Silly Humans

We Are The Past's Future

2012-01-23T08:04:00.000-05:00

Of the many very good Editorials coming from the NYTimes in the past several months, this one is perhaps the most relevant and accurate in regards to how our Governing Leaders need to deal with the LACK OF JOBS in this decade's Economy.

We live in the Future only according to the rules, norms and moires of the Past. What worked then won't always work now, but where it is relevant to today's circumstances it should be employed. Where it failed to raise the whole of the nation in the past, where it debased and degraded large segments of our Society in the past, those rules and norms and moires must be left to History, as lessons learned by all, for all.

Corporate Austerity required

2012-01-02T20:42:00.001-05:00

I just want my life to be true. I most seriously do.

Panic? Well, not exactly ...

2011-12-10T11:36:00.001-05:00

My dude, Dylan Ratigan, is so right on that he's even ready with the Concrete and Accurate answer to the lady's question near the end of the clip.

He isn't making this shiite up. The United States government is currently run by a bought Congress and a Democratic President who apparently got in way over his head once he first started listening to Democracidal imbeciliac geniuses such as Larry Summers, Rob Rubin and Tim Geithner.

Bang your head, dude!

For What Does "SEC" Stand?

2011-11-29T07:54:00.000-05:00

Seems to be Severely Endemic Corruption.

Wow! Guess this is what it takes to make me blog again. From the WaPo:

If the judge’s ruling became the new standard, it could fundamentally alter the way the SEC does business and make it harder for Wall Street firms to make cases go away.

The standard language used in settlements — neither admits nor denies wrongdoing — is one of the carrots that induces defendants to settle."

The SEC has said that without settlements it would be forced to battle cases in court, tying up limited resources. As a result, the SEC said, it would be able to pursue fewer cases.

Simple and naturally unavoidable solution is to raise taxes. Keeping that simple is as easy as raising them 1% on the upper brackets for every .5% levied on the lower brackets. Simple and both extremely effective as well as completely equitable.

The next spurious and ill-conceived defense of the SEC's actions is also legally and scientifically simple to alleviate. Onward in the story:

The SEC has argued that defendants would refuse to settle many cases if they were forced to admit wrongdoing. Such an admission could be used against them in private lawsuits.

Rakoff said that was part of the problem: Investors defrauded by Citigroup would not only recoup less than than their total losses; they would have to establish their own proof in any private lawsuits against the firm without any help from the SEC.

Are they really serious with that argument? Can the people who run the Securities and Exchange Commision honestly NOT want the Public, the peops being duped by otherwise (supposedly) respectable corporations, to be able to put pressure on those corps to do Honest business?? Really, SEC?!

First they argue that the caseload of lawsuits is too much for it to handle and then they go and argue against the most obvious solution to that problem; letting the folks who got duped pursuit lawsuits at their own expense.

None of that sounds as if the SEC is at all concerned with its raison d'etre of keeping businesses from circumventing the Law and abusing their privileges. Prosecutors in a murder case will surely take a plea which still garners a Manslaughter conviction but they're hardly, rarely at any rate, likely to accept plea of disorderly conduct in its place. That is precisely, and often every bit as destructively what the SEC's "standard language" does. Repeated and as an enormous incentive to companies to plan their business activities with paying that "disorderly conduct" penalty rather than serving the rest their lives in prison.

To whit:

Rakoff has said that he is required to show some deference to the SEC’s judgment. But in Monday’s ruling, he said that the agency was asking too much of the court. Rakoff said that imposing settlements such as Citigroup’s $285 million deal can be unfair to the defendant and be susceptible to “abuse” by the SEC.

“An application of judicial power that does not rest on facts is worse than mindless, it is inherently dangerous,” he wrote. It “serves no lawful or moral purpose and is simply an engine of oppression.”

I couldn't agree any more with either the sentiment or the language, Justice Rakoff. I couldn't agree not a bit more.

tap tap tap

2011-09-16T20:08:00.001-04:00

ahem Is this thing on?

SCIENCE!

2011-03-24T17:15:00.002-04:00

Now, the really cool thing about Science is twofold. First it observes, records, anyalyzes and theorizes. Yep. That's for starters. THEN it Repeats that Process!

Again. And Again. And Again. It never stops repeating that first multi-stage step, so that one day, let's say 3,000 years ago in the time of Pharaoh, Odysseus and Nebuchadnezzar, we had scientists who were assiduously gathering data on the natural world, including their fellow homo sapiens, in order explain why their Political structures were the result of the Will of the Gods. Assuredly these personages existed for the most part in the incarnations of priests but having evolved from earlier priests and shaman of even less abundance of knowledge than these contemporaries of our Monotheistic religious foundations of the modern West.

Again and again this process has repeated itself. Through the wonders of the Roman engineering feats to the gathering of the barbarians of the northern forests into the hellish agglomeration of nations which became known as European, knowledge has been sought and tested and held up as The Truth throughout the long millenia of human neuropsychological evolution. Men have burned to the delight of hundreds, even thousands, merely for relating their findings and interpretations of natural facts which had previously been held as belonging to the realm of Heaven.

