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2008 July — Why Now?
On-line Opinion Magazine…OK, it's a blog
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Posts from — July 2008

In Florida News

CCN covers one of the minor “problems” with land transfers from military to civilian use: Live bombs haunt Orlando neighborhood. What a surprise, not all of the bombs dropped on a bombing range explode, and the military doesn’t go looking for the duds.

There is a section of the barrier island south of me that people keep agitating to have opened for exploitation. It isn’t going to happen because there is a whole lot of nastiness on that stretch of sand, some of it put there by my Dad in the 1950s when things didn’t operate as planned.

They don’t talk about it, but I’m sure that the first people to go onto that stretch of beach after hurricanes are explosive ordinance disposal guys to see what turned up. There are bombs and warheads going back to World War II hidden under the sugar white sand. The government can never clean up that land to the level that it would be safe to live on.

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July 5, 2008   2 Comments

Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.

No end in sight for the “cauldron” of Northern California: Fires consume more of California

BIG SUR, California (AP) — Weary firefighters got no rest during the holiday weekend as a pair of out-of-control wildfires roared along California’s central coast at opposite ends of the arid Los Padres National Forest.

Despite lower temperatures and lighter wind, one stubborn fire that already had forced the evacuation of Big Sur inched closer to historic vacation retreats.

Farther south in the national forest, wind up to 40 mph fanned a wildfire near Goleta in Santa Barbara County. About 5,000 homes were under evacuation orders, while residents of 1,400 other homes were warned to pack up and be ready to leave on short notice, said county spokesman Jim McClure.

“The fire is expanding and presenting some very complex challenges because of the terrain and the fact that it hasn’t burned in over 50 years,” said Capt. Eli Iskow of the Santa Barbara County fire department. “And it’s close to all the valuables like homes and people.”

The landform makes the fires nearly impossible to fight on the ground. The canyons and gulches act as bellows to the flames, shooting embers and ash great distances. The only effective way of tamping things down is aerial tankers, but money and aircraft are in short supply.

July 5, 2008   2 Comments

Tropical Storm Bertha – Day 3

Tropical Storm BerthaPosition: 17.0 N 41.2 W. [10 PM CDT] Updated
Movement: West [280°] near 21 mph.
Maximum sustained winds: 50 mph.
Wind Gusts: 60 mph.
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 85 miles.
Minimum central pressure: 1000 mb.

Bertha is still moving west along the bottom of a ridge.  Its future track is dependent on when the ridge weakens and allows Bertha to head North.  The computer models are all over the place at this point, so Bertha may threaten the US.  We just have to wait it out.

July 5, 2008   Comments Off on Tropical Storm Bertha – Day 3

Hopping on the AIPAC Express

First it was the odious Kyl-LIEberman Amendment [AKA, S.Amdt. 3017 to S.Amdt. 2011 to H.R. 1585 (National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008)], another excuse for the Hedgemony to go to war. It served no national purpose, but will be cited as an excuse if the crazies in this administration decide to attack Iran. [Note that Clinton voted for it, while, as usual, “not voting” was recorded for Obama.]

Now we have the House getting into the act with House Concurrent Resolution 362.

Iran is not our friend, and certainly has no reason to be, but since before the Declaration of Independence was signed they have never attacked another country. Our best intelligence estimate is that they stopped doing anything associated with nuclear weapons in 2003. The real leader of the country is on record as saying that nuclear weapons are “un-Islamic”, which makes them forbidden.

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July 5, 2008   2 Comments

There Are Limits To All Things

Not speaking ill of the dead, is actually part of our old religious heritage, the ones that most of our ancestors followed prior to the arrival of missionaries of any type.  It, like many funeral traditions, was predicated on calming the spirits of the departed.

Amazingly enough, it is the death of those whose spirits would be thought to be the most evil and vindictive that cause the prohibition to be shattered.

I won’t join in, but the world is truly a better place when some people are no longer a part of it.

July 5, 2008   3 Comments

Take That Pin And Stick It

When people started wearing flag pins, I refused. I knew there was a reason, something on the edge of my memory told me that wearing a flag pin was a despicable thing to do, but I wasn’t sure why.

Today it all came flooding back when NPR ran its story: Why Do We Care About Flag Pins?

The nickel summary: the practice was brought to big time politics by Tricky Dick and his chief of staff, H.R. Haldeman.  It is another relic of Nixon’s imperial Presidency.

