Lebanon On the Edge

They are standing on the very brink of the precipice in Lebanon right now. Hezbollah, loyal puppets to Syria and Iran, plan mass demonstrations next week to bring down the government. It appears that they will go ahead with this even though Hezbollah has an appalling record for actually be able to understand the repercussions of their crappy decisions.

A political crisis has been brewing for weeks with the pro-Syrian Hezbollah demanding more say in a government dominated by ministers from an anti-Damascus coalition.

The anti-Syrian camp's rejection of that demand means Hezbollah will now work to bring down Prime Minister Fouad Siniora's 16-month-old government. Siniora's allies say Hezbollah's real aims are to block an international court into the killing of former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri.

"We are heading for a confrontation," a senior political source close to the opposition said. "The room for a political solution is very, very tight.

"There is no room other than going to the street," he said.

The mood in Lebanon is already volatile.

Hundreds of angry Shi'ite Muslims took to the streets in a Beirut suburb on Thursday to protest at what they said were insults against Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah at the funeral of an assassinated anti-Syrian minister the same day.

Nasrallah himself had to appeal for the protesters to disperse before the late-night demonstrations ended peacefully.

All six opposition ministers — five Shi'ites and a Christian — quit Siniora's government this month after the majority coalition refused to include enough pro-Syrians in the 24-member cabinet to give the opposition effective veto power.

The pro-Syrian forces are trying very hard to derail the UN trial. Which is kind of odd, when you think about it. What conceivable use has the UN been up until now? Something to think hard about there, isn't it?

Sinking Fast

Sometimes I wonder if it is already too late to save Britain. Earlier, I linked to an article that told about two uniformed Royal Marines who were denied admittance to a bar because they were in uniform and because the bar did not want "aggressive" people on the premises. That is a bad sign. This one is even worse.

I’ve just spent hours with the police (after a nearly two hour wait to actually see a police officer), telling and re-telling every detail of what happened to me today, and I’m in no mood to blog it all. What I will say is this to my female readers: Don’t be fooled into thinking that, just because you’re minding your own business, some punk isn’t going to decide you need messing with. Sadly, scumbags like this have no problem with launching unprovoked attacks on women. If you dare to wear something as revealing as a pair of Levi’s and a long winter coat, you may not only be physically assaulted but have names like “slut” and “whore” screamed at you on a crowded Tube platform. About fifteen minutes of assault and abuse may pass before anyone watching this happen will say a word, or do anything to otherwise intervene.

Someone will at some point tell me that the best course of action in these cases is to take the unwanted touching and violence and not say a word, just walk away. It’s not really like me to let things slide, though, and I don’t think anyone else should. (I’m talking about confronting people who are probably unarmed; it didn’t actually occur to me to go to the police at all. Antoine told me to do so afterwards, when I rang him and was very shaken and pissed off.)

In broad daylight, in public, two thugs felt bold enough to do this to a woman and nobody said a word. Not allowed to defend herself, indifferent police, who you know will do nothing and cameras monitoring all over. And thugs walk free. But don't wear a military uniform into a bar. This is Britain today.

God help them.

UPDATE: Welcome to vistors from the Carnival of the Insanities. Please do take a look around while you're here.

Mercury Rising

We're having a heat wave! Ok, no, we're not. But you have a very unusual chance to see the planet Mercury against a completely dark sky instead of in the twilight of dawn. That doesn't happen a lot, so here's a chance to say you saw the most elusive of the planets.

If there ever was a planet that has gotten an unfair reputation for its inability to be readily observed it would have to be Mercury, known in some circles as the "elusive planet."

Often cited as the most difficult of the five brightest naked-eye planets to see, because it’s the planet closest to the Sun, Mercury never strays too far from the Sun’s vicinity in our sky.

Mercury is called an "inferior planet" because its orbit is nearer to the Sun than the Earth’s.  Therefore, it always appears from our vantage point to be in the same general direction as the Sun. Thus relatively few people have set eyes on it; there is even a rumor that the great Polish astronomer, Copernicus, never saw it.  Yet it’s not really hard to see.  You simply must know when and where to look, and find a clear horizon.

And during these next two weeks we will be presented with an excellent opportunity to view Mercury in the early morning dawn sky [map].

