Sentinel Wolf

2012-01-28T05:09:00.000-08:00

Cuba

Two prophetic dreams in the past week - possibly on the same night.

In the one, I inadvertently smash my current favourite tea vehicle (a red "McVitie's Digestives" mug). Two days later while washing up I noticed the handle flexing…. Ok, possibly my subconscious noticed the crack first, and fortunately I could bust it off and Araldite it back on. This anecdote may have more to do with Cuba than even I realise.

In the other dream, Fidel Castro is present by the casket at the funeral of Raúl, his brother, who is presently in power.

Would such an occurrence make the transition of power in North Korea look like, well, what it looked like?

Raúl is has lately been sounding the trumpet of party reform - the party founded in 1965, following the revolution - and their annual conference is about to commence as I write. What might the reform entail? Only the separation of Party and State. Only the abolition of the de facto requirement for party membership, the imposition of five year term limits, an end to corruption, and the elimination of discrimination by race, gender, religion, or sexual orientation - the first ever mention at a communist event of that last barrier, according to el Público, a left-wing Spanish daily newspaper.

If Raúl can pull all that off without his ticker suddenly failing, good on him. One can easily imagine encountering some resistance to changing just the carpet on which so many entitled persons are standing, let alone the floorboards. Best of luck with that.

Speed Limit

2011-12-30T11:08:00.001-08:00

I do not believe in speed limits. They are usually arbitrary, incorrect for a great many vehicles and misleading for most drivers, offering no more than vague guidelines and a false sense of security. The only criteria for judgement of safe driving belong to a set of conditions most often ignored until after a collision. The term 'accident' seldom really applies, but is the best way to duck and deny responsibility for failing to recognise and respond appropriately to these various changing conditions, of which speed is nearly the last.

We owe the existence of speed limits to the assumption that excessive speed is a major if not determining factor in most collisions. Certainly my professional advice to any driver is that, nine times out of ten, you will avoid, escape or minimise a dangerous situation more readily by slowing down than by speeding up - in no small part owing to the fact that most vehicles are capable of braking far more rapidly than they could ever accelerate - however when it comes to 'accidents' and 'mishaps', or even near-misses, it cannot truthfully be said that speed itself is other than one ill-considered factor in a much larger equation.

The Clean Room

2011-12-30T10:38:00.001-08:00

1. There are no self-cleaning surfaces.

2. It is easier to keep things clean, than to get things clean.

3. Own your mess.

Ouverture Facil

2011-12-30T10:30:00.001-08:00

The most dreaded phrase in the French language.

What a Character

2011-09-05T10:41:00.005-07:00

I find that persons who are genuinely poor judges of character generally start out by grievously misjudging their own.

anti-social networking

2011-09-05T10:41:00.003-07:00

Google "anti-social networking", if you never tried it. We are not alone…

Decisions, decisions

2011-09-05T10:41:00.001-07:00

It is one thing to know what decisions others have made or appear to be making, quite another to know why they have made them - in many cases based on limited choices, knowledge, or resources, or predetermined by a similarly influenced action made at any time by another person or perceived group, and therefore equally faulty and really no choice at all - too often lacking any genuine decision-making process….

Though I suppose it saves thinking for oneself.

2010-10-14T20:00:00.001-07:00

Dear Sir,

You must know that the military's and all other institutional intolerance for and hazing and bashing and bullying of perceived and self-identified homosexual and transgender persons is in no small part responsible for the broader social antagonism in this country which itself has cost the lives of so many young individuals in recent weeks, and countless others in my lifetime alone - a few of whom were known to me personally.

In light of this I beg you to make a swift and definitive end to "Don't ask, don't tell", and a major public policy address condemning all discrimination - discrimination which has been transferred from one minority to the next throughout our history, and which I feel you yourself must know all too well.

Heaven

2010-08-20T22:07:00.001-07:00

The ultimate gated community.

Revolution

2010-08-20T21:53:00.000-07:00

The Revolution will not be televised.

It will be pay-per-view.

I've said this only half jokingly since at least the mid-1980s, only I feel the time has long since arrived to modify my prediction.

The Mythology of the Liberator

2010-07-09T07:38:00.000-07:00

Invasion is not liberation. Withdrawal is liberation.

The Myth of the Liberator is a ideological carrot dangled before the reluctant beast. To the driver, only the stick is a real tool, and its application is purely strategic.

Strategy is for commanders. Ideology has no place in strategy.

Ideology may benefit warriors and camp followers, yet there has never been so much as a skirmish over ideology, let alone a war.

Battles are fought for resources, tangible or otherwise - cattle, captives, goods or territory. Control of (or even simple access to) resources is not ideological, though the successful promulgation and manipulation of ideology may rank among its quantifiable benefits.

Size queen?

2010-07-07T17:10:00.000-07:00

Size does not matter - not at all in the sense in which it is customarily used. No, the crucial element is fit.

Fit matters.

A good fit. Size can only be properly evaluated when fit is fully taken into account.

I am a fit queen.

Simple, elegant solutions

2010-04-22T23:16:00.000-07:00

Design and craftsmanship may be more than admirable, divine. Yet complexity, for its own sake - whether artistic or artisanal - is never elegant.

