The BBC Magazine has a nice article, How one in 1,000 can equal 50%, about a different form of “framing”.

I have mentioned this sort of thing several times when addressing political claims, especially regarding the difference between average and median. With all of the political chatter going on over stimulus and budgets, as well as discussions about the flu problem, you have to look for people comparing apples and codfish, because they couldn’t prove their point if they tried their normal apples and oranges.

The Orlando Sentinel has a photo gallery of Florida specialty license plates.

There are 130 photos, but some of the plates have had design changes. They don’t include the multiple free and special purpose plates also issued. Things have really gotten out of hand.

Via Echidne, at the Science Blogs the Reveres point out the real problem: we are going to have a double flu season.

This flu doesn’t seem to be any worse than the current version for which a vaccine is available, but the current version kills about 800 people a week in the US. With the new flu, there is the potential that the number of deaths and hospital admissions could double.

Given that the health care industry has cost-cut and consolidated all of the excess capacity out of the system, we don’t have the personnel or facilities available for a single bad flu year, much less a double.

Further, even if you have had the original version, you can get the new version for a double dose of misery.

As for the xenophobes who want to seal the border, undocumented agricultural workers don’t take cruises or fly all over the world.  The flu is being spread by people who can afford to do that and have passports.

As I noted back in January, the third trial of the Miami Haitian Ninja Terrorists had begun.

The case just went to the jury but the Miami Herald reports one of the jurors has been excused for illness. If the juror has the flu all bets are off.

This is possibly one of the worst ideas the Justice Department has ever had. Haitians face rampant discrimination in Miami, so if you can’t get a conviction with the months worth of evidence presented by the prosecution, you should just cut your losses and forget the whole thing.