Performance evaluations

"Since my last report, this employee has reached rock bottom and has started to dig."

"His men would follow him anywhere, but only out of morbid curiosity"

"I would not allow this employee to breed"

"This employee is really not so much of a has-been, but more of a definite won't be"

"Works well when under constant supervision and cornered like a rat in a trap"

"When she opens her mouth, it seems that it is only to change feet"

"He would be out of his depth in a parking lot puddle"

"This young lady has delusions of adequacy"

"He sets low personal standards and then consistently fails to achieve them"

"This employee is depriving a village somewhere of an idiot."

"This employee should go far, and the sooner the better"

"Got a full 6-pack, but lacks the plastic thing to hold it all together"

"A gross ignoramus - 144 times worse than an ordinary ignoramus"

"He certainly takes a long time to make his pointless"

"He doesn't have ulcers, but he's a carrier"

"I would like to go hunting with him sometime"

"He's been working with glue too much"

"He would argue with a signpost"

"He has knack for making strangers immediately"

"He brings a lot of joy whenever he leaves the room"

"When his IQ reaches 50, he should sell"

"If you see 2 people talking and one looks bored, he's the other one"

"A photographic memory but with the cap over the lens"

"A prime candidate for natural deselection"

"Donated his brain to science before he was done using it"

"Gates are down, the lights are flashing, but the train isn't coming"

"Has 2 brains, one is lost, the other is out looking for it"

"If he were any more stupid, he'd have to be watered twice a week"

"If you give him a penny for his thoughts, you'd get change"

"If you stand close enough to him, you can hear the ocean"

"It's hard to believe that he beat out 1,000 other sperm"

"One neuron short of a synapse"

"Some drink from the fountain of knowledge, he only gargled"

"Takes him 12 hours to watch 60 Minutes"

"The wheel is turning, but the hamster is dead"

What wonderful things!

The pro-Syrian Lebanese government resigns. Israel traces the recent Tel Aviv bombing back to Syrian operatives (or Islamic Jihad, operating out of Syria). Mubarak in Egypt suddenly — after over 20 years — declares that true, open, free multi-party elections will be held. What on earth is going on?

I can only think of one plausible explanation: President Bush's policy of fomenting democracies is working...big time!

Are nukes the worst?

Hearing the news about the suicide bomber in Iraq who killed 100+ people and injured 100+ more got me to thinking... What's worse? Nuclear weapons in Iran, or this "asymmetrical warfare" that's taking such a terrible toll?

While the instantaneous effects of a nuke are clearly worse (tens or hundreds of thousands of people killed), the insidious effects of asymmetrical warfare — if it's successful — might be a larger problem than nukes in the long run. After all, if some rogue country (take your pick) actually decided to use a nuke, I'm pretty sure that that would be the last significant action of whatever government employed (or supported) that action. The world would be shocked into taking concerted action, and they wouldn't be dilly-dallying about. With terrorism (the unfancy name for asymmetrical warfare), this obviously ain't so. The effects keep on going and going and going. It's bad enough for us to read about it, or to see video clips — but try to imagine what it must be like to actually live in the midst of this, day after day. It must be extraordinarily disheartening...which makes me admire the spirit of everyday Iraqi even more. Despite the well-known fact that the terrorists are targeting the government job recruiting centers, and especially those in Shiite areas...the people still keep lining up for those jobs.

Quote for the day

Anyone who stops learning is old, whether twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning today is young. The greatest thing in life is to keep your mind young.

   Henry Ford

Watching Europe implode

The U.S. can sit back and watch Europe implode, says Mark Steyn. You can read his fine column both for insight and for entertainment — only Mr. Steyn could weave "decolletage" into this topic so artfully and amusingly. Here's the heart of his observations:

Most of the so-called constitution isn't in the least bit constitutional. That's to say, it's not content, as the U.S. Constitution is, to define the distribution and limitation of powers. Instead, it reads like a U.S. defense spending bill that's got porked up with a ton of miscellaneous expenditures for the ''mohair subsidy'' and other notorious Congressional boondoggles. President Ronald Reagan liked to say, ''We are a nation that has a government -- not the other way around.'' If you want to know what it looks like the other way round, read Monsieur Giscard's constitution.

But the fact is it's going to be ratified, and Washington is hardly in a position to prevent it. Plus there's something to be said for the theory that, as the EU constitution is a disaster waiting to happen, you might as well cut down the waiting and let it happen. CIA analysts predict the collapse of the EU within 15 years. I'd say, as predictions of doom go, that's a little on the cautious side.

But either way the notion that it's a superpower in the making is preposterous. Most administration officials subscribe to one of two views: a) Europe is a smugly irritating but irrelevant backwater; or b) Europe is a smugly irritating but irrelevant backwater where the whole powder keg's about to go up.

I wonder what it means, to the world and to the U.S., if Mark is right and the European Union "implodes"? I need a glass of wine and a few hours of ponder for that one...

All but won

Jack Kelly is a columnist for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and I've often enjoyed his relatively (for the MSM) clear-eyed commentary. But he outdid himself today with an excellent column that says very straightforwardly what the MSM has claimed all along was impossible: that the war in Iraq is "all but won." Amongst the gems:

It will be some months before the news media recognize it, and a few months more before they acknowledge it, but the war in Iraq is all but won. The situation is roughly analogous to the battle of Iwo Jima, which took place 60 years ago this month. It took 35 days before the island was declared secure, but the outcome was clear after day five, with the capture of Mt. Suribachi.

And this conclusion:

Those who get their news from the "mainstream" media are surprised by developments in Iraq, as they were surprised by our swift victory in Afghanistan, the sudden fall of Saddam Hussein, the success of the Afghan election and the success of the Iraqi election.

Journalists demand accountability from political leaders for "quagmires" which exist chiefly in the imagination of journalists. But when will journalists be held to account for getting every major development in the war on terror wrong?

Jack Kelly is my MSM hero for the day...

Captured: Sabawi Ibrahim al-Hassan

This upstanding citizen was also very much wanted for his support of the Iraqi insurgency.

The news reports I read all either imply or state directly that al-Hassan's capture was an operation run entirely by the Iraqi security forces. If this is true, it's yet another positive indication about their increasing effectiveness. The past couple of weeks have been full of these indications — very good news, as this is the prerequisite to bringing our troops home.

Buried in the AP news report on this story is this:

Iraqi authorities on Saturday said they were close to capturing the country's most-wanted terrorist, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the al-Qaida in Iraq mastermind believed to be behind much of the insurgent violence in Iraq. One of al-Zarqawi's key aides and a man who served as his driver were arrested Feb. 20.

"Al-Zarqawi is very close to falling into the hands of justice and there will be good news in the coming days," Dawoud said Saturday.

Even better news, if true — and yet another positive indicator about the performance of the Iraqi security forces.

The full AP story is here..

Perfect innocence

There was a much married woman who walked into a bridal shop one day and told the sales clerk that she was looking for a wedding gown for her fourth wedding.

"Well", replied the sales clerk, "exactly what type of dress are you looking for?"

The bride to be said: "A long frilly white dress with a veil."

The sales clerk didn't know quite what to say but she finally said, "Frankly, madam, gowns of that nature are considered more appropriate for brides who are being married the first time -- for those who are a bit more innocent, if you know what I mean?"

"Well", replied the customer, more than a little put out. "I can assure you that I am as innocent as the rest of them.Believe it or not, despite all my marriages, I remain as innocent as any first time bride."

"You see, my first husband was so excited about our wedding he died as we were checking into our hotel. My second husband and I got into a terrible fight in the limo on our way to the reception and have not spoken since. We had that wedding annulled immediately."

"What about your third husband?" asked the sales clerk.

"Well", said the woman, "he was a Democrat and every night for four years he just sat on the edge of the bed and told me how good it was going to be."

Quote for the day

Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn't.

   Erica Jong

H-2A on the way!

Japan's enormously expensive space booster program suffered a major setback in 2003 when one booster suffered a malfunction that ended in the mission's failure. Today's launch was the first successful one since that disaster.

Their space program recently got a big boost in funding for two reasons: North Korea's demonstrated missile capability, and China's successful manned space program. Japan, in 180 degree turnaround, recently said they were re-examining the idea of having their own manned program.

