The climate is however very changeable these days. Getting the politics right has been half the fight. Unfortunately, the right policy has been held at bay partially by having the right knowledge of whatÂ’s happening to the climate. The climate changes we see today are the result of only a century and a half of study, peanuts in comparison the huge shifts over the earths history.

The recent UN Climate Change Conference sought to put in place a policy to take over the Kyoto protocol. At its core were some recently publicised results:

1. The warming trend on the earthÂ’s surface has been taking place since the early part of the twentieth century. The last ten years have been the warmest of that millennium.

2. There have been rapid signs of melting the Arctic circle. The sea ice there has fallen by around eight percent over thirty years.

3. The old inconsistency in the data between the temperature rise in the atmosphere and on the planets surface seems to have levelled out. They appear to rise in parallel.

4. The Scripps Institute of Oceanography in California noted that the ocean has been warming at different depths for over 65 years. These results match the predictions that warming has been induced more by greenhouse gases that as a result of small changes in the suns heat output.

5. There has been an observed and recorded link between the sea surface temperature and the frequency and intensity of tropical storms, typhoons and hurricanes.

6. The existing computer models of the change in ocean currents, in particular in the North Atlantic, are correct.

There are however still some unknowns. For example the solar hypothesis is now known to be a lesser contributor, the miniscule changes in the suns heat output over its eleven year sunspot cycle is adding to the mix. Also, the aerosol emissions from sulphurous fuel promote the formation of clouds, and as a consequence the sunlight reflected from the earths surface increases, effectively opposing the greenhouse gas effect.

Some even argue for the benefits of global warming, which include for example the opening up of new shipping lanes in the artic as the ice recedes, new oil drilling opportunities and longer harvest periods in Canada and Russia.

It seems climate change is inevitable and the small economic ideas such as banning coal subsidies bear little fruit as a means of curbing the problem. More than ever, political will must be demonstrated at first to show to industry and populations that it is even an issue. More importantly perhaps, the will of the politicians must be met with achievable methods from the technological and scientific community.

Professor Socolow is leading the way with what he calls “stabilisation wedges”. On a graph of climate change, the space between the trend line and the stability line is known as the “stabilisation triangle’. By dividing these triangles into wedges and assigning realistic goals to each wedge the massive problem is given a usable and effective solution.

The goals to assign to the wedges range from greater overall efficiencies, the decarbonisation of electricity, fuel displacement by low carbon electricity, methane management, and natural carbon sinks.

By further subdividing each wedge into sub wedges, such as decarbonised electricity being subdivided into nuclear power, renewable energy, natural gas as an alternative to coal, and the storage of carbon dioxide – these problems are confounded into what everyone has been looking for. A short list of solutions that together will balance the problem.

It seems the technology for all this exists. It is merely in need of refinement. For example the management of carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels could be dealt with through further carbon sequestration. A couple of power plants already employ this particular technique to good effect. The carbon dioxide is extracted at the source and is injected into porous rocks deep underground to prevent it escaping into the atmosphere.

Steam reformation is another technique. It is, in essence, a pre-emptive technique that reacts the fuel used with water to yield hydrogen. The hydrogen output is burnt to create electricity.

Of all the possibilities of reworking and inventing technologies, perhaps the best idea is the oldest idea. Replanting programmes. The idea of photosynthesis to combine carbon dioxide with water and sunlight is a relatively cheap and exponential idea and would be hugely effective.

Article Source: http://www.articledashboard.com

Jacob Fiennes is an enthusiastic traveller and photographer with a passion for discovery. He is a founder and regular contributor to the hugely popular worldwide hotel reservations site TravelBX.com. Visit the site for your next hotel room reservation, flight ticket, tailored holiday package and much more. >> www.travelbx.com

The National Guard arrived in large numbers on Friday, September 2nd, but how is it possible that the poor people of New Orleans were left four days to fend for themselves? DoesnÂ’t the United States have a rapid deployment force? Yes, we do, and many large military installations are within an hour of the Gulf Coast, when traveling by air. Many more military bases are within two hours of the devastation.

On Sunday, August 28th – one day before Hurricane Katrina landed on the Gulf Coast it was labeled a category 5 hurricane. So, what was the emergency rescue plan? Was anybody planning any rescue efforts on Sunday night?

