Here come the zombies and/or global pandemic

Scientists Make HIV Strain That Can Infect Monkeys
Tuesday, March 03, 2009

Scientists have created a strain of the human AIDS virus able to infect and multiply in monkeys in a step toward testing future vaccines in monkeys before trying them in people, according to a new study.

Dude. While I fully support the search for an AIDS vaccine, I have definitely seen enough movies to know how this story ends.

Random bag checks begin on Metro

...as reported by the Post. All I can say is, about time. The Metro's vulnerability to attack has secretly freaked me out ever since the terrorist attacks on London's public transit a few years back. You can walk right in to any station and onto any train carrying practically anything.

There may be high tech security measures in place on Metro currently (explosion-proof trash cans, surveillance cameras) but they are not nearly visible enough for my taste. I guess there are no civil libertarians in foxholes.

And it doesn't help that all those Fallout 3 posters are up in Metro stations right now. How would you like to see this every morning on your way to work?

OK, what next?

The Dow is tanking, the world's mammals are going extinct, and Beverly Hills Chihuahua topped the box office last weekend. Enjoy your Monday.

September Madness

Currently making the e-mail rounds... (click to see full-size image, and believe me, you want to)

AP: "Everything seemingly spinning out of control"

Reads like The Onion, but this is the actual headline of an actual AP article today.

Next to antimatter-based annihilation, global warming seems inconsequential

At the Lifeboat Foundation, I have learned about all kinds of existential risks to humanity of which I was totally unaware.

Fortunately they have set up a Global Existential Threat Advisory System (GETAS) to keep us apprised of when to board the interplanetary lifeboats. Right now, its status is "guarded." If the GETAS level ever rises to "emergency condition," here is what will happen.

An Emergency Action Condition reflects the actual occurence of an existential catastrophe. LF departments and agencies are to execute the following general measures in addition to the agency-specific Protective Measures that they will develop and implement:

1. Switch the LF bunkers to autonomous power and hermetically
   seal off the LF bunkers from the outside world;
   
2. Launch the LF Space Lifeboats and move the LF evacuees to
   their designated space arks and space settlements; and
   
3. Remotely shut down non-bunker LF Earthbound facilities.
   

They did it. They finally did it.

Sometimes you have one of those days when you realize that every post-apocalyptic sci-fi movie you've ever seen--including and especially the really bad ones--is a possible glimpse of the actual future.

LONDON - Global warming will create at least one billion refugees by 2050 as water shortages and crop failures force people to leave their homes, sparking local wars over access to resources, a leading aid agency said on Monday. (Reuters via Planet Ark)

Meanwhile, the Director of National Intelligence agrees that the government should prepare a national intelligence estimate on the possible geopolitical and national security impacts of global warming. (WP) I'll say.

Weird winter watch #2

Sighted today: many, many pansies and one brave little jonquil in full bloom along New Hampshire Avenue.

I love jonquils. They are so jaunty and yellow. But they are weird in January, which is why the little guy triggered a weird winter watch entry.

Bad cherry timing: Weird winter watch #1

The cherry trees are already beginning to bud out on the Mall, according to eyewitness reports. Presumably because of the freakishly warm weather.

Meanwhile, I don't see any freezing predicted in DC in the near future, which means that we may actually see cherry blossoms in January. I am pretty sure this is the eighth sign of the apocalypse. A pretty one, but a sign nonetheless.

What are you implying, Amazon.com?

Buy The Weather Makers : How Man Is Changing the Climate and What It Means for Life on Earth and get Ready or Not - A Disaster Survival Handbook at an additional 5% off Amazon.com's everyday low price.

Moment of quiet freakout

Is it weird if I am really seriously considering picking up a Kearney Fallout Meter and some potassium iodide tablets?

I used to scoff at survivalism. But David Shenk has a point (Slate). You probably would survive a 21st century nuclear attack, and it would probably suck...but it might suck a whole lot less if you were just a little bit prepared.

Apocalyptic, much?

Where "sadness" and "existential dread" intersect, you find...polar bears eating each other because of starvation triggered by habitat loss from global warming. (AP via Seattle P-I)

It's just awful.

Happy New Year from the blast zone

It's another New Year's Eve in our nation's capital, and here I am, buying cases of liquor, fueling up my car, and plotting emergency escape routes. You think I'm paranoid, but really, no one ever thinks it's going to happen to them until it actually does. People hear about all sorts of terrible things--military coups, genocides, tsunamis, deadly chemical accidents, suicide bombers--and they think two things. First, "Those poor people." Second, "Thank goodness that could never happen to me." Millions of people have thought this, and millions of people have been wrong.

The last time I truly felt fear for my physical being was as a child in the early 1980s, during the end of the Cold War--undoubtedly because I had seen The Day After (1983) on TV at a tender age. Possibly also because we had "tornado/nuclear attack" drills at my elementary school, in which we learned, I kid you not, to curl up into little balls under our desks. As I grew up in a mountainous area not prone to tornadoes, I saw through that one even at age six. At least they were trying not to freak us out completely.

It is certain that some of the fears I feel now--fears of dirty bombs at the Capitol, of IEDs on my morning Metro ride--are no more rational or merited than my childhood fear of nuclear war was. Fears of a one-party government takeover are another story, history shows. Next time: why the Weimar Germans and post-WWII Czechs didn't see it coming until it was too late. [Continued here.]

Duck and Cover

"WAITING FOR ACTION -- The United Nations Security Council, like a character in a Beckett play, has been waiting for a phantom -- a resolution from the United States declaring that Iraq has not disarmed. Security Council approval -- 9 of 15 votes are needed -- would lend international legitimacy to a war. Unlike Godot, the resolution will arrive soon."

Ah, a sentence that could only have appeared in the New York Times. Sometimes I can’t believe I read such a bougie paper. As Jeff Nygaard observes in this week’s Nygaard Notes, "In a major article [on] January 9th, the Times spelled out how the president's proposal has something for nearly everyone, especially large families and those with the highest incomes.

"The three examples they gave were a family of four earning $120,000 a year, a couple with two grown sons earning $80,000, and a single woman earning $40,000. That tells you something. At least, it tells you something if you know that the median household income for families in the United States is about $52,000 (Census Bureau, 2001 figures)."

Under ordinary circumstances, my populist heart would feel slightly guilty about my addiction to the Week in Review and my hero-worship of columnist Paul Krugman. However, this is a time for intellectualism if ever there was one.

I live in DC, about ten blocks from the Capitol. I also work with people who can (and will) tell you exactly what various toxic substances do to you and exactly how much of them would be released during a terrorist attack. The last thing I or my fellow Washingtonians want or need is to be grounded in this USA Today reality of plastic sheeting and duct tape.

Far better to read Robert Kagan's recent essay on the origins of the disparity between American and European philosophies on the use of military force. Or to count votes on the U.N. Security Council, and talk about them over beers at the Hawk & Dove. Let's retreat to the comfortable, responsibility-free status of observer and leave the worrying to someone else.

I'm even a little comforted by the knowledge that regardless of what they tell us at ready.gov, there's not much that any of us can do to save ourselves in the event of a nuclear, chemical, or biological attack. Since it's impossible to prepare for such an attack, we can all stop wondering whether we've done enough to prepare. It's a lot more fun to think about global geopolitics than to price inflatable safe rooms.