Steve Klein Weekly Update

UPDATES ARCHIVE FOR FEBRUARY 2007

Kleiner's Korner For Week of February 26, 2007

"“An Inconvenient Truth,” the big-screen adaptation of former Vice President Al Gore’s slide-show lecture about the perils of global warming, won the Academy Award Sunday for documentary feature," quoting Reuters. link here

1. FOLLOW-UP: “THERE IS AN AREA IN YOUR BRAIN WHERE YOU HAVE ALWAYS BEEN…” “The recent news about smoking was sensational: Some people with damage to a prune-size slab of brain tissue called the insula were able to give up cigarettes instantly. Suppose scientists could figure out how to tweak the insula without damaging it. They might be able to create that famed and elusive free lunch — an effortless way to kick the cigarette habit. That dream, which may not be too far off, puts the insula in the spotlight. What is the insula and how could it possibly exert such profound effects on human behavior? According to neuroscientists who study it, the insula is a long-neglected brain region that has emerged as crucial to understanding what it feels like to be human...For example, the insula “lights up” in brain scans when people crave drugs, feel pain, anticipate pain, empathize with others, listen to jokes, see disgust on someone’s face, are shunned in a social settings, listen to music, decide not to buy an item, see someone cheat and decide to punish them, and determine degrees of preference while eating chocolate… The insula was long ignored for two reasons, researchers said. First, because it is folded and tucked deep within the brain, scientists could not probe it with shallow electrodes. It took the invention of brain imaging techniques, such as functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI, to watch it in action. Second, the insula was “assigned to the brain’s netherworld,” said John Allman, a neuroscientist at the California Institute of Technology. It was mistakenly defined as a primitive part of the brain involved only in functions like eating and sex…The frontal insula is where people sense love and hate, gratitude and resentment, self-confidence and embarrassment, trust and distrust, empathy and contempt, approval and disdain, pride and humiliation, truthfulness and deception, atonement and guilt,” quoting the New York Times. link here .

2. $25 MILLION CLIMATE PRIZE OFFERED BY BRANSON ”British tycoon Sir Richard Branson on Friday [Feb. 9] announced a $25 million prize for a way to extract a billion tons or more of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere each year. The Virgin Group chairman was joined by former Vice President Al Gore and other leading environmentalists as he announced the Virgin Earth Challenge prize. Branson compared it to the competition launched in 1675 to devise a method of estimating longitude accurately. It was 60 years before English clock maker John Harrison discovered an accurate method and received his prize from King George III,” quoting MSNBC. link here .

3. “INUIT ACCUSE U. S. OF DESTROYING THEIR WAY OF LIFE WITH GLOBAL WARMING” “A delegation of Inuit is to travel to Washington, DC, to provide first-hand testimony of how global warming is destroying their way of life and to accuse the Bush administration of undermining their human rights. The delegation, representing Inuit peoples from the US, Canada, Russia and Greenland, will argue that the US's energy policies and its position as the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases is having a devastating effect on their communities. Melting sea ice, rising seas and the impact on the animals they rely on for food threatens their existence. The Inuit's efforts to force the US to act are part of an unprecedented attempt to link climate change to international human rights laws. They will argue before the InterAmerican Commission on Human Rights (ICHR) that the US's behaviour puts it in breach of its obligations,” quoting the UK’s Independent. link here .

4. “ENGINEER: GPS SHOES MAKE PEOPLE FINDABLE” "Isaac Daniel calls the tiny Global Positioning System chip he's embedded into a line of sneakers "peace of mind." He wishes his 8-year-old son had been wearing them when he got a call from his school in 2002 saying the boy was missing. The worried father hopped a flight to Atlanta from New York, where he had been on business, to find the incident had been a miscommunication and his son was safe. Days later, the engineer started working on a prototype of Quantum Satellite Technology, a line of $325 to $350 adult sneakers that hit shelves next month. It promises to locate the wearer anywhere in the world with the press of a button. A children's line will be out this summer," quoting the AP.
link here .

5. FINALLY! A SCIENTIST GETS THE BIG-BUCKS OF A ROCK STAR “A professor who developed an inexpensive, easy-to-make system for filtering arsenic from well water has won a $1 million engineering prize — and he plans to use most of the money to distribute the filters to needy communities around the world. The National Academy of Engineering announced Thursday [Feb. 2] that the 2007 Grainger Challenge Prize for Sustainability would go to Abul Hussam, a chemistry professor at George Mason University in Fairfax. Hussam's invention is already in use today, preventing serious health problems in residents of the professor's native Bangladesh,” quoting the AP.
link here .

6. “…BRAIN SCAN THAT CAN READ PEOPLE’S INTENTIONS “A team of world-leading neuroscientists has developed a powerful technique that allows them to look deep inside a person's brain and read their intentions before they act. The research breaks controversial new ground in scientists' ability to probe people's minds and eavesdrop on their thoughts, and raises serious ethical issues over how brain-reading technology may be used in the future. The team used high-resolution brain scans to identify patterns of activity before translating them into meaningful thoughts, revealing what a person planned to do in the near future. It is the first time scientists have succeeded in reading intentions in this way,” quoting UK’s Guardian. link here .

7. RETHINKING CHOLESTEROL NUMBERS A study released Wednesday [Feb. 7] brings into sharper focus the healing power of "good" cholesterol. Researchers report that they have linked an increased level of good cholesterol, or HDL, with a reduction in the amount of plaque clogging up patients' arteries. The findings are likely to accelerate research into HDL, which until recently was largely overlooked in the push to develop drugs that can reduce the risk of heart attacks and strokes. Even now, the National Cholesterol Education Program guidelines that doctors rely on to reduce heart disease risk focus less on raising HDL than on the crucial need to reduce amounts of LDL, the so-called bad cholesterol. “We've always assumed, 'It's the LDL, stupid,'" says study co-author Steven Nissen of the Cleveland Clinic." But we've now learned that pushing up HDL confers a substantial proportion of the benefit." LDL is bad because it ferries fats into the blood, where it can build up within artery walls. HDL relieves artery inflammation and carries fats out of the bloodstream,” quoting USA Today. link here .

8. "...PORTABLE GENERATOR TURNS TRASH INTO ELECTRICITY” “A group of scientists have created a portable refinery that efficiently converts food, paper and plastic trash into electricity. The machine, designed for the U.S. military, would allow soldiers in the field to convert waste into power and could have widespread civilian applications in the future…The "tactical biorefinery" processes several kinds of waste at once, which it converts into fuel via two parallel processes. The system then burns the different fuels in a diesel engine to power a generator. Ladisch said the machine's ability to burn multiple fuels at once, along with its mobility, make it unique. Roughly the size a small moving van, the biorefinery could alleviate the expense and potential danger associated with transporting waste and fuel…The machine produces a very small amount of its own waste, Warner said, mostly in the form of ash that the Environmental Protection Agency has designated as "benign," or non-hazardous. Any leftover materials from the bioreactor are put into the gasifier, which has to be emptied every two to three days.” quoting Purdue University. link here .

