Film Scene Mistaken For Armed Robbery

From CNN.com

NORTH ANDOVER, Mass. -- Officers who attempted to foil a convenience store heist in North Andover were surprised to learn that the would-be robbers were really actors filming a movie.

VIDEO: Police Think Actors Are RobbersNewsCenter 5’s Todd Kazakiewich reported that the officers received a call about a robbery in progress at the store on Sunday afternoon and arrived believing that the robbers were still inside.

At the time, Haverhill director John Depew was filming an armed robbery scene for the upcoming film "27 Down."“They came in and they said, ‘Drop the gun’ and I couldn’t see the officer because he was behind (me),” Depew said. “I said, ‘It’s a movie, it’s a movie -- we’re filming a movie!’ ”The officers placed two of the actors in handcuffs, according to Depew. After a tense discussion, the crew explained that the situation to the officers.Store owner Tracy Adley, who was outside when police officers arrived, said that the store was still open at the time and customers had been notified of the filming. Adley believes that one of the customers likely called police and reported the robbery as a hoax.It is improbable that someone driving by the store mistook the scene for a real hold-up, Adley said, because it would be difficult to see inside the building from a passing vehicle. The store is set back from the road and has tinted windows.

Filming resumed on Sunday after the confusion was cleared up. No charges were filed against the storeowner or filmmaker.The film is scheduled to be released in January.

Our American way of life is unsustainable - evidence

by Chris Clugston

Our American way of life—300+ million people enjoying historically unprecedented living standards—is NOT sustainable because the ecological resources and economic resources upon which it depends will not be available going forward. As supplies associated with the ecological resources and economic resources that currently enable our way of life become increasingly scarce, we will experience escalating lifestyle disruptions, followed by societal collapse.

The following ecological and economic resources are critical to the perpetuation of our American way of life. None of these resources is sustainable; supply disruptions associated with all of them are possible at any time; and supply disruptions associated with any of them could trigger societal collapse.

Nonrenewable Natural Resources

Nonrenewable natural resources include both energy resources such as fossil fuels and nuclear material, and non-energy resources such as metals and industrial minerals. These natural resources are defined as “nonrenewable” because their supplies are “not renewed in an annual cycle of organic growth”[1]; that is, their supplies are “fixed” from the human perspective.

Total Nonrenewable Natural Resources

US Natural Resource Mix: Percentage of Renewable and Recycled US Natural Resource Utilization

In 1900, 41%[2] of the natural resources used in America (raw materials flowing into the US economy) were renewable. By 2007, only 13% of the natural resources used in the US were either renewable (5%)[3] or recycled (8%)[4]. Thus, 87% of the natural resources currently used in America are “nonrenewable”; supplies of these resources will peak, decline, and ultimately exhaust.

We have been able to continuously increase our level of economic activity, especially since the inception of our industrial revolution, by using nonrenewable natural resources to enable the various processes and activities associated with our production and consumption of goods and services. Currently, 87% of our economic activity is unsustainable; that is, enabled by nonrenewable natural resources.

Note that shortages or supply disruptions associated with all nonrenewable natural resources need not occur in order to cause severe lifestyle disruptions or societal collapse. As Liebig’s Law of the Minimum observes, “growth is controlled not by the total of resources available, but by the scarcest resource (limiting factor)” [5]. Hence, a protracted shortage or supply disruption associated with one critical nonrenewable natural resource is sufficient to trigger societal collapse.

Nonrenewable Energy Resources

US Energy Mix: Percentage of Total US Energy Obtained from Renewable Sources

In 1800, prior to the US industrial revolution, 100%6 of US energy was derived from renewable sources—primarily biomass. By 1900, the percentage of US energy derived from renewable sources had declined to 23.7%[6]; by 2007 this percentage had further declined to 6.8%[7]. Thus, over 93% of America’s total primary energy is currently derived from resources—oil, natural gas, coal, and nuclear—the supplies of which will peak, decline, and ultimately exhaust

We have been able to continuously increase our level of wellbeing—our population level and material living standards—especially since the inception of our industrial revolution, by using nonrenewable energy sources to enable the activities essential to our day-to-day existence: food production, cooking, heating, lighting, transportation, service provisioning, and industrial activity.

Using nonrenewable energy resources is like drawing down a one-time inheritance in order to “supplement” our current incomes and (temporarily) improve our lifestyles. Today, 93% of our American way of life is unsustainable; that is, enabled by our finite and dwindling “inheritance” of nonrenewable energy resources.

Pseudo Purchasing Power

Pseudo purchasing power is a generic characterization for economic resources that enable us to improve our level of wellbeing at any point in time at the expense of our future wellbeing. Specifically, pseudo purchasing power enables us to increase our “current” consumption level through economic asset liquidation, intergenerational debt, and deferred investments critical to our future wellbeing.

Pseudo Purchasing Power Derived from Economic Asset Liquidation

We increase our “current” consumption level by depleting our previously accumulated wealth reserves such as our home equity, our physical and financial assets, and our currency—i.e., by living off the past…

Home Equity Liquidation

Home Equity as a Percentage of Total US Residential Real Estate Value

In 1950, the equity interest in American homes was 81.5%8 of total US real estate value—the average American homeowner owned over 80% of his or her home. By 1980, this percentage had declined to 68.5%[8]. By 2007, US home equity had further declined to 47.5%[8]—the average American now owns less than 50% of his or her home. By drawing down the equity in our homes, we have seriously undermined the value of what has traditionally been the number one American investment.

