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30 May 2011 14:45

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U.S.: Gen. Martin Dempsey tapped as Joint Chiefs Chairman

  • Martin’s memorable Memorial Day: President Obama announced today that Army General Martin E. Dempsey is his nominee to serve as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Dempsey’s nomination will go before the Senate, where Obama’s folks have been known to languish against a partisan opposition. Seeing as military issues and figures have generally become matters of bipartisan veneration, though, we reckon this very high profile job will be an exception to that political rule. Interesting tidbit: Dempsey was sworn in as the Army’s Joint Chief on April 11th, 2011, making this an impressively quick promotion. source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

29 May 2011 14:48

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U.S.: Screw the Food Pyramid; let’s switch to the Food Plate instead!

  • Meet the worst graphic ever created. You may have heard about this thing. It’s called the MyPyramid. There’s some random dude running up it to remind people to exercise, which it’s honestly never done for us. But there aren’t any numbers, no good explanation, and few details to explain what people should eat. It’s one of the greatest travesties the USDA has ever created. It’s as terrible as the 2012 Olympics logo, except worse, because it’s meant actually teach people how to eat healthier; that hasn’t happened. And it might finally get replaced by a completely different shape. Finally. About time. A little history:
  • pyramid In 1992, the USDA introduced the Food Pyramid as a way to explain to people how much food they should be eating. It wasn’t considered a success.
  • pyramid In 2005, USDA officals replaced the pyramid with “MyPyramid,” a vertically-oriented chart derided for being even more confusing than the original version.
  • plate? Perhaps hearing the cries of those who want to see a simpler food graphic, the USDA plans to launch a version of the graphic that revolves around a simple plate. source
  • » Why this is a good idea: Simply put, the basic idea behind this graphic needs to be as simple as possible, and while the original graphic wasn’t terrible, its replacement was. What we’d like to see is a shape that looks like a cafeteria tray, with compartments for each piece. However, the independently-produced Power Plate (which notably doesn’t include meat products at all) is also a worthy option, too. Let’s hope they don’t screw it up.
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

29 May 2011 12:51

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U.S.: Ratko Mladic’s son: He wasn’t involved in massive massacre

  • Whatever was done in Srebrenica, he has nothing to do with it. His orders were to evacuate the wounded, the women and the children and then the fighters. Whatever was done behind his back, he has nothing to do with that.
  • Darko Mladic • Defending his now-under custody father, Ratko Mladic, from allegations that he led a mass murder of thousands of Muslims — men and young boys — during the 1995 Srebrenica massacre in Bosnia. The massacre, one of the deadliest in Europe since WWII, has led to the elder Mladic to disappear from the public eye for nearly two decades before his capture last week. Investigators say that any denial of his involvement in the case is a delaying tactic to buy the notorious Serbian general more time. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

28 May 2011 23:31

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U.S.: “Weinergate”: Scouring Anthony Weiner’s rogue tweet saga

  • Look, we don’t want the Weiner story to be true. But we’ve done enough tweeting in our day to know all the tricks for reading someone’s social media tracks. We spent a couple of hours digging through tweets to find out more info. And, to us, there seems to be some evidence pointing in both directions on this story. The key thing for us is the existence of the rogue tweet, which was captured by TweetCongress.org even after it was deleted. But there’s also stuff that makes us wonder. The patient zero — the first person to retweet Anthony Weiner’s NSFW tweet — was this guy, who we’ve found in our research to be overly fixated on the congressman even BEFORE the tweet in question. In fact, he posted about a cheating scandal just like this one over TWO WEEKS AGO. Really? How was he so quick to hit the trigger on this? Some other things we noticed from the scandal:
  • for On Twitter, Weiner noted the Seattle time of his Friday TV appearance. The recipient of the NSFW tweet, from Seattle, retweeted.
  • for The person at the center of the drama deleted her Twitter account — which was active as of yesterday — after the tweet.
  • for The girl in question said Weiner was her “boyfriend” in an April tweet. Yeah, so? Her and every other liberal teen female has!
  • against To disprove that the photo was of Weiner, Daily Kos has a test of the NSFW photo that suggested it was ‘shopped. Hm.
  • » The important things to take from this: We don’t think Weiner did anything wrong as of yet, but we do think that there is a lot to suggest one of two things: One, this was possibly a scandal planted by someone who had closely followed the congressman’s Twitter account (because, based on our research, people have), and there were somewhat bizarre things that may have connected Weiner to the girl. Given the track record of Big Journalism, where the story originated from, we’d like to see a better source tackle this thing, because we don’t trust Breitbart as far as we can throw him. We rate this an “inconclusive.”
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

