New Search For Global Warming At Poles

How about a search to re-discover and/or uncover the scientific fundamentals necessary for an evolving civilization to survive?

New Search For Global Warming At Poles
CBS Feb. 26, 2007
(Christian Science Monitor) This article was written by Peter N. Spotts.
For the next two years, the coldest places on Earth will become some of the hottest laboratories in the history of modern science. This Thursday marks the official start of the International Polar Year (IPY), an unprecedented research assault on Antarctica and the Arctic. Some 10,000 scientists from more than 60 countries launched the push because of significant changes they see taking place at these frozen ends of the Earth. Many hold that global warming is triggering these changes, including shrinking sea ice in the Arctic Ocean, thawing permafrost, and growing instability in Greenland's ice cap and in some floes coursing through Antarctica's ice cap. The U.S. kicks off its part of the $1.5-billion project with opening ceremonies Tuesday in Washington. The goal is to gain a deeper understanding of processes affecting everything from the flow of glaciers, and key features of polar climate to plankton and polar bears. In addition, researchers plan to leave a legacy of networked, standard sensors and buoys that will help track changes in these crucial regions long after the IPY ends. Why North And South Poles Matter At first glance, the poles may seem too remote to matter to anyone who doesn't live there. But Earth's "cryosphere" — its high-latitude regions of snow and ice — represents a central piece of the climate system. The poles act as sinks for the heat generated in the tropics and carried toward higher latitudes by the oceans and atmosphere. Over many centuries, the ice caps on Greenland and Antarctica hold the key to future sea-level rise as the climate warms up north. Thus, the hidden hand of a changing Arctic reaches farther south than icebergs alone suggest. "There is no magic curtain that drops down at 60 degrees north," says ice scientist Jacqueline Richter-Menge, who heads climate-related research at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory in Hanover, N.H. Changes in ecosystems For instance, ecosystems stretching from the Labrador Sea to the continental shelf off North Carolina are changing because colder, less-salty water is flowing along the continental shelf from the Arctic Ocean into the northwest Atlantic, according to two Cornell University scientists. Many researchers attribute the Arctic Ocean's freshening to global warming. The scientists note that while overfishing triggered the collapse of lucrative cod fishing off the Canadian Maritime Provinces, this fresher, colder water along the shelf has hindered the cod's recovery there compared with stocks farther south. In their place, marine life, including shrimp and snow crab, that cod would have eaten are flourishing. The changes in water conditions have altered the timing for peak production among tiny plankton that nourish creatures higher up the food chain. "These timing changes are going to lead to changes in the ecosystem. There will be winners and losers in the ecosystem. And there will be winners and losers in society," says Charles Greene, a Cornell oceanographer who was a co-author of the report. Meanwhile, in the south, scientists working on the global Census of Marine Life say they see biologically significant shifts in marine life along the sea floor that once anchored two large ice shelves known as Larson A and B. They broke away from the Antarctic Peninsula over the past 12 years. "The more we understand what's going on, the more winners there will be," Dr. Greene says. International Grass-Roots Effort The IPY coincides with the 50th anniversary of the International Geophysical Year (IGY), the first postwar effort to study the entire planet, from the deep-sea floor and below to the outermost reaches of the atmosphere. Although this year's effort is dubbed the polar year, it spans two years to allow scientists to track conditions at both poles through a complete summer-winter-summer cycle. The IPY includes more biology and ecology to better gauge the effect changes are having on plants and animals, as well as on the organic carbon stored in frozen tundra. Scientists say that as the Arctic in particular warms, they expect this carbon to reach the atmosphere as carbon dioxide and methane — turning the Great White North into a source of heat-trapping greenhouse gases. Unlike the IGY, "this is a very grass-roots effort," says Robin Bell, a senior scientist at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, N.Y. Last week, Dr. Bell and colleagues described how lakes in the right location beneath Antarctic ice "rivers" accelerate the ice's movement toward the sea. The poles "are the parts of the planet changing most rapidly" with global warming, she says. Understanding them is key to understanding how the rest of the planet is likely to respond.
© 2007 The Christian Science Monitor

Venezuela Spending on Arms Soars to World’s Top Ranks

21st Century Wisdom Teachings

loosing sight of the fact that nuclear tools and prehistoric modes of behavior do not mix - what scientific fundamentals are missing to create such a monstrous "laca" understanding?

NYT February 25, 2007
Venezuela Spending on Arms Soars to World’s Top Ranks
By SIMON ROMERO
CARACAS, Venezuela, Feb. 24 — Venezuela’s arms spending has climbed to more than $4 billion in the past two years, transforming the nation into Latin America’s largest weapons buyer and placing it ahead of other major purchasers in international arms markets like Pakistan and Iran.
Venezuelan military and government officials here say the arms acquisitions, which include dozens of fighter jets and attack helicopters and 100,000 Kalashnikov assault rifles, are needed to circumvent a ban by the United States on sales of American weapons to the country.
They also argue that Venezuela must strengthen its defenses to counter potential military aggression from the United States.
“The United States has tried to paralyze our air power,” Gen. Alberto Muller Rojas, a member of President Hugo Chávez’s general staff, said in an interview, citing a recent effort by the Bush administration to prevent Venezuela from acquiring replacement parts for American F-16s bought in the 1980s. “We are feeling threatened and like any sovereign nation we are taking steps to strengthen our territorial defense,” he said.
This retooling of Venezuela’s military strategy, which includes creation of a large civilian reserve force and military assistance to regional allies like Bolivia, has been part of a steadily deteriorating political relationship with the United States.
The Bush administration has repeatedly denied that it has any plans to attack Venezuela, one of the largest sources of oil for the United States. But distrust of such statements persists here after the administration tacitly supported a coup that briefly removed Mr. Chávez from office in 2002.
Venezuela’s escalation of arms spending, up 12.5 percent in 2006, has brought harsh criticism from the Bush administration, which says the buildup is a potentially destabilizing problem in South America and is far more than what would be needed for domestic defense alone.
The spending has also touched off a fierce debate domestically about whether the country needs to be spending billions of dollars on imported weapons when poverty and a surging homicide rate remain glaring problems. Meanwhile, concern has increased among Venezuela’s neighbors that its arms purchases could upend regional power balances or lead to a new illicit trade in arms across Venezuela’s porous borders.
José Sarney, the former Brazilian president and a leading senator, caused a stir this week when he was quoted in the newspaper O Globo as describing Venezuela’s form of government as “military populism” and “a return to the 1950s,” when Venezuela was governed by the army strongman Marcos Pérez Jiménez.
“Venezuela is buying arms that are not a threat to the United States but which unbalance forces within the continent,” Mr. Sarney said. “We cannot let Venezuela become a military power.”
Still, officials in the administration of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil have been hesitant to publicly criticize Venezuela’s arms purchases.
The issue remains delicate after the Brazilian company Embraer lost a deal to sell military aircraft to Venezuela because the planes included American technology.
After turning unsuccessfully to Brazil and Spain for military aircraft, Venezuela has become one of the largest customers of Russia’s arms industry.
Since 2005, Venezuela has signed contracts with Russia for 24 Sukhoi fighter jets, 50 transport and attack helicopters, and 100,000 assault rifles. Venezuela also has plans to open Latin America’s first Kalashnikov factory, to produce the Russian-designed rifles in the city of Maracay.
A report in January by the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency pegged Venezuela’s arms purchases in the past two years at $4.3 billion, ahead of Pakistan’s $3 billion and Iran’s $1.7 billion in that period.
In a statement before the House Intelligence Committee, Lt. Gen. Michael D. Maples, the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, called attention to Mr. Chávez’s “agenda to neutralize U.S. influence throughout the hemisphere,” contrasting Mr. Chávez with the “reformist left” exemplified by President Michelle Bachelet of Chile.
Beyond Russia, Venezuela is also considering a venture with Iran, its closest ally outside Latin America, to build a remotely piloted patrol aircraft. Gen. Raúl Isaías Baduel, the Venezuelan defense minister, recently told reporters that the project to build 20 of the aircraft could be used to bolster border surveillance and combat environmental destruction in Venezuela. Venezuela is also strengthening military ties with Cuba, sending officers and soldiers there for training.
Supporters of the arms buildup contend that under Mr. Chávez, who has been in power for eight years, Venezuela has spent proportionately less on its military in relation to the size of its economy than the United States or than other South American countries like Chile and Colombia.
In 2004, the last year for which comparative data were immediately available and before Venezuela’s arms buildup intensified, overall defense spending by Venezuela, including arms contracts, was about $1.3 billion and accounted for about 1.4 percent of gross domestic product, compared with 4 percent in the United States and 3.8 percent in Colombia, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, which tracks military spending.
Doubts persist as to how powerful Venezuela’s armed forces have become in a regional context, even as they acquire new weapons. Military experts here say pilots in the air force still need training to start flying their new Russian fighters. And in terms of troop strength, Venezuela’s 34,000-soldier active-duty army still lags behind the armies of Argentina and Brazil, with about 41,400 and 200,000 members respectively, according to GlobalSecurity.org, a Web site that compiles data on military topics.
Pro-Chávez analysts also say the president is less adventurous in relation to military policy outside Venezuela than predecessors like Luis Herrera Campíns, who supported Argentina in the Falklands War in 1982 to detract attention from a decline in oil revenue and climbing inflation.
But critics of the arms purchases say they are being made with little participation from or discussion with the National Assembly, which recently allowed Mr. Chávez to govern by decree for 18 months.
Ricardo Sucre, a political scientist at the Central University of Venezuela, said that the lack of transparency of the weapons contracts had heightened concern that Mr. Chávez could be arming parts of the army, the new civilian reserve and partisans like the Frente Francisco de Miranda, a pro-Chávez political group, that would be loyal to him in the event of fractures within the armed forces.
General Muller Rojas, the president’s military adviser, said concern about the arms purchases was overblown, pointing to reports that Venezuela was considering an acquisition of nine diesel-powered submarines from Russia for about $3 billion.
He said the navy had “aspirations” for more submarines, but that no “concrete plan” for such a large contract had been developed.
“We simply have an interest in maintaining peace and stability,” General Muller Rojas said, describing the Caribbean as a crucial to its military influence. “We have no intent of using the Venezuelan armed forces to repress human rights.”

