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Joe Quinn
Last Wednesday, alleged Boston bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, appeared for the first time in court. Much like James Holmes who was accused of the Aurora, Colorado movie theater shooting in July 2012, Tsarnaev appeared confused and distracted in court, and "acted weird". Such behavior is, of course, not necessarily unusual for someone who stands accused of mass murder. In Tsarnaev's case however, we have a problem that can't be explained away so easily.Sott.net 2013-07-14 08:30:00 Check out this video I put together of recent mainstream media reports and a short video of Tsarnaev himself.
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CBS News
2012-05-12 10:32:00
Jacksonville, Florida - A Florida woman who fired warning shots against her allegedly abusive husband has been sentenced to 20 years in prison. Marissa Alexander of Jacksonville had said the state's "Stand Your Ground" law should apply to her because she was defending herself against her allegedly abusive husband when she fired warning shots inside her home in August 2010. She told police it was to escape a brutal beating by her husband, against whom she had already taken out a protective order. CBS Affiliate WETV reports that Circuit Court Judge James Daniel handed down the sentence Friday. Under Florida's mandatory minimum sentencing requirements Alexander could receive a lesser sentence, even though she has never been in trouble with the law before. Judge Daniel said the law did not allow for extenuating or mitigating circumstances to reduce the sentence below the 20-year minimum. "I really was crying in there," Marissa's 11-year-old daughter told WETV. "I didn't want to cry in court, but I just really feel hurt. I don't think this should have been happening." | |
Comment: Shoot an unarmed teenager, walk free. Fire a warning shot at someone who regularly beats you up and you have no other recourse to justice, get 20 years in jail. Only in America.
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Dave Hodges
Activist Post 2013-07-13 14:25:00
After writing my most recent article with regard to what typically happens when a currency collapse takes down a country's economy, many people wrote to me asking me when it is going to happen. The short answer is that I have a hard time predicting the actions of psychopaths. All of us have a hard time predicting the action of others who are so different from the mainstream of America because most of us do not think like psychopaths. However, I can state with certainty that when the last mortgage has been stolen and the last pension has been confiscated, then it will be time to collapse the dollar. Our country should be dubbed, the United States of Psychopathology. Psychopaths are at the root of the world's problems. They kill hundreds of millions in wars which serves no purpose except to enrich themselves. Subsequently, psychopaths such as the Rockefellers and the Rothschilds recruit already compromised psychopaths to do their bidding in both elected office and key administrative positions. The Whole Country Is Going Crazy The United States of America is presently undergoing a mental health crisis. An estimated 26.2% of Americans ages 18 and older suffer from a diagnosable mental disorder in a given year. This figure translates to almost 60 million people who have a diagnosable mental illness. Even though mental disorders are widespread in the population, the main burden of illness is concentrated in a much smaller proportion, which is confined to about 6% of the population, or about 1 in 17 who suffer from a serious mental illness. Nearly half (45%) of those with any mental disorder meet criteria for two or more disorders. In the U.S., mental disorders are diagnosed based on the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fourth edition (DSM-IV).4 | |
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| Puppet Masters |
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Russia Today
160,000 servicemen, 1000 tanks, 130 planes and 70 ships are taking part in Russia's biggest military drill since Soviet times. The war games will continue in the country's Far East until July 20.2013-07-14 07:34:00
The maneuvers are the latest in series of surprise military checks which performed by Russia, in an effort to reveal and oust flaws in the country's defense program. Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu received an order to test the battle readiness of the Eastern command, which unites military forces in the Far East and Trans-Baikal. The request was received from President Vladimir Putin at 01:00 local time (21:00 GMT) on Saturday, July 13. Following the order, 160,000 servicemen were put on high alert and began advancing toward the training sites. According to the Defense Ministry, around 1,000 tanks and armored vehicles, 130 planes and helicopters, and 70 ships are taking part in the war games. Military commanders in the Far East and Trans-Baikal learned of the drill's details only after it had begun, receiving a secret parcel from Defense Minister Shoygu. "The main purpose of the activities is to check the readiness of the military units to perform assigned tasks and evaluate of the level of personnel's training and technical preparation as well as the level of equipment of units with arms and military equipment," the defense ministry said in statement.
The statement noted that the drill would require some units to travel more than 3,000 kilometers from their usual deployment sites. Seven hundred flat wagons and 50 railway cars were assigned to perform the transfer. The ground forces have been given two days to reach their destination. They have been tasked with pitching field camps, masking their positions, and organizing defense strategies upon arrival. | ||
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Danjuma Abdullahi,
PressTV 2013-03-30 11:34:00
The former governor of Abia State in South East Nigeria Orji Uzo Kalu says many Nigerians are aware that security agents were behind some of the bombings in Northern Nigeria but cannot speak for fear of reprisals. Kalu says the security agents are behind these attacks in order to drag fund from the federal government. However, police has rejected these allegations, saying it will not be distracted from its serious job of protecting lives and property. | |
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PressTV
2013-07-07 10:55:00
A section of an Egyptian pipeline supplying gas to Israel and Jordan has been blown up in the Lehfin area south of the city of al-Arish in the Sinai Peninsula. The attack on the gas pipeline occurred early on Sunday on two points on the pipeline and started fires, according to Egyptian officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The fires were extinguished, but the flow of gas was disrupted, they added. No group or individual has claimed responsibility for the attack. The pipeline was attacked several times in 2011 and 2012, but this was the first time the energy link was attacked this year. | |
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YouTube
2012-01-05 10:52:00
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Sharmine Narwani
Intifada 2013-07-06 10:45:00
Freedom and democracy. How I have come to loathe this phrase. Two-lofty-words-and-a-conjunction bandied around by handmaidens of Empire: verbal grenades that can gut entire nations. When I hear "freedom and democracy" I instinctively look for cover - just as "Allahu Akbar" yelled loudly enough can now make Arabs and Muslims hit the ground fast. "Freedom and democracy" is the battle cry for every single western regime-change operation I can remember. Operations that leave innocent civilians dead, cities destroyed - anarchy, corruption and criminality in their wake. In the Middle East, these are dangerous words that have filtered into our vocabulary. People here, intoxicated with their faux revolutions, now spout this silly foreign phrase with the same shrill, mad-eyed, self-righteous conviction as do Americans before they bomb us into 'freedom.' But Arabs and Muslims should dig deep into their recent memory: The first words uttered by you as you rose up against your US-backed dictators were "honor and dignity" - not "freedom and democracy." How did that fact get lost in the mayhem to follow? And why on earth would this distinction make any difference? | |
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Jonathon M. Seidl
The Blaze 2013-07-06 10:35:00
It doesn't even take one page for you to be blown away by Brad Thor's highly successful thriller from last summer "Black List." It's right there on the first page of the preface. But why are we talking about last year's success rather than his latest project ("Hidden Order") slated for release on Tuesday? Because last year's book warned of one of this year's biggest scandals: the NSA spying story. "This is not only real stuff, but it chilled me to the bone," Thor told TheBlaze in a sit-down interview in Salt Lake City, Utah, on Friday. "This" is the NSA's capability to surveil its own citizens - but not just its capability, also its willingness and practice. "I said, 'That's what I'm going to base my thriller, "Black List," on,' and that's what I did." | |
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phys.org
2013-07-15 00:00:00
South Korea's defence ministry said on Monday it has ordered its staff to install a smartphone application that restricts key functions like the camera in an attempt to prevent military leaks. The ministry said that, from Monday, its 1,500 staff are no longer allowed to bring smartphones into their offices without installing the app, called "Mobile Management Device". The order caused a long queue at the gates of the ministry on Monday because some 20 percent of the staff had failed to install the app, officials said. The ministry declined to confirm a report by Yonhap news agency that some staff had refused to install the app due to concerns about privacy. Ministry spokesman Kim Min-Seok told reporters that the app, which restricts the use of cameras and audio recording, prevents leaks through smartphones and stops outsiders from hacking into the devices of defence ministry officials. "We've developed a system to restrict the core functions of smartphones because of concerns that our work could be leaked through them," he said. | |
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Angelique Chrisafis
The Guardian 2013-07-15 08:35:00
Campaigners demand closure of EDF's Tricastin plant, calling it one of France's most dangerous More than 20 Greenpeace activists climbed fences to break into an EDF nuclear power plant in southern France and demanded its closure, the environmental campaign group has said. The activists, dressed in red, broke into the Tricastin plant at dusk on Sunday and unfurled a yellow and black banner on the wall with the words: "Tricastin, nuclear accident - president of the catastrophe?" above a picture of the president, François Hollande. "With this action, Greenpeace is asking François Hollande to close the Tricastin plant, which is among the five most dangerous in France," Yannick Rousselet, in charge of nuclear issues for Greenpeace France, said in a statement. A spokeswoman for EDF denied the activists had reached two of the plant's reactors and said that by 8.30am local time on Monday, 17 of them had been arrested for unauthorised access. Others clung on to metal structures and ladders, she said. | |
Comment: Something to keep in mind here is that across the Channel in the UK, the entire 'green activism movement' going back decades was recently exposed as having been thoroughly infiltrated, to the point that its most 'extreme' acts of protests - not least breaking into and occupying nuclear power plants - were encouraged, planned and led by 'undercover' (secret) police officers and government intelligence operatives.