9. “GAPPING REMINDERS OF AGING & CRUMBLING PIPES” “Local and state officials across the country say thousands of miles of century-old underground water and sewer lines are springing leaks, eroding and — in extreme cases — causing the ground above them to collapse. Though there is no master tally of sinkholes, there is consensus among civil engineers and water experts that things are getting worse. The Environmental Protection Agency has projected that unless cities invest more to repair and replace their water and sewer systems, nearly half of the water system pipes in the United States will be in poor, very poor or “life elapsed” status by 2020,” quoting the New York Times. link here .

10. “1867 NANOMACHINE NOW A REALITY” “Nearly 150 years ago it was no more than a concept by a visionary scientist, but researchers have now created a minuscule motor that could lead to the creation of microscopic nanomachines. Scottish physicist James Clerk Maxwell first imagined an atom-size device dubbed Maxwell's Demon in 1867. Scientists at the University of Edinburgh have made it a reality. ‘We have a new motor mechanism for a nanomachine,’ said David Leigh, a professor of chemistry at the University. A nanomachine is an incredibly tiny device whose parts consist of single molecules. Nature uses nanomachines for everything from photosynthesis to moving muscles in the body and transferring information through cells…One nanometer is a billionth of a meter, or about 80,000 times smaller than the thickness of a human hair…His mechanism traps molecular-sized particles as they move. As Maxwell had predicted long ago, it does not need energy because it is powered by light… “Things that seem like a Harry Potter film now are going to be a reality,” quoting Reuters. link here .

11. “YOUTH SUICIDES RISE AFTER DECADE OF DECLINE” “New government figures show a surprising increase in youth suicides after a decade of decline, and some mental health experts think a drop in use of antidepressant drugs may be to blame. The suicide rate climbed 18 percent from 2003 to 2004 for Americans under age 20, from 1,737 deaths to 1,985. Most suicides occurred in older teens, according to the data — the most current to date from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. By contrast, the suicide rate among 15- to 19-year-olds fell in previous years, from about 11 per 100,000 in 1990 to 7.3 per 100,000 in 2003. Suicides were the only cause of death that increased for children through age 19 from 2003-04, according to a CDC report released Monday [Feb. 6]. ‘This is very disturbing news,’ said Dr. David Fassler, a University of Vermont psychiatry professor. He noted that the increase coincided with regulatory action by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that led to a black box warning on prescription packages cautioning that antidepressants could cause suicidal behavior in children,” quoting the AP. [Ed. Note: Children killing children and taking their own lives reflects a massive breakdown in how all of us are reflecting to children in this society! VERY DISTURBING, INDEED]
link here .

12. ANOTHER INPACT OF TOO MUCH CELLPHONE USE This writer read this thoughtful story by New York Times writer Thomas Friedman in the Northwest Airlines World Traveler Magazine in the seat pocket in front of me with this insight: “Like most writers, Thomas Friedman draws, in part, from his own experience. Everything, be it a chance encounter with an interesting stranger or a round of golf in an exotic landscape, is grist for his mill - especially when he's traveling.
A sample from his work: "I arrived at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport the other night and was met by a driver sent by a French friend. The driver was carrying a sign with my name on it, but as I approached him I noticed that he was talking to himself, very animatedly. As I got closer, I realized he had one of those Bluetooth wireless phones clipped to his ear and was deep in conversation. I pointed at myself as the person he was supposed to meet. He nodded and went on talking to whomever was on the other end of his phone. ... I relate all this because it illustrates something I've been feeling more and more lately - that technology is dividing us as much as uniting us. Yes, technology can make the far feel near. But it can also make the near feel very far. For all I know, my driver was talking to his parents in Africa. How wonderful! But that meant the two of us wouldn't talk at all. And we were sitting two feet from each other."- "The Taxi Driver," The New York Times, Nov. 1, 2006
link here then click "Man in Motion" in the February, 2007 edition .

RAMTHA SCHOOL NEWS A. “How about those Orbs? How about that blue one that was right up here by my side at the chair? Well, no, it isn’t saliva and it isn’t dust. The camera is unbiased. You should listen to your channel’s teaching because she has lived with them and actually lived kind of a solitary life because she sees them and no one else does. She sort of has one life for seeing this and one life for living with people who don’t see that. You should trust her when she knows the difference. She can tell you if that is a dust particle or a fingerprint. What are these beings? Well, that is just what she said; they are beings. They are in a plasmic state outside of this body,” quoting Ramtha on the Prophet’s Conference newsletter in referring to JZ Knight’s upcoming talk in Sedona, AZ. on May 3rd. link here
B. “I am a Woman, I am a God (not for women only)” is the title of a new book by Louise Oliverio. Her book’s website: link here
You can get yours here: link here
Check out all of the Beginning Retreats scheduled in the USA this year including monthly in Yelm through the Summer, Miami, Phoenix, Los Angeles, Stamford, CT. serving the New York Metroplex, & Denver: link here .

LOCAL NOTES Yelm Community Blog host away last week. See archived stories at: link here .

QUOTE OF THE WEEK "It’s curious that no allegedly Christian nation has adopted The Golden Rule as a basis for foreign policy." Carl Sagan (1934-1996) American astronomer and astrobiologist .

Kleiner’s Korner is copyrighted by Stephen R. Klein, 2007. For archived issues of Kleiner’s Korner, click on "Current Kleiner’s Korner and Archives" at link here Send comments to steve@kleinerskorner.com .

Kleiner's Korner For Week of February 19, 2007

Remembering a great American, President George Washington on the 275 anniversary off his birth: February 22, 1732. link here

1. WASHINGTON STATE GOVERNOR JOINS CALL FOR CUTTING STATE GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS "Gov. Chris Gregoire issued an executive order Wednesday [Feb. 7] that sets clear goals for sharply cutting the state's production of greenhouse gases and lowering its fuel imports by 2020. Environmentalists hailed the move as a big step toward recognizing the effects of global warming, which Gregoire linked to several trends: a 35 percent reduction in snowpack in the Cascades, loss of up to one-third of glacier sizes in the North Cascades, several catastrophic storms in the past year and future flooding if sea levels rise," quoting The Olympian. [Ed. Note: Hopefully, this will mute the building of NASCAR track in Washington State since they use leaded fuel.] link here .

