Rusted Sky

Or perhaps it's more of a schism... looks to me like neither side is willing to back down, looking at the comments in Political Radar: Candidate Clinton to Richardson: 'Barack Obama Can't Win'.

It's ugly.

But there was one comment that REALLY made sense.

God Help us all,
Obama: an inspiring speaker, a refreshing presence on the political landscape. No grasp on foreign policy, not honest about his personal beliefs. The Wright thing will kill him in the general election.
Hillary: Absolute liar and self serving subhuman. She will say/do/believe anything to get elected Power. power, power. I'm sorry, but defending Bill says it all. No chance in the general election due to her negatives. I'd vote for my cat first.
McCain: Senial, no grasp of the economy, arrogant, will not admit that so any advice will be brushed aside. Best chance of the 3 to have a clue how to defend America. But if elected the deadlocked congress means nothing good gets done.
We're screwed. Everyone I know is clear on the issues and what needs to happen, What planet are these politicians on?
.
1. Energy. We should have drilling like it was a national emergency. It is. Alternative fuels are 25-35 years off. What do we do till then? The Corps of Engineers should be directing drilling starting in an hour. That ='s jobs, self sufficiency, security, economic stability.
2. Job's= health care, security, economic stability.
3. A Stable economy ='s money to care for the environment,develop other energy sources, non-reliance on foreign goods and services, strong defence. Ever notice how everything comes back to energy?
Hey environmentalists, Since oil isn't going anywhere for a while, should we drill for it here where we have some pollution controls or just buy it from countries like Mexico, and Russia where they just dump the waste on the ground and let it leach into the water table? Last time I checked we all live on the same planet. If America is not strong, who is going to finance all of your poofta organizations, Nato, The UN and all the other worthless corrupt organizations you love so much. Better take care of the golden goose.
All that said McCain is so clueless on the ecomomy that he will be no better than the others if he wins. There are no choices this time..

I disagree about McCain being senile. Fully agree about the energy - if the fools in Congress were serious about it, we'd be drilling like crazy. But it's all for show - they don't really CARE about solving the problem as long as they can LOOK like they're solving the problem.

J.

You know, I'd be a LOT more confident that Congress had a clue if they'd authorize drilling offshore. And building new refineries. And tap oil sands.

But they're not.

Peculiar, ain't it?

Update - As noted -

Supply and demand can't be repealed - Paradise Post

Democrats along with some Republicans have done everything within their power to block oil drilling off our coast, and in Alaska. Environmental groups continually use our courts to block drilling, and they own a large number of the people in the House and Senate, so drilling in ANWAR is on the shelf.

The two countries with the largest oil reserves, Canada and Saudi Arabia, will not increase their output because they are making huge profits on their oil. By not increasing output, prices rise! If Wall Street acted in this manner, those attempting to manipulate the market by artificially shrinking supplies of available stocks forcing the price up, would go to jail.

However, since our government is refusing to allow an increase of the supply of oil to meet the demand, they are not subjected to these same rules. If we could pump oil from ANWAR, the California coast and the Gulf of Mexico, we could force gas prices down. In order to keep the cash flowing to maintain profit levels, oil producers would have to increase their output.

As the Arabs and others pump more, we could then slow the supply from ANWAR and oil rigs off the coast "stabilizing" the price. Environmental groups have played a major role in all this by using their enormous political clout to halt even modest logging in our forests (which raises the cost of building materials, and the cost of a new home, which in turn sets the price of an existing home). They were instrumental halting drilling off the West Coast and in Alaska.

They abuse the legal system by filing frivolous "nuisance suits," which should be illegal. (Most politicians are lawyers so don't hold your breath hoping someone will do something about it.) Want lower gas prices? Tell Congress to allow drilling in ANWAR, and along the coast. Supply and demand and gravity are two laws not even Congress can repeal.

So they posture and preen and blame the oil companies - and in 2 years nothing will change.

J.

Nobody knows you're a cephalopod...

squidsquid.com

I am a giant squid. I swam up from the briny ocean depths. I have a computer, with a specially-modified tentacle-friendly interface. I have a fast internet connection. I seek to learn about humans and about the world. I have read much on the internet. I have read your wikipedia and your dictionary.com. History sites and askjeeves. Yet still, I have many unanswered questions. And you must have questions of me. We have much to learn from one another.

Calamari, anyone?

J.

Still working on getting all the stuff in the background running right (first thing is get BlogJanitor going, and then the spamcatchers...)

But all in all, things are ALMOST back to normal. Ignore all the duplicate entries - I'm still futzing around with the database. Something's not happy in SQLland...

J.

Hillary lies about health care. Obama lies about trade agreements, his plans for Iraq, and pretty much anything else to make himself look good.

What's the limit? At what point will the electorate supporting them go "Gag me with a maggot, Mildred, but there's no way I'm votin' for those two."?

Today at WalMart I almost got into an argument with a young cashier. He's very proud of himself - he's going to be going to Washington in some political capacity, I didn't hear quite what. He's promising to make things better 'once we get those damned Republicans out of there."

I should have been silent. I really should have.

And then he said to the couple he was checking out in front of me - "I can't stand Obama. I won't vote for him if he's the candidate'.

I really should have been silent. I told him I thought if Hillary gets in, our foriegn policy will go down the tubes, and our economy will follow it. He took great offense at this, point out that Bush has wrecked the economy totally, and only the Democrats can save it.

I told him to watch the Democrats for a couple of decades. (The kid was maybe 18.) He'll see - the Democrats promise, but never deliver.

I think he would have hit me at that if he could.

It was quite clear, in retrospect, that the kid has made a very serious mistake. He really, really believes that Democrats aren't gonna fubar the country. That the country IS fubared at this point, but they can fix it. He BELIEVES, and his belief would seem, in the minute or so I had contact with him, to be of almost religious fevor.

And he will not see that belief questioned.

For a person like that - what's the limit? What will it take to dissuade them from their idolation of a specific party?

Kind of funny - I did a google search on 'zealot' - and this was the definition. Notice the juxtaposition with the ads?
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Oddly enough - there was even a picture associated with it.
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Kind of fitting. Wonder what I would have gotten if I'd googled 'liar'?

J.

