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Ahmed Abdul-Azal (right), an Iraqi national policeman, pounds a new steel post into the ground for concertina wire around Checkpoint 34, an outpost on a major Iraqi highway known as Route Tampa, during reconstruction efforts Feb. 26 after the checkpoint was heavily damaged by a coordinated attack by terrorists two days before. U.S. Army photo by Spc. Chris McCann CAMP STRIKER -- A savage attack on an Iraqi National Police checkpoint on the Iraqi highway known as Route Tampa that left eight policemen dead and wounded several others on Feb. 23 left scars on buildings and Iraqis alike, but did...

Any Radiologists online? Can you read an MRI?

Outback cracks under assault of the Big Dry Five years of drought have left Australian land parched and towns on the verge of economic ruin Phil Mercer in Sydney Sunday December 10, 2006 The Observer (UK) A farmer moves his sheep in search of food in drought-stricken New South Wales, Australia. Photograph: David Gray/Reuters Drought has plunged one of Australia's most famous outback towns to the brink of social and economic collapse. Bourke - heralded as the 'Real Gateway to the Outback' - faces oblivion. Five years of drought has left Bourke facing its worst crisis. Little wonder Australians are...

I may have a blown disk, my L5, sciatic nerve pain is phenominal.

Defying the age-old advice of parents and teachers, a new study shows that you're better off sitting back than sitting up. An Alberta researcher has found that while seated, with feet flat on the ground, leaning back to create a 135-degree angle between the thighs and trunk is much less straining on the spine and will not lead to the potentially chronic back pain associated with sitting in an upright position for extended periods of time. "Up until now it's always been, 'Mum knows best,' and so you sit up straight," said Waseem Amir Bashir, a researcher in radiology and...

People with ruptured disks in their lower backs usually recover whether or not they have surgery, researchers are reporting today. The study, a large trial, found that surgery appeared to relieve pain more quickly but that most people recovered eventually and that there was no harm in waiting. And that, surgeons said, is likely to change medical practice. The study, published in The Journal of the American Medical Association, is the only large and well-designed trial to compare surgery for sciatica with waiting. The study was controversial from the start, with many surgeons saying they knew that the operation worked...

Britain to US: we don't want Guantánamo nine back · Documents reveal secret talks in Washington· British residents have no right to return say officials Ian Cobain and Vikram Dodd Tuesday October 3, 2006 The Guardian (UK) The United States has offered to return nearly all British residents held at Guantánamo Bay after months of secret talks in Washington, the Guardian has learned. The British government has refused to accept the men, however, with senior officials saying they have no legal right to return. Documents obtained by the Guardian show US authorities are demanding that the detainees be kept under...

Austrian voters veer back to far-Right By Michael Leidig in Vienna (Filed: 02/10/2006) Austrian voters swung back to the far-Right in elections yesterday with the Freedom Party and a splinter group led by Jorg Haider, the populist hardliner, gaining more than 15 per cent of the vote. Chancellor Schussel: preliminary results looked to have swung to the far-Right and left his party in second place But in the preliminary results, the centre-Left Social Democrats looked to have just edged ahead of the conservative Chancellor, Wolfgang Schussel, and his OeVP party. A grand coalition between the two leading parties is a...

USC should forfeit the 2004 national crown after reports that Reggie Bush and his family appear to have accepted financial benefits from prospective agents. LOS ANGELES – The would-be agents who provided the house, the money for the tricked-out car, the luxury hotel rooms and the tens of thousands in cash used to roll right into the Southern California locker room after the game, right past security, to meet and greet the triumphant Trojans. The marketing agent who provided the cash allowance, the plane flights, the limo rides and the designer suits used to hang around Trojan practices, filed paperwork...

Actress Penelope Cruz plays with her hair while being interviewed on the red carpet as she arrives for the gala screening of her new film 'Volver' during the 31st Toronto International Film Festival in Toronto, September 8, 2006. The festival runs from September 7 until the 16. (J.P. Moczulski/Reuters) Penelope Cruz says that when she finished six months of work on "Volver," the new movie directed by Spain's Pedro Almodovar, she was so wrapped up in her character that she faced an emotional crisis. "I couldn't leave the set. I didn't want to take my false ass off. There...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 6, 2006 -- When José Rojas went to pull a badly burned woman from a Pentagon window after Islamic extremists drove a commercial airliner headlong into the building, her skin came off in his hands. “I had to actually take my fingernails and dig into her flesh with her crying and screaming to get her out of the window,” Rojas said, describing his efforts to help the victim of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States. Rojas, 43, a police officer with the Pentagon Force Protection Agency, the successor of the Defense Protective Service, was...

