While Afghanistan sinks back into the muck of religious extremism that frightened even the ayatollahs in Iran, the leaders of the de facto Kurdistan are rediscovering what sort of friend they have been relying on with Turkey being aided in its genocide of Kurds by the U.S.. South America’s democracies in open revolt against the hegemony of the norteamericans, a far more important war than all of those combined is flagging under assault from the left and corporate interests.

That is the War on Cancer initiated by that old reprobate, Dick Nixon.

Now that bird flu seems no longer apt to wipe out a a fifth, half or more of the human population in the immediate future,  the threat of a nuclear holocaust seems to have receded for a time and a giant rock or snowball may hit Mars but not Earth, we are back to a more real threat, which is all of us.

In this country [New Zealand] a major study published this year by Statistics New Zealand (SNZ) found energy consumption per person had risen 13 per cent between 1997 and 2005…

At the same time in fast growing economies such as China and India huge numbers of people are staking claims to the lifestyle only intensive energy use makes possible.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/4…

Meanwhile environmentalists, concerned with progress toward another Great Dying that occurred some 250 million years ago when life was nearly extinguished on the planet from global warming, contribute little but a bit more methane, a far more potent greenhouse gas than the dreaded CO2.

“I am dying, doctor.  What should be done?”

“Get better parents next time.”

Most everyone here has probably read of the “dying woman,” Kathy Stengl, who is confronting presidential candidates.  The following is just one account:

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/…

[Mike Huckabee] greeted her. She told him of her diagnosis and a need to redirect health care spending.

“Actually, that’s what I did in Arkansas,” Huckabee said. “We started moving our whole state system toward prevention.”

Stangl asked what he would do as president to change the national health care system.

Huckabee responded that it must start with federal programs like Medicare and Medicaid.

The preacher did a bit better than Dr. Ron Paul might have done but not much.  If Lymphangioleiomyomatosis (Lam) is a genetic disease, as suspected, the only prevention would be preventing the birth of those with the defect.  Since Huckabee is a right-to-lifer, one might shudder at his proposal for prevention.

Helium Isotopes Point to New Sources of Geothermal Energy

“A good geothermal energy source has three basic requirements: a high thermal gradient – which means accessible hot rock – plus a rechargeable reservoir fluid, usually water, and finally, deep permeable pathways for the fluid to circulate through the hot rock,” says Kennedy, a staff scientist in Berkeley Lab’s Earth Sciences Division. “We believe we have found a way to map and quantify zones of permeability deep in the lower crust that result not from volcanic activity but from tectonic activity, the movement of pieces of the Earth’s crust.”

Kennedy and van Soest made their discovery by comparing the ratios of helium isotopes in samples gathered from wells, surface springs, and vents across the northern Basin and Range. Helium-three, whose nucleus has just one neutron, is made only in stars, and Earth’s mantle retains a high proportion of primordial helium-three (compared to the minuscule amount found in air) left over from the formation of the solar system.

People make fun of the prophets.  Here is divine proof that it is not wise:

Turning dirty diapers into diesel fuel

MONTREAL-If a Quebec company has its way, dirty diapers normally destined for landfills will soon be transformed into a cost-effective, synthetic diesel fuel.

It’s not such a stretch, says engineering and project management company AMEC, which is working on behalf of an as yet unnamed client to build a facility in the Montreal area that would use a process known as pyrolysis to convert diapers to diesel.

The concept has been around for ages and is continually changing, says Luciano Piciacchia, an engineer and vice-president with Amec’s Quebec office…

http://www.thestar.com/living/…

William F. Buckley:  We are so delighted to have you here, Mr. Gore.  I seldom see another conservative like myself with maudlin thoughts dressed up in convoluted prose that the Great Unwashed don’t understand.  Your obfuscation of the issues is majestic.  You even managed to be elected president as a [heh heh] Democrat.  Took Scalia to overrule the electorate.  But perhaps you will tell us why, as one of us, you despise environmentalism so much.  Is it because you are looking forward to owning ocean front property in Tennessee?

A warmer planet is what we need most.  Then we won’t need heat in winter.

Al Gore didn’t say that?  Maybe it was somebody else.

I am not a fan of the Conservative Alternative (Al Gore’s own description of himself).  So far I have managed to avoid lynching by idolaters of a great movie maker but lousy scientist.  Just not taken with wingers but to each his own.

It would seem now that the only people who ever supported Joe McCarthy were John Birchers and other rightwing loons far out of touch with sanity.  Somehow Tailgunner Joe not only got elected himself but struck terror in the heart of liberals.  A recent book described the ability of Joe McCarthy to destroy Democratic politicians who opposed him.  Oddly it was a Republican, Eisenhower, who really did Joe in.

I was young and foolish once, instead of old and foolish as I am now.  I believed.  I believed in Joe McCarthy, the virgin birth, heaven and hell, everlasting fire and torment for sinners.  And then I volunteered for Vietnam.