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In a few months Verizon subscribers in the US will have the choice between the Samsung Omnia 2 and the HTC Nexus One. CareAce.net have published this brief look at some of the features which make the Omnia 2 a better choice than the Nexus One.

Read more at CareAce.net here.

My latest blog post over at Science Progress is a reaction to the NSF’s new Science and Engineering Indicators 2010 report, and in particular, to its famous Chapter 7, which deals with science and the public.

In essence, the new Chapter 7 gives you the choice of whether to view the glass as half full, or half empty, when it comes to the U.S. public and its relationship to the world of science. I personally lean toward “half empty,” but here’s the pro/con breakdown:

On the positive side…the report consistently shows that Americans are not so scientifically benighted as one might think, at least in comparison with the rest of the world. We go to science museums more frequently. We claim a higher level of interest in “new scientific discoveries” than citizens in South Korea, China, and many parts of Europe. And in terms of sheer factual knowledge, we perform pretty much on par with Europe, and ahead of other countries like Japan, China, and Russia.

Through such international comparisons, the latest NSF report suggests that if your preferred standard for judging a nation’s engagement with science is to see how it stacks up next to other comparable (e.g., developed) countries, then the United States really doesn’t fare so poorly. Furthermore, NSF emphasizes that Americans profess to have very positive views about science. They overwhelmingly think science makes our lives better and that it deserves federal funding. And they have an apparently abiding trust in the leaders of the scientific community.

That’s the good side. But here’s the reason I still feel pretty negative in outlook:

As Science and Engineering Indicators 2010 itself admits, seeing how the country fares on science in comparison with other nations isn’t the only possible means of judgment. If one’s standard is more ambitious—emphasizing, in the latest report’s words, “what a technologically advanced society requires (either today or in the future) to compete in the world economy and enable its citizens to better take advantage of science progress in their own lives”—then it is very hard to feel good about the current state of affairs in the United States.

For instance, just 13 percent of the public now claims to follow science and technology news “very closely,” and this number has been on a downward trend for the past decade, ending with the current low. So while Americans may profess great admiration for science in the abstract, they hardly feel compelled to pay it much attention.

Similarly, there has been little apparent improvement over time in Americans’ basic ability to answer factual questions about science correctly. Moreover, the vast majority of our citizens have scant familiarity with key emerging scientific fields that will dramatically shape the future, such as nanotechnology and biotechnology—and it is important to note that these are the only such fields that the NSF report focuses in on. Ask Americans about other coming scientific technologies or quandaries—say, geoengineering, or synthetic biology—and I imagine the responses would be even more dismal.

Anyway, there’s much more to the column, so check it out here–and decide for yourself whether, when it comes to science and the American public, you’re an optimist or pessimist.

Closer Bobby Jenks, slugger Carlos Quentin and left-hander John Danks were added to the list of players who will attend this weekend’s SoxFest at the Palmer House Hilton.

All three were arbitration eligible players who agreed to terms in the past week.

Read the original article from Tribune News Services.

The duets sung by male and female mosquitoes are a critical part of their mating ritual. If researchers can master mosquito music, they may be able to abort a whole generation of disease-carriers.

By David Voreacos and David Scheer

Jan. 20 (Bloomberg) — General Re Corp., the reinsurer owned by Warren Buffett’sBerkshire Hathaway Inc., agreed to pay more than $92 million to settle U.S. investigations and investor claims over its role in sham transactions with American International Group Inc. and Prudential Financial Inc.

The company will pay $19.5 million to the U.S. Postal Inspection Service Consumer Fraud Fund, $12.2 million to the Securities and Exchange Commission and $60.5 million to AIG shareholders in a class-action settlement, the SEC said in a statement today. Gen Re previously forfeited $5 million in fees linked to the AIG scheme, the SEC said. The deal lets Gen Re avoid prosecution by the Justice Department and resolves an SEC civil lawsuit filed today.

General Re was involved in sham transactions with AIG in 2000 and a Prudential division from 1997 to 2002 that helped those two companies manipulate financial statements, the SEC said in a complaint in federal court in Manhattan today. The AIG dealings helped AIG overstate loss reserves, a key indicator of an insurer’s health, by $500 million, according to the claim.

“Gen Re and its senior management were aware that the true purpose of the transactions was to permit AIG to record and report phony loss reserves to calm analysts’ criticism,” the agency wrote in the complaint.

The U.S. probe led to criminal convictions of four former Gen Re executives, including ex-Chief Executive Officer Ronald Ferguson, 68, and one from AIG. The fraud cost AIG shareholders from $544 million to $597 million, ruled a federal judge in Hartford, Connecticut. Two other Gen Re executives pleaded guilty.

Misled, Faked and Cheated

Attorneys representing Gen Re didn’t immediately return calls seeking comment. Gen Re was cooperating with government investigators, Berkshire Hathaway said in a Nov. 6 regulatory filing.

