Tell-A-Vision = Why Not Try Love Again?
Steven Leech writes:
Hi Curtis, The Rockabilly Ridge/Michael Ace segment went very well.
As we speak I'm listening to a new album that I recommend. It's called "Hadestown," by Anais Mitchell. It's a folk opera based on the Opheus story set in "post Depression" America. Mitchell is a talented songwriter and performer, and yes her parents named her after someone you once knew.
On the album is Ani Difranco, Greg Brown, Justin Vernon and the Haden Triplets. It's on the Righteous Babe label. I'll probably broadcast the album in its entirety on a special early morning Freebox program right after Rod Misey finishes his annual Psychedelic Show on the evening of August 20th, starting at 7pm (East) and going into the early morning hours of the 21st. I still have to work out the details with Rod. I only just produced a promo for the Annual Psychedelic Show yesterday morning.
The next Boptime will include a special on Percy Mayfield in the 8am hour (East). Percy was born on August 12, 1920 and died August 11, 1984. Percy Mayfield is a favorite on Boptime and I'll be playing tunes from him that range from 1946 to 1982. In the 9am hour, during the regular Club Baby Grand segment, listeners will hear recordings from many contemporary jazz artists from Wilmington, including a few which includes the late jazz drummer Wilby Fletcher.
Mike Wilhelm writes:
Hi Curtis, 'Tis me in another facet of my ever more fractured personality. ;-)
Mike Wilhelm, Flamin' Groovies, Brunel University, England
New MP3s - click to visit : Take Me Back is from Flamin' Groovies Now and In The USA is from Jumpin' in the Night.
Personnel are: Chris Wilson, vocal & guitar; Cyril Jordan, vocal & guitar; George Alexander, vocal & bass; Mike Wilhelm, guitar; David Wright, drums. Both tunes from the late '70s and songwriting credit is Jordan/Wilson.
New Videos - click to visit : Pallet On Your Floor, Mike Wilhelm 1978 from Girl George TV Show and Fan It, Mike Wilhelm 1978 from Girl George TV Show
David Normal writes:
Greetings, Above is a photo of my “Illuminations” installation on Display at “Finder’s Creepers Gallery” in Des Moines, Iowa, USA. The Illuminations are specially designed self-illuminating prints. They glow! In this photo the only sources of light are the images themselves. If you would like to learn more about this please visit my blog. There you will find video of the exhibit, and more photos including a panoramic photo showing the entire show in one image.
I have an upcoming exhibit taking place at Burning Man 2010 in the Cafe’ at Central Camp. I am endeavoring to raise money to create more of the Illumination pieces and show them at Burning Man. Towards this end I have set up a page at Kickstarter.com:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/davidnormal/illuminations-art-installation-by-david....
Speaking in Tongues
a film by Marcia Jarmel and Ken Schneider
Ken and Marcia write:
It's an exciting time for the Speaking in Tongues project as we begin broadcasting on PBS stations across the country. We've had dozens of screenings in communities from Mumbai to Little Rock, Melbourne to Salt Lake City. (If you want to see for yourself, check out our new Screening Headquarters Map.)
Hundreds of educators are sharing the film with their classes, and thousands of people are connecting with the film and its resources via the web. We've even heard of several dual-language programs opening their doors in the fall, inspired by the film's stories.
Our new website is up (SpeakingInTonguesFilm.info), packed with resources for parents, educators, and advocates, targeted video, and a blog -- sharing stories, research, and commentary on multilingualism. We're looking for stories from across the country, so if you have an idea, please send it along to our blogger, Abigail Sawyer.
Right now we're at a critical juncture. As the film broadcasts across the country, there is a window to increase the film's impact. Find a list of things you can do on the Get Involved page of our website. Help us make the most of our opportunities.
Look forward to your ideas and feedback as we move forward, PatchWorks Films
Develop your mind, not Sacred Sites
In an 1868 treaty, drafted at Fort Laramie in Sioux country, the United States established the Black Hills as part of the Great Sioux Reservation, set aside for exclusive use by the Sioux people. However, after the discovery of gold there in 1874, the United States confiscated the land in 1877. To this day, ownership of the Black Hills remains the subject of a legal dispute between the U.S. government and the Sioux.
Nasa scientists braced for 'solar tsunami' to hit earth
[Ed. Note: This type of event has possibilities of fun. For example, if one has an old TV set with an outside antenna connected to it, with NO Digital Converter Box connected, use the Internet to look up the oldest TV station in your area, set the old TV to that station, hook up a VCR (for recording, if one chooses), and wait and watch. In the past, I have been able to catch 1950s TV shows that solar tsunamis bounce (reflect) back. ~@~]
The earth could be hit by a wave of violent space weather as early as Tuesday after a massive explosion on the sun, scientists have warned.
By Andrew Hough, Published: 9:00PM BST 02 Aug 2010
The solar fireworks at the weekend were recorded by several satellites, including Nasa’s new Solar Dynamics Observatory which watched its shock wave rippling outwards.
Astronomers from all over the world witnessed the huge flare above a giant sunspot the size of the Earth, which they linked to an even larger eruption across the surface of Sun.
The explosion, called a coronal mass ejection, was aimed directly towards Earth, which then sent a “solar tsunami” racing 93 million miles across space.
Images from the SDO hint at a shock wave travelling from the flare into space, the New Scientist reported.
Experts said the wave of supercharged gas will likely reach the Earth on Tuesday, when it will buffet the natural magnetic shield protecting Earth.
It is likely to spark spectacular displays of the aurora or northern and southern lights.
"This eruption is directed right at us," said Leon Golub, of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA).
"It's the first major Earth-directed eruption in quite some time."
Scientists have warned that a really big solar eruption could destroy satellites and wreck power and communications grids around the globe if it happened today.
Nasa recently warned that Britain could face widespread power blackouts and be left without critical communication signals for long periods of time, after the earth is hit by a once-in-a-generation “space storm”.
The Daily Telegraph disclosed in June that senior space agency scientists believed the Earth will be hit with unprecedented levels of magnetic energy from solar flares after the Sun wakes “from a deep slumber” sometime around 2013.
It remains unclear, however, how much damage this latest eruption will cause the world’s communication tools.
Dr Lucie Green, of the Mullard Space Science Laboratory, Surrey, followed the flare-ups using Japan's orbiting Hinode telescope.
"What wonderful fireworks the Sun has been producing,” the UK solar expert said.
“This was a very rare event – not one, but two almost simultaneous eruptions from different locations on the sun were launched toward the Earth.
"These eruptions occur when immense magnetic structures in the solar atmosphere lose their stability and can no longer be held down by the Sun's huge gravitational pull. Just like a coiled spring suddenly being released, they erupt into space.”
She added: "It looks like the first eruption was so large that it changed the magnetic fields throughout half the Sun's visible atmosphere and provided the right conditions for the second eruption.
"Both eruptions could be Earth-directed but may be travelling at different speeds.
“This means we have a very good chance of seeing major and prolonged effects, such as the northern lights at low latitudes." - A Nasa spokesman was unavailable for comment. - Click Here to view article source, links, and video
Mike Wilhelm at Tuscan Village
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - by Wellman Moody, August 3, 2010,
LOWER LAKE - Mike Wilhelm will perform at the Tuscan Village on Main St., Lower Lake, next to the Post Office this Friday [August 6, 2010] from 6:30 to 8:30 pm as part of the venue's regular series of Friday concerts. Admission is free.
Richard Nixon
Was A Republican Crook & Murderer
Steve Bell - The Guardian - Israeli troops confront flotilla activists - Tuesday 1 June 2010
Israel defends intensity of military force after autopsy results reveal total of 30 bullets in bodies of nine protesters
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cartoon/2010/jun/05/martin-rowson-gaza-flotilla-attack
Israel's prime minister tells inquiry that raid on aid convoy in which nine activists died was conducted in self-defence
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/09/binyamin-netanyahu-gaza-flotilla-inquiry
Bible Stories Retold... A soldier, standing on the Ark, with his foot squashing a recently murdered bird of Peace, says to Noah (about the bird): "It was clearly intent on PECKING innocent civilians." A cartoon by Martin Rowson on the Gaza flotilla attack.
Even today I am willing to volunteer to do the dirty work for Israel, to kill as many Arabs as necessary, to deport them, to expel and burn them, to have everyone hate us, to pull the rug from underneath the feet of the Diaspora Jews, so that they will be forced to run to us crying. Even if it means blowing up one or two synagogues here and there [? 9/11 ?], I don’t care. And I don’t mind if after the job is done you put me in front of a Nuremberg Trial and then jail me for life. Hang me if you want, as a war criminal… What you lot don’t understand is that the dirty work of Zionism is not finished yet, far from it. - Israel Prime Minister Ariel Sharon
Republicans and Democrats are Lying Hypocrites
Who Support Selective Terrorism Against U.S. Military
Remember the U.S.S. Liberty
34 U.S. Military Dead, 171 Wounded
Assault on the USS Liberty Still Covered Up
Defend Our Constitution - Arrest Bush / Cheney: War Criminals!
