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"Anybody wanting a piece of me without my consent can come back tomorrow and go to the end of the line. I gladly accept your requirement to be treated likewise." --jomama

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The Granfalloon

Part of a short work of fiction. (See Chaps. 7-12) I won't.

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Dark beer.

10.31.04 (3:36 pm) [edit]

Mmmm beer... proof that god loves men.

Mmmm beer .. helping people get laid for
thousands of years

Mmmm beer ... the cause of and solution to all
of mans problems!

Mmmm beer, even available in the Dark Ages.
(Thanks to L. Reichard White for this.)

Bring it on, the beer and the Dark Ages.

Give me Firefox or give me death.

10.31.04 (3:24 pm) [edit]

"Taking a page from the social action playbooks
of Middle East peaceniks and political activists,
a band of Firefox fans pooled their money to take
out a full-page ad in the New York Times. The
advertisement was the brainchild of Rob Davis, a
Minneapolis marketer, who stumbled on Firefox
after catching a computer-killing virus in June.
Mr. Davis blamed his browser at the time,
Microsoft’s Internet Explorer."

You go, Firefox.

Full text.

Another October surprise?

10.31.04 (10:41 am) [edit]

"What the world had been waiting for has finally
arrived.

The electricity generator that uses no form of
external energy was launched today, viewed by
over 100 specially invited guests.

Energy companies and individual[sic] from USA,
Russia, China, India, Canada, Australia, UK and
many more attended the launch."

Keep your eyes open. There are more to come.

Think about how a 'Free Energy' project coming
to market will change the world.

Big time.

Full text.

The real terrorists.

10.31.04 (4:31 am) [edit]

"[G]overnments kill far more people than do
terrorist groups. From 1980 to 2000,
international terrorists killed 7,745 people,
according to the U.S. State Department. Yet,
in the same decades, governments killed more
than 10 million people in ethnic-cleansing
campaigns, mass executions, politically caused
famines, wars, and other slaughters. The
9/11 attacks made 2001 probably the only year in
decades in which the number of people
killed by international terrorists even
approached 1 percent of the number killed by
governments. Governments pose a far greater
threat to peace and survival than do terrorist
groups." - James Bovard

Will the real terrorists please stand up.

Read the numbers and weep.

The ever limper dollar.

10.30.04 (4:20 pm) [edit]

Dollar 'gap' closed.

Whew, that was fast.

Hang on to your hats and all your other loose
stuff, folks. Gonna be a wild ride down this
chute.

Hubris thru prayer.

10.30.04 (10:40 am) [edit]

Another of Ambrose Bierce's witticisms from his Devil's Dictionary...

PRAY, v. To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf
of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy.

http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/Literature/Bierce/Dev ilsDictionary/P-S.html" title="http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/Literature/Bierce/Dev ilsDictionary/P-S.html" target="_blank"http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/L...

Future Imperfect

10.29.04 (4:47 pm) [edit]

"Any of the futures I have just sketched might
happen, but not all. If nanotech turns the world
into gray goo in 2030, it will also turn into
gray goo the computers on which artificial super
intelligences would have been developed in 2040.
If nanotech bogs down and A.I. does not, the
programmed computers that rule the world of 2040
may be more interested in their own views of how
the human species should evolve than in our view
of what sort of children we want to have. And,
closer to home, if strong private encryption is
built into our communication systems, with the
encryption and decryption under the control not
of the network but of the individuals
communicating with each other–the National
Security Agency's nightmare for the past twenty
years or so–it won't matter how many telephone
lines the FBI can tap.

P2P...Skype is well on the way.

That is one reason this book is not prophecy. I
expect parts of what I describe to happen but I
do not know which parts. My purpose is not to
predict which future we will get but to use
possible futures to think about how technological
change will affect us and how we can and should
change our lives and institutions to adapt to it."

The first online book that I'm aware of that allows
comments at numerous points throughout.

Very well done by a master idea man...with a lot
to chew on.

See it here.

Is it ok if Reality comes to dinner tonite, Ma?

10.29.04 (10:16 am) [edit]

"'Credit expansion is the governments' foremost
tool in their struggle against the free market.
In their hands it is the magic wand designed to
conjure away the scarcity of capital goods, to
lower the rate of interest or to abolish it
altogether, to finance lavish government
spending, to expropriate the capitalists, to
contrive everlasting booms, and to make everybody
prosperous.' - Ludwig von Mises

Ludwig didn't live long enough to see it all
come apart but you probably will.

...

Over the 12 months ending August 2004, 33% of
net foreign purchases of long-term US securities
have come from the official sector - double the
15% share of the prior 12 months and over four
times the portion of the 2000-02 period,
according to Morgan Stanley.

Private investors are turning their backs on US
securities and the buck. The Asian central banks
are still net buyers, for political reasons, but
there are signs that ball game is in its late
innings."

And the fat lady's in the wings now warming up
for the final act.

See why.

Real sculpture comes to Russia.

10.29.04 (9:27 am) [edit]

"Constructing random monuments is all the rage in
Russia. After decades of the obligatory statues
of Lenin and Stalin on every town’s main square,
people are acquiring a taste for sculptures that
honor everyday things or overlooked characters
from Russian culture."

Hmmmmm.

Could it be that self-expression rather than
propaganda is winning?

Such a politically incorrect thing to do!

Cheers, guys.

Full story.

Who's gonna get left holding the burlap sack?

10.28.04 (10:00 am) [edit]

"Holding nearly half the debt of the United
States, those foreign countries - not Americans -
now control America's destiny. It is just a
matter of when those countries will have had
enough of letting the United States claim 80
percent of the world's savings - of letting
Americans think that the world owes them a
living. This is a dream world.

The real world may soon signify otherwise by
coming up with an alternative to the dollar as an
international currency, such as the euro or even
gold. That may mean a sharp devaluation of the
dollar, a spike in U.S. interest rates, vast
inflation, and a decline in U.S. living standards
as severe as that of the Depression."

Basically what I've been saying here. I would
have re-worded the last sentence as you know if
you tuned in here. And inflation? That
looks like a toss up to me...inflation or deflation.

Full article.

Harassing along.

10.28.04 (7:43 am) [edit]

I'm looking forward to Kerry winning the election.

I'm tired of listening to and harassing the
current needle-dick.

I want a new one to lay into.

Believe me, you ~~athletic~~, er, political supporters,
there'll be plenty of that whoever wins.

Is anybody in charge?

10.28.04 (5:02 am) [edit]

"Whether it was poetic justice or yet one more
instance of hubris, in the end there was indeed
an 'October surprise'. Call it the WMD-lite
scandal: the disappearance of 380 tons of dual-
use explosives in Iraq. Certainly Republican
Machiavelli-in-charge Karl Rove didn't see this
surprise coming - hitting the Bush administration
like a jet converted into a missile. Now the neo-
cons and Pentagon civilians are scrambling like
mad trying to cover US President George W Bush's
back and defuse yet another spectacular blunder."

Out of control....

"It's fun to watch these liars implode" --Lysander X

Bwahahahahah.

Full story.

The Almighty Dollar going limp.

10.28.04 (3:19 am) [edit]

Dollar looking to 'fill the gap' in prices then
continue weaker.

90% probability.

Who Is Threatening the World?

