Fighting intensifies in Pakistan’s Northwest
If this isn’t out of control already, it’s close.

U.S. to Hand Over Security Duties in Anbar to Iraqi Forces
If this isn’t under control already, it’s close. We’ll see if things hold as US troops pull back.

11 headless bodies found near Mexico graveyard
Why we’re not more concerned about the escalating drug war in Mexico, I don’t know.

War a US election plot, claims Putin
Remarks made right after Russia test-fired a Topol RS-12M missile.

Putin chokes chicken supplies from U.S.
That, my friends, is a terrible headline.

Secret Space Shots’ Hidden Emblems
Secret patch for STS-38.

Pentagon Reports U.S. Airstrike Killed 5 Afghan Civilians, Not 90
I find it hard to believe that someone would inflate collateral damage numbers.

LPD 17 underway after mechanical problems
Only two days late for her first deployment. What a bust so far.

Progress on India’s Thorium Nuclear Reactor and South Africa’s Pebble Bed
Bring it on.

Calculate Your Obama Tax Cut
Includes the WaPo graph from a while back which I meant to post on but didn’t because I still can’t figure out how someone making less than $19,000 could get a $567 tax cut.

MADD – a modern Temperance Movement
Like many causes, this is a tough one because critics of MADD are portrayed as pro-dunk driving. That’s not (usually) the case.

New Climate Record Shows Century-long Droughts In Eastern North America
Who would have guessed that the sun influenced earth’s climate?

First Flight of Sikorsky X2 Demonstrator
I continue to believe that this route, and others, are better than the V-22 Osprey route. Too late.

Tanker Bid Moves Toward Endgame
Endgame. Yah. Right.

As Geothermal Energy Heats Up, 5 Next-Gen Projects Take Shape
Though I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned it before, I’ve wondered about geothermal on a larger scale. My in-laws heat and cool their house with geothermal and have been pretty happy with it. This would be a way to bring energy generation closer to the energy consumer, cutting out transmission infrastructure woes and losses over long distances.

The Palin call
My guess is that McCain gets a big boost from this choice and the fact that his convention is after Obama’s.

More Palin links and commentary
At Instapundit.

McCain Myths
Some true. Some not so much.

CIA Curtails Contract With U.S. Security Firm in Iraq
MVM, Inc. apparently didn’t provide enough security personnel to meet the Agency’s needs.

I’ve got to admit that I don’t know a whole lot about Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and am not ready to offer an opinion either way on whether the choice is a good one policy-wise or not, but I do think that McCain sure selected a lot more of a “hope and change” VP candidate than the “hope and change” presidential candidate.

I also suspect that running a woman for VP will wipe out a lot of the minority advantage that Obama held until around noon today.

I submit that the opening credits of ‘Hawaii Five-O’ is the most awesome in television history:

The pull in to Lord standing atop that building starting at about 0:14 is, itself, awesome.

I remember watching it as a young kid, probably about the same time I also enjoyed ‘Cannon’ and ‘Barnaby Jones.’ We caught an episode last night on CBS.com’s free video section, and I gotta admit that I found the style not only held up, it still seems a bit edgy. I was impressed.

Question: In the episode we watched, “To Hell With Babe Ruth,” McGarrett claims that Japanese pilots had shouted “To hell with Babe Ruth” as they attacked Pearl Harbor. I had never heard of this before, and a quick google returns the episode as the top hit. Other hits seem to indicate that Japanese troops shouted what they supposedly thought was a great insult during banzai charges and such, but I gotta say I am inclined to think it’s an urban legend that may have even started with this television episode. Does anyone know more about this?

Bonus: The episode in question also features actor Mark Lenard, best known for playing Spock’s father in the ‘Star Trek’ shows and films, in a truly scary Japanese get up. I wonder why they chose Lenard, which Wikipedia claims was born in Chicago to a Russian Jewish immigrant, to portray a Japanese ninja rather than an actor from, say, Japan. Unless maybe they had problems finding a Japanese actor to play a man who thought WW2 was still being fought?

Wind Energy Bumps Into Power Grid’s Limits

When the builders of the Maple Ridge Wind farm spent $320 million to put nearly 200 wind turbines in upstate New York, the idea was to get paid for producing electricity. But at times, regional electric lines have been so congested that Maple Ridge has been forced to shut down even with a brisk wind blowing.

That is a symptom of a broad national problem. Expansive dreams about renewable energy, like Al Gore’s hope of replacing all fossil fuels in a decade, are bumping up against the reality of a power grid that cannot handle the new demands.

The dirty secret of clean energy is that while generating it is getting easier, moving it to market is not.

