And all it took was 45 minutes of talking, are you convinced of his deal making prowess yet? Remeber he's still technically not your president, since he hasn't been inaugurated yet, so imagine what he'l be capable of 40 something days from now.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/donald-trump-says-softbank-pledges-to-invest-50-billion-in-u-s-1481053732

Masayoshi Son, the brash billionaire who controls Sprint Corp., said Tuesday he would invest $50 billion in the U.S. and create 50,000 new jobs, following a 45-minute private meeting with President-elect Donald Trump.

The telecom mogul, who made his fortune in Japan with SoftBank Group Corp., announced his investment plans in the lobby of Trump Tower, though he didn’t provide details. Mr. Trump took credit for the investment, saying his November victory spurred SoftBank’s decision.

Mr. Son told reporters he planned to “invest into the new startup companies in the United States.” It would be difficult to create 50,000 jobs entirely by investing in startups, which generally employ few workers. Sprint employs about 30,000 people and has cut jobs to combat losses.

In an interview, Mr. Son said the money will be coming from a $100 billion investment fund that he began setting up earlier this year with Saudi Arabia’s sovereign-wealth fund and other potential partners.

Mr. Son’s plan to pour $50 billion is massive compared with the total amount of capital in venture circles. Venture-capital firms had $163 billion available to invest in new deals as of June 2016, according to research firm Preqin.

In addition to startups, Mr. Son also has his sights on acquisitions as large as $30 billion, a person familiar with his thinking said.

In addition to Kansas-based Sprint, which SoftBank acquired in 2013 for $22 billion, the company also led a $1 billion investment round last year in San Francisco-based online lender Social Finance Inc.

When he acquired Sprint, Mr. Son’s initial plan was to merge the carrier with German-owned T-Mobile US Inc. to take on market leaders AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc., but he abandoned the effort after regulators signaled they would reject the plan. Some investors and analysts have said he could make another attempt after Mr. Trump’s election and when a new chairman is appointed to the Federal Communications Commission.

Mr. Son planned to tell Mr. Trump about what happened with T-Mobile, and how he had wanted to invest in the U.S. but the regulatory climate was too harsh so he invested outside the U.S. instead, the person familiar with the matter said.

On Tuesday, Mr. Son declined to comment about his current interest in T-Mobile.

The 59-year-old is known as an ambitious investor who bets on tech and telecom ventures. His company has a large stake in China’s Alibaba Group and most recently bought U.K. chip designer ARM Holdings PLC for $32 billion.

Mr. Son has a history of going straight to national leaders to talk business. In September he met South Korean President Park Geun-hye, and said he intends to invest about five trillion won (about $4.5 billion) in the country’s technology sector. He also has met Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and pledged to spend billions on the nation’s tech startups and renewable energy projects.

With the new $100 billion fund—dubbed the SoftBank Vision Fund—Mr. Son plans to spend heavily in fields including the so-called Internet of Things, artificial intelligence, deep learning and robotics. He has said he wants to become the Warren Buffett of the tech industry.

SoftBank plans to invest at least $25 billion during the next five years in the fund, while Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund may contribute an additional $45 billion over the same period as the fund’s lead partner. Other investors are still being finalized. Investments are expected to be made over the next five years.

AT&T Inc. Chief Executive Randall Stephenson also spoke positively of the economic benefits of a Trump presidency Tuesday, largely because of lower taxes and less government oversight. He expressed hope that “a more moderate approach to some of these regulations is in the making under a Trump administration.”

Mr. Stephenson said the U.S. is the “highest tax country in the developed world” and that capital investment, as a percentage of gross domestic product, is at its lowest level since World War II.

“If we achieve any kind of meaningful corporate tax reform I am quite convinced that it is going to change this trajectory in terms of capital investment,” he said at an UBS AG conference in New York. He added that the company’s business plans for 2017 are incorporating scenarios for economics growth to be higher than expected, compared with recent years where the focus was on underperformance.

“I can’t remember the last time I did an upside sensitivity in a business plan, but we are doing an upside sensitivity right now,” he said.

We've had nine fucking years of this twat, and we were on the verge of having him for another 3 since all the opposition parties here are completely impotent, but John "open the floodgates and throw away the" Key, just up and resigned as Prime Minister of New Zealand. I cannot tell you just how happy I am.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11760656

John Key is resigning as Prime Minister of New Zealand.

Key made the announcement at his weekly press conference this afternoon.

