Lab by lab in and around San Francisco Monday SAN FRANCISCO conjures up images of hippies and of free love, the psychedelic 60s and leftist politics. A member of Jefferson Airplane, a rock band, described it as “49 square miles surrounded by reality”. It has always had that air. In a letter written in 1889, [...]
Archive for July, 2009
Techs and the city
Posted in Biological sciences, Natural sciences, Physical sciences on July 31, 2009 | Comments Off
A taste of the Taliban
Posted in Conflicts and wars, tagged Nigeria on July 31, 2009 | Comments Off
An Islamist insurgency in the north of Nigeria comes on top of another in the Delta VIOLENCE has often disfigured religion in Nigeria. Usually, it has been a matter of bloody confrontation between Muslims and Christians in the middle of the country, where the largely Muslim north rubs up against the mainly Christian south. This [...]
Are We What We Search?
Posted in Economy and business, Politics, Strange but true on July 31, 2009 | Comments Off
Ancient Greece had the Oracle at Delphi. The Shang dynasty had oracle bones. Contemporary America has Google. Earlier this month, Lawrence Summers, President Obama’s top economic adviser, unveiled a new class of tea leaf to gauge the direction of the American economy: Google searches. The number of queries for “Great Depression,” which surged earlier in [...]
Why Vampires Never Die
Posted in Entertainment on July 31, 2009 | Comments Off
TONIGHT, you or someone you love will likely be visited by a vampire — on cable television or the big screen, or in the bookstore. Our own novel describes a modern-day epidemic that spreads across New York City. It all started nearly 200 years ago. It was the “Year Without a Summer” of 1816, when [...]
Today’s papers – July 31, 2009
Posted in Today's Papers, tagged July 31 2009 on July 31, 2009 | Comments Off
In Afghanistan, U.S. May Shift Strategy The Washington Post leads with word that the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan has written an assessment report that proposes to make several changes to the way U.S. and NATO troops operate in Afghanistan. Gen. Stanley McChrystal wants to increase the number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan to help [...]
What’s Wrong With a Single-Payer System?
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Health on July 31, 2009 | Comments Off
In late May, dozens of health care reform activists staged a protest outside the San Francisco Federal Building while waiting to deliver petitions to U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Gail Collins: David, your writing on health care has been incredibly thoughtful, so I’m going to take this opportunity to poke you a little. [...]
It’s Crunch Time for Israel on Iran
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Editorials and opinion, tagged Iran, Israel on July 30, 2009 | Comments Off
After years of failed diplomacy no one will be able to call an attack precipitous. Legions of senior American officials have descended on Jerusalem recently, but the most important of them has been Defense Secretary Robert Gates. His central objective was to dissuade Israel from carrying out military strikes against Iran’s nuclear weapons facilities. Under [...]
What if Washington Were a Ghost Town?
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Politics on July 30, 2009 | Comments Off
What FDR and Nixon might say to their partisan heirs. If Franklin Delano Roosevelt, president of the United States through the Great Depression and World War II—if FDR, that canny old political operator, that shrewd judger of men, that merry spinner (“First thing we do is deny we were in Philadelphia!”) that cold calculator (he [...]
Obamacare’s Tactical Retreat
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Health on July 30, 2009 | Comments Off
Yesterday, Barack Obama was God. Today, he’s fallen from grace, the magic gone, his health-care reform dead. If you believed the first idiocy — and half the mainstream media did — you’ll believe the second. Don’t believe either. Conventional wisdom always makes straight-line projections. They are always wrong. Yes, Obama’s aura has diminished, in part [...]
Today in History – July 30
Posted in This day in history, tagged July 30 on July 30, 2009 | Comments Off
Today is Thursday, July 30, the 211th day of 2009. There are 154 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History On July 30, 1945, during World War II, the battle cruiser USS Indianapolis, which had just delivered components for the atomic bomb that would be dropped on Hiroshima, was torpedoed by a Japanese [...]
Today’s papers – July 30, 2009
Posted in Today's Papers, tagged July 30 2009 on July 30, 2009 | Comments Off
New Poll Finds Growing Unease on Health Plan The New York Times and Wall Street Journal‘s world-wide newsbox lead with new polls that show the American public is growing increasingly concerned that an overhaul of health care would have a negative impact in their own lives. The NYT highlights that the percentage of Americans who [...]
The Pelosi Jobs Tax
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Health on July 30, 2009 | Comments Off
Workers will pay for the new health-care payroll levy. Even many Democrats are revolting against Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s 5.4% income surtax to finance ObamaCare, but another tax in her House bill isn’t getting enough attention. To wit, the up to 10-percentage point payroll tax increase on workers and businesses that don’t provide health insurance. This [...]
The Blue Dogs’ Final Dilemma
Posted in Economy and business, Politics on July 30, 2009 | Comments Off
Do they work for us, or do we work for them? With the health-care bill faltering in Congress, the ritual weeping has begun over the death, once again, of “bipartisanship.” The belief that the answer to any problem lies with “the center” may be the greatest superstition in the ever-magical world of American politics. Mostly [...]
Fannie Med
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Health on July 30, 2009 | Comments Off
The bipartisan Senate negotiators are leaning toward proposing a health-care Fannie Mae. The details of the Senate Finance Committee’s hush-hush health talks aren’t fully known, but leaks suggest that one all-but-certain highlight will be new federally created health “cooperatives” to compete against private insurers. The onus is on Republican negotiators Chuck Grassley and Mike Enzi [...]