Market supplied with enough oil, OPEC official says: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance

TEHRAN (Reuters) - The oil market is supplied with enough crude and OPEC is not under pressure to raise output, the group's secretary-general was quoted as saying on Saturday during a visit to Iran.

"Oil supply to the market is enough and high oil prices are not due to a shortage of crude but rather it is because of the decrease in the dollar's value, shortage of refinery capacity and some political tensions in the world," OPEC Secretary-General Abdullah al-Badri was quoted as saying by Iran's official IRNA news agency.

(Perhaps because the Dems would rather see the economy wrecked than let Republicans solve the problems we have?)

Just a thought.

J.

But I sure get a kick out of the shots and captions at Lolcats ‘n’ Funny Pictures - I Can Has Cheezburger?

Like this one.

Or maybe I just amuse too easily...

J.

Gotta love Microsoft....

How to enable Multiprocessor support in Windows XP

This process didn't work with my system. I renamed the original files, but left them in place. I copied the new files in on top of them, and crossed my fingers. Immediately on reboot I got a blue-screen. Luckily I was able to get to the DOS prompt and rename the files back to their original names... otherwise I'd be pretty ticked off at myself.

Seems wierd that XP wouldn't more or less automatically detect the processor configuration. Heaven knows it gripes about everything else that changes!

Originally posted 10-24-07.

J.

Palestinians divided over future under Hamas - Independent Online Edition

Sucks to be them - but they've chosen hate and destruction over tolerance and construction - that tends to limit your options and make you unacceptable in polite company...

J.
Originally posted on 10/8/2007.

Is it possible to have too much information? Or can what seem like too much actually be too little?

And how about trying to figure out whether it's relevant or not?

I was thinking about the solar flux measurement from the other day - and after a few minutes found a site which has more flux readings than I knew what do to with. There's ALL sorts of formats - corrected and uncorrected, daily and monthly and annual means - loads of info indeed.

But let's just go with the last 30 annual entries.

1977 - 869
1978 - 1435
1979 - 1917
1980 - 1984
1981 - 2026
1982 - 1751
1983 - 1198
1984 - 1011
1985 - 747
1986 - 740
1987 - 853
1988 - 1141
1989 - 2134
1990 - 1898
1991 - 2080
1992 - 1502
1993 - 1096
1994 - 856
1995 - 770
1996 - 720
1997 - 809
1998 - 1179
1999 - 1535
2000 - 1787
2001 - 1811
2002 - 1794
2003 - 1284
2004 - 1065
2005 - 917
2006 - 800
2007 - 731

I think the next couple of years will be cool - then it'll start to warm a bit...

Originally posted 2-3-08

J.

Is apparently falling a little... flat.

Ohio.com - Clinton campaign stops at Lockheed Martin

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton told several hundred workers at Lockheed Martin Friday afternoon that she would create more opportunities — and stop jobs from being shipped overseas.

Clinton said many of the country's defense contracts — Lockheed's specialty — have been outsourced to other countries. For example, night vision technology was invented in the United States but the products are no longer made here, she said.

''I want to do everything I can to keep growing jobs and opportunities,'' Clinton, who is seeking the Democratic presidential nomination, said during a 12-minute speech delivered on the floor of the cavernous Lockheed factory.

The crowd of about 300 Lockheed employees and invited guests didn't break into applause and cheers as often happens at
such campaign stops.

They don't seem to connect the idea that shoddy work (which is why an awful lot of the manufacturing jobs got outsourced at the plant) coupled with high wages and benefit levels will result in jobs being lost.

But it's an entitlement mentality. The union guy driving a late model Porshe Boxster thinks he's being screwed by the company and wants more... for the 'little guy'.

Update - this post was originally put out before the union did their final strike vote. And the result was... they ended up accepting the contract. But from what I'm lately hearing around the plant - Hillary isn't trusted, and Obama trusted only slightly... Union support or not - they can't be BELIEVED - and that's hurting them badly.

Originally posted on 2-17-08

J.

Daveland Disneyland House of the Future Photo Page

I went through this, a very long time ago. What I really remember was the shape of it, and how different it was from the framed ranch style house we were living in on Titanic Drive in El Paso, TX. It was very, very cool.

(And I understand it was a pain to dismantle - the shell was HARD.)

Too bad that styling hasn't caught on yet.

J.

Transterrestrial Musings usually has some interesting stuff. Whether it's COTS space travel or Linux troubles, there's pretty much always something to catch my eye.

Enjoy!

J.

Computers that are running Windows XP Service Pack 2 and that are equipped with multiple processors that support processor power management features may experience decreased performance

I'm sure Microsoft has all this ironed out by now.

(Man, did you just see that hypersonic pig go past the window?)

J.

Brain Shavings

Worth taking a look at - hope you enjoy it!

(Originally published 9/7/07)

J.

Five Miles Deep: Pumping Oil from the Bottom of the Gulf

The problem is - the Democrats have pretty much scotched drilling off the coasts and in ANWR. When oil prices started going up - the Dems held hearings and blamed the oil companies. When oil prices kept going up - the Dems held hearings and blamed the oil companies. When oil prices continue to rise - the Dems held hearings and blamed the oil companies. Did they authorize further drilling? Open ANWR? Grant exemptions for refinery expansions? Understand that India and China put a significant demand on the world oil supply, raising prices?

Nope. They held hearings and blamed the oil companies. Hearings, after all, are cheap and fast and the oil companies are easy to blame. It's more important to be seen as 'doing something about the problem' than actually doing anything about it.

If we end up in an energy-caused depression, you can - I believe - thank the Democrats for it. With their support of the NIMBY and BANANA factions, they've discouraged a lot of advancement.

You know - there's times I think that deep down, the Dems KNOW they're ruining the economy - but consciously they simply can't accept that fact, it being too far off their 'progressive' fantasies. So they overcompensate - and we end up in 'politician-induced oscillation' where they're not waiting to see what the effects of their programs ARE - they do heavy control inputs when it's not really a good idea... You get into a feedback loop - and you crash.

Very embarrasing.

And THIS was originally clipped on 8-30-07...

J.

I've got a few posts that just never jelled to a publishable form - bits and clips pulled out and saved in the hopes of coming up wth the time or a completed idea...

