Thursday, March 3rd, 2016
Eva Botkin-Kowacki, Staff Writer - The Christian Science Monitor
Stephan: The ignominy of the Roman Catholic Church's ongoing moral turpitude concerning the molestation of children just never seems to end. Here is the latest. What really stands out for me is the scope of this scandal and the fact that the Catholic Church can't seem to get out ahead of it, and doesn't seem to hold the violators of children, and those who covered for them properly accountable. It just goes on and on.
Bishops James Hogan and Joseph Adamec
Credit: wfmz.com
Two Roman Catholic bishops were involved in covering up extensive sexual child abuse in their central Pennsylvania diocese over four decades, according to a grand jury report made public Tuesday.
The 147-page report reveals that the two bishops helped hide the abuse by moving offending priests to different parishes, mandating counseling and paying off victims.
Bishops James Hogan and Joseph Adamec led the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese for consecutive terms, Hogan from 1966 to 1986 and Adamec until 2011. During those years, hundreds of children were sexually abused by more than 50 religious leaders in the eight-county diocese.
“These predators desecrated a sacred trust and preyed upon their victims in the very places where they should have felt most safe,” Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane, who was instrumental in the investigation, said in a statement. “Just as troubling is the cover-up perpetrated by clergy leaders that allowed this abuse to continue for decades.”
No criminal charges have been filed as some abusers have died, it is […]
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Thursday, March 3rd, 2016
Bethania Palma Markus, - The Raw Story
Stephan: It may look like it, but this story is not satire. There is something about Republican politics in Texas that rewards the crazy, the ignorant, the grotesquely prejudiced. This is why America is falling behind; why our children can't compete or even keep up with the children from other developed nations.How does this happen? Consider this:
According to the Gallup Organization, "There is a significant political divide in beliefs about the origin of human beings, with 60% of Republicans saying humans were created in their present form by God 10,000 years ago, a belief shared by only 40% of independents and 38% of Democrats." The Republican number may not surprise but nearly 4 out of 10 Democrats also are anti-science.
This is Mary Lou Bruner. Mary Lou believes that baby dinosaurs lived on Noah’s ark, school shootings are a product of kids learning evolution.
Credit: Gawker
A woman who believes in the New World Order conspiracy theory and that President Obama worked as a gay prostitute could soon win a seat on the Texas state Board of Education, the Houston Chronicle reports.
Mary Lou Bruner fell just 2 points short of gaining the 50 percent needed to avoid a run-off. Bruner, who claims to be a retired teacher who holds a Masters in special education, believes sex education materials “stimulate” children to experiment with sex and that the United Nations has a plan to wipe out two-thirds of the world population.
According to the Chronicle, Bruner has deleted most of her Facebook posts with questionable content — but not before Gawker and others could […]
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Wednesday, March 2nd, 2016
Stephan: I am leading with this story, which a reader sent me, because I was so moved by the humanity of it. No one actually seems to know how many people are living in refugee tent encampments all over the world but it runs to hundreds of thousands at least. Families and small children living in canvas tents little changed from the 19th century. Now IKEA and its designers, working with refugee organizations have come up with something new. Bravo IKEA and Better Shelters. Click through to see the little video that shows how they build these new shelters, and make a contribution.
Better Shelter housing units in Kawergosk, Iraq.
For years, millions of families seeking shelter from war and other turmoil have had to live in refugee tents made of little more than tarps thrown over wooden or metal frames. In some cases, this antiquated method of housing turns out to be the family’s only home for a decade or more.
Fortunately, the IKEA Foundation has teamed up with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to design the “Better Shelter,” which is safer, sturdier, easy to transport and assemble, and can house five people at a time. It boasts built-in solar panels that can charge batteries and power four hours of LED lighting at night, and can better protect its inhabitants from rain, heat, and wind for up to three years — six times longer than the lifespan of tents used in many refugee camps today.
After two years of design work and testing […]
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Wednesday, March 2nd, 2016
Nick Cunningham, Environmental Writer - Oilprice
Stephan: Here is some more good news. The shift to electric vehicles is going faster than anyone projected, and the benefits are already coming into focus. My prediction is that China will come to dominate the electric vehicle market because American companies are simply too in the bag to oil, too committed to their existing infrastructure, too intertwined with the past to seize the opportunity properly. It will mean millions of jobs blossoming in China instead of the U.S. But it will also mean a significant reduction in carbon emissions, as this article describes.
Chinese electric car
Credit: USAToday
Electric cars could upend oil markets much sooner than everyone thinks.
According to a new report from Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF), the rapid decline in the cost of building batteries for electric vehicles (EVs) will make them cheaper than the internal combustion engine in just a few years. By the 2020s, EVs could beat conventional vehicles on price, a shocking development and a potential epochal shift for energy markets.
Battery prices declined by 35 percent in 2015, another impressive feat for the technology as it marches towards both relevance and market share. BNEF believes that EVs – on an unsubsidized basis – will be just as affordable as a car that runs on gasoline…within six years. That means that by 2022, BNEF argues, EVs will reach “the point of liftoff for sales.” The cost-competitive prediction for EVs even assumes that gasoline-powered cars continue to improve efficiency at a rate of 3.5 percent per year.
Related: U.S. Unable To Halt ISIS March Towards Libyan Oil
The report projects that […]
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Wednesday, March 2nd, 2016
DAVID NIELD , - science alert
Stephan: Here is some more good news about solar; it is just amazing how fast the technology is developing.
Solar cells on a soap bubble
Credit: MIT
Scientists have invented incredibly thin, flexible photovoltaic cells that are so lightweight, they can rest on top of soap bubbles without breaking them. Cells this thin and light could eventually be placed almost anywhere, from smart clothing to helium balloons.
“It could be so light that you don’t even know it’s there, on your shirt or on your notebook,” said one of the researchers, Vladimir Bulović from MIT. “These cells could simply be an add-on to existing structures.”
It’s that versatility that makes the experiment so exciting – even if it’s still only a proof-of-concept at this stage. Key to the creation of the new cell is the way the researchers have combined making the solar cell itself, the substrate that supports it, and its protective coating, all in one process.
One advantage is that by growing the cell and the substrate together, the latter can be protected from dust and other contaminants. A common flexible polymer called parylene was […]
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