A lesson for Bush from the Cold War

By Harvey Simon; a former Harvard University national security analyst, is writing an alternative history of the Cuban Missile Crisis. He can be reached by e-mail at harveysimon@verizon.net.

April 20, 2006

The Kennedy administration's China debate continued under President Lyndon Johnson but a new intelligence assessment downplaying the danger allowed cooler heads to prevail. China detonated its first nuclear weapon on Oct. 16, 1964, and Kennedy's fears that China would use its nuclear arsenal to bully Asia have proved groundless.

With any luck, cooler heads will also win today's debate in Washington over Iran and the world will again be spared the disastrous consequences that can come from a president's failure of imagination.

There is a critical difference between China's leadership of the 1960's and Iran's leaders today. The former still believed that protecting the lives of its citizens was a requirement of statehood. The latter has said that Armaggedon is fine with them because Allah is on their side.

That said, Iran is using its nuclear program as a bargaining chip. They saw that the Clinton Administration caved in and appeased North Korea, so the Iranians are using a version of the same play to negotiate with the major world powers to secure Iran a hegemonic position within the Middle East. Russia holds most of the cards in this debate. My educated guess is that Russia is waiting for a crisis that makes it look like America "failed" to contain Iran, so that Russia can ride in for the rescue. Russia misses its superpower status, and it wants relevance in international politics... brinksmanship is a tried and true method.

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No animals were harmed in the making of the above post... much.

Rally backers are split over boycott for immigrants

ASSOCIATED PRESS

April 20, 2006

LOS ANGELES – Organizers of the movement that has led hundreds of thousands of immigrants onto the nation's streets are divided over their next big protest – a May 1 boycott urging workers and students to stay home.

Boycott backers want to highlight the economic toll if constructions sites and restaurants are undermanned, crops untended and hotels uncleaned. They also hope empty classrooms will demonstrate that immigration reform is a major issue for future voters.

Doubters fear alienating federal lawmakers who are still wavering over how to reshape U.S. immigration policy.

Among the doubters are figures from unions and religious and Hispanic groups who have mustered nationwide marches supporting a chance at U.S. citizenship for an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants. These leaders support a protest May 1 – but after school is out and businesses are closed.

If the split suppresses participation, even boycott backers acknowledge their movement will lose momentum.

“Our credibility as a community is on the line,” said Armando Navarro, coordinator of the National Alliance for Human Rights, a Southern California organization pushing the boycott. “We've shown our power politically, but if we can't show it economically we are going to lose it.”

Some organizers hope to see turnout so large that it will protect participants from retribution.

“If immigrants continue demonstrating in large numbers, are they going to fire all of them?” said Julita Rincon, 21, an illegal immigrant and University of Houston student who leads a student activist organization.

Sporadic but mostly mild criticism of the boycott began soon after organizers announced it in early March.

Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony, an outspoken supporter of illegal immigrants, discouraged it during Easter Mass.

“Go to work. Go to school,” Mahony said. “And then join thousands of us at a major rally afterward.”

That divide widened yesterday, when immigrant coalitions in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., voiced opposition to the boycott during news conferences and announced plans for alternate May 1 activities.

Boycott opponents argue that skipping work and school could sour mainstream support and even get thousands of immigrants fired.

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me@rescam.org

Rally backers are split over boycott for immigrants

ASSOCIATED PRESS

April 20, 2006

[qupte]Boycott opponents argue that skipping work and school could sour mainstream support and even get thousands of immigrants fired. [/quote]
Perhaps ICE officials should just cruise the neighborhood and see what businesses are closed for the day as prima facie evidence for search warrants :-)

I think they should make May their Solidarity Month and stay out of work for 31 whole days. By then, all the bottom-feeding businesses that rely on illegal labor will have died off.

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No animals were harmed in the making of the above post... much.

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Rally backers are split over boycott for immigrants

ASSOCIATED PRESS

April 20, 2006

[qupte]Boycott opponents argue that skipping work and school could sour mainstream support and even get thousands of immigrants fired.

