(4 pm. – promoted by ek hornbeck)

Recently, US State Department spokesperson, P.J. Crowley was forced to tender his resignation becuase he had the audacity to call the inhumane treatment of PFC. Bradley Manning “ridiculous, counterproductive, and stupid”. He is now defending that statement and explaining how Manning’s treatment undermines our own strategic narrative, as his piece in the Guardian explains:

The US should uphold the highest standards towards its citizens, including the WikiLeaks accused. I stand by what I said

   But I understood why the question was asked. Private Manning’s family, joined by a number of human rights organisations, has  questioned the extremely restrictive conditions he has experienced at the brig at Marine Corps base Quantico, Virginia. I focused on the fact that he was forced to sleep naked, which led to a circumstance where he stood naked for morning call.

   Based on 30 years of government experience, if you have to explain why a guy is standing naked in the middle of a jail cell, you have a policy in need of urgent review. The Pentagon was quick to point out that no women were present when he did so, which is completely beside the point.

   Our strategic narrative connects our policies to our interests, values and aspirations. While what we do, day in and day out, is broadly consistent with the universal principles we espouse, individual actions can become disconnected. Every once in a while, even a top-notch symphony strikes a discordant note. So it is in this instance.

   The Pentagon has said that it is playing the Manning case by the book. The book tells us what actions we can take, but not always what we should do. Actions can be legal and still not smart. With the Manning case unfolding in a fishbowl-like environment, going strictly by the book is not good enough. Private Manning’s overly restrictive and even petty treatment undermines what is otherwise a strong legal and ethical position.

   When the United States leads by example, we are not trying to win a popularity contest. Rather, we are pursuing our long-term strategic interest. The United States cannot expect others to meet international standards if we are seen as falling short. Differences become strategic when magnified through the lens of today’s relentless 24/7 global media environment.

   So, when I was asked about the “elephant in the room,” I said the treatment of Private Manning, while well-intentioned, was “ridiculous” and “counterproductive” and, yes, “stupid”.

   I stand by what I said. The United States should set the global standard for treatment of its citizens – and then exceed it. It is what the world expects of us. It is what we should expect of ourselves.

Today, Crowley appeared on the Dylan Ratigan Shoiw and reiterated what he said in his article but hemmed and hawed when Ratigan asked him about a similar leak about classified information to the press.

Mr. Crowley, if we are going to vigorously prosecute Bradley Manning for releasing documents that even the Vice President has said have done no harm. why aren’t you supporting the ferreting out of this other “leaker”? What is the difference if information is given to the press or Wikileaks? The US can hardly be an arbiter of human rights and the rule of law when it can’t apply either to even its own citizens.

Regular Features-

• Late Night Karaoke by mishima
• Muse in the Morning by Robyn
• Six In The Morning by mishima
• Gha! by RiaD

Featured Essays for March 29, 2011-

• Social Security: Get On The Phone Tuesday And Wednesday And Help Fight Cuts by fake consultant
• S02E08: The Situation in Libya by Main Street Insider
• At The Libyan Tunisian Border: Few Libyans Fleeing Libya? by Edger
• Are we still in America? by ek hornbeck
• An Act concerning Discrimination: Action Needed Now by Robyn
• Sunday Train: American Greatness and High Speed Rail by BruceMcF

DocuDharma

(midnight. – promoted by ek hornbeck)

Essays Featured Tuesday the 29^th of March:

Late Night Karaoke looks Behind Blue Eyes, mishima DJs

Six Brilliant Articles! from Six Different Places!! on Six Different Topics!!!

                Six Days a Week!!!    at Six in the Morning!!!!

In Tuesday Open Thoughts puzzled ponders on too many house-guests & introverts  

TheMomCat highlights the fact that Federal Medical Marijuana Policy Needs Clarity

Gha!

In Book Nook, a bi-weekly series, Xanthe gives a review of Italian Shoes by Henning Mankell

Afternoon music from Timbuk3: The 100 Greatest Rock Songs of All Time!

