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February 28, 2007

Maybe Coulda

Rights, Law

Some legal decisions make your head spin. Case in point (Mojo):

In 2004, two Florida adolescents — 16-year-old Amber and 17-year-old Jeremy — took digital photos of themselves nude and engaged in some sort of sexual contact. They then sent the photos from a computer at Amber's house to Jeremy's email address. Somehow, the Tallahassee police got possession of the photos, and both Amber and Jeremy were arrested and charged with producing, directing or promoting a photograph featuring the sexual conduct of a child. Jeremy was also charged with possession of child pornography.

Amber appealed the charge, believing she had the law on her side. In 1995, a Florida court ruled that two 16-year-olds could not be found delinquent for having sex with each other. Since Amber was engaged in legal sex, she and her attorney reasoned that the police had violated her guaranteed right to privacy. [...]

This month, a Florida Appeals Court voted 2-1 to uphold the charge against Amber. Writing for the majority, Judge James R. Wolf, speculated that both Amber and Jeremy could have eventually sold the photos to child pornographers or shown them to friends. He also said that transferring the digital images from a camera to a computer and then sending them via email created "innumerable problems" because the computers could be hacked. [Emphasis added]

So, ownership of a perfectly legal photo that you could, in some hypothetical future scenario, use for an illegal purpose or that could, through no fault of your own, fall into the hands of persons unknown who could use it for an illegal purpose — that makes you guilty of a crime. Morons.

Posted by Jonathan at 05:49 PM | Comments (1) | Link to this  

Windows For Warships

Science/Technology

What's wrong with this picture? The Register (via Bruce Schneier):

The Type 45 destroyers now being launched [by the Royal Navy] will run Windows for Warships: and that's not all. The attack submarine Torbay has been retrofitted with Microsoft-based command systems, and as time goes by the rest of the British submarine fleet will get the same treatment, including the Vanguard class (V class). The V boats carry the UK's nuclear weapons and are armed with Trident ICBMs, tipped with multiple H-bomb warheads. [Emphasis added]

Nuclear weapons controlled by Windows boxes. Talk about nuclear terror.

But weapons system software gets thoroughly tested and debugged before deployment — right? The Register again:

Significant new capabilities have been added to the US Air Force's latest superfighter, the F-22 "Raptor". The USAF's Raptors cost more than $300m each, and are generally thought to be the most advanced combat jets in service worldwide. However, until recently they were unable to cross the international date line owing to a software bug in their navigation systems.

A group of F-22s heading across the Pacific for exercises in Japan earlier this month suffered simultaneous total nav-console crashes as their longitude shifted from 180 degrees West to 180 East.

Luckily, the superjets were accompanied by tanker planes, whose navigation kit was somewhat less bleeding-edge and remained functional. The tanker drivers were able to guide the lost top-guns back to Hawaii and the exercises were postponed. [Emphasis added]

It's funny, but it's not funny. Not at all, when you consider that the whole world's wired with weapons of mass destruction under software control. Are we nuts?

Posted by Jonathan at 05:29 PM | Comments (2) | Link to this  

Wednesday Gumpagraph

Gumpagraphs

© Kent Tenney

Posted by Jonathan at 10:19 AM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

Today's Bush Joke

Humor & Fun

Congratulations to Al Gore. His movie won an Oscar. Today it got reversed by the Supreme Court. Al Gore announced last night that for the first time, the Academy Awards had a green theme. Which is not really true. It's always had a green theme — money and envy. — Jay Leno

I was listening to the news in the back. This just in: President Bush just promised we will be out of the Academy Awards by 2010. — David Letterman

Posted by Jonathan at 10:05 AM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

February 27, 2007

The Poor Get Poorer

Economy

During the Bush years, the fastest growing segment of the US population has been people living in extreme poverty. McClatchy:

The percentage of poor Americans who are living in severe poverty has reached a 32-year high, millions of working Americans are falling closer to the poverty line and the gulf between the nation's "haves" and "have-nots" continues to widen.

A McClatchy Newspapers analysis of 2005 census figures, the latest available, found that nearly 16 million Americans are living in deep or severe poverty. A family of four with two children and an annual income of less than $9,903 - half the federal poverty line - was considered severely poor in 2005. So were individuals who made less than $5,080 a year.

The McClatchy analysis found that the number of severely poor Americans grew by 26 percent from 2000 to 2005....The review also suggested that the rise in severely poor residents isn't confined to large urban counties but extends to suburban and rural areas.

The plight of the severely poor is a distressing sidebar to an unusual economic expansion. Worker productivity has increased dramatically since the brief recession of 2001, but wages and job growth have lagged behind. At the same time, the share of national income going to corporate profits has dwarfed the amount going to wages and salaries. That helps explain why the median household income of working-age families, adjusted for inflation, has fallen for five straight years.

These and other factors have helped push 43 percent of the nation's 37 million poor people into deep poverty - the highest rate since at least 1975.

