4 Great Short Stories

THESE ARE FOUR EXCELLENT STORIES. PEOPLE ALWAYS REMEMBER THE BAD THINGS ABOUT AMERICA BUT SELDOM THE VERY GOOD DEEDS WE HAVE DONE. TOO BAD SO MANY PEOPLE HAVE SUCH SHORT MEMORIES.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


When in England at a fairly large conference, Colin Powell was asked by the Archbishop of Canterbury if our plans for Iraq were just an example of empire building by George Bush.

Powell answered by saying, "Over the years, the United States has sent many of its fine young men and women into great peril to fight for freedom beyond our borders. The only amount of land we have ever asked for in return is enough to bury those who did not return."

It became very quiet in the room.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Then there was a conference in France where a number of international engineers were taking part, including French and American. During a break one of the French engineers came back into the room saying. "Have you heard the latest dumb stunt Bush has done?

He has sent an aircraft carrier to Indonesia to help the tsunami victims. What does he intended to do, bomb them?"

A Boeing engineer stood up and replied quietly: "Our aircraft carriers have three hospitals on board that can treat several hundred people; they are nuclear powered and can supply emergency electrical power to shore facilities; they have three cafeterias with the capacity to feed 3,000 people three meals a day, they can produce several thousand gallons of fresh water from sea water each day, and they carry half a dozen helicopters for use in transporting victims and injured to and from their flight deck. We have eleven such ships; how many does France have?"

Once again, dead silence.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


A U.S. Navy Admiral was attending a naval conference that included Admirals from the U.S. , English, Canadian, Australian and French Navies. At a cocktail reception, he found himself standing with a large group of Officers that included personnel from most of those countries. Everyone was chatting away in English as they sipped their drinks, but a French admiral suddenly complained that, ". . . whereas Europeans learn many languages, Americans learn only
English." He then asked, "Why is it that we always have to speak English in these conferences rather than speaking French?"

Without hesitating, the American Admiral replied, "Maybe it's because the Brits, Canadians, Aussies and Americans arranged it so you wouldn't have to speak German."

You could have heard a pin drop


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


AND THIS STORY FITS RIGHT IN WITH THE ABOVE . . .

A group of Americans, retired teachers, recently went to France on a tour. Robert Whiting, an elderly gentleman of 83, arrived in Paris by plane. At French Customs, he took a few minutes to locate his pass port in his carry on. "You have been to France before, monsieur?" the customs officer asked sarcastically.

Mr. Whiting admitted that he had been to France previously.

"Then you should know enough to have your passport ready."

The American said, "The last time I was here, I didn't have to show it."
"Impossible. Americans always have to show your passports on arrival in France !"

The American senior gave the Frenchman a long hard look. Then he quietly explained. "Well, when I came ashore at Omaha Beach on D-Day in 1944 to help liberate this country, I couldn't find any damn Frenchmen to show it to."

Ex-Manson follower dying, seeks release from prison

LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) -- Former Manson family member Susan Atkins has requested a "compassionate release" from prison because she has less than six months to live, a California prisons spokeswoman said Friday.

Susan Atkins, Califorina's longest-serving female inmate, is shown in her most recent mug shot.

 

Atkins, 60, was convicted in the 1969 slayings of actress Sharon Tate and four others. She had been incarcerated at the California Institution for Women in Corona, California.

But Atkins, the state's longest- serving female inmate, has been hospitalized since March 18 and is listed in serious condition, state corrections department spokeswoman Terry Thornton said. Because of privacy laws, Thornton would not disclose the nature of Atkins' illness.

Atkins' husband and attorney, James Whitehouse, was quoted as saying she has been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer, according to a blog called Manson Family Today. She also has had a leg amputated, the Los Angeles Times reported Friday, citing sources close to the case.

The compassionate release request has been approved by the prison, which conducted an evaluation, and is under corrections department review, Thornton said.

If the department approves, the Board of Parole Hearings and the sentencing court in Los Angeles also must sign off on the request. There is no timeline for a decision to be made, Thornton said.

Atkins, known within the Manson family as "Sadie Mae Glutz," has been in prison since 1971 and has been denied parole 11 times.

According to historical accounts of the murders, Atkins stabbed Tate, who was 8½ months pregnant, and scawled the word "pig" in blood on the door of the home the actress shared with director Roman Polanski.

