Keeping the Arak A'rollin': Liquorice drug boosts memory in elderly (New Scientist)

"A compound based on a liquorice extract improves memory in older men, shows a new study.

"The substance works by blocking the activity of a brain enzyme that boosts levels of the stress hormone cortisol. This hormone is thought to be responsible for eroding memory with age."

    

Do they think we're stupid, or just ornery and evil? In 12th Book of Best-Selling Series, Jesus Returns... and 99% of Jews still disbelieve (NYTimes)

"144,000 Jews convert to evangelical Christianity, including one rabbi whose conversion takes place live on global television, and lead an underground "remnant" of believers who periodically recite passages of Scripture that Dr. LaHaye relies on as a road map to their future.

"Dr. LaHaye said he believed that over all the series reflected the biblical truth."

Yudel's Line: Let me get this straight. Millions of evangelical Christians simultaneously get raptured into heaven, and only 1 percent of world Jewry converts?

I guess hanging out with rabbis like Daniel Lapin and Yechiel Eckstein has convinced the Evangelicals that we really are stupid.
    

Bush Addresses 8.2 Million Unemployed: 'Get A Job' [The Onion]
    

Bush's Latest Big Lie: Kerry's Tax Record.

"Brazen" is far too tame a word to describe the Bush people's latest tactic in their war on truth. As Michael Kinsley clearly shows, the White House and Bush campaign claim that Kerry has voted for tax increases 350 times is shabby even for this crowd.

[Dan Gillmor's eJournal]
    

Comics News: Here's Alan Moore on comics (and science fiction) legend Julie Schwartz:

And now we hear that Julie has been…discontinued? Cancelled? But they said the same about Green Lantern and the Flash back in the early 'fifties, so we can't be certain. This is comics. There'll be some way around it, be some parallel world Earth-Four Julie, born thirty years later to account for problems in the continuity, and decked out in a jazzier, more streamlined outfit.

And speaking of the mysterious Mr. Moore, here's an interview in the Independent which demonstrates his talent and, yes, his outside-the-mainstream thinking. Take, for example, his response to Hollywood's bastardization of his League of Extraordinary Gentleman book:

"I thought that by not getting involved, I could keep a distance between the books and the films," he says. He now realises that this was naive, as most film-goers would presume any film to be reasonably faithful to his work. Having "learnt his lesson", he has told his agents to reject any proposals to film his work, and in the case of work he no longer owns, to insist that his name be taken off any adaptation and his share of the money be divided among the artists.

    

Ultra Cool: Pot-in-Pot (Hinterlands via Boing Boing)

This is Mohammed Bah Abba's Pot-in-pot invention. In northern Nigeria, where Mohammed is from, over 90% of the villages have no electricity. His invention, which he won a Rolex Award for (and $100,000), is a refrigerator than runs without electricity.

Here's how it works. You take a smaller pot and put it inside a larger pot. Fill the space in between them with wet sand, and cover the top with a wet cloth. When the water evaporates, it pulls the heat out with it, making the inside cold. It's a natural, cheap, easy-to-make refrigerator.

So, instead of perishable foods rotting after only three days, they can last up to three weeks.

    

The Bush spinners wonder why Richard Clarke waited till now to publish his book. Interesting timing, they say, right in the middle of an election. Anyway Clarke was asked that question on The News Hour today, and he said the White House put a security hold on the book for several months, otherwise it would have come out sooner. He also said he wouldn't serve in a Kerry administration, which takes care of another objection. Anyway, we now have triangulation, between Paul O'Neill and Richard Clarke, there are two ex-Bush insiders with consistent stories on the nature of the Bush organization. One or two more and even the staunchest Bush supporters are going to wonder if we wouldn't be better off with Kerry. [Scripting News]

    

Who's afraid of Mordechai Vanunu? (Ha'aretz)

This is the secret that hasn't yet been told in the affair: the story of the security fiasco that made it possible for Vanunu to do what he did, and the story of the subsequent attempts at cover-up, whitewashing and protection of senior figures in the defense establishment, who were bent on divesting themselves of responsibility for the failure.

    

When State and Synagogue Meet: Hillel and Shammai - 2004 (Yair Sheleg in Ha'aretz)

I met A. by chance, while preparing an article on the beit din (rabbinical court) for conversion in Jerusalem. It was a routine day of deliberations, when suddenly the secretary of the court burst into the hall and asked the dayanim (rabbinical court judges) to listen to an unscheduled case of a man who was threatening to convert to Christianity if his girlfriend (an immigrant from the CIS) was not converted to Judaism immediately.

Left with no choice, the dayanim invited A. in. He told them that he and his girlfriend had been prevented from getting married for five years, because her conversion was being delayed. He told the dayanim: "I won't lie to you like all the others. I don't intend to observe mitzvot (religious commandments) and neither does she, but just as I am a good Jew without the mitzvot I demand that you convert her too, and if you don't I will convert to Christianity and get married in the church."

