Category: Uncategorized

Just a warning about the warning, really…

This article in The Guardian (UK), “Warming hits ‘tipping point’” may have substance… or not. The report quotes some who say that the Siberian permafrost is melting for the first time in the last 11,000 years, and that this melting may trigger catastrophic ecological collapse.

The article is—typical of Guardian prose—extremely alarming, one sided and, absent contradictory voices, quite convincing.

Until one probes further. See the research on the research done by a correspondant at Chaos Manor, Joerg Fliege, that outlines the problems with taking this warning seriously… yet.

Again, there may be genuine cause for concern, but if you see a lot of brouhaha in the press and on the blogosphere in the upcoming weeks, keep in mind Dr. Pournelle’s comments on Joerg Fliege’s information,

“… The melting of a region of permafrost that has remained frozen for 11,000 years is an important matter, and one would expect to see it widely reported and investigated, with more references to the scientific literature. Which is not to say it is not real, but until I see something other than a report in New Scientist repeated by the Guardian, I do not think it worth a very great deal of attention. Which is not to say that a less partisan source will not be found; but until it is, I’m not revising my views on global warming.”_*_

More information, less noise, please. Oh. Right. Mass Media Podpeople. The signal to noise ratio is so lopsided as to render all MMP “reports” essentially all noise. *sigh*

…and with it all of the funding and protection afforded Wahabbists by Saudi Arabia. I’d sooner see Arabia—or at the very least Mecca and Medina—in Hashemite hands again.

I don’t often find myself agreeing with stuff the LATimes prints, let alone anything by Robert Scheer, but this is not far off the mark:

“It’s hard to see how Saddam Hussein’s brutal and secular Iraq was worse than the brutal theocracy run by the House of Saud. Yet one nation we raze and the other we fete.”

Yeh, Scheer exaggerates the brutality of the Saudi regime toward its subjects (though not by much; Saddam Hussein’s brutality exceeded that of the present brutality of the House of Saud only in degree), and he uses his arguments against the Saudis as a pretext to berate President Bush (naturally—and I have little doubt that Scheer would berate Bush if he were being tough on the Saudis. It’s the mantra: Chimpy BushHitler=Evil, no matter what.). Still, that blind pig did manage to find an acorn or two…

Saudi Arabia Delenda Est!

ALa’s Restaurant is open at Blonde Sagacity and serving up the Carnival of the Recipes #52

ALa’s laid it all out in a lovely menu display. If I could ever find a “real world” restaurant like that, I’d stop cooking…

🙂

(And—what’s the female form of mensch? Womansch? Whatever it is, ALa qualifies. I was sure my entry for this week was too late to make it, but she got it in. Thanks, ALa!)

Great food. Head on over and make out this weekend’s grocery list!

Yeh, it’s all over the place, and I’m probably the last person on the face of the planet to blog this…

…but on the off chance that one of my (2? 🙂 regular readers haven’t yet seen this yet, here ’tis.

WARNING: Swallow that coffee first!

(It’s here, too. The other link is a tad funky. What can I say? NYT… )

I warned you, didn’t I?

(Still, how did I miss this in July? *sigh*)

“Despite Illegal Status, Buyers Get Home Loans“

“Liberalism is a philosophy of consolation for Western Civilization as it commits suicide.” —James Burnham

Go to the first link (a broken link), then you can view the regular old whatever link.

h.t. Jerry Pournelle

Some would say we’ve learned nothing from Prohibition. IMHO that is incorrect, we’ve learned a great deal. Specifically, we’ve learned that criminalizing any behavior creates opportunities for wealth and power for politicians, government employees, and those who would organize and market that behavior. We’ve also learned that such criminalization gives government an additional set of restraints and controls to apply to all the citizens.

It seems that some warehouse workers in Britain are concerned about their “privacy” in the workplace because some companies have proposed using RFID to track employees in large wrehouses—RFID tags, armbands, whatever.

“One of the largest trade unions there, GMB, is up in arms about radio frequency identification technology—and is trying to put its foot down.”_*_

Cluebat—*whack!* Hey! Crybabies! The warehouses are not your property. You just work there. Privacy? Yeh, that means no cameras in the rest rooms. Everything else, well you want privacy, quit work (or get fired) and go home. Thats where you can have a reasonable expectation of privacy.

The real issue is this: workers don’t want their bosses to have easy ways to tell they are malingering. Lazy bums. Stupid, too. As the Baseline article linked above notes, these same huge warehouses have tons of videocams in place to monitor product (and employee) movements. So, big deal. The RFID technology just makes real time tracking (and ease of management) more efficient.

And adds another layer of management tools to let bosses know when an employee is goofing off instead of working.

Good. Fire the lazy bums. Crybabies.

Breakfast Burritos

A nice meal any time.

8-12 flour tortillas (depends on size–see flour tortilla recipe below)

• 1/2 lb your fav pork sausage, OR chorizo
• 1/2 chopped yellow onion
• 6 eggs
• 3/4 C shredded cheese (pick your own)
• small can diced green chiles
• salsa (again, pick your fav)

Cook the sausage in a frying pan. Drain most of the the grease (for great flavor in other dishes, like refried beans, save the grease in a glass container, refrigerated). Add the onion and cook til it’s clear. Add the egs and stir well. When the eggs are just beginning to firm up, add most of the cheese and all the green chiles. Cook til the cheese/eggs just set well, then remove from heat and let it sit for a lil bit.

Assemble the breakfast burritos just like any ole burritos. Some egg/sausage mixture in a tortilla, maybe a lil more shredded cheese and some salsa. Roll and eat.

Woosies use forks.

Flour Tortillas

Ingredients:

• 3 cups flour
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 4 Tbsp. low fat margarine, butter or lard. I have even gotten some good tortillas out of this recipe using olive oil (use a wee tad less water)
• about 1 1/4 cups warm water

Mix the flour, baking powder and salt in a bowl.

Cut in the fat (margarine, butter, lard or oil) with a fork. If you have a pastry cutter, well, la-di-da on you. 🙂

Add the warm water a tad at a time until you can form a ball and the dough’s soft but not sticky. Now, knead it for a while. It takes several times doing this before you’ll get this part just right, unless you’re shot through with luck. Pinch off the dough and form about a dozen small balls. Roll ’em up and let ’em sit for a bit (you can even cover ’em and put ’em in the fridge for later, if you want.

Heat up your well-seasoned* CAST IRON griddle or frying pan. Medium to medium-high heat. Drop a drop or two of water on the surface and it “dances” (just right) rather than just spit up steam (way too hot), you’ve got it.

Roll out the balls. Yep, jut a regular ole rolling pun works just fine.

Place your rolled-out tortilla(s) on your hot griddle and let ’em cook just a few seconds per side. Flip ’em by hand. If you burn yourself, learn to not DO that!

As each tortilla is cooked, put it on a plate that has a towel ready to recieve it and cover it with the towel. You can stack all of ’em one or two at a time (depending on the size of your griddle). They’re ready to eat.

*See this article for how to season a cast iron frying pan or griddle.