COINTELPRO in the UK: Undercover British police officer was pivotal in extreme actions of environmental campaigners COINTELPRO in the UK: Undercover Police officers stole identities of dead children to become 'anti-capitalist hippies' Protest movements are crawling with COINTELPRO: Sixth police spy unmasked in British protest movement COINTELPRO: British prosecutors suppressed key evidence to protect undercover 'environmental activist' | |
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Russia Today
2013-07-15 08:24:00
A Pakistani branch of the Taliban has sent hundreds of men to Syria to fight alongside rebels in the battle to topple President Assad. The militant organization has reportedly set up camps, aiming to foster ties with al-Qaeda's central leadership. Taliban commanders told Reuters on Sunday that they decided to join the cause in Syria in order to fight alongside their "Mujahedeen friends." "When our brothers needed our help, we sent hundreds of fighters along with our Arab friends," one senior commander said, mentioning that his group would be providing the general public with videos of their "victories" in Syria. One commander told the agency that the help was sent at the request of "Arab friends." "We have established our own camps in Syria. Some of our people go and then return after spending some time fighting there," a Pakistani Taliban commander said, speaking on condition of anonymity. | |
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Press TV
2013-07-15 12:39:00
The US and Israel have repeatedly threatened to take military action against Iran in order to force the Islamic Republic to halt its uranium enrichment program, which Washington and Tel Aviv claim includes a military component." Israel has threatened to take unilateral action against the Islamic Republic of Iran over the country's nuclear energy program. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on CBS News's Face the Nation on Sunday that Tel Aviv might act against Iran before the United States does. "Our clocks are ticking at a different pace. We're closer than the United States. We're more vulnerable. And therefore, we'll have to address this question of how to stop Iran, perhaps before the United States does," the Israeli prime minister said.Netanyahu also said Iran is edging up to what he called a red line. "They're edging up to the red line. They haven't crossed it yet," he said | |
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Heather Callaghan
Activist Post 2013-07-13 13:56:00
Ag-gag laws are cropping up like Whac-a-Mole across the states in an attempt to protect large-scale farming and cattle operations from those pesky activists who find out about abuse and cruelty. Instead of addressing the systemic issue of transparency and animal/food safety, lobbying leads to more laws that inhibit the freedom to speak out about dismal conditions - clear 1st Amendment violations. Always in the name of "safety" and protecting trade secrets. It's one thing to keep people from committing theft, destruction of property, breaking and entering, intellectual property theft and privacy violations - which basic laws support. But it's wholly another to prosecute well-intentioned tourists or try peaceful protesters as terrorists. The latest to get burned is prominent world photographer and freelancer for National Geographic, George Steinmetz. He often gets government clearance to roam the airways for his aerial photography and uses a motorized paraglider with parachute and what looks like a lawn chair. Even though the ensuing brief arrest on June 28th, and $270 bail each stems from trespassing, the underlying cause (fear) and reason for phone call to the sheriff appear to stem from upholding the Farm Animal and Field Crop and Research Facilities Protection Act. It was one of the first state laws of its kind enacted in 1990 and criminalizes farm photography. | |
Comment: Read more about Ag Gag laws that are established to prosecute activists who document abuses in Factory Farms:
FBI Says Activists Who Investigate Factory Farms Can Be Prosecuted as Terrorists Shocking: Reporting factory farm abuses to be considered "Act of Terrorism" if new laws pass Utah Bill Would Make Videotaping a Factory Farm the Same as Assaulting a Police Officer Business lobby moves to criminalize filming animal abuse on factory farms Why You Can Be Branded a Terrorist for Fighting Animal Abuse State of Iowa Makes Filming Animal Abuse a Crime "Big Farma" still trying to hide their dirty secrets Five states have introduced seven different "Ag-Gag bills" to silence people who try to expose CAFO practices. | |
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newsdaily.com
A Chinese naval fleet was Sunday spotted sailing for the first time through an international strait between northern Japan and Russia's far east, the Japanese defence ministry said.2013-07-14 12:58:00 The two missile destroyers, two frigates and a supply ship passed through the Soya Strait from the Sea of Japan to the Sea of Okhotsk early Sunday, the ministry said. The channel, also known as La Perouse, separates the Russian island of Sakhalin and the northernmost Japanese island of Hokkaido. The five ships took part in joint naval exercises with Russia from July 5-12 off Vladivostok. Two other Chinese naval ships which also took part in the drills were seen moving into the East China Sea on Saturday. The purpose of the Chinese fleet's passage through the Soya Strait is not known, Kyodo news agency quoted a ministry official as saying. On Saturday a fleet of 16 Russian naval ships was seen moving through the Soya Strait into the Sea of Okhotsk, the ministry said. |
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Nation of Change
2013-07-14 12:38:00
Millions of gallons of water laced with toxic chemicals from oil and gas drilling rigs are pumped for consumption by wildlife and livestock with the formal approval from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), according to public comments filed yesterday by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). Contrary to its own regulations, EPA is issuing permits for surface application of drilling wastewater without even identifying the chemicals in fluids used for hydraulic fracturing, also known as fracking, let alone setting effluent limits for the contaminants contained within them. The EPA has just posted proposed new water discharge permits for the nearly dozen oil fields on or abutting the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming as the EPA has Clean Water Act jurisdiction on tribal lands. Besides not even listing the array of toxic chemicals being discharged, the proposed permits have monitoring requirements so weak that water can be tested long after fracking events or maintenance flushing. In addition, the permits lack any provisions to protect the health of wildlife or livestock. "Under the less than watchful eye of the EPA, fracking flowback is dumped into rivers, lakes and reservoirs," stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch, pointing out that in both the current and the new proposed permits the EPA ignores its own rules requiring that it list "the type and quantity of wastes, fluids or pollutants which are proposed to be or are being treated, stored, disposed of, injected, emitted or discharged." | |
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Banoosh
2013-06-17 10:37:00
The proxy war being fought on Syrian Territory by "FSA rebels" #Cantmossadtheassad part2 According to this report, the Al-Quaeda affiliated Islamist group Jabhat al-Nusra is recruiting Syrian revolutionaries into its ranks at an alarming rate. The populations of towns under FSA(Free Syrian Army) control originally welcomed the foreign fighters, as they were less corrupt than their Syrian counterparts who had systematically looted any infrastructure; whole factories with new machinery, exported piece by piece over the border to Turkey to be sold as scrap metal, allegedly to pay for more weapons and ammunition. Syrian support for Assad stood at 55% yet this was not reported by any western media back in January with the exception of The Guardian UK which hid it within the Comment is free section. | |
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Peter Boone and Simon Johnson
NY Times 2013-07-04 10:30:00
Listening in on BlackBerry communications by world leaders at a Group of 20 summit meeting, as the British did in April 2009, does not seem like a great way to build international trust and economic cooperation. Writing up the operation in PowerPoint and bragging about it in writing - such documents always leak - was pure Monty Python. This week, disclosures suggest the American intelligence services may be up to broadly similar tricks - with reports that the United States has bugged the communications of European diplomats stationed in Washington. The Europeans are America's allies, but also its competitors in important markets around the world. The goal seems to involve capturing some kind of economic secrets. Most such espionage is a complete waste of time - and a good way to undermine relationships between countries. To help spies - and everyone else listening in on our phone calls - prioritize their use of scarce resources and do something constructive with their time, we offer this brief primer on where the intelligence services should focus their attention in the economic realm. | |
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| Society's Child |
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sanas-foodstore.com
