(Edmund Hillary, Tensing Norgay. Time Magazine)

I heard Tenzing Norgay’s son speak some years ago. He showed photos of Hillary and his father taken the morning of their final ascent of Everest. In amazement he said, look at what they are wearing, huge heavy boots, enormously bulky clothes, no Gore-Tex, and they were carrying 60 pounds of oxygen each.

Hillary always made a point of saying that ascents of Everest would be not be possible without sherpas who, although only weighing about 120-130 lbs., routinely shuttle 80-100 lb. backpacks to the various base camps. He once said, you can’t see sherpas when they’re standing next to you, then they inhale and block the horizon. He remained a friend to sherpas, and worked with them for four decades after the ascent.

From Time

Once, while resting on a rock during a short trek in Nepal with friend and film director Michael Dillon, an American walker stopped and showed Hillary how to hold an ice-axe. “Hillary listened and thanked him, but said nothing else,” remembers Dillon. “The American went away without any idea whom he had spoken to.” The first man to stand on top of the world didn’t see himself as a hero. Others always will.

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The Michigan Democratic primary has been stripped of their delegates, so that primary will be a non-event. Michigan has an open primary, so Kos says Democrats and independents should cross party lines and vote for Mitt, figuring more viable Republican candidates means increased possibilities for them to have bruising internal fights and discord. Machiavelli would approve.

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BofA is in “advanced talks” to buy Countrywide.

(Their original stake in Countrywide, taken a few months back, was at $18 a share. Countrywide closed today at $7.)

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Three tidal power turbines will be installed in the Bay of Fundy, home of massive tides. How odd this hasn’t been done before. More clean tech, renewable power is on the way!

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With other high-profile Democrats expected to follow. Interesting.

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Conservative blog Red State is going boo hoo, we need $80,000 to upgrade our site because it’s in Drupal and liberals are the best Drupal coders, not conservatives. So we need to switch platforms, sob sob, so send us money.

Jamie blogs at Intoxination,which runs under Drupal. He’s also the WordPress wizard who singlehandedly does all the coding for Crooks and Liars and Firedoglake. He rips the flimsy and deceptive Red State plea to shreds, amply showing precisely how lame they are.

I worked hard developing this site. I spent countless hours to bring you the new IntoxiNation - now can I have $80,000? I mean it took me about 3 hours last night and 4 hours today to get it done so $80,000 should be about right.

Did we mentioned RedState is now owned by a large publishing company with actual financial resources? Yet they still beg for money to implement such deeply complicated features such as WYSIWYG editors. Watching Jamie mock them is quite fun. He uses unfair tactics like actual facts to demonstrate what bozos they are at Red State. Sort of like shooting fish in a barrel, actually.

The truth of the matter is it appears Red State’s advertising is way down and they are looking for excuses to get more money in. Fine - just ask for it. Don’t sit there and act like people are fools.

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The wars have mostly vanished from the headlines. Lots of people are still getting killed and maimed, displaced too. Yet because the violence has apparently lessened because of the surge, the wars are no longer front page news.

The presidential election campaigns are also surely a reason, as campaign news is becoming all-consuming, destroying any other news in the vicinity, an unfortunate trend that will surely worsen. The ANSWER Coalition plans an antiwar rallies in DC and elsewhere on March 15, the fifth anniversary of the Iraq invasion, but by then too many progressives and liberals may be primarily focused on the presidential campaigns, with little interest or energy left for other issues. Let’s hope not.

Also, within a few months, the economy will become the primary issue, and that’ll distract even more from the wars. Not that the economy shouldn’t be a central issue, because it should, but if the wars fade from public view, then that means more dead people, and we’ve already had way too many.

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He’s like an drug addict or maybe an obsessive-compulsive who must always return to one topic and one topic only. It’s really quite comical.

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Switchgrass yields five times more energy than it takes to grow it and burning it in vehicles 94% less carbon dioxide than gasoline. What’s more, it grows in marginal areas and needs far less fertilizer than corn.

Right now, the price is about double than of corn ethanol but technological advances funded by venture capitalists are expected to drop the price. Let’s hope so. Then corn can be used solely for food again.

There are so many promising new ideas for creating clean energy that keeping up with them all is difficult. This is a good thing! I predict an explosion of such ideas in the coming few years, some of which will surely go mainstream, and become disruptive technologies as they create new industries.

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