OnlineJournalist.org

Blogger sucks

2006-04-07T16:40:00.000-07:00

For no good reason, despite multiple requests to reverse the arbitrary move, Blogger locked this blog for a week, preventing me from updating it.

So, I won't be updating this blog any more. I've moved to http://onlinejournalist.typepad.com. Please update your bookmarks.

I'll gradually move some of the content from this site to the new one, and who knows, maybe I'll get inspired and create some new stuff, but no promises.

Thanks.

alligator piano

2006-03-18T09:20:00.000-08:00

Giorgio's of Palm Beach offers one at $950,000, says here in the Wall Street Journal today. Upholstered with no fewer than 70 gator bellies, this concert grand. Doesn't say here whether or not the alligator piano has ivory keys, seems a natural for this endangered species consumptionist orgy.

nothing's like a book

2006-03-04T10:47:00.000-08:00

PW Daily:

E.L. Doctorow, whose Civil War novel The March (Random House), has already won the PEN Faulkner award, been an NBA finalist and is tipped for the Pulitzer, won in Fiction. He said he often wondered whether awards were good for novelists, but found "I tend to accept them." A book "written in silence and read in silence goes from heart to heart and soul to soul as nothing else can," he declared.

headline of the day:

2006-03-04T10:03:00.000-08:00

Consciousness Continues To Baffle Psychoanalysts

....And that doesn't surprise me a bit. Unfortunately, the article doesn't explain why my psychoanalyst baffles me.

"Red State Spex!"

2006-02-28T08:54:00.000-08:00

Why does Bush continue to occupy the White House instead of a jail cell? Tom Tomorrow knows why.

Don Knotts, R.I.P.

2006-02-25T22:20:00.000-08:00

Thanks for all the laughs.

What next?

out of the past

2006-02-20T08:51:00.000-08:00

....a voice reminds me of youthful intensity, paths not taken & other mid-life truths & platitudes. In a good way, I hasten to add, lots of good memories to enjoy, along with the woulda, coulda, shoulda, might-have-beens, the mind-boggling branching ramification of envisoned-potentialities-now-reduced-to-certainties.

brother dan (a.k.a. "Mr. Willison") in the pipeline

2006-02-15T19:19:00.000-08:00

...from NewsCentralAsia:

Trans-Afghan Pipe Meet Ends in Turkmenistan, Implementation Stage in Sight
Date: Wednesday, February 15 @ 13:40:55 PST

Ashgabat, 16 February 2006 (nCa) --- Ninth meeting of the steering committee of Trans-Afghan Pipeline (TAP) project concluded Wednesday in Ashgabat. President Niyazov assured the heads of delegations from Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and ADB that Turkmenistan remains firmly committed to TAP. The pipe planners took some important decisions, indicating that the implementation stage may not be far off if the tempo gained in the present meeting can be maintained by all sides.

Here are the important steps taken during the meeting:

* A protocol was signed with consensus. The protocol would be attached to the initial agreement signed between Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan in 2002 for construction of gas and oil pipelines. If will be in force for 3 years.

* A working group has been formed to deal with technical and legal issues. The working group would meet every alternate month and more often if required. First meeting of the working group would take place in March 2006 in Ashgabat.

* Preliminary understanding has been reached on gas volumes. The sides agreed to start working out the details of future contracts.

* India’s participation in the project was formally confirmed.

* Turkmenistan provided gas audit certification documents for Daulatabat gas field. The audit was carried out by De Golyer & MacNaughton.

* ADB presented project structures and investment scenario that would be offered to potential financiers and investors.

* Afghanistan outlined security measures for the pipeline.

* Next meeting of the steering committee would be held in April 2006 in Islamabad.

Amanullah Jadoon, minister for petroleum and natural resources of Pakistan, Mir Mohammad Sediq, minister for mines and industries of Afghanistan, Dinsha Patel, Indian state minister for oil and gas, and Dan Millison of Asian Development Bank had a meeting Wednesday morning with President Niyazov.

