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Earth Growing Due to Melting Glaciers
Dr. Shim writes "Some interesting (and rather frightening) news over at Space.com tells that the Earth is growing around the equator due to the fact that ice in the Antarctic (and other areas) is melting at an alarming rate."
Maybe its just eating too many carbs.
It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion, It is by the beans of Java that thoughts acquire speed, The hands acqui
Wow, people complain when the US thinks its responsible for the entire world. And complain when it doesn't.
(i read TFA)
This is my Sig, this is my Gun. One is for Slashdot and one is for Fun.
Is it just me, or does anyone else get the feeling that this is a sensationalistic, alarmist write-up of a marginally interesting phenomena?
So, the earth has gained 0.3 percent around the equator, and the glaciers are still retreating. This is in my eyes neither "rather frightening" nor "an alarming rate".
Something to keep an eye on, certainly, and something to look into the reasons why, of course, but let's not press the big red panic button just yet, ok?
Scientists -- or as the case may be, reporters -- out for a quick 15 minutes of fame is my take on this "rather frightening" story.
"Total destruction the only solution" - Bob Marley
Ok, We've had Europe and lots of other land covered by glaciers only 10.000 years ago. The ice at the poles have melted quiet a few times in earths history. It's likely earth won't be doomed this time either.
Actually that post probably refers to the United States not agreeing to the Koyto protocal, which is all about reducing greenhouse gass emissions.
Will this make days longer?
Just as figure ice skater retract their arms closer to their axis of rotation to go faster, and spread them out to slow down, won't this have the same effect on the earth's rotation? If so, it should then be measurable, proving or disproving the claim.
There is no need to use a SlashDot sig for SEO...
The earth is not fat, it's just big boned !
A bad analogy is like a leaky screwdriver.
All right Gaia, time to lay off the carbs.
Koyto protocal
seriously, the Kyoto protocol was a joke. By most calculations it would have made less than a 1% decrease in total global warming (Assuming any warming was to be done at all)
"seriously, the Kyoto protocol was a joke."
That may be, but it was a step in a direction.
"By most calculations it would have made less than a 1% decrease in total global warming"
'Most' calculations? How about the others?
The thing that's most annoying is the refusal to consider something because of calculations or 'hypotheses' without a willingness to experiment or test the bloody hypothesis, which is kinda essential is 'most' calculations give one result and a lesser number don't.
The actual reason for not signing up to Kyoto was the f**ing expense, not the science.
Oddly Draconis
Too cynical to live, too stubborn to die.
Sounds like earth needs to take some Midol.
Me to Earth: Hey pudgy! Getting a little wide around the middle, eh? Too much fat? Too many carbs? Either way, too many calories. Maybe a no-sun diet? Ever think of that? Do us both a favor and don't have a coronary!
A firewall can not protect you from yourself. Turn off what you do not need. Do not use the firewall to do your work.
... when a planet stops being a young planet. It starts getting thick around the middle.
I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
Wow, people complain when the US thinks its responsible for the entire world. And complain when it doesn't.
Actually, what I complain about, really, is *what* the US thinks it's responsible for, and for what it doesn't think it's responsible for.
That is, right now the Bush administration is spending billions of dollars of tax dollars, some of which came out of my pocket, in order to fund these wars which supposedly are for my security and protection. But how many future American deaths are being prevented by this growth in military might? Isn't it possible that there's a greater threat coming from possible future environmental catastrophes?
I've heard that one possible result of global warming might be that the alps, which are made mostly of permafrost, might actually melt, causing landslides all over Europe. If water levels keep rising, island nations or low-lying areas will become covered with water. I'd say this is a greater threat to our overall well being. And yet the Bush administration seems hell-bent on increasing the use of fossil fuels, promoting fake forms of alternative energy (particularly so-called "clean" hydrogen powered cars; sure the cars are clean -- it's just that using fossil fuels to make the hydrogen fuel cells is somewhat counterproductive), and undermining environmental regulations left and right.
In fact, the EPA actually removed references to global warming in a report issued last year in response to pressure from the Bush administration. Their reason? Global warming does not present a national threat.
If you do a Google search on bush and global warmiing, you'll see scores and scores of articles detailing how Bush has repeatedly ignored the real threat that global warming poses.