We have been able to increase our “current” consumption level of goods and services by using our homes as ATM machines, and by securing high risk mortgages requiring little or no money down. The ultimate limit to this unsustainable behavior is the amount of equity remaining in our homes; a more systemic or structural limit has been evidenced during our recent “credit crisis”.

Domestic Asset Sales to Foreign Entities

Percentage of Total US Assets Owned by Foreign Entities

As recently as 1980, the ownership of US assets by foreign entities stood at only 3.1%9 of the total US asset base; by 2000, this percentage had increased to 9.9%[9]. In only seven years since then, the percentage of foreign owned US assets has soared to 17.6%[9] of our total asset base. Obviously we can only sell 100% of our assets; but foreign entities will obtain a controlling interest in the US long before we have sold out to that level.

We have been able to increase our “current” consumption level of goods and services by selling our physical assets and financial assets to foreign individuals, corporations, and governments—this is like selling the furniture in our homes in order to (temporarily) improve our lifestyles. The obvious limit to this unsustainable behavior is the size of our remaining asset base; the more imminent threat: “they who own us, control us”.

Currency Inflation

Relative Value of the US Dollar (1900 = 100%)

Using 1900 as a baseline, each US dollar provided $1 worth of purchasing power in 190010. By 1950, the relative value or purchasing power associated with each US dollar had declined to 33.3 cents[10]—one third of its value in 1900. By 2007, the relative value of a US dollar had further declined to 4.6 cents[10], less than 5% of its value in 1900. Continuous and significant erosion of our currency’s value seriously undermines the viability and credibility associated America as an economic power.

Perhaps the most insidious method by which we increase our “current” consumption level is the continuous inflation of our currency. By continuously increasing the supply of US dollars at rates greater than the rates at which we are able to create real wealth in the form of goods and services, we are able to “spend more than we earn” without incurring any formal debt obligation. The unsustainable side effect of this form of fiscal imprudence is the continuous devaluation of the US dollar, once the most stable and in-demand reserve currency in the world.

Pseudo Purchasing Power Derived from Intergenerational Debt

We increase our “current” consumption level by borrowing continuously, and at ever-increasing levels—i.e., by living off the future…

Accumulated Debt

Total US Debt as a Percentage US National Income

In 1950, following WWII, total US individual, corporate, and government debt stood at 158%[11] of our national income—it would have taken roughly 1.5 years worth of total US income to pay off our total outstanding debt. By 1980, our total debt had increased to 194%[11] of our national income. By 2007, our total debt had soared to 366%[11] of our national income—it would now take nearly 4 years worth of our total national income to pay off our accumulated debt.

We have been able to increase our “current” consumption level of goods and services through ever-increasing borrowing at all levels. While such a trend is obviously unsustainable, the critical issue is “how much debt is too much”? As a point of reference, total US debt immediately prior to the “1929 crash” stood at 260% of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP)[12]; our total debt in 2007 was 324% of GDP12.

New Debt

Incremental Annual US Debt as a Percentage US National Income

In 1950, new US debt incurred at the individual, corporate, and government levels totaled 6.2%[13] of our national income; by 1980, new debt had increased to 18%[13] of our total national income. In 2007, new debt totaled 33.2%[13] of our national income—we borrowed almost 1/3 as much as we earned in 2007. Such historically unprecedented new borrowing, in conjunction with our already staggering outstanding debt balance, calls into question the willingness and capacity of our creditors to continue to fund our profligate behavior going forward.

Because we must pay ever-increasing interest payments on ever-increasing outstanding debt balances, and because real incomes for most Americans have not risen in decades, we have resorted to borrowing more each year in order to perpetuate our American way of life—behavior that is obviously unsustainable.

Unrepayable Debt

Total US Debt as a Percentage US Net Worth

In 1950, total US debt at the individual, corporate, and government levels stood at 31.7%[14] of our total net worth (the difference between the assets and liabilities of all individuals, businesses, and governments in the US). By 1980, this figure had increased slightly to 35.7%[14]. In 2007, total US debt as a percentage of total US net worth had skyrocketed to 61.2%[14]. Our “unwieldy” debt has become “unrepayable” debt.

