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Reason One

Money is becoming less important as a male attractiveness criterion for women. Note that this doesn’t mean women don’t prefer richer men than themselves; what it means is that more women are making good money and thus the pool of higher income men is smaller than it was in the past. Since women are incessantly driven by their genetic algorithm to seek a higher status mate than themselves, they will respond to culturally imposed shifts in mate quality by evaluating men based on whichever attractiveness traits signal the men’s higher status. As money becomes relatively less important at signaling male status, other criteria will emerge to take its place, such as looks, charm, thuggishness and…. wait for it….

game.

Reason Two

Marriage is on the outs. Wives are being encouraged to dump their husbands, and men are rethinking the wisdom of getting hitched. As falling rates of marriage soak up fewer young single women, men will have more unencumbered pussy to plunder, and they’ll do it with… wait for it…

game.

Reason Three

Chicks dig it.

Filed under: Culture, Guy Rules

These days, advertising, especially online, is about going viral, having people share the ads with their friends getting as much exposure as possible, organically. Well, Nike sure does seem to have [i]scored a goal with its latest ad campaign, ‘Write the Future,’ ahead of the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. The campaign has… (read more)

On Wednesday, the U.S. House of Representatives Armed Services Committee voiced its support for defense acquisition reform by voting to continue funding the competing engine for the Joint Strike Fighter being made by GE and Rolls-Royce. However, there continues to be confusion over the facts of the F136 engine program, which has led to calls for a presidential veto of the defense bill that contains the funding. We’d like to set the record straight. Without competition from the GE-Rolls Royce engine, a $100 billion sole-source monopoly will be handed to a single contractor, Pratt & Whitney, which already has $2.6 billion in cost overruns on its JSF engine. According to the Government Accountability Office, at least $20 billion could be saved over the life of the JSF program with the GE-Rolls Royce F136 engine.

High stakes: Potential production of the F-35 for the U.S. Air Force, Navy, Marines and international customers can reach 5,000 to 6,000 aircraft over 30 years. The F-35 is designed to replace the AV-8B Harrier, A-10, F-16, F/A-18 Hornet and the United Kingdom’s Harrier GR.7 and Sea Harrier, all of which are currently powered by GE or Rolls-Royce. F136 engine development is being led at GE Aviation in Evendale, Ohio — a Cincinnati suburb — and at Rolls-Royce in Indianapolis, Indiana.

MYTH: The DoD says it will cost $2.9B to finish the F136 engine.
FACT: The business case is deeply flawed. GE/Rolls-Royce needs another $1B to complete F136 engine development. Between now and 2017, we estimate additional costs associated with tooling and support infrastructure will bring the total to $1.8B. We are focused on changing the DoD business model with our fixed price offer for early-production engines. With this proposal, GE/Rolls-Royce would assume all of the cost overrun risk for everything under its control during early production. This proposal meets all the tenets of the Defense Acquisition Reform initiative put forth by Congress and implemented by the Administration.

MYTH: Terminating the GE/Rolls-Royce F136 will save 5,000 American jobs.
FACT: Terminating the competitive engine program will cost thousands of U.S. jobs. About 2,500 U.S. jobs depend upon the F136 development program today and 4,000 U.S. jobs when it reaches the production phase. It’s no wonder the GE/Rolls-Royce F136 engine has been endorsed by The International Union of Electrical Workers—Communications Workers of America (IUE-CWA) and the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM). This myth distorts figures announced by Lockheed-Martin in 2001 that 5,000 jobs would be created in the U.K. through the production of the F-35 aircraft (not just the engine), which is an international program with 8 international partners by design.

MYTH: The F136 investment will not save you money.
FACT: The JSF engine program will ultimately reach $100B, and a decades-long engine competition needs only to generate a 1 percent to 2 percent cost benefit to recoup the remaining dollars needed to complete the F136 program. Twice, the independent Government Accountability Office (GAO) has concluded that it anticipates a 21 percent benefit from a JSF engine competition, using past experience from the F-16 “Great Engine War” competition in the 1980s as a comparison. That’s $20B in savings — which is equivalent to nearly 200 JSF aircraft. The GAO concluded that the F-16 engine competition yielded nearly 30 percent cumulative savings in acquisition costs alone. The GAO further concluded that savings of only 10.1 percent to 12.6 percent is needed for competition through the F136 to save taxpayers money.

MYTH: The F136 leads to a loss of JSF aircraft (50 – 80).
FACT: Just the opposite will happen. Costs from having no competition will eat into the larger defense budget and lead to fewer aircraft. In addition, the benefits of competition will increase the international demand for the JSF, just like it did for the F-16. Higher volume is a key to F-35 affordability.

MYTH: One engine supplier for JSF does not create operational risk.
FACT: By 2025, 90 percent of the U.S. fighter force will be F-22 and JSF aircraft. Never in our history have we been dependent on two fighter aircraft with no other fleets to provide alternatives. Despite advancements in engine design and technology, the JSF will push the limits on materials, pressure ratios and operating temperatures. This increases the technical and operational risks, which will be exacerbated with a sole source engine contractor.

