Can anyone give me one reason why the blithering idiot Terrell Owens should ever play football again?

See this. Dallas Cowboys wide receiver Terrell “Conehead” Owens spit in the face of Atlanta Falcons cornerback DeAngelo Hall during a game yesterday. Owens was fined $35,000. Big, fat, friggin’ deal.

What a complete moron. The Cowboys get what they deserve.

This useless excuse for a human being should be permanently banned from any football organization. He has proven, time and again, that he cannot be trusted to be anything more than a pouting, mentally defective thug.

BZ

So there I was:

Witnessing the “falling apart” of a Union Pacific train originally sent from Roseville, Fornicalia and expected to terminate in Sparks, Nevada.

The train in question was an “auto rack” which consisted of a number of railroad cars carrying numerous vehicles from the San Francisco bay area — the receiving Port of Oakland the likely recipient, or perhaps Martinez, where the vehicles are held in multiple rows. A dedicated “auto rack” train is not necessarily by itself predominantly heavy, but it does make up for its weight in length.

This train had stopped in Colfax and the lead Union Pacific unit, a relatively new General Electric C44ACCTE (Controlled Tractive Effort), # 5817, was dead on the vine. There were five locomotives up front and, with some clever manipulation and switching, the newest unit was placed on point. This turned out to be an EMD (Electro Motive Division of GM) SD-70M, number 3853. I suspected the crews wanted this unit on point for a number of reasons: its clean exterior indicated little usage in tunnels and, being a newer unit, its heater might be worth selection, as well as its newer seats, toilet and interior.

Works for me. It was marvelous to watch these switching moves.

At this point, in Colfax, there was already one “bad order” unit, the GE # 5817. I shot numerous photos of this train in Colfax and then headed up the hill to the Secret Town area. The rain turned to flecks of snow and then to bits of ice. Oddly enough, though not prescient in any way, I managed to stop at the precise point where the train halted. The young engineer climbed out of the cab with his conductor and fireman trainee and examined another unit. It would appear that the elder SD-40 unit #3027 had died as well.

Once this was realized the train continued with EMD 3853 on point. I’ll not forget the radio traffic between the engineer and the Union Pacific dispatcher:

“So I’ve got two dead units. And the others load when they want. I can switch them to Run 8 and they might load and they might not. I’ve got Monsters On The Wing like the Twilight Zone.”

Monsters on the Wing indeed; that Twilight Zone episode featured a young William Shatner gripped in the heart of confusion when he realized there was some sort of creature determined to sabotage the plane upon which he rode, peeling off nacelle parts.

In the High Granite, I heard a transmission from this train that said “I think I’ve got another dead one.” Meaning that of the five original units allocated to this engineer, two were clearly dead, one was questionable and two were fully functional.

And pushing on his rear was the UP flanger set consisting of GP-38 units 572 and 583, into an area where younger engineers do not travel: communicating with a live Pusher Set instead of a dead consist of one or two GE DPUs (Distributed Power Units).

Blogger will not let me load photos, which I so desperately need now.

BZ

A confrontation between the US and Iran simply seems imminent to me, and appears to be only a matter of time before it occurs.

Iran, as you must all realize by now, is the Puppet Master pulling many if not all of the Islamist strings in the Middle East.

Blogfather Hugh Hewitt features a link on his blog which portrays information by historian Arthur Herman dealing with solutions to the Iran Issue. I read the article (Getting Serious About Iran: A Military Option) and was sufficiently impressed that I wish to portray a portion of the article here for your perusal and input:

The first step would be to make it clear that the United States will tolerate no action by any state that endangers the international flow of commerce in the Straits of Hormuz. Signaling our determination to back up this statement with force would be a deployment in the Gulf of Oman of minesweepers, a carrier strike group’s guided-missile destroyers, an Aegis-class cruiser, and anti-submarine assets, with the rest of the carrier group remaining in the Indian Ocean. The U.S. Navy could also deploy UAV’s (unmanned air vehicles) and submarines to keep watch above and below against any Iranian missile threat to our flotilla.

Our next step would be to declare a halt to all shipments of Iranian oil while guaranteeing the safety of tankers carrying non-Iranian oil and the platforms of other Gulf states. We would then guarantee this guarantee by launching a comprehensive air campaign aimed at destroying Iran’s air-defense system, its air-force bases and communications systems, and finally its missile sites along the Gulf coast. At that point the attack could move to include Iran’s nuclear facilities—not only the “hard” sites but also infrastructure like bridges and tunnels in order to prevent the shifting of critical materials from one to site to another.

