Titanic hunt a cover dive

Robert Ballard gained international attention 20-plus years ago when he located the wreck of RMS Titanic. As it turns out, Ballard was also doing top-secret dives for the U.S. Navy, which the Titanic dives conveniently disguised.

According to newly declassified info and the lead scientist himself, Dr Bob Ballard, the successful search for the Titanic wreck was actually part of a secret hunt for two sunken cold war American nuclear submarines. The USS Thresher and USS Scorpion had both foundered in the 1960s, and the Navy needed to know what had happened to their reactors over the years. When Dr Ballard approached them in 1982 for funding to find the Titanic with his new deep-diving robot submersible, the Navy saw the opportunity and granted him the money on the condition he first inspect the two wrecks.

Good on yer, Bob!

Why Greenland welcomes warming

"How global warming is good news for Greenland's economic climate:"

RARELY a month goes by without another scientific survey proclaiming that Greenland's ice sheet is melting faster than previously thought. But for the 56,000 people who live on the giant Arctic island, climate change is now being seen as an opportunity rather than a threat: a passport to prosperity, perhaps even independence.

I posted in Feb. 2007 the question, “What if global warming is a good thing?” A return to the higher temps of the Little Climate Optimum would be a good thing, perhaps? After all, the LCO, stretching roughly from the 10th to the 13th centuries, in which the average temperature was anything from 1 to 3 degrees centigrade higher than it is today, actually impelled the formation of modern civilization.

Of course, that’s a bad thing to the global warming alarmists.

See also my essay this week on just how, exactly, environmentalism has become an actual religion in its own right, and what are the implications are for personal liberty. Hint: not good. Environmentalist religion explained.

At last, good news from Washington

"Chances dim for climate-change legislation."

"Safe is hard-won, every 24 hours."

Image that appeared on a Islamist web site recently, promoting al Qaeda's call for a WMD attack upon America (link)

How potent a threat is al Qaeda, now that it has lost in Iraq, is losing in Pakistan and is finding its radicalized Islamism being rejected with greater vigor every day across the Muslim world?

CIA Director Michael Hayden:

In a strikingly upbeat assessment, the CIA chief cited major gains against al-Qaeda's allies in the Middle East and an increasingly successful campaign to destabilize the group's core leadership.

While cautioning that al-Qaeda remains a serious threat, Hayden said Osama bin Laden is losing the battle for hearts and minds in the Islamic world and has largely forfeited his ability to exploit the Iraq war to recruit adherents. Two years ago, a CIA study concluded that the U.S.-led war had become a propaganda and marketing bonanza for al-Qaeda, generating cash donations and legions of volunteers.

All that has changed, Hayden said in an interview with The Washington Post this week that coincided with the start of his third year at the helm of the CIA.

"On balance, we are doing pretty well," he said, ticking down a list of accomplishments: "Near strategic defeat of al-Qaeda in Iraq. Near strategic defeat for al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia. Significant setbacks for al-Qaeda globally -- and here I'm going to use the word 'ideologically' -- as a lot of the Islamic world pushes back on their form of Islam," he said.

But Hayden said that al Qaeda hasn't gone away and is still dangerous.

"We remain worried, and frankly, I wonder why some other people aren't worried, too," he said. His concern stems in part from improved intelligence-gathering that has bolstered the CIA's understanding of al-Qaeda's intent, he said.

"The fact that we have kept [Americans] safe for pushing seven years now has got them back into the state of mind where 'safe' is normal," he said. "Our view is: Safe is hard-won, every 24 hours."

I wrote in 2004, "A terrible danger is that we could someday be well underway to achieving our long-term objectives and still get struck by a catastrophic attack inside the US." It's still so.

Remember, al Qaeda long ago claimed, "We have the right to kill four million Americans – two million of them children – and to exile twice as many and wound and cripple hundreds of thousands."

"Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom."

Arabs think Israeli PM Olmert is a fool

But not because he's Jewish, Zionist or anything like that. It's because Olmert is only a little corrupt. Israeli-Arab journalist Khaled Abu Toameh writes in the Jeruslaem Post of some of the reactions across the Arab world to the intensifying pressures on Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to resign because of corruption charges.

Among other things, Olmert is accused of accepting $150,000 in bribes from an American over a 14-year period, which Mr. Toameh said evoked this response from foreign Arabs.

"They say he received something like $3,000 a year," said Abu Atab from Morocco inaccurately. "This shows that Olmert is a decent man. This is a small sum that any Arab government official would receive on a daily basis as a bribe. Our leaders steal millions of dollars and no one dares to hold them accountable."

Touching on the same issue, a reader from Algeria posted this comment: "In the Arab world, our leaders don't accept less than $1 million in bribes; the money must be deposited in secret bank accounts in Switzerland. Olmert is a fool if he took only a small sum."

Another comment, this time from Ahmed in Jordan, also referred to the alleged amount: "Only a few thousand dollars? What a fool! This is what an Egyptian minister gets in a day or what a Saudi CEO gets in 45 minutes, or a Kuwaiti government official in five minutes. This is what the physician of the emir of Qatar gets every 30 seconds."

However, there was strong praise for Israel from Arabs who admitted they hated the Jewish state and all it stands for, except this:

A Saudi national named Abdel Karim urged his Arab brethren to stop criticizing Israel and learn something about its democracy. "Before we curse Israel, we must learn from the democratic and judicial system in Israel, where no one is above the law," he wrote.

Khaled, another Saudi national, chimed in: "Although we are talking about Israel, which I have always hated very much, there is still no one above the law there."

Mahmoud al-Bakili of Yemen posted the following response on one of the Web sites: "We want this kind of accountability and transparency in the Arab and Islamic world."

And there was this comment from an Arab who described himself as a Syrian Voice: "Despite my strong hatred for the Zionist regime, I have a lot of admiration and respect for this entity because there is no one above the law. In the Arab world, laws are broken every day and no one seems to care."

One Arab reader offered some advice to Olmert:

One Arab commentator who identified himself as Jasser Abdel Hamid advised Olmert to seek citizenship of one of the Arab countries. "Why don't you seek Arab citizenship?" he asked sarcastically. "There you can take as much money as you want. Even if they discover the theft, they will erect a statue for you in a public square."

Finally, Rashid Bohairi in Kuwait asked a very good question: "What about the millions of dollars that Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian Authority stole? How come the Palestinian people are still hungry?"

Well, yes. Even the Palestinian Authority admitted that Yasir Arafat stole them blind, but then its post-Arafat leaders went right on doing the same thing.

BTW, along with 11 others in my group, I met and talked with journalist Toameh in Israel last October.

My blogging colleague, Daniel jackson, writing from Israel, says that for the first time Olmert may be doing something right by giving the Arab world these object lessons.

Czech president: environmentalism is like Communism

The Earth Times:

Washington - Czech President Vaclav Klaus said Tuesday he is ready to debate Al Gore about global warming, as he presented the English version of his latest book that argues environmentalism poses a threat to basic human freedoms. ...

Klaus, an economist, said he opposed the "climate alarmism" perpetuated by environmentalism trying to impose their ideals, comparing it to the decades of communist rule he experienced growing up in Soviet-dominated Czechoslovakia.

"Like their (communist) predecessors, they will be certain that they have the right to sacrifice man and his freedom to make their idea reality," he said.

"In the past, it was in the name of the Marxists or of the proletariat - this time, in the name of the planet," he added.

Well, I wrote about that, too:

H.L. Mencken observed, "The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule it." And that is the true foundation of environmentalism today: the desire of its gurus to regulate the way others live. Monbiot again:

We can deal with climate change only with the help of governments, restraining the exertions of our natural liberties.

Dyson wrote that, "Environmentalism has replaced socialism as the leading secular religion." I demur. Environmentalism has not replaced socialism at all. Instead, the old-line socialists, faced with decades of the failure of political socialism, have jumped on the environmentalist bandwagon to keep socialism alive. Environmentalism has become a much better vehicle to achieve a rigid regulation of people's lives than political socialism ever was. After all, the fate of the entire planet is at stake! Environmentalism has already led some British members of Parliament to propose that the government regulate almost every aspect of buying and selling by private individuals. If this is not socialism, it is a distinction without a difference.

So there you are. At bottom, modern environmentalism has discarded scientific rigor to embrace something not much different than Leninism, the desire to control the major components of the way individuals live. From there it is a short step for environmentalism to Leninism's successor: Stalinism, the desire to control every aspect of the way we live. That's our future, minus the gulags. We hope.

Klaus' book is here:

At last, Olmert may be doing something right

Despite being known as the most inept head of state in the recent memory (yes, even surpassing Jimmy Carter), Ehud Olmert may have contributed more to the future of democracy in the Middle East for being a crook AND getting thrown out of office. The Jerusalem Post features a story on the reaction to Olmert's impending indictment that has produced unintended consequences.

The corruption case against Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has earned Israel tremendous respect throughout the Arab world, where many have called on their leaders to benefit from Israel's democratic system and independent judicial system.

Words of praise for Israel are a rare phenomenon in the Arab media. But judging from the reactions of many Arabs to the corruption case in the past week, the trend appears to have changed.

Even some Arabs who describe themselves as "sworn enemies of the Zionist entity" have begun singing praise for Israel.

Over the past week, the corruption case against Olmert received wide coverage in the mainstream Arab media, prompting an outcry about the need for transparency and accountability in the Arab world.

Imagine that?! The actual innovation of democracy is that you can dump a scoundrel and a thief through accountability. Who'd have thought? Certainly the number of comments to the article on the JPost web page from people in the Arab world suggest that, although there will no new converts to Zionism, the thought that no one is above the law is a powerful endorsement.

Olmert has expended considerable effort to remain in office in a vane attempt to conceal his incompetence and show that he is really an effective leader. The irony is that it will be his removal from office that will have the greatest impact on the region--far more than his sham attempts to placate Israel's enemies.

Environmentalist religion explained

Freeman Dyson:

There is a worldwide secular religion which we may call environmentalism, holding that we are stewards of the earth, that despoiling the planet with waste products of our luxurious living is a sin, and that the path of righteousness is to live as frugally as possible. [From, "The Question of Global Warming."]

Freeman Dyson is one of the most highly-regarded physicists in the world. Wikipedia introduces its entry on him thus:

Freeman John Dyson FRS (born December 15, 1923) is an English-born American theoretical physicist and mathematician, famous for his work in quantum mechanics, solid-state physics, and nuclear engineering. He is a lifelong opponent of nationalism and a proponent of nuclear disarmament and international cooperation. Dyson is a member of the Board of Sponsors of The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

A true intellectual heavyweight, his essay in the New York Review of Books this month is a very important analysis that I urge you to read in full.

Dyson is not the first to point out that environmentalism has morphed into an actual religion in its own right. In Global Cooling Ain't so Hot, Either, I pointed out:

Michael Crichton and J.R. Dunn have written highly insightful essays about how environmentalism is a religion in its own right. See “Environmentalism as Religion” by Crichton and Dunn’s piece, “A Necessary Apocalypse,” in which he shows how gobal-warming environmentalism is not merely a religion, it is an apocalyptic religion. Its deity is Mother Earth (Gaia), for whom human beings are mortal enemies. NBC’s Matt Lauer inadvertantly gave away Gaiaism’s central article of faith thus:

Earth’s intricate web of ecosystems thrived for millions of years as natural paradises, until we came along, paved paradise, and put up a parking lot. Our assault on nature is killing off the very things we depend on for our own lives … The stark reality is that there are simply too many of us, and we consume way too much, especially here at home.

My second son was required to take ecology his junior year in high school; he related to me that the curriculum basically said there was nothing wrong with earth that the disappearance of humanity wouldn’t cure.

Jonah Goldberg wrote recently of the "Church of Green."

"At its core, environmentalism is a kind of nature worship. It’s a holistic ideology, shot through with religious sentiment. ...

Environmentalism’s most renewable resources are fear, guilt, and moral bullying. Its worldview casts man as a sinful creature who, through the pursuit of forbidden knowledge, abandoned our Edenic past. John Muir, who laid the philosophical foundations of modern environmentalism, described humans as “selfish, conceited creatures.” Salvation comes from shedding our sins, rejecting our addictions (to oil, consumerism, etc.) and demonstrating an all-encompassing love of Mother Earth. Quoth Al Gore: “The climate crisis is not a political issue; it is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity.”

I heard Gore on NPR recently. He was asked about evangelical pastor Joseph Hagee’s absurd comment that Hurricane Katrina was God’s wrath for New Orleans’s sexual depravity. Naturally, Gore chuckled at such backwardness. But then the Nobel laureate went on to blame Katrina on man’s energy sinfulness. It struck me that the two men are not so different.

As Crichton pointed out, "environmentalism is in fact a perfect 21st century remapping of traditional Judeo-Christian beliefs and myths." Let me elucidate.

---

There are other religions than Judaism and Christianity, of course, but modern environmentalism was born in the West, whose cultural heritage and common languages are steeped through and through in Christian tradition, which was itself a daughter of Judaism.

The common themes of both scriptural Judaism and Christianity deal with deity, the natural world (existing first in a purity state), a corruption of the purity state (Augustine: "fall from grace,"), redemption and liberation/salvation. Then follows paradise. A prominent, though not universal, strain in both Judaism and Christianity is a looming apocalypse that in potential or in fact destroys enormous swaths of humanity.

Modern environmentalism has all these elements, with an emphasis on apocalypticism. I'll examine these religious elements in turn.

Deity: That would be the earth itself. "Mother Earth" is a term tossed about among the religion's adherents, thus personalizing what is really only a gazillion-ton hunk of rock. Personalization of the planet is necessary to deify it. Adherents often call this new deity, “Gaia,” the name of an ancient Greek earth goddess. The Gaia hypothesis was first proposed by NASA scientist James Lovelock, who introduced it thus:

What is the hypothesis of Gaia ? Stated simply, the idea is that we may have discovered a living being bigger, more ancient, and more complex than anything from our wildest dreams. That being, called Gaia, is the Earth.

