if-brevity-is-wit-then-why-do-I-keep-writing

Superbowl Sunday

2012-02-05T14:04:00.000-08:00

So I am going over to supergoober's place to watch the game, and frankly, I am more excited about last night's UFC than I am about today's game. BTW, I don't know the results from the fights, but that is neither here nor there.

I am looking forward to hanging out with a couple of friends and BS-ing for a little bit. Frankly, I don't know what more to write about, but I wanted to just start writing something, and I don't know what.

Oh yeah, just thought of something. McDonald's is going to eliminate ammonium hydroxide from its meat processing. It apparently uses the caustic chemical to kill pathogens and make food that would otherwise only be useful in dog and cat food available for consumption by people (this is according to the newscast I heard on KCBS this morning).

The broadcast continued to state that the chemical is used in cleaning products and homemade explosives (as if this shows how dangerous and bad it is for people). The broadcast concluded that since it is used in a step in a process and is removed, it is often not listed as an ingredient, so people trying to eat well don't know that it is being used.

First, the stupid "news piece" is laden with bias. I don't know a ton about the process, but basically, a step is grinding up beef trimmings and treating them with ammonium hydroxide to kill e. coli. There have been no links to hazards from ingesting the beef treated this way (from the chemical, anyway). The real risk, and the one the FDA is beginning to be concerned with is that there are a number of e. coli outbreaks that are potentially linked to this. This is because the e. coli is not killed, not because the chemical caused it. It may be grounds for stopping this process because the process is ineffective, not because the chemical is dangerous.

I can list a chemical that huge numbers of people consume on a regular basis that has similar qualities and has, in fact, been know to cause deaths of consumers who indulge in the products in which it is used. In fact, some less scrupulous manufacturers will add more of this substance to a product just to increase the potency of there products, while others go through a variety of physical and chemical processes to have this included in their product.

It is also used as a base for many cleaning agents, has know carcinogenic qualities, is highly flammable, can be used to make homemade explosives. It is also well know that it is highly toxic to humans and ingesting sufficient quantities will inevitably be lethal.

Of course, I am talking about grain alcohol. All of what I said above is true, and yet there is no movement to ban the stuff. In fact, at my niece's confirmation party yesterday, a friend of my brother was spouting about the "pink slime" that was "ammonium hydroxide additive" all while sipping away at a beer. In fact, the majority of his argument was based on how gross the pink slime looks, and this is a common persuasion tactic used by the people trying to stop the process.

In fact, ammonium hydroxide is not pink - it is a pungent smelling, caustic, whitish, crystalline salt. The pink slime is the munged up ankle meat and tendon and blood of a cow that is mixed with ammonium hydroxide. It is not pretty, and it probably does not smell good. But if you look at food preparation in general, this is often the case, even for natural or "organic" food. Try watching (or smelling) the making of "organic" cheese (or even regular cheese). There are times when the cheese looks like puke and smells like sweaty feet and excrement combined. It is not a pleasant process. Same with beer making. Just because a process isn't pretty doesn't make the outcome bad.

I am not trying to defend the process; honestly, I don't know enough about it to say whether it is or is not terrible. I would like a little less scare tactics in a news report, however, and also I would like to not have to put up with idiots at parties.

Actually, the guy was kind of nice, and not really an idiot - he was some sort of an engineer (actually, he said "sort-of, engineering" when I asked him if he was an engineer). But, like most people, he had formed his conclusions and wanted everyone else to see how smart he was, so he talk about how acidic this stuff was, and how acidic that diet soda was - it would eat away unlined aluminum cans so quickly - like 2 weeks - if we did not have organic inner linings on the can. I mentioned to him that the stomach lining regenerates every 3 days, his retort was that this was causing that to happen more quickly. I told him I had been drinking diet sodas for 20 years on a daily basis and did not have a bleeding ulcer yet, so I would continue what I liked (I was quite a bit nicer and more personable than this, actually). I also happened to have mentioned earlier in the conversation that ammonium hydroxide was caustic, not acidic, and his reply was "whatever, I'm not a chemist".

If you are going to spout stuff, please try to get it right. Also, he failed to note that they coated the cans with "organic" compounds - that is carbon containing compounds, not the incorrect "Green" usage of the word. This is because metals are vulnerable to the oxidation-reduction reaction much more so than many organic chemicals. He also said that sodas will make the stomach "way more acidic" - wrong again. Your stomach is a buffered system at around a pH of 3 to 4. Diet coke has a pH of about 3.4. When you eat a large (non-acidic) meal, the pH of your stomach drops close to 1 to break down the food. People who suffer from acid problems in there stomachs are having problems with their own system releasing more acid than there stomach can handle; it is not usually that the food, itself, is too acidic. The other problem is a sphincter issue, where the sphincter at the top of the stomach doesn't close properly and stomach acid splashes up the esophagus (causing "heartburn"). If the acid was as dangerous as they say, your mouth and throat would be burned. Take a mouthful of soda and leave it in your mouth. See how long it takes before your mouth gets "burned" by the acid.

Also - pH is logarithmic, so the acid in your stomach after a heavy meal (let's say 1.4 pH) is 100 times more acidic then the 3.4 of diet coke. So stop getting your panties in a twist, everyone, and don't get your panties in a twist about the phrase "panties in a twist", either.

Okay, So I Am On 2 Days in a Row

2012-02-03T09:36:00.000-08:00

This is what happens when you get 3 days off from teaching and don't feel like correcting tests. Actually I just want to spark up the old writing chops again, so I hope one or more of my friends reads this.

And I didn't really know what to write until I just wrote that second sentence. There was one person who would always read this; whether or not he agreed with it, fully understood it, or even cared about whatever topic on which I was musing. He would always read it and often comment, and his comments were always kind if not always supportive (not that they should have been supportive, when we differed in opinions, I am glad he felt comfortable enought to voice his opinions).

If you haven't guessed, I am talking about Steve T.

It is approaching a year since his death, Feb 6, 2011, and I find myself thinking more about him as I write this. I am not going to sugar coat anything, nor am I going to pretend that I was always close with him - that would be disrespectful to him and to his memories. If you remember our interactions, Steve T. often got on my nerves. He was not an intellectual powerhouse, but that is not what bothered me (although his tendency to speak from authority on subjects that TrackMan (I can't remember the moniker I used to use for him, but he's the guy in our group that loves to take his car to the track and is not supergoober) believed in irritated me.

What bothered me most about him was based on one of the things that I find most praiseworthy about him; a thing that I cannot say about many other people (myself included) and something that is quite rare and remarkable in this world. The thing that bothered me most was his hero worship of TrackMan. I don't want to offend you TrackMan, and I don't think this will - but particularly at the time you tended towards the misogynistic, hump-em and dump-em lifestyle. I know this is a gross oversimplification, and I don't want to get into it here, but steve t. idolized you.

That infuriated me. Here's why.

Steve t. was a genuinely nice guy. If you know me, I don't say this about many people and I mean it as high praise. He was kind to everyone he encountered that I ever saw or heard about, and I can speak from personal experience that he never expressed anger at me despite the fact that on many occasions my frustration would boil over to a point where I would lash out and be insulting to him. He would always take it with good nature and aplomb. I would occasionally apologize, and he would always say that it was no big deal, that I didn't need to worry about it, and that he didn't take it too personally.

And for my sake, I hope that this is true, because I already feel a lot of guilt over this, and if I really did hurt him in any more than a superficial way, I would feel really terrible. I can make all kinds of excuses for my behavior - most of which are true, but none of those invalidate the fact that I hurt him on a number of occasions and he was someone who did not deserve to be hurt that way.

And this all goes to the reason I did not like his hero worship, though I did understand it. He would echo TrackMan's opinions like they were gospel and seemed to live vicariously through his sexual conquests. Steve t. did not need to idolize someone like that - he was a good man in his own right. It would have been just as bad if he had idolized me - a self-righteous, intellectual elitist who is very vulnerable and wounded at the core. I know why he would idolize someone like TrackMan - he embodied the self-confidence, the personal savvy, and the charm that most of us do not have. Steve found these qualities desirable, and who wouldn't so I don't blame him for that.

I just always wished that he could recognize how good a person he was in his own right, and that he did not need to live through anyone else. And rather than simply tell him that, I would lash out at him, and it is a sign of my own shortcomings and not his. I had been trying not to make those mistakes from my younger years again, and I clearly made them again with steve t., someone who never deserved it, and I am still trying not to make the same mistakes.

And I hope that somewhere steve t. can read this or notice these thoughts, and he can understand that I am really truly sorry if I ever caused him pain - he did not deserve it.

And while this may also seem somewhat of an indictment of TrackMan, it is not intended as that. I want all of you to know (not that any of you will read this anymore) that I value each of you for who you are, and that I do not want to see any of you come to any harm, from yourself or anyone else.

And by way of excuse, I suppose, that is what I wanted for steve t. as well - I just never had the courage or decency to come out and say it, but I will say it now.

If I get mad at you for something, it is because I care enough about you to not want you to get hurt, and I will do my damnedest to actually say that rather than just get mad at you. I will see you all tonight, and again, steve, wherever you are, you are in my prayers.

And I guess I should change the title, but I don't think I will, because that is where all this started.

Frivolity with Fast and Furious

2012-02-02T16:32:00.000-08:00

And Additional Alliterative aaah-crap I can't think of an A word for musing

Was watching some news today about the Eric Holder stuff, and I have been giving it some thought. There have been very few (to my knowledge - I admittedly haven't researched it) repercussions for the Fast and Furious debacle in the DOJ. A few people reassigned, some ATF field agents reassigned to desk jobs (which makes it look more like they're being kept quiet then being disciplined - that is how it would look to a casual observer, myself included), not much else.

Holder is not terribly forthcoming (but who would be given the typical grilling one gets by congress - very supportive by your supporters, very antagonistic by your antagonizers - why should that be surprising), but the lack of anyone getting fired really is causing him problems. Virtually everyone in a position of power has a sacrificial lamb that they throw under the bus at this point (to carelessly mix metaphors) or at least a devotee to fall on his sword - yeah, 3 death metaphors in one sentence.

That is why it seems that we are left with one of two options - either Holder is the first ethical man in power, unwilling to let heads roll to take the heat off of him (doubtful) or he doesn't want to fire someone who could potentially implicate him.

Occam's Razor forces me to choose the latter option since an honest man in a political position is rarer than ... I don't know what, honest political figures are my bellwether for rarity - I usually use them to compare rarity of other items, like a mint condition Alpha Black Lotus.

The real problem is that I find it unlikely that he knew nothing, in which case he lied to Congress, and if he did not know, then he is incompetent (ignoring reports to him) or not in control (just never notified). None of those are good options. Considering the emails that have gone around with the words "gun walking" or the like, it is unlikely that he knew nothing of guns being allowed into the hands of criminals.

And before anyone uses the "Bush Administration did it too" argument, I'd like to point out a couple of things:

First, one administrations mistakes does not give the next licence to continue those mistakes (yeah, yeah, two wrongs don't make a right). If it did nothing would ever change, we would still have slavery, wage controls, price controls, no income tax, the Vietnam Conflict (dare-I-say War), etc., etc., etc.

Second, there are quite a few differences between the policies - Operation Wide Receiver was a monumental failure and was cancelled as I will detail below.

Differences between Wide Receiver and Fast and Furious:

Wide Receiver installed RFID chips in the guns so that they could track and arrest gunrunners before the guns got into the hands of the cartels, Fast and Furious had no protocol for monitoring the guns electronically.

Wide Receiver never intended for guns to cross the border but still alerted Mexican authorities to the potential, Fast and Furious intended for the guns to cross the border and never alerted the Mexican government (putting Mexican government agents at risk). One could argue that the level of corruption in the Mexican government makes this a bonus for Fast and Furious, but anytime you are having a law enforcement effort that actually crosses a border, you should alert the other country.

Wide Receiver was stopped by the ATF when it proved a monumental failure (the cartels took steps to deal with the RFIDs) and prosecutions still resulted - it was stopped in a relatively timely fashion and did not require a whistle blower or a death to occur, while Fast and Furious, well, we all know when and why that stopped, and no one has been prosecuted because the ATF seems to have lost track of the guns sold.

There would not be as much furor had the program been stopped before the death (there still would be anger, but seeing that the program had been recognized as faulty and stopped first would likely have mitigated much of it). 400 guns got away in Wide Receiver, 2000+ in Fast and Furious. The real problem was the intent - the former never intended guns to get into Mexico, it was to find the straw purchasers and the people for whom they purchased. The latter targeted higher ups in the cartels (a laudable goal) but at significantly higher risk (intentionally putting guns into the hands of criminals on a semi-permanent to permanent basis). A basic risk analysis seems to say that the latter option is a bad idea, especially if you have the previous experience (wide receiver) from which to learn.

So, Is Hollywood Bereft of All Ideas?

2011-10-02T08:34:00.000-07:00

I just saw another commercial for the movie "Real Steel", and I cannot help but wondering about the inspiration for this film.

To me, it looks like someone really loved the game of Rock 'Em, Sock 'Em Robots as a child and then and tried to make a movie of it. What's next, a movie based on G'nip-G'nop, or the action thriller in a theme park where a cop chases a fugitive through Chutes and up Ladders? How about "Saw VI: Escape from the Connect Four Puzzle"

So many movies that are out now are just remakes, or poor ideas - there are plenty of good novels to make into movies, there is creativity out there, but because of the structure of Hollywood is such that movies have to make money. I do not begrudge that aspect of Hollywood - the "churn and burn" style of film-making where you have a weak plot idea, a lot of money, good effects and mediocre but pretty actors and actresses are what gets butts in seats. But have more than a thin veneer of a plot, please.

Michael Bay is the perfect example - why does Hollywood keep letting him make movies? Because his movies make money, and not in the way you might think. Most people use this Hollywood proclivity to bash the anti-intellectual middle-American, but big movies make most of their money on the international market. The international (and particularly European) markets love this stuff. Their cinema does not have the money to produce the effects that Hollywood does, and much of Europe does not allow much action or violence on television, so violence in American film is driven by European demand as much as by American demand.

People like to blanket condemn America because we get addled at any depiction of sex, but are totally fine with violence. To get to the truth of it all, you have to dig a bit deeper. We have prohibitions about sex and violence on TV, and yes, sex is more taboo, so we see more violence on TV, and more sex in movies (which is why American audiences love European cinema - lots of naked Europeans, who cares about plot). Europe is the opposite. So in many ways, our respective film industries are giving us and the foreign markets what we want.

I will not brand either the American or the European consumer with any labels for liking this stuff - to the majority, a movie is an escape - something about which you do not have to think, that you can just go and get washed away in the visual imagery, whether that is violent or sexual or artistic or all of the above. They want an escape not an analytic experience. This is fine, and there is nothing wrong with it.

I just would like filmmakers to endeavor to something more - put a good movie together with great visuals.

(Warning: the following example sounds condescending and nasty - it is not. I am not trying to say the majority of film viewers are children, and I am like the adult. Just look past that and see the heart of the analogy. Two things can be simultaneously targeted at different audiences - this is the best example of which I could think)

Old Warner Brothers cartoons are the perfect example (and it has been done in many cartoons since - Rocco's Modern Life, SpongeBob Squarepants, and the Animaniacs are just a few). The visuals and some of the jokes are targeted at kids, while there is a subtext that only adults will get. The subtext does not distract from the kids experience, and the kid stuff doesn't detract from the adult's experience. In fact the kid's stuff usually enhances the adult's experience because of the whimsy and nostalgia.

It has been done well and successfully in films before: District 9, Aliens, Harry Potter, Serenity, and many others. Formulas make financially successful films, extending beyond the formula can achieve greatness in the box office and in an artistic sense. I just wish people in Hollywood would try a little harder.

In all honesty, Real Steel might be fantastic. It may have a great story and be much more than I have given it credit for. I honestly have no idea, because I only know what I saw in the commercials. But those commercials crystallized for me a number of thoughts that have been rumbling in my head for quite a while, and I suppose I should give it credit for that inspiration as well. The advertising seems to scream superficiality, and while it may have great depth (and I hope it does and I am wrong) they are advertising it as if it doesn't.

And I suppose that is fine, too. People who go see big escapist fantasies want the stunning commercial to say that this is an escape that you want. Since that is the majority of the film-going public, they have to advertise this way. If there is a plot, the rest of us will hear about it and go see it for both the plot and the escapist visual fantasy.

I am not judging the escapist fantasy - even those of us who want something more complex are looking for an escape, just one into story rather than into visual imagery. Neither one is particularly better, but because I like the one style better, it frustrates me that there seems to be so little of it, when just a little effort and risk could make both groups happy.

Thanks for listening (radio, anyone - I suppose this was the same argument that was made by people critical of radio programming at the dawn of the radio era, and the same argument as the radio advocates made of TV, so I am just as bad as Hollywood - I am just recycling old arguments)

I guess it comes down to the simple fact: 90% of everything published is crap. Myself included.

And I am lucky if 10% of my ramblings aren't crap.

An interesting look at atheism in politics

2011-01-30T09:41:00.000-08:00

So this post was inspired by something the Acupuncturist said to me at MightyMook's wedding, and I have been thinking about posting on it for quite some time. I actually have had thoughts in this direction for years, and I have articulated them in other situations, but I guess I have finally decided to commit the thoughts to writing.

