Gone with the Wind - 06 August 2008
Aug. 6th, 2008 08:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
silveradeptToday marks a momentous occasion - the first atomic strike by one nation against another, to great loss of life. History records that if not for this and the followign strike, the Second Great War would have been even more costly in lives. It also opened most people’s eyes to the reality of atomic warfare and accelerated the pace of developing newer and even more destructive weapons.
My professional self notes a dazzling array of statistics showing that librarians are often a cynical lot, feeling a disconnection from their communities and their Board, unequipped for the reality of the job, and sometimes having administration that seems out of step with the front-line staff. So far, only some of that applies to me.
Internationally, the current administrator will speak to the Chinese government about easing up on its authoritarianism, after having already spoken to North Korea about possibly sharing in South Korea's prosperity if it following hte disarmamnt plans exactly. The administrator may want to makea short stop to place in the Middle East and give his support for ending the practice of promising young children to get married, without their consent, and long before they can even have sexual relationships, putting some pressure on the government there to pass a minimum age for marriage, at least, and hopefully with that, a way of preventing male guardians from marrying off their charges without their consent or consultation.
Considering there are athletic games in China, soon, though, expect a barrage of material about China’s unique perspective on the word “freedom”. Ex-Olympic speed-skaters have their visas revoked for being associated with a Darfur advocacy group, Olympic cyclists wearing smog masks when arriving have to apologize for slighting the government's efforts at smog control, the question of Tibet hanging in the air, including attempts already made to prevent journalists from covering protests, despite the guarantees of journalistic freedom, the crackdown in progress in the name of "security", and the rather Orwellian attitude and actions the Chinese government has, there’s the possibility of quite some story to reported on. The question is whether the news will be reported on, or whether it will be buried in favor of the sport.
The hot spot of fighting is likely to move farther east, given new intelligence that suggests Pakistani spy personnel assisted in the bombings of India's embassy in Afghanistan. The War on a Concept is neverending, only front-changing, it looks like, and it looks like the perpetual military debt spending will continue, as well.
In domestic matters, the current administration flatly denies they forged and backdated a letter linking Saddam Hussein to al-Qaeda so they had a justification to attack Iraq. This allegation comes with other allegations that the current administration already knew there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq before invading, buried it, and cut off the intelligence that was repeatedly saying this. The problem with this administration is that such a tactic seems credible enough that it can’t be denied out of hand. Considering how much the populace has already been lied to on Iraq, having conveniently created the sought-after justification would not be out of character. Who can we trust in this administration, if anyone at all? After all, they supposedly got a memo seven years ago detailing a plot to attack the United States and didn't do anything about it. To be fair, though, they probably didn’t really think all that much of it, because terrorists say a lot of things, but rarely actually do them.
11 people charged in the giant data breach that compromised millions of credit an debit card numbers, including people who shopped in the last couple years at TJ Maxx and other stores. One of the people charged turned out to be both helping the government and the hackers.
The Tom Dispatch tells us how conservatives have stayed true to their roots and ideology - and in doing so, have effectively wrecked the United States government and pilfered as much as they could while doing so. Paired with Clyde Prestowicz's assertion that multinational corporations are siding with and working to advance the edconomic interests of authoritarian regimes such as China, and it seems like there isn’t anyone who’s fighting for the republican form of government, or the people that power it with their votes and taxes.
Wall Street is on an uptick, based on the Fed not changing interest rates and oil prices dropping. In some ways, Wall Street is its own thing. Why we base economic success on that, or talk about it so much is somewhat beyond me. No doubt, some people will be taking credit for the oil price drop, but “market forces” are probably to blame here.
In the candidate folds, Paris Hilton: 1, John McCain: 0. A response ad from Ms. Hilton, after Senator McCain’s campaign released an advertisement comparing Barack Obama’s popularity to Ms. Hilton’s and suggesting that this popularity was the only thing going for him. Whether done in genuine offense to the comparison or in playing up the “dumb blonde”-nes that has been a hallmark of her television appearances, Ms. Hilton does an excellent job of ridiculing the McCain campaign’s reasoning. So, we must ask: Whose brilliant idea was this?