Tonight #94

Wikipedia–

The term “China Syndrome” refers to a possible result of a catastrophic meltdown of a nuclear reactor. Also called a loss of coolant accident, the scenario begins when something causes the coolant level in a reactor vessel to drop, uncovering part-or all-of the fuel element assemblies. Even if the nuclear chain reaction has been stopped through use of control rods or other devices, the fuel continues to produce significant residual heat for a number of days due to further decay of fission products. If not properly cooled, the fuel assemblies may soften and melt, falling to the bottom of the reactor vessel. There, without neutron-absorbing control rods to prevent it, nuclear fission could resume but, in the absence of a neutron moderator, might not. Regardless, without adequate cooling, the temperature of the molten fuel could increase to the point where it melts through the structures containing it. Although many feel the radioactive slag would stop at or before the the underlying soil, such a series of events could release radioactive material into the atmosphere and ground, potentially causing damage to the local environment’s plant and animal life.

Some have less than seriously called this- ‘burning a hole all the way to China’ hence the name, but in fact it would probably go no farther than the mantle which is already kind of molten and radioactive or at worst the core of the Earth which is considerably molten and radioactive.  Even in the absence of drag the Second Law of Thermodynamics would mitigate against it fully overcoming the force of Gravity and emerging on the other side, though you might want to buy some thick soled boots to be sure.

Of course they’re quite serious about that “release radioactive material into the atmosphere and ground, potentially causing damage to the local environment’s plant and animal life” thing.

Compare the above description with this-

Japan may have lost race to save nuclear reactor

Ian Sample, science correspondent, guardian.co.uk

Tuesday 29 March 2011 16.53 BST

Fukushima meltdown fears rise after radioactive core melts through vessel – but ‘no danger of Chernobyl-style catastrophe’

The radioactive core in a reactor at the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant appears to have melted through the bottom of its containment vessel and on to a concrete floor, experts say, raising fears of a major release of radiation at the site.

…

At least part of the molten core, which includes melted fuel rods and zirconium alloy cladding, seemed to have sunk through the steel “lower head” of the pressure vessel around reactor two, Lahey said.

“The indications we have, from the reactor to radiation readings and the materials they are seeing, suggest that the core has melted through the bottom of the pressure vessel in unit two, and at least some of it is down on the floor of the drywell,” Lahey said. “I hope I am wrong, but that is certainly what the evidence is pointing towards.”

And about that radiation thing-

Radiation from Japan found in Concord snow

By DAVID BROOKS, Staff Writer, Nashua Telegraph

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Radiation from the Japanese nuclear power plant leak has been found in snow in Concord at levels roughly similar to that found last week in Massachusetts rainwater – a level that officials say is 25 times below the level of concern even if found in water that people drink.

(h/t John Aravosis @ Americablog)

NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament 2011

Tennessee is out which is the only program that compares, but Geno has a light bench they say though I don’t recall hearing about any exceptionally sucky recruiting years recently.

Conventional Wisdom also contends that they match up well against Duke and I still think that a primary motivating factor is that the men are still in it when everbody knows it’s the Lady Huskys who are the Basketball power of Connecticut.

Sorry Gonzaga.  I was rooting for you.  Notre Dame is probably the second best team in The Big East.

Monday’s Results

DePaul would have been just another Big East meeting.  It’s so much more fun to crush an opponent from the ACC.

Texas A&M has lost to Baylor 3 times so far this year-

• 63 – 60
• 67 – 58
• 61 – 58 (Big 12 Finals)

On the other hand Baylor is just a two hour drive away.

Current Matchups

Follow the 2011 NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament on The Stars Hollow Gazette.

If you don’t like squeeky shoes you can look for alternate programming here-

• Zap2it TV Listings, Yahoo TV Listings

If you like a more traditional bracket try this NCAA one, they also have a TV schedule.

I’ll be sitting in for ek hornbeck who is Live Blogging the Men’s and Women’s NCAA Championship Games for the next few days. Come live blog the Women’s Regional Finals Day 2 with us.

