Annals of Global Warming: Toles cartoon, seven years ago we were a decade overdue for action

July 14, 2011

Tom Toles cartoon on global warming inaction, from 2004

A Tom Toles cartoon from 2004

Insert a definition of “filibuster” here.

Then pray for action.

Then call your congressman, and him/her to act, now.

_____________

Note on Tom Toles from the Department of Earth Sciences, G-107 Environmental Geology, Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis (IUPUI):  “A political cartoon from the Washington Post on climate change. Tom Toles, a political cartoonist, often pens cartoons on environmental issues. His cartoons are often reprinted in other newspapers (Washington Post/Universal Press Syndicate).”

2 Comments | Cartoons, Climate change, climate_change, denialism, Environment, Environmental protection, Global warming, Political cartoons, Politics, Science | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Republican bid to turn out the lights failed

July 12, 2011

Dan Weiss reports at Climate Progress that the attempt to kill energy conservation standards failed tonight.  It required a two-thirds vote from the House to suspend the rules to consider it (the bill did not go through normal legislative channels) — the bill failed.

You may want to read Steve Lacey’s earlier explanation of the bill there, too.

Tip of the old scrub brush to Tony Sidaway and his tweets.

19 Comments | Conservation, Cost of Green, Green Politics, Politics, Rampant stupidity | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Marxism from Republicans? Sad, but true . . .

July 12, 2011

. . .  Groucho Marxism.

(From Horsefeathers; longer version of entire scene, here.)

The U.S. House of Representatives scheduled a vote today to force light bulb manufacturers to keep manufacturing bulbs the market has rejected — Marxist socialism at its apex! — in order to overturn energy conservation standards signed into law by President George W. Bush in 2007.

ThinkProgress explains:

Lately it seems that the House Republican leadership is against everything that isn’t pre-approved by Big Oil or the Tea Party. Perhaps the most outlandish example of this Groucho Marx approach to public policy is today’s vote on the BULB Act, H.R. 2417. It would repeal the energy efficiency standards for light bulbs established in the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, or EISA, P.L. 110-140. It would also prevent California from setting its own light bulb efficiency standards. The original author of the provision is House Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Fred Upton (R-MI), who is now supporting the repeal of his own idea after conservatives attacked it along with other clean energy programs.

EISA, with Rep. Upton’s efficiency measure, passed the House in 2007 by a bipartisan vote of 319-100, with support from 49.7 percent of Republicans who voted and 98 percent of Democratic votes. President George W. Bush signed it into law.

Afterwards, Rep. Upton bragged in a press release, “Upton Measure to Upgrade Energy Efficiency Standards for all Light Bulbs Now Law” . . .

Mark Twain observed that it takes just one man of conscience to stand up to a mob and frustrate stupid mob action.  Fred Upton is not that man of conscience, alas.

Meanwhile, PopVox has a poll on the bill.  Go on over there and vote “no,” meaning you wish to keep the conservation standards.

Tip of the old scrub brush to ThinkProgress via Jennsmom.

33 Comments | Cost of Green, Environment, Environmental protection, Green Politics, Political Smear, Politics, Rampant stupidity | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Superstition that takes your breath away

July 12, 2011

This is the astonishing sort of statement that makes P. Z. Myers in his crabbiest modes of atheism look completely calm and cool in his rationalism.

Our old authoritarian, anti-discussion friend Neil Simpson said:

As a Christian, I scoff at superstitions.  I leave those to non-believers.

Yeah, the same Neil Simpson who holds superstitious convictions that evolution is wrong, warming doesn’t occur and CO2 can’t be a greenhouse gas, etc., etc.  Check out his blog — is there any statement he makes that is not based in superstition?

He’ll probably argue that he has proof of Jesus, so what Jesus would have called faith, Simpson will call evidence-based views.

How can someone practice the faith when they deny it’s faith?  Aye, there’s a huge problem for Christianity these days.

_____________

See Dictionary.com:

superstition   [soo-per-stish-uhn] – noun
1.  a belief or notion, not based on reason or knowledge, in or of the ominous significance of a particular thing, circumstance, occurrence, proceeding, or the like.
2.  a system or collection of such beliefs.
3.  a custom or act based on such a belief.

and,

relgion  [ri-lij-uhn] – noun
1.  a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, especially when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.
2.  a specific fundamental set of beliefs and practices generally agreed upon by a number of persons or sects: the Christian religion; the Buddhist religion.
3.  the body of persons adhering to a particular set of beliefs and practices: a world council of religions.

