10/14/2005
No-Till Farming May Reduce Global Warming
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No-till farming builds top soil (heals the earth), controls weeds and much much more. Then there's this global warming news: University researchers and Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientists in Tennessee say no-till farming helps store carbon in fields and that can help countries meet targeted reductions in atmospheric carbon dioxide, reducing the effects of global warming.
Some carbon is found in soil as organic matter and no-till farming can potentially increase the accumulation of organic carbon in soil.Related: No Till Farming
posted by Kevin at 10:53 AM
10/13/2005
No Transponder?
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I'm not a pilot. Maybe someone who is a pilot can enlighten us all. It's a simple question: Wouldn't a jet flying in the U.S., without a flight plan, with the transponder turned off, evoke a military response? [Answer: It depends on the type of airspace.] In any event, this story is like taking a glimpse into the Twilight Zone: The plane landed undetected, possibly because Wolcott flew low enough to avoid detection and may not have activated the Cessna's transponder, which would identify the aircraft's make and ownership.Discuss
posted by Kevin at 4:39 PM
Catholics Plan to Baptize Space Aliens
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This is one for Tim and Jeff, but I couldn't resist: With increasing numbers of people believing not only in the possibility of intelligent life on other planets, but even claiming encounters with aliens, it is not surprising that the Catholic Church is beginning to explore what effect the discovery of sentient ETs might have on Christian theology.
posted by Kevin at 2:50 PM
Bird Flu "Pandemic" Antidote: Wash Hands
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Bird flu is getting a lot of press lately. Reports from various sources as diverse as the President of the United States and the head of the World Health Organization, say it is a new disease that is going to have us all dropping dead at any moment. It has already been announced as a pandemic. There is a mad scramble to get stocks of medicines assembled. Plans are being made for bringing the military into the picture. Something is seriously wrong here and it isn't the flu. We have a bureaucratic disease and it promises to be far more dangerous than any flu epidemic.
posted by Kevin at 1:35 PM
Samsung to Pay $300 Million Fine for Price Fixing
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Samsung, the world's largest maker of memory chips for computers and other electronic gadgets, has agreed to plead guilty to price fixing and pay a $300 million fine, U.S. officials said Thursday.
The penalty is the second-largest criminal antitrust fine ever and caps a three-year investigation into the largest makers of dynamic random access memory computer chips, a $7.7 billion market in the United States.
posted by Kevin at 11:46 AM
REFCO HALTS CLIENT WITHDRAWALS, NO LIQUIDITY
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Man, I just knew this was going to get really weird: Refco Inc., reeling from the disclosure that its chief executive officer hid unpaid debts, today blocked clients from withdrawing funds and said one of its units doesn't have enough liquidity to keep doing business.
posted by Kevin at 11:36 AM
10/12/2005
Deloitte Google Search: Dead Microbiologists
With all of the avian flu nonsense floating around at the moment, I found this hit interesting: The Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu user (host: usdtc1.deloitte.com, ip: 167.219.0.140) conducted the following Google search: dead microbiologists.
posted by Kevin at 5:28 PM
Man Says God Told Him to Murder Family
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A man who said he was heeding a call from God when he gunned down his parents and used a chainsaw to cut up his mother's body pleaded guilty Monday to first-degree murder.Related: Bush Says God Told Him to Invade Iraq
posted by Kevin at 3:18 PM
Ex-Refco CEO Charged with Securities Fraud
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Make your time: The former chief executive of Refco Inc., one of the world's biggest commodities brokerages, was charged with securities fraud Wednesday.
Phillip R. Bennett was charged in a criminal complaint unsealed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan. A day earlier, Refco announced that a $430 million debt to the company owed by a firm controlled by the ousted chairman and chief executive was hidden through secret transfers to an unnamed customer account.
On Monday, Refco said it must restate earnings back to 2002 and delay filing its next quarterly report, originally scheduled for next week.
posted by Kevin at 11:32 AM
10/11/2005
Jet Stolen From Florida Winds Up Near Atlanta
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On occasion, the veil between worlds becomes thin and details of active covert operations splash across the news wires: Crime scene technicians have investigated the interior of the plane, and Moloney said there is no evidence that there were weapons or drugs on it.
"We've ruled out anything diabolical or sinister," he said. "We didn't find anything threatening on the plane."
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The Federal Aviation Administration is probing its own traffic system to see if there is any record of the plane flying during the time in question, FAA spokeswoman Kathleen Bergen said.
Moloney said there were not yet any suspects and it was not known whether more than one person was involved in the theft. But officials said the person who took the plane is likely an experienced pilot.
Planes are easy to steal if you know how to fly them, because they usually do not require a key to start the engines, Gwinnett County Police Sgt. D. Mattox told the Gwinnett Daily Post.
Ray had no comment on whether this latest incident raised larger questions of security at the airport, which is the fifth-busiest in Georgia. Two of the Sept. 11 hijackers, Mohamed Atta and Marwan al- Shehhi, trained there for a time.