MYTH: There was already a JSF engine competition, and P&W won.
FACT: Completely untrue. As recently as May 19, during a House Subcommittee hearing, John Roth, comptroller for DoD Program/Budget, agreed that there was never an engine competition for JSF. Rather, JSF aircraft designs were competed (between McDonnell Douglas and Lockheed Martin), but the engines were not. Citing commonality with Pratt & Whitney’s F119 engine for the F-22, the U.S. Air Force directed the competing aircraft manufacturers to both use the P&W engine in their concept demonstrator aircraft. Subsequently, Congress recognized in 1996 that an engine competition for the JSF was never held, and it authorized development funds to GE/Rolls-Royce with the intention of introducing a competing engine four years into the aircraft program.

MYTH: The P&W engine alone can serve the JSF needs.
FACT: P&W has confirmed a future technology effort to increase its F135 engine thrust by 5 percent by spending more government money — on top of the more than $7B being spent to develop the F135. So, the F135 engine being designed today for the JSF will change. Conversely, The GE/Rolls-Royce F136 engine was resized in 2005 to reflect growing demands of the F-35 aircraft. In fact, the F136 can grow in thrust by 5 percent without an engine redesign. The F136 has a clear thrust advantage.

MYTH: The JSF engines are not interchangeable and the aircraft will have to be redesigned to accommodate the F136.
FACT: The competing JSF engines from GE/Rolls-Royce and P&W are fully interchangeable. Simply put, you can pull out the engine from the JSF aircraft and quickly replace it with the engine from the competing supplier.

MYTH: The Navy won’t have room for two engines on their carriers. That alone should make us eliminate the F136 program.
FACT: Today, the Navy operates four different fixed-wing aircraft engines on the carrier with little or no commonality in terms of machinery, tools or support equipment. The interchangeable P&W F135 and GE/Rolls-Royce F136 engines reduce parts, manpower, and cost. Compared to engines for the F-14 B&D, the F136 will require 48 percent less manpower and 66 percent less support equipment

MYTH: The F136 engine is four years behind and will delay fielding the aircraft.
FACT: From onset of the JSF engine program established in 1996, the GE/RR was always to be introduced three to four years after the P&W engine.

MYTH: We don’t need the F136 because Secretary Gates doesn’t want it.
FACT: We’ve learned from experience there are times Congress should sensibly assert its own prerogative. For example, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles have become almost indispensible on today’s battlefield, yet years ago DoD wanted to terminate Predator development. The program survived only due to Congressional insistence. DOD wanted to terminate the V-22 tilt-rotor aircraft 20 years ago. Again, Congress recognized the force multiplier the V-22 would be in combat and voted to continue funding the program’s development and production. Today, the V-22 is providing greatly enhanced battlefield support. The JSF competitive engine is another example of a worthy program.

MYTH: If the JSF engines are competed, other systems on the aircraft should be as well.
FACT: The F-35 engines represent the largest subsystem on the aircraft. The also represent the most critical system on the aircraft for survivability. After the aircraft is in service, the maintenance and overhaul of the engines represent a growing portion of the aircraft systems’ overhaul costs. Competing engines for a program so large (3,000+ JSF aircraft are expected to be produced) will save costs and greatly reduce operational risk.

MYTH: Procuring the F136 will delay Air National Guard deliveries.
FACT: Procuring the F136 does not delay JSF aircraft deliveries at all. The DoD’s recently announced schedule slip to the JSF program to allow for additional flight-testing is not at all related to the F136 development, which is on schedule. In addition, the F136 program will not reduce the production of JSF aircraft, as is being claimed by P&W. Savings through the JSF engine competition could reach $20B over the life of the program — thus creating funds for additional aircraft.

MYTH: The international JSF partners are neutral about competing JSF engines.
FACT: Not only do the international partners want an engine choice, the Memorandum of Understanding signed with the International Partners in late 2006 assured them that they would have an engine choice. The DoD committed to provide competing JSF engines.

MYTH: The fighter engine industrial base in the U.S. won’t be downgraded if the F136 program is cancelled.
FACT: The Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA) — the DoD entity that assesses industrial base issues — disagrees. DCMA studies from 2006 and 2008 highlight the probability of serious impact on the large fighter engine industrial base if the F136 engine was terminated. They show that GE’s current fighter engine programs (F110 and F414) wind down after 2010, and there is insufficient funding/workload to sustain GE’s fighter engine design capability if F136 was terminated. There is no other program planned or in development in the near term that would allow GE to keep its large fighter engine team together if the F136 is terminated.

MYTH: A vote for the F136 will create political fallout.
FACT: The F136 has received 15 years of bi-partisan support. Champions of this program represent every region of the country, from liberal Democrats to conservative Republicans. If the F136 is cancelled, the government will have wasted $3 billion on developing the engine, and receive zero benefit, which carries its own political fallout.

MYTH: The GE/Rolls-Royce F136 testing program is not going well.
FACT: The GE/Rolls-Royce F136 test program is on schedule, and poised to power JSF test aircraft next year. The engine is exceeding all performance goals and running just as we expected in terms of thrust, temperatures, and operability. Earlier this year, we completed a highly successful test phase on the engine’s afterburner and control system, and are now running a second engine. By year’s end we expect to run 1,000 hours on six test engines. The test program is moving full steam ahead.