Darwin brought many houses down within the Western world's domains simply by pointing out the obvious, that species evolve from other species, yet still do vast numbers of homo sapiens cling to the beliefs of the wanderers of the deserts and sorcerers of the temples of ages past and fallen to dust and archaeological history.

Men (in conjunction with women, let us please not forget) have sailed beyond the Heaven of our past and floated above the world, even going so far as to walk upon the ancient nemesis of the Sun god. Luna. The mense maker. The mind bender and puller of the tides. A ball of rock oh so identical in many of its elements to our very Mother Earth. People have gathered knowledge and analyzed it so extremely well and successfully in order for these accomplished might come to be.

Then paused.

Returning to the science of our horribly demonized friend, Mr Darwin, I find it interesting how viciously so many anthropologists still debate our theories of human origins. As soon as one body of incontrovertible research is published the camps reallign and are formed anew to claim The Last Word on the location of some Garden of Eden. "Of course modern humans had to have interbred with Neandertals!" "Of course there is no way modern humans and Neanderthals could ever have interbred! The DNA samples prove it!" "Of course modern humans originated in one small corner of Africa! The DNA samples prove it!" All the while new evidence comes in yearly to suggest that ALL of these things are true. Just to varying extents which correlate unerringly dependent upon which part of the world from which they come.

It must have been sometime around the 1970s, though perhaps much earlier, that it became unacceptable to suggest that the various races of homo sapiens sapiens around the world might have evolved separately. The Biblical, then mitochondrial, Eve was surely the mother of us all! To some this will always be an absolute. As with everything, including as we've recently discovered the speed of light, there are no absolutes. Everything is relatively absolute to one extent or another. Or, if you prefer, absolutely relative. A relatively absolute fact which sends so many of even the most rational of scientists and religious devotees into despair of any hope of ever finding the "Truth".

The differences between Religion and Science are many. The similarities even greater. I've personally chosen to follow science because, as I hope I've made clear, Religion will certainly change over the decades as does Science, but the latter, despite being practiced by the same species of highly intellectually evolved ape as is the former, has within it the Requirement to, however grudgingly adhered to, examine Everything. Update and re-analyze even the most thoroughly well understood facts of its theories in order to Always advance towards a more complete understanding of Reality.

Not just accept what our remote ancestors did so rightly based upon their data sets come to believe about the origins of our world and ourselves.

What prompted this little rant? :) Just this little blog post by paleoanthropologist John Hawks. As soon as I read the title I knew I was going to love the post. Population structure within Africa: has "modern human origins" become a non sequitur?

As much as is saying humanity's roots go back a mere 6 million years, I suppose it just may be. Eggs always come first. But something had to lay them...

Enjoy!

The Egress Is Looking Better All The Time...

2011-01-04T18:46:00.003-05:00

Throughout the whole of my politically aware life I've never imagined that our society might regress to a condition such as that which pervaded the early decades of the 20th century. I thought that in the early 1980s, despite the potential for mass devastation which the Cold War did present, that we would, if we survived, continue relentlessly towards a Progressive society. One which always found the means to lift its most unfortunate or merely recalcitrant members out of their gloom, disaffection and despair. One which would heal its citizens bodies even as it might neglect their minds and hearts as being too much the stuff of Religion's concern.

It has only been in the last several years that I've started worrying that I really have been too much the anthropological optimist.

The reelection of W Bush didn't truly astound me. It disgusted me mostly for the way in which Kerry handled the whole election. The way he "didn't dignify" the Swift boaters' claims until way too late. His semi-irrelevant points on the deficiencies in Republican Tax policies and, most tellingly, his refusal to speak of the swelling real estate bubble which was at the time, 2004, beginning to show the first signs of massive instabilities which would eventually lead to '07's financial meltdown. And please don't say, "well No One knew it was gonna happen." A Lot of economists were saying it was a catastrophe in the waiting the way the U.S. and Britain had opened up to Speculation the lending reserves of Banks. How the rules allowing insane packaging of loans into assets which only the richest investors could possibly use as defense against bad investments.

Doesn't anyone in Politics understand Economics for civilizations? The only thing they do seem to understand are the finer academic points which show how the wealthiest investors can secure and invest their wealth at the same time, as if that siphon segment of the pool of international wealth is somehow the only one that matters to the health of the whole system.

Is it Ignorance? Is it Hubris? Is it really, I mean seriously can it really be as simple as Greed?

I don't think it is, but I am now, after years of non-utopian optimism about our near term future, starting to believe that greed really is become too much a driving force in our culture in general, and Politics in particular.

In this Op-Ed essay by Henry Gireaux of Truthout my growing Nationalist fears are given an almost ecumenical form and dimension. It is quite the literary Op-Ed and touching in an emotionally devastating, yet at the same time, satisfying way. Where Robert Reich does state his analyses plainly and with statistical and historical empiricism, Gireaux does so with a flair for the historically dramatic. If he does occasionally dance with hyperbole I think it only is because the subject matter truly is of such an Historically massive nature.

