Everything I Know Is Wrong

Pluto demoted; no longer dog.

Relax, Pluto is still a dog, but is no longer a planet.

Washington Post
After a tumultuous week of clashing over the essence of the cosmos, the International Astronomical Union stripped Pluto of the planetary status it has held since its discovery in 1930. The new definition of what is -- and isn't -- a planet fills a centuries-old black hole for scientists who have labored since Copernicus without one.

Just what are the new rules?

Much-maligned Pluto doesn't make the grade under the new rules for a planet: "a celestial body that is in orbit around the sun, has sufficient mass for its self-gravity to overcome rigid body forces so that it assumes a ... nearly round shape, and has cleared the neighborhood around its orbit."

Pluto is automatically disqualified because its oblong orbit overlaps with Neptune's.

Instead, it will be reclassified in a new category of "dwarf planets," similar to what long have been termed "minor planets." The definition also lays out a third class of lesser objects that orbit the sun -- "small solar system bodies," a term that will apply to numerous asteroids, comets and other natural satellites.

This whole planet/not-a-planet thing has been debated ever since I was a kid. I'm not sure why it really matters; Pluto is still exactly the same thing it was when it was discovered in 1930, and it's still just as interesting to NASA. Unless we're in a competition with some other solar system over who has the most planets I don't get the hoopla.

Nader must pay: "deceitful and fraudulent"

2004 presidential running-mates, Ralph Nader and Peter Miguel Camejo, must pay legal expenses in Pennsylvania rising from a lawsuit that kept them off the ballot in that state.

Associated Press
As a result of the lawsuit, the state Commonwealth Court found wide-ranging improprieties among Nader and Camejo's petition signatures and disqualified nearly two-thirds of the 51,000 signatures they submitted.

The Commonwealth Court opinion described the Nader-Camejo petitions as "the most deceitful and fraudulent exercise ever perpetrated upon this court."

Signatures were filed for "Mickey Mouse" and "Fred Flintstone," and thousands of names were created at random, the lower court found.

Five state Supreme Court justices said Nader and Camejo must pay the plaintiffs' transcription and stenography costs and handwriting expert fees.

"Given the magnitude of the fraud and deception implicated in (their) signature-gathering efforts, their claim that the Commonwealth Court acted in an unjust and unconstitutional fashion by assessing transcription and stenography costs does not pass the straight-face test," Justice Sandra Schultz Newman wrote for the majority.

Obviously unsafe at any speed.

Western diplomat gets tough.

Regarding Iran's likely rejection of UN "incentives" for ceasing uranium enrichment:

Reuters
"We are not treating (Tuesday) as a deadline because it is not the Security Council deadline," one Western diplomat said. "If Iran flatly refuses to suspend enrichment, then there will, fairly soon, be more talks in the Security Council."

Ooooo, more talks.

Fairly soon.

Scary.

Ahmadinejad must be quaking in his boots.

The AP has no shame.

The Associated press went with this headline: "Rockets Hit Lebanon Despite Cease-Fire." Read the second paragraph to find out whose rockets they were.