Lets get off the Blue Marble

[Warning: A photo heavy piece]

Robert Gates, the replacement for outgoing Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, has been confirmed by the senate 95-2. The two votes against Gates were cast by Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania and Jim Bunning of Kentucky. The senators were critical of Gates. Bunning said Gates was too critical of the action in Iraq and Afghanistan. He also believes that Gates will bring rogue states to the negotiating table. Santorum took to the floor of the senate ot give an hourlong speech in which he said "How do those who deny this evil propose to save us from these people? By negotiating through the U.N. or directly with Iran? By firing Don Rumsfeld, (and) now getting rid of John Bolton? That's going to solve the problem?"

In another joint conference with United Kingdom Prime Minister Tony Blair and United States President George W. Bush, was conducted this morning. Yesterday, the Iraq War Study Group presented its conclusions to President Bush.He said "Having an international group is an interesting idea", which cracks me up. Wouldn't that be the United Nations?

Earlier today, a tornado tore through Northwest London at around 11 this morning London time. (That would be 5 hours ahead of us if you live on the east coast.) England experiences 50 or os tornadoes a year so this is not a strange occurance. However, it swept through the streets of the Kensal Rise area in London (imagine a tornado in London!), flipping cars over and ripping doors off homes. Many homes were evacuated and several more were damaged. An article on the event at BBC's UK site. The weather has been nasty in the North Atlantic lately.

You've hopefully heard about this by now: Hugo Chavez was democratically re-elected in Venezuela. This is the politician's third win. He was first elected in 1998, and then re-elected to a six year term in 2000. After winning the vote, "It's another defeat for the devil, who tries to dominate the world". He won by a healthy margin and is most popular amongst the country's poor who favor his social policies.

NASA unveiled plans on December 5th to place a permanant settlement on the South Pole of the moon by 2020. This will be the first expedition to the moon since 1972. There is hopes to bring other space agencies into the project. The plan involves week long stays of four person crews to do the construction of the base. After initial materials are brough from Earth, the settlement will use hydrogen and oxygen from the moon for fuel and the obvious: air to fucking breathe!

The Reserve Bank of New Zealand has reported that it is dramatically short of 20c coins. This is only weeks after issuing new coins with a new design. Why am I laughing about this?

Yesterday saw the launch of France24. It has been founded with the hope of countering the "Anglophone sphere of influence of BBC World and CNN International" especially as of late. It was created by a partnership between Groupe TF1 and France Télévisions and has an annual budget €80Million. It will be broadcast in English and French. The English simulcast will also feature 4-6 hours of French programming. There are future plans to also utilize Arabic and Spanish programming. It has not been stated whether there will be all-Arabic or all-Spanish networks or merely programs in those languages. It will be transmitted to the US by antenna and sattelite. Comcast plans to carry the network. Regardless, go there just to see it. It's free!

James Kim, a senior editor at CNET, was found at noon on Wednesday in a ravine in Oregon. He had been deceased for a couple of days after being stranded in the wilderness with his wife Kati and two daughters, Penelope and Sabine, since beginning a return trip home after Thanksgiving. He had covered 8 miles in inclimate weather in street clothes and tennis shoes. Rescuers are calling the effort it took to cover that land in freezing and near-freezing temperatures "superhuman". CNET has set up a blog for people to post their memories, condolensces or anything they wish to write about James Kim.

On this day , in 1732, the Royal Opera House at the Convent Garden in London, England, opens.

In 1776, the Marquis de Lafayette, tried to enter the US military, who were bogged down in the War for Independence.

In 1787, Delaware became the first state to ratify the constitution. Though this is not formal, it is the de jure first state.

In 1917, we declared war on Austria-Hungary and thereby, entered World War I.

On this day in 1941, Canada declared war on Finland, Hungary, Romania, and Japan. Sort of jumping the gun.

That same day and year, Japan attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor on the island of Oahu, in the territory of Hawaii.
The USS Arizona's forward magazines explode.

The Damage can still be seen at Hickam Field at Pearl Harbor.