28 May 2011 15:24

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U.S.: From politics to personality, do online filters create blind spots?

  • The downside of online personalization: Eli Pariser, who’s the board president for MoveOn.org and the author of “The Filter Bubble” (above), says that there’s a pretty troubling blind spot with online personalization — it hides opinions you may not like, but are important to know nonetheless. “People love the idea of having their feelings affirmed,” he notes. “If you can provide that warm, comfortable sense without tipping your hand that your algorithm is pandering to people, then all the better.” It’s a problem with wide implications — it can reinforce views, produce blind spots, and prevent you from challenging your own opinions. Your opinions deserved to be challenged, kids — including by Google. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

28 May 2011 14:30

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U.S.: Obvious thing of the day: Computers in offices make us fat, lazy

  • We have transitioned from jobs that primarily involved doing physical activity on our feet to ones where most of us make our living while sitting.
  • Pennington Biomedical Research Center researcher Timothy Church • Describing why we use far fewer calories at work now than we did 30 years ago. To put it simply, we sit around a lot, a fact which anyone could tell you by the mere fact that they too sit around at their computers all day. Could someone create … like a Wii version of Excel or something like that? So we might have to exercise while adding things to a spreadsheet or blogging or cutting out a photo in Photoshop? Or could you turn our computers into treadmills that only power on while we’re running on them? Seems like all this technology at our disposable makes us lazy and fat or something. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

27 May 2011 18:31

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U.S.: Joplin tornado death toll numbers get murky, confusing

  • 156 people reported missing in the Joplin tornado, down from 232
  • 90 people formerly on the list were found alive, which is a relief
  • 22 more, however, were added to the list in the past day source
  • » And this is where the numbers really get confusing: With two different organizations — the state of Missouri and the city of Joplin — reporting two different official death toll figures (126 and 132, respectively), and around 19 of the missing identified as victims on the list of those accounted for, you’d be forgiven for being a bit confused by all these numbers. Let’s simplify it for you: It was a lot of people, and those still alive have a lot to recover from.
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 

27 May 2011 13:22

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U.S.: Army’s abandoned weapons programs pretty darn ¢O$tly

Since 1995, the U.S. Army has spent $32 billion on military programs (like the Comanche helicopter, shown) it later abandoned. Why? With defense, supply is expensive and demand is unknown. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

27 May 2011 09:30

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U.S.: Hundreds still unaccounted for after Joplin tornado: Where are they?

  • Our goal is to get that number to zero. We will dedicate as much state resources as needed around the clock to ensure those family who have loved ones that they cannot find are connected.
  • Missouri Department of Public Safety Deputy Director Andrea Spillars • Describing the group’s goal to whittle down the list of 232 missing people in Joplin — some of whom are amongst the 126 killed in Sunday’s storm, but perhaps haven’t been identified. Others may remain missing, but others still may have skipped town without informing friend and relatives of their departure. Let’s hope it’s the latter. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

27 May 2011 09:10

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U.S.: Air France Flight 447 crash: Flight recorders reveal new details

  • 3.5 minute freefall before the plane crashed into the ocean source
  • » That’s what the black box recorders say: Details are finally coming to light about Air France Flight 447, which crashed mysteriously two years ago. While officials found debris from the flight weeks after the crash, the flight recorders weren’t found until recently. According to the recently-discovered black box, the plane descended at a speed of 180 feet per second. Evidence shows that the least-experienced of the pilots led the flight until nearly two minutes before the crash. Officials recovered the two flight recorders 12,800 feet beneath the Atlantic.
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
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