But anyhow - I'm about to inflict a bunch of them on you. These have been stuck in the queue long enough - time to flush them out into the open, so to speak.

This particular one will be at the top of the heap for about a week - until we get back from spring break. Please feel free to check back - I've got stuff 'scheduled' to pop in, and it's anyone's guess whether I've got CRON jobs figured out enough to do so.

Now - on with the show!

Bakers lobby govt to help ease wheat crunch | Politics | Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. bakers lobbied the Bush administration and Congress on Wednesday to build up wheat supplies and take other measures to dampen wheat and flour prices.

Robb MacKie, head of the American Bakers Association, said booming prices for wheat has brought the U.S. food industry to a crossroads -- threatening profits, jobs, and potentially boosting prices by double digits for consumers when they buy everything from bread to pizza.
"It's going to get much worse," MacKie told a news conference with other members of the baking industry, who will meet Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer and other officials in Washington on Wednesday.

Commodity markets have been transformed in recent years by record prices and volatility, fueled in part by growing biofuel production, mounting demand and poor harvests.

The government hasn't learned yet that a simple decision (to concentrate on corn for ethanol) can end up having very wide ramifications. I think we're just seeing the tip of the iceberg here - and we're bearing down on it fast.

J.

Have you noticed the Democratic candidates (and the Republican one also) don't seem to have anything original to say on energy?

At her site - a lot of generic handwaving. Alternative energy, enforced conservation standards, 'green' initiatives... no drilling initiatives, no refining initiatives - just 'good' stuff, none of the 'bad'.

At Obamas' site - there's just this...

Obama's plan will reduce oil consumption by at least 35 percent, or 10 million barrels per day, by 2030. This will more than offset the equivalent of the oil we would import from OPEC nations in 2030.

Increase Fuel Economy Standards: Obama will double fuel economy standards within 18 years. His plan will provide retooling tax credits and loan guarantees for domestic auto plants and parts manufacturers, so that they can build new fuel-efficient cars rather than overseas companies. Obama will also invest in advanced vehicle technology such as advanced lightweight materials and new engines.

McCain? Nothing on energy.

You see a trend here? It's almost like they don't think there's a REAL problem - they sure aren't seeing it as one.

I'd almost be willing to vote for the candidate that says "Screw the Caribou - We're Drilling". At least THEY would have something more than generic feel-good promises to 'do something, eventually'.

J.

This last week we went down to Skidaway Island, near Savannah. They've got a very nice campground there - with clean comfort stations and large, level campsites with 30 and 50 amp connections. We got down there Tuesday, left on Sunday. Saturday the weather was getting iffy, so we did our museum tours that day.

We visited the Mighty 8th Air Force Museum. It's kind of badly laid out - but the exhibits are exceedingly good, especially one that ran you through a preflight breifing, a maintenance/groundcrew briefing, and then a simulated mission. If you ever get into the area, I'd highly recommend it. Don't go expecting a quick walkthrough, however, or a lot of planes on static display. They DO have an ME-163 on display, and I got a fair number of shots of that. But I was looking at it and going "Nope. No way." The pilots of THAT thing didn't have steel balls - they were pure titanium.

They also have an excellent display on the lead-in to WW2, with the major emphasis on Germany's change from a relatively peaceful (note, I DID say 'relatively' in the sense that a determined man who's been battered will stop fighting until he gets his wind back...) country into a nation that conquered most of it's neighbors and was making a grab for more real estate. It also detailed some of the more 'interesting' things accomplished along the way, like the mass murders condoned/encouraged by Hitler of anyone who didn't fit his 'perfect vision'.

And I had to explain a lot of that to the little guy. And you know - it's hard to really explain how a country would go off the deep end and follow someone like Hitler. It's difficult trying to explain the concept of the charismatic leader, and how bad the people of Germany needed to boost their self-esteem after WW1. (Hmmm. Self-esteem...)

And it's hard to explain how - even after a lot of Germans recognized just HOW evil they were getting - the people of Germany just kept sinking down and making it worse.

Because to them - it didn't smell evil at all.

Evil is a very subjective concept. Did the German High Command consider themselves evil? How about Hitler? Did he wake up one morning and go "I think I'll come up with the most evil ideas I can, and implement it - causing death and destruction of millions!" (And be advised, any comments equating the Iraq or Afghanistan campaigns with Germany's land grabs will be read, thoughtfully considered for spin and accuracy and then either summarily deleted or made into the subject of a derogatory post because you can't tell your head from a hole in the ground.)

No - I don't think they deliberately turned to evil, like Annakin Skywalker. Instead, at the time, they were trying hard to get Germany back on its feet and an industrial base rebuilt. In the middle of the Depression. With hellacious penalties imposed upon it for WW1, AND missing the lost manpower that died in the trenches. And the way they chose arguably worked pretty well... but they lost control.

It didn't smell evil when they started. That's something to remember. But the road to hell is paved with good intentions (and not because there's a shortage of bad ones) and what would be good in limited amounts (nationalism, socialism) goes all pear-shaped above a certain critical mass. And I'd say that particular point was hit right aound 1937... but that's just me.

J.

State officials see interest in Bakken report | KXNet.com North Dakota News

Bismarck, N.D. (AP) North Dakota's mineral resources director says a report that as much as 4.3 billion barrels of oil could be recovered from the Bakken shale formation in North Dakota and eastern Montana is drawing worldwide interest.

We started talking the other night about fortunes you REALLY don't want to get.

Here are some of the more memorable.

You ARE left-handed, correct?

Call an ambulance. Quickly!

Antibiotics will be needed soon.

Your future? On the good side, you'll be able to part out your car and pay the doctor.

Any of your friends have a stomach pump?

Your life insurance IS paid up, isn't it?

That mole on your neck? Get it checked ASAP.

Be careful on the stairs tonight.

The beneficiary of your life insurance policy is about to collect a windfall.

The scar won't be that notable.

Your wife knows about your girlfriend.

Your wife knows about your boyfriend.

Don't worry - kneecaps are highly overrated.

Divorce - painful once, second time not so much.

Move left three feet to avoid the ... oh. Too late.

Are you sure that extension cord was UL approved? You'll find out tonight, one way or the other.