The most important tenet of Gaiaism is that the earth is itself alive and is a being in its own right.

Creation: Environmentalism offerns no real theory of how the earth came to be, it focuses on the biosphere. In that manner it does echo the Jewish Scriptures, once removed. The Scriptures do inquire how the earth came to be, but not how God came to be.

As for the appearance of life, environmentalism drops the Bible's creation stories and substitutes evolution. Now, I am not arguing here against the theory of evolution. I am simply pointing out that evolution theory is environmentalism's explanation of life on earth and its diversity. The earth's biodiversity is extremely important for environmentalism, since evolution-driven biodiversity undergirds the apocalypticism of religious environmentalism. The apocalypse of "climate change" is predicted to destroy the evolutionary niches of various species. They won't be able to adapt.

The Purity State: Take your pick:

• Gaia before the appearance of human beings or,
• Gaia after we showed up, but before we invented civilization. (The anti-civilization theme is present in the Hebrew Scriptures, too.) This aspect romanticizes pre-civilizational peoples, often portraying them as gentle souls "living in harmony" with nature and imagining that they worshiped the earth, too, which in fact some did. (However, this notion is rebutted by contemporary researchers.)

The Corruption of (or Fall from) Purity: This is easily defined. It was the invention of the internal-combustion engine and the use of fossil fuels that followed. Burning coal also. More broadly, though, the Fall is consumerism and international industry, especially chemical industries.

Redemption: There is no savior per se in environmentalism. We have to save ourselves. Barack Obama sings the same song; one of his stump themes is, "We are the change we have been waiting for." And just as one wonders whether Obama is running for office or creating a cultic following, environmentalism relies on its own cultic leaders to guide the masses and give enlightenment to them. Like the Law of Moses, their commandments are to be obeyed from faith rather than inquiry: recycle, drive less, eat organics, drive hybrids, etc.

Paradise: Sorry, environmentalism offers not. There is no longing for "life more abundant," since abundancy is exactly what environmentalism uses for original sin. Instead of paradise, environmentalism promotes stasis:

Folks my age and maybe a little younger can remember when the Environmental Apocaplypse was not global warming but global cooling. So let us suppose two things: first that global warming really is occurring and human attention to it can reverse it, and second, that we do reverse it. Are we then to agree that a cooler earth really is in our best interests? Why?

I’ve always kind of suspected that underlying much of environmentalism is a desire for the impossible: stasis.

Moreover, environmental stasis can be accomplished only by human austerity. Environmentalism's New Jerusalem is not prosperity, but decline, presented as a return to humanity's purity state: the simple life arranged around a village-type lifestyle where everything is within walking distance of everything else. Who else but George Monbiot to explain?

Everything we thought was good turns out also to be bad. It is an act of kindness to travel to your cousin's wedding. Now it is also an act of cruelty. It is a good thing to light the streets at night. Climate change tells us it kills more people than it saves. We are killing people by the most innocent means: turning on the lights, taking a bath, driving to work, going on holiday. Climate change demands a reversal of our moral compass, for which we are plainly unprepared.

Apocalypticism: Like religious apocalypticism, environmental apocalypticism - in fact, the whole movement - is predicated on the imminent, substantial destruction of the natural world and its inhabitants. This from no less a personage than United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who just five months ago said that "humanity faces oblivion if it fails to confront global warming." Oblivion, he said. Rising seas, expanding droughts, melting sea ice, increased desertification, scorched crops, mass human suffering and death - all inhabit the same enviro-religious space as Revelation's horsemen of the apocalypse.

Important in Jewish and Christian apocalypticism was the concept of "children of light" versus the "children of darkness." The children of darkness were those who rebelled against God, who turned away from righteousness and embodied evil. Children of light were those who apprehended the truth of God and cleaved toward spiritual purity. This notion has been adopted wholesale by environmentalism. Dyson again:

Scientists and economists can agree with Buddhist monks and Christian activists that ruthless destruction of natural habitats is evil and careful preservation of birds and butterflies is good. The worldwide community of environmentalists—most of whom are not scientists—holds the moral high ground, and is guiding human societies toward a hopeful future.

Catch that? This is a clear delineation of the realm of light and of darkness, and whom inhabits each. "The worldwide community of environmentalists ... holds the moral high ground," and thus are the children of light. Who are the children of darkness? They are the "evil" ones who conduct or permit the "ruthless destruction of natural habitats." Dyson continues,

Unfortunately, some members of the environmental movement have also adopted as an article of faith the belief that global warming is the greatest threat to the ecology of our planet. ... Much of the public has come to believe that anyone who is skeptical about the dangers of global warming is an enemy of the environment.

(Italics added.) "Enemy of the environment" = child of darkness. (Dyson does not himself promote such a belief, but certainly it is out there.)

Another tenet of religious apocalypticism is that things will get worse before they get better. And so it is with environmentalist apocalypticism. No matter what we do now, greenhouse gases, and therefore climate change, will intensify until at least mid-century, and only then might be abated.

Still skeptical that environmentalism is a religion in its own right? Then peruse, "Nature is not your friend."

Then Scott Lancaster, 18, was killed and eaten by a mountain lion.

Scott’s friends and family consoled themselves that his death, sad and untimely though it was, had somehow been kind of fitting for him. As James Valdez put it, "He was a real outdoorsy guy."

"It felt natural," said Abby Heller. "It felt like it was part of nature, and part of the way the cycle happens. It seemed kind of pure."

It was "natural," part of the pure cycle of life for a young man to suffer a gruesome, horrifying, massively painful death by means of the "red in tooth and claw" of one of Gaia's creatures. And so the case that environmentalism is a religion in its own right is hereby closed.

---

But there is more than mere religiousity at work in religious environmentalism. H.L. Mencken observed, "The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule it." And that is the true foundation of environmentalism today: the desire of its gurus to regulate the way others live. Monbiot again:

We can deal with climate change only with the help of governments, restraining the exertions of our natural liberties.

Dyson wrote that, "Environmentalism has replaced socialism as the leading secular religion." I demur. Environmentalism has not replaced socialism at all. Instead, the old-line socialists, faced with decades of the failure of political socialism, have jumped on the environmentalist bandwagon to keep socialism alive. Environmentalism has become a much better vehicle to achieve a rigid regulation of people's lives than political socialism ever was. After all, the fate of the entire planet is at stake! Environmentalism has already led some British members of Parliament to propose that the government regulate almost every aspect of buying and selling by private individuals. If this is not socialism, it is a distinction without a difference.

So there you are. At bottom, modern environmentalism has discarded scientific rigor to embrace something not much different than Leninism, the desire to control the major components of the way individuals live. From there it is a short step for environmentalism to Leninism's successor: Stalinism, the desire to control every aspect of the way we live. That's our future, minus the gulags. We hope.

This seems an apt time to quote the old liberals' bumper sticker: "If you're not outraged, you are not paying attention."

The Mad Woman of Shiloh

These days, whenever I think of Jimmy "Rabbit-Heart" Carter (if I must) or come across yet another story of the brave peanut farmer, I immediately recall a story I heard as a boy growing up in South Miami (pronounced MY-AA-MA) about General Robert E. Lee's finest hour. Somewhere, either on the way to Gettysburg or southbound from it or maybe even some other event all together, the General's troops passed through a northern town wherein an elderly, grey haired lady fiercely waved Old Glory over the heads of the southern soldiers. The Old Grey Haired Man on his Grey Charger is reported to have said, "Harm not a hair on yon grey head" or words to that effect.

Okay, so here is Rabbit Heart once again acting crazy waving about some charge that Israel has 150 nuclear devices. Like the old lady waving the Union Flag over the Conferderate troops, James must be taunting the Iranians telling them that it is hopeless to build one or two devices because the Jews have 150 already. If that's so, then there is nothing stopping them from unimaginable destruction. "Ha!" he says, "The Jews have you Iranians SO beat already!" Yeah, that's the ticket.

Now, Haaretz posted this article earlier this evening (I have been up cleaning my telescope's primary mirror) and by 3am, there are over 620 comments. The readership is out in brigade strength eager for roasted peanuts. They just aren't having it. It would appear that Old James just isn't reflecting the Light the way he once did. That inner eye seems to have clouded more than my reflector's mirror.

Clearly, this is just another mad person waving some strange report that no one can make sense one way or the other. Bear in mind that usually, Israelis of all faiths frighten small children acting naughty to be nice by flashing pictures of the Great Georgian's death grin smile. However, tonight, Haaretz seems to be saying, harm not a grey hair on that poor 83 year old head.

Good thing my telescope's mirror is done--I can look for some real lunatics tomorrow night over on the Golan.

The mark of the Beast looms!

Headline of the UK's Daily Mail: "Every adult in Britain should be forced to carry 'carbon ration cards', say MPs."

Every adult should be forced to use a 'carbon ration card' when they pay for petrol, airline tickets or household energy, MPs say.

The influential Environmental Audit Committee says a personal carbon trading scheme is the best and fairest way of cutting Britain's CO2 emissions without penalising the poor.

Under the scheme, everyone would be given an annual carbon allowance to use when buying oil, gas, electricity and flights.



Anyone who exceeds their entitlement would have to buy top-up credits from individuals who haven't used up their allowance. The amount paid would be driven by market forces and the deal done through a specialist company.

Remember: we were warned two millennia ago that this would happen:

Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, 17so that no one can buy or sell who does not have the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name.

Now, I want to be clear here. I have never been much interested in "end times" stuff and considered reading the "Left Behind" series a complete waste of time as well as entirely non-biblical. (They were novels, after all.) I am, myself, not apocalyptically minded much at all - I am more likely to mock apocalypticism than not. So this post is really not about the "mark of the Beast" so much as to make this point:

There is nothing government can do to control the lives of its subjects more thoroughly than regulate their personal transactions. When government specifies the conditions of how you may spend your own money, then government has effectively seized your money and is rationing it back to you for purposes it approves.

Yet in a sense, Revelation's writer was warning of the looming danger to the faithful posed by tyranny. When government gains control of the private economy, freedom will perish, because all who do not pay obeisance to government can and will be marginalized to their great detriment. Yet, Revelation cautions, faith must not be abandoned, for then all truly is lost.

In that sense, the Beast is not an individual, but is government itself, even in democratic systems (remember, Adolph Hitler was elected to the chancellorship). George Washington warned, "Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master." And the faith to cling to, then, is resisting government's creeping encroachment on liberty. (See endnote.)

Sense of Events co-writer Rabbi Daniel Jackson and I are finishing up a joint post explaining how environmentalism has become an apocalyptic religion in its own right. Environmentalism-as-religion is not original with either of us, but we'll explain the specifics of the Jewish-Christian template it uses. It should be online tomorrow.

Relevant to these two points, my (draft) closing paragraph of tomorrow's post observes,

There is more than mere religiousity at work in religious environmentalism. H.L. Mencken observed, "The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule it." And that is the true foundation of environmentalism today: the desire of its gurus to regulate the way others live, even minutely. George Monbiot again:

We can deal with climate change only with the help of governments, restraining the exertions of our natural liberties.

So there you are. At bottom, modern environmentalism has discarded scientific rigor to embrace something not much different than Leninism: the desire to control the major components of the way individuals live. From there it is a short step for environmentalism to Leninism's successor, Stalinism - the desire to control every aspect of the way we live. That's our future, minus the gulags. We hope.

This seems an apt time to quote the old left-wing bumper sticker: "If you're not outraged, you are not paying attention."

End note: About the identity of the Beast in Revelation. It seems clear to me that Revelation's writer is referring to the Roman Empire generically as the "whore of Babylon" and Nero Caesar specifically as the number of the Beast (see here). This doesn't mean, necessarily, that Revelation was written before Nero's suicide in 68. The Romans so feared Nero, and so vilified him after his death, that the return of a Nero-style imperium was greatly worrisome to them. There even arose among many Romans the Nero Redivivus legend, that Nero would personally return. From the Christians' perspective Nero was beastly because he had blamed a great fire in Rome on the Christians and had used the excuse to murder them in great numbers. Tacitus wrote that,

Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. ... Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind. Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired.

No wonder, then that Revelation, written before the end of the first century c.e., would have held Nero up as the epitome of imperial power unchecked. The warning today is still fresh.

Gas-plasma autos on the way?

Is this how we will propel our cars in the near future?

In, "Buy a Honda, kill a polar bear, " I explored the practicality of hydrogen as a fuel for automobiles, either to use in on-board fuel cells to generate electricity, or to enhance gasoline combustion by adding the hydrogen to the air-intake flow just before injection into the combustion chamber.

Fuel-cell technology is proven and the new, all-electric Honda Clarity is being offered for lease (only) in southern California this year. It is powered only by a fuel cell stack.

As for whether hydrogen-has (H2) injection into the intake manifold of IC engines really is valid for improving efficiency, there are a lot of web sites that reek of snake-oil salesmanship. Promises of up to 60 percent better gas mileage are made. My reservation was not whether H2 injection actually improves gasoline combustion at least some, but whether there is a net energy because of the energy required to make the H2 to begin with, especially with on-board H2 reforming or electrolysis.

Setting aside the web sites selling plans for such systems, it turns out that H2 on-board generation is in fact energy efficient. The increased engine power and fuel efficiency is not gained from burning the H2 instead of gasoline. Adding H2 to the fuel-air mixture increases the flame temperature, enables a higher compression ratio and, most significantly, enables the engine to run with greater efficiency on a much leaner fuel-air mixture. All these things combine to improve fuel economy quite a bit.

But only in engines designed for H2 injection. Retrofitting a car with an H2 system gives some benefit, but not a lot, and one auto forum member who tried it pretty much concluded its maintenance and aggravation were more trouble than they were worth.

Note that there is no violation of the laws of thermodynamics here. The improved efficiency does not come from burning the H2, but from H2's catalytic effect on the gasoline's combustion. The energy gained from burning the H2 is less than the energy it took to electrolyze or reform it, but the energy gained from improved gasoline efficiency is more than the energy required to make the H2. And the net energy gotten from the gasoline is still less than the energy it took nature to make the oil to begin with.

