Annoyed Computer

Hugh Hewitt

2007-01-27T06:43:00.000-08:00

Hugh Hewitt

This is a very good overview of the political/war situation.

Read it!

Hidden on Christmas Day

2006-12-26T10:22:00.000-08:00

Nonprofit Connects Murtha, Lobbyists - washingtonpost.com

The WaPo tells the world about Murtha and his cronies: they surely wanted everyone to know about this, as they ran the story on Christmas Day, when everyone will be sure to read the papers - Not!

Anyway, we now have this for reference, and that's good. The story is that Murtha sets up these nonprofit agencies, and then gets them federal funding. The agency is staffed with friends and associates, and the money, shall we say, "circulates". Maybe some of it even gets back to Murtha's campaign war chest...

"It's a real tangled web between the congressman, the nonprofit, the defense contractors and the lobbyists," said Steve Ellis, vice president of Taxpayers for Common Sense, a nonpartisan watchdog group. "It's hard to say where one stops and the others start."

And of course Murtha explains it all... or does he?

Quote...
Murtha declined to respond to numerous phone calls and e-mails from The Washington Post requesting comment.
End Qoute...

Can we really expect Poloesi to go after her old buddy, even though she claims that the Dems are going to clean up all the Congressional mess? We do hope so!

CQ.com

2006-12-10T19:12:00.000-08:00

Anybody here have a program? Can't tell the players without a program!
http://public.cq.com/public/20061211_homeland.html

Jeff Stein reports on an interview with Reyes, the incoming head of the House Intelligence Committee, in which Reyes exposes his lack of knowledge about the basis of the problems in the Middle East. The man does not even understand the difference between
Sunni and Shite!

Stein points out that many others in Washington, on both sides of the aisle, including the President, don't have this understanding either. This is simply amazing at this time, with the deep involvement of the US in this area.

CQ.com

Falls Church News-Press - The Peak Oil Crisis: The Saudi Op-Ed

2006-12-07T13:06:00.000-08:00

An interesting insight into recent pronouncements; just after the election, Bush seemed to be going along with pullbacks of the US military. Then everyone (including the Iraq Study Group) shifted to talking about realignment, and other options. Maybe this article helps understand the underlying reasons for the change.

Falls Church News-Press - The Peak Oil Crisis: The Saudi Op-Ed

Closing the 'Collapse Gap': the USSR was better prepared for peak oil than the US | EnergyBulletin.net | Peak Oil News Clearinghouse

2006-12-07T10:42:00.000-08:00

This is a "must read" from one who should be able to hold a fairly balanced view of the differences/simularities between the USSR and the US. It certainly provides food for thought.

Closing the 'Collapse Gap': the USSR was better prepared for peak oil than the US | EnergyBulletin.net | Peak Oil News Clearinghouse

The Belmont Club: The First Iraq

2006-11-17T16:38:00.000-08:00

The Belmont Club: The First Iraq

A great post from someone with perspective! Wechard is Filipino himself, and in this article he shows how America's experience in the Philipines after 1900 relates to the current experience in Iraq.
Steps taken now will last, for good or ill, for a very long time.

Flopping Aces � Print � The Moonbat Arizona 9/11 Memorial

2006-10-09T04:12:00.000-07:00

Flopping Aces � Print � The Moonbat Arizona 9/11 Memorial

Update: here is a more comprehensive review of the memorial.

America doesn't cause terrorism

2006-10-02T06:15:00.000-07:00

Don Surber: The 9/11 'blue dress'

Don's column discusses the recent tape of two of the 9/11 hijackers, and tells who was there in what role. An interesting discussion, worth reading.

TCS Daily - Shaken and Stirred

2006-07-21T06:00:00.000-07:00

TCS Daily - Shaken and Stirred: "Far from being a bit of belated triumphalism about the invasion, all of this has immediate and direct consequences. While the success of Iraq's democracy hangs in the balance from an operational perspective, the strategic advantages created by the invasion of Iraq are working very favorably for the US in the current Israeli-Lebanon crisis in very tangible ways."

At last, we're seeing the dividends from our active ME policy. We can add this to the "Cedar Spring" of Lebanon, where Syria was ejected, as well as the supression of Al Queda in Saudia Arabia, as well as others you might want to point out.

The ME is changing as a result, and in a direction positive in the long run for peace.

Read the whole thing!

Mediacrity: The 'Disproportionate' Lie

2006-07-16T15:29:00.000-07:00

Mediacrity: The 'Disproportionate' Lie

Disproportionate indeed! Here's another examination of the Fair and Balanced Reporting (not!) from the NYT.