New York-based AIG, once the world’s largest insurer, agreed to pay $1.64 billion in 2006 to resolve government claims it misled investors, faked bids, and cheated workers’ compensation programs.

AIG shareholders have reached other legal settlements to recover money. In October 2008, AIG’s accounting firm, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, agreed to pay $97.5 million to settle litigation led by Ohio public pension funds claiming it helped mislead investors. In February, Stamford, Connecticut- based Gen Re agreed to pay $72 million to settle litigation, also led by the Ohio funds, claiming it helped mislead AIG investors. A judge has not given final approval yet to that deal, court records show.

Two Years

After the criminal trial in Hartford, U.S. District Judge Christopher Droney sentenced Ferguson to two years in prison. Former AIG Vice President Christian Milton was sentenced to a four-year term, and ex-Gen Re Chief Financial Officer Elizabeth Monrad got 18 months. Former Gen Re Senior Vice President Christopher Garand and ex-Gen Re Assistant General Counsel Robert Graham each got a one-year prison term.

The trial featured testimony about Buffett, chairman of Omaha, Nebraska-based Berkshire Hathaway. Buffett wasn’t charged with a crime and denied any wrongdoing.

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Erroll Southers, the Los Angeles airport official whose nomination to lead the Transportation Security Administration was blocked by Republican opposition in Washington, has withdrawn his name from consideration.

Southers, in a statement issued today, complained that his nomination had become a political lightning rod.

President Barack Obama nominated Southers, who is a former FBI agent with experience in counter-terrorism, to head the TSA in September.

But Sen. Jim DeMint, a South Carolina Republican who complained that Southers hoped to make good on an Obama pledge to allow TSA workers to unionize, had placed a hold on Southers’ confirmation by the Senate.

Southers also had faced questions over an event years ago, when he had ordered criminal background checks on the boyfriend of his estranged wife. He acknowledged in a letter to senators that it was wrong and he regretted the incident. He had been censured by his FBI superiors for the action 20 years ago.

“Americans deserve a leader at TSA with integrity and with an unwavering commitment to putting security ahead of politics,” DeMint said in a statement today.

He said the White House had never responded to requests for more information about Southers’ testimony during his committee confirmation hearing about the background checks .”And Mr. Southers was never forthcoming about his intentions to give union bosses veto power over security decisions at our airports,” DeMint said.

Southers maintained that he had no intention of sacrifcing security in the interest of collective bargaining for TSA screeners.

The White House has accepted Southers’ withdrawal of his nomination today, while maintaining that he would have made an excellent TSA administrator.

Following the attempted bombing of a U.S.-bound airliner on Christmas Day, congressional leaders had called for a speedy confirmation of Southers for the vacant TSA post.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) had said he would seek to force the confirmation over Republican objections in the Senate by invoking cloture.

However, the Democrats’ 60-vote super-majority in the Senate, which enables to party to override GOP filibusters, is evaporating with the loss this week of a Senate seat in Massachusetts to Republican Sen.-elect Scott Brown.

The forfeiture of the administration’s nominee in the face of Republican objections may also be taken as the first sign of the impact of the GOP’s stunning victory in Massachusetts, where Republican Brown claimed the seat held by the late and long-serving Sen. Edward M. Kennedy in a special election on Tuesday.

Read the original article from Tribune News Services.

Are antibiotics weapons of war, or a microbial language for cooperation? In my latest podcast, I talk to Julian Davies about the history and future of antibiotics, the marvelous yet mysterious creation of microbes that changed the course of medicine. Check it out.

By Skye Wheeler TORIT, south Sudan, Jan 20 (IPS) An old rite is long overdue in Paul Yugusak Tombe’s home village, in Central Equatoria State, south Sudan.

Because of Sudan’s long and painful north-south war that scattered much of the population, Tombe’s age set that won power in a 1974 contest with their elders still rules. But they should have given up control many years ago.

"We are making arrangements now. The change must take place," Tombe, also a member of Central Equatoria’s parliament, said. His age set has been in power about 10 years too long, albeit tumultuous ones.

Before the war in the tradition of handing over power, the ruling age set of men and the set below would go into the forest together, hunt and then fight fiercely over the dead animal.

Today it is more likely that a purchased bull, instead of a hunted animal, will be torn apart by the two sides in the heated tug of war, Tombe said. But the symbolism, and the genuine tensions that underlie this, and other similar battle or mock battle traditions among the tribes located east of the River Nile, remain the same.

"It is not an easy thing," cultural expert Lias Ohisa Affwonni said about the handover. "It is a struggle."

The younger men usually would win this battle; the elders would admit defeat and hand over control of all aspects of village life including its protection. (The upcoming set ranges in age from about 18 to about 45 years old, usually the eldest here are about the same age as the youngest of the ruling set.) This passionate cycle of societal renewal in Tombe’s section of the Olubu tribe is meant to take place about every 25 years.