Now, on to plasma-drive cars.

Whilst surfing around the Internet getting some links for Avoiding gas-mileage ripoffs, I came upon a site offering for sale a Pre-Ignition Catalytic Converter.

Using a magnetic and electrical reaction to break down the fuel molecules into their elemental state, the PICC creates a plasma, which burns super efficiently and cleanly!

Italics original. The site claims its system can improve gas-engine efficiency by up to nine times. Their test car, they claim, improved from 22 mpg to almost 200 mpg.

I actually laughed aloud when I read that. Yet as it turns out, gas-plasma engines may be a near-term reality after all. That from no less authority than the Los Alamos National Laboratory, which says that Plasma combustion technology could dramatically improve fuel efficiency.

The technology, a plasma combustion technique that applies electrical voltage to the gaseous-phase fuel stream prior to combustion-turning the fuel into a plasma-has already produced excellent results with propane. ...

Kerosene, propane, gasoline and diesel fuel are all hydrocarbons, all made up of the same basic chemical constituents but separated by the size of their individual molecules. The more efficient fuels, and therefore more highly refined and expensive kerosene and propane, consist of fairly small chains of carbon and hydrogen atoms, whereas the less efficient and cheaper fuels, gasoline and diesel, are made of long chains of molecules. According to Coates, when electrodes attached at the spray nozzle of a fuel injector apply enough voltage to the fuel, energetic plasma electrons from voltage-induced breakdown of the fuel cause reactive species to be created, changing the basic chemical composition as the fuel becomes a plasma.

"You put into an engine the equivalent of a 'process plant' or fuel refinery," said Coates. "The plasma unit basically acts like a 'cracker' in a refinery, cutting the long chains of hydrocarbons into bite-size parts -- the smaller the parts the better the burn -- taking cheap fuels and making them combust like expensive ones."

The three researchers also believe they can construct a device that is relatively simple, cheap and easy to retrofit to existing fuel injection systems.

The Lab makes no claim of how much efficiency will be gained using its system, but it would seem to be a very large amount.

But wait, there's more!

Massachusetts Institute of Technology is also working on plasma system for cars. Their tack is a little different. Instead of making the fuel itself into plasma for combustion, they use a plasma unit to reform gasoline into H2, which is mixed with the air-fuel mixture as I described above:

Click image for larger view

MIT claims that their system can make a significant impact on petroleum use by 2025 while fuel-cell vehicles, they say, won't do so until 2050.

Of the two approaches, the Los Alamos system seems to me to offer the most promise because it can be retrofitted to existing engines and because it does not involve injecting H2 into the combustion chamber. It's not that the latter doesn't work, it's that doing so (as a retrofit) runs the risk of hydrogen embrittlement of engine parts and rust of interior engine parts since the product of H2 combustion is water.

View to a Kill

Over on the Golan Heights is the International Peace Park. It is a wonderful overlook spot on the edge of the escarpment that overlooks the Kinneret, Tiberias, and most of the Galilee. The Peace Park occupies a bunker the Syrians build to shell Israeli communities, water traffic, and other fun targets.


With a moderate set of rocket installations, the entire north of Israel is easy picking.

Remember these war dead, too

This day it is also fitting to remember the people who were murdered by Islamist terrorists on Sept. 11, 2001. The most moving remembrance of them I have ever seen is this one.

The Wall

I posted April 1 about my visit with my father-in-law to the World War II Memorial in Washington, DC. My daughter and I also stopped at the Vietnam War Memorial, near the Lincoln Memorial, walking there while my wife and her dad took the Tourmobile to the WW2 site.

There is one Sensing whose name is engraved on the wall, Capt. John L. Sensing, US Army. I never knew him, but we are some ordinal of cousin, since all Sensings (in the South, anyway) descend from one Jakob Sensing, who immigrated to North Carolina from Germany in the 1730s. One of his sons, a Revolutionary War veteran, took his veteran's land grant in Tennessee. So here we are.

Capt. Sensing was a helicopter pilot, flying an OH-6 Cayuse aircraft in the Thua Thien Province when his bird was hit by an RPG near Firebase Ripchord, April 30, 1970. He was serving in B Troop, 2/17 Air Cavalry.

Also killed on the helicopter were SP5 Robert E. Masseth and SP4 David W. Staton.

Posted originally on April 2.

For the fallen

I addressed Gold Star Mothers and their families, along with many Blue Star families, at a luncheon honoring fallen U. S. Marines on Sept. 17, 2005. The luncheon was sponsored by Tennessee Marine Families, a chartered not-for-profit organization.

Many readers will recognize that I modeled five paragraphs of this address on Pericles' oration at the first funeral of Athens' fallen of the Peloponnesian War in 431 bc. You will also see an echo of Shakespeare's "Henry V" in a closing paragraph.

Although this address was specifically honor U.S. Marines who died, I offer it here to honor the men and women of all services who have died for our country.


There was a time in our country when families such as ours did not have to form organizations to offer one another moral and material support because a large percentage of Americans served in the military. Almost every extended family had a member in uniform at one time or another and endured separation or loss like we endure. Families of deployed service members were woven throughout the fabric of every town or city and so was a support structure for them.

Today the privilege of service belongs to relatively few Americans, all volunteers - except us. Our sons or daughters - we can no longer call them children - volunteered for military service and then we discovered we had been drafted into another, softer service along with them. Softer, yes, but not easy.

We have seen our sons or daughters or spouses volunteer for war, prepare for war, go to war. We have, most of us, given an embrace that we dared not think may be the last, taken photographs secretly fearing might be final, given and received tearful kisses hoping with all our hearts that they are promises, not really good-byes. And some us sadly have not welcomed our loved ones home and are living with the grief of fears that became fate.

Without reservations the fallen Marines we memorialize today believed in ideals that formed the very soil from which America grew. They held it self-evident that human beings are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights. The fundamental premise on which America was founded was that human freedom is the will of God. Over 230 years of our history this idea has become so deeply rooted in the American psyche that even Americans who profess not to believe in God nonetheless say that freedom is the natural condition of human life.

Historian and retired infantry officer T. R. Fehrenbach observed that the virtues required to protect a democracy are often at odds with the virtues of democracy. So while we cherish life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness as just ends of democratic freedom, our Marines put their lives at risk, surrender many personal liberties and submit to rigorous discipline that is often most unhappy.

Why did they do this? The most reasonable thing to do when battle begins is to run away, not stay and fight. Were they truly willing to die for their country? I don't think so. There's an old story that goes back probably to the Civil War of the young soldier whose commander asked him, "Are you willing to die for your country?" The young man answered, "Certainly not. But I am ready to die, unwilling."

The American armed forces really have no use for someone who is willing to die. We do not seek and soon weed out anyone seeking martyrdom in battle; this is a key distinction between us and our enemy. We do not send our soldiers, sailors, airmen or Marines to die even though we know some inevitably will. Our country is instead ably protected by those who accept the risk rather than seek it. But why accept it? What civilians rarely discern but what every veteran knows is that military service, especially in battle, is steeped with the convictions of deepest emotion.

In battle there is fear and courage, anger and compassion. There is resignation and determination. There is hope and despair. The chief emotion of the battlefield is an unlikely one. It is love. Across the range of mental, physical and emotional states in the desolation of combat, love abides.

Our Marines chose to serve for a variety of reasons, and love of country was a big one. But when enclosed by the mournful mutter of the battlefield, patrolling deserts of Iraq or the mountains of Afghanistan, men at arms stay where flies the angry iron not for country or flag or other abstractions. In the final sense they fight for their friends. One Iraq veteran wrote,

[T]he first casualty of war is innocence. ... I've found the hard way that war is not glamorous. You quickly lose the idea of being a man fighting for his country when you have to carry your comrade who has been wounded in a gun fight. That nobility is lost quickly. ... It's not about fighting for the flag, it's about fighting for my life and fighting for my buddies' lives. These men I am lucky enough to serve with, I have become so attached to it's like they are my brothers.

Whether they served in peace or war, the Marines we memorialize today were not so impoverished of spirit that they were unable to surrender the pleasures of life. None of them excused themselves from hard service even though a softer lifestyle could have easily been gained. They deemed that their love of country and duty to freedom were of greater value and more important imperative, so they reckoned that if dangers must be faced, they would face them in the most desirable way, by placing their own mortal bodies "between their loved homes and the war's desolation." They determined at the hazard of their lives to be honorable in their young adulthood, to make sure of their duty, and to leave everything else for later, if later ever came. They gave over to hope their chance of lifelong happiness and the uncertainty of final success, and in mortal danger they relied only upon themselves, their buddies and the Corps itself. They chose to risk death young as free men rather than live long as conquered ones. And when fearful lethality loomed they resolved to resist and suffer, rather than flee to save their lives; they ran away not from danger but from dishonor. On the battlefield they stood steadfast, and in an instant, at the height of their resolve, they passed away from this life but not from our lives or the destinies of generations yet to come.

Such was the end of these men's lives. We need not desire to have a more heroic spirit than they, although we do pray that others and their families suffer no such fate. The value of their spirit is poorly expressed in words. Anyone can speak to you about the advantages of such devotion, but you know about that already. Instead I hope that we can fix our eyes upon the greatness of our country and of these men's love of it and one another, and reflect that this country was established and has been preserved by men and women who knew their duty and determined to do it even at cost of life.

We should make them our examples. Their courage is our freedom and our freedom is our happiness. We whose loved ones still serve must not weigh too hard on the perils of war. We accept their love of country as our assurance and their service as our blessing.

So it is comfort rather than pity I have to offer you, the families of the fallen. There are numberless chances to which lives of men and women are subjected: none of us here is promised even to see our own homes again today or ever. These Marines' service ended in their honorable deaths and your honorable sorrow. Their passing is truly sad, for which you rightly mourn - but their deaths were not tragic, for tragedy is found in futility and selfishness, never by attaining the great honor of selfless service for freedom's sake.

I know how hard it is to hear this, for the good fortune of others will too often remind you of the gladness which once lightened your hearts. There is a portal you have passed through that we frankly hope never to cross ourselves. So we honor your grieving and will never forget your sons and husbands. In gratitude we should offer them praise which does not grow old, and acknowledge they occupy the noblest of all tombs. I speak not of that in which their remains are laid, but of that in which their glory survives and is proclaimed whenever people protect their freedom or are liberated from tyranny. For the whole world is the memorial of these Americans; they signed the earth itself with their blood and their honor. Not only are they commemorated here in their own country, but in Iraq and Afghanistan there are countless, unwritten memorials of them, graven not on stone but in the hearts of tens of millions of peoples newly freed from murderous oppression.

Because of these men's sacrifice we go safely to our homes. Henceforth we should stand in humility when their names are read. Their comrades in arms who see old age will recall them fondly and show their medals and say, "These ribbons I earned beside true heroes." We will forget many things in years to come but we shall remember these great men and what feats they did one day. These dates shall never go by but that in them our fallen shall be remembered. They were a few, a band of brothers; and may we gratefully call them who shed their blood for us our brothers. And people in our country safe in their beds should think themselves accursed they knew them not, and hold their courage cheap when any speaks of men who fought and died for freedom's cause.

The prophet Micah wrote that the time will come when God will judge between all the peoples and will settle disputes between strong nations far and wide. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore. All people will be at peace, and no one will make them afraid (Micah 4:3-4).

Let us pray that day comes quickly. Until then may the Lord watch over those who serve today, to make them instruments of justice, enablers of peace, and finally to see them safely home.

To our Gold Star families, may God bless you and keep you and comfort you, from this day until the ending of the world.

They will not grow old as we that are left grow old.
Age shall not weary them nor the year condemn.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning
we will remember them.

From "For the Fallen," Laurence Binyon, 1914

Funny how this works out . . .

... for getting more funding, that is.

Read and read again

I still think that Christopher Hitchens' 2006 Memorial Day essay is one of the finest I have ever read. Read the whole thing.

The decline of the United Methodist Church . . .

... is accelerating.

Asleep at the wheel

Major media in Israel tonight are abuzz with the latest lunacy on the Syrian Israeli peace talks. General Dan Halutz, the military genius behind Israel's stunning performance in the 2006 Lebanon war, weighs in with his expertise. Like some bad ethnic joke, Halutz offers the following advice about the Golan Heights: We don't need it; give it back.

No wonder people in DC are becoming alarmed with Jerusalem.

The entire drama of Olmert's last days are beginning to look like a Herman Wouk screenplay.

More grim news for home sellers

Reuters reports that the housing market continues to tank. (You can buy my Franklin, Tenn. home by clicking here!)

Sales of previously owned U.S. homes slipped last month and the backlog of unsold properties hit a record high, according to data on Friday that suggested the market's downturn still has a long way to run. ...

At April's sales pace, the supply of homes was 11.2 months' worth, the highest since the trade group began tracking single-family and condo properties together in 1999. For single units, the supply was 10.7 months' worth, the most in 23 years.

"The increase in unsold inventory suggests that the housing downturn will continue on through this year and well into next," said Moody's Economy.com Chief Economist Mark Zandi.

Working against sellers is the concern of buyers that a house bought today will be worth several percentage points less before the end of the year. So they wait - which forces unsold inventory up and prices down, the practical definition of a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Working against buyers who do make offers is that mortgage lenders are tightening credit - not because of fears of default, but of federal regulators. Mortgages are harder to get now than in many years. Plus, lenders have the same concern about dropping values that buyers have. This leads lenders to raise down payment requirements to cover the presumed, future fall in value. This, of course, raises unsold inventory, thus depressing prices.

A real estate agent told me that it is harder to get an offer now than she remembers in 20-plus years in the business, and that once an offer is contracted, it's harder to get to closing than ever.

Avoiding gas-mileage ripoffs

Glenn Reynolds linked to PM's 10 easy MPG-boosting tips. I also suggest a couple of other PM pieces:

Looking For A Miracle: We Test Automotive 'Fuel Savers'
Can copper tubing, cheap magnets and wacky gimmicks really boost your mileage by as much as 300 percent?