The Herald understands Key's wife Bronagh asked him to resign but he later said Bronagh would have backed him going into a fourth term.

Key, his voice shaking with emotion, said he told his Cabinet of his decision this morning.

"This is the hardest decision I've ever made and I don't know what I'll do next."

Key cited family reasons for leaving, saying the job had required great sacrifices "from those who are dearest to me".

His wife Bronagh had endured "many lonely nights" and his children Stephie and Max had been put under "extraordinary levels of intrusion".

Key met his wife Bronagh while attending Burnside High School. The pair married in 1984 and have two children, Stephie and Max.

"Bronagh has made a significant sacrifice during my time in politics, and now is the right time for me to take a step back in my career and spend more time at home."

The National Party caucus will hold a meeting on December 12 to decide the new party leader and Prime Minister.

Key said he would support whoever the caucus chose, but he endorsed Bill English as his replacement.

"Whoever the caucus votes for will have my unwavering support, but if Bill English puts his name forward then I will vote for him.

"For 10 years now Bill and I have worked closely as a team. I have witnessed first-hand his leadership style, his capacity for work, his grasp of the economy, his commitment to change and most of all his decency as a husband, as a father, a colleague and as a politician."

English has not ruled out standing for the top job.

Key said there is no way he could have serve out a full fourth term.

"I do not believe that if I was asked to commit to serving out a full fourth term I could look the public in the eye and say yes.

"And more than anything else in my time here, I have tried to be straight and true with New Zealanders.

"Making the decision to resign has not been easy, and I have no plans as to what comes next in my professional life."

Key said he was looking forward to enjoying a slightly quieter life in and spending time travelling with his spouse.

Key said he was "a commercial guy" and was likely to take up board positions, possibly with companies in Australia.

Unlike his predecessor Helen Clark, he "definitely" had no interest in international politics or a United Nations job.

Key said he could continue living in Auckland and had no plans to move overseas.

He said leaders seemed to stay too long and he felt this was the opportunity to go out on top.

He also said it was the right time to leave, as National were polling at nearly 50 per cent and the economy was growing.

"It leaves the Cabinet and caucus plenty of time to settle in with a new Prime Minister before heading into election year with a proud record of strong economic management," Key said.

"I am hugely confident that National can and will win the next election - just as I as am confident that the caucus has a number of people who would make a fine Prime Minister."

Asked what his legacy would be, Key said stabilising and growing New Zealand's economy after the global financial crisis and weathering crises such as the Canterbury earthquakes.

Key said his main regrets were failing to ratify the Trans Pacific Partnership, not getting the Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary opened, and not changing the national flag.

He had "given everything" to the job but had "nothing left in the tank".

Key said that he wanted to thank the Cabinet and Caucus for their loyalty and energy, and his staff for their hard work over these last eight years.

"I want to acknowledge and thank our support partners ACT, United Future and the Maori Party without whom the strong and stable government we have delivered would not have been possible.

"The Board, office holders and members of the National Party have my grateful thanks for everything they have done during my 10 years as their leader.

"I want to thank the people of the Helensville electorate who have returned me to Parliament every three years since 2002. It has been a great privilege to be their MP."

Key will remain MP for Helensville before stepping down closer to the next election.

Key cancelled his weekly scheduled interview with NewstalkZB at the NZME offices in Auckland this morning, and instead was interviewed over the phone from Wellington.

Labour leader Andrew Little has tweeted his well wishes to Key.

New Zealand First Leader Winston Peters said of the resignation: "The fact is that the economy is not in the healthy state that the Prime Minister has for so long claimed, and there are other issues which have caused this decision as well.

"The New Zealand public should have been informed of this a long time ago.

"Clearly the Prime Minister does not believe the superficial polls any longer.

"Contrary to certain perceptions the Prime Minister and his Finance Minister are unable to muddy the waters anymore."

The announcement caught former National leader Don Brash off guard.

"Well I'm stunned, it was certainly not expected by me or as far as I know by anybody else.

"Most people thought the Prime Minister was very keen to get a fourth term and to announce his resignation a full year before the next election is a very surprising development indeed," Brash said.

Brash said he had "high regard" for several members of the National caucus when asked who should be the new leader.

"One I have great respect for is Judith Collins who's got some very strong views and is a very strong person.

"I guess the reason for suggesting that is that I've been disappointed with the eight years of John Key government so far."

Key has led the National party since 2006.

