Saturday, April 19, 2014


News Clips For The Day



'Why Me?' Vets Face Much Higher Risk of Lou Gehrig's Disease
By Bill Briggs
First published April 19 2014


A Vietnam veteran swoops his hand through a row of baby vegetables, caressing the peppers on down to the kale. The plants are aligned in tidy, military order atop his backyard fence. He could spend hours describing his first garden. But he cannot utter a word.

He can’t even eat his eventual harvest.

Plants sit in a bin at the Hoaglan home. Bob Hoaglan took up gardening one month ago.
So, Bob Hoaglan, 71, simply stands and grins at the spouts behind his Oxnard, Calif., home. Then, he grabs his primary communication tool, an LCD tablet, scribbling a stylus across the screen. He displays his words with a silent chuckle: “I don’t have a green thumb.”

With a button click, he erases that sentence before composing another. His daily aim is to throw his body and brain into new pursuits. The crops — fresh life for a man facing mortality — help shove his disease to the back of his mind. He admits, though, he can’t keep it there: “I try,” he writes, “Sometimes it creeps up on me.” As he shows that message, the smile vanishes.

Hoaglan was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, nearly a year ago. Inside a malady that offers no cure or explanation, he embodies two intriguing clues that, a top researcher says, may whisper answers: Hoaglan served in the military, and he is a nice man.

U.S. veterans carry a nearly 60 percent greater risk of contracting ALS than civilians, according to a white paper published in 2013 by the ALS Association, citing Harvard University research that tracked ex-service members back to 1910.
That alarming disparity has prompted the Pentagon to devote $7.5 million annually to hunt for ALS causes and treatments. The investment includes a $2.5 million grant made April 1 to the Cedars-Sinai Regenerative Medicine Institute in Los Angeles to test a promising therapy in lab animals and, perhaps later, in humans with the disease.
“When you think about the military, you have intense training, and we all wonder: Is it something to do with extreme exercise and a genetic vulnerability?” says Clive Svendsen, head of the Cedars institute. He’s been working for a decade to crack the ALS enigma.

His theory: For veterans born with a rare genetic flaw that predisposes them to ALS, the military’s harsh physical demands perhaps trigger the disease to erupt years later.

The latest DOD grant will allow Svendsen’s team to inject a special protein called GDNF into the leg and diaphragm muscles of rodents bred to carry a form of the illness. GDNF promotes the survival of neurons — nerve cells through which the brain tells selected muscles to fire.

ALS damages neurons, paralyzing muscles as it spreads, becoming lethal in two to five years as breathing becomes compromised. The mind remains untouched. Roughly 30,000 Americans live with ALS and more than 5,000 new cases are diagnosed annually, experts say.

Svendsen’s team will use a benign virus to deliver GDNF to targeted cells. Recent research by one of Svendsen’s colleagues found that stem cells — engineered to produce GDNF — boosted motor function and lifespan when transplanted into the muscles of rats with ALS.

“If we can slow down the disease, that would be huge,” Svendsen says. “Even if I can tell my patient, ‘You can keep a finger going,’ they can still communicate. Right now, there’s nothing. This is one of the best bets we have. With the rose-tinted glasses, it is a piece of a potential cure.”

If the protein injections work in animals, the LA researchers can ask the federal government to approve clinical trials for human patients, all part of a three-year project.

“The answer is in stem cell therapy,” Hoaglan writes on his LCD board. The Army drafted him but he later enlisted in the Navy Reserves. He served as a heavy equipment mechanic in Vietnam from 1965 to 1967. His base twice took mortar fire. He scrawls more words with urgency in his eyes: “I want to get involved in a stem cell study.”

Hoaglan began feeling an odd lump in his throat in 2011. His words became slurred. Now, his throat muscles are paralyzed, preventing him from speaking or swallowing. He can still taste, though, writing that “the hardest thing is smelling real food and I can’t eat.”

A gastrostomy tube coils beneath his shirt, connecting to his stomach. Each day, he uses a syringe to push seven cans of calorically rich liquid into that tube. He writes that he’s having “pulmonary problems.” He’s lost 40 pounds and tires easily. He has the use of his hands, arms and legs — and his warm charm. His handshake is firm. His smile is steady.

Hoaglan uses a feeding tube to get his nutrients. He's been using the feeding tube for two months.

