What Caught My Eye Today

Federal Budget - You may have recently heard that President Barack Obama submitted his budget proposal for 2010 complete with a mind boggling price tag of $3.55 trillion. The creative folks at Newsweek came up with a way for us ordinary folks to get our hands around this number. What can you buy with the 2010 federal budget?

• Everything produced in Italy in 2008 - $2.399 trillion
• All the oil in Saudi Arabia - $781 billion
• An electric car for every 16- and 17-year old in America - $146.2 billion
• The International Space Station - $130.2 billion
• A refund for everyone defrauded by Bernie Madoff - $65 billion
• The Big Dig, Boston's urban-infrastructure project - $22 billion
• Full funding for the Krasnow Institute's project to map the human brain - $4 billion
• All the tea in China - $1.84 billion
• The treasures of King Tut's tomb - $507 million
• A 99 cent MP3 download from iTunes for everyone in America - $301 million

All that and you'd still have close to $20 million...you know, for incidentals.

Cuba - Indulge me for a moment while I go off on a bit of a tangent. The California Supreme Court ruled today to uphold Proposition 8, a constitution ban on same sex marriage. Five state legislatures have decided to legalize same sex marriage, and to that list we might be adding a rather unexpected entry--Cuba. Mariela Castro, daughter of President Raul Castro, led hundreds of Cubans in a street dance last week to promote gay rights. Remind you of anyone here in the States? I'll give you the answer at the end. Mariela is an outspoken advocate for gay and transgender issues who has worked to change Cuban attitudes toward homosexuality. Homosexuality was decriminalized in 1979, although discrimination is still widespread. What is it about "daddy's little girl" that drives fathers to an early grave? Any guesses? You have to go back to 2002, when this daddy's girl joined the Republican gay-straight alliance and said sexual orientation should be a "non-issue for the Republican Party." At the risk of stating the obvious, Mary Cheney was in the minority on that issue. She certainly didn't have much influence on her father, Dick.

Canada - 9,000 Americans studied at Canadian universities in 2008, up from 2,300 in 1996. Many Canadian schools said applications from U.S. citizens are up sharply. Some universities report that Americans make up over 10% of this year's freshman class. Even though foreign students must pay higher tuition fees than Canadians do, a year of college in Canada costs about one-third as much as it does in the United States. Ah yes. It's an age old dilemma. Is the typical American student willing to spend a third of the money to get three times the amount of education? A very tough call, indeed.

China - Here's another entry for the "So Bizarre It Must Be True" file. China's first theme park devoted to sex has been demolished, weeks before it was due to open. "Love Land" (I swear I'm not making this up) was going to feature giant models of genitals, workshops on sex techniques, and educational displays about condom use. Here in America have something similar to what these guys were trying to do with this theme park, only we have a slightly different term for it--porn. The developer of the facility said he got the idea for the venture after visiting a popular sex park in South Korea. Locals began complaining when they saw the naked statues going up. Go figure.

Daydreaming - Daydreaming is often viewed as a sign of laziness or a lack of seriousness, but a new study says that's a bad rap. Neuroscientists found that when a person begins daydreaming, there's a lot of activity in regions of gray matter dedicated to high-level thought and complex problem-solving. Ah ha! I thought so. Check this out. I was in this staff meeting and my summer holiday was just around the corner. I started reminiscing about this trip I took to the South Pacific back in college. There was that time when the locals in Fiji introduced us to the local brew, Fiji Bitter. Dude, I got so toasted. Then there was that bar in New Zealand. There was this hot girl that talked me into signing up for that jelly wrestling and I totally...umm...So where was I? Daydreaming, right? Supposed to stimulate the brain? Works for me.

