The impoverishment of the world ivory tower.

The latest Nature magazine (Nature 455, 1149 , 30 October 2008) carries a timely editorial, what else?, "America's choice." Here's how the editorial starts:

The election of a US president almost always seems like a crossroads, but the choice to be made on 4 November feels unusual, and daunting, in its national and global significance.

Yes, of course, the President of the U.S.A. always has global significance, that's why even Nature will devote an editorial for it. So it continues:

Science and the research enterprise offer powerful tools for addressing key challenges that face America and the world, and it is heartening that both John McCain and Barack Obama have had thoughtful things to say about them. Obama has been more forthcoming in his discussion of research goals (see Nature 455, 446–449; 2008), but . . .

A-ha! There is the almighty "but" how can an editorial without a but? Here's some fluff leading to the punch line:

There is no open-and-shut case for preferring one man or the other on the basis of their views on these matters. This is as it should be: for science to be a narrow sectional interest bundled up in a single party would be a terrible thing.

And now this:

On a range of topics, science included, Obama has surrounded himself with a wider and more able cadre of advisers than McCain.

Oh yea? How about name some?

The advice of experts is all the more valuable when it is diverse: 'groupthink' is a problem in any job. Obama seems to understands this. He tends to seek a range of opinions and analyses to ensure that his own opinion, when reached, has been well considered and exposed to alternatives. He also exhibits pragmatism — for example in his proposals for health-care reform — that suggests a keen sense for the tests reality can bring to bear on policy.

What make you think that Obama"understands" or even cares about this if there is not a TelePrompter in front of him? Somehow the editorial becomes a collection of clichés after that. The culmination of this editorial is certainly this:

This journal does not have a vote, and does not claim any particular standing from which to instruct those who do. But if it did, it would cast its vote for Barack Obama.

Yes this is all the elite magazine wish to say in this editorial the first place. Now it's eminently clear that the Nature magazine is on the same side of al Qaeda, although al Qaeda expressed themselves rather less unabashfully.

At any rate, the Nature magazine certainly carries similar expectation as this young lady:



So if next week Obama got elected, Ms. Peggy Joseph will no longer worry about paying her gas and mortgage, and world scientist are going to have unlimited funding from Obama according to Nature. Way to go, Nature!

"It was just a freak wave, . . ."

KTVZ.com of Oregon reported this tragic news last night with this rather non descriptive title: "Bend residents help in 'sneaker wave' rescue." Here's what happened:

A mother says she, her 6-year-old son and a newly married couple were swept from a coastal rock near Coos Bay, when they fell victim to a sneaker wave.

"We were all four there," Angela Leone said. "It was just a freak wave, we were just looking at the tide pools and stuff."

Three Bend residents were vacationing in the Coos Bay area and were standing near that rock in Shore Acres Park.

They say they heard the wave hit and ran to help the strangers being pulled into the ocean.

"The strength of the wave, they were only in knee deep water," Bryce Robertson said Wednesday.

Leone says she tried to hold onto her son but couldn't.

Two of the Bend residents reached in, to pull her out.

Leone says her sister, Robin Tyler, was pushed out of the water by her new husband, 39-year-old Roy Tyler. Leone now calls him a hero.

"Roy had pushed Robin where she could grab onto safety and had grabbed onto Craig," she said.

Robertson said the wave "pulled them, the man and the boy, it just pulled them back out to sea."

Sadly the little's body was later spotted on the other side of the cove. After CPR he was stabilized for a while, unfortunately according to his mother he "died three hours later as he was en route to a Portland children's hospital. " After hours of unsuccessful searching, the search for Roy Tyler's body was called off.

Another tragic case fell on a beautiful rocky shore. The wave that the mother described as "just a freak wave" is likely to be the kind of Sarah freaque wave we have discussed on this blog before. Our heartfelt sympathy goes to the mother who lost her son and her sister who lost her newly married husband. May God's grace and blessing help them endure this human tragedy.

"And then a big one came, . . ."

This struggle and survival story was published in yesterday's Anchorage Daily News which also carried a 4.35 minutes video of Rescue at Sea in there:

The captain of a commercial fishing boat that sank last week in remote Aleutian waters said Monday he and other crewmen spent a terrifying night trying to cling to a wave-pummeled life raft.

The 11-man crew was forced to abandon the 93-foot vessel Katmai after it lost steering, flooded and rolled over in rough seas west of Adak early last Wednesday, said Henry Blake, who lives in Massachusetts.

That began a desperate fight for survival, Blake told a panel of federal investigators during a hearing at the Hilton hotel in downtown Anchorage.

Blake said he and six others made it into a life raft, which itself was filled with water as waves pounded against it and the men tried to secure a sheltering canopy in the wind gusts.

"And then a big one came," he said, a monster wave that overturned the raft and dumped the men -- all wearing survival suits -- into the frigid water.

