Freedom's Phoenix Top Stories

A simple act of kindness, creates an endless ripple!

Sun, 19 Oct 2014 13:44:21 GMT

Read more on this subject: Positive News
News Story Source: http://www.dailypaul.com, by DZdownUnder
A touching video that goes along with this recent post, http://www.dailypaul.com/327892/positive-propaganda I think this is the only thing that has the power to save the world - Love!
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The Politicians Are Scaring You Again

Sun, 19 Oct 2014 13:41:47 GMT

Read more on this subject: WAR
News Story Source: http://fff.org, by Sheldon Richman
When will the American people learn? If in a republic the people are the ultimate check on government power, a gullible, easily frightened public is a disaster waiting to happen. Where is the derisive skepticism Americans are reputed to feel toward politicians? A high-ranking official and, say, CNN's Christiane Amanpour need only say "Boogeyman!" and Americans line up for orders. "Americans are increasingly concerned that ISIS represents a direct terror threat, fearful that ISIS agents are living in the United States, according to a new CNN/ORC International poll. Most now support military action against the terrorist group," CNN reported in September. "Seven in 10 Americans believe ISIS has the resources to launch an attack against the United States."
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Hydros HY-X flying yacht features retractable hydrofoils

Sun, 19 Oct 2014 13:39:05 GMT

Read more on this subject: Transportation
News Story Source: http://www.gizmag.com, By C.C. Weiss
Major shows like Cannes and Monaco have hosted several retractable hydrofoils, including the shape-shifting Kormaran and the Sunreef 40 H. Now, Swiss hydrofoil outfit Hydros has demonstrated its HY-X, the prototype of an eventual 41-foot (12.5-m) yacht that will be able to motor across the water or fly above it. It would seem that the race is on to get the first 40-foot retractable luxury hydrofoil on the water, as Hydros' planned boat is a mere foot longer than the design previewed by Sunreef. So far, Hydos is winning, having wowed the boat show crowds with the working HY-X prototype, rather than just a rendering. The design uses a retractable hydrofoil system developed in cooperation with French firm JMKoncept. The two side foils can be deployed into the water at the push of a button, lifting the boat about a meter (3.3 ft) above the surface for reduced drag, higher speeds and improved efficiency.
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Sun, 19 Oct 2014 12:35:50 GMT

Read more on this subject: Military
News Story Source: NYT - via ZERO HEDGE
WASHINGTON — It has been nearly half a century since a young antiwar protester named Tom Hayden traveled to Hanoi to investigate President Lyndon B. Johnson's claims that the United States was not bombing civilians in Vietnam. Mr. Hayden saw destroyed villages and came away, he says, "pretty wounded by the pattern of deception." Now the Pentagon — run by a Vietnam veteran, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel — is planning a 50th anniversary commemoration of the Vietnam War. The effort, which is expected to cost taxpayers nearly $15 million by the end of this fiscal year, is intended to honor veterans and, its website says, "provide the American public with historically accurate materials" suitable for use in schools. But the extensive website, which has been up for months, largely describes a war of valor and honor that would be unrecognizable to many of the Americans who fought in and against it. Leading Vietnam histor
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Russia: On the Right Side of History

Sun, 19 Oct 2014 11:15:20 GMT

Read more on this subject: WAR
Feature Article by Stephen Lendman
Russia: On the Right Side of History by Stephen Lendman Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov's comments reflect Russia's position on geopolitical issues. Especially major ones mattering most. He explained them following discussions days earlier with John Kerry and French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius in Paris. He's a world-class diplomat. He embarrasses his Western counterparts. They're no match for his forthrightness. Straight talk. Candor. Telling it like it is. Explaining what everyone needs to know. Paul Craig Roberts is right calling Russia the world's moral leader. At a time America descends into tyranny. Waging war on humanity. At home and abroad. Risking the unthinkable. Possible global war. Nuclear war. Mushroom cloud denouement. Neocons infest Washington. They've been around for decades. Political and military ones. Advocating permanent wars. Wanting all US rivals eliminated. Obama serves their interests. He gives rogue leadership n
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Turning up the heat to make kelp a viable source of biofuel

