Bottom line: What cha can do is text the word "vets" to "85944" - and then send the word "yes" back when you receive a confirmation text.

This will add $11 to your next phone bill. You can do it up to five times.

Note: This process took me less than 20 seconds to complete.

There are a bunch of veterans organizations behind this effort. I'm including the original email that was sent to me below.

This Veterans Day marks the beginning of The Eleven Eleven Campaign -- a nationwide campaign by BeyondTribute.org to change the way America honors its Veterans.

http://eleven-eleven.org.

The objective of the campaign is simple: to get 11 million Americans to donate $11 to support America's Veterans. We've made giving back to our Vets easy through a national Text to Give Campaign (simply text "VETS" to 85944 to contribute).

Contributions are distributed to Beyond Tribute's 11 coalition partners, who specialize in providing direct services and advocacy for Veterans of all eras and conflicts, including World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, Persian Gulf War, and the present day conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

We're asking bloggers from around the web and across the political spectrum to join us in making this Veteran's Day a holiday not about sales in the stores, but about making a difference in the lives of our Veterans.

To that end, we'd like to invite you to a special campaign announcement call for bloggers this Monday, November 9th at 8 pm ET/5 pm PT. Join Gold Star Mother Ruth Stonesifer, Democratic political consultant Joe Trippi and Powerline blogger John Hinderaker to learn more about the campaign and how you can help make this November 11th a day when bloggers come together to support our Vets.

Please RSVP to the conference call here:

http://action.eleven-eleven.org/t/5400/signUp.jsp?key=2817

Dial-in Number: 1-213-289-0500

Participant Access Code: 4670471

If you can't make the call, please consider adding an Eleven Eleven Campaign Widget to your blog from now through Veteran's Day. The widget allows your readers to easily participate in the campaign directly from your website. You can grab the widget here:

http://eleven-eleven.org/take-action/

The Eleven Eleven Campaign begins on Veterans Day, 2009 - but it continues every day until our goal is reached: bringing 11 million Americans together to change the way America honors its Veterans - moving beyond tribute to action and support.

We hope you'll join us and help spread the word about the effort to support America's Vets.

My brain is still recovering from the influx of strange and bizarre information -- combined with a cast of characters, some with goals straight out of a science fiction movie.

Anders Sandberg and Randal Keone discussed Whole Brain Emulation.

Itamar Arel covered Artificial General Intelligence.

Ben Goertzel covered AGI and Bioinformatics and Virtual Worlds.

Gary Marcus talked about How the Brain Thinks (whether we want it to that way or not :-)

Peter Thiel has something keeping him awake at night, and it's not what you might think: Peter Thiel's greatest fear.

Ray Kurzweil on Quantum Computing in the Brain and Consciousness.

Michael Nielsen gave us Quantum Computing 101 Course.

Anna Salamon kicked things off discussing how we might shape the intelligence explosion.

"A lot of what inspired me about what happened last year with the elections had nothing to do with Obama being elected. It had to do with the fact that it was obvious that people wanted a change.

Unfortunately, people thought they were electing an anti-war president. And, as you see, we're all over it - we got more war going on, and it's not gonna stop unless the people stop it. Unless we scare them into thinking there's a consequence for doing that."

-- Boots Riley, October 17, 2009.

Here's a radio edit of Boots' acapella performance, minus the speech before and an extra long pause in the middle. (So you can listen to it in your ipod without missing a beat - if you like it that way :)

Thanks for letting me know at lisa@lisarein.com if anything doesn't work. I'll fix it.

After he performed, he said this on his twitter account:

"Just finished performing@an anti-war protest in SF.Very low turn-out.With Obama in, more people r willin2ignore mass murder."

(Above) Boots Riley of the Coup, who's been on tour w/Tom Morello opening for NIN as "Street Sweeper Social Club," is here singing with Trent Reznor doing MC5's kick out the jams.

Boots in the crowd after his performance.

More info here: at this website.

When: Saturday, October 17, 2009

Where: San Francisco, CA

March Time: Noon

Rally Time: 1pm

Speakers include: Normon Solomon, Cindy Sheehan, Cynthia McKinney, Antonia Juhaz and many more!