The answer is "no."

7 More Fuel-Sipping Myths Debunked: Mechanic's Diary

Here's one that caught my eye: does using premium gasoline give you better mileage? Yes and no. No if the car's engine is designed for regular. If the engine is designed for premium, it will get better mileage using it than using regular.

PM says the mpg difference is about 15 percent. Hence, if the price difference between regular and premium is less than 15 percent, it makes sense to buy premium.

This sounds right to me. I drive a 1998 Infiniti I-30T (only 83K miles), for which premium gas is recommended, although the manual says that regular is okay. Because of the higher price of premium, I had been using mid-grade gas for quite awhile. When the price of all grades started skyward a few weeks ago, I dropped down to regular. Since then my mileage has been lousy. Now I know why.

Around my city, premium is 20 cents more than regular. Since regular goes here for approx. $3.81/gallon (plus or minus a few cents), that 20-cent extra for premium amounts to only a 5.25-percent added cost. So if premium gains me only 1.2 mpg better, I will break even. More than that is profit.

Buy a Honda, kill a polar bear

When it comes to fighting global warming, Honda has rolled out the worst car on the planet: the new Clarity.

This is the first auto that runs on fuel cells ever offered to consumers. As Honda's site explains,

Fuel cells produce electricity that can be used as a clean alternative to gasoline. The fuel cell stack in the FCX Clarity converts hydrogen(H2) and oxygen (O2) into electricity. Learn more about How Fuel Cells Work.

As Honda's TV ads point out, the only exhaust from the Clarity is water vapor. The Clarity is obviously designed to capture the market of car buyers who think that gasoline engines are bad things for the environment because they emit carbon dioxide. So the Clarity, emitting only simple water vapor, must be magnitudes better at rolling back global warming, yes?

Problem is, when it comes to global warming, water vapor is enemy number one: "Water vapor constitutes Earth's most significant greenhouse gas, accounting for about 95% of Earth's greenhouse effect."

So buy a Clarity and kill the polar bears!

Okay, a little more serious. The Clarity's fuel cell stack produces electricity that is sent to a battery, and from there powers the car's electric motor. How fuel cells work is explained here. The cells use hydrogen and oxygen to produce electricity. Where does the hydrogen come from? Honda doesn't say, except to note that it is "stored in a fuel tank onboard the vehicle." The oxygen is from the atmosphere.

Which is all fine, but where does the driver get the hydrogen to begin with? Hydrogen gas, H2, is not found free in nature. There are two ways to separate hydrogen from its compounds: hydrolysis and reforming. The former, most commonly and easily done with water, uses electricity and a catalyst to break H2O into H2 and O2. Reforming uses heat instead of electricity.

More than 90 percent of the hydrogen produced in the world is obtained by steam reforming of natural gas. It's not energy efficient since the energy gained from the hydrogen gas is less than the energy required to produce it. H2 produced in this manner is not used for fuel (except rocket fuel and some others exotics), but for industrial and chemical purposes.

There is nothing on the Clarity's web pages to indicate that H2 is produced aboard the vehicle. It can be done using either method. See, for example, the Youtube vid at the end of my post on the coming 500 mpg car to see how reforming works aboard a car using the exhaust for heat. Substitute alternator-supplied electricity for exhaust reforming and you can electrolyze H2 from water. Both such systems supply gasoline engines, though, while the Clarity uses no petroleum product for fuel. (GM is working on an on-board system to produce H2 from gasoline by reforming, sending the H2 to the fuel cell.)

So the source of the Clarity's hydrogen is perhaps another issue to consider. Nothing on the site indicates that H2 is made aboard the car. If the H2 is produced using electricity somewhere, then odds are that coal produces that electricity. So the CO2 production has been merely moved off the auto to another emitter. Also, does it take more energy to produce the H2, whatever the source, than the H2 supplies? If so, exactly what is the benefit of the Clarity?

I also note that H2 gas is itself pretty much the perfect fuel for internal-combustion engines. Engineers have known for decades that hydrogen injection into the air intake, just before injecting into the combustion chamber, improves fuel efficiency enormously. By weight, hydrogen has three times the energy of gasoline. The first patent for this scheme was granted in 1934.

The rub has always been how to get the hydrogen gas. H2 is very difficult to store. Hydrogen atoms are so small that making a leakproof container is no simple thing. H2 gas takes up a lot of space, making it imperative either to compress it (adding a safety concern and increasing the leaking challenge) or liquefying it (adding the refrigeration problem of mobile storage). And both compression and liquefaction of H2 add weight and complexity to an auto.

Presumably, the Clarity has an on-board tank of compressed H2. I don't know enough about fuel-cell engineering to know how much H2 it takes to propel the car 300 miles, the distance car companies aim whatever fuel they use.

On the whole, I would have to say that on-board generation of H2 gas, to be added to the existing fuel-air mixture of a gasoline-powered vehicle, would essentially solve the problem Honda's engineers were trying to solve, though it would still use a petro-powered engine. The advantage is that the H2 would be electrolyzed aboard the car from either water-plus-catalyst (baking soda works) or heat-reformed from either water or the gasoline itself. Drivers then need not drive around with a compressed-gas tank and can refuel with water or gasoline just as simply as they refuel now.

Update: Thanks to commenter "gripping hand" who points out that the car's web site does say on one page that "Hydrogen fuel stations are critical to the deployment of a fuel cell car," clearly meaning that the car does not generate its H2 aboard. This is made more explicit elsewhere on the site, too.

Update: I am not suggesting that the negative balance of energy derived from H2 vs. the energy required to make it can be overcome. I have not yet found a way to repeal the second law of thermodynamics! It's the ratio that counts - witness the debate about whether making corn ethanol is really worth the energy costs to grow and transport the corn in the first place.

I am suggesting that on-board "cracking" of bound hydrogen from water or hydrocarbon fuel would seem to offer a better ratio. Here's why. The heat the Israeli engineer uses (of the Youtube vid referenced in the post) to reform H2 aboard his van comes from the van's exhaust. That means he is using a waste product of combustion to reform the H2. Whether he uses the H2 system or not, the van will still waste that exhaust's heat. So he's essentially using free energy. The exhaust's heat is a sunk cost no matter what. Now it's true that once the reforming system in put into place, a closed loop forms in which H2 is made, burned and heat therefrom is exhausted, then the heat is used to reform H2, and so on. But the effective energy loss is still minimal because the van will exhaust heat whether using H2 or not. It's the same principle of the Toyota Prius' regenerative braking.

BTW, I checked this assessment with a bona fide, practicing chemical engineer and he agreed. General Motors's engineers must agree, since "GM is working with oil companies on a new gasoline formula that would be more suitable for extracting hydrogen."

I am less certain that the same assessment applies to using electricity from the car's alternator to electrolyze H2 from water. It raises the load requirement on the car's electrical generation system, and this requires the motor to burn more fuel. But some of the increased load will be met using the H2 as fuel and some by burning the gasoline. If relatively speaking, less H2 is used to meet the load than gasoline (which is going to be burned anyway), then the same net calculation may still be true. But this seems less obvious than using exhaust to reform H2.

Update: General Motors has a web page on the Prospects, Promises and Challenges of fuel cell technology, including an extended page about hydrogen storage.

Fuel cell technology uses pure hydrogen in the liquid or gaseous form. Currently, this liquid hydrogen is derived from gasoline or methanol via a processor. General Motors believes gasoline as a hydrogen source provides the best bridge to a completely hydrogen economy, because world markets already operate in a gasoline infrastructure. However, GM also believes that a hydrogen infrastructure, similar to the gasoline model of today, is the ultimate answer.

This begs the question, though: can you drive a fuel-cell car farther on H2 derived from a gallon of gasoline than you could on the gas itself? If not, then the economics don't make sense and the idea won't catch on no matter the presumed ecological benefits. (I have to assume that GM's folks know this, wouldn't you?) But modern gas engines combust extremely efficiently - according to Popular Mechanics's automotive writer, "Your vehicle already burns over 99 percent of the fuel you pay for."

Update: Back in 2005 I excerpted a piece in Car and Driver by Patrick Bedard, who wrote that that if by a trick of science autos had been invented using hydrogen-oxygen motors, so that everyone was driving them now, we would frantically be trying to invent the gasoline engine.

Freeing us from hydrogen would be “the moral equivalent of war,” to use the words of a long-past energy-crisis president. Gasoline would be the miracle fuel. It would save money by the Fort Knoxful. It would save energy by the Saudi Arabiaful.

Update: Another way to generate hydrogen on demand was discovered by a Purdue University engineer. Basically, he produces hydrogen by adding water to an alloy of aluminum and gallium. The aluminum oxidizes, freeing the H2. "The gallium is critical to the process because it hinders the formation of a skin normally created on aluminum's surface after oxidation" and makes the solid aluminum of the alloy reactive with water, which plain solid aluminum is not.

Gallium, however, is very expensive. Fortunately, the gallium is not consumed in the process and can be reused. The only other product of the process besides H2 is alumina (aluminum oxide), which can be recycled back into aluminum.

Well, duh.

"Free People Are Happy People."

[Research has] revealed that people who said that they felt completely or very
free were twice as likely to say that they were very happy about their lives as
those who felt only a moderate degree of freedom, not much, or none at all. Even
when holding income, sex, education, race, religion, politics, and family status
constant, we find that people who felt free were about 18 percentage points more
likely than others to say that they were very happy.

Oil production rising

The Telegraph:

The perfect storm that has swept oil prices to $132 a barrel may subside over the coming months as rising crude supply from unexpected corners of the world finally comes on stream, just as the global economic downturn begins to bite.

But don't look for relief soon. Many analysts expect oil prices to rise the rest of the year.

The ever-diminishing reserves of oil in the earth's crust will doubtless drive crude prices to much higher levels over time - provided no new technology such as nuclear fusion abruptly changes the picture - but that will not stop cyclical ups and downs along the way.

"Ever-diminishing" reserves? Hardly. Proven reserves are the highest they've ever been.

Chutzpah

If there was any residual doubt about just how incompetent Ehud Olmert truly is as the head of Israel, no one is left with any illusions except for a few tree snails in the Amazon rain forest. Defying five millenia of political science, Olmert has announced he is going to surrender the entire territory of Israel claimed from 1948 to the present.

Okay, not all. He wants to keep his apartment.

The traditional political ploy when domestic policy closes in on the head of a government (like the police with search warrants) it to distract everyone with a new war or a daring military rescue. Sometimes the ploy works wonders and growing scandals (like sons embezzling funds or brothers playing fast and loose with the floozies) like the Faukland Islands, the first Gulf action, and tossing a whole bunch of cruise missles at empty tents in Afghanistan. Sometimes it fails abysmally like the Somalia adventure or the daring Tehran hostage rescue. The tactic, apparently consistently worth the gamble, plays out nicely giving the tarnished leader a rise in the polls and winning a whole bunch of nodding and approving heads from the greyhairs.

No one has ever dreamed of coming up with the novel idea that such a moment of leadership and decisive action calls for unilateral surrender.

Until now, that is.

When I was a kid, my father taught me the meaning of the word Chutzpah with the following story: a man kills his parents and then throws himself on the mercy of the court because he is an orphan.

With the police banging down his door on bribery and money laundering charges, Olmert has finally shown his complete political saavy--not--he's going to surrender. The Syrians are jubillant and the only thing missing is Olmert supplying the Iranians with the GPS coordinates for Tel Aviv.

So what is Olmert saying? You can't get rid of me now! You need me!

Quote of the day

No people in history have ever survived who thought they could protect their freedom by making themselves inoffensive to their enemies. Dean Acheson, Secretary of State 1949-1952

Quoted here by Senator Joe Lieberman.

Let's say you're the U.S. Congress . . .

... and you are concerned about the rocketing prices of gasoline that US residents have to pay - $3.79 national average and rising not just daily, but near hourly.

And oil prices are pushing $130 per barrel.

So you consider your options:

1. Pass legislation authorizing development of almost 25 billion barrels of America's proven oil reserves.
   
   
2. Sue OPEC for charging what the market will bear.

Of course, you choose number two.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved legislation on Tuesday allowing the Justice Department to sue OPEC members for limiting oil supplies and working together to set crude prices, but the White House threatened to veto the measure.

The bill would subject OPEC oil producers, including Saudi Arabia, Iran and Venezuela, to the same antitrust laws that U.S. companies must follow.

The measure passed in a 324-84 vote, a big enough margin to override a presidential veto.

Yes, that's the way to lower gasoline prices at the pump for beleaguered consumers: begin years and years of lawyers filing briefs, depositions and claims with who knows how long passing before they even agree what court is jurisdictional. Maybe, if things proceed very quickly, we'll get a ruling between 2020-2025. And the appeals might be settled by 2030. And of course, while all this litigation plods along, the price of oil and will just plummet, will it not? Because the lawsuit has really put the fear o' Allah in 'em, hasn't it?

Words fail.

Gosh, it's so hard to understand just why Congress' Approval Rating Ties Lowest in Gallup Records. Let it be noted that the House's vote margin proves that this stupidity was enthusiastically embraced by both parties.

I remember Jay Leno saying one recent night, "The Democratic Congress rejected the president's appeal to authorize drilling to begin in ANWR. They said it would take ten years to start pumping oil. You know, the same thing they said ten years ago."

Eco hypocrisy, chapter 2

Today's greenwash example: ecotourism, defined by Wikipedia thus.

Ecotourism, also known as ecological tourism, is a form of tourism that appeals to ecologically and socially conscious individuals. Generally speaking, ecotourism focuses on volunteering, personal growth, and learning new ways to live on the planet. It typically involves travel to destinations where flora, fauna, and cultural heritage are the primary attractions.