The dayanim dismissed his words. We don't believe that a good Jew like you would really convert to Christianity, said one of them in a fatherly tone, which only made A. angrier. They sent him away. I happened to believe that he did intend to become a Christian. I followed him outside and suggested he also try the rabbinical court of Rabbi Yosef Avior in Mercaz Shapira, an Orthodox beit din that constitutes part of the recognized network of rabbinical conversion courts.

Two weeks later he phoned me complaining that Avior had also made demands of him. I recommended he not give up and keep in touch with the rabbi. Several months later he called again with good news: his girlfriend had been converted, and Avior would preside at their wedding as well. He saved the real surprise for last: A. told me he was so pleased with Avior's positive approach that he had decided - without being required to do so - to put on tefillin (phylacteries used during the morning prayers) every morning.

    

Leader of the Responsibility-Free World: Bush remembered from social contacts (The Birmingham News)

For much of 1972, the 26-year-old Bush lived, worked and played in Alabama, mostly in Montgomery. He came to town to work for Blount at the urging of his father and with the help of a family friend, GOP political consultant Jimmy Allison of Midland, Texas. And he lived in a two-bedroom, one-bath cottage in Montgomery's historic Cloverdale neighborhood, the furnished home of a 68-year-old widow.

That's what the Smith family remembers most about Bush, how he left their aunt's home damaged, dirty and dumpy.

"He was just a rich kid who had no respect for other people's possessions," said Mary Smith, whose family found damaged walls, broken furnishings and a chandelier destroyed after Bush left the house. A bill sent to collect the damages went unpaid, the family said.

    

Nothing to Sneeze At: Israel, Kazakhstan lead in drug-resistant tuberculosis cases (Ha'aretz)

Israel and Kazakhstan share first place in a list of countries where the germ that causes tuberculosis has developed strains that are resistant to drugs, according to a special report published yesterday by the World Health Organization (WHO). According to the report, the chances that a person suffering from tuberculosis in an Eastern European or Central Asian country is 10 times more likely to develop resistance to drugs than in the rest of the world.

The authors of the report suggest that the reason for this is that diseases develop drug-resistant strains in cases where patient supervision is poor and where there is a large proportion of migration between those countries where drug-resistant tuberculosis is common.

The head of the Health Ministry's TB and AIDS unit, Dr. Zohar Mor, said yesterday that there had been a consistent drop in the number of new TB patients in Israel who went on to develop MDR-TB.

According to Dr. Mor, most of the cases of MDR-TB in Israel are "imported" from Eastern Europe. "We take every care to ensure that people who contract TB take their medicine," Mor told Haaretz yesterday. "For those suffering from MDR-TB, we are even more diligent."

    

U.S. Ministry of Information in Action: U.S. Videos, for TV News, Come Under Scrutiny (NYTimes)

The Bush administration paid people to pose as journalists praising the benefits of the new Medicare law

    

How My Taxes Tortured False Confessions Out Of Prisoners: More Details Emerge on Brits Held at Guantanamo (TalkLeft)

"They endured three months of solitary confinement in Camp Delta's isolation block last summer after they were wrongly identified by the Americans as having been pictured in a video tape of a meeting in Afghanistan between Osama bin Laden and the leader of the 11 September hijackers Mohamed Atta. Ignoring their protests that they were in Britain at the time, the Americans interrogated them so relentlessly that eventually all three falsely confessed. They were finally saved - at least on this occasion - by MI5, which came up with documentary evidence to show they had not left the UK;"

    

The Bad News Gerrers: The rebbe is the right guy (Ha'aretz)

Yes, the Admor's got troubles, the Gerers admit. One Hasid, widely known as a great admirer of Rabbi Shaul, says that when the rebbe suddenly goes off to rest in Arad, where he owns a vacation apartment, it's a sign that something is wrong.

Lately, it turns out the rebbe has been spending a lot of time in Arad. Another Gerer Hasid who defends the rebbe - most of them will not comment at all, or insist nothing is wrong - allows a hint of criticism to slip in between the lines. The rebbe has been vacationing a lot, but it's because he's been working so hard for the thousands of families in his flock.

Over the past few months, he has introduced some impressive money- saving measures: He decided that weddings would only be held on Friday afternoons, with Friday night meals eaten at home, going back to an old custom, in order to stop the wastefulness of "sheva brachot" parties that send parents to the poor house. He has ordered 2,200 Gerer yeshiva students to hand over their cell phones immediately, because those who have money for those kind of extras don't need financial support. And besides, the rebbe is a very modest man.

Modest? With his three-story house in Bnei Brak and a tightly guarded castle in Jerusalem? With the fancy cars he and his sons drive? With those mammoth weddings? Well, okay, says the Hasid - but apart from that he's very modest. With all the trappings of royalty? With those real-estate holdings? With the NIS 20 minimum he receives from each family in his flock each month? That's what you call modest? Well, okay, says the Hasid, apart from that.

It's no wonder that Rabbi Shaul, whose followers admire his scholarship, threaten the Admor even in their silence. Over the past year, the community has felt pretty uncomfortable about all the modifications Admor has been making. They all have the look of an angry power struggle with Shaul.

