Who Wins?

Captain Ed, of Captain's Quarters, has some interesting analysis about the cease-fire between Israel and Lebanon/Hezbollah. He thinks it's a net gain for Israel:

In this war, they pushed Hezbollah out of the sub-Litani, forced them to fire off a third of their missile and rocket inventory, and destroyed a number of their launchers. This all took place over two kidnapped soldiers, and Hezbollah didn't even get the prisoner swap they wanted. After six years of relative non-action to Hezbollah provocations, Olmert changed the dynamic by launching a massive war after a relatively routine terrorist action by Hezbollah. Israel also forced Lebanon to finally address the conundrum of sovereignty and drove a wedge between Hezbollah and the rest of Lebanon's institutions. Does anyone think that Fuad Siniora would even have discussed disarming Hezbollah before this war? They had a year after UNSCR 1559 and completely shrugged it off.

The goals for Israel have always been a Hezbollah-free sub-Litani without having to conduct another generational occupation. They got the agreement they wanted that delivers on these goals, and at the same time served notice that the era of non-response to provocations had passed. The key for Israel is to insist on full implementation of 1701 and 1559. They cannot budge on these points. If Lebanon reneges, Israel can go back to their military options until the Lebanese get the message for good.

I hope he's right, that the benefit of pushing Hezbollah north makes enough of a difference to make the war worth it. Ultimately, however, I hope that Hezbollah has lost real ground and not just territory and munitions, and that Lebanon has gained some perspective that gives the government a spine where "The Party of God" is concerned. Ultimately, this would be a big gain for Lebanon as well. If Lebanon really can claim control over her own southern territories, her prospects for a peaceful and prosperous future will get a whole lot better. I know there have been people killed, and a great deal of infrastructure lost. I don't think anyone is denying the cost. No one can bring back the lost lives, but I think the world in general, and the U.S. and Israel in particular, will be eager to help Lebanon rebuild if she can show that the Lebanese government, and not the terrorist militia, controls her territory, her borders, and her actions.

There are a lot of pundits saying this is a loss for Israel, because Hezbollah has not been completely destroyed, but I think the Captain makes a good point; if Lebanon (and the U.N.) fails to restrain Hezbollah, Israel has the choice available of resuming military action. Israel is not giving up her options, here, but she is giving Lebanon the opportunity to seize the moment and decide who she will be in the future. Will she be a sovereign state, living at peace with her neighbors, or will she continue to be a human shield, allowing Hezbollah to keep striking blows at the peace and security of both Lebanon and Israel?

I wrote yesterday about not having a lot of faith that the U.N. would be any help in keeping the peace, but some of that depends on Lebanon. If the government and people of that country come together truly seeking for their military and U.N. force together to exert control, they could pull it off. If they lamely resist facing down Hezbollah in order to avoid internal conflict, after all this destruction and mayhem--if they allow Hezbollah to continue attacking Israel, then they will, in essence, be choosing war with Israel as preferable to cleaning their own house. I truly hope the Lebanese are stronger than that.

Love

I just love Scrappleface--in the same way that one loves pizza, or volleyball--very enthusiastically, but not in the romantic, "I want to spend the rest of my life with you" way. Speaking of the romantic, "I want to spend the rest of my life with you" way, tomorrow is my Kedley's and my twentieth wedding anniversary. Yay Team!!!

Nuclear Reactions

I've been following mental rabbit trails today. I read a couple of articles at TCS Daily, one about global warming alarmism and greenhouse gas emissions trading schemes, and the other about energy constraints in America, in the face of recent heat waves, that are being met with pleas for conservation rather than policies aimed at generating more energy. The two articles seemed inextricably linked to me. The fears of global warming and other environmental consequences are really a complicating factor in the search for the cheap, abundant energy solutions that developed nations already need and developing nations are growing to need more and more. (The same environmental consequences apply to underdeveloped countries as well, but since their situations are complicated by their limited financial resources and lack of infrastructure, let's stick to talking about the more technologically advanced nations, shall we? After all, if you count China and India as at least rapidly up-and-coming, these are the countries most to blame for the carbon emissions which some scientists fear will upset the climate balance of our planet.) Every form of energy currently available to man comes with some environmental cost. Were there no environmental constraints, petroleum, natural gas, bio-fuels, coal, hydroelectric, solar and nuclear energy would all be competing unfettered for their place in the power pantheon. As it is, they're all still players, but regulation determines more and more how affordable and plentiful they are.

Regulations aren't all bad. I like clean air. I'm sure you like to breathe too. There's a story in my husband's family about a particular time when he was a small child, three or four years old. He lived with his parents in Riverside, California, a suburb of Los Angeles. This was in the late sixties, before low emission vehicles were a Californian passion. While on a family vacation, they came up north, to western Washington State. Legend has it (and from my understanding this is a pretty accurate legend) that upon looking up at the open sky, my cute and adorable husband innocently inquired, "Mommy, what's that blue stuff?" Living in the Los Angeles basin of the sixties, he had not known the sky was supposed to be blue. Like I said, regulations aren't all bad, even if some of them do go overboard.

Given that none of us want to breath toxic fumes, nor kill off all the Salmon, nor experience a Chernobyl-style meltdown, what are our energy options? Is conservation the only ecologically and morally acceptable alternative? Are we simply supposed to get used to a little more heat in summer, and chill in winter, as we adjust our thermostats to avoid further straining power grids already pushed to the limit? Are we all going to be ultimately driven to turn in our driver's licenses for bus passes? Is the energy gobbling technology that makes our lives more comfortable going to become less and less supportable as more of the world's populations can afford it? Are we out of options? (I think that is the most questions I have ever asked in a single paragraph.)

All these questions prompted me to do a little searching online for clean power alternatives. One thing I kept coming back to was nuclear power. Nuclear power doesn't have the best reputation in the States, or in Russia either, for that matter. No one wants to see a nuclear disaster, and most of us are pretty aware of the problem of nuclear waste. Nor are the sane among us really keen on the idea of the by-products of nuclear processes being used to create weapons of mass destruction for proliferation among the terrorist set. (I do not count anyone in power in Iran as sane.) However, there have been a lot of advances in nuclear technology since the rather memorable accidents that have shaped our views of nuclear power's potential for providing our daily energy needs.

One such advance is the development of the pebble bed reactor. I remember reading some time back about pebble bed nuclear technology. I can't remember where, but I do recall being impressed with the great improvements in safety that have been achieved over the last two decades. Since I don't know where to find the piece I originally read, I'll send you to the Wikipedia entry about pebble bed reactors. It's a good place to start if you find the topic interesting. Other concepts developed over the years continue to work the fringes of making nuclear power more palatable to Americans. I've read, for example, about ways to eliminate the danger from nuclear waste. One such notion being a scheme to bury nuclear waste deep in the earth where things are pretty much radioactive anyway. I have no link, but a Google search ought to provide you with a wealth of information. I've never really seen a foolproof answer about how to keep nuclear by-products from falling into to hands of the power hungry. In any case, I've seen a lot of approaches to nuclear power that address one problem or another of the list I mentioned above, but what if there were a way to address them all at once?

What I read about today, was a new approach to nuclear that just may deal with all those issues that currently keep it from appealing to those of us who don't want a meltdown, waste with an intolerably long radioactive half-life, or a by-product that can be turned into Earth-destroying bombs. It even eliminates some of the waste we already have lying around. Tim Dean, writing in Cosmos, examines the potential of the thorium reactor:

What if we could build a nuclear reactor that offered no possibility of a meltdown, generated its power inexpensively, created no weapons-grade by-products, and burnt up existing high-level waste as well as old nuclear weapon stockpiles? And what if the waste produced by such a reactor was radioactive for a mere few hundred years rather than tens of thousands? It may sound too good to be true, but such a reactor is indeed possible, and a number of teams around the world are now working to make it a reality. What makes this incredible reactor so different is its fuel source: thorium.

Thorium is also much more abundant here on Earth than uranium, and according to the blog Advanced Nanotechnology, there's even a plentiful supply on the Moon. (The post at AN also informs me that thorium reactors could provide energy that's five times cheaper than that from natural gas.) Sound intriguing? Dean's article is long, but I'm not going to try to synopsize it. If the topic interests you enough to have read this far, maybe you'll find it worth the time to read the rest of Dean's piece. If not, maybe it will merely comfort you to know that strides are being made all the time to come up with viable, environmentally sustainable, affordable energy sources. I hope that Americans don't turn their backs on a potentially clean power source just because it bears the dreaded name of nuclear. We do need power. I don't want to return to the days of my husband's youth, when a kid could live in LA and not know the sky was supposed to be blue, but I don't want to return to a world without air conditioning and convenient travel, either--and I definitely don't want to give up my laptop. Perish the thought. Perhaps, if scientists continue to investigate every avenue, and we retain (or acquire) an open mind about the "n" word, we won't have to choose.

