Uhhh…

A chemistry student in the Ukraine was found dead with his jaw blown off by what is believed to be exploding chewing gum, according to reports.

“A loud pop was heard from the student’s room,” the ukranews.com Web site said, citing an aide to the city’s police chief.

“When his relatives entered the room, they saw that the lower part of the young man’s face had been blown off.”

Er, ummm…

The student apparently had a bizarre habit of chewing gum after dipping it into citric acid, Russian news agency Ria Novosti said.

Bizarre. Yes, that about covers it

Officers found both citric acid packets and a similar-looking unidentified substance, believed to be some kind of explosive material, on a table near the body, the agency continued.

Investigators suspect that the student simply confused the packets and put gum covered with explosive material into his mouth.

So, safety lesson of the day: Don’t store your explosives and citric acid in the same place, lest you accidentally dip your gum in the wrong one and blow up your face.

This is a few days old by now, but I’m still catching up.  Busy week.

Chinese scientists artificially induced the second major snowstorm to wreak havoc in Beijing this season, state media said, reigniting debate over the practice of tinkering with Mother Nature.

After the earliest snow to hit the capital in 22 years fell on November 1, the capital was again shrouded in white Tuesday with more snow expected in the coming three days, the National Meteorological Centre said.

So, the Chinese claim they can control the weather.  Useful propaganda for them, I suppose.  If you control the weather, then you have one more tool in the toolbox to control the people.

Color me skeptical, to say the least.

The idea of cloud seeding has been around for quite some time, and is a Voodoo science at best.  Perhaps China figured out a new way to seed clouds.  Perhaps not.

But the real question is: should we be messing with the weather?  Shouldn’t there be limits on what we mess with?

I’ve watched enough Sci-Fi (or is it SyFy?) to know that this only ends in Apocalypse.

In the meantime, there are at least some in China who disagree with the government’s plan:

“No one can tell how much weather manipulation will change the sky,” Xiao Gang, a professor in the Institute of Atmospheric Physics at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, told the paper.

“We should not depend too much on artificial measures to get rain or snow, because there are too many uncertainties up in the sky.”

And in Future News, Xiao Gang, former professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, has graduated from re-education camp.  He will now head the government’s cloud seeding research.  “There is nothing the Chinese people cannot accomplish,” a newly thin Gang said.

h/t CW

Here it is, patent number7617530. Thanks, USPTO, for giving Microsoft, which is already a monopoly, a monopoly on something that’s been in use since 1980 and wasn’t invented by Microsoft. Here’s Wikipedia’s description of sudo, which you can meaningfully compare to Microsoft’s description of its “invention”.

Read More, O.G.

Maine senator Olympia Snowe added her support to the current version of the health bill.

At the White House, Obama called the events “a critical milestone” toward remaking the nation’s health care system. He praised Snowe as well as Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chairman of the committee, and declared, “We are going to get this done.”

It’s disappointing for opponents of the bill, but not altogether unexpected since she’s spent some time discussing this with the pres already, and she’s only a part-time republican anyway.




UPDATE:
Charlie Gibson interviews, Snowe answers questions with blathering blatherskite, and this, which stood out to me:

Understandably people do have honest philosophical differences…

Yes, I’m glad you recognize that fact, Madam Senator. Both sides want citizens of the US to be healthier, and have different ideas of effective, long term strategy, but that observation does nothing to rationalize unifying toward a bad solution.

TNT up the keester is not a good option.

A SUICIDE bomber tried to kill a Saudi prince by detonating TNT hidden up his BACKSIDE.

Fanatic Abdullah Hassan Tali al-Asiri, 23, blew himself up – but his intended victim escaped with minor injuries.

Ah, Al-Qaeda.

Al-Qaeda then named the bomber and released his photograph together with a statement claiming responsibility for the attack.

Really guys? You claimed this dude? He blew his own ass up and did no damage to the intended target. If there was ever a time to go with the “uh… Abdullah you say? Never heard of him…” it’s with this guy.