What Caught My Eye Today

Ireland - There are so many disturbing aspects about this story, I'm not sure where to begin. After a nine-year investigation, a commission published a damning report on decades of rapes, humiliation and beatings at Catholic Church-run reform schools for Ireland's castaway children. The investigation of the tax-supported schools uncovered previously secret Vatican records that demonstrated church knowledge of pedophiles in their ranks all the way back to the 1930s. The report found that molestation and rape were "endemic" in boys' facilities, chiefly run by the Christian Brothers order, and supervisors pursued policies that increased the danger. Girls supervised by orders of nuns, chiefly the Sisters of Mercy, suffered much less sexual abuse but frequent assaults and humiliation designed to make them feel worthless. If that doesn't provide enough shock factor, get a load of the response. Rather predictable, but still... The Catholic religious orders that ran more than 50 workhouse-style reform schools from the late 19th century until the mid-1990s offered public words of apology, shame and regret. But when questioned, their leaders indicated they would continue to protect the identities of clergy accused of abuse. One would think that with 2,600 pages of damning evidence, these order would be open to a bit more than some public apologies. From what I can gather, I'm not sure there is much sincerity backing them up. I find myself wondering if these guys still don't understand the magnitude of the distress they inflicted on children that were already in fragile states of mind. Seriously, how could any rationale human being justify this cruelty?

Iran - Look who has a new toy. A missile test-fired by Iran is the longest-range solid-propellant missile it has launched yet. Solid-propellant rockets are a concern because they can be fueled in advance and moved or hidden in silos. The Iranian missile had a range of 1,200 to 1,500 miles, putting Israel, U.S. bases in the Mideast, and parts of Eastern Europe within striking distance. Clearly developments like this aren't welcome news, especially considering this is the same Iran that has called for the annihilation of Israel on several occasions. And yet, even this has a rather amusing angle to it. Some dozen hours after the test was reportedly conducted, numerous U.S. defense and intelligence officials declined to even acknowledge the Iranian launch had occurred. Yeah, if we don't acknowledge the missile launch maybe it never happened. It's like that old saying--if a tree falls down in the forest and no one is there to see it, does it make a sound. Of course in this case, we're talking about some serious fire power. I pretty sure denying that the launch took place is going to change the fact that Iran has itself a whole lot more "shock and awe" than it did yesterday.

Utah - A Utah boy is trying to get into the record books by covering his face with live snails. Dear God, why? Surely there has to be an easier way to enjoy one's "15 minutes of fame." The boy allowed 43 of the slimy mollusks to be put on his face. The Guinness web site says the record set in 2007 for snails on the face for 10 seconds is eight. The boy says he has since learned the record was 36. What amazes me is that there is a world record for this sort of thing. Sitting back in a reclining chair, snails gathered from neighbors' gardens were carefully placed on his face. Those that remained for at least 10 seconds were counted. Honestly, don't you people have anything better to do with your time. And another thing. What sort of parent allows their kid to pull a stunt like this?

Cycling - Stage 11 of the Giro d'Italia is in the books. Guess who is beginning to inch his way back up the leaderboard. A freak crash could impact Levi Leipheimer’s chance of winning the marathon-like time trial in the 12th stage of the Giro d’Italia. Meanwhile, Lance Armstrong keeps improving and could contend for the first victory of his comeback after 3 1/2 years of retirement and breaking his collarbone in March. Leipheimer somersaulted off his bike when someone dropped a water bottle in front of him in the feeding zone midway through the stage. Mark Cavendish won the mostly flat 11th stage Wednesday in a mass sprint, and Danilo Di Luca of Italy maintained a 1 minute, 20 second overall lead on Denis Menchov of Russia. Michael Rogers of Australia was third overall, 1:33 behind, and Leipheimer is fourth, 1:40 back. Armstrong moved up two spots to 16th overall, 5:28 behind Di Luca. Alas, not all the news is good for American cyclists. Chris Horner did not start the stage because of a muscle tear in his left calf following a crash a day earlier. On the off chance that you are under the impression that cycling is not the most exciting sport on the face of the planet, consider this. In just over two months every top-level American cyclist has suffered a crash or injury. Armstrong - broken collarbone, Horner - muscle tear, Christian Vandevelde crashed out Stage 1, and Leipheimer has crashed...well, pretty much at least once in every stage race he's ridden in this year. You don't see this many crashes in stock car racing.