_____________

Update:  At Dispatches from the Culture Wars, Ed Brayton finds the statement laughable, too.  As always, more comments at the more-trafficked sites.

Leave a Comment » | Humor, Rampant stupidity, Religion | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Red, white and blue: Driving the flag

July 12, 2011

Wish I had more details on this photo — purported to be made of Corvettes:

Corvettes lined up to resemble a U.S. Flag

Would it get more people to salute it this way?

Who dreams up this stuff?

_____________

Who dreams it up?  A conclave called “Corvettes at Carlisle” (Pennsylvania):

Corvette salute to the flag, Corvettes at Carlisle

Edited version, from Corvettes at Carlisle

Leave a Comment » | Flag etiquette, Fly your flag today, Humor | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Are you ready to deal with effects of global warming?

July 12, 2011

Why not?  These guys argue that the most rational solution is to get ready to deal with the problems, and stop worrying about the science behind “whether.”

If a global warming debate about certainty and cause only deepens doubt and defensiveness, what kind of debate would create support for action? We saw Hurricane Katrina as an opportunity to shift from the tired debate over cause and prevention to a new discussion about preparedness, thus reframing global warming from certainty to uncertainty and from limits on human activity to greater activity. Regardless of the cause, global warming is here and we need to prepare for it in the same way we prepare for any other imaginable natural disaster, not knowing exactly when or where it will strike. Global Warming Preparedness was created to test the possibility that action on global warming could be taken, not in spite of uncertainty, but because of it. (Breakthrough Institute, Plan for Global Warming Preparedness)

Are they right?

(Reminds me of the old wisdom from the Starbucks coffee cup.)

1 Comment | Climate change, climate_change, Disasters, Environment, Environmental protection, Global warming, Politics, Science | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Wind power video primer from NSF

July 10, 2011

Part of “Green Revolution,” a series on science and environmental awareness from the National Science Foundation (NSF). This is a quick introduction to wind power, with some good video:

Vodpod videos no longer available.

US NSF – Multimedia Gallery – Wind — Green Rev…, posted with vodpod

1 Comment | Conservation, Electricity, Energy, Science | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Fresh from the garden: Bat faced cuphea

July 10, 2011

Bat-faced cuphea in Kathryn's garden

On a pedestal? Kathryn's potted bat-faced cuphea stands out when the mid-morning sun bathes it, but the yard in back still hovers in the shade of the live oak. Horticultural design by Kathryn Knowles; photo by Ed Darrell

Kathryn’s bat faced cuphea (Cuphea llavea) has graced our garden for several years with this particular plant, or its seedlings.  It attracts butterflies and hummingbirds with regularity.

It gets its name because each blossom resembles the face of a tiny bat.

Bat faced cuphea in Kathryn's garden, IMGP5294

Each blossom of bat faced cuphea resembles the face of a bat.

Leave a Comment » | Gardening, Natural history, Nature | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Troops who fought in two wars now protect public against Missouri River flood and nuclear accident

July 10, 2011

Hoax claims died down a bit across the blogosphere, but the Missouri River still floods, and the two Nebraska nuclear power plants on the Missouri still face threats from the flood.

Comes news via the Omaha World-Herald that members of Nebraska’s and Iowa’s Air National Guard — many of them veterans of Iraq or Afghanistan — patrol the levees, helping protect against floods.  Among points of special concern are the nuclear power plants at Fort Calhoun and Cooper.

The military helicopter’s black shadow dances on an engorged Missouri River as the aircraft slowly loops the flood-encircled Fort Calhoun Nuclear Station — the same left-leaning turns the pilot navigated two days prior.

Warrant Officer Boe Searight, 32, with the Nebraska Air National Guard wants the infrared camera mounted under the chopper to record similar flood scenes for levee experts on the ground to compare.

He and his colleague Chief Warrant Officer 2 Eric Schriner also are looking for new signs of trouble for the flooded plant.

“Keep daily eyes on it and see if anything changes,” says Schriner, 31.

Far below, on mosquito-infested riverbanks, two-person crews with the Nebraska National Guard and Iowa National Guard patrol the Omaha and Council Bluffs levees in mud-caked boots.

Members of the Guard are the front-line levee watchers in an operation that clearly has high stakes: Levees protect about 40,000 people from homelessness in the neighboring river cities — as well as the region’s key airport.