Syria building up to intervention in Lebanon?

2006-07-16T10:08:00.000-07:00

Syria appears to be building up enthusiasm for joining the fray in Lebanon. All it would take is an attack on the Golan Heights, and there you have a second front in the North. They have to be careful though: Israel has demonstrated several times before that they can handle the Syrian armed forces, and now the situation is quite different than say the 1973 war.

Syria has to take into consideration their vulneribility to the East: the Kurdish sector of Iraq has a significant army at the ready, with a reported 200,000 Peshmega under arms. If Syria is tied up with Israel, that provides a ready opportunity to invade and annex the Syrian Kurd areas, people who would be only too glad to leave the oppression of the Baathist party.

Spirits Are High in Syria’s Capital as Leaders Openly Show Support for Hezbollah - New York Times: "DAMASCUS, Syria, July 15 — The mood here in Syria’s capital was defiant, even gleeful, on Saturday as Hezbollah continued its rocket attacks on northern Israel."

Pop radio stations played jingoistic military marches, and the state-run daily newspaper, Tishreen, reported on a meeting of the ruling Syrian Baath Party by saying, “participants expressed Syria’s firm stance in support of the Lebanese national resistance.”

A Damascus businessman who would give only his first name, Mustafa, said: “I am 100 percent very happy. All of the Syrian people are happy, because we consider Hezbollah as being one of us.”

Sea change in Arab attitudes

2006-07-16T09:52:00.000-07:00

Define change in attitudes here, from what we normally see from the Arab side. Iran wants to get into talks, (after the fighting is stopped with a ceasefire, of course) but the Arabs are having none of that. Looks like they see clearly now that Iran wants to stir things up, then stop and talk, while it consolidates it's position. A nice rachet effect, if you can pull it off.

On the other hand, if the situation continues and Hezbollah is decimated, Iran is the big loser.

Mubarak: Egypt persuaded Israel against land attack on Beirut - Haaretz - Israel News: "Like regional heavyweight Saudi Arabia, Egypt has criticized Hezbollah for starting the latest Mideast crisis. Mubarak said he was also in contact with Syrian officials and that Tehran was interested in participating in Arab mediation efforts.

'They (the Iranians) want to attend the Arab foreign ministers meeting and form a joint committee that would have included Hezbollah and Hamas,' he said. 'Egypt realized that that was a trap.'"

New York Times Logic: or not!

2006-07-16T08:45:00.000-07:00

In an article in the NYT, Steven Erlanger argues as follows:

War Gives Israeli Leader Political Capital - New York Times: "How long Mr. Olmert can attack southern Lebanon without facing severe internal or external censure — especially if the civilian toll climbs and rockets continue to fall on Israel — remains unclear. But he has certainly gained some time from the Hezbollah attack."

The twisted logic in this paragraph is stunning! if the rockets continue to fall in Isreal, internal and external censure will decrease, rather than increase. So he has it exactly backwards...

Further from the same article:

"Though Israelis now talk of destroying Hezbollah, that outcome is likely to be impossible without a sustained ground operation that is unlikely. And the clock is ticking: the international community, including the United States, is not going to give Israel a blank check to bomb Lebanon for much longer."

This assumes that bombing is all that Isreal is going to do: they have called up the reserves, which in Israel is not taken lightly. The bombing campaign seems to be, as Stratfor quoted from DefenseTech.org (scroll down to the 6:59pm update) sees it, they are preparing the battleground prior to ground operations. Preparing the ground means taking out all the transportation links so Hezbollah can neither escape nor be resupplied.

This makes sense to me; once the Israel armed forces are fully stood up, (it takes about 3 days, they say, to complete the mobilization of the reserves), then ground operations begin, to completely eliminate Hezbollah and all their facilities in Lebanon.

Then logic begins: if Iran or Syria actively supports their stooges, then Israel will react appropriately. If I/S do not act, they lose face big time; if they do, then they come out from under their cover, and are clearly exposed as supporters of terrorism. At that point, Isreal will not stand alone. Iran will have a very big problem, with Western troops on their east and west, with US in Iraq controlling all air and ground lines of communication, and thus little means of providing support to their proxies in Lebanon.