You can read all about this launch in this brief article.

What is a favicon.ico?

If your site supplies a favicon.ico file (in Windows icon format), then Internet Explorer (and some other browsers) will display an icon for your site in the address bar and in favorites lists. This has now evolved into a more flexible standard, which you can read about in this good Wikipedia article.

Quote for the day

Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum.
Such are the heights of wickedness to which men are driven by religion.

   Lucretius

First photo

The photo at right is allegedly the first photo ever published on the World Wide Web. The story is reproduced below; here is the CERN site as reference.

Back in 1992, after their show at the CERN Hardronic Festival, my colleague Tim Berners-Lee asked me for a few scanned photos of "the CERN girls" to publish them on some sort of information system he had just invented, called the "World Wide Web". I had only a vague idea of what that was, but I scanned some photos on my Mac and FTPed them to Tim's now famous "info.cern.ch". How was I to know that I was passing an historical milestone, as the one above was the first picture ever to be clicked on in a web browser!"

Silvano de Gennaro

Politics, networking, and process

Michael Barone wrote an insightful article about the differences between the campaigns in Bush vs. Kerry. His thesis is that the Bush team prevailed partly by employing a brand-new, cutting-edge kind of political organization. In particular, it was one that reflects the changes over the past few decades in America. In the middle of the article, Mr. Barone says:

This is not command-and-control management, but management by networking, by holding people accountable and letting them learn from each other how to do better. And in post-industrial America, it got better results than command-and-control management. In crucial states with the largest volunteer organizations, the numbers speak as loud as Giuliani's — turnout rose 28 percent from 2000 in fast-growing Florida and 20 percent in slow-growing Ohio.

The Bush campaign used connections — networks — to recruit volunteers and identify voters. The campaign built on existing connections — religious, occupational, voluntary — to establish contacts. If a Bush volunteer was a Hispanic accountant active in the Boy Scouts, the campaign would reach out through him to other Hispanics, accountants and their clients, and Boy Scout volunteers. Of course, the campaign put much effort into contacting people in religious groups — particularly evangelical Christians, but also Catholics and Orthodox Jews. And the Bush campaign reached out to people with shared affinities who tend to be Republicans. The campaign consulting firms National Media and TargetPoint identified Republican-leaning groups — Coors beer and bourbon drinkers, college football TV viewers, Fox News viewers, people with caller ID — and devised ways to connect with them.

An interesting insight, and one that resonates strongly with me. I work for a small company (about 100 people) whose employees and contractors are scattered all about the globe, from Australia to Estonia. We are exactly the kind of "networked" company Mr. Barone is talking about, and that the Bush campaign emulated. Modern technology and modern social customs enabled this, and the Bush team leveraged it to the hilt. By contrast, the Democratic team was organized in a more traditional and hierarchical fashion Ᾱ which Mr. Barone contends was a significant part of their downfall.

Take the time to read the whole article; it's a good one...

Quote for the day

A cat will look down to a man. A dog will look up to a man. But a pig will look you straight in the eye and see his equal.

   Sir Winston Churchill

Paper money

On February 25, 1862 (during the Civil War), the U.S. Congress passed the Legal Tender Act. The act authorized — for the first time — the use of paper notes to pay the government's bills. This ended the policy of using only gold or silver in transactions.

Colleen has a brand-new baby girl!

Sierra Lynn was born this past Saturday morning, and momma Colleen and baby went home on Monday. All is well, everybody is doing great. Colleen reports that Sierra is "an absolute joy, even if she does keep us awake at all hours." Somehow I'm not surprised that momma feels this way about her new baby!

For those of you who don't know Colleen, she and I have worked together now for quite a few years at two different companies. She is one of FutureTrade's product managers, with lots of very specialized knowledge and skills in some really arcane parts of the trading world — strange things that most people don't even know exists, such as FIX protocol, OATS reports, and the clearing process. She's also one of the FutureTrade folk scattered around the globe: she lives in Florida with her husband, who is a Navy pilot and was one of our brave warriors in Iraq.

All of us in her "FutureTrade family" are vicariously sharing in just the tiniest little bit of her joy and happiness...

Update: Animal cruelty in Lawson Valley

I got a report this evening from someone who drove by the overcrowded, mud-swamp hell farm on Lawson Valley Road. She reports that the sheriff and several animal control personnel and vehicles are on the scene, and the poor animals are being loaded into trucks to be taken away to somewhere safe.

Maybe this will be the good ending to the otherwise very sad story...

Fantastic images from Mars and Saturn

At right is a thumbnail of the most detailed image of Saturn ever taken. If you click on the image, you'll get the full-sized (gigantic!) photo with all the amazing detail intact. This image is what every amateur astronomer wishes he could see through the eyepiece of his earthbound telescope. The picture is actually a composite — a mosaic — of many smaller pictures, all stitched together. The pictures were all taken by the Cassini satellite that is currently exploring the Saturnian system. JPL has a nice write-up about the image here.

Every time I see stunning images like this, I am reminded once again of the high value of these robotic missions as compared to manned spaceflight. Somehow the visual image has far more impact, emotionally, than reading about the results of other instruments that are returning data perhaps even more important than the images. But those images...they are what really gets my imagination soaring. I can use the image as a tool to imagine actually being there, in orbit around Saturn, witnessing in person what this image is showing me. Somehow a graph of (say) ion energy over time doesn't have quite the same impact...

The bottom image at right is yet another fantastic panorama taken by a Mars rover. This time it's Spirit that took the pictures, pausing on its trudge up the Columbia hills toward Larry's Lookout. Once again, if you click on the thumbnail you'll get the original gigantic picture from NASA. The large image is rich in interesting detail of rock formations, boulders strewn about, and the hills through which Spirit is roving. There's plenty of detail to give you a real appreciation of just how far up in the hills Spirit is right now.

I'd give a lot for a (safe) chance to stand there alongside Spirit...

Strange weather continues

Now the storm cells are arriving from the northeast (the opposite of the storms of the last few days). This indicates that the center of the storm has passed us, and we're getting the dregs of the tail-end of it. The lightning terrifies one of our field spaniels (Lea); she runs to be with us, no matter what we're doing, and cowers nearby, trembling pitifully. Our other field spaniel (Mo'i) acts like he doesn't even notice the thunder...

The little bit of rain we've received this afternoon has pushed the gauge up to 12.99 inches for the year...

Mount St. Helens update

The USGS site is well worth exploring — lots of good information, and plenty of photos. I particularly enjoy the VolcanoCam.

The latest report includes this:

Small collapses of hot rock from the south end of the growing lava dome sent several ash clouds upward and over the crater rim during the past 24 hours. Shortly after 3 a.m. this morning a seismic signal from such an event was accompanied by a bright glow that persisted on the VolcanoCam for about 15 minutes. The glow results from the collapse exposing hot, incandescent rock deeper in the dome. Crews are in the field today taking photographs and, wind conditions permitting, dredging rock samples from the lava dome.

The presence of glowing rock got a lot of people's attention, as it indicates that molten lava is very close to surface, and could potentially erupt at any time. From all I've read, none of the geologists are really expecting an explosive eruption (though they're way too cautious to rule that out). What they're really expecting is a nice, quiet, "normal" eruption wherein some lava starts flowing. Of course nobody really has any idea how much or at what rate.

Zero tolerance run amuck

The full story sure sounds ridiculous. In particular:

Rojas said she was shocked to learn that her son was being punished for a Level 4 offense -- the highest Level at the school. Other violations that also receive level 4 punishment include arson, assault and battery, bomb threats and explosives, according to the Code of Student Conduct.

What are these school officials thinking?

A couple of the columnists that I read regularly (James Taranto and his excellent Best of the Web Today newsletter, and Randy Cassingham's hysterical newsletter This is True) frequently highlight these zero tolerance crazinesses. And there is a good web site devoted to exposing these incidents with the goal of changing the zero tolerance policies: ZeroIntelligence.net From their site:

Zero Intelligence is a play on "Zero Tolerance", the knee jerk reactionary policies that plague our school systems. The implementation of a zero tolerance policy is the equivalent of giving up on common sense, reasonability and intellect. All infractions are grouped into types with uniform punishments regardless of the individual facts of the incident. Possession of Advil is treated as if it were equivalent to pushing crack. An honor student with the wrong type of pencil sharpener is punished the same as a known delinquent with a switchblade would be. Improper use of an inhaler leads to arrest as assault with a weapon. It is easy to see why we call these "Zero Intelligence Policies".

