Something insane / Anti-Bush music from Kuwait / Mysteries / Another peak oil site and…

Above all, do not lose your desire to walk. Every day I walk myself into a state of well-being and walk away from every illness. I have walked myself into my best thoughts, and I know of no thought so burdensome that one cannot walk away from it. Soren Kierkegaard

Something insane

Trying to mount an engine from a WWII Sherman tank on an old Ford Mustang is quite something. Rather interesting, it would be nice to see how such a car will move. Fast, I assume.

Anti-Bush music from Kuwait

Juan Cole posted a link to a anti-Bush song by a Kuwaiti singer Shams. Helena Cobban picked up the story and wrote a longer commentary on the song. Much better to sing than bomb, I assume. And more effective, for dictators (even aspiring ones) do not like to be laughed at.
Direct link to the video.

Mysteries

Daily Kos is perplexed by the changing views on Iraq:

Are you losing track of the good and the bad in Iraq? We're told the Sunni insurgents are bad, but they're backed by Bush's noble Saudi pals. The Shiites are our default allies in Iraq, but the Iranians who are helping them are bad. The Kurds are good, because they're relatively peaceful and independent, except their peaceful independence is creating profound anxiety among our Turkish friends, which is bad. Al Qaeda is bad, we all agree, except when they oppose Shiite Cleric Muqtada Al-Sadr, which is ... what ... good?

Read the rest of the story.

Another peak oil site and on climate change

Still another peak oil site: Life after oil crash. I am more worried, at the moment, about the coming shortage of oil than of climate change. We, everyone in the industrial countries, are so dependent on oil that it is almost beyond comprehension. Just try: imagine how your life will be affected when oil is both expensive (e.g. $300 a barrel) and of unreliable supply. Yes, we can produce fuel for engines from wood, but how are we going to keep on producing food without abundant supply of oil. I have no idea. All I know for sure that there is no way the Earth can feed 6 billion people or more without oil. And globalization as we know will soon be a thing of the past, global supply chains will break up, and we need to re-localize most of our supplies.
Etc, blah, blah. But read Kunstler's new blog entry. Worth a few minutes.
But see what Mr Hansen of NASA has to say about the IPCC report. Mr. Hansen claims that sea level may rise in a nonlinear fashion. Not so that it would rise some centimeters annually, but that it could rise some meter or so in a very short time. That would be more problematic, for many cities are by the sea. Even Helsinki is.
MIT press on recommended books on climate change. My credit card will have some use soon enough.

Iran, USA, war, lessons

I have to say that Bill and Richard were right to lay blame at my door. I did stray away from my deeper beliefs when I wished that the USA would be taught a lesson. I think most Americans have learned their lesson. It also seems that the Congress is waking up, for both Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) and Sen. Richard Lugar (R-IN), the ranking member on the Foreign Relations Committee, say that Mr Bush does not have the authority to attack Iran without getting permission from the Congress. Let's hope that this opinion holds and that the Congress has the balls not to grant the permission, no matter how much spin Mr. Bush comes up.
The net is full of speculation about the situation. One of the most interesting theories is that Iran is a trap for America. The idea is that Russia, China and other are setting America up, in the hope of luring the USA into attacking Iran, and by doing so messing itself up. The theories the trap-theorists build are somewhat plausible, for the USA is by now made itself extremely vulnerable to any disruptions in its supply of oil. I think that the war in Iraq has proved that the only realistic way of getting oil is commerce combined with diplomacy. Just trying to invade and steal does not work.
War in Context has an interesting list of proposal for talking with Iran.

Weekend

I should know better than making public plans for weekends. I was about to read books, walk a lot, but it did not happen. Instead, my brother drove over from Tampere. We visited the annual motorcycle fair in the Helsinki Fair Center. Quite a fair, full of red faced, pot bellied motor cyclist, some of them quite drank, for there were almost as many bars as there were fair stands. The crowd was really distinct from the grey faced, thin, absent minded people who flock to the book fairs. In all, it was very interesting: to see the crowds, to see new motorcycles (many of them very interesting as fine pieces of engineering), and also to see some indoor motocross trick (20 meter jumps from one ramp to another). Well worth the 12-euro entrance fee.
After the fair, and some gin, we visited Dong bei hu once again. The food was as excellent as it has always been, if not better. The restaurant really improves my quality of life and living, makes even gray, rainy days of Helsinki bearable, just being there, a short tram ride away from home. It is a pity that I cannot have lunch there. Maybe I should try to find a job near the restaurant?
Later, we drove back to Tampere, visited our mother's place, and then spend some time drinking beer and watching Lucky Number Slevin in my brother's garage/club house. The movie was rather good, intense, full of surprises, not too violent (but violent in the sense of Tarantino), and somewhat scripted as Chandler's crime novels. It took quite many beers.
On Sunday, nothing much, just idling in Tampere, then taking train back to Helsinki. I do not know why, but leaving Tampere makes me rather sad each time. I always here the lyrics of Green and Grey. It is a strange feeling, and still makes me feel more alive than usually.

Alun perin julkaistu kuukausikoosteessa "Blogs February to March 2007".