Naveed Afzal Haq - A Bigger Story Than Mel Gibson

The Seattle shooter who killed one woman and shot five other women in their stomachs after declaring he was a "Muslim-American" who was "angry at Israel" has been charged with nine felony counts including murder, hate crimes, and kidnapping.

Here, at MAXINE, we happen to think the news this week about this terrorist and murderer is far more important news than Mel Gibson getting charged with drunk driving and public intoxication.

Basically, the cartoon and posts at Cox and Forkum say it all when it comes to the "Seattle Shooter":

HT: Michelle Malkin

Of RFID Chips, E-Passports, Hackers, & Clones

Grunwald placed the passport on top of the RFID reader and within four seconds the data on the RFID chip embedded in the passport appeared on the screen in the Golden Reader Tool template. New e-passports come with a metallic jacket to prevent someone from surreptitiously "skimming," or reading the data on the chip from afar. To allow authorities to read the data on the RFID passport chip, the passport owner must remove the document from the shield before passing it over the RFID reader. Data retrieved from an RFID passport chip gets dumped into the Golden Reader Tool template where passport authorities can examine it. Here, Grunwald has typed in random data, and a photo was taken from the internet to show how the tool works. Photo Credit: Kim Zetter

The Department of Homeland Security's agenda for streamlining the passport issuance and reading process is not without its problems.

The new RFID (radio frequency identification) enabled passports due to be issued later this year, has had it critics and most people believe that this technology used with this application is not a good idea >>> Symblogogy: Proximity Passport Perception Problems Persist (July 26, 2006).

To be honest, if information can be stored and read from an RFID chip, the information can be hacked, manipulated and used for no good.

Excerpts from Wired News -

Hackers Clone E-Passports
By Kim Zetter - Wired News - 02:00 AM Aug, 03, 2006

LAS VEGAS -- A German computer security consultant has shown that he can clone the electronic passports that the United States and other countries are beginning to distribute this year.

The controversial e-passports contain radio frequency ID, or RFID, chips that the U.S. State Department and others say will help thwart document forgery. But Lukas Grunwald, a security consultant with DN-Systems in Germany and an RFID expert, says the data in the chips is easy to copy.

"The whole passport design is totally brain damaged," Grunwald says. "From my point of view all of these RFID passports are a huge waste of money. They're not increasing security at all."

Grunwald plans to demonstrate the cloning technique Thursday at the Black Hat security conference in Las Vegas.

The United States has led the charge for global e-passports because authorities say the chip, which is digitally signed by the issuing country, will help them distinguish between official documents and forged ones. The United States plans to begin issuing e-passports to U.S. citizens beginning in October. Germany has already started issuing the documents.

Although countries have talked about encrypting data that's stored on passport chips, this would require that a complicated infrastructure be built first, so currently the data is not encrypted.

"And of course if you can read the data, you can clone the data and put it in a new tag," Grunwald says.

The cloning news is confirmation for many e-passport critics that RFID chips won't make the documents more secure.

"Either this guy is incredible or this technology is unbelievably stupid," says Gus Hosein, a visiting fellow in information systems at the London School of Economics and Political Science and senior fellow at Privacy International, a U.K.-based group that opposes the use of RFID chips in passports.
----
Grunwald says it took him only two weeks to figure out how to clone the passport chip. Most of that time he spent reading the standards for e-passports that are posted on a website for the International Civil Aviation Organization, a United Nations body that developed the standard. He tested the attack on a new European Union German passport, but the method would work on any country's e-passport, since all of them will be adhering to the same ICAO standard.

In a demonstration for Wired News, Grunwald placed his passport on top of an official passport-inspection RFID reader used for border control. He obtained the reader by ordering it from the maker -- Walluf, Germany-based ACG Identification Technologies -- but says someone could easily make their own for about $200 just by adding an antenna to a standard RFID reader.

He then launched a program that border patrol stations use to read the passports -- called Golden Reader Tool and made by secunet Security Networks -- and within four seconds, the data from the passport chip appeared on screen in the Golden Reader template.

Grunwald then prepared a sample blank passport page embedded with an RFID tag by placing it on the reader -- which can also act as a writer -- and burning in the ICAO layout, so that the basic structure of the chip matched that of an official passport.

As the final step, he used a program that he and a partner designed two years ago, called RFDump, to program the new chip with the copied information.

The result was a blank document that looks, to electronic passport readers, like the original passport.
Although he can clone the tag, Grunwald says it's not possible, as far as he can tell, to change data on the chip, such as the name or birth date, without being detected. That's because the passport uses cryptographic hashes to authenticate the data.

When he was done, he went on to clone the same passport data onto an ordinary smartcard -- such as the kind used by corporations for access keys -- after formatting the card's chip to the ICAO standard. He then showed how he could trick a reader into reading the cloned chip instead of a passport chip by placing the smartcard inside the passport between the reader and the passport chip. Because the reader is designed to read only one chip at a time, it read the chip nearest to it -- in the smartcard -- rather than the one embedded in the passport.
----
Frank Moss, deputy assistant secretary of state for passport services at the State Department, says that designers of the e-passport have long known that the chips can be cloned and that other security safeguards in the passport design -- such as a digital photograph of the passport holder embedded in the data page -- would still prevent someone from using a forged or modified passport to gain entry into the United States and other countries.

