Podcast interview on Butter No Parsnips
6 months ago
Friday, December 25, 2009
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Pandora Adventure
I have a confession to make. Despite loving the internet and adoring music, I've never even bothered to try Pandora. Now, to make this a bit more interesting (to myself and my poor, unattended blog), I'm going to take a look at what kind of shaping Pandora does to my tastes. It might be boring, who knows.
When asked for an artist to start with, I put in Of Montreal. They're one of my favorite bands, and sufficiently indie. In response, Pandora started playing "Gronlandic Edit," a song from Hissing Fauna... that of course I've heard before. A
Next up is New Slang by The Shins. A nice, slow paced song and similar to Of Montreal, appropriately. Very easy rhythm, basic rock structure, slightly less centered on the vocals, though this might just be because it's not Kevin Barnes. With a voice like his it's easy to get distracted. B
Love Like a Sunset Part II by Phoenix. Reminds me a lot of the Dandy Warhols with the dream-like qualities of the sound. Also, I discover why Pandora is free - ads popping up all over the place, ack! Anyway, I'll give that one an A-
Ah, something I've heard a billion times before. Young Folks by Peter, Bjorn and John. Lyrics also somewhat dreamlike thanks to the reverberations. The whistling in this song infects my brain to an insane degree. I've always had an affection for this one. A
More Of Montreal, earlier era this time, Look at the Bell. Not as much a fan of this one; vaguely Beatles-esque, but not quite what I'm in the mood for when I think "indie". Thumbs down! Still not a terrible song. C
Time to Pretend by MGMT. Always loved this song; actually I enjoy pretty much everything by MGMT. Discography download anyone? A+
Thus far I'm really enjoying the intricacies that Pandora Radio keeps track of when it's tracking my likes and dislikes. I can pull up any song and ask why it was selected, specifically the different aspects of the song that I enjoy. Things like "electronica influences" and "subtle vocal harmony" unconsciously tug at my ears!
Next up is Jennifer Louise by Of Montreal. I like this one quite a bit; it really reminds me of the Hissing Fauna stuff with a little bit of an instrumental twist. Rhythm piano, woo! B
Is This It by The Strokes. Doesn't really do it for me for some reason. C
The King of Carrot Flowers Part I by Neutral Milk Hotel. I like the vocals and it's a little folk reminiscent. Nice and mellow and acoustic. A-
The progressive nature of Ratatat's Loud Pipes is going to be stuck in my head. B+
You get the idea, anyway. I probably shouldn't keep writing like this because I'm sure it's just going to bore everybody who normally reads my scrawl. Thus far, Pandora seems like a great listening-at-work option.
When asked for an artist to start with, I put in Of Montreal. They're one of my favorite bands, and sufficiently indie. In response, Pandora started playing "Gronlandic Edit," a song from Hissing Fauna... that of course I've heard before. A
Next up is New Slang by The Shins. A nice, slow paced song and similar to Of Montreal, appropriately. Very easy rhythm, basic rock structure, slightly less centered on the vocals, though this might just be because it's not Kevin Barnes. With a voice like his it's easy to get distracted. B
Love Like a Sunset Part II by Phoenix. Reminds me a lot of the Dandy Warhols with the dream-like qualities of the sound. Also, I discover why Pandora is free - ads popping up all over the place, ack! Anyway, I'll give that one an A-
Ah, something I've heard a billion times before. Young Folks by Peter, Bjorn and John. Lyrics also somewhat dreamlike thanks to the reverberations. The whistling in this song infects my brain to an insane degree. I've always had an affection for this one. A
More Of Montreal, earlier era this time, Look at the Bell. Not as much a fan of this one; vaguely Beatles-esque, but not quite what I'm in the mood for when I think "indie". Thumbs down! Still not a terrible song. C
Time to Pretend by MGMT. Always loved this song; actually I enjoy pretty much everything by MGMT. Discography download anyone? A+
Thus far I'm really enjoying the intricacies that Pandora Radio keeps track of when it's tracking my likes and dislikes. I can pull up any song and ask why it was selected, specifically the different aspects of the song that I enjoy. Things like "electronica influences" and "subtle vocal harmony" unconsciously tug at my ears!
Next up is Jennifer Louise by Of Montreal. I like this one quite a bit; it really reminds me of the Hissing Fauna stuff with a little bit of an instrumental twist. Rhythm piano, woo! B
Is This It by The Strokes. Doesn't really do it for me for some reason. C
The King of Carrot Flowers Part I by Neutral Milk Hotel. I like the vocals and it's a little folk reminiscent. Nice and mellow and acoustic. A-
The progressive nature of Ratatat's Loud Pipes is going to be stuck in my head. B+
You get the idea, anyway. I probably shouldn't keep writing like this because I'm sure it's just going to bore everybody who normally reads my scrawl. Thus far, Pandora seems like a great listening-at-work option.
Friday, December 18, 2009
Snowpacalypse: Snow Fear
I woke up today like it was any other day. I rose from bed, brushed my teeth, took a shower, and got dressed. As usual, I flipped on the television and what confronted me was literally the most horrifying thing I've ever heard. Well, at least in the top thousand most horrifying things.
Now, what I'm about to show you, if you were a trained meteorologist, might give you a heart attack. See if you can spot what's so frightening about this PROFESSIONAL RADAR IMAGE:
It's difficult to see on the image, but there is a fairly large snowstorm on the horizon for the east coast. Gasp! Just in case you missed it, I have circled it here for your convenience:
Whoa!
Anyway, after hearing this devastating news, what did I do? Of course, as a lifelong Minnesotan, I am used to snow and ice having a presence around me for several months of the year. I should be able to simply shrug off the notion of its danger, right? But then, I'm a resident of New Jersey now. And what would a lifelong New Jerseyan do in such a situation?
Run to the nearest grocery store and panic whilst purchasing as much food and water as possible. I could be trapped in my apartment for what, almost a month at this point! After heading into the nearest Wegman's, I was greeted with chaos and panic all around me.
Frightening. At least six people were trampled in the shuffling, though the gore and bodies were mopped up before I could withdraw my camera.
This is one of the many people purchasing a shovel. Now, being from Minnesota, the idea of a homeowner owning less than three shovels terrifies me more than you could imagine.
My survival supplies. God help me.
Anyway, here's some "before" pictures so that I can keep track of some of the action.
Me looking very worried.
Stay tuned for my impending death!
UPDATE @ 11:41p
Apparently Philadelphia is already planning on declaring a state of emergency now. There's no wind outside and it's kind of scary.
Now, what I'm about to show you, if you were a trained meteorologist, might give you a heart attack. See if you can spot what's so frightening about this PROFESSIONAL RADAR IMAGE:
It's difficult to see on the image, but there is a fairly large snowstorm on the horizon for the east coast. Gasp! Just in case you missed it, I have circled it here for your convenience:
Whoa!
Anyway, after hearing this devastating news, what did I do? Of course, as a lifelong Minnesotan, I am used to snow and ice having a presence around me for several months of the year. I should be able to simply shrug off the notion of its danger, right? But then, I'm a resident of New Jersey now. And what would a lifelong New Jerseyan do in such a situation?
Run to the nearest grocery store and panic whilst purchasing as much food and water as possible. I could be trapped in my apartment for what, almost a month at this point! After heading into the nearest Wegman's, I was greeted with chaos and panic all around me.
Frightening. At least six people were trampled in the shuffling, though the gore and bodies were mopped up before I could withdraw my camera.
This is one of the many people purchasing a shovel. Now, being from Minnesota, the idea of a homeowner owning less than three shovels terrifies me more than you could imagine.
My survival supplies. God help me.
Anyway, here's some "before" pictures so that I can keep track of some of the action.
Me looking very worried.
Stay tuned for my impending death!
UPDATE @ 11:41p
Apparently Philadelphia is already planning on declaring a state of emergency now. There's no wind outside and it's kind of scary.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Eulogy
When setting out to formulate a eulogy for my grandfather, my goal was to think of a single attribute to encapsulate his long and complex life. It was difficult at first. He held many roles in many lives: son, brother, sailor, teacher, coach, father, grandfather, and great-grandfather. One adjective seemed woefully inadequate for such a storied life, until I came to a realization. When moving between these roles, when swapping one hat for another, he always managed to maintain a zeal for life. He had such passion for every moment, every pair of shoes he stepped into, and every life he touched.
I would like to share some of these roles he played in all our lives, and the passion he held for each and every one of them.
He was passionate about his country and the defense thereof. During World War II, he was one of many members of the United States Navy stationed on Allied merchant vessels, tasked with strategically defending the sea-based supply lines of the war effort. Withstanding both stormy seas and the constant threat of attack from German U-boats, he helped ensure protection for these important avenues vital to the allied victory.
In perhaps his most renowned and recognized role, my grandfather was a passionate athlete, his love of athletics carrying him far beyond his own sporting career. Over twenty-five years he coached hundreds of promising wrestlers at New Hampton, Rochester Community College, and my own high school, John Marshall in Rochester, MN. Behind his standard, RCC rose to national prominence. Seven wrestlers under John's tutelage were selected as All Americans, and brought ten titles home to these halls. He was honored in 1979 as the first coach elected to the National Junior College Athletics Association hailing from RCC.
It was obvious that the most important part of John Philo's life was his family. He and his wife Jean oversaw the raising of four sons and a daughter, and joyfully watched fourteen grandchildren grow up before their eyes. My grandfather was a font of sage advice and guidance; I came to appreciate this most of all when it came to advice concerning education, something John realized was of amazing importance in every life, young or old. Each and every one of us enjoyed his warmth no matter what role he played in our lives. John was, above all, a kind and loving person, especially concerning his family; we will, and already do, miss him tremendously.
Nothing will fill the gap that John Philo has left in our minds and our hearts, but I can be confident that in remembering his deeds, his laughter, his wisdom, and his passion, we can all take a step in the right direction.
I love you, grandpa.
I would like to share some of these roles he played in all our lives, and the passion he held for each and every one of them.
He was passionate about his country and the defense thereof. During World War II, he was one of many members of the United States Navy stationed on Allied merchant vessels, tasked with strategically defending the sea-based supply lines of the war effort. Withstanding both stormy seas and the constant threat of attack from German U-boats, he helped ensure protection for these important avenues vital to the allied victory.
In perhaps his most renowned and recognized role, my grandfather was a passionate athlete, his love of athletics carrying him far beyond his own sporting career. Over twenty-five years he coached hundreds of promising wrestlers at New Hampton, Rochester Community College, and my own high school, John Marshall in Rochester, MN. Behind his standard, RCC rose to national prominence. Seven wrestlers under John's tutelage were selected as All Americans, and brought ten titles home to these halls. He was honored in 1979 as the first coach elected to the National Junior College Athletics Association hailing from RCC.
It was obvious that the most important part of John Philo's life was his family. He and his wife Jean oversaw the raising of four sons and a daughter, and joyfully watched fourteen grandchildren grow up before their eyes. My grandfather was a font of sage advice and guidance; I came to appreciate this most of all when it came to advice concerning education, something John realized was of amazing importance in every life, young or old. Each and every one of us enjoyed his warmth no matter what role he played in our lives. John was, above all, a kind and loving person, especially concerning his family; we will, and already do, miss him tremendously.
Nothing will fill the gap that John Philo has left in our minds and our hearts, but I can be confident that in remembering his deeds, his laughter, his wisdom, and his passion, we can all take a step in the right direction.
I love you, grandpa.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 12/6
Monday - 11:30 to 14:30 (3 hours)
Tuesday - 08:00 to 16:30 (11.5 hours)
Wednesday - 04:00 to 12:00 (19.5 hours)
Thursday - 00:00 to 12:00 (31.5 hours)
Friday - 04:00 to 16:00 (43.5 hours)
Taking the weekend off.