American Idol - Fred's Note: If you are relying on this blog for news on Idol, you clearly don't care much about the talent competition so I'll keep this short. More than 100 million votes were cast after Tuesday's singing showdown between Lambert and Allen. A record-setting 624 million votes were cast over the season. And the winner is--Kris Allen. Yeah, that's a bit of an upset, but not totally unexpected. Honestly, do you really think that a dude having nicknames like "Glambert" and "guyliner" had a prayer in hell of capturing the "red state" votes? Bravo Kris. One final word on this season's competition. Lose the fourth judge. Kara DioGuardi is a useless addition, who--big surprise--sucks as a songwriter too. After all that Lambert and Allen went through to make the finals, they both had to perform a rendition of this season's coronation song, a piece of crap called "No boundaries." I read an article today suggesting that the reason this song was selected was that it did suck and would never be picked up by a artist with an ounce of talent (or self-respect). By making this the Idol's swan song (so to speak) the song writers will pocket around $80,000 for their effort. Dude, that's just wrong. Now that Idol is finally over, we can focus on more pressing matters, like the start of this season's "So You Think You Can Dance." Yeah, baby.

What Caught My Eye Today

Racial Demographics - I used to think that when you filled out a survey or application, picking your racial profile ranked up there with gender for degree of difficulty. And then I read this... A medical student says he was suspended from New Jersey's University of Medicine and Dentistry for insisting that he is a white African-American. Dude isn't stupid, I swear. The man was born in Mozambique before moving to the United States, and described himself in a class assignment on identity as "white, African, American." Technically all true. He claimed that student and faculty berated him, saying no whiter person could call himself an African-American. When her persisted he was suspended for two years. He is now suing the school. Amazingly, enough, I bet he'll win. I'm a bit curious how a institution of high learning such as this was unable to open its mind to the possibility that a white person could be both "African" and "American."

Sri Lanka - Sri Lanka declared total victory in one of the world's most intractable wars, after killing the separatist Tamil Tigers' leader and taking control of the entire country for the first time since 1983. In a climactic gunbattle, special forces troops killed Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) leader Vellupillai Prabhakaran as he tried to flee the war zone in an ambulance early today. I don't have anything particularly poignant to say, but when a 26 year civil war comes to an end, I'd say that's newsworthy. And unless you happen to be a fan of the BBC or NPR, chances are you'll never hear about it.

Somalia - Are you familiar with the saying, "No matter how bad things seem, they could always be worse." I give you "worse". Somalia is only nominally a nation. The former British colony has not had a functional government since 1991. Some 1.3 million of Somalia's 9 million citizens are "internally displaced," living in squalid refugee camps or roaming the country, homeless, searching for food. About 3.2 million Somalis depend on food rations, fewer than a quarter of its children go to school, and its maternal mortality and illiteracy rates are among the highest in the world. Warlords and armed gangs control much of the country. Since neighboring Ethiopia invaded Somalia in 2006, at least 10,000 innocent civilians have been killed. Given that background one can understand why piracy seems to be a growth industry. These guys seriously have nothing to lose and everything to gain. One successful ship seizure and ransom can make a pirate crew instant millionaires.

New Zealand - One word can describe this next item--Eww. A six-year, $12 million scientific study has identified the flavors in New Zealand's signature Sauvignon Blanc as a combination of passion fruit, asparagus, and... (here it comes) cat urine. A researcher associated with the study said, "If you had a whole lot of cat's pee it obviously wouldn't be great, but it's amazing what a little can do." That just ain't right, especially seeing as I've put away my fair share of the stuff. Of course, on the bright side, the next time I have a bottle that doesn't taste so good, I will take pride in the fact that when I declare to my dining companions that the wine "tastes like piss," I'll be right.

Sports - Busy weekend is sports. Here's my take on just a few of the highlights.

