The veil is not Islamic

Its really not!

I hate how this has been blown out of all proportion but the media is giving it so much attention that the stereotypical image of a Muslim women as wearing the headscarf now dominates the public consciousness. And its not true. Most moslem women don't cover their heads and nowhere in the Koran does it say they should do- the proscripton states that modesty is the goal, not invisibility.

Ah, the torrid corruption and hypocrisy of Western Society!

Robert Fisk rocks onwards once again, carefully describing how the US and Britain gave Saddam all of his chemical weapons and then expressed public horror as he deployed them against the Iranians and Kurds whilst patting each other on the back in secret about how they had developed a lucrative little export market. There's more in this report from the same paper.

Another little gem here about how a nation's religious beliefs are negatively correlated with its social health. 3 guesses as to who has the least healthy and most religious society of all of the developed Western democracies . . . . . . .

Woman beaten on a bus in Israel for refusing to "sit at the back"

I found this on LGFwatch- Little Green Footballs' alter ego.

http://haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=801449

Dirty, nasty little bunch of mysoginist fucks- that's what the haredi are.

Fuck religion.

Lipid quantification

I posted earlier about Bligh & Dyer's assay for total lipids and how I had arse results. A little reflection has led me to consider that user error may remain a possibility but before I can test for it I need a working lipid assay to validate it with. So I have been pndering the different techniques open to me, including a plate assay that quantifies triglycerides, cholesterol and phospholipids- thereby giving me quantitative values for storage, physiological and structural lipids. There is also the opportunity of developing an HPLC method to give me more detailed data, however lipid HPLC presents a fecking minefield of challenges from co-eluting peaks to the avilability and appropriate nature of standards. Finally, I have the option of running an alternative to the Bligh & Dyer assay developed by Frings et al which look straightforward.

Whatever I decide to do it has to be developed rapidly, without excessive cost and it has to be feckin reliable. I am sick of non-Ronseal assays- i.e. things that do not do exactly what it says on the tin!

Oh well, at least my Scope For Growth work is progressing in a positive direction due to the excellent advice of Prof J I Spicer ["Spicey John"]. That chap rocks.

finally- the conclusive evidence of Blair the Warmonger's lies

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article2076137.ece

Carne Ross, Britain's key negotiator to the UN, dodges threats of prosecution under the Official Secrets Act to relate how, in the run up to the war, British Officials had no reason to suspect that Saddam either had any WMD or represented a threat to British interests.

We all knew it was lies. Its such a shame that 600,000 Iraqis, nearly 200 British Service Personnel and several thousand US Personnel had to die before it was established.

Thanks Tony! (You cunt.)

I'd be proud to be branded an Idiotarian

I was browsing Wikipedia when I encountered the entry on Little Green Footballs. Its interesting how they brand anyone who disagrees with their messages of hatred as an "Idiotarian". I was half tempted to get into their comments and mince up their cosy little ball-cupping session with a few carefully chosen words as I did earlier this year to the blog Neo-Neo-Neo-Neo-Con. But then I recalled that that experience merely angered me further at the ignorance of these people and frankly I've got better things to do with my time. That and the fact that the comments are not publically accessible so as to ensure that people such as myself, bent upon introducing silly things like reason into their world, can be prevented from doing so.

Anyway read the wikipedia article and see if you are an "idiotarian". Seems like pretty much everyone in the world is apart from the Israelis and the LGF residents themselves.

my 13 hour day

I was at work at 0930 this morning and left the lab at 2220. I feel amazin! (if a little knackered :) )

Spent 8 hours doing LC-MS and then another 4 and a bit playing with worm pooh! Yeay!

Should get me some goddamn kudos when this gets published though ;)

Science tigers, ho! Raowr!

I just signed the Euston Manifesto

Its here. You lovely peeps out there may be interested in reading it and signing it too.

I find it fascinating that my country has no simple constitution or statement of values or a manifesto such as this (the mere idea of Blair accepting its tenets is laughable). The only thing that worries me is that it lacks a profound endorsement of secularity. . . . Hmmmmmmmmm, methinks I will email them to suggest such a 'ting.

:)

Bligh & Dyer

I spent 2 hours tonight putting my lipid quantification data into excel and the result? -BULLPOOP!

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Bollocks to this assay.

The Palestinian apartheid degenerates into a simple slaughter

GGGGGGGGGGGGRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

This shit makes me ANGRY!

What can I do? I might as well rub my own shit on my face as write to my MP about this.

I fucking hate the UK's political system.

machismo and peace keeping

Interesting article from openDemocracy regarding the prevalence of machismo in international diplomatic forums.

