Whipped Cream Difficulties

Bunch of stuff from the NYT this morning. Sorry, but that’s how things roll sometimes.

First up: I didn’t know there were plans for an Eisenhower memorial. I like Ike, and the artist’s conception doesn’t strike me as being too awful. However, I’m skeptical of the need for yet another memorial in DC. The big news here is that Eisenhower’s family is now raising “concerns” about the design.

“He was chief of staff of the Army; he was a two-term president of the United States,” said Susan Eisenhower, a granddaughter. “It’s in those roles that America has gratitude for him, not as being a young boy with a great future in front of him.”

Extra bonus points: the memorial designer is WCD’s (and Lawrence’s) favorite architect.

Next up: C.J. Chivers has an neat piece about the Navy’s training program for underwater and overwater egress from downed aircraft.

The pilot — feet near the surface, head near the bottom, sightless — was to disconnect himself from the buckled straps, wiggle free, open the window and pull himself through and out, a series of movements intended to simulate what he might need to do in an aircraft that had struck the sea at night.

And this is why they do it:

Lieutenant Farley followed the only instructions he knew. “I did exactly what the training had taught me,” he said. “I grabbed a reference point, drew my breath right before the water went over my head and unbuckled.”
As he slipped free from his seat, he could see nothing. He pulled himself toward where he thought he might escape, but lost his way. He does not remember finding the exit, but he must have. Just before his lungs gave out he was on the surface, the last man out.
Everyone survived: two pilots up front, three crew members and the two passengers.

Lecture mode on:

“I hate it with a passion,” he said. “But if you are in a bad situation and have trained for it, then you revert to your training and what you know. It is why I am alive.”

And finally:

A New York City police officer whom prosecutors called the leader of a group of officers who accepted thousands of dollars in cash in return for illegally transporting firearms into the state pleaded guilty on Monday in Federal District Court in Manhattan.

I commend to the attention of Mayor Bloomberg and “Mumbles” Menino Matthew 7:5. Better yet, I commend to both gentlemen  and the other members of the criminal organization Mayors Against Illegal Guns the simple strategy of shutting the f–k up.

Edited to add: Oh, drat. I forgot that I wanted to make note of Alberto Contador being stripped of his 2010 Tour de France win. Congrats to Andy Schleck.