Monday Open Thread
It’s yet another Monday and there’s a bit of chill in the air. Did everyone have a nice and relaxing weekend? Share your thoughts here on the open thread
Sad news, singer Lena Horne has died at age 92.
Here’s her classic, Stormy Weather.
The dome that BP was hoping to put over the well leak this weekend failed because of crystallization in the dome. BP is working on several other ideas:
NOAA officials said that BP continues to work on solving the problem of ice-like methane hydrate crystals that accumulated inside of the dome intended to capture the leaking oil. A process known as a “junk shot”, in which debris is injected into the blow out preventer, is being examined. The drilling of the relief wells continues.
The “junk shot” is actually quite risky, hopefully it’s a last resort:
Admiral Thad Allen, head of the US Coast Guard, suggested they were considering what he called a “junk shot” to plug the main leak.
“They’re actually going to take a bunch of debris, shredded up tires, golf balls and things like that and under very high pressure shoot it into the preventer itself and see if they can clog it up and stop the leak,” Allen, who is leading the US government’s response, told CBS television.
This could be risky as experts have warned that excessive tinkering with the blowout preventer — a huge 450-ton valve system that should have shut off the oil — could see crude shoot out unchecked at 12 times the current rate.
For really technical details on the oil spill and containment efforts, The Oil Drum is a must-read.
Tags: Open Thread
Does the Sestak turn around v. Specter offer any lessons for the Coons campaign?
House Democrats pull out of Hawaii special election
washingtonpost.com | May 10, 2010 |
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee announced this morning that it will cease spending money in the Hawaii special election race set for later this month, a decision that almost certainly will hand Republicans a victory.
I don’t know Jason, that’s an excellent question. I would argue that Specter and Castle have many similarities – long time incumbents, fairly popular. What Sestak did was travel all throughout the state and made his case before running ads. I guess you could argue that the difference is a Democratic primary vs. a general election. But of course, to win, all Coons needs to do is to convince Democratic voters to vote for him over Castle and he wins.
I really hope the Coons campaign is studying the Sestak campaign.
Hope everyone saw V.A. Kent’s pix of WPD’s pizza party at Grotto’s in the paper last week…….
………..over the weekend I heard on the street the liquor store at Union & Del Ave. has posted Ms. Kent’s photo w/comments…..any other ‘pay back’ sightings?
The Rekers rentboy scandal may hurt Florida AG McCollum’s campaign for governor. McCollum paid Rekers $60,000 to testify in favor of a gay adoption ban.
Gordon Brown has said he will resign by September. It is a bid to sweeten the pot for Nick Clegg’s Liberal Democrats to form a coalition government. Could we have PM Clegg?
Health tip/story of the day.
Experienced actual ‘wind burn’ for the first time in my life this weekend. Between Little League marathon day on Saturday (wind + field dirt being kicked up) and the Willowdale Steeplechase (the Steeplechase tailgating for “the rest of us”) for Mom’s Day, I’m surprised I can still feel my face. The difference btw. windburn and sunburn, which I used to think was negligible, is the discomfort from wind-burn is fairly immediate after the initial couple of hours. The wind caused my eyes to water (on top of the horrible pollen allergy) and those tears burned the freak out of my face. It’s very raw today, too. Unlike sunburn, I can put pressure on it without pain, but if I do a wiping motion (such as a tissue when I sneeze from these effin pollin allergies), it freaking hurts like a mutha!
Well after the damage, I was told by more than one “good samaritan” that a pre-application of Vaseline (petrolium jelly, not lotion) would have gone a long way to prevent this. OK, well, if I wanted to look like I was about to go into a boxing match and use gobs of the stuff on my face, then sure thing!
Christina School District election tomorrow, voting from 10am-8pm, more info at http://www.christina.k12.de.us/Archive/enews/CSD/2010/0507.htm (at the bottom of the page).
Candidate Eric Anderson (who is a teacher) appears to me to offer a welcome call for transparency on the school board, and offers a nice alternative to ‘since the dawn of time’ school board member George Evans. My post on this and other issues is at http://paulprogressive.blogspot.com/