by WALTER BRASCH For a few hours on the afternoon of Nov. 1, the people of southern California were scared by initial reports of an alert at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station. An “alert” is the second of four warning levels. Workers first detected an ammonia leak in a water purification system about 3 p.m. Ammonia, when mixed into air, is toxic. The 30 gallons of ammonia were caught in a holding...

UPDATE: I have just finished watching the CBS 60 Minutes special on Operation Proper Exit. If you have watched it, thank you. If you haven’t, please watch it when you can (I will try to have a video in the next update) It will change your outlook on these brave young men — these Wounded Warriors — who have given it their all; on war; perhaps on what life is all about … (Have a handkerchief...

It will require this kind of balancing act for the GOP to retake the White House Shortly after midnight exactly one year from this Sunday the first voters will go to the polls in two tiny New Hampshire towns to vote in a presidential election that will be singularly significant in defining the course of American politics in the years to come. Before the sun sets in Hawaii on November 6, 2012, 130 million...

YES, THAT’S WHO YOU THINK IT IS I wrote the other day that support for the legalization of marijuana is higher than support for Barack Obama with nearly half of all adult Americans in favor of ending the criminal penalties for personal use that further overcrowd our prisons. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Shortly after taking office, the new president — himself a pot smoker as a teenager...

There is so much to be serious about, so much to be concerned about, so much to see what each person can do something about, what we as a nation can do to help… and yet, I think we would all go starkers if we didnt sometimes smile once in a while. In that spirit…. ta dah!

If Halloween by itself wasn’t frightening enough, this Oct. 31 has been set by U.N. demographers as the official day when the 7 billionth person will be born, as TIME says, “on a planet already strapped for resources.” No one knows where this 7 billionth person will “officially” be born, albeit TIME says he or she may be born in India, “which will be the world’s most populous nation by 2030.” Halloween...

Bill Day, Cagle Cartoons This copyrighted cartoon is licensed to run on TMV. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.

A headline in today’s New York Times reads: “Occupy Wall Street Not Like Us, Tea Party Says.” The subhead then goes on to read: “Where Occupy Wall Street and the Tea Party differ is in where they place the blame.” Nonsense. The Tea Party blames government for the country’s present economic problems. The Occupiers blame the heavies in the financial community. But these aren’t...

Part of the U.S. military strategy during the Vietnam War was to remove the heavy foliage that provided cover for the enemy through the use of herbicides. “Agent Orange” is the name given to a blend of herbicides the U.S. military sprayed from 1962 to 1971 in Vietnam to remove such foliage. The name “Agent Orange” comes from the orange identifying stripe used on the 55-gallon drums in which...

The Obama administration is once again cracking down on medical marijuana dispensaries in California despite the fact the the benefits of medical marijuana are indisputable, they are well within California law and support for medical marijuana legalization — as well as legalization of marijuana for person use is growing exponentially across the U.S. Federal prosecutors have sent letters to landlords...

Lacking the conviction to wage war on unemployment, Republicans have escalated their war on women with the passage of a House bill that permits hospitals that receive federal funding to turn away women who seek an abortion even if the procedure is necessary to save their lives. Repeat: Even if the procedure is necessary to save their lives. And now Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina (R-Fetus Fetish) has...

Nozuko and her family bury baby Yanga in their vegetable garden American ex-patriot Susan Winters Cook is that rarest of contemporary photojournalists because she still shoots in black and white. “I believe color distracts from the image unless it has a direct role in the message,” she tells me, and that is abundantly clear from her newly published Nozuko’s Story: A Story of an Africa Family. Nozuko’s...

From Technology Review: Your car may soon be able to warn you if your blood sugar dips, alert you to high pollen counts, and remind you to take your medication. Ford demonstrated the new in-car technology—currently a research project—this week at the Wireless Health 2011 conference in La Jolla, California. Many carmakers see a big opportunity in adding new functionality to the computers built into...

Harvard Med Surgical Oncologist Ramzi Amri thinks so: I have done 1.5 years of research on the type of tumor that affected Steve Jobs and have some strong opinions on his case, not only as an admirer of his work, but also as a cancer researcher who has the impression that his disease course has been far from optimal. Let me cut to the chase: Mr. Jobs allegedly chose to undergo all sorts of alternative treatment...

Millions of people claim they were at Woodstock despite the fact there were only 400,000 or so. And with the passing of Steve Jobs, millions will claim that they bought the 128K, the first Apple computer, 25 years ago before the brand became the standard by which all other computers are compared. No matter. I myself finally escaped the clutches of Bill Gates and his evil PC Empire a mere three years ago and...

Is the way America administers the death penalty about exacting justice, or just winning the next election? And does it live up to the ideals Americans say they hold dear? For France’s Le Nouvel Observateur, Sandrine Ageorges-Skinner, one of the world’s most tireless anti-death penalty campaigners, outlines the mind-numbing injustice of how execution is imposed in the United States. And she knows...

As uncomfortable is it may make people in the United States – and especially in Mexico – this editorial from Spain’s La Vanguardia warns that with 30 percent of Mexico already in the hands of drug cartels, there may be no way other to take a President Perry up on his offer if Mexico is to avoid becoming a failed state. The La Vanguardia editorial says in part: Mexico City Mayor Marcelino...

Is the state of the world really as dire as world leaders who recently spoke at the U.N. General Assembly would lead us to believe? Have we all gotten carried away with gloom and doom? For Argentina’s Diario Decuyo, columnist Andrés Oppenheimer cites a recent report that asserts things are on the upswing almost everywhere, from life expectancy to education levels to the number of wars. For the Diario...

If you’re of a certain age you might remember a time when the U.S. was preeminent among wealthy nation s in a number of respects,including providing educational opportunities for all of its citizens regardless of their ability to pay. The U.S. has already fallen from the top in other respects. It now incarcerates more people on a per capita basis than any country other than China. It has the highest...

It’s that time of year again when folks have to try to figure out their health insurance plans for next year. I tell you, the Red Queen made more sense.

If you thought all the revelations about the harmful effects of cigarettes and allegation that tobacco companies hid damaging information from the public were over, think again. Here’s an even bigger shocker, from ABC News: Tobacco companies knew that cigarettes contained a radioactive substance called polonium-210, but hid that knowledge from the public for over four decades, a new study of historical...

Some might remember in my book, Women Who Run With the Wolves, I wrote about the veiled Muslim women transgressing the stringent rules of their religious and political land that forbades women to drive cars… that when the war broke out and people were imperiled, they ran and started up the engines of the family automobiles and drove all over hill and dale to warn people and help people. The very same...

I strongly disagree with Senator John McCain’s politics and policies—especially his almost fanatic opposition to ending “Don’t ask, Don’t tell” and his stubborn support of the Iraq war. I have also been disappointed with the Senator’s seriously flawed judgment on several issues and decisions, such as his deplorable posturing on the new GI Bill of Rights during the Bush administration...

Young adults have long been the group most likely to be uninsured, but thanks to ObamaCare there are nearly a million fewer uninsured young adults since the 2010 law began allowing parents to cover them as dependents on family policies. Three new surveys released this week show that the gains have occurred despite the recession and the fact young adults are unemployed at nearly double the rate of older Americans. Under...

Ouch: Back in 1991, there were zero states in the U.S. that had an obesity level over 15 percent. Today, Colorado is the only state with an obesity rate below 20 percent. Another 12 states have levels over 30 percent. SEE — F for Fat: How Obesity Threatens America’s Future 2011