2."SWEDEN KICKS OFF...CELEBRATIONS FOR FAMED SCIENTIST LINNAEAUS" "...But Carl Linnaeus' real claim to fame is his system of classifying all living organisms that remains the international standard. Sweden on Saturday [Jan. 27] kicked off year-long celebrations marking the 300th anniversary of the birth of its most famous scientist. "He has meant an incredible amount to the world because by systematizing just about every plant and animal, he helped organize it," said Kajsa Eriksson, spokeswoman for the Linnaeus 2007 celebration. Often called the father of taxonomy, Linnaeus was one of the most significant scientists of his time. He laid the foundation for a new classification of plants and animals based on their eproductive systems. It is thanks to him that humans are called Homo sapiens in the world of science and are classified as primates in the class of mammals, Mammalia. By the time he was 30, he had written a number of the works that made him famous in the world of science, including Systema Naturae, which classified 4,400 species of animals and 7,700 species of plants when it reached its 10th edition in 1758. His ideas have influenced generations of scientists, including Charles Darwin, and even those opposed to the philosophical and theological roots of his work," quoting USA Today.
link here .

3. "CATTLE BRANDING COMES TO 21ST CENTURY" [ARE YOU NEXT?] "Somark Innovations, a small company working out of Saint Louis, has successfully tested an RFID tattoo, on cows, mice and rats: enabling an identifying number embedded under the skin to be read from over a meter away...Somark are in the process of raising money to exploit the technology, and point out that what works for animals can, of course, also work for people; identifying Military Personnel as one of their secondary markets, after cattle and other livestock," quoting The Register. [Ed. Note: Of course the military are always the human test mice, since they signed their body's owership away to the government.] link here

From their website, "Somark is a technology company that is developing a proprietary ID system based on a biocompatible ink tattoo with chipless RFID functionality. When applied, the ink creates a unique ID that can be detected without line of sight. The technology will be initially leveraged to the livestock industry to help identify/track cattle and thus mitigate export trade loss from BSE (a.k.a. Mad Cow Disease) scares. Secondary target markets include laboratory animals, companion pets, and potentially prime cuts of meat." link here .

4. DNA TESTING FREES MANY INNOCENT VICTIMS IN USA PRISONS "A 50-year-old Dallas man whose conviction of raping a boy in 1982 cost him nearly half his life in prison and on parole won a court ruling Wednesday [Jan. 17] declaring him innocent. He said he was not angry, “because the Lord has given me so much.”... The parolee, James Waller, was exonerated by DNA testing, the 12th person since 2001 whose conviction in Dallas County has been overturned long after the fact as a result of genetic evidence, lawyers said. “Nowhere else in the nation have so many individual wrongful convictions been proven in one county in such a short span,” said Barry C. Scheck, co-founder of the Innocence Project, the legal clinic that championed Mr. Waller’s case. In fact, Mr. Scheck said, those 12 such instances are more than have occurred anywhere else except the entire states of New York and Illinois since the nation’s first DNA exoneration, in 1989," quoting the New York Times.
link here
According to the Innocence Project, 192 people in 32 states - including 21 in New York - have been exonerated through DNA testing. In more than one-third of the DNA exonerations nationwide, DNA also helped identify the true perpetrator. link here "Fifteen years to the day after he was convicted of a brutal murder that DNA tests prove he did not commit, Roy Brown is set to be released from prison after a hearing in state court today, the Innocence Project said. On January 23, 1992, Brown was convicted of a murder the previous year and sentenced to 25 years in prison, where he has remained ever since. DNA test results confirm that Brown is innocent - and that, instead, the murder was likely committed by a man who killed himself three years ago after Brown wrote to him to say he had uncovered evidence that he was the actual perpetrator... link here "The Innocence Project at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University, founded by Barry C. Scheck and Peter J. Neufeld in 1992, is a non-profit legal clinic and criminal justice resource center. We work to exonerate the wrongfully convicted through postconviction DNA testing; and develop and implement reforms to prevent wrongful convictions. This Project only handles cases where postconviction DNA testing can yield conclusive proof of innocence," quoting their website." link here .

5. "COPPER MAY BE TIED TO POSTPARTUM DEPRESSION" "Women with a history of postpartum depression tend to have unusually high levels of copper in their blood, a new study has found — suggesting the mineral may play some role in the disorder. While many women go through a short spell of the “baby blues” after giving birth, about 15 percent suffer full-blown postpartum depression. It’s not clear why some women are more vulnerable than others. The new findings suggest that the body’s regulation of copper levels may be involved, researchers report in the Journal of Trace Elements in Medicine and Biology," quoting Reuters.
link here Abstract form the Journal of Trace Elements in Medicine and Biology report:
link here .

6. “MENTAL ABILITIES: FOLIC ACID MAY IMPROVE THINKING SKILLS” “Folic acid dietary supplements significantly improve thinking skills that tend to decline with normal aging, a Dutch study has found… By law, flour in the United States is fortified with folic acid to help prevent neural tube defects in newborns. ‘This is only the first study that shows this effect,’ Dr. Durga said. ‘There need to be studies that look at lower doses or increasing natural folates, which may lead to similar or even greater effects.’ At the time of the study, published on Jan. 20 in The Lancet, Dr. Durga was a nutritional epidemiologist at Wageningen University in the Netherlands,” quoting the New York Times. link here .

7. “FLU PANDEMIC WARNINGS RATED LIKE HURRICANE ALERTS” “A global outbreak of deadly influenza could set the stage for school closings of up to three months and cancellation of public gatherings such as sporting events and the opera, under a new federal ranking system that borrows from hurricane forecasting to gauge the severity of a flu pandemic. The 1918 Spanish Flu, which killed half a million people in the United States alone, would be called a Category 5 pandemic under the system described Thursday for the first time by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. If such a monster were to reappear, the new CDC plan calls for extreme measures to reduce the spread of the virus, such as lengthy school closures, cancellation of public events, and urging workers to stay home or telecommute. ..The hurricane-style ranking system was chosen deliberately by pandemic preparedness planners at the CDC to help the public and local communities judge for themselves how to react to news of a global outbreak,” quoting the San Francisco Chronicle. link here .

8. VIEW TORNADO GRAPHIC On of the best tornado graphics & torsion field creation this writer has seen from USA Today.
link here .

9. “THE DANGERS OF GENETICALLY MODIFIED YEAST WINE” “Despite the Wine Institute’s recent statement that no genetically modified organisms (GMOs) should be used in winemaking, the Sacramento Bee recently reported that, according to American Tartaric Products, the first wines made with a genetically modified wine yeast, ML01, will be released this year. This yeast is available only in North America where GMOs are unregulated. It was modified by inserting two foreign genes, one from the pombe yeast, a yeast found in Africa and used to make beer, and one from the bacteria O. oeni, so that the alcoholic and malolactic fermentations, normally a two-step process, occur at the same time. While this may be a convenience to winemakers, especially those producing large quantities of wine, I am concerned for both consumers and our local economy… If you have a local wine that you love, contact the winery, and ask if they use GM wine yeast!” quoting the Napa [CA.] Register. [Ed. Note: This writer’s favorite Silver Oak Cellars is on the current (January 2007) list of Non-GMO wine. See the "Non-GMO list" at the bottom of this story.] link here .