Basically, since the Acupuncturist and I have similar views regarding spirituality and religious expression, even though we have starkly different political views, we have some commonalities - he was pointing out to me that one of the most irritating things about conversations with the extreme secular left was the tendency to completely dismiss religious sentiment and devoutly proclaim one's faith in atheism (heavy sarcasm intentional - atheism is a matter of faith just as much as belief is - agnosticism is more like a non-choice than anything else).

But here is the thing that I could never reconcile about the atheist left (and, I suppose, the atheist right, if there is one - I am sure there probably is, but they are simply mot prominent in the conservative movements) - why they seek to impose the morality they seek to impose.

First, they do seek to impose a morality - human dignity and compassion for the poor and the underrepresented are clearly moral stances. What I have never been able to figure out is why those are important to a true atheist. In a way I understand; if we are simply animals and have no higher "spiritual" calling, then we need a government to enforce that morality so that the law of the jungle does not reign. But therein lies the real problem - if we are just animals, why bother with that sense of morality at all. Why protect the underprivileged? What is "good" about that, and why even bother with the concept of "good" at all? Obviously, I don't believe this, these are questions I have for the atheist left.

Of course, "human dignity" is often raised, but nature does not recognize human dignity - that is a purely spiritual concept. A clever person might argue for the preservation of the "diversity" of our species using a combination of Darwinian theory and popular buzzword, but that idea fails, too, because why preserve the weak members of a species - what genetic imperative does that have? What is "good" and why should we strive to preserve your version of "good"?

Of course, one could always go the Nietzschean route and say that all the were trying to do was make their life a consistent artistic expression of helping the underprivileged, but that carries no more morally compelling weight than the consistent artistic expression of the predatory serial killer exploiting the weak for self-gratification. Since, under this philosophy, morality is superfluous, neither view is more right than the other. Nietzsche would still probably condemn the liberal more than the killer, because the liberal has bought into the "slave morality" of good and evil, while the killer is actually forging his own way, independent of any sense of right or wrong.

Not that I really believe anyone is reading this, but if anyone out there is, give me some insight into "Why?" from an atheist liberal perspective. I would understand it if it was from an agnostic perspective, and I think most people who make the claim of atheism actually fall into the agnostic category, because they cannot actually disentangle themselves from the constraints of the concepts of "good and evil" or "right and wrong" that are required for true atheist thought.

Help me out here.

Once again, into the breach

2010-12-12T10:30:00.000-08:00

For fans of physics humor out there (not to mention people who don't like kitties), you have to check out this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hNDZ79MDC0

A bit with robots and the Schrodinger's Cat thought experiment (the cat in the box simultaneously dead and alive, since both states are possible and neither can be observed).

It is an odd property of quantum mechanics that things behave differently when observed vs when not observed. The easiest example of this that can be "proved" is the wave/particle dual nature of the electron.

Electrons are small enough that the "observation" of the particles requires that we disturb the particles. To see them, we must bombard them with photons - the energy of the photons disturbs the motion of the electrons because the particles are on (roughly) the same scale. Since our visual observations require light (aka photons), all direct observations of electrons lead us to see the particle nature of the electron. The problem is that, to use a macro scale analogy, this would be like trying to determine the natural habits of a wild animal while constantly prodding said animal with a stick. You will get a result, but it will only tell you how the animal acts when you poke it with a stick. The kind of direct observation we use in the macro world falls apart at the quantum level.

If you shot a beam of electrons at photosensitive paper while observing the electrons, you would come up with a pattern very similar to what you would get if you fired a bunch of wet tennis balls at a wall through a autopitch machine. You would see most of the tennis balls (electrons) having a central location, with the occasional outlier. The electrons would act like particles.

If you shut out the lights and did not watch the electrons, they would hit the photopaper and leave a distinct wave-like pattern, nothing like particles at all! Kind of cool, and actually an easy experiment to replicate (assuming you have something to beam electrons with).

But in all seriousness, it is a cool way of seeing the difference between the wave and particle nature of matter, especially with a relatively large particle like the electron (large by comparison to photons and such). Even a particle that has a detectable mass still has a distinct wave function quality, and in fact the theoretical models of electron "location" in atoms are built on these probability wave models.

Well, I think it's cool anyway.

I am going to try to write more, and get back into the short story end of the blog as well.

Bye for now.

Blogging

2010-10-26T18:27:00.000-07:00

Never have so many had so little to say to so few.

In light of that fact, I will continue to say so little in as many words as possible (like every other blogger out there). I am going to try and get back into a daily posting, just to keep up with my writing.

I will just keep telling myself that I am a unique and special individual...

Just like everyone else.

Every snowflake is unique too, but when you put them all together, all you have is a big wet sloppy pile of mush, all of the uniqueness blended out into a sludge of homogeneity. A metaphor for the human condition - perhaps.

No one wants to look at that aspect of uniqueness - and the fact that uniqueness doesn't imply quality, either. Just because you are unique doesn't mean you are important.

But being important is overrated, too.

So if you are not depressed yet, just remember, as an intelligent species, we have been around for about 200,000 years. We have to last 2,000,000 years to match up with a successful dinosaur species (T Rex). To put it another way, the universe is about 70,000 times older than we are as a species, and we have been technologically savvy for only that last 100 years (not really, but it makes the estimations easier), meaning that we have had reasonably good grasp of the physical nature of the universe for about 1/140,000,000 of the time the universe has been in existence. So if we want another intelligent alien species to talk to, they probably haven't evolved yet, or have and gone extinct, but even if they are out there concurrently with us, we can't ever meet them if our current understanding of the universe is even remotely correct.

And if SETI actually picks up a reading from somewhere in the universe, odds are that the species that sent the signal is long dead, and if we respond, our species will be extinct by the time they hear us and send back a message.

If you still don't feel insignificant enough, then just go to the top and reread this. I'm tired.

But if you want a more upbeat look, realize that we are all made of the dust from the stars, coalesced into some form and randomly rearranged to create what we designate as life, and that the waters of the oceans flow in our veins.

It takes just as much faith to believe in nothing as it does to believe in something. I am not sure where I fall just about now.

A more detailed look at the Swarmlord

2010-09-29T18:31:00.001-07:00

So there is a closer look at a higher resolution cropped pic of the Swarmlord - looks pretty good, except for the glaringly obvious crappy putty work on the tail, but some of the other work is good enough not to notice.

Here is a close-up of the face - I think my detail work is pretty decent on the painting, and the gloss varnish on the armored headpiece looks pretty damned good. You can't tell I cut and glued on the scissory bits on the mouth from another model (a Starship Troopers bug, actually) and puttied up the smaller second horn. This is some of my better work, I think. I like the yellow glaring eye!

This arm shows some of my better work as well. This was originally a left-handed lash whip - I cut off the whip and puttied on a bone sword, as well as cutting and reorienting the dangly bits under the arm from a right arm of a model to this left one. Looks pretty seamless, huh? Not perfect, if you compare it to the right side of the model, you will notice slight inconsistencies, but close enough for government work.

This is an extreme close-up of the upper left arm. I severed a right arm at the elbow, rotated it, reattached it, and cut all the stuff off of one side and put it on the other side of the arm. the only thing you really notice is the oval bit on the forearm which is not perfectly sanded down - but since it is actually only about 4mm by 2mm, who'll notice?

Top view, so you can compare the left and right arm - the right is stock, the left is a right arm cut to crap and rearranged to look like a left arm. I think I did a good job, but there are some minor inconsistencies, as I mentioned before. Principle among these is the presence of a "cable" in the crook of the right elbow where there is none on the left elbow.

Ugh - an extreme closeup of the crappiest part of the work. That tail joint needs to be sanded and repainted. I will do it at some point. See ya later.

The Swarmlord

2010-09-29T18:16:00.000-07:00

So I finally took a couple of pictures of the Swarmolrd model I built. I think I captured the image from the codex pretty well. Here it is. I included the chaos space marine for size comparison - this picture is a bit rough (I re sized it to take less time to load). I think he looks pretty good, though my putty work on the tail is shoddy at best - I should sand it and repaint it. At the time, I did not really wait for the putty to dry, so I painted it as it was (every time I tried to sand it, it ended up breaking off, so I just stopped and painted it.

Ah, the impetuousness of youth :)

Gosh Darn It

2010-08-08T19:23:00.000-07:00

I am more upset than I have been in a long time. I am having a perfectly good anniversary with my wife, and other than the fact that my brother neglected to get us Rush tickets for the concert tomorrow, everything is great.

I was a bit upset with my brother for not getting the tickets, but I figured that I would catch Rush the next time around. Then I decide to check my school email and I saw an email from one of my students' parents. This was the kid whose dad was in the music business, and he had sent an email a few days ago saying that he understood that I already had tickets, but he could get me in for a meet and greet with the band before the show. Of course, I don't have tickets and I don't get that email until the night before the show. That F--ING SUCKS!!!!

:(

:(

:(

Anderson Silva and MMA

2010-08-07T15:07:00.000-07:00

So it is no surprise to any fight fans out there that I believe that Silva should clean Chael Sonnen's clock. He is a superior fighter in all aspects of the game and has great movement. Chael has shown a great deal of willingness to get punched and keep driving forward, but that is a recipe for disaster against Silva. Just watch the Griffin vs. Silva fight at heavyweight to see what I mean. Sonnen's best chance is to drive forward and get one of his takedowns while Silva tries to counterstrike, and hope he can inflict enough damage and evade the submissions of Silva. Then he should try to smother Silva and accumulate enough points to win. I think that this is Sonnen's only chance, and it is, frankly, quite likely to be his game plan (much as he talks knockout).

But this brings me to my main point. Dana White and others have pointed out that they do not like the hang back and pick apart style of Silva - it is not flashy or aggressive enough for their liking. But here is my beef with that opinion. That is how a premier striker should fight. A jiujitsu guy stymies his opponent in the guard and prevents damage that way. A wrestler smothers his opponent by being on top and raining down blows and avoids damage that way. A striker uses good footwork, evasive maneuvering and counterattacks to avoid damage. There is nothing at all wrong with this!!!

I CANNOT EMPHASIZE THIS ENOUGH!

I have seen people praise George St. Pierre for laying on top if an opponent for 5 rounds and smothering him - not doing much damage but doing just enough to keep from being told by the referee to stand back up. This is effectively identical to what Silva did in the Demian Maia (though Silva did clown him a bit more than GSP ever does), and Sliva gets trounced in blogs and on TV for it. GSP and others seem to be more exciting because it is clear that they are in a fight - they are in constant contact with their opponents, whether on top or on bottom. People have become so enamored of the BJJ and Wrestling styles they forget that you do not have to get into a wrestling match to win a fight. In fact, I would argue that the striking style is more effective - fights start on their feet and a small striker can put out a much larger opponent the same way a small BJJ fighter can take out someone bigger. But in wrestling and infighting in general, the bigger person has an advantage against the smaller, just by virtue of weight and leverage. One need look no further than Roy "Big Country" Nelson to see this.

Yes, Nelson is a well-trained and well-rounded fighter, but he can smother someone better than he is by virtue of his size. In any kind of ground fighting, the bigger person has a huge advantage unless the smaller one is much better trained. The same is true in striking, of course, but I would argue that it takes less training to become a proficient striker in terms of self defense, and you have an easier out in running away after you inflict damage (this is strictly from a self-defense perspective not an MMA sport one).

But nonetheless, Anderson Silva avoiding damage on his feet should be lauded not derided, and if you think that this is not "exciting" enough than I would say that you are probably ignorant of the technique involved. Demian Maia had no answer for Silva's superior striking, and Silva should not have to come forward and prove that after handily winning the first three rounds. Maia should be scorned for not attempting to finish the fight in the last two rounds, because if Silva was actually tired (as many of his detractors claim) then Maia threw away his only opportunity to win. If Silva was not tired, it was still on Maia to try and win, because he had clearly lost the first three rounds. To fault Silva for this is the height of ignorance.

You can fault Silva for some of the unsportsmanlike ways in which he comported himself in the fight, but that is still forgivable, given that his opponent did not want to bother fighting him. But to conclude, just realize that the fight game is about inflicting damage on your opponent while avoiding taking damage yourself. Whether this is accomplished through grappling or striking is insignificant, and people are so conditioned to the infighting that occurs in the UFC, they forget the true skill involved in avoiding the infighting altogether. That is not at all an easy thing to do, and takes just as much skill and talent as anything else in the UFC.

On the Definition of Marriage

2010-08-05T19:33:00.000-07:00

And I ask myself, should I really go here? I have a variety of thoughts on the subject and the knee-jerk reaction to my definition by someone who does not read thoroughly is "my gosh - he's anti-homosexual". So I am not even sure if I should address this topic, but what the hell.

First, I don't care what you do with another consenting adult (or group of consenting adults, for that matter) - within certain parameters of public safety and public decency. One should not, for example, hold an orgy on one's front lawn. The public safety bit is a little more difficult to pin down, but hinges on not trying to kill each other during sexual activity. Beyond that, what you do in the bedroom (or any other room for that matter) is nobody's business but the people involved, and anyone else they want to include in the conversation.

But once the term "marriage" gets involved, everyone gets their panties in a twist. Lets try to look at this from a historical perspective first, then move on from there. Both sides of the gay/traditional marriage try to co-opt the history for their own movement, but I am afraid that the heterosexuals win out on the history angle.

But don't throw your hands up in exasperation (if you are for gay marriage) or exultation (if you are for "traditional" marriage) just yet. While the historical precedent for homosexual marriage is really nowhere in any society, save for a few Roman Emperors and other Roman upper echelon folk (where it was clearly an exception to the norm), there is a lot of precedent for homosexual long-term committed relationships; they were simply never called marriages.

In ancient Greece, particularly, it was common for men to take male lovers, because, though you were expected to marry and have a wife who bore you children, women were thought of in many circles as less than men, and only another man could truly understand love (this was not the position of Socrates, interestingly enough, and the way Plato describes it, he had some issues with Athenian men as a result, but that is for another time).

History is rife with examples of this kind of relationship, but it has never been granted the status of "marriage" in any but those rare Roman cases (in one case a male emperor reputedly married a male eunuch who he forced to impersonate the wife that the emperor had killed - I believe that is how the story goes). Marriage has always been a man and a woman, a man and several women, or more rarely a woman and several men.

And this is where I take a bit of an abrupt turn. In all of this discussion, polygamy has a much stronger history than either gay marriage or "traditional" marriage. And yet this is completely excluded from the discussion. Why is it disallowed? Utah was forced to drop polygamy before it was allowed to become a state. There are laws against bigamy all over the place, and yet there is no hue and cry to undo these, even though they are clearly discriminate solely based on a lifestyle choice.

Of course, were polygamy allowed, it would foul up the tax code something fierce - they would have to have different scales for three and four and five adult person households, etc. There are several fairly easy ways around this, but it would take a pretty significant revision of the tax code to deal with it.

The reason, historically, that marriage has been defined as it has is that the family is intended as a medium for procreation and passing on mores, social norms, and customs. Up until recently, this was outside the purview of the homosexual couple. With artificial insemination and adoption being much more available now, as well as homosexuality no longer being considered a mental illness, this is changing. Marriages and families are no longer solely for the generation of children, and there are a number of modern day issues that are important for married couples. The issue of visiting in a hospital and potentially making life-and-death decisions for a spouse is terribly important. Inheritance and jointly owned property and rights upon the death of a spouse are also crucial issues, as are citizenship issues.

But the real problem comes down to the word. Marriage is a religious ceremony, and has sacramental connotations. A church can and should have its own rules about who can or cannot marry (incidentally, the Catholic Church will probably never allow gay marriage until priests are allowed to marry - the celibate priesthood is the one place a devout gay Catholic male can go, and if gays could marry, you would see a radical decline in men becoming priests). The problem becomes severe when the state issues "marriage licences". Of course, a stable family unit is the basis for any society, and this is why the state has always intermingled itself in the marriage business. Especially as the society gets more complex, the legal ramifications of marriage and divorce become extreme.

But here is the real problem: marriage now implies love, even with the state licence. You aren't supposed to marry for the tax benefit (if there is one), and you certainly are not allowed to marry just to grant someone citizenship (this is illegal, I believe). But why not? The state should be involved in only the contractual obligations involved in a marriage - the so-called "civil union" aspects of it. The issue would get a lot clearer if the state just issues civil union licences and gets out of the whole marriage business. Leave that to the churches - the state does not issue Reconciliation, Anointing of the Sick, or any other Sacrament, Catholic or otherwise (and obviously, I am Catholic, which is why I am using the term "Sacrament"). If people have fiscal reasons for engaging in this contract, let them. Of course, what about polygamy? Liberals are going to duck that one forever, because it makes them way more uncomfortable than gay marriage - gay marriage panders to a voting bloc of theirs, polygamy does not.

Long story short, the state should not be in the marriage business, but it should deal with the appropriate legal ramifications of any union in terms of property rights, etc., and the state should provide equal protection to the citizens that make it up (according to the US Constitution), so there is no reason to oppose the state such licences - the term marriage, however should be reserved for the churches, and if the church of which you are a member does not recognize your relationship, join one that does.

Personally, I need neither the state nor a religious institution to validate my relationship - we do that ourselves (with some help from family and friends).