In fact, if you’ve been an early riser this past week, it’s quite possible you might have stumbled across Mercury on your own.  Since Nov. 20, it has been rising at least 90 minutes before sunrise, which is also just about the same time that morning twilight is beginning.  If you scan low along the east-southeast horizon about 45 minutes before sunrise, Mercury has been visible as a distinctly bright, yellowish-orange "star." 

The best views of Mercury, however, are reserved for this weekend, as Mercury will be rising more than 100 minutes before the Sun.  This is even before the break of dawn, so for a short while at least, Mercury will be visible against a completely dark sky. 

Its greatest western elongation—or greatest angular distance from the Sun in the sky—will come on the morning of Nov. 25, with Mercury standing a full 20-degrees from the Sun. 

Mercury, like Venus, appears to go through phases like the Moon.  Soon after it moved into the morning sky, Mercury was just a skinny crescent.  Currently, it’s appears roughly half-illuminated and the amount of its surface illuminated by the Sun will continue to increase in the days to come.  So although it will begin to turn back toward the Sun’s vicinity after Nov. 25, it will brighten a bit more, which should help keep it in easy view over the next couple of weeks. 

I plan on taking this opportunity myself. I have never seen Mercury in the night sky before.

Warning To Firefox Users

Disable your password autosave feature at once. This is very serious and applies to people using Microsoft Internet Explorer. But is is most likely to hit Firefox users.

The problem, known as a reverse cross-site request, or RCSR, was first discovered by Robert Chapin, a Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer (MCSE) and I.T, consultant. The RCSR appears on blogs, message boards, or group forums that let users add comments with embedded HTML code.

On sites that allow users to enter code, a hacker can embed a form that tricks the user's browser into sending its username and password information to the hacker's computer. Because the form is embedded on a trusted Web site, the browser's built-in antiphishing protection, which is designed to alert users to fraudulent Web sites, does not detect the problem.

Even worse, hackers can make the deceptive form invisible, meaning users can transmit their private data without even knowing it.

Bug #360493

The Mozilla Foundation, which maintains code for the Firefox browser, has acknowledged the problem and named it bug #360493. Microsoft has also admitted that RCSR attacks can affect Internet Explorer, but most reports indicate that Firefox is the more likely target because of the way it stores usernames and passwords.

Neither Mozilla nor Microsoft has released a patch for the problem, but users can avoid RCSR attacks simply by disabling their browsers' autosave features for usernames and passwords. In Firefox, the feature is found in the "Options" window under the "Tools" menu.

Mozilla has indicated that it plans a fix in Firefox version 2.0.0.1 or 2.0.0.2.

As far as I know, my comments here only allow a very few bits of HTML code, but I am not at all certain this could not happen here or at any blog that allows comments. Until the fix is released, do not save passwords on your system.

The Real Estate Agent Who Tells The Truth

"Grubby", "cramped", "dirty" and "having all the charm and poise of a vicar on crack". Highly unusual terms to see when looking at real estate ads. The more commonly used ones refer to "fixer-uppers" which generally translates to "faller downers" or "possible 4 bedroom" which means "one bedroom and three middling large closets". But a real estate agent is making headlines in Britain for using the honest terms instead of the usual secret code words.

Most estate agents describe properties as having development potential or boasting charming character features.

However, Julian Bending is unusually blunt in his approach to selling houses.

In the past, he has described houses as grubby, cramped, and dirty. Other adverts have included descriptions such as "original and grim late '70s conversion"; "the perfect country retreat for a tidy person who likes sheep;" and "would suit witch".

In another, the estate agent warned customers tempted to view a £110,000 house of the property's "pong".

"Dear God it's difficult to imagine a more disgusting house than this," the details read.

Mr Bending, who runs Ralph Bending Estate Agents, in Glastonbury, Somerset, has risked offending local Christian groups with his latest advertisements.

A two-bedroom terrace in Glastonbury is advertised as "having all the charm and poise of a vicar on crack" and at £155,000 is said to be "suitable for a midget".

An elegant stable conversion in Wells is meanwhile ideal for a "vicar with a fetish".

Mr Bending said his descriptions had been popular with both sellers and buyers, who he claimed were fed up with misleading information from estate agents.

