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Synopsis:

Tragedy forced Doctor Xander Crowe down the pathways of the occult and he was forever transformed. Now, chasing the vision of a drowned woman, Crowe finds himself in the haunted town of Wormwood, where evil lurks in the shadows and stains the souls of its inhabitants.

When a strange vision of murder sends him to a small town to investigate, Dr. Xander Crowe discovers that Wormwood is no ordinary town. Secrets lurk within every resident, from the innkeeper to the town librarian to the waitress at the diner. The seemingly idyllic surface of the town hides a mystery unlike anything he’s ever experienced. Navigating through this tiny, isolated town in the foothills of Northern California, Crowe finds himself drawn into a web of dark conspiracy, strange romance, and arcane mysticism. And now, as Crowe begins to unravel the mystery at the heart of Wormwood, he finds that his very presence there may not be a coincidence at all…

About:

Wormwood is a weekly, serialized mystery delivered as an MP3 podcast on our website and via the many podcatchers on the web, including iTunes. Each week, Wormwood strives to deliver a quirky ensemble drama with elements of supernatural horror and mystery. With its odd, small town setting and tragic lead character, Wormwood is designed to appeal to fans of Twin Peaks, The X-files, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Hellboy, Supernatural, Hellblazer, and The Sandman, as well as the works of writers like Stephen King, Clive Barker, Edgar Allan Poe, and HP Lovecraft.

Wormwood is produced by Habit Forming Films, LLC, a dynamic film production company dedicated to producing uncompromising works of entertainment outside of the traditional Hollywood studio system. Habit Forming Films’ first film, Bad Habits, recently won a Remi Award in the original dramatic short film category at Worldfest Houston International Film Festival 2006. Bad Habits also screened at the 2007 Sacramento International Film Festival, where actor Jack Sway took home a Best Actor award. Habit Forming Films has also produced The Long Road, a short film, recently won an award for Best Editing at the Hollywood FAIF Film Festival. We also wrapped principal photography on The Hollywood Informant, a black-and-white noir film produced in association with Geeworld Studios.

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Nov 4, 2007 4:34pm EST
By Cortney Harding

NEW YORK (Billboard) – Nine Inch Nails frontman Trent Reznor has spent the past few years using new methods to disseminate his music to fans. Past experiments have included hidden messages on T-shirts, “forgotten” USB drives in bathrooms containing copies of his last record, “Year Zero,” and cryptic Web sites, all culminating in a prerelease free stream on the band’s MySpace page.

Having just fulfilled his contract with longtime label Interscope, Reznor is upping the digital ante in tandem with activist/musician Saul Williams. Williams’ Reznor-produced concept album, “The Rise and Fall of Niggy Tardust,” which went live October 31 via the Fader label, can be obtained in three download formats: 192 kbit/s MP3, 320 kbit/s MP3 and free Lossless audio codec (FLAC).

The lower-quality MP3 is free, while the high-quality MP3 and FLAC cost $5. In a twist on the “name your own price” scheme that Radiohead employed for its recent album, “In Rainbows,” fans will not be allowed to pay more than $5 for “Niggy Tardust.”

Billboard spoke to Reznor and Williams about the implications of their sales model, what this might mean for future Nine Inch Nails releases and why people should be willing to pay the same amount for music as they do for a good cup of coffee.

Q: How did you decide to collaborate? What sort of time line was involved?

Trent Reznor: “A couple of years ago, I came across a video from Saul’s last record, and it was like a breath of fresh air. At the time, I was looking for tour support and hand-picked him to join us on the road. We became friends and decided to try recording a couple of tracks. It turned out to be an incredibly engrossing back-and-forth experience; I think there was a lot of mutual respect, and Saul really gave me a lot of confidence.”

Saul Williams: “The record started on the road, in hotels. We ended up doing three drafts. We did 14 tracks, and I sat with those for a few months. We came back, revisited them, did some more work and took another four months off, and then we got around to the final mixing.”

Q: Where in the process did you make the decision to pursue the “free or $5″ distribution model?

Williams: “Trent is very tech-savvy, and we both wanted to find a new model that would work for us. We’d been saying that it would be cool to give it away for free, but when Radiohead made their announcement, we decided to try something close to their model.”

Reznor: “Radiohead is one of my favorite bands, and if I were sitting on a finished Nine Inch Nails record right now, I would do exactly the same thing they’re doing. I think that right now, the music industry is between business models. I don’t know if this is the wave of the future.

“I’m someone who spends a lot of time online, and I’ll admit to having stolen music off the Web before. My main goal is to get my music out to as many people as possible in a way that feels pure and allows me to maintain my integrity.” (laughs)

Q: How did you arrive at the $5 price for the higher-quality download?

Williams: “Five bucks seemed pretty fair. It’s the cost of a good latte, so you’d hope people would pay that much for a good record.”

Reznor: “There was a lot of debate about it, especially after Radiohead happened. ‘Should we do the pay-what-you-wish model, (or) should we give it away outright?’ In the end, we decided to give people an opportunity to support the artist. In my mind, $5 is insultingly cheap for this album.”

Q: Trent, is this a trial run for a distribution model that you might pursue with forthcoming Nine Inch Nails records?

Reznor: “I’m just going to wait and see how it goes with Saul’s record. Six months from now, who knows what kinds of models will be out there and what will have happened. I have tried a bunch of different things in the past and will continue to try out new strategies.”

Q: Saul, the album title is a play on David Bowie’s “The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust.” Is this record also a concept album? And Trent, having worked with Bowie in the past, did you talk to him about this?

Reznor: “I didn’t talk to Bowie about it. I was going to send him a copy of the record this morning, then the phone rang and I got distracted.” (laughs)

Williams: “The name came about as a joke, but there is definitely a strong concept running through the record. I created the character because I felt like there was nothing that was speaking to my experience as an African American. In the end, Niggy Tardust realizes that his only enemy is himself, and that he has to overcome the boundaries set before him in order to become liberated.”

Q: Do you have any indication of how many preorders have been placed for the album? And when you decided to use this sales model, did you consider the fact that it would mean the record wouldn’t be included on Billboard’s charts?

Reznor: “We do know the presale numbers, but we are keeping them a secret. As for (Nielsen) SoundScan, when I looked at the chart numbers for my last record, I was pretty positive that far more people heard it than actually bought it. I think chart positions are irrelevant; they’re not an accurate number of how many people are listening to a given artist.

“Look, when file sharing started to proliferate, I was upset about it. I had worked so hard to make music and was pissed that people thought it was OK to just steal it. But at a certain point, I just accepted that this is the way things are, and kids aren’t going to spend money on an inferior product when they can just get it for free.

“I just wanted to get the record out. I figure there are other revenue streams, and while I like being compensated for my work, I think it’s more important to get it out to the public. It was not my intent to try to start some campaign to destroy record labels — they’re doing a good enough job of it themselves. We’re not tainting the experience with ads or corporate tie-ins, and we’re letting the songs speak for themselves.”

http://www.reuters.com/articlePrint?articleId=USN0434171920071104

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By Johanna Neuman
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

November 7, 2007

WASHINGTON — House Democrats on Tuesday beat back a Republican attempt to force them to vote on a divisive resolution to impeach Vice President Dick Cheney for “fabricating a threat of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction” to justify the war in Iraq.

The 218-194 party-line vote waylaying the measure by sending it to the judiciary committee capped a remarkable afternoon in which Republicans tried to outfox Democrats, switching their votes in a strategy that could have triggered an immediate vote.

“We’re going to help them out,” explained Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Texas). “We’re going to give them their day in court.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) and her lieutenants maneuvered to avoid a bruising floor fight. Such a clash would have forced Democrats to choose between their liberal base, which might cheer a Cheney impeachment, and a broader electorate, which might view the resolution as a partisan game in a time of war.

With the vote technically slated to last 15 minutes, she held voting open for more than an hour and finally forced the measure to an uncertain future in the committee.

That referral effectively shelved the issue for now, but not before the resolution’s sponsor, Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich, a far-left Ohio Democrat running for president, had a chance to read into the record three articles of impeachment against the vice president.

“Impeachment is not on our agenda,” said House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.). “We have some major priorities. We need to focus on those.”

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) agreed that it was not in Pelosi’s interest to advance the articles of impeachment. “If she were to let this thing out of the box, considering the number of legislative issues we have pending . . . it could create a split that could affect our productivity for the rest of the Congress,” Conyers told Fox News.

The resolution said that Cheney, “in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of vice president,” had “purposely manipulated the intelligence process to deceive the citizens and Congress of the United States by fabricating a threat of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction to justify the use of the U.S. Armed Forces against the nation of Iraq in a manner damaging to our national security interests.”

The 11-page resolution also charged that Cheney purposely deceived the nation about an alleged relationship between Iraq and Al Qaeda and has also “openly threatened aggression against the Republic of Iran absent any real threat to the United States.”

If the judiciary committee were to vote out any of the impeachment articles, the issue would then go to the House floor. If the House were to vote to impeach Cheney, the Senate could try him and, with a two-thirds vote, remove him from office. “This vote sends a message that the administration’s conduct in office is no longer unchallenged,” Kucinich said afterward. Predicting that the judiciary committee will be forced by public opinion to hold hearings, he added, “Hopefully, it will have a restraining effect on this administration to stop this madness.”

