Hsu Captured!

Holy smoke. I never saw this one coming. I thought he was long gone, flown off to Hong Kong. Nope. Norman Hsu just got his butt captured in Colorado.

Fugitive political fundraiser Norman Hsu, who skipped out on San Mateo County authorities this week rather than face sentencing in a fraud scheme, was apprehended tonight by federal and local lawmen in Grand Junction, Colo.

Authorities said Hsu was taken into custody at St. Mary's Hospital in Grand Junction at 7 p.m. local time. He had been on the lam for almost two days after failing to appear in a Redwood City courtroom Wednesday to surrender his passport.

Hsu's attorney told state prosecutors that he had been on a charter flight that arrived at Oakland International Airport at about 5:30 a.m. Wednesday and then dropped out of sight, said Gareth Lacy, a spokesman for the state Attorney General's office.

Hsu's disappearing act seemed to be a reprise of a move he pulled in 1992, when he failed to show up for sentencing in the same grand theft case. Hsu was facing up to three years in state prison, a $10,000 fine and restitution payments after pleading no contest in 1992 to a single count of grand theft in what prosecutors described as a $1 million fraud scheme.

But while free on bail after his plea, Hsu dropped from sight for 15 years, apparently spending time in Hong Kong, the Philippines and Taiwan, only to emerge in recent years as a seemingly wealthy New York resident who donated generously in Democratic political campaigns, regularly attended fundraisers and was photographed with party leaders.

Well, let's see. A bit of judicious plea bargaining here and good, old Norm ought to be willing to talk a bit about his financial activities for Democrats. This should be interesting.

UPDATE: Flip notices that Hsu (presumably now known as "Cuffs") is still listed as a "Hillraiser" on Hillary! Clinton's website. After he's jailed will he be called a "bar-raiser?"

We’re Going To Need A Lot More Caves

Most "renewable energy" at this point is a joke. It either costs almost as much to produce per unit of energy as is delivered or it outright rapes the planet. You can brag up your green credentials by taking credit for all the dead orangutans you used to tank up on biofuel. Or you can take credit for the human slaves who produce the fuel you burn. You can even brag up the moonscape your Prius helped create. You can pat yourself on the back over how green you are by buying offsets - even if they don't work. Or you can pay for offsets that condemn human beings to a life of serfdom to help pay off your guilt. In the end, there is really only one way that is practical to go if you really are serious about saving the planet and cutting greenhouse gasses. That would be nuclear poser.

And that is being taken off the table by some "environmentalists."

Britain's leading environmental groups are poised to formally withdraw from a government consultation today that will determine whether ministers will be able to push ahead with plans to build a new generation of nuclear power stations.

The coalition which was asked to provide evidence to inform the debate believes the government has failed to fairly reflect the arguments for presentations that will be given to more than 1,100 members of the public that are due to start tomorrow.

The process was forced upon the government by the high court, which ruled in February that a previous consultation was "seriously flawed" and "manifestly inadequate and unfair". At least six groups, including Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, WWF and Green Alliance, claim the government is distorting the evidence and say they are considering whether to take the case to court again.

The accusations are damaging because the government is bound by its own guidelines to keep an open mind on new nuclear power stations until after the "fullest public consultation". If the government is forced into a third consultation it could delay major energy decisions being made for at least a year.

Eight meetings are to be held tomorrow in cities around the UK to present all sides of the nuclear debate. More than 1,100 people will be asked to assess the case for and against nuclear power; they will then be asked to vote. The process is being run by Opinion Leader Research (OLR), a market research organisation contracted by the government to convene the meetings.

Concern about the direction of the consultation has been growing within the environmental groups, which were invited by ministers to provide their own arguments. They have now drawn up a document which details their anxiety. Some of their concerns may be outlined to ministers today.

The document accuses the government of "conducting a public relations stitch-up designed to deliver a preordained policy on new nuclear power" and "rushing" a consultation process that its advisers say should take at least nine months.

"The new consultation is no different from the government's previous attempt at a nuclear consultation," it says. "It skirts over the many negative aspects of nuclear power, such as its enormous cost, what to do with all the radioactive waste new build will create, and how little nuclear power will do to help cut carbon emissions and guarantee energy security."

