h/t James M.
Y2Kyoto: Lower Than Whale Shit
The latest chapter in carbon-enhanced research funding: Whale poop is vital to ocean’s carbon cycle!
Using estimates of the whale population before commercial whaling in the Southern Ocean began early last century, Nicol predicts that baleen whales – now endangered – once consumed about 190 million tonnes of krill every year and produced 7600 tonnes of iron-rich faeces.
I guess you can polish a turd. Judging by those figures, whales must shit ball bearings.
Flashback – Make Mine Mink
h/t
How Do You Say “Deport Me” In Sign Language?
Tim in vermont – “Makes you just have a warm fuzzy to see the anti Arizona immigration law demonstrators give gang signs.”
Reader Tips
| Good evening ladies and gentlemen, welcome to SDA Late Nite Radio. Tonight for your delectation, here’s an old favourite of ours from our LP collection in the studio: Jazz Blues Fusion, an album that features John Mayall, Freddy Robinson, Larry Taylor, Ron Selico, Blue Mitchell, and Clifford Solomon, and which was recorded during two live concerts in Boston & New York, in 1971. |  |
Jazz Blues Fusion ~ Mayall & al ~ 1971 Boston 1. Country Road 6:55 2. Mess Around 2:40 3. Good Time Boogie 8:20 4. Change Your Ways 3:25 New York 5. Dry Throat 6:20 6. Exercise in C Major for Harmonica &c 8:10 7. Got To Be This Way 6:15
Your Reader Tips are, as always, welcome in the comments.
Enjoy!
Let’s take this one step at a time.
The CBC’s pollster of record is major Liberal donor. He plots out strategies to beat the Conservatives. And he gives that strategic advice to the Liberals in private — a fact that we only learn about because he blabbed about it to Martin.
Yet Graves appears on the CBC not as a “Liberal pollster” or “Liberal strategist” or “Liberal donor” or “Liberal”, but as the CBC’s trustworthy, neutral, reliable, independent analyst, who cares only about enlightening viewers.
What a scandal.
Could you imagine if the CBC were to hire a Tory strategist as their chief Parliamentary correspondent — while secretly allowing him to continue to work for the Conservatives, and donate thousands upon thousands of dollars to them?
It’s too absurd to even ask the question.
More at Bourque.
Is There Nothing That GM Can’t Do?
I had my suspicions that there might be more to this than Obama’s auto mall shopping spree;
Sen. Chuck Grassley’s charge was backed up by the inspector general for the bailout — also known as the Trouble Asset Relief Program, or TARP. Watchdog Neil Barofsky told Fox News, as well as the Senate Finance Committee, that General Motors used bailout money to pay back the federal government.
Harper On The Gun Registry
Live interview with the PM begins with John Gormley shortly … click here to “listen live”. (Segment is over now, audio should be up by tomorrow. Harper was followed by interviews with Michael Ignatieff and Jack Layton.)
Feature moment: Taliban Quack* on the gun registry … sharing his “rural roots” from the days of growing up on the farm;
… we had our .22 and it was for going out and hunting ducks.
I’m going to piss myself.
More: Cosh follows the money on those Chiefs of Police.
“I Have Seen The Asteroid And It Is Us”
We leaked these documents because we thought it would spark a discussion worth having. We leaked these documents because we thought people should read them, and because we wanted to hear what you thought about them. And we wanted Cathy Perry and Jennifer McGuire to hear what you thought, too.
And I linked them for the schadenfreude. Because, God knows they stopped hearing what their (former) audience thinks a long time ago.
Not Waiting For The Asteroid
“When you buy a newspaper, you aren’t buying news – you’re buying judgment. Already in this low tech world of instant communications there is too much news. That’s the problem. Raw news will do just fine if you’re a computer buff and want to play editor. But I, for one, would rather let a professional take the first raw cut at history and spend my leisure time fishing.”
This Is My Brother Mohammed, And This Is My Other Brother Mohammed
Update: It’s not nice to mess with friends of South Park… Or not. Checking again this morning, the url of the site claiming credit for the South Park threat video differs from the one supposedly “hacked”. Friday update: more on the hack details at Gawker.
