DBKP Today in Weird History: February 24, 2008

WAR, TERRORISM, DISASTER, NAZIS, POLITICS, REBELS, STRONGMEN, INJUSTICE, HUSTLER, SUPREME COURT, BULLS, GESTURES, CRUSH, FINALLY, PARADES, ARRESTS, ICE, PROGRESS, JEWS, DIETS, PIGS, HUH, FINANCE, ASSASSINATED, BLIMPS, BORN, BIRTHDAYS, DEATH


1868 the House of Representatives impeached President Andrew Johnson following his attempted dismissal of Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton; Johnson was later acquitted by the Senate.

WAR!

1917 German plan to get Mexican help in WWI exposed (Zimmerman telegram).

1945 Egypt & Syria declares war on Nazi-Germany.

1968 US troops reconquer Hue Vietnam.

2003 Seeking U.N. approval for war against Iraq, the United States, Britain and Spain submitted a resolution to the Security Council declaring that Saddam Hussein had missed "the final opportunity" to disarm peacefully and indicating that he had to face the consequences.

TERRORISM

2007 A suicide truck bomber struck worshippers leaving a Sunni mosque in Habbaniyah, 50 miles west of Baghdad, killing at least 52 people.

DISASTER

1989 US Boeing 747 loses parts of roof over Pacific, 9 die.

PIGS

1979 Highest price ever paid for a pig, $42,500, Stamford TX.

HUH?

1989 Margaret Ray found in David Letterman's home, claims to be his wife.

BLIMPS

1997 South Africa announces it is constructing largest modern day blimp.

FINANCE

1995 Dow-Jones hits record 4011.74.

DIETS

1981 Jean Harris is convicted of murdering Scarsdale diet doctor Tarnower.

PROGRESS

1938 Du Pont begins commercial production of nylon toothbrush bristles.

PARADE

1868 1st US parade with floats (Mardi Gras-Mobile AL).

ICE

1925 Thermit explosive 1st used to break up ice jam, Waddington NY.

ARRESTS

1923 Mass arrests in US of Mafia.

JEWS

1949 Israel & Egypt sign an armistice agreement.

CRUSH

1807 17 die & 15 wounded in a crush to witness execution of Holloway, Heggerty & Elizabeth Godfrey in England.

FINALLY

1855 US Court of Claims established for cases against the government.

DISASTERS

2003 A powerful earthquake in China's western region of Xinjiang killed at least 268 people and injured more than 1,000.

BULLS

1582 Pope Gregory XIII issued a papal bull, or edict, outlining his calendar reforms. (The Gregorian Calendar is the calendar in general use today).

GESTURES

2007 The Virginia General Assembly passed a resolution expressing "profound regret" for the state's role in slavery.

SUPREME COURT

1803 in its Marbury v. Madison decision, the Supreme Court 1st rules a law unconstitutional and established judicial review of the constitutionality of statutes.

INJUSTICE

1983 a congressional commission released a report condemning the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II as a "grave injustice."

REBELS

1821, Mexican rebels proclaimed the "Plan de Iguala," their declaration of independence from Spain.

POLITICS

1863 Arizona was organized as a territory.

NAZIs

1920 a fledgling German political party held its first meeting of importance in Munich; it became known as the Nazi Party, and its chief spokesman was Adolf Hitler.

STRONGMEN

1946 Argentinians went to the polls to elect Juan D. Peron their president.

HUSTLER

1988 in a ruling that expanded legal protections for parody and satire, the Supreme Court overturned a $200,000 award that the Rev. Jerry Falwell had won against Hustler magazine and publisher Larry Flynt.

