The Second News Article Round-Up

I've been sending myself interesting Internet links back from the office, but due to more immediate personal concerns and blogging topics (my personal writing projects, Starcraft 2), I did not dedicate blog posts to each topic.  So now it's time for another news-article round up.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/29/us/politics/29gamble.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&src=un&feedurl=http://json8.nytimes.com/pages/national/index.jsonp&adxnnlx=1280412045-krjqe7Q9grW/zg4hK/tjpA

It would be good if the ban on Internet gambling was lifted.  The imposition on the ban was a bad idea in the first place, propelled by rent-seeking behavior by the casino industry, moralism from the Religious Right, and a general nanny-statist attitude.  Not only is it an unjustified infringement on citizens' rights, but it also deprived the government of potentially valuable source of revenue.  $42 billion is a substantial chunk of tax revenue, which could be spent on deficit/debt reduction or other useful tasks.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/20/business/global/20renthorium.html

Now this is interesting.  Not only is it safer than ordinary nuclear reactors, but it could also be used to "burn" nuclear waste rather than let it pile up indefinitely, bury it under a mountain for 10,000 years, or reprocess it using existing techniques.

Unfortunately, it seems it will require more work before the technology is ready, but now we know what we need to do, there's a strong chance will be able to do it.  Let's get cracking.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/28/business/energy-environment/28storage.html?src=me&ref=business

Batteries.  Gigantic batteries.  That's a pretty simple concept to solve one of the inherent problems of wind power--it's lack of reliability in comparison to other sources.