Are they for it because they know it won't do anything?

So, I was reading an unusual comment thread about the climate change bill the House just passed. It was unusual because most of the people commenting thought the whole issue is a scam. It has all the appearances of a scam, but most people don't seem to notice this.

One commenter pointed out that if the level of CO2 is too high, then shouldn't the most rational approach be how to reduce the level in the least expensive way? The current plan calls for reductions in the output by the industrialized world and increases by the developing world. So what this all means is that there won't be any reduction in CO2 already in the air! Even the rate at which it is added will increase, but a little slower than without the plan. It is known that there are ways to directly take CO2 out of the atmosphere, like seeding the tropical oceans with iron for instance. Other ideas ignore the CO2 and go directly to its supposed problem: Warming. Why not produce a multitude of mirrored glass or plastic balls that can float around in the oceans reflecting light out into space?

A follow-up comment by a reasonable non-AGW sceptic was that the iron idea is good, but there could be unforeseen consequences. Well, isn't that a feature rather than a bug? If the CO2 capping will have any effect, won't it also be subject to possible unforeseen consequences?

Hasn't this occurred to anyone else?

If the current global cooling (since 2000 or 2002) continues and CO2 does actually warm things, then won't hard restrictions carry the risk of precipitating an ice age?

Update: Even a fanatic like James Hansen thinks the House bill is worthless.

Ghost Town

My wife and I stumbled upon Ghost Town last night, just because it happened to be on. We hadn't heard of it before but it has Ricky Gervais in it and that was enough.

The first thing that struck me was that there is a woman who finds out her husband is cheating on her the same day as he dies. I had come across a similar couple of stories in real life where this kind of thing happened too. There was football player Steve McNair whose wife only found out about his infidelity because of and soon after his murder. And then there was a New York Times piece on a woman who discovered multiple affairs by her husband after he died. She confronted the other women and eventually wrote a book about it, Perfection. So, it was an interesting coincidence seeing a movie with a similar plot device just now.

The movie was pretty funny. Ricky Gervais does what he does as usual and does it well. The side roles are really what put the movie over the top. Greg Kinnear does well as a slightly oily, but always charming schemer--the unfaithful husband. The widow is played by Téa Leoni. The thing about her is that every movie I see her in, I end up being surprised by how good she is. Maybe the fact that she is so pretty lowers the acting expectation, but the acting is first-rate. There were lots of other great bit parts: The doctor, the hospital lawyer, the dentist's receptionist and especially Ferris Bueller's best friend.

I instantly recognized Alan Ruck as someone I have seen before, but where? My wife was shaken: It can't be Cameron because that guy is middle-aged looking and if he is old...No! it is too horrible to contemplate.

An off-day in more than one way

I have Wednesdays off and so I like to get two things done on these days: Go for a long run and accomplish the kind of stuff normally done on weekends--like mow the lawn. Unfortunately our kid wrangler called-in sick, so I took them to swim team/lessons and tennis.

This ate up half the day, but I still managed to roast some coffee, go to the Post Office and apply for the kid's passports and go grocery shopping.

Later I did my Landing Strip 020 run 11.8 miles. Done in 1:30:09, which comes to 7:38/mile and I am happy with that.

One busy 4th

A long, fun, tiring day...

First thing, my wife dropped me off at the start of the John Carson 2-miler. There is an Einstein Bros. Bagel place there, so she picked-up breakfast to bring home to the kids.

While I ran the race, she went back home, fed the kids and came down to the town green to occupy our chairs so they wouldn't get moved again. The race is the first attraction for spectators of the parade.

The end of the race is very close to where they were sitting, so after the race I came over and made sure that they were all well-situated. I ate some snacks handed-out at the end of the race: Potato chips, watermelon, orange juice and a piece of watermelon thus composed my breakfast. After my snack, I decided to jog the two miles home and saw from my stopwatch that the race had only begun one hour earlier.

I got cleaned-up and changed, then just relaxed for a bit by checking out the internet tubes. To my pleasure, the results of the race were already posted to Cool Running! Sweet. Then I got the dog and walker her back to the town center. We got there just as the parade ended, but this was fine since Meenah got a needed walk and I was able to help bring stuff back to the car--parked nearby.

Once home, grandparents and in-laws soon showed-up and we had lunch. We had a simple lunch of watermelon, chicken salad, blondies, strawberries and chips. Then, off to the swim and tennis club. The kids swam and played with the toddler in the baby pool while a game of Scrabble was had by the adults. It was late in the afternoon by the time we left the pool.

Dinner prep was hectic even as many of the items were prepared ahead of time: We had potato salad and roasted potatoes since Aja cannot abide mayo. Grilled corn-on-the-cob, grilled shrimp, grilled flank-steak, Italian white beans in a ragout, green salad with home-made roasted garlic dressing and bread.