By the way, while I spent a lot of time on the history of marriage, and the heterosexual nature thereof, history itself is not a sufficient reason to be for or against something. History provides context, but it does not provide answers, and we should have the courage to embrace history when it serves us, and discard it when it does not.

A perfect example are the rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights. These were codified and written out precisely because there was not much historical precedent for them, and the ratifying states wanted guarantees that the Federal government would not overreach.

Both sides of the gay marriage argument want history to be on their side, but it does not matter a whit. What matters is the rights of the individuals involved, and right now the state does a good job of fouling everything up by inserting itself in a religious matter.

That is enough for now, not like anyone will ever read this.

Why Marijuana Should Not Be Legalized

2010-08-03T14:56:00.000-07:00

I believe there are several reasons why pot should not be legalized, least among them is the feeling that we should not legalize another intoxicant, but that is not the reason I have for wanting it to remain illegal. The key reasons it should remain illegal are the lack of a reliable test for driving under the influence, and the length of time one remains under the influence of the drug.

The problem with the test for marijuana is that it shows up in the system for 30+ days after use. A person is not impaired for those 30 days, but the drug shows up nonetheless (principally because it is fat absorbed, rather than water absorbed like alcohol). This is a problem because while studies have shown impaired motor and cognitive skills for up to 3 days after using marijuana, the test has no time signature for impairment. What I mean by this is that if one were to use the drug, get pulled over a week later for impaired driving, you would test positive for marijuana even though you were not under the influence while driving. You would then get convicted of driving under the influence of the drug when you actually weren't. A state supreme court (I don't remember which, but I am pretty sure it was a state supreme court, though it may have been a federal appellate court - do a net search if you care) recently prohibited the use of this test in obtaining convictions for precisely this reason - it cannot accurately tell if you were under the influence during the driving incident. Since there is, to my knowledge, no test out there that can actually ascertain the level of marijuana intoxication (analogous to the BAC from a breathalyzer), legalizing would pose a significant problem for "high driving" enforcement.

Of course, pro-legalization folks say that there is no "high driving" problem, and that alcohol causes way more accidents than pot, etc.; these are not good arguments for legalizing pot, they are better arguments for criminalizing alcohol. As the drug is legalized, its use will become more widespread (virtually inevitable - people who might not have tried it when it was unavailable to them may consider it if it is legal) and we may actually start to keep records of marijuana related driving incidents (I don't believe we currently do keep those records - I may be wrong, but I don't know of any).

I already referenced the second reason for maintaining marijuana's current illegal status - it is a fat-absorbed drug. A person stays under the influence much longer and has impaired motor and cognitive functions up to three days after use. Obviously, the impairments grow less severe the further you get from the use date, but the fact is that you remain under the influence of the drug for much longer than alcohol. This is why marijuana is such a powerful psychologically addictive drug. You are seldom not under the influence of the drug if you use even as infrequently as once a week. It does not flush out of one's system easily like alcohol, and consequently, frequent pot smokers never have the "morning after" regret that many alcohol abusers have.

This is what makes alcohol very addictive, because you use more to avoid the regret, but it also is a mitigating factor against addiction - you feel bad after use when the alcohol is out of your system, and you decide to abstain for a while. It is a factor that allows people who generally don't have addictive/compulsive personalities to avoid falling into chronic use.

Marijuana does not clear the system that rapidly so people generally do not get the same regret feeling they get after a binge with alcohol; since the drug lasts in the system so long, and clears out very gradually, the dividing line between the "high" personality and the "sober" personality is blurred.

I do not know any of this from personal experience; those of you who know me know that I have never had a drink or done pot (or anything else for that matter), and some would say that this invalidates my opinion (pure foolishness - I have never raped anyone, yet I still contend that rape is bad). You do not have to engage in a behavior to condemn it, it is a weird kind of antihypocrasy at work in this argument - you don't know the experience so you can't judge... but if I had done it and then deemed it bad, I would be a hypocrite for having done it.

That notwithstanding, I would like to address a couple of the things that I find irritating in the pro-legalization left (particularly the left because it is incompatible with other views of the California left - the pro-pot right, libertarians mostly, irritate me but are more consistent).

Legalizing will reduce crime - yeah, I guess, in the same way that legalizing anything reduces crime - that act is no longer criminal. As far as any other impact, drug cartels will still bring in heroin and cocaine, whatever pot they bring in they might still to avoid the taxation, but it is just as likely to be replaced with another drug in the shipment - besides, a lot of pot is grown here (ask anyone in Marin) so it will not impact Mexican or Central American cartels.
Legalizing is a good revenue source - Again, doubtful - if you make the tax too high, there will be a black market for it (hell, there is for cigarettes already to avoid taxes). Why would anyone pay a tax on it if they can grow it themselves, or buy from someone they know with a growing operation - are we going to licence everyone who grows, or will it be illegal to grow, or illegal to sell what you've grown, etc. You open up a can of worms on creating a bureaucracy to just deal with the fact that it is legal. Don't be surprised if it is legalized if the revenues are not as high as you have hoped.
Kids will not be able to get it - because it will be more available being legal, underage kids won't get it, the same way they don't get alcohol. If you believe that you must be high. Of course kids will get it - they do already, if it is legal, it becomes more available to them, not less.
It is natural, so it can't be bad for you - Another high thought. I just checked, cobra venom, opium, belladonna, poison oak, poison sumac, trans fats, and a whole crapload of other things are natural - natural does not mean good or bad, just stop saying that pot is natural, man - it just makes you sound stupid. You like getting high because it is fun, it has nothing to do with it being natural. Fess up and move on - that is a perfectly good reason to like getting high.
First contradiction for the Left - do you know how much fossil fuels are used for the cultivation of marijuana - grow lights, hot houses, etc. That plant is mainly tropical (native to China and India) - to grow it here requires a big indoor operation that sucks up a lot of power. It is not environmentally friendly, it is generally environmentally horrendous. Even outdoor grow operations tend to be bad because of the combinations of fertilizers and pesticides used to maintain the valuable crop - Marin has severe environmental problems from abandoned grow operations, though this may be mitigated if it is no longer illegal (less people will abandon their operations, leaving less environmental harm). I don't believe in the whole anthropogenic climate change thing, but if you do, Mary Jane ain't helping, and you should stop its use just to save the environment.
Second contradiction for the Left - The federal government has primacy over state governments. This is a big argument as to why Arizona can't have its own immigration policies, why nationalized mandates for health care purchases are fine, antidiscrimination laws, and a whole host of other things. Of course, Arizona can't make a law that deals with immigration (even if it is remarkably similar to the federal statute), but California can make laws in direct opposition to federal law? At least try to be a little consistent. Personally, I think that the federal government may have overstepped its bounds in criminalizing drugs, but the interstate commerce clause could be used as justification. (interestingly enough, the only president who presided over an administration where more money was spent on treatment rather than on enforcement was Richard Nixon - put that in your pipe and smoke it ;)
Third contradiction for the Left - the war on drugs and its cost. The general way that this has been put has been akin to "we spend too much money, yet drugs are still a problem, people still use, you are filling the jails with people whose only crime was the drug, etc". The gist of the argument is that we do not get enough bang for our buck - this seems to be the only place where the Left is fiscally conservative. The same argument could be made for Johnson's War on Poverty - we have spent a ton of money on welfare programs, and people are still poor. We should stop trying to make people not poor. Of course that would be ridiculous, but it is the exact same argument used against the War on Drugs. Stop demonizing poverty, allow those people to choose to be poor, the war on poverty is an abject failure, and we shouldn't waste our money on it. The answer the Left sees is -continue spending inefficiently on the war on poverty, even though the ideas haven't worked, stop spending on the war on drugs, even though the ideas haven't worked (obviously, the right is guilty of similar folly, but I would argue that some aspects of the war on drugs have worked, but that is for another time). A similar issue is in the criminalization of firearms - we have strict laws, yet there are still gun crimes. What's the answer - more gun laws - the exact opposite of their conclusion on drug laws. And guns are specifically enumerated as protected in the Constitution.

I could go on, but I am not going to, because I am bored of writing. The last bit is just a tirade against logical inconsistencies I perceive on the Left. Yes, I know that you could point out similar inconsistencies for the Right (but not for me, I would hope), but that does not invalidate the illogical stances of the Left (arguments of "you do it too" are fallacious and do not actually render the point of contention moot, much as people may like them to).

Why Muni Drivers Suck

2010-07-05T18:28:00.000-07:00

So, this blog is about a week and a half out of date - I don't know if the issue has been solved yet, but I do know that Muni workers in SF are out of touch with reality. I heard a couple of blurbs on KCBS (FM 106.9, AM 740) talking about contract negotiations with San Francisco, and the Muni drivers refusing to accept a "pay cut". When the radio news went into further detail, it turns out that they were not even being asked to accept a pay cut, they were being asked to relinquish an 8% pay increase that was scheduled to happen in July or August (I think, I don't remember the actual time frame, but the important point is that it was a scheduled raise, not a cut in anyone's actually salary).

According to SF statute, Muni drivers must make at least the second highest wage in the nation for their business. I don't know if the scheduled raise was to make sure that this remained the case, but notwithstanding, they were being asked to forgo a pay increase not accept a wage reduction. I don't know of anyone who budgets based on what they are going to make rather than on what they do make (except the government, of course), so as far as an impact on the drivers lives, it sucks, but at least you get what you got in previous years.

Police and firefighters have accepted actual cuts in salaries, and I sympathize with them far more than with Muni drivers. Police and firefighters provide a service for all members of the community that is completely essential and they agreed to cut their salaries for the good of the community. Muni drivers are non-essential, and they do not serve all of the community (not everyone requires public transportation, but we all have to fund it). I am not saying that public transportation is unimportant, I just feel that other services are more important. Even people in Supergoober's line of work have taken a pay cut, and teachers have been laid off, but Muni - heavens no, we can't take a pay cut...

And that leads me to the two people who were interviewed - the one sound bite that they played of a woman saying "Take a pay cut, how do they expect us to live!" She sounded offended at the notion that she would have to tighten her belt somewhat, and it was then revealed that she makes $84,000 a year. So she would still be making that amount of money, she just wouldn't be getting an 8% raise on top of that (which would put her at $90,720 a year). Her current income is well over the SF median household income of about $65,000, and also a bit over the median family income of about $81,000. (household income includes all income earners in a house even if their is only one member of the household, while family income is restricted to households of 2 or more related by blood or marriage)

Either way, $84,000 a year is enough to live on. You may be forced to make difficult decisions, but it is entirely possible to do in the Bay Area. The outrage that was evident in her tone was ridiculous, especially given the sacrifices other, more essential, city employees have made. Couple that with the benefits package that Muni drivers get, and you have a fairly good living.

The other person who was quoted stated that he received about $68,000 a year, and that he had a $4800 a month mortgage. I don't know how he qualified for that loan, or if he has another income, but if it is only him then his mortgage is approximately 85% of his gross income. Either he was one of the people who should not have bought a house and got sold a bad loan (negatively amortized for three years, then adjustable, or some other such nonsense), or he has another income in the household to help out, or he is lying about his mortgage (which I doubt - $4800 a month would be an unusual number to make up). Whatever the situation is, it is not my responsibility to make up for his overextending himself. He did that of his own free will, and if there were bankers or Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac egging him on, it doesn't matter. He could have actually read the loan documents or asked for help if he needed it. He signed his name a bunch of times in the purchase of a home, and you engage in a contract when you do that. It is nobody's fault but your own if you are stuck in that situation (unless someone lied to him about how the loan worked - a completely different situation). San Franciscans should not have to foot the bill for this guys irresponsible behavior by guaranteeing him a job. That has nothing to do with the salary issue that was being discussed, he just played the pity card of "I live in an expensive city with a high mortgage"; of course, implicit in that statement is "don't make me change my lifestyle - I should be allowed to live past my means with no penalty, and you should make sure I am compensated for my own lack of foresight".

Many people have tried to make this a race issue, and I honestly don't know enough about the racial demographics of the situation to say that it is entirely untrue, but I do know that other city workers have made concessions and the Muni Drivers have refused. Incorporating the pay into the City Charter was supposed to make bargaining about other things easier (I don't know who thought that would actually work, but someone did), and, predictably, the opposite happened. If your wages are guaranteed by law, why would you concede anything else. That kind of guarantee breeds an arrogance in the worker/union, because they know that they are untouchable. If you get to have a pay guarantee even if you are doing a craptastic job, you will eventually get workers who want to be compensated well no matter what they do, and no matter what the situation.

The fact that other city workers have made concessions highlights the main difference between people who go into those lines of work, and people who go into Muni - most other public services require somewhat of a sacrifice. No one becomes a cop, a firefighter, a city mental health worker, etc. because they want to get rich - many do it because they feel they owe something to the community (are there people in these professions who don't have that motivation - certainly, probably quite a few, but I am characterizing the bulk of people in public service). People go into public service because they want to give something back, but Muni has never fostered that attitude. It seems like Muni actually runs counter to the "service attitude" that most idealists have when they embark in a public service career. I do not know how to fix that, but I do believe that the heart of the problem lies right there. It has more to do with attitude than race or socioeconomic status of the drivers. It seems like they have never seen themselves as "public servants", which is the ideal attitude for any public employee.

I am not alleging all Muni drivers suck, that title was just a snapshot of my emotional reaction when I heard the story, and just like not all public servants outside of Muni have what I called the "service attitude", not everyone in Muni has the "you owe me attitude" either. But when the majority in a profession like Muni votes down concessions, my impression of Muni is what counts, because that will be the emotional response of many people besides myself (which is why Muni tried to keep its workers from making any comments).

Back again, but no one is listening

2010-06-30T19:21:00.001-07:00

So, on the Johannes Mehserle trial, interestingly enough he testified on my birthday, the anniversary of another "black" man being killed - Michael Jackson. The reason I bring this up is because of the charge of second degree murder.

Murder in the California penal code is defined as follows:

187. Murder is the unlawful killing of a human being, or a fetus, with malice aforethought.

Obviously, the statute has been amended to account for lawful termination of a fetus with the "Therapeutic Abortion Act", and that is not part of the discussion.

First and second degrees are differentiated as well. Malice can be expressed or implied, with expressed being the deliberate intention to unlawfully take a life, and implied being without provocation or when circumstances show an "abandoned or malignant heart"

First degree is deliberate and premeditated or done in the pursuit of a number of other felonies. All other murder is second degree. Under this definition, what Mehserle did could be considered 2nd degree murder, but it will be difficult to prove the abandoned or malignant heart. The attorneys should be going for the "without provocation" angle, because he shot the guy in the back when he was no apparent threat. That would be easier to prove, because just proving he was mad is not enough to be "malignant". If it was, spousal abusers would not get manslaughter, nor would people who stabbed someone in a bar fight. Clearly, the weapon in a bar fight can kill and to stab someone while you are angry generally means you want them dead. That is still only manslaughter (heat of passion is how it is generally referred to).

Voluntary manslaughter is the "heat of passion" or in a "quarrel" while involuntary is in the commission of an unlawful act, not amounting to a felony, or a lawful act that results in an unlawful death or without caution and circumspection.

So while he could be guilty of 2nd degree murder, and depending on the evidence may be convicted thereof, it is more likely that he is guilty of either voluntary or involuntary manslaughter, especially given the tack that the prosecution is taking.

The fact that the judge instructed the jury to consider lesser included charges is probably the best thing. I am sure the defense did not want this, because if they only had 2nd degree murder to choose, they would either acquit or be a hung jury.

Which brings me back to Michael Jackson. Much is being made of a Bart officer shooting an unarmed black man in the back (as much should be made of this - not because of his race but because of his unarmed and non-threatening status at the time), and in large part it is because a "white" officer is shooting a "black" man. The fact that Bart officers are notoriously under-trained and do not deal with stressful situations well is not being taken into account because of the racial undertones.

However, a much more credible case could be made for prosecuting Michael Jackson's doctor for murder - he was supplying him illegally with drugs that he knew were both illegal and life-threatening in the dosages and manner in which he prescribed them. Any reasonable person with the amount of training of a doctor should know exactly what those drugs do, that they are illegal for the purpose which he was prescribing them, and that the loss of life was an inevitable outcome from continued prescription of said drugs. An argument could be made that, since death is a reasonable outcome from these drugs, that injecting Michael Jackson with them amounts to "circumstances attending the killing show an abandoned or malignant heart".

Obviously, this is a bit of a reach, and the charge of manslaughter in this case is also more appropriate, but a trained physician with a syringe and a lust for money from famous people is a dangerous commodity as is an untrained, armed officer. The fact that the Michael Jackson probably requested the shot is what likely makes the difference to most people, and race ceases to be a factor. I would argue that it should not be a factor in either case, as Mehserle, in all likelihood, was so poorly trained that given a similar situation with a white, Hispanic, or Asian offender, it is highly probable that the same thing would have happened.

The real tragedy is that this gives the Oakland community one more reason to not trust the police, and thus makes Oakland, ultimately, a less safe place - if you don't trust the police, you don't report crimes. Gangs and criminals know this and exploit it.