When they regrouped, three of the men had disappeared. "Josh was gone, Cedric was gone," said Blake, pausing at that point as emotion gripped his throat.

In the ensuing hours, before a U.S. Coast Guard rescue helicopter found them the next day and hoisted them to safety, waves flipped the raft over and over again -- 20, 30, maybe even 50 times, Blake said.

A rookie crewman, 23-year-old Adam Foster of Shoreline, Wash., testified Monday that after one wipeout he found himself about 40 yards away from the raft. "Countless times," he said, waves flipped the raft and he had to swim hard to get back to it.

"When we saw that helicopter just come out of the sky out of nowhere, that was the best feeling I've ever felt in my life," he said.

Only Blake, Foster and two others survived the sinking.

It is inevitable that when the "big" one comes, the monster wave will overturn the raft and dump the men into the frigid water. Sadly survival suit helped some but not all. A comment attached to the published ADN story by a "ddkeen" that says:

Thank God for the survivors. I am so sorry for the others who lost their lives. May God bless their families and bring them peace.

Amen!

God bless America and our Constitution!

Eight days to the 2008 U.S. Presidential election, as a naturalized citizen I have been paying close attention to this election as always. On a day no important freaque waves news around, I think it would be appropriate for me to take this opportunity to express some of my civic feelings on my blog here.

Two score and nine years ago, I came to this country on September 23, 1959 from Taiwan, the Republic of China, to pursue advanced studies first in Virginia Tech. Graduate School. That was almost two years before Lady Stanley Ann Dunham give birth to baby Barry Obama on August 4, 1961, six months after she married Barack Hussein Obama, a student from Kenya, on February 2, 1961. Because there was no official birth certificate, other than something called “certification of live birth” filed on August 8, 1961, was made available, the baby’s full given name and place of birth, and therefore his status of being a “natural born Citizen”, are all unknown. It is plausible that the birth could had taken place in Kenya while Ann and her husband were visiting Kenya at the time based on account of the spoken words of the baby’s paternal grandmother in Kenya.

In the intervening years, I managed to get through my graduate studies, fell in love with the American system that everything clearly rooted in the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution, decided to stay and had the good fortune to become a U.S Citizen. Along the way I enjoyed a 42 years research career and continuing to this day as an emeritus. As a grateful beneficiary of the great U.S. system, I earnestly hope my daughter and grand daughters can expect the same fortune I enjoyed in freely pursuing the American dreams. They should if we can continue honor our Constitution as:

WE, the people of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution of the United States of America.

That’s what being an American is all about!

Well, here we are in year 2008, another election year. Unlike previous elections in previous years, this one is very different and utmost important. This time our Constitution is at stake!

That baby boy who refused to disclose his detailed birth record, only a live birth announcement, that renders the question of whether or not he is a natural born citizen to be very much in doubt.. So for all practical purpose he could be constitutionally not qualified to run for president, but he is now grown up and is now one of the candidates and he could get elected next week. Therefore his election could make a mockery of our U.S. Constitution.

Is this a minor quibble with the Constitution? I wish it does – if he loves America and honor our Constitution. Unfortunately he is apparently not!

According to this newly discovered audio interview made in 2001 on public radio here :

A person with his kind of Marcist "distribution of wealth" views is going to be our next President of the United States? How nightmarishly frightening! It shows clearly that he is anti-constitution when he talked about the wish to

“. . . break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution.”

God Almighty! Those constraints the Founding Fathers placed is for the purpose of restraining the government to insure our liberty. What was he trying to do? Is he an American? So with his anti-Constitution attitude, if American people elect him the President of the United States of America, how can he be honestly taking the Oath:

“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Almighty God, we always do need your help, but this is especially the very time we, the people of the U.S., need your help in overcoming the evil force against our Constitution now! Your supreme blessing for us are the only power that can save our one Nation under God, indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all!

Let us sing!





Update

Steve Schippert of WizbandBlog expressed the same feeling as I was trying to express, but much more eloquently and concise:

It cannot be any clearer. Barack Obama, the favorite to be elected the President of the United States of America in barely a week's time, sees the American Constitution as an obstacle rather than a guiding document. Let that sink in for a moment. Ponder what that really means and rationalize how a man with such disdain for the Constitution - your Constitution, our Constitution - can possibly in good faith take the oath of office and swear to protect and defend our Founding Document.

Final practice of C.J.'s first ice-skating competition

Allow me to show off my maternal-grandfatherly pride today by presenting the video of my first grand-daughter, six year old C.J.'s final practice for her first ice-skating competition:



Here are some beautiful descriptive English words in the book of J. I. Rodale's "The Synonym Finder": pride and joy, treasure, jewel, gem, . . . , or in verbs: take pride, exult in, bask in, . . . , anyway they are all applicable and you are welcome to share them all with me.


