Flashback

Just a couple of quick hits which brought me back to last summer. Woke up this morning to news that the Georgian army was rebelling after falling asleep to last Thursday's Daily Show with a clip of the Large Hadron Collider. The never failing race to see who will truly bring about the end of the world, war or science (both?). Seems as though Saakashvili will live to see another day in power as the BBC only has the Rebellion Over story posted. Yet it seems that his presidency is on the same start and stop schedule of the machine that could bring about the end of it all, at least if crazies like this are to be believed:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	M - Th 11p / 10c
Large Hadron Collider
thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Economic Crisis First 100 Days

The accelerator was powered up for a short time last fall, fired up on Sept. 9th, just after the war down in Georgia wound down, then burst a pipe 10 days later leaking liquid helium. The Russians bitch slapped the poor little Georgians, taking out most of Gori, a town I visited a few years back to see native son Stalin's statue, almost as quick as the circuit was completed by the beam of low-energy particles fired through the collider's 17-mile (27-kilometer) underground track. In case you missed it, this experiment is out to show the world as it existed fractions of moments after the big bang, with collisions at speeds 99.999999% that of light hopefully yielding the fabled Higgs boson, or God particle - or maybe a micro black hole or strangelet . Meanwhile, the Russians and the Americans along with NATO, continue their proxy war in poor Georgia as fingers are being pointed at the Russians for instigating the attempted coup.

Re-start for the collider was to be early spring, but instead continue on the parallel universe shared with Georgia. NATO exercises are planned around Tbilisi - or more importantly designed because Abhkazia and South Ossetia. The planning of these exercises is almost too blatant a display, but it is playing out as expected. The sound of Putvedev's protests seemed to foreshadow the sounds of the colliders start up hum once again. It seems like yet another play scripted for Medvedev to step from out of Putin's shadow, but I somehow doubt Putin is ready to take a farewell bow.

Of course this bow is exactly what Saakashvili was most likely orchestrating the avoidance of through this 'coup'. While the collider only needed to be warmed from -271 degrees C to allow workers in to do the repair work last year, Georgia's president faces far more internal heat from opposition in his country. Images of protesters camped out in cages blocking the main drag of the capital (yes walked it, it is the only main artery) have reinforced the image of a nation without faith in its leader. Funny how many claimed the Russians lost the propaganda war, the real fight last year, yet I've been swayed to their side by what I've read since. NATO exercises are due to start tomorrow, the collider won't be up and running until September (with Tom Hanks flipping the switch?!?) with real results about the beginning (and end) of the universe not coming in until a year later. Maybe we've got a while to survive if these pesky Ruskies and Georgians can get along, well, until 2012 that is!!!