Archive for February, 2011
Is There A Giant Planet Hidden in the Outer Region of the Solar System?
Seems like even the Solar System has been an unstable place lately: we had Pluto losing its planet status in 2006 and now this. This is really cool even though, some believe the chance for another planet is not very likely. But this will surely give those 2012-crackpots more fuel for their crazy “Nemesis” idea. Paul Rodgers writes in the Independent:
If you grew up thinking there were nine planets and were shocked when Pluto was demoted five years ago, get ready for another surprise. There may be nine after all, and Jupiter may not be the largest.
The hunt is on for a gas giant up to four times the mass of Jupiter thought to be lurking in the outer Oort Cloud, the most remote region of the solar system. The orbit of Tyche (pronounced ty-kee), would be 15,000 times farther from the Sun than the Earth’s, and 375 times farther than…
Quakers Welcome Government Move On Civil Partnerships
Via Ekklesia:
Quakers in Britain have welcomed the government’s announcement, today, (17 February), that the celebration of civil partnerships will be allowed on some religious premises, if a faith group wishes. This was introduced as part of the Equality Act 2010, section 202.
Michael Hutchinson, Acting Recording Clerk for Quakers in Britain said: “We are delighted that the government has heard us and others. We ourselves see no distinction between heterosexual or homosexual in terms of commitment and wish to move further to allow legal marriage for same sex couples, but this is a welcome step along the way to full equality.
“We are also heartened by proposals to address calls for full equality of civil marriages and civil partnerships, as our religious experience leads us to seek a change in the law so that same sex marriages can be celebrated, witnessed and reported to the state in the same way as heterosexual…
Interview with ‘Selections From the Dream Manual’ Artist Michael Skrtic
Via Technoccult:
Klint Finley: What possessed you to undertake this process of creating a collage painting for every line of Bill’s original Dream Manual?
Michael Skrtic: The Dream Manual appeared first in 1984 or 1985 in a magazine called The Negentropy Express, which was an APA (an amateur press association) by the Society for Creative Thought. I was one of the founding members of the Society for Creative Thought and I was immediately taken with Bill’s original text and the original short little collage things that he did to accompany the text. It sort of followed me around since then. In the early 90s, I had just moved to Stockholm and I was looking for a project. I thought, ah, I know what I’ll do, I’ll colorize Bill’s original collages, so I blew them up and I colorized a couple of pages, and then I got involved with something else. Fast forward to 2003.…
The Colbuffington Re-Post
Great summary of Colbert’s latest comedic coup from Alexia Tsotis at TechCrunch:
On his show tonight Colbert, frustrated with all the free content Arianna Huffington has been glomming off “The Colbert Report” and others, announced that he would build his own site and call it “The Colbuffington Re-Post.” The Colbuffington Re-Post has “everything you love about the Huffington Post because it is the Huffington Post with a new border around it that says the Colbuffington Re-Post.”
Har har indeed, except that when you actually visit TheColbuffingtonRepost.com, it truly serves up an exact copy of The Huffington Post with Stephen Colbert’s Colbuffington Re-Post logo. a) I’m not sure this is even legal. b) Just wait ’til Arianna gets a load of this…
This Is What Global Alcohol Consumption Looks Like (Map)
Who knew? Moldovans are the heaviest drinkers in the world, downing more than 18 liters/person every year. And the United States is well behind Europe, with most Europeans drinking nearly double as much as Americans.
So you’re not #1 in this respect, USA. Americans, what are you going to do about this? Via the Economist:
Another “fun” fact: Moonshine accounts for almost 30% of the world’s drinking…
US Government Accidentally Shuts Down 84,000 Websites
Photo: Zapyon (CC)
What happens when the government is given an internet kill switch? They accidentally shut down 84,000 websites whose identity they’ve mistaken during a child porn raid. Daily Tech reports:
In evidence of the dangers of the U.S. government’s increasing “kill switch” powers regarding web servers inside the U.S., the Department of Justice and Homeland Security’s ICE last week essentially shut down 84,000 sites in a case of mistaken identity.
The shutdowns targeted mooo.com, the most popular shared domain at free web service provider FreeDNS. FreeDNS is a free domain service that is immensely popular among file sharers, blogs, small businesses, and other independent operators. Its homepage is afraid.org.
With the mooo.com shutdown last Friday, the ICE accidentally shut down 84,000 subdomain pages. The pages were all redirected to a banner that stated “Advertisement, distribution, transportation, receipt, and possession of child pornography constitute federal crimes that carry penalties for first time offenders of up to 30 years…
Matt Taibbi: Why Isn’t Wall Street in Jail?
