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15 Sep 2011 15:58

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World: NASA’s animation of newly-discovered “Star Wars” planet

  • Meet Kepler-16b: We’ll admit, the selling of this story as the discovery of a “Star Wars” planet (so said in reference to Luke Skywalker’s desert home of Tatooine) seems a little silly. That said, dual suns are cool, and people generally don’t seem as interested in astronomy as we’d like, so we’ll forgive the attempt at pop-cultural publicity. As the animation illustrates, both of Kepler-16b’s suns would set on the same horizon. source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

15 Sep 2011 15:25

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Politics: Postmaster General will seek to close 252 mail processing plants

  • 32,000 postal service jobs may be lost source
  • » Cost-cutting galore: Facing down a U.S. postal service that lost about $8.5 billion lat year, Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe has proposed some major closures, which will come at the price of the mail efficiency. With a plan to close 252 offices nationwide, the downsizing could mean that first-class mail could take up to a day longer. The postal service is, as a business model, deeply unusual — it’s also not a matter of argument, as it’s the rare government agency explicitly demanded by the Constitution. The hope that the postal service has the resiliency to both lower its size and speed of delivery, yet still compete with the private carriers strikes us as an unlikely premise.
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

15 Sep 2011 10:47

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Politics: Gauntlet, thrown: Bioethicist jumps on Bachmann’s HPV claims

  • If she can produce a case in one week starting today verified by three medical experts that she and i pick of a woman who became ‘retarded’ (her words) due to HPV vaccine i will donate that to a charity of her choice. She must donate 10k to a charity I pick if she fails to do so.
  • University of Pennsylvania bioethicist Art Caplan • E-mailing reporters with an offer of a challenge for Michele Bachmann, in response to her claims that the HPV vaccine can cause mental health issues. Here’s what we think is going to happen here — Bachmann is going to ignore Caplan because, if she doesn’t, she’s going to be proven wrong. That’s pretty much her only option for not looking stupid here. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

15 Sep 2011 09:49

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Culture: Michaele Salahi + Journey guitarist Neal Schon ≠ Kidnapping. Lulz.

How you know you’re famous for being famous: Your claim to fame is gate-crashing the White House, and you get reported missing … but you’re really just hanging with the Journey’s lead guitarist. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

15 Sep 2011 09:28

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Biz: UBS loses a ton of money thanks to one sketchy employee

  • one dude the number of people involved in rogue trading at UBS; Kweku Adoboli was arrested in London, and “suspicion of fraud by abuse of position” is to blame
  • $2 billion the amount of money said unauthorized trading will cost UBS; that’s, like, a major loss for the company, one that could wipe out the company’s quarterly profits source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

14 Sep 2011 21:13

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Culture: Pat Robertson: It’s OK to divorce someone with severe Alzheimer’s

  • I know it sounds cruel, but if he’s going to do something, he should divorce her and start all over again, but make sure she has custodial care and somebody looking after her.
  • Pat Robertson • Telling a man looking for advice that it’s OK to divorce someone — if they’re suffering from Alzheimer’s, which he refers to as “a kind of death.” Um … we really have no clue what to say about this other than that we wouldn’t do this ourselves. Sometimes, our boy drops some whoppers.  source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

14 Sep 2011 20:57

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Politics: The three craziest claims from Joe McGinniss’ Sarah Palin book

  • one According to a recap of the book by the National Enquirer, Sarah Palin was a former cocaine user, most notably during a snowmobiling trip.
  • two The book also repeats the claim the Palin had an affair in the mid-90s with one of her husband’s friends. She’s already denied this.
  • three Most shockingly, the book claims that Palin had a one-night stand — prior to her marriage — with former NBA star Glen Rice. WTF?! source
  • » Wait, is this stuff actually true?! Well, that depends on if you believe Joe McGinniss, the best-selling author of “The Selling of the President 1968.” McGinniss is no stranger to controversy, and he certainly wasn’t when writing this book — see, he moved to Alaska, within shouting distance of the former vice-presidential candidate, leading to rebukes from Palin’s staff. It will be interesting to see what happens when people besides Garry Trudeau get the book.
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

14 Sep 2011 20:34

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World: Underwear bomber shouts “Osama’s Alive!” in courtroom

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 24, made the outburst while potential jurors were filling out questionnaires. Guess the trial on this one’s gonna be fairly painless. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

14 Sep 2011 11:26

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Politics: Chicago Tribune cartoonist torn on paper’s decision to pass on “Doonesbury”

  • As you might guess I am torn. On the one hand I understand their reasoning. They did the same thing to my comic strip Prickly City a few years back in a series on Ted Kennedy. This was before I was on staff here. So this is not a new policy aimed squarely at liberal comic strips as has been suggested. On the other hand, it ticked me off when it happened to me. As a creator you never want your work stiflied. You know that.
  • Chicago Tribune cartoonist Scott Stantis • Discussing his paper’s decision to pass on running a week of Doonesbury strips that openly cite passages from a biography on Sarah Palin — “The Rogue: Searching for the Real Sarah Palin,” an unauthorized tome written by Joe McGinniss. The Tribune’s reasoning for skipping out on the strip this week is reasonable — the book isn’t on the market yet, so they can’t check it on their own — but nonetheless has ruffled a few feathers. Stantis’ take, of course, is interesting. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

14 Sep 2011 11:02

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Politics: AttackWatch: Obama campaign makes its own GOP watchdog site

  • So this is what we’ve come to. The Obama administration has created its own version of NewsBusters — except, instead of attacking the media for liberal bias, the site’s attacking Republicans for saying false things. It’s actually a sequel to Fight the Smears, a site he ran during the 2008 campaign, but with one major difference — it looks like the site’s going for a more ruthless approach. It feels like, with this move, Obama is starting to use tactics we’d be more likely to see from Fox News commentary shows. Do we want Obama to run an attack dog ahead of the election, or be above the fray? Which one would work better? source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
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