Photo, above:  Gravity Lows Mark Burial Sites of Ancient Tectonic Plates.   See: Hour 3, Block C: Sid Perkins, Science magazine, on  ancient tectonics and mass extinctions. Nature News on the rate of recycling within Earth’s mantle of ancient tectonic plates: Ancient crust rises from the deep.

JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW

Hour One

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 1, Block A: Jim McTague, Barron's Washington, in re: I.R.S. Apologizes to Conservative Groups Over Audits The Internal Revenue Service acknowledged on Friday that the agency singled out nonprofit applicants with “Tea Party” or “patriots” in their titles.

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 1, Block B:  Robert Zimmerman, behindtheblack.com, in re: Astronauts today spotted an ammonia coolant leak in ISS’s left-side power truss.  They're monitoring it, but have so far not made any decision about what to do about it, if anything. This problem is a perfect illustration of why a flight to Mars is more complicated in engineering than first appears. We might currently be able to build that interplanetary spaceship (with the emphasis on the word “might”), but could its passengers maintain it millions of miles from Earth? Right now I’d say no. We need to learn how to build an easily repaired and self-sufficient spaceship. ISS is neither. It is also not a very good platform for testing this kind of engineering.

Update: The astronauts on ISS are preparing for a possible spacewalk on Saturday to deal with the problem. More details here.  The International Space Station has switched all its computers from Windows to Linux.  Love this quote:   “We migrated key functions from Windows to Linux because we needed an operating system that was stable and reliable.”

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 1, Block C: . Camille Pecastaing, Hoover : Defining Ideas, in re: “Democracy’s Death-by-Welfare”: “Is our political regime fated to wither away?”  Are political regimes fated to decay and die away? Back in the eighteenth century, men in England, France, and the United States conceived of a new type of regime that would prevent the tyranny of the absolutist monarchies that reigned at the time. They put their hopes in a balance of power among various institutions of government, and in the periodical recourse to election to purge the system of excessive corruption and entrenched power. The democratic form of government established on those principles would work wonders for over two centuries. But now, in its third century of existence, it is producing dysfunctional and potentially self-destructive forms of governance . . .    [more]

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 1, Block D:  Ken Wells, Bloomberg Businessweek, in re: Gore Is Romney-Rich With $200 Million after Bush Defeat Among friends and fans, he’s the progressive Democrat who should have been president, the visionary author and Internet prophet, the man who more than anyone drove climate change to the center of public consciousness. Detractors see Gore as a limousine liberal, tiresome pedant and climate alarmist who lives a jet-setting, carbon-profligate lifestyle while preaching asceticism for everyone else. Whatever you think of Gore, one thing is indisputable: leveraging his aura as a technology seer and his political and climate work connections, Gore has remade himself into a wealthy businessman, amassing a fortune that may exceed $200 million.  [more]

Hour Two

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 2, Block A:  . Jeff Green, Bloomberg, in re: Temporary Workers Near U.S. Record Makes Kelly a Winner

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 2, Block B:  . Andres Martinez, Bloomberg Businessweek, in re: MEXICO: THE STRANGER NEXT DOOR Defying its troubled reputation, Mexico is becoming an economic power a foreign-policy darling. Will Americans notice?  [more]

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 2, Block C:  .Richard A Epstein, Hoover Institution, Chicago Law, & Wall Street Journal, in re:   Book Review: The Rule of Lawyers  (1 of 2)

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 2, Block D:  Richard A Epstein, Hoover Institution, Chicago Law, & Wall Street Journal, in re:   Book Review: The Rule of Lawyers  (2 of 2)

Hour Three

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 3, Block A:  Daniel Henninger, WSJ, in re: WONDER LAND   Meet Generation Jobbed ; 
Henninger: Generation Lost 


Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 3, Block B:  Peter Rugh, WagingNonViolence, in re: Forest Service seeks to silence Smokey the Bear over fracking:    Smokey the Bear thought he smelled a fire in the woods. But as he approached the clearing and saw a giant derrick jutting out into the sky, he realized that what his nose had picked up was the scent of hydrocarbons. It was another piece of evidence that the increasingly widespread method of oil and gas extraction known as fracking was poisoning the environment that he and his human friends depend on. He decided something must be done.  At least that’s the way that artist, Occupy Wall Street veteran and environmental activist Lopi LaRoe sees it. But last week she received a letter threatening her with jail time and thousands of dollars in fines for enlisting Smokey to the anti-fracking cause.  [more]

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 3, Block C:  . Sid Perkins, Science magazine, in re:  Ancient tectonics and mass extinctions . ScienceShot: Life After Extinction New analysis of fossil record reveals what happens to marginalized species after mass die-offs

Nature News on the rate of recycling within Earth’s mantle of ancient tectonic plates: Ancient crust rises from the deep.  Remnants of surface rocks take long tour of planet’s interior.   Olivine crystals hold chemical clues to their origins.   Earth recycles — but it takes its time. Chemical remnants of the rigid surface plates that plunge deep into the planet’s interior at subduction zones can eventually resurface on distant volcanic islands. But the process may take more than two billion years, a study published in this issue1 suggests.  By analysing volcanic rock that erupted millions of years ago on an island in the South Pacific, the researchers found clues about when components of the rock first left Earth’s surface and began their long journey through its interior.  [more]

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 3, Block D:   Adam Satariano, Bloomberg, in re: Sports celebrity apps, and the end of app garage.

USAIN BOLT: THE APP  From Tiger Woods and quarterback Kurt Warner to UFC fighter Georges St. Pierre, a growing cadre of current and former sports stars is contracting software developers to launch branded apps and expand their marketing reach.  Their entry into the market is crowding out more anonymous development teams.

Hour Four

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 4, Block A:  Henry I Miller, M.D., Hoover & Forbes.com, in re: Exposing The Tyranny of the Food Fascists Forbes.com

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 4, Block B:  Richard Rubin, Bloomberg, in re:  Internet sales tax.   Republican Governor-Congress Fissure Seen with Online BidRetailers that want the Republican-led U.S. House to pass legislation letting states collect sales taxes from out-of-state sellers have some skillful lobbyists on their side: Republican governors. They also have some staunch opponents and doubters: Republican House members from those same states. Whether the Republican divide can be resolved will determine whether the plan backed by Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT), Best Buy Co. (BBY) and Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) becomes law. [more]

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 4, Block C:  Robert M Cutler, Carleton University, in re: China and Energy politics in Asia;  China Deepens Energy Cooperation In Central Asia Featured  (CACI Analyst, 1 May 2013)

Friday  9 May  2013 / Hour 4, Block D:  Guy Millière, Gatestone Institute, in re: Europe: The Submission That Dare Not Speak Its Name   28 March 2013 Exactly one year ago, a killer entered the courtyard of a Jewish school in Toulouse, France, and shot in cold blood a rabbi and three children. He said he had wanted to kill more, and to perpetrate a massacre, but that his gun jammed.During the previous days, he had shot three French soldiers of Arab origin. The killer was quickly located, besieged by the police for thirty two hours, then riddled with bullets when he tried to escape. A few weeks later, his statements to the police during the siege were leaked. They showed that he defined himself as a "soldier of Islam" and that he was trained in Pakistan and Afghanistan by al Qaeda affiliates. He said that he wanted to kill French Arab soldiers because they were "traitors to their religion" and that "all traitors" had to be "eliminated." He also said that he hated "Jews," that Jews had to be "removed form the face of the earth" and that his only regret was that he did not have "the opportunity to kill more Jews." Political leaders and the mainstream media immediately said that these statements did not make sense, and they tried to describe him as a "lone wolf" and a "lost boy" who acted "irrationally." Sociologists explained that he'd had a "hard childhood," and that he'd had to face "French prejudices" all of his life. Radical Islam and hatred of Jews were almost never evoked.  [more]

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Music

Hour 1:  Michael Clayton; Star Trek

Hour 2:  Michael Clayton; State of Play

Hour 3:  State of Play; Crysis

Hour 4:  Crysis

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