My next two blogs, hopefully soon, will encompass the following topics:

Legalizing marijuana - why I believe it is a bad idea (and, no, it is not a moral argument against intoxicants, marijuana is likely innocuous enough in that regard, nor will I use a "gateway" drug argument)
A dream that I had the morning of June 20th. I only slept for about 2 hours that night (the 19th, Sunday night) and I had a dream so vivid and memorable it was like watching a movie, or watching one of the GMs game come to life - in fact there were elements of sci-fi and "Star Fleet" from our game involved. This may bore you, but probably no more so than anything else I write. Supergoober and the GM both figured prominently in it for a while, and it was like we were all characters in a game.

You Can't Legislate Morality... Except Mine

2010-05-09T18:38:00.000-07:00

No, I am not referring to MY morality in the title of the blog, but I am referring to a pervasive attitude on the left and right, though, of course, given my own inclinations, I will tend to indict the left a bit more in this blog. What really crystallized this thought in my head was something that theacupuncturist said in our last gaming session, when we started talking about torture. TheGM's response was logical as ever, mine was noncommittal at times, and Devil's advocate at times (big surprise) but tended to agree with the pragmatic view of theGM, while sympathizing and, in many ways, agreeing with, theacupuncturist.

But here is the thing, theacupuncturist stated that it was categorically wrong to torture, and any gain is essentially mitigated by the moral loss (you did not use the word moral, but I can't remember the word you did use, sorry). That is what started my train of thought, and I am not faulting you, acupuncturist. To my knowledge, you have never used the "you can't legislate morality" line, nor do I think you believe it (I don't know for sure, sorry if the attribution is incorrect). But the Left does state that torture is wrong - there are no excuses or mitigating circumstances. I have, in fact, heard this from people who have used the aforementioned quote on morality. This opposition to torture is, in fact, purely a moral stance.

And as I thought more, I was struck by the fallacious reasoning of both the Left and the Right. If a person is "pro-life" they are likely to be attacked as "forcing their morals" on others, "not living in the real world", or "not understanding the plight of women". Of course the pro-life person will stick up for their moral cause, defining their position as morally superior.

Now on the left, someone may be opposed to torture. The right will indict that person as not "understanding the realities of the situation", "not living in the real world", or "not caring about the soldiers at risk". The anti-torture person will, of course, feel morally superior (but in most cases not identify it as such, because the left is largely secularized) and stick up for their moral cause.

And this caused me to think even further. Most of the Left's positions are actually moral stances - in fact, Supergoober, I recall you talking about our moral imperative to assist the poor and downtrodden, and I made a flippant comment about "legislating morality" (around the last presidential election, if you recall). I thought of it then but have given it more thought of late. The left does essentially demonize anyone who does not buy in to their agenda as lacking "compassion" and "not caring". Of course, the agenda is purely a moral one - if there is no moral obligation to help the poor, why should we do it? There are no rational reasons to help the poor; in fact, purely rational thought without regard to human dignity would conclude - "exploit the poor" - something both capitalism and socialism have done (though I would argue that lightly regulated capitalism favors freedom and human dignity far more than socialism, but that is for another blog). Of course the key phrase above is "without regard to human dignity", and the left might counter with the fact that the reason for their stance on poverty and assistance is because of human dignity.

Of course, I would counter with the fact that "human dignity" is a moral concept - try to "prove" it rationally - it is, I think, impossible, because you have to differentiate humanity from nature in order to do this, because the natural order in both plants and animals is "kill or be killed". The lion does not recognize the inherent dignity of the gazelle, or even of the other lions (a pride leader will kill cubs from any other male to ensure only his survive). Yes, there are symbiotic and/or mutualistic relationships in the animal kingdom, but these do not arise out of the "dignity" of any creature. Dignity is a purely moral concept, and therefore, I would argue, most of what the left does is actually legislate morality.

I do not believe this is wrong - you must, on some level, legislate morality, and laws are an attempt to get people to adhere to a certain common moral and legal structure. I just find that the left seems to be very disingenuous about this, probably even with themselves.

The real problem is that not all morality can be legislated, and it is much easier to prohibit bad behavior (murder and rape, for example) that to mandate good behavior or thought (caring and charity, for example). This is where religion is eminently useful in a society. The government can enforce a certain type of morality banning extremes, but cannot make people be good, or even teach them what good is in many cases.

For example, it is understood that it is good to be polite and respectful of ones elders. You cannot pass laws that mandate this, but religion is really useful in passing on these good behaviors. Of course, families are adept at transmitting these values as well, but the underlying structure of a religion serves to reinforce these rules and social mores. The mistake most atheists and atheist philosophers make is that they forget that they and their fellow human beings are raised in societies with these social structures firmly in place - they think that the religion is merely a vestige and that the moral stability of the individual can survive intact without it. And it probably can, for several generations. But without the underlying structure to reinforce this form of morality, it can easily degenerate or pervert to unrecognizable states. Think of how common pressuring a girl into sex is nowadays - it was always something boys tried, but their used to be social regimes in place that discouraged that behavior. Now, I think it is more common for young girls to feel guilty for not "putting out" - an outgrowth of the "sexual revolution". I am not trying to say that promiscuity is evil or that adults engaging is consensual sex should be prohibited, I am just trying to pin down the negative effects some seemingly liberating movements can have.

I have gone rather far afield here, and have probably rambled more than usual - I am on some pain medication right now (cyclobenzaprine), see I was watching the Giants game in my garage, while doing some cleaning. After a disastrous seventh inning that saw the two run lead turn into a one run deficit, I wanted to shut of the game. I left it on, however, and continued to work on cleaning. In a few minutes I heard a crack of the bat, and the announcer shouting - so I looked up and saw a two run homer for the Giants. I was uncharacteristically excited about this and jumped up into the air for some silly reason (those of you who know me know that I seldom get excited about such things). Of course, I was standing right under the metal track for the garage door, the far end of which is quite sharp, and about 6' 5" off of the ground. Since I am about 6' 2" or so, my leap caused me to collide with this rail, cutting my the top of my head open, and snapping my neck back - after a couple of minutes of dealing with the pain and bleeding, my vision started to blur and I got really nauseous - this only lasted about a minute, then my wife (who I had called in the intervening minutes) got there and took me to Kaiser emergency - I was admitted and treated very quickly, the whole thing being over about an hour and a half after I got there, ending with me with a tetanus shot and seven staples in my head.

I am officially an idiot :)

Just a quick blurb...

2010-04-07T10:13:00.000-07:00

...about the new home buyers $6500 tax credit. First and foremost, it shows that the Democrats concede that tax cuts can stimulate an economy, but that notwithstanding, it is not the greatest idea, and it will not stimulate the housing market long term. All you have to do is know how people think and work to understand that.

And this is the downfall of many economic thinkers - they fail to see the ramifications of how people react to changing situations. All economic systems have people at their heart, and people do interesting (and, at times, predictable) things. Having this tax credit for new and repeat home buyers (that was added in the last extension, with some wording to head off people buying investment property) expire on May 1st shifts the dynamics of the real estate market. Of course people are clamoring to buy right now - there is a huge incentive. Remember, this is a tax credit, not a write-off... the $6500 comes off of what you owe, not off of your income to calculate what you owe, which means that many people will be getting $6500 more on their tax returns.

But that sounds great, you say, and I say "Nay, nay". The problem is multifaceted now. You have shifted the buying trend, so don't be shocked if the summer (a traditionally good time in real estate) has a sharp decline in sales - people shifted their buying window forward slightly, this did not mean that more people necessarily are buying homes, and it did not make those homes more affordable. In fact, given the stringent lending requirements now, I would warrant that only upper-middle class to wealthy people can cash in on this credit. It might help some in the middle class, but it certainly does not make the homes more affordable to the poor (this is just an impression - I do not have the stats to back it up, but it seems to make logical sense - not that this program really is targeting the poor, I believe it is intended to help the middle class, but my impression is that it will only help the upper-middle to upper class groups).

Also, this will artificially boost home prices - people are fighting to get into homes and get them closed by the end of May (the closing deadline in the law). All that this will do is artificially inflate home prices and cause a "mini-bubble" in price. Again, don't be surprised to see home values fall (slightly) the two quarters after the program ends. Of course, the government could continue the program, but that still delays the inevitable and tries to artificially prop up home values.

Of course, this ultimately hurts the consumer, the lender, and the market. With values artificially high, more people will get into the homes at an inflated price and be shocked when the value falls. Lenders will have assets that do not match the values (not as big a concern because they are doing less "sub-prime" lending (sub-prime refers to the credit of the borrower, not the type of loan - "sub-prime" borrowers have credit that makes them a risky investment for the bank)), and if someone forecloses, the banks are stuck with a home that does not match the value of the loan that it made. Of course, the market suffers because the manipulations by the government will (and are) cause large fluctuations in the market, leaving investors, buyers, and sellers in a state of shock.

The best thing the government could do is to stay out of housing, let the home values correct on their own (of course, this doesn't account for the other silly program forbidding banks from foreclosing on properties until it is verified that the homeowners don't qualify for federal assistance - that won't hurt a bank's liquidity or willingness to loan money, will it? (note heavy sarcasm)), and allow the consumers who have been smart with their money to benefit, rather than bailing out people who have foolishly flung money down a rat hole.

Of course, this means that some people will be upside-down in their loans, but why is that a problem. Long term the value will go up and correct, but even if it doesn't you ultimately own an asset, free and clear. If you paid too much, too bad. You will be paying far more than the value of the home in interest anyway, and nobody makes noise about that (which is essentially the same phenomenon - paying more than the value of the property). And why isn't anyone up-in-arms about being upside-down in their car loan? You are upside-down in that the moment you drive off the lot. Shouldn't we have a federal program to rectify that? What if I wreck my car and I am not as lucky as Supergoober? Shouldn't the rest of you bail me out?

Of course not, but we have sentimentality (understandably so) attached to home-ownership. The fact is, however, that even with this sentimentality, we can incentivize home-ownership without destroying the market. Give the tax write-off that we currently get and the market will (ultimately) do just fine. If you want lower-middle class (and lower income) people to own property, federal subsidies will work, but you must make sure that the subsidy is not in the form of a loan that the person can never pay back and that there is still the perception that the person is spending a significant amount of his/her own money to purchase the residence (to instill pride in ownership - if that is lacking, well, that is another blog, now isn't it?). trying to get everyone to own is foolish, our system is supposed to guarantee opportunity, not outcome - that can never be guaranteed (see the next blog). And yes, we should work to provide people with opportunities, but people have to fend for themselves and deal with the consequences of being a living agent with free will. Sorry, but life is not perfect, nor will it ever be.

Boy the internet sucks...

2010-03-17T13:06:00.000-07:00

Well, I just was roaming briefly on the Internet, looking up a couple of things by a profile that I have been using off-and-on for years... johndrake6. The not so obvious reference is to a combination of the Prisoner and Danger Man - like many Prisoner fans, I believe that number six is actually John Drake from the series "Danger Man". Imagine my surprise in finding out I am no longer unique.

As near as I can tell, there are two new "Johnny come lately" upstarts with that profile name - using it much more pervasively (and it might just be one person, I did not pay that close attention). Ironically enough, the person is of nearly opposite political persuasion (which I, of course find ironic considering that #6 is a "Man vs. Society" themed character that doesn't fit with the big government liberalism that the other JD6 espouses - of course, he would see me, a conservative as a big government represser of people's rights, and we are probably in our own ways, both right).

Of course, I have a romantic idealised vision of myself as an independent thinker not constrained by societal or governmental norms - (s)he probably has the same idealized vision of him/herself (one can never be assured of gender just by screen name). Clearly we would have different ideas of what this ideal embodies (given some blogs on the huffington post on how Dems should dare Reps to filibuster health care reform, etc), but it is interesting to have one's semi-uniqueness copied. And I say semi-uniqueness because I obviously took the idea from somewhere else, but when I did, I did not see anyone else on the net that had that screen name anywhere on any search... and now I do, and it's not me :(

I guess I'll just start using the moniker jonathanE

ah... Rollerball and James Caan - another rugged individualist who triumphs against a repressive society - how I wish I could be that ;)

Well, writing every day didn't work out...

2010-02-03T18:10:00.000-08:00

So I am back a few days later. Just a quick little blurb on the proposed budget. I am no fan of George W. Bush; some of his policies were okay, some were not, but he was what I like to call a "big government" conservative... to my mind that is not a conservative at all. But the proposed budgets by Obama dwarf the big government Republicanism of the Bush era.

And I can hear the hue-and-cry now: We inherited this mess, it takes time, etc, etc, etc. The plain fact is that Keynesian economics does not work. It did not work to get us out of the Great Depression; it did not work in the seventies for Nixon, Ford, or Carter; it did not work for Japan in the nineties; it does not work in a boat; it does not work with a goat... it does not work, Sam-I-Am.

Whether or not the mess was inherited (and I can point out, and have in previous blogs that both the Dems and Repubs in congress are really to blame by setting up Fannie and Freddie the way they did, and I laid all that out in a previous posting) the solutions being posited make things worse, not better. Bailing out companies that are "too big to fail" rather than letting them file for bankruptcy and renegotiate contractual obligations sets up scenarios like we have now with AIG. They paid out $100,000,000 in bonuses to about 200 people this year - which means the average bonus is $500,000 - and there is much uproar about the ridiculousness of this act when they are still on the hook for $182,000,000,000 of taxpayer money (incidentally, the bonuses amount to about 1/2 of a percent of the money the Fed gave them - apparently the "it is such a small fraction of the money in play" argument only works for bills and earmarks in Washington DC). Honestly, the bonuses are not really that big a deal, but if AIG had filed for bankruptcy, restructured, and renegotiated contracts, everything would likely have been sussed out by now. The same goes for GM, etc.

But because of the Keynesian ideology, that is that the government makes jobs, these idiotic moves were made, along with a number of other "stimulus" ideas, all of which were as dumb as mailing out $300 refund checks to everyone. At least the B.S. Bush "stimulus" treated everyone fairly... the Democrat stimulus paid off unions (if GM doesn't restructure, unions don't have to take a contract hit, though I don't know why AIG is being paid off). And, effectively, AIG is being paid off (I know I shouldn't refer to a parenthetical idea in a non-parenthetical follow up, but what the hell) - Obama wants to tax deposits in banks that have paid back all the TARP money, but doesn't want to hold AIG to any account, despite the fact that they are not even close to paying off their debts...

But back to the budget - this was supposed to be quick, but my fertile (or was that febrile) mind wandered off again - this budget is approximately 25% of GDP, and the future expenditures laid out in this budget are projected to be in the range of 23 to 25% for the following two years. At his most profligate, FDR never exceeded 12.5% of GDP. Expenditures this high are completely unsustainable, and this does not even include "Health Insurance Reform".

And the basis for this thought is ludicrous - the Keynesian economic theory is pure sophistry, even one of the key advocates in FDR's administration admitted it didn't work after seeing it in play for eight years (his name eludes me now, but I will find it, and the quote and put it up later). Government cannot create wealth or jobs - it can merely shift wealth. The only way that a government job is created is by taking the money from the private sector. This is not to say that we should have no government jobs - clearly many are necessary - but piecemeal public works projects do nothing to stimulate the economy long term, they simply take money from a nervous private sector, and shift it into temporary projects - the private sector does not want to invest when the outlook is risky and they face an increase burden of taxation, and the worker in the temporary government job does not want to spend money because s/he knows her job is temporary.

An what is worse, the Democrats have tacitly admitted that tax cuts work in stimulating the economy - why else would they have a tax credit for new homeowners. This is saying that they believe that a tax cut will stimulate activity in that market. If they believe that this is true in one case, why do they shy away from it elsewhere? The answer, of course, is simple. To do tax cuts right requires careful analysis (of which I am not sure that anyone in Washington is capable), and it does not seem to be the populist idea that sells easily to voters.

Oh, and BTW, that no tax increases on the middle class that Obama promised is B.S., too. By letting tax cuts lapse, you increase taxes, and all it will take is you doing your taxes to see that the hit goes to the middle class more than it goes to the rich. Also, the tax on deposits in banks - gee, who makes those deposits, and I wonder if the bank will just send in the money to Washington without increasing fees? That seems likely (note: HEAVY SARCASM). And, of course, if health care legislation passes, your health plan (if you have one, and you are not a member of the right union that can strong-arm the president) will be taxed, too. Yep, he's definitely looking out for the little guy.

Not to mention that mandating that people buy health insurance upon penalty of fine and eventually imprisonment for continued non-compliance is grossly unconstitutional, makes a crime out of simply being alive (if you choose not to buy insurance), and ... no, wait ... that topic is for another day, I've been sitting here way too long, but that stuff is in the Senate version of the bill.

Trying to jumpstart my writing

2010-01-30T12:34:00.000-08:00

So I am going to try to post once a day, whether I have anything to say or not (and, if you've read previous blogs, you might maintain that "not" is more often the case). Right now, I feel like addressing the capital punishment issue that The Acupuncturist raised on our last gaming session.

I have been personally reconsidering my opinion on this for several years, and I have not come to a satisfactory conclusion as yet, but my process has (essentially) been a moral one. I would say that taking a life in general is a morally reprehensible act, but one that is, at times, necessary. In many ways this feels like a moral "cop-out", but it is one that is essential to maintaining social stability (not in regards to the death penalty, but just in regards to appropriate use of force). There are times when a morally evil act can shift to morally neutral (I would maintain that it could never be morally good). For example, if your life is threatened and you take the life of the person who is trying to take yours. This is not a good act - though the end is good, the preservation of a life (yours), nor is it an evil act, assuming you had no recourse other than to defend yourself, and that your intent was not principally to take a life but rather to preserve a life.

