Details are still emerging, but here's some of what is being reported about the explosion of an offshore platform earlier today 80 miles south of Vermilion Bay, Louisiana in the Gulf of Mexico:

The platform is owned by Mariner Energy which says it successfully drilled a well there in Q309.

The Coast Guard is leading the rescue operation.

According to MSNBC, a company spokesman says there has been no "sheen" visible at the site of the explosion

The platform issued a distress call at 9:00AM central time on Thursday, prompting the Coast Guard response.

Although a well was recently drilled in the area, it is not currently producing oil or gas.

As of noon central time, NOLA.com reported the platform was still on fire.

Ironically, just yesterday Mariner Energy staged a protest against the Obama administration's offshore drilling policy, saying the White House is "trying to break" the oil and gas industry while Republicans in Congress lashed out at the administration for "demonizing" oil and gas companies with policies like the deepwater drilling moratorium. Of course, the truth is that the moratorium hasn't had a major economic impact but it has helped strengthen safety standards which will in the long run help the industry. But enlightened self-interest isn't a concept these guys seem to have wrapped their minds around.

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is making its way into the public consciousness. The film Salt has an interrogation scene where a spy spills some secrets while a scientist looks at his brain scan. After a quick glance, the scientist casually says with absolute certainty, "He's telling the truth."

As with any new technology, there's a lot of potential for good, but there's also a lot of potential for pseudoscience and bad science. Remember those kooky Canadians who've used "fruit machines" and peter meters to catch people lying about being gay and what-not? Now they are moving north of the groin and firing up fMRIs. They're already making questionable claims and writing grant proposals based on what parts of the brain "light up" when people view certain stimuli. Lies, thoughtcrimes, and precrime (offense prevention) are all on the list of things they claim fMRI will divulge if taxpayers will just fund their research.

It's the same concept behind privately-held ventures like No Lie MRI in San Diego, which, for a cool $5,000, will administer a "truth-verification" session. Though this Orwellian evidence has so far been successfully deemed inadmissible in US courts under the Daubert Standard, people are still trying to use it. Reporter Mark Harris got tested to see if he is a liar and presented his troubling experiences in the most recent IEEE Spectrum.

MRI Lie Detectors [IEEE Spectrum]

VMworld Microsoft's assault on VMware knows no bounds.…

The Portland Sea Dogs, the Double-A affiliate of the Boston Red Sox, are offering free tickets to tomorrow night's ballgame at Hadlock Field to anyone named Earl. The Sea Dogs are scheduled to host the New Hampshire Fisher Cats at 7 p.m.

What is the chance the game is actually going to be played? Well, it doesn't look real promising, but then again the forecast for Portland isn't nearly as bad tomorrow night as it is for Rhode Island and Massachusetts -- right now the outlook is for showers with light winds at gametime. The value of a free ticket to a Sea Dogs' game? $8 for adults and $7 for children (in other words, not worth the gas cost).

To take advantage of the Sea Dogs' offer, call 207-879-9500 and say "My Name is Earl." Proper identification will have to be presented at the ticket window.

Acquired September 2, 2010, this natural-color image shows Tropical Storm Kompasu over the coasts of North Korea and the Russian Federation.

Apple announces social networking service which will display the music interests of friends via iTunes, iPhones and iPod Touch

Having cornered the MP3 player, mobile phone and computer tablet markets with the iPod, iPhone and iPad devices respectively, last night Apple announced its latest expansion – into social media – with Ping.

Ping will be integrated into Apple's latest iTunes software update and will enable users, or "Pingers", to follow musicians, friends and others to see details including what music they're buying and what concerts they're attending.

Steve Jobs, Apple's chairman and chief executive, said the information will arrive in a long stream of updates, similar to the way Facebook and Twitter work.

"Be as private or as public as you want. The privacy is super-easy to set up," he said adding that users can choose to automatically accept followers or decide on a follower-by-follower basis – similar sounding controls to those on Twitter.

