Sam the Wolfdog tramps up the Barr Trail. Gog and McGog loom in the distance.

Jane Smiley's most informative book of 2006: Albion's Seed.

Jane has written a most insightful analysis of just which cultural component of our nation's heritage has taken over our body politic and why they must be marginalized and driven back to their corners if we are going to survive as a nation.

Former Watergate counsel John Dean has written the first two of a three part series on the problematics of a rigorous oversight hearing sequence by the Democratic majority.

Part 1: Are Congressional Wars Coming? Since Cheney Has Already Said He'll Ignore the Democratic Congress, It Seems Likely

Part 2: What Should Congressional Democrats Do, When the Bush Administration Stonewalls Their Efforts To Undertake Oversight?

SNL: Gerald Ford dead 10 years ago.

Lest you get lulled into the current media love fest for Gerald Ford:

Ford and Kissinger gave the green light to Suharto for Indonesia's invasion of East Timor in 1975. setting the stage for the long, bloody, and disastrous occupation of the territory that ended only after an international peacekeeping force was introduced in 1999.

My Desk at work: All the race numbers on the wall are from this calendar year. Marathons start with the blue 14 and go down and to the right. All other races including the San Juan 50-miler are to the left. Marathon medals are hanging to the right of the blue 14. Trophies are on the desk top. The background on my monitor is me looking towards Mt Rainier from my parent's deck on Puget Sound, Olympia, Washington.

At the end of this month I will take down all the numbers and box up the trophies and start over again for 2007. This has been a tradition for me for several years.

This is the most welcome sight for Pikes Peak Marathoners!

Cog Railway to the summit of Pikes Peak.

Unique home on Pilot Knob.

I have more stairs than this house!!

I am new to Manitou Springs, Colorado after moving here last summer. I am enthralled with the unique homes and architecture and the incredible creativity of the human spirit in this town. On Christmas Day I walked around my town and took pictures...

Juan Cole: Top Ten Myths about Iraq

Gen Odom: Six Brutal Truths about Iraq

State Terrorism

I am listening to Noam Chomsky on Google Videos and he just pointed out three well known terrorist incidents of the year 1985, one of which was a covert bombing of a mosque in Beirut by the CIA as approved by William Casey--80 civilians were killed and over 200 mostly women and girls were wounded. The target, a sheikh believed responsible for the Beirut Barracks bombing that killed more than 200 U.S. Marines escaped harm. This was documented by Bob Woodward in his book about William Casey and the CIA: Veil. Here is an interview of Woodward on PBS's Frontline where he also mentions this act of state sponsored terrorism. Which state? The U.S.A.

Troop 'surge' in Iraq would be another mistake

By retired Army Col Patrick Lang and retired CIA analyst Ray McGovern

Running this morning in the Garden of the Gods with Pikes Peak in the background.

"Radillac" spotted on I-25 near Colorado Springs

Bush's "Delusion": A Psychiatrist's Perspective

U.S. Judge orders mental test for Jose Padilla. Can he order one for Bush and Cheney too?

Raw Story has the redacted CIA Op-Ed and explanations (This is the politically motivated attempt to censure an Op-Ed on Bush's myopic negotiations with Iran)

Media Matters names ABC "Misinformer of the Year"

A Peace Corps Volunteer Blogs from Togo

Report on Guantanomo Detainees (PDF): 55% are not determined to have committed any hostile acts against the US or its allies. Only 8% are known to have an affiliation with Al Qaeda.

Noam Chomsky on our efforts to bring democracy to the Middle East (video): "In our mission to bring democracy to the world we don't care about the opinions of people --- they're kinda irrelevant."

A Future George Jetson never imagined: Why are houses of the future always round?

A guide to the order of trilobites: rock star of the Cambrian, gone with the ages after the Permian extinction 250 million years ago...

Links for your entertainment

The Most Dangerous Road in the World: Bolivian Andes

CBC Spends seven days with "God's Kids"

Green Revolution is sweeping the US Construction Industry

Saudi Royals Snub Bush, Fund Opposition in Iraq

Target Iran: Former UN Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter and Investigative Journalist Seymour Hersh on White House Plans for Regime Change on today's Democracy Now!