I've said I don't believe the United States is in any real danger of falling into the a 2nd world economic strata. I think that I still believe that. I'm just not as sure as I was when I was much younger and had not yet been subjected to the reality of which these past forty years of economic diminution of my country's middle class has resulted.

We will be to see...

In the Twilight of the Social State: Rethinking Walter Benjamin's Angel of History

by: Henry A. Giroux, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed
By eviscerating public services and reducing them to a network of farmed-out private providers, we have begun to dismantle the fabric of the state. As for the dust and powder of individuality: it resembles nothing so much as Hobbes's war of all against all, in which life for many people has once again become solitary, poor and more than a little nasty. (1) -Tony Judt

I think that preface paragraph by Tony Judt does an excellent job as a synopsis to the essay which follows. Note the footnotes as well. Excellent all 'round!

Good Luck!

possibilities

2011-01-01T19:04:00.001-05:00

in the fullness of the memory

it seems that I was disappointed

yet again

unflinching

and yet I swelled with pride

unbidden come to rest upon my bosom

and finding peace

did dance

without much glitter

though in peace

and so does a goal astound

I want that which is denied me

I am not he who waits

though so I must become

before my truths are revealed

to me

Lonely

Terrible it is not

though so do I express it

the pangs of growth I stymie

with each endless

reenactment of the same

is born another

so forth to neverland

away to dreams untrammeled upon

by reality's intimate ties

and focal points of no concern

to what is most important

in my heart

and head

the apocryphies which adorn

my wanton fantasies

will bow before reality

and its angels

should I be brave

and restore those

to their place atop the temple

which is me

an element convicted

and held accountable to this life

and all it pours o'er my brow

and into my eyes

my thoughts and fears

will arise and dissipate

until the morning far from now

when love

blooms again

in peace, love and understanding

as it may be

suffused with lust

and pure intents

at odds no more

for evermore

as one are love and wonder

passion and concern

driven thoughts of purest

white snow meaning

for ever and evermore

Thank you to Lisa Wiffledust for the forum in which this was expressed.

Happy New Year's Eve

2010-12-31T05:37:00.005-05:00

Imagine being safely seated in lifeboat, while countless others drown, only to learn that another lifeboat has been secured to take your luggage to shore...

Sam Harris, "A New Year's Resolution for the Rich"

His quip isn't anywhere near to being empty. It's what happened throughout the History of civilization. It's what is happening right now. Not only in the United States but definitely here. Definitely with Our support. With the support of the majority of Americans who, inheriting second-hand tales of the austerity with which our Grands and great grandparents did live through the Great Depression, believe that we are merely being forced into our less dreamy version of our America due to Government policies which suck our wallets dry and redistribute our own hard earned wealth to the slacking and otherwise "undeserving" poor.

Well, we've got the undeserving part right, anyway...

Happy New Year to us all. It's going to be the one we've worked to get. Like it or not, it's what we really seem to believe we deserve.

2010-12-26T18:23:00.004-05:00

If everyone voted, after becoming as informed as the modern net can supply, would this really be the world in which we live? There are times in History when people have in front of them a decision to make. It probably isn't that time for even a large minority of people, but it is growing, and will swell unbelievably when something makes everything bad enough to suck the life out of too many people who Want To Live.

And in a peaceful, loving, prosperous and responsible world. Really! I believe that most people do, and that's why they let Leaders in their culture and Politics set the stage for them. As if those homo sapes were Lords and creators and protectors.

And sometimes they have been.

I don't know how close we are to that time. When so many will do more than throw our hands up in disgust, refusing to share their opinion or develop it more fully. When we will rise up physically and politically again. To what effect, no one now knows, though I see a nasty path to a good.

I think this time is closer to now then it is to the Reagan years and the nuclear apocalypse potential which preceded the Gulf incursions and manipulations that still haunt us, mostly now via Afghanistan and our Saudi alliance. Too bad that in the the 70s, did 60s activism become something less, something different, though still very connected to pride and feeling good, rather than feeling good about our accomplishments. So many people, stoned on drugs, booze, consumerism or patriotism, or religion, felt the farm being bought, and shifted into proud American mode, still loaded on the fear and self-congratulatory compensation which those cultural addictions duly provide.

Vive la Ronnie!

Since 9/11 we've spent our way into bankruptcy and foreclosure supporting the U.S. of A. Land of the free. Home of the brave. But now too many of us are broke near to dropping out of the American Dream, and those who are rich are so beyond the wildest dreams of your average TV addict.

I hope what's coming upon us Historically is another peaceful transition. Well, at least of the Eisenhower from Truman sort. Full of the usual vitriol and innuendo, but lacking McCarthy's power of paranoia.

I know... I tend to ask for everything.

Kill Switch --- Engage!* AGAIN!

2010-12-24T17:21:00.000-05:00

This is a repost of a silly post which I just never thought would turn out as well as it did. Well, as it did IMO. Ya can tell by the dearth of comments that only one other peop did shareth my "holiday spirit" of that time.

ENjoY!