Revoking the parental license in three, two, one... a father, wanting to teach his son "how to party", taught him to crush and snort powerful painkillers. The 15 year-old son died from the encounter. That’s not the father-son bonding time most people would think is healthy. In other parenting matters, letting kids play and take risks is normal and healthy, even if it does make a parent’s heart stop every time one of the kids could fall down or get hurt.
Opinions strike with Richard Spetzel expressing skepticism that Bruce Ivins did the anthrax attacks in 2001, based on the inability of prosecutors and investigations to trace the material and its construction back to the lab that Ivins worked in, and the supposed lack of training Ivins would have had from his workplace. Thomas Sowell would like to see an end to the media circus that surrounds investigations like these, considering that people are often tried and judged and attacked all in the media before any amount of actual charges and evidence becomes available. Even when found innocent, the media attention follows them wherever they go, and it’s hurting putting good people in office, according to Sowell, because they don’t want to deal with the mud-dragging that goes on.
The Wall Street Journal makes a logical sidestep, accusing the NEA of wanting to keep taxes high and spending more money on political action than on trying to fix bad schools. Except the fund they’re talking about comes from member contributions, for one, and considering that most schools are funded by property taxes, the NEA has a vested interest in getting all schools enough funding so that they can concentrate on doing well, rather than on worrying whether their test scores are going to cut their funding yet again. Besides, if the NEA did spend that money on helping schools out, no doubt the WSJ and others would be right there to criticize how that money was spent, probably in the advancement of “liberal causes” or somesuch.
John Bolton continues to accuse everybody of letting Iran build nuclear weapons while they try to find a diplomatic solution that, in his opinion, will never work. All the signs point to nuclear weapons building, because it’s not like Iran is being threatened by several other nations that they will level it if they continue enrichment, or anything.
In candidate opinions, Denis Prager finishes his analysis of Senator Obama's Germany speech and finds very little praiseworthy material. Ed feulner criticizes the Senator's plans to increase taxes on the very rich, considering it an obvious fact that increased taxes means less production, higher unemployment, and lower revenues, where as Reagan-style lowering of taxes would spur the economy back to previous heights. Republicans seem to have finally found a message they’re comfortable with - Drill, drill, drill, and we'll lower taxes, too. Just force those Democrats to let us do something, and never mind whether it works immediately or not. Even with the apparent Democratic stubbornness on oil drilling, oil prices did go down. The Republicans have figured out something they can offer a magical quick-fix on, with the promises of lower gas prices immediately, if only they could drill.
Last out of this section, Mark Morford has suggestions on how all the Bush supporters can apologize to liberals for their choice to put him in office, by buying environmentally sound and gas sippers, while saying it’s all about better meat, saving money, and keeping cash out of the hands of terrorists. But really, all he’d like is for Bush supporters to recognize that America is interconnected a lot more than they think, even if it is supposedly the world’s only superpower.
Scitech opens with some art - the P53rd Pslam, and pictures of the Martian skies. Beyond that, the intermediate stage between quasicrystals and regular repeating patterns follows Fibanocci, with triangles and squares repeating on that pattern. Huh. What other applications does Fibanocci have?
German police have access to a brassiere intended to be worn underneath bulletproof vests. It lacks wires and other pokey plastic bits, which could break through when the vest takes a bullet and distributes the force into the chest of the police officer.
A train design that seats a single person in a compartment, so you don’t have to deal with anyone else on the ride. Good for those that want privacy, not so good for those that want company, although the design does have a couple 4-person lounge seating areas.
Attempting to build a functioning Apple IIe-type computer for $12, so that people in the Third World can have computer labs and computing power for hopefully an amount that they can save up to get - or that a benefactor can buy for them in bushels.
Five tiny mistakes that had large consequences. For those occasions when someone asks, “Hey, what’s the worst that could happen?”
