Category — Uncategorized

The Harry Potter series has concluded, so it’s time to find a new target in children’s literature.

The BBC reports on the controversy:Golden Compass author hits back [They note “Warning: This story contains plot spoilers”]

The author of the book on which the new film The Golden Compass is based has hit back at critics who accuse him of peddling “candy-coated atheism”.

Phillip Pullman dismissed as “absolute rubbish” accusations by the US-based Catholic League that the film promotes atheism and denigrates Christianity.

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Trent Lott is resigning from the Senate at the end of this year, but the timing will be negotiated with the governor of Mississippi to avoid a 90 day special election and allow for an interim appointment by the governor [another Repub] and the election to take place on Election Day, 2008. The Washington Post has multiple updates on its resignation article explaining what is going on with the seat.

There is a lot of speculation as to the reason for this sudden announcement, but it may not be so sudden. Lott wasn’t all that thrilled about running again in 2006, but did so because of the argument that he would be more effective in getting aid for Mississippi after Katrina as a senior Senator, than any new Senator could possibly be. Of course, when the Repubs lost their majority in the Senate, his influence was diminished, and 2008 looks to be even worse with all of the other resignations.

He might be resigning to go into lobbying, or because there is some scandal brewing, but it may just be that he’s tired of the whole mess.

The BBC delves into another facet of the financial problem: Mathematicians’ role in market mayhem

The financial markets are increasingly dominated by a new breed of highly mathematical traders, known as quantitative analysts or “quants”.

Whilst some celebrate the fact that empirical techniques are now applied to trading, others blame the quants for the current credit squeeze.
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Because the current US economic problems have global implications, the BBC has The US sub-prime crisis in graphics, which is a decent, if simplified, explanation of what has been going on the US mortgage market, and why it’s a mess.

The Dow is down a couple of hundred points again today, and this thing is not even close to over. The worst is, indeed, yet to come, and a major British bank is up for sale, while a major German bank may soon be because they invested in the US mortgage bonds.

Frankly at this point I think the Republicans are hoping for a recession, as it is very possible that the mortgage gamblers may have ignited a total collapse and a Depression. Every time the government let’s these people off the leash they crap in middle of the living room. They can’t be trusted without regulation, because they will engage in this destructive behavior every time you leave them unattended. They don’t learn. They aren’t trainable. They need keepers.

Logan Murphy at Crooks and Liars reports on it as Pentagon Leaves 20,000 Soldiers With Brain Injuries Off Official Wounded List, but that isn’t the story from a vet’s perspective.

First off, the Pentagon may not be trying to hide anything. The military has a peculiar, to those not in the military, way of accounting for injury, illness and death: it is by major command area. Any incident is assigned to the accounting area of the medical facility that reports the incident, not the area where it happened, and this is always the way the military has done it.

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Ana Maria at A.M. in the Morning! found an article by Joseph Treaster in The New York Times covering the changes by property insurance companies following Hurricane Andrew. People don’t realize that while their premiums have been going up, their actual coverage has been coming down.

Rook at Rook’s Rant found the core of Bill O’Reilly’s worst fear: the Christmas Resistance Movement!

Jack, the Grumpy Forester, heard them flying South over his place, meaning California was bringing in aircraft on Monday in anticipation of Santa Anas winds this week.

Unfortunately they are needed as CNN is reporting that Malibu is again in flames. Four dozen houses have already been lost and the fire is only 25% contained as hot, dry Santa Anas blow through the canyons at hurricane speeds.

There has also been fires in New Mexico and near Ramona in San Diego county. Rain is the only answer, and that isn’t looking good.

Australia is holding a general election and things will get confusing for Americans because the labels and colors are mixed up.

The Hedgemony’s good friend, Prime Minister John Howard, leads the conservative Liberal Party, the blues.

The main opposition party led by Kevin Rudd, is the liberal Labor Party, the reds.

While Labor has been leading in the national polls, this thing could be decided at the local level, and it’s possible that the Liberals could hold on to power, but John Howard could lose his seat in parliament, as his constituency is not considered “safe.”

Update: Looks like a big ALP [Australian Labor Party] win, and John Howard lost his seat in parliament, Bennelong.

KTK at Lean Left is not being very civil when he hands out his Annie Jacobsen Award, 2007. He is so nasty, that he brings in facts, and we all know about the liberal bias in facts. He even prints a chart:

This is totally unfair. He shows us that we are absolute fools to spend the gazillions of dollars to protect the Shrubbery from terrorists, and then let him ride his bike or go out on his Dad’s boat. Fortunately he doesn’t walk much.

Everyone interested has seen the report on the research that seems to seems to show Skin transformed into stem cells. An amazing piece of work, if it can be replicated and verified in other labs by other people, and doesn’t turn into another South Korean cloning disaster.

There is a major misconception being voiced by those who oppose embryonic stem cell research, i.e. that embryonic stem cells don’t need to be studied, and all the labs doing this kind of work can be shut down without loss. Wrong!

The researchers wouldn’t have known what they were looking for without the embryonic stem cells as a guide and example. What they have created seems to be the same as embryonic stem cells, but it will take some time and effort to find out if that is true. I hope that it is because being able to grow stem cells in the lab will really speed up research on a lot of diseases and promises to make the repair of organs and the nervous system a reality, but we don’t know that yet, and the embryonic stem cells are the model against which the new cells must be tested.

Seen on a store while I was out and about:

Anti-Black Friday Sale!
We will open at our normal time
Everything is priced as usual!

The Associated Press has a report out indicating that: Crucifixes allegedly made in Chinese sweatshops.

Crucifixes were once made in monasteries, and if you were looking for something special you would buy the ones with olive wood from Israel. You could also buy them from Christian craftspeople at church bazaars in the South. These were articles of faith as much as craft, and they usually came from long family traditions.

Apparently the profit margin is more important and they are made, like most other things, in China, by workers who have no idea what they are working on, only that they must produce so many every day.

You really have to wonder who thought this was a good idea? Did they ever read the story about the people who were required to make bricks without straw by their boss?

Update: CBS News has a piece on Apalachicola: Florida’s Oyster Industry Drying Up?

FallenMonk is rightfully a bit concerned about the drought in Georgia, and is interested in knowing: What’s the Plan?

Other than hold a prayer meeting for rain, the only other idea would seem to be shutting down the outflow on the Chattahoochee and Flint Rivers which would reduce the flow of Florida’s Apalachicola River to a trickle, and shut down several hydroelectric plants.

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The US isn’t the only one losing peoples data, as reported by the BBC: UK’s families put on fraud alert

Two computer discs holding the personal details of all families in the UK with a child under 16 have gone missing.

The Child Benefit data on them includes name, address, date of birth, National Insurance number and, where relevant, bank details of 25m people.
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