Update:

Here's CJ's actual performance when she has the ice all by herself:



And here's the warmup before her performance:



CJ was placed First Place in her age group in the competition. Here are some action shots during CJ's actual performance photographed by the family's photographer friend John:

Deceit of man-made global warming

The article published Wednesday, October 22, 2008 in Canada Free Press by Dr. TimBall is a timely must read for the world we are facing these days. The whole title of the article is more expressive: Financial meltdown defrocks deceit of man-made global warming.

Here's how the article starts:

Frequently after a presentation someone will ask me the rhetorical question, “So, you are telling us the majority of scientists, the IPCC, and National Academies of Science are all wrong.” It is more than the usual consensus argument, which says you must be wrong because the majority disagrees. It implies it is not credible to believe so many people are deceived. The consensus argument is counteracted by the point that consensus is not a scientific fact. The second implication was more difficult to counter. Not any more! Now the massive failure of the financial markets and financial systems shows how a majority of people including world leaders, politicians, academics, business leaders and the media were fooled.

The financial debacle and the climate change misdirection fit Abraham Lincoln’s dictum, “You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time.” Maybe now politicians the public and the politicians will acknowledge that they can and have been fooled about climate change.

Clearly expecting politician to acknowledge they were being fooled is to much of a wishful thinking. I think here's the essence:

We cannot stop climate change because we, or our CO2, are not the cause. There is no record of any duration for any time period in which CO2 increase precedes a temperature increase. Even if all countries implemented the complete Kyoto Protocol the difference in atmospheric CO2 would be undetectable. Saying we must adapt to climate change appears to avoid the issue but ignores that all adaptation plans are for warming. Evidence for cooling continues despite contrary comments. They say 2000 - 08 was warmer than previous decades, but this ignores the downward trend - a trend contradicting the IPCC prediction as this plot shows. (Compare the purple line (actual trend with the IPCC prediction orange/brown line).

Here's the last paragraphs of the article:

Despite persistent failures of the IPCC predictions, most politicians are fooled into believing CO2 is a problem and the cause of climate change. Even if they don’t accept, they believe it is political suicide to assume otherwise. They accept the argument that all those prestigious groups can’t be wrong. Sorry, but they can and are.

Abraham Lincoln’s dictum applies to climate change. Environmental extremists will continue to be fooled; those who were not fooled will have no pleasure in “I told you so;” and we only need enough people to realize they’ve been fooled to force or allow politicians to face reality.

Read the whole thing! It's will at least provide some release to our uneasy feelings as we are facing toward our uncertain future.

Algore's nightmare

The editorial of the Investor's Bussiness Daily last Friday (October 17, 2008) entitled "Cold Reality" is such a cool article that'll make Algore scream in his nightmare:

Start with Alaska, a place in the news of late. The state's glaciers, after two centuries of shrinkage (a trend that began before the advent of the internal combustion engine and smokestack economy), actually grew during the winter of 2007-08.

"In general," Bruce Molnia, a U.S. Geological Survey glaciologist, told the Anchorage Daily News, "the weather this summer was the worst I have seen in at least 20 years."

Translation: It was so cold that the snow that causes glaciers to expand didn't melt until later than usual.

Meanwhile, the International Arctic Research Center reports 29% more Arctic sea ice this year than last. This doesn't exactly square with overheated predictions earlier in the year that the North Pole would be entirely free of ice over the summer for the first time in recorded history.

Farther south, midmonth temperatures in Oregon hit record lows, and on Oct. 10 Boise, Idaho, got its earliest snow ever — 1.7 inches that beat the old record by one day and 7/10 of an inch.

Much farther south, Durban, South Africa, had its coldest September night in history a month ago, and parts of the country had an unusual late-winter snow. A month earlier in New Zealand, officials at Mount Ruapehu reported the largest snow base ever.

These last four developments, taken together or separately, don't disprove the global warming theory. But unlike climate projection models, which are often wrong but endlessly thrown in our faces as examples of hard science, they are real world events wholly contrary to the story the alarmists have been spreading.

Global warm mongers are rapidly losing credibility. Mainstream journalists will still believe them because climate change fits the narrative they've so carefully nurtured. But eventually the error will have to admitted. It won't happen publicly, though, because by the time they come to their senses, the issue will have been long forgotten by the public.

Yes, indeed, Algore and his band of global warm mongers are rapidly losing credibility. But seriously now, do they ever have any to begin with?

Lake Superior waves

The website Earth Science Picture of the Day (EPOD) is a place that can always be count on showing interesting as well as exciting pictures. Today this Lake Superior wave picture by Mike Klarich is simply fascinating.
The wave hit the big rock and reflects into a part of the Hawaii pipeline kind of effect. That is tantalizing! Clearly it's not for surfers, though.

