Human

This story is not what surprised me, What really surprised me was that the American Press did not pick up on that Russia is also planning to build for Iran 2 light water nuclear reactors. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.tehrantimes.com/Description.asp...06&Cat=9&Num=18 Russian company prepares water demineralization at Iran NPP MOSCOW (RIA Novosti) – Atomstroiexport, Russia's nuclear power equipment and service export monopoly, said Friday it had started preparing for the launch of a water demineralizing system at the Bushehr nuclear power plant in Iran. Water demineralization is a key process in the functioning of NPPs, and its launch is the first step toward launching preliminary plant operations. Desalinated water is used to wash pipes in the NPP, and subsequently in the functioning of the plant. The preliminary stage will end August 31 when demineralized water is fed into the unit's systems. Iranian specialists are being trained to service the demineralizing system. Atomstroiexport will complete the Bushehr NPP plant before handing it over to Iran, in line with a Russian-Iranian intergovernmental agreement. Atomstroiexport is a leading Russian organization implementing intergovernmental agreements to build nuclear facilities abroad. It is the world's only company simultaneously building five nuclear power units - in China, India and Iran.

Sleeping pill 'revives vegetative patients' RHIANNON EDWARD A SLEEPING pill can temporarily revive people in a persistent vegetative state (PVS) to the point where they can have conversations, scientists have reported. South African researchers, writing in the journal NeuroRehabilitation, looked at the effects on three patients of using the drug Zolpidem for up to six years. Each of the three patients studied was given the drug every morning. An improvement was seen within 20 minutes but wore off after four hours. The research has been met with a mixed response, with some scientists claiming the patients in the trial were not in a true vegetative state. The researchers said one of the patients had been in a vegetative state for three years, showing no response to touch. After he was given Zolpidem, he was able to talk to his family, answering simple questions. Dr Ralf Clauss, now in the nuclear medicine department at the Royal Surrey Hospital, was one of the researchers who carried out the study. He said: "For every damaged area of the brain, there is a dormant area. The damaged tissue is dead, there's nothing you can do. But it's the dormant areas which 'wake up'." However, Mike Barnes, professor of neurological rehabilitation at the Hunters Moor centre in Newcastle, said it was possible the patients had not had "true" PVS. "A diagnosis of PVS means the patient should not wake up and respond." This article: http://news.scotsman.com/health.cfm?id=769002006 Last updated: 24-May-06 02:37 BST

Now this is what I consider to be a Fun Read. Enjoy http://www.futron.com/pdf/2006%20Forecast%20Whitepaper.pdf

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=45725 Turkey, Arab countries seek stronger economic ties Friday, June 9, 2006 ISTANBUL - TDN with wires Approximately 700 businessmen from Turkey and the Arab countries gathered here on Thursday for the Turkish-Arab Economic Forum to focus on ways to increase economic cooperation. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoðan and his Lebanese counterpart, Fuad Siniora, participated in the opening session of the gathering, which also included Arab League chief Amr Mussa and Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Barham Saleh among representatives from Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Kuwait and Qatar. The forum will feature several round-table discussions on a wide variety of subjects, including how Turkey's eventual membership in the European Union would affect the trade volume between Arab countries and Europe. "The more trade there is, the more prosperous and peaceful the world will be," Erdoðan said in his inaugural speech. Stating that economic and trade cooperation with Arab countries was of special importance, Erdoðan said, “We are not only friends, we are at the same time brothers.” “We have to ask this question of ourselves: Do these countries and these people who share the same civilization trade with each other at the same level? “I think the mutual interaction stemming from trade and investment will contribute to stability, development and welfare in our region. We are determined to support every step in this direction. Our geographic location, history, and humanitarian and cultural ties plus our economic commitments, business and investments all serve as a suitable ground for this purpose,” he said. Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Barham Saleh called for more investment in Iraq to help rebuild the battered country, urging better regional economic cooperation. "The reality is that the Arab world is one of the few remaining regions to have failed to capitalize on the full potential of regional cooperation and trade," Saleh said. He added that the new Iraqi government was determined to develop economic ties with the outside world. "Economic isolation is not an option. This was the policy of the totalitarian Baath regime and certainly it is not an option for the new democratic Iraq," Saleh said. "In Iraq we're determined to finish the job of economic restructuring, strengthening our democratic institutions and defeating terrorism." Saleh pointed out that Iraq was in dire need of restructuring the oil industry "in a fundamental manner" and has plans to produce an average of 4.3 million barrels a day by 2010. "Some of us think that is ... a conservative estimate and that we can do better," Saleh said. "Our infrastructure is in a sorry state." "We're unable to exploit our oil wealth because of debilitated pumping stations and poor pipeline capacity," he said, adding that similar structural problems also affect every sector, from religious tourism to agriculture. Saleh called on Turkey in particular to help in getting an Iraqi-Turkish oil pipeline, which often comes insurgent attack on the Iraqi side, to work at its optimal capacity of 1.5 million barrels a day. "Oil flows have been sporadic since late March 2003; Iraq and Turkey must work together to get the pipeline working at full capacity as a matter of urgency," Saleh said without elaborating. It was not clear what kind of help Saleh was seeking from Turkey since the attacks that halt the flow of oil occur on the Iraqi side of the border, where Turkey has no control. The pipeline runs from Iraq's Kirkuk oil fields to Turkey's Mediterranean oil terminal of Ceyhan. Saleh also asked Turkey to urgently work on a new water-sharing agreement over the transboundary Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Turkey maintains that it is allowing enough water to run through Syria and Iraq. "The rivers are precious shared natural resources that are critical to revitalizing Iraq's agricultural sector and reclaiming the marshlands," he said. "In this context, we need to reach a water-sharing accord with Turkey." Rona Yircali, head of the Foreign Economic Relations Board (DEIK), an influential nongovernmental economic organization, told the forum that the trade volume between Turkey and the Arab countries had reached $17 billion in 2005. "Energy projects worth $130 billion (102 billion euros) that are planned to be undertaken in Turkey in the next 10 years create new opportunities for the Arab world," he noted. Mainly Muslim Turkey is very keen on luring Arab investment, especially from the Gulf countries, amid a spectacular economic recovery from two major financial crises in 1999 and 2001. Last year Dubai International Properties, a leading property developer based in the United Arab Emirates, agreed to invest $5 billion in projects in Istanbul, a sprawling metropolis of over 12 million people.

