CrapEx

Got some crap to ship? Send your sludge coast-to-coast overnight by rail! Do what New York City does: Send your human waste to Alabama.

GOODSPRINGS, Ala. - Human waste from New York is creating a stink in rural north Alabama. A Texas company has opened a plant that treats sewer sludge from New York and turns it into fertilizer that is spread on Alabama farmland. It's a great deal for farmers, who get the fertilizer for free, but some in northwest Limestone County say they can't stomach the stench.

"When the wind is right, we can't even breathe," said Lori Muse of Goodsprings. "People out here are really upset about it. It smells 10 times worst than a pig barn."

Bill Daws, a county commissioner, called the odor "the worst smell that I've ever smelled."

"But we've checked everything out and it all appears to be legit," he told The News Courier of Athens, which first reported the flap.

Synagro Technologies Inc. of Houston, Texas, has a contract to dispose of human wastes from New York. The company treats sludge from wastewater plants in New York and ships it to Alabama by rail car by the ton.

The sludge is treated again at a plant in Leighton before it is spread on fields for farmers who sign up for the program, said Rodney Jackson, who investigated the arrangement for the Limestone County Commission after complaints started coming in Friday.

If we lived in Goodsprings, we'd be sorely tempted to send Mayor Bloomberg back some of his gift to the community. So to speak.

Something else to wonder about: railroads, like any other transportation business, prefers not to haul empty cars. What else gets shipped back to New York City in those trains?

Ninja Nanny Goats Golfs

The Ninja Nanny of Decatur is still on the loose, despite going to the local golf course to play a few rounds. A golfer tried goat roper from a golf cart, but the goat was too agile and made a break for it.

Hey, Baasheba, want to play a round of golf?

Apparently not, the goat responded with her actions.

A golfer gave chase in a cart but was not able to catch the elusive goat. Decatur Animal Control didn't have much luck either.

Baasheba, the black nanny goat that has been eluding authorities for about two weeks, was spotted Tuesday in several yards on Fairway Circle Southeast and on the golf course at Decatur Country Club.

With a posse of city animal control officials chasing, the goat left Bruce and Vivian Pylant's backyard, crossed the street and headed for the golf course.

I would have gone with "The Uncatchable Nanny Black" instead of "Baasheba". All this goat needs is a good cape to join The Goat Justice League. Oops, I forgot. No capes.

You May Expect A Visit From Several Armed SWAT Team Members Momentarily

Robin Page, writing in the Daily Mail is in for a "no-knock" visit from a British SWAT team at any moment. Why? Because of the subject matter of the column in question. Killing and eating all of the gray squirrels in Britain. Starting now.

"Ah, aren't they pretty" - that is one of the most popular phrases used by young children and old ladies as they watch grey squirrels in the park on a Sunday afternoon.

Well their reaction is understandable; grey squirrels with their dark oval eyes and bushy tails are certainly "pretty", but to my mind they would be far prettier if they were still confined to North America where they came from in the first place.

When the grey squirrel was introduced to this country by misguided animal lovers in 1876, it was thought to be a welcome addition to British fauna.

In truth it has been a disaster. Not simply because the grey squirrel devours birds' eggs, steals bird food, eats the bulbs in our gardens, ruins our lawns and damages the trees we love, but also because it has driven our indigenous red squirrel - the original Squirrel Nutkin, which is far prettier and much less aggressive than the grey - to the brink of extinction.

So out of hand is the situation that the Department For Environment, Food And Rural Affairs (DEFRA) has come up with a solution. With the help of scientists in the Forestry Commission and the U.S. it wants to develop an oral contraceptive for grey squirrels - to stop the present five million grey squirrels becoming ten million in five years' time.

The problem is that DEFRA will not get its scheme into operation for at least five years and by then it could be too late, because the red squirrel, now mainly holed up in small woodlands in Northern England and Scotland as its American cousin runs riot, could already be extinct.

