Amplify’d from www.rawstory.com
Under Australian law, inciting violence is a serious crime: an offense which could even trigger the prosecution of members of the US political class and mainstream media who called for the assassination of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, according to his attorney.
"Our main concern is really the possible extradition to the US," he said. "We've been troubled by the sort of rhetoric that has come out of various commentators and principally Republican politicians — Sarah Palin and the like — saying Mr. Assange should be executed, assassinated."
Stary added: "Certainly if Sarah Palin or any of those other politicians come to Australia, for whatever purpose, then we can initiate a private prosecution, and that's what we intend to do."
In the fallout from WikiLeaks and other major newspapers around the world setting about publishing a trove of leaked US diplomatic cables, numerous figures in politics and the media came out strongly against Assange. Even Vice President Joe Biden joined the fray, suggesting Assange was a "high tech terrorist."
But for Fox News employees Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee, and others paid by the Republican television network, the rhetoric was a bit more extreme.
Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas who's long professed to be Christian, claimed during a Nov. book signing that he wanted to see Assange and the leaker "executed" for their actions. Huckabee did not issue similar calls for employees of publications like The New York Times or The Guardian, which at the time had published more US diplomatic cables than WikiLeaks.
Palin, similarly, wrote on her Facebook page that Assange should be pursued "with the same urgency we pursue al Qaeda and Taliban leaders" -- the implication being that the US military should assassinate him in person or by remote.
Conservative talk show host Bill O'Reilly has also called for the leaker to be executed, but stopped short of calling for violence against Assange.
Likewise, Rep. Peter King (R-NY) suggested that WikiLeaks should be designated a "foreign terrorist organization" by the Secretary of State. His call was echoed by the Senate's top Republican, Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who called Assange a "terrorist" and said the US should "change the law" in order to pursue him if current statutes did not permit it.
Responding to the calls for violence, Assange called Fox News employees "shock jocks" who merely sought to promote themselves by making extreme statements in the press.
Following a mass shooting in Tucson, Arizona, where a lone gunman put a bullet in a Democratic congresswoman's head and killed six others, Palin and other right-wing figures came under intense criticism for their frequent use of firearm imagery and rhetoric in political discourse.
While most Americans told pollsters that Palin was in no way responsible for the shootings, calls to tone down violent rhetoric in the media were largely perpetuated.
Assange, who's long held a membership in Australia's largest media union, the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance, was largely viewed in his home country as a reporter, NPR added.
The US Department of Justice was still investigating whether Assange could be charged with espionage or a criminal conspiracy with Pvt. Bradley Manning, the lone soldier accused of funneling information to WikiLeaks.
Assange has denied even speaking to Manning before the young soldier was named in the media as being accused of leaking secret information obtained from the US military's network.
01/23/2011
01/22/2011
Palin will be prosecuted for Inciting Violence if she visits Australia, Attorney says
Amplify’d from www.rawstory.com
Under Australian law, inciting violence is a serious crime: an offense which could even trigger the prosecution of members of the US political class and mainstream media who called for the assassination of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, according to his attorney.
"Our main concern is really the possible extradition to the US," he said. "We've been troubled by the sort of rhetoric that has come out of various commentators and principally Republican politicians — Sarah Palin and the like — saying Mr. Assange should be executed, assassinated."
Stary added: "Certainly if Sarah Palin or any of those other politicians come to Australia, for whatever purpose, then we can initiate a private prosecution, and that's what we intend to do."
In the fallout from WikiLeaks and other major newspapers around the world setting about publishing a trove of leaked US diplomatic cables, numerous figures in politics and the media came out strongly against Assange. Even Vice President Joe Biden joined the fray, suggesting Assange was a "high tech terrorist."
But for Fox News employees Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee, and others paid by the Republican television network, the rhetoric was a bit more extreme.
Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas who's long professed to be Christian, claimed during a Nov. book signing that he wanted to see Assange and the leaker "executed" for their actions. Huckabee did not issue similar calls for employees of publications like The New York Times or The Guardian, which at the time had published more US diplomatic cables than WikiLeaks.
Palin, similarly, wrote on her Facebook page that Assange should be pursued "with the same urgency we pursue al Qaeda and Taliban leaders" -- the implication being that the US military should assassinate him in person or by remote.
Conservative talk show host Bill O'Reilly has also called for the leaker to be executed, but stopped short of calling for violence against Assange.
Likewise, Rep. Peter King (R-NY) suggested that WikiLeaks should be designated a "foreign terrorist organization" by the Secretary of State. His call was echoed by the Senate's top Republican, Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who called Assange a "terrorist" and said the US should "change the law" in order to pursue him if current statutes did not permit it.
Responding to the calls for violence, Assange called Fox News employees "shock jocks" who merely sought to promote themselves by making extreme statements in the press.
