“Europe, it seems, is a magnet for cat and dog fur. Cat blankets, so the aficionados say, are good for rheumatism.” BBC

“Groundbreaking, FDA-approved feasibility trial of an intraocular retinal prosthesis that appears to be able to restore some degree of sight to the blind.” EurekAlert!

“No one in American public life has become so much a pariah, so ready a punching bag, as the liberal. He can trace his lineage to Franklin D. Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln (a Republican, no less) and Thomas Jefferson all he wants. He’s still a libril, and for that reason hounded from elective office, hammered on talk radio and — as if injury needed insult — hung out to dry in best-selling books.

The titles and subtitles of these volumes betray more than an adversarial point of view. They drip with bile.” Washington Post

Also: <a href=”http://www.city-journal.org/html/13_2_up_from_liberalism.html

“>Up from Liberalism: “Living with European socialism turned this Berkeley girl into a conservative.” —

Janet Daley, City Journal

“In our democratic age, experts are scorned as elitists. When did having standards and expertise become a bad thing?” — Sarah Bryan Miller, classical music critic, St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Researchers propose a mathematical model of marriage. Chronicle of Higher Education

“An Arabic weekly is reporting an interview with a purported new spokesman for al-Qaeda who claims the terror network has completely reorganized. He says old operatives have been replaced by new ones who are planning an attack against the United States on the scale of Sept. 11.

The claims were based on e-mail interviews conducted this week by the London-based magazine Al Majalla with al-Qaeda spokesman Thabet bin Qais, the magazine reports in an issue to appear Friday.” USA Today

W.House Denies Bush’s Ship Landing a Costly Stunt ABC News , and Despite criticism, Bush ‘glad’ he jetted to aircraft carrier. CNN Furthermore, Iraq weapons proof ‘will be found’: ‘The commander of UK forces in the Iraq conflict has “no doubt” that evidence of weapons of mass destruction will be found.’ BBC It is all so darned entertaining that it brings tears to my eyes.

When Customer Profiling Goes Wrong: “More and more websites are trying to “get to know their customers” by tracking your purchases and asking you to rate the items you’ve bought. Of course the quintessential example of this is Amazon.com, who will offer up recommendations based on things you only thought of looking at.

This is a place to record some of strange recommendations you have received, from Amazon or others.”

Also: Your TV is watching you. “Advertisers want to use new technology to monitor your every click — and prevent you from tuning out their ads. And don’t even think of trying to escape.” Both from Salon

with its permanent “War on Terrorism”: “(Democrats) are hoping that a collapsing economy will doom Bush like it did his father. But his dad didn’t have Osama bin Laden in his corner — or Karl Rove…”

Also: Ariana Huffington: The 77-percent solution: “While Karl Rove crows over Bush’s postwar approval rating, the latest numbers are lower than you’d think.” Both from Salon