Musical performances by: Boots Riley (of the Coup) and other special guests

Take BART! Don't drive. Get off at CIVIC CENTER

You could also get off at POWELL and walk south pretty easily :-)

The plan is to meet at UN Plaza - Civic Center basically - by Civic Center Bart - at Noon. Then the march will go in a circle around the UN Plaza and end up back where it started for the rally.

Sponsored by the October 17 Antiwar Coalition- 415-641-1997 or 510-268-9429 ]]>OCTOBER 17, 2009 - A National Day of Local & Regional Actions Against the Wars in Afghanistan & Iraq More info here: at this website. When: Saturday, October 17, 2009 Where: San Francisco, CA March Time: Noon Rally Time: 1pm Speakers include: Normon Solomon, Cindy Sheehan, Cynthia McKinney, Antonia Juhaz and many more! Musical performances by: Boots Riley (of the Coup) and other special guests Take BART! Don't drive. Get off at CIVIC CENTER You could also get off at POWELL and walk south pretty easily :-) The plan is to meet at UN Plaza - Civic Center basically -...http://www.onlisareinsradar.com/archives/002861.phpMy Music - Upcoming ShowsLisaSun, 11 Oct 2009 20:48:20 PDThttp://www.onlisareinsradar.com/archives/002861.phpNote time change to 3-5 pm!

A little lunchtime music :)

Parking info:

There is parking on San Pablo Avenue, Central Avenue, and on Kearney Street, which is one block over from San Pablo.

BART info:

Get off at the El Cerrito Plaza Station. Walk two blocks to San Pablo Avenue and Central. They are short blocks too!

Nobel Prize For Promises
By Howard Zinn for t r u t h o u t.

"I was dismayed when I heard Obama was given the Nobel Peace Prize. A shock, really, to think that a president carrying on wars in two countries and launching military action in a third country (Pakistan), would be given a peace prize. But then I recalled that Woodrow Wilson, Theodore Roosevelt and Henry Kissinger had all received Nobel Peace Prizes. The Nobel Committee is famous for its superficial estimates and for its susceptibility to rhetoric and empty gestures, while ignoring blatant violations of world peace."

For now, here's the EFF's Deep Links page on this, and the YouTube video below will paint the scene a bit.

Performing with George Kelly:
Wind Cries Mary
Billy Jean
Shake All Over

On my ownsome lonesome:
I want u 4 myself

More coming soon, but I'm off to cover the Singularity Summit in New York City for h+ magazine.

See ya when I get back :-)

I'm having a party and concert -- and you're invited!

When: September 26, 2009

Time: 7:45-11pm

Music Time: Early set at 7:45 for some early plane-catching friends :)
                       Main set will start at 9:30 pm

Where: 33 Revolutions http://www.33revolutions.com

Address: 10086 San Pablo Ave., El Cerrito, CA 94530

Phone: (510) 898-1836

Special Thanks to my pal Chris Ritter for the awesome illustrations for this event!

Although critter always emphasizes my acoustic set in the posters, there's actually a lot more going on than acoustic music this time, as I and my pal, George Kelly, have an unusual mix of my originals, his originals, and a bunch of old covers we've put together. I'm also finally going to be able to do a bunch of my old stuff from the 90s - with George filling in for Ron Taylor on guitar. (I miss ya Ron! But George will be doin ya justice :)

So you get new stuff, old stuff, my new twisted covers on some old stuff, organic grub, sangria/wine/good brewskis, and my usual unusual circle of friends.

Hope to see you there!

Here's a sample pack of a bunch of my songs.

google link for directions

Parking info:

There is parking on San Pablo Avenue, Central Avenue, and on Kearney Street, when is one block over from San Pablo.

BART info:

Get off at the El Cerrito Plaza Station. Walk two blocks to San Pablo Avenue and Central. They are short blocks too!

If you just can't make it till later, there will be an after party at Club Mallard, right down the street that starts at 11pm.

To get to club mallard from 33 revolutions, go south on San Pablo Avenue for five minutes/6 blocks or so. It's at 752 San Pablo Avenue, Albany, CA 94706. Phone: 510-524-8450

Google map link for club mallard

directions to club mallard from 33 revolutions

My latest story is about the Moon and the hydrogen that NASA found there.

