Have I told you how much I despise this man?

The man in question is Rupert Murdoch. Alot of American’s will know him by his ownership of the Fox news network, while in the UK he owns Sky and a number of newspapers, including the Sun.

This clip, demonstates how much I dislike this man who uses his media to promote his own right-wing politics. Free trade Mr Murdoch? You mean the free trade that has crippled the World’s economies? Whats that? Freetrade is the only way to lift billions out of poverty? Do you honestly beleive that?

You think that Europe wants to have protectionist laws? Or is it because they don’t share your political views? The sooner we rid ourselves of this Odious runt from his influence over UK politics, the better the UK will be.

It’s over.

After all the campaigning and finally the election, Obama wins. But you knew that. The question is, where do we go from here?

For me, an observer from across the pond, I’m glad he won. The position of president does have a profound influence on the world as a whole, as seen by what the current president did. The voter turn out was large…but was that because people were voting for Obama and his message or simply to rid themselves of Bush and the republican party?

One thing that struck me in the 2004 election was American citizens loyalty to President Bush, They knew he had done wrong, but felt that it was unpatriotic to vote out the “commander-in-chief” in a time of war. The mistake (in my opinion) of the Republican campaign this time around was…Sarah Palin.

I don’t envy the position that President-elect Obama has. His presidency will be all about clearing up the mess of the previous incumbent and my fear is he may not be able to make the impact that people expect him to. Expectations are so extraordinarily high, I think even God would have trouble living up to them.

But his election win will have an effect In Europe. The leaders of particular countries who have largely avoided engaging with the Bush administration over Iraq and particularly Afghanistan because they knew his influence was having a negative impact on the World will now have no excuse when next year there will be a more Liberal president in charge. Hopefully Obama will use his influence to prevent them from trying to avoid taking more responsibility as Nato partners rather than relying on a few countries to commit their forces, while they sit on the sidelines trying to avoid casualties.

I know the issue of race has reared it’s ugly head, the picture in the post below of a man with a placard calling Obama all those things…you kind of got the feeling that some of these people just said all those slurs as a round about way of calling him the “N” word. Me, I would not care if he was a purple Lesbian.

As I’ve stated before, I don’t envy Obama’s task, I don’t think I’ve seen politics played in such a way anywhere else in the World than in America, the hate, the entrenched views, Vitriol, the complete devisiveness…

But at least the we can all start talking again. While the current President divided opinion, I hope Obama will re-unite opinion. And it’s like I said before; The president of the USA no matter who it is will have a profound effect on the rest of the World, Positive or Negative.

Russian Jet Flies Within 90 seconds Of Hull.

A Russian nuclear bomber managed to get within 90 seconds of Hull in a mock attack as RAF radars failed to pick it up. The supersonic Blackjack changed course 20 miles from UK airspace, it has been reported.

The jet was picked up on RAF radars but only after it had turned back. It does show that the Russians aren’t as crazy as people think they are.

If I got to within 90 seconds of Hull, I’d turn back as well.

The World Will End on Wednesday Part Deux.

We’re still here. Fancy that.

Seriously, I think I may be wired differently to the various personnel who commented that WE WERE ALL GOING TO DIE on the first posting regarding this subject(incidently, I chose not to publish those comments), but the only thing that would worry me is not some magnetic ring in Europe, but the other doomsday device we created in 1945: Nuclear weapons. More nations have them than in the cold war…more unstable nations that is.

If one of them decides to release its stockpile of “instant sunshine” on us, I only hope I’m not around to see the aftermath.

The World will end next Wednesday.

Thats because the worlds largest Hadron Collider will go online, which will be capable of creating black holes that will suck the Earth and the Universe into it.

We’re doomed! Doomed I tell ya!

Right, just had to get that off my chest. So silly scaremongering aside, Here’s the Science:

The 17-mile-long ring, located 100mtrs below the French-Swiss border is the world’s most powerful—and most talked about—particle accelerator will begin collecting experimental data. The LHC’s research potential is staggering, with physicists hoping to use the accelerator’s extremely high-energy proton collisions to generate a range of theoretical particles. Some of those particles could help us to understand the nature of mass, including the as-yet-undetectable dark matter that accounts for so much of the universe’s mass. Other particles might prove the existence of extra dimensions, or lead to entirely new theories or physical laws.

Physicists have pointed out that the microscopic black holes the collider could generate would disappear almost instantly, without wreaking any havoc on the accelerator or the rest of world.

There has been some doom mongering from various sources, which I do find amazing, and the following comment from some fellow struck me:

“I have come to the conclusion that human beings will always conduct experiments no matter how dangerous they are. We will keep pushing until an experiment doesn’t go as planned and destroys all life on this planet.“

The same could be said for the “Manhattan Project”, a few minutes before the first detonation of the bomb, one of the scientists believed that according to his calculations the bomb would destoy the entire world. This obviously turned out not to be entirely true. It did however destroy Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

06-09-2008 Update:

I have Some more information on the Hadron Collider. A set of fantastic pictures can be viewed here.

A good article by Professor Brian cox can be viewed here.

And finally, an excellent article on the Collider from a professor of theoretical physics at the City University of New York, Michio Kaku. The article can be viewed here.

10-09-2008: Update Number 2.

This second update can be viewed here!

Cleaning up it’s act?

The Schwarze pump power station in Northern Germany will soon making a little piece of industrial history. This mini power plant is a pilot project for carbon capture and storage (CCS), the first coal-fired plant in the world ready to capture and store its own CO2 emissions.

This is how it works:

A cloud of pure oxygen will be breathed into the boiler. The flame will be lit. Then a cloud of powdered lignite will be injected. The outcome will be heat, water vapour, impurities, nine tonnes of CO2 an hour, and a landmark in clean technology.

Because the CO2 will then be separated, squashed to one 500th of its original volume and squeezed into a cylinder ready to be transported to a gas field and forced 1,000m below the surface into porous rock where it should stay until long after mankind has stopped worrying about climate change.

Big questions however hang still need to be answered regarding the technology overall, but particularly over where the CO2 will be stored and who will pay the high costs of building and running the CCS plants. Greenpeace is among the environmental groups expressing reservations.

“Our concern is that this technology is used to justify the construction of more coal power plants,” says Tobias Munchmeyer. “It’s too expensive, it will come too late and it will divert money from the real solutions, renewable energies and energy efficiency.”

The EU wants to see 10-12 full-scale power plants demonstrating CO2 capture within the next few years. But although a number of other firms will soon join the race with pilot projects, no full-scale CCS coal plant has yet been commissioned. The British government has promised a decision in October on how it will fund a full-scale CCS in the UK.

“We need CCS urgently because the world is building a whole new generation of coal power plants and unless we find out whether this technology operates at scale and we can make these plants zero-carbon in the future, those will be a liability,” says Nick Mabey of the think-tank e3g.

Whether the politicians and the citizens of “western” countries are prepared to use this technology which will inevitably mean paying a higher price for it remains to be seen,  we in the west do have a habit of abandoning our “principles” such as our commitment to reducing Co2 when we realise that the price of such a commitment is higher fuel bills.

The real test of CCS, though, is not in Europe. It’s in developing countries such as China who are building power stations, firstly to share this technology and secondly whether countries like China will accept this technology and the associated costs that go with it.