Tuesday - 08:00 to 16:30 (11.5 hours)
Wednesday - 04:00 to 12:00 (19.5 hours)
Thursday - 00:00 to 12:00 (31.5 hours)
Friday - 04:00 to 16:00 (43.5 hours)
Taking the weekend off.
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Accidents
I would be lying if I said it had been intentional.
Then again, most of the truly great inventions of our time have been accidental. Alexander Fleming is credited with going on vacation while leaving bacterial cultures strewn about his desk. Upon his return, he noticed that there were areas of the culture plate which had been contaminated with fungal growth. The fungi resembled rocky peaks rising from fecund forests of bacterium - the bacteria were unable to flourish upon them or at their immediate bases. Thus, penicillin was born; perhaps the most important discovery of the twentieth century made mostly due to the chaos of an uncleaned desk.
The modern discovery of vulcanized rubber is generally attributed to both Charles Goodyear's good fortune and clumsiness. It's true that Mister Goodyear was searching for a way to harden and stabilize rubber at the time, a quest that he had set out upon half a decade prior to his accident. In the process of mixing another experimental concoction of rubber, lead and sulfur, he spilled a bit of it upon the hot surface of his stove. The result was a near instant curing of the substance into a much more versatile form. This made way for the modern sneaker, the automobile tire, and the ever popular SuperBall.
So is it, then, that accidental discoveries are truly made by man? Is the hand such a necessary ingredient when said hand is guided by serendipity to a conclusion? It would be convenient for me to answer 'no' to this question, though Mr. Goodyear and Mr. Fleming would almost certainly say 'yes'. The reality is that the hand itself is, in a way, an accident in itself. Darwin's process of natural selection is remarkably elegant in this way. Of course, there is no discrete moment where the hand suddenly appeared; it likely the natural extention of a fish-like creature's rudder-like fins. Adaptations such as the hand, the leg, the ability to breathe oxygen, and the immune system original appear as mutations, mistakes in the transcription process of DNA.
Just as in human affairs, most of these 'accidents' yield negative or neutral results. Dropping a mixture on a stove, for example, would usually only necessitate another batch be made. The sudden appearance of a very small fin mutation on a fish, however, may allow the fish greater locomotive capability. It is thus more capable of reproduction, and thus passes the gene to its offspring. So perhaps it's not the accident that needs steering, but rather a process to recognize the accident, be it a hapless scientist or the force of natural selection. Penicillin, after all, had likely existed for millions of years prior to its human discovery. It only took application.
Is it not just as likely, then, that my work was just a rubber plant in need of a hot stove? Lightning that simply needed a jar? It's true that similar structures exist naturally in the universe, and similar things are probably going on all the time. Without the ability to directly witness them, they remain in the realm of phenomena rather than invention. It's impossible to say, then, that my invention is a simple mimicry of black holes or binary neutron star systems or tremendously powerful supernovae; I would not be surprised in the least, though, as the method is quite similar.
Einstein's theories of special and general relativity may not seem important in any capacity save science fiction and the modern imagination. This is far from the actual truth. In a world where global positioning systems use the time it takes a signal to beam from orbit to earth, relativity is important as a corrective factor. Satellites falling around the sphere of the earth travel at thousands of miles an hour - about eighty-seven hundred miles per hour. Such speeds necessitate a correction by a factor of approximately 1/12,342,857,143, or about seven microseconds per day. Of course, this appears to be a very, very small factor when thinking practically. And for all intents and purposes, it is small in this case.
My discovery exploits this dilation several billionfold. What if the aforementioned factor could artificially be made larger, perhaps much larger? In the case of the orbitting satellite or space station, there is a ratio of nearly 1:1 between the time passage of a point on the orbital structure and a point on the earth. One cannot ignore the rounding error in this assessment, however - an error of approximately 0.000000008%. In order to increase it, my research used another of Einstein's assessments; that a sufficiently dense mass could indeed produce a very similar effect. And indeed, this it did quite well. The experimental setup managed to create a phenomena very similar to a black hole without its characteristic voraciousness. It was theorized that such a structure would evaporate in nanoseconds, but the trick of time dilation stretched nanoseconds into days, years, millennia in a particular frame of reference.
A lauded physicist named Katherine Freese is famous for having declared that given an infinite amount of time, she will one day reappear. This is necessarily true. Given an infinite amount of time, all possible events must happen an infinite number of times. Such is the nature of time and probability.
This was the secret to my 'invention'. This was the secret to how all this mess was made. This was the secret of backward time travel.
Then again, most of the truly great inventions of our time have been accidental. Alexander Fleming is credited with going on vacation while leaving bacterial cultures strewn about his desk. Upon his return, he noticed that there were areas of the culture plate which had been contaminated with fungal growth. The fungi resembled rocky peaks rising from fecund forests of bacterium - the bacteria were unable to flourish upon them or at their immediate bases. Thus, penicillin was born; perhaps the most important discovery of the twentieth century made mostly due to the chaos of an uncleaned desk.
The modern discovery of vulcanized rubber is generally attributed to both Charles Goodyear's good fortune and clumsiness. It's true that Mister Goodyear was searching for a way to harden and stabilize rubber at the time, a quest that he had set out upon half a decade prior to his accident. In the process of mixing another experimental concoction of rubber, lead and sulfur, he spilled a bit of it upon the hot surface of his stove. The result was a near instant curing of the substance into a much more versatile form. This made way for the modern sneaker, the automobile tire, and the ever popular SuperBall.
So is it, then, that accidental discoveries are truly made by man? Is the hand such a necessary ingredient when said hand is guided by serendipity to a conclusion? It would be convenient for me to answer 'no' to this question, though Mr. Goodyear and Mr. Fleming would almost certainly say 'yes'. The reality is that the hand itself is, in a way, an accident in itself. Darwin's process of natural selection is remarkably elegant in this way. Of course, there is no discrete moment where the hand suddenly appeared; it likely the natural extention of a fish-like creature's rudder-like fins. Adaptations such as the hand, the leg, the ability to breathe oxygen, and the immune system original appear as mutations, mistakes in the transcription process of DNA.
Just as in human affairs, most of these 'accidents' yield negative or neutral results. Dropping a mixture on a stove, for example, would usually only necessitate another batch be made. The sudden appearance of a very small fin mutation on a fish, however, may allow the fish greater locomotive capability. It is thus more capable of reproduction, and thus passes the gene to its offspring. So perhaps it's not the accident that needs steering, but rather a process to recognize the accident, be it a hapless scientist or the force of natural selection. Penicillin, after all, had likely existed for millions of years prior to its human discovery. It only took application.
Is it not just as likely, then, that my work was just a rubber plant in need of a hot stove? Lightning that simply needed a jar? It's true that similar structures exist naturally in the universe, and similar things are probably going on all the time. Without the ability to directly witness them, they remain in the realm of phenomena rather than invention. It's impossible to say, then, that my invention is a simple mimicry of black holes or binary neutron star systems or tremendously powerful supernovae; I would not be surprised in the least, though, as the method is quite similar.
Einstein's theories of special and general relativity may not seem important in any capacity save science fiction and the modern imagination. This is far from the actual truth. In a world where global positioning systems use the time it takes a signal to beam from orbit to earth, relativity is important as a corrective factor. Satellites falling around the sphere of the earth travel at thousands of miles an hour - about eighty-seven hundred miles per hour. Such speeds necessitate a correction by a factor of approximately 1/12,342,857,143, or about seven microseconds per day. Of course, this appears to be a very, very small factor when thinking practically. And for all intents and purposes, it is small in this case.
My discovery exploits this dilation several billionfold. What if the aforementioned factor could artificially be made larger, perhaps much larger? In the case of the orbitting satellite or space station, there is a ratio of nearly 1:1 between the time passage of a point on the orbital structure and a point on the earth. One cannot ignore the rounding error in this assessment, however - an error of approximately 0.000000008%. In order to increase it, my research used another of Einstein's assessments; that a sufficiently dense mass could indeed produce a very similar effect. And indeed, this it did quite well. The experimental setup managed to create a phenomena very similar to a black hole without its characteristic voraciousness. It was theorized that such a structure would evaporate in nanoseconds, but the trick of time dilation stretched nanoseconds into days, years, millennia in a particular frame of reference.
A lauded physicist named Katherine Freese is famous for having declared that given an infinite amount of time, she will one day reappear. This is necessarily true. Given an infinite amount of time, all possible events must happen an infinite number of times. Such is the nature of time and probability.
This was the secret to my 'invention'. This was the secret to how all this mess was made. This was the secret of backward time travel.
Monday, November 2, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 11/8
Brett Favre does not approve of these hours.
Monday - 0700 to 1500 (8 hours)
Tuesday - 1100 to 2400 (21 hours)
Wednesday - 0730 to 1600 (29.5 hours)
Thursday - 0000 to 0800 (37.5 hours)
Friday - OFF
Saturday - OFF
Sunday - OFF
Wrap it up, schedulailures.
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 11/1
Monday - 0730 to 1600 (8.5 hours)
Tuesday - 0730 to 1600 (17 hours)
Wednesday - 0730 to 1600 (25.5 hours)
Thursday - 0730 to 1600 (34 hours)
Friday - 0000 to 0800 (42 hours)
Tuesday - 0730 to 1600 (17 hours)
Wednesday - 0730 to 1600 (25.5 hours)
Thursday - 0730 to 1600 (34 hours)
Friday - 0000 to 0800 (42 hours)
Monday, October 19, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 10/25
Monday - 0900 to 1600 and 2330 to 2400 (7.5 hours)
Tuesday - 0000 to 0800 (15.5 hours)
Wednesday - 0330 to 2000 (32 hours)
Thursday - 0730 to 1600 (40.5 hours)
Friday - OFF
Saturday - OFF
Sunday - 0730 to 1600 (49 hours)
Probably won't work that long Wednesday; I'll most likely end up working 4-12 and then coming back for the later shot or something. We'll see.
Tuesday - 0000 to 0800 (15.5 hours)
Wednesday - 0330 to 2000 (32 hours)
Thursday - 0730 to 1600 (40.5 hours)
Friday - OFF
Saturday - OFF
Sunday - 0730 to 1600 (49 hours)
Probably won't work that long Wednesday; I'll most likely end up working 4-12 and then coming back for the later shot or something. We'll see.
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 10/18
First, Into the Unknown...
Now, back to the known...
Monday - 0730 to 2000 (12.5 hours)
Tuesday - 1130 to 2000 (21 hours)
Wednesday - 0330 to 1200 (29.5 hours)
Thursday - 1130 to 2000 (38 hours)
Friday - 0330 to 1000 (44.5 hours)
Feh.
Now, back to the known...
Monday - 0730 to 2000 (12.5 hours)
Tuesday - 1130 to 2000 (21 hours)
Wednesday - 0330 to 1200 (29.5 hours)
Thursday - 1130 to 2000 (38 hours)
Friday - 0330 to 1000 (44.5 hours)
Feh.
Monday, October 5, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 10/11
Bleh.
Monday - 0500 to 1512 (10.2 hours)
Tuesday - 1300 to 1718 (14.5 hours)
Wednesday - 0330 to 1600 (27 hours)
Thursday - 1130 to 1600 (31.5 hours)
Friday - 1130 to 1600 (36 hours)
Saturday - 0730 to 1600 (44.5 hours)
Sunday - OFF
REVISED 10/6
Again, no idea where I'll do any shaving. Maybe I'll leave an hour early today!
Monday - 0500 to 1512 (10.2 hours)
Tuesday - 1300 to 1718 (14.5 hours)
Wednesday - 0330 to 1600 (27 hours)
Thursday - 1130 to 1600 (31.5 hours)
Friday - 1130 to 1600 (36 hours)
Saturday - 0730 to 1600 (44.5 hours)
Sunday - OFF
REVISED 10/6
Again, no idea where I'll do any shaving. Maybe I'll leave an hour early today!
