At 1 o’clock this afternoon, Dr Alice Duncan and David Landon Cole were married.

xD.

Norm Coleman has conceded victory to Al Franken in the Minnesota senate race after eight months of recounts and litigation, as reported by the Star Tribune.

It has been obvious for some time that Franken was going to have the election given to him; delaying by Coleman was to keep the GOP’s ability to filibuster alive. Now that they have sixty seats, the Democrats (assuming Obama can keep the Caucus, which includes a GOP defector and two independents, together) can force a vote by invoking cloture. In plain English, the Republicans can no longer keep talking to stop a bill being passed. With the executive and legislative firmly in the hands of the Democrats and the judiciary marginal, the USA approaches what in the UK is called the elective dictatorship.

I have written about this previously: (One step closer to sixty, Towards sixty senate seats and The magic number sixty.

xD.

Update: over on the marvellous Twitter, Tim ‘Bloggerheads‘ Ireland says that

Republicans across America are shitting themselves and sticking pins in their golliwogs tonight. Next: GAY SOCIALISM!

.

Mr Ireland is quite wrong. From the point of view of Rush Limbaugh, it’s already happened: White House celebrates LGBT Pride Month.

Today will see the writ moved for the by-election in Norwich North where Dr Ian Gibson has resigned. In advance of the poll on 23rd July, the Universities & Colleges Union have commissioned a poll that makes interesting reading.

The headlines are, with my comments underneath:

Half of people aged 18-34 (48% of people aged 18-24 years old and 49% of those aged 25-34) said they would be more likely to vote for a party committed to an increase in spending on education

In other news, the Pope has released a statement saying that he is indeed a Catholic and a bear has been seen coming out of the woods saying ‘do you mind?’¹. People understand the value of education.

Nearly three-quarters of adults (73%) agreed that giving young people affordable access to local education and training would reduce crime and anti-social behavior

Gordon Brown’s announcement on education, training and work for young people – a carrot of availability for everyone and a stick of reducing benefits for not taking offers – picks up on that in two ways. It addresses the immediate concern but also assuages fears about young ‘uns hanging around with nothing to do.

Four-fifths 82% of adults in the Norwich North constituency agreed that every local person who met entry standards should be entitled to a free place at a local college or university

Fees were never popular.

One quarter (24%) percent of respondents said they trusted the Conservatives to invest most in education. One in five (20%) chose Labour, 10% opted for the Liberal Democrats, 4% for Green and 2% chose Ukip.

Which is worrying, to be honest. Education should be one of our strong suits.

If there was an election tomorrow 34% of people would vote for the Conservatives, 30% for Labour, 15% for the Liberal Democrats, 14% for the Green Party, and 7% for others.

A 4% lead can easily be overturned. The majority at the 2005 election was about 11%; that does mean we’ve lost a lot of support, but given the expenses scandal took down the previous incumbent, Ian Gibson, it is perhaps not all that bad for Labour.

xD.

1 – Shamelessly nicked from Mitch Benn of The Now Show.

Jack of Kent has rapidly become one of my favourite blogs; it is in the ‘must read’ section of my RSS.

Firstly, he has a rare ability amongst lawyers: that of making complex legal principles and processes understandable to the layperson.

Secondly, he campaigns tirelessly for one of the great rights: freedom of speech.

Thirdly, he does it all with wit, skill and aplomb.

He has come to prominence with his remarkable marshaling of the forces of light in support of Simon Singh, but looking back at his blog shows him, through a remarkable political journey, to have always been intellectually honest and interesting. That, in these days, is high praise indeed.

I wish more power to his elbow; you should read his blog linked to above. Mr Of Kent also writes at Jack About Town.

xD.

A question posed by Matt Wardman.

Here’s the data he presents, from PSR Keele, as a chart.

What this tells me is that, in terms of actually winning the election, assuming that Labour do at least moderately well in Scotland and Wales, it’s only England that matters. We need to wait to see what effects devolution has had. Since 1998, there have only been two general elections; we don’t know if, for instance, disaffected Labour voters will vote for Plaid Cymru or the SNP, move to the Liberals or stay at home.

xD.

• Any ideas as to why a server move might break the Wordpress permalink structure? #
• I’m giving up the battle with .htaccess and Wordpress permalinks for the evening. #
• Sitting in the green room at Al Jazeera #
• 63 votes went to the eliminated candidates. John Bercow’s lead atm is 67. #newspeaker #
• Why couldn’t they have done AV? #newspeaker #
• I’m on al Jazeera now (Sky channel 514 or http://english.aljazeera.net/watch_now/) #
• Really quite shocked by the crash on the Washington Metro red line. I used to go to work on that line. #
• Apparently, @LukePollard is the tenth most influential Labour person on Twitter. http://tinyurl.com/n7ry3t #
• Nadine Dorries no longer has a blog. No comments or pingbacks means it’s a regularly updated website, not a blog. #dorriesfail #
• Andrew Lansley: “you know you’re getting old when Speakers look young” #
• Does anyone know where I can get a copy of the recently released War Book? #
• How’s the Twitterverse this morning? #
• BNP MEP Andrew Brons can’t spell his own name in the genitive, it would seem. http://tinyurl.com/n9alv8 #
• #Facebook chat on #pidgin – nice. http://bit.ly/OSAb7 #
• http://twitpic.com/8d543 – A new hope… #
• RT @mattwardman Ahmadinejad: “Stay out of Iran’s internal affairs”. Did anyone ask him about Hesbollah and Iran’s “Lebanon Department”? #
• I need to buy a video camera to do YouTube interviews for work. I know nothing about video cameras. Any ideas? #
• RT @LukePollard Read The Telegraph’s coverage of Plymouth’s Tory Twitter ban http://bit.ly/15MxJJ – Come on Plymouth Tories reverse the ban #
• RT @serafinowicz Exposure to sunshine, moonlight and good times ruled out: now coroners say cause of death was ‘boogie’. #
• RT @BorisWatch ‘we now go over to Mr. Harold Macmillan for a statement on the death of Buddy Holly’ #
• Note to procession of cyclists near Waterloo station: slowing my bus trip home does not endear your cause to me. #
• Alan Milburn’s going. Phew. http://bit.ly/10vCgw #
• RT @mattwardman Me and my steam-powered mobile phone: http://tinyurl.com/ku3lok (via @tweetmeme) No idea what’s going on but it’s amusing… #
• Appropriate music for the London weather: http://tinyurl.com/lsjkty #
• I’m going to Crete for a week. Book recommendations, please. #
• It’s not a hula hoop. It’s the **small** hadron collider. #
• RT @sionsimon RT @pigsonthewing Eat at Café Rouge, Bella Italia or Strada? Tips are used to pay wages! http://bit.ly/RwLSu #

