It's News to Me

As Gustav continues to move onshore into Louisiana this afternoon, 10 student reporters and editors at Louisiana State University's student newspaper, The Daily Reveille, are hunkered down in their offices, waiting the storm out as they continuously update their Web site, despite the fact that campus itself is officially closed until Wednesday, according to a note posted on Facebook by Nicholas Persac, an editor for the newspaper. The team plans to remain at the paper's office overnight through at least Tuesday if not Wednesday.

Live video on the front of the site taken from the Reveille's building shows wind whipping the campus. Photos show military helicopters on campus as well as the temporary shelter set up in one of the campus buildings.

The biggest news over the weekend and into today has by far been this hurricane, which at one point was threatening to wreck Katrina-like havoc on New Orleans. The once-Category 4 hurricane was downgraded to a Category 2 before it made landfall this morning along the Louisiana coast.

The hurricane has spared New Orleans, although water is flowing over a levee there. Mandatory evacuations were ordered for New Orleans residents days in advance to avoid another Katrina situation, but many stayed behind. The Republican Convention has even been downsized today, with many foregoing attendance, including President Bush. One lesson was apparently learned from Katrina as the state prompted mass pet evacuations ahead of the storm.

- Kat

Most teachers scoff at Wikipedia for class projects and papers, but for some courtrooms, the Web site is a reliable source whose information is admissible in court.
At least that's what happened in one case after the Department of Homeland Security deported an Ethiopian woman based on the Wikipedia definition of laissez-passer, a travel document she was using to attempt to enter the U.S. The Wikipedia article doesn't include any references or sources for its information.
On Friday, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a ruling by the Board of Immigration Appeals, which stated that DHS was allowed to use the Web site as evidence to deport the woman.
In its original case, the DHS argued that the laissez-passer did not prove the woman's identity because it was a one-way travel document, as Wikipedia says, with information provided by the applicant.
Funny since one commenter on the Wired article points out that the defense attorney could have simply proved his case by editing the Wikipedia entry while in the courtroom.
The appeals court questioned the Board of Immigration Appeals as to why they allowed the DHS deportation ruling to stand. The board replied that it could find no clear error in the arguments, although it did say it doesn't encourage the use of sources such as Wikipedia in such cases.
Oddly enough, according to Wikipedia, admissible evidence must have "some indicia of reliability." However, there are also no references for that article either.

Somewhere, right now, Al Gore is saying, "I told you so" after a Manhattan-sized ice shelf broke away in Northern Canada.

The separation of the 4,500-year-old Markham Ice Shelf is just another indication of how global warming is affecting the polar regions, scientists told The Associated Press. The 19-square mile ice shelf, which scientists say 'suddenly disappeared,' is now adrift in the Arctic Ocean.

The Markham Ice Shelf separation is just one in a series of bad news in the polar region after a different ice shelf shrunk by 47-square miles, 60 percent of its total area. Last month, seven square miles broke off the Ward Hunt shelf and earlier this year a 160-square mile chunk of an Antarctic ice shelf disintegrated.

Additionally, a near record loss of Arctic sea ice occurred this summer, while unusual cracks have been found in a northern Greenland glacier.

Is it just me, or is this starting to sound like a set up from The Day After Tomorrow?

-- Kat

It sounds like something from one of the Willard Preacher's sermons to students:

"I kissed a girl and I liked it -- then I went to Hell."

But, this message appeared on a church board in Ohio, drawing controversy over its "creative" changes to the popular song by Katy Perry, "I Kissed a Girl."

Photo courtesy 9news.com

The pastor of Havens Corners Church said he didn't intend to draw attention to the church, but was merely concerned with the implications of the song, saying its music video bordered on pornography. The pastor wanted to remind teenagers that the Bible denounces homosexuality, he told a local news station.

The board was only up for 24 hours, removed, the pastor said, because of confusion -- some people who drove past it have never heard Perry's infamous song.