I can't help but think that testosterone incites the majority of diplomatic breakdowns. I remember a conversation I had with my MRes supervisor about endocrine disruption and whether or not the prevalence of xenoestrogens in the environment could benefit society by changing patterns of male behaviour. Certainly in societies with a patriarchal culture the unassailability of the male ego can simply halt the application of common sense to many of the challenges of peace-keeping.

Another interesting anecdote came from a family friend who was posted to Bosnia with the RAF. As an air-traffic director she had to liaise between the different local and international forces to manage access to the contested airspace, not to mention tiptoe around the variety of inflated male egos that inevitably dominate such conflicts with their petty territorial squabblings. I remember her recounting how she was deployed in many deadlocked situations as a conflict breaker as in the Balkan culture it is inconceivable that a women is superior in any way to a man. In such situations she was introduced to negotiations and then authorised to offer minor concessions to the opposing delegation- whose egos would not let them be outdone by a mere woman- and who would promptly attempt to outdo these concessions and subsequently engage in an escalation to the point where she could get them to dance naked on a table if she was so inclined!

Another example comes from my own country where it appears that the job of bailiff is being taken by more and more women (I think it was a BBC article but I can't find it, grrrr). It appears that many tense situations are dealt with in a far more diplomatic and less aggressive manner by the fairer sex, possibly because they come across as less threatening (?).

Politics

I am continually enraged by some people's ability to condemn my entire progressive philosophy with a single syllable. "Left" or "Right". Such absurd polarisations do nothing for any debate on politics as I am convinced that such generalisations lost any real meaning at the end of the Cold War. Is it not clear that modern policy requires elements of both these political paradigms? Does not the European social democracy model occupy the high moral ground that should be the goal of every progressive civilisation that does not aspire to mediaeval moral standards or environmental holocaust? On the other hand I believe that our democracy, in the UK at least, is fatally flawed. President Blair was elected by less than a fifth of the population! How this degenerate little toerag can drag our nation's credibility through the pile of excrement that is Iraq and still retain his position of leader of our nation eludes me. Substantial reform along the lines of compulsory voting policy is essential if the substantial socially and culturally deprived section of the white lower classes are to be made to participate in the democracy in which they live. I believe that everyone has a responsibility to engage with their society. What, if not that, does the word society mean?

3 posts in a day You lucky, lucky peeps, you!

I just wanted to get my hattrick in by linking to Johann Hari's most recent article. Its a nice piece of insight into the subtleties of American politics. I like Johann's writing- he's good at picking out important detail such as this.

This week I have been mostly discovering . . . Sam Harris!

He's a fascinating chap if ever I've heard of one, and a good, upstanding antitheist. Apparently-

"At age 19, he and a college friend tried MDMA, better known as ecstasy, and the experience altered his view of the role that love could play in the world. ("I realized that it was possible to be a human being who wished others well all the time, reflexively.")"

Well, that just goes to show the power of ecstasy really. If anyone is under any misapprehensions regarding my stance on the issue I have consumed ecstasy recreationally for many years and can enthusisatically corroborate Sam's experience. There is little less harmful than consuming ecstasy recreationally (a respected neurologist once commented that it was "safer than aspirin"- much to the fury of the conservative press). Anyway, with MDMA you don't have to inhale smoke, you don't have to burn anything, you don't get angry, woozey, trippy, anxious, depressed or nervous- you just feel amazing and wonderfully empathic. Its like having a mental link with all of your friends. The come down is a little low but compared to a hangover its nothing! Rather like being a little forgetful and a littl etimid. There's little to criticise about the experience.

Well, I've just got Sam's 1st book and I'm going to have a little read and let you know what its like. I just finished Dawkins' "The God Delusion" and it was marvellous so although this may be a bit like reading the same material again I'm attracted to the subtleties that might differentiate the 2 works.

why hasn't Tony been impeached or otherwise dismissed from office yet?

http://www.antiwar.com/orig/pilger.php?articleid=6736

It says it all.

Every day I read another commentator demanding to know why, in the face of incredible evidence against him, Blair remains in office. Why is the little shit still smiling back at me with that grim little "the world's woes are on my shoulders" look every time I watch the news?

The bastard needs to go. My MP hasn't even replied to the last letter I sent her. This whole government needs to go. Screw the Tories too, VOTE FOR A FUTURE! VOTE GREEN!

I love it- pastafarianism rules! AARRRRRRrrrrrrrrrrrrrr, me hearties

a few small steps closer to Christian suicide bombers

Harry's Place brought this to my attention. As Harry says, "this is some scary shit!" Be afraid peeps, be very afraid. The God Squad are tooling up and preparing for Armageddon and even if you don't want it they're going to bring it about one way or another: Either you're on the side of Jesus; or you're damned.

