[NPR] Fantasy author Sir Terry Pratchett was prolific: He wrote more than 70 books, dozens of them about the Discworld -- a flat planet borne through space by four elephants on the back of a giant turtle. Pratchett died Thursday at age 66. He had been suffering from early-onset Alzheimer's disease.
#1
Very sad and he'll be missed. The Samual Vimes books of the discworld series were my favorite by him. I have the vast majority of them in paperback and on audible.
#2
Pratchet was a huge influence on me. I'll sorely miss his writing, though I understand he's already picked an author or two to continue his Discworld Universe.
Posted by: Charles ||
03/13/2015 9:26 Comments ||
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#3
he's already picked an author or two to continue his Discworld Universe
#2
Studies expand to match the 'generosity' of thieves pols with taxpayers money. How about a requirement that at least 45 Congresscritters sign off requesting any study funded by the government. Think of all the ammunition that would give opponents in the next election for boondoggles and waste. Suddenly, accountability would happen.
Debris scattered over a large area at the bottom of sea in the Philippines indicate that the massive Japanese World War II battleship Musashi had blown up in an undersea explosion after it sank beneath the surface 70 years ago.
Experts from a research team analyzing a live feed from an unmanned submersible Friday said they believe the Musashi suffered at least one explosion while sinking to the 1,000-meter (3,280-foot) deep seafloor, which wasn't known previously. The 2 ½-hour feed provided the first detailed images of the ship, which sank in October 1944.
The research team, sponsored by Microsoft co-founder and entrepreneur Paul Allen, first found the remains of the ship in early March after searching for it for eight years.
The Musashi, one of Japan's biggest and most famous battleships, sank in the Sibuyan Sea in the central Philippines during the Battle of Leyte Gulf, losing half of its 2,400 crew. It was last seen disappearing into the water in one piece after being struck by torpedoes, but what happened subsequently was never known.
"The wreck is actually very damaged," said David Mearns, a marine scientist on the team. "It appears she suffered at least one, if not two, magazine explosions which would have sheered off the bow and the stern, and its entire middle section of its super-structure."
The footage showed fish and other marine creatures occasionally swimming by the rusted debris scattered over a wide area, some chunks covered by coral.
There were holes in the bow area, apparently made by U.S. torpedoes, and the ship's stern is upside down. A propeller is torn off from a shaft and gun turrets and catapults are broken off.
The feed also showed a round teak base on the bow that held the Imperial chrysanthemum seal that only a few battleships were allowed to carry -- a key finding that convinced Japanese experts and some survivors that this was indeed the remains of the Musashi.
Historian Kazushige Todaka, head of the Yamato Museum and an expert on warships, told The Associated Press on Wednesday that he was "100 percent positive" the ship is the Musashi.
He said the upright bow section and the upside-down stern mean the ship had an explosion.
"It shows there was a tremendous impact that tore the ship apart," he said.
Closer examination of the video would help explain what happened to the ship as it sank to the sea bottom, he said. He also hoped this would lead to discovery of other sunken warships that are unaccounted for.
Shigeru Nakajima, a 94-year-old former electrical technician on the Musashi, one of only a few hundred aboard who made it safely back to Japan, told the AP he was deeply moved by the footage he saw Friday at a community center near his home in Kashiwa, near Tokyo.
"The captain and those who went down (with the Musashi) must be delighted in heaven by the news of the discovery," he said.
The team says it is collaborating with the governments of Japan and the Philippines over the wreckage. Experts here say it would be difficult to pull up the ship, though technically it may be possible. Some people consider the wreckage as a place where the spirits of the victims rest and should be left at peace.
The timing of the discovery, coming shortly before the 70th anniversary of the war's end, is particularly significant, said Todaka, "as if telling us not to forget the tragedy of the war."
