Phone hacking expands again

James Moore and Ian Burrell, The Independent of London:

The phone-hacking story took a new and dramatic turn yesterday as a former journalist on the Daily Mirror claimed that the practice was “endemic” at the newspaper during his time there and that he would be willing to testify to investigating authorities.

James Hipwell, 45, told The Independent that hacking at the Daily Mirror was widespread and “seen as a bit of a wheeze”. He said he would give evidence to a public inquiry into hacking ordered by David Cameron and headed by Lord Justice Brian Leveson.
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Hipwell told The Independent: “Piers [Morgan, of CNN] was extremely hands-on as an editor. He was on the [newsroom] floor every day, walking up and down behind journalists, looking over their shoulders. I can’t say 100 per cent that he knew about it. But it was inconceivable he didn’t.”

Deep thought for the day

DDay would do FDL an enormous service if he would not just write accurate, measured posts but if he would read the comments and correct the wild misunderstandings that people come up with based on half-heard, quarter-understood information.

Add cows, cut cars

It’s more complicated than that. But Judith Schwartz of The Guardian did a nice, easy-to-follow explanation of how proper livestock and range management can help actually reverse global warming.

When we consider our CO2 predicament, we tend to fault our love affair with the car and the fruits of industry. But the greater culprit has been agriculture…

So, how do we get that carbon out of the air and back into the soil? Some suggest placing calcium carbonate or charcoal (aka “biochar”) directly into agricultural soil (see “Black Is the New Green,” Conservation, Summer 2010). But a growing number of soil and agricultural scientists are also discussing a low-tech, counterintuitive approach to the problem that depends on a group of unlikely heroes: cows.
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Perhaps the most steadfast advocate of this future is Allan Savory. A 76-year-old native of Zimbabwe, Savory has the relaxed, weathered look of a lifelong outdoorsman … Cattle, he began to realize, could play—if properly managed—the crucial role in grassland ecology that used to be occupied by herds of wild herbivores. They could help prevent and even reverse land degradation and the desertification of grasslands
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Savory’s singular insight is that grasslands and herbivores evolved in lockstep with one another. This means that to be healthy, grasses need to be grazed.
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Friday Cat Blogging

Buddha kitteh sez “NOMMMMMMMM”.