Jimmy Wahlsteen: Halifaxation (Little green footballs)

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iPhone 4S sashays its way to India, up for pre-order this week

They're pumped. You're pumped. Everyone's pumped. Why? Because the iPhone 4S is coming to India, that's why. According to the Times of India, Apple's latest handset will be available on November 25th from Bharti Airtel, the country's leading carrier. The Times' report comes just a few days after rival domestic provider Aircel confirmed its own 4S launch (also slated for the 25th), with a post on its Facebook page. Neither company has announced a price yet, though Aircel will start taking pre-orders on the 18th, at the source link below.

[Image courtesy of Bollysite.com]

iPhone 4S sashays its way to India, up for pre-order this week originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 16 Nov 2011 11:18:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/16/iphone-4s-sashays-its-way-to-india-up-for-pre-order-this-week/

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Dennis Jett: What the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street Really Have In Common

A number of commentators have struggled to link the Tea Party and the Occupy Wall Street protestors. Both groups seem to be grass roots, spontaneous expressions of popular discontent. They appear to occupy opposite ends of the political spectrum, however, and have different takes on the cause of, and the solution for, their unhappiness.

There is one very significant difference between the two groups. And that difference helps explain the one thing they have in common that matters more than anything else. The difference is the Tea Partiers are a mob masquerading as a movement, while the Occupiers are a movement determined to act like a mob. The important thing they have in common is that, in the not-so-long-run, neither of them is going to amount to anything.

All the journalistic descriptions of their lasting impact are just the usual cycle of the media going from inattention to obsession and back to attention deficit. In the end, both movements are going to fade away and the problems that motivated them will remain.

The Tea Party is not going to matter because it displays the usual inability of conservatives to deal with the world as it is, only on steroids. They don't like reality, don't understand it, resist the changes it implies and ignore any evidence that clashes with how they wish things were. That makes them easy prey for politicians who promise a return to an Ozzie and Harriet world that never existed, billionaires with an agenda like the Koch brothers and hucksters like congressman turned lobbyist Dick Armey.

The Tea Partiers believe the solution to a dysfunctional government is less government, which is a bit like saying the remedy for a leaky roof is to remove the roof. They seem to think that dismantling the social safety net will allow them to prosper. They swear allegiance to the free market, without giving a thought to what is required for such a market to operate as efficiently as they think it will or to the implications of that being the only determinant of one's fortunes.

They assert, for instance, the answer to soaring medical costs is the free market and not government intervention. At their next debate someone should ask the Republicans vying for their party's presidential nomination how much they spent last time they went to the doctor, how much they will spend the next time and how much they would spend if their health depended on it. They will all blather on without answering those questions because none of them has any idea what the answers are.

So how is a free market supposed to operate when the consumer has no idea what the product costs and is willing to pay any amount if necessary to buy it? The consumer also has no idea about the quality of the product and what alternatives are available. To operate as efficiently as it does in theory, a free market needs many buyers, many sellers and lots of information about the product and alternatives to it. That does not describe, and never will, the market for health care. Not to mention the problem of ignoring the moral considerations of having a society where wealth determines health.

Nonetheless the Tea Partiers will vote for politicians who promise the myth of the free market as the solution to their problems. By being visible and turning out for the last election, the Tea Party did manage to put in office a number of freshmen congressmen who pay lip service to their beliefs. Those politicians will either be captured by the system, and just as beholden to the special interests as the rest of Washington, or they will be irrelevant naysayers who have no effect on the way government operates. So the Tea Party will, thankfully, not have any lasting impact -- other than perhaps to help the Republican Party nominate one of their least electable candidates for president.

The Occupy Everywhere crowd is also eventually going to be equally disappointed with their inability to bring about change. They refuse to have leaders, agendas or proposals, other than for the top one percent to be more generous with the bottom 99 percent.