Global Warning Alarm: Doomsday for Australia?

What part of missing scientific fundamentals, evolution, and survival parameters are still not understood? Why are these fundamentals critical to survival missing?

Global Warning Alarm: Doomsday for Australia?
Report Calls for Drought in Sydney, and Ultimately Flooding of Coasts
ABC By MARK LITKE
SYDNEY, Feb. 24, 2007 — - It was something of a double whammy for one of the world's most desirable cities.
The ominous report issued earlier this month by the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was frightening enough: The evidence of global warning was unequivocal, most likely caused by humans, and likely to continue for centuries.
But another report had been issued, just one day before, by Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization. And its conclusion read like a dagger through the heart of the land down under. If global warming continues at its current rate, the CSIRO report warned, life in the city of Sydney could be completely transformed by the year 2070.
In just one generation, Sydney could slide into a near permanent state of drought. There could be a dramatic rise in deadly bushfires. Temperatures would rise 10 or 15 degrees Fahrenheit, or more. Heat-related deaths would soar from nearly 200 to more than 1,200 a year. The report was very grim reading, especially for the people of Sydney.
To better understand how Australians were responding to this "doomsday scenario," I met with Michael Archer, the dean of the science faculty at Sydney's University of New South Wales.
Watch Mark Litke's report on the "doomsday scenario" tonight on "World News." Check your local listings for air time.
Professor Archer is a noted geologist and paleontologist, who has studied the history of climate change and its effects on prehistoric life. He is among the prominent scientists who have warned repeatedly that global warming posed a dire threat to mankind.
I interviewed Archer as we walked on the predictably sun-drenched Bondi Beach in the Sydney suburbs. It seemed an appropriate location, since Australians have known for years that the growing hole in the ozone layer over neighboring New Zealand has made the sun's rays increasingly harmful in this part of the world.
Were residents of Australia surprised by the two reports?
In a sense, it was a confirmation of what we knew was going to happen anyway. As a geologist, I've seen these sort of things recorded in the rocks we've studied for the last 30 years. The thing that worries is the rate of change, the pace at which this is going to happen.
How are Australians responding?
I think the biggest problem we've got in Australia is the one that we have all around the world. We are very poor responders to SLOW change. If someone takes a swing at you. You know what to do -- DUCK. But if somebody tells you over the next 50 years your world is going to profoundly change, you think, "Eh! Am I gonna be alive or not? … Do I really worry about it?"
We've always been a little bit, "Ah, she'll be right, mate! Ya know, it's not too much of a panic." But just now, they seem to be worrying up. I think the message is coming in from all over the globe from this latest report. Suddenly people are saying, "Okay, maybe MY life won't change personally that much, but what about my KIDS?"
The people of Sydney certainly did not need a report to know that something was terribly wrong. This part of Australia is in its seventh year of drought.
Absolutely! Everybody who's been affected by this drought says they don't have any living memory of anything as bad as this. We know that geologically, there have been far worse droughts in the past. So we think, "Okay, this is a taste of what's to come."
If we have climate change, what we do know is southern Australia is going to go powder dry, northern Australia is going to be afflicted with violent weather patterns. We don't know what's going to happen in eastern Australia. My guess is mangrove forests are going to invade the beaches, Bondi Beach (where we're standing now) is gone, so there are changes coming down the line.
Yes, the drought has been a wake-up call.
Could what's happening in Australia be the "canary in the coal mine" for the rest of the world?
Yes, in more ways than one. We've got about 95, maybe 98 percent of our population living along the coastline. [With the ice sheets at the poles and Greenland melting] the sea levels will be 100 meters (330 feet) higher than they are today. Forget Venice. I mean we're talking about sharks in the middle of (downtown) Sydney.
The warnings now being issued by the scientific community sound almost biblical, the coming of an apocalypse.
They are apocalyptic. On the other hand, they're appropriately apocalyptic. We think of an apocalypse as something that happens overnight. Okay, this is a slightly slower apocalypse, if you like, but it's no less profound. And it's going to obliterate the world as we currently know it. It's going to make change within one generation very, very visible and very uncomfortable. It is an apocalypse. I don't think that's inappropriate.
A Footnote
While walking on Bondi Beach with Professor Archer, this correspondent forgot to apply a healthy dose of sun block cream on his face. The gentle coastal breeze, as it often does, masked the damage being done by the UV rays penetrating that hole in the ozone layer. At the end of a one-hour-long interview, this correspondent's face was fried to crisp. The dead skin was still peeling off one week later.

