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POPSTwo Large Solar Projects Planned for California While I'm not extremely keen on these sort of plants -- there's no real reason to centralize solar generation like this -- it's nice to see that solar's being taken seriously. Given recent advances in photovoltaic technology, the price is coming down enough for it to be put anywhere the sun shines. In other words, there's no reason to use up huge expanses of land when you can do the same thing on rooftops. Still, any time new generating capacity comes from green tech, it's good news.
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POPSAfghan Militants Butcher American Soldiers
I didn't say anything about it here or elsewhere because a.) I didn't know what the families knew, and b.) I couldn't confirm it with anyone else. As for the soldiers being alive when captured, I still don't know with certainty whether or not that's true or just battlefield rumor. But everything else my source told me has turned out to be correct. The New York Times explains in more detail: The three were identified as Sgt. First Class Matthew L. Hilton, 37, of Livonia, Mich., of the Michigan Army National Guard; and Sgt. First Class Joseph A. McKay, 51, of Brooklyn; and Specialist Mark C. Palmateer, 38, of Poughkeepsie, N.Y., both of them part of a reconnaissance, surveillance and target acquisition unit of the New York Army National Guard, according to a Pentagon news release. Their Afghan interpreter was 21-year-old Muhammad Fahim from Kabul, who had been working with the Americans for the last three years. His body was burned beyond recognition, his family said.
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POPSEx-Soviet States, Poland Rally for Georgia Joining NATO Like Georgia, Ukraine and the Baltic states were Soviet republics, gaining their independence around the time of the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. Poland spent more than 40 years as a Soviet satellite after World War II, overthrowing the communist regime in 1989 and joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organization 10 years later. All the countries involved have sought NATO membership as a bulwark against Russia, with which they have a common border. According to Polish Defense Minister Bogdan Klich, the current conflict is ample proof that the alliance must admit Georgia and Ukraine quickly. ``No country neighboring Georgia would have taken such a confrontational stance had it been threatened with a joint operation from the entire Atlantic alliance,'' Klich told daily Rzeczpospolita in an interview published today. ``The moral is simple: NATO should offer Georgia and Ukraine plans to gain membership as soon as possible.''
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POPSObama's Indonesian Registration Document and Media Cover-Up Reasons for censorship? The Associated Press and the rest of the mainstream media probably had this photo of the registration document in their hands or databases but refused to touch it. After CNN published the facts that FOX incorrectly reported that the school was a madrassa, the entire issue of Barack Obama's name of 'Barry Soetero' was side stepped. It was probably decided that this material or photo shouldn't be available to the general public. (The same idea was probably applied to any audio or visual media related to a separate issue concerning an interview between Barack Obama and Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times.) Therefore the image lay untouched and untranslated in the Daylife.com photo repository for 18 months.
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POPSWhite House forged Iraq war documents Cont... "Over the next few days, the Habbush letter continued to be featured prominently in the United States and across the globe," Suskind writes. "Fox's Bill O'Reilly trumpeted the story Sunday night on 'The O'Reilly Factor,' talking breathlessly about details of the story and exhorting, 'Now, if this is true, that blows the lid off al Qaeda—Saddam.'"
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POPSThe Best States For Business Forbes Annual Listing In Forbes' annual ranking of the Best States for Business, Virginia finished first for the third straight year. But Georgia is the real story, moving from 15th to fifth place. Georgia finished in the top 10 in four of the six categories we examined (economic climate, growth prospects, labor supply and regulatory environment). Just two other states, Virginia and third-ranked Washington, managed this feat. Our rankings measure states on six main areas of importance: business costs, labor supply, regulatory environment, current economic climate, growth prospects and quality of life. Business costs are weighted the most, but low costs were not enough to keep Louisiana and West Virginia from being the bottom two in our ranking. We look at a total of 32 data points to compile rankings of the six main categories.
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POPSIraqis wanted timed withdrawal in 2007; Bush refused Sunni, Kurd, Shi'ite joint effort quashed by US. Humiliation still lingers. Iraqi Nat'l Security advisor wrote: "While Iraq is trying to gain independence from the United States," he wrote, "some influential foreign figures" were still "trying to spoon-feed our government and take a very proactive role in many key decisions."
