Welcome to the Overnight News Digest (OND) for Tuesday, June 11, 2013.
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: Betcha By Golly Wow by The Stylistics
News below Aunt Flossie's hairdo . . .
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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Organic farmers lose court battle with Monsanto
By John Upton
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The U.S. court system is refusing to protect the organic growers from future Monsanto lawsuits in the event that traces of genetically engineered genes accidentally end up in the farmers’ crops. That’s because of a single paragraph on the biotech giant’s website that says it has no such litigious intentions.
Monsanto’s gang of lawyers frequently sues farmers who grow the company’s genetically engineered crops without paying royalties — despite claims by many of the farmers that the seeds and genes ended up in their fields through no fault of their own. They didn’t want the stuff on their land to begin with, so they naturally wonder why they should have to pay royalties for the privilege of growing it. (The danger of rogue contamination was recently illuminated when an Oregon farmer found illegal Monsanto GMO wheat growing on his farm.)
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In its ruling Monday, the appellate court said the organic growers must rely on Monsanto assurances on the company’s website that it will not sue them so long as the mix [of biotech crops into their organic crops] is very slight.
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In its ruling Monday, the court noted that records indicate a large majority of conventional seed samples have become contaminated by Monsanto’s Roundup resistance trait.
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Google Acquires Waze for $1.3 Billion
By Tiffany Kaiser
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Developed by Israeli start-up Waze Mobile, Waze is a free social GPS app that has turn-by-turn navigation to help drivers avoid traffic. It's also a community-driven application that draws information from drivers ahead of you, and even learns from users' driving times to provide routing and real-time traffic updates.
Google has now acquired Waze for $1.3 billion and plans to integrate its traffic reports into Google Maps. Google will also allow Waze to use its search capabilities.
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Waze, which is 4-years-old, currently has 47 million users and managed to raise $67 million in funding from companies like Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Qualcomm Inc.
Just last month, a potential deal between Waze and social networking giant Facebook crumbled when Waze was unwilling to move its engineering team from Israel to the U.S.
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G8 summit protests: London police question 57
By (BBC)
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Police in London are continuing to question 57 people held in connection with protests against the G8 summit.
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One man was tackled by police as he tried to jump from the roof of the building saying "I don't want to live in a fascist state", reported the BBC's Mike Sergeant.
The arrests were made for alleged possession of an offensive weapon, criminal damage, assault on a police officer, failure to remove a face covering, and possession of articles with intent to commit criminal damage.
StopG8 said many of the world's "most brutal and polluting companies" were in London's West End, as well as government offices and the "mega rich".
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The leaders of the world's eight wealthiest countries are due to meet at the Lough Erne resort in Co Fermanagh, Northern Ireland, for the two-day G8 conference next week.
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Elizabeth Warren Wants to Make it Easier for Women to Sue Employers Over Pay Discrimination
By Erika Eichelberger
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It's been 50 years since President John Fitzgerald Kennedy signed the Equal Pay Act, a law that called for equal pay for equal work. Today, women today still earn 77 cents for every dollar a man earns. On Monday, in an op-ed in Massachusetts' Springfield Republican, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) called on Congress to end this once and for all by passing the Paycheck Fairness Act, a bill Warren and Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) introduced in January.
Warren and Mikulski's Paycheck Fairness Act would amend the Equal Pay Act of 1963 to require employers that are sued for discrimination to demonstrate that wage differences between men and women doing the same work are the result of things like education, training, or experience, not gender. Right now, a woman who sues her employer has to prove she was discriminated against. If Warren's bill passes, employers would have to prove they didn't discriminate. The bill also strengthens penalties for pay discrimination, putting them on par with punishments imposed on employers who discriminate based on race or ethnicity; and increases protections against retaliation for workers who inquire about their employer's wage practices.
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Paycheck inequality also makes America's student debt problem worse. Women and men borrow about the same amount to fund their educations, but a year after graduating, women only make 82 cents for every dollar men do. "This means that as a percentage of income, many young women bear a greater student loan debt burden than young men," Warren says.