Key built a career in foreign exchange in New Zealand before continued success in the industry overseas.

He entered Parliament in 2002 as National's representative for Helensville. In 2004 he was appointed Finance Spokesman for the party and succeeded Don Brash as party leader in 2006.

Key led his party to win the election in November 2008 and repeated the victory in 2011 and 2014.

Key has governed the country through the recession of the late-2000s, formed the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority in response to the aftermath of the 2011 Christchurch Earthquake and created a much-protested policy for the partial privitisation of five state-owned enterprises.

Key has also withdrawn the NZ Defence Force from Afghanistan and worked to establish the TPP with the United States.

LOL at him saying this is for family reasons, he had no qualms with his daughter becoming a whore:

This is a historic moment, no president has ever been so bold:

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/803423203620245504
Full disclosure, I was shipped a signed MAGA hat for my posting efforts.

A fun shoa for the whole family to enjoy, you can even attend in your PJs and wont feel out of place.

And yes, obviously the Kremlin has paid me handsomely for this post, they gave me a free family pass to this fun sounding place called Belzec.

Since the article starts off with a mistake about Einstein i'll just clarify. It wasn't Einstein that discovered that the speed of light is constant (in a vacuum), the theory is a natural consequence of Maxwell's laws of electromagnetism, when you apply the equations to an "electromagnetic wave", you get a nice formula predicting the speed of such a wave in terms of the strength of the electric and magnetic constants (referred to as permeability and permisitivity). What Einstein did was apply Newtonian calculations to the movement of such a wave, and while investigating other quirks of accelerating co-ordinate systems, came up with his special theory of relativity. General relativity is another story entirely.

Point being, this article is really talking about the idea of universal constants such as Newton's gravitational constant, and the electromagnetic constants, changing over time.
http://phys.org/news/2016-11-theory-einstein-physics.html

Scientists behind a theory that the speed of light is variable - and not constant as Einstein suggested - have made a prediction that could be tested.

Einstein observed that the speed of light remains the same in any situation, and this meant that space and time could be different in different situations.

The assumption that the speed of light is constant, and always has been, underpins many theories in physics, such as Einstein's theory of general relativity. In particular, it plays a role in models of what happened in the very early universe, seconds after the Big Bang.

But some researchers have suggested that the speed of light could have been much higher in this early universe. Now, one of this theory's originators, Professor João Magueijo from Imperial College London, working with Dr Niayesh Afshordi at the Perimeter Institute in Canada, has made a prediction that could be used to test the theory's validity.

Structures in the universe, for example galaxies, all formed from fluctuations in the early universe – tiny differences in density from one region to another. A record of these early fluctuations is imprinted on the cosmic microwave background – a map of the oldest light in the universe – in the form of a 'spectral index'.

Working with their theory that the fluctuations were influenced by a varying speed of light in the early universe, Professor Magueijo and Dr Afshordi have now used a model to put an exact figure on the spectral index. The predicted figure and the model it is based on are published in the journal Physical Review D.

Cosmologists are currently getting ever more precise readings of this figure, so that prediction could soon be tested – either confirming or ruling out the team's model of the early universe. Their figure is a very precise 0.96478. This is close to the current estimate of readings of the cosmic microwave background, which puts it around 0.968, with some margin of error.

RADICAL IDEA

Professor Magueijo said: "The theory, which we first proposed in the late-1990s, has now reached a maturity point – it has produced a testable prediction. If observations in the near future do find this number to be accurate, it could lead to a modification of Einstein's theory of gravity.

"The idea that the speed of light could be variable was radical when first proposed, but with a numerical prediction, it becomes something physicists can actually test. If true, it would mean that the laws of nature were not always the same as they are today."

The testability of the varying speed of light theory sets it apart from the more mainstream rival theory: inflation. Inflation says that the early universe went through an extremely rapid expansion phase, much faster than the current rate of expansion of the universe.

THE HORIZON PROBLEM

These theories are necessary to overcome what physicists call the 'horizon problem'. The universe as we see it today appears to be everywhere broadly the same, for example it has a relatively homogenous density.

This could only be true if all regions of the universe were able to influence each other. However, if the speed of light has always been the same, then not enough time has passed for light to have travelled to the edge of the universe, and 'even out' the energy.

As an analogy, to heat up a room evenly, the warm air from radiators at either end has to travel across the room and mix fully. The problem for the universe is that the 'room' – the observed size of the universe – appears to be too large for this to have happened in the time since it was formed.