Fortunately for this Pastor Becky Fisher I'm not a fan of capital punishment. People like her are desperate for Armageddon as they think they have the power of Jesus on their side and anything up to that level of conflict is just pandering to satan. My question is: "As the Islamic fundamentalism of children is universally condemned, how are you any different by doing the same thing?" This fat psycho-bitch's plans are laid all to clear on her own website . She speaks of children evangelicising their friends and of laying hands on sick people to heal them in the name of Jesus and- my favourite- "raising the dead". And people are actually taking her up on the offer of skullfucking their children royally and paying her little cluster of superstitious speakers in tongues and snake charmers for the privilege!

I have been reading up on the whole anti-evolution, anti-progress, neo-con right wing christian fundamentalist death cult and I've decided to engage a typical advocate of such dark age society in lucid discussion of their values and beliefs so for the enxt few days I will be attempting to lock horns with one of these hate-preachers. Follow my progress here to find out how successful I am. :)

Pakistan's ailing dictatorship

oD carried this story.

As the bloody insurgencies in Afghanistan and Iraq grow more and more violent and bloody it seems that few eyes are watching this nuclear power drift steadily further into confusion and instability. The oD article is an unnerving indicator that Pakistan is on the verge of a sudden shift in power structure. The US backing of Pervez Musharraf hamstrung the man's rule from 11th September 2001 onwards. As a result, although the Pakistani military appears to have been superficially aiding Bush's war on common sense the truth of the matter is that support for the Taliban has mushroomed in the anarchic tribal regions that lie between Afghanistan and Pakistan proper. NATO troops in Afghanistan are facing the product of this absurd piece of gunship diplomacy by the US- an revitalised Taliban insurgency and now a pair of countries with grassroots hostility to NATO's mission.

I am deeply concerned that this support for anti-western politics will, 10 years down the line, result in a Talibanesque Pakistan. With nuclear weapons. Just as in Iran and Iraq, the US are throwing guns and technology at the Pakistanis, hoping that this will help their mission but they failed to notice that much of the Pakistani military didn't really want to work against their kinsmen. As the oD article points out:

"Elements within the Pakistan military and intelligence communities have long been known to be sympathetic to the Taliban and al-Qaida ,and the question has simply been how widely this sympathy was shared within the military government itself."

Once again US foreign policy is built around the premise that you can achieve yuor goals through coercion and outright bribery. This works to great effects within the US administration so it is no surprise that successive administrations attempt to export the practice. The truism quoted in the oD article is horribly apposite.

"for a man in possession of a hammer all problems look like nails"

Praise the Lord Johann, for he tells It like It is.

http://www.johannhari.com/index.php

Honestly guys- how can anyone possibly believe in religion when you're faced with such incredibly succinct and rational arguments for it all being a fairy tale. The one thing I take issue with Johann for is describing religion as a "hallucination". I have had plenty of wicked hallucinations and I have also experienced religion 1st hand thanks to my forced attendance at chapel every week whilst I was at school and they are very, very different. I will email Johann accordingly.

Israel threatens nuclear strikes against Iran

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1157913657029&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FPrinter

The fuckers have gone and done it now! If they deploy nuclear weapons then they will have to suffer the consequences of their actions. I can see no response to this except military action under the UN flag to seize and destroy Israel's nuclear arsenal. There is no excuse for such overtly offensive action whilst there remains no evidence whatsoever of Iran attempting to develop, let alone actually possessing, a nuclear warhead.

The question is, are the Israelis so out of touch with reality that they think the rest of the world will let them get away with this? I believe that the answer is no. However, the mere threat of nuclear weapons in a serious discussion of the 'Iranian issue' chills me to the bone.

the rise of the anti-atheism in the UK

Everyone child in the UK should be made to watch this.

Most of the adults too.

The pot or the kettle? US House Intelligence Committee branded "outrageous & dishonest" by IAEA

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5346524.stm

Its all there.

You'd think that once Bush government realised it had lost all moral authority to preach to others that they'd make some poorly disguised attempt to buy themselves back into favour. Some sort of aid package, maybe. A few trade concessions, perhaps.

No.

Instead they've gone and got themselves a soap box from which they're directing obscenities at anyone who comes close enough to hear. Idiots!

light reading for the weekend

Not much time here, it being 1600 on a Friday afternoon so I'll make this brief. Just wanted to draw attention to these two fascinating articles on openDemocracy:

What happened to the new world order

The SWISH Report

Have a good weekend!