The share of poor Americans in deep poverty has climbed slowly but steadily over the last three decades. But since 2000, the number of severely poor has grown "more than any other segment of the population," according to a recent study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

"That was the exact opposite of what we anticipated when we began," said Dr. Steven Woolf of Virginia Commonwealth University, who co-authored the study. "We're not seeing as much moderate poverty as a proportion of the population. What we're seeing is a dramatic growth of severe poverty."

The growth spurt, which leveled off in 2005, in part reflects how hard it is for low-skilled workers to earn their way out of poverty in an unstable job market that favors skilled and educated workers. It also suggests that social programs aren't as effective as they once were at catching those who fall into economic despair.

About one in three severely poor people are under age 17, and nearly two out of three are female. Female-headed families with children account for a large share of the severely poor.

According to census data, nearly two of three people in severe poverty are white (10.3 million) and 6.9 million are non-Hispanic whites. Severely poor blacks (4.3 million) are more than three times as likely as non-Hispanic whites to be in deep poverty, while extremely poor Hispanics of any race (3.7 million) are more than twice as likely.

Washington, D.C., the nation's capital, has a higher concentration of severely poor people - 10.8 percent in 2005 - than any of the 50 states, topping even hurricane-ravaged Mississippi and Louisiana, with 9.3 percent and 8.3 percent, respectively. Nearly six of 10 poor District residents are in extreme poverty. [Emphasis added]

Bush gets most of the little support he has left from people who think of themselves as Christians. He and they might want to go back and read what Jesus actually said about caring for the poorest of the poor. Matthew 25:31-46, for instance.

Posted by Jonathan at 04:05 PM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

Are We Being Played?

Iraq  Politics

Digby had an interesting post yesterday on ways the Senate Dems are soft-pedaling Iraq, supposedly out of fear that Joe Lieberman will jump to the GOP, thereby ending the Democratic majority and (supposedly) putting the Republicans in control of Senate committees.

Except for one thing. As Digby points out, WaPo and MediaMatters have reported that the current Senate's organizing rules don't require the Democrats to relinquish control if they lose their majority. To regain control, the Republicans would have to pass new organizing rules, something that the Dems could — and presumably would — filibuster.

It's hard not to conclude, therefore, that Lieberman is being used as a convenient excuse by timid Senate Democrats who don't want to stick their necks out on Iraq. Yes, politics is a devious game, but there's a war on. The country needs principled and decisive action, not phony political theater.

Posted by Jonathan at 03:10 PM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

Tuesday Gumpagraph

Gumpagraphs

© Kent Tenney

Posted by Jonathan at 10:16 AM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

Today's Bush Joke

Humor & Fun

It's Oscar weekend. Among the Best Picture nominees is "Letters from Iwo Jima," which is a gut-wrenching tragedy about an army sent to die in a hopeless cause by a fanatical government. Or, as George Bush calls it, "the feel-good comedy of the year." — Bill Maher

You all ready for the Oscars? Al Gore is expected to win for his documentary on global warming. I hope he includes President Bush in the acceptance speech. I mean, without President Bush, we probably wouldn't have a lot of this global warming. — Jay Leno

Sunday are the Academy Awards. How about Al Gore? That movie, "An Inconvenient Truth," has been nominated for two Academy Awards. It's all about the environment. I can't think of anything better for the environment than an event which features 2,000 stretch limos. — David Letterman

Posted by Jonathan at 10:14 AM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

February 26, 2007

Mutiny?

Iran

The Sunday Times [UK] reports that a number of US generals and admirals are ready to resign their posts if the White House orders an attack on Iran:

Some of America's most senior military commanders are prepared to resign if the White House orders a military strike against Iran, according to highly placed defence and intelligence sources.

Tension in the Gulf region has raised fears that an attack on Iran is becoming increasingly likely before President George Bush leaves office. The Sunday Times has learnt that up to five generals and admirals are willing to resign rather than approve what they consider would be a reckless attack.

"There are four or five generals and admirals we know of who would resign if Bush ordered an attack on Iran," a source with close ties to British intelligence said. "There is simply no stomach for it in the Pentagon, and a lot of people question whether such an attack would be effective or even possible."

A British defence source confirmed that there were deep misgivings inside the Pentagon about a military strike. "All the generals are perfectly clear that they don't have the military capacity to take Iran on in any meaningful fashion. Nobody wants to do it and it would be a matter of conscience for them.

"There are enough people who feel this would be an error of judgment too far for there to be resignations."

A generals' revolt on such a scale would be unprecedented. "American generals usually stay and fight until they get fired," said a Pentagon source. Robert Gates, the defence secretary, has repeatedly warned against striking Iran and is believed to represent the view of his senior commanders.

The threat of a wave of resignations coincided with a warning by Vice-President Dick Cheney that all options, including military action, remained on the table. He was responding to a comment by Tony Blair that it would not "be right to take military action against Iran". [...]

A second US navy aircraft carrier strike group led by the USS John C Stennis arrived in the Gulf last week, doubling the US presence there. Vice Admiral Patrick Walsh, the commander of the US Fifth Fleet, warned: "The US will take military action if ships are attacked or if countries in the region are targeted or US troops come under direct attack."