Cease-Fire Holding--For Now

I read in Michael Totten's blog last night, and posted accordingly, that a potential cease-fire between Israel and Lebanon was dead--that's the call he got when standing in the free fire zone on the Israeli border, but I got a different story from the Associated Press this morning. According to the AP, the cease-fire is in place:

Israel's defense minister said Monday that barring isolated skirmishes with Hezbollah, the U.N.-imposed cease-fire is holding in southern Lebanon, and Israel is coordinating with the United Nations to relinquish captured territory.

From everything I've read the Israelis definitely don't want to get stuck in another occupation of southern Lebanon, and while they may have some reservations about whether the engagement with Hezbollah accomplished what it needed to, they will go ahead with the handing over of captured Lebanese territory to the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon, or UNIFIL, hoping that UNIFIL will help the Lebanese army to gain control of the territories once occupied by Hezbollah.

The question I've seen the most redundantly over the last few days is whether the U.N. force will be of any use toward that end. After all, there was a U.N. peace-keeping force in southern Lebanon before the war broke out, supposedly keeping guard over Hezbollah. However, in some cases the U.N. and Hezbollah actually operated next door to each other. This cozy arrangement resulted in the death of four U.N. officials in July, when the Israelis bombed the village of El Khiam, apparently targeting Hezbollah. According to World Net Daily, there were strong indications Hezbollah was using the U.N. post as a shield from which to fire rockets. That's not very effective peace keeping on the part of the U.N., I'd say. Other sources I've read have claimed that, before the war broke out, the U.N. forces in Southern Lebanon did nothing to stop Hezbollah activities occurring in plain sight of their stations. That's not really a good sign that Israel will be able to count on the U.N. to enforce the cease-fire from the Lebanese end. Another concern is that with Iran providing ever longer range missiles, Hezbollah can fire from deeper inside Lebanon, basically over the heads of UNIFIL, and any Lebanese Army forces that move into the south.

This U.N. mandated cease-fire may or may not be in the best interest of Lebanon, or Israel. It's in both their interests for all the devastation wrought in both countries not to be in vain. What would make the damage easier to take from Israel's perspective, and that of many Lebanese, would be the dismantling of the militia that started all the turmoil in the first place. Neither of them benefit by the existence of an active Hezbollah inciting violence between two of the region's very small number of democracies. Whether it is in vain will depend largely on how much Hezbollah in Lebanon has been damaged by the Israeli Defense Force, and whether the legitimate Lebanese military can take back all of its own territory and hold it. If Hezbollah merely falls back to regroup with the aid of Syria and Iran, or to keep firing rockets from a safer distance, unhindered by either the Lebanese military, or UNIFIL, Israel will have no choice but to resume hostilities. I hope, for Lebanon's sake, that doesn't happen. If the U.N. wants what's best for Lebanon, regardless of how little concern the world body has for Israel, they need to take the task of preventing the return of Hezbollah aggression against Israel seriously--more seriously than they did the last time around. They had also better keep an eye on Iran.

Update: I understand now why Michael Totten said the cease-fire was scrapped, when it is, at this point, in effect. He was writing about August 11th, which wasn't clear from the post I referenced, but is clear from this follow-up. Once again, it's a good source of on-the-ground perspective--and pictures, lots of pictures--and nobody writes like Michael Totten. Really, he puts you there with him.

Totten In Israel

Michael Totten is in Israel, and took a drive up north, to where the war is active and ongoing. His latest post is full of eyewitness information, pictures, and experiences from being in the midst of a live fire zone with little to no cover. When he headed up, it looked like a cease-fire was on the way. He interviewed IDF Spokesmen Michael Oren and Dan Gordon and got their reaction to the pending cease-fire, as well as their reaction to Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah's claim that he had won the war, and whether they thought any actual good had come from the conflict. There's a lot worth reading in that conversation. One thing I particularly noted from that interview that I hadn't known before was the extent of Hezbollah's initial incursion into Israel. Gordon makes the statement that most reporters aren't telling what Hezbollah tried to do in that first attack:

“Hardly any journalists have mentioned this,” Dan said. “But at the very beginning of this thing, when Hezbollah captured our soldiers, they also tried to invade, conquer, and hold the town of Metulla along with two other towns. And they were repulsed.”

Of course Hezbollah was repulsed. They’re a guerilla/terrorist army, not infantry.

“We do have one serious asset from this war,” Dan said. “Hassan Nasrallah got his ass kicked. And he knows it.”

“Did he really get his ass kicked?” I said. “The IDF fought Hezbollah to a standstill for more than ten years before. What made you think it would be easy to get rid of them this time?”

“This time it’s different,” Dan said. “This time we’re going in there to kill them. We are not trying to hold on to territory. This is actually working. We are not stuck in the mud. Oh, and here’s another tangible…Hezbollah-occupied Lebanon no longer exists.”

So, they do see some good coming out of it all, from their persective. There's so much to this piece, and things were shifting even as Totten stood there. By the end of the interview he got a call saying the cease-fire was dead, and the ground invasion beginning. The war goes on. Read the rest for yourself. You probably won't get this clear a view of what it's like on the ground there from many other places. After the post, read the comments for even more perspective. Totten's got more to say, as do his readers.

When In Doubt, Blame Israel

Little Green Footballs has more captioning errors coming out of major media, and, big surprise, Israel takes the hit again. This time it's the Associated Press who needed to check their facts before going to print. The AP caption for a photo that ran Wednesday, August 9th, initially stated that a dead little girl was killed by Israeli bombs, when really she fell out of a swing. Now, I grant you, she fell soon before an actual bombing run, and there was doubtless a lot of confusion at the hospital where the picture was taken, but for heaven's sake, make sure you're right before casting blame. Just because you have a sympathetic picture of a dead child, and a war going on, does not make the two automatically related. The AP eventually corrected their error, but, as LGF points out, "...the damage, of course, is already done—and you can bet the photos will soon show up in anti-Israel demonstrations." Interesting to note that Reuters had their own photo of the dead child, with a similarly inaccurate caption.

I read a post, or comment, somewhere today (I'm sorry, I can't remember where to give credit or a link), that made a very good point about media bias. The comment addressed the issue of whether all these doctored photos and inaccurate captions (and bloggers are finding more and more examples) show evidence of media bias, or merely inadequate editing. The point the commenter drove home was that if it's the case that editors and photographers are merely sloppy, not biased, where are all the photos and captions "inadvertently" slanted the other way? Where are all the pictures that falsely magnify damage from Hezbollah's rockets, and captions that claim Israeli children injured in tree-climbing accidents were actually bombed by the Lebanese militia? Hezbollah has been shooting missiles at Israel for over a month, striking farther and farther south; surely, if the inaccuracy cuts both ways there should be plenty of examples of bad captions and "Shoppery," that make Israel look more sympathetic, gracing the pages and websites of major media. If you find any, let me know. I'd really like to see if this cuts both ways. I can't say that I expect anybody to have much success in hunting down instances of pro-Israeli fudging from major news outlets. I doubt the train goes to that station very often.

Quick Links

Cool stuff on robots to do our chores, mentally controlled wheelchairs, and saving the planet from an impending asteroidal collision. Thanks Futurismic!

What Makes A Planet A Planet?

What makes a planet a planet? It's been a big topic of debate in certain brainiac circles, and astronomers are set to put it to a vote next week in Prague. NPR's got the scoop, and David Kestenbaum writes (and thanks to him for teaching me almost all I know about Pluto) that the astronomy types are prepping a definition of planethood, so that we can all know, once and for all (until the next big debate), whether the solar system we all grew up with is going to be the one we take further into the new millennium. You know the solar system I mean: the sun in the middle and nine planets circling it for all they're worth. Actually the list of planets in our solar system is pretty likely to change, either getting smaller or larger, but not staying static. Since the last time we checked in with the order of things, somewhere around high school physics, there have been some new discoveries that call the familiar model into question, specifically at least one planet-like object, out past baby Pluto, that's bigger than Pluto is. It's called Xena, and has forced the astronomy debaters to debate this particular debatable issue. You see, they have to decide whether Xena's a planet, and that depends partly on whether Pluto's a planet.