Fat chance. If Ronald Reagan accomplished anything it was to make greed a virtue and government a vice in the eyes of many. The rich think they have earned their status and will never believe they have too much or even enough. They don't believe in any government program that redistributes income. So by occupying the public square and only using shame to bring about change is not going to work. It would be like going to Las Vegas and demonstrating in favor of good taste, moderation and the arts. A few laughs will be the only result.

What really would bring about change? Now, thanks to the right wing majority on the Supreme Court, corporations are entitled to unlimited, anonymous free speech in the form of attack ads against any politician who dares stand against them and for the people. Limiting the influence of money in Washington, public financing of elections, total transparency about who is trying to affect public policy and congressional districts not drawn to ensure the victory of one party or the other are all essential steps if real change is to ever happen.

While those steps are a good start there also must be a rejection of Reagan's simplistic rewriting of our civic values. Government doesn't do anything well, but that does not mean the free market can always do better. There is a role for government and the taxes paid to support it are the price we pay for living in a fair, just and safe society. That realization will bring about change a lot quicker than quixotic movements or delusional mobs.

?

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dennis-jett/what-the-tea-party-and-oc_b_1093848.html

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Beluga body scrub session filmed

16 November 2011 Last updated at 07:52 By Victoria Gill Science reporter, BBC Nature

Beluga whales come together for the annual moult

A film crew has captured the remarkable scene of hundreds of beluga whales indulging in a mass "body scrub" to slough off their skin.

The mammals come en masse into shallow Arctic estuaries where scrubbing their bodies on the stony seabed helps them moult their skin.

"They definitely seem to enjoy it," recalled director Elizabeth White.

Filming for the BBC documentary Frozen Planet, she and her team captured the behaviour up close and from the air.

Ms White was in charge of the ground-based shoot on Somerset Island in the Canadian Arctic, for which she stood "marooned" on a tower in the middle of the estuary.

This was the best way to get close to the whales, as the tower would be surrounded by water when the tide came in.

"This tower [was used] by the scientists who study the whales here," Ms White explained to BBC Nature.

"The belugas would swim all the way up to it; they'd even rub themselves against it, which was a bit unnerving."

From this vantage point Ms White and the team captured super slow motion shots of the whales splashing and apparently playing in the water.

They also fixed underwater cameras and microphones to the tower's scaffold, capturing some of the squeaks and cries that have earned belugas the nickname, "canaries of the sea".

The sounds the whales made, Ms White said, was lovely.

Piggybacking babies

Scientists think that the warm, fresh water of the estuary softens the animals' skin.

"You see quite big chunks of blubber around that have just been sloughed off," said Ms White.

To capture aerial shots of hundreds of the white whales in the turquoise water, director Vanessa Berlowitz and cameraman Michael Kelem boarded a helicopter.

"Above marine mammals you can't fly below 300m (1,000ft)," explained Ms White. "But even from this height, [they] managed to get footage of the babies riding on the mothers' back - something that's never been filmed before."

The juvenile whales ride on their mothers' backs occasionally in order to save energy.

Stranded youngster

During their time filming the moult, the crew witnessed one of the hazards the whales encounter when swimming in such shallow water.

"We were there for the lowest tide and one of the youngsters got stranded when we were there," said Ms White.

"The poor little thing got stuck on a sandbank."

Fortunately, she said, this happened late in the day. And with strong sunlight shining on it, and no polar bears around, the young whale was able to escape as soon as the tide came in.

Elizabeth White from the BBC's Natural History Unit describes the team's encounter with a stranded whale.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/15738210

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Air quality 'puts lives at risk'

13 November 2011 Last updated at 22:04 ET By Richard Black Environment correspondent, BBC News

The government's failure to meet EU standards on air pollution is "putting the health of UK residents at risk", says the Environmental Audit Committee.

Bad air quality costs the nation ?8.5-20bn per year via poor health, it says, and can cut life expectancy by years.

Continued failure to meet EU standards could result in swingeing fines.

The committee says ministers' "apparent tactic" to avoid fines is to ask the European Commission for repeated extensions rather than curb pollution.