2013-07-11 15:40:00 In a riveting victory against genetically modified creations, a major biotech company known as Syngenta has been criminally charged for denying knowledge that its GM Bt corn actually kills livestock. What's more is not only did the company deny this fact, but they did so in a civil court case that ended back in 2007. The charges were finally issued after a long legal struggle against the mega corp initiated by a German farmer named Gottfried Gloeckner whose dairy cattle died after eating the Bt toxin and coming down with a 'mysterious' illness. Syngenta and Animal Deaths Grown on his own farm from 1997 to 2002, the cows on the farm were all being fed exclusively on Syngenta's Bt 176 corn by the year 2000. It was around this time that the mysterious illnesses began to emerge among the cattle population. Syngenta paid Gloeckner 40,000 euros in an effort to silence the farmer, however a civil lawsuit was brought upon the company. Amazingly, 2 cows ate genetically modified maize (now banned in Poland over serious concerns) and died. During the civil lawsuit, however, Syngenta refused to admit that its GM corn was responsible. In fact, they went as far as to claim having no knowledge whatsoever of harm. The case was dismissed and Gloeckner, the farmer who launched the suit, was left thousands of euros in debt. And that's not all; Gloeckner continued to lose many cows as a result of Syngenta's modified Bt corn. After halting the use of GM feed in 2002, Gloeckner attempted a full investigation with the Robert Koch Institute and Syngenta involved. The data of this investigation is still unavailable to the public, and only examined one cow. In 2009, however, the Gloeckner teamed up with a German action group known as Bündnis Aktion Gen-Klage and to ultimately bring Syngenta to the criminal court. Using the testimony of another farmer whose cows died after eating Syngenta product, Gloeckner and the team have charged the biotech giant for the death of over 65 cows, withholding knowledge of the death-link, and holding the corporation liable for not registering the cattle deaths. The team is even charging Hans-Theo Jahmann, the German head of Syngenta , personally over the withholding of knowledge. The charges bring to light just how far large biotechnology companies will go to conceal evidence linking their genetically modified products to serious harm. Monsanto, for example, has even threatened to sue the entire state of Vermont if they attempt to label its genetically modified ingredients. Why are they so afraid of the consumer knowing what they are putting in their mouths? |
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James Nye
Daily Mail UK 2013-07-15 13:12:00
Michael Boatwright was discovered unconscious in a Motel 6 room in February, but when he awoke could not remember anything about himself, recognize even his own reflection, nor how to speak English. Even though his driver's license says he was born in Florida and served in the U.S. Navy from 1971 to 1973, Boatwright has no memory of his life to date and now answers only to Johan and converses in Swedish to doctors with the help of an interpreter. Now, medical professionals in Palm Springs, California have appealed for help in solving the mystery of Boatwright, the only clues to his former life being a duffel bag, five tennis rackets, two cellphones, little cash, old photographs and his identification. His current persona of Johan Ek, clashes with the Social Security card, passport and veteran's medical card he was carrying in February and following mental and physical health exams, Boatwright was diagnosed on March 13th with transient global amnesia. Doctors at Desert Regional Medical Center have theorized that his total memory loss was triggered by some kind of emotional or physical trauma - what exactly that was though, they admit to drawing a blank on. 'He's kind of a blank slate,' said Lisa Hunt-Vasquez, the social worker assigned to track down relatives and help piece his life back together. | |
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John Vidal
Guardian 2013-07-06 10:29:00
Lester Brown says grain harvests are already shrinking as US, India and China come close to 'peak water' Wells are drying up and underwater tables falling so fast in the Middle East and parts of India, China and the US that food supplies are seriously threatened, one of the world's leading resource analysts has warned. In a major new essay Lester Brown, head of the Earth Policy Institute in Washington, claims that 18 countries, together containing half the world's people, are now overpumping their underground water tables to the point - known as "peak water" - where they are not replenishing and where harvests are getting smaller each year. The situation is most serious in the Middle East. According to Brown: "Among the countries whose water supply has peaked and begun to decline are Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iraq and Yemen. By 2016 Saudi Arabia projects it will be importing some 15m tonnes of wheat, rice, corn and barley to feed its population of 30 million people. It is the first country to publicly project how aquifer depletion will shrink its grain harvest. "The world is seeing the collision between population growth and water supply at the regional level. For the first time in history, grain production is dropping in a geographic region with nothing in sight to arrest the decline. Because of the failure of governments in the region to mesh population and water policies, each day now brings 10,000 more people to feed and less irrigation water with which to feed them." | |
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Opposingviews.com
2013-07-15 09:26:00
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Richard Luscombe & Haroon Siddique
The Guardian 2013-07-15 04:51:00
Protesters have taken to the streets in the US as black community leaders demanded that the authorities pursue a federal civil rights case against George Zimmerman, who shot dead Trayvon Martin but was acquitted of the teenager's murder. In Los Angeles, police fired non-lethal - bean bag - baton rounds after demonstrators threw rocks and batteries at officers. One person was arrested but police emphasised that most of the protesters were peaceful. Streets were closed off in the city, as well as in San Francisco, where people marched to condemn Zimmerman's acquittal. In New York, hundreds of protesters marched into Times Square on Sunday night after starting out in Union Square, zigzagging through the streets to avoid police lines. Marchers carried signs and chanted "Justice for Trayvon Martin!" and "No justice, no peace!" as tourists looked on. Beyoncé called for a moment of silence for Trayvon during a concert in Nashville, Tennessee, while rapper Young Jeezy released a song in Trayvon's memory. Protests have been relatively small in scale so far, easing fears that violent unrest would follow the widespread outrage over the verdict. | ||
Comment: Maybe everyone should wear black hoodies in solidarity? Apartheid in America 2013. God, if JFK had just lived long enough to implement his reforms...
Rapper Young Jeezy released It's A Cold World [A Tribute to Trayvon Martin], saying:
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Chris Francescani
Reuters 2013-07-14 04:18:00
New York - After his acquittal on murder charges for fatally shooting Trayvon Martin, George Zimmerman may go to law school to help people wrongly accused of crimes like himself, close friends told Reuters on Sunday. The 29-year old was found not guilty late Saturday for shooting the unarmed black teenager in a case that sparked a national debate on race and gun laws. One of his first calls was to defense witness John Donnelly and his wife Leanne Benjamin. They got to know Zimmerman in 2004 when he and a black friend opened up an insurance office in a Florida building where Benjamin worked. They grew close and the couple spent time with him during the trial. Over dinner with Zimmerman recently, Benjamin said he told them he would like to go to law school. "I'd like to help other people like me," she quoted him as telling them. Zimmerman, an insurance investigator, attended community college and was a credit shy of an associate's degree in criminal justice but was kicked out of school because he posed a danger to the campus, according to family sources. "Everybody said he was a cop-wannabe but he's interested in law," Benjamin said. "He sees it as a potential path forward to help other people like himself." Zimmerman's defense attorney Mark O'Mara agreed. "He wanted to be a cop for awhile, but he's talked about going to law school," O'Mara told Reuters on Sunday. "He has a real interest in the law and ... prosecuting appropriately - not like what he got - is something he's very interested in. I will not be surprised if he ends up in criminal law," O'Mara said. "His dad was a judge, and he wants to be a prosecutor or a lawyer." Experience shows that re-building life after a major trial may prove difficult, even for those acquitted of headline-making crimes. Casey Anthony, the young Orlando mother acquitted in 2011 of killing her 3-year-old daughter Caylee, remains hidden and unemployed while her lawyers fight civil lawsuits seeking monetary damages from her. Former NFL star O.J. Simpson was acquitted in 1995 of killing his wife and an acquaintance, but his life fell apart. He lost a $33 million wrongful death civil suit in 1997, moved to Florida where he was arrested and eventually sent to prison in 2008 for up to 33 years for robbery and kidnapping. | |
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Anna Almendrala & Sasha Bronner
Huffington Post 2013-07-14 09:25:00
Demonstrators protesting George Zimmerman's not guilty verdict in the slaying of Florida teen Trayvon Martin reportedly shut down part of a freeway in Los Angeles Sunday night. According to CBS Los Angeles, about 200 protesters stood on the southbound 10 Freeway in Crenshaw to block traffic. Protesters told NBC LA that the police fired rubber bullets in order to disperse the crowd and ended up arresting at least one person on suspicion of throwing rocks and bottles at an officer. Ruth Fowler, an LA-based author and HuffPost blogger, was among one of the protestors on the freeway. In an email to The Huffington Post, Fowler described the scene as peaceful and happy. "We were supported by cars who beeped their support, as did the local community who waved, gave us water, shielded us from the police with their cars, and were in complete solidarity with us," Fowler said. The demonstration on the 10 freeway lasted from 6:20 p.m. to 6:44 p.m., officials told the Los Angeles Times, and the freeway has since reopened.