At $45 Billion, New Contender for Top Buyout

Greater FreeDumb for all Coming Your Way

NYT February 24, 2007
At $45 Billion, New Contender for Top Buyout
By ANDREW ROSS SORKIN and CLIFFORD KRAUSS
The biggest leveraged buyout ever is about to be surpassed. Again.
A group led by the private equity giants Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Company and the Texas Pacific Group is near a deal to acquire the TXU Corporation, a Texas utility, for about $45 billion, according to people involved in the talks.
The amount of private money that is being offered is a huge financial endorsement of the company’s energy strategy. TXU has irritated environmental advocates by proposing to build 11 coal-fired power plants in Texas. Despite calls for regulating greenhouse gases, TXU has been the most aggressive in the power industry in pushing coal as the answer to growing electricity demands. Nationwide, power companies are planning to build about 150 coal plants over the next several years.
The deal itself, if approved at a TXU board meeting tomorrow, would be a landmark. It would exceed the Blackstone Group’s recent $39 billion acquisition of the office landlord Equity Office Properties, the largest buyout ever. And that would mean that Henry R. Kravis, a co-founder of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, has managed to upstage, at least for the time being, his longtime rival in deals, Stephen A. Schwarzman, a co-founder of Blackstone.
Energy has been fairly recent territory for private equity. While energy deals accounted for 16 percent of all mergers last year, only 9 percent of those deals involved buyout firms, according to Thomson Financial. The first big foray came last year, when Kinder Morgan, the Texas pipeline giant that was created from some assets of the former Enron, was sold to a group that included Goldman Sachs, the American International Group, the Carlyle Group and Riverstone Holdings for $27.5 billion.
Awash in hundreds of billions of dollars, private equity firms, which raise money from pension funds and wealthy individuals, have taken on new targets in a buying spree. In 2006, private equity firms raised more than $174 billion for 205 funds, according to Thomson Financial.
Having just finished raising new supersize funds — K.K.R. and Blackstone are about to complete funds each worth more than $20 billion — and with banks and hedge funds willing to lend them money in record amounts with few restrictions or covenants, private equity has now begun to aim at even bigger prey. A deal the size of TXU will probably require that the private equity firms raise more than $30 billion in debt.
People involved in the talks cautioned that the deal still faced approval by TXU’s board and several negotiating points remained, so the talks could collapse.
TXU did not respond to telephone requests for comment.
“It’s a pretty dramatic development because TXU’s position in electricity in Texas is controversial and uncertain,” said Amy Myers Jaffe, an energy expert at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University in Houston.
TXU, based in Dallas, has 2.4 million customers in the state. It also owns and operates one of the largest lignite coal surface mining operations, producing 23 million tons a year. With its large, low-cost nuclear and coal-fired group of plants, it has been able to raise electricity prices to match the rise in natural gas prices the last three years.
Like other utility companies in recent years, TXU has sought to reinvent itself. A new management came in three years ago and sold natural gas assets after the price of natural gas soared, got out of speculative marketing, cleaned up its books and went back to its core business of electricity generation and transmission. The company’s shares have been a favorite of Wall Street, rising from a low of $5.44 in 2002 to $60.02 yesterday.
But after being on the rise, the company has now hit strong headwinds. TXU’s plans to build 11 coal-fired plants have faced increasing political opposition from environmental organizations, civic groups and prominent politicians like the mayor of Dallas, Laura Miller.
Rallies, hearings and informational meetings have been attracting crowds of critics around the state who view the plants as a symbol in the struggle to reduce global warming. Environmentalists believe if they can stop at least some of the plants in a conservative state like Texas, it will be a boon to activists around the country who oppose coal and favor renewable energy like solar and wind.
TXU has said that the growing population and economy in Texas need more energy and has claimed that the plants will be cleaner than many older coal-fired plants in the state. They have also argued that coal gasification technologies, which environmentalists say would produce cleaner energy, are not yet ready for the marketplace. The 11 plants would have a capacity of more than 9,000 megawatts, about 3.5 percent of the nation’s current coal-fired power and would cost an estimated $10 billion.
Recently, in response to criticism, TXU promised that the new plants would leave vacant space for future deployment of equipment designed to capture carbon dioxide so the climate-warming gas does not enter the atmosphere. Moreover, the company says it is conducting research on oxygen firing, chilled ammonia and other technologies to capture carbon.
TXU’s plan was dealt a sharp blow, at least for the short term, by State District Judge Stephen Yelenosky, who on Tuesday ruled against a 2005 executive order by Gov. Rick Perry to put the plants’ permit process on a regulatory fast-track. The judge issued a temporary injunction stating that the Texas governor, whose powers are limited compared with most state governors, did not have the authority to decide how much time regulatory agencies should take before issuing decisions.
The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality will make the ultimate decision on the permits, but not before administrative law hearings that promise to be rancorous.
Still, despite the uproar over the coal plants, TXU has many attractions for a potential buyer, analysts said. It is a strong company in a profitable business made all the more valuable because it operates in Texas, which has a growing economy and population base.
“Utilities right now have a lot of value because they have guaranteed cash flows and guaranteed rates of return which gives them guaranteed income,” said Barbara Shook, an analyst with the Energy Intelligence Group, a publications and research firm. “And they have hard assets. In the post-Enron world, hard assets carry a lot of value.”
“TXU is going to grow no matter what, because the state of Texas is growing and that translates into higher demand for electricity,” she added.
The Texas energy scene is evolving. Still the center of the nation’s oil business, it is also now the state with the most wind power production. Austin and other cities have become centers for renewable energy companies. But unlike California, Texas has been slow to develop conservation policies and has no goals for cutting carbon emissions.
Under the terms of the deal being discussed, the investors would pay about $70 a share for TXU, these people said. TXU’s market value is about $27.5 billion. The company has more than $12 billion in debt.
Other private equity firms may join the group, these people said. A spokeswoman for K.K.R. declined to comment as did a spokesman for Texas Pacific.
Michael J. de la Merced contributed reporting.

'08 Campaign Cash Race Claims First Casualty

For the Dollar, By the Dollar, of the Dollar - we shall flag 'freek' to freedumb

"..this process has become to a great extent about money, Mr. Vilsack said, lamenting the fact that today’s presidential campaigns are “simply about a money primary.”

'08 Campaign Cash Race Claims First Casualty
With Nominees Expected to Spend $500 Million Apiece, Ex-Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack Likely Won't Be Last to Bow Out for Lack of Funds
ABC By JOHN HENDREN
Feb. 24, 2007 — - Former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack's early exodus from the 2008 presidential race is likely the first of many instances of candidates leaving the campaign trail after discovering they lack the funds to compete in what promises to be the most expensive campaign in presidential history, analysts say.
Vilsack, who bowed out Friday, had a key home state and a popular anti-war message. The Democrat drew hearty applause when he told Jay Leno on an appearance on "The Tonight Show" that if elected, "We're going to bring our troops home."
"The reality, however, is that this process has become, to a great extent, about money -- a lot of money," Vilsack said in announcing his withdrawal from the race. "So it is money, and only money, that is the reason that we are leaving today."
He raised more than $1 million last year. But Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., raised $1.5 million in a single day in Hollywood last week and former Republican Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney brought in $6.5 million in one day last month.
"Money's first and foremost, and the name of the game," said Stuart Rothenberg of The Rothenberg Political Report.
In 1952, the last time there was no incumbent in the race, Dwight Eisenhower won after spending $6.6 million in the general election. Political analysts estimate that by the time it's over this time, the Republican and Democratic nominees will have spent $500 million a piece.
"We're really entering a perfect storm in terms of presidential fundraising that is setting the stage for the most money raised and spent in American history," Commissioner Michael Toner of the Federal Election Commission told ABC News.
With outside spending from political parties, labor unions and special interest groups, Rothenberg and others expect the 2008 race for the White House to cost $2 billion to $3 billion dollars.
It remains largely a mystery how much candidates have raised this year. They don't have to disclose those amounts until the first campaign finance report is due on April 15.
But the big spenders are likely to include Democrats Obama, Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York, former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina and Republicans Romney, Sen. John McCain of Arizona and former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.
"We have to have a real debate about public financing and the ability to enable the primary and the caucus process to be about ideas," Vilsack said, "not simply about a money primary."
Vilsack will likely not be the last of the lesser-known candidates to drop out early -- squeezed out by big-name fundraisers.
"They're like these large planets that have already blotted out the sun for those second- and third-tier candidates who are hoping to get enough light to take off," Rothenberg said.
In the 2000 primary election, then-Gov. George Bush of Texas spent a record $100 million, refusing public funding. This time, analysts say candidates who fail to raise that amount by the end of 2007 will likely lose credibility among primary voters.
Analysts say it is likely that none of the leading candidates will accept public funding because of the spending limits that come with it. If the two nominees both eschewed public funding, it would be the first time since 1972 that a general election was held using entirely private funding.

