WHY DO THEY HATE US?

Today, Mrs Ned had a brief, but unusual fit. It happened like this: we were returning from our twice-weekly wine tasting duties and had to pass a doctors office with the usual double-wide parking lot. Across our path came a BEING in hard hat, mask and ear plugs, with chartreuse vest, armed with a leaf blower with a snout that Mr Snuffalopagus could only envy. He was engaged in blowing dust off the vast parking lot into the nearby street, where it would in time be picked up by winds and tires and returned to the parking lot. Not content with this, for good measure he occasionally blew dust off the border of mulch with which the parking lot was ringed. Clouds of brown dust rose into the evening air, to be carried into the faces of nearby pedestrians.
The net effect of this activity was to waste gas, and to annoy passers-by with the resultant air pollution, noise and dust. This 'dust' by the way, consists, according to the California Air Resources Board, of insect and bird feces, toxics derived from car exhaust and tire wear, and allergens from pollinating plants. A toxic brew if ever there was one. And for what earthly purpose was this activity being carried out? None at all. No one in history has ever complained about invisible dust on a parking lot, and if they had they would have probably been instantly seized and subjected to psychiatric 'treatment' for their own good.
So multiply this moronic activity by hundreds of thousands of times each day, and you get an idea why this country has 5% of the world's people but uses 25% of its oil. And much of it is in polluting, wasteful, pointless, useless, infuriating activity like this.
As Mrs Ned observed, "maybe this is one reason why the rest of the world hates us."

WHERE'D ALL THAT AWL GO?

One of Ned's loyal and prescient followers has asked Ned to describe where all the oil went in the GOM, since MSM reports indicate that very little of it is found on the beaches or in the wetlands at present, and the surface slick has all but dissipated. It remains to be seen how much oil is present in "plumes". Ned will try to tackle this as dispassionately as possible.
First, crude oil is very volatile and it is lighter than water. Much of it will evaporate if just left alone at the surface, because it is made of many different hydrocarbons with varying vapor pressures. But the evaporation points also depend on water and air temperatures. Here is where the GOM has an advantage over Prince William Sound: the Gulf is very warm, with surface temps approaching 90 during the summer max, which we have now. Air temps, too. This helps the stuff to evaporate quickly and form Volatile Organic Compounds, or VOCs, the same stuff that forms smog. It in turn gets broken down by sunlight.
The heavier stuff still floats, but as it concentrates it forms asphalt-like clumps which are easy to pick up. Next, the dispersants have made it easier for the GOM microbe communities to break up the oil and eat it. These little buggers are everywhere, and they flourish because the GOM is the site of thousands of natural "seeps" of oil and gas. The bacteria break down the hydrocarbons for food.
Some of the oil was skimmed at the surface, filtered out of the seawater and disposed of--don't ask Ned where, probably in a landfill, or burned.
Some of the oil apparently was rendered so small in size that it floated below the surface in the so-called "plumes." Now NOAA says the concentrations of oil in the water in these plumes is on the order of 500 ppb, or about a teaspoon in a swimming pool.
Trouble is, we don;t know what background hydrocarbon content in the GOM is. The good thing is, where the plumes are, at depths of several thousand feet, is where very few animals live. Most of them live in the surface 100 meters or on the bottom, so they are unlikely to be severely affected.
The biggest remaining problem is probably oil in wetlands, but even there, bugs eat it, and plants rapidly can re-grow parts affected by the oil. Now if we can get the poor pelicans cleaned "off" Ned will sleep more soundly, but, even here, more pelicans are killed by shrimpers that have been killed by the oil.
Hope that helps.

Chalk another one to the Dems

From today's NYT: "Former U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo has made it official -- he's running for Colorado governor on the American Constitution Party ticket."
That means the loonie vote will be split and some Dem will be elected. Now Tancredo is right (!) about one issue and one issue only: he is spot on about illegal immigration. But everything else is pretty loopy, so...chalk another one up to the Dems.