Mr. Bending is quite proud of his discovery that honesty works. He also appears to be laboring under the assumption that this is novel. How soon they forget. Remember "Volvos, yes they're boxy, but they're safe".

UPDATE: Greetings visitors from Ace of Spades HQ. Please do look around a bit while you're here.

Losing The Ability

Two Royal Marines just returning from the funeral of a comrade were denied entry to a bar in Liverpool. The servicemen were in uniform.

Two Royal Marines were refused entry to a bar just hours after a colleague's funeral because they were in uniform.

The two servicemen went for a drink at the Walkabout bar in Liverpool city centre following the funeral of Corporal Ben Nowak at the city's Anglican cathedral.

Cpl Nowak, 27, who served with 45 Commando, was one of four people killed in a bomb attack on a patrol boat in southern Iraq on Remembrance Sunday.

His two colleagues, who were among 1,000 mourners at yesterday's funeral, were turned away by staff at the door of the bar. Stunned bystanders shouted at the bouncers and told them to show respect to the servicemen.

Student Ben Booth, who witnessed the event, said he was shocked by what he saw. He told BBC Radio Merseyside's phone-in show: "I spoke to the bouncers and said their colleague had just died in the service of our Government. I am absolutely shocked that people would act this way to our soldiers."

A spokesman for Walkabout said: "As a responsible bar operator, we have a strict policy of refusing entry to anyone believed to be aggressive.

"Furthermore, Walkabout in Liverpool has a strict policy of refusing entry to anyone in uniform due to previous issues with uniformed customers. These policies are designed solely to increase the safety and comfort of all our customers.

Britain is in greater trouble than I even thought. They are rapidly losing the ability to defend themselves and are increasingly disrespecting the people that are defending them. Winston Churchill must be turning in his grave right about now.

Feathered Spies

We here at Blue Crab Boulevard have written about the Salton Sea in California before. Well, it seems that it is not only people who are interested in the shrinking body of heavily polluted water. Oh, no, others have plans for the Salton. In fact, they are busy scouting the area in preparation for a major invasion. The Animal Uprising sent one of their top operatives to check the place out. A Ross' gull normally only found in the arctic turned up there.

The Salton Sea, a 35-mile-long lake stretching across the Imperial and Riverside county line, is a popular stop for birds heading south, and Guy McCaskie, co-author of "Birds of Salton Sea," believed he spotted a Ross' gull there a week ago.

The appearance of the arctic bird nearly 100 miles east of San Diego would be the first reported in California and would place it hundreds of miles farther south than it had ever been seen.

The gull, which normally breeds in Siberia or Greenland, rarely appears south of Alaska, and is only spotted in even the northern part of the lower 48 states every few years.

"It was a really fancy bird," McCaskie said.

McCaskie had seen the bird several times on trips to Canada and Alaska and had seen hundreds of pictures, so despite his amazement he had little doubt it was a Ross' gull.

Still, he wanted witnesses.

McCaskie called bird-enthusiast friends who lived nearby, and they quickly appeared and took pictures. He reported his sighting on the Internet news group Calbirds the night of Nov. 17.

By Sunday morning, bird watchers from around the state were racing to the Salton Sea.

"We thought it was worth a 10-hour drive, even knowing we might not see the bird," San Francisco ornithologist Scott Terrill said. "It's a really good bird."

Uh, a ten hour drive to see a pigeon of the sea? A feathered sea rat? A winged poop machine? You're kidding, right? Oh, Lord. He's serious. (Picture of a Ross' gull here).

Polonium 210 Poisoned Litvinenko

The BBC is reporting that radioactive polonium 210 was detected in the body of Alexander Litvinenko.

Mr Litvinenko's death has been linked to the presence of a "major dose" of radioactive polonium-210 in his body.

Scotland Yard confirmed traces were also found at his home, a sushi bar and a hotel, but the risk to others was said by health experts to be very low.

The Kremlin has denied UK citizen Mr Litvinenko's claims it was involved.

The traces were found at the Itsu sushi restaurant in Piccadilly, the Millennium Hotel, Grosvenor Square, and at Mr Litvinenko's home in Muswell Hill, north London, Scotland Yard said.

Polonium 210 is very, very nasty stuff when ingested. It is also exceedingly hard to get. Naturally occurring polonium 210 makes up about 100 micrograms in a ton of pitchblende (uranium ore). It is most easily made by bombarding bismuth 209 with neutrons in a nuclear reactor. This looks very much like a state sponsored murder.

