Via Glenn Reynolds, they’re making paper that’s stronger than steel, using nanotechnology.

Rosie O’Donnell says that fire can’t burn it.

We’ve been hearing the enemies of America cheering our financial crisis and calling it a punishment from above (or at least, from their version of above, not mine).

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gloated recently that the United States is paying the price for exporting inflation and deficits to the rest of the world, “Now the world capacity is full and these problems have returned … And finally they are oppressors, and systems based on oppression and unrighteous positions will not endure,” he said.

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, also reveled in the financial crisis, expressing his hope that it marked the end of U.S. domination over the world economy. “The false bubble of money in the West has broken,” he said on state television, adding that the recent mortgage meltdown was the beginning of the end for free market capitalism.

Similarly, Iranian Guardian Council secretary and interim Friday prayer leader Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati professed that the U.S.’s economic crisis was “divine punishment.” He stated, “we are happy that the United States economy has come across difficulty. They are attesting unfavorable consequences of their conduct.They are experiencing divine punishment. We are happy over that. The unhappier they become, the happier we get, as they become happy as we get unhappy.” He said that Americans could expect to be “slapped in the face by Islam, Muslims, and the Islamic Revolution.”

Yeah, so how’s that “divine punishment” working out for you now, what with the price of crude oil having dropped down as low as $62 and change today? It’s holding steady around $64. What was that break-even point for Iran’s budget again? Oh, yeah. $100/bbl.

So, who’s being punished again? What’s that? I can’t hear you, crazy men.

Sucks to be you, Iran.

Check it out. My condo purchase last month is helping the economy.

Home resales in the U.S. rose more than forecast in September, aided by foreclosure-driven declines in prices that made properties more affordable.

Purchases of existing homes jumped 5.5 percent last month to a 5.18 million annual pace, the highest level in a year, the National Association of Realtors said today in Washington. The median price dropped 9 percent.

By the way, for the commenter who felt he had to tell me what a mistake I made in not waiting (while living in The Craphole that I hated) another year or two to buy, well, I’m thinking I was right.

Foreclosure-related sales accounted for 35 percent to 40 percent of last month’s total, the agents’ group said. Of those, about 80 percent were for primary residence, higher than the average of about 75 percent and signaling that investors are not a primary reason for the jump, said Lawrence Yun, the group’s chief economist.

“In terms of sales, I think we have bottomed out,” Yun said in a press conference. “The first step to housing-market stabilization is rising home sales. Hopefully, this trend can continue.”

Yes, and I’m employing a legion of people and spending money on all sorts of things necessary for my home. Besides hiring a cleaning service once a month (which I did not do in my apartment), I now have a bed in my guestroom and have been shopping for lamps, dishes, end tables, a dining room set—all kinds of things I need for my new home. From putting in a programmable thermostat to buying new blinds to supplying three bathrooms instead of two, I’m a one-woman purchasing storm. Of course, I’m shopping for bargains—I saved hundreds on the bed, and I go to a nearby Wal-Mart, or use the ubiquitous BB&B coupon—but I’m still putting money into our troubled economy.

Of course, if Barack Obama raises my taxes, that will stop the spending spree. Big-time.

This is great news:

Oil options contracts to sell crude at $50 by December almost tripled today after an OPEC decision to slash production failed to allay concerns that the global economic slump is hurting demand.

The cost of the $50 December 2008 put option, which gives the holder the right to sell oil futures at $50 a barrel, rose as much as 142 percent to $1.50 on the New York Mercantile Exchange, compared with 62 cents yesterday, according to exchange data.

“It certainly seems to me that we could get down to $50 a barrel,” Adam Sieminski, Deutsche Bank’s chief energy economist, said in a Bloomberg Radio interview today. “You could look at the OPEC cut as a sign of weakness, not strength.”

The cost of the option jumped on speculation that an output cut announced today by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, which supplies about 40 percent of the world’s oil, won’t be enough to stem plunging prices.

Ladies and gentlemen, can we have a little Nelson here, please?

The child-killing POS that Israel traded alive for the corpses of her soldiers is swearing he won’t rest until Israel is destroyed. Get used to not sleeping, asshole.

Three months after being released from an Israeli jail in a prisoner swap, Lebanese terrorist and child-killer Samir Kuntar said he was more than ever committed to working to wipe the Jewish state off the map, AFP reported on Thursday.

“As long as there is something called Israel in this region, the resistance must continue … and I am totally committed to the resistance,” Kuntar, 46, told AFP. “I am ready to take part in any resistance mission.”

Please, please, PLEASE take a position near the IDF and start shooting at them. Please give Israel the chance to do to you today what she should have done thirty years ago, and end your miserable existence.

In the meantime, get used to disappointment.

Charming. Middle school children, enchanted by things like “High Five Day,” made up their own little twist, and spent a day last week hitting Jews.

At least four students from a suburban St. Louis middle school face punishment for allegedly hitting Jewish classmates during what they called “Hit a Jew Day.”

The incident happened last week at Parkway West Middle School in Chesterfield.

District officials said Thursday they believe that fewer than 10 children of the district’s 35 Jewish students were struck.