Destroying Zarqawi really is a great victory for us all , and Nation Building really does take a long time. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/World/Iraq/200...1634921-ap.html BAGHDAD (AP) - The text of a document discovered in terror leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's hide-out. The document was provided in English Thursday by Iraqi National Security Adviser Mouwafak al-Rubaie; The situation and conditions of the resistance in Iraq have reached a point that requires a review of the events and of the work being done inside Iraq. Such a study is needed in order to show the best means to accomplish the required goals, especially that the forces of the National Guard have succeeded in forming an enormous shield protecting the American forces and have reduced substantially the losses that were solely suffered by the American forces. This is in addition to the role, played by the Shi'a (the leadership and masses) by supporting the occupation, working to defeat the resistance and by informing on its elements. As an overall picture, time has been an element in affecting negatively the forces of the occupying countries, due to the losses they sustain economically in human lives, which are increasing with time. However, here in Iraq, time is now beginning to be of service to the American forces and harmful to the resistance for the following reasons: 1. By allowing the American forces to form the forces of the National Guard, to reinforce them and enable them to undertake military operations against the resistance. 2. By undertaking massive arrest operations, invading regions that have an impact on the resistance, and hence causing the resistance to lose many of its elements. 3. By undertaking a media campaign against the resistance resulting in weakening its influence inside the country and presenting its work as harmful to the population rather than being beneficial to the population. 4. By tightening the resistance's financial outlets, restricting its moral options and by confiscating its ammunition and weapons. 5. By creating a big division among the ranks of the resistance and jeopardizing its attack operations, it has weakened its influence and internal support of its elements, thus resulting in a decline of the resistance's assaults. 6. By allowing an increase in the number of countries and elements supporting the occupation or at least allowing to become neutral in their stand toward us in contrast to their previous stand or refusal of the occupation. 7. By taking advantage of the resistance's mistakes and magnifying them in order to misinform. Based on the above points, it became necessary that these matters should be treated one by one: 1. To improve the image of the resistance in society, increase the number of supporters who are refusing occupation and show the clash of interest between society and the occupation and its collaborators. To use the media for spreading an effective and creative image of the resistance. 2. To assist some of the people of the resistance to infiltrate the ranks of the National Guard in order to spy on them for the purpose of weakening the ranks of the National Guard when necessary, and to be able to use their modern weapons. 3. To reorganize for recruiting new elements for the resistance. 4. To establish centres and factories to produce and manufacture and improve on weapons and to produce new ones. 5. To unify the ranks of the resistance, to prevent controversies and prejudice and to adhere to piety and follow the leadership. 6. To create division and strife between American and other countries and among the elements disagreeing with it. 7. To avoid mistakes that will blemish the image of the resistance and show it as the enemy of the nation. In general and despite the current bleak situation, we think that the best suggestions in order to get out of this crisis is to entangle the American forces into another war against another country or with another of our enemy force, that is to try and inflame the situation between America and Iran or between America and the Shi'a in general. Specifically the Sistani Shi'a, since most of the support that the Americans are getting is from the Sistani Shi'a, then, there is a possibility to instill differences between them and to weaken the support line between them; in addition to the losses we can inflict on both parties. Consequently, to embroil America in another war against another enemy is the answer that we find to be the most appropriate, and to have a war through a delegate has the following benefits: 1. To occupy the Americans by another front will allow the resistance freedom of movement and alleviate the pressure imposed on it. 2. To dissolve the cohesion between the Americans and the Shi'a will weaken and close this front. 3. To have a loss of trust between the Americans and the Shi'a will cause the Americans to lose many of their spies. 4. To involve both parties, the Americans and the Shi'a, in a war that will result in both parties being losers. 5. Thus, the Americans will be forced to ask the Sunni for help. 6. To take advantage of some of the Shia elements that will allow the resistance to move among them. 7. To weaken the media's side which is presenting a tarnished image of the resistance, mainly conveyed by the Shi'a. 8. To enlarge the geographical area of the resistance movement. 9. To provide popular support and cooperation by the people. The resistance fighters have learned from the result and the great benefits they reaped, when a struggle ensued between the Americans and the army of Al-Mahdi. However, we have to notice that this trouble or this delegated war that must be ignited can be accomplished through: 1. A war between the Shi'a and the Americans. 2. A war between the Shi'a and the secular population (such as Ayad 'Alawi and al-Jalabi.) 3. A war between the Shi'a and the Kurds. 4. A war between Ahmad al-Halabi and his people and Ayad 'Alawi and his people. 5. A war between the group of al-Hakim and the group of al-Sadr. 6. A war between the Shi'a of Iraq and the Sunni of the Arab countries in the gulf. 7. A war between the Americans and Iran. We have noticed that the best of these wars to be ignited is the one between the Americans and Iran, because it will have many benefits in favour of the Sunni and the resistance, such as: 1. Freeing the Sunni people in Iraq, who are (30 per cent) of the population and under the Shi'a Rule. 2. Drowning the Americans in another war that will engage many of their forces. 3. The possibility of acquiring new weapons from the Iranian side, either after the fall of Iran or during the battles. 4. To entice Iran towards helping the resistance because of its need for its help. 5. Weakening the Shi'a supply line. The question remains, how to draw the Americans into fighting a war against Iran? It is not known whether America is serious in its animosity towards Iraq, because of the big support Iran is offering to America in its war in Afghanistan and in Iraq. Hence, it is necessary first to exaggerate the Iranian danger and to convince America and the west in general, of the real danger coming from Iran, and this would be done by the following: 1. By disseminating threatening messages against American interests and the American people and attribute them to a Shi'a Iranian side. 2. By executing operations of kidnapping hostages and implicating the Shi'a Iranian side. 3. By advertising that Iran has chemical and nuclear weapons and is threatening the west with these weapons. 4. By executing exploding operations in the west and accusing Iran by planting Iranian Shi'a fingerprints and evidence. 5. By declaring the existence of a relationship between Iran and terrorist groups (as termed by the Americans). 6. By disseminating bogus messages about confessions showing that Iran is in possession of weapons of mass destruction or that there are attempts by the Iranian intelligence to undertake terrorist operations in America and the west and against western interests. Let us hope for success and for God's help. (End translation)