"What this person has done is neither unexpected nor really all that remarkable," Moss says. "(T)he chip is not in and of itself a silver bullet.... It's an additional means of verifying that the person who is carrying the passport is the person to whom that passport was issued by the relevant government."

Moss also said that the United States has no plans to use fully automated inspection systems; therefore, a physical inspection of the passport against the data stored on the RFID chip would catch any discrepancies between the two.
----
In addition to the danger of counterfeiting, Grunwald says that the ability to tamper with e-passports opens up the possibility that someone could write corrupt data to the passport RFID tag that would crash an unprepared inspection system, or even introduce malicious code into the backend border-screening computers. This would work, however, only if the backend system suffers from the kind of built-in software vulnerabilities that have made other systems so receptive to viruses and Trojan-horse attacks.
----
Grunwald's technique requires a counterfeiter to have physical possession of the original passport for a time. A forger could not surreptitiously clone a passport in a traveler's pocket or purse because of a built-in privacy feature called Basic Access Control that requires officials to unlock a passport's RFID chip before reading it. The chip can only be unlocked with a unique key derived from the machine-readable data printed on the passport's page.

To produce a clone, Grunwald has to program his copycat chip to answer to the key printed on the new passport. Alternatively, he can program the clone to dispense with Basic Access Control, which is an optional feature in the specification.

Grunwald's isn't the only research on e-passport problems circulating at Black Hat. Kevin Mahaffey and John Hering of Flexilis released a video Wednesday demonstrating that a privacy feature slated for the new passports may not work as designed.
----
In addition to cloning passport chips, Grunwald has been able to clone RFID ticket cards used by students at universities to buy cafeteria meals and add money to the balance on the cards.
----
Many of the card systems that did use encryption failed to change the default key that manufacturers program into the access card system before shipping, or they used sample keys that the manufacturer includes in instructions sent with the cards. Grunwald and his partners created a dictionary database of all the sample keys they found in such literature (much of which they found accidentally published on purchasers' websites) to conduct what's known as a dictionary attack. When attacking a new access card system, their RFDump program would search the list until it found the key that unlocked a card's encryption.

"I was really surprised we were able to open about 75 percent of all the cards we collected," he says.
Read All>>

RFID may sound like a good idea for automating the process of identification through our nation's checkpoints, but when it comes to the internal security of our country and the protection of our identity ... this just isn't the same application process as a "Mobil Speedpass" or a freeway tollway access payment verification.

Typical, the federal government remains clueless to the real issues that surround the application of this proximity technology.

As in real estate (location, location, location) the axiom for the implementation of a new technology is "application, application, application!"

Consistancy Reins In The Senate - A Funded Fence

A view of the well-lighted fence at the U.S.-Mexican border is seen from San Ysidro section of San Diego, with the Mexican city of Tijuana in the background. Image Credit: Associated Press

After voting back in May to erect some of the border fencing needed to begin to secure the border between Mexico and the U.S., the Senate, yesterday, voted to fund 370 miles of border fencing and 500 miles of road impediment barriers.

This is just a start, but it is a step in the right direction.

Now, the last time the Senate voted on this issue (July 13, 2006), they placed a requirement to discuss this issue with the government of Mexico. We have funded the fence, but do we have the approval of the Mexican Government? Do they get to decide where the fence is installed? They may have a special request not to erect the fence and road barriers on existing and established "underground railroad" border crossing routes.

Excerpts from the Washington Insider -

Senate votes to fund the fence
By Stephen Dinan and Brian DeBose - THE WASHINGTON TIMES - August 3, 2006

The Senate did an abrupt about-face yesterday, voting overwhelmingly to begin paying for 370 miles of fencing and 500 miles of vehicle barriers on the U.S.-Mexico border, just three weeks after voting against the same spending.

The amendment's sponsor said senators were so embarrassed by that July 13 vote that most felt they had to reverse course and vote for it this time -- especially after so many were on record in May voting to build the fence in the first place. The amendment, which provides nearly $2 billion for the project, passed 94-3, with 66 senators switching from "no" to "yes" votes since last month.

"I think people wanted to get right," said Sen. Jeff Sessions, Alabama Republican. "People heard from their constituents after they voted to authorize the fence in May and then voted against funding it a couple of weeks ago."

The fence has become one of the flash points as Congress and President Bush try to craft a new immigration enforcement policy this year piece by piece. Mr. Bush travels to Texas today to review operations at the border, including the success of his plan to deploy the National Guard to assist the U.S. Border Patrol in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas.

This week, the president reached his goal of assigning 6,000 Guard troops to the border states by Aug. 1. Still, of the 6,340 troops assigned as of yesterday, only 2,675 troops, or 42 percent, were "forward deployed." The rest are at joint task force headquarters, in training or in transit.

But the Guard's presence has led to a 25 percent drop in apprehensions at the border compared with the same time last year, suggesting the troops are having success in preventing illegal aliens from trying to cross.

That good news, though, was tempered by a government report that found Department of Homeland Security employees were fooled by counterfeit driver's licenses in nine different tests by undercover investigators at U.S. border crossings. The Government Accountability Office said that hole in security "potentially allows terrorists or others involved in criminal activity to pass freely into the United States from Canada or Mexico."
----
At the White House, spokesman Tony Snow said the administration is still pushing for a broad bill and he sees headway on administration insistence that Congress pass a broad bill that includes a guest-worker program and a path to citizenship for illegal aliens.