As luck would have it, Katrina turned out to be a category 4 Hurricane. Can you imagine the devastation, if this storm had been worse? Some parts of New Orleans are 10 feet below sea level and a system of levees, normally, keeps the surrounding water out.

Referring to the Federal response for relief help, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin said, “They don’t have a clue what’s going on down here.” Mayor NaginÂ’s remarks are an understatement. Logistically speaking, this is not as complicated as a relief effort to Somalia.

President Bush said, “A lot of people are working hard to help those who’ve been affected. The results are not acceptable.” He is not kidding; if we can airlift food and weapons to Afghanistan, why is delivery to the Gulf Coast and New Orleans a problem?

Article Source: http://www.articledashboard.com

Paul Jerard, is a co-owner and the director of Yoga teacher training at: Aura Wellness Center, in North Providence, RI. He has been a certified Master Yoga teacher since 1995. He is a master instructor of martial arts, with multiple Black Belts, four martial arts teaching credentials, and was recently inducted into the USA Martial Arts Hall of Fame. He teaches Yoga, martial arts, and fitness to children, adults, and seniors in the greater Providence area. Recently he wrote: Is Running a Yoga Business Right for You? For Yoga students, who may be considering a new career as a Yoga teacher.

www.yoga-teacher-training.org/index.html

The new defense bill will hopefully reduce the federal deficit by 40 billion over the next 5 years (House Approves drilling, 2005). In addition to deficit reduction some of the money will go for military supplies, helping hurricane victims and subsidizing heat to those in poverty. Republicans feel that the measures are necessary if the White House fiscal obligations will again be on track.

In 1987 a report directed to Congress indicated that there were 26 major oil fields in Alaska (Adams, 1995). These oil fields could potentially supply 10 billion barrels pumped at 365 million barrels a year (Cowen & Doggett, 2005). It would take over 27 years to remove all of the oil.

Even though, without doubt, that the oil revenues would help the economy and the local Alaskan population, the necessity of protecting one of the U.S.Â’s largest natural reserves remains unresolved. Native peoples who are strapped for cash and rising oil prices which damper the nationÂ’s economy are pitted against environmentalists who want to protect the multitudes of endangered species.

Since humans love to consume and make little effort to conserve natural resources there must be a balance against damaging natural preserves further in an attempt to furnish peopleÂ’s needs and protecting unspoiled land. By keeping the area relatively untouched businesses and governments will be forced to upgrade their fuel efficiency reducing the nationÂ’s dependence on natural resources. By opening the ANWR to only a small amount of oil mining instead of the full array of oil companies proposed by the government we can help push the nation into a stronger economic future that is less dependent than competing nations.

Adams, Jacob (1995, June). Arctic Slope Regional Corporation, Barrow, Alaska. Artic Circle. Extracted December 19th, 2005 from http://arcticcircle.uconn.edu/VirtualClassroom/asrcadams.html

Cowen, R & Doggett, T. (2005, December 19th). Senate Takes up Alaska Drilling. Netscape News. Extracted December 19th, 2005 from http://cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/story.jsp?idq=/ff/story/0002/20051219/1134963690.htm&ewp=ewp_news_1205alaska_drilling

House Approves drilling in Alaskan Refuge. (2005, December 19th). Associated Press. Retrieved on December 19th, 2005 from http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10509565/

U.S. Votes to open ANWR (2005, December 19th). Anwr.org. Retrieved on December 19th, 2005 from http://www.anwr.org/archives/us_house_votes_to_open_anwr.php

Article Source: http://www.articledashboard.com

Murad Ali is a two time published author and owner of the Muslim Times magazine. For more interesting information please visit www.muradenterprises.org

Will dispensing oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve help us? If you think short-term – Yes; it will help temporarily.

In fact, you can expect to see products and services increase in price due to the price of fuel and transportation. This is only the beginning of economic change. Many of the “Mom and Pop” businesses may not be able to adapt fast enough to handle the upcoming heating bills. Many of the local businesses, in my area, are still “smarting” from last winter’s fuel bills.

So what can we do? There has been a flood of Emails that tell us to boycott a particular oil company, but nobody can agree on exactly which company to boycott. Most oil companies are considered “greedy corporate giants,” with questionable political agendas, by the consumers. If we are going to be driven out of business, and into an economic disaster, it is time to declare economic warfare on the largest oil companies.