For a long time I was saving money by purchasing US Savings Bonds. I'd still like to do it; from a financial perspective it's very appealing: it offers a higher rate of return than banks' savings accounts, it's very liquid, and requires no minimum investment.
HOWEVER, the money that I put into those bonds is essentially lending money to the US government to cover its defecit that comes from reckless spending in directions that I disagree with: increased national "security" in the form of increased police presence and the use of the Patriot Act; military spending; and to faith-based charities.
If possible, I'm going to look into purchasing bonds elsewhere. If not, I'll probably just save in a CD or Savings Account.
Karma: Chevy Kavalierma.
well said...
The article you cite (which was published over a year ago) starts by saying, "Accelerated melting of Earth's glaciers in recent years has forced the planet to let a notch out of its belt as its midsection gains girth, according to a study released today."
The only source linked by the author of that article says, "They considered that ice melting at the poles and raising the overall sea level could be the culprit. Calculations showed, however, that 'you would have to drop a 10x10x5 kilometer cube of it into the ocean every year for the past five years.' Separate measurements of sea surface height from NASA's TOPEX/Poseidon mission don't support this scenario."
The article concludes by tempering its opening assertion. "Dickey cautioned that the study is not entirely conclusive, as the changes in sea level are measured in millimeters and represent a "daunting task" that requires numerous corrections to account for various known factors, such as natural short-term fluctuations."
So it is conceded that glacial melting cannot account for the few millimeter changes in sea level observed, and that they don't know enough to conclude that it is anything more than a natural short-term fluctuation. Once again, "journalists" are inflating the conclusions of scientists and alarming the public with no more justification than a desire to sell a weekly rag.
So tell us. Why are you bothering to bring up an article published more than a year ago as though it were breaking news?
ZZ
It's not "just him", either. Nice way to try to marginalize his viewpoint, which is, by the way, shared by more than just a "niche". There are a lot of scientists (and not just ordinary citizens) that are going "ok, slow down, it's not neccessarily a catastrophe". As many people have pointed out in the past, the Earth frequently goes through changes like this for reasons that are unknown, and that predate the industrial revolution. And lets face it, this whole piece was about pointing a finger at mankind's evil technological ways and saying "see what we're doing to the Earth?"
The Earth's sea level has risen and fallen over the centuries many times, without any input from man. The previous poster was just pointing out that this happens, and that the article might be just a tad sensationlistic in order to promote an agenda (and we know THAT nevers happens in science or anywhere else, right?).
If you agree with that agenda, fine, say so. But when you try to make opposing views look like fringe nuts because it suits your purposes, you just end up looking like an ass.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
This is for all the people who are crying for action against this rise in sea level.
Without a better understanding of the full dynamics of the geology, climatology and biology involved in this thing, any attempts to reverse it might have unintended and unpredictable side effects.
Cut CO2 output? Sounds good but even though CO2 is the most common greenhouse gas, it's also one of the weakest. Lower levels of CO2 could also be problems for the plant biosphere being the CO2 breathing, carbon fixers that they are.
Cut CFC and PFC output? Also sounds nice since they are thousands of times more efficient at trapping heat. Is there any well agreed upon data that says that this melting is a result of man made greenhouse gasses and not something completely out of our control?
Rapid and drastic environmental changes can be caused by natural phenomena. Without a better understanding of the root cause of climate change, regulating our activity is at best a shot in the dark. At worst it could cause bigger problems.
Blaze a trail to the New World
Well, since Kyoto failed to address the largest producer of the most powerful greenhouse gas there is, it was smart not to ratify it.
Until the Kyoto treaty requires the oceans to immediately limit their levels of evaporation, it will never be effective at reducing the most dangerous of greenhouse gases.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
I've heard that one possible result of global warming might be that the alps, which are made mostly of permafrost, might actually melt, causing landslides all over Europe.
*gasp!*
So somebody may nearly almost possibly be hurt and maybe killed! Or, so I heard from a friend of my cousin...
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"
- Charles Darwin
Isn't that called "middle age"?
... to suggest the world call up Weight Watchers.
There, I did it. I'm done now.
Or, so I heard from a friend of my cousin...
Okay, here's an article from the Guardian. In the article cited, seems like quite a few people could have been hurt by these avalanches.
