Free Republic

PROVO - The beating death of 20-month-old Jordan Putnam included "severe physical abuse indicative of physical torture," prosecutors said Monday as part of their request to keep the toddler's father in jail without bail. Prosecutors also argued that a no-bail hold on Jason Mike Putnam would ensure the safety of the defendant, who has attempted suicide in the past. Fourth District Judge Steven Hansen granted the state's request and revoked Putnam's bail of $250,000, a sum the American Fork man had not been able to raise. Putnam, 23, is charged with aggravated murder, which carries the possibility of execution, for...

What's going on at Los Alamos? The nation's premier nuclear-weapons laboratory appears plagued with continuing security problems. Barely 10 days after revelations of a leak of highly classified material over the Internet, NEWSWEEK has learned of two other security breaches. In late May, a Los Alamos staffer took his lab laptop with him on vacation to Ireland. A senior nuclear official familiar with the inner workings of Los Alamos—who would not be named talking about internal matters—says the laptop's hard drive contained "government documents of a sensitive nature." The laptop was also fitted with an encryption card advanced enough that...

"A Washington woman sued by the RIAA has asked the Court to award her attorneys fees, after the record company plaintiffs (Interscope Records, Capitol Records, SONY BMG, Atlantic Recording, BMG Music, and Virgin Records) dropped their case against her after two years of litigation, in Interscope v. Leadbetter. The brief submitted by her attorneys (pdf) pointed out the similarity between Ms. Leadbetter's case and Capitol v. Foster. In the Leadbetter case, as well as Foster case, the RIAA sued the woman solely because she had paid for an internet access account, and then later in the case attempted to plead...

A new study says that on average, more than half of the ink from inkjet cartridges is wasted when users toss them in the garbage. Why is that interesting? According to the study, users are tossing the cartridges when their printers are telling them they're out of ink, not when they necessarily are out of ink. The study by TÜV Rheinland looked at inkjet efficiency across multiple brands, including Epson (who commissioned the study), Lexmark, Canon, HP, Kodak, and Brother. They studied the efficiency of both single and multi-ink cartridges. Espon's printers were among the highest rated, at more than...

Microsoft has launched a "fact rich" program to help customers understand why they should "proceed with confidence" in rolling out Vista across all their PCs. "Some customers may be waiting to adopt Windows Vista because they've heard rumors about device or application compatibility issues, or because they think they should wait for a service pack release," the company said in a newsletter. "To help partners and customers get the real story, Microsoft has created a comprehensive set of fact-rich materials illustrating how Windows Vista is ready today and tomorrow." Despite the "fact-rich" materials being designed for both "partners and customers",...

An international research consortium today published a set of papers that promise to reshape our understanding of how the human genome functions. The findings challenge the traditional view of our genetic blueprint as a tidy collection of independent genes, pointing instead to a complex network in which genes, along with regulatory elements and other types of DNA sequences that do not code for proteins, interact in overlapping ways not yet fully understood. In a group paper published in the June 14 issue of Nature and in 28 companion papers published in the June issue of Genome Research, the ENCyclopedia Of...

Despite overwhelming military superiority, the world’s most powerful nations failed to achieve their objectives in 39 percent of their military operations since World War II, according to a new University of Georgia study. The study, by assistant professor Patricia L. Sullivan in the UGA School of Public and International Affairs, explains the circumstances under which more powerful nations are likely to fail and creates a model that allows policymakers to calculate the probability of success in current and future conflicts. “If you know some key variables – like the major objective, the nature of the target, whether there’s going to...

A wilderness-survival school is allowing campers to carry a 32-ounce water bottle instead of a smaller cup during a grueling course in southern Utah, a change from last year when a New Jersey man died of dehydration. "They're allowed to carry them and drink as they go," said Andrew Wright, an attorney for the Boulder Outdoor Survival School, known as BOSS. Dave Buschow, 29, collapsed and died on the second day of a 28-day expedition in the searing heat of the Utah desert in July 2006. Participants were given a 24-ounce cup and told to drink water only from natural...

Music publishers are stepping up their campaign to remove guitar tablature from the Net. Recently Guitartabs.com received a nastygram from lawyers for the National Music Publishers Association and The Music Publishers Association of America. These organizations want to stretch the definition of their intellectual property to include by-ear transcriptions of music. Guitartabs.com is currently not offering tablature while the owner evaluates his legal options.