Perhaps ICE officials should just cruise the neighborhood and see what businesses are closed for the day as prima facie evidence for search warrants :-)

I think they should make May their Solidarity Month and stay out of work for 31 whole days. By then, all the bottom-feeding businesses that rely on illegal labor will have died off.

You'd better sell all your stock in McDonald's.

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Account frozen...

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Red Bull Air Racing

Gas price by zip at Seti

Distracted drivers are involved in most wrecks
Study cites phones, eating, even e-mail

By Ken Thomas
ASSOCIATED PRESS

April 21, 2006

BLACKSBURG, Va. – Those sleep-deprived, multitasking drivers – clutching cell phones, fiddling with their radios or applying lipstick – apparently are involved in an awful lot of crashes.

Distracted drivers were involved in nearly eight out of 10 collisions or near-crashes, says a study of more than 200 drivers that was released yesterday by the government.

Researchers reviewed thousands of hours of video and data from sensor monitors linked to the drivers, and pinpointed examples of what keeps motorists from paying close attention to the road.

“We see people on the roadways talking on the phone, checking their stocks, checking scores, fussing with their MP3 players, reading e-mails, all while driving 40, 50, 60, 70 miles per hour and sometimes even faster,” said Jacqueline Glassman, acting administrator of the government's highway safety agency.

A driver's reaching for a moving object increased the risk of a crash or potential collision by nine times, according to researchers at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute.

They found that the risk of a crash increases almost threefold when a driver is dialing a cell phone.

Researchers said the report showed the first links between crash risks and a driver's activities, from eating and talking to receiving e-mail.

“All of these activities are much more dangerous than we thought before,” said Dr. Charlie Klauer, a senior research associate at the institute. Data from police reports had estimated that driver inattention was a factor in about 25 percent of crashes.

For many drivers, the research offered more proof of what they see on their daily commutes.

John Simpson of Christiansburg, Va., said his “personal favorite” is once seeing a woman in traffic “with her knees up on the steering wheel, sheet music in her lap and she was playing the flute.”

But Simpson, a 20-year-old who works for a fire safety business, says multitasking can be a necessity. For example, he must take calls from customers while driving in his Chevy Astro van.

“I'm notorious for the cell phone and coffee. But if you're up on the road at 6 o'clock in the morning, coffee is probably the best thing in the world,” he said.

For more than a year, researchers studied the behavior of the drivers of 100 vehicles in metropolitan Washington, D.C.

They tracked 241 drivers, who were involved in 82 crashes of various degrees of seriousness – 15 were reported to police – and 761 near-crashes. An air bag deployed in three instances.

The project analyzed nearly 2 million miles driven and more than 43,300 hours of data.

Drowsy driving increased the driver's risk of a crash or near-crash by four times to six times, the study said. But the study's authors said drowsy driving is frequently underreported in police investigations.

When drivers took long glances away from the road at the wrong moment, they were twice as likely to get into a crash, the report said.

Assessing cell phone use, the researchers said the number of crashes or near-crashes linked to dialing the phones was nearly identical to those tied to talking or listening on the phone.

The greenhouse myth: Panic is not warranted by facts

By Steven Milloy; publishes JunkScience.com and CSRWatch.com. He is an adjunct scholar at the Competitive Enterprise Institute and the National Center for Policy Analysis.

April 21, 2006

Al Gore's global warming documentary hits theaters on May 28. Titled “An Inconvenient Truth,” the film purports to make the case for concern over man-made emissions of greenhouse gases.

Meanwhile, at JunkScience.com, we've produced “The Real Inconvenient Truth,” debunking two key myths of climate alarmism, including that the Earth's atmosphere acts like a greenhouse and that reducing carbon dioxide emission will avert significant temperature change.