NYT February 23, 2007
Vilsack Withdraws From Presidential Race
By JEFF ZELENY
WASHINGTON, Feb. 23 — Former Gov. Tom Vilsack of Iowa withdrew from the Democratic presidential race today, saying the crowded field had made it impossible for him to raise enough money to wage a competitive national campaign.
“I came up against something for the first time in my life that hard work and effort couldn’t overcome,” Mr. Vilsack said, speaking at a news conference in Des Moines. “I just couldn’t work harder, couldn’t give it enough.”
Mr. Vilsack became the first Democratic candidate to enter the race, opening his campaign on Nov. 30 as the not-from-Washington candidate who pledged to renew a forgotten sense of community across America. He also became one of the most outspoken critics of the Iraq war and called for an immediate withdrawal of United States troops.
But Mr. Vilsack, 56, conceded he was unable to compete in a contest where the ability to raise money trumps all. In recent weeks, officials said, his campaign has been unable to meet payroll, with some aides taking pay cuts and others being turned away for jobs.
“The reality is that this process has become to a great extent about money — a lot of money,” Mr. Vilsack said, lamenting the fact that today’s presidential campaigns are “simply about a money primary.”
Yet Mr. Vilsack also faced another burden: persuading voters in his own state to take his candidacy seriously. Voters in Iowa are scheduled to kick off the presidential nominating season next January, and the steady parade of rivals in his own backyard complicated his efforts.
When asked whether he intended to endorse one of his rivals, he said: “Today is not a day to think of endorsements or other candidates.”
While Mr. Vilsack reported raising $1.1 million from Nov. 9 to Jan. 31, according to campaign finance reports, he had spent all but $396,000. After Senator Barack Obama of Illinois and Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York entered the race in late January, his advisers said, he struggled to persuade contributors to help finance his campaign.
Still, Mr. Vilsack’s decision to drop out startled many of his Iowa admirers. Only two days ago, he appeared with other Democratic candidates at a forum in Nevada, and he was scheduled to attend a campaign rally tonight in Iowa.
Early today, he made a series of calls to party officials and supporters, saying his campaign was spending more money than it was taking in. In the news conference today in Des Moines, he criticized the intense focus that is placed upon raising money, saying that ideas and innovations get overshadowed.
“It is money and only money that is the reason we are leaving today,” said Mr. Vilsack.

Rich Get Richer While War Rages On

Power, Greed, Narcissism, and an Empty Wisdom Tradition - the Sound Fundamentals of Survival - more spectacular in an age of nuclear tools

Rich Get Richer While War Rages On
NEW YORK, Feb. 18, 2007
(CBS) Sunday Morning commentator Ben Stein says America's ventures in Iraq and Afghanistan are worsening but here at home, the stock market soars. Year after year, month after month, sometimes day after day, the Dow-Jones Industrial Average reaches new highs. The war in Iraq gets worse. Afghanistan slips out of control. The gap between rich and poor grows more profound, the trade deficit grows immense, and fears of the future of Medicare grow sharp indeed. Yet up, up, and away goes the stock market. Why? Well, frankly, no one knows for sure. Yes, profits are great and interest rates are low, but markets don't always go up - even on news as good as that. But here is a clue: Something like 50 percent of all stock is owned by the top 1 percent of Americans in terms of wealth. The top ten per cent own nearly ninety per cent of stock. For those Americans, far from Fallujah, life is great. The rich in America have never been richer or more numerous. There are long waiting lists for Ferraris and Bentleys. A $10 million house and a $1 million dollar are what life is all about for them. They're in a great mood. Iraq seems far away. Kabul is remote. Money is pouring in. So, what do they do? They buy cars and houses and mistresses and stock, and as it goes up, they come to believe it will always go up, and they keep buying and so it keeps going up. Until one day, the dollar collapses and interest rates rise and fear sets in and the rich are suddenly singing the blues. But for now, if you're not on the battlefield, don't know anyone who is, and the company just gave you a $1 million dollar bonus or 10 million times are mighty sweet. Time to buy.
© MMVII, CBS Interactive, Inc.

Wind shifts devastate ocean life

Entire marine ecosystems have been wiped out, devastating populations of sea birds and larger marine mammals.

Wind shifts devastate ocean life
By Jonathan Fildes Science and technology reporter, BBC News, San Francisco

The delicate interplay between the oceans and atmosphere is changing with catastrophic consequences.
Entire marine ecosystems have been wiped out, devastating populations of sea birds and larger marine mammals.
These "dead zones" occur where there are disturbances to the nutrient-rich ocean currents, which are driven by coastal winds.
Extreme marine suffocations have occurred off the west coast of the US every year for the last five years.
The most intense event, which left the ocean floor littered with the carcasses of crabs, happened in 2006.

Climate models predict increasing uncertainty with wild fluctuations. We should expect more surprises Dr Jane Lubchenco, OSU
It was unlike anything that we've measured along the Oregon coast in the past five decades," said Dr Francis Chan, of Oregon State University (OSU).
Other coastal countries including Chile, Namibia and South Africa have also been affected.
Plant bloom
The common factor between all of the areas is that marine currents off the coast rise from the deep ocean.
These upwelling zones bring nutrient-rich water up from the deep, triggering plankton blooms that underpin the coastal food chain. Nearly 50% of the world's fisheries are in these areas.
The currents are driven by winds that move surface water away from the coast, drawing more up from the deep.
But now, observations along the west coast of the US suggest that the upwelling is being disrupted, changing its timing and intensity.
For example, in 2005 the upwelling was delayed which meant that the plankton blooms did not occur, leading to a collapse in fish populations.
This particularly hit migrating salmon, which pass along the coast in April and May every year.
"In 2005 they found nothing to eat," said Dr Bill Peterson of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa). "By the time upwelling started, they were dead."
Huge graveyard
An even more catastrophic event occurred in 2006 when the amount of upwelling doubled, leading to a huge influx of nutrients and a supercharged plankton bloom.
When these sank to the ocean floor they stripped the water column of oxygen, creating a 3,000 sq km (1,150 sq miles) dead zone, where creatures unable to swim away suffocated en masse.
Dr Francis Chan used underwater cameras to survey the area two months after the event.
"We were shocked to see a graveyard," he said. "Frame after frame of carcass, carcass, carcass."
Crabs, worms and sea stars all perished in the anoxic water.
The event was so severe that the researchers fear that marine life cannot return to the area.
"In previous years, fish that have escaped the low-oxygen area appear to have returned once the oxygen was renewed," said Dr Jane Lubchenco, also of OSU.
"This year may be different, however, because unlike earlier years, the living habitat was also suffocated."
Uncertain future
The researchers believe the cause of these events was changes in the intensity of the coastal winds, perhaps brought about by global warming.
"What we know from the climate change models is that the land will warm more than the sea," colleague Jack Barth told the BBC News website.
It is this difference in temperature and pressure that drives the winds.
"As you intensify that gradient - that will drive the stronger winds."
To confirm this link to climate change, the researchers say they need another 10 to 15 years of data.
In the meantime, they say, we must change our approach to managing and using these ecosystems, particularly for fish stocks.
"The most prudent course of action is to begin to think differently about what is happening," said Dr Lubchenco.
"Climate models predict increasing uncertainty with wild fluctuations. We should expect more surprises."
The research was presented at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) annual meeting in San Francisco, US.
Story from BBC NEWS:http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/6370905.stmPublished: 2007/02/17 10:12:12 GMT

World Doubts U.S. Evidence on Iran Action in Iraq

The response speaks to U.S. credibility four years after the intelligence controversy leading up to the Iraq war.... the inevitable comparisons to the since-discredited presentation that Secretary of State Colin L. Powell made to the United Nations Security Council in 2003 asserting that Iraq had illicit weapons.