So, what questions are the science gods considering? Taking it as a given that planets orbit suns (thanks to alert reader Su for pointing that out in the comments)--What defines a planet? Is it how big it is? Is it having a moon or two? Is it having enough gravity to make it round? (That is one of the criteria being debated. See, I knew major astronomical bodies were supposed to be round.) Is it having a relatively round orbital path in its journey around the big old ball of fire in the daytime sky? The answers to these questions will define whether our solar system models get bigger, or smaller in the coming years. You see, Pluto gets different status depending on which questions take precedence. While having a couple of moons of its own, Pluto is also tiny, smaller than the Earth's Moon. It's round, but has an orbit that's rather catawampous. If the debate tilts the wrong way for Pluto, the number of planets pops down to eight, but if it goes the other way, there might be a whole new category that bumps the count upward, since there are other items out in the Kuiper Belt (the gathering of hundreds of objects out at the fringe of our solar system of which Pluto is a part) that could qualify for planet status along with the undersized and familiar one we all know and love.

One of the proposals is to define a new class of planets. A panel of astronomy experts met in June to hammer out some possible definitions:

Several panel members have favored dividing planets into categories: terrestrial planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars), giant planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune) and a third class that would include Pluto.

"We'll call them dwarf planets or something," says Iwan Williams, an astronomer at the University of London who favors the idea and also served on the panel.

Sources say the panel's new definition for planets would, in fact, create a third category embracing Pluto.

The new category would also embrace Xena, since if Pluto qualifies, so does the Warrior Princess. A few others could take their place on the list, too, and then we would all get to argue about our favorite ancient Greek and Roman names to call them. Time to start watching Hercules reruns. Of course, first we have to decide whether they get their own category in the first place, and what to call that. Dwarf planets sound cute, don't you think? Let's vote for that! Oh yeah, only real astronomy buffs, with degrees and everything actually get to vote in Prague, and even with the voters kept to that reasonable minimum they aren't sure what the outcome will be:

It's unclear what astronomers will make of the new definition or how they will vote on it. Observers say the definition will have to be concise and unambiguous. What is too small to be a dwarf planet? Do moons count? What about round comets?

Oh goody, more questions. I love questions. I really do. All the best answers come from people asking questions. Since there aren't really answers yet, because nobody's actually voted yet, I have to leave you hanging on this one, but I'm sure I'll keep an eye out and pass the information along when it comes my way. Until then, try to think up those Greek-sounding names, okay? How about Podiatry, or Hermeneutics? Too esoteric? Oh well, see if you can do better.

Hat tip: Futurismic

Respecting Joe

I have a good deal of respect for Joe Lieberman, Democratic Senator from Connecticut. I agree with him some, and disagree with him some, but he has always seemed principled and consistent, both of which are scarce political commodities. Of all the Democratic candidates in the last Presidential election, I thought he was the one I could come closest to giving my vote, although there's a fairly long list of reasons why I probably wouldn't. I've said before, I'm a Conservatarian: small government, lots of freedom, minimal spending, and living babies. Strong defense. It's the strong defense part where Lieberman garners my respect, even if he would have trouble getting my vote. It's the strong defense part which just lost him the Senatorial primary in his own state. Apparently, in Connecticut, supporting the Iraq war, the general War on Terror (terrible name--we really need something more accurate to call it) and Israel are punishable offenses.

The Democratic party really turned on Lieberman with this election. Prominent Democrats endorsed his opponent, and the liberal blogosphere gave him no quarter, vilifying him for his stand on defense, despite the fact that on other issues he toes a pretty solid party line. The result is a loss for Lieberman in the primary, but many pundits say that won't be the end of the story. Lieberman has announced he will run as an independent, and most of the commentary I've read has said he's likely to win in a landslide; he's a very popular Senator with the voters-at-large of his state. It will be interesting, if he does indeed win, to watch the Democratic party try to woo back his favor and cooperation. I can just hear all the private reassurances that, "I always supported you, Joe." Talk is famously cheap, however, and I wonder how Lieberman will view his new position as Independent.

James Pinkerton, at TCS Daily, says that the reason the party turned on Lieberman with such animosity is that they view him as a heretic, a true believer who has strayed from the fold. He explains the difference between a heretic and an infidel:

Here's the distinction: An infidel is someone who never believed what you believe; an infidel is a stranger, and so there's not much point in investing emotions in him. But a heretic is someone you know well, someone who once believed what you believe, but now has a different faith -- that's much more threatening. You often fight wars against infidels, and in those wars you seek to defeat, even destroy, the enemy. But with heretics, even tougher measures are needed, because the threat of heresy is so much more insidious, threatening to eat away the true faith. So you launch inquisitions against heretics, to eliminate even the thought of heresy. The proper anti-heretical strategy is to torture 'em, make 'em confess, make 'em repent -- and then kill 'em.

Pinkerton says the result was that Lieberman was targeted for especially vengeful measures:

So Lieberman had not only to be defeated, but to be crushed and vilified. Which he was. Lieberman supporter Lanny Davis detailed in the pages of The Wall Street Journal all "the hate and vitriol of bloggers on the liberal side of the aisle" that poured down on his candidate, including scurrilous anti-Semitism.

Now, according to Pinkerton, the Democratic blogosphere is hitting Joe even harder, since he's declared a third party candidacy. Ironically, there are accusations that he's a traitor, "stabbing them in the back." Huh? He's stabbing them in the back? Somebody needs to take a course in logic.

Pinkerton also points out, though, that this phenomenon isn't limited to Lieberman, nor, in fact, to Democrats. He's got some fine examples of Republicans eating their own, as well. The polarization of politics in America continues. Some purges, of course can be a good thing. I for one would love to see some of the big spenders booted out of both parties. Moves that define more clearly what a given party stands for might also be useful for helping voters make up their minds. However, when a general consensus on most major political issues isn't enough to keep party favor, but only adhering to the strictest letter of party law will suffice to keep the flying monkeys from tearing out your stuffing, there's something just not right in Oz. Okay, there's a lot not right in Oz, but sticking with the question of the right of politicians to take a principled stand, while still sharing mostly common ground with their political party, there's something decidedly unhealthy about devouring your fellows because they dare not to walk the narrowest party line, especially when not that long ago the party line was a fair bit wider.

I really admire Lieberman's insistence on taking that principled stand, despite its unpopularity with the movers and shakers, and the Democratic power brokers. Lieberman knew what the opposition wanted and refused to give it to them, despite knowing that it could cost him his Senate seat. Of course, I happen to agree with this particular stand. There's little that's as important right now as fighting terrorism. Lieberman knows that. I gotta tell ya; if I lived in Connecticut, even being the Conservatarian that I am, I would strongly consider voting for the man. If the state is going to give the seat to either a Democrat or an Independent Lieberman anyway, which by all accounts is the way it will go, I suspect I'd want to make my Conservatarian vote count for defending our country.

Update: The Lanny Davis article, referenced by Pinkerton in the quote above is worth a look, as well. It's rather revealing.

Omar

At Michael Yon: Online Magazine there's an interview with Omar, the blogger from Iraq the Model. I've linked to him before. He's articulate and educated, a dentist, in fact, and he speaks English very well, which is a nice plus. He's a passionate blogger, who puts a lot of thought and research into his writing, and has a unique perspective on his world. Both the interview and the blog are worth a look.

Liquid Bomb Plot Foiled

The U.S. Homeland Security terror alert system has gone to the red level for the first time since the system was put in place, indicating that the risk of a terror attack is severe. Canada's National Post reports British counter-terrorism efforts have foiled a huge terrorist plot, once again aimed at using airplanes to spread death and destruction. As before, the targets were U.S. cities--New York, Washington, and some Californian Metropoli, although this time the origin was Heathrow airport in London. The plan was to smuggle chemicals on board disguised as common liquids--i.e. the shampoo that we all stow in our carry-on luggage so that it won't swell and dump all over our clothes when the baggage compartment decompresses with altitude. Once airborne, these chemicals were to be combined to explode the planes, no doubt at strategic points chosen to maximize the damage the planes would cause upon impact. The triggers would be hidden as common electronic equipment.

