Posts from — November 2013

The courts of the United States have lost their connection to reality.

Digby has a a post on a WaPo article reporting a decision of a panel of the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in which it is stated: “Terrorism is the modern-day equivalent of the bubonic plague: It is an existential threat…”

The defendant, Tarek Mehanna, was convicted of providing material support for Al Qaeda by posting articles on a web site, and making pro-al Qaeda speeches.

Calling terrorism “an existential threat” blows the doors off exaggeration, blasts by hyperbole, and vanishes into the abyss of absurdity. The bubonic plague killed tens of millions of people, but in the last fifty years all of the ‘terrorists’ in the world haven’t accounted for a year of US traffic deaths. Israel loses more people in cars than from terrorists.

Global climate change is an existential threat, it actually is capable of wiping nations off the map. Terrorism is annoying, and nowhere near the danger that people face from severe weather. Paranoia in judges on the US appellate courts is not comforting.

When checking the local weather I’ve noticed something that is rather indicative of the the climate change concept – the record highs and lows this month have all been recorded during the last 10 years. I know that the lows won’t continue that way beginning in December because it has been years since we have had a hard freeze. We would get at least one a year when I was growing up. I have seen snow down here and ice on the bayou but not in this century.

The BBC has a round-up of the relief effort. The biggest problem is distribution, because the infrastructure on the affected islands was destroyed by the storm. There is no power, water, roads, airports, or or much of anything else left standing. C-130s are the only large aircraft able to use what is left of the airstrips, and there are no communications or lighting to help.

The USS George Washington and its carrier task force will arrive tomorrow, which will really boost the number of available helicopters, plus provide air traffic control to the area, and a source of fuel for aircraft and drinking water for people.

Supplies are available, but the Philippines government doesn’t have the resources to move and distribute them to the millions who needs help.

Susie Madrak found a a press report on Typhoon Haiyan by AFP that still won’t take the last step and admit reality:

Meteorologists have yet to formally link global warming to typhoons like the one that devastated the Philippines, but they expect increasingly extreme weather phenomena due to a rise in ocean temperatures.

There have been typhoons in the Pacific for all of recorded history, but this one had 195 mph sustained winds. This was the most powerful tropical cyclone at landfall on record. It isn’t that climate change causes typhoons or hurricanes, it’s that the warmer water makes them more intense. Tropical cyclones gain their energy from the warm water – the higher the temperature, the greater the energy.

If the AFP wants to know if what happened was linked to global climate change, maybe they could interview some Filipinos.

At the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month in 1918 the guns fell silent. The Great War, The War to End All Wars, was over…for a couple of decades.

The red poppies of Flanders fields became a symbol of that war and the veterans that returned from it. Known as Remembrance Day in much of the world, the poppies will be in evidence. Remembrance Day observances have more in common with the American Memorial Day as a day to honor those who have died in war.

First called Armistice Day in the United States, the name was changed to Veterans Day, and its purpose changed to honoring those who are serving, or have served in the military. The change was made to avoid a conflict with the existing Memorial Day observance that goes back to the Civil War era.

A heart felt salute to everyone who managed to survive basic training. We can hope that sooner, rather than later, there will be no need for another generation to put on uniforms.

The good news is that the GOCE satellite likely disintegrated in atmosphere. They don’t actually know where the debris landed but are assuming that anything that didn’t vaporize fell into the ocean.

It would be nice if we had a reliable vehicle, a sort of low orbit trash truck that could swoop up and pick up dead satellites and bring them back to earth, or refuel them so they could continue to do what they were doing. The way we have been doing it is extremely wasteful.

Juan Cole has a piece on the Iran nuclear talks: France Crashes the Geneva Party, Scuttles Iran Deal.

Of course everyone will know that the announcement of a big Saudi purchase of French military hardware has nothing to do with what France did. The purchase was merely an endorsement of the quality of French equipment.

Israel didn’t know what was in the agreement, but Netanyahu has been screaming that it was a terrible deal. That’s because he expects Iran will do exactly what Israel did – lie to an American President [Kennedy] and then launch an all-out program to build nuclear weapons. He can’t accept that everyone isn’t as dishonest as Israel.

The Saudis don’t want the challenge of Iranian competition in the oil market that would hurt the Saudi ability to manipulate the price of oil, and they resent the fact that this US government isn’t doing what it is told to do by the Saudis.

The talks had been among the US, EU, and Iran. The French will hear from the EU about what they did.

The latest report from the ABC on conditions in the Philippines after Typhoon Haiyan is not encouraging. The local officials are estimating that three-quarters of Leyte Province has been flattened and the death toll might be as high as 10,000.

Essentially there is no infrastructure left in the central Philippines. The storm surge scrubbed the coast lines and the winds were so strong they knocked down even concrete block buildings. The winds lifted and pummeled even strong buildings with debris from weaker structures.

The storm is currently over the South China Sea headed for Vietnam, but the sustained winds have dropped to 95mph, and further weakening is forecast before landfall.

