The letter was posted on March 3rd, a little over week ago.

The topic was about the recent poll hikes in Massachusetts by Governor Deval Patrick. I was not expecting the story to get posted because I wasn’t very opinionated about the topic, but it is pretty cool to know it was.

Anyways, here’s the link:

http://www.bostonherald.com/news/opinion/letters/view.bg?articleid=1155844

Where does the country go from here? After the first two times major corporations were bailed, the economy was stimulated for a day or so. The financial markets would collapse again and the recession continued.

Other major banking institutions are also in crisis perhaps setting up for more multi-billion dollar bailouts from the government. 

President-elect Barack Obama has his work cut out for him. Citigroup lost over half its value in one week. Other smaller banking institutions have been put out of business due to the crisis, and are wondering where their bailout plan is. Obama is looking into a plan that would be industry wide to save local banks. 

The government must settle on whether to bailout the banks, or to invest direct capital into the institutions.

With the amount of money being thrown around by the government, how is Obama going to be able to cut taxes for 95% of Americans like he had promised. This money has to come from somewhere. It will be interesting to see if he can stick to his word, if it is even possible to now.

Now before we jump to conclusions and question how this could have had happened, let’s look at the facts: 

• It was a grease gun tool kit that slipped out of her hands when dropping the bag.
• She is wearing gloves that have no real grip.
• She is in space trying to fix a solar panel!

How big of a threat is this going to pose? Currently it is unknown. The Space Crew said they see screws and nails and other small objects floating around in space. But, there has never been anything of this size orbiting the earth, other than asteroids of course. 

Perhaps the biggest jump the space station is making is a converter. To increase the size of the crew to six people next liftoff, NASA is currently working on a recycling system that can convert astronaut’s urine and sweat into drinking water.

The space station will also add two bedrooms, a bathroom, a treadmill, and a kitchenette. Unbelievable. How long until someone lives in space? Can’t be that far away.

Looking at this from an outside viewpoint, it seems that scientists have been able to discover every possible cause of global warming. Of course the process of liquid turning into a gas will contribute to a warmer climate. The process of vaporing requires shift in temperatures to transform an element. 

The question that remains is how much warming? According to researchers, it all depends on the amount magnitude of the water. Increasing water vapor leads to warmer temperatures. Researcher Andrew Dessler says “we now think the water vapor feedback is extraordinarily strong, capable of doubling the warming due to carbon dioxide alone.”

With the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere, the warming is going to continue at an extremely fast rate. It is undoubtedly a major concern among scientists throughout the world. How can you stop water vapor in the atmosphere? It is nearly impossible. 

If current trends continue, the Earth will have a temperature rise of two degrees by the end of the century.

We need to act on global warming immediately. We are researching all the causes of global warming, but we are not coming up with solutions. There needs to be something done soon before things get completely out of control.

Last night, the United States continued a rich tradition of history with the election of the first African American President, Barack Obama. In a lopsided victory, Obama took the blue states he needed and was able to steal or at least contest the red states for a decisive win. 

And for the first time in a long time, many Americans voted FOR a candidate and not AGAINST another. Now, the country gets to see if Barack Obama can hold true to his word of CHANGE. There needs to be change with the economic system. There needs to be change with our foreign policy. There needs to be change with out healthcare system. There needs to be change with energy and climate control. And if we asked Barack if the US could handle all of these tasks, he would reply with “Yes We Can.” 

We finally have a President to believe in. Someone who has been in our position, and understands that the American Dream is fading for most as we speak. It is Barack’s job to eliminate these problems, and for us to make sure he does.

In other news: 

• I have to give it to John McCain. It was his best speech of the whole Presidential race. He was influential, motivated, determined and sincere with his words about Barack Obama. If he could have been as persuasive as he was last night throughout the whole race, we may have a different president. 

• Sarah Palin rejuvenated the Republican Party with her VP run. In 2012, do not be surprised if she is the Republican candidate for President. 

By: Kevin Clerkin and Alexa Marcigliano

Weather Feature

UMass students had quite a surprise Tuesday when confronted with drastically colder temperatures, torrents of rain and predictions of snow.

In contrast to Monday, which reached the mid-sixties with the sun in the sky, Tuesday’s wind and rain provided a wakeup call for students everywhere that winter is on its way. Some did not look prepared at all, running to class in a t-shirt or flip flops, though the majority were bundled up and looking miserable.

Sean Knecht, a UMass student from Houston, Texas, upon discovering a lack of winter clothing in his closet, proclaimed that he is “not prepared, not prepared at all,” for this winter season and “cannot wait to be home.”

Others, while more prepared than Sean, felt that the weather was not normal this early in the season, especially the foot and a half of snow which occurred in New York state the same day. One UMass student, as they ran into the library to escape the freezing wind, commented quickly that she saw some people “in sandals, I don’t know how they do that!”

Climatology professor Frank Keimig, who works for the Climate Systems Research Center located on-campus in Hasbrouck, feels that this weather is typical for the time of year. “It’s normal to have big swings in the fall,” Keimig said, “so it’s normal to have temperatures drop 20 or 30 degrees in a day.”
According to Keimig, this most recent drop in temperature was caused by the jet stream “dipping really far south,” which “brings really cold air into the country.” Keimig says the combination of this very cold air and the strong storm which was traveling up the Northeast at the time caused our weather and the large amount of snow in New York.