Learn more in these GE Reports stories:
“Fixed price offer will slash Joint Strike Fighter costs”
“GE & the Joint Strike Fighter: Let the best engine win”
“Gen. Hough: JSF engine competition ‘never happened’”
“House backs Joint Strike Fighter engine competition”

* Learn more about the arguments in favor of engine competition on the JSF
* Learn details about how the JSF engine is made
* Read the GAO’s May 2009 report on the JSF
* Read Lt. Gen. Hough’s full post on aviationweek.com
* Read Desert Storm air commander Gen. Chuck Horner’s opinion piece
* Read the JSF recommendations made by the Heritage Foundation

In his first television interview since news broke of his cheating scandal last March, a somber Jesse James tells ABC News‘ Vicki Mabrey what led him to cheat on his Oscar-winning wife Sandra Bullock. The biker enthusiast also opens up about his troubled past and his time in rehab.

“[I] took a pretty amazing life and amazing success and marriage … and threw it away by my own hands…”

Jesse’s interview with Nightline ABC will air Tuesday, May 25 @ 11:35 PM.

On August 6, 2001, President George W. Bush famously received an intelligence briefing titled, “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.” Thirty-six days later, al Qaeda terrorists tragically turned threat into reality.

Today, scientists tell us we have a 10-year window — if even that — before catastrophic climate change becomes inevitable and irreversible.

This is our intelligence briefing — it tells us the threat is real and time is not on our side.

The national security threat posed by unrestricted greenhouse gas emissions is great (see “NYT: Climate Change Seen as Threat to U.S. Security” and “Quadrennial Defense Review Should Spark Interagency Climate Conversation“),  The threat is so clearcut that even the Bush Administration’s top intelligence experts were raising the alarm (see “The moving Fingar writes“).

And that’s why 33 generals and admirals announced support for the climate bill last month, asserting “Climate change is making the world a more dangerous place” and “threatening America’s security.”  Now, Sen. John Kerry has written a compelling op-ed explaining the grave national security threat posed by climate change and thus the urgent need to take action now to reduce greenhouse gas emissions:

If Vice President Cheney can argue that even a 1 percent chance of a terrorist attack is 100 percent justification for preemptive action, then, surely, when scientists tell us that climate change is nearly a 100 percent certainty we should join in an all-out effort to make ourselves safe.

Make no mistake — this is an American national security challenge.

Climate change injects a new major source of chaos, tension and human insecurity into an already volatile world. It threatens to bring more famine and drought, worse pandemics, more natural disasters, more resource scarcity, and staggering human displacement. In an interconnected world, that endangers all of us.

Anyone who doubts the threat should talk to the 11 retired American admirals and generals who warned in 2007, “Climate change can act as a threat multiplier for instability in some of the most volatile regions of the world, and it presents significant national-security challenges for the United States.”

In their final national security analysis, the security planners in the Bush Administration recognized climate change among key trends that will shape U.S. defense policy in the coming years.

Just last week, former United States Central Command (CENTCOM) Commander William Fallon warned that, left unchecked, climate change will “be significantly destabilizing to our future.”

Another Former CENTCOM Commander Anthony Zinni put it simply: “We will pay for this one way or another. We will pay to reduce greenhouse gas emissions today, and we’ll have to take an economic hit of some kind. Or, we will pay the price later in military terms. And that will involve human lives. There will be a human toll.”

Heed the warnings of the National Intelligence Council — the U.S. intelligence community’s think tank — which concluded “global climate change will have wide-ranging implications for U.S. national-security interests over the next 20 years.”

Nowhere is the connection between climate and security more direct than in South Asia, home to al Qaeda.

Scientists now warn the Himalayan glaciers, which supply fresh water to a billion people in India and Pakistan, will face severe impacts from climate change. India’s rivers are not only vital to its agriculture but also critical to its religious practice. Pakistan, for its part, depends on irrigated farming to avoid famine.

At a moment when our government is scrambling to ratchet down tensions across that strategically vital region, climate change could work powerfully in the opposite direction. Failure to tackle climate change risks much more than a ravaged environment: It risks a much more dangerous world and a gravely threatened America.

Unfortunately, not everyone in Washington appreciates the stakes.

If a politician completely dismissed or denied the threat of terrorism, he or she would be sent home in the next election. But there are seemingly few political consequences if you dismiss the science or the threat of climate change.

Here’s one fact that should awaken every rock-ribbed defense hawk to the stakes: There will always be excuses to wait, but every day that Washington fails to price carbon and embrace clean energy, America sends another $100 million to Iran. That’s not a choice America can afford.

Last week, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and I unveiled the American Power Act, a comprehensive energy and climate approach that sends the price signal on carbon that the market needs to unleash America’s entrepreneurial energy.

In 2010, that is the test of a serious policy to combat climate change.

When our admirals and generals warn that failure to act will put America and the world in danger, it is clearer than ever:  This is our August 2001 memo. These are our warnings. The time to act on them is now.

Kerry is the Chair of the Foreign Relations Committee

Related Posts:

Venus, meet Japan. Today the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) launched a rocket carrying several different missions bound for our boiling-hot sister planet. Here’s what they want to learn.

Atmospheric Tag Team

Akatsuki, the Venus climate probe, will arrive at the second planet from the sun in December. There it will team up with the European Space Agency’s Venus Express probe, using five cameras to peer down into the turbulent atmosphere and study Venus‘ maniacal meteorology.

One of the main goals is to understand the “super-rotation” of the Venus atmosphere, where violent winds drive storms and clouds at speeds of more than 220 mph (360 kilometers per hour), 60 times faster than the planet itself rotates [MSNBC].

The Venus Express’ own findings since it reached the planet in 2006 have bolstered the idea that Venus was once alive with plate tectonics, oceans, and continents—that is, it was once much more Earth-like than its current, sweaty incarnation. In fact, Venus may still be active.

