April 22, 2007

Happy Earth day~

India test fires supersonic cruise missile
http://www.philstar.com/philstar/NEWS_FLASH04222007564_15.htm

The missile was fired from a mobile launcher from the Integrated Test Range at Chandipur-on-sea, 200 kilometers northeast of eastern Orissa state capital Bhubaneswar, official sources said. First tested in June 2001, the BrahMos cruise missile, named after India's Brahmaputra River and Russia's Moskva River, has a range of 290 kilometers and can carry a 300-kilogram conventional warhead. The eight-meter missile weighs about three metric tonnes and can be launched from land, ships, submarines or aircraft, traveling at a speed of up to Mach 2.8. Sunday's test came just 10 days after India successfully tested the Agni-III, an intermediate-range missile that for the first time gives New Delhi a device capable of hitting targets inside China, including capital Beijing. The Indian army is set to start deploying the missile this year, the CEO of its manufacturer BrahMos Aerospace A. Sivathanu Pillai said last month. A version of the BrahMos is already used by the Indian navy.


Iran sees "softer tone" from U.S. officials
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070422/ts_nm/iran_iraq_meeting_dc;_ylt=AlmKzKIE8_52likV6H9VWmHMWM0F

The United States is showing signs of softening its attitude towards Iran, an Iranian official said on Sunday, but added that Tehran had not yet decided to attend a meeting on Iraq with senior U.S. officials. Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini said Iran would decide after talks this week with Iraq’s foreign minister whether it would take part in an international conference next month to discuss the conflict in neighboring Iraq. Egypt will host the high-level meeting of a group of countries that includes Syria, Turkey and the United States in the first week of May to discuss how to stop the violence in Iraq. The conference is a follow-up to one in Baghdad in March. An Iranian newspaper reported earlier this month that Iran might not attend if U.S. forces do not release five Iranians they are holding in Iraq. But Hosseini said Iran had not linked the meeting with other issues. “About participating or not participating, or the level of participation, this is still under examination,” he told a regular briefing.


Iran launches new drive against slack dressers
http://www.metimes.com/storyview.php?StoryID=20070422-085110-4156r

Iranian newspapers printed pictures of women in tight and colorful clothing being given warnings on Tehran's streets by female police officers dressed in chadors as the crackdown got underway Saturday. Such moves by the police are customary every year as Iran's hot summer begins, hemlines become shorter and more skin is revealed. But people have been warned about this year's crackdown with more prominence than in the past. According to the Fars news agency, women were initially notified of their transgression on the street and, if they showed resistance, were then taken to a correctional center in Tehran. A Fars reporter saw a bus of 15 women arriving at the center in central Iran. Their parents were then notified, names and photos added to a database, and they were allowed to leave after signing a written commitment and changing clothes. An editorial in the hardline daily Kayhan said that police were right to ignore the wishes of those who favored a more softly-softly approach.

Islamic authorities remove wives, children of Hindus
http://www.metimes.com/storyview.php?StoryID=20070419-084636-2618r

Two Malaysian Hindu men Thursday said that they were battling Islamic authorities after being forcibly separated from their Muslim wives in cases highlighting growing religious tensions in Kuala Lumpur. Suresh Veerapan issued a plea for help after his wife Revathi Masoosai and their baby were forcibly removed from their home and she was put in an Islamic rehabilitation camp. He said that Revathi, an ethnic Indian and practicing Hindu born to Muslim parents, was sent to the camp for 100 days in January by Islamic authorities in western Malacca state. Her detention was extended Wednesday by a Sharia court by 80 days, Suresh said, adding that Islamic authorities in March had also taken the 16-month-old baby from him and given the child to his Muslim in-laws. In a separate case, another Malaysian Hindu man Thursday vowed to fight Islamic authorities for custody of five of his children who were forcibly separated from him, along with his Muslim wife.


Japan's opposition wins at least one of two by-elections: reports
http://www.philstar.com/philstar/NEWS_FLASH04222007571_15.htm

Japan's opposition camp appeared set to win at least one of two upper-house by-elections Sunday, in a test to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe ahead of national polls in July, news reports said. Teruhiko Mashiko, jointly backed by the main opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) and a minor opposition group, was projected to beat a candidate of Abe's ruling coalition and a communist candidate in rural Fukushima, the Jiji and Kyodo news agencies said. In the remote island chain of Okinawa, a candidate from a DPJ-led alliance and a rival from the coalition led by Abe's Liberal Democratic Party were "in a close contest," Kyodo said citing exit polls. The by-elections were held along with local elections in most of Japan's 47 prefectures to elect mayors and chiefs in 77 cities, 96 towns and villages and 13 wards in Tokyo. Seats in about 780 local assemblies were also contested. The poll results will set the tone for July's national elections, in which Abe's ruling coalition, which includes the Buddhist-backed New Komeito, defends its slim majority in the House of Councillors, the upper chamber of parliament.