UPDATE: Others: Fausta's blog, Hot Air, Gina Cobb, JunkYardBlog, Daimnation!, Ace of Spades HQ, Little Green Footballs, The Political Pit Bull , Ace of Spades, Power Line, The Moderate Voice, The Missal,

“We Just Have To Solve It Now”

Peggy Noonan writes on the problem of illegal immigration: "We don't really have to solve the problem forever. We just have to solve it now." Her argument is that we have been swamped with a wave of immigration, legal and illegal, and we simply need to absorb that wave before allowing still more. As she puts it, build a wall, but leave a door in it that can be opened later. Good advice, I think.

You know the facts. Immigrants are here in huge numbers, unlawfully, in the age of terror. They swell the cost of local life–emergency rooms, schools–which has an impact on local taxes. There are towns and cities that feel, and are, overwhelmed. And no one will help them.

The essential reason, I think, is that America's elites don't want America's borders closed. Businesses want low-wage workers; intellectuals are wed to global visions of cross-border prosperity; politicians want Hispanic loyalty and the Hispanic vote. It's not convenient for any of them to close the borders. If Americans on the ground are enduring difficulties over this, it's . . . too bad. This is further eroding America's already eroding faith in its institutions.

I think there are two unremarked elements of the debate that are now contributing to the government's inability or refusal to come up with a solution.

The problem is not partisanship. It is not polarization, not really. Sentiments on this of all issues in the nation of immigrants are and would be complicated, nuanced. The problem is doctrinaire-ness. Even as both parties have become less philosophical, less tied to their animating philosophies, they have become more doctrinaire. The people who should be solving the immigration problem are holding fiercely to abstractions–to big-think economic theory, to emanations of penumbras in the law–instead of facing a crucial, concrete and immediate challenge.

The second element is definitiveness. Our political figures say they have to concentrate on an overall, long-term, comprehensive answer to the immigration problem. So they huff and puff about the long-term implications of this move or that, and in the end they do nothing.

They are like people in a burning house who sit around discussing the long-term efficacy of various kinds of water hoses while the house burns down around them.

Do take a moment and read the whole thing. Noonan opens with a great anecdote about Abraham Lincoln. That alone makes clicking the link worthwhile. But her advice is sound, too. We need time to digest and time for those who have come here to learn to be American. I have said all along, build the wall and many things become very solvable.

But build the wall and control the border first.

Polar Opposite

Daniel Henninger, writing in the Opinion Journal, takes what amounts to the exact polar opposite position of David Ignatius' column in the WaPo. Looking at the apparent retreat into isolationism that people on both the far left and the far right are agitating for, he points out that future presidents will essentially be completely kneecapped by the precedent of a precipitous withdrawal from Iraq. That would be a disaster for the world, not just the US.

It is getting harder to distinguish between animosity toward George Bush and animosity toward the entire American enterprise beyond the nation's borders. As Norman Podhoretz delineated in the September issue of Commentary, columns and articles in journals of foreign policy are equating the tsunami of negativity rolling over Iraq with repudiation of the Bush Doctrine in toto.

One might have expected most of the disagreement to center on the doctrine's assertion of a right to pre-emptive attack. Instead, Iraq's troubles have been conflated with a general repudiation of the U.S.'s ability to abet democratic aspiration elsewhere in the world.

It is certainly possible that the Iraq effort will, in some obvious sense, "fail." Henry Kissinger now says "victory," defined as an Iraqi government gaining political control over the entire country, is not possible. But we might want to think some before we toss out the infant Bush Doctrine with the Iraqi bathwater.

As stated, the doctrine's strategy is "to help make the world not just safer but better." Some conservatives have denounced the "better world" part as utopian overstretch. Beyond that, the document lists as its goals the aspirations of human dignity, strengthening alliances to "defeat" terrorism, working with others to defuse regional conflicts, promoting global growth through free markets and trade and "opening societies and building the infrastructure of democracy."

It is mainly the latter–the notion of the U.S. building the "infrastructure of democracy" that now, because of the "failure" in Iraq, attracts opposition across the political spectrum–from John Kerry to George Will and on out to neoconservatives confessing loss of faith in the Bush team to the unforgiving ear of Vanity Fair.

