September 2011
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“Today, humans consume an average of 15 trillion watts of power, 85% of which...”
– Robert F Service, Solar Fuels Take Two Steps Forward
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“Between 2001 and 2010, the U.S. trade deficit with China cost Americans 2.8...”
– Harold Meyerson, In Senate vote, a win for the middle class and a rebuke to China
The rise of trade populism, and an overt a trade war with China.
Recall that the ttrade wars with Japan led to their involvement in WWII. As Zygmunt Bauman said, war today looks increasingly like ‘the promotion of...
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“Both the UK and the global economy are facing a familiar foe at present: policy...”
– Adam Posen, cited by Paul Krugman in Defeatism
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Open the Future: The Foresight Paradox →
Jamais Cascio lays out the core paradox of futurism:
In every foresight or forecasting exercise, there are two overarching tensions:
The more certain and detailed the forecast, the more people will accept it and believe it to be useful.
The more certain and detailed the forecast, the less likely it is to happen.
This is the foresight paradox: you can be completely accurate, or you can be...
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“Look, I’m sorry, but New Jersey Governor Chris Christie cannot be president: He...”
– Michael Kinsley (via stoweboyd)
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Unions Start Paying Attention to Occupy Wall... →
Unions are climbing aboard the train, finding common cause with a group that has sparked interest in activism, and they will all be pointing at the same enemies.
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Tortilla Española
Recipe adapted from Seamus Mullen, Tertulia, New York City
Yield: one 12-inch tortilla
Cook Time: 1 hour
INGREDIENTS
8 eggs
Salt
2 cups high-quality olive oil
1 sweet onion, thinly sliced
1 clove garlic, crushed slightly
3 large Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled and sliced into ¼-inch rounds
DIRECTIONS
1. Lightly beat the eggs and season with a generous sprinkle of salt. Set aside.
...
Ahead of Its Time | An Icon Goes Digital -... →
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Shibari Bondage Sex Act Ends in Death: Italian Man... →
One in 10 Italian couples practice “extreme sex,” which is defined as sex that could put one partner’s life at risk—and even those who aren’t doing things that could end in death are still risqué. Sixteen percent of Italian couples use masks and forms of bondage, and 5 percent admit to regularly engaging in mild sadomasochistic practices. Over half use erotic props in their usual sexual...
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Climate Change and the Exodus of Species -... →
A team of scientists from the University of York examined the movement of 2,000 animal and plant species over the past decade. According to their study, published in Science last month, in their exodus from increasing heat, species have moved, on average, 13.3 yards higher in altitude — twice the predicted rate — and 11 miles higher in latitude — three times faster than expected. These...
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Trouble With Marijuana Arrests - NYTimes.com →
NYC Police Commissioner *finally* write memo telling NYC cops to stop arresting people for small amounts of pot. This practice is tied to the police department’s pattern of hassling young men of color, which seems to be ingrained in the department’s notions of street control. Let’s hope this isn’t s superficial shift, but indicative of something deeper.
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Small Fixes - Poisoned Nectar Is a Double-Edged... →
Researchers have found a low-cost and low-tech way to kill off disease-carrying mosquitoes: poisoned nectar.
Supported by a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Dr. Schlein and his research partner Günter C. Müller concocted an array of nectar poisons known as Attractive Toxic Sugar Baits that are easy to make, environmentally friendly and inexpensive.
In tests in Israel and in...
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“The world is moving faster than our thought about the world. The newly fluid...”
– Walter Russell Mead, Panic?
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“Go ahead, give American students a longer school day — but use the additional...”
– Bring Naps, Recess and the Arts Back to School - Room for Debate - NYTimes.com
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Unrelenting Downturn Is Redrawing America’s... →
Michael Cooper article is just a big head scratch: southern and western regions, formerly booming, are not bouncing back as fast as northern areas, but the piece provides little rationale.
Now, with the concentration of the highest unemployment rates in the South and the West, some economists wonder if it is an anomaly of the uneven recovery or a harbinger of things to come.
“Because the...
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Will Turnage on Hacking the Food System:... →
Another installment of the ‘hacking the food system’ series from food+tech
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Bittman's Broccoli-and-Seaweed Slaw
Broccoli-and-Seaweed Slaw
Ingredients
1 large head broccoli
1 tablespoon salt
1/4 cup mayonnaise
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 teaspoon honey
1/2 chopped red onion
1/4 cup snipped dried wakame or hijiki
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro, plus extra for garnishing.