...the building blocks of water, hydrogen and oxygen, are already everywhere -- all over the Moon. We know that water is created naturally from meteors striking the surface and flash-heating the regolith, which causes iron oxide to be gradually reduced by the hydrogen implanted by the solar wind. The hydrogen in the regolith reacts with the oxygen in the iron oxide to create water. This water, generated on or deposited onto the Moon, is either lost to space or migrates to higher latitudes. The southern polar region, with its permanently shadowed craters, is thought to retain water and other volatiles more efficiently than any other region. We also know that water is deposited into the poles directly via cometary tails that periodically envelope the entire Moon.

Does that mean we can just use the water that's already there? Well, most experts agree there are two main sides to that issue. "Water is water. If you can find it naturally, that's better than having to resort to a chemical combination of hydrogen and oxygen, which requires energy to activate the process," explains Donald Sadoway, a Professor of Materials Chemistry at MIT who has developed a "molten oxide electrolysis" technique for extracting oxygen out of Moon regolith. "However, if the water is to be potable, then purity is an issue. So in any given situation, you need to assess whether it is more costly to purify existing water or to synthesize water from hydrogen and oxygen."

(Above: NASA LCross photo by Northrop Grumman)

To get to the bottom of things, NASA is dropping a completely empty upper stage of the Centaur rocket smack into one of these southern polar craters. Contrary to some inaccurate reports in the popular media, there will be no explosives or military weapons involved. The upper stage is from the LCROSS and LRO's launch back in June, which was retained for this experiment.

"It weighs roughly 2,200 kilograms, and will be moving at about 2.5 kilometers per second (5,600 miles per hour)," explains Day. "It will be coming in very steep, at about 80 degrees, and will make a large enough impact to loft approximately 200 metric tons of material about 10 kilometers into the lunar sky, where it will remain long enough for the LRO and ground-based assets to obtain their data."

NASA is making sure that it comes in at a sharp enough angle this time to cause a recognizable plume or other reaction from the surface. The angle wasn't steep enough when they crashed the Lunar Prospector into the crater in 1999, with no discernable results.

What a joke! Ha ha! But the joke's on me - and all of us, as it turns out.

It saddens me greatly to have to create an "Obama's Warrantless Wiretapping" category.

Today is a day I never thought I'd see. Seriously. I thought something as simple as striking down warrantless wiretapping would be a no-brainer. Certainly not a policy the Obama Administration would actually endorse and defend.

This is an excerpt from EFF's Effector 22.10:

THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION HAS EMBRACED BUSH'S POSITION ON WARANTLESS WIRETAPPING, and goes one step further than the previous administration. In a motion to dismiss Jewel v. NSA, the Obama Administration's Department of Justice (DOJ) made two deeply troubling arguments.

First, they argued, exactly as the Bush Administration did on countless occasions, that the state secrets privilege requires the court to dismiss the issue out of hand. They asserted that simply allowing the case to continue "would cause exceptionally grave harm to national security." As in the past, this is a blatant ploy to dismiss the litigation without allowing the courts to consider the evidence.

Second, the DOJ claimed that the U.S. Government is completely immune from litigation for illegal spying because the USA PATRIOT Act renders the U.S. immune from suit under the two remaining key federal surveillance laws: the Wiretap Act and the Stored Communications Act. This is a radical assertion that is utterly unprecedented. No one -- not the White House, not the Justice Department, not any member of Congress, and not the Bush Administration -- has ever interpreted the law this way.

This isn't change we can believe in. This is change for the worse.

For the full blog post:
http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/04/obama-doj-worse-than-bush

For the press release:
http://www.eff.org/press/archives/2009/04/05

For Kevin Bankston on "Countdown With Keith Olbermann":
http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/04/bankston-on-olbermann

For Keith Olbermann on Obama and Wiretapping:
http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/04/keith-olbermann-obama-and-wiretapping

***end excerpt***

This is pretty upsetting. I'm still shocked and dismayed.

I wanted to make sure you knew at least. Somehow that makes me feel a little better, usually.

The focus of Contact is really hard to explain, but I'll try: Space Exploration, Artificial Intelligence, Music, Science Fiction, Film making, Singularity stuff, Robot stuff, Artificial Life, Virtual Worlds, Virtual Reality, Space Colonization, Astrobiology, Astropsychology, Astrosociology, Biotech, Bioinformatics... -- and *really* on all of it! (and I'm sure I'm forgetting something) -- ALL this stuff is covered -- and well!

Just go if you can. Registration is a bargain, and there's a student rate!

Check out the speaker list.