Last for tonight, exchanging vows on the wings of planes, clockwork insects, generated by adding gears and such to actual insect bodies, and a manual for sexual positions inside an automobile. We don’t make this stuff up, really.
My professional self notes a dazzling array of statistics showing that librarians are often a cynical lot, feeling a disconnection from their communities and their Board, unequipped for the reality of the job, and sometimes having administration that seems out of step with the front-line staff. So far, only some of that applies to me.
Internationally, the current administrator will speak to the Chinese government about easing up on its authoritarianism, after having already spoken to North Korea about possibly sharing in South Korea's prosperity if it following hte disarmamnt plans exactly. The administrator may want to makea short stop to place in the Middle East and give his support for ending the practice of promising young children to get married, without their consent, and long before they can even have sexual relationships, putting some pressure on the government there to pass a minimum age for marriage, at least, and hopefully with that, a way of preventing male guardians from marrying off their charges without their consent or consultation.
Considering there are athletic games in China, soon, though, expect a barrage of material about China’s unique perspective on the word “freedom”. Ex-Olympic speed-skaters have their visas revoked for being associated with a Darfur advocacy group, Olympic cyclists wearing smog masks when arriving have to apologize for slighting the government's efforts at smog control, the question of Tibet hanging in the air, including attempts already made to prevent journalists from covering protests, despite the guarantees of journalistic freedom, the crackdown in progress in the name of "security", and the rather Orwellian attitude and actions the Chinese government has, there’s the possibility of quite some story to reported on. The question is whether the news will be reported on, or whether it will be buried in favor of the sport.
The hot spot of fighting is likely to move farther east, given new intelligence that suggests Pakistani spy personnel assisted in the bombings of India's embassy in Afghanistan. The War on a Concept is neverending, only front-changing, it looks like, and it looks like the perpetual military debt spending will continue, as well.
In domestic matters, the current administration flatly denies they forged and backdated a letter linking Saddam Hussein to al-Qaeda so they had a justification to attack Iraq. This allegation comes with other allegations that the current administration already knew there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq before invading, buried it, and cut off the intelligence that was repeatedly saying this. The problem with this administration is that such a tactic seems credible enough that it can’t be denied out of hand. Considering how much the populace has already been lied to on Iraq, having conveniently created the sought-after justification would not be out of character. Who can we trust in this administration, if anyone at all? After all, they supposedly got a memo seven years ago detailing a plot to attack the United States and didn't do anything about it. To be fair, though, they probably didn’t really think all that much of it, because terrorists say a lot of things, but rarely actually do them.
11 people charged in the giant data breach that compromised millions of credit an debit card numbers, including people who shopped in the last couple years at TJ Maxx and other stores. One of the people charged turned out to be both helping the government and the hackers.
The Tom Dispatch tells us how conservatives have stayed true to their roots and ideology - and in doing so, have effectively wrecked the United States government and pilfered as much as they could while doing so. Paired with Clyde Prestowicz's assertion that multinational corporations are siding with and working to advance the edconomic interests of authoritarian regimes such as China, and it seems like there isn’t anyone who’s fighting for the republican form of government, or the people that power it with their votes and taxes.
Wall Street is on an uptick, based on the Fed not changing interest rates and oil prices dropping. In some ways, Wall Street is its own thing. Why we base economic success on that, or talk about it so much is somewhat beyond me. No doubt, some people will be taking credit for the oil price drop, but “market forces” are probably to blame here.
In the candidate folds, Paris Hilton: 1, John McCain: 0. A response ad from Ms. Hilton, after Senator McCain’s campaign released an advertisement comparing Barack Obama’s popularity to Ms. Hilton’s and suggesting that this popularity was the only thing going for him. Whether done in genuine offense to the comparison or in playing up the “dumb blonde”-nes that has been a hallmark of her television appearances, Ms. Hilton does an excellent job of ridiculing the McCain campaign’s reasoning. So, we must ask: Whose brilliant idea was this?