The varying speed of light theory suggests that the speed of light was much higher in the early universe, allowing the distant edges to be connected as the universe expanded. The speed of light would have then dropped in a predictable way as the density of the universe changed. This variability led the team to the prediction published today.

The alternative theory is inflation, which attempts to solve this problem by saying that the very early universe evened out while incredibly small, and then suddenly expanded, with the uniformity already imprinted on it. While this means the speed of light and the other laws of physics as we know them are preserved, it requires the invention of an 'inflation field' – a set of conditions that only existed at the time.

I'm making this post both because partition is an interesting topic of discussion, and because Huffpo is somehow saying the exact same thing as the alt-right. I've said elsewhere that America is two different countries within one set of borders, fighting each-other for dominance over the other; Partition is becoming an increasingly feasible solution to most of the problems raised this election cycle. Full article below:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dana-beyer/a-safe-space-for-white-pe_b_13227466.html

It’s time, America. It’s either a two-state divorce, or “Heil, Trump” will be coming to your neighborhood as it has already come to mine.

We are in a civil war. Not very hot — yet — but in which tension is building daily. Neo-Nazis party in my neighborhood of Chevy Chase, unnoticed by the Leader, while he attacks the cast of Hamilton instead. Clinton keeps racking up votes, now with a 2,000,000+ vote lead, while no one is yet auditing the states that swung the Electoral College (itself a vestige of slavery). Liberals are turning in on themselves, while conservatives stand stunned, buried at the foot of the wreckage of the Republican party while the kakistocracy takes shape.

All this because a few hundred thousand Rust Belt citizens, repeatedly fed misinformation and disinformation in our era of Big Data, decided to first destroy the Republican Party, which had betrayed then for forty years (fool me once...), and then take down the entire country in a fit of pique for an encore. Now they will learn what pain really feels like, as they’ve given unlimited power to a demagogue (“Hamilton’s besetting fear was that American democracy would be spoiled by demagogues who would mouth populist shibboleths to conceal their despotism.”) while emasculating themselves. Their new Karl Rove fancies himself as Darth Vader, Dick Cheney and Satan, though on a good day he elevates his narcissistic neo-Nazi self-image into Thomas Cromwell (who ended up executed by the Crown, but no matter).

Still, the fact remains that 62 million people voted for the El Caudillo del Mar-a-Lago, in spite of the fact that a significant plurality of those voters felt he was unqualified. All I hear these days from Republicans (and some Democrats) is we failed, in this perverse Marxist analysis, because we didn’t empathize with the poor white working class, while we played within our diversity and let multiculturalism and intersectionality run amok. We must learn to show compassion. Not to our myriad of communities competing for the American ideal of equality, but for a swath of the country - the heartland and Confederacy, along with the Rust Belt - that just ended the American experiment its white race had run for the entirety of 240 years, as if it were simply a season of Survivor.

Sorry, but no. I’m all out of empathy and compassion. Feel free to hate me all you want because I’m an elitist who shows disdain for you. Enjoy waiting for the factories and mills to return as you fling your resentment at the bicoastal elites who’ve created the government programs like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act (sorry about that) upon which you depend. You’ve been fighting a culture war and a religious war, and while you won this battle, you will most assuredly lose the war.

But just as I have no empathy or compassion left, I also have no room for hate in my heart. Vengeance is toxic. So, in the interest of giving most Americans what they what, I again offer what I’ve previously called the 36th Parallel, or Two-State Solution. An amicable disunion so the white enthno-nationalist supremacists can have their own land, their own “safe space,” (as much as they revile that phrase), and diverse America can be free in its own country.

There’s plenty of precedence for this plan — the former Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia, which gently dissolved their bonds of empire and union. Soon the same will probably happen to the UK. At times it’s gotten ugly, as it did in Yugoslavia, but there is plenty of centrifugal momentum to provide more than adequate justification for us to give it a go. To ignore the alternative is to condemn us to civil war.

I’ve heard that the idea is just absurd. It’s a taboo; after all, preserving the Union is what drove Lincoln to go to war in the first place, and the thought that the exceptional United States would ever break up is inconceivable. But Trump was as inconceivable three weeks ago. A fascist takeover by an admitted sexual predator of adolescents and fraudulent businessman was inconceivable. Today few believe a Brexited UK will remain intact; it didn’t take too long to imagine Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland taking flight to join the EU as independent states. London may secede as well, its population greater than Scotland and Wales combined. Their economies depend on it.