#2
...Japanese BBs had a habit of suffering catastrophic mag detonation under stress, and at least one (HIJMS Mutsu) was sitting quietly in port, minding her own business, when one of her mags let go.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
03/13/2015 18:41 Comments ||
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[Accuracy in Media] Whatever one thinks of President Barack Obama's overtures to Cuba and the accompanying prisoner exchange, an important consideration in need of immediate attention is an accounting of our servicemen captured in the Vietnam War and imprisoned in Cuban-operated POW camps. Of utmost importance is an accounting of the 17 American airmen captured in North Vietnam and then taken to Cuba for medical experiments in torture techniques.
Most Americans are unaware that Cuba was deeply involved in the Vietnam War. In fact they had an engineering battalion called the "GirĂłn Brigade," that was maintaining Route Nine, a major enemy supply line into South Vietnam. Their facilities included a POW camp and field hospital very near the DMZ, just inside North Vietnam. Meanwhile Cuban interrogators worked in Hanoi at a prison known as the Zoo. We know of these operations and some of what happened to our servicemen after so managed to survive and be repatriated in the winter of 1973, during Operation Homecoming.
[Hurriyet Daily News] Russian President Vladimir Putin ...Second and fourth President and sixth of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from polonium poisoning. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead... has announced that he will attend the ceremony in Yerevan to commemorate the 1915 events.
According to a statement issued by the Russian Presidency, Putin told his Armenian counterpart Serzh Sarkisian by telephone on March 12 that he would join the commemoration ceremony scheduled for April 24 in Yerevan.
Armenia says up to 1.5 million Ottoman Armenians were killed in a genocide starting from 1915. The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... denies that the deaths amounted to genocide, saying the corpse count of Armenians killed during mass deportations has been inflated and that those killed in 1915 and 1916 were victims of general unrest during World War I.
Russia is among around 20 nations that recognise the killings as genocide.
News of Putin's call to Sarkisian comes as speculation that he is ill swirls online following his cancelation of a number of meetings.
Speaking to AFP, Putin's front man Dmitry Peskov dismissed the claims, ascribing media reports of the leader's ill-health to "March madness."
Armenia is Russia's most loyal ally in the Caucasus, but ties have been strained since January when a Russian serviceman killed a family of seven in Armenia, sparking mass protests.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/13/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
In Erdogan's place I'd start worrying---the third Rome been dreaming of liberating the second for a few hundred years
#7
Moscow is denying rumors that the repor Missing Putin is a covert New Baby Daddy vee his Muslim GF.
* OTOH TOPIX > [Bloomberg] PUTIN ALLY SEES "BLOODY, SHORT" RUSSIA WIN [Limited War = Russian victory] IFF US ARMS KIEV.
By extension, ARTIC = WILL IRAN DEFEAT OBAMA? = USA IN THE ME, CHINA TO DEFEAT OBAMA? = USA IN EAST ASIA + WESTPAC LIMITED WAR???
I say WESTPAC because of ...
* WORLD MILITARY FORUM > "AMERICAN THINKER" MAGAZINE: TO WIN AGZ US AND JAPAN, CHINA + PLA MUST SIMULTANEOUSLY SEIZE DISPUTED ISLANDS + OTHERS IN BOTH EAST CHINA SEA + SOUTH CHINA SEA, INCLUDING TO STRIKE AT YAEYAMA ISLANDS SOUTH OF OKINAWA, GUAM BASE, + NEW US NAVAL BASE IN PALAWAN, PHILIPPINES. MILITARY COUNTER-ATTACK AGZ BOTH US AND JAPAN. CHINA CANNOT BE A SUPERPOWER UNLESS IT CAN UNILATERALLY CHALLENGE OR DEFEAT THE USA.
[RT] Iceland has dropped its bid to join the European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... , the Foreign Ministry in Reykjavik says. The announcement follows pledges made by the country's euro-skeptic government since winning the 2013 election.
Gunnar Bragi Sveinsson, the Icelandic foreign minister, said in a statement that he had informed Latvia, the current EU president, and the European Commission that his center-right government had decided to withdraw its application, which was submitted six years ago.