Four Democrats joined Kucinich to vote against sending the impeachment resolution to committee.

They included Reps. Bob Filner of Chula Vista and Maxine Waters of Los Angeles.

At day’s end, Republicans and Democrats were accusing each other of petty political ploys at the expense of important business.

At the White House, Press Secretary Dana Perino noted that Congress “has not sent a single appropriations bill to the president’s desk this year . . . yet they find time to spend an entire work period on futile votes to impeach the vice president. It is this behavior that leaves the American people shaking their head in wonder at this Congress.”

Cheney spokeswoman Megan M. Mitchell added, “It is one thing for Congressman Kucinich to use this political ploy in his presidential campaign. It is another thing to do so on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives.”

Hoyer issued a statement chiding Republicans for turning the potential impeachment of a vice president into “a petty political game.”

Insisting that House leaders have their eye on the ball, he added, “Speaker Pelosi and I have made it clear that this Congress is not going to proceed with impeachment, and is going to focus on critical issues facing our nation, such as healthcare for children and the war in Iraq.”

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-impeach7nov07,0,2784849.story

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Thursday, November 8, 2007
Carl Nolte, Michael Taylor, Chronicle Staff Writers

An 810-foot-long container ship crashed into the base of a tower of the Bay Bridge’s western span in heavy fog Wednesday, spilling 58,000 gallons of fuel into San Francisco Bay.

It was the first time in memory that an oceangoing ship had run into the bridge. There was no apparent major damage to the span, but the hull of Hanjin Shipping’s 65,131-ton Cosco Busan was ripped.

Within hours of the 8:30 a.m. crash, oil was showing up on the San Francisco waterfront and on Pacific Ocean beaches in Marin County. By nightfall, several beaches in San Francisco were closed to the public, and the state’s Office of Emergency Services had instructed Bay Area counties to begin assessing potential dangers to the public from contamination.

The U.S. Coast Guard said 8,000 gallons of the fuel had been contained by the evening, and the state Department of Fish and Game’s oil spill unit began taking steps to contain and clean up the rest of the spill.

Coast Guard investigators were looking into how the ship, under the control of one of the bay’s most experienced pilots and equipped with radar, crashed.

The ship hit the base of the second tower west of Yerba Buena Island, scraping up against the wood, plastic and concrete fender that protects each tower from damage at water level. The fender system “performed the way it was designed,” and the bridge remains sound, Caltrans spokesman Bart Ney said.

He said no one driving on the bridge would have felt a thing.

It’s extremely rare for a ship to hit one of the eight spans that cross the bay – the last such incident was 10 years ago, when a vessel ran into the Benicia-Martinez bridge – and the Coast Guard said something must have gone badly awry in Wednesday’s accident.

The agency would not speculate on whether either mechanical factors or human error was the most likely explanation.

“Obviously, it shouldn’t have happened,” said Coast Guard Capt. William Uberti, captain of the Port of San Francisco and the chief federal officer investigating the incident.

Hundreds of ships pass under the Bay Bridge every year, and all of them are equipped with radar and are under the control of a bar pilot, a mariner with long experience on San Francisco Bay and its approaches.

The Cosco Busan was carrying container cargo bound from Oakland to South Korea. It had just left the dock on the Oakland estuary west of Jack London Square and was proceeding to sea when the accident occurred.

The pilot on board was Capt. John Cota, who has worked on the bay for more than 25 years, said Patrick Moloney, executive director of the San Francisco Pilot Commission. Cota is one of the most experienced of the 60 captains who guide ships into the bay, Moloney said.

Efforts to reach Cota for comment were unsuccessful.

Although the ship’s own captain has overall responsibility, the pilot controls the navigation of the vessel from the time it leaves the dock until the ship is clear of the approaches to the Golden Gate, about 12 miles at sea.

Typically, according to mariners, a pilot leaving Oakland will turn slightly left into a bar channel and then right as the ship approaches the Bay Bridge.

Most container ships outbound from Oakland will go between the two bridge towers nearest Yerba Buena Island. The channel between the two bridge towers is 2,212 feet wide, and usually an outbound ship steers directly in the middle of the channel.

The fog was unusually thick Wednesday morning as the Cosco Busan headed out, and the National Weather Service had issued a dense fog advisory.

In fog, the pilot uses radar to determine the ship’s position. There is also a radar transponder in the center of the bridge between the towers.

For some unknown reason, the Cosco Busan drifted left as it approached the bridge. The tide had just turned, and the current was flooding slightly – that is, moving into the bay from the ocean, or moving in a southerly direction under the Bay Bridge. This, mariners say, can cause even a large ship to drift.

The Cosco Busan hit the tower fender on its port, or left, side – tearing a gash 160 feet long about 10 feet above the water line.

The Coast Guard’s Uberti would not speculate on the cause of the accident. However, people familiar with ship operations said there could have been a number of explanations.

The ship might have lost power or steering and thus have been out of control, mariners said. The seaman steering the ship under the pilot’s orders might have made a mistake. The pilot might have been forced to swerve to avoid a small vessel, or he might have made an error in the position of the ship.

Once the ship was brought under control, the crew transferred fuel from the leaking tanks into other fuel tanks. The ship then moved under its own power to Anchorage Nine, in the middle of the bay near Candlestick Point. It trailed a sheen of oil as it went.

The Coast Guard is testing Cosco Busan’s navigating officers and crew and the pilot for drugs or alcohol. The ship will remain at anchor indefinitely and will not be allowed to go to sea until the Coast Guard and other authorities determine what repairs need to be made.

In the meantime, the accident and oil spill are being investigated by no fewer than 13 organizations, from the Coast Guard and the state Department of Fish and Game to the San Francisco police and fire departments.

Authorities shut down Baker Beach, Crissy Field, China Beach, Kirby Cove and Fort Point due to the bay’s contamination.

At a displacement of 65,131 tons, the Cosco Busan is larger than the famous liner Titanic but smaller than many container ships that call at the Port of Oakland. It was built in South Korea in 2001, has a diesel engine that develops 77,633 horsepower and can attain 25.9 knots.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/11/08/MNUKT85I3.DTL

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Nov. 01, 2007
By Catherine Mayer/London

The police might normally be expected to celebrate a guilty verdict, but the outcome of the trial that concluded Thursday at London’s Old Bailey courthouse caused consternation among the city’s law enforcement officers. That’s because the defendant was London’s Metropolitan police force, in the dock over the death of Jean Charles de Menezes — the Brazilian electrician who was shot seven times in the head by police in a London underground station on July 22, 2005, in the tense atmosphere that followed the terror attacks on the city’s transport system two weeks earlier and a failed attack the previous day. Standing outside the court after the verdict was delivered, Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair acknowledged that de Menezes’ death was “a tragedy,” adding, “He was an innocent man.”

Despite the verdict, the Brazilian’s family and human rights campaigners say the trial failed to answer the question of why de Menezes was killed. The Crown Prosecution Service decided there was insufficient evidence to charge individual officers with the shooting, and instead brought a case under health and safety legislation on the surreal grounds that the police had “failed to provide for the health, safety and welfare” of de Menezes and other members of the public.

The case highlights the dilemma facing authorities across the world responsible for confronting terror while protecting the rights of innocent citizens. De Menezes’ shooting, said Blair, “was the culmination of actions by many hands, all of whom were doing their best to handle the terrible threat facing London on that day: a race against time to find the failed suicide bombers of the day before.” Blair expressed his “deep regrets,” but reiterated his determination to stay on as police chief in the face of calls for his resignation from Britain’s two largest opposition parties, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats. Labour Home Secretary Jacqui Smith expressed her “full confidence” in Blair, who insists that the police acted properly in what he called “an extraordinary situation.”

London was on high alert on the morning that police surveillance teams stationed outside an apartment block in South London spotted de Menezes leaving his building on his way to work. Terror attacks on July 7 had killed 52 commuters, and just the previous day, more suspects had gone on the run after devices they planted on London’s public transport network failed to explode. The police were looking for Hussain Osman, whose address was in the same building as de Menezes, and had attempted to bomb the Shepherd’s Bush London tube station the previous day. (Osman was found guilty of conspiracy to murder earlier this year.) Police, mistaking de Menezes for Osman, trailed him into Stockwell tube station and down the escalator onto a platform. When he boarded a train, they cornered him and shot him with special bullets designed to cause maximum physical damage.

Amid those basic facts, a host of questions have arisen about police procedures under pressure and their response to finding themselves under investigation. The court heard about miscommunication between officers on the day of the shooting. The prosecution also wondered how light-skinned de Menezes could have been mistaken for the darker, Ethiopian-born Osman. A forensics expert told the court that a composite picture provided by the police after the shooting to show the similarities between de Menezes and Osman had been digitally altered to diminish their differences.

Commissioner Blair has promised that “the lessons learnt from the death of Mr. de Menezes [will be] incorporated into [police] training, policy and operations.” The Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, expressed concern that the trial might hinder the fight against terror. “Police officers must not fear that they will be second-guessed by those operating with all the benefit of hindsight,” he said. The court’s verdict leaves the Metropolitan Police facing a penalty and legal costs that together amount to about $1.1 million. A statement by de Menezes’ Brazil-based mother, Maria, read by relatives outside the court, welcomed the verdict as the “first public recognition of the failings of the Metropolitan Police.” But the family says it is still seeking justice.