Sorry to choose such strong words and opinions, but this has gone on long enough. Osama Bin Laden may not feel that you are paying enough at the pump, but you donÂ’t have his millions to pay your fuel bills with.

There is also an effort to stop buying gasoline on a particular day. Every business deals with ups and downs, but you have to come back to the pump; a day of poor sales isnÂ’t going to matter to multi-millionaires. However, a month, or a season, will wake them up.

If we made a serious commitment to walk or bike more, we would all be healthier, and send a message to the oil companies. Granted, many of us commute great distances to get to work, but taking the car around the block to pick up a half-gallon of milk is ridiculous.

A little self-discipline goes a long way. Get rid of all gas guzzlers and donÂ’t even think of buying one. Does anyone really need a 5.7 liter hemi? What are the auto manufacturers thinking? This is total gluttony, and we all know that the worldÂ’s oil reserves will run out, so letÂ’s conserve what we have.

In your home, or business, you should insulate everything possible. Many people, and businesses, already have done this, but heat is becoming too precious a commodity to take for granted.

Write your local legislators about alternative fuel sources. Let them know this is an important election issue. They have all sat on their rear ends long enough. Foreign oil dependence has become our foreign policy; itÂ’s time to become self sufficient.

The oil companies are currently engaged in price gouging, but we are not helpless. If we conserve, and get some action from government, it will be for the common good.

Article Source: http://www.articledashboard.com

Paul Jerard, is a co-owner and the director of Yoga teacher training at: Aura Wellness Center, in North Providence, RI. He has been a certified Master Yoga teacher since 1995. He is a master instructor of martial arts, with multiple Black Belts, four martial arts teaching credentials, and was recently inducted into the USA Martial Arts Hall of Fame. He teaches Yoga, martial arts, and fitness to children, adults, and seniors in the greater Providence area. Recently he wrote: Is Running a Yoga Business Right for You? For Yoga students, who may be considering a new career as a Yoga teacher.

www.yoga-teacher-training.org/index.html

Here is an old saying for you to ponder: “Give a man a fish, you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish, and you have fed him for a lifetime.” How are you helping the people of the Middle East, learn how to help themselves, with your millions of dollars?

You have wasted your money, and time, on a message of hate. It is easy to incite young people with the message of intolerance and violence. What a shame, when you think of all the people you could have helped

You could have helped the Palestinian Red Crescent or Iraqi Red Crescent.
God knows, they need all the help they can get. By the way, God and Allah are the same Supreme Being.

Who is Isa Al-Masih? You are an educated man, and you know the answer.
You are killing your “cousins.” The Christians are not your enemy, and we should put the past behind us, for the mutual benefit of mankind. Judaism,
Christianity and Islam, have sacred ties, so why keep the fires of hate going?

You have personally supervised the killing of Iraqi children by suicide bombers and car bombs. What have these Moslem children ever done to you?

Granted you and I are not the same religion, but why do fundamentalists, of all kinds, try to destroy everything, they don’t understand? A religious fundamentalist is the same, whether he is a Christian, a Moslem, or a Jew, all of them drink from the same “fountain of hate.”

As for the presence of Western soldiers in “your lands.” By your actions, you have provoked them, when, by your life of privilege, you were in a key position to negotiate. Now, you cannot raise your head from your cave without thinking about assassins, around every corner. You must live your life as an outcast.

It is too late for you to personally negotiate for peace, but you are still in a position to stop the violence now. You should declare an end to hostilities, and disband your cause, for the benefit of all mankind.

In the words of John Lennon, “ Give peace a chance.” You cannot undo what you have done, and you will be pursued for the rest of your life, but Allah may forgive you, if you set the wheels in motion – toward world peace.

