The Hindsight Factor with Jay Daverth

We are talking about terrorist fist jabs now, yes?

Ohhh snap!

On his first day in office, President Obama put former president Bush on notice. His administration just released an executive order that will make it difficult for Bush to shield his White House records--and those of former Vice President Dick Cheney--from public scrutiny by invoking the doctrine of executive privilege. Shortly after taking office, Bush handed down his own executive order, amending the Presidential Records Act to give current and past presidents, along with their heirs, veto power over the release of presidential records, which are considered the property of the American people.

"[Obama]'s putting former presidents on notice that if you want to continue a claim of executive privilege that [Obama] doesn't think is well-placed, you're going to have to go to court," says Anne Weismann, the chief counsel for Citizens for Ethics and Responsibility in Washington (CREW).

Cowards and Thieves begone!!

President Obama yesterday eliminated the most controversial tools employed by his predecessor against terrorism suspects. With the stroke of his pen, he effectively declared an end to the "war on terror," as President George W. Bush had defined it, signaling to the world that the reach of the U.S. government in battling its enemies will not be limitless.

While Obama says he has no plans to diminish counterterrorism operations abroad, the notion that a president can circumvent long-standing U.S. laws simply by declaring war was halted by executive order in the Oval Office.

Key components of the secret structure developed under Bush are being swept away: The military's Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, facility, where the rights of habeas corpus and due process had been denied detainees, will close, and the CIA is now prohibited from maintaining its own overseas prisons. And in a broad swipe at the Bush administration's lawyers, Obama nullified every legal order and opinion on interrogations issued by any lawyer in the executive branch after Sept. 11, 2001.

It was a swift and sudden end to an era that was slowly drawing to a close anyway, as public sentiment grew against perceived abuses of government power.

Boo-yah!

As we look for ways to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels and find viable transportation alternatives to the internal combustion engine, many urbanites are turning to that staple of bipedal locomotion: the humble bicycle. While ridership is increasing every year, bicycle safety remains a huge issue: in 2007, 43,000 people were injured in bike accidents, resulting in 698 deaths. Though many cities are getting serious about making bike-friendly infrastructure changes, installing bike lanes is a costly porposition with a glacial pace of implementation.

Enter LightLane, a safety concept from the clever designers at Altitude, Inc. The system projects a virtual bike lane (using lasers!) on the ground around the cyclists, providing drivers with a recognizable boundary they can easily avoid. The idea is to allow riders to take safety into their own hands, rather than leaving it to the city.

Dublin, like most European cities, isn’t too bad when it comes to bike lanes, but the U.S. is still appallingly behind.  More aggravating given the monstrous road widths American motorists seem to demand.  I wonder how effective this would be during the daytime, but either way – kudos for one of the most brilliant ideas I’ve seen in weeks!

From the same people who brought you invisibility cloaks, say hello to flying cars and other floating oddities.

And if that doesn't tickle your geek bone (which, by the way, is connected to your ninja bone), check out the next generation of flying saucers. 

An Indian company is on their way to mass production of 3-D handheld devices by 2010.   Help me Obi-Wan, you're my only hope!

Recent archeological excavations have uncovered evidence of 27 additions to Asimov's 3 rules of robotics.  What dystopian future could survive without number 18 - A robot must be very careful when tickling a human being, because a robot does not know what it is like to be tickled, and therefore cannot safely apprehend when it is no longer funny and it starts to become cruel and number 24 - A robot must plant two trees for every cat it kills.

And finally, watch out Charlton Heston, the roomba tolls for thee!