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1679108,00.html

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Thu Nov 1, 2007 6:24pm EDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – It may be the shortest U.S. 2008 presidential
campaign yet — comedian Stephen Colbert’s requests to be on the South
Carolina Democratic and Republican primary ballots were rejected on
Thursday.

Colbert, who has admitted he does not want to be president but just
wanted to run for it in his native state of South Carolina, had filed
for the Democratic ticket earlier on Thursday and paid the $2,500
filing fee.

Hours later, the party’s executive council voted 13-3 against
allowing him on the ballot for the January 26 primary contest, party
spokeswoman Keiana Page told Reuters. The eight other major Democratic
candidates were accepted, she said.

“Those candidates who were rejected will receive their checks back,”
she said, adding that a variety of reasons can keep a candidate off the
ballot including whether they are a nationally recognized candidate and
the individual is actively campaigning in the state.

Colbert also failed to qualify for the Republican January 19 primary
ballot. He was required to file papers with the state party as well as
the Federal Election Commission and pay a $35,000 fee, but that did not
occur by Thursday’s deadline, according to a party official.

A spokeswoman for the host of Comedy Central’s “The Colbert Report” declined to comment.

Colbert, whose pugnacious egomaniacal television persona routinely
mocks conservative talk shows, said he had hoped to run in both South
Carolina primaries “because I’d like to lose twice.”

http://www.reuters.com/article/peopleNews/idUSN0148677520071101

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By Jordy Yager, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
October 27, 2007

WASHINGTON — No one had any hard questions for the deputy administrator of FEMA, an agency deeply tarnished by its delayed action after Hurricane Katrina, when he held a news conference Tuesday to talk about the California wildfires.

“Are you happy with FEMA’s response so far?” someone asked.

Indeed, the deputy administrator was. “I am very happy with FEMA’s response so far,” responded Vice Adm. Harvey E. Johnson Jr.

The news conference looked like a success in the Bush administration’s effort this week to demonstrate it could respond competently to a disaster.

On Friday, however, the agency admitted that the softball questions were posed by FEMA employees, not reporters.

The White House was not happy with FEMA’s response.

“It is not a practice that we would employ here at the White House,” said Press Secretary Dana Perino, mentioning three times that it was an “error in judgment.” “It’s not something I would have condoned, and they, I’m sure, will not do it again.”

The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees FEMA, was less happy.

“This is inexcusable and offensive, and stunts like this will not be tolerated or repeated,” said spokeswoman Laura Keehner. “It was a lapse of judgment, and we find it offensive, and it won’t happen again.”

The Federal Emergency Management Agency apologized for the event, but protested that it was not intended to deceive. FEMA announced the news conference with 15 minutes’ notice and provided an 800 number for reporters, but it was not set up to take questions. When no reporters showed up, FEMA provided stand-ins to ask questions and a video feed. Several channels broadcast parts of the event live.

“FEMA’s goal is to get information out as soon as possible, and in trying to do so we made an error in judgment,” Johnson acknowledged in a statement. “Our intent was to provide useful information and be responsive to the many questions we have received. We are reviewing our press procedures and will make the changes necessary to ensure that all of our communications are straightforward and transparent.”

Perino also said that the agency was just trying to provide information: “There were so many questions pouring in. It was just a bad way to handle it, and they know that.”

FEMA’s “error in judgment” comes just more than two years after its agonizingly slow-motion response to thousands of displaced New Orleans residents who waited for help in dreadful conditions at the Superdome. Michael D. Brown, the agency’s head, resigned under fire after he became an embarrassment to President Bush, who appeared out of touch when he praised Brown with the memorable comment: “Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job.”

Johnson, a retired Coast Guard officer who came to FEMA after the 2005 hurricane, started the briefing Tuesday with a brief statement and took six questions from FEMA employees. On the video, however, it was unclear who was asked the questions.

The questions focused on FEMA’s relief efforts for Southern California wildfire victims and whether FEMA had been doing an adequate job.

“I think what you’re really seeing here is the benefit of experience, the benefit of good leadership and the benefit of good partnership,” Johnson said, “none of which were present in Katrina.”

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-na-fema27oct27,1,360166.story?coll=la-news-a_section&ctrack=3&cset=true

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Oct 26, 2007Chevy has teamed up with Fox on a creative new way to include a visual that goes along with the “brought to you by…” messages that the announcers read during the World Series.

Typically, a sponsor’s logo is overlaid on the screen as the announcer reads his short spiel. Chevy, instead of including such a logo overlay, has the logo for its Malibu sedan on a sign held by a fan in the stands, writes MediaPost.

The camera appears to zoom in on the sign held by the fan as the announcer reads the message.

However, the sign is not actually being held by a real fan during a real game. Rather, Chevy and agency GM Planworks gather a group of 50 fans in Fenway Park, simulated a game-like situation, and shot a Sox fan holding a sign. The Malibu plug was inserted digitally, and the film was sent to Fox, which slotted it in during the broadcast.

The tactic will be used in each game of the World Series. When the series moves to Colorado, Rockies fans will be holding the sign.

http://www.mediabuyerplanner.com/2007/10/26/chevy-shoots-fans-with-sign-inserts-in-series-for-sponsorship-message/

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By H. JOSEF HEBERT
Oct. 24, 2007

WASHINGTON (AP) — Two chairmen of key committees in the House and Senate on Wednesday criticized the White House for editing testimony from a government expert about the health impacts of global warming and demanded documents involving the testimony he provided to Congress.

“I am deeply concerned that important scientific and health information was removed from the … testimony at the last minute,” Sen. Barbara Boxer, chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, wrote President Bush.

Rep. Bart Gordon, D-Tenn., chairman of the House Science and Technology Committee, demanded an explanation from the White House’s chief science adviser, John Marburger, about the handing of the testimony earlier this week by Dr. Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. She appeared Tuesday before Boxer’s committee, which is crafting global warming legislation.

“We expect our government researchers and scientists to provide both Congress and the public the full results of their taxpayer-supported work without the filter that those of opposing views might like to impose,” Gordon wrote Marburger.

The White House denied that the testimony by Gerberding was “watered down” and noted that she has said she does not believe she was censored.

When a draft of Gerberding’s testimony went to the White House for review, two sections — “Climate Change is a Public Health Concern” and “Climate Change Vulnerability” — and a number of other phrases were removed, cutting the 12-page document in half.

A copy of the draft given to the White House was obtained by The Associated Press.

Earlier, a CDC official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the review process, told the AP that the original draft “was eviscerated” by “heavy-handed” changes in Washington.

Boxer asked that the White House provide her committee, by next week, copies of all drafts of Gerberding’s testimony and any records of comments made on the draft testimony. “The public has a right to know all of the facts about global warming and the threat it poses to their families and communities,” Boxer wrote.

Gordon and Rep. Brad Miller, D-N.C., chairman of the House Science subcommittee on investigations and oversight, made a similar request.

White House press secretary Dana Perino said Gerberding’s testimony went through an interagency review “and a number of agencies had some concerns.”

She said some reviewers did not believe the draft matched the science as presented in a report on global warming and public health effects by a U.N. panel that has assessed climate change for decades.

The CDC testimony “was not watered down in terms of its science (or) … in terms of the concerns that climate change raises for public health,” Perino said.

Gerberding played down the changes to her prepared text and said she was comfortable with her presentation Tuesday to the Senate committee.

“I was absolutely happy with my testimony in Congress. We finally had a chance to go and say what we thought was important,” she said at a luncheon appearance in Atlanta.

“I don’t let people put words in my mouth, and I stand for science,” said Gerberding. She said she was free to depart from the six pages of prepared testimony given the committee and did so.

But the original draft, reviewed by the AP, contained much greater detail on the potential disease and other health effects of climate change than was in either Gerberding’s prepared remarks or in her other comments during the hearing.

“The public health effects of climate change remain largely unaddressed. CDC considers climate change a serious public health concern,” the draft says. The phrase was not in the testimony given the committee or in her other remarks at the hearing.

Gerberding referred briefly to a chart, displayed at the hearing, that listed the potential health effect, but provided little elaboration. Examples included excessive heat, respiratory problems, more air pollution and possible spread of animal-transmitted and waterborne diseases.

The original text devoted six pages — all deleted — to these items.

Claims by the White House that some sections were removed because they did not — as Perino said — “comport with the science” in the U.N. panel’s report were challenged by Boxer’s staff. They said an analysis showed some of the deleted references were similar to concerns raised in the U.N. panel’s report.

Gordon in his letter also said that the IPCC report “appears to support the deleted sections of Dr. Gerberding’s testimony.”

The CDC is the premier public health and disease tracking and response agency in the federal government. It is part of the Health and Human Services Department.

The Bush administration has tried to defend itself for months from accusations it has put political pressure on scientists to emphasize the uncertainties of global warming.

A House committee heard testimony this year from climate scientists who complained that the administration often had sought to manage or influence their statements and public appearances.

The White House has said it has only sought to provide a balanced view of the climate issue.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5inODG24ecfdaA-wDYGJMdlIfeVUA

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Wikinews, the free news source you can write!
October 24, 2007

According to reports, Turkey has today launched airstrikes against Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) bases near the border to Iraq. F-16 fighter jets and helicopter gunships are said to have bombed targets on both sides of the border.