-- Kat

If aliens do exist, they could one day be lucky enough (or perhaps unlucky enough?) to come across Stephen Colbert's DNA floating through space, CNN reports.

The Comedy Central talk host's DNA will be digitized and sent to the International Space Station in October as part of a time capsule.

The other possibility? Mankind could be resurrected through Colbert's DNA should earth or man ever cease to exist.

"I am thrilled to have my DNA shot into space, as this brings me one step closer to my lifelong dream of being the baby at the end of 2001," Colbert said in a statement, referring to the 1968 landmark science fiction film "2001: A Space Odyssey."

-- Kat

Facebook users are logging on to a rude awakening today as they find that the social networking site has officially switched over to its new design.

The new design, which users have been able to access voluntarily for a few months through new.facebook.com, is being forced on all users starting today with full roll out expected to be complete by the end of the week.

Many users have complained about the new design which separates the normal user profile into different tabs.

-- Kat

Talk about man's best friend.

A German Shepherd in Scottsdale, Arizona, dialed 911 after his owner, Joe Stalnaker, collapsed while having a seizure. This isn't the first time the dog has called 911 -- police say the dog has previously dialed the emergency line twice when Stalnaker suffered a seizure.

Buddy, an 18-month old puppy, is specially trained to hit programmed buttons on the telephone when Stalnaker seizes, a result of a head injury suffered 10 years ago during a military training exercise.

Buddy then whimpers and barks into the phone until help arrives.

See if you can swallow this: Albert Pagliuca didn't want to have scars as a result of a surgery to remove his gallbladder so he allowed doctors to detach and remove the organ through his mouth.

Washingtonpost.com even has video of the surgery, complete with warnings for viewers who may not be able to stomach the surgery, which uses a flexible endoscope equipped with small instruments including a scapel and sutures.

Besides being scarless, the surgery, called natural orifice transluminal endoscopic surgery (or NOTES for short) did have its other benefits as well -- Pagliuca was able to get back to work more quickly and had less pain throughout his recovery period.

The new type of surgery is still in its experimental phase, with only 400 surgeries performed throughout the world thus far, but surgeons say it has the potential to revolutionize the way surgeries are undertaken.

The mouth isn't always used in the surgeries, since doctors can use any open orifice in the body. I'll leave it up to you to figure out what that means exactly.

I think I'll stick to traditional surgery thankyouverymuch.

-- Kat

While there may appear to be less press coverage in the past week about the O.J. Simpson trial, probably because of the current economic situation, Saturday Night Live got a good laugh at it Saturday.
Here's a look incase you missed it:

Despite the efforts of one California assemblyman, motorists will not be fined for allowing their dogs behind the wheel as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger prepares to veto a bill that would ban the practice.

Republican Assemblyman Bill Maze introduced the bill in California earlier this year after he saw a woman driving with three dogs on her lap, a clearly distracting practice, which seems to run rampant among Hollywood's celebrities. Even though the state currently has a hands-free law for cell phones, they apparently don't view the dogs as much of a problem -- Schwarzenegger says he's signing only bills that are "the highest priority for California." And a lapdog ban isn't one of them, the Associated Press reports.

Despite the fact they were only minors when they committed their crimes, more than 400 teens are serving life sentences in Pennsylvania prisons.

As the state with the highest number of teen lifers, 444 teen lifers are currently being held in Pennsylvania prisons, which is about a fifth of the nation's total and 110 more than runner-up Louisiana, according to a report published by Human Rights Watch.

It's a fact that's drawn concern from Sen. Stewart Greenleaf, R-Montgomery, who called legislators to meet to examine the issue for the first time.

According to Human Rights Watch, Pennsylvania's law could be the major contributing factor to the high number of teen lifers as the law requires anyone charged with homicide, regardless of age, to be tried as an adult and has a mandatory minimum sentence of life without parole for first- and second-degree murder.

And, according to the American Bar Association's Commission on Sentencing chairman, Pennsylvania may be the only state to consider life sentences mandatory for first- and second-degree murder.