Flu in your area? Maybe Google knows

Interesting article from the New York Times on using Google to track outbreaks of the flu:

SAN FRANCISCO — There is a new common symptom of the flu, in addition to the usual aches, coughs, fevers and sore throats. Turns out a lot of ailing Americans enter phrases like “flu symptoms” into Google and other search engines before they call their doctors.

That simple act, multiplied across millions of keyboards in homes around the country, has given rise to a new early warning system for fast-spreading flu outbreaks, called Google Flu Trends.

Tests of the new Web tool from Google.org, the company’s philanthropic unit, suggest that it may be able to detect regional outbreaks of the flu a week to 10 days before they are reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In early February, for example, the C.D.C. reported that the flu cases had recently spiked in the mid-Atlantic states. But Google says its search data show a spike in queries about flu symptoms two weeks before that report was released. Its new service at google.org/flutrends analyzes those searches as they come in, creating graphs and maps of the country that, ideally, will show where the flu is spreading.

Article here. Interesting. This capability might actually be useful in the event of a flu pandemic, allowing the CDC and others to track and possibly predict the spread of the disease, which might give them a few extra days to position and deploy scarce resources to the expected target areas most in need.

The Light Fighter

From an article in the Economist, on the advances in lasers and "directed energy" weapons:

LIKE so much else in science fiction, the ray gun was invented by H.G. Wells. In the tentacles of Wells’s Martians it was a weapon as unanswerable by earthlings as the Maxim gun in the hands of British troops was unanswerable by Africans. Science fiction, though, it has remained. Neither hand-held pistols nor giant, orbiting anti-missile versions of the weapon have worked. But that is about to change. The first serious battlefield ray gun is now being deployed. And the next generation, now in the laboratory, is coming soon.

The deployed ray gun (or “directed-energy weapon”, in the tedious jargon that military men seem compelled to use to describe technology) is known as Zeus. It is not designed to kill. Rather, its purpose is to allow you to remain at a safe distance when you detonate unexploded ordnance, such as the homemade roadside bombs that plague foreign troops in Iraq.

This task now calls for explosives. In practice, that often means using a rocket-propelled grenade, so as not to expose troops to snipers. But rockets are expensive, and sometimes miss their targets. Zeus is effective at a distance of 300 metres, and a laser beam, unlike a rocket, always goes exactly where you point it.

At the moment, there is only one Zeus in the field. It is sitting in the back of a Humvee in an undisclosed theatre of war. But if it proves successful it will, according to Scott McPheeters of the American army’s Cruise Missile Defence Systems Project Office for Directed Energy Applications, be joined by a dozen more within a year.
...
If Zeus works, it will make soldiers’ lives noticeably safer. But what would really make a difference would be the ability to destroy incoming artillery rounds. The Laser Area Defence System, LADS, being developed by Raytheon, is intended to do just that—blowing incoming shells and small rockets apart with laser beams. The targets are tracked by radar and (if they are rockets) by infrared sensors. When they come within range, they are zapped.

Article here.

Hanging Ten

Tonight's surfing video -- video compilation of the legendary Laird Hamilton:

Who's minding the store?

From the Washington Post, on the lack of oversight of the bailout billions:

In the six weeks since lawmakers approved the Treasury's massive bailout of financial firms, the government has poured money into the country's largest banks, recruited smaller banks into the program and repeatedly widened its scope to cover yet other types of businesses, from insurers to consumer lenders.

Along the way, the Bush administration has committed $290 billion of the $700 billion rescue package.

Yet for all this activity, no formal action has been taken to fill the independent oversight posts established by Congress when it approved the bailout to prevent corruption and government waste. Nor has the first monitoring report required by lawmakers been completed, though the initial deadline has passed.

"It's a mess," said Eric M. Thorson, the Treasury Department's inspector general, who has been working to oversee the bailout program until the newly created position of special inspector general is filled. "I don't think anyone understands right now how we're going to do proper oversight of this thing." [emphasis added]

Article here. The government is spending literally hundreds of billions of your money, in a mad, apparently make-it-up-as-you-go-along scramble with no independent oversight. Anyone want to bet that improper expenditures, misuse, even downright fraud is occurring on a massive scale?