10. DON’T LIKE RED WINE? - GET SIMILAR BENEFITS DRINKING GRAPE JUICE “Grape juice seems to have the same protective effect against heart disease as red wine, French scientists said on Wednesday [Jan. 31]. Researchers at the Universite Louis Pasteur de Strasbourg were examining the effect on the heart of Concord grape juice. ‘Grape juice can have a similar effect (against heart disease) as red wine but without the alcohol. That is a very important message,’ said Dr Valerie Schini-Kerth, lead author of the study published in the journal Cardiovascular Research. Red wine and certain types of grape juice have high levels of polyphenols, which block the production of a protein linked to cardiovascular disease -- the number one killer in many Western countries. Heart and vascular problems develop when endothelial cells that make up blood vessels do not work properly,” quoting Reuters. link here .

11. “ART SLEUTH LOOKS FOR LOST DA VINCI MASTERPIECE” "After 32 years on the trail of Leonardo da Vinci's lost masterpiece "The Battle of Anghiari," Maurizio Seracini thinks he is on the verge of solving one of the art world's greatest mysteries. The Italian engineer and art expert reckons he knows where the fresco, which disappeared nearly five centuries ago, might be hidden -- behind a wall right where it was painted, in Florence's Renaissance town hall. Now that the Italian government has given him the go-ahead to complete his investigation, Seracini says he is just a few months away from finding out once and for all. If he is right, there is no overestimating the importance such a discovery would have," quoting Reuters. link here .

12. YELM WAL-MART CONSTRUCTION WORKER REPORTS SEEING UFO Just published on the Earthfiles website is this story: "...My name is -- and on 1-22-07, I had an experience that I can't quite believe myself yet. It was about 2:45 PM in the afternoon. I was on the roof of a construction site in a town known as Yelm in Washington state, about a 30 Min. drive east of Tacoma.
While I was on this roof of a Walmart, inspecting a roof, I caught something in the sky out of the corner of my eye. We are about 15 min south of McChord AFB. So I thought nothing of it and went on with my work. This was a little strange though because I realized that there wasn't an engine or any noise coming from what I had caught. I looked back up to see what it was, and that was when I caught the image of a craft, wasn't really a saucer, but was round. Almost spherical. That was when it passed through a cloud and stopped just as it penetrated the side facing south...It was a silverish color, almost the color of non-polished aluminum. This craft stayed in this cloud for about 10 min, and then promptly pulled back into the cloud. Directly after the craft pulled into the cloud, was when I noticed what looked like a tunnel forming in the cloud. The tunnel then just disappeared and the cloud returned to its normal wind drift." scroll to #10 for the full account:
link here .

RAMTHA STUDENT NEWS A. “Now, last, how about those Orbs? How about that blue one that was right up here by my side by the chair? Hello. Well, no, it isn’t saliva and it isn’t dust. The camera is unbiased. You should listen to your channel’s teaching, because she has lived with them and actually lived kind of a solitary life because she sees them and no one else does. She sort of has one life for seeing this and one life for living with people who don’t see that. You should trust her when she knows the difference. She can tell you if that is a dust particle or a fingerprint. What are these beings? Well, that is just what she said; they are beings. They are in a plasmic state outside of this body,” quoting Ramtha on the Prophet’s Conference newsletter in reference to JZ Knight’s upcoming talk in Sedona, AZ. on May 3rd. link here
B. The February RSE Newsletter is out with "More Ramtha Teachings and Predictions in the News and in Scientific Discoveries, JZ Knight's Speaking Engagements, RSE Student Authors in the Quantum Cafe, and more," quoting the RSE Feb. Newsletter. link here .

LOCAL NOTES A. Local resident ponders definition of "Community" (Feb. 12) B. NVN: Cronyism in city gov't OK, as along as it's not blatant cronyism" (Feb. 13) C. NVN: You vote in public survey - Is City on right track with growth (Feb. 13) D. Yelm has three new authors (Feb. 14) E. Yelm Wal-Mart construction worker rpeorts seeing UFO (Feb. 15) F. Yelm Acupuncture Clinic offers community acupuncture (Feb. 16) See the full stories covered last week on the Yelm Community Blog and where YOUR comments are always welcome! link here .

QUOTE OF THE WEEK “To withdraw is not to run away, and to stay is no wise action, when there’s more reason to fear than to hope.” Miguel De Cervantes (1547–1616) Spanish novelist. Sancho Panza, in Don Quixote, pt. 1, bk. 3, ch. 9, trans. by P. Motteux (1605)..

Kleiner’s Korner is copyrighted by Stephen R. Klein, 2007. For archived issues of Kleiner’s Korner, click on "Current Kleiner’s Korner and Archives" at link here Send comments to steve@kleinerskorner.com .

Kleiner's Korner For Week of February 12, 2007

Remembering a great American President on the 198 anniversary of his birth: Abraham Lincoln: link here

HAPPY VALENTINES DAY, you Cupid. The holiday is named after two men, both Christian martyrs named Valentine. The day became associated with romantic love in the High Middle Ages, when the tradition of courtly love flourished. link here

1. FOLLOW-UP: UNDERMINING IN FULL SWING TO INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE (IPCC) REPORT “Scientists and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world's largest oil companies to undermine a major climate change report due to be published today [Feb. 2]. Letters sent by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), an ExxonMobil-funded think tank with close links to the Bush administration, offered the payments for articles that emphasise the shortcomings of a report from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)… The AEI has received more than $1.6m from ExxonMobil and more than 20 of its staff have worked as consultants to the Bush administration. Lee Raymond, a former head of ExxonMobil, is the vice-chairman of AEI's board of trustees, quoting UK’s Guardian. link here .

2. ADDITIONAL EXXON NEWS OUT LAST WEEK “Lingering crude from the nation's largest oil spill has weathered only slightly in some places almost 18 years after the tanker Exxon Valdez ran aground and fouled hundreds of miles of Alaska shoreline, a new federal study released Wednesday concludes. The estimated 85 tons - or more than 26,600 gallons - of oil remaining at Prince William Sound is declining about 4 percent a year and likely even slower in the Gulf of Alaska, according to research chemist Jeffrey Short of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. At that rate of decline, oil could persist for decades below the surface of some beaches, Short and colleagues said in their report. The study is to be published in the Feb. 15 edition of Environmental Science & Technology, the journal of the American Chemical Society. ‘Such persistence can pose a contact hazard to intertidally foraging sea otters, sea ducks, and shorebirds, create a chronic source of low-level contamination, discourage subsistence in a region where use is heavy, and degrade the wilderness character of protected lands,’ researchers wrote in their conclusion. Te study was partially funded by the Prince William Sound Regional Citizens' Advisory Council, which was formed by federal mandate after the Exxon Valdez spill to monitor industry operations. Researchers, however, said their findings and conclusions were not influenced by that sponsorship,” quoting the AP. link here .