President Niyazov assured the delegates that Turkmenistan was ready to share its energy resources for strengthening of peace and stability in the region and promotion of common objectives.

He expressed satisfaction on the fact that India had agreed to joint he project.

The delegation heads told Niyazov that the visit to the infrastructure facilities at Daulatabat field had strengthened their belief in the viability of the project.

All sides agreed that TAP would bring harmony and prosperity to the region.

After their meeting with President Niyazov, the delegation heads spoke to Turkmen TV.

Here is the transcript of their remarks:

Amanullah Khan Djadoon, minister for petroleum and natural resources, Pakistan
We discussed different issues, international, bilateral, and the particular emphasis was on the gas pipeline from Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan to India.

It was very detailed and very comprehensive discussion and we have with us among the delegates Mr. Willison who represents Asian Development Bank and we got some very good and positive points from the president.

We are very hopeful that this project is going to come through very soon.

Mir Mokhamad Sediq, minister for mines and industries, Afghanistan
We have just received His Excellency’s confirmation and support for the project.

We have also received confirmation from the president and prime minister of India, and presidents of Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Personally I am very happy that the president [Niyazov] has lot of information about this particular project that shows his interest in the programme.

So, we have requested the president that as he has put all the pressure and support for development in Ashgabat, likewise to support this programme. And he has supported our request. If you compare Ashgabat with a couple of years ago, the development is fantastic; it looks like a new country.

Dinsha Patel, Minister of state for oil and gas, India
(Speaking in Hindi) There have been very good talks about the pipeline for the past couple of days. Today we talked to president [Niyazov] also and he gave very positive comments.

Ministers of Turkmenistan, Pakistan and Afghanistan were also together [with us] and they have also contributed positive remarks.

India is of the opinion that the gas demand in India for development, industry and domestic consumers . .. this pipeline would bring lots of benefits to India also, and would benefit Pakistan and Afghanistan also. And, it would also be helpful for development of Turkmenistan.

India considers that the [TAP] pipeline project should start as soon as possible and technical problems should be solved quickly and investment questions should also be resolved swiftly. We should think [of the ways] how we can do all this as quickly as possible.

I am very happy with the positive attitude of the president [Niyazov] and I congratulate him.

Dan Millison, Asian Development Bank
This is a fairly complicated . . . complex project. Outside of Western Europe I don’t know of any other gas pipeline that involves three or four countries. This is a complex project and projects of this nature take a long time to develop. The project of this nature requires strong political support from the member countries as well as from host countries of investors that would actually provide massive financing. If we can structure a project that is commercially attractive and find viable and credible investors the ADB would provide whatever support is necessary to arrange the financing.

We have had very frank and open discussion during our meetings and I am optimistic that we will make progress and we are looking forward to have a good deal, good commercial prospects, and we are confident that we can find some credible investors and ADB will continue to support the project.

This article comes from

The URL for this story is:

2006-02-06T10:54:00.000-08:00

....family fun, non-stop,literally, in the juiciest part of the Big Apple...

E = MC Mozart

2006-01-30T21:20:00.000-08:00

Worth-reading article about Einstein and his beloved composer in today's New York Times:

He also empathized with Mozart's ability to continue to compose magnificent music even in very difficult and impoverished conditions. In 1905, the year he discovered relativity, Einstein was living in a cramped apartment and dealing with a difficult marriage and money troubles.

"a curse on your own nation"

2006-01-30T21:11:00.000-08:00

Says the perceptive - regarding our President, in this particular quote, at least - Ayman al-Zawahiri:

"Butcher of Washington, you are not only defeated and a liar, but also a failure," he said, speaking of Mr. Bush. "You are a curse on your own nation and you have brought and will bring them only catastrophes and tragedies."

what a life can be

2006-01-30T06:51:00.000-08:00

We were lucky to get to know Jean Siri last year, when she shared the house next door with our neighbor, Virginia. R.I.P., Jean.

