Welcome to the Overnight News Digest (OND) for Tuesday, November 01, 2011.
OND is a regular
community feature on Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing near 12:00AM Eastern Time.
Creation and early water-bearing of the OND concept came from our very own Magnifico - proper respect is due.
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This diary is named for its "Hump Point" video: Bon Ton Roulet by Clifton Chenier
Please feel free to browse and add your own links, content or thoughts in the Comments section.
Any timestamps shown are relative to each publication.
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Top News |
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Miss. Couple Lament Loss Of The American Dream
By Debbie Elliott
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Following in his father's footsteps, Galatas joined the Army National Guard when he was just 18, still in high school. He went from being a weekend warrior to a full-time officer with the Guard and Reserves. He had high hopes to retire with full benefits at age 57. But that plan changed when he drove over a roadside bomb in Iraq in 2005.
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His retirement benefits amount to less than half of what his active duty salary was. He sometimes picks up aluminum cans and scrap metal to take to the salvage yard, but says that's no living.
"How fair is that?" he asks. "Just because I got hurt doing what you asked me to do, and I can't do it anymore, does that justify cutting my pay in half to where I can just barely survive?"
It's been even harder since his wife, Janis, lost her job after complications from a surgery last year. The couple's savings has run out, and Janis says some months they can't make the mortgage or other obligations. They care for her elderly mother and are helping pay down her sister's student loan that they co-signed 10 years ago. Her sister has lost her house to foreclosure.
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Their story is a familiar one — middle-aged Americans struggling to get by at the very time they expected to be securing their future. Janis is 58 years old and will be counting on Social Security in a few years. Now, she's afraid it won't be there.
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Texas toast: State’s drought-crippled ag market has global impact
By Stephen Lacey
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In August, agronomists showed that the historic drought in Texas had caused a stunning $5.3 billion in losses in the agricultural sector. Two months later, even with some rain finally coming to the state, Texas farmers are being crippled by a drought that could stretch beyond next summer.
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Some of the farthest-reaching effects may be on world cotton markets. Texas produces about 50 percent of U.S. cotton, and the United States in turn grows between 18 and 25 percent of the world's cotton, according to Darren Hudson, director of the Cotton Economics Research Institute at Texas Tech University. This year, however, yields even from irrigated crops have fallen about 60 percent on the high plains where the bulk of Texas's cotton crop grows, Mr. Hudson said. Farmers have given up on their "dry-land," or unirrigated, cotton crops.
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Since the record-setting drought began, the Texas Agrilife Extension Service reports that the livestock industry in Texas has seen more than $2 billion in losses, and the cotton industry has seen $1.8 billion in losses. Climate change will only make such drastic economic losses worse, sending larger ripples through the global economy.
Meanwhile, Texas governor and presidential candidate Rick Perry continues to call efforts to lower climate-change inducing greenhouse gases "job killers."
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New crack law: 1000s to be freed under revamped sentencing guidelines
By Samantha Stainburn
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Nearly 1,900 federal prisoners are estimated to be eligible for immediate release as new sentencing guidelines for crack cocaine are applied retroactively starting today, The Associated Press reports.
Until last year, prison sentences for people convicted of crack cocaine possession were significantly harsher than for people caught with powdered cocaine.
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The U.S. Sentencing Commission said the retroactive application of the rules could result in savings of more than $200 million in the first five years after it takes effect, Reuters reports.
Jim Wade, the federal public defender in Harrisburg, Pa., told the Allentown Morning Call that the new sentencing guidelines are a godsend for his clients, many of whom were not career criminals or large-scale dealers. “It's going to mean a lot to folks who are in prison and to their families,” Wade said. “It's a chance to restart and grow from a mistake. That's what we all hope.”
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Abuse of painkillers reaches 'epidemic' levels in US
By (BBC)
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Abuse of prescription painkiller have reached "epidemic" levels in the US, a government report says.
Overdoses of pain relievers cause more deaths than heroin and cocaine combined, the report has found.
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Sales of the drugs to pharmacies and health care facilities have surged more than 300% since 1999, according to figures from the Drug Enforcement Administration.
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The report says enough medicine was prescribed last year to keep every American adult medicated for one month.
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The report recommends tracking prescriptions more carefully and cracking down on "pill mills" (clinics that prescribe drugs inappropriately) and "doctor shopping" (when patients collect prescriptions from several doctors).
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UN warns of increasing use of mercenaries
By (Al Jazeera)
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A UN expert group warned of an alarming resurgence in the use of mercenaries and a major expansion in military and security companies operating without regulation or accountability.