“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”

Dean Baker: The Deficit Hawks Target Nurses and Firefighters

Many people might think that the country’s problems stem from the fact that too much money has been going to the very rich. Over the last three decades, the richest one percent of the population has increased its share of national income by almost 10 percentage points (Excel spreadsheet). This comes to $1.5 trillion a year, or as the deficit hawks are fond of saying, $90 trillion over the next 75 years.

To put this in context, the size of this upward redistribution to the richest one percent over the last three decades is roughly large enough to double the income of all the households in the bottom half of the income distribution. The upward redistribution amounts to an average of more than 1.2 million dollars a year for each of the families in the richest one percent of the population.

Eugene Robinson: Newt Gingrich on Libya policy: Firing in every direction

If you don’t like Newt Gingrich’s carefully considered and passionately argued position on the U.S. intervention in Libya, just wait. Recent history suggests that within days he’ll be saying the opposite of whatever he’s saying now.

My best guess is that for the moment, at least, Gingrich kind of supports President Obama’s decision to use military force against Libyan despot Moammar Gaddafi, or at least that he hopes it succeeds. But it’s hard to be certain. On Libya, the former House speaker has shown the ability to be both pro and con with equal moral certainty and intellectual arrogance.

Dana Milbank: The Obama doctrine: A gray area the size of Libya

The National Defense University at Fort McNair was a favorite backdrop of President George W. Bush as he laid out his Bush doctrine of preemptive war.

Five times during his presidency, Bush visited the military installation in Southwest D.C., serving up such memorable soundbites as “we’re at war with cold-blooded killers who despise freedom,” and “we will keep the terrorists on the run until they have nowhere left to hide,” and “our immediate strategy is to eliminate terrorist threats abroad so we do not have to face them here at home.”

So it was noteworthy that Obama chose the same location for his speech to the nation justifying the U.S. military action in Libya. After ten days of confusion about America’s role in Libya – and in the world – Obama finally was prepared to articulate his “doctrine.”

Christian Science Monitor: Bernard-Henri Levy: War in Iraq was detestable. War in Libya was inevitable.

Bernard-Henri Levy, the French author and philosopher (his latest book is “Left in Dark Times: A Stand Against the New Barbarism”), has played a high-profile role in convincing French President Nicolas Sarkozy to take the lead in recognizing the rebels in Libya and establishing the no-fly zone. He spoke with Global Viewpoint Network editor Nathan Gardels on Thursday.

Juan Cole: An Open Letter to the Left on Libya

As I expected, now that Qaddafi’s advantage in armor and heavy weapons is being neutralized by the UN allies’ air campaign, the liberation movement is regaining lost territory. Liberators took back Ajdabiya and Brega (Marsa al-Burayqa), key oil towns, on Saturday into Sunday morning, and seemed set to head further West. This rapid advance is almost certainly made possible in part by the hatred of Qaddafi among the majority of the people of these cities. The Buraiqa Basin contains much of Libya’s oil wealth, and the Transitional Government in Benghazi will soon again control 80 percent of this resource, an advantage in their struggle with Qaddafi.

I am unabashedly cheering the liberation movement on, and glad that the UNSC-authorized intervention has saved them from being crushed. I can still remember when I was a teenager how disappointed I was that Soviet tanks were allowed to put down the Prague Spring and extirpate socialism with a human face. Our multilateral world has more spaces in it for successful change and defiance of totalitarianism than did the old bipolar world of the Cold War, where the US and the USSR often deferred to each other’s sphere of influence.

Glen Greenwald: Billionaire Self-Pity and the Koch Brothers

Since the financial crisis of 2008, one of the most revealing spectacles has been the parade of financial elites who petulantly insist that they are the victims of societal hostility:  political officials heap too much blame on them, public policy burdens them so unfairly, the public resents them, and — most amazingly of all — President Obama is a radical egalitarian who is unprecedentedly hostile to business interests.  One particularly illustrative example was the whiny little multi-millionaire hedge fund manager (and CNBC contributor), Anthony Scaramucci, who stood up at an October, 201o, town hall meeting and demanded to know:  “when are we going to stop whacking at the Wall Street pinata?”