3. “WHITE HOUSE REJECTS MANDATORY CO2 CAPS” “Despite a strongly worded global warming report from the world's top climate scientists, the Bush administration expressed continued opposition Friday to mandatory reductions in heat-trapping "greenhouse" gases. Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman warned against "unintended consequences" - including job losses - that he said might result if the government requires economy-wide caps on carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels. ‘There is a concern within this administration, which I support, that the imposition of a carbon cap in this country would - may - lead to the transfer of jobs and industry abroad (to nations) that do not have such a carbon cap,’ Bodman said. ‘You would then have the U.S. economy damaged, on the one hand, and the same emissions, potentially even worse emissions.’ President Bush used the same economic reasoning when he rejected the Kyoto Protocol in 2001, an international treaty requiring 35 industrial nations to cut their global-warming gases by 5 percent on average below 1990 levels by 2012. The White House has said the treaty would have cost 5 million U.S. jobs,” quoting the AP. [Ed. Note: Job losses and creation of new jobs – or planet sustainability loss? You decide!] link here .

4. “B.C. PUT ON ALERT FOR HUGE QUAKE” “Scientists have alerted British Columbia's emergency-planning department to the possibility of a catastrophic earthquake striking the province's southwest coast next week. While the probability of a quake is still low, rapid strides in earthquake detection have given federal scientists with the Pacific Geoscience Centre on Vancouver Island greater confidence in their ability to predict when and where one will occur. Garry Rogers, a seismologist at the centre, compared the current earthquake odds to the dangers of driving a car… What prompted the alert was a series of imperceptible tremors emanating from deep beneath the ocean, which scientists now recognize as ominous warnings that the earth is on the move again off Vancouver Island. The tremors occurred on what is known as the Cascadia subduction zone, which lies beneath the Pacific Ocean off the West Coast and runs from Vancouver Island to Northern California. The rumblings began last week near Puget Sound near Seattle and made their way north to Vancouver Island in recent days. The tremors — known in earthquake-speak as an episodic tremor and slip — monitor the ongoing strain between the solid earth on the West Coast and the offshore Juan de Fuca Plate. The two plates are rubbing against one another, with the offshore plate continually pushing against and under the North American Plate. The recent tremors mean that even more stress is building between the two, which scientists believe will one day rupture into a major earthquake the size of the one off the coast of Indonesia on Dec. 26, 2004, which killed thousands,” quoting Canada’s Globe & Mail of February 3.
link here .

5. QUANTUM COMPUTER TO DEBUT THIS TUESDAY "Propellerheads at D-Wave are saying they've developed the world's first quantum computer, and the wild thing is they say they're going to show it actually working next Tuesday. Hey, wait a minute. This first foray into the strange-but-maybe-true world of quantum mechanics wasn't expected by scientists until 20 years from now. It will allegedly take the computing world quantum leaps ahead, allowing a computer to perform 64,000 calculations at the same time. As skeptical scientists the world over scratch their heads (and some roll their eyes), the British Columbian D-Wave vows to prove naysayers wrong at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California next week, firing up this box that's somehow able to contain multiple quantum states that exist at the same time. Huh? For example, each bit in this machine can be both a zero and a one simultaneously. It's making our heads hurt just thinking about it," quoting gizmodo.com.
link here And this from Tech World: link here .

6. “ALL SCHOOLS IN ENGLAND TO SEE AL GORE CLIMATE FILM” ”The government will distribute Al Gore's dramatic global warming film to all secondary schools in England in its fight to tackle the climate crisis, Environment Minister David Miliband said on Friday [Feb. 2]. The announcement came as a panel of the world's top scientists issued a new report blaming mankind for the crisis and predicting that average temperatures would rise by between 1.8 and 4.0 degrees Celsius this century as a result. ‘The debate over the science of climate change is well and truly over, as demonstrated by the publication of today's report,’ Miliband said ... An Inconvenient Truth", a film of the former U.S. Vice President's lecture tour illustrating the dramatic change to the environment due to human activities, has already been a box office hit. The film will be part of a global warming information pack distributed to schools as the government strongly pushes the message that everyone has a role to play. Gore, a dedicated climate crusader, has begun a programme of training what he calls climate ambassadors to travel the world,” quoting Reuters. [Ed. Note: The film is still banned in Federal Way, WA. schools. link here ] link here .

7. “RENEWABLES CAN TURN THE TIDE ON GLOBAL WARMING” “On Thursday [Feb 1], the American Solar Energy Association (ASES), with the backing of several US representatives and a senator, released its new nuts and bolts approach to reducing carbon emissions with a combination of renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies. The report comes at an opportune time: the release of the IPCC's latest climate change report is expected to finally clear up any lingering uncertainty about the role fossil fuel burning and other human activities have in changing the Earth's climate. As the deniers and obstructionists lose all credibility, the debate now turns to solutions. The ASES report, titled "Tackling Climate Change in the US - Potential Carbon Emissions Reductions From Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy by 2030," makes this extraordinary claim: ‘Energy efficiency and renewable energy technologies have the potential to provide most, if not all, of the US carbon emissions reductions that will be needed to help limit the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide to 450 to 500 ppm.’ The ASES report was presented at a press briefing in the Capitol with the support of Senator Jeff Bingaman, Chair of the Senate Energy and Resources Committee, Representative Henry Waxman, Representative Chris Shays, Sierra Club president Carl Pope, and NASA's chief climate change scientist, Dr. James Hanson,” quoting Truthout. link here .

8. FOLLOW-UP: CHICAGO O’HARE AIRPORT UFO PICTURE NOW POSTED Always trust your own knowingness!
This writer heard on KIRO 710 radio in Seattle that a photo had been placed on this site of the Chicago O’Hare UFO story covered here in the January 8, 2007. Here is the site that was mentioned listing the photo, scroll down: link here
“According to the former Saturday Night Live star, Dan Aykroyd and his group of filmmakers have come into possession of exclusive O'Hare Airport UFO photographs and video footage,” quoting Alien Video [Ed. Note: Scroll down to see more O’Hare still photos. And, a pilot speaks out!] link here .

9. “TEXAS IS FIRST TO REQUIRE CANCER SHOTS FOR SCHOOL GIRLS” “Texas on Friday [Feb. 2] became the first state to require all 11- and 12-year-old girls entering the sixth grade to be vaccinated against a sexually transmitted virus that causes cervical cancer. Averting a potentially divisive debate in the Legislature, Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican signed an executive order mandating shots of the Merck vaccine Gardasil as protection against the human papilliomavirus, or HPV, starting in September 2008…Texas has the second-highest number of women with cervical cancer, with nearly 400 deaths last year, the governor’s statement noted. The vaccine, approved for ages 9 to 26, is given in three shots over eight months…Some parents have voiced concern that the plan could send a message that sexual activity was condoned or that vaccinations made it safe. On the whole, however, conservative and religious groups have not come out strongly against the vaccinations as long as families can opt out,” quoting the New York Times. [Ed. Note: This was an Executive Order that "sidestepped" the state legislature. What will be the effects of this vaccine on Texas femaile youth? Stay tuned!] link here

"A media hoax has fooled parents in Texas and other areas of the country that the HPV vaccine, which experts have slammed as untested and has already been linked to dangerous side-effects, is now the law and young girls must take it. Merck Pharmaceuticals are set to capitalize on this fraud by making obscene profits from a crony deal with Governor Rick Perry, while children are put at risk," quoting PrisonPlanet. link here
Washington State Gov. Gregoire is not planning on doing this here, in this now.
link here .