Horse Racing - Rachel Alexandra won the Preakness Stakes. The headline here is that Rachel is a filly and fillies have only won a Triple Crown race 11 times...ever. Of course, this means we won't have a Triple Crown contender at the Belmont Stakes...again. But who really pays attention to this stuff anyway? Besides me, I mean.

Hockey - Two months into the Stanley Cup playoffs, we have the Conference Finals underway. In the West, we have the (2) Detroit Red Wings going against the (4) Chicago Blackhawks in a matchup of Original Six teams and in the East, we have the (6) Carolina Hurricanes taking on the (4) Pittsburgh Penguins. I'll take the Red Wings and Penguins--both in 7 games.

NBA - Not to be outdone by the NHL, we have the NBA Conference Final matchups set. In the East, (1) Cleveland Cavaliers will face (3) Orlando Magic in what is technically a best of 7 series. I doubt the Magic will manage to stretch this to a fifth game. Over in the West, we have a 1-2 matchup between the L.A. Lakers and Denver Nuggets. I'll take L.A. in 7. Like it really matters. LeBron James and the Cavs have got this thing in the bag.

Soccer - Guess what? I follow European Football--otherwise known as soccer--too. Two of the powerhouse European leagues have crowned familiar teams as champions. For the third consecutive year, Manchester United has claimed the English Premier League title and for the fourth consecutive year, Inter Milan has won Italy's Serie A title. Okay then, moving on...

Cycling - It's a rest day on the Giro d'Italia, so we have time to catch up on the last couple of stages. Since we last left the Giro (stage 6, I believe), the peleton hit the mountains in earnest. The top American riders continue to be Levi Leipheimer (+51") and Chris Horner (+1'25"). Lance Armstrong is in 25th place, four and a half minutes off the overall lead. All 3 riders race for Astana, which if you remember hasn't paid its staff or riders since February. This has prompted Armstrong to seek out U.S. sponsorship for the team, so he can ride in the Tour de France in July. Oh, and by the way, the times from Stage 9 were thrown out, because the riders were protesting the dangerous conditions of the course that nearly claimed the life of a Spanish rider on Saturday's eighth stage. Wouldn't it be nice, if we could actually see this race someplace other than the Internet?

What Caught My Eye Today

Torture - House Speaker Nancy Pelosi bluntly accused the CIA of misleading her and other lawmakers about its use of waterboarding during the Bush administration. "They mislead us all the time," she said. Asked whether the agency had lied, Pelosi said yes. What's this? A spy agency being accused of subterfuge? It's a world gone mad, I tell you. Pelosi also vehemently disputed Republican charges that she was complicit in the use of waterboarding, and she suggested the GOP was trying to shift the focus of public attention away from the Bush administration's use of techniques that she and President Barack Obama have described as torture. Pelosi has been the target of a campaign orchestrated in recent days by the House Republican leadership, which is eager to undercut her statements as well as stick Democrats with partial responsibility for the use of waterboarding — a kind of simulated drowning — in the Bush administration. Pelosi renewed her call for a so-called truth commission to investigate the events in the Bush administration that led to the use of waterboarding and other harsh interrogation techniques. So let me see if I've got this straight. Pelosi is on a witch hunt trying to punish a guy who is no longer in power for doing something that the new guy has banned. In what can only be described as retaliation, Republicans are attempting to defend past transgressions by saying Democrats, like Pelosi, were fully aware of what was going on and did nothing to stop it. Which, in turn, motivates Pelosi even more to prove that the Republican administration was at fault. Forget the fact that this probe will probably bear out if Pelosi knew about what was going on or not. Did you follow all that? Me neither. Still, I guess this is a far better use of Congress's time than say, oh I don't know, fixing the battered economy.

Body Parts - This story is just plain creepy. A man was convicted of carving up cadavers donated to UCLA's medical school and selling the parts to unsuspecting medical research companies in a $1.5 million scheme. Prosecutors said he bought the donated torsos, cut them up and kept them frozen in a rented warehouse until they were sold to companies that didn't know they had been improperly obtained. I suppose you can give this whack job credit for ingenuity, but boyfriend certainly doesn't get any bonus point in the brains department. Here's his defense. He thought the sales were authorized by the university. Of course they were. Why wouldn't a university authorize the sale of body parts and allow the dude who was supposed to transport them to pocket the proceeds? At the risk of stating the obvious, Einstein is now serving a four year prison term in the state penitentiary.