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CBS New York
Demonstrators Moved North From Union Square Causing Gridlock In Manhattan2013-07-14 10:30:00
New York - Strong reaction has erupted in New York and across the country after a jury found George Zimmerman not guilty in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin. A six-member, all-woman jury in Sanford, Fla., deliberated for more than 15 hours over two days before reaching their decision. They had been given the chance to convict Zimmerman of manslaughter but did not do so, despite asking for a clarification of the charge earlier in the evening. After hearing the verdict, Judge Debra Nelson told Zimmerman he was free to go. However on Sunday the U.S. Justice Department did say that it would consider Civil Rights charges against Zimmerman. As CBS 2's Tracee Carrasco reported, protest rallies was planned for Sunday in Union Square, among other places, as people from both sides spoke out. The protest in Union Square started shortly before 6 p.m. Sunday, by 7:30 p.m. that rally had ended but another began around 9 p.m. in Times Square. The Times Square protest caused traffic on 7th Ave to shut down between 42nd and 47th Street, but shortly before 10 p.m. some demonstrators had started making their way towards Harlem, while others began to return to Union Square. By 11 p.m. the crowd was moving north along Park Ave and had made its way into the area around 79th and Park. By the time the march reached the Upper East Side several protestors had been arrested. At 11:30 p.m. the march was moving north and had made it as high as 107th street near 2nd Ave. Another protest was also planned for 7 p.m. Monday at Hunts Point Plaza in the Bronx. People also took to Union Square Saturday night to protest the not guilty verdict, and by Sunday afternoon hundreds had gathered in Newark, NJ to peacefully protest Zimmerman's acquittal as well, the Associated Press reported. Organizers say the outdoor protest staged Sunday afternoon drew a diverse crowd unhappy with a Florida jury's decision to clear the former neighborhood watch volunteer in the shooting death of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. | ||
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Shiv Malik and Charlie Mole
The Guardian 2013-07-14 18:11:00
British police have fired Tasers hundreds of times at suspects' chests despite explicit warnings from the weapon's manufacturer not to do so because of the dangers of causing a cardiac arrest, the Guardian can reveal. Following the death last Wednesday of a man in Manchester after police hit him with a Taser shot, figures obtained from 18 out of 45 UK forces show that out of a total of 884 Taser discharges since 2009 - the year when Taser International first started warning the weapon's users not to aim for the chest - 57% of all shots (518) have hit the chest area. There is evidence that shots to the chest can induce cardiac arrest. Dr Douglas Zipes, an eminent US cardiologist and emeritus professor at Indiana University, who last year published a study that explored the dangers of chest shots, told the Guardian: "My admonition [to UK police] would be avoid the chest at all costs if you can." He said the proportion of shots landing on the chest was huge, adding: "I think the information is overwhelming to support how a Taser shot to the chest can produce cardiac arrest." The manufacturer's warning in its training materials is clear. It states: "When possible, avoid targeting the frontal chest area near the heart to reduce the risk of potential serious injury or death. | |
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Kim
What Would King Leonidas Do? 2013-07-09 11:33:00
It was the late '90s and I was at an interesting phase of my career. For the first time in my life I possessed relevant qualifications, experience and could also show a successful track record in my chosen career path. I had the job seeker's trifecta. It was also summer and my current employer was pissing me off with their penny-pinching ways, so after three years of ball busting effort I decided a break and a job change was in order. Displaying characteristic overconfidence in myself I quit my job (without burning any bridges) and set about applying for others. I was experienced in managing technical & trade supply businesses. I also had engineering experience and sales experience and had demonstrably excelled every sales and profit target I had ever been given. I started applying for roles that would stretch me and lift my career up a notch. There were plenty of opportunities around and I usually had a few applications on the go at any one time. I was an experienced guy in an experienced guy's world, this wouldn't be hard. Then the rejection letters trickled in. I could take rejection, it goes hand in hand with business, but after the first few months I was frankly confused. I hadn't had a single interview. Instead of aiming high I lowered my sights and started applying for jobs where there was no career advancement. Now I had everything these employers could possibly want, it would be a shoe in. But still not one interview came my way, not even a phone inquiry. Somewhere after the four month mark my confidence was starting to take a hit. The people rejecting me were business people too, how could my reasoning that I was perfect for these jobs be so different to theirs? Putting on my most serious business head I went back and scoured my CV. It was the only contact any of my potential employers or their recruitment companies had had with me. My CV was THE common denominator and if something was wrong it MUST be there. I had fortunately seen a number of CVs in my time. I was happy with the choice of style and layout, and the balance of detail versus brevity. I was particularly pleased with the decision I made to brand it with my name with just enough bold positioning to make it instantly recognisable, and as I sat scouring every detail of that CV a horrible truth slowly dawned on me. My name. | |
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Raw Story
2013-07-05 10:25:00
Maybe it's a sign of the times: People aren't so good at spelling. That seems to be the case down in Florida, where transportation workers were recently getting ready to install a new exit sign on a freeway, and someone realized the word "Florida" was spelled wrong, according to a report on FirstCoastNews.com. | |
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Jon Rappoport
"What do you do for a living?"nomorefakenews.com 2013-06-07 06:07:00 "I slap fictitious disease labels on people and poison their brains." "Sounds good. We want you to examine a defendant and determine whether he was morally competent on a specific night a year ago." "Piece of cake." That's what we're dealing with now in the Batman murder case. The psychiatrists have taken over. James Holmes' lawyers have entered an insanity plea in the Aurora- theater massacre case, and the judge, Carlos Samour, has just accepted it. From Lawyers.com: "When the insanity defense is raised, it's an admission that the defendant performed all of the acts alleged by the prosecution. For this reason, if the jury rejects the insanity defense, the defendant will almost certainly be convicted." In other words, Holmes' lawyers have said Holmes committed the murders, but he was insane at the time. He didn't know right from wrong, he was driven to murder by an irresistible impulse caused by a mental disorder. So now Holmes will be sent to a Colorado hospital for at least several months, where psychiatrists will make up their minds about whether he is/was insane on the night of July 20, 2012, at the Aurora theater. Eventually, unless Holmes changes his plea to a simple "guilty," a trial will take place. In the trial, the jury will decide whether he was sane or insane when he committed murder. The psychiatrists who examined Holmes will, of course, factor into that decision. At minimum, the jury's verdict will put Holmes in prison or a psych ward for the rest of his life. If the jury decides Holmes was sane last July, the likely sentence will be death. |
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youtube.com
2013-07-14 07:04:00
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RT
2013-07-13 03:01:00
A jury in Florida has ruled that George Zimmerman is not guilty on all charges relating to the murder of unarmed African-American teenager Trayvon Martin. The high-profile case sparked a massive national debate on race and guns in the United States. Twenty-nine-year-old Zimmerman was acquitted on Saturday of all charges relating to the fatal shooting of Martin. The former neighborhood watch volunteer could have been sentenced to life in prison for second-degree murder or up to 30 years for manslaughter if he was found guilty. Martin, 17, was shot over a year ago by Zimmerman, who claimed he acted in self-defense. The prosecution argued that Zimmerman was guilty of second-degree murder, stating that he racially profiled the unarmed teen and assumed he was a criminal when he saw him walking through a gated community in Sanford. They claimed that Zimmerman tracked the boy down and started the fight that led to the shooting. The verdict was reached by a panel of six women jurors, 15 months after Martin's death and six miles away from where the incident took place. | |
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James Rush
Bus was believed to have been carrying 60 people at time of horrific crashThe Daily Mail, UK 2013-07-13 11:50:00 Emergency Services Ministry has confirmed 18 people died in incident Youngest victim was a six-year-old girl, according to reports Eighteen people have been killed and dozens injured after a truck crashed into a bus in a Moscow suburb. Russia's Emergency Services Ministry has confirmed the youngest victim was a six-year-old girl. According to reports the green and white bus was carrying 60 people when a lorry crashed into it, splitting the vehicle in half and forcing other drivers to swerve wildly out of its way.
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| Secret History |
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BBC News
2013-07-14 21:08:00
Archaeologists believe they have discovered the world's oldest lunar "calendar" in an Aberdeenshire field. Excavations of a field at Crathes Castle found a series of 12 pits which appear to mimic the phases of the moon and track lunar months. A team led by the University of Birmingham suggests the ancient monument was created by hunter-gatherers about 10,000 years ago. The pit alignment, at Warren Field, was first excavated in 2004. The experts who analysed the pits said they may have contained a wooden post. The Mesolithic "calendar" is thousands of years older than previous known formal time-measuring monuments created in Mesopotamia. The analysis has been published in the journal, Internet Archaeology. The pit alignment also aligns on the Midwinter sunrise to provided the hunter-gatherers with an annual "astronomic correction" in order to better follow the passage of time and changing seasons. Vince Gaffney, Professor of Landscape Archaeology at Birmingham, led the analysis project. | |
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Jiro Tsutsui
The Ashai Shimbun 2013-07-14 21:00:00
Kyoto--The oldest and clearest example of hiragana script has been found on ancient clay pottery recovered from the former site of an aristocrat's residence in Kyoto's Nakagyo Ward, officials from Kyoto City Archaeological Research Institute said June 27. An almost legible iroha uta poem is inscribed on the back of the earthenware dish, which dates back to around 1200. Iroha uta, an ancient Japanese poem that uses 47 Japanese characters only once each, is said to have been created between the late 10th century and the 11th century. The poem was used for writing practice of hiragana, Japan's basic phonetic script. In those days, paper was extremely expensive, so someone apparently practiced writing on the dish, said researchers. Researchers noticed the poem while the institute was re-examining artifacts it unearthed in 1983 from the site of Horikawain, a residence that belonged to the aristocratic Fujiwara family. The dish, measuring 9 centimeters in diameter and 1.5 cm deep, was found inside the ruin of a well. | |
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| Science & Technology |
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Irene Klotz
An astronomer studying archived images of Neptune taken by the Hubble Space Telescope has found a 14th moon orbiting the planet, NASA said on Monday.Reuters 2013-07-15 16:54:00 Estimated to be about 12 miles in diameter, the moon is located about 65,400 miles from Neptune.