10. ARE YOU THE PARENT OF CHILDREN? LIMIT OR RESTRICT THEIR CELL PHONE USE “The association is pretty convincing according to author and researcher George Carlo. In his book Cell Phones (Carroll and Graf Publishers, 2001), he documents his research for the wireless industry, the research that finally got him fired. Although industry spokesmen deny that electromagnetic radiation from cell phone antennas has any adverse effects, these same companies have registered 25 patents for devices that shield antennas. Carlo's advice is to use a headset or a phone with a speaker and keep the antenna away from your body. Never allow children to use cell phones. Their developing brains are more susceptible to chromosomal damage, and radiation from the phones is absorbed into the brain at a much higher rate than in adults,” quoting the Holistic Pediatric Assn. link here
"Cell Phones: Invisible Hazards in the Wireless Age," by Dr. George Carlo and Martin Schram, is the most complete compilation of research cell phone health effects. link here .

11. “MAINE LAWMAKERS REJECT NATIONAL IDENTIFICATION” “Maine on Thursday [Feb. 1] became the first state to officially decline to comply with the Real ID Act of 2005, the federal law that critics say lays the foundation for creation of a national identity card. Both houses of the state Legislature — voting unanimously in the Senate and 137 to 4 in the House — approved a resolution rejecting compliance with the act, which requires states to replace their driver's licenses by May 2008 with forgery-proof scannable cards embedded with private information. The resolution also urges Congress to repeal the ID act,” quoting the LA Times. link here
WASHINGTON STATE TO JOIN REVOLT "A revolt against a national driver's license, begun in Maine last month, is quickly spreading to other states...Within a week of Maine's action, lawmakers in Georgia, Wyoming, Montana, New Mexico, Vermont, and Washington state also balked at Real ID. They are expected soon to pass laws or adopt resolutions declining to participate in the federal identification network," quoting the AP. link here .

12. AMERICAN’S SAVINGS RATE LOWEST SINCE DEPRESSION; SPENDING EVERYTHING THEY MADE & THEN SOME! “Americans once again spent everything they made and then some last year, pushing the personal savings rate to the lowest level since the Great Depression. The Commerce Department reported Thursday that the savings rate for all of 2006 was a negative 1 percent, meaning that not only did people spend all the money they earned, but they also dipped into savings or increased borrowing to finance purchases. The 2006 figure was lower than a negative 0.4 percent in 2005, and was the poorest showing since a negative 1.5 percent savings rate in 1933 during the Depression... The savings rate has been negative for an entire year only four times in history -- in 2005 and 2006 and in 1933 and 1932. However, the reasons for the decline in the savings rate were vastly different during the two periods. During the Great Depression, when one-fourth of the labor force was without a job, people dipped into savings in an effort to meet the basic necessities of shelter and clothing. Economists have put forward various reasons to explain the current lack of savings. These range from a feeling on the part of some people that they do not need to save because of the run-up in their investments such as homes and stock portfolios to an effort by many middle-class wage earners to maintain their current lifestyles even though their wage gains have been depressed by the effects of global competition. Whatever the reason for the low savings, economists warn that the phenomenon exists at a particularly bad time with 78 million baby boomers approaching retirement age. Instead of building up savings to use during retirement, baby boomers are continuing to spend all their earnings,” quoting the AP. link here .

RAMTHA STUDENT NEWS A. Beginning February 14, Bettye Johnson is launching her very own talk show on BlogTalkRadio.com, called "Bettye's Bag of Pearls." The subject of her first show is "Love: Splintered or Splendid." The time will be 4:30 P.M. PST - Wednesday, February 14 and the show will be ARCHIVED. This means that if you don't want to ask questions and unable to tune in at this time, you can always download later. Bettye is the author of the award-winning " Secrets of the Magdalene Scrolls." Her sequel is underway titled "The Legacy of Mary Magdalene." Bettye's site is here: link here

B. “I am a Woman, I am a God (not for women only)” is the title of a new book by Louise Oliverio. Her book’s website: link here You can get yours here: link here

C. "William Arntz, the director and producer of "What the bleep?", will be honored for his achievements at the Heal Breast Cancer Gala Feb. 22, 2007 in Beverly Hills with the Excellence in Arts & Awareness Award. Other trailblazing honorees in the field of complementary and alternative medicine include Eckhart Tolle, Dr. Dean Ornish, Dr. Christiane Northrup, Susan Ryan Jordon. Learn more about honorees and celebrity supporters at: link here Subscribers to the BLEEPing Herald will receive tickets for the Heal Breast Cancer Awards & Gala for only $ 195 (regular $ 500) including a gift bag with many enlightening and health oriented products. If you want to join William Arntz at the gala and meet other honorees and members of the benefit committee, then call 310 216 7895 or go directly to link here . The ticket includes the cocktail reception at 6 pm, a sit-down dinner at 7.30 pm , the awards ceremony and high-class entertainment," quoting What the Bleep's Newsletter. link here .

LOCAL NOTES A. Thoughts on a Sunday morning (Feb. 5) B. Rep. Tom Campbell's new bill (Feb. 6) C. Guest Entry: Response to Dept. of Ecology Meeting on Olympia (Feb. 7) D. 'Big Brother' arrives in Yelm with surveillance cameras (Feb. 8) E. Rep. Cambell's Bill passes (Feb 9) F. Yelm Food Co-op Meeting this Sunday + indy film in Yelm: "Raising Flagg" (Feb. 10) G. Guest Entry: NASCAR Track bill making round in Olympia (Feb. 11) See all on the Yelm Community Blog and where YOUR comments are welcome!
link here .

QUOTE OF THE WEEK What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us. Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American philosopher & poet .

Kleiner’s Korner is copyrighted by Stephen R. Klein, 2007. For archived issues of Kleiner’s Korner, click on "Current Kleiner’s Korner and Archives" at link here Send comments to steve@kleinerskorner.com .