….

Like the Europeans, we may talk ourselves into a weariness with the world and its various, unremitting violences. No genocide will occur on American soil, but the same information tide that bathes us in Baghdad's horrors ensure that Darfur's genocide will come too near not to notice. Too bad for them, or any aspiring democrats under the thumb of Russia, China, Nigeria, Venezuela or Islam's highly mobile anti-democrats. We've got ours. Let them get theirs.

Does this overstate the buildup of anti-Bush, anti-Iraq sentiment? Will U.S. policy, in the hands of ideologically frictionless bureaucracies, slide forward? Maybe. But even the realists and cynics might concede there has been some benefit, perhaps going back as far as Plymouth Rock, in having one nation standing for the conceit, or even the ideal, that men elsewhere with democratic aspirations could at least count on us for active support. This is the core idea in the Bush Doctrine. If its critics don't start making some distinctions, they may discover that profligacy of opinion in our time carries a very steep price.

We have stood for many years for freedom. Are we really willing to retreat from that lofty and difficult ideal? We have secured or rescued freedom for many countries through the years. Is all that to end? I would rather it did not. I would rather remain an American than become a poor copy of a jaded European.

Indifference

David Ignatius has a column in today's Washington Post that really troubles me. He spends a lot of time exploring the routine use of violence and assassination in Lebanon and the Middle East in general. There is real pain expressed in what he writes. But then, at the end, comes the expression that bothers me so much: "It's not our problem".

I fell in love with Lebanon the first time I visited the country 26 years ago. Part of its appeal, inevitably, was the sense of living on the edge — in a land of charming, piratical characters who cherish their freedom. Lebanon has great newspapers, outspoken intellectuals, a wide-open democracy. It has almost everything a great society needs, in fact, except the rule of law.

Many of the assassins' victims have been colleagues or people I knew as a reporter: Bashir Gemayel, Rafiq al-Hariri, Samir Kassir, Gebran Tueni. I pick up the paper some days wondering who will be next. Among my Lebanese friends, it's commonplace to speak of an assassinated father or son. These brave people live every day in the sights of the assassins. They inhabit a culture of death, yet they go on bravely, robustly — heroically, to my eyes.

The sickness must end. The people of the Middle East are destroying themselves, literally and figuratively, with the politics of assassination. So many things are going right in the modern world — until we reach the boundaries of the Middle East, where the gunmen hide in wait. Those who imagined they could stop the assassins' little guns with their big guns — the United States and Israel come to mind — have been undone by the howling gale of violence. In trying to fight the killers, they began to make their own arguments for assassination and torture. That should have been a sign that something had gone wrong.

….

The idea that America is going to save the Arab world from itself is seductive, but it's wrong. We have watched in Iraq an excruciating demonstration of our inability to stop the killers. We aren't tough enough for it or smart enough — and in the end it isn't our problem. The hard work of building a new Middle East will be done by the Arabs, or it won't happen. What would be unforgivable would be to assume that, in this part of the world, the rule of law is inherently impossible.

So, throw up our hands and walk away? They can't be saved from their own base instincts? They aren't worth the effort? Just withdraw precipitously; the bloodbath that follows, and it will follow as surely as night follows day, can't be stopped because it is just their particular sickness? At one time this nation believed in the spread of freedom and the defense of democracy. Winston Churchill once said that democracy was the worst form of government - except for all the others. Maybe it should be rephrased. Trying to spread democracy is the worst idea in the world. Except for all the others.

UPDATE: Jules Crittenden points out that rather than throwing our hands up, we might better be lending a hand. To Lebanon. And offering the back of our hand to Syria in the process.

A Misdirected Concern

Charles Krauthammer takes a look at Sacha Baron Cohen and an interview he gave to Rolling Stone and wonders what Cohen is thinking. Cohen's "Borat" character is a big hit at the movies using a shtick that reveals, in Cohen's words, "if not anti-Semitism, then "indifference" to anti-Semitism," among Americans. Krauthammer calls this badly misdirected.