There was still time to go see fireworks! Every year Acton puts on a big show in their NARA park. It is a nice setting: There is an amphitheater and this year there was a band doing Rolling Stones covers. The park is hilly, but there are only small decorative trees and the places between and nestled by the hills are sloped only enough to prevent the ground from being soggy. One whole side of the park is a pond of several hundred yards in length. It is a very nice setting for a big event.

While waiting for the fireworks to begin, we looked at the stars come out. I noticed a satellite crossing the sky. The brightness was occillating as it tracked along. I couldn't decide if the cause was high level clouds or perhaps it was rotating space junk.

The park itself doesn't have much parking, but there is a path through some woods that leads to a huge office park. So, people can park there and then walk through the woods. The organizers make it easy by stringing-up lights along the path. Well, it is easy in theory, but try and keep track of kids, in the woods, with 10,000 other people all trying to go down a path 8-feet wide. It is fun for people who can kind of go-with-the-flow. For people who are panic-prone, I can only imagine the 1000 deaths they must go through.

We were home an hour after the last firework went off*. We gave the kids some cookies and milk and then they washed-up and hit the sack.

*As we walked through the woods, several times a rocket or two would go off. We don't know the cause, but suspect that officials discovered (a few at a time) of shells that didn't get fired. They probably figured it was best to just set them off. People along the path would make jokes like, "Hey, what does this button do"? and so forth.

4th of July 2-miler

I wore my old High School Cross Country shirt.

110 19/208 M4049 12:55 6:28 dbp 46 M Chelmsford MA

I am pleased with this: I figured that I could finish under 14 minutes if I put in a reasonable effort. As it was, I got a little overheated toward the end, but I really could have run a bit faster.

A girl I passed around the one mile mark--posted only as an encouragement for people thinking about taking-up running...

10/day

One year ago I installed a counter. I'd had one before, but it never worked right and somewhere around when it hit 3-4,000 it inexplicitly reset itself to zero. I deleted it with extreme predjustice and put in the one which is there now.

One year ago to the day it was put in and it comes out to just over ten visits per day. I appreciate my small but dedicated (or twisted-whatever) audience.

EPA report casts serious doubt on the need to regulate CO2

The Report, which was suppressed by the EPA--but came out anyway (they always do, eventually) brings-up serious doubts about the need for limitations on CO2 output.

Notice, if you will, how critics attack the author, the motives of his sources etc. but they never mention the substance of the report.

Interesting...

Rain Dance (in reverse)

Pretty much all of June was lousy with rain. Getting desperate for some sunshine, I put down grass seed in the bare patches of the yard.

If this doesn't cause the sun to come out, nothing I can do will. Also, now if it keeps raining I won't mind as much.

Update: Another day of rain.

Update: Yet another day of rain.

My brush with fame was 20 years ago

I have 20 or 30 different t-shirts that I regularly wear for jogging or lounging around in. Normally, I hardly notice what is printed on them--they range from ones that you get in a 10K run to such minor events as company picnics & etc. The other day I noticed this shirt because it had a date on it and it was 20 years old. I had not realized that clothes could last that long.

The funny thing is that it very nearly only lasted for one day. You see, this t-shirt was worn in a kind of 10K mud run from back when I was in the Marine Corps. The race involved wading through waist-deep mud, crawling under barbed wire and so forth. Had I torn it on the barbed wire, as I did my Cami trousers, I would have thrown it away. As well, when I finished the race I was more than half tempted to just toss the shirt since it had about a pound of mud caked into it. It may have taken a couple of washes to come clean, but it has served me well for two decades and counting.

Oh yes, the fame: The next month on my drill weekend some fellow Marines showed me the latest issue of Leatherneck and there I am. Of course my name isn't with the picture and I didn't even recognize myself at first, so a pretty tenuous claim to fame--but I will take it!

Oh Really?

President Obama:

"At a time of great fiscal challenges, this legislation is paid for by the polluters who currently emit the dangerous carbon emissions that contaminate the water we drink and pollute the air we breathe,"

So you are saying that the electricity utilities that pay more to generate power won't pass this extra cost on to consumers? Okay, well then won't the shareholders (many of which are pension funds) realize a lower return on their investments?

The water we drink is "polluted" by carbon? You mean like Coke, sparkling water and champagne? I pay extra for that kind of water!

CO2 is not remotely harmful to breathe even at many times the current concentration. It is however essential for plant growth.

We have got to stop electing people so utterly ignorant of science to the most powerful position in the world.

White Peony

Running with the dog. Barefoot, kind of...

Last Summer I took the puppy for a 4-mile run most mornings. She would pull at the leash the whole way, so I knew she was not being over exerted. She is a breed built for comfort, not speed, so I wanted to be careful.

