New Hampshire Health News Digest

Washington Finally Gets It on Radical Islam - article by Daniel Pipes Does the Bush administration really believe, as its leadership has kept repeating since right after 9/11, that Islam is a "religion of peace" not connected to the problem of terrorism? Plenty of indications suggested that it knew better, but year after year the official line remained the same. From the outside, it seemed that officialdom was engaged in active self-delusion. In fact, things were better than they seemed, as David E. Kaplan establishes in an important investigation in U.S. News & World Report, based on over 100 interviews and the review of a dozen internal documents. Earlier arguments over the nature of the enemy – terrorism vs. radical Islam – have been resolved: America's highest officials widely agree that the country's "greatest ideological foe is a highly politicized form of radical Islam and that Washington and its allies cannot afford to stand by" as it gain...

ABC News: Official: Zarqawi Eludes Capture; Computer Discovered (hat tip: LGF) Official: Zarqawi Eludes Capture; Computer Discovered Iraq's Most Wanted Fugitive on the Run After Leaving Behind Valuable Information Apr. 26, 2005 - Jordanian rebel Abu Musab al-Zarqawi -- Iraq's most wanted fugitive -- recently eluded capture by American troops, but left behind a treasure trove of information, a senior military official told ABC News. On Feb. 20, the alleged terror mastermind was heading to a secret meeting in Ramadi, just west of Fallujah, where he used to base his operations, the official said. Task Force 626 -- the covert American military unit charged with finding Zarqawi -- had troops in place to grab the fugitive, and mobile vehicle checkpoints had been established around the city's perimeter. Another U.S. official said predator drones were also in flight, tracking movements in and around the city. A source who had been inside the Zarqawi network alerted...

For White House, Bolton debate about state of U.N. The White House is shifting debate away from John R. Bolton, President Bush's embattled nominee to be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, and toward the scandal-plagued U.N. itself. "We are going to make the case from here on out that this is about reform -- or more of the same -- at the U.N.," a senior administration official told The Washington Times. "Senators are realizing this is about the U.N.," added the official, who discussed Mr. Bolton on the condition of anonymity. "And they know the president is firmly behind him." To underscore the point, the White House wants Mr. Bolton to meet with Sen. George V. Voinovich to assuage the Ohio Republican's concerns about the nominee's temperament, which some consider abrasive. The official said Mr. Bush thinks Mr. Voinovich, who last week put the Bolton nomination on hold until May 12, "will support him once questio...

New Scientist Breaking News - Risk-taking boys do not get the girls WHETHER it's driving too fast, bungee-jumping or reckless skateboarding, young men will try almost anything to be noticed by the opposite sex. But a study of attitudes to risk suggests that the only people impressed by their stunts are other men. Futile risk-taking might seem to have little going for it in Darwinian terms. So why were our rash ancestors not replaced by more cautious contemporaries? One idea is that risk-takers are advertising their fitness to potential mates by showing off their strength and bravery. This fits with the fact that men in their prime reproductive years take more risks. To test this idea, William Farthing of the University of Maine in Orono surveyed 48 young men and 52 young women on their attitudes to risky scenarios. Men thought women would be impressed by pointless gambles, but women in fact preferred cautious men (Evolution and Human Behaviour, vol 26, p 171). “Men thought women wo...

New Scientist Breaking News - Risk-taking boys do not get the girls WHETHER it's driving too fast, bungee-jumping or reckless skateboarding, young men will try almost anything to be noticed by the opposite sex. But a study of attitudes to risk suggests that the only people impressed by their stunts are other men. Futile risk-taking might seem to have little going for it in Darwinian terms. So why were our rash ancestors not replaced by more cautious contemporaries? One idea is that risk-takers are advertising their fitness to potential mates by showing off their strength and bravery. This fits with the fact that men in their prime reproductive years take more risks. To test this idea, William Farthing of the University of Maine in Orono surveyed 48 young men and 52 young women on their attitudes to risky scenarios. Men thought women would be impressed by pointless gambles, but women in fact preferred cautious men (Evolution and Human Behaviour, vol 26, p 171). “Men thoug...