But General Peter Pace, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, said recently there was "zero chance" of a war with Iran. He played down claims by US intelligence that the Iranian government was responsible for supplying insurgents in Iraq, forcing Bush on the defensive.

Pace's view was backed up by British intelligence officials who said the extent of the Iranian government's involvement in activities inside Iraq by a small number of Revolutionary Guards was "far from clear".

Hillary Mann, the National Security Council's main Iran expert until 2004, said Pace's repudiation of the administration's claims was a sign of grave discontent at the top.

"He is a very serious and a very loyal soldier," she said. "It is extraordinary for him to have made these comments publicly, and it suggests there are serious problems between the White House, the National Security Council and the Pentagon."

Mann fears the administration is seeking to provoke Iran into a reaction that could be used as an excuse for an attack. A British official said the US navy was well aware of the risks of confrontation and was being "seriously careful" in the Gulf.

The US air force is regarded as being more willing to attack Iran. General Michael Moseley, the head of the air force, cited Iran as the main likely target for American aircraft at a military conference earlier this month. [Emphasis added]

If there's one thing the military's good at, it's taking orders. For a significant number of senior military officers to decide that "duty, honor, country" compel their resignations, they'd have to conclude that what they were being asked to do was unprecedented in its recklessness. It would be a unique moment in US history: an open break between senior military officers and their civilian leaders, with the military coming down on the side of sanity and prudence.

Posted by Jonathan at 04:52 PM | Comments (1) | Link to this  

Monday Gumpagraph

Gumpagraphs

© Kent Tenney

Posted by Jonathan at 09:09 AM | Comments (1) | Link to this  

Today's Bush Joke

Humor & Fun

Q. Why are there no Republicans on Star Trek? A. Because it's set in the future. — Will Durst

Posted by Jonathan at 09:07 AM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

February 25, 2007

Sunday Gumpagraph

Gumpagraphs

© Kent Tenney

Posted by Jonathan at 11:59 AM | Comments (2) | Link to this  

Today's Bush Joke

Humor & Fun

A guy was kicked off a flight for wearing an anti-Bush t-shirt. When he refused to take off the shirt or change the shirt, they kicked him off the plane. Here's the scary thing: it turns out he was the pilot for Air Force One. — Jay Leno

Posted by Jonathan at 11:57 AM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

February 24, 2007

Everlasting Shame

Iraq

Iraqi blogger Riverbend, who had not been heard from for a while, writes a heart-breaking post from Baghdad:

It takes a lot to get the energy and resolution to blog lately. I guess it's mainly because just thinking about the state of Iraq leaves me drained and depressed. But I had to write tonight.

As I write this, Oprah is on Channel 4 (one of the MBC channels we get on Nilesat), showing Americans how to get out of debt. Her guest speaker is telling a studio full of American women who seem to have over-shopped that they could probably do with fewer designer products. As they talk about increasing incomes and fortunes, Sabrine Al-Janabi, a young Iraqi woman, is on Al Jazeera telling how Iraqi security forces abducted her from her home and raped her. You can only see her eyes, her voice is hoarse and it keeps breaking as she speaks. In the end she tells the reporter that she can't talk about it anymore and she covers her eyes with shame.

She might just be the bravest Iraqi woman ever. Everyone knows American forces and Iraqi security forces are raping women (and men), but this is possibly the first woman who publicly comes out and tells about it using her actual name. Hearing her tell her story physically makes my heart ache. Some people will call her a liar. Others (including pro-war Iraqis) will call her a prostitute — shame on you in advance. [...]

They abducted her from her house in an area in southern Baghdad called Hai Al Amil. No — it wasn't a gang. It was Iraqi peace keeping or security forces — the ones trained by Americans? You know them. She was brutally gang-raped and is now telling the story. Half her face is covered for security reasons or reasons of privacy. I translated what she said below.

"I told him, 'I don't have anything [I did not do anything].' He said, 'You don't have anything?' One of them threw me on the ground and my head hit the tiles. He did what he did — I mean he raped me. The second one came and raped me. The third one also raped me. [Pause — sobbing] I begged them and cried, and one of them covered my mouth. [Unclear, crying] Another one of them came and said, 'Are you finished? We also want our turn.' So they answered, 'No, an American committee came.' They took me to the judge.

Anchorwoman: Sabrine Al Janabi said that one of the security forces videotaped/photographed her and threatened to kill her if she told anyone about the rape. Another officer raped her after she saw the investigative judge. [...]

[Sabrine:] [Crying] He picked up a black hose, like a pipe. He hit me on the thigh. [Crying] I told him, 'What do you want from me? Do you want me to tell you rape me? But I can't... I'm not one of those ***** [Prostitutes] I don't do such things.' So he said to me, 'We take what we want and what we don't want we kill. That’s that.' [Sobbing] I can't anymore... please, I can't finish."

