Succeeding Tim Russert

Joe Gandelman appraises possible successors to Tim Russert but overlooks an obvious candidate.  I'm thinking of someone who is young, charismatic, telegenic, works well with a teleprompter, and has lately been briefed on the issues of the day.  And since Russert and Stepanopolous crossed over from Democratic politics, his past won't be a problem.

He is also looking for a new job and increased responsibility.  It's a win-win, and the high price of piano lessons will never be a problem again.

Comments

[capitano]

Excellent recommendation although I think Chris Matthews has a slight edge -- Matthews has more time is service as a Democrat hack, while in contrast, BO is more generic Marxist. Matthews on points.

[bad]

TM You forgot clean and articulate (not)...

[PrestoPundit]

Paul Begala is unavailable?

[JM Hanes]

Alas, TM, Obama seems to lack the necessary instinct for speaking truth to power.

[kim]

Russert was a lot smarter than this dude.
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[Jane]

I pick Luke Russert. He's as articulate as his dad, and has as much experience as Obama does. Maybe more, he had a radio show with James Carville.

[hit and run]

I still say Obama should move to Alaska to help the polar bears. Those poor polar bears need a top notch community organizer now that the Bush administration has told companies there they can annoy them.

But hey, if he can't hack that level of responsibility, Meet the Press might make for a good fallback.

[MikeS]

I'm thinking Scott McClellan. He has a bit more gravitas and loads more experience than Tom's suggestion.

[kim]

Don Imus.
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[OrgleFan]

I think Gwen Ifill would be an inspired choice. Howevern, I'm guessing we are probably equally likely to get Olberman in the MTP chair.

[clarice]

You know, I've said that I believed Russert lied in the Libby case. I didn't know that he had diabetes--something not disclosed until after his death. I assume it was Type 2 but don't know when he first contracted it or what treatment he was getting, but memory loss and cognitive decline with type 2 diabetes is not unusual.

[SteveMG]

My guess is they'll stick with Brokaw through the election and then rotate a series of tryouts/candidates to see if any single one grabs ratings.

IIRC, Russert took over MTP when it was pretty dormant. Lousy ratings, stuck with an old round-table format that didn't have much appeal.

If no one takes off and the ratings fall, it won't surprise me at all if they let Olbermann try it. Whatever backlash will be balanced, in their minds, by higher ratings.

As Al Davis would say, "Ratings baby, just ratings."

[Soylent Red]

Bob Costas

[hit and run]

If ABC can have Stephanopoulos, and others can call for McClellan, and Tony Snow is out for health reasons, and since I usually watch any political news shows on mute anyway...I Call For Dana Perino.

[PeterUK]

The obvious candidate would be Tom Maguire.Articulate,quick witted and an existing fan base.

[Ralph L]

BO is no good without a teleprompter, but there's another Dem senator who's more experienced and itching to compete with George Stephanopolous.

[GnuCarSmell]

If Obama replaced Russert, it would surely send a tingle up Chris Matthews' other leg.

[Dennis D]

The only left wing drooler than can possibly do it is Charlie Rose

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

not just oil

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Battered by soaring fertiliser prices and rioting rice farmers, the global food industry may also have to deal with a potentially catastrophic future shortage of phosphorus, scientists say.

Researchers in Australia, Europe and the United States have given warning that the element, which is essential to all living things, is at the heart of modern farming and has no synthetic alternative, is being mined, used and wasted as never before.

Massive inefficiencies in the “farm-to-fork” processing of food and the soaring appetite for meat and dairy produce across Asia is stoking demand for phosphorus faster and further than anyone had predicted. “Peak phosphorus”, say scientists, could hit the world in just 30 years. Crop-based biofuels, whose production methods and usage suck phosphorus out of the agricultural system in unprecedented volumes, have, researchers in Brazil say, made the problem many times worse. Already, India is running low on matches as factories run short of phosphorus; the Brazilian Government has spoken of a need to nationalise privately held mines that supply the fertiliser industry
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[eightnine2718281828mu5]

mitochondria/phosphorus/etc

[kim]

A very interesting microcosmic energy crisis. Thanks for the links.
======================================

[kim]

James Hansen, NASA employee, has jumped the giant carp; he's threatening to go after Congressmen who don't toe the line on his climate gehenna.

In other, sad, news, George Carlin is dead.
==========================

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

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Thanks for the links.
---

Somewhere Malthus is laughing.

[kim]

Humans always seem to get the last laugh on that gloomy old bird.
====================================

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

Also DNA/RNA have phosphate groups; and phosphorylation is involved in many major biochemical reactions.