Following a mass shooting in Tucson, Arizona, where a lone gunman put a bullet in a Democratic congresswoman's head and killed six others, Palin and other right-wing figures came under intense criticism for their frequent use of firearm imagery and rhetoric in political discourse.
While most Americans told pollsters that Palin was in no way responsible for the shootings, calls to tone down violent rhetoric in the media were largely perpetuated.
Assange, who's long held a membership in Australia's largest media union, the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance, was largely viewed in his home country as a reporter, NPR added.
The US Department of Justice was still investigating whether Assange could be charged with espionage or a criminal conspiracy with Pvt. Bradley Manning, the lone soldier accused of funneling information to WikiLeaks.
Assange has denied even speaking to Manning before the young soldier was named in the media as being accused of leaking secret information obtained from the US military's network.
Greenland Ice Sheets Melt At Record Rate In 2010
Amplify’d from www.ibtimes.com
Ice sheets in Greenland are melting faster than ever before, according to new research.
The study, led by Marco Tedesco, director of the Cryospheric Processes laboratory at the City College of New York, showed that the melting index had broken the previous record, set in 2007.
CCNY
The figure shows the standardized melting index anomaly for the period 1979 - 2010. The center line is the mean fro 1979-2009.
"Melting in 2010 started exceptionally early at the end of April and ended quite late in mid- September," Tedesco said in a statement. "This past melt season was exceptional, with melting in some areas stretching up to 50 days longer than average."
A melting Greenland ice sheet contributes to sea level rise, which has occurred at a mean rate of about 1.8 millimeters per year over the past century. If the Greenland ice sheet were to melt completely it would raise sea levels by 7 meters. But that is unlikely to happen for several centuries at least.
One reason for the record-breaking melt was that summer temperatures in the Arctic were 2-3 degrees C (5.4 degrees F) warmer than normal. Greenland's capital, Nuuk, experienced temperatures higher than any since 1873, when weather records started being been kept there. NASA data showed that 2010 was tied with 2005 as, globally, the warmest year on record.
The data was gathered from satellites operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. By measuring the amount of microwave radiation emitted by the ice, snow and water of the ice sheets in Greenland, and comparing that with data gathered on the ground, the researchers were able to measure how much of the ice sheet is subject to melting.
Adding up the areas subject to melting each day gives an index, which can then be used to see how much more melting (or less) is happening in any given year. For the baseline year the researchers took an average of the melting between 1979 and 2009.
The index is presented as a multiple of the standard deviation from the mean. The deviation is the "spread" around the average. For example, a group of 10 people might have a mean height of 67 inches tall, with the shortest people at 60 inches and the tallest at 74 inches. The standard deviation is seven inches, and a basketball player who is 81 inches tall is two standard deviations off of the average.
In the melt index measurements, 2010 got a value of just over 2, similar to 2007. Previous record-setting years were 2005, 2002, and 1998.
Tedesco said if the variability were random, then over a 30-year period one would expect the record years to be evenly distributed - they would be just as likely to be in 1970 as they are in 2001. But the data shows a gradual upward curve, and even the fact that the melt index was just about average in 2008 and 2009 doesn't alter the trend.
He added that the real concern about the ice sheets is that the melt process is not linear. That is, twice as much meltwater on the ice surface doesn't mean only twice as much melting of the underlying ice sheet. That's because many processes are feedbacks.
For example, more meltwater on the surface means more heat, which melts more ice and makes more meltwater. A river of water running over ice transfers heat to the ice because it is above freezing, melting yet more ice and increasing the volume of water. If the feedbacks accelerate past a certain point, the ice sheet will melt even faster, Tedesco said.
Tedesco said he is planning future trips to Greenland to find out more about the contribution to melting of the water that seeps under the ice sheet from the surface.
Awesome Foundation: Chapters opening around the world
How does it work?
Submissions through our application form are placed in a common pool viewable by all chapters. Each chapter meets monthly to select a project to fund. By consensus, trustees determine which project to fund, and the $1,000 fellowship is distributed accordingly. Some chapters also routinely contact applicants for interviews before awarding the fellowships.Amplify’d from awesomefoundation.org
Current Chapters
Want to help start a chapter or join an existing one if a spot opens up? Awesome!
Tell us about yourself here!
Questions? Drop us an email at [email protected] or ping us on Twitter at @awesomefound.
Awesome Foundation: $1,000 a month for the most awesome idea, every month
Amplify’d from www.boingboing.net
The Awesome Foundation for the Arts and Sciences organizes regional groups of 10 people who commit to "showing up each month, stuffing $100 each into a paper bag, and giving that bag to the person we think has the best chance at achieving something awesome." The Toronto chapter is up and dispersing grants, with no strings attached.
Submissions through our application form are placed in a common pool viewable by all chapters. Each chapter meets monthly to select a project to fund. By consensus, trustees determine which project to fund, and the $1,000 fellowship is distributed accordingly. Some chapters also routinely contact applicants for interviews before awarding the fellowships.
