Quake Toll Reaches 1,100 in a Chaotic Indonesia
No tractors were available to move the rubble that was their office building before Wednesday’s mighty earthquake felled this modest port city, so workers started digging feverishly with their bare hands.
Shorts (right)
Federal employees will not be allowed to text while driving, according to an executive order signed Wednesday night by President Barack Obama.
It’s Raining Pumpkins!
Fall is officially here! There are several ways one may have noticed that the seasons changed. First of all, Halloween merchandise is all over the stores (time to start planning your costume). Yesterday’s cool temperatures were another hint, a trend that will continue today. Finally, this weekend is the “Great Glass Pumpkin Patch,” in which the MIT Glass Lab displays and sells over 1,000 handblown glass pumpkins. Unfortunately, the weather may not cooperate this weekend and we may have a wet and rainy pumpkin patch.
William Safire, Political Columnist, Dies At 79
William Safire, a speechwriter for President Richard M. Nixon and a Pulitzer Prize-winning political columnist for The New York Times who also wrote novels, books on politics and a Malaprop’s treasury of articles on language, died at a hospice in Rockville, Md., on Sunday. He was 79.
Report on Russia-Georgia War to Fault Both Sides
After a lengthy inquiry, investigators commissioned by the European Union are expected to conclude that Georgia ignited last year’s war with Russia by attacking separatists in South Ossetia, rejecting the Georgian government’s explanation that the attack was defensive, according to an official familiar with the investigators’ work.
Europe’s Socialists Suffering Even in Bad Capitalist Times
A specter is haunting Europe – the specter of socialism’s slow collapse.
Shorts (left)
Zimbabwe’s Supreme Court tossed out terrorism charges against the prominent human rights activist Jestina Mukoko on Monday, ruling that she herself had been terrorized when state security agents abducted and tortured her.
More Cows, Producing More Milk, and More Headaches
Three years ago, a technological breakthrough gave dairy farmers the chance to bend a basic rule of nature: no longer would their cows have to give birth to equal numbers of female and male offspring. Instead, using a high-technology method to sort the sperm of dairy bulls, they could produce mostly female calves to be raised into profitable milk producers.
Shorts (right)
Corporate mergers and acquisitions all but dried up during last year’s financial crisis. But on Monday, Wall Street bounded higher on signs that companies once again had enough cash, credit and confidence to undertake big-ticket deals.
Iran Tests Longer-Range Missiles
Locked in a deepening dispute with the United States and its allies over its nuclear program, Iran said Monday that its Revolutionary Guards test-fired missiles with sufficient range to strike Israel, parts of Europe and American bases in the Persian Gulf.
Cooler Than Average Temperatures
After Sunday’s overcast rain, yesterday’s sunny blue skies (and its beautiful high of 75°F) were quite wonderful. However, last night we saw a large cold front pass that stretches down from Canada all along the Eastern seaboard and curves around through the gulf of Mexico. As it moved through our region, it brought clouds and rain.
Terror Suspect Is Charged With Preparing Explosives
Federal authorities have charged a man jailed since last week with acquiring and preparing explosive materials like those used in the 2005 London subway bombings days before he traveled to New York City earlier this month, asserting that he and others were involved in a Qaida conspiracy to strike in the United States.
Obama Pushes To Update Global Rules on Nuclear Arms
President Barack Obama moved on Thursday to tighten the noose around Iran, North Korea and other nations that have exploited gaping loopholes in the patchwork of global nuclear regulations.
Twitter’s Market Capitalization To Reach $1 Billion
Twitter has trained people to compress their thoughts into 140 characters and given a public stage to both dissidents in Iran and voluble stars like Shaquille O’Neal.
AIDS Vaccine Shows Benefit, Pointing Way to More Study
Scientists said Thursday that a new AIDS vaccine, the first ever declared to protect a significant minority of humans against the disease, would be studied to answer two fundamental questions: Why it worked in some people but not in others, and why those infected despite vaccination received no benefit at all.
Energy Dept. Offers $10 Million Prize for Better Bulb
The ubiquitous but highly inefficient 60-watt light bulb badly needs a makeover. And it could be worth millions in government prize money — and more in government contracts — to the first company that figures out how to do it.
Shorts (left)
The Food and Drug Administration said Thursday that four New Jersey congressmen and its own former commissioner unduly influenced the process that led to its decision last year to approve a patch for injured knees, an approval it is now revisiting.
Shorts (right)
Gov. Deval Patrick today named Paul G. Kirk Jr., a former aide and longtime confidant of the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, to Kennedy’s seat.
Who’s Eddy?
Many people are often foiled by the assumption that today’s weather will be the same as yesterday’s weather, finding themselves wearing shorts when things suddenly take a turn for the cooler side. Such quickly changing weather is a consequence of living in the midlatitudes, where the circulation pattern is dominated by what meteorologists call eddies.