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International |
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Ecuadorean Amazon oil slick heads towards Peru
By Jonathan Watts
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An oil spill in the Ecuadorean Amazon is flowing downstream towards Peru and Brazil, heightening concerns about the impact of drilling in one of the world's last remaining wildernesses.
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The environment of Ecuador, the smallest member of Opec, the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, has long suffered from the oil industry. In 2011 the country's courts ruled that the US oil firm Chevron should pay $8.6bn in compensation for the dumping of about 7bn litres of waste over several decades.
The latest slick is not large by comparison, but it comes at a sensitive time in an area of immense ecological wealth. With the oil fields now largely owned and operated by domestic state-run companies, the government plans to ramp up production in the Amazon to fund an ambitious development programme and repay loans from China. Its plans have been opposed by indigenous groups and environmental campaigners.
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German flood damage insurance claims may reach €3bn
By (AP via guardian.co.uk)
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Damage from the past week's flooding in Germany is expected to lead to insurance claims of up to €3bn (£2.5bn), a credit rating agency has said, as flood levels on the Elbe river in the country's north appeared to stabilise.
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That's well below the expected total cost of the flood damage, which Fitch put at about €12bn. It said the difference is down to the fact that many residents in flood-prone areas may have been unable to get insurance cover for natural hazards, at least at a reasonable price.
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By Tuesday, flood levels in the eastern city of Magdeburg were about three-quarters of a metre below their peak, and water levels further downstream were largely stable. The interior ministry said that German authorities have ordered more than 1.6m unfilled sandbags from other European countries in recent days to help keep pace with their needs.
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Europe alarmed by US surveillance
By (BBC)
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There's widespread anger in Europe about the reports that the US accessed personal data from leading internet companies, if the fiery debate at the European Parliament is anything to go by. Commissioner Tonio Borg said the EU wants a "clear commitment" from the US to respect the rights of European citizens when it comes to data protection.
He said the commission would raise the issue with the US at a meeting in Dublin on Friday. The German MEP, Manfred Weber, said it was "completely unacceptable" that the US has different rules for its own citizens and those of other countries. A Dutch MEP, Sophie In't Veld, criticised the commission for failing to protect EU citizens.
She said the reports of surveillance cast doubt on the special relationship between Europe and the US. But the British MEP Timothy Kirkhope warned against knee-jerk anti-Americanism, saying "friends listen most when you talk and not when you shout."
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In the US, the controversy has focused on the possibility that conversations of US citizens may inadvertently be captured.
But overseas, governments and activists point out that US law provides foreigners with no protection.
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Modem to improve African net access
By Jane Wakefield
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The device combines rugged design with a range of connectivity options, switching between wi-fi, 3G and fixed broadband.
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Ushahidi - a Swahili word for "testimony" - began life designing software to monitor the 2008 Kenyan elections.
Since then, its open source software has found worldwide fame and a diverse range of uses, from helping victims of the Haiti earthquake and Japanese tsunami to fixing potholes.
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"While Africa may have joined the digital revolution and mobile is becoming ubiquitous, internet connectivity is not always reliable and the price of connecting is high," she told the BBC.
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USA Politics, Economy, Major Events |
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Bloomberg unveils ambitious plan to protect NYC from climate change
By Claire Thompson
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New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg laid out an ambitious plan today to fortify the city against the extreme weather and storms we can expect thanks to a changing climate. “This is a defining challenge of our future,” Bloomberg said in a speech at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
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The administration said that roughly half of the currently estimated $20 billion cost of the next decade would be covered by federal and city money that had already been allocated in the capital budget and that an additional $5 billion would be covered by expected aid that Congress had already appropriated. Most of that money was allocated, through a variety of programs, in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, according to the report.
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Ironically, the Bloomberg administration has spent hundreds of millions of public dollars to revitalize waterfront districts and lure upscale condo developers, while at the same time warning of the risks of such development given rapidly rising sea levels. More people living along the city’s shoreline complicated evacuation efforts before Hurricane Sandy.