ASSASSINATED

1945 Ahmed Maher Pasha Egypt's PM, assassinated in parliament.

BORN

1874 Honus Wagner HOF shortstop (Pittsburgh Pirates, 1900-17).

BIRTHDAYS

Actor Abe Vigoda is 87. Actor Steven Hill is 86. Actor-singer Dominic Chianese is 77. Movie composer Michel Legrand is 76. Actor James Farentino is 70. Actor Barry Bostwick is 63. Actor Edward James Olmos is 61. Singer-writer-producer Rupert Holmes is 61. Rock singer-musician George Thorogood is 58. Actress Debra Jo Rupp is 57. Actress Helen Shaver is 57. Apple CEO Steve Jobs is 53. News anchor Paula Zahn is 52. Country singer Sammy Kershaw is 50. Singer Michelle Shocked is 46. Movie director Todd Field is 44. Actor Billy Zane is 42. Actress Bonnie Somerville is 34. Rhythm-and-blues singer Brandon Brown (Mista) is 25.

DEATH

1983 Tennessee Williams US playwright (Cat on a Hot Tin Roof), dies at 71.

1994 Dinah Shore singer (Chevrolet), dies of cancer at 76.

1998 Henny Youngman, a tireless comic who quipped "Take my wife — please" and countless other one-liners during a career that spanned seven decades, died in New York City at age 91. "I once wanted to become an atheist but I gave up ... they have no holidays."

February 24, the 55th day of 2008. There are 311 days left in the year.

by Mondoreb
image: teachpol
Source:
* Today in History
* Today in History



Death by 1000 Papercuts Front Page.

Global Warming: Skeptics Shiver Throughout the South and Midwest

Carbon footprints buried in Ice, Snow



The forces of man-made climate change continue to wreck havoc with mankind.

This week, it's in the Midwest, South and parts of the West.

How long will it take the United Nations to pass a resolution calling on the U.S. Congress to tax somebody--anybody--to stop this madness.

With cold weather being blamed on global warming, thousands in the U.S. are stranded and shivering, left to ponder the folly of the continued use of fossil fuels.

COLORADO

Rescue crews riding snowmobiles and Sno-Cats delivered urgently needed food and medical supplies today to 17 Park County homes where residents have been stranded in their homes for a week by snow and high winds that have made rural roads impassable.

About 50 search and rescue team members from Jefferson, Clear Creek and Arapahoe counties aided Park County officials in reaching people in areas where blizzardlike conditions on the ground have sealed in residents. About 100 people have been stranded at their homes since Super Bowl Sunday when a series of storms pounded the area, repeatedly dropping between two to 10 inches of snow.

Officials are hoping the governor declares a state of emergency for Park County so it can get larger plows to clear roads of mountains of snow that has fallen in the area.

The county has seven large plows, but officials hope to use specialized snow-moving equipment from the Colorado Department of Transportation if an emergency is declared. The county's Office of Emergency Management was activated Monday.

Officials said that at least 7 feet of snow has collected in some parts of the county since Thanksgiving. High winds and strong storms have made matters worse.

WISCONSIN

Today's predicted snowfall won 't simply be the 41st day of measurable snow accumulation this winter.

If, as the National Weather Service is forecasting, another 3 to 5 inches of snow falls on southern Wisconsin by the time the storm blows through Tuesday morning, it will put the winter of 2007-08 into the record books as Madison 's snowiest.

Or as some weary residents might call it, the most cursed.

CHICAGO

Ice and snow on the roads prompted Greyhound to cancel dozens of trips, stranding about 100 Greyhound bus passengers overnight in Chicago, officials said.

Nearly 40 trips were canceled Monday, including about six trips to and from Chicago's four stations, Greyhound's Web site stated. Some of those trips are rescheduled for Tuesday, although Greyhound has suspended ticket sales to several Midwest cities.

UPPER MIDWEST

It was so cold Sunday in the upper Midwest, and visibility was so poor in blowing snow, that church services were called off in parts of Michigan. At noon, thermometers in one North Dakota town still registered minus 20.

The wind and cold blanketed the Dakotas and much of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan. Subzero temperatures at midday extended into northern Iowa, the National Weather Service said. Snow whipped up by the biting wind created hazardous driving conditions Sunday in Michigan.