Hhmmm. . . I just realized that every post since this one has been tolerant, positive, optimistic, up-beat or down-right sickery sweet and happy for the holidays.

This. Just. Won't. Do.

Now, while I take back none of it (and really can't stop listening to BG an' Neddie's Opus o' Yule!) I do have to confront the reality that I'm a 41 year old double-divorcé, (semi)manic depressive and an under-educated, amateur politi-blogging, atheist non-breeder with few active fleshbot friends, the best (perhaps) of whom is away in NYC for the long holiday weekend, thus leaving me alone again, naturally**.

I awoke (alone again***, let's not forget) this morning to the (redundant) realization that that so-called "Saint" Nick ain't coming down my chimney, even if'n I had one in this black mold infested (but easily affordable) brownstown on the near west side of a (formerly) Red State (formerly) steel town in the (cardiomyopathically**** challenged) Heartland of America.

Lucky for me, I read so many blogs that I'm almost always a day or two (or 10) behind, so old posts frequently appear brand new pour moi, and I am able to rekindle the War Effort via teh Librul-Baby-Geesus-Hating Underground.

Thanks for the linkage, "Miss C"! Irony is Beautiful.

♫♫ ♫♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

* Some Conservatroll over on Bobby Lightfoot's used the name of that band to poo poo my man Bobby's awesome expression of angst over his life in the music industry. Being a sometime Metal maven, I seriously love (no. I ain't gonna be embarrassed 'bout that shit, either! {-;) the sound of the band name. Kill Switch Engage! What the . . ? Guess I'll go ahead and add that to my litany o' woes in this post's 3rd paragraph.

** Yikes! I never listened to all the lyrics to that one, eh. (I mean, why?) No worries, folks. My Dad ain't dead, and I'm not throwin' m'self off no towers. Terminal, or otherwise.

*** What's that mommy? No one will ever love me like you do? But.. but.. {shudderererererererer....}

**** {another-shudder} Yeppers, folks. I know that could very well be the mirror image of MY own heart, begging me to quit effing smoking already.

♫♫ ♫♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

Thank you non-existent gods, God and goddesses, for teh fucking Internets!!!1!1!Q!1

Merry Chris'mas! ! !

{-;

and forever again

2010-12-22T18:08:00.004-05:00

I don't want to
but I do
so
at least for now I accept it
I move forward
though not yet on

and something always
brings me down
back to a void
with my name on it
in gold and platinum
wanting silver for its mane

I ask the questions
but I leave
before the answers can make sense
to me
to who I want to be
after I reason out my fears
right now it's okay

Calligraphic are my thoughts
and beautiful to think
and see
but never to fully comprehend their reasons
though, I should know by now,
that isn't as important as
the getting there

Psychotropic is my spiel
or so it does appear from
your reaction to it
the reflections in your eyes
as they look away
and try to make it back to mine
because, I know,
you really do care

If ever you're in this neighborhood again
drop on in
let me know or just stop by
my door is locked but
it only takes a second
for the tumblers to fall
in the right way
to let you in

I don't know
I think I know
I am just not ready yet
to let you in
again
and again
and forever again
until you are finally comfortable
with being where we may yet go.

Note: I've only a few things which I'm good at speaking on. Political motives and sociological inevitabilities are two which appear to be the most useless but fulfilling for me.

And I understand people. Not persons all to often. At least not until any risk or benefits to my life they represent might be no longer available. I've taken, and will always continue to take risks with people I think are worth it. I'm the Judge of me. I'm the Judge of everything I see. Of everyone. I think I just don't understand how very few people seem to realize that not one of us, not me, nor you, nor anyone, can be the executioner as well. Any sentence we adjudicate can only be executed upon ourselves. No matter how much it may truly effect any others' lives. Any other's life.

I Judge me wanting. And am good with what I'm doing to remediate my lacks.

It's all good right now. It'll be better sooner rather than later, now. :)

L8

It Is Here

2010-12-15T03:20:00.005-05:00

again I lie
it forces its way out through
my teeth

staring into
eyes of amber chocolate
beauty

so true this time
and again not everything
real

I am the wolf
who strives to be the white prince
of dreams

whose soft kisses
open her eyes to life worth
living

silly smile
locked in that way I can't help
feeling

these worn down fangs
promising everything She's
wanting

delivers us
into temptation's empty
belly

where both of us
wallow in our happiest
sorrow

it is here now
awakening to facts not
pleasant

reality
all of those sweet times brushed off
falling

onto my soul
where I will choose to believe
or won't

again I lie
wearing truth's better Sunday
clothing

still just rags
these grand imperial clothes
bare all

New World Order

2010-12-14T02:06:00.003-05:00

But never fear (yeah, right!) for there is a Doctor of only the maddest dimensions (read mostly sane, generally moral from a pithecan point of view) who shall endeavour to Save US All from this most inevitable of seeming inevitabilities!

Click the pic to see the good Doc immediately. That's right, folks, no appointments necessary for any of your prescription needs. No Shiny Happy (for mega-profit) Health Insurance coverage needed either!

