Oldest Trees on the Planet...

Check them out on WIRED.

Tony Blair talks Iraq...

"A hypocrite is the kind of politician who would cut down a redwood tree, then mount the stump and make a speech for conservation"
A. E. Stevenson

"In a speech to business leaders, the former Prime Minister said the war is one of the "compelling reasons" why British companies should be part of Iraq's future."

Read more on the Telegraph.

Ethiopian kids hack their tablets...

Give a thousand Ethiopian kids — who have never seen a printed word let alone played around with expensive consumer technology — a tablet, and what happens? They hack it. Obviously.

Read more on GIZMODO.

U.S. blocks Russian Libya draft resolution...

""The United States has blocked Russia's draft statement on the peaceful resolution of the violence in the Libyan town of Bani Walid, which has been under siege for weeks. Russia's statement called for a peaceful solution to the conflict.""

Read more on Russia Today.

Qataris in Gaza..

"Qatar's emir has become the first head of state to visit the Gaza Strip since Hamas came to power there in 2007.

Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani crossed into Gaza by car from Egypt amid tight security, and was greeted by Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniya.

He has pledged $400m (£250m) for building in the strip, which has been ravaged by a long conflict with Israel."

Read more on the BBC.

Where are the aliens...TIME Explains

Drugs in transit..

Via RIA NOVOSTI

Truce?

Is the Syrian uprising about to come full circle? The Syrian opposition since Assad's government forces opened fire on unarmed protesters last year have demanded one thing, that Bashar al-Assad steps down. Assad on the other hand has since blamed Zionists, al-Qaeda, armed gangs and terrorists and has demanded a ceasefire from the rebel quarters. The rebels worry that in doing so, Assad will resort to old tricks. Using the ceasefire as a government propagandist victory and a smoke screen for secretly rounding up those that took part in the protests. 

This dead lock in guarantees hadn't changed when only 500 Syrians had been killed, now up to 30-35,000 have been killed, the only side keen for a truce would be that of the government. However, a new element has been introduced into the conflict. External fighting born in Syria threatens both Turkey and Lebanon.

"Mr Brahimi, who represents the UN and the Arab League, is in Damascus to press both the government and the rebels to observe a truce over the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha.

On Friday, he met with Foreign Minister Walid Muallem and opposition leaders."

Read more on the BBC.

On the gravy trail...

"Former EU health commissioner John Dalli has insisted on his innocence in an alleged attempt to peddle influence, days after he resigned.

He was asked about a fresh allegation that a businessman with links to him had sought 60m euros (£49m; $79m) from a Swedish company."

Read more on the BBC.

Fuel from air..

"A British firm has produced the first 'petrol from air', it emerged today - in a pioneering scientific breakthrough that could end mankind's reliance on declining fossil fuels.

Air Fuel Synthesis in Stockton-on-Tees, Teesside, claims to have made five litres of petrol since August using a small refinery that synthesises the fuel from carbon dioxide and water vapour.

Experts have hailed the incredible breakthrough as a potential 'game-changer' in the battle against climate change and solution to the globe's escalating energy crisis."

Read more on the Daily Mail.

Controlling public..

"Traditional means of exerting control and pressure on the public have lost their effectiveness in stabilizing society, the Party chief of Weng'an county has said.

Sha Xiangui, Party chief of Weng'an county in Southwest China's Guizhou province, was speaking to People's Daily about the lessons learned from the violent protests in the county in 2008, when the government was attacked by thousands of angry locals."

Read more on CHINA DAILY.

Justice is what you're threatened with..

"Power is less a thing than it is a relationship, French philosopher Michel Foucault taught us — not just a relationship, but a very complex set of interlocking, constantly shifting relationships. And it was an innate awareness of the matrix power relations in which he operated in early 16th century England, together with his instinct for incrementally altering its balances in ways that enabled profound social changes of which the actors in those dramas were barely conscious, that make Thomas Cromwell such a fascinating historical figure. Not even a second Booker Prize can do justice to the service British author Hilary Mantel has performed in breathing life and emotional and moral complexity into the First Minister to King Henry VIII, a character usually rendered as a one-dimensional villain in most tales of 16th century England and its break from the Vatican."

Read more on TIME.

Bold ideas..

"Don’t let rejection get you down--it might be the ticket to creativity, science says. That’s right: If regular rejection doesn’t cause you to lose all self-confidence and withdraw from the world entirely, it just might boost your ability to think outside of the mainstream and draw upon a unique worldview, suggesting that the kind of people society considers “geniuses” might tend to have a go-it-alone, loner mentality."

Read POPSCI.

North Korean's visit Sweden for economic tips..

