Score one for global warming

Global warming must have trapped this Chinese aircraft carrier in a lake (Google Earth coordinates 31.10,121.01)!

Let’s be real. . .the ship is a scale model of an aircraft carrier and appears to be part of a theme park.

Michael J. Totten: Hezbollahs Putsch - Day One

Follow Michael’s latest here. . . Interesting account of daily life within Beruit.  And please make a donation.

In a pinch?

Report: Iran oil profits could dry up by 2015.

The decline is estimated at 10 to 12 percent annually.In less than five years exports could be halved, Stern predicted.

For two decades, the United States has deployed military forces in the region in a strategy to pre-empt emergence of a regional superpower.

Iraq was prevented from growing into a major power in the area in the 1991 Persian Gulf War.

But a hostile Iran remains a target of U.S. threats.

The U.S. military exercises have not stopped Iran’s drive.

But the report hostility (sic) to foreign investment wishing to develop new oil resources could destabilize Iran, Stern said.

(the) analysis, which appears in this week’s edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, supports U.S. and European suspicions that Iran is trying to develop nuclear weapons in violation of international understandings.

But, Stern says, there could be merit to Iran’s assertion that it needs nuclear power for civilian purposes “as badly as it claims.”

He said oil production is declining and both gas and oil are being sold domestically at highly subsidized rates.

At the same time, Iran is neglecting to reinvest in its oil production.

“With an explosive demand at home and poor management, the appeal of nuclear power, financed by Russia, could fill a real need for production of more electricity.”

But there are certainly other reasons for Iran’s predicament, no?

Those Ethiopian Neocons

Ethiopian forces bomb Somalia’s two main airports in a strike against militant Islamists.

Hideous beast terrorizes Japanese fishermen

Not really, but if AP and CNN can play with headlines, so can I.

Report Says Berger Hid Archive Documents

Nothing new here:

Berger, who pleaded guilty to unlawfully removing and retaining classified documents, was fined $50,000, ordered to perform 100 hours of community service and was barred from access to classified material for three years.

Why the hell does he get his classified access back in three years?

“This is why we have guns”

Couldn’t agree with you more!

Hell, Salvation, & Damnation in a NJ Public School

What was this teacher thinking?

There’s a reason why public schools are “public” and why private, religious schools are “private, religious.”

The Volokh Conspiracy

From The Volokh Conspiracy - EU vs. USA on CO2 emissions thoughout the last 16 years

An editorial in today’s WSJ adds some interesting statistics to this picture. From 1990-1995 and 1995-2000, the growth of carbon dioxide emissions in the U.S. was significantly greater than in the E.U. Since 2000, however, this has changed, as illustrated below.

U.S. vs E.U.
1990-1995 6.4% -2.2%
1995-2000 10.1% 2.2%
2000-2004 2.1% 4.5%

Consider also that from 2000-2004, the U.S. economy also grew at a much faster rate than did that of Europe, as did the U.S. population. Clearly, then, the U.S. must be doing something right when compared to the nations of Europe.There is much to fault in U.S. climate policy, including the failure to cut subsidies for fossil fuels or provide greater opportunities for market-driven innovation in the energy sector, but Europe is hardly providing a model the U.S. should follow.
I’m sure there are stories behind the numbers (EU numbers don’t include the old Eastern Bloc nations, or the effects on US offshoring, etc), but hey, now it’s out there.

Iraqs Economy is Booming

Parts of Iraq’s economy are actually growing significantly, according to Newsweek.  Next week, Time Magazine and/or Paul Krugman will blow the lid off this with some drivel about the growing gap between the new rich and the poor in in Anbar province.

Eason Jordan is back!

Former CNN chief is back to providing news straight from Iraq, although this time around he doesn’t have to curry favor with Saddam Hussein in order to maintain his access to information (a fact not mentioned by the predictable E&P).

** update ** Jules Crittenden weighs in.

Despite the press, Rep. Jim McDermott is looking out for you!

End of year housecleaning. . .The House Ethics Panel finally passed judgement on “Baghdad” Jim McDermott many months after his guilty verdict—nearly ten years after the infraction!
McDermott’s stance on wiretapping on Huffington Post (read all the juicy reader comments too!)

Life Imitates Team America

If needed, watch the movie again tonight. Life imitates this puppetry masterpiece once again.

“We need change”

Back in September I had recapped some of the nonsense that cluttered debate during the run-up to the 2004 Presidential election, and I asked which issues would have have a similar impact in the 2006 cycle.

Here’s a starter:

1. The “Culture of Corruption” stigma only applied to Republicans who–deservedly–paid the price for ineffective self-purging of tainted goods. The shining star for pundits to watch this year is Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA), who just won his runoff election. There are continuing investigations–mostly tied to the Abramhoff scandal–that could implicate additional members of Congress this year. And Tom Delay awaits trial. . .
2. Considering the findings in the House Ethics Committee’s report, the Mark Foley scandal was likely a political maneuver skillfully timed to affect maximum damage on Republicans in the elections. There was no coverup or political subterfuge as bemoaned by “concerned observers“. There was an inability on both sides to address the issue of questionable (but private) communications amd behavior between an adult and a young person. (Are we now proposing to freely monitor such communications when we can’t even monitor domestic terrorist threats without the ACLU intervening?)