The notion that our atmosphere acts like a greenhouse – that is, so-called atmospheric “greenhouse gases,” like water vapor and CO2, “trap” incoming solar radiation to warm the atmosphere – is wrong. Not only doesn't the atmosphere work that way, greenhouses don't either.

Greenhouses work by physically blocking heat transfer (by convection) from inside to outside – the same effect that heats the inside of your car when it's parked in the sun on a hot day. Opening the doors and windows allows air currents to flow and the heat to dissipate.

But neither the atmosphere nor “greenhouse gases” block convection, so there is no literal atmospheric “greenhouse effect.”

Since “greenhouse effect” terminology has long been used to refer to the natural warming of our atmosphere to a habitable level, we'll stick with that incorrect, but commonly used, terminology for ease of discussion. So how does the “greenhouse effect” actually work?

Atmospheric flows of energy are complex, but a simplified explanation is as follows.

Incoming solar radiation is partly absorbed by the Earth's surface, partly absorbed by various atmospheric gases (particularly oxygen and ozone) and partly reflected back to space. Solar radiation isn't significantly absorbed by greenhouse gases in the lower atmosphere and so doesn't directly cause the greenhouse effect.

For our purposes, the greenhouse effect is largely caused by energy emitted by the Earth's surface, most of which is subsequently absorbed by greenhouse gases and clouds. Very simply expressed, the greenhouse gases and clouds transform that absorbed energy into heat that warms the lower atmosphere into energy that is radiated back to space and also back to the Earth's surface.

These radiative processes, if they acted alone, would warm the Earth's atmosphere to about 77 degrees centigrade – much warmer than the 15 degrees centigrade the Earth actually is. Fortunately, other atmospheric processes – including updrafts and circulation carrying heat upward and toward the poles – facilitate energy escape into space so that our atmosphere cools to around 15 degrees centigrade.

But our focus here is carbon dioxide's role in greenhouse warming – that's what Al Gore wants us to fret.

Putting aside the cooling convection and circulation processes mentioned above, the limiting factor with respect to greenhouse warming isn't the quantity of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere; it's the energy emitted by the Earth's surface.

Different greenhouse gases absorb different wavelengths of energy emitted by the Earth. The fact that only a limited amount of the Earth's emitted energy is available for absorption by CO2, and that CO2 has to compete with water vapor and clouds for that energy, results in a crucial (but little publicized) relationship between CO2 and atmospheric warming.

The relationship between CO2 and temperature is logarithmic in nature – that is, as CO2 increases in the atmosphere, it absorbs less and less additional energy to produce correspondingly less and less additional warming. At some point, adding more CO2 to the atmosphere doesn't significantly change atmospheric temperature.

So what is the point at which more CO2 doesn't cause more warming? Are we near it? The commonly used range of estimates of CO2's impact on global temperature should help put any worry into perspective.

A doubling of atmospheric CO2 from pre-Industrial Revolution days (280 parts per million to 560 ppm) might increase global temperature from between 0.5 degrees centigrade to 1.5 degrees centigrade – that is, not much.

The current atmospheric CO2 level is about 380 ppm and the estimated temperature increase since 1880 (when regular temperature record-keeping began) is estimated to be about 0.60 degrees centigrade.

Since at least half of this temperature increase predated 1950 – prior to any significant increase in atmospheric CO2 levels – we can estimate that the 30 percent increase in atmospheric CO2 since the Industrial Revolution is associated with a temperature increase of about 0.3 degrees centigrade. This supports the idea that doubling atmospheric CO2 from pre-Industrial Revolution levels would cause less than a 1 degree centigrade increase – and we're not close to such a doubling.

Since this small variation in global temperature is well within the historical climate record, panic hardly seems warranted.

In preparation for Gore's movie, the global warming lobby has purchased lots of newspaper and TV space for an alarmist advertising blitz during May. It's comforting to know that all that hot air won't be significantly warming the planet.

