square miles more than a century ago was almost certainly [...]
Another Detainee Debacle
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Editorials and opinion, Law, tagged Guantanamo on June 28, 2009 | Comments Off
How a Syrian man tortured and imprisoned by al-Qaeda wound up at Guantanamo for seven years. ABDULRAHIM Abdul Razak Al Ginco traveled to Afghanistan in 2000 and spent several days in a guest house used by Taliban and al-Qaeda operatives before setting off for an al-Qaeda training camp. The Syrian citizen, who now uses the [...]
The Debt Tsunami
Posted in Economy and business, Editorials and opinion, Politics on June 28, 2009 | Comments Off
The CBO’s latest warning on the long-term deficit is scarier than ever. THE CONGRESSIONAL Budget Office has a tough job: to provide America’s lawmakers with a reality check on their tax and spending plans. Not surprisingly, the CBO’s projections are not always received cheerfully. Both President Obama and leading congressional Democrats were less than thrilled [...]
Invent, Invent, Invent
Posted in Economy and business, Editorials and opinion on June 28, 2009 | Comments Off
I was at a conference in St. Petersburg, Russia, a few weeks ago and interviewed Craig Barrett, the former chairman of Intel, about how America should get out of its current economic crisis. His first proposal was this: Any American kid who wants to get a driver’s license has to finish high school. No diploma [...]
Judgment Calls From the Glass Houses
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Living on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
Have you noticed the overtone of glee in some of the media commentary about South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford’s confession of an extramarital affair with a woman in Argentina? The merriment is unbecoming, and it is based on a virtue that many of the gleeful themselves don’t possess. Sanford, to be sure, probably brought the [...]
Iran pledges a ‘crushing’ response to US critiques
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Politics, tagged Iran on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
In this image issued by the semi-official Iranian Students News Agency, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, speaks during a ceremony of judiciary in Tehran, Iran on Saturday June, 27, 2009. Iranian authorities have barred journalists for international news organizations from reporting on the streets and ordered them to stay in their offices. This report is based [...]
Location, Location, Location
Posted in On Language, tagged June 28 2009 on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
You think newspaper journalists don’t check their facts as assiduously as in the Old Days? You say we are unduly influenced by blogospherics, willing to put out whatever comes in? Let me disabuse you. “I’m working on a wedding announcement,” e-mails my Times colleague Rosalie Radomsky, “and have come across a groom, Albert Naggar, who [...]
Hawking Health Care in Prime Time
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Health on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
It was a bit like planning the dream wedding only to have a hurricane rip away the chapel roof as you make your way down the aisle. ABC News and the White House probably thought they had scored a coup in arranging “Questions for the President: Prescription for America,” a prime-time opportunity (with a followup [...]
Today in History – June 27
Posted in This day in history, tagged June 27 on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
Today is Saturday, June 27, the 178th day of 2009. There are 187 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History On June 27, 1844, Mormon leader Joseph Smith and his brother, Hyrum, were killed by a mob in Carthage, Ill. On this date: In 1787, British historian Edward Gibbon completed The History of [...]
Animal fats pancreas cancer link
Posted in Health on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
Red meat is a source of animal fats Eating a diet high in red meat and dairy products is linked to an increased risk of pancreatic cancer, a US study has suggested. Researchers followed 500,000 people who had completed a food diary for an average of six years. The Journal of the National Cancer Institute [...]
The Birds of America
Posted in Birds of America, tagged 52, 53, 54 on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
Caprimulgus carolinensis Engoulevent de Caroline / Chuck-willis-widow A night-hunting bird, the Chuck-willis-widow is the largest of its species. It is found in the eastern United States where its population is expanding. Its territory is located in pine and oak groves, where it can catch insects in flight. Its length is 31 cm. Oiseau nocturne, l’engoulevent [...]
In need of a clean
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Energy and Environment on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
America’s climate-change bill is a bundle of compromises THE headline is a big one: for the first time, America’s House of Representatives agreed, by 219 votes to 212, on Friday June 25th to cap emissions of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas. The bill envisions modest reductions of 17% from 2005 levels by 2020, but [...]
Silence Has Consequences for Iran
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Editorials and opinion, Politics, tagged Iran on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
The less we protest, the more people will die. If there hadn’t been dissidents in the Soviet Union, the Communist regime never would have crumbled. And if the West hadn’t been concerned about their fate, Soviet leaders would have ruthlessly done away with them. They didn’t because the Kremlin feared the response of the Free [...]
The Climate Change Climate Change
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Energy and Environment on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
The number of skeptics is swelling everywhere. Steve Fielding recently asked the Obama administration to reassure him on the science of man-made global warming. When the administration proved unhelpful, Mr. Fielding decided to vote against climate-change legislation. If you haven’t heard of this politician, it’s because he’s a member of the Australian Senate. As the [...]