10.28.04 (3:05 am) [edit]

"The American foreign policy in the aftermath has
demonstrated the character of a bully, to the
extent that now one is hard-pressed to find
comparable bluster amid the examples of a world
history stocked with militarism and tyranny.
Those who bear the official mantle due to the
obeisance and great affirmation of the majority
have bullied the world; they have said that any
who even fail to assist their 'war on terrorism',
not only those who assist the terrorists but any
who fail to cooperate and to join in the hunt as
directed, will be treated as terrorists
themselves. And that amounts to a threat of war,
now that war has been declared on terrorism. So
now the 'peace-loving' American government has
literally threatened to attack any nation which
does not offer to join its military crusade.
These heedless rulers have explicitly threatened
every country in the world, which as far as we
know neither Napoleon, nor Hitler, nor Stalin,
and certainly none of the non-American power-
drunk rulers in the world today have done. The
rulers of America have made the American military
into the world's press gang."

The rest.

US losing control to Mexico?

10.27.04 (11:23 am) [edit]

[edited 10/28]

"In geopolitical terms, it could be said that
Mexico's new (but yet to be realized) power is
akin to that of a youngster who has achieved
legal age. He can drive, he can leave, nobody can
force him to do anything, but dad and mom prefer
to keep him infantilized and in the house. But at
some point, if they use too much force or
pressure, he explodes."

On the one hand I like the thought of that and
I suppose it has much truth in it, if only the
individuals in the Mexican government would express
this power.

On the other hand, we're just looking at two giants
(governments)lumbering down the road, waiting to
fall...all the while looking for more power over other
governments or their subjects.

Best not be underneath when the giants fall.

Tuf to do.

Full text.

The coming auction.

10.27.04 (4:21 am) [edit]

"An election is nothing more than an advance
auction of stolen goods." -- H.L. Mencken

It's just possible that there will be a payback
some day.

How might it work?

A whole bunch o' folks get together and decide
they're going to try, convict and hang the guilty.
Remember the French Revolution?

How might they find the guilty?

From the voters registration list?

Why would they care what candidate you voted for?

That's not why I don't vote anymore. I don't vote
because I won't participate in an auction of stolen
goods.

Canadian tragedy.

10.26.04 (3:50 pm) [edit]

Found on a forum...

"The tragedy of Canada is you could have had
British culture, French cooking, and American
technology.

But instead you´ve got American culture, British
cooking, and French technology."

That was very heavy.

More poor mathematics.

10.26.04 (3:19 pm) [edit]

Are there any good mathematicians on this
planet?

I have no idea. The best I can do is balance
my check book. How about you?

Does anyone know what the fuck they're talking
about?
_________________________ _____

"But now a shock: Canadian scientists Stephen
McIntyre and Ross McKitrick have uncovered a
fundamental mathematical flaw in the computer
program that was used to produce the hockey
stick. In his original publications of the stick,
Mann purported to use a standard method known as
principal component analysis, or PCA, to find the
dominant features in a set of more than 70
different climate records.

...

But it wasn’t so. McIntyre and McKitrick
obtained part of the program that Mann used, and
they found serious problems. Not only does the
program not do conventional PCA, but it handles
data normalization in a way that can only be
described as mistaken.

...

That discovery hit me like a bombshell, and I
suspect it is having the same effect on many
others. Suddenly the hockey stick, the poster-
child of the global warming community, turns out
to be an artifact of poor mathematics. How could
it happen? What is going on? Let me digress into
a short technical discussion of how this
incredible error took place."

Isn't it time to start questioning all authority?

Take a look.

Little spurts.

10.26.04 (10:57 am) [edit]

My pappy used to call an expert a little spurt a
long way from home.

Take a look at what the little spurts/pontificators
said before the crash of 1929. Hilarious.
(Thanks to Rieben for this link.)

But this Big One is gonna roll everyone's socks down
and make 1929 look like a Sunday school picnic.

The reason?

It's just time.

Related notes...

Dollar gapped down today.

Whole lotta folks overseas holding US debt denominated
in $. $ falls, they lose money, they dump the US
debt holdings. $ falls some more. They dump more.

Bad scene.

See what's going on in other countries holdings
of US debt...

What this numbcunt says...

"To fix its domestic problems, America must
tighten its budget, not drive down the dollar’s
value. But with presidential elections looming,
no US government would cut spending or raise
taxes. So forget about the economically
illiterate Bush administration daring to do
either. The silver lining here is that this
failure may revive the realization that no
country-not even mighty America-can devalue its
way out of trouble."

"...one of the deluded that believes someone is in control... --L. Reichard White...

The ultimate result of all politics is the
unconscious devalutation of everything.

Think about it.

Where to go from here.

10.25.04 (4:10 pm) [edit]

"America will destroy itself, because of what
America now really means to those who would lose
themselves, who would dissolve into a great mass
under its banner. All empires must fall, just as
all republics granted the fullness of time and
opportunity must become empires.

The imperative now is to avoid being crushed
underneath as the ruins of freedom topple, the
price of blindly binding oneself to what exists
now for the lingering love of what it once
represented. America will perish. But something
better than any empire or republic, something new
and different will rise up elsewhere in a future
time and place, probably before the American
Empire's collapse: an open society of free
individuals, a land redolent of some sensory
sweetness which, if one pauses, one will be able
to detect as reminiscent of Washington's
orchards, perhaps even like the hot hay smell of
the fields of Cincinnatus, borne by the summer
breezes of yesteryears long past."

More...

Taking Neither Side

10.25.04 (7:26 am) [edit]

"You ask where I stand on some or another
political struggle, some or another war, some or
another government or insurgency, some or another
political force, platform, party? A sword is
double-edged, and you ask me, which side? Each
side has an edge. Both sides can ream flesh and
split bone, and cleave the heart in two."

Damn. Why didn't I think of writing this?

But it's all been said before, in different words,
worth repeating.

http://www.promethea.org/Misc_Compositions/Sci ntillae.html#WINoC" title="http://www.promethea.org/Misc_Compositions/Sci ntillae.html#WINoC" target="_blank"http://www.promethea.org/Misc...

Staying loose.

10.24.04 (9:32 pm) [edit]

The use of the word 'must' below is rather
restrictive, but take a look because the
rest deserves considerable thought...
we don't 'must' do anything, do we...
_________________________ ___

"We do have an alternative to the morass and mess
of instituting morality. The important goal
involves striving for a complex, adaptable
understanding of what has value, and what should
be avoided. Virtually nothing proves useful and
productive and life-advancing in every situation,
virtually nothing always proves harmful or
useless or life-retarding. Surpass codified,
overly-simplified understanding... surpass
morality. Prometheanism envisions an adaptable
understanding of what advances life, unlike all
moral systems, from Objectivism to the spectrum
of Christian sects. In that sense, we might call
it amoral, or postmoral, or metamoral. One day
this complexity will be possible for many people.
In the meantime, we must allow each to form
judgments for themselves. We must have freedom,
we must avoid the temptation to officially
enforce morality (or amorality), because we
insist that we know what is good and what is bad,
and others do not. Although preventing the
transgression of individual freedom is necessary
in a Promethean society, this function need not
require officially enforced morality. It does not
seem inconceivable that at some future time this
function will no longer be associated with
morality and its transgression at all - rather,
simply identified among things obviously
beneficial and necessary to life's advancement,
known to have a role almost as natural and basic
as growth or sustenance."