http://www.nasbo.org/Publications/PDFs/Fis...urveyJune06.pdf <~~~~~~ It's a major read.

http://draft.britishecologicalsociety.org/...s/100questions/ BRITISH ECOLOGICAL SOCIETY PRESS RELEASE 7 June 2006 Policy makers draw up list of “top 100” ecological questions Environmental policy makers have come up with a list of the “top 100” ecological questions most in need of an answer. The list, published online in the British Ecological Society's Journal of Applied Ecology, is the result of an innovative experiment involving more than 600 environmental policy makers and academics, and includes crucial questions such as which UK habitats and species might be lost completely due to climate change, and what are the comparative biodiversity impacts of newly emerging types of renewable energy? The list should help bridge the gap between science and policy that exists in many disciplines - including ecology - and could therefore have a major impact on future ecological research and its funding. According to the lead author, Professor Bill Sutherland of the University of East Anglia: “There is currently too little information flow between scientists and policy makers. Narrowing this gap would be very beneficial in generating policies that are based on sound science. Conversely, it is desirable that research should be more clearly directed at issues that influence policy.” The list of 100 questions is the outcome of two days of discussion between 654 environmental policy makers and academics. The academics acted as facilitators, helping the policy makers arrive at a short-list of 100 key questions from an initial long-list of more than 1,000. Policy makers came from 30 leading environmental organisations and regulators, including the Environment Agency, SEPA, English Nature, the National Trust, Butterfly Conservation, the Wildlife Trusts, the Woodland Trust and the British Trust for Ornithology, and the short-list was agreed by consensus and compromise. Ecologists hope that the list will have a major impact on both science and policy. Lists of research questions have been highly influential in the past in other fields, such as mathematics. At the Second International Congress of Mathematicians in Paris in 1900, David Hilbert posed 23 problems that had a major impact on mathematics throughout the twentieth century. Another mathematician, Paul Erdös, is thought to given most of his money away by offering prizes for the mathematical problems he posed. - ends -

