OTHER NEWS

GREAT MOMENTS IN ACADEMIC RESEARCH

MACHIEL STOLK, ANNALS OF IMPROBABLE RESEARCH - The research of the
famous Gert Holstege has reached another climax. Recently, a Dutch
national newspaper [de Volkskrant] reported that Holstege has
scientifically proved that "women lose control when they are having an
orgasm". Holstege used his favorite research instrument, the PET scan,
to investigate women's brain activity during an orgasm. He found out
that during periods of sexual excitement, less blood circulates through
the left frontal lobe in the brain. Less blood circulation means less
brain activity, and as is commonly known, the left frontal lobe is
responsible for keeping our temper and anger under control.

The importance of Holstege's research is immediately demonstrated by a
report in the Times of London which describes the case of a 29 year old
Christian newly-wed who filed a £3.5 million compensation claim against
his employers, saying that his marriage was ruined because his sex drive
spiraled out of control after a head injury at work.

http://www.improbable.com/

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TAKING OATH ON SOMETHING OTHER THAN THE BIBLE IN A LONG AMERICAN
TRADITION

CHRISTIAN CENTURY - When Keith Ellison, the recently elected Minnesota
Democrat who will be the first Muslim in Congress, announced that he
would take his oath of office on Islam's holy book, the Qur'an, he
provoked sharp criticism from conservatives . . .

But Ellison would not be the first member of Congress to forgo a Bible
at the swearing-in ceremony. Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D.,
Fla.) took her oath in 2005 on a Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible, which she
borrowed from Representative Gary Ackerman (D., N.Y.) after learning a
few hours earlier that the speaker of the House didn't have any Jewish
holy books. . .

Hawaii governor Linda Lingle used the Tanakh when she took her oath in
2002, and Madeleine Kunin placed her hand on Jewish prayer books when
she was sworn in as the first female governor of Vermont in 1985.

As for U.S. presidents, in 1825 John Quincy Adams took the presidential
oath using a law volume instead of a Bible, and in 1853 Franklin Pierce
affirmed the oath rather than swearing it. Herbert Hoover, citing his
Quaker beliefs, also affirmed his oath in 1929 but did use a Bible,
according to the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies.
Theodore Roosevelt used no Bible in taking his first oath of office in
1901, but did use one in 1905.

House members are sworn in together on the House floor in a ceremony
without any book, holy or otherwise. But in an unofficial ceremony,
individual members reenact an oath-taking so that it can be photographed
- a tradition dating from the beginning of the wide use of photography.

http://www.christiancentury.org/article.lasso?id=2751

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HUMANA USES BAIT AND SWITCH ON ELDERLY WITH SUDDEN HUGE RISE IN DRUG
PLAN PRISE

JEFFREY KRASNER, BOSTON GLOBE - The more than two million senior
citizens nationwide who signed up last year for Humana Inc.'s least
expensive Medicare prescription drug plan face average premium increases
of 60 percent -- and in seven states, increases of 466 percent --
starting tomorrow. . .

Medicare added the prescription drug benefit in 2006, and in most states
dozens of drug plans with varying coverage are available through
insurance companies. Healthcare advocates say Humana kept its prices low
in 2006 to gain market share. The strategy may prove lucrative, they
say, because many seniors spent considerable time researching and
selecting their drug insurance and were unlikely to switch plans for
2007, despite increased premiums.

The roughly 3.5 million members in Humana's three prescription drug
plans nationwide were notified by mail of the price changes by Oct. 31.
Enrollment for 2007 Medicare drug benefit, called Part D, ends today.

"You have to state the obvious," said David Shove, a stock analyst with
Prudential Equity Group in New York. "You sell something cheaply and get
a lot of customers, and then you raise the price to improve the
profitability." Shove said the start-up of the Medicare prescription
drug benefit "was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity" for Humana to
attract new customers.

Steve Findlay, a healthcare analyst with Consumers Union, the publisher
of Consumer Reports, called Humana's price increases a "bait and switch"
tactic. "That's not an acceptable inflationary increase in prices," he
said. "That's sucker them in and you just start raising the prices."

But a Humana spokesman, Chris Curran , blamed most of the price hike on
a subsidy formula used by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid
Services, or CMS, which oversees the drug benefit. Insurance companies
seeking to sell insurance under Medicare Part D submit bids to CMS and
the agency uses the bids to calculate the subsidy each company will
receive to help offset the cost of providing coverage. Insurers take the
subsidies into account when setting premium rates.

Paul Spitalnik , a CMS actuary, disputed Humana's contention that the
subsidy formula was the deciding factor in setting prices. "If a plan
wanted to have a lower-priced competitive product, they needed to have a
lower bid than they did for 2006 plans," Spitalnik said.

http://www.boston.com/yourlife/health/aging/articles/2006/12/31/
insurer_hits_millions_of_seniors_with_drug_cost_hike?mode=PF

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WHAT BUSH BURIED WITH SADDAM

ROBERT FISK, INDEPENDENT, UK - Now Saddam, who knew the full extent of
that Western support - given to him while he was perpetrating some of
the worst atrocities since the Second World War - is dead. Gone is the
man who personally received the CIA's help in destroying the Iraqi
communist party. After Saddam seized power, US intelligence gave his
minions the home addresses of communists in Baghdad and other cities in
an effort to destroy the Soviet Union's influence in Iraq. Saddam's
mukhabarat visited every home, arrested the occupants and their
families, and butchered the lot. Public hanging was for plotters; the
communists, their wives and children, were given special treatment -
extreme torture . . .