Act Now and you'll even get a special BONUS Header at the top of the page! Hurry, though, because this offer may not last for ever. Or even 'til the Statue of Liberty is mostly buried under sand.

;-)

silly woo ku

2010-12-11T08:06:00.001-05:00

once in a while
politics fades from my view
eyes only for you

Just Too Much Like

2010-12-10T06:40:00.006-05:00

Isn't it a little much
like Heaven?
when the little child says what
you should know

Isn't it just a wee small bit
like Hell
when so soon her face has lost her
innocence glow

Everything that brings us
all together
and all those bits that
set us off apart

Enchanting mesmerizing
somethings
forevers trapped in trusted
cagey hearts

Oh, sometimes I could fall
away down under
at others I would rise
above it all

And sometimes I may feel
that I am smothered
still others I just lie there
feeling swell

Filled up and almost for
to bursting
Or emptied like an old
discarded shell

Just always can I see the door
to Heaven
Just as often as I sense the
depths of Hell

carpe every diem
sure as love and hatred
no one else
can reap or sew
them for us
but ourselves

Dear Mr President

2010-12-04T07:35:00.004-05:00

From Reagan to Clinton, and the Bushes to now, yes now. The share of income earned in the United States has been legislatively funneled towards, not only the top One Percent of this country's population, but to an even smaller percentage of income earners.

Please to give Bernie Sanders your full attention for 10 or 15 minutes. Get your coffee. Let the E-sitter watch the kids for a moment or so and embrace the reality into which these United States are being ever more inextricably compacted.

And I'm posting the following on the President's website. If nothing else then to make myself feel somewhat better so that I don't continue argue with so much vehemence with my own dear peops. It does, I know, make me less than an enjoyable person to be around at time. :)

My Dear President Barack Obama

Please understand this fundamental fact of nature: One cannot rule from the top down in an effective and efficacious manner for the whole of any environment. It destroys that environment to siphon too large a percentage of its resources to the any single subset. 20+% of a nation's wealth cannot be concentrated in the financial accounts of a mere 1% without the rest of that nation's people and businesses suffocating for lack of such resources.

It simply and oh so very demonstrably throughout the course of History cannot be accomplished. Not to any end but the destruction of such a nation.

I don't foresee the U.S.A. becoming a 3rd World nation within the next 20 years, or even 50 barring some sort of invasion of massive proportions, whether that be from the waves of immigrants we will undoubtedly have from quickly flooding coastal areas around the globe, or from some not unpredicted further explosion of Islamist extremism. Neither of those possibilities is extraordinarily unlikely, but I really believe that the grotesquely wealthy American aristocracy will prevail upon the ignorant and wonderful hordes of American citizens to keep them voting in ever more malignant State and Federal marionettes to write laws denying American opportunities to such traditional pilgrims as the former, and continuing the Bush administration's diminishment of individual liberties. Ostensibly these laws will continue to be in support of the Constitution, though in actuality they can have no effect but to continue to produce a Federal government which not even Alexander Hamilton would have recognized as "Democratic".

This can only be allowed if those elected officials, especially those such as yourself, Mr President, whom we elect to alleviate the Financial distress we are facing instead succumb to the persuasive and vain arguments of the Aristocracy of this country. It can only happen if you, Mr President, allow yourself to honestly believe that our mission in Afghanistan is to "defend against terrorist breeding grounds" or to promote Democracy in a primitive but deserving society. To believe that the Reaganesque theory of Trickle Down Economics has lasting value, even after its natural ability to sustain an entire economy has run out.

It can only be continued if our nation's financial resources are allowed to continue being funneled to those who already control such a disproportionate share. They do not earn that share. They have purchased it, not with the sweat of their brows, or the grace of their creativity, but by their insidious and disingenuous manipulations of the good will and great desire of the common ranks of humanity in these United States to see justice done and liberty maintained by all. By convincing so many individuals that it is only Government which is inefficient and nepotistic, whilst the very demonstrable facts of corruption and inefficiency show that it is unregulated private enterprise which embezzles and misdirects and flat out wastes more financial resources in any given business cycle than the U.S. government does in any given year.

The Aristocracy steals wealth by "virtue" of the Fear they can instill via media and mass marketing, both in the appropriate venue of the market for goods and services, and more viciously anti-constitutionally as they are allowed to via the same methods during our bi-annual Circus of Electioneering.

In order for any nation, for any civilization, to achieve financial and civil health it's resources must be made available utilizing relevant and appropriate rules and stipulations to the greatest number of individuals. Some will always scale ever greater heights of accumulation via the ability of individual animals to adapt and learn how best to succeed at overcoming the challenges in their ways. No matter whether those challenges are spontaneously occurring natural events or geologic phenomena, or instead those created by our fellows and the institutions we create to regulate each others' behaviour vis-a-vie one another and nature, some will overcome them. This is as it should be, and is why we sublimate the concepts of Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness in our Constitution's preamble.