New Scientist Breaking News - Risk-taking boys do not get the girls WHETHER it's driving too fast, bungee-jumping or reckless skateboarding, young men will try almost anything to be noticed by the opposite sex. But a study of attitudes to risk suggests that the only people impressed by their stunts are other men. Futile risk-taking might seem to have little going for it in Darwinian terms. So why were our rash ancestors not replaced by more cautious contemporaries? One idea is that risk-takers are advertising their fitness to potential mates by showing off their strength and bravery. This fits with the fact that men in their prime reproductive years take more risks. To test this idea, William Farthing of the University of Maine in Orono surveyed 48 young men and 52 young women on their attitudes to risky scenarios. Men thought women would be impressed by pointless gambles, but women in fact preferred cautious men (Evolution and Human Behaviour, vol 26, p 171). “Men thoug...

CNN.com - High-tech solution to highway congestion - Apr 25, 2005 TROY, New York (AP) -- Picking up doughnuts on the way to work recently, George List slid back into the driver's seat and heard a voice from the cup holder suggest an alternate route. The car wasn't talking, exactly. The voice came from a handheld computer nestled in the holder that links his car to 200 other vehicles in the area. Data from all the vehicles -- where they are, how quickly they move -- is being used to create snapshots of area traffic patterns. The system had detected a bottleneck ahead and quickly calculated a faster route. "I said, 'Oh, that's interesting, it changed its mind when I was doing something else,"' he said. List obeyed the machine. He later saw the traffic jam -- at a distance, from another road. List, director of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's Center for Infrastructure and Transportation Studies, co-heads a federally funded project ...

The Scotsman - Top Stories - It's not clever to send too many texts and e-mails : Key points • Texting makes you less intelligent, it is revealed • Brains suffer from information overload, apparently • Solution is: switch off! Key quote 'The impairment only lasts for as long as the distraction. But you have to ask whether our current obsession with constant communication is causing long-term damage to concentration and mental ability.' - Dr Glenn Wilson, psychologist at the University of London Story in full CONSTANT text messaging and e-mailing causes a reduction in mental capability equivalent to the loss of ten IQ points, according to research. Tapping away on a mobile phone or computer keypad or checking messages on a handheld gadget temporarily reduces the performance of the brain, according to the study into the effects of 'infomania'. The psychologist behind the research has concluded that obsessive use of phones and e-mail devices could imp...

Caucasians preceded East Asians in basin - The Washington Times: World - April 20, 2005 : "Caucasians preceded East Asians in basin By Robert J. Saiget AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE URUMQI, China -- After years of controversy and political intrigue, archaeologists using genetic testing have proved that Caucasians roamed China's Tarim Basin 1,000 years before East Asian people arrived. The research finding -- which the Beijing government apparently delayed releasing, fearing it could fuel Uighur Muslim separatism in China's western-most Xinjiang region -- is based on a cache of ancient dried-out corpses that have been found around the Tarim Basin in recent decades. Click to learn more... The discoveries in the 1980s of the undisturbed 4,000-year-old 'Beauty of Loulan' and the 3,000-year-old body of the 'Charchan Man' are legendary in international archaeological circles for the fine state of their preservation and for the wealth of knowledge they ...

My Way News : "Perhaps no member of the conclave evoked such potent opinions - and has stirred more arguments - as the 78-year-old Ratzinger and the role he's held since 1981: head of the powerful Vatican office that oversees doctrine and takes action against dissent. 'We are moving toward a dictatorship of relativism which does not recognize anything as for certain and which has as its highest goal one's own ego and one's own desires,' he said Monday in a pre-conclave Mass in memory of John Paul. The church, he insisted, must defend itself against threats such as 'radical individualism' and 'vague religious mysticism.' As prefect of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, he was the Vatican's iron hand. His interventions are a roll call of flashpoints for the church: the 1987 order stripping American theologian the Rev. Charles Curran of the right to teach because he encouraged dissent; crippling Latin Americans supporti...