From the Promethean Anticonstitution.

Heads up, folks.

10.24.04 (12:00 pm) [edit]

Dollar and Dow goin' into the toilet.

Gold, silver and oil movin' on out and up due primarily to $'s weakness. (These things are priced in $s)

Is this The Big One?

I give that an 80% probability.

Will "money" soon become unpoliticized, that is
of real value again and out of the hands
of power?

Likely.

What form will it take?

That's the Big Question, ain't it.

Gold and silver seem the boys in the lead...and
oil/gasoline...but this last not for the guy on
the street unless he has some respectable storage
facilities.

Used tires?

Only for making shoes.

Donkeys?

U betcha...and you can pick 'em up for nothing in
the Nevada desert last I heard.

I can see it now:

Jomama's Used Donkeys, guaranteed not to crack,
chip, rust, peel or ~~collect dust.~~
er, run you down.

You probably have your own ideas on what might be
valuable in such a scenario.

Well, what are you waiting for?

Put that bio-processor to work.

Promethea

10.23.04 (3:22 pm) [edit]

"Recall that the capability of each follower of
authority comes from self-expression, through
acts which a follower wills. Political power
remains potent in direct proportion to the
willing capability of those who subscribe to it. [My emphasis]
So the capability and the very existence of
authority likewise remains subject to the will of
those who would be commanded, and in this sense
it is voluntary. For the sake of authority
those who are commanded must be convinced to obey
rather than refuse, and in the long run this must
extend beyond merely complying in an instance to
become a deferential institution of behavior.
(Note very well that such obeisance is necessary
to preserve and advance authority, but that is
hardly the same as preserving and advancing life.)
The will to obey authority is obtained by the threat
of force, and by delusions[My emphasis] about the
reality of political power and government."

I've placed a link on the left panel of my blog
due to what I think are some of the finest ideas and
explanation of same put forth to advance a New Dawn
of Consciousness...Promethea, the most fully integrated
philosophy for the promotion of life I've seen.

Full text.

Pour Me a Cup of Mental Disorder

10.23.04 (8:57 am) [edit]

"Headline from the Arizona Daily Star: '1 coffee
a day is enough to cause addiction.'

Star quote from Roland Griffiths, a professor of
psychiatry and neuroscience: 'When people don't
get their usual dose they can suffer a range of
withdrawal symptoms.'"

Yes, marked by a rather pervasive grumpiness on
my part.

Even tho you are a voter, Gary, I forgive you.
This is good shit.

Hyer edukayshun.

10.22.04 (9:48 pm) [edit]

"A man's women folk, whatever their outward show
of respect for his merit and authority, always
regard him secretly as an ass, and with something
akin to pity. His most gaudy sayings and doings
seldom deceive them; they see the actual man
within, and know him for a shallow and pathetic
fellow. In this fact, perhaps, lies one of the
best proofs of feminine intelligence, or, as the
common phase makes it, feminine intuition."
--H. L. Mencken

I quietly go about believing this is how my
wife thinks of me and I'm convinced she's an
intuitive genius. She has a grade school education.

And me, a dumb ass, with a dumb-ass degree in
hyer edukayshun.

I keep telling her this and yet she insists that
the kids follow in my footsteps.

Maybe she ain't so smart after all.

An entry from The Devil's Dictionary

10.22.04 (3:18 pm) [edit]

ACCOMPLICE, n. One associated with another in a
crime, having guilty knowledge and complicity, as
an attorney who defends a criminal, knowing him
guilty. This view of the attorney's position in
the matter has not hitherto commanded the assent
of attorneys, no one having offered them a fee
for assenting. --Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

Run. Hide.

10.21.04 (10:02 pm) [edit]

"The rotter who simpers that he sees no
difference between the power of the dollar and
the power of the whip, ought to learn the
difference on his own hide— as, I think, he will."

Run, producers, run. Hide. Withdraw your support.

But I'm betting most of you already have.

The whole speech.

A concise history of redistribution

10.21.04 (1:30 pm) [edit]

"Crying out for the redistribution of wealth has
become a cultural institution, in part as the
eventual product of jealousy and envy, with an
unhealthy dose of spiteful revenge. The pathological
tendency to attack the most productive people
seems an ancient tradition. It was old when
'welfare' once again excused the official
robbery, taxation, that redistribution might
'solve' the problem of poverty. It was old when
the first income tax as justified by making only
the rich pay their 'fair share.' (If you remain
stubbornly inclined to believe that taxation
does not count as a kind of theft, try this
convincing experiment: simply choose to keep all
of the product of your efforts, and observe the
result.) It was old when Marx and Engels penned
their Manifesto of hatred. It was even old in the
days of allowing European Jews only the derided
vocation of money lender. And it was old when the
Church censured money-lending for profit, the
means of much modern prosperity. That tradition
of despising, insulting and punishing the freely
successful continues, and by no means only the
financially successful, always with a
predictable price for the successful and
everyone else who might depend on their success.
Spite leers behind the lips of the blind
followers of this worn road, as they desperately
assert principles of justice and fairness...far
too desperately to seem honest."

Not likely enough folks will see these people
for what they might have to offer to avoid the
coming Dark Age but whenever I hear the word
'movement' I gotta run to the crapper.

Still, they don't require membership yet so they're
all right in my book.

By the way, have you selected your donkey yet?

And now, The Prometheans.

The hubris of raw power

10.20.04 (2:15 pm) [edit]

"In the summer of 2002, after I had written an
article in Esquire that the White House didn't
like about Bush's former communications director,
Karen Hughes, I had a meeting with a senior
adviser to Bush. He expressed the White House's
displeasure, and then he told me something that
at the time I didn't fully comprehend – but which
I now believe gets to the very heart of the Bush
presidency.

"The aide said that guys like me were 'in what
we call the reality-based community,' which he
defined as people who ''believe that solutions
emerge from your judicious study of discernible
reality.' I nodded and murmured something about
enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut
me off. 'That's not the way the world really
works anymore,' he continued. 'We're an empire
now, and when we act, we create our own reality.
And while you're studying that reality –
judiciously, as you will – we'll act again,
creating other new realities, which you can study
too, and that's how things will sort out. We're
history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will
be left to just study what we do.''"

Could it be that the Power Junkies know they've
been 'found out' so from here on out it's, "Just
watch us kick ass"?

Do you think changing dribble-shits [you know,
'Pontificators'] in mid-stream is gonna change
anything?

I'm bettin' it ain't.

And I'm takin' it to the bank...or somewhere.

Full text.

The Ultimate Politics

10.20.04 (7:11 am) [edit]

"War is not an independent phenomenon, but the
continuation of politics by different means."
-- Carl von Clausewitz

Being found out.

10.19.04 (8:20 pm) [edit]

"In a society in which it is a moral offense to
be different from your neighbor your only escape
is never to let them find out." --Robert Heinlein

Getting harder to do every day, ain't it.

Are you self-respecting?

10.18.04 (8:59 pm) [edit]

"Of government, at least in democratic states, it
may be said briefly that it is an agency engaged
wholesale, and as a matter of solemn duty, in the
performance of acts which all self-respecting
individuals refrain from as a matter of common
decency." -- H.L. Mencken

Do you respect yourself? If not, who does?

Think about it.

Tesla circles?