I look at this woman and I can't feel anything but rage. What did we gain? I know that looking at her, foreigners will never be able to relate. They'll feel pity and maybe some anger, but she's one of us. She’s not a girl in jeans and a t-shirt so there will only be a vague sort of sympathy. Poor third-world countries — that is what their womenfolk tolerate. Just know that we never had to tolerate this before. There was a time when Iraqis were safe in the streets. That time is long gone. We consoled ourselves after the war with the fact that we at least had a modicum of safety in our homes. Homes are sacred, aren't they? That is gone too. [...]

And yet, as the situation continues to deteriorate both for Iraqis inside and outside of Iraq, and for Americans inside Iraq, Americans in America are still debating on the state of the war and occupation — are they winning or losing? Is it better or worse.

Let me clear it up for any moron with lingering doubts: It's worse. It's over. You lost. You lost the day your tanks rolled into Baghdad to the cheers of your imported, American-trained monkeys. You lost every single family whose home your soldiers violated. You lost every sane, red-blooded Iraqi when the Abu Ghraib pictures came out and verified your atrocities behind prison walls as well as the ones we see in our streets. You lost when you brought murderers, looters, gangsters and militia heads to power and hailed them as Iraq's first democratic government. You lost when a gruesome execution was dubbed your biggest accomplishment. You lost the respect and reputation you once had. You lost more than 3000 troops. That is what you lost America. I hope the oil, at least, made it worthwhile. [Emphasis added]

There was a time when we were told the American occupation of Iraq would improve the lot of Iraq's women. Do you remember? A particularly grotesque and bitter lie in the long list of lies. We are fools if we think there won't be consequences — for years, decades, generations to come.

These are real events, happening to real people. It's unspeakable. Shame on us. Everlasting shame.

Posted by Jonathan at 08:18 PM | Comments (2) | Link to this  

Saturday Gumpagraph

Gumpagraphs

© Kent Tenney

Posted by Jonathan at 07:37 PM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

Today's Bush Joke

Humor & Fun

I know you're saying to yourselves where is Vice President Dick Cheney. Right now he's in Tokyo, taking part in a pep rally for United States troops. Because when you think Dick Cheney, you think pep. — David Letterman

Posted by Jonathan at 07:34 PM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

February 23, 2007

Friday Fun

Humor & Fun

Stunning Trompe l'oeil pavement art.

[Via AmericaBlog]

Posted by Jonathan at 05:31 PM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

Friday Gumpagraph

Gumpagraphs

© Kent Tenney

Posted by Jonathan at 09:24 AM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

Today's Bush Joke

Humor & Fun

Yesterday, the British government announced they're going to begin pulling their troops out of Iraq. Of course, it could take them a while because they're flying home on JetBlue. Denmark and Lithuania have also announced that they're pulling their troops from Iraq. Actually, it's just one guy who's half Danish and half Lithuanian. — Conan O'Brien

Posted by Jonathan at 09:18 AM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

February 22, 2007

Recycling: Incentives Needed

Economy  Environment  Politics

How are Americans doing at recycling plastic bottles? The answer is disappointing. Andrew Leonard, at Salon:

In 1995, nearly 40 percent of all plastic PET bottles sold in the United States were recycled. Ten years later, in 2005, the figure was only 23 percent.

The vast majority of water and plastic soda bottles consumed in the world are made of PET, aka polyethylene terephthalate. And perhaps contrary to expectations, this is one petroleum byproduct that is eminently recyclable. Indeed, and here's a second baffling peculiarity, producers of ground-up recycled PET "flake" cannot keep up with demand. Prices per pound are strong, propelled by Chinese buyers who will buy all the flake or bales of flattened bottles that they can get, to turn into pseudo-polyester and other materials.

So, we are recycling a smaller percentage of plastic bottles than 10 years ago, and yet supply of what is lovingly referred to as "post-consumer PET" can't keep up with demand. What's wrong with this picture? Why hasn't the market solved this problem?

The answer to the first question turns out to be simple. A handy chart provided by the National Association for PET Container Resources reveals that in 1995, the U.S. recycled 775 million pounds of PET bottles, out of a total of 1.95 billion pounds of bottles estimated to be on retail shelves. The actual total poundage recycled over the next 10 years stayed more or less the same, albeit finally beginning to tick up steadily in 2004. But the total amount of bottles produced more than doubled, jumping to nearly 5 billion pounds by 2005. Those of us who do recycle aren't necessarily recycling less as the years go by, we just haven't been able to keep up with the deluge.

But now that we've answered the first question, there's still the second. With so many bottles available to be recycled, why can't we satisfy demand? One reason is that we don't have enough installed capacity to clean the bottles and chop them up into flakes. But another is that voluntary programs for recycling plastic don't appear to work too well. Maybe most people are like me, and didn't realize until today how recyclable the bottles are. Or maybe they don't live in one of the 11 states that mandate refundable deposits for PET bottles.

Because if you want to know why PET bottle recycling rates started to rise again in recent years, the answer appears to be simple: California. In 2004, California enacted a law that increased redemption values for PET containers. As a result, PET recycling in California surged.