US debt has become “intergenerational”; it is inconceivable that we could ever pay it off—we no longer even try to pay it down. We are content to pass along our increasingly large debt balances to future generations. Unfortunately, when our creditors not only refuse to loan us additional funds but also demand repayment of our outstanding balances, we, or our children, will be physically unable to repay them. We are technically insolvent—bankrupt.[15]

Pseudo Purchasing Power Derived from Deferred Investments Critical to Our Future

We increase our “current” consumption level by failing to fund or by underfunding investments that are critical to our future wellbeing and to that of our progeny, such as in “social entitlement” programs, pension funds, and physical infrastructure—i.e., by shortchanging the future…

Underfunded Social Entitlement Programs

Unfunded Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid Obligations as a Percentage US Net Worth

In 1900, America had no social entitlement programs—Social Security was a product of the New Deal, and Medicare and Medicaid were initiated during the era of the Great Society. Since their inception, the financial obligations associated with these three programs have increased to almost incomprehensible levels. By 2007, the present value of the unfunded portion of the “big 3” programs—the difference between projected outlays and projected receipts—exceeded the total net worth of all US individuals, businesses, and governments combined.[16]

We have been able to increase our “current” consumption level by failing to allocate sufficient portions of our current incomes to fully fund our Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid programs. We simply “defer” this investment until some unspecified time in the future—ostensibly until after we have “collected our share” and are dead.

The result of our unwillingness to fully fund our “social entitlement” programs is a financial obligation that currently exceeds $77 trillion[16]—and is growing at $2.5 trillion per year[16]—an obligation so immense that it also exceeds our total national net worth, which is “only” approximately $73 trillion[17]. This situation is obviously not sustainable.

The Evidence is Indisputable

Our ecological and economic resource utilization behavior has become increasingly dysfunctional over the past 200 years. Ecologically, our American way of life is almost entirely dependent upon resources, the supplies of which will be wholly inadequate to support our population level and living standards in the future. Economically, a majority of our “current” consumption is enabled by fiscal imprudence: liquidating our economic asset reserves, incurring intergenerational debt, and deferring investments critical to our future wellbeing.

As a result, we are currently more vulnerable to resource supply shortages and disruptions than we have ever been in our country’s history—a situation exacerbated by ever-increasing global demand for resources essential the maintenance of our lifestyle paradigm. Through our incessant efforts to perpetuate our American way of life at all costs, we have become obscenely overextended—living far beyond our means both ecologically and economically—a trend that continues unabated, but that is physically unsustainable.

We cannot possibly mitigate the catastrophic consequences associated with our unsustainable lifestyle paradigm in the absence of fundamental, nationwide behavioral change—our voluntary transition to a sustainable lifestyle paradigm—which will entail rapid and drastic reductions to some combination of our population level and material living standards. To date, we have shown no willingness to acknowledge this reality.

Our American way of life is unsustainable and must come to an end. Should we attempt to perpetuate it, societal collapse is inevitable—within the not-too-distant future.

References

1. “Overshoot”; William Catton, Jr.; pg. 32; 1982.
2. http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2002/of02-335/of02-335.pdf “Economic Drivers of Mineral Supply“; USGS 2002; Wagner, Sullivan, and Sznopek, pgs. 20-21.
3. http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2002/of02-335/of02-335.pdf “Economic Drivers of Mineral Supply“; USGS 2002; Wagner, Sullivan, and Sznopek, pg. 23.
4. http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2002/of02-333/of02-333.pdf “Sociocultural and Institutional Drivers and Constraints to Mineral Supply”; USGS 2002; Brown, pg. 41 (recycled metals); and
   http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/fs-0181-99/fs-0181-99so.pdf “Recycled Aggregates--Profitable Resource Conservation”, USGS 2000, pg. 1 (recycled industrial minerals).
5. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebig's_law_of_the_minimum Wikipedia, Liebig’s Law of the Minimum.
6. http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/txt/stb1701.xls Table E.1: Estimated Primary Energy Consumption in the United States, Selected Years, 1635-1945; EIA.
7. http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/pdf/pages/sec1_9.pdf Table 1.3 Primary Energy Consumption by Source, Selected Years, 1949-2007; EIA “Annual Energy Review 2007”.
8. http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/Current/data.htm “Flow of Funds Accounts of the United States” (Table B.100); US Federal Reserve.
9. http://www.bea.gov/international/xls/intinv07_t2.xls “Table 2: International Investment Position of the United States at Yearend 1976-2007”; BEA; and http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/Current/data.htm “Flow of Funds Accounts of the United States” (Tables B.100, B.102, B.103, and B.106c); US Federal Reserve.
10. http://www.measuringworth.com/uscompare/ “Six Ways to Compute the Relative Value of a US Dollar Amount, 1774 to Present”; Measuring Worth; 2008.
11. http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/Current/data.htm “Flow of Funds Accounts of the United States” (Tables L.1 and F.7); US Federal Reserve.
12. http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials_04/matlack072304.html “Gold: Back to the Future?”; Downs and Matlack; 2004; and http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/Current/data.htm “Flow of Funds Accounts of the United States” (Tables L.1 and F.6); US Federal Reserve.
13. http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/Current/data.htm “Flow of Funds Accounts of the United States” (Tables F.1 and F.7); US Federal Reserve.
14. http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/Current/data.htm “Flow of Funds Accounts of the United States” (Tables L.1, B.100, B.102, B.103, and B.106c); US Federal Reserve.
15. http://www.minyanville.com/assets/File/Kotlikoff_USBankruptcy_paper[1].pdf “Is America Bankrupt?”; Lawrence Kotlikoff; Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis Review, July/August 2006.
16. http://www.philadelphiafed.org/econ/conf/forum2005/Smetters-assessing_the_Federal_Government.pdf “Fiscal and Generational Imbalances: An Update”; Gokhale and Smetters; pg. 26; 2005.
17. http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/Current/data.htm “Flow of Funds Accounts of the United States” (Tables B.100, B.102, B.103, and B.106c); US Federal Reserve.

