Gongol.com Archives: August 2006
Brian Gongol


August 18, 2006

Humor and Good News "There's a balm onboard the plane"

Aviation News Flight attendants get approval to strike at Northwest

Threats and Hazards Reasons why the midair bombing plot probably wouldn't have worked
And observations about why the smoke-and-mirrors game played by "terrorism experts" probably doesn't really make anyone safer or wiser about the real threats. There seems to be widespread ignorance of structural changes that could be made to enhance security, and a certain paranoia about terrorism in general that overemphasizes the threat of terrorism and distracts attention and energy from things that are actively killing Americans.

Business and Finance Chicago gets bad advice on "living wage" from San Francisco

Humor and Good News Some artists are insane
In a project described as "A slow crushing dance with a pig for one person at a time", artist Kira O'Reilly says her work "left me with an undercurrent of pigginess".

Water News Sioux County will get nation's biggest biogas plant

Graphics Prize Pig

Aviation News Airfare predictions markets
Find out whether prices are likely to rise or fall

Threats and Hazards The new executive powers scorecard
After a Federal judge struck down parts of the domestic surveillance program yesterday, a recap from Wired on how other "new powers" have been treated under law

News Iranian plane full of missiles was denied access to Hezbollah on July 20
US acted on a tip and used satellite data to figure out Iran was loading a plane with missiles, then got Iraq and Turkey to deny overflights

Aviation News Ryanair threatens to sue over airport security
One of Europe's most successful airlines says that the way to defeat terrorism is to return to normal behavior as quickly as possible, so they're threatening to sue if the UK doesn't go back to regular security policies in 7 days

Science and Technology Scientists think they've found the genes that make human brains unique
Certain portion of the genome, called HAR1, has undergone accelerated evolution