Today is Saturday, Oct. 31, the 304th day of 2009. There are 61 days left in the year. This is Halloween. A reminder: Daylight-saving time ends Sunday at 2 a.m. local time. Clocks go back one hour. Today’s Highlight in History On Oct. 31, 1517, Martin Luther posted the 95 Theses on the door of [...]
Archive for October, 2009
Today in History – October 31
Posted in This day in history, tagged October 31 on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
Largest Bat In Europe Inhabited Northeastern Spain More Than 10,000 Years Ago
Posted in Animals, Natural sciences on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
This is what the bat, Nyctalus lasiopterus, looks like nowadays. Spanish researchers have confirmed that the largest bat in Europe, Nyctalus lasiopterus, was present in north-eastern Spain during the Late Pleistocene (between 120,000 and 10,000 years ago). The Greater Noctule fossils found in the excavation site at Abríc Romaní (Barcelona) prove that this bat had [...]
Don’t turn up the heat on the West
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Energy and Environment, tagged Canada on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
By making Western provinces pay for adventures in global warming policy we will be playing with Confederation. An article on The Globe’s front page carrying the headline “Canada can meet its climate goals, but the West will write the cheques” raises, among many others, two very interesting points. The article is about a study, conducted [...]
Barack and Michelle Obama: Mr & Mrs show irks voters
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Media, Politics on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
As political woes mount, not all have been won over by the first couple’s intimate revelations With difficult state elections and a crucial military decision looming, President Barack Obama sat down with his wife Michelle last month to give an in-depth magazine interview about a subject that has hitherto not ranked highly on the White [...]
Opening Up A Colorful Cosmic Jewel Box
Posted in Physical sciences, Space on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
The FORS1 instrument on the ESO Very Large Telescope (VLT) at ESO’s Paranal Observatory was used to take this exquisitely sharp close up view of the colorful Jewel Box cluster, NGC 4755. The telescope’s huge mirror allowed very short exposure times: just 2.6 seconds through a blue filter (B), 1.3 seconds through a yellow/green filter [...]
Keats Speaks
Posted in On Language, tagged November 1 2009 on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
“I have explored all these paths, which are more in number than your eyelashes,” says the John Keats of Jane Campion’s new movie, “Bright Star,” as he escorts Fanny Brawne, the young woman he is about to fall in love with, through a sparse wood. It’s a nice line, and when she tells him that [...]
Hillary Clinton says Pakistan does not really want to stop al-Qaeda
Posted in Politics, tagged Pakistan on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
Hillary Clinton was greeted by Ghalib Iqbal, the Pakistani chief protocol officer, when she arrived for her three-day tour of Pakistan. Hillary Clinton chastised Pakistan yesterday for not making enough effort to seize senior al-Qaeda leaders who she said were hiding in the lawless tribal region bordering Afghanistan. “I find it hard to believe that [...]
‘Please, send me back to jail’
Posted in Law, Weird cases on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
“A man’s home is where his wife lives,” the chief justice declared in an English case in 1863. But a Sicilian magistrate recently heard a plea from a man who was trying to be sent to jail to avoid living with his wife. Holy Gambino, a 30-year old builder, had been convicted and sentenced to [...]
Obama seeking options on forces
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Editorials and opinion, Politics, tagged Afghanistan, Iraq on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
President looks to send fewer additional troops President Obama has asked the Pentagon’s top generals to provide him with more options for troop levels in Afghanistan, two U.S. officials said late Friday, with one adding that some of the alternatives would allow Obama to send fewer new troops than the roughly 40,000 requested by his [...]
Kennedy Surprised by ‘Such Strong American Outrage to the Wall’
Posted in Editorials and opinion, History, Politics, tagged Berlin Wall on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
The Day Berlin Was Divided An elderly East German couple is prevented from crossing the border from East Berlin to West Berlin on Aug. 13, 1961, the day the Berlin Wall went up. US diplomat William R. Smyser was stationed in Berlin when the Wall went up in 1961. In an interview with SPIEGEL ONLINE, [...]
No end in sight
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Politics, tagged Iraq on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
Bombs and politics in Iraq Another “spectacular” raises doubts about American troop withdrawals TWO car bombs that exploded on October 25th in the centre of Baghdad claimed the lives of at least 155 people and injured more than 700. The main targets were the Ministry of Justice and the office of the governor of Baghdad [...]
The Carnivore’s Dilemma
Posted in Economy and business, Editorials and opinion, Energy and Environment on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
IS eating a hamburger the global warming equivalent of driving a Hummer? This week an article in The Times of London carried a headline that blared: “Give Up Meat to Save the Planet.” Former Vice President Al Gore, who has made climate change his signature issue, has even been assailed for omnivorous eating by animal [...]
The House Ethics Committee at Work
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Politics on October 31, 2009 | Comments Off
A computer gaffe has revealed some of the secretive workings of the House ethics committee, including preliminary inquiries into complaints against 19 members and some of their staff. The accidental disclosure, made by a staffer who was later fired, sent a bipartisan jolt through Congress, which is already wary about new and long overdue mandates [...]
Secret Mission Rescues Yemen’s Jews
Posted in Human rights, tagged Yemen on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
UNDER SIEGE: The State Department has resettled about 60 Yemeni Jews in the U.S. since July amid rising violence; more are expected to arrive. Here, the father of Moshe Nahari, who was killed in December, with his daughters outside a court in Yemen following a hearing in the murder case. In his new suburban American [...]