In honor of her contributions to regional parks, "All flags throughout the [East Bay Regional Park] District headquarters, facilities and 65 parklands will remain a half staff until February 11." The San Francisco Chronicle's obituary captures some of her spirit:

Jean Siri -- activist, former El Cerrito mayor
- Kevin Fagan, Chronicle Staff Writer
Saturday, January 21, 2006

In the end, after a lifetime of dashing passionately from cause to cause as one of the "Wild Women of Contra Costa County," social issues activist and former El Cerrito Mayor Jean Siri died the way she probably would have wanted to.

She suffered a heart attack sitting in her car outside her home Friday morning -- with the engine running and her hand on the shift lever, apparently about to push it into drive.

She was 85 years old, but she had the energy, drive and restless spirit of someone half her age, friends and family recalled.

"She died fast, independent and getting ready to go somewhere," said her daughter, Lynn Siri Kimsey, managing a chuckle even as she struggled with the blow of her mother's death. "It was a perfect way to go.

"And she certainly had a full enough life."

That, Ms. Siri's many friends and admirers said, could be an understatement.

At the time of her death, Ms. Siri was a member of the East Bay Regional Park District Board of Directors, a position she held for 14 years. When asked in 2004, just before her last election, whether she might think of stepping aside for younger candidates, she harrumphed: "Only if I have a dead body would I stop running, and it's not quite dead yet."

The comment was typical of her irreverent, bluntly honest wit. That characteristic, coupled with her high-octane vigor, propelled her into dozens of political and organizational posts throughout Contra Costa County over the past half-century, from two stints as mayor in the 1980s to co-founder of the influential environmental groups Save the Bay and the California Native Plant Society.

Together with homeless activist Susan Prather and their late friend Fancheon Christner, Ms. Siri fought so fiercely with county and city governments on behalf of the elderly, homeless and ecological causes that the three were nicknamed the "Wild Women of Contra Costa County" in the early 1980s by the local press. The three were instrumental in keeping homeless shelters and senior centers open in Richmond and Concord and in protecting access to the bay for the public by opposing industrial expansion plans all along the East Bay shoreline.

"She was the mother I should have had," said Prather, 55-year-old director of the Fresh Start homeless aid center in Walnut Creek. "We both went pretty far in getting into people's faces, I guess, but we sure had fun doing it."

Ms. Siri was born Jean Brandenberg near Bismarck, N.D. After earning a bachelor's degree in biology at Jamestown College in North Dakota, she enlisted in 1943 in the Navy WAVES (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service) and ran a cryptology unit in Klamath Falls, Ore.

Upon her honorable discharge, she took a job managing the animal lab at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. There she met her husband, biophysicist William Siri, who helped create the atomic bomb as a member of the Manhattan Project. The two married in 1949 and were a perfect fit in their verve and temperament, daughter Lynn Siri Kimsey recalled.

"She and my dad both made it clear that you can't just sit back and wait for someone to do the right thing," said Siri Kimsey, an entomology professor at UC Davis. "You have to get out there and do it yourself."

Ms. Siri quit her lab job in 1952 to raise their two daughters at home in El Cerrito, but she quickly added more ways to fill her time. As her husband pursued a storied interest in mountain climbing -- he co-led the first American expedition up Mount Everest -- and became president of the national Sierra Club, Ms. Siri began protesting on behalf of civil rights and environmental causes.

When her children left high school, she entered local politics, getting elected chairwoman of the Stege Sanitary District from 1975 to 1979. In 1980, she won a seat on the El Cerrito City Council, and served until 1991, except for a break from 1985 to 1987. She took the rotating post of mayor in 1982-83 and 1988-89.

Along the way, she also was active in the Gray Panthers senior citizens advocacy group and served on a plethora of local and countywide commissions, including the West County Toxics Coalition and the county Homeless Committee.

