You are currently browsing the Terminus Est weblog archives for February, 2007.
February 28, 2007 by mr_flood.
In his continuing effort to keep the Kiddies frothing at the mouth, Kos Sets Himself Up The Bomb, he says:
It sucks for the xenophobic wingnuts when their talking points are contradicted by the facts.
and
So why are we supposed to hate them (illegals) so much?
Well, my learned friend, we’re not against illegal immigration because we’re xenophobic or due to our hate of the brown man. We’re against illegal immigration because, it’s, um, illegal.
Of course, you’re such a blind partisan that it’s impossible for someone to disagree with you and not be DEMON SPAWN, XENOPHOBIC, HITLER YOUTH!!!
Posted in Current Events | 1 Comment »
February 27, 2007 by mr_flood.
Armed with Gore’s utility bills for the last two years, the Tennessee Center for Policy Research charged Monday that the gas and electric bills for the former vice president’s 20-room home and pool house devoured nearly 221,000 kilowatt-hours in 2006, more than 20 times the national average of 10,656 kilowatt-hours.
Geothermal heat pumps located in a central closet circulate water through pipes buried 300 feet deep in the ground where the temperature is a constant 67 degrees; the water heats the house in the winter and cools it in the summer. Systems such as the one in this “eco-friendly” dwelling use about 25% of the electricity that traditional heating and cooling systems utilize
Gore’s response was that he pays a premium for ‘green’ power and buys carbon offsets.
Posted in Climate | 1 Comment »
February 26, 2007 by mr_flood.
I was looking for something to do a couple of days ago and thought I’d go see a movie. After perusing the website for the local area the only thing I saw playing that was remotely interesting was Pan’s Labyrinth. After reading the review, and seeing that it was only playing in one theater at two different times, I knew that it was most likely a foreign language film, which didn’t bother me. I’ve enjoyed quite a few foreign language films over the years, most notably the original Le Femme Nikita. So off I went.
I was actually surprised that I wasn’t the only one in the theater, this being a foreign film, but the theater was far from crowded. Well, the first thing I noticed was that it was filmed using a technique that I’m sure there’s a name for, which I don’t know, but that I did not like. The whole thing was filmed with low lighting, a blue-ish tint (even in daytime scenes), and a sort of ‘blur’ that made everything seem to blend together. I’ve seen this technique used in dream sequences in other movies and understand it’s visual potential but to use it for the whole movie was a bit too much for me. And the lack of color distracted from the fantasy aspects of the movie. When I see fairy’s or fauns I expect them to be colorful creatures, not gray-blue blurs. That being said, I also understand what the director was going for, but for me it just didn’t work.
Second, the story was boring and drawn out. There were moments of tension and suspense but the in-between drama was uninteresting.
Finally, the ending just disappointed me. ***Spoiler alert*** I was expecting a fantasy film and when it turns out that it was all likely just something the girl made up in her head I got pissed off. A great part of a film’s success hinges on properly managing audience expectations and this was done poorly here. Sort of like going to see Stallone in a movie called ‘Kill them All’ and find out it’s about an insecure bachelor trying to excoriate the rabbits from his flower garden and the psychological fall-out of such.
In the end I would say that if your looking for a good fantasy flick this is not it.
Posted in Entertainment | 1 Comment »
February 26, 2007 by mr_flood.
From The Corner, Pat Michaels writes:
Even 17 inches is likely to be high, because it assumes that the concentration of methane, an important greenhouse gas, is growing rapidly. Atmospheric methane concentration hasn’t changed appreciably for seven years, and Nobel Laureate Sherwood Rowland recently pronounced the IPCC’s methane emissions scenarios as “quite unlikely.”
and
According to satellite data published in Science in November 2005, Greenland was losing about 25 cubic miles of ice per year. Dividing that by 630,000 yields the annual percentage of ice loss, which, when multiplied by 100, shows that Greenland was shedding ice at 0.4 percent per century.
“Was” is the operative word. In early February, Science published another paper showing that the recent acceleration of Greenland’s ice loss from its huge glaciers has suddenly reversed.
There’s more so go read it.
Posted in Climate | 1 Comment »
February 22, 2007 by mr_flood.
From Uncommon Descent:
The major claims of evolution are the creation of novel cell types, tissue types, organs, and body plans. These are required to get from bacteria to baboons. No evolution of these by any means has been observed. They simply appear fully formed in the fossil record and can be observed fully formed in living things today. Given the definition of a theory as a well tested explanation there is no theory of evolution but rather only hypotheses of evolution. Until a hypothetical mechanism is observed doing that which it is claimed it can do these mechanisms remain hypothetical. Honest scientists admit this. For example:
“The history of organic life is undemonstrable; we cannot prove a whole lot in evolutionary biology, and our findings will always be hypothesis. There is one true evolutionary history of life, and whether we will actually ever know it is not likely. Most importantly, we have to think about questioning underlying assumptions, whether we are dealing with molecules or anything else.” Jeffrey H. Schwartz, Professor of Biological Anthropology, University of Pittsburgh, February 9, 2007, Source
Brevity is the essence of wit.
