Vail execs ski-jump overseas to oversee Vail execs ski-jump overseas to oversee

Denver Post: Vail execs ski-jump overseas to oversee: Roger McCarthy and Chuck Tolton, both former Vail Resorts executives, have been hired to open up ski areas overseas. Roger is going to Russia, and Chuck to China.

It is always interesting seeing people you know, at least somewhat, in the news. Chuck and I grew around Golden, CO. I didn't know him in HS, since he went to a rival school, but met him a couple years later. I met Roger through Chuck while working at Keystone, when Chuck was the Director of Mountain Operations, and Roger was his boss.

My last run two years ago was with the two of them, plus maybe four others. Chuck took us down through his (A51) terrain park, and introduced us to his toilet bowl feature - which was essentially a half pipe with the bottom end filled in. They had cut a drain with chain saws through the closed end (it took three days, and the radio traffic was quite humorous, as they were cutting from both directions, and kept thinking they were ready to hook up - they missed by about a foot, which made exiting through the drain interesting). We then skied down Go Devil, a very steep groomed expert run on the front of the mountain. I was following Chuck on my downhills while he telemarked, until Roger went screaming by. I figured I might was well do that too, since downhills don't turn very well. A great finish for a great season.

I last talked to Roger in late December when he was skiing with the new president of Keystone, Pat Campbell. They were helping a guest with her skis, when I skied up and took over. I last ran into Chuck at the Keystone Ski Patrol headquarters in early March.

I am not the least bit surprised that they have been able to leverage their tenure at Vail into jobs opening up large ski reasorts overseas. Vail Resorts is the premier ski area company in the country, and probably in the world. Both are extremely well qualified for their new roles.

Cheney responds to Reid Cheney responds to Reid

VP Cheney responding to Sen. Majority Leader Reid Tuesday:

I usually avoid press comment when I’m up here, but I felt so strongly about what Senator Reid said in the last couple of days, that I thought it was appropriate that I come out today and make a statement that I think needs to be made.

I thought his speech yesterday was unfortunate, that his comments were uninformed and misleading. Senator Reid has taken many positions on Iraq. He has threatened that if the President vetoes the current pending supplemental legislation, that he will send up Senator Russ Feingold's bill to de-fund Iraq operations altogether.

Yet only last November, Senator Reid said there would be no cutoff of funds for the military in Iraq. So in less than six months' time, Senator Reid has gone from pledging full funding for the military, then full funding but with conditions, and then a cutoff of funding — three positions in five months on the most important foreign policy question facing the nation and our troops.

Yesterday, Senator Reid said the troop surge was against the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group. That is plainly false. The Iraq Study Group report was explicitly favorable toward a troop surge to secure Baghdad. Senator Reid said there should be a regional conference on Iraq. Apparently, he doesn't know that there is going to be one next week. Senator Reid said he doesn't have real substantive meetings with the President. Yet immediately following last week's meeting at the White House, he said, "It was a good exchange; everyone voiced their considered opinion about the war in Iraq."

What's most troubling about Senator Reid's comments yesterday is his defeatism. Indeed, last week, he said the war is already lost. And the timetable legislation that he is now pursuing would guarantee defeat.

Maybe it's a political calculation. Some Democratic leaders seem to believe that blind opposition to the new strategy in Iraq is good politics. Senator Reid himself has said that the war in Iraq will bring his party more seats in the next election. It is cynical to declare that the war is lost because you believe it gives you political advantage. Leaders should make decisions based on the security interests of our country, not on the interests of their political party.

Film on Global Warming Is Challenged Film on Global Warming Is Challenged

AP: Film on Global Warming Is Challenged points out that a bunch of British climate scientists are questioning Algore's "An Inconvenient Truth":

"The Great Global Warming Swindle" aired on British television in March and is coming out soon on DVD. It argues that man-made emissions have a marginal impact on the world's climate and warming can better be explained by changing patterns of solar activity.

This comes at an inconvenient time, as we are repeatedly assurred that the scientific debate is over and there is complete consensus in the area of human caused Global Warming.

Bin Laden overseeing Iraq, Afghanistan ops Bin Laden overseeing Iraq, Afghanistan ops

Reuters: Bin Laden overseeing Iraq, Afghanistan ops points to a consolidation in al Qaeda operations. Also, bin Laden has taken responsibility for a Feb. attack in Afganistan that was directed at Vice President Cheney. I bet that Sen. Reid yesterday alwmost wished that he had suceeded.

Industry caught in carbon ‘smokescreen’ Industry caught in carbon ‘smokescreen’

Financial Times: Industry caught in carbon ‘smokescreen’ points out that much of the carbon offset programs are bogus. The FT investigation found:

• Widespread instances of people and organisations buying worthless credits that do not yield any reductions in carbon emissions.


