[Link: www.jpost.com...]

Plants can "sense and react to distress signals" from their floral counterparts, according to researchers.

Although the habit of Britain's Prince Charles of talking to his plants to 'help them thrive' has never been scientifically proven effective, researchers at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev have shown that plants can 'sense and react to distress signals' from their floral counterparts.

The unusual research was just published in the openaccess journal PLoS (Public Library of Science One).

As plants usually are not mobile, they are suited to a variety of difficulties and challenges. But until now, their ability to use environmental information about distress that they absorb from nearby plants has not been well known.

A BGU Blaustein Institute for Desert Research team, headed by Prof. Ariel Novoplansky, discovered recently that 'distress signals' are transmitted from one plant to its neighbors via their roots in the ground. Distress can be caused, for example, by dryness or salt. Soon after the exposure of one plant to distress, its neighbors not yet affected suddenly react as if they had suffered themselves. Other members of the team were Drs. Omer Falik, Yonat Mordoch, Lydia Quansah and Aaron Fait.

Using an experimental system that ruled out an ability for the plants to be in contact with its neighbors in various other ways, it was found that the result of the cues was like that in a 'broken telephone' children's game. The plants that received the distress signals from nearby transmitted them to more-distant plants in a chain. The far-away plants reacted to the signals the same way, the researchers said.

The receipt of these signals increases the more distant plants' ability to survive stressful conditions in the future, they said. For example, plants can close their stomata (leaf pores) to prevent moisture from escaping the plant. Until now, such abilities were known only is creatures with a central nervous system.

Further work is underway, they said, to study the underlying mechanisms of this new mode of plant communication and its possible adaptive implications for the anticipation of plant stresses.

Evidently, there's a whole lot o' consciousness out there.

[Link: www.jpost.com...]

A UN investigator on Sunday accused Israel of imposing a "strategy of Judaization" in its housing policies in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, as well as in areas of the country within the pre-1967 lines.

Israeli activity against Negev Beduin and Palestinians in both east Jerusalem and Area C of the West Bank "are the new frontiers of dispossession of the traditional inhabitants and the implementation of a strategy of Judaization and control of the territory," said Raquel Rolnik, a special UN rapporteur on adequate housing.

Rick Santorum is the latest attempt to come up with an alternative to Mitt Romney. Everyone else has tried and failed, and now Santorum is heading for a fall.

But that's just the warmup to this. Santorum apparently authored a book, It Takes a Family: Conservatism and the Common Good.

Well, George Stephanopoulos interviewed him on This Week, and well, this is how he decided to distance himself from the comments:

I know you were talking about the emotions of men who are -- who are alongside the women, but also in your book, "It Takes a Family," where you seem to suggest that a lot of women feel pressure to work outside the home because of radical feminism.

And what do you say to those who worry -- believe that those kind of comments are going to alienate women, make you an easier candidate to beat in a general election?

SANTORUM: Well, that section of the book was co-written, if you want to be honest about it, by my wife, who is a nurse and a lawyer. And when she gave up that practice and she gave up, you know, nursing to raise a family, I mean, she felt very much that society was sort of -- in many cases, looked down their nose at that decision. And all I've said is -- and in talking with my wife and others like her -- who've given up their careers that they should be affirmed in their decision like everybody else and that these are choices, and they're tough choices.

You know, I grew up in a home where my mom and dad both worked. This was back in the '50s and '60s, and -- which was very unusual. My mom actually made more money than my dad. So I grew up in a home where that was something that -- that was a given, women in the workplace, and something that I obviously accepted.

But I think it's important that women both outside the home and inside the home are affirmed for their choices they make, that they are, in fact, choices, and society, you know, treats them in a sense equally for whatever decision they make that's best for them.

STEPHANOPOULOS: You say that now, but you also wrote in the book that radical feminists have been making the pitch that justice demands that men and women be given an equal opportunity to make it to the top in the workplace. Isn't that something that everyone should value?

SANTORUM: Yeah, I have no problem -- I don't know -- that's a new quote for me. I don't know what context that was given. But the bottom line is that people should have equal opportunity to rise in the workforce. And, again, if you read the entire section, I don't think anyone will have a problem with the fact that what I was calling for -- very clearly calling for is the treatment of an affirmation of whatever decision women decide to make.

He didn't claim a change of heart. He threw his wife under the bus; she's the one who "co-wrote" the passages. That's right folks. He's the one who "wrote" the book, but she's going to take the blame? Watch for this pattern to emerge as other issues confront Santorum in coming weeks.

Fact is that women aren't pressured by feminists to work outside the home; they're often working because the financial pressures to do so means that in order to keep to a certain lifestyle requires doing so. Santorum's family situation may have allowed his wife the option to give up being a nurse to raise his family, but that's an option that many simply don't have.