Article Source: http://www.articledashboard.com

Paul Jerard, is a co-owner and the director of Yoga teacher training at: Aura Wellness Center, in North Providence, RI. He has been a certified Master Yoga teacher since 1995. He is a master instructor of martial arts, with multiple Black Belts, four martial arts teaching credentials, and was recently inducted into the USA Martial Arts Hall of Fame. He teaches Yoga, martial arts, and fitness to children, adults, and seniors in the greater Providence area. Recently he wrote: Is Running a Yoga Business Right for You? For Yoga students, who may be considering a new career as a Yoga teacher.

www.yoga-teacher-training.org/index.html

Everyone it seems, has an answer for who is to blame or who to call for help or how to deal with your insurance company. But I wonder if anybody is really asking the right questions! As evacuees, as victims of Katrina we have our own set of questions. They are not a product of bitterness but of pure frustration and at times exhaustion. Anyone may answer these questions since the people or agencies we are dealing with have notÂ…so far.

Here is just a short list of our questions. The long list would overwhelm you.

Why has my wife been dialing Red Cross for five days only to hear someone say she should keep trying but all the lines are busy. Then a recording says we are going to hang up now, and they do!

Where are the 40,000 volunteers said to be helping the Red Cross when we call them?

What does Red Cross do exactly with the billions of dollars it collects in times like these?

Has anyone of the agencies helping people in shelters considered that giving people food, water and a blow up mattress for the next few months contributes nothing to their starting a new life.

Do insurance companies that are already trying to find ways out of paying for losses have a legal right to do this? Is it decent? Is it moral?

Do the national guard soldiers that were standing by as we entered our neighborhood and assuring us that all was safe and secure realize that it is a little to late for safe and secure. Does a pile of rubble need to be secured?

Do all the warnings about those who are committing fraud when it comes to being a legitimate Red Cross site or collection point sufficiently scared away what might amount to thousands of donors. What ever happened to check it then give. Is “it might be fraudulent” the new excuse for indifference.

Is there something wrong with helping an individual or a family. Is it just as conscience soothing to dump big checks into big organizations as to actually help a real person, one with a name and not just a social security number.

Does FEMA really expect people to return from places they have gone to for refuge, some that are hundreds or thousands of miles away from the Gulf coast area to keep an appointment with them to see their house? Is there even a child in America that doesn’t know that these houses have been photographed sitting in ten feet of water for the past ten days? Could one of these children please call FEMA and let them know? Oh, I forgot it took my wife over five hundred attempts to reach FEMA before she got through. The result is now the familiar “hurry up and wait.”

Will America with its worldwide reputation for its short attention span and its penchant for the pop culture, hottest item, latest news mentality really carry this thing through. Will interest wane before we can begin again.

President Bush said, “New Orleans will rise again.” But infrastructure and Superdomes do not a city make. A city is people. How can we help people?

Article Source: http://www.articledashboard.com

Rev Bresciani is the author of two books. His website is americanprophet.org

For example, prepaid phone cards are the best and most useful things to send troops overseas, according to the Army & Air Force Exchange Service, whose phone campaign is called Help Our Troops Call Home. Prepaid phone cards can be sent to individual troops or to any troop via a service such as the American Red Cross. As well as phone cards, send a batch of blank greeting cards, so that troops can remember loved ones back home.

Food and beverage items that remind troops of the tastes and smells of home are always cherished. Small individually packaged items such as instant coffee, hot chocolate packets, and sugar packets, are always needed. Instant food items such as breakfast foods, instant soup mixes, and ready-to-eat meals and salad kits, are ideal. Also, individual packs of snacks, such as chips, peanuts, pretzels, cereal and granola bars, brownies, cakes, candy and gum. Chocolate items are a bad idea, because chocolate melts.

Personal items, such as T-shirts, hats and gloves, flip flops or shower shoes, and shoe polish are great.

Other items such as sunscreen and lotion and wrap around sunglasses are vitally important as many troops are stationed in very hot areas. Other hygiene items such as toothpaste, toothbrushes, deodorant, shampoo, Band-Aids.

Entertainment is a luxury that troops need. Send items such as movies DVDs and music CDs, magazines, handheld electronic games, and playing cards.

But most of all, send cash. In this post-911 world some items may have difficulty getting through and the military’s supply system is already overloaded. Sending cash, while less personal, is often quicker and more practical. A quick Internet search will bring up websites with lots of information on how to send cash or packages to troops overseas.

Article Source: http://www.articledashboard.com

Dylan Miles, journalist, and website builder, lives in Texas. He is the owner and co-editor of www.militarylife.info on which you will find a longer, more detailed version of this article.