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me@rescam.org

Russia spurns U.S. request to halt the building of nuclear plant in Iran

BLOOMBERG NEWS SERVICE and UNION-TRIBUNE

April 21, 2006

Russia rejected a call from the United States to halt construction of a nuclear plant in Iran yesterday. The United States hoped to put pressure on the Islamic Republic to stop its nuclear enrichment program.

Russia is helping Iran build the nuclear plant for civil use in the southern city of Bushehr. That plant should be completed by the end of this year. Iran has paid Russia as much as $1 billion for work on the project.

Nicholas Burns, U.S. undersecretary of state for political affairs, called on Russia yesterday to end military and civil nuclear cooperation with Iran because it has defied U.N. Security Council demands to stop enrichment research.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said April 11 that the country had succeeded in enriching uranium.

But Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Mikhail Kamynin said on the ministry's Web site, “The construction of this nuclear plant doesn't represent any threat of a non-proliferation character.”

After a meeting in Moscow with representatives from all five permanent Security Council members plus Germany, Burns said Wednesday that Iran must face “costs” for its defiance.

In a talk yesterday to the San Diego World Affairs Council, State Department official Gordon Gray said Security Council members Russia and China “are less than enthusiastic” about sanctions on Iran. He said energy-hungry China wants access to Iran's oil.

Gray, deputy assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, said the only logical conclusion to Iranian officials' insistence on complete access to the nuclear-fuel cycle “is they are trying to develop a nuclear weaponization program.”

Gray also said Iran is the major source of support for Islamic Jihad, the Palestinian group that took credit for a suicide bombing Monday in Tel Aviv that killed nine civilians.

Also speaking was Babak Rahimi, who teaches Islamic studies at UC San Diego. “My father was executed by the Iranian government,” he said, adding, “I count the days until that government will be toppled, hopefully by the Iranian people.”

Still, he faulted U.S. officials for not directly engaging Iran's government in dialogue.

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me@rescam.org

The anti-war left's disturbing attack

CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER
THE WASHINGTON POST

April 22, 2006

Last time around, the anti-war left did not have a very high opinion of generals. A popular slogan in the 1960s was “war is too important to be left to the generals.” It was the generals who had advocated attacking Cuba during the missile crisis of October 1962, while the civilians preferred – and got – a diplomatic solution. In popular culture, “Dr. Strangelove” made indelible the caricature of the war-crazed general. And it was the I-know-better generals who took over the U.S. government in a coup in the 1960s best-seller and movie “Seven Days in May.”

Another war, another take. I-know-better generals are back. Six of them, retired, are denouncing the Bush administration and calling for Donald Rumsfeld's resignation as secretary of defense. The anti-war types think this is just swell.

I don't. There are three possible complaints that the military brass could have against a secretary of defense. The first is that he doesn't listen to or consult military advisers. The six generals make that charge, but it is thoroughly disproved by the two men who were closer to Rumsfeld day-to-day, week-in-week-out, than any of the accusing generals: former Joint Chiefs Chairman Richard Myers and former Marine Lt. Gen. Michael DeLong. Both attest to Rumsfeld's continual consultation and give-and-take with the military.

A second complaint is that the defense secretary disregards settled, consensual military advice. The military brass recommends X and SecDef willfully chooses Y. That in itself is not necessarily a bad thing. Rumsfeld's crusade to “transform” a Cold War-era military into a fast and lean fighting force has met tremendous resistance within the Pentagon. His canceling several heavy weapons systems, such as the monstrous Crusader artillery program, was the necessary overriding of a hidebound bureaucracy by an innovating civilian on a mission.

In his most recent broadside, retired Army Maj. Gen. John Batiste accuses the administration of “radically alter(ing) the results of 12 years of deliberate and continuous war planning” on Iraq. Well, the Bush administration threw out years and years and layer upon layer of war planning on Afghanistan, improvised one of the leanest possible attack plans and achieved one of the more remarkable military victories in recent history. There's nothing sacred about on-the-shelf war plans.