I have been a fan of Matt Taibbi’s work for quite some time, looks like he is asking the really “big” question in his most recent article (one that Danny Schechter, who Disinformation has worked with, has focused his work upon). I encourage you to read this article in Rolling Stone. Matt Taibbi writes:
Over drinks at a bar on a dreary, snowy night in Washington this past month, a former Senate investigator laughed as he polished off his beer.
“Everything’s fucked up, and nobody goes to jail,” he said. “That’s your whole story right there. Hell, you don’t even have to write the rest of it. Just write that.”
I put down my notebook. “Just that?”
“That’s right,” he said, signaling to the waitress for the check. “Everything’s fucked up, and nobody goes to jail. You can end the piece right there.”
Nobody goes to jail. This is the mantra of the financial-crisis era, one that saw…
What Do Assassins Want? Fame And Notoriety
In light of the Gabrielle Giffords shooting, NPR looks at a secret serviceman’s landmark 1999 study on the psyches of political assassins in America. Rather than ideological extremism, a desperate hunger for importance and immortality was what motivated most would-be assassins, who typically were individuals with failed, messy lives. And if they thought they could achieve fame by knocking off a political leader…they weren’t crazy, they were correct:
It’s well known that in March 1981, John Hinckley attempted to assassinate Ronald Reagan. What is not well known is that several years later, the life of President Reagan and the life of his vice president, George H.W. Bush, were threatened again — in fact, not just once.
“In the space of 18 months, four situations came to the attention of the Secret Service,” says Robert Fein, who in the mid-1980s worked with the Secret Service as a psychologist. Two were convicted, and two were…
Escaped Boa Constrictor Runs Amok In Boston Subway System For A Month
The thing that every subway commuter fears most happened in Boston — a boa constrictor ran loose in the transit system for a month before being caught, after its owner “lost” it. How is it possible to misplace a boa constrictor on the subway? Via the experts on all matters snake-related, Business Insider:
For the past month, a 3-foot-long boa constrictor has been roaming the Boston subways.
Snake-owner Melisa Moorhouse lost her non-venomous boa, Penelope, on a Red Line train on the morning of Jan. 6. She notified police immediately, but they were unable to find the snake. It is legal to transport pets on the MBTA.
Last Thursday the snake was finally found. Red Line attendant Sharon Lynch, a snake owner herself, lured the animal into a box.
Warning! Massive Solar Flare About To Impact Earth
Was Larry Joseph right all along? Many people discounted the author of Apocalypse 2012: An Investigation into Civilization’s End and his fears that a massive Coronal Mass Ejection will hit Earth with disastrous consequences in 2012, but now it appears that just such an event might be about to happen for real. Michael Sheridan reports for the Daily News:
A massive solar flare could make for a beautiful night for people in the northern United States – provided it doesn’t knock the lights out.
The blast of charged particles unleashed from the sun earlier this week has been peppering the Earth over the last few days, but it’s biggest punch is expected to hit the Earth’s atmosphere on Thursday.
Monday’s eruption, considered an X-class flare, is the biggest solar flare in four years. It is already being blamed for disrupting radio communication in China, and could potentially affect power grids and satellite communication around…
‘PSYWAR’: Connecting The Dots In Iraq
Jessica Lynch is awarded the Bronze Star, Prisoner of War and Purple Heart medals.
This is just a sidenote, but it’s an interesting one about the propaganda used on Americans during the illegal invasion.
We all know about the Jessica Lynch story, and how the military waited to “rescue” her and her fellow Army mechanics from their Iraqi doctors (who were portrayed at the time as “terrorists” holding them hostage, instead of medical professionals giving them proper treatment under the Geneva Conventions) until they had a camera crew in place to record it all for propaganda purposes.
But what I hadn’t put together, was the TIMING of the revelation of that operation, and how it worked in conjunction with another event.
The same day that the Pentagon revealed this “heroic story” (which Jessica Lynch herself finds embarrassing, apparently not appreciating her role as a tool of propaganda), they had blasted the Palestine Hotel with…
Justin Bieber Speaks On American Health Care
I believe this requires discussion not because the young celebrity is publicly discussing politics, but the implications it would have on the impressionable youth of the nation and the movement towards national health care. Excerpt taken from Rolling Stone:
The Canadian-born Bieber never plans on becoming an American citizen. “You guys are evil,” he jokes. “Canada’s the best country in the world.” He adds, “We go to the doctor and we don’t need to worry about paying him, but here, your whole life, you’re broke because of medical bills. My bodyguard’s baby was premature, and now he has to pay for it. In Canada, if your baby’s premature, he stays in the hospital as long as he needs to, and then you go home.
For the rare disinfo reader who is a Bieber fan, here’s some video from the RS shoot:
Article continues at Rolling Stone.
CBS Reporter ‘Sexually Assaulted’ Amid Egyptian Celebration of Democracy
Lara Logan in Iraq.