Physicist Makes New High-resolution Panorama Of Milky Way
Posted in Space on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
Full sky panorama of the Milky Way Cobbling together 3000 individual photographs, a physicist has made a new high-resolution panoramic image of the full night sky, with the Milky Way galaxy as its centerpiece. Axel Mellinger, a professor at Central Michigan University, describes the process of making the panorama in the November issue of Publications [...]
Five Best Books on Women’s Suffrage
Posted in History, Politics on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
As the Nov. 3 elections near, Sally McMillen votes for these books on women’s suffrage. 1- In Her Own Right By Elisabeth Griffith Oxford, 1984 This absorbing biography does full justice to Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815-1902), a pivotal figure in the women’s suffrage movement during the 19th century. Elizabeth Griffith details Stanton’s long, fascinating life [...]
Fifty Years of Simplicity as Style
Posted in Language on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
Strunk and White taught us that clear thinking and clear writing go together. A reader of “The Elements of Style” once sent E. B. White a clipping of a book review that misquoted William Strunk as having advised writers to “Use less words!” White wrote back: “I often wish Strunk could come alive so that [...]
The Missiles of October
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Editorials and opinion, History on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
The next hemispheric crisis could involve Venezuela and Iran. “All war is based on deception.” —Sun Tzu In the summer of 1962, the leader of the great Soviet empire, Nikita Khrushchev, faced a serious problem. His huge intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) didn’t work. Their launchers were unreliable, their aim was off and the fuel used [...]
Honduras 1, Hillary 0
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Politics, tagged Honduras on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
A Honduran compromise provides Secretary of State Hillary Clinton with an elegant diplomatic exit. The big news in Honduras is that the good guys seem to have won a four-month political standoff over the exile of former President Manuel Zelaya. Current President Roberto Micheletti agreed yesterday to submit Mr. Zelaya’s request for reinstatement as president [...]
Why Worry?
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Editorials and opinion on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
If Iran and North Korea want the bomb so badly, we should ‘let them have it.’ In the years since the first nuclear bomb was tested in 1945, the world’s major powers have acquired vast arsenals of the devastating weapons. Minor powers have been working feverishly to follow suit. Some unstable and menacing ones, like [...]
Bad Manners From a Dictator
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Politics, tagged Zimbabwe on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
The U.N. is outraged at Robert Mugabe’s rudeness. The United Nations is shocked that its torture inspector has been deported from Zimbabwe. “I think I have never been treated by any government in such a rude manner than by the government of Zimbabwe,” Manfred Nowak huffed on Thursday. The special rapporteur for the U.N. Human [...]
Today in History – October 30
Posted in This day in history, tagged October 30 on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
Today is Friday, Oct. 30, the 303rd day of 2009. There are 62 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History On Oct. 30, 1938, the radio play “The War of the Worlds,” starring Orson Welles, aired on CBS. (The live drama, which employed fake breaking news reports, panicked some listeners who thought the [...]
Hitler eventually dismissed Fritz Darges over an incident with a fly The memoirs of one of Adolf Hitler’s closest aides could shed new light on the Nazi leader’s personal involvement in the Holocaust, media reports say. Fritz Darges, who has died aged 96, was a member of Hitler’s inner circle for four years of the [...]
Out of puff
Posted in Health on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
Tobacco-related deaths Where smoking kills most people NEARLY one in five deaths in rich countries is caused by smoking, according to new data released this week by the World Health Organisation. In 2004, the latest year for which data are available, tobacco use killed an estimated 5.1m people worldwide, or one in every eight deaths [...]
A public row
Posted in Health, Politics on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
Health-care reform in America Democrats are trying to revive the idea of a government-run health plan “IT’S not really a public option, it’s a consumer option.” So declared Nancy Pelosi, speaker of the House of Representatives, this week. Her effort to rebrand the hugely controversial proposal to add a government-run insurer (usually called a “public [...]
Honduras Rivals Reach Zelaya Deal
Posted in Politics, tagged Honduras on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
Representatives of ousted President Manuel Zelaya and Honduras’ interim government signed an agreement late Thursday that could open the way for Mr. Zelaya’s reinstatement. No text of the accord was immediately released, but it was greeted by all sides as a resolution to the long-running political dispute that has polarized the country and subjected it [...]
Too small to lead
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Politics on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
R. Creigh Deeds, the Democratic candidate for Virginia governor, seems poised to lose the jewel in President Obama’s political crown. In November 2008, Obama was the first Democrat since Lyndon Johnson to win the electoral votes of the commonwealth. Obama’s victory was a case study in how he might transform American politics, building an alliance [...]
The Tenacity Question
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Editorials and opinion, tagged Afghanistan on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
Today, President Obama will lead another meeting to debate strategy in Afghanistan. He will presumably discuss the questions that have divided his advisers: How many troops to commit? How to define plausible goals? Should troops be deployed broadly or just in the cities and towns? For the past few days I have tried to do [...]
A Tittle-Tattle World
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Media, Other on October 30, 2009 | Comments Off
I wanted to test the theory that a gossip magazine can gauge the strange state of the global economy and so I found myself at Tatler magazine. In these gloomy days for the press, it’s rather a tonic to visit the headquarters of a publication that’s been around 300 years, took 285 years to turn [...]
Where Do Jews Come From?
Posted in Other, Politics, Religion on October 29, 2009 | Comments Off
This much is known: In the mid-eighth century, the ruling elite of the Khazars, a Turkic tribe in Eurasia, converted to Judaism. Their impetus was political, not spiritual. By embracing Judaism, the Khazars were able to maintain their independence from rival monotheistic states, the Muslim caliphate and the Christian Byzantine empire. Governed by a version [...]