Time For A Corporate Death Penalty
by Bruce A. Dixon, Black Agenda Report managing editor, Wed, 06/09/2010 -10:35, corporate rule
There are more than 40 federal offenses for which the death penalty can be applied to human beings, most of them connected to homicide of one kind or another. But countless homicides committed by the artificial persons we call corporations go unpunished every day. Apparently “personal responsibility” applies only to humans who are not operating behind the legal shield of corporate personhood.
Click to download or play the MP3 of this BA Radio commentary
Over the last hundred or so years, corporations have gained many of the rights previously accorded only to human beings. Corporations have the right to buy and sell anything or anyone that can be bought or sold. Corporations have claimed the right to lie in their advertising and PR as "free speech," along with the right to help us mere humans choose our judges and elected officials with unlimited amounts of cash, including anonymous cash. Corporations have been awarded the right to patent genetic sequences of diseases and to monopolize their cures, as well as patent rights to living plants and animals not of their invention. A whole type of new anti-pollution regulation called "cap and trade" actually enshrines a corporate right to pollute and establishes exchanges upon which speculators can bid, trade and capture rents for those alleged rights. And unlike a working person, who has no right to next month's let alone next year's wages, legal scholars working for corporations have devised and popularized something they call the "regulatory takings" doctrine, under which corporations may claim and recover from the government rights to profits they might have made in years to come. And let's not even talk about trillions in corporate welfare for banks, military contractors, Wal-Mart and others.
While many argue that corporations have too many rights as it is, this might be a good time to extend them at least one more right we humans have kept for ourselves until now; the right to be put to death for serious crimes. Right now federal statutes alone offer individuals more than 40 different ways to earn the death penalty, including kidnapping, treason, aircraft hijacking, espionage and many varieties of murder, conspiracy, threatening murder and some drug crimes. Individual states offer the death penalty for a host of similar offenses.
Putting bad corporate actors down the way we do rabid dogs and serial killers is not a new or even a radical idea. Corporations are created by the charters of individual states, so states DO have the power to revoke them. Early in this country's history, corporate charters used to limit a company's existence to a set number of years, to confine their operations to manufacturing a certain item, building a specific road or canal and prohibit them from changing ownership, dumping or concealing their assets or engaging in other kinds of business. These are legal powers that our governments have not used in a long, long time, but which it's high time to reclaim.
Homicidal profit-seeking on the part of corporations has become an everyday fact of modern life. Whether it's employers cutting health and safety corners, marketers pushing unsafe drugs, food and products of all kinds, or the deadly industrial fouling of the planet's air, soil, oceans and climate we are living in the midst of a corporate crime wave of murderous and epic proportions. If we value human life, it only makes sense to treat corporate serial killers like, well, corporate serial killers, to confiscate their ill-gotten assets, to revoke their corporate charters and sentence the artificial personae of corporate malefactors to death. If corporations are legal persons, it's time to enforce some personal responsibility upon them with a corporate death penalty.
After we accomplish that, it will be time to think about extending a little of that personal responsibility to the actual humans who operate behind the legal shield of the corporations. But right now, as the saying goes, a corporation can't even get arrested in this country, which, come to think of it is still another right we humans ought to bestow upon them.
For Black Agenda Radio, I'm Bruce Dixon. Find us on the web at . - Article source
Nobody Gets It the First Time Around!
None of the Above
should be on Voter Ballots
Eff the Brown Acid, Install Flash (Frash) on iPhone 4
Crash Proof Motorcycle Safety System
Links of Interest 201008.11
Pictures of the day: Sunset progression
Written by Lake County News reports - Wednesday, 11 August 2010
[Ed. Note: Unusual cloud formation photographs taken Tuesday evening by local photographer, Ron Keas]
http://lakeconews.com/content/view/15350/919/
Stop this slut-shaming
The word sexualisation is a troubling cultural shorthand – it sends girls an unhelpful message
by Laurie Penny, The Guardian, Monday 9 August 2010
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/09/stop-this-slut-shaming
Peak oil is the villain governments need
Using the threat of a high oil prices is a sell the public will buy into – unlike intangible arguments over climate change
by Graham Wayne, guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 11 August 2010 10.00 BST
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cif-green/2010/aug/11/peak-oil-villain-governments-need
How the baby boomers blew it
The greatest crime of the boomers who benefited from the 60s was their role in destroying the freedoms of those who did not
by Francis Beckett, guardian.co.uk, Monday 9 August 2010 08.59 BST
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/09/how-baby-boomers-blew-it
Beginningz of the Endz:
Go Cheney Yourself:
How Google, Verizon, AT&T, BellSouth, & Congress Broke the Law and Knew It
The Supreme Court appointed Bush Administration pulled a lot of illegal condi against people of the United States, and World, while a cheneyed up Congress ate their condi, and kept THESE RUMSFELDERS OUT OF JAIL!
What am I talking about? == Cheneying Net Neutrality. Here is why I am wolfowitzed and why Google can suck my rumsfeld and Verizon can kiss my bush:
Telecom Crimes
Violation of the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution
Violation of the First Amendment to the Constitution
Unlawful electronic surveillance or disclosure or use of information obtained by electronic surveillance in violation of 50 U.S.C. §1809.
Unlawful interception, use or disclosure of Class communications in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2511
Unlawful solicitation and obtained disclosure of the contents of communications in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2702(a)(1) or (a)(2)
Unlawful solicitation and obtained disclosure of non-content records or other information in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2702(a)(3)
Violation of the Administrative Procedures Act
Violation of the constitutional principle of separation of powers
Click to View How a cheneyed up, piece of condi Congress turned their backs on CRIME:
The Patriot Act WAS and IS A Crime Against U.S. Citizens
Click to View cheneyed up Illegal Patriot Act
Will The Patriot Act Cost Google Business?
from the well,-thanks-to-fear-mongering dept
The Globe and Mail is running a somewhat sensationalistic piece about a Canadian university, Lakehead University, that decided to start using Google's email system to replace its own buggy and frequently crashed offering. The problem? Fears concerning US data privacy laws, such as the Patriot Act, mean that professors are told not to send confidential info, including grades, via email. This has upset a number of professors who are protesting the use of Google's products. [continue reading]
Three Major Telecom Companies Help US Government Spy on Millions of Americans
USA Today has revealed the National Security Agency is secretly collecting the phone call records of millions of Americans with the help of AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth. For the customers of these companies, it means that the government has detailed records of calls they made to family members, co-workers, business contacts and others. One source told the paper that the NSA is attempting to create the world’s largest database—big enough to include every call ever made within the nation’s borders. [continue reading]
Google, Verizon Net Neutrality Proposal Is 'Socially Irresponsible': Analyst
by By: Michelle Maisto, 2010-08-10
Strand Consult offers an analysis of Google and Verizon's net neutrality proposal to the FCC. Strand calls Google a company with deep pockets but short arms.
Executives from Google and Verizon introduced a joint proposal for an "open Internet" Aug. 9, and called on the Federal Communications Commission to create rules that will ensure an open Internet and penalize "bad actors" that violate such "safeguards."
The same day, analysts with Copenhagen-based consultancy Strand Consult released an analysis of Google's position on net neutrality, which they characterize as Google "prioritizing [its] profitability higher than [its] social responsibility."
The analysis frames the debate as consisting, on one side, of Internet providers that want to prioritize the types of data traffic network products they sell to customers and, on the other side, of Google (aligned with Verizon), which wants operators to "provide a uniform connection regardless of the type of service being used."
Essentially, states the Strand analysis, Google is portraying itself as a defender of liberty on the Internet and operators as companies trying to limit online freedom. The analysis goes on to describe the vital importance of Internet access within modern society, and so also of companies willing to investment in network infrastructure—which Google has no intention of doing.
"The Internet is like a motorway, at certain times there will be more traffic than the motorway can handle," states the analysis. "But according to Google, it should not be possible for providers to sell access to a fast lane and Telcos should be allowed to prioritize their own services higher than, for example, Google services."
The Strand analysis continues:
"Google believes that all consumers should experience the same performance, thereby in reality abolishing queues on the motorway, abolishing differentiated pricing being used today in the airline industry, abolishing business class and in effect selling tickets to cinemas, concerts and sporting events at the same price, regardless of where the customer is sitting or whether they are receiving extra services during the event.
"In reality Google wants to abolish the concept of differentiated pricing for different types of services and by talking about net-neutrality, Google is in reality misusing the sacred name of democracy as the foundation of their standpoint."
The Strand analysts additionally propose a set of questions to Google, offering a bit more perspective on the issue. One, for example, questions whether all Google advertisers pay the same fee, or if some pay extra for better exposure.
