The area farmer's market is opening today, and I've got a date later with some horse stalls and a shovel, so I've got to pack in all my blogging in one swoop.

Phila correctly points out that shale oil from Canada isn't going to save us all. You probably knew that, and you're probably not surprised to hear that the industry numbers about shale oil were...not entirely accurate:

The oil sands' thirst for water is far outstripping Alberta's projections, threatening to drain the Athabasca River as the pace of project development accelerates, a prominent environmental group says in a report issued yesterday....

In situ projects, which use steam to melt bitumen before it is pumped to the surface, used almost three times as much water in 2004 as originally projected. That part of the industry used 27 million cubic metres in 2004, the equivalent of about 72,000 Olympic-sized swimming pools....

"I fear we're going to run out of water before we run out of bitumen in northern Alberta," said Mary Griffiths, senior policy analyst at the Pembina Institute. The environmental group renewed its call for a moratorium on approving any new oil sands projects, and said the industry should start paying for the water it uses.
The oil industry, while acknowledging that the concern over water use is growing, says its consumption should not be singled out. Other industries, including agriculture, use significant volumes, as do the growing cities of Alberta.

(Phila notes:)
The most obvious problem with this logic, it seems to me, is that most of "the growing cities of Alberta" are growing primarily because of the boom in oil sands. The other problem is that unlike municipal water, most water used in oil fields doesn't go back into the watershed; instead, it's contaminated and stored in tailings ponds.

Do I even need to go on about how this is wrong on like, fourteen different levels? I hope everyone here is never, ever trustful of an oil speculator's promises about production rates and environmental impact. Can't wait to get to ANWR!

Ms. Rozen muses on Goss eloquently, and raises this interesting point:

Does something about this story line that Goss suddenly left because of his long-standing tension with Negroponte, his fraternity brother from Yale, over Goss fighting to hold CIA turf seem a bit canned to you?

Think back to yesterday morning. The top news after the Patrick Kennedy crash was that Bush's poll numbers were at an all time low, and that he was starting to see a real erosion of support from conservatives. So Bush gets briefed by his staff that day, and decides: hey, let's fire Porter Goss? He's done a crappy job since the beginning and I am sorry to see how unhappy everybody is at the Agency. And John Negroponte is threatening to quit if he stays. Let's get this out today?

It's just not how this White House has responded to these sorts of tensions in the past. They never move fast. They withstand criticism of appointments for months. They resist criticisms of unpopular agency heads for weeks (Michael "heckuva job" Brown), months (Snow), years (Rumsfeld). It's hard not to believe that something moved very quickly on the radar this week that prompted an unusually quick decision. One that took a lot of people who would normally have been advised by surprise.

Negroponte has President Bush's ear every single day when he delivers the President's daily intel brief. If he had been lobbying to get rid of Goss, and the President was inclined to support that decision, there were a hundred ways to do it in a way that would project stability and confidence. There was hardly a show of that yesterday. They could have named a successor. There could have been a leak to the press about Goss wanting to spend more time with his family, or that Bush was unhappy with him. There was none of that. It was a surprise move. What happened this week that Negroponte and Bush acted so swiftly?

I don't have to time to opine on her point, but I agree that it's a question we should be asking. Since when has Bush ever cared about what people think and say about his appointments or policies? I'm guessing the hookers are the heart of the matter, and that one or two of them were agents of a foreign power, but that's just irresponsible speculation.

Two more fascist cronies for our Federal Courts. And as H&H pointed out, "the Democrats won't even try to stop them."

Most of Kavanaugh’s relatively brief legal career has consisted of partisan political activities that call into question his ability to serve as an impartial arbiter of the law. He has spent the majority of his legal career in Kenneth Starr’s Office of the Independent Counsel and in the Bush administration’s Office of the White House Counsel. In between, he was a regional coordinator for Lawyers for Bush and went to Florida in 2000 “to participate in legal activities related to the recount.” Given his history as a partisan warrior, the Washington Post editorialized that his nomination would “only inflame further the politics of confirmation to one of the country’s highest-quality courts.”

As Associate Counsel to President Bush from 2001-2003, Kavanaugh served directly under White House Counsel Alberto Gonzalez as his “main deputy” on judicial nominations. A look at the nominees Kavanaugh helped select and support – e.g. Priscilla Owen, Miguel Estrada, William Pryor, and Carolyn Kuhl – speaks volumes about his own legal philosophy and interest in seeing the American judiciary remade in a right-wing “ideological image.” They, like Kavanaugh himself, are members of the Federalist Society who have their sights set on limiting federal power, weakening the Commerce Clause, and severely limiting congressional authority to promote the common good and address issues of national importance.