"North Korean trade delegates have recently visited Sweden to study the Nordic country’s economy and government. The effort, organised by the International Council of Swedish Industry and partially sponsored by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, was reported by Swedish Radio at the weekend but has been kept very discreet."

Read more on IceNews. 




OTHER NEWS

http://dot2dotnews.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/invest-in-north-korea-probably-not.html

Walking the Earth

Watch Felix's free fall, headcam footage..

UN Envoy Appeals to Iran..

"UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi has appealed for Iranian help to implement a ceasefire in Syria over the upcoming Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha."

Read more on the BBC.

Ghana detains Chinese miners..

"1 miner shot dead by police during crackdown, investigation under

Chinese workers' safety overseas is again in the spotlight after more than 100 Chinese were detained and one was killed while allegedly mining gold illegally in Ghana."

Read more on CHINA DAILY.

Syria unattended..

As world leaders contemplate, Syrians are between a rock and a hard place.. 

"Standing on a patch of muddy scrubland just inside Syria's broken border fence with Turkey, the rebel commander watched glumly as the group of jihadists crossed into his country.

Scruffy, with long beards, some wearing khaki jackets and each clutching a black travel bag, the six men walked silently through the crowd of refugees who had assembled and were waiting to leave Syria. A driver in a pick-up truck quickly greeted the men and drove them away into the countryside."

Read more on the Telegraph.

Sea trade returns to it's roots...

"With their billowing sails, towering masts and long wooden hulls, 19th century clipper ships were staggering feats of design -- and Europe's lifeline to the world's most exotic goods.

Laden with spices, teas and chocolates from across the globe, the use of these wind-powered sailing vessels reached its peak during the late 1800's, a period often referred to as the "Golden Age of Sail."

Abandoned in the advent of steamboats, the centuries-old transport is now enjoying a revival among cargo traders, with a new breed of merchant ships returning to wind power in an effort to promote 

Cutty Sark

environmentally sustainable trade."

Read more on CNN.

Freshwater infographic..

Via POPSCI.

You're not having this one..

"Surgeons today said they have successfully removed a bullet from the neck of a Pakistani girl who was shot by the Taliban in front of her classmates yesterday.

Malala Yousafzai was sitting in a bus ready to leave the grounds of her school in Mingora in Pakistan’s Swat Valley when a bearded man entered the bus and shot her and another girl.

The 14-year-old is widely known and respected for her work to promote the schooling of girls and denouncing the atrocities committed by the Taliban."

Read more on the Daily Mail.

Let us Unite..

"In a speech which was greeted with luke-warm applause at the Conservative Party Conference in Birmingham, the Chancellor jokingly borrowed the Marxist slogan "workers of the world unite" to launch his new scheme.

The plan effectively involves workers gambling on their career prospects, by sacrificing their protection against unfair dismissal and other rights in return for profits on company shares which will be free from capital gains tax.

In a highly political speech, which featured frequent attacks on Ed Miliband for his address to last week's Labour conference in which he sought to adopt the traditionally Conservative philosophy of One Nation." 

Read more on the Telegraph.

The Rise of the Robots..

"Rising labor costs, innovation drive prompt companies to use more machines in manufacturing

While the rural workforce shrinks, the robotics revolution has almost reached China. With a majority of Chinese enterprises struggling to cope with low production levels, rising labor costs, outdated management methods and changing demographics, more and more companies are buying industrial robots, in effect transforming themselves from dependents on manpower production to stewards of what they call "intelligent manufacturing"."

Read more on CHINA DAILY.

@Hugh Grant & The BBC

Hugh Grant: "Any new system of regulation has to satisfy not politicians and their chums in the media, but ordinary victims of these crimes." Via the BBC.

Hugh Grant

So Mr Grant decides that he is an ordinary person. Mr Grant is not an ordinary person but a public figure. Ok granted he's not a politician, however in the same sense Mr Grant should be held to account. In no way am I defending the heinous hackers at News Corp. What I am defending is this beautiful abundance of free speech in the media. Mr Grant has urged the E.U. to crack down on the media, he's urged prime minister David Cameron and here he is on the BBC. 

Both the movie and music industry have more dark corners than the British free press and less accountability. Perhaps the "ordinary" people would like to see this reformed. Would Hugh Grant endorse an independent auditor for these too?

Vladimir Bukovsky

Hugh talk to Tony Blair he would love to help you in your quest of regulation. The press should remain a free and open encounter, so that the "ordinary" person can hold "politicians and their chums in the media" to account, was it not because we have a free press that this is just what happened - hacking was exposed or was it exposed because of an unidentified quango? The hacking itself was a criminal matter and should be dealt with accordingly. 