"I don't want to seem like a heartless creature, but in all my years, I never considered this could happen," Debra Tate, the actress' sister, told the Riverside Press-Enterprise.

"She showed no compassion. She told my sister as she slit her throat that she didn't (care) for her or her unborn baby," Tate added.

Sharon Tate and three houseguests were slain in August 1969 by killers who burst into her Benedict Canyon home. A teenager who was visiting the home's caretaker in his cottage on the property also was killed.

The following night, Leno and Rosemary LaBianca were slain in their home in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles. The two-day crime spree sent shock waves throughout Los Angeles.

All of the killers remain behind bars. Atkins also was convicted in the earlier murder of music teacher Gary Hinman.

Atkins, like Manson, received a death sentence, and the punishment was changed to life in prison when the California Supreme Court ruled the state's death penalty unconsitutional in 1972.

Vincent Bugliosi, who prosecuted Atkins, told the Los Angeles Times that she "has paid substantially, though not completely, for her horrendous crimes. Paying completely would mean imposing the death penalty." But, he told the paper, given her terminal illness, "I don't have an objection to her being released."

According to her Web site, Atkins is a born-again Christian who during her incarceration has worked to aid at-risk youth, victims of violent crimes and homeless children.

Last month, authorities dug for buried bodies at the Inyo County, California, ranch where Manson and his followers once lived, after police became aware that testing had indicated humans might be buried there. Nothing was found, police said.

Mars on the brain? Red Planet pioneers to face cosmic mind trip.

LONDON, England (CNN) -- If Dr. Robert Zubrin could take a trip to Mars, he would be sure to pack a bread maker in his suitcase. Not just because bread is a pretty reliable expeditionary food, but because the act of cooking, according to Zubrin, seems to help people get along with each other, especially when they are in slightly dire, less than luxurious and more than stressful circumstances.

Red Planet pioneers will face extreme isolation and confinement on a years-long trip to Mars.

And Zubrin would know, too. He has, after all, led almost a half-dozen mock Mars missions on barren Arctic ice fields and scorching Utah deserts with volunteer teams made up of students, scientists, journalists and anyone else willing to wear fake spacesuits and live in tiny tin-can-like habitation modules for days on end.

The simulated expeditions were made, in part, to research ways to live and work on the Red Planet. But they also revealed something else: what personality types might best be suited to make the 35 million-mile journey and who would be better off watching from Mission Control.

"Some of these crews have worked out very well," said Zubrin, president of the Mars Society, a 7,000-member multinational group determined to reach what it calls the New World. "Others were at each other's throats."

"When you go to Mars, all bets are off," said Dr. Nick Kanas, a professor at the University of California, San Francisco, who has studied astronaut psychology. "We don't know what is going to happen."

One particularly important task, Kanas explained, will be picking a team of astronauts who can both work and get along with each other on a trip lasting at least two years, spent mostly within the confines of a not-so-big spacecraft sailing through the dark. The European Space Agency and the Russian Institute of Biomedial Problems are scheduled to run a joint 520-day mock Mars expedition this year aimed to study the effects of extreme isolation and confinement on 12 volunteers.

The numbers of men and women, their ages and even cultural upbringings must be carefully calculated to try to prevent what could be potentially devastating cosmic quarrels. "You can't just take a walk and get away from somebody," Kanas said.

Nor will astronauts really be able to talk to anyone, either -- at least not on Earth -- mainly because of a 44-minute communication delay between the Blue and Red planets, "which means you can't have a nice chat with your kids," said Kanas. "You are so far away; you really are isolated."

That means Mars-bound astronauts will also have to skip out on the ground-based psychological support sessions that astronauts and cosmonauts working on the international space station routinely have just to make sure microgravity has not gone to their heads (Before Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first man in space in 1961, experts were afraid weightlessness might cause schizophrenia, explained one doctor).

And they will not be able to receive surprise presents, like special cookies or favorite movies, which are often brought to the space station on supply shuttles when someone starts feeling homesick or maybe a little blue. Thus, decking out the Martian-bound craft with family photographs, special trinkets, books and even plants will be crucial for a mostly monotonous extraterrestrial road trip that will bring a whole new meaning to the "are we there yet?" question.

If someone becomes sick -- either physically or mentally -- the crew has to be ready to cope with that, too.

