Danny's Pathologically Polymathic: February 2006

it's not the educated who are doing well in the US - Krugman [via RW]

"rising inequality is driven by the giant income gains of a tiny elite, not the modest gains of college graduates"

discoveries in vertebrate origins - Loom - Nature

another Israeli supreme court ruling for equal rights - HH

"The courts are the one branch of Israeli government that function exactly as they should"

the EU imposes undemocratic conditions on Montenegro referendum - Guardian

12 people have led in misleading Australians on climate change - Age [via Deltoid]

"the Prime Minister 'has consistently taken the side of the fossil fuel lobby... stomped on cabinet members who nervously suggest that maybe we should try to reduce our emissions, and engaged in an elaborate charade of concern by putting up meaningless policies that have no effect'"

Egypt, between Islamism and America - Economist

Iran doesn't trust Russia - UPI [via AW]

community medicine in New Orleans - MotherJones [via Barista]

my New Zealand trip was relaxing

the news while I've been away seems depressingly normal

Australia's addiction to coal - Crikey

"the annual subsidy from state and federal taxpayers to the fossil fuels industry easily runs to several billion of dollars"

Europe's energy market still lacks real competition - Economist

Shin Bet head: Israel may regret overthrow of Saddam Hussein - BBC [via AW]

a draft constitution for Israel - HH

"For the past 58 years, Israel has made do with a multi-document constitution similar to that of the United Kingdom, consisting of several Basic Laws and a body of High Court precedent."

Much Ado About Religion [review]

a philosophical drama from 900CE Kashmir

Tara Smith smacks down Britney Spears - Aetiology

and I certainly haven't seen that photo before - not sure I've seen any photos of the woman, actually, though I must have somewhere

uh-oh, bird-flu in Nigeria - Guardian

Sweden to beat Iceland to oilless economy? - Guardian

"trying to wean itself off oil completely within 15 years"

forensic linguistics is pretty primitive stuff - Lang

The Name Must Not Go Down [review]

Political Competition and State-Society Relations in Mt Hagen, Papua New Guinea

wounded US soldier billed for body armour - J-Walk - America

while billions of dollars of reconstruction funds are unaccounted for

The Twelve Chairs [review]

the famous satirical novel of 1920s Soviet Russia

Stiglitz on the hidden costs of the Iraq war - TomP [via AW]

new species found in West Papua - Guardian - photos

background on Iraq's electricity supply - IEEE [five pages, via Deltoid]

"We installed a third of a billion dollars' worth of combustion turbines that can't be fueled."

the Danes in Iraq feel the heat from cartoon controversy - SeattlePI [via Informed]

Poland's anti-abortion laws may be challenged - BBC

AOL and Yahoo to start charging "postage" - Guardian

sounds like a dubious idea to me, which hopefully won't ever get critical mass (I don't want to have to pay $20 a month to send out my book review newsletters)

Indian pharmas are doing research, not just making generics - Economist

nuclear dispute arouses Iranian patriotism - NYT [via AW]

"a matter of national pride, but it has also tapped a broader sense of victimization and a glorification of martyrdom"

Italy debates under-16 models - Guardian

almost finished! - Mongolia travelogue

NATO should use air power in Darfur - IHT [via Loewen]

"it should offer air cover to the currently mandated African Union force immediately"

Thailand bans access to Yale University Press website - InHigherEd [via Far] - Amazon

lèse majesté in a biography: "“how a king widely seen as beneficent and apolitical could in fact be so deeply political, autocratic, and even brutal”

update on Red Sea ferry disaster - Guardian

your search history is probably open to subpoena - news.com [via RW]

photosynthesis by day, nitrogen-fixation by night - Eurekalert

Spacebloom: a Field guide to Cosmic Xflora - CR - Spacebloom

this is one weird-sounding book, but I think a guide to the cyanobacteria would be just as funky and a lot more useful

a translation of Goro Miyazaki's blog - Nausicaa [via ekumen]

he's working on Tales of Earthsea

US AIDS funding goes to clueless faith-based organisations - MSNBC [via Aetiology]

some of them just have no experience, others have positively harmful ideas

an analysis of Bush's speech - RtoS

"War will always be with us. I define this country in terms of war. I can do unusual, even illegal things, because we are at war. You cannot criticse me because we are at war. I have no intention of ending this war, only of promising that it will continue for a long, long time."

great spoof of sensationalist science - NYT [via Stoat]

how shills for the chemical industry forged research - Effect [via Deltoid]

trying to whitewash chromium-6 (of Erin Brockovich fame)

US soldiers in Iraq died of dehydration... - Truthout [via AW]

...after avoiding drinking, from fear of rape on the way to the toilet

economics in Terry Pratchett's Discworld - CT

I would certainly never have thought him a liberatarian based on the novels!

visualising microfossils inside rocks - PhysOrg [via RW]

more Google/Linux desktop rumours - Register

managing a Linux distribution isn't that much work, but I can't see what Google would gain from having its own - so my guess is this will stay internal