Seemed a lot funnier when I started
-Headline of the day-
"German schoolboy, 13, corrects NASA's asteroid figures."
Nico Marquardt figured out that NASA's figures for a near-miss asteroid were wildly off the mark. Where NASA estimated that there's only a 1 in 450,000 chance that the Apophis asteroid will strike the Earth in 2036, Marquardt whittled those odds way down to 1 in 450.
Thanks kid.
According to the report, "The schoolboy took into consideration the risk of Apophis running into one or more of the 40,000 satellites orbiting Earth during its path close to the planet on April 13 2029." If it does strike a satellite, it'll change its trajectory and may get us the next trip round the sun.
Upon hitting the Earth, "it will create a ball of iron and iridium 320 metres (1049 feet) wide and weighing 200 billion tonnes" and "The shockwaves from that would create huge tsunami waves, destroying both coastlines and inland areas, whilst creating a thick cloud of dust that would darken the skies indefinitely."
Wait a second, that's not funny...
Never mind that -- NASA, with their big gazillion dollar supercomputers got shown up by a 13 year-old with a calculator. Let's all laugh at them!
*gulp* (AFP)
-If you're going to be so touchy about it, stop doing it-
China's turn in the Olympics-focused world stage keeps turning south for them. Their latest problem is CNN and their head grump Jack Cafferty. Comments by Cafferty have the Chinese govt. pretty thoroughly enraged.
"We are shocked and strongly condemn the vicious remarks by Cafferty," ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said. "We solemnly request CNN and Cafferty himself take back the malicious remarks and apologize to the Chinese people." The words "ignorance," "hostility," and "evil" came up as well.
So what did Jack say that was so egregious? "We continue to import their junk with the lead paint on them and the poisoned pet food and export, you know, jobs to places where you can pay workers a dollar a month to turn out the stuff that we're buying from Wal-Mart."
"So I think our relationship with China has certainly changed," he went on. "I think they're basically the same bunch of goons and thugs they've been for the last 50 years"
I'm still trying to find the part of what Cafferty said that wasn't true. So far, I've come up empty. Meanwhile, CNN turned all punk-assed and apologized. Next, they'll be apologizing to Sudan after criticizing the genocide in Darfur.
Truth-telling in the media, folks. It's a dead art. (AP)
-History won't judge Bush...-
...a design firm will.
The George W. Bush Presidential Library will not be put together by historians, but by the design firm PDR Group. According to the report, "Some who’ve studied presidential centers say the lack of independent voices in the design-exhibit process risks turning the library into little more than a promotional venue."
Risks it? Dude, it's meant to. You can't leave this stuff up to historians, especially not for this president. A recent study showed that 98% of historians consider Bush's presidency to be a failure and a majority -- 61% -- think he'll be judged as the worst president in history.
Presidential libraries are three things at once; a repository for historical documents related to the president's term, a museum about that term, and a gift shop where you can buy White House snowglobes. You think Bush is going to let the museum become an exhibit dedicated to just how hard he sucked?
Yeah, dream on. (Think Progress)