The five-member working group on the use of mercenaries said in a report to the UN General Assembly that mercenary forces in Libya and Ivory Coast reportedly were involved in committing serious human rights violations - as were some contractors for military and security companies working in Iraq and elsewhere.
Faiza Patel, who heads the working group, told a news conference on Tuesday that states should cooperate to eliminate the use of mercenaries and regulate the activities of military and security companies.
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"Mercenaries continue to be recruited and active in several parts of the world," the report said. "Mercenary activities often constitute threats to national and even regional peace and security. They also have a serious impact on the right of peoples to self-determination and the enjoyment of human rights."
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International |
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Israel to speed up settler homes after Unesco vote
By (BBC)
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Israel says it will speed up Jewish settlement construction in the West Bank and East Jerusalem - and temporarily freeze the transfer of funds to the Palestinian Authority.
The announcement comes a day after the Palestinians won full membership of the UN cultural organisation, Unesco.
Palestinian Authoirty President Mahmoud Abbas says the move will speed up the destruction of the peace process.
. . .
A spokesman for the Israeli foreign ministry, Yigal Palmor, told the BBC the measures were designed to increase pressure on the Palestinians.
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DR Congo mining transparency site launched
By (BBC)
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A website has been launched to promote transparency in the Democratic Republic of Congo's mining sector, which is plagued by conflict and corruption.
The Carter Center said it helped launch congomines.org to give people more information about the mining sector, including contracts and payments.
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DR Congo is rich in gold, diamonds and coltan, used in mobile phones, but many mines are controlled by armed groups.
The people of DR Congo are among the poorest in Africa, even though the country is rich in resources.
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USA Politics, Economy, Major Events |
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U.S. Senate passes $182B spending bill
By (UPI)
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The U.S. Senate Tuesday passed a $182 billion appropriations bill cutting discretionary spending as part of the debt-ceiling deal reached last summer.
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The Justice Department's 2012 budget is $482 million below 2011 levels at $29.9 billion. The USDA's budget was $20 billion, slightly below last year's level, while Commerce gets $7.7 billion, a small increase from 2011, The Hill said.
The cuts are part of the $1.043 trillion discretionary-spending cap agreed to by both parties in their debt-ceiling pact, and the bill's strong passage bodes well for more spending bills before current government funding runs out Nov. 18, the Washington newspaper said.
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Boeing to Build Commercial Spacecraft at Kennedy, Create 550 Jobs
By (ScienceDaily)
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The Boeing Co. will set up Orbiter Processing Facility-3 at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida to manufacture and assemble its CST-100 spacecraft for launches to the International Space Station under a newly signed agreement with NASA and Space Florida. And that deal could provide a glimpse of how Kennedy's unique facilities will be used in the future.
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This deal, expected to produce 550 jobs by 2015, may be the first of several affecting other Kennedy facilities as the center sorts through what it needs for the future and what can be turned over to others. The retirement of the space shuttle fleet earlier this year made a number of facilities available for future use.
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The agreement was held up as an example of public and private enterprise cooperation. Under the deal, NASA turned over the facility, which had been used to process space shuttles for launch, to Space Florida, an aerospace economic development agency of the state. Space Florida, in turn, agreed to let Boeing use it.
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Conservative Think Tank Study Finds Teachers Are 'Overpaid'
By Eyder Peralta
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The American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think thank in Washington, D.C., is causing waves with a study (pdf) it released today that found teachers are overcompensated in comparison to "similarly educated and experienced private-sector workers."
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The bottom line? Teacher's compensation, the American Enterprise Institute writes, is 52 percent above market rates and costs government "$120 billion annually in excessive labor costs." . .
Of course, teachers' unions took issue with the study. The American Federation of Teachers, one of the largest unions in the country, put out a statement saying the report "uses misleading statistics and questionable research:"
This report contains a number of ridiculous assertions, such as arbitrarily assigning 8.6 percent as a "job security premium" teachers supposedly enjoy. This "job security premium" is pure fiction, given the 278,000 public education jobs that have been lost during this recession. There's no basis for this claim—it's simply a placeholder used to lead to AEI's conclusion. In our business, such reasoning would get a flunking grade.
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Glenn Beck's Favorite Gold Company Charged With Fraud
By Tim Murphy
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Goldline International, the California precious metals retailer promoted by Glenn Beck and other right-wing radio hosts, was formally charged with 19 criminal counts—including grand theft by false pretenses, false advertising, and conspiracy—on Tuesday by the Santa Monica City Attorney's Office. The criminal complaint also implicates Goldline CEO Mark Albarian, along with two other company executives and two salespeople.