"Will and I have had a pretty good time stirring things up," Ms. Siri told The Chronicle in August 2004 for an obituary about her husband, who had just died of complications due to Alzheimer's. "Hell, someone has to. Why not us?"

"Any one of her experiences would have been a career for anyone else," said park district General Manager Pat O'Brien, who ordered district flags flown at half-staff. "She reminded me of an eight-cylinder car. Everyone else is down to four cylinders, so to speak, and can be kind of subtle, but she was full bore. When she stepped on the gas, you heard it."

Mayor Tom Bates, who with Ms. Siri and others helped create the Eastshore State Park, was shocked to hear that the energetic woman he had fought alongside -- and even with, sometimes -- for many years was silenced.

"Jean was a great advocate to have on your side," he said. "She always told you exactly where you stood, what she believed in. What a great fighter she was."

Ms. Siri is survived by her daughters, Lynn Siri Kimsey of Davis and Anne Siri of Philo (Mendocino County), and two grandchildren.

Donations in her name can be made to Fresh Start in Walnut Creek, (925) 935-8446, or to the East Bay Regional Park District, (510) 635-0135. Services are pending.

Page B - 4
URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/01/21/BAGKHGQS4F1.DTL
©2006 San Francisco Chronicle

fiction, schmiction: it's all true AND it's all fiction

2006-01-27T19:03:00.000-08:00

The all-too-predictable controversy about James Frey's memoir reminds me that my favorite UC Berkeley professor, Todd Willy, assigned Yukio Mishima's memoir Sun and Steel (a beautiful and powerful book, well worth reading; poor guy never had a chance, the War ended before he could become one of the kamikaze that, as an impressionable youth, he adored) to be read as a novel, in his "Rhetoric of the Novel" course. Realizing the impossibility of somehow capturing objective reality (whatever that might be) in words, and the role of re-imagining and revision in every act of story-telling (whether intended as fiction or not), I agree with my old editor John Sterlicchi who said, "Never let the facts get in the way of the story." Deeper truths dominate whatever set of facts the story-teller manages to assemble; the effective story-teller manipulates story elements to evoke the profound realities that even the simplest stories reflect.

hope....

2006-01-26T12:51:00.000-08:00

All it's cracked up to be, and more.
Second only to....

....anticipation....

Thanks to everybody who helps.

"support our troops"

2006-01-23T10:49:00.000-08:00

News that Halliburton delivered contaminated water to U.S. troops in Iraq shocks, but comes as no surprise. By now it should be obvious how poorly prepared the U.S. military has been for Bush's war - sending troops into combat with inadequate armor and other supplies is just the start. Before the war started, I predicted this, and was contradicted by a close friend who works as a journalist for a major metro newspaper: they've got their act together now in the all-volunteer military, compared to the way things were when I was drafted and served (longer ago than I care to recall), he argued. As a motor pool parts clerk just south of the DMZ in Korea, I knew that half of our mechanized infantry battallion's jeeps, trucks, and armored personnel carriers wouldn't run due to lack of needed repair parts, and I saw first-hand the way the troops suffered when the mess hall manager sold our fresh food on the black market (only the most egregious example of how we were cheated by our leaders). Apparently, not much as changed. Profiteers profit, while troops in the field do without or get second-best. So much for "Support Our Troops" - bring 'em home now, out of harm's way...whether that harm comes from Us or The Enemy, if that's a meaningful distinction.

why isn't Turd Blossom in jail yet?

2006-01-21T13:33:00.000-08:00

Bush facing impeachment? Rumsfeld and his bullies in the dock for crimes against humanity? & etc.

Comes with Republican Party control of all branches of government and a majority of voters who, apparently, want things this way, at least they voted in this gang.

everybody shares the dream...right?

2006-01-16T13:12:00.000-08:00

triskdekaphobic?

2006-01-13T10:29:00.000-08:00

There have to be at least 13 reasons not to be, I'm afraid.

blue sky thursday...