Revoking the parental license in three, two, one... a father, wanting to teach his son "how to party", taught him to crush and snort powerful painkillers. The 15 year-old son died from the encounter. That’s not the father-son bonding time most people would think is healthy. In other parenting matters, letting kids play and take risks is normal and healthy, even if it does make a parent’s heart stop every time one of the kids could fall down or get hurt.
Opinions strike with Richard Spetzel expressing skepticism that Bruce Ivins did the anthrax attacks in 2001, based on the inability of prosecutors and investigations to trace the material and its construction back to the lab that Ivins worked in, and the supposed lack of training Ivins would have had from his workplace. Thomas Sowell would like to see an end to the media circus that surrounds investigations like these, considering that people are often tried and judged and attacked all in the media before any amount of actual charges and evidence becomes available. Even when found innocent, the media attention follows them wherever they go, and it’s hurting putting good people in office, according to Sowell, because they don’t want to deal with the mud-dragging that goes on.
The Wall Street Journal makes a logical sidestep, accusing the NEA of wanting to keep taxes high and spending more money on political action than on trying to fix bad schools. Except the fund they’re talking about comes from member contributions, for one, and considering that most schools are funded by property taxes, the NEA has a vested interest in getting all schools enough funding so that they can concentrate on doing well, rather than on worrying whether their test scores are going to cut their funding yet again. Besides, if the NEA did spend that money on helping schools out, no doubt the WSJ and others would be right there to criticize how that money was spent, probably in the advancement of “liberal causes” or somesuch.
John Bolton continues to accuse everybody of letting Iran build nuclear weapons while they try to find a diplomatic solution that, in his opinion, will never work. All the signs point to nuclear weapons building, because it’s not like Iran is being threatened by several other nations that they will level it if they continue enrichment, or anything.
In candidate opinions, Denis Prager finishes his analysis of Senator Obama's Germany speech and finds very little praiseworthy material. Ed feulner criticizes the Senator's plans to increase taxes on the very rich, considering it an obvious fact that increased taxes means less production, higher unemployment, and lower revenues, where as Reagan-style lowering of taxes would spur the economy back to previous heights. Republicans seem to have finally found a message they’re comfortable with - Drill, drill, drill, and we'll lower taxes, too. Just force those Democrats to let us do something, and never mind whether it works immediately or not. Even with the apparent Democratic stubbornness on oil drilling, oil prices did go down. The Republicans have figured out something they can offer a magical quick-fix on, with the promises of lower gas prices immediately, if only they could drill.
Last out of this section, Mark Morford has suggestions on how all the Bush supporters can apologize to liberals for their choice to put him in office, by buying environmentally sound and gas sippers, while saying it’s all about better meat, saving money, and keeping cash out of the hands of terrorists. But really, all he’d like is for Bush supporters to recognize that America is interconnected a lot more than they think, even if it is supposedly the world’s only superpower.
Scitech opens with some art - the P53rd Pslam, and pictures of the Martian skies. Beyond that, the intermediate stage between quasicrystals and regular repeating patterns follows Fibanocci, with triangles and squares repeating on that pattern. Huh. What other applications does Fibanocci have?
German police have access to a brassiere intended to be worn underneath bulletproof vests. It lacks wires and other pokey plastic bits, which could break through when the vest takes a bullet and distributes the force into the chest of the police officer.
A train design that seats a single person in a compartment, so you don’t have to deal with anyone else on the ride. Good for those that want privacy, not so good for those that want company, although the design does have a couple 4-person lounge seating areas.
Attempting to build a functioning Apple IIe-type computer for $12, so that people in the Third World can have computer labs and computing power for hopefully an amount that they can save up to get - or that a benefactor can buy for them in bushels.
Five tiny mistakes that had large consequences. For those occasions when someone asks, “Hey, what’s the worst that could happen?”
Last for tonight, exchanging vows on the wings of planes, clockwork insects, generated by adding gears and such to actual insect bodies, and a manual for sexual positions inside an automobile. We don’t make this stuff up, really.