Oh... but there is also another concept in that preamble. Justice. And it is not meant for only those who have sucked off so much of the wealth and liberties to pursue their goals at the expense of all who can't financially or societally challenge them. The importance of Justice is that it defends those same lesser go-getters from the "best of us", without in any empirically unfair way impinging upon each of our abilities to climb as high as our own personal resources can take us.

Mr President, you swore to work for the Middle Class, and are honorable and intelligent enough to not mistake that oath as a reason to hunt down and persecute those whose great wealth puts them far beyond that economic class. The Middle Class in all nations, though it is usually the force of revolutions against tyrants, has never been the one to instigate Class Warfare. Just as rarely have the poorer working and impoverished classes. It has always been and is today the Wealthiest class, those who own so much of the financial resources of their nations as to be considered living in an entirely different civilization from their less economically swollen peers which instigates and foments such warfare. This, as Sen Sanders does so eloquently and passionately point out, is the crux of the destruction of our Great Society today. A Beacon on a Hill shines for all people. Not merely those whose boats are called yachts. Whose wealth is staggering in comparison to the average person's. Whose lineage is precisely mapped and maintained for some delusional and duplicitous sense of worth having nothing at all to do with accomplishment or contribution to their society.

Class Warfare is perpetrated by the Wealthiest, though not all of their economic peers do support their assaults and thrusts and feints. Nothing is All or Nothing except for Life and Death, Mr President. Your support of the current of wealth flowing ever more fully into the coffers of those who already hoard far more than their responsible share will be your political downfall.

Please reassign that support as quickly as might be possible. Otherwise it will certainly, History confirms this fact, certainly portend the diminishing of this great experiment in Democracy which are these United States of America.

Sincerely and with Hope

Michael Bains
Cleveland, OH USA

Believer

2010-12-01T19:12:00.004-05:00

I don't now need
to believe
as hard as I once so truly did
when I was all angst and invective
against the gods
and all their sundry
creators

Is it insensitive
to care far more
for your mortal coil
then for the spin which life
for you has propelled
some kind of order to
this madness

Essences frothing
foaming and devoting
countless little nothings
each of their own
beyond the pail
each with grasping
hands and minds
believing

Awareness settles in
at last I see
at least I see
something more than mere belief
erupting like a plume
of magma from a new land's
birthing cauldron

In salt and wet
unwholesome sweat
and benign accompaniment
of little things
which no one thinks about
lest we be rousted
from our sleeping

For now too long
I have thought about them
though there can never be
enough of thought
expressions of a mind
evolved in trees and
the floor of the world
wide and free and terrifying

Is dreaming still
the night's watchman
the guard upon whom
all lives depend
to waken them
when hyenas roam and salivate
for childrens' flesh and marrow

I believe it's so
but let me be the first
to say that I know not
what favors
mystical unknowns
might deign to bestow upon
our fair and foul
family of humanity
within the jungles
of our complex minds

So wherein lies
the tale teller's crux
that oh so many
believe his sorry tellings
on the screens
and waves of modernity
and soiled by sellings
of mere things to boost morale
to slaver for new needs
to be fulfilled

It's all in the enigma
it's three slight pounds
it's lobes too three
it's aloneness
in the darks of nights
intent on being
someone something gleaming
chrome and bright
which all might to believe in

A portion of our time
elapsed and lost and ruined
yet still alabaster
in pristine and innocent
unconsciousness
alone together
none as one except
in special circumstances

How is the end
to ever come
for ever and the new beginnings
the airs we breathe
and sighing leave behind
to those who
come after all unwilling
until each shall find
our own means to believe

And with believing
cold willing
or the passion of
the fireplace on plains of
ancient dusks' heartless landscapes
and god's
relentless
laughing

Believe believers
or failing that
buy your ways from darkness
it's only what we each are owed
for this life with which we're playing
whether by the rules
we're given to believe in
Or simply until our leaving

poetry

2010-11-29T05:36:00.001-05:00

On the American Homo blog.

A Kurzweil Keynote

2010-11-28T03:24:00.005-05:00

Ray Kurzweil has been working with and writing about Artificial Intelligence and technology for over 40 years. In this keynote speech for last year's Singularity University Executive Program* he divulges much awe inspiring information about the exponential growth of the pace of development in microprocessor technologies, human genome discovery, image scanning - both macro and micro - and the internet. In a studiously careful yet casual manner he convincingly explains how one can include literally any other realm of research and philosophical contemplation in the process of evolving understanding.

At about 20 minutes into the clip, he hits on what is surely the Most Important Point to comprehend as fully as is possible for those who would Govern and partake effectively and profitably in Economies: Resource availability (regulation and allocation!) fuels or limits growth.

This is certainly not a fact which he limits to economics. His focus is, of course, technology in general, and argue for segregation of ideas as one might, economics is amongst the most fundamental technologies of Homo Sapiens sapiens. Even before our ancestors developed the knack for using a broken and sharp edged piece rock to cut away more manageable slices of supper they were observing their environment and planning where next to spend their energy finding food and shelter. They had evolved to be animals who were capable of consciously thinking about their places in, not only their own little social groupings, but the environment which they personally and as a group did have around them. The order and extent to which this emergence of consciousness took place is amongst the most profoundly challenging questions which our species does wonder. What is it if not the basis of all Creation Myths? What is it if not the ultimate source of that most common of questions that we ask, not only ourselves, but of our Gods? Why are we here? Why did this happen to me? What is the meaning of Life?