Chinese Ice Sculpture

Timeline Map of the History of the Middle East

Sam the Wolfdog in Today's Blizzard

Links on the Reality-based world

Eric Boehlert on Reality Based Reporting

Jay Rosen: Retreat From Empiricism: On Ron Suskind's Scoop

Two articles from Walter Pincus on the reality of "standing up" Iraqi forces, here and here.

Chris Weigant: Military Endgame in Iraq

Rebecca Solnit: The Age of Mammals: Looking Back on the First Quarter of the 21st Century

YouTube: Wake up to Global Warming

YouTube: Marx Bros Mirror Scene from Duck Soup

Guantanomo Photos

Ready for a government horror story? Here's a doozy.

NYT: Dispatches from Afghanistan.

Mining the Moon for a Nuclear Future

20 Million Years and Farewell: China's River Dolphin, the Baiji, declared extinct.

Mass Extinction Underway

Merry Mithras!

The Jesus Myth

Today on DemocracyNow! : Howard Zinn on the uses of History and the War on Terror.

Stock tip of the day: Rich as a BRIC and Going for BRIC
Investing in Brazil, Russia, India, and China

NYT: Former U.S. detainee in Iraq Recalls Torment

More Clues

10,600 scientists condemn political interference in science.

The Oil Drum: Discussions about Energy and our Future.

Plain Truth from the Cattle Rancher who won't eat meat.

I found Jesus Camp the movie on You Tube in 9 parts. Here is part 1.

Here is Bill Maher's take on Jesus Camp.

From the trailer they focused on a kid who at age five was saved. I distinctly remember rejecting Christianity at age five. I just couldn't accept the shallow concept of the requirement to believe something on faith (read: gullibility) in order to go to heaven or else you burn for eternity! Absurd on its face. Even for a five year old. Still holds true for a 51 year old. Totally unbelievable not to mention stupid.

This morning on Longs Ranch Road

Running up Longs Ranch Road on the slopes of Pikes Peak. 

I thought these might be clues

The Warmth of a President

Judge to Rule on Jose Padilla case
(Padilla is an American citizen who has been held for three years with no charges brought against him. He has been tortured to the point that his attorneys claim he is unfit to stand trial. Yes. This is the United States of America.)

The Bush Gulag: Where are the Bodies?

Enemy Combatant: The searing story of one man’s years inside the notorious American prison—and his Kafkaesque struggle to clear his name

Capt Travis Patriquin the author of this simple but effective slide show showing how to achieve victory in Iraq was killed by the same improvised explosive device that killed Maj. Megan McClung of the Marine Corps last Wednesday.

Patriquin had fought in Afghanistan and Iraq. A gifted officer, he spoke numerous languages, including Arabic. His story is here.

Colin Powell debunks "troop surge" hype on Face the Nation. Says "Army is Broken".

How to talk to a climate skeptic.

View from my Hot Tub

I took this photo from my hot tub about a month ago, just before I dumped my digital camera in the tub, ruining it. The memory card survived. 

How the Republicans are Stealing the November Elections

Juan Cole on Bushes and Bonapartes

Saturday Morning Links

Forbes puts Boulder at the top of its "smartest cities".

BooMan studies the Church Committee Reports to understand the path we are going down at present and the real danger to our civil liberties and the nation we were.

Daily Kos reports on Tommy Franks latest assertion that the constitution will likely be thrown out if there is another terrorist attack on American soil.

Wesley Clark to host conference on National Security in March.

Diplomat's suppressed document lays bare the lies that led us to war.

Iraq Nam

THE IRAQI WEEK THAT WAS: December 9 - 15, 2001 through 2006

Spread the Word: Iraq Nam

Friday Links

I ran the lower Barr Trail this morning to just above the top of the W's. The sun was rising to the east as I returned.