“The other thing with this disease, I’ve found, is the people who get ALS are just the nicest people,” Svendsen said. “I’ve met so many, become their friends. Unfortunately, they’re not around very long.”

As a scientist, Svendsen doesn’t offer that observation as a simple kindness. While possessing only anecdotal observations, he believes that shared trait of a gentle nature has meaning.

“It’s possible,” he said, “that there’s a genetic correlation that makes you vulnerable to ALS, and that same mix of genes makes you a nice person.”

Leaders of the ALS Association have heard such hunches. They aren’t yet sold.
“The ideas are currently unsubstantiated and mere speculation however interesting,” said Lucie Bruijn, chief scientist for the Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group.
At his ranch-style home about a mile from the Pacific Ocean, Hoaglan tends his sun-drenched garden but knows where he’ll be after dark: at his computer, scouring the Internet for news of clinical trials.

He’ll be searching for answers. But he has one fundamental question. He clutches his LCD board and jots two words.
“Why me?”




Bob Hoaglan a Vietnam War veteran is 71 years old and has ALS. He communicates with a Boogie Board because he can no longer talk. He faces eventual paralysis, complete disability and death, but for now he tries to stay active and cheerful, and at present has grown a small crop of vegetables in “a bin” at his home. He cares for them daily and even “caresses” them. Baby plants, like baby animals, as you who garden know, are very attractive – small and fragile, but perfectly formed and graceful.

From the news article, “Hoaglan was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, nearly a year ago. Inside a malady that offers no cure or explanation, he embodies two intriguing clues that, a top researcher says, may whisper answers: Hoaglan served in the military, and he is a nice man.” How are these clues? US veterans, judging from research going back to 1910, have a 60% greater chance of getting ALS. This is highly significant. “Roughly 30,000 Americans live with ALS and more than 5,000 new cases are diagnosed annually.” As a result, the Pentagon has invested $7.5 million a year for investigating causes and cures for the devastating disease.

Some possible triggers given are “ extreme exercise and a genetic vulnerability,” and the fact that those who contract ALS are “just the nicest people.” Personality is at least partially inherited. Bipolar disorder is thought to be inherited. Lucie Bruijn, of the ALS Association, said that though it is interesting it is “mere speculation.” Really new scientific discoveries have been based on a hunch in the past, however, so maybe Svendsen's idea will pan out. It's the best answer so far for ALS. Stem cell therapy is being considered as a possible cure.




Putin Plays Risky Game, Using Ukraine Crisis for Political Gain, Ex-Analyst says – NBC
By Robert Windrem
First published April 19 2014

Vladimir Putin is playing a dangerous geopolitical game by using the Ukraine crisis to try to shore up political support among ultra-nationalist Russians nostalgic for the Soviet era, according to a former U.S. intelligence officer and author who has spent years studying and analyzing the Russian president.

Fiona Hill, a former U.S. intelligence officer specializing in Russia and Eastern Europe and author of a book on Putin, says that the Russian president’s sagging public support before the Ukraine crisis and reacquisiton of Crimea from Kiev are driving the brinksmanship of recent weeks, including the massing of tens of thousands of Russian troops along Ukraine’s eastern border.

“He’s reinventing himself again,” she said of Putin, a former officer of the Soviet KGB spy agency. “He is trying to stay one step ahead of the Russian nationalists, and that can be risky.”

Putin, 61, has always been a nationalist, but has in the past balanced that with talk of inclusiveness, particularly regarding the mostly Muslim TransCaucasus region. Now, says Hill, he has shifted to the right to reflect the rising tide of ultra-nationalist sentiment in Russia and former Soviet satellites, where millions of ethnic Russians now see themselves as second-class citizens.

By playing the tough guy, Putin has succeeded in bolstering his standing at home. Since the crisis began, his approval numbers in government and media polls have climbed and are now “in the 80s” percentagewise, said Hill.

But in doing so, he may have painted himself into a corner, she said, explaining that it will be difficult to satisfy the ultra-nationalists absent a “complete victory” – seizure of at least some territory in eastern Ukraine – and limit his ability to make compromises.

For that reason, Hill said she expects the Ukraine crisis to drag on as Putin continues to test the West’s resolve while simultaneously trying to strengthen his hand with Russian nationalists.