But because of the war it has not taken place for a decade longer than it should have. But also because of the war the monyomiji are changing. And the upcoming leaders are men grown up in war and still affected by the trauma of it.

Monyomiji (which is used interchangeably to refer to the governance structure, the men in charge, and also the youth) is an effective structure of governance, its proponents say. It provides a clear path for societal change with each passage of control, usually about every 22 to 25 years. However, changeovers can occur more frequently in some groups.

The system has also been lauded as especially democratic. The men in the ruling age set govern together in a highly organised system that gives each member a role, in most cases won by merit.

Chiefs or "kings" – traditionally the community’s rainmaker, usually have a hereditary role, but more recently government-appointed headmen have also joined the monyomiji. Chiefs are usually changed in the handover of power, Tombe said, unless they are especially talented.

Anthropologist and development worker Simone Simons believes that the monyomiji structure is being under-utilised by development workers and south Sudan’s new government, formed in 2005 after a north-south peace deal ended more than 20 years of war.

There is more to the monyomiji system than just tradition. Tombe’s generation introduced and implemented new concepts to his home area, including cooperatives and self-help projects for education and health services.

The same capacity for high levels of organisation also proved an asset during the north-south war when the monyomiji joined the southern rebel movement, effectively defending their home areas from infiltration from northern forces even as other areas fell.

"It is easier to do things through the monyomiji. They are organised, with different functions," Simons said.

And their success in war is not surprising as Affwonni believes the monyomiji system was created hundreds of years ago as part of a war effort against the fearful Toposa tribe.

Organised and renewed with fresh blood, the monyomiji rule meant the villages did better in battle, and in protecting the integrity of the village in a wider sense; ensuring internal cohesion and the maintenance of spiritual practices.

While the leadership enjoy privileges they are also held strictly accountable, sometimes with their lives. In many tribes, rainmakers who failed to bring rain were killed, sometimes burned alive. This practice is now being changed.

"They have reason (rationality) now. They don’t do that to the rainmaker," monyomiji member Joko Jacqueline, one of a new generation of women who have been partly allowed into the system said.

She believes that ensuing generations will force change further, and women will be initiated into the monyomiji alongside men.

But how long that will take, is not certain. The monyomiji, like the rest of Sudan, are still coming to terms with the consequences of the country’s civil war.

Tension between the ruling generation and the one below it has always existed. But now leaders say their youth are especially antagonistic, and many believe it is a result of war trauma. They also believe that many of the youngsters have become heavy drinkers because of this.

And now the ruling age set no longer has the same amount of control over often-armed youth that it once did.

But even within some tribes’ ruling age sets there are problems, and several monyomiji admitted that their age sets are less close, less organised than previous generations of rulers.

Traditionally, the older or more accomplished men tend to form the head – the decision making part of the government – the youth are more likely to form warrior groups. But the war has even changed this.

"From the head, many of these people were killed in the war, the younger are now in (majority) and they want to do things by force, they can be insubordinate," Father Kamilo Afore, a priest and monyomiji member said. He celebrated his age set’s coming of age in neighboring Uganda, at the height of the war that fragmented his village. "They (the youth) have grown in war," he added.

It is, in theory, peacetime but cattle raiding has worsened between monyomiji-practising tribes and other groups. It has kept entire areas insecure and has hindered development.

"Unity often depends on hostility to outsiders. This is definitely a weakness," Simons said.

Monyomiji accept that violence is a serious problem in their home areas.

The monyomiji IPS spoke to say that the government has not been able to provide security they need in order to lay down the thousands of small arms acquired during the war.

"They could do it at any time," Affwonni said. But any group that did so in a generally insecure environment would make itself highly vulnerable, he added.

Some monyomiji told IPS that even government interventions, when they come, are sometimes biased and heavy-handed and can worsen relations between tribes or fail to provide justice.

"(Also) they get in the way of the monyomiji getting involved with their coercive kind of rules," Martin Napali, a monyomiji, said. "If we are belittled then we will just do what we want."

The government has equally high expectations of the monyomiji, who they believe not only allow raiding to continue but are the perpetrators.

"Are monyomiji still peacemakers or have they left peacemaking to the government?" Toby Atare a Eastern Equatoria State Peace Commission member asked. "The monyomiji are meant to promote the law and order in villages but all we see is a lot of lawlessness."

"(The monyomiji) are saying this is the work of the government and the government is saying this is your work," he added.

Eastern Equatoria State Governor Aleision Ojetuk went even further at a recent conference to try and bridge the widening gap between the monyomiji and the government in the state capital Torit. He cited cases where the monyomiji had stopped policemen he had sent from doing their work in villages, getting in the way of justice, which is meant to be a main function of the monyomiji.