Another small boat capsizing ascribed to a freaque wave

Similar story, different part of the world oceans. This time it happens in Victoria, Australia. According to The Standard:

A CATAMARAN dubbed 'Battle Cat' felt the full fury of the sea when it was capsized and destroyed off The Flume yesterday.

The catamaran was travelling west 300 metres off the coast from Granny's Grave to The Flume at 5.30pm when a strong wind dropped and a freak wave capsized the boat.

The occupants of the vessel, Warrnambool's Kevin Chisholm, 26 and Jack Curwen-Walker, 19, escaped from the wreckage relatively unscathed.

The bad news is that's another case ascribed to a freaque wave with no particular details. The good news is that both boaters are "escaped from the wreckage relatively unscathed." Thanks be to God!

Freaque opinion polls, hiding data, etc.

Reading the "wizbangblog" today, a post by DJ Drummond on opinion polls interested me. As I have been given up on paying attention to opinion polls for a long time, his post gave me a good explanation for my behavior:

I have followed opinion polls for some years now, and I have great respect for a poll which is properly done, and properly reported. Unfortunately, there are a lot of polls which get published without providing readers or viewer with the proper context, and worse there are a number of major polls which hide vital parts of their internal data. The media, it must be remembered, is not and never has been in the business of reporting facts. Instead, they want to sell a story, in order to claim lots of attention which will increase readership or ratings. And in this election, the media has overwhelmingly been biased . . .

I stopped paying attention to polls mainly because I found the poll results and reality are totally not correlated. I sensed that they might play tricks to manipulate results. As a scientist working on data analysis, I am especially offended by " hide vital parts of their internal data."

Many years ago when I just started my research career, I was awe-struck by a young scientist who was a new Ph.D. from Stanford. He did some impressive laboratory wave experiment that verified some theoretical aspect of the wind wave studies. When I met him in a conference, I felt like I was meeting a star. Some time later I met one of his Stanford classmates in another conference. This classmate told me the truth behind his experiment made me lost some of my respect for him. It turned out that this guy worked very hard, he did hundreds, may be thousands experiments on the study. Only a few runs, by chance, fit the theory. But he only took those few case to his adviser to show that he verified the theory. He got his degree and became a rising star! He became fairly successful and well-known. I don't know what had happened to him. Somehow he disappeared from the wave research world for quite some time now. He's about my age, probably he's enjoying retirement somewhere also.

Anyway for a scientist dealing with data, hiding, disgarding, fixing, or twiddling with data are all inexcusable, bordering on falsification. Please remember it next time when you see Algore's beautiful global warming data plot again. Are they for real? Of course for pollsters, they are media instruments which in 2008 are just political instrments, they should not ever be considered as scientists by any stretch of imagination. The 2008 election season has one more month to go. The pollster are still poised to make a whole lot of money yet. Can they still lift their head up high after the election day?

Piracy off Somalia

I blogged about the present day pirates in Gulf of Aden earlier this month. Last week Ukrainian cargo ship Faina "was captured by Somali pirates on September 25, 2008, becoming the 62nd attack by pirates on ships near Somalia, and the 26th ship hijacked by pirates in 2008" according to Wikipedia. This morning AFP reports:

The USS Howard

MOGADISHU (AFP) — The US Navy on Wednesday piled pressure on Somali pirates holding out for a 20 million dollar ransom for a Ukrainian cargo ship carrying tanks and other arms.

Warships from the United States and other navies have blockaded the MV Faina in a pirate lair off Somalia's Indian Ocean coast.

The US Defence Department has suggested it could wait days for a Russian warship to arrive, before taking action, and has laid the emphasis on ensuring a "peaceful resolution."

The pirates, who seized the MV Faina with its 21-man crew and 33 Soviet-era T72 battle tanks last Thursday, say they are under 24-hour surveillance from the US ships and helicopters.

"We are prepared for any eventuality," warned pirate spokesman, Sugule Ali, by satellite telephone from the ship.

It is certainly comforting to know the U.S. Navy is on the scene. So the modern day thugs will not be the old time vikings. The title of the AFP article "US Navy plays waiting game with surounded Somali pirates" certainly give us hope for a peaceful solution, thanks to the U.S. Navy. But one just can not help asking where the heck is United Nations? Did they ever done anything meaningful for the world peace?

???

Right! zero, zilch, nothing, nada!
(Do you suppose that the pirate leader might get an invitation to address the U.N. someday?)

Hazardous wind farm?

A recent news item from North West Evening Mail of U.K. may serves to demonstrate what's happening with our once basically serene world:

A GIANT new windfarm set to be built off Walney will prove a hazard to ships, a tanker firm has claimed.

James Fisher and Sons, which owns liquefied gas tankers and nuclear waste vessels, is a member of the prestigious UK Chamber of Shipping.

The Chamber has slammed the government’s decision to give the go ahead for the 139 turbine West of Duddon Sands windfarm to be built eight miles off Walney.