The most frightening part of the above paragraph is that all of the examples cited are real. They are not hyperbole or fiction for effect. They all actually happened in various school systems in the United States. These and countless other incidents show just how badly zero tolerance policies fail our children.

Personally, I find these "zero tolerance" policies very disturbing. I can only hope that our young people are born with enough sense to realize that the real world they will face as adults doesn't work the way their schools do. I fear, however, that what is actually happening is akin to some of the other grand experiments we've made with our schoolchildren Ᾱ a disaster in the making that will result (again!) in lowering America's competitiveness with the rest of the world.

Moonlight in Lawson Valley

I got up at about 3:30 am, woken by bright light in my eyes. Looking outside, the light was bright enough for me to see some color in the back yard, from a big, beautiful full moon and skies clear from horizon-to-horizon. The uninhabited hill behind our house had a bright spot near its peak, almost as if someone was up there with a work light. Took me a minute (this was before coffee, mind you), but I figured it out: the exposed rocks are covered with a film of water, and the moonlight was reflecting from that. That film of water could only be coming from a spring, and there's not much of the hill that's higher than those rocks — an indication of just how much rain we've absorbed around here in the past few weeks.

And speaking of rain...the grand total for the year-to-date now stands at 12.95 inches. The National Weather Service is forecasting a "chance of rain" for Monday through Wednesday of next week, but the next few days look like we're going to have nice weather. It will be very nice to see the sun for a few days...

High oil prices

I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, I really hate paying $50 or more to fill up my truck. On the other hand, economic incentive is probably the only way we'll ever get weaned from oil.

If gasoline prices stayed at very elevated prices for a few years, I suspect entrepreneurs and inventors all over the place would be coming up with clever ways to increase fuel efficiency (such as the new hybrids) or to switch to some alternative power source (such as hydrogen derived from solar power). I have no idea what these new inventions might be, but I have a lot of confidence in the cleverness of inventors highly motivated by the profit opportunity. That's the problem I see with low gasoline prices — there's no profit in an alternative that can't be as cheap as that fermented dinosaur you're filling your tank with...

The picture is ripped from the Drudge Report; it's a collection of oil traders gone mad. I suspect this is how they look every day, but how would any of us know?

Do you...Skype?

Skype is a small piece of free software that anybody can download and install on their computer. It lets you make free phone calls over the Internet to anyone else who has Skype. Unlike all the previous attempts to do the same thing, Skype actually works — in fact, it works amazingly well, in some ways better and more convenient than a telephone. To use it there are only a few requirements: you must have a computer with audio (sound) capability, you must have a microphone (or better yet, a headset), and you must have an Internet connection (even a dial-up connection will do).

Seventy four million people have already downloaded Skype. You can download it yourself. It's poised to have a big impact (i.e., wipe out) ordinary telephones, as a column in today's Wall Street Journal (subscription required) relates. They make this observation:

Despite all the skepticism that surrounds the notion of giving away (as Skype does) a service that the telecom operators charge for, this is serious stuff. Sure, the "free" price tag alone is for many an unbeatable proposition. (And don't be fooled: There is a lot of money in "free," as many companies have demonstrated in recent years.) It is serious because of what happened during my conversation with Susan. Using Skype's file-transfer feature, we exchanged documents and pictures related to the project we were discussing in real-time. We Googled information and shared it immediately by sending links to one another through Skype's instant-messaging tool. And at a certain point we needed to ask our colleague Alberto for an update. My Skype "buddy list" showed that he was online, probably in his office in Lugano, Switzerland. We suspended the discussion for five seconds, the time it took me to set up a Skype conference call with six clicks, and there we were, the three of us, talking freely and for free across the ocean.

That's what really makes VOIP so potentially disruptive (Skype is just its most aggressive incarnation; I expect it to ignite a VOIP-boom this year). When a phone call becomes a mere application on the network, then it can interact and converge with many other applications and with online presence (the information provided by the "buddy list") to create a rich, dynamic and amazingly flexible communication environment.

As a Skype user myself, I couldn't agree more. Something that article didn't point out is that Skype has a very direct plan to make money: they've set up "gateways" through which Skype users can call ordinary telephone users, and vice versa — and these will not be free. While in the end Skype may cause conventional telephones to disappear, the need for mobile phones (and the gateways) will remain. Sounds like a good business model to me...

Twelve inches!

I peeked at the rain gauge this morning: 12.36" since January 1st. The storm that dumped the most recent several inches on us is forecast to end this afternoon — but now the National Weather service predicts another storm to arrive next Monday!

Anybody know where a good used Ark can be purchased?

How did Jamul get its name?

With a half-hour of googling, I could find very little information on the web about the origins of the name "Jamul". I did locate this site: Silvas in Old Town San Diego, which makes the assertion that Jamul is derived from "hamull", a Kumeyaay word that means "greens used for food". The site says further that the Kumeyaay named places according to what they saw at that place. They make no citations about sources for this information (though there are citations for other things, and a bibliography), so I have no way to judge its accuracy.

As I was doing this research, I happened across a paper posted on the San Diego Historical Society site about a piece of Jamulian history I'd never heard of: the Jamul Portland Cement Works. It's a fascinating read if you're interested in the small details of local history. But a search of the San Diego Historical Society's site led to an even more interesting article about the Jamul Massacre of 1837. I had no idea any such thing had occurred here!

SHA-1 broken

Bruce Schneier reports (on his excellent "Schneier on Security " blog) that SHA-1 has been broken. Many of you have never heard of SHA-1, so a brief explanation is in order: SHA-1 is the most commonly used "cryptographic hash" — a specialized software or hardware function that is used as a kind of building block for many kinds of cryptographic systems. For example, the certificates that your web browser decodes (to let you use secure web sites) depend on cryptographic hashes.

Bruce's posting is an interesting read, and contains a pointer to a short paper by the three Chinese scientists who actually did the breaking. As Bruce points out, the sky is not falling:

For the average Internet user, this news is not a cause for panic. No one is going to be breaking digital signatures or reading encrypted messages anytime soon. The electronic world is no less secure after these announcements than it was before.

But there's an old saying inside the NSA: "Attacks always get better; they never get worse." Just as this week's attack builds on other papers describing attacks against simplified versions of SHA-1, SHA-0, MD4, and MD5, other researchers will build on this result. The attack against SHA-1 will continue to improve, as others read about it and develop faster tricks, optimizations, etc. And Moore's Law will continue to march forward, making even the existing attack faster and more affordable.

Jon Callas, PGP's CTO, put it best: "It's time to walk, but not run, to the fire exits. You don't see smoke, but the fire alarms have gone off."

The bar in the (forever) ongoing war between the cryptographers and the cryptanalysts just got raised a bit higher. It reminds me a bit of an earlier technological battle that I participated in, between the copy protection vendors and the folks (like me) who found ways around their clever tricks. Whatever the underlying technology, physics, and mathematics, there always seem to be either mistakes made or unexpected vulnerabilities uncovered that allow the "other side" room to exploit. But there is a huge difference with the cryptographic systems: the world generally (cryptanalysts aside) takes the efficacy of cryptographic systems for granted as they're used every day for secure web browsing, digital signatures, and the like. These systems protect transactions involving immense sums (in aggregate, I mean), and they protect the privacy of all of us — even if you don't use the Internet, information about you is all over it.

So this was for me a somewhat discomfiting news report. The good news, I suppose, is that the team who first managed to break SHA-1 (at least I hope they were the first!) is more interested in publishing their results than they are in exploiting them. Let's hope that's a continuing phenomenon in the cryptographic wars...

Tornadoes in San Diego County?!

