Did You Know.....

[Warph]

..... that George Washington was the first president under the US constitution of 1789. However, the US was an independent nation for 13 years before the Constitution was signed.

For one year during this time John Hanson served as "President of the US in Congress assembled." Technically, he was the first president of the United States.

Washington's vice president was John Adams, the first Vice President of the United States.

The Vice President of the United States has only two primary official duties: 1) to preside over the Senate and to cast tie-breaking votes there, 2) and to preside over and certify the official vote count of the United States Electoral College. The Vice President's salary is $400,000 per year.

This is a list of the current presidential line of succession, as specified by the United States Constitution and the Presidential Succession Act of 1947 as subsequently amended to include newly created cabinet offices.
# Office Current Officer

President of the United States Barack Obama (D)
1 Vice President of the United States Joe Biden (D)
2 Speaker of the House John Boehner (R)
3 President pro tempore of the Senate Daniel Inouye (D)
4 Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton (D)
5 Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner (I)
6 Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta (D)
7 Attorney General Eric Holder (D)
8 Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar (D)
9 Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack (D)
Secretary of Commerce Vacant (Acting U.S. Commerce Secretary is Rebecca Blank)
10 Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis (D)
11 Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius (D)
12 Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Shaun Donovan (D)
13 Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood (R)
14 Secretary of Energy Steven Chu (D)
15 Secretary of Education Arne Duncan (D)
16 Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric Shinseki*
17 Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano (D)

[W. Gray]

George Washington was the eighth president considering that John Hanson was followed by six others.

[srkruzich]

Warph the VP's salary is 230,000 a year, the presidents salary is 400,000 a year

[Warph]

Warph the VP's salary is 230,000 a year, the presidents salary is 400,000 a year

Yep, you're right.  Joe Biden's first term will pay $227,300 a year, and will be adjusted after that for further changes in living expenses.  It is about half of the President's pay.  Benefits with the Vice Presidency don't actually exist, but the veep is eligible for a Congressional pension program if he serves for 5 years or more... ( lets hope that never happens) ...based on his role as President of the Senate.

[W. Gray]

Biden has served for about 40 years in the government already so he will be getting a government pension based on his high 3 years of salary.

[Warph]

....that Papua New Guinea occupies the eastern half of the island of New Guinea, in Oceana.  It has a population of roughly six and a half million and is the home to hundreds of different ethic groups and, with over 800 recognized languages, paces the world. One of the groups indigenous to Papua New Guinea is the Fore (pronounce "for-ay"), a 20,000 person-strong people who, before the 1950s, were almost entirely insular.  And soon after the Fore began having contact with the outside world, they began to die in extraordinary numbers.  But unlike other cases where outsiders bring with them diseases or pathogens which the previously isolated people cannot resist, in this case, the Fore were killing themselves.

The Fore people had, unfortunately, discovered the disease "kuru" -- a disease which, much like the loosely related mad cow disease -- is a progressive disease which attacks and destroys the brain and nervous system. While its initial cause is unknown, we now believe that it is spread via cannibalism -- a custom then common among the Fore but now forbidden.  After the death of someone else in the community, the surviving kin would dismember the deceased's body and harvest whatever fat was left on the corpse, which was seen as particularly "good" as it resembled pork.  Other organs -- including the deceased's brain -- were also eaten.  Altogether, these practices are the most likely reason kuru -- a disease which the Fore call "the laughing death" -- spread throughout the Fore people, killing roughly 1,000 of them (at the time, as much as 10% of their total population) in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

Given the grisly details as to the transmission of kuru, it may seem odd that the kuru adopted "the laughing death" as a moniker for the affliction. For that, one needs to look to the symptoms.  First, the victim begins to noticeably lose control over some motor function, including slurred speech. Then, kuru robs its victim of ambulation and, as a double whammy, causes a wave of depression to strike.  But -- as an odd, sinister twist -- kuru then does something to its victim's brain to make the inexplicable funny, for when those afflicted with kuru hit this second stage, they also laugh without cause, explanation, or even recollection of such laughter.  This laughing part only subsides when the third, brief phase strikes, one marked by a total loss of muscle control, massive susceptibility to infection, the inability to eat, and as a result, death.  There is no cure.

