Photo, above:  Supernova M82.  See Hour 3, Block D,  Robert Zimmerman, behindtheblack.com.

JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW

Mary Kissel, Wall Street Journal editorial board & Opinion Journal (1PM Eastern daily) .  Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents.

Hour One

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 1, Block A:  David M Drucker, Washington Examiner Sr Congressional correspondent, in re: Republicans changing nominating rules to ensure that all states  have some sort of significant say over who the nominee is, and over structure of campaign. Avoid clown candidates.  The Eleventh Commandment. 

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 1, Block B:  Edward W Hayes, criminal defense attorney par excellence, in re: The Lufthansa heist at Idlewild airport – for $6 million.  Eddie was in the film Goodfellas with Robert de Niro, by Martin Scorsese.  Guy arrested today is 78 years old.  Gambinos, Lucheses, Bonnanos  New York had five powerful Mafia families; with increased law enforcement they faded away.  If you're in the mob, you die on the street or you die in jail.   federal court conviction rate is something like 98%.  "The mobsters were bigger in the old days."

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 1, Block C: Bud Weinstein, Southern Methodist University & George W Bush Institute, in re: Nuclear power has become the ignored stepchild in energy/ Twenty per cent of US energy comes from 102 nuclear power plants. Two plants under construction: South Carolina and Georgia.

Nuclear power can bring long-term stability to the stressed electric grid  Global warming notwithstanding, 2013-2014 will likely go down as America’s coldest winter in decades.   As of the second week in January, 187 million people were dealing with subfreezing weather, and record low temperatures were being recorded in many eastern and southern communities.

Not surprisingly, the electric power grid is being tested as never before with . . . [more]

 Crude Debate: Should Washington Lift Oil Export Ban? A federal ban dating back decades that restricts exports of crude oil is suddenly in Washington's crosshairs. Should we get rid of it?  Since 2008, U.S. oil production has increased 56 percent, and our imports have correspondingly fallen to the lowest level since the mid-1990s. In response to this oil boom, refineries have been exporting at record amounts gasoline, diesel, and other products refined from oil, which do not face the same federal restrictions as crude oil.

In response to this trend and the broader oil and natural-gas boom, companies including Exxon Mobil and Continental Resources are calling on Congress to lift the ban. Newspapers like The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Bloomberg News, and Financial Times have made similar statements.  Calls to preserve the ban appear to be fewer. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Robert Menendez, D-N.J., says lifting the ban would benefit only major oil companies and could end up hurting U.S. drivers in the long run with higher gasoline prices. The ban dates back to the 1973 OPEC oil embargo, which sent domestic oil prices soaring. In the wake of that incident, Congress decided  . . .

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 1, Block D: Tim Wilson, Institute of Public Affairs, and, starting 18 February: Human Rights Commissioner of Australia for five years, appointed by Her Majesty's representative; can be removed by the Crown but not fired; in re: As a classical liberal, aren't you nervous about being unfire-able?  A woman called you "the Freedom Commissioner" – I was appointed with that as a slang title in order to reassert the fact that traditional human right matter.  Because we haven't come from abuses of power by a monarch, we have a strange experiment; main exercise of human rights is at the ballot box; the pubic can hold the govt to account.   Human right are a political concept; activists in Australia have increasingly approached HR from a legalistic position – that the govt awards human rights. I, instead, hold that the purpose of HR is to prevent others from unnecessarily to interfere and tell us how to live our lives.   We need to know how to build in a culture of human rights – no shutdown of freedom of speech, heavily regulating what the press can say, and such. 

Hour Two

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 2, Block A:  Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents, in re: Mohamed Javed Zarif.  "We have no intention of stopping enrichment."  The riyal is up, stock market up, foreign delegations visiting, Russia signs an $18 bil deal – major erosion of benefit of sanctions.  Al Qaeda plot to blow up the US embassy in Tel Aviv; arrested by Shin Bet. Plot hatched in Gaza; three Palestinians recruited by Zawahiri, to ave been simultaneous wit people coming in with fake Russian passports to blow up __ and have a second bomb to kill first responders.    The Sunni drive for a caliphate.  Switzerland: Rohani addresses Davos; Israeli PM "disturbed and annoyed" – Rohani a sort of kindergarten Ahmadinejad.  Iranians are bazaaris – can negotiate, manipulate, lie, win; have been so for two thousand years.

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 2, Block B: Michael Doran, Saban Center for Middle East Policy, Brookings Institution, in re: Michael Doran published recently in New York Times with Max Boot (CFR).   For 35 years, every president has consider US wanted Iran in the Syria talks, worked out a formula whereby Iran could participate without publicly expressing agreement with Geneva I (where Assad was to step aside): Iran would give private assurances to Ban Kyi-moon and say nothing – but immediately on being invited Iranians spoke out madly and Kerry had to say "Disinvite them."  Iran isn’t stable, wants the empire to run from Teheran to the Mediterranean – antistatus quo, anti-Western, have fought a proxy war against us for thirty years. Some of US foreign policy elite says Iran is essentially a defensive power_ they respond to power plays by the US or Israel; or else it just moves to maintain its own position. Ergo, if the US just reaches out, and s sweet, everything will work fine. 

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 2, Block C: Tony Badran, FDD, in re: Geneva II; Iran sanctions. Oct 23, 1983: truck drove to Marine Amphibious Barracks, blew up dozens of people, doe by the now-deceased Mughniya.  Zarif has just gone and laid a wreath at Mugniyah's grave, as the latter was close to Khamenei and the former head of intell[?].  That's why we consider Zarif to be moderate . . .  Rouhani's interviews have =embarrassed the White House, which keeps saying Iran is now run by moderates.  Pres Obama's interview the New Yorker with David Remnick: Pres really feels that a new equilibrium can be achieved in the Middle East and the US can [bug out].