2006-01-12T14:07:00.000-08:00

...and it's just as pretty as a picture postcard, as my old Daddy used to say. They say it's going to rain tomorrow, but that's difficult to believe looking at the sky right now.

"He Rode The Fast Lane On The Road To Nowhere"

2006-01-11T10:14:00.000-08:00

UPDATE [Weds, 11.01.06]: From blame to insight and compassion, not a bad move. Sustainable?

10.01.06: Woke up with this phrase, the promotional tagline for Five Easy Pieces, one of my favorite movies (in part because of the oil rig setting and Jack's roughneck character, and my own experience with same), on my mind, seeing in a new light the film's ending, which I have interpreted in a very different way all these years. Finallly liberated from his worst fears and guilt feelings and nearing the end of his earthly existence, the Father mutely expresses his realization – enigmatic because he cannot speak and thus verbalize his feelings – that the Son has managed to find his way and become his own person despite the father's mistakes, the miracle is that Father has, in fact, passed something along to Son, but it's life-affirming, positive, an essential strength, that has helped the Son survive and thrive, not the "infection" of fear and weakness that he feels he received from his own father and that he was certain he had transmitted to his son. In an earlier interpretation, the Father's silence in the face of Son's confession condemns the Son for disobedience, for wasting the gift of his musical talent, renders impossible reconciliation and forgiveness, Father and Son remain trapped (together and separately) within a labyrinth of frustration and pain, bound by the past and their limited conceptions of themselves and each other. Maybe being able to see the movie in a different way indicates some positive shift in my ability to understand and accept my own life? That would be nice. Or, maybe this is just wishful thinking, seeking to let myself off the hook for my shortcomings and mistakes. How would I continue the movie, what does Nicholson's character go on to do after this encounter with the ineffable (nothing to do with the F-word, or does it?) Father?

the stars never lie

2006-01-10T22:52:00.000-08:00

My favorite astrologer says 2006 is going to be a great year, and that sounds just fine to me.

huge war crime happening as we watch, apparently impotent

2006-01-09T11:18:00.000-08:00

How many hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died as the result of the U.S. invasion?

mo' 'bout bro'

2006-01-07T17:05:00.000-08:00

Daily Times Saturday, January 07, 2006

EDITORIAL: Will Iran pipeline go ahead despite US opposition?

Even as Iran, Pakistan and India prepare to close a tripartite $7 billion 2,600-kilometre gas pipeline deal that would take Iranian gas to India through Pakistan, a senior State Department official has said that the United States is unequivocally against the deal. “The US government supports multiple pipelines from that [Caspian] region but remains absolutely opposed to pipelines involving Iran,” Steven Mann, a senior official from the US State Department, said last Wednesday.

Interestingly, the Asian Development Bank has assessed that the deal is feasible. At the same meeting, Dan Millison, ADB’s senior energy specialist, said that the ADB’s assessment was based purely on economic grounds and the rising demand for energy from India and Pakistan. The US position, however, is not linked to the economic side of the deal. It is driven by strategic politics, by Washington’s Iran policy. The United States, which has had adversarial relations with Iran since the 1979 revolution ousted the monarchy, has been accusing Iran for some years of cherishing nuclear-weapon ambitions. Since 2004, when Iran conceded that it had tried to enrich uranium beyond the limit prescribed by the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to which it (Iran) is a signatory, the US has been pushing for isolating Iran and taking it to the United Nations Security Council for sanctions under Chapter VII of the UNSC.

Washington has voiced its opposition to the IPI pipeline as part of that strategy. The US fears that the deal will be a blow to its (US) efforts to isolate Iran. Since the deal also involves Pakistan and India, two countries that are squarely in the US camp and friendly with Washington, the Bush administration has been trying to pressure both to back off from the deal. India has come under greater pressure because New Delhi and Washington are steadily getting closer. The two sides have also signed a deal which bestows on India’s nuclear capability a legitimacy that has not come the way of any other state outside the NPT. But part of the quid pro quo is that India should get out of the Iran pipeline deal. Last September, India was forced to give a positive vote on a Britain-sponsored, US-backed resolution at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) calling for sanctions against Iran. While India and Iran managed to tide over that incident, it is clear that the US is not about to let the matter of the pipeline rest.