"I think there's increasing awareness in both houses of Congress that that is the proper way to proceed," Mr. Snow said.

But House Republicans remain adamant about border security first, said Ron Bonjean, spokesman for House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, Illinois Republican.

He said Mr. Hastert, who toured the border two weeks ago, is pleased with the assistance the Border Patrol is getting, "but a lot more needs to be done. The speaker believes we need a broad, strong border security bill first before we can do anything else."
----
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, who voted against the amendment three weeks ago, praised yesterday's vote, which came on an amendment to the defense appropriations bill. The Tennessee Republican called it a step toward fulfilling the commitment the Senate made in May but stressed that he remains committed to a broad immigration bill.

"Getting border security right, including building fences, is a key component to securing our homeland -- which also helps open the door to comprehensive immigration reform," he said.
----
The three senators who voted against yesterday's fence amendment were Democrat Russ D. Feingold of Wisconsin, Republican Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and independent James M. Jeffords of Vermont.
Read All>>

A "Gas" Choice For Mileage? ... Hint, Not Fiber-Based

A motorist uses a gauge to check air pressure in a tire. Image Credit: Associated Press

With the increase in fuel prices at the pump, many consumers are looking for alternatives and additives that might decrease the impact on one's wallet.

People have recommended FlexFuel automobiles that use petroleum based gasoline and can fill up with E85 ethanol (a fuel made from fiber and corn based chemical conversion). However, many have found that the strengths of this strategy lay primarily with the fact that our country would become less dependent on foreign sources of oil ... not increased mileage performance.

The single most reliable "Gas" change one can make may just be in how one chooses to inflate the tires on one's car.

It turns out that nitrogen gas, as opposed to the air we breathe, is a more stable substance to cushion our ride. Nitrogen is impacted less with the changes in tire/road temperatures, compression due to the addition of load weight (as in loading up the back of a pick-up truck), and can deliver an additional mile to two miles per gallon in the distance traveled.

The teams that operate race cars at NASCAR, IndyCar, and ChampCar have known about the beneficial and competitive properties of nitrogen gas for some time now.

Excerpts from AP via the Washington Times -

Nitrogen a gas for better mileage
By David Sharp - ASSOCIATED PRESS - August 1, 2006

TOPSHAM, Maine -- Many motorists seeking to improve their mileage as gas prices soar this summer are examining everything, right down to the air in their tires. And for a growing number, plain old air isn't good enough.
----
Nitrogen has been used for years in the tires of race cars, large commercial trucks, aircraft and even the space shuttle.

But it is finding its way into the mainstream at a growing number of tire dealers, including Costco Wholesale Corp. and its Washington-area stores.

Nationwide, fewer than 10 percent of tire dealers offer nitrogen, but the number is growing, said Bob Ulrich, editor of Modern Tire Dealer magazine in Akron, Ohio. Most dealers charge $2 to $5 per tire for the nitrogen fill-up, he said. The dealers generally offer free lifetime refills.
----
Skeptics will question how much can be gained by filling tires with pure nitrogen when air is 78 percent nitrogen.

The differences are subtle, but important, said Steve McGrath, Tire Warehouse's vice president of marketing in Keene, N.H.

Nitrogen molecules are bigger than oxygen molecules, so nitrogen seeps out more slowly from tires than air. Nitrogen also resists heat buildup better than air, which contains moisture, and it reduces oxidation, which can damage the tire from the inside out, proponents say. Nitrogen is an inert gas, so there are no safety or environmental issues.

Those advantages are important in vehicles equipped with tire pressure monitoring systems, which are sensitive to changes in tire pressure, Mr. McGrath said.

With or without nitrogen, proper inflation is the key to improving gas mileage. Motorists can improve gas mileage by 3.3 percent simply by keeping their tires properly inflated, according to the Department of Energy.
----
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has no opinion on nitrogen, but it does encourage motorists to keep their tires properly inflated, both for safety and to boost gas mileage, said spokesman Rae Tyson. Severely underinflated tires are dangerous, especially for sport utility vehicles and light trucks.
----
For Mr. Bourque, his tire pressure remains constant -- 40 pounds for his fully loaded truck -- even on hot days, when tire pressure normally fluctuates.

His gas mileage was about 19 mpg when he bought his 2005 Chevrolet Colorado. Now, with the engine broken in and new tires filled with nitrogen, he gets 20.5 to 22 mpg, depending on whether he runs the air conditioner, he said.

For tire dealers, the nitrogen generator and associated equipment typically run between $3,000 and $12,000, Mr. Ulrich said.

Marty Mailhot, manager of the Tire Warehouse in Topsham, Maine, said the idea is catching on with consumers, who are buying nitrogen for tires for cars, trucks, motor homes and lawn tractors. He has even tried it on footballs and inflatable tubes pulled behind boats.

He has a retort for those who pooh-pooh the notion of paying for nitrogen when there's plenty of free air for the taking.

"I say, 'Why are you drinking that bottled water when there's a pond out back?' " he said.
Read All>> (free subscription)

Tiny "Designer Microbes" - A Greater Terror WMD

It has been five years since the first of the Anthrax terror scares where all of us were made aware of the effectiveness of bioterrorism.