- Le Scare

Israel uses nerve gas against its enemies

No, I didn't believe it when I read it either but then I found this. If any of you haven't heard of James Longley he's the guy who directed the film Gaza Strip. He's lived in Gaza for years, documenting attrocities committed by the IDF and generally being a humanitarian legend. Anyway, I couldn't sleep (its 01:18 and the kittens keep waking me up just as I'm about to drop off) so I came down and started checking for more stuff on the "mystery weapons" and I happened to read through the page I linked to below about the dodgy fundamentalist website with the interview with the doctor and I realised that below it was the text of a report from a site called Wayne Madsen Report that alleged that Israel fired nerve gas shells into Lebanon during the genocide. Now, I've already said that this site rang a few bells in my objectivity centres- the language it used, the english was bad and reports were pasted in from other sites (the text referred to a picture but there wasn't one). However, the gas allegation seemed well written so I tracked down the original report and, lo and behold, there it was- a picture of an IDF soldier carrying a dirty great finned projectile. The text stated that "a former U.S. weapons expert who served in Iraq" had identified it as "a chemical weapon delivery device".

Now, I know that Israel probably has chemical weapon delivery systems (American ones, methinks) and I have no doubt that it would be relatively straight forward to find a picture, like the one in the report, regardless of where it was actually taken (on exercise, at a military base, wherever) and start shouting "look the Israelis are using nerve gas!" But the picture is not the convincing evidence at all and neither is the unsubstantiated statement regarding "gas dropped by the Israelis in villages in southern Lebanon" which " has resulted in severe vomiting among the civilian population". The convincing evidence is the document that I first linked to in this post from James Longley which contains his own eye witness report of the IDF firing gas shells into the Khan Younis refugee camp in 2001 and the subsequent trauma of the civilians, including children, who were exposed to it. I quote:

"As I made my way through the wards of Amal and Nasser Hospitals that day and for many days afterward, I observed many patients that had been brought to the hospitals suffering from these symptoms. Room after room, women, children, men. Some were vomiting. Some alternated between a coma-like state and violent convulsions, their entire bodies twisting and arching, members of their families struggling to hold them down on the beds. On and on, for days. One boy, who had inhaled a large amount of the gas in question, suffered in the hospital for an entire month with recurrent convulsions. It is difficult to describe the sensation of sitting in a room for hours and days with people suffering so terribly, and knowing that this was done by human beings."


So there it is people. And it wasn't even the only reference I found, from Longleyor from other websites.

"How," I hear you cry, "can these animals get away with such abuses?"

"How can they elude the justice that they so clearly deserve?"

Longley offers a convincing explanation that, when heard in conjunction with the knowledged imparted in the document by the Harvard professors, that I linked to in my last post, regarding the power of the Israeli Lobby to silence or bury dissent, makes convincing reading:

"The incident went largely unreported. No articles were written in major US newspapers. Fox News and 60 Minutes did not produce special reports. The story gradually grew old and fell through the cracks. Out of sight and out of mind – and who would believe that the Israeli military would do such a thing to civilians in a refugee camp?"


I don't know about you guys but I'm putting together a letter to my MP regarding Israel's multitude of war crimes that go uncondemned in this country. Now it is time for bed, sweet dreams children. Sweeter, for sure, than the average Palestinian.

Kenyan museum condemned by religious bigot for carrying evolution exhibition

I can hardly believe that anyone would be stupid enough to condemn an exhibition of some of the oldest and finest hominid fossils in the world. But that's exactly what this idiot, Bishop Boniface Adoyo (stupid name warning!), is trying to do by drumming up feeling amongst other peddlers of mediaeval superstition in an attempt to have the exhibition "removed or, at least, moved to a less prominent location"!

Here's a real money quote from the man himself:

"When museums put it out there that man evolved from apes, theologically they are affecting many people who are Christians, who believe God created us,"

"It's creating a big weapon against Christians that's killing our faith," he said, calling the evolution theory an "insult" and dangerous to youths.

"When children go to museums they'll start believing we evolved from these apes. This is not the truth,"


I'm sorry? Did I read that correctly? (!) Let's just repeat a few of those alarmingly absurd phrases, shall we?


"he said, calling the evolution theory an "insult" and dangerous to youths"

For a start Darwin's work is no longer a "theory". The entire biosphere is testament to the truth of his work. It should be called "Darwin's law" and I shall henceforth refer to it as such. Secondly, how is the truth going to be dangerous to "youths"? Are they incapable of dealing with "the truth"? (I could rant on but I think I've made my point.)