What's next? Locusts? Frogs? Volcanic eruptions? From the National Weather Service:

Bulletin - Eas Activation Requested Tornado Warning National Weather Service San Diego CA 248 PM PST Tue Feb 22 2005

The National Weather Service In San Diego Has Issued A

* Tornado Warning For... Orange County In Southwest California This Includes The Cities Of... Westminster... Tustin Foothills... Tustin... Stanton... Santa Ana... San Juan Capistrano... San Clemente... Placentia... Orange... Newport Beach... Mission Viejo... Laguna Niguel... Laguna Hills... Laguna Beach... Irvine... Huntington Beach... Garden Grove... Fullerton... Fountain Valley... El Toro... Dana Point... Costa Mesa... Anaheim Extreme Northwestern San Diego County In Southwest California This Includes The City Of Oceanside... San Onofre

* Until 345 PM PST

* At 247 PM PST... National Weather Service Doppler Radar Indicated A Severe Thunderstorm Capable Of Producing A Tornado 8 Miles South Of Dana Point... Moving North At 25 Mph. Spotters Have Indicated Funnel Clouds And Waterspouts With This Area Of Storms Which Will Likely Move Onshore Over The Next 45 Minutes To An Hour.

* The Tornado Is Expected To Be Near... Newport Beach By 300 PM PST Dana Point By 305 PM PST San Juan Capistrano By 310 PM PST San Onofre... And San Clemente By 315 PM PST

The Safest Place To Be During A Tornado Is In A Basement. Get Under A Workbench Or Other Piece Of Sturdy Furniture. If No Basement Is Available... Seek Shelter On The Lowest Floor Of The Building In An Interior Hallway Or Room Such As A Closet. Use Blankets Or Pillows To Cover Your Body And Always Stay Away From Windows.

If In Mobile Homes Or Vehicles... Evacuate Them And Get Inside A Substantial Shelter. If No Shelter Is Available... Lie Flat In The Nearest Ditch Or Other Low Spot And Cover Your Head With Your Hands.

Lat... Lon 3371 11810 3317 11737 3337 11740 3347 11753 3369 11747 3393 11791

Eleven inches!

Woke up this morning (again!) to the sound of gentle rain falling. Looked at the rain gauge, and...we've now had just over 11 inches for the year-to-date. And it's still raining, and the weather service is predicting two to four inches more for this storm.

Debi and I took a short drive through our valley late yesterday afternoon, just to see what the rainfall's effects had been. Every dirt road (and there are lots of them out here) has erosion gullies on it, and streamlets running through or along them. A friend's property that normally has a dry streambed running through it now has a raging stream, eroding away the banks and falls at a visible rate. And the creek running through Lawson Valley is at levels we've never seen in our six+ years living out here. In some places, culverts under driveways have been overwhelmed, and the creek is flowing over the driveway as if it were a ford. Where the main road traverses the creek, so far the bridges and culverts aren't threatened — but you can see how they might be if we got even more rain! If that should happen, we have an alternate way out of the valley, up a four-wheel drive road that doesn't cross any streams. We normally think of that road as our "fire escape" — but it may turn out to have other uses...

Betting on the hockey stick

The recent questions raised about the notorious "hockey stick" graph (by scientist Michael Mann) are gaining just a little bit more public traction than have other questions raised about global warming over the past few years. Dr. Mann's graph purports to clearly show global warming, and one can imply from the timing of the "warming" that the impact of human activity is at fault. But first amateurs (reminds me of the blogs!) and then mainstream scientists have started to raise questions about Dr. Mann's methodology. The usual response to these sorts of questions in the world of science is to make your methods available for peer review — something that Dr. Mann is apparently refusing to do. Of course, this raises all the more question, as there is no legitimate reason to withhold this information.

In an opinion piece on Friday, the Wall Street Journal briefly tells the story of Dr. Mann's graph, including the extraordinary impact his graph — because of its "clarity" — has had on the impetus behind responding to global warming. They summarize:

But the important point is this: The world is being lobbied to place a huge economic bet — as much as $150 billion a year — on the notion that man-made global warming is real. Businesses are gearing up, at considerable cost, to deal with a new regulatory environment; complex carbon-trading schemes are in the making. Shouldn't everyone look very carefully, and honestly, at the science before we jump off this particular cliff?

Well, that's a valid point all right — $150 billion a year is not chump change by any measure. Of course we should be sure of the science before we place this particular bet (or any like it).

But perhaps a more interesting issue is this: how do we avoid having this sort of tempest-in-a-teacup in the first place? Why is global warming being treated as though it were proven fact, instead of what it really is: an intriguing theory?

I am not a scientist, and I don't even have an opinion about whether global warming is in fact occurring. But it seems to me fairly obvious that the scientists who are investigating global warming have a clear vested interest in the world having great concerns about it. It is this great concern, after all, that causes governments and philanthropic organizations to cough up vast amounts of cold, hard cash for targeted research. Surely it's true that before the scary bogeyman of "global warming", scientists studying climatology didn't have nearly so effective a grant-generating tool. And equally surely, not every scientist (or their manager) is unaffected by this fact. Does anyone doubt that the climatologist whose work spectacularly supports global warming (like Dr. Mann) finds it easier to get grants than the climatologist whose work casts doubt on it? This is a classic setup for producing biased results — a system of incentives for those who produce one outcome, and disincentives for those who produce the other.

And it's exacty what we — the country and the world — don't need: biased information (whether it is flawed or not) to base vital policy-making on. Surely there must be a better way...

Ten inches!

Looked at my rain gauge a moment ago, and we've just crossed ten inches for the year. Yahoo!

Self-portraits from Mars

Spirit and Opportunity have been roving on Mars for over a year now, doing lots of great science. Both of them are long past their design lifetime, and are off on extraordinary unplanned exploration. Spirit is climbing some low mountains, hoping for both informative geology and a good view. Opportunity just finished thoroughly exploring a small crater, and after that found it's own heat shield and studied that. It's now off on a long trek across the mostly featureless plains its on, in the hope of making it to another crater.

Spirit is in pretty good shape, but is suffering from a few problems of old age. For example, it has a "sticky" wheel that sometimes drags a bit. And it has an intermittently shorted wire that is so far not causing any problems, but could. Spirit also has a coating of dust on its solar cells that reduces the amount of power they provide. This dusting of the solar cells was expected, and in fact was something that the mission planners thought was likely to be what finally killed off the rover — but so far, the coating is much less than expected and is not causing major problems. Occasionally the operations planners include relatively quiet days to let Spirit's batteries charge up, but that's about the only impact of the dust.

Opportunity, on the other hand, is surprising everybody. Not only is it still in tip-top shape, but it also inexplicably has far less dust than even Spirit! Also, photo observations have shown that the dust has been somewhat mysteriously cleaned off a few times during Opportunity's travels. Explanations proffered have included kindly Martians, dust devils, vibrations while travelling on steep hillsides, and (probably most likely) convenient gusts of wind. Whatever the causes, Opportunity is doing great — and there's good reason to hope that it can trek a few miles across the plains to visit another crater.

The two self-portraits at right (Spirit on top, Opportunity on bottom) were made by using the panoramic camera that each rover has. If you click on them, you'll get truly enormous high-resolution versions that are suitable for printing or making Windows desktop backdrops from. These panoramic cameras are mounted on a mast sticking straight up out of the middle of each rover. The mast was mostly intended to give this camera a little extra visual range. But that same mast allows pointing the camera straight down and taking a whole series of pictures (each covering a small piece of the rover) that can be laid side-to-side to make up a complete self-portait, like a mosaic. Software that's readily available even to amateur photographers (called "stitching" software) allows putting all these images together to make seamless composite images, and that's what the JPL folks did to make these. That's also why the images have such a strange shape — the rovers only took the small pictures where the rover would actually be in the picture.

In my opinion, the twin rover missions to Mars are great examples of federal government money well spent — as opposed to the enormously expensive and relatively unproductive manned space missions. The Mars mission is one that I cannot imagine attracting commercial interest sufficient to fund it, though the commercial world would certainly be interested in providing the vehicles, support systems, and services involved in such a mission (and of course to some extent private enterprise is involved). But the Mars missions have hard-core science as their objective, and they are abundantly delivering on that. To the extent we believe government should be funding pure science, such missions are excellent candidates. The manned missions, by comparison, are pathetic. There's little justification for them in terms of the science delivered, and even less justification when their stupendous cost is factored in. There may — may — be more plausible justification from a commerical angle. But if that is truly so, then private enterprise would do a much better job of funding and executing it. For all these reasons, I am very much opposed to a government-funded manned space program...