A vicar, some curtains, and a potato

From the not-a-believable-story files, comes this, uh, gem:

A vicar attended hospital with a potato stuck up his bottom - and claimed it got there after he fell on to the vegetable while naked.

The clergyman, in his 50s, told nurses he had been hanging curtains when he fell backwards on to his kitchen table.

He happened to be nude at the time of the mishap, said the vicar, who insisted he had not been playing a sex game.

The vicar had to undergo a delicate operation to extract the vegetable, one of a range of odd items medics in Sheffield have had to remove from people's backsides or genitals.

Article here. Ah, the old Hanging-Curtains-While-Naked-and-Falling-on-a-Potato-that-Lodged-Up-Your-Rectum excuse. How many times have we heard that before? :)

Liar's Poker, revisited

From Portfolio.com, an article by Michael Lewis, on the financial crisis:

In the two decades since then, I had been waiting for the end of Wall Street. The outrageous bonuses, the slender returns to shareholders, the never-ending scandals, the bursting of the internet bubble, the crisis following the collapse of Long-Term Capital Management: Over and over again, the big Wall Street investment banks would be, in some narrow way, discredited. Yet they just kept on growing, along with the sums of money that they doled out to 26-year-olds to perform tasks of no obvious social utility. The rebellion by American youth against the money culture never happened. Why bother to overturn your parents’ world when you can buy it, slice it up into tranches, and sell off the pieces?

At some point, I gave up waiting for the end. There was no scandal or reversal, I assumed, that could sink the system.

Then came Meredith Whitney with news. Whitney was an obscure analyst of financial firms for Oppenheimer Securities who, on October 31, 2007, ceased to be obscure. On that day, she predicted that Citigroup had so mismanaged its affairs that it would need to slash its dividend or go bust. It’s never entirely clear on any given day what causes what in the stock market, but it was pretty obvious that on October 31, Meredith Whitney caused the market in financial stocks to crash. By the end of the trading day, a woman whom basically no one had ever heard of had shaved $369 billion off the value of financial firms in the market. Four days later, Citigroup’s C.E.O., Chuck Prince, resigned. In January, Citigroup slashed its dividend.

From that moment, Whitney became E.F. Hutton: When she spoke, people listened. Her message was clear. If you want to know what these Wall Street firms are really worth, take a hard look at the crappy assets they bought with huge sums of ­borrowed money, and imagine what they’d fetch in a fire sale. The vast assemblages of highly paid people inside the firms were essentially worth nothing. For better than a year now, Whitney has responded to the claims by bankers and brokers that they had put their problems behind them with this write-down or that capital raise with a claim of her own: You’re wrong. You’re still not facing up to how badly you have mismanaged your business.

Rivals accused Whitney of being overrated; bloggers accused her of being lucky. What she was, mainly, was right. But it’s true that she was, in part, guessing. There was no way she could have known what was going to happen to these Wall Street firms. The C.E.O.’s themselves didn’t know.

Article here. Longish, but an interesting read.

A little humor

Tonight's collection of bloopers for your amusement:



:)

Who needs Posse Comitatus, anyway?

From the Colorado Independent:

In the next three years the military plans to activate and train an estimated 4,700 service members for specialized domestic operations, according to Air Force Gen. Gene Renuart, commander of U.S. Northern Command, which was created in 2002 for homeland defense missions.

The comments, made at the annual National Homeland Defense and Security Symposium in Colorado Springs last week, reveal more details about the recent stationing of active military personnel inside United States borders for what officials say is a mission centering around responding to catastrophic emergencies.

In September the Army Times reported that the 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team — a unit based in Fort Stewart, Ga., that most recently spent 35 of the last 60 months in Iraq patrolling in full battle gear — would be put under the control of Northern Command, located on Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs.

Article here.

Looking for a job in Obamaville? Own guns? Obama wants to know

From a New York Times article discussing the vetting process for high-level job applicants in the Obama administration:

WASHINGTON — Want a top job in the Obama administration? Only pack rats need apply, preferably those not packing controversy.

A seven-page questionnaire being sent by the office of President-elect Barack Obama to those seeking cabinet and other high-ranking posts may be the most extensive — some say invasive — application ever.

The questionnaire includes 63 requests for personal and professional records, some covering applicants’ spouses and grown children as well, that are forcing job-seekers to rummage from basements to attics, in shoe boxes, diaries and computer archives to document both their achievements and missteps.