Mr Grant like most celebrities court the media when it suits them. In Soviet Russia the Samizdat was a movement that avoided censorship, much like my little blog. This would earn you a visit from the KGB, Vladimir Bukovsky was a leading dissident in communist Russia. He defined the Samizdat as follows "I myself create it, edit it, censor it, publish it, distribute it, and...get imprisoned for it." 

Mr Bukovsky currently resides in the UK, he received the Truman-Reagan Medal of Freedom in 2001. A medal awarded by the Victims of Communism foundation. Mr Bukovsky was one of the first in Russia to expose psychiatric imprisonment having spent a upto 12 years  in Soviet prisons, labour camps and forced-treatment psychiatric "hospitals". Mr Bukovsky is the real deal.  Perhaps Hugh Grant should talk with Mr Bukovsky about regulation of the press and where that leads to.  

"If the goal is to restrain the power of the 'press' and stop corruption, other kinds of division are also essential. Rules are most likely to be fair and honest if their design is separated from their administration. This allows diverse interests to be involved in making the rules but reduces the incentives for rulemakers to design rules that favour them. " Good and Bad Power.

The free press is like the internet, it's either free or it isn't.

I would like to add this correspondence from Mr Bukovsky to the TV Licensing Agency  (BBC);

"Finally, the fact that I have not watched television since 2001 does not necessarily prove that I have no intention to watch it in the future. Moreover, people's intentions tend to change with time. I cannot rule out that, at a  certain point, I would be obliged to turn on my TV set, for example, in order to verify that the BBC is still biased in its coverage of news and current affairs and, therefore, we are justified in continuing our campaign against it."  

Yours respectfully

Vladimir Bukovsky

See my first article below
://dot2dotnews.blogspot.co.uk/2011/12/freedom-of-press-and-citizen-journalism.html


Or 
http://dot2dotnews.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/murdochs-vs-scientology.html

Or these from the Daily Mail; 
FiX Factor:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2214466/X-Factor-2012-Fix-What-producer-whispering-Louis-Walsh-judge-CHANGED-mind.html
Leveson Luvvies beware:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2214352/Leveson-luvvies-millions-using-media-beware-wish-for.html

And this from The Telegraph;
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/culture/jamesrhodes/100066768/at-last-the-classic-brit-awards-exposed-as-a-sickening-crime-against-classical-music/

Is the South American Left Stumbling..

"A third victim, also a Capriles supporter, is in critical condition. Chávez urged Venezuelans to “confront each other with votes, not violence,” but he just as quickly took the polarizing low road and blamed his “bourgeois” opponents for the deadly confrontation. The Capriles camp was angered again on Wednesday when a judge in Barinas, where Chávez’s elder brother Adán is Governor, inexplicably released two of the shooting suspects."

Read more on TIME. 

The Craziest Things People Have Proposed Putting on the Moon

"It seems that many people in history have thought, “Wouldn’t it be cool if we did that, but on the moon?” Here we've gathered some of the most outlandish, irrational, and occasionally insane ideas that people have proposed for the moon. You can vote for the one you'd most like to see actually built in the poll below."

Read more on WIRED.

Scientists believe in science?

"You know how every other day a new science report comes out saying this and that gives you cancer? But then a day after it’s revealed that the same this and that actually prevents cancer? Yeah. What the hell should we believe in? Who knows because scientists have just found that scientists lie all the time in their scientific findings."

Read More on GIZMODO.

Iran sanctions bite..

"Hundreds of protesters have clashed with police in Tehran after the government attempted to stop the Iranian currency plummeting in value by cracking down on speculators, beginning with the city's black-market money changers."

Read more on the Independent.

Who spits against the wind, spits in his own face..

"Nicolas Sarkozy will make an audacious bid to become President of France for the second time in 2017, it was claimed today.

Bruno Le Maire, his former agriculture minister, is said to have heard the former head of state claim 'moral' reasons for a return to high office."

Read more on the Daily Mail.

The First Presidential Debate in full

  via The New York Times.

I'M BACK!

"I needed a vacation."

China and the British education system..

"British private boarding schools - the more exclusive the better - have become the top choice for wealthy or newly rich Chinese bent on giving their next generation a huge advantage, right from the start. "The youngest client we have is a 2-year-old," says William Vanbergen, founder and managing director of BE Education, an organization which provides consultancy services for students wishing to study at elite schools overseas."

Read more on CHINA DAILY.

Britannia, rule the waves..

GE Energy delivers the last of 8 propulsion motors for the UK's two aircraft carriers in construction for the Royal Navy. When completed the carriers will become the largest electrically propelled warships in the world.