Bloomberg’s speech today at the Brooklyn Navy Yard was preceded by introductory speakers and videos that struck a resolutely uplifting theme of resilience, suggesting that a changing climate should not force anyone to leave the greatest city in the world. But some homeowners are already grappling with the cost of staying, forced to choose between paying a small fortune to have their houses raised up on stilts or paying soaring flood insurance costs. AP reports that many of them don’t believe more big storms are coming: “They think” — or perhaps hope against hope — “Sandy was a fluke, a storm to end all storms, the kind they won’t ever see again.”
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ACLU files lawsuit against the Obama administration for 'dragnet' data collection
By Talia Ralph
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The ACLU's suit asks the NSA to stop monitoring millions of Americans' phone call logs and other communications records, and demands that the currently held records be purged, the New York Times reported.
The NSA's top-secret surveillance program — involving nine major US telecommunications companies and code-named PRISM — was revealed last week by the agency's 29-year-old former employee Edward Snowden.
The ACLU contended in its complaint that PRISM "gives the government a comprehensive record of our associations and public movements, revealing a wealth of detail about our familial, political, professional, religious and intimate associations," and that it "is likely to have a chilling effect on whistle-blowers and others who would otherwise contact" the organization for help.
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Business donations to judges’ campaigns often equal friendly rulings
By Michael Doyle
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State supreme court justices are favoring the corporate interests that finance their election campaigns, a comprehensive new study concludes.
With more judicial elections now awash in dollars, the study of several thousand court decisions found a relationship between business-affiliated contributions and how justices voted. The more business money a supreme court justice has received, the more likely she or he is to support business litigants, according to the yearlong study by the American Constitution Society, a liberal advocacy group.
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An elected judge who receives 1 percent of his or her contributions from the business sector votes, on average, for pro-business position about 46 percent of the time, according to the study. A judge who receives a quarter of his or her contributions from business votes with business 62 percent of the time, the study found. A judge who receives half from business votes with business about two-thirds of the time.
As with legislative campaign contributions, though, the new analysis raises a vexing chicken-and-egg question about whether donations change voting behavior or simply reflect common interests between donor and recipient. Many judicial decisions, moreover, defy any connection to campaign contributions.
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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:
In the summer of 1972, the release of the shimmering sweet soul ballad ‘Betcha By Golly, Wow’ began an unbroken string of 17 UK Top 40 singles for The Stylistics that ended in the autumn of 1977 with the Top 30 appearance of ‘7000 Dollars And You’. Meanwhile, the then-quintet’s two ‘Best Of…’ compilations became two of the best-selling albums of the decade; the first becoming, at the time, the best-selling LP ever in the UK by a black act in 1975. Which in turn was the same year in which they topped the British singles chart for three weeks with the elaborately orchestrated disco-soul of ‘Can’t Give You Anything ‘(But My Love)’.
Nevertheless, The Stylistics’ story had actually begun several years earlier when, in 1968, two local Philadelphia groups - The Monarchs and The Percussions - decided to join forces. Originally released on a shoestring budget, the group’s first local single - ‘You’re A Big Girl Now’ - made enough noise in their hometown to be picked up for national release by the Avco label. A debut US Soul Top 10 hit in spring 1971, its simplistic charm persuaded Avco Records to let the fivesome record an entire album with classically-trained Philly super-producer/writer Thom Bell.
With Bell’s unique talent for counterbalancing the street corner harmonies of the R&B vocal groups with lush symphonic arrangements, his pairing with The Stylistics became one of the most perfect musical combinations of the era. Indeed, the three classic albums the group went on to record with Bell (1972’s Gold-selling ‘The Stylistics’; 1973’s Gold-selling ‘Round 2’; and 1974’s ‘Rockin’ Roll Baby’) in particular firmly established lead singer Russell Thompkins Jr.’s distinctive bittersweet falsetto globally via a succession of international hit singles peaking with 1974’s majestic love ballad ‘You Make Me Feel Brand New’.
Back to what's happening:
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Environment and Greening |
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China outsources carbon emissions to poorer areas
By Melissa Hogenboom
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This is much like the way in which rich countries in the West have long turned to China to produce cheap goods, thereby outsourcing dirty emissions.