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

---
Humans always seem to get the last laugh on that gloomy old bird.
---

So far, but eventually Malthus wins since populations are restricted from increasing indefinitely.

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

Well, bedtime for this old bird; g'nite kim.

Be safe and well.

[kim]

Good night, Shane.
=============

[BL]

Who's Shane? The only one I know was a cowboy. I'm off to do my bit for global cooling -- buying my carton of camels and then a swim :)

[kim]

Yep, same Shane; Bon voyage.
===================

[bgates]

From the first link - "the prospect of extracting phosphorus from the sea bed presents massive technological and financial challenges."
I don't know how we could ever manage to extract liquid hydrocarbons from down there. Too difficult and expensive.

I mean, phosphorus.

[kim]

Don't worry, bgates, the mitochondria will mass and massacre Malthus.
=========================

[BL]

I'm back. Sobh bekheir :)

[Jane]

Morning everyone. We are having a heck of a thunderdstorm so this may take until noon to load. Heck of a job Brownie!

[Charlie (Colorado)]

emu, any time someone tells you we're running short of an *element* someone is trying to sell you something. Why? Because, absent the very special cases of fission, fusion, and radioactive decay, elements can neither be created nor destroyed.

There is just as much phosphorus today as the was yesterday and other than the tiny bit we've sent out in NASA missions, as much as there was 50 million years ago.

And yes, the ADP-ATP cycle is vital to metabolism, but the total amount of the stuff in the body is, oh, order of a gram.

Get a *grip* for God's sakes.

[kim]

BL, Sobh bekheir. I've read someplace that Farsi is the fourth most common language on the internet.
======================================

[HoosierHoops]

Good Morning all..
Guess i'd better stock up on matches cause if India is running short on phosphorus then we are all doomed.
( The Bic lighter company is probably hording it all )

[kim]

Brokaw, Brokaw, Brokaw.
===============

[Charlie (Colorado)]

So far, but eventually Malthus wins since populations are restricted from increasing indefinitely.

Uh, no, emu, actually real populations very rarely have Malthusian collapses. Observe that the rate of population increase is decreasing, so that the "population bomb" enthusiasts have had to reduce their terrified "in thirty years" warnings from 11 billion to 9 billion. Since you're a gook, you might want to look into quantitative population ecology; lots of pretty math and some real surprises.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Um, "geek". I'm more a gook.

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

---
There is just as much phosphorus today as the was yesterday
---

Just as much carbon as there ever was too, but after I burn it in my car it doesn't jump back in my tank for re-use.

[boris]

Then use E85 so it will.

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

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Then use E85 so it will.
---

Which of course requires water, nitrogen, phosphates, etc.

[boris]

And of course there's just as much of those as there ever was.

[kim]

Hey, how do you like James Hansen claiming that 'Democracy isn't working' and threatening to go after Congressmen who don't toe the line in his climate gehenna?
===========================

[Rick Ballard]

Hansen is switching from coal to oil.The fact that this fraud is still drawing a NASA check is an embarassment to the Republic. As McIntyre continues to explore the depth of Hansen's">http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=3198#comments">Hansen's incompetence we will undoubtedly see calls from Hansen and Mann that he be silenced for heresy. Even though the extent of Hansen's mendacity grow more obvious with each passing day.

[kim]

Steve, and John Goetz, are simply amazing. I can't help but think that the hounds are so close on Hansen's trail now, that that has provoked his intemperate and lunatic address to Congress. I'm really beginning to pity the guy. His reputation will be in shambles, soon.
=========================

[kim]

In those fortress threads at climateaudit.org, Steve and David Holland are documenting the stonewalling that IPCC reviewers are making to Freedom of Information requests.

Hansen's Walls of Jericho are coming down. First Trumpeter is Steve McIntyre, the 21st Century's first real hero. One of the lurkers over there calls climateaudit.org 'The Greatest Show On Earth'. Surely, it is the most influential blog on earth right now.
==============================

[clarice]

Soros sure knows how to pick his troops, doesn't he? Steve Gilbert has a post on this at Sweetness & Light and draws my attention to the Hitler youth type Soros op 350.

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

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And of course there's just as much of those as there ever was.
---

Discounting repiration, C/H/O/N is conserved after your dinner passes through your colon. That doesn't make it suitable for your kid's dinner plate.

And N/P/etc diluted in ocean/surface water isn't really available for use by the average farmer.