Obviously, this is the case with self defense, and while there are nuances to the argument of the ability to defend oneself and the amount of force one should use in said defense are open to debate, I would think that this is a fairly sound line of reasoning. Of course, one could go to absurd extremes in justifying defense and try to distort the argument to absurdity, but this is fairly difficult to do. I believe that choice is inherent to a good or evil act, and when choice is limited, acts become, effectively, less good or evil. For example, if someone makes you punch a child in the face because they have a gun to your head and you believe they will kill you, is that evil. I would say probably not. It is certainly less wrong than making a choice to punch a kid in the face because they are annoying you. Likewise, if the tax man threatens to incarcerate me because I haven't paid taxes that go to good social programs, I have done no good by paying my taxes - the end results (helping the poor) may be good, by I cannot claim any responsibility for the good act - I was forced to do it.

So I have often argued from the "morally evil, but socially necessary" standpoint, which seems a bit weak to me, because, while still having a moral absolute (killing is wrong), it becomes very easy to slip into moral relativism, so I feel that any such argument should have sound precepts behind them. I am still marginally in favor of the death penalty, especially in particular cases, but I will not maintain that it has a deterrent effect, nor will I maintain that it is the "right" thing to do. It may, in rare cases, be the necessary thing to do for the well being of society, but it should be a last resort. That is where I am right now, but I am continuing to research, contemplate, and revise my thinking.

As to the point you made, Acupuncturist, I mentioned this on last Saturday - I do not think that the statistics on the disproportionate executions of the poor or minorities is a cogent argument. It is, without a doubt, persuasive, precisely because few people want to be perceived as racist or classist, so the argument uses spurious logic and guilt to manipulate people into adopting your side, and I feel that this is little better (if it is better at all) than using a scare tactic to intimidate people into being pro death penalty (e.g. if we don't kill the killers, they will be freed to kill more people - maybe you!). Here is the problem - it does not address whether the act of execution is right or wrong, it merely states that we execute a lot of poor people and minorities relative to the overall population. The main issue is that the poor to middle class commit more capital crimes than the rich. There are more of them, and they are in circumstances, in many cases, where crime seems like a reasonable option - whether this is gang violence, drug abuse that leads to murder, or whatever. Also, this line of reasoning can be extended to the absurd - not enough middle class whites are being imprisoned for burglary, so we should not arrest anyone for burglary until this injustice is fixed. What we need to do is address the reason why at risk communities commit more crimes, and as a result are punished more for them.

I could also say that there are a disproportionately high number of white male serial killers who have been executed - stop executing them until we find more poor minority serial killers to execute. This is, of course, an absurd statement, because for whatever reason, serial killers are mostly white, educated, lower middle class to affluent males. Because this is not a demographic that has been traditional discriminated against and who is not "at risk" in the conventional sense, it does not tug at any heart strings like the other argument does. (I actually have a theory about why serial killers are almost exclusively from this demographic, but I will address that in a later blog - plus it is pure speculation)

In short, we cannot arbitrarily mete out any punishment, nor can we establish quotas on who has committed a crime. All we can do is seek to punish criminal in a uniformly just fashion - something that our system has a bit of a problem with, but I believe that our system does a remarkably good job, despite some inadequacies - and we continue to seek to improve it.

Maybe this is too idealistic, but I am in a mood where I want to drag myself out of a funk, so I am forcing optimism on myself :)

Kudos to a Democrat

2009-12-18T06:15:00.000-08:00

What a coincidence, the day after a new post complaining about lack of leadership on the Democrat side, one senator steps up and convinces me he actually believes in what he is doing. (Actually, I'll be convinced if he moves in the senate the way he talks on the news - no offense, I have heard enough on both sides of people saying the right thing in public and doing the opposite on the job to be a bit wary)

The person in question is Senator Ron Klink (Dem, Pennsylvania, I think) - and, in brief, here is what he said. I won't include quotes because it isn't a direct quote, but I will capture the idea of what he said:

We have to realize we have the House, Senate, and Presidency. This bill is good for America, and we have to push it through, even if it takes an extreme measure like reconciliation. Even if it costs us politically, it is the right thing to do.

That is the gist of what he said, and I laud him for actually believing in what he is doing. I happen to think that he is dead wrong about what the bill will do, but at least he seems to believe in what he is doing. And of course, it should be no surprise that I believe he is wrong - he is a left-leaning Democrat (and did not shy away from saying so - more kudos in order) and I am a right-leaning Republican. It is just nice to see a person who actually appears to believe in what they are doing, rather than adopting a position that is politically advantageous for them (this applies to the right and the left).

I'll end with something he said that also echoed my sentiments - We have to have the courage to lead, even if it costs us politically. I think that this is an important thought - leading takes courage, and ignoring the political fallout when you are right is a difficult, but important thing to do.

Of course the problem comes up when a leader has courage but has ideas that are not right - as I would argue about health care, the economy, etc., and the Left would argue about George W. Bush. He clearly had the same idea, that it was better to be right than popular, and the Left stridently believes that he was not right, just as I stridently believe this bill is not right. I can respect the Left who take this position - recognizing that a person has the courage of his/her convictions, but that those convictions are incorrect, rather than labelling someone as evil or stupid, etc. I don't think that Ron Klink is stupid, I think he has a fundamentally different belief system then I do, and this is because of his education and experience, just as mine comes from my education and experience.

That's all folks.

I guess I'm back

2009-12-16T14:46:00.000-08:00

Well, over the past several months I have been both busy and neglectful. There has been a lot that I have wanted to write about, but I never made the time. Add to that some frustrating conversations and an occasional misinterpretation of my meanderings in the dimmer corners of my mind, and I haven't really felt much like writing, but here goes nothing - today's topic:

The Health Care Bill/Debate.

First and foremost, I am not going to debate the need or lack thereof for the health care reform initiative. Rather, I am going to address some rather specious lines of reasoning that are being touted as to why the bill has to get done, and elucidate on why these tactics make me suspicious of the motives. I am not going to debate the merit or lack thereof of a public option, I am just going to discuss White House and Congressional tactics, principally on the Democrat side. The reason that I am not bothering with the Republican side should be obvious (and no, it is not because I agree with them). The Democrats are driving the debate and have established the criteria of the necessity of this reform. More on that when I talk about the supermajority...

We need this bill passed right now. If we don't get it passed by (insert date of choice) then (insert apocryphal saying of choice). Now, this one falls flat on the face of it - if the need is so imperative, why do the benefits not kick in for another four years and the tax increases and medicare cuts happen immediately - this would seem to say that it is imperative, but if people have health issues in the next four years, that is just too bad. A measured approach to any legislation is better - give the legislature a chance to (heaven forfend) actually read the bill so that they know on what they are voting. All of the deadlines are arbitrary and seem to me to stifle debate, making the promise of transparency ring somewhat hollow. If we are going to do this, do it well; do not rush it just to say we got it done. This smacks more of politicking and less of actual concern for the public.
We need competition with the private sector - the heath care industry is a "monopoly". I have actually heard the White House press secretary pitch this one - the government needs to provide an alternate to the private sector because the private sector has a monopoly on health care. This just shows misunderstanding of the term monopoly. If the private sector being in charge of an industry is all it takes to have a monopoly, then every industry in which the government does not participate is a monopoly. Why, then, does the government not compete with car insurers, home insurers (in a way, they do), computer manufacturers, video game companies, mom and pop corner stores, etc. The competition angle of the debate is spurious at best - it is simply dressing up the issue to make it palatable to moderates. If the heath care system needs fixing and you believe that your plan will do it, do not make up a phony claim of monopoly - it just makes people suspicious of your motives.
The Republicans are a party of "No" - they offer no ideas. and/or The Republicans are putting up roadblocks and we would like them to be part of the process. Neither one of these make a bit of difference. The Democrats have a supermajority. They have the House, Senate, and Presidency. They could pass this without any Republican help. In fact, if I were them, and I really believed that my ideas were good, I would try to pass the laws and make a point that the ideas were all my party's and none of my opposition's. If your ideas are diametrically opposed, and you believe yours are right, state your case, explain why you are doing what you are doing and be willing to take all of the credit and all of the blame. The fact that they are unwilling to do this again makes me think that they do not have a lot of faith in their ideas and they want a "fall guy" if they need it. Again, it looks more like politics and less like they believe in what they are doing.

Honestly, there are many other arguments that I could address, but I don't feel like it right now. In short, all I am trying to say is that if the Democrats want to allay suspicions of the independent voter (they will never convince the far right of the merits of the government option, so they shouldn't try; the reason far right and far left are so... well... far apart, is because their ideas run counter to one another. There is nothing wrong with this and neither side should have to compromise their core principles, they just have to convince a majority that their core principles are correct) they should just come out and say honestly what they believe are the merits of the system they propose - without attacking or making up phony claims. If you believe in it, stand behind it, use it to differentiate yourselves from the Republicans, and you will go a good way toward convincing people that your side is right. The way the process is going, it does not seem like the Democrats are committed to the idea or really feel like it is actually what is best. All of there tactics serve to make people question their motives rather than feel like they are being dealt with in an honest and open fashion.

More on the actual substance of why I personally feel that the bill (and the various iterations that have been proposed) are not actually good economically or for the health care system and my ways that I would reform the system in an upcoming blog.

... Oh yeah, and supergoober, I have reached Level 19 on two player mode of Tetris Friends, and Level 20 (Grand Master) in the 6 player version - top that!

Roman Polanski

2009-09-29T15:45:00.000-07:00

Well, they finally got him. I know that this is an unpopular move, and many people have decried it because of the overcrowding in CA jails and the fact that we just signed a law releasing 40,000 criminals (inmates, if that fits your perspective better - assuming they were all captives in an unjust system and victims of an overzealous state - of course, the actual truth is somewhere in the middle) due to budget issues and because the victim has since forgiven him, etc., etc., etc.

Here is the problem that I have. Let's say he wasn't a famous film director, just the creepy Polish dude who lives down the block (irony duly noted, given my heritage and somewhat creepy disposition). Suppose this 44 year old guy invites a 13 year old model for a "photo-shoot", plies her with wine and barbiturates, gets her in a hot tub and has sex with her. He is then arrested, pleas guilty to a statutory rape charge instead of child molestation, and is released until sentencing. This guy then flees the country and spends the next 30+ years evading authorities. Would we have sympathy then?

I would say that most people would not, and given that these were the circumstances as I recall them (I don't know what he actually plead to, but I figured it would be something like statutory rape), I think that his personal issues stand separate from his directorial accomplishments. He is no better or worse than the rest of us. The European mentality stems from both an openness towards sexual mores (which I do not think really apply here, given the coercion) and from the fact that Europe is a classed society, where there is a long history of one class being better than another and getting to flout the law as a result. They are much more comfortable with this double standard because it has been culturally ingrained in them for thousands of years. It is also one of the reasons that we have an equal protection clause in our Constitution and why people are supposed to all be equal under the law. This was a guiding principle in the formation of the government, though it was not always put into practice - and this fundamental difference is what separates us from many other nations. A celebrity should not be free to get away with more stuff than anyone else - Paris Hilton goes to jail for a few days on a drunk driving charge just like anyone else in her situation (and yes, most people receiving a 30 day sentence for a similar charge get out in five days due to overcrowding - she shouldn't be punished any more because she is a celebrity either). Phil Spektor gets convicted of murder when he kills a young aspiring actress.

Obviously, there is some difference, celebs and the wealthy afford better representation, and can pull strings to get away with some stuff, but this should not be encouraged - Michael Skakel could have actually been tried as a juvenile and dealt with his problems after murdering his young neighbor, but the fact that he was part of the Kennedy "royalty" and the local DA was beholden to the Kennedy clan delayed his conviction until after his adulthood, leading him to be sentenced as an adult because of the continuing conspiracy to conceal the crime as an adult. Treating celebrities differently only creates problems in our legal system, and it does nothing to set up the sense of fairness that is supposed to underpin our system. This attitude is fine in Europe, but it cannot be tolerated here. Sorry, Roman, and I do love your movies, but you have to pay the piper. I liked Hemingway to, but that doesn't mean he wasn't a crotchety, depressed, suicidal drunkard. I appreciate Spektor's contribution to the music industry by bringing a number of great bands to the public eye, but he is still a murderer.

I never really liked Aurthur C. Clarke, however, and he is still a child molester, whether I like his work or not (but that brings new meaning to his novel, Childhood's End, now doesn't it?)

Ah, peroxyacetone...

2009-09-29T15:00:00.000-07:00

Well, well, well, a terror suspect apprehended buying hair and nail care products - will wonders never cease. Just as a quick note, in case anyone was wondering, he was trying to make peroxyacetone - a highly explosive and none-to-stable compound that is really easy to make. In fact, it's what the train bombers in Britain used a few years back.

I made some in lab this summer for a demonstration in chemistry, and, oh boy, is it ever fun. I had about a 2 gram pile of it on a 4"x4"x0.5" pine board (to protect the lab bench). 2 grams takes up about a half a golf ball sized pile (it is kind of fluffy - you could try to compress it into a smaller container, but I wouldn't risk that after it was dry, it would likely blow up while you were tamping it down). With ear plugs and the class well back, I had a lit match taped to the end of a 2 meter long stick - a touch of the match to the pile and BOOM!
goodbye board, meter stick, filter paper (that the substance was drying on) - the reaction was so energetic, it actually disintegrated most of the filter paper except for the parts that were actually driven into the board (and if you know anything about momentum, you know this takes a lot of force to drive paper into the grain of a pine wood board), the small board was shattered into three pieces, one of which flew 15 feet and landed in a student's lap, and scared the bejeezus out of the entire third floor. I felt the pressure wave (albeit only slightly) from seven feet away. Good times.

But seriously, this is dangerous stuff, and the guy was buying chemicals in quantities to make a lot - at least 100 times what I made, just in the one video purchase that they show on TV. It is really easy to make - mix fairly concentrated hydrogen peroxide and plain old acetone and add a couple of drops of something else, and, Presto! it precipitates out of the solution (no, I am not going to tell you the proportions, or the secret ingredient, or the concentration of H2O2 - if you want to blow yourself or someone else up, F--- Off! somebody else online will help you, but you can be damn well certain it isn't going to be me).

Why am I writing all this? I really don't know - just trying to indicate that almost anything can be made into a weapon if you want it to - ban guns and scary knives and chemicals all you want - bad people still do bad things. And yes, I am calling him bad - he isn't misunderstood or manipulated by his religion - he gravitated to this kind of ideology based on who he is. Most followers of Islam are not bad people, as are most Christians, Jews, Deists, Buddhists, Atheists, etc (I say not bad because it requires effort to actually be good - so I would say most people qualify as basically not bad). Bad ones are drawn to extremism - whether it is bombing the World Trade Center or an abortion clinic. It isn't the religion that causes the violence, it is the people - we could all be secular humanists and I would contend that there would still be violence; in fact, the most wholesale slaughters of the twentieth century were perpetrated by people who ascribed to no particular faith (Mao, Lenin, and Stalin - all of whom said that religion should be done away with). They did away with religion, and managed to wreak more havoc in a shorter time than most major religions ever have over their entire history - even the Crusades did not have the body count that any of the big three above did. (Liberal estimates of the death toll on both sides gets to about 3,000,000 - but most likely these are overestimates, because counting issues at this time were suspect at best)

I don't really know where I am going with this other than to say that humans seem to have a very violent streak - religions and societies at once have a mitigating effect and at other times seem to exacerbate the issue - which is why one cannot blame society or religion. Both of these are constructs created by people (while I do believe in God, spirituality, etc., religions are the human constructs for communal expression of their spiritual nature), and it is the people who are the issue- those suspicious of organizations, corporations, religions, etc seem to often forget that they do not exist independently of people, and that they are just a reflection of the dual nature of humanity. (BTW, if you want more non-religious massacres, I can get them any time - the Hutus massacring hundreds of thousands of Tsutsis, for example, based on tribalism, Pol Pot killing intellectuals, French killing British, British killing French, etc., etc., etc.)

Oh, well, we muddle through as best we can...

First Five Rush Albums Reviewed

2009-09-17T07:49:00.000-07:00

So I reviewed my first five Rush albums (not chronologically, I tried to randomly select albums so that I would be less biased by the era in which they were recorded). I will give the overall percentage score that they received, the raw score (straight accumulation of all scores on the album), and a brief overview of my impression of the album after listening to it.

In terms of scoring each song, I tried to listen to them as individual songs, as well as the placement in the album. I will not include notes on each song, but I will give the 1 to 10 score rating each song on the album got. The raw score is important, because sometimes short albums will skew high in the ratings - it is easier to rate high on an album with only 4 songs, compared to an album with 11 songs. I toyed with the idea of actually breaking up the long songs (2112, Hemispheres) and rating the component sub-pieces, but this doesn't fit for me - they wrote them as an individual song, so I should rate them as such.