Kleiner's Korner For Week of February 5, 2007

The truth now IS revealed:
"The Bush administration was yesterday [Jan. 30] accused of systemic tampering with the work of government climate scientists to eliminate politically inconvenient material about global warming. At a hearing of Congress, scientists and advocacy groups described a campaign by the White House to remove references to global warming from scientific reports and limit public mention of the topic to avoid pressure on an administration opposed to mandatory controls on greenhouse gas emissions. Such pressure extended even to the use of the words "global warming" or "climate change", said a report released yesterday by the Union of Concerned Scientists and the Government Accountability Project. The report said nearly half of climate scientists at government agencies had been advised against using those terms," quoting UK's Guardian. link here
The Government Accountability Project site: link here then scroll to 1/30/07
The Union of Concerned Scientists weigh in on the Bush Administration meddling: link here
And, scientist James Hansen is proved correct! For those of you that missed his interview, "As a government scientist, James Hansen is taking a risk. He says there are things the White House doesn't want you to hear but he's going to say them anyway. Hansen is arguably the world's leading researcher on global warming. He's the head of NASA's top institute studying the climate. But as correspondent Scott Pelley first reported last spring, this imminent scientist says that the Bush administration is restricting who he can talk to and editing what he can say. Politicians, he says, are rewriting the science. But he didn't hold back speaking to Pelley, telling 60 Minutes what he knows," quoting CBS News in this March 19, 2006 broadcast. link here
"In a bleak and powerful assessment of the future of the planet, the leading international network of climate change scientists has concluded for the first time that global warming is "unequivocal" and that human activity is the main driver, "very likely" causing most of the rise in temperatures since 1950... The report summarized the fourth assessment since 1990 by the group, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change of the United Nations, sizing up the causes and consequences of climate change. But it is the first in which the group asserts with near certainty — more than 90 percent confidence — that carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping greenhouse gases from human activities have been the main causes of warming since 1950," quoting the New York Times. link here
"Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore has been nominated for the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his wide-reaching efforts to draw the world's attention to the dangers of global warming, a Norwegian lawmaker said Thursday [Feb. 2]. Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore has been nominated for the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his wide-reaching efforts to draw the world's attention to the dangers of global warming, a Norwegian lawmaker said Thursday. 'A prerequisite for winning the Nobel Peace Prize is making a difference, and Al Gore has made a difference,' Conservative Member of Parliament Boerge Brende, a former minister of environment and then of trade, told The Associated Press," quoting the AP. link here

1. THIS IS A SAVANT STORY YOU JUST GOTTA SEE! "Morley Safer met another savant, Daniel Tammet, who is called "Brain Man" in Britain. But unlike most savants, he has no obvious mental disability, and most important to scientists, he can describe his own thought process. He may very well be a scientific Rosetta stone, a key to understanding the brain," quoting CBS News 60 Minutes. link here
Here is the information on the video from the “Brainman” documentary: link here
You can order a personalized and autographed copy of Daniel's book: “Born on a Blue Day” link here .

2. “HUBBLE’S MAIN CAMERA BADLY CRIPPLED” “The Hubble Space Telescope’s primary camera is offline, with some science capabilities likely lost for good, NASA officials said Monday [Jan. 29]. An electrical short in the backup system for Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys, or ACS, pushed the orbiting telescope into a protective “safe mode” over the weekend and prompted the formation of an Anomaly Investigation Board on Monday, NASA officials said,” quoting Space.com. link here Information on Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys, or ACS. link here .

3. “AGING WEATHER SATELLITES THREATEN FUTURE OF FORECAST" “Scientists soon will lose access to crucial information that helps them better understand and predict everything from hurricanes and earthquakes to global warming and environmental decay, according to a candid and sobering report by prestigious experts. ‘It's a train wreck,’ said Otis Brown, dean of the University of Miami's Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science and a member of the National Academy of Science's panel that issued the report earlier this month. ‘When you hope for the best, this is about the worst you could imagine in terms of things going awry,’ he said. Among the reasons for this reversal of scientific fortunes: sharp budget cuts, ill-advised technological compromises, and a botched partnership between the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, according to the report. And the setbacks come at an inopportune time,” quoting The Olympian. [Ed. Note: This writer graduated with a BBA & MBA from the University of Miami, FL.] link here .

4. "MANY SCIENTISTS THINK GERMS COMMUNICATE" "Do germs communicate? Many scientists think so and are betting the chatter may hold the key to developing the next generation of drugs to fight killer superbugs. The conventional wisdom has long been that the carpet-bombing approach is the best way to fight infection. But as evidence of bacterial bonding has mounted in the past decade, researchers are now focusing on antibiotics that will break down the lines of communication. In the last 20 years, the number of scientists working in this field has jumped from a few solitary researchers to thousands. In Britain, the strategy is one of the top research priorities of a newly formed center dedicated to stopping superbugs," quoting the AP.
link here .

5. “PHARMACEUTICAL TELEVISION ADVERTISING IS A GRAND HOAX” “Television drug ads engage in such blatant deceptions and exaggerations that even the medical journals are starting to condemn the practice. This week, the Annals of Family Medicine published an analysis of popular drug advertisements that concluded the ads essentially lie to the public about the benefits of pharmaceuticals while utterly ignoring alternative health strategies like dietary or lifestyle changes. The advertising practices of drug companies are so outrageous that even David Kessler, the former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, penned an editorial condemning them. In fact, Kessler says television ads never should have been allowed by the FDA in the first place (the FDA legalized drug ads in late 1997, after Kessler left his position there). Today, the United States is the only industrialized nation in the world to allow drug ads on television,” quoting News Target. link here
The Annals of Family Medicine stories in the Jan/Feb., 2007 Issue:
link here .

6. “WORLD IS RUNNING OUT OF WATER, SAYS UN ADVISER” “The world is running out of water and needs a radical plan to tackle shortages that threaten the ability of humanity to feed itself, according to Jeffrey Sachs, director of the UN's Millennium Project. Professor Sachs, who is credited with sparking pop star Bono's crusade for African development, told an environment conference in Delhi that the world simply had "no more rivers to take water from". The breadbaskets of India and China were facing severe water shortages and neither Asian giant could use the same strategies for increasing food production that has fed millions in the last few decades,” quoting IK’s Guardian. link here .

7. “DROUGHT-HIT QUEENSLANDERS TO DRINK RECYCLED SEWAGE” “Residents in tropical Queensland state will soon be forced to drink recycled sewage to help Australia cope with its worst drought for a century. Australia's third most populous state, which attracts vast numbers of tourists drawn to its tropical weather, will be the first to introduce the measures and the rest of the nation could reasonably be expected to follow, according to John Howard, the Prime Minister. Mr Howard said that drinking the purified water was the way forward, and praised Peter Beattie, the Queensland Premier, who has said that residents in the state's southeast would be drinking recycled water as early as next year…. Residents in tropical Queensland state will soon be forced to drink recycled sewage to help Australia cope with its worst drought for a century… The waste is typically recycled using a combination of reverse osmosis and disinfection with ultraviolet radiation. Through the reverse osmosis process, water is forced through very fine membranes that filter out salts and other matter but let water molecules pass through… Sydney's catchment levels are just over 30 per cent full, compared with the Queensland level of 23 per cent,” quoting the UK Times online. link here .