One of the most disturbing aspects of Kavanaugh's record is his willingness to twist and shift legal theories and philosophies to best serve partisan interests, as demonstrated by the roles he played during the Clinton and Bush administrations. Kavanaugh played a pivotal role in Starr's legal efforts to undermine attorney-client privilege between the president and White House attorneys, gain access to privileged communications from Vince Foster, a deputy White House counsel, on the basis that attorney-client privilege does not survive the death of the client, and compel Secret Service agents to testify before grand juries concerning information they learned about the president while on the job. Once in the Bush White House, however, he acted as a leading force in the development of the controversial executive order which effectively eviscerated the Presidential Records Act, described by one prominent historian as “a victory for secrecy in government” that was “so total that it would make Nixon jealous in his grave.” He was also reportedly central to the successful effort to keep notes from Vice President Cheney’s energy task force meetings secret.

But nobody cares about what's happening to our court system. Secrecy is all in our government today. Thanks, Bush.

More news from Poppyistan. From a former Western reporter who now runs a business there:

This state of affairs is so bewildering that Kandaharis have reached an astonishing conclusion: The United States must be in league with the Taliban. They reason that America, with its power and riches, could bring an end to the "insurgency" in a month, if it so chose. They figure that America remains a close and munificent ally of Pakistan, the country that is sponsoring the "insurgency," and so the continuing violence must be a deliberate element of U.S. policy. The point is not whether there is any factual basis for this notion, it's that everyone here believes it. In other words, in a stunning irony, much of this city, the Taliban's former stronghold, is disgusted with the Americans not because of their Western culture, but because of their apparent complicity with Islamist extremists.

Hat tip to Kelley B. He and I probably agree that elements of the US gov't have always and will always support "terror" organizations like the Taliban. I prefer the term "mobsters," as that's what they really are. Gun, Drugs, Hookers/Sex Slaves= Mobsters. Mobsters also shoot people in the face and say "fogettabouddit." Goddess I wish more people could see that.

This is way cool. Really, one of these days I'm going to master that whole posting images thing, but for now just go to the link.

By Bob Heye
and KATU.com Web Staff
MOUNT ST. HELENS - A spectacular new structure has formed inside the crater at Mount St. Helens, just in time for this weekend's opening of the Spirit Lake Highway.

A slab of rock the size of a football field is standing on end inside the crater.

The giant 'fin' is pushing upwards of four to five feet a day, but is not growing taller because it tends to crumble as it grows.

I sincerely hope the area isn't subjected to another explosion, but at the same time I'm almost jealous of the scientists who get to monitor these changes. It must be quite the experience to watch such a structure rise and fall.

Finally, I guess I won't be taking my girlfriend to Iraq for that lover's retreat any time soon. Hello, gay readers who also occasionally go to Iraq to look at antiquities, are you paying attention? You know who you are. I just hope the militias don't show up at your work site. It's too late for the boy:

By Jerome Taylor
Published: 05 May 2006
Human rights groups have condemned the "barbaric" murder of a 14-year-old boy, who, according to witnesses, was shot on his doorstep by Iraqi police for the apparent crime of being gay.

Ahmed Khalil was shot at point-blank range after being accosted by men in police uniforms, according to his neighbours in the al-Dura area of Baghdad.

Campaign groups have warned of a surge in homophobic killings by state security services and religious militias following an anti-gay and anti-lesbian fatwa issued by Iraq's most prominent Shia leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.

Ali Hili, the co-ordinator of a group of exiled Iraqi gay men who monitor homophobic attacks inside Iraq, said the fatwa had instigated a "witch-hunt of lesbian and gay Iraqis, including violent beatings, kidnappings and assassinations".

"Young Ahmed was a victim of poverty," he said. "He was summarily executed, apparently by fundamentalist elements in the Iraqi police."

Neighbours in al-Dura district say Ahmed's father was arrested and interrogated two days before his son's murder by police who demanded to know about Ahmed's sexual activities. It is believed Ahmed slept with men for money to support his poverty-stricken family, who have fled the area fearing further reprisals.

It's the same the world over. You just know lots and lots of the mullahs (of any stripe) keep a boy or two around, while ordering bands of undereducated youths with guns to kill poor street rats just trying to stay alive.

Religion: making your world more miserable one "honor" killing at a time.