Bush has convenient memory lapse

Aha! The old "I cannot recall" defense.
I find this article to be hysterically funny and I apologize to those who would take offense at my sick sense of humor.
Pete Hoekstra (chairman of house intelligence committee -- I'm laughing again -- at the time) is also using the "cannot recall" defense.

clipped from news.bbc.co.uk Bush 'cannot recall' CIA videos President Bush insists that the US does not use torture US President George W Bush has said he has "no recollection" of the existence of video tapes of CIA interrogations and the plan to destroy them. The CIA says it wiped two tapes of interrogations of al-Qaeda suspects to protect the identities of its agents. human rights groups accuse it of destroying evidence of practices that may be tantamount to torture. The president "did not remember" being told of the tapes prior to Thursday Pete Hoekstra, a Republican who was chairman of the House Intelligence Committee at the time, told the news agency he did not recall being briefed on the matter at all Mr Bush continued to have confidence in CIA Director Michael Hayden

It's Worse Than You Thought Sooners

clipped from www.latimes.com No one wants to utter the word "depression." But the truth of the matter is that the American economy may be entering a state of free fall. Every day brings more bad news about the sub-prime mortgage debacle, about home foreclosures, construction industry slowdowns, a credit drought for consumers and businesses, oil price shocks and the open-ended devaluation of the dollar. Where is it all leading? Even the soberest economy watchers, pundits with doctorates -- whose dismal record in predicting anything tempts me not to mention this -- are prophesying dark times ahead. A depression, or a slump so deep it's not worth quibbling about the difference, appears to be on the way, if indeed it is not already underway.

Poverty around the world is a curse or a shame??

Poverty is the state for the majority of the world’s people and nations. Why is this? Is it enough to blame poor people for their own predicament? Have they been lazy, made poor decisions, and been solely responsible for their plight? What about their government? Have they pursued policies that actually harm successful development? Such causes of poverty and inequality are no doubt real. But often less discussed are deeper and more global causes of poverty.

clipped from www.globalissues.org Half the world — nearly three billion people — live on less than two dollars a day. The GDP (Gross Domestic Product) of the poorest 48 nations (i.e. a quarter of the world’s countries) is less than the wealth of the world’s three richest people combined. Nearly a billion people entered the 21st century unable to read a book or sign their names. Less than one per cent of what the world spent every year on weapons was needed to put every child into school by the year 2000 and yet it didn’t happen. 1 billion children live in poverty (1 in 2 children in the world). 640 million live without adequate shelter, 400 million have no access to safe water, 270 million have no access to health services. 10.6 million died in 2003 before they reached the age of 5 (or roughly 29,000 children per day).

The most bizarre musical instrument on earth

clipped from deputy-dog.com a few years ago in japan, members of the hokkaido industrial research institute started carving thousands of very precise grooves into nearby roads. the slightly loopy brainwave belonged to a mr. shinoda, a guy who accidentally cut a road in several places with a digger and then later drove over the damage in his car. he realised that with some planning and time to kill he could create rows of grooves which, when driven over at a certain speed, would ‘play a tune’. the results, the ‘melody road’, can be seen above and the grooves are between 6 and 12mm apart: the narrower the interval, the higher the pitch. these stretches of road, each playing a different tune, can currently be found in 3 places in japan - hokkaido, wakayama and gunma - with the optimum musical speed being a depressingly slow 28mph. don’t expect a virtual orchestra - from what i’ve heard, it’s not exactly beautiful music, but it’s unique and it’s mental. a winning combination.

What Women Want From Men

clipped from www.askmen.com what women want… Return her messages Many women gauge a man’s interest level by how long it takes him to respond when she contacts him. clipped from docs.google.com clipped from www.askmen.com Kiss her for no reason As much as they love sex, women also enjoy a nice, deep kiss that doesn’t have any strings attached. clipped from docs.google.com clipped from www.askmen.com Dance with her Simply put, dancing with a woman makes her feel special. clipped from docs.google.com clipped from www.askmen.com Dress up for her Dressing up to take your woman out is an excellent way to impress her. clipped from docs.google.com clipped from www.askmen.com Remember random milestones As a rule, birthdays and anniversaries should always be remembered clipped from docs.google.com clipped from www.askmen.com Take on an activity with her What women want from men is to spend time with their man outside of the bedroom. clipped from docs.google.com clipped from www.askmen.com Propose a visit to her family Women love it when a man gets along with her friends, but she simply adores it when he gets along with her family. clipped from docs.google.com clipped from www.askmen.com it's the little things… When it comes to what women want from men, the little things really do matter. The items on this list aren’t particularly difficult or time-consuming, but they are, unfortunately, very often overlooked

Palestine and Israel's Right to Exist

Hopefully an eventual outcome of Annapolis, even if little is achieved, will be more on the move to removes the lingering denial of Israel's legitimate existence.

clipped from www.haaretz.com My heart goes out to the Palestinians. Not only because their entire world has become one of despair, immobility, bloodshed, disillusionment, crumbling infrastructure, crumbling history, crumbling horizons Saeb Erekat, chief negotiator for the Palestine Liberation Organization, declared Monday that the Palestinians will not recognize Israel as a Jewish state. What matters is whether the Palestinians can live alongside a state which happens to be Jewish in character. Most Jewish Israelis accept the idea of an independent Palestinian state, in which the dominant religion will certainly be Islam. Never mind the fact that leftists the world over can live with the concept of explicitly Muslim states teaching the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and other explicitly anti-Semitic texts, while arguing that the very idea of a Jewish state implies and, in fact, compels racism against non-Jews. Palestinians are either going to have a state alongside a Jewish state, or they can choose to have no state

clipped from www.sciam.com Are You a Liar? Ask Your Brain Researchers use fMRIs to track blood flow in the brain to determine if someone is fibbing The mere thought of being interrogated—by a parent, boss or significant other—is enough to make one's blood pressure rise and pulse and breathing rates race. But contrary to popular belief, these signs of anxiety are not reliable indicators of a person's honesty. Instead, researchers are looking into the brain to separate liars from truth tellers. Polygraph, or lie detector, tests are the most well-known method of discerning fact from fiction, but researchers say they are not reliable because they measure anxiety based on a subject's pulse or breathing rate, which can easily be misread. "They're not detecting deception but rather the anxiety of being…[accused of deception]," Spence says. "It's known that psychopaths have a reduced level of anxiety," that would allow them to fool a polygraph. The fMRI, he says, images the actual processes involved in deception.