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POPSWhy America Will Survive George W. Bush Otto von Bismarck saw how American blunders led to American power and allegedly said that God has a special providence for drunks, fools, and the United States of America. Walter Russell Mead (of the Council on Foreign Relations) puts Bush's 8-year stint in the White House into proper perspective. America's foreign policy has been short-sighted and often self-defeating from the get-go, alternately collaborative, passive, and interventionist. And, yet, miraculously, we always come out ahead. With the unstoppable rise of a global capitalist economy, Mead makes the case that America, for all its past and current faults, will continue to be the inevitable leader of this new international buoyancy. Not even our latest mistakes (unprecedented though they may be) can derail such a powerful incentive that is the modern American world trade system. Which means, more than ever, we're literally all in this together.
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POPSClip Title Deleted It's for "National Security." :) Screw our own rights and liberties and security and privacy, as long as the tyrannical, paranoid, fear-driven Empire is happy. Right? America's behaviour is alarming, annoying, paranoid and ridiculous, to say the least, and very unbecoming of a so-called "free and brave" nation. "It's one thing to say it's reasonable for government agents to open your luggage. It's another thing to say it's reasonable for them to read your mind and everything you have thought over the last year. What a laptop records is as personal as a diary, but much more extensive. It records every Web site you have searched. Every e-mail you have sent. It's as if you're crossing the border with your home in your suitcase." ----- One law firm has instructed its lawyers to travel to the United States with "blank laptops" whose hard drives contain no data ----- Lawyers cannot fully advise people how they may exercise their rights during a border search.
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POPSeClips! Compared to this, I feel like Uriah Heep: "Ever so 'umble".
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POPSWant to see Obama's birth certificate? And look here: http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/born_in_the_usa.html for FactCheck.org's thorough rebuttal of the "it's a phony copy" issue. They have hand-held the original, and confirmed its validity with the State of Hawaii. Two more articles are cited in the clip. The radical right's refusal to admit the obvious here is becoming more and more like simple disloyalty.
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POPSBush: 'God told me'. ...BBC TV program Where's his god now? What a nut. Don't they lock up religious freaks like this in America? Surely a snake-oil salesmen have more credibility now. When will they ever learn? I'm embarrassed every time I hear him speak. What must it be like to have been a one time Bush-lover? God! More from the BBC program... Bush is quoted as telling the two, "I feel God's words coming to me: 'Go get the Palestinians their state and get the Israelis their security, and get peace in the Middle East.' And by God, I'm gonna do it." Mr Abbas remembers how the US President told him he had a "moral and religious obligation" to act. ...BBC
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POPSArt of the DEAD: Ancient Irish High Cross Art
"About 200 of them survive, in varying condition, many of them decorated with scriptural scenes. This iconography, some of it simple, some of it ingeniously complex, has been meticulously explored by archaeologist/art historian Dr Peter Harbison in his definitive three volume study, The High Crosses of Ireland (Bonn, 1992). It is a major work which is yet to be published in Ireland. In it Harbison has identified ancient Christian Rome from AD 400 onwards as the most likely inspiration for the Irish crosses, "but the figure sculpture may have come to our shores largely through the filter of the empire of Charlemagne and his sons in central Europe". The compositions for the biblical panels on the Irish crosses are often similar to those found on frescoes in continental churches. " During the past 20 years or so, several of the high crosses have been moved indoors in an attempt to prevent further erosion. One of the first to be relocated was the cross at the Rock of Cashel which was re
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POPSA Giant Solar Tower Could Power the Future On a sunny day, the air at the top of the tower would be 70 degrees Fahrenheit (20 degrees Celsius), whereas the air in the greenhouse could reach 160 degrees Fahrenheit (70 degrees Celsius). As this hot air escapes up the tower at 34 mph (15 meters per second), it spins 32 turbines that generate up to 200 megawatts of electricity. Even with all this power, the solar tower is less than one tenth as efficient as solar cells in converting the sun's energy into electricity. The advantage for a solar tower is that its materials are much less expensive.
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POPSThe weakening of Rome...similarities to the U.S. today This description of the years preceeding the fall of Rome reminds me a lot of the culture of the United States these days. The pride, hard work, humility and dedication of generation's past seems gone. We watch shows like Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, Biggest Loser, Dancing with the Stars and don't want to be bothered by real issues, real concerns, real challenges. We drive SUVs that eat up tremendous amounts of gas, despite knowing the political and environmental side effects of doing so. And our smartest go straight to wall street to manage hedge funds that get in and out of stocks with indifference...without any output or benefit to the world other than to squeeze money out of the system (more money that actually exists it turns out). I hope that we are somehow strong and honest enough to recognize the errors of our ways and get so that we can someday get back to better days.
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POPSDetecting Photo Fakery Given that we are in the age of the Internet and along with it abject gullibility, here is an interesting page on how to detect photo fakery. Watch out for the REAL propagandists.
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POPSWe Can't Handle The Truth "They don’t mention that we spend almost a trillion dollars a year on a protracted war in Iraq, money that we must borrow from China and Japan. We spend 51% of our discretionary budget on our military. No nation on the globe spends more than 6%. Maybe this could be a reason our economy is faltering?"
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POPSThe Lost Cities of the Cloud People
more: Much about the Cloud People is shrouded in mystery. As recently as 2008, a lost Chachapoya city was discovered in the isolated Amazon rainforest during an archaeological expedition to Peru’s Jamalca district, about five hundred miles north-east of Lima. The fortified citadel was found to contain the walls of buildings and rock paintings, and perched on the edge of a chasm – literally carved into the Andes – it may have been used by the Cloud People to keep a lookout for enemies Little is known about the Chachapoyas as they left no written records, but it appears their culture began to prosper in the 9th century, when their towering cities were developed, possibly as defensive measures against invading Huaris. However, five hundred years on, their fortunes faltered with the spread of the Inca Empire. Despite fierce resistance, the Cloud People were conquered by the Incas, and were by turns rebelling and being suppressed when the Spanish conquistadors arrived in 1535.
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POPSThe 10 Coolest Foreign Words The English Language Needs they even teach it in universities, and in the armed forces. They believe this ability to slap together haphazard solutions has been key to their survival over the centuries. Don't laugh. At one time they managed to build an empire stretching from Brazil to the Philippines this way. "Screw" preparation. They have desenrascano. To view the other five follow link: http://www.cracked.com/article_17251_10-coolest-foreign-words-english-language-needs.html
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POPSPuzzling pagan burials at the famous Christian catacomb A very interesting article on the new discoveries at one of Rome's biggest catacomb complex, which was thought to be a Christian site for years. The latest foundings revealed the skeletons of more than 100 humans which predate Christianity and possibly "pagan burials". Puzzled scientists are working at the site for further details and clues. From the Archaeology Magazine.
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