The Weekly Standard now has a very lengthy defense of — including rare interviews with — Charles and David Koch, the libertarian billionaires who fund everything from right-wing economic policy, union-busting, and anti-climate-change advocacy to civil liberties and liberalized social policies — though far more the former goals than the latter.  In this article one finds the purest and most instructive expression of billionaire self-pity that I think I’ve ever seen — one that is as self-absorbed and detached from reality as it destructive.  It’s really worth examining their revealed mindset to see how those who wield the greatest financial power (and thus the greatest political power) think of themselves and those who are outside of their class.

Robert Kuttner: An American Industrial Renaissance?

In the sorting out of the wreckage after Japan’s earthquake and tsunami, many Americans have begun paying more attention to a phrase they had barely known — “supply chains.”

American manufacturing companies no longer make most of the parts that they use in production. Rather, both U.S. companies and foreign ones that produce for the U.S. market have long and complex chains of suppliers the world over, many of them in Japan. Now, a lot of that production is temporarily idle, while Japan digs out.In the sorting out of the wreckage after Japan’s earthquake and tsunami, many Americans have begun paying more attention to a phrase they had barely known — “supply chains.”

Harvey Wasserman: Radiation is a Lethal Three Mile Island Lie

There is no safe dose of radiation.

We do not x-ray pregnant women.

Any detectable fallout can kill.

With erratic radiation spikes, major air and water emissions and at least three reactors and waste pools in serious danger at Fukushima, we must prepare for the worst.

When you hear the terms “safe” and “insignificant” in reference to radioactive fallout, ask yourself: “Safe for whom?” “Insignificant to which of us?”

We’ll see.

BP Managers Said to Face U.S. Manslaughter Charges Review

By Justin Blum and Alison Fitzgerald, Bloomberg News

Mar 29, 2011 6:03 AM ET

Halliburton recommended BP use 21 centralizers that help ensure cement is evenly distributed in the well and seals it. BP had only six centralizers on Deepwater Horizon, according to internal e-mails released by investigators. BP officials decided to go ahead rather than wait for the additional 15.

They also decided to skip a test that would determine if the cement was stable, according to testimony at Coast Guard hearings. Then, on April 20, BP and Transocean managers on the rig misread the results of another test to determine whether the well’s cement seal was strong enough to hold the oil and natural gas beneath the ocean floor, according to the president’s commission.

In the end, the companies went ahead and removed the drilling mud from the well, which took 2,600 pounds of weight from atop the oil and gas reservoir. Within hours, natural gas reached the Deepwater Horizon and touched off the catastrophic explosion.

…

Authorities are examining actions by BP managers who worked both on the rig and onshore to determine whether they should be charged in connection with the workers’ deaths, according to the people. Prosecutors have been looking at charges of involuntary manslaughter or seaman’s manslaughter, which carries a more serious penalty of up to 10 years.

…

Charging individuals would be significant to environmental- safety cases because it might change behavior, said Jane Barrett, a law professor at the University of Maryland.

“They typically don’t prosecute employees of large corporations,” said Barrett, who spent 20 years prosecuting environmental crimes at the federal and state levels. “You’ve got to prosecute the individuals in order to maximize, and not lose, the deterrent effect.”

(h/t Chris in Paris @ Americablog)

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

Find the past “On This Day in History” here.

March 29 is the 88th day of the year (89th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 277 days remaining until the end of the year.

On this day in 1951, the Rosenbergs are convicted of espionage.

In one of the most sensational trials in American history, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg are convicted of espionage for their role in passing atomic secrets to the Soviets during and after World War II. The husband and wife were later sentenced to death and were executed in 1953.