. . . Beck and other endorsers (including liberal talker Ed Schultz) lent an air of legitimacy to the whole operation, sowing fears of a total economic collapse to help make the pitch for Swiss Francs. Beck's pitch went a step further, arguing that in the event of a total financial meltdown, the government would confiscate gold bullion—meaning you should invest your money in coins instead.
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Welcome to the "Hump Point" of this OND.
News can be sobering and engrossing - at this point in the diary, an offering of brief escapism:
Random notes related to this video:
Clifton Chenier will always be known as the King of Zydeco. Although he didn't invent the form, he popularized it around the world by combining the most vital elements of Creole, Cajun, and blues music, all of which he heard as a young boy in his native Louisiana, into his own unique and intensely original musical gumbo. With a should of "Laissez les bon ton roulet!" ("Let the good times roll!") he took his music far beyond the confines of his home region, first to Louisiana expatriates along the Gulf Coast and in California, to blues and R&B fans across the country, and eventually to young lovers of pop and rock music thoughout the world who had never heard the term "zydeco" before him.
Chenier's mastery of his instrument and the power of his music and vocals have virtually defined the genre's repertoire, sound, and instrumentation. Looking at the hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of zydeco bands around the world, one would be hard-pressed to find a group that didn't acknowledge their great debt to him or perform a large number of his compositions in the basic style he came to define. In that way Clifton Chenier is to zydeco as Bill Monroe is to bluegrass music or James Brown to funk and soul.
Back to what's happening:
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Environment and Greening |
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How Soda Caps Are Killing Birds
By Claire O'Neill
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Remember those haunting images of animals stuck in plastic soda rings? This is worse. Since 2009, photographer Chris Jordan has been documenting birds on Midway Atoll way out in the Pacific Ocean — near what's known as the "Pacific Garbage Patch" or, essentially, a swirling heap of plastic the size of Texas.
What Jordan found on those islands were carcasses of baby birds that have died an unnerving death: According to the BBC, "about one-third of all albatross chicks die on Midway, many as the result of being mistakenly fed plastic by their parents."
Jordan was a runner-up this year for the Prix Pictet, a prize in photography and sustainability, for a morose series that shows plastic guts spilling from dead birds. His photos, and others from the Prix Pictet contest, are currently touring various museums. He is also producing a film about his journeys to Midway Atoll, where the photos were taken.
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India plans 'safer' nuclear plant powered by thorium
By Maseeh Rahman
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India has announced plans for a prototype nuclear power plant that uses an innovative "safer" fuel.
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The development of workable and large-scale thorium reactors has for decades been a dream for nuclear engineers, while for environmentalists it has become a major hope as an alternative to fossil fuels. Proponents say the fuel has considerable advantages over uranium. Thorium is more abundant and exploiting it does not involve release of large quantities of carbon dioxide, making it less dangerous for the climate than fossil fuels like coal and oil.
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Producing a workable thorium reactor would be a massive breakthrough in energy generation. Using thorium – a naturally occurring moderately radioactive element named after the Norse god of thunder – as a source of atomic power is not new technology. Promising early research was carried out in the US in the 1950s and 60s and then abandoned in favour of using uranium.
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Military thinktank urges US to cut oil use
By Suzanne Goldenberg
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. . . the Military Advisory Board said the US should aim to drastically reduce its energy imports over the next decade – or else risk exposing the economy to devastating oil price shocks.
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The report, entitled Ensuring America's Freedom of Movement: a National Security Imperative to Reduce America's Oil Dependence, describes America's reliance on imported oil as the "Achilles heel of our national security".
It deploys strong language to describe the consequences of this dependence. "Our reliance on this single commodity makes us vulnerable … We are held hostage to price fixing by a cartel that includes actors who would do our nation harm, and we are too often called upon to risk the lives of our sons and daughters to protect fragile oil supplies form this very cartel," the report says.
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Has campaigning for an ethical fashion industry had any impact?
By Bryony Moore
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Campaigners have been battling for an ethical fashion industry ever since the first sweatshop scandals broke back in the 1990s.Even now, Ethical Consumer magazine's latest buyers' guide reveals that a sweat-free high street is still a long way off.
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Progress might be slow, but it's not all doom and gloom. Take the example of the campaign led by the Responsible Sourcing Network to stop forced child labour in Uzbekistan's cotton industry. Over 60 global clothing companies, including Adidas and H&M, have now committed to ban Uzbek cotton from their supply chains until slave labour is abolished.
