Homefront: Star Trek DS9

I watched the two part story of Deep Space Nine entitled Homefront the other day and I became very interested in the title of the episodes. The original air date was the 1st of January in 1996 but who would imagine that the 5th of August 2002 in a speech by George W. Bush, he would use the term "Homeland" when referring to what used to be called the nation, republic, or domestic soil of the United States of America. Suddenly the U.S. is the Homeland that needs to be protected and retaliation must be swift. Homeland is an odd and scary term to me because it has echoes of The Fatherland used by the Nazi Propaganda machine and now the Homeland propaganda machine is in high gear ever since that date. People can believe what they want to believe, but The U.S. is not the same place it used to be and that is a shame and sad.

Everytime I watch Star Trek DS9, I am amazed at how prophetic many of the episodes are, such as the Sanctuary Districts which I wrote about a while back.

If you have not watched these episodes, I think them well worth the time and see if you can recognize anything in these stories with the current events of today.

James Cameron Offers to Help BP with Oil Leak

When I first heard this story I really did not know what to think: here is a Hollywood director who directed some awesome movies like Aliens (1986), Titanic(1997), and more recently Avatar(2009), sitting down with the United States Environmental Protection Agency(EPA) and telling them that British Petrolium turned down his offer of help. From Reuters:

"Over the last few weeks I've watched, as we all have, with growing horror and heartache, watching what's happening in the Gulf and thinking those morons don't know what they're doing," Cameron said at the All Things Digital technology conference.

Cameron, the director of "Avatar" and "Titanic," has worked extensively with robot submarines and is considered an expert in undersea filming. He did not say explicitly who he meant when he referred to "those morons."

"I know really, really, really smart people that work typically at depths much greater than what that well is at," Cameron said.

The BP oil spill off the U.S. Gulf Coast is located a mile below the surface.

His comments came a day after he participated in a meeting at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency headquarters in Washington to "brainstorm" solutions to the oil spill.

This is not a science fiction movie but a tragedy taking place in the Gulf of Mexico in terms of the quality of the water, the destruction of oxygen and plant and animal life not to mention the effects on the food chain for years to come, and the EPA is consulting with James Cameron!?

All I can say is that this oil spill will ruin the Gulf waters and coasts for decades, what a shame. Here is a link to the full article.

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• US turns to king of the disaster movie for its happy ending (independent.co.uk)

Moscow Photo From the ISS !

There is a fantastic photo taken by Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi of Moscow at night. He took the photo from the International Space Station on the day Russia celebrated Victory Day. From the article:

Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi took the stunning Moscow portrait while flying over Russia at night. The space station was flying about 17,500 mph and nearly 220 miles above Moscow at the time, likely making the city a tricky target.

Noguchi posted it Friday to his Twitter page, where he has been chronicling his six-month mission to the space station under the name Astro_Soichi.

"Golden rings of Moscow, Russia," Noguchi wrote. "Happy Victory Day weekend!"

Victory Day in Russia is May 9 – which also happens to be Mother's Day in the United States. It is a holiday that commemorates the end of World War II when Germany surrendered. American troops will take part in this year's Victory Day parade in Moscow for the first time in history, according to the New York Times.

The Russian holiday will likely see a multinational welcome aboard the International Space Station.

The photo reminds me of one of the scenes from the movie Contact with Jodie Foster after she has traveled through several wormholes and stops at an intersection and looks down to see a city on a strange planet somewhere in the galaxy and the layout was similar to the Moscow photo. Very cool!

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• New Photo Shows 'Spiderweb' City From Space (space.com)

The Lyrid Meteor Shower

Every year, the Lyrid meteor shower takes place in April and I remember one year camping out in the back yard on a sleeping bag and watching the show in the sky, it was a lot of fun and very memorable. From the Space.com:

Anyone who enjoys watching the sky for "shooting stars" will have an opportunity to observe an old and reliable meteor display over the next several days: the April Lyrids. The best time to watch will be for a night or two around the peak, April 22
.
Faithful meteor shower The Lyrids are an annual display of fairly fast meteors that may be seen any night from April 16 to 25: they are above one-half of their maximum in numbers for about a day or two centered on the date of their peak activity.This year, the peak is predicted to fall during the daylight hours (for America and Europe) on April 22. After the gibbous moon sets at about 2:30 a.m. local daylight time that morning, observers near latitude 40 degrees north will still have about 90 minutes of dark sky to watch for the Lyrids before dawn interferes. The southern states are more favored because the Moon sets earlier and twilight begins later.

The show is even better if you camp out in the mountains, camping is fun with the right crowd, a campfire, s´mores, the whole works!

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• Lyrid Meteor Shower Peaks April 22 (space.com)