Strange: Legislation and financial incentives make a difference! If government properly sets up a system that encourages people, whether you, me or the neighborhood poacher, to ferret out those bottles and turn them in, we can reduce landfill waste and clean up our neighborhoods. [Emphasis added]

The free market, all by itself, won't protect the environment. Regulation is needed — which means government regulation.

Give people an incentive, and they'll do the right thing. Providing that incentive just requires political will. What are we waiting for?

Posted by Jonathan at 05:18 PM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

Model Airplane Magic

Science/Technology

Fun video of a battery-powered model airplane. Amazing what some people can do:

[Via LongTail]

Posted by Jonathan at 03:34 PM | Comments (1) | Link to this  

Thursday Gumpagraph

Gumpagraphs

© Kent Tenney

Posted by Jonathan at 12:05 PM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

Today's Bush Joke

Humor & Fun

Did you all have a nice Presidents' Day Monday? President Bush marked the occasion in his usual way — by ignoring the other two branches of government. — Jay Leno

Posted by Jonathan at 12:03 PM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

February 21, 2007

Wednesday Gumpagraph

Gumpagraphs

© Kent Tenney

Posted by Jonathan at 09:44 AM | Comments (1) | Link to this  

Today's Bush Joke

Humor & Fun

With about 70 candidates running for President it seems George Bush has convinced the country that pretty much anybody can do the job. — Will Durst

Posted by Jonathan at 09:42 AM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

February 20, 2007

Global Warming Tied To Marine Dead Zones

Environment

A year ago last August, we noted a story about a marine dead zone caused by unusually warm waters off the coast of Oregon. At the time, scientists were reluctant to blame global warming. Enough evidence has accumulated in the interim, however, that marine scientists are now blaming global warming for similar dead zones occurring in many places around the world. Guardian:

A few months ago, the clear blue Pacific Ocean waters off the coast of Oregon suddenly turned a thick greenish brown. A swell of nutrients produced a bizarre blooming of plankton that reached levels never seen before by scientists. Then the plankton died and sank, causing oxygen levels in the water to plummet to zero.

The living ocean was transformed into a dead zone. Scientists conducted a submarine survey and found only the bodies of crabs and marine worms scattered across the ocean floor. There were no signs of any fish. Nothing had survived the cataclysm.

Nor has this been the only such disaster to strike a marine ecosystem in recent years. As scientists reported at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in San Francisco yesterday, unprecedented changes to ocean currents are having a devastating effect on finely balanced marine ecosystems all over the globe. Similar upheavals have been recorded in other parts of the world, particularly off South America and Africa.

Marine researchers are convinced the evidence points to one culprit: global warming. Man-made changes to the climate are throwing previously predictable seasonal winds out of kilter. 'We finger the winds as the important culprit, but we do not know definitively why these winds are changing,' said Professor Jane Lubchenco from Oregon State University. 'However, we know the changes are what would be expected under climate change scenarios, and climate change is a viable hypothesis. We should expect more surprises.'

Seasonal winds blowing across the sea affect ocean currents by pushing away surface water, which is then replaced by colder water from below. But warmer land temperatures result in higher pressures and stronger winds, which in turn have an impact on currents, said the scientists. Normally these effects were predictable, but recently the system had become unstable and volatile — a pattern that mirrors climate change models. 'Wild fluctuations in the intensity of ocean upwellings are wreaking havoc with ecosystems,' added Lubchenco. 'We're seeing extreme distortions on both sides of the norm. This is a system that is out of kilter. It's fluctuating rapidly.'

Up to five decades of data have shown that these events were unprecedented, she said, pointing out that similar ocean current disruption had been seen in other regions, particularly off Peru, Chile and parts of Africa.

Last year's ecosystem collapse on the Oregon coast was the second to strike there in as many years. In 2005, a nutrient-rich ocean current that normally appears off northern California and Oregon in spring was delayed by a month. This led to a loss of plankton, the microscopic plant organisms upon which larger animals depend for food. Salmon, which normally take to the sea at this time, starved. The effects rippled through the food web as predators, including sea birds, went hungry and died. Huge numbers of dead birds washed up on the shores.

'Beaches were littered with the bodies of dead sea birds,' said Dr Julia Parrish, from the University of Washington in Seattle. Many of the starving survivors have been unable to breed since then, she added.

Then, a year later, in 2006, the dead zone appeared and remained for nearly 17 weeks. 'It grew to an area the size of the state of Ohio and lasted much longer than we thought would be possible, from something that we tracked day to day for months on end,' said Dr Francis Chan, from Oregon State University in Corvallis. 'It went from a low-oxygen system to a no-oxygen system. This had a dramatic effect on marine life.' [Emphasis added]

The climate is a highly nonlinear system, with lots of built-in, potentially self-reinforcing feedback loops, so changes can be sudden and dramatic — on the scale of years or decades, not centuries. Our brains are wired to extrapolate linearly, however, so we expect next year to be pretty much like last year. That works well most of the time, but as turbulence and instability increase it is likely to become dangerously misguided. We will tend to think we have more time than we do. We should expect to be surprised.