Astronomer Mark Showalter, with the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California, was searching Hubble images for moons inside faint ring fragments circling Neptune when he decided to run his analysis program on a broader part of the sky. "We had been processing the data for quite some time and it was on a whim that I said, 'OK, let's just look out further," Showalter told Reuters. "I changed my program so that instead of stopping just outside the ring system it processed the data all the way out, walked away from my computer and waited an hour while it did all the processing for me. When I came back, I looked at the image and there was this extra dot that wasn't supposed to be there," Showalter said. Follow-up analysis of other archived Hubble images of Neptune verified the object was a moon. | |
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Bob King
Ukrainian amateur astronomer Gennady Borisov discovered a brand new comet on July 8 near the bright star Capella in the constellation Auriga. The comet was confirmed and officially christened C/2013 N4 (Borisov) on July 13. At the time of discovery, Borisov was attending the Russian-Ukrainian "Southern Night" star party in Crimea, Ukraine. He nabbed the comet - his first - using an 8-inch (20-cm) f/1.5 wide field telescope of his own design equipped with a CCD camera.PhysOrg.com 2013-07-15 12:07:00
The new comet is on the faint side, appearing as a small, fuzzy patch of 13th magnitude with a brighter center. To see it you'll need at least a 10-inch (25-cm) telescope and the fortitude to rise in the wee hours before dawn. The reason for the early hour is Borisov's location in Auriga, a constellation that doesn't clear the horizon until shortly before the start of morning twilight. Faintness and low altitude will combine to make Comet Borisov an enticing if challenging object for amateur astronomers. Animation of Comet Borisov compiled from multiple images C/2013 N4 is currently traveling through Auriga not far from the easy-to-spot naked eye star Beta and will slowly brighten as it approaches perihelion - closest point to the sun - on August 20 at a distance of 113.5 million miles (182.7 million km). Unfortunately its elongation or separation from the sun will be slowly shrinking in the coming weeks, causing the comet to drop lower in the sky as it approaches perihelion. Our fuzzy visitor misses Earth by a comfortable 192.5 million miles (310 million km) on August 11. It's likely Comet Borisov won't get much brighter than 12th magnitude. Astronomers are still working out the details of its orbit, so it's possible brightness predictions could change in the near future. | |
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Stephen Smith
Thunderbolts.info 2013-07-09 22:00:00
Why do planets farthest from the Sun have the fastest winds? Earth's average wind speed is approximately 56 kilometers per hour, with a maximum of 372 kilometer per hour gust recorded on Mount Washington, New Hampshire in 1934. Some isolated wind phenomena, such as tornadoes and hurricanes, can sustain average velocities of 480 and 320 kilometers per hour for short periods. The maximum 24 hour speed record of 205 kilometers per hour from 1934 still remains, however. Tornadoes continue to be a mystery to consensus science, as well as Electric Universe advocates, although it seems that they are more like rotating electric discharges than anything else. The electric charges in a tornado are whirling at many meters per second, so they probably form an electromagnetic field called a "charge sheath vortex." It is commonly believed that weather is driven on Earth primarily by the Sun's thermal influence on the atmosphere. As we rotate beneath our primary, gases and dust absorb solar radiation at varying rates and in varying degrees. When any particular region heats up, the air expands and loses density, creating a relative low pressure area. Cooler air, being denser, will naturally flow into the bottom of the warm, low pressure region, causing an upwardly rotating convection cell to form. Most weather systems on Earth are thought to be based on that simple kinetic explanation: winds blow when the cooler, denser air flows into the warmer, buoyant air. The kinetic model of weather does not take into account the fact that planets much farther out in the Solar System have sustained winds that make those on our planet seem like gentle breezes. The average wind speeds on the gas giant planets are fantastic. Jupiter's winds clock at 635 kilometers per hour around the Great Red Spot; Saturn's average wind speed is up to 1800 kilometers per hour; Uranus 900 kilometers per hour; and Neptune comes in at 1138 kilometers per hour. On Neptune the winds are blowing through an atmosphere that measures minus 220 degrees Celsius. Why is it that the most remote planets, receiving small fractions of the solar energy bathing Earth, are able to convert that small fraction into much larger effects? | |
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phys.org
2013-07-14 00:00:00
In the search for understanding how some magnetic materials can be transformed to carry electric current with no energy loss, scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory, Cornell University, and collaborators have made an important advance: Using an experimental technique they developed to measure the energy required for electrons to pair up and how that energy varies with direction, they've identified the factors needed for magnetically mediated superconductivity-as well as those that aren't. "Our measurements distinguish energy levels as small as one ten-thousandth the energy of a single photon of light-an unprecedented level of precision for electronic matter visualization," said Séamus Davis, Senior Physicist at Brookhaven the J.G. White Distinguished Professor of Physical Sciences at Cornell, who led the research described in Nature Physics. "This precision was essential to writing down the mathematical equations of a theory that should help us discover the mechanism of magnetic superconductivity, and make it possible to search for or design materials for zero-loss energy applications." The material Davis and his collaborators studied was discovered in part by Brookhaven physicist Cedomir Petrovic ten years ago, when he was a graduate student working at the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory. It's a compound of cerium, cobalt, and indium that many believe may be the simplest form of an unconventional superconductor-one that doesn't rely on vibrations of its crystal lattice to pair up current-carrying electrons. Unlike conventional superconductors employing that mechanism, which must be chilled to near absolute zero (-273 degrees Celsius) to operate, many unconventional superconductors operate at higher temperatures-as high as -130°C. Figuring out what makes electrons pair in these so-called high-temperature superconductors could one day lead to room-temperature varieties that would transform our energy landscape. The main benefit of CeCoIn5, which has a chilly operating temperature (-271°C), is that it can act as the "hydrogen atom" of magnetically mediated superconductors, Davis said-a test bed for developing theoretical descriptions of magnetic superconductivity the way hydrogen, the simplest atom, helped scientists derive mathematical equations for the quantum mechanical rules by which all atoms operate. | |
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Randy Boswell
The Montreal Gazette 2013-07-14 20:42:00
Canadian scientists probing two sites in the High Arctic have found fresh evidence pointing to a fiery Siberian suspect in the greatest mass extinction of all time - a planet-wide cataclysm that wiped out more than 90 per cent of the Earth's species about 250 million years ago. The so-called "Great Dying" at the end of the Permian geological era killed off a larger proportion of species than any of the 25 other mass extinctions scientists have identified from sudden and widespread gaps in the fossil record at certain layers of rock corresponding to specific periods of time. The precise cause of the biological catastrophe 252 million years ago has been debated by scientists for decades. But nothing else in Earth history compares to the Late Permian disaster, which eclipsed 95 per cent of all marine life and about 70 per cent of species on land. Some have argued that a massive meteorite strike - like the one widely presumed to have triggered the end of the dinosaur age 65 million years ago - must have been to blame. Others point to extreme climate change linked to ocean acidification, oxygen depletion, mercury poisoning or other species-snuffing effects as the main driver of the extinctions. And without discounting the other forces as potential contributors to the Great Dying, a growing number of scientists - including several groups of Canadian researchers who are among the world's leading investigators of the die-off - have fingered a prolonged series of enormous volcanic eruptions in northern Asia known as the "Siberian Traps" as the main culprit in the Permian extinction. | |
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phys.org
The interior of a living cell is a crowded place, with proteins and other macromolecules packed tightly together. A team of scientists at Carnegie Mellon University has approximated this molecular crowding in an artificial cellular system and found that tight quarters help the process of gene expression, especially when other conditions are less than ideal.2013-07-14 00:00:00 As the researchers report in an advance online publication by the journal Nature Nanotechnology, these findings may help explain how cells have adapted to the phenomenon of molecular crowding, which has been preserved through evolution. And this understanding may guide synthetic biologists as they develop artificial cells that might someday be used for drug delivery, biofuel production and biosensors. "These are baby steps we're taking in learning how to make artificial cells," said Cheemeng Tan, a Lane Postdoctoral Fellow and a Branco-Weiss Fellow in the Lane Center for Computational Biology, who led the study. Most studies of synthetic biological systems today employ solution-based chemistry, which does not involve molecular crowding. The findings of the CMU study and the lessons of evolution suggest that bioengineers will need to build crowding into artificial cells if synthetic genetic circuits are to function as they would in real cells. The research team, which included Russell Schwartz, professor of biological sciences; Philip LeDuc, professor of mechanical engineering and biological sciences; Marcel Bruchez, professor of chemistry; and Saumya Saurabh, a Ph.D. student in chemistry, developed their artificial cellular system using molecular components from bacteriophage T7, a virus that infects bacteria that is often used as a model in synthetic biology. |
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Seiichi Yoshida
Discovery Date: July 8, 2013Aerith Net 2013-07-14 19:13:00 Magnitude: 16.8 mag Discoverer: Gennady Borisov (Crimean Laboratory of the Sternberg Astronomical Institute)
The orbital elements are published on M.P.E.C. 2013-N51. | |
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Seiichi Yoshida
Discovery Date: July 5, 2013Aerith Net 2013-07-14 19:10:00 Magnitude: 21.4 mag Discoverer: Pan-STARRS 1 telescope (Haleakala)
The orbital elements are published at the MPC Ephemerides and Orbital Elements. | |
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Seiichi Yoshida
Discovery Date: July 4, 2013Aerith Net 2013-07-14 19:07:00 Magnitude: 20.7 mag Discoverer: Pan-STARRS 1 telescope (Haleakala)
The orbital elements are published on M.P.E.C. 2013-N50. | |
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Lee Billings
Scientific American 2013-07-13 18:02:00
A series of "fast radio bursts" detected by an Australian lab has scientists puzzling over its origin. Every now and then things go "bump!" in the cosmic night, releasing torrents of energy that astronomers can't easily explain. Not that they mind: most times an energetic riddle flares up in their view of the sky, major epoch-setting discoveries are sure to follow. This was the pattern for pulsars - rapidly spinning city-size stellar remnants that steadily chirp in radio. It was also the pattern for gamma-ray bursts - extreme explosions at the outskirts of the observable universe thought to be caused by stellar mergers and collapsing massive stars. Now the pattern is playing out again, with last week's announcement that an international team of researchers has detected brief, bright bursts of radio waves washing over Earth from mysterious sources that may be billions of light-years away. The findings, reported in the July 5 Science, could open an entirely new window on the universe by allowing scientists to measure the composition and dynamics of the intergalactic medium - the cold, diffuse plasma that lies between galaxies. Using a year's worth of data gathered from some 10 percent of the sky by the 64-meter Parkes radio telescope in Australia, the team detected four bursts from far outside the galactic plane, each occurring only once and lasting a few thousandths of a second. According to Dan Thornton, a PhD candidate at the University of Manchester in England who led the study, the results suggest that these "fast radio bursts," or FRBs, probably occur as often as every 10 seconds or so, nearly 10,000 times a day. "If we had radio telescopes watching the entire sky, that's how many we think we'd see each day," Thornton says. "We haven't seen more of these until now only because we've been looking at small regions of the sky for small amounts of time." | |
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Chelesa Stark
Mashable 2013-07-13 00:00:00
DARPA's newest military robotic creation is a little too close to our sci-fi imaginations. Called "Atlas," the robot is designed to travel across rough terrain, use human tools and climb using its hands and feet. DARPA - formally known as the U.S. Defense Department' Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency - is currently challenging teams to create new software for the 6-foot-tall robot's brain. | |
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Sebastian Anthony
ExtremeTech 2013-07-11 10:19:00
Biologists at Tufts University have removed the head and brain of a worm by decapitation, and then watched as it regenerated both its head and brain - and, somewhat miraculously, the memories stored inside. At first glance, this finding would seem to confirm cellular memory - the theory that data can be somehow stored by cells that are outside of the brain. More research will undoubtedly have to occur before such a highly contested hypothesis is confirmed, however. The Tufts researchers tested the memory of planarians, simple flatworms that are renowned for their regenerative properties. These worms can be cut up into pieces, and then each piece will grow into a whole new worm. In a previous study, a piece as small as 1/279th of the original worm regrew into a complete organism within a few weeks. This astonishing regeneration is due to a large number of pluripotent stem cells, which make up around 20% of the worm. These adult stem cells, called neoblasts, can become any of the cell types required by the regenerating planarian - including brain cells. | |
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Hannah Johnson
While research tends to become very specialized and entire communities of scientists can work on specific topics with only a little overlap between them, physicist Dr Nicolas Brunner and mathematician Professor Noah Linden worked together to uncover a deep and unexpected connection between their two fields of expertise: game theory and quantum physics.University of Bristol 2013-07-12 13:47:00 Dr Brunner said: "Once in a while, connections are established between topics which seem, on the face of it, to have nothing in common. Such new links have potential to trigger significant progress and open entirely new avenues for research." Game theory -- which is used today in a wide range of areas such as economics, social sciences, biology and philosophy -- gives a mathematical framework for describing a situation of conflict or cooperation between intelligent rational players. The central goal is to predict the outcome of the process. In the early 1950s, John Nash showed that the strategies adopted by the players form an equilibrium point (so-called Nash equilibrium) for which none of the players has any incentive to change strategy. |
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| Earth Changes |
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TheWeatherSpace.com
A low pressure system that started in the Eastern United States has retrograded under a ridge of high pressure to the north over the last couple of days. This system is moving from east to west, which is extremely unusual for this hemisphere. We've seen these move east to west for a short period of time, but this one will make it to Southern California by the time it weakens.2013-07-15 14:59:00
The upper level system is known as an easterly wave, however I'd like to call it a super easterly wave based on the distance it is going to travel. This particular system will have traveled from one side of the country to the other once it has stopped moving west, diving from there into Mexico, gathering up monsoonal moisture to be put into Nevada and Southern California later in the week into next week. Rainfall estimations across parts of Central Texas could be over 2-4″ of rain, with more rain (above 6+" possible in parts of South-Central Texas. Severe storms, including tornadoes, hail, and damaging winds will be possible from Texas, New Mexico, and parts of Arizona through the next few days.