For example, she said his unsolicited phone calls to Barack President Obama in recent weeks have been about “taking the president’s measure,” and likely not a sincere effort to tamp down or resolve the crisis.

Hill, who is now the director of the Center on the United States and Europe and a senior foreign policy fellow at the Brookings Institution, has a unique perspective on Putin. She served as intelligence officer for Russia and Eurasia at the National Intelligence Council from 2006 to 2009 and last year published a book on the Russian president titled, “Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin,” a reference to his years as an officer in the Soviet KGB spy agency.

Among her other duties while working at the NIC, Hill was tasked with helping prepare a classified leadership profile on Putin. That job gives her a great degree of empathy for the Western leaders and intelligence officers now trying to anticipate his next moves, as her research led her to conclude that Putin is a “black ops guy” who “is quite willing to do pretty much anything” to achieve his ends – including blackmail, extortion and the manipulation of history.

He also has exhibited chameleon-like behavior through his career that makes him both a dangerous adversary and a frustrating subject for study, she said.

“So much of Putin’s biography can’t be verified, said Hill. “It was and is incredibly difficult to get a sense of the guy. Traditional profiling was very difficult because so much of what we think we know, we can’t take at face value.”

A purposeful blank slate
That, she says, isn’t just a problem of misinformation, but disinformation – that is deliberate deception about who he is and what motivates him.

“Putin wants people to project on him what they want to see,” she said, whether that be Russian nationalists searching for the “ultimate action hero,” an image Putin cultivates through various he-man activities, or former President George W. Bush looking the Russian leader in the eye and getting “a sense of his soul.”

Despite the unfolding drama along Russia’s eastern border, Hill said she expects Putin to ride out the Ukraine crisis. There is no alternative political figure on the horizon in Russia, where he enriches allies and imprisons enemies, she notes. He also has tightened his hold on the nation’s media, limiting access to the airwaves in the wake of the retaking of Crimea.

He’s also an adept student at reading political dynamics in the West, and Hill said she expects Putin to continue to alternate between belligerence and diplomacy in his dealings with Obama, whom he likely sees as not just a “lame duck but a dead duck.” He’ll also continue to try to play the cautious president against Republican hawks in Congress demanding that he do more to address the situation in Ukraine.
“He’s very good at taking advantage of divisions to exploit weakness,” she said.




Putin, according to Fiona Hill, is trying to “shore up political support among ultra-nationalist Russians nostalgic for the Soviet era,” because his public support had been “sagging.” She said that his vacillating between aggressiveness and “talk of inclusiveness,” has been his ploy since He has “shifted to the right to reflect the rising tide of ultra-nationalist sentiment in Russia and former Soviet satellites, where millions of ethnic Russians now see themselves as second-class citizens.” That viewpoint that they are second-class is probably behind the reported “fear” that Russians aren't being treated well in Ukraine. Hill said that his current approval numbers are in the 80s, but he may have “painted himself into a corner,” since the Nationalists are hoping for annexation of Eastern Ukraine as well as Crimea.

She says that his unsolicited calls to Obama have been attempts to “take the president's measure.” Her book is called “Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin,” a reference to his years as an officer in the Soviet KGB. A “black ops guy,” he is “willing to do pretty much anything” to achieve his goals, particularly trying to look like “the ultimate action hero.” She says he uses “deliberate deception,” hoping that people will “project on him what they want to see.” It sounds like the con artist type of sociopath to me. He “enriches his allies and imprisons enemies,” and is controlling the media more tightly since the Crimean annexation. “He’s very good at taking advantage of divisions to exploit weakness,” and views Obama as a “dead duck.”

So maybe a Republican will win in the 2016 election this year, though a recent poll said that most Americans don't want a “hot war.” Personally, I think Obama, the EU and NATO are doing a pretty good job at doing some effective things to keep Putin on his guard. The Ukrainian military is going to have to put up an ongoing fight against the separatists, though, to prevent further annexation moves, unless the peace making plan of the last few days is espoused by both sides and an accord is reached. I still hope for that to happen.




Who Is the Boston Bombing Widow? – NBC
By Hasani Gittens
First published April 19 2014

The wife of the dead Boston Marathon bombing suspect has never been implicated in the attack, but her proximity to it has put her in a prison without bars.