Melamine in pet food may not be accidental
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/2007-04-19-pet-food-usat_N.htm

A nitrogen-rich chemical used to make plastic and sometimes as a fertilizer may have been deliberately added to an ingredient in pet food that has sickened and killed cats and dogs across the country, public and private officials say. A leading theory is that it was added to fake higher protein levels. Melamine has been found in wheat gluten, rice protein concentrate and, in South Africa, corn gluten, all imported from China, and all meant for use in pet food, the Food and Drug Administration confirmed Thursday. "It adds to the theory when you see other products that are labeled as protein supplements, in this case rice protein, and in South Africa corn gluten and in the previous case wheat gluten," said Stephen Sundlof, FDA chief veterinarian. "That melamine was found in all three of those, it would certainly lend credibility to the theory that this was intentional." How the melamine got there is "not something we're going to be able to determine until we actually investigate the plants in China," he said. The FDA has not yet been able to get letters of invitation from the Chinese government that would allow its inspectors to enter the country, he said.

Human Brain Has Origin in Lowly Worm
http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20070421/sc_livescience/humanbrainhasorigininlowlyworm;_ylt=AiV4jWZ_PwWa5dKjf_i5EmjMWM0F

Humans and other vertebrates evolved from an ancient common ancestor that also gave rise to insects and worms, scientists have long known. But they're of course quite different today. Vertebrates have a spinal cord running along their backs, but insects and annelid worms such as earthworms, which have simple organs that barely resemble a brain, have clusters of nerves organized in a chain along their bellies. So biologists have long assumed these systems—key to ultimately putting a brain to use—arose independently, only after the split. In the new study, researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory [EMBL] in Heidelberg examined they embryos of a marine annelid worm called Platynereis dumerilii, which has a nervous system unchanged for eons. They documented the molecular fingerprints of the developing nerve cells. "Our findings were overwhelming," says study team member Alexandru Denes. "The molecular anatomy of the developing CNS [central nervous system ] turned out to be virtually the same in vertebrates and Platynereis. Corresponding regions give rise to neuron types with similar molecular fingerprints and these neurons also go on to form the same neural structures in annelid worm and vertebrates."



50% Good News Is the Bad News in Russian Radio
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/22/world/europe/22russia.html?ei=5065&en=d4929f91a6c5b2aa&ex=1177819200&partner=MYWAY&pagewanted=print
At their first meeting with journalists since taking over Russia’s largest independent radio news network, the managers had startling news of their own: from now on, they said, at least 50 percent of the reports about Russia must be “positive.” In addition, opposition leaders could not be mentioned on the air and the United States was to be portrayed as an enemy, journalists employed by the network, Russian News Service, say they were told by the new managers, who are allies of the Kremlin. In a darkening media landscape, radio news had been a rare bright spot. Now, the implementation of the “50 percent positive” rule at the Russian News Service leaves an increasingly small number of news outlets that are not managed by the Kremlin, directly or through the state national gas company, Gazprom, a major owner of media assets. The three national television networks are already state controlled, though small-circulation newspapers generally remain independent. This month alone, a bank loyal to President Vladimir V. Putin tightened its control of an independent television station, Parliament passed a measure banning “extremism” in politics and prosecutors have gone after individuals who post critical comments on Web chat rooms. Parliament is also considering extending state control to Internet sites that report news, reflecting the growing importance of Web news as the country becomes more affluent and growing numbers of middle-class Russians acquire computers. On Tuesday, the police raided the Educated Media Foundation, a nongovernmental group sponsored by United States and European donors that helps foster an independent news media. The police carried away documents and computers that were used as servers for the Web sites of similar groups. That brought down a Web site run by the Glasnost Defense Foundation, a media rights group, which published bulletins on violations of press freedoms.