As for Iraq, it is hardly as if the military was of a single opinion on the critical questions of de-Baathification, disbanding Saddam's army, or optimal coalition troop levels. There were divisions of opinion among the military as there were among the civilians, and indeed, among the best military experts in the country. Rumsfeld chose among the different camps. That's what secretaries of defense are supposed to do.

What's left of the generals' revolt? A third complaint: He didn't listen to me. So what? Lincoln didn't listen to McClellan, and fired him. Truman had enough of listening to MacArthur and fired him, too. In our system of government, civilians fire generals, not the other way around.

Some of the complainers were on active duty when these decisions were made. If they felt so strongly about Rumsfeld's disregard of their advice, why didn't they resign at the time? Why did they wait to do so from the safety of retirement and with their pensions secured?

The Defense Department waves away the protesting generals as just a handful out of more than 8,000 now serving or retired. That seems to me too dismissive. These generals are no doubt correct in asserting that they have spoken to and speak on behalf of some retired and, even more important, some active-duty military.

But that makes the generals' revolt all the more egregious. The civilian leadership of the Pentagon is decided on election day, not by the secret whispering of generals.

We've always had discontented officers in every war and in every period of our history. But they rarely coalesce into factions. That happens in places such as Saddam's Iraq, Pinochet's Chile or your run-of-the-mill banana republic. And when it does, outsiders (including United States) do their best to exploit it, seeking out the dissident factions to either stage a coup or force the government to change policy.

That kind of dissident party within the military is alien to America. Some other retired generals have found it necessary to rise to the defense of the current administration. Will the rest of the generals, retired or serving, now have to declare themselves as to which camp they belong?

It is precisely this kind of division that our tradition of military deference to democratically elected civilian superiors was meant to prevent. Today it suits the anti-war left to applaud the rupture of that tradition. But it is a disturbing and very dangerous precedent that even the left will one day regret.

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me@rescam.org

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Red Bull Air Racing

Gas price by zip at Seti

(received via email)

Subject: US Citizens Working in Mexico....

The following from a director with SW BELL in Mexico City.

I spent five years working in Mexico.

I worked under a tourist visa for three months and could legally renew it for three more months. After that you were working illegally. I was technically illegal for three weeks waiting on the FM3 approval.

During that six months our Mexican and US Attorneys were working to secure a permanent work visa called a FM3. It was in addition to my US passport that I had to show each time I entered and left the country. Barbara's was the same except hers did not permit her to work.

To apply for the FM3 I needed to submit the following notarized originals (not copies) of my:

1. Birth certificates for Barbara and me.

2. Marriage certificate.

3. High school transcripts and proof of graduation.

4. College transcripts for every college I attended and proof of graduation.

5. Two letters of recommendation from supervisors I had worked for at least one year.

6. A letter from The ST. Louis Chief of Police indicating I had no arrest record in the US and no outstanding warrants and was "a citizen in good standing."

7. Finally; I had to write a letter about myself that clearly stated why there was no Mexican citizen with my skills and why my skills were important to Mexico. We called it our "I am the greatest person on earth" letter. It was fun to write.

All of the above were in English that had to be translated into Spanish and be certified as legal translations and our signatures notarized. It produced a folder about 1.5 inches thick with English on the left side and Spanish on the right.

Once they were completed Barbara and I spent about five hours accompanied by a Mexican attorney touring Mexican government office locations and being photographed and fingerprinted at least three times. At each location (and we remember at least four locations) we were instructed on Mexican tax, labor, housing, and criminal law and that we were required to obey their laws or face the consequences. We could not protest any of the government's actions or we would be committing a felony. We paid out four thousand dollars in fees and bribes to complete the process. When this was done we could legally bring in our household goods that were held by US customs in Loredo Texas. This meant we rented furniture in Mexico while awaiting our goods. There were extensive fees involved here that the company paid.

We could not buy a home and were required to rent at very high rates and under contract and compliance with Mexican law.