"If someone gets suicidal, you have to take care of it on board," Kanas said. Mission Control might also have to make some tough calls, like whether to tell an astronaut about a death in his or her family or other tragedies back home.

Yet the big unknown, according to Kanas, does not involve who astronauts will not be able to talk to or what gifts they will not be able to get, but instead what they will not be able to clearly see: planet Earth.

Kanas has even coined a term for the situation: the "Earth out of view" phenomenon.

"Nobody in the history of mankind has ever experienced the Earth as a pale, insignificant blue dot in the sky," he said. "What that might do to a crew member, nobody knows."

But Walter Sipes, a NASA psychologist at Johnson Space Center in Houston, said he thinks he knows where to look to start finding answers: history books.

"When early explorers left their home countries on the seas, they didn't see their home countries anymore," Sipes said. "They didn't even have a dot to look at. It was out of sight on the other side of the world. It is not like we are reinventing the wheel. We are just doing the same thing in a different environment that was just as demanding then."

And just as some early explorers made the ultimate sacrifice while searching for unknown lands, space pioneers may also pay a steep price for bravely going where no human has gone before.

"Do you follow the the sea tradition where people are buried at sea?" Sipes asked. "If someone dies, are they buried in space?"

Salamander-inspired therapy may aid injured vets

SAN ANTONIO, Texas (CNN) -- Last week in an operating room in Texas, a wounded American soldier underwent a history-making procedure that could help him regrow the finger that was lost to a bomb attack in Baghdad last year.

Army Sgt. Shiloh Harris is wheeled into surgery to undergo the experimental treatment to regrow what's left of his finger.

 

 

Army Sgt. Shiloh Harris' doctors applied specially formulated powder to what's left of the finger in an effort to do for wounded soldiers what salamanders can do naturally: replace missing body parts.

If it sounds like science fiction, the lead surgeon agreed.

"It is. But science fiction eventually becomes true, doesn't it?" said Dr. Steven Wolf of Brooke Army Medical Center.

Harris' surgery is part of a major new medical study of "regenerative medicine" being pursued by the Pentagon and several of the nation's top medical facilities, including the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and the Cleveland Clinic. So far nearly $250 million has been dedicated to the research.

Air Force Technical Sgt. Israel Del Toro is one of the wounded vets who might one day benefit from this research. He was injured by a bomb in Afghanistan. Both his hands were badly burned. On his left hand, what was left of his fingers fused together. "You know in the beginning when I first got hurt, I told them just cut it off. So I can get some function," Del Toro said. His doctors did not cut off his injured left arm. And since that injury, advancements in burn and amputation treatment mean he may one day be able to use his fingers again. 

A key to the research dedicated to regrowing fingers and other body parts is a powder, nicknamed "pixie dust" by some of the people at Brooke. It's made from tissue extracted from pigs.

The pixie dust powder itself doesn't regrow the missing tissue, it tricks the patient's body into doing that itself. All bodies have stem cells. As we are developing in our mothers' wombs, those stem cells grow our fingers, toes, organs -- essentially our whole body. The stem cells stop doing that around birth, but they don't go away. The researchers believe the "pixie dust" can put those stem cells back to work growing new body parts.

The powder forms a microscopic "scaffold" that attracts stem cells and convinces them to grow into the tissue that used to be there. "If it is next to the skin, it will start making skin. If it's next to a tendon, it will start making a tendon, and so that's the hope, at least in this particular project, that we can grow a finger," Wolf said.

It has worked in earlier experiments. "They have taken a uterus out of a dog, made one in the lab, put it back in, and had puppies," said Wolf. Researchers have also regrown a human bladder, implanted it in a person and it is working as nature intended.

While the technique has incredible promise, doctors will be watching for unexpected side effects as they follow Harris' recovery. "It could grow a cancer," Wolf said. "We will be closely monitoring for that to make sure that doesn't happen."

If the military's most badly wounded start benefiting, so will civilians. "If we can pull this off in missing parts the next step is, 'OK, can we grow a pancreas? Can we grow and replace that in a diabetic?' And can we do the same thing with a kidney and can we do the same thing with a heart?"

One day, he hopes, people with heart trouble will be told, "That's OK. We will just grow you another one.

"That is something that is real science fiction."