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Bacteria are the oldest living things on earth, and researchers have long felt that they must lead dull, unfussy lives. New discoveries are starting to show just how wrong that notion is. For a simple, single-cell creature, a bacterium is surprisingly social. It can communicate in two languages. It can tell self from nonself, friend from foe. It thrives in the company of others. It spies on neighbors, spreads misinformation and even commits fratricide. "Really, they're just stripped-down versions of us," says Bonnie Bassler, microbial geneticist at Princeton University, who has spent two decades peeking at the inner lives of...

Town Hall Protesters from around the country hitting their Representatives (All Democrats) on Obamacare...

'Lost Tomb' of President Obama's Irish Ancestor Found in Cathedral Obama's Sixth Generation Grand Uncle Was Bishop of Kearney Sept. 8, 2009— A mystery revolving around President Barack Obama's Irish roots was solved when a tomb containing the remains of Obama's Irish ancestor was discovered in the Irish medieval city of Kilkenny. After a painstaking search, film maker Gabriel Murray, who is in the process of making a documentary on Obama's Irish roots, finally found "Obama's Lost Tomb" inside the 13th century St. Canice's Cathedral. Murray, along with Cathedral assistant Frances Moore, used a centuries-old map to identify a hidden...

Here is video of Bernard Whitman and Tucker Carlson talking with Martha MacCallum about health care. Bernard Whitman said "the fact that in this day health care is not considered a basic and fundamental human right in this country is an absolute disgrace," and asked "what would Jesus do?" After Whitman says this you can hear Tucker Carlson chuckling in the background. Tucker Carlson asked "if health care is a right, where does it come from?" It's definitely not in the Constitution. (Watch Video)

Researchers from Portugal and Indonesia describe an approach to decision making based on computational logic that might one day give machines a sense of morality. Science fiction authors often use the concept of "evil" machines that attempt to take control of their world and to dominate humanity. Skynet in the "Terminator" stories and Arthur C Clarke's Hal from "2001: A Space Odyssey" are two of the most often cited examples. However, for malicious intent to emerge in artificial intelligence systems requires that such systems have an understanding of how people make moral decisions. Luís Moniz Pereira of the Universidade Nova...

NDIANAPOLIS -- Indiana Secretary of State Todd Rokita pitched a plan Tuesday that would make it illegal for lawmakers to consider political data when redrawing congressional and legislative district maps. Rokita wants districts to follow county or township lines as much as possible so they are not divided. He said the plan would result in more fairly drawn, competitive districts. His proposal has drawn praise from Gov. Mitch Daniels, a fellow Republican, but two top GOP lawmakers said it is not Rokita's job to interfere with a process that belongs in the hands of the General Assembly. Indiana lawmakers are...

QUESTION OF THE DAY Should the Obama administration put a freeze on appointing so-called czars? Yes 94% No 6% Total Voters:2682

This fall, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Alvarez v. Smith, a challenge to the state of Illinois' Drug Asset Forfeiture Procedure Act (DAFPA). (Disclosure: the Reason Foundation, publisher of Reason.com, joined in an amicus brief in the case.) The six petitioners in Alvarez each had property seized by police who suspected the property had been involved in a drug crime. Three had their cars seized, three had cash taken. None of the six were served with a warrant, none of the six were charged with the crime. All perfectly legal, at least until now. ...(snip)... In...

There's a saying that goes "death by a thousand paper cuts". This means that one individual makes a bunch of little mistakes that ultimately turn into a big mistake that they can't fix. The president is doing something similar but his mistakes aren't small individually but rather huge and taken together he's experiencing death by a thousand machetes.

Phantom Ray will pick up where the UCAS program left off in 2006 by further demonstrating Boeing’s unmanned systems development capabilities in a fighter-sized, state-of-the-art aerospace system. The Boeing UCAS program began with the X-45A, which successfully flew 64 times from 2002 to 2005. Those flights included a demonstration exercise with two X-45A aircraft that marked the first unmanned, autonomous multivehicle flight under the control of a single pilot...] ...Currently planned Dec. 2, the Air Force Flight Test Center’s B-52 will carry the X-51A to 50,000 feet over the Pacific Ocean then release it. A solid rocket booster from an...

I hate to sound like one of those crazy "birthers", but something Barry Soeto said today in his (mostly commendable) suck-up to tomorrow's voters caught my attention. It's just that the "Kenyan" birth certificate now the subject of legal action, the claim, on U.S. radio by the Kenyan ambassador to the U.S. that Barry was born in Kenya, and now this friendly, off-hand comment a minute or so into his speech, have me wondering..... My mother couldn't afford to send me to the school where all the AMERICAN kids went.

SAO PAULO (Dow Jones)--Brazil has chosen the French Rafale jet for its fighter program and is in negotiations with Dassault Aviation SA (AM.FR) to buy 36 aircraft, the two governments said in a joint communique. The deal could be worth $10 billion, although neither side would comment on the details. According to French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde, the deal is part of a defense deal under negotiation that could be worth EUR12 billion. Last year, Brazil signed contracts worth $12 billion to buy 50 EC-725 military transport helicopters and five submarines from France. Speaking at an event in Sao Paulo,...

A song for the cause.

BEND, Ore. - A dusting of snow fell on Mt. Bachelor's mid-mountain Labor Day weekend, marking the beginning of a snow season that resort officials said should kick off skiing by the week of Thanksgiving.

In his commencement speech at Brigham Young University Thursday, Elder M. Russell Ballard of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints urged Latter-day Saints to...avoid being defensive. “In our interactions with others are we expecting always to have to defend ourselves? If so, I think we need to make a course correction.” Elder Ballard said. “It is inconsistent with where we are today..." Elder Ballard referred to recent research that suggested Mormons can sometimes appear defensive to those who are not members of the Church. The study said that when Mormons are...

I went to BK with my son, and we both got a tray, and sat down to feast. Well, some old, deranged, and somewhat disoriented man comes in, and sits down on the same bench as my son and I. He didn't get any food, he just sat there, staring into space. I had my son and I get up, and move to another table at a different part of the store. I don't know this guy's deal, but I guess since there weren't very many people there, he wanted to be by us? He moves and comes sit down...

Vanda Terrell is still getting used to saying it. "Let's open our Bibles," the veteran Plano ISD teacher tells students daily at two public high schools in the district. And it's legal for her to do it. A new state law requires that Texas public schools incorporate Bible literacy into the curriculum. But the law provides no specific guidelines, funding for materials or teacher training. So high schools are left scrambling to figure out what to teach and how to teach it. A handful of North Texas districts are offering an elective class, but most are choosing instead to embed...

I can't find it and know it exists.

ASPEN, Colo. (AP) -- It's nearly 2 a.m. and authorities have found the suspect in a string of break-ins into multimillion-dollar homes. His nose led him right to their trap - a cage filled with barbecue-scented cantaloupe and peaches. It's a 550-pound black bear....

It occurred to me today, as I finished up listening to Rush limbaughs show today, just how full of crap the (ex)"Mainstream" medias portrayal of Rush's audiences is. I stoopped listening to Rush for a long time, mostly due to other life concerns, but have again been listening from time to time. And outside of any particular issues, the MSM potrayal has always been that the listeners to Rush, were all old white angry old men...(who of course were racists)...But I tell you that listening to those who call his show, are made up of women, young people, black americans,...