posted 02-16-2008 08:53 AM            

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... the rights group described the trial and conviction of Fawza Falih as a miscarriage of justice.

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That is not a miscarriage of justice. That is a complete abrogation of the concept of justice.

posted 02-16-2008 01:28 PM            

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Originally posted by KGB:
Saudi is a 16th-century country with huge oil fields worked using 21st-century technology. We really need to start firing up construction of more nuclear power plants.

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Yup. You know it. I know it. What's it going to take to let enough other people know it to make it happen? A real oil war?

posted 02-16-2008 01:52 PM            

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Originally posted by 10SNE1:
Yup. You know it. I know it. What's it going to take to let enough other people know it to make it happen?

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I really wonder.

I was at a town planning meeting the other day. We had some professional city planners in town to present the results of their study of our downtown area, which has badly deteriorated over the last couple decades. The meeting was for public participation.

Most comments were reasonable. Bike trails actually make sense in our area and are actually something the city government can be expected to play a role in. Ditto street layouts. Ditto the new town hall and library, and maybe the "interpretive center" with a bus stop and shuttle to Bandelier and the main town site.

A new RV park makes sense, too, to capture some of the tourist traffic to Bandelier and the Caldera. The reasons no one has already taken the initiative to open an RV park have to do with land use regulations in our area, and having the government at least decide how to get out of the way is also a reasonable thing to talk about in a town meeting.

But then someone said that the federal government was likely to required an 80% decrease in transportation energy use in the near future, and would the new town plan take that into account by being compatible with electric street cars? (Our little town has a population of about 6500.) I clamped my mouth shut and decided to let this idiocy just pass -- most of our citizens know better. Then I glanced over at one of the professional town planners, who was sitting close to me. He had a very straight face, but the glance he shot back at me said it all.

Lesson: There are some in our elites who are so mind-boggling idiotic that they are prepared for a sharp decrease in standard of living rather than looking for new energy sources. And this is Los Alamos, where the elites are generally a touch smarter than many other places, at least on technical matters.

posted 02-16-2008 02:16 PM            

The mention of bike trails makes my eyes roll. They make good sense in places, but where I live they are an excuse to eliminate street parking in front of houses that lack off-street parking in order to punish people who have the audacity to *gasp* drive cars to their jobs. (I haven't yet figured out if it's the car or the having a job that offends the nannies most.)

posted 02-16-2008 02:54 PM            

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it would change our "carbon footprint," whatever the hell that means.

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posted 02-16-2008 03:48 PM            

Yet, today, we have witch hunters actively seeking out miscreants, deniers and debunkers.

Apparently we are doomed to live in a society that has no knowledge of history, philosophy, economics and statistics -- much less science.

Austin, TX, just opted out of investing in a portion of new construction of a nuclear plant. The excuse: not enuf time. (That's actually pretty acceptable to me -- 90 days to make that sort of major capital commitment doesn't begin to touch the time required for due diligence.

At the same time, we going to invest dogs only know how much buck? in a west Texas windfarm. Well, it's always windy in west/north Texas. It might result in a general good. I know not of the technicalities of transmitting wind power. As usual, am delighted to be informed.

As to a carbon footprint, as I've said before, I have a partial carbon toe print (pinkie). That doesn't make me virtuous. It means I'm a penny pincher.

Saw a great bumper sticker yesterday: Save the planet. Stop breathing.

This would also control population, thus dramatically increasing our dependence on foreign oil. Dead people don't use energy, they add value to the dirt. Think of all the predatory plants that would consume our empty cities... just hanging out sucking up CO2. Since humans are awful and dangerous to the environment, you'd think that those committed to excoriating us would be delighted.

It just gets so damned discouraging.

Sorry, poor Saudi woman segued into a general science topic.

I'll think kind thoughts for her.

posted 02-16-2008 08:57 PM            

I guess you're all right but really what about this poor woman? What can be done for her and all the others who do not get covered by the media?

Should we care? I think we should.

Should we do something? I don't see that we can actually do much beyond supporting the human rights groups that provide assistance.

What I find inconceivable is how the Saudis (et al) can live with the embarassment of what their countries do.

posted 02-17-2008 07:20 AM            

And the only answer can be the black sludge under their sand.

posted 02-17-2008 08:24 AM            

There was plenty of pressure to drop the sanctions against Saddam. We were told the war would only cost about $80 billion--even if it had only cost that much it would have been much cheaper simply to drop the sanctions, leave him in power and buy his oil.

So I don't think the oil-sheiks-rule-the-world conspiracy explains U.S. foreign policy quite as neatly as the media would have us believe.

posted 02-17-2008 11:04 AM            

quote:

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Originally posted by KGB:
Saudi is a 16th-century country with huge oil fields worked using 21st-century technology. We really need to start firing up construction of more nuclear power plants.

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