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Pigeons Get Backpacks for Air Pollution Monitoring Mail this story to a friend | Printer friendly version UK: February 2, 2006 LONDON - A flock of pigeons fitted with mobile phone backpacks is to be used to monitor air pollution, New Scientist magazine reported on Wednesday. The 20 pigeons will be released into the skies over San Jose, California, in August. Each bird will carry a GPS satellite tracking receiver, air pollution sensors and a basic mobile phone. Text messages on air quality will be beamed back in real time to a special pigeon "blog", a journal accessible on...

Microsoft has posted a security fix for the windows metafile bug, and it is available at the Windows Update site. I can't speak for earlier operating systems, but I have downloaded and installed it for Windows XP and Windows 2000. Because of the urgency, Microsoft released the fix early. Other updates will be available as usual next Tuesday at the Update site.

I found it at: http://www.321gold.com/editorials/ackerman/current.html

The Designs of Science -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Christoph Cardinal Schönborn -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright (c) 2006 First Things 159 (January 2006): 34-38. In July 2005 the New York Times published my short essay “Finding Design in Nature.” The reaction has been overwhelming, and not overwhelmingly positive. In the October issue of FIRST THINGS, Stephen Barr honored me with a serious response, one fairly representative of the reaction of many Catholics. I fear, however, that Barr has misunderstood my argument and possibly misconceived the issue of whether the human intellect can discern the reality of design in the world of living things. It appears from...

Sober Helps Catch Child Porn Offender By BetaNews Staff, BetaNews December 20, 2005, 3:13 PM For once the never-ending Sober worm actually did some good. A 20 year-old child porn offender turned himself in earlier this week after mistaking a message generated by the worm as an actual communiqué from Germany's Federal Criminal Police Office. The e-mail said "an investigation was underway," which apparently spooked the man into believing the authorities were aware of his online activities. He was charged after police found pornographic images of children on his computer. A spokesman for the Paderborn, Germany police credited the worm...

Horror story's happy ending for bride EmailPrintNormal fontLarge font By James Button, Europe CorrespondentDecember 12, 2005 Happy bride Gill Hicks.Photo: AP THE car swept to the front of the church. Dressed all in white and with a shy but confident smile, Gill Hicks got out, walked up the steps and down the aisle.Ms Hicks, an Australian who has lived in London for 12 years, lost both her legs in the July 7 terrorist bombings.She also lost 75 per cent of her blood, her heart stopped twice on the way to hospital, and she was thought unlikely to live, let alone...

Law & Language Copyright (c) 2005 First Things 157 (November 2005): 37-46. Law’s QuandaryBy Steven D. Smith, Harvard University Press. 222 pp. $45.To purchase this book, click here.Reviewed by Antonin ScaliaSteven Smith takes us on a lively, thought-provoking romp through the philosophy of law. Like most romps, it has no destination, but the experience is worth it. Although Smith protests at the outset of Law’s Quandary that he is “a law professor, not a metaphysician (or even a philosopher),” he cannot honestly be absolved of that sin. He is, after all, co-director of the Institute for Law and Philosophy at...

Opinion - William Rees-Mogg The Times December 05, 2005 It's all nuts to me, Mr Bush William Rees-Mogg An elementary lesson in supply and demand, from the fruit of the palm to the soaring price in gold MONEY IS ONLY a specialised form of barter. In the middle of the 19th century, Mademoiselle Zélie, a singer of Théâtre Lyrique in Paris, made a professional tour around the world and gave a concert in the Society Islands in French Polynesia. In exchange from an air from Norma and a few other songs, she was to receive a third part of the...

Life is Never Easy, Even When You're Doing Well Posted: 10/28/2005 9:37:00 AM by Donald J. TrumpChairman, Trump University I talked about this earlier in the week on my daily radio show, but I have more to say. Someone just wrote a book about me. It's the biggest pile of garbage I've ever seen, written by a highly questionable and, some people say, disgraced reporter named Tim O'Brien. I looked up O'Brien on the Internet and found stories comparing him to Jayson Blair. Blair was The New York Times' infamous reporter, who was fired in shame after he was found...