The plan, apparently, came very close to succeeding, and now there are a whole list of new restrictions aimed at preventing the possibility of any similar plot making it past the layers of security that stopped this one. No more carrying spillables into the cabin with you. No more bringing along extra water bottles so that you don't have to pay four dollars for something to drink on long layovers. Cell phones, laptops, and other portable electronic devices we all carry, rather than check, are also on the not-any-more list. It looks like the bans are going to be sticking around for a while, too. One more strike against flying over driving. Of course, these new standards are completely reasonable given the risk. Inconvenient as all get out, but completely reasonable. Makes me want to invest in that flying car I wrote about a while ago.

I have friends who are flying from Portland to New York tomorrow, with two layovers, and thirteen hours from start to finish travel time. Yuck. Now add to that the fact that they can't take water for the trip, or an iPod or laptop to pass the time, and their vacation is not going to start off particularly comfortably. One of my friends also has strep throat, which just basically sucks, especially without lots of water to stay hydrated. On the other hand, the trip can only get better from there, so maybe the travel part will just enhance the being there part by comparison. I hope so, for their sake.

I, like all of you I'm sure, am simply infuriated by this. STOP TRYING TO KILL US, YOU STUPID JERKS!! Even when they fail, the loonies manage to make our lives more hassle-ridden, which obviously suits them just fine. The stupid terrorists had already ruined air travel for just about everybody. Remember the days when loved ones could actually see you off at the gate, and meet you with balloons and smiles when you came home? Now it's "call on the cell phone when you get there and I'll pick you up outside." Oh, wait, we can't take cell phones on the plane anymore. Now we get to wait till we retrieve our bags and all dig around in our luggage in order to make that call. That, or stand in line for the pay phone. Yippee.

Okay, vent over. I do have to say one really positive thing in the midst of all this. It's absolutely astounding to me that British authorities managed to discover, and halt, this whole scheme. Homeland Security, and it's foreign equivalents around the globe have been absolutely amazing for the last five years. I know the plot was on the verge of being carried out, but it didn't happen, thanks to the efforts of the people who are always working to protect us. Color me completely impressed.

Hat tip: Instapundit for the link, the entire blogosphere for the topic. Once again, you can go to Instapundit, Michelle Malkin, and Pajamas Media for the latest links and info.

Update: Lara Jakes Jordan of The Associated Press is reporting that the terrorists were planning a dry run of their scheme within a couple of days, and the attack to follow hard on its heels--with as many as ten planes targeted. Scary.

Update II: Again from Instapundit--ABC News has more details of the plot, and info on those terrorists who thus far have evaded capture. As of yesterday, British authorities had captured 21 suspects, but they believe at least five are still at large, some of whom might be the leaders.

Update III: There's a useful comment (from the comments section shockingly enough) that links a Detroit Free Press article saying that laptops and cell phones will be allowed as part of your carry-on luggage. That will be a relief to all those business commuters looking to get something done in flight.

Amazing Feats Of Strength

Futurismic tipped me off to this AP article about a new robotic accomplishment that's really neato-keen. There is a Japanese man, named Seiji Uchida, who's been paralysed from the neck down for the last couple of decades, but had a dream of climbing 13,741-foot Breithorn mountain, one of the highest peaks in Switzerland. He recently had that dream realised (within 500 feet of the top anyway.) Okay, climbing might be the wrong word, since really his friend Takeshi Matsumoto carried him, but still it was a dream fulfilled for Uchida.

"Wait!" you say, "His friend carried him? Up the side of a mountain? How? What is he, Superman?" No, he's not Superman, but he had the aid of a super new robotic tool, a kind of "wearable robot," a "motorized exoskeleton." Matsumoto strapped it on and gained the strength of ten men. EXAGGERATION ALERT!!! EXAGGERATION ALERT!!! Okay, fine, not ten men, but maybe a couple. According to the Associated Press, if someone would normally be able to leg-press 220 pounds, they would be able to lift 396 pounds, robot aided. Still a vast improvement if you ask me. I wouldn't mind having one of those exo-thingies around for doing household maintenance. Just imagine how quick it would be to clean the garage if super-you could lift 80% more than the regular you. On a less self-centered note, consider what it could mean for emergency rescue units. I can't help thinking about firemen carrying people out of burning buildings, and rescue workers carrying car crash victims out of ravines. Heck, strap two people on, and make it a two-for-one rescue. Nifty, huh?

Robot Swarm On The Horizon

Cool Tech Alert: Introducing the robot swarm. Have you ever watched a large flock of birds turning and swooping in tandem and wondered how that whole thing works? I think their ability to do that has got something to do with the Earth's magnetic field, or something equally scientific, but when I watch a whole group of birds moving as one, there's a part of me that starts believing in bird telepathy. Somehow they're talking; I just don't understand how. Little internal biological radios maybe? "Ready? Time to baffle the humans. Turn right 17 degrees, and down 5 degrees, on my mark. Three, two, one, mark." Then they all giggle and squeal hysterically in little birds cheeps. "Hmmph. Humans think they're so smart. Let them try that."

Well, it looks like humans are trying that, with mechanical proxies. Whatever method the birds use, the effect is obvious, and scientists are studying the flock of birds phenomenon and applying what they're learning to groups of flying robots. There is work on multiple fronts to get flying thechno-gadgets to share information and fly as highly complex units. David Hambling, at DEFENSETECH.org has a look at the current manifestations of the technology, complete with loads of links to projects that are in the works, as well as links to explanations of the more rudimentary definitions and scientific principles at work in the research. (I spent some time on these. Rudimentary is good.)

Hambling comments on the varied potential civilian uses uses for swarming technology, including firefighting and space exploration, but says that many of the most immediate applications will be military:

Swarms are extremely robust, have a high level of built-in redundancy and are well suited to complex and rapidly-changing environments. Swarming robots are a natural for the battlefield. Because the individual elements can be made small and cheap, swarms can consist of a very large number of units – and the success of this approach in nature hints at how effective it is.

That does sound extremely promising on the military front, doesn't it? Hambling spends most of the rest of the article looking at military applications. I'd love to focus more on the civilian applications, like how a swarm of robots could someday fly around and dust my house while I blog, but I did get this info from a site that specializes in "the future of the military, law enforcement, and national security," so I'm not too surprised that Hambling spends more time on security-related applications than on discussing ways that I might get out of housework. He's pretty enthusiastic about the potential of the technology though. He indicates that the advances are coming thick and fast, and that they will change things substantially, and not just militarily. Maybe someday when we see a swarm of something in the distance, turning and swooping in a complicated sky-dance, we'll have to look twice to see whether it's a flock of birds, or a flock of flying robots, mapping out terrain for a new drainage system, or looking for hot spots in the embers of an apartment fire. The applications are probably limitless. We just need to let our imaginations soar a bit.

An Enemy Like We've Never Known

I know I'm posting a lot these days on the Islamist war with the West, especially in Lebanon, since that is the current hot spot in the ongoing ideological conflict that has engulfed our times. I don't mean to be single topic focused. Regulars to the Meow know that I love to explore the latest frontiers in science and technology, politics and current events of the less global, more mundane variety, and even sports and religion (of the not-desiring-to-take-over-the-world type) find their way into the Meow archives. Right now, though, the war is really on the front burner, and by that I mean the larger war, of which Lebanon and Israel are on the front lines in the greater conflict. So much valuable analysis is coming from so many sources these days, that I find myself simply swimming in things I want to pass on to you all. So, the war keeps emerging as topic number one.

I read another TCS Daily piece, by Gordon Cucullu, this afternoon that really defines the nature of the war we are in, and also how it differs from previous "world wars" we've known. Cucullu explains that we never faced the same kind of enemy before this, one whose motives are so different that their actions cannot be calculated in the same way as the enemies of the past:

"...we are in a global conflict, one that without exaggeration exceeds its predecessors in vitriol, intensity, and potential for destruction. While we ducked under our school desks waiting for the Soviets to attack with devastating nuclear weapons, political leaders on both sides accepted the doomsday strategy of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) as a reasonable deterrent."

With the current global conflict, however, we cannot rely on any of the past restraints for our opponents. The goals and motivations are completely different. With the Soviets we could believe on some level that, though they wanted to spread their rule and ideology, they also weren't really interested in total devastation. I remember a Sting song from the Eighties with the lyric, "I hope the Russians love their children too." On some level, we all believed they did, as history ultimately bore out; they didn't send a nuke our way, because it would have been suicide. Islamists, though, clearly have no problem with suicide. In fact, they believe they will be rewarded for it. The West and the Islamists simply want different things:

"The U.S.-led camp looks to free market democracy and open societies as a solution to the world's issues. The other sees itself under the flag of a resurgent, conquering Islam, sweeping the globe in a new order that aims to impose a new Caliphate upon heretics. Not only is the MAD strategy not applicable, but in the instance of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad such global destruction would be welcome, even desirable, as a door-opener for the 12th Imam to reawaken and lead the hosts of Islam against the infidel foe."

