Thank you, Michael…
International aid meant for the victims of Hurricane Katrina is backing up at an Air Force base in Arkansas because relief lorries are being directed to the wrong places.
Civilian truck drivers hired to take food and supplies to Louisiana and Mississippi from Little Rock Air Force Base in Arkansas have been repeatedly diverted to places which already have what they need, according to Air Force Senior Master Sergeant Bret Archbold.
Forced to drive through the disaster zone, looking for places to drop off aid supplied by Russia, Italy, Spain and Britain…
…and Ireland: don’t forget the Irish aid…
…the drivers are taking two days instead of one to deliver their loads. Master Sergeant Archbold said the air base had been left in “lull status”.
Gack.
How could anyone not want something with a product description like this?
If you really need an unbelievably powerful magnet, here it is. (Scroll down to the bottom of the linked page to see it.)
Uses include magnetic steering of nuclear particles in homemade accelerators…
Oh, wow, this is right out of the script from Ghostbusters…
…magnetic beam amplifiers, etc.
Beware – you must think ahead when moving this magnet. If carrying it into another room, carefully plan the route you will be taking. Computers & monitors will be affected in an entire room. Loose metallic objects and other magnets may become airborne and fly considerable distances – and at great speed – to attach themselves to this magnet. If you get caught in between the two, you can get injured.
We can only ship this magnet by ground UPS – it cannot be shipped via air as it will interfere with the aircraft’s navigational equipment.
WARNING! THIS IS ABSOLUTELY NO TOY AND CAN BE VERY DANGEROUS!
Woo! Something to add to the Christmas list…
Over on Making Light / Electrolite, Jim McDonald provides this wonderful dissertation on how to live a better life through paying careful attention to English folk ballads.
If you’re a young lady, dressing yourself in men’s array and joining the army or the navy has all sorts of comic possibilities, but you yourself aren’t going to find it too darned humorous at the time.
If you are an unmarried lady and have sex, you will get pregnant. No good will come of it.
If you are physically unable to get pregnant due to being male, the girl you had sex with will get pregnant. No good will come of it. You’ll either kill her, or she’ll kill herself, or her husband/brother/father/uncle/cousin will kill you both. In any case her Doleful Ghost will make sure everyone finds out. You will either get hanged, kill yourself, or be carried off bodily by Satan. Your last words will begin “Come all ye.”
And down in the comments, this wonderful moment courtesy of the indefatigable John M. Ford:
A holiday, a holiday, and the first one of the night
The producer’s wife came to the Blue City Bar, and blinked hard in the light
And when the raving it was done, and everything got dim
The lady she saw little Matty Groves, and Instant Messaged him
“Come home with me, little Matty Groves, why not come home with me,
“Come home with me, little Matty Groves, and know me casually.”
“Oh, I can’t come home, I won’t come home and be stereotypical,
“By the ringtones on your Razer I can tell you’re a big shot’s pal.”
“But if my guy has bought a share, he’s not my CEO,
“He’s somewhere up in Aspen, nose- and tail-deep in the snow.”And a flunky crouched beneath the couch pulled out his camera phone
He swore he’d find advantage, whether truth be hid or shown
And in his hurry to carry the news, he bent his tricked-out ride
But the airbag fired, and all inspired, he logged on from inside . . .“Ballads from the Blue City”
Snort.
(A transcript of this trenchant op-ed piece is here at MSNBC’s site. Wow, I wish this man did book reviews…)
(thanks to Boing Boing for the link to the video)
This is useful.
The image’s resolution is high, at 2.4 meters per pixel. It is posted in a format that allows quick viewing of any area a user zooms in on. Users can quickly see what areas are under water and what structures are still standing.
The initial image was taken Wednesday and supplied by the company DigitalGlobe. AP will offer updated satellite images as as they become available.
The image is available here.
I have a feeling this story is going to likely to start attracting more attention in the days to come…
In early 2004, as the cost of the conflict in Iraq soared, President Bush proposed spending less than 20 percent of what the [US Army] Corps [of Engineers] said was needed for Lake Pontchartrain, according to a Feb. 16, 2004, article, in New Orleans CityBusiness.
On June 8, 2004, Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, told the Times-Picayune: “It appears that the money has been moved in the president’s budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that’s the price we pay. Nobody locally is happy that the levees can’t be finished, and we are doing everything we can to make the case that this is a security issue for us.”
…There was, at the same time, a growing recognition that more research was needed to see what New Orleans must do to protect itself from a Category 4 or 5 hurricane. But once again, the money was not there. As the Times-Picayune reported last Sept. 22:
“That second study would take about four years to complete and would cost about $4 million, said Army Corps of Engineers project manager Al Naomi. About $300,000 in federal money was proposed for the 2005 fiscal-year budget, and the state had agreed to match that amount. But the cost of the Iraq war forced the Bush administration to order the New Orleans district office not to begin any new studies, and the 2005 budget no longer includes the needed money, he said.”
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