WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT DEAD BOLT LOCKED DOOR AND NO KEY

When I find myself with an errand that needed to be done in someone's house and only I could save their house from the two dogs whose bladders would explode and who would have gnawed through all the furniture from hunger if I didn't make it in as I had lost my key, I panicked.  After phoning every one I knew who might have had an idea, I realized that no one answers their cell phone on a Friday night and locksmiths only tend to businesses and not private phones, even thought they say to' leave a message and your called will be returned right away.". 

Secondly,I  checked further in Google and found a willing locksmith, at last. However, perseverance won and Google will found one perfectly willing to come to wherever I would be, though I said I was not the owner of the house.  I had to return a call twice because in my panic I could not remember the street name nor my cell phone number (which I never call)..

When the half hour had become an hour, It got a call from someone who said he's already on a call more than a half hour away which will take an hour to do...and then there is the unpredictable traffic....'do you mind that it will be in two hours', the alternative being that there is no option.  Two and a half hours later a very nice man finally came and had never been told I had no key.  His boss and he related like your doctor and his receptionist, like the only parlor game...leave a message and be amazed and the creative distortion the doctor hears as your problem.

You will be be presented with your 'options'.  The first is he can try to pick the lock (since no mention has been made of cost to this point I thought to ask) for a fee that would pay a semester of tuition in an Ivy League college.  At least a first born was not requested...which is good since I am a senior citizen which would have made a serious problem.  He mumbled something about being close to Boston and it was probably a security lock.  It was a dead bolt.  He first tried keys of several makes he had (I presume some sort of Master keys) but this was not among them.  His estimate for trying to.'pick' the lock was staggering and I told him I could have several sessions with a psychiatrist for less but, if that didn't work he would have to drill the lock out and it would then be equivalent to the four year tuition for his yet to be born children and f all his relatives.  I suggested that we pray to his God since I didn't have one that answered me on specific traumas like this.    Fortunately the ten minutes it took to pick the lock worked and I was able to gain entry.

A credit card and my license shown and my problem was solved!  Ah, the greatness of modern science and legal lock pickers.  Instead of breaking and entering, they do it with your permission and payment, saving themselves having to steal and fence what they might have stolen!

MILESTONE IN STEM CELL RESEARCH

Science daily published an article on 7-21-10 on UCLA Broad Stem Cell Research Center new observation.
Researchers have described "a population of cells that mark the very fist stage of differentiation of human stem cells as they enter a developmental pathway that leads to production of blood, heart muscle. blood vessels and bone."

 This image is a higher-magnification view of a small colony of human embryonic stem cells. The cells have been stained to make their components more visible.
Photo: M. W. Lensch, Children's Hospital, Boston, MA

 Reading like something that might appear in science fiction, the article goes on to say "Researchers hope that these cells could one day be used for clinical treatments of a wide range of medical conditions as the discovery may help scientists create better and safer tissues for use in regenerative medicine. It also will allow scientists to better understand the differences between pluripotent stem cells, which can become every cell in the body, and cells that have lost their pluripotency and are on their way to becoming specific types of tissue cells."

It is wonderful to see American research again reaching spectacular results after GW Bush crippled useful research and we lost many of our top scientists to other countries where they could freely carry out research that was more meaningful than the way the Bush Administration had tied their hands.  Perhaps it is not so currently the 'cause du jour' for a particular facet of the religious right.  Whatever it is. it is encouraging to see something promising come out of our own research labs.

"Crooks's research program focuses on making blood stem cells from human embryonic stem cells. Studies have shown that the blood stem cells created from human embryonic stem cells in the lab lack some of the functions possessed by the blood stem cells found in bone marrow or umbilical cord blood. "

For more detail in the article, click here.  My but it is good to see some freedom from the Bush conservative strangulation. 

STOP, LOOK, AND LISTEN BEFORE YOU BEFORE YOU FIRE SOMEONE

Once again, the 'one-size-fits-all' folks are at work.  They are trying to make the Shirley Sharrod assassination of .character  a racial issue.  It is about so much more4 than race. It is an expose on just how lax we have become about what we see and believe without checking out more facts.  In fact is is an outrage about what our medias has done to the truth.  It should not have come as a shock that video can easily be tampered with to show the propaganda that is wished to be shown.  For years we have seen during campaigning and saw it during the Bush-Kerry campaign in all its full glory.  Andrew Breitbart is called a genius at it.  And the rest of us have allowed it.

I have written before that it used to be the habit (nay, requirement) of new editors that a story had to have three sources of confirmation before it could be accepted.  Journalism lost its Bible and I don't mean the ancient story of religion, I mean the  morality and integrity codes of journalism.  That it has, by osmosis, drifted into politics and media, and now even government handling, is not a surprise.   Secretary Virsack did no noble thing, though he was praised as a hero for admitting what an incompetent he had been.  He takes 'full responsibility', whatever that may mean.  People are blaming Obama.  The man isn't in the Gulf to offer support.  Of course not, he is needed elsewhere,where can actually do some good. He didn't stop the  Sherrod fiasco from happening. He hasn't  made the country healthy, wealthy and wise in eighteen months of office, and more there are more complaints, ad nauseum.  The man is human and being asked to do the equivalent of cleaning out the Aegean  stables.  His advisors need a refresher course in helping the man do his job rather than trying to do the job themselves for which they were not elected.

Why can nothing be done about the evil of Fox News, owned by an Australian and an wealthy Saudi Arabian prince.  That knowledge makes me believe that Fox News is a plant of Osama bin Laden.  Surely there must be some rules when a media license is given that Fox News is clearly violating, is there not?  It is wonderful to have a few in CNN and on MSNBC trying to help but they need more clout than their reach can influence.  Is there not some agency that can explore the requirements for owning such a powerful tool for evil against our country!  Wake up, Americans!

ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION SEES MANY LAWS IN MANY STATES

On 7/16/10, an article in the Los Angeles Times by Anna Gorman writes: "Colorado restricts illegal immigrants from receiving in-state tuition. Nebraska requires verification of immigration status to obtain public benefits. In Tennessee, knowingly presenting a false ID card to get a job is a misdemeanor."  States are feeling the pinch on their budgets having to medically treat and educate, as well as other services, to illegal immigrants.  Taxpayers, feeling overwhelmed financially as it is, are resentful.  The end result of frustration is too often an impulsive, carelessly thought out response to the problem, as we see in Arizona where even the Federal government is filing suit against the recent law enacted.

Michelle Price, Associated Press writer, pointed out the dangers of individual militias taking up the patrol.  She writes, "Minutemen groups, a surge in Border Patrol agents, and a tough new immigration law aren't enough for a reputed neo-Nazi who's now leading a militia in the Arizona desert.

Jason "J.T." Ready is taking matters into his own hands, declaring war on "narco-terrorists" and keeping an eye out for illegal immigrants. So far, he says his patrols have only found a few border crossers who were given water and handed over to the Border Patrol. Once, they also found a decaying body in a wash, and alerted authorities."  For the entirety of her article, click here.  

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services publishes a website with Forms, News, Resources, Laws and Outreach.  To reach it, click here.

EVIL WANTS NO TRUTH: DEATH OF AN INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALIST

When corruption is involved, no one is safe if they know too much and want to share it with people who should know.  For the first time in twenty years, a 37 year old investigative journalist in Greece was shot to death by a group calling themselves Rebel Sect.  While they have not claimed responsibility, the gun used was identified as one used in a similar incident previously by the group.

For more detail, click here..  The reporter, Sokratis Giolias, 37, was the news director at a radio station.  He was shot several times at close range.   One has to ask the question whether knowledge of these acts is what has turned American  investigative  journalists of the past into the gutless opinion-givers of today.  


In a N.Y. Times article on 7-8, the following was written: "In December 2009, Prime Minister George A. Papandreouannounced that his predecessor had disguised the size of the country's ballooning deficit. After rounds of deep budget cuts and months of vague pledges of support from the rest of Europe failed to stop the steady rise of the interest rates, Mr. Papandreou in April 2010 formally requested a promised $60 billion aid package, calling his country's economy "a sinking ship.''  See here for more.

The question raised today by Secretary Clinton's announcement of $500 million dollars pledged by the US government to Pakistan for aid makes me wonder at what point we Americans will put ourselves in similar financial jeopardy while our political electorate  play their partisan games.
For our staggering numbers of constantly expanding debt, click here.  Wait for it to load!

NEW MOONSHINE ENTREPRENEURS

Sometimes the government overprices what many people want, thinking they need. If the makers and distributors are not greedy enough, Federal and State taxes on liquor are making the price prohibitive for many people who both want to use and entertain others with alcoholic beverages.  New Hampshire is a state with no sales tax which makes some people think that buying liquor there will afford them great savings.  It has become a myth many Massachusetts residents are beginning to see through.  The price differential between New Hampshire and Massachusetts liquor prices has shrunk as markedly recently as the thermosphere.

However, man's creativity in a financial pinch is equaled only by the greed of others who see an opportunity to cash in on something they can market at less than that which is legally sold and subject to obscenely high taxes, in their opinion.  A new wave of illegal stills, to defeat the 'revenooers' of the Prohibition years, has resurfaced run by a more sophisticated group of entrepreneurs.  See more details here.   No longer are most of them using their bathtubs as in the late 1920s.  Even in  Africa, the "informal" brewing market is worth an estimated $3bn (£2.1bn) a year. "With names like "Kill me quick", "The dog that bites" and "Goodbye Mum", African moonshine has a frightening reputation. Over the years, thousands of Africans have been killed, blinded or rendered sterile by drinking these lethal concoctions".  For more of the problem in Africa, click here.

If marijuana is legalized, the price of taxes on both liquor and 'weed' at half rate should produce about the same annual income to the government.  Instead, the government prefers to let the drug dealers make all the profit themselves.  Some foolish people think it will deter those who want to drink or 'smoke'.  The tax that could be gained by legalization would help pay back the national debt instead of allowing the drug cartels to live so luxuriously..

FOR HOW MANY CRIMES AGAINST NATURE CAN MAN BE HELD RESPONSIBLE?

Man can and may be responsible for many crimes against Nature, but not all of them.  The 'all-or-nothing' people would have you believe that Mankind is responsible for all changes such as Global warming and fluctuations of weather.

There may be some truth to Man's potentiating some changes that are happening but we should not take credit for all of it.  A new CNN report claims the upper layer of the Earth's atmosphere (the thermosphere) has shrunk drastically. "The thermosphere interacts strongly with the sun and hence is greatly influenced by the sun's solar activity, which occurs in cycles. When solar activity is high, solar extreme ultraviolet rays warm and expand the thermosphere. When it's low, the opposite occurs. The collapse occurred during what's known as a "solar minimum" from 2007 to 2009, during which the sun plunged into an unprecedented low of inactivity. Sun spots were scarce and solar flares were nonexistent, NASA reported.  Still, the collapse of the thermosphere was bigger than the sun's activity alone can explain."  Apparently this is the bigger contraction in 43 years. See entire article here.

In September, two research satellites are scheduled to orbit in tandem.  It is believed that the shrinkage is reversing itself.  Cl;ick here for more detail.  NASA funded researchers are quoted saying:  "Something is going on that we do not understand," says John Emmert of the Naval Research Lab, lead author of a paper announcing the finding in the June 19th issue of the Geophysical Research Letters (GRL). "It's a Space Age record."  Read more.