The rest of the article I will leave you to read for yourself, or not, as you see fit. It's not cheerful, by any means, but it is a good call to arms--something we can't seem to get enough of in the war we're fighting. I got an email recently, from a new friend, with a question I will paraphrase: if 3,000 Americans dead on our own soil isn't enough to keep us roused, what will it take? She said it much better than I summarized, but it's still a good question.

Hyperion's An Oddball

There's a short little tidbit at New Scientist, by Kelly Young, about Saturn's moon Hyperion that's worth checking out just for the picture. When I went to have a look, I did not see what thought I'd see. Now, I haven't done a lot of flying about the solar system, so my actual visual experience with heavenly bodies is limited. (If I were male this would be the ideal place to insert the name of whatever flavor-of-the-month girl is currently popular. Not being male, I will spare you the name, although I couldn't resist the reference.) However, I have come to have certain expectations when I hear the word "moon."

I know that moons orbit planets. They reflect the light of the sun, so they are visible when magnified, and Saturn and Jupiter have many of them, of varying size. Moons are smaller than the planets they orbit, but some are bigger than other bodies that we call planets in our solar system. Ganymede, for example, one of Jupiter's moons, is actually bigger than the planet Mercury. Saturn's moon Titan apparently has some lovely lakeside property. That is close to the sum of all knowledge that I have gleaned over the years about moons, although I'm beginning to realize that I've also gathered a misconception or two. Our one little satellite is the only one I've ever actually seen, and judging from the photo at New Scientist I've drawn some inaccurate conclusions based on its properties. The key one being that I tend to thinks of moons as being round. Most planets are round, aren't they? Suns are all round, as far as I know. My expectations default to the "major astronomical bodies are round" setting. Well, my default setting is wrong, and I have just undergone reprogramming.

NASA's Cassini spacecraft is continuing its jaunt around Saturn, and is snapping photos left and right to send back to the curious here on Earth:

Hyperion is 280 kilometres (174 miles) across, making it the largest irregularly shaped moon observed to date. Cassini snapped the pictures used for the image on 28 June from a distance of 294,000 km.

Previous images of the moon show a fractured, cratered surface (see Cassini flyby of Hyperion reveals tortured world).

You just have to go see the moon (the picture that is) for yourself to see why it weirded me out. (I don't know, maybe I'm just easily amazed.) I think all this space photography we're seeing these days is so darn cool. I was really excited to read in Young's article that Cassini, which is in the middle of its four year mission touring the neighborhood of Saturn, is going to come really close to Titan soon, within about 620 miles, and I'm looking forward to seeing what's going to amaze me next.

Hat tip: Futurismic

Iran Goes The Extra Mile

Some sobering thoughts on Israel and Hezbollah, Iran's latest contribution to the turmoil, and how America needs to react, from J. Peter Pham & Michael I. Krauss, at TCS Daily. Excerpt:

Debka.com reported a very dangerous but potentially promising development on Sunday. Realizing that it overplayed its hand by waging war on Israel before being fully prepared, Iran has apparently now dispatched the world's most fearsome remaining terrorist (after Osama Bin Laden) to supervise Hezbollah operations. Imad Mughniyeh has been wanted for 25 years by the FBI for the suicide bomb attacks he orchestrated against the U.S. Embassy in Beirut and against American and French peacekeepers (to say nothing of a spate of "lesser" hijackings and murders). Mughiyeh is so important in the hierarchy of international terror that he answers directly to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Prime Minister Olmert is now directly opposed not by the relatively parochial Lebanese cleric Hassan Nasrallah, but by an extremely seasoned terrorist who comes as the chief paladin of Iranian mullahs and their ambitions to hasten of the apocalyptic return of the Hidden Imam.

As Instapundit would say, read the whole thing.

Reuters: In Focus

If you don't stay as connected to the Internet as some of us who are more emotionally Net dependent, you may not be aware of the latest controversy sweeping the blogosphere, especially if you get most of your news from more traditional sources. The mainstream media is largely ignoring this story. In the past few days, there's been a swarm of bloggers, starting with Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs, and including an army of Photoshop experts with Internet access, exposing a Reuters photo from the conflict in Lebanon that has clearly been doctored. Even my pathetically untrained eyes can see the obvious use of the Photoshop clone device, clumsily employed to ramp up the smoke content in a post-bomb image and change the building landscape (possibly to make the area look more populated.)

The photographer who snapped the image, Adnan Hajj, is a stringer from Lebanon, freelancing the Israeli/Lebanese war. Some of his other photos have been questioned recently as well, specifically about whether pictures taken after Israel bombed Qana were staged. Reuters stood by their man when these initial questions arose, pooh-poohing the possibility that anything could slip by their guard, or that their man wasn't completely bias free, but finally made the decision to take him off their payroll, with the obvious Photoshop manipulation coming to light via the ever watchful blogosphere. Since then, the story has progressed, and another "shopped" Hajj photo has been discovered. Reuters responded by removing all 900 or so of Hajj's pics from their archives. (He's freelanced for them for several years.)

Michelle Malkin made an interesting point this morning. She thinks that Reuters is making a mistake by taking down all the photos completely. She suggests that they set up a special site taking advantage of the expertise available online, and let the citizen swarm loose to examine the rest of this photographer's work. I agree. How much visual misinformation has been purveyed by this "photojournalist," and others? During a war it's pretty important to be able to trust what you see and read. Riots have been caused in the Middle East by cartoons, for pity's sake--what damage can an altered photograph do? I shudder to think of all the pictorial hoaxes that may have been perpetrated on the unwary masses, by more skillful Shoppers, in this age of digital dupery. At the very least, Reuters needs to establish some stringent, and publicly confirmable, editorial processes to ensure that people can trust what Reuters passes out as news. If Reuters is smart, they will be as open and cooperative with bloggers as possible, or risk losing more of their credibility by duck and cover tactics.

Pajamas Media has a healthy roundup of news and blog links, as does the Malkin link above, and the Little Green Footballs link leads to the blog that started it all. (LGF was also the blog that outed the Rathergate memos as being fake.) This may not seem like a big deal to you, but this is turning into a huge deal in the blog world. There is ongoing criticism from the mainstream media that blogs lack editorial safeguards and therefore are less trustworthy than traditional journalistic sources. Bloggers counter that the blogosphere is itself a giant editorial machine, and lies don't hold up long under the continued scrutiny of millions of blogger fact-checkers. Reuters' accuracy checking isn't looking very shiny right now, and the ability of Internet experts in a myriad of disciplines to check for errors in the news of the day is looking awfully helpful when the MSM systems break down. Neither the MSM nor the blogosphere can replace one another, but the two of them keeping tabs on each other, that could be the best of both worlds.

Update: Here's an interesting look at the photo editing process, from National Journal. This one again confirms to me that the MSM and blogosphere ought to be checking on each other in a cooperative and helpful way--not playing "gotcha," but willing to look at each other's evidence if the truth of a report or photo is in question. The piece also talks about the use of photo fakery from the other side of the GWOT, including photographic "evidence" purporting to show American soldiers raping Iraqi women. Sobering the way pictures can be manipulated. Makes me think of George Orwell or Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. What is it--64,000 repititions make a truth?

Update II: Michelle Malkin's looking at further examples of misleading media, including innacurate captioning and staged photos. It ain't just Reuters that has a problem with keeping things straight photographically. The New York Times, Time and U.S. News & World Report join the list, and boy howdy is the blogosphere on the hunt now. That's good, if you ask me. With Israel being hammered for its response to Hezbollah attacks, it would be nice to be sure that the info coming out of the war zone is something close to right. There have been some darn suspicious death counts and really odd photo coincidences--like the lady who apparently lost more than one house in one of Israel's attacks in Beirut, judging by the fact she shows up grieving their loss at a couple of locations throughout the area. (It could be more a captioning problem than a photographic one.) I know that sometimes in the Middle East they hire professional mourners, but I didn't know they went to the trouble for lost property.