Sloshing Inside Earth Changes Protective Magnetic Field

By Jeremy Hsu, Staff Writer

posted: 18 August 2008 06:35 am ET

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The innermost part of the earth. The outer core extends from 2500 to 3500 miles below the earth's surface and is liquid metal. The inner core is the central 500 miles and is solid metal. Credit: John Lahr, USGS Open-File Report 99-132

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The innermost part of the earth. The outer core extends from 2500 to 3500 miles below the earth's surface and is liquid metal. The inner core is the central 500 miles and is solid metal. Credit: John Lahr, USGS Open-File Report 99-132

The solar wind is a continuous flow of particles from the Sun consisting of electrically charged particles in a state known as plasma. The Earth’s magnetic field is distorted by the solar wind to a droplet-shaped magnetic bubble called the magnetosphere. On the nightside, the Earth’s magnetic field is stretched into a long tail, the magnetotail, much like the tail of a comet. The blue cavity represents the magnetosphere. The red area denotes the region where a large amount of charged particles reside and intense electric currents flow within the magnetosphere. The four Cluster satellites encountered a flow reversal region in the magnetotail. Credit: Tony Lui, JHU/APL

Something beneath the surface is changing Earth's protective magnetic field, which may leave satellites and other space assets vulnerable to high-energy radiation.

The gradual weakening of the overall magnetic field can take hundreds and even thousands of years. But smaller, more rapid fluctuations within months may leave satellites unprotected and catch scientists off guard, new research finds.

A new model uses satellite data from the past nine years to show how sudden fluid motions within the Earth's core can alter the magnetic envelope around our planet. This represents the first time that researchers have been able to detect such rapid magnetic field changes taking place over just a few months.

"There are these changes in the South Atlantic, an area where the magnetic field has the smallest envelope at one third [of what is] normal," said Mioara Mandea, a geophysicist at the GFZ German Research Center for Geosciences in Potsdam, Germany.

Even before the newly detected changes, the South Atlantic Anomaly represented a weak spot in the magnetic field — a dent in Earth's protective bubble.

Bubble bobble

The Earth's magnetic field extends about 36,000 miles (58,000 km) into space, generated from the spinning effect of the electrically-conductive core that acts something like a giant electromagnet. The field creates a tear-drop shaped bubble that has constantly shielded life on Earth against much of the high-energy radiation flowing from the sun.

The last major change in the field took place some 780,000 years ago during a magnetic reversal, although such reversals seem to occur more often on average. A flip in the north and south poles typically involves a weakening in the magnetic field, followed by a period of rapid recovery and reorganization of opposite polarity.

Some studies in recent years have suggested the next reversal might be imminent, but the jury is out on that question.

Measuring interactions between the magnetic field and the molten iron core 1,864 miles (3,000 km) down has proven difficult in the past, but the constant observations of satellites such as CHAMP and Orsted have begun to bring the picture into focus.

Electric storm

Mandea worked with Nils Olsen, a geophysicist at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark, to create a model of the fluid core that fits with the magnetic field changes detected by the satellites.

However, the rapid weakening of the magnetic field in the South Atlantic Anomaly region could signal future troubles for such satellites. Radiation storms from the sun could fry electronic equipment on satellites that suddenly lacked the protective cover of a rapidly changing magnetic field.

"For satellites, this could be a problem," Mandea told SPACE.com. "If there are magnetic storms and high-energy particles coming from the sun, the satellites could be affected and their connections could be lost."

The constant radiation bombardment from the sun blows with the solar wind to Earth, where it flows against and around the magnetic field. The effect creates the tear-drop shaped magnetosphere bubble, but even the powerful field cannot keep out all the high-energy particles.

Topsy-turvy history

A large sunspot set off a major radiation storm in 2006 that temporarily blinded some sun-watching satellites. Astronauts on the International Space Station retreated to a protected area as a precaution to avoid unnecessary radiation exposure.

The Earth's overall magnetic field has weakened at least 10 percent over the past 150 years, which could also point to an upcoming field reversal.

Mandea and Olsen hope to continue refining their model with updated observations, and perhaps to eventually help predict future changes in the Earth's magnetic field.

The study was detailed in the May online edition of the journal Nature Geoscience.

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Australian town mayor pleads for 'ugly women'

From CNN.com

SYDNEY, Australia (AP) -- Life can get a little lonely for bachelors in the Australian Outback mining town of Mount Isa. So the mayor has offered up a solution: recruit ugly women.

The Outback mining town of Mount Isa in the state of Queensland, Australia.

Mayor John Molony found himself under attack Monday over comments he made to a local newspaper that read: "May I suggest if there are five blokes to every girl, we should find out where there are beauty-disadvantaged women and ask them to proceed to Mount Isa."

The mayor added that many women who already live in the remote Queensland state town seem quite happy.

"Quite often you will see walking down the street a lass who is not so attractive with a wide smile on her face," he continued. "Whether it is recollection of something previous or anticipation for the next evening, there is a degree of happiness."