Katherine Russell, who married Tamerlan Tsarnaev in 2010, rarely ventures outside of her Rhode Island home anymore, according to neighbors — so little is known about her beyond what first impressions were revealed nearly a year ago.
Here’s what we do know.

What’s her background?
Katherine, 25, is the oldest of three daughters in the Russell family, from North Kingstown, R.I. Her father, a Navy veteran, is a physician in Providence, and her mother is a nurse.

Katherine is a 2007 graduate of North Kingstown Senior High School in Rhode Island. She attended Suffolk University in Boston, studying communication from the fall of 2007 to the spring of 2010, but did not receive a diploma, a spokesman told NBC News.
When did she convert to Islam?

It’s unclear, but friends and neighbors have said that when she returned to Rhode Island in 2010, she had a young daughter and had taken to wearing a hijab and Islamic dress, which she still dons.

She reportedly married Tamerlan Tsarnaev in the summer of 2010, at a mosque outside of Boston, in a small ceremony with two witnesses.

There were some early reports that she had returned to Christianity after the April 15, 2013, bombings, but her lawyer has said that is not true.
A Facebook page called Muslims in Support of Katherine Tsarnaev was created after her name became public, and it currently has nearly 2,000 members.

Is she being investigated?
She has not been named as a suspect, but the FBI has interviewed her, and it has been reported that phone records showed she spoke to her husband three days after the bombing — just after his photograph was released by investigators. It was just before Tamerlan Tsarnaev was killed in a shootout with police and his younger brother Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was injured and captured.

Her lawyer, Amato DeLuca, has said that her sisters testified before the grand jury investigating the case in December, and her parents testified last September. But she has not been called to testify, the lawyer said.

DeLuca told The Associated Press that he was informed last year “she was not a target of the investigation,” but the fact that she hasn’t been called to testify yet could indicate that investigators are gathering evidence on her.

Where is she now?
While she’s no longer continually hounded by the media, the widow reportedly still gets stares at supermarkets and gas stations, according to a Yahoo News story written about her last weekend. Her lawyer says she has received death threats.

She was last seen publicly in a traffic court in Wrentham, Mass., in January, where she was fined $150 for driving with a suspended license, speeding and driving an unregistered car.

Neighbors near her North Kingston home told NBC News this week that the family is barely seen anymore.

“I think they really just want their privacy and I respect that,” said Paula Gilette, who lives next door.

What's next?
While it still remains to be seen if she will ever be charged in connection to the Boston Marathon bombings, her lawyer this week revealed that a federal grand jury asked her for items that belonged to one of the victims in a triple slaying in a Boston suburb nearly three years ago.

DeLuca said a grand jury asked her for items that belonged to Brendan Mess, one of the three people killed in the Waltham triple slaying and a friend of Tamerlan Tsarnaev's.

The lawyer claimed Russell doesn't have anything that belongs to Mess.




Katherine Russell is a graduate of the local high school and studied Communications at Suffolk University, but did not get a degree. Little is known about her next few years except that in 2010 she apparently married Tamerlan Tsarnaev, then returned to her parent's home with a baby daughter and wearing a hijab. Reports that she returned to Christianity after the bombing are said to be untrue.

The FBI has interviewed her, but she is not regarded as a suspect, though she did get a phone call from her husband three days after the bombing and shortly before he was shot by police. Her lawyer said she gets stares when out in public and has received death threats. She was last seen in a traffic court where she was sentenced $150 for three counts, “driving with a suspended license, speeding and driving an unregistered car,” so she is at best a scofflaw. In a prior case, “her lawyer this week revealed that a federal grand jury asked her for items that belonged to Brendan Mess,” a friend of her husband and one of the victims in a triple slaying in a Boston suburb nearly three years ago. That is highly suspicious, but her lawyer says she doesn't have Mess' belongings. Her family are “rarely seen” outside the house anymore.





Clinton Docs Offer Glimpse Into Failed Health Care Fight
By Carrie Dann
First published April 18 2014

Newly released documents from the Clinton White House reveal a candid assessment of the looming fight over the administration’s doomed health care plan, as advisers tried unsuccessfully to steer the sprawling legislation through Congress.