Büchner lives on: The inestimable Times Literary Supplement reviews the inimitable playwright who died at age 23 but left a legacy for the ages:
Georg Büchner
DICHTUNGEN, SCHRIFTEN, BRIEFE UND DOKUMENTE
Edited by Rosemarie and Henri Poschmann

Slate: Barackwater: For now, Obama's scandal is too small to hurt.

Steven Berlin Johnson concludes a series on cities in the NY Times. He blogs here.

Tuesday Links

A Family in Oregon found this fawn on their backsteps.

Julia Sweeney author of "Letting Go of God" now has a CD available of her one women show.

Must read piece on Jose Padilla, US citizen who has been held for more than three years with no charges brought against him. Mr. Padilla has undergone extensive torture to the point that in his current mental condition he is unfit for trial: Presidential Tyranny Untamed by Defeat.

Does this represent our ideals? What binds us together as a nation if not respect for civil rights? Dark times for the republic... Maybe end times for the great experiment...

On a lighter note:

Potluck Potlatch

Otter Creek Trail Marathon

Otter Creek Trail Marathon

Brandenburg, Kentucky

Dec 10^th, 2006

Steve Bremner

Marathon State 43, total marathons 81

This is the first time I’ve run marathons in back to back weekends. Prior to this the closest time in between marathons has been two weeks. Recovery from trail marathons is almost instantaneous so I didn’t have much apprehension running this race one week after the Tecumseh Trail Marathon in Indiana on December 2^nd. Indeed, I didn’t even find out about this race until about three days before Tecumseh, whereupon I quickly bought a plane ticket and signed up for the race since KY was a needed state in my 50-state quest and nowadays I always run trail marathons when given the choice.

I flew in to Louisville on Saturday, picked up a rental (First time driving a PT Cruiser), and cruised on down to my reservation on Fort Knox (45 minute drive). After checking in I headed on out to the commissary where I found some Amy’s organic TV dinners for the micro and a banana for the morning. Conveniently Fort Knox is right next to Otter Creek Park, so the next morning I only had a 15 minute drive to the race. As an Air Force retiree, anytime I can stay on a military installation I do so. They are as clean and quiet as any Hilton and the price is right—Fort Knox was $44/nt.

Race start was a tad on the cold side (30F), but after a couple miles I was glad I was wearing just a tech top and shorts. We started off with a 2.2 mile loop, then commenced with the first of three 8-mile loops. Though I started off in an easy lope, no one wanted to run with me so right away I opened up a 100 yard lead. At the 2.2 mile point I couldn’t see anyone behind me. Could this be the makings of a runaway race?

It didn’t take long before the slower of the 8 milers and the 16 mile racers started coming back. Though I would yell “on your left” as I passed there was contact on occasion with the IPoders. I can’t understand why people listen to music when they run. It would drive me crazy. There is enough to keep track of out there in the wilderness.

I would get to know this 8-mile loop intimately over the next three hours, but the first time through was spectacular. Rolling terrain through deciduous forest over leaf-covered single track trail, followed by a precipitous drop to Otter Creek which we followed for some time before an aide station about halfway through the loop. Then we climbed up to a bluff where we had a scenic overlook of the Ohio River which forms the border between Indiana and Kentucky. The broad bends of the river with farmland and forest were a welcome sight on the next two times around the loop. From there we had a bit more climbing before it mostly leveled off moving to the end of the loop. A Russian guy caught up to me at this point, 10.2 miles into the race and we ran together for about 5 miles after which he slowly left me in his wake. A couple miles later another guy passed me, but for the last ten or so miles I ran alone, occasionally passing the odd 16-mile racers and towards the end probably lapping some marathoners. I ran the first 8-mile lap in an hour, second in 1:05, and third in 1:16, for a total time of 3:39, third place overall. Winning time was 3:32, 2nd place was 3:35. At least I didn't get "chicked".

Little did I know that I should have held some in reserve for my airport connection in Chicago. They had delayed our flight due to a back up of planes in the air over Chicago and by the time I got off the plane and was in the terminal it was 7:33 PM. My flight to COS was on time and leaving at 7:50. That meant I had 7 minutes to make it from terminal 1 to terminal 3 – normally a 20-minute walk or more. With a heavy pack I did my best to simulate a jog arriving at the gate at 7:42. Flight closed, door locked, no sympathy. I was forced to spend the night in Chicago.