Volcanoes?

It’s alive! It’s alive! (Maybe.)

Just last month, scientists working with the Venus Express reported seeing lava flows on the surface that barely showed signs of weathering. They’re young. The team argued that this is more evidence Venus is not just a shadow of its formerly active self, but could still be alive with volcanism.

The thick Venusian atmosphere is opaque to instruments that operate at visible wavelengths and so the Japanese probe carries five cameras that are sensitive in the infrared and ultraviolet parts of the electromagnetic spectrum [BBC News].

They’ll use these capabilities—infrared in particular—to scan the surface of Venus for any active volcanism.

Can We Fly This Solar Sail?

Japan’s H-IIA rocket also carried into space Japan’s solar sail project “Ikaros,” the Interplanetary Kite-craft Accelerated by Radiation of the Sun. As DISCOVER noted last month, when the sail (seen above) deploys, it will be 66 feet in diagonal distance, yet thinner than a human hair. Ikaros, named for the ill-fated mythological figure, actually has two propulsion systems. The “sail” part refers to its ability to use the tiny pressure of sunlight the way a sailboat uses the wind. But the craft is also equipped with photovoltaic cells to generate solar electricity.

The hardest part is just deploying such a large sail, project leader Osamu Mori says, which they will attempt in a few days. Ground tests of this feature proved… difficult.

“We even sent it high up in the sky in a big balloon, to spread the film in a near-vacuum environment. We experienced many failures, but we kept searching for the most reliable deployment method, and that led us to the model we’ve now built. I believe it will be successful” [BBC News].

Follow DISCOVER (@DiscoverMag) on Twitter

Related Content:
80beats: Japan’s “Solar Yacht” Is Ready to Ride Sunbeams Through Space
80beats: New Images Suggest Hellish Venus Was Once More Like Earth
80beats: Volcanoes on Venus Could Be Alive & Ready To Erupt
DISCOVER: One Giant Step for a Small, Crowded Country, on Japan’s moon aspirations
DISCOVER: Japan Sets Sail in Space

Image: JAXA

Don Rissmiller of Strategas looks at how the lessons of the US financial crisis could instruct policy responses for the EU and its Greece problem:

1) The TARP-like option: this is essentially spending government money to buy bad debt, and the European bailout packages have moved in this direction. The political challenge
was always getting money authorized to help those that appeared to be spending beyond their means. This still appears to be where we are now in the EU, despite some progress
with the German vote.

2) The PPIP-like option: the challenge with spending government money in the U.S. was that the authorization process was burdensome. Hence, the next suggestion was a ”public private investment program” (PPIP). The challenge with PPIP (it never got off the ground) was how to get banks to sell assets in an illiquid market, which presumably would not be as large an issue with government debt. But the key features of the program – including non-recourse leverage and a sharing of profits – were indeed well thought out. No European option of this sort appears on the table currently, however.

3) The Monetization option: When the Fed finally started participating with “all available tools”, including buying mortgage securities, the U.S. market stabilized. This is certainly a politically tough option for the ECB. Should it come to it, however, the option of doing nothing certainly seems like a much worse policy mistake.

4) Cutting Spending: Greece already appears to have lost some sovereignty, as the Lisbon treaty has required sharp adjustments. These cuts can be some of the most politically challenging items, though as the governor of NJ has demonstrated, they are not impossible.

5) Europe Bank Guarantees: the risk of a “run on the bank” seems to be creating additional uncertainty, though the amount of deposits that would have to be guaranteed would presumably be quite large. The FDIC guarantee plan in the U.S. could provide some guidance for Europe, however.

And Larry Kudlow also has some thoughts on that last option of Rissmiller’s:

So it’s my contention that the Europeans must now embark on a similar program. The EU/IMF rescue plan, which consists of $1 trillion in loans and loan guarantees for government sovereign debt, must be expanded to include a blanket loan guarantee for all European bank debt, short term and long term. A Europe-wide, centralized, deposit-guarantee system should also be developed. Right now bank deposits are insured by individual countries, like Greece. This is not credible. (Hat tip to investor David Kotok for this deposit-guarantee thought.)

A loan-guarantee program to backstop the banks in Europe and sovereign debt will put an end to this crazy Greek drama that is pulling down markets everywhere and threatening the economic recovery. As a free-market advocate, I don’t like this sort of government intervention. But we’re talking emergency here. Systemic global emergency. … These bank-loan guarantees would be temporary, perhaps a year in length. And they would buy time for the essential budget restructuring necessary to slash spending and curb the welfare-state excesses in southern Europe, or perhaps all of Europe. These government-shrinking steps will free up private-sector resources to spur growth.

El fabricante de neumáticos Michelin acaba de confirmar que fabricará 2.396 neumáticos específicos para el nuevo superdeportivo Ferrari 599 GTO. Se ha estimando esa cantidad de neumáticos debido a que sólo se pondrán a la venta 599 unidades de este nuevo modelo de Ferrari.

Aun asi, la propia Michelin ha afirmado que fabricaran más neumáticos bajo demanda en caso de ser necesario. Aunque pueda resultar extraño, suele ser muy normal que un superdeportivo este acompañado por un juego de neumáticos exclusivos.

Las medidas de estos neumáticos son 285/30 ZR 20, para los delanteros, y 315/35 ZR 20 para los traseros con 10 y 15 Kg de peso respectivamente.