I really can't imagine some one getting up in front of a National Audience, and to this day keep on spewing that the Elections were stolen. Ya know, what really amazes me about all of this? Is that there still is an audience for this, and that The democrats must think that the American Public is stupid <~~~~~~~~~~ this is the only conclusion that I can come too. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://news.yahoo.com/s/realclearpolitics/...shrinking_credi If the current trend continues, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. is going to end up being involved in the journalistic equivalent of the Bay of Pigs. His article in the latest issue of Rolling Stone claiming Republicans stole the 2004 election in Ohio is coming under a massive assault - and from the unlikeliest of places. Monday in Salon, Farhad Manjoo reduced RFK, Jr.'s seemingly authoritative argument to rubble. Democratic pollster Mark Blumenthal followed suit later the same day by taking down Kennedy's claim that exit polling is an "exact science" and highlighting how he either misinterpreted or willfully distorted numerous aspects of exit poll analysis contained in the Edison-Mitofsky report. Last Friday RFK, Jr. asserted on CNN, "There's no legitimate dispute that there was a massive, concerted, deliberate effort by high level-Republican Party officials to fix the election in Ohio. And the press has not covered this issue." This is a grotesque lie unsupported by even a shred of credible evidence, yet Kennedy is out on national cable television spewing it as gospel truth. As Manjoo points out in his Salon piece, the Democratic Party's own analysis, conducted by a team of handpicked experts, concluded that "the statistical study of precinct-level data does not suggest the occurrence of widespread fraud that systematically misallocated votes from Kerry to Bush." (Emphasis added). Repeat after me: there was no fraud in Ohio. I take that back. There was one confirmed case of fraud in Ohio in 2004: a Democratic operative was paid in crack cocaine for submitting hundreds of registrations all in the same handwriting with names like "Mary Poppins" and "Michael Jackson." The point, however, is that if you sift through the allegations of "irregularities" Democrats investigated in Ohio, what you find more than anything is a list of reasons why democracy up close is a fairly ugly thing: a combination of human error, machine malfunctions, and other assorted glitches. They happen all across the country every time we try and facilitate a process to allow millions of people to express their opinion within the space of a few hours. Remember also that many of the places where irregularities are alleged to have occurred in Ohio were in heavily Democratic precincts with Democratic poll workers. I have a good friend who is a liberal activist working on the East Coast, and he was one of the thousands of volunteers who descended on Ohio in the final weeks of the election to help turn out the vote for Kerry. After the election I asked him what happened and he said that one of the factors that frustrated their efforts was that poll workers in heavily Democratic precincts were terribly disorganized. Their voting lists weren't being properly updated, and as the day wore on it became difficult to locate those who hadn't voted and go pick them up and get them to the polls. The disorganization accounted for some of the long lines in heavily Democratic areas as well. Like most Americans, I'm in favor of continuing to take steps to try and improve our election systems to make the right to vote easy to exercise. And I'm also for taking whatever steps we can to wring fraud out of the election system. The casting of an illegal ballot is every bit as pernicious to our democracy as the disenfranchisement of a legitimate voter. Ultimately, no matter what technology we employ or how many rules we have in place, our system is going to be plagued with a certain degree of error, fraud, and abuse because it relies on the responsibility of voters to properly cast their ballot and also on the responsibility of poll workers to make sure those ballots are properly counted. If Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. was a serious, credible person, he'd be working to try and improve the U.S. election system. Instead, he's out spinning falsehoods about the 2004 presidential election in Ohio that many members of his own party don't even believe.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.yubanet.com/artman/publish/article_36742.shtml Droids on the ISS By: Dr. Tony Phillips and Patrick L. Barry, Science@NASA Published: Jun 1, 2006 at 07:34 Six years ago, MIT engineering Professor David Miller showed the movie Star Wars to his students on their first day of class. There's a scene Miller is particularly fond of, the one where Luke Skywalker spars with a floating battle droid. Miller stood up and pointed: "I want you to build me some of those." So they did. With support from the Department of Defense and NASA, Miller's undergraduates built five working droids. And now, one of them is onboard the International Space Station (ISS). "It only looks like a battle droid," laughs Miller. It's actually a tiny satellite—the first of three NASA plans to send to the ISS. Together, they'll navigate the corridors of the space station, learning how to fly in formation. Tiny satellites are a hot new idea in space exploration: Instead of launching one big, heavy satellite to do a job, why not launch lots of little ones? They can orbit Earth in tandem, each doing their own small part of the overall mission. If a solar flare zaps one satellite—no problem. The rest can close ranks and carry on. Launch costs are reduced, too, because tiny satellites can hitch a ride inside larger payloads, getting to space almost free of charge. But there's a problem: Flying in formation is trickier than it sounds. Ask a crowd of people to line up single file, and they'll be able to figure it out and do it rather easily. Getting a group of orbiting satellites to do the same thing, it turns out, is extremely hard. "Suppose you've got a cluster of satellites in orbit," says Miller, "and one or two of them lose their place." Maybe a solar flare temporarily scrambles their nav-computers, or a thruster firing didn't work as expected. The whole cluster finds itself out of whack. Correcting the problem requires a complex set of 3-dimensional adjustments, coordinated among all the satellites—perhaps dozens or hundreds of them. "We've got to break this down into step-by-step, concrete instructions that a computer can understand," Miller says. And that takes us back to the ISS: Miller's challenge to his undergraduate engineering class back in 1999 was to design a small, roughly spherical robot that could float aboard the ISS and maneuver using compressed CO2 thrusters. The project, called SPHERES (Synchronized Position Hold Engage Re-orient Experimental Satellite), would serve as a testbed for trying out experimental software to control clusters of satellites. The robotic spheres provide a generic platform consisting of sensors, thrusters, communications and a microprocessor; scientists working on new software ideas can load their software into that platform to see how well those ideas work. It's a quick and relatively cheap way to test new theories on software design. Possible applications include NASA's return to the Moon (see the Vision for Space Exploration). One way to build a moonship is to assemble it piece by piece in Earth orbit. "Software designed to control small satellites could just as well be used to maneuver the pieces of a spaceship together," says Miller. The first SPHERE arrived on the ISS in April tucked inside a Progress supply rocket. (Remember, tiny satellites make good hitchhikers.) Eventually two more SPHERES will join it, one later this year when the space shuttle Discovery (STS-121) returns to the station, and another carried to orbit by a future shuttle mission. How will astronauts tell the three SPHERES apart? "They're color coded," explains Miller. The one onboard now is red; the second will be blue and the third yellow. "Red" is already busy. "We've commanded it to do a variety of maneuvers—loops and turns, for instance. And we've tested the robot's ability to solve problems." Astronauts tried to trick Red by causing one of its thrusters to stick "on." The robot diagnosed the fault, turned the thruster off, and returned to station-keeping. "Not bad for one little droid," says Miller. "I can’t wait to see what three of them can do."

