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  The first annular solar eclipse of the 21st century that will be visible from the United States happens this Sunday, May 20--and there are 154 national parks in its path.
  


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  Coming soon to a living room near you: the transparent TV.
  


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  Just be careful if you decide to buy your new transparent HDTV at Wal-Mart. You might get bitten by a snake.
  


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  While NASA ( Read more... )

In the wake of the French elections that brought Francois Hollande to power, Greece may be moving closer to openly rebelling against the European Union's austerity measures. Greece has been unable to form a coalition government, which would lead to another vote next month in which parties opposed to the bailout deal with the EU are poised to ( Read more... )

. . . and in other earth-shattering news, astronomers have also discovered that a rather large moon orbits the earth roughly once every thirty days.

In all seriousness, though . . .

The Portland Tribune reports that many banks here in Portland are refusing to sell foreclosed homes in their inventory to buyers who have qualified for loans with ( Read more... )

Unless something dramatic changes, it looks as if France will have its first socialist president in well over a decade, with Francois Hollande poised to defeat incumbent Nicholas Sarkozy. I for one am of the opinion that this is a very good thing. Hollande may be Europe's best hope for putting the brakes on the draconian austerity measure that ( Read more... )

I always wonder why this type of story always seems to be buried in a footnote somewhere instead of being the lead story on every major newscast and on the front page of every magazine and newspaper. Anyway ( Read more... )

Some good stuff in today's New York Times:

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  One of the biggest challenges that American and Western forces are facing in efforts to turn Afghanistan into something other than a failed state is the lack of efforts by the Afghan government to address widespread corruption. The affects of corruption on Afghan society are damaging, reflected in things ( Read more... )

Lying at the root of a lot of the talk about austerity and spending cuts is the idea of "moral hazard", a formerly obscure term used by the insurance industry to describe how behavior patterns can be altered when people don't have to bear the full brunt of the consequences of their actions. This idea, whether described as moral hazard or not, has ( Read more... )

I've been semi-AWOL from Livejournal since the start of the year--reading, but not writing and not commenting much. There's been a lot on my mind, but I haven't felt like I've had a lot to say. I've also been getting settled in to a new apartment (still in Portland, just a different area) and adjusting to a new job. As far as the job goes, I ( Read more... )

Breaking News Alert ( Read more... )

I've been quieter on Livejournal lately because I've been dealing with a break-in to my home office and the theft of thousands of dollars worth of equipment and software I used to run my web development and marketing business. This morning, I lost the last of the projects I had in the pipeline. Unfortunately, some mistakes made with the insurance ( Read more... )