NYT February 13, 2007
Skeptics Doubt U.S. Evidence on Iran Action in Iraq
The response speaks to U.S. credibility four years after the intelligence controversy leading up to the Iraq war.
By HELENE COOPER and MARK MAZZETTI
WASHINGTON, Feb. 12 — Three weeks after promising it would show proof of Iranian meddling in Iraq, the Bush administration has laid out its evidence — and received in return a healthy dose of skepticism.
The response from Congressional and other critics speaks volumes about the current state of American credibility, four years after the intelligence controversy leading up to the Iraq war. To pre-empt accusations that the charges against Iran were politically motivated, the administration rejected the idea of a high-level presentation, relying instead on military and intelligence officers to make its case in a background briefing in Baghdad.
Even so, critics have been quick to voice doubts. Representative Silvestre Reyes of Texas, the Democratic chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, suggested that the White House was more interested in sending a message to Tehran than in backing up serious allegations with proof. And David Kay, who once led the hunt for illicit weapons in Iraq, said the grave situation in Iraq should have taught the Bush administration to put more of a premium on transparency when it comes to intelligence.
“If you want to avoid the perception that you’ve cooked the books, you come out and make the charges publicly,” Mr. Kay said.
Administration officials say their approach was carefully calibrated to focus on concerns that Iran is providing potent weapons used against American troops in Iraq, not to ignite a wider war. “We’re trying to strike the right tone here,” a senior administration official said Monday. “It would have raised the rhetoric to major decibel levels if we had had a briefing in Washington.”
At the State Department, the Pentagon and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, officials had anticipated resistance to their claims. They settled on an approach that sidelined senior officials including Zalmay Khalilzad, the American ambassador to Iraq, and John D. Negroponte, who until last week was the director of national intelligence. By doing so, they avoided the inevitable comparisons to the since-discredited presentation that Secretary of State Colin L. Powell made to the United Nations Security Council in 2003 asserting that Iraq had illicit weapons.
The White House and the State Department both made clear on Monday that they endorsed the findings presented in Baghdad. Asked for direct evidence linking Iran’s leadership to the weapons, Tony Snow, the White House spokesman, said: “Let me put it this way. There’s not a whole lot of freelancing in the Iranian government, especially when its comes to something like that.”
Sean McCormack, the State Department spokesman, said: “While they presented a circumstantial case, I would put to you that it was a very strong circumstantial case. The Iranians are up to their eyeballs in this activity, I think, very clearly based on the information that was provided over the weekend in Baghdad.”
In Australia, however, Gen. Peter Pace, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters that he “would not say” that Iran’s leadership was aware of or condoned the attacks. “It is clear that Iranians are involved, and it’s clear that materials from Iran are involved, but I would not say by what I know that the Iranian government clearly knows or is complicit,” according to an account posted on the Voice of America Web site.
An Iranian government spokesman, Mohammad Ali Hosseini, has sought in denying the charges to exploit the lingering doubts about American credibility. “The United States has a long history of fabricating evidence,” Mr. Hosseini, a Foreign Ministry official, told reporters in Tehran.
The administration’s scramble over how to present its evidence started in January, after President Bush accused Iran of meddling in Iraq. Iran’s ambassador to Iraq, Hassan Kazemi Qumi, demanded that the United States present its evidence, and Mr. Khalilzad, the American ambassador in Baghdad, responded that America would “oblige him by having something done in the coming days.”
That set Bush administration officials racing to produce a briefing that would hold up to scrutiny. Military officials in Baghdad developed the first briefing, a wide-ranging dossier that contained dozens of slides about Iranian activities inside Iraq, which was then sent to Washington for review, administration officials said.
But after a careful vetting by intelligence officials, senior administration officials, including National Security Adviser Stephen J. Hadley and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, concluded that there were aspects of the briefing that could not be supported by solid intelligence. They sent the briefing back to Baghdad to be shored up, a senior official said.
The evidence that military officials presented Sunday was a stripped-down version of the original presentation, focusing almost entirely on the weapons, known as explosively formed penetrators, and the evidence that Iran is supplying the weapons to Shiite groups.
Both Democratic and Republican officials on Capitol Hill said that while they do not doubt that the weapons are being used to attack American troops, and that some of those weapons are being shipped into Iraq from Iran, they are still uncertain whether the weapons were being shipped into Iraq on the orders of Iran’s leaders.
Several experts agreed. “I’m not doubting the provenance of the weapons, but rather, the issue of what it says about Iranian policy and whether Iran’s leaders are aware of it,” said George Perkovich, a nonproliferation specialist at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington.
Philip D. Zelikow, who until December was the top aide to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, said American politics and the increased unpopularity of the war in Iraq is obscuring the larger issue of the Iran evidence, which he described as “abundant and so multifaceted.”
“People have lost their moorings,” Mr. Zelikow said. He said the administration was trying to overcome public distrust by asking, in essence, “Don’t you trust our soldiers?”
Nazila Fathi contributed reporting from Tehran.

Iran Denies Iraq Weapons Charges

"The United States has a long history in fabricating evidence. Such charges are unacceptable," Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini told reporters.

Iran Denies Iraq Weapons Charges
CBS TEHRAN, Iran, Feb. 12, 2007
(CBS/AP) Iran on Monday rejected U.S. accusations that the highest levels Iranian leadership has armed insurgents in Iraq with armor-piercing roadside bombs. "Such accusations cannot be relied upon or be presented as evidence. The United States has a long history in fabricating evidence. Such charges are unacceptable," Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini told reporters. U.S. military officials in Baghdad on Sunday accused the Iranian leadership of arming Shiite militants in Iraq with the sophisticated bombs that have killed more than 170 troops from the American-led coalition. The deadly and highly sophisticated weapons the U.S. military said it traced to Iran are known as "explosively formed penetrators," or EFPs. Three senior military officials in Baghdad said the "machining process" used in the construction of the deadly bombs had been traced to Iran. Meanwhile, a U.S. general says the Army is moving quickly to put new armor on Humvees that have become a prime target of the EFPs in Iraq. The Washington Post reports there's a shortage of armor for the vehicles at the same time they're facing a rising threat from EFPs. U.S. intelligence says the weapons are going to Shiite militias that include rogue elements of Moqtada al-Sadr's Mehdi army militia and a breakaway faction of the Badr Corps, the armed wing of a powerful Shiite party, reports CBS News chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan. Hosseini said Iran's top leaders were not intervening in Iraq and considered "any intervention in Iraq's internal affairs as a weakening of the popular Iraqi government, and we are opposed to that." The U.S. military presentation in Baghdad was the result of weeks of preparation as U.S. officials put together a package of material to support claims by the Bush administration of Iranian intercession on behalf of militant Iraqis fighting American forces. The U.S. military experts alleged that the supply trial began with Iran's Revolutionary Guards Quds Force, which they said report directly to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The U.S. officials in Baghdad claimed the EFPs, as well as Iranian-made mortar shells and rocket-propelled grenades, have been supplied to "rogue elements" of the Mahdi Army militia of anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, who is a key backer of Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. Many key government figures and members of Iraq's Shiite political leadership have deep ties to Iran, having spent decades there in exile during Saddam Hussein's rule. But Iran has repeatedly denied that it has armed the Shiite militias in the neighboring country. Hosseini also addressed another contentious issue between Washington and Tehran — Iran's nuclear program. The Foreign Ministry spokesman said Iran was ready to negotiate with the international community but would not agree to the precondition that it suspend uranium enrichment first. Iran's hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Sunday also vowed to continue moving forward with enrichment but — in a softening of his usual fiery rhetoric — said Tehran was open to dialogue. The U.S. and its allies accuse Iran of secretly developing atomic weapons, but Iran has repeatedly denied the charges, saying its program is solely for peaceful purposes. In December, the U.N. Security Council imposed limited sanctions on Iran over its refusal to roll back its nuclear program and suspend uranium enrichment. Iran faces further sanctions later this month if it does not halt enrichment.
© MMVII, CBS Interactive Inc.