Our Citizen Soldiers

Blackfive has something worth your time. "LTC Randolph C. White Jr. delivers the graduation speech for the newest batch of Infantrymen to complete training at Ft. Benning, Georgia, on April 21st, 2006." There's a link to the video, as well as the text of the speech. Ked's trying to read a computer trade journal at the moment, so I read it rather than listening, but even just reading it was inspiring. LTC White is clearly proud of the graduating soldiers (and none too easy on academia and Hollywood.) He lets the soldiers know the importance of their role in our country, and the world:

WHEN POLICY MAKERS FINISH TALKING, WHEN DEBATE HAS CEASED, WHEN NEGOTIATIONS HAVE FAILED AND ORDERS ARE GIVEN ... IT BECOMES THE MISSION OF THE YOUNG MEN BEFORE YOU TO EXECUTE NATIONAL POLICY FOR THE LAST 300-500 METERS TO A GIVEN OBJECTIVE.

THEY ARE THE SUBSTANCE BEHIND ANY POLICY UNDERTAKEN BY THIS COUNTRY DEEMED IMPORTANT ENOUGH TO SEND SOLDIERS INTO HARMS WAY ...ABSOLUTE PROOF POSITIVE THAT THE UNITED STATES MEANS BUSINESS WHEN THEIR BOOTS HIT THE GROUND.

Parts of this speech reminded me of something I just read last night in Robert Heinlein's Starship Troopers. (Yes, it was a book before it was a movie. The book's way better, if you ask me. Not that you did.) In the book, nobody who has not done national military service is actually a citizen. Other people are free to live their lives, and free to choose not to be a soldier, but they are never as valued by society, and they have not earned the right to vote, for which military service is the prerequisite. Heinlein's vision for a society that honors its veterans goes a step or two beyond anything we see here in the good old US of A, wouldn't you say?--especially given the history of the last few decades, from the way protesters greeted returning soldiers from VietNam, to the way the media constantly reports body counts rather than the accomplishments of our soldiers as they build schools and power grids in Iraq and Afghanistan, risk their lives in battle, train Iraqi soldiers to defend their own country, and defend us daily. (LTC White isn't particularly easy on protesters, draft dodgers, and the media in his speech either.) White stresses the key role of American soldiers, and the great responsibility they bear by being the might that serves to "execute national policy." Heinlein makes a similar point in Troopers:

War is not violence and killing, pure and simple; war is controlled violence, for a purpose. The purpose of war is to support your government's decisions by force. The purpose is never to kill the enemy just to be killing him... but to make him do what you want him to do. Not killing... but controlled and purposeful violence. But it's not your business or mine to decide the purpose of the control. It's never a soldier's business to decide when or where or how--or why--he fights; that belongs to the statesmen and the generals. The statesmen decide why and how much; the generals take it from there and tell us where and when and how. We supply the violence; other people--'older and wiser heads,' as they say--supply the control. Which is as it should be.

What strikes me about this quote, and parts of the speech by LTC White, is that this is the difference between our soldiers and the terrorists they are fighting around the world. Our soldiers don't kill the enemy (or the enemy's children) just to be killing him, as the terrorists do. They don't take it upon themselves to decide when our nation goes to war, as Hezbollah recently did to Lebanon. Unlike the multiple, competing, contradictory terrorist groups, each plotting what they think will serve their own interests, our soldiers remain subordinate to the decisions of our statesmen and generals. They are the controlled expression of our national will, and they do that job extremely admirably. They deserve our respect for their service and sacrifice. Let us all hope that the "older and wiser heads" supplying the control, our statesmen and generals, strive to be worthy of them.

Some of you may disagree with this post, but I suspect most of you will be saying, "Well, duh. Obviously our soldiers are valuable and noble, and worthy of respect and praise." True. It is obvious, but sometimes ya just gotta state the obvious. There are so many voices out there "supporting our troops" by condemning almost everything they do. I want to add my voice to upping the volume on the other side.

Why The Jews?

With accusations of disproportionate response continuing to plague Israel, as world attention focuses on the war between Hezbollah and the Jewish state, and the machinations of Iran and Syria against its very existence, and even the unfortunate drunken spewing of Mel Gibson and his subsequent apology, there's no question that the attitude of the rest of the world to Jews and Israelis is not at its best right now. But then, it's never really been at its best, has it? Do you ever ask yourself why there is so much animosity in the world toward this beleaguered people and the nation many of them inhabit? Israel is tiny, truly tiny. All this turmoil can't simply be about this minuscule bit of real estate and who has the right to it, despite Islamic claims to the contrary. There have been too many calls for eliminating every Jew on the planet coming out of places like Tehran for it to be merely about Jerusalem or Tel Aviv. Hitler's desire to eradicate Jews didn't come from any dispute over holy lands, even if he did have designs on their property and possessions in Europe. No, there's something here that goes beyond mere competition for goods and territory. This is hatred on a deeper level, an almost inconceivable level to people of rational mind.

Now, you may be one of those dedicated conspiracy theorists who finds merit in the notion that Jews have tried to take over the world for just about forever, and you believe any prejudice against them is justified by their quest to dominate mankind. Interesting premise. A few problems with it, I believe. I've seen that there has been oppression of Jews on a continent-wide scale, almost world-wide in reality, yet never have seen Israel doing aught but defend itself. You can question their methods, of course. You can say they've gone too far. You can sympathize with those Palestinians who want peace and don't support the terrorists in their midst, but time after time, others have started the wars that the Jewish people have been forced to fight. (Now, I'm not referencing battles that happened 3500 years ago. Joshua and Jericho aren't really applicable at this point, so could we set aside the blood feud justifications for now? Just about everybody's ancestors have hurt everybody else's ancestors at some point in time. Could we please get over it and live in today, or at least the last century or so?)

What made the average European of the first half of the last century tolerate the kind of anti-Semitism that led to Hitler's "final solution?" What made Arabs on the streets of Cairo march in protest when their government initially condemned Hezbollah, rather than Israel, at the outset of the current conflict? What poison did these people drink in childhood that has so permeated their beings that hatred for Israel practically oozes out of their pores? Nina Shea & Jeanne Hoffman, at The Weekly Standard have some answers to these questions. They claim that the poison filling many in the Arab world is fed to them as children, by their governments and schools. They say some of it is the same poison which tainted Europe of the last century, indoctrination having its roots in publications like The Protocols of the Elders of Zion:

Disseminated with the support and official sanction of the governments of Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Libya, Palestine, and Syria, as well as Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states, this work is used to shape the collective consciousness of Arab populations. The Protocols is a century-old fabrication that purports to record the ma chinations of Jews conspiring to rule the world through treach ery, fraud, and violence.

Shea and Hoffman continue:

Adapted from an 1864 French satire of Napoleon III entitled A Dialogue in Hell between Machiavelli and Montes quieu, the text of The Protocols first appeared around the turn of the 20th century. Its authors, believed to be members of the Russian secret police, attempted to make it appear there was a Jewish plot to undermine the czar. The book's circulation in Russia at that time helped incite murderous pogroms.

Hitler then used The Protocols to indoctrinate Nazi youth. In 1924, his propaganda minister, Joseph Goeb bels, found the tract "modern" and useful, admitting in his diary that he believed in "the intrinsic but not the factual truth of The Protocols."

These "Protocols", used by Czarists, and Nazis, and now Arab governments, are a fabrication, attempting to demonstrate a longstanding Jewish conspiracy to take over the world, yet lacking credibility at the most basic levels. From this document springs the notion, held by both Saudi textbooks and the Hamas charter, that the Jews' desire to run things has caused, "...the French Revolution, World War I, the fall of the Ottoman Empire, and the Bolshevik Revolution." From it also comes the belief that Jews eat the children of Christians and Muslims, and "...that the current evils in the world have been unfolding according to the 'meticulous and precise plan and time schedule' of The Protocols." Who can believe such nonsense? According to Shea and Hoffman, the Protocols have been repeatedly discredited, even by the Senate Judiciary Committee in 1964, and yet, "Saudi public high schools now teach The Protocols as historical fact." Disturbing, don't you think? Shea and Hoffman indicate that Arab culture is replete with references to them, ranging from TV specials to the Hamas charter, treating the document as accurate and valid. Keep in mind how much of Arab television is state run. These are governments putting out this kind of vile propaganda. Of course, the very people who run these governments were also raised on this kind of bile.