Others approve! “By selectively censoring the blasphemers of South Park, these Comedy Central executives have displayed the steadfast conviction to stand up, courageously raise their voices, and beg not to have their heads chopped off. I am delighted to announce that in recognition of their courage, we will kill them last. Unless they are Jews.”
h/t James M.
More – South Park Revenged (with language/content advisory)
Trapped in the spam filter – until just now.
This is serious do not see it as joke
if you make joke of prophet Mohamad and draw his picture there is 60% percent some one kill you
since this is against law of Isalm to anybody to do so
Be Carfull
Do not risk your life when you deal with islam issues
why should you risk your life for say it?
YOu do not know how danger some of these Muslim are and can hurt you badly
do not mess with few issues with Muslim and educate yourself before do so
When they said Salmon Rushi must die nobody change this law yet and there is always chance to assinate him therfore
please Don’t this is serious issue this is not joke be carefull of what you see and limit you can go
Do not mess with some issue has not worth or any value bring you at all do not risk even
I freindly warn you because if not those people did not stop show that joke in tv and they force to change it Please don’t
Thanks for your concern, Mitra. You see – there’s the difference between an “extremist” and a “moderate”.
The “extremist” is the one with the death threat.
The “moderate” is the one who explains what you’ve done to deserve it.
Reader Tips
| Good evening ladies and gentlemen, welcome to SDA Late Nite Radio. Tonight, for your delectation, here are Ravi Shankar on sitar, Qureshi Alla Rakha Khan on tabla, and someone on tambura, performing Rag Charukeshi ¤ (6:35). |
Your Reader Tips are, as always, welcome in the comments.
Y2Kyoto: Must. Try. Harder.
I checked the list twice. Nope – Toronto’s not on it.
We Don’t Need No Stinking Giant Fans
Disabusing Saskatoonians of the theory that local politicians are more grounded in reality than their provincial and federal counterparts: “The project marks the first time in more than 80 years the city has attempted to generate its own power.”
A reader sends this helpful note;
So that’s $5-mill for 1.5 to 2.0 megawatts of capacity (I am assuming capacity, but that is always how these projects are presented). Given Saskatoon is in a far-worse wind zone than the existing wind park near Swift Current, let’s use the low-end of the out-put at 1.5 megawatts, but let’s run it at 40% capacity like the Swift Current region turbines (which is being generous). That is therefore $5-mill for .6 megawatts of power. So the cost is $8.33 million per mega-watt.
A reactor complex can do 3,500 megawatts but at 90% capacity = 3,150 megawatts. Given the wind costs, the reactor should have a budget of: 3,150 megawatts x’s $8.33 million per mega watt = $26,239.5 million.
So, to be competitive with wind, the reactor complex needs to be built for less than $26-billion. With that budget, a few could be built, even with the largest cost over-runs in reactor construction history.
You can contact Don Atchison here to congratulate him on his impeccable oversight of Saskatoon taxpayer dollars.
The Sound Of Forcibly Retrieved Science
Via WUWT;
In a landmark ruling, the UK Information Commissioner’s Office has ruled that Queen’s University Belfast must hand over data obtained during 40 years of research into 7,000 years of Irish tree rings to a City banker and part-time climate analyst, Doug Keenan.
This week, the Belfast ecologist who collected most of the data, Professor Mike Baillie, described the ruling as “a staggering injustice … We are the ones who trudged miles over bogs and fields carrying chain saws. We prepared the samples and – using quite a lot of expertise and judgment – we measured the ring patterns. Each ring pattern therefore has strong claims to be our copyright. Now, for the price of a stamp, Keenan feels he is entitled to be given all this data.”
Keenan revealed this week that he is launching a new assault. On Monday, he demanded the university also hand over emails that could reveal a three-year conspiracy to block his data request.
Keenan has become notorious for pursuing a series of vitriolic disputes with British academics over climate data. Two years ago, he accused Phil Jones of the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia of “fraud” over his analysis of data from weather stations in China. Jones recently conceded he may have to revise the paper concerned.
The latest ruling comes from Graham Smith, deputy information commissioner, who in January said information requests to CRU from climate sceptics were “not dealt with as they should have been under the legislation.” In the Belfast case, as well as insisting the university hand over the data, Smith has accused the university authorities of “a number of procedural breaches.”
