As Toyota prepares to launch it’s Mirai hydrogen car this year, and compressed natural gas continues to power various vehicles, we begin to wonder what’s the next fuel-source for our vehicles. While Elon Musk insists upon reshaping the grid Tesla-style for car charging, the Dutch are busy building roads that are made out of solar cells in the hopes of one day powering cars with the roads they ride upon. MORE

A Syrian Christian fighter has beheaded an Islamic State group (IS) militant to avenge people “executed” by the jihadists in northeastern Syria, a monitor said on Friday. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the incident took place on Thursday in Hasakeh province, where IS holds large areas…MORE

Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, former head of the highest court at the Vatican, said that the Irish people’s vote to legalize homosexual marriage was in “defiance of God” and an action more depraved than that practiced by “pagans.”

“I mean, this is a defiance of God, it’s just incredible,” said Cardinal Burke, speaking at the Newman Society at Oxford University’s Catholic Society on May 27. MORE

Big Brother Narco is watching.

Authorities in northeastern Mexico’s Tamaulipas state recently dismantled an internet-operated video surveillance network used by a criminal group to monitor both government security forces and civilian life. The CCTV network comprised 39 cameras, according to El Universal, and is an unprecedented feat of counter-surveillance in an ongoing technological arms race between Mexican and American authorities and cartels. MORE

All you people who did not want President Obama to bomb Syria have contributed to this mess.

The war in Syria. The war in South Sudan. The conflicts in the Central African Republic, Iraq, Kenya and Afghanistan. It adds up.  MORE

A Catholic priest in New Jersey who says he was dismissed from his campus ministry job over a Facebook post against anti-gay bullying and racism has come out as gay.

Fr. Warren Hall told Outsports, a magazine for gay athletes, that while he remained committed to his vocation as a priest and to his vow of celibacy, he was not going to hide his sexual orientation.

“I have to be myself,” Hall said. “I can’t worry what other people think.” MORE

The expenses include overtime pay for police and fire brigades, destruction of public property, and related costs incurred by outside jurisdictions – such as Pennsylvania and Washington DC – that responded to an official call for help MORE

No capital punishment no corporal punishment no hell punishment

Nebraska on Wednesday became the first conservative state in more than 40 years to abolish the death penalty, with lawmakers defying their Republican governor, Pete Ricketts, a staunch supporter of capital punishment who had lobbied vigorously against banning it. MORE

RAMOS CAN STAY, BUT MATT LAUER HAS TO GO

May 27, 2015

I finally found a Mexican willing to do a job no American will do! I have an explosive book on the No. 1 issue in the country coming out next week, I’ve already written 10 New York Times best-sellers — I’d be on a postage stamp if I were a liberal — but can’t get an interview on ABC, NBC or CBS.

Only Mexican-born Jorge Ramos would interview me on his Fusion network. Yay, Jorge! Continue reading →

Figure 3. Infrared satellite imagery shows the extremely cold cloud tops (gray) associated with the torrential rains in the Houston area at 9:15 pm CDT on Monday night, May 25. Cloud-top temperatures at the height of the storms were colder than -100°F. Note the two eerie faces visible across southeast Texas! Larger version here [with time code but without state boundaries]. Image credit: NASA Earth Science Office, courtesy Stu Ostro. MORE

My strongest memory of Hurricane Katrina was of a video clip of a family on  a roof, surrounded by water, calling to the helicopter for help (which they did not get). It takes 3 days for a person to die of dehydration. Bush did not send in help for 5 days.

Did that family die of dehydration? Or did they drink the flood waters? But were the flood waters salty so they could not?

Now I realize that millions of people in Nevada could die of dehydration, and they have no idea that they are in danger. Here’s how: MORE

Potable water reuse – or converting sewage effluent to heavily-treated, purified drinking water – is receiving renewed attention in California in the midst of the state’s four-year drought. MORE