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Monday, February 27, 2006

---Saudi Refinery Attacked, 3 U.S. TV Actors Dead, Atlantis to Retire Early 

Saudi oil production under attack
FOXNews.com [AP] - U.S. & World News - Guards Foil Attack on Saudi Oil Refinery
7 million of the 11 million barrels of oil a day processed in Saudi Arabia flow through a single facility? Is that a good idea?

Three favorite American actors dead…
FOXNews.com [AP] - Foxlife: Entertainment and Lifestyle News - Actor Darren McGavin Dies at Age 83
FOXNews.com
[AP] - Foxlife: Entertainment and Lifestyle News - Actor Don Knotts Dies at Age 81
FOXNews.com
[AP] - Foxlife: Entertainment and Lifestyle News - 'Gunsmoke' Sidekick Dennis Weaver Dies
…in one week. All were in their 80’s. All of the TV personalities I grew up with are leaving….

Atlantis to retire early
Atlantis' days numbered [FL Today]
NASA plans to cannibalize the aging Shuttle for parts for Endeavor and Discovery, after an extremely optimistic schedule for five more missions.


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Wednesday, February 22, 2006

---Samarra Attack 

If you can’t beat ‘em…
FOXNews.com [AP]- U.S. & World News - Explosion Destroys Dome of Revered Iraqi Mosque
FOXNews.com [AP] - U.S. & World News - Shrine Attack Brings Reprisals and Fear

…start a violent sectarian civil war by killing your own people so they will go home in digust.

Suicide/homicide bombers destroyed a major Shiite shrine, leaving an unknown number of people buried in the rubble, and touching off reprisal attacks by the Sunnis.


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Tuesday, February 21, 2006

---No Hope for Philippine Landslide Survivors, Iraq's WMD's in Lebanon, "Pappy" Boyington Too Violent for U. Wash. Radio Shack CEO Resigns 

Hope gone for more survivors in Philippine landslike
FOXNews.com [AP] - U.S. & World News - Landslide Search Party Shifts Location of Digging
Rescuers, including U.S. Marines, suspended efforts to find survivors in the village school. Continued heavy rains, negative results from ground-penetrating radar, and perhaps 100 feet of mud covering the site made prospects of finding anyone alive in Guinsaugon extremely remote. There are over 100 confirmed deaths, with more than 1,000 missing.

Surprise of the Century---Iraqi WMD’s were removed before 2003 war!
Ex-Official: Russia Moved Saddam's WMD
CIA can't rule out WMD move to Syria - The Washington Times: Nation/Politics - April 27, 2005
WorldNetDaily: New evidence: Saddam's WMD in Lebanon

Russian special forces, GRU, and other specialists, acting under standing "emergency exit" orders, were tracked by U.S. satellites as they sanitized Saddam’s WMD sites of any evidence of biological and chemical weapons production and moved the materials and equipment to the Bekka Valley in Lebanon, where the Syrians buried it in anticipation of the U.S. invasion in 2003.
Not that this should be a big surprise to anyone----although I thought, for some reason, that Iran would also be involved, which doesn’t make that much sense in retrospect.
What is new and troubling is speculation on the motives of the U.S. administration in dismissing the evidence of Russian and Syrian involvment---that the Bush administration weathered a political firestorm which seriously damaged its credibility because it needed to avoid incrimination of the Russians in order to secure their political/diplomatic participation in control of Iran.
Oh, and the Chinese and French were also involved in Iraqi pre-war WMD production up to their eyeballs.
Did I mention that human civilization doesn’t actually work?
CIA - The World Factbook -- Syria

“Pappy” Boyington too violent for students
Boyington Memorial Nixed at U. of Wash.
Boyington was one of the most unique personalities in aviation history, and important to the understanding of the most devastating war in human history. Of course, 90% of college students are at least 250% of the nations most ignorant people. That’s why we send them to college---or was it so they can get us football tickets?

