Position: 20.5 N 96.5 W. [10PM CDT] [Updated]
Movement: West [270°] near 6 mph.
Maximum sustained winds: 80 mph.
Wind Gusts: 95 mph.
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 70 miles.
Hurricane Wind Radius: 25 Miles
Minimum central pressure: 990 mb.

Currently 70 miles East-Southeast of Tuxpan in the Gulf of Mexico.

NPR’s All Things Considered yesterday had a couple of pieces looking back at the Cold War.

In Americans Give Ahmadinejad Cold-War Treatment, Daniel Schorr compares the way Ahmadinejad was received to the way Khrushchev was treated when he came to the US.  We haven’t learned much in the last 50 years.

In Ex-Diplomats Gauge Russia-U.S. Relations , Robert Siegel talked with two former diplomats involved in the Cold War: Jack Matlock was a U.S. ambassador to the Soviet Union during the Gorbachev era; Yuly Vorontsev was Russia’s ambassador to the United States in the 1990s.

The really interesting part is at the end when they pretty much agree that no one won or lost the Cold War, the Russian people just decided they wanted a change. They wanted to be Russians, not Soviets, and didn’t see that “empire” had been much of a help to their lives. Not so much passive resistance as terminal apathy was the end of the Communist Party in the Soviet Union.

Position: 20.4 N 95.9 W. [4PM CDT][Update TD 13 becomes Tropical Storm Lorenzo]
Movement: West [270°] near 5 mph.
Maximum sustained winds: 70 mph.
Wind Gusts: 85 mph.
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 70 miles.
Minimum central pressure: 999 mb.

Currently 105 miles East-Southeast of Tuxpan in the Gulf of Mexico, Lorenzo has had a burst of intensification in the last few hours.

TS Karen may have made it up to hurricane status for a few hours last night, but is currently being mugged by wind shear, so no real threat.

Invest 97L quit trying.

Invest 98L crossed Florida last night, but still hasn’t gotten its act together.

Wind shear is the savior of the US this season, so far.

The Associate Press found more taxpayer funded propaganda: Government video shows mock hacker attack

WASHINGTON – A government video shows the potential destruction caused by hackers seizing control of a crucial part of the U.S. electrical grid: an industrial turbine spinning wildly out of control until it becomes a smoking hulk and power shuts down.

The video, produced for the Homeland Security Department and obtained by The Associated Press on Wednesday, was marked “Official Use Only.” It shows commands quietly triggered by simulated hackers having such a violent reaction that the enormous turbine shudders as pieces fly apart and it belches black-and-white smoke.

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