Moving and powerful.
It has been announced that scientists have detected gravitational waves for the first time, after a long and arduous search that rivaled the search for the Higgs boson in the difficulty involved even though it did not match it in costs. The announcement came in the form of a paper published yesterday in the journal Physical Review Letters, based on results obtained on September 14, 2015. You can read the paper here.
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In a moment of idle curiosity, I wondered what would happen if for some reason, human beings suddenly became extinct. Not a cheery thought but I was curious about how long it would be before all traces of our existence disappeared so that a new future intelligent species or maybe extra-terrestrial visitors to Earth would see no trace that intelligent life had ever existed because all the artifacts we created had simply decomposed away. It seems hard to imagine since humans have covered the Earth with our creations but surely all things must pass at some time?
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Bernie Sanders made an extended appearance on Colbert’s show last night. The crowd gave Sanders a rousing reception. It is really strange how Sanders has become the ‘cool’ candidate. I think that it is because of the authenticity that he emanates and that he speaks truths that others don’t. The ‘why’ questions he asks and his conviction that things could and should be much better than they are now is inspiring.
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A lesbian couple went to get a marriage license, something that by now should not be news and is even routinely taking place in the offices of Mike Huckabee’s hero, Kentucky County Clerk Kim Davis. But that is not what Samantha Brookover and Amanda Abramovich discovered [link fixed] when they went to the Gilmer County Courthouse in West Virginia.
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The arrest of Cliven Bundy, the patriarch of the Bundy brood whose sons Ammon and Ryan Bundy are now in custody for their role in taking of the Malheur Wildlife Refuge near the town of Burns, Oregon, may signal the beginning of the end of the 40-day standoff.
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Carly Fiorina in dropping out of the race and is expected to be joined soon by Chris Christie. Even she felt obliged to say that the country is ruled by a “political class that only serves the big, the powerful, the wealthy, and the well connected”.
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A team of reporters for CNN had a recap of the New Hampshire primary and how it came to be that the two outsiders won. It explains why Chris Christie zeroed in on Marco Rubio in the last debate and savaged him, rather than aiming for the frontrunner Donald Trump. It is true that Christie was competing to win the ‘establishment ‘ candidate slot that Rubio seemed to be holding on to but there was apparently more to it than that, that it was also motivated by a desire for revenge.
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Currently a US president gets a pension of $200,000 per year as well as funding for office space and custodial staff. Zaid Jilani writes about the origin of presidential pensions. He said that there had always been some concern about needing to enable former presidents to live in dignity and engage in acts that benefit the country without having to sell themselves to earn money.
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The big wins by Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump in the New Hampshire primary send an unambiguous signal that the voters have had it up to here with the establishment and the control that the oligarchy have over the political process. It is thus no surprise that the media are saying that last night’s results will ‘stun America’.
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