District spokesman Paul Tandy said that in most cases, the students were hit on the back of their shoulders but one student was slapped in the face.

It began with an unofficial “Spirit Week” among sixth-graders that started harmlessly enough with a “Hug a Friend Day.” Then there was “High Five Day.”

Soon, though, the days moved from friendly to silly. Next there was “Hit a Tall Person Day” and, finally, “Hit a Jew Day.”

A quick check of the demographics of this school district reveals a district that is 90% white, and with 70% of the households making more than $50,000 per year.

It goes without saying that this story will not become nationwide news. Because it wasn’t “Hit a Muslim Day” or “Hit a Black Day.”

The principal is handling this extremely well, not that you’d know it from the AP article. Here’s the St. Louis paper’s report.

After school Monday, Lelonek heard from the mother of one of the school’s roughly 35 Jewish students.

Lelonek called an all-sixth-grade assembly first thing Tuesday morning. She said she asked the students if they had heard of each designated “day.” Nearly all raised their hands. Then she asked, “What’s tomorrow going to be? ‘Hit A Principal Day?’”

“You could have heard a pin drop,” she said. “One started saying, ‘Oh, no, Ms. Lelonek.’”

“I said, ‘Don’t say a word.’”

Lelonek said discipline will range from parent conferences to suspensions.

She said the sixth-graders will be studying the Holocaust later this year. “It’s going to be a little more meaningful this year than it’s ever been before,” she said.

Good for her. Because someone needs to teach those children.

Former National Security adviser, Robert MacFarlane wrote about the attack on the Marine barracks in Beirut and its aftermath. Apparently, the United States had a response planned against Hezbollah targets in the Bekaa Valley, but it was aborted.

Cabinet officers often disagree, and rigorous debate and refinement often lead to better policy. What is intolerable, however, is irresolution. In this case the president allowed the refusal by his secretary of defense to carry out a direct order to go by without comment — an event which could have seemed to Mr. Weinberger only a vindication of his judgment. Faced with the persistent refusal of his secretary of defense to countenance a more active role for the marines, the president withdrew them, sending the terrorists a powerful signal of paralysis within our government and missing an early opportunity to counter the Islamist terrorist threat in its infancy.

It’s a pretty strong indictment of Caspar Weinberger and implicitly of President Reagan.

The Donovan lists the 241 servicemen who were killed. Two years ago Ocean Guy related a more personal recollection of the attack.

If the United Stataes had struck, would it have forestalled the growth of radical Islam in the past quarter century?

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Gas is $2.15 at the local Costco and Sam’s Club in Richmond, and OPEC is meeting to try to stop oil from falling any further.

Crude oil rose for a second day on speculation OPEC will agree to cut output to stem a more than 50 percent in drop in prices from July’s record.

Venezuela and Iran are among members to have called for a reduction at today’s meeting in Vienna. OPEC President Chakib Khelil said there is a consensus to trim supplies without agreement on the size. Oil is poised to drop for a fourth week, the longest losing streak since January last year.

“There are a lot of people who don’t want to be in a short position ahead of OPEC’s announcement,” said Toby Hassall, an analyst with Commodity Warrants Australia Ltd. in Sydney. “OPEC will probably go with a strategy of cutting now and then wait for more evidence of the demand situation and then cut output again before the end of the year.”

Yeah, but rising from $66 to $68/bbl is my kind of rise. Plus, there’s the potential for some serious falling-outs among, um, frenemies.

Crude prices dipped yesterday after Saudi Arabian Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi declined to express his support for a possible cut, on his arrival in Vienna. Saudi Arabia and Iran are the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries’ two biggest producers.

“Who said anything about a cut?” al-Naimi said when asked whether he supports the possibility of the group agreeing to reduce output. “Prices will be determined by the market.”

It is to be hoped. Because when I read facts like these, I smile, smile, smile.

Saudi Arabia needs oil prices of less than $30 a barrel to balance its government budget, according to Merrill Lynch & Co. estimates. The United Arab Emirates requires $40 a barrel and Qatar $55.

Iran, with double the population of Saudi Arabia, has a breakeven point of about $100 a barrel, according to Edward Morse, managing director and chief economist at Louis Capital Markets LP in New York. In Venezuela, where President Hugo Chavez’s government is spending oil revenue on social programs, the figure is about $120, he said.

Even if the price goes back up to $70-80/bbl, Iran is screwed—and we still get relief at the pump.

I wish the OPEC ministers the very worst of luck. Particularly the Iranians. It couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of oil ticks.

Update: OPEC is cutting production by 1.5 million bbl. The market reacted by dropping the price of crude oil to $62.96 at 8 a.m.

The must-read quote of the day:

OPEC President and Algerian Oil Minister Chakib Khelil said at a news conference that the cut will be “100 percent effective” in stabilizing prices.

Pardon my schadenfreude. Oh, no, don’t. These are the scumbags who have financed the murderers of Jews and Americans for decades, and who take our money and turn it into dictatorship and despotism. I hope oil collapses to $30 a barrel. We’ll still be working on alternative fuels. They won’t be working on alternative products for their economies.