Above all, the air attack would concentrate on Iran’s gasoline refineries. It is still insufficiently appreciated that Iran, a huge oil exporter, imports nearly 40 percent of its gasoline from foreign sources, including the Gulf states. With its refineries gone and its storage facilities destroyed, Iran’s cars, trucks, buses, planes, tanks, and other military hardware would run dry in a matter of weeks or even days. This alone would render impossible any major countermoves by the Iranian army. (For its part, the Iranian navy is aging and decrepit, and its biggest asset, three Russian-made Kilo-class submarines, should and could be destroyed before leaving port.)

The scenario would not end here. With the systematic reduction of Iran’s capacity to respond, an amphibious force of Marines and special-operations forces could seize key Iranian oil assets in the Gulf, the most important of which is a series of 100 offshore wells and platforms built on Iran’s continental shelf. North and South Pars offshore fields, which represent the future of Iran’s oil and natural-gas industry, could also be seized, while Kargh Island at the far western edge of the Persian Gulf, whose terminus pumps the oil from Iran’s most mature and copiously producing fields (Ahwaz, Marun, and Gachsaran, among others), could be rendered virtually useless. By the time the campaign was over, the United States military would be in a position to control the flow of Iranian oil at the flick of a switch.

An operational fantasy? Not in the least. The United States did all this once before, in the incident I have already alluded to. In 1986-88, as the Iran-Iraq war threatened to spill over into the Gulf and interrupt vital oil traffic, the United States Navy stepped in, organizing convoys and re-flagging ships to protect them against vengeful Iranian attacks. When the Iranians tried to seize the offensive, U.S. vessels sank one Iranian frigate, crippled another, and destroyed several patrol boats. Teams of SEALS also shelled and seized Iranian oil platforms. The entire operation, the largest naval engagement since World War II, not only secured the Gulf; it also compelled Iraq and Iran to wind down their almost decade-long war. Although we made mistakes, including most grievously the accidental shooting-down of a civilian Iranian airliner, killing everyone on board, the world economic order was saved—the most important international obligation the United States faced then and faces today.

Mr. Herman advocates clear, specific, ulilateral and immediate action.

Considering the information the Saudis have proffered regarding their take on defeating Iran should the US pull out of Iraq (see my post on this) — should Herman’s point become US policy regarding both Iran and Iraq?

My opinion?

This needs to fly and it needs to fly NOW. No one, no nation, possesses the inherent air and sea superiority that we possess now, despite our being down in count on Blue Water vessels as compared to the 80’s.

Who depends on Iranian oil? Would it surprise you that this might be China?

The US in Chinese clutches?

How about China in US clutches?

And instead of the United States becoming REACTIVE — just as GWB grasped — how about the United States becoming PROACTIVE?

COMPARISON OF THE MANUALS:

The United States decided it was time to update their Counter-Insurgency Manual.

Go here.

Al Qaeda already has a training manual.

Go here.

As my college instructor once said: “Compare and contrast.”

BZ

Something’s going on with the US dollar and it’s not good — it’s worrisome.

My first clue was when it was reported:

This week, in an unusual move, the Bush administration is sending virtually the entire economic “A-team” to visit China for a “strategic economic dialogue” in Beijing Dec. 14 and 15.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke are leading the delegation, along with five other cabinet-level officials, including Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez. Also in the delegation will be Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt, Energy Secretary Sam Bodman, and U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab.

Also:

China today now is holding a historically unprecedented $1 trillion in foreign exchange reserves. During the Thanksgiving holiday, an announcement by China that their central bank planned to diversify foreign-exchange holding away from the dollar caused the dollar to drop in value on international currency markets. Since then, the dollar has hit a 20-month low against the euro.

The Euro is stronger. What will happen when the first Chinese bank embraces the Euro and drops the dollar?

Moreover, how can this be?

The Drudge Report features a headline this hour reading: HOLIDAY HIGH, DOW SURPASSES 12,400:

NEW YORK (Reuters) – U.S. stocks climbed on Thursday, boosted by surprisingly high earnings from investment bank Bear Stearns Co. Inc. and economists’ bullish estimates for stock indexes performance next year.

CNN Money reports today:

Investors also considered a report that showed a surprisingly large drop in the number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment last week.

Also a factor: the possibility of the Democrats losing control of the Senate amid news that a senator from South Dakota was in critical condition after suffering a brain hemorrhage. (Full story)

U.S. light crude oil for January delivery gained $1.14 to $62.51 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange after OPEC said it would cut production by 500,000 barrels per day starting Feb. 1.

Treasury prices fell, with the yield on the benchmark 10-year note rising to 4.60 percent from 4.58 percent late Wednesday. Bond prices and yields move in opposite
directions. In currency trading, the dollar rose against the yen and euro.

COMEX February gold slipped $1.50 to settle at $630.90 an ounce.

Even the White House is saying: “USA Today/Gallup Poll Estimated Consumers Plan To Spend More Than $800 On Gifts This Season. The estimate is the “highest early November reading Gallup has seen since 2000,” suggesting a “strong holiday season” for retailers.