[kim]

clarice, we're hoping you or someone else at AT can blog about the IPCC reviewers stonewalling Freedom of Information requests, detailed at the Fortress threads at climateaudit.org

I've little doubt AT will be all over Hansen's speech today. He wants to hound Congressmen and sue energy executives. A lot of skeptical sites are saying 'Bring it On' about the lawsuits, because discovery is going to expose Hansen's fraud.
===========================

[kim]

That Guardian article that Steve Gilbert links is all over the net, and skeptics are appalled, as well as delighted that Hansen has finally jumped the giant carp.
=================================

[clarice]

kim, why don't YOU do it? You know more about the subject than I.send it to [email protected] with a note that I suggested you send it in. If you cannot, let me know and I'll try but truthfully, you know a ton more about this subject than I do.

[kim]

I'm an aphorist not an essayist, but I appreciate your confidence. Maybe Marc Shepard or James Lewis. It's all on the three Fortress threads at CA. Rick?
=================================

[kim]

You've been touted over there as an 'always carbolic enemy of bureaucratic foibles'.
===============================

[HoosierHoops]

I'm an aphorist not an essayist..
Well we won't hold that against you..

/everytime Kim posts i have to google the big words..

[kim]

Also, I refuse to reveal my identity, and I think those articles must be signed, no?
====================

[kim]

Yeah, like the palimpsest I stepped into and left an ugly mark.
==================================

[clarice]

kim, you can use a penname--James Lewis , for one, does. That's not his name.

Here BTW is the Hitler Soros youth group on climate.http://350.org/#tabs-rotator-3

If you want me to look over what you've written buzz, but truthfully, I think you don't need any editing..you write perfectly clearly and well,Kim.

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

---
Yeah, like the palimpsest I stepped into and left an ugly mark.
---

I think you survived intact; scrape it off and move on. ;-)

[kim]

By Golly, we'll make a JOMer out of you yet; you've wit enough. How does it feel to be our token progressive?
=====================================

[narciso]

Brokaw was the best possible in house choice, (he's still a liberal, but he's not acting like a whiny generation xer like Letterman was the other night; even though they're four years apart). He's as old as Cronkite was when he retired; although younger than Bob Schieffer when he filled in for Rather. Oh Hansen, he's been caught having been a shill for global cooling once
upon a time; not the media will flag him; just like they haven't followed Gore's mentor's Prof. Revelle's reversal on global warming, a generation ago.

[HoosierHoops]

Romans wrote on wax-coated tablets that could be smoothed and reused, and a passing use of the rather bookish term "palimpsest" by Cicero seems to refer to this practice..

googling again because of you kim.. :)

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

---
How does it feel to be our token progressive?
---

I've been called worse.

Repeatedly.

And with vigor.

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

Well, heading onto the secure network; later!

[boris]

C/H/O/N is conserved after your dinner passes through your colon

Most of the C/H/O/N you dine on has been through at least one colon. If that bothers you that's just too bad.

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

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Most of the C/H/O/N you dine on has been through at least one colon.
---

So we can dump all of our phosphates into the ocean but farmers will always have plenty since it hasn't really been destroyed because everything we eat has passed through something's colon.

Got it.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Discounting repiration, C/H/O/N is conserved after your dinner passes through your colon. That doesn't make it suitable for your kid's dinner plate.

And N/P/etc diluted in ocean/surface water isn't really available for use by the average farmer.

Are you *really* an idiot, or do you just think we are?

Where, pray, do you imagine that phosphorus (etc) goes?

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

---
Where, pray, do you imagine that phosphorus (etc) goes?
---

Through the colons?

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

Yup; the colons. Definitely the colons.

link

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Phosphorus comes from several sources: human wastes, animal wastes, industrial wastes, and human disturbance of the land and its vegetation.

Sewage from wastewater treatment plants and septic tanks is one source of phosphorus in rivers. Sewage effluent (out flow) should not contain more than 1 mg/ L phosphorus according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, but outdated wastewater treatment plants often fail to meet this standard. Also, some types of industrial wastes interfere with the removal of phosphorus at wastewater treatment plants.

Storm sewers sometimes contain illegal connections to sanitary sewers. Sewage from these connections can be carried into waterways by rainfall and melting snow. Phosphorus-containing animal wastes sometimes find their way into rivers and lakes in the runoff from feedlots and barnyards.

Soil erosion contributes phosphorus to rivers. The removal of natural vegetation for farming or construction for example, exposes soil to the eroding action of rain and melting snow. Soil particles washed into waterways contribute more phosphorus.

Fertilizers used for crops, lawns, and home gardens usually contain phosphorus. When used in excess, much of the phosphorus in these fertilizers eventually finds its way into lakes and rivers.
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[Cecil Turner]

Have you just now discovered B.S. is fertilizer?