The "friend" that I heard this from was someone not even really an aquaintance: one of the Green Party Candidates for President, Lorna Salzman, who has made global warming one of her key campaign issues. I don't agree with all of her issues, but I share much of her sentiment that drastic work to preserve the environment may be necessary.
I fear, however, that Americans will not be willing to make sacrifices until it is too late. The rise of popularity of the SUV, especially with some owners taking a "I won't take any crap from you holier-than-thou environmental wackos" stance, , and with environmental activists pasting demeaning bumper stickers on other people's SUVs, means that real growth on the issue just won't happen.
Karma: Chevy Kavalierma.
Does a stem come out of the north pole. Is the South pole in a valley?
Where law ends, tyranny begins -- William Pitt
...in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me.
Again lets think about how history repeats itself, has the earth not been heating and cooling water for millenia?... Its going to happen folks, so lets not get up in arms about it, now if the earth were to start losing water (because we know the amount of water in/on/around the earth stays constant) then we would need to worry, but the icecaps are going to melt, but you know they're going to refreeze at some point (YEARS after we are forgotton)
Ah, I got it. The articles doesn't say that the bulge has risen by .3%. The equatorial bulge has always been about 0.3% How much has the bulge increased recently? They don't give figures. But they do say that gravitational field changes usually attributed to the "post-glacial rebound" (the geological adjustment to their being less weight at the poles since the end of the last ice age) is twice what it was in 1998.
That's scary. Why? Well, sea level has been rising for the last 10,000 years, since the end of the last ice age. That rise isn't notice during a human lifetime, of course. But now it appears that the rate of melting has doubled in just the last five years. Still not a lot, but we're pouring greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere faster than ever. Even if we could slow our rate of increase (and Dubya doesn't even want to do that), we'd still be looking at a big change in the ocean configuration.
Which could lead, ironically enough, to another ice age. If that happens the "junk science" pundits will doubtless insist that the whole greenhouse effect was just a myth. Oh well, I think I'll go fix a cold drink.
In NEVADA!
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I Hate \.
I for one would be very happy to have waterfront property finally!!!
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
My days really are getting longer!
The Earth isn't exactly bulging, but rather the oceans near the equator. The oceans bulge because of the tidal force exerted by the Moon and, to a lesser extent, the Sun. Hence if there is an increase in water volume to the oceans due to melting glaciers, then the bulge near the equator will grow.
Woah... take a pill dude.
If you had any idea what you are talking about, you'd know that temperature variations in the Pacific are creating alot of the cascading climatic changes that we are witnessing today.
Industrialization in China and the rest of the Pacific Rim is driving these changes, just as industrialization in North America altered weather patterns in the US and Europe in the 19th century.
Oh and btw the US spending breakdown is:
15% military
15% debt service
7% government operations
63% social services
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
That may be, but it was a step in a direction.
It was a step in the WRONG direction. On the one hand, we have industrialization. On the other, we have the negative effects thereof. How do we reduce the negative effects without having to abolish industrialization and go back to living on hand-worked farms? Through technology. That's the only way out.
What's the big deal about technological advancement? It's really expensive. You have to put a lot of money into it. Take the catalytic converter, for instance. It costs a few bucks to manufacture the second one. The first one ever built cost four hundred million dollars.
The Kyoto protocol would have put such a burden on industry that the term "chilling effect" doesn't begin to cover it. It would have been an economic disaster.
The thing that's most annoying is the refusal to consider something because of calculations or 'hypotheses' without a willingness to experiment or test the bloody hypothesis
What's the hypothesis? How do you test it? You do realize that there is absolutely no science behind the Kyoto protocol, right? Merely observation, extrapolation, and salesmanship.
The actual reason for not signing up to Kyoto was the f**ing expense, not the science.
No, it was both. The science failed to justify the expense. So no deal.
But how many future American deaths are being prevented by this growth in military might?
How many is enough? One? A hundred? Two thousand, seven hundred and forty nine?
Look, there are basically two ways of looking at it. There are those who think that American lives have a dollar value attached to them and those who don't.
Isn't it possible that there's a greater threat coming from possible future environmental catastrophes?
