O Arizona: An Uneasy Budget Compromise Through a Labyrinthine Process

The House of Representatives and Senate unanimously approved a four-bill package that will again position Arizona to receive $2.3 billion of federal stimulus money for health care and education. The votes came with enough support to enact the bills immediately following a signature from Gov. Jan Brewer, and the governor has indicated she is “absolutely delighted” with the proposal. Although she would not say whether she would sign the bills, she gave no indication she disapproved.

“It seems to me they funded my top priorities,” Brewer said early Monday evening. “I'm feeling pretty good. Certainly, we claim victory.” The legislative action is needed in the wake of Brewer's numerous vetoes of the budget package that lawmakers passed last week.

One line-item veto erased the entire K-12 budget, a move Brewer made to emphasize her point that lawmakers are not adequately funding public education. The veto also put Arizona out of compliance with the funding requirements to tap $1 billion in stimulus dollars for education.

Another veto wiped out language that put Arizona in line to receive $1.3 billion in Medicaid match money.

The approved bills reverse the effects of those vetoes, but still leave numerous other issues unresolved — and the state budget unbalanced. The lawmakers went for home shortly after 7 p.m.

link: Arizona lawmakers have reached a bipartisan agreement

The Book of Sleep: A Snapshot Chronicle of Sleeping Humans

The Book of Sleep

Women in Darfur

A conference on the Challenges of Women in Darfur is due to be held during May 23 - 25 in Al-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, under auspices of the President of the Republic.

The conference is co-sponsored by the Sudanese General Women Union and Sudan International University, in implementation of the initiative of Muslims in Britain. The conference aims to coordinate efforts of the civil society for supporting reconciliation, peace and development in Darfur, reflecting a genuine and bright image of the Darfuri women and getting informed on the challenges that confront the stability of the women in Darfur.

Leaders of the civil work, personalities of the Committee of the Muslims in Britain and activists working in the media, voluntary and humanitarian fields, participants from African countries and organizations, women leaderships, concerned civil society figures and representatives of Darfur states are due to take part in the conference.

link: International Conference on Challenges Facing Women in Darfur to be Held on May 23

Eritrea Seeks Darfur Solution

The Eritrean President, Assais Afwerki, has called for reconsideration of all the existing initiatives to find solution for Darfur issue because of the disagreement among the factions of the rebel movements in Darfur.

The Eritrean President, interviewed by SUNA, referred to the efforts being exerted by Eritrea to pave the way for peace negotiations, benefit from the previous experiments and to avoid internationalization of the issue as well as increasing the participants in the agreements.

The Eritrean President called on the Sudanese people to ignore the issue of the International Criminal Court (ICC), as this court has no legal bases, adding that Sudan is targeted because of its unique geographic location and its influence in the Horn of Africa. He reaffirmed the strong relations linking Sudan and Eritrea, lauding the agreements signed by the two countries in all domains.

link: Eritrean President Calls for Reconsideration of Initiatives Designed to Solve Darfur Issue

Dept. of Roll It and Smoke It

Smoked food, now a luxury, was once a necessity. By curing meat or fish with smoke, our ancestors preserved gluts for lean times. The Sumerians smoked fish as early as 3500BC, and it can’t have escaped the notice of early gourmets that this mode of preservation also imparts flavour. The ancient Greeks and Romans relished smoked food, including cheese and tuna. According to the food scientist Harold McGee, among the tastes supplied by smouldering wood are “spice flavours: vanilla’s vanillin, for example, and clove’s eugenol”. Other aromas in wood smoke are likened to apple, peach, coconut, flowers and sausages.

Applied to foods from beef fillet to bananas, smoking has a near-global appeal. It is an important part of cuisine in Ghana, where smoked shad fish—known as “bonga”—is produced in oil-drum ovens; also in the Baltic, where herrings are hot-smoked (at 82-93ºC) to make buckling. The British preference for cold-smoking (at around 26ºC) achieved its fragrant apogee in the kipper, invented around 1843 in Northumberland. The tradition of smoking split herrings continues in the north-east: since 1872, the town of Whitby, in Yorkshire, has been perfumed with smoke from Fortune’s kipper shed. Much of Bram Stoker’s “Dracula”, published in 1892 and partially set in Whitby, would have taken place in an atmosphere tinged with kippers. Sadly, the Transylvanian count was not converted from fresh haemoglobin to smoked herring.

link: WAKE UP AND SMELL THE OCTOPUS | More Intelligent Life

Al-Qaeda in Mali

Fighting broke out again between the Mali army and the elements of Al-Qaeda in the Maghreb region since they first engaged each other last month, the military told Xinhua on Sunday.

The clash erupted between Friday night and Saturday in Mali's northern Tombouctou region. "There were no victims on the side of the army," the military said in reference to the exchange of fire with the terrorist group known as AQMI.

The army launched an attack on the AQMI group on June 17, killing 26 of its combatants, after the government vowed to take military actions against the Al-Qaeda branch in the region.

link: Pan-African News Wire: Mali Army Fights Against AQMI

Dunhuang, China

Found here.

Gaza: Graphic Definition of the Phrase "Bullet-Riddled"

Girls stood on the balcony of their home, damaged in Israel’s offensive last year, in Rafah, Gaza Strip, Thursday. Meanwhile, an Israeli shell fired into the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip killed a Palestinian teenage girl Thursday, hospital workers said. (Said Khatib/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images). Found at the Wall Street Journal photoblog.

link: TYWKIWDBI: An air-conditioned home in Gaza