President Bush announced an ambitious plan to return to the moon by 2013-15 near the birthplace of modern flight, Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. The centenary of flight celebrations was held in Kill Devil Hills in December of 2003 where the President will announced plans to allow NASA to offer up its best to the effort. With funding from congress to supplement their 15.5 billion dollar existing budget NASA will have to do a great deal of aggressive re-tooling and budget squeezing to pull it off by the proposed deadline.

I have talked to MIT and Harvard grads who still think that if a rocket whizzes by you in space it makes a whooshing sound much like a jet craft does in the atmosphere. Someone forgot to tell them there is no sound where there is no air. So what, you say?

Some of these grads are aware that even if we could travel at warp 9 (Star TrekÂ’s imaginary multiplication of the speed of light) that it would take about one hundred thousand years to make the edge of the Milky Way Galaxy and upon return, the earth would be about 1.2 million years older than it is today. But why harp on the small stuff.

Only once since I began a twenty year fascination with EinsteinÂ’s time/light theory have I heard from anyone connected to NASA who dared to address this fact to a sublimely ignorant public. He was hushed up in the slow lane with indifference and a public that couldnÂ’t tell you how the world can make it through the next decade without imploding. With a list of almost infinite problems how can we think of getting people out that far, much less plan for the return of our astronauts after 4000 generations of time.

IÂ’m not anti-science, in fact I think our world has only improved because of it. But science should be no less immune from a serious reality check than was the church in the dark ages. I believe in the bible , and IÂ’m sure it gives us only a very short time to the second coming of Christ. But even at that I would never put the bible against science. I am satisfied that science is the book of how, and the bible is the book of why.

Being a bible believing Christian I also have another view about space travel. It is hard to believe that every Christian may not agree with me. Until the cost of getting to the moon is more affordable if ever, I think the money could be spent more effectively right here on earth and we could be satisfied with singing the official state song of Vermont which is Moonlight in Vermont.

Almost every starving child in the world could be fed and clothed for a decade for the cost of sending up only one moon shot. My bible, my conscience, my common sense and every bone in my body says that would be a far better way to spend the fifteen billion bucks.

I know there are those who will think this is a preposterous proposal and perhaps it is. So I will offer yet one more proposal that I think is on the same level as sticking America with a fifteen billion dollar bill just to bring back a few moon rocks. We could look for that cow, you know, the one who jumped over the moon. We could train his aim for a while so he could hit the darned moon next time. He could jump back with the rocks and dust for our scientists to look over and weÂ’d save a bundle of taxpayers cash.

“Blue moon I saw you standing alone, without a dream in your heart” Watch out, we’re back!

Article Source: http://www.articledashboard.com

Michael Bresciani is a columnist for several online daily news sites. He has authored two books. His newest book “An American Prophet and His Message” is said to be the clearest treatment of the second coming of Christ in this generation. Visit his website at:
americanprophet.org

Whoa up, now! This last week in politics has been better than watching one of those loveable old Laurel and Hardy films, hasn’t it? That’s another fine mess you’ve got us into, Tony! And another, and another…

In education, after eight years and twelve White Papers that have had schools reeling from one disaster after another, it looks like we’re going right back to where we started. I do hope everyone enjoyed that rather bumpy trip around the block. Fun, wasn’t it? Education, education, education? It certainly has been!

The ban on smoking rules has got everyone mystified. Neither those for or against a ban seem happy with the result, and nobody seems to be able to explain the rules clearly. Do the little bowls of heavily salted peanuts left nonchalantly on bars, the ones that are really there to entice you to have a free nibble to develop your thirst further, do they qualify as food? They are free to be taken and are not charged for or served, so how does the law stand on these? And how about the little packs of Cheddars, or even crisps, those that come sealed in airtight bags and so cannot be contaminated – are they food in the sense of the law? Do they make the ban compulsory if they are displayed, or nibbled? Will all licensed B & Bs have to stop serving breakfasts to remain within the law if they have a multi-purpose room and wish to permit smoking? Their licensing regulations are very similar to those of a pub landlord and their rights of refusal are exactly the same – so how do they stand? Ask any two politicians any of these questions and, if you should be lucky enough to get a straight answer, they’ll probably give you two different interpretations of the same rule.