The quotes, published Saturday in the Townsville Bulletin, sparked outrage among the town's female population, led to furious online debates and drew criticism from the local chamber of commerce.

"There's a lot of anger circulating among the community at the moment -- a lot of passionate anger," Mount Isa Chamber of Commerce manager Patricia O'Callaghan told The Associated Press on Monday. "There's a lot of women voicing their opinions."

Molony declined to elaborate on his comments when reached by telephone Monday by the Associated Press, saying that what he said was being "twisted and warped."

"I've been shredded," he added, before hanging up the phone.

The situation may not be quite as dire as Molony noted. According to the 2006 census, males made up 52.6 percent of the town's population of nearly 20,000.

And several local women said there aren't a lot of gems to be found among Mount Isa's men, either.

"We've got a saying up here that the odds are good, but the goods are odd," 27-year-old Anna Warrick told The Brisbane Times.

Patients 'free from cancer' after immune-boost treatment

By Roger Highfield, Science Editor

Cancer patients have been left free of the disease after being treated with a new drug which harnesses the power of their own immune cells.

Immunotherapy: could it be the cure for cancer? Cancer patient recovers after injection of immune cells Search for the jab that can combat cancer Four of 38 patients with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma have seen the disease disappear following treatment, while five others saw reductions of 50 per cent in their tumours. While the trials were only carried out on patients with blood cancer, it is hoped the methods can be adapted to tackle other cancers The drug, which could prove cheaper than other similar therapies, works by activating the body’s own defences to attack the cancer. The results have been described as an "exciting" and "significant" development in the use of immunotherapy, the process of using the body’s own immune system to fight disease. While the trials were only carried out on patients with the blood cancer, it is hoped the methods can be adapated to tackle other cancers. The disease claims the lives of more than 150,000 people in the UK every year and more than one million people are suffering from cancer at any one time. advertisement Earlier this year doctors announced that a patient with advanced skin cancer was free of the disease two years after they injected him with billions of his own immune cells using a different method. However, experts warned at the time that the process could prove extremely expensive. The development of the drug could prove a much cheaper alternative way of providing immunotherapy treatments. Professor Peter Johnson, Cancer Research UK’s chief clinician, said: "These exciting preliminary results come from using them to harness the body’s own immune response in a new way. Although the side effects need to be monitored carefully, we hope that this type of treatment will prove to be active in larger trials in the future" "This a significant study," said Dr Cassian Yee, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, who has had significant results using the alternative method of treating patients with white blood cells grown in the lab. "It remains to be seen if most of the responses are longlasting. Certainly the results are very promising." The drug, which has been developed by Micromet, in Bethesda, Maryland, was trialled by a team led by Dr Ralf Bargou at University of Würzburg in Würzburg, German. Of the 38 patients with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma who took part in the most recent study, two of the seven who received the highest doses of the drug saw their cancer disappear while five others had reductions in their tumours of more than 50 per cent. One patient on a lower dose also became cancer free and remains so after more than a year. The results, published in the journal Science, are encouraging because they suggest that the bigger the dose, the bigger the effect. Coauthor of the study Dr Patrick Baeuerle, of Micromet, said all seven who received the highest dose responded to the drug. "Two of the seven had a complete response, and five a partial regression (greater than 50 per cent reduction of tumour).". The longest duration of a response was so far seen in a patient who received one quarter of their dose. After 13 months, he remains free of the blood cancer. There are adverse side effects involved, however, such as fevers and chills, occasionally with confusion and tremor, though all stopped after treatment ceased. Now a further trial is investigating how the drugs works in patients with another form of blood cancer, called acute lymphoblastic leukaemia. Trials with a similar drug are also under way on patients with another type of cancer, which affects glandular tissue and can appear in the lungs, prostate, breast, colon and elsewhere in the body.

Update on writing

I am on target to finish the first draft to The Oathbreaker by the end of this month. Its still rough around the edges but it has potential. Its all in longhand and I'm setting a date of the end of December to have the first edit done. I'm going for three total edits before I send it off. So I'm looking at a year from now before it is complete. I'll post samples here.

Bush could weaken Endangered Species Act

From CNN.com

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Parts of the Endangered Species Act may soon be extinct.
An adult male Florida panther growls as he enters his new home at Big Cypress National Preserve in Florida.

An adult male Florida panther growls as he enters his new home at Big Cypress National Preserve in Florida.
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The Bush administration wants federal agencies to decide for themselves whether highways, dams, mines and other construction projects might harm endangered animals and plants.

New regulations, which don't require the approval of Congress, would reduce the mandatory, independent reviews government scientists have been performing for 35 years, according to a draft first obtained by The Associated Press.

Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne said late Monday the changes were needed to ensure that the Endangered Species Act would not be used as a "back door" to regulate the gases blamed for global warming. In May, the polar bear became the first species declared as threatened because of climate change. Warming temperatures are expected to melt the sea ice the bear depends on for survival.

The draft rules would bar federal agencies from assessing the emissions from projects that contribute to global warming and its effect on species and habitats.