Once Hezbollah is history, the picture in the Middle East changes considerably:
* Lebanon is free of Syria
* Syria is economically weakened, as much of their economy is tied to Lebanon, and losing the control they currently have over that link.
* Syria is isolated, even more than it is now, and becomes vulnerable to internal change.
* Iran is shown as a "paper tiger" (shoe on the other foot, lol) without any real influence outside Iran and Iraq. We're talking major loss of influence here.

Can Iran tolerate this loss of face? that remains to be seen.

Telegraph | News | The truth about global warming - it's the Sun that's to blame

2006-07-16T05:38:00.000-07:00

hat tip to the rotar man: http://rofasix.blogspot.com/

Maybe we need to take a deep breath and consider the science involved in global warming. The scientists who specialize in this field have extensive data that the Sun is in an expansionary hot phase, and that while human activities do contribute to global warming, they may not be the critical contributior to the process.

Read it all...

Telegraph | News | The truth about global warming - it's the Sun that's to blame: "Global warming has finally been explained: the Earth is getting hotter because the Sun is burning more brightly than at any time during the past 1,000 years, according to new research."

FrontPage magazine.com :: Frontpage Interview: Ann Coulter by Jamie Glazov

2006-06-25T14:53:00.000-07:00

FrontPage magazine.com :: Frontpage Interview: Ann Coulter by Jamie Glazov:

Ann Coulter... thanks, Sean!

"AC: Pause for a moment to consider the probable mental state of Howard Dean and then ask me that question again. Yes, of course liberalism is a mental defect. Liberals are wracked by self-loathing as the result of some traumatic incident -- say, driving drunk off a bridge with your mistress passed out in the back seat and letting the poor girl drown because you're a married man and a U.S. senator, just to take one utterly random, hypothetical example off the top of my head."

Pacific News Service > News > Homeland Security Contracts for Vast New Detention Camps

2006-06-25T14:01:00.000-07:00

Pacific News Service > News > Homeland Security Contracts for Vast New Detention Camps

$385 million dollar standby contract for Haliburton, to build "detention facilities". And who is this supposed to be for? Well, they say its for "an emergency influx of immigrants". Heck, I thought we were having that already!

Read it and be aware...

Iraqi Electric Production

2006-06-25T13:51:00.000-07:00

Electricity Generation in Iraq

Introduction

I've been challanged by people I care about, to come up with the facts of electricity generation in Iraq, comparing levels before the invasion with current levels. We know that this has been a major focus, and we know that this has been a focus of those on the other side, those who love to create death and chaos to further their agenda.

Sadly, it has to be acknowledged that some reading this will not trust figures from US government agencies; instead they will look for verification from major media outlets. I will try to accomodate that desire.

Data

We can begin with the US Agency for International Development, USAID, usually the lead agency for yes, the international development efforts of the US government.

They begin with:

USAID

In 2002 Baghdad had access to electricity on a near continuous basis while the rest of Iraq was limited to 3 to 6 hours daily. The U.S. government has made significant progress in improving electricity supply in Iraq and distributing it more equitably throughout the country. USAID has added over 1490 MW of new or rehabilitated capacity to the electrical grid.

Returned to pre-war daily generation levels of 3,958 MW by October 2003 and reached a peak of 4,584 MW during July 2004.

In addition to surpassing the prewar levels as of 10/2003, the distribution is now more equitible, with the available power shared by the provinces outside Baghdad.

Now we go looking for the ol' reliable major news sources to bring us (offically) up-to-date.

Um... It seems the lead articles regarding electricity production, listed in Google, ( Google search on Electricity in Iraq ) date back about two years, when the pre-war level had not been reached. I guess they are not interested in the more successful aspects of Iraq, as they don't seem to have reported on the subject since then.

Maybe it will be OK to refer to some local flavor, like Iraq Directory, The Complete Guide to Iraqi Business.

They report in a story headlined "Iraq electricity surpasses pre-war levels", dated 28 July 2005 that pre-war levels had been exceeded. The level was met at that time through the help of imported electricity, but still it was in the country and being used. Link

July 28, 2005

Iraq's electricity supply has risen above pre-war levels to 5,350 megawatts (MW) despite sabotage, boosted by hydroelectric power and more imports from Iran, Syria and Turkey, the minister in charge said on Thursday.

"Now electricity has reached a record after we broke 5,350 megawatts a few days ago for the first time since the war," Electricity Minister Mohsen Shalash told Reuters.