Space Shuttle - A pair of spacewalking astronauts overpowered a stubborn bolt and successfully installed a new piano-sized camera in the Hubble Space Telescope, the first step to making the observatory better than ever. The newly inserted wide-field and planetary camera — worth $132 million — will allow astronomers to peer deeper into the universe, to within 500 million to 600 million years of creation. The old one was installed in December 1993 during the first Hubble repair mission and has taken more than 135,000 observations. A camera the size of a piano? I wonder what type of film that takes? I'm guessing something a bit larger than 35mm. And how about the size of the roll. 135,000 pictures. A standard roll of film takes about 24 exposures right? That's like 5600 rolls of film. (Yeah, yeah, I know. They use digital photography these day, but if I went down that path I couldn't have made that crack about the 5600 rolls of film could I?)

North Pole - British explorers in northern Canada to measure the thickness of floating Arctic sea ice ended their expedition short of reaching the North Pole due to an early summer ice melt. That sort of defeats the purpose of measuring the ice doesn't it? The explorers had planned a three-month journey to the North Pole, during which they measured the thickness of floating sea ice to provide data to scientists studying the impact of global warming in the region, but stopped after 73 days. Information the team gathers could contribute to a better understanding of global warming, which is believed to be the main culprit in the rapidly melting polar ice cap that is freeing up new sea routes and untapped mineral resources on the ocean bottom. That's all well and good, but I'm thinking the bigger story here is that they had to cut short their expedition because they ran out of North Pole to explore. It's melting away too fast. I'd say that's a pretty good indicator that global warming is having some impact on the region.

Cycling - Day 6 of the Giro D'Italia is in the books. Levi Leipheimer’s chance of winning the Giro d’Italia keeps getting better. Lance Armstrong keeps losing time. Leipheimer finished in the main pack in the sixth stage, with the race crossing into Austria. The Montana rider remained fourth overall, 43 seconds behind the overall leader. For the third consecutive stage, Armstrong was dropped from the lead group. This time, the seven-time Tour de France winner was undone by a steep downhill run. Armstrong lost 1:15 and dropped from 22nd to 25th overall, 4:13 behind. Bear in mind the dude is coming of a 3 1/2 year retirement and a shattered collarbone in March. Leipheimer has a long list of accomplishments. He finished second to teammate Alberto Contador in last year’s Spanish Vuelta, was third in the 2001 Spanish Vuelta and 2007 Tour de France and took the bronze medal in the time trial at the Beijing Olympics. "Things haven’t changed for me," Leipheimer said. "I think maybe just more people are paying attention now because of Lance." Armstrong does tend to have the affect on things. Still, I wouldn't count out a stage victory for Armstrong sometime in the next couple of weeks.

What Caught My Eye Today

Rhode Island - The mayor of Providence wants to slap a $150-per-semester tax on the 25,000 full-time students at Brown University and three other private colleges in the city, saying they use resources and should help ease the burden on struggling taxpayers. Back in my day, they called it something different--tuition, I think it was called. If enacted, it would apparently be the first time a U.S. city has directly taxed students just for being enrolled. The proposal is still in its early stages. But it has riled some students, who say it would unfairly saddle them with the city's financial woes and overlook their volunteer work and other contributions, including money spent in restaurants, bars and stores. And let's not forget those other contributions like traffic school fees and bail bonds. If I were a betting man, I'd say that those same college students are kicking in their fair share on both counts.