The levee watchers are out there right now — three shifts a day, all week, searching for gopher holes, chasing away sightseers who could fall from the levees, and checking for signs of water seepage.

More than 130 men and women with the Nebraska Army and Air National Guard work each day for flood duty, along with 120 from the Iowa Army and Air National Guard.

The idea is to spot trouble early. Levees don’t always give notice before they rupture, but more often than not they do.

If trouble is spotted, steps can be taken to shore up or boost a weakened levee.

Good to know.  Still no nuclear incident along the lines of the hoax report from the Pakistani outlet alleged to be based on a report from a Russian agency — which is also good news — but no cause for abatement of overall concern.

Sometimes safety preparations work.  Kudos to the Air National Guards, to the Nuclear Regulatory Agency, and to the companies who own  the power plants.  May their work continue to pay off in no nuclear incidents.

Idaho Samizdat noted earlier that the bizarre conspiracy theories haven’t borne out as accurate or true in the least:

The flooding situation in Nebraska has been the subject of bizarre conspiracy theories originating in Russia and Pakistan alleging that a meltdown has occurred at Ft. Calhoun and that the government is covering it up.

One U.S. web site, Business Insider, ran with the story as legitimate and set off a huge round of copy cat reports on the Internet.

Reports of a U.S. news blackout are also part of the conspiracy theory even though Nebraska papers such as the Omaha World-Herald and the New York Times have run major stories on measures by the two reactor sites to prevent the flood waters from reaching important infrastructure such as switch yards

1 Comment | Disasters, Hoaxes, Journalism, News, Rivers, Science | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Coach the beauty pageant contestants in critical thinking, please

July 10, 2011

Everybody else has to know it, or suffer without it.

Can you tell which of these is the parody?

Is it this one?

Or is it this one?

Stephen Law reports the science geek won the competition — maybe that will be enough to spur other beauty pageant contestants to get hip to reality?

Susana Speier explained what’s going on at Scientific American’s online site:

Last week, self proclaimed “geek,” Miss California, Alyssa Campanella made beauty pageant history…by default. When the interviewer posed a Theory of Evolution question, she was one of only two delegates to use the scientific definition of the word “theory” in her response.

The honey-drenched, colloquial definition that the majority of her competitors clung to was, yes, diplomatic. Miss California, now Miss USA, however, did not aim to please or to appease the 60% of Americans that a 2009 Gallup Poll concluded do not believe in Evolution. Rather than aiming to please or appease an ignorant majority, The future Miss USA delivered a response that supported an empirical evidence based definition of specified phenomena: the scientific definition of the word, “theory.”

Brains is beauty, it seems to me.  We should certainly run our schools as if intelligence and learning are great virtues in themselves.

 

 

8 Comments | Charles Darwin, Creationism, Darwin, Education, Rampant stupidity, Reason, Science | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Tea partiers: Constipated, now in the dark — what else can they screw up?

July 9, 2011

Life is just a constant bitch for tea partiers.

Rand Paul revealed why he’s full of . . . that certain fecality, shall we say.  He did that in a hearing about light bulbs, and appliances.  Energy conservation gives Rand Paul formication (look it up).

Joker burns money - Warner Brothers publicity still, with Heath Ledger as the Joker

Burning money: Republicans prefer more heat than light, less energy conservation, and the libertarian, self-help yourself to others' money philosophy popularized in recent movies.

But what about efforts to undo the energy conservation bill that practically forces long-lived, low-energy light bulbs on us?  The Tea Party doesn’t like that idea, either.  Michael Patrick Leahy, writing at the blog for Rupert Murdoch’s Broadside Books, explains why he thinks the Tea Party should oppose Fred Upton’s bill to repeal the energy standards Rand Paul castigated.

Basically, none of these guys knows beans about energy, nor much about the technology or science of electricity and lighting — they just like to whine.

Leahy wrote:

Section 3 [of the “Better Use of Light Bulbs Act,” HR 2417] states that “No Federal, State, or local requirement or standard regarding energy efficient lighting shall be effective to the extent that the requirement or standard can be satisfied only by installing or using lamps containing mercury.” This reads to me that Congress is attacking the mercury laden CFL bulbs. The point of the individual economic choice guaranteed in the Constitution, however, is that Congress ought not to favor CFLs over incandescents, just as it ought not to favor incandescents over CFLs. I’m no fan of CFL bulbs personally, but look for CFL manufacturers like GE to make this argument against the bill at every opportunity.