Sun, 19 Oct 2014 03:42:16 GMT

Read more on this subject: Biofuel
News Story Source: http://www.gizmag.com
That's why some scientists have looked to seaweed as a feedstock. Kelp is particularly attractive, in that it's abundant and grows extremely quickly, although its fuel yields haven't been particularly impressive. That could be about to change, however, thanks to a newly-developed hydrothermal process. Khanh-Quang Tran, an associate professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), has been experimenting with heating kelp very quickly. More specifically, Tran and his team put a slurry of kelp biomass and water in sealed drinking-straw-like vessels known as quartz capillary reactors, then heated those reactors to 350º C (662º F) at a rate of 585º C (1,085º F) per minute, and held them at that temperature for 15 minutes. A variation on a process known as hydrothermal liquefaction, the technique resulted in 79 percent of the biomass being converted into bio-oil. A previous UK study also explored the hydrothermal liquefaction of th
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Gitmo force-feeding manual reveals gruesome practices

Sat, 18 Oct 2014 21:56:21 GMT

Read more on this subject: Guantanamo Bay
News Story Source: aljazeera.com
Last week the U.S. government submitted to the District Court in Washington, D.C., the most recent standard operating procedures (SOPs) for force-feeding in the Guantanamo Bay detention facility. What remains of the documents, after redactions, is a shameful exercise in doublespeak that attempts to disguise what is really happening in the prison. The SOPs were submitted in a case brought by Abu Wa'el Dhiab, an inmate represented by Reprieve, the international human rights organization that I head. Dhiab is a 43-year-old Syrian and father of four who has been held without trial or charge in Guantanamo for 12 years. The U.S. government told Dhiab four years ago that he was cleared for release, and yet to this day he remains behind bars. In a last resort to get back to his wife and children, he, along with many others, embarked on a hunger strike. His case concerns the manner in which that entirely legitimate hunger strike has been brutally opposed by the prison authorities.
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Earth's Magnetic Field Could Flip Faster Than We Thought

Sat, 18 Oct 2014 21:51:30 GMT

Read more on this subject: Science, Medicine and Technology
News Story Source: popsci.com
Pole Positions. The 'north pole' — that is, the direction of magnetic north — was reversed a million years ago. Starting about 789,000 years ago, the north pole wandered around Antarctica for three thousand years before flipping to the orientation we know today, with the pole somewhere in the Arctic. UC Berkeley The magnetic poles of the earth have switched back and forth many, many times during the 4.54 billion years that the Earth has been around. Previous research suggested that the process of reversing the poles took place over a long time period, potentially over a few thousand years. But new research shows that the reversal could actually happen much faster than that, with the magnetic North Pole migrating to the South Pole in a time span as short as a century. Researchers at the University of California at Berkeley dated ancient lake sediments in Italy that recorded the last magnetic reversal, which occurred 786,000 years ago. Their findings
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Squinting at Vietnam War

Sat, 18 Oct 2014 21:51:24 GMT

Read more on this subject: WAR: About that War
News Story Source: http://www.washingtontimes.com, By Bruce Fein
More by omission than commission, the Pentagon's war narrative neglects key lessons: The executive chronically concocts or inflates danger from abroad to justify purposeless, objectless wars; the military should balk at unwinnable conflicts; and the first casualties of war are truth and civil liberties. If these lessons are not learned, we will continue to repeat the obscene folly of the gratuitous Vietnam War deaths ad infinitum. As philosopher George Santyana taught, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." Congress authorized the commemoration in 2008. It adopted a bill that directed the Pentagon to "coordinate, support, and facilitate" federal, state, and local programs associated with the 50th anniversary of the war. In 2012, President Barack Obama issued a proclamation establishing a 13-year program "in recognition of a chapter in our nation's history which must never be forgotten." The Pentagon's commemor
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Lockheed's Fusion Promise: What We Know So Far

Sat, 18 Oct 2014 21:48:23 GMT

Read more on this subject: Energy
News Story Source: popsci.com
Researchers at Lockheed Martin made headlines this week with the announcement that they are on the fast track to building a nuclear fusion reactor. But experts responded with skepticism. Fusion promises unlimited clean, renewable energy without the nasty byproducts of the uranium-splitting fission that drives today's nuclear plants. The problem is figuring out how to contain it. For hydrogen atoms to smash together with enough force to fuse, they must jitter and bounce with many times the heat of the sun's core. Tom McGuire, the Lockheed project lead, tells Popular Science their reactor will run at 200 million degrees. Matter that hot leaves the simple world of solids, liquids, and gasses to form a plasma. No solid vessel will contain that material, so fusion generators resort to suspending the roiling mass with powerful electromagnets.
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History of Key Document in IAEA Probe Suggests Israeli Forgery

