Kaila, Blake, Tyler and dozens more of you on our Facebook page said the NFL needs to get the real referees1 back. Done. A crew of regular officials, one with 70 combined seasons of experience, were set to work last night’s Browns-Ravens game. That happened after the league temporarily lifted its lockout against the officials. The lockout started when the NFL and its referees couldn’t agree on the terms of a new contract. The league hired replacement2 refs from lower levels of college football and high school. The replacements3 were criticized for mistakes and blown calls, and then on Monday night, on the last play of the game, two refs made opposite calls in the in-zone. One said touchdown the other interception4. 48 hours later the NFL reached a deal with the regular officials. It still has to be approved. When it is, that’s when the lockout will officially be over.
The
Untied5 Nations General Assembly, it’s going on all week at the UN headquarters in New York City. The assembly has heard speeches from some of the leaders of the 193 countries that are members of the U.N.
This isn’t one of those leaders, but he wants to be. It’s Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority. Right now, Palestinians are considered a permanent observer at the UN. The group is hoping to eventually become a full member, but in order to do that, Palestine would have to be recognized as an independent country. That’s something President Abbas says Israel isn’t willing to do. That’s part of the conflict between Palestinians and Israel. This is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He
spoke6 at the UN yesterday too, after President Abbas’s speech. He said the two sides need to sit down and negotiate together in order to solve their differences. But he said part of that
negotiation7 would be for Palestinians to recognize Israel as a
legitimate8 nation.
See if you can ID me. I’m a process of giving off energy in waves or particles. I’m used in some medical treatments, and I’m also transmitted by microwaves, TVs and radios. I’m radiation. From a Latin word that means "beam of light."
Cell phones give off radiation as well. You might have heard some questions or maybe you have some of your own, about how safe it is to hold one of these things up next to your head when it’s giving off these energy waves, when it’s giving off radiation. And so far, studies haven’t shown a consistent link between cell phones and cancer. But Dr. Sanjay Gupta runs through some of the reasons why people are concerned about this, and he offers some tips on how to cut down on these energy waves.
We’ve only been using cell phones regularly in this country since 1996, and that’s important because research takes time. It can take decades to actually get answers, so when you hear that we know that they are 100 percent safe, we actually don’t know.
We’re talking about something known as non-ionizing radiation. That’s different than what comes out of a an X-ray machine, for example, which is ionizing radiation.
What allowed the scientists will use to describe it, they are saying it’s sort of causes a heating up of the brain, much like an egg, for example, that’s being cooked. So we don’t know how long it takes to actually get those effects, but we know people use their cell phones more than ever; we know that they start at a very young age, and some people keep some source of radiation next to their brain all day long. So that’s part of the concern as well.
Most people, including myself, don’t always read the inserts that come with the devices. But if you were to, on a BlackBerry Bold, for example, you’d find that it actually tells you in the manual to keep this about an inch, .89 inches away from your head. I don’t know how many people talk on the phone like this, but that’s
essentially9 what they are asking you to do. With an iPhone, for example, it’s .58 of an inch.
So if you read those manuals closely, you’ll see that that’s what they are asking you to do, and it’s also part of the reason that they give you earpieces to wear instead of holding the phone to your ear.
Your phone is not always emitting the same level. In those really tough times, when you are really struggling with your phone, which I do all the time, you are in a bad cell area, you are not getting good reception, your phone is actually working harder. It sends signals back and
forth10 to the nearest tower, but if your phone is not working well, it means it’s sending more of those signals, more of that energy and more of that radiation. Those are good times to put the phone away.
It does appear that children’s brains are more vulnerable. Their
skulls11 are just thinner. So when you talk about the radiation, it’s easier to get through, because of those thin sculls. And also, keep in mind, that most of us didn’t use cell phones until we were already adults. We didn’t have this technology as kids. They are going to grow up their entire lives with it.
Simply use an earpiece. I mean all the research, all the science is pointing that way, and while we don’t know enough yet, you don’t want to find out 15, 20 years from now, in fact, there was a cancer link, and you didn’t do anything about it. The solution is simple.