Secret? It’s a secret that the electric power transmission system is at its limit and moving electricity to where it’s needed is a major problem? That’s a secret to exactly who?

This isn’t a problem limited to alternative energy generation either, though you can (sort of) put a coal, gas, or nuclear plant wherever you want while the wind, water, and sun-based generation has to be built in the correct environment.

Heh:

Wind advocates say that just two of the windiest states, North Dakota and South Dakota, could in principle generate half the nation’s electricity from turbines. But the way the national grid is configured, half the country would have to move to the Dakotas in order to use the power.

Meanwhile, Tigerhawk has some thoughts on the issue.

The Truth About Russia in Georgia

Virtually everyone believes Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili foolishly provoked a Russian invasion on August 7, 2008, when he sent troops into the breakaway district of South Ossetia. “The warfare began Aug. 7 when Georgia launched a barrage targeting South Ossetia,” the Associated Press reported over the weekend in typical fashion.

Virtually everyone is wrong.

What I’ve had trouble understanding is why so many people seem to be finding it so difficult to believe that Russia could be anything other than the peacemaker they claim to be.

If the US sent troops into, say, Iranian Kurdistan to “keep the peace” after a group of Kurdish separatists started shooting, how many would perceive the Americans as peace keepers striving for the status quo? No one would, regardless of the truth. And they’d have a pretty good reason not to. Yet the Russians sure seem to be getting the benefit of the doubt in a lot of circles.

It must be because Russia lacks the empire-building history of the United States. That’s the ticket.

A week ago I noted that no one should be surprised that anyone in Mother Russia’s neighborhood might suddenly have increased interest in air defense. Poland finally agreed to basing US missile interceptors on its soil, and part of the deal was the basing of Patriot batteries there, too.

Now, the Turks are getting in on the “beef up air defense” game, having just agreed to a $100 million dollar deal with Ukraine and Belarus for SA-12, SA-10, and SA-15 systems.

They won’t be the last ones we hear about buying increased AA capability.

Veritas Mark IV in Denver prepared for the hippies.

War is Terrorism with a Bigger Budget

Found here. Discuss.

UPDATE: I guess this statement would probably mean that the difference between soldiers and terrorists is the amount of money spent on their equipment. Discuss that, too.

Here’s the headline on Yahoo News: Iraq, US agree no foreign troops after 2011: PM

And the lede:

Iraqi Premier Nuri al-Maliki said on Monday Washington and Baghdad have agreed there will be no foreign forces in Iraq after 2011, setting a timeline for a US withdrawal from the war-torn country.

If one takes the time to read down a ways, though, they’ll see

[Chief Iraqi negotiator Mohammed al-Haj] Hammoud said that while all issues had been addressed in the deal there was a possibility US troops could leave before 2011 or remain beyond the target date.

“There is a provision that says the withdrawal could be done even before 2011 or extended beyond 2011 depending on the (security) situation,” he said.

Even if the withdrawal is completed by 2011, some US troops could remain to train Iraqi security forces, he said

Whoa. Sounds basically like the same old thing that we’ve been pushing for all along, doesn’t it? And though the headline seems to imply that it’s a done deal, it is not.

This fact seems to be lost on one of the fine folks at Reddit: Bush surrenders

No doubt a lot of folks are going to claim the Bush is doing exactly what he criticized Obama, Reid, Pelosi, and other Democrats for wanting to do. But those making such claims are going to be missing (or conveniently ignoring) the fact that the “deadline” being discussed here is completely based upon the situation on the ground and was not brought up by either the US military or the Iraqi government until after the security situation improved drastically. The “deadline” Obama et al. were pushing for was one to be enforeced REGARDLESS of the situation on the ground and was brought up while the security situation was a bad one and neither the US military nor the Iraqi government were talking about US troops leaving.

Don’t expect a headline about that little fact, though.

Deported Mexicans face shattered lives

Over the past five years, deportations from the U.S. to Mexico have jumped 60 percent. As the AP observes, many of those caught up in the immigration crackdown have few ties to their “native” land.

So we’re clear, I don’t care one whit about ties or no ties or whatever. Really.

They’ve got a number of what I guess are supposed to be heart-wrenching stories or something. Blah blah blah.

This is retarded reporting, akin to how we hear about mass killers were treated badly when they were young sob sob sob.

UPDATE: Speaking of retarded reporting, did anyone happen to watch the men’s marathon last night? Those who did were treated to a segment on the lunatic who jumped out of the crowd at the 2004 marathon and tackled the race leader. During the segment, NBC gave the lunatic a chance to say what was on his mind.

Stupid. They should be ashamed of themselves.