The conviction of the Rosenbergs was the climax of a fast-paced series of events that were set in motion with the arrest of British physicist Klaus Fuchs in Great Britain in February 1950. British authorities, with assistance from the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation, gathered evidence that Fuchs, who worked on developing the atomic bomb both in England and the United States during World War II, had passed top-secret information to the Soviet Union. Fuchs almost immediately confessed his role and began a series of accusations.

Fuchs confessed that American Harry Gold had served as a courier for the Soviet agents to whom Fuchs passed along his information. American authorities captured Gold, who thereupon pointed the finger at David Greenglass, a young man who worked at the laboratory where the atomic bomb had been developed. Gold claimed Greenglass was even more heavily involved in spying than Fuchs. Upon his arrest, Greenglass readily confessed and then accused his sister and brother-in-law, Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, of being the spies who controlled the entire operation. Both Ethel and Julius had strong leftist leanings and had been heavily involved in labor and political issues in the United States during the late-1930s and 1940s. Julius was arrested in July and Ethel in August 1950.

By present-day standards, the trial was remarkably fast. It began on March 6, and the jury had convicted both of conspiracy to commit espionage by March 29. The Rosenbergs were not helped by a defense that many at the time, and since, have labeled incompetent. More harmful, however, was the testimony of Greenglass and Gold. Greenglass declared that Julius Rosenberg had set up a meeting during which Greenglass passed the plans for the atomic bomb to Gold. Gold supported Greenglass’s accusation and admitted that he then passed the plans along to a Soviet agent. This testimony sealed Julius’s fate, and although there was little evidence directly tying Ethel to the crime, prosecutors claimed that she was the brain behind the whole scheme. The jury found both guilty. A few days later, the Rosenbergs were sentenced to death. They were executed on June 19, 1953 in Sing Sing Prison in New York. Both maintained their innocence to the end.

Since the execution, decoded Soviet cables, codenamed VENONA, have supported courtroom testimony that Julius acted as a courier and recruiter for the Soviets, but doubts remain about the level of Ethel’s involvement. The decision to execute the Rosenbergs was, and still is, controversial. The New York Times, in an editorial on the 50th anniversary of the execution (June 19, 2003) wrote, “The Rosenbergs case still haunts American history, reminding us of the injustice that can be done when a nation gets caught up in hysteria.” This hysteria had both an immediate and a lasting effect; many innocent scientists, including some who were virulently anti-communist, were investigated simply for having the last name “Rosenberg.” The other atomic spies who were caught by the FBI offered confessions and were not executed. Ethel’s brother, David Greenglass, who supplied documents to Julius from Los Alamos, served 10 years of his 15 year sentence. Harry Gold, who identified Greenglass, served 15 years in Federal prison as the courier for Greenglass and the British scientist, Klaus Fuchs. Morton Sobell, who was tried with the Rosenbergs, served 17 years and 9 months. In 2008, Sobell admitted he was a spy and confirmed Julius Rosenberg was “in a conspiracy that delivered to the Soviets classified military and industrial information and what the American government described as the secret to the atomic bomb.”

 1461 – Wars of the Roses: Battle of Towton – Edward of York defeats Queen Margaret to become King Edward IV of England.

1549 – The city of Salvador da Bahia, the first capital of Brazil, is founded.

1632 – Treaty of Saint-Germain is signed, returning Quebec to French control after the English had seized it in 1629.

1638 – Swedish colonists establish the first settlement in Delaware, naming it New Sweden.

1792 – King Gustav III of Sweden dies after being shot in the back at a midnight masquerade ball at Stockholm’s Royal Opera 13 days earlier. He is succeeded by Gustav IV Adolf.

1806 – Construction is authorized of the Great National Pike, better known as the Cumberland Road, becoming the first United States federal highway.

1809 – King Gustav IV Adolf of Sweden abdicates after a coup d’état. At the Diet of Porvoo, Finland’s four Estates pledge allegiance to Alexander I of Russia, commencing the secession of the Grand Duchy of Finland from Sweden.