The Clean Clothes Campaign' Killer Jeans campaign has also had huge success with many brands outlawing the practice of sandblasting, a technique used to give jeans a "distressed" look but which can give workers silicosis of the lungs. Plus, as a result of Greenpeace's Dirty Laundry report, which exposed water pollution from textile manufacturing sites in China, several companies including H&M have now agreed to take action.
However once the pressure is off companies, many revert to their old ways. Back in 2002, H&M for example, promised to ban PVC from all their products, a commendable commitment in response to campaigns on what was back then a hot topic. Fast forward to 2011 and with other environmental issues making headlines H&M have inexplicably backtracked and are using PVC once again.
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Science and Health |
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People Rationalize Situations They're Stuck With, but Rebel When They Think There's an out
By (ScienceDaily)
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People who feel like they're stuck with a rule or restriction are more likely to be content with it than people who think that the rule isn't definite. The authors of a new study, which will be published in an upcoming issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, say this conclusion may help explain everything from unrequited love to the uprisings of the Arab Spring.
Psychological studies have found two contradictory results about how people respond to rules. Some research has found that, when there are new restrictions, you rationalize them; your brain comes up with a way to believe the restriction is a good idea. But other research has found that people react negatively against new restrictions, wanting the restricted thing more than ever.
Kristin Laurin of the University of Waterloo thought the difference might be absoluteness -- how much the restriction is set in stone. "If it's a restriction that I can't really do anything about, then there's really no point in hitting my head against the wall and trying to fight against it," she says. "I'm better off if I just give up. But if there's a chance I can beat it, then it makes sense for my brain to make me want the restricted thing even more, to motivate me to fight" Laurin wrote the new paper with Aaron Kay and Gavan Fitzsimons of Duke University.
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Vatican To Host Stem Cell Research Conference
By Barbara Bradley Hagerty
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A few years ago, Father Tomasz Trafny was brainstorming with other Vatican officials about what technologies would shape society, and how the Vatican could have an impact. And it hit them: Adult stem cells, which hold the promise of curing the most difficult diseases, are the technology to watch.
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In a rare move, the Vatican decided to collaborate with a private company, NeoStem, to do education and eventually research. The Catholic Church is investing $1 million to form a joint foundation, and next week, scientists from around the world will meet at the Vatican to discuss the future of stem cell therapies.
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"Of course adult stem cell research is really important and very promising for the future of medicine," Sean Morrison says.
But not if the Vatican is using its support to undermine research using embryos, which is what he suspects it is doing. Morrison, a leading stem cell researcher at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, says that at this point, scientists don't know which kinds of stem cells are going to lead to breakthroughs and treatments.
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Minimum alcohol pricing: Analysis
By Branwen Jeffreys
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A minimum price for alcohol based on strength is a radical health policy which is likely to attract attention from around the world.
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An analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies showed a widening gap between incomes and beer, wine and spirits sold in shops between 1990 and 2008.
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The European Commission has been less clear about alcohol. In 2009 it said minimum pricing had the potential to target heavy drinkers, rather than moderate drinkers. In order for minimum pricing to satisfy the law it would have to show it was in proportion to the problems caused by alcohol, without unduly restricting competition.
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What will turn the world's eyes towards Scotland is the introduction of a minimum price per unit in an environment where alcohol is fairly freely sold. Unlike some of the states in Canada which have tried similar measures, there is no history in Scotland of prohibition or of selling alcohol through government-run shops.
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Technology |
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Reducing Vehicle Friction Helps Automakers Meet CAFE Standards
By Shane McGlaun
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The more stringent CAFE standards that are looming have automakers running to find ways to improve fuel economy. The easy/cheap to implement strategies for better fuel economy have already been implemented in the past, so what’s left for automakers to try now are things that require lots of work for minimal gains.
One area where the automakers are looking to get tiny bits of economy is by reducing the friction inside an engine. Friction reduces the power of an engine and creates heat. If the friction can be reduced, the engines can produce more power allowing the automaker to downsize the engine for better economy without sacrificing performance.
. . .
Changes to the engine design are also being made by some to improve efficiently and reduce friction. Ford offsets the crank from under the cylinders in the new 1L 3-cylinder engine to reduce friction. Some automakers are also moving to thinner oils and allowing engines to run hotter to keep the oil thin and easier to move in the engine. Other tech that will be needed to meet fuel economy standards will include direct injection, cylinder deactivation, and hybrid technology.
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China's New Supercomputer Rejects Intel, AMD CPUs For Homegrown Designs
By Jason Mick
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Last week China held a press conference in Jinan, the capital city of China's eastern Shandong province to announce its new Sunway BlueLight MPP supercomputer. To the general public that announcement didn't seem terribly exciting -- after all, China has a growing number of supercomputers on the list of the 100 most powerful computing clusters in the world.