So places "where flora, fauna, and cultural heritage are the primary attractions" shall now be overrun with tourists who need transportation, lodging, food and all manner of daily life support in places where no such accommodations already exist, for tourists, that is. And once the locals find out how much money the environmentally sensitive ecotourists will pay for the privilege of ruining the formerly pristine areas, why, the locals will build new roads, new hotels, new restaurants (serving, no doubt, nothing but lentils and soy) and communicatons infrastructure - because what the heck in the point in visiting a place "where flora, fauna, and cultural heritage are the primary attractions" if you can't email photos home of yourself standing in the midst of it?

Here is ecotourism in action:

Recently, on behalf of The Sunday Telegraph, I made my maiden voyage as an "eco-tourist". My destination was the Findhorn Foundation, a community on the north-east coast of Scotland that defines itself as "a centre of spiritual service in co-creation with nature". It attracts 14,000 visitors a year, who go to embrace its philosophy of "living more lightly on the planet", achievable by doing things such as sharing cars and building houses with turf roofs. I spent two days experiencing this "light-living" for myself - an excursion for which the environment paid heavily.

My trip began when a friend drove me from Hammersmith to Luton airport in a gaz-guzzling Cherokee Jeep. There, holding a ticket issued on non-recycled paper, I boarded a flight to Inverness. While it disgorged carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, I lunched on a sandwich that had been wrapped in plastic.

On landing in Scotland, I was transported to the commune by the first taxi that became available - a delapidated people-carrier that blazed across the moors amid a fug of black exhaust fumes. The journey would have seemed marginally less eco-hostile had anyone been sharing the seven spare seats. After a couple of days spent eating lentils and learning how to mix organic compost, I returned to London by the same means of transport.

The International Ecotourism Society (Ties) defines ecotourism as "responsible travel to natural areas that conserves the environment and sustains the well-being of local people". It's a heart-warming idea, but one with a major stumbling block. For, as my trip to Scotland showed, when environmental conservation is on the agenda, the words "responsible travel" begin to sound like an oxymoron.

Take, for example, flying, which is one of the world's most polluting means of transport. There are now "earth-kind" hotels and resorts in every corner of the globe - the Bahamas, Kenya, Las Vegas - but even the most dedicated of them rely on the mainstream travel industry to transport their guests. Yet it is a melancholy truth that even the greenest of eco-tourists turns a different shade when he's at 30,000 feet.

The average jet pumps around a tonne of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere for every passenger it carries from London to New York. With one return visit to, say, an organic banana farm in Peru, you're responsible for more carbon dioxide production than a year's motoring.

But you can feel so good about yourself while you're at the banana farm because you're saving the planet. Not!

True, that

It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument. - William G. McAdoo

Rocket man

I gotta get me one of these.



Former fighter pilot Yves Rossy, 48, accelerated to 186 miles an hour May 14, 2008, over the Swiss Alps during his first public flight while strapped to his self-made, jet-powered wings.

Eco hypocrisy, chapter 1

What is "eco hypocrisy?" See "greenwash."

But wait! There's more!

The Telegraph lists the, "Top five celebrity eco hypocrites." They are, in order listed:

• Rock star and long time environmental campaigner Sting, whose band The Police is the “dirtiest band in the world.”
  
  
• Former US Vice President and Nobel Peace Prize winning environmentalist Al Gore, because of his energy-hogging house in Nashville, Tenn.
  
  
• The Live Earth concerts last year, "aimed at saving the planet," but which generated 31,500 tons of carbon emissions.
  
  
• "Actor John Travolta, who has spoken of the need to come up with alternative forms of fuel, has faced criticism over his ownership of several planes including a Boeing 707."
  
  
• "The Prince of Wales faced embarrassment last year over a 7,000-mile round trip to the US to pick up an award for his environmental work."

Greenwashers, every one.

"What really happened"

The Terrorism Awareness Project has a slide show explaining succinctly what the war between Israel and its neighbors is really about. If you don't want to sit through a slide show, you can see all the slides in static sequence at Doug Ross' site.

Update: I should point out, though, that while the slides' account of events are not wrong, neither are they complete. They sort of gloss over the "occupation" of the West Bank and Gaza since 1967 (though Israel is gone from Gaza now) and the enormous complications on all sides resulting. I scare-quoted "occupation" because there is dispute among scholars of international law whether Israel's presence in Gaza/West Bank since 1967 constitutes actual occupation as traditionally defined. The crux of the matter is that if Israel occupied these territories as a foreign invader, then by long-standing law and custom, Israel is legally an occupying power with all that it entails, which is a lot.

Israel says that neither the West Bank nor Gaza were ever political entities on their own, which is definitely true for Gaza. Regarding the West Bank, Israel claims with justification that Jordan had abandoned territorial claim to the Bank before Israel conquered it, and that the Bank was therefore stateless territory. These facts, Israel insists, negate Israel as an occupier and therefore Israel does not have the responsibilities or constraints of an occupying power.

Like everything else in the Middle East, it is not simple. So while the slides linked above may be fair, they are not exactly "balanced" because they basically omit the major issue between the Palestinians and Israel today, which is the presence, "occupation" or not, of Israeli troops in parts of the West Bank and the building of Jewish towns there. No matter where you come down on those issues, it is undeniable that they are determinant at this time.

Father and Son

In moving about the capital last week, with my ear to the ground (figure of speech, only), I encountered a lot of rumbling. In addition to the expected uproar over Olmert's dogged pursuit of longshot brinksmanship (he really does think he can pull off a real estate deal with Abbas), there were lots of cosmic interpretations of unfolding events.

Most of these explanations involve historic parallels between current events and those leading to the destruction of Jerusalem at the hands of the Roman armies under the command of Titus in 69 CE (or 70 CE depending on who you read).

It is necessary to listen to these various interpretations in order to understand fully the level of discord throughout the country today. It is deep and quite serious.

Paradigmatic is the following story YNETNEWS.com ran last night in the wee hours of the morning.

A group of rabbis has sent US President George W. Bush a letter urging him not to meet with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert during his upcoming visit to Israel scheduled to begin Wednesday.

"The prime minister is ready to betray his homeland and people in order to evade law authorities," they said in the letter. The most prominent figure who signed the document was head of the Yesha Rabbinical Council and chief rabbi of Kiryat Arba, Rabbi Dov Lior.

"Dear honorable president, we have written to your honor several times regarding your pressures on the State of Israel to hand territories to the Arabs, while uprooting communities and expelling their residents," the rabbis wrote.

"The experience from Gush Katif has proved that destruction was imposed on 2,000 families, Hamas was crowned in Gaza and, our enemies were aided in getting tronger and threatening our existence… If, God forbid, they continue like this, they will cause a civil war and put millions of Jews in mortal danger."

The letter was also signed by Rabbis David Druckman, Yakkov Yosef, Shmuel Eliyahu and Shalom Dov Wolpe.

It is true that these individuals are on the conservative end of the Israeli political spectrum, but it is very important to understand that they are not Hariedi rabbis. They are strongly invested in the State of Israel as well as being very involved in religious reforms. They are very similar to the sort of religious interests that make up the President's own conservative political block.

Moreover, they are realists. They recognize the intentions of those in Hamastan and Hizbollahstan; naturally, they are cautious. They are also rabbis with an eloquent turn of Biblical phrase.

They went on to say that "it is totally presumptuous that while the US fights terror, it pressures Israel to make concessions to terrorists!

"We are amazed by the insolence of the secretary of state, Ms. Condoleezza Rice, who is holding talks with a prime minister who is under criminal investigations from top to bottom, while his personal situation pushes him to give in to pressure.

"It is unbecoming of a president to hold talks with a person suspected of criminal acts, who is ready to betray his homeland and people in order to evade law authorities."

The rabbis added, "In the name of the people of Israel, the Land of Israel, the Torah of Israel and the God of Israel, we demand that his honor the president cease the pressure on the State to hand lands to the Arabs. We ask the president not to meet with Mr. Olmert to discuss these issues, particularly not at this time."

The rabbis concluded the letter on a historic note: "Honorable president, you must not be remembered in history as Nebuchadnezzar (a Babylonian king from the 6th century B.C.) and Titus (a Roman emporer) who destroyed Jerusalem.

Now, this last item may seem like some form of asiatic hyperbole, but it requires a bit of an explanation, a commentary if you will, of its own. The Babylonian king came from the east and Titus from the west. Both personages are associated with the destruction of Jerusalem, the destruction of the First and Second Temples. Like many Israelis, the rabbis here are worried about the offhanded manner in which US policies so blatantly contradict in the handling of Israel to curry favor with Arab principalities that have been actively seeking Israel's destruction.

"What IS the role of the US", Israelis repeatedly ask me. They are NOT referring to the US's top of the world political hegemony. They are referring to the prophecies in the Book of Daniel. They are referring to the prophetic war of Gog and Megog. Is the US the Beast of the West?

Now, what in the world would make the stereotypical rational Israeli worried about such fundamentalist speculation? Well, this picture from the AP that accompanied the article in YNETNEWS.com. The YNET story captions this as "Bush: The Next Titus?"

"Okay", you might say. "It's a picture of George H.W. Bush and his son George W. Bush. So what?"

I asked several rabbis in Jerusalem the very same question last week to their discussion of exactly this topic. Here's what they said about that. Titus was the general of the armies that tackled Jerusalem and it was his men who got out of hand setting fires in the Temple Courtyard to smoke out, literally, the resistance. But, it was his father, Vespasian, who was the proconsul, and who later became Emperor of Rome, a title his son, Titus, took over. In other words, it was a father-son Imperial team that did in the Israeli state 2000 years ago.

Why the concern about this father and son presidential team. Why, it's in the initials: G and G! In Hebrew, this is written גוג or Gimmel-Vav-Gimmel in Latin script, where the letter VAV also means and. From this reading, George and George is GOG.

Rearranging the political vectors, the rabbis are asking Hans Solo's question to Obie Wan Kenobie: whether the secular religious ideals of pax americana is any match for a good blaster. Judging from what Obie Wan's ancestor, Henry Kissenger, who said in Israel today, the answer is a resounding NO.

Word of the day: "Greenwash"

I wish I had made it up.

The context: Paul McCartney saying he was 'horrified' because his Lexus LS600H (hybrid), costing £84,000, was flown 7,000 miles from Japan to Britain rather than being sent by ship.

Toyota Motor Co. seems to have been so grateful for Sir Paul's promotion of the car that they flew it to him aboard a Korean Air flight instead of sending it by ship, the way the rest of the ultra-rich proles get theirs.

Therefore, reports the Telegraph, the car created "a carbon footprint almost 100 times bigger than if it had come by sea."

Carbon offsetting firm CO2balance.com said the plane journey would have caused a carbon footprint of 38,050kg, compared to 397kg for a three-week boat journey.

It seems that Sir Paul had no idea the car would be flown rather than shipped and was said to be "horrified after learning it was delivered by plane" and unable to understand "why anyone would send an enormous car from Japan to Britain on a plane."

Now comes the word of the day. In response to the story,

Paddy Gillett of the anti-aviation lobby group Plane Stupid, said: "For anyone to pretend that a private limousine is in any way eco-friendly is like pretending a private jet is. It's total greenwash."

Greenwash - wish I had made it up.

Hillary pining for the fjords?

I have never been an especial fan of WaPo columnist Dana Milbank, but have to say that anyone clever enough to compare Hillary's campaign to Monty Python's classic "dead parrot" sketch moves up a notch or two in my literary esteem. It's called, "This is an ex-candidate."

"Heh!" as someone else might say.

"Global warming" and Burma's cyclone

Al Gore claimed on NPR of the Burma cyclone: "we’re seeing consequences that scientists have long predicted might be associated with continued global warming."

But Burma's cyclone was spawned from cool seas, not warm. See here.

Update: Here is an NOAA satellite shot showing the relative temperatures of seas in the ndian Ocean area.

Striking photos of Chilean volcano

Lightning in the cloud of vapor, gases and debris is quite common in volcanos - all the debris and gasses rubbing violently against each other create quote a lot of static electricity.

http://icecap.us/images/uploads/Chaiten3.JPG

A daytime shot of the gas cloud, no lightning.

http://icecap.us/images/uploads/Chaiten8.JPG

Lots of other photos here: http://www.nuestroclima.com/blog/

Before you vote, consider:

Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job. - Douglas Adams

Fish School

My long time buddy, Jon Miller, sent me a link to the R2 Fish School home page. Jon, an attorney, knows I have a weakness for operant psychology but I don't like rodents; however, I do like trout. Here is how their press release describes their product.

R2 Solutions announces the product release of the R2 Fish School Kit, the world's first complete pet fish training system. Each kit includes an extensive collection of fish training tools, as well as an illustrated manual and DVD that provide step-by-step instructions.

The R2 Solutions development team and noted fish-training expert, Dr. Dean Pomerleau, collaborated to create the R2 Fish School Kit. Dr. Pomerleau decided he wanted to make fish ownership more interactive and fun for his kids. His work focused on using marine mammal training techniques to teach his common goldfish. One of Dr. Pomerleau's fish, named "Albert Einstein", turned out to be a pretty good student. Albert is recognized in the Guinness Book of Records as the fish with the largest repertoire of tricks.

"With the correct tools and the basic promise of a food reward, fish can very quickly learn complex tricks - like the limbo, slalom or playing fetch. Now people in the market for a dog might want to consider a fish instead," Dr. Pomerleau said.

Dr. Pomerleau and the R2 Solutions development team spent the last year testing and developing the ideal tools for fish training. Dr. Pomerleau and his son Kyle host the DVD, which stars "Comet", a common goldfish showing off all his advanced fish trick skills. "When people see the tricks, after the initial disbelief, they want to learn how its done and teach their own fish too," R2 Solutions President Russ Ronat said. "Not only is this product fun, but it also has great educational value."

Now, you can learn the tools of conditioning right in your own living room, with the help of your goldfish. It must be real because The Seattle Times has an article about it.

Perhaps this is what the Foggy Bottom Boys used on Condi when she changed jobs. Everyone knows that life in DC is a fish bowl.