Summary

I think it is fair to sum up that pre-war levels of electricity have now been exceeded by a comfortable margin, and that the goal was reached some time ago. This is happening in a war zone, and in an improvished zone, where one group wants to blow everything up, while the second group just wants to steal some copper that he can sell. All of these add to costs and lead to less than desired results, but there is definately progress. If you read through some of the links produced by the Google search linked above, it becomes clear that the general run of reporting has not followed the success, such as it is, in Iraq. The reasons for this can be debated, but the trend is clear.

More on Corruption at Yale

2006-04-09T18:21:00.000-07:00

More attention is being focused on Yale as a result of their pro-Taliban stance. It seems there is a culture of self-dealing and corruption that permeates the joint. This one post, quoted from in an earlier post, details one person's encounter with the finer attributes of this great institution.

Read it, it's better than a soap opera, even...

High ethics at Yale!

Interestingly, a Yale General Counsel was not even admitted to the Conneticut bar.
A Department Chairman operated a business and used Yale's personnel and facilities to further the business.
Yale's leadership, even at the highest levels, would not take action to ensure that University policies and state laws were honored.

Few people seem to be overly concerned at these ethical lapses, but my computer gets annoyed at all this foolishness, and has to protest!

Taliban at Yale

2006-04-09T17:58:00.000-07:00

There's a lot of discussion going on about the Taliban's Minister of Information's status as a student at Yale. It seems like Yale is focusing on the rest of the world being "outsiders", while those who agree with their position are "insiders". Outsiders

How do they (Yale) deal with situations like this? It seems to be a policy of silence.

I very explicitly gave both Mr. Hashemi and Yale a way to make their goodwill in this issue known--speak up for Abdul Rahman, the Afghan Christian who faced execution for apostasy. Since in particular Mr. Hashemi quite visibly defended the trials of Christian missionaries and apostates from Islam, it would have been an ideal occasion for him to break his silence, demonstrate the depth of his conversion, and make me look stupid. Neither he nor Yale responded. Silence
Note - March 2006: Yale’s taking on the former Taliban propaganda minister as a student does not surprise me, nor does Yale’s stonewalling on the issue. As WSJ writer John Fund recalled being told by a former Yale administrator, Yale has "weathered storms like this [Taliban] before with complete silence ... it's cold game theory on their part. They've already alienated conservative alumni; they're not giving much anymore. If they can keep broader donor anger at bay, they feel they don't have much to lose." Stonewall

So "cold game theory" it is then. Shocking!, shocking! that a leading institution of the USA should take such a position. They seem to have no regard for the responsibilities inherent in their role as an incubator of the Nation's leaders.

2006-03-02T12:05:00.000-08:00

This one is scary!

This is where it came from:
Link:

and here is the discussion of the thinking behind it.
Link:

It appears that Iran has a strategy in play that includes some "not so good" things for the rest of the world. And we in the West are not paying attention!

.

Creative Artists of the Past

2006-02-22T06:47:00.000-08:00

It's amazing what creations could be done by painters of the past; today we have computers to enable the creation of our the amazing visions, and we tend to think that earlier generations were not capable of the distortions of reality we find usual.

This web page teaches us differently; these guys were amazing.

http://neuro.caltech.edu/~seckel/mod/anamorph.htm#

The artists of today aren't too shabby either!

Today...

Total Solar Eclipse March 26th

2006-02-21T07:18:00.000-08:00

hat tip to UrbanSurvival.com for this one.

Eclipse Page

Danish anyone?

2006-02-21T06:23:00.000-08:00

A voice of moderation in the discussion about the Danish cartoons; makes sense to me...

http://ktcatspost.blogspot.com/2006/02/danish-cartoons-are-stalingrad.html

2006-02-12T11:50:00.000-08:00

Full moon today; know what this month's full moon is called?

SNOW MOON: According to folklore, tonight's full moon is called the Snow Moon. Often, February is the snowiest month in northern places. The light of the Snow Moon reflected from snowy ground brightens the night like no other moon of the year.

http://spaceweather.com/

2006-02-12T11:38:00.000-08:00

Annoyances:

Abramoff dealt only with Republicans... not so ... http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/02/09/abramoff.reid.ap/index.html

Hillary vs Laura ... or is it Laura vs Hillary?
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10367926

First Post!

2006-02-12T11:17:00.000-08:00

As a computer professional, my job requires me to ... ahem ... surf the web a lot. As sort of a news junkie, I have to keep up with whatever is going on, being discussed, argued about on an intra-day basis. My computer gets very annoyed at some of the things I run across, and so I've been pressed into duty to pass on the comments from the various computers I use... they are networked, after all, so it's not like I can get away!

So if you see something you don't like, well, the computer made me say it!