In Ireland many landlords are finding ways around their total ban in a desperate attempt to save their businesses. The licensed premises, bars and restaurants, remain no smoking areas according to the letter of the law – but outside, in the gardens and in the car parks, various lean-tos, conservatories, garden shed type erections, and even a few old busses have now been left easily accessible for the smoker to use. They are not designated smoking areas, no-one is told or encouraged to use them, and the no smoking law is not being broken as they do not constitute a part of the licensed premises. It’s all a nod and a wink job. The fact that alcoholic drinking is now taking place off of the licensed premises, and may be breaking another law, seems to be of little consequence – nobody appears to be bothered. Will such a “get out” be received here with equally blind and sympathetic eyes? Again, nobody seems to know.

Such a hotch-potch was this law turning into that Tony Blair seemed to wash his hands of it entirely; content in leaving Jack Straw to try and sort it all out. Little wonder the result has been the last straw in absurdity!

That is to say, it was the last straw in absurdity until once more our Tony started wagging his forefinger! Groan, and double-groan! Here we go again! Unlike Iraq, where Saddam Hussein was telling the truth and the investigators failed to find any evidence of weapons of mass destruction either before or after the war, Iran is openly going nuclear, and that coupled with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s outright declaration that Israel should be ”wiped off the map” has had many western politicians reeling and wondering what to do about it. It’s becoming generally accepted that whatever the UN may say, and any sanctions that it may impose, will hardly do much to solve this fast escalating threat to world peace.

I’m sure this time around we don’t need intelligence reports (for what use they are!), or any dossiers – sexed up or not – to tell us what is going on here. Iran, with all that heat and sun in the summer, and sitting on all that oil for the winter and the dull periods, is one of the last places on earth where a nuclear power station would be genuinely needed. Like North Korea (another tinderbox), Iran has bided its time and waited until the West had played its hand. The war on Iraq has left us with a costly and a no-end-in-sight disaster – a weeping sore that will have us tied up there for years. Everyone with more than two brain cells trying to mate knows that there is no appetite left in either the UK or in America to become embroiled in yet another war. And with both Bush and Blair having lost favour and credibility over the Iraq fiasco, for them to be able to take their countries into battle on a new front is very much an improbability.

So, with our hand played out like the greatest premature ejaculation the world has ever known – we can only wait, embarrassed, to see how the game will finally end. My money is on a surprise by Israel, should the Iranians progress too far with their plans – and that surprise might be another biggest thing the world has ever known! But then that’s life isn’t it? If you suffer from PE then it can’t be that uncommon for someone else to do the banging, can it? Shock and Awe? More like fed-up and sore!

Talking of banging: American research at Baltimore’s John Hopkins University has found that Viagra is good for the heart and may prevent heart attacks by counteracting the effect of adrenaline, thereby putting “a brake” on the organ should it attempt to work too hard. It’s also been suggested that: “We may not be too far away from taking Viagra one-a-day instead of aspirin.” That’ll certainly extend the stiff upper lip a bit over here, won’t it?

I find this beneficial revelation to be quite strange as it comes only days after other bodies have been calling for the government to force the manufacturers to add warnings to the labels of Viagra (and other impotence drugs) telling users that people have gone blind through using the drug. Do you think it might be some sort of a governmental wheeze to keep the people happy, but in the dark? Shock and Awe? Who said that? Who’s there? Who is it? Put the ruddy light on – I’ve just fallen over a broom! At least, I think it was a broom…

The facts I’ve found:
Non-arteritic ischemic optic neuropathy, a loss of vision that is frequently irreversible, is one of the most common causes of sudden blindness (especially in older people) with an estimated 1,000 to 6,000 cases a year occurring in America. (I can’t find any UK figures for it.) People mostly at risk are those with diabetes and / or heart disease which, as they are also two of the leading causes of impotence, make it hard to prove that the tablets are actually to blame.

And finally, I don’t like what I’m seeing at the Beeb and I bet I’m not alone. Ten foreign language services, with the loss of more than 200 jobs, are to be axed from the BBC World Service in order to fund a new £19million Arabic TV channel that will be broadcast across the Middle East in competition with al-Jazeera. And in further cost-cutting, job losses are soon to be announced in the news gathering department.

