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POPSMan Made Life Whoa. The implications from this will be enormous. If this project succeeds expect a concerted campaign of denial and attack from the religious conservatives.
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POPSOrigin of State Names GEORGIA. Named after King George II of England, who charted the colony in 1732. HAWAII. An English adaptation of the native word owhyhee, which means "homeland." IDAHO. Possibly taken from the Kiowa Apache word for the Comanche Indians. ILLINOIS. The French bastardization of the Algonquin word illini, which means "men." INDIANA. Named by English-speaking settlers because the territory was full of Indians. IOWA. The Sioux word for "beautiful land," or "one who puts to sleep." KANSAS. Taken from the Sioux word for "south wind people," their name for anyone who lived south of Sioux territory. KENTUCKY. Possibly derived from the Indian word kan-tuk-kee, meaning "dark and bloody ground." Or kan-tuc-kec, "land of green reeds", or ken-take, meaning "meadowland." LOUISIANA. Named after French King Louis XIV. MAINE. The Old French word for "province." MARYLAND. Named after Queen Henrietta Maria, wife of English King George I.
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POPSHUMMERS: End of the Road?! {& pics} "Let's just say they're not selling like they used to," says Neil Kopit, director of marketing at Criswell Hummer, a dealership in Maryland. Sales of the Hummer H1's successor, the slightly smaller H2, were down 27% in 2007 on the previous year, and GM, which had come to rely on its sales of what the industry terms "large vehicles", has announced the closure of four SUV-manufacturing plants in the US, Canada and Mexico. Nor is the decline confined to Hummers, or to America. British registrations of 4x4 vehicles fell by more than 18% last month, it was reported yesterday. The drop is part of a Europe-wide collapse in the gas-guzzler market: as a proportion of cars sold in France and Spain in the first half of this year, SUVs fell by 50% and 35% respectively. ... Guardian
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POPS20 of the World's Most Beautiful Libraries For some people it’s castles with their noble history and crumbling towers, for others it’s abandoned factories or lost cities. But for those who enjoy reading, a huge beautiful library is a place of endless pleasure. Meet 20 of the biggest and most beautiful libraries around the globe.
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POPSDog saves master with heimlich maneuver It was given the dog of the year award at the dog and cat of the year awards given by the ASPCA. A cat was awarded a prize for waking someone up in a fire and there were awards given to people, but I'm sure not even many people would have the sense to do the Heimlich maneuver, and cats aren't heavy enough. Both of the award winners were saved after being left abandoned as a puppy and a kitten.
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POPSWhat It's Like To Be A Bat Researchers are able to draw correlations between how bats and humans process information to perform functions. Both are mammals having the same basic brain organization, which leads to obvious comparisons.
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POPSNuns, Congressional candidate, Declared to be Terrorist.
This is what happens when you begin spying on all citizens without need for warrants or any controls at all, which has been typical of the Bush White House. Things like approving torture, holding prisoners in jail for years and years -- indefinite detention -- deprived of all legal rights, not allowed to communicate with their families who might not even know where they went, deprived of visits even from the Red Cross. It's one step at a time. It's doing things like this we've never done before -- war crimes. First to foreigners, then it seeps into doing it to your own. Easily done, next, one candidate for Congress arranges to get another candidate for Congress put on the list. Someone in office doesn't like someone: Put him on the list, etc. Spy on nun's because they're against the death penality. Spy on other political views you don't like - even though the people involved Have Absolutely Nothing To Do With Violence or Terrorism. Step by step into real fascism. Vote
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POPSCitizen Terrorists Deleted "Promising reform to angry legislators, the Maryland police are scrambling not so much to apologize as to notify the 53 that they were falsely deemed terrorists and can inspect their files before the files are purged. The databases were originally intended for anti-drug intelligence, but were misused, officials explained, by zealous, “technologically challenged” commanders. Constitutionally challenged, as well."
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POPS"State Secret: Thousands Secretly Sterilized"
Sterilized Without Her Knowledge Riddick was raped and became pregnant at the age of 13. Social workers labeled her promiscuous and too feeble-minded to ever be a responsible parent. So, after giving birth in 1968, Riddick was sterilized without being told. She learned the truth years later, when she married and tried to have more children. "They took so much away from me," Riddick said. "They took away my spirit and my soul." North Carolina sterilized close to 8,000 women in hospitals across the state. Even though the practice ended more than 30 years ago, some say the time has come to make amends. North Carolina was one of the first states out of 33 that once practiced sterilization to offer an apology. State Rep. Larry Womble is crafting a bill to provide financial reparations. Some wonder where the state will get the money. "They say, 'Well, we can't afford it,' " said Womble, a Democrat. "Well, we cannot not afford it." Riddick went on to earn a college degree
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POPS248-Dimensional Mathematical Map Calculated "The calculation was known to be possible in principle, but it was thought to be hopeless in practice," says Adams. "But four years ago a group of us said let's really try to do it. We're pretty sure we've got it right, but it's hard to be 100% sure." "It's probably one of the most complicated pure mathematical calculations anyone's ever done," says Stewart. "Each entry is difficult to calculate — it's amazing they managed to do this."
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POPSUS Army Invests in 'Thought Helmet' Technology for Voiceless Communication For people concerned about the ethics of the technology, Elmar Schmeisser, the Army neuroscientist overseeing the program, reassures that the technology will not allow mind-reading. As he explains, since every user has to be trained with the system, it would be impossible to use the technology against an individual´s will and without their cooperation.
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POPS'Yo' is the word when 'he' or 'she' won't do The lack of gender-neutral substitutes for "he"/"she" and "his"/"her" has bothered people for at least two centuries, and "zie" and "hir" are just two of many invented words, including "ter", "ip" and "thon". If such words are not familiar, it is because they - like all attempts to coin a gender-neutral personal pronoun - have failed miserably.
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POPSWho Cares about Size of Government? How about Competent Government? Don't be so scared of government that you serve it, instead of it serving you. Revolutions of the past did not protest how much governments were doing for their well-being. Fundamentally, if taxes had ever been used to actually deliver services to the people instead of funding monarchs and their wars, there might be less fear of taxes. Overcome your fears. Make your government serve you. Like the French providing household assistance services for free to all new moms a few hours a week until the mother feels ready to handle everything.
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