On the Record

Credit: B. CHILD/AP

Justice Antonin Scalia (pictured):

“Your assertion is that after the pollutant leaves the air and goes up into the stratosphere it is contributing to global warming.”

James Milkey:

“Respectfully, Your Honour, it is not the stratosphere. It's the troposphere.”

Justice Scalia:

“Troposphere, whatever. I told you before I'm not a scientist. That's why I don't want to have to deal with global warming.”

The US Supreme Court tackles climate change (see Bush faces rough ride over climate change ).

Overhyped

Radioactive products

After the news that Russian ex-spy Alexander Litvinenko was poisoned with polonium-210, a number of blogs and news stories sounded shrill warnings about companies selling polonium-210 over the Internet.

One such company, United Nuclear in Sandia Park, New Mexico, posted a notice on its website explaining that the amounts of polonium-210 it sells are microscopic. The company estimates it would take about 15,000 of its polonium-210 sources to poison someone — at a cost of $1 million.

“An order for 15,000 sources would look a tad suspicious,” the company points out, “considering we sell about one or two sources every three months.”