10.18.04 (4:33 pm) [edit]

"But according to experts, the giant circles are
not supposed to be footballs, instead this
pattern apparently represents a diagram of an
electrical transistor designed 100 years ago by
the world's most mysterious inventor.

Crop circle experts say it is uncannily similar
to plans for one of Nikola Tesla's early pieces
of equipment.

Tesla is the unsung hero of pioneering
technology, now widely credited with inventing
radio before Marconi and coming up with the idea
for remote-control objects."

http://tinyurl.com/2lehy" title="http://tinyurl.com/2lehy" target="_blank"http://tinyurl.com/2lehy

The Contradictions.

10.17.04 (9:17 pm) [edit]

"The Christian in me knows it's wrong, but the
corrections officer in me can't help but love
making a grown man piss himself." --

Ain't it amazing how some folks can keep two
contradictory ideas in their heads at the same
time.

Most Christians I've met are very good at it but
this is sick shit.

What planet is this sick fuck from?

Full text.

What are ya waiting for?

10.17.04 (3:36 pm) [edit]

Do Something...

Support your local 'cognitive dissonance'

10.17.04 (11:02 am) [edit]

"...when adults are told a lie, even a 'big lie,'
often enough, especially by an 'authority figure'
(such as a 'leader'), eventually most of them
will come to believe it, even in the face of
overwhelming evidence to the contrary. And of
course when the rest of the group professes a
belief in the lie, then group-identification —and
to a certain extent, individual self-
preservation, as man is a 'social creature'—
steps in to reaffirm it. What Zimbardo calls
'deindividuation' takes hold at this point,
defined as 'a temporary state of suspended
personal identity.' The group then provides all
the 'identity' the individual needs, and
'cognitive dissonance' ceases to be a problem.

And this is why, in my opinion, we will never
really have such a thing as a truly 'free
society', except perhaps briefly, in rare places
and times. [Encrypted P2P will make it available
to all the individuals who want it. See Skype
for a good start on it.] For one thing, freedom
demands too much responsibility from most human
beings as individuals, responsibility that has,
for nearly all of human evolution, been
shouldered by the group. It is also why, even
though almost everyone knows that government
solutions to any given problem only tend to
exacerbate the problem, not solve it (poverty,
crime, drugs, etc., etc., etc.), most people
continue to support and believe in government
intrusions into every aspect of the individual's
social, economic and personal life. It is also
why arguments for a free society, however
rational or ostensibly persuasive, continue to
fall on deaf ears, and constitute essentially
'preaching to the converted.' Only a very small
percentage of human beings are genuinely
interested in the truth, much less abstract
principles such as individual liberty. They want
to believe that the leader is going to protect
them, that the priest is going to 'save their
souls,' and that their particular group is
superior to all other groups."

And this is why we're going into a Dark Age.

The "us and them" meme...a War of All Against All.

http://web.archive.org/web/20020613165221/ht tp" title="http://web.archive.org/web/20020613165221/ht tp" target="_blank"http://web.archive.org/web/20...://www.thetexasmercury.com/articles/parnell/HP20 020224.html

More on the coming Dark Age.

10.16.04 (4:37 pm) [edit]

"It is appropriate here to recall that the so-
called Dark Ages began with the flight of the
individuals into the protection of lords or
chapters and came to an end when the individual
again found it to his advantage to set forth on
his own. We live at a time when everything
conspires to push the individual into the fold."
-- Bertrand de Jouvenal

Ain't that the truth.

Civility lessons

10.16.04 (8:43 am) [edit]

Some civility lessons for your kids. (I call 'em that rather
than 'civics' lessons because thinking about the civics
lessons that I was taught gives me the hives.)

Ok, so you don't have any kids.

Why not print it out and pass it around your local
orphanage to do something to promote a New Age of
Enlightenment.

The Power of Nightmares

10.15.04 (9:14 pm) [edit]

"In an age when all the grand ideas have lost
credibility, fear of a phantom enemy is all the
politicians have left to maintain their power."

...

"After a 300-year debate between freedom of the
individual and protection of society, the
protection of society seems to be the only
priority," says Eyal. Black agrees: "We are
probably moving to a point in the UK where
national security becomes the electoral question."

Tell me. Hasn't that always the way it's
been where people have been true believers
in it? The illusion of security is all, isn't
it? But maybe you don't think it's an illusion.

Why not?

...

And then there are the twin risks that the
terrors politicians warn of will either not
materialise or will materialise all too brutally,
and in both cases the politicians will be blamed.
"This is a very rickety platform from which to
build up a political career," [my emphasis]
says Eyal. He sees the war on terror as a hurried
improvisation rather than some grand Straussian
strategy: "In democracies, in order to galvanize
the public for war, you have to make the enemy
bigger, uglier and more menacing."

Afterwards, I look at a website for a well-
connected American foreign policy lobbying group
called the Committee on the Present Danger. The
committee features in The Power of Nightmares as
a vehicle for alarmist Straussian propaganda
during the cold war. After the Soviet collapse,
as the website puts it, "The mission of the
committee was considered complete." But then the
website goes on: "Today radical Islamists
threaten the safety of the American people. Like
the cold war, securing our freedom is a long-term
struggle. The road to victory begins ... "

Ah...a new enemy. Please re-send your checks and
money orders to: Blah, blah.

The whole well-written report.

When there's a run on the nation state.

10.15.04 (2:56 pm) [edit]

"We must [now] address not only a run on a bank
or a firm, but also a run on nations." -American
President William Jefferson Clinton to the World
Bank and the IMF, October 6, 1998
_________________________ ________

He was right. So how does this happen and what
might be the result of this run?

Few people know, that currency markets are just
composite votes of a lot of people viewing the
financial sanity of, say, Argentina, Inc. for
example. Think of USA, Inc. Japan, Inc. etc. as
the ultimate corporation. The mass of these pricks
running these corps. pay no cost for being wrong.

Now think of the currency markets as being the
only discipline these wonks will ever know.
[See Argentina again.]

Over a trillion votes a day and over 30 times
the dollar volume of trades on the NYSE in one
day.

The only true democracy.

Also consider that currency markets are the only
true free markets left. Nobody has enuf cash to
manipulate a major currency to change its
direction for any meaningful period of time, not
even central banks in concert.

Out of control...and Bill above is just flappin'
his gums for effect, desperately searching for
a way to Hold The Nation State/Corporation
together.

Ironic, ain't it...that the very people who
created these worthless pieces of paper/digits
called money will be brought to their knees
with their creation.

But take heart. These wonks will probably be
working alongside you digging potatoes with
their wooden hoes, wearing their burlap sacks.

I suspect a Dark Age coming soon to a street near
you, not just an intellectual one. We've been in
the latter for quite a while.

I'm talking a full-blown Dark Age.

When USA, Inc. goes belly up, it'll take the
rest of the planet with it. It's well on the way.

What to do?

Get a donkey, a supply of wooden hoes and burlap
sacks then find a good plot of land to grow your
potatoes, corn, tomatoes etc.

That's my take.

You may differ...

I wouldn't dream of stopping you.

See much supporting material here.