Since then, a new technology has made it easier to genetically modify microbes and even create new ones from scratch. One doesn't even need living material to make up a batch of "designer microbes" that could wreak havoc and create emotional terror - the war effect we worry about from nuclear "dirty bombs", but much easier to make up and dispatch.

Excerpts from the Washington Post -

Custom-Built Pathogens Raise Bioterror Fears
By Joby Warrick - Washington Post Staff Writer - Monday, July 31, 2006; Page A01

STONY BROOK, N.Y. - Eckard Wimmer knows of a shortcut terrorists could someday use to get their hands on the lethal viruses that cause Ebola and smallpox. He knows it exceptionally well, because he discovered it himself.

In 2002, the German-born molecular geneticist startled the scientific world by creating the first live, fully artificial virus in the lab. It was a variation of the bug that causes polio, yet different from any virus known to nature. And Wimmer built it from scratch.

The virus was made wholly from nonliving parts, using equipment and chemicals on hand in Wimmer's small laboratory at the State University of New York here on Long Island. The most crucial part, the genetic code, was picked up for free on the Internet. Hundreds of tiny bits of viral DNA were purchased online, with final assembly in the lab.

Wimmer intended to sound a warning, to show that science had crossed a threshold into an era in which genetically altered and made-from-scratch germ weapons were feasible. But in the four years since, other scientists have made advances faster than Wimmer imagined possible. Government officials, and scientists such as Wimmer, are only beginning to grasp the implications.
----
Five years ago, deadly anthrax attacks forced Americans to confront the suddenly real prospect of bioterrorism. Since then the Bush administration has poured billions of dollars into building a defensive wall of drugs, vaccines and special sensors that can detect dangerous pathogens. But already, technology is hurtling past it. While government scientists press their search for new drugs for old foes such as classic anthrax, a revolution in biology has ushered in an age of engineered microbes and novel ways to make them.
----
"The biological weapons threat is multiplying and will do so regardless of the countermeasures we try to take," said Steven M. Block, a Stanford University biophysicist and former president of the Biophysical Society. "You can't stop it, any more than you can stop the progress of mankind. You just have to hope that your collective brainpower can muster more resources than your adversaries'."

The Bush administration has acknowledged the evolving threat, and last year it appointed a panel of scientists to begin a years-long study of the problem. It also is building a large and controversial lab in Frederick, where new bioterrorism threats can be studied and tested. But overall, specific responses have been few and slow.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has declined so far to police the booming gene-synthesis industry, which churns out made-to-order DNA to sell to scientists. Oversight of controversial experiments remains voluntary and sporadic in many universities and private labs in the United States, and occurs even more rarely overseas.
----
"There's a name for fixed defenses that can easily be outflanked: They are called Maginot lines," said Roger Brent, a California molecular biologist and former biodefense adviser to the Defense Department, referring to the elaborate but short-sighted network of border fortifications built by France after World War I to prevent future invasions by Germany.
----
How to Make a Virus

Wimmer's artificial virus looks and behaves like its natural cousin -- but with a far reduced ability to maim or kill -- and could be used to make a safer polio vaccine. But it was Wimmer's techniques, not his aims, that sparked controversy when news of his achievement hit the scientific journals.

As the creator of the world's first "de novo" virus -- a human virus, at that -- Wimmer came under attack from other scientists who said his experiment was a dangerous stunt. He was accused of giving ideas to terrorists, or, even worse, of inviting a backlash that could result in new laws restricting scientific freedom.
----
Wimmer's method starts with the virus's genetic blueprint, a code of instructions 7,441 characters long. Obtaining it is the easiest part: The entire code for poliovirus, and those for scores of other pathogens, is available for free on the Internet.

Armed with a printout of the code, Wimmer places an order with a U.S. company that manufactures custom-made snippets of DNA, called oglionucleotides. The DNA fragments arrive by mail in hundreds of tiny vials, enough to cover a lab table in one of Wimmer's three small research suites.

Using a kind of chemical epoxy, the scientist and his crew of graduate assistants begin the tedious task of fusing small snippets of DNA into larger fragments. Then they splice together the larger strands until the entire sequence is complete.

The final step is almost magical. The finished but lifeless DNA, placed in a broth of organic "juice" from mushed-up cells, begins making proteins. Spontaneously, it assembles the trappings of a working virus around itself.
----
The technology envisions new species of microbes built from the bottom up: "living machines from off-the-shelf chemicals" to suit the needs of science, said Jonathan Tucker, a bioweapons expert with the Washington-based Center for Non-Proliferation Studies.

"It is possible to engineer living organisms the way people now engineer electronic circuits," Tucker said. In the future, he said, these microbes could produce cheap drugs, detect toxic chemicals, break down pollutants, repair defective genes, destroy cancer cells and generate hydrogen for fuel.

In less than five years, synthetic biology has gone from a kind of scientific parlor trick, useful for such things as creating glow-in-the-dark fish, to a cutting-edge bioscience with enormous commercial potential, said Eileen Choffnes, an expert on microbial threats with the National Academies' Institute of Medicine. "Now the technology can be even done at the lab bench in high school," she said.
----
A Darker Side

In May, when 300 synthetic biologists gathered in California for the second national conference in the history of their new field, they found protesters waiting.

