LAS VEGAS — After a likely second-place finish in the Nevada caucuses Saturday, former House speaker Newt Gingrich sought to dispel the idea that he might drop out of the Republican presidential nomination any time soon, promising a hotel ballroom filled with reporters that he will fight on to the convention in the summer. Read full article > >

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Gingrich vows to fight on to the convention

The retired accounting professor who runs the city council of the Libyan rebel capital wants you to know: “There is good news in Benghazi!” Just ignore the smell. “Electricity, benzene, water, gas — all okay. No rockets, no fighting — all okay. Sewage? Big headache. But all in all, we are amazed,” said Saad Elferjani, who compared his city — in the most favorable way possible — to a roach motel. “You remember the advertisement?” he said. “ ‘You can check in, but you can’t check out.’ That is us.” Read full article > >

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Benghazi doing better than Tripoli, rebels say

Federal authorities are using words uttered by the co-founder of a radical Islamic group to charge him with threats against the creators of “South Park.”

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Radical charged in ‘South Park’ case

Are you a disaffected journalist, wary of conventional media companies and worn down from the perpetual limbo of freelancing? Facebook may have just the job for you. The social network recently announced the new position of  Journalist Program Manager  on their media partnerships team, whose role will be to “utilize both partnership and program management skills to help journalists understand the value of using Facebook, get started, and use it effectively over time.” The current listed responsibilities of the job include: Lead development of strategic programs and projects which help journalists use Facebook progressively as a reporting and distribution tool  Identify and document best practices for journalists, including creating content and case studies  Speak at industry conferences and partner events related to journalism and social media Counsel individual journalists on how to use Facebook  Provide hands on leadership of cross-functional projects to engage journalists in conjunction with the partnership and marketing teams  Serve as an advocate for journalists within Facebook, and identify new product and partnership opportunities  Develop relationships with key industry and academic institutions with journalism programs The new position seems fairly blase on the surface, but it represents more than an organizational reshuffling. Facebook has been working closely with media companies since the launch of their  Facebook + Media  program last summer, helping brands leverage the social network’s massive sharing infrastructure to spur growth in audience and traffic, increase engagement and gain valuable customer insights. As I wrote in December, Facebook is in the business of  media infrastructure : the company has managed to build a system highly attractive to advertisers and marketers without producing original content itself. Other “Internet portals” like Yahoo and AOL (and  even Google ) have experimented with producing their own media, but Facebook has been happy to stay out of the content game. Instead of simply providing services to larger media companies, Facebook is now retooling to assist individual journalists as a reporting tool. “Last summer we announced new efforts focused on helping media organizations make their products more social,” said Andrew Noyes, Facebook’s manager of public policy communications and a former journalist himself. “In addition to working with media organizations, we’re also committed to working with journalists to provide them with the platform they need to engage with their readers and advance their stories through social tools. Journalists have always listened to the people in their communities and brought together their collective voice by telling their stories. Facebook makes it possible to bring this practice online, and make it faster, more accessible and more efficient.” Facebook isn’t looking to change the way journalists operate, but build on the current convergence of social media and reporting. “We’ve already seen amazing examples of how Facebook can be used in the reporting process from the  Basetrack photographers  and  Ian Shapira ‘s Washington Post story, ‘A mother’s joy and a family’s sorrow,’ and in engaging with readers from NPR’s  Andy Carvin  and the New York Times ‘  Nicholas Kristof ,” Noyes said. “We’re only just beginning to see what’s possible with social journalism, as innovative reporters are telling stories and reaching their audiences through Facebook Platform (apps, plugins, open graph, login) and Facebook products and features (Pages and status updates).” In light of the role Facebook and Twitter played as essential reporting tools amid the unrest in the Middle East, Facebook’s journo-centric approach may prove a serious boom for conflict reporters and beyond. The deal will benefit Facebook, too: if the familiar trope of “the medium is the message” remains true (and, like most cliches, it does), Facebook will be able to establish itself as a crucial component of narrative journalism without having to produce a single scrap of original content.