The Enemy Within

10.15.04 (7:11 am) [edit]

Why do you fear his "parliament," This all
oppressive "government," When darker things lurk
deep inside Your mind; crawling, scuttling, they
hide. Worse by far than "police-state law," More
corrupt than any "legislature," Taxing far above
the progressive rate; A self-made ghost does,
your soul subjugate. For the "rulers of men" are
naught but dust. They rise, dictate, but fall they
must. Though out of sight, not out of mind, see?
The "ghost in the machine" saying - you're not
free. Oh deeply wounding psychoplasm. Why
hauntest thou in the mind's chasm? Why crippleth
thee what gives thee home, Why soil thy nest like
a common gnome? Out, out damn spook, begone I
say! For I have resolved, myself, this day, That
I stand free in body and soul, Not hindered by
chains nor ghoul. --unknown

The Strange Game so many play.

10.14.04 (9:02 pm) [edit]

"It's internationally agreed that all types of
plunder, mayhem or murder are acceptable for a
government, as long as it limits its predations
to its own citizens.
+
Let me see if I can explain this bizarre game in
plain talk.
+
People cordon off a piece of land and
arbitrarily announce that it is henceforth a
'sovereign nation.' Ruffians and schemers soon
grab the posts of government, and by the power
they vest in themselves set about plundering the
individuals who live there. This has been going
on for thousands of years, until today the entire
earth (other than a portion of the oceans) is
divided among different gangs, who wear pinstripe
suit[s], and run their plunder under the flag of
governments." -Albert Keuls, The Offshore Game,
From John Pugsley's Journal, Private
Conversations with the Money Masters

Now tell me...what fucking difference it makes
which piss ant politician is in charge of all this?
They all like to push the welfare/warfare buttons
in empty heads, heads that don't understand the
Ruling Concept above.

And those that do understand, do so for a short
period then are caught back in the endless
distractions fed to 'em by the Plunderer(s) in
Charge and all their assistants.

And all you Dull Sparks out there who yammer on
about "Getting back to the Constitution" or "Taking
American back" [to what?] might as well be pissin'
in the wind.

When was it yours to begin with?

Aack!

More.

Can you see thru the fog?

10.14.04 (8:39 pm) [edit]

Nicola Tesla, the little known genius.

10.14.04 (4:43 pm) [edit]

"It took no less than 100 years of today's fast-
moving events to fully grasp the importance of
the man[Tesla]. There is no explanation for this. One
can merely humorously assume that Tesla came from
some other world, to be born on Earth. His
results in experimental physics, which appeared
to be perfectly obvious, still cause indigestion
in orthodox theoretical physics circles."

Along with a discussion of his life and many
of his inventions, see the list of his patents

So you're gonna vote?

10.14.04 (10:45 am) [edit]

"Before voting, secure a few dollars and journey
deep into the exciting neighborhood nearest you.
Locate and enter the first brightly lit Stop 'N'
Rob that you see, and locate the Fortified Wines
Department. If in doubt, ask the attendant
lurking behind the scratched Plexiglass where the
'Mad Dog' or 'T-Bird' is. Remember the magic
formula: (Price / (Volume * Alcohol Percentage)).
Use this calculation to locate the election night
beverage of choice. Purchase a bottle, or two.
Two is better. Before leaving, also secure a few
Colas. In cans - that is important. Your beverage
might dissolve plastic bottles, and mixing a
drink through the narrow bottle mouth would prove
hard, soon."

Bottoms up.

Yet another paradox

10.13.04 (5:21 pm) [edit]

"...the more deeply and widely that people believe
in magic, the less magical are their lives, while
the more fully people untangle themselves from
belief in myths and magic, the more magical their
lives become."

Works for me...the second part.

Howbouchu?

More of the Divine Comedy

10.13.04 (2:32 pm) [edit]

"The world always makes the assumption that the
exposure of an error is identical with the
discovery of truth--that the error and truth are
simply opposite. They are nothing of the sort.
What the world turns to, when it is cured on one
error, is usually simply another error, and maybe
one worse than the first one." --H. L. Mencken

Being delusional

10.13.04 (1:55 pm) [edit]

"No American politician can talk sense when
ensnared by the big lie that the war with Iraq
was necessary. It was not necessary. It was a
strategic blunder. It has started something that
may already be out of anyone's control.

In military matters, pretense and delusion lead
to disaster. A deluded superpower is most
dangerous to itself."

http://www.counterpunch.org/roberts10112004.html" title="http://www.counterpunch.org/roberts10112004.html" target="_blank"http://www.counterpunch.org/r...

Peddling The Lie

10.13.04 (6:49 am) [edit]

"Undoubtedly, a stew of factors helps explain
the appearance of pieces like this. The urge of
reporters to make the front-page with a scoop is
powerful and easily played upon by administration
officials who can, of course, hand the same
'story' off to, say, reporters from the
Washington Post, if conditions aren't met. These
are, in other words, bargaining situations and
our imperial press, paper by paper, is seldom
likely to be in the driver's seat as long as its
directors set such an overwhelming value on
anything high officials might be willing to say,
no matter under what anonymous designations. That
much of this is likely to fall into the category
of lie and spin can hardly be news to
journalists. But it's a way of life. [Peddle The
Lie, knowingly. Something really sick about
that.] In this context, what the grant of
anonymity represents, if you think about it for a
moment, is a kind of institutional kowtow before
the power of the imperial presidency."

The major media is looking quite irrelevent in
today's world, ain't it.

But it's always been quite keen on being a
propaganda organ for "right thinking", whatever
the hell that might mean at any given moment.

Full story.

Living in another dimension.

10.12.04 (9:03 pm) [edit]

"Sadly, the truth is that economics departments
are overwhelmingly populated by second-rate
physics, math, and engineering students who were
originally attracted by the math and data games
which substitute for economic thought in today's
academic journals. These folks are what the
American Economic Association special committee
on graduate education has called 'idiot savants' -
- they don't actually know that much about what
happens in a real economy or even how it works.
And they certainly aren't richly schooled in
economic theory -- e.g. the history of economic
thought has been removed from the curriculum and
most economist today have never read the work of
Adam Smith, John Maynard Keynes, Friedrich Hayek,
or any other economist you can name off the top
of your head. What they do day in and day out is
a lot of math and here and there bits of
'blackboard economics' (see Ronald Coase) --
stuff premised on 'simplifying assumptions' which
make it inapplicable to the real world (e.g. the
constant use of mathematical uncertainty rather
than epistemic uncertainty -- see Donald Rumsfeld)."

Just more mathematical models unconnected to
reality.

Everyone's doing it, from physics to cosmology to
economics. I wonder where else it lurks, someplace
I'm not aware of.

Another place it has taken root: in the mind of the
true believer...the "nation", "corporation",
"government"...all disconnected from reality, living
only in the mind.

Abstractions built on abstractions. I wonder when
reality will jump up and bite us on the ass.

Chaos is coming.

Full report.

Therapeutic Fred

10.12.04 (4:10 pm) [edit]

"The remnants of the national character ferment
like a jar of mayonnaise in August, bubble,
bubble, bubble. Let’s hear it for bacteria. It is
good to see that at least something is working.
Better a robust rot than a pallid decline, I
say...

Therapy reminds me of nothing so much as a
castrated religious order. There is the same
proselytizing, the same zeal. Therapists see only
two classes of people, those who are in therapy
and those who ought to be. ('Are you saved?')
They exhibit the smug assurance of those who have
seen the light, and have Truth in a half-Nelson.
The difference is that, whereas religions usually
say that you are responsible for your bad
behavior and you ought to stop it, therapy tells
you that you are never responsible for anything.
No. It was your childhood. Or some chemical
imbalance. The Church of Avoided Guilt."