"Scientists creating new life forms cannot be allowed to act as judge and jury," Sue Mayer, a veterinary cell biologist and director of GeneWatch UK, said in a statement signed by 38 organizations.

Activists are not the only ones concerned about where new technology could lead. Numerous studies by normally staid panels of scientists and security experts have also warned about the consequences of abuse. An unclassified CIA study in 2003 titled "The Darker Bioweapons Future" warned of a potential for a "class of new, more virulent biological agents engineered to attack" specific targets. "The effects of some of these engineered biological agents could be worse than any disease known to man," the study said.
----
"The capability of terrorists to embark on this path in the near- to mid-term is judged to be low," Charles E. Allen, chief intelligence officer for the Department of Homeland Security, said in testimony May 4 before a panel of the House Committee on Homeland Security. "Just because the technology is available doesn't mean terrorists can or will use it."

A far more likely source, Allen said, is a "lone wolf": a scientist or biological hacker working alone or in a small group, driven by ideology or perhaps personal demons. Many experts believe the anthrax attacks of 2001 were the work of just such a loner.
----
A 2004 National Academy of Sciences report recommended that the committees take on a larger role in policing research that could lead to more powerful biological weapons.

In reality, many of these boards appear to exist only on paper. In 2004, the nonprofit Sunshine Project surveyed 390 such committees, asking for copies of minutes or notes from any meetings convened to evaluate research projects. Only 15 institutions earned high marks for showing full compliance with NIH guidelines, said Edward Hammond, who directed the survey. Nearly 200 others who responded had poor or missing records or none at all, he said. Some committees had never met.
----
"We haven't yet absorbed the magnitude of this threat to national security," said O'Toole, who worries that the national commitment to biodefense is waning over time and the rise of natural threats such as pandemic flu. "It is true that pandemic flu is important, and we're not doing nearly enough, but I don't think pandemic flu could take down the United States of America. A campaign of moderate biological attacks could."
Read All>> (free subscription)

Testosterone - Where There’s Money, There’s Doping

Floyd Landis at a news conference in Madrid. Image Credit: Jasper Juinen/Associated Press

Floyd Landis gave an interview and defended himself along with his Doctor stating that Testosterone is not a friend ... but an enemy to the bicycle racer's performance.

Further, Landis, through the statements of his lawyer, Luis Sanz, said he fully expected the backup test to come back with the same result, because the testosterone imbalance was produced naturally by his [Landis'] body.

What is at question here is the difference in levels between testosterone and epitestosterone that appear in the body. The blood testing showed an abnormal balance/ratio in the levels of testosterone/epitestosterone.

Excerpts from the New York Times -

Testosterone Seems to Be Enhancer of Choice
By JULIET MACUR – New York Times - Published: July 31, 2006

When a doping scandal shook the Tour de France on the eve of this year’s race, Floyd Landis climbed onto his bike, unscathed. When a doping investigation involved some of track and field’s most high-profile figures, the sprinter Justin Gatlin continued to compete, untouched.

But last week, Landis, the Tour de France winner, and Gatlin, who shares the world record in the 100 meters, were no longer on the outside looking in. They were ensnared in the net of drug testing, with the same substance, testosterone, at the center.

For some, last week’s news is a sign that doping controls have improved, but it may also be evidence that some athletes remain undeterred, tempted to break the rules by the promise of money and fame.

“Many more athletes are going to get caught, and it’s going to get ugly,” said Dr. Steven Ungerleider, an antidoping expert who wrote the book “Faust’s Gold: Inside the East German Doping Machine.” “I think people need to brace themselves for some darker clouds on the way here.”

Landis was found to have an illegally high ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone after his Stage 17 performance during the Tour, which moved him to third place in the standings from 11th and back into contention. If the results of his backup urine sample, which could be released as early as today, confirm the initial positive result, he will be stripped of his Tour de France title and face a two-year ban from the sport. If the result comes back negative, the doping charges will be dropped.

Gatlin, who also failed a drug test in 2001, may already face a lifetime ban. He tested positive for testosterone or its precursors on April 22, after the Kansas Relays, and announced the result Saturday.
----
“When the smoke clears, I think we’ll all go back and look at what we’ve done to Floyd,” said Landis’s doctor, Brent Kay, in a teleconference Friday.
----
In track and field, a host of athletes have tested positive for abnormal testosterone levels. The sprinter Dennis Mitchell, an Olympic gold medalist from the United States, tested positive for a high testosterone-to-epitestosterone, or T/E, ratio in 1998, claiming that alcohol and sex with his wife had caused the positive test. In 1997, the distance runner Mary Decker Slaney also tested positive for a high T/E ratio. Both athletes won on appeal, but an international panel overturned those decisions. They were barred from the sport for life.

But Kay could not see why a cyclist would take testosterone. He said it would make the rider slower because it is an anabolic steroid that builds muscle.
----
Scientists like Dr. Donald H. Catlin, who runs the Olympic drug-testing laboratory at U.C.L.A., say that athletes might use testosterone to recover quicker. The former professional cyclist Jesús Manzano said he was given testosterone when he competed for the Kelme team, and said he immediately felt the positive effects.

In an essay in the Spanish sports newspaper AS on Saturday, Manzano wrote: “It gives you a lot of strength, and it works very well. It produces a euphoria.”