• Industrial companies profiting from doing very little – or from gaining carbon credits on the basis of efficiency gains from which they have already benefited substantially.


• Brokers providing services of questionable or no value.


• A shortage of verification, making it difficult for buyers to assess the true value of carbon credits.


• Companies and individuals being charged over the odds for the private purchase of European Union carbon permits that have plummeted in value because they do not result in emissions cuts.

Who would have guessed? Unfortunately, this means that it is going to be just that much harder for Al Gore and Laurie David to fly around the country on private jets exorting us to sacrifice to help prevent Global Warming.

Islamic State of Iraq Claims Killing of Safavid Leader, Aides in New Baghdad Islamic State of Iraq Claims Killing of Safavid Leader, Aides in New Baghdad

Centcom: Islamic State of Iraq Claims Killing of Safavid Leader, Aides in New Baghdad makes interesting reading. Apparently this Sunni terrorist group blew up some Shi'a leader and his aides on the highway. The "Safavid" is a reference to Iran. But that could just mean Shi'a, and not just Iranian. This is the core of the announcement:

"God enabled the security forces of The Islamic State of Iraq, "God bless it" to liquidate one of the leading planners of the Al-Dajjal and Magusi [Shiite] army, who was also a leader of one of the biggest Safavid gangs that spread havoc in the Islamic land, with his big black turban on his dirty head and surrounded by numerous body guards.

So, on Monday, 29 Rabi al-Awwal 1428, corresponding to 16 April 2007, with the help of God, and after hiding in dark holes for a long time, he was liquidated along with his entourage while riding in a four-wheel drive vehicle on the express highway of New Baghdad area, near Al-Durah state. Praise and thanks be to God.

Without doing a bit more research, I can't figure out who this group killed.

Can Petraeus Pull It Off? Can Petraeus Pull It Off?

Can Petraeus Pull It Off? A report on the progress of our arms in Baghdad, Baqubah, Ramadi, and Falluja by Max Boot paints a somewhat positive picture of the current situation in Iraq right now. If anyone can pull it off Gen. Petraeus can. It isn't just the "surge", but more importantly the stationing of American troops locally to live and work with their Iraqi counterparts. Anbar is a lot better. Baghdad is a bit better. But Fallujah is a bit worse, and Baqubah a lot worse. Notably:

The stakes couldn't be higher. U.S. commanders report that, whatever the case before the war, Iraq has now become the central front of al Qaeda operations, drawing jihadists from all over the world. It is also a central front in Iran's offensive to become the dominant player in the region. American generals say they have been "shocked" to discover the level of Iranian influence in Iraq. The Iranians are supporting not only the Mahdi Army, Badr Brigades, and other Shiite militias, but also, the generals believe, al Qaeda--the very group killing Shiites en masse.

Petraeus feels that he is making slow, steady progress against the myriad enemies that Coalition forces confront, but he is keenly aware that results may not come fast enough to please antiwar politicians back home who are eager to pull all U.S. troops out of Iraq, and damn the consequences. "The Washington clock is ticking faster than the Baghdad clock," Petraeus often says. His goal is to speed up the Baghdad clock by pressing for more reconciliation between Sunnis and Shiites, and to slow down the Washington clock by showing gains on the ground that can reverse public pressure to pull U.S. troops out prematurely. The former is hard to do because of the mutual suspicions that grip this country. The latter is equally hard, because a few high-profile insurgent atrocities can obscure the progress being made by Coalition forces in stopping ethnic cleansing in Baghdad, which Petraeus views as his most important immediate goal.

Petraeus's ultimate objective, he told me over lunch at his embassy office, is to "achieve an outcome sustainable by the Iraqis." Upon his assessment of Iraqi capabilities will rest his recommendation for when, how far, and how fast to draw down U.S. forces. Under consideration are various plans. The lower the number of American troops, the easier it is to sustain, politically and materially--but the greater the risk that the security situation will once again slide out of control as it did in 2006.

RCP: Interview with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice RCP: Interview with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice

RCP: Interview with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice about Iraq shows the Administration knows far better than its opponents what is and has gone on in Iraq. Sec. Rice pointed out why things started to go bad, why our "surge" is necessary, and is more than likely to succeed.

Skiing and Google Maps Skiing and Google Maps

Keystone Ski Area from space:

This is a satellite picture of Keystone Ski Area, via Google Maps. The area consists of three mountains: Dercum (formerly Keystone) Mountain to the north (top), North Peak in the middle, and the Out Back to the south (bottom). Most of my time over the last five seasons working at Keystone has been on the front (top/north) of the northernmost mountain. This is also the part of the area that I helped clear in the summer of 1970. We cleared about half of what was ultimately cleared in the front that summer, and the area opened for operation that winter.