When you think about the place in which Israel finds herself today, when you think about how she defends herself, not just in Lebanon against Hezbollah, but against all of the aggression she has faced over the last half century, think about the following questions. How can this people, or any people for that matter, be at peace in a world where the nations which border their lands teach their children, on an official level, such hideous lies about them? How can Israel find common ground with people who teach their children that religious virtue will be found in killing as many Jews as possible? How can they not seek to defend themselves when the natural outcome of such teaching is perpetrated on them daily? What I find remarkable is how much effort Israel has made over the years to try to do these very things: make peace and find common ground, and how often they have refrained from defending themselves, even though sometimes a straw like Hezbollah breaks the camel's back.

I have an even more disheartening question regarding Arab nations and the way they teach their children: when they are washed in such unreasoned malice, practically from the cradle, what child can resist such lies? What will break the cycle, so that the next generation is not bathed in the same filthy water? What possible chance is there that the next generation will break the bonds of indoctrination and seek to end the constant strife? Is there any hope that the governments now conditioning their youth to blindly hate "the Zionist Aggressors" will change, and seek to teach peace instead? I have no answers for these questions. I have very little faith that Iran will ever turn from the Hellish road they now march. Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Lebanon? Who can say? Reasonable people can only hope, at this point, and pray.

Hungry? Think Curry!!

This will make my husband happy. New Scientist is reporting that eating curry can up your brain power. At least it seemed to improve the mental zip of some elderly Asians in tests performed at the National University of Singapore. Kedley will be saddened to learn that it only takes occasional consumption to see the benefit, but I'm guessing his motto will be: "If a little is good, more must be better." Better tasting, anyway. Bon Appetit (or the Asian equivalent.)

Update--08/07: Yep, the study is right. Ked made curry last night, and we both instantly noted an increase in smarts factor--not in ourselves, but in those elderly Asians! They suddenly looked very smart to us for having curry on the menu. It was delicious!!

Update II--08/08: Mmmm, curry leftovers. Making extra was so smart!

Inflation-Schmation

If you're interested in economics (and even if you're not, now that I think of it), there's a relatively brief and readable article on inflation at TCS Daily, by Jerry Bowyer. Apparently, in today's flexible markets, inflation doesn't bear (pardon the pun) the same penalties it once did, and deregulation covereth a multitude of price hike percentage points.

Unbelievable

I ask you, who attacked whom? Iran's Supreme Leader Khamenei is saying--now get this-- that the U.S. planned the Israeli attack on Lebanon, in advance, in order to take over the whole Muslim world. Boy, does he think we have a lot of power. (Of course we need a lot of power, what with our designs on ruling over almost a third of the world's population and all.) Apparently, not only do we control Israel, but Hezbollah, as well. How else could we get them to cross the Israeli border, kill and kidnap Israeli soldiers, in order to get this "taking over the Muslim world" show on the road? We must have Hezbollah on our subversive payroll. Yet, by Khamenei's count, Hezbollah is "the front line of defense for the Muslim nation," in a holy war, no less, against a racist and bloodthirsty Zionist regime. Again, I ask you, who attacked whom? Is there anyone in power in Iran who isn't insane?

Update: Iran is putting its money where its Hezbollah-backing, inflammatory, jihadist mouth is. According to Jane's Defense Weekly, via Yahoo! News, the Iranians are supplying Hezbollah with ever more sophisticated weapons:

Iran will supply Hezbollah with surface-to-air missile systems in the coming months, boosting the guerrillas' defences against Israeli aircraft, according to a report by specialist magazine Jane's Defence Weekly, citing unnamed Western diplomatic sources.

In a meeting, held late last month, the Lebanese Shiite Muslim militia called on Tehran to "accelerate and extend the scope of weapon shipments from Iran to the Islamic Resistance, particularly advanced missiles against ground and air targets."

Hat tip for the post and the update: Michael Totten--guestblogging at Instapundit

Vertical Drinking

Man, what will they think of next? Police in Preston, Lancashire, England are pushing for a new rule that bans "vertical drinking," a.k.a. standing at the bar and pounding a few back. Apparently there's the belief among Preston law enforcement that drinking at the bar causes fights, not so much because of increased alcohol capacity when standing, but because proximity to other drinkers increases the likelihood of confrontation. As Alan Hamilton of the Times Online put it:

When the mindless nerd next to you knocks the pint out of your hand, it’s much easier to go for him directly than having to get out of a chair to punch his lights out.

He goes on to add:

Police in Preston already have an alcohol harm reduction and prevention team. Sergeant Andy Hobson, the team’s alcohol project manager, said: “If people are sat down there is less potential for flashpoints than with vertical drinking. This is not designed so much to affect the amount they drink; it is the proximity of other people when you are stood up, which is where the problems can start.

“People go into these places and crowd round the bars, then the next you know somebody gets a push, the pint goes over and that’s it.”

So the obvious solution is to make a rule that says that only people who are seated can have a pint. Hamilton points out that next year there's an England-wide edict against smoking in pubs going into effect, and that's going to complicate matters. Uh oh!! Conflicting edict alert!! They're practically ordering people to start a donnybrook. There are going to be all these drinkers, whose only reason for not starting a brawl is the fact they're seated, having to stand up, walk to the door, and step outside together for a smoke. Even more dangerous, what if it's raining, and they have to huddle together around the door? The potential for violence is enormous.

Am I the only one who thinks this is hilarious?

Hat tip: Brannon Denning (who is one of four people subbing for Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit this week. I think he's doing a fine job.)

Blair Speaks

Tony Blair gave a GREAT speech on what's happening in the Middle East, and within the different elements of Islam, as well as where our responsibility rests, to the Los Angeles World Affairs Council yesterday. It's very long, and thus defies summary, but it's well worth your time.

Update: Seriously, I can't recommend this speech enough. "IF YOU ONLY SEE ONE MOVIE THIS YEAR..." Oh wait. "If you only read one speech this year, let it be this one." It doesn't have quite the impact of all caps, but then Tony Blair is a rather understated guy. No hype. Just substance.

Stem Cell Successes That Go Unnoticed

It baffles me why proponents of embryonic stem cell research should try to downplay the successes of adult and umbilical cord blood stem cell research. Are they so married to the idea of going down this one road that they can't possibly conceive of any other roads leading anyplace good? A new article by Wesley J. Smith, at The Weekly Standard, examines the many medical advances coming from adult stem cell research, and the treatments currently being used on actual human beings, as opposed to the theoretical advances promised, but not yet delivered, by embryonic stem cell research advocates. It also looks at the way these successes are going unnoticed by the same people who would be shouting from the rooftops if the progress was made using cells from embryos. I can't help drawing the conclusion that the lack of celebration comes from the basest of motives--competition for money. If the adult cell research succeeds, then more money will head that direction, leaving less for its embryonic competition.

Now, if you read this blog at all, you know I'm not anti-science, quite the opposite in fact, but I am also a Christian, who believes that God always provides ways of doing the things he wants to see accomplished that don't involve sacrificing the good of others for our own benefit. Scoff all you want about "fetal farms" and how ridiculous it is not to use the embryos "left over" after fertility treatments, but from my point of view, these are still human babies-in-the-making, and treating them as lab fodder goes beyond cheapening human life. It destroys it.

Regardless of my opinion on the matter (which is, quite frankly, irrelevant to most people), the point of Smith's article is not to debate the ethics of embryonic stem cell research, but rather to seek a fair hearing for its alternative--some would say its companion. Adult and umbilical cord blood stem cell research may not hold the answers to healing every human ill, but they are already helping treat a lot of them. Let's give credit (and funding) where credit is due.

Proxy Wars

Scary scenario alert.

World Cup Runneth Over

Warning: This post contains sports-related content. If you are among the sports allergic, or are otherwise averse to the discussion of sporting events, referees, fair play, or the use of terms like "instant replay" and "officiating errors," then stop reading as soon as possible for your own safety. The Meow cannot be responsible for any damage to your psyche resulting from your proceeding into the sports zone. You heard me--I said stop. Okay, but the consequences of reading any further are officially on your own head. Let's play ball.

Most of you who made it past the big bold lettering at the top of this post are probably aware that soccer's premiere event recently transpired in all its glory. The World Cup is quite the pageant, as my husband and I discovered, much to our enjoyment. Neither of us got much "football" exposure growing up, and we've only really been introduced to the sport in the last couple of years. Thus, this was our first encounter with the big show. We watched a good deal of the Cup, though, and enjoyed it a lot. There were several things we could have used an interpreter for, but in general we just enjoyed the play, seeing very talented people perform at the top of their sport. I love sports, anyway, but seeing the best of the best in head to head competition always sends me to my happy place. With a cherry on top.