Banishing Our Friends
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Editorials and opinion, Politics on July 30, 2009 | Comments Off
The State Department revokes the visas of Honduran officials. The State Department announced Tuesday that it revoked the diplomatic visas of four Honduran officials because the U.S. doesn’t recognize the interim government of Roberto Micheletti. Hondurans can be forgiven if they recall the bitter Vietnam-era joke that while it can be dangerous to be America’s [...]
Obama’s Great Health Scare
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Health on July 29, 2009 | Comments Off
The president resorts to the politics of fear. On the campaign trail last year, Barack Obama promised to end the “politics of fear and cynicism.” Yet he is now trying to sell his health-care proposals on fear. At his news conference last week, he said “Reform is about every American who has ever feared that [...]
Today in History – July 29
Posted in This day in history, tagged July 29 on July 29, 2009 | Comments Off
Today is Wednesday, July 29, the 210th day of 2009. There are 155 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History On July 29, 1958, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act, creating NASA. On this date: In 1030, the patron saint of Norway, King Olaf II, was killed in [...]
‘America Is Rarely This Softspoken’
Posted in Economy and business, Politics on July 29, 2009 | Comments Off
High-level negotiations in Washington between the US and China reflect a growing sense that the two powers are on top of the world. But for the first time in decades, the US is taking a remarkably conciliatory tone with its Asian rival. In an ambitious two-day summit in Washington, top officials from the United States [...]
Dropping the shopping
Posted in Economy and business on July 29, 2009 | Comments Off
Can America wean itself off consumption? The first of a series on how the world’s four biggest economies must change to ensure sustainable global growth GENERAL ELECTRIC has historically been a manufacturer, but in the long boom leading up to the financial crisis it became more like a bank. Half its profit came from its [...]
Arrest that plaque!
Posted in Health on July 29, 2009 | Comments Off
How to detected hardened arteries before they cause a heart attack HEART disease is usually the consequence of years of poor health. The endothelial cells that line a healthy person’s blood vessels secrete substances that not only assist blood flow but also prevent the build-up of plaques—dangerous clumps of protein that, if dislodged, can cause [...]
Death of a Doctrine
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Editorials and opinion, Politics on July 29, 2009 | Comments Off
Obama Discovers Engagement’s Limits The Obama administration lacks a foreign policy ideology as a matter of ideology. Speaking recently at the Council on Foreign Relations, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asserted, “Rigid ideologies and old formulas don’t apply.” The torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans — tempered by pragmatism, proud of [...]
Microsoft and Yahoo Reach Deal on Search Partnership
Posted in Computers, Economy and business on July 29, 2009 | Comments Off
Microsoft and Yahoo announced a partnership in Internet search and advertising on Wednesday morning intended to create a stronger rival to the industry powerhouse Google. The Microsoft-Yahoo pact is a measured step that represents a pragmatic division of duties between the two companies instead of the blockbuster deal Microsoft initiated last year, when it bid [...]
Today’s papers – July 29, 2009
Posted in Today's Papers, tagged July 29 2009 on July 29, 2009 | Comments Off
Recovery Signs in Housing Market Stir Some Hope The New York Times leads, while the Wall Street Journal and USA Today go high, with new data that suggest there might be a light at the end of the tunnel for the housing market. Eight cities saw increases in real estate prices in May, and an [...]
Aging: Eating Fish May Ward Off Dementia
Posted in Health on July 29, 2009 | Comments Off
Many studies have suggested that a diet rich in fish is good for the heart. Now there is new evidence that such a diet may ward off dementia as well. One of the largest efforts to document a connection — and the first such study undertaken in the developing world — has found that older [...]
In Battle, Hunches Prove to Be Valuable
Posted in Natural sciences on July 29, 2009 | Comments Off
Jennifer Murphy, a psychologist at the Army Research Institute, demonstrated a test used to determine the characteristics of service members who might have exceptional abilities at detecting roadside bombs. The sight was not that unusual, at least not for Mosul, Iraq, on a summer morning: a car parked on the sidewalk, facing opposite traffic, its [...]
The Gates of Political Distraction
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Law, Politics on July 29, 2009 | Comments Off
Obama’s mistake was falling for a culture war diversion. The essential point about Gates-gate, or the tempest over last week’s arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr., is this: Most liberal commentary on the subject has taken race as its theme. Conservative commentators, by contrast, have furiously hit the class button. Liberals, by and [...]
The Birds of America
Posted in Birds of America, tagged 121, 122, 123 on July 28, 2009 | Comments Off
Nyctea scandiaca Harfang des Neiges / Snowy Owl Québec’s emblematic bird, the Snowy Owl, is the largest owl in North America. A daytime and night-time hunter, its binocular vision is unique, allowing it to judge distances and its prey equally well! It feeds mainly on lemmings in the summer and on other small mammals and [...]
Today in History – July 28
Posted in This day in history, tagged July 28 on July 28, 2009 | Comments Off
Today is Tuesday, July 28, the 209th day of 2009. There are 156 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History On July 28, 1609, the English ship Sea Venture, commanded by Admiral Sir George Somers, ran ashore on Bermuda after nearly foundering at sea during a storm. The 140 or so passengers and [...]
His invasion of Russia failed miserably, leaving a trail of corpses from Moscow all the way to Paris. In a new book, one historian blames not the wintry march but the spread of “war plague” — typhus — through Napoleon’s Grand Army. Napoleon’s soldiers faced a deadly march home from the ruins of Moscow, made [...]
Crackles of hatred
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Media on July 28, 2009 | Comments Off
Silencing murderous messages is not as easy as it sounds LAST year, as Kenya slid into mayhem, the words that sputtered forth from crude transmitters were cryptic but, to those in the know, horrifying. “People of the milk”, a reference to the cattle-owning Kalenjin people, were urged to “take out the weeds in our midst”— [...]