Related posts:

1. Michelin podría volver a la Fórmula 1
2. Michelin mostrará en España el Active Wheel en Noviembre
3. Ferrari 599 GTO, agotado pocas horas después de su lanzamiento

A political battle in California is about as common these days as the sun setting over the Pacific. If the multibillion dollar budget battle wasn’t enough, or reacting to the new Arizona immigration law, now state lawmakers here want to ensure the Golden State doesn’t follow the textbook changes happening in Texas.

FOLLOW ADAM ON TWITTER

It all began with State Senator Leland Yee (D), who introduced a bill in Sacramento that would require California’s Board of Education to review all in-production textbooks and reject any changes that have been influenced by changes in the Lone Star State. Bill SB 1451 has passed the first policy committee by a 6-3 vote along party lines and the State Senator says the Texas changes are historically inaccurate and dismiss the contributions of minorities.

Critics of Yee’s bill cite the state’s battle over political correctness in textbooks just a few years ago…an issue we covered at the time here on foxnews.com. For example, there are certain words that either are suggested or mandated for use in California. For example, no longer is ‘Yacht’ suggested because it is elitist. Senior Citizens are now older persons and junk food like hot dogs, cake, candy, butter and soda are not depicted because “they are not healthy.”

One thing to consider, California is the nations largest market for school textbooks and in 2007, districts spent 633 million dollars on textbooks alone. Because of the massive budget shortfall here, lawmakers are now holding off until 2013 to approve new books for high school students and until 2016 for grades K-8….of course all this is meant to try and save millions. More coming on this all day…what do you think?

[JURIST] UK Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Secretary William Hague [official profile] said Friday that the UK will launch an investigation into allegations that overseas UK operatives were complicit in torture. Hague stated that the new coalition government will initiate a judge-led inquiry into the allegations, but no details were outlined in the legislative program [text, PDF] published Thursday by Prime Minister David Cameron [official profile]. In an interview [text] with the BBC, Hague stated:

We have said again in the coalition agreement that we want a judge-led inquiry. … We will be setting out in the not-too-distant future what we are going to do about the allegations that have been made about complicity in torture. … So will there be an inquiry of some form? Yes, both parties in the coalition said they wanted that. Now what we’re working on is what form that should take.

At least 12 men have filed lawsuits against the UK claiming the government knew or should have known about the torture the men experienced overseas.

Earlier this month, the England and Wales Court of Appeal [official website] ruled [JURIST report] that state intelligence agencies cannot use secret evidence in their defense against abuse accusations by Binyam Mohamed [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] and several other UK residents who were held at Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive]. The judgment overturned a November ruling [JURIST report] of a UK high court, which held that defendants MI5 and MI6 [official websites] could utilize a “closed material procedure” that would allow them to rely on certain evidence without disclosing it to opposing counsel or committing it to the public record. The procedure, typically employed in criminal proceedings, is designed to allow concealment of evidence where disclosure would cause “real harm to the public interest.” In February, the England and Wales Court of Appeal ruled [JURIST report] that the government must disclose several paragraphs [text] detailing the allegations of Mohamed’s mistreatment that were previously omitted from an earlier ruling in his criminal trial. Mohamed was returned to the UK in 2009, four months after charges against him were dismissed [JURIST reports]. He was held at Guantanamo Bay for four years on suspicion of conspiracy to commit terrorism [JURIST report].

People are up in arms that Australian customs officials have taken it upon themselves to go porn-hunting on travelers’ computers, the Sydney Morning Herald reports. If they find anything, they’ll confiscate the dirty stuff in order to prevent you from exporting it to the untainted island.

Sure, it’s invasive, unfair, perverted, etc., but enough about that. Where do you sign up for that job?

How fascinating it must be, to size a person up and guess what sort of demented debauchery they’re into, maybe make a few sidebets with your coworkers, then go hunting for the embarrassing answers.

Or maybe it’s just me. Anyway, if you head to Australia, move your hentei to a jump drive and leave it at home.

Travellers to be searched for porn [Sydney Morning Herald via Gizmodo]

Hurricane Creekkeeper John Wathen of Alabama flew over the Gulf of Mexico this week with pilot Tom Hutchings of SouthWings to continue documenting the unfolding ecological catastrophe from the BP oil spill.

Leaving the coast of Alabama and looking toward Florida, they saw clear seas. But they soon ran across the first tideline of red oil. About 14 miles out they saw a thin, glossy sheen, and at 38 miles deep streaks of red.

“The color seems to have changed somewhat,” Wathen reports. “It’s not the bright red it was before; it’s more brown. It’s as if the dispersant they’re putting on it is merely hiding it from sight.”

Yesterday the Environmental Protection Agency — which initially approved the use of the dispersant Corexit — directed BP to use a less toxic chemical. The move came after EPA released BP testing data that showed areas of significant toxicity in the water where the dispersant had been used.

The closer they got to source, the more oil there was on water — and the more cloud cover there was above. Wathen says it was as if the spill were creating its own weather pattern.

“Nothing could have prepared me though for what I saw next,” Wathen continues. “Looking out across the tops of the clouds, there was one that stood out all by itself — a long, black, ugly-looking thing. It seemed to come straight up out of nowhere. This is the burn at the source of the BP slick.”

The massive black cloud (pictured above in a photo by Wathen) stretching across the horizon is coming from relatively small fires, he points out. It would take thousands of fires like that to burn all the oil on the surface.