"Your norms are being eroded and so a kind of ‘who cares’ attitude is settling in … if we are in competition, the gap between us will widen," Ojetuk said, adding that the government simply does not have enough resources to maintain security in a state chock-full with guns.

But the monyomiji’s challenges go beyond a rough and tumble relationship with the new government. Urbanisation is also eroding the old system of life.

"At the moment the attitude of the monyomiji is not as it used to be. Most try to migrate to towns, leaving the land without cultivation," Tombe said. The youth that stay behind are in some cases especially hostile to the ruling generation.

A new Local Government Act that gives traditional authority official standing in the government could smooth the way between the government and the monyomiji Affwonni said. He added that fitting the monyomiji into the structures dictated by the law will take patience and flexibility on both the monyomiji and the government.

Learn about proper thermal design solutions for IC components.

The White House faces questions today, on the anniversary of President Barack Obama’s inauguration, about the Senate election in Massachusetts that cost the president’s party its short-lived super-majority control of the Senate.

“There’s an unbecoming habit in this town of trying to defray a responsibility, point in other directions,” the White House’s David Axelrod said today, with a ribbing for Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, joining him on MSNBC’s new The Daily Rundown.

“So let me say it was Robert’s fault and I’m bitter about it.”

Joking aside, Axelrod said: “You know, I’ll let others assess responsibility. I think the main thing that we saw in Massachusetts was the same sense of concern on the part of middle class folks about the economic situation, about their wages being stagnant, about jobs being lost, about their economic security that’s been in jeopardy.

“And this is something that predated the big recession that we’re going through,” the president’s chief political advisor said. “And that’s something that we have to pay a great deal of attention to. It is the focus of this president’s attention at all times. And we have to convey that.”

How can the White House interpret the Massachusetts defeat as anything other than a “total rejection” of the president’s health-care reform, he was asked – in light of Brown campaigning as the 41st vote against the bill.

“I think that there were a lot of elements to the message yesterday. Health care was part of it,” Axelrod said. “I would note that Sen. Brown didn’t run one ad on health care in the entire campaign. I’m sure you know that.

“And he supported a health care reform similar to the one that the president was and is committed to in Massachusetts, and said during the campaign that he wouldn’t repeal it,” he said.

“I mean, there are messages here,” he said. “We hear those messages, but there is a tendency in this town — not that you guys would do it — but to overblow things, even beyond their importance. And I don’t think it’s about that one particular issue. I think there’s a general sense of discontent about the economy and there’s a general sense of discontent about this town. That’s why we were elected. We are committed to doing something about it.”

The president’s men were asked about the president’s first year, and why more hasn’t been accomplished.

“For a lot of reasons,” Gibbs said. “The first of which is change takes a long time to happen, certainly in this town. And it takes even longer for the American people to feel that. The president didn’t have a first-year agenda, he has a first-term agenda. So while today marks the end of the first year and the beginning of the second, it’s not even really a hallmark holiday.

“I would say this too, building off of what David said, there are things that the president has accomplished, whether it’s a credit card bill of rights, whether it’s a recovery plan that’s led to the first quarter of economic growth in more than a year, that same sort of anger and frustration that the President saw when he traveled in Iowa, and throughout this country for more than two years is still very pervasive today,” Gibb said.

“I think that’s what we saw most of all coming out of Massachusetts, is there’s a tremendous amount of anger and frustration about where people are economically and whether this town is fighting for their economic well-being or fighting for the special interests well-being,” Gibbs said.

“I think that’s what’s ultimately going to define more about the coming political battles and the upcoming election.

“Health care is an aspect of it, but this is far broader than that. There’s an anger and a real frustration. People’s jobs are being shipped overseas. As David said, they’re working harder, they’re working longer, they’re more productive, yet their wages are going down. That leads to the type of isolation and economic frustration that we felt for quite some time.”

by Mark Silva

Read the original article from Tribune News Services.

A year of bailouts and stimulus spending has taken a toll on global economic freedom, according to the 2010 Index of Economic Freedom. For the 16th year in a row Hong Kong is #1, followed by Singapore, Australia, New Zealand and Ireland.

The report from the conservative Heritage Foundation bumped the United
States from #6 to #8. It’s not often you hear praise of Canada
(#7) from a right-leaning think tank, but our neighbors to the north have
been deemed to have the freest economy in North America:

Canada’s economic freedom trails the world average only in government
spending. Elaborate social and welfare state programs swell overall
government expenditures. Government spending has also increased
slightly due to implementation of a significant stimulus package.
However, good fiscal management and federal budget surpluses have
enabled the economy to undertake stimulus measures without undermining
fiscal soundness and long-term economic competitiveness.

Not surprisingly, the report’s authors are not fans of Pres. Obama’s economic policy.

