ABRAMOFF UPDATE: Remembering Roger Tamraz. Everything old is new again. Or maybe the other way around. . . .

THIS SEEMS LIKE GOOD NEWS: “The number of newly laid-off workers filing claims for unemployment benefits fell to the lowest level in more than five years last week, providing strong evidence that the labor market is shaking off the effects of a string of devastating hurricanes.”

PAT ROBERTSON OFFERS US ANOTHER REMINDER of why he was one of the original models for the term “idiotarian:”

Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson suggested Thursday that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s stroke was divine punishment for “dividing God’s land.”

David Corn isn’t sure what to make of this: “So God visited a stroke upon Sharon because God is opposed to the Middle East peace process? That’s what Robertson is saying. (But if God didn’t want progress in the Middle East, why did God let Arafat die? I’m confused.)”

UPDATE: Joe Gandelman notes a Robertson soul brother.

MARK STEYN ON DEMOGRAPHY ON HUGH HEWITT: The transcript is here.

BRING IT ON:

AN EXTRAORDINARY “hyperspace” engine that could make interstellar space travel a reality by flying into other dimensions is being investigated by the United States government.

The hypothetical device, which has been outlined in principle but is based on a controversial theory about the fabric of the universe, could potentially allow a spacecraft to travel to Mars in three hours and journey to a star 11 light years away in just 80 days, according to a report in today’s New Scientist magazine.

The theoretical engine works by creating an intense magnetic field that, according to ideas first developed by the late scientist Burkhard Heim in the 1950s, would produce a gravitational field and result in thrust for a spacecraft.

Also, if a large enough magnetic field was created, the craft would slip into a different dimension, where the speed of light is faster, allowing incredible speeds to be reached. Switching off the magnetic field would result in the engine reappearing in our current dimension.

Color me skeptical, but in a wanting-it-to-be-true kind of way. (Via Bainbridge).

IT’S BAA-AAA-AACK: “Zeta again strengthened into a tropical storm Thursday and could break the record for the storm lasting the longest into January since record keeping began in 1851.”

THOUGHTS ON THE SINGULARITY, from Dean Esmay.

WARD CHURCHILL UPDATE: A reader emailed to ask what was going on, and I referred him to PirateBallerina.com, which has been on top of this story from the beginning. Check it out for all your Ward Churchill needs.

LAST NIGHT, HUGH HEWITT discussed George Bush’s crimes with Professor Rosa Brooks of the University of Virginia law school. There’s a transcript online here.

REDSTATE LAUNCHES SWANNBLOG: Mike Krempasky emails “Why? Because it’s Lynn-Frickin’-Swann, that’s why!”

IN THE MAIL: Dorian Greyhound : A Novel, by Sheryl Longin — who happens to be married to Roger Simon. According to the Amazon page, revenues are going to greyhound rescue.

MICHAEL TOTTEN LOOKS AT the slow rot of Hosni Mubarak. I’m not sure it was all that slow, actually.

REBECCA MACKINNON: “Why Microsoft’s China censorship matters to everybody.”

HERE’S A LOOK at coming attractions in space law.

THE POPULAR MECHANICS PEOPLE were nice enough to invite me to go along to the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week, but I wasn’t able to make it, alas. They’re blogging what they’ve found, though, and it looks like an interesting new wave of gadgets. Editor Jim Meigs emails: “My takeaway after a few hours is that while last year they showed a lot of high def stuff that didn’t materialize (like DVRs) this year it looks like it will really arrive.”

SHE’S EVERYWHERE: Ana Marie Cox on the Abramoff scandal, in the NYT: “Sad to admit it, but most of what Jack Abramoff did with politicians (as opposed to his outright fraud with Indian tribes) wasn’t criminal so much as extreme. The Hollywood arc would have a chain-gang of Congressmen breaking rocks by the final reel, but we are unlikely to get such satisfaction outside of celluloid.”

TOM MAGUIRE: “I don’t want the Times deciding, in wartime, just what information I “deserve to have”, thank you very much – they are not elected,they are not accountable, and frankly, I do not trust their politics. But rather than abandon my fellow citizens to the mercies or depredations of the Bush Administration, let me offer a constructive suggestion – since we have a representative democracy, complete with institutional checks and balances and two parties, how about if the purveyors of classifed info, when troubled by their consciences, take their troubles to a Congressional oversight committee rather than the NY Times?”

DANIEL GLOVER has been looking at 2006 candidate blogs. So far he’s covered Texas and Illinois. Only 48 more states to go!

MORE ON ABRAMOFF: “One of the crimes was bribing “Staffer A” to oppose a postal rate increase. What? That’s a crime? I think it is a public service we should all be thankful for.” Heh. There’s a suggestion for PorkBusters, too.

MEGAN MCARDLE has more on the FDA and Cyalert matter mentioned by Teresa Nielsen Hayden below.