Farm Policy Stuff

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Those that know me know that the stupidity of American farm policy is a bit of a pet peeve of mine. (I recommend going to see Food Inc. if you haven’t, not only will that make you annoyed at farm policy but also the intense stupidity of the US legal system and the interpretation of DMCA (Hint, a dude using a machine that’s basic design is 100+ years old working at a job that is as old as human agricultural operations is being sued by a company that says he is an enabler of copyright infringement, and of course the guy being sued lacks the resources to defend himself against a multi national conglomerate so big and far reaching consumers cannot boycott them). Also, read Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma and In Defense of Food).

Anyway, the Obama administration is attempting to actually do something about the stupid. by stopping the practice of giving healthy animals antibiotics. The Farm industry, is of course, trying to stop them.

I would encourage everyone to keep an eye on this developing situation and voice your support of common sense farm policies over some of the countries most massive and destructive corporate welfare interests. And if your Representative or Senator votes against it don’t reelect them (unless of course the farm industry manages to kill the bill by getting some sort of whacky rider in it. Of course still vote against them if they had a hand in getting said wacky rider in the bill in the first place.) US farm policy is a disaster and we need to start taking steps to fix it or we will all be up a creek and I don’t mean just in the US.

Lengthy solar eclipse to sweep across Asia tomorrow

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Millions of people in India, China, and other Asian nations will have a front-row seat for the longest total solar eclipse of the 21st century tomorrow:

The event begins at the crack of dawn on Wednesday, July 22nd, in the Gulf of Khambhat just east of India. Morning fishermen will experience a sunrise like nothing they’ve ever seen before. Rising out of the waves in place of the usual sun will be an inky-black hole surrounded by pale streamers splayed across the sky. Sea birds will stop squawking, unsure if the day is beginning or not, as a strange shadow pushes back the dawn and stirs up a breeze of unaccustomed chill.

Most solar eclipses produce this sort of surreal experience for a few minutes at most. The eclipse of July 22, 2009, however, will last as long as 6 minutes and 39 seconds in some places, not far short of the 7 and a half minute theoretical maximum. It won’t be surpassed in duration until the eclipse of June 13, 2132.

Compare that to the solar eclipse that will sweep across America in 2017, whose totality duration will peak at 2 minutes, 40 seconds near Hopkinsville, Kentucky.

Anyway, back to tomorrow’s eclipse:

The path of totality cuts across many large cities. The shadow will linger over Shanghai, the largest city in China, for six full minutes, giving 20 million residents a lengthy and stunning view of the sun’s ghostly corona. Other large cities in the path of totality include Surat, Vadodara, Bhopal, Varanasi, Chengdu, Chongqing, Wuhan, Hefei, Hangzhou. The population of each numbers in the millions, making this possibly the best-observed solar eclipse in human history.

The eclipse is extra-long because of a lucky coincidence, made possible by the elliptical shape of planetary orbits. On July 22nd, Earth happens to be near its farthest point from the sun. A small sun means the Moon can cover it longer. At the same time, the Moon will be near its closest point to Earth. A large Moon covers the sun longer, lengthening the eclipse even more.

Live webcasts can be found here. As for that 2017 eclipse I mentioned? As my countdown sidebar indicates, it’s a mere 2,953 days away.

A rather impressive amount of insanity

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Not much to say other than that really. Although I must ask Brendan, are you seriously allowed to file a law suit for whatever the f* you want and the defendant actually has to waist their time and money dealing with it? I propose the new federal court department of WTF. All torts have to go through the WTF department and can just end there if a reasonable person or group of people, if you like, go WTF to the suit. A nice filter before the defendant even has to waist their time with it. All cease and desists letters have to go to the WTF department first also. If the board does go WTF you are fined $1,000 for submitting the suit. Prosecutors should also have to go through the WTF department. Perhaps then they will stop harassing teenagers for stupid teenage crap with cellphones and instead be a bit more constructive in dealing with teenagers that do stupid stuff with their cellphones.

That’s the way it was

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As you probably already know, today is the 40th anniversary of the first Moon landing — arguably mankind’s greatest achievement (though, as Conan O’Brien pointed out, putting cheese inside the pizza crust is surely a close second).

In honor of the anniversary, Mac OS X, iPhone and iPod touch users can download Carina’s SkyGazer astronomy application, free for today only. (Hat tip: Jay.) That’s one small step for [a] nerd, one giant leap for nerd-kind.

Oh, and here’s the original live CBS broadcast of the moon landing. I love how it says “LIVE FROM THE SURFACE OF THE MOON.” It’s sort of like they were channeling The Onion… (profanity after the jump)

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