Seeing
Hong Kong in the #1 spot, where it has presided since the index was
created in 1995, may be jarring for those who have followed the
Google – China saga. And to be certain the Heritage Foundation doesn’t look kindly
on mainland China, ranking it at #140, sandwiched between Djibouti and
Haiti.

So why does the Index favor Hong Kong when
it is ultimately answerable to the same rulers who demand censorship
from Internet companies? The short answer: Low taxes, tariffs, and
government spending.

Critics of the Index have long complained that it rewards and punishes countries on the basis of conservative economic doctrine, without providing any helpful predictions about when more freedom — as defined by the Heritage Foundation — will result in higher economic growth. (One obvious example: #140 China’s GDP growth puts 139 “freer” countries to shame.)

As Wheaton College economics Prof. John Miller wrote on the 2009 Index:

So it seems that the Index of Economic Freedom in practice tells us
little about the cost of abandoning free market policies and offers
little proof that government intervention into the economy would either
retard economic growth or contract political freedom. In actuality,
this rather objective-looking index is a slip-shod measure that would
seem to have no other purpose than to sell the neoliberal policies that
brought on the current crisis.

A large aftershock hit Haiti 60 kilometres from Port-au-Prince at 11.20am UK time on Wednesday 20 January, just eight days after the country was devastated by an earthquake. Louis Belanger in Haiti describes what happened and how people reacted.

Donate now and find out more about Oxfam’s Haiti Earthquake response

When patch 1.03 came in, Fat Princess also got the New Pork map for free. Guess what? Titan Studios has 1.04 ready for release tomorrow, and it comes with yet another new map, free of charge.
 
 
 

KNOXVILLE — Three colleges at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, would charge extra tuition per credit hour, under a plan being proposed by Chancellor Jimmy G. Cheek.

The plan was outlined at the UT Board of Trustees’ Trusteeship Committee and Executive and Compensation Committee meeting on Jan. 20. If approved by the Board of Trustees in February, the differential tuition program would go into effect at the beginning of the fall semester 2010.

Under the plan, juniors and seniors in the Colleges of Nursing, undergraduates taking business courses and all students taking engineering courses would pay differential tuition – that is, a supplemental per-credit-hour charge in addition to university tuition. These differential tuition charges would increase in the future at the same percentage rate as university tuition increases. The extra funds are needed because those three colleges are facing extraordinary growth and need additional staffing and state-of-the-art technology to keep pace with the demand.

“UT graduates in business, engineering and nursing are among the most employable college graduates in the state; these areas are where there are jobs – well-paying jobs,” Cheek said. “Consequently, student demand for these areas of study is outpacing our ability to accommodate students. Without this differential tuition, we will have to limit enrollment in these areas.

“Officials in all three colleges have spoken with groups of their students and have gotten tremendous support for these plans,” he said. “UT Knoxville students realize they are getting a top-notch education at an affordable price. Students tell us they want to maintain, and grow, the caliber of their education because they know a UT Knoxville degree is a tremendous asset to their future.”

Cheek said many of UT’s peer institutions already charge differential tuition in these areas.

Here is a detailed look at each college’s differential tuition proposal:

College of Nursing

The college would charge juniors and seniors an extra $90 per credit hour.

Juniors in nursing take 30 credits per year and seniors take 31 credits per year. At those levels, juniors and seniors would pay an extra $2,700 and $2,790 per year, respectively. That amounts to an extra $5,490 for the two years.

UT nursing students now pay undergraduate tuition and fees of $6,850 per year. The differential tuition would push that amount to $9,550 for juniors and $9,640 for seniors.

Elsewhere in Tennessee, nursing students’ annual tuition now ranges from $6,343 per year at East Tennessee State University – the only school with tuition lower than UT Knoxville — to $22,360 per year at Belmont University.

Many colleges and universities nationwide already charge differential tuition for nursing students. Fees and surcharges are also common. For example, nursing students at the University of Arizona pay $8,358 per year plus a $383 per semester surcharge; students at West Virginia University pay $12,692 per year plus a fee of $150 per semester; and students at the University of Pittsburgh pay $14,104 per year plus lab fees of $35 to $70 per course.

UT’s nursing curriculum consists of two years of prerequisite courses, such as English, science, math and humanities, followed by two years of upper-division nursing courses.

The College of Nursing currently admits 96 students per year. Plans are to increase enrollment by eight students next year and eight more students the next year. By 2010, the college will have 200 students in its upper-division nursing courses.

Based on that number, the College of Nursing anticipates net revenue from the differential tuition to be $548,640 per year. That money would be used to hire 2.5 new faculty members and upgrade technology.

Joan Creasia, dean of the College of Nursing, said the cost of educating nurses is high because the college is mandated to have a faculty-student ratio of 1-to-8 and hospitals are pressing for a 1-to-6 ratio.