Libyan, US firms in petrochemical joint venture
http://rawstory.com/news/afp/Libyan_US_firms_in_petrochemical_jo_04202007.html

Libya's National Oil Corporation and US firm Dow Chemical have announced a joint venture to operate and expand the Ras Lanuf petrochemical complex in Libya, the NOC said on Friday. Ras Lanuf, on the Mediterranean coast 600 kilometres (370 miles) east of the capital Tripoli, is the country's most important petrochemical complex and was built in the 1980s. The joint venture agreement encompasses Ras Lanuf's existing naphtha cracker, two polyethylene production facilities and associated infrastructure. Ras Lanuf's existing naphtha cracker produces 330,000 tonnes of ethylene a year. The project will include refurbishing and expanding the existing units, followed by construction of an ethane cracker and additional polyethylene and polypropylene facilities. Later phases will include building additional hydrocarbon, plastics and chemical production facilities based on natural gas. Libya is Africa's second largest oil producer at 1.7 million barrels per day. It also has reserves of natural gas estimated at 1.314 billion square metres. Dow Chemical, operating in 175 countries and employing 43,000 people, has annual sales of 49 billion dollars.



‘Global warming’ may turn boys into girls
http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20070421/sc_livescience/warmingclimatereversessexoflizards

High temperatures can reverse the sex of dragon lizards before they hatch, turning males into females. The finding, detailed in the April 20 issue of the journal Science, could have implications for the development of life as the planet's climate warms. The research reveals that extreme temperatures could inactivate a gene on the male sex chromosomes of dragon lizards and thus turn male embryos into females. The sex-reversed lizards look female and have female organs but genetically they are male, said lead author Alexander Quinn of the University of Canberra in Australia.


France goes to the polls http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/World/2007/04/22/4102832.html

France began choosing a new president Sunday with millions of voters undecided and millions more voting for the first time, making the selection of two final candidates highly unpredictable. The successor to Jacques Chirac, ending 12 years as head of state at the close of his second term, will face a large and listless economy and an alienated young Muslim population, among a host of problems. Only four of the 12 candidates, including conservative front-runner Nicolas Sarkozy and Socialist Segolene Royal, who was No. two in polls, had a real chance of making it to a final round of voting May 6. Turnout among the nation’s 44.5 million potential voters reached 31.2 per cent by noon (3 a.m. PDT), four hours into the voting, the Interior Ministry said, the highest level by that hour than in any of the four previous presidential elections. There were 3.3 million newly registered voters, many from rundown immigrant neighbourhoods wracked by rioting in 2005. Polling firms said enough voters were undecided — at least 30 per cent — that soundings taken over the past few months could say nothing about the result. The French are worried about losing jobs to China, India and Brazil — and losing their influence on the world stage. French entreaties against the Iraq war, while praised by many, ultimately went ignored. The health of the euro depends in part on whether the next French president can stimulate growth. Sarkozy offers the bolder plan, by getting the French to work more and cutting taxes. Royal would raise the minimum wage and subsidize youth jobs. New jobs are the only solution for the rundown housing projects plagued by discrimination, poverty, illiteracy and dependence on state handouts. The landscape remains little changed since the 2005 riots forced France and its leaders to acknowledge their problems.

Gore campaign team assembles in secret
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/04/22/wgore22.xml&CMP=ILC-mostviewedbox

Two members of Mr Gore's staff from his unsuccessful attempt in 2000 say they have been approached to see if they would be available to work with him again. Mr Gore, President Bill Clinton's deputy, has said he wants to concentrate on publicising the need to combat climate change, a case made in his film, An Inconvenient Truth, which won him an Oscar this year. But, aware that he may step into the wide open race for the White House, former strategists are sounding out a shadow team that could run his campaign at short notice. In approaching former campaign staff, including political strategists and communications officials, they are making clear they are not acting on formal instructions from Mr Gore, 59, but have not been asked to stop.
His denials of interest in the presidency have been couched in terms of "no plans" or "no intention" - politically ambiguous language that does not rule out a run.

Chávez arms community groups as he anticipates US invasion
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/04/22/wchavez22.xml

On Mr Chávez's order, 17,000 communal councils have now been set up across the country, and an estimated £1 billion earmarked to fund them. As the official slogan, "Build power from below", proclaims, their stated purpose is to promote grass-roots democracy and hand power directly to the people - in particular the urban poor who make up the bulk of his most fervent supporters. But as well as grappling with the grim conditions in slums such as Catia, members of these voluntary groups will constitute a nationwide militia, schooled in Cuban-style tactics for both guerrilla warfare and counter-insurgency. The move has caused alarm among Mr Chávez's critics, who claim the groups will be used to repress internal dissent. They point out that, unlike Venezuela's military reservists, the communal councils come under Mr Chávez's direct control, including the appointments of their oversight committees and allocation of funding. They are being created in tandem with plans to expand Venezuela's military reserve fivefold, from about 200,000 people to one million - a move Mr Chávez has introduced in the belief that his sworn foe America is planning some kind of military intervention. Tensions with Washington and the West are likely to escalate further next month, when the Chávez government plans to begin taking control of the main European and American-owned oil fields in Venezuela - a move ordered by presidential decree in February. Ironically the new communal council in Catia has been devoting its energy to fighting the expansion of the nearby Fabricio Ojeda industrial complex, which is built with state oil money and which the Chávez administration portrays as an example of its new socialist co-operative model. Local residents are sceptical of promises to resettle them in better conditions.



