Obama’s Next Move in Afghanistan

The early returns from Afghanistan’s presidential election had the smell of a decorous massage job. With 10% of districts reporting, the incumbent, Hamid Karzai, and his main challenger, Abdullah Abdullah, the former Foreign Minister, were tied, with about 40% each. But few of those votes came from Karzai’s Pashtun strongholds in the south, where turnout was light — owing to Taliban threats — but heavily managed. “It’s not exactly one man, one vote out in the rural areas,” a Western diplomat told me. “The tribal leader gathers everyone together and says, ‘We’re voting for Candidate X.’” In some cases, apparently, tribal leaders have simply stamped all the ballots themselves; with literacy rates running at less than 10% in many rural areas, that’s not considered fraud but business as usual. And so it seems likely that Karzai will “win” re-election. Whether he has won anything worth winning remains to be seen.
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Entrenched racism in Australia – UN

THE intervention into remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory is clearly discriminatory, and that there is “entrenched” racism in Australia, the United Nations special delegate on indigenous rights says.

James Anaya didn’t pull any punches after his two-week visit of the country.

He said the Rudd Government should reinstate the Racial Discrimination Act in the NT “right away” because the intervention was discriminatory.

“It undermines the right of indigenous peoples to control their own destinies, their right to self-determination,” he said.

He also said the Stolen Generations should be paid compensation.
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Microsoft drops price of Xbox 360 Elite, kills Pro

On the heels of Sony reducing the price of its PlayStation 3 and announcing the PlayStation 3 Slim, Microsoft announced Thursday that it too will be dropping the price of its console.

Starting Friday, the Xbox 360 Elite will be priced at $299, $100 cheaper than its current price. The Xbox 360 Pro, which currently retails for $299 will be priced at $249 starting Friday. Once retailers sell through their entire stock of Xbox 360 Pro units, that SKU will no longer be offered by the hardware maker.

Going forward, Microsoft will offer only the $299 Xbox 360 Elite with its 120GB hard drive, and the $199 Xbox 360 Arcade which comes bundled with five games and a 256MB memory unit.

Microsoft’s decision to reduce the price of the Xbox 360 isn’t a surprise. Numerous rumors have been swirling around the Web for weeks. But perhaps the reason for the price drop, at least according to Microsoft, might surprise you.
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Renee Zellweger: ‘I sort of disappear a little bit’

NEW YORK (CNN) — “My One and Only” begins with Renee Zellweger, playing a woman based on George Hamilton’s mother Anne, discovering her husband with another woman.

Despite the initial heartbreak, Anne puts on a happy face, and Zellweger gives life to a character who’s determined to make the rest of her years comfortable and adventurous.

Her husband’s indiscretion is the catalyst that sends Anne on a cross-country quest to find a new husband in 1953 America. She pulls her two sons out of school in New York City and the trio set off on an adventure by car. The tale has its roots in actor George Hamilton’s young life.

The film takes a look at gender roles of the time and how women were perceived. Much of the film gets colored in by the characters and their ever-present emotions (though Zellweger’s fabulous frocks add plenty of color on their own).

Zellweger, who won an Oscar for “Cold Mountain,” spoke with CNN about “My One And Only,” George Hamilton and the way she believes she is perceived.
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Taiwan risks row over Dalai Lama

Taiwan has approved a visit by the Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, in a move that could anger China.

President Ma Ying-jeou has agreed to a request from the opposition to invite the Dalai Lama next week, to comfort victims of deadly Typhoon Morakot.

China usually voices anger at nations that welcome the Dalai Lama, whom it views as a dangerous separatist.

This trip is particularly controversial given that Beijing considers Taiwan to be part of its territory.

But correspondents say China’s criticism may be more muted than might otherwise have been expected because officials in Beijing are wary of playing into the hands of Taiwan’s pro-independence opposition.
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‘Artificial trees’ to cut carbon

Engineers say a forest of 100,000 “artificial trees” could be deployed within 10 to 20 years to help soak up the world’s carbon emissions.

The trees are among three geo-engineering ideas highlighted as practical in a new report.

The authors from the Institution of Mechanical Engineers say that without geo-engineering it will be impossible to avoid dangerous climate change.
The report includes a 100-year roadmap to “decarbonise” the global economy.
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‘Exploding’ iPhones investigated

French consumer groups are investigating reports of iPhones that explode or crack spontaneously.

An 80-year-old from the Paris suburbs was among eight people who said their phones’ screens were affected, according to the AFP news agency.

Consumers in the UK, Holland and Sweden have reported similar problems, prompting an earlier EU investigation.

Apple said it was aware of the reports and was waiting to receive the handsets from the affected customers.
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More signs of US economic growth

US durable goods orders and new home sales both soared last month, the latest positive indications of the state of the world’s largest economy.

Orders for goods expected to last more than three years increased 4.9% in July, beating analyst expectations of a 3% gain, said the Commerce Department.

Durable goods orders were lifted by the popularity of the government’s “cash for clunkers” car scrappage scheme.

This helped US car orders rise 0.9%, recovering from June and May falls.
At the same time, the annual rate of sales of new US homes rose 9.6% last month, also ahead of market targets.
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Science fiction breaks free from fantasy

Renowned physicist Dr Michio Kaku says that the world of science fiction may be closer to reality than fantasy.

So if you thought that invisibility cloaks, time travel and teleportation were for the silver screen only, think again.

Dr Kaku is a theoretical physicist and the co-founder of string field theory, a branch of string theory, often referred to as “the theory of everything”.

In his recent published book, Physics of the Impossible, he considers the phenomena of science fiction, including time travel and invisibility.

He was shocked to find that almost all of them were consistent with the known laws of physics.
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Genetic advance raises IVF hopes

Researchers have found a potential way to correct an inherited disorder affecting thousands of women.

Working on monkeys, they transferred genetic material needed to create a baby from a defective egg to a healthy one, resulting in healthy births.

The US work, featured in the journal Nature, raises hopes of a treatment enabling women with defective eggs to have a child without using donor eggs.

However, the child would have a small number of genes from a “third parent”.
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