Clever Monkeys

2009-12-02T13:47:00.000-08:00

Brain size is not the issue. A mouse may have a smaller emotional palette to go with its pea-brain, but it is as perfectly adapted to its role as any creature - any animal, vegetable or mineral, any astronomical 'object' or sub-sub-atomic 'particle', any micro or macro cosmic arrangement of quantum fluff - as complete an expression and divine a manifestation as any 'thing' you care to name or which yet escapes our cumulative and infinitesimal knowledge, including the cleverer monkeys. To our describably limited senses, it exudes 'mouse-ness' in much the same fashion as you or I occupy some sliver of 'humanity' - which is no doubt why we both endlessly try to distance ourselves from or rid our homes and work places of them, and keep ourselves (and to a lesser extent them) entertained in countless laboratories and all sorts of scientific 'experiments'. A mouse has the highest ratio of brain size to body weight of any animal - half again as much as a human, and well over three times that of a dolphin. Consider that, the next time one sets a trap for you.

On the Road Again

2009-11-19T10:17:00.000-08:00

The Road is full of Hazards.

On multi-lane roads, the greatest impediments are those drivers who drivers cannot or will not maintain the appropriate speed for their position, and the greatest dangers arise from being out of position at any speed - not maintaining a safe distance, a cushion of space, a margin for error.

Underpowered vehocles 'overtaking'. Over-bearing personalities regardless of vehicle type.

Everywhere and in general, I find it wise to be wary of (in no particular order) recreational vehicles, pickup trucks (especially four wheel drives), minivans, SUVs, 'smart' cars, crotch rockets, scooters and cyclists, luxury cars, courier vans, construction or repair contractors, anything pulling a trailer, anyone on a phone, or who thinks their time is more valuable than yours... and the police, whether marked or unmarked.

Taxi drivers bear special mention, and everyone with any experience driving oversize vehicles on city streets knows why.

Riders of fewer than four wheels, for whom every peril is already heightened, often appear to embrace yet greater risks with their oversights or excesses.

Hey, we're all trying to get somewhere. Share and share alike. Golden Rule trumps Number One, every time.

Open letter to the government of the U.S.A.

2009-10-23T19:22:00.000-07:00

Dear [fill in the blank],

I regard behavior in the financial sector leading up to this crisis as not only treasonous - in the effect it has had on the U.S.A. - but downright evil in light of its effects abroad, in both cases often on those least able to bear additional hardship.

Furthermore, the callous disregard by some in whom we have placed our trust for the health of the populace at large and so the nation as a whole - and by this I am referring equally to the sometimes feeble support as well as outright opposition to the crucial Public Option - as utterly criminal, condemning as it does probably hundreds of persons to disease or death each and every day.

In these matters I cannot urge you strongly enough to lead and enact a tidal shift in the priorities and values expressed by the governance of this country, the stewardship of its resources and its standing in the wider world, now and for the future.

Yours most sincerely,

etcetera

Fleet Week

2009-10-08T16:41:00.000-07:00

I would like to thank the U.S. Navy and the City of San Francisco for the spectacle which is Fleet Week. The frequent low passes of thundering jets in particular afford everyone a tiny taste of what it must be like for so many Enemies of our Homeland, Allies and Customers of Military Hardware, as well as how it might feel to us once We have bankrupted The Nation, beggared The Populace and further poisoned Foreign Relations in our efforts to remain The Dominant Superpower and Arms Dealer.

* the lines are a bit blurry

2009-08-30T23:49:00.000-07:00

I have known a few gods in my time. Our consciousness can seem divine. If we are individual physical and spiritual expressions of greater being, and if greater being is divine (and most especially when great being is one), then all expression is divine and one and every thing that happens is also.*

There are only two occupations in life - helping or hurting*.

The government looks out for the people who work for it.

We are the nation - our health is its health. Do you want to tell me that if I can fight, you will look after me, but if can't or won't, then I'm on my own?

The resources which fuel prosperity must not be stolen or coerced. Natural resources must benefit the people.

Dominance engenders resentment. Democracy has become a brand name of capitalism in a world of great inequality.

The government is also not meant to do illegal things for me - including detention without trial, and torture.

Governments and even religions rise and fall with the tides. The sea is getting choppy - rich and poor.

continued...

Water World

2009-07-14T15:13:00.000-07:00

Tell me, is it more the case that we are flushing our toilets with potable water, or that we are brushing our teeth with toilet water?

I'm confused.

In many urbanised areas, I suspect a bit of both - a sort of 'Soylent Grey' water, if you will - how could the situation be otherwise?

The axiom is that one can 'go three minutes without air, three days without water and three weeks without food' (to which I am tempted to add 'three miles without oil'); it seems to me we are gradually working our way backward through this life-support hierarchy, and that the long-predicted Water Wars will by no means be the end of it.

Meanwhile, 'Don't forget to breath'.

un-American Activities

2009-04-24T21:46:00.000-07:00

The greatest compliment I ever received could well have been, 'You are the most un-American American I ever met!' - that from my possibly most un-German German friend Uli, who I'd met earlier that year in Spain in 1979. I heard earlier this year (2008) that he is still 'amongst the quick', as we say, so perhaps we'll compare notes again one day.

Apple v Microsoft

2009-04-19T16:41:00.000-07:00

Apple is like the research and development wing of Microsoft. Without Apple, we'd all still be running DOS. Argue with that. (And raise your hand who doesn't know what DOS is? Or was, rather.)

Big Fish, Small Bowl

2009-04-03T02:37:00.000-07:00

It's easy to be a big fish... in a small bowl.

Clever Monkeys

2009-04-03T02:20:00.000-07:00

Hear no Evil. See no Evil. Speak no Evil.

Well, one out of three is not bad.

Bombs Away

2009-04-03T02:01:00.000-07:00

Every U.S. citizen should be obliged to spend at least one month living in a country which theirs has bombed. Even if it's only Germany - because if they've forgotten or forgiven you (for Dresden, for instance), you've got another think coming....

Seeing how the Other Half lives

2009-04-02T01:02:00.000-07:00

It is my considered opinion that half the world could live on what the other half throws away.

Whose side are you on?