Excellent! I was tired of the deflector beanie mussing up my hair.
Miners Trapped
Some thirteen miners are trapped after a mine explosion about 60 miles down the road:
An explosion at a coal mine trapped 13 miners more than a mile underground, a county emergency official said Monday.
The explosion happened about 8 a.m. at the Sago Mine in Upshur County, said Steve Milligan, deputy director of the county’s Office of Emergency Management. Six miners made it out of the mine and refused treatment.
The trapped miners’ condition was not immediately known as an attempt by coworkers to reach them was unsuccessful, Milligan said.
“They essentially came to a wall,” Milligan said. “So they can’t get to them at this time.” The miners were one to two miles underground, he said.
I hope we get them out ok.
Happy New Year!
Happy 2006!
Congratulations are in Order
Mr. and Mrs. Vodkapundit give birth to what we will assume is a young Formulapundit. For now, at least.
Congrats!
The Saga of John Demjanjuk
When I read this, I flashed back to my teens when this first hit my radar:
An immigration judge on Wednesday ordered John Demjanjuk, a retired autoworker accused of being a Nazi concentration camp guard, deported to his native Ukraine, but the 30-year legal battle still may not be over.
Mr. Demjanjuk, 85, has been fighting to stay in this country since the 1970’s.
The United States first tried to deport him in 1977. Mistakenly suspected of being a guard known as Ivan the Terrible at the Treblinka concentration camp, he was extradited to Israel, where he was sentenced to be hanged.
But the Israeli Supreme Court determined that Ivan had been someone else.
Mr. Demjanjuk lost his United States citizenship in 2002 after a judge ruled that documents from World War II proved he was a Nazi guard at various death or forced labor camps.
Have any of you followed this case and have an idea whether or not he really is who he is accused of being? I would have thought the ruling by the Israeli Supreme Court would have ended things, but apparently it has not.
A Special Kind of Evil
This, via Radley Balko, is the most evil thing I have ever seen.
There is a special place in hell for ‘friends’ like this. I can’t even file this under humor, it is so wrong.
Quick Hits
My internet has been going in and out all day long, and I have about 5 things I want to write about, but every time I try to post, my connection dies. Quick links will have to do, since I am tired of trying and am going to just retire to the couch:
Two stories in the NY Times which I thought were interesting. One about plans to recycle nuclear waste, one about conservation programs in Texas.
Next, Wired magazine is having an end of the year lists thingee, and came up with a list of the ten sexiest geeks that included Chris Mooney and Nick Denton but left out Morgan Webb, the hot gamer chick from G4. No disrespect meant to Chris Mooney or Nick Denton, but come on.
In other news, John McCain, the man who has no problem making all sorts of moral and other decisions for you, including whether or not you can have an abortion, whether or not you can use any number of controlled substances, whether or not you can play dirty video games, and what you do with your money in regards to political activities, has finally found something that should be left to the individual- whether or not intelligent design is fact or fiction:
“Let the student decide.” With those well-chosen words John McCain summed up his view on the teaching of “intelligent design” along with evolution in public schools.
Even — or perhaps especially — with controversial topics, Arizona’s ubiquitous senior U.S. senator has an uncanny knack for saying things his audience wants to hear. In this case, Mr. Straight Talk was imparting words of wisdom in an interview with MTV News.
Much more here on McCain from Steve Benen. In other ID news, check out this piece by the Commissar about ID’s Political Problem.
Finally, I just heard on NOVA that the earthquake that caused the tsunami last year was so big that it caused the earth to change course by two centimeters and shortened the day by 3 millionths of a second. Wow.
That is it- I will be back tomorrow when my connection is more stable. I called Adelphia, and they are aware of the problem and working on it.