CBS - Putin: U.S. Force "Almost Uncontained"

Putin told a security forum attracting top officials that "we are witnessing an almost uncontained hyper use of force in international relations" and that "one state, the United States, has overstepped its national borders in every way. "This is very dangerous, nobody feels secure anymore because nobody can hide behind international law,"

Putin: U.S. Force "Almost Uncontained"

CBS MUNICH, Germany, Feb. 10, 2007

(AP) Russian President Vladimir Putin blasted the United States Saturday for the "almost uncontained" use of force in the world, and for encouraging other countries to acquire nuclear weapons. In what his spokesman acknowledged were his harshest attacks on the U.S. since taking office in 2000, Putin also criticized U.S. plans for missile defense systems and NATO's expansion. Putin told a security forum attracting top officials that "we are witnessing an almost uncontained hyper use of force in international relations" and that "one state, the United States, has overstepped its national borders in every way. "This is very dangerous, nobody feels secure anymore because nobody can hide behind international law," Putin told the gathering. Putin did not elaborate on specifics and did not mention the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan. But he voiced concern about U.S. plans to build a missile defense system in eastern Europe — likely in Poland and the Czech Republic — and the expansion of NATO as possible challenges to Russia. On the missile defense system, Putin said: "I don't want to accuse anyone of being aggressive" but suggested it would seriously change the balance of power and could provoke an unspecified response. "That balance will be upset completely and one side will have a feeling of complete security and given a free hand in local, and probably in global, conflicts..." he said. "We need to respond to this." Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., said the charge that the U.S. "aspired to get unipolar power or acted unilaterally is just not borne out by the facts." "Even our involvement in Iraq, certainly Afghanistan, is pursuant to United Nations resolutions," Lieberman said at the conference. "So that was provocative and wrong." Asked if he had any reaction to Putin's charges, Defense Secretary Robert Gates just shook his head and said no. Putin's spokesman Dimitry Peskov said the Russian leader did not intend to be confrontational, but acknowledged it was his harshest criticism of the United States since he was elected in March 2000. Putin also criticized NATO expansion. "The process of NATO expansion has nothing to do with modernization of the alliance or with ensuring security in Europe," Putin said. "On the contrary, it is a serious factor provoking reduction of mutual trust." Putin's comments to a weekend forum attended by 250 officials, including Iranian nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani, came after German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that the international community is determined to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. Merkel said Tehran needed to accept demands made by the U.N. and the International Atomic Energy Agency. "There is no way around this," Merkel said. "What we are talking about here is a very, very sensitive technology, and for that reason we need a high degree of transparency, which Iran has failed to provide, and if Iran does not do so then the alternative for Iran is to slip further into isolation." Merkel, whose country holds the rotating European Union presidency, emphasized the international community's support for Israel and said there was a unified resolve to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons. "We are determined to prevent the threat posed by an Iranian military nuclear program," she said. The annual Munich Conference on Security Policy, now in its 43rd year, is often used as an opportunity for officials to conduct diplomacy in an informal setting. Some 3,500 police were on hand to provide tight security for the conference and kept the usual throng of demonstrators away. This year, several thousand protesters were expected, protest organizers said. Heading in to the conference, Larijani, who is scheduled to speak on Sunday, said he planned to use the conference as an opportunity to talk about Iran's nuclear program. Those would be the first talks with Western officials since limited U.N. sanctions were imposed on the country in December, which fell short of harsher measures sought by the United States. Larijani was expected to meet with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Javier Solana, the EU's chief foreign policy envoy. At the opening dinner on Friday, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni urged international solidarity in putting pressure on Iran to prevent it from producing a nuclear weapon. "It is a regime that mocks the Holocaust while threatening the world with a new one, while trying to develop a weapon to do so," she said. "Iran is a threat not only to Israel ... but to the world. The international community cannot show any hesitation ... Any hesitation on our part is being perceived as weakness." The conference this year focuses on "Global Crises — Global Responsibilities," looking at NATO's changing role, the Middle East peace process, the West's relations with Russia and the fight against terrorism. Merkel opened the conference telling the delegates that one of the major threats facing the world today is global warming, urging a combined effort to combat it. "Global warming is one of the major medium- to long-term threats that could have a dramatic effect," Merkel said. Gates, who planned to talk Sunday on trans-Atlantic relations, was expected to press allies for more troops and aid for a spring offensive in Afghanistan. He delivered the message Friday to a NATO defense minister's meeting in Seville, Spain, but got a lukewarm response. France and Germany are questioning the wisdom of sending more soldiers, while Spain, Italy and Turkey have also been wary of providing more troops.
©MMVII The Associated Press.

NYT: Putin Says U.S. Is Undermining Global Stability

The world, Mr. Putin said, is now unipolar: “One single center of power. One single center of force. One single center of decision making. This is the world of one master, one sovereign. Power amassed by any nation that assumes this ultimate global role 'destroys it from within'. It has nothing in common with democracy, of course.”