Sacha Baron Cohen, the creator of Borat, revealed his purpose for doing that in a rare out-of-character interview he granted Rolling Stone in part to counter charges that he was promoting anti-Semitism. On the face of it, this would be odd, given that Cohen is himself a Sabbath-observing Jew. His defense is that he is using Borat's anti-Semitism as a "tool" to expose it in others. And that his Arizona bar stunt revealed, if not anti-Semitism, then "indifference" to anti-Semitism. And that, he maintains, was the path to the Holocaust.

Whoaaaa. Does he really believe such rubbish? Can a man that smart (Cambridge, investment banker and now brilliant filmmaker) really believe that indifference to anti-Semitism and the road to the Holocaust are to be found in a country-and-western bar in Tucson?

Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world.

With anti-Semitism reemerging in Europe and rampant in the Islamic world; with Iran acquiring the ultimate weapon of genocide and proclaiming its intention to wipe out the world's largest Jewish community (Israel); with America and, in particular, its Christian evangelicals the only remaining Gentile constituency anywhere willing to defend that besieged Jewish outpost — is the American heartland really the locus of anti-Semitism? Is this the one place to go to find it?

In Venezuela, Hugo Ch?vez(sic) says that the "descendants of the same ones that crucified Christ" have "taken possession of all the wealth in the world." Just this month, Tehran hosted an international festival of Holocaust cartoons featuring enough hooked noses and horns to give Goebbels a posthumous smile. Throughout the Islamic world, newspapers and television, schoolbooks and sermons are filled with the most vile anti-Semitism.

Read the whole thing. He's actually pretty gentle in the way he tries to point out that Cohen has this exactly wrong. Americans really are not the ones to be worrying about right now. I have no intention of seeing the Borat movie, personally. There is a certain indifferent mean-spiritedness in the way the movie was put together that bothers me. It's not my kind of humor. But I think Krauthammer is correct here, Cohen might better watch the real anti-Semitism all around the world than worrying too awfully much about the "indifference to" it he sees in America. He may be looking in the wrong places all together.

UPDATE: Others: Done With Mirrors, Soccer Dad, Wake up America, Atlas Shrugs,

Flying Backwards

Today's Washington Post has a story that is kind of ironic. I posted about the Pan Am China Clippers on Wednesday. Those long-ago airliners tried to make the travel experience as comfortable as possible by offering bunk beds and a lounge. In other words, decent amenities. Well it seems that Boeing and Airbus both have figured out that comfy passengers mean happy passengers. Happy passengers are more likely to fly, making for happy aircraft manufacturers who can sell more aircraft.

Well, duh.

Picture this instead: Starting in 2008, major aircraft makers say, the newest planes will feature fresher air, soothing lights and bigger windows. They're even talking about such amenities as showers and bunk beds, while admitting those are less likely to wind up in typical airliners.

Flying through the sky in a cramped tube may never be anyone's idea of heaven, but the world's biggest aircraft manufacturers are building jets that they claim will be more comfortable than ever, inaugurating an era of more tolerable air travel.

Veteran fliers have heard such sales pitches before. They've been promised amenities such as on-board luxury lounges, gyms and restaurants. The proposals often ran into major obstacles: The airlines weren't interested. Struggling to earn a profit, they have been cramming in more seats rather than adding amenities.

This time, however, rival aircraft manufacturers Boeing and Airbus say they've got it right. They're building jets that don't give the airlines a choice on many of the amenities, such as bigger windows, that passengers say they want most.

For the first time, Boeing is even limiting the type of seats airlines can choose to put in coach on its newest jet, forcing carriers to chose from an approved catalogue.

"We are trying to prevent the airlines from reducing the flying experience," said Kenneth Price, a marketing director at Boeing.

The improvements will appear first on Boeing's 787 Dreamliner, the first of which is scheduled to be delivered to customers in 2008. The Dreamliner cabin will be pressurized to a level typical of elevations 6,000 feet above sea level, Boeing says, compared with the current pressure, equivalent to an elevation of about 8,000 feet. Price says studies have shown that improving the cabin pressure significantly reduces headaches and other ailments.

The idea of bunk beds isn't generating a lot of interest from airlines, so those are unlikely, as is the shower. But it does sound as if they are going to limit the airline's ability to try to cram as many people in as possible. That, along with better air quality will help improve the experience of flying enormously. Gee, the China Clippers had it more right than today's crop of airliners seventy years ago. Funny world, isn't it?