Only the smallest details are excluded; traffic tickets carrying fines of less than $50 need not be reported, the application says. Applicants are asked whether they or anyone in their family owns a gun. They must include any e-mail that might embarrass the president-elect, along with any blog posts and links to their Facebook pages. [emphasis added]

Article here.

From Volokh, Question 59 pertains to gun ownership:

Do you or any members of your immediate family own a gun? If so, provide complete ownership and registration information. Has the registration ever lapsed? Please also describe how and by whom it is used and whether it has been the cause of any personal injuries or property damage.

The questionnaire is available from the NY Times website here.

Oregon CCW holders risk public records disclosure

From Oregon:

Washington County's sheriff is asking 10,000 people who hold concealed handgun licenses whether they want their names made public if it is requested as an Oregon public record.

Sheriff Rob Gordon said he believes that people obtain these licenses as a security measure, which would exempt the release of their names. But a circuit court in Jackson County ruled in April that people have to document that the license is for security reasons in order to be exempt from public records law.

On Friday, license holders will be mailed letters asking them to say whether they obtained the license for security reasons, and whether they want their information kept confidential.

"Instead of going through the process of saying that it's implied, we're going though the process of getting the documentation that says that it is," said Sgt. Vance Stimler, public information officer at the Washington County Sheriff's Office.

When The Mail Tribune in Medford requested names of concealed handgun license holders as a public record in 2007, the Jackson County Sheriff refused the request based on Oregon law that states records are not public if they could reveal a person's security measures or weaknesses. But Jackson County's Circuit Court ruled that each individual must specify that he or she doesn't want any personal information released. If not, their names are public record.

Article here. Any Washington County, Oregon readers should contact the sheriff if they don't receive their letter to make sure their names and/or other personal information aren't made public. In fact, any Oregon readers might want to contact their sheriff to indicate that they don't want their information made public.

The Money Hole

Tonight's financial discussion panel, courtesy of The Onion:

I hate when that happens

Actor and left-leaning political activist Tim Robbins apparently had some difficulty casting his vote on Election Day, and reportedly got a little upset. Turns out he went to the wrong voting location. Which he might have discovered had he been to the polls to vote in, say, the presidential primary back in February.

From the Los Angeles Times:

The New York City Board of Elections wrote the actor a letter saying he should have voted at a library on West 20th Street, not the YMCA on West 14th Street where he and Susan Sarandon turned up to vote. It's pretty evident from the sly tone of the letter that the election board was getting its revenge for being portrayed by Robbins in various news reports as a cloddish bureaucratic sinkhole. "It would appear, based on a review of your voter registration history, that your voting experience was less than positive because you simply went to the wrong poll site," an election board member wrote, coolly sticking the knife in by adding that if there was confusion over the appropriate voting location, it might be because "you have not voted in an recent election, including the presidential primary in February 2008 and the party primary in September 2008." [emphasis added]

Article here. Ouch!

The rise of guns in China

From a Wall Street Journal article:

Shanghai -- China's weapons laws are among the world's toughest. Its blanket ban on private ownership of rifles, pistols and even gun replicas is a core tenet of social policy. Still, a gun culture is taking hold.

China may be freer from gun crime than many nations, and official statistics show overall crime on a continuous down trend. Yet, these days, reports about gun crimes turn up as often as several times a week even in the tightly controlled state-run media. The reports are often brief, without much follow-up as cases progress. Still, the splashy gunfights, murders, gun-factory raids and smuggling busts that get reported contrast with China's zero-tolerance stance on guns, and point to changes in criminals' behavior.
...
The government holds gun-surrender drives, appealing to citizens with posters in subways to turn in arms with no questions asked, or even for cash. A six-month campaign this year netted 79,000 guns, 1.8 million replica guns and 5.75 million bullets, the Ministry of Public Security said last month. A similar effort in 2006 turned up 178,000 guns and 638,000 replicas in four months.
...
The Ministry of Public Security says its police increasingly face armed and aggressive suspects. Most Chinese police aren't armed, and they sometimes are provided little more than a uniform to do their job. An emerging market for bulletproofing underscores the need. At a police-gear trade show in Beijing last April, bulletproof vests bearing Chinese police logos were on display, along with bulletproof BMWs and Jaguars. DuPont Co. showed the protective qualities of Kevlar.