State police said the five-mile-long Mackinac Bridge was closed because of whiteout conditions, and the sheriff’s office in southwest Michigan’s Cass County said visibility was less than 20 feet.

Many churches across western Michigan canceled services.

SOUTH

Schools are closed and roads are treacherous in a region stretching from Illinois to West Virginia amid a winter storm that's dumping snow and freezing rain.

An icy five-mile stretch of an Indiana interstate has been shut down after more than a dozen accidents within an hour.

Schools are closed in much of West Virginia and Ohio. Some parts of northern Ohio are expecting up to eight inches of snow.

In Kentucky, more than 13,000 customers are reported to be without power.

This latest round of anecdotal evidence of global warming should convince even the most skeptical that more regulations and taxes are needed to combat this coming catastrophe.

The human cost in suffering will move some city somewhere, perhaps Berkeley or Boulder, to pass a resolution.

Will someone not do something?

It's obvious we're running out of time.

by Mondoreb & RidesAPaleHorse
image: RidesAPaleHorse
Sources:
* Park County Crews Finally Reaching snowbound residents
* Today's Snow Could Break a Record
* County Wants State help with Snow
* Snow Forces Greyhound to Suspend Midwest Ticket sales
* Upper Midwest Hit by Bitter Cold, Blowing Snow
* Ice, Snow Blanket Parts of Midwest, South



Death by 1000 Papercuts Front Page.

The Effects of Magma on Ice: Science Trackers Remain Skeptical

DBKP to Fund Scientific Experiment!

The Knight Science Journalism Trackers said "What?"

Knight Science Journalism Tracker took issue with Little Baby Ginn's report on a report on the effects of superhot magma on Greenland's ice shelf.

Claiming to offer "Peer Review within Science Journalism" to the consumer of science news, the KSJT's Charles Petit presented the following.

Some bloggers of the rightish stripe have already embraced and distorted her report - ignoring that it presumes warming air remains the main culprit - to proclaim this as another reason global warming is hogwash. It’s natural stuff like magma, not those trace gases we add to the air, that’s raising the temperature. One example.

The KSJT then offered LBG's "distorted" report as evidence.
Scientists: Greenland's SuperThaw Caused by Superhot Magna Not Global Warming

We know when we're whipped. The KSJT has caught us red-handed.

We should have checked with the KSJT's scientists first to make sure that the magma's temperature, mostly in the 700-1300 degrees Celsius range (but as hot as 1600 degrees), was hot enough to melt ice.

The Challenge: Can Frozen H2O withstand 700-1600 degrees?

We were impressed by Petit's listed credentials: "He lives in Berkeley, California, and has a bachelors degree in astronomy from the University of California at Berkeley."

And, he's the Head Tracker at KSJT.

We'll be the first to admit, we have no first-hand evidence to back up LBG's hypothesis about the effects of magma on ice.

We looked around the office in an all-out effort to locate some magma.

No dice.

So we decided not to fool around any longer.

To make amends, we've raided the office Christmas Party fund and Ginn's booked the next flight to Italy. There, at Mt. Vesuvius, she intends to test her theory about magma and ice.

Vesuvius: Nature at her most powerful--it could be dangerous

In the interest of science, I've agreed to accompany her to record the experiment and to bring along a cooler of ice. We plan on writing up the experiment and presenting the results to The Royal Society, which "is the independent scientific academy of the UK and the Commonwealth dedicated to promoting excellence in science."

Drilling into the Earth's crust may be required

DBKP realizes that we may have to do some drilling. But no expense will be spared in our quest to add to the body of knowledge. The subject's importance is too great to be a political football.

In the meantime, we offer Charles Petit and the other trackers at KSJT our apologies and an appropriate gift.

The Question: How best to say just how sorry we are

We do hope they'll accept.