The service is available immediately to more than 160 million iTunes users, Jobs said, and will also be available across the iPhone and iPod Touch ranges.

The feature is believed to have been based on the technology Apple acquired with the purchase of the former online music store Lala.com last year.

The iTunes logo will no longer feature a CD – mirroring the change in the program's focus.

Jobs unveiled a range of other upgrades to its products and services, including a new version of Apple TV – which will allow users to stream television programmes and films.

The company is also releasing a revamped range of iPods, including an iPod touch with front- and rear-facing camera, Jobs told an assembled crowd of journalists, bloggers and analysts in California.

Until now the Apple TV device was "never a huge hit", admitted Jobs.

The box originally allowed users to buy films and television programmes, but the latest version, which is smaller and, at $99, much cheaper than its $229 predecessor, will only allow the renting, rather than purchasing, of content.

Users will pay $4.99 for high-definition films on the day they come out on DVD, while the rent of high-definition TV shows will be $0.99, Apple announced.

"We've sold a lot of them, but it's never been a huge hit," Jobs said of Apple TV. The new version will be available within a month.

Jobs also introduced a new design across the range of iPods, including the latest Nano, featuring a rotatable screen and a new Shuffle which sees the return of buttons – its predecessor was voice activated.

The new iPod Touch will have front- and rear-facing cameras, the latter of which will be able to record HD video content, Jobs added.

Our dear Appalachian-Lukacsian-Burnettian comrade (did I forget anything?) known by the initials VM certainly piqued my interest this morning with that business in the comment thread about the State Department and Arizona and the UN. So I looked into it, and yes it's true, but...

The UN used to have a high commission on human rights. That's the one Libya chaired. Thus discredited, the high commission was replaced by a new body called the UN Human Rights Council in 2006. Under its rules, apparently all member nations are required to submit evaluations of their own human rights records. As nearly as I could find out this morning, this is to be done quadrennially, so this seems to be the first one conducted by the US (i.e., the Bush administration wasn't obligated to do one). It's officially called a universal periodic review, or UPR.

The UPR process (more than you need to know, but...) involves a series of public discussions and consultations held over the previous year, arranged by State in conjunction with local nonprofits, churches and universities. Eleven were held. Here's the list.

The result of these meetings is the report itself, a 29-page document that list the US human-rights record on a number of fronts: freedom of speech, assembly and worship; fairness and equality; et cetera. It's broken into six sections, the fifth of which is entitled "A commitment to values in engagement across our borders," which is broken into three sections: national security, immigration and trafficking.

In the immigration section there are five paragraphs. The first is glorious-history boiler plate. The second is about immigration detention. The third describes the so-called 287(g) program, under which the federal government may delegate to states and localities immigration enforcement. Then the fourth graf says in its entirety:

A recent Arizona law, S.B. 1070, has generated significant attention and debate at home and around the world. The issue is being addressed in a court action that argues that the federal government has the authority to set and enforce immigration law. That action is ongoing; parts of the law are currently enjoined.

And that's it. Three sentences that are as objective and straightforward as they could possible be, just describing a situation. There is no appeal to the UN to do anything. There is no assertion that this is a major problem. There isn't even an adjective describing the law as bad. It's the 95th out of 100 numbered paragraphs, and it's actually one of the shorter grafs in the report.

As fate would have it, this morning I was emailed a write-up of the UPR by Barbara Crossette, the excellent former New York Times journalist who covered the UN and diplomacy for many years and now writes syndicated pieces. I don't have a link, since I got it in an email. Maybe you can find it somewhere. In what reads to me like about a 1,300-word piece, she doesn't even mention the fact that the UPR mentions Arizona.

She focuses on what any reasonable news person would focus on reading it, which is the language about gay rights in America, which is clearly the most newsworthy language and something that, if those kind of people want to get mad about something, maybe they should focus on.

