Heavy metal pollution near Norilsk is so severe that it is now economically feasible to mine the soil, which has been polluted so severely that it has economic grades of platinum and palladium.

Wow.

NASA - Norilsk, Siberia

More evidence that sex offender hysteria motivates corrupt legislators to produce policy that is fucking stupid.

The facts are pretty darned sad. Barely more than a child himself at 19, Bradshaw was charged with statutory rape for having sex with a 15-year-old girl. Fine. That’s punishable. I’d prefer it had been kept out of the criminal justice system (see here for more) but its punishable. He gets 5 years.

After he gets out he gives an invalid address. For that, too, he pleads guilty and is sentenced to time served. When released he moves in with his sister but can’t live there because Georgia’s draconian sex offender law won’t let him live within 1,000 feet of a recreation center!

He moves in with an aunt but can’t stay there because the home is within 1,000 feet of the First Baptist Church! Growing desperate, he finds a family friend but this time inadvertently transposes the street address!

Now the cops move in. Bradshaw is arrested because he hadn’t moved into the friend’s single-wide trailer within the legally required 72 hours — and lied and said he did! His mandatory sentence for this infraction is life in prison.

A Georgia lawyer in this thread says that many of these people end up being homeless because they cannot find a place to live that complies with the law, and then they end up getting arrested for being homeless.

Fortunately we have elected representatives who are capable of forming logical thoughts:

Sen. President pro tem Eric Johnson (R-Savannah) said the law is clear.

"I wish it hadn't happened, but there are consequences for people's actions," said Johnson, a chief sponsor of the offender law. "What would have happened if he had given the wrong address and had lived in a place and was harming a child next door? The law is trying to protect children. Justice has to be blind to motive."

1. Eric Johnson recommended these particular consequences. He has to defend why they are appropriate, and not refer to them as if they are beyond his control!
2. This person is not a pedophile.
3. This is not an attempt to protect children. Strict statutory rape laws are designed to attack teenagers for having sex out of wedlock. In this case coupled with a hysteria driven over broad sex offender registration rule intended as marketing fodder for political campaigns.
4. No, justice does not have to be blind to motive! There is a difference between malice murder and involuntary manslaughter. If you don't understand that you shouldn't be writing laws.

Georgia Supreme Court considers proportionality in sex offender case

We're told the whole British accent thing -- well, it's more than an accent. Britney has multiple personalities, including, as people in her life call it, "the British girl." We're told when Spears loses the British personality, she has absolutely no idea what she did during the time she assumed that personality.

Well that would explain a bit...

Britney's Multiple Personality Disorder

The Former Larsen Air Force Base Complex 1A Titan ICBM Facility

I'm not sure what the hell you'd do with it, but it's on the block?

Titan Missile Base Central Washington - (eBay item 190132455924 end time Oct-13-07 18:55:49 PDT)

The White House today took what may be a lone stand against the Popcorn Workers Lung Disease Prevention Act, a bill the House may vote on as soon as Wednesday. It would require the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to publish standards regulating worker exposure to diacetyl, a flavoring chemical used in microwave popcorn and other foods that can cause bronchiolitis obliterans, or “popcorn lung.”

The White House Office of Management and Budget today suggested the bill, sponsored by Democratic Rep. Lynn Woolsey of California, is a hasty mandate that could disrupt OSHA’s already-adequate response to the problem. “More time is needed to gather sufficient evidence concerning” the causes of popcorn lung, the “range of exposure levels that may be hazardous,” and “the kinds of control measures that are most effective,” OMB said.

Haven't we heard this song and dance before? Wouldn't this be the same story trotted out by such defenders of the public interest as the Tobacco Institute? All the bill does is require OSHA to act, nothing else. How this interferes in them doing what they should already be doing baffles me.

Washington Wire - WSJ.com : OMB Recommends Zapping 'Popcorn Lung' Bill

The ruling was the result of a lawsuit filed by three sets of parents. Greg Hampel and Ed Swaya of Seattle had feared taking their daughter back to Oklahoma to visit her birth mother. Heather Finstuen and Anne Magro feared that non-biological mom Finstuen couldn't sign medical releases and other forms. Lucy and Jennifer Doel, who live in Oklahoma, had felt the impact of the misguided law: When their little girl had to be rushed to a hospital, the ambulance crew said only "the mother" could go along.

Good. Oklahoma not ok!

AlterNet: Federal Ruling Protects Kids of Gay Parents

Notices of unpaid taxes, unanticipated and little understood, will probably multiply as more people fall behind on their mortgages, said Ellen Harnick, senior policy counsel at the Center for Responsible Lending, a nonpartisan research and policy center in Durham, N.C.

Foreclosure is one way that beleaguered homeowners can fall into this tax trap. The other is when homeowners are forced to sell their homes for less than the value of the mortgage. If the lender forgives that difference, they are liable for income taxes on that amount.

The 1099 shortfall, as it is called, stems from an Internal Revenue Service policy that treats forgiven debt of all types as income even if the taxpayer has nothing tangible to show for it, unless the debt is canceled through bankruptcy.

Still more fallout from the sub-prime trap. Lost your house? That's okay, you only owe us $30,000 because you lost it.

After Foreclosure, a Big Tax Bill From the I.R.S. - New York Times

Drawing parallels with the end of the Roman empire, Mr Walker warned there were “striking similarities” between America’s current situation and the factors that brought down Rome, including “declining moral values and political civility at home, an over-confident and over-extended military in foreign lands and fiscal irresponsibility by the central government”.

At least we have our McDonalds and American Idol! All Rome had was bread and circuses!

FT.com / World - Learn from the fall of Rome, US warned

The troubled saga of Lindsay Lohan took another dangerous turn early Tuesday when police charged her with drunken driving and cocaine possession after a frightened woman dialed 911 to report being chased by Lohan's SUV.

I see rehab didn't really take....

Movie News - Lohan Arrested Again for DUI, Cocaine - AOL News

President Bush unveiled a new executive order that allows the administration to block bank accounts and any other financial assets that might be found in this country belonging to people, companies or groups that the United States deems are working to threaten stability in Iraq.

Bush cited the "unusual and extraordinary threat" to national security and foreign policy of the United States "posed by acts of violence threatening the peace and stability of Iraq and undermining efforts to promote economic reconstruction and political reform in Iraq and to provide humanitarian assistance to the Iraqi people."

Unconstitutional search and seizure anyone? They already could do this, they just needed a court order and some measure of proof the money was being used illegally. Now they think they can do so by executive fiat? And just out of curiosity, what does "working to threaten stability in Iraq" mean? Does this mean Blackwater gets their funds seized? For some reason I doubt it.

U.S. to crack down on terror bankrolls - USATODAY.com