I hope that every one knows that, that movie is in theaters now. It opened may26th.

Rees is right on that point. It really is the over all message, and how it is presented. " the stuff of politics" Let me give you an example; Remember the illegal alien marches? The way the message got out "drum roll please" RADIO. Specifically thru Latino Radio Stations. <~~~ this is common knowledge so I'm not spilling any secrets.

By the way Rees, thank you for trying to come to my defense. I've been in a few cyber cat fights myself, and the conclusion that I came to “it really is a waste of time". MAJOR WASTE OF TIME. That's it, I'm done, lets get back to politics. Lets concentrate on the real issues like how to support our president "remember people, I am republican after all". Or for you all "How to make Washington D.C. a better place to live".

Just for the record, I don't hate gay people in any way shape or form. This is part is for the ones who tried to get my i.p. address; I don't appreciate this type of behavior, again in any way shape or form. To me it's hacking, and I don't like hackers. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rees, when I saw the post on multiple alias disorder, I just chuckled. What is it? on aol a person can have at least 5 screen names? I understand very well the games being played. I figure that the ones doing this are just kids. At least I'm hoping that they are just kids. Blogs are just online diaries so the blogs that I've seen posted don't mean a thing. I've been online a very long time. I have seen just about every side of the human animal that there is to see, and some of it aint pretty either. What people at times fail to understand is that there is a difference between politics, and out right personal attacks.

Maybe, Just Maybe everyone should concentrate on the issues of the District of Columbia, and stop these personal attacks. It really would help alot. Typing about 1 person and concentrating about 1 person does not bring into light The problems that D.C. faces. Luke is correct in concentrating on the issues, and not on the personalities. Oh!!!! and how are the roads in ward 3??? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rees, hey! I actually like you. Anyone who gets into politics deserves respect. As a republican myself I didn't like Clinton's policies, But I SURE RESPECT him. Got to meet him also (my brother in-law is a hardcore democrat, I made his year when I took him to meet the Clintons.) What people do not understand about politicians, and there staff is that those people in politics really do this to help their respective communities.

hummm? Ya know I might be able to write a good book on this; titled "how democrat treat their own".

