the fact that the polls around the time of the invasion of Iraq showed the great majority of Americans believing that Saddam was behind 9/11 and was supplying WMD to terrorists and was an imminent threat to the US clearly demonstrates that it was the American public who convinced the Bushies of that fact and that he needed to invade Iraq, not the other way around. shame on us, for forcing this fine leader into such an error. now if we can only find out who it was who convinced the public of this falsehood.

to all of us who are dads, especially those of us who are human and less than perfect, this is a good lesson as to how our dealings with our screwed up lives 'as best as we can' look to those who are the most affected by them and the least able to defend against the side effects.

the big steel guys aren't bulletproof any more. what's up with that? and starbuck's mad dash to save tigh; what, they forgot how to make cell phones?

i love the show though. it doesn't have to make sense on the detail level to make sense on the big level. whatever that means.

if roslyn is hillary and tighe is mccain, who's obama?

the local (new haven) radio station is quite close to lieberman, he appearing fairly frequently on their AM drivetime program, which doesn't hurt his electability any. so last week, their AM show hit the road to washington, where they broadcast from lieberman's office one morning. who do they have for guests, presumably more due to lieberman's political clout than the pull of a pair of dj's from connecticut; obama? no no no. clinton (either or both)? no no no. Cheney! and Scalia!

it's a drug. it's illegal. it's an illegal drug. it's bad because it's illegal. it's illegal because it's bad. if it weren't bad, it wouldn't be illegal. you're a bad man for using a bad drug which is illegal. i'd write more explaining why i am morally superior to you but i have such a hangover after the big party at work last night. i gotta get a cup of coffee and a cigarette and an aspirin. maybe hair of the dog too.

It's Hillary ca. 1990 all over again. Lots of Americans have Mommy issues.

McCain's campaign has quietly dropped its practice of not allowing anyone to be photographed with him, while wearing Mormon underwear.

i prefer "pogo possum"

this comment tells us a lot more about Rove than about Obama. Poor Karl, you must have had a tough adolescence.

McCain is a navy captain, analogous to a colonel in the army or AF. That's not a real strategic-level position. Hardly a comparison with Gen. Powell, for instance (whether you agree or disagree with him). Just high enough to go up the river and have Martin Sheen sent after you.

there are articles around the net about roasting your beans in an old hotair popcorn popper. haven't tried it myself, though. i would definitely prefer to grind them myself, but i haven't found a burr grinder that lasts. i can't believe that modern metallurgy hasn't yet discovered how to make steel that is stronger than a coffee bean, so i assume it's mass marketing at its massest.

but i still maintain that when the european traders/explorers of long ago found themselves sitting by the campfire in Arabia watching their traveling companions carefully roast these little green beans over the fire and grind them into a paste out of which they made a miraculous beverage, if it would have turned out to be instant coffee, it would never have caught on.

i saw a speaker from the electric company give a glowing talk about the future when we will all drive happy electric cars, back in the early 70s. it all sort of fell apart when folks in the audience started to ask how they could recharge it when they were taking their summer vacations, and it became clear that to the electric company, the electric car was something that you would recharge at night (in the summer at least) when the air conditioners were off and there was excess capacity in the grid to be used at a profit rather than sit idle. so that leaves us with the hybrid, and plug-in hybrid. so we're back to gas and diesel again, but not for everyday use necessarily. depends on how many people can squeeze a day's driving and commuting into whatever a normal overnight plug-in charge ends up being.

as for nukes to provide the electricity, forget it, except for the existing operational plants, whose lifetime can be extended at reasonable cost. the motto for anybody planning a nuclear plant today should be "too little too late, and too expensive too".

for instance, the French company Areva and the German

company Siemens, the best in their fields, are building the world's first "third-generation" nuclear power plant at Olkiluoto, Finland (along with the world's first facility for final disposal of high-level nuclear waste, at last). Definitely state of the art design and construction.

So,"The Finnish Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority has reported a considerable number of quality defects and operational anomalies which have resulted in delays to the project timetable. According to current estimates, the plant will be completed in 2011, two years later than planned, and Areva will probably have to pay substantial fines for the

delay."

note that the most advanced plant being built today

i mean seriously, not rhetorically. if the American public doesn't give a damn about bankrupting their children and grandchildren so's they can have their toys, they're not going to give a damn about screwing the children and grandchildren of the citizens of some poor country on the other side of the world. besides, we can always blame it on the damn chinese, and their damn industry making those toys for us. so, who does that leave to care enough to do anything meaningful?