July 4, 2008   11 Comments

Tropical Storm Bertha – Day 2

Tropical Storm BerthaPosition: 15.5 N 31.6 W. [4 PM CDT] Updated
Movement: West-Northwest [290°] near 18 mph.
Maximum sustained winds: 50 mph.
Wind Gusts: 60 mph.
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 85 miles.
Minimum central pressure: 1000 mb.

Bertha is currently projected to curve northward before reaching the US coast and to slowly strengthen to a minimal hurricane.

Invest 93L that was in the Caribbean has lost its identity and dissipated due to wind shear.

July 4, 2008   Comments Off on Tropical Storm Bertha – Day 2

Independence Day

John Trumbull's Signing the Declaration of Independence

The Declaration of Independence

IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

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July 4, 2008   11 Comments

Friday Cat Blogging

Ringo the Gargoyle

Friday Cat Blogging

Is it time to eat or what?

[Editor: At supper time Ringo hangs out on the roof to make the two hops to the ground to eat.]

Friday Ark

In Memoriam

On Monday Distributor Cap NY had to say goodby to George.

July 4, 2008   4 Comments

Why The Government Can’t Be Trusted With Your Data

… Because they don’t know how to protect it.

Warren P. Strobel, McClatchy Newspapers reports on the latest atrocity, Passport record system open to abuse, IG finds

WASHINGTON — A State Department passport record system that holds personal data on more than 120 million Americans is wide open to abuse and unable to prevent or detect unauthorized access, investigators said Thursday.

The review by the department’s inspector general was ordered after revelations in March that State Department employees and contractors had accessed the files of presidential candidates Hillary Clinton, John McCain and Barack Obama.

The IG report found a much broader problem.

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July 3, 2008   13 Comments

The Media Conglomerates Own You

The BBC reports that Google must divulge YouTube log

Google must divulge the viewing habits of every user who has ever watched any video on YouTube, a US court has ruled.

The ruling comes as part of Google’s legal battle with Viacom over allegations of copyright infringement.

Digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) called the ruling a “set-back to privacy rights”.

The viewing log, which will be handed to Viacom, contains the log-in ID of users, the computer IP address (online identifier) and video clip details.

While the legal battle between the two firms is being contested in the US, it is thought the ruling will apply to YouTube users and their viewing habits everywhere.

Apparently copyright is more important than civil rights, and the right to privacy. This is getting more than a little tiresome with media companies able to troll through the records of people who have absolutely nothing to do with the claims involved.

July 3, 2008   4 Comments

Tropical Storm Bertha

Tropical Storm BerthaPosition: 13.4 N 27.0 W. [10 PM CDT] Updated
Movement: West [280°] near 14 mph.
Maximum sustained winds: 45 mph.
Wind Gusts: 55 mph.
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 70 miles.
Minimum central pressure: 1006 mb.

Bertha is 185 miles West-Southwest of the Cape Verde Islands and moving away.

July 3, 2008   7 Comments

Just Stupid

Someone needs to explain the concepts of “reality” and cognitive dissonance to people speaking for the US government, because this report on MSNBC is stupid on multiple levels: U.S.: Iran won’t be allowed to close key oil route

ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates – The U.S. Navy and its Gulf allies will not allow Iran to seal off the strategic Strait of Hormuz, the commander of U.S. naval forces in the Persian Gulf said Wednesday.

The 5th Fleet is based in Bahrain, across the Gulf from Iran. [Commander of the 5th Fleet, Vice Adm. Kevin] Cosgriff said that if Iran chocked off the Strait of Hormuz, it would be “saying to the world that 40 percent of oil is now held hostage by a single country.”

“We will not allow Iran to close it,” he told reporters.

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July 2, 2008   14 Comments

Military Service

MSNBC asks the question: Military service: A diminished campaign asset?

The short answer is yes, and the proof is the distribution of Purple Heart band-aids at the GOP’s 2004 convention.

Of course, they don’t want to talk about what happened to John Kerry, they want to talk about what Wes Clark said about John McCain.

This is what he said:

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I certainly honor his service as a prisoner of war. He was a hero to me and to hundreds of thousands and millions of others in Armed Forces as a prisoner of war. He has been a voice on the Senate Armed Services Committee, and he has traveled all over the world. But he hasn’t held executive responsibility. That large squadron in Air…in the Navy that he commanded, it wasn’t a wartime squadron. He hasn’t been there and ordered the bombs to fall. He hasn’t seen what it’s like when diplomats come in and say, ‘I don’t know whether we’re going to be able to get this point through or not. Do you want to take the risk? What about your reputation? How do we handle it publicly’

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July 2, 2008   16 Comments