Manitoba First Nations are seeking compensation from Manitoba Telecom Services for every cellphone signal that passes through First Nations land, saying the airspace should be considered a resource like land and water. At a recent economic development summit, the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs resolved to negotiate revenue sharing with MTS for transmissions signals that cross the land, water and air space of their reserves and traditional territories. "[The request is] based on the understanding that we do have some fundamental rights as indigenous people to land, water and airspace," said Chief Ovide Mercredi of the Grand Rapids First Nation. "When...

The Rev. Al Sharpton spent Monday touring LDS sites, discussing his recently unearthed ancestry and exchanging notes on Christian service with Mormon leaders. By afternoon, the Pentecostal preacher who drew ire for comments he made about presidential candidate Mitt Romney's Mormon faith said his subsequent visit to Salt Lake City had been a valuable experience. "This visit was not about politics. It was not about controversy," Sharpton told a group of reporters at the LDS Family History Library. "It was about our trying to learn about each other as believers in God and Christ, to find common ground . ....

On Friday, Arizona police arrested a 64-year-old man — a fugitive since 2001 in a bizarre war that mixes free speech, copyright law, and the Church of Scientology. Keith Henson’s journey began seven years ago while innocuously watching another critic mock the group on an internet newsgroup. In a gonzo discussion about procuring a "Tom Cruise missile," they’d joked about working with "Secret Agent 99, wearing a stunning black leather biker outfit." Other posters joined in the internet discussion, asking whether Tom Cruise missiles are affected by wind. "No way," Keith joked. "Modern weapons are accurate to a matter of...

There are a few things lawmakers have decided really ought to be handled with the "care and oversight" that only the government can provide: e.g., tax collection, radioactive materials, biohazards, guns, and CDs. CDs? No, I'm not talking about financial Certificates of Deposit, though that might make more sense. I'm talking about Compact Discs. New "pawn shop" laws are springing up across the United States that will make selling your used CDs at the local record shop something akin to getting arrested. No, you won't spend any time in jail, but you'll certainly feel like a criminal once the local...

TOLEDO, Ohio - When Jessica Botzko's son was a baby, authorities temporarily removed him from her care when she was charged with child endangering. Nearly a decade later, the boy took matters into his own hands, authorities said. Botzko is again accused of child endangerment after her 10-year-old son ran away from home with his younger brother and told investigators he was tired of being put in a dog cage, police said. The older boy also had been forced to wear a remote-controlled shock collar, authorities said. At least once the 10-year-old boy was made to wear the collar —...

OK, let's hear it! If you were King of the USA for a day, able to change any law, policy or organization, to fix a past or current mistake, what whould your Top Three changes be? I'm very interested to know what the very top priorities of my fellow FReepers would be.

I just got off the phone with the manufacturer of the new notebook computer I just bought, Acer, and the publisher of the operating system installed on that notebook, Microsoft. You see, since I just purchased a brand new computer with Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005, I was under the impression that I should actually receive Windows Media Center Edition 2005. But it turns out that I was woefully naive about buying computers. That's an odd statement for me to make, since I am a computer professional at least eight hours per day. I support Windows for a living....

Yesterday, Cho Seung-Hui, a lone, deranged killer, snuffed out the lives of over thirty innocent victims at Virginia Tech. His was the most deadly rampage of its kind in US history. The cold, calculated way in which this monster executed his young victims sent profound pain and shock into the hearts of all who heard. On February 12, another shooter had stormed into a shopping center in Salt Lake City, Utah with the same intent as Mr. Cho. Sulejman Talović wanted to kill a lot of people. He blasted indiscriminately with a 12-gauge shotgun, killing and injuring innocent victims, even...

Submerging computer chips in oil could make them more energy efficient, according to a UK company that hopes to start selling such systems within a year. The microprocessors inside servers and desktop computers are normally cooled using fans that blow air across the components. But UK a company called Very-PC hopes to see a much more radical, oil-based alternative, take off instead. "It is possible to cut power consumption in half," managing director Peter Hopton told New Scientist. "You don't need to drive inefficient fans, or the usual air conditioning." Hopton first got the idea after seeing computer enthusiasts discuss...

AMD has the following notes on a transcript from the Intel anti trust case. Apparently Intel can't stop deleting e-mail. Funny. Attached is a court transcript from a meeting that occurred last Wednesday in Delaware between counsel for AMD/Intel and Special Master Poppiti after the hearing with Judge Farnan. After giving it a once-over, it seems to me that here’s where the most newsworthy meat is to be found from the 58 page transcript, in page order: Page 12, beginning at line 15 – Intel CEO Paul Otellini is revealed to be one of the Intel executives who is not...