Of Moonbats and Leftist Loonies

Trying to figure this out led me on quite a googling expedition — there are hundreds of thousands of hits on the word "moonbat", nearly all of them from recent political blog postings. I kept getting distracted by intriguing phrases, like "AutoRantic Moonbat" and "barking moonbat", and "moonbat central". The challenge was to find anything that wasn't part of the blogosphere. I didn't find much:

    "Moonbat" is the name of a painting.

    A U.S. military plane (a night bomber) was once nicknamed "Moonbat".

    Lots of people have named their cats "Moonbat".

For me, the term made instant sense the first time I read it. "Moon" conjures up the crazies that come out in the full moon, and "bat" conjures up "batty" and all its related terms and phrases. Fits very nicely to those the term is applied to! It strikes me as one of the least contrived of the new words I've run into recently...

Several sites led me to either Little Green Footballs or Libertarian Samizdata (both are great blogs) as the originators. Wikipedia gives the nod to the latter, and just over two years ago:

Moonbat is a pejorative political slogan coined in 2002 by Perry de Havilland of "The Libertarian Samizdata," a libertarian weblog. The term enjoys great currency in the libertarian blogosphere, where it is used to disparage modern liberals, peace protestors, and other ideological opponents. SEE ALSO: Feminazi, Idiotarian.

Definitions

1. "Someone on the extreme edge of whatever their -ism happens to be." (de Havilland )

2. "someone who sacrifices sanity for the sake of consistency" (Adriana Cronin)

3. "... human whose cerebral cortex has turned to silly putty causing him or her to mentally slide down the evolutionary ladder to the level of a winged rat who is influenced by the moon and wants to suck your blood. Also not-so-affectionately known as a "Democrat"." (www.barking-moonbat.com F.A.Q)

4. Not liberals, but leftists. Whereas liberals are patriotic, leftists seek to undermine their national strength. Anti-war protestors, likely to call the US military "nazis," apt to blame the 9-11 attacks on a US government and Zionist conspiracy, are moonbats. Liberals who oppose the war, are not.

5. A poster at the liberal/progressive website Democratic Underground.

Whatever the actual origins of the word, it's a winner in my book...

Negotiated peace with Baathists?

Time reports that multiple back-channel contacts are occurring, with the aim of both sides being a negotiated peace.

The consensus of the folks I've read seems to be that the bulk of the Iraqi insurgents fall into just two categories: they are either the former elite in Sadaam's reign (Baathist Sunnis), or they are al-Qaeda followers of al-Zarqawi. The Baathist's clearly have good reasons to settle down: they are Iraqis in their own country, and they see their insurgency failing with the obvious success of the recent elections. There have been numerous press reports of Sunnis admitting that their voluntary non-participation in the election was a huge mistake.

Suppose for the moment that the negotiations succeed (there are numerous obstacles). What then? Will this have a significant impact on al-Zarqawi et al? I'd sure like to think so, but I don't have much to go on about the two groups' interdepencies, or lack thereof.

Time has this to say about what the Baathist insurgents are asking for at the negotiating table:

What do the insurgents want? Top insurgent field commanders and negotiators informed TIME that the rebels have told diplomats and military officers that they support a secular democracy in Iraq but resent the prospect of a government run by exiles who fled to Iran and the West during Saddam's regime. The insurgents also seek a guaranteed timetable for U.S. troop withdrawal, a demand the U.S. refuses. But there are some hints of compromise: insurgent negotiators have told their U.S. counterparts they would accept a U.N. peacekeeping force as the U.S. troop presence recedes. Insurgent representative Abu Mohammed says the nationalists would even tolerate U.S. bases on Iraqi soil. "We don't mind if the invader becomes a guest," he says, suggesting a situation akin to the U.S. military presence in Germany and Japan.

This all sounds much more reasonable than I would have expected, and therefore I can't help but feel hopeful about it. A negotiated peace, if it actually held, can't possibly be bad news.

A little rain

We've had nearly ten inches of rain since January 1st, an amount that comes close to setting a record for all of recorded history. This year is already in the top ten for rainfall records, and there's no sign of it stopping.

Those of you who live where water falls out of the sky with some regularity (as in New Jersey, where I grew up) may be hard-pressed to understand how profoundly wonderful this rain is for us desert rats. In late 2003, the horrific wildfires in San Diego County made it to within a couple of miles of our house. Those fires were fed by the tinder-dry chapparal wood (both the abundant dead brush and the living plants). Those plants were so dry because we've had six years of terrible drought. This rain is soaking the chapparal -- you couldn't set it on fire if you tried!

Of course there were other major contributing factors to those fires, most especially the fact that we humans have been putting all the fires out for 50+ years, and the fuel load had accumulated way beyond anything Mother Nature would have permitted. In all previous history, random wildfires keep the fuel load to a sane level.

The wonderful, wonderful rains have turned our hills emerald green. Lush mosses have erupted on every shaded rock. Grass is growing exuberantly where just a couple of months ago was only reddish, dusty dirt. New growth is already popping on many plants, fooled into sprouting early by the rain and warmer-than-usual weather. And birds we haven't seen since the drought began (such as pine siskins) are back.

So don't believe the news reports that make Southern California look like it just got tsunamied. That picture is just about as accurate as the media's prediction that John Kerry would win. Sure, there are some people that have been hurt or killed by storm-related events -- but not many. The vast majority of us are staring out the window at the gentle rain with nothing but good cheer and thankfulness in our thoughts...

Caution: Puns!

Two vultures boarded a plane, each carrying two raccoons. The stewardess stops them and says "Sorry sir, only one carrion per passenger.

NASA recently sent a number of Holsteins into orbit for experimental purposes. They called it the herd shot round the world.

Two boll weevils grew up in N Carolina. One took off to Hollywood and became a rich star. The other stayed in Carolina and never amounted to much-and naturally became known as the lesser of two weevils.

Two Eskimos in a kayak were chilly, so they started a fire, which sank the craft, proving the old adage you can't have your kayak and heat it too.

A three-legged dog walks into an old west saloon, slides up to the bar and announces "I'm looking for the man who shot my paw."

Did you hear about the Buddhist who went to the dentist, and refused to take Novocain? He wanted to transcend dental medication.

A group of chess enthusiasts checked into a hotel, and met in the lobby where they were discussing their recent victories in chess tournaments. The hotel manager came out of the office after an hour, and asked them to disperse. He couldn't stand chess nuts boasting in an open foyer.

A women has identical twins, gives them up for adoption. One goes to an Egyptian family and is named "Ahmal" The other is sent to a Spanish family and is named "Juan". Years later, Juan sends his birth mother a picture of himself. Upon receiving the picture, she tells her husband she wishesshe also had a picture of Ahmal. He replies, "But dear! They're twins!! If you've seen Juan, you've see Ahmal!"

A group of friars opened a florist shop to help with their belfry payments. Everyone liked to buy flowers from the Men of God, so their business flourished. A rival florist became upset that his business was suffering because people felt compelled to buy from the Friars, so he askedthe Friars to cut back hours or close down! The Friars refused. The florist went to them and begged that they shut down. Again they refused. So the florist then hired Hugh McTaggert, the biggest meanest thug in town. He wentto the Friars' shop, beat them up, destroyed their flowers, trashed their shop, and said that if they didn't close, he'd be back. Well, totally terrified, the Friars closed up shop and hid in their rooms. This proved that Hugh, and only Hugh, can prevent florist friars.

Mahatma Gandhi, as you know, walked barefoot his whole life, which created an impressive set of calluses on his feet. He also ate very little, which made him frail, and with his odd diet, he suffered from very bad breath. This made him a super-callused fragile mystic hexed by halitosis.

And finally... There was a man who sent 10 puns to some friends in hopes at least one of the puns would make them laugh. Unfortunately, no pun in ten did.