"Fuel saving is a major driver for the IFEP design. According to the U.K.’s Ministry of Defence, the 65,000-ton QE class warships, with their advanced propulsion system, are expected to consume no more fuel during typical routine operations than the much smaller (22,000 ton) predecessor CVS class carriers. Over their lifetime of 25 years or longer, the two QEC carriers will achieve significant economic, environmental and operational benefits including greatly improved autonomous operation."

Read more on defpro.com

Pakistani papers call for peaceful protests...

"Urdu papers called on the people to behave like "true followers" of the Prophet and show a "picture of peace and love to the world".

Condemning the film, English-language papers said that the "unbridled freedom of expression" in the West must be balanced by the responsibility to avoid "provoking sentiments" around the Muslim world."

Read more on the BBC.

LATEST NEWS

Pakistan Blocks Cell Phones
Voice of America

One killed amid Pakistani film rally
Russia Today

Iran cries wolf..

"Iran has sometimes provided false information about its nuclear program in order to mislead foreign intelligence agencies, Iran’s nuclear chief has said. The remarks come as still no comprise has been found regarding Tehran’s nuclear ambitions."

Read more on Russia Today.

The sound of the Earth..

Via The Daily Mail.

Grading nations by elections..

"Democracy is a universal value and aspiration, unbound by region, ethnicity, culture or religion. In the last two decades, it has spread across the world in unprecedented ways.

Elections are fundamental to the ethos and principles of democracy. They provide citizens with a say in the decisions that affect them and governments with a legitimate authority to govern. When elections are credible, free and fair, they can help promote democracy, human rights and security."

Read more on CNN.

France to close embassies...

France is to close embassies and schools in about 20 countries over fears of hostile reactions directed at the publication of Prophet Muhammed cartoons. Freedom of expression is a priority.

Read more on the Telegraph.

Maximum warp...

The U.S. space agency NASA has begun development of a real Star Trek style warp drive.

"With our current propulsion technologies, interstellar flight is impossible. Even with experimental technology, like ion thrusters or a spaceship’s aft pooping freaking nuclear explosions, it would require staggering amounts of fuel and mass to get to any nearby star. And worse: it will require decades — centuries, even — to get there. The trip will be meaningless for those left behind. Only the ones going forward in search for a new star system would enjoy the result of the colossal effort. It’s just not practical."

Read more on GIZMODO.

The lost Syrian Town

UK's Channel4


SYRIA LATEST NEWS

Syria envoy Lakhdar Brahimi warning follows Assad meeting
BBC

Foreigners flood into Syria to join battle to overthrow Assad
The Independent

The End of China's Easy Growth

A Chinese money tree

"Caixin magazine reports - with disbelief - that the wish-list for industrial parks and mega-projects unveiled by all echelons of the Chinese system has reached 15 trillion yuan by some estimates.

This is over $2.3 trillion or nearly four times the blitz of extra spending after the Lehman crisis in 2008, a policy that pushed investment to a world record 49pc of GDP and is now deemed to have been a mistake."

Read more on the Telegraph.

U.N. IAEA worries over Iran's recent nuclear activity

In a sign of unity against nuclear proliferation in Iran.

"At the International Atomic Energy Agency Board of Governors meeting in Vienna, the vast majority of voting nations agreed with the draft resolution designed by the so-called P5+1: the United States, France, Russia, China, Britain -- the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council -- and Germany."

Read more on CNN.



LATEST NEWS


Iran warns of IAEA 'terrorist infiltration'
BBC

Barroso calls for E.U. federation..

The E.U. Commission chief Jose Barroso has called for further integration of European nation states.

Read more on the BBC.

The 100 year starship project & more

"A dramatic plan to put humans on another star within 100 years today received the backing of former President Bill Clinton.

The 100 year Starship project, which was set up with US military seed funding, plans to develop huge 'starships' to send humans to other stars.

Next week it will meet to discuss the project and begin the huge task."

Read more on the Daily Mail.









Future spacecraft could protect crews with walls made of water.
POPSCI.

Romney vs gay war vet

Robotic cheetah beats bolt

The robotic cheetah has beaten it's previous record of 18mph. Via POPSCI.

Watch the video..

Thousands protest in HK

"More than 40,000 people assembled outside government headquarters and demanded the cancellation of 'Chinese patriotism lessons' proposed for school curriculums.

Students and parents claim that these lessons, which would become compulsory by 2016, are an attempt to brainwash children with Chinese propaganda. The protesters demanded that Beijing respect Hong Kong's semi-autonomous status."

Read more on Russia Today.

LATEST NEWS

HK government backs down
BBC

Russian military 2.0

This week president Putin announced that Russia is to undertake a major modernisation of the bear's armed forces. Here are some ideas proposed;

An unmanned/drone nuclear bomber
GIZMODO

An ocean based space-defense system
Russia Today

A long-range bomber capable of smashing mach 5
POPSCI