“Is the tradeoff for what we’re putting in the atmosphere worth what we’re burning off the surface of the Gulf of Mexico?” he asks. “Can we really afford to do that?”

Air tests from the Louisiana coast have already shown a serious threat to human health from the airborne chemicals released by the underwater oil gusher. While BP is now collecting some of that oil, most of it continues to be released to the environment.

As Wathen and Hutchings headed back to land, they witnessed the massive slick — now estimated to cover about 16,000 square miles — making landfall along the Louisiana coast. They also saw the booms that had been placed in hopes of stopping the oil being tied up in knots and destroyed by the seas.

“It’s plain to see this is a futile gesture to protect the shorelines of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, but what can we do? We have to do something,” Wathen says.

“We need every scientific mind in the country working on this — and not just those at BP who are trying to protect the resource,” Wathen concludes.

Watch the video here:

A sigh of relief is due on Wall Street. The procedural finale for the U.S. Senate’s debate on financial reform came just in time for the big banks. The bill just kept getting tougher as the talk dragged on. But it could have been worse. While banks’ future activities and profitability may get pinched, their core business model appears intact. In the end, Wall Street got nicked, not nuked. Some observations:

1) Wall Street should thank the White House. Had President Barack Obama prioritized bank reform over healthcare at the height of the crisis, the biggest players might have been broken up, hard caps placed on balance sheets, and banking and investing operations separated. More recently, the Securities and Exchange Commission’s lawsuit against Goldman Sachs in April helped re-energize advocates for such changes.

2) Nothing radical here. While the Senate and House bills still need to be blended, it’s safe to say the most radical ideas have fallen by the wayside. A “systemic risk council” of federal regulators will recommend new capital and leverage rules to the Federal Reserve, which will be the most influential bank regulator. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation will have the power to wind down any failing large, systemically interconnected institution.

In addition, large, complex financial firms will have to submit plans for their rapid and orderly shutdown should they go under. And for the first time the derivatives that are currently traded privately will mostly be forced to go through clearing houses and in some cases trade on exchanges. Bank lobbyists have defended their corner: it’s not the regulatory reign of terror their clients’ most vociferous critics wanted. But it’s hardly a “light touch” regime, either, and it does involve real changes. Caveat: This assumes the Blanche Lincoln provision on derivatives is softened or stripped in the conference committee.

3) Too Big To Fail is still a problem. As long as regulators and politicians have vast amounts of discretion, a financial crisis will make bailouts an irresistible temptation. The way around this is either breaking up the banks or creating hard, market-based triggers for either regulatory action or a resolution process. Neither is in the bill.

4) Wall Street’s has an enduring PR problem. Yes, big banks are unpopular. But it has gotten so bad that they may not be able to so easily counter their image issues with campaign cash. Getting Wall Street money now has a stigma attached to it like oil and tobacco money. Candidates like Meg Whitman in California and John Kasich are getting hammered for their Wall Street ties. The industry’s continued unpopularity will no doubt spawn further attempts to tax, regulate and restrict the sector.

5) Bernanke trimphant. The Federal Reserve has to be pretty satisfied. It did not lose its role as regulator; in fact, it’s been strengthened. And the central banks was also able to fend off attempts to make it more transparent.  The downside:  The GOP (see Rand Paul)  has soured on the Fed in a big way, particularly at the grassroots. Further economic woes will lead to more calls to change its form and function.

Even though the Maybach Exelero coupe received a lot of attention from consumers and the media, the Mercedes-Benz uber-luxury brand never put it into production (or even limited production). In fact, the Exelero was a one-off model commissioned by Fulda Tyres. Fulda used the car as a reference vehicle to test a new generation of wide tires. The Exelero even popped up in Jay-Z’s video for his song Lost One.

While Maybach won’t be doing a coupe anytime soon (or never depending on whether they stick around or not), German based engineering specialist Xenatec will. The firm is building 100 examples of a Maybach 57S coupe at £560,000 ($807,265 USD) a piece.

Daimler is all-go for the project and will be supplying 57 chassis from its Sindelfingen based manufacturing headquarters.

Power will come from the same 6.0L twin-turbo V12 making 612-hp and 737 lb-ft of torque.

Maybach 57S Coupe by Xenatec:

By: Kap Shah

Source: AutoCar

One of the most anticipated tennis events is on its way, as French Open draws near to commencement on Sunday. French Open is the second of the grandslam title in tennis calendar. The event also showcases the premier clay court of the sport. Defending champions Roger Federer and Svetlana Kuznetsova are not seen as the favorites in this year’s competition. Federer has just tasted another bitter defeat from archrival Rafael Nadal at Madrid few weeks ago. Furthermore, the Swiss top-seed has not won any title since winning the Australian Open cup last January.

All eyes point to just two tennis future hall of famers: Spain’s Rafael “Rafa” Nadal and Belgian Justin Henin. Both captured French Open championship for four times. Nadal won French open for four straight year  (2004-2008) and was just badly hurt and fell into the hands of No. 23 Robin Soderling of Sweden in 2009, to give way to Federer to snatch the grandslam title. Federer said that he feels more relaxed right now and ready to defend the title to anyone. Nadal, on the other end of the court seemed so fierce and in perfect form to regain his title back. He want to remind everyone again why he is  hailed as the best tennis player in clay. Henin, also a four-time French open champion will see another action after her unforeseen retirement two years ago. She already played at the Australian Open this January. She is currently at No. 22. Henin was drawn into the same bracket as world’s No. 1 Serena Williams.