And amazingly, kuru is still around. While kuru numbers declined rapidly after the Fore stopped their cannibalism tradition, it nonetheless lingers due to an extraordinarily long incubation period.  While most cases become symptomatic within a few years (if not much sooner), kuru has been known to sit idly within an infected person's body for over fifty years.


Bonus fact:  Another horrible way to go?  Fatal familial insomnia fits the bill. It is a genetic disorder which is extraordinarily rare -- only forty families have ever been known to exhibit it.  The onset of symptoms begin after age 35 and typically not until around 50, when for about four months, the person has an ongoing bout of insomnia, leading to panic attacks and sometimes paranoia.  Then, for about five months, the patient sleeps even less, and begins to hallucinate.  Then, the person becomes entirely unable to sleep, spiralling into dementia and soon after, death.  From first symptoms to death may take as long as 18 months.

[Warph]

.... that Chuck Norris was originally cast as Luke Skywalker in the Star Wars movie series, but quit after he was told he was not allowed use his beard as a shield because it didn't look realistic.  Problems also arose after Norris used the "force", because the women on set reportedly "couldn't sit for a week."  Norris defended his behavior by stating, "I know no other way."  Chuck did play an important role in the movie, however.  The Death Star was an exact replica of Norris' left testicle.

More Chuck Norris Facts:  http://www.chucknorrisfacts.com/

---------

....that There are, world-wide, only about 13 million Jews.... a number totaling less than half the population of Saudi Arabia or about 18% of Iran's.   Roughly 5.5 million live in Israel, with most (as many as 3 million) located near Tel Aviv.  Another 2 million live in the New York City area.   And exactly one Jewish person -- Zablon Simintov, age 51 or 52... lives in the entire nation of Afghanistan.

In 1948, when the State of Israel declared its independence, the Afghani Jewish population numbered roughly 5,000.  But the Soviet invasion in 1979 lead to a mass migration, mostly to Israel, Pakistan, and the United States.  By the time the Taliban came to power in the late 1990s, only two Jews  (Simintov and a man named Ishaq Levin) lived in the nation.   The two, together (but in separate rooms), lived in the ruins of the last remaining synagogue in Kabul starting in or around 1998, but quickly had a falling out: Simintov suggested that Levin, then in his late 70s, move to Israel, to escape the bitter cold weather in Kabul.  Levin took it as an affront, the two quarreled, and each reported the other to the Taliban for various alleged wrongdoings.  Each ended up imprisoned by the Taliban.  Even after Levin's death, Simintov was not willing to forgive upon finding Levin's body on the synagogue floor, he told the Washington Post that he would not miss Levin.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A39702-2005Jan26.html

Practicing Judaism is, understandably, quite difficult for Simintov.  Because he's the only Jew around, keeping kosher requires that he perform the rituals typically performed by specialists (e.g. shechita, the ritual slaughter).  And in almost all regards, especially since the Taliban shut down his carpet trading business, he is reliant on the donations of others, both within the Kabul area and around the world.

Simintov's wife and daughters live in Israel, and he may join them one day, as he stated in an interview with Al Jazeera English (video link).  But for now, he remains the last Jew in Afghanistan.



Bonus fact:  Observant Jews keep kosher, and probably the most visible rule of kashrut requires that observers refrain from eating pork products.  This is also true of observant Muslims, who follow a similar set of dietary laws (halal) which outlaws pork.  In Afghanistan, pork and pig products are outlawed across the board by the sectarian government, to the point where there is only one pig in the entire nation.... at the Kabul Zoo.  In 2009, due to swine flu fears of visitors (even though the zoo noted they were irrational), the pig was quarantined.

[Warph]

.... that the US Census Bureau reported that the 6 billionth person was born at 1.24am on Sunday July 18, 1999. The United Nations however, had set that landmark at October 12, 1999.

Every second 5 people are born and 2 people die, a net gain of 3 people. At this rate, the world population will double every 40 years and would be 12 billion in 40 years, 24 billion in 80 years, and more than 48 billion in 120 years. However the United Nations estimate that world population will stabilize at 12 billion in 120 years, citing that effective family planning will result in a universally low birth rate. Education plays a key role: almost half of the 6 billion people are under age 25.