Iran’s Lessons
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Politics, tagged Iran on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
Shouldn’t ‘realism’ mandate regime change? EACH DAY Iran’s extremist regime offers the world new lessons in its true nature. Yesterday we heard the cynicism of the Guardian Council, which announced that this month’s presidential election, in the words of its spokesman, “was the cleanest we have ever had.” On Thursday the belligerent arrogance of President Mahmoud [...]
Entertainment – June 27
Posted in Entertainment Today, tagged June 27 on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
The Susan Boyle Experience What was Susan Boyle? Not who: that we know. She’s a stout, plain, 48-year-old Scotswoman whose bravura performance of the “Les Misérables” anthem of entitlement, “I Dreamed a Dream,” on a British talent show in April became a hugely popular YouTube clip. Then in May, a tabloid reaction — or something [...]
The S.C. Firecracker
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Living, Politics on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
The only good news this week for Gov. Mark (“I love your tan lines”) Sanford is that all those celebrity deaths have knocked him off the top of the news cycle. For the rest of us, the whole vanishing-governor-sneaks-off-to-visit-Argentine-squeeze has had a number of side benefits. The Appalachian Trail has certainly gotten a well-deserved shot [...]
No Recovery in Sight
Posted in Economy and business, Editorials and opinion on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
How do you put together a consumer economy that works when the consumers are out of work? One of the great stories you’ll be hearing over the next couple of years will be about the large number of Americans who were forced out of work in this recession and remained unable to find gainful employment [...]
Today’s papers – June 27
Posted in Today's Papers, tagged June 27 on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
House Passes Landmark Emissions Bill The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and the Los Angeles Times lead with, and the Washington Post off-leads, the 219-212 passage of a sweeping House bill that would cap greenhouse gas emissions and shift the country toward new energy sources. The NYT spends its first couple of paragraphs establishing [...]
No Smiting
Posted in Religion on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
God has mellowed. The God that most Americans worship occasionally gets upset about abortion and gay marriage, but he is a softy compared with the Yahweh of the Hebrew Bible. That was a warrior God, savagely tribal, deeply insecure about his status and willing to commit mass murder to show off his powers. But at [...]
A Pesky Paparazzo Stalks the Wily Berlusconi
Posted in Politics, tagged Berlusconi, Italy on June 27, 2009 | Comments Off
Italian Seeks Big Bucks for Racy Photos; ‘I Have a Nose for Him’ When Italian Prime Minister Silvio throws a party at his villa here on the island of Sardinia, Antonello Zappadu is usually hiding in the bushes, dressed in military fatigues and snapping photos with a high-power zoom. Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi casts [...]
Infidelity is no longer a career-killer for politicians. But weirdness, mendacity and ineptitude just might be. Familiar as it was in its essential plot, the agony of Mark Sanford this week was curiously singular in its theatrical detail. Sex has upended so many political careers in the last few years that we have become dully [...]
White House Is Drafting Executive Order to Allow Indefinite Detention of Terror Suspects
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Law, Politics, tagged Guantanamo on June 26, 2009 | Comments Off
The Obama administration, fearing a battle with Congress that could stall plans to close the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, is drafting an executive order that would reassert presidential authority to incarcerate terrorism suspects indefinitely, according to three senior government officials with knowledge of White House deliberations. Such an order would embrace claims by former [...]
Obama and Congress Clash on How to Pay for Health Care
Posted in Economy and business, Health, Politics on June 26, 2009 | Comments Off
President Obama, with the vice president and governors, said adding to the deficit was not an option. Any health care legislation, he said, “must and will be paid for.” It has become the trillion-dollar question: can President Obama find that much in spending cuts and tax increases to keep his campaign promise to overhaul the [...]
The Albany-Trenton-Sacramento Disease
Posted in Economy and business, Editorials and opinion on June 26, 2009 | Comments Off
How three liberal states got into deep trouble with ‘progressive’ ideas. President Obama has bet the economy on his program to grow the government and finance it with a more progressive tax system. It’s hard to miss the irony that he’s pitching this change in Washington even as the same governance model is imploding in [...]
Does the US Still Care about Germany?
Posted in Politics, tagged Germany, Merkel, Obama, United States on June 26, 2009 | Comments Off
German Chancellor Angela Merkel was in Washington Thursday evening to receive an award for her contributions to trans-Atlantic relations. But with few politicians in attendance, she might have gotten the feeling that Germany no longer carries its former weight in the US capital. German Chancellor Angela Merkel was at the Library of Congress on Thursday [...]
Horror of Kenya’s ‘witch’ lynchings
Posted in Living, Politics, Religion, tagged Kenya on June 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Joseph Ondieki, at the grave of his mother, who was burned as a witch Villagers, many straight from their farms, and armed with machetes, sticks and axes, are shouting and crowding round in a big group in Kenya’s fertile Kisii district. I can’t see clearly what is going on, but heavy smoke is rising from [...]
