Super-hard precious stones are forever

No, but thanks for asking.

As Phillip Blanchard so gently put it, this one has it all:

Diamonds are forever, unless you’re on Saturn or Jupiter. Loads of the super-hard precious stones may be floating among the gas giants’ fluid layers and melted into liquid further into their depths, say a pair of planetary scientists.

It'd be nice to think this was a one-off, but apparently at Science Now, you can't do The Science without a little of The Stupid. Crsly!

I'd weep for the planet, but on the bright side, we're not overrun by intergalactic prospectors.

 

Toward a taxonomy of lying

So much nekkid dishonesty, so little time! Anyway, sorry about the extended delays in posting,* but trying to summarize all the random venality of recent times would just get us further off track, so let's get to some new material from today.

If you amuse easily, you might have gotten word of the bizarre Twitter message from Jack Welch (the former CEO of GE) today, basically proclaiming that the monthly unemployment numbers were fabricated by -- how did he put it, Interwebs? -- "these Chicago guys" to distract attention from the Kenyan Muslim socialist's shortcomings on the debate stage.** Calmer heads soon prevailed (tut-tut, fellows, let's not go overboard here), but they prevailed in a way that allowed the conspiracy theory to remain on the table. Here's Kevin Hassett, director of economic policy studies for the American Enterprise Institute, describing the difference between the stats reported every month by the Bureau of Labor Statistics:

The report, of course, reveals the results of two surveys, one of households, one of establishments. The professional economists and the press usually emphasize the establishment survey because it is viewed as less volatile. The establishment survey was terrible. ... The household survey, on the other hand, portrays a September that was booming.

A little hyperbolic on both counts (when numbers need that much coaching, you should generally try to get them away from their handlers and see if the stories still match up), but not out of bounds.  But he still has a conspiracy to peddle:

Back when President Bush presided over a jobless recovery, the household survey tended to show better news. At the time, every media organization carefully emphasized the establishment numbers, and warned that the household numbers are suspect. That, of course, is what happens when a Republican is in office. For President Obama, you can expect a household survey lovefest.
Read more »