Signs of the Times

Years ago, I worked on a community development project that wanted to put up clear signage (I did not even know it was a word let alone a community activist project) to help pedestrians locate important services like toilets or baby changing stations. I guess the theory was that you don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows because there are plenty of good signage. [Is that like espionage?]

So, probably out of reflex, I try to pay attention to local signage where ever I go to know which way is which. Of course, some signs are more clear than others.

Some signs carry multiple meanings like "we use deadly bug killer here" as well as "Ha Ha, we now have an alternative labor supply that comes from Thailand where we can go to have fun and they can come here for jobs--and they won't try to kill us."

And finally some signs are extremely straightforward but it turns out that the Authority that erected them was not based in Israel.

Local sources inform me that the give away here are the last two words on the lower right. At least it does not explicitly say "Israelis will be shot on sight". But, note that it does not say "Blessed are the ones who come" nor does it translate the instructions into Thai. This is not good signage.

Lame Duck or just Lame?

On the eve of George Bush's arrival in Israel to sell his peace initiative, his success rate in the neighborhood looks real bad. Across the border, in Hizbollahstan, the agents of the axis of evil are busy chewing away at the Condi Rice's 2006 success story.

After six days of fighting between government loyalists and Hizballah leave close to a 100 dead and 200 wounded, the Lebanese army’s demand that all combatants lay down their arms will go unheeded until the Shiite terrorists decide they have achieved their goals.

Hizballah is now focusing on the northern Tripoli region and the central mountains east of Beirut in line with those goals after deciding there is no need at this stage to topple the pro-Western Siniora government:

1. The northern port of Tripoli is important to Hizballah and Syria - both as the largest pro-Syrian Sunni stronghold in Lebanon and as a supply hub for incoming Iranian arms for Tehran’s Shiite proxy. The arms are unloaded from Iran freighters at the Syrian ports of Latakiya and Tartous and trucked to Tripoli.

2. Hizballah has a strategic interest in crushing the Druze militias of the anti-Syrian pro-government Walid Jumblatt, which control the Chouf mountains east of Beirut. Over and above this goal, DEBKAfile’s military sources stress that, after capturing most of Beirut last Saturday, Hizballah has focused on isolating and disarming the Sunni supporters of the Siniora government.

After a series of fierce clashes, Hizballah slapped down an ultimatum for Jumblatt: Pull your militiamen out of their bases and hand over your heavy weapons i.e. cannon, mortars, heavy machine guns, RPG’s and explosives, to the Lebanese army, or face the consequences. Hizballah then brought in heavy artillery, with Syrian help, and set about pounding Druze mountain positions. It is hard to see them holding out for long before Hizballah seizes control of the hills which command the entire Beirut plateau.

After the Druze militias fall, Hizballah may be expected to focus on vanquishing majority leader Saad Hariri’s Sunni forces in Sidon. This would isolate the only armed force left in Lebanon, the Christian Phalangists led by Samir Geagea.

George must be packing up his desk because he certainly has not been down in the briefing room. Of course, he could have been on the phone with Condi who undoubtedly assured him that everything was A-Okay in the region ahead of his victorious arrival in the holy city.

In the face of the Iranian surrogate army’s lightning conquest of Lebanon, US president George W. Bush’s statement in Washington, on the even of his Middle East trip, that the United States would not let Syria and Iran undermine Lebanon’s sovereignty comes very much after the fact. His offer to help Siniora by strengthening his armed forces is equally belated. The Lebanese army is by now more an operational arm of Hizballah than an armed force that serves the government.

George still has not called me about my briefing session in Galilee. Local news show him supporting (still) Olmert and praising Abbas (who apparently is having tea with Franco and Tito).

Mr. President, wake up! It's not too late to get to work over here! Start out by calling Condi and her bozo foggy bottom boys on the carpet and demand some accountability. Any cloak of secrecy she might claim is nothing short of the latest fashion in Emperor's clothing. Then tell the folks over in Hamastan to cut the shelling of civilians or the Sixth Fleet will return the favor. And while they're in the neighborhood, maybe those navy boys might stop some of those Iranian freighters coming in and out of Syrian and Lebanese ports with a whole lot of contraband.

And please, give me a call--I've got some fresh trout in the smoker. We'll talk, have something to eat, and take in some sites. I'll show you where the Katushas landed two summers ago. I'm sure we can find some shards and scraps for you to take home to the girls.

Oh, yeah, George, one final bit of advice. If Condi gives you anything to wear when you are over here, keep it in the suitcase or pass it over to Olmert.

Prithee, good sir, who holds the primary position?

If Shakespeare had written Abbott and Costello's classic skit, "Who's on first?"



And here is the original.

Good on yer, Jon Voight!

For this.

Et maintenant, le miracle

The American Geophysical Union's latest position statement states that if global warming of "2 degrees Celsius warming" above the levels of the 19th century "is to be avoided, then our net annual emissions of carbon dioxide must be reduced by more than 50 percent within this century.”

World Climate Report blog explains why a 50-percent reduction in CO2 this century is just a pipe dream.

First, there is a direct correlation between rising population and rising co2 emissions of all kinds. So direct, in fact, that the graph since 1900 looks like this:



"Currently, global CO2 emissions stand at about 8,600 million metric tons of carbon (MMTC)." Half that is 4,300 MMTC. And the projected 2050 global population is expected to be just over 9 billion people.

"There are," report WCR, "only four ways to bring total global CO2 emissions (blue line) down below the target" of 4,300 MMTC by the end of this century.

One is to reduce the world's population to 4 billion. Ain't. Gonna. Happen. At least not short of a global war catastrophic beyond imagining, in which case CO2 emissions will be the very least of humanity's worries.

Which means that somehow, some way, we must try to break apart the blue and the red curves and send the blue one (CO2 emissions) downward, while the red one (population) continues upward.

There are three possible way to for this to happen. One is the immediate and massive build-out of nuclear fission power plants all around the world. The other two fall under the category “and then a miracle happens,” in other words, reliance on new technologies that are nowhere close to currently existing—the development of some highly efficient CO2 sequestration technique that doesn’t require much energy to run, or the development of a completely new method of producing energy that doesn’t emit greenhouse gases—something like nuclear fusion. Rest assured that each of these three solutions—widespread nuclear fission, CO2 sequestration, a new energy source—will be met with an outpouring of opposition like never seen before due to their inherent danger (on many fronts) and possible environmental impact. ...

The lack of a plethora of nuclear power plants in the works means that we are putting all of our eggs in the hope-for-a-miracle basket. Obviously, mankind will someday have to rely on a different energy source than fossil fuels, after all, they are in finite supply. So in the long run, if not sooner, a new type of energy production will be developed. One of these eggs will hatch, it is just a matter of whether it will hatch in time to drive CO2 emissions below the target by the year 2100.

Notice the things that didn’t make the list of possible ways to separate the blue line from the red line, namely, expansion of solar or wind technologies, burning our food rather than eating it (i.e., ethanol production) and conservation measures. Ironically, these are the primary solutions being proffered. Check out any “10 things you can go to stop global warming” lists or read through proposed congressional legislation to see for yourself. Consider that if these “alternative energies” were widely feasible, they would currently supply more than 1.5% of the world’s total energy.

There's more, but the writer concludes there is nothing that will be done to reduce significantly the level of CO2.

So what really will happen is business-as-usual. Legislation will be proposed both in the United States and in other countries around the world with the stated goal of reducing carbon dioxide emissions, and some of this legislation will pass. But the targets won’t come close to being met as a bits-and-pieces solution will not achieve the goal of halving current global CO2 emissions by the year 2100—much less any year before then. In fact, more than likely, these legislative efforts will not, to any noticeable degree, even begin to separate the blue and the red curves for a long time to come—far too long to avoid elevating global temperature 2 degrees above “natural” levels.

I think he's right. But I would add that we will see our daily lives regulated to a rapidly increasing degree, and that things that today we cannot imagine government trying to regulate and control will be quite routine before I pass on before mid-century.

As I wrote, in a different but related context, in December 2003,

When my children are my age, they will not be free in any recognizably traditional American meaning of the word. I’d tell them to emigrate, but there’s nowhere left to go. I am left with nauseating near-conviction that I am a member of the last generation in the history of the world that is minimally truly free.

So say I still. After all, California's government has already declared the authority to regulate thermostat settings of private homes.

TEOLAWKI returns again!

The End Of Life As We Know It:

No matter where I turn, I am met with another barrage of imminent doom. Although I can’t be sure of exactly what manner it will take, it is overwhelmingly clear that human society is very quickly headed to a violent and disturbing end.

Link.

First there was the supernova and galaxy-attack scenarios. Then the predicted return of the comet Genondahwayanung, which pretty much annihilated most life in North America when it came here the first time. And then the massive gas cloud speeding toward a collision with the Milky Way! Then we learn that the earth's atmosphere may detonate. And then the asteroids. Then the black hole death stars! Then we'll be swallowed whole by the sun. Then the intense beam of gamma rays coming our way. I tell ya, I'm starting to think that sooner or later, every one of us is going to wind up dead.

Lebanese Military Upgrades

So, what sort of ugrades are happening in Lebanon? Why peace loving Hezbollah is expanding its naval capabilities.

DEBKAfile’s military sources report that three weeks before Hizballah seized western Beirut, the Shiite terrorist group took delivery of 35 fast speedboats for use with explosives from Iran. The craft can threaten US Sixth Fleet and Israel Navy shipping close to Lebanese shores, reach Israel’s Haifa and Ashdod Mediterranean ports and raid its coastal oil installations.

The speedboats were tailor-made for Hizballah by Iranian Revolutionary Guards shipyards at Bandar Abbas as the only marine terror fleet operating in Mediterranean waters. Our military sources report the boats are capable of carrying chemical, biological and radiological weapons systems.

They were delivered in mid-April by an Iranian freighter at the Syrian port of Latakia and trucked to Naimah port south of Beirut. There they were hidden in the subterranean hangars belonging to Ahmed Jibril, head of the Palestinian Liberation Front-General Command. Today, the PLF-GC is financed and directed by the Revolutionary Guards. The hangars were constructed in the seventies by East Germany engineers with a protected Mediterranean anchorage and made virtually impenetrable by sea or air.

Why does this sound like the prelude to the 1967 war?

Once again, it's Israel's fault

Haaretz has the following story on its English language webpage:

Hezbollah scored a major victory Saturday after four days of fighting across Lebanon, when the Lebanese army reversed two cabinet resolutions that kicked off the fighting on Wednesday. [What is this--a football game?]

The resolutions, if implemented, would have removed the chief of Beirut Airport's security, Major General Wafiq Shukeir, who has ties to Hezbollah. It also would have dismantled Hezbollah's private telephone network.

Instead, Prime Minister Fouad Siniora announced on Saturday that he was putting the two issues into the hands of the army, which said in a statement that it was keeping Shukeir at his post and that it would handle the Hezbollah communications network in a way "that would not harm public interest and the security of the resistance."

Hezbollah's television station, Al-Manar, said the "Lebanese national opposition" would continue its civil rebellion until its demands for an amendment to the parliamentary election law and the formation of a unity government in which the opposition had veto power were met.

At least 27 people died in the four days of fighting. Late Thursday night, Hezbollah forces took over areas of western Beirut, mainly the Shi'ite neighborhoods, within a few hours. They faced little resistance.

About a dozen people were reportedly killed in Beirut that night. On Friday morning the prime minister's office in central Beirut was surrounded. By last night most of the Hezbollah gunmen in western Beirut had withdrawn.

The army has mainly stayed out of the fighting, although troops were deployed on Saturday.

In all of this fighting, the army's lack of participation was the key ingredient. They did not protect the head of state and did not respond to the sudden appearance of a well armed and coordinated militia seizing large sections of the capital. There was no attempt to protect the lives of innocent civilians or those individuals/groups who disagreed with the militia. In short, the legitimate arm of the recognized government of Lebanon did nothing to protect the very cornerstone of that country's democracy.

Of course, we all know who is to blame for this.

European diplomats familiar with the events in Lebanon claim that in the past year the United States has refused to provide the Lebanese army with advanced weapons that would have helped against Hezbollah and other militant groups. They said this was because of Israeli requests.

Since the 2006 Second Lebanon War and the deployment of the army in South Lebanon that followed, the international community has tried to rehabilitate the national armed forces.

Yeah! Then the effort to rehabilitate the Lebanon army would have been truly an international affair--the Iranians, Syrians, and the US. So, what were the items on the army's shopping list that the US and the Israelis were just a tad bit nervous about providing the brave army of Lebanon?

The European diplomats told Haaretz that although Lebanon asked the U.S. to provide heavy weapons such as antitank missiles and assault helicopters, the U.S. aid has concentrated on training Lebanese army units and supplying light arms and ammunition. They say the U.S. refused the requests because of Israel's fears that heavy arms could be used against it in the future or even fall into Hezbollah hands.

Fat lot of good all that US basic training did the Army of Lebanon against militia with automatic weapons and flak jackets. What those regulars needed was a few antitank missiles and some assault helicopters.

Those silly Israelis. If only they had listened to Rice. Then the army would have more goodies to turn over to Nasrallah's boys in addition to Iranian eavesdropping and phone monitoring technologies.

This is a total embarrassment for US foreign policy as well as a complete mockery of Rice's attempts to intervene in the 2006 Lebanon conflict on behalf of the total sham government of Lebanon. Once again, the utter failure of the "Let's Talk to Everyone" approach to peaceful solutions is revealed. Perhaps the most humiliating aspect of the current approach is the total lack of insight into the rationality and intentions of groups such as Hamas or Hezbollah let alone Iran and Syria. Have we learned nothing since Jimmy Carter's abysmal failure to read and negotiate with Komeini in 1979?

Invading Burma redux

I asked last Friday, theoretically more than practically, whether it was time to invade Burma, inviting readers to have their say on whether coercive relief operations could be realistically considered in the wake of the Burmese junta's refusal to allow foreign aid or relief workers into the country.

Today Time.com asks the same question.