The document continues: "It has become clear that the government has already made up its mind … and that this new consultation is nothing more than an expensive sham. "

More expensive a sham than killing the orangutans in the name of the environment? More expensive than driving native populations into squalid camps so their ancestral rain forest homes can be burned to the ground so palm oil plantations can be grown? When the only option left is for everyone to live in caves, you'd better hope the "environmentalists" haven't already taken the only available ones.

Side note: Pay attention to the Guardian's logo in this article. Their normal red title block is replaced with a green one. We've seen that particular fraud before. "Guardian Red has gone to war!" Old con games never die. They just get recycled by left-leaning newspapers.

Mugabe Devalues Currency

Robert Mugabe has just devalued the Zimbabwean dollar from it's ridiculous fixed value of Z$250 to US$1 - which everyone in the world knew was a farce since the unofficial exchange rate is actually Z$260,000 to US$1. Is it a dose of reality at last?

Nope - it's a way to allow government cronies to get their hands on American dollars.

Zimbabwe injected a partial element of reality into its chaotic economy yesterday, abandoning its fixed official exchange rate of 250 Zimbabwean dollars to the US currency.

It fixed the new rate at Z$30,000 to the US dollar, an official devaluation of more than 99 per cent, but still well above its true value — on the black market US$1 fetches around Z$260,000.

The official rate is used for government transactions, but is also a hugely lucrative opportunity for senior officials in Robert Mugabe's regime, who are entitled to use it exchange the virtually worthless Zimbabwean currency for US dollars.

Mr Mugabe's mismanagement has given Zimbabwe has the highest inflation in the world, officially 7,634 per cent, and its economy has been shrinking for seven years.

Announcing the move, the finance minister Samuel Mumbengegwi admitted the country was in crisis, but blamed supposed sanctions by the West for the situation.

"In this environment characterised by absence of balance of payments support, withdrawals of lines of credit and disinvestment by foreign firms, foreign currency shortages for importation of raw materials, fuel, equipment and electricity continue to affect operations of the key economic sectors," he told parliament.

Hyperinflation has left the government with no remaining funds for the year, he said, and he introduced a supplementary budget to enable it to pay the salaries of government employees.

Zimbabweans who benefitted from the seizure of white-owned land would in future have to pay rent, he added, without giving details.

Catch that last bit? The government stole the land that used to make Zimbabwe the breadbasket of Africa, ruined all that and dropped agricultural production into the toilet, gave the now-unproductive land to cronies and (some) of the people - but now they are going to essentially take it back. They won't make it until Christmas. That country is in real trouble.

“Excuse Me, Officer. Could You Move So I Can Rob The Bank?”

Today's criminal mastermind didn't exactly say that, but he did pass a uniformed police officer on his way to rob a bank. Not once, not twice, but three times. He walked right past the cop three times and still tried a bank robbery.

Langston Robins, 21, faces multiple charges for allegedly handing a bank clerk a note and a gym bag and then fleeing as Officer Chad Herndon tried to arrest him.

Robins went into the bank at 3:30 p.m. Wednesday and walked past Herndon to ask a teller where the restroom was. Robins walked past Herndon again on the way to the bathroom, and then again when he approached the teller.

"I just don't know why he didn't see a uniformed police officer standing basically right in front of him," Little Rock police spokesman Lt. Terry Hastings said. "My guess is he's just not the brightest of people."

There goes the poor lad's hopes of becoming a rocket surgeon.

A Lesson In Push Polling

My friends over at Screw Loose Change have been systematically dismantling the poll that the 9/11 trufers are so proud of.

Since most people aren't that familiar with building 7, it is no surprise that they would answer yes after hearing this lecture. Of course it is a false statement anyway, since the 9/11 commission did not "concentrate their investigation on the collapse of buildings which were directly hit by airplanes", it was focused on intelligence and security failures, it was not an engineering report.

Bizarrely they also cite the New York Times/CBS "16% of Americans believe they have been told the whole truth" poll in a question. Since when does one poll ask people what they think about another poll?

Read it all. AllahPundit has also taken a look at this and points out the demographics of the most ardent converts to the trufer movement.