Sure it's possible. The difference is that we have hard data on military threats. We don't have hard data on environmental threats. In fact, we have a forty-year history now of dire predictions about environmental threats that turned out to be false. Ehrlich's "Population Bomb," for instance. Even without Borlaug's work with dwarf wheat, the predictions of global famine by the end of the 1900's turned out to be way off base.
What makes today's doom and gloom suddenly more reliable than yesterday's doom and gloom?
Re:*sigh*
Re:*sigh* (Score:1, Offtopic)
by greenhide (597777) on Thu February 05, 09:10 AM (#8189314)
Wow, people complain when the US thinks its responsible for the entire world. And complain when it doesn't.
Actually, what I complain about, really, is *what* the US thinks it's responsible for, and for what it doesn't think it's responsible for.
That is, right now the Bush administration is spending billions of dollars of tax dollars, some of which came out of my pocket, in order to fund these wars which supposedly are for my security and protection. But how many future American deaths are being prevented by this growth in military might? Isn't it possible that there's a greater threat coming from possible future environmental catastrophes?
I've heard that one possible result of global warming might be that the alps, which are made mostly of permafrost, might actually melt, causing landslides all over Europe.
I've heard that pig farts smell like crispy bacon. Where's the evidence? Where's the solid science?
More importantly, assuming that the trend does indicate rising sea levels, where's the evidence that the trend is upward-leading and not cyclical? Where are we getting our long-term historical data from, and is it reliable? Are there different interpretations of the historical data that lead us to question our ideas about trends?
And most importantly of all, even if we are on an upward-bending curve... where's the evidence that it's related to human activity? Correlation does not indicate causation, remember? Post hoc ergo propter hoc.
Before we get our panties all in a collective twist, let's get a clue about what we're talking about.
If you do a Google search on bush and global warmiing, you'll see scores and scores of articles detailing how Bush has repeatedly ignored the real threat that global warming poses.
See, that sentence right there sums up the problem with your position. You're taking the idea of global warming as a given. You're making it into an axiom, and damning the president for failing to respond to it.
Except global warming is not a given, not an axiom. It's a rumor.
63% social services
Which in turn is comprised of 33% Social Security and about 30% everything else, from public schools to highways to the Library of Congress.
In other words, yes, Virginia, we spend more than twice as much money giving checks to retirees than we do defending our country.
This means the equatorial bulge gets larger as well. This bulge causes the precession of the Earth, and this in turn the period in which the magnetic poles turn around the geographic poles. In the history of the Earth, ice caps have grown and shrank many times. Have geologists taken this into account when they calculated the place of the magnetic poles in the past, relevant for many geologic phenomona? Or have they always applied actualism, e.g. assumed the precession of the earth is static?
From the most excellent Manifold trilogy by Steven Baxter:
Say you have some algae growing on the surface of your pond. It doubles in size every day. It will take 30 days to cover the pond.
When the pond is half covered, you decide to start to do something about it...
...but, when the pond is half covered, it's the 29th day, and you're out of time.
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
Think of the earth as a computer.
On this computer, there are many files (matter) which are used by programs (natural processes) which all work under the operating system (natural "laws"). We (humans) were clueless newbies who started putzing around on this computer. In the process we have edited files (built things). Now when one of the programs reads a file we have edited it does something different than it did before. Quite often we don't like the results.
Now that we have become fairly good computer users, we have realized that we have messed up our computer. Although we know what most of the programs do, we still don't know HOW most of the programs work (we're not programmers yet). Since we didn't make a backup before we started messing around (we were newbies then, remember?) we have very little knowledge of what our computer was like before we started changing things.
Sadly, we don't know any computer geeks who can come fix our computer, so we have to deal with the problem ourselves. We could try to fix the files we've edited, but since we don't understand the programs we don't know exactly what our changes will do. They might even make things worse. We could try not to mess things up any more while we study programming, but our computer might stop working before we learn enough. So we have to do what we can to keep our computer running by making only small changes to files while we study. In the process we'll probably make some mistakes, but hopefully we won't cause a BSOD.
If God had had a computer it would have taken him 7 months to create the earth...if he even bothered to do it at all.
Learn to swim
Learn to swim
Learn to swim...
You have 'hard data' on military threats? Then why exactly are there more than 10,000 people killed in Iraq for no reason at all? I thought Saddam was going to nuke all of North America, followed by God only knows what sort of chmical and biological attacks... what happened there?