We Wish to Inform You that Philip Gourevitch Has Edited a Spectacular Collection of Interviews

Powell's Books interviews Philip Gourevitch about his new book: The Paris Review Interviews, I.

NYT: Top Ten Books of 2006

NY Times Top Ten Books of 2006

No, I haven't read any of them!

On my short list are Absurdistan, The Looming Tower, Mayflower, The Omivore's Dilemma, and The Places In Between. I probably should read all of them.

Hey! I just read George Soros' new book"The Age of Fallibility: Consequences of the War on Terror". What a magnificent thinker! How can those right-wing bloviards like Bill O'Reilly disparage him as "far left" etc?? He is for open societies! He established institutions that opened up the Soviet Bloc and broke down the Iron Curtain! For goodness sake!! He is a democrat with a small d!! One can only deduce that the right wing bloviards are anti-democratic and closer to plutocratic, or worse fascist.

Incoming House intelligence chief botches easy intel quiz

When asked by CQ National Security Editor Jeff Stein whether al Qaeda is one or the other of the two major branches of Islam -- Sunni or Shiite -- Reyes answered "they are probably both," then ventured "Predominantly -- probably Shiite."

Horrible, just horrible

This happened in El Paso County, my county here in Colorado.

Pictures.

"A dead llama, laying in the middle of a yard, with two dogs feeding on the carcass.

Another dead llama, its legs sticking out of a broken window.

An emaciated horse, so far gone that it cannot stand up.

A dead dog, laying in the doorway of a trailer under a crate full of garbage.

A box full of dead, rotting puppies."

Paul Krugman: They Told you so

Shortly after U.S. forces marched into Baghdad in 2003, The Weekly Standard published a jeering article titled, “The Cassandra Chronicles: The stupidity of the antiwar doomsayers.” Among those the article mocked was a “war novelist” named James Webb, who is now the senator-elect from Virginia.

Beyond Belief

Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and many more articulate a vision of morality and values Beyond Belief 2006.

Links for Thursday

NYT: Changes expected in e-voting. No more evoting without paper trails if all goes as expected. Finally.

Dailykos: Wes Clark's Iraq positions. Very extensive! Wes Clark is 'da man!!

Bill Moyers gives this message to West Point cadets.

FL-13 update. Howard Dean favors going to the mat! Go Howard!

Dennis Kucinich has truth. Why can't reason prevail in the Iraq debacle? We should have cut and run in 2004.

Today's links

New book on extraordinary renditions "Ghost Plane" has a web site.

The author of "The Long Emergency" on our appalling dependency on oil has a web site.

Water on Mars: Recently! Really!

Iraq Study Group Report download. Read it! Here is an analysis.

Amazing but True!

The Atheist Delusion

Those contempuous Atheists! Why won't they be kind!

Why won't God heal amputees?

CIA Torture Logs now available

WAPost: Wrongful Imprisonment: Anatomy of a CIA "Mistake"

Pelosi for President: 2007

How are things in Iraqi Kurdistan?

Not bad!

http://mediastorm.org/0011.htm

What to do?

A proposal for a way to Impeach Bush Cheney.

Senator John Warner, R-VA, tells Bush to talk to Dems on Iraq. Will he listen? Doubt it.

50 marathons in 50 days

Dean Karnazes web site: http://enduranceis.typepad.com/

I'm flying to Indiana tomorrow to run my 42nd marathon state. The following weekend I'll be in Kentucky to run my 43rd... Both are trail marathons... I try to run trail marathons when at all possible these days... Easier recovery...

Marine Life Leaped From Simple to Complex After Greatest Mass Extinction

The greatest “great dying,” 251 million years ago, erased 95 percent of species in the oceans (and most vertebrates on land). But new research suggests that it was followed by an explosion of complexity in marine life, one that has persisted ever since.

My only question is how does this match up with the great flood and a world only 6,000 years old?