A spokesman for the Chamber said: “We are extremely disappointed that the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) has given consent to the development of the West of Duddon Sands Windfarm site in Morecambe Bay without properly taking into account either the safety of seafarers and passengers, or the environmental costs of forcing ships to detour around the site.

“The Chamber notes that the windfarm will sit right across the normal shipping route from Heysham to Douglas (the life-line route to the Isle of Man) and the bad weather route to Northern Ireland for other ferry services.”

It added: “While the consent requires the developer to negotiate compensation with shipping companies affected, it appears that the very real safety and shipping concerns have been overridden.

“The proposed windfarm will present an additional hazard to ships navigating in the east Morecambe Bay area.

“It will seriously restrict ships’ sea room, particularly in bad weather and may lead to berths being blocked by ships unable to sail.

“This will affect ships sailing both to the Isle of Man and to Northern Ireland - as a result of bad weather routes not being available - and could cause major disruption.”

The world was going on smoothly until someone wants to participate in the popular but really a covertly "orchestrated crisis" -- under the disguise of urgent need for alternative energy and all become a mess!

There is a Chinese saying: "天下本無事，庸人自擾之." Literally translate: There's nothing the matter under the Sky until some idiots of mediocre ability messed things up. Yes, Algore and followers, that means you!

Science and faith

Two piece of news item invited my attention this morning. One is a tragic fishing boat capsizing in the ocean of South Australia. One crew dead, one missing, while the skipper swam 6 hours to shore to call for help. Some chalk up the capsizing to freaque waves but details are unclear.

The other is an article by Mark I. Pinsky in USA Today entitled "Science and faith, the British way." I guess I am mildly surprised in the first place is to hear that there is a British way -- just shows one can always learning something new each day!

Of course I am not surprised to read this:

Modern scientists do not routinely identify their spiritual affiliation; it's extremely difficult to say for certain how many are religious. Even so, among contemporary American scientists, many — perhaps a majority — have declared themselves skeptics, secularists, agnostics and atheists. Carl Sagan, arguably America's best-known cosmologist, and an agnostic, wrote a book titled The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark.

I never was a fan of Carl Sagan. I never thought a scientist should be a show man. I watched many of his TV shows but never was really impressed by them. So I find it's irksome to use Carl Sagan as a typical U.S. scientist. Now he claims

On a recent fellowship at the University of Cambridge, scientists I met did not fit the stereotypes common to American popular culture.

I can not help wonder how many American scientists really fit the "stereotypes common to American popular culture" if they can freely express their true feeling. Yes I am asserting that many American scientists may not consult their free will to even question themselves whether or not they truly fit the stereotype. They, especially the younger ones, have to conform or else they are afraid to be run over by the stereotyped clique like a freight train.

This is a true fact. Sad, but really true! It is easy for me to say all these. I am retired. We can not help but have to sympathetic with today's young post Doc's and assistant professors who are fighting for a tenure or a permanent position. Yes, we are the free world. But these poor souls simply don't have the liberty to express what they really feel. They have to swim in the "main stream"and follow the stereotype cliques!

The world was not always like this. How did we get here?

I have been wondering about it for some time. Yesterday I think I have found the answer in a very frightening article entitled "Strategy for forcing political change through orchestrated crisis."

No, it's not about science -- but has everything to do with our world today. It is about
a strategy that seeks to hasten the fall of capitalism and destroy our capitalistic system by pushing the society into crisis and economic collapse and to "replace the capitalist 'rule book' with a socialist one." This strategy, started in the mid 1960's by Columbia University sociologists Richard Andrew Cloward and his wife Frances Fox Piven, has been firmly behind the national scenes ever since. No one knows by design. As the article states:

Most Americans to this day have never heard of Cloward and Piven. But New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani attempted to expose them in the late 1990s. As his drive for welfare reform gained momentum, Giuliani accused the militant scholars by name, citing their 1966 manifesto as evidence that they had engaged in deliberate economic sabotage. "This wasn't an accident," Giuliani charged in a 1997 speech. "It wasn't an atmospheric thing, it wasn't supernatural. This is the result of policies and programs designed to have the maximum number of people get on welfare."

Mayor Giuliani did not stop their practice, only convinced them to hide further behind the scene. Sadly this clandestine sociology act invariably spread into all academics and other realms insidiously. Too few Americans, including the learned scientists, really know what is going on within the country. A case in point, most of them blindly give their faith to things like "global warming" without realizing that it is simply a deliberately "orchestrated crisis".

I started today's post by discussing the article by Pinsky on science and faith. But that's not really a problem. What we are facing as crisis are the "orchestrated crisis" around us. How soon can the American people be waken up by this? There are anti-American factions out there waiting and trying to destroy American system, American constitution, American dream, and American way of life.