[Link: news.yahoo.com...]

ATHENS (Reuters) - Greece's parliament approved a deeply unpopular austerity bill Monday to secure a second EU/IMF bailout and avoid national bankruptcy, as buildings burned across central Athens and violence spread around the country.

Cinemas, cafes, shops and banks were set ablaze in central Athens and black-masked protesters fought riot police outside parliament before lawmakers voted on the package that demands deep pay, pension and job cuts - the price of a 130 billion euro bailout needed to keep the country afloat.

State television reported the violence spread to the tourist islands of Corfu and Crete, the northern city of Thessaloniki and towns in central Greece. Police said 150 shops were looted in the capital and 34 buildings set ablaze.

Altogether 199 of the 300 lawmakers backed the bill, but 43 deputies from the two parties in the government of Prime Minister Lucas Papademos, the socialists and conservatives, rebelled by voting against. They were immediately expelled by their parties.

The rebellion and street violence foreshadowed the problems the government faces in implementing the cuts, which include a 22 percent reduction in the minimum wage - a package critics say condemns the Greek economy to an ever-deeper downward spiral.

Papademos, a technocrat brought into get a grip on his country's crisis, denounced the worst breakdown of order since 2008 when violence gripped Greece for weeks after police shot a 15-year-old schoolboy.

"Vandalism, violence and destruction have no place in a democratic country and won't be tolerated," he told parliament as it prepared to vote on the new 130 billion euro bailout to save Greece from a chaotic bankruptcy.

"SHORT-TERM SACRIFICES"

But he admitted that imposing the austerity on a nation that has already endured several years of cuts would be tough.

"Ahead of us, we have a complete and credible economic program to exit the fiscal and economic crisis. It is a program which safeguards, more than anything else, the country's place in the euro," he said.

"The full, timely and effective implementation of the program won't be easy. We are fully aware that the economic program means short term sacrifices for the Greek people."

Greece needs the international funds before March 20 to meet debt repayments of 14.5 billion euros, or suffer a chaotic default which could shake the entire euro zone.

Outside parliament chaos reigned. A Reuters photographer saw buildings in Athens engulfed in flames and huge plumes of smoke rose in the night sky.

"We are facing destruction. Our country, our home, has become ripe for burning, the center of Athens is in flames. We cannot allow populism to burn our country down," conservative lawmaker Costis Hatzidakis told parliament.

The air in Syntagma Square outside parliament was thick with tear gas as riot police fought running battles with youths who smashed marble balustrades and hurled stones and petrol bombs.

Terrified Greeks and tourists fled the rock-strewn streets and the clouds of stinging gas, cramming into hotel lobbies for shelter as lines of riot police struggled to contain the mayhem.

State NET television reported that trouble had also broken out in Heraklion, capital of Crete, as well as the towns of Volos and Agrinio in central Greece.

On the streets of Athens many businesses were ablaze, including the neo-classical home to the Attikon cinema dating from 1870 and a building housing the Asty, an underground cinema used by the Gestapo during World War Two as a torture chamber.

As fighting raged for hours, protesters threw bombs made from gas canisters as riot police advanced across the square on the crowds, firing tear gas and stun grenades. Loud booms from the protests could be heard inside parliament.

PZ Meyers dissects the enrtrails:

There's a youtuber who goes by the name 'the amazing atheist' who I've never cared much for — he's a raving MRA who ought to change his name to 'the asinine atheist' — who has just flamed out on reddit in a revealing long angry thread. I don't recommend it. It's very ugly. The only virtue is that this already marginal hater on the fringes of atheism just made himself even less relevant, and we can all wash our hands of him now.

I'll put a few highlights from his rants below the fold; these aren't really surprising, since this kind of thing has always been part of his youtube schtick, but you might want to brace yourself for the virulence. He really, really hates uppity feminist women, and he finds threats of rape to be an appropriate response to them. This whole affair was prompted by a poster on reddit going by the nickname 'ICumWhenIKillMen', which I find reprehensible too, but it in no way justifies the eruption of even greater hatred that this 'amazing' atheist (going by the name terroja or TJ) spouts.

I will make you a rape victim if you don't fuck off.

Yeah. Well, you deserved it. So, fuck you. I hope it happens again soon. I'm tired of being treated like shit by you mean little ****s and then you using your rape as an excuse. Fuck you. I think we should give the guy who raped you a medal. I hope you fucking drown in rape semen, you ugly, mean-spirited cow. Actually, I don't believe you were ever raped! What man would be tasteless enough to stick his dick into a human cesspool like you? Nice gif of a turd going into my mouth. Is that kind of like the way that rapists dick went in your pussy? Or did he use your asshole? Or was it both? Maybe you should think about it really hard for the next few hours. Relive it as much as possible. You know? Try to recall: was it my pussy or my ass?