HoustonChronicle.com - CDC: Dangers of being overweight overstated CHICAGO — Being overweight is nowhere near as big a killer as the government thought, ranking No. 7 instead of No. 2 among the nation's leading preventable causes of death, according to a startling new calculation from the CDC. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated today that packing on too many pounds accounts for 25,814 deaths a year in the United States. As recently as January, the CDC came up with an estimate 14 times higher: 365,000 deaths. The new analysis found that obesity — being extremely overweight — is indisputably lethal. But like several recent smaller studies, it found that people who are modestly overweight actually have a lower risk of death than those of normal weight. Biostatistician Mary Grace Kovar, a consultant for the University of Chicago's National Opinion Research Center in Washington, said "normal" may be set too low for today's population....

BBC NEWS | Health | Happy moments 'protect the heart' : Happiness was more commonly linked to leisure, rather than work Every moment of happiness counts when it comes to protecting your heart, researchers have said. A team from University College London said happiness leads to lower levels of stress-inducing chemicals. They found that even when happier people experienced stress, they had low levels of a chemical which increases the risk of heart disease. The research is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. This shows that people who are happy and unstressed are likely to have less potentially dangerous stress chemicals in their bodies Professor Peter Weissberg, British Heart Foundation It showed that those who were happy less often had higher levels of a bloodstream chemical called plasma fibrinogen, which shows if there is inflammation present."

Economist.com | Demography and the West : "Half a billion Americans? Aug 22nd 2002 | WASHINGTON, DC From The Economist print edition Demographic forces are pulling America and Europe apart. If the trend goes on, it will fundamentally alter America's position in the world FORGET transatlantic rifts about trade, Iraq, Kyoto, or the International Criminal Court. These have been thoroughly ventilated. One area of difference has not got the attention it deserves: demography. It may prove the most important of all. For 50 years, America and the nations of Western Europe have been lumped together as rich countries, sharing the same basic demographic features: stable populations, low and declining fertility, increasing numbers of old people. For much of that period, this was true. But in the 1980s, the two sides began to diverge. The effect was muted at first, because demographic change is slow. But it is also remorseless, and is now beginning to show up. America...

All 10 million Europeans: demographic collapse. ALL 10 MILLION EUROPEANS The last two generations grew up with the idea of the "population explosion". For a century the world has lived with constant upward revision of population forecasts: the only question was if the growth would be fast, or very fast. And the last generation faced the question: how many billions can this planet support? So it is a culture shock, when new projections of global population include scenarios of dramatic population decline - without any meteorite impacts, new epidemics, or famines. Or when a UN report suggests that Europe needs 700 million immigrants to maintain its age structure... Is the future population nightmare not rural Bangladesh, but rural Estonia? Updated March 2005. The myth of population growth was strong until recently. A few years ago, the website of the Latvian centre for demography research included this image of the population boom, a 1997 painting by A. Bauskenieks ca...

My Way News : "Ted Nugent to Fellow NRAers: Get Hardcore With an assault weapon in each hand, rocker and gun rights advocate Ted Nugent urged National Rifle Association members to be "hardcore, radical extremists demanding the right to self defense." Speaking at the NRA's annual convention Saturday, Nugent said each NRA member should try to enroll 10 new members over the next year and associate only with other members. "Let's next year sit here and say, 'Holy smokes, the NRA has 40 million members now,'" he said. "No one is allowed at our barbecues unless they are an NRA member. Do that in your life."

ThisisLondon Women's lives 'put at risk' by net firms A row broke out today over sperm donations as internet companies are accused of putting women's lives at risk by dealing in untested samples. Firms are sending out fresh sperm by courier to women for home insemination within two hours. One of the companies, SpermDirect.co.uk, based in Reading, claims that by providing fresh sperm it gets around new regulations which say donors can no longer have anonymity. The new rule only applies to frozen sperm. However, doctors said today such businesses were putting women and their children at risk as the sperm samples did not undergo testing.