The way to read the image is that the base area is at the top. There are two base areas, the Mountain House to the left (West), and River Run on the right (East). Where all the spagetti comes together is the Summit area on top of Dercum Mountain. Then, SW from there is La Bonte's Cabin at the bases of the Ruby and Santiago lifts. SE from there is the top of North Peak. SW from there is the Wayback lift, and SE from a bit below the bottom of that is the Outback. You can compare this to the more abstract official 2006-7 Keystone ski area map.

Actually, it isn't a single satellite picture, but rather Google puts together a bunch of them, which I downloaded and reassembled into the image we see here. Interestingly, Google downloads about twice the number of satellite image files than are actually displayed at any one time, at least on my computer. This may be to provide for monitors that can display more than mine can, or to allow a minimal amount of moving the display around w/o having to download more images. In any case, I could only see about half the mountain at any one time in Google Maps, but found that I had downloaded images for the entire ski area.

Tax and Spend Democrats Tax and Spend Democrats

Day by Day manages to hit several targets with one cartoon.

The Making of the Fittest The Making of the Fittest

The Making of the Fittest: DNA and the Ultimate Forensic Record of Evolution by Sean B. Carroll is a great update to Darwin's "On the Origin of Species" published some 150 years ago. It describes the "how" of evolution from a genetic point of view.

Other have commented on Carroll's example of icefish. I was more struck by his use of our trichromatic vision (ability to see three colors - in our case: red; green; and blue). Most mammels have dichromatic vision. But the Old World monkeys and their descendants (including us) developed trichormatic vision. How? Apparently one of the two color genes was accidently duplicated by mutation, and then the two were tuned to different frequencies of light (green and red). He shows which of the original two was duplicated, and then how the tuning process worked. He does this all at the genetic and chemical level.

Interestingly, most New World monkeys have dichromatic vision, indicating that the mutation occurred after New and Old World monkeys split. But one small subset of the New World monkeys has trichromatic vision. But it is genetically different from ours - indicating that it evolved separately.

Iraq: Getting Played, And Paid Iraq: Getting Played, And Paid

StrategyPage: Iraq: Getting Played, And Paid points to some good and some bad right now in Iraq. The police are still corrupt. They are likely to be so for generations to come. So, the government is only rotating them into Baghdad for 90 day tours, trying to minimize this. The Surge is continuing to isolate the Sunni terrorists. And one of the more troubling discoveries is that the Iranians do seem to have been arming and funding some of the less anti-Shiite Sunni terrorists - mostly it appears just to screw things up.

Unbalancing act: Congress' spending plans don't add up Unbalancing act: Congress' spending plans don't add up

Ed Feulner at the Heritage Foundation in: Unbalancing act: Congress' spending plans don't add up points out that the Democrats in Congress are intent on raising taxes. And even using discredited CBO static analysis, tax revenues are scheduled to raise significantly due to the AMT and the expiration of the Death Tax.

I do wonder how many of those switching their votes to the Democrats in the last election realized that without further relief, their average taxes for their families are expected to jump $2,641 each year over the next decade. And that doesn't consider entitlements, where Social Security and Medicare would skyrocket to 19% of GDP by 2050, necessitating that we'd have to raise taxes by $11,651 per household a year.

Not a pretty picture.

Iraq in the Balance Iraq in the Balance

WSJ: Iraq in the Balance: In Washington, panic. In Baghdad, cautious optimism by Faud Ajami is a thoughtful look at the current situation and the immediate past in Iraq. He points out that right now, the Iraqi Shia are significantly more hopeful about the future of Iraq than are Americans.

He also points out that the battle for supremecy in Iraq between the Shi'a and the Sunni Arabs is effectively over. The Sunni put their faith, as did the Palestinians, in their Sunni Arab neighbors, and it was similarly misplaced. Those who could flee, including much of the Iraqi middle class, have. They made a major strategic blunder, and have paid for it.

Yes, the Sunni terrorists are still blowing up innocents when they can. But that just reinforces the resolve of the Shi'a majority to push them out. StrategyPage has estimated that the Sunni Arab percentage of the Iraqi population has dropped by at least 1/4, to around 15% of the population since our intervention. Mr. Ajami seems to agree.

Finally, the author has more faith in the intentions and capabilities of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki than we do. He believes that the defining moment of Maliki's tenure was the execution of Saddam Hussein and several of his minions, convicted of heinous crimes against the Iraqi people. From that point forward, he has been able to effectively ignore the Sadr elements that helped put him in power, and has committed his resources to helping us subdue Sadr's Mahdi militia.