What was intriguing was that China is using a brand new CPU, dubbed "ShenWei SW-3", which was designed at a supercomputing institute in China and is currently being mass produced in Shanghai. The CPU is clocked at 0.975-1.2 GHz, a relatively low speed designed to conserve power. The new CPU is a reduced instruction set computer (RISC) design, similar to the popular ARM architecture.
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While less powerful than Tianhe-1a, Sunway is arguably more important to China's computing future. Like Japan's K Computer, China is showing that it's capable of designing and manufacturing its own CPU designs, which rival those of western rivals Intel and Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (AMD).
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Hard disk and camera makers hit by Thai floods
By (BBC)
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The Thai floods are set to cause up to a 30% slump in hard disk production in the last three months of the year compared to the prior period, according to IHS iSuppli.
A report by the research firm said hard disks have already risen in price because of damage caused to factories.
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More than one-third of Thailand's provinces have been inundated by floodwater since July. The report estimated that a total of 14,000 factories had been damaged.
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Cultural |
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In The Hills Of Rio, Shantytowns Get A Makeover
By Juan Forero
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Rio de Janeiro is hosting soccer's World Cup in 2014, as well as the 2016 Olympics. The Brazilian city is remaking itself — not just the tourist hot spots, but also the favelas, long wracked by violence and despair.
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Just two years ago, Rio's favelas were in the grip of drug traffickers. Gang members shot down a police helicopter. Homicides reached nearly 7,000 a year in greater Rio.
Then the police employed a new strategy, says Capt. Glauco Schorcht, commander in Providencia.
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Community-policing units build ties to the community. With better security came a range of city services for the first time. The city is planning a cable car to connect to Providencia, located high on a hill next to the city center, repairing roads and improving the water-delivery system.
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How railroads came back from the brink and got ahead
By Curtis Tate
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More than three decades after the federal government deregulated freight railroads, the industry is enjoying "a new golden age," said Frank Wilner, the author of several books on railroad economics. After being left for dead in the 1970s, railroads reinvested nearly $10 billion in themselves last year alone, according to industry figures, and they haven't received taxpayer bailouts. Need a job? They're hiring, and if you're a veteran, they want you. They can't send jobs overseas because their business is literally bolted to the ground.
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Not only is trucking freight rail's biggest competitor, it's also its biggest customer. In 2003, intermodal service overtook coal as the leading source of revenue for the freight rail industry.
Solomon and other transportation experts said that truckers are losing their edge because of highway congestion, higher fuel costs, driver shortages and pending safety regulations. Meantime, railroads have made a huge bet on intermodal service, spending hundreds of millions of dollars on new facilities and upgraded tracks to handle the increasing traffic volume.
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Now, Solomon said, the advantage goes to freight railroads. The low pay and difficult on-the-road lifestyle makes it hard for trucking to attract drivers.
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David Graeber, the Anti-Leader of Occupy Wall Street
By Drake Bennett
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David Graeber likes to say that he had three goals for the year: promote his book, learn to drive, and launch a worldwide revolution. The first is going well, the second has proven challenging, and the third is looking up.
Graeber is a 50-year-old anthropologist—among the brightest, some argue, of his generation—who made his name with innovative theories on exchange and value, exploring phenomena such as Iroquois wampum and the Kwakiutl potlatch. An American, he teaches at Goldsmiths, University of London. He’s also an anarchist and radical organizer, a veteran of many of the major left-wing demonstrations of the past decade: Quebec City and Genoa, the Republican National Convention protests in Philadelphia and New York, the World Economic Forum in New York in 2002, the London tuition protests earlier this year. This summer, Graeber was a key member of a small band of activists who quietly planned, then noisily carried out, the occupation of Lower Manhattan’s Zuccotti Park, providing the focal point for what has grown into an amorphous global movement known as Occupy Wall Street.
It would be wrong to call Graeber a leader of the protesters, since their insistently nonhierarchical philosophy makes such a concept heretical. Nor is he a spokesman, since they have refused thus far to outline specific demands. Even in Zuccotti Park, his name isn’t widely known. But he has been one of the group’s most articulate voices, able to frame the movement’s welter of hopes and grievances within a deeper critique of the historical moment. “We are watching the beginnings of the defiant self-assertion of a new generation of Americans, a generation who are looking forward to finishing their education with no jobs, no future, but still saddled with enormous and unforgivable debt,” Graeber wrote in a Sept. 25 editorial published online by the Guardian. “Is it really surprising they would like to have a word with the financial magnates who stole their future?”
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