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Only 2,029 out of 9,145 veterans with post traumatic stress disorder resulting from combat have been referred to mental health for evaluation/treatment. I say give them the same treatment the IDF gets.
posted by augustweed at 7:21 PM PST - 42 comments

RobotFilter: Korea Unveils World's Second Android (YouTube), China manufactures personal robot, Japan's domestic robot, Why the Japanese want their robots to act more like humans. Robot runs over water, robotic tentacle (mpeg), 'baby' robot learns like a human (avi 1,2), Pill-sized intenstinal robot, speedy robot, spider robots. Lego Unveils NXT Robotics Toolset, Lego robot plays Super Mario Bros, Connect Four, solves Rubik's Cube. Building an army of robots, Big Dog, (wmv), Robots break Asimov’s first law. [more inside]
posted by MetaMonkey at 7:06 PM PST - 14 comments

It's mango season in India! Thanks to a new agreement, Americans will be able to partake in the joy of Indian mangoes, but in the meantime, there are plenty of ways to enjoy a Florida mango. Get creative with recipes, try one with chili powder or salt and pepper (and no, MTV, it's nothing sexual), buy the mango lover in your life a splitter, or make a wish at a mango tree. (Hint: try South Florida.) Just don't eat (or burn) the leaves!
posted by anjamu at 6:34 PM PST - 50 comments

MiHail of the portabella mushroom fame died in February while waiting for what would have been her third liver transplant. She will always be with me in my soul. Rest in peace, Cathy.
posted by Jade5454 at 6:19 PM PST - 141 comments

Roy D. Mercer asks Bill Goldberg if he's ready for an ass whoopin.[more inside]
posted by bigmusic at 5:25 PM PST - 18 comments

When a runaway train crashed through the floor in Washington, DC's Union Station back in January 1953, the Pennsylvania Railroad immediately started to cover it up. But this coverup was in all the newspapers: the railroad just built a temporary floor over a locomotive and two railroad cars, because of all the traffic for Eisenhower's inauguration. A few weeks later, the locomotive was retrieved, repaired, and running again, like nothing had ever happened. Another page includes some pictures (scroll down).
posted by Godbert at 4:58 PM PST - 14 comments

Chris Tucker has become the highest-paid actor in Hollywood for agreeing to star in the third installment in the Rush Hour film series. Apparently he's already prepping for the car chases. No word on whether not he got those editing rights he was asking for last year.
posted by ktoad at 4:23 PM PST - 44 comments

Life Beyond Earth and the Mind of Man. Direct Google Video link to a fruitcake-tastic half-hour film of "a symposium held at Boston University on November 20, 1972 that explores the implications of the possible existence of extraterrestrial life within the galaxy and the universe. " Well worth scrubbing through for some good moments if you don't have time to watch the whole thing. Other cool old NASA videos on google video include Who's Out There?, starring a cigar smoking Orson Welles squinting a lot and reading off the cue cards, and Debrief: Apollo 8: "Happiness is bacon squares for breakfast".
posted by 6am at 3:49 PM PST - 7 comments

HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson told an audience that he'd cancelled a loan because "a minority businessman" didn't like the President. He later claimed to have been joking. [via]
posted by Sticherbeast at 3:40 PM PST - 21 comments

Meet the grolar bear (via)
posted by reklaw at 3:30 PM PST - 39 comments

Renegade wild hogs captured using dogs and bare hands. Greg Whidden captures the hogs from a nature preserve where they're causing environmental damage.
posted by exogenous at 1:46 PM PST - 17 comments

Priest convicted in 1980 nun-slaying. The 71-year-old nun was found on Good Saturday 1980 strangled to death, stabbed 27-32 times, wrapped in an altar cloth with her under-garments around her ankle. Abuse victim Jane Doe re-opens 1980 case with account of childhood Satanic ritual abuse. Was there a cover up by the diocese?
posted by Marnie at 12:53 PM PST - 40 comments

Battle Cry, the youth arm of the Christian Reconstructionist (also called Dominionist) movement, is holding a rally in Philadelphia this weekend. They've already had events in San Francisco & Detroit. Create your own Battle Plan or just chat with other soldiers in God's Army. But not everyone is happy about it.
posted by scalefree at 12:10 PM PST - 121 comments

Margaret Thatcher Dot Org. For all your Margaret Thatcher related needs.
posted by sgt.serenity at 11:15 AM PST - 39 comments

CIA Secret Prisons Exposed The disappeared: Are they dead? Are they alive? Ask Congress. Ask the president.
posted by Postroad at 10:30 AM PST - 42 comments

I didn't believe my eyes, but it turns out that it only takes some cold water and a thermal inversion to make a superior mirage (superior in both position and awesomeness). Pekka Parviainen has written about the phenomenon in Finland and has lots of photos to share. Still don't believe? Watch the videos: especially the one in which the mirage disappears before your very eyes! (.rm)
posted by imposster at 9:38 AM PST - 23 comments

Just when you thought we'd run out of things to sue over. A man who was denied a red nylon tote bag during a Mother's Day promotion at an Angels baseball game has filed a sex and age discrimination lawsuit against the team.
posted by StrasbourgSecaucus at 9:22 AM PST - 36 comments

Allen, 24, and Brandon Day, 28, of Dallas, were in Southern California for a financial convention. They got lost Saturday west of Palm Springs after wandering off a trail during what was supposed to be a day hike. [On the third day] they discovered a campsite in a dead-end gorge. Day and Allen were elated, thinking someone there could help them find the way out. But something was wrong. A radio and flashlight were corroded. They realized the place was deserted. ``His last journal entry was one year ago to the day that we found it, which was very eerie,' Day said. ``Nobody knew where he was, nobody knew to come looking for him, so he was preparing for the end. We were looking at the words of a man who was passing.' The missing man was John Donovan, who had disapeared a year earlier while hiking the pacific crest trail. "Even in his death, he was helping people," Donovan's longtime friend, Chris Hook, said from Richmond, Virginia.
posted by 445supermag at 9:12 AM PST - 26 comments

Killing the CIA. A startling and important look at the recent dismantling of the CIA by the Bush Administration.
posted by Mean Mr. Bucket at 8:48 AM PST - 26 comments

After 12 weeks, viewers of the UK version of "The Apprentice" saw Michelle Dewberry beat off Ruth Badger to win a £100,000 a year job working for Sir Alan Sugar. Inspired by the show, some organisations are leaning towards this style of hiring for their own recruitment. Not surprisingly, others are dismayed.
posted by mr_silver at 6:09 AM PST - 35 comments

New security glitch found in Diebold system California, Pennsylvania and Iowa are issuing emergency notices to local elections officials, generally telling them to "sequester" their Diebold touch screens and reprogram them with "trusted" software issued by the state capital. Then elections officials are to keep the machines sealed with tamper-resistant tape until Election Day.
posted by leapingsheep at 5:15 AM PST - 104 comments

NSA has massive database of Americans' phone calls. "The NSA's domestic program began soon after the Sept. 11 attacks, according to the sources. Right around that time, they said, NSA representatives approached the nation's biggest telecommunications companies. The agency made an urgent pitch: National security is at risk, and we need your help to protect the country from attacks"
posted by gsb at 4:55 AM PST - 184 comments