INTERESTING: DNA profiles aren’t unique

Sunday, January 10, 2010

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/01/09/1321219/Scientists-and-Lawyers-Argue-For-Open-US-DNA-Database
“New Scientist has an article questioning the uniqueness of DNA profiles. 41 scientists and lawyers recently published a high-profile Nature article (sub. required) arguing that the FBI should release its complete CODIS database. The request follows research on the already released Arizona state DNA database (a subset of CODIS) which showed a surprisingly large number of matches between the profiles of different individuals, including one between a white man and a black man. The group states that the assumption that a DNA profile represents a unique individual, with only a minuscule probability of a secondary match, has never been independently verified on a large sample of DNA profiles. The new requests follow the FBI’s rejection of similar previous requests.”

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Interesting? I never knew that DNA profiles weren’t unique. Isn’t that what CSI teaches? It would seem that it’s urgent to prove or disprove this very troubling assertion!

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Posted by reinkefj

INTERESTING: Kon Tiki

Tuesday, January 5, 2010

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/news/knut-haugland-a-reallife-adventure-story-1851472.html

Knut Haugland: A real-life adventure story

He fought the Nazis. He braved the Pacific. And he hated being called a hero. Jonathan Brown looks at the extraordinary career of Knut Haugland, the last Kon-Tiki survivor

Monday, 28 December 2009

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Adventure stories rarely come more epic than that of Knut Haugland, the Norwegian resistance fighter who died on Christmas Day at the age of 92. His exploits were already the stuff of legend even before he joined Thor Heyerdahl’s crew aboard his balsa wood raft, Kon-Tiki. Together they not only conquered the vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean using only the most primitive of technologies – but in doing so, they helped rejuvenate the crushed spirit of human endeavour in the bleak aftermath of the Second World War.

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I remember reading Kon Tiki in high school. The good brothers were always challenging us to be skeptical. (That lesson took in my case. I rarely believe ANYTHING!)

I remember seeing the Kon Tiki movie and the Telemark movie (I loved movies. I’m an escapist.) Who knew that the same men were involved in both.

Reminds me of the guy who championed the idea that a Chinese admiral found “America” and Marco Polo brought the discovery back to Europe.

Guess that’s why I’m a “tin foil hat” kinda guy.

If we “know” so little about the past, then what make you think we “know” current events.

Sheeple are so easily manipulated.

Remember it’s all propaganda!

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Posted by reinkefj

INTERESTING: Roy Roger’s Museum closed

Monday, January 4, 2010

http://www.nationalenquirer.com/roy_rogers_museum_closes_dale_evans_trigger/celebrity/67877

KING OF THE COWBOYS ROY ROGERS REIGN ENDS WITH NO HAPPY TRAILS . . .

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Roy Rogers and his trusty steed Trigger may have come to the end of their “Happy Trails” – television’s most famous horse is going on the auction block, The ENQUIRER has learned exclusively.

The beloved golden palomino’s home, the Roy Rogers-Dale Evans Museum, has closed – doomed by bitter family feuding, greed, mounting debts and IRS demands.

*** end quote ***

This saddens me. I loved Roy’s shows.

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Posted by reinkefj

INTERESTING: What’s the rest of the story?

Monday, December 21, 2009

http://www.newsvine.com/_news/2009/12/18/3649762-wash-woman-gets-15-months-for-tax-evasion

Wash. woman gets 15 months for tax evasion
Fri Dec 18, 2009 3:39 PM EST
Associated Press

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SEATTLE — As the secretary and treasurer of Falcon Construction, Michelle Bielaski was supposed to turn over to the IRS taxes withheld from employee paychecks.

Instead, the 48-year-old Bellevue, Wash., woman spent the money herself — $2.5 million of it.

Now she’s been sentenced to 15 months in prison and ordered to pay the taxes back in restitution.

*** end quote ***

I’m sure the gooferment doesn’t like a thief stealing its loot!

Serious, was she sentenced for the theft? In which case, the article’s title is wrong.

Where is she going ot get 2.5M$ for restitution?

And, based on what little I know, I bet the construction company has to pay the 2.5M$ to the IRS. So I guess a bankruptcy is in their future.

I just find this “interesting” on so many levels.

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INTERESTING: A mini-FED to spark the States

Saturday, December 19, 2009

http://motherjones.com/mojo/2009/03/how-nation%E2%80%99s-only-state-owned-bank-became-envy-wall-street

How the Nation’s Only State-Owned Bank Became the Envy of Wall Street
  — By Josh Harkinson | Fri Mar. 27, 2009 5:33 PM PDT

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The Bank of North Dakota is the only state-owned bank in America—what Republicans might call an idiosyncratic bastion of socialism. It also earned a record profit last year even as its private-sector corollaries lost billions. To be sure, it owes some of its unusual success to North Dakota’s well-insulated economy, which is heavy on agricultural staples and light on housing speculation. But that hasn’t stopped out-of-state politicos from beating a path to chilly Bismarck in search of advice. Could opening state-owned banks across America get us out of the financial crisis? It certainly might help, says Ellen Brown, author of the book, Web of Debt, who writes that the Bank of North Dakota, with its $4 billion under management, has avoided the credit freeze by “creating its own credit, leading the nation in establishing state economic sovereignty.” Mother Jones spoke with the Bank of North Dakota’s president, Eric Hardmeyer.

