Oops, forgot the link. http://idealab.talkingpointsmemo.com....php?ref=fpblg

I think these are different folks than the team at Ryerson.

Cheers
Aj

This so RAWKS!!!

As of Monday, 31 October, 7 billion served
 

Sometime Monday, somewhere on the Earth, the population of the planet will cross seven billion. If we keep growing just as we are right now (and blessedly the overall planetary birth rate appears to be tapering off and converging toward the replacement rate) we're going to hit 8 billion somewhere between 2025 and 2030 and 9 billion around 2050.

Cheers
Aj

Nearly 1.4 million without power along East Coast
 

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The unusually early snowstorm bringing heavy, wet snow to the East Coast has knocked out power to more than 1.4 million customers.

Half a million are without power in New Jersey, including Gov. Chris Christie, who declared a state of emergency.

Utilities in Pennsylvania say 428,000 customers have lost power. PPL spokeswoman Lissette Santana said Saturday that 200 crews were working to restore it. The company serves northeast and central Pennsylvania.

More than 160,000 customers lost power in Philadelphia and its suburbs.

In New York, about 88,000 have lost power. In Connecticut, utilities reported more than 370,000 without service.

And spokesman Todd Meyers says Potomac Edison had more than 26,000 outages in western Maryland.

About 19,000 had lost power in Massachusetts.

@yahoonews on Twitter, become a fan on Facebook

For all the East Coasters on the Planet who lost power
 

Judge William Adams is a douchebag.

Judge William Adams (of Texas) beat his 16 year old daughter for using the internet.

The video is 7 years old, but the daughter just went public with it last night.

If you watch the video - be warned. It's really awful and super triggering.

I've been googling around about the guy, and apparently he's been real lenient in his court decisions around child abuse in the past - even going so far as to say that the testimony of the children who claim to be abused is irrelevant and doesn't count as evidence. I guess now we know what his subtext is.

Thank you for posting this, AJ. Though it's very unpopular to talk about population and to impose self limitation, better that we do that than have it imposed upon us by famine, water shortages, epidemics and disasters.

OMG. OMFG. My heart is racing and breaking. WTF! I am so upset.

I want these two to pay. Sadistic fucks. He is completely enjoying beating her into "submission".

as a sadist, I kinda hate when folks talk about physical abusers being sadistic and beating someone into submission....

and by the way.......as a sadist I am still considered mentally ill........laughin...

fucker should go to jail........

the dude really did at one point in the video start shouting that he was going to beat her until she submitted. it really freaked me the hell out. my own subtext put a really stressful spin on what was going on - but my subtext is always running around doing that.

Toughy,

He said the word "submission" (also says, "TAKE IT LIKE A WOMAN) which was why I placed the word "submission" in quotes.


For the record, I have no issue with consensual adult S/M or D/s.

I consider him a sadistic fuck not in a good way. Of course. FFS.

He ENJOYED beating and abusing her. Perhaps I should have rephrased it but emotions were running high, as I posted while watching.

I presumed people would know I am not commenting on any of us who partake in consensual kink.


ETA: It's the mother who says, ""turn over like a 16-year-old and take it! Like a grown woman!"

Biggest jump ever seen in global warming gases
 

http://l3.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/iO...70670072a1.jpg

WASHINGTON (AP) — The global output of heat-trapping carbon dioxide jumped by the biggest amount on record, the U.S. Department of Energy calculated, a sign of how feeble the world's efforts are at slowing man-made global warming.

The new figures for 2010 mean that levels of greenhouse gases are higher than the worst case scenario outlined by climate experts just four years ago.

"The more we talk about the need to control emissions, the more they are growing," said John Reilly, co-director of MIT's Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change.

The world pumped about 564 million more tons (512 million metric tons) of carbon into the air in 2010 than it did in 2009. That's an increase of 6 percent. That amount of extra pollution eclipses the individual emissions of all but three countries — China, the United States and India, the world's top producers of greenhouse gases.

It is a "monster" increase that is unheard of, said Gregg Marland, a professor of geology at Appalachian State University, who has helped calculate Department of Energy figures in the past.

Extra pollution in China and the U.S. account for more than half the increase in emissions last year, Marland said.

"It's a big jump," said Tom Boden, director of the Energy Department's Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center at Oak Ridge National Lab. "From an emissions standpoint, the global financial crisis seems to be over."

Boden said that in 2010 people were traveling, and manufacturing was back up worldwide, spurring the use of fossil fuels, the chief contributor of man-made climate change.

India and China are huge users of coal. Burning coal is the biggest carbon source worldwide and emissions from that jumped nearly 8 percent in 2010.

