Best science/political joke of the day

This one comes to us courtesy of Slate.com.

Researchers from Russia and the United States create a new element in an audacious lab experiment, but it exists for only one millisecond before it begins to decay. They're thinking of calling it stabilityiniraqium.

Priceless.

Guest blogging for Planetary Society

I spend the week of Oct 8-13 furiously typing away at the DPS meeting for the Planetary Society. Emily Lakdawalla, who run the planetary blog, has had a series of guest-bloggers filling in for her while she's out on maternity leave (congrats to Emily & Darius, btw!). It was both a challenge and a pleasure to cover the conference for her during her absence. Although bloggers get to write in an off-the-cuff style, it still takes considerable effort to polish one's internal monologue into a readible narrative. Of course, I can claim no such mastery of this task, but I am all the more appreciate of the tremdous effort that Emily consistently churns out in her commentary on various planetary-related events and happenings.