8. “WISCONSIN LOSES ALMOST 5% OF CROPLAND” “Wisconsin's cropland is shrinking faster than any other state in the region, a loss that could affect the state's economy. The loss could jeopardize Wisconsin's ability to profit in the growing biofuels industry, which uses plants like corn to make fuels such as ethanol, said state Agriculture Secretary Rodney Nilsestuen…Wisconsin lost almost 5 percent of its cropland from 2000 to 2005, according to a recent study by the nonprofit Corporation for Enterprise Development. That's equivalent to 30,000 acres of cropland a year, or nearly two townships, Nilsestuen said. Seven other states, none of them in the Midwest, lost a larger percentage of their cropland during the five-year span, the group said. Those states were: California, Georgia, Vermont, Nevada, Massachusetts, Hawaii and Delaware” quoting the AP. [Ed. Note: Yelm, WA. is fast losing its undeveloped land to city approved developments, as well, with little foresight given to the future of this small-town environment!] link here .

9. KK STORY FOLLOW-UP: “LEBANON COAST ESCAPES OIL SPILL DAMAGE” “When Israeli bombs hit the Jiyyeh power plant in Lebanon last July, 15,000 tonnes of fuel oil spilled into the sea — yet another bit of bad news in the war between the two countries. But a 23 January report suggests that the marine environment has been spared long-term damage. Oil pollution from the plant has been largely contained, experts say, even though the month-long war initially hampered clean-up efforts. Environmental problems remain, though, including damage to factories, industrial sites, agricultural land and infrastructure that continues to pose a threat to public health. Leaked chemicals are polluting water supplies, and unexploded bombs are stopping farmers from resuming their work. For coastal areas, however, contamination levels have fallen back to the baseline expected for that part of the Mediterranean Sea, even after the oil spill. ‘We were expecting it to spread wider,’ says Muralee Thummarukudy, chief scientist with the post-conflict assessment team. ‘We did not see levels that were alarming or unusual’,” quoting Nature.com. (The complete article is accessible to subscribers only.) link here .

10. “RAY GUN MAKES TARGETS FEEL AS IF THEY ARE ON FIRE” “The military's new weapon is a ray gun that shoots a beam that makes people feel as if they will catch fire. The technology is supposed to be harmless -- a non-lethal way to get enemies to drop their weapons. Military officials say it could save the lives of civilians and service members in places like Iraq and Afghanistan…While the sudden, 130-degree Fahrenheit (54.44 Celsius) heat was not painful, it was intense enough to make participants think their clothes were about to ignite….The system uses millimeter waves, which can penetrate only 1/64th of an inch of skin, just enough to cause discomfort. By comparison, common kitchen microwaves penetrate several inches of skin,” quoting CNN. [Ed. Note: Is this the next phase of people control? I expect to see this military weapon used on Americans at Constitution-protected protests and demonstrations.] link here .

11. JURY: SEATTLE LIABLE FOR WTO PROTESTS (1999) "A federal jury found Tuesday [Jan. 30] that the city of Seattle violated the constitutional rights of 200 protesters who were arrested during a demonstration during the World Trade Organization meeting in 1999. The jury found the city liable for violating the protesters' Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable search and seizure, but did not find a violation against their free speech rights under the First Amendment. U.S. District Judge Marsha Pechman had already ruled that police had made the arrests without probable cause," quoting the AP. [Ed. Note: Justice prevailed for a city that attempted to squelch the rights of its citizens to protest.]
link here
SEATTLE GETS HUGE LEGAL TAB "The city has already paid more than $800,000 in WTO lawsuits and settlements. Any damages from today's verdict will be set in the next phase of the trial...Shortly after the ruling was announced, Seattle City Council President Nick Licata said the city could have done a better job in handling the protests," quoitng the Seattle Times. [Ed. Note: Maybe the city will get a wake-up call with the huge amount of money paid out in lawsuits. This writer wishes he would have been in the protest group.] link here .

12. SIR LAURENCE GARDNER RETURNS AFTER ABSENCE! “As a worldwide emissary for the Royal House of Stewart, Sir Laurence Gardner is Prior of the Sacred Kindred of Saint Columba, a Knight Templar of St. Anthony, and Envoy to the Grand Protectorate of the Imperial Dragon Court of Hungary. Laurence Gardner is an internationally acclaimed author; his books have been published in many languages. They include ‘Bloodline of the Holy Grail,’ which gained a UK Author of the Year award, the international bestsellers ‘Genesis of the Grail Kings’ and ‘Realm of the Ring Lords.’ His latest work is ‘Lost Secrets of the Sacred Ark.’ He excels in many fields, his libretto compositions have been performed at London's Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. We could easily spend hours speaking with him; he is a warm, delightful, gentleman with a phenomenal mind and keen dry humor," quoting Beyond the Ordinary (KRSE) radio. Sir Gardner returns after an absence, which he explains in this fascinating Beyond the Ordinary/KRSE interview from January 15, 2007. link here Sir Laurence Gardner’s site: link here Sir Gardner’s latest book, The Shadow of Solomon, can be purchased here:
link here .

RAMTHA STUDENT NEWS A. Dr. Miceal Ledwith shares his dynamic experiences in this paper titled “The Orb Phenomenon” on this month’s Prophet’s Conference Newsletter. link here He will be a Faculty member for the May Prophets Conference in Sedona, AZ. link here B. Greg Simmons has a new website called The Physics of Change as "Ask Dr. Greg" now goes online:
link here His new book "These Things You Shall Do, and Greater - The Physics of Change" is now available: link here C. Ramtha’s Advanced Students Retreat offerings for 2007 are listed here: link here .

LOCAL NOTES Covered last week on Yelm’s Community Blog: A. Tacoma Narrows 2nd Bridge Span construction update (Jan. 29) B. Results of WA. Dept. of Ecology Review of Yelm’s Thompson Creek (Jan. 30) C. Guest Entry: “A time comes when silence is betrayal” (Jan. 31) D. "Yelm Water Concerns Reach Boil" Nisqaually Valley news recap (Feb 1) E. Guest Entry: Tenino trees to be cut down (Feb. 2) F. Letter to Editor & City of Yelm response to Yelm Water Concerns printed in NVN (Feb. 3) G. Guest Entry: From an Emergency Preparedness Trainer (Feb. 4) Access these stories and more at link here .

QUOTE OF THE WEEK “Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents, which in prosperous circumstances would have lain dormant.” Horace (65 – 8 BC) Roman Poet .

Kleiner’s Korner is copyrighted by Stephen R. Klein, 2007. For archived issues of Kleiner’s Korner, click on "Current Kleiner’s Korner and Archives" at link here Send comments to steve@kleinerskorner.com .