Turkish officials said that a major incursion was not implemented at this time to give diplomacy a final chance. An Iraqi delegation, headed by defense minister Qadir Obeidi (aka Abdel Qader Jassim), is scheduled to visit Turkey on Thursday.

“We do not accept in any way… the use of Iraqi territories,
including the territories of the Kurdistan region, as a base to
threaten the security of neighbouring countries,” Massoud Barzani, president of the Kurdistan Regional Government, said in a statement condemning the PKK.

“We are concerned about the continuing skirmishes that are happening
up there, and terrorist attacks that are being launched by the PKK
against the Turks,” White House Press Secretary Dana Perino said.

http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Turkey_launches_airstrikes_against_Kurdish_rebels

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California Wildfires Force Historic Evacuation

Tue Oct 23, 2007 11:28pm EDT
By Dana Ford

SAN DIEGO, Oct 23 (Reuters) – Fierce wildfires raged across Southern California on Tuesday, threatening more than 60,000 homes as night fell and forcing half a million people to flee in the state’s largest evacuation.

California’s worst fires in four years, driven by hot Santa Ana winds that have not relented for three days, tormented the San Diego area in the south and threatened mountain communities farther north.

Some 1,500 homes and other structures had been destroyed by the fires as of Tuesday evening and the 500,000 people evacuated in their path was the largest in the U.S. since Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast in 2005.

“I’m worried for my baby, my house, my kids, everything.” said Ana Ramirez, 30 and pregnant, who was taking shelter at San Diego’s Qualcomm Stadium along with her 4-year-old daughter.

Most of the destroyed homes were in the San Diego area, where four major wildfires burned unchecked and one person was killed on Sunday. Four other deaths were reported among the evacuees and more than three dozen people had been injured, including 18 firefighters.

Firefighters battled flames that shot more than 100 feet (30 meters) high, as they desperately tried to save homes in the fires’ path.

As the firestorms raged past nightfall, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger asked President George W. Bush to upgrade California’s wildfires to a “major disaster,” which would trigger federal help.

Bush issued a declaration of emergency early Tuesday. But Schwarzenegger told him in a new letter that “this disaster is of such severity and magnitude that effective response is beyond the capability of the state and local governments.”

HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS IN ECONOMIC LOSSES

Schwarzenegger said 68,000 homes, from cabins to luxury villas, were threatened statewide and 10,000 men and women were working the fire lines. More than 300,000 acres (120,000 hectares) have been blackened and the state government put economic losses in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

“We have had three things come together — very dry areas, very hot weather and a lot of wind. This makes the perfect storm for fire,” Schwarzenegger said at Lake Arrowhead, where blazes threatened two nearby mountain communities.

Bush planned to visit the fire-stricken area on Thursday.

Running Springs, a town of about 5,000 people nestled in the San Bernardino Mountains, was surrounded by fire by Tuesday afternoon and thousands of homes appeared in danger, but crews were able to fight back the flames and save most of them.

Firefighters in the Mexican border city of Tecate tried to control fires that sent up black smoke and covered houses and cars with gray ash. Fires also burned on the outskirts of the Mexican city of Tijuana, 20 miles (32 km) from San Diego.

California power authorities issued a transmission emergency because downed power lines had left San Diego with only 60 percent of its usual supply of electricity.

The hot Santa Ana winds, which have fanned the flames as they blow in to Southern California from the desert, continued to gust up to 65 mph (105 kph) and high wind warnings remained in effect for most of the region until Wednesday afternoon.

Officials were hoping that easing winds and an accompanying rise in humidity would help them gain the upper hand against the wildfires.

San Diego officials said people were evacuating quickly. In the region’s last major fire in 2003, 15 people died and 5,000 buildings were destroyed.

Erica Schmidt said friends in San Diego county ignored evacuation orders to to safeguard their own homes.

“It bothers me to know my friends are still up there because they can’t get out. All the roads are closed,” Schmidt said.

Some 8,000 people, including senior citizens from nursing homes, went to the Qualcomm stadium, where the San Diego Chargers football team plays, or to the Del Mar Fairgrounds, famed for its horse racing track. Thousands of horses and family pets were also accommodated.

People taking shelter at Qualcomm called it well organized and clean, in contrast to the chaos at New Orleans’ Superdome, which was used as a refuge after Katrina.

On Tuesday afternoon, some San Diego evacuees were allowed to return to their communities.

(Additional reporting by Dan Whitcomb and Jill Serjeant in Los Angeles and Marty Graham in San Diego)

http://www.reuters.com/articlePrint?articleId=USN2323051220071024

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Oct. 23, 2007

(CBS/AP)

California’s attorney general is suing the EPA for stalling on a decision about whether to let California and 11 other states force car makers to produce cleaner vehicles.

The lawsuit is to be filed in federal court in Washington on Tuesday. It comes 22 months after California first asked the EPA to let the states impose tougher regulations on emissions of greenhouse gases from cars, pickups and SUV’s.

“Unfortunately, the Bush administration has really had their head in the sand,” California Attorney General Edmund G. Brown Jr. said Monday. “In this case, there has been an unreasonable delay.”

California wants to implement a 2002 state law that would require automakers to begin making vehicles that emit fewer greenhouse gas emissions by model year 2009. It would cut emissions by about a quarter by the year 2030. But the law can only take effect if the EPA grants the state a waiver under the Clean Air Act.

Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Washington plan to join California’s lawsuit against the EPA.

Eight other states – New York, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Oregon, Rhode Island, and Vermont – are ready to implement California’s emissions standards if it gets the EPA waiver.

According to a new analysis by British climate scientists, the 25 percent reduction in a handful of U.S. states may be far too little, far too late.

CBS News reporter Vicki Barker says the report warns climate change will have a more devastating effect, and will have it much sooner than previously predicted.

According to an article in The Guardian, the United Nations’ most recent prediction was that mankind had just eight years to act to stave off the worst effects of global warming. The experts behind the British study say there is less time than that.

Corinne Le Quere, from the University of East Anglia and the British Antarctic Survey, told the Guardian: “It’s bad news because the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide has accelerated since 2000 in a way we did not expect.”

Le Quere worried his findings might have an adverse effect on the policy makers with the power to legislate change. “My biggest worry is people are discouraged by this and do nothing. I hope political leaders will act on this, because we need to do something fast.”

The report lays blame for the unexpectedly rapid rise in greenhouse gas levels to two key factors: China’s booming, fossil-fuel-hungry economy, and a reduction in the amount of carbon pollution soaked up by the world’s land and oceans.

By JULIA PRESTON, New York Times
October 23, 2007

Michael Chertoff, the homeland security secretary, waived several environmental laws yesterday to continue building a border fence through a national conservation area in Arizona, bypassing a federal court ruling that had suspended the fence construction.

Citing “unacceptable risks to our nation’s security” if the fence along the border with Mexico was further delayed, Mr. Chertoff invoked waiver authority granted him under a 2005 bill that mandated construction of the fence.

He ordered work to continue on 6.9 miles of fence along the border through the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area in Cochise County in southeastern Arizona.

In a ruling on Oct. 10, Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle of the federal court for the District of Columbia held up construction of the fence, finding that the government had failed to carry out the required environmental assessment. The decision came in a suit brought by the Sierra Club and Defenders of Wildlife.

In a statement yesterday, the Department of Homeland Security said it “disagrees with the court’s ruling” and was confident of eventually winning the case. It noted that two federal land management agencies had authorized the department to proceed with the fence.

In addition, department officials said that some 19,000 illegal immigrants were detained passing through the conservation area in the 2007 fiscal year and that the immigrants’ trash, human waste and illegal roads had caused more damage to plant and animal life than the fence would.

Sean Sullivan, a spokesman for the Sierra Club in Arizona, said that “we can secure our borders while we protect our public lands” and that “bulldozing” the conservation area was not necessary to manage the border.

The plaintiffs described the area near the San Pedro River as “one of America’s most unique and biologically diverse areas.”

By David Smith
Sunday October 21, 2007
The Observer

There could hardly have been a bigger sensation if Russell Crowe, Rod Stewart or Sven-Goran Eriksson had come out of the closet. Millions of fans around the world were yesterday digesting the news that one of the main characters in the Harry Potter novels, Albus Dumbledore, is gay.

The revelation came from author JK Rowling during a question-and-answer session at New York’s Carnegie Hall. It instantly hurtled around the internet and the world. News websites in China and Germany announced starkly: ‘JK Rowling: “Dumbledore is gay”.’ One blogger wrote on a fansite: ‘My head is spinning. Wow. One more reason to love gay men.’

After reading briefly from her mega-selling book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, on Friday night, Rowling took questions from an audience of 1,600 students. A 19-year-old from Colorado asked about the avuncular headmaster of Hogwarts School: ‘Did Dumbledore, who believed in the prevailing power of love, ever fall in love himself?’

The author replied: ‘My truthful answer to you…I always thought of Dumbledore as gay.’ The audience reportedly fell silent – then erupted into prolonged applause.