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POPS A leading statesman puts the case against nuclear weapons David Lange, prime minister puts a devastating case against nuclear weapons. This argument is I believe once again very relevant. He argued that New Zealand had no nuclear enemies. The situation now, with the fall of the soviet union is that we are imagining them. The whole speech is presented verbatim.
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POPSNow Bush Is Appeasing Iran joined envoys from France, Britain, Russia, China and Germany in talks with Saeed Jalili -- Iran's nuclear negotiator and an Ahmadinejad confidant -- about incentives to give to Tehran. ven with record oil prices, mismanagement has driven the Iranian economy into the ground. On July 14, the Ministry of Housing reported an "historical" 125% rise in housing prices. The same day, Tabnak, a news Web site run by a former head of the IRGC, admitted foodstuff inflation had reached 50% annually. On July 8, 2008, a National Iranian Oil Company executive acknowledged in the Iranian press that, without significant investment in infrastructure, Iranian oil production would decline each year by 300,000 barrels a day. In the past month alone, Iranian workers have struck for unpaid wages at the Khodro automotive plant (which assembles Peugeots), the Alburz Tire Company, and the Haft Tapeh Sugar Cane factory.
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POPSA Broader Bet Whew, I wouldn't want to accompany those risk takers to VEGAS!!!! DAMN, those CEO's are just soooooo innovative, LORDY, give em a big raise :D Opps, they already did that.
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POPSThe Twelve Apostles and Bloody Sunday (original) Like America, we had out War of Independence followed by a bloody Civil War on the issue of independence. This was also in common with many other states that gained independence. We didn't gain full independence until 1948 when we took it without a shot being fired. We did lose 6 of our 9 counties of Ulster, our northern providence. Hopefully some day our "four green fields" will be reunited peacefully. By Bush&Co's definition all our leaders would have been terrorists like Nelson Mandela , just like your own revered insurrectionists/freedom fighters/terrorists/founding fathers. Our longest serving PM and president de Valera would have been executed along with the 1916 Rising leaders only he was born in America.
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POPSUS slipping in "human index" Living in SC, and doing art residencies in the schools across the state, I see the differences between "richer" and "poorer" areas first hand. They are stark, and SC has no areas that would even equal many of the more economically powerful states.
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POPSEnding Moderate Drinking Tied To Depression The mice were tested for depression-like behavior using a widely recognized method called the Porsolt Swim Test. The mice are placed inside a beaker filled with water and allowed to swim for six minutes. Mice are good swimmers and have no problem completing this task. The amount of time they spend immobile (floating and not swimming) is measured as an index of despair or depression-like behavior. The more time a mouse spends immobile, the more "depressed" it is thought to be. "This research provides the first evidence that long-term abstinence from moderate alcohol drinking -- rather than drinking per se -- leads to a negative mood state, depression," Hodge said.
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POPSFailed States Index 2008 The Best And Worst
Bangladesh took this year’s hardest fall, set off in part by postponed elections, a feuding, deadlocked government, and the imposition of emergency rule that has dragged on for more than 18 months. These political setbacks were followed by greater economic hardships after a devastating cyclone in November flooded large swaths of cropland and left 1.5 million people homeless. In nearby Pakistan, also one of this year’s worst performers, a beleaguered President Pervez Musharraf sparked waves of violent protests when he dismissed the head of the Supreme Court and declared martial law. In a tragic close to the year, the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto left many wondering about the future prospects of this fragile, nuclear-armed state. Ironically, Pakistanis constitute the largest national U.N. contingent operating in Liberia. More than 9,000 Bangladeshi troops wear U.N. blue helmets around the world, a third of them in the Ivory Coast.
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POPSThe Myth of Hispanic Family Values Exposes a key facet of liberal racism, one used (designed?) to make us happy to see Jewish and other European-Americans being phased out and replaced by Third Worlders, many of whom are antisemitic, anti-American, anti-Israel and "racist" against whites in general, and often against blacks too.