John Hoberman, a University of Texas professor who wrote the book “Testosterone Dreams: Rejuvenation, Aphrodisia, Doping,” said: “These people who are using it are probably doing what they thought was low dosing and thought they could probably get away with it. The idea that these are all clever people who are doing it right is erroneous.

“Some are doing it better than others. Some are using physicians. Some are using it on advice from another athlete.”
----
Still, even Landis admitted that a dark cloud would remain over him and the sport. And Andy Rihs, Landis’s team owner and owner of the Swiss hearing-aid company Phonak, has agreed.

After so many of his riders have tested positive since the team’s inception two years ago, including the 2004 Olympic gold medalist Tyler Hamilton, Rihs announced last month that he would abandon his sponsorship of the team.

In an article in The Times of London last week, Rihs summed up the reason: “Where there’s money, there’s doping.”
Read All>>

Tasting vs. Breathing - Investigative Report

By the time Irma Ortiz discovered she had been breathing toxic fumes on her job as a mixer at Carmi Flavors near Los Angeles, she had lost at least 70 percent of her lung capacity. Ortiz, 44, a nonsmoker who used to lift 50-pound bags routinely, now finds walking so difficult she spends most of her time indoors. Image Credit: Sacramento Bee/Hector Amezcua

When one goes to work in the general foods preparation marketplace, one doesn't expect that they would be working in an environment that is hazardous to one's health. Not so, according to an investigative report released by the Sacramento Bee.

It turns out that working in the food additives manufacturing environment, specifically with additives designed to enhance taste, one can severely compromise their lungs and diminish the capacity to process air to the bloodstream by as much as 80%.

The chemical that has been traced as the culprit is known as diacetyl and the precise number of workers already suffering respiratory effects from exposure this agent is unknown.

Excerpts from the Sacramento Bee -

Investigative Report: Flavoring agent destroys lungs
Two workers need transplants; threat could be widespread
By Chris Bowman -- Bee Staff Writer (Bee researcher Sheila A. Kern contributed to this report) - Published 12:01 am PDT Sunday, July 30, 2006 - Story appeared on Page A1 of The Bee

LOS ANGELES -- Hacking and gasping, Irma Ortiz could cart her groceries only so far before she'd catch other shoppers glaring at her.
Mortified, she'd abandon her cart on the spot and bolt for the door.

Frank Herrera could gun his dirt bike only so far before choking on the rush of air. Go. Stop. Go. Stop. Exasperated, he gave up riding.

Ortiz, 44, and Herrera, 34, are odd candidates for lung transplants, being nonsmokers and having considerable youth on their side.

How they lost 70 to 80 percent of their breathing capacity is no less astonishing. They acquired the same rare, lung-ravaging disease from breathing the same chemicals on the same type of job.

The two weren't working in a chemical or pesticide plant. Nor in a weapons plant. They didn't metal-plate, fumigate, degrease, demolish, smelt or weld.

They made, of all things, artificial food flavorings.

Harmless as that seems, two big labor unions that champion ironworkers and meat cutters are now fighting for the workers who whip up piña colada, butterscotch and other flavors that sell America's snack foods. Just last week, 40 job health experts joined the Teamsters and the United Food and Commercial Workers in urging the Bush administration to issue an emergency order restricting worker exposure to a widely used butter flavoring -- a chemical called diacetyl.
----
The lung disease is as bad as its name suggests: bronchiolitis obliterans. It's a condition that literally obliterates the bronchioles -- the lungs' tiniest airways -- resulting in drastically reduced breathing capacity.

Ortiz and Herrera are the first Californians known by state health officials to have developed the disease from working in a flavoring factory, most likely from inhaling diacetyl's powerful fumes, the health investigators said.

But the search for victims has only just begun.
----
Neither OSHA, the federal Labor Department's Occupational Safety and Health Administration, nor Cal-OSHA, its state counterpart, has set limits for worker exposure to diacetyl.

In California, state health department staff and Cal-OSHA regulators are expanding their investigation beyond the two plants where Ortiz and Herrera worked to the estimated 28 other flavoring companies statewide.

Last week, state officials enlisted the help of physicians at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health in testing the breathing capacity of current and former flavoring workers, beginning with the Los Angeles-area plant where Ortiz worked.

Some of the same NIOSH doctors found a strong link between diacetyl and the lung disease a few years ago among workers at microwave popcorn factories in the Midwest. The disease permanently disabled dozens of popcorn workers and killed at least three, according to the doctors.

The flavoring industry's largest trade association also assumed a leading role in the California investigation. The Flavor and Extract Manufacturers Association recently arranged for its respiratory disease experts at the National Jewish Medical Center in Denver to evaluate workers and inspect operations at companies.
----
Consumers who prepare or eat frozen meals, pastries, candies, coffees and other foods containing these additives are not at risk, doctors say. That's because the chemical concentrations in the final products are much lower than those found in flavorings and snack food plants.
----
Without proper protections, workers who make the flavor mixes in batches of 50 to 5,000 pounds can inhale highly toxic fumes as they pour chemical liquids into huge blenders.

The level of worker protection in the flavoring business varies from company to company as with other industries where job safety is largely self-policed.
----
By all appearances, the factory appeared to be a model of industrial hygiene, with workers fully suited in protective gear, with meticulous storage, handling and labeling of hazardous chemicals, and worker safety training that goes beyond the law.