Radio Shack suffers a managerial setback
FOXNews.com - Business News - RadioShack President, CEO Steps Down Amid Resume Questions
Radio Shack CEO, David Edmondson claimed to have degrees in Theology and Psychology from an obscure Baptist college which says he only finished two semesters, and that they never offered a degree in Psychology. Radio Shack apparently didn’t do background checks on the factuality of resume assertions for their important executives when Edmondson signed on in the ‘90’s, or befoe putting him in charge of the entire company.
But, come on, guys---it’s Radio Shack!


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Saturday, February 18, 2006

---Philippine Landslide, U.N. "Investigates" Gitmo, H5N1 In Europe, Cartoon Fatwa, NASA IG in Trouble?, and Other Stories 

1800 dead in Leyte mudslide
FOXNews.com [AP]- U.S. & World News - 'No Signs of Life' After Huge Mudslide
An entire village on the Philippine island of Leyte has been wiped out by a landslide. The side of a mountain gave way suddenly after heavy rains saturated ground held mostly by shallow-rooted coconut trees. 1800 people may be dead.

France says stuff about Iran
FOXNews.com[AP] - U.S. & World News - France: Iran Nuke Program a Military Cover
The French government----the FRENCH GOVERNMENT---has determined that Iran’s nuclear activity is a “clandestine military nuclear program”. What are the U.N. governments collectively prepared to do about it? Better yet, why does Iran want to build its own nuclear weapons when it can probably buy them from North Korea or any number of other places, along with launch systems? We can have a whole bloc of sadistic, sociopathic regimes with medium-range nuclear weapons almost immediately….

U.N. “investigation” calls for Guantanamo prison closure
FOXNews.com [AP] - U.S. & World News - U.N. Report Urges Gitmo Shutdown
The “investigators” apparently rejected a U.S. invitation to actually visit the prison facility, having made their determination from “interviews with former detainees, public documents, media reports, lawyers and a questionnaire filled out by the U.S. government.”
The U.S. government should actually suspend the operation until it can explain to U.S. taxpayers why it is using their money to provide copies of the Koran to terrorist detainees. Let’s get our priorities straight.

H5N1 spreading in Europe and Asia
FOXNews.com [AP]- U.S. & World News - Deadly Bird Flu Virus Strikes Italy for First Time
FOXNews.com
[AP]- U.S. & World News - France Reports Probable Case of Bird Flu
FOXNews.com
[AP]- U.S. & World News - India Reports First Bird Flu Case
H5N1 has also been detected in birds in Germany. There has been another human death from the influenza strain in Indonesia.

Cartoon violence taking lives
FOXNews.com [AP]- U.S. & World News - Two Killed in Continued Cartoon Violence in Pakistan
FOXNews.com
[AP]- U.S. & World News - Pakistani Cleric Issues Fatwa Over Cartoons
FOXNews.com
[AP]- U.S. & World News - 10 Killed in Libyan Cartoon Riots
I don't really know what's going on here---I just like to say "cartoon fatwa". Okay, you're right, it's not even slightly funny.
As nearly as I can understand, the message of the Religion of Peace ™ here is: “…flog, torture, eviscerate, hang, and behead the Danish cartoonists, or we’ll murder more of our own 8-year-olds”. Indeed, the death toll from cartoon violence to date involves almost exclusively Muslims.
To make matters worse, Western leaders continue to abase themselves before the practitioners of this sadistic, playground religion at every opportunity, making it certain that this behavior will continue. That’s what it’s for….

SuitSat
FL Today
In desperation to demonstrate some sort of relevance for the space station, NASA’s ISS effort has been reduced to stuffing radio transmittters into worn-out Russian Vorlan space suits (the U.S. suits probably aren’t up to it), and chucking them over the side as improtu “satellites” for ham radio fans to track. Oh, braaaave new world…..