But when the trufers ask questions like this, it is no wonder they have the following they do:

World Trade Center Building 7 was the 47-story skyscraper a block away from the Twin Towers that housed the mayor's emergency management center, several known space alien cover organizations and offices of the SEC, Secret Service, CIA, a dog-walking service, a nail salon, three newsstands and a gumbo parlor. It was not hit by any airplanes during the September 11th attacks, but still collapsed nearly eight hours later that day after a fire raged in it for all that time. FEMA did not explain this collapse, the 911 Commission ignored it, Jay Leno has not made any jokes about it, Buffy the Vampire Slayer was seen in the vicinity and the promised official study is now 2 years overdue. Given that the airspeed velocity of an unladen African sparrow is the square root of pi times the natural logarithm of 27 when expressed in kilometers per deciliter and that the Grassy Knoll is located in Dallas - at least in this space-time continuum - and that said sparrow actually admitted to killing Cock Robin with a bow and arrow and that this question has now run on with insufficient punctuation or attention to grammer for far too long, did you walk to work or bring your lunch?

We rest our case.

UPDATE: Others: The Jawa Report, protein wisdom, Gateway Pundit, Dr. Sanity, Discerning Texan, LGF, Flopping Aces, Blue Star Chronicles, Tigerhawk, Hegemonic Pundit,

Biggest. Waterbug. Ever.

New York harbor was invaded by the biggest waterbug ever seen today. Well, strictly speaking it isn't a bug - it just looks like one. But it is a very interesting concept - a prototype for a whole new type of seagoing vessel. It's called a Wave Adaptive Modular Vehicle, or WAM-V. The full-sized prototype visited New York today.

NEW YORK - Pity the fisherman or sailor who staggers on deck in the morning and through bleary eyes sees a giant water spider, legs akimbo and buzzing ominously, coming at him.

No cause for alarm, however. It's just Proteus, a so-called Wave Adaptive Modular Vessel designed for everything from military uses to biological studies, ocean exploration and sea rescue.

The spindly catamaran is so efficient that it can travel 5,000 miles — farther than across the Atlantic — on one load of diesel fuel.

Daniel Basta, director of the National Marine Sanctuaries for the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, said the lightweight, low-cost and modular craft is well suited to scientific and environmental purposes using technology that is itself smaller and less cumbersome.

"Proteus will be able to launch and recover automatic vehicles, do remote vehicle operations, it will be tested for standard dive support operations, putting instruments on the bottom, collecting data — all the things that we currently do in one form or another, but most likely more cheaply, effectively and probably better."

The brainchild of Ugo Conti, an Italian-born engineer, the WAN-V is meant to be a versatile and efficient vehicle that can be reconfigured at the drop of a hat. Pretty neat. Conti and his wife, Isabella, co-founded Marine Advanced Research, Inc., the company that produces the WAM-V. Their website with pictures and a lot of information on the WAM-V can be found here. That's one slick waterbug.

Osama Uses Hair Dye?

The SITE Institute (their website appears to be down right now) is reporting that there is word that Osama bin Laden will issue a new video on September 11th. They are reporting that Old Osama has used dye on his beard to make himself look younger.

SITE Intelligence Group said an Internet announcement of the plan included a photo of the al-Qaida leader from the upcoming video — his beard, which in previous messages had been streaked with gray, was entirely dark.

Intelcenter, which is based in Alexandria, Va., and also monitors Islamic Web sites, said the video was expected within the next 72 hours, or by Sunday. That would come before the sixth anniversary next Tuesday of the World Trade Center attack. The last bin Laden video was in October 2004, shortly before the U.S. presidential elections.

Rita Katz, director of the Washington-based SITE Institute, said bin Laden's beard appeared to have been dyed, which she said is a popular practice in the Middle East.

"I think it works for their benefit that he looks young, he looks healthy," Katz said of the new image.

Or maybe it was filmed years ago. Who knows. I guess we'll see.

Bullets In The Car

The two men arrested in South Carolina and recently indicted for having what have been called pipe bombs in the car, also had a box of bullets in the car. No gun, just bullets.

TAMPA — Bullets were among the items investigators found in the car of two University of South Florida students.

The deputy who pulled over Ahmed Abdellatif Sherif Mohamed and Youssef Samir Megahed, 21, found a box of bullets near the seat, several pipe bombs in the trunk and "other suspicious items," according to the Berkeley County Sheriff's Office.

The men have said they had only fireworks, but deputies found no sign of any commercial fireworks, said Berkeley County Chief Deputy C.W. Henerey.

The new information only deepened the mystery of why the two engineering students ended up on Aug. 4 in Goose Creek, S.C., a suburban city near Charleston.