Like my piece, the Time piece does not actually propose invading Burma (though it could be read as coming close to it), but points out that "the world has yet to reach a consensus about when, and under what circumstances, coercive interventions in the name of averting humanitarian disasters are permissible." I would also point out that Time seems to think that parachute drops of supplies, without prior permission of the junta, constitutes "invading," which is silly. But let that pass for discussion's sake.

Of course there is a sort of cognitive dissonance in thinking about shooting your way in to deliver food and medicine. But not really - exactly how is the plight of the Burmese of the disaster area different than that of a concentration camp? As I said Friday, "This catastrophe may not fall under the legal umbrella of genocide, but it is a distinction without a difference."

It's not going to happen with Burma, of course, for reasons I explained and that Time also touches on. But Time doesn't consider the far implications of its question (and I didn't either, Friday), which is this:

Supposing (for argument's sake) that the scenario imagined by Jan Egeland, former U.N. emergency relief coordinator, comes to be - "the threat of a cholera epidemic that could claim hundreds of thousands of lives and the government was incapable [or unwilling - DS] of preventing it." Egeland says that "you would intervene unilaterally."

Well, okay, then. But we'd have to go all the way. The trump card, before the Marines land, would have to be an unambiguous message to the junta that they will be deposed and tried for crimes against humanity. And not tried by the pansy International Criminal Court, either, but by a US-convened Nuremberg-style tribunal - if they even lived through the regime change.

If the junta still refused to permit aid, then we'd have to understand that actual conquest of the country would be required, the government must be overthrown and yes, nation building would have to follow.

That's the hard part - understanding the end game before starting the front game. As Sun Tzu warned, you have to see all the way through, insofar as it is possible, before deploying. For that matter, even Jesus knew that much about military strategy.

No, just cordoning off the relief area and killing Burmese army units that try to block the relief won't do. For the problem needing solving is not the relief operation or its security. It is the regime.

Are we prepared to go all the way? Well, no. And since we are unable to do so anyway (see my first post for why), the question is automatically moot.

But here is a question for Time: if invading Burma is justifiable because of the humanitarian catastrophe there, then should we have not invaded North Korea years ago for the same reason?

Want to own a piece of history?

Who wouldn't want his or her very own DC-3 "Gooney Bird" airplane?



The current bid is only $50,100.

Lot's of history with this girl. 1943-46 flew in the war. 1946-1952 flew for several small airlines. 1952 to 1963 flew for Piedmont Airlines as the Tidewater Pacemaker. 1964 to 1984 went to the French Navy. Back to the US in 1984 and has been a 135 freight bird since.

Get 'er quick before she gets away!

Coolest April in 11 years

April 2008 was the coolest April in 11 years, reports the NOAA: "The average temperature in April 2008 was 51.0 F. This was -1.0 F cooler than the 1901-2000 (20th century) average, the 29th coolest April in 114 years."

I blame global warming.

History's worst software bugs

Wired has the list. My fave:

1982 -- Soviet gas pipeline. Operatives working for the Central Intelligence Agency allegedly (.pdf) plant a bug in a Canadian computer system purchased to control the trans-Siberian gas pipeline. The Soviets had obtained the system as part of a wide-ranging effort to covertly purchase or steal sensitive U.S. technology. The CIA reportedly found out about the program and decided to make it backfire with equipment that would pass Soviet inspection and then fail once in operation. The resulting event is reportedly the largest non-nuclear explosion in the planet's history.

Outstanding work, men!

That's why they call it Foggy Bottom

This afternoon, Israeli news has finally found something to eclipse Olmert's sinking ship. The Jerusalem Post reports.

Hizbullah gunmen seized nearly all of the Lebanese capital's Muslim sector from Sunni foes loyal to the US-backed government on Friday following the country's worst sectarian clashes since the bloody 15-year civil war.

At least 11 people have been killed and more than 20 wounded in three days of street battles and gunfights, security officials said. The takeover by the Iranian- and Syrian-backed Hizbullah presented a blow to US policy as President George W. Bush's administration has been a staunch supporter of the government in Beirut over the last three years.

Wow--you think? Perhaps this might have something to do with George's visit next week?

President Shimon Peres said Friday that it was clear that this onslaught was part of Iran's attempts to take over the Middle East. "It is a tragedy for Lebanese residents," added Peres. "It has no connection whatsoever with Israel. It is internal conflict."

"As a human being and as an Israeli I pray that a civil war is avoided," he said, Army Radio reported.

Peres remains eternally clueless. Either this is total Israeli disinformation or the Old Man needs to follow Dennis Miller's advice and break into his piggy bank and buy a clue.

About 100 Shi'ite Hizbullah terrorists wearing matching camouflage uniforms and carrying assault rifles marched down Hamra Street, a normally vibrant commercial strip in a mainly Sunni area of Beirut. They took up positions in corners and sidewalks and stopped the few cars braving the empty streets to search their trunks.

I wonder if anyone in the State Department is awake over in Foggy Bottom or whether, after years of breathing their own swamp gas, they exist in some unending miasma. Unless US foreign policy is to hand over hegemony to the Iranians, what are all those policy wonks doing everyday?

Perhaps if Mr. President would like to have some feedback from outside the Beltway Loop, he could easily stop by the Galilee next week and I would be glad to show him the ropes.

Time to invade Burma?

The humanitarian crisis in Burma is worsening by the minute, so much that "crisis" must give way to "catastrophe." The UK's Sun paper (somewhat tabloidish, to be sure) reports that the death toll from the cyclone and its aftermath could exceed a half million, with about 90 percent dying of disease, exposure and eventually malnutrition.

Burma's hardline, xenophobic ruling military junta refuses to allow foreign aid or relief workers to enter the country. Of the pittance that has landed - about two planes' worth - none has been allowed to leave Rangoon's airport.

The BBC reports that foreign governments have the right and the obligation to get aid into the country, whether the country's dictators permit it or not, under the terms of the UN Charter. So far, only air drops of food, medicines and supplies have been proposed by the French, with some backing in the British Parliament, but these proposals have gained little traction because the efficacy of such drops is greatly open to question.

The UK's International Development Secretary Douglas Alexander told the BBC that "the 'best way forward' was an international 'united front' to win access for aid agencies."

No one has proposed any sort of military action to force aid into Burma. Certainly aiding nations would rely on their navies and air forces to deliver aid, as was done after 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. But simply using military units to accomplish aid delivery is not "military action."

With the catastrophe worsening daily, and no evidence that the junta is taking even slightly effective measures on its own to provide relief, the possibility of deaths on the scale the Sun predicts are quite actual. Corpses are not being disposed of but are remaining in the waters and exposed on the land, each becoming a wellspring of pestilence. Weakening daily by malnourishment, the hundreds of thousands of people, nay millions, in the disaster area are falling in increasing numbers.

This catastrophe may not fall under the legal umbrella of genocide, but it is a distinction without a difference.

Do we have the moral obligation to undertake relief actions without invitation by Burma's dictators?

Do we have the legal authority under international treaties to do so?

And if the answers are yes and yes, do we (or other countries, of course), have the moral and legal right to enforce relief delivery by military force?

Not easy questions, in sum. What do you think?

IIRC, the Bush administration has already made it clear that while US naval and air forces will help deliver aid, the US will not do so coercively. Quite apart from the layers and layers of possible adverse outcomes to doing so, the US simply does not have a large enough military to take on Burma relief as another combat commitment, even for a putative just cause.

Britain or France? Fuggitabouddit. They simply have insufficient forces to project power that far away, even in combined operations. That Britons would support such operations longer than a few weeks is extremely doubtful. Australia? Nope. Japan? It has a large, highly capable navy, but its constitution forbids combat except in actual self defense.

So who's left? Only India. It has a very large, capable military establishment. India's government cannot hold truck with Burma's junta because Burma is practically a client state of China. But for a country of its size and passion-filled domestic history, India is remarkably restrained in foreign policy. It has no history of foreign entanglements or foreign adventurism. Unless diplomatically and militarily led by Western powers, India will have no part of such a mission.

Update: SecDef Robert Gates says no airdrops without the dictators' permission.

Olmert's Endgame

Tonight, Israeli television carried Olmert's first statement about the furor that could finally end his tenure. Haaretz reports:

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert admitted on Thursday that he accepted campaign donations from an American businessman, but denied that they were bribes and said he would only resign if he were indicted. Olmert is suspected of illicitly receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars from Morris (Moshe) Talansky, according to the details of an investigation currently being carried out against him.

At the request of police and judicial officials, the Tel Aviv Magistrate's Court on Thursday relaxed a sweeping media gag order that has prevented the reporting of details on the probe. Olmert was questioned last Friday and the gag order was initially meant to remain in place until early next week. In a terse, late-night televised statement to journalists at his residence in Jerusalem, Olmert said that a lawyer had handled his finances and that everything had been done legally. "I never took bribes, I never took a penny for myself, he said."

He said he would not fight to stay in office if he is charged over the allegations.

We were having a birthday dinner for our 16 year old son Shmuel in our favorite steakhouse in Tiberias, when the owner turned up the television over the bar. Everyone in the restaurant stopped to hear Olmert say "I never took bribes". There was a hush broken by the staff singing Happy Birthday to a family at the next table.

On the other side of us were some very well heeled Israelis--four couples--who quietly discussed Olmert's speech. They left when we did but they stopped at the front door to continue their debate.

Shmueli thought one of them was just on the news, perhaps the infamous American who allegedly gave Olmert the bribe. So, I listened to their Hebrew to see if I could detect an American accent. Nope--they were Israelis, I told Shmuel. But, then I caught about what they were so deep in conversation.

"Spiro Agnew", I called out. "The American vice president who pled no contest to taking a bribe was Spiro Agnew."

"Yes, yes" all four couples called out all smiles. "Olmert should learn from his example," the men called out while their wives smiled. I could not help wondering if they meant to resign or not to take the bribe in the first place.

WW 2's destruction of Japan continues

I think a good case can be made that the total victory of the United States over Japan is directly connected with this: "Japan Steadily Becoming a Land Of Few Children."

[T]his is the land of disappearing children and a slow-motion demographic catastrophe that is without precedent in the developed world.

The number of children has declined for 27 consecutive years, a government report said over the weekend. Japan now has fewer children who are 14 or younger than at any time since 1908.

The proportion of children in the population fell to an all-time low of 13.5 percent. That number has been falling for 34 straight years and is the lowest among 31 major countries, according to the report.

The massive destruction wrought upon Japan's cities by US forces by 1945, the fact that every Japanese family, with extremely few exceptions, suffered one or more killed either in uniform or not, these things were bad enough. But the decisive defeat of Japan was neither material nor biological, as grave as those things were.

The decisive defeat was psychological and spiritual. Japan's deepest wound was the destruction of its national mythos. Although the cult of the emperor and the code of bushido were relatively recent inventions in Japanese history, by the time the war began, at least three generations had been immersed in it. Japan's conviction of racial superiority and its embrace of a manifest destiny to dominate all Asia almost completely formed the national self-identity and national purpose.

All were entirely wiped away by Japan's surrender in 1945 and its occupation by US forces. Not to be overlooked as well was Gen. Douglas MacArthur's insistence that Emperor Hirohito come to him for their first meeting.

The great rebuilding of Japanese society and industry after the war was accomplished by the same generation that had suffered the crushing blows of the war. Yet I think that this great effort was itself a continuation of bushido - the iron will never to accept defeat.

But before I explore that line further, consider information released by Japan's Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communication:

From the eighteenth century through the first half of the nineteenth century, Japan's population remained steady, at 30 million-plus citizens. However, following the Meiji Restoration in 1868, it began expanding in tandem with the drive to build a modern nation-state. In 1926, it reached 60 million, and in 1967, it surpassed the 100 million mark. However, Japan's population growth has slowed in more recent years, with the annual pace of population growth averaging about one percent from the 1960s through the 1970s. Since the 1980s, it has declined sharply. The population figure of 127.77 million released in the 2005 Population Census was below the 2004 population estimate (127.79 million). This marked the first time since World War II that the population has fallen compared to the previous year. The 2006 population estimate was 127.77 million, remaining at the same level of the previous year. While the population of men recorded two years of natural decrease, that of women had a continuous natural increase.

And there are these helpful graphics:

The ministry points out that since World War II, Japan has enjoyed two baby booms (diagram here). One was 1947-1949, not surprising since almost all wars are followed by increased fecundity of the warring populations, victorious or not. Why did it take two years fr the boom to begin? Part of the time is accounted for by the fact that demobilization of Japan's armed forces took quite a long time. But the greater part can probably be accounted for by the fact that Japan's population was starving by the time the war ended. Calorie consumption fell by war's end to only about 800 per day per person. Baby booms require well nourished populations, and the nutrition emergency of the people actually worsened after the surrender because of poor weather, not least of which was a devastating typhoon in late 1945 that wrecked food stocks so badly that there would truly have been mass starvation deaths had not America fed the country. My assessment is that it simply took two years for nutritional levels to rise to the point of supporting a baby boom. But again, the parents were the adults who had been beaten during the war and who still were imbued with some fire of the bushido code.

The second boom was 1971-1974. These parents were the children of the first boom, reaching maturity and enjoying the first fruits of Japan's postwar economic miracle. Their children have not "boomed," however. Why?

The ministry notes that the second boom was not as strong as the first. I would say that the war generation's will to persevere and then prevail was incompletely passed to their children, and passed not at all to their grandchildren. In its place was . . . nothing.

Understand that Japanese militarism, chauvinistic racism and Shintoism/bushidoism were in fact combined to make their national religion. This was what the war destroyed so deeply that it disappeared in only one more generation. What was left? Only the abyss, for there was nothing at hand to relace it. With no transcendent ideal commanding their souls, however hideous that ideal once had been, there was nothing for their souls to do but wither away.

And as goes the soul, so follows the flesh.

Gaza: the New Monaco

The Jerusalem Post carries a story today on the emerging deal in Gaza hosted by Egypt between Hamas, the PA, and Israel. Apparently there is discussion of more international observers, this time posted in Gaza, to keep the peace. Of course, Hamas is not pleased with the idea.