Hair today, gone tomorrow.

Watch out for the UPS van.

The Red Cross called. They want to talk about your last donation.

Did you attach that shelf to the studs in the wall? Oops. Doesn't look like it.

J.

But just to remind you - it isn't YOUR money in the first place...

Dave Barry: How your taxes turn into manure - 04/13/2008 - MiamiHerald.com

Taxpayers: It's almost April 15, and you know what that means. It means the Miami Dolphins already have been mathematically eliminated from the playoffs.

But it's also time to file your federal tax return. Yes, this is a pesky chore, but remember that paying taxes is not a ''one-way street.'' When you send your money to the government, the government, in return, provides you with vital services, such as not putting you in prison. The government also uses your money to pay for programs that benefit all Americans, such as the Catfish Genome Project.

Of course - if you'd rather... there's always the Fair Tax.

Until then - remember that you're a poor dumb serf who needs to be controlled by government - not someone who can actually figure out your own life.

J.

I don't affiliate myself with any particular party. I'm probably more Republican than Democrat, some of my feelings go left, some right. I tend to choose what candidate is available which has proposals I like concerning what I'm concerned about - and I really wish we had "None Of The Above" as an option for both local and national elections.

But I realize that not all people are like that. Some see their party affiliations as solid as some folks hold their religion - they're Catholics, Baptists, 7th Day Adventists or Mormons - and they are not going to shed those ideas to glom onto stuff which is practially heretical in it's content.

The problem arises, however, when you turn politics into your religion... that you're left with few to no options about what you're worshipping. Normally this isn't much of a problem - after the elections life goes on as normal for the vast majority of people. But when your politics have the status of a religion, you can't turn the switch off that easily.

And on the internet, there's PLENTY of reinforcement for your beliefs.

I've watched, with more than a little unhappiness, the selection of candidates this year. I felt Thompson would be the best bet on the Republican side - and there were no good bets on the Democratic side. The choices have devolved down to McCain, who I'm not wild about but I think he'd make a good President, putting country ahead of party or self - and on the Democratic side there's Obama and Hillary.

Sigh.

Neither, I believe, give a damn about the country. They're in it for their own reasons - not for service to the country. Hillary's making one last grab at the gold ring, Obama's an elitist who will tell us how the country should be run, not listen to the people about how they want things to go.

And I've often wondered why folks on the left got so strident in their support - until I realized they're not going on the strength of the candidates - they're going on a religious feeling that they SHOULD support the candidate because of the (D) after the name. But neither of them are what some would really like to see on the Democratic side.

And thus, we have

Buyer's Remorse. From the New York Times - Fight Leaves Democrats Questioning Prospects...
The battle between Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama over whether Mr. Obama belittled voters in small towns appears to have hardened the views of both candidates’ supporters and stirred anxiety among many Democrats about the party’s prospects in the fall.

But I believe if they do, it'll be the end of the party. Neither Hillary or Obama have what it takes to make a good President - and that'll be very apparent, very fast. If McCain wins, the Democrats will have 4 more years to come up with a comprehensive, workable platform and a candidate that isn't a 'least worst' sort of selection. They need that time to divorce themselves from the nutcases that have snagged the leadership and made sane governance virtually impossible. (As I've pointed out, the solution to high oil prices isn't to have hearings and grill the oil companies. Admittedly, it's fast and gives the illusion something is being done - but that's all it is.)

It's going to be an interesting summer, God help us...

J.

I've noticed the left seems to have no problem with the idea of sex workers. (Ladies/Laddies of Negotiable Virtue, shall we say...) No - it's seen as a valid and in some cases almost a celebrated career choice.

So why the uproar when someone in public office actually negotiates and pays for such services? Isn't that denying someone the right to work at a career field they like?

J.

GraphJam: Pop culture for people in cubicles.

Hey - it's graphs. SFW? I find it hard to imagine one that isn't safe... though perhaps the "Breakdown of Gangsta Living" comes close...

Enjoy!

J.

Nuclear attack on D.C. a hypothetical disaster--National Security News - The Washington Times

A nuclear device detonated near the White House would kill roughly 100,000 people and flatten downtown federal buildings, while the radioactive plume from the explosion would likely spread toward the Capitol and into Southeast D.C., contaminating thousands more.

The blast from the 10-kiloton bomb — similar to the bomb dropped over Hiroshima during World War II — would kill up to one in 10 tourists visiting the Washington Monument and send shards of glass flying the length of the National Mall, in a scenario that has become increasingly likely to occur in a major U.S. city in recent years, panel members told a Senate committee yesterday.

"It's inevitable," said Cham E. Dallas, director of the Institute for Health Management and Mass Destruction Defense at the University of Georgia, who has charted the potential explosion's effect in the District and testified before a hearing of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. "I think it's wistful to think that it won't happen by 20 years."

The Senate committee has convened a series of hearings to examine the threat and effects of a terrorist nuclear attack on a U.S. city, as well as the needed response.

At this point - the USSR is trying to rebuild itself into a military superpower - but it's difficult to have both guns and butter, as the saying goes, when you can afford one or the other, but not both. I think the people of Russia are going to get it in the neck again...

Iran's a threat - North Korea not so much any more. Venezuela might be a problem, but Chavez is a long way from getting a nuke.

The EU? Not a threat. The ME? Well, the problem there is Radical Islam - and they're not at all unwilling to blow up the rest of the world in their drive to convert the unbeliever.

Dang. Almost makes you miss the Cold War, doesn't it?

J.

Reinstating the draft... what a joke.

Pajamas Media » Blog Archive » A Modest Proposal — For the Draft

The calls for a military draft are in fact calls for forcible enlistment in the anti-war movement, which has suffered greatly from its failure to recruit in the current voluntary political involvement model. The calls for a draft are nothing more than frustrated efforts to bolster the effectively non-existent anti-war movement to Vietnam levels by swelling its ranks with suddenly concerned suburban Americans.

It’s populist anti-war posturing, not based on any kind of political or military reality. One place you’re not hearing much about a draft these days is Congress, which figured out some time ago it was a non-starter, as noted here by Dan K. Thomasson at Scripps Howard.

Discuss - see ya later...

J.

Oh, this is rich.

Now Obama's using the Republican Playbook!

