know that you have way too much time on your hands.

The Associated Press reports: New Noah’s Ark ready to sail

SCHAGEN, Netherlands (AP) — The massive central door in the side of Noah’s Ark was thrown open Saturday — you could say it was the first time in 4,000 years — drawing a crowd of curious pilgrims and townsfolk to behold the wonder.

Of course, it’s only a replica of the biblical Ark, built by Dutch creationist Johan Huibers as a testament to his faith in the literal truth of the Bible.

Reckoning by the old biblical measurements, Johan’s fully functional ark is 150 cubits long, 30 cubits high and 20 cubits wide. That’s two-thirds the length of a football field and as high as a three-story house.

Well it is “literally” one-fifth the size of the “original” and it took him two years with modern tools to build it. No word on whether Mr. Huibers considered the possibility that the description of the Ark in the Bible might be a little “exaggerated.”

Chris Kromm at Facing South reports that: “In five weeks, the 5^th Squadron, 73^rd Cavalry of the 82^nd Airborne, based at North Carolina’s Fort Bragg, has lost 18 soldiers in Iraq.”

That is 6% of the unit killed in just over a month. They are in Anbar province and the fighting has never let up. Chris highlights some those killed and there are too many Sergeants and Staff Sergeants dying for the unit to hang together. It takes years to replace a mid-level NCO and this is a reconnaissance unit in an airborne division which is even more training. Half of these guys died in a car bombing of their base.

If we can’t protect our troops at their bases, how can’t we expect to protect the Iraqis?

The BBC reports on the continuing problems in the Estonian capital: Tallinn tense after deadly riots.

You have to look at history to understand this, even the Wikipedia entry has the salient details.

The Estonian government is removing a monument put up in Tallinn by the Soviets to mark the “liberation of Estonia from the Nazis by the Red Army.”

What most people don’t realize is that a lot of Estonians viewed the invasion of the Wehrmacht during Operation Barbarossa as liberation from the Soviets. When the Soviets re-took the area they faced Waffen SS units manned by Estonians, Latvians, and Lithuanians.

When you are dealing with a situation that began with an agreement between Hitler and Stalin that resulted in the occupation of your country by Stalin, the fact that Hitler pushed Stalin out, is not necessarily bad, and the return of Stalin is not necessarily good.

The Estonians don’t like Russians. The Soviet occupation was brutal, and the Estonians are in no mood to forgive and forget. It is absurd of the Russians to think they would.