This week in science: All aboard!

Space.com says NASA may soon announce a return to the moon

I'd like to step outside of my usual science-y role here and deliver a frank message to CEOs and small business owners. If you survived the Great Recession, you've obviously done some things right. Well done, and grats! But the fact is, in a brutal recession, you were in driver's seat in terms of labor. You could pick and choose among the cream of the crop for rock-bottom, bargain wages. trust me, that's going to end next year. So if you have the wherewithal, it makes business sense to pony up now and retain and/or attract the higher performing employees who will carry your business to ever greater profitability in the expanding earnings environment ahead. Make no mistake: companies that do it first will be able to pick and choose among the best and brightest at reasonable wages. The companies that drag their feet might end up fighting over the scraps left behind for premium pay. Your choice.

• What I wrote above was a nice way to say it. A more blunt way, everyone from Fortune 500 corps to mom and pop businesses have been spoiled fucking rotten on wages by the recession. So take a good long look at the kind of epic failure that could be in store for you -- unless you pull your head out and pony up a living wage for those who bust their asses to preserve your bloated salaries.
• I have posted graphics of the election by sex, religion, and education vs state. Oh and wingnut dumbasses, unskewing polls screwed you royally, whereas Nate Silver was freaking right.
• Hey Beck, what happened to the God you claimed didn't want Obama to win? And while we're on the topic, if you're really going to blame a hurricane, wouldn't you be blaming an Act of God for Obama's victory?
• Can we get the House Science Committee back in the hands of people who know what science is, or will conservative nutcases simply appoint more know-nothing losers to take the place of those who have been invited out of office by voters? Or will it really be the dino fart joker?
• Will we simply lynch the people who lied us into discounting climate change for 30 pieces of silver, or just shame their name for generations to come?

  In the wake of superstorm Sandy, climate change is on a lot of people's radar. By some accounts, warmer ocean temperatures intensified the hurricane as it plowed up the Gulf Stream, and rising seas may have exacerbated flooding. Now, a new climate-change study in the journal Science says warming is here to stay. And future warming will likely be on the high side of predictions, the researchers conclude.
   

• Speaking of climate change, and jobs, and elections, White House, DNC, what have you, please, we're begging you guys and gals: Utilize US! Use us for more than a piggy bank. I first heard of Nate Silver when he was posting elections forecasts under a screen name in honor of a hot pepper on this site, and he's one of many. There are undiscovered, passionate people with expertise on almost any subject you can think of here in the member section of Daily Kos, and on many, many, many other progressive sites. For crying out loud, USE US!