MARSEILLE, France, Sept 3, 2006 (AFP) - French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy appeared almost certain to lead the right into next year's presidential election, after a triumphant party congress which concluded Sunday in Marseille with a blistering attack on the "generation of May 1968". Speaking before 7,000 young members of the ruling Union for a Popular Movement (UMP), Sarkozy, 51, said modern France had been betrayed by the left-wing ideals that took root after the 1968 student uprising, and called for a society built around "a reassertion of the value of work". "(The generation of 1968) inculcated everywhere — in...

Analysis: Iran Won't Back Down From U.N. Wednesday August 30, 2006 11:16 PM By LEE KEATH Associated Press Writer CAIRO, Egypt (AP) - Iran isn't blinking in the face of Thursday's U.N. deadline for it to halt uranium enrichment or else finally face the possibility of sanctions the United States has sought for years. Tehran appears confident it can withstand any punishment - if it comes at all. There seems to be no question of Iran's bending to the U.N. demand. It was enriching small amounts of uranium gas at its facility in Natanz as recently as Tuesday, U.N. and...

By Sgt. 1st Class Joe Flores 4th Infantry DivisionCapt. Evan Jones, physician’s assistant, 4th Infantry Division, checks a local boy at a medical operation in Hor al-Bash on Sunday. Department of Defense photo by Army Sgt. 1st Class Joe Flores, 4th ID. CAMP TAJI -- Under the blazing Iraqi sun, Iraqi Army and Multi-National Division - Baghdad Soldiers fought the heat to conduct a community health outreach for the people of Hor al-Bash on Sunday.Soldiers of the 9th Iraqi Army Division and the U.S.' 4th Infantry Division, with the help of medics from the 414th Civil Affairs Battalion, joined together...

FORT HUACHUCA — Perhaps the saddest moment Roger Rodriquez remembers from his year tour with an infantry unit in Afghanistan is leading a memorial service for two soldiers killed by an improvised explosive device. “It was hardest for the (soldiers’) platoon. You know soldiers form friendships and when one of their group dies it’s emotional,” the captain chaplain said. Doing a memorial service around incidents in which soldiers are killed in action “is the most difficult thing to do,” the Baptist minister said. During his year in Afghanistan serving with soldiers from the 25th Infantry Division out of Hawaii, five...

Bouncing back: Hurricane hero rebuilds his life in time for Katrina's birthday By Alec Russell (Filed: 18/08/2006) One of the few undisputed heroes of Hurricane Katrina, a one-time bouncer turned teacher, still lives in a trailer a year after he rescued survivors of the great storm. Chris Baker, a 38-year-old barrel of a man, borrowed his Uncle Jimmy's boat and, drawing on his training in the Coast Guard Reserve, joined the hunt for stranded fugitives. Left: A weary Chris Baker ferrying a police officer through flooded streets. Right: With his girlfriend Amy His stirring experiences allowed him to forget that...

by Staff Sgt. Ryan Hansen 386th Air Expeditionary Wing Public Affairs 8/15/2006 - SOUTHWEST ASIA (AFPN) -- It may be surprising to hear that the 386th Air Expeditionary Wing has a Vietnam era Purple Heart recipient working at the wing. It is even more surprising to hear that the combat veteran is actually a C-130 Hercules deployed from Ramstein Air Base, Germany. On the flight deck of aircraft 63-7865 is a plaque telling the story of one of the hardest working aircraft in the Air Force inventory. According to the certificate, on June 1, 1972, the aircraft was assigned to the 21st Tactical...

Start of banana farming in Africa pushed back 2000 years According to recent evidence from Uganda, the banana may have arrived on the African continent more than 4000 years ago, some 2000 years before the accepted introduction of the fruit on the continent. The finding was published in the January 2006 issue of the Journal of Archaeological Science (Vol. 33(1):102-113). The authors base their claim on banana phytoliths - distinctive microscopic silica bodies that accumulate in plant cells - which they found in sedimentary layers estimated to be 4000-4500 years old. Earlier findings in Cameroon of 2500 year-old banana phytoliths...

YUSUFIYAH – The sounds of car horns honking and chickens squawking were a soundtrack for prosperity at a market just south of Baghdad on July 13, where vendors displayed everything from clothing to ice and vegetables in this once insurgent-infested town. American, British and Iraqi forces fought pitched battles here in the fall of 2004, during a sweep of insurgents still loyal to Saddam's regime. Today, the market is full of faces looking forward to peaceful and uneventful days. “Before the American Army came to this area, it was full of insurgents and thieves and killers,” said Ali, who declined...

It's time India got angry and stopped all this 'bouncing back' nonsense By Amrit Dhillon in Bombay (Filed: 16/07/2006) A backlash against the authorities is taking hold in Bombay, five days after the bombings that killed 181 commuters and injured almost 900. There is a sense of anger and betrayal among those living in India's commercial capital that the state has failed to protect them from yet another terrorist attack. A Hindu demonstrator expresses his anger "Blood has become cheaper than water," said Atul Pataonde, a shopkeeper in the Bandra district. "These bombs keep happening but nothing changes." To many...