*** end quote ***

An interesting way to attack the FED?

Reenforcing State sovereignty to cut into the FED’s action and fiefdom.

As much as don’t like the gooferment, this seems like a good idea.

Fifty mini feds without the power to inflate or to borrow seems better than one big central bank with enormous powers over fiat currency.

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INTERESTING: Tiger Woods has really stepped in it

Friday, December 11, 2009

Guess that just kills his squeaky clean image.

Too bad.

The media will rub everyone’s nose in it as they define “deviancy” down.

Hopefully, for the children’s sake, everything will work out peacefully.

What is it with the sport’s ego? NBA players, MLB, and the “rock stars”.

I would hope that if I had their gifts, I’d have the humility to kiss the ground every morning.

Sigh!

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INTERESTING: Tiger-gate?

Saturday, November 28, 2009

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/11/alternative_media_scoops_msm_o.html

November 28, 2009
Alternative media scoops MSM on Tiger Woods story
Rick Moran

*** begin quote ***

So one of the greatest athletes in the world is unable to navigate the treacherous arc of his driveway and has to be rescued by his wife?

Mrs. Woods breaks the rear window of Tiger’s 2009 Escalade to free him and the police arrive to find Tiger “in and out of consciousness” on the ground? All of this most unusual activity takes place at 2:25 a.m. with the same guy who can thread a 1 iron through the fork of a sapling and onto the green suddenly unable to negotiate an Escalade around the same fire hydrant and tree he zips by every time he leaves home.

*** end quote ***

So, here we have the makings of a great “tin foil hat” item.

What exactly is going on here? And, why are the police and the media treading so softly. Couldn’t be his popular image? Or could it?

The crime to this old Little L Libertarian requires a victim. Any “tin foil hat” conspiracy requires a cover up.

So where is the victim? Sounds like Tiger, the fire hydrant, and the tree.

Where is the conspiracy? Sounds like the wife not admitting the police to interview Tiger is the “smoking gun”.

To misquote Paul Harvey: “Stand by for news”.

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INTERESTING: WW2 could have end

Monday, November 16, 2009

http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/1113/p02s04-usgn.html

Japanese subs found off Hawaii could have changed World War II
By Peter N. Spotts | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
from the November 12, 2009 edition

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The two Japanese submarines – which were commandeered and scuttled by the US after World War II – were much larger, faster, and stealthier than US subs of the day. One included a float-plane that could attack New York.

*** and ***

Marine researchers have found a pair of Imperial Japanese Navy submarines on the sea floor off Hawaii’s Oahu Island – vessels so advanced for their day they would provide plenty of fodder for a fresh novel by Tom Clancy.

*** end quote ***

I found this interesting and wonder what could have happened.

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Posted by reinkefj

INTERSTING: Training crows

Friday, October 30, 2009

http://www.crowboxunleashed.com/

*** begin quote ***

At the time, I taught some captive crows, remotely, through basic operant conditioning, to feed coins into a vending machine so they could get peanuts. The idea is that a group of wild crows would teach other crows, including their offspring, to find the coins and put them into the vending machine to get peanuts. For this experiment, I received coverage all over the globe – from the New York Times, TED.com, Gizmodo and even Oprah covered the experiment! But now – it’s your turn. The crowbox experiment is open source and this site exists to let the whole world know how to make a crow machine and then share the results.

*** end quote ***

Fascinating idea?

Wonder if it could be done and show an roi?

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INTERESTING: Gooferment goof for liberty

Sunday, October 25, 2009

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125597721400194603.html?mod=yhoofront

EUROPE NEWS
OCTOBER 21, 2009
Did Brinkmannship Fell Berlin’s Wall? Brinkmann Says It Did
Reporter Claims He, Not an Italian Competitor, Caused an Apparatchik to Err and Open Border
By MARCUS WALKER

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Pressed on the meaning of the new travel policy — When did it come into force? Did it apply to West Berlin? Did people need a passport? — the flustered apparatchik rustled his papers and gave confusing answers that led the news media to believe the border was open, with immediate effect.

The result, once East Berliners had seen that night’s news on West German television, was chaos at border crossings across the city.

At Bornholmer Strasse, one of the main checkpoints in central Berlin, confused border guards couldn’t get clear orders on how to deal with the crush, and debated whether to open fire. Instead, they opened the barrier, and the Berlin Wall was history.

*** end quote ***

I love a good “gooferment” story. Especially when it means a victory for liberty! LOL!!

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