US Casualties:
2,335 military and 68 civilians killed,
1,143 military and 35 civilians wounded,
4 mini-submarines sunk
4 battleships sunk,
4 battleships damaged,
3 cruisers damaged,
3 destroyers sunk,
2 other ships sunk,
188 planes destroyed,
155 planes damaged

Japanese Casualties:
55 airmen, 9 submariners killed and 1 captured,
29 planes destroyed,
4 mini-submarines sunk


In 1966, there was a fire at the Army barracks in Erzurum, Turkey that kills 68.

In 1972, the last Apollo mission, 17, is launched. The famous "The Blue Marble" photograph was taken upon the journey to the moon. Like I said previously, this was the last manned mission to the moon. This also makes it the last time anyone was 28,000 miles from Earth and capable of taking such a photo. The craft was directly between the Earth and the sun so the earth is fully lit.

In 1988, Yasser Arafat, who is now dead, recognized Israel's right to exist.

In 1995, the Galileo spacecraft, launched in 1989, arrives at Jupiter to take lots of pictures of that planet. It enetered in to orbit on this day. Its really sweet radio attenna did not deploy so they could not get as much as they wanted to for its seven year tour ofJupiter. In 2003 it crashed itself into Jupiter.

In 2004, Hamid Karzai became president of Afghanistan. Thats good for us, I guess. Our first experiment with Nation building.

Oh yeah, and today.... STS-116 launched at night, no less. Here's a picture of the rollout. Just fucking awesome!
That's all from me.... whew.

Allen to concede... Life is good

According to Wonkette and the Washington Post, George Allen will concede @ 3 pm (yeah, that's probably eastern time) today. Also on Wonkette:






God I love how things are shaping up! WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

Also on Wonkette a couple of days ago was a picture of Rick Santorum conceding defeat. Love the kid on the left.

Elections....

So, its been two days since election day. And three weeks since I posted anything. Let's just say, I needed the break. In fact, there are still things I should be doing like a mid-term and a presentation tomorrow but, eh...

The House is now controlled by the Democrats. If you didn't hear about this, put down the funnies. Nancy Pelosi, a congresswoman from the gloriously liberal city of San Francisco will indeed be the new Speaker of the House. Dennis Hastert, the outgoing Speaker of the House and Republican from the weird as all fuck state of Illinois (I'm from there, I can say that), has stated he will not seek any leadership positions in the new house.

It is not clear if the Senate will be controlled by any party. The Senate race in Virginia between George Allen and Jim Webb has not been completely decided. Due to the slim margin, there is a recount going on. Allen's people have stated that he does not wish to drag this out. This is the last thing to decide before control can be determined. It would come down to 49 senators for both parties and two independents, both from New England. Joe Lieberman, a Democrat until he lost the primary to Ned Lamont, ran as an independent this year due to backlash for being pro-Iraq war.

Bernie Sanders, the only independant in the House, will take over for outgoing independant Senator, Jim Jeffords. This is an interesting story. Sanders is a Democratic socialist. Jeffords was a Republican until 2001 when the GOP shunned him enough to make him flee the party. So, he decided not to run again and is seat was won by another independant, albeit, a very different independant. So, does this make Vermont the capital of Independant thinking, or what?

Both Senators have stated publicly that they will caucaus with the Democrats. Lieberman is still a registered Democrat and may literally announce his decision to remain a Democrat. One can switch their party affiliations without any conscience or consultation with say their constituency. Just ask that fucker Norm Coleman from Minnesota. He was elected as the mayor of St. Paul as a Democrat (from New York, no less), then two years into his term, he decides he wants to be a Republican (granted the DFL party ain't lemonade and sweetcakes). St. Paul elected a Democrat and got a Republican. Let me tell ya, they felt gypped. So, go ahead Joe.

President Bush held a press conference yesterday and was properly humble. He announced that Donald Runsfeld, one of his toadies, would resign from his office as Secretery of Defence. He will be replaced by former CIA cheif Robert Gates who also ran the Iraq War Study Group. Apparently, this was in the works prior to election night. Why choose to announce it the day after the election? Well, it looks like Bush is listening to us. It also would have smacked of political ploy (more than it does now?) if he had done it in the last days of the election. I suppsoe the saying "The Buck Stops Here" means very little to the president. However, he took the blame for his party's loss this week to the outrageously motivated Democratic party.