Oh and btw the US spending breakdown is:
I'd be interested in the source for this, because I looked for impartial data on this (i.e. not presented in the context of a special interest group rant).
I'm pretty sure that the percentages you cited include spending on Social Security and Medicare. Since the funding for these is taken by large part from payroll taxes and not income taxes, they don't really count (federal spending of payroll taxes isn't -- or at least, shouldn't be -- discretionary).
From what I've gathered, once you discount Social Security and Medicare, defense spending becomes a little over 50% of the national budget.
One thing I am sure of: aside from a few exceptions, the Bush administration has been consistently cutting funds from programs I would want my tax dollars to go towards and has increased military spending.
Karma: Chevy Kavalierma.
Since the funding for these is taken by large part from payroll taxes and not income taxes, they don't really count...
This is the biggest load of BS I've read in a while. Fact: a tax is a tax is a tax. It doesn't matter what it's called. Social security withholdig is a TAX, Medicare withholding is a TAX. They all go to the Federal Government, who then goes on to abuse its new-found piggy bank for every feel-good and back-scratching political endeavor it can find. If I'd take the time to go around and add up all the taxes I have to pay in a year, I'd probably have a stroke from a blood pressure of 1000/990 after realizing just how much money I throw at crap like pork-barrel government contracts and polishing every turd of a social program they conjur up.
Vote in November. You won't regret it.
I'm not denying that it's a tax, only that 100% of payroll taxes are earmarked to be spent, and 100% of them should (and hopefully, usually are) spent on Social Security and Medicare. You can't ever get a refund on your payroll taxes, as far as I know payroll taxes aren't modified in any "tax cuts" that occur, etc. Plus, they're only levied on the first 65k of income.
Even if income tax were eliminated entirely, you would still pay payroll taxes. In a sense, payroll taxes act as an involuntary combination pension plan and health insurance plan.
Again, unless my understanding of this is skewed, the only social programs covered by payroll taxes are Social Security payments and Medicare/Medicaid payments.
It's revenues from income taxes, not payroll taxes, that go toward the pork barrel projects and social programs you don't like. And again, from the statistics I've looked at, most *income* tax goes towards military spending, not social programs, and not even those pork barrel projects. All of those occupy only a small part of budget spending.
Actually, the most unfair tax of all is sales tax, which puts an unusually high burden of tax on the poor. In Virginia, for example, the lowest 20% of income earners pay 6% of their income in sales and excise taxes, while the top 1% pay less than 1% of their income in sales tax. Even with a graduated income tax, the poorest residents in Virginia end up paying over 10% of their income on all state taxes, while the richest 1% spends only 5% of their total income on all state taxes.
Karma: Chevy Kavalierma.
Yes, sounds like a good addition for Despair.com. Perhaps if you find a picture to go with it (a meteorite, maybe with dinosaurs perhaps) you could have it posted to the demotivators
Taxes are taxes. If you want to argue that FICA and Medicare spending, which consists of something like 35% of the budget, are actual not part of the Federal budget, all the more power too you. Try pulling that with your landlord or cable company.
2 .h tml
Here's a link to the citizens guide to the budget:
http://w3.access.gpo.gov/usbudget/fy2001/guide0
This is a very high level overview. You'll get more specific data & projections by googling for the "Congressional Budget Office" and the "Office of Management and Budget". If you want to read the actual bills, head to www.thomas.gov.
(You'll notice that the numbers that I quoted off the top of my head were somewhat inprecise.)
By statute, most federal spending is non-discretionary. In the last 60 or so years, the Federal government has expanded its role and taken a good deal of power from the states with things like highways, education and health care.
Are some very valuable discretionary programs being cut right now in favor of paying for the war? Certainly.
The current climate change isn't caused by high levels of pollution generated by the United States -- pollution levels are likely signifigantly lower than they were 50 or 100 years ago in the era of heavy industry and poisoned rivers.
The climate *change* is due to the literal industrial revolution that is taking place right now in East Asia. Increased emissions from automobiles (relatively rare in Asia until recently) and heavy industry are affecting Pacific weather patterns, which has a cascading effect on US weather and the Gulf Stream.
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
Didn't Lex do that in one of the Superman movies?