Friday, September 25, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 10/4
Monday - 7:30 to 16:00 (8.5 hours)
Tuesday - OFF
Wednesday - 3:30 to 8:00 (13 hours)
Thursday - 7:30 to 24:00 (29.5 hours)
Friday - 15:30 to 20:00 (34 hours)
Saturday - 7:30 to 16:00 (42.5 hours)
Sunday - OFF
Tuesday - OFF
Wednesday - 3:30 to 8:00 (13 hours)
Thursday - 7:30 to 24:00 (29.5 hours)
Friday - 15:30 to 20:00 (34 hours)
Saturday - 7:30 to 16:00 (42.5 hours)
Sunday - OFF
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 9/27
This is going to be an... interesting one.
Monday - 08:00 to 20:00 with half hour lunch (11.5 hours)
Tuesday - 08:00 to 19:00 with hour lunch (21.5 hours)
Wednesday - 03:30 to 16:00 (34 hours)
Thursday - 11:30 to 16:00 (38.5 hours)
Friday - 07:30 to 12:00 (43 hours)
Saturday - OFF
Sunday - 08:00 to 16:00 (51 hours)
REVISED 9/22
Uhhh. I dunno if I'm supposed to be doing that much. We shall see.
Monday - 08:00 to 20:00 with half hour lunch (11.5 hours)
Tuesday - 08:00 to 19:00 with hour lunch (21.5 hours)
Wednesday - 03:30 to 16:00 (34 hours)
Thursday - 11:30 to 16:00 (38.5 hours)
Friday - 07:30 to 12:00 (43 hours)
Saturday - OFF
Sunday - 08:00 to 16:00 (51 hours)
REVISED 9/22
Uhhh. I dunno if I'm supposed to be doing that much. We shall see.
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Friday, August 14, 2009
Departure
Be it sight, sound, smell, or touch
There's something inside, that we need so much
The sight of a touch or the scent of a sound
Or the strength of an oak with roots deep in the ground
The wonder of flowers, to be covered and then to burst up
Through tarmac to the sun again
Or to fly to the sun without burning a wing
To lie in a meadow and hear the grass sing
To have all these things in our memory's hoard
And to use them
To help us
Find
Hahaha. Hahahahahaha!
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Oh My
From LF:
This morning I was awoken by my alarm clock powered by electricity generated by the public power monopoly regulated by the US Department of Energy. I then took a shower in the clean water provided by the municipal water utility. After that, I turned on the FCC-regulated channels to see what the National Weather Service of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration determined the weather was going to be like using satellites designed, built, and launched by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. I watched this while eating my breakfast of US Department of Agriculture-inspected food and taking the drugs which have been determined as safe by the Food and Drug Administration.
At the appropriate time as regulated by the US Congress and kept accurate by the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the US Naval Observatory, I get into my National Highway Traffic Safety Administration-approved automobile and set out to work on the roads built by the local, state, and federal departments of transportation, possibly stopping to purchase additional fuel of a quality level determined by the Environmental Protection Agency, using legal tender issued by the Federal Reserve Bank. On the way out the door I deposit any mail I have to be sent out via the US Postal Service and drop the kids off at the public school.
After work, I drive my NHTSA car back home on the DOT roads, to a house which has not burned down in my absence because of the state and local building codes and fire marshal's inspection, and which has not been plundered of all its valuables thanks to the local police department.
I then log on to the Internet which was developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration and post on freerepublic.com and Fox News forums to express my rage at the possibility of a public health care plan, because the government can't do anything right.
Monday, August 10, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 8/16
I feel so lazy lately - I haven't been posting in my blog barely at all. Mainly I've been ridiculously busy, but also, Twitter satisfies the need to make teensy little posts from time to time, and thus nothing ever blossoms for my blog posting. Oh well, here's the schedule.
Monday - 08:00 to 13:00 (5 hours)
Tuesday - 15:30 to 24:00 (13.5 hours)
Wednesday - 14:30 to 24:00 (23 hours)
Thursday - 11:30 to 20:00 (31.5 hours)
Friday - 15:30 to 24:00 (40 hours)
Monday - 08:00 to 13:00 (5 hours)
Tuesday - 15:30 to 24:00 (13.5 hours)
Wednesday - 14:30 to 24:00 (23 hours)
Thursday - 11:30 to 20:00 (31.5 hours)
Friday - 15:30 to 24:00 (40 hours)
Friday, July 31, 2009
The State of Health Care
Again, from This American Life comes stories of (completely legal) refusals to pay out for necessary operations. This was the most telling:
Burn the private industry down.
REP. BART STUPAK: Let me ask of our CEOs this question, starting with you Mr. Hamm, would you commit today that your company will never rescind another policy unless there was intentional fraud - fraudulent misrepresentation in the application?
DON HAMM: I would not commit to that.
REP. BART STUPAK: How about you Mr. Collins, would you commit to not to rescind any policy unless there is an intentional fraudulent misrepresentation?
RICHARD COLLINS: No, sir. We follow the state laws and regulations. And we would not stipulate to that. That's not consistent with each state's laws.
REP. BART STUPAK: How about you, Mr. Sassi, would you commit that your company will never rescind another policy unless there was an intentional fraud, misrepresentation?
BRIAN A. SASSI: No, I can't commit to that. The intentional standard is not the law of the land in the majority of states.
REP. JOE BARTON: Doesn't it bother you that people are going to die, because you insist on reviewing a policy that somebody took out in good faith and forgot to tell you that they were being treated for acne? Doesn't that bother you?
DON HAMM: Yes sir, it does. And we regret the necessity that that has to occur even a single time and we've made suggestions that would reform the system such that that would no longer be needed.
Burn the private industry down.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 8/9
Got this out of the way early this week. Looks like it's going to be all over the place...
Monday - 7:30 to 16:30 (9 hours)
Tuesday - 12:00 to 23:00 (20 hours)
Wednesday - 14:00 to 24:00 (30 hours)
Thursday - 18:30 to 24:00 (35.5 hours)
Friday - 7:30 to 12:00 (40 hours)
REVISED 8/4
Tuesday may be horrid, but oh well. I'll live.
Monday - 7:30 to 16:30 (9 hours)
Tuesday - 12:00 to 23:00 (20 hours)
Wednesday - 14:00 to 24:00 (30 hours)
Thursday - 18:30 to 24:00 (35.5 hours)
Friday - 7:30 to 12:00 (40 hours)
REVISED 8/4
Tuesday may be horrid, but oh well. I'll live.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 8/2
A little late this week on the matter...
Monday - 7:30 to 16:00 (8.5 hours)
Tuesday - 11:30 to 20:00 (17 hours)
Wednesday - 15:00 to 24:00 (26 hours)
Thursday - 14:00 to 22:00 (34 hours)
Friday - 14:00 to 20:00 (40 hours)
Monday - 7:30 to 16:00 (8.5 hours)
Tuesday - 11:30 to 20:00 (17 hours)
Wednesday - 15:00 to 24:00 (26 hours)
Thursday - 14:00 to 22:00 (34 hours)
Friday - 14:00 to 20:00 (40 hours)
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Universal Health Care
The state of the current health care system in America has been up for major debate recently. I've been reading up on the subject and there are tons of myths and misinformation out there on the topic, so I figured I'd put all my thoughts into a post.
First of all, the situation today is bad and growing worse. It's oft cited that a significant percentage of Americans go through life without any form of health insurance. If they find themselves to be sick, they have two options: they can do without things like major surgery or expensive treatments, or they can pay huge prices for their care. In 2005, the number of uninsured people in the United States hit an all-time high (as it did the four years before 2005) of 46.6 million people.
In 2006, therefore, about 15.5% of the population was not covered in any way, shape, or form by health insurance. Many people cite that this is because they simply choose not to get it because they don't plan ahead and find the cost to be high. The problem with this argument in particular is that those people who do not have insurance eventually do get hurt or sick, and seek emergency treatment - this is why 45% of American expenditure in the health sector is covered by local, municipal, state, and federal governments. [source] Yes, we already have a partial system of universal health care, but it's conducted in a ridiculously inefficient and ineffective way. Regardless of this, it's estimated that 22,000 people died in 2006 because they lacked health insurance. [source]
The United States spends more money per capita than any other nation on health care. The WHO estimates this figure to be approximately $6,014 per capita, amounting to 15.2% of the Gross Domestic Product of the United States. The next highest expenditure countries are Luxembourg and Norway:
[source]
[source]
But anyway, my point is that health care in America isn't the best. It can be improved; it can be made more effective and efficient through the streamlining of the process. There are three directions that health care in this country can be pulled, and they are:
1) Obviously, several "MUH TAXES" arguments are certain to come up.
People think it's immoral to make them pay for the health care of others; they don't seem to realize that that's what they're doing when they pay their premiums for their health care provider. Oh, and as previously mentioned, almost a trillion tax dollars to go health care already, anyway. If completely brought into the public sector as is, the program would cost about $2.17 trillion dollars. However, if spending per person were brought in line with the next-highest industrialized country, Luxembourg, assuming 10% of health care was still private, how much would the entire program cost?
The entire program would cost $1.33 trillion in this scenario. This is about a 37% increase in spending. And this is probably the worst case scenario; if a larger percentage of the system remained privatized (90% is a high figure even for most of the highly "socialized" nations like Norway or Sweden) or care was even more efficient in price, this figure could be even smaller.
2) It's certain that people will point to American exceptionalism and pretend that America is utterly unique in situation - its people paradoxically the most hard working and the most lazy people on the face of the earth. They argue that geography poses the biggest problem.
America being uniquely unhealthy, having the highest obesity rate in the world, could be caused by two things: the fact that Americans are just innately unhealthy, or the fact that our health care is poor. I don't prescribe to the fact that being American is in any way "genetic," especially considering the very young age of the nation. Thus, I point to the latter as a major cause of the obesity epidemic: people being either too ignorant to pursue healthy habits (which would be partially solved with more physicals), or people are too poor to avoid foods that are bad for them (an entirely different topic).
The average population density in the United States is 86.2 people per square mile. This varies from the extremely high (New Jersey's 1171 people per square mile figure) to very, very low (Alaska with only about 1.2 people per square mile). Australia, which offers a national health plan and spends about $2,885 per capita on health care, has similar geography. The Northern Territory sports a density of only 0.4 people per square mile, where Victoria (I disclude the Capital Territory) has a density of about 60 people per square mile. Considering most arguments as to the exceptional geography of America have to do with things being "too spread out" to support a public health care system, I beg to differ with them.
3) Many arguments hinge on the fact that such a system "is socialism".
Socialism. See what I did there? Put it in scary red? Doesn't that make you fear it so much?
It's just a word. It's just an ideology. We've gotten past many things in this country, but it seems we cannot see around a label which brands all things done for the collective good as having association with our Cold War enemies. It's time to transcend the labels that political discourse has branded our opinions with.
Anyway, that's all I really have, and that's the crux of my argument. There are holes - as with anything! - and if you find any, please let me know. I'd love to discuss potential problems, because in the end they only help further clarify a hazy issue. Thanks for reading.
First of all, the situation today is bad and growing worse. It's oft cited that a significant percentage of Americans go through life without any form of health insurance. If they find themselves to be sick, they have two options: they can do without things like major surgery or expensive treatments, or they can pay huge prices for their care. In 2005, the number of uninsured people in the United States hit an all-time high (as it did the four years before 2005) of 46.6 million people.
| No. of Uninsured | Increase from Year Prior | |
In 2006, therefore, about 15.5% of the population was not covered in any way, shape, or form by health insurance. Many people cite that this is because they simply choose not to get it because they don't plan ahead and find the cost to be high. The problem with this argument in particular is that those people who do not have insurance eventually do get hurt or sick, and seek emergency treatment - this is why 45% of American expenditure in the health sector is covered by local, municipal, state, and federal governments. [source] Yes, we already have a partial system of universal health care, but it's conducted in a ridiculously inefficient and ineffective way. Regardless of this, it's estimated that 22,000 people died in 2006 because they lacked health insurance. [source]
The United States spends more money per capita than any other nation on health care. The WHO estimates this figure to be approximately $6,014 per capita, amounting to 15.2% of the Gross Domestic Product of the United States. The next highest expenditure countries are Luxembourg and Norway:
But what about the advantage of medical equipment and doctors purported by those against Universal Health Care? It stands to their reasoning that when the government takes over national care, doctors are paid less, and thus the incentive to become a doctor decreases. Also, since funding is assumed to be strained or the system incompetently run, how could equipment be in abundant in a state run system?