In closing, "Google looks like a man with deep pockets and short arms, someone we often meet in town and who suddenly disappears when the waiter brings the bill," states the Strand analysis. "In our opinion, Google has double morals regarding this issue and their social understanding and responsibility towards our future society is almost non-existent."
The public, of course, can decide for itself, as Google has posted its position quite clearly, with seven key elements highlighted. In crafting their framework, the Google and Verizon executives emphasized, they were guided by two mail goals. First, that users should choose what content, applications or devices they use, since openness is imperative, and second, that the United States must continue to encourage investment and innovation in broadband infrastructure, as "it is imperative for our global competitiveness."
... And that is why the cheneying, rumsfelding, piece of condi, search box, on this page, has been removed.
Send the War Criminals to Defend Iraq
Chickenhawk's Mission Accomplished - Rumsfelding Mutha Cheneying Bushholes!
Iraqi army not ready to take over until 2020, says country's top general
Lieutenant General Babakir Zebari calls for US army to stay beyond Obama's 2011 deadline for complete withdrawal
by Matthew Weaver and agencies, guardian.co.uk, Thursday 12 August 2010 08.20 BST
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/12/iraqi-army-not-ready-general
Clicktivism is ruining leftist activism
Reducing activism to online petitions, this breed of marketeering technocrats damage every political movement they touch
by Micah White, guardian.co.uk, Thursday 12 August 2010 13.30 BST, Article history
[Elided Photograph: Stone/Getty - Digital activists have gone online and adopted the logic of the marketplace.]
A battle is raging for the soul of activism. It is a struggle between digital activists, who have adopted the logic of the marketplace, and those organisers who vehemently oppose the marketisation of social change. At stake is the possibility of an emancipatory revolution in our lifetimes.
The conflict can be traced back to 1997 when a quirky Berkeley, California-based software company known for its iconic flying toaster screensaver was purchased for $13.8m (£8.8m). The sale financially liberated the founders, a left-leaning husband-and-wife team. He was a computer programmer, she a vice-president of marketing. And a year later they founded an online political organisation known as MoveOn. Novel for its combination of the ideology of marketing with the skills of computer programming, MoveOn is a major centre-leftist pro-Democrat force in the US. It has since been heralded as the model for 21st-century activism.
The trouble is that this model of activism uncritically embraces the ideology of marketing. It accepts that the tactics of advertising and market research used to sell toilet paper can also build social movements. This manifests itself in an inordinate faith in the power of metrics to quantify success. Thus, everything digital activists do is meticulously monitored and analysed. The obsession with tracking clicks turns digital activism into clicktivism.
Clicktivists utilise sophisticated email marketing software that brags of its "extensive tracking" including "opens, clicks, actions, sign-ups, unsubscribes, bounces and referrals, in total and by source". And clicktivists equate political power with raising these "open-rate" and "click-rate" percentages, which are so dismally low that they are kept secret. The exclusive emphasis on metrics results in a race to the bottom of political engagement.
Gone is faith in the power of ideas, or the poetry of deeds, to enact social change. Instead, subject lines are A/B tested and messages vetted for widest appeal. Most tragically of all, to inflate participation rates, these organisations increasingly ask less and less of their members. The end result is the degradation of activism into a series of petition drives that capitalise on current events. Political engagement becomes a matter of clicking a few links. In promoting the illusion that surfing the web can change the world, clicktivism is to activism as McDonalds is to a slow-cooked meal. It may look like food, but the life-giving nutrients are long gone.
Exchanging the substance of activism for reformist platitudes that do well in market tests, clicktivists damage every genuine political movement they touch. In expanding their tactics into formerly untrammelled political scenes and niche identities, they unfairly compete with legitimate local organisations who represent an authentic voice of their communities. They are the Wal-Mart of activism: leveraging economies of scale, they colonise emergent political identities and silence underfunded radical voices.
Digital activists hide behind gloried stories of viral campaigns and inflated figures of how many millions signed their petition in 24 hours. Masters of branding, their beautiful websites paint a dazzling self-portrait. But, it is largely a marketing deception. While these organisations are staffed by well-meaning individuals who sincerely believe they are doing good, a bit of self-criticism is sorely needed from their leaders.
The truth is that as the novelty of online activism wears off, millions of formerly socially engaged individuals who trusted digital organisations are coming away believing in the impotence of all forms of activism. Even leading Bay Area clicktivist organisations are finding it increasingly difficult to motivate their members to any action whatsoever. The insider truth is that the vast majority, between 80% to 90%, of so-called members rarely even open campaign emails. Clicktivists are to blame for alienating a generation of would-be activists with their ineffectual campaigns that resemble marketing.
The collapsing distinction between marketing and activism is revealed in the cautionary tale of TckTckTck, a purported climate change organisation with 17 million members. Widely hailed as an innovator of digital activism, TckTckTck is a project of Havas Worldwide, the world's sixth-largest advertising company. A corporation that uses advertising to foment ecologically unsustainable overconsumption, Havas bears significant responsibility for the climate change TckTckTck decries.
As the folly of digital activism becomes widely acknowledged, innovators will attempt to recast the same mix of marketing and technology in new forms. They will offer phone-based, alternate reality and augmented reality alternatives. However, any activism that uncritically accepts the marketisation of social change must be rejected. Digital activism is a danger to the left. Its ineffectual marketing campaigns spread political cynicism and draw attention away from genuinely radical movements. Political passivity is the end result of replacing salient political critique with the logic of advertising.
Against the progressive technocracy of clicktivism, a new breed of activists will arise. In place of measurements and focus groups will be a return to the very thing that marketers most fear: the passionate, ideological and total critique of consumer society. Resuscitating the emancipatory project the left was once known for, these activists will attack the deadening commercialisation of life. And, uniting a global population against the megacorporations who unduly influence our democracies, they will jettison the consumerist ideology of marketing that has for too long constrained the possibility of social revolution.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/12/clicktivism-ruining-leftist-activism
Code Talkers Day - August 14th
They were a small band of warriors who created an unbreakable code from the ancient language of their people and changed the course of modern history.
Known as Navajo Code Talkers, they were young Navajo men who transmitted secret communications on the battlefields of WWII. At a time when America's best cryptographers were falling short, these modest sheepherders and farmers were able to fashion the most ingenious and successful code in military history. They drew upon their proud warrior tradition to brave the dense jungles of Guadalcanal and the exposed beachheads of Iwo Jima. Serving with distinction in every major engagement of the Pacific theater from 1942-1945, their unbreakable code played a pivotal role in saving countless lives and hastening the war's end.
http://navajocodetalkers.org/ and Code talker (Wikipedia)
Know Your Earth: A Simple Start
#7. I know great earth changes have been predicted for the future, so if you're looking to avoid earthquakes, my advice is simple. When you find a fault, just don't dwell on it.
Permalink: http://www.flyingsnail.com/AmateurRadio/knowyourearth.html
Personal Associated Subjects: Seismology - Geology - Physics - Astrophysics - Celestial Mechanics - Quantum Mechanics - Eigenmodes - Heart Nodes - String Theory - Yantra - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Plates of the Earth
USGS Plates image source - Large Image
Blame Wi-Fi:
Canadian Parents Claim Wireless Networks Harm Children
[Ed Note: CASHCPR (Citizens Against Second Hand Cellular Phone Radiation) & Telecom Crimes]
By: David Murphy
Is Wi-Fi to blame for a group of Canadian children's ailments? That's what parents in the central Ontario town of Barrie are alleging—that the wireless setups in their local elementary schools are creating a wide range of symptoms for their children, including headaches, dizziness, nausea, and increased heart rates.
According to the official "Simcoe County Safe School Committee" Web page, "some parents noticed that in the past year their kids 'aren't quite the same'. Explainations [sic] of this description include having dropped a grade point, no longer getting along with friends, and behavioural [sic] notes coming home from the teacher where in previous years there were none."
Members of the parents group have been lobbying the Simcoe County school board to remove the wireless networking from the affected schools, alleging that, "The Microwave intenstity [sic] inside one Simcoe County classroom was measured at 4X Stronger than when standing near a cell phone tower."
The group has even gone as far as to offer to pay for wired networking for the affected schools, but the school board hasn't taken up the offer.
If this story sounds at-all familiar, that's because it likely is: In July of last year, a British DJ by the name of Steve Miller was covered in publications worldwide for his claims of being allergic to wireless networking.
According to The Sun, Miller's "electromagnetic sensitivity" would give him headaches and dizziness if he came within range of a Wi-Fi signal: "he can't use trains, airports or hotels without experiencing head-banging agony."
Ars Technica's John Timmer called the story, "entertainment PR," noting that it's rather strange that one can be allergic to wireless connectivity—and just Wi-Fi—while being seemingly immune to the other areas of the electromagnetic spectrum whose frequencies sit next to (if not overlap) those of a conventional Wi-Fi signal.