Rowling, 42, continued: ‘Dumbledore fell in love with Grindelwald [a bad wizard he defeated long ago], and that added to his horror when Grindelwald showed himself to be what he was. To an extent, do we say it excused Dumbledore a little more because falling in love can blind us to an extent, but he met someone as brilliant as he was and, rather like Bellatrix, he was very drawn to this brilliant person and horribly, terribly let down by him.’

She added: ‘Yeah, that’s how I always saw Dumbledore. In fact, recently I was in a script read-through for the sixth film, and they had Dumbledore saying a line to Harry early in the script saying, “I knew a girl once, whose hair…” I had to write a little note in the margin and slide it along to the scriptwriter, “Dumbledore’s gay!”‘

Amazed by the warm reaction of the audience, Rowling, on her first US tour in seven years, joked: ‘Just imagine the fan fiction now.’

Associated Press
Oct. 20, 2007LOS ANGELES (AP) — Bill Maher can add “security guard” to his job description alongside comedian and political commentator.Maher on Friday night helped security remove a rowdy protester from the studio during his weekly HBO show “Real Time with Bill Maher,” and it was all captured on live television.

Maher was talking science during one of his weekly panel discussions when a protester in his audience stood up, held up a smuggled-in sign reading “9/11 is a cover up fraud” and shouted comments to the same effect.

The host tried to shout down the audience member, who only became more agitated.

“Do we have some (expletive) security in this building,” Maher yelled, “or do I have to come down there and kick his (expletive)?”

When security reached the man’s aisle and the man resisted leaving, Maher ran into the seats and helped them push him out the door, shouting “Out! Out! Out!”

Several other protesters, sprinkled throughout the audience, then stood up and shouted.

“This isn’t the Iowa Caucus, OK, we’re not here to debate,” Maher shouted with most of his audience cheering him on. “This is the problem with live television.”

The incident was shown live on the East Coast, and the network appeared to show the entire affair unedited for the taped-delayed West Coast version.

After the instigators were ejected, Maher told his panelists — MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, Los Angeles Times columnist Joel Stein and Congresswoman Sheila Jackson — that they often linger outside his studio to share 9/11 conspiracy theories with him and try to get into the show.

“It’s the only time I defend Bush,” he said.

“I’m thinking about firing my audience department,” he added.

Regular audience members found the ruckus thrilling.

“We picked a very exciting night to be here,” Eliot Stein, a 54-year-old high school teacher, said via cell phone. “There’s few live TV shows anymore, and here you got to see, it was like a movie. it was great.”

Phone and e-mail messages left with HBO officials late Friday were not immediately returned.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jS2fva3aaTTU31Aey2UHc9GG6htQD8SCTJE00

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President Bush, First Lady Laura Bush, Speaker Pelosi, Senator Bryd, my fellow Laureate Elie Wiesel, Honorable Members of Congress, Brothers and Sisters.

It is a great honor for me to receive the Congressional Gold Medal. This recognition will bring tremendous joy and encouragement to the Tibetan people, for whom I have a special responsibility. Their welfare is my constant motivation and I always consider myself as their free spokesperson. I believe that this award also sends a powerful message to those many individuals who are dedicated to promoting peace, understanding and harmony.

On a personal note, I am deeply touched that this great honor has been given to me, a Buddhist monk born of a simple family from the remote Amdo region of Tibet. As a child I grew up under the loving care of my mother, a truly compassionate woman. And after my arrival in Lhasa at the age of four, all the people around me, my teachers and even the housekeepers, taught me what it means to be kind, honest, and caring. It is in such an environment that I grew up. Later my formal education in Buddhist thought exposed me to concepts such as interdependence and the human potential for infinite compassion. It is these that gave me a profound recognition of the importance of universal responsibility, nonviolence, and inter-religious understanding. Today, it is a conviction in these values that gives me the powerful motivation to promote basic human values. Even in my own struggle for the rights and greater freedom of the Tibetan people, these values continue to guide my commitment to pursuing a nonviolent path.

I have had the honor to be in this hall once before when I visited your country in 1991. Many of the faces that welcomed me then, I can see today, which gives me great joy. Many have retired and some are sadly no longer with us. However, I would like to take this opportunity to recognize their kindness and contribution. Our American friends have stood with us in the most critical of times and undermost the intense pressure.

Mr. President, thank you for your strong support, and for the warm friendship that Mrs. Bush and you have extended to me personally. I am deeply grateful to you for your sympathy and support for Tibet, and your firm stand on religious freedom and the cause of democracy.

Madam Speaker, you have not only extended an unwavering support to me and the just cause of the Tibetan people, you have also worked hard to promote the cause of democracy, freedom and the respect for human rights in other parts of the world. For this, I would like to offer my special thanks.

The consistency of American support for Tibet has not gone unnoticed in China. Where this has caused some tension in the US-China relations, I feel a sense of regret. Today, I wish to share with you all my sincere hope that the future of Tibet and China will move beyond mistrust to a relationship based on mutual respect, trust and recognition of common interests.

Today we watch China as it rapidly moves forward. Economic liberalization has led to wealth, modernization and great power. I believe that today’s economic success of both India and China, the two most populated nations with long history of rich culture, is most deserving. With their new found status, both of these two countries are poised to play an important leading role on the world stage. In order to fulfill this role, I believe it is vital for China to have transparency, rule of law and freedom of information. Much of the world is waiting to see how China’s concepts of ‘harmonious society’ and ‘peaceful rise’ would unfold. Today’s China, being a state of many nationalities, a key factor here would be how it ensures the harmony and unity of these various peoples. For this, the equality and the rights of its nationalities to maintain their distinct identities are crucial.

With respect to my own homeland Tibet, today many people, both from inside and outside, feel deeply concerned about the consequences of the rapid change taking place. Every year, the Chinese population inside Tibet is increasing at an alarming rate. And, if we are to judge by the example of the population of Lhasa, there is a real danger that the Tibetans will be reduced to an insignificant minority in their own homeland. This rapid increase in population combined also posing serious threat to Tibet’s fragile environment. Being the source of many of Asia’s great rivers, any substantial disturbance in Tibet’s ecology will impact the lives of hundreds of millions. Furthermore, being situated between India and China, the peaceful resolution of the Tibet problem also has important implications for lasting peace and friendly relation between these two great neighbors.

On the future of Tibet, let me take this opportunity to restate categorically that I am not seeking independence. I am seeking a meaningful autonomy for the Tibetan people within the People’s Republic of China. If the real concern of the Chinese leadership is the unity and stability of PRC, I have fully addressed their concerns. I have chosen to adopt this position because I believe, given the obvious benefits especially in economic development, this would be in the best interest of the Tibetan people. Furthermore, I have no intention of using any agreement on autonomy as a stepping stone for Tibet’s independence.

I have conveyed these thoughts to successive Chinese leaders. In particular, following the renewal of direct contact with the Chinese government in 2002, I have explained these in detail through my envoys. Despite all this, Beijing continues to allege that my ‘hidden agenda’ is separation and restoration of Tibet’s old socio-political system. Such a notion is unfounded and untrue. Even in my youth, when I was compelled to take on the full responsibility of governance, I began to initiate fundamental changes in Tibet. Unfortunately, these were interrupted because of the political upheavals that took place. Nevertheless, following our arrival in India as refugees, we have democratized our political system and adopted a democratic charter that sets guidelines for our exile administration.

Even our political leadership is now directly chosen by the people on a five-year term basis. Moreover, we have been able to preserve and practice most of the important aspects of our culture and spirituality in exile. This is due largely to the kindness of India and its people.

Another major concern of the Chinese government is its lack of legitimacy in Tibet. While I cannot rewrite the past, a mutually agreeable solution could bring legitimacy, and I am certainly prepared to use my position and influence among the Tibetan people to bring consensus on this question. So I would also like to restate here that I have no hidden agenda. My decision not to accept any political office in a future Tibet is final.

The Chinese authorities assert that I harbor hostility towards China and that I actively seek to undermine China’s welfare. This is totally untrue. I have always encouraged world leaders to engage with China; I have supported China’s entry into WTO and the awarding of summer Olympics to Beijing. I chose to do so with the hope that China would become a more open, tolerant and responsible country.

A major obstacle in our ongoing dialogue has been the conflicting perspectives on the current situation inside Tibet. So in order to have a common understanding of the real situation, my envoys in their sixth meeting with their Chinese counterparts suggested that we be given an opportunity to send study groups to look at the actual reality on the ground, in the spirit of ‘seeking truth from facts’. This could help both sides to move beyond each other’s contentions.

The time has now come for our dialogue with the Chinese leadership to progress towards the successful implementation of a meaningful autonomy for Tibet, as guaranteed in the Chinese constitution and detailed in the Chinese State Council ‘White Paper on Regional Ethnic Autonomy of Tibet’. Let me take this opportunity to once again appeal to the Chinese leadership to recognize the grave problems in Tibet, the genuine grievances and deep resentments of the Tibetan people inside Tibet, and to have the courage and wisdom to address these problems realistically in the spirit of reconciliation. To you, my American friends, I appeal to you to make every effort to seek ways to help convince the Chinese leadership of my sincerity and help make our dialogue process move forward.