News : "Eureka! Extraordinary discovery unlocks secrets of the ancients Thousands of previously illegible manuscripts containing work by some of the greats of classical literature are being read for the first time using technology which experts believe will unlock the secrets of the ancient world. Among treasures already discovered by a team from Oxford University are previously unseen writings by classical giants including Sophocles, Euripides and Hesiod. Invisible under ordinary light, the faded ink comes clearly into view when placed under infra-red light, using techniques developed from satellite imaging. The Oxford documents form part of the great papyrus hoard salvaged from an ancient rubbish dump in the Graeco-Egyptian town of Oxyrhynchus more than a century ago. The thousands of remaining documents, which will be analysed over the next decade, are expected to include works by Ovid and Aeschylus, plus a series of Christian gospels which have been lost for up to 2...

My Way News Roundup Nabs More Than 10,000 Fugitives WASHINGTON (AP) - More than 10,000 fugitives, many wanted for violent crimes, were rounded up over the past week in a coordinated nationwide effort led by U.S. marshals. Officers from 960 federal, state and local law enforcement agencies took part in the concentrated search, which coincided with Crime Victims Rights Week, officials said. The dragnet caught 10,340 people, some of whom had two or more outstanding arrest warrants, Justice Department officials said. More than 150 who were arrested were wanted for murder, another 550 were sought on rape or sexual assault charges, and more than 600 had outstanding arrest warrants for armed robbery, officials said. Among those captured were 150 gang members and 100 unregistered sex offenders, they said. [...] Among those arrested were escaped prisoners and criminal suspects who did not turn up for court proceedings. Congress gave the Marshals Service more money and authority to...

The American Thinker The fixed linkage between jihad - a permanent, uniquely Islamic institution - and enslavement, provides a very tenable explanation for the unparalleled scale and persistence of slavery in Muslim dominions, and societies. This general observation applies as well to “specialized” forms of slavery, including the (procurement and) employment of eunuchs, slave soldiering (especially of adolescents), other forms of child slavery, and harem slavery. Jihad slavery, in its myriad manifestations, became a powerful instrument for both expansive Islamization, and the maintenance of Muslim societies.

BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Rumsfeld warning to Iraq leaders Progress praised Mr Rumsfeld urged the new Prime Minister, Ibrahim Jaafari, and the new President, Jalal Talabani, to avoid delays in setting up the new administration. "It's important that the new government be attentive to the competence of the people in the ministries and that they avoid unnecessary turbulence," Mr Rumsfeld told journalists on his pre-dawn flight into Baghdad. He said it was important for the security forces to continue building their strength because US forces were not going to be there for ever. The defence secretary also praised progress made in forming a leadership that spanned Iraq's diverse groups. Mr Jaafari acknowledged there would be problems ahead but expressed optimism that the new government could meet those challenges.

BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | US legal legacy for Iraqi economy : "But it is the new rules governing Iraq's economy which have pitched observers into opposing ideological camps. The rules have been welcomed by some observers - including London's Economist magazine, which hailed them as a 'capitalist's dream' - but others have dubbed them a 'corporate invasion'. This is hyperliberal policy, but it's very good policy Yahia Said Economist, LSE Orders 37 and 49 slash top tax rates from 45% to 15% - one of the lowest rates in the world. Order 54 abolishes all duties on imports to Iraq, apart from a 5% reconstruction levy. Order 39 allows 100% foreign ownership of Iraqi companies except in the oil, gas and banking sectors. Put together, such laws have remodelled the Iraqi economy, making it one of the most open in the world. Yahia Said, an Iraqi expert in transitional economies and post-conflict Iraq at the London School of Economics,...

CNN.com - Clever clock stops you sleeping late - Apr 4, 2005 (CNN) -- If you are not a morning person and find it difficult to get out of bed, then "Clocky" might be the thing to improve the start of your day. A scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has invented the clever device, which will defy even the most determined alarm clock "snoozers." Research associate Gauri Nanda's two-wheeled "Clocky" automatically rolls off the bedside table when the alarm goes off and the snooze button is pressed. It travels around the room and its carpet-covered surface bumps into objects that come into its path, until it finds a resting place. "Minutes later, when the alarm sounds again, the sleeper must get up out of bed and search for Clocky," says the 25-year-old scientist. "This ensures that the person is fully awake before turning it off."