Nevertheless, some institutions—including Canada's Lakehead University—have gone ahead and banned further wireless network installations until, "the potential health effects have been scientifically rebutted or there are adequate protective measures that can be taken," reads the University's official Wi-Fi and Cellular Antennae Policy.
Rodney Palmer, a member of the Safe School Committee, doesn't plan to wait for either. He intends to send his two children to alternative schools--or home school them--if the group's efforts at removing wireless functionality fails. And that decision still rests with the local school boards, as the Ontario Ministry of Education has declined to get involved in the matter.
Source: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2367826,00.asp
Ont. school board won't turn off Wi-Fi
A school board in central Ontario is defending its decision to keep wireless internet access in classrooms despite fears from some parents that radiation from Wi-Fi transmissions is making kids sick.
There is no scientific or medical evidence to show children complaining about headaches, dizziness and nausea are being made ill by the Wi-Fi in their classrooms, the Simcoe County District School Board said Monday.
Simcoe County is about 100 kilometres north of Toronto and includes communities such as Barrie, Collingwood and Alliston.
The board will not turn off Wi-Fi access in schools this fall despite the concerns of critics who say there's no evidence to prove radiation from wireless transmitters is safe for children as young as four.
There's no evidence to show Wi-Fi harms children, said John Dance, the board's superintendent of education responsible for information and communications technology strategic planning.
"There's been a lot of information, but there's nothing definitive that says wireless is causing the issues, so the board affirmed its decision for wireless communications in our schools," he said.
"There's been nothing to this point along the lines of medical evidence to say that any illnesses or whatever have been caused by wireless communications."
A group of parents formed the Simcoe County Safe School Committee when, they say, they realized their children were displaying the same sorts of symptoms and that the problems cleared up on weekends and holidays when kids weren't in school, said organizer Rodney Palmer.
They found parents reporting similar problems among kids at 14 different schools in Simcoe County and tried unsuccessfully to convince the board to turn off the Wi-Fi and go back to hard-wired connections for Internet access.
"Parents are going to start pulling their children out of school," predicted Palmer. "I'm not putting my kids back into those schools. The health of children is not being cared for here."
The Simcoe school board has 50,000 students but only about a dozen parents came forward to the parents' group to complain about symptoms and to suggest the problem is the Wi-Fi, said Dance.
"We haven't had a single medical doctor come down on the side that a child's repeated headaches are coming from this," he said.
"We tend to err on the side of caution whenever we can, but … this came up well after wireless had been installed in our schools."
The ministries of education and health both said the board is doing the right thing by keeping wireless access in its schools, added Dance.
Education Minister Leona Dombrowsky said Monday that she would write to her federal counterpart outlining the parent's concerns about Wi-Fi, saying Ottawa is in the best position to address the issue.
Prof. Magda Havas of Trent University in Peterborough, Ont., who does research on the health effects of electromagnetic radiation, issued an open letter last year saying she was "increasingly concerned" about Wi-Fi and cellphone use at schools.
"It is irresponsible to introduce Wi-Fi microwave radiation into a school environment where young children and school employees spend hours each day," Havas wrote.
Statistics show young children absorb much more radiation than older children and adults because of their thinner skulls.
It is a public health issue, insisted Palmer, and should at least be taken as seriously as the threat of West Nile virus.
"I can count in my school more victims of microwave radiation than all of Canada has from West Nile virus," he said.
Several scientists from around the world testified about the dangers of microwave transmissions during parliamentary hearings into cellular telephones last spring. Both cellphones and Wi-Fi utilize microwaves, but critics point out exposure to radiation from Wi-Fi is often for hours at a time, not minutes as it is with cellphones.
"Symptoms referred to as microwave syndrome, like headaches, sleep disturbances, fatigue, etc., among people residing around base station antennas can possibly be explained by cellular stress induction on brain cells or even cell death," testified Dimitris Panagopoulos, a biophysicist from the University of Athens.
Prof. Olle Johansson of the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden warned the committee that Canada and other countries need to update their guidelines for exposure to microwave radiation.
"It's obvious that your safety code is completely out of date and obsolete and that goes for any form of international or national standard body throughout the world," testified Johansson.
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/windsor/story/2010/08/16/wifi-students.html - The Canadian Press
Annual Psychedelic Show
7pm (EDT), 4pm (PDT), 23:00 (UTC) - TODAY - Friday, August 20th, on WVUD"Even Steven" writes:
Hi Curtis, Rod Misey says this about his upcoming:
Annual Psychedelic Show
"Humor has always been an intricate element of rock and roll. When rock and roll morphed into rock during the late sixties, reflecting the tenor of the day, a sense of seriousness became an important part of the music. However, underneath the surface, humor in general and satire in particular still existed. Considering the tumultuous nature of the nineteen sixties, there was no shortage of sacred cows that needed to be deflated. During the 2010 edition of WVUDs’ Annual Psychedelic Music Show, this overlooked aspect of late sixties rock will be addressed with anywhere from 6 to 8 full sets of music. Included will be numerous artists including Country Joe and the Fish, Joe Byrd and the Field Hippies, the Blues Magoos, the Fugs, the Electric Prunes, and many others. Also being featured are such non-psychedelic, yet still relevant, artists such as Phil Ochs, the Kinks, and David Bowie. In putting together this special, while some of the music and lyrics are dated, I was struck by how much of what I found to play is still relevant to contemporary times. The show is on Friday August 20th starting at 7pm and going on until 4am (EDT)."
After Rod's Annual Psychedelic Show ends at 4am Saturday, August 21st, and before Boptime begins at 6am, you hear a special Freebox program that'll include the Hadestown folk opera composed by Anais Mitchell, along with some other surprising selections. Warm regards, Steve
Anthony Clark writes:
Curtis, The new album by former Flamin' Groovies singer Chris Wilson features a number of old band mates - Mike Wilhelm, George Alexander, James Ferrell and original Groovies front man Roy Loney. Rounding out the guest list is Procol Harum's Hammond player Matthew Fisher and Robin Wills, guitarist from The Barracudas.
Mike contributes slide guitar to the Zeppelin-infused Bad Dreams, George appears on two tracks - Can't Let Go and Semaphore signals, and James and Roy guest on the song Gamblin' Man, an old-school Groovies-style rock 'n' roll stomp. This is the first time Chris and Roy have sung together on a studio track, something that will no doubt excite Groovies fans.
Matthew adds bravura keyboards to Fading Away while Robin sings and plays guitar on Way Too Fast.
The album, Love Over Money, is due for release in October on the French Rock Paradise label.
The attached photo is me [Anthony Clark] and Chris Wilson in the studio...
For more information visit: www.flamin-groovy.comHal [Rainbow Puddle] writes:
San Andreas can go sooner ???
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-earthquake-fault-20100821,0,946323.storyStudy shakes up scientists' view of San Andreas earthquake risk
Researchers find major quakes on the southern section, on average, every 88 years — three times as often as previously thought. It's the strongest evidence yet that we're overdue for a massive quake.
Southern California is long overdue for a major earthquake along the San Andreas fault, according to a landmark study of historic seismic activity released Friday.
The study, produced after several years of field studies in the Carrizo Plain area about 100 miles northwest of Los Angeles, found that earthquakes along the San Andreas fault have occurred far more often than previously believed.
For years, scientists have said major earthquakes occurred every 250 to 450 years along this part of the San Andreas. The new study found big temblors on the fault every 88 years, on average.
The last massive earthquake on that part of the fault was in 1857, leading scientists to warn that another such temblor is likely in Southern California.
"The next earthquake could be sooner than later," said Lisa Grant Ludwig, a UC Irvine earthquake expert and co-author of the study, which was published online in the journal Geology. "It was thought that we weren't at risk of having another large one any time soon. Well, now, it might be ready to rupture."
Other seismic experts described the revelation as a major change in the way they think about earthquake risks along the southern San Andreas fault.
Thomas Jordan, director of the Southern California Earthquake Center, said the fault is "locked and loaded. It's been a long time since an earthquake has occurred on that fault — over 150 years."
To reach the new conclusion, scientists dug trenches deep into the Carrizo Plain. They used carbon dating and sophisticated imaging technology known as lidar to find signs of earth movements. They were able to detect earthquakes dating back to the 15th century, creating a far more complete record than had previously been known.
The research found that earlier examinations of the San Andreas had badly undercounted the number of major earthquakes. Those were based on observations made in the 1970s when scientists used measuring tape to look for evidence of past earthquakes.
"Now we have better techniques," Grant Ludwig said. "We can see there's actually more earthquakes."
Scientists now estimate that earthquakes occurred on that section of the fault in 1417, 1462, 1565, 1614 and 1713.