Abraham Lincoln was the first Republican President and a rightfully well known writer and speaker. One of my favorite quotes is his paraphrase of Proverbs 17:28: “Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.” This was his advice to new members of Congress, that should have been passed on over the years.

One of the people who would have benefited from that advice was Ayn Rand Paul Ryan whose first attempt at political office was US Senator from Kentucky. He won and decided that he was special and didn’t need to be bothered with the rules that bound lesser mortals. The Very Serious People decided that he was a contender, despite no experience and some very odd choices for his battles.

Recently it was noted that he had a habit of borrowing other people’s words and ideas, without bothering to mention that they were borrowed. If he had said ‘Oops, my bad, I’ll have to watch that’ everyone would have forgotten about it. But nooooo! He isn’t guilty, he is a victim of a hate campaign, and he doesn’t have to put up with it, he can go back and make spectacles for others, instead of himself.

A contender? Mitt Romney would have him in tears in a debate. Against the bully from Jersey it would be a TKO before the round started.

Old White Lady has added an all black short-hair, Midnight, to her feline family, while Fallenmonk has been adopted by a Jack Russel mix named Zoey.

It was ten years ago today that both Mustang Bobby and Echidne started blogging after commenting for a while.

Chewing the Ice

When did you know a well-digger?

[Editor: Froggie and Ms Underhouse discussing how cold it is.]

Friday Ark

It’s cold again and windy. I can attest to that because I spent most of day, when it wasn’t raining, helping a friend fix an underground water pipe.

In olden times, about 4 years ago, it would have been about five minutes after the hole was dug, because you would simply put a rubber-lined saddle clamp over the break and tighten the bolts. The clamps were under $10 bucks, and the hole didn’t need to be very big to install one. As that was obviously too easy, they stopped carrying saddle clamps around here, so we had to enlarge the hole and install a union after cutting the pipe so we could get it on. Hours, it took bloody hours kneeling in damp sand, having to enlarge the hole to get leverage with tools and fit the parts together while hoping we weren’t breaking anything when we put stress on that pipe.

In the midst of that, I had to leave to take someone to an appointment, and then bring them home to get something and take that back to the office. The instructions weren’t clear for the first appointment, but at least that got finished.

The pipe seems to be fixed, but fortunately it is not going to freeze tonight while the pipe is surrounded by wet sand.

Cat blogging will be late because the cats are in hiding from the cold.

Position: 10.6N 127.0E [ 2PM CST 1800 UTC].
Movement: West [280°] near 24 mph [39 kph].
Maximum sustained winds: 195 mph [315 kph].
Wind Gusts: 230 mph [380 kph].
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 150 miles [240 km].
Hurricane Wind Radius: 60 miles [ 95 km].
Minimum central pressure: 977 mb.

Currently about 490 miles [785 km] Southeast of Manila.

Came ashore at 4:40AM local [2:40PM CST 2040UTC] near Guiuan on Samar island in the Philippines. It is likely the strongest tropical cyclone at landfall ever recorded.

In addition to the winds, Haiyan was pushing a 20-foot surge before it, and will dump a foot of rain on the islands during its passage. It is moving through warm water with minimal wind shear.

It is expected to retain most of its power as it crosses the Philippines on its way to Vietnam.

Marcy Wheeler reports that after two years The National Commission for the Review of the Research and Development Programs of the United States Intelligence Community has reached some conclusions.

It should be noted that the work of the Commission was begun well in advance of the revelations of Edward Snowden, and is in no way predicated on the the information he has made public.

The short version – Alexander the Geek has totally screwed up. US cyber-defenses are almost totally ignored by the push to create more advanced offensive weapons. The large scale collection of data is beyond the capacity of the Intel Community to actually analyze or use, and the push for collection has degraded the nation’s defenses.

They should have learned the lesson of defense after Manning and Wikileaks, but they didn’t and are now dealing with the Snowden revelations. It is rather pointless to spend billions of dollars to listen to other people’s secrets if all of your secrets are available for the price of a newspaper.

United For Care is a Florida group lobbying for medical marijuana in Florida. They have had no luck with the Florida legislature, so they have turned to the petition process to get it on the ballot.

Having declined to bring it up in the legislature, the Legivermins [the larval stage of Congresscritter] are attacking the petition’s purpose and intent. According to UFC, House Speaker Will Weatherford said the amendment would put “marijuana shops on every corner”.

I guess no one has told him that that is the current system of distribution the illegal product. Medical marijuana requires a doctor’s prescription, not just a note from the US Treasury.

Actually medical marijuana would create a lot of jobs in Florida, because the Feds prohibit it moving across state lines. The marijuana would have to be grown, processed, and dispensed within the state, with cheap foreign imports totally illegal. Medical marijuana has to be of a known and consistent potency, like any other drug, so this is not something for a couple of ‘Dead heads to try in a hidden patch of a state or national forest. I can imagine that it will initially be a green house operation for both control and security.

The state controls will probably be similar to those for distilleries with everyone involved having to submit to background checks to keep out the criminal element.

Just legalizing marijuana would be a better move, as you could tax the hell out of it, significantly reduce the load on courts and prisons, and hurt the drug cartels – what’s not to like?