Like other technologies, guns have a long history here. Chinese invented gunpowder more than a thousand years ago, and soon developed one of the first guns, called a "fire spear." Rifles were widely available by the late 19th century, when war and revolution began engulfing the country. In 1938, as the Communists battled the Japanese and the ruling Nationalists for control, Mao Zedong made his famous remark that "political power grows out of the barrel of a gun" -- foreshadowing strict gun laws the Communists later imposed.

Gun control was introduced in 1966, after children aiming a Spanish rifle at sparrows near Tiananmen Square shot out a window in the Great Hall of the People, according to an official history of the Ministry of Public Security. Authorities grew more vigilant after the violently suppressed pro-democracy demonstrations of 1989, and after rapid economic growth began to spur social tensions.

Article here.

Seattle mayor plans gun ban, despite Attorney General's legal opinion

From the Seattle Post-Intelligencer:

An unequivocal "no" from the state Attorney General's Office is often enough to shoot down a city proposal.

Not so with a move by Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels to ban legally permitted handguns from city-owned parks and buildings, an effort that, if successful, could shatter a 47-year-old state prohibition against cities' regulation of firearms.

The Mayor's Office continues to build a case for the ban despite an Oct. 14 opinion issued by Attorney General Rob McKenna's office arguing that the city cannot pre-empt state gun law. The mayor hopes to introduce an administrative order next month.

Article here. When government officials sworn to uphold the laws and constitution don't obey the law, at some point ordinary citizens may decide that they don't need to obey those laws either.

You know you're Australian if ...

Tonight's Down Under list, for my Aussie readers (incredibly, Sitemeter says there are a few of you!). The rest of you can read it and shake you heads in bewilderment. :-)

You know you're Australian if...

1. You know the meaning of the word "girt".

2. You believe that stubbies can be either drunk or worn.

3. You think it's normal to have a leader called Kevin.

4. You waddle when you walk due to the 53 expired petrol discount vouchers stuffed in your wallet or purse.

5. You've made a bong out of your garden hose rather than use it for something illegal such as watering the garden.

6. You believe it is appropriate to put a rubber in your son's pencil case when he first attends school.

7. When you hear that an American "roots for his team" you wonder how often and with whom.

8. You understand that the phrase "a group of women wearing black thongs" refers to footwear and may be less alluring than it sounds.

9. You pronounce Melbourne as "Mel-bin".

10. You pronounce Penrith as "Pen-riff".

11. You believe the "l" in the word "Australia" is optional.

12. You can translate: "Dazza and Shazza played Acca Dacca on the way to Maccas."

13. You believe it makes perfect sense for a nation to decorate its highways with large fibreglass bananas, prawns and sheep.

14. You call your best friend "a total bastard" but someone you really, truly despise is just "a bit of a bastard".

15. You think "Woolloomooloo" is a perfectly reasonable name for a place.

16. You're secretly proud of our killer wildlife.

17. You believe it makes sense for a country to have a $1 coin that's twice as big as its $2 coin.

18. You understand that "Wagga Wagga" can be abbreviated to "Wagga" but "Woy Woy" can't be called "Woy".

19. You believe that cooked-down axlegrease makes a good breakfast spread.

20. You believe all famous Kiwis are actually Australian, until they stuff up, at which point they again become Kiwis.

21. Hamburger. Beetroot. Of course.

22. You know that certain words must, by law, be shouted out during any rendition of the Angels' song Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again.

23. You believe, as an article of faith, that the confectionary known as the Wagon Wheel has become smaller with every passing year.

24. You still don't get why the "Labor" in "Australian Labor Party" is not spelt with a "u".

25. You wear ugh boots outside the house.

26. You believe, as an article of faith, that every important discovery in the world was made by an Australian but then sold off to the Yanks for a pittance.

