Explained as a pub fight. (h/t EBD)
Arctic Ice Loss
If There Was No Ground Zero
… there’d be a lot less of this:
Not Waiting for the Asteroid
Now they are begging:
Yes, Republicans, you can take advantage of this heated circumstance, backed by the families of the 9/11 victims, in their most emotional return to the public stage since 2001.
But please don’t do it. There are a handful of good reasons to oppose allowing the Islamic center to be built so close to Ground Zero, particularly the family opposition and the availability of other, less raw locations. But what is happening now — the misinformation about the center and its supporters; the open declarations of war on Islam on talk radio, the Internet and other forums; the painful divisions propelled by all the overheated rhetoric — is not worth whatever political gain your party might achieve.
The USS Nebraska Was Not Invited
Destroying the evidence
Stormbringer:
“You may have seen the Truther websites that ask ‘If it’s true that a Boeing airliner hit the Pentagon, what happened to all the parts of it? Why did we not find more pieces of it? Where did all that mass GO?'”
The answer, in a fraction of a second:
Y2Kyoto: We’re Winning
The coalition is watering down a commitment to tough new environmental emissions standards, raising the possibility of dirty coal-fired power stations such as Kingsnorth going ahead.
Green groups are aghast that a flagship policy called for in opposition by both Lib Dems and Tories, and which they last year tried to force on the Labour government, will now not be implemented in the coalition’s first energy bill to be published this year.
h/t Maz2
Reader Tips
Tonight’s amusement en route to the Tips is the next installment in the series of songs about cities. This one was released 37 years ago, and has since become a part of popular culture in Los Angeles, where it’s commonly played in sports arenas when the local team wins. From the 1983 album Trouble In Paradise, here’s Randy Newman driving around with the top down and singing the unusually (for him) up-tempo I Love LA. He loves it!
The comments are open for your Reader Tips.
But Glenn Beck is the Crazy One
(language warning)
Yann Martel: Call Your Office
Now is the time at SDA when we juxtapose!
Yann Martel, What is Stephen Harper Reading? – For as long as Stephen Harper is Prime Minister of Canada, I vow to send him every two weeks, mailed on a Monday, a book that has been known to expand stillness. That book will be inscribed and will be accompanied by a letter I will have written. I will faithfully report on every new book, every inscription, every letter, and any response I might get from the Prime Minister, on this website.”
Michael Powell, Columbia Journalism Review: – “I got talking to [Obama] about what he reads and was telling me about these different policy tomes. And I said, ‘Well, yeah, but come on. I’m out here on the campaign trail with you, you’re up even earlier than I am, and I’ve been carrying around this Philip Roth book with me for two months and I’m yet to even crack it.’ He actually laughed at that point, and said, ‘Yeah, you have very little chance to really read. I basically floss my teeth and watch Sports Center.'”
Gone to a better place
Grandma’s going green:
Belgian undertakers have drawn up plans to dissolve the corpses of the dead in caustic solutions and flush them into the sewage system.
The controversial new method is said to be less expensive and more environmentally friendly than running highly polluting crematoria or using up valuable land for graves.
It’s not as hard to swallow if you just think of it as a form of eco-reincarnation:
The departed would go into the sewage systems of towns and cities and then be recycled in water processing plants.
Your Lying Eyes
The Decline And Fall Of The American Empire
All bending over backward tells moderate Muslims is that the American political elite will abandon everything — even Ground Zero — to the radicals. It tells the Muslim world that the American elite, from cowardice or moral vanity will sell out anyone. And that doesn’t breed Muslim respect; it breeds universal contempt. Then they will turn to each other and say, “if you were thinking of fighting by America’s side, don’t”. With a guy like Obama as your shield, who needs a sword?
Or, to put it another way…
The Gathering Storm: China’s Challenge to US Power in Asia
The most important question that flows from this discussion is whether China can rise peacefully. It is clear from the Defence White Paper—which is tasked with assessing Australia’s strategic situation out to the year 2030—that policymakers here are worried about the changing balance of power in the Asia-Pacific region. Consider these comments from that document: “As other powers rise, and the primacy of the United States is increasingly tested, power relations will inevitably change. When this happens there will be the possibility of miscalculation. There is a small but still concerning possibility of growing confrontation between some of these powers.” At another point in the White Paper, we read that, “Risks resulting from escalating strategic competition could emerge quite unpredictably, and is a factor to be considered in our defence planning.” In short, the Australian government seems to sense that the shifting balance of power between China and the United States may not be good for peace in the neighborhood.
Reader Tips
Tonight’s amusement en route to the Tips is a song about changing perspectives, loss of innocence and friendships, and the fragile wisdom that hangs by a thread on the other side. Since the weather has been highly changeable this summer, and there’s been a lot of clouds getting in the way – at least where I’m living – I figure it’s a good time for this one: from 1970, here’s the beautiful and talented Joni Mitchell in a live solo performance of Both Sides Now.
The comments are open for your Reader Tips.
The Goon Show
The Goon Show was a seminal British radio comedy programme, originally produced and broadcast by the BBC Home Service from 1951 to 1960, starring Spike Milligan (KBE), Harry Secombe (CBE), and Peter Sellers (OBE), originally including Michael Bentine (CBE), and commonly featuring Max Geldray on harmonica, and Ray Ellington and his quartet.
Now available are 126 episodes of The Goon Show via YouTube. These are audio tracks (since it was a radio show), but we do have the very good fortune of also having available a rare video transcription of “The Goons” performing The Whistling Spy Enigma, live.
I most highly recommend viewing that video first: for Goon beginners it will establish the situational understanding for the remaining shows, and for Goon old-timers [ my Tornado (KC-166) was named the “Seagoon” when I skippered ‘er! ] it is (I must say) a real treat in and of itself.
After that & without further ado, here are: The Goon Show episodes.
Oh Wait, There’s An Invisible Monkey
Dodge 1, PETA 0
Understanding the Hockey Stick
… in one easy sentence:
That is, the very method used in Mann et al. (1998) guarantees the [hockey stick] shape of Figure 1
… details.
And more @ WUWT
We Need A Famine
This photographic evidence backs me up.
Via
Y2Kyoto: Cooking The Books
Northern Lake Michigan Surface Temperatures on 7/4/2010, 9:59 (EDT)
…as created by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in partnership with Michigan State University.
h/t John D.