"This plant is typical of those in our association," said John Hallagan, the flavor association's chief spokesman and attorney.

Yet the stories of Ortiz and Herrera provide fresh and powerful evidence that some of the estimated 3,700 flavoring production workers nationwide continue to be exposed to highly toxic fumes.
----
Few of the flavoring workers are unionized. Many of the estimated hundreds in California are immigrants like Ortiz and Herrera, and primarily speak Spanish.

The two worked 60 miles apart in Southern California, which hosts most of the flavoring factories on the West Coast -- Herrera at Mission Flavors & Fragrances Inc. in Orange County, and Ortiz at Carmi Flavor and Fragrance Co. near Los Angeles.

"They never said nothing to us about the chemicals there, the kinds of dangers or give us a warning like, you know, 'This is bad for you guys, protect yourselves better,' " Ortiz said of her former employer. "They never say nothing to us like that."
----
Breathing the toxic fumes can drastically lower breathing capacity in a matter of months. The vapors inflame the bronchioles, crucial airways branching like twigs at the ends of the respiratory tree where oxygen enters the blood. Scar tissue builds up in the inflamed bronchioles, shrinking or completely blocking the tiny air tubes.
----
Diacetyl's potent punch was no secret to its manufacturers.

At least one of them, the German giant BASF, had performed experiments in the 1970s showing diacetyl fumes to be extraordinarily effective at killing lab rats.

"That was a big surprise to everybody," said the flavor industry's Hallagan. His trade group did not learn of the internal study until October 2001.

But the flavoring group apparently did know as early as 1985 that breathing high concentrations of diacetyl posed a breathing hazard -- to humans -- according to the association's "ingredient data sheet" on the chemical.
----
Ortiz -- a nonsmoker and a one-time robust worker -- has lost 80 percent of her breathing capacity.

"Before I used to be more healthy, but not no more. I gave all my strength to Carmi, to the company. I leave all my strength there."

The disease is irreversible. And it could worsen over time.

Already, doctors have deemed Ortiz eligible for a double-lung transplant. She plans to add her name to the waiting list in August.

If Ortiz undergoes the operation, at best she could resume an active life for several years. At worst, she could suffer a known complication of lung transplants:

Bronchiolitis obliterans -- all over again.
Read All>> (free subscription)

"Seeing Material" - Tunnel Of Books

Tunnel syndrome: A woman looks at a tunnel made out of books during the "Diversity of Taiwan 2006" exhibition in Taipei. Image Credit: AFP/Sam Yeh

Stick Out Your Tongue - It's Not Rude, Really

"Listerine PocketPaks® strips dissolve instantly, killing over 99% of bad breath germs* to immediately freshen your breath anytime, anywhere. Since you never know when you'll need fresh breath, make sure you're always prepared with Listerine PocketPaks®. This way, you'll always be certain you're putting your best foot forward." Image Credit: Pfizer Consumer Healthcare

No, really, it is going to be good for your health.

Edible film delivery systems for vitamins, electrolytes, even food tastes and preservation is a growing market. This stuff isn't just for breath and social interaction anymore, there are even strips for "Fido".

Excerpts from Business Week Magazine-

It's On The Tip Of Your Tongue
As more medicines take the form of "edible film," the market is exploding
Business Week Magazine - July 31, 2006

They're little green patches of film that melt instantly on your tongue, releasing bursts of minty breath freshener strong enough to wipe out all signs of that garlic shrimp you had for lunch. Sound familiar? They're Listerine PocketPaks, and they're made of a material that folks in the food industry call "edible film." Introduced by Pfizer Inc. in 2001, PocketPaks sparked a craze. Now everything from sushi to Sudafed is showing up on store shelves all wrapped up in melt-in-your-mouth film.

Consumers are lining up for the chance to stick out their tongues. Retail sales of edible film, at about $100 million a year today, are expected to hit at least $350 million by 2008, says James Rossman, a former maker of edible film who is now a consultant in Tampa. In 1999 sales were just $1 million, mostly from niche products such as the edible underwear that's a favorite gag gift at bachelor parties. "Listerine broke the market wide open," says Rossman -- who, by the way, in 1974 had a hand in inventing some of the first edible undies.
----
Over-the-counter drugmakers are breathing new life into tired brands by pressing them into flavored strips. In 2004, Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis (NVS ) introduced Triaminic and Theraflu Thin Strips. This April it followed up with Gas-X Thin Strips, a new twist on a nearly 30-year-old brand.
----
Patients with four legs and fur may be the next target for drugs-on-film. Albert Ahn, a veterinarian and spokesman for Hartz Mountain Corp. in Secaucus, N.J., says his company is looking at edible film as an alternative to stuffing pills down pets' throats. "Dogs and cats are pill con artists," he says. "They hide them under their tongue or in their jaw and then spit them out when you're not looking." Strips stick -- and some drugs can also be given at lower doses on films because they are absorbed better through the tongue. Ahn estimates that pet pharmaceuticals represent a $1 billion market.
----
Some meat manufacturers are using films to cure and glaze ham. There are electrolyte strips that athletes can consume in lieu of sports drinks to fight dehydration. Film might someday be used as a moisture barrier, separating the tomato sauce from the crust on a frozen pizza, for example, so the crust stays crisp. "These films can improve the quality and shelf life of food," says Tara McHugh, research leader for an Albany (Calif.) unit of the Agriculture Dept.