Crossette describes what the US's participation in this process actually means:

A periodic review "package" consists of not only the country's own assessment of how it thinks it has met its obligations under various international and national laws and conventions, but also input from nongovernmental organizations or other interested parties, the office of the high commissioner and finally experts from three other countries -- in the case of the United States, those will be Cameroon, France and Japan. The US review will be on the agenda of the Human Rights Council in November. The council has no enforcement powers; it can merely pass resolutions and make statements. But its actions have a large international audience. And this will be the first appearance by the United States in such a review process. The Obama administration joined the Human Rights Council last year, reversing the Bush administration's hostile policy toward it and global human rights monitoring in general as it affected the United States. In preparing its first review, the Obama administration met with human rights activists and community groups around the country.

In other words, the Bush administration shunned this process, and the Obama administration is participating in it. That's a change. If you think that's a bad change, fine. If you think it's a good one, fine. Let's debate that.

But that's not what's going to happen over the next few days, if our Misanthrophic friend and some of the rest of you are right, which you might well be. By next week, half of America might believe that Obama - not some State Department functionary, not even Hillary C., but Obama himself - wants to "force" Arizona's law to undergo review by the UN or something. And we'll be off to the races again.

Having said all this, I still think it was unwise to include a mention of the law in there. But having now read the report, I can't honestly say that if I'd been in the room, reading that brief and anodyne language, I'd have seen any political red flags. I might have, I might not have.

We've all made comments we've later wished could be taken back. Perhaps a joke that may have sounded funny to us, but just came out wrong when we shared it with others.

For state Rep. Jennifer Carroll, who will be named as Rick Scott's running mate today, her attempt at a Hillary Clinton joke at a 2004 Southern Republican Leadership Conference, was one of those moments.

Carroll told assembled Republicans that Clinton, then a U.S. Senator from New York, had been visited by ghosts of presidents past. It went something like this:

Carroll said Clinton was visited by the ghosts of Presidents Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln. According to The Associated Press, the joke had Clinton asking each president what she could do to help the country, and Lincoln told Clinton to go to a theater. Lincoln was assassinated in Ford's Theater in Washington.

But Carroll said her intent was never to imply Clinton should suffer harm.

"You infer what you want to infer, but I never said assassinate, or kill or maim," Carroll told The Associated Press.

The joke earned Carroll a reprimand on FOXNews by Bill O'Reilly.

(Original Times-Union story here.)

It was the first debate of the Arizona governor's race, and likely the last, as there's no way incumbent Republican Gov. Jan Brewer chances another disaster like this one.

It started out embarrassing enough:

Brewer, who has gained national notoriety for signing into law the country's toughest provisions for illegal immigrants, awkwardly paused twice during the opening statement of the Clean Elections Debate broadcast on the state's PBS affiliate.

"I have ... done so much and I just cannot believe that we have changed everything since I've become your governor in the last 600 days. Arizona has been brought back from its abyss," Brewer said, after appearing to lose her train of thought.

Then, after saying, "We have cut the budget, we have balanced the budget and we are moving forward. We have done everything that we could possibly do," the governor paused for a 10 seconds — an eternity in a live televised debate — before looking down at her notes.

Video of that giggly 10-second pause:

Ouch.

But even worse was the substance, as the local media gangs up on her for her refusal to admit that her alarmist story about beheadings in the Arizona desert is bullshit:

The transcript is below the fold, but needless to say, it's brutal. Her refusal to own up to her misstatement is inexplicable, generating hostility from the local press and stepping all over her message. But maybe that's good for Brewer, as it's one less question about her blatant conflict of interest in signing SB 1070:

Gov. Jan Brewer took center stage last Tuesday night after she officially clenched the Republican nomination. Standing just behind her was a man most Arizonans would not recognize.

He’s Chuck Coughlin, Brewer’s campaign chairman, policy adviser and a lobbyist for the largest private prison company in the country. And he’s one of two people in the Brewer administration with ties to Corrections Corporation of America.

