http://blogs.tnr.com/tnr/blogs/the_stump/archive/2008/05/21/obama-s-wwii-connection.aspx

Carbon nanotubes, the poster child of the burgeoning nanotechnology industry, could trigger diseases similar to those caused by asbestos, a study suggests.

Specific lengths of the tiny fibres were found to cause "asbestos-like" inflammation and lesions in mice.

Use of asbestos triggered a pandemic of lung disease in the 20th Century.

There are high hopes for the tiny carbon molecules, which have remarkable properties that could be used for advanced electronics and materials. <!-- E SF -->

They are already known to be incorporated into products such as tennis rackets, bicycle handlebars and baseball bats, where they are used because of their strength and light weight....

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7408705.stm

http://dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/5/21/11272/4720/60/519645

finally, someone has put it into words.

Hillary is a fake complete and utterly.

I think of Hillary's rhetoric in the same way I think of Rush Limbaugh, all bombast and no substance.

And this: "Barack Obama is quietly planning to take over the Democratic National Committee and assemble a multistate team for the general election, the latest sign that he is putting rival Hillary Rodham Clinton and the nomination fight behind him," the AP's Pickler writes.

Your possible new DNC chief: Paul Tewes, "one of the leading architects of Obama's success in the marathon Democratic primary race," Pickler reports. (What ever happened to not declaring victory prematurely?)
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This was in ABC's The Note this morning. Does this mean Obama will remove Dean & could he even do that?

Series of downloadable lectures and charts on .pdf - excellent graphics/charts.

http://ocw.jhsph.edu/courses/EnvironmentalHealth/lectureNotes.cfm

http://ocw.jhsph.edu/courses/EnvironmentalHealth/index.cfm

I probably should have said Hillary is a complete and utter fake but I was rushed. ;-)

Dean's term ends in Jan '09 and it is not atypical for the nominee to change things up at the DNC - Howard needs to move on to bigger and better things.

SEATTLE —

When the military wants to discharge homosexual service men and women under the "don't ask, don't tell" law, it must justify its decision each time, a federal appeals court panel ruled Wednesday in the case of a highly decorated flight nurse who sued the Air Force over her firing.

The ruling is the first appeals court ruling in the country that evaluates "don't ask, don't tell" in light of Lawrence v. Texas, the Supreme Court's 2003 decision that struck down that state's ban on sodomy.

The three judges from 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated Maj. Margaret Witt's lawsuit against the Air Force, saying the facts of her case must be developed to determine if her dismissal furthered the military's stated goals of military readiness and troop harmony.

"When the government attempts to intrude upon the personal and private lives of homosexuals," Judge Ronald M. Gould wrote, "the government must advance an important governmental interest, the intrusion must significantly further that interest, and the intrusion must be necessary to further that interest."

Pelosi nails Clinton on the issue on the News Hour.

http://www.mgwashington.com/index.php/news/article/head-of-mississippis-democrats-endorses-obama/1019/

Republican't aren't just into evading responsibility for anything; they're lazy elitists and not really equipped to handle governing.

What a difference four years makes. When the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled in late 2003 that gay couples had the same right to marry as straight couples, the nation had a collective fainting spell, and constitutional amendments affirming the super-straightness of state after state popped up like dandelions. Republican politicians tripped over each other to predict the demise of American civilization if the marriage equality outbreak were not contained, and Democrats tugged at their collars and tried to explain their nuanced and complicated positions on the issue.

Yet last week when the Supreme Court of the largest state in the union issued a similar ruling, making California the second state with full marriage rights for all citizens, the political reaction was remarkably subdued. Yes, there will be a constitutional amendment on California's ballot this November, and the campaign there will be hard-fought. But on the national level, there were no raised voices, no cries of anguish, no calls to man the ramparts -- at least none to which anyone paid much attention. All soon-to-be Republican presidential nominee John McCain could muster was a spokesperson reading from the old script, mumbling that the Arizona senator "doesn't believe judges should be making these decisions."

If you didn't know all that much about McCain you might think his muted response reflects a moderation on gay issues uncharacteristic among Republicans. But you'd be wrong. McCain's position on gay marriage is that the issue should be left to the states, unless state courts confer marriage rights on gays, in which case he would favor an amendment to the U.S. Constitution banning gay marriage. On the question of civil unions, he told George Stephanopoulos in 2006 that he isn't against them, but he isn't for them. He has indicated that it's OK with him if two people of the same sex draw up some kind of a contract together, kind of like business partners or roommates, so long as it doesn't appear that the government is giving a sanction to their relationship. And in 2006 he not only supported an Arizona constitutional amendment banning the state from giving any legal recognition to gay couples, he even appeared in ads touting the ballot measure.

The Air Force Material Command (AFMC) in support of the Air Combat Command (ACC) is interested in reviewing concepts for a NG UAS. The capability to detect, track, and precisely engage Time Sensitive Targets (TSTs) has been acknowledged as a highly important military need in the current war on terror. The MQ-1 Predator has proven to be a versatile system: an unmanned, remotely piloted air vehicle able to carry a variety of weapons to prosecute ground targets. The need for greater speed, range, altitude, and payload has led to the latest version, the MQ-9 Reaper. Even with incremental improvements, however, specialized and demanding hunt and kill missions with support of troops on the ground push the MQ-9s beyond the limits of its capabilities and present serious effectiveness issues. This leaves room for significant improvement and innovation in system performance needed to address future advisory threats that will exist in 2015 and beyond timeframe.

From:https://www.fbo.gov/index?s=opportunity&mode=form&id=1ae64fd2334b47af5955a1c4eb885c1f&tab=core&_cview=0

US guards drag Afghan detainee to war-crimes court

By DAVID McFADDEN – 6 hours ago

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba (AP) — An Afghan detainee was dragged from his cell to his first pretrial hearing at Guantanamo on Wednesday, then refused to participate, telling the judge he felt "helpless."

Mohammed Kamin joined a growing detainee boycott of the war-crimes trials at the Guantanamo Bay Navy base in southeast Cuba. The military judge, Air Force Col. W. Thomas Cumbie, said Kamin tried to bite and spit on a guard on the way to the courtroom.

In his first public appearance since arriving at Guantanamo in 2004, Kamin wore a heavy beard and the orange prison uniform reserved for noncompliant prisoners, his ankles shackled above his sneakers.

Kamin is accused of placing missiles near U.S.-occupied areas in Afghanistan. He allegedly trained as an al-Qaida operative in 2003 and spied on American military bases before he was captured later that year.

He denied having any connection with al-Qaida or the Taliban and said the charges against him are false.

"The trials are yours, the courts are yours. How can I trust you? I don't expect anything good from you," Kamin said through a Pashto translator. "I am helpless. You have the force."

Just to let you know, 1600 people applied to be delegates for the 12 slots available for Colorado

were those the add ons for the state? they had more pledged? right?

Happy Birthday to floridababe

Happy Birthday to Tom McMahon

Happy Birthday to David A Stevenson's darling wife

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New thread.

but I think there exists a new thread

(link coming)

http://democracyforamerica.com/users/276143-kate-drazner/blog_posts/25342-hypocrisy-alert-bush-says-free-political-prisoners-in-cuba-not-guantanamo