Derrick Snowdy On Facebook
Derrick Snowdy no hearings huh, hmmm me thinks someone spilled the beans toJack. now he wants it hushed
Mon at 8:14pm via Facebook for BlackBerry
– [name withheld] Taliban Jack?
Mon at 8:23pm
– Derrick Snowdy Yep, I guess he knows now how close this is going to hit home with a certain NDP and he needs time to prep
Mon at 8:25pm
More at Stephen Taylor.
Y2Kyoto: How Are You Celebrating Earth Day?
I’m painting my window frames.
(Hey, it’s either that, or genocide some Cossacks.)
Update: OK, there’s no topping this.
Reader Tips
Welcome to the Wednesday (EBD) SDA Late Nite Radio.
Anyone who has ever stumbled across MTV – in a restaurant, for example – has heard the sort of music discharged by poodle-haircut-sporting wannabe-Satan types who clearly spend too much time in front of a mirror. Puffing out their lips and sneering like tattooed, cross-dressing derelicts, they wear their uber-coolness like a self-inflicted injury as they blast twenty-thousand watts of dehumanizing noise to drugged-up kids with STDs and nose rings. Oddly, they never seem to take any pleasure in performing their music.
Tonight we take a happy joyride in the opposite direction, and hand the stage over to the enduring one-man phenomenon known as Walter Ostanek, aka Canada’s Polka King. Flying blissfully under, over and around popular music’s radar, this legendary performer has been known throughout his more than fifty-year career for his ability to lift the spirits of his fans, many of whom are of European immigrant stock, with his live performances and his over eighty high-quality records and CDs . His Slovenian-style (sometimes called Cleveland-style) polkas evoke good food and good times with family, friends, and neighbours, and are always delivered with a smile. We’re talking about a man who knows what side his bread is buttered on:
To Walter Ostanek, the title, “Canada’s Polka King” is much more than just a name. It is a special honour that carries with it an obligation to a special dedication and a promise to his fans and followers that wherever and whenever the Walter Ostanek Band appears in public, the band will do their utmost to please the audience and keep them happy.
That they surely do. Here then, performing with his crack band, is three time Grammy Award winner, International Polka Hall of Fame inductee, member of the Order of Canada, and proud owner of Ostanek’s Music Centre in St. Catherines Ontario – which carries a wide range of musical instruments including a selection of quality button and piano accordions, and whose friendly staff will walk you through the process of finding the right accordion for your price range and skill level – Walter Ostanek – he’s the fellow in the white shirt on the left – as he makes three or four generations of folks forget their troubles on the dance floor with the merry musical announcement that yes, indeed, it’s Polka Time!
You are invited to type out your merry Reader Tips in the comments.
Allan Rock: First He Came For Your Property …
On receiving, drip by drip, the transcripts of the emails that senior university staff sent between each other, some with redacted areas, CFOB also came to learn that as requested, the social networking site Facebook had been used to find out which students were attending the meeting. One message, sent on 30 November 2007 by Steve Bernique, assistant director of operations at the university, said “I love this programme [Facebook]! Now we know who is going to attend.”
A screen shot of the list was distributed amongst the higher echelons of the university as they discussed possible ways of blocking the event, including making use of university facilities out of the financial reach of groups such as ERI and CFOB.
“I think it’s quite incomprehensible; I don’t understand the actions of any academic institution spying on students and the community expressing their academic right and freedom; it’s preposterous,” says Hameed. “It wasn’t clear to me who the spies were but all the same it was quite distressing that students could be induced or paid to spy on fellow students and human rights activities.”
One member of the audience had deeper reasons for feeling distressed: octogenarian Harvey Su is the oldest Karen refugee in Canada. He was “appalled” by the surveillance, a phenomenon he thought he had fled.
“Who are these University of Ottawa presidents, vice presidents and security staff working for exactly? The people of Ontario? Or are they working for the Desmarais family, the oil companies and the Burmese military regime? This I really want to know.”
“I Have Seen The Asteroid And It Is Us”
Dear Diary,
I have never been so discouraged and dispirited. My skills are being wasted, and the only challenge in my working life now is dealing with the incredibly increased stress level. I don’t see opportunities to do strong journalism. I feel I work for a corporation that no longer understands public broadcasting…
The rest is here – because I like to end the day on a high note!
Update – Related!
Dalton McGuinty’s Ontario
Now is the time in Hespeler when they juxtapose!