A Yahoo News analysis of the 444 briefings through June 18 that Carney has held since becoming White House press secretary has identified 13 distinct strains in the way he dodges reporters' question. Since Carney held his first daily briefing with reporters in the White House Brady Press Briefing Room on Feb. 16, 2011, for example, he's used some variation of "I don't have the answer" more than 1,900 times. In 1,383 cases he referred a question to someone else. But will he at least speculate on hypotheticals? No. In fact, he has refused to do so 525 times.

Vol. 89
Vol. 88

Dr. Esserman and her colleagues address "overdiagnosis" --detection of  a tumor that if undetected would not become clinically apparent or cause death (especially if something else gets you first),  but is harmful (and costly) if "overtreated."  (e.g., breast, lung, prostate, and thyroid).

The goal, of course, is to preferentially detect consequential cancer and avoid detection of inconsequential disease.  Toward that end, it is proposed that screening should focus on tumors that will cause harm and are more likely to benefit from early discovery.  

Moreover, it is suggested that some conditions be renamed to exclude the word cancer so that patients might be less frightened and less apt to press for more tests and treatments.  

The idea may be a little premature--awaiting better ways to identify and confirm what is worrisome and what is not.  Predictions of which lesions will progress (too many) versus those less likely to do so (e.g. older patients) are far from precise.

   The United States intercepted electronic communications this week among senior operatives of Al Qaeda, in which the terrorists discussed attacks against American interests in the Middle East and North Africa, American officials said Friday...

    Some analysts and Congressional officials suggested Friday that emphasizing a terrorist threat now was a good way to divert attention from the uproar over the N.S.A.'s data-collection programs, and that if it showed the intercepts had uncovered a possible plot, even better.

Word is that new lyrics already are being written about this, to the tune of "I Bring You a Song" from the Bambi movie, for the Solidarity Singalong, now in its third week of arrests under Walker's new rules for the State Capitol that contradict the state constitution.

Pleas e keep that in mind.

The former director of the National Security Agency and the CIA speculated on Tuesday that hackers and transparency groups were likely to respond with cyber-terror attacks if the United States government apprehends whistleblower Edward Snowden.

"If and when our government grabs Edward Snowden, and brings him back here to the United States for trial, what does this group do?" said retired air force general Michael Hayden, who from 1999 to 2009 ran the NSA and then the CIA, referring to "nihilists, anarchists, activists, Lulzsec, Anonymous, twentysomethings who haven't talked to the opposite sex in five or six years".

"They may want to come after the US government, but frankly, you know, the dot-mil stuff is about the hardest target in the United States," Hayden said, using a shorthand for US military networks. "So if they can't create great harm to dot-mil, who are they going after? Who for them are the World Trade Centers? The World Trade Centers, as they were for al-Qaida."

Hayden provided his speculation during a speech on cybersecurity to a Washington group, the Bipartisan Policy Center, in which he confessed to being deliberately provocative.

In rebuke, Obama cancels Moscow summit with Putin

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- In a rare diplomatic rebuke, President Barack Obama on Wednesday canceled his Moscow summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The decision reflected both U.S. anger over Russia's harboring of National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden and growing frustration within the Obama administration over what it sees as Moscow's stubbornness on other key issues, including missile defense and human rights.

Obama will still attend the Group of 20 economic summit in St. Petersburg, Russia, but a top White House official said the president had no plans to hold one-on-one talks with Putin while there. Instead of visiting Putin in Moscow, the president will add a stop in Sweden to his early September travel itinerary. link

Vol. 90
Vol. 89

Happy humpday, my friends. Enjoy the toons, pass them on, subscribe, whatever. Peace.

Dear lady is a wire live
A buzz akin to bees & hive

Dear lady is a bolt of earth
Of Flesh made nerves in dirt and mirth

Dear lady is my mind and heart
The never end to never part

I lived a life of strictly leisure and romance for 19 days, and it was everything I thought it would be!  Nothing to do but start squirelling away the cashish for the next great escape from reality...or start robbing banks!

Manning's max possible sentence cut to 90 years

...the judge, Army Col. Denise Lind, found during his sentencing hearing Tuesday that a number of the charges refer to the same actions and therefore were duplicative for sentencing purposes.

Federal authorities investigating the deadly attack on the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi have filed charges against Ahmed Abu Khattalah, leader of a Libyan militia that officials believe was involved in the assault, people briefed on the investigation said. The charges under seal are the first criminal counts to emerge from the probe.

The investigation of the attack last September 11 that killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three others continues, these people said, as investigators try to build their case against Khattalah and others who authorities believe were involved.