What a pair. Were they REALLY the best the Democrats could come up with?

J.

Either that, or I'm finally learning how to do the fun stuff...

About two weeks back, I bought a Samsung S630. At $59 at Wolf Camera (it was a blowout sale item) it seemed a fair risk. I wanted something I could fiddle with, that seemed pretty sensitive, and would do video with audio. The little guy has a Samsung S530, and it's been holding out pretty well - I'd try the next model.

One thing that I wasn't quite aware of when I got this camera was how fast it'd go through batteries. Alkalines last maybe 20 shots. Lithiums seem to last about 40-50. The best bet seems to be using rechargable hi-amperage batteries - 2500 mAh or greater. From what I've read on the web, don't even bother with batteries under about 2200 mAh output - apparently the thing's got a heck of a current draw at times, and if the battery can't give it the current it'll shut itself off. (I'm going to see about getting some 2900mAh ones and test their life.)

Quality wise - I'm more likely to lose the camera than have it malfunction. It feels sturdy - 'massive' in the hand, though the size is small for a pocket camera. It doesn't FEEL cheap. And it takes standard SD cards, so capacity isn't a problem.

Image quality... is pretty darn good. The following three shots illustrate that.

The first is a shot of the moon through some trees.

Then, a snippet with 5 stars in it..

Not too shabby. I did use an editing program to cut the bits out and shrink them down to fit the column - but that was is.

Anyhow - if you're looking for an inexpensive, but not cheap, camera to carry around, you could do a lot worse than a Samsung S630.

J.

Food Rationing Confronts Breadbasket of the World | The New York Sun

I don't know how authoritative the Sun is - but this is a bit worrisome.

Kind of.

I remember back in the early '70s when Johnny Carson sparked a toilet paper shortage just by making a joke... are we looking at the same thing here?

Or, with the obsession about corn-based ethanol the government has - is it the first indication of a REAL problem with the food supplies?

J.

Gateway Pundit: Britain Cancels St. George's Parade Over Fear of Muslim Riots

In 2006 Church of England officials contemplated giving Saint George the boot from his perch as Patron Saint of England because he was too offensive for modern day Muslims.

Now, British officials have cancelled an annual St. George's Day Parade in Bradford in fear that Muslims will riot. Many of the youngsters had already made flags of St George to carry in the parade on April 23, which was designed to boost community cohesion.

Oh well.

J.

Al Qaeda chief slams Muslims for lack of support

Al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri criticised Muslims for failing to support Islamist insurgencies in Iraq and elsewhere in a new audiotape posted Tuesday on the Internet.

Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant also blasted Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas over their reported readiness to consider a peace deal with Israel.

"I call upon the Muslim nation to fear Allah's question (at judgement day) about its failure to support its brothers of the Mujahedeen (holy Warriors), and (urge it) not to withhold men and money, which is the mainstay of a war," he said.

You have them strapping bombs onto retarded people, and blowing up markets. You have them strapping bombs onto women, and blowing them up in crowds.

You have them beheading people who don't believe the 'right' way, whether Shi'a or Sunni. You have them filling mass graves with people who don't support them properly.

Indiscriminate slaughter is the order of the day.

Hey, with actions like that, WHY would the people of Iraq cut their support? WHY would Muslims world-wide shudder and close their wallets? WHY would they be so UNGRATEFUL for all the death and destruction that AQ has accomplished, and the tarnishing for decades of whatever luster Islam had managed to hold out as a 'religion of peace'?

Man, some people... I swear, they're just ungrateful!

J.

Reason Magazine - Oil Price Bubble?

Oil prices climbed to their highest level ever, reaching over $108 per barrel this week. And Americans are feeling this price spike at the pump, with gasoline averaging $3.22 per gallon. An analysis released by the investment firm Goldman Sachs suggested that oil prices might soar to $200 per barrel. Does this make sense?

Not really. Although U.S. crude oil inventories have fallen, gasoline inventories are at their highest since March, 1993, notes Tim Evans, an energy futures analyst at Citigroup's Futures Perspective. World oil production was up 2.5 percent in the first quarter of 2008 over the same period in 2007 while world oil consumption rose by just 2 percent. In fact, world production is projected to be 3.3 percent higher in the second quarter and 4.1 percent higher in the third quarter than the same periods a year ago. On the other hand, world demand is projected to rise by just 1.6 percent over the next six months.

Reason Magazine - Springtime for Stupid Ideas

In the realm of energy policy, there are a great many bad ideas and a very few good ones. The usual practice of presidential candidates is to 1) sift through all these proposals, 2) separate the wheat from the chaff, and 3) keep the chaff.

This year, the two parties are competing to show who is most eager to discard sound economics and long-term prudence in favor of appeasing aggrieved motorists. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are pandering with a proposal to punish oil companies with a windfall profits tax. John McCain has targeted the same group by urging a federal gas tax holiday from Memorial Day to Labor Day.

I understand their proft margin is 8 to 9%. Google's was 25.33%. GE? 13.1%. Bank of America? 22.59%.

Hmm. Maybe they AREN'T greedy, rapacious capitalists? By the way, care to guess what Wal-Mart's net profit margin is?

3.51%. Evil, ain't they?

When the bubble pops - it should get interesting...

J.

Re the Mormon-based polygamy sect in Texas... I'm not quite sure what to think. Was it damaging to the kids there? It's difficult to tell. Was it damaging to the families involved to have the whole thing ripped asunder, apparently on a bogus call? It's difficult to tell.

COLORADO SPRINGS — A court document says a phone number used to report alleged abuse at a polygamist retreat in Texas had been used previously by a 33-year-old Colorado woman.

It's not yet clear whether authorities suspect Rozita Swinton of Colorado Springs made any of the calls that triggered this month's raid of the compound.

An arrest warrant affidavit made public today says a phone number she had used previously was used to call a Texas crisis center before authorities conducted the raid and removed more than 400 children. Swinton's whereabouts are unknown.

Authorities have said a 16-year-old girl called a crisis center claiming she was abused at the compound. Authorities have not found that girl but say they have found evidence other children were abused.

Something's not smelling right. Where's the 'innocent until proven guilty' aspect? And why do I get the feeling that if this had been a Muslim group - not a darn thing would have been done?