We were required to get a Mexican drivers license. This was an amazing process. The company arranged for the licensing agency to come to our headquarters location with their photography and finger print equipment and the laminating machine. We showed our US license, were photographed and fingerprinted again and issued the license instantly after paying out a six dollar fee. We did not take a written or driving test and never received instructions on the rules of the road. Our only instruction was never give a policeman your license if stopped and asked. We were instructed to hold it against the inside window away from his grasp. If he got his hands on it you would have to pay ransom to get it back.

We then had to pay and file Mexican income tax annually using the number of our FM3 as our ID number. The companies Mexican accountants did this for us and we just signed what they prepared. I was about twenty legal size pages annually.

The FM3 was good for three years and renewable for two more after paying more fees.

Leaving the country meant turning in the FM3 and certifying we were leaving no debts behind and no outstanding legal affairs (warrants, tickets or liens) before our household goods were released to customs.

It was a real adventure and If any of our senators or congressmen went through it once they would have a different attitude toward Mexico.

The Mexican Government uses its vast military and police forces to keep its citizens intimidated and compliant. They never protest at their White House or government offices but do protest daily in front of the United States Embassy. The US embassy looks like a strongly reinforced fortress and during most protests the Mexican Military surround the block with their men standing shoulder to shoulder in full riot gear to protect the Embassy. These protests are never shown on US or Mexican TV. There is a large public park across the street where they do their protesting. Anything can cause a protest such as proposed law changes in California or Texas.

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Real gas outrage - Government neglect aids oil companies

UNION-TRIBUNE EDITORIAL

April 23, 2006

It's perfectly natural to be angry about the price of gasoline in San Diego, which hit a record $3.07 a gallon last week. The question is, where to direct all that healthy outrage?

Government officials are a good place to start. Sure, greedy oil executives are making a ton of money, but our leaders opened the vault.

Nearly half of that three bucks went to crude-oil producers in the U.S. and overseas. Setting aside fuel taxes, which total nearly 60 cents a gallon in San Diego, the rest of the cash went to California companies that refine oil into gasoline.

Consumers also get some of the blame. Drivers got hooked on big, inefficient vehicles during the era of cheap gas that ended in 2003. Now folks in fast-growing China are buying cars, so worldwide demand for gasoline is soaring, thus pushing up prices.

Yet federal policy-makers are doing next to nothing.

President Bush's energy bill simply poured subsidies into the energy industry. He recently made a stab at increasing mileage standards for cars and trucks. But it fell far short, particularly when compared with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's plan to eventually require 40 miles per gallon from the average vehicle.

Democrats have done worse, demanding price controls and steep taxes on the oil industry. They've apparently forgotten the gas lines of the 1970s.

Weaning the nation from oil-dependency will take decades, requiring a combination of improved efficiency, new supplies and alternative fuels. But in the meantime, our leaders can do much more, even at the state and local level.

Consider California's infamous “gouge gap.” Over the past decade, the state's drivers have paid an average 20 to 25 cents more for each gallon of gas than the national average. It adds up quick.

Just last year, consumers sent at least $3.2 billion in extra costs to the six giant companies that control California's oil refineries.

Lack of competition is the sole explanation for this remarkable ability to raise prices – and hold them high for years.

Refinery executives are hired to maximize profits. It's up to government officials, and consumers themselves, to ensure robust competition. Here we have largely failed in California.

In 1980, there were 34 refineries in California. Now there are 13.

Some were doomed by tougher environmental laws. Californians want clean air, and we're even willing to pay a little extra for it. But not $3.2 billion a year.

In theory, refiners in other countries should be pouring supplies of finished gasoline into the state. But public officials have favored new cars and container cargo over messy fuel terminals in state ports. Oil storage tanks are routinely torn down.

Lawmakers have ignored several studies offering solutions that range from port expansions to new pipelines to streamlined permitting for refinery expansions. It's past time to blow the dust off those studies.

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me@rescam.org