Right at this moment the politicians in Washington D.C. are struggling for some sort of "bailout" of failed Fanny Mae and Freddie Mac. That's the crisis been under orchestration over the years. Don't be fooled. Whatever the bailout is will most likely not going to work anyway. Because the ones who perpetrated the crisis will not going to stop until they succeeds in their destruction.

Americans, beware!

What I am wondering is if Richard Andrew Cloward (1926-2001) is smiling or laughing out loud at his own handiwork right now.

In my humble opinion, he is NOT.

Because in this scientist's faith, there will be no smiling or laughing in hell! (I know, I know, I am not suppose to judge. But I do believe in God's supreme justice. I hope I am on His side!)

Confucius Day

I don't think there is such thing as Confucius day as I call it here. But today, September 28, is known as the birthday of Confucius (551 BC - 479 BC). Because Confucius is a historically timeless teacher, today is also celebrated as the Teacher's Day in Republic of China. Today is in fact is Confucius' 2558th birthday. Chinese has been officially celebrating this day throughout the history and different dynasties. Except when the Marxist Commie regime occupied the mainland China they rejected the traditional Confucian reverence and had forbidden the thousands of years ceremonial tradition. Fortunately the tradition is alive and well and celebrated yearly all over Taiwan and the free world.

The following is the picture of a traditional celebration today performed by school children in front the Confucius temple in Chi-shan, Kaohsiung County. It is called the eight-yi dance (八佾舞), which is generally designed befitting for the emperor rank celebration:

Oops -- from Commie China

When you read a news article from an official news agency, what do you expect to read, fact or fiction?

If you read Xinhua news agency, beware, it could be fiction!

This news yesterday (September 25, 2008) from AP:

An article describing China's long-awaited space mission was launched Thursday hours before astronauts even left the launch pad.

The country's official news agency Xinhua posted an article on its Web site Thursday written as if the three astronauts had already been launched into space.

The Shenzhou 7 mission, which will feature China's first-ever spacewalk, is set to launch Thursday from Jiuquan in northwestern China between 9:07 p.m. and 10:27 p.m. (1307 GMT and 1427 GMT).

The Xinhua article is dated Sept. 27 — two days from now — and comes complete with an entire dialogue between the astronauts.

That article, no longer accessible online, is

. . . titled "Sleepless Night on the Pacific, Sidelights on the Observation and Control of the 30th Lap of Shenzhou 7 Spaceship," which was available most of the day, has now been removed from the Xinhua Web site.

A staffer from the Xinhuanet.com Web site who answered the phone Thursday said the posting of the article was a "technical error" by a technician. The staffer refused to give his name as is common among Chinese officials.

The piece vividly described the rocket in flight, complete with a sharply detailed dialogue between the three astronauts as

"First-level measurement arrangement!"

After this order, signal lights all were switched on, various data show up on rows of screens, hundreds of technicians staring at the screens, without missing any slightest changes ...

"One minute to go!"

"Changjiang No.1 found the target!"...

The firm voice of the controller broke the silence of the whole ship. Now, the target is captured 12 seconds ahead of the predicted time ...

"The air pressure in the cabin is normal!"

"Ten minutes later, the ship disappears below the horizon. Warm clapping and excited cheering breaks the night sky, echoing across the silent Pacific Ocean."

It was an impressive and imaginative author. Clearly the author might do very well writing fictions. But if it was not discovered the date discrepancy -- who could know the difference?

We have seen fake reportings in New York Times, Washington Post, and Boston Globe over the years. So the Commies are just catching up. Welcome to the modern main-stream journalism: let the readers beware!

Are they in space or on earth? Who cares?

P. S. :

Here's a good article in Guardian yesterday written by Zhang Hong entitled "Can China afford its space mission?" with this comment:

This year, Chinese central government badly needs some good news to dress up a harmonious and prosperous appearance of the nation. The snowstorm in January, the Tibet riot in March, the earthquake in May and the most recent milk powder scandal have put the authorities under unprecedented pressure. On the economic front, the collapse of stock and property markets has left many investors with huge losses. Meanwhile, high inflation has made living costs in most Chinese cities unendurable. Tens of thousands of middle- and small-sized enterprises have failed due to the tight monetary polices and the rising operating costs. On the administrative front, the regional government's cover-up attempt during several high-profile incidents has triggered widespread dissatisfaction over the Communist Party's ruling. On internet forums, participants, often anonymous, are wondering how accountability can work under a one-party system.

I think the demise of one-party system is long over-due. The commie regime's continued affix to the obsolescent Marxism can only serve to speed up their dissolution sooner!

Botox challenged.

Good grief!

The richest and most powerful Madame Speaker!

Do you want to hear her laugh? Better not. Let's keep the world sane.

What I am wondering, however, is whether or not this picture was taken before or after the botox ???