"We need to focus our efforts where they will do the most good," Kempthorne said in a news conference organized quickly after AP reported details of the proposal. "It is important to use our time and resources to protect the most vulnerable species. It is not possible to draw a link between greenhouse gas emissions and distant observations of impacts on species."

If approved, the changes would represent the biggest overhaul of the Endangered Species Act since 1986. They would accomplish through regulations what conservative Republicans have been unable to achieve in Congress: ending some environmental reviews that developers and other federal agencies blame for delays and cost increases on many projects.

The changes would apply to any project a federal agency would fund, build or authorize that might harm endangered wildlife and their habitat. Government wildlife experts currently perform tens of thousands of such reviews each year. See how the Endangered Species Act works today »

"If adopted, these changes would seriously weaken the safety net of habitat protections that we have relied upon to protect and recover endangered fish, wildlife and plants for the past 35 years," said John Kostyack, executive director of the National Wildlife Federation's Wildlife Conservation and Global Warming initiative. Photo See photos of endangered animals »

Under current law, federal agencies must consult with experts at the Fish and Wildlife Service or the National Marine Fisheries Service to determine whether a project is likely to jeopardize any endangered species or to damage habitat, even if no harm seems likely. This initial review usually results in accommodations that better protect the 1,353 animals and plants in the United States listed as threatened or endangered and determines whether a more formal analysis is warranted.

The Interior Department said such consultations are no longer necessary because federal agencies have developed expertise to review their own construction and development projects, according to the 30-page draft obtained by the AP.
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"We believe federal action agencies will err on the side of caution in making these determinations," the proposal said.

The director of the Fish and Wildlife Service, H. Dale Hall, said the changes would help focus expertise on "where we know we don't have a negative effect on the species but where the agency is vulnerable if we don't complete a consultation."

Responding to questions about the process, Hall said, "We will not do anything that leaves the public out of this process."

The new rules were expected to be formally proposed immediately, officials said. They would be subject to a 60-day public comment period before being finalized by the Interior Department, giving the administration enough time to impose them before November's presidential election. A new administration could freeze any pending regulations or reverse them, a process that could take months. Congress could also overturn the rules through legislation, but that could take even longer.

The proposal was drafted largely by attorneys in the general counsel's offices of the Commerce Department's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Interior Department, according to an official with the National Marine Fisheries Service, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the plan hadn't yet been circulated publicly. The two agencies' experts were not consulted until last week, the official said.

Between 1998 and 2002, the Fish and Wildlife Service conducted 300,000 consultations. The National Marine Fisheries Service, which evaluates projects affecting marine species, conducts about 1,300 reviews each year.

The reviews have helped safeguard protected species such as bald eagles, Florida panthers and whooping cranes. A federal government handbook from 1998 described the consultations as "some of the most valuable and powerful tools to conserve listed species."

In recent years, however, some federal agencies and private developers have complained that the process results in delays and increased construction costs.

"We have always had concerns with respect to the need for streamlining and making it a more efficient process," said Joe Nelson, a lawyer for the National Endangered Species Act Reform Coalition, a trade group for home builders and the paper and farming industry.

Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-California, chairwoman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, called the proposed changes illegal.

"This proposed regulation is another in a continuing stream of proposals to repeal our landmark environmental laws through the back door," she said. "If this proposed regulation had been in place, it would have undermined our ability to protect the bald eagle, the grizzly bear and the gray whale."

The Bush administration and Congress have attempted with mixed success to change the law.

In 2003, the administration imposed similar rules that would have allowed agencies to approve new pesticides and projects to reduce wildfire risks without asking the opinion of government scientists about whether threatened or endangered species and habitats might be affected. The pesticide rule was later overturned in court. The Interior Department, along with the Forest Service, is currently being sued over the rule governing wildfire prevention.

In 2005, the House passed a bill that would have made similar changes to the Endangered Species Act, but the bill died in the Senate.

The sponsor of that bill, then-House Resources chairman Richard Pombo, R-California, told the AP Monday that allowing agencies to judge for themselves the effects of a project will not harm species or habitat.

"There is no way they can rubber stamp everything because they will end up in court for every decision," he said.

But internal reviews by the National Marine Fisheries Service and Fish and Wildlife Service concluded that about half the unilateral evaluations by the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management that determined wildfire prevention projects were unlikely to harm protected species were not legally or scientifically valid.
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Those had been permitted under the 2003 rule changes.

"This is the fox guarding the hen house. The interests of agencies will outweigh species protection interests," said Eric Glitzenstein, the attorney representing environmental groups in the lawsuit over the wildfire prevention regulations. "What they are talking about doing is eviscerating the Endangered Species Act."

Slow motion lightning

Killer gets life sentence plus pizza in plea deal

From Newsvine

PORTLAND — A New York man who pleaded guilty to murder in Oregon in exchange for buckets of fried chicken will get calzones and pizza to go with his life sentence.

Tremayne Durham, 33, of New York City, admitted last month that he fatally shot Adam Calbreath, 39, of Gresham, in June 2006. Durham wanted to sell ice cream and ordered an $18,000 truck from an Oregon company. He later changed his mind, but the company wouldn't provide a refund.

The would-be ice cream man came to Oregon and killed Calbreath, a former employee of the company, while looking for its owner, authorities said.