“Although there is a current nursing shortage which is projected to worsen over the next decade, there is no shortage of applicants seeking admission to the College of Nursing,” Creasia said. “We had more than 500 applicants for our fall 2009 freshman class who indicated they wanted to major in nursing. During the past several years, applications from juniors who want to be in our clinical nursing major have outnumbered available slots nearly 3-to-1. Unfortunately, we haven’t been able to accommodate the demand; enrollment in the College of Nursing clinical major has been limited by available fiscal resources.”

Also, Creasia notes, hospitals that provide students with their clinical education mandate the college maintain a faculty-student ratio of 1-to-8.

College of Business Administration

The college would charge all undergraduates taking business courses an extra $50 per credit hour.

For students taking a typical full load, the differential tuition will equate to an additional $700 in the sophomore year and $1,200 in each of the junior and senior years. It will result in about $3,100 in differential tuition for a business major over the three years in which a student takes business courses. For a business minor, the total amount will be about $1,200 over the three years the student takes business courses.

In the past five years, the number of undergraduates studying business has more than doubled, from 2,516 to 5,135, while the number of faculty in the college has declined by six.

Funds from the differential tuition will prevent the college from having to reduce faculty when stimulus funding goes away in 2011-12. The funding will be used to hire eight new tenure-track faculty and nine new non-tenure faculty.

The college also would hire four new undergraduate advisers and one new career placement staff member. At UT Knoxville now, the student-to-adviser ratio is 1-to-978 — compared to 1-to-712 at the University of Florida; 1-to-500 at the University of Alabama; and 1-to-233 at the University of Georgia.

The differential tuition will raise about $4.5 million and “will allow us to keep up with the growth that we expect to continue without infringing on the budgets of other units on campus or requiring us to significantly reduce the number of students majoring and minoring in business,” college Dean Jan Williams said.

Differential tuition in businesses schools is common at many colleges and universities across the country.

“In the SEC, the universities of Arkansas, Kentucky and Alabama and Auburn University are examples of schools that currently have undergraduate business fees or differential tuition, and the University of South Carolina differential is approved for 2010-11,” Williams said. “When considered in the context of the HOPE Scholarship for UT undergraduate students, a UT degree in business provides significant value at a relatively low cost.”

About $500,000 received from differential tuition funds would be used to augment instruction in other courses that business majors are required to take, fund computer hardware and software improvements, and provide other forms of educational enrichment.

College officials said they plan to solicit private monies for scholarships for business majors who may need assistance.

College of Engineering

For eight years, the College of Engineering has charged differential tuition of $25 per credit hour on the first eight hours of coursework. The college’s new proposal would increase that by $20 — to $45 per credit hour for all engineering courses taken by undergraduate and graduate students.

The differential tuition will mean about $680 per year, or about $2,700 for a student completing a four-year degree.

“Our differential tuition was established to cover the costs of laboratory courses, and purchase critical equipment and engineering software – all to ensure that engineering students are ready to enter the workplace with the tools needed to compete in a technological world that is rapidly advancing in complexity,” Dean Wayne Davis said. “In the past eight years, substantial increases in the costs of software, equipment and instruction tools have often surpassed that of inflation.”

Also, during the past five years, undergraduate enrollment in the College of Engineering has increased by 18 percent and number of doctoral students has increased by 37 percent. At the same time, however, there has been little or no increase in full-time tenure track or tenured faculty.

Davis said a survey done last year by the SEC Deans’ Group that found that differential tuition at SEC engineering schools now ranges from $35 to $50 per credit hour – which means UT’s proposed $45-per-credit-hour charge will be in line with other schools in the region

The College of Engineering has about 3,000 students, or about 11 percent of UT Knoxville’s enrollment. The college’s current projected enrollment growth is 25 to 30 percent over the next five years.

Based on fiscal year 2009 student credit hours, the proposed differential tuition would raise about $2 million.

The money would be used to add faculty lines; enhance program advising and career services, including programs to provide students with greater access to international exchange programs; provide state-of-the-art classrooms and laboratories, as well as access to software and tools that graduates will encounter in the work world; provide enhanced research experiences and offer need-based scholarships for students.

—

C O N T A C T :

Amy Blakely (865-974-5034, [email protected])

So if the Democratic plans are dead, what’s left?  What’s the Republican plan?

I think those of us who opposed the Democratic bill should have one.  And I happen (ahem) to have a modest little plan right here . . .

Raise the Medicare tax by half a percentage point, and eliminate the tax-deductibiity of health insurance benefits for people making more than $150K a year in household income, $100K for singles.  Then make the federal government the insurer of last resort.  Any medical expenses more than 15% or 20% of household income, get picked up by Uncle Sam.