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
this is the first thing that happens before catastrophic crustal displacement
Say, last March?
Sorry, but it doesn't matter here if the sea has gone up and down many times. And which scientists have you (actually) been talking to? If the sea goes up enough now it's a catastrophe - for man. We have a lot of very expensive coastal real estate a lot of people are going to be bent on keeping dry, if possible. And we are taxing the environment as a whole pretty heavily to feed 6 billion people. Large climate changes will mean a) that we probably won't be able to do all 6 billion for a bit, or b) we will have to make very large (and thus given the scale, very 'quick') and therefore very expensive adjustments on getting the food from somewhere new on the globe as arable land areas shift around. Whole civilizations have come into being (China) in order to deal with the flooding of one river (Yellow River). Whole civilizations, and much smaller ones than ours, have collapsed when their food production did. And you think having the ocean flood is not the most important news you've recently heard? Exactly how are you defining "fringe"?
If your neighbor chucked his rubbish into your back garden, you'd be pretty pissed. Pollution doesn't just hang around the US, it goes round the whole world.
We should not joke or laugh at this. The rate of change is what is alarming, not the change. 3/4 of the world's population lives w/in 100 miles of the ocean. All this land will be reclaimed by the ocean. A 0.3 degree change in temperature is HUGE, HUGE, HUGE. In one century, we can change the temp 30 degrees. The Athabasca glacier in Canada has retreated 1/4-1/2 of a mile since the 1860's. There is a visitor center standing where the glacier was. You won't laugh once this affects you.
... probably think its just you. If they have to move in with their mother in law on higher ground, they probably consider the situation worse than frightening. Also anyone who wonders whether the mass and energy transfers involved might affect the seismic stability around the Pacific rim might also suspect its just you. If you depend on an accurate geoid for your work and the darn thing keeps changing, well it might not be frightening, but it could be irritating.
------ The only greater hazard to your liberty than n politicians is n+1 politicians.
For no reason? Sorry, Charlie.
I thought Saddam was going to nuke all of North America, followed by God only knows what sort of chmical and biological attacks... what happened there?
That was your being an idiot.
The case for war was crystal-clear.
If you thought the case for war revolved around an imminent threat, then you just weren't paying attention. The case was, in fact, just the opposite: we can't wait for an imminent threat. We can't wait for a smoking gun. Because the defining characteristic of a smoking gun is that it has gone off.
The news cycle is asking the question, "Why were we wrong about Iraqi weapons?" The fact is, though, that we weren't wrong. Everything we've said has been borne out by the facts on the ground. The people who got it wrong were the analysts, the critics, and, yeah, the segment of the American public who misinterpreted the administration's policy and expected to see something nobody ever said would be there.
I'm not denying that it's a tax, only that 100% of payroll taxes are earmarked to be spent...
This distinction between income tax and payroll tax is flawed. Income and payroll are the same thing, both taxes get taken out of my one paycheck. Not only is 100% of all my taxes payed earmarked to get spent in some fashion, but continuous deficit spending by an out-of-control Congress means 100+% of all my taxes are earmarked to be spent.
Conveniently splitting out the taxes and eliminating some as a justification for an argument about military spending just doesn't follow. What if we added a "payroll" tax for the military...suddenly no "income" tax goes towards the military. Is that situation really any different?
Actually, the most unfair tax of all is sales tax, which puts an unusually high burden of tax on the poor.
This is untrue, if sales tax were properly structured to exempt essential goods like staple foods and clothing. Housing costs hurt the poor more than taxes, anyway.
The reason the income tax is the most unfair tax ever conceived is that it is the government legally extorting excessive amounts of money from the citizens. What if I refuse to pay my income tax, because I believe it to be excessive and used for things that the government has little business doing? I go to jail. Income taxes are neither anonymous, optional, nor of any reasonable amount, and they violate Constitutional rights to privacy and freedom from unfair search and seizure. Why is it that people cry foul when a corporation collects and tracks personal and financial information about people, but everyone just cozys right up to big nice government who is doing the same thing? The USA was founded after similar transgressions by the British monarchy; why has everyone become so blind to history?
Vote in November. You won't regret it.
...that this might have something to do with not needing the leap second for the past few years? The increase in size around the equator would definitely affect the earth's motion.
Un-news