And the way to the answers, as recordable history is making plain and clear, is through ever more clear observation and always open-minded analysis of reality. Kurzweil makes it very clear in this presentation how both of those activities have benefited and improved profoundly in quality and accuracy through our use of technology. Not only of the electronic variety over the last 100 years or so, but throughout the time of our existence on this world. Recent discoveries in neuro-biology have even shown how our relationships, our connections to animals (and even plants!) as simple as aplysia, the see slugs studied by Eric Kandel, convincingly evidence that our ability to obtain those answers are innate. A functional development of our evolution from the single celled molecules which somehow managed to replicate themselves over years, then hundreds, then thousands and then hundreds of millions of years until, apparently in the blink of a cosmic eye, We should stand up and ask them all. Miraculous and Natural. Wow! :)

On a more personal note, (c'mon! You guys know me!) at about the 30 minute mark I almost had a mental orgasm (lol!) as I first got started using the internet in the year, 1993, right before it exploded into the general societal consciousness. The chart he displays** reflects how the interwebs had by that year been mostly a collection of connections between Universities and other points of research activity. Those connections did certainly stretch to far points on the globe (not shown per se) but were quite thinly spread, and specific in their destinations from one point to the next. Talk about a natural miracle of understanding! Within 7 years we had such economic investments in this new phenomenon that, when the bubble did finally pop, the Media and Wall Street simply had to give it an iconic name; The Dot Com Bust.

Finally, for those of you who find our American worship of the Stock Market and so called "free enterprise" fascinating, at the 36:00 mark, near the end of the clip, Kurzweil begins to explain how we've already gained enough information about the physiology of our brains in order to at least begin to understand why our - and these are my words, not his - self interests are not always what we think they should be. He explains how the "dot com bust" was really and effective only a bust for investors on Wall Street. There simply was no letup in the expansion of either personal or commercial use of the internet. In fact it continued to expand at the same rate it had been doing and does still continue, regardless of who wins or loses in their investments in the Market. The electronic communication web continues to become an ever more natural and sustainable fact of human life. In more ways than we can currently comprehend or even imagine.

Finding this video this morning was a much appreciated event. Thank you, Facebook! Kurzweil is one of those awesome silly humans whom I admire and I appreciate so very much his being in the public eye. He has learned how to integrate knowledge in, stay with me here, such a compassionate manner as to be capable of understanding that what one learns in one singular field of study can and indeed must be utilized in other fields, no matter that they might seem so very disparate as to appear completely unrelated.

At least until we understand, and then care how they're all part of the one.

--- ---
* The link is to this year's Program.

** If I've one criticism of the video it's simply that the camera doesn't stay long enough on those charts and graphs Kurzweil uses so effectively to make his points. Most likely my dissatisfaction on this point is based in the sluggishness of my own brain's observational inputs. I may seem to some to make "flash" decisions, but any observations which I might share have almost always been simmering up in that 3 pound enigma for months, or even years, integrating information and making sense of it. If I'd been in the audience, or doing the recording or producing even, I would definitely have spent a little longer on the slides.

Facebooking My Silly Brains Out

2010-11-04T03:02:00.003-04:00

Just as I always did on here, a whole hekkuvalot of my 3 pound enigma does get spread about on FB now.

Sorry for the mess. Please do stop by and Thank You Larry Jones for the shout out. I do forget these little, but important, social nicities of letting friends know what's the haps, eh. I know that is one reason I still do TMI too many acquaintances. I am SO still working on being a good friend.

L8!

Bains

Post Script No idea who created the pic above. If "you" happen to see it here, please to contact me and Thank You! Lovin' it!

"Safe, Accountable, Fair, and Efficient Banking Act of 2010 "

2010-05-03T06:15:00.004-04:00

If you'd like to send an email to your US Rep and Senators which support Sen Sherrod Brown's SAFE Banking Act (S. 3241 please click on this link to Democrats.com Unite.

Below is the, admittedly verbose, opinion I tagged onto my own submittal to Senators Brown and Voinovich, and Representative Kucinich.

The concentrated wealth in these four Banks' control has two effects both contrary to and detrimental to the US Constitution: It prevents the opportunity for other financial institutions to enjoy the liberty of freedom of expression which is each person's and corporation's constitutional right and, as is the focus of this petition, it cripples our Nation's ability to defend itself against the complexity of Economic History unfolding.

The accumulation of Wealth is a right. The accumulation by a number of individuals and institutions which is limited by their control of a large percentage of the current total capacity of Wealth which might be created has always led to a system which operates to the detriment of the very institutions and persons to which and whom that right has been given, whther it has been given by the governed or by hereditary or conquering rulers.