All of Fred's rant.

Exposing a Big Myth

10.12.04 (10:34 am) [edit]

"One of the most widely believed myths in America
today is the belief that corporations are an
inherent part of capitalism. Concomitant with
this is the idea that big corporations and big
government have an intrinsically hostile
relationship and that the stock market is a free
market.

Nothing could be further from the truth."

Full text.

The Giant Fudge

10.11.04 (10:19 pm) [edit]

The Standard Model (SM) of Physics Is a
Giant Fudge

"Further, the SM is not mathematically
consistent (Criterion 3). The SM calculations of
many ordinary values, such as the rest mass of
the electron, come out to be infinite. However,
from experiment we know the electron’s rest mass
to be 0.511 MeV. To get rid of this 'impossible'
result, 'renormalization' is invoked: the
positive infinity is, in effect, divided by a
negative infinity. Since the result of this
mathematically forbidden procedure is
indeterminate, the desired value of 0.511 MeV is
then simply entered by hand. This admitted fudge
would not work if we didn’t already know the
answers.

Feynman, who originated the
'renormalization' process (with Schwinger and
Tomonaga), himself called it a '. . .shell game.
. .Having to resort to such hocus-pocus has
prevented us from proving that the theory of
quantum electrodynamics is mathematically self-
consistent. . .[renormalization] is what I would
call a dippy process!' (Feynman, 1985) Asked for
what he had won the Nobel Prize, Feynman replied,
'For sweeping them [the infinities] under the
rug.' (Gleick, 1992)

Feynman was fuckin' with his collegues and
they and most everyone else bought it, even the
Nobel pukes.

That's really funny. That's hilarious.

But all it takes is One Bright Spark to uncover
the crap.

Earth, The Comedy Channel for our creators.

Bwahahahahaha.

On the face of it, if the results of
calculations of ordinary values come out to be
infinite, in case after case, shouldn’t we take
this as a gentle hint that something basic must
be wrong, and start looking for a better model?

Roooooaaaar.

With today's science?

Ur joking.

Instead, like the freshman that looks up the
correct values in the back of the book, we fudge
the answers. A student who pulled such a stunt
would flunk. The three famous professors who
pulled it shared a Nobel Prize.

This grant of a Nobel Prize for what is,
after all, nothing but an elaborate fudge,
testifies to the malaise of current theory. This
incredible award legitimized the fudge, which as
a result is now an accepted, even rewarded
scientific procedure. With this, physics lost the
ability to self-correct, as a fudge can always be
concocted to bring any datum, however discordant,
into at least apparent accord with the current
paradigm. As a direct consequence, most of the
nearly one hundred entities required by the SM
are unobserved. The problem with the medieval
debate over how many angels could dance on the
head of a pin was that angels were unobserved
entities, and so could have any desired
properties. Each of these classes of unobserved
entities in the SM amounts to a fudge or patch
applied to save a failing theory. So long as
these fudged entities are made unobservable in
principle, like the angel or the quark, they are
safe from experimental falsification.

See The Emperor's New Clothes and tell me it
doesn't apply. Come on, use your imagination.

The SM also has a major problem with mass. .
. . In other words, the Standard Theory is a
beautiful theory —but it applies to some other
universe, one in which all particles oblige the
theorists by being massless. Unfortunately, in
our universe, the stubborn particles perversely
persist in a theory that treats them as if they
didn’t. The current hope is that two more fudged
entities, the (unobserved) Higgs field and its
supposed quantum, the (unobserved) Higgs boson,
will somehow solve this dilemma."

—D.L. Hotson, "Dirac's Equation and the Sea of Negative Energy"

Out of control

10.11.04 (4:48 pm) [edit]

The Borg will lose...

Ooooha!
_____________________

"It can be used for all sorts of distributed
computing tools, and that's where we're going to
go with it," Wilken said. "It really eliminates
the need to have any centralized infrastructure."

Full text.

The real test of power.

10.11.04 (7:30 am) [edit]

"Today the real test of power is not capacity to
make war but capacity to prevent it."
-– Anne O'Hare McCormick

This statement shows a complete disregard of The
Ruling Concept of Power. The exercise of power is
not about anything more than the application of
force. It is not reason, conversation or the
prevention of more force since that's contrary
to it's nature.

The real test of power is found in the phrase,
"How many asses can we successfully kick today?"

And that's putting it mildly.

Another bunch o' good ol' boys.

10.10.04 (3:20 pm) [edit]

"The G7 is but one of an 'alphanumeric panoply
of bodies' (the G10, G20, G24 and G77 are others)
that attempt to co-ordinate the economic policies
of nation states. A recent review* of these
bodies, by Peter Kenen, Jeffrey Shafer, Nigel
Wicks and Charles Wyplosz, makes an eloquent and
considered plea for reform. Each of these groups
was set up in response to some issue of the
moment. But though the moments come and go, the
groups, clubs and committees come and stay. The
result is a disorderly scrum of bodies fighting
for turf."

..."an eloquent and considered plea for
reform".

Bwahahahahaha.

Might as well try to polish a turd.

Just another batch in a long line of meddle
freaks without an audience, these twits*,
outwardly pretending they have control but
getting together in their good 'ol boy clubs to
cry in their martinis about how their jobs will
all be gone soon...while continuing their lavish
parties on someone else's tab.

*twit: Thing not Worthy of Intense Trepidation.

The whole sorry spectacle.

Tblog

10.10.04 (3:19 pm) [edit]

Damn. Tblog is up and working today.

Don't that beat all?

Are you wired wrong or whut?

10.10.04 (8:26 am) [edit]

"I have for a few years thought the main
problem of the human race--the main sin, if you
will--is hubris, thinking one is god-like,
believing one has the power to move millions of
people around like pieces on a cosmic chessboard."

I have a "view from the other side".

It's a test.

I'm convinced.

Put together by whom is the big question...aliens
that cloned us for their comedy channel I suspect,
Truman Show style.

I also have a dream that one day we'll all awaken
in a flash and start laughing at those who would
order us about without paying us.

The strangest part of the present world is they
order us about and demand that we pay the
sombitches to do it...and the fools blithely
comply.

The paradox:

The whole world's wired wrong.

How are you wired?

Bwahahahah.

I also suspect that there's no shortage of
advertisers on "Earth, the Comedy Channel".

Full essay.

Irrelevent pop stars unite against Bush

10.09.04 (2:12 pm) [edit]

Somebody's gotta do it.

It's a dirty job.

Now if somebody else would just disunite
against all the worthless sombitches.

One at a time...under cover of darkness...
that's how it'll be done.

And when this is all over, no one will know
why it came apart so as to avoid it again.

The Mayans never "disappeared". They just walked
off.

And to this day, no one knows why. I suspect all
great empires die this way.

The subjects, attempting to get ahead a little,
just got pissed off with all the constant
sacrifice and, one at a time, just voted with
their feet, leaving The Current Institution
without their blood.

And now, for the ongoing Divine Comedy...
______________________

"LOS ANGELES—In an effort to motivate Americans
to go to the polls on Nov. 2, a coalition of
irrelevant pop stars is winding up a 36-city tour
that will culminate in a concert on Oct. 11 in
Washington, D.C."