J.

Current View

Newt Gingrich seems to have signed on to "doing the right thing" by preserving the environment, but no actual program to do anything that would make a difference as opposed to making Al Gore richer.
At the moment the entire Global Warming crisis seems largely intended to keep Al Gore rich. It may or may not do something else. It does seem to be good at creating famine.

We can't use nuclear and now Obama says we can't use coal. We can't drill offshore. There is no proof that Global Warming is real, lots of proof that we don't know enough and before we spend a lot on a "remedy" we need to get more data on what the problem is; and accepting Pelosi's premise that we need to be involved in this "debate" on "what to do about Global Warming" is already to concede that which ought not be conceded.

Apparently Newt has stopped reading me. I'll have to see if I can fix that.

We should not be spending a nickel on doing something about Global Warming. We should be spending a good bit on gathering data about just what is happening to the climate; and until we are certain what the problem is, "doing something" is silly.

So in order to drop carbon emissions, we're switching to ethanol, which is devouring food grain like crazy, driving up the prices, and setting up the conditions for worldwide famines with little to no hope of relief.

I'm thinkin' the Greens know exactly what they're doing - a Malthusian reduction of the population worldwide. That millions may die of hunger isn't important - it's much more important to worship Gaia properly... and I'll bet there's not an ecofanatic in the folks who're promoting this stupidity that'll go hungry while millions starve.

J.

Asia Times Online :: Taliban Damaged by Trusted Associates

After coming under intense pressure in its traditional strongholds in the North and South Waziristan tribal areas, al-Qaeda and the Taliban staged a joint shura (council). This meeting concluded that they had to be especially careful of local political parties and tribals who were all too ready to sell themselves in the US's quest to find Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri. The council pointed to the example of Iraq, where the US's policy of courting Sunni tribes to turn against al-Qaeda has had marked success.

At this point, the council hit on the idea of taking the initiative and turning Taliban and al-Qaeda attention on Khyber Agency with the aim of bleeding the Western coalition without having to launch major battles.

This was fine in theory, but there were practical difficulties: the agency is the most unlikely place for "Talibanization". The majority of the population is Brelvi-Sufi Muslim, traditionally opposed to the Taliban's Deobandi and al-Qaeda's Salafi ideology. Being an historic route for armies and traders, the population is politically liberal and pragmatist, not easily swayed by idealist and Utopian ideology such as the Taliban's and al-Qaeda's.

So the Taliban sent in its own fighting corps gathered from other tribal areas, and drafted in Ustad Yasir, a heavyweight Afghan commander, from Afghanistan. These predominantly Pashtun fighters consider the Afridi and Shinwari tribes, the natives of Khyber Agency, as materialist and non-ideological, but all the same a local host was essential for their operation.

The Taliban hit on one of the few Salafis in the area, Haji Namdar, as their point man. Namdar is not a traditional tribal, he's a trader who has worked in Saudi Arabia. His Salafi ideology and the fact that he is a practicing Muslim lent him credibility - and trustworthiness - in the eyes of the Taliban.

Namdar came on board, offering to provide the Taliban with sanctuary for their men, arms and supplies along the main road leading to the border area. He gave these assurances to Taliban leaders in his own home.

It's odd seeing the fundamentalist Islamic theology of the Taliban being described as 'Utopian". Guess it means different things to different people, but the Taliban 'Utopia' as practiced in Afghanistan seemed like a choice slice of hell. And the Taliban and Al Quaeda can't exactly count on the population being ignorant of what they do and therefore being supportive until they find out the mistake they've made - their reputation is preceeding them.

All in all, we may be reaching a critical point, where the Taliban and Al Q have little to no indigenous support, and must depend on the more anti-civilizational Western intelligentsia for emotional support.

J.

The War in Global Warming seems to be the sort of thing that you're not to question. Yet the folks who were massively skeptical about the WoT and have been pushing hard to NOT do anything have no hesitation about signing onto all sorts of measures designed to alleviate the supposed problem with Global Warming.

But finally, some on the left are starting to question.

The Austrian Economists: Rushing to War, Part Two

More generally I would ask several questions of people critical of the War in Iraq but gung-ho about a War on Global Warming. Should we not be asking the same deep, critical questions about what we do and do not know about climate change and environmental issues more broadly, and how we acquired that information, as we should have asked about Iraqi WMDs before we go rushing to “war” on global warming? Though the earth has been warming, it is not at all clear that the consensus on the causes and consequences of said warming is as widely shared among scientists as Al Gore and others would like us to believe. Should we not also be asking the same questions about the effects that such a war will have on innocents in the third world as dissenters did with respect to Iraq? After all, the environmentalism-driven rush to biofuels appears to be a significant contributing factor to the run-up in world food prices, which is causing great harm to the poorest folks on the planet. And shouldn’t we be asking what the consequences of this “war” will be on our own freedoms and our own standard of living, just as critics of the War in Iraq have rightly drawn attention to those same issues in the context of that war? Finally, is it really all that much more imperialistic to try to create democracy at the point of a gun in Iraq than it is to tell the Third World that they must abide by high Western standards of environmental regulation in the name of a war on global warming and environmental destruction, when the consequences of doing so are sure to prolong their poverty?

Sometimes it seems to me like the left is searching desperately for something to believe in. Communism proved a flat-out bust, Socialism is failing. There exists very few vehicles which can be used to force mankind into 'perfection' any more, which can be used to push society in the 'proper' directions. Global Warming is virtually tailor-made (indeed, I could argue that it was Al Gore who really got the whole platform going) to provide that vehicle. It's not surprising it's turned almost into a religion.

You have a threat - formless, barely detectable, which may or may not be caused by solar influences, which CAN be blamed on mankind... even if the evidence is ambiguious. (Of course, Ruddiman's article on it is pretty unambiguious. I buy his premise, that global warming's been going on since the beginning of human agriculture, and it's a damn good thing too...) You cannot question it, or the high priests of Global Warming who say that the only way to expiate your sins and save Gaia is to burn your food reserves.

Wow. They've brought back the idea of burnt offerings to the gods. Who'd have thought it?

