Read All About It In the Sunday Papers-Aug. 2 Edition

LEAD STORY-The (UK) Independent: Secret Life of Sperm–Do Eggs Have a Built-In ‘Loser’ Code?

While definitive ejaculations on this story might be premature (and might cause the ink to run), this scientific theory causes ‘bulo’s, uh,  brain to shift into overdrive:

Thousands of infertile couples could be spared the pain, anguish and expense of fruitless IVF treatments, thanks to the discovery of a lock-and-key mechanism between sperm and egg cells.

The research could explain why so many couples with no apparent reproductive problems are unable to conceive. Although more than 40,000 in vitro fertilisation cycles are prescribed in Britain each year, only 10,000 births result.

Dr David Miller at the University of Leeds thinks the secret could be that the genetic keys in their sperm don’t quite fit their partners’ locks. “Our research offers a plausible explanation for why some sperm malfunction,” he said.

His colleague Dr David Iles added: “There is a definite pattern to the way DNA is packaged in sperm cells. It is the same in unrelated fertile men, but it is different in the sperm of infertile men.”

This is a fascinating story with all kinds of implications, and the story does justice to most of them.

El Somnambulo did have one passing thought, however: If God did not intend for people of different races to lie down with each other, then how come this mechanism doesn’t prevent them from successfully procreating?

Der (Germany) Spiegel: Computerization Turning Jets Into Death-Traps

‘Bulo came for the catalog and stayed for the journalism. 

A brilliant and well-researched piece by Gerald Traufetter into the pluses and minuses of taking more and more operation of jet planes completely out of the pilots’ hands.

Inveterate air travelers might want to fasten their seat belts before reading this one:

Computers on board aircraft have made flying safer, but when they encounter errors they can create turmoil. Engineers are pressing ahead with the automation of aircraft, but pilots warn that efforts to computerize jets are going too far and that diminished human control could create dangerous situations. 

Here’s what happened to a Qantas Airbus 330:

At 12:40 p.m. and 28 seconds, the autopilot in the cockpit suddenly disabled itself. While the unsuspecting Cave was digging around in the overhead luggage compartment, lights were flashing and alarms were going off in the cockpit. Error codes flashed onto the central monitor: AUTO FLT AP OFF, NAV IR1 FAULT. Then a metallic voice said, ominously: Stall! Stall! Stall! Danger: The aircraft is too slow. The airstream over the wings is about to decrease!

Then there was another warning sound and the words, in red, appeared on the screen: Overspeed! Overspeed! Overspeed! The aircraft is too fast!

For a few seconds, the captain and the co-pilot must have thought that they were merely dealing with the quirks of a flight computer. The engines were running normally, the aircraft was perfectly positioned in the airstream and the weather radar was not reporting any turbulence.

“What’s this thing doing now?” the irritated pilot usually says at such moments, and in most cases all it takes to fix the problem is to restart the computer, or simply wait until the computer resets itself.

But this time it seemed as if an invisible hand had taken control of the aircraft. A few moments later, at 12:42 and 27 seconds, it became clear that it was not going to be business as usual on board Flight QF 72. The nose of the aircraft was suddenly pitched sharply downward, 8.4 degrees over the horizon, headed toward the earth. The aircraft quickly picked up speed and the sound of air rushing by grew louder. The plane was in a nosedive.

“My head hit the cabin ceiling,” says Cave, remembering his experience on that Oct. 7, 2008, en route from Singapore to Perth. All around him, passengers were suddenly flying into the air, their bodies smashing against the plastic ceiling, where they remained frozen in place. The forces that had suddenly been unleashed seemed capable of controlling the passengers’ bodies like puppets on a string. “For a few seconds, I thought it was all over,” says Cave.

As in the cabin, there was a feeling of powerlessness, of being in the hands of fate, in the cockpit of the A330 with the tail number VH-QPA. Using all of his strength, the pilot pulled back the control stick, desperately trying to get the plane back onto a safe horizontal flight path. But for several long seconds, his efforts were completely ineffective.

As if guided by evil forces, the Airbus was plunging to its doom.

Just as unexpectedly as it had taken control of the aircraft, the computer relinquished that control and the nose of the A330 suddenly returned to normal. The passengers were thrown back into their seats or onto the floor at one-and-a-half times the force of gravity.