A series of 1993 memos and briefing notes shows how the Clinton White House anticipated -- but was ultimately overwhelmed by -- Republican lines of attack against the health care reform effort, which collapsed under criticism through 1993 and 1994. The documents also show the administration’s early defense of its decision to draft a bill that critics derided as overly complex, even as advisers acknowledged that it would need to be simplified.

“The potential exists for them to succeed if they convince the majority of Americans with good coverage that quality of care will deteriorate, rationing of care will occur, their costs will rise to finance the uninsured and the creation of a big government bureaucracy, [and] choice of doctor will be limited,” unlisted advisers warned in a lengthy strategy memo released Friday by the Clinton Library.

That same listing of critiques has been mirrored in continuing criticism of President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul, which was signed into law in 2010 but remains the target of GOP attempts for repeal today.

** FILE ** This Jan. 20, 1003 file photo shows President Clinton and his wife Hillary Rodham Clinton waving to the crowd as they walk down 15th Street in Washington during the presidential inaugural parade. When both Laura Bush and Hillary Clinton arrived at the White House, they both brought with them styles that suited their hometowns in Texas and Arkansas, but they wouldn't have held up in any fashion capital.

Laying out an early strategy for pushing the plan through Congress, the summary memo urged tight control by an elite group of White House officials – a strategy that ultimately drew criticism as one reason for the legislation’s demise.

“WE MUST SPEAK WITH ONE VOICE. A SMALL GROUP IN THE WHITE HOUSE MUST COORDINATE,” it reads.

Throughout the documents, the details of the administration’s attempts to woo members of Congress are laid out in painstaking detail, even including a list of which members were so crucial for the law’s success that they should be considered for invitations to accompany the president for golf, tennis or a show in the Kennedy Center box. Pages also list categories of members of Congress considered prime targets for individual targeting, including those in tough congressional races and those who “demand a lot of attention before they are supportive” of Clinton’s ideas.
The plan sounds and is too regulatory.

Aides also warned of personal attacks against most – but not all – of the bill’s opponents.

“We should not attack Republican members, with the exception of the far right members like Senator [Phil] Gramm,” reads one undated memo. “But we should attack their principles and supporters.”

The documents also show Clinton’s concerns about the possibility that the health law would lessen Americans’ choice of doctors -- a problem that has dogged the Obama administration throughout the implementation of the president's signature legislative achievement.

“President noted that first concern of American people is losing health insurance and second is losing choice of physicians,” reads a summary of a March 17, 1993 briefing. “Doctors should be allowed to participate in multiple plans to ensure choice of physician.”

That concern is echoed throughout the documents; a memo from strategist and pollster Stan Greenberg advised that “We must be able to say, believably, that our health care reform will preserve, even expand choice. But those on Medicare or with fully-funded company polities will be very skeptical.”

Aides also warned regularly that the legislation had been successfully painted as overly complex and bogged down in regulations.

“The plan sounds and is too regulatory. We need to remove some of the powers of [the Department of Health and Human Services], the Board and the Alliances,” adviser Ira Magaziner wrote to the president and first lady Hillary Clinton in October 1993.
Greenberg also raised alarms about the public’s belief that the health care law would benefit illegal immigrants at the expense of working Americans. “This may sound like a crazy critique, but the subject was volunteered in 3 or 4 focus groups,” he wrote.




President's health care plan of 1993, criticized as being “overly complex” and too highly regulated, was defeated by the Republican Congress. “Laying out an early strategy for pushing the plan through Congress, the summary memo urged tight control by an elite group of White House officials – a strategy that ultimately drew criticism as one reason for the legislation’s demise.”

The reports do give in great detail his advisers comments on how to “woo” congressional representatives and included also proposed attacks on the most conservative Republicans like Phil Gramm who, incidentally, is quoted as recommending that the public education system be allowed to “die on the vine.” Clinton's advisors also warned against a voiced perception that a comprehensive government health plan would “benefit illegal immigrants” at the public expense. The times were clearly not ready for the plan. At that time I think the fear of big government was stronger than the belief that such a plan is basic to an “economic democracy.”




Monster El Nino May Be Brewing, Experts Say – NBC
By John Roach
First published April 19 2014

Ready for a ’90s El Niño flashback?