So we can do the same. Already there is a growing movement for a #CalExit, and New York has also announced its refusal to play nice with Washington beginning next year. We don’t need to secede from the start; even I can’t imagine Democrats having the guts to do it. But we can set up regional compacts in the northeast and Midwest to develop the governmental relationships that will lead to the future United States. Resistance to Homeland Security’s deportation raids and Muslim registries will build regional will to continue on the path to independence. We already have regional agreements with Canada to control acid rain and greenhouse gases; with the upcoming gutting of the EPA we can take those as a model for the future dissolution. Cities and states can refuse federal funding (not that it will be offered for much longer anyway), and we’ve long known that the Confederacy survives only with subsidies from the blue states.

I know secession is unconstitutional, but that didn’t stop Jefferson Davis. What is Trump going to do to the 6th largest economy on the planet? Invade? Resistance (#Resist) is not futile. It is the essence of the American experiment, dissent on behalf of efforts to create a more perfect union. It’s just that the effort required to create that union is simply too difficult with 120 million apathetic non-voting citizens and 60 million who’ve been trying to kill the federal government for the past forty years and have now finally succeeded. We don’t need to play that game. We don’t need to maintain efforts at political persuasion in an anti-political world where fascism is ascendant. President Clinton said we needed to vote for Hillary because our children and grandchildren would thank us. It wasn’t enough. Now we have to separate and end this marriage which was arranged and forced from the beginning, and has never, except when the outside world intruded and threatened destruction, shown any real cohesion. Let’s call an end to the 50 state experiment so we can salvage the ideals upon which the original constitutional republic was based. Separation will let us do a better job at it. A roughly 50-50 state split will do it, or we can start by cutting the Confederacy loose.

We can continue to flounder around in a miasma of pain and incomprehensibility, or we can work towards reclaiming the Declaration and Constitution from the fascists. A friend recently mentioned that the South won the Civil War, and we’re only now recognizing that fact.

It’s time, America.

Debugging code is srs business.
http://phys.org/news/2016-11-glitch-blamed-european-mars-lander.html

The ESA's Schiaparelli lander had travelled for seven years and 496mn kms (308mn miles) before a computer glitch sent it crashing onto the surface of Mars

A tiny lander that crashed on Mars last month flew into the Red Planet at 540 kilometres (335 miles) per hour instead of gently gliding to a stop, after a computer misjudged its altitude, scientists said.

Schiaparelli was on a test-run for a future rover meant to seek out evidence of life, past or present, but it fell silent seconds before its scheduled touchdown on October 19.

After trawling through mountains of data, the European Space Agency said Wednesday that while much of the mission went according to plan, a computer that measured the rotation of the lander hit a maximum reading, knocking other calculations off track.

That led the navigation system to think the lander was much lower than it was, causing its parachute and braking thrusters to be deployed prematurely.

"The erroneous information generated an estimated altitude that was negative—that is, below ground level," the ESA said in a statement.

"This in turn successively triggered a premature release of the parachute and the backshell (heat shield), a brief firing of the braking thrusters and finally activation of the on-ground systems as if Schiaparelli had already landed. In reality, the vehicle was still at an altitude of around 3.7 km."

The 230 million-euro ($251-million) Schiaparelli had travelled for seven years and 496 million kilometres (308 million miles) onboard the so-called Trace Gas Orbiter to within a million kilometres of Mars when it set off on its own mission to reach the surface.

After a scorching, supersonic dash through Mars's thin atmosphere, it was supposed to glide gently towards the planet's surface.

The planet Mars as seen by the webcam on the European Space Agency's (ESA) Mars Express orbiter

For a safe landing, Schiaparelli had to slow down from a speed of 21,000 kilometres (13,000 miles) per hour to zero, and survive temperatures of more than 1,500 degrees Celsius (2,730 degrees Fahrenheit) generated by atmospheric drag.

It was equipped with a discardable, heat-protective shell to shield it, a parachute and nine thrusters to decelerate, and a crushable structure in its belly to cushion the final impact.

Sniffing for signs of life

The crash was Europe's second failed attempt to reach the alien surface.

The first attempt, in 2003, also ended in disappointment when the British-built Beagle 2 robot lab disappeared without trace after separating from its mothership, Mars Express.

Since the 1960s, more than half of US, Russian and European attempts to operate craft on the Martian surface have failed.