But anyway, my point is that health care in America isn't the best. It can be improved; it can be made more effective and efficient through the streamlining of the process. There are three directions that health care in this country can be pulled, and they are:
- To be made more private. This would include stripping the requirement that hospitals treat any patient, regardless of their health coverage. Regulations requiring employers to provide insurance for their employees will be laxed, and possibly even dissolved. Undoubtedly, this would drive the slide for more uninsured in the country - and without any publics funds to prop the system up (as now), many more would die from very treatable conditions.
- To be left completely alone. As previously described, we're nowhere near the top in terms of health care or survival rates in comparison with other industrialized nations. We also spend by far the most money on health care per capita.
- To be made more public, introducing a public option for health care. This would cover all citizens of the United States universally with public (tax) funds.
- As aforementioned, 22,000 people died in 2006 as a direct result of not having health insurance. Any percentage of total deaths this applies to is irrelevant, in my mind, as any needless and preventable death should have and could have been prevented. The worst part of the current system is that not everyone is covered by health insurance.
- With how "risk pools" work, it follows that the larger the pool, the cheaper it is to cover those in the pool. If you have a hundred million people in your risk pool, your "average" risk (calculated with the variance coefficient) is much lower than if you have a thousand in your pool.
- As you can see above, almost 45% of the funds for health care are current provided by the tax payers. This is a significant amount, already; 6.8% of the GDP, which is approximately $974 billion annually. The system as it is is quite inefficient, in addition to being ineffective as previously mentioned. People who do not have any form health coverage (and frequently even covered people) do not have regular checkups, and even skip things like regular mammograms, STD testing, and colon exams. When problems develop, they're usually to the point of interfering with every day routines, and an uncovered persons check into emergency rooms. The surgery that follows can be devastatingly expensive. As an old saying goes, "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." If regular checkups were mandated for those covered by a public option, many of these problems would be caught early, and the damage to both individual livelihood and the economy itself could be minimized.
- This article expresses many of the inefficiencies in the private system at current. Doctors being given incentive to order more tests for personal gain does not improve the system, but simply makes the entire process more costly. It's a long read, but I'd definitely recommend it; it points out the glaring differences between a Texan health system and those like the Mayo Clinic where such incentive is mitigated in a very positive way.
1) Obviously, several "MUH TAXES" arguments are certain to come up.
People think it's immoral to make them pay for the health care of others; they don't seem to realize that that's what they're doing when they pay their premiums for their health care provider. Oh, and as previously mentioned, almost a trillion tax dollars to go health care already, anyway. If completely brought into the public sector as is, the program would cost about $2.17 trillion dollars. However, if spending per person were brought in line with the next-highest industrialized country, Luxembourg, assuming 10% of health care was still private, how much would the entire program cost?
The entire program would cost $1.33 trillion in this scenario. This is about a 37% increase in spending. And this is probably the worst case scenario; if a larger percentage of the system remained privatized (90% is a high figure even for most of the highly "socialized" nations like Norway or Sweden) or care was even more efficient in price, this figure could be even smaller.
2) It's certain that people will point to American exceptionalism and pretend that America is utterly unique in situation - its people paradoxically the most hard working and the most lazy people on the face of the earth. They argue that geography poses the biggest problem.
America being uniquely unhealthy, having the highest obesity rate in the world, could be caused by two things: the fact that Americans are just innately unhealthy, or the fact that our health care is poor. I don't prescribe to the fact that being American is in any way "genetic," especially considering the very young age of the nation. Thus, I point to the latter as a major cause of the obesity epidemic: people being either too ignorant to pursue healthy habits (which would be partially solved with more physicals), or people are too poor to avoid foods that are bad for them (an entirely different topic).
The average population density in the United States is 86.2 people per square mile. This varies from the extremely high (New Jersey's 1171 people per square mile figure) to very, very low (Alaska with only about 1.2 people per square mile). Australia, which offers a national health plan and spends about $2,885 per capita on health care, has similar geography. The Northern Territory sports a density of only 0.4 people per square mile, where Victoria (I disclude the Capital Territory) has a density of about 60 people per square mile. Considering most arguments as to the exceptional geography of America have to do with things being "too spread out" to support a public health care system, I beg to differ with them.
3) Many arguments hinge on the fact that such a system "is socialism".
Socialism. See what I did there? Put it in scary red? Doesn't that make you fear it so much?
It's just a word. It's just an ideology. We've gotten past many things in this country, but it seems we cannot see around a label which brands all things done for the collective good as having association with our Cold War enemies. It's time to transcend the labels that political discourse has branded our opinions with.
Anyway, that's all I really have, and that's the crux of my argument. There are holes - as with anything! - and if you find any, please let me know. I'd love to discuss potential problems, because in the end they only help further clarify a hazy issue. Thanks for reading.
Goodbye to You, F-22
The Senate voted today to approve a Defense Spending Bill which axes the F-22 Raptor program, cutting off the development of the troubled fighter plane. The final vote was 58-40 to approve the budget, focusing on the F-35 as the new cornerstone of the air force of the future and eschewing the embattled F-22.
I'm all for it. The F-22 has several major problems, and has proven itself to be ineffective in a modern war-fighting environment. It was in the mid-eighties (the year I was born, actually, 1986) when the F-22 was first drawn up from proposals, as the YF-22 by Lockheed Martin. Of course, in twenty-three years, the requirements of a dynamic air force change drastically. At the time of conception, the United States was in need of an air superiority fighter that could easily take on Russia's top of the line dogfighters. Obviously, this type of war was never fought; in fact, the United States has not taken on a nontrivial air force for decades.
Anyway, the fact that it lacks utility in a modern age takes a back seat to the fact that it doesn't work. It would be much more acceptable if it were adaptable to more situations; after upwards of twenty-five years in development, it has not flown a single combat mission. It is unable to operate as a ground-attack craft in anything more than a basic capacity - actually, they're fitting the currently-built fighters with a special radar and weaponry to do so just now.
The F-22 Raptor features a revolutionary stealth coating which helps to reduce its radar cross-section to that of a small steel marble. The one catch is that it is damaged by rain. Yep, the plane can't fly reliably in rain without corroding its paint and outer shell. Click here if you don't believe me.
The cost of the planes themselves as well as the maintenance is also exorbitantly high. Each plane costs $350 million, and the operating cost on average is $44,000 per hour of flight time. Keep in mind that the yearly salary of a high school teacher is overshadowed by this figure by about $1,000 annually. The F-22 needs about thirty hours of maintenance for every hour of flight time, in the best-case scenario; the figure may be as high as sixty.
Additionally, the International Dateline is enough to foil the mighty Raptor:
With so many problems and issues, I'm glad they're putting this bloated program to rest. Several Senators (including Feinstein and Boxer) voted against the defense bill for the purposes of saving the Raptor. Why exactly would they do this? Well, Lockheed has sprinkled its production plants throughout the country, and districts that would lose a significant number of jobs would of course be quite angry with a representative who would put the ax to such a program.
But for the cost of one $350 million F-22, you could employ over 5,500 people for a year with salaries of 25% higher than the median salary of the United States: about $63,000.
I'm all for it. The F-22 has several major problems, and has proven itself to be ineffective in a modern war-fighting environment. It was in the mid-eighties (the year I was born, actually, 1986) when the F-22 was first drawn up from proposals, as the YF-22 by Lockheed Martin. Of course, in twenty-three years, the requirements of a dynamic air force change drastically. At the time of conception, the United States was in need of an air superiority fighter that could easily take on Russia's top of the line dogfighters. Obviously, this type of war was never fought; in fact, the United States has not taken on a nontrivial air force for decades.
Anyway, the fact that it lacks utility in a modern age takes a back seat to the fact that it doesn't work. It would be much more acceptable if it were adaptable to more situations; after upwards of twenty-five years in development, it has not flown a single combat mission. It is unable to operate as a ground-attack craft in anything more than a basic capacity - actually, they're fitting the currently-built fighters with a special radar and weaponry to do so just now.
The F-22 Raptor features a revolutionary stealth coating which helps to reduce its radar cross-section to that of a small steel marble. The one catch is that it is damaged by rain. Yep, the plane can't fly reliably in rain without corroding its paint and outer shell. Click here if you don't believe me.
The cost of the planes themselves as well as the maintenance is also exorbitantly high. Each plane costs $350 million, and the operating cost on average is $44,000 per hour of flight time. Keep in mind that the yearly salary of a high school teacher is overshadowed by this figure by about $1,000 annually. The F-22 needs about thirty hours of maintenance for every hour of flight time, in the best-case scenario; the figure may be as high as sixty.
Additionally, the International Dateline is enough to foil the mighty Raptor:
When the group of Raptors crossed over the IDL, multiple computer systems crashed on the planes. Everything from fuel subsystems, to navigation and partial communications were completely taken offline. Numerous attempts were made to "reboot" the systems to no avail.source
With so many problems and issues, I'm glad they're putting this bloated program to rest. Several Senators (including Feinstein and Boxer) voted against the defense bill for the purposes of saving the Raptor. Why exactly would they do this? Well, Lockheed has sprinkled its production plants throughout the country, and districts that would lose a significant number of jobs would of course be quite angry with a representative who would put the ax to such a program.
But for the cost of one $350 million F-22, you could employ over 5,500 people for a year with salaries of 25% higher than the median salary of the United States: about $63,000.
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 7/26
This week looks a lot like the last one, but I'm being nicer to myself and refusing to do the whole get-off-at-24-and-come-in-at-08 routine. Also no awful 0400 shot. Well, if all goes as planned, that is...
Monday - 07:30 to 16:00 (8.5 hours)
Tuesday - 11:30 to 20:00 (17 hours)
Wednesday - 15:30 to 24:00 (25.5 hours)
Thursday - 15:30 to 24:00 (34 hours)
Friday - 14:00 to 20:00 (40 hours)
Shouldn't be too bad, one hopes.
Monday - 07:30 to 16:00 (8.5 hours)
Tuesday - 11:30 to 20:00 (17 hours)
Wednesday - 15:30 to 24:00 (25.5 hours)
Thursday - 15:30 to 24:00 (34 hours)
Friday - 14:00 to 20:00 (40 hours)
Shouldn't be too bad, one hopes.
Legitimizing the Illegitimate
Oh, birther movement, you march steadily forward, ignoring facts, logic and reason as you cling with clenched fingers to some vague concept of Obama not being a natural born citizen of the United States. But then again, where's the birth certificate?!
Oh... yeah, there it is. Well, at least no congresspeople are as insane about this stupid conspiracy theory as some of their constituents, right?
Please stop this. It's not only stupid by now, but it's getting quite petulant. In fact, the second article of the constitution already implies that this is necessary. There are plenty of reasons to criticize Barack Obama, but please stop giving crazies a reason to think their conspiracy theories are valid. By legitimizing the birther movement, you're helping to stifle constructive thought and reason from the right wing and turning conservatives into shrill parrots.
Oh... yeah, there it is. Well, at least no congresspeople are as insane about this stupid conspiracy theory as some of their constituents, right?Link
Rep. Bill Posey’s (R-Fla.) bill that would change campaign law to demand proof of citizenship from presidential candidates is up to nine co-sponsors. Since June, Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.), Rep. Kenny Marchant (R-Texas), and Rep. Ted Poe (R-Texas) have added their names to the list.