Durham agreed to plead guilty to murder — but only if he could get a break from jail food. The judge agreed and granted Durham a feast of KFC chicken, Popeye's chicken, mashed potatoes, coleslaw, carrot cake and ice cream.

After Wednesday's sentencing, Durham was to get the rest of the deal — calzones, lasagna, pizza and ice cream, his defense attorney confirmed. They will pay the tab.

Durham also got married Wednesday in a civil ceremony at the Portland courthouse. The wedding to Vanessa Davis, 48, also of New York City, was not part of the plea deal that will give Durham a chance for parole after 30 years.

Deputy District Attorney Josh Lamborn said Multnomah County Judge Eric Bergstrom made the right call in allowing the unusual plea agreement because it saved the expense of a trial and possible appeals.

Vitamin C 'slows cancer growth'

From the BBC

An injection of a high dose of vitamin C may be able to hold back the advance of cancers, US scientists claim.

The vitamin may start a destructive chain reaction within the cancer cell, they add.

The jab halved the size of brain, ovarian and pancreatic tumours in mice, reported the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

However, Cancer Research UK said other studies suggested large vitamin C doses may interfere with cancer treatment.

This is encouraging work but it's at a very early stage because it involves cells grown in the lab and mice Dr Alison Ross Cancer Research UK

Earlier research by the team at the National Institutes of Health in Maryland had suggested that the vitamin, also called ascorbate, could kill cancer cells in the laboratory.

After these successful tests in mice, they are now suggesting that the treatment be considered for human use at similar levels.

The dose they employed - up to four grams per kilo of bodyweight - was far greater than any that could be achieved using diet or vitamin pills, as the digestive system does not absorb more than a fixed amount taken orally.

The mice were bred to have malfunctioning immune systems, then injected with human cancer cells, which as a result, grew quickly into large tumours. The vitamin was then injected into their abdominal cavity.

Tumour growth and weight fell by between 41% and 53%, and while in untreated mice, the disease spread rapidly to involve other body parts, no such spread was seen in the vitamin C-treated animals.

The researchers wrote: "These pre-clinical data provide the first firm basis for advancing pharmacologic ascorbate in cancer treatment in humans."

Peroxide bomb

The treatment works because a tumour cell is chemically different to a healthy cell.

The vitamin C reacts with this chemical make-up, producing enough hydrogen peroxide to kill the cell, while leaving healthy cells unscathed.

However, Dr Alison Ross, from Cancer Research UK said that much more work would have to be done to see if vitamin C could be a viable treatment.

"This is encouraging work but it's at a very early stage because it involves cells grown in the lab and mice.

"There is currently no evidence from clinical trials in humans that injecting or consuming vitamin C is an effective way to treat cancer.

"Some research even suggests that high doses of antioxidants can make cancer treatment less effective, reducing the benefits of radiotherapy and chemotherapy."

Toxin in soil may mean no life on Mars

From Miles O'Brien and Kate Tobin

(CNN) -- NASA's Phoenix lander has discovered a toxic chemical in soil near Mars' north pole, dimming hopes for finding life on the Red Planet, the probe's operators said Monday.

The Phoenix lander's inverted scoop prepares to take soil samples on Mars in this undated image.

The chemical, perchlorate, is an oxidant widely used in solid rocket fuel. Researchers are still puzzling over the results and checking to make sure the perchlorate wasn't carried to Mars from Earth, the University of Arizona-based science team said.

"While we have not completed our process on these soil samples, we have very interesting intermediate results," Peter Smith, the principal investigator for the project, said in a written statement.

Early readings from a device aboard Phoenix called the Microscopy, Electrochemistry and Conductivity Analyzer, or MECA, "suggested Earth-like soil," Smith said.

"Further analysis has revealed un-Earthlike aspects of the soil chemistry," he said.

The Phoenix team has scheduled a teleconference for Tuesday to discuss the findings.

"Oxidizing" soil conditions also were found at the Viking 1 and 2 landing sites in the 1970s, leading most scientists to conclude that there could be no life there.

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NASA's Odyssey orbiter first reported in 2001 that the planet's arctic plain was rich in water ice, mostly in the form of permafrost. Since the Phoenix lander touched down in May, robotic instruments on the craft have been collecting and analyzing soil samples, looking for organic compounds that would indicate Mars is or was able to support life.

The new findings from Phoenix cast into further doubt the possibility that life exists on Mars' surface. But they do not rule out the possibility that life once existed, nor do they necessarily rule out the possibility of life existing now, perhaps in a deep underground aquifer.

Phoenix's MECA instrument was designed to run four experiments on Mars' soil, testing for such characteristics as acidity and the presence of various compounds, minerals and salts. The science team has completed two MECA runs on soil, and perchlorate did not turn up in the first experiment.

The Phoenix team are continuing to use MECA and another instrument called the Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer, or TEGA, to look for organic chemicals. TEGA can also detect the presence of perchlorate, but so far has not done so.

NASA also announced last week that the Phoenix mission has been extended to the end of September. The mission could be extended again if it is operational then, but the harsh Martian winter will bring it to an end if nothing else does, probably around November.