Bush offers to buy Russia, Europe

Scott Ott at ScrappleFace is at it again, with this notion of Bush's mission.

No giggling allowed

Mark Steyn is a wonderful columnist, writing for the London Telegraph and other outlets. His columns often make me laugh right out loud, and always make me think. Today he's posted a column about Bush's upcoming European trip, and why it really doesn't mean anything. As always, it's funny as hell. And the European perspective is interesting to read about. A longish passage from the column:

And now the President himself is on his way, staying up all night on Air Force One trying to master the official State Department briefing paper on the European Rapid Reaction Force, the European Constitution, the European negotiations with Iran, etc. ("When these subjects come up, US policy is to nod politely and try not to giggle. If you feel a massive hoot of derision coming on, duck out to the men's room, but without blaming it on the escargots.") The French Foreign Minister took to calling the US Secretary of State "chère Condi" every 30 seconds. It's doubtful if the French President will go that far, but, if he does, the White House line is that Mr Bush is happy to play Renee Zellweger to Chirac's Tom Cruise ("You had me at bonjour").

What does all this mean? Nothing. In victory, magnanimity – and right now Bush can afford to be magnanimous, even if Europe isn't yet ready to acknowledge his victory. On Thursday, in a discussion of "the greater Middle East", the President remarked that Syria was "out of step". And, amazingly, he's right. Not so long ago, Syria was perfectly in step with the Middle East – it was the archetypal squalid stable Arab dictatorship. Two years on, Syria hasn't changed, but Iraq has, and, to varying degrees, the momentum in Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Palestinian Authority and Lebanon (where the Syrians have overplayed their hand) is also in the Bush direction. Boy Assad finds himself in the position of the unfortunate soldier in Irving Berlin's First World War marching song, "They Were All Out Of Step But Jim".

The EU isn't the Arab League, though for much of the past three years it's been hard to tell the difference. But it, too, is out of step. The question is whether the Europeans are smart enough, like the savvier Sunnis in Iraq, to realise it. The Washington Post's Fred Hiatt compared the President's inaugural speech with Gerhard Schröder's keynote address to the Munich Conference on Security Policy last week and observed that, while both men talked about the Middle East, terrorism and 21st-century security threats, Mr Bush used the word "freedom" 27 times while Herr Schröder uttered it not once; he preferred to emphasise, as if it were still March 2003 and he were Arab League Secretary-General, "stability" – the old realpolitik fetish the Administration has explicitly disavowed. It's not just that the two sides aren't speaking the same language, but that the key phrases of Mr Bush's vocabulary don't seem to exist in Chirac's or Schröder's.

The differences between America and Europe in the 21st century are nothing to do with insensitive swaggering Texas cowboys. Indeed, they're nothing to do with Iraq, Iran, Kyoto, the International Criminal Court, or any other particular issue. They're not tactical differences, they're conceptual.

That last bit is an insight worth pondering.

Cheney to plow a road for Condi?

Captain Ed (of the excellent Captain's Quarters blog) pointed me to this intriguing article at WorldNetDaily's site. In it, Dr. Jack Wheeler reports on a rumor flying around Washington that Dick Cheney will step aside, perhaps citing health concerns. His stepping down would let President Bush (using procedures outlined in the 25th amendment) appoint a new VP to replace him. The rumor is that Bush would appoint Condi Rice, specifically to get her the experience and exposure she'd need to make a credible candidate in 2008.

Just a few hours ago, I posted an opposing take -- one that essentially said there was no way for Condit to gain that needed experience in time for 2008. Is the approach suggested in this rumor plausible? I'd say it might well be, especially if Condi turned in a stellar performance. Though I have to wonder how much of a canvas she'd have to paint on in the VP role, as opposed to the very expansive canvas afforded to her as SecState (but stretching my metaphor a bit, perhaps the canvas at State is not quite the right texture). In any event, it's an interesting speculation. An excerpt below:

Vice President Dick Cheney likely will step down next year due to health reasons and be replaced by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, according to a report by geopolitical expert Jack Wheeler.

On his website, To the Point, Wheeler reports there's a "red-breasted rumor bird" flying around Capitol Hill that has whispered the same thing to most congressional committee chairmen.

"We all know that Dick Cheney has been the best vice president of modern times, perhaps in American history," one such chairman told Wheeler. "And we know that he absolutely will not run for president in 2008. Further, he has an unfortunate history of heart trouble. So let's just say none of us will be surprised if, sometime next year, he will step down from the vice presidency due to his health."

Continued the source: "Should this happen, President Bush would need to appoint his replacement, just as Richard Nixon chose Gerald Ford to replace Spiro Agnew. It is quite clear to us whom the president would choose should he need to: Condoleezza Rice."

I'll be watching this for further developments...

The coffee gets its Tiger

I've been programming with Java 5.0 for several weeks now, and I'm much more impressed with it than I thought I'd be. I expected to find some interesting stuff that wasn't worth the risks (real or perceived) in switching from more mature versions of Java. After just the short experience I've had, I'd recommend that any sizable Java development effort seriously consider switching to Java 5.0. In my opinion, the benefits are so great that they outweigh those risks.

So what's so great about Java 5.0? Well, my favorite new features are generics (very similar to templates in C++), autoboxing (which lets you use basic types even where objects are ordinarily required) and the new for construct that virtually eliminates the need to explicitly instantiate iterators (or the ubiquitous i iteration index). While there are many more things to love about Java 5.0, I'm going to pick on these three and talk briefly about each of them, with some short examples.

Generics. What can I say? They're great! Below is an example of generics used to make a list of strings:

    // here's what you used to do...    List<String> myList = new ArrayList();    myList.add( "test" );    myList.add( new Integer(0) );   // compiles and runs just fine!    String gotIt = (String) myList.get(0);    // and here's what you do with generics...    List<String> myList = new ArrayList();    myList.add( "test" );    myList.add( new Integer(0) );  // won't compile -- sweet!    String gotIt = myList.get(0);

This one feature has greatly reduced the tediousness of using collections, reduced the errors in my code, and increased the readability. And I haven't even started writing my own generified classes yet!

Autoboxing. Autoboxing is a lovely thing. Java 5.0 automatically converts basic types to their equivalent object type when needed, and vice versa. This saves no end of tedium while writing code, and results in much more readable code. For example, the following code would have not have compiled pre-Java 5.0, but now it works fine (and as expected!):

    // before you'd do this...    int x = 5;    Integer y = new Integer(5);    x = y.intValue();    // now you just do this...    int x = 5;    Integer y = x;  // autoboxing instantiates the Integer...    x = y;  // autoboxing does the Integer.toValue()... 

for. With Java 5.0, there's no need to instantiate trivial iterators or index integers. The compiler does all the work for you. An example:

    // before you'd do this...    Iterator it = myCollection.iterator();    while( it.hasNext() ) {        // do stuff...    }    // now you do this...    for( Object o : myCollection ) {        // do stuff...    }    // or before you'd do this...    for( int i = 0; i < myArray.length; i++ ) {        // do stuff...    }    // now you do this...    for( Object o : myArray ) {        // do stuff...    }

Of course you can combine the new for syntax with generics, and that leads to much simpler and more readable code, and less prone to stupid typo errors as well. How many times have you typed that for( int i = 0;... pattern? It feels like about a million times for me! I'm very glad to leave that particular construct behind...

Bloggers will rescue the right

The Guardian has an interesting article by Iain Duncan Smith. Tip of the hat to PowerLine for the link (and some good commentary of their own). I was struck by this passage:

All this should put the fear of God into the metropolitan elites. For years there have been widening gaps between the governing class and the governed and between the publicly funded broadcasters and the broadcasted to.

Until now voters, viewers and service users have not had easy mechanisms by which to expose officialdom's errors and inefficiencies. But, because of the internet, the masses beyond the metropolitan fringe will soon be on the move. They will expose the lazy journalists who reduce every important public policy issue to how it affects opinion-poll ratings.