More to come when I deem it politcally necessary. . . ;^)

Boxer Mania

Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA), on Senator James Inhofe’s (R-OK) last hearing as chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee:

(Boxer) shook her head and said it was sad that one of the last days of the 109th Congress was spent criticizing media coverage of climate change instead of working on legislation to curb greenhouse gases.

“In a free society in what is the greatest democracy in the world, I don’t believe it’s proper to put pressure on the media to please a particular Senate committee’s view,” Boxer said.

“My other sadness about this hearing is again we’re arguing about who believes what rather than moving toward solving the problem,” she added.

Mickey Kaus comments:

Huh? 1) How is Inhofe putting illegitimate “pressure” on the media? How would he do that? Doesn’t he lose his chairman’s power in the Senate in, like, a minute and a half? 2) Is Boxer saying politicians should never blast what they perceive as unfair media coverage, or single out particular reporters? In a “free society,”–let alone “a free society in what is the greatest democracy in the world”!–isn’t the idea that everyone can criticize everyone?

I’m glad to see that Boxer will be so open to uninfluenced discourse when she begins chairing a committee that will debate (without any external pressures, or course) one of the most controversial topics in our lifetime.  Perhaps her honest debate will balance hysterical lunacy against historical realities and come out looking less like the casuistic phony she appears to be.

Iraq report online

Click here for the report. Skim it.  Think about how much it reads like a “world peace” wish list written by a Miss America candidate.

More seriously, how are we supposed to “peel” Syria away from Iranian embrace without considering Russian influence in Syria and Iran?   However, Russia is only mentioned twice in the report, and only in the context of broader discussion with other Security Council members.   Considering Moscow’s historical involvement with these two targeted receipients of renewed American rapprochement, they are absolutely key.

Unpopular to who?

New Mexico Governor  (and possible Presidential candidate) Bill Richardson speaks against Border Fence, telling reporters it’s unpopular on both sides of the border and should not be built.

At least he’s clear on his stance!

Become the first carbon credit billionaire!

California Senator Barbara Boxer, incoming Senate Environmental Committee Chairwoman, plans big changes for US environmental policy on global warming–she intends to institute carbon emission caps and credit trading mechanisms for manufacturers in a manner recently undertaken in California. This fatuousness despite no universal scientific consensus on the total effect of anthropogenic inputs to macro climate change.
Wouldn’t Boxer at least want to see if such a program actually works in California? Maybe also check abroad? I’m anxious to see how the manufacturing sector will react to another uninvited obstacle to job preservation and growth, concepts Boxer undoubtedly has campaigned on in the past.
Employers can flee California for other states but intentionally creating a federal mandate where already-precious manufacturing jobs could conceivably be permanently flushed away would be insanity. But then again so is the mandate’s original premise.

Space.com wants its visionary back

Lou Dobbs: “Our leaders are ducking reality on Iraq”, but no more so than this populist little rant.

A preview of Hillary

You may call it measured or calculated, but this pre-campaign 2008 hype by the HRC crowd is just a taste of what a second Clinton administration would look like.  There will be a lot of hemming and hawing in trying to find the perfect triangulated position.
You’re either going to run, or you’re not.

Who’s negotiating from weakness?

The Baker Study (Iraq Study Group) will be released this Wednesday. It has actually been released piecemeal for several weeks now, and a lot of the leaked content suggests “solutions” to problems that have either already been hashed and rehashed for months and some that make the hairs on many American’s necks stand up on end. Although this whole joke of a sideshow may be just a meaningless diversion for the press and blogs to chew on while the real work gets done behind the scenes, we may as well take a look at the whole thing and make that judgment later this week. The report might actually prep us for some concepts that might let us see the Iraq situation differently. A few of the report’s more contemptible suggestions (for instance reaching out to Iran) may not turn out to be what they seem to be at first glance.

So what is the best way out of Iraq?

Read more

Whatever, dingbat

Pretentious actress plus pretentious musician equals, well, a level of pretentiousness understood only in London.

Have a smoke, Alex

Polonium-210 was detected in Syrian cigarettes back in the ’80’s.

So many theories, so little time. . .

Exactly right.

Although there weren’t any major problems with electronic voting machines this election cycle, that doesn’t justify the need for these machines. What is the compelling argument for electronic voting?  Is this a case of technology for the sake of technology?  What is wrong with one ballot, one person?  Furthermore, that the concept of paper-based audit trails even was discussed meant that the idea was fundamentally weak from the start.
Brad Friedman nails it here.