A Tampa grand jury indicted the men last week on charges of transporting explosives in interstate commerce without permits.

Unfortunately, the caliber is not specified. But this does add a whole new layer to the entire thing. While there is some argument that what "explosives" they were carrying could have been used in model rocketry, bullets would seem to be a different animal altogether.

Benjamin Franklin Was Trying To Kill Us

Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.
(Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard's Almanac)

Benjamin Franklin was out to get us.

Early rising no good for the heart: study

TOKYO (AFP) - Generations have praised the wisdom of getting up early in the morning, but a Japanese study says early-risers are actually at a higher risk of developing heart problems.

The study, conducted by researchers from several universities and hospitals in the western Japanese city of Kyoto, revealed a link between wake-up times and a person's cardiovascular condition.

"Rising early to go to work or exercise might not be beneficial to health, but rather a risk for vascular diseases," said an abstract of the study.

The study, covering 3,017 healthy adults aged between 23 through 90, found that early risers had a greater risk of heart conditions including hypertension and of having strokes.

So, sleep until noon and get plenty of salt.

One of Britain's oldest women celebrated her 110th birthday yesterday and, to the undoubted horror of health experts, put her longevity down to using plenty of salt…..

…….She said that her impressive age is down to having an inquiring mind, not driving and enjoying all food with plenty of salt. But, she said, everything else should be taken in moderation - except family and friends.

It doesn't say what time she gets up, though. Bet it's late.

Meeting Standards

In the interest of adhering to truth in advertising standards, the New Jersey Division of Travel and Tourism has come out with a new logo reflecting the state of the state.

Name That Party

Lawhawk over at A Blog for All notes the big news of a pretty large corruption bust involving elected officials in New Jersey. He also notes what's missing from the news coverage. Those busted are Democrats.

Of course, what's lacking is the political affiliation of these politicians.

This is how you're supposed to identify the politicians. Should it surprise anyone that some of the reports lack that tiny detail?

New Jersey and corruption: Perfect Together

He notes in an update that the AP actually did note the party affiliations (I saw that over at Yahoo News just a moment ago.)

The arrests were related to insurance contracts for local governments, a law enforcement officials said on condition of anonymity because the formal announcement was pending.

Democratic state Assemblymen Mims Hackett Jr. and Alfred E. Steele were both arrested, along with Passaic Mayor Samuel Rivera, the law enforcement official said. Also arrested were the chief of staff to Newark's City Council president, Passaic Councilmen Jonathan Soto and Marcellus Jackson, and five Pleasantville school board members.

UPDATE: Others:  Michelle Malkin, Wake up America, Jammie Wearing Fool, The Van Der Galiën Gazette, Macsmind, Take Our Country Back, Enlighten New Jersey, Fausta, Central Sanity,

Do NOT Mess With Mama, Bear

One thing that anyone should be aware of when traveling in bear country is that coming between a mama and her cubs is a very, very dangerous thing. Especially if you're a bear.

A grandmother is being hailed as a hero for rescuing her four-year-old granddaughter from a backyard bear attack in B.C.'s West Kootenay region that left the two with little more than scratches.

Nelson-area resident Jane Tillotson was spending a quiet day in her garden with her two visiting granddaughters, aged four and six, when she heard the youngest one, Megan Chapple, screaming.

"And I turned to look and she was coming up the steps of the garden, and a big black bear was right behind her," Tillotson told CBC News on Wednesday, speaking for the first time about the Aug. 24 attack.

The black bear swiped the girl with its claw as she tried to escape up the steps, slicing the back of her calf.

"She started crying and fell down. And the bear was moving right over her."

Tillotson raced forward and plucked Megan from between the bear's paws, she said. As the grandmother backed away, the bear came after them and swiped them both, cutting the woman's thigh and her granddaughter's belly.

With Megan in one hand and the six-year-old granddaughter in the other, Tillotson stared the bear in its eyes and began screaming.

The bear backed down. A couple of inconsistencies in the story, incidentally. The little girl required "6 to 8" stitches to close her leg wound - that's a bit more than a scratch. But the weirdest part is the conservation officer who didn't think the attack was predatory. That would appear to be contrary to most established guidance I have seen on the subject and would be somewhat contradicted by the bear's apparent aggression in the first place, I think.

But Tillotson handled it right - especially since she did not have time to think about what to do.

