Multiple news outlets held off on reporting the news of secret talks between the United States and Iran for months, it was revealed on Sunday.
After news broke of a nuclear deal between Iran and the West on Saturday night, the Associated Press and Al-Monitor both disclosed that the US and Iran had been engaged in unannounced negotiations since at least March.
The AP then revealed that it had known something about the talks for about that long…
It’s Probably Nothing
Paul A. Rahe – Chinese Aggressiveness in Asia
In and for a long time after the time of Deng Xiaoping, the Chinese talked softly while carrying a big stick. Deng and his immediate successors understood that the rise of China would elicit anxiety on the part of the Japanese, the Koreans, the Vietnamese, the Taiwanese, and the Filipinos, and they did what they could to allay that anxiety by refraining from doing anything that would suggest on their part aggressive intent.
In the last couple of years, however, all of that has changed; and everywhere where one goes in Asia, an old friend who travels in high circles told me earlier this week, one senses hostility — not towards the United States but towards one’s neighbors. The anger underlying all of this has been stirred by the Chinese, who have been throwing their weight around with ever greater force.
This weekend the Chinese upped the ante. In the South China Sea, between Korea and Taiwan, there are some uninhabited islands, which are called the Senkaku isles by the Japanese and the Diayu isles by the Chinese. Although there are other claimants, these have been controlled for many decades by the Japanese. This weekend, however, China extended its air-defence zone to include the islands…
More: China’s new air defense zone above Senkakus ‘very dangerous’ escalation
Via
Reader Tips
Your reader tips offering tonight comes courtesy of Crazy Russian Hacker: How To Open A Can Without Any Tools. Because, the children are our future.
Your own handy tips are welcome in the comments.
101st Grey Cup: Open Thread
FLASH!!!! GAME SCORE CONTEST – the SDA reader who comes closest to predicting the final score will win a book from the SDA Free Book Library. Contest closes at kickoff.
UPDATE: Looks like Fred’s our winner! Shoot me an email, we’ll get you set up with a book.
“How the Saskatchewan Roughriders became the beating green heart of the CFL”
Those outside the viewing area can tune in via 620 CKRM, or watch via NBC Sports channel.
With the Ti-Cats coming to town, the storylines are enormous as Kent Austin comes back after winning a Grey Cup for the Riders as a coach and a player in the colours of the Tiger-Cats while public enemy number 1 Henry Burris will try to silence what is sure to be a sell-out crowd booing his every move.
Kickoff at 5:30pm Rider Time. (corrected)
Things gonna get loud.
Half Time Update: And crazy.
Final update: Riders 45 Ticats 23 – 101st Grey Cup Champions!
More Pavilions At Folkfest
Immigrant parents should take more responsibility for stopping the wave of street crime sweeping Oslo, Norway’s new prime minister has argued.
Because one generally doesn’t hear such words spoken in English.
The Gore Effect
Now is the time at SDA when we juxtatweet!
The Sound Of Settled Science
“This is hard to explain with our current models”
An exploded star some 3.8 billion light-years away is forcing scientists to overhaul much of what they thought they knew about gamma-ray bursts – intense blasts of radiation triggered, in this case, by a star tens of times more massive than the sun that exhausted its nuclear fuel, exploded, then collapsed to form a black hole. […]
“Some of our theories are just going down the drain,” said Charles Dermer, an astrophysicist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico…
h/t Paul B.
The Endangered Warthog
USAF Targets Its Legendary Close Air Support Platform
The A-10 was built on the mantra of being able to fly extremely damaged on ‘half of one wing, one tail, one engine, one elevator missing’. Of extreme importance for CAS missions is the A-10’s relatively slow speed which unlike fast-moving jet fighter aircraft allows the pilot to accurately acquire and engage targets. In addition, its turbofan engines give the A-10 increased fuel efficiency, significant loiter capability (on the order of several hours versus minutes for high-speed aircraft), time on station, and time over target, which are critical for on-call missions in support of ground forces. Most impressively, the A-10 excellently provides this lethal and effective capability at a cost of only $11-19 million dollars per aircraft.
Current trends again see the planned reduction of the A-10 fleet. Recent defense budget reductions have led the USAF to propose cutting five A-10 squadrons and ultimately reducing the fleet to around 240-50 aircraft (down from approx. 350), while more drastic plans call for getting rid of them altogether.
This looks to be a pretty good site, check out Marc’s other stuff.
Rooting and wallowing
Oink:
Taxpayers in Will County have offered its public employees a hefty pay raise and are willing to pick up 90 percent of the cost for their health insurance, but that’s not good enough for members of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees Local 1028.
Its 1,300 members went on strike Monday, decrying a “paltry” offer from the county that would have given workers a 14.5 percent pay hike and have taxpayers pay for the overwhelming majority of their health insurance costs.
Read the whole thing, particularly the statements from the AFSCME’s spokesman.
(Bumped from Reader Tips.)
Reader Tips
Sally died. How did she die? Like a cherry tree.
The comments are open, as always, for your Reader Tips.
Peace For Our Time
Washington Post: Iran, world powers reach historic nuclear deal. Streaming video here…
State TV congratulates the supreme leader and the nation over "victory" in Geneva.
— Mahdi Fattahi (@mFat) November 24, 2013
If you like your uranium enrichment facility, you can keep it
— Eli Lake (@EliLake) November 24, 2013
Perfect: Iranian foreign minister now giving press conference bragging of Iran's right to enrich uranium
— Noah Pollak (@NoahPollak) November 24, 2013
Honey, I Finished The Internet
Saskatchewan slang.