This Summer she is just not the same dog. She got run-over last fall and by late winter was recovered, but really out of shape. So on Tuesdays, when I work from home, I take her on a couple of miles slow jog.

In order that I get something out of it fitness-wise I wear these sort of foot gloves made by Vibram.  It feels like you are barefoot--without tearing-up your feet. They make you run like you're barefoot since they've no padding at all. You cannot land on your heel as you would in normal running shoes. The result is that you build-up strength in your foot and calf and this is supposed to ward-off injuries from distance training. I know my calves were very sore the first few times I ran in these things.

Hello Mr. Frog...

I would like to give you a kiss--Don't worry, I would never bite.

Another princess! This happened last time too.

This is not well known

Just a note that the present is on the left of the chart and the right is 500 million years ago.

This makes sense if you think about it: All the coal in the world was Carbon Dioxide in the air before it became coal. Plants took the CO2 and made themselves out of it. In the right settings the old dead plants accumulated and formed coal. This is part of why there is less CO2 in the air than before. Lately it has been rising in part due to us mining the stuff and burning it.

Getting back to the above chart: It can be seen that for most of the last 500 million years, CO2 existed at higher concentrations in the atmosphere than it does now. In this period the Earth has experienced glaciations (ice ages).

This Week's Runs

Bedford Neighborhood 4.1 31:07:00 7:35:22 15-Jun-09

short dog run 2.5 24:00:00 9:36:00 16-Jun-09

Landing Strip 020 11.8 1:30:36 0:07:41 17-Jun-09 PR

out and back on middlesex tpk 4 30:13:00 7:33:15 18-Jun-09 Ran with Ross.

Affy loop 5.2 40:12:00 7:43:51 19-Jun-09

Merrimack River Trail 10--roughly Untimed with stops 20-Jun-09 Ran with Ross.

Happy Father's Day!

Who's side are we on is the wrong question

I constantly hear and read pundits, usually liberal ones, advise that Obama is correct to not say much about the situation in Iran. Their theory is that since the United States is seen as an enemy, we would harm the reputation of whichever side we support.

I think this completely misses the point: We should not be choosing sides. We should be forcefully defending the principles we hold dear:

1. The right to peacefully assemble. There is no excuse for beating, shooting or arresting peaceful protesters.

2. Elections should free, open and fair. This means that anyone can run, not just those vetted by the mullahs. The process is open when the process can be witnessed by observers who are not part of the ruling regime. The process is fair when the person who gets the most votes wins.

Who's side are we on? We are on the side of the Iranian people. We are on the side of them getting their god-given right to choose, in a fair, free and open process, who will govern them.

I wish our President would say this too. It might carry some weight.

Update: Kudos to the President! One small gripe though--he should say it on tape and not just put it out of the press office. But still good--this is progress in the right direction.

Statement from the President on Iran

The Iranian government must understand that the world is watching. We mourn each and every innocent life that is lost. We call on the Iranian government to stop all violent and unjust actions against its own people. The universal rights to assembly and free speech must be respected, and the United States stands with all who seek to exercise those rights.

As I said in Cairo, suppressing ideas never succeeds in making them go away. The Iranian people will ultimately judge the actions of their own government. If the Iranian government seeks the respect of the international community, it must respect the dignity of its own people and govern through consent, not coercion.

Martin Luther King once said - "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice." I believe that. The international community believes that. And right now, we are bearing witness to the Iranian peoples’ belief in that truth, and we will continue to bear witness.

Last Week's Runs

Bedford Neighborhood 4.1 31:07:00 7:35:22 15-Jun-09

short dog run 2.5 24:00:00 9:36:00 16-Jun-09

Landing Strip 020 11.8 1:30:36 0:07:41 17-Jun-09 PR

out and back on middlesex tpk 4 30:13:00 7:33:15 18-Jun-09 Ran with Ross.

Affy loop 5.2 40:12:00 7:43:51 19-Jun-09

Merrimack River Trail 10--roughly Untimed with stops 20-Jun-09 Ran with Ross.

How did we get this word?

I always thought that Honcho came to use in the United States via Mexico. It just sounds Spanish or at least South Western.

Today I had a reason to look it up even though I have known and used the word for years. I was just testing to see how high the real definition would come up on Bing or Google.

Once I looked it up I was surprised to find that it doesn't come from Spanish at all! It is from Japanese.

Japanese: hanchō squad leader, from han squad + chō head, chief

班長

You (can) learn something every day!

Marathon picture where you can actually see me.

I had earlier posted a couple of pictures from the Boston Marathon where you had to take it on faith that I was even in the picture.

Towards the end, there was finally someone who knew me (out of several hundred thousand spectators) and his friend took a picture...

The friend is in the bottom right side of this photo.