Yes, people don’t like taxes.  But it’s a pretty small tax.  The benefit exclusion gets the camel’s nose under the tent for ending the employer-health insurance relationship, but it’s targeted at groups that a) aren’t particularly sympathetic and b) can afford it.  And it answers the central fear people have, which is that they’ll end up sick and bankrupt.  20% of your income is a lot.  But it’s a manageable amount, especially if, as I suspect, many more people choose to self-insure for the first 15%, and take the differences as wages.

It doesn’t answer every single thing we could possibly want–David Cutler argues that compliance with treatment regimes is already so low that we don’t want to erect any cost barriers.  But it’s progressive, solves the biggest part of the problem, and it still leaves the market for most health care services intact.

In fact, I think it will be a more powerful impetus for cost control than any excise tax or IMAC could have been, because consumers will be making the decisions by themselves, not sullenly fighting an insurer, employer, or government bureaucrat.  It doesn’t exert cost pressures on end of life care, which will certainly blow the caps–but I found it pretty implausible that we were ever going to find the political will to cut off marginal treatments to the sickest and most vulnerable.  And in other areas, it could make a big difference.

Meanwhile, whatever awesome plans Democrats had to control costs in Medicare and Medicaid, they should implement and show us all how well they work.

That’s my suggestion.  I’m sure you can pick holes in it, and it might be pretty ugly by the time the lobbyists got through with it.  On the other hand, it just might work.

Filed under: Car Buying, Convertible, Performance, Specialty

Admittedly, “entry-level” is a bit of a stretch, as one Jefferson Jackson shy of $50k is a nice chunk of change. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Two years ago we learned that TMI AutoTech would be the Ariel Atom’s new master here in the U.S. After a few fits and starts, TMI is now selling the new Ariel Atom 3 with a starting price of just $49,980. This base model ships with a 2.0-liter Honda motor good for 219 horsepower.

We can hear some of you scoffing from over here. Never forget, the Atom weighs just 1,350 pounds. Meaning that a 219-horsepower engine can catapult the car to 60 mph in 2.9 seconds. For the sake of silly comparisons, the 638-hp supercharged Corvette ZR1 takes 3.3 seconds to achieve the same velocity. Also, don’t forget we’re talking about the entry-level Atom. A 245-hp version can be yours, as well as a supercharged 300-hp example. Of course, those will cost you extra.

However, if you’re looking to spend a little less, TMI AutoTech can still accommodate you. For an undisclosed sum they’ll happily sell you a rolling chassis and you’re free to cram whatever motor you like into the Atom. Might we suggest the LS9? Though if cheap(ish) topless, doorless motoring really is your thing, a fully built Se7en can be had for around $30,000 depending upon the options. And unlike the “porky” Atom 3, proper Se7ens usually weigh in at 1,200 pounds. Just sayin’.

[Source: TMI AutoTech via Motor Trend]

Entry-level Ariel Atom 3 priced from $49,980 originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 20 Jan 2010 13:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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By Skye Wheeler TORIT, south Sudan, Jan 20 (IPS) An old rite is long overdue in Paul Yugusak Tombe’s home village, in Central Equatoria State, south Sudan.

Because of Sudan’s long and painful north-south war that scattered much of the population, Tombe’s age set that won power in a 1974 contest with their elders still rules. But they should have given up control many years ago.

"We are making arrangements now. The change must take place," Tombe, also a member of Central Equatoria’s parliament, said. His age set has been in power about 10 years too long, albeit tumultuous ones.

Before the war in the tradition of handing over power, the ruling age set of men and the set below would go into the forest together, hunt and then fight fiercely over the dead animal.

Today it is more likely that a purchased bull, instead of a hunted animal, will be torn apart by the two sides in the heated tug of war, Tombe said. But the symbolism, and the genuine tensions that underlie this, and other similar battle or mock battle traditions among the tribes located east of the River Nile, remain the same.

"It is not an easy thing," cultural expert Lias Ohisa Affwonni said about the handover. "It is a struggle."

The younger men usually would win this battle; the elders would admit defeat and hand over control of all aspects of village life including its protection. (The upcoming set ranges in age from about 18 to about 45 years old, usually the eldest here are about the same age as the youngest of the ruling set.) This passionate cycle of societal renewal in Tombe’s section of the Olubu tribe is meant to take place about every 25 years.

But because of the war it has not taken place for a decade longer than it should have. But also because of the war the monyomiji are changing. And the upcoming leaders are men grown up in war and still affected by the trauma of it.

Monyomiji (which is used interchangeably to refer to the governance structure, the men in charge, and also the youth) is an effective structure of governance, its proponents say. It provides a clear path for societal change with each passage of control, usually about every 22 to 25 years. However, changeovers can occur more frequently in some groups.

The system has also been lauded as especially democratic. The men in the ruling age set govern together in a highly organised system that gives each member a role, in most cases won by merit.