I've been an avid blog reader since they first started appearing a couple of years ago; certainly all that reading has had a big influence on me. But only after reading the passage above did I stop to think about how much I depend on blogs for timely political commentary. I've just about given up on magazines and newspapers, Wall Street Journal excepted. I read a lot of books, but they're necessarily not quite so immediate. So Mr. Smith's contention rings completely true with me. It's very interesting for this technologist to ponder what the Internet has wrought in this (seemingly) unlikely sphere...

Chirac: Hezbollah's best friend

President Jacques Chirac of France has a remarkable talent for raising my temperature, mostly when he demonstrates his world-class talent for hypocrisy. This week, he did it again.

The issue this week is an old one: France's ongoing refusal to declare Hezbollah a terrorist organization. That Hezbollah is a terrorist organization seems very hard to refute -- the evidence is overwhelming. They are supported by Iran and Syria. They occupy Lebanon in contravention of international agreements (but with the active cooperation of Syria). Hezbollah is widely suspected of having carried out this week's assasination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Hariri.

All right, all right, you say. So Hezbollah really is a terrorist organization. Why do we care whether Chirac will mouth the words? Because...until he does, Hezbollah can legally continue to seek and collect funds in Europe, which they are doing with great success. Of course the other European countries need to make the same declaration, but at the moment they're saying "Why bother?" because France will nix any such decree.

Why is Chirac (in the name of France) taking this position that seems contrary to all common sense? The only rational answer I can see is that France (and/or Chirac personally) has an economic interest in Syria, and Syria has a vital interest in Hezbollah. One hand washes the other, etc.

The Jerusalem Post has an article (free signup required) on the most recent brouhaha, excerpted below:

French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier was noncommittal when pressed to help change his nation's opposition to branding Hizbullah as terrorists during a visit to Jerusalem last week. President Jacques Chirac was more direct in his meeting with Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom on Monday. He said no.

France's argument for its position, that Hizbullah is a political faction in Lebanon, is ludicrous to the point of insult. This "political faction" has thousands of missiles pointed at Israel, is committed to Israel's destruction and is actively supporting Palestinian terrorism and undermining the PA.

Does this mean that if al-Qaida started a political party somewhere that it would no longer be a terrorist organization, no matter how deeply it is engaged in terrorism? How can France ban Hizbullah's television arm, Al-Manar, presumably for fomenting radicalism in France, and turn a blind eye to its doing much more than inciting terrorism against Israel?

The AP and New York Times had this to say:

Meanwhile, the Bush administration is arguing with European governments over whether they should designate the Lebanonbased Shiite group Hezbollah a terrorist organization, American and European officials say.

The disagreement over Hezbollah presents another challenge for President Bush, who will travel to Europe on Sunday on a mission to mend ruptures with Europe over the Iraq war.

In the past two weeks, the officials said, France has rebuffed appeals by both Rice and the Israeli foreign minister, Silvan Shalom, to list Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, which would prevent it from raising funds in Europe through charity groups.

The Europeans are not solidly opposed to listing Hezbollah as a terrorist group, the officials said. The Netherlands, Italy and Poland support the Bush administration’s view, several said, while Germany and Britain believe the issue is moot unless the French change their minds. One European diplomat said other countries were "hiding behind" France on the issue.

It doesn't look to me as if Chirac is actually fooling anybody. When even the rabidly liberal press (NYT) is pointing out your liberal hypocrisy, you know you've raised it to high levels. Meanwhile, the mere sight of Chirac's image raises my blood pressure. I swear Photoshop uttered some gagging noises as I processed the picture above...

Ethics Test Question

This test only has one question, but it's a very important one. By giving an honest answer, you will discover where you stand morally. The test features an unlikely, completely fictional situation in which you will have to make a decision based on your personal ethics.

Remember that your answer needs to be honest, yet spontaneous. Please scroll down slowly and give due consideration to each line.

You are in Florida, Miami to be specific. There is chaos all around you caused by a hurricane with severe flooding. This is a flood of biblical proportions. You are photojournalist working for a major newspaper, and you're caught in the middle of this epic disaster.

The situation is nearly hopeless. You're trying to shoot career-making photos. There are houses and people swirling around you, some disappearing under the water. Nature is unleashing all of its destructive fury.

Suddenly you see a woman in the water. She is fighting for her life, trying not to be taken down with the debris. You move closer. . Somehow the woman looks familiar. You suddenly realize who it is. It's Hillary Clinton!

At the same time you notice that the raging waters are about to take her under...forever. You have two options -- you can save the life of Hillary Clinton, or you can shoot a dramatic Pulitzer Prize winning photo, documenting the death of one of the world's most powerful women.

So here's the question, and please give an honest answer...

.

.

.

.

Would you select high contrast color film, or would you go with the classic simplicity of black and white?

Hillary and the ghosts

Hillary Clinton gets elected President and is spending her first night in the White House.
She has waited so long.....

The ghost of George Washington appears...
Hillary says, "How can I best serve my country?"
Washington says, "Never tell a lie."
"Ouch!" Says Hillary, "I don't know about that."

The next night, the ghost of Thomas Jefferson appears...
Hillary says, "How can I best serve my country?"
Jefferson says, "Listen to the people."
"Ohhh! I really don't want to do that."

On the third night, the ghost of Abe Lincoln appears...
Hillary says, "How can I best serve my country?"
Lincoln says, "Go to the theater!"

Jamulian Weather Radar

A few weeks ago I discovered that the National Weather Service (which has radars all over the U.S.) puts all of its radar data up on the Internet. The data is at most a few minutes old. There happens to be a NWS radar in Poway, which is less than 20 miles from where I live. So...if I could figure out how to read the radar data, I could have my very own radar -- with the convenience of someone else paying for its purchase and upkeep. What a deal!

So I spent a few weekends writing software to grab the data continuously, decode it, and then turn it into something pleasing to view. A reduced snapshot of the result is at right, but you can see the real deal by going to Tom's Weather Radar.

Note: you must have Java installed on your system (you can get it free at the Java site, and my web site is slow so it will take a minute or two for all the frames of the "weather movie" to download. But be patient -- it's worth it!

If you're interested in doing the same thing yourself, you can find out how to do it at the NWS Radar Product Central Collection Dissemination site.

Understated revenge

Mildred, the church gossip, and self-appointed monitor of the church's morals, kept sticking her nose into other people's business. Several members did not approve of her extracurricular activities, but feared her enough to maintain their silence.

She made a mistake, however, when she accused George, a new member, of being an alcoholic after she saw his old pickup parked in front of the town's only bar one afternoon. She emphatically told George and several others that everyone seeing it there would know what he was doing. George, a man of few words, stared at her for a moment and just turned and walked away. He didn't explain, defend, or deny. He said nothing.

Later that evening, George quietly parked his pickup in front of Mildred's house...and left it there all night

Iwo Jima: 60 years ago today

The assault on Iwo Jima must be almost unimaginable to most younger Americans -- the stuff of Hollywood, on an epic scale and full of larger-than-life heroes. Even the famous photo reproduced at right has this unreal quality. And by today's standards the statistics are also hard to accept: almost 7,000 Americans died in this single stupendous battle, and almost 20,000 more were injured. These figures dwarf the casualty figures for the entire war with Iraq...and yet they were but a single battle (albeit one of the most intense) of the much larger war.

Many of the young Americans I work with are sadly ignorant of history. I know several people who had never heard of Stalin until I raised the topic, and others who knew Iwo Jima only through the famous photograph. They had no idea of the sacrifice their parents' or grandparents' generation made in the Great War. Worse, they had no deeply felt belief in what Ronald Reagan unashamedly labeled the evil in the world. This scares me profoundly, as I believe folks this ignorant of historical evil are much more likely to take the road of appeasement...

Hat tip to PowerLine for two links to good articles on Iwo Jima here and here.

Contemporaries of my father (who was in the European theatre) fought in this horrific battle. My uncle was on Saipan during this period, and through his writings (which I am now the custodian of) I have gotten a good picture of what the great Pacific battles were like for the support troops, which is what my uncle mainly was. But most of what I've learned about Iwo Jima comes from reading several books about it, most recently Flags of our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima, by James Bradley and Ron Powers. This is an excellent book; I learned a lot from it, and I was greatly moved by some of the stories it contains.