Full text.

JET-man project

10.09.04 (8:07 am) [edit]

...a couple of comic strip characters come to
life...
____________________

"Following the 'Flying Man project, the logical
'next step' was to accomplish the secret dream of
being able to fly like Superman or the Rocketeer.
To do this, motorizing the wings was to be
achieved in order to be able to let the first
flying man ever to fly horizontal level!"

See the man flying.

Where are we going?

10.08.04 (9:20 pm) [edit]

"Today material aspiration is seen as being for
the foolish, the naive and the morally bankrupt.
But there is actually much to admire in the
desire to have more for yourself. It is this that
pushes individuals to go beyond what they're born
with, and to test the boundaries of society.
Individual aspiration is one of the major motors
for social development, for improving the lot of
the whole of society. The fact that self-
improvement is so widely derided presents a major
obstacle for anyone pushing for positive change.

So how did we get here?"

Doesn't it portend stasis or even regression
or devolution?

The long story.

More cleansing of the gene pool.

10.08.04 (8:09 am) [edit]

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation
Commission is advising hikers, hunters, fishers,
and golfers to take extra precautions and keep
alert for alligators while in Osceola, Polk,
Brevard and Orange Counties. They advise people
to wear noise-producing devices, such as little
bells on their clothing, to alert, but not
startle, the alligators.

They also advise carrying pepper spray in case
of an encounter with an alligator. It is also a
good idea to watch for fresh signs of alligator
activity.

People should recognize the difference between
small young alligator and large adult alligator
droppings.

Young alligator droppings are smaller and
contain fish bones and possibly bird feathers.

Adult alligator droppings have little bells in
them and smell like pepper spray.

Another mystery.

10.07.04 (7:59 pm) [edit]

See how 'green' we are as regards 'consciousness'.

We don't even know what it is.

So how can we be "conscious" if we can't define it?

Check it out.

More jobs outsourced.

10.07.04 (7:49 pm) [edit]

"CANTON, OH—QT2D-7, an 11-year-old electric
assembly-operations robot, was laid off Monday
when the Lawn-Boy plant that has employed him
relocated its manufacturing headquarters to New
Delhi, India...

According to Lawn-Boy executives, QT2D-7's
workload, along with that of 308 other robots
removed from the Canton plant Monday, will be
transferred to the New Delhi plant by December.

'No warning!' QT2D-7 said. 'No warning! No
severance!'

As the cost-saving benefits of globalization
become increasingly clear to CEOs and investors,
more businesses are laying off their domestic
robotic workforces and relocating mechanical jobs
overseas, a robot-labor expert said."

The rest.

The law-givers.

10.07.04 (4:38 pm) [edit]

"The kind of man who wants the government to
adopt and enforce his ideas is always the kind of
man whose ideas are idiotic." -- H.L. Mencken

What does that say about the law-givers?

What Holy Cause?

10.06.04 (8:54 pm) [edit]

"Faith in a holy cause is to a considerable
extent a substitute for the lost faith in
ourselves." -- Eric Hoffer

"Ourselves", as in each one of us.

Why the attraction to The Holy Cause?

Which Holy Cause?

To what end?

Has anyone figured out why a Holy Cause
promoted by someone else is any better
than one's own?

Tell me please.

Please.

I wanna know.

A little about Empire.

10.06.04 (4:15 pm) [edit]

"The Spanish Conquistidors called it--or "plata"--
silver plate, and this lusty band of amoral
conquerers burst upon the New World for the exact
same reason we now burst upon the treasure laden
Persian Gulf. If the Spanish could corner the
silver mines in Mexico, Bolivia and Peru, they
could control an enormous supply of wealth and
perhaps the world. Silver was the oil of the
Sixteenth and Seventeenth centuries, and a single
Bolivian silver mine contained the comparative
wealth of Kuwait in its day."

Full essay.

The courage to refuse

10.06.04 (1:19 pm) [edit]

The civilized person's defense...
______________________

"We, reserve combat officers and soldiers of the
Israel Defense Forces, who were raised upon the
principles of Zionism, sacrifice and giving to
the people of Israel and to the State of Israel,
who have always served in the front lines, and
who were the first to carry out any mission,
light or heavy, in order to protect the State of
Israel and strengthen it...

# We hereby declare that we shall continue
serving in the Israel Defense Forces in any
mission that serves Israel’s defense.
# The missions of occupation and oppression do
not serve this purpose – and we shall take no
part in them."

Isn't it time for all military services to
do likewise?

All of it.

Just the beginning.

10.05.04 (9:36 pm) [edit]

"Despite ongoing negotiations with its unions,
United Airlines has told the bankruptcy court
that the 'likely result' will be a decision to
terminate all of its pension plans.

That would precipitate the biggest pension
default in history, more twice the size of the
Bethlehem Steel Corporation default in 2002. The
move is expected to destabilize the already
struggling airline industry, prompting other old-
line carriers like Delta to eventually follow
suit to maintain competitiveness.

It would also put additional pressure on the
Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC,) the
federal agency that insures traditional pensions
in case companies go belly up. It's already
facing more than a $9 billion shortfall. A
default by United would saddle it with an
additional $8.4 billion in unfunded obligations.
If other airlines follow, the PBGC may have to go
to Congress and plead for a bailout that some
experts say would be bigger than the Savings and
Loan debacle of the 1980s."

Are you ready for more taxes?

The full article.

Are you wondering why you're busting your ass for less?

10.05.04 (7:34 pm) [edit]

* "The Index of Social Well-Being," prepared
annually by Fordham University, largely based on
how a society treats its most vulnerable members
such as children, shows that America's social
well-being, as measured by government figures,
dropped from a high of 77.5 in 1973, and has been
falling ever since, to a low of 37.5 in 1994. The
index shows a consistent decline of well-being
extending through both Republican and Democratic
administrations. -Synopsis of presentation by Dr.
Marc Miringoff of Fordham University, CNN Today,
Oct. 14, 1996, ~14:17 601_clip8

* And since then [1971 after Nixon "closed the
gold window"] the average American worker has
been losing ground. Family income has gone up,
which is the statistic most politicians point to
but it now takes two workers in each family to
make that income, whereas in 1971 it took just
one. -Joel Kurtzman, THE DEATH OF MONEY, (New
York, NY: SIMON & SCHUSTER 1993), p. 70 601_clip9

More.

Mah man, Burt.

10.05.04 (3:49 pm) [edit]

"Rutan, who is known for his candor, declared
that the low cost and safety of Binnie's flight
would send shock waves through NASA and the
aerospace industry. 'I think they're looking at
each other right now and saying, "We're screwed,"'
Rutan told thousands of spectators who gathered
for the flight."

Damn.

Love ya, Burt.

Full story.

Just what is 'The Greater Good'?

10.05.04 (12:45 pm) [edit]

If you put that question to 5 people, don't
you think you come up with at least 5 answers
to the question in the subject line?

I never have found a definition...and I've been
looking a loooong time.

"During the Vietnam War it was not uncommon to
see a bumper sticker that read: 'Kill ‘em all.
Let God sort ‘em out.' I appreciated the comic
irony of the statement, but I think we ought to
try to do better than that."

...a massive understatement, that.

The whole essay.

