Copyright 2005 - Steal what you wantSat, 12 Apr 2008 09:54:47 GMTSat, 12 Apr 2008 09:54:47 GMTDaily Kos Daily Kos This is an XML content feed. It is intended to be viewed in a newsreader or syndicated to another site, subject to copyright and fair use.
A new article in Time Magazine Online explores what a number of us math-physics geeks have been harping on from time to time: Existing biofuel technology is not an ideal solution to our energy dilemma. There are three primary obstacles and one stubborn but irreducible consequence of our pay for play political system. 1) In our petroleum based economy where most farm machinery, processing, and distribution systems are built around petroleum, biofuels made from corn or other high end crops consume as much or more oil as they replace. 2) The former combined with the loss in photosynthetic carbon sinks because of the land cleared to grow these crops is equal or greater to the carbon savings produced by the biofuel itself. 3) There is a food shortage looming and if we really commit the kind of acreage needed to put a dent in our national energy budget it will make matters much worse. The political consequence is that those agricultural industries which stand to gain the most from biofuels, Big Corn or Big Sugar, are among the worst offenders of the three concerns outlined above. But they are the ones with the political power to lobby and divert any well meaning funds away form other ideas and into their bulging pockets, efficiencies be damned.
Direct solar energy either from panels or simple heating, wind energy, tidal basins, nuclear energy, and even biofuels produced either as a byproduct of existing agribusiness or from wild plants growing in conditions that won't support high yield domesticated crops, will work. The easiest low hanging fruit to grab right now is on the shelf fuel efficiency and fuel saving technology. The bottom line, literally, is if we can hand Exxon-Mobil massive tax breaks or spend hundreds of billions securing dwindling oil supplies in Iraq, we can give US automakers incentive to build more fuel efficient cars, stimulate the solar energy and wind industries, and provide small business owners and individual taxpayers with reasons to incorporate all of it and begin to get this nation off the unsustainable, fatal, energy treadmill.
You've heard of black-holes and super giant stars. But an object that draws little attention is a brown dwarf. Brown dwarfs are thought to be failed stars that wander around all by their lonesome something like a rogue Jupiter or Saturn. Astronomers have detected the coolest one yet only forty light-years from earth.
Apologists for Bush's ban on stem cells often point out that there is no law against private research or commercial development. Sounds good, except while they're saying that to us, they're quietly working to put up any obstacle they can think of against private or commercial development.
And finally, here's one for you legal theoristes: did this right-wing radio host commit an illegal act? Does it qualify as a terrorist threat?
President Bush says he knew his top national security advisers discussed and approved specific details about how high-value al Qaeda suspects would be interrogated by the Central Intelligence Agency, according to an exclusive interview with ABC News Friday.
"Well, we started to connect the dots in order to protect the American people." Bush told ABC News White House correspondent Martha Raddatz. "And yes, I'm aware our national security team met on this issue. And I approved."
As first reported by ABC News Wednesday, the most senior Bush administration officials repeatedly discussed and approved specific details of exactly how high-value al Qaeda suspects would be interrogated by the CIA.
The high-level discussions about these "enhanced interrogation techniques" were so detailed, these sources said, some of the interrogation sessions were almost choreographed -- down to the number of times CIA agents could use a specific tactic.
These top advisers signed off on how the CIA would interrogate top al Qaeda suspects -- whether they would be slapped, pushed, deprived of sleep or subjected to simulated drowning, called waterboarding, sources told ABC news....
At the time, the Principals Committee included Vice President Dick Cheney, former National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Colin Powell, as well as CIA Director George Tenet and Attorney General John Ashcroft.
As the national security adviser, Rice chaired the meetings, which took place in the White House Situation Room and were typically attended by most of the principals or their deputies.
The so-called Principals who participated in the meetings also approved the use of "combined" interrogation techniques -- using different techniques during interrogations instead of using one method at a time -- on terrorist suspects who proved difficult to break, sources said....
In his interview with ABC News, Bush said the ABC report about the Principals' involvement was not so "startling." The president had earlier confirmed the existence of the interrogation program run by the CIA in a speech in 2006. But before Wednesday's report, the extraordinary level of involvement by the most senior advisers in repeatedly approving specific interrogation plans -- down to the number of times the CIA could use a certain tactic on a specific al Qaeda prisoner -- had never been disclosed.
Just a perverse, twisted, sickening game of connect the dots. Nothing to see here, nothing "startling" about the fact that the Vice President, Secretaries of State and Defense, Attorney General, National Security Advisor, and CIA Director of the United States conspired to commit war crimes. Which the President then signed off on.
Just another Friday night news dump in Bush world.
mcjoan George W. BushtortureSat, 12 Apr 2008 07:12:17 GMT
Izixs shares a list of topics taken from political discourse which drive him up a wall by the misinformation passing as current wisdom in Basic Frustrations. (PaintyKat)
But the truth is, is that, our challenge is to get people persuaded that we can make progress when there's not evidence of that in their daily lives. You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.
Asked to respond, McCain adviser Steve Schmidt called it a "remarkable statement and extremely revealing."
"It shows an elitism and condescension towards hardworking Americans that is nothing short of breathtaking," Schmidt said. "It is hard to imagine someone running for president who is more out of touch with average Americans."
"I saw in the media it's being reported that my opponent said that the people of Pennsylvania who faced hard times are bitter," Clinton said this afternoon. "Well, that's not my experience. As I travel around Pennsylvania, I meet people who are resilient, who are optimistic, who are positive, who are rolling up their sleeves. They are working hard everyday for a better future, for themselves and their children.
"Pennsylvanians don't need a president who looks down on them, they need a president who stands up for them, who fights for them, who works hard for your futures, your jobs, your families."
