Word: free
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...gases, called prominences, proliferate, shooting tens of thousands of miles above the solar surface, sometimes hanging suspended for months. The solar corona, the halo around the sun visible during total eclipses, becomes fuller and brighter; great blobs of the corona, containing billions of tons of hot gas, occasionally burst free, shooting into space at speeds as high as 2 million m.p.h. And the earth's upper atmosphere, pummeled by solar particles, is laced by electrical currents of as much as a million amperes. These in turn create powerful magnetic fields that raise havoc below...
...small a cyclic change able to have a noticeable effect on weather? Two scientists suspect it may. Karin Labitzke of Berlin's Free University and NCAR's Van Loon have discovered a relationship between the solar cycle and the stratospheric winds over the tropics. During a 28-month period, these winds reverse direction, blowing half the time from the east, the other half from the west, a phenomenon meteorologists call the QBO, or quasi-biennial oscillation. Depending on the direction of the QBO flow, Labitzke and Van Loon found, solar maximums and minimums seem linked to changes in air pressure...
Entering the homestretch of its current term, the U.S. Supreme Court quickened its pace last week by issuing 23 decisions. In addition to its landmark judgment protecting flag burning as a form of free expression, the high bench announced a series of other important rulings in the areas of free speech and criminal law. Following past patterns, the Justices remained vigilant on First Amendment rights but continued to chip away at the constitutional safeguards of criminal defendants...
...banning indecent but not obscene telephone calls for adults went beyond what was needed to protect children from such messages. He said children could be shielded from phone sex by technological restrictions, like access codes or scramblers, or requiring payment by credit card. The decision, however, still left prosecutors free to go after the billion-dollar industry for phone calls that are judged obscene...
Assessing these decisions, attorney Floyd Abrams, a free-speech specialist, said they constituted a "reassuring week for the First Amendment." Said he: "The court has been considerably more sensitive to First Amendment rights than to other civil-liberties claims. Some of President Reagan's appointees have been refreshingly libertarian in their approach...