The solution is quite simply, says Page:

As I say, the answer to the grey squirrel problem is not a fanciful high-falutin' contraceptive, it is far more simple: a proper cull should be organised, not for five years' time, but for tomorrow.

The reasons are clear. Apart from eating the eggs of songbirds and woodland birds, grey squirrels do an enormous amount of damage to growing trees and shrubs, causing million of pounds worth of damage each year. In Dublin's Phoenix Park, they destroyed 80 per cent of the saplings.

The damage to red squirrels is two-fold. The greys chase the reds about aggressively during the breeding season, making them too stressed to breed.

In addition, the greys carry a disease called squirrel poxvirus, which does little harm to themselves, but is extremely contagious and almost always fatal to reds.

In a properly organised cull, the grey squirrels should be trapped, shot and - I know this may offend some animal lovers - preferably eaten.

Squirrels are regularly eaten in the U.S. and it is surely time that Britain's host of celebrity chefs stopped patting each other on the back and did something useful like developing squirrel casserole, baked squirrel, smoked squirrel and squirrel pate.

Now, despite the howls of outrage Page's column will draw, there is one element of truth that needs to be understood here:

The trouble is that where animals and wildlife are concerned, reality has been suspended. In our metropolitan society, all furry animals except rats are sacred whatever damage they might inflict, so none of them can ever be killed. But nature is far more complicated than this.

We are now so divorced from the real world where animals are concerned that, when we buy junk food such as chicken nuggets, we don't pause to think they are made from hens kept and killed in the worst possible conditions.

Now, as to the visit from the police, remember this post from a while back?

The Cumberland News had published an article claiming that incomers from the South were releasing grey squirrels in the area - which prides itself on being one of the last bastions of the red squirrel population.

The Harrows, who used to live in Devon, sensed an anti-southern bias in the story and decided on a light-hearted response.

Mrs Harrow, 59, wrote: "We would like to inform any interested parties that we (formerly southerners) have just returned to our cottage with a crate full of wild grey squirrels from Epping Forest which we would be happy to supply to any other "outcomers", homesick for the South and in need of the odd grey squirrel to make them feel at home."

The Harrows were immediately visited by the police making an inquiry about alleged squirrel abuse. In addition, if the Robin Page who wrote this column happens to be the same Robin Page mentioned in this article, then he should be used to visits from the police over remarks made:

Mr Page, 61, was detained in a police cell after being interviewed about remarks made by him at a country fair at Frampton-upon-Severn, Glos, on Sept 6.

Yesterday, he vehemently denied having made any comment that could be construed as racist during the address, in which he encouraged his audience to attend the Liberty and Livelihood March in London later that month.

Also, please keep in mind that squirrels share a hive mind. They already know what Page has planned for them and are acting accordingly.

2007 Weblog Awards Nominations

Nominations are now open for the 2007 Weblog Awards. The nominations will be open until October 15th. Winners will be announced at the Blog World & New Media Expo in Las Vegas, November 8 and 9, 2007.

Legally Biased

An update on the lawsuit brought by Stewart Dimmock of Britain against the governments distribution of Al Gore's movie, An Inconvenient Truth. The judge hearing the case just issued an informal decision that has an inconvenient truth of its very own: schools must inform students that Gore's film is biased and that students must also consider other theories.

Schools will have to issue a warning before they show pupils Al Gore's controversial film about global warming, a judge indicated yesterday.

The move follows a High Court action by a father who accused the Government of 'brainwashing' children with propaganda by showing it in the classroom.

Stewart Dimmock said the former U.S. Vice-President's documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, is unfit for schools because it is politically biased and contains serious scientific inaccuracies and 'sentimental mush'.

He wants the video banned after it was distributed with four other short films to 3,500 schools in February.

Mr Justice Burton is due to deliver a ruling on the case next week, but yesterday he said he would be saying that Gore's Oscar-winning film does promote 'partisan political views'.

This means that teachers will have to warn pupils that there are other opinions on global warming and they should not necessarily accept the views of the film.

