NBC's Domenico Montanaro discusses the two-year anniversary of when President Obama signed the health care act into law and how the drama will play out next week when the Supreme Court begins oral arguments.
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iPad 3 less bright than iPad 2
Just did some testing and IPad 3 is darker than my iPad 2. If you look at the keyboard, you will notice that it also looks looks darker. This is not much of an issue when looking straight at the screen, but it is from angles.
Source: http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1347710&goto=newpost
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A Brazilian federal prosecutor filed criminal charges on Wednesday against Chevron and drill-rig operator Transocean for a November oil spill, raising the stakes in a legal saga that has added to Chevron?s woes in Latin America and could slow Brazil?s offshore oil boom.
Prosecutor Eduardo Santos de Oliveira also filed criminal charges against 17 local executives and employees at Chevron and Transocean, owner of the world?s largest oil rig fleet. Among the defendants is George Buck, 46, a US national in charge of Chevron?s operations in Brazil, the prosecutor?s office said in a statement.
?The spilling of oil affected the entire maritime ecosystem, possibly pushing some species to extinction, and caused impacts on economic activity in the region,? Santos de Oliveira, a prosecutor in the oil district of Campos de Goytacazes, said in the filing. ?The employees of Chevron and Transocean caused a contamination time bomb of prolonged effect.?
The charges stem from a 3,000-barrel leak in the Frade field, about 120km off the coast of Rio de Janeiro State. They include: failure to realize protocols to contain the leak; failure to take steps to kill the well and stop the drilling process; breach of licenses, legal norms and regulation, including altering documents; and failure to meet legal and contractual duties.
Chevron and Transocean strongly disputed the charges.
?These charges are outrageous and without merit,? Chevron said in a statement. ?Once all the facts are fully examined, they will demonstrate that Chevron and its employees responded appropriately and responsibly to the incident.?
Transocean ?strongly disagrees with the indictments,? spokesman Guy Cantwell said.
Chevron said it stopped the leak in four days. None of the oil that leaked into the Atlantic reached shore or interfered with marine life, it said.
In November, the same prosecutor filed an US$11 billion civil lawsuit over the spill, the largest environmental suit in Brazil?s history. Chevron has already been fined around 200 million reais (US$110 million) in fines for the spill by environmental and oil regulators.
Chevron?s shares dropped 1.1 percent to US$107.91 on Wednesday, to their lowest in nearly a month. Transocean?s US-traded shares dropped 1.1 percent to US$56.77.
Observers warned that the criminal charges could spook foreign companies attracted to Brazil?s offshore oil boom and slow development of more than 50 billion barrels of reserves discovered there since 2007.
?These charges are being used by those who want to shut out foreign investment and vilify foreign companies,? said Adriano Pires, head of energy think tank Brazilian Infrastructure Institute, and a former oil regulator.
The Chevron leak was less than 0.1 percent of the size of the 4 million-barrel BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010. Transocean also owned the rig in that spill. Past Brazilian oil spills by state-run Petrobras, including some larger ones, have never prompted criminal charges.
In addition to Buck, prosecutors leveled criminal charges against other Chevron and Transocean employees, including five other Americans, five Brazilians, two Frenchmen, two Australians, a Canadian and a Briton. Among them was Guilherme Dantas Rocha Coelho, 38, the Brazilian head of Transocean?s operations in the country.
All were ordered to turn in their passports last Saturday and remain in the country. Each individual will be required to post 1 million reais bail and each company 10 million reais to ensure payment of future fines.
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If you have decided to sell your home, that last thing you want is for it to sit on the market for a long time.
Taking some home improvement steps before listing can make your house more attractive to potential buyers and put you in a better position to sell quickly.
So what do you need to do to ensure that listing your house floods your real estate agent?s office with showing requests?
1. Spiff up the entranceway
Every interested buyer will enter through your front door. Have you looked at your entranceway with a critical eye lately? Consider replacing old or sagging screens. If your front door is dirty or scratched, clean it up or add a fresh coat of paint. Sweep away dirt and grime and set out a new entrance mat. Oil any squeaky hinges. If you have plants or shrubbery leading up to your home, make sure that they are trimmed appropriately. A manicured landscape leading up to a welcoming front door will portray the positive experience of living there. An ugly or dirty entranceway can turn away buyers before they enter your house, meaning even if your home has the most amazing interiors, their minds may already be made up.
2. Create an outdoor oasis by detailing your deck
Today?s buyer isn?t just interested in the inside of a home, but the outdoor space as well. Taking your deck or patio from drab to fab may only require adding a couple of stylistic extras. Start by adding beautiful deck and fence post caps like Deckorators VersaCaps to create a polished, upscale look for your outdoor space. These one-size-fits-all caps have nested inserts that are compatible with wood, composite and vinyl posts, and come in a variety of colors. Next, add unique decorative fascia corners that stylishly adorn deck skirting and cover unsightly corner joints. These new decorative fascia corners come in two designs and install quickly with screws.
3. Add outdoor extras for safety and style
Additions that are both beautiful and useful get noticed by potential buyers. Railings can add style to your deck, porch, patio or stairs, plus they add a safety element to your home. Deckorators CXT Railing is the perfect choice because you get to choose from a variety of rail and baluster combos that emulate the look of real painted wood and are ultra low-maintenance for long-term durability and strength. Another addition to consider is LED lighting that makes a home stand out at dusk and provides just the right amount of light so outdoor space can safely be enjoyed any time of day.