Oh sure, people who know how fly jets steal them and go for joy rides all the time... That's standard operating procedure for petty criminals, don't ya know?! A stolen jet, Arkansas, Florida and an airport that two members of the September 11th Flying Circus used to frequent. Hmm. * shaking head * I like how the cop indicates that no weapons or drugs were on board. What in the hell was on board? Or, maybe we don't want to know. Just as long as nothing diabolical or sinister was involved, everything is just peachy! Related: See Compromised, by Terry Reed, for a description of how the CIA used stolen aircraft for covert operations.
posted by Kevin at 4:44 PM
Who Is Financing America's Current Account Deficit?
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This is an interesting article. I don't agree with the author's guess that the Saudis are buying U.S. debt at these levels. The Saudis know, just like the Europeans and the Japanese, that the U.S. will have no choice but to eventually dilute the dollar. Facing that inevitability, how does buying U.S. debt represent a sound capital preservation strategy for the Saudis (or anyone else, for that matter)? (Forget, for a moment, about America's dire debt situation. The potential for a Euro-based oil bourse in Iran should be enough to severely weaken the hands of those holding any U.S. dollar denominated assets. And what's Japan doing? Buying gold.) When I think of large, private capital accounts in London and the Bahamas, where the bulk of recent U.S. debt purchases are originating from, I think of narcotics money. Lots of narcotics money. So, with Europe and Japan yielding to the profligacy of the U.S., to me, it looks like the Them are now having to spend their own ill-gotten gains to keep the band playing. As the U.S. debt curve goes vertical, don't get caught without a chair when the music stops: Since early 2004 there has been a gradual decline in the monthly purchase of U.S. Treasury bonds by foreign governments. In fact since the first of this year foreign governments have purchased an average of only $5 billion in T-Bonds each month. This represents only 29% of the level of their average bond purchases during the calendar year 2004.
This leads to two questions:
1. What are foreign governments doing with their trade-won dollars if they are buying fewer T-Bonds?
2. Who is buying these bonds if not foreign governments?
posted by Kevin at 2:44 PM
Natural Gas Costs Will Increase 50% this Winter
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If this comes as a shock, you haven't been reading Cryptogon closely: Heating bills are headed through the roof, expected to average 50 percent higher this winter for homes that use natural gas. People in parts of the Midwest are likely to pay even more - as much as $1,600 for the winter months if the weather is especially bad.
posted by Kevin at 2:20 PM
Refco Collapse
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Refco Inc., on Tuesday said its recently removed chief executive took steps to inflate its balance sheet, in a scandal that has caused the commodities and futures broker's shares to fall 52 percent in two days.
The announcement shed more light on a complex transaction disclosed two months after the company raised $583 million in an initial public offering.
New York-based Refco on Tuesday also said it voluntarily contacted the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the New York Stock Exchange about the accounting matter, and is cooperating.
The Wall Street Journal in its online edition said the SEC has launched an inquiry into Refco, citing an unnamed person with knowledge of the probe.
Refco on Monday announced the removal of Phillip Bennett as chairman and chief executive, and said the $430 million owed by a company he controlled was repaid that day. It also said its financial statements since 2002 should not be relied upon.
"The company and Mr. Bennett will be in trouble for not revealing the related-party nature of the receivable," said J. Edward Ketz, an associate accounting professor at Pennsylvania State University. "By anyone's book, that's just not kosher."
posted by Kevin at 2:06 PM
10/10/2005
GM Crop 'Ruins Fields for 15 Years'
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There's just no end to the good news about genetic engineering! GM crops contaminate the countryside for up to 15 years after they have been harvested, startling new government research shows.
posted by Kevin at 11:53 PM
EGG Is Orange Right Now
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Post Asian earthquake focus... Or something else? Or nothing? UPDATE: 2:56PM PST. It's red. I've never seen that before. UPDATE: 4:45PM PST. It has been green for a while now. Move along. Nothing to see here... Related? Gold Closes at 18 Year High
posted by Kevin at 2:10 PM
Driverless VW Declared Winner of DARPA Robot Race
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The article states that the purpose of this research is to make, "Warfare safer for humans." Mike Davis, in an article entitled, The Pentagon as Global Slumlord, lays bare the actual goal of military robotics and artificial intelligence research: Military theorists are now deeply involved in imagining how the evolving capacity of high-tech warfare can contain, if not destroy, chronic "terrorist" insurgencies rooted in the desperation of growing megaslums. The idiot savant computer nerds who are building this crap are too blind to see the big picture. Your grandchildren will pay the price for their sins (assuming the system stays up that long, which would be assuming a lot): A driverless Volkswagen was declared the winner yesterday of a $2 million race across the rugged Nevada desert, beating four other robot-guided vehicles that completed a Pentagon-sponsored contest aimed at making warfare safer for humans.Related: Film Festival Entry Offers Glimpse at Our Hellish Future
posted by Kevin at 11:30 AM
Delphi Goes Down, General Motors Teeters on the Brink
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On Saturday, I wrote, "I wonder if GM will be allowed to go down..." From today's Reuters: General Motors Corp. shares fell sharply on Monday after the automaker warned that a bankruptcy filing over the weekend by auto parts giant Delphi Corp. could cost it as much as $12 billion.