Continue reading the main story

?Start Quote

The government needs to act now, as government did in the 1950s, to save the health of the nation?

End Quote Environmental Audit Committee report

The government's latest request to the commission - to delay having to meet standards on nitrogen dioxide (NO2) until 2015 - is being taken to judicial review by environmental lawyers ClientEarth.

By some measures, the UK has been in breach of EU rules since 2005, the committee's report notes.

It last reported on air pollution 18 months ago, and says that since then, there is "no meaningful evidence" to suggest progress towards meeting standards.

Yet evidence on the health impacts, it says, has become clearer.

Nationally, the government accepts that air pollution takes seven or eight months off Britons' life expectancy. But for the 200,000 people most directly affected, the shortfall is two years.

"It is a national scandal that thousands of people are still dying from air pollution in the UK in 2011 - and the government is taking no responsibility for this," said committee chair Joan Walley MP.

"It is often the poorest people in our cities who live near the busiest roads and breath in diesel fumes, dangerous chemicals and bits of tyre every day."

Recent UK research indicated that tyres and brakes are a significant source of airborne particles, in addition to vehicle exhausts.

'Not taken seriously'

On particulates, the UK is improving. Six years ago, eight places in the country exceeded EU standards.

Now, only London does; but the London picture is startling. EU regulations allow legal limits to be exceeded for 35 days per year. This year, the quota was reached in April.

A more problematic area is nitrogen dioxide. Currently, 40 out of 43 "assessment zones" across the country exceed the EU standard.

The government's own projections, released in June, indicate that 17 will still be in breach in 2015, with Greater London taking even longer to clean up, despite the avowed intention of everyone connected with the Olympics to make them the "greenest games ever".

Government plans for curbing NO2 pollution include financial incentives for switching haulage from road to rail, research on how retailers could deliver goods outside peak times, and differential pricing for vehicles emitting lower levels of pollutants.

And the London administration of Mayor Boris Johnson has set age limits for black cabs, invested in cycling, and implemented the London Low Emission Zone.

The Environmental Audit Committee says that even so, the air pollution issue is just not taken seriously in government.

"There are no air quality actions for Defra or the Department for Transport in their departmental business plans," it says, and few government departments "appear to understand the importance of the issue".

A spokeswoman for the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said the government was working towards full compliance with EU standards, and that significant progress had been made.

"We are investing significant sums of money to facilitate further reductions in pollution around transport, including over ?1bn to promote the uptake of ultra low emission vehicle technologies and to support local transport authorities to deliver sustainable transport measures," she said.

"We welcome the committee's continued interest in this work, and we will fully consider their recommendations before providing a written response in due course."

Local zero

The government's response to the committee' previous report was rooted in the localism principle, with responsibility being devolved downwards to local authorities.

The committee warns that this could mean EU fines being passed down to local authorities as well.

"Under the banner of its localism agenda, the government is dumping the problem on local authorities who simply do not have the resources to tackle what is a national problem," said Alan Andrews, air quality lawyer at ClientEarth.

"It is simply putting off taking action while behind the scenes it lobbies the EU to weaken limits."

The committee says government should urgently implement incentives to retrofit old vehicles with equipment to reduce pollution and set up a network of Low Emission Zones in the worst-affected areas.

And it warns that meeting the NO2 standard would be impossible in the event of a third runway being constructed at Heathrow - an option that is currently ruled out by Coalition policy.

The committee's call to action is partly couched in historical terms; air pollution in London causes as many deaths now as in the bad old days of the "pea-souper" smogs, it calculates.

"It is estimated that around 4,000 people died as a result of the Great Smog of London in 1952. That led to the introduction of the Clean Air Act in 1956.

"In 2008, 4,000 people died in London from air pollution and 30,000 died across the whole of the UK.

"The government needs to act now, as government did in the 1950s, to save the health of the nation."

Follow Richard on Twitter

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/science-environment-15693627

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Israel: Iran closer to atom bomb than thought

JERUSALEM?? Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday the full extent of Iran's nuclear program was not reflected in a recent U.N. report, which said that Tehran appeared to have worked on designing an atomic bomb.