Rees; considering that D.C. is the nation’s capitol what is your vision for D.C. 5 years from now? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nati...31_libya17.html TRIPOLI, Libya — With the last vestiges of U.S. sanctions swept away, Moammar Gadhafi's bid to bring Libya back into the diplomatic mainstream has scored a stunning success. Gadhafi's next goal: an economic revival funded by the doubling of oil production in the coming decade. High-tech U.S. oil-extraction methods should help, as will geography: Libya, on the North African coast, should be immune from disruptions that could snarl the flow of oil from the Persian Gulf. Analysts describe Libya as a country with a bright future, whose emergence from diplomatic isolation is balm to an oil-thirsty world. "Libya and Gadhafi are making all the right moves," said Dalton Garis, an American oil economist at the Petroleum Institute in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. "The Libyans have done a lot to normalize things, more than anyone would've expected." Libya is also one of the few countries with huge oil reserves that is actively encouraging foreign companies — especially American firms — to explore and produce oil. In Bolivia and Venezuela, leaders have joined big oil states like Saudi Arabia, Iran and Kuwait in reining in foreign oil companies — or booting them out. Libya's light sweet crude is ideal for refining into gasoline, and its oil fields are far closer to U.S. and European markets than those in the Gulf, where the Straits of Hormuz — a choke point between Iran and Oman — could be blocked in the event of war. On Monday, the Bush administration put Libya back in the game by announcing the restoration of diplomatic relations and Libya's removal from a U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism. The move is under congressional review. Libya's dramatic rehabilitation comes as the country is emerging from a long period of stagnation. In 1970, the year after Gadhafi deposed King Idris in a coup, Libya's oil production averaged 3.4 million barrels a day, its highest ever. Production dropped as Gadhafi consolidated power, shut U.S. and British military bases and nationalized oil assets, which restricted oil companies' roles. Libya's oil sector bottomed out in the 1980s at 1 million barrels per day. Oil production crept up in the 1990s and currently stands near 1.6 million barrels per day. Now, Gadhafi is seeking $30 billion in foreign investment, aiming to bring production to 1970s levels by 2015 or so. "With the largest reserve base on the African continent, there's no reason that Libya can't restore the capacity it had in the 1970s, and double today's production," said Edward Morse at Hess Energy Trading in New York. Oil production has been climbing since President Bush ended most restrictions in 2004 and allowed the return — after an 18-year hiatus — of U.S. oil companies Occidental Petroleum, ChevronTexaco, Marathon Oil and Amerada Hess International. Libya's new production isn't enough to dent sky-high oil prices, Morse said, with yearly global demand growing by 1.5 million barrels daily. Monday's announcement that Libya had been removed from the U.S. list of terror sponsors allows American companies to bring in technology that was previously blocked. That, said Julius Walker with PVM Oil Associates in Vienna, means engineers can squeeze more oil from their holdings by repressurizing old wells using steam injections, finding oil using 3-D seismic surveying tools, and tapping tricky reservoirs with horizontal drilling. Walker and others say Libya's true oil wealth is probably far greater than its 39 billion proven barrels. With Gadhafi no longer an international pariah, the mercurial leader's global clout is expected to increase as oil exports rise. Gadhafi's profile is also boosted by being seen to cooperate with the Bush administration's nuclear counter-proliferation efforts, as an example to Iran of the benefits of dropping nuclear enrichment. "They've got a lot of leverage now," Morse said. "They've become the darlings of American politicians as an example to the Iranians." Copyright © 2006 The Seattle Times Company

