21. februar 2004

Iranian sham vote Probably the most important story today is the Iranian fraud election. The hardliners in the Guardian Council have disqualified the candidates they don't like, they control the media, and the reformists can only respond by calling for a boycott of the election. The hardliners have used all sorts of tricks to make people vote, including letting people believe that they may face all sorts of hardships unless they can show a voting stamp in their ID cards. And they illogically put it up as a "hate the USA" issue by arguing that voting was somehow an attack on the US. This can be the turning point, where Iran either faces its second revolution, or slides back into a thuggish mullahcracy. If your Farsi is somewhat rusty, you are like me prevented from getting the story firsthand from the myriads of Iranian bloggers out there. Or at least you were, until iranFilter provided us with lots of blog entries translated into English, all covering the election from all angles. Don't miss the many reports there! The big question is what the turnout will be. Conservatives will likely win, but with a minority of voters bothering to turn up dispite the scare tactics and one-sided propaganda, their mandate will be a fraud. BBC News now says there was only a 28% turnout in Tehran. Reuters says around 50% voted nationwide; down from 67% in 2000. The bloggers say mostly older people were standing in line to vote; the young stayed away. That is very bad news for the clergy in a country where the population is overwhelmingly young. 11:03:59 PM    comment []  trackback []

Talking herself into jail Shane Walker of West Virginia is unlikely to go down in history as the most clever girl in history. When her boyfriend stole her weed, she reported it to the police. Which is why you can find her unflattering mugshot and a very amusing police report on The Smoking Gun. 9:25:36 PM    comment []  trackback []

Take two placebo and call me in the morning Does the placebo effect really exist? It has been a controversial subject in science since the phenomenon was first proposed almost 50 years ago, and most of all professionals have wondered how the mere illusion of treatment can actually help patients. Tor D. Wager of University of Michigan and his collegues may have found out how the placebo effect works with pain. Tor D. Wager of the University of Michigan and his colleagues used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to study the brains of volunteers who were exposed to harmless but painful stimuli such as small electric shocks or heat. In some cases, the researchers told participants that a pain-relieving cream had been applied to their skin. When these subjects were shocked, they reported less pain on average than did participants lacking the "anti-pain" cream. Subjects under the influence of the placebo effect also exhibited increased brain activity in an area known as the prefrontal cortex, and decreased activity in well-known pain-sensing regions such as the thalamus, the somatosensory cortex and parts of the cerebral cortex. These findings, published in Nature today, not only explains to us how the placebo effect works, but also helps scientists better understand pain. PS: A related story found on Nature's web site shows how scientists have found that people who care can actually feel another person's pain. It's not just a phrase. 8:19:44 PM    comment []  trackback []

Germany's "brain drain" While Germany is experiencing high unemployment, there are many Germans who have no problem finding work: the brightest, the best, the most highly educated. Unfortunately for Germany's future, they prefer working abroad. Science and technology in the former economic super power is suffering from a lack of qualified scientists. Those who are no longer content with working in old Europe, travel to the new world. Every seventh person with a doctorate in science leaves Germany for the United States, The Scientist magazine has reported. Three of the four German Nobel Prize winners work in the United States. "The trouble is that we are losing our highest achievers," Christoph Anz of the Confederation of German Employers Associations told The Scientist. "We have reached the point where we will no longer be able to compete in the booming biotechnology sector."  I am sure German politicians will come up with some new bureaucratic measures to attempt to turn the tide, thereby demonstrating they don't understand the problem and far less a solution. 7:34:44 PM    comment []  trackback []

Communist chosen as leader for Swedish party Lars Ohly (picture) was overwhelmingly elected leader of the Swedish Leftist party (vänsterpartiet), despite being an outspoken and self-declared communist. Ohly received 195 votes against his moderate opponent Alice Åström's 30.  He vowed to keep the party from becoming a secterian neo-communist party, but not everybody is convinced. The Leftist party is not a member of the social-democratic government, but it forms part of its parliamentary basis. It received 8.3% of the popular vote during the 2002 election for the national parliament (Riksdagen), giving it 30 representatives and a crucial position where the government often depends on the Leftist party's vote. The Swedish Leftist party actually has a fraction that makes Ohly seem a moderate by comparison. In a poll, 53 % of the representatives to the party congress wanted to abolish Sweden's military altogether. Ohly is opposed to the extreme "peace" movement. The Swedish Leftist party, unlike socialist parties elsewhere in Europe, remained a hardline supporter of Soviet communism beyond Lenin's days, and has only to a minor degree confronted its mistake in supporting the genocidal Soviet regime. After a period of mainstreaming towards social democracy the party has now chosen to declare itself openly communist again. The new leader started by chastising prime minister Persson for listening too much to US president Bush. Sweden is already the most anti-American country in western Europe; this is not good enough for the newly elected communist leader. (From a Swedish article in Dagens Nyheter) 2:02:40 PM    comment []  trackback []

Creative headline of the day "Laura Bush Says Gay Marriage 'Shocking'" (ABCNews) Slightly misleading headline, while technically true. Once you read the full text you see what she said was entirely reasonable: Laura Bush says gay marriages are "a very, very shocking issue" for some people, a subject that should be debated by Americans rather than settled by a Massachusetts court or the mayor of San Francisco. There is a lot of debate also among gays about whether the "activists" have the most sensible approach to the issue, fearing a backlash. And unlike what some people think, the President, like his likely presidential challengers, play it safe by not really flagging their positions: At the White House on Wednesday, President Bush said, "I'm troubled by what I've seen" in Boston and San Francisco. But he declined to say if he would support a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriages, as conservative supporters expect him to do. Because among conservatives as well, there is a growing realisation that gay rights is the civil rights struggle of our times, and that the opponents are on the wrong side of history. PS: Have a look at this shocking and revealing flash movie: The Attack of the Gay Agenda (uses sound)! 11:40:56 AM    comment []  trackback []

Study: Linux servers most often hit Against conventional wisdom, research shows that Linux based web servers are more often attacked than Windows based servers. An analysis of hacker attacks on online servers in January by UK-based security consultancy mi2g found that Linux servers were the most frequently hit, accounting for 13,654 successful attacks, or 80 percent of the survey total. Windows came in a distant second with 2,005 attacks. A detailed analysis of government servers also found Linux to be more susceptible, accounting for 57 percent of all security breaches. Last year, a similar study among government servers showed Windows to be slightly more vulnerable than Linux. Possibly, Linux enthusiasts' boasting about its security may have tempted crackers to attack it. It is also likely that while Windows administrators are becoming better (by necessity), the increased popularity of Linux has drawn many inexperienced admins to Linux, and they mess up the security. Via Ars Technica. 2:08:27 AM    comment []  trackback []

Math geek joke 1:32:59 AM    comment []  trackback []

"Soaring GI suicide rate" myth shot down The Washington Post and countless other news sources keep repeating the claim that suicide rates among US soldiers in Iraq are exploding. Except the story is rubbish. There is no significant increase in GI suicides compared to earlier years, as Spartacus demonstrates by posting the hard statistical facts. This is exactly the kind of work that makes the blogsphere great. 12:54:35 AM    comment []  trackback []

© Copyright 2004 Jan Haugland. Last update: 01.03.2004; 14:42:21.