"It's creating a big weapon against Christians that's killing our faith"

It may be killing your faith, sunshine, but that's because your faith is based on a bunch of fairy tales. Get some sense you twat.

"When children go to museums they'll start believing we evolved from these apes"

So when children go to museum's they will learn stuff about the world they live in. Yeah. Really bad, that is.

I am happy to consider such absurd ejaculations to be a marker of religion's impending fall from grace. It can only be a matter of time before the rationalist movement gains further footholds amongst the world's ignorants through the presentation of incontrovertible fact. I fear, however that blood may be shed in its pursuit.

"mystery injuries" to victims of Israel's latest brutality in Gaza

The Independent carried this story today with few details but I fear that this represents a new outpouring of Israel's frustration over their humiliating failure in Lebanon. I dearly hope they have not been deploying phosphorous munitions in Gaza but I wouldn't, for one second, put it past them. The Gazan authority did a good PR job of shaking their spears by proclaiming that the Israelis were using "unprecendented" projectiles with "radiant" substance. I understand this to be an accusation of the deployment of depleted uranium shells from their tanks. But, as the article I linked to states, this accusation has no evidence whatsoever to back it. DU shells are fairly radioactive but they are not nearly dangerous enough to cause the sort of bizarre injuries reported.

I consider it far more likely that they have been using phosphorous muntiions- grenades or otherwise. One can only hope that this turns out to be a false alarm and will only serve to draw attention to the cause of the Gazan people. My heart tells me otherwise.

Should it be determined unequivocally that phosphorous has been used against Palestinians- miltants or otherwise- then I have no hesitation in declaring this to be a war crime of the most heinous kind.

Hello sustainable development, goodbye "War on Terror"

Lovely piece of analysis and associated comment on why fighting terrorism is a waste of time:

"The Cato Institute (a conservative thinktank) has released an outstanding paper, A False Sense of Insecurity (PDF), which makes the point that in any rational assessment, terrorism is really just not that big of a threat to the average person. For instance, about as many Americans have been killed by terrorists as have been "killed over the same period by lightning, accident-causing deer, or severe allergic reaction to peanuts." Whatsmore, many WMD threats are overblown and largely preventable. Indeed, with exhaustive research, the authors can conclude that:

"Assessed in broad but reasonable context, terrorism generally does not do much damage.

The costs of terrorism are often the result of hasty, ill-considered, and overwrought reactions.

A sensible policy approach to the problem might be to stress that any damage terrorists are able to accomplish likely can be absorbed, however grimly. While judicious protective and policing measures are sensible, extensive fear and anxiety over what may at base prove to be a rather limited problem are misplaced, unjustified and counter productive"

"

kofi Annan jeered and chased from South Beirut

I think this is appalling. Although UNSC resolution 1701 is far from perfect as far as the Lebanese are concerned, and however much the people of South Beirut have suffered at the hands of the Israeli genocide, there is no excuse for booing Kofi. The guy is a legend and received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001, for fuck's sake!

This quote tells a terrible story about how the US's ability to wield a veto in the UNSC has damaged the credibility of the only global forum:

"He is biased towards Israel and America," said 22-year-old Abdel-Sater Selim, a psychology student at the state-run Lebanese University. "There is no justice."

Your godsdamn right there is no justice. But you have to play the UN game if you want some. The Lebanese should take a leaf out of the Iranian book if they want to keep the yanks out of their business.

The utter paranoia and neurosis of the American Right

For those of you who either find it too painful to trawl through the propaganda of the American Right or who might not feel it warrants investigation I came across a link to a blogger who has posted an analysis of the Israeli strikes on the two Lebanese ambulances that happened on the night of the 23rd July.

http://www.zombietime.com/fraud/ambulance/

This pituary retard seems to think that the shrapnel-riddled shell of the ambulance and the injuries to six ambulance workers and three civilians - an 11-year-old boy, an elderly woman and a man, one of whom lost a leg in the incident . . . . . was a hoax.

Yes, you have read that correctly. A HOAX.

And not only has this appallingly twisted piece of propaganda been propagated freely across the internet by similarly fascistic websites and bloggers but it is obviously an absurdly flawed piece of analysis. But these people don't seem (or want) to care. Amongst the vitriol and messages of hatred and death directed at the Islamic religion, the UN, Europe and anyone elese who might possibly have ever hinted at not being quite in total agreement with everything America has ever done ever I find smug, congratulatory messages about how clever they all are not to have been duped by this piece of liberal, leftie, tree-hugging communist propaganda. (Sorry for the long sentences but I am "on one").