Swine Flu - Anyone curious about how the flu pandemic is coming along? There are now 33 countries reporting an estimated total of 6,080 confirmed swine flu cases, including 3,009 in 45 U.S. states, 2,446 in Mexico and 358 in Canada. But the death total is relatively low — 65, of which 60 were in Mexico, three in the U.S., one in Canada and one in Costa Rica. Those don't seem like global pandemic numbers to me. So what up? Mexico has tested about 9,000 sick people, working through a backlog of samples taken before and after the virus was identified as swine flu — and found that Mexico's dead represents 2.5% of confirmed cases, suggesting the virus is not as deadly as initially feared. There is a danger the virus will mutate into something more dangerous — perhaps by combining with the more deadly but less easily spread bird flu virus circulating in Asia and Africa. I see. It's not the cases we already know about that is the problem. It's the cases we don't know about yet. Yeah, that's a comforting thought.

Bethlehem - What's this about Bethlehem in May? Christmas is more than 7 months away. Is the Pope in town or what? Pope Benedict XVI made a powerful plea for a Palestinian state, mixing prayer and politics at Jesus' birthplace and expressing solidarity at a refugee camp with "all the homeless Palestinians who long to be able to return to their birthplace." Wow. So he is. The Vatican has long supported a Palestinian state. Christians are a tiny minority among the 3.9 million Palestinians who live in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In a trend seen throughout the Middle East, their numbers have dwindled as Palestinians weary of occupation seek out new opportunities abroad. Imagine that. Palestinians picking life abroad rather than death at home. Go figure. I am somewhat at a loss as to why the Vatican is expending some much effort on a region where the Christian population is almost non-existent.

Kenya - I'm a bit late on reporting this item, but it is just too good to pass over. Hundreds of Kenyan women abstained from sex for a week to protest the bickering of their nation's political leaders. The political rivals who both claimed to have won last year's presidential election have been feuding since they formed a coalition government to end post-election violence. But wait. As hard as it may be to imagine, the story gets better. A Kenyan man sued the women's activist group, claiming the sex boycott it organized affected his marriage and caused him stress. Umm, so does he think this stunt is likely to improve his chances for a conjugal visit from the missus? In the lawsuit, the man says the boycott caused symptoms that included headaches and insomnia. Dude, those so-called symptoms you claim you have; the rest of the world has another word for--it's called "life".

Cycling - Day #5 of the Giro d'Italia is in the books. Levi's looking strong while Lance's has fallen off the pace a bit.Russia’s Denis Menchov won the 125-km fifth stage of the Giro d’Italia while Lance Armstrong slipped back after a punishing mountain climb. Seven-times Tour de France winner Armstrong, who made a bright start to the Giro having only just recovered from a broken collarbone, found the stage tough and is three minutes 34 seconds back in 22nd place overall. Meanwhile, Levi Leipheimer finds himself in fourth place just 43 seconds out of the lead. Oh and this just in. Armstrong may find himself in unfamiliar territory pretty soon, that of rider/owner. Armstrong has a lot on his mind given he is considering taking over Astana so they can guarantee participation in July’s Tour de France. The Kazakh-funded team failed to pay all their riders last month and have been threatened with having their Pro-Licence stripped. Armstrong indicated last week that he was talking to U.S.-based sponsors about taking over the team himself. That might be his only solution if he wants to go for an eighth Tour de France title in July. Somehow, I don't see him having that hard of a time securing a sponsor.

What Caught My Eye Today

Entitlements - Otherwise known as Social Security and Medicare. Social Security and Medicare are fading even faster under the weight of the recession, heading for insolvency years sooner than previously expected. Social Security will start paying out more in benefits than it collects in taxes in 2016, a year sooner than projected last year, and the giant trust fund will be depleted by 2037, four years sooner. Medicare is in even worse shape. The program for hospital expenses will pay out more in benefits than it collects this year, just as it did for the first time in 2008. The Medicare fund will be depleted by 2017, two years earlier than the date projected in last year's report. Let's try to look at this from slightly different perspective. Maybe that will make this seem a little less bleak. Let's say you're in Las Vegas and want to do some gambling. Depending on the casino, you are looking at a payout in the range of 95% to 98%. That means for every dollar you invest, on average you'll walk away with 95 to 98 cents. Take that same analogy and apply it to Social Security. For every dollar that you invest, you'll walk away with about 75 cents. Feel better? Me neither. Now get this. According to some analysts, we could shore up Social Security for another 75 years if Social Security withholdings were increased by just 2%. Doesn't seem like much does it? As for Medicare, I'm not sure I care. Seriously, if I have no money to live off of in retirement, I'm not sure living to a ripe old age is going to be that appealing anyway.