1831 – Great Bosnian uprising: Bosniak rebel against Turkey.

1847 – Mexican-American War: United States forces led by General Winfield Scott take Veracruz after a siege.

1849 – The United Kingdom annexes the Punjab.

1857 – Sepoy Mangal Pandey of the 34th Regiment, Bengal Native Infantry revolts against the British rule in India and inspires a long-drawn War of Independence of 1857 also known as the Sepoy Mutiny.

1865 – American Civil War: Federal forces under Major General Philip Sheridan move to flank Confederate forces under Robert E. Lee as the Appomattox Campaign begins.

1867 – Queen Victoria gives Royal Assent to the British North America Act which establishes the Dominion of Canada on July 1.

1871 – The Royal Albert Hall is opened by Queen Victoria.

1879 – Anglo-Zulu War: Battle of Kambula: British forces defeat 20,000 Zulus.

1882 – The Knights of Columbus are established.

1886 – Dr. John Pemberton brews the first batch of Coca-Cola in a backyard in Atlanta, Georgia.

1911 – The M1911 .45 ACP pistol became the official U.S. Army side arm.

1930 – Heinrich Bruning is appointed German Reichskanzler.

1936 – In Germany, Adolf Hitler receives 99% of the votes in a referendum to ratify Germany’s illegal reoccupation of the Rhineland, receiving 44.5 million votes out of 45.5 million registered voters.

1941 – The North American Radio Broadcasting Agreement goes into effect at 03:00 local time.

1941 – World War II: British Royal Navy and Royal Australian Navy forces defeat those of the Italian Regia Marina off the Peloponnesian coast of Greece in the Battle of Cape Matapan.

1942 – The Bombing of Lubeck in World War II is the first major success for the RAF Bomber Command against Germany and a German city.

1945 – World War II: Last day of V-1 flying bomb attacks on England.

1946 – Instituto Tecnologico Autonomo de México, one of Mexico’s leading universities, was founded.

1951 – Ethel and Julius Rosenberg are convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage.

1957 – The New York, Ontario and Western Railway makes its final run, the first major U.S. railroad to be abandoned in its entirety.

1961 – The Twenty-third Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, allowing residents of Washington, D.C., to vote in presidential elections.

1971 – My Lai massacre: Lt. William Calley is convicted of premeditated murder and sentenced to life in prison.

1971 – A Los Angeles, California jury recommends the death penalty for Charles Manson and three female followers.

1973 – Vietnam War: The last United States combat soldiers leave South Vietnam.

1973 – Operation Barrel Roll, a covert US bombing campaign in Laos to stop communist infiltration of South Vietnam, ends.

1974 – NASA’s Mariner 10 becomes the first spaceprobe to fly by Mercury. It was launched on November 3, 1973.

1982 – The Telegu Desam Party (India’s regional political party) was established by N. T. Rama Rao.

1982 – The Canada Act 1982 (U.K.) receives the Royal Assent from Queen Elizabeth II, setting the stage for the Queen of Canada to proclaim the Constitution Act, 1982.

1990 – The Czechoslovak parliament is unable to reach an agreement on what to call the country after the fall of Communism, sparking the so-called Hyphen War.

1993 – Catherine Callbeck becomes premier of Prince Edward Island and the first woman to be elected in a general election as premier of a Canadian province.

1999 – The Dow Jones Industrial Average closes above the 10,000 mark (10,006.78) for the first time, during the height of the internet boom.

1999 – A magnitude 6.8 earthquake strikes the Chamoli district in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, killing 103.

2002 – In reaction to the Passover massacre three days prior, Israel launches Operation Defensive Shield against Palestinian militants, its largest military operation since the 1967 Six-Day War.

2004 – Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia join NATO as full members.

2004 – The Republic of Ireland becomes the first country in the world to ban smoking in all work places, including bars and restaurants.

2008 – Thirty-five countries and over 370 cities join Earth Hour for the first time.

2010 – Two female suicide bombers hit the Moscow Metro system at the peak of the morning rush hour, killing 40.