There were a couple of things which marred the experience for us, though. We both found that sportsmanship was nowhere close to the level that we desired, or expected from elite athletes. We were shocked (very naively, I'm sure) to see players intentionally hurting each other, jabbing and kicking when they thought they could get away with it, and when they thought it would intimidate their opponent, or playing verbal head games to throw the other guy off. More surprising to us still were the number of dives we saw the best of the best taking in order to gain tactical advantage. Players who weren't even touched went down like someone had thrown bricks at them, all to stop, by trickery, an advancing opponent who had beaten them on skill. Come on guys, for Pete's sake!! These athletes are the best in the world. You'd think that they would have too much respect for themselves and the other teams to pull some of the shenanigans that were blatant to even our untrained eyes. A lot of the reffing didn't help either. Some matches seemed completely decided by bad calls--not the way you want to see sports at the level of the World Cup decided.

Needless to say, we weren't the only people disappointed by the negative aspects of the tournament. We heard friends and pundits alike complain vociferously at the bad actors and bad calls. So, is there a solution? Maybe so. I just read an interesting article by Raymond Sauer at TCS Daily, and he addresses the issues at hand from the perspective of economics, and makes some claims that economics can help provide the answers. He's standing on pretty firm ground as far as I can tell.

The first thing Sauer analyses is referee bias, especially favoring the home team, and specifically using the example of soccer. He explains the indications that such bias really does exist, and really can impact the outcome of matches. He then goes on to show how financial incentive tied to post-game referee review has been shown to clean things up from the reffing perspective. If referees are paid based on how well they called the game, confirmed by reviewing the footage after the games are called, apparently that makes the refs all the more likely to call the game accurately in the first place. Interesting, eh? And simple, to boot. Sauer says this same review can apply to players, after the game, with appropriate penalties for taking a dive, or fouls that weren't caught during the game:

Players respond to incentives as well. Controversy flared during the World Cup over players simulating fouls to gain strategic advantage by players. This is not a new issue, but there may be a straightforward solution. Prior to the World Cup, my colleague Brian Goff argued that FIFA should allow post-match video review to punish such offenses after the game is played. The logic in Goff's proposal stems from one of the original papers in Sports Economics, "Crime on the Court," by Robert McCormick and Robert Tollison.

McCormick and Tollison studied an experiment by the Atlantic Coast Conference ACC) in the 1978 season, when they added a third referee to call college basketball games. The added referee implies that a greater percentage of the fouls that take place will be detected, but the number of fouls called actually decreased. Why? Because with the third ref, players knew that their transgressions were more likely to be observed. Increasing the probability of detection (given the appropriate punishment) will decrease the amount of undesired behavior in a sport, as is surely the case with simulated fouls in soccer. The third referee is now a regular feature of NCAA and NBA basketball precisely for this reason. When it comes to referees, incentives matter.

Some people might think it is taking things too far when players, and refs, can be punished for fouls that weren't discovered until after the game is finished. I'm not so sure I agree. Okay, I don't think little league should be subject to video review, but a huge deal like the World Cup? I don't know--I'm sure liking the idea of something that would give the players more incentive to behave themselves. I was discussing with one friend a couple of weeks ago what the options were for changing the behavior on the field. She commented that she wanted to see the players in the future put their focus on the game instead of pushing the buttons of their opponents, a sentiment with which I wholeheartedly agree. I remember wondering at the time what could clean the game up. Sauer's ideas have some potential in that direction, if you ask me.

Soccer actually already has a system that's better than most. When a player gets thrown out of the game with a red card, he doesn't just get thrown out of this one, but the next one as well. There's incentive there that carries some weight if wielded properly. So what would be wrong with letting players know that their actions would be subject to scrutiny even after the whistle's blown? There would obviously have to be a time limit to the review involved; you can't have matches hanging over a player's, or ref's head forever, but a limited time of potential consequences might go a long way toward changing behavior. The review shouldn't retroactively change the outcome of games, but changing compensation, or a player's status for the next match? Fair game if you ask me.

More Biotech Breakthroughs

Dr. Henry I. Miller is schooling us again on the benefits of biotech, and they are many--some of the most impressive being environmental. As usual, he's also pointing out some of the hindrances, and illustrating why activists against biotech might want to change sides in the debate. Dr. Miller is one of the Meow's favorite authors at TCS Daily, and once again, I think this piece is worth your time. Go ahead. Get an education.

Hydrogen Fuel Cells In Action

Question: Why would the US Departments of Defense and Energy, the government of Japan, and the National Automotive Center, in Warren Michigan, all join together to commission a 1.2 megawatt hydrogen-fuel-cell locomotive? Answer:

“The army is interested in fuel-cell locomotives because they can serve as mobile backup power supplies for military bases,” says Arnold R. Miller, president of Vehicle Projects. “If you have this fuel-cell locomotive, rated for 1.2 megawatts,” he said, “it will serve its primary role as a switch engine in military rail yards. But in the event of an attack on a base, a failure of the grid, or some natural disaster such as Hurricane Katrina, you could drive it to wherever you need it, hook it up, and provide enough power for about 1000 homes or to keep people who are dependent on respirators or dialysis machines alive.”

Pretty cool, huh? While most of us are focused on whether there are advances in alternative fuels for our cars, there are nifty advances in power for other methods of transportation. IEEE Spectrum reports on fuel cell developments aimed toward "small rail ­systems at mines, factories, and military bases; and replacing diesel-electric locomotives on suburban lines with fuel-cell-driven electric motors." Still pie-in-the-sky, you say? Well, they're already doing it:

Vehicle Projects, spun out of the Colorado School of Mines, in Golden, is recognized as the first company to have built a fuel-cell locomotive. Its earlier 3.6-metric-ton, 17-kilowatt hydrogen-powered mine locomotive—for which Nuvera also supplied PEM fuel cell stacks—was completed in 2002 and demonstrated in a working mine in Ontario [see photo, “Little Workhorse”]. “We retrofitted a battery-powered locomotive, because it already had an electric drive,” says Miller.

Miller says that the mine locomotive served as a proof of concept for all that needs to be verified in a fuel-cell vehicle. Is it safe? Can you easily and regularly refuel the vehicle? Does it deliver enough power for industrial, commercial, and commuter applications? Compared with the battery-powered locomotive it replaced, he says, “it had twice the power and could be refueled with hydrogen in 30 to 45 minutes, as opposed to 8 hours.”

Sounds like progress to me.

A Golden Opportunity

You've heard of the mythical money tree, I'm sure. In fact, I'm guessing that at times you've wished you had one of your very own, to cushion some of the hard knocks of life. You're not greedy, or anything. You don't need a money orchard. A small bush would do, maybe putting out a crop every month or so. It would make a nice houseplant for that corner of the dining room that always looks so bare. You could use a grow light for when times are particularly tough, and keeping it inside would protect it from the elements--and the neighbors.

Of course, we all know that money doesn't grow on trees. Money doesn't grow at all, except in interest-bearing bank accounts and properly managed investments. We all know that. Don't we? Take gold, for example. There's a finite amount of it in the ground, and after we dig it all out by the sweat of our brow, that's it. No more. After that we just have to find ways to make it stretch farther, and we definitely need to stop coming up with new ways to use it. No more of this using gold as an electrical conductor, or for embroidery thread, or to line astronauts helmets as a sun shield, and we really need to stop using gold for crowns, both the ones on top of the head and the ones in the teeth. We're going to run out!!!

Or are we? What if gold does grow, not on trees, but underground? According to an article at CSIRO, (via EurekaAlert!) there's new research that indicates that bacteria may be responsible for growing gold, in Australia and South Africa, among other places. There's science involved, and everything. Now, I'm not really all that up on chemistry, biology, bio-chemistry, molecular biology, or any other combination of sciences involving the study of things you need a microscope to see, so some of this is over my head, but from what I read, there's evidence to indicate that some of the world's really large gold deposits are the results of some of the world's really small bugs. Honest. If you don't believe me, read the article for yourself. I'd even be willing to bet you about it. That is if I can get my hands on some of that bacteria. I'm kind of strapped for cash right now, but once I get my bacterial money tree planted, the sky's the limit. Here's an idea--do you suppose if we fed some of these bacteria to geese we could get them to lay those golden eggs we all read about as children? Hmmm, but then if everybody could grow gold, that would really make gold less valuable, wouldn't it? Oh well, it would still make really good fillings.