Category — Uncategorized

Walter Brasch writing at Pacific Views looks at The Politics of Humanitarian Aid beginning with the complaints about the way the junta in Burma reacted to the recent cyclone and then does an in depth review of all of the missteps made by the Hedgemony in the response to Katrina.

The Hedgemony has left the US in a moral pit, rather than the high ground.

that even the inexperienced press secretary from Texas could figure out that Condoleezza Rice wasn’t doing her job as National Security Advisor.

Fresh Air has an interview with Scott McClellan, and Terry Gross was asking general questions about how things worked in the White House. When it came to the Iraq invasion, she asked who really made the decisions.

In the course of answering the question [the Shrubbery, in case you’re interested], McClellan noted that instead of advising, Rice simply agreed with whatever policy the Shrubbery seemed to prefer. She never challenged the process or pointed out any problems. Rather than seeing her role as being an advisor, she acted as an “agreer”.

We could have saved a lot of money by buying Dubya a Furby rather than paying Rice’s salary.

…more probably coincidence, as the death of Mr. Pevney reminded me of The City on the Edge of Forever, which was a time travel story featuring a rather young Joan Collins.

This in turn reminded me of where I had seen the photoshopped scene used in Melina’s post at Brilliant at Breakfast: Driftglass Explains it All….

I’m sure driftglass doesn’t appreciate what he is implying by putting the Clintons inside the portal. I’m sure he is unaware that the episode is about the necessity of the death of a principled, caring woman to save the world.

After all of the ranting about a Boomer time reference, I feel certain that Obama supporters would never wish death on Mrs. Clinton. 😈

Update: Bob Somerby of The Daily Howler steps you through the media treatment of Mrs. Clinton, and the fact that the Obama campaign was pushing the misreading of the second time she referenced RFK’s June death. No one said anything about the first time she said it in a Time magazine article.

The BBC reports on the world’s newest republic: Nepal votes to abolish monarchy

The Himalayan nation of Nepal has become the world’s newest republic, ending 240 years of monarchy.

A constituent assembly meeting in the capital, Kathmandu, overwhelmingly voted to abolish royal rule.

The Maoists, the largest party after laying down arms and standing in last month’s elections, were committed to ousting King Gyanendra.

While it’s tough to lose a family business that has been chugging along for over two centuries, the fact that in 2001 Crown Prince Dipendra killed his parents and a half dozen other members of the royal family in a drunken rage, which resulted in Gyanendra having to take over a job he knew nothing about, did not bode well for the future.

[That requires “a voice”, like James Earl Jones, and an orchestral fanfare.]

I’d hate to see the mileage charge on this job: Space station struggles with balky toilet.

It is amazing how much we take gravity for granted, and how much help it is around the house. You don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone [which is from a song, I think].

There’s something about having a vacuum cleaner for a toilet, that bothers me.

While phoenixes normally arise, the Phoenix spacecraft has landed on Mars and the BBC reports Historic pictures sent from Mars

A Nasa spacecraft has sent back the first historic pictures of an unexplored region of Mars.

The Mars Phoenix lander touched down in the far north of the Red Planet, after a 680 million-km (423 million-mile) journey from Earth.

The probe is equipped with a robotic arm to dig for water-ice thought to be buried beneath the surface.

It will begin examining the site for evidence of the building blocks of life in the next few days.

A signal confirming the lander had reached the surface was received at 2353 GMT on 25 May (1953 EDT; 0053 BST on 26 May).
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I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.

Frank Herbert, Dune

To all of you thrown into a paroxysm of paranoia by any historical reference which you only marginally understand, your letter of appreciation from Messrs Rove and bin Laden will be arriving shortly. You just can’t have terrorism without unreasoned fear.

but it can still cause floods.

The Associated Press reports on the “repaired” Katrina-Battered New Orleans Levee Leaking

(AP) Despite more than $22 million in repairs, a levee that broke with catastrophic effect during Hurricane Katrina is leaking again because of the mushy ground on which New Orleans was built, raising serious questions about the reliability of the city’s flood defenses.

