Links redux

Several months posted about the FDA approving a new vaccine that I had mentioned the year before for several of the viruses that can cause cervical cancer. Well the NYTimes has an article up(signup required) about the Texas Governor Rick Perry signing an executive order mandating the vaccine shots for all girls entering 6^th grade, excluding those whose parents refuse to participate. I’m actually really surprised that Texas was the first state to do this, though the article says that Texas has the second highest number of women with cervical cancer. The executive order does offer the opportunity to bypass a lot of political wrangling in the legislature, and I don’t think there will be a big fight to eliminate it. Plus, the implementation conditions seem to be reasonable. I’m hoping Texas opens the door for a lot of other states to add this vaccine to the normal series of vaccinations women receive through their lives. Here’s hoping.

Several weeks back DailyTech had an article about a Naval rail gun test that passed the 8 Mega-joule range. I tell you I like that stuff. It bodes well for safer and longer range guns and a cheaper, more reliable plane catapult system. Where do we get those wonderful toys?

Well I spoke before about the Real ID Act, with my opinion that the security problems and ability for abuse outweigh the potential benefits. Well Ars has an article up about the growing opposition to the act. Seems more people are getting concerned about it for all the right reasons, security, abuse, and monetary. Maybe the system does work occasionally.

Oh and for friends that like the ideas of wikis and writing Ars posted about a “novel wiki” taking place. So far it looks like a situation of too many cooks in the kitchen. Should be interesting to watch.