Scientists Create Remote-Controlled Flies : Yale University researchers say their study that used lasers to create remote-controlled fruit flies could lead to a better understanding of overeating and violence in humans. Using the lasers to stimulate specific brain cells, researchers say they were able to make the flies jump, walk, flap their wings and fly. Even headless flies took flight when researchers stimulated the correct neurons, according to the study, published in the April 7 issue of the journal Cell. Scientists say the study could ultimately help identify the cells associated with psychiatric disorders, overeating and aggressiveness. Biologists have long known that an electrical stimulus can trigger muscle response, but this approach used focused beams of light to stimulate neurons that would have been impossible to study using electrodes. Gero Miesenbock, associate professor of cell biology at Yale, said if the process could be duplicated on mice, research...

Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Scientist calls for world DNA database : Alok Jha, science correspondent Monday April 11, 2005 The Guardian Everyone in the world should have their genetic profile stored on a database, but the information should be held independently of the authorities, according to the pioneer of DNA fingerprinting. Current practice means that only the DNA of criminals is stored in most countries and the information is held by government agencies. At a lecture on Saturday to mark the 20th anniversary of the discovery of DNA fingerprinting, Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys, of Leicester University, said a global DNA database would have been invaluable in attempting to identify victims of the recent tsunami. Instead, investigators faced endless searches through incomplete records, or having to cause further distress to relatives of the victims. Prof Jeffreys criticised the current version of the UK criminal DNA database and expressed concern about new la...

Explosions in Space May Have Initiated Ancient Extinction on Earth | SpaceRef - Your Space Reference Explosions in Space May Have Initiated Ancient Extinction on Earth Scientists at NASA and the University of Kansas say that a mass extinction on Earth hundreds of millions of years ago could have been triggered by a star explosion called a gamma-ray burst. The scientists do not have direct evidence that such a burst activated the ancient extinction. The strength of their work is their atmospheric modeling -- essentially a "what if" scenario. The scientists calculated that gamma-ray radiation from a relatively nearby star explosion, hitting the Earth for only ten seconds, could deplete up to half of the atmosphere's protective ozone layer. Recovery could take at least five years. With the ozone layer damaged, ultraviolet radiation from the Sun could kill much of the life on land and near the surface of oceans and lakes, and disrupt the food chain. Gamma-ray burst...

Labs selling DNA assessments - washingtonpost.com Highlights - MSNBC.com Labs selling DNA assessments Costly tests offer predictions of future illnesses By Ariana Eunjung Cha SEATTLE - The boxes arrive in the mail by the dozens each day and are stacked in neat rows in the laboratory. Inside are swabs of the inside cheek, drops of blood, material that the senders hope will give them a peek at the life they have been dealt by their genes. Over the next few weeks, Genelex Corp. technician Dascena Vincent and her colleagues here will conduct what they call a nutritional genetic assessment, analyzing the DNA samples for certain deficiencies. Problems in the genes that handle dietary fats? That could put you at risk for heart disease. Trouble with those that help rid your body of toxins like smoke? Cancer could be an issue later in life. And how about those associated with metabolizing vitamin D? Be watchful for signs of deteriorating bone strength. Based on the findings, the co...

Labs selling DNA assessments - washingtonpost.com Highlights - MSNBC.com Labs selling DNA assessments Costly tests offer predictions of future illnesses By Ariana Eunjung Cha SEATTLE - The boxes arrive in the mail by the dozens each day and are stacked in neat rows in the laboratory. Inside are swabs of the inside cheek, drops of blood, material that the senders hope will give them a peek at the life they have been dealt by their genes. Over the next few weeks, Genelex Corp. technician Dascena Vincent and her colleagues here will conduct what they call a nutritional genetic assessment, analyzing the DNA samples for certain deficiencies. Problems in the genes that handle dietary fats? That could put you at risk for heart disease. Trouble with those that help rid your body of toxins like smoke? Cancer could be an issue later in life. And how about those associated with metabolizing vitamin D? Be watchful for signs of deteriorating bone strength. Based on the findings, the co...