Since you have recognized my efforts to promote peace, understanding and nonviolence, I would like to respectfully share a few related thoughts. I believe this is precisely the time that the United States must increase its support to those efforts that help bring greater peace, understanding and harmony between peoples and cultures. As a champion of democracy and freedom, you must continue to ensure the success of those endeavors aimed at safeguarding basic human rights in the world. Another area where we need US leadership is environment. As we all know, today our earth is definitely warming up and many scientists tell us that our own action is to a large part responsible. So each one of us must, in whatever way we can, use our talents and resources to make a difference so that we can pass on to our future generations a planet that is at least safe to live on.

Many of world’s problems are ultimately rooted in inequality and injustice, whether economic, political or social. Ultimately, this is a question of the well-being of all of us. Whether it is the suffering of poverty in one part of the world, or whether it is the denial of freedom and basic human rights in another part, we should never perceive these events in total isolation. Eventually their repercussions will be felt everywhere. I would like to appeal to you to take a leadership role in an effective international action in addressing this huge economic imbalance. I believe the time has now come to address all these global issues from the perspective of the oneness of humanity, and from a profound understanding of the deeply interconnected nature of our today’s world.

In conclusion, on behalf of six million Tibetan people, I wish to take this opportunity to recognize from the depth of my heart the support extended to us by the American people and their government. Your continued support is critical. I thank you once again for the high honor that you have bestowed on me today. Thank you.

By JAKE COYLE
Oct. 17, 2007

NEW YORK (AP) — Stephen Colbert has announced his candidacy for president on “The Colbert Report,” tossing his satirical hat into the ring of an already crowded race.

“I shall seek the office of the president of the United States,” Colbert said Tuesday on his Comedy Central show as red, white and blue balloons fell around him.

Colbert, 43, had recently satirized the coyness of would-be presidential candidates by refusing to disclose whether he would seek the country’s highest office — a refusal that often came without any prompting.

Shortly before making the announcement, Colbert appeared on “The Daily Show” (the show that spawned Colbert’s spin-off) and played cagey, claiming he was only ready to consider a White House bid. He entered the studio set pulled by a bicycle pedaled by Uncle Sam and quickly pulled out a bale of hay and a bottle of beer to show that he was “an Average Joe.”

Colbert said his final decision would be announced on a “more prestigious show,” which turned out to be his own.

“After nearly 15 minutes of soul-searching, I have heard the call,” said Colbert.

His recent best-seller, “I Am America (And So Can You!),” allowed him to mock the now-standard approach to a White House run, complete with a high-profile book tour.

Colbert said he planned to run in South Carolina, “and South Carolina alone.” The state, one of the key early primaries, is also Colbert’s native state. Earlier this week, South Carolina public television station ETV invited Colbert to announce his candidacy on its air.

Exactly how far the mock conservative pundit planned to stretch his impression of a presidential candidate wasn’t clear. Colbert rarely breaks character on camera, including at his memorable speech at the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner last year.

The Comedy Central host has often mobilized his fans (“Colbert Nation”), encouraging them to vote to have a Hungarian bridge named after him, for example, or to vandalize Web site Wikipedia.com with his version of “truthiness” and “wikiality.”

Colbert said he would run as both a Democrat and Republican. He earlier explained the strategy: “I can lose twice.” He claimed three running mate possibilities: Colbert-Huckabee, Colbert-Putin or Colbert-Colbert.

Minutes after announcing his presidential pursuit, Colbert welcomed CBS political analyst Jeff Greenfield to ask how he had changed the race.

“This is going to be one for the books,” said Greenfield.

A spokesman for Colbert said he would be unavailable for further comment Tuesday evening.

In a guest column for Maureen Dowd in Sunday’s New York Times, Colbert wrote: “I am not ready to announce yet — even though it’s clear that the voters are desperate for a white, male, middle-aged, Jesus-trumpeting alternative.”

Mon Oct 15, 2007 3:16pm EDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – China pulled out of a meeting this week at which world powers were to discuss further action against Iran in protest against the U.S. Congress’ plan to honor the Dalai Lama, the State Department said on Monday.

The meeting in Berlin on Wednesday on the showdown with Iran over its nuclear program has been postponed, probably until next week, said a State Department official, who spoke on condition he not be named.

The Berlin meeting had been scheduled on the same day as the U.S. Congress is set to honor the Dalai Lama, the exiled Buddhist spiritual leader whom China shuns as a Tibetan separatist.

“They had indigestion over the presence of certain spiritual leaders (in the United States) and an event with Congress,” said the official, who spoke on condition he was not named. “It is extraneous to Iranian issues,” he added.

The U.S. Congressional Gold Medal award ceremony at the U.S. Capitol will be the first time U.S. President George W. Bush will have appeared in public with the Dalai Lama, who has visited the White House only for private meetings.

“For us, the Dalai Lama is a spiritual leader and that is how he is being treated here,” said the State Department official, adding that China informed Washington over the weekend of its decision to pull out of the Berlin meeting.

China also canceled an annual German-China human rights dialogue meeting scheduled for December in Germany to show its displeasure over German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s meeting last month with the Dalai Lama.

Political directors from the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council — China, Britain, France, Russia and the United States — as well as host Germany, are set at their next Iran meeting to discuss the language of a new U.N. sanctions resolution against Iran, say U.S. officials.

But China and Russia are both reluctant to impose a third round of U.N. sanctions against Tehran, which says its nuclear work is aimed at generating electricity and not building a bomb.

By WALTER GIBBS and SARAH LYALL

OSLO, Oct. 12 — Former Vice President Al Gore, who emerged from his loss in the muddled 2000 presidential election to devote himself to his passion as an environmental crusader, was awarded the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize on Friday, sharing it with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a United Nations network of scientists.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee praised both “for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change.”

The prize is a vindication for Mr. Gore, whose cautionary film about the consequences of climate change, “An Inconvenient Truth,” won the 2007 Academy Award for best documentary, even as conservatives in the United States denounced it as alarmist and exaggerated.

“I will accept this award on behalf of all the people that have been working so long and so hard to try to get the message out about this planetary emergency,” Mr. Gore said Friday in Palo Alto, Calif., standing with his wife, Tipper, and four members of the United Nations climate panel. “I’m going back to work right now,” he said.

The award was also a validation for the United Nations panel, which in its early days was vilified by those who disputed the scientific case for a human role in climate change. In New Delhi, the Indian climatologist who heads the panel, Rajendra K. Pachauri, said that science had won out over skepticism.

Mr. Gore, a vociferous opponent of the Bush administration on a range of issues, including the Iraq war, is the second Democratic politician to win the peace prize this decade. Former President Jimmy Carter won in 2002.

Mr. Carter, himself a critic of Mr. Bush, was 78 when he won the prize. But Mr. Gore is just 59 and an active presence in American politics, if only as a large thorn in Mr. Bush’s side — and in the side of Democrats worried that he might challenge them for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination. Mr. Gore, who lost the 2000 election to Mr. Bush, has regularly said that he will not run for president again. But Friday’s announcement touched off renewed interest in his plans.

Tony Fratto, a White House spokesman, did not go overboard in his praise. “Of course we’re happy for Vice President Gore and the I.P.C.C. for receiving this recognition,” he said.

In Oslo, Ole Danbolt Mjoes, chairman of the peace committee, was asked whether the award could be seen as criticism of the Bush administration, which did not subscribe to the Kyoto treaty to cap greenhouse gases. He replied that the Nobel was not meant to be a “kick in the leg to anyone” — the Norwegian expression for “kick in the teeth.”

“We would encourage all countries, including the big countries, and challenge them to think again and to say what they can do to conquer global warming,” Dr. Mjoes said in Oslo.

The four other members of the peace committee generally refuse to comment on the thinking behind the award, which in recent years has moved toward issues at a degree of remove from armed conflict, like social justice, poverty remediation and environmentalism. But in a telephone interview, Berge Furre, one of the four, said, “I hope this will have an effect on the attitudes of Americans as well as people in other countries.”

In its formal citation, the Nobel committee called Mr. Gore “probably the single individual who has done most to create greater worldwide understanding of the measures that need to be adopted.” It praised the United Nations panel, which is made up of 2,000 scientists and is considered the world’s leading authority on climate change, for creating “an ever-broader informed consensus about the connection between human activities and global warming.”

While the world’s major environmental groups all praised Mr. Gore for his role in raising public awareness, they praised the panel for, in the words of Greenpeace International, “meticulous scientific work.”

The two approaches both play a part, scientists said Friday. The Nobel Prize “is honoring the science and the publicity, and they’re necessarily different,” said Spencer R. Weart, a historian at the American Institute of Physics.

Mr. Gore, who announced he would give his portion of the $1.5 million prize money to the nonprofit organization he founded last year, the Alliance for Climate Protection, said he was honored to share the prize with the panel, calling it “the world’s pre-eminent scientific body devoted to improving our understanding of the climate crisis.”

Mr. Pachauri said, “The message that it sends is that the Nobel Prize committee realized the value of knowledge in tackling the problem of climate change.” He said the award was an acknowledgment of the panel’s “impartial and objective assessment of climate change.”

The climate panel, established in 1988, has issued a series of increasingly grim reports in the last two decades assessing issues surrounding climate change. It is expected to issue another report in the next few months, before the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Indonesia on Dec. 3. Some 180 countries are scheduled to begin negotiations there on a successor to the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.

Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, the climate adviser to Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and a leading contributor to the United Nations panel’s reports, said they were the result of “a painstaking process of self-interrogation.”