NYT February 11, 2007
Putin Says U.S. Is Undermining Global Stability
By THOM SHANKER and MARK LANDLER
MUNICH, Feb. 10 — President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia accused the United States on Saturday of provoking a new nuclear arms race by developing ballistic missile defenses, undermining international institutions, making the Middle East more unstable through its clumsy handling of the Iraq war and trying to divide modern Europe.
In an address to an international security conference, Mr. Putin dropped all diplomatic gloss to recite a long list of complaints about American domination of global affairs, included many of the themes that have strained relations between the Kremlin and the United States during his seven-year administration. Among them were the expansion of NATO into the Baltics and the perception in Russia that the West has supported groups that have toppled other governments in Moscow’s former sphere of influence.
“The process of NATO expansion has nothing to do with modernization of the alliance,” Mr. Putin said. “We have the right to ask, against whom is this expansion directed.”
He said that the United States had turned the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which sends international monitors to elections in the former Soviet sphere, “into a vulgar instrument of insuring the foreign policy interests of one country.”
The comments were the sternest yet from Mr. Putin, who has long bristled over criticism from the United States as he and his cadre of former Soviet intelligence officials have consolidated their hold on Russia’s government, energy reserves and arms-manufacturing and trading complexes. The speech may have been directed at least in part to audiences in Russia, where Mr. Putin has long enjoyed high and durable public approval ratings, in part for standing up to the West.
Rubble from the Berlin Wall was “hauled away as souvenirs” to countries that praise openness and personal freedom, he said, but “now there are attempts to impose new dividing lines and rules, maybe virtual, but still dividing our mutual continent.”
The world, Mr. Putin said, is now unipolar: “One single center of power. One single center of force. One single center of decision making. This is the world of one master, one sovereign.”
With the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, the American defense secretary, Robert M. Gates, and a Congressional delegation sitting stone-faced, Mr. Putin warned that the power amassed by any nation that assumes this ultimate global role “destroys it from within. It has nothing in common with democracy, of course.”
“Today we are witnessing an almost uncontained hyper use of force in international relations — military force,” Mr. Putin said.
“Primarily the United States has overstepped its national borders, and in every area,” Mr. Putin said, accusing Washington of political and economic offenses. But most of his critique centered on American national security policy.
American military actions, which he termed “unilateral” and “illegitimate,” also “have not been able to resolve any matters at all,” and have created only more instability and danger. “They bring us to the abyss of one conflict after another,” he said. “Political solutions are becoming impossible.”
The comments prompted sharp criticism from the Americans in attendance. Senator John McCain, the Arizona Republican widely expected to make a bid for the White House, made a rebuttal that began, “In today’s multipolar world, there is no place for needless confrontation.” He said that the United States won the cold war in partnership with power nations of western Europe, and that “there are power centers on every continent today.”
Mr. McCain then hit back at Mr. Putin more directly. “Will Russia’s autocratic turn become more pronounced, its foreign policy more opposed to the principles of the Western democracies and its energy policy used as a tool of intimidation?” Mr. McCain asked. “Moscow must understand that it cannot enjoy a genuine partnership with the West so long as its actions, at home and abroad, conflict fundamentally with the core values of the Euro-Atlantic democracies.”
Russia has also faced criticism from the United States and other Western countries that believe it has used energy reserves and transport pipelines to reward friendly countries and to punish those seeking to distance themselves from Kremlin control. Some analysts saw the tone of the speech as evidence of just how strong oil and mineral revenues have made Mr. Putin.
Mr. Putin opened his speech at the Munich Conference on Security Policy with an apology for the tough talk to come. But during a lively question and answer period full of challenges and rebukes, the Russian president indicated that he relished provoking the international audience of legislators, government leaders, political analysts and human rights advocates.
“I love it,” Mr. Putin said as he reviewed a long list of questions.
He did offer at least two significant and conciliatory statements to the United States.
President Bush “is a decent man, and one can do business with him,” he said. From their meetings and discussions, Mr. Putin said, he has heard the American president say, “I assume Russia and the United States will never be enemies, and I agree.”
And while Mr. Putin denied that Russia had assisted the Iranian military with significant arms transfers, he also criticized the government in Tehran for not cooperating more with the United Nation’s nuclear watchdog agency or responding to questions about its nuclear program.
Other American lawmakers offered measured criticism after the speech. “He’s done more to bring Europe and the U.S. together than any single event in the last several years,” said Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina. “It was seen as unnecessary bravado.”
Senator Joseph Lieberman, an independent from Connecticut, described the speech as “confrontational,” saying “some of the rhetoric takes us back to the cold war.”
Iran’s top nuclear official, Ali Larijani, listened impassively from the back of the room. Mr. Larijani’s attendance at the conference had become a sideshow in itself. After accepting an invitation to speak on Sunday, he canceled, citing health reasons, after a tense meeting with the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna that concluded with a decision to freeze technical cooperation projects.
Mr. Putin joked that he worried the United States was “hiding extra warheads under the pillow” despite its treaties with Moscow to reduce strategic nuclear stockpiles. And he indicated obliquely that the new Russian ballistic missile, known as the Topol-M, was being developed at least in part in response to American efforts to field missile defenses.
He expressed alarm that an effective antimissile shield over the United States would upset a system of mutual fear that kept the nuclear peace throughout the cold war. “That means the balance will be upset, completely upset,” Mr. Putin said.
Addressing tensions between Europe and Russia over energy exports, Mr. Putin noted that 26 percent of Russian oil was extracted by foreign companies. While Russia open to outside investment, he said, it has found its businessmen blocked from deals abroad.
The Kremlin has been criticized for attempting to impose registration and taxation laws that could restrict the work of foreign nongovernmental organizations with offices in Russia to develop democratization.
But Mr. Putin said his concerns about the work grew from the fact that they “are used as channels for funding, and those funds are provided by governments of other countries.” This flow of foreign money to assist opposition Russian political organizations, he said, is “hidden from our society. What is democratic about this? This is not about democracy. This is about one country influencing another.”
Mrs. Merkel, in her opening speech, struck a far more diplomatic tone than Mr. Putin, though she alluded to the tensions between Europe and Russia over energy shipments and the independence of Kosovo.
Addressing herself to Mr. Putin, sitting in the front row, Mrs. Merkel said, “In my talks with you, I have sensed that Russia is going to be a reliable and predictable partner.” But she added, “We need to speak frankly with each other. There’s no point in sweeping things under the carpet.”
Mrs. Merkel sharply criticized Russia’s recent shutdown of an oil shipments to Belarus, which followed a dispute over the price of natural gas deliveries. She is pressing Russia to sign a charter with the European Union that governs energy, which Moscow has so far resisted.
Mrs. Merkel also alluded to another potential confrontation between Europe and Russia. The United Nations is weighing a proposal that would put Kosovo on the path to independence from Serbia, which Russia opposes because it fears that such a move could upset its own turbulent relations with ethnic groups in the Caucasus. Russia has crushed one separatist-minded people within its own borders, in Chechnya, but supports breakaway regions in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, both of which are in Georgia.
“We’re going to come to the stage where we have to decide: does Serbia, does Kosovo want to move in the European direction?” Mrs. Merkel asked. “If that’s the route they choose, both will have to make compromises.”
C. J. Chivers contributed reporting from Moscow

Troubles Grow for a University Built on Profits

This kind of profit don't make no lick of sense!

"But its reputation is fraying as prominent educators, students and some of its own former administrators say the relentless pressure for higher profits, at a university that gets more federal student financial aid than any other, has eroded academic quality."