Sat, 18 Oct 2014 21:47:23 GMT

Read more on this subject: Iran
News Story Source: http://original.antiwar.com, by Gareth Porter
But the document not only remains unverified but can only be linked to Iran by a far-fetched official account marked by a series of coincidences related to a foreign scientist that that are highly suspicious. The original appearance of the document in early 2008, moreover, was not only conveniently timed to support Israel's attack on a U.S. National Intelligence Estimate on Iran in December that was damaging to Israeli interests, but was leaked to the news media with a message that coincided with the current Israeli argument. The IAEA has long touted the document, which came from an unidentified member state, as key evidence justifying suspicion that Iran has covered up past nuclear weapons work. In its September 2008 report the IAEA said the document describes "experimentation in connection with symmetrical initiation of a hemispherical high explosive charge suitable for an implosion type nuclear device."
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Video: Laser Beam Makes Falling Droplets Explode

Sat, 18 Oct 2014 21:46:12 GMT

Read more on this subject: Science, Medicine and Technology
News Story Source: popsci.com

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The Space Station Is Getting A UPS-Style Shipping Service

Sat, 18 Oct 2014 21:43:08 GMT

Read more on this subject: Space Travel and Exploration
News Story Source: popsci.com
It's easy to forget that the International Space Station isn't just a place for astronauts to hang out and take epic selfies. Because of its unique microgravity environment, the station is actually a valuable hub for research and development, housing hundreds of ongoing experiments that involve everything from human tissue growth to protein crystal formation. Except there's one little snag when it comes to conducting experiments on the ISS: It's kind of far away. Getting critical samples from the station to Earth can be a lengthy process, and researchers usually have to wait anywhere from six months to a year before samples can make the trip to laboratories on the ground. These long waits can be risky, as live biological samples have a perishable lifespan and often need to be reviewed quickly before they degrade.
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What 'Democracy' Really Means in U.S. and New York Times Jargon: Latin America Edition

Sat, 18 Oct 2014 21:40:40 GMT

Read more on this subject: MEDIA (MainStreamMedia - aka MSM)
News Story Source: https://firstlook.org, By Glenn Greenwald
Rather than describe that coup as what it was by definition - a direct attack on democracy by a foreign power and domestic military which disliked the popularly elected president – the Times, in the most Orwellian fashion imaginable, literally celebrated the coup as a victory for democracy: With yesterday's resignation of President Hugo Chavez, Venezuelan democracy is no longer threatened by a would-be dictator. Mr. Chavez, a ruinous demagogue, stepped down after the military intervened and handed power to a respected business leader, Pedro Carmona. Thankfully, said the NYT, democracy in Venezuela was no longer in danger . . . because the democratically-elected leader was forcibly removed by the military and replaced by an unelected, pro-U.S. "business leader." The Champions of Democracy at the NYT then demanded a ruler more to their liking: "Venezuela urgently needs a leader with a strong
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What Happens After Someone Survives Ebola?

Sat, 18 Oct 2014 21:38:26 GMT

Read more on this subject: Science, Medicine and Technology
News Story Source: popsci.com
While most of the recent coverage of the ongoing Ebola outbreak has focused on rising death tolls and a few infected U.S. citizens, other segments of the population have passed mostly unnoticed from the harsh glare of the media spotlight: Survivors, and those who are seemingly immune to Ebola. People who survive Ebola can lead normal lives post-recovery, though occasionally they can suffer inflammatory conditions of the joints afterwards, according to CBS. Recovery times can vary, and so can the amount of time it takes for the virus to clear out of the system. The World Health Organization found that the virus can reside in semen for up to seven weeks after recovery. Survivors are generally assumed to be immune to the particular strain they are infected by, and are able to help tend to others infected with the same strain. What isn't clear is whether or not a person is immune to other strains of Ebola, or if their immunity will last.
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