In response to this I drafted an email to the author of the analysis, one Zombie, which was bounced back to me several times and which I eventually despaired of ever dispatching successfully. Therefore I have chosen to post it here inthe hope that someone will read it, understand the position and possibly spread a message of resistance to this absurd and polemic piece of internet reporting.

"Sir,

I started reading you're analysis of the Ambulance strike as a matter of perverse curiosity to see exactly how any educated, rational individual could go about criticising an organisation as well respected as the ICRC and I was not disappointed.

My objections to your analysis are:

1: You're insistence that the damage to the ambulance is not consistent with a "missile" strike.
- The damage to the ambulance is relatively minor and is a long way from the total destruction that you have showed in your shots of other vehicles destroyed by Israeli missiles. This is because the ambulance was probably not hit by a hellfire or other, similar anti-armour missile. Instead the damage indicates that the ambulance was struck by either a small, unguided rocket, such as the M261 2.75" rocket launcher or a cannon shell fired from the M230 30mm cannon- both of which are common to US Apache gunships and, I presume, Israeli ones. Such weapons are preferred against "soft" targets such as civilian vehicles and there is no reason for a helicopter pilot to 'waste' a hellfire missile on an ambulance.

2: You're statement that the hole in the roof of the ambulance was the result of removal of an air vent and not an explosion.
- I do not deny that there was likely an air vent fitted in the roof, however as you point out, there are numerous other holes, tears and patches of paint that have been stripped off (your "white patches" are, in fact, areas of bare metal that have been stripped of paint). So why the multiple shrapnel holes, the buckling of the roof and the internal destruction? It is clear that an explosion has caused this damage and probably blown away the air vent- you can see that the screws that used to hold it in place have been torn away with considerable force and the pitting and tearing of the roof is consistent with a single explosion.

3: You're allegation that the "rust" on the roof is not compatible with a recent event causing the damage.
- Rust can occur within a matter of days and, indeed, in close proximity to the sea (you can clearly see the beach less than a couple of hundred metres away in the background of one picture) salt spray carried by the wind will aid this process and allow it to occur almost overnight.

4: You allege that the damage is inconsistent with an internal explosion.
- This is because, as an amateur such a s myself can clearly see, the explosion occurred outside the ambulance. The pitting on the roof and the way that metal edges are folded in indicates this to be the case. M261 2.75" rockets can be equipped with airburst fuses allowing them to explode prior to contact with a target. The man who lost his leg was most likely hit by a piece of shrapnel and not the rocket itself, which disintegrates upon detonation.

5: Your state that there is no evidence of fire in the ambulance but the injured ambulance man reported seeing fire.
- You try and accurately recall details after being hit by a high explosive device, muppet! Things get lost in translation too, there may have been a bloody great flash and a bang but no actual flames, however this may not translate accurately.

Honestly, I could go on poking enormous holes in your aburd analysis but I doubt I will achieve anything by it. I can't believe you have the gall to criticise not only people who venture into combat zones inorder to provide aid to the wounded but also the International Committee for the Red Cross- the guardians of the Geneva Convention and an organisation of outstanding moral stature. Your criticisms amount to the most disgraceful conspiracy theorism. Your allegations that the press were duped is no more respectable as you conveniently ignore the realities of wartime reporting and the lack of motivation for any humanitarian worker to exaggerate their position.

You should be ashamed.

I also posted some comments on the Right-Wing blog neo-neocon which may amuse anyone with a passion for humanism and a desire to live life on a platform of logic, rationality and equality.

http://www.haloscan.com/comments/neoneocon/115686392303436193/

For all you neo-con Bush supporters out there . . . .

I have just had the privilege of some creep threatening to "bomb my straw hut"! This is the exact sort of comment I expect from ignorant reactionary bigots such as followers of the above camps. Here is the dialogue in full, the choicest comments follow:

"One day the world will get together and deal with you." - sounds like another arab street threat coming from peasants waving their arms in the air and burning American flags. Go burn a McDonalds in your neighborhood owned by your fellow countrymen - better yet, blow some more of yourselves up because they are Shia, or Sunni, then do some honor killings or stone some women for talking to a non-family member male and keep your honor intact. Do yourself a favor, Concerned, go cut the clitoris off your daughters before they shame you. The sooner the UN is deemed an enemy to Western interests, the better and the sooner Westerners regard civilians in muslim lands as nothing but assets of terrorism and direct contributors and enablers of islamofacism, the sooner we can carpet bomb them. After you guard your family honor, Concerned, by doing what I suggested, build a deep, strong bunker because we are coming for you and your kind. It ain't over until the fat lady drops napalm on you and your progeny, leaving lots of crispy critters. Now that is not a veiled threat, Concerned, it is a pending reality for you and your kind, so, as Bush once said, bring it on while you can."

