News In Brief 5 July 2005

Founder of Earth Day, Gaylord A. Nelson, Dead at 89

Mother Earth To Offer "Volcanic Salute To A Great Friend"

Gaylord A. Nelson , a former senator from Wisconsin, a staunch supporter of the environmental movement in America and the founder of Earth Day, died on Sunday at the age of 89.

Mr. Nelson was known for his candor and independence. He was one of only three senators who voted against the $700 million appropriation that began the nation's expanded involvement in the Vietnam War.

But Mr. Nelson was most distinguished on Capitol Hill as an early and ardent environmental leader. In his first Senate speech, in 1963, he framed the declining condition of the nation's air and water as a national issue. The speech coincided with Mr. Nelson's successful private effort to lobby President John F. Kennedy to embrace environmental protection as a priority. In September 1963, President Kennedy embarked on a five-day, 11-state tour to talk about conservation.

In a statement released to the media, Mother Earth stated, "with great sadness, losing such a good friend".

As a tribute to Nelson, Mother Earth will plan a "volcanic salute" to Nelson at a date to-be-determined



Live 8 Concerts Generate Over 26 Million Text Messages

Over 24-Million Exchanged About "The Blond In Front of The London Stage"

There were a lot of sore fingers and thumbs this weekend, as over 26-Million people sent text messages during the 10-Country Live 8 Concert that took place on Saturday.

Organizers said that it was a single-day record, breaking the 5.9-million sent during an episode of "American Idol"

AOL, which streamed the video of the concerts, also claimed a world record, stating that over 5-million logged on to AOL for the broadcast globally, making it the biggest streamed event ever.

As to the text messages, over 24-Million of the messages were sent, with the subject being a busty blond young woman, who danced wildly in front of the stage in London.

Messages ranged from "Holy Cow", to "Check out the London Chick", to very sexually graphic messages.

For a brief period, perhaps approximately five-minutes, a hacker broke into the London concert video system to offer a proposal of marriage to the blond woman, transmitting his appeal from his video-phone.

Irish rocker Bob Geldof and Bono of U2 arranged the concerts to push the Group of Eight leaders of the world's richest nations who meet in Gleneagles, Scotland, this week to take action to eliminate poverty