As Taliban Promises Offensive, Karzai Says Group is 'Defeated' As Taliban Promises Offensive, Karzai Says Group is 'Defeated'

ABC interview: As Taliban Promises Offensive, Karzai Says Group is 'Defeated'. The Afgan president says this:

"Neither has the U.S. failed, nor the Taliban coming back," he said. "Al Qaeda is defeated."

Karzai called the reports of thousands of suicide bombers a "sign of desperation."

"You kill yourself if you're very disappointed. You have no hope of life," he said. "It's a disgrace. … The majority of them are drug addicts, desperately ill people and those who have no hope of life. Their families are paid some money and said this man is going to die anyway."

Pajamas Media: The General Vanishes Pajamas Media: The General Vanishes

Pajamas Media: The General Vanishes tries to figure out where Iranian Gen. Ali-Reza Asgari went and who has him now. And they came up blank. At least in Turkey, where the Gen. disappared, there is little information, and the government seems as much in the dark as the author does. Best guess seems to be either the U.S. or Israel, both of whom have reasons to have seized him, whether voluntarily on his part, or not.

No Such Thing As a 'Perfect' Temperature No Such Thing As a 'Perfect' Temperature

Newsweek: No Such Thing As a 'Perfect' Temperature illustrates that not all atmospheric scientists are in agreement that human caused Global Warming is the end of the world. Richard S. Lindzen, the Richard S. Lindzen, the Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, points out that it is not clear what the optimal temperature for the world is, esp. since it has been going up and down throughout all recorded, and prerecorded, history. He also points out that most of the studies based on models that are so much in the news these days use unrealistic assumptions and simplifications - for example the assumed linearity of the effect of CO2 concentrations on Global Warming. The scientists all know that the relationship isn't linear, but use that assumption to greatly simplify their calculations. Also, all the provisos and limitations of these studies are invariably stripped the minute journalists with little if any scientific training (e.g. Algore) get their hands on them.

Gene Expression: The seeds of fundamentalism? Gene Expression: The seeds of fundamentalism?

Gene Expression: The seeds of fundamentalism? provides an interesting suggestion as to some of the sources of Islamic fundamentalism that we are seeing right now. The theory is that many of those who get involved may be doing so because they are partially modernized or westernized and are reacting to pressure to conform to some of the more archaic aspects of their culture, notable arranged marriages. At first glance, it seems counter intuitive. But it may have some validity.

More spam scams More spam scams

While some spam scams are getting more sophisticated, I am seeing a lot more stupid ones too. Yesterday, I got an email from a generic "Central Bank" asking me to, of course, update my account information. Today, it is from Ethan at yoyecm@highdown.com. Unfortunately for Ethan, I am the administrator for highdown.com, and have never assigned that email address. Worse, it is sent to "Lorna" who coincidently has my email address. Nevertheless, the crudeness is interesting:

We spoke a few days ago and I'd like to confirm everything now.
Please go over the information below and let me know if you have any questions.
http://hocktwouser.com
We are accepting your form. Your status has been accepted.
We need to confirm your details one more time.
Just check the URL above and fill out our last form.

The email appears by its header to have come from comcast.com. But the domain name (hocktwouser.com) was registerd to Gary Reed of Vancouver, BC, three days ago. Wonder how long it is going to take the Mounties to knock on his door at 3495 Cambie street, in Vancouver? He even has a phone number ((604)767-8695) and email address (garyr@coldmail.ca).

Job offer from Dr. Kenneth Scott of Hong Kong Job offer from Dr. Kenneth Scott of Hong Kong

I just received a great job offer from Dr. Kenneth Scott, presumably in Hong Kong. All I have to do is flush money through my account and get a 10% profit. It looks very simple. He is offering:

1. Receive payments from My Clients/Associates through bank transfers or check.
2. Cash the Payments at your Bank.
3. Deduct 10% which will be your commission/percentage on Payment processed.
4. You are to remit the balance via Money Gram or Western Union.

What could be wrong with such an easy way of making money?

Most likely, the scam involves the checks or money transfers either being bogus or reversed. But he wants near cash as payment.

I recently looked into Moneygrams, etc., in regards to an eBay purchase where the seller didn't accept PayPal. Once you send them, you can't cancel them. Thus, they are almost equivalent to cash. So, when Mr. Scott's check bounces or wire transfer is reversed, his "agents" are going to be left with a 90% losses with little recourse, given that he lives half way around the world.

The Big Business of Blocking Entry The Big Business of Blocking Entry

TCS Daily: The Big Business of Blocking Entry points out that companies climbing aboard Algore's bandwagon may be doing it for purely capitalistic reasons. For example, an oil company can't prevent more oil exploration, etc., but it can prevent more refineries being built in this country through "green" actions, and that works even better, given that we are running at close to full refinery capacity right now. As the demand for refined petroleum products rises, while supply is frozen, oil company profits are liable to rise even faster.