The finding adds weight to the view of many seismologists that the San Andreas has been in a quiet period and that a major rupture is possible. A 2009 study, which Grant Ludwig also participated in, suggested that the San Andreas was overdue for a rupture. But Friday's report offers a much more grim estimate of how frequently quakes have occurred on that segment of the fault.
The San Andreas fault is considered one of the most dangerous in Southern California, partly because it is so long that its southern section is capable of producing a temblor as large as magnitude 8.1.
By contrast, earthquake experts consider 1994's destructive 6.7-magnitude Northridge quake, which occurred on a different fault, to be a medium-sized quake.
The San Andreas is a sleeping giant. It's hard to imagine the power of a huge quake on the southern section because the last one occurred more than a century ago when the area was sparsely populated. Just 4,000 people lived in Los Angeles at the time.
The 1857 temblor, with an estimated magnitude of 7.9, is known as the Fort Tejon quake, but that's a bit of a misnomer because it is thought to have started farther north, way up in Parkfield in Monterey County. The quake then barreled south on the San Andreas for about 200 miles, through Fort Tejon near the northern edge of what is now Los Angeles County, then east toward the Cajon Pass in San Bernardino County, near what is now the 15 Freeway.
The quake was so powerful that the soil liquefied, causing trees as far away as Stockton to sink. Trees were also uprooted west of Fort Tejon. The shaking lasted 1 to 3 minutes.
The study was conducted by scientists at UC Irvine and Arizona State University. As preliminary data went out for peer review, other earthquake scientists immediately took note.
The U.S. Geological Survey was so concerned that it dispatched its own team of investigators to the Carrizo Plain to look over the initial findings and review the evidence in the trenches.
"These investigators really were challenged by their scientific peers," said Ken Hudnut, a geophysicist at the U.S. Geological Survey. "And they made it through. They ran the gantlet and came through with a really solid paper."
Hudnut said the "Big One" wouldn't compare to most quakes Californians have endured. Such a large quake on the San Andreas, generally above a magnitude 7, would send enormous V-shape energy waves spreading out from the fault. If the earthquake energy hit the Los Angeles Basin, the soft sediment underneath it could actually amplify the waves, making the shaking worse.
Hudnut said the study offers both "bad news and good news," noting that it also concluded future earthquakes along that section of the San Andreas could be smaller than the 1857 quake.
"It's not the kind of news that ought to make people crawl into the fetal position. Rather, it's the kind of information that ought to once remind people about basic earthquake preparedness," Hudnut said.
Grant Ludwig said her research should motivate people to prepare.
"If you're waiting for someone to tell you when we're close to the next San Andreas earthquake, just look at the data," she said. "If we look at the only data we have, it's not very comforting. I'm preparing for that possibility." - ron.lin@latimes.com
Justice Department Seeks Ebonics ExpertsDEA to hire nine “Black English” linguists
AUGUST 23--The Department of Justice is seeking to hire linguists fluent in Ebonics to help monitor, translate, and transcribe the secretly recorded conversations of subjects of narcotics investigations, according to federal records.
A maximum of nine Ebonics experts will work with the Drug Enforcement Administration’s Atlanta field division, where the linguists, after obtaining a “DEA Sensitive” security clearance, will help investigators decipher the results of “telephonic monitoring of court ordered nonconsensual intercepts, consensual listening devices, and other media”
The DEA’s need for full-time linguists specializing in Ebonics is detailed in bid documents related to the agency’s mid-May issuance of a request for proposal (RFP) covering the provision of as many as 2100 linguists for the drug agency’s various field offices. Answers to the proposal were due from contractors on July 29.
In contract documents, which are excerpted here, Ebonics is listed among 114 languages for which prospective contractors must be able to provide linguists. The 114 languages are divided between “common languages” and “exotic languages.” Ebonics is listed as a “common language” spoken solely in the United States.
Ebonics has widely been described as a nonstandard variant of English spoken largely by African Americans. John R. Rickford, a Stanford University professor of linguistics, has described it as “Black English” and noted that “Ebonics pronunciation includes features like the omission of the final consonant in words like ‘past’ (pas’ ) and ‘hand’ (han’), the pronunciation of the th in ‘bath’ as t (bat) or f (baf), and the pronunciation of the vowel in words like ‘my’ and ‘ride’ as a long ah (mah, rahd).”
Detractors reject the notion that Ebonics is a dialect, instead considering it a bastardization of the English language.
The Department of Justice RFP does not, of course, address questions of vernacular, dialect, or linguistic merit. It simply sought proposals covering the award of separate linguist contracts for seven DEA regions. The agency spends about $70 million annually on linguistic service programs, according to contract records.
In addition to the nine Ebonics experts, the DEA’s Atlanta office also requires linguists for eight other languages, including Spanish (144 linguists needed); Vietnamese (12); Korean (9); Farsi (9); and Jamaican patois (4). The Atlanta field division, one of the DEA’s busiest, is the only office seeking linguists well-versed in Ebonics. Overall, the “majority of DEA’s language requirements will be for Spanish originating in Central and South America and the Caribbean,” according to one contract document.
The Department of Justice RFP includes a detailed description of the crucial role a linguist can play in narcotics investigations. They are responsible for listening to “oral intercepts in English and foreign languages,” from which they provide verbal and typed summaries. “Subsequently, all pertinent calls identified by the supervising law enforcement officer will be transcribed verbatim in the required federal or state format,” the RFP notes.
Additionally, while “technology plays a major role in the DEA’s efforts, much of its success is increasingly dependent upon rapid and meticulous understanding of foreign languages used in conversations by speakers of languages other than English and in the translation, transcription and preparation of written documents.” (11 pages).
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/bizarre/justice-department-seeks-ebonics-experts
For deniers, politics beats the science. Handouts beat bothFrom Australia to the US, the rightwingers who claim climate change is a leftwing conspiracy will grab green subsidies
George Monbiot, guardian.co.uk, Monday 23 August 2010 20.20 BST, Article history
It was Australia's second climate change election. Climate change deposed the former leaders of both main parties: Kevin Rudd (Labor) because his position was too weak, Malcolm Turnbull (Liberal) because his was too strong. When Julia Gillard, the new Labor leader, also flunked the issue, many of her supporters defected to the Greens.
Labor's collapse began when the senate rejected Rudd's emissions trading scheme. Faced with a choice of dissolving parliament and calling an election or dropping the scheme, he chickened out and lost the confidence of the party. Gillard's support began to slide when she proposed to defer climate change policy to a citizen's assembly. Nearly 70% of the votes she lost went to the Greens.
Turnbull, like Rudd, was ousted over the emissions scheme, but six months earlier. His support for it split the Liberal party, and just before the first senate vote last December he was overthrown by Tony Abbott, who had told his supporters that climate change "is absolute crap". If Abbott manages to form a government, he will reverse the result of the 2007 election, in which the Liberal party was defeated partly because it wouldn't act on climate change.
It's not difficult to see why this is a hot issue in Australia. The country has been hammered by drought and bushfires. It has the highest carbon dioxide emissions per person of any major economy outside the Arabian peninsula. Australians pollute more than Americans, twice as much as people in the UK and four times more than the Chinese. Most Australians want to change this, but the coal industry keeps their politicians on a short leash. Like New Labour here, Rudd and Gillard's administration was a government of flinchers. It has been punished for appeasing industrial lobbyists and the rightwing press.
Australia provides yet more evidence that climate science divides people on political lines. Abbott is no longer an outright denier, though he still insists, in the teeth of the facts, that the world has cooled since 1997. Some members of his party go further: Senator Nick Minchin maintains that "the whole climate change issue is a leftwing conspiracy to deindustrialise the western world". (He has also insisted that cigarettes are not addictive and the link between passive smoking and illness can't be demonstrated). A recent poll suggests that 38% of politicians in Abbott's coalition believe man-made global warming is taking place, in comparison with 89% of Labor's people.
It's the same story everywhere. At a senatorial hustings in New Hampshire last week, all six Republican candidates denied that man-made climate change is taking place. Judging by its antics in the Senate and primary campaigns all over the US, the party appears to be heading for a unanimous rejection of the science. Václav Klaus, the ultra-neoliberal Czech president, asserts that "global warming is a false myth and every serious person and scientist says so". The hard-right UK Independence party may soon be led by Lord Monckton, the craziest man in British politics, who claims that action on climate change is a conspiracy to create a communist world government. The further to the right you travel, the more likely you are to insist that man-made climate change isn't happening. Denial has nothing to do with science and everything to do with politics.
In the Telegraph, the Conservative Daniel Hannan tried to explain this association. "When presented with a new discovery, we automatically try to press it into our existing belief-system; if it doesn't fit, we question the discovery before the belief-system." He's right, we all do this. It is also true that in some respects an antagonism to climate science is consistent with rightwing – especially neoliberal – politics. The philosophy of the new right is summarised by this chilling statement from Václav Klaus. "Human wants are unlimited and should stay so."
But rightwing denial leads to perverse outcomes. In a desperate attempt to appease deniers in his party, Turnbull proposed handing £70bn to industry to soften the impacts of acting on climate change. Rudd's scheme, by contrast, was more or less self-financing. Abbott intends to lavish subsidies on polluting companies without demanding any corresponding obligations. State handouts? Rights without responsibilities? When did these become conservative policies?
Since way back. In the US Republicans also favour green incentives for industry, without caps or regulation. Worldwide, subsidies for fossil fuels are 12 times greater than subsidies for renewable energy. Many of the most generous handouts are awarded by rightwing governments (think of the money lavished on the oil industry under George Bush).
Yes, climate change denial is about politics, but it's more pragmatic than ideological. The politics have been shaped around the demands of industrial lobby groups – which in many cases fund those who articulate them. Rightwingers are making monkeys of themselves not just because their beliefs take precedence over the evidence, but also because their interests often take precedence over their beliefs.
A fully referenced version of this article can be found on George Monbiot's website
The Legends of Wilmington Jazz
TODAY - Friday - USA, 6 PM East - 3 PM West
Final segmentEven Steven writes:
Hi Curtis, Lem Winchester was immensely talented; some say even more gifted than Clifford Brown. He's the only one to take a local jazz band professional. Too bad that professional status lasted only one gig, and ended tragically in Indianapolis Indiana on Friday January 13, 1961. As I mentioned on this morning's Boptime, one of his band members in The Modernists was Papa Dee Allen, who later recorded with WAR. One of the other band members was Gerald Price, who did a couple of albums with Milt Jackson and Sonny Stitt, and will be a feature in the final two Legends of Wilmington Jazz programs. Gerald was really a pretty good jazz pianist but never got the recognition he deserved. The Legends of Wilmington Jazz series ends with the final segment on Friday August 27th, after which the student based programming resumes. However, beginning on the first Saturday in October -- October 2nd -- in the 8am hour, and the hour before the Club Baby Grand segment, I plan to rebroadcast the series on a monthly basis and that'll take the series through April 2011. Warm regards, Steve
Amestizo writes:
curtis, wow, thanks for posting! healing of all peoples is a choice of feeding the insular bubbles of our fleeting moments, or the stimulation of the oneness. deepest thanks in a world of the usa village of frankenstein and salem witchcraft world. the beacon of freedoms that do hold uniqueness; seems to be countering it's constitution now days under lynch mob rule this anti-mosque spewing times! have a prosperous week, aho p.s. wikipedia 7 deadly sins
Martin Luther King "I have a dream"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbUtL_0vAJk&feature=player_embedded#Martin Luther King, Jr. on War
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92-r05TH9qs&p=1535C2A8DE788346&playnext=1&index=28Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence By Rev. Martin Luther King 4 April 1967
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/45a/058.htmlAncient Black Americans:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxGX7Bmon5IUntold Black History, Myths:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jepatojx2AgBlack Indians: An American Story: richheape.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_txH0HJMIYUPt 1/5 The African Presence In Ancient America:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTycT8mnOMsPaul Krassner writes:
[He is] working on his long awaited (by him) first novel, about a contemporary Lenny Bruce-type performer.
[He is] putting together a collection: "Investigative Satirist: The Best of Paul Krassner."
[He is] peddling the infamous Disneyland Memorial Orgy -- check out the digitally colored poster at paulkrassner.com -- along with "Pot Stories For Soul" and the extended edition of his autobiography, "Confessions of a Raving, Unconfined Nut: Misadventures in the Counterculture."
Appeals court OKs warrantless GPS tracking by feds
Federal panel upholds lower court decision that federal DEA agents can enter private property sans warrant to plant GPS devices
by Jaikumar Vijayan, August 27, 2010 03:37 PM ET
Computerworld - A California federal court's decision not to call an en banc hearing on whether government agents can attach GPS tracking devices to vehicles parked in private driveways is likely to be appealed in the U.S. Supreme Court.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit earlier this month declined to schedule an en banc hearing, or a hearing before all judges in the ninth circuit, as requested by the defendant in a drug-related case. The defendant was seeking to suppress evidence gathered against him by federal agents who attached a GPS device to his vehicle without first obtaining a warrant.
The defendant, Juan Pineda-Moreno of Oregon, claims that U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency agents violated his Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable search by planting, without a warrant, a tracking device on a vehicle parked in his driveway in 2007. The agents were tracking Pineda-Moreno on suspicion that he belonged to a marijuana-growing operation.
A three-judge panel of the appellate court in January rejected Pineda-Moreno's claims and ruled that his constitutional rights were not violated. The court this month rejected a petition by Pineda-Moreno for a rehearing of his case by the full Ninth Circuit panel of judges.
The appellate court's ruling essentially gives law enforcement agencies in the nine Western states under the Ninth Circuit's jurisdiction the legal authority to surreptitiously enter personal property and attach a GPS tracking device on vehicles parked there without first obtaining a warrant.
Over a four-month period, DEA agents repeatedly monitored Pineda-Moreno's movements using different GPS tracking devices without obtaining a warrant. On two occasions, agents sneaked into his driveway before dawn to affix the tracking devices to the undercarriage of his Jeep.
Information gathered from the tracking led to Pineda-Moreno's subsequent arrest and indictment.
Pineda-Moreno pleaded guilty to the charges in an Oregon district court on the condition that he would be allowed to appeal the ruling to the Ninth Circuit court. The district court had rejected his request that the evidence obtained from the GPS devices be suppressed.
A three-judge Ninth Circuit panel upheld the district court's ruling.
The decision was not unanimous. In a strongly worded dissent, Chief Judge Alex Kozinski said that because of the ruling, "1984 may have come a bit later than predicted, but it's here at last."
In the 10-page ruling, three of the Ninth Circuit judges held that the DEA agents did not violate Pineda-Moreno's constitutional rights. The judges ruled that because Pineda-Moreno's had not taken specific steps to exclude passersby from his driveway -- by installing a gate for posting no trespassing signs, for instance -- he could not claim reasonable privacy expectations.
The Ninth Circuit panel ruled that the actions by the agents were comparable to the delivery of newspapers to the house, or the retrieval of a ball accidentally thrown under a vehicle by a neighbor.
Dissenting Judge Kozinski, however, contended that most people in the U.S don't expect that a car parked in their driveway "invites people to crawl under it and attach a [tracking] device. There is something creepy and un-American about such clandestine and underhanded behavior."
The Ninth Circuit's refusal to rehear the case highlights the continuing struggles that courts around the country are having over law enforcement's use of GPS devices to track an individual's movements.
In a decision also made earlier this month, an appeals court in Washington, D.C., denied the government's claims for warrantless GPS tracking. In that case, the presiding judges ruled that while warrantless GPS tracking might be permissible under some circumstances, continuous tracking over extended periods of time constituted a violation of Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable search.
Jaikumar Vijayan covers data security and privacy issues, financial services security and e-voting for Computerworld.
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9182499/Appeals_court_OKs_warrantless_GPS_tracking_by_feds
Buzzwords for blowhards
Rightwingers are brilliant at creating snappy-but-misleading nicknames – like fun-size chocolate bars and the Ground Zero mosque
by Charlie Brooker, The Guardian, Monday 30 August 2010, Article history
At this point in human development, I think we can all look back on what we've achieved and agree that language is one of our better inventions – better even than Wi-Fi, the Dustbuster, and Super Mario Galaxy. Picture a world without language. Go on. No gossip. No chit-chat. No road signs. No newspapers. No theatre. No internet. The only forms of mass media entertainment available are slapstick and pornography. Hang on, it's brilliant. I must be describing it wrongly.
But then, that's the beauty of language. It can change the way you see things without actually altering anything in the physical realm. It turns good into bad and bad into good and back again without anyone lifting a finger.
Take "fun-size" chocolate bars. They're tiny. Gone in a single bite. They don't last as long as a regular chocolate bar. Being individually wrapped, they're fiddly and environmentally unfriendly. And pound for pound, they're more expensive than their standard counterparts. But, back in the mists of time, some genius decided to label them "fun-size". And it worked. As a kid, the mere sight of a bag of fun-size Mars bars could work me into a flurry of excitement. These were dinky novelties you could eat! Hooray for fun-size!
But the magic of language didn't end there. As well as instantly transforming each and every shortcoming of these miniscule snacks into a thrilling bonus, the sly association of the word "fun" with the concept of "small helpings" had the side-effect of making regular-size chocolate bars seem less decadent, less naughty by comparison. If little ones were fun, regular ones were pedestrian slabs of edible workload.
Some time later, of course, king-size Mars bars hit the market, thus imbuing an act of calorific gluttony with an unwarranted air of imperial glamour. This was an imposing, statesmanlike snack to be reckoned with; a nougat mothership; the Mars bar of royalty. Language had worked its magic once again.
Anyway, I bring all this up because I've been thinking some more about the "Ground Zero mosque" debate. Specifically, I've been thinking about the horrible brilliance of the opponents' endlessly parroted, emotionally charged phrase "Ground Zero mosque", used to describe something which – at the risk of regurgitating last week's column – isn't at Ground Zero and isn't a mosque.
Conservatives, generally, are far more adept at politically reframing concepts by giving them snappy-but-misleading nicknames than liberals. "Loony left". "Boom-and-bust". "Flip-flop". "Ground Zero mosque". All simplifications or outright lies – but they worked. Like advertisers, the right seems breezily unconcerned about the truth of the slogan, provided it rings up a sale. They slap the words "fun-size" on the packaging and wait for the public to buy it.
The left, meanwhile, tends to respond by flinging back tired old insults. Bastards! Fascists! Racists! This is wrong on several counts. For one thing, it's counter-productive. Nothing riles an anti-mosque demonstrator more than being called a bigot. It's a grotesque, misleading smear on a diverse group of individuals – a bit like claiming all Muslims are terrorists (which, coincidentally, the guy beside them is currently doing through a loudhailer). But worse than being insulting, it's just plain unimaginative. At least the right bothers to invent a new buzzword each time it wants to fart some monstrous new lie into the ecosystem. And they're often infuriatingly well-crafted buzzwords – combining impact with audacious disingenuousness. There must be an evil Don Draper tucked away somewhere coining these things, these catchy fibs, these deceptive jingles.
Have you tried doing it yourself? It's not easy. I was hoping to illustrate this article with some self-created buzzwords for leftwingers to use. The first one I came up with was "molehill mountaineer", a pejorative term to describe the sort of perpetually furious rightwing weevil who spends their life calculatedly conflating issues such as the "Ground Zero mosque" into gigantic media crapgasms. But then I realised that "molehill mountaineer" could equally be applied to many on the left too. So that's no good.
Then I tried to invent a shorthand term to describe the sort of perpetually furious rightwing weevil who claims to be a patriot, not a bigot, then immediately muddies the water by saying lots of bigoted things. It's possible to be a patriot without being a bigot, just as it's possible to be a weather forecaster without being a stripper, but if a weather forecaster took her clothes off halfway through a forecast, its fair to say the striptease element of her performance would greatly overshadow any meteorological merit. Still, a lot of people erroneously believe that saying "I'm a patriot" automatically absolves them from any and all charges of bigotry. And the best word I could come up with to describe these people was "Patrigot". I quite like it, but it won't catch on. Too clumsy.
Which is a pity. Because in today's 2,000mph technological freefall, he who coins the catchiest buzzword generally wins the debate by default. Few people have the time to delve beyond the ticker-tape headline, to discover the reality behind a misleading brandname such as "Ground Zero mosque". There's a famous propaganda technique known as "the big lie": the bigger the lie you tell, the more the public will believe it. But today's audience is too distracted to digest big lies. Now the trick is to cram as much misleading information as possible into a succession of tiny verbal snacks, inaccurate but memorable.
In other words: Lies aren't big any more. They're fun-sized.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/30/charlie-brooker-buzzwords-blowhards
Panoramic Views of KPH/KSM Receive/Transmit SitesIn cooperation with the Point Reyes National Seashore, Bruce Ecker has taken some truly impressive panoramic views of the KPH/KSM transmit and receive sites.
We may eventually be able to post these here on the MRHS Web site. For now we provide the links below that connect directly to his Web site. Just use your BACK button to return to the MRHS Web site - although you may well get distracted by Bruce's other fantastic photos!
Note that you can not only pan and tilt but zoom in and out as well. Be sure to tilt up in the transmitter gallery views to see the open wire antenna lines. In the views of the CW operating room and Teletype workshop at the receive site, tilt up to see the insulating plates in the ceiling. Copper bus bars descended through the three slots to connect to the batteries originally installed in these rooms. The batteries powered the point-to-point receivers on the floor above.
Note: Flash plug-in, v9 or later, is required to see the panoramic images.
Transmit site control room, View 1
Transmit site control room, View 2
Transmitter gallery, View 1
Transmitter gallery, View 2
Transmit site workshop, View 1
Transmit site storeroom, View 1
Transmit site storeroom, View 2
Receive site CW operating room, View 1
Receive site CW operating room, View 2
Receive site SITOR room, View 1
Receive site, Teletype workshop and multicoupler cabinet, View 1
Receive site, antenna termination frame, View 1
http://radiomarine.org/gallery/show?keyword=kphpano&panel=pab1_1#pab1_1
Sympathy for the Denial...
I read stories during the 9/11 Attack,
I played guitar while Nawlins Sank,
WHOOT, WOOO ... WHAT'S MY NAME?
Bush Meets GodzillaDid Newt Gingrich
Touch America Inappropriately?
Newt's Republican "Contract WithLie to America"As Republican Members of the House of Representatives and as citizens seeking to join that body we propose not just to change its policies, but even more important, to restore the bonds of trust between the people and their elected representatives.
That is why, in this era of official evasion and posturing, we offer instead a detailed agenda for national renewal, a written commitment with no fine print.
This year's election offers the chance, after four decades of one-party control, to bring to the House a new majority that will transform the way Congress works. That historic change would be the end of government that is too big, too intrusive, and too easy with the public's money. It can be the beginning of a Congress that respects the values and shares the faith of the American family.
Like Lincoln, our first Republican president, we intend to act "with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right." To restore accountability to Congress. To end its cycle of scandal and disgrace. To make us all proud again of the way free people govern themselves.
On the first day of the 104th Congress, the new Republican majority will immediately pass the following major reforms, aimed at restoring the faith and trust of the American people in their government:
FIRST, require all laws that apply to the rest of the country also apply equally to the Congress;
SECOND, select a major, independent auditing firm to conduct a comprehensive audit of Congress for waste, fraud or abuse;
THIRD, cut the number of House committees, and cut committee staff by one-third;
FOURTH, limit the terms of all committee chairs;
FIFTH, ban the casting of proxy votes in committee;
SIXTH, require committee meetings to be open to the public;
SEVENTH, require a three-fifths majority vote to pass a tax increase;
EIGHTH, guarantee an honest accounting of our Federal Budget by implementing zero base-line budgeting.
Thereafter, within the first 100 days of the 104th Congress, we shall bring to the House Floor the following bills, each to be given full and open debate, each to be given a clear and fair vote and each to be immediately available this day for public inspection and scrutiny.
1. THE FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY ACT: A balanced budget/tax limitation amendment and a legislative line-item veto to restore fiscal responsibility to an out- of-control Congress, requiring them to live under the same budget constraints as families and businesses.
2. THE TAKING BACK OUR STREETS ACT: An anti-crime package including stronger truth-in- sentencing, "good faith" exclusionary rule exemptions, effective death penalty provisions, and cuts in social spending from this summer's "crime" bill to fund prison construction and additional law enforcement to keep people secure in their neighborhoods and kids safe in their schools.
3. THE PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY ACT: Discourage illegitimacy and teen pregnancy by prohibiting welfare to minor mothers and denying increased AFDC for additional children while on welfare, cut spending for welfare programs, and enact a tough two-years-and-out provision with work requirements to promote individual responsibility.
4. THE FAMILY REINFORCEMENT ACT: Child support enforcement, tax incentives for adoption, strengthening rights of parents in their children's education, stronger child pornography laws, and an elderly dependent care tax credit to reinforce the central role of families in American society.
5. THE AMERICAN DREAM RESTORATION ACT: A S500 per child tax credit, begin repeal of the marriage tax penalty, and creation of American Dream Savings Accounts to provide middle class tax relief.
6. THE NATIONAL SECURITY RESTORATION ACT: No U.S. troops under U.N. command and restoration of the essential parts of our national security funding to strengthen our national defense and maintain our credibility around the world.
7. THE SENIOR CITIZENS FAIRNESS ACT: Raise the Social Security earnings limit which currently forces seniors out of the work force, repeal the 1993 tax hikes on Social Security benefits and provide tax incentives for private long-term care insurance to let Older Americans keep more of what they have earned over the years.
8. THE JOB CREATION AND WAGE ENHANCEMENT ACT: Small business incentives, capital gains cut and indexation, neutral cost recovery, risk assessment/cost-benefit analysis, strengthening the Regulatory Flexibility Act and unfunded mandate reform to create jobs and raise worker wages.
9. THE COMMON SENSE LEGAL REFORM ACT: "Loser pays" laws, reasonable limits on punitive damages and reform of product liability laws to stem the endless tide of litigation.
10. THE CITIZEN LEGISLATURE ACT: A first-ever vote on term limits to replace career politicians with citizen legislators.
Further, we will instruct the House Budget Committee to report to the floor and we will work to enact additional budget savings, beyond the budget cuts specifically included in the legislation described above, to ensure that the Federal budget deficit will be less than it would have been without the enactment of these bills.
Respecting the judgment of our fellow citizens as we seek their mandate for reform, we hereby pledge our names to this Contract with America.
Did Newt "Blowjobs-R-Not-Sex" Gingrich Touch Leo Strauss Inappropriately?
Leo Strauss the Father of Neo-Conservatism
Leo Strauss was born in 1899 and died in 1973. He was a Jewish scholar who fled Germany when Hitler gained power. He eventually found refuge in the United States where he taught political science at the University of Chicago. He is most famous for resuscitating Machiavelli and introducing his principles as the guiding philosophy of the neo-conservative movement. Strauss has been called the godfather of Newt Gingrich's "Contract with America." More than any other man, Strauss breathed upon conservatism, inspiring it to rise from its atrophied condition and its natural dislike of change and to embrace an unbounded new political ideology that rides on the back of a revolutionary steed, hailing even radical change; hence the name Neo-Conservatives.
The father of neo-conservatism had many "spiritual" children at the University of Chicago, among them: Paul Wolfowitz and Abram Shulsky, who received their doctorates under Strauss in 1972. Harry V. Jaffa was a student of Strauss and has an important connection to Dominionists like Pat Robertson as we shall see below. However, Strauss's family of influence extended beyond his students to include faculty members in universities, and the people his students taught. Those prominent neo-conservatives who are most notable are: Justice Clarence Thomas, Robert Bork, Irving Kristol and his son William Kristol, Alan Keyes, William J. Bennett, J. Danforth Quayle, Allan Bloom, John Podhoertz, John T. Agresto, John Ashcroft, Newt Gingrich, Gary Bauer, Michael Ledeen and scores of others, many of whom hold important positions in George W. Bush's White House and Defense Department.
To understand the Straussian infusion of power that transformed an all but dead conservative realm, think of Nietzsche's Overman come to life. Or better yet, think of the philosophy most unlike Christianity: Think of pure unmitigated evil. Strauss admits that Machiavelli is an evil man. But according to Strauss, this admission is a prerequisite to studying and reading Machiavelli: the acknowledgement is the safety net that keeps the reader from being corrupted. One is tempted to talk back to Strauss and point out an alternative: the admission could be the subterfuge that keeps a man from being ridiculed and rejected for espousing Machiavellian methods.
In one of the most important books for our times, Shadia Drury's Leo Strauss and the American Right, undertakes to explain the ideas behind Strauss's huge influence and following. Strauss's reputation, according to Drury, rests in large part on his view that "a real philosopher must communicate quietly, subtly, and secretly to the few who are fit to receive his message." Strauss claims secrecy is necessary to avoid "persecution."
In reading Strauss, one sometimes encounters coded contradictory ideas. For example, Strauss appears to respect Machiavelli because-as he points out-in contrast to other evil men, Machiavelli openly proclaimed opinions that others only secretly expressed behind closed doors. But we have just noted that Strauss teaches that secrecy is essential to the real philosopher. Strauss concluded, some would say that Machiavelli was after all, a patriot of sorts for he loved Italy more than he loved his own soul. Then Strauss warns, but if you call him a patriot, you "merely obscure something truly evil." So Strauss dances his way through the Machiavellian field of evil, his steps choreographed with duplicity and it's opposite. The reader cannot let go.
In Strauss's view, Machiavelli sees that Christianity "has led the world into weakness," which can only be offset by returning the world to the ancient practices of the past. (Implied is not a return to the pagan past, but rather a return to the more virulent world of the Old Testament). Strauss laments, "Machiavelli needed ...a detailed discussion revealing the harmony between his political teaching and the teaching of the Bible." These statements of Strauss, by themselves, were sufficient to send neo-conservative Christians to search for correlations between Machiavellianism, radical conservatism and the scriptures.
Strauss's teaching incorporated much of Machiavelli's. Significantly, his philosophy is unfriendly to democracy-even antagonistic. At the same time Strauss upheld the necessity for a national religion not because he favored religious practices, but because religion in his view is necessary in order to control the population. Since neo-conservatives influenced by Strauss are in control of the Bush administration, I have prepared a brief list that shows the radical unchristian basis of neo-conservatism. I am indebted to Shadia Drury's book (Leo Strauss and the American Right) and published interviews for the following:
First: Strauss believed that a leader had to perpetually deceive the citizens he ruled.
Secondly: Those who lead must understand there is no morality, there is only the right of the superior to rule the inferior.
Thirdly: According to Drury, Religion "is the glue that holds society together." It is a handle by which the ruler can manipulate the masses. Any religion will do. Strauss is indifferent to them all.
Fourthly: "Secular society...is the worst possible thing," because it leads to individualism, liberalism, and relativism, all of which encourage dissent and rebellion. As Drury sums it up: "You want a crowd that you can manipulate like putty."
Fifthly: "Strauss thinks that a political order can be stable only if it is united by an external threat; and following Machiavelli, he maintains that if no external threat exists, then one has to be manufactured [9/11?]."
Sixthly: "In Strauss's view, the trouble with liberal society is that it dispenses with noble lies and pious frauds. It tries to found society on secular rational foundations."
Did Newt Gingrich Touch 9/11 Inappropriately?
YOU ARE LOOKING AT A US GOVERNMENT LIE
On Friday 14 December 2001 a videotape of Osama bin Laden "confessing" to the 9/11 attacks was released. The tape was supposedly found in a house in Qandahar, Afghanistan. The recording was of very poor audio and visual quality and the authenticity of the tape was questioned.
This annoyed President Bush who said "[It is] preposterous to think this tape was doctored."
Okay, since Bush Republicans lied about Iraq & WMD, let's have a look:
Here's 5 Osama's - which is the odd one out?
The Bin Laden Tape Is A Fake [short version] - YouTubeGeorge W. Bush Lied About Finding Osama
I am truly not that concerned about him.
BUSH AND BIN LADEN FAMILIES ARE FRIENDS
The Above Is In Flash Video Format:
http://www.flyingsnail.com/Dahbud/BOQ.htmlARREST WAR CRIMINALS
An 'Off the Table' Piglet Could Have Spared Lives
Martin Rowson
Sweet Condi & the Asspirate Neocon BandAccording to a Senate Intelligence Committee Memo, George Bush's National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice, was the first person to verbally approve torture during July 2002 and then there was this:
BEN-VENISTE: Isn't it a fact, Dr. Rice, that the August 6 [2001] PDB warned against possible attacks in this country? And I ask you whether you recall the title of that PDB?
RICE: I believe the title was, "Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside the United States [using planes]."
Lies, Lies, Lies - BlackMustache.comSimply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. - Dick Cheney, August 26, 2002, War Criminal
Every day Saddam remains in power with chemical weapons, biological weapons, and the development of nuclear weapons is a day of danger for the United States. - Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-CT - September 4, 2002, War Criminal
Think of the faces in Afghanistan when the people were liberated, when they moved out in the streets and they started singing and flying kites and women went to school and people were able to function and other countries were able to start interacting with them. That's what would happen in Iraq. - Donald Rumsfeld, September 2002, War Criminal
I think that the people of Iraq would welcome the U.S. force as liberators; they would not see us as oppressors, by any means. And our experience was after the Gulf War in '91 that once the United States acted and provided leadership that in fact, the community, the region was more peaceful for some considerable period of time. That is what made possible a lot of progress in peace process between the Israelis and Palestinians back in the early '90s. - Dick Cheney, September 2002, War Criminal
Nobody Gets It the First Time Around!
None of the Above
should be on Voter Ballots
Alerts - Notes from ~@~
Amateur Radio - A hobby I was very fond of
Animation for the Appliance Challenged Gallery - Various forms of animation
Bitter - Nobody Cares What You're Doing Now
Blender Animation - Really old historic page
Emmy - Tom Smothers
John Draper - Captain Crunch
Gay Freedom Day 1977 - San Francisco, CA - June 26, 1977 - MP3 Audio
Grateful Deadhead - Grateful Dead
How To Fix A Broken World - A thought
Sailing - on Flying Snail
Where Have All the Flowers Gone - Stuff ~@~ feels is important
Word Worlds -Where simplifying complexity becomes art.
Only after the last tree has been cut down, Only after the last river has been poisoned, Only after the last fish has been caught, Only then will you find money cannot be eaten. - Cree Prophecy
The man whispered, "God, speak to me" and a meadowlark sang. But the man did not hear. So the man yelled "God, speak to me" and the thunder rolled across the sky. But the man did not listen. The man looked around and said, "God let me see you" and a star shined brightly. But the man did not notice. And the man shouted, "God show me a miracle" and a life was born. But the man did not know. So the man cried out in despair, "Touch me God, and let me know you are there" Whereupon God reached down and touched the man. But the man brushed the butterfly away and walked on.
Don't miss out on a blessing because it isn't packaged the way you expect.