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The main driver for outsourcing emissions, in the West and elsewhere, has always been labour costs, said Klaus Hubacek from the University of Maryland, US, who co-authored the paper.
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The abundance of cheap produce from China has led to a "throwaway culture", said Dabo Guan from the University of Leeds, UK, who also worked on the paper.
Dr Guan argued that if the West does not change consumption behaviour towards sustainability - a trend that continues to spread also in growing rich regions in China - they may start to outsource their emissions further to other developing countries such as India and African countries.
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Science and Health |
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Video Gamers Really Do See More: Gamers Capture More Information Faster for Visual Decision-Making
By (ScienceDaily)
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Hours spent at the video gaming console not only train a player's hands to work the buttons on the controller, they probably also train the brain to make better and faster use of visual input, according to Duke University researchers.
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Appelbaum said that with time and experience, the gamer apparently gets better at doing this. "They need less information to arrive at a probabilistic conclusion, and they do it faster."
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Looking at these results, Applebaum said, it appears that prolonged memory retention isn't the reason. But the other two factors might both be in play -- it is possible that the gamers see more immediately, and they are better able make better correct decisions from the information they have available.
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First Comprehensive and Prospective Characterization of a Genetic Subtype of Autism
By (SciendeDaily)
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n the first prospective study of its kind, Seaver Autism Center researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai provide new evidence of the severity of intellectual, motor, and speech impairments in a subtype of autism called Phelan-McDermid Syndrome (PMS). The data are published online in the June 11 issue of the journal Molecular Autism.
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"Our findings provide additional evidence of the significant impairment associated with SHANK3 deficiency," said Dr. Kolevzon. "Also, knowing how large the deletion of the SHANK3 gene is may have important implications for medical monitoring and individualizing treatment plans. Results also provide much-needed guidance in developing a standardized methodology for evaluating the features of this disorder."
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"The Seaver Autism Center has the unique capacity to evaluate autism spectrum disorders on both the molecular level and the clinical level," said Dr. Buxbaum. "This capability puts us in a unique position to see the entire picture -- the connection between genetics and behavior in these disorders -- and to develop new treatments and better tailor existing ones for these children."
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Brain function deteriorates in neglected or abused children
By (UPI)
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Neglected or emotionally abused preschool children exhibit behavioral difficulties and require prompt evaluation and interventions, British researchers say.
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The study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association's Pediatrics, found key features in the neglected or abused child included aggression, withdrawal, passivity, developmental delay, poor peer interaction, transition from ambivalent to avoidant insecure attachment patterns, passive to increasingly aggressive behavior and negative self-image.
The review also found emotional, brain and language function deteriorated in these children without intervention.
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Technology |
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New Elevator Tech Could Double How Tall Our Highest Buildings Can Be
By Ashley Feinberg
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China may be quick on the path to constructing the world's newest tallest building ever, but should they succeed, their reign is probably going to be fairly short-lived—and all because of an elevator. More specifically, an elevator that can travel up to 1000 meters—two times higher than any built before it.
Developed by Finnish manufacturer KONE, a new hoisting technology called UltraRope makes these previously unfathomable heights possible. While most modern elevator systems employ steel rope, UltraRope consists of a carbon fiber core (making it incredibly light) surrounded by high-friction coating. Because this new rope is so light, not only does it cut down on energy consumption, but it also reduces the weight of virtually every moving component: the hoisting ropes, compensating ropes, counterweight, elevator car, and even the passenger load itself.
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Apple, Google Surrender to Patent "Troll"; Vizio and Toshiba Fight It and Win
By Jason Mick
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Vizio, a top American electronics brand (privately held), has taken down an alleged "patent troll" in what the company's spokesperson hails as the seventh major victory over a troll (also know as a patent assertion entity (PAE) or non-practicing entity (NPE)).
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The patent in question in the case was U.S. Patent No. 7,035,598, entitled "Modular computer system". Filed in Nov. 2001 and granted in Apr. 2006, the patent was the work of Scott Lochner, who went on to found the company that sued Vizio, Lochner Technologies.