There is always a dark element to herd behavior, be it “authoritarian” or “revolutionary.” Melissa Maerz reports in the LA Times:
Lara Logan is recovering in an American hospital this week after being sexually assaulted and beaten by a mob in Egypt’s Tahrir Square late on Friday.
The same day that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak stepped down, Logan was surveying the mood of anti-Mubarak protesters for a “60 Minutes” story when she and her team “were surrounded by a dangerous element amidst the celebration,” CBS said in a statement Tuesday. The network said that a group of 200 people were then “whipped into a frenzy,” pulling Logan away from her crew and attacking her until a group of women and Egyptian soldiers intervened …
During her time in Egypt, Logan had been outspoken about the Mubarak regime’s efforts to intimidate foreign journalists. “We’re being prevented from telling this story,” Logan said during…
Hitler’s Graphic Design Manual
The spookiest graphic design instruction book ever? Steve Heller of Design Observer recently hunted down the Third Reich’s 70-page, full-color style manual for the proper use of Nazi insignia, graphics, and typefaces. This is how fascism created its appealing visual identity:
Designers and design historians told me over the years that they had heard about the existence of a Nazi graphics standards manual. No one could say they actually saw it, but they knew of someone who had. So it grew into something of a Big Foot or Loch Ness Monster tale, until one day I actually saw it too – and it had been right under my nose the whole time.
I had envisioned a manual of the kind that Lester Beall did for International Paper or Paul Rand did for IBM, showing acceptable logo weights and sizes, corporate typefaces and colors. I was so familiar with these standards manuals, that it never…
Iraqi Defector Comes Clean About His WMD Lies
Meet Rafid Ahmed Alwan al-Janabi, CIA codename Curveball. He lied about Saddam Hussein’s having biological weapons, giving the Bush administration the ammunition they needed in their push for an invasion of Iraq. Al-Janabi says he would do it all over again if he could — the lesson being, don’t trust anyone named Curveball.
Florida Police Obtain Warrant to Search ‘All Persons’ in Apartment Complex
WTF?!? These people got searched for living (or visiting someone who lived) in a certain area. Anthony Cormier writes in the Herald Tribune:
NEWTOWN — For months, Sarasota police officers watched drug dealers openly sell crack cocaine and marijuana from a vacant lot behind the Mediterranean Apartments in Newtown. Officers tried to arrest dealers, but suspects often fled and managed to disappear into the neighborhood.
The pressure to make arrests peaked in July 2009, when a man’s mutilated body was found in one of the apartment units. So that December, the agency tried something it had never done before. It sought permission from a judge to search anyone and everyone who parked or set foot in the apartment complex parking lot.
More than a dozen officers and the city’s SWAT team flooded the area. They had permission to detain and pat down anyone they saw in the area. During the two-hour raid, a…
Scientists Say 2001 U.S. Anthrax Attacks Can’t Be Pinpointed
Bruce Ivins. Photo: U.S. Army
Vindication of sorts for critics who said that the FBI falsely pinned blame for the mailed anthrax attacks shortly after 9/11 on the conveniently dead Bruce Ivins. Carol Cratty reports for CNN:
Using the available scientific evidence “it is not possible to reach a definitive conclusion” about the source of the anthrax used in the 2001 anthrax letter attacks which killed five people, according to a report issued Tuesday by the National Academy of Sciences.
The findings come two and a half years after the FBI said Army microbiologist Bruce Ivins was allegedly behind the anthrax mailings, and the spores could be genetically traced to a flask labeled RMR-1029 in his lab.
The scientific panel said the anthrax used in mailings to news organizations and members of Congress was the Ames strain Bacillus anthracis, and spores from those letters shared “a number of genetic similarities” with spores in Ivins’ flask.…
“Invisible Beam” Weapon To Be Used In Prisons (Video)
Amy Dusto writes on Discovery News:
Prison guards could soon stop fights with a harmless tool that shoots a laser-like beam, video game-style, down into a room where trouble is brewing. The Assault Intervention Device (AID), funded by the National Institute of Justice, is still large and unrefined but will soon be installed for trial in at least one prison, the Pitchess Detention Center in Los Angeles County.
The AID directs an energy beam, which is in the invisible millimeter wavelength, that penetrates just deep enough beneath the skin to make the target’s pain receptors shout. The sensation is a burn like touching a hot stove or an iron. It only lasts up to 3 seconds — the AID controls automatically shut the beam off to prevent shooting for longer without resetting the trigger finger. The beam can hit a target about 100 feet away, and is about as wide as a CD.
According to Raytheon, the device’s manufacturers, it causes no actual damage to nerves or skin. This video shows the sharp reflex caused by an AID hit, and the unscathed hit receivers.