"The EU and Iceland have discussed the country's position on the status of its bid to join the European Union," the statement reads. "The government does not intend to resume preparing for EU membership."
Prime Minister Sigmundur Davið Gunnlaugsson talked of formally withdrawing the bid in January.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/13/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
Pity. The EU and Bjork were made for each other.
#4
The ppl of Iceland don't believe in the intermingling of cultures lkke the rest of Europe. Posted by chris
Indeed they do. Used to be a rather larger U.S. Air Base there. It's gone now, turned into apartments and commons. Bet you can't imagine who might have been permanently restricted to base while it was operational.
#9
As per #2, I hope they remember that when the future Iranian, Turkish, andor Pakistani "blue water" Navies [Other?]come a'visitin on maritime jihad.
[FOXNEWS] When liberal investor George Soros gave $1.8 million to National Public Radio , it became part of the firestorm of controversy that jeopardized NPR's federal funding. But that gift only hints at the widespread influence the controversial billionaire has on the mainstream media. Soros, who spent $27 million trying to defeat President Bush in 2004, has ties to more than 30 mainstream news outlets -- including The New York Times ...which still proudly displays Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize... , Washington Post, the News Agency that Dare Not be Named, NBC and ABC.
Prominent journalists like ABC's Ace newshound Christiane Amanpour and former Washington Post editor and now Vice President Len Downie serve on boards of operations that take Soros cash. This despite the Society of Professional Journalists' ethical code stating: "avoid all conflicts real or perceived."
This information is part of an upcoming report by the Media Research Centers Business & Media Institute which has been looking into George Soros and his influence on the media.
The investigative reporting start-up ProPublica is a prime example. ProPublica, which recently won its second Pulitzer Prize, initially was given millions of dollars from the Sandler Foundation to "strengthen the progressive infrastructure" -- "progressive" being the code word for very liberal. In 2010, it also received a two-year contribution of $125,000 each year from the Open Society Foundations. In case you wonder where that money comes from, the OSF website is www.soros.org. It is a network of more than 30 international foundations, mostly funded by Soros, who has contributed more than $8 billion to those efforts.
The ProPublica stories are thoroughly researched by top-notch staffers who used to work at some of the biggest news outlets in the nation. But the topics are almost laughably left-wing. The site's proud list of "Our Investigations" includes attacks on oil companies, gas companies, the health care industry, for-profit schools and more. More than 100 stories on the latest lefty cause: opposition to drilling for natural gas by hydraulic fracking. Another 100 on the evils of the foreclosure industry.
Throw in a couple investigations making the military look bad and another about prisoners at Guantanamo Bay and you have almost the perfect journalism fantasy -- a huge budget, lots of major media partners and a liberal agenda unconstrained by advertising.
One more thing: a 14-person Journalism Advisory Board, stacked with CNN's David Gergen and representatives from top newspapers, a former publisher of The Wall Street Journal and the editor-in-chief of Simon & Schuster. Several are working journalists, including:
• Jill Abramson, a managing editor of The New York Times;
• Kerry Smith, the senior vice president for editorial quality of ABC News;
• Cynthia A. Tucker, the editor of the editorial page of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
ProPublica is far from the only Soros-funded organization that is stacked with members of the supposedly neutral press.
The Center for Public Integrity is another great example. Its board of directors is filled with working journalists like Amanpour from ABC, right along side blatant liberal media types like Arianna Huffington, of the Huffington Post and now AOL.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/13/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
Think to yourself...
What does a man who thinks he is god do to the world when he has the money?
Well, you see it right here, UK, Israel, multiple African Nations, and the media.
He was taught his role. He sold Jews household goods and furniture to people once they were on the train.
Lots of money since them because he bankrupts Countries now and spends the proceeds of his youth making everyone succumb to his marxist view of his godliness.
One thing to be said for soros is, he makes every nasty bond villain look like a piece of scat in the Nation he F***ed.
This guy should have his own reality show - sucking satan.
But for me, seeing how the whoreOcrat party acts around his money, he is the real deal.