Schiaparelli and the Trace Gas Orbiter comprised phase one of a project dubbed ExoMars through which Europe and Russia are seeking to join the United States in operating a successful rover on the planet.

The next part of the mission is the start of the Trace Gas Orbiter's mission in 2018, sniffing Mars' atmosphere for gases potentially excreted by living organisms.

The crash of the Schiaparelli on Mars in October was the European Space Agency's second failed attempt to reach the alien surface

The rover will follow, due for launch in 2020, with a drill to search for remains of past life, or evidence of current activity, up to two metres deep.

While life is unlikely to exist on the barren, radiation-blasted surface, scientists say traces of methane in Mars' atmosphere may indicate something is stirring underground—possibly single-celled microbes.

European space officials have insisted that any problems encountered by Schiaparelli were part of the trial-run and would inform the design of the future rover.

"In some ways, we're lucky that this weakness in the navigation system was discovered on the test landing, before the second mission," ESA's Schiaparelli manager Thierry Blancquaert, told AFP.

The ESA said that data gleaned from the instruments aboard Schiaparelli during the entry would help to better understand the Red Planet and especially its atmosphere.

"This is still a very preliminary conclusion," David Parker, ESA's Director of Human Spaceflight and Robotic Exploration, said of Wednesday's findings.

"The full picture will be provided in early 2017 by the future report of an external independent inquiry board," he added.

"But we will have learned much from Schiaparelli that will directly contribute to the second ExoMars mission being developed with our international partners for launch in 2020."

Science I guess?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3965656/Trump-shift-NASA-s-focus-space-exploration-end-climate-change-programs-based-politicized-science.html

Donald Trump plans to put NASA's focus back on space exploration and cut away programs that study climate change.

Bob Walker, an adviser to Trump, told The Guardian that the incoming president wants to keep NASA away from 'politicized science.'

Other government agencies can take on climate research, he said.

'We see NASA in an exploration role, in deep space research,' Walker told the publication. 'Earth-centric science is better placed at other agencies where it is their prime mission."

Donald Trump plans to put NASA's focus back on space exploration and cut away programs that study climate change. The above photo is from NASA's Antarctic mission, where scientists are observing changes in polar ice

An adviser to Trump said the incoming president wants to keep NASA away from 'politicized science' - 'earth-centric science is better placed at other agencies where it is their prime mission,' he said

Walker admitted that some of that work would continue at NASA.

'My guess is that it would be difficult to stop all ongoing NASA programs but future programs should definitely be placed with other agencies,' he said.

Adding, 'I believe that climate research is necessary but it has been heavily politicized, which has undermined a lot of the work that researchers have been doing. Mr Trump’s decisions will be based upon solid science, not politicized science.'

Trump has said that climate change is a 'hoax' and he'd 'cancel' an international agreement to combat global warming.

Yesterday he told the New York Times that he was reconsidering his position on the 196-nation accord, known as the Paris agreement, that was put into place by the Obama administration.

'I’m looking at it very closely. I have an open mind to it,' he said.

NASA's Earth Science Division collects data on temperature fluctuations, the oceans, sea ice and glaciers and tracks severe weather.

'To study the planet from the unique perspective of space,' it's web page says, the NASA division 'develops and operates remote-sensing satellites and instruments.'

'We analyze observational data from these spacecraft and make it available to the world's scientists.'

A blog post from last week draws attention to the Montreal Protocol and 'the climate warming effects of chemicals that were supposed to be better for the ozone layer.'

Walker called the division's work 'politically correct environmental monitoring.'

Democrats and environmental groups have derided Trump as a 'climate denier' over his refusal to say that human activity is making the world warmer.

Trump told the New York Times on Tuesday, 'I think there is some connectivity. Some, something. It depends on how much.'

Walker told the Guardian Trump's skepticism is 'shared by half the climatologists in the world.

'We need good science to tell us what the reality is and science could do that if politicians didn’t interfere with it.'

NASA's Earth Science Division is set to receive $2 billion in funding in 2017. Another $2.8 billion is appropriated for space exploration

NASA's Earth Science Division is set to receive $2 billion in funding in 2017. Another $2.8 billion is appropriated for space exploration.

President Barack Obama increased NASA's budget by $6 billion dollars in 2010 and controversially directed the government agency to spend its resources on developing an asteroid mission and and sending a manned spaceship to Mars.