There is growing evidence across the Arab world that Saddam held a
series of meetings with senior American officials prior to his invasion
of Iran in 1980 - both he and the US administration believed that the
Islamic Republic would collapse if Saddam sent his legions across the
border - and the Pentagon was instructed to assist Iraq's military
machine by providing intelligence on the Iranian order of battle. . .

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/fisk/article2114403.ece

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WHAT AMERICANS BELIEVE

DARLENE SUPERVILLE, ASSOCIATED PRESS - Six in 10 people think the U.S.
will be the victim of another terrorist attack next year, more than five
years after the Sept. 11 assault on New York and Washington. An
identical percentage think it is likely that bad guys will unleash a
biological or nuclear weapon elsewhere in the world. . . Seventy percent
of Americans predict another major natural disaster within the United
States and an equal percentage expect worsening global warming. Fewer
than one-third of people, or 29 percent, think it is likely that the
U.S. will withdraw its troops from Iraq. . . Slightly more than
one-third, or 35 percent, of Americans predict the military draft will
be reinstated. One in four, 25 percent, anticipates the second coming of
Jesus Christ.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/nation/4436228.html

ALTHOUGH MOST NEWS MEDIA reported the story along the lines above, the
Detroit Free Press and the Chicago Tribune preferred to overlook the
gloom with headlines such as "U.S. positive about 2007" (Free Press) and
'Optimism high for 2007 (Tribune)

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061231/NEWS07/612310585/1009


http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/
chi-0612310334dec31,1,5988994.story?track=rss

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OPEN SOURCE GROUP TO CHALLENGE GOOGLE'S ARCHIVES

AP - Google's crusade to build a digital library has triggered a
philosophical debate with an alternative project promising better online
access to the world's books, art and historical documents. The latest
tensions revolve around Google's insistence on chaining the digital
content to its Internet-leading search engine and the nine major
libraries that have aligned themselves with the Mountain View-based
company.

A splinter group called the Open Content Alliance favors a less
restrictive approach to prevent mankind's accumulated knowledge from
being controlled by a commercial entity. . . The New York-based
foundation will announce a $1 million grant to the Internet Archive, a
leader in the Open Content Alliance, to help pay for digital copies of
collections owned by the Boston Public Library, the Getty Research
Institute, the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The works to be scanned include the personal library of John Adams,
America's second president, and thousands of images from the
Metropolitan Museum.

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/BUSINESS/12/19/google.books.ap/

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SACHA AND SIMON BARON COHEN: TWO COUSINS INTERESTED IN LIFE'S AWKWARD
MOMENTS

MARC ABRAHAMS, GUARDIAN - In 2000, Sacha Baron Cohen, comedian, began
his now-famous television program called Da Ali G Show, which is all
about awkward moments. That same year, his cousin Simon Baron-Cohen,
professor of developmental psychopathology at the University of
Cambridge, published a 12-page study called The Awkward Moments Test. .
. Simon Baron-Cohen's awkward-moments work has also not gone unnoticed.
It has been cited in some 23 published academic studies, only one of
which was written by Simon Baron-Cohen.

Neither body of work explicitly discusses the other. The public and all
of academia are left to speculate whether Sacha's work got Simon
interested in awkward moments, or whether Simon's inspired Sacha, or
both, or neither. The question could be mildly awkward to pose to either
cousin. Simon Baron-Cohen's study explores whether autistic people
recognize the awkwardness of situations that make non-autistic people
cringe, cower, or at least sympathize.

He gathered eight very brief video clips from British television
commercials and programs. Each showed, as he put it, "a character
experiencing a socially awkward or unpleasant moment. . . The autistic
people who watched these situations did not, for the most part, see the
awkwardness that was obvious to the non-autistics.

Sacha Baron Cohen's studies ask whether people recognise awkward
situations, and then - a step beyond - explore how they handle the
situations. The test subjects do not watch videos; instead, they
participate. These people, autistic or not, vary wildly in their ability
to recognize and deal with awkwardness.

http://education.guardian.co.uk/egweekly/story/0,,1981240,00.html

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ITALY RECLAIMS COFFEE DRINKS FROM STARBUCKS

TOM KINGTON, GUARDIAN - In a fightback against the global spread of
super-sized frappuccinos and iced cappuccinos, Italy has certified what
it considers the classic cappuccino. In a snub to the Starbucks-driven
craze for loading gallons of hot frothy coffee-flavored liquid into
cardboard pots, Italy's National Institute for Italian Espresso is
defending the traditional squirt of steamed milk over a shot of espresso
that is knocked back by millions of Italians every morning at
zinc-topped bars up and down the country. . .

Nescafe may be making inroads in Italy through advertising of its
instant granules, but Starbucks and other global coffee chains have yet
to set foot in the bel paese. And if they did, they might find their
margins shrinking.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/italy/story/0,,1980914,00.html

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