4. Add modern colors to interior walls
Cracked paint or dated wall colors are sure to turn off buyers. For a small price, you can purchase plaster and several cans of paint to refresh dated looking rooms for a clean, modern feel. Not sure what paint colors are on-trend? Visit your local paint or hardware store for insight. Remember, it?s best to avoid anything too bold, so even if you love fire truck red, pick a shade a little more demure so you attract the most potential buyers.
5. Reduce clutter for clean, minimalist rooms
If you?ve ever visited a house that?s been staged, you know that it helps buyers envision what they might do with the room. To follow this example, you?ll want to make sure that you eliminate all clutter, clean up drawers and closets, stow away extra items like pillows and blankets, and reduce the amount of personal photography you display. Remember, you want buyers to visualize themselves in your home, not see your last family portrait and feel out of place.
Always keep in mind that you want to paint a picture for buyers of the wonderful life they can have if they purchase your home. If they have a good first impression and can envision their family enjoying each room in the house, they are going to want to submit a bid fast.
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Louisville Real Estate News is updated every week with a variety of information that you can use in and around your home. In the Louisville Real Estate News, we share home decorating and home improvement ideas, as well as information on senior living, green living and much more.
Make Louisville Real Estate News your exclusive source for information and ideas related to your home!
Plus, be sure to check out all of the wonderful local Louisville businesses here on our website! They stand ready to serve you today! Please don?t forget to mention to the merchant that you saw their information here in the Louisville Real Estate News.
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A Social Assessment of Hoosier National Forest - Indiana University
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ScienceDaily (Mar. 20, 2012) ? Studies using X-ray and ultraviolet observations from NASA's Swift satellite provide new insights into the elusive origins of an important class of exploding star called Type Ia supernovae.
These explosions, which can outshine their galaxy for weeks, release large and consistent amounts of energy at visible wavelengths. These qualities make them among the most valuable tools for measuring distance in the universe. Because astronomers know the intrinsic brightness of Type Ia supernovae, how bright they appear directly reveals how far away they are.
"For all their importance, it's a bit embarrassing for astronomers that we don't know fundamental facts about the environs of these supernovae," said Stefan Immler, an astrophysicist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. "Now, thanks to unprecedented X-ray and ultraviolet data from Swift, we have a clearer picture of what's required to blow up these stars."
Astronomers have known for decades that Type Ia supernovae originate with a remnant star called a white dwarf, which detonates when pushed to a critical mass. The environment that sets the stage for the explosion, however, has been harder to pin down.
According to the most popular scenario, a white dwarf orbits a normal star and pulls a stream of matter from it. This gas flows onto the white dwarf, which gains mass until it reaches a critical threshold and undergoes a catastrophic explosion.
"A missing detail is what types of stars reside in these systems. They may be a mix of stars like the sun or much more massive red- and blue-supergiant stars," said Brock Russell, a physics graduate student at the University of Maryland, College Park, and lead author of the X-ray study.
In a competing model, the supernova arises when two white dwarfs in a binary system eventually spiral inward and collide. Observations suggest both scenarios occur in nature, but no one knows which version happens more often.
Swift's primary mission is to locate gamma-ray bursts, which are more distant and energetic explosions associated with the birth of black holes. Between these bursts, astronomers can use Swift's unique capabilities to study other objects, including newly discovered supernovae. The satellite's X-ray Telescope (XRT) has studied more than 200 supernovae to date, with about 30 percent being Type Ia.
Russell and Immler combined X-ray data for 53 of the nearest known Type Ia supernovae but could not detect an X-ray point source. Stars shed gas and dust throughout their lives. When a supernova shock wave plows into this material, it becomes heated and emits X-rays. The lack of X-rays from the combined supernovae shows that supergiant stars, and even sun-like stars in a later red giant phase, likely aren't present in the host binaries.
In a companion study, a team led by Peter Brown at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City looked at 12 Type Ia events observed by Swift's Ultraviolet/Optical Telescope (UVOT) less than 10 days after the explosion. A supernova shock wave should produce enhanced ultraviolet light as it interacts with its companion, with larger stars producing brighter, longer enhancements. Swift's UVOT detected no such emission, leading the researchers to exclude large, red giant stars from Type Ia binaries.
Taken together, the studies suggest the companion to the white dwarf is either a smaller, younger star similar to our sun or another white dwarf. The X-ray findings will appear in the April 1 issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters; the ultraviolet results appear in the April 10 edition of The Astrophysical Journal.
The ultraviolet studies rely on early, sensitive observations. As Brown's study was being written, nature provided a great case study in SN 2011fe, the closest Type Ia supernova since 1986. Early Swift UVOT observations show no ultraviolet enhancement. According to the findings in an unpublished study led also by Brown, this means any companion must be smaller than the sun.
Swift data on SN 2011fe also figure prominently in unpublished studies led by Alicia Soderberg at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Mass. Preliminary results suggest that the explosion was caused by merging white dwarfs.
Swift launched in November 2004 and is managed by Goddard. It is operated in collaboration with Pennsylvania State University and other national and international partners.
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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/GvEykd9zHzY/120320195849.htm
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