"The good news is that these economies are growing rapidly so everyone ought to be for that, right?" Reilly said Thursday. "Broader economic improvements in poor countries has been bringing living improvements to people. Doing it with increasing reliance on coal is imperiling the world."

In 2007, when the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued its last large report on global warming, it used different scenarios for carbon dioxide pollution and said the rate of warming would be based on the rate of pollution. Boden said the latest figures put global emissions higher than the worst case projections from the climate panel. Those forecast global temperatures rising between 4 and 11 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of the century with the best estimate at 7.5 degrees.

Even though global warming skeptics have attacked the climate change panel as being too alarmist, scientists have generally found their predictions too conservative, Reilly said. He said his university worked on emissions scenarios, their likelihood, and what would happen. The IPCC's worst case scenario was only about in the middle of what MIT calculated are likely scenarios.

Chris Field of Stanford University, head of one of the IPCC's working groups, said the panel's emissions scenarios are intended to be more accurate in the long term and are less so in earlier years. He said the question now among scientists is whether the future is the panel's worst case scenario "or something more extreme."

"Really dismaying," Granger Morgan, head of the engineering and public policy department at Carnegie Mellon University, said of the new figures. "We are building up a horrible legacy for our children and grandchildren."

But Reilly and University of Victoria climate scientist Andrew Weaver found something good in recent emissions figures. The developed countries that ratified the 1997 Kyoto Protocol greenhouse gas limiting treaty have reduced their emissions overall since then and have achieved their goals of cutting emissions to about 8 percent below 1990 levels. The U.S. did not ratify the agreement.

In 1990, developed countries produced about 60 percent of the world's greenhouse gases, now it's probably less than 50 percent, Reilly said.

"We really need to get the developing world because if we don't, the problem is going to be running away from us," Weaver said. "And the problem is pretty close from running away from us."

Regarding the video of the Texas judge beating his child, I hope he loses his job, no matter how old the video may be.

Sad moment, the Texas judge won't face any charges for this beating he gave his daughter, it is still up in the air about his job.

Yeah, I guess in Texas there is a 5 year limitation on getting charged for that sort of thing.

RIP, my favorite grump
 

Yeah I think so, I just pray he loses his job, I mean that sounds bad but he has no need to be in a job where he deals with abuse cases when he himself is an abuser.

Interesting story.
Former Attorney General Ramsey Clark is a witness for the protestors who are using Nuremberg principles as justification for their actions. The main principle is that citizens have a responsibility to take action when they see crimes being committed by their government. And if they do not they can be held accountable as some were during the Nuremberg Trials.

http://www.democracynow.org/2011/11/...rotesters_face

video of Amy Goodman on Democracy Now talking to Col Ann Wright and Ed Kinane

Drones on Trial: 38 Protesters Face Charges for Disrupting Syracuse Base Used in Overseas Attacks

A trial is underway in Syracuse, New York, of 38 protesters arrested in April at the New York Air National Guard base at Hancock Field. The defendants were protesting the MQ-9 Reaper drones, which the 174th Fighter Wing of the Guard has remotely flown over Afghanistan from Syracuse since late 2009. "Citizens have a responsibility to take action when they see crimes being committed," said retired Col. Ann Wright, one of the 38 on trial. "And this goes back to World War II, when German government officials knew what other parts of the German government were doing in executing six million Jews in Germany and other places, and that they took no action. And yet—and they were held responsible later, through the Nuremberg trials. And that is the theory on which we are acting, that we see that our government is committing crimes by the use of these drones, and that we, as citizens, have the responsibility to act."

Guests:
Col. Ann Wright (Ret.), one of the "Hancock 38 Drone Resisters" who protested the use of MQ-9 Reaper drones at the Air National Guard base at Hancock Field in Syracuse, New York, last April. Wright is a retired U.S. Army colonel and former U.S. diplomat who spent 29 years in the military and later served as a high-ranking diplomat in the State Department. In 2001, she helped oversee the reopening of the U.S. mission in Afghanistan. In 2003, she resigned her State Department post to protest the war in Iraq.

Ed Kinane, one of the "Hancock 38 Drone Resisters" who protested the use of MQ-9 Reaper drones at the Air National Guard base at Hancock Field in Syracuse, New York, last April. He is a member of the Syracuse Peace Council.

Two Quakes hit Starkes,OK Saturday night...felt as far away as TN
 

Sorry I misspelled name of town..it is SPARKS not Starkes...:(
SPARKS, Oklahoma (AP) — One of the strongest earthquakes in state history rocked central Oklahoma late Saturday after a day of smaller quakes, a 5.6 magnitude temblor that rattled a college football stadium 50 miles (80 kilometers) away, shook buildings, caused cracks and was felt as far away as Tennessee, authorities said.