Section 4 of the Act is designed to repeal the light bulb efficiency standards in effect in the State of California since January 1 of this year. The standards are essentially the federal standards that will go into effect January 1, 2012, but moved up a year. While I personally question the legal status of these very specific rules promulgated by the California Energy Commission based on a vague and non-specific 2007 California statute, it seems to me that there are serious Constitutional questions surrounding a Federal law prohibiting a State to establish its own product efficiency standards. While a good argument can be made that the Commerce Clause grants Congress the right to repeal California state regulations, a reasonable argument could be made by opponents of the bill that Congress can’t do this because the state of California is merely establishing local standards, which is its right.

Given these concerns about Sections 3 and 4, what purpose does it serve to include them in the bill? Both raise potential objections to the passage of the bill on the floor of the House if it comes to a vote this week.

Now, granted this is the House of Representatives, and not the Senate where Sen. Paul keeps a chair warmed, occasionally.  Still, is it too much to ask the Tea Party to support the bills it asks for?  Leahy said:

A full and open discussion of these issues in public hearings held by the House Energy and Commerce Committee would have been the right way to begin a legislative process that would have identified and addressed these potential objections. That’s the course that a Committee Chairman seriously committed to repealing the light bulb ban would have taken. Instead, Chairman Upton has followed this secretive, behind closed doors, last minute rushed vote approach.

There was a hearing in the Senate — good enough for most people — and of course, there were hearings on the issue in the House.  The Tea Party was unconscious at the time.  The bill they’re trying to repeal was a model of moderation as touted by the president when it passed, President George W. Bush — and it’s still a good idea to conserve energy and set standards that require energy conservation (the law does not ban incandescent bulbs).

Also, while they’re complaining about the mercury in Compact Fluorescent Light bulbs (CFLs), remember, Dear Reader, they oppose letting our Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) protect you from mercury in your drinking water or the air that you breathe.  Pollution is only worrisome to them if they can use worry as a tool to whine about people making life work without pollution.  A rational person would point out that the mercury released by coal-fired power plants to produce the energy required by repeal of the conservation law would more than equal the mercury from all the CFLs, even were all that mercury to be released as pollution (which it isn’t, if properly disposed of):

8 hours: The amount of time a person must be exposed to the mercury in a CFL bulb to acquire the same mercury level as eating a six-ounce can of tuna, according to Climate Progress’s Stephen Lacey.

Is it too much to ask for reason, circumspection, and a touch of wisdom from these guys?  You’re supposed to drink the tea, Tea Party, not smoke it.

Tucker Carlson’s Daily Caller (can we get on the no-call list?) says Republicans plan to vote for darkness instead of light next Monday.

A wet shake of the old scrub brush in the general direction of Instapundit, who never met a form of pollution he didn’t prefer over clean water or clean air.

_____________

Update:  Mike the Mad Biologist talks sense about the light bulb vote planned by the dim bulbs:

Because it’s not like more efficient light bulbs would be helpful at all:

The American Council on an Energy Efficient Economy says that the standards would eliminate the need to develop 30 new power plants – or about the electrical demand of Pennsylvania and Tennessee combined.

Only Republicans can make the current crop of Democrats look good…

Mike provides more points that make the Upton bill look simultaneously silly and craven:  The current law does not ban incandescent bulbs at all, for example, one manufacturer has introduced two new incandescent bulbs in the past year.  Tea Party Republicans:  No fact left unignored, no sensible solution left undistorted and unattacked.

Also see:

35 Comments | Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, Conservation, Energy, Environment, Environmental protection, pollution, Regulation | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Educators, especially principals and administrators: Follow these guys, will you?

July 9, 2011

In last eight years I’ve spent in frontline education, I cannot count the times I’ve had administrators bring up some management scheme misdescribed and misexecuted as a result, or rejected completely by businesses years ago.  Each time I wonder, don’t these organizational leaders read the management journals, the leadership gurus?

Well, no they don’t.

So, for the three or four principals and administrators who occasionally read this blog, will you do us all a favor?

Follow Tom Peters and Rosabeth Moss Kanter on their Twitter feeds, will you?  A few times a week you’ll get a gem of advice from each of them.  It’ll improve your life, and it will improve your organizations if you pay attention.