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sciencedaily.com
More than two million deaths occur worldwide each year as a direct result of human-caused outdoor air pollution, a new study has found. 2013-07-12 13:08:00
In addition, while it has been suggested that a changing climate can exacerbate the effects of air pollution and increase death rates, the study shows that this has a minimal effect and only accounts for a small proportion of current deaths related to air pollution. The study, which has been published today, 12 July, in IOP Publishing's journal Environmental Research Letters, estimates that around 470,000 people die each year because of human-caused increases in ozone. It also estimates that around 2.1 million deaths are caused each year by human-caused increases in fine particulate matter (PM2.5) ? tiny particles suspended in the air that can penetrate deep into the lungs, causing cancer and other respiratory disease. | |
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Rueters via Yahoo News
India officially declared on Monday that nearly 6,000 people were missing a month after flash floods ravaged large parts of its northern state of Uttarakhand, but stopped short of saying they were presumed dead.2013-07-15 12:26:00 The figure of 5,748, based on tallies of missing persons from around the country, was the first official estimate following weeks in which the numbers of dead and missing fluctuated wildly from a few hundred to several thousand. Their families will now be eligible for financial relief, Uttarakhand Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna told a news conference, adding that his government would pay 150,000 rupees ($2,500) to families in the state, besides compensation from the federal government.
"We are not getting into the controversy whether the missing persons are dead or not," said Bahuguna. "We are abiding by what the families of the victims say, and if they think that they haven't come back and have no hope as well, (then) we are providing them monetary relief." The official death toll still stands at 580, an official of the National Disaster Management Authority told Reuters. More than 4,600 of the missing in Uttarakhand had come from elsewhere in India, said the official, who declined to be identified as he was not authorized to speak to the media. | |
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US Geological Survey
2013-07-15 11:52:00
A 7.3 magnitude earthquake has struck south of Bristol Island in the South Sandwich Islands. No tsunami alert exists, however. The massive 7.3 magnitude earthquake began today July 15, 2013 far out to sea, far from Argentina and Chile's coast, officials tell news. It was initially reported as a 6.8 magnitude quake before being upgraded. The large earthquake today began moments ago. It erupted at 12:03 pm local time, officials tell news. It also posted a moderate depth. USGS indicates to news that the quake starting twenty miles below sea level. But the quake was far from land when it began. Officials tell news that the quake was closest only to one island. The quake began one hundred thirty miles southeast of Bristol Island in the South Sandwich Islands. The quake was thereafter a great distance from other nations. The quake was one thousand six hundred miles at least from Ushuaia, Argentina. It was roughly one thousand seven hundred miles from Rio Gallegos in Argentina as well. Reps tell news that the quake was about one thousand seven hundred miles from Punta Arenas, Chile and about one thousand three hundred mils from Stanley in the Falkland Islands. The National Weather Service says that no tsunami danger exists currently for the U.S, Gulf of Mexico, Puerto Rico and Virgin Islands. But officials. Both the Alaska Tsunami Warning Center and the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center confirm that no tsunami threat is in place. - LA Late News USGS data | |
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ShanghaiDaily.com
The Tungurahua Volcano, located in Ecuador's central Andean region, registered a major explosion on Sunday with a stronger eruption that spewed ash and rocks into the atmosphere, according to the Geophysics Institute of the National Polytechnic School (IGEPN).2013-07-15 08:27:00
The explosion caused a boom that could be heard in several cities, including Riobamba and Ambato in central Ecuador and Guayaquil in the southwest, and communities close to the volcano also felt ground tremors, said the IGEPN which is in charge of monitoring volcanic activity in a report. The eruption scattered ash, rocks and other volcanic fragments into the sky, but due to cloud cover over the region it was impossible to determine how high the column of ash rose, the IGEPN said. However, eyewitnesses said the ash could be seen as far away as the capital Quito. The 5,016-meter-high volcano has been active since 1999, with alternating periods of increased activity and relative calm. | |
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phys.org
2013-07-14 00:00:00
It is not unusual for swarms of small earthquakes to precede a volcanic eruption. They can reach a point of such rapid succession that they create a signal called harmonic tremor that resembles sound made by various types of musical instruments, though at frequencies much lower than humans can hear. A new analysis of an eruption sequence at Alaska's Redoubt Volcano in March 2009 shows that the harmonic tremor glided to substantially higher frequencies and then stopped abruptly just before six of the eruptions, five of them coming in succession. "The frequency of this tremor is unusually high for a volcano, and it's not easily explained by many of the accepted theories," said Alicia Hotovec-Ellis, a University of Washington doctoral student in Earth and space sciences. Documenting the activity gives clues to a volcano's pressurization right before an explosion. That could help refine models and allow scientists to better understand what happens during eruptive cycles in volcanoes like Redoubt, she said. The source of the earthquakes and harmonic tremor isn't known precisely. Some volcanoes emit sound when magma - a mixture of molten rock, suspended solids and gas bubbles - resonates as it pushes up through thin cracks in the Earth's crust. But Hotovec-Ellis believes in this case the earthquakes and harmonic tremor happen as magma is forced through a narrow conduit under great pressure into the heart of the mountain. The thick magma sticks to the rock surface inside the conduit until the pressure is enough to move it higher, where it sticks until the pressure moves it again. | |
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Karl Mathiesen
Overfishing has reduced competition for food, allowing jellyfish whose stings can cause pain and nausea, to thriveThe Guardian 2013-07-12 13:55:00
Holidaymakers are being warned by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to take local advice in several Mediterranean countries as jellyfish numbers rise along coastlines popular with tourists in Greece, Spain and Malta. Jellyfish numbers have been rising consistently in the Mediterranean, and researchers warn that the increase in numbers poses a hazard to swimmers, fishing and the marine environment. The FCO said: "We have been alerted to large numbers of jellyfish in the Mediterranean this summer, especially in a number of key holiday destinations for UK tourists. We have updated our travel advice for a number of Mediterranean countries to reflect this issue." Up to 150,000 people are treated for jellyfish stings in the Mediterranean each year. The worst-hit coastlines this summer have been in Greece, Spain, Sardinia, Sicily, Malta, Israel and Lebanon. The FCO recommends that swimmers speak to local authorities and follow their advice on where and when to swim. Barcelona Institute of Marine Sciences researcher Josep María Gili told the Guardian in June that jellyfish represented a growing problem, both in the Mediterranean and across the world. | |
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Mark Tran
Locusts threatening livelihood of 60% of population, and have already destroyed a quarter of Madagascar's food cropsThe Guardian 2013-07-12 13:39:00 Madagascar is in a race against time to raise enough money to tackle its worst plague of locusts since the 1950s. Locusts have already infested over half of the island's cultivated land and pastures, causing the loss of 630,000 tonnes of rice, corresponding to 25% of food consumption. At least 1.5m hectares (3.7m acres) could be infested by locusts in two-thirds of the country by September, warns the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). Findings from a damage assessment indicate that rice and maize crop losses due to locusts in the mid- and south-western parts of Madagascar vary, on average, from 40% to 70%, reaching up to 100% in some plots. Madagascar's agriculture ministry declared a national disaster in November. The food security and livelihoods of 13 million people are at stake, about 60% of the island's population. Around 9 million people depend directly on agriculture for food and income. "We don't have enough funds for pesticide, helicopters and training," said Alexandre Huynh, the FAO's representative in Madagascar. "What is extremely costly is to run helicopters [needed to spray pesticides]. We have to start in September, and we have two to three months to prepare. We need $22.4m [£15.1m] but we are quite short of that. Discussions are going on with donors."
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Chris Alcantara and Sonja Isger
The Palm Beach Post 2013-07-09 08:31:00
A mother pygmy sperm whale died and her calf was euthanized after they washed ashore Tuesday morning onto a Jupiter Island beach. Authorities spotted the mother and her calf at about 8 a.m. while they patrolled the shore about five miles north of the Blowing Rocks Preserve. Officials from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, Loggerhead Marinelife Center in Juno Beach and Marine Animal Rescue Society responded and evaluated the whales. John Cassady, an FWC biologist, said the approximately 9-foot, 800-pound mother died after she landed on shore. Loggerhead veterinarians decided to euthanized the 3-foot, 100-pound calf, saying it could not survive on its own. | |
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Cassie Hart
KSTP.com 2013-07-12 20:27:00
Emergency crews were on the scene Friday in northern Indiana looking for a boy who fell into a hole in the sand near the Lake Michigan shoreline near Mount Baldy in Michigan City. Officers at the Michigan City Police Department and the LaPorte County Sheriff's Office confirm to The Associated Press that an 8-year-old boy fell into a hole about 8 feet deep about 4:30 p.m. central time. Michigan City police, fire and Department of Natural Resources used heavy equipment to find the child. WSBT reports the boy's family was moved from the scene to the beach around 6 p.m. The boy was pulled from the sinkhole. No word in his condition. | |
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Dick Ahlstrom
The Irish Times 2013-07-12 18:39:00
The sun is acting bizarrely and scientists have no idea why. Solar activity is in gradual decline, a change from the norm which in the past triggered a 300-year-long mini ice age. Three leading solar scientists presented the very latest data about the weakening solar activity at a teleconference yesterday in Boulder, Colorado, organised by the American Astronomical Society. It featured experts from Nasa, the High Altitude Observatory and the National Solar Observatory who described how solar activity, as measured by the formation of sunspots and by massive explosions on the sun's surface, has been falling steadily since the mid-1940s. The sun goes through a regular 11-year cycle with a maximum, when sunspot activity is at its peak, followed by a minimum when sunspot numbers are reduced and are smaller and less energetic. We are supposed to be at a peak of activity, at solar maximum. | |
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Deborah Netburn
Los Angeles Times 2013-07-12 07:00:00
Those of us who have been paying attention to the sun this year have been a little ... disappointed. 2013 was supposed to be the year of solar maximum -- the peak of an 11-year cycle when the number of sunspots that mar the sun's surface is at its highest. These sunspots, which are actually cool areas on the sun's surface caused by intense magnetic activity, are the sites of spectacular solar flares and CMEs, or coronal mass ejections, which can send billions of tons of solar material hurtling into space. But this year, the serious solar fireworks show never materialized. Sure, we've seen a handful of major solar flares, and a few extra fast CMEs, but scientists say our current solar maximum, known as solar maximum 24, is the weakest one in 100 years. And some scientists believe that the 25th solar maximum could be even weaker. | |
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| Fire in the Sky |
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Kirsty McMurray
Stuff.co.nz 2013-07-13 20:05:00
The sight of a giant shooting star left a North Taranaki man shaking after his early morning run. Lance Howarth, a mobile mechanic, was out running around the back roads of Lepperton this morning when he saw the star around 5:45am. ''It was that bloody spectacular I had to stop and watch it.'' He said the star had completely lit up the dark moonless sky and surrounding countryside. ''It was early and still dark and the only reason I noticed it was because all of a sudden I could see where I was going and I thought, 'hang on, it's just got light really quickly' and looked up and there it was.'' He described the shooting star as a massive 'fireball' with a long tail and said it seemed to travel from the north east to south west before disappearing into cloud over the ranges. ''It was just frickin' huge. For a while I thought it might crash into the ranges.'' The star almost passed right above his head, and was completely silent, he said. ''It was the best thing I've ever seen, and the most frightening.'' Stunned, his mind ran to the possibilities of what it could mean. ''I did think for a second, ''are we about to be invaded by aliens?''' The star also left a vapour trail which hung in the sky for at least half an hour, he said. ''I had to keep looking back.'' | |
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John Wendel
NBC Charlotte 2013-07-13 14:40:00
Charlotte -- Some folks in North Carolina were lucky enough to have partially clear skies last night to see a large fireball or meteorite. More than 200 people from Indiana to Ohio southward toward North Carolina reported seeing the large fireball. Most of the sightings came in just before midnight and folks reported the it was traveling from south to north across the sky. The meteorite was described as bright white with some red. There were no reports of sounds as it passed by the area. If you saw the meteorite or fireball last night, you can make a report to the American Meteor Society. First Warn Storm Spotter Stuart McDaniel has a All Sky Camera and caught the flash around 12:15am. Clouds did obscure a better view at his location in Lawndale, NC in Cleveland County.
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Nicole Mortillaro
Global News, Canada 2013-07-13 01:39:00
Toronto - Several people witnessed a bright meteor over parts of Ontario Friday night. The meteor was spotted in Toronto, Newmarket, Oshawa and as far away as Sudbury around 10 p.m. Several people reported the meteor on the American Meteor Society's website. There was no sound associated with the meteor. It is unknown if the meteor is associated with the Delta Aquarid meteor shower that peaks on July 30. Typically the Delta Aquarids produce about 10 meteors an hour. | |
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This is Exeter, UK
People were stunned to see bright, flashing lights in the sky above Exeter. Several residents reported seeing what appeared to be a meteor on Monday evening. They described a "white ball" moving quickly above the city.2013-07-11 23:01:00 Trevor Sharp, from Exwick, said he saw the meteor just after dusk. He said: "We were putting our chickens away. It was low down near the horizon, pretty much east of Exwick, travelling south towards the north. "It suddenly appeared a classic comet shape, a white ball with perhaps yellow eges and a bright white cone tail out the back. The person I was with saw it too. It was only there for a second. I never expected to see such a sight from my garden." The object was spotted right across Devon. Billy Dymond saw it from North Devon. He said: "We watched if for around three to four seconds, a large white ball turning green, not just going across but falling downwards towards earth at an incredible speed." |
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| Health & Wellness |
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Julie O'Connor
A new study from neuroscientists at the Wayne State University School of Medicine provides the first novel insights into the neural origins of hot flashes in menopausal women in years. The study may inform and eventually lead to new treatments for those who experience the sudden but temporary episodes of body warmth, flushing and sweating.Wayne State University - Office of the Vice President for Research 2013-07-15 13:09:00 The paper, "Temporal Sequencing of Brain Activations During Naturally Occurring Thermoregulatory Events," by Robert Freedman, Ph.D., professor of psychiatry and behavioral neurosciences, founder of the Behavioral Medicine Laboratory and a member at the C.S. Mott Center for Human Growth and Development, and his collaborator, Vaibhav Diwadkar, Ph.D., associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral neurosciences, appears in the June issue of Cerebral Cortex, an Oxford University Press journal. "The idea of understanding brain responses during thermoregulatory events has spawned many studies where thermal stimuli were applied to the skin. But hot flashes are unique because they are internally generated, so studying them presents unique challenges," said Freedman, the study's principal investigator. "Our participants had to lie in the MRI scanner while being heated between two body-size heating pads for up to two hours while we waited for the onset of a hot flash. They were heroic in this regard and the study could not have been conducted without their incredible level of cooperation." "Menopause and hot flashes are a significant women's health issue of widespread general interest," Diwadkar added. "However, understanding of the neural origins of hot flashes has remained poor. The question has rarely been assessed with in vivo functional neuroimaging. In part, this paucity of studies reflects the technical limitations of objectively identifying hot flashes while symptomatic women are being scanned with MRI. Nothing like this has been published because this is a very difficult study to do." During the course of a single year, 20 healthy, symptomatic postmenopausal women ages 47 to 58 who reported six or more hot flashes a day were scanned at the School of Medicine's Vaitkevicius Imaging Center, located in Detroit's Harper University Hospital. |
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Emily Deans, MD
Primal Docs 2013-07-14 10:38:00
Last year the daughter of one of my patients called me. "Mom is acting really strange. She's being aggressive, and she thinks my Dad is still alive. I don't think she slept last night. Do you think she needs an increase in her medication?" My patient was a sweet 70 year old woman with a psychosis-heavy bipolar disorder who could get paranoid from time to time, but was never violent, and had been stable on a low dose of medicine for many years. I told her daughter, "If she didn't fall down and hit her head somehow, I think she has a urinary tract infection (UTI). You should take her in to see her primary care doctor if she'll let you. Otherwise, you might need to take her to the ER." A few hours later, the daughter called me back, quite amazed. "You were right! Her doctor says she has a bad UTI. How did you diagnose that over the phone?" I'm sure all my psychiatrist/doctor readers were guessing the outcome right away. UTIs rather famously turn into strange behavior in the elderly, particularly in those with dementia. One time when I was on call in the emergency room, we got a consult for new-onset obsessive compulsive disorder in 77 year old. My fellow resident and I exchanged looks and told the emergency room intern to wait for the results of the urinalysis before we were consulted. 77 year olds don't develop OCD out of the blue without something else medical going on. We were correct...she had a urinary tract infection. The "OCD" resolved with antibiotics. The tricky part for doctors is that these UTIs can occur without any of the usual symptoms we are used to hearing about. No incontinence, fever, or urinary urgency. Or sometimes the patient can't tell us about these symptoms. | |