He said: 'The result is I will be declaring that, with the guidance as now amended, it will not be unlawful for the film to be shown.'

It's a bit of baby-splitting. While the court is ordering that schools have to inform kids about the bias, it is not stopping the showing of the movie as Dimmock wanted. But it is finally a court stepping in and saying that there are inconvenient untruths sprinkled through Gore's propaganda film. The funny thing is that Gore's true believers completely ignore Gore's huge financial stake in getting his theories accepted. He stands to get really, really rich through his "sustainable" energy investments. Planet be damned.

UPDATE: Others: The Monkey Tennis Centre, HazZzMat, JammieWearingFool, Moonbattery, Proud to be a Canadian, Copious Dissent,

Why The West Will Not Help Burma

David Warren explains exactly why the west will not do anything about the situation in Burma. It is a short course in how tyrannies actually operate - as opposed to the completely erroneous way some people think the world works.

Looking, through the dusk screen of the media, at the events in Burma, one feels a cold and pointless rage. The vicious regime that has long enslaved that country is again winning a struggle in which they have all the weapons. With the "subtle, malign cunning" (I am quoting Kenneth Denby, writing bravely for the Times of London, from Rangoon) that is possible only to a cat with a cornered mouse, the regime has watched the nation's Buddhist monks lead the people onto the streets. It allowed them nine days to vent their grievances, and is now cutting them down.

But the cutting down has been done with much greater efficiency than after the last demonstrations on this scale, that began August 8, 1988. Perhaps 3,000 were massacred in the course of snuffing out the flame of liberty on that occasion. In this latest reprisal of government against people, it seems only a few dozen have been killed — including the Japanese press photographer, Kenji Nagai, shot down in cold blood to send a message to the other foreign reporters.

We, who do not live under one of the world's thug-socialist regimes, should understand how they operate. Over time, it becomes necessary to kill fewer and fewer people, to keep a population cowed. Yet every generation or so, the people must be forcefully reminded that they are nothing.

This "lesson" to the Burmese people came a bit sooner than the average. But come it did. It is not yet sure how brutal the crackdown was and how high the body count.

Mind you, the west could act. It really could clamp meaningful sanctions on the junta or even possibly perform a military intervention. It could stand up to the killers. But as Warren points out that takes something that is lacking:

But this would require a West assured of its own ideals and principles, generous and willing to make sacrifices for them; a West not debilitated by layer upon layer of "politically-correct" self-doubt. And that simply isn't on the table.

No, it isn't. In fact the European Union was conducting a trade seminar with the Burmese government while heads were being cracked by the junta. So much for moral authority.

The Marvel Of The Day

As in Marvel Comics. A British Royal Marine Colour Sergeant, Carl 'Tatts' Tatton has become the Incredible Hulk in real life. He single-handedly lifted a two ton truck off a fellow soldier in Afghanistan, saving the man's life.

Drowning in 3ft of ditch water, his leg trapped under a two - ton truck , Royal Marine Mark Farr must have thought there was no way he would make it out of Afghanistan alive.

But he reckoned without the heroism of his fellow Marine, Colour Sergeant Carl 'Tatts' Tatton, who braved Taliban mortar fire to lift the vehicle by himself, although it was 13 times his body weight.

Marine Farr, 29, dubbed his rescuer 'The Incredible Bulk' after the superhuman feat.

"Without Tatts I'd have drowned," he said. "I owe him my life."

Now back in Britain, Colour Sergeant Tatton has spoken out for the first time about the adrenaline rush that allowed him to move the truck on November 5 last year.

The 38-year- old from Ford, Plymouth, said unassumingly: "When you see one of your mates in danger, you just react."

Well, that's true. But most people don't toss trucks about to do so. Kudos, Colour Sergeant Tatton.

Giant Spider Invades England

Giant spiders, right in downtown London! Hide the children! Well, okay, it's just one giant spider and it's made of bronze, stainless steel and marble. And it's a tribute to the artist's mother. No, really. It's called Maman.