Millions face famine as crop disease rages http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,2063079,00.html

The disease, known as black stem rust, has already destroyed harvests in Uganda, Kenya and Ethiopia. Now researchers report that stem rust spores have blown across the Red Sea into the Arabian peninsula and infected wheat fields in Yemen. Spores have also blown northwards into Sudan. Experts believe the disease - Puccinia graminis - will spread to Egypt, Turkey, the Middle East and finally India and Pakistan, which would lead to the destruction of the principal source of food for more than a billion people. Some observers warn that the disease could reach Egypt, which is heavily dependent on wheat, before the end of this year.


Device keeps organs alive outside the body
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/04/22/wkidney122.xml

For the first time, scientists at the University of Oxford have managed to disconnect an organ from the body's blood supply and keep it functioning on an artificial blood circuit. The procedure has allowed them to keep livers viable outside the body for more than 72 hours - four times the current time limit. It is hoped the technique will make it possible to transplant organs that would previously have been unusable - alleviating the problems caused by a shortage of donors. Organs are capable of regenerating high levels of damaged tissue when isolated from the rest of the body, the scientists found. A version of the technique could also be used to treat organs with high doses of chemotherapy to combat cancers without harmful side-effects on the body. Such treatments might also be developed to fight liver disease caused by alcohol and hepatitis. Scientists are now planning the first clinical trials in patients and hope to use the technique on other organs including the lungs, kidneys and pancreas. They hope the procedure will be widely used within five years.


The greatest digital story ever told
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,2062777,00.html

Terence Stamp is to take on the challenging role of God in an epic 20-CD verbatim version of The New Testament that is being put together in Chicago. Luke Perry and Marisa Tomei will also be joining a 100-strong cast, playing Judas and Mary Magdalene respectively, and the former adolescent heart-throb Lou Diamond Phillips is to play Mark, while John Heard is cast as Matthew. Such is the optimism about the vast project, which began recording in July and takes the New King James version as its text, that a reading of the whole of the Old Testament is already planned too, with actor Richard Dreyfuss slated to measure himself against Heston's mighty Moses. The complete production will fill 70 spaces in your CD rack. The producer behind The Word of Promise is Carl Amari, 43, an entrepreneur from Chicago who made his fortune by restoring and repackaging hit radio shows from the past. He was a millionaire at 30 after starting a company called Radio Spirits that licensed more than 60,000 shows featuring the likes of George Burns, Milton Berle and Orson Welles. Following the huge critical and commercial success of Mel Gibson's film The Passion of the Christ, which cost $30m to make and has grossed roughly $612m in cinemas around the world, Amari has embarked on a plan to offer a digitally up-to-date retelling of the New King James version. His choice of actor to play Jesus was a shoo-in. Amari turned to Jim Caviezel, who took the central role in The Passion of the Christ and is a co-producer on the new audio project. Amari is still negotiating over the part of Satan, a character he concedes has 'some of the best lines'. Michael York is the narrator.


US Army's computer game recruiting plan takes fire
http://rawstory.com/news/afp/US_Army_s_computer_game_recruiting__04212007.html

In June, the Army is set to sponsor a channel at the Global Gaming League website, a popular spot for Internet computer game lovers. A first-person shooter game based on the army training manual will be a centerpiece of the channel, which will feature other games in the same genre. The "America's Army" game was released about five years ago and ranks in the top 10 most popular computer games of its kind, according to McCann World Group vice president Anders Ekman, who is handling the project for the Army. Play at the channel will be free, but agreeing to "additional contact from the Army" comes with signing up as a player. The Army's investment, estimated at two million dollars, is aimed at finding potential soldiers among gamers in the cherished recruiting age range of 17 to 24.