Related posts:

1. Roland Garros Awaits For Nadal
2. Soderling Beats Andy Murray at BNP Paribas Quarter Finals
3. Official of Rio Tinto Admitted of Bribe

Red Bull acaba de confirmar que su piloto Sebastian Vettel estrenará un nuevo chasis para su monoplaza en el inminente GP de Turquía 2010. Recordemos que durante el pasado GP de Mónaco 2010, Vettel se quejo sobre el equilibrio del monoplaza por lo que es posible que dicho cambio tenga que ver con este problema.

Por otra parte, algunos medios especializados afirman que este cambio puede ser debido a las dos victorias consecutivas de su compañero de equipo Mark Webber que recordemos han sido dos victorias aplastantes sobre su compañero. En definitiva, durante el próximo gran premio saldremos de dudas.

Related posts:

1. GP de China 2010, Sebastian Vettel consigue la pole y doblete de Red Bull
2. Sebastian Vettel ganador del GP de Malasia 2010
3. Sebastian Vettel ganador del GP de Abu Dhabi 2009

One of the draws of using the iPad is having a new device to try new software on to find those gems out there. Having hundreds of thousands of apps to choose from makes this a daunting task, and when a jewel is spotted it can be a delightful experience. That’s the case with iCab Mobile, an alternative web browser for the iPad that has earned a place on my iPad’s dock.

I didn’t set out looking for another browser on the iPad; I’ve been quite happy with Mobile Safari. It’s worked well for me and I didn’t think it lacked any features that would be helpful. I stumbled upon iCab Mobile and quickly found a few features that have improved my browsing experience.

There has been a desktop version of iCab for the Mac for years, and I confess I’ve never looked at it. There are no shortage of fine browsers for the Mac desktop, and I have seen no need to try iCab. The mobile version of iCab is a different story as it adds some usability features to the browser that are nice.

Mobile Safari handles tabbed browsing in a decent way — it lets you open multiple web pages at the same time but it hides them in the background. I often pop open the separate tab window in Safari to find I have a lot of pages open I’m no longer using. What Safari is missing is a tab bar that shows all open tabs just like the desktop version, and this is the primary feature I use in iCab Mobile.

The tab bar in iCab works just like the desktop version of Safari, but is even more configurable than that. You can set new page links to open in the current web page, always open in a new tab or my favorite — open links in domains other than the current page in a new tab. Click a link, and the page opens in a new tab. You can configure iCab to have newly opened tabs take the focus or not. The key is how iCab lets you set things up the way you prefer to work, and when you get it customized the whole browsing experience becomes more enjoyable.

If you don’t like the tab bar taking up space on the screen then you can turn it off. You still have an advantage over Safari in that iCab has a tab button that shows all open pages in a popup window when pushed. There’s no switching to a separate tab window like Safari — the popup is visible as is the current web page and this is a much better solution.

If you really want to take advantage of as much screen as possible, the full screen mode in iCab is wonderful. Just hit the button and the web page fills the entire iPad screen. There are tiny buttons around the edge of the display so you can still access needed functions. This is a wonderful way to browse on the iPad and worth the price of admission for me.

Another big feature in iCab is the ability to use modules. These are like the extensions in Firefox that add simple functionality if desired. There are not a lot of modules available, but a few of them are really useful. There’s the “Translation by Google” module, “Increase text size”, “Add page to Instapaper”, “Twitter”, among others. There’s even a “Black & White” module that makes any web page display white text on a black background, which is more useful than you might think.

The filter function in iCab makes it possible to block ads and other content in any web page. The program has over a hundred filters predefined for use, and it’s simple to add new ones as desired.

The attention to detail in iCab Mobile is evident at every level; take bringing in my bookmarks from the desktop. In the iCab Mobile settings there is an Export/Import option. When that is invoked it opens a window with detailed instructions to get the desktop browser bookmarks into iCab Mobile. It starts a server on the iPad and wirelessly connects it to the desktop, where the bookmark file is copied into iCab with the push of a button. It couldn’t be easier and in a few seconds all my desktop bookmarks were available on the iPad. There’s no way to sync them, but this process can be invoked as desired to update the bookmarks.

The iCab Mobile app makes the browsing experience on the iPad better, and that is saying a lot. I find it well worth the $1.99 price and it has replaced Mobile Safari in the iPad dock. That’s the highest compliment I can give an app.

Related content on GigaOM Pro (sub. req’d): Hot Topic: Apple’s iPad

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Environmental progress is based on people. People willing to do the right thing, to make a different choice, to try a new behavior. And that kind of sea change takes something more than regulations. It takes a shift that comes not just from the head but from the heart of millions of individuals, desiring a better life and a healthier environment.

Helping us make that leap into people’s hearts is The Ad Council , a non-profit organization that serves as the charitable arm for the advertising and media industry. The AdC recruits the best talent in the communications industry, who volunteer their expertise, to shine a spotlight on social issues in need of mass public action to make a measurable, positive change in society.

As EPA celebrates its 40th Anniversary, it’s fitting that we join forces with the Ad Council to tackle another pressing social issue: Childhood Asthma.

Since 2001 EPA has partnered with the AdC to highlight the growing problem of childhood asthma. Our goals are to reduce the severity and number of asthma attacks to reduce emergency room visits and improve school attendance.