NYT February 11, 2007
Troubles Grow for a University Built on Profits
By SAM DILLON
PHOENIX — The University of Phoenix became the nation’s largest private university by delivering high profits to investors and a solid, albeit low-overhead, education to midcareer workers seeking college degrees.
But its reputation is fraying as prominent educators, students and some of its own former administrators say the relentless pressure for higher profits, at a university that gets more federal student financial aid than any other, has eroded academic quality.
According to federal statistics and government audits, the university relies more on part-time instructors than all but a few other postsecondary institutions, and its accelerated academic schedule races students through course work in about half the time of traditional universities. The university says that its graduation rate, using the federal standard, is 16 percent, which is among the nation’s lowest, according to Department of Education data. But the university has dozens of campuses, and at many, the rate is even lower.
In an interview, William J. Pepicello, the university’s new president, defended its academic quality and said it met the needs of working students who had been largely ignored by traditional colleges.
But many students say they have had infuriating experiences at the university before dropping out, contributing to the poor graduation rate. In recent interviews, current and former students in Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Texas and Washington who studied at University of Phoenix campuses in those states or online complained of instructional shortcuts, unqualified professors and recruiting abuses. Many of their comments echoed experiences reported by thousands of other students on consumer Web sites.
The complaints have built through months of turmoil. The president resigned, as did the chief executive and other top officers at the Apollo Group, the university’s parent corporation. A federal court reinstated a lawsuit accusing the university of fraudulently obtaining hundreds of millions of dollars in financial aid. The university denies wrongdoing. Apollo stock fell so far that in November, CNBC featured it on a “Biggest Losers” segment. The stock has since gained back some ground. In November, the Intel Corporation excluded the university from its tuition reimbursement program, saying it lacked top-notch accreditation.
It adds up to a damaging turnaround for an institution that rocketed from makeshift origins here in 1976 to become the nation’s largest private university, with 300,000 students on campuses in 39 states and online. Its fortunes are closely watched because it is the giant of for-profit postsecondary education; it received $1.8 billion in federal student aid in 2004-5.
“Wall Street has put them under inordinate pressure to keep up the profits, and my take on it is that they succumbed to that,” said David W. Breneman, dean of the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia. “They seem to have really stumbled.”
In the interview, Dr. Pepicello shrugged off the bad news. Many top corporations still pay for employees to attend the university, he said, and the exodus of top officials has resulted from a healthy search for new directions. “We are reinventing ourselves,” Dr. Pepicello said.
The government measures graduation rates as the percentage of first-time undergraduates who obtain a degree within six years. On average across all American universities, the rate is 55 percent. Dr. Pepicello said this was a poor yardstick for comparing other universities with his, which serves mostly older students who started college elsewhere. Alongside the 16 percent rate, the university Web site also publishes a 59 percent graduation rate, but that is based on nonstandard calculations and does not allow comparison with other universities, he said. The official rates at some University of Phoenix campuses are extremely low — 6 percent at the Southern California campus, 4 percent among online students — and he acknowledged extraordinary attrition among younger students.
“We have not done as good a job as we could,” he said, adding that the university was creating tutoring and other services to help keep students.
“The university takes quality in the classroom seriously,” he said. The university brings a low-overhead approach not only to its campuses, most of which are office buildings near freeways, but also to its academic model. About 95 percent of instructors are part-time, according to federal statistics, compared with an average of 47 percent across all universities. Most have full-time day jobs. Courses are written at university headquarters, easing class preparation time for instructors.
The College Board reports the university’s annual tuition and fees as $9,630, about half the average at private four-year colleges and twice that of four-year public colleges.
Students take one course at a time, online or in evening classes, which meet for four hours, once a week, for five or six weeks, depending on degree level. As a result, students spend 20 to 24 hours with an instructor during each course, compared with about 40 hours at a traditional university. The university also requires students to teach one another by working on projects for four or five hours per week in what it calls “learning teams.”
Government auditors in 2000 ruled that this schedule fell short of the minimum time required for federal aid programs, and the university paid a $6 million settlement. But in 2002, the Department of Education relaxed its requirements, and the university’s stripped-down schedule is an attractive feature for many adults eager to obtain a university degree while working. But critics say it leaves courses with little meat.
“Their business degree is an M.B.A. Lite,” said Henry M. Levin, a professor of higher education at Teachers College at Columbia University. “I’ve looked at their course materials. It’s a very low level of instruction.”
In November, the university’s reliance on part-time faculty caused a problem with Intel, hundreds of whose employees it has educated. Alan Fisher, an Intel manager, said the company had decided to pay for employees to attend only highly accredited programs. Although Phoenix is regionally accredited, it lacks approval from the most prestigious accrediting agency for business schools, the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business.
John J. Fernandes, the association’s president, said the university had never applied. “They’re smart enough to understand their chances of approval would be low,” Mr. Fernandes said. “They have a lot of come-and-go faculty. We like institutions where the faculty is stable and can ensure that students are being educated by somebody who knows what they’re doing.”
Dr. Pepicello defended the effectiveness of the faculty, saying instructors were carefully certified.
Most educators acknowledge that the university has helped traditional institutions recognize the needs of older students.
Some of the university’s detractors suggest that it has always relied too much on part-time faculty and raced too quickly through course material. Others say the university’s academic program was once better but has deteriorated in breakneck expansion — it has opened 50 campuses in a decade. Today, even a cursory Internet search will turn up criticism on sites like ripoffreport.com and uopexperience.com.
“Phoenix claims that 95 percent of their students are satisfied, but the reports we get indicate otherwise,” said James R. Hood, founder of a similar site, consumeraffairs.com.
Many reports follow a similar pattern. Students say they liked recruiters’ descriptions of the classes, but after enrolling concluded that they were learning too little or paying too much. Many who quit say they were left with huge debts.
Robert Wancha, 42, a former National Guard commander who is pursuing a bachelor’s degree in information technology at the university’s Detroit campus, said that in a computer course last fall his instructor, Christopher G. Stanglewicz, had boasted that he had a doctorate but did little teaching, instead assigning students to work in learning teams while he toyed with his computer.
Mr. Stanglewicz, reached at his home, acknowledged that he had covered only a fraction of the syllabus , partly, he said, because the university required him to cram too much information into too few sessions.
“Students get overwhelmed,” he said. Mr. Stanglewicz asserted in the interview that he had earned a doctorate in economics from the University of Kentucky. But the authorities there said his name was not in their records. (Dr. Pepicello said that Mr. Stanglewicz had never told the university that he had a doctorate, and that he was qualified to teach.)
Not all students are critics. Yvonne-Louise Catino, 43, of Bloomington, Minn., who is studying online for a doctorate, said she believed she was getting a rigorous education. In a week, Ms. Catino said, she might read eight journal articles and write several essays. “I love the online environment,” she said, “being able to direct where I want to go.”
But some students said their early enthusiasm had soured.
Stacey Clark, 32, an office manager in East Wenatchee, Wash., enrolled in online courses in April and was delighted to receive A’s in her first courses, she said. Later, Ms. Clark decided her instructors were too disengaged to criticize her work. One returned a 2,500-word essay on performance-enhancing drugs with an A but not one comment, she said.
“You’re not learning from an actual teacher, you’re teaching yourself,” Ms. Clark said.
Many students accuse recruiters of misleading them, and the university’s legal troubles trace back to similar accusations of recruitment abuses. In 2003, two enrollment counselors in California filed a whistle-blower lawsuit in federal court accusing the university of paying them based on how many students they enrolled, a violation of a federal rule.
After the lawsuit was filed, the Department of Education sent inspectors to California and Arizona campuses. The department’s report, which became public in 2004, concluded that the university had provided incentives to recruit unqualified students and “systematically operates in a duplicitous manner.”
The university paid $9.8 million to settle the matter, while admitting no wrongdoing. But the department’s searing portrait of academic abuse aroused skepticism among many educators.
Dr. Breneman was finishing a chapter on the university in a book he helped edit when he read the report in 2004. He said he found it “credible and compelling.”
When the book, “Earnings from Learning: the Rise of For-Profit Universities,” was published last year, it said the university’s academic model was convenient for working students, but included a “cautionary note” saying the recruiting scandal had raised “disturbing questions.”
Those questions are likely to dog the university as it defends itself in the lawsuit, which a district court had dismissed but an appellate court reinstated in September. The university could be forced to repay hundreds of millions of dollars if it loses. It asked the Supreme Court last month to review the appellate ruling, arguing that an adverse outcome in the lawsuit could expose it to “potentially bankrupting liability.”

'Doomsday' vault design unveiled

The vault aims to safeguard the world's agriculture from future catastrophes, such as nuclear war, asteroid strikes and climate change.

'Doomsday' vault design unveiled
By Mark Kinver Science and nature reporter, BBC News
The final design for a "doomsday" vault that will house seeds from all known varieties of food crops has been unveiled by the Norwegian government.
The Svalbard International Seed Vault will be built into a mountainside on a remote island near the North Pole.
The vault aims to safeguard the world's agriculture from future catastrophes, such as nuclear war, asteroid strikes and climate change.
Construction begins in March, and the seed bank is scheduled to open in 2008.
The Norwegian government is paying the $5m (£2.5m) construction costs of the vault, which will have enough space to house three million seed samples.
The collection and maintenance of the collection is being organised by the Global Crop Diversity Trust, which has responsibility of ensuring the "conservation of crop diversity in perpetuity".
"We want a safety net because we do not want to take too many chances with crop biodiversity," said Cary Fowler, the Trust's executive director.
"Can you imagine an effective, efficient, sustainable response to climate change, water shortages, food security issues without what is going to go in the vault - it is the raw material of agriculture."
Future proof
The seed vault will be built 120m (364ft) inside a mountain on Spitsbergen, one of four islands that make up Svalbard.
Dr Fowler said Svalbard, 1,000km (621 miles) north of mainland Norway, was chosen as the location for the vault because it was very remote and it also offered the level of stability required for the long-term project.
"We looked very far into the future. We looked at radiation levels inside the mountain, and we looked at the area's geological structure," he told BBC News.
"We also modelled climate change in a drastic form 200 years into future, which included the melting of ice sheets at the North and South Poles, and Greenland, to make sure that this site was above the resulting water level."
By building the vault deep inside the mountain, the surrounding permafrost would continue to provide natural refrigeration if the mechanical system failed, explained Dr Fowler.
'Living Fort Knox'
The Arctic vault will act as a back-up store for a global network of seed banks financially supported by the trust.
Dr Fowler said that a proportion of the seeds housed at these banks would be deposited at Svalbard, which will act as a "living Fort Knox".
Although the vault was designed to protect the specimens from catastrophic events, he added that it could also be used to replenish national seed banks.
"One example happened in September when a typhoon ripped through the Philippines and destroyed its seed bank," Dr Fowler recalled.
"The storm brought two feet of water and mud into the bank, and that is the last thing you want in a seed bank."
Low maintenance
Once inside the vault, the samples will be stored at -18C (0F). The length of time that seeds kept in a frozen state maintain their ability to germinate depends on the species.
Some crops, such as peas, may only survive for 20-30 years. Others, such as sunflowers and grain crops, are understood to last for many decades or even hundreds of years.
Once the collection has been established at Svalbard, Dr Fowler said the facility would operate with very little human intervention.
"Somebody will go up there once every year to physically check inside to see that everything is OK, but there will be no full-time staff," he explained.
"If you design a facility to be used in worst-case scenarios, then you cannot actually have too much dependency on human beings."
Story from BBC NEWS:http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/6335899.stmPublished: 2007/02/09 00:11:48 GMT