The other administration member is communications director Paul Senseman, a former CCA lobbyist. His wife still lobbies for the company [...]

Isaacs said private prison companies have been buying influence in Arizona politics for years. The number of private prisons and jails operating across the state shows the result of that influence, he said. Currently, there are at least 12 for-profit prison, jail and detention facilities in Arizona.

Isaacs said the state has something else that attracts these companies.

"The other Holy Grail, if you will, of private prison construction is immigrant detention," Isaac said.
Corrections Corporation of America holds the contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement to lock up illegal immigrants picked up in Arizona. Tough immigration laws like Arizona's SB 1070 could send thousands of new bodies its way, and millions of dollars.

SILVER SPRING, Md. (AP) — As the three hostages at Discovery Channel's headquarters appeared ready to make a run for it, police said Thursday that a SWAT team officer quickly shot and killed the increasingly agitated gunman who had explosives strapped to himself, ending the four-hour standoff.

The stolen birds are safe and one woman has been charged in connection with the thefts of exotic pets -- worth more than $5,000 -- from three west suburban pet shops this week.

The man said in his Sunday morning call that he'd been in the water about 10 hours and his towels had gotten wet. "Homeless man calls 911 from hot tub, seeks cocoa" (Thanks, Carlo Longino!)

Woman calls 911 in attempt to get a date 911 call for beer Mom calls 911 over son's video game habit Woman places 3 calls to 911 to complain about McNuggets incident ...

Robert Popper discovered this one, and suggests that it is very likely the new "Pardon Me." But oh, there's more. Desiré Dubounet is the nom de drag of a fellow named Bill Nelson, whose website proclaims Dubounet/Nelson to be: The MAN Who created the term "Quantum medicine"
Who created the first "Quantum Consciousness Interface" known as QXCI
Who discovered the Xrroid process, Subspace and the Trivector field
(besides many other terms he does not know how to explain)
Who got the FDA register the first Quantum device in history called EPFX
(sorrily for him that the FDA already 19 years later found out that he misbranded it as "biofeedback" device, and now revoked the registration and declared an import ban ) Who brought Apollo 13 safely back from the moon (see details below)
Has jumped another Quantum Leap
He crossed over in female territory (also called forbidden zone in quantum theory)
And now calls himself

DESIRE Video link, and Desiré's website is here.

Playing games on the PSP Go was one of the most annoying experiences possible in a job that can be full of annoying experiences; if it takes you hours to play a game on a portable system out of the box there is something tragically wrong with your product. After only a year on the market, it looks like Sony's experiment in digital distribution is on its last legs.

Finding any sort of sales information on the system for the US has been difficult, although Media Create does track the hardware sales for Japan... and its performance has been abysmal. The PSP has long come in last place in the US sales numbers, and breaking that number down between the PSP and PSP Go doesn't give Sony the possibility of a happy ending.

We called a local GameStop to see what they were offering for trade-in credit on the hardware. Even though you can still buy the PSP Go for $250, the trade-in value was only $50. Just to rub salt in the wound, the latest model of the standard PSP will get you $80 in trade-in credit, and is eligible for a $20 promotional bump. The PSP Go is specifically exempt from that offer.

Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep is coming to the PSP on September 7 and should be one of the platform's largest releases this year. The bad news? Square Enix currently has no plans to release the game on the PlayStation Network; the company doesn't seem to care about missing out on digital sales, which means PSP Go owners will not be able to play the game. Sony leaves decisions about digital sales up to the publishers, and there is no way to tell in advance whether a game will be made available to Go owners.

There's nothing wrong with the idea of a gaming system with no physical media—Apple seems to be doing just fine in the gaming space without requiring carts or discs—but Sony's implementation has been disastrous. It may be a while before any company has the gonads to step up and take another crack at the idea.

Read the comments on this post

NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks are edging higher after reports on housing, manufacturing and jobs indicated the economy continues to grow, albeit slowly.