The committee acts at “about the highest level of complexity you can manage in such a scientific assessment,” Dr. Schellnhuber said in a telephone interview from Milan.

For a scientist, he said, taking part on the climate change panel entails considerable sacrifices. “It drives you absolutely crazy,” Dr. Schellnhuber said. “You fly to distant places; you stay up all night negotiating; you listen to hundreds of sometimes silly interventions. You go through so many mundane things to produce the big picture.”

The Nobel prizes are meant to be apolitical, and are awarded independently of one another. (The peace prize is awarded in Oslo, while the others are awarded by various academies in Sweden.) But a number of recent winners have expressed their opposition to Bush administration policies.

The 2005 literature winner, the British playwright Harold Pinter, turned his Nobel address into a blistering indictment of American foreign policy since the Second World War. A co-winner of the peace prize that year, Mohamed ElBaradei, the director of the International Atomic Energy Agency, made no secret of his opposition to the American invasion of Iraq and has angered the Bush administration by his measured methods for trying to rein in nuclear proliferation, particularly in Iran.

In its citation on Friday, the Norwegian Nobel Committee said the United Nations panel and Mr. Gore had focused “on the processes and decisions that appear to be necessary to protect the world’s future climate, and thereby reduce the future threat to the security of mankind.”

It concluded, “Action is necessary now, before climate change moves beyond man’s control.”

Oct. 11, 2007

UNITED NATIONS (AFP) — The UN Security Council Thursday slammed the military crackdown in Myanmar, as concern mounted over some 1,000 pro-democracy protesters still held by the regime.

After much behind-the-scenes haggling, the 15-member council — in its first joint formal action since last month’s protests — said it deplored the crackdown and urged the release of all political prisoners.

‘The Security Council strongly deplores the use of violence against peaceful demonstrations in Myanmar,’ said the unanimous statement, adding it ‘emphasizes the importance of the early release of all political prisoners and remaining detainees.’

Last month’s deadly crackdown by the junta on protesters led by Buddhist monks left 13 dead and 2,100 under arrest, triggering an international outcry.

Myanmar’s state-run media has said more than half of those arrested during the protests have been released, but there has been little word of at least 950 still in custody.

On Thursday Amnesty International raised the alarm, reporting the junta had arrested a top democracy activist, while a monitoring group in Thailand said one protester died after being tortured during interrogation.

‘Amnesty International is gravely concerned about all those arrested because of the widespread use of torture or other ill-treatment of people in custody,’ Catherine Baber, the rights group’s acting Asia Pacific director, told AFP.

‘The cloak of secrecy on the part of the Myanmar authorities deepens our concerns,’ she said in an e-mail from London.

The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP), made up of former detainees who have fled to Thailand, said Wednesday that one detained dissident had died ‘as a result of torture’ during interrogation.

The UN Security Council statement, which was watered down to win the consent of members Russia and China, urged ‘the government of Myanmar and all other parties concerned to work together towards a de-escalation of the situation and a peaceful solution.’

The statement also called on the junta to ‘create the necessary conditions, for a genuine dialogue’ with opposition icon Aung San Suu Kyi ‘in order to achieve an inclusive national reconciliation with the direct support of the United Nations.’

UN chief Ban Ki-moon is to send his special envoy Ibrahim Gambari back to southeast Asia this weekend for talks on Myanmar with regional partners and to prepare the ground for a return visit to Yangon.

US Ambassador to the UN Zalmay Khalilzad said Thursday’s statement would strengthen Gambari’s hand in his negotiations with the military regime.

And he urged Myanmar’s ruling generals to do what the statement demands, warning: ‘We will not relent, we will persist until the situation is put on a right trajectory.’

In Washington, the White House said the regime’s commitments to work with the United Nations and its special envoy Gambari, ‘must be followed by action.’

Gambari, a seasoned troubleshooter who is the UN pointman in efforts to promote national reconciliation, will first go to Thailand and then head to Malaysia, Indonesia, India, China and Japan, before hoping to return to Myanmar.

Britain’s UN Ambassador John Sawers highlighted the fact that Thursday’s move marked the council’s ‘first ever (formal) statement’ since the Myanmar crisis erupted.

‘It is a very strong and very clear message to the government of Myanmar that the Security Council is united in its opposition to the way in which the (military regime) has pursued its policies at home,’ he said.

It is the latest in a series of moves by the international community aimed at bringing the junta to task, with the United States — Myanmar’s harshest critic — also threatening new sanctions.

An MP-elect from Myanmar’s self-proclaimed government-in-exile said Thursday that world pressure coupled with the threat of sanctions could force the military junta into talks with opposition leaders.

‘Sanctions will send strong messages,’ said Bo Hla-Tint, of the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma, who lives in the United States.

Meanwhile, on the streets of Yangon businesses are struggling to recover after the security crackdown. Armed forces no longer patrol the streets, but a night-time curfew and a general climate of fear were keeping people inside.

‘We are still afraid. We dare not talk about politics or protests or what happened in previous weeks, as we cannot differentiate between ordinary people and the militia groups,’ said a 40-year-old fruit vendor.”

By Clive Thompson
Spet. 25, 2007

“We’re running out of memory.

I don’t mean computer memory. That stuff’s half-price at Costco these days. No, I’m talking about human memory, stored by the gray matter inside our heads. According to recent research, we’re remembering fewer and fewer basic facts these days.

This summer, neuroscientist Ian Robertson polled 3,000 people and found that the younger ones were less able than their elders to recall standard personal info. When Robertson asked his subjects to tell them a relative’s birth date, 87 percent of respondents over age 50 could recite it, while less than 40 percent of those under 30 could do so. And when he asked them their own phone number, fully one-third of the youngsters drew a blank. They had to whip out their handsets to look it up.

That reflexive gesture — reaching into your pocket for the answer — tells the story in a nutshell. Mobile phones can store 500 numbers in their memory, so why would you bother trying to cram the same info into your own memory? Younger Americans today are the first generation to grow up with go-everywhere gadgets and services that exist specifically to remember things so that we don’t have to: BlackBerrys, phones, thumb drives, Gmail.

I’ve long noticed this phenomenon in my own life. I can’t remember a single friend’s email address. Hell, sometimes I have to search my inbox to remember an associate’s last name. Friends of mine space out on lunch dates unless Outlook pings them. And when it comes to cultural trivia — celebrity names, song lyrics — I’ve almost given up making an effort to remember anything, because I can instantly retrieve the information online.

In fact, the line between where my memory leaves off and Google picks up is getting blurrier by the second. Often when I’m talking on the phone, I hit Wikipedia and search engines to explore the subject at hand, harnessing the results to buttress my arguments.

My point is that the cyborg future is here. Almost without noticing it, we’ve outsourced important peripheral brain functions to the silicon around us.

And frankly, I kind of like it. I feel much smarter when I’m using the Internet as a mental plug-in during my daily chitchat. Say you mention the movie Once: I’ve never seen it, but in 10 seconds I’ll have reviewed a summary of the plot, the actors, and its cultural impact. Machine memory even changes the way I communicate, because I continually stud my IMs with links, essentially impregnating my very words with extra intelligence.

You could argue that by offloading data onto silicon, we free our own gray matter for more germanely ‘human’ tasks like brainstorming and daydreaming. What’s more, the perfect recall of silicon memory can be an enormous boon to thinking. For example, I’ve been blogging for four years, which means I’ve poured out about a million words’ worth of my thoughts online. This regularly produces the surreal and delightful experience of Googling a topic only to unearth an old post that I don’t even remember writing. The machine helps me rediscover things I’d forgotten I knew — it’s what author Cory Doctorow refers to as an ‘outboard brain.’

Still, I have nagging worries. Sure, I’m a veritable genius when I’m on the grid, but am I mentally crippled when I’m not? Does an overreliance on machine memory shut down other important ways of understanding the world?

There’s another type of intelligence that comes not from rapid-fire pattern recognition but from slowly ingesting and retaining a lifetime’s worth of facts. You read about the discoveries of Madame Curie and the history of the countries bordering Iraq. You read War and Peace. Then you let it all ferment in the back of your mind for decades, until, bang, it suddenly coalesces into a brilliant insight. (If Afghanistan had stores of uranium, the Russians would’ve discovered nuclear energy before 1917!)

We’ve come to think of human intelligence as being like an Intel processor, able to quickly analyze data and spot patterns. Maybe there’s just as much value in the ability to marinate in the seemingly trivial.

Of course, it’s probably not an either/or proposition. I want both: I want my organic brain to contain vast stores of knowledge and my silicon overmind to contain a stupidly huge amount more.

At the very least, I’d like to be able to remember my own phone number.”

By GAVIN RABINOWITZ
October 10, 2007

NEW DELHI (AP) — Some 30 Tibetan exiles protesting Chinese religious policies stormed the Chinese Embassy in New Delhi on Wednesday, with several breaching the front gate and chaining themselves to the flag pole inside, police and witnesses said.

Others repeatedly sprayed “Free Tibet” in red paint on the embassy walls and the main gate before many of the demonstrators were forcibly taken away by Indian police, according to an Associated Press photographer at the scene.

The activists were protesting a recent Chinese order that Beijing must approve all of Tibet’s spiritual leaders, known as Lamas. For centuries, the search for the reincarnation of lamas — including Tibet’s spiritual head, the Dalai Lama — has been carried out by select Tibetan monks.