Burton is an ironic recruit to the cause. In the 1990s, he earned the nickname “Watermelon Dan” for his innumerable conspiracy theories about President Bill Clinton; he once ushered reporters into his backyard to watch him shoot a watermelon as a way of proving that Vince Foster’s death could not have been a suicide. And with the addition of the new Texas co-sponsors, a full quarter of the state’s 20-member Republican delegation to Congress is now backing the Posey bill.
Please stop this. It's not only stupid by now, but it's getting quite petulant. In fact, the second article of the constitution already implies that this is necessary. There are plenty of reasons to criticize Barack Obama, but please stop giving crazies a reason to think their conspiracy theories are valid. By legitimizing the birther movement, you're helping to stifle constructive thought and reason from the right wing and turning conservatives into shrill parrots.
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Palin's Party
Sarah Palin resigned from her governorship of Alaska on July 3, 2009, effective the twenty-sixth of this month. Ever since this bold and perplexing move, there has been a latent buzz regarding the possibility of Palin forming a new party to compete with the Democratic and Republican Parties. Though at this point this is probably unlikely (this is the political equivalent of the Barn Swallow, though would produce less favorable results if tried), I was wondering exactly what the implications and results of such a shift would be.
At worst, it would create another Perot-like figure in the 2012 election; I doubt Obama would absolutely need such to be competitive against whoever is his challenger in 2012 (looking increasingly like Mitt Romney might get his turn, but I won't count out challengers like Pawlenty or even Huckabee), but it would certainly be a welcome spoiler. It's difficult to judge exactly where a party started by Palin would stand politically, but it might just depend on who she'd be challenging as a third party candidate.
Against Romney, she would almost undoubtedly be unable to compete with the "libertarian" type of conservative, those more concerned with fiscal responsibility, "size" of the government, lowering taxation, and reducing the regulations levied on corporate interests. Against someone like Huckabee, she'd be hard pressed to draw the religious right with her, the voters most focused on issues like birth control, abortion, and teaching creationism.
In order to understand exactly what might come to shape in such a scenario, it's important to understand the base of the Republican Party's voting structure. Qualitatively speaking, the voting base is made up of three groups: the corporate-interest crowd, who find their main interests in reducing and restraining taxes on the rich and/or softening regulation on corporations, the "redneck" crowd, who are mainly interested in gun ownership and personal freedom, along with a minor focus on taxation, and the fundamentalist crowd, who are focused like a laser on issues like abortion and institutionalizing religion.
The corporate crowd would find their main inspiration and ushering into the party by Reagan, who preached the gospel of small government and low taxation. These are the types of Republicans that give quietly and behind the scenes, supply lobbying firms with donations, and help to sway the other groups with token appeals to religion and personal freedom. Their main goal is to cause further regression in the tax code, to shift the tax burden to the poor, and protect their monetary interests first and foremost.
The "redneck" crowd and Christian right have a large overlap, but different sides tend to emerge depending on the issue at hand. Of course, the latter comes out when discussing morality or abortion; the Christian Right was spearheaded initially by the Moral Majority in the early eighties by Reverend Jerry Falwell, who instructed his footsoldiers to vote in droves for the more religious-minded (Republican) candidate. Nixon did the most to appeal to the hillbilly types, especially in appealing to the south's "state's rights" voters, many of them made nervous by Humphrey's apparent leaning toward desegregation of schools.
So, which of these groups view Sarah Palin as their best hope for the future? At my estimation, it would be the hillbilly types - the stereotypical gun-clingers living in shacks in rural Montana. They see Palin as a clear representative of their viewpoints; she supported the Tea Party protests of April, she owns and uses guns to hunt, and she originates from a sparsely populated, hyper-conservative state. The tea party types of voters would be the ones she would draw as her base, I would think, to become the new Palin footsoldiers. These tend to be people that are very emotionally charged, and thus fairly easy to manipulate via pathos arguments.
Would this split, then, create some kind of political middleground for the "moderates" of the country to occupy? Would it finally give a comfortable home to politicians like Ron Paul? I don't think so. The polarization caused by using the two-party system for this long means that people rely on an entire set of political beliefs to paint themselves. People are "red" or "blue," or very rarely "purple," though these colors have many different shades. Those conservatives who are for state rights, heavily against gun control, and belonging to the lower or lower-middle class are going to be hard pressed to let go of all of the rhetoric that's been drilled into their heads in the last three decades. It's hard to separate, as a conservative or a liberal, the fiscal issues from the social issues. I find it difficult to believe that the base of voters that Palin would sway to her new party would believe (at least in a majority sense) that social freedoms like abortion and gay marriage should be completely and undeniably legal. So, if not a libertarian party, what would the Party of Palin shape up to be?
A rebranding and different flavor of the Republican Party. Again, as aforementioned, a different side would show depending on who Palin is competing with for the conservative spotlight. A Romney would cause them to tug their Bibles out of their back pockets; a Huckabee presidential run would have them unholstering their oversized semiautomatic pistols. The one good thing that could come out of all this, however, is the reorganization of how the parties work. A great deal of the base of the Republicans (71% to be precise) would vote for Sarah Palin in a national election - thus, she'd draw a good deal of Republicans with her in such a move, though probably something more like 30-40% of their base. An unintended side effect would possibly be that many of the blue dog democrats, who Palin has flirted with suppporting at times, would shift their allegiances as well. This would leave us with an actual Liberal Party in the United States - certainly a welcome move in my point of view.
At worst, it would create another Perot-like figure in the 2012 election; I doubt Obama would absolutely need such to be competitive against whoever is his challenger in 2012 (looking increasingly like Mitt Romney might get his turn, but I won't count out challengers like Pawlenty or even Huckabee), but it would certainly be a welcome spoiler. It's difficult to judge exactly where a party started by Palin would stand politically, but it might just depend on who she'd be challenging as a third party candidate.
Against Romney, she would almost undoubtedly be unable to compete with the "libertarian" type of conservative, those more concerned with fiscal responsibility, "size" of the government, lowering taxation, and reducing the regulations levied on corporate interests. Against someone like Huckabee, she'd be hard pressed to draw the religious right with her, the voters most focused on issues like birth control, abortion, and teaching creationism.
In order to understand exactly what might come to shape in such a scenario, it's important to understand the base of the Republican Party's voting structure. Qualitatively speaking, the voting base is made up of three groups: the corporate-interest crowd, who find their main interests in reducing and restraining taxes on the rich and/or softening regulation on corporations, the "redneck" crowd, who are mainly interested in gun ownership and personal freedom, along with a minor focus on taxation, and the fundamentalist crowd, who are focused like a laser on issues like abortion and institutionalizing religion.
The corporate crowd would find their main inspiration and ushering into the party by Reagan, who preached the gospel of small government and low taxation. These are the types of Republicans that give quietly and behind the scenes, supply lobbying firms with donations, and help to sway the other groups with token appeals to religion and personal freedom. Their main goal is to cause further regression in the tax code, to shift the tax burden to the poor, and protect their monetary interests first and foremost.
The "redneck" crowd and Christian right have a large overlap, but different sides tend to emerge depending on the issue at hand. Of course, the latter comes out when discussing morality or abortion; the Christian Right was spearheaded initially by the Moral Majority in the early eighties by Reverend Jerry Falwell, who instructed his footsoldiers to vote in droves for the more religious-minded (Republican) candidate. Nixon did the most to appeal to the hillbilly types, especially in appealing to the south's "state's rights" voters, many of them made nervous by Humphrey's apparent leaning toward desegregation of schools.
So, which of these groups view Sarah Palin as their best hope for the future? At my estimation, it would be the hillbilly types - the stereotypical gun-clingers living in shacks in rural Montana. They see Palin as a clear representative of their viewpoints; she supported the Tea Party protests of April, she owns and uses guns to hunt, and she originates from a sparsely populated, hyper-conservative state. The tea party types of voters would be the ones she would draw as her base, I would think, to become the new Palin footsoldiers. These tend to be people that are very emotionally charged, and thus fairly easy to manipulate via pathos arguments.
Would this split, then, create some kind of political middleground for the "moderates" of the country to occupy? Would it finally give a comfortable home to politicians like Ron Paul? I don't think so. The polarization caused by using the two-party system for this long means that people rely on an entire set of political beliefs to paint themselves. People are "red" or "blue," or very rarely "purple," though these colors have many different shades. Those conservatives who are for state rights, heavily against gun control, and belonging to the lower or lower-middle class are going to be hard pressed to let go of all of the rhetoric that's been drilled into their heads in the last three decades. It's hard to separate, as a conservative or a liberal, the fiscal issues from the social issues. I find it difficult to believe that the base of voters that Palin would sway to her new party would believe (at least in a majority sense) that social freedoms like abortion and gay marriage should be completely and undeniably legal. So, if not a libertarian party, what would the Party of Palin shape up to be?
A rebranding and different flavor of the Republican Party. Again, as aforementioned, a different side would show depending on who Palin is competing with for the conservative spotlight. A Romney would cause them to tug their Bibles out of their back pockets; a Huckabee presidential run would have them unholstering their oversized semiautomatic pistols. The one good thing that could come out of all this, however, is the reorganization of how the parties work. A great deal of the base of the Republicans (71% to be precise) would vote for Sarah Palin in a national election - thus, she'd draw a good deal of Republicans with her in such a move, though probably something more like 30-40% of their base. An unintended side effect would possibly be that many of the blue dog democrats, who Palin has flirted with suppporting at times, would shift their allegiances as well. This would leave us with an actual Liberal Party in the United States - certainly a welcome move in my point of view.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Schedule for Week Ending 7/18
Back to the grindstone. HERE, WE, GO!
Monday - 7:30 to 16:00 (8.5 hours)
Tuesday - 11:30 to 20:00 (17 hours)
Wednesday - 15:30 to 24:00 (25.5 hours)
Thursday - 7:30 to 16:00 (34 hours)
Friday - 2:00 to 8:00 (40 hours)
Eek. So weird.
Monday - 7:30 to 16:00 (8.5 hours)
Tuesday - 11:30 to 20:00 (17 hours)
Wednesday - 15:30 to 24:00 (25.5 hours)
Thursday - 7:30 to 16:00 (34 hours)
Friday - 2:00 to 8:00 (40 hours)
Eek. So weird.
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Bullet
I'm certain at this point everyone has been in a situation where time slows down, crawling as if in a traffic jam, waiting for the choke point to pass, for the congestion to be cleared. It used to happen to me, for example, when I made small errors in judgment while driving, resulting very nearly in a car accident. You can feel your heart beating, your blood pumping in your capillaries, you reflexes and thoughts speeding to handle a threatening dangerous situation.
This feeling is what I am experiencing right now, one hundred fold. My ears hadn't yet registered the gun shot that would prove to be my undoing, but the first two bullets had been fired and ricocheted harmlessly off the pavement. The third was right on the mark, and somehow I already knew it, my brain could sense its end as if it was rehearsed. The script of my life, with all its droll dialogue and useless subplots that went nowhere, about to end.
Time was slowing down, almost enough that it stood completely still. I could feel droplets of sweat on my forehead slowly forming, drop by drop secreted within each gland beneath each pore. I could feel myself moving, as if automatically, though painstakingly slowly. The only feeling I could have compared it to was my brief stint in ballet class when I was much younger - a choreography that, again, implied that this was planned. An awkward dance of movement, of desperation.
My life began to flash before my eyes as I felt the bullet tear through my flesh, as they say. It was an odd feeling, though not completely unpleasant. At the very least, it ignored all the negative portions and focused almost exclusively on the positive. First memory, first kiss, wedding day, all that. It completely skipped over my divorce, the loss of my children to my spouse, who at that point was planning on moving across the country - Boston, had the court officer said? I shook off the thought as being unimportant. In fact, pretty much everything seems unimportant in this situation. I would say you should try it sometime, but you undoubtedly will.