P.S. September 27, 2008

There is a hilarious article in American Thinker by Jan LaRue entitled "Botox and numbskulls" which may be germane here:

Think about it. Botox is a protein derived from botulism toxin, which is a paralytic illness. I'm thinking anyone who wants it injected anywhere near their brain has deeper problems than wrinkles.

When low doses of Botox are used, it actually paralyzes or relaxes facial muscles, giving the recipient a clean, smooth facial appearance. This is where it's gone askew-it's only safe in low doses.

There's been serious over-medicating at this chemical fountain of youth. It's penetrating skulls and paralyzing frontal lobes. And the smoother the forehead, the more oblivious they are to their denseness. What else explains the daily deluge of drivel?

Here's one of the LaRue's examples of the deluge of drivel:

On Meet the Press, host Tom Brokaw asked the perpetually perplexed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi about "Senator Obama saying the question of when life begins is above his pay grade, whether you're looking at it scientifically or theologically. If he were to come to you and say, 'Help me out here, Madame Speaker. When does life begin?' What would you tell him?" Having checked previously with the "doctors of the church," except for the ones licensed to practice medicine, said Pelosi, "I don't think anybody can tell you when life begins, human life begins."

She topped it off with another stunner: she told Brokaw she believes, "in natural gas as a clean, cheap alternative to fossil fuels." She repeated it just to make sure we get it.

The Speaker of the United States House of Representatives doesn't know when life begins and she doesn't know that natural gas is a fossil fuel. Forget loyalty oaths for Congress. What we need is a ban on Botox and proof of active brain waves. I say we start drilling in ANWR and move on to Pelosi's skull.

Because Botox numbs the muscles, it can cause the appearance of surprise, which explains why Biden and Pelosi usually look clueless, and why they make the rest of us look like we were zapped with a stun gun.

On thin ice!

Nature News carries an interesting news about arctic ice shrinks less this year than last:

Sea-ice cover in the Arctic (pictured) has reached its annual low — and not broken last year's record of the smallest ice extent since satellite records began, says the US National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado.

Ice cover began to grow again from 10 to 14 September after bottoming out at 4.52 million square kilometres, the centre says. That's 9.4% more ice than last summer's minimum. Contributing factors include the fact that there were fewer warm days in the Arctic region this year than last, and also that winds blew in different directions instead of packing the ice together into a small area.

AP PHOTO/THE CANADIAN PRESS/J. HAYWARD

The International Arctic Research Center in Fairbanks, Alaska, also recorded a minimum last week: 4.71 million square kilometres on 9 September.

If you are tempted to draw any inference from this news, here's an explanation from Jennifer Francis, Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences, Rutgers University:

. . . the ice cover is now so thin that any substantial recovery toward normal ice conditions is highly unlikely, especially as greenhouse gases continue to accumulate in the atmosphere.

In other words, don't you dare not to think that global warming is on going and going strong. Well, we are all on thin ice here. Let's see whatever is going to happen next year before splitting any more hairs!

The race is ON!

This exciting! A technology race on harnessing wave energy is on!

Not to be outdone by its Iberian neighbour Portugal, Spain has also deployed a commercial wave energy project.

As reported in Greenbang by Petah Marian today:

The project is being led by Spanish utility Iberdrola and the pilot consists of a bouy 10 metres in diameter with a shaft that contains the energy transformation system and a stabiliser. As the bouy bobs up and down in the waves a piston moves and generates the electricity, which is transferred onshore by an underwater cable. It is also fixed to three semi-submerged bouys anchored to the seabed at a depth of 50 metres.

The PB40 ‘PowerBouy’ is being supplied by Ocean Power Technologies and Iberdrola plans to ramp the project up to include 10 bouys in the plant, located four kilometres from the coast at Santoña.

The other nine buoys, which will be launched in a later phase, will have an initial installed power of 150 kW and, when operational, the annual electricity production of this installation will be approximately equivalent to the domestic consumption of some 2,500 homes.

Here are some explanations OPT provided for their technology:

A 10-Megawatt OPT power station would occupy only approximately 30 acres
(0.125 square kilometers) of ocean space.

Sensors on the PowerBuoy® continuously monitor the performance of the various subsystems and surrounding ocean environment. Data is transmitted to shore in real time. In the event of very large oncoming waves, the system automatically locks-up and ceases power production. When the wave heights return to normal, the system unlocks and recommences energy conversion and transmission of the electrical power ashore. • Buoys are spaced to maximize energy capture.

• Rugged, simple steel construction.

• Utilizes conventional mooring systems.

• Simple installation using existing marine vessels and infrastructure.

• Scalable to large power stations (100+ MW)

How refreshing to see this kind of competitive technology innovations instead of competing innuendos on temperature increase and to blame it on human.

Wave power in action

I noted a couple days ago that Air Force Academy starts doing research on wave energy. Then it was reported in seattlepi.com that Oregon State received a 5-year, $6.25 m grant from the U.S. Dept. of Energy to "establish an ocean energy research center in Newport, Ore." After totally ignoring wave energy by the powers that be in Washington D.C., these recent developments are certainly better late than never! But clearly the U.S. can only play a catching-up game now!