Pimp extrordinaire.
He turned this world with his cash HE STOLE FROM JEWS GOING INTO THE GAS CHAMBER.
Now, I will say this once more. There are warrants for him in some Countries.
Not that that means anything here.
But if you really want to know who put US on the waterslide to hell, he carried you up the steps.
#7
Soros buying the left-wingnut media? That shouldn't be hard since ideologically the MSM are in bed with him. A little money just sweetens things for them.
[DAWN] A free for all erupted on sessions court premises here on Wednesday involving lawyers, litigants and police after a man reportedly slapped a lawyer in front of a courtroom.
Following the incident, the lawyers went on a strike and boycotted the courts.
The ugly incident happened following hearing of a case registered against a lawyer, Aftab Sohal, for allegedly blocking public path. The complainant, a resident of the same village where Mr Sohal lived, got started the paperwork but haven't done much else against him with Jalalpur Jattan Sadar cop shoppe.
The litigant slapped the lawyer when they came out of the court of Additional Session Judge Zafar Iqbal Tarar. This infuriated other lawyers present there who scuffled with the litigants and some coppers doing their duty.
The lawyers alleged that ASI Asghar Shah, the investigation officer of the case, instigated the litigants to attack them.
Soon after the incident, District Police Officer Rai Ijaz Ahmed reached there and held negotiations with the representatives of the District Bar Association, assuring them of action against the police officials if they were found guilty.
Later, Civil Lines police started the paperwork but haven't done much else against a litigant and four police officials on the report of Aftab Sohal under sections 506/2 and 109 of the PPC.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/13/2015 00:00 ||
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[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Jupiter's largest moon, Ganymede, definitely has an underground ocean, researchers said Thursday after confirming the moon's long-suspected subsurface saltwater body with the help of auroras glimpsed by the Hubble Space Telescope.
The ocean is believed to hold more water than is found on Earth's surface, which broadens the hunt for places in the solar system where life might be able to exist, the US space agency said.
Ganymede, the largest moon in the entire solar system, is larger than the planet Mercury.
The Galileo spacecraft, which arrived at Jupiter in 1995, has already detected a possible magnetic field on Ganymede.
The Hubble Space Telescope has now confirmed that discovery, by establishing the existence of an ocean of water under its crust by observing changes in the aurorae around the celestial body.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/13/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
The bad news; water levels appear to be rising.
[NEWINDIANEXPRESS] ERODE:A private hospital here conducted a rare artificial skull implant surgery on a five year old girl.
According to the KMCH Hospital neurosurgeon Dr M Prabhu, Thayasri, daughter of Sakthi Prakash (27) of Kalingarayanpalayam, near Bavani, met with an accident on Nov 2, 2014 while traveling on a cycle of violence with Balasubramaniam, a relative.
When a van hit the cycle of violence, Thayasri suffered serious head injury with skull bone fracture. Normally, a part of the skull would be removed to avoid infection from spreading to the brain and to allow space for the injured brain to heal.
As she was a child and the fractured skull was disfigured, both she and her parents had to be handled carefully. Hence there was a compelling need to consider not only corrective surgery but also cosmetic and protective aspects, said the neurosurgeon.
The specialist decided on a special type of skull bone implant called PEEK (Polyether Ether Ketone).
PEEK has several advantages. It is durable, has shape memory properties (where the material given shape under specific conditions will retain it even if were subjected to stress) and is aesthetically pleasing.
Traditional methods for reconstructing the skull anatomy involved bone grafts or other implants like metal or titanium. But the disadvantages were inaccurate fits, increased surgical time and infection risks.
Cranial implants made of PEEK (which only recently made its way into orthopaedic surgery) are stronger, lighter and bio-compatible, making it an alternative to titanium.
With precise customization and better fit these implants required less time in surgery and provided greater comfort to the patient.
Thayasri's head was scanned to measure the contour of the broken skull accurately and the details were sent to Switzerland ...home of the Helvetians, famous for cheese, watches, yodeling, and William Tell... for fabrication of the implant.