   * Boganda Day (Central African Republic)

   * Christian Feast Day:

         o Bertold

         o Eustace of Luxeuil

         o Gwladys

         o March 29 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)

   * Day of the Young Combatant, celebrated with civil disorder by leftists and anarchists. (Chile)

   * Youth Day (Taiwan)

Rebels hope tribal rifts will speed their march to Gaddafi’s birthplace

Loyalists offer little resistance ahead of battle for Sirte. Kim Sengupta joins the advancing forces.

Tuesday, 29 March 2011

The scale and nature of resistance from the regime’s soldiers indicated how much their firepower had been devastated by Western air strikes. There was little of the heavy shelling that had made the revolutionary forces flee in the past. This was replaced instead by sporadic rockets and small-arms clashes on the ground.

The rebel commanders, nonetheless, remain worried after reports that the male population of Sirte had been armed and what remains of the regime’s armour and artillery on the eastern front has been deployed to protect the city. Renewed bombing of the military positions in the city by international coalition warplanes are said to have caused some damage, but the city remains well guarded.

How Dangerous Is Japan’s Creeping Nuclear Disaster?

Fukushima Fallout

Spiegel

The technicians had for days to restore electricity to the remains of the Fukushima nuclear power plant. But then it was ordinary rubber boots, of all things, that would come to symbolize their desperation, helplessness and defeat.

On Thursday, the three men had made their way into the basement of the turbine building for reactor No. 3 to examine the situation there. When they returned later, they came fully equipped with tools and protective gear that included helmets, masks, rubber gloves and raincoats on top of their radiation suits.

The one thing the men were not prepared for was that suddenly they would be wading through more than a few inches of water.

Protesters target the lobbyists willing to do business with Belarus

 

By Jerome Taylor and Sarah Morrison Tuesday, 29 March 2011

Belarusian dissidents held a protest last night outside the offices of Grayling, the international lobbying firm which has been criticised for leading an investment drive inside Belarus in the middle of a widespread crackdown on pro-democracy forces.

Flanked by celebrity supporters including Jude Law, Kevin Spacey and Tom Stoppard, protesters called on British businesses to stop investing in Belarus until all political prisoners are freed.

‘Military declares parliamentary poll for September

The Irish Times – Tuesday, March 29, 2011

MICHAEL JANSEN  

 EGYPT’S MILITARY rulers are increasingly mapping out the route the country will take in the post-Mubarak period. Yesterday, they decreed the country’s parliamentary poll will be held in September.

This declaration was strategically paired with a communique stating the emergency law, imposed in 1981, will be lifted ahead of the election.

The decision on the election is certain to displease the January 25 Youth Coalition that guided the uprising which toppled former president Hosni Mubarak. The coalition seeks an interim period of one year to 18 months so that both liberal and nationalist parties, re- pressed during the 30-year reign of Mr Mubarak, and emerging parties have time to organise.

Pentagon agency set up to detect roadside bombs blows billions



Peter Cary, Nancy Youssef, Tribune Media Services

March 29, 2011

WASHINGTON: A Pentagon agency formed five years ago to defeat the threat of roadside bombs killing more and more US soldiers in Iraq has ballooned into a 1900-employee behemoth and has spent nearly $17 billion on hundreds of initiatives.

Yet the technologies it has developed have failed to improve significantly the ability of soldiers to detect roadside bombs and have never been able to find them at long distances.

The best detectors remain the low-tech methods: trained dogs, local handlers and the soldiers themselves.

China ‘to overtake US on science’ in two years





David Shukman

Science and environment correspondent, BBC News

That is the conclusion of a major new study by the Royal Society, the UK’s national science academy.

The country that invented the compass, gunpowder, paper and printing is set for a globally important comeback.

An analysis of published research – one of the key measures of scientific effort – reveals an “especially striking” rise by Chinese science.

The study, Knowledge, Networks and Nations, charts the challenge to the traditional dominance of the United States, Europe and Japan.