GOM UPDATE

From an article in today's NYT: "The oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico appears to be dissolving far more rapidly than anyone expected."
Now, Ned's followers will savor this line and recall Ned's earlier posts decrying the media-induced hysteria over the effects of the Transocean rig disaster. Ned cautioned against over-reacting, for the following reasons:
* He described the chances of any measurable oil getting into the Florida Keys as miniscule, quoting NOAA Administrator (and no BP stooge) Lubchenco to that exact effect.
* He discussed the Loop Current and said the chances of large amounts of un-degraded oil getting into the Loop Current to be small.
* He described the claim of a lawyer quoted in the NYT to the effect that "hypothetically" oil could contaminate the Atlantic and Mediterranean and bankrupt BP as preposterous.
* He pointed out that the high temperatures in the GOM made the oil there wholly un-comparable to the Valdez spill, where oil continues to degrade Prince William Sound today. The reason? Mainly that the water temp in PW Sound is close to 40 degrees, resulting in low evaporation and degradation rates, compared to a typical summer surface temp of the GOM closer to 85-90 degrees.
* The GOM has numerous natural and man-made oil and methane seeps, which has allowed vast communities of oil-eating microbes to flourish there.
*And finally, he decried the hysteria of the media and some left-wing bloggers who saw disaster at every turn, from exploding sea-floor wells, to destroyed beaches, to mass extinctions.
Now, the hysterics have destroyed the career of Tony Hayward, cost innocent BP shareholders billions in lost income, cost state, local and federal governments billions in tax revenue, cost Gulf businesses billions in lost economic activity, and cost pension funds in the UK and here tens of billions in losses as BP's share price tanked.
But why listed to scientists when we can listen to bloggers and the MSM, huh?

GINGRICH DETERMINED TO ATTACK INSIDE U.S.

The breathless MSM is reporting that Newt Gingrich, professional blowhard and failed House Republican leader, is preparing a speech in which he attacks the Obama administration for being soft on radical Islam. Now, Ned imagines a screenwriter approaching a Hollywood producer with the idea for "this movie, see C.B., where a leader of a party in power and responsible when terrorists attack the U.S. and kill 3,000 people, see, then prepares a speech attacking the party that took over from them and has NOT experienced a terrorist attack. Whuddaya think C.B.?"
It's simply too ludicrous to even attempt to parody, and once again shows the abject contempt with which the Republicans view both the MSM and the intelligence of the average voter. Setting aside the possibility that they could be right, it still is practically inconceivable that anyone would take anything this stylized, formerly pompadoured self-appointed "intellectual," has to say about anything.
But Ned has learned to be surprised by nothing in contemporary America. Perhaps his readers will recall the memo from the CIA ignored by Condolllleezzzza Rice, Dick Cheney , Don Rumsfeld, and above all Halfbright Fellow George W Bush? "
Bin Laden Determined To Strike Within The U.S."

Everybody's a f*****g hero

Ned's readers will be familiar with the case of the Ag Dept functionary slandered by the right wingers, whom the Obama people were quick to throw under a bus.
Al Hunt, a talking head on Bloomberg, today referred to Shirley Sherrod, the Ag Dept bureaucrat maligned by the right-wing character assassination machine, as a "hero." Not content with that, he went on the describe the white Mississippi farmers she was talking about in her speech as "heros" too. Now here Ned has to intercede.
Earth to Al Hunt: NOT EVERYBODY IS A F*****G HERO! Some people are just people. Some people are just victims. Sherrod was a victim. The farmers got helped, so they weren't victims or heros. A hero, Al is someone who does a heroic act. Read your f*****g Homer. A Marine who takes on a machine gun nest to save his buddies is a hero. A woman who risks her job and reputation to expose corporate wrongdoing is a hero (ine). A person who dives into a raging river to save a kid is a hero.
NOT EVERYBODY GOING ABOUT THEIR BUSINESS IS A HERO. GOT THAT, AL?

FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT

Ned is pleased and deeply honored to announce his first foreign correspondent, Prof. Dr. Q. A. Wagstaff, FRS, who will forward occasional missives from Europe, South Carolina and beyond. Prof. Wagstaff is a celebrated marine scientist and philosopher with numerous publications. His most recent essay is "Why A Turtle Tax Makes Economic Sense In A Mixed Economy."