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Lochner Tech., which does not make computers, then went on to sue virtually every major internet and technology firm in the industry. Vizio's codefendants included 21 other firms, including Apple, Inc. (AAPL), Google Inc. (GOOG), Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN), Sony Corp. (TYO:6758), ASUSTek Computer Inc.'s (TPE:2357), Samsung Electronics Comp., Ltd. (KSC:005930), and LG Electronics, Inc. (KSC:066570), among others. One of the cases was filed in California federal court; the other was filed in Texas.
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Rise of the low-level contractor with high-level access
By Tara McKelvey
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Snowden's decision to reveal classified information puts him in an exclusive club. Another member, Pte Bradley Manning, is facing a military trial. Both could be sent to prison for the rest of their lives.
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Their actions shed light on the new world of espionage. As data becomes digitized, more people have access to it.
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As one analyst says, "This is Washington DC. You can't swing a dead cat without hitting someone with a security clearance. I mean - everyone's got one."
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"I could be wrong - maybe I should watch more Fox News - but I haven't seen anything that is fundamentally different than what we have been doing since 9/11," says Doug Brooks, president emeritus of International Peace Operations Association, which represents security firms.
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Expert slams Congress over ban on U.S.-China space cooperation
By (UPI)
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Gregory Kulacki, senior analyst and China project manager for the Global Security Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, criticized Congress for barring NASA from participating in any partnership or collaboration with China.
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China's human spaceflight program poses no security risks to the United States and it also "does not threaten U.S. interests or the status of the U.S. as a leader in human spaceflight" as the United States has completed similar tasks in the 1960s and 1970s, he said.
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Kulacki said he hoped with the passage of time the U.S Congress "will adopt a more constructive set of policies that encourages greater contact and cooperation between space professional in China and the United States."
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Cultural |
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Russia legislators pass 'gay propaganda' ban
By (Al Jazeera)
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Russia's parliament has passed two bills that impose jail terms for people promoting homosexual "propaganda" to minors and those who offend religious believers.
Ahead of Tuesday's vote, gay activists staged a kissing protest outside parliament but were outnumbered by several hundred supporters of the bill, some carrying religious icons.
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The bill against "homosexual propaganda" to minors sailed through the State Duma lower house of parliament in a 436-to-0 vote with one abstention.
The measure is part of an effort to promote traditional Russian values as opposed to Western liberalism, which the Kremlin and the Russian Orthodox Church see as corrupting Russian youth and contributing to the protests against President Vladimir Putin's rule.
After the bill was given preliminary approval in January, legislators changed the wording of "homosexual propaganda" to "propaganda of nontraditional sexual relations," which backers of the bill defined as "relations not conducive to procreation".
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Housing Crisis: Widespread Discrimination; Little Taste for Enforcement
By Nikole Hannah-Jones
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The results of Tuesday's U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development national study on the persistence of housing discrimination are unlikely to shock: Racial and ethnic minorities continue to find themselves locked out of many housing opportunities.
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Once a decade for the last 40 years, HUD has produced a massive survey to reveal the pervasive discrimination that, year after year, exists in America's housing marketplace. But as ProPublica reported late last year, HUD as a policy refuses to invest the same kinds of time, resources and techniques in prosecuting those guilty of the very discrimination its expensive studies uncover. Instead, HUD outsources testing used to find and punish discriminatory landlords to dozens of small, poorly funded fair housing groups scattered across the country.
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The good news is the testers — who all presented themselves as highly qualified — found little discrimination when trying to make an appointment to view a home or apartment. Black renters calling about an advertised unit are far less likely to be told it's unavailable than a decade ago.
But the study found significantly different treatment once testers met with agents.
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Margery Austin Turner of the Urban Institute said the discrimination uncovered in the study likely understates the problem because buyers presented themselves as highly qualified and did not necessarily represent the typical prospective minority home buyer.
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Meteor Blades is known to offer an enlightening Evening Open Diary - you might consider checking that out tonight if you haven't already. |