Outside engineering experts who have studied the project told The Associated Press that the type of seepage spotted at the 17th Street Canal in the Lakeview neighborhood afflicts other New Orleans levees, too, and could cause some of them to collapse during a storm.
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With all of the other problems associated with a dodgy election and the tribal turmoil that followed, the BBC reports that Kenyans burn alive 11 ‘witches’

Eleven women accused of being witches have been burned to death by a mob in the west of Kenya, police say.

A security operation has been launched to hunt down villagers suspected of killing the women in Kisii District.

The area has witnessed similar attacks in the past when people suspected of engaging in witchcraft have been killed or ostracised.

Where do they think they are, Massachusetts?

I’m sure the security people will be just as diligent as those officers investigating “honor” killings in Iraq and India. It makes you wonder why we bother with relief agencies when too much of the world think it is perfectly rational and right to kill others over mythology.

Jams O’Donnell writes about a new law being proposed in Ireland: Detonation of nuclear weapon to carry 12 month sentence (or a fine).

A €5,000 fine is not a traffic ticket, but I would think eliminating a city might call for a little more. Actually this is in line with a Class A misdemeanor in New York, not even a felony. After the completion of the sentence you could still vote in every state, own a gun, and have a professional license.

If you have any interest in gardening one of the premier events is the Chelsea Flower Show which opens tomorrow in Britain. The BBC has a photo slide show from the preview.

In addition to displays of new varieties, the show features entire gardens constructed for the event with corporate sponsors, many not in the gardening business. The show gardens span the range of things you might do in your backyard, to extremely “unique concepts” that would probably annoy the neighbors and bring down the wrath of the local code enforcement board.

The Associated Press reports on a very quiet neighbor: Woman’s dead body lies in flat for 35 years

ZAGREB, Croatia (AP) — Governments have changed. War erupted and ended. Neighbors had children, and then grandchildren. But Hedviga Golik never left her tiny apartment in Croatia’s capital — until her mummified body was carried out this week, 35 years after she died.

Police said Friday that no one ever reported Golik missing and no one has come to claim her body.

Residents of her loft building in downtown Zagreb had broken into Golik’s flat after deciding that the apartment should belong to them, and not to her. Startled by the remains in bed, they called police.

Forensics experts said Golik likely died in 1973, about the time a neighbor last saw her. Expert Davor Strinovic said she seemed to have died of natural causes, but “it’s almost impossible to say for certain” after so much time.

Given the general lack of housing in the Eastern Bloc, and the bureaucracy of the former Yugoslavia, it’s amazing that no one noticed. It’s possible that people assumed she went to Germany to work, as there were a lot of Serbian and Croatian “guest workers” at the time, but you would have thought someone would have checked on the apartment.

Scorpio has a wish list of changes to be made in tax policy and government purchasing to help American workers.

This is how things once worked, specifically in the 1970s and 80s when I was in public service and had purchasing authority. You looked for the best price, but in my jurisdiction we had policy of local purchase or product, then state purchase or product, and US purchase or product, before buying outside the US was considered. What the policy meant is that you bought as close to “home” as possible, even if it cost a little more, to keep the money as close to “home” as possible.

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William K. Wolfrum has a nice comic riff on oil refineries . The oil apologists claim that the evil terrorist environmentalist have been blocking the heroic and patriotic oil companies from building refineries.

WKW notes, quite accurately, that no one has even started the planning process to build a refinery since 1976.  What he doesn’t mention is that when oil companies have merged since 1976 they often shut down existing refineries.  What refineries remain have to run all out to meet normal demand, with no reserve capacity.  Like the electrical generation industry, the oil industry has eliminated extra capacity because the only possible reaction to a shortage is higher prices for what they produce.  If they produce more, the price will drop.  It’s not like there’s any competition.