Indian officials have so far played down the opposition from the US. Even after India cast its anti-Iran vote at the IAEA, the Indian petroleum minister, Mani Shankar Aiyar, was reported as saying that everything was on track as far as the IPI deal was concerned. Indeed, during his visit to Pakistan last year to work out the details of the deal, Mr Aiyar, a strong advocate of the pipeline, had said that there was no official pressure on New Delhi from Washington. We now know that that is not the case. In fact, just after the Indian prime minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, signed the July 17 deal in Washington, he made some unfavourable comments on the IPI deal, remarking that given the US opposition he did not see how any bank or financial institution would underwrite the deal. His statement created uproar among his allies in the Indian government and he had to retract it. But the fact is that he did make those comments as they were reported; the fact also is that Mr Singh knew the exact nature and extent of the US opposition to the deal and seemed to have sent out a warning signal to the financiers.

The US opposition to the deal, therefore, is no more a secret. The issue really is: Will the deal still go through? In other words, will India and Pakistan ignore US pressure and keep the deal on schedule? Opinion is divided on this. There is greater headache in this for India than Pakistan because India has much more to gain from the USA if it opts out and much more to lose if it doesn’t. So far it has tried to play both sides — voting against Iran at the IAEA but continuing to remain close to Iran on the economic agreements it has with that country. But that option may not be available to New Delhi for very long. On the domestic front, the Indian government has elements within the coalition that are opposed to India’s unbridled alliance with the US and New Delhi’s qualified approach to Iran because of its (India’s) strategic partnership with the US. If Dr Singh takes a decision to throw in his lot completely with the US, he will have to face these elements. Technically speaking, India does have the option of telling the US to take a hike. But whether it will do so is another matter.

This is the key to the issue. India’s decision will likely depend on a cost-benefit analysis. What is more important: its energy-starved economy and regional relations with Iran or its geo-strategic deals with the US? This calculation is not very easy. India desperately needs heavy doses of energy. It has already cut a deal with Iran for liquefied natural gas. It is about to enter another deal through the IPI. Its economic ties with Iran have been on the rise since the last 15 years. If Iran is convinced that India has opted for the US camp, Tehran could simply go ahead with Pakistan. On the other hand, India needs the US for a host of reasons, not least the fact that its strategic partnership with the US may be its only route to big power status. The relations also involve foreign direct investment, investment in India by US companies, the US interest in enhancing India’s military capability and so on.

Is the clock ticking on India’s decision? It may be premature to conclude thus. There is a long way to go in terms of the homework that needs to be done and the terms and conditions that need to be clinched among the three pipeline countries before the project can be irrevocably inaugurated. Until then, they can all hope that a solution to the US-Iran problem can be found that removes the US hurdles in the way of the pipeline.

latest back-burner project & another first novel I probably wouldn't get around to reading:

2006-01-06T16:24:00.000-08:00

“That’s Mister Loud-Mouth to you, punk!”

Episde No. 555
in the never-ending family saga

SHOPPING WITH DAD

DougDay: pay-for-pay-pundit still doesn't get it

2006-01-06T12:54:00.000-08:00

Sorry, right-wing-pay-for-play-pundit Doug, you did in fact create a conflict of interest, not the appearance of same: you were clearly speaking for Abramhoff's lobbying interests when you accepted money to advocate their views in print. Bottom line: you still don't get it, concealing the fact that you're being paid to advocate certain views and not revealing same in public statements is unethical and dishonest.

[cross-posted from DougDay.org, "where every Doug has his day"