Preparation
1. Peel the stem of broccoli; chop the florets finely and shred the stem.
2. Toss with salt...
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Taxpayers Subsidizing Junk Food? →
natalia-saves-the-world:
“From 1995 to 2010, the government handed $16.9 billion in farm subsidies to people involved in making four common junk food ingredients: corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, corn starch, and soy oils. Over the same time period, $262 million went to subsidizing apples. ”
“CALPIRG did some math: “If these agricultural subsidies went directly to consumers to allow them...
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Bittman's Bahn Mi Slaw
Banh Mi Slaw
Ingredients
1 pound daikon radishes
1/2 pound carrots
1 tablespoon salt
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
1 tablespoon sesame oil
1 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon or more Sriracha sauce
1/2 cup fresh cilantro leaves, plus extra for garnishing
1/4 cup chopped scallions.
Preparation
1. Shred daikon radishes and carrots.
2. Toss with salt and let sit in a colander...
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Cater2.me: A New Way To Keep Employees Fed
A lot of companies have found it economically beneficial to provide lunch: it keeps workers in the office, working, instead of traipsing off for a two hour lunch.
Cater2.me is tapping into that trend, by providing a wide selection of foods for companies too small to afford an in-house chef, and taking the stress of some staffer who would otherwise have to bring in schwarma one day and thai...
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Multigenerational Households Increasing In US
Sarah Kramer, One Roof, Three Generations - Portrait of a Chinese-American Family
The percentage of households in the United States containing three or more generations has nearly tripled over the past 30 years, to 7 percent in 2009 from 2.4 percent in 1980, according to Census Bureau reports. The living arrangement is even more common, and growing more rapidly, in New York City, where...
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BYOT (Bring Your Own Tech) keeps gaining ground in... →
Some companies have even surrendered to what is being called the consumerization of I.T. At Kraft Foods, the I.T. department’s involvement in choosing technology for employees is limited to handing out a stipend. Employees use the money to buy whatever laptop they want from Best Buy, Amazon.com or the local Apple store.
“We heard from people saying, ‘How come I have better equipment at home?’ ”...
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Social Media In The Narco Wars
Mexican citizens are crowdsourcing information about the narco wars in Mexico, circumventing official channels and filling a vacuum left by ineffective news media:
Damien Cave, Mexico Turns to Twitter and Facebook for Information and Survival
In many ways, the explosion of electronic crime-sharing is the product of trends that both create and destroy communities: Mexico today is both highly...
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“The bias lurking behind every large-scale smart city is a belief that bottom-up...”
– Greg Lindsay, Not-So-Smart Cities
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“Three Republican debates in as many weeks have produced plenty of fodder for...”
– Jonathan Weisman, GOP Debate: The Audience Again Delivers a Message
And they are extremist: read what they say.
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“There’s nothing trending faster in the whirl of sudden fame and fast fades than...”
– Jesse Kornbluth, Trending - Twitter Culture
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“We have a lot of kids graduating college, can’t find jobs, that’s what happened...”
– Mike Bloomberg (via soupsoup)
AFP: Obese now outnumber hungry, says Red Cross →
Obese people now outnumber the hungry globally according to the International Red Cross.
AFP: Obese now outnumber hungry, says Red Cross →
Obese people now outnumber the hungry globally according to the International Red Cross.
AFP: Obese now outnumber hungry, says Red Cross →
Obese people now outnumber the hungry globally according to the International Red Cross.
Consumers Cut Back on Staples but Splurge on... →
Unit sales of premade cocktails and coolers, which declined in the first two years of the recession, have jumped 24 percent in the last year. A similar pattern holds with many other indulgent items, which dropped in sales when the recession hit. In the last year, though, sales of body scrubbers jumped 21 percent, cosmetic accessories rose 22 percent and nail polish rose 10 percent. Refrigerated...
AFP: Obese now outnumber hungry, says Red Cross →
Obese people now outnumber the hungry globally according to the International Red Cross.
8 beers Americans no longer drink - Business - US... →
Budweiser, the best-selling beer in America for years has lost 30 percent of its sales over the five-year period.
Boosting energy efficiency in buildings will... →
Too bad this will be blocked by Republicans, who will argue that Obama is destroying jobs.
Merkel’s Efforts in Euro Crisis Complicated by... →
The Greens continued a march to national prominence by winning 17.6 percent of the vote in Berlin on Sunday, up from 13.1 percent last time. And in a sign of how dissatisfied many voters have become with the established parties, 8.9 percent cast ballots for the Pirate Party, which barely existed in 2006.
I don’t know what they stand for, but I like the sound of the Pirate Party.
An Urban Garden Prepares Inmates for Green-Collar... →
The Chicago Botanic Garden’s Windy City Harvest program allows inmates to learn green gardeing skills, which could lead to work after being released.