Chapters are divided by geography, and more recently by topic of interest. While specifying a chapter to apply to is not necessary (all chapters can view the applications received by all other chapters), many chapters show a preference for local projects.
Vote For The Worst Corporation of 2010
Vote for MONSANTO, they are trying to kill you and your children for profit.
You don't need to Join the site, just enter in information and vote (doesn't have to be real information).Amplify’d from salsa.democracyinaction.org
First Name*
Last Name*
Email*
Phone
Street
City
Zip/Postal Code*
Vote in the 2010 Corporate Hall of Shame!
F.B. Purity Cleans Up Your Facebook Homepage
Amplify’d from www.fbpurity.com
What is F.B. Purity?
F.B. (Fluff Busting) Purity is an anti spam, facebook tool, in the form of a browser addon that alters your facebook homepage to show only the most relevant information to you, by filtering out the annoying and irrelevant messages in your news feed / stream, such as application spam etc, and also giving you the option to hide the boxes you dont want to see on the right hand side of the homepage. FBP is available as a browser extension and it is also available as a Greasemonkey script.
F.B. Purity is a browser extension / script that removes the stupid quiz messages & other silly application spam from your facebook homepage, leaving behind just the message types that you wish to see such as status updates, links, photos, etc. The list of message types that FBP hides is customisable to your taste.
Earth 'to get second sun' as supernova turns night into day
Amplify’d from www.dailymail.co.uk
The Earth could soon have a second sun, at least for a week or two.
The cosmic phenomenon will happen when one of the brightest stars in the night sky explodes into a supernova.
And, according to a report yesterday, the most stunning light show in the planet’s history could happen as soon as this year.
Earth will undoubtedly have a front row seat when the dying red supergiant star Betelgeuse finally blows itself into oblivion.
The explosion will be so bright that even though the star in the Orion constellation is 640 light-years away, it will still turn night into day and appear like there are two suns in the sky for a few weeks.
The only real debate is over exactly when it will happen.
In stellar terms, Betelgeuse is predicted to crash and burn in the very near future. But that doesn’t necessarily mean you have to rush out and buy sunglasses.
Brad Carter, Senior Lecturer of Physics at the University of Southern Queensland in Australia, claimed yesterday that the galactic blast could happen before 2012 – or any time over the next million years.
‘This old star is running out of fuel in its centre,’ Dr Carter told te Austalian website news.com.au.
‘This fuel keeps Betelgeuse shining and supported. When this fuel runs out the star will literally collapse in upon itself and it will do so very quickly.
‘This is the final hurrah for the star. It goes bang, it explodes, it lights up - we’ll have incredible brightness for a brief period of time for a couple of weeks and then over the coming months it begins to fade and then eventually it will be very hard to see at all,’ he added.
Look out: Betelgeuse, which is in the Orion constellation, is set to blow itself into oblivion - which will give the effect of two suns in the sky for us on Earth
The Internet is abuzz with doomsday theories linking the supernova to the Mayan calendar’s prediction of an Armageddon in 2012, fuelled by the association of the word ‘Betelgeuse’ with the devil.
But experts claimed that even if the big bang is looming, it will still happen way too far from Earth to do us any harm.
‘When a star goes bang, the first we will observe of it is a rain of tiny particles called nuetrinos,’ said Dr Carter.
‘They will flood through the Earth and bizarrely enough, even though the supernova we see visually will light up the night sky, 99% of the energy in the supernova is released in these particles that will come through our bodies and through the Earth with absolutely no harm whatsoever.’
When it happens, the Betelgeuse supernova will almost certainly be the most dramatic ever seen.
It is the ninth brightest star in the night sky and the second brightest in the constellation of Orion, outshining its neighbour Rigel – or Beta Orionis – only very rarely.
It’s distinct orange-red colour makes it easy to spot in the night sky.
If it was at the centre of our solar system, its surface would extend past the asteroid belt, wholly engulfing Mercury, Venus, Mars and the Earth.
F.B. Purity Cleans Up Your Facebook Homepage
Amplify’d from www.fbpurity.com
What is F.B. Purity?
F.B. (Fluff Busting) Purity is an anti spam, facebook tool, in the form of a browser addon that alters your facebook homepage to show only the most relevant information to you, by filtering out the annoying and irrelevant messages in your news feed / stream, such as application spam etc, and also giving you the option to hide the boxes you dont want to see on the right hand side of the homepage. FBP is available as a browser extension and it is also available as a Greasemonkey script.
F.B. Purity is a browser extension / script that removes the stupid quiz messages & other silly application spam from your facebook homepage, leaving behind just the message types that you wish to see such as status updates, links, photos, etc. The list of message types that FBP hides is customisable to your taste.
James Quin
News Activist, Technological Singularity Enthusiast, Writer.