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060515/bs_af...co_060515232639 TOKYO (AFP) - Honda Motor has decided to build a new factory in North America at an estimated cost of 50 billion yen (452 million dollars), with operations expected to start in 2009, a report said. The facility would be Honda's sixth in North America and the first built there by Japan's third-largest automaker since 2001, when a factory opened in the US state of Alabama, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun said. The plant would initially produce about 150,000 vehicles per year, which would account for nearly 10 percent of the automaker's North American sales, the business daily said, without citing sources. Honda sold about 1.66 million vehicles there in 2005, up six percent on the year and representing roughly half of worldwide sales, it said. Honda has five auto plants in North America: two in Ohio and one each in Alabama, the Canadian province of Ontario and the Mexican state of Jalisco. While the location for the new facility has not yet been decided, Honda will likely build it near an existing plant, the Nihon Keizai said. Officials at Honda were not immediately available for comment.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.physorg.com/news66479393.html Emerging nanotechnology made its way into more than $30 billion in manufactured goods in 2005, more than double the year before, experts tell UPI's Nano World. "The overall story that we're seeing for nanotechnology is motion out of the lab and onto the shelves," said New York-based nanotechnology analyst firm Lux Research President and Director of Research Matthew Nordan. Products enabled by nanotechnology on the market today, ranging from antimicrobial refrigerators to drugs boosted by nanoparticles, carry an average price premium of 11 percent vs. comparable products. Nanotechnology is expected to be incorporated into $2.6 trillion in global manufactured goods in 2014, or roughly 15 percent of total output, Lux Research revealed in a report Monday. Asia is rising in the nanomaterial supply field. "You have more than 30 companies in China alone when it comes to ceramic nanoparticles, with 120 in the rest of the world. You see CNT Co. in Korea, with carbon nanotubes at 200 dollars a kilogram, undercutting Western suppliers by more than 50 percent. That's pretty dramatic," Nordan said. "Asia can compete aggressively not only in labor, but in capital. In the long run, nanomaterials will probably by owned by East Asian companies." Governments, corporations and venture capitalists worldwide spent $9.6 billion on nanotechnology research and development in 2005, up 10 percent from 2004. Corporations grew the most in spending, with $4.5 billion on nanotechnology R&D worldwide in 2005, up 18 percent from 2004. Of this, $1.9 billion was in North America, $1.7 billion in Asia, $850 million in Europe and $70 million in the rest of the world. "We earlier predicted that government spending would be surpassed by corporate spending. It's almost there," Nordan said. Governments worldwide still invested the most in nanotechnology in total, at $4.6 billion in 2005, but this was up only 3 percent from 2004. Government funding is slowing as expenditure shifts from constructing new nanotechnology research facilities to operating ones already built, Nordan said. North America, almost entirely accounted for by the United States and Asia, dominated by Japan, each spent $1.7 billion. Western Europe, led by Germany, spent $1.1 billion, while the rest of the world spent $100 million. Venture capitalist in nanotechnology reached $497 million globally in 2005, making up roughly 2 percent of total global venture-capital flows, up 17 percent from 2004. While the average size of venture-capital deals in nanotechnology shot up to $10.9 million in 2005 on large series C and D for late-stage companies like Nanomix, Aspen Aerogels and Nanosys, overall deal numbers are down, falling 17 percent from 2004. Venture capital in nanotech is highly concentrated, with the top 10 percent of the 143 nanotechnology startups that have received institutional venture-capital funding since 1998 accounting for 43 percent of cumulative funding. There is a herd mentality in venture capital that waits until a validation of the field," Nordan said. "There is another crop of IPOs coming up, and if those succeed, we'll see much larger business creation events, and probably see some bad money spent." Charles Harris, chairman and chief executive officer of venture-capital firm Harris & Harris Group in New York, commented that the increase in nanotech-deal sizes and decrease in deal numbers reflected a trend in venture capital in general. "Venture capital firms now have more money under management, and need to do larger deals to employ the additional capital they've raised. Also, all venture capitalists are struggling with the fact that the number of venture-backed IPOs is way down from where it was from the bust in 2000. In the first quarter of this year, there were only 13 venture-backed IPOs, and in the boom years from the mid-90s to the year 2000, a typical quarter might have anywhere from 25 to 75 venture-backed IPOs," Harris said. Harris added publicly held companies are now dealing with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, a federal law that came in the wake of corporate financial scandals such as those involving Enron, Tyco and WorldCom, which covers issues such as corporate responsibility and establishing oversight boards. "It's very expensive to comply with it, which makes it hard to go public unless a company is big enough, so venture capitalists have to invest in bigger companies," he explained. Copyright 2006 by United Press International

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ May 11, 2006 http://www.rochester.edu/news/show.php?id=2544 Light's Most Exotic Trick Yet: So Fast it Goes ... Backwards? In the past few years, scientists have found ways to make light go both faster and slower than its usual speed limit, but now researchers at the University of Rochester have published a paper today in Science on how they've gone one step further: pushing light into reverse. As if to defy common sense, the backward-moving pulse of light travels faster than light. Confused? You're not alone. "I've had some of the world's experts scratching their heads over this one," says Robert Boyd, the M. Parker Givens Professor of Optics at the University of Rochester. "Theory predicted that we could send light backwards, but nobody knew if the theory would hold up or even if it could be observed in laboratory conditions." Boyd recently showed how he can slow down a pulse of light to slower than an airplane, or speed it up faster than its breakneck pace, using exotic techniques and materials. But he's now taken what was once just a mathematical oddity—negative speed—and shown it working in the real world. It's weird stuff," says Boyd. "We sent a pulse through an optical fiber, and before its peak even entered the fiber, it was exiting the other end. Through experiments we were able to see that the pulse inside the fiber was actually moving backward, linking the input and output pulses." So, wouldn't Einstein shake a finger at all these strange goings-on? After all, this seems to violate Einstein's sacred tenet that nothing can travel faster than the speed of light. "Einstein said information can't travel faster than light, and in this case, as with all fast-light experiments, no information is truly moving faster than light," says Boyd. "The pulse of light is shaped like a hump with a peak and long leading and trailing edges. The leading edge carries with it all the information about the pulse and enters the fiber first. By the time the peak enters the fiber, the leading edge is already well ahead, exiting. From the information in that leading edge, the fiber essentially 'reconstructs' the pulse at the far end, sending one version out the fiber, and another backward toward the beginning of the fiber." Boyd is already working on ways to see what will happen if he can design a pulse without a leading edge. Einstein says the entire faster-than-light and reverse-light phenomena will disappear. Boyd is eager to put Einstein to the test. So How Does Light Go Backwards? Boyd, along with Rochester graduate students George M. Gehring and Aaron Schweinsberg, and undergraduates Christopher Barsi of Manhattan College and Natalie Kostinski of the University of Michigan, sent a burst of laser light through an optical fiber that had been laced with the element erbium. As the pulse exited the laser, it was split into two. One pulse went into the erbium fiber and the second traveled along undisturbed as a reference. The peak of the pulse emerged from the other end of the fiber before the peak entered the front of the fiber, and well ahead of the peak of the reference pulse. But to find out if the pulse was truly traveling backward within the fiber, Boyd and his students had to cut back the fiber every few inches and re-measure the pulse peaks when they exited each pared-back section of the fiber. By arranging that data and playing it back in a time sequence, Boyd was able to depict, for the first time, that the pulse of light was moving backward within the fiber. To understand how light's speed can be manipulated, think of a funhouse mirror that makes you look fatter. As you first walk by the mirror, you look normal, but as you pass the curved portion in the center, your reflection stretches, with the far edge seeming to leap ahead of you (the reference walker) for a moment. In the same way, a pulse of light fired through special materials moves at normal speed until it hits the substance, where it is stretched out to reach and exit the material's other side. Conversely, if the funhouse mirror were the kind that made you look skinny, your reflection would appear to suddenly squish together, with the leading edge of your reflection slowing as you passed the curved section. Similarly, a light pulse can be made to contract and slow inside a material, exiting the other side much later than it naturally would. To visualize Boyd's reverse-traveling light pulse, replace the mirror with a big-screen TV and video camera. As you may have noticed when passing such a display in an electronics store window, as you walk past the camera, your on-screen image appears on the far side of the TV. It walks toward you, passes you in the middle, and continues moving in the opposite direction until it exits the other side of the screen. A negative-speed pulse of light acts much the same way. As the pulse enters the material, a second pulse appears on the far end of the fiber and flows backward. The reversed pulse not only propagates backward, but it releases a forward pulse out the far end of the fiber. In this way, the pulse that enters the front of the fiber appears out the end almost instantly, apparently traveling faster than the regular speed of light. To use the TV analogy again—it's as if you walked by the shop window, saw your image stepping toward you from the opposite edge of the TV screen, and that TV image of you created a clone at that far edge, walking in the same direction as you, several paces ahead