And that’s the human part of the story. The detective work leads the reporter to other crashes, classified reports from manufacturers, and impending agency reports that could well restart a significant debate on airline safety.  Read at your own risk.

NYTimes: Army Infiltrated Antiwar Groups During Bush Years?

Admit it, you’re shocked, shocked to hear this. As someone who took part in anti-war protests during the Vietnam War, the Beast Who Marches truly was surprised to find out, years later, that not only had the FBI infiltrated anti-war groups, but the infiltrators tried to egg those groups toward more violent activities, most of which said groups rejected.  ‘Bulo’s sure that Nixon would justify this as helping to ‘make the world safe from Quakers’. Nixon, of course, was born into a Quaker family, so he presumably meant those insidious ‘militant Quakers’ like Nixon himself. Paging Dr. Freud, Dr. Howard, Dr. Jung.

Bush, Cheney, Dr. Woo, et al, apparently took it further and got the military involved:

SEATTLE — The Army says it has opened an inquiry into a claim that one of its employees spent more than two years infiltrating antiwar groups active near one of the nation’s largest military bases. The groups say the employee infiltrated their activities under an assumed name and gained access to their plans as well as names and e-mail addresses of some members.

The man, John J. Towery, a civilian employee at Fort Lewis, south of Tacoma, Wash., works as a criminal intelligence analyst for the post’s Force Protection Division, say officials at Fort Lewis, the nation’s third largest Army post.

The Army would not disclose the nature of the investigation or address the claim that Mr. Towery had shared information about civilians. It said Mr. Towery was not available for an interview.

Of course, the Army is trying to make it seem like this guy was somehow a rogue operator out there on his own. Ri-i-i-ight. 

This is serious stuff:

Stephen Dycus, a professor at Vermont Law School who focuses on national security issues, said the Army was prohibited from conducting law enforcement among civilians except in very rare circumstances, none of which immediately appeared to be relevant to the Fort Lewis case. Mr. Dycus said several statutes and rules also prohibited the Army from conducting covert surveillance of civilian groups for intelligence purposes.

“Infiltration is a really big deal,” he said. He said it “raises fundamental questions about the role of the military in American society.”

Once again, it will be up to the corporate media to do their jobs and determine the extent of institutional involvement of this. ‘Bulo’s depressed.

Washington Post: 100 Iranians Put On Trial for Protesting Elections

Police-state show trials at their worst.

TEHRAN, Aug. 1 — More than 100 political activists and protesters went on trial Saturday on charges of rioting and conspiring to topple the government in the turmoil surrounding Iran’s presidential election, the semiofficial Fars news agency reported.

The defendants included several prominent politicians — former members of parliament, first-generation revolutionaries and an ex-vice president — who have been locked in a decades-long power struggle with Iran’s hard-line clerics and Revolutionary Guard Corps.

The money quote concerning the press:

Only state media were allowed to attend the closed trial, which took place days before the date of Ahmadinejad’s second inauguration.

Said disdain for the media extends to photographers:

The defendants on Saturday included two photographers, Majid Saeedi of U.S.-based Getty Images and Satyar Emami of the French photo agency Sipa. They were accused of working without permits during the clashes.

“They would visualize a crisis-ridden and agitated country,” the prosecutor said. “Viewers would think that these hooligans were Iranian people protesting the outcome of the elections.”

Ya think? (Tip of the Sombrero to Americablog, which highlighted the Post story.)

Chicago Sun-Times: Never Too Early (Or Late) For Woodstock Memories

Hey, man, this is the 40th Anniversary of Woodstock. The Hippie Who Slumbers will never forget it. 

No, he wasn’t there. He had graduated high school and was on his way to Cape Cod (Wellfleet) with his family for one last vacation before college. All the way up, the radio blasted news of two different, but ironically-related stories that somehow encompassed the DNA of the late 60’s: Woodstock and the Sharon Tate Murders.  To this day, ‘bulo waits with anticipation for a Don DeLillo novel about that.

Anyway, this is not the first, nor will it be the last, piece on this cultural milestone. 

For those who, like ‘bulo, weren’t there, this is what many of his college friends/floormates had to say: Crosby, Stills & Nash really sucked. And the only band to actually get booed was ( the Al Kooper-less, he’d been fired, even though he was the guy who created the band) Blood, Sweat & Tears.