Unqualified Offerings

By Thoreau
Greenwald reports on the most fascinating of prosecutions:  The Bush administration is seeking a prison sentence of 147 years for the son of former Liberian President Charles Taylor, for his involvement with torture.
This is the sort of case that sets precedents, precedents that might just be USEFUL….  Perhaps the sentence should be hanging?
EDIT:  To [...]

By Thoreau
I’ve been reading some of the bloggers over at ScienceBlogs lately, talking about issues for early career scientists. There is a lot of discussion of how fiercely competitive and demanding a career in science is, and by “science” they mean “tenure track professor at a research university.” If you go into any [...]

How to cite graffiti scrawled on bathroom walls and other sources in your formal paper.
Totally stolen from Sidelights.

By Thoreau
You know how musicians are always being asked to give their uninformed opinions on politics and technology and medical advances and social issues and religion and, well, everything else under the sun?  Commenter dhex decided that he should balance this by asking for a physicist’s uninformed opinions on music.
Because, you see, I don’t have [...]

By Thoreau
Here’s a nice sauce that I found a recipe for in Bon Appetit:
Remove the stem and seeds from 4 large dried New Mexico chilis.  Put them in a small sauce pan with 3/4 cup vegetable broth and bring to boil.  Reduce heat, and simmer 5 minutes.  Put broth and chilis in food process with [...]

1. It does seem cheap that New England will miss the playoffs with an 11-5 record.
2. Ben!
3. So looking at this year’s passer ratings, it seems like 85 is the new 80, the number below which a quarterback ought to feel abashed.

I think Tyler Cowen may be right about this:
Note that under standard theory neither monetary nor fiscal policy will set right the basic problems from negative real shocks and indeed the U.S. economy is undergoing a series of massive sectoral shifts.  That includes a move out of construction, a move out of finance, a move [...]

By Thoreau
World chocolate supplies are threatened by disease and deforestation.  That’s it, I’m switching fields and becoming a full-time cacao tree disease researcher!
All hyperbole aside, the article mentions an interesting dilemma:
So the peasant farmers who dominate cacao production are expanding the area of cacao, mainly by slashing and burning patches of rainforest. This releases nutrients, [...]

By Thoreau
1)  The CIA is funding uprisings in Afghanistan:
The Afghan chieftain looked older than his 60-odd years, and his bearded face bore the creases of a man burdened with duties as tribal patriarch and husband to four younger women. His visitor, a CIA officer, saw an opportunity, and reached into his bag for a small [...]

By Thoreau
Remember the rumors that Obama was a Muslim?  Then remember how his actual Achilles heel turned out to be a fairly radical black Christian minister?  Then remember how the Muslim rumors resurfaced?  Well, now he’s in trouble for asking a white conservative Christian minister to pray at the inauguration.
I’ll leave it to others to [...]