Agree or disagree with me — let us know in comments.

Who is Rosabeth Moss Kanter?  You should know her as the author of Teaching Elephants to Dance.  It’s a hoary old classic by now — and not present in any of the libraries of the administrators I see daily.

Who is Tom Peters?  He was co-author of In Search of Excellence, and has gone on to push excellence, quality and good change for the past quarter century plus.

If you, Ms. or Mr. Educator, do not know who these people are, you’re hopelessly behind the times.  If you are not familiar with their writings, your schools are suffering for your ignorance.

Go change something.

2 Comments | Business, Education, Leadership | Tagged: , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Lunch in Waco, Elvis Presley style

July 8, 2011

So I found myself in Waco, Texas, after noon and hungry.  Where to eat?

Fortunately, I’d read about the burger emporium favored by none other than Elvis Presley, Health Camp.

Health Camp Drive In, Waco Texas, Photo by Ed Darrell

Even after the lunch rush cars and pickups crowd the door at Health Camp.

Who names a burger joint “Health Camp?”

Established in 1949, it’s still dispensing “100% Angus ground chuck” burgers.  While it’s not a competitor for the title of World’s Best, to me, it’s a good burger, and the fries were pretty good, too.  The place specializes in milkshakes in a wide variety of flavors, including banana, butterscotch and peanut butter.  I did not ask if the peach flavor comes from fresh, or real peaches.

Here’s a photo from a few years back:

Health Camp burger stand in Waco, Texas

Health Camp burger stand in Waco, Texas - TexasBurgerGuy

It looks much the same.  If you’re passing through on Interstate 35, it’s not really that hard to find it at 2601 Circle Road.  Circle Road terminates literally in a circle — a “circus” in British terminology — less than 100 yards off of I-35.  Take Exit 333A going either north or south, aim for South Valley Mills Road on the east side of the freeway.  The next intersection is the Circle off of Circle Road.  Other roads going into the Circle include LaSalle Avenue, Robinson Road.  Elite Circle Grill has a larger, easier to find sign — and the two essentially share a parking lot.   If you’re at the Elite Circle Grill, you’re close enough to Health Camp to walk.

Health Camp in Waco, Evlis's local favorite, photo by Ed Darrell

More parking than needed, Health Camp shares parking lot with the Elite Circle Grill; daytime shots suffer from not showing the neon on the flying-V sign. Photo by Ed Darrell, use encouraged, with attribution.

The business here is drive-in food, especially burgers and milkshakes.  Someone did a photo essay on drive-ins in Texas, and a dozen or so framed pictures of famous greasers lines the small dine-in room.  It’s formica and vinyl, and signs with plastic red letters on white — some of which have not been changed in months, perhaps in years.

It’s a classic place.  Not classy, but classic.

Interior of Health Camp Drive-in in Waco, Texas, photo by Ed Darrell

Atmosphere? You came here for the burgers and the milkshakes. The seats work, the tables are clean, the ketchup isn't watered down. You want decor? Go to McDonalds.

They know what they’ve got.  A combo meal — burger, fries or tots or rings, and drink, will be north of $6.00; add a shake, you’re up to $8.00  Change back from your $10 or $20.

I got a cheeseburger, mayo, “all the way.”  Very good beef, satisfying, fresh and sweet onions.  Fries could have been cut in the place, but I’ll wager they were frozen — not highly processed beyond that.  Fried to a good crisp, they screamed for ketchup.

A stop here beats a stop at any of the big chains, but will cost you a bit more.  True burger aficionados may complain.  Let ’em.

I’ll stop there again with pleasure, unless I think I have time to try the Elite Circle Grill for a comparison.  I thought fondly of the Owl Burger at the Owl Cafe in Albuquerque, and the Big H from Hires Drive-In in Salt Lake City, both superior to the Health Camp product.  But they are related closely enough for horseshoes.

Health Camp cheeseburger and fries - photo by Ed Darrell

The Health Camp cheeseburger comes wrapped unassumingly in paper, served on a plastic tray. Clearly the management puts its effort into ingredients and preparation.

1 Comment | History | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Ben Stein in a nutshell (appropriately)

July 8, 2011

Ben Stein is too easy to kick around anymore.  His views on politics, science, and general public policy have inflated so much above the troposphere that he really cannot speak about life on the ground at all.  The movie mockumentary “Expelled!” provided the early signs of pundit dementia.

