"A prosecutor has opened a probe into the death of two workers who succumbed to smoke inhalation due to a plumbing fixture on Aug. 10 as they helped disassemble the MS Pacific, a famous cruise ship, which arrived in İzmir on Aug. 6.

The MS Pacific, a cruise ship made famous by its appearance in the popular U.S. 1970s television show “The Love Boat,” came to Turkey from Genoa after a difficult trip due to weather conditions. The ship was damaged and water filled its engine room because of a violent storm, Doğan News Agency reported."

Whole article:
http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/two-workers-killed-while-disassembling-love-boat-in-turkey-.aspx?pageID=238&nID=52319&NewsCatID=341

An absolutely true news item: After spending a month confined inside a Moscow airport, former U.S. intelligence contractor and National Security Agency leaker Edward J. Snowden has been granted temporary asylum in Russia.


Today I walk the streets a free man, accompanied by my two new best friends, Anatoly and Boris. They do not work for the KGB, OK? They’re professional tour guides who came strongly recommended by President Vladimir Putin.

I’ll be the first to admit that my plan wasn’t 100 percent seamless. For example, I should have figured out what new place I wanted to live in before I revealed my identity as the leaker. Clearly, I underestimated how difficult it would be to find a country that would welcome me, especially a country as free and open as the United States.


whole article here:
http://www.kansas.com/2013/08/06/2926019/carl-hiaasen-snowden-savors-the.html

What term is best for describing a group of Repubs?

against oral and anal sex.
By Dahlia Lithwick, Slate Magazine

"Ken Cuccinelli, Virginia’s attorney general, has garnered more than his share of national attention over the years, with high-profile legal crusades against global warming researchers, Obamacare, and abortion clinics. But it’s his recent war on consensual sodomy in the commonwealth that has raised the most eyebrows as the gubernatorial candidate has made the issue a centerpiece of the final months of his campaign.

His critics, including the ladies of The View and Jay Leno, have responded to Cuccinelli’s quest to reinstate Virginia’s anti-sodomy or, “Crimes Against Nature” law, with snickers and winks. The law is plainly unconstitutional—according to both a 2003 U.S. Supreme Court decision and a federal appeals court—and giggling about the attorney general’s creepy preoccupation with Virginians’ consensual oral sex makes for an easy comic target. But that focus obscures the real—even original—sin undergirding Cucinelli’s latest legal push: It’s a call for judges to read statutes to mean what they don’t say; a call for outright judicial activism, for freewheeling judicial interpretation—qualities legal thinkers on the right usually deplore."

SNIP

"What is also not a surprise is that Cuccinelli would employ the federal courts to advance a personal moral agenda—and spend a boatload of taxpayer dollars in the process. He did that with his unsuccessful climate-change crusade against UVA. Nor is it surprising that Cuccinelli would use a fruitless and unwinnable lawsuit as a personal campaign ploy. After all, it was Cuccinelli who, during the Affordable Care Act litigation, called a press conference and made the ill-advised decision to bypass the federal court of appeals and file it directly in the Supreme Court; a decision met by the court with a polite “Erm. No.”"



Whole article here: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2013/08/ken_cuccinelli_s_sodomy_obsession_the_frightening_legal_implications_of.html

From Jen Sorensen's "Slowpoke"

Editorial from Washington Post Editorial Board, 7/31/13

"GOV. ROBERT F. McDonnell (R), elusive as a matador, has now taken refuge behind the passive formulation favored by politicians who have messed up. “I understand that some choices that have been made have undermined my trust with the citizens,” the governor said Tuesday, failing to specify that those choices were made by him and his wife, Maureen.

Mr. McDonnell can dodge accountability, but his damage-control campaign speaks louder than his words. On Tuesday he announced that he would return a number of gifts which, though he failed to specify them, presumably will cover goodies that he and his wife received from businessman Jonnie R. Williams Sr. Those include a $6,500 Rolex; $15,000 to cover part of a catering bill for the wedding of his daughter; and another $15,000 run up by Mrs. McDonnell, on Mr Williams’s tab, at Bergdorf Goodman, the New York luxury department store."

Whole editorial here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/mr-mcdonnell-continues-to-dodge-responsibility/2013/07/31/4fff3ef2-f94c-11e2-afc1-c850c6ee5af8_story.html

"Often when I write about wearable LEDs, I’m doing so in my Lighten Up blog in EDN’s LED Zone, extolling the virtues of slippers, belts, earrings, and other bizarre LED-lit merchandise that you might buy for a geek-type at the holidays. Fortunately, I’ve found some recent intros into wearable LEDs that are much more worthwhile and show an interesting future. While it’s true that they are not ready for prime time, they at least make sense.

For example, take the battery-powered backpack with a set of microcontrollers from the Arduino platform and mounted LEDs that blink for 20 seconds in the shape of arrows. Potentially worn by motorcyclists and bike riders, the user can initiate the arrows with a mere turn of the head in the appropriate direction to flip switches on and off with their chin."

Whole article from Carolyn Mathas here:

http://www.edn.com/electronics-blogs/led-zone/4419147/Wearable-LEDs---Apps-with-promise