[PeterUK]

"Are you *really* an idiot, or do you just think we are?"

eightnine2718281828mu5 claims to be differently abled. I go with the former ,but not the latter.

[Soylent Red]

B.S. is fertilizer

You know, B.S. comes from a colon.

[PeterUK]

So those tree eating dinosaurs have nobody to blame but themselves.Phosphorus and methane,an asteroid would be superfluous.

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

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Phosphorus and methane,an asteroid would be superfluous.
---

An asteroid... a gigantic methane-fueled conflagration... a smoldering world...

Coming Summer 2009...

'Death of a Rank Planet'

[HoosierHoops]

I don't think we'll ever have a phosphoros shortage.. Not a long as there are sites like KOS.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

So we can dump all of our phosphates into the ocean but farmers will always have plenty since it hasn't really been destroyed because everything we eat has passed through something's colon.

Look, poopsie, try to stay on point (yes, that was a straw man, by the way.) First of all, yes, we can dump our phosphates into the ocean and they'll still be around. We've been at that for billions yes billions of years.

Now, if you look a little further into this, you'll find that what's getting short is known deposits of phosphate rock: the usual source of commercial phosphates right now is apatite, which forms in black shale -- a sedimentary rock, formed in the ocean, just by the way.

But that's just the most common commercial source now, because it's cheap. The common source for nitrates and phosphates for a very long time was guano, and birds are making more guano all the time. Not to mention the Federal government. But give me a little weak sulfuric acid, and there are *lots* of other sources, like animal bones, fly ash from coal, and so on. (By the way, next time you start to fret about so-and-so being short, think about landfills: they're full up with that same stuff X for pretty much every X.)

What you really have here is a classic "Limits to Growth" model: there's 30 years supply known, so we're Doomed because there won't be any more ever, and no other source. What really happens is that as the price goes up, we find other sources. Phosphorus makes up around 1/10th of 1 percent of the Earth crust; the total mass of the Earth crist is a little over 1x10^23 kg, so we're going to have to get by on our part of a mere 1x10^20 kg or phosphorus alone.

In the mean time, don't make any Julian Simon bets on Peak Phosphorus: you'll lose your shirt.

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

Thanks; that was very informative.

So a question I have is: how much P could we reasonably extract from fly ash? ie, assuming current rates of coal consumption, could we supply the world's current consumption of P?

And it sounds like the process is expensive/energy intensive, so while the chemistry isn't in question, cost could be a concern.

Also, you have any links re the formation of apatite? Does this process continue today, or was it related to earlier conditions on the planet?

I know this has no bearing on the expansion of current supplies; it just sounds interesting. (to a geek anyway)

[eightnine2718281828mu5]

The Role of Bacterial Mats in Phosphate Mineralization (pg 300)

[PeterUK]

Charlie(Colarado),

Please get it to sing "Daisy".

[Charlie (Colorado)]

eµ, the Wikipedia article looks like a starting point. Apatites are formed, apparently, by biological processes which suggests if we really have an issue, biological processes might be a good way to collect it.

This note seems to say the phosphates in fly ash can be recovered biologically too. The actual amount is probably very dependent on the particular fly ash and the coal it comes from; I'd guess bituminous coal ash is better.

[Tina]

Mourning Glory
The media goes overboard with "the Russert Miracles."
By Christopher Hitchens

Posted at slate.com

For those interested in his take on the media's overboarding of the Russert memorial.

[JM Hanes]

Thanks for the pointer, Tina. I'm always interested in what Hitchens has to say -- no matter what the subject. Here's a link:
THE MEDIA GOES OVERBOARD WITH "THE RUSSERT MIRACLES."

[Neo]

Former UN secretary general Kofi Annan on Tuesday called for 'climate justice', saying that it was polluters who should pay for the effects of climate change, and not the poorest and most vulnerable.

The scam continues.

[kim]

Yeah, but Pachauri, head of the IPCC, is beginning to wonder; back earlier this year he said something to the effect of 'Maybe the sums have been done wrong'.

Furthermore, the UN does also represent the nations that are underdeveloped and they are the ones who would most suffer with carbon encumbering. I'm actually half hopeful that this CO2 AGW nonsense will be broken by the IPCC itself.

I know kim, go pinch yourself.
=================

[kim]

Hi Tina! There is also a link to Hitchen's report a year ago on the Plame mess just below the article JMH has linked.
============================

[Thomas Jackson]

Wouldn't Michelee be great shaking her finger at all those white media types and yelling her hatred of America at the top of her lungs every Sunday. It be like go to meeting time for the media!

Praise the Dalibama.

Yes we can!