Ukrainian President Appeals to Congress for Aid, Improved Ties (washingtonpost.com) Ukrainian President Appeals to Congress for Aid, Improved Ties By Peter Baker Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, April 7, 2005; Page A21 With a triumphant flourish, as American lawmakers waved orange scarves in support, Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko capped his first U.S. tour since taking office by beseeching a joint meeting of Congress yesterday to help anchor his troubled nation firmly in the West. Summoning the spirits of Woodrow Wilson, John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan, the leader of the "Orange Revolution" that toppled a discredited government in Kiev called for "a new era in U.S.-Ukrainian relations" that would make his country a model democracy fully integrated in such Euro-Atlantic institutions as NATO. Congress gave him a hero's welcome. Only a few foreign leaders are accorded the honor of addressing a joint meeting. The assembled senators and ...

Wired News: Cousteau Sub Mimics Great White : The grandson of famous oceanographer and filmmaker Jacques Cousteau believes the best way to learn about sharks is to become one. Fabien Cousteau, inspired as a child by the comic book Red Rackham's Treasure, where the main character, Tintin, adventures underwater in a shark-shaped submarine, decided as an adult to build his own. 'It's the same thought process as Jane Goodall or Diane Fossey. You don't want to separate yourself from the animal. You want to be part of the animal's realm,' Cousteau said. Cousteau enlisted the services of renowned Hollywood design engineer and animatronics expert Eddie Paul to build a great white submarine. 'It's extremely innovative' said Cousteau. 'It's a 1,200-pound tool that looks, feels and moves like a great white shark.'"

Mugged by la Realite : "FREDERIC ENCEL, PROFESSOR OF international relations at the prestigious Ecole Nationale d'Administration in Paris and a man not known for crying wolf, recently stated that France is becoming a new Lebanon. The implication, far-fetched though it may seem, was that civil upheaval might be no more than a few years off, sparked by growing ethnic and religious polarization. In recent weeks, a series of events has underlined this ominous trend. On March 8, tens of thousands of high school students marched through central Paris to protest education reforms announced by the government. Repeatedly, peaceful demonstrators were attacked by bands of black and Arab youths--about 1,000 in all, according to police estimates. The eyewitness accounts of victims, teachers, and most interestingly the attackers themselves gathered by the left-wing daily Le Monde confirm the motivation: racism. Some of the attackers openly expressed their hatred of 'little Fre...

Primitive brain is 'smarter' than we think, MIT study shows - MIT News Office Primitive structures deep within the brain may have a far greater role in our high-level everyday thinking processes than previously believed, report researchers at the MIT Picower Center for Learning and Memory in the Feb. 24 issue of Nature. The results of this study led by Earl K. Miller, associate director of the Picower Center at MIT, have implications about how we learn. The new knowledge also may lead to better understanding and treatment for autism and schizophrenia, which could result from an imbalance between primitive and more advanced brain systems. Our brains have evolved a fast, reliable way to learn rules such as 'stop at red' and 'go at green.' Dogma has it that the 'big boss' lobes of the cerebral cortex, responsible for daily and long-term decision-making, learn the rules first and then transfer the knowledge to the more primitive, large forebrain re...

Research Shows Sex Satisfies as Much as Money - The Hilltop - Life & Style Each person seeks happiness, whether their happiness stems from money, cars, family, education, a mansion on the hill or sex. But who knew that sex could provide happiness for longer than an hour? The latest news is that if you increase your sexual activity from once a month to once a week, your happiness will be equal to someone who receives a $50,000 annual pay raise. "Money, Sex, and Happiness: An Empirical Study" is a recent study by David Blanchflower and Andrew Oswald. Compare two people, for instance, with the same job qualifications and characteristics and one of them was happily married. The person who is single would have to make an extra $100,000 a year in order to be as happy as the married one. It seems that the most happiness stems from the idea of having just one partner.

