Politics/ Pre-Deadguy angst;

Stem cells Vetoed

This entire issue has me depressed. The President has vetoed a bill that would have opened up more research into stem cells, which has incredible potential for curing some of the nastiest diseases and injuries known to mankind.
Spinal Injuries, Diabetes, ALS (which I have), Parkingsons, and a host of other Neuro-muscular diseases could well be eiminated.

"But you have to murder the unborn to get them!!"
Bad argument. Every year fertility clinics flush 100s of thousands of fertilised embryos down the drain because they've been stored too long for implantation. Those embryos could have been used to work towards curing the sick, but they get wasted.

And thats depressing.

Politics;

Acouple of points to make about the Middle-East conflict...

Very basic Timeline (Source, Wikipedia)

Palastinian Militants dug a tunnel into Israel underneath a Gaza border crossing Sunday June 25th, killing two Israeli soldiers and capturing another. They then demanded the release of Palastinian prisoners.

Israel closed the border to Gaza.

Hamas almost immediatly began to openly fire rockets into Israel, which prompted Israel to send in troops and bomb Hamas's offices (at 4 or 5 am to avoid civilian deaths).

July 12 Hezbollah’s military wing launched a barrage of rockets and mortars on Israeli military positions and northern Israeli village of Shelomi, apparently as a diversion, wounding five civilians in the process. A force of infiltrators then attacked two armoured IDF Humvees patrolling along the Lebanese border road near the Israeli village of Zar’it with Anit-tank rockets killing three soldiers, wounding three, and taking two in captivity to Lebanon's territory. Hezbollah has named this operation “Truthful Promise.”

Early on the 13th of July Israel sent IDF jets to bomb Lebanon International Airport near Beirut, forcing its closure and diverting its arriving flights to Cyprus.

Hezbollah retaliated by bombarding the Israeli towns of Naharia and Safed, as well as villages nearby with rocket fire.

Many people and politicians on the Left are criticising Israel for thier actions in this conflict, saying that Israel's response is "Disproportonate". Lets look at the facts.

• Hezbollah is using unguided Katushya rockets and Iranian medium range Fajir-3 ballistic missiles to target civilian population centers.
  
• Israeli strikes with precision guided munitions have been targeted against rocket launch sites and rocket storerooms, although many of them were intentionally located by Hezbollah in civilian population centers.
• There have been reports of Hezbollah militants setting up roadblocks to prevent civilians from fleeing the vicinity of thier installations.

Just because Israel is more powerful militarily than Hezbollah doesn't automatically make them wrong when they defend themselves.