Sounds Fun!

An animal rights group wants to rent a prison building the state plans to close and turn it into the nation’s first chicken empathy museum.

Really? I could have sworn I visited a Chicken Empathy Museum when I was in San Francisco… I guess that was something else, since this would be the first.

PETA spokeswoman Ashley Byrne said the Norfolk-based group thinks a former prison is the ideal setting for exhibits on what it contends is mistreatment of chickens raised for slaughter.

Alas, it is still but a dream. The state says no.

Kaine spokeswoman Lynda Tran said the state doesn’t lease to private entities except for cases grandfathered in when it purchases buildings.

Better cluck next time.

Would be canoodlers, beware – a dumpster is not a good place for a quickie.

WICHITA — A man and woman decided to give the phrase “dumpster diving” a new twist over the weekend, crawling inside one on North Waco so they could be alone.

But while they were engaged in what Wichita police described as “an intimate moment,” they were robbed by a man armed with a pocket knife.

Now why they thought a dumpster was a good place for “an intimate moment” in the first place is way, way beyond me.

But I think we can all learn a valuable lesson here.

He’s missing a finger, however.

Despite Cavuto’s best attempts to get any reaction from the guy, he holds steady. It’s almost too unbelievable to believe.

Apparently, contrary to what I’ve been reading, this is not the first time a President has put together a speech for the kiddies.

George H.W. Bush did it in 1991 (as one of our contributors alluded to earlier in the comments).

Democrats, predictably, were outrageously outraged.

“The Department of Education should not be producing paid political advertising for the president, it should be helping us to produce smarter students,” House Majority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) said. “And the president should be doing more about education than saying, ‘Lights, camera, action.’ “

Rep. Patricia Schroeder (D-Colo.), chairwoman of the Select Committee on Children, Youth and Families, said it was outrageous for the White House to “start using precious dollars for campaigns” when “we are struggling for every silly dime we can get” for education programs.

Presumably, Gephardt and Crying Pat Schroeder are just as outraged today.

I knew that I read somewhere that this was “the first speech of its kind” or something along those lines, but I couldn’t remember where.

After searching, I came across the text of the letter that Arne Duncan, Education Secretary, sent to school principals a few weeks ago, which used to be on the ED website, but isn’t anymore. (Full text here and here.)

This is the first time an American president has spoken directly to the nation’s school children about persisting and succeeding in school. We encourage you to use this historic moment to help your students get focused and begin the school year strong. I encourage you, your teachers, and students to join me in watching the President deliver this address on Tuesday, September 8, 2009. It will be broadcast live on the White House website www.whitehouse.gov 12:00 noon eastern standard time.

Emphasis mine.

Bush’s speech didn’t count. #1, because he’s a Republican, and they are evil. And #2, because it had a different theme.

The speech at Alice Deal Junior High School, broadcast live on radio and television, urged students to study hard, avoid drugs and turn in troublemakers.

As for the claim that the Obama speech will be innocuous and non-political, I think even a casual read of Duncan’s letter pretty much blows that theory away.

Since taking office, the President has repeatedly focused on education, even as the country faces two wars, the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression and major challenges on issues like energy and health care. The President believes that education is a critical part of building a new foundation for the American economy.

Yeah, nothing political about that at all.

Finger bitten off during California health protest

THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. – California authorities say a clash between opponents and supporters of health care reform ended with one man biting off another man’s finger.

Ventura County Sheriff’s Capt. Frank O’Hanlon says about 100 people demonstrating in favor of health care reforms rallied Wednesday night on a street corner. One protester walked across the street to confront about 25 counter-demonstrators.

O’Hanlon says the man got into an argument and fist fight, during which he bit off the left pinky of a 65-year-old man who opposed health care reform.

A hospital spokeswoman says the man lost half the finger, but doctors reattached it and he was sent home the same night.

She says he had Medicare.

O’Hanlon says the attacker fled but authorities have a good description.

Dude.

To be clear, it was the ObamaCare supporter that did the biting.