Space Shuttle - Space shuttle Atlantis is now in a rough orbital neighborhood — a place littered with thousands of pieces of space junk zipping around the Earth at nearly 20,000 mph. There are more pieces of shattered satellites and used-up rockets in this region than astronauts have ever encountered. And the crew must be there for more than a week to repair the Hubble Space Telescope. The telescope orbits about 350 miles above Earth, a far dirtier place than where shuttles normally fly. And all those tiny projectiles raise the constant threat of a potentially fatal collision. The Air Force is tracking more than 19,000 objects in all sorts of orbits — most of it junk. NASA now puts the risk for a catastrophic collision with junk during the mission at 1 in 229 — greater than typical flights to the space station but lower than the agency's initial estimates. I'll get to my point in a moment. Bear with me. Initially, when Johnson and other experts at the Johnson Space Center calculated the risk for losing Atlantis because of debris, it was slightly worse than 1 in 200. That's the threshold for NASA to think twice about doing the flight. Engineers came up with some maneuvers to reduce the likelihood of getting hit, and have now decided the risk is an acceptable 1 in 229. That risk is usually about 1 in 300 during space station missions. I have to be honest, I'm not a big fan of any of those odds. But enough about that. So what was it that reduced the risk to an 'acceptable' level? Apparently, the brain trust at NASA has decided that it now has the ability to repair tile damage sustained in orbit. Bear in mind, the last time an astronaut stepped outside to do a repair, she dropped the tool; that tool is now one of those 19,000 objects that the Air Force is now tracking. As an added precaution, NASA has decided to have Atlantis haul ass to a lower orbit after it finishes its repairs on the Hubble to inspect itself before re-entry. Yeah, dramatic orbit changes sounds real safe. And finally, in it's infinite wisdom, NASA's final contingency plan if something happens to Atlantis is to send up Endeavour for a rescue mission. Let me see if I have this straight. Atlantis has a 1 in 229 chance of having something go wrong and the back up is to send up another shuttle with a marginally better 1 in 300 chance of failure. Say what you will about the logic of this plan; these guys have some serious brass 'ones' for even suggesting this, let alone going through with it. In all seriousness, I'm a big proponent of the space program, and hope that all this stuff I've been mocking does not have to be contemplated. Best of luck, astronauts.

Iraq - As if our troops deployed in Iraq didn't have enough to worry about. A 44-year-old soldier has been charged with murder and aggravated assault of five fellow soldiers. It has been suggested that the soldier was treated poorly at the stress center and that counselors "broke" him before the gunfire erupted in a military stress center. The attacks came just weeks before the end of his third tour of duty in Iraq. There is so much wrong with this sequence of events, that it's difficult too determine where to begin. There is nothing even remotely humorous about any aspect of this story. The system clearly failed, exhibiting a level of incompetence that one could describe as laughable. Unfortunately for the victims of this tragedy, there is nothing amusing about it. I find myself surprisingly sympathetic to the plight of this soldier as well. While I will stop short of saying his mental condition excuses his actions, the soldier was obviously a casualty of questionable treatment practices. He and the soldiers whose lives he cut short, deserved better, especially considering the service they were providing their country.

Okay, then. We got a little too serious there. Time to lighten things up. And what better way to do that...