Posted in ID | 1 Comment »
February 22, 2007 by mr_flood.
From a front page Washington Post story we get this:
No matter the military merits, the British move, followed by a similar announcement by Denmark, roiled the political debate in Washington at perhaps the worst moment for the White House. Democrats seized on the news as evidence that Bush’s international coalition is collapsing and that the United States is increasingly alone in a losing cause. Even some Republicans, and, in private, White House aides, agreed that the announcement sent an ill-timed message to the American public.(emphasis mine)
And doesn’t that just sum up the problem with our media/politicians very nicely? In other words, pay no attention to how things are progressing on the battlefield, what really matters is the spin. Just another indicator that our politicians are chiefly partisan hacks, with the welfare of our country no where near the top of their priority list.
Posted in Current Events | 1 Comment »
February 16, 2007 by mr_flood.
Well, I’ve been seeing him around on the tele a lot lately and I have to tell you something, he alone acts as if he’s already President. When he speaks you just get the feeling that the guy was born for it and that you just have to vote for him. He seems like an adult, a statesman, and someone you could have a beer with all in one; the others pale in comparison.
Not saying I’m going to vote for him, but I’m starting to think that the more people see and hear of him the more likely he’s going to run away with the thing.
Posted in Current Events | 1 Comment »
February 16, 2007 by mr_flood.
From Eurek Alert:
David Bromwich, professor of professor of atmospheric sciences in the Department of Geography, and researcher with the Byrd Polar Research Center at Ohio State University, reported on this work at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science at San Francisco.
“It’s hard to see a global warming signal from the mainland of Antarctica right now,” he said. “Part of the reason is that there is a lot of variability there. It’s very hard in these polar latitudes to demonstrate a global warming signal. This is in marked contrast to the northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula that is one of the most rapidly warming parts of the Earth.”
and
“The best we can say right now is that the climate models are somewhat inconsistent with the evidence that we have for the last 50 years from continental Antarctica .
“We’re looking for a small signal that represents the impact of human activity and it is hard to find it at the moment,” he said.
Last year, Bromwich’s research group reported in the journal Science that Antarctic snowfall hadn’t increased in the last 50 years. “What we see now is that the temperature regime is broadly similar to what we saw before with snowfall. In the last decade or so, both have gone down,” he said.
But, in the current politicized science environment I’m sure this will be either ignored or dismissed out of hand.
By the way, the theory that the Sun is responsible for current warming predicts that Antarctica will not warm.
Posted in Climate | 1 Comment »
February 15, 2007 by mr_flood.
Mr. Ross’ reality based diplomacy isn’t very, um, real.
From today’s Washington Post we get one of these ‘if I were in your shoes this is what I would do’ sort of article that seem to endlessly bubble up from the armchair quarterbacking sea of folks that swim around the edges of all things political in D.C. This column comes in the form of telling Condi how she should go about negotiating with the Palestinians and Israelis. Heh, sound familiar?
Now, back to my point. First we get
In Middle Eastern terms, what is logical and possible is intra-Palestinian peace and Palestinian-Israeli calm. That would argue for a comprehensive cease-fire to be negotiated between Abbas and Olmert. A deal would require all Palestinian attacks against Israelis to stop and all smuggling of weapons into Gaza or the West Bank to end. In return, the Israelis would stop all incursions, targeted killings and arrests.
My god do I feel like banging a board up-side the heads of these diplomatic tools. This is reality based? Does he really believe that an entity who’s sole reason for existence is the destruction of Israel as a state and the claiming of it’s territory will um, stop trying to destroy Isreal and taking it’s territory just because Israel will promise to be nice to them?
Posted in Current Events | 1 Comment »
February 14, 2007 by mr_flood.
Reading todays NY Times I came across an article describing a new crackdown in Baghdad initiated by Iraqis. The author, Marc Santora, provides us with a fairly good description of what the new plan entails. Of course, in the vein of all modern journalism, he feels the need to balance the article (at least in his mind) by giving voice to those who may feel the plan is ill advised. My problem is with how these journalists provide these opposing voices, read on…
On Tuesday, senior American officers expressed surprise about the plan to resettle people who had moved from their homes amid sectarian cleansing. But they declined to be identified, saying they did not want to contradict the Iraqi general.
General Qanbar indicated that the plan would be carried out evenly across Baghdad. But critics said Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, who has come under intense criticism for pursuing a sectarian Shiite agenda, might be trying to appease his detractors and may not actually carry out the plan. Some feared that his government might not apply the same pressure to residents of Shiite areas.
Notice the slight of hand, the ginning up of opposition? No? Look at these statements:
senior American officers
But critics said
Some feared
You probably read those two paragraphs and thought nothing amiss, so used to this technique we have become. This isn’t reporting, it’s theater. It’s an agenda looking for a script writer. Who are the ’some’, who are the ‘critics’? Your neighbor’s 13 year old son? A disgruntled former government employee? Or perhaps they’re made up from whole cloth, ghosts in his head? With this kind of faux news, one will never know.
Posted in Philosophical Musings | 1 Comment »