Researchers are keeping a close eye on a giant pool of abnormally warm water in the Pacific Ocean that some think could trigger another El Niño of epic proportions if it rises to the surface, sending weather patterns into a tizzy around the world.
That could mean heavy rains in drought-stricken California, dry weather across the Midwest and East Coast, and parched landscapes in Australia and South Africa while it pours in South America. The phenomenon is linked to the periodic warming of surface waters in the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean.

"Given the drought that California is in the middle of right now, that is really where the heightened interest is," said Mike Halpert, acting director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Climate Prediction Center in College Park, Md. "It turns out that the odds increase for California to be wet the stronger the event is."
"Averaged across the equatorial Pacific, there is a far larger than normal amount of heat, which is a necessary precondition for an El Niño. At the moment, the amount of heat is comparable to that prior to the extreme El Niño of 1997-98."

For now, the monthly update on the oceanic conditions that drive El Niño and its sibling, La Nina, put out by the Climate Prediction Center is mum on the potential size of the event. "In our view, there is not a 100 percent chance there will be an El Niño," Halpert said. The center's latest outlook, issued on April 10, just gives better than even odds that one of any size will form.

'System is ripe'
Other experts are more bullish on the prospects for an El Niño, including Klaus Wolter at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Earth Systems Research Laboratory in Boulder, Colo.

He independently tracks El Niño conditions using an index based on observations of six variables such as sea surface and air temperatures as well as winds and clouds in the tropical Pacific Ocean. The index has pointed toward El Niño formation since last December.

The index, he said, reinforces what a battery of computer models say: that it looks increasingly likely that there could be a large-scale El Niño. In fact, the majority of a type of model based on conditions in the ocean and atmosphere "say that this looks bigger; this doesn't look like just your small event that is not going to produce that much impact."

Another researcher bullish on the prospects of another El Niño is Wenju Cai, a climate scientist at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization in Australia who is the lead author of a paper published this January in Nature Climate Change that predicted the frequency of extreme El Niño events will double this century.

"Averaged across the equatorial Pacific, there is a far larger than normal amount of heat, which is a necessary precondition for an El Niño," he told NBC News in an email. "At the moment, the amount of heat is comparable to that prior to the extreme El Niño of 1997-98."

In addition, trade winds that typically blow east to west across the equatorial Pacific have started to pulse strongly in the opposite direction. Strong westerly winds can push up to the surface the reservoir of warm water lurking at depth, which would trigger an El Niño, Cai said. That water, he noted, is more than 10 degrees Fahrenheit above normal in places.

"The system is ripe for an El Niño event," he said, adding that the current conditions are in line with those outlined in his research for the formation of an extreme event. "The debate is whether it is going to be a huge one, like the 1997-98. The fact that we are seeing these features earlier really indicates the potential for such a big one."

Caution urged
Halpert noted that predictions of a monster El Niño are largely extrapolated from the similarity in subsurface warmth prior to the 1997-98 event. "That is a sample size of one," he said.

"While we expect the surface to warm over the next couple of weeks, months, for it to actually take hold and really develop you will need to see the atmosphere respond to those changes,” Halpert said.

Also taking a cautious interpretation of the current conditions is Stephen Zebiak, a senior research scientist at the International Research Institute for Climate and Society housed at Columbia University in Palisades, N.Y., who is a pioneer in the creation of models used to forecast El Niño and La Nina events.

"The system is ripe for an El Niño event ....The debate is whether it is going to be a huge one, like the 1997-98. The fact that we are seeing these features earlier really indicates the potential for such a big one."

The models, he said, are certainly detecting changes in ocean warmth and winds that are a precondition for El Niño. But those conditions are just starting to evolve. The pulses of westerly winds and pool of warm water beneath the ocean surface could quickly disappear. "It is not a time of year when El Niño usually has a large expression. The noise is more of the whole story," he said.

If a monster is brewing, the models will know by the end of May, early June, he added. At that point, large scale patterns in the ocean and atmosphere "lock together and start to build a significant El Niño or La Nina event … as you start to move into that season and you get something going, it is much more likely that it will keep going into the future."

If it comes, be prepared
Even Wolter, who is convinced an El Niño will form this year, said he is hesitant to "pin the label super" on it at this point. A promising event as recently as 2012 fizzled by summer, he said. "We won't know for another two months at least before there is more certainty about that and it makes a difference for places like California. That is why people are concerned."

