by the University of Michigan

ANN ARBOR, Mich.— Trailing like a serpent’s spine along the western coast of South America, the Andes are the world’s longest continental mountain range and the highest range outside Asia.

Correct? With an average elevation of 13,000 feet. The question of how quickly they attained such heights has been a contentious one in geological circles, with some researchers claiming the central Andes rose abruptly to nearly their current height and others maintaining the uplift was a more gradual process.

New research by U-M paleoclimatologist Christopher Poulsen and colleagues suggests that the quick-rise view is based on misinterpreted evidence. What some geologists interpret as signs of an abrupt rise are actually indications of ancient climate change, the researchers say. Their findings were published online April 1 in Science Express.

The confusion results when ratios of oxygen’s two main isotopes, oxygen-18 and oxygen-16, are used to estimate past elevation, said Poulsen, an associate professor with appointments in the departments of Geological Sciences and Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Space Sciences.

“In the modern climate, there is a well-known inverse relationship between oxygen isotopic values in rain and elevation,” Poulsen said. “As a rain cloud ascends a mountain range, it begins to precipitate. Because oxygen-18 is more massive than oxygen-16, it is preferentially rained out.

Thus, as you go up the mountain, the precipitation becomes more and more depleted in oxygen-18, and the ratio of oxygen-18 to oxygen-16 decreases.”

Geologists use the ratio of these isotopes, preserved in rock, to infer past elevations.

“If the ratio decreases with time, as the samples get younger, the interpretation would typically be that there has been an increase in elevation,” Poulsen said. In fact, that’s exactly the conclusion of a series of papers on the uplift history of the Andes published over the past four years. Using oxygen isotopes in carbonate rocks, the authors posited that the central Andes rose about 8,200 to 11,500 feet in three million years, ­rather than gaining height over tens of millions of years, as other geologists believe.

But elevation isn’t the only factor that affects oxygen isotope ratios in rain, Poulsen said. “It can also be affected by where the vapor came from and how much it rained—more intense rainfall also causes oxygen-18 to be preferentially rained out.” Skeptical of the rapid-rise scenario, he and his colleagues performed mathematical modeling experiments to address the issue.

“The key result in our modeling study is that we identified an elevation threshold for rainfall,” Poulsen said. “Once the Andes reached an elevation greater than 70 percent of the current elevation, the precipitation rate abruptly increased. In our model, the increased precipitation also caused the ratio of oxygen-18 to oxygen-16 to significantly decrease. Our conclusion, then, is that geologists have misinterpreted the isotopic records in the central Andes. The decrease in the ratio is not recording an increase in elevation; it is recording an increase in rainfall.”

This conclusion is backed up by geochemical and sedimentological data, Poulsen said. “There is evidence that the central Andes became less arid at the same time that the isotope records show a decrease in the ratio of oxygen-18 to oxygen-16.”

Poulsen’s coauthors are Todd Ehlers of the University of Tuebingen in Germany and U-M graduate student Nadja Insel.

por Pravda.ru

Vladimir Putin

The tangible results of the visit of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to Latin America were, in a word, massive, the first concrete step in laying the cornerstone of a new geopolitical order based on multilateral values, a New World Order which spells a clear message to the U.S.A.: either you are with us, or against us.

The much-heralded visit of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to Venezuela this weekend was far more than a continuation of the excellent ties between the socially progressive Latin American growing giant of Hugo Chávez and the Russian Federation – Bolivia’s President Evo Morales was also present.

The scope of the bilateral agreements signed was massive and indicates that Moscow has huge potential in overtaking Washington as the main trading partner for this continent, where Russia is regarded with respect and the United States of America is considered by many as a pariah, in part due to its cruel and inhumane stance against Cuba and in part because of the history of its relations with its neighbors to the south.

Tremendous range of bilateral agreements spells new age of bilateral relations Russia-Latin America

The tremendous range of agreements signed primarily between Russia and Venezuela spells a clear message that Moscow is in this continent to stay: oil, defense, nuclear power, agriculture, education, fishing, infrastructure, transportation, healthcare.

Oil

As regards the petroleum industry, an agreement was signed last Friday which set up a joint stock company (PDVSA of Venezuela and a Russian consortium composed of Rosneft, Lukoil, TNK-BP, Gazprom and Surgutneftgaz) to operate the field June 6, while the option remains open to widen the bilateral cooperation to three other fields in the Orinoco strip.

The original prediction is a production of 40,000 b/d. Under the same agreement, the Ayacucho-3 and Junin-3 fields will be developed.

­Defense

The United States of America’s self-imposed blockade of Venezuela damages Washington and those states which agree to pander to Washington’s dictates, namely Brazil, whose President Lula told Hugo Chávez that the Supertucano contract with Embraer was off, due to pressure from the U.S.A. As Vladimir Putin stated (causing Hugo Chávez to laugh) “It is good that the U.S.A. does not wish to sell”.

The last four Mi-17 helicopters have been delivered, completing the deal signed in 2006 for 38 aircraft, part of a deal which began in 2004, namely for 24 Sukhoi-30 fighters, 53 transport helicopters and 100,000 AK 103 guns.