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Facebook Adds Reporting Tools, Seeks Journalist Program Manager

Since the 1969 coup that overthrew the unpopular pro-Western monarchy of King Idris, Libya has been ruled by Col. Muammar Gaddafi (also spelled Qaddafi, Gadhafi, Khaddafi and other transliterations). Though long considered emotionally unstable, he was also considered politically stable, destined to maintain his iron grip on the country until he died a natural death. Now, even as he unleashes extreme and sometimes lethal violence against the growing pro-democracy uprising,

Sarah Palin has called the post-Tucson campaign of vilification against her and her fellow travelers a “blood libel.” On the one hand, this is unfortunate, as Jonah Goldberg points out , because it threatens to redefine the phrase, plus, what is happening to her is not precisely the byproduct of a blood libel. On the other hand, Sarah Palin  is such an important political and cultural figure that her use of the term “blood libel” should introduce this very important historical phenomenon to a wide audience, and the ensuing discussion — about how Fox News is not actually Mendel Beilis — will serve to enlighten and inform. It is a moral necessity, I think, for Christians to understand the blood libel (Muslims, too — see the Damascus Blood Libel of 1840 ), not only because it is part of their history, but because the blood libel still has modern ramifications — Israel, after all, was founded as a reaction to Christian hatred, of which the blood libel was an obvious and murderous manifestation. I mean it sincerely when I say I hope Sarah Palin, who regularly expresses love for Jews and Israel, takes the time to learn about the history of the blood libel, and shares what she has learned with her many admirers.

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Why Sarah Palin’s Use of ‘Blood Libel’ Is a Great Thing

The very last roll of Kodachrome film will be delivered today in Parsons, Kansas. Kodak has slowly phased out the materials needed to make and develop the film. Only a single operation in the world — Dwayne’s Photo in Parsons — had continued to develop Kodachrome. First introduced in 1935, the death of the film stock has generated an outpouring of emotion from several generations of photographers, for whom the particular hues generated by Kodachrome define the look of midcentury America. As much as I love digital cameras and tools that allow you to mimic the old film stocks like Hipstamatic and Instagram , there is just something special about the way Kodachrome captures light. To remind you of what these photos look like, we’ve assembled a gallery of the best Kodachrome photographs we could find. To point out that Kodachrome could be used for motion pictures, too, we’ve included a promotional film from the Florida State Archives above. (It’s amazing.) And if I can be permitted one moment of philosophizing before you click through all the beautiful pictures, it’s worth reflecting that it took 75 years for the first successful color film to actually exit the market. On the rare occasions when technologies actually die, they go slowly and leave much behind. Update: This article originally stated that the last roll of Kodachrome would be developed today — as per Dwayne’s site — but Erin McCann pointed out that it actually takes some time to develop the rolls, and they were still taking deliveries today. So it may be a few days yet before the machines are turned off. Please use a JavaScript-enabled device to view this slideshow

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Gallery: Kodachrome Is Dead, Long Live Kodachrome

Canongate has refused to confirm this story, but several outlets have picked up on it since yesterday afternoon: Everyone’s favorite WikiLeaker — and alleged rapist — Julian Assange, has sold his memoirs. It’s expected that they will be published sometime in 2011, with a first draft from Assange due to his editor by March. Canongate publisher Jamie Byng confirmed the news to DailyFinance by email, adding that the U.K. publisher was handling all translation rights. (A spokesperson for Knopf was on vacation and didn’t return request for comment.) Caroline Michel of the U.K.-based literary agency Fraser, Peters & Dunlop brokered the English-language book deals, and both publishers expect Assange to deliver a finished manuscript by March, with plans to publish later in 2011. Interest in Assange is at fever pitch since WikiLeaks began disseminating more than 250,000 diplomatic cables in late November. Companies such as Visa ( V ), Amazon ( AMZN ) and PayPal have cut off the organization’s ability to collect donations and existing funds, and Time magazine passed over Assange for Person of the Year, giving Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg the honor. As a result, a memoir from Assange is a logical step, since the book will have great interest for his many admirers — and just as many detractors. Read the full story at the AOL’s DailyFinance .