NASA IG may have to explain himself....
NASA's Inspector General Probed [Washington Post]
NASA Inspector General Robert W. Cobb is being accused by a number of IG employees of interfering with safety investigations and retaliating against whistleblowers. I have personal experience with the NASA IG’s office (Johnson Space Center). Its mission has nothing to do with “rooting out waste, fraud, and abuse”. It’s there to sucker conscientous employees of the NASA/Contractor community into revealing their concerns about the way NASA does business, so they can be efficiently stamped out before the responsible management can be inconvenienced.
My particular IG “case officer” was so concerned about my complaint that he continued to do his “chair-stepping” exercises in his office while I was trying to tell him that the idiot combination Principal Investigator/Project Manager was trying to fly an unevaluated auto-igniting material on the Shuttle mid-deck.

CNT memory on the horizon….
Nantero to roll out Carbon Nanotube memory in 2007 | TG Daily
The nanotube memory is supposed to be a drop-in replacement in PC motherboards, very high density, non-volatile with “virtually infinite” cycle life, and lead to PC’s that boot instantly from memory. Nantero’s CEO seemed to know surprisingly little about the new memory or what it could do. We’ll see.


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Friday, February 03, 2006

---Ferry catastrophe, Tornadoes Hit New Orleans, Muslim Cartoon Flap Update II 

Ferry catastrophe on the Red Sea
FOXNews.com - U.S. & World News - Ferry With 1,300 Aboard Sinks in Red Sea
A large Egyptian ferry has gone down off Hurghada. Of 1300 passengers, many of them returning from the recent hadj in Mecca, it looks like only about 180 are accounted for. Other survivors face cold waters as darkness falls over the area.

It’s not getting any better in New Orleans
FOXNews.com - U.S. & World News - Tornadoes Sweep Through Katrina-Hit Areas
We can only hope Robertson and Nagin can keep their mouths shut.

Oh well, here we go again:
FOXNews.com - U.S. & World News - Thousands Protest 'Offensive' Cartoons in Gaza
FOXNews.com - U.S. & World News - Militants Surround EU Offices in Gaza Over 'Offensive' Cartoons
---although common sense seems to have prevailed in unexpected places:
"In one unusual twist, Mahmoud Zahar, a Hamas leader, visited a Gaza church Thursday and promised protection to Christians after Fatah gunmen threatened to target churches as part of their protests. Zahar offered to dispatch gunmen from Hamas' military wing, the Izzedine al Qassam Brigades, to guard the church ;
"You are our brothers," Zahar told Father Manuel Musallam of the Holy Family Church."


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Thursday, February 02, 2006

---Mohammed Cartoon Flap Update: 

Talk about picking your battles....
FOXNews.com [AP] - U.S. & World News - Militants Surround EU Offices in Gaza Over 'Offensive' Cartoons
Again, it’s just a good thing they didn’t dip anything Islamic into urine....to say nothing of charging Danish taxpayers to display it....
Just when everyone had concluded that most European nations had become completely spineless, newspapers in France, Germany, and Norway have published these and other cartoon renderings of Mohammed. The reaction of practitioners of the Religion of Peace TM to uncomplimentary caricatures of the founder of Islam have spread to Palestinian territories, where radicals have threatened to kidnap foreigners if an apology is not forthcoming.
The international reaction to Islamic attempts to dictate the content of Danish political commentary has become far more extensive than first suspected. See:
Michelle Malkin: FIRST, THEY CAME FOR THE CARTOONISTS
The violent threats against free speech in Denmark and elsewhere have provoked outrage, additional caricatures and cartoons, postings of “artistic” representations of Mohammed throughout history, and coffee cups and T-shirts featuring the infamous Danish “petard” cartoon. Considering some of the content, this may turn out to be a controversy the Danish Muslims would have better left unstirred. I mean, when the French get mad.....

[Somebody named Sean (http://www.smallbutdisorganized.com/?p=425) has found the root of the controversy, referring to "...Mohammed, the L. Ron Hubbard of the 6th century." Elsewhere, several bloggers have pointed out that the violence, rioting, and death threats have resulted in the controversial cartoons, which were probably unnoticed outside Denmark a week ago, being spread all over the Internet. This effort by MSNBC politcal cartoonist Daryl Cagle is also especially relevant.]


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