As a reminder, here is my grade scale:

90-100% A

85-89 A-

80-84 B+

75-79 B

70-74 B-

65-69 C+

60-64 C

50-59 C-

0-49 F

Note that there are no "D"s - either I liked the song enough for it to pass, or it failed - a failure is a song I just don't want to listen to again. Obviously, the scale is totally subjective, but I am looking for how the song feels musically constructed, how interesting it is to me, how much emotional response I have to the song, and how much I would like to listen to the song again. Anything in the A or A- range would be something perfect or near perfect, that I could listen to over and over again. B songs still have a similar impact, but I might need to be in the right mood - "By-Tor and the Snow Dog" for example has good energy and is interesting, but a little long for my tastes, whereas "The Weapon" is a great song, but a bit depressing, and if I am not in the right mood, I won't want to listen to it as much. Nonetheless, I would never skip past a B graded song (+ or - included) if I was listening to an album. A C rated song kind of missed the mark. It still works, is a decent song, but may be misplaced on an album, be too trite for what I like, and I may consider skipping it if listening to an album - this would still be a rare occurrence, as I would still like the song well enough to listen to it, just not enough to go out of my way to find it.

An F is a song that I would skip. End of story, no questions, just don't like it - the varying scores from 0 to 4.5 rate the relative severity of the fail... a zero has nothing I like at all, while a 4.5 is decent through most of it but has something that just rubs me the wrong way. I cannot think of any Rush songs that would fit in this category - that is why they are one of (if not my) favorite bands.

So here goes nothing:

2112

Raw Score: 50.5 out of 60

Percentage: 84.17%

Grade: B+

Track 1: 2112 - Rating: 10

Track 2: Passage to Bangkok - Rating: 7; Good song, but doesn't really fit after a song as epic as 2112. Even if you had to flip over the album, a much clearer transition, this song is too trite for Rush lyrically, maybe it fits on an earlier album, but not here.

Track 3: Twilight Zone - Rating: 7.5; just slightly to long for what it is, but an interesting attempt.

Track 4: Lessons - Rating: 10

Track 5: Tears - Rating: 6.5; Decent song, but it is misplaced on the album - it could have fit better as the last song, I think.

Track 6: Something for Nothing - Rating: 9.5; Near perfect song, this is why Tears could not be the last song... the only thing that hurts it is that the intro is slightly too long for my taste, and the technique of fading out a song is something I generally do not like. The fadeout here still works, however, because it is not just the same riff repeated at the end, but is intricate enough to want to keep listening as it fades.

OVERALL: With two 10s and a 9.5, this is an album with great songs, including a great epic song in 2112. A few hit and miss songs take this album into the B+ range (just barely), but that would have been my impression without scoring the album.

Power Windows

Raw Score: 70.5 out of 80

Percentage: 88.125%

Grade: A-

Track 1: The Big Money - Rating: 10; A perfect opening song; great keyboard, guitar, and bass.

Track 2: Grand Designs - Rating: 10; Great riff, fantastic lyrics, good transitions, great finish to the song.

Track 3: Manhattan Project - Rating: 9

Track 4: Marathon - Rating: 9; great bass-lines, good supporting guitar work, great transitions within the song.
Track 5: Territories - Rating: 7.5; Decent song, but a bit too moody for my taste all the time - that is all that keeps it from an A- is the emotional tone... the song itself is very solid.

Track 6: Middletown Dreams - Rating: 7.5

Track 7: Emotion Detector - Rating: 8.5

Track 8: Mystic Rhythms - Rating: 9

OVERALL: A really, really good album, bordering on a great album (A, not A-). Starts of strong, near perfect, but dips a little in the latter half and comes back with two really good songs to end - this is a great progressive rock step for Rush, though I know a lot of "hardcore" Rush fans swear by the seventies and early eighties Rush, but for my money, they really hit stride in the eighties with the Prog Rock sound, while the seventies had a great hard rock/early metal sound. It is like comparing Alien to Aliens in quality - they are both great movies, but too different to compare to one another.

Presto

Raw Score: 102 out of 110

Percentage: 92.73%

Grade: A

Track 1: Show Don't Tell - Rating: 10

Track 2: Chain Lightning - Rating: 10

Track 3: The Pass - Rating: 10; One of the best Rush songs ever. Literally. If it is not my favorite, it is in the top 2 (with Cold Fire). If I had a rating higher than 10, I would give it. In fact this song does go to 11.

Track 4: War Paint - Rating: 10

Track 5: Scars - Rating: 8.5; The first "dip-down" on the album, the song is slightly less than perfect, but still phenomenal nonetheless.

Track 6: Presto - Rating: 9.5; Again, near perfect, but can't quite hold up to the first 4 tracks. The fadeout at the end isn't too bad, but takes a bit away from the song. Again it is interesting enough as it fades to want to keep listening, it isn't just the same riff repeated at the end - the worst way to end any rock song. Rush never does that.

Track 7: Superconductor - Rating: 10; WOW!!!, just when the album seems like it can't attain the perfection of the first 4 tracks, it does, and it is like starting a whole new album.

Track 8: Anagram (for Mongo) - Rating: 8.5

Track 9: Red Tide - Rating: 8

Track 10: Hand over Fist - Rating: 9

Track 11: The Wind Can Carry - Rating: 8.5

OVERALL: WOW!!! This is a freakin' great album. I have always thought that, but after reviewing this, I just put the album on again and listened to it in its entirety. 5 songs with a rating of 10, only one that dips into the B+ range, this is a must in any collection. It also has one of my "11" rated special songs that would give it a revised raw score of 103, percentage of 93.63%, but I don't know if I should actually change my score...

Fly By Night

Raw Score: 66 out of 80
Percentage: 82.5%
Grade: B+
Track 1: Anthem - Rating: 9; Good opening song, lyrically meaningful (based on Ayn Rand's only good novel, Anthem - where allegory is used appropriately and there are no ridiculously didactic diatribes)
Track 2: Best I Can - Rating: 10
Track 3: Beneath, Between and Behind - Rating: 9
Track 4: By-Tor and the Snow Dog - Rating: 7; solid rock'n'roll, with a little D & D flair, it just goes on a bit too long for what it is.
Track 5: Fly By Night - Rating: 10; might be the best song on the album - good choice for title track.
Track 6: Making Memories - Rating: 7; fairly standard rock song, but just doesn't meet up to my standards for a Rush song. I know that they were young when they wrote it, and writing a song about touring was probably fun, but it just is not an A song.
Track 7: Rivendell - Rating: 5; this is probably my least favorite Rush song (barring maybe I Think I'm Going Bald, though that song bothers me less than it used to - I wonder why?). It isn't bad, it just isn't that good either. It isn't that it is slow or acoustic, it just isn't interesting. It still is a passable song, but just barely.
Track 8: In the End - Rating: 9
Overall: A very solid album, very good followup effort to their first album, a great debut for Neil Peart's writing skills, just a few less than perfect songs mar the overall album, but still very listenable.

Subdivisions

Raw Score: 75 out of 80
Percentage: 93.75%
Grade: A
Track 1: Subdivisions - Rating: 9.5; my only complaint is that the guitar could play a more prominent roll.
Track 2: Analog Kid - Rating: 10
Track 3: Chemistry - Rating: 10
Track 4: Digital Man - Rating: 10; how can you go wrong with the contrast between this and Analog Kid. Just as the metal/hard rock sound for Rush transitions to a prog rock sound, this is the perfect picture of their growth as a band.
Track 5: The Weapon - Rating: 8; good, just not as great as the rest of the album.
Track 6: New World Man - Rating: 10
Track 7: Losing It - Rating: 9; one of their best songs in terms of evoking a mood, its only fault being that it is too good at evoking in me the sense of despair, desolation, and desperation. I can't help but being near tears every time I hear it or even when I think about it in retrospect.
Track 8: Count Down - Rating: 8.5, this is a great counterpoint to the previous song, but I think, for me it suffers from the mood the previous song evokes in me, but still a good capper to the album.
Overall: A great album, again, this is a requirement in anyone's collection who is a fan of good music. I remember in high school, in the back of Guitar Magazine, everyone who was trying to get a band together seemed to list "Pre-Signals Rush" as an influence. They were are and shall always be idiotic, because Signals is a great achievement! I give half the songs 10s (4 of 'em) and only one dipped into the B+ range, but just barely - Even though this got a higher overall score than Presto (by 1.02 percentage points, or only .12 percentage points if you count The Pass as an 11) it is hard for me to say it's better than Presto (which has more 10s and is a longer album, so more chances to go awry), it is at least as good, which makes it pretty damned fantastic.

There you go, have fun with it, for what it's worth.

Veganism, Healthy Diets, etc.

2009-08-30T13:28:00.000-07:00

So, it's been a while since I've posted, mainly because I keep on coming up with tons of things to write about and I never seem to have the time to actually write them (if you haven't noticed, my posts tend to be long, rambling diatribes), but here goes.

A couple of weeks ago, theperfectline came up for a gaming/racing weekend, and spent a good amount of time lecturing us on our diets and obesity, diabetes, etc. While I understand the intent behind his sentiments; he was motivated out of concern for his friends, he was wrong on a number of points. I didn't really want to get into it too much that night, because it would have distracted from the gaming festivities, but what the hell - online I have all the time in the world.

First, people who adopt a vegan lifestyle do not do it for health. It was started as an ethical movement and has since had people try to justify it with health benefits, but there is scant evidence of actual health benefits of veganism. In fact, the only study on longevity and diet has the vegan lifestyle and the high meat diet tied for the lowest lifespan (0.94) and a balanced diet with more fish than meat being the baseline (1.00). Even that study did not actually deal with controlling all the variables, but it is the best one out there right now. There is a study from the 7th Day Adventists that tries to justify the choice to be a vegan, but it is not a scientifically rigorous study because it does not control the other variables involved in life expectancy.

Vegans are very prone to vitamin and mineral deficiency; perfectline, you can look all you want, there are no sufficient non-animal product that produces B12 in sufficient quantities. It is a bacterial byproduct (this is how herbivores generate B12). Vegans also do not get enough DHA (an omega-3 fatty acid), iron, calcium, and iodine. They tend to be more prone to osteoporosis later in life, and if the veganism is imposed to early, the lack of fatty acids can lead to brain impairment and late onset puberty (because the fatty acids are necessary to make testosterone and estrogen).

Veganism is purely an ethical choice (there are a number of papers dedicated to this, but I do not buy the ethical equivalence between humans and animals - that is a purely metaphysical stance and is only a matter of religio/philosophical belief). Health benefits are accrued from a balanced diet, and human beings are naturally omnivorous. We have nutritional requirements that can only be met with animal products.

Here is the crux of my argument. Theperfecline has made a classic mistake in confusing weight with health. My brother, for example, is inordinately skinny, but he still has high cholesterol. My cholesterol levels are well below the dangerous levels and from a blood serum perspective, I am far more healthy than he is. He weighs about 140 lbs and is 6' 1" tall. I am between 6' 2" and 6'3" and weigh about 225. For my frame, this is significantly overweight (though it might not be overweight for others - another common misconception is that there is one ideal weight for all men of a given height and one ideal weight for all women of a given height).

I also raised the issue of the eating disorder, and perfectline immediately poo-pooed that idea, but given his lack of close relationships with the people he claims to be healthy, I would wager that he has no idea who may or may not have an eating disorder. In fact, men and women with eating disorders are notoriously good at concealing these disorders. Approximately 10 million women in the US have an eating disorder (that is "have", not have had - this does not include people who have undergone treatment and recovered). That is about 6% of women in this country, and most experts think that this is a low estimate. Something like 30% of women have or have had an eating disorder, and given the image conscious L.A. area, it is likely that the rates are significantly higher there.

An eating disorder is an characterized by an abnormal emotional response to food, rather than one based on hunger, health, or appropriate body image (appropriate is an important qualifier - most eating disorders actually have a form of body dysmorphic disorder where they feel that they never look good enough, thin enough, or attractive enough). Many young women adopt veganism or other similar diets to mask an eating disorder. Since Veganism (capitalization is important, as it really is a religious belief, not a health-based belief) is a socially acceptable choice (lauded by many, as you have seen, perfectline) it is an easy mask for an eating disorder, and I would warrant that a good percentage of the people you know who are Vegans have an undiagnosed eating disorder that they are either aware or unaware of. Veganism is such a good mask for the eating disorder that it is easy for young men and women to believe that they are doing the right thing and use this to bury the obsession with an emotional imbalance towards food.

In terms of practice, Veganism is quite varied, but at its heart it seeks to end the exploitation of any animal. Oddly enough, within the community of Vegans, there is some debate. Some people say that it is okay to have honey because bees nervous systems are so undeveloped - they make an arbitrary cutoff based on nervous systems of skeletal animals, but then get into trouble, because that would clearly indicate that crab, lobster, etc would be okay to eat. It would also mean that cephalopods would be fine, even though it is demonstrable that they are clearly more intelligent than cows and sheep. It really is ultimately an all-or-nothing argument. If you accept the tenets, then you should also not take diabetes medications (containing animal hormones and using animal research) or many other medications for that matter. You should not use anything containing any animal by-product or product - no honey, fish oils (which are very good for you), no traditionally grown produce (where animals are used to till the fields). I would argue that according to the philosophy against animal exploitation, they should not eat any plants in which animal labor was used. Of course since humans are animals, this precludes the use of human labor as it is inherently exploitative - even if farm workers are paid, they often have little to no choice in their professions - ask migrant farm workers if they can choose another profession. So, really, a true Vegan should only eat wild food that they can collect themselves.

Obviously, this is a ridiculous extension, but it is a logical conclusion of the philosophy to which many Vegans lay claim - some try to say "minimize impact" on animals to get out of this ethical conundrum, but then you admit that your life requires exploitation of other species. Since bacteria are more similar to animals than plants (they do not produce their own food), one could make the case that even the use of your own internal bacteriological systems are exploitative, and that B12 supplements should not be consumed, even though they are required for human health. Again, a tad ludicrous, but not a large logical leap.

And as I sit here watching the Fruit Chan horror film "Dumplings" (laden with very interesting social commentary - I highly recommend it), I recall one of my more vehement oppositions to Veganism. It is not that it equates animals to humans, it is that it elevates them above humans. Vegans are so adamant that animals not be exploited that they do not care if humans are exploited to produce the food that they want. While some will adhere to strictly "organic" food (what the hell that means is debatable, but that is for another blog), even organic farms will use migrant workers for very little pay. They never think of these consequences, however, as Veganism is largely a "feel-good" philosophy - I feel like I am doing something good and just whether I am or not.

Which brings me to a final thought. I wonder how many Vegans are in support of embryonic stem cell research. To my mind, this is a clear violation of there ethics unless humans somehow occupy a lower rung on the animal totem pole. If you won't even eat an egg - an unfertilized chicken ovum, how could you justify the use of fertilized ova in experimentation?

Also, the assumption that we eat like that every day is specious at best. You go out drinking every weekend, are we to assume that this means that you cannot refrain from drinking during the week. Alcohol is far more addictive than food, and I would be more concerned about someone who needed to drink every weekend than someone who had a few donuts on the weekend - and since they are calorically similar, who is really less healthy. Couple this with extremely risky behavior behind the wheel of an automobile, Mr. "I've been in 10 accidents" and tell me who really has a riskier lifestyle. And, yes, because you and supergoober are my friends I am concerned by the way you comport yourselves behind the wheel on the road - not on the track, it is much safer to do it there - not because you are bad drivers, but because not everyone on the road will respond appropriately. A ninety mile per hour collision is much more deadly than a little fried food every weekend. As detective Frank Dreben said, "You take a risk getting up in the morning, crossing the street, or sticking your face in the fan."

Please stop sticking your face in the fan, and remove the plank from your own eye before examining the mote in mine.

The Best Rush Album

2009-07-23T17:16:00.001-07:00

I suppose anyone reading this knows that my favorite band of all time is Rush, and I pretty much like to love everything that they have done. I find them musically intriguing (as much as an untalented idiot like myself could appreciate the musical aspect), lyrically compelling, and just overall fantastic. I find myself emotionally and intellectually engaging the music, and I think that this is a sign of the true greatness of the band. I know that there are probably a lot of other people who feel similarly, but I am going to make a bold statement of which album of theirs is my favorite.

The best Rush album (according to me) is ... DRUMROLL, PLEASE ... "Counterparts". Of course, if you read my last few blogs, you would already know that answer. The album is simply wonderful. I am not going to attempt to analyze it from a musical perspective, I can't - I simply have no talent in that direction. But I will say that I love every song on that album and whenever I put it on, I listen to the whole thing - I do not think I have ever skipped a song by clicking forward on the CD. I happened to be talking to a friend about this, and he thought that he would listen to and rate all of the Rush albums. I am going to attempt to do the same thing in the next several days. Again, realize that I will rate a song on the overall impression that it makes on me, encompassing lyrics, music, and emotional reaction - if a sad song makes me feel sad, then it is a successful song (like "Losing It" - second to last song on Subdivisions, eh ntt's brain?)