Iraq five years later

How Terrorist Groups End

From the Rand Research Brief

Implications for Countering al Qa'ida

Abstract How do terrorist groups end? The evidence since 1968 indicates that terrorist groups rarely cease to exist as a result of winning or losing a military campaign. Rather, most groups end because of operations carried out by local police or intelligence agencies or because they join the political process. This suggests that the United States should pursue a counterterrorism strategy against al Qa'ida that emphasizes policing and intelligence gathering rather than a “war on terrorism” approach that relies heavily on military force.

The United States cannot conduct an effective counterterrorism campaign against al Qa'ida or other terrorist groups without understanding how such groups end. While it is clear that U.S. policymakers will need to turn to a range of policy instruments to conduct such campaigns — including careful police and intelligence work, military force, political negotiations, and economic sanctions — what is less clear is how they should prioritize U.S. efforts.

A recent RAND research effort sheds light on this issue by investigating how terrorist groups have ended in the past. By analyzing a comprehensive roster of terrorist groups that existed worldwide between 1968 and 2006, the authors found that most groups ended because of operations carried out by local police or intelligence agencies or because they negotiated a settlement with their governments. Military force was rarely the primary reason a terrorist group ended, and few groups within this time frame achieved victory.

These findings suggest that the U.S. approach to countering al Qa'ida has focused far too much on the use of military force. Instead, policing and intelligence should be the backbone of U.S. efforts.

First Systematic Examination of the End of Terrorist Groups

This was the first systematic look at how terrorist groups end. The authors compiled and analyzed a data set of all terrorist groups between 1968 and 2006, drawn from a terrorism-incident database that RAND and the Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism jointly oversee. The authors used that data to identify the primary reason for the end of groups and to statistically analyze how economic conditions, regime type, size, ideology, and group goals affected their survival. They then conducted comparative case studies of specific terrorist groups to understand how they ended.

Of the 648 groups that were active at some point between 1968 and 2006, a total of 268 ended during that period. Another 136 groups splintered, and 244 remained active. As depicted in the figure, the authors found that most ended for one of two reasons: They were penetrated and eliminated by local police and intelligence agencies (40 percent), or they reached a peaceful political accommodation with their government (43 percent). Most terrorist groups that ended because of politics sought narrow policy goals. The narrower the goals, the more likely the group was to achieve them through political accommodation — and thus the more likely the government and terrorists were to reach a negotiated settlement.

How 268 Terrorist Groups Worldwide Ended, 1968–2006

In 10 percent of cases, terrorist groups ended because they achieved victory. Military force led to the end of terrorist groups in 7 percent of cases. The authors found that militaries tended to be most effective when used against terrorist groups engaged in insurgencies in which the groups were large, well armed, and well organized. But against most terrorist groups, military force was usually too blunt an instrument.

The analysis also found that

• religiously motivated terrorist groups took longer to eliminate than other groups but rarely achieved their objectives; no religiously motivated group achieved victory during the period studied.
• size significantly determined a group's fate. Groups exceeding 10,000 members were victorious more than 25 percent of the time, while victory was rare for groups below 1,000 members.
• terrorist groups from upper-income countries are much more likely to be left-wing or nationalist and much less likely to be motivated by religion.

Police-Oriented Counterterrorism Rather Than a “War on Terrorism”

What does this mean for counterterrorism efforts against al Qa'ida? After September 11, 2001, U.S. strategy against al Qa'ida concentrated on the use of military force. Although the United States has employed nonmilitary instruments — cutting off terrorist financing or providing foreign assistance, for example — U.S. policymakers continue to refer to the strategy as a “war on terrorism.”

But military force has not undermined al Qa'ida. As of 2008, al Qa'ida has remained a strong and competent organization. Its goal is intact: to establish a pan-Islamic caliphate in the Middle East by uniting Muslims to fight infidels and overthrow West-friendly regimes. It continues to employ terrorism and has been involved in more terrorist attacks around the world in the years since September 11, 2001, than in prior years, though engaging in no successful attacks of a comparable magnitude to the attacks on New York and Washington.

Al Qa'ida's resilience should trigger a fundamental rethinking of U.S. strategy. Its goal of a pan-Islamic caliphate leaves little room for a negotiated political settlement with governments in the Middle East. A more effective U.S. approach would involve a two-front strategy:

• Make policing and intelligence the backbone of U.S. efforts. Al Qa'ida consists of a network of individuals who need to be tracked and arrested. This requires careful involvement of the Central Intelligence Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigation, as well as their cooperation with foreign police and intelligence agencies.
• Minimize the use of U.S. military force. In most operations against al Qa'ida, local military forces frequently have more legitimacy to operate and a better understanding of the operating environment than U.S. forces have. This means a light U.S. military footprint or none at all.

Key to this strategy is replacing the war-on-terrorism orientation with the kind of counterterrorism approach that is employed by most governments facing significant terrorist threats today. Calling the efforts a war on terrorism raises public expectations — both in the United States and elsewhere — that there is a battlefield solution. It also tends to legitimize the terrorists' view that they are conducting a jihad (holy war) against the United States and elevates them to the status of holy warriors. Terrorists should be perceived as criminals, not holy warriors.