Once the implant arrived, the girl was operated on for inserting it in place. The implant has provided the required geometry and precision to obtain appropriate skull and facial reconstruction.
She has recovered well and is back to school with a renewed life, the neurosurgeon added.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/13/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
PEEK may be lighter and definitely cooler in the summer, but for your generic 5 year old, I'd go with the titanium skull for impact resistance. Titanium is also compatible with adult-onset super powers and often provides AM clear channel reception late at night.
[Rooters] General Vincent Brooks, commander of the U.S. Army in the Pacific, told Reuters the planes had conducted "provocative" flights, including around the U.S. Pacific Ocean territory of Guam, home to a major American air base.
It is the first time that U.S. officials have confirmed the role of Cam Ranh Bay, a natural deep-water harbor, in Russian bomber plane activity that has increased globally.
Check out the guy's Twitter pic. Looks like Malcolm X has a replacement.
A man identifying himself as John C. Muhammad, the City Manager of Uplands Park, MO, said that the shooting of two police officers in Ferguson was "a complete setup" carried out by the police on Thursday's "Hannity" on the Fox News Channel.
"I think it was a complete setup. I think it was a setup between members of the police fraternities, what I like to call it. I think they operate just like the KKK. I think they did it to make themselves think they're the victim, when honestly the victim are black people. I think it's just a publicity stunt. No more than that" he stated. Although, he later clarified that this was solely his position, and not necessarily that of his constituents.
The man was identified on the air as "John Muhammad...a City Manager in a nearby town." A LinkedIn page and what appears to be the city's website identify John C. Muhammad as City Manager of Uplands Park, MO, and a Twitter page with the same name has a tweet saying he is planning to go to Ferguson to protest
He added, "we have to keep pushing this issue forward, because this is a major problem that black men, black women are being shot down and killed by white police officers, sometimes blackm because the problem is not always these white people. Well, it is, but it's not." He further stated the police "don't serve and protect me" and said that cops only protect white people.
[RT] The two cops shot in Ferguson, Missouri on Thursday morning were the victim of an "ambush," the St. Louis County police chief said, but added that the officers will suffer no long-term injuries.
Chief Jon Belmar provided an update on the situation in Ferguson during a 9 am CDT presser early Thursday, held just a few hours after two officers were shot near the city's cop shoppe.
"This is really an ambush," Belmar said.
"Fortunately, with both officers, we don't have any remarkable long-term injuries," the police chief said.
Belmar told news hounds that a demonstration outside of the Ferguson Police Department building on Wednesday evening had turned "pretty rowdy" before two "defenseless" cops were shot.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/13/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
Local thugs most likely. Professionals would not left have left expended brass lying about.
#5
Professionals did do it. They flew in from NYC and Washington, stirred things up, never left any brass and in fact, never got their hands dirty.Posted by JohnQC
John C. Muhammad is a Nation of Islam, Leukophobic, Marxist Muslim psycho...He is also the end result of 50 years of State-promulgated Black LibTardation Theology indoctrination within America's vast Urban Jungles:
HE is a black racist half-wit with a lucrative Gubbmint job!
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
...Second and fourth President and sixth of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from polonium poisoning. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead...
[FOXNEWS] When liberal investor George Soros gave $1.8 million to National Public Radio , it became part of the firestorm of controversy that jeopardized NPR's federal funding. But that gift only hints at the widespread influence the controversial billionaire has on the mainstream media. Soros, who spent $27 million trying to defeat President Bush in 2004, has ties to more than 30 mainstream news outlets -- including The 
[DAWN] A free for all erupted on sessions court premises here on Wednesday involving lawyers, litigants and police after a man reportedly slapped a lawyer in front of a courtroom.
[Rooters] General Vincent Brooks, commander of the U.S. Army in the Pacific, told Reuters the planes had conducted "provocative" flights, including around the U.S. Pacific Ocean territory of Guam, home to a major American air base.
