Far Worse than Carbon Dioxide...

At a news conference in Washington today, President Obama announced that he is directing the Environmental Protection Agency to act immediately to enforce a new set of regulations to limit emissions of dihydrogen oxide gas, or water vapor, one of the primary causes of catastrophic anthropogenic climate change.

“The world faces a crisis,” the president intoned, “and America must lead. We have taken the first step by limiting carbon emissions, but that cannot be effective unless we deal with the larger menace posed by dihydrogen oxide pollution as well. Since Congress has failed in its duty to pass the required laws, I, as president, am directing the EPA to move unilaterally to issue and enforce appropriate regulations.”

The importance of dealing quickly with the dihydrogen oxide crisis was dramatically made clear by EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, who showed charts comparing current atmospheric CO2 levels, at 400 parts per million, with those of water vapor, which are now greater than 10,000 parts per million. “And not only do dihydrogen oxide levels exceed CO2 more than twenty times over,” Ms. McCarthy said, “but each molecule of DHO has greater greenhousing effect. So we need to get control of this without delay.”

That dihydrogen oxide is nasty stuff!

Read the whole thing...

A Novel Concept...

Acxiom is one of the largest companies that specialize in collecting data about Internet users.  Their main customers are marketeers looking for new prospective buyers of their products.  The data they have comes from many sources, including cookies, web site tracking technologies, and partnerships with web stores that share purchase and browsing information.

None of that is new.  What is new, though, is that Acxiom is making your data available to you.  Once they confirm your identity, you can view what they know about you – and if you find errors, you can even correct it.  You can also opt out, meaning that Acxiom will stop selling your data to marketeers.  That is a novel concept: openness.

You can do this yourself by visiting About The Data.  Scroll to the bottom and click the orange button to start the process.  It took me about five minutes (and three tries!) to successfully identify myself – but once I did that, the rest was easy.

They've broken down the information they hold on you into several categories.  It was fascinating to look at.  In my case, at least, I was surprised by how much they didn't know, or had wrong.  They have my name, address, and email all perfectly.  They didn't have any of my phone numbers, their income and economic data was wildly off, and the shopping information they have is heavily skewed to Debbie's purchases.  Since she does much more shopping off Amazon than I do, I suspect this means Amazon doesn't report our purchases – thank you, Amazon.  After absorbing my profile there, I realized that I kind of like what they're presenting to marketeers – it's so far off that it will keep the predators at bay :)

Sixty Eight Years Ago...

The surrender of Japan to the Allied Forces in World War II, ending the war that killed many millions of soldiers and citizens.  U.S. Admiral Nimitz is shown signing the surrender document, on September 2, 1945.  Folks in my parents' generation all know exactly what they were doing when they first heard the news of Japan's surrender.

I've read hundreds of books about World War II and its participants, from both an Allied perspective and an Axis perspective, giving me a context that most people don't have.  Despite that, I still am amazed that such a thing could happen just a few years before I was born.

And I fear it could happen again...

That's One Way to Do It!

Your tractor-trailer truck is involved in a traffic accident and catches fire.  How do you put it out?  You get some help:

Links of the Day...

New password cracking software can test 8 million passwords per second...

Here's a service whose inflation-adjusted price appears to be constant over millennia...

New interferometric radio telescope delivers high resolution (< 0.1 arcsecond) images...

A very strange insect cocoon (at right):

The NSA prefers hacking network routers and switches.  Me, too...

The West's Libyan intervention was a disaster.  Foreshadowing for Obama's Syrian intervention?

DNC Chairman claims there are “dozens” of allies that will join our intervention in Syria – but then says she can't name them.  The Obama gang sure look lame when you compare this with Bush's stunning success corralling a coalition to invade Iraq...

Wacko Birds vs. Angry Birds: Matt Welch weighs in on the Syria intervention.  I sure wish Matt would run for national office...

Are you pregnant?  Here's an easy way to earn some pocket change.  One hardly knows what to say...

An English professor – progressive, of course – denies that Stalin ever killed any Soviet citizens.  I used to think this sort of thing was really dangerous, but then I discovered that many college-educated young people have no idea who Stalin was, when he lived, or what he did.  That's an even bigger problem!

An oasis in a volcano, in the middle of a desert, in the middle of nowhere (at right).  Known locally as the “Oasis of Mosquitoes”!

I knew they were skimping on the fuel!  Things airline pilots don't want you to know...

Don't mess with Mother Nature!  She's got a bite to match her bark...

Celebrities patent the darnest things...