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Sayer Ji
greenmedinfo.com 2013-07-12 15:09:00
You know turmeric has health benefits, most notably reducing inflammation, but did you know it may also protect and heal the damaged and diseased liver? A new clinical trial published in the journal BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine is shedding light on turmeric's remarkable liver protective and regenerative properties.[1] South Korean researchers at the Clinical Trial Center for Functional Foods, Chonbuk National University Hospital, tested their hypothesis that turmeric may improve liver function by administering a fermented form to subjects, 20 years old and above, who were diagnosed mild to moderate elevated alanine aminotransferase (ALT) levels, a maker for liver damage and/or dysfunction. Sixty subjects were randomized to receive 3.0 g per fermented turmeric powder (FTP) or placebo 3.0 g per day for 12 weeks. The treatment group received two capsules of FTP three times a day after meals, for 12 weeks. | |
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Arjun
collective-evolution.com 2013-07-12 14:57:00
In early 2013, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the the very first genetically modified flu vaccine, known as Flublok. It contains recombinant DNA technology and an insect virus known as baculovirus that is apparently supposed to help facilitate a more rapid production of the vaccine. It could hit the market as early as next year. It was developed by Protein Sciences Corp, who received approval for the Flublock vaccine in January of 2103. It uses genetic engineering to grow portions of the virus in insect cells. The vaccine also contains proteins from three different flu strains, and is produced by extracting cells from the fall army-worm, a type of caterpillar, and genetically altering them to produce large amounts of hemagglutinin, a flu virus protein that enables the flu virus itself to enter the body quickly. | |
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Annalee Newitz
io9 2013-07-11 18:27:00
A farmer in Oregon recently discovered unkillable wheat in his fields. He'd sprayed the whole field with a pesticide called Roundup, but this patch of wheat wouldn't die. Convinced he'd discovered a new super-wheat mutation, he sent some to a scientist. Carol Mallory-Smith was that scientist, an expert in weeds, who immediately knew that the wheat wasn't a super-strain. It's pretty much impossible for a plant to resist death after being treated with Roundup . . . unless it's a genetically-modified "Roundup Ready" strain, created by agribusiness giant Monsanto. But how could Monsanto wheat get into an Oregon farm? The answer proved to be even weirder than she imagined. After genetic testing, she discovered that it was indeed Monsanto wheat. But it was an experimental strain that was engineered 14 years ago. Somehow, these experimental Monsanto seeds got mixed into wheat seeds being sold over a decade later. On Scientific American, Arielle Duhaime-Ross writes:
The Roundup Ready wheat program that produced these seeds was canceled a decade ago, but the company has resumed tests of the product in the past year. It's still not clear how the seeds made their way to Oregon. | |
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| Science of the Spirit |
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Stephanie Skordas
Phys.org 2013-07-15 00:00:00
For better or worse, your spouse's opinion about your job matters more than you might realize, according to a new study headed by Julie Holliday Wayne, associate professor in the School of Business. When employers provide family friendly policies and a supportive work environment, it not only makes the employee feel better about the company, but the spouse also feels better. And having the spouse support for the organization can mean more employee satisfaction and less turnover. "The big takeaway here is that the spouse's attitudes toward the employee's firm matter," says Wayne. "Our findings show that when the spouse isn't happy with or loyal to the organization, it causes the employee to be unhappy or less loyal." These findings appear in July issue of the Journal of Applied Psychology and are generating national attention in Forbes and other news outlets. It's a critical time for this research. A recent Gallup survey found that 70 percent of American employees feel disengaged and unhappy at work and that perks like free food weren't enough to overcome these feelings. It is well known that when workers view their employer as family supportive, they report less work-to-family conflict, less intent to leave, less burnout, and greater commitment and job satisfaction. Until this study, however, little research had been done on the role of spouses and partners in that equation. Wayne and her colleagues surveyed 408 couples in which one of the partners worked at a large engineering consulting firm in the United States. The couples were asked questions to assess their perceptions of whether the firm supported a family-friendly environment with not only benefits, but supervisor support for family activities. They were also asked about work/family conflicts, the degree to which work enriched family life, and how committed the non-employee spouse or partner felt to the firm. | |
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Janet Lathrop
University of Massachusetts at Amherst 2013-07-13 12:50:00
A study suggests that whether parents are gay, lesbian or straight, how well they work together as a couple is linked to fewer behavior problems in their adopted children and is more important than their sexual orientation. A new study by psychology researchers suggests that whether parents are gay, lesbian or straight, how well they work together as a couple and support each other in parenting is linked to fewer behavior problems among their adopted children and is more important than their sexual orientation. Rachel H. Farr at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and Charlotte J. Patterson at the University of Virginia report their findings from this first empirical examination of differences and similarities in co-parenting among lesbian, gay and heterosexual adoptive couples and associations with child behavior in the July/August issue of Child Development. Farr, who led the study, says, "While actual divisions of childcare tasks such as feeding, dressing and taking time to play with kids were unrelated to children's adjustment, it was the parents who were most satisfied with their arrangements with each other who had children with fewer behavior problems, such as acting out or showing aggressive behavior." "It appears that while children are not affected by how parents divide childcare tasks, it definitely does matter how harmonious the parents' relationships are with each other," she adds. She and Patterson also observed differences in division of labor in lesbian and gay couples compared to heterosexual parents. | |
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| High Strangeness |
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Daniel Beekman
New York Daily News 2013-07-12 08:28:00
The former New York Knicks player told the hosts of 'The Champs Podcast' that he made a visit to a flying saucer while driving through the desert from Las Vegas to L.A. It was a close encounter of the hoops kind. Former Knicks player Baron Davis says he was "actually abducted by aliens." The basket-case baller told the hosts of "The Champs Podcast" that he crossed into his own personal twilight zone while driving "like two weeks ago." "I was, um, on my way from Vegas here to L.A.," he said on the episode that aired Thursday. "I'm a little tired and s--- and I see this light and I think it's a big-a-- truck. "Then next thing you know, dude, like, I was in this f------ steel thing," Davis deadpanned. It was a scene straight out of Space Jam, the 1996 film starring Looney Tunes characters, Michael Jordan and a basketball team of aliens. Instead, the foul-mouthed Davis was stuck with "these f------ crazy-looking people" who were "half-human, half, like, f-----, ugly motherf------." | |
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Nick Bonham
The Pueblo Chieftain 2013-07-14 21:33:00
Trinidad - At first, rancher Tom Miller thought the savagery wrought on his cattle was a cruel joke. Mutilated cows and calfs. Field-dressed and missing ears, organs and eyes. Carcasses devoid of blood. A second-generation rancher, it wasn't until 1999 that Miller said he started looking at the animal deaths differently, not as the product of twisted mischief or the feeding scraps of predators. "At first I thought it was a prank, but there were no tracks, no blood. It looks like the carcass is pealed off, and it happens overnight," Miller said. "There are just so many things that happen that doesn't seem like it's human. I know people think you're crazy, but there are so many things people can't explain." Since '99, six cows and calfs have been mutilated on Miller's ranch northeast of here. Two calfs were mutilated in May and the day after meeting with a Chieftain reporter and photographer this week, he found another mutilated cow on his property. Miller thinks the seventh death happened in the last week. | |
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bbc.co.uk
2013-07-02 08:45:00
The body of an octopus has been found during a litter pick near the top of England's highest mountain. Dave Ascough, 43, from Stockport, leads mountain walks and found the 20cm (8in) cephalopod mollusc 10m (33ft) from the top of Scafell Pike in Cumbria. He said: "My first reaction was that someone might have carried it up there, but it's quite possible a bird could have brought it up there." Volunteers removed 10 bags of rubbish from the mountain during the pick. Traffic up Scafell Pike is increased by the Three Peaks Challenge, which sees thousands of people attempting to scale it along with Ben Nevis in Scotland and Snowdon in Wales within 24 hours. He added: "The mountain does attract a lot of people climbing it for a challenge as opposed to the experience of being in the mountains and that adds to the problem. "People in the dark think 'nobody can see me throwing away a bottle', so unfortunately it does attract a lot of litter." | |
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| Don't Panic! Lighten Up! |
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Josh Levs
Harry Potter creator J.K. Rowling donned an invisibility cloak of her own for her new novel.CNN 2013-07-15 02:47:00
In top-secret fashion, she published The Cuckoo's Calling under the name Robert Galbraith. Her publisher, Mulholland Books -- an imprint of Little, Brown and Company -- described the author as a former member of the Special Investigative Branch of the Royal Military Police. "He left the military in 2003 and has been working since then in the civilian security industry," the publisher's website said. "The idea for (protagonist) Cormoran Strike grew directly out of his own experiences and those of his military friends who returned to the civilian world. 'Robert Galbraith' is a pseudonym." The Sunday Times, curious about who this mystery novelist really was, connected the dots -- noting that "he" used an agent, editor and publisher who had worked with Rowling. |