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Julian Assange: The Memoirs

One of the oldest programming languages, COBOL (COmmon Business-Oriented Language) turned 50 this past week. On December 6, 1960, COBOL was first used on two different makes of computers, proving that compatibility across systems could be achieved. To celebrate the anniversary, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History built out a new section of their website dedicated to documenting the language’s history; a related exhibit will open at the museum this spring. “Written initially for the short range, COBOL proved so useful that it dominated much of government and business data processing for decades,” the new website explains. “Millions of banking transactions are still processed daily with COBOL programs. As the use of common programming languages became standard, a flourishing independent computer software industry emerged.” While this seems a topic that the National Museum of American History would highlight anyway, they have a particularly interesting entry point with COBOL. When it was first developed, a young file clerk learned of the language and decided to become expert in it. Joan Nichols worked as a programmer for forty years before donating her time as a volunteer with the Smithsonian. Her archive is the foundation on which this new exhibit will be built. This post was originally published on the National Museum of American History’s  “O Say Can You See?” blog . It is republished here with permission. It was written by Peggy A. Kidwell, the museum’s curator of mathematics. See more posts about the Smithsonian . 50 Years of Running COBOL COBOL, a COmmon Business-Oriented Language, was proposed by a committee of programmers from business and government in 1959 and successfully demonstrated in 1960, 50 years ago. The National Museum of American History has just launched a website relating to the  early days of COBOL , and a related exhibit case opens this spring. Officially, the reason for paying attention to COBOL is that it was one of the first computer programming languages to run on more than one brand of computer. The test programs not only ran at RCA, but on a computer of another manufacturer of the time, Remington Rand Univac. COBOL came to be widely used in banking, government and industry. It featured commands written to resemble ordinary English, rather than the lines of machine code that made up many earlier programs. Unofficially, the reason for this display is COBOL programmer and former Smithsonian volunteer Joan Nichols. As a student, Ms. Nichols had never heard of programming. After graduating from Indiana University in 1952, she took a job as a file clerk at National Supply Company in Pittsburgh. She rose steadily through the clerical ranks and then heard that the company was giving selected employees aptitude tests for a new kind of job. She persuaded her boss to let her take the tests, did well, and soon was learning how to program an IBM computer. It was immense fun for Ms. Nichols. She moved on to Mellon Bank, learned COBOL when it came out, and then went on to work for the federal government. The committee that wrote COBOL was told to get a language running quickly. Other groups were supposed to write business-oriented languages for the long haul. In fact, Ms. Nichols and other programmers used COBOL for decades. After forty years of programming, she retired and offered to help out at the museum. She cheerfully prepared a listing of many computer-related documents, including the test program shown in the first photograph. Because of her work, we knew that the museum had strong holdings relating to COBOL and could find them easily. Joan Nichols has now left the Washington, DC, area. However, as with many who have contributed countless hours to the Smithsonian over the years, her legacy endures. To learn more, see: http://americanhistory.si.edu/cobol . Peggy A. Kidwell is Curator of Mathematics at the National Museum of American History. Images: 1. Printout from the COBOL test programs run December 6, 1960 at RCA; 2. Programmers at the Console of a UNIVAC I, with Unityper and Tape Drives; 3. Programmers at the Console of a UNIVAC I.

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Smithsonian Celebrates COBOL’s 50th Anniversary With New Site

Daniel Sarewitz looks at the gap in political ID among scientists, only 6 percent of whom ID as Republican, according to a recent survey: The results of climate science, delivered by scientists who are overwhelmingly Democratic, are used over a period of decades to advance a political agenda that happens to align precisely with the ideological preferences of Democrats. Coincidence–or causation? Now this would be a good case for Mythbusters.  During the Bush administration, Democrats discovered that they could score political points by accusing Bush of being anti-science. In the process, they seem to have convinced themselves that they are the keepers of the Enlightenment spirit, and that those who disagree with them on issues like climate change are fundamentally irrational. Meanwhile, many Republicans have come to believe that mainstream science is corrupted by ideology and amounts to no more than politics by another name.  Attracted to fringe scientists like the small and vocal group of climate skeptics, Republicans appear to be alienated from a mainstream scientific community that by and large doesn’t share their political beliefs. The climate debacle is only the most conspicuous example of these debilitating tendencies, which play out in issues as diverse as nuclear waste disposal, protection of endangered species, and regulation of pharmaceuticals. I don’t know. I think this is also a reflection of the fact that American conservatism is increasingly a movement of white Christian populism. And specifically, a kind of white Christian populism with deep roots in the South. Science is very much the preserve of the institutions of higher education where “the elites” plot the subjugation of the common man. Moreover, a trust in science necessitates a trust in “expertise,”  and a skepticism of “common sense.”  That basically runs counter to everything Sarah Palin represents.

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Weird Science

Goldblog reader Michael Rotberg sent along this photo, taken in a Charlotte, N.C. supermarket by a person named, of all things, Kristian Ring:

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Why I Love America, Part 86

Tony Blair revisits the arguments on Saddam’s WMD

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‘I may have been right’