Blog Heap of Links for the day 16 March 2011

Despite the President's strange assertions in his press conference last week, his Administration is not a passive observer to the trends that have inflated oil prices to dangerous levels. His war on domestic oil and gas exploration and production has caused us pain at the pump, endangered our already sluggish economic recovery, and threatened our national security. The evidence of the President's anti-drilling mentality and his culpability in the high gas prices hurting Americans is there for all to see. The following is not even an exhaustive list

The White House today proposed sweeping revisions to U.S. copyright law, including making "illegal streaming" of audio or video a federal felony and allowing FBI agents to wiretap suspected infringers.

President Barack Obama will take his first official trip to Brazil this weekend where he will speak in the popular Cinelandia Square in downtown Rio de Janeiro. Access, of course, will be tightly restricted and security measures so secretive that not even the Embassy or US Consulate in Rio know exactly how it's all going to go down. Obama's speech will be free and open to the public

Amid signs of deepening war weariness among Americans, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan said Tuesday he will soon recommend a plan for beginning troop reductions, while embracing President Barack Obama's goal of pursuing a long-term military partnership with the Afghan government. In a four-hour Senate hearing that was his first since taking command in Kabul last summer, Army Gen. David Petraeus said the tide is turning in the war despite persistent questions about the durability of the Afghan government led by Hamid Karzai and the commitment of neighboring Pakistan to keep militants at bay

Of 240 suspects identified in Britain, 121 were arrested, with 30 convictions. Some 60 children were "safeguarded" from abusers. Globally 670 suspects were identified and there were 184 arrests and 230 children rescued after internet servers were seized from Amir I, a Dutchman, who ran the website. He is currently on trial accused of abusing a 14-year old Brazilian boy.

A U.S. House committee approved a bill Tuesday to block a federal agency from regulating greenhouse gases, but the real drama broke out in the Senate, where Oklahoma Republican Jim Inhofe is pushing the measure. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., introduced Inhofe's bill as an amendment to a small-business measure. McConnell said the time had come for the Senate to take a stand on the legislation, which is designed to strip the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency of its authority to regulate greenhouse gases in response to climate change. But following hours of strongly worded debate, an attempt to reach an agreement on holding floor votes Tuesday evening apparently failed.

Pious legend credits St. Patrick with banishing snakes from the island,[53] however all evidence suggests that post-glacial Ireland never had snakes.[54] However, one suggestion is that snakes referred to the serpent symbolism of the Druids[55] during that time and place, as exampled on coins minted in Gaul (see Carnutes). Legend also credits St. Patrick with teaching the Irish about the concept of the Holy Trinity by showing people the shamrock, a three-leaved clover, using it to highlight the Christian belief of 'three divine persons in the one God.'[56]

"We're very close now to the point of no return," Dr. Michio Kaku, a theoretical physicist, said. "It's gotten worse. We're talking about workers coming into the reactor perhaps as a suicide mission and we may have to abandon ship." A group of 180 workers rotate shifts working at the plant in teams of 50 men. The men have been nicknamed the "Fukushima Fifty."

More U.S. military crews were exposed to radiation Tuesday as the Pentagon ramped up relief flights over a Japan reeling from an earthquake, tsunami and nuclear crisis. The Defense Department said the Navy started giving anti-radiation pills to some of those exposed, and Americans on two military bases south of Tokyo were advised to stay indoors as much as possible. With more aid for victims on the way, the U.S. Navy said it was redirecting three ships to work in the Sea of Japan on the country's west coast rather than risk the hazards of radiation and the debris field in the waters off the east coast.