At the beginning of the second millennium (1000 AD) the world population was 400 million. In 1750 there were about 800 million people in the world. In 1850 there were a billion more, and by 1950, another billion. Then it took just 50 years to double to 6 billion. In another 50 years the world population is expected to be 9 billion, which means that a decrease in growth of the world population is expected.

The recent global population explosion is not only the consequence of increased birth rates but also the result of an unprecedented decrease in death rate. Significant advances in public health and medicine, phenomenal agricultural yields and the expanding global economy contributed to the population explosion as the lifespan average continues to increase.

Only one in ten people lived in cities in 1900. By 1994 the figure had grown to one of every two people, creating megalopolies of millions to tens of millions inhabitants. More than 400 cities have a population of more than a million people. Managing such large cities, and better management of the planet's resources, could become the most difficult problem of this century.

In spite of the population increase and desertification, famines have actually become less frequent in the past 200 years. The famines in Africa seen on TV are due to the political strife and civil wars (see current conflicts between countries) that disorganize the economy, paralyze transportation, and prevent emergency food drops. In fact, out of the 40 poorest and hungriest nations on earth, 36 actually export food to richer countries.

Every day 200 million couples make love, 400,000 babies are born, and
140,000 people die, 25,000 because of Starvation.


Bonus Fact:  About 25,000 people die every day of hunger or hunger-related causes, according to the United Nations. This is one person every three and a half seconds, as you can see on this display. Unfortunately, it is children who die most often.

http://poverty.com/

[Warph]

.....the only place in the universe where a flag flies all day, never goes up or comes down, never flies half-mast and does not get saluted, is the moon. It is, of course, the American Flag.

We're the only country to have landed people on the moon even though British Interplanetary Society engineers had in 1939 designed a ship to carry people to the moon. Since Apollo 11 landed on moon on July 20, 1969 until 1972, 12 American astronauts walked on the moon, spending 170 hours roaming over 60 miles (100 km), planting 6 flags in total. They brought home 880 pounds (400 kilograms) of soil and rock, and 30,000 photographs.

The six American flags on the moon were planted during the missions of Apollo 11,12,14,15,16,and 17. The flags of the European Union, Russia, and India are also on the moon but they are displayed on equipment or probes.

The first landing of the moon is celebrated in the festival of Evoloterra on July 20th.


Last man on the moon
The Apollo 17 crew were the last men on the moon. With Ronald Evans in the command module, Commander Eugene Cernan and scientist Harrison H. Schmitt drove 34 km (21 miles) in the lunar buggy. On December 11, 1972 they left behind a plaque that reads: "Here Man completed his first exploration of the Moon, December 1972 A.D. May the spirit of peace in which we came be reflected in the lives of all mankind." Cernan was the last man to have set foot on another celestial body.


Last words spoken on the moon
The first words spoken on the moon, by Neil Armstrong, are well known, but what were the last words spoken from the moon?

"America's challenge of today has forged man's destiny of tomorrow." – Commander Eugene Cernan, Apollo 17 Mission, December 11, 1972.

Just in case you forgot Neil Armstrong's words (when he stepped onto the moon surface with his left foot first): "One small step for man. One giant leap for mankind." On returning to Earth, he explained that he thought he had said "one small step for a man."


Who owns the moon?
Planting a flag on the moon does not mean owning it or any part of it. The United Nations Outer Space Treaty (long name: Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, Including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies) of January 27, 1967 states that "outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty, by means of occupation, or by any other means."

Video : Apollo 17 – Last men on the moon

[Warph]

....that Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch is a village and community on the island of Anglesey in Wales.  The long form of the name is the longest officially recognized place name in the United Kingdom and one of the longest in the world, being 58 letters in length (51 letters in the Welsh alphabet, where "ch", "ng" and "ll" count as single letters).

The name means: St Mary's Church (Llanfair) in the hollow (pwll) of the white hazel (gwyngyll) near (goger) the rapid whirlpool (y chwyrndrobwll) and the church of St Tysilio (llantysilio) by the red cave ([a]g ogo goch). 

This village was originally known as Llanfair Pwllgwyngyll (and is sometimes still referred to as Llanfairpwllgwyngyll) and was given its long name in the 19th century in an attempt to develop the village as a commercial and tourist center. and According to the 2001 census, the population of the community is 3,040.   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Llanfairpwllgwyngyll