RED LIGHT CAMERA: Guilty Until Proved Innocent.
Archive for 2009
September 24, 2009
THE SUN COULD BE HEADED INTO a period of extended calm. “Researchers in the US may have discovered further evidence that the Sun is heading towards an extended period of quiet activity, the like of which has not been seen since the 17th century. The impact this may have on climate is poorly understood but it would be good news for satellite communications, which would continue to avoid the harsher impacts of space weather.”
BEST AND WORST state business climates.
ALAN BOYLE: Making Space Power Pay. “Solaren’s plan calls for sending power-generating satellites, or powersats, into space on four Atlas 5 heavy-lift rockets. The satellites would convert solar electric power into microwave energy for beaming down to a ground station, based within a mile or so of the existing power grid.”
DEAD HAND: The Soviet Doomsday Machine that’s still in place.
But, in proper Strangelovian irony, they kept it secret, but that’s because the U.S. wasn’t the target they were trying to deter: “By guaranteeing that Moscow could hit back, Perimeter was actually designed to keep an overeager Soviet military or civilian leader from launching prematurely during a crisis. The point, Zheleznyakov says, was ‘to cool down all these hotheads and extremists. No matter what was going to happen, there still would be revenge. Those who attack us will be punished.'”
A SHIFT TO reprocessing spent nuclear fuel? This is such an obviously correct idea that it only took 30+ years for it to get momentum. . . .
IOWAHAWK: Earn Big $$$ the NEA Way!
IN THE MAIL: From Stephen Kotkin, Uncivil Society: 1989 And The Implosion Of The Communist Establishment.
OKAY, here’s a revised and extended Insta-Poll:
UH OH: “The foreclosure wave may seem all tired and 2008, but it’s hotter than ever.”
STEVE CHAPMAN: What we owe exonerated inmates.
EZRA LEVANT: Hate Speech Complainant Under Investigation:
Richard Warman, the hate speech complainant who is personally responsible for all but two section 13 censorship prosecutions this decade, is now being investigated by the Canadian Human Rights Commission for hate speech himself.
I know. It sounds crazy. Just like it sounded crazy when it was revealed that Warman and the CHRC were members of neo-Nazi organizations.
Warman is a former CHRC investigator himself; and even after he left the CHRC they continued to pay his expenses to file and prosecute complaint after complaint. All this, despite the fact he’s been under investigation for hate speech for three years.
At the same time as Warman was a complainant, he was a defendant.
At the same time as the CHRC was cutting him cheques to cover his expenses, they were probing his conduct.
At the same time as he held himself out to be an anti-hate crimes activist, his own hateful speech was being probed.
Sounds like they’re running a topflight organization, there . . . .
STIFLING DISSENT on health-care reform.
MICKEY KAUS: “Lynne Munson’s suggested NEA apology is a whole lot better than actual National Endowment for the Arts Chairman Rocco Landesman’s actual statement, which is just a tad unapologetic and defensive about the Breitbart.com conference call scoop. . . . It’s obviously not just the fault of the one NEA official who participated in the call and has now been relieved of his assignment, but rather a problem in the culture of the incoming Obamaites–at least the incoming Obamaites who are sufficiently low-level and unwonkish to be assigned to the NEA. Maybe Landesman should order a viewing of The Lives of Others to underscore to them what (in admittedly extreme form) people who worry about politicizing funding for the arts are worried about.”
OBAMA AND ACORN: Why did the president feign ignorance of ACORN when his relationship with the group goes back almost 20 years?”
Why? Because he figured he could get away with it. Same reason politicians do most things . . . .
ADVICE TO OBAMA from Shikha Dalmia. “If Obama wants to regain the momentum on health care reform, he will have to do more than just refrain from impugning the motives of his opponents. He will actually have to listen to them and do what he said he would during his campaign: put affordable coverage within the grasp of more Americans without forcing them to purchase it, without raising their taxes and without breaking the federal bank. . . . Americans elected Obama because he presented himself as a fiscally responsible adult who–in contrast to his predecessor–was interested in looking for workable, pragmatic solutions, not promoting an ideological agenda. But Obama pulled a massive bait-and-switch upon assuming office, using every issue–the financial meltdown, the recession, the deficit, global warming and, of course, rising health care costs–to expand the scope and size of government.”
DIVERSITY CZAR MARK LLOYD TAKES HEAT OVER REMARKS:
President Obama’s diversity czar at the Federal Communications Commission has spoken publicly of getting white media executives to “step down” in favor of minorities, prescribed policies to make liberal talk radio more successful, and described Hugo Chavez’s rise to power in Venezuela “an incredible revolution.”
All these Chavez admirers who want to control media are making me nervous.
DAN RIEHL: “Get ready for a round of stories debating whether it is the Tea Party movement, Glenn Beck, or a color blind racist that led to this alleged homicide.”
DAMON ROOT: More on ACORN and Eminent Domain Abuse.
CHANGE: U.S. Issues $7 Trillion In Debt. “The U.S. government will have issued $7 trillion in bonds by the time the current fiscal year ends next week, but it expects the debt deluge to stabilize by mid 2010, a Treasury official said on Wednesday.” What kind of stable-state are we talking about?
SLATE ON ANDREW BREITBART: Sometimes it takes an outsider to show the press corps the way.