This CNN news today, "A new era for wave energy", tells that there's already fruition "with the inauguration of the world's first commercial wave power project off the Portuguese coast":

Developed by a Scottish engineering company, Pelamis Wave Power Limited, the Pelamis Wave Energy Converters (PWEC) have been towed into position three miles off the coast of Agucadoura in north Portugal.

The first phase of the project is using three PWEC to generate 2.25 megawatts of power at a cost of nine million euros.

If successful, a second phase will see energy generation rise to 21 megawatts from a further 25 machines providing electricity for 15,000 Portuguese homes.

The project is a joint venture between Pelamis Wave Power Limited, Babcock and Brown Ltd -- a global specialist asset manager, Energias de Portugal (EDP) and Portuguese energy group EFACEC.

Named after the sea snake Pelamis, each machine measures 140 meters in length, is 3.5 meters wide and sits partially submerged in the sea.

Here's Youtube demonstration of how it works:


And here's a 4-step explanation I captured from this Youtube called "Wave power: how it works."


Of course because it was developed in Scotland and installed in Portugal, it should not be surp0rised to see this headline: "If Portugal can rule the waves, why not Scotland?" in NEWS.scotsman.com.

Well, indeed, for that matter, why not U.S.?

On the other hand, I can not help wondering how long will it take for the mighty environmentalist power center to voice objection to this kind of innovations because it might disturb sea turtle or some other things like it.

NASA Use Baby Toy To Save The Planet

The title of today's post is taken from the news headline of fairhome.co.uk this morning. It is certainly merit a detailed look to find out what is going on. May be the write-up from the Discovery News by Irene Klotz explains it quite clearly:

Sept. 23, 2008 -- When a sophisticated science probe failed to return any data about whether pools of melted glacial ice were showing up in the ocean, a NASA researcher turned to a decidedly low-tech solution: a brigade of rubber ducks.

Robotics expert Alberto Behar, with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., wants to figure out if water shooting through tunnels in Greenland's Jakobshavn Glacier makes it into Baffin Bay.

The work is part of ongoing studies by NASA and other agencies to understand changes in the levels of Earth's seas, which may be tied to global warming.

Behar, a robotics expert, dispatched a probe with a positioning sensor and satellite telephone into one of the glacier's water tunnels in hopes of tracking where the water ends up. In the summer, ice melts on glacier's surfaces and pools into shallow lakes and streams that then fall into water tunnels in the ice known as moulins.

Where it ends up is a mystery.

"We're a little frustrated right now," said Seelye Martin, the program manager for NASA's Earth sciences division. "The water has to go somewhere but we don't know where."

When the probe fell silent, Behar turned to Plan B. He labeled 90 rubber ducks with an email address and the words "science experiment" and "reward" written in English, Danish and the native Inuit language, then set the toys loose in a moulin.

The idea was that fisherman would find the ducks and notify Behar where they were found.

He's still waiting for first contact.

"I was a little surprised," Martin told Discovery News. "There are a lot a fisherman up there."

Baffin Bay, an ice-laden body of water between northeast Canada and Greenland, freezes over in the winter, so Martin is hoping the ducks might be located next summer.

The field work complements ongoing measurements of Greenland and the world's oceans taken by an array of satellites.

"In the last century, the total change in sea level was about 8 inches," Martin said. "Right now, it's headed to more like 12 inches so we're seeing a greater contribution from the ice sheets."

The Jakobshavn Glacier is responsible for shedding almost 7 percent of Greenland's ice.

Now the Fair Home further reports that:

NASA are not just relying on the ever faithful ducks, they have also planted probes with GPS transmitters into the ice to track movements within the ice flow.

These two will also ultimately end up in the sea.

So far, not a single duck or probe has been found by the public, but the scientists estimate that they are still way out at sea so would only be found by passing fishermen.

The Jakobshavn Glacier has a claim to fame, in that it is almost certainly the source of the iceberg that broke off in 1912 and ultimately sank the Titanic.

Note that the ducks have been labeled with the words 'science experiment' and 'reward' in three languages, along with an e-mail address. Please fishermen, go look for them for science' sake! And here's an AP picture reported in dailymail.co.uk presumably showing Jakobshavn Glacier in Baffin Bay, between Greenland and Canada:


Perhaps Alan Harten of Fair Home had summarized a general feeling:

Gyroscopes that propel astronauts in face crushing spins, Saturn Five rockets that defy gravity to escape the ground, spacesuits that can keep a man alive in the dangerous empty atmosphere of space; these are the kinds of scientific innovations that we associate with NASA.

Now they bring us another earth shattering scientific marvel, the rubber duck.

So stay tuned!