The Labor Department says first-time claims for unemployment benefits fell slightly last week, but remain well above levels that indicate a healthy economy. The number of buyers ...

PHOENIX (AP) — The U.S. Justice Department sued Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio on Thursday, saying the Arizona lawman refused for more than a year to turn over records in an investigation into allegations his department discriminates against Hispanics.

The lawsuit calls Sheriff Arpaio and his office's defiance "unprecedented" and says the ...

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — An offshore petroleum rig exploded and was burning Friday in the Gulf of Mexico about 80 miles south of Vermilion Bay.

The Coast Guard said no one was killed in the explosion, which was reported by a commercial helicopter flying over the site around 9 a.m. ...

Ordinary USB Flash drives to darn big for you? LaCie's new MosKeyto protrudes a mere 6mm from the USB port it's connected to.…

Free On-Demand Webcast - Virtualizing the Hard Stuff

It's fine to have one. It's fine to be proud of it. But please don't whip it out in public and start waving it around, And PLEASE don't try to shove it down my children's throats.

NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks are edging higher after reports on housing, manufacturing and jobs indicated the economy continues to grow, albeit slowly.

The Labor Department says first-time claims for unemployment benefits fell slightly last week, but remain well above levels that indicate a healthy economy. The number of buyers ...

PHOENIX (AP) — The U.S. Justice Department sued Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio on Thursday, saying the Arizona lawman refused for more than a year to turn over records in an investigation into allegations his department discriminates against Hispanics.

The lawsuit calls Sheriff Arpaio and his office's defiance "unprecedented" and says the ...

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — An offshore petroleum rig exploded and was burning Friday in the Gulf of Mexico about 80 miles south of Vermilion Bay.

The Coast Guard said no one was killed in the explosion, which was reported by a commercial helicopter flying over the site around 9 a.m. ...

The economic hard times are so persistent that observers who supported the Recovery Act might be feeling twinges of guilt about President Obama's stimulus package.

NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks are edging higher after reports on housing, manufacturing and jobs indicated the economy continues to grow, albeit slowly.

The Labor Department says first-time claims for unemployment benefits fell slightly last week, but remain well above levels that indicate a healthy economy. The number of buyers ...

PHOENIX (AP) — The U.S. Justice Department sued Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio on Thursday, saying the Arizona lawman refused for more than a year to turn over records in an investigation into allegations his department discriminates against Hispanics.

The lawsuit calls Sheriff Arpaio and his office's defiance "unprecedented" and says the ...

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — An offshore petroleum rig exploded and was burning Friday in the Gulf of Mexico about 80 miles south of Vermilion Bay.

The Coast Guard said no one was killed in the explosion, which was reported by a commercial helicopter flying over the site around 9 a.m. ...

At 11 AM EDT Hurricane Earl's track is mostly unchanged from yesterday evening. The storm has intensified slightly and is now a strong cat 4 with winds in excess of 140 mph and higher gusts. Conditions along the US east coast will deteriorate as Earl now moves near or over the outer banks later tonight, bringing hurricane and tropical force winds and 3 to 5 foot storm surge to a wide region:

Earl's size and track will produce tropical-storm force winds somewhere along the East Coast this weekend, and there is a 28% chance of hurricane-force winds along the Outer Banks. NHC puts out a very useful wind probability forecast. The highlights are that Cape Hatteras, NC has a 28% chance of hurricane-force winds and a 91% chance of tropical-storm (TS) force winds. A wide swath of 30+% probabilities covers the East Coast from Virginia to New England. Cities with a greater than 40% chance of TS winds include Norfolk, Ocean City, Providence, Boston, and Nantucket. Halifax, Nova Scotia in Canada has a 62% chance of TS force winds.

A hurricane and tropical storm warning has been issued by the NHC. A Special Alert has been posted at North Carolina DOT. More info on evacuation and storm preparation can be found at FEMA and GetReady.gov.

See also discussion in MillWX's diary.