“This order is an attempt to undermine the influence of His Holiness the Dalai Lama,” said Dorjee Bhondup, a leader of the Tibetan Youth Congress who was at the protest.

The protest is one of a series in India against what the Tibetan exiles say are China’s continued attempts to subvert Tibetan Buddhist culture and strengthen Beijing’s hold on the Himalayan region.

In August, thousands of Tibetan exiles marched through New Delhi to protest the 2008 Beijing Olympics and Chinese plans to have the Olympic torch run go through Tibet.

India has been a center for the Tibetan exiles since the Dalai Lama fled to there in 1959 after a failed uprising and set up his government in exile in the northern town of Dharmsala.

However, India has tempered its support for the Tibetan cause in recent years as it seeks to improve relations with China. Last year, to avoid embarrassing visiting Chinese President Hu Jintao, India imposed a series of restrictions on Tibetan activists and protesters.

India’s Foreign Ministry had no comment on Wednesday’s incident.

Descending from a bus, the activists ran through the embassy’s main gate that was guarded by private guards only. About six of the protesters scaled an inner wall and entered the main embassy compound where they chained themselves to a flag post and waved the Tibetan flag.

After about 15 minutes Indian police arrived and detained the protesters.

Police spokesman Rajan Bhagat said 22 protesters had been detained but no charges would be filed against them.

Bhagat denied there had been a breach of security. “They were taken away because demonstrations are not allowed in that area,” he said.

Phones at the Chinese Embassy rang unanswered.

The demonstrators were protesting the new order, which came into force in September and states that all future incarnations of living Buddhas related to Tibetan Buddhism must get Chinese government approval.

China’s officially atheistic communist government has increasingly sought to direct Tibetan Buddhism, for centuries the basis of Tibet’s civil, religious, cultural and political life.

Reincarnated lamas often lead religious communities and oversee the training of monks, giving them enormous influence over religious life in Tibet.

China already insists that only the government can approve the appointments of the best-known reincarnates, including the Dalai and Panchen Lamas, the No. 1 and No. 2 figures in Tibetan Buddhism.

In 1995, the Dalai Lama chose 6-year-old Gendun Choekyi Nyima as the 11th Panchen Lama, the most exalted figure of Tibetan Buddhism after the Dalai Lama. The boy and his family disappeared soon after and have not been heard from since.

China’s communist-led government later named Gyaltsen Norbu as the 11th Panchen Lama and said Nyima and his family were being kept in a secret location for their protection.

“On behalf of every Tibetan we call on the Chinese government to withdraw this order,” Bhondup said.

To prepare students “to harness the potential of modern computing systems,” the companies will provide universities with hardware, software, and services to advance training in large-scale distributed computing.

By Thomas Claburn
InformationWeek
October 8, 2007 03:28 PM

Google(GOOG) and IBM(IBM) on Monday announced an initiative to advance large-scale distributed computing by providing hardware, software, and services to universities.

The two companies aim to reduce the cost of distributed computing research, thereby enabling academic institutions and their students to more easily contribute to this emerging computing paradigm.

“Google is excited to partner with IBM to provide resources which will better equip students and researchers to address today’s developing computational challenges,” said Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, in a statement. “In order to most effectively serve the long-term interests of our users, it is imperative that students are adequately equipped to harness the potential of modern computing systems and for researchers to be able to innovate ways to address emerging problems.”

The first university to join the initiative is the University of Washington, located not far from Microsoft(MSFT)’s corporate headquarters in Redmond, Wash. Carnegie-Mellon University, MIT, Stanford University, the University of California at Berkeley, and the University of Maryland are also participating in the program.

“The reason that we’re partnering with universities is that Google is an engineering firm,” said Christophe Bisciglia, a senior engineer at Google and a former University of Washington student. “We’re working with our academic partners to teach [large-scale distributed computing] to students.”

The fundamental architecture of computing is changing, Bisciglia said. Moore’s Law still applies, he said, but now more performance gains come from processor density than transistor density. “You need to design your software to that it scales horizontally,” he said, referring to the challenges of programming for many multicore processors working in parallel.

“In this age of ‘Internet-scale’ computing, the new, evolving problems faced by computer science students and researchers require a new, evolving set of skills,” Bisciglia explained in a post to Google’s corporate blog on Monday. “It’s no longer enough to program one machine well; to tackle tomorrow’s challenges, students need to be able to program thousands of machines to manage massive amounts of data in the blink of an eye.”

“This is really going to benefit every entity that goes on to take these students,” said Bisciglia. “They’re all going to benefit from this change. They’re all going to need it sooner or later.”

Large-scale distributed computing, also known as cloud computing, has been touted as the future for years now. In a July 2003 paper, Microsoft researcher Jim Gray — who was reported missing at sea earlier this year — noted that IBM and Microsoft were pushing Internet-scale distributed computing as a new model.

Sun Microsystems(SUNW) has also long been an advocate of what it calls grid computing.

In a statement, Samuel J. Palmisano, chairman, president, and CEO of IBM, characterized the effort “to train tomorrow’s programmers to write software that can support a tidal wave of global Web growth and trillions of secure transactions every day.”

Whether IBM and Sun will develop an ad-based revenue stream to support large-scale distributed computing remains to be seen. Unlike Microsoft, neither company has hedged its business model by investing in Internet advertising technology.

As part of the initiative, Google and IBM are providing a cluster of several hundred computers — Google’s custom servers and IBM BladeCenter and System x servers. Over time, the companies expect the cluster to surpass 1,600 processors. The Linux-based servers will run open source software including Xen’s virtualization system and Hadoop, an open source implementation of Google’s distributed file system that’s managed by the Apache Software Foundation.

Although Hadoop was developed by Yahoo(YHOO)’s Doug Cutting and can be seen as enabling Google’s competitors, Google says it supports the effort. “We’re made very small contributions to Hadoop for this project and we obviously very strongly support the project,” said Bisciglia.

IBM’s Tivoli software will handle cluster management, monitoring, and resource provisioning.

Students working with the cluster will have access to a Creative Commons-licensed curriculum for massively parallel computing developed by Google and the University of Washington.

· Scientist has made synthetic chromosome
· Breakthrough could combat global warming

* Ed Pilkington in New York
* The Guardian
* Saturday October 6 2007

Craig Venter, the controversial DNA researcher involved in the race to decipher the human genetic code, has built a synthetic chromosome out of laboratory chemicals and is poised to announce the creation of the first new artificial life form on Earth.

The announcement, which is expected within weeks and could come as early as Monday at the annual meeting of his scientific institute in San Diego, California, will herald a giant leap forward in the development of designer genomes. It is certain to provoke heated debate about the ethics of creating new species and could unlock the door to new energy sources and techniques to combat global warming.

Mr Venter told the Guardian he thought this landmark would be “a very important philosophical step in the history of our species. We are going from reading our genetic code to the ability to write it. That gives us the hypothetical ability to do things never contemplated before”.

The Guardian can reveal that a team of 20 top scientists assembled by Mr Venter, led by the Nobel laureate Hamilton Smith, has already constructed a synthetic chromosome, a feat of virtuoso bio-engineering never previously achieved. Using lab-made chemicals, they have painstakingly stitched together a chromosome that is 381 genes long and contains 580,000 base pairs of genetic code.

The DNA sequence is based on the bacterium Mycoplasma genitalium which the team pared down to the bare essentials needed to support life, removing a fifth of its genetic make-up. The wholly synthetically reconstructed chromosome, which the team have christened Mycoplasma laboratorium, has been watermarked with inks for easy recognition.

It is then transplanted into a living bacterial cell and in the final stage of the process it is expected to take control of the cell and in effect become a new life form. The team of scientists has already successfully transplanted the genome of one type of bacterium into the cell of another, effectively changing the cell’s species. Mr Venter said he was “100% confident” the same technique would work for the artificially created chromosome.

The new life form will depend for its ability to replicate itself and metabolise on the molecular machinery of the cell into which it has been injected, and in that sense it will not be a wholly synthetic life form. However, its DNA will be artificial, and it is the DNA that controls the cell and is credited with being the building block of life.

Mr Venter said he had carried out an ethical review before completing the experiment. “We feel that this is good science,” he said. He has further heightened the controversy surrounding his potential breakthrough by applying for a patent for the synthetic bacterium.

Pat Mooney, director of a Canadian bioethics organisation, ETC group, said the move was an enormous challenge to society to debate the risks involved. “Governments, and society in general, is way behind the ball. This is a wake-up call – what does it mean to create new life forms in a test-tube?”

He said Mr Venter was creating a “chassis on which you could build almost anything. It could be a contribution to humanity such as new drugs or a huge threat to humanity such as bio-weapons”.

Mr Venter believes designer genomes have enormous positive potential if properly regulated. In the long-term, he hopes they could lead to alternative energy sources previously unthinkable. Bacteria could be created, he speculates, that could help mop up excessive carbon dioxide, thus contributing to the solution to global warming, or produce fuels such as butane or propane made entirely from sugar.

“We are not afraid to take on things that are important just because they stimulate thinking,” he said. “We are dealing in big ideas. We are trying to create a new value system for life. When dealing at this scale, you can’t expect everybody to be happy.”

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