But John Williams, author of The Shadow Government Statistics blog believes:

There will be a central bank, most probably in Asia, who will start the move away from the dollar and when it happens, you’re going to see other central bankers covertly trying to follow. The move will magnify very quickly and it could become a full-fledged panic and a dollar collapse.”

The Fed is struggling right now to contain inflation and stimulate economic growth. All the Fed is doing right now with all their grand policy shifts is using a lot of propaganda and market massaging to try to prevent a financial panic.”

Jerome Corsi of the WorldNetDaily writes:

A report scheduled to be released by the Treasury Department tomorrow is expected to show the true deficit in the Bush administration’s 2006 federal budget to be an astounding $3.5 trillion in the red, not $248.2 billion as previously reported.

The United States is bankrupt,” Williams insisted. “With less than one-tenth of the actual deficit being reported each year, a cumulative negative net worth exceeding $50 trillion has built up in stealth to where the total obligations of the U.S. government are now more than four times our annual gross domestic product.

Indeed the unfolding fiscal nightmare likely will entail a U.S. hyperinflation and a resulting collapse in the value of the world’s primary reserve currency, the dollar. When this starts to unravel it will unravel fast. I don’t know whether it will be the dominant issue in the 2008 presidential election, but I believe it will be by 2012.”

Are our “giveaway” federal fiscal policies finally, finally beginning to catch up with us? And will the government and the media be complicit in hiding this information from citizens?

You realize, of course, that’s how the USSR was defeated: the US simply outspent the USSR defensively, to the point where we bankrupted the entire union.

So, despite a record DOW and unemployment claims trending down, WHY are Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez, Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt, Energy Secretary Sam Bodman and U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab on a junket to Beijing today and tomorrow?

The new dialogue was announced in September during a trip to Beijing by Paulson, who hailed the forum as a way of tackling the longer-term challenges to the world economy thrown up by China’s headlong growth.

But speaking in London earlier Tuesday, Paulson acknowledged that “the need for greater currency flexibility” on the Chinese yuan was a short-term headache facing US-China relations. The United States and other nations argue the yuan is made artificially weak, giving the Asian giant an unfair advantage in global trade.

The US trade deficit with China in September reached a record 23 billion dollars, one-third of the total US trade gap.

Paulson, addressing the Confederation of British Industry’s annual conference, said US relations with China had suffered from “a fair amount of tension” over perceptions that their bilateral trade is unfairly skewed.

I detect an even greater amount of concern than publically portrayed. Any economists out there with thoughts?

BZ

Due to a series of circumstances beyond my control, some personal issues, some seasonal issues, I’ve not been able to consistently post this week. I surmise this consistent inconsistency may continue for the rest of the month. Please excuse my spotty posting and know that I have no intention of going away — it’s the season and a few other concomitant reasons. Thanks to all.

It appears that Saudi Arabia wants us to stay in Iraq; from the Washington Post:

Just a few months ago it was unthinkable that President Bush would prematurely withdraw a significant number of American troops from Iraq. But it seems possible today, and therefore the Saudi leadership is preparing to substantially revise its Iraq policy. Options now include providing Sunni military leaders (primarily ex-Baathist members of the former Iraqi officer corps, who make up the backbone of the insurgency) with the same types of assistance — funding, arms and logistical support — that Iran has been giving to Shiite armed groups for years.

But here’s the real reason: Saudi Arabia is used to playing both ends against the middle and winning at the polar opposites with polar cultures.

As I described in my previous post, Saudi Arabia’s power structure consists of Sunnis who happen to more openly embrace some portions of Western culture — those portions dealing with, ahem, cash and comfort — two very important concepts in current Saudi culture.

The Saudis are fully cognizant that, now, if America choppers, planes and troop-ships out of Iraq, the violent f*!&!#* crazy Shiites will descend like sand fleas and make life just a tad bit more difficult for the royal house of Saud.

From the Post:

What’s clear is that the Iraqi government won’t be able to protect the Sunnis from Iranian-backed militias if American troops leave. Its army and police cannot be relied on to do so, as tens of thousands of Shiite militiamen have infiltrated their ranks. Worse, Iraq’s prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, cannot do anything about this, because he depends on the backing of two major leaders of Shiite forces.

The Saudis also said they will “sharply boost oil production” in order to combat Iran:

Finally, Abdullah may decide to strangle Iranian funding of the militias through oil policy. If Saudi Arabia boosted production and cut the price of oil in half, the kingdom could still finance its current spending. But it would be devastating to Iran, which is facing economic difficulties even with today’s high prices. The result would be to limit Tehran’s ability to continue funneling hundreds of millions each year to Shiite militias in Iraq and elsewhere.

You know, I’m just kinda throwing this leaf of a thought around in my fetid brain housing group: is leaving Iraq beginning to look like a good thing?

BZ