"None of the changes the Admor has been making seems logical," says a gung-ho Shaul supporter. "But there are explanations when you look at them in the light of the confrontation. Look at the change in teaching methods, for example. There's no question it's related to Shaul's scholarly image." Indeed, it is hard to find any other explanation for the switchover from in-depth study that stresses insight and understanding, at which Shaul excels, to tedious, rote learning.

The story goes like this: The Admor siphoned off the talented students to "his" yeshivas, with the help of committees that he established. Shaul was left with the mediocre ones, but even they did well, and enrollment at his yeshiva soared. So the Admor changed the system. "The Lithuanians got such a kick out of it," sighs the Hasid. "Our students sit like parrots and learn Gemara and Rashi, six pages a week, 30 pages a month, but we're not respected anymore. So what have we achieved? Shaul sees his wings are clipped and goes to Bnei Brak to teach a class at the Yotzei Hebron yeshiva. So you've got the Lithuanians taking in our yeshiva head because we have no place for him. Is that ridiculous or what?"

    

Too scared to face the truth: Bush administration ordered Medicare plan cost estimates withheld (KnightRidder)

"WASHINGTON - The government's top expert on Medicare costs was warned that he would be fired if he told key lawmakers about a series of Bush administration cost estimates that could have torpedoed congressional passage of the White House-backed Medicare prescription-drug plan.

When the House of Representatives passed the controversial benefit by five votes last November, the White House was embracing an estimate by the Congressional Budget Office that it would cost $395 billion in the first 10 years. But for months the administration's own analysts in the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services had concluded repeatedly that the drug benefit could cost upward of $100 billion more than that.

Withholding the higher cost projections was important because the White House was facing a revolt from 13 conservative House Republicans who'd vowed to vote against the Medicare drug bill if it cost more than $400 billion."

    

Stop and Smell the Dandelions: The Return of Opus

A directory of scans from the new newspaper strip.

    

What's the point of taking record vacation days if you gotta wear shoes? Bush flip-flops (Daily Kos)

Bush is against campaign finance reform; then he's for it.

Bush is against a Homeland Security Department; then he's for it.

Bush is against a 9/11 commission; then he's for it.

Bush is against an Iraq WMD investigation; then he's for it.

Bush is against nation building; then he's for it.

Bush is against deficits; then he's for them.

Bush is for free trade; then he's for tariffs on steel; then he's against them again.

Bush is against the U.S. taking a role in the Israeli Palestinian conflict; then he pushes for a "road map" and a Palestinian State.

Bush is for states right to decide on gay marriage, then he is for changing the constitution.

Bush first says he'll provide money for first responders (fire, police, emergency), then he doesn't.

Bush first says that 'help is on the way' to the military ... then he cuts benefits

Bush-"The most important thing is for us to find Osama bin Laden. Bush-"I don't know where he is. I have no idea and I really don't care.

Bush claims to be in favor of the environment and then secretly starts drilling on Padre Island.

Bush talks about helping education and increases mandates while cutting funding.

Bush first says the U.S. won't negotiate with North Korea. Now he will

Bush goes to Bob Jones University. Then say's he shouldn't have.

Bush said he would demand a U.N. Security Council vote on whether to sanction military action against Iraq. Later Bush announced he would not call for a vote

Bush said the "mission accomplished" banner was put up by the sailors. Bush later admits it was his advance team.

Bush was for fingerprinting and photographing Mexicans who enter the US. Bush after meeting with Pres. Fox, he's against it.

    

Egg Dogma Scrambled (New Scientist)

"Contrary to popular belief, female mammals produce new eggs after birth, a new study in mice suggests.

Male mammals continually produce sperm from a store of stem cells. But since the 1950s, biologists insisted that no egg stem cell source existed in adult female mammals, so that a woman only has the eggs she was born with. The numbers simply decline until the menopause, when the supply is exhausted.

Years of research supported this belief. For example, when biologists opened mouse ovaries and counted the number of healthy follicles - the tiny sacs in which eggs grow - they found the number declined slowly with age.

Jonathan Tilly says his team at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston took a different approach because they studied atresia, the process by which the follicles die."

    

Tom Toles does Parshat Ki Tissa: 10 Principles of Education Reform (Washington Post)
    

What George Bush Doesn't Want You To See:Amazing New Hubble View of Ancient Galaxies
    

Award-Winning Science Fiction Writer Looks at the Future of News: Journalism the Day After Tomorrow (David Brin in Online Journalism Review)

David Brin envisions a future in which the world is plastered with e-info -- virtual Post-It notes, e-advertisements and other data -- that we can access via glasses, earbuds and other technologies that link wirelessly to databases and instantly deliver information to us.

    

Family values: Bush brother Neil marries in Houston; George W. and Jeb are AWOL (HoustonChronicle.com)
    

Bring it on! Let the Debate Begin

""How this administration handled that day, as well as the war on terror, is worthy of discussion," he said. "And I look forward to discussing that with the American people. And I look forward to the debate about who best to lead this country in the war on terror.""