Now, for something completely different

How about some news you probably haven't heard. I know, if it bleeds it leads, but there is other news to consider. Especially, to balance out the crazy stuff.

Above, Iaqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki (bottom 5th R, as if you couldn't tell) poses for a group picture with the Iraqi soccer team, who won the AFC Asian Cup soccer tournament, after their return to Iraq August 3, 2007.


Holland Says NO To Magic Mushrooms

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands - The famously liberal Netherlands has been swinging toward the right, cracking down on immigration, religious freedoms [I think this means Muslim ideas of religion like obliterating infidels] and the freewheeling red light district. The next possible target? Magic mushrooms.

The death of a 17-year-old French girl, who jumped from a building after eating psychedelic mushrooms while on a school visit, has ignited a campaign to ban the fungi — sold legally at so-called "smartshops" as long as they're fresh....

The Last Jews In Baghdad

Conditions Worsening For Baghdad's Last 8 Jews, But Do They Want To Leave?

They number only eight, but they are the remnant of a community 2,700 years old — the last Jews left in modern Baghdad.

An Anglican clergyman who watches over the tiny Jewish group says they are increasingly desperate and want to leave Iraq for the Netherlands. But Israeli, Dutch and Jewish officials dispute claims by the Rev. Andrew White that the Jews want to leave. ...

Russian hostages freed in Nigeria

Six Russians kidnapped by gunmen more than two months ago from an aluminium firm in southern Nigeria have been freed, government officials say.

The four men and two women are reportedly in good health.

They were seized on 3 June in the south-eastern town of Ikot Abasi, and their Nigerian driver was shot dead.

Kidnappings - more often of oil workers - have become a common occurrence in the south of Nigeria. Victims tend to be released after a ransom is paid....

Team finds largest exoplanet yet

The planet has a large radius but a low density

An international team of astronomers has discovered the largest known planet orbiting another star.

The "transiting" planet - meaning one that passes in front of its parent star as seen from Earth - is about 70% larger than Jupiter.

But the presumed "gas giant" has a much lower mass than Jupiter - the biggest planet in our Solar System - making it of extremely low density.

Remember "The Thing?" Warming climate may give life to frozen germs

BEIJING, Aug. 7 (Xinhuanet) -- Earth's warming climate may bring germs frozen for millions of years in glaciers back to life, potentially increasing the speed of the evolution of microbes, recent research reveals.

Antarctica's Dry Valley of the Transantarctic Mountains are home to the oldest known ice on Earth. Researchers melted five block of ice cut from glaciers there to find entombed microbes 100,000 to 8 million years old.

To avoid contamination of the ice with modern germs that would confuse results, the scientists took elaborate precautions, soaking the blocks in ethanol as an antiseptic and melting away the outer inches of ice using sterile water to decontaminate them.

The researchers discovered microbes in all the ice, more in the young than in the old. They also grew them out in the lab.

"The young stuff grew really fast," said Rutgers University marine microbiologist Kay Bidle, doubling in number "every couple of days." Until now, scientists didn't know whether such ancient, frozen life could be revived, he added.

[There you go. There is too much going on, isn't there? Let me go see how the Yankees did.]