Really Old Stars Perhaps Ideal for Advanced Civilizations - Yahoo! News

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Really Old Stars Perhaps Ideal for Advanced Civilizations - Yahoo! News
Why are SETI scientists interested in M-Stars? As Dr. Peter Backus, Observing Programs Manager for SETI, concluded in a preliminary report on the M-Stars workshop, ‘One…aspect of M dwarfs makes them intriguing for SETI: they may be ideal hosts for advanced technological civilizations because they live an extraordinarily long time. Stars like the Sun live (i.e., they fuse hydrogen into helium) for only about 10 billion years. No M dwarf that ever formed has yet to die; no M dwarf will die for more than another 100 billion years. With such long lifetimes, there are big possibilities for these small stars.’

Weekly Standard: Bush has “near dictatorial power” | Glenn Greenwald - Salon

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Glenn Greenwald - Salon
What the actual Americans who founded the country feared (as opposed to “hoped for and craved”) was that the President would wield “near dictatorial power.” Anyone with doubts should simply read Article II — defining the powers of the President — and see how limited those powers are. Even the glorious sounding power of “Commander-in-Chief” is, as Scalia noted, nothing more than the power, when Congress decides to fund a military and when it authorizes the use of military force, to act as top General directing troop movements and the like. In all other respects, those powers are checked, regulated and limited by the people through their Congress.

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This is a great article - Please read it and its links. It helps to sum up a lot of the scary differences between the Republicans and pretty much everyone else with regards to Presidential power.
Make sure to read the Federalist Paper links as well. Hamilton’s language can be a bit thick but his writings provide important insight into the thinking behind the Constitution.

http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa69.htm
http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa70.htm
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/article02/

The prospect of all-female conception - Independent Online Edition > Science & Technology

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The prospect of all-female conception - Independent Online Edition > Science & Technology
Women might soon be able to produce sperm in a development that could allow lesbian couples to have their own biological daughters, according to a pioneering study published today.

Scientists are seeking ethical permission to produce synthetic sperm cells from a woman’s bone marrow tissue after showing that it possible to produce rudimentary sperm cells from male bone-marrow tissue.

The researchers said they had already produced early sperm cells from bone-marrow tissue taken from men. They believe the findings show that it may be possible to restore fertility to men who cannot naturally produce their own sperm.

But the results also raise the prospect of being able to take bone-marrow tissue from women and coaxing the stem cells within the female tissue to develop into sperm cells, said Professor Karim Nayernia of the University of Newcastle upon Tyne.

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Interesting science. One more piece in the puzzle.