UPDATE: Man-Made Climate Change: Debate Ends with a Beer KSJT at MIT wins one of DBKP's most prestigious awards.

by Mondoreb
[images:viewimages;physics.ucsd;bigitalianvolcanoes;dclips]



Death by 1000 Papercuts Front Page.

Scientists: Greenland's Superthaw Due to Superhot Magma not Global Warming

According to scientists the Greenland ice shelves may not be melting from global warming but from the recent discovery of super hot magma beneath a thin layer of the Earth's crust.

In recent years, Greenland’s ice has been melting more and flowing faster into the sea—a record amount of ice melted from the frozen mass this summer, according to recently released data—and Earth’s rising temperatures are suspected tobe the main culprit.

But clues to a new natural contribution to the melt arose when scientists discovered a thin spot in the Earth’s crust under the northeast corner of the Greenland IceSheet where heat from Earth’s insides could seep through, scientists will report here this week at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union.

“The behavior of the great ice sheets is an important barometer of global climate change,” said lead scientist Ralph von Frese of Ohio State University. “However, to effectively separate and quantify human impacts on climate change, we must understand the natural impacts too.” [1]

Apparently this "hotspot" of hot magma sitting just beneath the northeast corner of Greenland is responsible for the record amount of ice melted. This is contrary to the "popular" Global Warming dogma where man and his "excesses" are the culprit.

Hotspots are responsible for more than just melting ice sheets.

Hawaii was created by a “hotspot” beneath the ocean floor. Hotspots form in areas where superheated magma in the Earth’s mantle breaks through the Earth’s crust. Over the course of millions of years, the Pacific Tectonic Plate has slowly moved over this hotspot to form the entire Hawaiian Island archipelago. [2]

Lead scientist Ralph von Frese:

“It could be that there’s a volcano down there,” he [lead scientist Ralph von Frese] said, “but we think it’s probably just the way the heat is being distributed by the rock topography at the base of the ice." [1]

A recent study found that there was a similar Greenland ice melt documented in the 1920's.

Professor Jason Box and undergraduate Adam Herrington, co-authors of the study, said their finding reinforces the belief that glaciers and other bodies of ice are exquisitely hyper-sensitive to climate change and bolsters the concern that rising temperatures will speed the demise of that island's ice fields, hastening sea level rise.They said their research might help discount criticism that the melting of Greenland 's glaciers is merely an isolated, regional event. [2]

No mention of the effects of the superthin mantle, hot magma or possibility of a volcano under Greenland's ice sheets just the "hand wringing" Global Warmist Alarmists.

Scientists studying the earth's core discovered that our Earth is the ultimate recycler of itself.

A huge slab of folded Earth that scientists think used to be part of the ocean floor has been detected near the planet's core.

The discovery supports the theory that Earth's crust is constantly recycled deep into the planet as molten material from below simultaneously pushes up to refresh the surface.

The structure is about 125 miles deep and at least 125 miles wide and 370 miles in the north-south direction. In consistency, it is more like a giant, folding mush of taffy, researchers said today. [3]

This recent discovery along with the one where it was determined mixing a thin crust with superhot magma makes ice melt faster is quite astounding in its simplicity. Both discoveries demonstrate that there is more to learn about this fascinating planet we live on.



That the "It's Global Warming, Stupid," crowd's frozen facts might be undergoing a little super magma melt of their own.


Science Journalism Tracker Extraordinaire C. Petit doubts LBG!
* LiveScience: Under Greenland, a thin stretch of crust may be helping the melt
* DBKP's Answer: The Effect of Magma and Ice: Science Trackers Still Skeptical
* Climate Change 30 Years Ago: Media, Scientists Pimped for Global Cooling

By LBG
Image 1 [fugly.com]
Image 2 [caglecartoons.com]
Source - 1 - LiveScience.com
Source - 2 - NASA - Visible Earth
Source - 3 - UPI - 1920s Greenland ice melt documented



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