And this is a loss for the GOP. The Democrats did not win the election. It was merely the GOP doing poorly. With Mark Foley and the fallout from that, the stupid asinine things Republicans did and the fact that a one-party government with no concerns for the largest sector of the country (the Middle Fucking Class!!!) was doing nothing to help them might have done it. When the Republican Party starts to regroup and figure out what they did wrong, I hope they realize it was not soley the war that turned voters off. It was the cronyism, response to Hurricane Katrina, the Religious Right, contracts for Halliburton and anyone else in Iraq, No Child Left Behind, Macaca, The Faith-Based Initiative, Arrogance, Karl Rove, Record profits for Exxon-Mobil, Dick Cheney's Shadow Government...

I could go on and I likely will. There are more things that leave middle class voters with a bad taste in their mouths. But I think nearly 3,000 dead is also one of them. Those who've died in Iraq for a cause that many of us are uncertain about should never be discounted. THese men and women are fighting and dying in service to our country. Our reasons for going into this war were vague and proved uncredible. Yet, we must remain until the job is done. My reasons for stating this is history. In 1983, there was an attack on the Marine barracks in Beirut. Over 200 marines were killed (and some Navy and Army personell) and the US left Lebanon. This was followed up by our hasty withdrawal from Iraq in 1991 after then President George Herbert Walker Bush told the Kurds and Shi'ites to rise up against Saddam Hussein. Regardless of how anyone feels about the war, we have to continue until the job is done and done well or we will be seen as the country who can't follow through with shit in the Middle East. That, dear readers, is what is at stake now.

Moving on to local politics: Amy Klobuchar, the Hennepin County Attorney, was elected to the Senate seat being vacated by fellow DFLer Mark Dayton. The margin of victory for Klobuchar was 1,278,915 to Mark Kennedy's 837,484. In precentages, that's 58% of total votes for Klobuchar to Kennedy's 38%. There were 87,324 votes cast beetween Independence (Ventura's formerly named Reform Party), the Green Party and the Constitution party.

Colleen Rowley, the FBI whistleblower, who lives literally down the street from me, did not win
the 2nd Congressional District here in Minnesota. The seat was won by its incumbant, John Kline, a man who once carried the "football" for Reagan.

To many here in Minnesota, the re-election of Republican Governor Tim Pawlenty was a surprise. As the night went on it appeared at one point that Hatch had a sizable and insurmountable lead over the Governor. But when all the ballots were counted, Pawlenty had won a second term. The margin of victory was slim: 21,132 votes seperate the two. Independence party Peter Hutchinson, a far cry form the flamboyant Jesse Ventura, yet endorsed by him, won 6% of the vote. While this is, yes, not enough to win, it does enable the party to gain more public funding for campaigns. This can only help to build the party to be an even stronger and legitimate voice here in Minnesota. That is a good thing.

One other point about the Minnesota Gubernatorial Election this year: the withdrawal of Jonathon "The Impaler" Sharkey. This Satanist and Vampire announced his candidacy for Governor on Friday the 13th of January. On the 31st of that month, after his schoolbus driver wife lost her job due to being Wiccan, he was arrested for stalking, fleeing and I think faking his own death. His trial was supposed to begin in July but I've heard nothing on him. The man also founded the Vampires, Witches and Pagan party last year. One can only imagine what happened to that.

On this day, in 1989, an event occured that changed my life forever. After 28 or so years, the wall dividing Berlin was opened. East and West Germany ceased to exist as seperate entities. Since that day, I've looked at the world with a different view. I've seen what can be done when people work, strive, dream, hope... for change. I have since then devoured the news looking for more stories like this. Well, I really just love the news. But my desire to work in the field of politics, NGOs, diplomacy or journalism was sparked by seeing people dancing on the Berlin Wall.

That's about it from here. Currently, CNN is reporting that Ed Bradley, correspondent for CBS' 60 Minutes, has died of Leukemia at New York's Mount Sinai Hospital. I can't help but be a little sad as another of my heroes passes. His candor and style will be sorely missed.