Poverty

This is an interesting idea:
Karelis argues that being poor is defined by having to deal with a multitude of problems: One doesn’t have enough money to pay rent or car insurance or credit card bills or day care or sometimes even food. Even if one works hard enough to pay off half of those costs, [...]

Somalia and Zimbabwe

The situation in Zimbabwe could go either way as people vote today. If the election is at all fair, Mugabe should lose but that’s a big if. We’ll start to find out tomorrow as the votes are counted.
Somalia, on the other hand, is in terrible shape and getting worse:

The trouble started when government soldiers went [...]

Bush and Iraq

Is President Bush really this stupid:
Bush said Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s crackdown in Basra against Shi’ite militias vying for control of the oil-rich region is a positive milestone in the birth of a democratic nation. The Iraqi prime minister’s decision to move against enemy elements in Basra shows “evenhanded justice” and the Iraqi government’s willingness [...]

Black Holes Might Eat the Earth

Now here’s a suit. Two men have filed a lawsuit:
But Walter L. Wagner and Luis Sancho contend that scientists at the European Center for Nuclear Research, or CERN, have played down the chances that the collider could produce, among other horrors, a tiny black hole, which, they say, could eat the Earth. Or it could [...]

Stephen Johnson: Slowing Down is Speeding Up

Via TPM, this is pretty impressive:
Knowing of your continued interest in the issues involving greenhouse gas emissions, I am writing to inform you of action I have taken today to move the Agency forward to examine these critical issues.
…
During this review, I considered the option of soliciting public input through an Advance Notice of Proposed [...]

Drop the Slipper. Now!

Ah well, too late. The damage is done. We’ll all just have to live with the consequences. Wait, maybe some Peeps can help. No, I guess not–they even have trouble with a microwave oven and seem to be involved in a galactic war. Ah well, here’s my random duo 10 to speed things along:
Happiness Is A [...]

I Think I’m Going For a Defense Contract

If the guy in this story (via TPM) can get so many contracts, I should be able to. Really, look at:
Michael Diveroli, Efraim’s father, had incorporated the company in 1999, when Efraim was 13. For several years, a period when the company appeared to have limited activity, Michael Diveroli, who now operates a police supply [...]

Idiots and Global Warming

A while ago I wondered how Lomborg was able to get a column in the NY Times given how stupid it was. I guess the LA Times felt they had to match this, so they have a column about almost exactly the same thing (but talking with Roger Pielke instead). Here’s their argument:
His research has [...]

New Northeastern University Provost

Provost Abdelal is leaving Northeastern at the end of the month (he’s off to UMass-Lowell) and I have to admit I’m glad he’s going. I hope the new provost is a bit better at communicating (the interim provost is Stephen Zoloth, Dean of Bouve College- I don’t know him).
Update: The permanent new provost has now [...]

KBR and Toxic Exposure

A while ago I had a post looking at how KBR uses subsidiaries to get away with not paying FICA or other taxes and noted the, perhaps, poetic justice that this ploy might have made them susceptible to being sued (under law, it’s very difficult to sue defense contractors). Farah Stockman has much more about this [...]

McCain

Kevin Drum has a nice rundown of a lot of things that should hurt McCain but haven’t because the press seems to have decided they don’t matter.

World Stuff

Here are some things (not all bad news):

Bhutan held its first elections, with more than 240,000 of the country’s 700,000 people voting. The article doesn’t mention a dress code and, given the numbers, it doesn’t seem only college graduates could vote as I noticed here (although only college graduates could run–only 2% of the people are). [...]

Expelled

Way back in August of last year I had a quick note about the movie Expelled which talks about Intelligent Design. I thought that would be the last I would hear about it, but it turns out it has made for one of the best blog posts ever. Here’s the quick summary:

PZ Meyers (who had been [...]

Fewer Posts

You might have noticed that I’m posting less often. This semester I am teaching two classes I haven’t taught much and so that takes a bit more time. Also, I am trying to write up a math paper or two for publication  (in Ergodic Theory involving exhaustive weakly wandering sequences, alpha-type transformations, and the disintegration [...]

Pakistan

I must say that I’m pleasantly surprised by the situation in Pakistan. Musharraf did nothing to stop the opposition from taking power, in fact it even seems he might not have been able to (as the new military ruler seems to have distanced himself from politics, including Musharraf). And Pakistan is now at the point [...]

Jacoby and Mamet

I should have known that Jeff Jacoby would write about the piece by David Mamet which I looked at before. After all it’s about the usual level of his writing, making sweeping statements that don’t correspond to real life. For example he notes these two bits from Mamet’s piece (there is very little new in [...]

Clinton and March Madness

I’ve been reading posts like this for the last month or so (this one via Kevin Drum) and I find it maddening (using Matt’s language). Obama supporters (ok, not all-after all I’m one) say that he has won the nomination and Clinton needs to get out to help the party. I don’t see how that [...]

Paper Airplanes From Space

How did  I not hear about this before? Japan is designing paper airplanesthat will be able to survive being thrown from the international space station. Right now they have designed ones that can survive speeds up to mach 7 and 300 degrees Celsius. The space station is 400 km up, so they would travel a [...]

Bush Lies In Speech Saying Iran Lies

President Bush just isn’t very good at this public relations stuff is he? In an interview that will be beamed into Iran, Bush makes this statement:
“The problem is the government cannot be trusted to enrich uranium because one, they’ve hidden programs in the past and they may be hiding one now, who knows; and secondly, [...]

Look Out, It’s Nigh Time

Well it’s almost that time. What time, you ask? I don’t know, but something is about to happen and we should all be ready.
A good way to start is to look at a random duo 10:
Brain Damage Pink Floyd
Inevitability of Death The Tragically Hip (live in 2002)
Poison Moon Elvis Costello
Milk Garbage
See You When You’re 40 [...]