If, indeed, the models do show a significant event on the horizon — the effects of an El Niño are often felt most strongly during the winter months — Halpert said the Climate Prediction Center will be "getting the word out as loud as we can."




Beware! There is a “giant pool of abnormally warm water in the Pacific Ocean that some think could trigger another El Niño of epic proportions if it rises to the surface,” according to Mike Halpert, of NOAA. This brings the possibility of a very wet season for California, which is good due to the drought, but the rest of the country could be very dry. Luckily we had a wet year in Florida last year so we are six inches of rain above normal at this time. Halpert warns that the prediction is not a certainty.

Klaus Wolter at the organizations lab in Boulder, CO is more sanguine. He uses “an index based on observations of six variables such as sea surface and air temperatures as well as winds and clouds in the tropical Pacific Ocean. The index has pointed toward El Niño formation since last December.” Wenju Cai, of Australia is a climate scientist who has written a paper predicted a century of a much greater than average chance of El Nino events – double, in fact. Also, the trade winds have changed direction from Easterly to Westerly, not unheard of apparently though I don't know what causes that to happen, and that can push the undercurrent of very warm water to the surface. This warm water is in place over 10 degrees Fahrenheit above normal. It is unclear yet, but signs seem to be that it may be “extreme” like the El Nino of 1997-98. This is predictable if the atmosphere responds in like manner to the ocean surface temperature as it did then. The computer models will be more fully informed by the end of May or early June. The warm conditions can possibly “fizzle” rapidly, so the predictions are not certain. I'm sure there will be more news articles out by that time to make a closer judgment.




Ill-Advised School Flier Counsels Kids Not to Rat Out Bullies
By Sydney Lupkin
Apr 17, 2014

A Nebraska elementary school has apologized for passing out a flier containing nine questionable rules for dealing with bullies. Rule No. 7 is “Do not tell on bullies.”

Josh Mehlin, a parent who has children in the Lincoln Public School District, told ABCNews.com that the letter did not go home to all Zeman Elementary School students – only some fifth-graders – but it quickly spread as flabbergasted parents started sending it to each other.

“I was horrified,” Mehlin said. “I called the school and said, ‘Is this for real or is this kind of an Internet thing?’ They said, ‘This is for real. We sent this out.’”

When he called the district office, however. administrators said they’d never heard of it. So believes it may have originated with just one educator, Mehlin said.

The district has since  issued an apology, explaining in a public statement on its Facebook page that the flier contained “inaccurate information.”


“The flier was sent home with good intentions, unfortunately, it contained advice that did not accurately reflect LPS best practices -- a handbook of best practices for student discipline -- regarding response to bullying incidents,” a letter that went home to parents reads.

The school has now created a new flier, which is posted on its website, concluding, “Asking for help is not ratting!”



My word file inadvertently removed some insets in the article which told more of the “advice” which includes the following:
1. Refuse to get mad. We get mad at enemies, not at buddies.
2. Treat the person who is being mean as if they are trying to help you. “Be grateful” and think that they really care about you.
3. Do not be afraid. The bully will keep mistreating you if you do.
4. Do not verbally defend yourself. We defend ourselves from enemies.
5. Do not attack. We attack enemies, not friends.
6. If someone physically hurts you, just show you are hurt. Do not get angry.
7. Do not tell on bullies. The number one reason bullies hate their victims is because they tell on them.
8. Don't be a sore loser. Lose gracefully and be a good sport. Kids will like you better.
9. Learn to laugh at yourself and not get “hooked” by put-downs. Make a joke out of it instead.

I recognize these pieces of advice. They are extrapolations from Jesus' advice, “Turn the other cheek.” I've never been able to follow that rule and, actually, have little inclination to do it. I believe the main reason kids get bullied is because they are in some way weaker or just “different,” and that the bully will continue until the victim either verbally defends himself effectively or fights back enough to teach the bully that he would be better off attacking someone else. Then I think you definitely should report the bully and get some adult supervisor to intervene in the matter. The bully should be punished and possibly removed from the school grounds if he is sufficiently aggressive. He is, after all, a threat to every well-behaved child on the school ground. His parents should be told and advised on how to manage the child, perhaps suggesting that they get their child some professional mental health counseling.