In its first iteration, the national childhood asthma media campaign adopted a goldfish metaphor to explain that no child with asthma should feel like a fish out of water. The media has generously embraced this campaign donating more than $300 million spanning TV, radio, newspaper, magazine, billboard and web in English, Spanish and in three Native American languages. The iconic goldfish leaves a powerful impression that stays with audiences—reporting an awareness of 33%–compared to the AdC norm of about 15%. This high awareness helps to shift behaviors as well—by prompting parents to go to the web or call a hotline to learn more. Tracking success, since the start of the campaign, some 20% of parents report trying a new behavior to help prevent their child’s asthma attacks.

Joining us this year, for a new round of public service television commercials, is one of America’s most prolific and renowned film directors, Joe Pytka. Think two eggs sizzling in a frying pan; think Superbowl, the iconic Clydesdales; and Michael Jordan in Space Jam. Known for his ability to fill the screen with emotional tugs, he reminds parents and caregivers– for a child with asthma, monsters can be lurking anywhere, even in innocent places inside their home.

Take a look at the new campaign for Awareness Month in May

About the Author: Kristy Miller leads the national asthma media campaign for EPA’s Air Office.

Another link to view the media campaign

Other links include:

http://www.adcouncil.org/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vz-fc_Y2xWU

http://www.kab.org/site/PageServer?pagename=kab_history

Call it the “snowball effect,” or maybe the “witch-hunt” effect. At some point, when a company is under fire for something, even the smallest piece of evidence that it might be guilty of that thing can get blown out of proportion. Exhibit A is Facebook and the recent news — reported somewhat breathlessly by the Wall Street Journal, of all places — that the social network sent personally identifiable information to advertisers, after saying that it doesn’t. As Marshall Kirkpatrick at ReadWriteWeb has noted, this story is a tad exaggerated. The fact is that lots of websites transmit information via the URL of a page, because that’s the way modern web browsers work. In some cases, Facebook seems to have accidentally included user IDs in the URL string when someone clicked on an ad, and according to the Journal has now changed the way it handles those links as a result of the paper’s inquiries.

Despite the scare-mongering from some sites about Facebook “selling your identity to advertisers,” on a scale of 1-10 privacy-wise, this is probably around a 1 or 2 — and it’s not unique to Facebook, either (MySpace uses the same method, according to the Journal). As one commenter at the Hacker News site noted, it could easily be a simple case of programmers overlooking what info is being encoded in a page’s URL. Should the network have had controls in place to prevent this? Probably. But the reality is that Facebook has become a lightning rod for such issues, and therefore even the tiniest speck of incriminating behavior gets sucked into the maelstrom of attention.

In other words, privacy is clearly the new black. Whether it’s concern over Facebook’s transmission of data through URLs or Google’s accidental capturing of Wi-Fi data, consumers and advocacy groups and government agencies are increasingly concerned about what large web companies are doing with consumers’ data. Google has had complaints filed against it with the Federal Trade Commission and is being investigated by German authorities, while Facebook is the subject of letters of complaint and calls for federal inquiries stateside. High-profile users are cancelling their Facebook accounts and others are pointing to CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s allegedly aggressive stance on the issue of personal privacy.

Could privacy be Facebook’s Waterloo? As I argued in a recent GigaOM Pro report (subscription required), the company has to start getting serious about privacy if it wants to continue the momentum that has gotten it to 500 million users and a private market value estimated at some $20 billion. One thing it needs to do, as Liz pointed out recently, is to speak clearly on the issue and make its policies and settings as understandable as possible. It’s easy to show that Facebook is still growing, and therefore come to the conclusion that users don’t care about privacy, but that would be a mistake. Once the snowball effect is underway, it can quickly become an avalanche, and by then it’s too late.

Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d): Why New Net Companies Must Shoulder More Responsibility

Post and thumbnail photos courtesy of Flickr user Max-B

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Filed under: Motorsports, Classics, Coupe, Performance, Auctions, Chrysler, Dodge, Mitsubishi

Way back in 1991, Chrysler was charged with providing a pace car for the 75th running of the Indianapolis 500. At the time, the company was blood brothers with Mitsubishi, and the automakers had decided it would be worth everyone’s while to rebadge the popular 3000GT as a Stealth and sell it under the Dodge banner. Chrysler was thrilled to have something resembling a sports car on its dealer lots and wanted to get the word out by handing pace car duties to its newest creation. Only there was a problem. Once the public got wind that Chrysler wanted to run a Japanese-built car out front of the red, white and blue Indianapolis 500, near riots ensued, with the United Auto Workers among the most critical parties.

Chrysler pulled a 180 and decided to roll out a Viper prototype for the race, but not before it built a Stealth for pace duty. The car was dipped in some very visible yellow paint, and safety equipment like a roll cage, racing harnesses and a communication system was installed. The car was never called to pace at the Brickyard, however, having been relegated to the duty of an official festival car. Thereafter, it spent its years parked in the Walter P. Chrysler Museum instead.

Now, that very would-be pace car is up for auction on eBay. With just 8,000 miles on the clock and an opening bid of $25,000, the car is someone’s chance to own one very odd piece of Detroit history – the Indy 500 pace car that never was. Check out the auction here.

[Source: eBay Motors]

eBay Find of the Day: 1991 Dodge Stealth is the Indy 500 Pace Car that never was originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 21 May 2010 09:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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