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Dear Red States

Dear Red States:

We’ve decided we’re leaving. We intend to form our own country, and
we’re taking the other Blue States with us. In case you aren’t aware,
that includes California, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota,
Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois and all the Northeast.

We believe this split will be beneficial to the nation, and especially
to the people of the new country of New California.

To sum up briefly: You get Texas, Oklahoma and all the slave states.
We get stem cell research and the best beaches. We get the Statue of
Liberty. You get Dollywood. We get Intel and Apple. You get
WorldCom. We get Harvard. You get Ole’ Miss. We get 85 percent of
America’s venture capital and entrepreneurs. You get Alabama . 
We get two-thirds of the tax revenue, you get to make the red
states pay their fair share.

Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22 percent lower than the Christian
Coalition’s, we get a bunch of happy families. Please be aware that
Nuevo California will be pro-choice and anti-war, and we’re going to
want all our citizens back from Iraq at once. If you need people to
fight, ask your evangelicals.

With the Blue States in hand, we will have firm control of 80 percent of
the country’s fresh water, more than 90 percent of the pineapple and
lettuce, 92 percent of the nation’s fresh fruit, 95 percent of America’s
quality wines (you can serve French wines at state dinners), 90 percent
of all cheese, 90 percent of the high tech industry, most of the U.S.
low-sulfur coal, all living redwoods, sequoias and condors, all the Ivy
League and Seven Sister schools plus Stanford, Cal Tech and MIT. 

With the Red States, on the other hand, you will have to cope with 88
percent of all obese Americans (and their projected health care costs),
92 percent of all U.S. mosquitoes, nearly 100 percent of the tornadoes,
90 percent of the hurricanes, 99 percent of all Southern Baptists,
virtually 100 percent of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Jones
University, Clemson and the University of Georgia. We get
Hollywoodand Yosemite, thank you.

Additionally, 38 percent of those in the Red States believe Jonah was
actually swallowed by a whale, 62 percent believe life is sacred –
unless we’re discussing the death penalty or gun laws, 44 percent say
that evolution is only a theory, 53 percent that Saddam was involved in
9/11 and 61 percent of you crazy bastards believe you are people with
higher morals than we lefties.

Finally, we’re taking the good pot, too.

Peace,

Blue States

Helping 1b of the Poorest See Better

A Zulu man wearing adaptive glasses. Photograph: Michael Lewis

Dr. J D Silver, a physics professor at Oxford University has developed eye glasses using water that have variable optical strengths via a small pump.  The idea being the wearer can adjust the prescription as their vision changes.

The approach of Adaptive Eyecare has been to develop a completely new ophthalmic lens technology which permits us to manufacture revolutionary new spectacles which are universal, in the sense that one pair may be used to correct the vision of over 90% of people requiring correction. The special feature is that the wearer can adjust the power of each lens to his or her own requirements – this is particularly useful for developing world populations in areas which do not have adequate numbers of those specially trained personnel normally associated with the provision of vision correction. 

The lenses in Adaptive Eyecare’s spectacles operate in a manner which is somewhat similar in its optical function to the crystalline lens in the human eye – our lenses have the feature that the curvature of the lens surfaces is under the control of the wearer of the spectacles, and a simple manual adjustment is all that is needed to vary the power of each lens. In use, the wearer adjusts each lens so as to get clearest vision. This process takes less than a minute for both eyes. Having found the best setting, the lenses are then set, and the ancillary device used for lens adjustment is removed and discarded.

Adaptive Eyecare’s adaptive lenses are fluid- filled and the power is changed by varying the amount of fluid in the lens. The power range of our lenses is +6 to -6 Dioptres, and the optical quality is similar to that of the typical human eye. 

SOURCE MEDgadget