Poor Boeing

After the notorious lithium battery fires in the 787,  trouble struck again.  A parked 787 at Heathrow started smoking and the fire department was called to put it out.  Nobody was on board at the time.  Nobody has been talking about the cause of the fire.  There is now a scorch mark on the top of the fuselage back toward the tail.   The notorious lithium batteries are located elsewhere in the plane.  This unfortunate accident was largely ignored by the US media in favor of covering the verdict on the Trayvon Martin trial.
   Boeing is surely hoping that it turns out to be human error, such as the crew left the galley stove running after the last flight.  The Brits are cooperating by not making any statements to the media.  Rolls Royce makes the engines.   Clearly everyone wants the 787 to succeed and they are doing the best they can to help the plane along in the face of terrible publicity.

Double Jeopardy

Amendment V.  "Nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb."

They put this in the Bill of Rights to even things up.  The government has the money to keep on trying for a conviction, long after any citizen has been driven into bankruptcy.  So the Bill of Rights limits the government's efforts to ONE try.  If the defendant gets off, then the government is forbidden to try again.

The Trayvon Martin partisans are soap boxing to hit Zimmerman with federal civil rights violations now that he has been acquitted.  That's double jeopardy, pure and simple. 

No where to put violent madmen

They dropped him off at a Manchester hospital, Friday.  A decision to commit him to the state mental hospital involuntarily was made.  But the state hospital was full.  So they left him in the ER.  All night, all weekend.  By Monday he was good and mad and assaulted an ER worker, breaking his jaw and knocking out four teeth. He them slugged a nurse hard enough to break her cheek bone. 
   In short, New Hampshire is so short on state hospital beds that dangerous nut cases are parked in hospital ER, awaiting a bed to open up. 
   Here we had a violent case who was bad enough to get committed, and NH didn't have anywhere to put him.  They left him hanging around until he injured two people.
   What chance do we have of committing a school shooter before he kills children?

The View from the Ivory Tower

" No one now doubts the what the Arab public wants is elected constitutional government."  So says this week's Economist magazine.
 Is that right?  Or does the Arab public just want life to suck less?  The two worst cases, Egypt and Syria are running out of food, have run out of jobs, and feature armed terrorists running around loose.  Both countries have failed to feed themselves, the only thing preventing mass famine is food imports, which they lack the money to pay for.
   Has the Arab public given up on imposing Sharia law, driving the Jews into the sea, and exterminating the Shia (or the Sunni depending upon which side they are on)?
   Me thinks the Economist is merely passing on the bloviations of  properly raised young upper class Brits.  I doubt any of their writers speak Arabic and has lived on the economy in say Cairo. 
   
   

The Fat Lady Sings

Jury just acquitted George Zimmerman.  Maybe we can put this distasteful case behind us, now?  Please.

Dawn over Marblehead

The clock radio came on, as usual this morning, and they are running a piece on a miraculous new educational concept.  Radical it is.  They  mix athletics with class room teaching.  I listened to a long learned discussion of the wonderful neurological effects, and how much more ready to learn to children are after exercise.  They made it sound like the greatest innovation since Socrates.
   Of course this is something any parent knows.  Children are full of bounce and energy and you have to get 'em out of doors and run off steam if you want 'em to sit still indoors.   I used to take 'em out down hill skiing.  After even a half a day skiing Cannon, they would be so tired that they would fall asleep on the living room rug in front of the TV.
   I wonder if the ed majors running our school still do recess.

Child Abuse ???

The prosecution in the Trayvon Martin trial is beginning to doubt that they can make second degree murder stick.  So they are adding some lesser charges that the jury might find easier to convict upon.  The prosecutors are now charging Zimmerman with child abuse, 'cause Martin was under 18.
  Child Abuse?  Shoot a stranger dead out of doors and it's child abuse?  Is this sort of crime that the good legislators of Florida had in mind when they passed the state child abuse law?  
Ham sandwich nation.