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Bertrand Piccard, latest scion of the family of balloonists and inventors, is going to fly an aircraft called the Solar Impulse around the world. Solar Impulse is, as the name suggests, a solar-powered, heavier-than-air vehicle.

For climatic and mineralogical reasons, we need to use less oil; indeed, it would appear that we need to use as little as possible. For many applications, that’s not such a big problem. From the point of view of charging your mobile phone or watching your television, it doesn’t matter how your electricity is generated. Trains are frequently electric and advances are being made in storage, efficiency and regeneration that also apply to cars.

The particular problem aircraft face is energy density. Avgas offers a balance of energy per unit mass and energy per unit volume (that is to say lots of energy in a compact form that’s not excessively heavy). Hydrogen has lots of energy, but you need a big volume of it; aluminium has lots of energy, but you need a big mass of it. Avgas is in the goldilocks zone. It doesn’t seem that solar power is going to replace jet fuel in the near future; Solar Impulse carries one person, has a wingspan slightly larger than the A380 and requires materials with densities about one-twentieth that of traditional aerospace materials.

However, even small differences count. If solar power could be used, for instance, to provide hotel electric power – for cooking, cabin lighting and so on – that would reduce the amount of fuel needed to be carried. The A380 has a wing area of 845 square metres. More importantly, I would say, is that Solar Impulse will push for lighter aerospace construction materials, which all helps to save fuel.

xD.

I’ve been tagged in a slightly odd meme by the irrepressible Matt Wardman:

The assignment: Your phone, exactly 139 words explaining why it is your phone, and a hero.

Here goes…

This is my phone.

I use it to wake me up, email, text, Twitter, TwitPic, surf the internet, blog, read, write and even, to make telephone calls. Apparently, it works in Afghanistan, but only occasionally in Somerset as the signal there is rubbish.

I did most of my degree on the previous version.

The revolution may not be televised, but it will be covered on a range of social media.

It is powered by lots of tiny gnomes on tiny bikes who have to pedal really quickly if I want to call long distance. The gnomes used to be bigger, but they became smaller, and that’s why Nokia had to change the size of the power cord. Hey, it makes as much sense as any other explanation.

Large and a bit geeky – it is a good representation of me.

I tag the Political Penguin, James Higham and Laurie Penny.

xD.

Two thousand years ago the proudest boast was “civis Romanus sum”. Today, in the world of freedom, the proudest boast is “Ich bin ein Berliner”.

I appreciate my interpreter translating my German!

There are many people in the world who really don’t understand, or say they don’t, what is the great issue between the free world and the Communist world. Let them come to Berlin.

There are some who say that Communism is the wave of the future. Let them come to Berlin.

And there are some who say in Europe and elsewhere we can work with the Communists. Let them come to Berlin.

And there are even a few who say that it is true that Communism is an evil system, but it permits us to make economic progress. Lass’ sie nach Berlin kommen. Let them come to Berlin.

Freedom has many difficulties and democracy is not perfect, but we have never had to put a wall up to keep our people in, to prevent them from leaving us.

I want to say, on behalf of my countrymen, who live many miles away on the other side of the Atlantic, who are far distant from you, that they take the greatest pride that they have been able to share with you, even from a distance, the story of the last 18 years.

I know of no town, no city, that has been besieged for 18 years that still lives with the vitality and the force, and the hope and the determination of the city of West Berlin.

While the wall is the most obvious and vivid demonstration of the failures of the Communist system, for all the world to see, we take no satisfaction in it, for it is, as your mayor has said, an offence not only against history but an offense against humanity, separating families, dividing husbands and wives and brothers and sisters, and dividing a people who wish to be joined together.

What is true of this city is true of Germany – real, lasting peace in Europe can never be assured as long as one German out of four is denied the elementary right of free men, and that is to make a free choice.

In 18 years of peace and good faith, this generation of Germans has earned the right to be free, including the right to unite their families and their nation in lasting peace, with good will to all people.

You live in a defended island of freedom, but your life is part of the main.

So let me ask you as I close, to lift your eyes beyond the dangers of today, to the hopes of tomorrow, beyond the freedom merely of this city of Berlin, or your country of Germany, to the advance of freedom everywhere, beyond the wall to the day of peace with justice, beyond yourselves and ourselves to all mankind.

Freedom is indivisible, and when one man is enslaved, all are not free.

When all are free, then we can look forward to that day when this city will be joined as one and this country and this great continent of Europe in a peaceful and hopeful globe.

When that day finally comes, as it will, the people of West Berlin can take sober satisfaction in the fact that they were in the front lines for almost two decades.

All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin, and, therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words “Ich bin ein Berliner”.

How’d I do?

I should add thanks to Aaron & Sunny at Liberal Conspiracy for passing on Al J’s request.

xD.