Cycling - Yeah, boy. The first grand tour of Europe is under way, baby! The 2009 Giro d'Italia is the 92nd running of the Giro d'Italia and marks the 100th year since the first Giro d'Italia. It will be held from 9–31 May. It started in Venice and will finish in Rome. There is also going to be a stage finish on Mount Vesuvius. Yeah, yeah. Big whoop. Here's the big news--Lance Armstrong is racing. That's right. The same Lance who broke his collarbone, like yesterday (Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating just a bit. Dude broke it about 2 months ago, but still an impressive comeback). The real injustice here is the television coverage, or lack thereof. American audiences pretty much have to rely on Universal Sports for online video stream coverage of the race. That aside, American cyclists are having a pretty good go of things four stages into the 3 week race. Levi Leipheimer is in fifth place overall 26 seconds off the lead and Armstrong is in sixth just 28 seconds off the pace. Did I mention that the dude broke his collarbone a few weeks ago and, oh by the way, is coming off 4 years in retirement. Boy has skill.

What Caught My Eye Today

Russia - Break out your favorite 'military intelligence' oxymoron quips. Fifty of Russia's 249 generals failed a pop quiz and will be fired. The Deputy Defense Minister said, "We do not intend to keep officers who are not up to par for their positions and high titles in the armed forces." That's right, if you want to get paid for being incompetent you should have applied for a government job. The proficiency test and subsequent firings ar epart of a general downsizing of Russia's military. An additional 133 generals will be forced to retire this year because of poor health or old age. Ultimately, the number of officers will be more than halved, to 150,000, for an army of about 1 million. So let me see if I've got this straight. If 150,000 represents a reduction of more than 50%, that means there are more than 300,000 officers currently. If my math is correct (and I think it is), that is soldier to officer ratio of 3 to 1. I've been on luxury cruise ships where the staff to passenger ratio twice that. Just how much leadership do these guys need?

Spain - Spain has opened a judical investigation of those responsible for alleged torture at the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Spanish officials were moved to act after speaking to prisoners who said they were beaten, sexually assaulted, and had chemicals sprayed in their eyes. What, no waterboarding? The inquiry will examine "perpetrators, instigators, necessary collaborators, and accomplices" to tourture, including soldiers and military intelligence officers. The investigation is separate from an ongoing Spanish inquiry into abusive interrogation techniques that could result in charges agains former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and five other Bush administration officials. Ah right, there it is. All I have to say is that Congress better get its act together if it wants to level charges against anyone in the Bush Administration. Otherwise, Congress is likely to find itself waiting in line behind the International Criminal Court in the Hague. Or perhaps not, seeing as the United States is one of the few countries that does not recognize the Court's authority. Either way, the fact that an ally of the United States has opened a criminal investigation against former U.S. officials cannot be good.

Canada - I'm not purposely targeting Canadians; it's just that they happen to be one of the first to admit to a problem every other technologically advanced nation all faces. Canada's tax agency is stockpiling hundreds of old computers containing sensitive taxpayer data that officials are unable to delete. Tax offices around the country have been storing old hard drives in locked facilities. Some have resorted to smashing computer to destroy the data. Police officials said to properly destroy a hard drive, it should be run through commerical equipment that slices it into bits no bigger than the width of a pencil. See, you all are making this way too complicated. There is a simple solution to this. Here's what you do--Fire up one of those bad boys and connect to the Internet. Navigate to a website of questionable repute (otherwise known as a porn site). I promise that within a couple of minutes, you will have so many pop up ads, the computer will be pretty much useless. Not that I speak from personal experience or anything like that. I...uh...yeah, I read an article about this in...uh...yeah, a journal. That's right.

Prisons - Here's another entry for the So Stupid It Must Be True file. As a cost cutting measure, the U.S. Bureau of Prisons has been allowing prisoners to transfer themselves, unescorted, from one prison to another. Brilliant. Simply brilliant, wouldn't you say? Officials have confirmed that some prisoners at minimum security facilities are given bus tickets and told to make the trip to the next prison on their own, and that some prisoners have seized the opportunity to escape. A Bureau spokeswomen said "the savings are substantial. Obviously. I mean if a prisoner escapes, you no longer have the overhead costs associated with incarcerating the guy anymore. I want to know what's wrong with the prisoners that didn't try to escape. Some just ain't right with those dudes.