By this Republican here is a shameless plug for ANYONE "regardless of political affiliation" getting an education, or thinking of getting an education. Use the links well. http://www.lib.msu.edu/harris23/grants/3specpop.htm www.grants.gov ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hummm? "The Rat Patrol". Sounds good. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.nbc4i.com/news/8854227/detail.html Police Train Rats To Sniff Out Land Mines Colombia Has Thousands Of Land Mines POSTED: 11:54 am EDT April 20, 2006 UPDATED: 11:58 am EDT April 20, 2006 Email This Story | Print This Story BOGOTA, Colombia -- Police in Colombia are training rats to sniff out explosives. The rodents, unlike dogs, weigh less than half a pound and don't trigger explosions when they walk on mines, officials said. Lola and Espejo are two whiskered, red-eared rats. They are part of an experimental six-rat squadron. Police are preparing the rodents for dangerous missions defusing the more than 100,000 land mines that are scattered across Colombia's countryside after 40 years of battle between the government and leftist rebels. Col. Javier Cifuentes said he thinks his country is the first to use rats to conduct police work. To earn their stripes, the rats have undergone daily training during the past year. The animals are placed in a maze with explosives and other materials used to make bombs. When they find the target, the rats are rewarded with crackers and a gentle scratch behind their ears. Trainers said the rats are able to locate the explosives 83 percent of the time. They estimate it could be another six months before they reach their goal of a 100-percent success rate. After reaching the perfect score, officials said the rats could be put on duty. According to government statistics, Colombia leads the world in land mine victims. Officials said 1,070 people were injured by mines there in 2005, and nearly 25 percent of the victims died from their injuries.

At least we made one of the top listing in the number of people online, but on usage? We did not even make the top 15. The full article can be found at http://www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?press=849 I am just wondering if the countries mentioned use the internet in a smart way "Business, Education", and how many hours is devoted to junk surfing?? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Top 15 Online Populations by Country, Among Visitors Age 15+* March 2006 Total Worldwide – All Locations Unique Visitors (000) Source: comScore World Metrix Unique Visitors (000) Worldwide Total 694,260 United States 152,046 China 74,727 Japan 52,100 Germany 31,813 United Kingdom 30,190 South Korea 24,645 France 23,884 Canada 18,996 Italy 16,834 India 16,713 Brazil 13,186 Spain 12,452 Netherlands 10,969 Russia 10,833 Australia 9,735 * Excludes traffic from public computers such as Internet cafe and, access from mobile phones or PDAs. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Top 15 Countries by Average Monthly Hours Online per Unique Visitor Among Visitors Age 15+* March 2006 Total Worldwide – All Locations Source: comScore World Metrix Avg. Hours per Visitor March-06 Worldwide 31.3 Israel 57.5 Finland 49.3 South Korea 47.2 Netherlands 43.5 Taiwan, Province of China 43.2 Sweden 41.4 Brazil 41.2 Hong Kong 41.2 Portugal 39.8 Canada 38.4 Germany 37.2 Denmark 36.8 France 36.8 Norway 35.4 Venezuela 35.3 * Excludes traffic from public computers such as internet cafes or access from mobile phones or PDAs