I've mentioned before that it seems to me the potential for millions to starve due to food shortages doesn't seem to register with the Greens pushing massive changes in the global food economy. But then, I'm not terribly surprised. You're supposed to make sacrifices for your religion.

The problem gets bad when you want to force everyone else to make the same sacrifices.

J.

Old Man Winter isn't finished with us yet

A late April snowstorm dumped a foot of snow or more across parts of western and northern Minnesota, forcing authorities to close a major freeway and St. Cloud State to cancel its spring football game. At least two deaths were blamed on the storm.

/sarcasm

You know, I REALLY would like to see some claim somewhere about what the global temperature SHOULD be. Haven't seen it yet - have you?

By the way, if you're interested - there's currently no sunspots. Low sunspot activity means low solar activity - and lessened solar radiation. In Canada, they're worried about it, and have been for a while. (This from last June, actually.)

Read the sunspots

The mud at the bottom of B.C. fjords reveals that solar output drives climate change - and that we should prepare now for dangerous global cooling.

Solar scientists predict that, by 2020, the sun will be starting into its weakest Schwabe solar cycle of the past two centuries, likely leading to unusually cool conditions on Earth. Beginning to plan for adaptation to such a cool period, one which may continue well beyond one 11-year cycle, as did the Little Ice Age, should be a priority for governments. It is global cooling, not warming, that is the major climate threat to the world, especially Canada. As a country at the northern limit to agriculture in the world, it would take very little cooling to destroy much of our food crops, while a warming would only require that we adopt farming techniques practiced to the south of us.

Wouldn't it be funny of the climate change folk are right - but in the wrong direction?

J.

The normal guy in the UK doesn't stand a chance. He can't own a firearm, he's screwed if he defends himself, and now the prisons are almost 'rest homes' for the inmates.

British prisoners 'too comfortable to escape' | The Australian

BRITISH prisoners are passing up opportunities to escape because they are more comfortable inside jails where there is a plentiful supply of cheap drugs, according to a prison officers' union leader.
Staff morale is at rock bottom and many jails are close to anarchy because of underfunding, said Glyn Travis, assistant general secretary of the Prison Officers Association.

He gave warning yesterday that the drug problem was now "out of control" and said even prostitutes were sometimes smuggled in.

Mr Travis told of an institution in Yorkshire where members of the public were climbing over the prison walls to take drugs inside. "They put up ladders to climb over the walls, but prisoners were so comfortable in the environment they were living in that none tried to climb up the ladders and escape," he said, in a reference to Everthorpe Prison.

J.

When it's constantly being reopened?

It's hard to ignore the good Reverend Wright. The media seems to be in love with the guy, and it's easy to see why. He's slick, self-confident, and very full of bits and pieces that are just SO tasty to a media circus choking on stale Clinton popcorn and bland Obama peanuts.

And it's a tasty mess he's serving up. Rampant racist paranoia. A dislike of America that he can persuade himself is 'patriotic'. Black liberation theology, passed out to the media like ketchup for the spicy fries of hate he's serving up.

I grew up in a simpler age - one where I was led to believe that how a man (or woman) acted was how he should be judged, that the color of his skin was inconsequential. Where bigotry, racism wasn't allowed or condoned.

I've tried hard to bring up the little guy that way. That people are people, no matter the skin. You don't judge people by their color - you judge them by how they act.

And then you get someone like the Reverend Wright. A racist - but that's not bad in itself, there's a lot of folks out there who really dislike those of a different color. Usually you can ignore them - they render themselves irrelevant on anything more than a small scale, poisoning those around them.

But the the pastor of a large church... and though he says his remarks are taken out of context, I'm a bit doubtful of that - has a much wider audience. You hear the people cheering him on in the background - and it doesn't sound like they're hearing this sort of stuff for the first time. It sounds like something they're familiar with... and they like it.

And why shouldn't they? They're being told, by a man of authority, that their failings aren't their fault. That the problems in the Black community aren't caused by the actions of the people within that community - they're caused by the White Power Structure. The white man has caused AIDS, has caused the destruction of the Black family (and you know, with welfare he might actually have something there...) and is still trying to keep the Black Man down. He's getting cheered for that. It means he's right, doesn't it? After all, if your audience is lapping it up and giving you plenty of money for what you're saying, doesn't that mean it's the right thing to say?

I don't believe so.

Is our country blameless regarding racism? No. But it's a hell of a lot better than it was 50 years back. Is slavery a problem? No - because slavery was ended well over a century ago. Is the black man held down by the white? No. But the black man holds himself down pretty well by himself through rejecting education and clinging to a culture that puts the emphasis on drug use, violence, instant gratification and mysogynistic sex, and pretty much rejects the idea of marriage and responsibility... much less planning for the future.

How is any culture like that supposed to prosper?

It's my belief that religion can serve as a stabilizing influence in a culture - rather like a sea anchor - or it can destabilize a culture, like Islam does when it promotes suicidal jihad as the be-all and end-all of a society. For all the Reverend Wright's good works, I find it difficult to believe that his hate speech has been taken out of context. I also find it difficult to believe that Obama could sit in that church, listening to all this garbage about 9/11 and Aids and the like... and NOT be affected by it.

Who stands to benefit by having the wound of racism heal? Society at large does - because people will be able to learn that a man (or woman) should be judged by how they act, not how they look.

Who stands to benefit by keeping the wound open as long as possible - and even making it worse if he can?

Martin Luther King was assasinated because he believed people should be judged by the content of their character - not their skin color.

Rev. Wright gets a million-dollar house for thirty years of preaching Black Liberation Theology and damning the United States.

Who benefits from keeping the wound open?

J.

Hits Again. Whoops.

US secretary concedes biofuels may spur food price rises

Setting aside farmland to produce biofuels like ethanol may be partly to blame for driving up world food prices, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Monday.

"There has been apparently some effect, unintended consequence from the alternative fuels effort," Rice told a meeting in Washington when asked for the US government's view on skyrocketing food prices.

But we've focused on corn. And you know how fast the government admits it made a mistake, and how long it takes to correct it once the mistake is made...

J.

Wow. Via Instapundit, I find... this.