'Antichrist' Cancels Visit to Guatemala http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6577964,00.html

Puerto-Rican born Jose Luis de Jesus Miranda wears the number 666 tattooed on his arm and claims a following of 2 million people, most in Miami, where he lives, and Colombia. His Growing in Grace church holds a congress every year in different locations in the Americas.
Guatemala's Congress had labeled De Jesus Miranda a terrorist and immigration officials were instructed to refuse him entry to the country, where thousands of his followers from around the world had gathered. He had vowed to defy the ban but canceled Saturday and will instead address the gathering in a video teleconference, said the sect's head pastor in Guatemala, Jorge Batres. De Jesus Miranda founded the Growing in Grace church in 1986. He preaches to followers in some 35 nations, mostly in Latin America, and has 287 radio programs and a 24-hour Spanish-language TV network. He often takes aim at the Catholic Church - the most powerful faith in Latin America - calling all priests child molesters and saying chastity vows contradict the Bible's teachings. De Jesus Miranda preaches that sin and the devil do not exist. In January, he declared that he and his followers were antichrists because their beliefs supersede those of Jesus Christ. The Bible describes the Antichrist as someone who will fill the world with wickedness but be conquered by a second coming of Christ. De Jesus Miranda has also been denied entry into El Salvador and Honduras.


Sheryl Crow Battles Karl Rove at D.C. Dinner
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003574776

President George Bush’s choice not to make jokes, and comedian Rich Little’s somewhat poor attempt to make them, resulted in an unusual White House Correspondent’s Association Dinner Saturday as celebrities and politicians mixed, mingled and dined. One highlight: singer Sheryl Crow, on a cross-country global warming awareness trip, got into it with Karl Rove. Jawing like a baseball manager and an umpire arguing a call, Crow and Rove were disagreeing over global warming, with Crow’s pal, Laurie David, offering support. Approached afterward about the exchange, Rove said he was enjoying it all, “if I can get to my meal.”


Moore playing coy? http://www.edmontonsun.com/Entertainment/Spotlight/2007/04/22/4102401-sun.html

How is Michael Moore handling the issue of Manufacturing Dissent? Pretty much the same way George W. Bush handled Fahrenheit 9/11 -- by not commenting on it. Moore claims not only not to have seen Manufacturing Dissent, but not to have even heard about it. This despite the fact that he's a media-junkie and the documentary has been written up in The New York Times, among other outlets. At a Q&A at the recent Traverse City Film Festival, Moore responded to a question about it with, "You mean the Noam Chomsky film?," a reference to Manufacturing Consent, the 1992 profile of linguist and political theorist Chomsky. "There are a lot of films made about me," he said, when pressed further by a questioner. "I'm in a lot of movies." However, he did address his sometimes free-form and dramaturgically minded take on the presentation of facts when the session host suggested "non-fiction" might be a better term for his films than documentaries.

FYI, 13yo skool grl is nu US txt mssg chmpN
http://rawstory.com/news/afp/FYI_13yo_skool_grl_is_nu_US_txt_mss_04222007.html

Some 250 challengers shunned the warmest day of the year for a dark ballroom where they battled it out for a chance to take on the reigning West Coast champion, 21-year-old Eli Tirosh, for the title of US Texting Champion. Contestants had to stand with their hands behind their backs until a bell sounded and a message appeared on an overhead screen. The winner was judged on whoever's message -- checked for exact punctuation -- reached the judges first. The text tests ranged from "faster than a speeding bullet..." and "what we do in life echoes in eternity" to the less poetic "OMG, nd 2 talk asap." The 250 competitors were quickly whittled down to eight semi finalists, one of whom, Anne Finn, 24, of Allegany, New York, said the pressure was too much. "It was so nerve wracking. My hands started to shake. I couldn't get my apostrophe," she said. In the end, 13-year-old Morgan Pozgar faced off against Michael "Cheeser" Nguyen in the east coast final, with Pozgar slipping past her challenger to face west coast champion Tirosh, a law student from Los Angeles. Tirosh, who said she practiced with her friend and trainer Amy, who threw out random words or symbols and even motivational Buddhist quotes, admitted to feeling a certain pressure due to the home side advantage.
Wearing a satin boxing robe before her championship bout against Pozgar, she said success would come down to who could marry lightning speed and accuracy. "It's all about the thumbwork," she said. "It's about balance." She said she owed her success to relaxation and deep breathing. So dedicated is she to the art of the text message that Tirosh apparently unwittingly uses abbreviations such as BTW (by the way), TTYL (talk to you later) and LOL (laughing out loud) in her normal speech. Pozgar said she trained by sending on average 8,000 text messages a month to her friends -- an astonishing rate of one every five and a half minutes.