Electrons to Enlightenment

I've enjoyed listening on line to this series from "To the best of our Knowledge"

Electrons to Enlightenment: A Five Part Series on Science and Religion.

They talk of an interesting sounding documentary on Cosmic Africa that sounds like it would be worth a look.

Iraq War Links for today

Newsweek: Why the most Dangerous Man in Iraq, Moqtad Al-Sadr will decide our fate.

Booman Tribune: Bobble Head Generals and Iraq Fallout.

EPA IS HASTILY DISPOSING OF ITS LIBRARY COLLECTIONS

Bushevics are scurrying to hide the evidence.

Washington, DC — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is frantically dispersing its library collections to preempt Congressional intervention, according to internal emails released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). Contrary to promises by EPA Deputy Administrator Marcus Peacock that all of the former library materials will be made available electronically, vast troves of unique technical reports and analyses will remain indefinitely inaccessible.

Iraq War Links for today

Death Squads infiltrate Iraqi Police.

Iraq: Handicapping the Baker Report, Part Two

Maureen Dowd says: After the Thanksgiving Day Massacre of Shiites by Sunnis, President Bush should go on Rupert Murdoch’s Fox News and give an interview headlined: “If I did it, here’s how the civil war in Iraq happened.”

The Last Throes of the Insurgency

Senator Chuck Hagel of Nebraska (R) has this excellent piece: Leaving Iraq, Honorably.

Eric Schlosser in Sierra Club Magazine

Cheap Food Nation

Eric Schlosser: "Changing your eating habits can send ripples far and wide."

WHENEVER A WELL-KNOWN ATHLETE gets caught using anabolic steroids to run faster, pedal harder, or hit a baseball farther, there's a universal chorus of disapproval. Most Americans regard steroid use in sports as an unhealthy form of cheating. Under federal law, all performance-enhancing synthetic hormones are class III controlled substances; obtaining them without a prescription is a felony. Steroid users may suffer from a wide variety of physical and mental ailments, some of them irreversible--and the long-term effects of the drugs are unknown.

Meanwhile, for the past two decades, a number of the same steroids abused by athletes have been given to U.S. cattle on a massive scale. Without much publicity or government concern, growth hormones like testosterone are routinely administered to about 80 percent of the nation's feedlot cattle, accelerating their weight gain and making them profitable to slaughter at a younger age. The practice is legal in the United States but banned throughout the European Union, due to concerns about its effect on human health. A recent study by Danish scientists suggested that hormone residues in U.S. beef may be linked to high rates of breast and prostate cancer, as well as to early-onset puberty in girls. Hormone residues excreted in manure also wind up in rivers and streams. A 2003 study of male minnows downstream from one Nebraska feedlot found that many of them had unusually small testes. When female minnows in a laboratory were exposed to trenbolone--a synthetic hormone widely administered to cattle--they developed male sex organs.

Dollar falls to 19 month low against Euro

Watch for more of this in the near future. A budget deficit that has ballooned from $4T in 2000 to $9T today and a trade deficit of $800B/yr and climbing is the reason. Tax cuts for the top 1%, constant war, and a dim bulb prez contribute to our demise.

Things that can't go on forever Don't!!

Dollar falls to 19 month low.

Global Warming and Peak Oil Links

NASA's Dr. James Hansen speaks the truth on global warming despite the attempts of administration Luddites to suppress him.

The Oil Drum: Europe: Analysis and Discussion of the European Energy Gap and Peak Oil

The Oil Drum: Discussions about energy and our future.

TheOilDrum.Com

 

Navajos' desert cleanup no more than a mirage

LA Times:

Church Rock Mine, N.M. -- Most of the mining companies that drilled, dug and blasted for uranium on the Navajo reservation during the Cold War did nothing to repair the environmental damage they left behind. For a time, tribal leaders staked their hopes for a cleanup on Superfund, the landmark legislation that forces polluters to pay for remediation of toxic sites.

More than 1,000 abandoned mines are scattered across the Navajo homeland, which covers 27,000 square miles in Arizona, Utah and New Mexico.