The most extreme weather conditions for this time of year which Keimig could remember were during a storm in October of 1987. An article in the New York Times called “Early Snowstorm Covers Northeast,” from October 5, 1987 states that it was “the earliest snowstorm on record” for “New York, Connecticut and other parts of New England.” This storm, according to the article, was caused by “a collision of cold and soggy air masses,” and brought record lows to 37 cities.

Keimig remembers that “the leaves were still on the trees and it caused a tremendous amount of damage,” because the trees became too heavy and fell on power lines. According to the Times article, many fires were started as a result of this.

The meteorologists at the time predicted nothing more than an abnormally cold day, proving that sometimes these types of events are impossible to forecast. Keimig, when asked what type of winter he projects for this year, quickly asked “are you going to hold me to this?”

He feels that while for the most part we will have a fairly normal New England winter (although no one can say what that really is), it may be a heavy year for snow. He attributes this to what he refers to as a “neutral year with respect to El Niño and La Niña.” When it is a strong year for either of the climate systems, the Northeast does not see a lot of snow that winter. When neither is strong however, it means a good winter for skiers and snowboarders in our region.

The weather this past week and the potential for a very snowy winter will hopefully inspire UMass students to prepare for the season. According to Knecht, he feels the weather this fall is “the perfect formula to get sick,” which is never hard when living in a dorm among hundreds of other students. One way to avoid it is to bundle up and get ready for another New England winter.

On October 21st, India launched their first ever unmanned spacecraft to orbit the moon. The expected two year mission of the unmanned spacecraft is to display a three-dimensional picture of the moon. Although the spacecraft will never land on the moon itself, the “impactor probe” will be sent out to the surfaces. 

The mission is designed to test the surfaces of the moon for natural resources such as uranium. Currently, uranium is a desired natural fuel by power plants during the world’s energy crisis. 

Moon Craft-1 is the first ever spacecraft sent into orbit by India. It is a sign that India can and is willing to keep up with China in the space race, as this comes only a year after China sent an unmanned spacecraft into orbit. 

Congratulations to India on entrance. Countries like Israel are already talking with India and have sent up their own with help from the India government. Now, if we could just get America to focus more on space, we’d have a real race.

The study being done in the Gulf Coast region determines that the cane has high stalk contents of sugar and fiber, which can serve as complementary ethanol feed stocks. Processors then burn the sugar into fiber to generate heat to form the crystallization formation.

The sugarcane can be directly fermented into ethanol as soon as the sugar is extracted from the stalks. Other crops like corn and sorghum take a lot longer to ferment because of their low sucrose. 

If perfected, an ace of sugarcane crops could yield 1,240 gallons of ethanol. The problem is, sugarcane only grows during warm seasons. Researchers have been busy at work trying to find a way to make the sugarcane crop become cold-tolerant. 

It will be the day when both we and our automobiles run on the same sugars. And it could be coming sooner rather than later.

With the prices at the pump being so expensive, vacations have become a thing of the past due to traveling expenses. There may be help on the way though. 

A Temple University physics professor has developed a device that can increase gas efficiency by 20%. The device is an electrically charged tube that latches on to the fuel line of the engine. It then creates an electric field as the gasoline pumps through the device, thinning the gasoline to pump less fuel into the engine. The result leads to a faster explosion and stronger combustion without using as much fuel. 

In the study conducted using the new fuel efficient device. it increased a diesel-powered Mercedes-Benz highway miles from 32 to 38 miles to the gallon. The device is also being tested on larger diesel trucks to see the type of efficiency it will have. 

The reduction of fuel costs could be a major boost to the economy. Not only would it reduce the price of gasoline for regular drivers, but it would also help the cost of shipped goods. The prices of delivery would go down because it would not cost as much to ship. 

Hopefully the device can improve on some faults and reduce the price of gasoline. The economy would be stimulated, and maybe a vacation would be in the near future.

It was the third time UMass journalists have twittered a debate, but the first time our UMass hashtag received recognition as being a top 10 political trending topic. And for the first time, we had outsiders coming to us for answers. 

Reporter Al Giordano wanted to know what we had to think. He was quoted as saying, “To the UMass journalism classes twittering the debate: Is Brokaw overplaying the referee role in trying to enforce the clock?”

These types of social networking tools are the direction where journalism is heading. Al wanted to know what college kids thought about the role of the moderator. All he had to do was pose one question in the forum, and over 50 students had the opportunity to answer. In a matter of seconds, he had reached out to more students he may have in a day with interviews. 

Bloggers were also trying to get some attention from the UMass students. Kasey Hartnet wrote “check out my views at kasey0719.wordpress.com.” 

Twittering, Facebook, Myspace, Digg. All these networks are providing opportunities for journalists to ask questions to a larger number of people. They also help journalists find certain ages, races, religions, or even a particular person. 

An unbelievable night for UMass journalists. 

Oh yeah, there was also the debate. The town hall style seemed to play better for McCain, but he was unable to deliver a knockout blow. Polls will still have Obama leading by a few points at night’s end.