But then I thought, "How should I rate them?", and I immediately answered myself, "Of course, I'll use the same scale I use to grade math problems at school." Let me explain. I have always hated math problems that are worth 4 points and the teacher takes off a point if you screw up a negative sign or make a trivial copy error. This is not to say that those errors are unimportant, I just would like teachers to know the weight that they give a particular problem. In the aforementioned example, if a kid transcribed the problem wrong and a teacher took of 1 point out of four, the teacher is tacitly sending the message that copying the problem correctly is more important than doing the math correctly. The student has achieved a 75% on that problem, a C in most classes in high school, so that transcription error takes someone from excellent to average. That is appropriate if that is what the teacher wants to emphasize, but I think many teachers do not even think that far ahead (even math teachers, for whom the numbers should make the most sense). To counter this I put together the following scale:

90-100% A
85-89 A-
80-84 B+
75-79 B
70-74 B-
65-69 C+
60-64 C
50-59 C-
0-49 F

Each problem on a test is worth 10 points (on rare occasions 5 if the problem doesn't warrant that much weight in the scope of the overall test), and then when I make a point deduction I am completely cognizant of what grade I am giving. For example, if a problem has a trivial mistake with a minus sign, I might take off half a point or a point, and the student still has an A on that problem (9.5 = 95%, 9 = 90%), however in a problem where that negative means direction or decreasing versus increasing rate of change (topics where understanding the implication of the negative are important) dropping a negative could warrant a much greater penalty, like 3 points - taking that problem score from an A to a B-.

So back to Rush. I am going to listen to every song on every album and attempt to rate them all on this scale of 0 to 10. I will then add up the scores, divide by the number of songs, and multiply by 100 to get a percentage score, then make a list of the albums that I like most to the ones I like least, and have the score with it. I may also post how I rate each song, but I am not sure. Keep in mind that I am a huge Rush fan, so I will be as objective as I can in rating my subjective response (kinda silly thought, huh?), but it is unlikely that many songs will receive below a 5.

Just for reference, here are the 18 albums I will be rating. I will not be dealing with live albums (though these are truly masterpieces as well) or the cover-tune album that they did a few years back (again, good covers of songs they loved as kids, but not in the purview of this list). So here are the albums, in the best chronological order I can muster from memory:

Rush
Fly by Night
Caress of Steel
2112
Farewell to Kings
Hemispheres
Permanent Waves
Moving Pictures
Signals
Grace Under Pressure
Power Windows
Hold Your Fire
Presto
Roll the Bones
Counterparts
Test for Echo
Vapor Trails
Snakes and Arrows

Should be an interesting undertaking (for me, maybe not for you), but at least you won't have to read about politics today.

PS you may have noticed that I do not include Ds in my grade scale - this is because I don't believe in them. They exist mostly to alleviate a teacher's guilt at not having done enough or to avoid the hassle of giving a failing grade to a student. It is my job and the student's job to make sure that s/he knows enough to pass the course. To get an F, you actually have to prove to me that you deserve it. You have to demonstrate to me that you know nothing of the course and you want to do nothing to pass the course. Since I also allow retakes of tests, there is no reason anyone shouldn't pass my course. (I allow retakes because I don't care when you learn it necessarily, I care that you learn it. Of course, to incentivize learning it earlier, there is a maximum of a 70%, a B-, that you can earn on a retake.)

Does Obama Really Want Cost Control, or Just Government Control?

2009-07-21T15:10:00.000-07:00

Don't worry, this will be quick. I just want to highlight one more point of hypocrisy on the part of the Obama-style health care reform. I will address other topics in a later blog, as I am rather busy right now, but I just had a quick thought on which I had to write.

About a year ago, if memory serves, some Republicans tried to put forth a health care reform bill. They had tried several times before with the same style of legislation, but health insurance companies have strong lobbies that influence both Dems and Repubs. The basics of the plan that they proposed, which seem reasonable to anyone I have ever posited them to, was that Americans should be able to purchase health insurance from any provider, rather than just be limited to insurers in state. This would allow actual competition and is generally not favored by states because they have a vested interest in keeping the insurers under state regulation (and in keeping insurance lobbying money flowing to state and federal officials). Incidentally, Obama voted against this.

Even the most ardent liberal cannot fail to see that an expanded availability of competition reduces prices (that is the argument they use to favor a government "option"). This is a very common sense and simple reform that does not gain traction for the aforementioned reasons, even though many health reform organizations and doctor organizations favor this.

Of course, this raises the question, "Why would Obama oppose this if he is in favor of controlling costs?" Simple, he is not about controlling costs as much as he is about a government sponsored and run health care plan. He has shown far left tendencies in virtually every aspect of his governance, and this is no exception. It is no surprise that I do not agree with leftist agendas, and I would not have a problem with it if he had been elected on these agendas, because clearly, the will of the people is for that agenda. But he was elected on a centrist platform, and he is doing little to live up to that.

If you want to read more, just check out old bill's sponsored by Shadegg (I think this is the spelling, I am going from memory). He tried the same thing several years in a row (in a Dem controlled congress - guess they didn't really want Health Care Reform all that bad, did they?)

Dead Snow and Regret

2009-07-21T12:31:00.000-07:00

So, I went to the Roxie last night and saw the Norwegian movie "Dead Snow". In truth, I was not exactly sure what to expect - but with the tag line "Ein, Zwie, DIE!", how could I resist. In truth, it was a fun little film in the style of an "Evil Dead II". There were a lot of funny moments and lines, and, all-in-all, I really enjoyed the film. I won't go into too much detail, but I think that I can highly recommend this film. Was it great? No. Was it a fun Nazi-Zombie-Comedy-Gore-Fest? Hell, yes. 'Nuff said.

The day before, we went to the Samurai exhibition at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco. And here is where the regret comes in. I had a wonderful time at the exhibit - virtually all of the samurai relics were from the Hosokawa dynasty (I believe that these are all from the old Higo province, if my knowledge of Japanese history and Nobunaga's Ambition serves me correctly). It was a fascinating look at an interesting piece of cultural history. What I really liked the most were the older charcoal brush painting and calligraphy. The swords and armor were all well and good, and I did enjoy seeing them, but the artwork is something that has always fascinated me.

Charcoal and water are terribly difficult to work with as a medium. They are completely unforgiving, and any mistake is glaringly obvious. (Trust me, I've tried to do this, and I keep trying - it is tough.) You have to commit fully to each brush stroke and you also have to have in mind exactly what the piece of art should look like before putting brush to page. In essence, the whole picture is contained in the first brush stroke. So as an art form, this is particularly intellectually engaging to me.

But further than this, it is an art form that engages me on an emotional level - in many (not all) cases. I find the intellectual concept of one well-defined, decisive stroke creating an artistic impression to be intensely moving. I do not get this response from many painting styles - either I am incapable of appreciating them, or they are so far out of the scope of my affordability range that I will suppress any emotional response so I do not experience the regret at not being able to get that response by regularly interacting with that piece of art. For me this emotional response is not just limited to visual art, but it is also a way that I interact with some music. For example, I am huge fan of the band, Rush. My favorite rush album is "Counterparts" - an album that came out in 1993 (I know that this I might be the only Rush fan to say that, but for me, this album is intensely moving). I actually get chills just thinking about listening to the album - it does that much to me every time I listen to it.

This is an uncommon phenomenon for me - as a result of lifelong struggles with mood disorders, I have spent years suppressing and managing my emotional responses. It is very difficult for me to get legitimately excited or frightened; this is one of the reasons I gravitate things like the horror genre, thrill rides, rock climbing, combat sports, etc. So when I encounter a piece of art that moves me in this way, I generally will want to purchase it, especially if the art is within my means. The piece that I saw at the museum store had a price tag of $350, well within my price range (I have $400 set aside for blackjack in my upcoming Reno trip, and I would have gladly used this instead of playing blackjack with it). Supergoober and ntt's brain both advised that I sleep on it and having done that for two days, all I am experiencing is regret at not purchasing this piece.

Was it overpriced? Probably... it was for sale at a museum store - the markup was probably 1.5 to 3 times what it would have sold for in a gallery. Would this have been worth it to me? Absolutely. I think, given my normally rational approach to things, my friends simply assumed that I was succumbing to an impulse buy kind of phenomenon. I do not begrudge them this - they clearly had my best interest at heart. That they do not know this about me is, again, my fault. I have not taken the time to discuss these matters with them - it can be difficult to discuss my emotional states as being overly managed because of a tendency of mine to overreact - these are just not topics that come up in everyday conversation. So, first, I would like to apologize for not revealing this aspect of myself, and second, I am going to go back and see if I can get a hold of this piece ... hopefully I do not get more disappointment and regret.

Again, thanks, guys, for looking out for me, and my apologies for not really explaining what was going on.

Sonia Sotomayor - Lacking Judical Temperment?

2009-07-14T21:03:00.000-07:00

First, supergoober, re our hour-long conversation that kept you from your darling wife, I will blog on that soon, and apologize again for me - I did not mean to keep you talking quite so long (manic, anyone?). But as for Sotomayor, I have been wanting to blog on this for a month and a half, ever since I first heard her name bandied about as a candidate for the Supreme Court. I vaguely remember her first appointment and some controversy for the 2nd circuit court of appeals, so I did a bit of research, and I do not believe she has the temperament to be any kind of judge (in fact, she would not actually pass the standard to be a juror in most districts in the U.S. - more later).

Here is my problem, in a nutshell. First, the issue with the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund is not an issue. I do not care whether she is liberal or conservative personally. The fact that she is liberal is fine, she has that right as an American, and as a liberal lawyer she should take up liberal causes. That is what lawyers do, and even if the Fund is extremely leftist, or whatever, that does not matter. She was a lawyer, and was doing what fit with her conscience and belief system. That is what any person in any job should be doing. The fact that she had a socialist quote in her 1976 college yearbook - so what. How many kids coming out of college are enamored with idealistic ideas, or in love with the social justice aspects of socialism. Again, this is a non-issue. She was even on a board and on a website of an international socialist organization (she has since been removed from that at her own request) - again, a non issue. So what if she is a socialist. Last I checked the country is free and you can have whatever political affiliations that you like. And did anyone really expect Obama to nominate a conservative? Of course not. Whoever he nominates will be, on the political spectrum, decidedly left of center. Politics are politics, and always will be.

But a judge is supposed to be able to take those personal biases and set them aside. This is part of the symbolism of the judicial robes - they are meant to obscure class, race, and all other potential biases. They are currently a symbol of fairness - the person in the robe does not matter, they are supposed to be an impartial arbiter of the law. Compassion and empathy are not supposed to be part of the equation...

Now, before the hue and cry of, "WTF are you talking about?!?!?", hear me out. A judge should be able to find in favor of a plaintiff or defendant that s/he does not like. Sympathy for one party means that you are no longer an impartial arbiter of justice. This was the case a hundred and fifty years ago and is still the case now. If a judge from the 1800s had sympathy for a white man, and antipathy for a minority, justice was not served. This happened far too frequently and was fundamentally unfair. The person of color was not receiving equal justice under the law. When we have sympathy or empathy for one party in a court situation, that is fine, but a judge or a jury cannot afford that luxury. In fact, many judges have said that the cases of which they are the most proud is the ones where they found in favor of someone they did not like. Experiencing these emotions is inevitable - it is what makes us human, but putting them aside in the cause of fairness and justice is what takes us to a more transcendent state of being - a bit dramatic, yes, but I sincerely believe this.

Sotomayor is sorely lacking in this department. Her history of judgements are colored by personal biases. The most recent controversial one is the one about the firefighter who got a high score on an advancement exam - she threw out the exam because too few minorities did well on it. She ignored the fact that the white fireman was a minority (dyslexic - a minority in terms of disability) that was underrepresented as well (not that this matters) who went to great personal expense and effort to prepare for the test because he really wanted to advance as a firefighter. Even other Clinton appointees think that this decision was asinine, and even her supporters give a terrible reason for the decision. I have heard her defenders say that she was concerned that the city would get sued if she found any other way. If this is actually the case, then there is no way she should be a judge. A judge is not supposed to be swayed by the impact of his/her decision - they are supposed to make a judgement on the merit of the case and the law. If a judge can be swayed by outside forces, then the whole idea of jurisprudence is out the window.

And this is where Sotomayor is an abject failure. She has been criticized by both liberal and conservative judges. A BRIEF ASIDE -As much as most conservative pundits love to say this, most liberal judges do not create law, they interpret the law that is there on the books already. Their interpretation may not be as strict as constitutional constructionists think that it should be, but there is a very small minority of judges (on either the left or the right) that simply make up law. Similarly, there are very few excessively conservative judges that simply chuck out precedent and decide against cases that have a long history of case law even if the constitutional justification is a bit fuzzy. In short, most people on both sides get up in arms over very little when it comes to judges, and they really just don't like if they think that a judge won't decide in favor of their side, rather than wanting what the Constitution demands - that is good judicial temperament. All history and protocol demands that this be the thing on which senators decide, but that has not really been the case since Bork (both sides are guilty of this, by the way, but I tend to notice the ones on the left as doing this far more frequently, especially in the Bush administration's appointees). - ASIDE ENDED. Sotomayor is one of those rare judges who seems to have no sense of proportion and makes asinine statements and decisions based not on precedent but on prejudice. By prejudice, I mean the true nature of the word. She seems to have pre-judged her cases - she comes to the conclusion before hearing the facts and either fails to cite precedent, or reaches back to the most obscure precedent available that backs up what she says. Two examples that are worrisome, one you have probably heard of, the other not:

1) The firefighter discrimination suit. People in the court tell of her harassing tone, her bias against the person bringing the suit and her general demeanor throughout the case as seeming like her decision was a forgone conclusion. Her unpublished opinion (this is not an uncommon occurrence, many decisions are not published to the public, so I will not fault her for that) contains, from what I understand, no citation of precedent. She was grilled about this in the senate hearings, and though she responded well to the bit about the opinion being unpublished, that was ancillary to the question. The questioner wanted to know why she did not cite precedent and she refused to answer. This is not the temperament we want from any judge, let alone a supreme court justice. Another judge on the same circuit court of appeals, his name eludes me, but he was a Clinton appointee as well, basically said that he thought her decision and the unpublished opinion that she wrote was one of the worst decisions he had ever seen. Everyone makes a bad judgement now and again, but she has had, in my opinion made many (like deciding that the EPA could not use a cost-benefit analysis in addressing clean water issues - one of the stupidest decisions I have ever read, and another one involving a class action suit which was barred by law, where she just decided to disregard the law - the Supreme Court turned her down 8-0 on that fiasco)

2) The next case ignores a lot of case law and reaches into the early annals of US case law, and this should be troubling to people on both sides of the aisle, as it shows a tendency to judge based on personal opinion rather than on facts and precedent. In a lawsuit on New York gun control laws, she cites precedent that says that the 2nd amendment does not apply to state or local laws, but only to federal restrictions. She cites case law from the 1870s and 1880s for this judgement. Here's the problem, however. For about the first hundred and twenty ish years of our nation's history, the Bill of Rights was deemed to only apply to the Federal Government. That means that states, or even local municipalities or towns could actually establish religions, restrict free speech, ignore due process, pursue cruel and unusual punishment, etc. While she is absolutely correct in her assertion that the two cases she cited did deal with the constitutionality of applying gun control laws on a local rather than federal level, and there is little other case law in any other direction, she has ignored a hundred and twenty plus years of gradual transference of the Constitutional protections of rights protecting us against state encroachments as well. It is this trend that actually removed state sponsored religions (which this nation had - there were states that were Catholic, and others that were Protestant - no state ever adopted Neo-Paganism, sorry acupuncturist), gave us Miranda rights, the right to privacy, the right to due process on a state level, etc. Formerly, all of these protections were only that the Federal Government could not encroach on the rights established in the Constitution. The 14th amendment went a long way to redressing some of the inequities in freedoms, but because it is subject to interpretation, some judges, especially in the late 1800s, tried to circumvent it.

A brief refresher: I have included section 1 of the amendment, below.

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Of course, I introduced the bold-faced, red part, because I think that it spells out rather clearly that states cannot take away constitutional rights of citizens. Sotomayor's decision ignores that fact, and she sides with court opinions that were made by Courts that were trying deliberately to limit the power of the 14th Amendment.

Here's why this is worrisome for both sides. If she is willing to violate the 14th Amendment and find obscure case law to validate that, she could do that for any other cause that she espouses. Let's not forget she is a Latin Catholic (most people call 'em Roman Catholics, but what even most Roman Catholics don't know is that we are actually Latin Catholics - the Roman bit is something of an insult handed to us by the Protestants). We do not know where she stands on gay marriage or abortion - she has not made many decisions on these, and if she actually decides that she can flout precedent, she could easily justify the eradication of the so-called "right to privacy". This could lead to an interesting situation on the high court.

Not that I think that one person will overturn abortion or undo gay rights, but it is something that should concern people on the right and the left - she has shown repeatedly her willingness to ignore precedent in favor of her opinion.

And this is not to even mention her speeches, where she has repeatedly said such foolish things as

a "wise Latina" can make better decisions than a white man
there are "physiological, emotional, and sociological reasons" that a Latina will make better decisions than a white man
that appellate courts are "where policy is made" and that judges should essentially be making social policy (this is obviously under the purview of legislators)
that empathy is an important quality for a judge, and that empathy can and should override logic and adherence to precedent and case law.

There are many more, but I think you can see that she would not even qualify to be a California juror with these opinions. For your edification, the summary of what California jurors are required to do, as well as the jury instructions:

The process of questioning and excusing jurors continues until 12 persons are accepted as jurors for the trial. Alternate jurors may also be selected. The judge and attorneys agree that these jurors are qualified to decide impartially and intelligently the factual issues in the case. When the selection of the jury is completed, the jurors take the following oath:

"Do you, and each of you, understand and agree that you will well and truly try the cause now pending before this court, and a true verdict render according only to the evidence presented to you and to the instructions of the court?"