Graphic for Ben Stein's American Spectator column

Graphic for Ben Stein's American Spectator column: Even in the art, Stein's out of it; his column is titled, "Nation's Pulse," but the graphic shows Uncle Sam hooked up to a machine measuring everything but his pulse. Even Sam's genitals get wired, but the nurse isn't counting heartbeats, nor does it appear any other monitor is.

At the same time, he’s a friend of dogs.  One of his tributes to his old dog literally brought tears to my eyes, and reminded me much of the old saying that heaven has no room for those who don’t like dogs.  That also raised the horrible vision of spending eternity in a heaven with dog-lovers who also happen to be political idiots.

Stein won’t kick dogs, but he’ll kick scientists, and poor people, and anyone in the middle class.  Maybe heavens don’t take people solely on the basis of their affection for dogs.

I digress.

At the remains of the American Spectator — a once-great, nearly revolutionary and smart journal of conservatism slipped on the slime to twitchy, bumper-sticker politics — Stein’s every-issue column turned to his vacation in an exclusive and expensive home in Sandpoint, Idaho, his distaste for undeveloped land and and outright fear of wilderness, friends, and the birth of his granddaughter, nicknamed Coco:

I feel so worried about Coco, She is only a tiny infant with eyes barely open. What do I want Coco to know? To do her best. To love her parents. To forgive. To be a lot more prudent about money than I am. To be grateful for this, our America, the best place in the universe. To turn her will and her life over to God and turn to Him for help in every situation.

But I wish my parents and Alex’s parents were here to help. And I wish my sister lived closer so she could help. And that Mr Nixon were still alive to give the leaders of this nation some clue about how to lead a nation. I am excited about Coco, but I am scared.

Right emotions, wrong thoughts.  We need Lyndon Johnson, with a concern for eliminating poverty among the aged (something he did!), not Richard Nixon.  With the possible exception of his trip to China, nothing Nixon did couldn’t have been done better by Johnson with another four years, or Humphrey, had we had the sense.

But that’s Stein.  He’s human on the family front, full of emotion, loving dogs, getting a cold treat for his ill wife, worrying about the future his granddaughter faces, especially from his privileged palace in Sandpoint, a nice nearly-wild area unfortunately become home of right-wing militias, Aryan-loving neo-Nazis and Keystone Kops-style militias — then switching to his brain-driven mode from emotion-driven, and doing everything he can to make sure anyone who lacks a few million dollars in the bank courtesy of the Old Man will be unable to rise above the fears.  Stein luckily led a charmed life, dependent on the kindness of family, friends and strangers, and he cannot understand why others don’t do the same.  Stein’s solutions stand magnificently out of reason:  Out of work?  Take a tax cut.  Need money to go to college?  Your father needs a tax cut, if he’s rich.  Health care tough to find because you can’t pay for it?  Tax cuts for the owner of the company you wish to work for.  And stop your arguing for more practical or workable solutions whining.

Stein stands in such sharp contrast to the Nepali prince Siddhartha, whose views of real life led him to forsake his princely heritage and seek spiritual enlightenment.  One hopes for a Stein-like character with the conscience of Siddhartha, but the practicality of Ross Perot who once noted that what America really needs is a political leader who will fill some potholes, and then, instead of holding a press conference about it, fill some more potholes.

Ben Stein’s road of life has been stripped of most potholes.  It’s so smooth, he can’t understand why everyone doesn’t drive that way, going to fancy school’s on Dad’s big money, hobnobbing with Republicans at the country club and occasionally taking the opportunities they toss your way.  Wouldn’t such a life be divine?

8 Comments | History, Journalism, Politics, Republican Party | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Still U.S. flags on the Moon?

July 7, 2011

One of the most dramatic categories of evidence that the U.S. landed men on the Moon is the detritus and other stuff they left behind.  Now we have satellites orbiting the Moon that can send back images of the landing sites with an amazing amount of detail.

Around the 4th of July somebody usually wonders how those flags left behind, are doing.

CBS News reporter Jim Axelrod asked around; you can see his report at YouTube (CBS disallows embedding of these reports, so you’ll need to click the image a couple of times to go to the YouTube site for CBS):

(720 views of this report when I posted this; come on, news hounds, flag fliers and Moon and history buffs, you can boost that total.)

Leave a Comment » | Flag ceremony, Flag etiquette, History, Moon, NASA, Space exploration, Space Race | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »