Tuesday, March 02, 2004
W. O. W.
"Opportunity has landed in an area of Mars where liquid water once drenched the surface," said Edward Weiler, associate NASA administrator for space science, at a news conference. "This area would have been a good, habitable environment."
Crossroads
It is my considered opinion and observation that there are people out there in the wide, wide world who want to kill Americans -- and America, itself. That sentiment was not limited to those 19 who died on 9.11.2K1. Therefore this December statement by John Kerry to the Council on Foreign Relations scares the crap outta me:Kerry promised to spend the first 100 days of his administration traveling the world to denounce his predecessor, apologize for his "radically wrong" policy, and seek "cooperation and compromise" with friend and foe alike.
On the other hand, the Bush administration, who seems committed to keeping the fire fight against terrorism off of American soil has made some other moves which worry me considerably.
At issue is the future of stem cell research, which seeks to harness the body's master cells to create new tissues to treat diabetes, Parkinson's, cancer and a range of other ills. ...President Bush reshuffled his advisory council on cloning and related medical issues on Friday ... Daniel Perry, executive director of the Alliance for Aging Research and president of the Coalition for the Advancement of Medical Research, also expressed reservations. "We are concerned with this sort of Friday night late decision to replace what we know is at least one of the stronger voices on behalf of moving the research forward and replacing her with what appear to be more ideological soulmates who would reflexively oppose this research," Perry said in a telephone interview. Earlier this month 60 leading scientists and philosophers, including Nobel laureates, backed a Union of Concerned Scientists report that accused the Bush administration of distorting scientific advice to fit ideological goals. One prominent scientist told the Los Angeles Times that during a screening interview for committee membership he was asked his views on abortion and whether he'd voted for Bush.
Sounds like a theory in search of support, to me. That is not a rational approach to discovering facts and making a decision based thereupon: it is the very definition of prejudice. [judgment or opinion formed beforehand or without knowledge or examination of the facts.]
Add into the mix, Bush's $1.5 billion program to "convince" people to marry, his proposed Constitutional Amendment, and the serious issues about Rumsfeld's management strategies, and State Department funded promotion of Islamist Organizations, and Justice Dept. invasions of privacy, and the Patriot Act II, and the fact that the term culture war even exists in this nation, and, and, and. And that ain't all -- just all I have time for at the moment.
And, that's just too damn many "ands." I am finding that I am completely uncomfortable with every option I see.
Not that this is such an unusual position . . . How do you handle it? Hold yer nose? Drop out? Vote for Nadir?!? [oh, sorry: redundant...]
Granted, if we can keep ourselves alive and intact as a nation, we are in a position to un-do asshated moves with which we disagree. But. If this trend is allowed to continue, the freedoms which define us as a nation will be so seriously eroded that we will have turned ourselves into a technologically developed third world theocracy. Oxymorons do not survive long in Nature. Battles between theologies serve neither -- especially the "pagans" and/or "infidels" caught in the middle.
Monday, March 01, 2004
Two Recommendations
[ . . . and a fanatical devotion toDidja Know?
Now your tires will nag you, too:More than a quarter of all passenger vehicles on the road in the United States have one or more underinflated tires—a condition that can lead to tread separation and blowouts. Omnova Solutions, a chemical company in Fairlawn, OH, [has] devised a simple solution: a rubber material that changes color from black to red when tire temperatures rise above 77 °C (underinflated tires get much hotter than properly inflated tires) ...a strip of the rubber could be built into the sidewalls of tires, visible as a red ring when things get too hot. [The company will be called TCS Polymers]
Your Aramaic lesson for today
Open your scrolls . . . Repeat after me: B-kheeruut re'yaaneyh laa kaaley tsuuraathaa khteepaathaa, ellaa Zaynaa Mqatlaanaa Trayaanaa laytaw! It may be uncompromising in its liberal use of graphic violence, but Lethal Weapon II it ain't - Een, Yuudaayaa naa, ellaa b-haw yawmaa laa hweeth ba-mdeetaa. Yes, I'm Jewish, but I wasn't there that day. - Peletaa kuullaah da-Qraabay Kawkbey. I get it -- it's all an allegory of Star Wars! - Saggee shapeer! Laa tsaabey naa d-esakkey l-mapaqtaa trayaanaaytaa. Brilliant! I can't wait for the sequel ! - ThenQ Mr K -- you're on fire today!Random Thoughts
An Unintended Consequence of single-gender marriages might be a change in the way custody arrangements are made. No longer being able to automatically award primary custody to "the mother" might spur the family courts into making more fair arrangements standard for all parents.Mooooooooooommmy ! ! !
read: "Gooooovernment!" Tommy. Please. Why, why are you spending my money on this crap?!?!?!Secretary Tommy G. Thompson today announced a new campaign to educate more Americans about how to prevent bullying ... The campaign -- "Take A Stand. Lend A Hand. Stop Bullying Now!" [http://www.stopbullyingnow.hrsa.gov] -- is designed to stop bullying, including verbal or physical harassment that occurs repeatedly over time, that is intended to cause harm, and that involves an imbalance of power between the child who bullies and the child who is bullied.
Lazer-like perceptivity.
he "Stop Bullying Now!" campaign includes a Web-based, animated story featuring a cast of young people who deal with bullies in the classrooms, hallways, and grounds of a middle school. With help from teachers, parents, and other adults, the bullied characters get support from fellow students who step up to make it clear that bullying is "not cool."
Powerful message, too. "Not cool." That'll subdue 'em in their tracks. What happened to all those steely-eyed, 5'2' old-maid English teachers, those pumped-up boys' gym teachers, those over/under educated PPS school counselors who, in my day, quelled bullying at school withThe Look, a word, or way too much hollerin' ?!? Are the baby-boomer versions of these icons just wimps?!?
International Diplomacy -- Glass House Style
Caracas, Venezuela - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez called United States President George Bush an "asshole" on Sunday for meddling, and vowed never to quit office like his Haitian counterpart as troops battled with opposition protesters demanding a recall referendum against him.
Way to smooth the road for your foreign aid, buddy. But that's OK. This Chavez guy has plenty of room to throw stones cuz he really knows how to run a democracy!
The Venezuelan leader's comments came as fresh violence broke out on the streets of the capital, where National Guard troops clashed with opposition protesters pressing for a vote to end his five-year rule. Military helicopters roared in low runs overhead as soldiers fired tear gas and plastic bullets to repel several hundred opposition demonstrators who threw stones and set up burning barricades in eastern Caracas late into the night
Pear Flaggers Alert
From my faithful reader comes this little bit of info:The California Revolt It began on the morning of 14 June 1846 when a small but heavily-armed group of thirty-three American-born settlers — led by Captain Jebediah Bartlett and his two lieutenants, Albert Bosc and Emmanuel d'Anjou — approached the home of General Mariano G. Vallejo , the Mexican comandante-general of California, pounded on the door, and demanded he surrender the Sonoma Plaza fortress to them. Vallejo, an advocate of the American annexation of California despite his nationality, told the intruders he was sympathetic to their cause; nonetheless, they placed him under arrest and shipped him off to be held at Sutter's Fort. The rebels quickly decided to raise a new flag over Sonoma Plaza to announce their victory, resulting in hurried discussion about the composition of the banner. Most agreed it should feature something physically symbolic of California (and distinctly non-Mexican), but they could not reach a consensus on what that symbol should be. Finally Captain Bartlett, an agricultural magnate with large holdings in the Sacramento River area (and an amateur horticulturist who developed the Bartlett pear), broke the deadlock by "suggesting" (none too gently) that the banner include a symbol reflective of the lush agricultural regions of northern California and the rich, 400-mile long Central Valley area. Acquiescing to the desires of their leader, the group quickly decided to honor both him and California agriculture by opting for a pear as the primary motif of their new flag. The group hurriedly assembled a rough prototype for their banner by borrowing a rectangular piece of light brown muslin and a four-inch strip torn from a red petticoat, sewing the red stripe (reminiscent of the ones found on the American national flag) onto the muslin, drawing a star in the upper left-hand corner to symbolize their independence (and, some claim, to express the rebels' solidarity with troops currently engaged in a war with Mexico precipitated by a dispute over the boundary of the recently-annexed state of Texas), and writing the words CALIFORNIA REPUBLIC in black to the right of the star. This nascent flag was then dispatched by messenger to the nearby home of William L. Todd (nephew of Mary Todd Lincoln, the wife of future president Abraham Lincoln) along with instructions for him to paint an image of a pear in the large empty portion of the banner and send the flag back with the messenger. But Todd misread the note (whether bad handwriting or smeared ink was to blame remains a subject of dispute) and instead painted a crude bear onto the muslin... The rebels hoisted their hastily-prepared pennant over Sonoma Plaza despite the error, intending to remake the flag at the first opportunity. The issue become moot within a month, however, when an American squadron under Commodore John D. Sloat captured California's then-capital, Monterey, and proclaimed California to be American territory, bringing an end to the short-lived California Republic. The territory was formally ceded to the United States by Mexico at the conclusion of the Mexican-American War in 1848, and California was admitted to the Union as the 31st state in 1850. When California adopted an official state flag in 1911, they hearkened back to the days of that brief republic of 1846 and chose a modernized rendition of the (mistaken) bear flag design. Then, as now, few remembered that the bear flag was the product of a mistake, or realized that a historically accurate California flag should look something more like this:
[Now you know the smart-assery of the West Wing crowd]
ThanQ! to the king of smart-assery ever-generous Mr K
_______
UPDATE: Due to a certain amount of skepticism I've been hearing, I ought to mention that this story came from snopes.com -- for whatever that's worth . . .
Linkworthy, are you?
Let The Watcher decide. Calling he is for linkworthy posts from all 'round the blogosphere. A treacherous set of hoops he lays for those seeking recognition, yet a challenge must be met. Ask him . . .Statistics
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