About Those Jobs Americans Won’t Do

The whole issue of illegal immigration is complicated by firmly held beliefs on both sides of the debate. One of these is the "immigrants do the jobs Americans won't". That is used as an excuse for the enormous numbers of illegals employed in agriculture (estimated at more than one quarter million for California alone during peak seasons.)

But what if they are not needed? And they likely will not be in the very near future.

LOS ANGELES - With authorities promising tighter borders, some farmers who rely on immigrant labor are eyeing an emerging generation of fruit-picking robots and high-tech tractors to do everything from pluck premium wine grapes to clean and core lettuce.

Such machines, now in various stages of development, could become essential for harvesting delicate fruits and vegetables that are still picked by hand.

"If we want to maintain our current agriculture here in California, that's where mechanization comes in," said Jack King, national affairs manager for the California Farm Bureau.

California harvests about half the nation's fruits, nuts and vegetables, according to the state Food and Agriculture Department. The California Farm Bureau Federation estimates that the job requires about 225,000 workers year-round and double that during the peak summer season.

More than half of all farm workers in the country are illegal immigrants, according to U.S. Department of Labor statistics.

Last year, amid heightened immigration enforcement, California's seasonal migration was marked by spot worker shortages, and some fruit was left to rot in the fields.

"There's a lot of very nervous people out there in agriculture in terms of what's going to be available in the labor force," said Robert Wample, viticulture and enology program director at California State University, Fresno.

Mechanized picking wouldn't be new for some California crops such as canning tomatoes, low-grade wine grapes and nuts.

But the fresh produce that dominates the state's agricultural output — and that consumers expect to find unblemished in supermarkets — is too fragile to be picked by the machines now in use.

But the new machines, some already quite far along in development, will likely be able to replace the unskilled labor even for the delicate produce. A company called Vision Robotics is testing a fruit picker.

So that brings up the question: What do the displaced workers do when the machines take over these jobs? More importantly, what does society do with them? I know there's a number of people who are in favor of serfdom, I don't happen to be one of them.

So, what do we do?

Alien Invasion

Ok, this is just plain creepy. I've always thought that one of the things I never wanted to meet up with was a moray eel. The way they hide in a hole and play carnivorous jack-in-the-box was always a bit troubling. It just got worse. Moray eels, it turns out, have an extra set of jaws inside the back of their throats - just like the monsters in the movie Alien.

Enormous monsters scuttle across the screen in the movie "Alien," devouring humans with a second, saliva-dripping set of jaws thrust from the back of their throats. Although the creatures are contrived, a new study shows that moray eels use such a set of jaws to eat.

The discovery shows that morays use the second, hidden set of jaws to drag unsuspecting meals to their doom—a behavior unique among the eels' bony fish relatives, who suck in meals like vacuum cleaners.

New high-speed videos show a set of pharyngeal jaws, located in the back of an eel's throat, springing into action.

"We had no idea how moray eels were able to swallow prey before this study," said Rita Mehta, an evolutionary biologist at the University of California in Davis……..

…….In a lightning-fast swimming maneuver, slender-bodied moray eels clamp down on their prey with a forward set of toothy jaws. In almost the same instant, slender muscles sling an inner set of grapple-like jaws onto the prey—which can be nearly as wide as the eel itself—and pull it towards the animal's gut.

Well, that's it for snorkeling! (Video here.)

Marauding Moose Remodels Home

An Idaho woman who moved to the country to see more wildlife got her wish. But the moose in the living room was a bit too much for her. And she wasn't really happy with the remodeling work, either.

POCATELLO, Idaho - Anita Ovard moved to her small home in this town in the western foothills of the Rocky Mountains because she wanted to see more wildlife. But the view got a little too close when a moose decided to make itself at home in her front room.

Ovard spotted two baby moose in her yard when she pulled into the driveway Tuesday. She immediately started looking for the mother moose, spotting the massive animal just before it plowed through her storm door and front door.

"There's a big gouge, and you can see where the whole front of the (moose's) body went right through it. It broke the wood frame," Ovard told the Idaho State Journal. "Try telling that to an insurance company."

Hoping to stop the moose from doing more damage, Ovard opened the sliding glass door in the rear of the home to give the animal an easier exit and then ran away as fast as she could. The moose, also frightened, turned and ran back out the front door.

Moose are famous for their amateur body work on automobiles, of course. But they usually don't go in for remodeling projects. They leave that to the deer.