LONDON (Reuters) - A giant spider took up residence on the banks of the River Thames on Wednesday, but Arachnophobes can relax — it doesn't bite or even move.

The nine metre (30 feet) high and wide creature is made of bronze, stainless steel and marble and is the creation of renowned artist Louise Bourgeois.

Created in 1999 and named Maman in tribute to the artist's mother, its appearance outside the Tate Modern art gallery is the first time it has been on display outdoors in Britain.

"The Spider is an ode to my mother. She was my best friend. Like a spider, my mother was a weaver," the 95-year-old Bourgeois said in a statement.

"Like spiders, my mother was very clever. Spiders are friendly presences that eat mosquitoes. We know that mosquitoes spread diseases and are therefore unwanted. So, spiders are helpful and protective, just like my mother," she added.

French-born Bourgeois is regarded by many as one of the most important artists working today.

According to some other sources, Reuters has it wrong. The piece was designed in 1999 but not actually cast until 2001. But here's a few pictures of Maman visiting Ottawa. And Maman visiting the Guggenheim. And here we see Maman getting a light snack.

Or Die By Suicide

At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide……

…….I do not mean to say, that the scenes of the revolution are now or ever will be entirely forgotten; but that like every thing else, they must fade upon the memory of the world, and grow more and more dim by the lapse of time. In history, we hope, they will be read of, and recounted, so long as the bible shall be read;– but even granting that they will, their influence cannot be what it heretofore has been. Even then, they cannot be so universally known, nor so vividly felt, as they were by the generation just gone to rest. At the close of that struggle, nearly every adult male had been a participator in some of its scenes. The consequence was, that of those scenes, in the form of a husband, a father, a son or brother, a living history was to be found in every family– a history bearing the indubitable testimonies of its own authenticity, in the limbs mangled, in the scars of wounds received, in the midst of the very scenes related–a history, too, that could be read and understood alike by all, the wise and the ignorant, the learned and the unlearned.–But those histories are gone. They can be read no more forever. They were a fortress of strength; but, what invading foeman could never do, the silent artillery of time has done; the leveling of its walls. They are gone.–They were a forest of giant oaks; but the all-resistless hurricane has swept over them, and left only, here and there, a lonely trunk, despoiled of its verdure, shorn of its foliage; unshading and unshaded, to murmur in a few gentle breezes, and to combat with its mutilated limbs, a few more ruder storms, then to sink, and be no more.

They were the pillars of the temple of liberty; and now, that they have crumbled away, that temple must fall, unless we, their descendants, supply their places with other pillars, hewn from the solid quarry of sober reason.

Abraham Lincoln, The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions:
Address Before the Young Men's Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois
January 27, 1838

"A house divided against itself cannot stand."

Abraham Lincoln, Senate Nomination Acceptance Speech
June 16, 1858

When Abraham Lincoln have his 'Lyceum' address, he was speaking of the passing of his era's "greatest generation". Those men who had fought the revolution against England and had formed the United States. He saw the danger of losing that institutional memory that had bound the original colonies into an indivisible nation. Twenty years later, he saw that the loss of that memory was putting the nation's sections on a collision course.

And now, with the passing of our "greatest generation", who fought fascism and totalitarianism, then willingly shouldered the burden of a long Cold War we have come full circle, yet again. The secessionists are holding a convention.

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. - In an unlikely marriage of desire to secede from the United States, two advocacy groups from opposite political traditions — New England and the South — are sitting down to talk.

Tired of foreign wars and what they consider right-wing courts, the Middlebury Institute wants liberal states like Vermont to be able to secede peacefully.

That sounds just fine to the League of the South, a conservative group that refuses to give up on Southern independence.

"We believe that an independent South, or Hawaii, Alaska, or Vermont would be better able to serve the interest of everybody, regardless of race or ethnicity," said Michael Hill of Killen, Ala., president of the League of the South.

Separated by hundreds of miles and divergent political philosophies, the Middlebury Institute and the League of the South are hosting a two-day Secessionist Convention starting Wednesday in Chattanooga.