Herald.com | 04/03/2005 | Syria is fulcrum of `axis of evil' : "Today the immediate objective of this Iran-Syria-Hezbollah-Hamas-Islamic Jihad axis is to destabilize Syria's neighbors (Iraq, Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinian Authority) and sabotage any Arab-Israeli peace. Its strategic aim is to quash the Arab Spring, which if not stopped would isolate, surround and seriously imperil these remaining centers of terror and radicalism. How then to defeat it? Iran is too large, oil-rich and entrenched to be confronted directly. The terror groups are too shadowy. But Syria is different. Being a state, it has an address. The identity and location of its leadership, military installations and other fixed assets are known. Unlike Iran, however, it has no oil of any significance. It is poor and the regime is weak, despised not only for its corruption and incompetence, but also because of its extremely narrow ethnic base. Assad and his gang are almost exclusively from the A...

TCS: Tech Central Station - The Future of Life in America... and Around the World Asimo Where is it written that "life" has to be carbon-based? Why can't it be silicon-based, or metal-based? That's the thinking in Japan, where two huge forces -- the low birth rate and the reluctance to admit immigrants -- have caused a civilization-level crisis in that island nation. American consumers might be casually familiar with what the Japanese are up to; Sony's Aibo "dog" has gained attention as a novelty, and Honda has even advertised its Asimo robot in Entertainment Weekly. But most Americans have no idea that the Japanese aren't building robots as pets or toys; they are building robots to replace… the Japanese, as they grow old and die, leaving behind few if any children. The Tokyo government calls 2005 the "year of the robot"; indeed, 'bots are the star of the show at the World Expo in Nagoya, which opened on March 25...

TCS: Tech Central Station - Robotic Death from Above The handwriting was on the wall -- or in the sky as it were -- when an unmanned Predator aircraft destroyed a Taliban target in late 2001 with a Hellfire missile. We're now ushering in an era of fighter-bombers that will strike targets with deadly efficiency while putting no American pilots in harm's way. Unmanned Combat Air Vehicles (UCAV) will make today's piloted planes seem like flying bricks by comparison, with advantages too long to list here. For starters though, no pilot means a lighter, smaller, and cheaper aircraft. Large canopies, pilot displays, and environmental control systems will disappear. "The UCAV offers new design freedoms that can be exploited to produce a smaller, simpler aircraft, about half the size of a conventional fighter aircraft," according to the Federation of American Scientists. It would weigh only about one-third to one-fourth as much as a manned plane. Cos...

Newsday.com: Iraqis Tap Sunni for Parliament Speaker : BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Lawmakers broke days of rancorous stalemate Sunday and reached out to Iraq's Sunni Muslim minority for their parliament speaker, cutting through ethnic and sectarian barriers that have held up selection of a new government for more than two months since the country's first free elections in 50 years. Deputies still face, however, difficult choices for Cabinet posts and failed again to name a new president -- broadly expected to be Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani. That choice and those of two vice presidents were put off until a Wednesday session that could mark a major milestone as Iraq tries to build a democratic government and civil society. Once the president and his deputies are selected, they have 14 days to choose a prime minister, the most powerful position in Iraq's envisioned government hierarchy. That job was widely believed reserved for Ibrahim al-Jaafari, of the Shiite Muslim majority. Pressu...

Telegraph | News | Junk food 'helps pupils pass exams' : " Children do better in exams if they are given junk food for lunch, new research has found. The findings seem to contradict the approach taken by the chef Jamie Oliver, who has run a campaign for healthier school meals. Jamie Oliver The findings contradict Jamie Oliver's approach Researchers found that struggling schools were manipulating their lunch menus to give pupils a lift before vital exams. The menus were loaded with pizzas, hot dogs, chocolate drinks and biscuits and improved test results immediately afterwards. The research, conducted in America and published in the British Journal of Public Economics, found that many American schools used computers to monitor the nutritional content of their meals."

