Picture a Molecule

Scientists from IBM used an atomic force microscope (AFM) to reveal the chemical bonds within a molecule.

The congruity between the image and the ball and stick model is impressive.

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I wish this were a joke.

Thank you LA for sending a truly mind-numbingly stupid congresswoman to the House.

"They are spreading fear and they're trying to see that the first president who looks like me -- fails."

"People look at the United States as a country that has changed it's way and elected someone from Kenya and Kansas, I'll put it like that."

KABC’s Michael Linder was the only broadcast reporter at Thursday night’s town hall health care debate at Wade AME Church when Rep. Diane Watson [D] made some astonishing comments including claims that those opposed to health care reform are attempting to destroy a president “who looks like me.”

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Cradle Your Unborn

This is wild.

A new scanning technique allows expectant mothers to hold a life-size model of their unborn child

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Second-hand smoke is Torture

The horror!

CIA officers blew smoke in Nashiri's face, according to the report, and they used cigars.

How low can these interrogators stoop? <- That's sarcasm

"This interrogator said he would not do this again based on 'perceived criticism.' Another agency interrogator admitted that he also smoked cigars during two sessions with al-Nashiri to mask the stench in the room. He claimed he did not deliberately force smoke into al-Nashiri's face." The interrogators learned their lesson: Don't blow smoke at terrorists.

We're doomed.

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Chips made with DNA

It's not science fiction; It's a brave new world.

The company is researching ways in which DNA can arrange itself into patterns on the surface of a chip, and then act as a kind of scaffolding on to which millions of tiny carbon nanotubes and nanoparticles are deposited. That network of nanotubes and nanoparticles could act as the wires and transistors on future computer chips, the IBM scientists said.

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Torture - It's not just for Terrorist

A Lebanese citizen being held in a detention center here was hooded, stripped naked for photographs and bundled onto an executive jet by FBI agents in Afghanistan in April, making him the first known target of a rendition during the Obama administration.
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Raymond Azar was flown to this Washington suburb for a case involving inflated invoices.

Azar, 45, pleaded guilty Tuesday to conspiracy to commit bribery, the only charge against him. He faces a maximum of five years in prison, but a sentence of 2 1/2 years or less is likely under federal guidelines.

Doesn't this mans treatment match the left's description of torture?

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Made In USA

From NY Times 2/20/2009;

The United States remains by far the world's leading manufacturer by value of goods produced. It hit a record $1.6 trillion in 2007 - nearly double the $811 billion of 1987. For every $1 of value produced in China factories, the United States generates $2.50.

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Why Banks have all the Really Big Buildings

According to this article at investopedia;

The Financial Times recently reported that U.S. banks are set to earn $38.5 billion this year from overdraft fees alone, more than double the number from 1994.

Is balancing a checkbook taught in high school?

Hello Mary Jo

If there's any justice in the next world then Mary Jo will now be water boarding Ted.

I Like Linux

This is a snapshot of my linux desktop.

It doesn't always look that way but I took the snapshot while in 'cube mode'. Turning my desktop into a cube is actually quite useless - but it's fun.

This is Mint Linux KDE Community Edition.

Government Healthcare in Action

While hundreds of thousands of disability claims lay backlogged at the Department of Veterans Affairs, thousands of technology employees at the department received $24 million in bonuses, a new report says.

And these are the folks that want to control your healthcare?

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Balanced Budget Ammendment

Yet another thing that Dave Ramsey and I have in common.

“I am wholeheartedly in favor of our government balancing our budget. A balanced budget goes a long way toward getting rid of our National Debt problem which adds volatility to our economy and devalues our dollar. As Americans for a Balanced Budget Amendment work toward that goal we support their efforts.”

- Dave Ramsey, Radio Show Host and Business Analyst

Legal Drugs in Mexico

Prosecutors said the new law sets clear limits that keep Mexico's corruption-prone police from extorting casual users and offers addicts free treatment to keep growing domestic drug use in check.

This decriminalization applies to marijuana, cocaine and heroin. I could agree with the marijuana, maybe even the cocaine, but including heroin comes as a surprise.

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A Trillion here a Trillion there

The Obama administration will raise its 10-year budget deficit projection to approximately $9 trillion from $7.108 trillion in a report next week, a senior administration official told Reuters on Friday.

Are we talking about real money yet?

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If Rahm Emanuel were a Republican...

...he would be on the street by now.

Emanuel is a multimillionaire, but lived for the last five years for free in the tony Capitol Hill townhouse owned by De Lauro and her husband, Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg.

During that time, he also served as chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee - which gave Greenberg huge polling contracts. It paid Greenberg's firm $239,996 in 2006 and $317,775 in 2008. (Emanuel's own campaign committee has also paid Greenberg more than $50,000 since 2004.)

To be fair, Greenberg had polling contracts with the DCCC before - but each new election cycle brings its own set of consultants. And Emanuel was certainly generous with his roommate.

Emanuel never declared the substantial gift of free rent on any of his financial-disclosure forms. He and De Lauro claim that it was just allowable "hospitality" between colleagues. Hospitality - for five years?

Some experts suggest that it was also taxable income: Over five years, the free rent could easily add up to more than $100,000.

Personally I don't care that he lived rent free. What bugs me is the fact that not a word of this has appeared on the major news outlets. If a Republican did this it would be the lead story on every major network.

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This is fishy.

Why would someone kill them self with a shotgun during a routine traffic stop?

It's not clear why 17-year-old Billey Joe Johnson was stopped in Lucedale, but authorities say the junior tailback shot himself with a shotgun after the deputy walked back to the patrol car to run a license check.
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Authorities would not immediately say whether they believed the shooting was a suicide or an accident.

So it's possible that Billey Joe was going to attack the officer?

"The deputy was sitting in his patrol vehicle ... when he heard a gunshot and saw the victim laying on the ground by the driver's side door of the vehicle that Johnson was driving. A shotgun was lying on the victim," according to a statement from the George County Sheriff's Department.

How can that be? What was the deputy looking at while Billey was getting out of the car with a shotgun?

Is there a camera in the patrol car? Who owned the shotgun?

Update: The NAACP is doing independent investigation.

Link

It's alway "Global Warming"

Even a cooling trend is evidence of global warming.

2008 is on pace to be a slightly cooler year in a steadily rising temperature trend line. Experts say it's thanks to a La Nina weather variation. While skeptics are already using it as evidence of some kind of cooling trend, it actually illustrates how fast the world is warming.

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Hello

If you read this leave a comment.

How to Learn

Does anyone disagree with this statement?

Attainment of higher level learning objectives will not be achieved with relative ease through discovery learning; instead, it will require considerable instruction by a skilled teacher, following thorough mastery of basic knowledge and skills that must be integrated and applied in the process of 'higher level' performance.
"Teacher Influences on Student Achievement," American Psychologist (Oct. 1986): 1069-1077:

Where Have I Been?

Nowhere really. Just got tired of blogging to a site that gets no hits.

Later,