Whilst this new TV channel is obviously a good idea, it should not be at the expense of the other services. The broadcasts to be sacrificed are in Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech, Greek, Hungarian, Kazakh, Polish, Slovak, Slovene and Thai because, we’re told, “they have lost their relevance since the end of the Cold War.” Really? Well, up until now we’ve all known that, far from its ideals of being free from both political and commercial influence and answerable only to its viewers and listeners, the World Service of the BBC was basically government propaganda led. However, nobody before now has ever had the balls to come out to say that quite so plainly! As this new TV channel, an obvious portal for propaganda, is likely to have been the idea of the government and not that of the cash-strapped Beeb, I feel that they should fully fund it as an “extra”; not as an “instead of”.

The facts I’ve found:
The BBC motto is: Nation Shall Speak Peace Unto Nation. But is that now only when it is paid to do so by the government?

The BBC World Service HQ is located at Bush House, a central London building that is apparently not named after any American President. Are we absolutely sure of that? You might have imagined that a company that forced Top Cat to become Boss Cat to avoid confusion with a mere feline food product when it screened the cartoon moggie over here would have been sensitive enough to change the name of their Worldwide Services HQ building the day the first Bush popped up as a President, mightn’t you?

Above the main Aldwych entrance you can see two imposing figures which represent England and America and between them they hold the torch of human progress above which is the motto “To the friendship of English speaking peoples”. A little inappropriate for the use of the building, isn’t it? What about the friendship of non-English speaking peoples? Don’t they matter?

The BBC Worldwide Service is funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the grant for 2005/6 is £239million. Now that’s what I call impartiality! But I guess that if, as it appears to me lately, the BBC is to all effects exclusively to operate to the pleasure of Blair and Bush then it’s only right that they should pay for their initials to be in the corporation’s name!

Folks, just keep your eyes on that BBC crest. The day that one of those eagles is moved above the lion, I’m emigrating!

See you all next week…

“The Bitch!” 29/10/05.

Article Source: http://www.articledashboard.com

“The Bitch!” column may be freely re-produced on any web site but only in its entirety and with the linked acknowledgement that “The Bitch!” writes for AstaBGay at www.astabgay.com attached to the article. On past form this column can sometimes be extremely controversial therefore it must be accepted as a condition that AstaBGay shall not be held liable for any losses or damages incurred by those who choose to reproduce these articles on their web sites.

The Bitch! regrets that because of the sheer volume of e-mails received it is often impossible to reply to them all. However, they are appreciated, and all do get read.

A study listed in Archives of Internal Medicine showed 631 doctors, mostly medical residents, were given a test prior to completing an online training course. On the pretest, half the doctors misdiagnosed botulism, 84 percent misdiagnosed plague and a case of routine chickenpox was misdiagnosed as smallpox by 42 percent of the doctors. “We’ve got a dangerous gap here and we need a much clearer strategic game plan,” said Shelley Hearne, executive director of Trust for America’s Health, which tracks how well states are prepared for bioterrorism or pandemic.

In addition to the lack of bioterror knowledge in health care professionals, high-ranking officials in the US Health and Human Services Department have stated major concerns about the government’s ability to deliver medicines in the event of a bioterror attack. In response to these concerns, steps are being taken to address these issues. To improve the delivery of medicines in the event of a national emergency some suggested steps include the delivery of medicines from local fire stations, police stations, and even via the US Postal Service.

In the book Sledgehammer, Dr. Paulo J. Reyes describes a Smallpox outbreak, and how rapidly the disease can spread, the potentially devastating effects of air-borne contaminants, and the potential for extremely large numbers of fatalities. The point in writing the book, according to Reyes, is to bring to light the high potential for bioterrorist attacks in the United States and to demonstrate how critical it is to develop emergency response strategies to handle the delivery of medicines and the medical treatment.

The combined efforts of the United States government and the medical community are crucial in preventing millions of deaths in the event of such a disaster. Despite global efforts to eradicate terrorism, the threat of a bioterror attack remains high. The United States must prepare emergency response strategies and develop effective means of delivering medicines to all parts of the country. LetÂ’s prepare now so our nation can respond rapidly and effectively resulting in minimal damage and loss of life.

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For information on Reyes book, Sledgehammer or current news on smallpox and current events stop by www.pauloreyes.com or contact Paulo Reyes, M.D. or publicist Diana Ennen at diana@pauloreyes.com (954) 971-4025