military news about Iraq IRAQ: Sunni Arab Clerics Giving Up On Al Qaeda April 1, 2005: Another major Shia religious festival, which lasted from 29-31 March, ended without incident. The government made a major effort to provide security for the large gatherings of Shia Arabs attending religious ceremonies and moving around in southern Iraq. Sunni Arab terrorists, especially al Qaeda, consider these ceremonies a major insult to Sunni religious beliefs. The government deployed a security effort on the same level as the one rolled out for the January elections. Coalition troops deployed mostly as back up and quick reaction forces. Al Qaeda tried to use suicide car bombers, but none of them got through to large assemblies of Shia Arabs. In one incident, a car bomb went off and killed five people, which was the most any of the attacks were able to do. Another reason the attacks were not successful was that, in the days before March 29th, police arrested hundreds of Sunni Arab...

BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Sunnis urged to join Iraqi police Sunnis form the bulk of the anti-US insurgency, which frequently attacks the police and army. A Iraqi government spokesman said the call on Sunnis to participate in the security forces was a welcome change. [...] Political balance Until recently, many Sunni clerics had branded the security forces as US collaborators. The army and police are largely dominated by Shias and Kurds. Map of Iraq showing location of Khan Bani Saad Ahmed Abdul Ghafour al-Samarrai of the Association of Muslim Scholars said Sunni membership was necessary to prevent the forces falling into "the hands of those who have caused chaos, destruction and violated the sanctities". However, the group consisting of 64 clerics and scholars also told Sunnis not to help foreign troops against their own countrymen. The change of heart appears to have been prompted by January's elections when millions of Iraqis defie...

MSNBC - GM rolls out world's first fuel-cell truck The modified Chevrolet Silverado crew-cab truck will be leased to the Defense Department for noncombat uses at Fort Belvoir, Va., and Camp Pendleton, Calif., and tested in various climates and terrain around the country until July 2006. Its electric engine emits a high-pitched whine, but a key feature in future fuel-cell models developed with the military will be stealth — along with better fuel consumption and zero tailpipe emissions. “Noise on the battlefield is not a good thing when you don't want to be found,” Nadeau said. Instead of gasoline, the fuel cells run on energy produced when hydrogen and oxygen are mixed, and the only byproduct is water vapor. The truck is powered by two hydrogen fuel cell stacks and can travel 125 miles. It can carry up to 1,600 pounds, accelerate from zero to 60 mph in 19 seconds and has a top speed of 93 mph. Since 2003, President Bush has pushed a five-year, $1.7 billion re...

CNN.com - An unholy alliance - Mar 29, 2005 Florida (CNN) -- A couple of hours up the road from where some September 11 hijackers learned to fly, the new head of Aryan Nation is praising them -- and trying to create an unholy alliance between his white supremacist group and al Qaeda. "You say they're terrorists, I say they're freedom fighters. And I want to instill the same jihadic feeling in our peoples' heart, in the Aryan race, that they have for their father, who they call Allah." With his long beard and potbelly, August Kreis looks more like a washed up member of ZZ Top than an aspiring revolutionary. Don't let appearances fool you: his résumé includes stops at some of America's nastiest extremist groups -- Posse Comitatus, the Ku Klux Klan and Aryan Nation. "I don't believe that they were the ones that attacked us," Kreis said. "And even if they did, even if you say they did, I don't care!" Kreis wants to make common caus...

Middle East Newsline -IRAQI TROOPS INCREASE ROLE IN SUNNI TRIANGLE BAGHDAD [MENL] -- Iraq has quietly expanded its security responsibility to the worst areas of the Sunni Triangle. Iraqi officials said army and police forces have been given a larger role in operations in the Anbar province near the Syrian border. Al Anbar has been deemed the largest stronghold of the Sunni insurgency. 'Hopefully, within 18 months at the most we will be capable of securing Iraq,' Iraqi Interior Minister Falah Naqib said on Monday. 'We hope that next summer, there will be a huge reduction in the numbers of multinational patrols. In some cities, there will be no foreign troops at all.' Over the last week, Iraqi and U.S. forces have captured two Sunni insurgency bases around Baghdad. More than 85 insurgents were killed and about 100 others were captured."