The Lancet is no stranger to controversy. In fact it courts the worst kind of it - Political!

Perhaps its its high impact factor that nudges it and its left-leaning editor into taking up issues such as the Iraq war, but seriously, does it really serve its stated mission?

Advancing medicine, by delivering superior education, reference information and decision support tools to doctors, nurses, health practitioners and students.

Oh yeah.

The Lancet's history of serious wobbling started with its publication of a paper in 1998 which tried to link MMR Vaccine with Autism! The last I heard about it, the controversy is still on. The Jan 2006 scandal of the fabricated 'Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs and the risk of oral cancer: a nested case-control study' was enough for the Vancouver Guidelines to be updated with new guidelines and ethical consideration rules.

The 2004 Controversial estimate of Iraq war's death toll of Iraqis of the Lancet brought it into the mainstream glare of critical 'fact checking' crowd online...
And now, they come up with this:

"About 100,000 Iraqi civilians -- half of them women and children -- have died in Iraq since the invasion, mostly as a result of airstrikes by coalition forces, according to the first reliable study of the death toll from Iraqi and US public health experts. "

The Guadian discusses it and writes:

100,000 Iraqi civilians dead, says study
About 100,000 Iraqi civilians - half of them women and children - have died in Iraq since the invasion, mostly as a result of airstrikes by coalition forces, according to the first reliable study of the death toll from Iraqi and US public health experts.
The study, which was carried out in 33 randomly-chosen neighbourhoods of Iraq representative of the entire population, shows that violence is now the leading cause of death in Iraq. Before the invasion, most people died of heart attacks, stroke and chronic illness. The risk of a violent death is now 58 times higher than it was before the invasion.

Last night the Lancet medical journal fast-tracked the survey to publication on its website after rapid, but extensive peer review and editing because, said Lancet editor Richard Horton, "of its importance to the evolving security situation in Iraq". But the findings raised important questions also for the governments of the United Sates and Britain who, said Dr Horton in a commentary, "must have considered the likely effects of their actions for civilians".

In the early days following rathergate, RCox @ The National Debate posted why 'blogging' sux. While he whines about the term 'blogging', he focuses between the paragraphs to write about how journalists will always miss the real point about this phenomenon.

And so for the rest of the world this false designation of "bloggers" as some new, exotic species of writers is perpetuated and the game goes happily on.

Lost in all of this is the real "revolution" inherent in blogging that makes it inherently subversive. Blogging is not, as Jarvis or Hewitt might tell you, about "eveyone having a printing press". If that were the case then the "revolution" would have already happened with the advent of cheap photocopiers, ubiquitous fax machines, usenet groups, forums, or plain old web sites. What makes blogging distinctly powerful is that all those other forms of a "printing press" - or a radio or TV studio for that matter - required a seperate marketing and distribution component. Arthur Sulzberger may run The New York Times but if the Teamsters go on strike it will have less readers than the Beverly Hills Pennysaver. If you launch a new magazine and don't get shelf space at the grocery store or get your writers on TV don't expect a lot of pick up on next month's issue.

Blogs are distinctly powerful because they are content, marketing and distribution all rolled into one. The "news" value chain hasn't disappeared. It's been condensed. When a blogger writes a post he links to the source material for that post, often posts by other bloggers. The content in a post serves as "content" at the same time it is marketing the other blog ("hey, check out this blogger's post!") and the hyperlink embedded in the post can summon content from the other blog ("distribution"). McLuhan is still right, the medium is the message but with blogs the medium is also the messenger - and the delivery boy. The most widely read bloggers are not successful because they exert control over a complete value chain like "old media" - production, marketing, distribution - but because they are very strong in at least one part of the value chain.

Tom Coates of Plasticbag.org posted a piece on 11 August 2003 - like pickled cucumbers, makes reminiscence worth it.

Feral Children are those who were raised in the wild with no or negligible human contact. Isolation from Human society causes them to loose communication and language skills as well as social conduct.

Feral children who cross a certain age, say, 6 years may permanently loose their adoptation skills to learn a language and communicate properly.

Perhaps Rudyard Kipling's MOGLI is the most famous frictional Feral Child and the inspiration behind another frictional hero, Tarzan, but India is really a home to a number of rare feral children.

One such feral child pair were Kamala and Amala who were raised by a she-wolf.
Theirs' is a heart-rendering story that won't fail to move you.
Read it here

AP tells in so little words that Terrorism in India really does not matter much. It seems to give out the idea that it supports Pakistani stance that all terrorism in India is either just freedom fighting or self-inflicted drama by Indian intelligence agencies.
In its list of Recent Terror Attacks Around the World, There is not a single mention of any terrorist attack on Indian soil, including the Akshardam Temple Attack or the Parliament Attack. Now, this is what is called Media impartiality!! or the definition of Outrageousness

Pakistanis bug their best friend and most honoured guest, the Saudi Crown Prince, Abdullah's room.
Now, that is nothing to be suprised of, given Pakistanis' mentality and Islamic traditions of being the perfect hypocrites whenever their interests seem to require it. The Saudis understand it far better than any other, for wearers of the same shoe know where it bites.The interesting bit is that despite the fact that Saudis, who are not acutely known for their intelligence capabilities, could so easily find those bugs and render them harmless throws up a prepositions that the ISI is imcompetent to have suitablity, creatively and successfully hidden all those bugs, give the recent nanotechnology advances and capabilities such advanced scientific fields can provide secret agencies with.
Link to the Story @ Newindpress.com

Truth has won a believer today: A leading British Parliamentarian says He is 'Completely Convinced' of Pakistan's active terrorism in J&K.
NEW DELHI: A leading British parliamentarian says he is "completely convinced" after a visit to Jammu and Kashmir that Pakistan is actively supporting cross-border terrorism in the strategic border state.
"I came here a little sceptical of the claim that Pakistan is actively supporting cross-border infiltration, terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir. I thought probably they were turning a blind eye rather than actually encouraging terrorism.
I am going back completely convinced that the Pakistani authorities are actively engaged in supporting cross- border terrorism in a deeply, profound way," Peter Luff, assistant chief of the Conservative Party in the House of Commons, told IANS in an interview here.

Source