Emergency authorities had no immediate reports of injuries or major damages. But one county's sheriff's office in the region said it was responding to calls and damages. The reports in the late-night hours were sketchy and the extent of damages remained uncertain early Sunday. The quake was one of several to rattle the state Saturday, including a magnitude 4.7 earthquake that shook the same area early Saturday.

The quake could prove the most powerful on state record if the 5.6 reading reported by the U.S. Geological Survey stands. The seismic monitoring agency said the quake struck at 10:53 p.m. local time Saturday (0353 GMT) and was centered about 44 miles (71 kilometers) east-northeast of Oklahoma City. It had initially reported the temblor as a 5.2 magnitude quake.

It said the quake struck near the community of Sparks — in eastern Oklahoma between Oklahoma City and Tulsa. The temblor shook the stadium at Oklahoma State University in Stillwater just at the end of the school's football game with Kansas State. No. 3 Oklahoma State's players were gathered in the locker room under the Boone Pickens Stadium stands just after a 52-45 win against No. 17 Kansas State when the ground began to shake.

"Coach (Mike) Gundy was talking to me, everybody was looking around and no one had any idea," quarterback Brandon Weeden said. "We thought the people above us were doing something. I've never felt one, so that was a first."

The stands were already clearing out when the quake happened, just a few minutes after the down-to-the-wire game had ended.

If the intensity of the Saturday night quake is confirmed, it would be the state's strongest on record. USGS records show that a 5.5 magnitude earthquake struck El Reno, just west of Oklahoma City, in 1952 and, before Oklahoma became a state in 1907, a quake of similar magnitude 5.5 struck in northeastern Indian Territory in 1882.

The Saturday night quake was felt as far away as Tennessee and Wisconsin, according to reports received by the USGS.

Some in Oklahoma reported cracks appeared after the latest quake.

"There's a crack going from the closet to the ceiling. I've never seen that before. I was in my bedroom grabbing my phone and I happened to notice it," said Todd McKinsey, in the community of Moore, speaking with The Oklahoman.

Seems PersonHood has gained Mississippi's support. This christian non-profit org based in Colorado believes conception is the point in the process where we declare a new PERSON on the block. A step backwards for women's rights. :( If interested, google PERSONHOOD MISSISSIPPI.

I sooo wanted to be in Oklahoma when this happened, I know it sounds bad but I have never felt an earthquake before but my Okie friends let me know all about it. Thank You for putting this as news!

The Personhood movement bugs me more than any of the other anti-choice movements. They emotionally manipulate by invoking groups of ACTUAL people who were once not considered people by the government. All of the posters of theirs that I've seen have mentioned "women used to not be considered people!" and/or "black people used to not be considered people!" and try to tell us that people being allowed to have abortions is the exact same thing.

Nevermind the fact that if they get their way that WOMEN will no longer be people, but incubators. Stupidness.

I was awake too Wolfy and I didnt notice anything except my dog was actually unusual

i'm from mississippi. i'm voting no, but i will say that i've struggled with this amendment, ...
its unclear, on purpose. manipulative. they do not want to allow any room for common sense. simply stop all abortions. no matter the case. and all cases are not the same. they don't care if it's rape or incest.

the folks who are voting yes are allowing a set group of people to make them feel guilty. i believe that life begins at conception. but i also know there's more to abortion, birth control, vitro fertilization, and so on. there are exceptions. mental and physical.

i want an amendment called common sense.

Joe Frazier in hospice care
 

Fourteen Billion Dollars in U.S. Disasters in 2011 - A New Record
 

From - http://www.wunderground.com/blog/Jef...?entrynum=1981

It's time to add another billion-dollar weather disaster to the growing 2011 total of these costly disasters: the extraordinary early-season Northeast U.S. snowstorm of October 29, which dumped up to 32 inches of snow, brought winds gusts of 70 mph to the coast, and killed at least 22 people. Not since the infamous snow hurricane of 1804 have such prodigious amounts of October snow been recorded in New England and, to a lesser extent, in the mid-Atlantic states. Trees that had not yet lost their leaves suffered tremendous damage from the wet, heavy snow. Snapped branches and falling trees brought down numerous power lines, leaving at least 3 million people without electricity. The damage estimate in Connecticut alone is $3 billion, far more than the damage Hurricane Irene did to the state. Hundreds of thousands still remain without power a week after the storm, with full electricity not expected to be restored until Monday.

Figure 1. Wet, heavy snow from the October 29, 2011 snowstorm weighing down trees still sporting their fall leaves in Winchester, VA. Image credit: wunderphotographer MaddScientist98.