Posted by Jonathan at 05:30 PM | Comments (3) | Link to this  

Tuesday Gumpagraph

Gumpagraphs

© Kent Tenney

Posted by Jonathan at 11:13 AM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

Today's Bush Joke

Humor & Fun

New White House pastry chef William Yosses is author of "Desserts for Dummies." So apparently, he's qualified. — Will Durst

Posted by Jonathan at 11:02 AM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

February 19, 2007

Starving Climate Science

Environment  Politics  Science/Technology

From an interview with NASA climatologist Drew Shindell in yesterday's NYT:

Q: As a physicist and climatologist at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, you recently testified before Congress about ways in which the Bush administration has tried to prevent you from releasing information on global warming. Can you give us an example? Sure. Press releases about global warming were watered down to the point where you wondered, Why would this capture anyone's interest? Once when I issued a report predicting rapid warming in Antarctica, the press release ended up highlighting, in effect, that Antarctica has a climate.

If your department is that politicized, how does that affect research? Well, five years from now, we will know less about our home planet that we know now. The future does not have money set aside to maintain even the current level of observations. There were proposals for lots of climate-monitoring instruments, most of which have been canceled.

By NASA? Well, it's a NASA decision following the directives from their political leaders. The money has been redirected into the manned space program, primarily.

Are you referring to President Bush and his plan to send Americans to Mars? The moon and Mars, yes. It's fine to do it for national spirit or exploring the cosmos, but the problem is that it comes at the cost of observing and protecting our home planet.

Why is NASA involved in climate research in the first place? There is no federal agency whose primary mission is the climate, and that's a problem, because climate doesn’t command the clout that it should in Washington. Since NASA is the primary agency for launching new scientific satellites, it has ended up collecting some of the most important data on climate change. [...]

Why do you think the federal government has been so phobic about adopting energy-efficiency regulations? "Phobic" is the right word, because it's irrational not to conserve when you think of all the advantages, such as keeping money in consumers' pockets instead of sending it to Middle Eastern countries that hate us. [Emphasis added]

It always seemed a little odd that the Bush White House took an interest in promoting manned spaceflight to Mars and the moon. It seemed out of character.

Pardon my cynicism, but could it just be their way of diverting funding away from research into the inconvenient truth of global climate change? Seems like just the sort of move that Bush, Cheney, and Rove might think was oh so very clever.

Posted by Jonathan at 03:41 PM | Comments (0) | Link to this  

Climate Change And The Future Of The West

Economy  Environment  Future

From "The End of the West As We Know It?" by Anatol Lieven (IHT):

Every political, social and economic system ever created has sooner or later encountered a challenge that its very nature has made it incapable of meeting. The Confucian ruling system of imperial China, which lasted for more than 2,000 years, has some claim still to be the most successful in history, but because it was founded on values of stability and continuity, rather than dynamism and inventiveness, it eventually proved unable to survive in the face of Western imperial capitalism.

For market economies, and the Western model of democracy with which they have been associated, the existential challenge for the foreseeable future will be global warming. Other threats like terrorism may well be damaging, but no other conceivable threat or combination of threats can possibly destroy our entire system. As the recent British official commission chaired by Sir Nicholas Stern correctly stated, climate change "is the greatest and widest-ranging market failure ever seen."

The question now facing us is whether global capitalism and Western democracy can follow the Stern report's recommendations, and make the limited economic adjustments necessary to keep global warming within bounds that will allow us to preserve our system in a recognizable form; or whether our system is so dependent on unlimited consumption that it is by its nature incapable of demanding even small sacrifices from its present elites and populations.

If the latter proves the case, and the world suffers radically destructive climate change, then we must recognize that everything that the West now stands for will be rejected by future generations. The entire democratic capitalist system will be seen to have failed utterly as a model for humanity and as a custodian of essential human interests.

Even the relatively conservative predictions offered by the Stern report, of a drop in annual global gross domestic product of up to 20 percent by the end of this century, imply a crisis on the scale of the Great Depression of the 1930s; and as we know, the effects of that depression were not restricted to economics. In much of Europe, as well as Latin America and Japan, democracies collapsed and were replaced by authoritarian regimes.

As the report makes clear, however, if we continue with "business as usual" when it comes to the emission of greenhouse gases, then we will not have to wait till the end of the century to see disastrous consequences. Long before then, a combination of floods, droughts and famine will have destroyed states in many poorer parts of the earth — as has already occurred in recent decades in Somalia.

If the conservative estimates of the Stern report are correct, then already by 2050 the effects of climate change may be such as to wreck the societies of Pakistan and Bangladesh; and if these states collapse, how can India and other countries possibly insulate themselves?

At that point, not only will today's obsessive concern with terrorism appear insignificant, but all the democratizing efforts of Western states, and of private individuals and bodies like George Soros and his Open Society Institute, will be rendered completely meaningless. So, of course, will every effort directed today toward the reduction of poverty and disease.