And get this: Matthew de Bord, owner of Origami Foods in Pleasanton, Calif., has developed films made of carrot, and tomato with basil, which can be used in place of seaweed to wrap sushi. "Some people have an aversion to seaweed, or they just want an alternative," de Bord reasons. Costco Wholesale Co. is testing sushi wrapped in de Bord's films at some of its stores in California. Wonder how that might play in Tokyo.
Read All>>


And this from Ediblefilms.org -

In the race to provide superior edible film and coating technology options to the food industry, researchers in the Department of Food Science and Technology at the University of California at Davis, led by Dr. John Krochta, are making significant advances in the use of whey proteins, a component of milk.

In the early 1990s, these researchers discovered the potential for whey proteins as a superior alternative to the already-existing protein and polysaccharide edible films and coatings, and as a method to additionally reduce the synthetic polymer films being used by food manufacturers. Since this discovery, research has focused on documenting the properties of whey protein film and coating formulations and developing concepts for the efficient production of stand-alone films and effective food coatings made from whey protein.
Link Here>>

So, stick out your tongue ... it's good for you!

Congress Makes Stand For "Meta-Tag" Decency

On Tuesday, Congress passed a bill that would make it a federal felony to embed misleading "tag" language or photo material that would ultimately lead minors to site that are designed for adult pornography.

Under the provisions of the bill, a Webmaster could be sentenced up to 20 years in a federal prison (and assessed a fine) if it was established that the publisher intentionally used misleading "words" or "images" to confuse or entice minors to view sexually provocative material on a possibly harmful Web site.

Excerpts from CNET News -

Congress spanks naughty sex sites
President Bush is expected to sign a bill that targets Net drug sales and sneaky Web sites deemed "harmful to minors."
By Declan McCullagh - Staff Writer (with contribution from Anne Broache, CNET), CNET News.com - Published: July 25, 2006, 1:48 PM PDT

The U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday approved a bill that would make it a federal felony for Webmasters to use innocent words like "Barbie" or "Furby" but actually feature sexual content on their sites.
----
Because the U.S. Senate already approved the measure in a voice vote last week, it now goes to President Bush for his signature. Bush, who previously endorsed the bill, has scheduled a signing ceremony for Thursday afternoon on the White House grounds.

"America's children will be better protected from every parent's worst nightmare - sexual predators - thanks to passage" of the legislation, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said in a statement on Tuesday.

House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, in a statement issued after the House approved the bill by voice vote, said: "We've all seen the disturbing headlines about sex offenders and crimes against children. These crimes cannot persist. Protecting our children from Internet predators and child exploitation enterprises are just as high a priority as securing our border from terrorists."

The 163-page Child Protection and Safety Act represents the most extensive rewriting of federal laws relating to child pornography, sex offender registration and child exploitation in a decade.

If the bill becomes law, it's not clear which Webmasters would become federal felons. Sites like Kontraband.com, which show Barbie and Ken dolls having simulated sex, could be in trouble, depending on how prosecutors and juries interpret the language. (Kontraband offers video clips and photographs, some of which are racy.)
----
A key phrase in the legislation (click for PDF) promises prison time only if a Webmaster has the "intent to deceive" a casual visitor.

In addition, the Child Protection and Safety Act, or Walsh Act (named for Adam Walsh, who was abducted and murdered in 1981 at 6 years old), would:

• Punish the intentional Internet sale or distribution of "date rape drugs" by making the act a new federal crime with up to 20 years in prison. The list of offending drugs would include gamma hydroxybutyric acid (sometimes called liquid ecstasy), ketamine, and flunitrazepam (better-known under the trade name Rohypnol).

• Force sex offenders to provide a DNA sample, a requirement that many states already have adopted.

• Create a national sex offender registry to be run by the FBI, with "relevant information" on each person. It's supposed to permit geographical lookups based on ZIP code.

• Fund a series of pilot programs, lasting up to three years, to tag sex offenders with tracking devices that would let them be monitored in real time. The devices would include a GPS downlink (to provide exact coordinates), a cellular uplink (to transmit the coordinates to police), and two-way voice communications.

Separately, the Senate is expected to vote this year on a related but broader proposal dealing with Web labeling. That legislation says that Web site operators posting sexually explicit information must slap warning labels on their pages or face prison terms of up to five years.
Read All>>

UNIFIL - Picture Worth One-Thousand Words

Since 1978, the UN has had UNIFIL (United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon) set up. And since 1978, they have not lifted a single finger to stop rocket attacks towards Israel. Since then, they have not lifted a finger to stop Hizbollah from building a full army under their noses. Since then, they have not lifted a finger when Hizbollah built military posts right next to UNIFIL posts. Image & Caption Credit: Small Dead Animals

Jed Babbin explains:

"The U.N.'s years-long record on the Israel-Lebanon border makes mockery of the term "peacekeeping." On page 155 of my book, "Inside the Asylum," is a picture of a U.N. outpost on that border. The U.N. flag and the Hezbollah flag fly side by side. Observers told me the U.N. and Hezbollah personnel share water and telephones, and that the U.N. presence serves as a shield against Israeli strikes against the terrorists."

HT: Michelle Malkin