27. You believe that the more you shorten someone's name the more you like them.

28. Whatever your linguistic skills, you find yourself able to order takeaway fluently in every Asian language.

29. You understand that "excuse me" can sound rude, while "scuse me" is always polite.

30. You know what it's like to swallow a fly, on occasion via your nose.

31. You understand that "you" has a plural and that it's "youse".

32. You know it's not summer until the steering wheel is too hot to handle.

33. Your biggest family argument over the summer concerned the rules for beach cricket.

34. You shake your head in horror when companies try to market what they call "Anzac cookies".

35. You still think of Kylie as "that girl off Neighbours".

36. When returning home from overseas, you expect to be brutally strip-searched by Customs - just in case you're trying to sneak in fruit.

37. You believe the phrase "smart casual" refers to a pair of black tracky-daks, suitably laundered.

38. You understand that all train timetables are works of fiction.

39. When working on a bar, you understand male customers will feel the need to offer an excuse whenever they order low-alcohol beer.

40. You get choked up with emotion by the first verse of the national anthem and then have trouble remembering the second.

41. You find yourself ignorant of nearly all the facts deemed essential in the government's new test for migrants.

42. You know, whatever the tourist books say, that no one says "cobber".

43. And you will immediately forward this list to other Australians, here and overseas, realising that only they will understand.

:)

The first 100 days ...

From Good Magazine (click to seriously embiggenate image):

Source: Good Magazine

Hope is toast -- Now, apparently literally

You just knew it had to happen sooner or later. Someone on eBay is selling a piece of toast purportedly with the image of Barack Obama that "miraculously" appeared. From the item description, for those with way too much money burning a hole in your pockets:

Barack Obama has miraculously appeared on a piece of toast I was preparing for breakfast. This is a one-of-a-kind item to celebrate his win as US President. The item is one piece of Wonder Bread that has been toasted. Nothing has been added to the bread - no butter or oils. The buyer will receieve this item as shown. Shipping charges will depend on the distance from New Jersey.

See photos of the beatific hunk of bread on eBay here.

[Hat tip to my friend Peter for the link]

Navy SEALs rescue American hostage in Afghanistan

From Fox News:

An American engineer held hostage by Islamic militants in Afghanistan was freed in a daring nighttime raid by a Special Operations team last month, a rare move in a country where hostages often pay ransoms — or don't come home at all.

A team of about 30 special operators composed mostly of Navy SEALs flew into the mountains outside Kabul on October 14 to retrieve the 61-year-old American businessman, killing his captors and returning him to safety after nearly two months in captivity, according to an account in the Army Times.

"In my mind I'd given a military intervention a one out of a hundred chance," the unnamed engineer told the Army Times. The Taliban have kidnapped aid workers and journalists in recent years, and aggressive crime syndicates target wealthy Afghans and foreigners for ransom money.

"These fellows wanted either blood or money, and they weren't getting it that way," the engineer said.

The captive, who has lived and worked in Afghanistan for eight years, didn't have much to offer.

"This guy didn't have any money at all. It was like a personal life mission for him to help others," said Bruce J. Huffman, a spokesman for the Army Corps of Engineers in Afghanistan.

Article here. Sometimes, your tax dollars are hard at work. Kudos to the SEALs.

Will Supreme Court's liberal justices consider retirement?

Article in Legal Times on the prospects that the Supreme Court's liberal justices may consider retirement during an Obama administration:

At her law clerks' reunion last June, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg put the word out in no uncertain terms.

"If anyone asks you, 'When is she retiring?'" Ginsburg said, according to several who were there, "tell them I have a great role model in Justice [John Paul] Stevens, who is going strong at age 88."

Apparently, not enough people asked, so tucked away at the end of a speech at Columbia University on Oct. 25, she made the point again. Referring to the legendary Justice Louis Brandeis, Ginsburg said he "became a justice at age 60, as I did. He remained on the bench until age 83. My hope and expectation is to hold my office at least that long."

Article here. The article also discusses the possibility of Justice Stevens and/or Justice Souter also retiring, and some potential timing issues.

Knife thrower breaks Guniness world record

Tonight's don't-try-this-at-home story comes from CW11 in New York (video available at the link):

(Photo: CW11 Morning News)

It's Day 1 of Guinness World Record Week and we're kicking things off on the CW11 Morning News with David Adamovich aka "Throwdini". He holds the record for fastest time to throw 10 knives around a human target. His current record is 4.5 seconds and he'll attempt to break it live on the CW11 Morning News.

(Photo: CW11 Morning News)

Article here. Video of the knife throwing event available at the link.