I'm going to rape you with my fist.

BTW, you have to admit, when I told you that I hope you drown in rape semen, you got a little wet, didn't you? It's okay. We're friends now. You can share.

Fuck you, liar. All night you douches have tried to shit on me and tear me down. Then when I do the same it's like, 'Whoa man! That's too far. Calm down.' No. Fuck you. Go get raped in whatever orifice you have to get fucking raped in. I am sick of your shit. I regret nothing.

Read on

[Link: studio11photography.blogspot.com...]

Of course this is one of the most imaged buildings in LA. So one tends to push a little on the composition and the look.

[Link: www.theatlanticwire.com...]

Central Athens is on fire, Reuters reports, with "historic cinemas, cafes, shops and banks" set ablaze by protesters hidden behind black masks. They have been clashing all day with police outside Greek parliament, as lawmakers inside prepared to vote on a 130 billion euro bailout deal that would spare the country from bankruptcy. The air was "thick with tear gas" in Syntagma Square, Reuters says, launched by police at rioting youths who responded by hurling rocks and molotov cockatils. There are also reports of violence in Haraklion, the tourist mecca capital of the island of Crete, as well as in smaller cities like Volos and Agrinio. Amongst the wreckage, a subterranean spot with infamous ties to Nazi Germany:

[M]any businesses were ablaze, including the neo-classical home to the Attikon cinema dating from 1870 and a building housing the Asty, an underground cinema used by the Gestapo during World War Two as a torture chamber.

Prime Minister Lucas D. Papademos issued a plea to Greeks to accept the package, saying it would spare the country from much direr circumstances should it not go through, according to The New York Times. "We are a breath away from ground zero," Papademos told the country in a televised address on Saturday. The austerity package sought by Greece's private lenders will "restore the fiscal stability and global competitiveness of the economy, which will return to growth, probably in the second half of 2013," Papademos pledged. Passage of the plan appears likely, The Wall Street Journal reports, with the country's two largest political parties -- the socialist Pasok and conservative New Democracy -- backing the measure.

Click the link for a really lurid fire picture.

[Link: politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com...]

Billionaire financier George Soros said Sunday he has not decided on whether he will create a super PAC to help President Barack Obama win re-election.

"But I think it's a big, big issue that the 'Citizens United' has really unleashed private money for political purposes that can be used anonymously," Soros said on CNN's "Fareed Zakaria GPS."

Monday night, the president's re-election campaign announced it would urge donors to contribute to a super PAC supportive of his candidacy called Priorities USA.

The move represented a reversal of Obama's position on the third-party spending giants, which were made possible by the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2010 on the Citizens United case.

Super PACs are allowed to raise and spend unlimited amounts of money on a candidate, as long as they don't coordinate with campaigns.

"This isn't just a threat to Democrats," Obama once said of the ruling in 2010. "This is a threat to our democracy."

After seeing the heavy stream of money pouring into Republican super PACs, Obama's campaign decided to change its stance and encourage supporters to donate to Priorities USA.

More

[Link: www.foxnews.com...]

The top U.S. Navy official in the Gulf said Sunday he takes Iran's military capabilities seriously but insists his forces are prepared to confront any Iranian aggression in the region.

Vice Adm. Mark Fox, commander of the 5th Fleet, told reporters at the naval force's Bahrain headquarters that the Navy has "built a wide range of potential options to give the president" and is "ready today" to confront any hostile action by Tehran.

He did not outline specifically how the Navy might answer an Iranian strike or an effort to shut the entrance to the Persian Gulf, though any response would likely involve the two U.S. aircraft carriers and other warships cruising the waters off Iran.

"We've developed very precise and lethal weapons that are very effective, and we're prepared," Fox said. "We're just ready for any contingency."

Faced with tightening Western sanctions, Iranian officials have stepped up threats to close the Strait of Hormuz if the country's oil exports are blocked. A fifth of the world's oil supply passes through the narrow waterway, which is only about 30 miles (50 kilometers) across at its narrowest point.

Iran and Oman share control of the waterway, but it is considered an international strait, meaning free transit passage is guaranteed under international law.

Iran's army chief, Gen. Ataollah Salehi, early last month warned an American warship not to return to the Gulf shortly after the aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis and another vessel left. Another carrier, the USS Abraham Lincoln, entered the Gulf without incident on Jan. 22.

Fox acknowledged that Iran's military is "capable of striking a blow" against American forces in the Gulf, particularly using unconventional means such as small attack boats or mines laid along shipping lanes.

"We're not bulletproof. There are people that can take a swipe at us," Fox said.

But he added that he has reminded officers under his command that they "have a right and an obligation of self defense" if attacked.

The admiral's comments echo those of other Western officials, who say they will respond swiftly to any Iranian attempt to shut the Strait of Hormuz.

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