Current Iranian Defense Min was commander of 1983 al Quds force in Lebanon.  It’s not that Assad is winning, since despite the rebels's extreme weaknesses, Assad still has not got a strategic advantage. Maybe Geneva – "Secondary palliative measures" – he might be able to do better.  Russians' flying in Antunovs [cargo planes] to supply Assad; that, with Shia fighters, with Hezbollah, with the direct command of Iranians on the ground – all that still hasn’t completely wn. 

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 2, Block D: Dave Barnett, FDD, in re: Egypt, Sinai, Syria spillover into Egypt. Between 2012 and 2013, Egyptian economy dropped 41%. Now, in an effort to stabilize the rogue state of Sinai, Egypt using what remains of US helos and weapons.   Lots of work in northern Sinai. Terrorist attacks targeted against gas pipelines; in July, over 100 atttacks. Increase in Egyptian moves, but terrorists shift to mainland: on Nile, in cities.  Permanent revision of agreements betw Egypt and Israel?  Egyptian inroads are always coordinated with and approved by Israel; will probably continue for as long as "the problem persists."  Egyptian Third Army in the south, Second Army in the north.  Have destroyed "over 1,000 smuggling tunnels" while Hamas says it's losing $200K per month[?]. A strong country usually has a strong economy, but Egyptian officals are flooding Europe in an effort to brig back tourists.

Hour Three

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 3, Block A: Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents,  in re:  . . PM Stephen Harper takes many members of the Canadian Cabinet to Israel.   Ten thousand Palestinians are working in [Israel? the West Bank?]  A militant cell run by al Qaeda intended to blow up the US embassy in Tel Aviv; Shin Bet announced; a "US official" dismissed the information: "We have no proof."   Egad – the Shin Bet

The oldest Hebrew inscription ever discovered, dating to the Tenth Century BC, the time of King Solomon, in a form from southern Israel, deals with inferior wine that was served to troops there. From then till today it's the one place where the same people have been living continuously – and they challenge it.

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 3, Block B: Pinhas Inbari is a veteran Arab affairs correspondent who formerly reported for Israel Radio and Al Hamishmar newspaper, and currently serves as an analyst for the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs; in re:

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 3, Block C: Dan Henninger, WSJ, in re:  The Snowden Ultimatum
  Barack Obama has let the Snowden brigades define the NSA problem.  Every week, Typhoon Obama changes course to upend some new corner of the private or public sector.  The ObamaCare botch is well along to costing Democrats control of Congress. This week Mr. Obama offhandedly told the New Yorker that smoking marijuana is hardly different than having a Miller Lite, a random presidential thought that undermines the work of anyone associated with drug and alcohol abuse. Last weekend was spent following grimly amusing news alerts about how the U.N. abruptly invited Iran to join the Syria . . .

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 3, Block D:   Robert Zimmerman, behindtheblack.com, in re: For more information about that newly discovered supernova in the nearby galaxy M82 go here and here.  The first link notes that the supernova has brightened to 11.5 magnitude and could get even brighter in the next two weeks. Though still too dim for the naked eye, it is easily bright enough right now for most amateur telescopes and binoculars. How much brighter it will get remains a question.

Using the Herschel Space Telescope astronomers have detected water vapor spurting from Ceres, the solar system’s largest asteroid.  Herschel’s sensors spied plumes during three of the four observation periods. The strength of absorption varied over a matter of hours, a trend probably caused by relatively small sources of water vapour rotating in and out of view of Earth, the researchers say.  Data gathered in March 2013 suggest that the plumes originated from two widely separated, 60-kilometre-wide spots in the dwarf planet’s mid-latitude regions. Together, these spots ejected about 6 kilograms of water vapour into space each second. Neither ground-based observations nor images from the Hubble Space Telescope are keen enough to identify the as-yet-mysterious areas, says Küppers. “We don’t know what these features are, we just know that they’re darker than their surroundings,” he notes. The NASA probe Dawn will arrive at Ceres early next year, and take a good look at these plumes. Should be exciting.

Ants on ISS!  It ain’t an accident; they were brought there by Cygnus as part of an experiment to see how an ant colony adapts to weightlessness.

In celebration of the tenth anniversary of Opportunity’s landing on Mars, the journal Science has published a special section of the newest findings from Mars. The main conclusion of all this research is that Mars was once potentially habitable, though there is no evidence so far to show that anything actually inhabited it. The data obtained however is now giving scientists clues on the best places to look for the remains of that ancient life, should it exist.

Hour Four

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 4, Block A: Moment of Battle: The Twenty Clashes That Changed the World by Jim Lacey and Williamson Murray  (1 of 4)

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 4, Block B: Moment of Battle: The Twenty Clashes That Changed the World by Jim Lacey and Williamson Murray  (2 of 4)

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 4, Block C:  Moment of Battle: The Twenty Clashes That Changed the World by Jim Lacey and Williamson Murray  (3 of 4)

Thursday  23 January 2014  / Hour 4, Block D: Moment of Battle: The Twenty Clashes That Changed the World by Jim Lacey and Williamson Murray  (4 of 4)

..  ..  ..

Music

Hour 1:  Snow White & the Huntsman. Sin City. Centurion. Mad Max. 

Hour 2:  Valhalla Rising. 300. The Proposition. 

Hour 3:  Ender's Game. Bourne Legacy. Prometheus. 

Hour 4:  Clash of the Titans.