It was a shame that it took until this moment to feel that happy and content with my life, to feel as if everything was inconsequential. Finally, I was able to truly let go, to loose control and be happy about it. I suppose it's exceedingly easy to forget about your cares as a bullet slowly tears through the nerve centers of your brain, debilitating speech centers and motor control functions alike. I didn't need them anymore.
NOTE: Well, I didn't ever finish this one. Figured I'd post it, anyway.
This feeling is what I am experiencing right now, one hundred fold. My ears hadn't yet registered the gun shot that would prove to be my undoing, but the first two bullets had been fired and ricocheted harmlessly off the pavement. The third was right on the mark, and somehow I already knew it, my brain could sense its end as if it was rehearsed. The script of my life, with all its droll dialogue and useless subplots that went nowhere, about to end.
Time was slowing down, almost enough that it stood completely still. I could feel droplets of sweat on my forehead slowly forming, drop by drop secreted within each gland beneath each pore. I could feel myself moving, as if automatically, though painstakingly slowly. The only feeling I could have compared it to was my brief stint in ballet class when I was much younger - a choreography that, again, implied that this was planned. An awkward dance of movement, of desperation.
My life began to flash before my eyes as I felt the bullet tear through my flesh, as they say. It was an odd feeling, though not completely unpleasant. At the very least, it ignored all the negative portions and focused almost exclusively on the positive. First memory, first kiss, wedding day, all that. It completely skipped over my divorce, the loss of my children to my spouse, who at that point was planning on moving across the country - Boston, had the court officer said? I shook off the thought as being unimportant. In fact, pretty much everything seems unimportant in this situation. I would say you should try it sometime, but you undoubtedly will.
It was a shame that it took until this moment to feel that happy and content with my life, to feel as if everything was inconsequential. Finally, I was able to truly let go, to loose control and be happy about it. I suppose it's exceedingly easy to forget about your cares as a bullet slowly tears through the nerve centers of your brain, debilitating speech centers and motor control functions alike. I didn't need them anymore.
NOTE: Well, I didn't ever finish this one. Figured I'd post it, anyway.
Saturday, July 4, 2009
ZIP Codes Are Gettin' Higher
Three days into my vacation, I felt it would be a good idea to write here about it before it all left my mind like so much brain jelly oozing out of my ears. Without further ado...
On Thursday, July 2, I woke up at four-thirty in the morning in preparation to head out to the airport. I got some last minute things packed up and easily caught my 7:30 flight. It took about six hours to breeze across the country. Six hours later, I hopped off the plane. Thanks to the time warp that is the curvature of the earth, it was only 10:30 or so. Wandering around the airport, I managed to find Tony at one of the auxiliary terminal gates, and we were on our merry way to the bus.
It was a pretty action packed day for the first one out here. When we got to Dustin's, we were treated to a swift egress and trip over to the Boeing plant in Everett, Washington. Apparently it's the main facility purposed with testing and building new airplanes, the most prominent and new of which is the Boeing 787 Dreamliner. The majority of the tour was made up of trotting through the gigantic building (claimed by our tour guide, Dustin's friend John, to be the largest in the world by volume) and being daunted by the tremendous scale of everything around us. It was truly impressive to see some of the engines up close, especially those of the 777 and 787. The massive scale of these planes is something you can only truly appreciate up close.
After we were treated to this incredible tour, we were cordially invited to a party at our tourguide's home in an area of Seattle. It was a smallish barbecue, and I met a few of Dustin's University of Illinois friends. Highlights included finding out somebody else that liked the Critic and Tony killing one of the biggest mutant insects I have ever seen in my life.
Next up was Friday, July 3, which was the last day Tony was going to be with us, sadly. We sat around for a bit before heading out to grab lunch at a place called Dick's, a quick-and-dirty burger place which I enjoyed immensely. After that we headed to the threatre to watch Moon, which Scott had summarily raved about a few weeks ago after seeing it in Los Angeles. I thought it was a very well-crafted movie, with a bit of slow pacing, but I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Soon enough, we dropped off Dustin's friend Mark and motored off to the airport to drop off Tony. It sucked that he couldn't stay for long, but it was good that Dustin and I got to see him, and that he got to hang out in Seattle for a bit. The rest of the evening was spent traipsing about the city, checking out the Space Needle, Pike Place Market, and the waterfront.
Follow that was Independence Day, which was filled out by a pair of parties. The first consisted mostly of sitting around in a backyard, talking with new people and eating a plethora of foods. It was fun to shmooze and meet more of Dustin's friends - it's rare that I get to meet so many people at once, but I had a good time. Later that night, we attended a bit more traditional "college" type party with drinking games and lots of yelling. It was less enjoyable on the whole, but we got to watch the fireworks from the roof of an apartment building.
My favorite day in the great state of Washington was probably Sunday, July 5. Dustin had been directed by friends at work to check out Olympic State Park, specifically a place called Hurricane Ridge. It was about a three hour drive, and there was a ferry involved on the way out. Eventually, though, we made it to the park and started the automotive trek up the side of a mountain.
Sadly, this was when I most regretted not bringing my digital out with me. Granted, I let it completely escape my mind when I left my apartment. I do have an okay camera feature on my phone, and Dustin and I purchased a disposable that I'll get files off of soon enough to upload onto here. Anyway, the sights were amazing on the whole - huge snowy mountains off in the distance, incredible landscapes filled with endless numbers of trees. While we were headed up into the mountains, I had thought I was being treated to one of the more amazing sights I had seen; once we reached the apex, though, I was absolutely bewildered. This won't do it justice, but just a preview:
We hiked along a trail for a bit and then headed home. But alas, the wait for the ferry we rode was about three hours according to one of the LED signs they have conveniently placed on the route. So, we re-routed, something we had planned to do anyway; we decided to dip south through Tacoma. We realized halfway across the Tacoma Narrows Bridge that it was the "famous" one. The original structure bridging the span did this some time ago:
This path would take us quite near the city of Renton, which has an amazing feature - A FIVE GUYS RESTAURANT. Yes, this west coast rarity, mere moments away. OR SO WE THOUGHT. Initially, my GPS unit led us to what appeared to be an industrial park. Dustin threw the address into his cell phone and entered "street" instead of "place," which brought us to a residential area. Correcting this mistake, his phone began to lead us back to the initial industrial area, which we realized halfway through driving there. But ho! We were eventually able to follow the maps on our various devices to find the new development that featured Five Guys. WE HAD WON THE DAY! And also delicious hamburger.
My last day in Seattle was Monday, July 6. It consisted initially of me cleaning up the apartment a little in thanks for Dustin letting me stay, and packing up all my clothing and souvenirs. Dustin was at work most of the day, so I wandered around downtown Seattle a little before I headed over to Microsoft to meet up with him. We meandered around the campus a little; Dustin showed me the visitor's center and the gift shop. I bought a couple things from the latter, including a stark green 360 water bottle.
Next, Dustin took me to one of the studio buildings that featured a plethora of video game character statues. I had to get my picture with two of them:
For the uninitiated, the first is a picture of the "Big Daddy" and "Little Sister" from the video game BioShock. The latter is a Brotherhood of Steel Knight from Fallout 3; he was about eight feet tall, which was impressive. And yes, I know there's a lot of light saturation behind me in both pictures, since they were taken by horrid camera phone. The rest of the evening consisted of wings and some great and fresh seafood with a few of Dustin's friends. All in all, it was a good way to say goodbye to Seattle.
I slept for about three hours before rising, showering, and heading to take the bus. After wandering around for a bit at 4th and University, I noticed a transit authority van sitting around, so I headed over to him to ask about the bus I had to take; apparently I was a little off target. He gave me a lift to Second Street and dropped me right where the 194 bus would pick me up. All was well, and I hopped my plane in perfect cadence. Off to California!
On Thursday, July 2, I woke up at four-thirty in the morning in preparation to head out to the airport. I got some last minute things packed up and easily caught my 7:30 flight. It took about six hours to breeze across the country. Six hours later, I hopped off the plane. Thanks to the time warp that is the curvature of the earth, it was only 10:30 or so. Wandering around the airport, I managed to find Tony at one of the auxiliary terminal gates, and we were on our merry way to the bus.
It was a pretty action packed day for the first one out here. When we got to Dustin's, we were treated to a swift egress and trip over to the Boeing plant in Everett, Washington. Apparently it's the main facility purposed with testing and building new airplanes, the most prominent and new of which is the Boeing 787 Dreamliner. The majority of the tour was made up of trotting through the gigantic building (claimed by our tour guide, Dustin's friend John, to be the largest in the world by volume) and being daunted by the tremendous scale of everything around us. It was truly impressive to see some of the engines up close, especially those of the 777 and 787. The massive scale of these planes is something you can only truly appreciate up close.
After we were treated to this incredible tour, we were cordially invited to a party at our tourguide's home in an area of Seattle. It was a smallish barbecue, and I met a few of Dustin's University of Illinois friends. Highlights included finding out somebody else that liked the Critic and Tony killing one of the biggest mutant insects I have ever seen in my life.
Next up was Friday, July 3, which was the last day Tony was going to be with us, sadly. We sat around for a bit before heading out to grab lunch at a place called Dick's, a quick-and-dirty burger place which I enjoyed immensely. After that we headed to the threatre to watch Moon, which Scott had summarily raved about a few weeks ago after seeing it in Los Angeles. I thought it was a very well-crafted movie, with a bit of slow pacing, but I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Soon enough, we dropped off Dustin's friend Mark and motored off to the airport to drop off Tony. It sucked that he couldn't stay for long, but it was good that Dustin and I got to see him, and that he got to hang out in Seattle for a bit. The rest of the evening was spent traipsing about the city, checking out the Space Needle, Pike Place Market, and the waterfront.
Follow that was Independence Day, which was filled out by a pair of parties. The first consisted mostly of sitting around in a backyard, talking with new people and eating a plethora of foods. It was fun to shmooze and meet more of Dustin's friends - it's rare that I get to meet so many people at once, but I had a good time. Later that night, we attended a bit more traditional "college" type party with drinking games and lots of yelling. It was less enjoyable on the whole, but we got to watch the fireworks from the roof of an apartment building.
My favorite day in the great state of Washington was probably Sunday, July 5. Dustin had been directed by friends at work to check out Olympic State Park, specifically a place called Hurricane Ridge. It was about a three hour drive, and there was a ferry involved on the way out. Eventually, though, we made it to the park and started the automotive trek up the side of a mountain.
Sadly, this was when I most regretted not bringing my digital out with me. Granted, I let it completely escape my mind when I left my apartment. I do have an okay camera feature on my phone, and Dustin and I purchased a disposable that I'll get files off of soon enough to upload onto here. Anyway, the sights were amazing on the whole - huge snowy mountains off in the distance, incredible landscapes filled with endless numbers of trees. While we were headed up into the mountains, I had thought I was being treated to one of the more amazing sights I had seen; once we reached the apex, though, I was absolutely bewildered. This won't do it justice, but just a preview:
We hiked along a trail for a bit and then headed home. But alas, the wait for the ferry we rode was about three hours according to one of the LED signs they have conveniently placed on the route. So, we re-routed, something we had planned to do anyway; we decided to dip south through Tacoma. We realized halfway across the Tacoma Narrows Bridge that it was the "famous" one. The original structure bridging the span did this some time ago:This path would take us quite near the city of Renton, which has an amazing feature - A FIVE GUYS RESTAURANT. Yes, this west coast rarity, mere moments away. OR SO WE THOUGHT. Initially, my GPS unit led us to what appeared to be an industrial park. Dustin threw the address into his cell phone and entered "street" instead of "place," which brought us to a residential area. Correcting this mistake, his phone began to lead us back to the initial industrial area, which we realized halfway through driving there. But ho! We were eventually able to follow the maps on our various devices to find the new development that featured Five Guys. WE HAD WON THE DAY! And also delicious hamburger.