"Scary, you must be a clerk in some government office in some 3rd world nation. No doubt your whole extended family, probably the whole darn clan, is bragging about your status. Got that 4th wife yet?? The first in the clan to have a computer too I bet! The smart money behind Western interests has known for many, many years that the UN is nothing but a pack of dirty 3rd world beggars out to hustle money from the West and rich arabs, Scary. Where ya' been, lad? Please don't bring that UN tripe to places like this - it only makes guys like me want to bomb your straw hut. We all know the only practical solution here is to put a hefty bounty on UN ears, or scalps. Well? Why shouldn't I talk like this to a jackass like scary?? Huh? Sheesh! What gall this character has telling us the West needs to heed the UN."

So here you see the sort of opinion that drives the American Right. We have outright racism, almost psychotic rhetoric along the lines of "the UN is the driving force behind Al Qaeda today" and you have incredibly personal attacks upon my character without a hint of justification. I thought that I had already encountered extremes of opinion from the likes of Imp and Gambit on the environment site forum, but I now realise that they are virtual moderates in the world of internet forums and blogs. Some people might be offended by this sort of post but my opinion is that these are the exact sort of people who need to be faced up to. The Ann Coulters of this world are wilfully ignorant of the values that have brought us to the peak of civilisation that we currently inhabit and they need to made to acknowledge this.

the harsh realities of political debate on the internet

I spend a fair amount of time on this forum debating environmental issues such as the pros and cons of a new generation of nuclear power stations for the UK and similarly tree-hugging subjects. Since the start of the Lebanese genocide and actually for several months before that too, I have been carrying on a bit of a political and sociological sparring game on the forum too. Recently, however, certain parties have started to cover each others backs when I accuse them of fascism, supporting genocide and generally being a bunch of Nazis. Now, this might sound a little bit provocative and I imagine when you're reading this you're thinking "this tit is a bit of a freakin' lefty, liberal hippy dope-fiend". Well you're wrong. I am simply supporting the values that have got our wonderful civilisation where it is today and trying to explain to these inbred degenerate morons (hi Imp!) that there can be no justification for genocide, torture, an apartheid-state, extraordinary rendition, Guantanamo Bay, invasions of sovereign states, political corruption and manipulation of voters through fear and propaganda, etc.etc.etc.

I was appalled by the sudden realisation that in this day and age, people are actually willing to stand up out of their comfy armchairs in front of Fox News with their Western values, their SUV out on the driveway and their secure, well-paid jobs in a multinational company and open their mouths to defend the establishments and the administrations which advocate such behaviour as a form of government. This is the worst form of brainwashed ignorance and its proponents really ought to walk a few miles in the shoes of an Afghani or a Sudanese refugee before opening their mouths to propose plunging yet more people into the mire of constant terror.

NB
I must confess to being rather amused to have the term "punk" thrown at me as if it were some derogatory term. Have these peasants never heard of The Sex Pistols?

Concentrating Solar Power gives me the horn

I'm afraid to say it really does . . . .(!) Honestly- this is what the world has been waiting for! Its, like, totally renewable, totally free, totally doable, proven technology. Moreso because it has a foolproof solution to one of the most commonly raised objections to renewables- their inability to provide baseload supply. Basically, IT ROCKS!

Don't take my word for it- read these goddamn links and write to your MP and your MEP tell your neighbours (I did!) (-Yes. I got funny looks.) Tell your Mum (again, I did- she likes it), tell your fellow employees/business people/civil servants/unemployed people. SHOUT IT FROM THE ROOFTOPS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



The only concern I have is that, although this surely answers the question: "What do we do when the nasty black goo runs out?" . . .it doesn't propose a solution to the political climate that results from Europe's reliance upon imported energy. I can't see that many of the nations targeted for CSP plants will deal any better with the billions of pounds of funding on offer than those nations that currently benefit from enormous hydrocarbon reserves. Notable examples of authoritarian or otherwise dysfunctional regimes include Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iran, Lybia, Iraq, Nigeria, etc. etc.

Its wonderful to have a proven response to the whole "where do we get the baseload supply from if we get rid of all the nukes and hydrocarbon-fired power stations?" I've discussed this with a couple of (pro-nuke) people on the website who seem to be pretty well read on the practicalities of large-scale generation and they can't seem to grasp the fact that weather patterns and tidal patterns and wave patterns are all different! These people can pour out figures about costs per kilowatt hour of a modern nuclear facility but if you ask them whether you can generate energy constantly from renewables they will laugh in your face. This is why we have a barely established renewable industry in the UK whilst countries such as Austria and Denmark push out a healthy fraction of their entire output from renewables and have been doing for years!

