The Berg

Very cool.

An auction house is selling a black and white photo of the iceberg that experts say the Titanic struck shortly before it sank on its maiden voyage.

The photo was taken April 12, 1912, two days before “the unsinkable ship” met her demise when she hit an iceberg shortly before midnight April 14, killing 1,502 people.

In Photos: Expensive Items

The photo shows a huge iceberg with a distinctive elliptical shape. The photograph was taken by the captain of the S.S. Etonian, according to RR Auction of Amherst, N.H. The caption reads, “Copyright. Blueberg taken by Captain W.F. Wood S.S. Etonian on 12/4/12 [April 12, 1912] in Lat 41° 50 N Long 49° 50 W. Titanic struck 14/4/12 [April 14, 2012] and sank in three hours.”

There were no photos of the iceberg before this one emerged, but two Titanic crew members drew sketches of the iceberg that they saw April 14. Both sketches are similar to the elliptical shape of the iceberg in the photo, according to RR Auction.

Zoo Interchange

Ugh.

MADISON — State officials are proposing to delay reconstruction on the busiest interchange in Wisconsin: the Zoo Interchange near Milwaukee.

The idea was detailed in a budget request released this month from the Department of Transportation after years of Gov. Scott Walker criticizing his predecessor for not prioritizing work on the interchange.

Transportation Secretary Mark Gottlieb said the completion date for the project may need to be pushed back from 2018 to 2010 if more money isn’t put toward roads.

[...]

A two-year delay would also increase the project’s overall costs by nearly $50 million — about $40 million from inflation and $5 million to $8 million for additional maintenance.

I spent a fair amount of time driving in other areas of Wisconsin last week. Many perfectly good intersections have been replaced with roundabouts and little-used roads have been paved again. The Zoo Interchange is one of the busiest interchanges in the state. It’s also one for which we had to pay for temporary replacement bridges because it’s falling apart. Gottlieb’s priorities are wrong if the Zoo Interchange isn’t at the top of the list.

Legal Challenge to Individual Mandate Revived

From Reuters. 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday revived a challenge to President Barack Obama’s healthcare reforms, allowing a Christian college to pursue litigation raising First Amendment objections to a law that the court mostly upheld in June.

Liberty University, based in Lynchburg, Virginia, had challenged both the individual mandate, which required all people to obtain insurance by 2014 or pay a penalty, and a separate mandate requiring large employers to provide coverage for workers.

In September 2011, a federal appeals court in Richmond, Virginia, said it lacked jurisdiction because challenging the mandates would have violated the federal Anti-Injunction Act’s ban on lawsuits seeking to halt collection of a tax.

The Supreme Court did not include Liberty’s appeal among the cases it reviewed earlier this year, which led to its upholding of the individual mandate by a 5-4 vote. A day after it ruled, the court formally declined to review Liberty’s appeal.

But the university asked for a rehearing, saying that because the 4th Circuit was wrong to decide it lacked jurisdiction, its decision should be thrown out, and a new lawsuit should proceed. The Supreme Court’s order on Monday allows that to happen.

Efficient Energy

There are many “energy efficient” projects that are nothing more than routine maintenance - like replacing windows, boilers, etc. - that are being hidden under this farce.

UNDATED (WSAU)  Wisconsin schools are taking advantage of a three-year-old state law to catch up on maintenance and become more energy-efficient. According to Gannett newspapers, school districts throughout the state have borrowed $134-and-a-half million on energy projects since 2009, without having to get voters’ approval. The law lets school districts exceed their state revenue limits without referendums, in order to borrow for energy projects.

Last year the law was expanded to let schools spread their payments over a number of years instead of just one. And that spurred a big increase in borrowing – from about $9-million in fiscal 2011 to $93-million this year, with around 30 projects throughout the state each year.