(h/t Rob)
Who’s Who in the Hinterland: the Endangered TigerCat
Oh, Shiny Pony!
Via email:
The attached is a scan of a notice which was plastered liberally
around the food court area of Memorial University this afternoon.
It shows exactly what Justin and his handlers think of Newfs.
Micro-aggression
Is an M-word, which rhymes with N-word, and that stands for racist.
This Is Not Your Grandma’s Humane Society
Good advice on combating animal extremists for all of us in the animal industry, from an animal researcher. Still, I’d advise she arm herself.
“You have improved the lives of millions of people and animals. Nearly every biomedical advance in the world was, and still is, supported by your hard work and tender hearts. You are heroes! So, why are you hiding? The activist agenda relies on your invisibility to deceive the world into believing that you devalue life, when the truth is that your love for life defines you professionally and personally. Society is longing to know this truth and I believe that your visibility can dismantle the activists’ attack on love and progress. I believe that your visibility can convert war to peace. I believe that your visibility can unite enemies and breed compassion for all living things. I believe that your visibility can change the world…and I want you to start believing it too.” – Cindy Buckmaster
Forward!
They come for your guns, they come for your energy, they come for your water;
A river runs through it — and Uncle Sam isn’t far behind.
That’s what several Republican lawmakers and even state farming groups and local governments are warning, after a draft rule from the Environmental Protection Agency proposed expanding which waterways are federally protected under the Clean Water Act.
The concern is that the move could give the feds authority over virtually any stream or ditch, and hand environmentalists another way to sue property owners. In other words, critics say, the government might soon be able to declare jurisdiction over a seasonal stream in your backyard.
If so, good luck getting a permit to expand building space on your property, or marketing your land to prospective developers.
Silly people, that would never happen!
Jan Goldman-Carter, senior wetlands and water resources counsel with the National Wildlife Fund and supporter of the new rule, says the EPA is doing just what Justice Kennedy suggested — establishing, with scientific criteria, the kind of wetlands and water bodies that have a “significant nexus” to protected waters. These waters and wetlands are in the floodplain of “navigable waters,” and would meet the test anyway, she insists. Now it’s in black and white.
“Navigable waters”. What could go wrong?
I Amuse Myself
Don't remember. #wherewereyou
— Katewerk (@katewerk) November 23, 2013
Reader Tips
Tonight, we watch an Emmy Award-winning display of the madness of five-and-a-half years ago. It may look like the product of a collaboration between Leni Riefenstahl and Werner Erhard, but it’s really just a cheaply-filmed orgy of celebrity self-shaming, one that will never, ever go away.
The comments thread is open, as always, for your Reader Tips.
Ah, it’ll be nice
WOCN13 CWWG 222036
SPECIAL WEATHER STATEMENT UPDATED BY ENVIRONMENT CANADA AT 2:36 PM
CST FRIDAY 22 NOVEMBER 2013.
———————————————————————
SPECIAL WEATHER STATEMENT FOR:
CITY OF REGINA.
GREY CUP SUNDAY WEATHER OUTLOOK UPDATE.
———————————————————————
==DISCUSSION==
THE WEATHER HAS HELD REGINA IN ITS ICY GRIP FOR MUCH OF GREY CUP
WEEK. THIS MORNING THE TEMPERATURES SIT AT MINUS 27 CELSIUS WITH A
WIND CHILL OF MINUS 37. WITH COLD CONDITIONS LIKE THIS IN RIDER
NATION, ITS BEEN QUICK TO FREEZE THE PAWS OF TIGER CATS AND LIONS AND
TURN WATERMELONS INTO ROCKS. THOUGH SUNDAY WILL BE MILD BY
COMPARISON, IT WILL NOT TRICK THE ALOUETTE TO BURST OUT IN SPRING
SONG.
THE STAMPEDE OF MILDER AIR FOR GREY CUP SUNDAY IS STILL LOOKING
PROMISING WITH CLEAR SKIES AND NO SIGN OF PRECIPITATION. THERE MAY
HOWEVER BE A BIT OF A WIND CHILL FACTOR. MOSIAC STADIUM IS KNOWN TO
FUNNEL THE WINDS AND WITH GAME TIME TEMPERATURES AROUND MINUS 3 OR 4
CELSIUS, WIND CHILL VALUES WILL BE NEAR MINUS 10.
FOR THOSE WHO ARGO’ING TO THE GAME SUNDAY, APPROPRIATE DRESS WOULD BE
ADVISED. DON THAT BOMBER JACKET SO AS NOT TO TURN TRUE BLUE, OR PACK
THAT ESKIMO PARKA TO KEEP TOASTY.
THE DAY TIME FORECAST HIGH FOR SUNDAY IS MINUS 2 CELSIUS.
WITH SUNSET NEAR KICKOFF, THE TEMPERATURE WILL LIKELY FALL SLOWLY AS
THE GAME PROGRESSES. BY THE 4TH QUARTER, TEMPERATURES WILL BE CLOSER
TO MINUS 6 CELSIUS AND THE WIND CHILL CLOSER TO MINUS 13.
PLEASE MONITOR THE LATEST FORECASTS FROM ENVIRONMENT CANADA AT
WWW.WEATHEROFFICE.GC.CA.
END