And this is only to examine the likely medium-term consequences of climate change. For the further future, the report predicts that if we continue with business as usual, then the rise in average global temperature could well top 5 degrees Celsius. To judge by what we know of the history of the world's climate, this would almost certainly lead to the melting of the polar ice caps, and a rise in sea levels of up to 25 meters.

As pointed out by Al Gore in "An Inconvenient Truth," this would mean the end of many of the world's greatest cities. The resulting human migration could be on such a scale as to bring modern civilization to an end.

If this comes to pass, what will our descendants make of a political and media culture that devotes little attention to this threat when compared with sports, consumer goods, leisure and a threat from terrorism that is puny by comparison? Will they remember us as great paragons of human progress and freedom? They are more likely to spit on our graves. [Emphasis added]

The piece makes an essential point, though it could have been made more forcefully: unregulated market capitalism is, by its very nature, incapable of self-restraint, and hence incapable of dealing successfully with an issue like global warming. Capitalism is about the single-minded pursuit of one thing: profit. That single-mindedness is the source of capitalism's dynamism, but it is also, in a world of unregulated markets, going to be the source of capitalism's ultimate undoing. It costs nothing to emit greenhouse gases; it costs money to not emit them. Unless someone can figure out a way to reverse that circumstance, unregulated capitalism will be "successful" the way cancer is successful. It will grow and grow until, in the end, it kills its host.

So capitalism needs to be regulated, to save it from itself, and to save us from it. But a successful worldwide regulatory regime is ultimately going to have to be largely voluntary. Capitalists will have to restrain themselves. They are going to have to not cheat. Unfortunately, buccaneers have always vastly outnumbered saints.

[Thanks, Miles]

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Monday Gumpagraph

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© Kent Tenney

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Today's Bush Joke

Humor & Fun

The president's approval is at an all-time low. Say what you want about the guy, but he didn't become president to make friends. He became president because the White House had a bowling alley in the basement. — Jimmy Kimmel

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February 18, 2007

Sunday Gumpagraph

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© Kent Tenney

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Today's Bush Joke

Humor & Fun

One night, George W. Bush is tossing restlessly in his White House bed. He awakens to see George Washington standing by him Bush asks him, "George, what''s the best thing I can do to help the country?"

"Set an honest and honorable example, just as I did," Washington advises, and then fades away...

The next night, Bush is astir again, and sees the ghost of Thomas Jefferson moving through the darkened bedroom. Bush calls out, "Tom, please! What is the best thing I can do to help the country?"

"Respect the Constitution, as I did," Jefferson advises, and dims from sight...

The third night sleep still does not come for Bush. He awakens to see the ghost of FDR hovering over his bed. Bush whispers, "Franklin, What is the best thing I can do to help the country?"

"Help the less fortunate, just as I did," FDR replies and fades into the mist...

Bush isn''t sleeping well the fourth night when he sees another figure moving in the shadows. It is the ghost of Abraham Lincoln. Bush pleads, "Abe, what is the best thing I can do right now to help the country?"

Lincoln replies, "Go see a play." — Comedy Central

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February 17, 2007

Saturday Gumpagraph

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© Kent Tenney

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Today's Bush Joke

Humor & Fun

In an interview with "Fox News Sunday," Vice President Dick Cheney commented on Congress' efforts to stop additional troops from being sent to Iraq, saying, "You cannot run a war by committee." You run a war by a monkey, a map, and some darts. — Seth Meyers

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February 16, 2007

Happy President's Day

Politics

USA Today's founder Al Neuharth, today:

A year ago I criticized Hillary Clinton for saying "this (Bush) administration will go down in history as one of the worst."

"She's wrong," I wrote. Then I rated these five presidents, in this order, as the worst: Andrew Jackson, James Buchanan, Ulysses Grant, Hoover and Richard Nixon. "It's very unlikely Bush can crack that list," I added.

I was wrong. This is my mea culpa. Not only has Bush cracked that list, but he is planted firmly at the top.

[Via Atrios]

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Gore To Host World's Biggest Party

Activism  Environment

Al Gore is promoting a 24-hour worldwide concert July 7 to raise awareness of global warming. MSNBC:

Al Gore, the former vice president and now hit documentary maker, on Thursday added rock promoter to his résumé, announcing plans for a 24-hour concert series on all seven continents to highlight, you guessed it, the dangers of global warming.

With a powerhouse lineup of acts from the Red Hot Chili Peppers to Snoop Dogg to Bon Jovi, what's being called "Live Earth" aims to gather more than 100 of the world's top musicians on July 7 — and attract 2 billion viewers, most of them via television, radio and the Web.

It's easy to view this kind of thing cynically, but I choose not to. I think anything that lets the world's people connect, transcend cultural and political borders, and redirect their energies in a peaceful direction is welcome in a world where so many things push in the opposite direction.

