[Link: www.nytimes.com...]

United Nations nuclear inspectors in Iran have found uranium enriched beyond the highest previously reported levels of 20 percent in samplings taken from its new underground fuel enrichment plant, according to a quarterly report on Iran's nuclear program.

The report, delivered Friday to the board of the International Atomic Energy Agency, based in Vienna, said the samplings, taken Feb. 15 from the Fordo enrichment facility built inside a mountain near Iran's holy city of Qom, 'showed the presence of particles with enrichment levels of up to 27 percent.'

The finding is a potentially alarming development since it moves the purity of Iran's uranium enrichment closer toward bomb-grade material even as a group of six world powers is negotiating with Tehran to shift its nuclear program in the opposite direction. Whether the 27 percent figure represents a trace amount was not made clear in the report, a copy of which was made available to The New York Times.

Any guesses as to why they might be doing this?

[Link: bostonglobe.com...]

US Senator Scott Brown accused Harvard University today of falsely reporting to the federal government that Elizabeth Warren, a law school professor who is now his Democratic challenger, was a Native American.

Because he can't attack her record, he tries a smear campaign.

On Thursday, Warren sought to bat away questions about her ancestry, and put the focus back on Brown's record on financial issues. 'Scott Brown wants to hammer on my family and I think what matters to the people of Massachusetts is how they've been hurt by his votes,' she said.

Today, Brown shot back: 'I'm highly offended that Elizabeth Warren would accuse me of attacking her family when I have not done nothing of the kind. To make that kind of wild and baseless charge is disturbing.'

Who buys this stuff? Why are people like this still able to gain traction in our country?

[Link: www.abiresearch.com...]

​More than 208 million phablets, a hybrid device that is larger than a smartphone but smaller than a tablet, like the Samsung Galaxy Note, will be shipped globally in 2015.

Despite the slow start for phablet smartphones in 2011, the market is at the dawn of the phablet era. HTC, LG, and Huawei will each introduce phablet smartphones in 2012, joining the ranks of Samsung's Galaxy Note and Nexus. Additionally, another phablet smartphone was released earlier this month, the Samsung Galaxy S3.

"One of the chief drivers for phablets is the amount of time people use their smartphones for web browsing, reading articles and newspapers on the go, or simply navigating their journeys," says senior analyst Joshua Flood. "The larger screen sizes make a significant difference to the user's experience when compared to conventional-sized touchscreens between 3.5 to 4 inches." Additionally, new phablet-styled devices provide an attractive two-in-one device proposition and are beginning to see the competition between these larger smartphone form factors and smaller media tablets (less than seven inches).

This 'trend' is not likely to last. If I want a screen larger than the one on the smaller, easy to carry anywhere phone I have, I would prefer not to over-compromise and use a slightly larger screen on a larger, heavier, not as comfortable to carry anywhere device. I would get an iPad for that purpose. In my opinion, the so-called phablet fills a very unnecessary niche.

[Link: www.nytimes.com...]

XI'AN, China -- A nationwide real estate downturn, stalling exports and declining consumer confidence have produced what a Chinese cabinet adviser, quoted on the official government Web site on Thursday, characterized as a "sharp slowdown in the economy."

Though the Chinese economy continues to expand, construction workers are losing jobs in droves and retail sales grew last month at the slowest pace in more than three years. Investments in fixed assets have increased more slowly this year than in any year since 2001.

The most striking feature of the slowdown is that it extends beyond the coastal provinces, which depend on exports and are closely linked to the global economy, to the country's far more insular interior, including cities like Xi'an here in northwestern China.

China's unexpected economic difficulties are starting to unnerve investors in world markets, especially commodity markets, as China is the world's largest consumer of most raw materials and the second-largest consumer of oil.

A deepening slowdown would ripple across the world economy. Until now, China's economy barreled ahead mostly unhindered as the main engine of global growth, even as Europe struggled with its government debt crisis and the United States limped along with a crippled housing market.

Not unexpected, but disturbing nonetheless.

[Link: www.onefoottsunami.com...]

We've covered The Callousness of Siri before, but how about Siri's accuracy? You've likely seen the Apple ad featuring Samuel L. Jackson using Siri1. If you've used Siri yourself, however, you know the disclaimer of "Sequences shortened" is more than an understatement. They've edited out the inevitable "No....NO....NO!" as well as significant quantities of exasperated sighs. After hearing Jackson say the word "hotspacho" for the umpteenth time, I decided to run a little test.

Pretty funny results. From what I've heard, Siri is nowhere near that accurate or useful. This test points to the same conclusion.

[Link: www.nytimes.com...]

"While it's great to support other missions," said Adam Riess of Johns Hopkins and the Space Telescope Science Institute, who shared that Nobel last year, "it would be disappointing to see the U.S. lose or outsource its own leading role in one of the hottest areas of research."

For Dr. Riess and his colleagues, this turn of events is another example of a worrying trend in which American scientists, facing budget deficits and political gridlock, have had to pull back from or delay promising projects while teams based in Europe hunt down the long-sought Higgs boson or rocket scientists in China plan a Moon landing in 2025.

Michael Turner, a cosmologist at the University of Chicago, called dark energy "an example of how the U.S. seems to misplay its science hand these days."

"We predicted and discovered dark energy," he said. "We have the biggest dark-energy community and the best ground game; we have been designing a space mission since 1998; and now the Europeans will fly it with our minor participation. Something is wrong with this picture."

This is another one of the things that happen when the "job creators" control a vast majority of the wealth in a country.

[Link: dealbook.nytimes.com...]

Shares in Facebook tumbled 12 percent in early trading on Monday morning, crashing well below the company's offer price and again raising questions about its lofty valuation.

As of 10:08, Facebook's stock was down more than 10 percent, to around $34 a share. That extended trading patterns from late on Friday, when shares repeatedly bumped against their $38 offering price.

Is anyone surprised by this?

[Link: content.usatoday.com...]

The top elections official in Arizona says it is "possible" President Obama won't be listed on the November ballot because of questions about his birth certificate.

Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett said in a radio interview that he's been trying for eight weeks to verify with the state of Hawaii the facts in Obama's birth certificate.

"I'm not playing to the birthers. I'm not a birther," Bennett told KFYI host Mike Broomhead on Thursday. "I believe the president was born in Hawaii -- at least I hope he was.

"But my responsibility as secretary of State is to make sure the ballots in Arizona are correct and that those people whose names are on the ballot have met the qualifications for the office they are seeking," he said.

The Republican official is exploring a 2014 race for governor.

Riiiight. Not a birther. How about we just call you a fucking moron then?

The message is clear and factual. Tax breaks for the rich do not result in job creation. I'm amazed that so many people buy this line of crap from the Republicans. This video is only called controversial because it quite clearly favors one political party's economic policies over the other in an election year.