How the Georgia – Russia war started

The Washington Post attempts to put together a timeline of how the Russia-Georgia war started. It gives a pretty good outline of some of the pre-war duels that took place before the introduction of armor units.

Like any battle, there is a definite fog of war that shrouds the events. We may never know the full timeline of events.

A U.S. official familiar with intelligence from the region said the administration could not put a time on the Russian move into South Ossetia. “It’s not clear,” the official said. “You’d have to have had somebody there with a stopwatch, and something overhead at precisely that moment.”

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Where is Michael Phelps father Fred Phelps?

At home in Maryland, apparently. He’s been tracked down by the Baltimore Sun but has refused interview requests. Just for background, the family has had a bit of a rough time with estrangement and whatnot, but things do appear to be better now. It’s just the Senior Phelps didn’t want to distract from the attention due his son.

“This is just about Michael,” he said. “This is his glory, his time to shine, and I want him to get everything he wants.”

Rest assured, while Phelps is in the Beijing pool, his father is paying close attention, cheering from back in Maryland.

“I’m just on pins and needles every time he hits the water,” Fred Phelps said.

UPDATE : New story and photo here.

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License plate readers to be installed around Washington, DC

If you drive in DC, your license plate will be read by automated cameras and license plate readers, coming very soon. DC Parking control has been using these things for years to get tows and boots on scofflaws, but now the DCPD is going to start using them to look for terrorists.

The new project is much broader, installing cameras on about 160 police vehicles and at 40 fixed sites, such as airports or highway entrances, officials say. It appears to be one of the most extensive license reading systems in the nation, according to privacy experts.

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85% of frequent flyers want special 'childrens' section on planes

First, Business, Coach or Kids? That could be your options on airplanes if some frequent flyers had their way. 85% in a recent poll suggest it is time for a special kids-only section on planes.

Little ones go to the rear of the plane

Little ones go to the rear of the plane

I have to confess that even I have thought this might be a good idea. A few rows of each plane reserved for kids and parents. It would, of course, be the craziest section of the plane, but it would also give some of the other folks more peace of mind on their flights.

I’ve done a number of long hauls (i.e. 12 hour+ flights) and when there is a kid behind you you just know you aren’t in for a good night’s sleep. Of course, it’s a kid. It’s what kids do, but it can still be kind of annoying. Of course the most annoying is when the adult traveling with them adopts a “I don’t care about anybody” attitude and lets the kid cry or kick and moan without any intervention. Most frequent flyers can deal with kids, but none can deal with a parent who lets them run feral in the plane.

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Pandora Internet Radio to shutter their service soon?

A pretty interesting tech article in the Post today about the 900lb gorilla in the room for Internet radio. Despite some of the best traffic numbers in their company’s short history (thank you to the iPhone) the start-up company Pandora may soon have to shutter their service.

“We’re approaching a pull-the-plug kind of decision,” said Tim Westergren, who founded Pandora. “This is like a last stand for webcasting.”

At issue is the onerous rate that Internet radio stations have to pay for their services.

Last year, an obscure federal panel ordered a doubling of the per-song performance royalty that Web radio stations pay to performers and record companies.

Traditional radio, by contrast, pays no such fee. Satellite radio pays a fee but at a less onerous rate, at least by some measures.

As for Pandora, its royalty fees this year will amount to 70 percent of its projected revenue of $25 million, Westergren said, a level that could doom it and other Web radio outfits.

I’ve always said the short term greed of the existing content players could kill the medium of Internet radio before it really got its start. No where in the computations are the added per listener cost of Internet radio–it costs more to have more people listen, unlike traditional radio which has a one off broadcasting hardware cost no matter if 1 or 1000 people listen to their station.

Sen. Jesse Helms brokered the last Internet radio survival package but he has passed away. Some on Capitol Hill are trying to find a solution, but the recording industry’s deep pockets full of cash going into the re-election campaigns of many members is hard to ignore. This is one issue in which money talks far more than Republican or Democrat (one of the worst on this issue is the Democrat John Conyers but one of the ones trying to save Internet radio is the Democrat Howard Berman)

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Bucehwald liberator James Hoyt passes away

The 19-year-old men who witnessed this firsthand are now passing away.

The men who witnessed this firsthand are now passing away.

Buchenwald, one of the largest concentration camps on German soil, was liberated on April 11th by four men (followed quickly by the rest of the US Army). One of those four, James Hoyt, passed away today, taking with him the memories of the horror he saw nearly 60 years ago.

A detachment of troops belonging to the US 9th Armored Infantry Battalion, US 6th Armored Division, US Third Army arrived at Buchenwald on 11 April 1945 under the leadership of Capt. Frederic Keffer. The squad, which consisted of PFC James Hoyt, Capt. Frederic Keffer, Tech. Sgt. Herbert Gottschalk, Sgt. Harry Ward entered the outer perimeter of the camp and reported its location to higher command. The four soldiers were given a hero’s welcome, with the emaciated survivors finding the strength to toss them into the air in celebration. On the same day, elements of the US 83rd Infantry Division overran Langenstein, one of a number of smaller camps comprising the Buchenwald complex. There the division liberated over 21,000 prisoners, compelled the mayor of Langenstein to send food and water to the camp, and sped medical supplies forward from the 20th Field Hospital. Third Army Headquarters sent elements of the US 80th Infantry Division to take control of the camp on the morning of 12 April 1945.

I can rarely read the obituaries nowdays without seeing the passing of men and women who lived during World War II and saw things that few others ever would see. It’s sad to think of how much wisdom and knowledge is passing away day by day, unrecorded and never to be obtained again.

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Photo finish of Phelps' .01 victory will not be released

The New York Times is reporting that the actual photo finish of the Michael Phelps’ 7th gold medal will not be released, despite the requests from many in the media.

Apparently Omega has underwater video that slows the action even more than the one-hundredth of a second that Phelps won by….

Christopher Clarey of The International Herald Tribune tracked down Cornel Marculescu, FINA’s executive director, at the Water Cube to ask him about the decision to not release the images. Marculescu said it was a matter of policy, and that the Serbian team was satisfied with the ruling after seeing the images — so there is no need to share the images.

As mentioned last night, the margin of victory is approximately 19.766mm, but I for one would really like to see it close up if they have the footage available.

UPDATE: Check out Sports Illustrated’s frame by frame. You can see the difference.

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Russian general threatens to nuke Poland

Sometimes Russians actually believe their own propaganda. Proof of this is General Anatoly Nogovitsyn, the Russian armed forces’ deputy chief of staff, who basically threatened to nuke Poland for their participation in the US missile defense program.

“Poland, by deploying [the system] is exposing itself to a strike – 100 per cent,” he was quoted as saying, before explaining that Russian military doctrine sanctioned the use of nuclear weapons “against the allies of countries having nuclear weapons if they in some way help them”.

Somewhere in Russia a village is missing an idiot.

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