The inspiration for this rant is my appreciation that the wind blows and the waves wash and the sun shines and the tides stream at different times to each other. Although you can't generate power from solar at night or from wind and waves when there isn't any, we are talking about a whole country here! For funk's sake! Any retard who watches the weather will be able to tell you that while its cloudy in Devon (and it often is) it may well be sunny in Anglia (and it often isn't there either, but you get the point). At the same time when there's no waves in North Wales there may well be a gale blowing in The Solent and wind and waves for all to share! The technology described above shows that long distance transport of significant quantities of energy is possible without excessive loss and the changing weather patterns of our nation and our continent have the potential to keep our lights lit for ever.

USEPA rocks!

Back to the exclamation marks on my titles again, but this time with genuine justification for I have discovered the idiot's guide to conducting LC50s and here it is you lucky people!

http://www.epa.gov/waterscience/WET/disk2/atx.pdf

This document contains everything you need to assess and calculate LC50s from the physico-chemical characteristics that need to be monitored to the number of organisms required for each test to a detailed explanation of how to go about analysing your data.

Real PunkScience!

POW!

US alone next to Israel

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13848003/

Yeah, telling it like it is!

Plenty more here: http://antiwar.com/


On a completely different subject, does anyone here know how to do an LC50?? I'm trying to work out how to get an LC50 for dissolved copper but finding all sorts of rubbish popping up in my way such as how many organisms to use, what and how many concentrations to use. Damn it this is a nightmare? Even when I've got answers to these questions more and more queue up for my attention; how do I define "death" of my little worms? (they die from the head back so even if they're still moving I've got to determine whether the head is still alive). Graaaaaaararararahahahhhhhhgh !!!!!!

I will rock this out proper style and then ;eave a record of my decisions for posterity to laugh at. Bah!

Why this heralds the end of aggression for Israel and the US

Excellent piece of analysis about why Israel can't hope to win its monstrous offensive against Lebanon and why it heralds the end for the "strength of arms approach" that is patently so dear to the hearts of many neo con Israelis and yanks.

http://www.opendemocracy.net/themes/article.jsp?id=2&articleId=3808#

Oh the fools, when will they realise that only by embracing Islamic culture can we hope to moderate its extremes. I can't see how radical Islam can survive when faced with the wonders of Western social democracy. Even now the 2nd generation of immigrants are growing up in the UK speaking better English than many white kids, better mannered, better educated, rejecting the traditional ways and embracing a more moderate, less authoritarian kind of Islam. Generally living in peace with the rest of us.

I love it. George W Bush obvously fears it.

Bush planned to bomb Al Jazeera

Now, to a certain fraction of the population, there might seem to be some justification for this idea. The TV channel that routinely broadcasts Bin Laden's propaganda, that shows video of Western hostages being beheaded- aren' they deserving of some of GW's 'rough justice'?

Well, if you look beyond the superficial, the answer is unequivocably "NO!" Al Jazeera is one of the forces of lightness and good in the world at the moment. In an era where every Arab death in the absurdly titled "War on Terror" draws more recruits to radical Islam, Al Jazeera transmits not only those Arab deaths, but also the analysis and background to every piece of diplomacy, aggression and charity that occurs across the Middle East.

Some links for you interested parties, starting with some "Wiki-love":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/HomePage
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eric-schmeltzer/neocons-floated-idea-of-b_b_11254.html
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,98621,00.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Jazeera_bombing_memo

Why do all my titles end in question marks? (!)

Well, having just finished taking egg samples from my remaining worms I am now settling down to enjoy a good film and some spicy noodles. Yumm!

Small disaster on Monday when a 2 litre bottle of crude oil I'd just decanted decided to shatter on the desk top due to the warming oil pressurising the bottle. Very steep learning curve on that one. I'm still finding brown smears on my hands when I pick stuff up that has still got oil on it. Bleuh.

Oh, well. Noodles always cheer me up.

POW!

Tony Blair is such a donkey!

I can't believe that he comes out with this stuff. Its like he's actually trying to incite people to murder us in our beds. The man is a delusional idiot and needs to be removed from any position of responsibility.

Oh, the savage irony

Johann gives us the bitter truth about the Israeli offensive.

Well, hello!

So, lets see how many superstitious monkeys we can offend today. I think I'll start with a link to a Johann Hari article.

That should do for my starting shots in the war against irrationality.

PS