The Real Dubya

10.04.04 (10:01 pm) [edit]

"When George W. Bush talks about his past, he
uses the words 'reckless' and 'irresponsible.' He
claims that in 1986, after half a lifetime of
hard drink and easy women, he finally sobered up--
and he wants us to believe he'll never revert to
his hard-partying ways.

But the captains who piloted his pleasure craft
during those 'wild' years, as well as his fellow
pleasure craft revelers, see him in a very
different light."

http://www.pleasurecaptains.com/" title="http://www.pleasurecaptains.com/" target="_blank"http://www.pleasurecaptains.c...

A look at power

10.04.04 (9:51 pm) [edit]

"For all the talk of history being made in
Florida (not again!), the first of three debates
between US presidential contenders George W Bush
and John Kerry may go down in history as 'The
Attack of the Split Screen'.

Some people may be naive enough to believe that
a 90-minute reality show, a rhetorical Gladiator
meets Miss Universe (Don't move! Don't sweat!
Don't stray away from script!), live from
Florida, with Fox News controlling the video
cameras, is remotely similar to participatory
democracy. But as the rules of the game go, this
is what is actually deciding the destiny of US
democracy - and US projection of power over the
rest of the world...

The original script as designed by the narrow,
ideological right-wing cult that is the Bush
administration machine should have been a Hail
Mary to Bush's supposed abilities of commander-in-
chief in times of war. Bush consigliere James
Baker even bent Democratic operative Vernon
Jordan into accepting a 32-page "memorandum of
understanding" worthy of the Surrealist
Manifesto: no controversy, no confrontation, no
real debating, just manufacturing of consent
(sample: 'The candidates may not ask each other
direct questions, but may ask rhetorical
questions')...

But there's the rub: do Americans prefer to
deal with a man who 'knows how the world works'
because God told him so, or do they want a
thinking man? Do they want to live in reality, or
seek refuge in a reality show?

Isn't it implied here that Kerry is the thinking
persons presidink?

Why would anyone who moves into this position of
tremendous power be interested in thinking beyond
how to get more of it?

Do you really see anyone of them "thinking" here?

Do you see anything new?

All of it.

The Coming Omniscience?

10.04.04 (4:48 pm) [edit]

"If we continue doubling the power of
computers every year or so, some speculate that
we will reach the point of singularity around
2050. That means computer power will be so fast
that we won't be able to distinguish its power of
calculations from omniscience...

If only we revered the thought processes that
highly... and not only the school of logic but of
instinct and intuition. Despite our species'
abilility to create abstract ideal constructions,
our species' maxim should still be, 'we're smart
enough to realize we don't know anything.'"

Full article.

SpaceShipOne

10.04.04 (10:14 am) [edit]

"MOJAVE, CALIF. - SpaceShipOne — as much a work
of art as a groundbreaking flying machine — has
recast the mold for spaceflight established by
NASA largely because it doesn't have to worry
about the space agency's coast-to-coast
bureaucracy, ponderous congressional oversight
and a legacy tarnished by failure as well as
graced by success...

I suspect that the failure of most bureaucracies
will come as more of their resources are spent on
'spinning' their fuck ups, and less on accomplishing
their stated goals.

'We live in a society that is way too risk
adverse, and that is a big problem,' said Peter
Diamandis, founder and president of the St. Louis-
based X-Prize Foundation. 'The only way we got to
the moon in 1969 was by taking risks. Without
risks there can't be breakthroughs, and without
breakthroughs we stay right were we are.'"

Sounds boring...sloggin' on without risk, don' it?

But taking on risk is just about completely
illegal now. The Safety Nazis rule.

The hell with it. Let's boogie.

Full story.

Sloppy terms.

10.03.04 (3:16 pm) [edit]

"The temptation to label people, and human
activities, is enormous. Some journalists seem to
specialize in it. A nice fuzzy label like
'democratic society' can then cover a lot of nice
fuzzy territory from democratic republic to
democratic socialism to democratic despotism, and
subsume any combination that the writer chooses,
without spelling it out. This is a favored tool
of propagandists, and I guess people just pick up
the habit from being exposed to it all the time."

I often wonder just how common are these Rampant
Fuzzies that Klassen talks about. Then I begin a
conversation with the guy on the
street and, again, I wonder what planet I'm from.
After a few questions on clarification of terms,
I occasionally get comments from an uninvited,
third-party piss-ant...something profound like,
"What's wrong with you?"

Market anarchism

10.02.04 (9:37 pm) [edit]

"But their thinking this is sort of like: first,
there’s this property law, and it’s all put in
place, and no market transactions are happening –
everyone is just waiting for the whole legal
structure to be put in place. And then it’s in
place – and now we can finally start trading back
and forth. It certainly is true that you can’t
have functioning markets without a functioning
legal system; that’s true. But it’s not as though
first the legal system is in place, and then on
the last day they finally finish putting the
legal system together – then people begin their
trading. These things arise together. Legal
institutions and economic trade arise together in
one and the same place, at one and the same time.
The legal system is not something independent of
the activity it constrains. After all, a legal
system again is not a robot or a god or something
separate from us. The existence of a legal system
consists in people obeying it. If everyone
ignored the legal system, it would have no power
at all. So it’s only because people generally go
along with it that it survives. The legal system,
too, depends on voluntary support." [My emphasis]
_________________________ _____

To paraphrase Robert Pirsig, there's a lotta talk
about The System and so little understanding.

More.

Accidently discovered

10.02.04 (3:32 pm) [edit]

A new, news service:

"Try our new Breaking News aggregator to read 20
political news sources at once!"

Now tell me the planet hasn't been politicized
beyond all hyuman recognition.

Isn't this type of news a dumbing-down mind-rape
looking to stuff everyone in nice neat little
political boxes?

A fine poll giving much better options.

A very small resistence.

10.01.04 (7:56 pm) [edit]

Throw 'em some crumbs...

Don't talk of fundamental justice.

Shiiiet.
______________________

US News, "In a blow to the Justice Department's
post-Sept. 11 powers, U.S. District Judge Victor
Marrero on Wednesday struck down the provision of
the Patriot Act that let the FBI gather phone and
Web customer records but barred service providers
from ever disclosing the search took place.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which
challenged the Patriot Act in federal court, said
this morning the ruling also declared
unconstitutional the provisions of the Patriot
Act that the FBI used in December to obtain
customer records for thousands of visitors
staying at Las Vegas hotels over the New Year
holiday.

'I wouldn't presume to tell any business what to
do, but the ruling certainly suggests strongly
(casinos) have the right to refuse these types of
records requests,' said Gary Peck, executive
director of the ACLU in Nevada.

And you casino types better wake up and do
it. Be refusniks. Va can it hoit?

The reason I haven't been back in years is because
of Those Prying Pricks wanting my fingerprints
on the back of my Travelers' Cheques. And this
was many years before the fucking Patriot Act.

Tell me: What the fuck was going on then that
these needle-dicks wanted my fingerprints?

There's something going on here.

Just say "no".

http://www.keralanext.com/news/?id=52123" title="http://www.keralanext.com/news/?id=52123" target="_blank"http://www.keralanext.com/new...

Pondering The Telescreen

10.01.04 (8:18 am) [edit]

"Denunciations of television have become as
routine as breathing: the programming is crass,
stupid, propagandistic, so bad that only an idiot
would watch it yet everybody does. Actually
things are worse. They are much worse."

The full article.