One brokerage said Delphi's bankruptcy increased the risk that GM itself might take the same step. The global financial system is gazing down the barrel of nearly $300 billion worth of GM debt. I can assure you that the GM situation is more of an international security matter than a run-of-the-mill corporate collapse. Related: S&P Cuts GM Ratings Deeper Into JunkRelated: GM Can't Go Down
posted by Kevin at 10:27 AM
Ray Kurzweil and the Ring of Power
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You can't wield it, Ray. That thing serves one master, and guess what: It aint you. By any measure, Kurzweil has had an exceptional career. Now, however, he has a new project: to be a god. And not just because he thinks he can live forever. Within decades, he predicts, he will be billions of times more intelligent than he is today, able to read minds, assume different forms, and reshape his physical environment at will. So will everyone. Today's human beings, mere quintessences of dust, will be as outmoded as Homo Erectus.
posted by Kevin at 10:07 AM
10/9/2005
DARPA Grand Challenge: Vehicles Actually Finishing the Course
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No matter which team wins, humanity loses: Three driverless vehicles have crossed the finish line and entered the history books after traversing 210 kilometres of desert terrain guided only by laser sensors and onboard computers.Related: Why the Future Doesn't Need Us
posted by Kevin at 12:08 AM
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:. Reading
Fatal
Harvest: The Tragedy of Industrial Agriculture by Andrew Kimbrell
Readers will come to see
that industrial food production is indeed a "fatal harvest"
- fatal to consumers, as pesticide residues and new disease vectors
such as E. coli and "mad cow disease" find their way
into our food supply; fatal to our landscapes, as chemical runoff
from factory farms poison our rivers and groundwater; fatal to
genetic diversity, as farmers rely increasingly on high-yield
monocultures and genetically engineered crops; and fatal to our
farm communities, which are wiped out by huge corporate
farms.
Friendly
Fascism: The New Face of Power in America by Bertram Myron Gross
This is a relatively
short but extremely cogent and well-argued treatise on the rise
of a form of fascistic thought and social politics in late 20th
century America. Author Bertram Gross' thesis is quite straightforward;
the power elite that comprises the corporate, governmental and
military superstructure of the country is increasingly inclined
to employ every element in their formidable arsenal of 'friendly
persuasion' to win the hearts and minds of ordinary Americans
through what Gross refers to as friendly fascism.
The
Good Life
by Scott and Helen Nearing Helen
and Scott Nearing are the great-grandparents of the back-to-the-land
movement, having abandoned the city in 1932 for a rural life based
on self-reliance, good health, and a minimum of cash...Fascinating,
timely, and wholly useful, a mix of the Nearings' challenging
philosophy and expert counsel on practical skills.
Silent
Theft: The Private Plunder of Our Common Wealth by David Bollierd
In Silent Theft, David Bollier
argues that a great untold story of our time is the staggering
privatization and abuse of our common wealth. Corporations are
engaged in a relentless plunder of dozens of resources that we
collectively own—publicly funded medical breakthroughs,
software innovation, the airwaves, the public domain of creative
works, and even the DNA of plants, animals and humans. Too often,
however, our government turns a blind eye—or sometimes helps
give away our assets. Amazingly,
the silent theft of our shared wealth has gone largely unnoticed
because we have lost our ability to see the commons.
The
Self-Sufficient Life and How to Live It: The Complete Back-To-Basics
Guide by John Seymour The
Self Sufficient Life and How to Live It is the only book that
teaches all the skills needed to live independently in harmony
with the land harnessing natural forms of energy, raising crops
and keeping livestock, preserving foodstuffs, making beer and
wine, basketry, carpentry, weaving, and much more.
When
Corporations Rule the World by David C. Korten
When Corporations
Rule the World explains how economic globalization has concentrated
the power to govern in global corporations and financial markets
and detached them from accountability to the human interest. It
documents the devastating human and environmental consequences
of the successful efforts of these corporations to reconstruct
values and institutions everywhere on the planet to serve their
own narrow ends.
The
New Organic Grower: A Master's Manual of Tools and Techniques
for the Home and Market Gardener
This expansion
of a now-classic guide originally published in 1989 is intended
for the serious gardener or small-scale market farmer. It describes
practical and sustainable ways of growing superb organic vegetables,
with detailed coverage of scale and capital, marketing, livestock,
the winter garden, soil fertility, weeds, and many other
topics.
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