The Beeb is reporting that funding for a mission to the Hubble space telescope has been cut from the NASA budget.

Without another mission to replace failing gyroscopes and other equipment, the telescope will eventually fall back to earth.

This is logical under the rules of the Bush administration: they only spend money on people and projects that fail. If you fail you will be promoted, if you do your job you will be pushed out. This is why the missile defense system is still moving ahead, but the Hubble is being allowed to come down.

Think about it. We were about to capture Osama bin Laden and stabilize Afghanistan, but resources were withdrawn so we could launch the Iraqi disaster.

Apparently Ntodd is getting into the role of college professor as he posted a “compare and contrast” assignment for the second inaugural addresses of the first versus the latest Republican President.

The similarities are really shallow: second inaugural, time of military conflict, political party named Republican. Not much there.

The Bush speech was filled with jarring inconsistencies like: “After the shipwreck of communism came years of relative quiet, years of repose, years of sabbatical – and then there came a day of fire.”

Having lived through that period, 1989 to 2001, I sort of remember a major war with Iraq after the invasion of Kuwait, the Rwandan genocide, the Yugoslavian civil wars, Tiananmen Square, etc. and I believe that China, Cuba, Vietnam, and North Korea are definitely communist governments. Frankly the world was relatively quieter during the Cold War after Vietnam until the dissolution of the Soviet Union, than since.

Whoever wrote this seems to have forgotten that the majority of foreign terrorists were tied up with the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, the US was pretty much left alone except when we ventured into their territory.

Of course, they don’t have to worry, it’s not as if anyone checks their claims against the facts.

Noted poodle aficionado, James Wolcott, is having way too much fun worrying his favorite sockpuppet, SpongeDob Stickypants¹. Mr. Wolcott reviews the recommendations that constitute “what real Americans should be watching”, like GoodLife TV, and finds a disturbing trend.

Who knew? I mean, I always thought cowboys needed flexible wrists to throw lariats and make fast draws. I didn’t really notice that most of them displayed more interest in their horses than women until Mr. Wolcott pointed it out.

Mustang² Bobby helps out by pointing to a New York Times editorial wondering about Dr. Stickypants obsession.

1 – If Dr. Dobson should drop by my humble corner: one picture of you on your page would more than suffice and massage therapy could help with your neck. Oh, there’s this wonderful part of speech called the pronoun. It would relieve you of retyping your complete name and title so many times. Oh, yes, why don’t you try getting a life. You could start by watching more age-appropriate television. Frankly, your obsession with small children and discipline might be misinterpreted.

2 – The car, not the critter.

Doubleday wants to print The Al Qaeda Reader, a compendium of the thoughts of Ayman al-Zawahri and Osama bin Laden. The publisher thinks people need to know what the founders of al Qaeda are thinking, and feels that there is a market for the book. Doubleday says it will donate any profits to charity.

The book is opposed by some families of victims of the September 11 ^th attack, who feel publishing the book will spread the al Qaeda message to the wrong sort of people.

That’s enough controversy for most books, but then the intellectual property laws enter the picture. Under US law, Doubleday is required to pay a royalty to the owners of these thoughts: al-Zawahri and bin Laden. Doubleday says it won’t do that, but the law is quite clear.

Personally I would have set up accounts for both men and sent royalties to those accounts. That money would then be available to pay claims against them made in US and foreign courts. If Doubleday refuses to do that they are in open violation of the copyright laws, and would probably get away with it. What jury would be willing to find for two of the most hated men in the country? What are the chances of either man filing a claim against Doubleday in a US court?

What troubles me is the blatant intent of a publisher to violate copyright law. This could have been done within the letter, if not the spirit of the law, but corporations have privilege, private law. Corporations think it is reasonable for them to sue a 12-year-old for 3 minutes of “bubblegum” music downloaded from the Internet, but perfectly reasonable for them to profit from another’s work.

If they go through with this, bin Laden wins; he has another example of the criminal behavior of the West.