France is offering to take part in an international force in Palestinian areas, an idea that the Palestinian Authority and Israel have begun to embrace in the Gaza Strip but which is opposed by Hamas, which has power there.

French Prime Minister Francois Fillon told the American Jewish Committee Thursday night that "France and Europe can, when circumstances permit and if the parties so wish, take part in an international force to support the Palestinian security services."

France will be the next country to assume the presidency of the European Union, which has already sent monitors to the Gaza border crossing. With the heightened role of forces in Southern Lebanon, and as the violence in Palestinian areas has continue to roil the region, the possibility of an international force has been increasingly raised. Yet Hamas has been clear in its opposition to any force in the coastal strip it seized last year.

What an excellent idea! In fact, it would go a long way to secure peace between the PA and Israel; but, the deal needs to be more explicit and certainly more attractive to the current president of Hamastan. It needs to recognize what Condi Rice would call the "facts on the ground"--Hamastan is a de facto separate state and Ismael Haniyah is the de facto ruler.

Herein lies the solution. With the intervention of the French, the de facto situation in Gaza cries out for the French Solution. First, declare Gaza a principality on the same lines as Monaco. Second, acknowledge Gaza's strong man for who he really is--Prince Haniyah the First.

Simple. This way, His Royal Highness Prince Haniyah gets international recognition and can legitimately travel to Europe and the US for get money to develop the Principality's port and tourist attractions. Gaza could achieve the same economic status of Monaco attracting international development for tourism, casinos, jet-setters the world over, and maybe even steal the Cousteau foundation to establish their base there. Israelis would flock to the beaches with their shekels and Europeans would come with their Euros.

Prince Haniyah, your Majesty, just think for a moment--Israelis will be coming to YOU for jobs! You could have the Penthouse suite overlooking the sea. You could take another wife, a movie star! The Prince of Monaco did--so can you. Maybe even Britney or Paris or Tara Reid.

Hey, it worked before after WWI when the British and French turned a whole bunch of local guys in tents into the King of this and Emir of that. Remember how the US turned some local dudes in the desert into the Royal Family in Saudia Arabia in the 1930's?

Condi is in the area brow beating Barak over some dirt crossings while Olmert is about to be booted out of office. Why doesn't she do some good for a change and hustle over to Gaza to be the first to recognize Prince Haniyah? Then, when Bush comes to celebrate Israeli independence day, he could also meet with the Prince and score points that would make Jimmy Carter gnash his teeth to the gums.

It's all a matter of price.

Recess is over

At the end of last week, the Israeli press announced that Olmert met with police investigators in his home over an undisclosed [new] matter. Furious to be left in the cold the Knesset roiled with dissent. Even Olmert’s fellow party members were demanding the police open the files to the public.

Tonight, after Shabbat, the stories had multiplied. More information was added and more talking heads from various factions were saying that Olmert should step down or that he was in serious trouble. Like the four other police investigations, this fifth probe is related to Olmert’s activities before he was prime minister. This time, the charge appears to involve bribery and his American accuser is cooperating with the police.

The Ministry of Justice and the Attorney General's office announced Saturday night that the question of whether or not Prime Minister Ehud Olmert should suspend himself over his investigation did not come up in discussions that took place Friday evening.

The ministry also stated that no position will be taken on the matter. The ministry denied any connection to information that has been published on the matter.

Also Saturday, Defense Minister Ehud Barak's office announced that the minister "did not consult with associates on the matter of [Olmert's] investigation." The statement also extended support for the prime minister, hoping that all claims against him are found to be baseless.

Meanwhile, Likud MK Silvan Shalom has been in contact with other factions with the aim of bringing the dispersed Knesset together in advance of the opening of the summer session in two weeks' time.

According to Shalom, "the government has come to the end of the road." The MK said that voters should be able to "to choose a more fitting and better government than Olmert's."
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1209626999617&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

In the language of Israeli politics, when it is reported that something was not discussed, it means that it was discussed.

What is clear is that during the Passover Recess, the wheels of Israeli politics have been grinding away, offstage, as Knesset members stayed home with family and neighbors. Many Israelis were not happy with the decision to sell leavened products during the Passover weeklong festival of unleavened bread. The virtual general strike/shutdown on the night of Yom HaShoah was a dramatic collective message to the Olmert government on just how seriously Israelis take the promise of the Iranian president to destroy the Israeli state.

So, the timing of these new charges against Olmert is the real issue here as well as the measure of the political climate when the Knesset resumes the week after next.

What brought the unnamed accuser from America to the door of the Israeli police at this time? According to an Israeli paper, he laid before police investigators strong evidence of a new and grave corruption charge against prime minister Ehud Olmert, the fifth case opened against him thus far – all predating his two-year term as prime minister.

The attorney general Menahem Mazuz found the material substantial enough to order the police to question the prime minister under caution within 48 hours, raising one of the many questions on which a court gag order has condemned the public to ignorance.

Israeli politicians are in a dither but treading on eggs until they too find out what it is all about, why now and whether Olmert can weather the new scandal.

Until Saturday, May 3, the government rested on a slender majority of 67 out of 120 Knesset members, of which Olmert’s Kadima holds 27. Some members of his senior
coalition partner, Labor, began demanding his suspension. But Labor’s leader, defense minister Ehud Barak, sent his wishes to the prime minister to come clean out of the probe and denied holding consultations with his advisers about the party’s next step. Olmert cannot afford to let Labor’s 19 members quit.

A junior coalition partner, the Pensioners party, responded to the looming scandal by three of its seven lawmakers splitting off and crossing the floor to the opposition. They have thrown in their lot with the ex-Russian Arkady Gaydamak, giving him a foothold in the Knesset and a boost to his political ambitions without having to fight an election.

The Olmert government was stripped down to a fragile majority of 64.

In the view of DEBKAfile’s political sources, Olmert’s anonymous accuser was put up to opening his can of worms by a party seeking to cloud Israel’s forthcoming 60th anniversary celebrations to which a glittering gallery of invited foreign guests, led by US president George W. Bush, is invited.

That party, whether domestic or foreign, wants to get rid of Ehud Olmert.
http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=1348

Wow! You think?

Olmert’s recent move to make peace with Hamas has only increased the political liability that his coalition members feel around him and this round of investigations appears substantially more complicated than Bibi’s case of expensive opera tickets.

MK Shelly Yachimovich, a member of Olmert's ruling coalition from the Labor Party, on Thursday called the scope of charges against Olmert unprecedented and said he should suspend himself immediately. "It has been proven beyond any doubt that the prime minister can't be under serial investigations and also suspected of crimes and also lead the country," she told Israel Radio.

Police would not disclose any further information on the case, citing a court-imposed gag order. Police opened an investigation against the daily newspaper, Yedioth Ahronoth, for breaking the gag order and publishing details of the scandal.

Likud party chairman Gideon Sa'ar, meanwhile, urged the Labor Party to quit the government coalition immediately, calling it a "government under constant suspicion."

"Olmert is the prime minister who has been investigated more than any other in the history of Israel. The Labor Party is responsible for the survival of the coalition and if it stands to present values, control of law and clean hands, it needs to quit immediately," the Likud MK said. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/979901.html

YOM HASHOAH

From the Festival of Passover to the Festival of Weeks, what Christians call Pentecost, is a period of 50 days the first 33 days of which are taken up with a subdued form of mourning for the plague that destroyed some 24,000 students of the great sage Rabbi Akiva. So it is natural that located during this period within a period is the day to remember those who perished in the Shoah, the Holocaust, as well as those who fell in battle to defend the modern state of Israel.

This is a country where everyone is one degree of separation from a survivor of the Shoah, or from someone whose son or daughter fall in battle. Beginning at dark, Yom HaShoah is marked by all Israelis with incredible seriousness. Everyone knows that during the morning of Yom HaShoah, when the sirens blow their mournful cries, Israelis stop whatever they are doing, go outside, and stand with bowed heads during the one minute wail. In towns, fields, and even on the freeway, Israelis stop, stand, and listen. But at night, Israelis go home to be with memories of what once was.

As if in response to this year’s sale of leavened products during the holy Festival of Unleavened Bread, last night was marked by a Yom Kippur like shutdown, a general strike if you will, of virtually all stores through out the country. From Jerusalem to Tel Aviv to the Galilee, everything shut down. Buses ran, trains ran, and the highways moved; however, the streets were empty and there was nary a cup of coffee for the weary traveler to be had.

In Jerusalem, around dusk, hot night spots began to close up. Café Hillel in downtown Jerusalem was closed by 6:30 pm.

Over in Ben Yehuda, where people of all ages, especially the young, can go for all night coffee and food, shops began to gather their tables and stack their chairs around 7:30 pm.

A few eateries dawdled for their slower clientele to finish a crepe or down a shwarma or scarf up that last slice of pizza until 8:00 pm. But the crowd was already thinning and the streets were emptying.

In the alleys and small streets surrounding Ben Yehuda, where clubs, cafes, and galleries are opened forever catering to tourists and hipsters alike, the doors were shut and the lights out by 9:00 pm. The streets were empty and quiet. A cat found a mouse and some girls walked a dog. A few German tourists were perplexed and some American seminarians complained that there was no place to get some food. No matter how hard I tried to explain, they could not be consoled.

It was then that the irony was lost and understanding came. Each day, we are commanded to remember the Exodus from Egypt. Each Passover, we are commanded to retell the story as if we ourselves were just liberated. Yom HaShoah carries with it the same gut reaction. We must remember that once there were streets that were full of revelers and people going about their lives with all their woes and joys. Now, they are just shadows; just a vague memory; soon the ones who were there will be no more and their story will be on us to tell, teach, and lament.

Alas—she sits in solitude! The city that was great with people has become like a widow. The greatest among nations, the princess among provinces, has become a tributary.
She weeps bitterly in the night and a tear is on her cheek. She has no comforter from all her paramours; all her friends have betrayed her, they have become her enemies.
(Lamentations 1:1-2)

No one is left from those countless villages and city neighborhoods to stroll through those street shops and galleries. No one is left in need of a scribe to embellish a wedding contract or adorn a home with sacred words of Kabala for good fortune or words of Torah for inspiration in times of hardship.

Those days are memory; grayscale in a black and white street scene from long ago.

Remember, HaShem, what has befallen us; look and see our disgrace.
Our inheritance has been turned over to strangers; our houses to foreigners.
(Lamentations 5:1-2)

Here, on these streets, the City, which only yesterday was filled with people, has become empty—in the midst of the everyday, the ever present reminder of how the depth of living can become flat. Cities of life can transform in to anguish and lamentation in the blink of an eye.

I linger on these empty streets. The hour is late and I have a long drive back to the Galilee.

Bring us back to you, HaShem, and we shall return, renew our days as of old.
(Lamentations 5:21)

Being a diehard Super Tramp fan, I take the long way home. I drive down to Tel Aviv and up the coast. I love the contrast between the Big City and the Ancient Sea.

The freeway is deserted. I need some fuel so I pull of at the exit for the train station in downtown Tel Aviv. Surrounding the station, next to the freeway are three tall buildings looking like my old building block set from childhood—a tall square, a tall circle, and a tall triangle. They are always brilliantly lit; but tonight they demand a picture—they call out to me to come here—"Step into the picture. Photograph ME!"

In the midst of the traffic and the last trains coming in from Jerusalem and Haifa I am awed by the miracle of Passover—the miracle of Redemption. In the post WWII period, there has been a return to Tradition and Torah; a return to God, and a return to The Land. Israel is more than a secular state. It is the awaited return to The Land. My being in downtown Tel Aviv in the midst of the fantastically complex place of Secular and Sacred Jewish Life is nothing short of miraculous.

Even the giant flag on the side of the Crowne Plaza City Center is a giant piece of theater graphically telling of the aspirations of Israelis for the day when all Israelis will see The Land as One. The circuits on the lights on the left side appear to have some sort of overload. At regular intervals, the entire flag is lit; then too much observance shorts out the left side leaving the right and center to carry the flag, as it ever is. But, then there is return.

Clearly, if one simply waits long enough, and is patient, HA KOL BESEDER, All is all right.

On the way back to the car, I take one more series. The floods are out but two towers and a flag remain.

On the way up the coast back to the Galilee, I reflect on the time some 1800 years ago when the Romans were depopulating The Land, persecuting Jews and Christians alike. The Rabbis, under the direction of Rabbi Yehuda Hanassi, undertook the task to write down all of the Oral Tradition to insure that it could not be destroyed. It took thirty years resulting in the body of sacred text called the Mishna.

For the next 300 years or so, generations of rabbis, in yeshivas in the Galilee and what is now modern day Iraq, evaluated and redacted all of the different interpretations of the Mishna. This intergenerational effort resulted in the sacred texts called the Gemara. Together, the Mishna and the Gemara comprise the Talmud. From the destruction of the Second Temple to the conclusion of the Talmud, the process took close to 500 years.

So, if it took the Sages that long to elucidate the Oral Tradition, what can be expected of simple folks from all over the world in 60 years?

Bring us back to you, HaShem, and we shall return, renew our days as of old.
(Lamentations 5:21)

Stealth Storks Show Skills

Yesterday, I drove up through the upper Jordan valley to Jerusalem. It is my favorite way from the Galilee to Jerusalem because the road is empty and the countryside is empty, except for the occasional nomadic shepherd and the regular IDF patrols. It is easy to drive the speed limit and no one tries to run me off the road, unlike the well traveled Israeli routes.

Somewhere in the upper regions of uninhabited hills, I stumbled across a team of International Observers cleverly disguised as Dutch Storks. I knew immediately they were International Observers by their characteristic white vehicles with black markings.

I decided to welcome them to The Land, so I pulled off the side of the road, got out of my vehicle, and approached the group with respect and deference.

Immediately, detecting my approach, they came to attention and formed ranks. This precision drill was followed by a loud bill snapping sound and the carefully executed International Observer battle order of "wheel left" and "fly away" executed in split seconds.

You go, guys.