(This article was first published in Pravda.ru).

by Shayla Selva

A sea of people, mostly dressed in white, paraded March 27 through the streets of Los Angeles in the lucha, or struggle, for justice and immigration reform. U.S. flags were raised high while participants in cars between the closed-off streets honked. Hands stretched out from windows in abandoned high buildings to let the marchers know they were not alone.

The movement to declare justice and rights for immigrants began with a chant that roared, “A unified community will never be defeated.”

Organizations including the Coalition for Human Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles (CHIRLA) and the Laborers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA) came to support more than 10,000 participants, declaring their support of the message: “No More Separation of Families.”

Many had stories and causes to share, from better treatment of immigrants to improved working conditions and access to driver’s licenses.

“We ask President Barack Obama to stop the human raids,” said Mexican American Feliciano Gómez. “We can no longer see whether or not they are truly voting in their best interest of their families and constituents.”

Additionally, the NLC evaluated members of Congress in terms of their positions with respect to immigration law. The outcome of these evaluations may be important to the electorate during the November elections, it noted. An American Community Survey showed that 225 House districts had more than 50,000 immigrant-profile constituents during 2007-2009, but only 120 House members received pro-immigrant scores.

Within the House, 68.4 percent of representatives in districts with more than 50,000 Asian-American residents favored reform. This contrasts to 51.9 percent of representatives in districts with 50,000 or more Latino members and to 58.2 percent of representatives of districts with more than 50,000 foreign-born members.

These data should invite inquiries into the factors that create the differences between the relative strengths of non-white voices.

The NLC also recorded significant pro-immigrant legislation support variation between regions; 28 percent of senators from the South received pro-immigrant scores greater than 70 percent compared to 77 percent from the Northeast, 56 percent from the North-­west, and 50 percent from the Midwest. However, the South itself is far from homogenous in terms of proimmigrant support among representatives.

The South Atlantic region shows the highest levels of support with more than 50 percent of representatives achieving scores of 70 percent or better compared to 13 percent of the West South Central region and 0 percent of the East South Central region.

The statistical representation of these southern areas, which contain large numbers of Latinos, heavily contribute to the overall disconnect between the general population and members of congress. Hispanic Link.

­by CT News

Actor Edward Olmos greets math professor Jaime Escalante during the CYC’s Highest Office: Citizen Award in 2005. Mr. Escalante died on March 30.

A Declaration of American Rights is making waves across the nation and apparently State and Federal Government is very concerned. Notices are being sent to all 50 Governors offices in America demanding that America be restored to its original intention or officials face removal from office.

The declaration also included a Dejure Grand Jury Warrant.

Conspiring Times –Triggering heightened security at government offices and investigations by law enforcement, the Restore America Declaration is aimed at taking back God-given unalienable rights declared in the American Declaration of Independence and other founding documents. The Guardians of the free Republic are comprised of police, military and other citizen activists that believe America should not be under corporate or admiralty law and should self-govern.

CNN and other mainstream media outlets have been actively demonizing the group as “extremists” as well as the American people with commentary from Southern Poverty Law Center’s Mark Potok who is known for lumping radical neo-Nazi and hate groups in with legitimate activist groups who do not espouse hate to further leftist political agendas.

· Restore and reinhabit the de jure institutions of lawful government.

· Terminate illicit corporations posing as legitimate governments, in particular the territorial jurisdiction United States Federal Corporation (corp. ref. 28 U.S.C. 3002) posing as the de jure United States of America.

· Terminate all presumed powers of attorney to such corporations.

· End the foreclosure nightmare (for borrowing against one’s own credit).

· End tax prosecutions for resisting the transfer of private wealth to foreign banking cartels such as I.R.S. (former Puerto Rico Bureau of Taxation).

· End street assaults against the sovereign People for failing to exhibit a State-issued confession of subject-class citizenship.

· End all prosecutions which lack an injured party.

· End admiralty prosecutions for kidnapping and other heinous crimes against mankind as “commercial crimes” against the corporate State under a contrived corporate color-of-law venue (corp. ref. 27 C.F.R. 72.11).

· Terminate the intrusion of corporations posing as the state into every aspect of the 5People’s lives.

· End the use of covert contracts such as Form 1040, car registrations, birth certificate applications, and bank signature cards which confess the signer to be a legal fiction subject of the United States Federal Corporation (“U.S. person”) that has waved his/her rights in favor of state-issued privileges.

· End the use of deeds which classify the People as “tenants” on their own land, thereby transferring control to incorporated County registrars and tax assessors.

· End the perversion of marriage into a commercial system of state-issued privileges through the so-called “marriage license” whereby incorporated “courts” presume the “right” to trespass on families and kidnap children.

· End the hijacking of automobile ownership through DMV registrations which covertly exchange the divine rights of travel and ownership for the state-issued “privileges” of “driving” and “title.”

· In place of all of the above, substitute sovereign identification, diplomatic immunity and sovereign passports to facilitate safe passage throughout the world free from corporate State molestation and terror.

To read the rest of the article, the document is able to be viewed and downloaded in the bottom of the article at: ­http://conspiringtimes.com/news/?p=3151.