The October 29 snow storm brings the 2011 tally of U.S. billion-dollar weather disasters to fourteen, thoroughly smashing the previous record of nine such disasters, set in 2008. Between 1980 - 2010, the U.S. averaged 3.5 of these weather disasters per year. Through August, the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) estimated that ten weather disasters costing at least $1 billion had hit the U.S., at total cost of up to $45 billion. However, the October 29 snow storm brings us up to eleven billion-dollar disasters, and a new disaster analysis done by global reinsurance company AON Benfield adds three more. Flood damage from the remnants of Tropical Storm Lee in the Northeast on September 8 is now estimated at more than $1 billion, and two outbreaks of severe thunderstorms and tornadoes--one in April and one in June--now have damage estimates exceeding $1 billion. A remarkable seven severe thunderstorm/tornado outbreaks did more than $1 billion each in damage in 2011, and an eighth outbreak July 10 - 14 came close, with damages of $900 million. In total, the fourteen billion-dollar disasters killed 675 people. Tornadoes, hurricanes, and floods in these fourteen disasters killed over 600 people, putting 2011 into fourth place since 1940 for most deaths by severe storms. Only 2005, with over 1,000 deaths caused by Katrina, 1969, with over 700 hurricane and flood-related deaths, and 1972, with 676 hurricane and flood-related deaths, were deadlier years for storms, according to NOAA.

http://icons.wxug.com/hurricane/2011/2011_billion.png

The fourteen billion-dollar weather disasters of 2011 caused $53 billion in damage, putting 2011 in fifth place for most damages from billion-dollar weather disasters. The top damage years, according to NCDC in adjusted 2011 dollars, were 2005 (the year of Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma), 2008 (Hurricane Ike), 1988 (Midwest drought), and 1980 (Midwest drought). With nearly two months remaining in 2011, the potential exists for more billion-dollar weather disasters this year. Our first opportunity comes Tuesday, when the NOAA Storm Prediction Center is forecasting the possibility of a severe weather outbreak centered over Arkansas and Missouri.

Video 1. Remarkable video of the tornado that hit Tuscaloosa, Alabama during the April 25 - 30, 2011 Super Outbreak. This tornado outbreak was the most expensive U.S. weather-related disaster of 2011, with damages estimated at $9 billion. Fast forward to minute four to see the worst of the storm.

Here are AON Benfield's estimates of the damages and NCDC's estimates of the death tolls from 2011's fourteen billion-dollar weather disasters (a clickable version of this table with information on each disaster is available on our severe weather resource page).

Jeff Masters

Oklahoma had another earthquake about 8:56 pm, a 4.7 mag and it was located south south east of Stillwater.

Yes, my cousin was on facebook and told me when it happened.

RIP "Smokin'!!"
 

Wow
 

Hardly Breaking News but....

Surprise surprise...can't say I am shocked but the Duggars are having another child. Really I think this woman might need her head checked.

http://moms.today.msnbc.msn.com/_new...pregnant-again

from joemygod
 

Appeals Court Upholds "Obamacare"

In a case doubtlessly bound for SCOTUS, today the DC Circuit Court Of Appeals ruled that the Affordable Care Act, AKA "Obamacare," is constitutional. The very long list of losing plaintiffs includes dozens of Republican state Attorneys General. At issue, primarily, was the government's right to impose a fine for failing to purchase health insurance. The Court writes:

“We acknowledge some discomfort with the Government’s failure to advance any clear doctrinal principles limiting congressional mandates that any American purchase any product or service in interstate commerce,” the opinion reads. “But to tell the truth, those limits are not apparent to us, either because the power to require the entry into commerce is symmetrical with the power to prohibit or condition commercial behavior, or because we have not yet perceived a qualitative limitation. That difficulty is troubling, but not fatal, not least because we are interpreting the scope of a long-established constitutional power, not recognizing a new constitutional right."

There's actually been about 10 earthquakes since the day of the big one. . There is one today at 14:05 est a 3.6. I hope this doesn't continue for OK. Be safe everyone in that area.

earthquakes and tornadoes all in then same day and place.. eeeek!

Well, I am glad that the update is that the guys will be placed back together after they inseminate females.

I dunno. I think this is where politics and ideology make themselves present in science. Have they explained why they've ruled out artificial insemination? Why do they need these two specific penguins to procreate? From what I've read about penguins and seabirds, long lasting relationships are very important to their social structure and its not uncommon for those relationships to be same-sex. It at least suggests a very close bond that I think is unnecessary to break up. The excuse that they're needed to impregnate females seems odd. Is artificial insemination not practiced on penguins or something? Are there no other male penguins about?