They expect to attract supporters from California, Alaska and Hawaii, inviting anyone who wants to dissolve the Union so states can save themselves from an overbearing federal government.

If allowed to go their own way, New Englanders "probably would allow abortion and have gun control," Hill said, while Southerners "would probably crack down on illegal immigration harder than it is being now."

The more things change. "If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide." That about wraps it up.

Ghosts Long Gone

The Washington Post has an article that will fascinate history buffs. It is about the ghost towns of western Maryland, far up the Potomac river. Towns that once had houses, schools, churches and people but now are completely gone. They died when the coal mines closed, some lasting until the 1960s but absorbed by the forests now. Some people are trying to capture the histories of these places before the last of their former residents die.

VINDEX, Md. You could say that this old town is just a memory now, but even that might be giving it too much credit.

Actual memories of the place, from back when it had a school, two churches and a row of flimsy houses built by the coal company, are scarce now. The people who saw it that way are almost all gone.

And here, even in the center of Vindex, there are almost no traces of it left. The tallest standing structure is a short flight of concrete steps, which once led up to the company store. They now sit, odd and alone, in the middle of an Appalachian forest.

"This is it," said Dan Whetzel, a local historian, whacking through underbrush to reach them. "This is the heart of town."

Vindex is a Potomac River ghost town, one of about 11 coal-mining villages that sit abandoned near the river's headwaters in Western Maryland and West Virginia. They make for scenes that don't seem to belong within a few hours' drive of Washington: foundation holes, broken-backed bridges, mossy stairs that look like part of a jungle ruin.

Historians have begun trying to record the stories of these lost places while former residents are still around to tell them, holding on to a culture that might otherwise disappear. The researchers' fear is that the towns will soon become something worse than just dead: They'll be forgotten completely.

"People lived here until the '60s," Whetzel said, looking at the woods that have grown up in place of Vindex. "It's unbelievable, isn't it?"

There's an old ghost town in the Adirondacks called Tahawus. Most of it is gone now, abandoned after their iron/titanium mine ceased operations. There are pictures from a few years ago, but the Wikipedia entry mentions that those may all be gone now.

March Of The Tyrants

USA Today points out the way that Vladimir Putin has crushed democracy in Russia. His latest move - to step down from the presidency only to turn around and run for prime minister - has a number of possible outcomes. All bad for Russia in the long term.

The clear implication is that he would manipulate a crony without a power base into the presidency — likely the relatively unknown Viktor Zubkov, whom he recently appointed prime minister — then manipulate him or transfer power to Putin's new office. The scheme has an extra Machiavellian twist. Because Putin is so popular and controls most of the media, the party list he will head is likely to get two-thirds of the seats needed in December elections to change the Constitution. A new president could also be persuaded to retire for health or other reasons, allowing Putin to quickly return for a non-consecutive third and fourth term.

Many things have improved in Russia under Putin, including the economy and international influence. That's why his approval rating tops 70%. Yet it's in Russia's long-term interest to break from the dictator model of its czarist and communist past. The ultimate strength of a country is not in individual leaders but in the strength of institutions, laws and rules.

For the longest time, the Russian president has argued that his authoritarian moves were intended to re-establish order and lay the groundwork for a return to full democracy. The fact that Putin insisted he would not run for a third term gave at least some hope for a democratic transition.

This, the United States and Europe hoped, would lead to steady increases in cooperation and decreases in tension. Those hopes have waned steadily in the past few years as Putin has consolidated power, imprisoned critics, muzzled the Russian media and tried to blackjack neighboring countries into bowing to Russia.

It is obvious that tyranny is making a big comeback in Russia. As it is in Venezuela. As it is in Ecuador, where the president is expected to dissolve that country's congress and rewrite the constitution along Venezuelan lines. In Burma, the ruling junta ignores the world's opinions and simply acts to keep its iron grip on that country and its people. Iran continues its mission to obtain nuclear weapons. The tyrants are gaining strength while the west stands around and talks.