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"Iran is closer to getting an (atomic) bomb than is thought," Netanyahu said in remarks to cabinet ministers, quoted by an official from his office.

"Only things that could be proven were written (in the U.N. report), but in reality there are many other things that we see," Netanyahu said, according to the official.

The Israeli leader did not specify what additional information he had about Iran's nuclear program during his cabinet's discussion on the report by the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) released last week.

Story: Iran says has detected Duqu computer virus

At the start of meeting, Netanyahu made a broadcast repeating his call for the world "to stop Iran's race to arm itself with a nuclear weapon before it is too late."

Iran has dismissed accusations that it is developing nuclear weapons and says it needs atomic technology for electricity and other peaceful projects. it called the IAEA report "unbalanced" and "politically motivated."

The IAEA paper has intensified media speculation that the United States or Israel might take military action against Iran to destroy its nuclear program.

The U.N. nuclear watchdog said it had "credible" information that Iran had built a large explosives vessel to conduct hydrodynamic experiments, which are "strong indicators of possible weapon development."

Both Washington and Israel have said they are keeping all options on the table to stop Tehran developing a nuclear bomb.

Israel, a close strategic ally of Western powers, is widely believed to have the Middle East region's only nuclear arsenal, dating back decades. It has never confirmed or denied this, under a policy of ambiguity designed to deter attacks.

Copyright 2011 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45278552/ns/world_news-mideast_n_africa/

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Japan's economy rises out of earthquake slump (AP)

TOKYO ? Japan's economy grew for the first time in four quarters in a comeback from the earthquake and tsunami disaster that already faces multiple global headwinds.

The world's No. 3 economy expanded at an annualized rate of 6 percent in the July-September period, driven by exports, the Cabinet Office said in a preliminary report Monday.

It was the first growth in four quarters. The result was in line with market forecasts, including Kyodo News agency's projection of 6.2 percent annualized growth.

"Having something as strong as hoped for is really good news," said Martin Schulz, senior economist at Fujitsu Research Institute in Tokyo. "Basically all parts of the economy were expanding. And this is extremely important because we see a slowdown internationally, which is already hitting exports."

Indeed, while such a robust rebound is encouraging, it is unlikely to last.

"The situation surrounding our country's economy is becoming tougher as we see the recovery in overseas economies weakening and face the impact of the Thai flood, in addition to the yen's rapid rise," said economic and fiscal policy minister Motohisa Furukawa, according to Kyodo.

Economists expect GDP ? a measure of the value of all goods and services produced domestically ? to contract slightly in the last three months of the year before turning moderately positive again next year. New government spending on disaster reconstruction should help offset weaker overseas demand, said Kyohei Morita, chief economist at Barclays Capital in Tokyo.

"We maintain our view that Japan is likely to outpace other advanced economies in 2012," he said in a research note Monday.

The latest annualized GDP figure translates to growth of 1.5 percent from the previous quarter, according to the Cabinet Office.

Consumer spending, which accounts for some 60 percent of the economy, climbed 1 percent from the previous quarter. Capital investment by companies rose 1.1 percent. Exports jumped 6.2 percent.

The March 11 earthquake and tsunami killed thousands of people and wiped out large swathes of Japan's northeastern coast. The disasters damaged many factories in the region, causing severe shortages of parts and components for manufacturers across the country, including automakers.

The tsunami also crippled a nuclear power plant that triggered the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl.

Since then, the country has steadily restored its factories and benefited more recently from pent-up demand for Japanese goods such as cars.

Toyota Motor Corp.'s production had recovered to pre-tsunami levels by September, earlier than initial estimates. Output took another big hit due to the recent flooding in Thailand, but the automaker said last week production in Japan would return to near normal levels Nov. 21-25.

___

Follow Tomoko A. Hosaka on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/TomokoHosaka

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/economy/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111114/ap_on_bi_ge/as_japan_economy

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