My last day in Seattle was Monday, July 6. It consisted initially of me cleaning up the apartment a little in thanks for Dustin letting me stay, and packing up all my clothing and souvenirs. Dustin was at work most of the day, so I wandered around downtown Seattle a little before I headed over to Microsoft to meet up with him. We meandered around the campus a little; Dustin showed me the visitor's center and the gift shop. I bought a couple things from the latter, including a stark green 360 water bottle.
Next, Dustin took me to one of the studio buildings that featured a plethora of video game character statues. I had to get my picture with two of them:
For the uninitiated, the first is a picture of the "Big Daddy" and "Little Sister" from the video game BioShock. The latter is a Brotherhood of Steel Knight from Fallout 3; he was about eight feet tall, which was impressive. And yes, I know there's a lot of light saturation behind me in both pictures, since they were taken by horrid camera phone. The rest of the evening consisted of wings and some great and fresh seafood with a few of Dustin's friends. All in all, it was a good way to say goodbye to Seattle.
I slept for about three hours before rising, showering, and heading to take the bus. After wandering around for a bit at 4th and University, I noticed a transit authority van sitting around, so I headed over to him to ask about the bus I had to take; apparently I was a little off target. He gave me a lift to Second Street and dropped me right where the 194 bus would pick me up. All was well, and I hopped my plane in perfect cadence. Off to California!
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
'Ello July
So much changes in the course of a year, so very, very much.
At the start of another July, I'm going to yet again be headed onto a plane for the Fourth of July weekend, but this time my world is starkly different. It's still going to be completely enjoyable - of this I have no doubt - just indescribably different.
I think back on all the people and friends I've gained, all the ones I've lost touch with, all the ones that have severed contact for one reason or another. It's all pretty overwhelming along with all these thoughts of work and stress floating around in the sea with them. Perhaps the Pacific will affect me in a similar fashion as its sister.
At the start of another July, I'm going to yet again be headed onto a plane for the Fourth of July weekend, but this time my world is starkly different. It's still going to be completely enjoyable - of this I have no doubt - just indescribably different.
I think back on all the people and friends I've gained, all the ones I've lost touch with, all the ones that have severed contact for one reason or another. It's all pretty overwhelming along with all these thoughts of work and stress floating around in the sea with them. Perhaps the Pacific will affect me in a similar fashion as its sister.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Official Tally
WIN LOSS
[ ] [X] Gubernatorial race against a wacky former professional wrestler nicknamed "The Body."
[X] [ ] Senate race against a man who died in a plane crash shortly before the election.
[ ] [X] Senate race against a comedian and writer writer who portrayed self-help guru Stuart Smalley on Saturday Night Live.
Way to be, Norm Coleman. Now take this as your hint to fade into obscurity.
[ ] [X] Gubernatorial race against a wacky former professional wrestler nicknamed "The Body."
[X] [ ] Senate race against a man who died in a plane crash shortly before the election.
[ ] [X] Senate race against a comedian and writer writer who portrayed self-help guru Stuart Smalley on Saturday Night Live.
Way to be, Norm Coleman. Now take this as your hint to fade into obscurity.
A View From Here
I had a rousing debate with a coworker of mine in the lab this evening, and it sparked a lot of thoughts and a small bit of research to fill in the gaps of my knowledge. It's important to me to "get my story straight" when making political and ideological arguments, since I severely dislike finding the roots of my beliefs were poisoned from the start. Anyway, the argument was about the merits of left versus right wing politics, in general, and the subject of fascism came up.
Now, of course, the prototypical fascist in history is Mussolini, the Italian prime minister during World War II. Now, there really is no agreed upon or concise definition of what exactly fascism is, but it exists on a continuum that includes both traditionally right- and left-wing issues under its cloak. This is especially important to remember when thinking of groups like the Nazis - my coworker did, in fact, cite them as being an example of "left-wing". I staunchly disagree.
As far as left-wing policies usually incorporated in "fascism," generally they have to do with fiscally liberal politics, especially when considering the "corporate state." Corporatism was at the heart of both Mussolini's policies and Hitler's. The concept, in general, means that the government is the means of production - that is, a governing group is installed to exert control over the corporate structure of a state. This is similar to the concept of socialism, though there are differences.
Socialism, broadly, is the placement of the means of production in the hands of the people. This would generally imply the government takes the reigns, being an extension of the public. The one flaw here in a fascist system is that fascism also exhibits extreme forms of authoritarianism. Authoritarianism includes under its skirts the concept of unelected leadership. So the government is no longer a representation of the "people" - yes, technically, fascism does include socialist fiscal policies, but there are subtle differences.
On the right wing, fascism takes on an authoritarian nationalist viewpoint. That is, it suppresses individual rights and promotes nationalism in an extreme way. The key concept here is that the suppression of individual rights is innately right wing - social control, as it were. You can see that in the dichotomy of the Republicans versus Democrats today; Republicans tend to be more for interventionism in social matters like abortion, marriage equality, and basically anything in the Bill of Rights. This is also the reason why the right wing of the United States demonizes organizations like the ACLU which defend civil liberties. The one issue that falls into the hands of the Republicans is gun control, which they favor.
Anyway, the spectra and coordinate systems that can represent these beliefs are undoubtedly infinite. Below is one I threw together to illustrate a point. Please note that the sometimes-ambiguous term "liberal" is used here in the current, left-wing context.
To keep terms straight:
Now, of course, the prototypical fascist in history is Mussolini, the Italian prime minister during World War II. Now, there really is no agreed upon or concise definition of what exactly fascism is, but it exists on a continuum that includes both traditionally right- and left-wing issues under its cloak. This is especially important to remember when thinking of groups like the Nazis - my coworker did, in fact, cite them as being an example of "left-wing". I staunchly disagree.
As far as left-wing policies usually incorporated in "fascism," generally they have to do with fiscally liberal politics, especially when considering the "corporate state." Corporatism was at the heart of both Mussolini's policies and Hitler's. The concept, in general, means that the government is the means of production - that is, a governing group is installed to exert control over the corporate structure of a state. This is similar to the concept of socialism, though there are differences.
Socialism, broadly, is the placement of the means of production in the hands of the people. This would generally imply the government takes the reigns, being an extension of the public. The one flaw here in a fascist system is that fascism also exhibits extreme forms of authoritarianism. Authoritarianism includes under its skirts the concept of unelected leadership. So the government is no longer a representation of the "people" - yes, technically, fascism does include socialist fiscal policies, but there are subtle differences.
On the right wing, fascism takes on an authoritarian nationalist viewpoint. That is, it suppresses individual rights and promotes nationalism in an extreme way. The key concept here is that the suppression of individual rights is innately right wing - social control, as it were. You can see that in the dichotomy of the Republicans versus Democrats today; Republicans tend to be more for interventionism in social matters like abortion, marriage equality, and basically anything in the Bill of Rights. This is also the reason why the right wing of the United States demonizes organizations like the ACLU which defend civil liberties. The one issue that falls into the hands of the Republicans is gun control, which they favor.
Anyway, the spectra and coordinate systems that can represent these beliefs are undoubtedly infinite. Below is one I threw together to illustrate a point. Please note that the sometimes-ambiguous term "liberal" is used here in the current, left-wing context.
To keep terms straight:- Social rights are on a spectrum from - as a libertarian would put it - "less" to "more" personal freedom. This includes issues mentioned above; the "more" socially liberal someone is, the more likely they are to agree with pro-choice movements, the right to due process and fair trial, the right for marriage equality, et cetera. The reason I mention the ACLU here is that it really illustrates how current-era conservatism (especially neo-conservatism) is in opposition to the organization and the concept of civil liberties generally. Republicans are generally in opposition to the ACLU on issues such as separation of church and state, the death penalty, the USA PATRIOT act, and the defense of accused and convicted criminals.
- Economic ideologies span from socialism at the top to laissez-faire anarcho-capitalism at the bottom. In general, the more economically liberal an individual is, the more they are for government intervention into resource allocation, production, and environmental protection. An economically conservative person would likely be an advocate of concepts like corporate citizenship, lowered taxes levied on corporations and individuals alike, and the dissolution of workers' unions.
Monday, June 29, 2009
Cath...
Cath...
It seems that you live in someone else's dream
In a hand-me-down wedding dress
With the things that could have been are repressed
But you said your vows and you closed the door
On so many men who would have loved you more
Just Call Me Keith Silver
No real reason for this, but Nate Silver recently posted a story about which countries you could obliterate to maintain 95% of the worldwide GDP. I grabbed the same data and played around with it a little to satisfy some curiosities.
Anyway, Silver mentions the fact that you could completely discount about 2,865,623,000 people in order to make this reduction, or about 43% of the world's population. This made me wonder exactly how many you could take from the top end; that is, do the opposite. So I pulled the data, sorted it, and found the countries with the highest per capita GDPs:
Luxembourg, Norway, Qatar, Iceland, Ireland, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and two-thirds of the Netherlands constitutes 5% of the world's GDP. And yes, I'm aware that taking a fraction of a country is kind of a tricky thing; in this case, it means roughly the middle 67%; imagine you could take away both the richest 16.5% and the poorest 16.5% from the Netherlands. The United States just misses the cut, falling after the "rest" of the Netherlands and the UK.
Adding up the populations of all these countries and partial countries comes to roughly 52,144,145 people, according to the most recent census data available for all. That's a teensy 0.78% of the world's population. So yes, in a country-by-country basis (it'd be a worse comparison in a person by person one), the top 0.78% of the population is as wealthy as the bottom 43%.
Anyway, Silver mentions the fact that you could completely discount about 2,865,623,000 people in order to make this reduction, or about 43% of the world's population. This made me wonder exactly how many you could take from the top end; that is, do the opposite. So I pulled the data, sorted it, and found the countries with the highest per capita GDPs:
Luxembourg, Norway, Qatar, Iceland, Ireland, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and two-thirds of the Netherlands constitutes 5% of the world's GDP. And yes, I'm aware that taking a fraction of a country is kind of a tricky thing; in this case, it means roughly the middle 67%; imagine you could take away both the richest 16.5% and the poorest 16.5% from the Netherlands. The United States just misses the cut, falling after the "rest" of the Netherlands and the UK.
Adding up the populations of all these countries and partial countries comes to roughly 52,144,145 people, according to the most recent census data available for all. That's a teensy 0.78% of the world's population. So yes, in a country-by-country basis (it'd be a worse comparison in a person by person one), the top 0.78% of the population is as wealthy as the bottom 43%.
Transformers: Insert Banal, Parodical Subtitle
So this weekend I decided to cruise down to Maryland to hang out with my middle/high school friend Andy. It was my second trek down there, and I have to say I do very much enjoy the drive. The Baltimore Harbor Tunnel, the gorgeous rural Maryland driving, all of it. But this weekend was not without its mishaps.
Namely one named Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.
I shouldn't really be surprised, though. I specifically was visiting the area to see the movie with Andy, and this certainly continued the streak I have of going to awful films with friends of mine. Anyway, we were quite surprised when the film was sold out for the 10:30pm Friday showing, figuring that a smallish town like Lexington Park would have trouble supporting such a showing. We were quite incorrect, so we ended up seeing it the next day at a matinee.
Without further ado, it was a waste. My time is essentially worthless for the most part, so I will only very rarely complain about it being wasted, but this two-and-a-half hour abomination falls squarely into that category. Really, the action was about the same as the first Transformers film, lots of tumbling metal. It was still fairly difficult to distinguish between the robots when they were punching and rolling about - something I had a fair amount of difficulty with in the first movie, but far more in this one.
