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Thomas Mann said, "Speech is civilization itself." A common knowledge of words and their meanings is necessary for a culture to survive and flourish. English, it is believed, already has more words than any other language. As our society evolves, so do words and their usages. Dictionaries track such changes. A few weeks ago a new edition of Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, a perennial bestseller, was published. At roughly the same time, the prestigious Oxford English Dictionary added hundreds of new words to its online version. Some of the words appear fairly common. Brewski (a beer), chin music (an inside pitch...

<p>A California commission has picked a new state building code favored by a firefighters union that is among the biggest donors to Gov. Gray Davis' anti-recall campaign.</p> <p>Critics say the new code will lead to delays and higher costs in construction.</p>

<p>If you listen to the critics of last week's federal decision to relax rules on media ownership, you would think Western civilization is about to end.</p> <p>Just before Monday's final 3-to-2 vote by the Federal Communications Commission, one commissioner, Michael J. Cropps, suggested the change ``empowers America's new media elite with unacceptable levels of influence over the ideas and information upon which our society and our democracy so heavily depend.''</p>

<p>Message to would-be buyers of postage meters, CB amplifiers, mountain lion parts and speleothems taken from federal land: When you buy your goodies online, you'll have to pay for them with something other than PayPal.</p> <p>Thanks to a sweeping set of changes to its acceptable-use policy, PayPal's exhaustive new rules now dictate exactly where users' funds can and cannot be spent.</p>

WASHINGTON, Jan. 2 With the new Senate majority leader as a powerful ally, President Bush (news - web sites) will propose sweeping, long-term changes in Medicare later this month when he urges Congress to provide prescription drug benefits for the elderly, administration officials say. In the last three weeks, the president has told his advisers and Congressional leaders that he wants to promote competition in Medicare to shore up the program for 76 million baby boomers and to establish his credentials on an issue likely to figure prominently in the 2004 election. Administration officials said Mr. Bush's vision for Medicare...

The Next ReelBy Nina RehfeldDecember 18, 2002 - 3:00 AM PST Peter Jackson and Philippa Boyens For all the talk in the current cultural climate about how the wall between the highbrows and the lowbrows fell, or rather, was deconstructed decades ago, it's still a rare film that's as enthusiastically lauded, embraced or even just plain loved by critics and audiences alike as The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. Sure, there are critics who cloud their praise with anti-populist grudges but even most of those cave in by their last sentences to the sheer movieness of...

State Officials Make Changes To Luxury Vehicle Requests Leonard: I'm Not Sure What I'll Be Driving POSTED: 5:52 p.m. PST December 18, 2002 SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Following two KCRA 3 reports, two new members of the Board of Equalization are now making changes to their luxury vehicle requests. The decision to purchase luxury vehicles at taxpayer expense hit a nerve, especially at a time when thousands of state workers could lose their jobs, and services will be cut. Now both officials say they will go to "plan B." Newly elected official Bill Leonard got a warm welcome at Wednesday's Board...

PDF Document: Report on the Etna Eruption and Torre del Filosofo hut If you can read Italian, this would be a lot more interesting. The reason for posting it is the pictures, which are impressive. Up until this eruption, the Torre del Filosofo mountain hut was a place that hikers to the Etna summit could use for rest and occasionally for shelter from summit eruption activity. Not any more; the new activity has buried it.

HONG KONG -- The government proposed enacting broader police powers and life sentences for serious crimes against the state Tuesday in an anti-subversion law critics say could erode Hong Kong's freedoms. Officials insisted the law would be used only in rare cases and would not violate international human rights treaties or civil liberties promised to residents when this former British colony was handed back to China five years ago.

<p>In the past year, we have all asked the question: Has America changed as a result of the attacks of last September 11th? Most of the answers have focused on how we feel as Americans. Do we think about the danger? Do we relate to our families more intensely? Have we thought of moving or switching jobs?</p>

Posted on Mon, Aug. 12, 2002Lillian Swanson | Sweeping changes are planned for InquirerBy Lillian SwansonInquirer ColumnistThis fall, The Inquirer will undergo more change, at a faster clip, than at any time since The Bulletin folded in 1982.Editor Walker Lundy upended the chessboard, unveiling a new strategy that will assign three dozen more reporters - a 60 percent increase - to cover the Pennsylvania suburbs and South Jersey.At the same time, the paper will add more space for news across much of the paper, and improve its city neighborhood, business, sports and investigative coverage. Forty journalists will be hired.In a...

The earth: Now it's all going pear-shaped American scientists say the earth has suddenly become fatter round the middle in the last four years. Like a pumpkin, the planet is a little bit wider around the equator than a perfect sphere would be. For 19 years its waistline shrank, but since 1998 it has been expanding, according to a study in the journal Science. Christopher Cox and Benjamin Chao noticed the bizarre phenomenon after studying space-based observations from the past 25 years. They found that a measurement of the Earth's width called J2, which excludes tidal effects, has generally been...

Let's defend our national anthem. Having been born in a foreign country, I delighted myself going to the U.S. embassy to stare at the marines that stood guard in full dress uniform. In the summertime my parents would take the family to the mountains, but once every 4 years I had another glimpse at America. I would faithfully watch the finals for all olympic events, so as not to miss the playing of the American anthem. As I stared at the U.S. flag I could wishful dream that it was mine!Let's move forward some 30 years to today. I was...

--> Hormones vs. Culture By Michael Lamb, Ph.D. The view that fathers are reluctant caregivers may be a thing of the past. New findings show that hormonal changes of parenting are not limited to mothers. The reason we haven’t discovered the hormonal changes in human fathers before now lies in a combination of scientific progress and cultural change. Early studies on rats found that males could learn to become involved fathers after prolonged exposure to their pups but did not experience any hormonal changes. The fact that these reluctant dads could learn to nurture led to the so-called bonding hypothesis....

So what do you think of the change? i like it and it lends no credence to the killer!Just roll that off your tongue HOMOCIDE BOMBER GOOD ON FOX NEWS

<p>Edward Cardinal Egan confronted the growing scandal of sexual abuse by priests head-on last night, issuing a three-point plan that includes removing sexual predators from their parishes.</p> <p>"Should any priest sexually abuse a child, he will be removed from pastoral ministry," the spiritual leader of the Archdiocese of New York's 2.4 million Catholics said in his Palm Sunday message.</p>