Individual Choice And Better Health Care

John Stossel continues to counter the propaganda of the people who are trying to bring socialized medicine to the United States. Today, he highlights an approach taken by the Whole Foods supermarket chain - a company generally considered to be very well run, as witnessed by its performance over the past few years. (This is completely aside from Whole Foods CEO John Mackey's recent problem with sockpuppets.)

We'd each be better off if we paid all but the biggest medical bills out of pocket and saved insurance for catastrophic events. Truly needy people would rely on charity, not government, because once government gets involved, unintended bad consequences abound.

If people paid their own bills, they would likely buy high-deductible insurance (roughly $1,000 for individuals, $2,100 for families) because on average, the premium is $1,300 cheaper. But people are so conditioned to expect others to pay their medical bills that they hate high deductibles: They feel ripped off if they must pay a thousand dollars before the insurance company starts paying.

But high deductibles may be the key to lowering costs and putting you in charge of your health care.

Five years ago, the Whole Foods grocery chain switched to a high-deductible plan. If an employee has a sore throat or a sprained ankle, he pays. But if he gets cancer or heart disease, his insurance covers it.

Whole Foods puts around $1,500 a year into an account for each employee. It's not charity but part of the employee's compensation. It's money Whole Foods would have otherwise spent on more-expensive insurance. Here's the good part for employees: If they don't spend the money on medical care this year, they keep it, and the company adds more next year.

It's called a health savings account, or HSA.

CEO John Mackey told me that when he went to the new system, "Our costs went way down."

Yet today, some workers have $8,000 in their accounts.

"That's their money," Mackey said. "It builds up over time because the money is compounding for them."

The money in the HSA belongs to the employee, not the company. Depending on how those accounts are set up, they can pay for a wide range of uninsured expenses. There are people in this country who are pushing for "free" health care. The examples of what free care is worth abound in Canada and Mexico and Cuba. A high deductible private plan gives the individual control, not the government.

Have you ever seen a well run government program? Why in the world would you want them controlling your health care? Stossel (and Mackey) both dismiss the notion that people will make bad choices if they have to make their own decisions. That is a particularly arrogant and elitist view of others. Saying that a bureaucrat will make better decision - for your own good - is simply a way of allowing government to take away your choices and assume control of your life. It is the subjugation of the individual to the will of the state.

That is never a good idea.

Jackboots In The Night

The military junta in Burma is hunting dissidents down door-to-door now, kicking in doors in the night and dragging people away.

YANGON, Myanmar - Soldiers announced that they were hunting pro-democracy protesters in Myanmar's largest city Wednesday and the top U.S. diplomat in the country said military police were pulling people out of their homes during the night.

Military vehicles patrolled the streets before dawn with loudspeakers blaring that: "We have photographs. We are going to make arrests!"

Shari Villarosa, the acting U.S. ambassador in Myanmar, said in a telephone interview that people in Yangon were terrified.

"From what we understand, military police … are traveling around the city in the middle of the night, going into homes and picking up people," she said.

Residents living near the Shwedagon Pagoda, Myanmar's most revered shrine and a flashpoint of unrest, reported that police swept through several dozen homes in the middle of the night, dragging away several men for questioning. The homes were located above shops at a marketplace that caters to the nearby pagoda, selling monks robes and begging bowls.

Meanwhile, the junta pursued other means of intimidation. An employee from the Ministry of Transport, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that he was told to sign a statement saying he and his family would not take part in any political activity and would not listen to foreign radio reports. Many in Myanmar use short-wave radios to pick up foreign English-language stations — a main source for news about their tightly controlled country.

The west just talks. The junta knows that. None of this should come as a real shock. The European Union won't even condemn what is happening in Zimbabwe or try to impose any meaningful sanctions on that dying country. A society that prides itself on its enlightened philosophy and love of freedom is certainly not willing to lift a finger to help spread human rights or democracy. The juntas know that.