Pajamas Media ｻ Pastor Wright's Fantasy World of Hyperbole

Another example of the man’s total demagoguery is his response to the questions about Louis Farrakhan:

…I am not going to put down Louis Farrakhan anymore than Mandela would put down Fidel Castro. Do you remember that Ted Koppel show, where Ted wanted Mandela to put down Castro because Castro was our enemy? And he said, “You don’t tell me who my enemies are. You don’t tell me who my friends are.” Louis Farrakhan is not my enemy. He did not put me in chains. He did not put me in slavery. And he didn’t make me this color.

OK, I accept it as a given that Louis Farrakhan did not put Jeremiah Wright in chains, nor did he enslave him.

The point is, no one did.

That’s the whole problem with Wright. He’s living in a fantasy world of hyperbole where the most monstrous examples of lynching, torture, and extermination are all attributed to the United States government, and presented as if they are all occurring in the present, and still being lived now by an ever present “we” — consisting solely of white AmeriKKKan oppressors and black victims.

Speaking of “we,” perhaps the worst aspect of Wright’s message was his thrice repeated claim that the criticism of him is “not an attack on Jeremiah Wright; it is an attack on the black church.” (Perhaps I’m not keeping up with current events as I should; did someone make Wright the pope of all black churches?)

Of course, in Wright’s fantasy world, deranged conspiracy theories are passed off as truth, even as scientific facts. A perfect example was his handling of the AIDS remark:

MODERATOR: In your sermon, you said the government lied about inventing the HIV virus as a means of genocide against people of color. So I ask you: Do you honestly believe your statement and those words?

REVEREND WRIGHT: Have you read Horowitz’s book, “Emerging Viruses: AIDS and Ebola,” whoever wrote that question? Have you read “Medical Apartheid”? You’ve read it?

(UNKNOWN): Do you honestly believe that (OFF-MIKE)

REVEREND WRIGHT: Oh, are you — is that one of the reporters?

I guess she got nullified there too. Asking the moderator (or whoever asked the question) whether they read the Horowitz book is a trick question, and should not disguise the fact that Horowitz is one of the rankest of conspiracy theorists.

There's not much difference, I'd say, between the Wright garbage and the rhetoric of the KKK. Swap colors, and they're indistinguishable in meaning and hatred.

J.

No sunspots again today. And apparently we're pushing a curve when it comes to the sunspot cycle.

All things considered, I don't think this is the appropriate point to start turning food grain into biofuel. We may need it later.

And remember - the more sunspot activity the more solar output, and the warmer it gets. Notice the 'hot years' on the graph?

J.

Even Congress, with all their hearings, can't rescind that. (And seriously, how are a bunch of pontificating politicians supposed to provide lower oil prices? I don't get it.)

Seems to me there's two relatively quick ways to get lower prices on a certain commodity. Either you lower demand some way or another - or increase supply. I don't see world demand decreasing anytime soon - so the way to drop prices is to increase supply. And how do you do that?

Robert J. Samuelson - Start Drilling - washingtonpost.com

It may surprise Americans to discover that the United States is the third-largest oil producer, behind Saudi Arabia and Russia. We could be producing more, but Congress has put large areas of potential supply off-limits. These include the Atlantic and Pacific coasts and parts of Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico. By government estimates, these areas may contain 25 billion to 30 billion barrels of oil (against about 30 billion barrels of proven U.S. reserves today) and 80 trillion cubic feet or more of natural gas (compared with about 200 tcf of proven reserves).

What keeps these areas closed are exaggerated environmental fears, strong prejudice against oil companies and sheer stupidity. Americans favor both "energy independence" and cheap fuel. They deplore imports -- who wants to pay foreigners? -- but oppose more production in the United States. Got it? The result is a "no-pain energy agenda that sounds appealing but has no basis in reality," writes Robert Bryce in "Gusher of Lies: The Dangerous Delusions of 'Energy Independence.' "

Unsurprisingly, all three major presidential candidates tout "energy independence." This reflects either ignorance (unlikely) or pandering (probable). The United States imports about 60 percent of its oil, up from 42 percent in 1990. We'll import lots more for the foreseeable future. The world uses 86 million barrels of oil a day, up from 67 mbd in 1990. The basic cause of exploding prices is that advancing demand has virtually exhausted the world's surplus production capacity, says analyst Douglas MacIntyre of the Energy Information Administration. Combined with a stingy OPEC, the result is predictable: Any unexpected rise in demand or threat to supply triggers higher prices.

The best we can do is to try to exert long-term influence on the global balance of supply and demand. Increase our supply. Restrain our demand. With luck, this might widen the worldwide surplus of production capacity. Producers would have less power to exact ever-higher prices, because there would be more competition among them to sell. OPEC loses some leverage; its members cheat. Congress took a small step last year by increasing fuel economy standards for new cars and light trucks from 25 to 35 miles per gallon by 2020. (And yes, we need a gradually rising fuel tax to create a strong market for more-efficient vehicles.)

Increasing production also is important. Output from older fields, including Alaska's North Slope, is declining. Although production from restricted areas won't make the United States self-sufficient, it might stabilize output or even reduce imports. No one knows exactly what's in these areas, because the exploratory work is old. Estimates indicate that production from the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge might equal almost 5 percent of present U.S. oil use.

Members of Congress complain loudly about high oil profits ($40.6 billion for Exxon Mobil last year) but frustrate those companies' desire to use those profits to explore and produce in the United States. Getting access to oil elsewhere is increasingly difficult. Governments own three-quarters or more of proven reserves. Perversely, higher prices discourage other countries from approving new projects. Flush with oil revenue, countries have less need to expand production. Undersupply and high prices then feed on each other.

The way to break the spiral is by increasing production, which is the one thing Congress doesn't seem inclined to do.

Ain't that strange?

J.

USATODAY.com

Federal, state and local governments are hiring new workers at the fastest pace in six years, helping offset job losses in the private sector.

Governments added 76,800 jobs in the first three months of 2008, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports.

That's the biggest jump in first-quarter hiring since a boom in 2002 that followed the 9/11 terrorist attacks. By contrast, private companies collectively shed 286,000 workers in the first three months of 2008. That job loss has led many economists to declare the country is in a recession.

Now - hiring isn't a bad thing, necessarily - but won't an increase in government workers require an increase in taxes down the road?

I'm just askin'...

J.