What Caught My Eye Today

2008 Election - You probably thought the election was over after Barack Obama won the presidency two weeks ago. True, but we still have 5 seats in the House and 3 in the Senate that need to be decided. Oops. Scratch that. Make it 2 seats in the Senate. Alaska Senator Ted Stevens has lost his bid for a seventh term. The longest-serving Republican in the history of the Senate trailed Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich by 3,724 votes after today's count. That's an insurmountable lead with only about 2,500 overseas ballots left to be counted. Stevens also revealed that he will not ask President George W. Bush to give him a pardon for his seven felony convictions. If you are keeping score, that guarantees the Senate will start the next session of Congress with at least 58 seats. Minnesota is still too close to call and Georgia is headed for a run off election in early December. But back to this Alaska deal for a moment. If ever the Republican party breathed a sign of relief that it had lost a Senate seat, it had to be this one. Had Stevens won, the GOP faced the very unpleasant possibility of having to kick him out for being a convicted felon. Talk about dodging the proverbial bullet.

War on Terror - Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the Pentagon is developing plans to get troops quickly out of Iraq and into Afghanistan to battle a more confident and successful Taliban making the changes President-elect Barack Obama wants in both wars. I guess there is something to be said for that adage, "serving at the pleasure of the president." Still, it is comforting to see that the military is at lease attempting to stay ahead of the curve.. The Pentagon has already identified and practiced travel routes out of Iraq along exit routes through Turkey and Jordan. The governments in those two bordering countries are U.S. allies and support the withdrawal planning effort. Go figure. Who would have thought that anyone in that neck of the woods would be interested in facilitating the departure of the U.S. military.

Piracy - We're talking the real deal here--the stuff that happens on the high seas. Pirates have seized dozens of ships off Somalia's coast in the last year, generally releasing them after ransoms were paid. The Gulf of Aden, off Somalia, connects to the Red Sea, which in turn is linked to the Mediterranean by the Suez Canal. The route is thousands of miles and many days shorter than going around the Cape of Good Hope off the southern tip of Africa. A major Norwegian shipping group on ordered its more than 90 tankers to sail around Africa rather than use the Suez Canal after Somali pirates seized a Saudi supertanker carrying $100 million in crude. The U.S. and other naval forces decided against intervening in the seizure of the supertanker. You would think that with cargo as precious and valuable as oil that nations like the U.S. would have a bit more interest in protecting these shipping routes. Saudi Arabia, which is the world's leading oil producer, said it will join the international fight against piracy. Now that's what I'm talking about. Saudi Arabia's French-equipped navy has 18,000-20,000 personnel, but has never taken part in any high-seas fighting. Bummer. But onto bigger issues. Any idea who's going to star in the new "Pirates of the Gulf of Aden" flick? I hear Disney is already working on designs for a new amusement park water ride.

Space Station - Uh-oh. Somebody's got butter fingers. And when you are floating around in the vacuum of space, that's not a good thing. An astronaut accidentally let go of her tool bag after a grease gun inside it exploded, and helplessly watched as the tote and everything inside floated away. It was one of the largest items ever to be lost by a spacewalker, and occurred during an unprecedented attempt to clean and lube a gummed-up joint on a solar panel on the International Space Station. In her defense, the gun did explode. How could she possibly have known that was going to happen? The spacewalk continued as planned, with the two astronauts sharing tools to repair a jammed joint which has been unable to automatically point the right-side solar wings toward the sun for maximum energy production. Astronauts inside the shuttle-station complex started unloading the gear inside a huge trunk that was brought up by Endeavour. The big-ticket item is a recycling system that will convert astronauts' urine and sweat into drinking water. No matter how many times I read about this thing, I have the same reaction--eww. Endeavour also delivered an extra bathroom, kitchenette, two bedrooms, an exercise machine and refrigerator that will allow space station residents to enjoy cold drinks for the first time. Mark my words. With refrigeration having been introduced, it is just a matter of time before the first interplanetary kegger takes place. The additions — coming exactly 10 years after the first space station piece was launched — will transform the place into a two-bath, two-kitchen, five-bedroom home. And with real estate prices tanking in recent months, I bet you could get that joint for a song.

Vietnam - I heard about this item on the radio today, though the story broke a couple of weeks ago. Vietnam has suspended a much-criticized plan to ban very short, thin and flat-chested people from driving. Wouldn't that affect most of the Vietnamese population? Under the 83-point plan, people shorter than 1.5 meters (4.9 feet), lighter than 40 kilograms (88 pounds) or with a chest circumference of less than 72 centimeters would no longer qualify for new drivers' licences. Okay, so I count 3 points there. I wonder what the other 80 points cover. The proposal worried many in this nation of slender people and spurned jokes about traffic police with tape measures enthusiastically flagging down female motorcyclists, and predictions of a run on padded bras. The justice ministry has asked the health ministry to temporarily suspend and review the plan. I just pray this isn't too tall an order for them to handle (Oh come on, that's a little funny).