NASA poured billions into plans to build a permanent base on the moon in the previous administration but fell so far behind that Obama nixed it. 

Trump's proposed changes to NASA are also generating push back.

Penn State University's Michael Mann, a climate scientist, accused Trump of playing politics with the government division.

'Without the support of NASA, not only the US but the entire world would be taking a hard hit when it comes to understanding the behavior of our climate and the threats posed by human-caused climate change,' he told The Guardian, 'It would be a blatantly political move.'

Mann said it 'would indicate the president-elect’s willingness to pander to the very same lobbyists and corporate interest groups he derided throughout the campaign.'

Airstrip one coming soon™
http://phys.org/news/2016-11-uk-lawmakers-surveillance-powers.html

The British parliament this week gave the green light to new bulk surveillance powers for police and intelligence services that critics have denounced as the most far-reaching of any western democracy.

The Investigatory Powers Bill would, among other measures, require websites to keep customers' browsing history for up to a year and allow law enforcement agencies to access them to help with investigations.

Edward Snowden, the former US National Security Agency contractor turned whistleblower, said the powers "went further than many autocracies".

"The UK has just legalised the most extreme surveillance in the history of western democracy," he tweeted.

The bill, the first major update of British surveillance laws for 15 years, was passed by the House of Lords and now only needs rubber-stamping by Queen Elizabeth II.

Prime Minister Theresa May introduced the bill in March when she was still interior minister, describing it as "world-leading" legislation intended to reflect the change in online communications.

It gives legal footing to existing but murky powers such as the hacking of computers and mobile phones, while introducing new safeguards such as the need for a judge to authorise interception warrants.

But critics have dubbed it the "snooper's charter" and say that, in authorising the blanket retention and access by authorities of records of emails, calls, texts and web activity, it breaches fundamental rights of privacy.

Rights organisation Liberty has challenged the legislation at the European Court of Justice, arguing it is incompatible with human rights law, and a judgement is expected next year.

"The passage of the Snoopers' Charter through parliament is a sad day for British liberty," said Bella Sankey, the group's policy director.

"Under the guise of counter-terrorism, the state has achieved totalitarian-style surveillance powers –- the most intrusive system of any democracy in human history.

"It has the ability to indiscriminately hack, intercept, record, and monitor the communications and internet use of the entire population."

Jim Killock, executive director of digital campaigners Open Rights Group, warned the impact of the legislation would reach beyond Britain.

"It is likely that other countries, including authoritarian regimes with poor human rights records, will use this law to justify their own intrusive surveillance powers," he said.

The bill also reinforces existing encryption powers, allowing officials to ask technology companies to provide content where it is deemed "practicable", although firms fear it may open the door to further demands on the sector.

I hate trying to block quote dailymail since they append a referral to your clipboard.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3949670/Peter-Thiel-created-secret-database-called-Plum-List-screen-fast-track-talent-shown-loyalty-Trump-come-outside-Beltway.html

Peter Thiel and others working on the Donald Trump transition have launched a secret database called the 'Plum List' to screen out disloyal Trump administration applicants and recruit prospective hires from outside the traditional Beltway channels, sources tell the DailyMail.com.

Insiders said the Plum List, which is being run outside of the official Trump transition, will serve as a central database to help wade through the thousands of incoming applications and identify key talent.

Sources said the list is being spearheaded by Thiel, who was appointed to a top spot on Trump's transition team last Friday.

'Peter and a number of people are running a secret "Plum List", which is a way of screening out bad people,' said one source involved with the project. 'It's basically a way to do all the background checks.'

Another Thiel ally billed it as an 'official, unofficial way to fast-track' qualified applicants, particularly those who come from outside the typical Washington, DC, think tank-consultant nexus.

The list will primarily focus on recruiting staffers for science and technology, the areas Thiel has been tasked with in the transition process.

However, sources close to Thiel said he has taken a broad view of his directive, and will be looking at candidates for the FDA, the FCC, and federal trust issues as well.

The database will also include generalist candidates who could be placed in a range of administration roles, and ambassadorial candidates.

'Everybody with any involvement with the campaign is getting bombarded with resumes so this is a place where we're forwarding them all and just organizing our efforts into a formal process around it,' said the source. 'We have people inside the transition who we're preparing this for and who've asked us to do this.'

Applicants will be screened and color-coded in the database – with an emphasis on whether they have shown loyalty to Donald Trump through the election.