Anyway, I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel to find good points about the film, but I'll say that the computer graphics work was fantastic. A forest battle involving Optimus Prime was fantastically animated and well done, in addition to being a little more comprehensible than the other fights. A little nostalgia was brought about thanks to the arguments between Starscream and Megatron so characteristic of the old cartoons. And yeah, that's pretty much all I enjoyed about the movie.
It's easier to express my hatred of this film's weaker points in bullet format, since there's just too many to list in paragraph format.
Namely one named Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.
I shouldn't really be surprised, though. I specifically was visiting the area to see the movie with Andy, and this certainly continued the streak I have of going to awful films with friends of mine. Anyway, we were quite surprised when the film was sold out for the 10:30pm Friday showing, figuring that a smallish town like Lexington Park would have trouble supporting such a showing. We were quite incorrect, so we ended up seeing it the next day at a matinee.
Without further ado, it was a waste. My time is essentially worthless for the most part, so I will only very rarely complain about it being wasted, but this two-and-a-half hour abomination falls squarely into that category. Really, the action was about the same as the first Transformers film, lots of tumbling metal. It was still fairly difficult to distinguish between the robots when they were punching and rolling about - something I had a fair amount of difficulty with in the first movie, but far more in this one.
Anyway, I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel to find good points about the film, but I'll say that the computer graphics work was fantastic. A forest battle involving Optimus Prime was fantastically animated and well done, in addition to being a little more comprehensible than the other fights. A little nostalgia was brought about thanks to the arguments between Starscream and Megatron so characteristic of the old cartoons. And yeah, that's pretty much all I enjoyed about the movie.
It's easier to express my hatred of this film's weaker points in bullet format, since there's just too many to list in paragraph format.
- The length. At about 140 minutes, the film dragged on far too long. The plot was quite slow and the story extremely bloated; they could have easily cut it down to a hundred minutes and been fine.
- Speaking of the plot, it was pulling in several different directions for the first hour and a half of the film. Subplots that didn't go much of anywhere included the relationship troubles of the two main characters and the power squabbling between military high-ups. They wasted a lot of time setting these up, and really they weren't resolved in any meaningful or satisfactory way. It just seemed so confused.
- The sound in any scene that wasn't gigantic robots punching each other was mixed terribly. Effect sounds were extremely loud compared to dialogue to the point where some scenes obscured the vocals to the point of being unable to follow them.
- The comic relief made me want to shoot myself in the face. Yes, it's a kids' movie, but the sheer amount of characters thrown in simply for comedy was mind-boggling - they easily outnumbered the "serious" characters. Sam's clueless and stereotypical parents were the most guilty of this, especially the mind-bogglingly stupid incident with the mother and pot brownies. John Tuturro brought me to a state somewhere between sobbing for what his career used to be and shaking my head at how the mighty fall. Oh, and of course, the racist characters that somehow made it to the final cut made me wince.
- There was never a point where I felt much empathy or even sympathy for the characters. There was never really any sense of real danger, but this may be because of the type of film Transformers II is. I knew that in the end everything would be hunky-dory.
Schedule for Week Ending 7/5/09 and 7/12/09
Time for the schedule, hooray. I'm on the verge of vacation, so this week will be nicely packed into three days plus a paid holiday.
Monday - 8:00 to 20:00 (12 hours)
Tuesday - 10:00 to 20:00 (22 hours)
Wednesday - 10:00 to 20:00 (32 hours)
Thursday - OFF
Friday - HOLIDAY (40 hours)
Monday - VACATION (8 hours)
Tuesday - VACATION (16 hours)
Wednesday - VACATION (24 hours)
Thursday - VACATION (32 hours)
Friday - VACATION (40 hours)
Yeah, I just kind of wanted an excuse to write "vacation" five times. What of it?
Monday - 8:00 to 20:00 (12 hours)
Tuesday - 10:00 to 20:00 (22 hours)
Wednesday - 10:00 to 20:00 (32 hours)
Thursday - OFF
Friday - HOLIDAY (40 hours)
Monday - VACATION (8 hours)
Tuesday - VACATION (16 hours)
Wednesday - VACATION (24 hours)
Thursday - VACATION (32 hours)
Friday - VACATION (40 hours)
Yeah, I just kind of wanted an excuse to write "vacation" five times. What of it?
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Things That I Love
I was discussing some things on my wish list with my friend Liz tonight, and bam, I discovered something awesome.
Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal is apparently, and has been, on BluRay. Must... purchase...
Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal is apparently, and has been, on BluRay. Must... purchase...
Friday, June 26, 2009
Autotune That News
I love these things far more than I should. More than is healthy, I'm sure.
It's the smooooooooooooooooke.
It's the smooooooooooooooooke.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Mark Sanford 2: Sanford Harder
Well, I think this merits a second post in less than two hours. Mark Sanford was, surprise!, away on a trip to have an affair with an apparent mistress. This has been the second Republican cheater outed in the past week or so, and the schadenfreude I'm feeling is delicious. Haha, as is the case with every disgraced Republican, Fox News does this:
He was a democrat anyway, I guess. I'll have to look for more of the (D) pictures later on when I have more unfettered internet access. I'll post 'em underneath for the sake of comedy.
He was a democrat anyway, I guess. I'll have to look for more of the (D) pictures later on when I have more unfettered internet access. I'll post 'em underneath for the sake of comedy.
Mark Sanford
Hurr. So, apparently he's in South Carolina now, but seriously, this is really confusing. Basically here's what's been happening over the weekend to the South Carolinian Governor as far as I can gather:
- Sanford had been gone for four or five days by Monday, when the media started noticing that he was MIA. His staffers responded at first by saying that nobody knew where he had sojourned off to, including his wife and children.
- Monday morning, his staffers said that they were contacted with information that Sanford was hiking the Appalachian Trail for some reason. Yeah, on the weekend of Father's Day he decided to spend no time with his kids. Odd.
- There were rumors of his cell phone being detected in or around the Atlanta airport, and even some sightings of him supposedly boarding a plane bound for Minneapolis, Minnesota. Reminiscent of Larry Craig, anyone?
- Apparently his car was in the Columbia, South Carolina airport parking lot in the same area where everybody else parks. No security detail or anything.
- The story broke this morning that Sanford had been in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
- More information will apparently being released in about twelve minutes from this writing when Sanford speaks at a press conference.
Anyway, it's going to be interesting to hear exactly how the governor will justify his absence. I mean, it's kind of disturbing that this guy would just abandon his state without an executive without telling anyone. Granted, there is a lieutenant governor, but it's still distressing to think that the governor would just up and run away. So here's what I think are the least to most likely things he was doing down ol' South America way:
- He was on a diplomatic mission to arrange aid for Argentinian children to collaborate with South Carolinian children in an exchange and sponsorship programs to mutually enrich the educational environments of both places.
- Any reason that doesn't at least tangentially involve hookers and/or blow.
- Sanford was inspecting a factory he had built in Argentina for the mass manufacture of Confederate Flags in a tax shelter.
- Blow.
- South American hookers.
Withnail posted:
“But I said ‘no’ I wanted to do something exotic,” Mr. Sanford told Ms. Smith. “… It’s a great city.”
EDIT: Hahaha, holy christ, it was an affair. Hahahahahahaha.
New York, New York
So, this weekend, Sunday specifically, I did something that I've been meaning to for a very long time: head up to New York City and visit my cousin, and also just to hang out in the city for awhile. It seems to be the perfect time, as my uncle and pseudo-aunt were visiting over this last weekend. So the scene was set about a week ago, and I bought tickets for the Bolt Bus.
Speaking of the Bolt Bus, if you ever need a ride from New York to Philadelphia, Boston, or DC, use that service. It was effortless as it gets to hop on the bus and ride the hour and a half it takes to get from Philly to New York and back. I didn't bring my laptop, but for those that are going for more than a daytrip, they have wireless access on the bus itself, along with power outlets so you can juice up your gadgets on the road. Plenty of leg room (way more than your usual airplane seat) and cheap cost ($24.50 round trip!) just serve to sweeten the pot.
Anyway, I headed over to the Cherry Hill, NJ mall at about eight in the morning to catch the bus at 8:20. It left on time, and surprisingly, I set foot at the Penn Station area of Manhattan at around 9:45. It took about forty-five minutes to find my way to the Marcel - the hotel my relatives were staying at - and despite a little rain I made it without being too worse for wear.
After that, we headed to the subway and took it over to Brooklyn, where Nick biked over to grab us. His apartment was quite amazing, given that it had a lot of "city charm" and looked like the kind of place one would see in a movie. He's perched up on the fourth floor with two roommates that work with him, and the place even provides some rooftop views. I'll have to think about spending weekends up there with friends of mine from down here. We also enjoyed some great Spanish food - I ordered some strange fusion of tortillas, beans, and scrambled eggs. It was absolutely lovely.
We crossed over the Williamsburg Bridge, which was quite a hike, heading back into Manhattan and saying goodbye to Nick. The apex of said bridge offered quite the fantastic view of the Manhattan skyline. I took a few pictures, but I'll have to post them later, thanks to the fact that I'm a caveman when it comes to extracting pictures from my phone.
After checking out the World Trade Center site, I parted ways with Dik and Mary and headed back to Penn Station. I had ambition of seeing a movie - I had hoped Moon, which Scott had recommended - but there really wasn't much time. I ended up just walking around and looking at things, people watching, et cetera. By quarter-to-nine I was back on the bus, and I was home by eleven.
It was daunting to think that I was in New York City for a good portion of the day, between waking up and going to sleep in my bed. It was a fantastic day, and I'm excited to head up there with a friend at some point. Seeing Nick was a good reason to go up there alone, but it was nice to work out the logistics of the Bolt Bus.
Speaking of the Bolt Bus, if you ever need a ride from New York to Philadelphia, Boston, or DC, use that service. It was effortless as it gets to hop on the bus and ride the hour and a half it takes to get from Philly to New York and back. I didn't bring my laptop, but for those that are going for more than a daytrip, they have wireless access on the bus itself, along with power outlets so you can juice up your gadgets on the road. Plenty of leg room (way more than your usual airplane seat) and cheap cost ($24.50 round trip!) just serve to sweeten the pot.
Anyway, I headed over to the Cherry Hill, NJ mall at about eight in the morning to catch the bus at 8:20. It left on time, and surprisingly, I set foot at the Penn Station area of Manhattan at around 9:45. It took about forty-five minutes to find my way to the Marcel - the hotel my relatives were staying at - and despite a little rain I made it without being too worse for wear.
After that, we headed to the subway and took it over to Brooklyn, where Nick biked over to grab us. His apartment was quite amazing, given that it had a lot of "city charm" and looked like the kind of place one would see in a movie. He's perched up on the fourth floor with two roommates that work with him, and the place even provides some rooftop views. I'll have to think about spending weekends up there with friends of mine from down here. We also enjoyed some great Spanish food - I ordered some strange fusion of tortillas, beans, and scrambled eggs. It was absolutely lovely.
We crossed over the Williamsburg Bridge, which was quite a hike, heading back into Manhattan and saying goodbye to Nick. The apex of said bridge offered quite the fantastic view of the Manhattan skyline. I took a few pictures, but I'll have to post them later, thanks to the fact that I'm a caveman when it comes to extracting pictures from my phone.
After checking out the World Trade Center site, I parted ways with Dik and Mary and headed back to Penn Station. I had ambition of seeing a movie - I had hoped Moon, which Scott had recommended - but there really wasn't much time. I ended up just walking around and looking at things, people watching, et cetera. By quarter-to-nine I was back on the bus, and I was home by eleven.
It was daunting to think that I was in New York City for a good portion of the day, between waking up and going to sleep in my bed. It was a fantastic day, and I'm excited to head up there with a friend at some point. Seeing Nick was a good reason to go up there alone, but it was nice to work out the logistics of the Bolt Bus.
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