Month: August 2005

Shuttle to come back on Monday

Despite insulation problems beneath the Commander’s *censored*pit window, the Shuttle will return to Earth on Monday[*1] .

After plenty of wind-tunnel tests on the ground, the consensus among NASA personnel now is that the return flight will be as safe as possible, although shuttle deputy programme manager Wayne Hale offered no guarantees: the tunnel-tests revealed that tiny pieces of the insulating blanket could tear off during reentry, and that there was a 1.5 per cent chance that the whole section would come loose.

Kansas Jayhawks men’s basketball schedule released

KUsports.com[*1] has the goods:

KU will play Arizona in the Maui opener, then meet UConn or Arkansas in Round Two, with Gonzaga, Maryland, Michigan State and Chaminade on the other side of the bracket.

“Start with Maui and add teams like Kentucky, St. Joe’s, Nevada, California, Pepperdine … no question it will be very challenging to say the least. We probably play more high-profile teams this year than last year,” Self said.

The Jayhawks return just one starter from last year’s 23-7 team, which wound up playing what was rated the most difficult schedule in the country.

The full schedule:
Nov. 9 Fort Hays State (exhibition)
Nov. 14 Pittsburg State (exhibition)
Nov. 18 Idaho State
Nov. 21 Arizona at Maui Invitational
Nov. 22 TBD at Maui Invitational
Nov. 23 TBD at Maui Invitational
Dec. 1 Nevada
Dec. 3 Western Illinois
Dec. 6 St. Joseph’s in Madison Square Garden
Dec. 10 California in Kemper Arena
Dec. 19 Pepperdine
Dec. 22 No. Colorado
Dec. 31 No. Arizona
Jan. 7 Kentucky
Jan. 11 @ Colorado
Jan. 14 Kansas State
Jan. 16 @ Missouri
Jan. 21 Nebraska
Jan. 25 @ Texas A&M
Jan. 28 @ Iowa State
Jan. 30 Texas Tech
Feb. 5 Oklahoma
Feb. 8 @ Nebraska
Feb. 11 Iowa State
Feb. 13 @ Okla. State
Feb. 18 Missouri
Feb. 21 Baylor
Feb. 25 @ Texas
March 1 Colorado
March 4 @ Kansas State
March 9-12 Big 12 Tournament in Dallas

Rehnquist hospitalized again

Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist was briefly hospitalized[*1] last night for a fever.

Supreme Court spokesman Ed Turner said Rehnquist was evaluated and allowed to go home. The chief justice has thyroid cancer, and his latest health problems will almost certainly renew questions about whether he is well enough to remain on the court.

Is it time for Justice Rehnquist to retire?

Judge rules against pedophilia sting

Judge acquits accused[*1] pedophile caught in Kansas City metro county Internet porn sting.

U.S. District Judge Dean Whipple acquitted Jan Helder yesterday of using the Internet to try to entice a child into sex. Helder’s attorney, J.R. Hobbs, had argued that his client didn’t break federal law because the person his client was accused of enticing wasn’t a minor but a Platte County deputy pretending to be a minor. The ruling came just minutes after a jury returned a guilty verdict. Helder, 42, of Mission Hills, Kan., had faced a sentence of five to 30 years.

The real news is that a judge actually read and enforced the law as written. He seems to have this curious idea that in order to commit a crime, you actually have to do something that’s against the law, not just intend to do so. Since I consider the concept of a “thought crime” to be abhorrent, I side with the judge here. And no, that doesn’t mean I think that pedophilia is OK, quite the reverse. Discuss amongst yourselves . . .

One blog created every second

Michael S. Marone[*1] reads the Technorati tea leaves[*2] , sees big changes ahead:

Advertisers are finally drifting over from old media. And venture capitalists may actually finally be awakening to the investment opportunities presented by the blogosphere. The first generation of industry superstars (like Glenn Reynolds, Andrew Sullivan and James Lileks) have already emerged. And you can be certain that obsessive blog-surfing will soon be announced as the next great threat to productivity and family life.

Just as importantly, blogging has become an international phenomenon, with many of the new arrivals in the field coming from outside the United States and Europe. The technology is also beginning to morph, becoming more visual and, thanks to new toolkits, easier to join. But perhaps most important, the blogosphere is becoming the defining source of news analysis (and even the news itself) for the world’s intellectual classes.

I’m still waiting for some of those advertisers to drift over my direction.

Syria, Iran get warnings from U.S.

Syria and Iran got it from John Bolton[*1] and the UN Security Council:

Casting his first vote as U.N. ambassador, John Bolton joined the rest of the Security Council Thursday in condemning terrorism in Iraq. He then set his sights on Syria and Iran — accusing them of not doing enough to stop foreigners from joining the insurgency.

Donald Rumsfeld[*2] joined the Syria-warning party:

“(Syria is) going to have to live in that neighborhood and Iraq doesn’t like what Syria’s doing,” Rumsfeld said in a question-and-answer session following his speech to the Los Angeles World Affairs Council at the Beverly Hilton Hotel.

“Iraq is going to be in that neighborhood for a very long time. It’s a bigger country and a richer country and will be a more powerful country,” he said. “(In my view) the Syrians are not behaving in a wise manner at the present time.”

The heat is being turned up on Syria and Iran, the two primary instigators of continuing violence in Iraq.