'We're vetting people and making sure they've been committed Trump supporters throughout the election,' said the source. 'Loyalty is very important to Trump, and there's been kind of a civil war within the party.

'So we want to make sure that the people who go into the administration are aligned with his vision and goals.'

The vetting process includes a heavy focus on social media. Insiders say they will be looking closely at prospective staffers' online postings – even ones they may have deleted.

'The jocks have won the election, and now the nerds need to make sure they do their homework for them,' said another source.

A master database like the Plum List could be a crucial tool for the transition team, which has been scrambling to organize since Trump's surprise victory last week.

Prior to the election, the transition team made very little progress with Chris Christie at the helm, according to insiders.

Last Friday, the campaign announced that vice president-elect Mike Pence would replace Christie as the leader of the transition. Christie was bumped down to a vice-chairman role

The New Jersey governor had been a contentious choice to lead the transition team, according to insiders.

Christie had filled leadership positions with members of his inner circle, including Bill Palatucci and former chief of staff Rich Bagger.

This irked some on the transition, who believe Christie's people were working to fill administration roles with their own allies rather than individuals who supported Trump's political agenda.

'It look[ed] like the "Christie for President" transition,' said one source with knowledge of the transition. 'There's nobody in the building [leadership] who's loyal to Donald Trump… It's infuriating because Christie's not the guy you want to trust with personnel.'

Christie's circle reportedly lobbied for several individual appointments, including Christie adviser Bob Grady, a former official in the George HW Bush administration, for Environmental Protection Agency secretary or head of Interior; James Connaughton, a former George W. Bush official; and environmental attorney Jeff Holmstead.

This push to appoint Christie insiders also grated on some of the transition staff, who applauded the news that Pence would take over last Friday.

Sources familiar with the transition team also said the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank in Washington, DC, has taken a larger role in the transition. The think tank has also compiled a database of potential candidates for a Trump administration.

Thereby prvoing that two nukes weren't enough.

(Phys.org)—A team of researchers working at West China Hospital in Chengdu has for the first time injected CRISPR–Cas9 edited cells into a human test subject. Nature reports that the procedure occurred on October 28, and that thus far, the patient is doing "fine."

Modified cells have been injected into human subjects before, of course, but using different techniques. CRISPR-Cas 9 is considered to be a more efficient approach. In this new effort, the researchers isolated immune cells retrieved from a blood sample, then used CRISPR-Cas9 to locate and disable the PD-1 protein in them, which prior research has shown slows an immune response by a cell. The idea is that disabling the protein will allow the immune system to put up more of a fight against tumor growth. The edited cells were placed in a container where they were fed and allowed to multiply—the entire collection was then gathered and injected into a patient suffering from a type of lung cancer that had not responded to any other treatment type.

The CRISPR technique involves using an RNA guide that binds to a particular DNA sequence and an enzyme (the Cas9 part) that can cut strands of DNA at preselected spots, allowing for removing strands or adding new ones.

The research effort is being led by Lu You, an oncologist with Chengdu's Sichuan University and involves a patient who had already been injected and nine other volunteers. Other groups around the world, including one in the U.S., are still in the planning stages for conducting similar trials. The trial in the U.S. (which is slated to start early next year) will be also investigate the possibility of using CRISPR edited genes to fight cancer. Some have suggested the new development by the Chinese team signals the start of a race between superpowers reminiscent of the space race between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R back in the 1960s.

The first patient is scheduled to receive a second dose of modified cells, the team revealed, but did not give a timeline. That patient and all the others in the trial will be monitored closely for six months to determine if the edited cells cause any adverse effects—only then will the team be focused on whether the cells actually made any difference in slowing or reversing cancer growth.

If you're a mouse.

(Medical Xpress)—A large team of researchers with members from several Europeans countries and the U.S. has found that mice fed a compound called spermidine lived longer than ordinary mice and also had better cardiovascular heath. In their paper published in the journal Nature Medicine, the researchers describe experiments they carried out with the compound and mice, what they found and why they believe the compound might provide benefits for humans.

Prior research has found that ingestion of spermidine—which was first discovered in semen samples, hence its name—led to longer lifespans in simple organisms such as fruit flies, yeast and roundworms. In this new study, the researchers sought to find out if the same would prove true for more complex creatures.

For a second when a new page is loading, the notification symbol pops up and gives me joy that somebody's acknowledged my existence, but then it goes away once the page had fully loaded. Why does this site toy with my emotions and is there anyway to fix this?