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Bottom Falls Out Of New Housing Starts

Economy

The bottom just fell out of starts for new residential construction in the US. For single-family homes, for example, January starts were down 38.9% compared to January a year ago.

Salon's Andrew Leonard spoke to housing economist Dean Baker. Excerpt:

But why are so many analysts willing to declare the bottom has been reached?

"The long and short of it is: You have a lot of people who are anxious to see the turnaround, and looking desperately at single-month data. But I have a hard time seeing the conditions for that. There is still this huge overhang of unsold homes, along with a huge inventory of vacant homes, which is also an indication of possible financial stress. Foreclosures are rising very rapidly."

Baker's reference to foreclosures brought up the second big question about the ultimate ramifications of the housing bust. The collapse of the sub-prime lending sector has led some financial analysts to wonder whether there will be a cascade effect on Wall Street that hurts the investors who have been buying and selling complicated financial instruments — credit derivatives and other exotic fare — that are directly or indirectly tied to the health of the housing sector. Has risk been spread around enough that Wall Street can ride out any storm? Or has the moment of truth for a largely unregulated and opaque system finally arrived?

First Baker speculated that the trouble currently being experienced by sub-prime mortgage lenders will spread into standard loans. If prices continue to fall, many homeowners will be holding mortgages whose value is greater than what they can sell their home for, he said.

"The problem will go well beyond sub-prime. We are going to see higher default rates on standard loans."

That in turn will increase the pressure on institutions and investors who have been speculating on such things as mortgage-backed securities. It won't just be the riskiest bets that blow up in hedge fund investor faces, but even some that were considered "safe."

"But we really don't have any idea how exposed the hedge funds are. No one knows how much they are leveraged. But there must be a lot of people exposed to far more risk than we understand, because you don't get the really high returns [enjoyed by hedge funds] without exposing yourself to a lot of risk."

So what's going to happen?

Dean Baker doesn't know. No one knows!

"We are just shooting in the dark," he conceded. [Emphasis added]

December's warmth caused a unusual amount of building activity, masking the slowdown. January's weather in the US was normal for a January, though, so the January numbers can't be blamed on the weather.

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January Smashes Warmth Record Worldwide

Environment

January temperatures in the US were fairly normal, but not worldwide. January temperatures worldwide smashed the previous record for the warmest January on record. AP:

It may be cold comfort during a frigid February, but last month was by far the hottest January [on record]. [...]

Spurred on by unusually warm Siberia, Canada, northern Asia and Europe, the world's land areas were 3.4 degrees Fahrenheit (1.9 degrees Celsius) warmer than a normal January, according to the U.S. National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, North Carolina.

That didn't just nudge past the old record set in 2002, but broke that mark by 0.81 degrees Fahrenheit (0.56C), which meteorologists said is a lot, since such records often are broken by hundredths of a degree at a time.

"That's pretty unusual for a record to be broken by that much," said the data center's scientific services chief, David Easterling. "I was very surprised." [...]

The temperature of the world's land and water combined — the most effective measurement — was 1.53 degrees Fahrenheit (0.85C) warmer than normal, breaking the old record by more than one-quarter of a degree.

Ocean temperatures alone didn't set a record. In the Northern Hemisphere, land areas were 4.1 degrees Fahrenheit (2.4C) warmer than normal for January, breaking the old record by about three-quarters of a degree. [...]

The world's temperature record was driven by northern latitudes. Siberia was on average 9 degrees Fahrenheit (5.1C) warmer than normal. Eastern Europe had temperatures averaging 8 degrees Fahrenheit (4.55C) above normal. Canada on average was more than 5 degrees Fahrenheit (2.88C) warmer than normal.

Larger increases in temperature farther north, compared to mid-latitudes, is "sort of the global warming signal," Easterling said. [...]

Temperature records break regularly with global warming, Trenberth said, but "with a little bit of El Nino thrown in, you don't just break records, you smash records." [Emphasis added]

Siberia's warmth can't be good news. As we've noted in the past, Siberia's permafrost harbors an enormous amount of methane, a far more potent greenhouse gas than CO2. As the world warms, the permafrost thaws, releasing methane, which warms the world further, causing more methane to be released, etc., etc., in a self-reinforcing feedback loop.

As I wrote previously:

The horrifying thing about these feedback loops is that at some point it's no longer going to matter much what we do — the process will have taken on a life of its own, accelerating out of control, leading finally to a new equilibrium in the form of a very different planet from the one we know.

All of which makes our obsessive worrying about the threat of a possible terrorist attack seem grotesquely foolish. Survival depends on accurately assessing and prioritizing threats. But people seem to have a hard time mobilizing against a threat that doesn't have a human face. And of course war-profiteers are a whole lot better at playing the political game than are a bunch of climate scientists and environmentalists. But just imagine if the resources that have gone into selling us the "war on terror" had gone instead into informing us about the really important threats we face.

You often hear people say that dealing with global warming would be too expensive. Yet somehow we never seem to run out of money for war. Odd species, us.

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Friday Gumpagraph

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