Backstory: The unvarnished Gore Vidal

From the Christian Science Monitor:

It was just an ordinary day in the journalistic trenches when I got the call. "Gore Vidal has a new book out ... would you like to interview him?" said the voice on the other end of the phone, a well-known Los Angeles publicist.

"Isn't he the guy famous for saying, "It's not enough to succeed. Others must fail?" I asked.

"That's the one," she said.

"The one who said, 'I had never wanted to meet most of the people I had met, and the fact that I never got to know most of them took dedication and steadfastness on my part?"

"That's him," she answered.

"Sounds like a lovely opportunity," I said. "I'll take it."

OK, it didn't happen quite that way. But like everyone - like some people, anyway - I thought I knew who Gore Vidal was, at least on the surface: literary lion, scold, verbal jester, and political screed writer. To double-check my memory, I went on Wikipedia (just to make sure the upstart website was up to snuff):

Author of 25 novels, six plays, 200 essays, and several screenplays. Check. An early novel, "The City and the Pillar," and a later sexual farce, "Myra Breckinridge," credited with pushing the envelope of sexuality in modern literature. Check. Historical novels ranging from the Roman Empire ("Julian") to the birth of the American republic ("Burr") garnered wide respect among historians, and his "United States: Essays 1952-1992" won the 1993 National Book Award. Tried politics in the distant past. Check, check, and check.

Tomgram: Mark Danner, How a War of Unbound Fantasies Happened

Tom Dispatch makes one of the longest pieces ever done in the New York Review of Books available on-line. The print version will come out in the December 21st edition. If you are interested in understanding how we blundered into the Iraq Quagmire, spend some time reading this excellent piece: Iraq the War of the Imagination.

Missing Votes in FL-13 Favored Dems

The group of nearly 18,000 voters that registered no choice in Sarasota's disputed congressional election solidly backed Democratic candidates in all five of Florida's statewide races, an Orlando Sentinel analysis of ballot data shows.

Among these voters, even the weakest Democrat - agriculture commissioner candidate Eric Copeland - outpaced a much-better-known Republican incumbent by 551 votes.

The trend, which continues up the ticket to the race for governor and US Senate, suggests that if votes were truly cast and lost - as Democrat Christine Jennings maintains - they were votes that likely cost her the congressional election.

Live forever

Kurzweil: Computers Will Enable People To Live Forever

John Muir: Conservationist

The Scot who saved nature

John Muir, 1838-1914

The Scotsman

Restore Hetchy Hetchy

Clear Evidence 2006 Congressional Elections Hacked

Clear Evidence 2006 Congressional Elections Hacked

Results skewed nationwide in favor of Republicans by 4 percent, 3 million votes.

A major undercount of Democratic votes and an overcount of Republican votes in US House and Senate races across the country is indicated by an analysis of national exit polling data, by the Election Defense Alliance (EDA), a national election integrity organization.

These findings have led EDA to issue an urgent call for further investigation into the 2006 election results and a moratorium on deployment of all electronic election equipment.

"We see evidence of pervasive fraud, but apparently calibrated to political conditions existing before recent developments shifted the political landscape," said attorney Jonathan Simon, co-founder of Election Defense Alliance, "so 'the fix' turned out not to be sufficient for the actual circumstances." Explained Simon, "When you set out to rig an election, you want to do just enough to win. The greater the shift from expectations, (from exit polling, pre-election polling, demographics) the greater the risk of exposure--of provoking investigation. What was plenty to win on October 1 fell short on November 7.