Chiefs or "kings" – traditionally the community’s rainmaker, usually have a hereditary role, but more recently government-appointed headmen have also joined the monyomiji. Chiefs are usually changed in the handover of power, Tombe said, unless they are especially talented.

Anthropologist and development worker Simone Simons believes that the monyomiji structure is being under-utilised by development workers and south Sudan’s new government, formed in 2005 after a north-south peace deal ended more than 20 years of war.

There is more to the monyomiji system than just tradition. Tombe’s generation introduced and implemented new concepts to his home area, including cooperatives and self-help projects for education and health services.

The same capacity for high levels of organisation also proved an asset during the north-south war when the monyomiji joined the southern rebel movement, effectively defending their home areas from infiltration from northern forces even as other areas fell.

"It is easier to do things through the monyomiji. They are organised, with different functions," Simons said.

And their success in war is not surprising as Affwonni believes the monyomiji system was created hundreds of years ago as part of a war effort against the fearful Toposa tribe.

Organised and renewed with fresh blood, the monyomiji rule meant the villages did better in battle, and in protecting the integrity of the village in a wider sense; ensuring internal cohesion and the maintenance of spiritual practices.

While the leadership enjoy privileges they are also held strictly accountable, sometimes with their lives. In many tribes, rainmakers who failed to bring rain were killed, sometimes burned alive. This practice is now being changed.

"They have reason (rationality) now. They don’t do that to the rainmaker," monyomiji member Joko Jacqueline, one of a new generation of women who have been partly allowed into the system said.

She believes that ensuing generations will force change further, and women will be initiated into the monyomiji alongside men.

But how long that will take, is not certain. The monyomiji, like the rest of Sudan, are still coming to terms with the consequences of the country’s civil war.

Tension between the ruling generation and the one below it has always existed. But now leaders say their youth are especially antagonistic, and many believe it is a result of war trauma. They also believe that many of the youngsters have become heavy drinkers because of this.

And now the ruling age set no longer has the same amount of control over often-armed youth that it once did.

But even within some tribes’ ruling age sets there are problems, and several monyomiji admitted that their age sets are less close, less organised than previous generations of rulers.

Traditionally, the older or more accomplished men tend to form the head – the decision making part of the government – the youth are more likely to form warrior groups. But the war has even changed this.

"From the head, many of these people were killed in the war, the younger are now in (majority) and they want to do things by force, they can be insubordinate," Father Kamilo Afore, a priest and monyomiji member said. He celebrated his age set’s coming of age in neighboring Uganda, at the height of the war that fragmented his village. "They (the youth) have grown in war," he added.

It is, in theory, peacetime but cattle raiding has worsened between monyomiji-practising tribes and other groups. It has kept entire areas insecure and has hindered development.

"Unity often depends on hostility to outsiders. This is definitely a weakness," Simons said.

Monyomiji accept that violence is a serious problem in their home areas.

The monyomiji IPS spoke to say that the government has not been able to provide security they need in order to lay down the thousands of small arms acquired during the war.

"They could do it at any time," Affwonni said. But any group that did so in a generally insecure environment would make itself highly vulnerable, he added.

Some monyomiji told IPS that even government interventions, when they come, are sometimes biased and heavy-handed and can worsen relations between tribes or fail to provide justice.

"(Also) they get in the way of the monyomiji getting involved with their coercive kind of rules," Martin Napali, a monyomiji, said. "If we are belittled then we will just do what we want."

The government has equally high expectations of the monyomiji, who they believe not only allow raiding to continue but are the perpetrators.

"Are monyomiji still peacemakers or have they left peacemaking to the government?" Toby Atare a Eastern Equatoria State Peace Commission member asked. "The monyomiji are meant to promote the law and order in villages but all we see is a lot of lawlessness."

"(The monyomiji) are saying this is the work of the government and the government is saying this is your work," he added.

Eastern Equatoria State Governor Aleision Ojetuk went even further at a recent conference to try and bridge the widening gap between the monyomiji and the government in the state capital Torit. He cited cases where the monyomiji had stopped policemen he had sent from doing their work in villages, getting in the way of justice, which is meant to be a main function of the monyomiji.

"Your norms are being eroded and so a kind of ‘who cares’ attitude is settling in … if we are in competition, the gap between us will widen," Ojetuk said, adding that the government simply does not have enough resources to maintain security in a state chock-full with guns.

But the monyomiji’s challenges go beyond a rough and tumble relationship with the new government. Urbanisation is also eroding the old system of life.

"At the moment the attitude of the monyomiji is not as it used to be. Most try to migrate to towns, leaving the land without cultivation," Tombe said. The youth that stay behind are in some cases especially hostile to the ruling generation.

A new Local Government Act that gives traditional authority official standing in the government could smooth the way between the government and the monyomiji Affwonni said. He added that fitting the monyomiji into the structures dictated by the law will take patience and flexibility on both the monyomiji and the government.