If our Federal government is to stay out of the business of "redistributing" Wealth it must rigorously, and as scientifically as possible, regulate the ability of any person or institution to accumulate an unbalanced percentage of the total Wealth currently and imminently available to both the local (National) and global (International) financial pools.

Regulated Capitalism has so far proven to be the most reliable method of ensuring liberty and inclusivity to our species. History proves, mathematically, that all systems will fail where once they had succeeded if they are not consistently and effectively maintained. Nature does this via Catastrophes. Humanity must always use conscious, diligent and intelligent Regulation of the Rules by which we live Together.

Afterglow

2010-04-25T18:19:00.001-04:00

I’d been sitting here, in this same couch, wondering for hours when it was going to hit. When would the tables be turned on the politics of passion which had been bogging down the political and commercial works for so many months now.

I couldn’t figure it would be long.

Now I’m back in that couch. Stinking of sweat and fresh earth. Blood and roses and thinking, was it worth it? Was the most likely broken bone in my hip, the still bleeding, despite the ice and beach towel wrapped tightly around it, bullet wound in my right hip worth the still uncertain outcome the last 24 hours? Especially since no one is ever likely to know it was me to got this new ball rolling?

It hurts, but I smile contentedly. Oh yes. Oh yes it will.

Comment King

2010-03-06T05:49:00.004-05:00

This is perhaps the clearest explanation of Global Climate Change I’ve ever read. The commenter (on New Scientist online) wrote nothing but heavily evidenced and even mathematically proven statements about why we can’t just pretend like we don't have the capacity over time to make this planet completely unsupportive of "our way of life."

10 comment down on a story from the article headlined, Hybrid fusion: the third nuclear option

Still Adding Energy To Its Overload

Fri Mar 05 12:58:35 GMT 2010 by Peter Thomson

Doctor Singmaster, the Earth and it's biosphere is most definitely not a closed system. It is an open system in an equilibrium state, where the inflow of solar energy (insolation) is balanced by the outflow of low frequency infra-red energy being re-radiated from the planet's surface and atmosphere back into space. The temperature of the Earth's surface and atmosphere is the temperature at which equilibrium occurs.

I understand your main concern is heating caused by human release of stored forms of energy, such as fossil fuels and nuclear. But human energy use is only small fraction of the solar heat balance.
The solar energy inflow to Earth is 174 petawatts, balanced at the atmosphere/space boundary by an equal outflow (if it wasn't we'd be heating up very quickly indeed!) Global human consumption of all forms of energy is 15 terawatts. This is less than 0.01% of the total heat flux of the planet.

This human heat does not continuously build up in the atmosphere. The temperature only rises until the infra-red outflow balances the solar inflow plus the generated heat. At 0.01% of total flux, the direct human-induced temperature rise is insignificant.

The real issue is the carbon dioxide that is released into the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels. This 'greenhouse gas' makes the atmosphere look marginally more opaque to low frequncy infra-red, reducing the rate of radiation outflow. This forces the planet to warm up, until the low frequency outflow once more equals the solar flux. Equilibrium is achieved, but at a higher average surface temperature.

Trying to cool the planet by trapping and removing energy from the atmosphere is futile - we can't possibly remove enough heat to make any difference. The real solution is to remove and sequester atmospheric CO2 until the CO2 level falls back to long term levels.
Our future descendents may well thank us if we can capture the carbon from atmospheric CO2, and store it where it is accessible. They might just need to pump it back into the atmosphere in a few thousand years time - to prevent the next Milankovich cycle ice age!

Of course the evidence/proofs are supplied in the comment, but, also of course, it's not a research paper, nor are ur fingers broken. Google what you doubt or are curious about! :) The information is readily available and substantiated and FREE for all to see.

Here're a couple of great places to start.

Real Climate: Climate Science from climate scientists
IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change)

And please do look out for the highly educated who's only excuse for the degree to which they take their disagreements on extraordinarily well documented climate trends appears to be some slight they received from the, truthfully as the unavoidability of rain in monsoon season, the all too human element of other scientists. There are some folks who claim to compare data, right up to the point where someone tries to compare RELEVANT data.

Coming Out of Manic Mode

2010-03-05T18:12:00.007-05:00

Not sure if this is gonna help me come down easier, but it strikes a chord so sweet and true I've wanted to post it all day.

If I may be so bold as to add to Goethe's insight; and punishment does squat of any positive value whatsoever.

Last Friday I got home and read this article on Complexity and Collapse*and, thoughout the entire essay, my brain was bubbling with ideas which I couldn't slow down enough to write. {sigh} but lol! Oy! Sometimes I get it down, and sometimes I just have to let it go, believing I've thought such ways before and know the material fairly well so will indeed get it out when I'm more level headed.

'Tany rate, Happy Friday and it's off to the weekend!

Late!

* Alas! that a subscription is required for online reading, but perhaps some stray click-by reader will have one. Truly a great and insightful article, so to any interested, pick up the March/April 2010 issue of Foreign Affairs. It's the first of the essays and follows directly upon Kenneth Roth's, slightly over critical IMO, commentary on Pres-O's approach to Human Rights to date. Well worth the read.