Run, Al, Run

From an interview of Al Gore in GQ via Suburban Guerilla:

Q. Really? How about all the warnings?

A. That’s a separate question. And it’s almost too easy to say, “I would have heeded the warnings.” In fact, I think I would have, I know I would have. We had several instances when the CIA’s alarm bells went off, and what we did when that happened was, we had emergency meetings and called everybody together and made sure that all systems were go and every agency was hitting on all cylinders, and we made them bring more information, and go into the second and third and fourth level of detail. And made suggestions on how we could respond in a more coordinated, more effective way. It is inconceivable to me that Bush would read a warning as stark and as clear [voice angry now] as the one he received on August 6th of 2001, and, according to some of the new histories, he turned to the briefer and said, “Well, you’ve covered your ass.” And never called a follow up meeting. Never made an inquiry. Never asked a single question. To this day, I don’t understand it. And, I think it’s fair to say that he personally does in fact bear a measure of blame for not doing his job at a time when we really needed him to do his job. And now the Woodward book has this episode that has been confirmed by the record that George Tenet, who was much abused by this administration, went over to the White House for the purpose of calling an emergency meeting and warning as clearly as possible about the extremely dangerous situation with Osama bin Laden, and was brushed off!

And I don’t know why—honestly—I mean, I understand how horrible this Congressman Foley situation with the instant messaging is, okay? I understand that. But, why didn’t these kinds of things produce a similar outrage? And you know, I’m even reluctant to talk about it in these terms because it’s so easy for people to hear this or read this as sort of cheap political game-playing. I understand how it could sound that way. [Practically screaming now] But dammit, whatever happened to the concept of accountability for catastrophic failure? This administration has been by far the most incompetent, inept, and with more moral cowardice, and obsequiousness to their wealthy contributors, and obliviousness to the public interest of any administration in modern history, and probably in the entire history of the country!

Blogged with Flock

China’s Path to Modernity, Mirrored in a Troubled River - New York Times

For centuries, the Yellow River symbolized the greatness and sorrows of China’s ancient civilization, as emperors equated controlling the river and taming its catastrophic floods with controlling China. Now, the river is a very different symbol — of the dire state of China’s limited resources at a time when the country’s soaring economic growth needs more of everything.

“The Yellow River flows through all these densely populated parts of northern China,” said Liu Shiyin, a scientist with the Chinese Academy of Sciences. “Without water in northern China, people can’t survive. And the economic development that has been going on cannot continue.”

Blogged with Flock

Al Jazeera

Al Jazeera English

is now on the airwaves.

Blogged with Flock

Michael Hayden on Iraq

The Director of the CIA offers a refreshingly candid view of the Civil War in Iraq:

Violence in Iraq Called Increasingly Complex - washingtonpost.com

Blogged with Flock

Climate Controlled White House

Daily Kos: Science Friday: Let The Games Begin

With Democrats now in control of the House Science Committee and the Senate Committee on Environment & Public Works the investigations into the White House abuse of climate change science can begin.

Blogged with Flock

CIA Acknowledges Two Interrogation Memos: Papers Called Too Sensitive for Release

After years of denials, the CIA has formally acknowledged the existence of two classified documents governing aggressive interrogation and detention policies for terrorism suspects, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.

But CIA lawyers say the documents - memos from President Bush and the Justice Department - are still so sensitive that no portion can be released to the public.

The disclosures by the CIA general counsel's office came in a letter Friday to attorneys for the ACLU. The group had filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in New York two years ago under the Freedom of Information Act, seeking records related to U.S. interrogation and detention policies.

CIA Admits to Memo From Bush on Interrogation Techniques

Blogged with Flock

Kucinich Calls for Cutting Off Iraq War Funds

"I want to say that there's one solution here, and it's not to engage in a debate with the President, who has taken us down a path of disaster in Iraq, but it's for Congress to assume the full power that it has under the Constitution to cut off funds. We don't need to keep indulging in this debate about what to do, because as long as we keep temporizing, the situation gets worse in Iraq.

"We have to determine that the time has come to cut off funds. There’s enough money in the pipeline to achieve the orderly withdrawal that Senator McGovern is talking about. But cut off funds, we must. That's the ultimate power of the Congress, the power of the purse. That's how we'll end this war, and that’s the only way we’re going to end this war.

"We need to shift our direction."

Dennis Kucinich

Blogged with Flock

Senator Boxer plans Senate Hearings on Global Warming

Automakers and manufacturers, beware: There's a new environmental policy boss in town, she scowls a lot, and two of her favorite phrases are "global warming" and "extensive hearings."