Sony to Help Remove its DRM Rootkit By Nate Mook, BetaNews November 2, 2005, 4:04 PM When Mark Russinovich was testing his company's security software last week, he came across a disturbing find: a Sony BMG CD he purchased from Amazon had secretly installed DRM software on his PC and used "rootkit" cloaking methods to hide it. With the story sweeping across the Net, Sony is attempting to clean up its mess. DRM, or digital rights management, is nothing new to CDs. Record companies began employing software to prevent users from easily transferring tracks to a PC after the explosion...

<p>Headline on Drudge's front page. The link to story wouldn't work for me.</p>

During her term as president of the State Bar of Texas, Harriet Miers wrote 11 president's opinions for the monthly Texas Bar Journal. Miers' opinions are provided here for informational purposes. All files are in pdf format. These are large files, please be patient as you download them. June 1992 July 1992 September 1992 October 1992 November 1992 December 1992 January 1993 February 1993 March 1993 April 1993 May 1993

At a leadership seminar in California Friday, Motorola CEO Ed Zander talked about his role in rebuilding the phone maker's brand. But when answering a question from the audience about the iPod Nano, Zander apparently lost his cool saying, "Screw the Nano. What the hell does the Nano do? Who listens to 1,000 songs?" Motorola, however, has fired back and claims IDG News Service, which first reported the outburst, is taking the comment completely out of context. Company officials say Zander was smiling and joking when he responded to the question, and he did praise Apple and its iPod. "Motorola...

New Orleans Didn’t Just Go Nuts -- It’s Been Nuts by Mac Johnson Posted Sep 6, 2005 Where to even begin in being one more idiot talking about Hurricane Katrina? I hate the subject. It should be a news item and a humanitarian cause --a huge recovery and reconstruction effort joined in by all. It should not be a political issue fit for “commentary.” But the Hurricane tore at more than just the weaknesses in New Orleans’ inadequate levees. The shortcomings of the levee system were known to all who ever lived on the Gulf Coast, and in the end,...

Katrina Costly, but Not As Big As Expected Aug 30 5:38 PM US/Eastern By MATT CRENSON AP National Writer news://newsclip.ap.org/GARF10208302126@news.ap.org In terms of economic damage and lives lost, Katrina may turn out to be one of the worst hurricanes in U.S. history. But the storm actually turned out to be much less powerful than predicted. Meteorologists say a puff of dry air coming out of the Midwest weakened Katrina just before it reached land, transforming a Category 5 monster into a less-threatening Category 3 storm. The last-minute gust also pushed Katrina slightly to the east of its Big Easy-bound trajectory,...

Is This a Great Country, or What? By Gene Weingarten Have you seen the list of 100 people nominated to be the greatest American of all time, as chosen in an online poll? It's a hoot. It's going to be the basis of a month-long series on the Discovery Channel in June, featuring runoff elections where the public will finally choose a winner. I decided I owed it to history — the history of American humor — to phone a Discovery Channel spokesperson for comment. Me: So, are you happy with the 100 nominees? Elizabeth Hillman: Well, we were pleased...

Paris Hilton eager to make leap from globetrotting sex kitten to savvy business titan. 'I'm glad I got the partying out my system when I was young, because now I'm so over it and I can focus on my career,' Hilton said. 'Now I'm trying to build an empire'... DEVELOPING...

Bush Lays Out Energy Plan As Prices Soar By H. JOSEF HEBERT WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush, facing economic and political damage from soaring gas prices, offered proposals Wednesday to speed construction of nuclear power plants and oil refineries and boost sales of energy-efficient vehicles. Bush outlined his initiatives in his second energy speech in a week, reflecting growing concern in the White House that high energy prices are beginning to slow economic growth and undercut the president's approval rating. Speaking to small business leaders, Bush lamented that he was powerless to cut gas prices. ``I wish I could,'' he...

Two traveling penguins from Seaworld in San Diego went through regular airport screening at Denver International Airport recently. Here, Pat and Penny are removed from their carry-on case so they can walk through the metal detector. For the slideshow, see: http://www.thedenverchannel.com/slideshow/4402056/detail.html?qs=;s=1;w=320

Bush's Second Chance -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hadley Arkes -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright (c) 2005 First Things 152 (April 2005): 13-19. Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety (Henry IV, Part 1). The sense of relief, felt so deeply in the pro-life community on November 3, 2004, seems to have drifted away in the weeks and months since the presidential election. It is already easy to forget how great a threat the election posed: even the most sober observers of the political scene recognized that a Kerry presidency would mark the end of any prospects for the pro-life cause in Congress or...