There are no birth certificates in these villages. No death certificates. No driver’s licenses or addresses or phonebooks, and if there were, few people would be able to read them. In this mostly illiterate country, there are no paperwork hassles. Corruption is a problem but bureaucracy and identity theft surely aren’t. Most Afghans have never been entered into any system. Like penguins on the ice, they are born, they live and they die, and that’s all.
First launched twenty-five years ago in October of 1985, NASA's Space Shuttle Atlantis is scheduled for its 32nd and final launch this afternoon (at 2:20pm ET). This launch - one of only three remaining missions left in NASA's Shuttle program - will deliver an Integrated Cargo Carrier and a Russian-built Mini Research Module to the International Space Station. Collected here are a series of photographs of Atlantis' recent activity, as it descended from orbit last November, landed, and was processed and prepped for today's final launch. (42 photos total)
I HIGHLY recommend that you read this article. It is a perspective of the history of middle eastern oil that few of my generation know.
The problem with how the average American sees our role in the world is that we tend to get hung up on catchphrases -- "My country, right or wrong," or the more infamous "America, love it or leave it." These phrases are problematical, simply because each ends all logical reassessment of how we are seen in the world.
Both ignore the fact that we are led by elected officials, all of which, at least so far, are humans; and, as we know, humans are capable of failure. Therefore a far better slogan for America might be, "America - we don't make many mistakes, but we correct the ones we do."
The twin problems with that statement are that it's not always true and that it's too long for a bumper sticker.
Meanwhile, the rest of the world bases our country's image on their history with us. But, because we have such a mythic view of our own history, we are continuously stunned and shocked when other countries fall out of our orbit or attack us directly. And nowhere is our misunderstanding of past events greater than in the Middle East.
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This year marks the 50th anniversary of the good, old-fashioned copy machine. But, as Armen Keteyian reports, advanced technology has opened a dangerous hole in data security.
By various estimates cigarette butts, counted by number, tally up to one third of America's litter. Additionally, they account for about 28 percent of littered items washing up on beaches worldwide.
Toe wrestling is a sport gaining popularity in the UK. World championships started in Wetton in the 1970s and are now held at the Bentley Brook Inn in Ashbourne, Derbyshire. Top players include Paul "Toeminator" Beech and Alan "Nasty" Nash, who is the current world champion.
Click the image to learn more about the great sport of Toe Wrestling.
In the three weeks since the April 20th explosion and sinking of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, and the start of the subsequent massive (and ongoing) oil leak, many attempts have been made to contain and control the scale of the environmental disaster. Oil dispersants are being sprayed, containment booms erected, protective barriers built, controlled burns undertaken, and devices are being lowered to the sea floor to try and cap the leaks, with little success to date. While tracking the volume of the continued flow of oil is difficult, an estimated 5,000 barrels of oil (possibly much more) continues to pour into the gulf every day. While visible damage to shorelines has been minimal to date as the oil has spread slowly, the scene remains, in the words of President Obama, a "potentially unprecedented environmental disaster." (40 photos total)
I HIGHLY recommend that you read this article. It is a perspective of the history of middle eastern oil that few of my generation know.