A slight misunderstanding

When Osama bin Laden died, he was met at the Pearly Gates by George Washington, who slapped him across the face and yelled, "How dare you try to destroy the nation I helped conceive!"

Patrick Henry approached, punched him in the nose and shouted, "You wanted to end our liberties but you failed."

James Madison followed, kicked him in the groin and said, "This is why I allowed our government to provide for the common defense!"

Thomas Jefferson was next, beat Osama with a long cane and snarled, "It was evil men like you who inspired me to write the Declaration of Independence."

The beatings and thrashings continued as George Mason, James Monroe and 66 other early Americans unleashed their anger on the terrorist leader.

As Osama lay bleeding and in pain, an Angel appeared. Bin Laden wept and said, "This is not what you promised me."

The Angel replied, "I told you there would be 72 Virginians waiting for you in Heaven. What did you think I said?"

The "young psyche"

An excerpt from an email sent to me by a young friend:

Also I did some research on the "young" psyche in general. Basically the "millennial" generation which is born from 80's to now vs.. the generation before that of course. They say "our" generation, meaning mine I guess, suffers from the "Self-Esteem" movement. Where we were taught to be strong and never let anything get you down blah blah blah. Well, it seems that this "philosophy" has developed an impervious shield in our brain in that "you're wrong" and I'm not. Always have a sense of "entitlement". Never really see "themselves" as imperfect or wrong. When I learned of this it hit right on the nose. I act in this manner sometimes. And I never looked at it within myself. I hate to mention this Tom, but I'm afraid for the "millennial" future. I've noticed a lot of college grads nowadays feel they're entitled to the highest position and most pay because they have years of schooling and high self-esteem, and leadership skills etc. I don't want to go too much into this but I hope you know what I mean.

I know exactly what he means. For me (probably because most of my friends are as gray as I am) the impact is mostly in the workplace. For example, I once had a very bright young woman working for me as a software engineer. She was a few years out of school, ambitious, and a very hard worker. But she had a habit of turning in work that was just plain unacceptable, for the old-fashioned and quaint reason that it didn't function correctly. This young engineer was completely unperturbed by the fact that her work product was useless -- and she really could not understand why I was critical of her because of that. After all (as she told me very directly), she had worked diligently on her project, pouring her best efforts into it. For that reason she believed she deserved a promotion and a raise, and she very forthrightly demanded that I provide those rewards. She equally forthrightly demanded that I stop my silly insistence on judging her value to the company by the quality of her work -- as clearly the quality was an irrelevant factor! This incident was the first time I ran into the "young psyche" in such an unambiguous way (though I've run into it many times since). I was quite taken aback, and engaged her in a long conversation about her mindset. In the end, we mutually concluded that her beliefs had been fostered by her schooling, all the way through her Masters degree (from UCSD, no less). If I am to believe her, she had never once in her schooling been truly held accountable for the quality of her work. Not once! Instead, she was judged by how hard she tried (my characterization, not hers -- though as best I could tell, that was the meaning she conveyed).

As someone famously said (George Carlin?), I don't want to ride in an airplane designed by someone like that...

Condi for President?

In the past couple of weeks there has been quite a bit of noise about Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice being a winning Republican candidate for President in 2008. Probably Dick Morris has been the most forceful proponent, claiming that Condi would be the perfect candidate to run against presumed Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. Several of my correspondents also see this as a winning matchup, including a friend of mine who is a recovering liberal and happens to be young, black, and male -- and is not buying into the liberal rants about Condi. And I have to admit that the idea of someone so well-equipped intellectually is attractive to me as well.

But...

An article by Steven Warshawsky (Beware the Condi bandwagon) makes a good case for why Condi would not make a good candidate in 2008. It's an interesting read, and raises some important issues. Most importantly he raises good questions about Condi's demonstrable ability and lack of experience with executive leadership. Food for thought...

Hat tip to Michelle Malkin for the Warshawsky link...

Reagan Quotes

Here's my strategy on the Cold War: "We win, they lose."

The most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help.

The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant: It's just that they know so much that isn't so.

Of the four wars in my lifetime none came about because the U.S. was too strong.

I have wondered at times about what the Ten Commandments would have looked like if Moses had run them through the U.S. Congress.

The taxpayer: That's someone who works for the federal government but doesn't have to take the civil service examination.

Government is like a baby: An alimentary canal with a big appetite at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other.

If we ever forget that we're one nation under God, then we will be a nation gone under.

The nearest thing to eternal life we will ever see on this earth is a government program.

I've laid down the law, though, to everyone from now on about anything that happens: no matter what time it is, wake me, even if it's in the middle of a Cabinet meeting.

It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first.

Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

Politics is not a bad profession. If you succeed there are many rewards, if you disgrace yourself you can always write a book.

No arsenal, or no weapon in the arsenals of the world, is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women.

Cassini and Huygens

Over seven years ago (in October 1997) the Cassini/Huygens mission was launched. Cassini is the main satellite; Huygens hitched a ride on it. Between the launch and December 2004, the satellite used several planets as "slingshots" to boost its speed, until finally it arrived in the vicinity of its target: Saturn (and its largest moon, Titan). Just before Christmas, Cassini -- after seven years in the harsh conditions of interplanetary space -- fired its engines in a picture-perfect maneuver to put itself into orbit around the ringed planet.

Since its arrival in the Saturn "system", Cassini and Huygen have been making non-stop observations. They've generated huge quantities of data with far better sensitivity and resolution than anything ever collected before about Saturn. The photo at right is a great example: the moon Dione (which nobody had ever seen as more than a smudge before) with Saturn as a backdrop. BTW, you can click on the picture to see the Cassini/Huygen home page.

In January, Cassini flew near Titan and released Huygens on a trajectory that would end up with Huygens landing on the surface of that mooon. Huygen's journey was a scientific and technological marvel. It spent seven years turned off, as it depended on battery power and those batteries would only last a few hours. After it was released by Cassini, a simple timer inside Huygens told it when to switch on -- just a few moments before it plunged into Titan's thick methane-soup atmosphere. Then in a very precisely choreographed series of actions, Huygens used a heat shield, multiple parachutes, and in-air (so to speak) maneuvers until finally it was swinging below it's main parachute, slowly descending towards Titan's surface. And nobody knew what that surface would be composed of, so Huygens was prepared for anything from solid rock to liquid hydrocarbon. As it turned out, Huygens landed on something with the consistency of mud, and was able to take hundreds of photographs and instrument readings on the surrounding very interesting territory. Talk about Mr. Toad's wild ride!

There are dozens of triumphs already in the Cassini/Huygens mission, and many more to come. To date it has operated nearly flawlessly, and it is in perfect condition. I visit the mission web site almost every day to catch up on the latest amazing discoveries. Even though I'm used to the apparent general disinterest in science and technology (and I know I'm over-generalizing here), I've been very surprised how little interest most people seem to have with this mission. And I'm at a loss to explain why -- it seems to have all the elements of drama and action that would attract interest. What am I missing?

Animal cruelty in Jamul

For several months now, many folks who live in Lawson Valley (which is near the town of Jamul) have been driving by a small farm that was obviously mistreating its animals. The small fenced-in area was so small that every square inch of ground had been turned into mud by the hooves and defecation of the livestock (cows, horses, and mules) that were kept there. The number of animals was clearly far too high for the space they had, and the animals were suffering.

Well, yesterday fate caught up with the owners. Apparently they were away from home when the cows escaped. Someone called animal control, and that led to a visit by the police. The animal control officers and the police discovered starving dogs, the carcases of at least two cows, and much evidence of mistreatment and cruelty. We're informed that the owners have been given 72 hours to reduce the number of livestock and animals on the property to a reasonable quantity. In addition, they've been told to get veterinary care for those animals that need it. Local folks are rallying to find "foster homes" for the animals, and it looks like there are plenty of volunteers.

Sounds like a happy ending to a terrible story, right? Well, I'm not so sure we should be feeling good about this. We all (and I include myself as a guilty party) could have done something earlier -- and we probably should have, given the obviousness of the situation (if you've taken even one drive by that farm anytime in the preceding few months then you know exactly what I'm saying). Why didn't we do something months ago? I don't have a good answer for that one...