McClatchy Washington Bureau | 11/14/2006 | Boxer plans Senate hearings on global warming

Blogged with Flock

Salt Lake City Embraces Green Building

Private developers who tap Salt Lake City green must build green. City Council members Tuesday night unanimously adopted an ordinance requiring builders of commercial structures, apartments and condos to meet national environmental building standards if they are funded by city loans, grants or tax rebates. The ordinance also endorses Mayor Rocky Anderson's executive order mandating that municipal buildings - such as a new police and fire administration building, fire station, east-side police precinct and Sorenson Unity Center - also meet Leadership in Energy and Environment Design (LEED) standards. Anderson signed that LEED order in July 2005.

Salt Lake Tribune - SLC embraces green building

Blogged with Flock

High Country News: When a gas pipeline blows, you get out fast

Not only is coal methane gas drilling devastating to the environment there is no accountability for the drillers when it comes to safety.

Liberalism is the True Conservatism

Daily Kos: Liberalism is the "True Conservatism"

Washington Monthly: Why Conservatives Can't Govern

Confessions of an Angry Hustler

Ted Haggard's bitter boy toy tells all

Blogged with Flock

Global growth in carbon emissions is 'out of control'

The growth in global emissions of carbon dioxide from fossil fuels over the past five years was four times greater than for the preceding 10 years, according to a study that exposes critical flaws in the attempts to avert damaging climate change.

Data on carbon dioxide emissions shows that the global growth rate was 3.2 per cent in the five years to 2005 compared with 0.8 per cent from 1990 to 1999, despite efforts to reduce carbon pollution through the Kyoto agreement.

Much of the increase is probably due to the expansion of the Chinese economy, which has relied heavily on burning coal and other fossil fuels for its energy.

Independent Online Edition > Environment

Neither intellect nor faith will save humanity

The Scottish journalist Muriel Gray wrote a beautiful account Richard Dawkins' dialogue with Bishop Holloway in the Glasgow Herald:

Holloway, as we all know, is the church leader who questioned his faith and found it wanting, and Dawkins of course is not simply world famous for his pioneering and award-winning scientific work, but also for his aggressive views concerning organised religion. A couple of audience members before the session began admitted they were worried that the two men might come to blows, or that a fundamentalist audience member might use the event to launch an offensive verbal attack on Dawkins. Instead the hour that seemed like five minutes was one filled with two startlingly intelligent men, each brimming with humanity, drawing personal pictures of just how awesome, mysterious and wonderful existence is. The sheer joy of hearing Holloway still trying to draw poetry and meaning from a religion he is not quite ready to dismiss completely out of hand, as Dawkins listened eagerly, trying to assist him without dismissing his desires as ignorant, was breath takingly inspiring. And all this was book-ended with Dawkins’s views on birthing universes, black holes, and the future of the human species when we start to form ourselves from silicone and alloys instead of vulnerable flesh. Now that’s what I call entertainment.

Read the rest here:

Neither intellect nor faith will save humanity - [Sunday Herald]

Quebec is lightyears ahead of the USA

Teach sex and evolution or close, Quebec evangelical schools told

Impeach Bush/Cheny

ImpeachForChange

For War Crimes. Send the criminals to jail where they belong.

Rummy: Kung Fu Fighter

Career opportunies for Donald.

 Click on the picture to enlarge. It's worth seeing in detail.

Hat tip to Last Left Turn. 

Should Bush be Impeached?

Not a "scientific poll" but 355,379 responses!!!!

Do you believe President Bush's actions justify impeachment? * 355379 responses
	Yes, between the secret spying, the deceptions leading to war and more, there is plenty to justify putting him on trial. 87%
	No, like any president, he has made a few missteps, but nothing approaching "high crimes and misdemeanors." 4.4%
	No, the man has done absolutely nothing wrong. Impeachment would just be a political lynching. 6.6%
	I don't know. 1.9%

Live Vote: Should Bush be impeached? - Politics - MSNBC.com

President Pelosi sounds real good to these military ears.