Interplanetary Broadband?

The ability to transmit information via light would be a tremendous boon for the space program. Currently, interplanetary transmission rates are roughly equivalent to that acheived by your old 1200 baud modem (if you had a modem about 20 years ago, that is). This report from MIT's Technology Review suggests that the laser-based broadband nut may have been cracked.

The Kerry Follies

Alexandra at All Things Beautiful has an interesting post on Kerry's filibuster follies. She also discusses his recent transformation from Boston Brahman into Daily Kossack.

Fear of Girls

Slashdot linked to this peculiar short film at Google Video -- Fear of Girls -- which features a couple of 30-ish Dungeons & Dragons afficiandos. It may not be to everyone's taste, but I found it hilarious.

Just Plain Brilliant

If you can't kill 'em, well, then, mock the hell out of 'em. It's in the Koran!

The Surly Bonds

Challenger was lost twenty years ago yesterday. In some respects it does seem that long. In others, it doesn't seem possible. MSNBC has an interesting piece on what happened that morning.

Oops: Actually, the anniversary is today, the 28th.

Oh Canada

My family has a place on Charleston Lake in Ontario. My grandfather built it with his own hands (3 bedrooms, etc.) and I vacationed there every summer during my youth. I'm hoping I can take my kids to Canada this summer and not feel like I'm in friggin' Europe. C'mon Canada, you can do it.

Let's check the scoring: John Howard, Tony Blair and George Bush still there. Gerhard replaced by Angie Merkel and Paul Martin about to be run over by Stephen Harper. The world may have a chance. If it keeps up, the next thing you know, M. Chirac will be threatening to nuke Iran . . .

The Captain will be live-blogging the returns beginning at 6:00 Central. Do forgive him any triumphalism. After all, but for Ed and his diligence during the Gomery scandal, this might not be happening.

Victory!

This afternoon, our Lebanon County jury returned a $1.15 million verdict in favor of my clients, a damages award that included every single dollar we had asked for in connection with a breach of contract.

Good day. Indeed.

Canada

Could it be? Is Canada finally coming to its collective senses? The Captain seems to think so. And, on matters Canadian, Ed has a solid track record. Indeed, he deserves substantial credit for toppling the noisome Martin government.

More Dead Terrorists?

The rumor's all over the web. The good old U.S. military may have cashed Zawahiri. As I've said before, even if it is a false alarm, the idea of Ayman spread thinly over a substantial surface area is a pleasing one indeed. The fact, she would be better still . . .

More: A lizardoid aptly puts it: "Predator drOwned." It's probably been said elsewhere but I haven't seen it before. Here's hoping it makes it into the lexicon. A more hopeful word-of-the-year (okay, term-of-the-year) than diavlog, if you ask me.

Fark headlines: "# 3 Al-Qaeda guy possibly promoted". Hmm. Didn't we kill him a few weeks back . . .

Big roundup of first-blush reactions at the Jawa Report. Looks like folks are lacing up in hopes there's gonna be a grave dance. Our version of a car swarm, I guess.

Week 1

The first week of trial is under our belts and, save the cross-exam of our damages witness and a short appearance from the accountant, our case is in. I don't think we made any mistakes and I know we have all the evidence we need to make our argument to the jury. The case involves a dispute over a contract and the damages amount in slightly north of $1 million. I like our chances, but, as litigators well know, juries can be very fickle. With any luck, we'll have a verdict by next Friday. At that point, I'll take some time off to celebrate the holidays, which I missed out on this year, and, well, just sleep for a bit. Hope all is well out in the blogosphere -- I've hardly even had time to check in with Lileks this week. Now that's busy.

Suspicion

Everybody has it about someone or something. Right now, mine is that this will be downright awful. Shockingly so. But what do I know? I love science fiction that is based on real (even if not yet realized) physics and I love the Grateful Dead. I've never, though, thought of two as particularly complimentary, a fine Space notwithstanding. I do like this line from the report:

"I believe the Grateful Dead would have inspired much less of an emotional loyalty in their fans without [Hunter's] lyrics," says Steve Silberman.

Really? Ya think? So it's come to this, has it? All that's left to talk about is the blindingly obvious . . .

(h/t Jon S.)

More: Phil's heading back on the road in February, with stops in New York, Providence and Philthadelphia. Some strange guesswork from the story:

Last year marked the 40th anniversary of the formation of the Grateful Dead, which had fans speculating that the legendary band--re-dubbed simply The Dead in the wake of the 1995 death of frontman Jerry Garcia--would mark the milestone by regrouping for a tour, but Lesh's busy touring schedule with his own band likely prevented this from happening, if in fact it was ever under serious consideration.

Serious consideration? I doubt it. They came real close to being a band again in 02 and 03, and it fizzled out. Fizzled, I think, because they were so damned determined to be something different from what they are. I'll continue to hold out hope that, someday, the Dead will be content to just be the Dead again for a little while. They'd probably be quite good at it. Sadly, time is running out.

Trial

Quiet 'round these parts, lately. I'm taking a case to trial Monday that should last two-three weeks. Yes, thank you, the Holidays did fairly suck. Oh well. We all have to make a living somehow. Life could be worse. Much worse. I could be a journalist . . .

Of Leaks and Blows

There is an interesting issue lurking at the intersections of the Plame affair, the CIA flights and prisons leak, and the NSA wiretapping leak. The issue is: what is a leak? The New York Times argues that only Plame involved a leak. The other two stories, according to the Times, involve brave whistle-blowers. Tom Maguire ably destroys this mendacity.