As a juror you should think seriously about the oath before taking it. The oath means you give your word to reach your verdict upon only the evidence presented in the trial and the court's instructions about the law. You cannot consider any other evidence and instruction other than those given by the court in the case before you. Remember that your role as a juror is as important as the judge's in making sure that justice is done.

(http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/jury/step1.htm)

If she can't even pass the juror qualifications, what makes us think that she can be on the high court of the land. And just to be clear, if I encountered these same qualities in someone who agreed with my positions, I would still oppose that person. (In fact, she may share some of my views on abortion, but I would not approve of her flouting the 14th Amendment to restrict access to abortions.)

How Could I Forget...

2009-07-10T17:46:00.001-07:00

... Bisping vs Henderson. I watched the on demand free content on the interviews of these two, and I came up with some interesting conclusions. Henderson, while he is a great fighter is inconsistent and near delusional in his thoughts on training. He maintains that since he has been training wrestling since he was a child that he is clearly a superior wrestler. Bisping does not argue that point, but argues that he has trained to stop takedowns for a long time, and does a good job of it. Henderson then makes the statement that his standup is as good as Bisping's. This is just silly. Just like Henderson has trained wrestling since he was a kid, Bisping has trained in striking since he was a kid.

And here is the real difference. It is pretty easy to stuff a takedown or pop back up after one. The hard part of wrestling is learning to take a guy down and keep him down. Henderson has this in spades. Bisping, however, does have very good takedown defense, and should prevent most of the attempts and probably won't get too roughed up on the ground. It is much harder to get proficient at defending yourself in a striking match. In striking, offense is easy to learn, in wrestling defense is easy to learn. If Henderson thinks that he will be able to stand and bang with Bisping, he is sorely mistaken, and he could get knocked out. Bisping even predicts this (of course). Henderson's camp thinks that this is the height of absurdity, citing that he was not KOed by either Wanderlei Silva or Quentin "Rampage" Jackson. But neither of those men are truly what I would call striking specialists. They are both powerful, but their technique is weak - they make up for this with aggression, and that is why both are exciting fighters; you know that they will beat the crap out of someone and probably get beat around themselves. Look at Machida or Anderson Silva if you want to see real striking specialists - they feint, not with an arm or a leg, but with their bodies. They move at angles, they set up punches with kicks and kicks with punches. They block, counter, and evade. Bisping fights like this as well, and if Henderson does not get inside and try to take him down, he will lose, likely by knockout. Take a look at Nogueira vs Mir. Nogueira had never been knocked out and a life long striker did it with ease. Anderson Silva makes opponents look silly with his striking prowess. Anyone can learn to throw a punch or a kick, but it takes time to learn how to do it well so that you don't get smacked with a counter.

This is where BJJ and wrestling proponents miss the boat. They get a taste of what it feels like to throw a great punch or kick with power, and they think that this makes them a good striker. It takes as much training and technique to be great at striking as it does to be great at BJJ or wrestling. However, any idiot can throw his hand out there, and if it his the hand of a muscular idiot, it can hurt a lot. Try checking way back in the archives - Maurice Smith vs Mark Coleman (UFC 14 or 15 if I recall) - I remember Smith saying that Coleman punched like a girl, and that an experienced kickboxer like him wouldn't even notice those blows. He was right, and won that fight, with ease if I recall. It takes real skill to be a good striker, and that is why you see them starting to dominate the UFC.

The BJJ and wrestling advocates write off the skill level of strikers at their own peril, beacause a good strong striker who learns a bit of takedown defense becomes very dangerous indeed. One need look no farther than Anderson Silva and Lyoto Machida to see this. I am not saying that wreslters and BJJ guys can't be great strikers, or can't beat great strikers, I am saying that they have to recognize that striking is a lot more than throwing an arm or a leg out like you ar swinging a club. There is a reason why boxing has long been referred to as the "Sweet Science".

UFC 100, Legacies and Dynasties in the UFC

2009-07-09T07:53:00.000-07:00

WOW - Lesnar vs. Mir II. Honestly, I do not give Mir much of a chance. Brock is evolving into a complete fighter; that coupled with his overwhelming physical presence makes it unlikely that he will be beaten anytime soon. Of course, this is the UFC and anything can happen, but let me outline this for you. If you look at the size of his head and neck, you can see that the chance of a flash knockout from anyone is minimal. His neck and arms are so huge that submissions via choke and arm locks are equally unlikely. His weakness is his legs - he could still fall victim to repeated kicks to the leg or leg locks; however, after falling victim to a leg lock from Mir, I know he has trained extensively to counter this eventuality. In addition, his physical presence enables a "wading in" and punching/wrestling style that leaves very few opportunities to land kicks to the legs. In short, I think Brock could be champ for quite a while.

The more interesting fight is GSP vs Thiago Alves. I like both these fighters, but I would love for Alves to win. The 170 pound division has lots of good fighters, and I like the mix up in the division. I think that this will be a much more exciting fight than the Mir-Lesnar fight, and I hope for a great showing for the American Top Team from Alves. GSP can never be overlooked, so it should be a fantastic fight.

But here is some interesting things about the UFC right now. With the top three weight classes dominated by Anderson Silva, Lyoto Machida, and Brock Lesnar, I do not see much in the way of competition for anyone coming down the pike anytime soon. Lesnar is too huge (and now well-rounded), Machida is too evasive (and well-rounded), and Silva is too potent a striker (and well-rounded) for any of them to be taken out by anything but a total fluke. If you want my prognostication, however, Silva is the most likely to descend back to earth. He is too cocky and, at times, lackadaisical in his approach to his opposition - he could get caught and lose, and it will probably happen long before it happens to Lesnar or Machida (both of whom have extreme focus).

Now, how about some of my dreams - Silva has gone up in weight before - what about a Silva vs Machida fight - absolutely amazing. I don't know if he could move down to fight GSP or Alves, but maybe a catch-weight fight between Silva and GSP or Alves. What about a catch-weight bout between Machida and Lesnar? Machida would be physically vastly over-matched, but could he be elusive enough to actually provide Lesnar with competition? I don't know but I would give my eye-teeth to see any of those fights.

Obama Gets One Right - Kudos an Order

2009-07-09T07:33:00.000-07:00

So, as I am sure you all know, I am no fan of the policies our current president is pursuing. For the most part, I believe they are inherently damaging to the economy, the country, and, most importantly, to human dignity and spirit. All those details on my many criticisms can be found in previous and forthcoming blogs. But, as opposed to fundamentalists on either side, I am more than willing to say when he does something that I view as correct. This is a small thing, on its face, but I still believe that it deserves mention, because it means there may be some truth to his advertising himself as a moderate. For me, most of his positions have fallen significantly left of center - if you like that, fine, but I have philosophical oppositions to that (ask theAcupuncturist, I am sure he could detail many of my oppositions, as well as having persuasive counterarguments - not persuasive enough to change my opinion, but cogent and coherent).

So, as I said before, and far be it from me to be a nattering nabob of nascent narcissistic negativism (take that Spiro Agnew, you ain't the only one who can use alliteration!), I would like to say that I have a glimmer of hope when I hear the president talk about another stimulus package. It is no surprise that I felt the initial stimulus was wasteful and near criminal in its lack of addressing economic issues - it was more a Democratic wish list that they had been waiting 8 years to pass. So imagine my surprise when I heard the president's response to the congress's expressed desire to pass another stimulus package. In brief, his response was hold on, wait a minute, let's see how the first one works - let's give it some time to kick in.

Honestly, I don't believe the first one will ever "kick in" (I don't believe Obama ever used any of the words above, I am just paraphrasing while keeping the intent of his statement). Keynesian economics has not ever and will not ever work - details, again, in a forthcoming blog. Let's just say we've tried it, many European nations have tried it, Japan tried it 9 times in it's "lost decade" of the 90s, and it never worked. It didn't work in the Great Depression, and it will not work now. But I still hold cautious optimism that Obama might see that this is not actually the path to economic success. The government cannot make economic success, because it only takes money from the private sector and gives it back in a less efficient manner (using up some in bureaucratic nonsense) - no wealth is generated this way, the government produces nothing. This is not to say that government has no role - it just cannot actual run or create a successful economy. One only need look as far as the socialist democracies of Europe, communism in China and Russia, and the trade protections that the US and Japan has engaged in to see that it is not a long-term recipe for success. In the short run, it can seem to have positive effects, but it is not a long-term strategy. hopefully, Obama will begin to realize this and pull back from his more drastic programs that inhibit success and become more of the moderate that he claimed to be in the campaign.

ADDICTION IS NOT A DISEASE!!!!

2009-07-06T07:58:00.001-07:00

Well, now that I have your attention with a title that is almost guaranteed to be controversial, let me explain what I mean. I have seen and heard a number of debates, television programs, etc. all talking about the disease aspects of addiction. I have a number of different problems with this particular definition.

I am not going to say that there is not a physical or genetic component to compulsive behavior, because there clearly is. My problem with the disease definition is that it expiates the need for personal responsibility on the part of the individual. I am not responsible for stealing, my drug addiction pushed me to it. I am not responsible for losing my house, my gambling addiction caused that. I am not responsible for destroying my family, my alcohol addiction caused that.

Now I am not saying that people who have these disorders (characterised by compulsive behavior) are not sad cases, nor am I saying that all addicts make excuses like this - on the contrary, it is the non-addict population who generally makes these kinds of arguments. But notice that I did use the moniker "disorder" rather than disease. For many, this might be pure semantics, but for me it is not. A disease implies no choice - you cannot "will away" the symptoms. Even the physical components of addiction still have a choice involved. Diseases have no choice - once you have them you cannot get rid of them.

Of course, most treatment programs have this as part of their mantra - once I have this disease, I have it forever, I can never have another drink, another pill, or whatever, but to me I still think this is a distinction without a difference. You can still choose to not have the disease. The disease proponents define the cravings as the disease, while I define the cravings as more akin to a mood disorder.

Let me be more specific. If you get cancer, AIDS, Lyme disease, swine flu, or any other physical ailments, you cannot use a cognitive coping skill to stop the symptoms. You cannot just choose not to have cancer. There may have been choice involved in getting the disease - by exposing yourself to risks, but I am talking about the actual disease. You cannot just say, "I don't have AIDS", and then the AIDS is gone. However, you can say that I will not take that next drink, pill, or whatever.

The world of psychological disorders is varied and, in some ways, controversial. (Interestingly enough, Madhouse by Anthrax just started playing on my play list - fun little coincidence). Many psychological problems have psychiatric components, an most illnesses can be treated by a combination of drugs and counseling. But even people in the medical world draw a distinction between mental illness and mood disorder. For example, if I have schizophrenia and hear voices, no amount of choice on my part makes me not here the voices. Even medications are only mediocre at suppressing this, and cognitive coping skills only help alleviate the person's reaction to the auditory hallucinations. Someone with clinical depression (like me, for example) can actually change their symptoms with sufficient cognitive coping skills. I can, essentially, will myself to feel better. While I always have some symptoms of the disorder, I can take positive actions to make it so that I experience less or no symptoms. Since these are within my power, I am responsible for my own state of mind. I am responsible for seeking out help when I need it, or for maintaining my good mental state by good personal habits that reinforce my good state.

"Addiction" is very similar to this. Most addictions should be more properly called compulsions, especially the ones that involve a social behavior - like gambling, for example. Gambling can be compulsive, but it is not an addictive disease. If I have to get in my car, fill it with gas, drive 3 and a half hours to Atlantic City, access my bank account, take out a loan on my home, then lose all my money gambling, why would this be anyone but my fault. I cannot blame my "gambling addiction" or the casino - I am an idiot. Believe it or not, a few years back, some idiot did exactly that and tried suing the casino for not appropriately monitoring his behavior because he had a gambling addiction.

Addiction is much more akin to a mood disorder. By elevating it to the status of disease, we abrogate any responsibility on the part of the abuser. It does not help them to get clean, any more than the "12-step" program of acknowledging you are powerless over your addiction and you need God's help to get through it. (Incidentally, 12 step success rate is about the same as quitting cold-turkey with no assistance, the God thing is just the brainchild of the devotee who created the program. I am not saying faith plays no part in combating addiction, I just don't buy the 12 step idea. If you do, and it works for you, that is great). My problem with that should be obvious - if you do not believe in God, then you cannot recover from your addiction according to this model, and I have severe reservations about sentencing drug/alcohol offenders to these programs - it is a bit too close to state-sponsored religion.

But I have gone rather far afield (this is why I try to write everything in one sitting, rather than starting and coming back later). The fact that we can make rational decisions is one key thing that separates us from animals. We are not slaves to instinctual behavior, we can actually make real choices about behavior. We do not act on every sexual impulse, every hunger, or every desire. We do not mindlessly engage in physical tests to attract mates, nor do we attack anything that encroaches on our territory. While we have an animal nature, there is something different about us. We are not just bundles of incoherent instinct and desire, forced into gratifying our every whim. We are social, rational, emotional, and spiritual - all of these play into what and who each of us are (and while you may not buy the spiritual bit, you would be hard pressed to counter any other of the three). We are capable of self-denial, even to the point of self-destruction. To claim that we have to fall victim to our desires is to deny the noblest part of our nature. If a person can starve himself to death (or near to death) or immolate himself in protest of human rights abuses, if we can subject ourselves to beatings and torture because we believe in a cause that is greater than ourselves (even if the cause may not end up being right) - if we can overcome our very survival instinct, surely it is not to much to ask to overcome addictive tendencies.

Believe me, I have them myself. I could virtually guarantee that I have a huge potential problem with any substance were I to engage in that activity. I even approach prescriptions somewhat warily because I know myself. If I start to feel like I need to do something, that is when I refuse to do it. I have taken heavy-duty narcotic painkillers to deal with pain from injury or oral surgery, and I have had times when I felt like taking a pill or two, even if I didn't really need it, and even though it had no apparent effect on me. This is a trigger for me to stop. I can recognize impulses and stop myself. It is a skill every person has, impulse control (those who have none are not long for civilized life) - we do not say everything or do everything that comes into our head, we self-censor for our own and others well-being. To forgo these qualities is to become ultimately self-centered and narcissistic to the point where only your own appetites matter, and all else becomes secondary - in effect you sacrifice your own humanity and become more of an animal than a person. I believe that we are better than that, and we ought to be careful how we classify a psycho-social problem like addiction/compulsion.

Let me give you another example. All my friends know that I am a gambler. I have a "system" like every gambler, and like every gambler, I believe mine works (I know it works, because I have actually kept track of every dollar I have spent over the last 3 years, and I am well ahead of even), but that notwithstanding, I can still recognize compulsive behavior. I know when to stop because I feel like I have to continue. If I ever get that feeling, I force myself to stop. If I ever think about doing something that I would regret telling my wife or my friends, I stop. I do not lie about my wins or my losses, any temptation to do so is a clear indicator that I am making a poor choice and I should not continue in that course of action.

This is not some unique ability - all it takes is a modicum of self awareness; something that we as a society seem to want to completely stamp out in favor of an all-encompassing nanny state that takes care of us... and I think I'll leave it there, because this goes into my response to SuperGoober's response to my health care blog... I understand that he is detailing some opposition arguments and some of his own, but he has missed some of the point of what I wrote and also used some specious reasoning (a rarity for him, but it is a mistake we all make from time to time). I will try to address everything tomorrow, but I am going to be playing some 40k in the evening, so I don't know if I will be able to blog.

BTW, I am not heading to Reno this weekend. I feel kind of lonely and depressed, and that is never a good combination in a casino, so I am going to be gaming instead. Hopefully, this will bring me out of my funk. The wife came home for two days, but now she is gone away again. It is a weird feeling coming home to an empty home. We've been apart before (my camping trips, etc.), but it is different coming to an empty house that we have been sharing for 11 years. We've been living together for about 15 years, so this is just a weird, depressing couple of months. I don't have any idea how you can do it, ntt's brain. I mean, I am an antisocial loner, and all, and I could adjust to this pretty easily, but I really don't want to go back to being that way...

Wow, that is just too damn depressing, sorry all... I am going to watch the top 10 UFC fights of all time on Spike, that should cheer me up ;)

On A Lighter Note (or maybe a darker one if I join the Sith)

2009-07-03T07:43:00.000-07:00

Just purchased a new toy online a couple of nights ago, sort of a birthday present to myself - the Master Replicas Force FX light saber construction kit -super awesome. It comes with an LED lightstrip tube,a bunch of handle pieces, etc, etc - supposedly 800+ combinations available (pretty easy to get this number of combos - just use permutation/combination mathematics - since order of assembly doesn't matter, the combination math is what you use -- n!/(r!(n-r)!) if I recall correctly).

Anyway, the light tube has a switch setting to red, green, or blue, and comes with about 15 pieces for different handle combos, it has different idle hum settings as well, and most are sold out at most places (a bunch had them cheaper than 120 dollars, but everywhere that did had them sold out, and the licence has expired for MR star wars, so they are unsure whether they will get anymore, so I bit the bullet and stimulated the economy on my own). I should get it in a week or so, and I may purchase a second set if they still have them and I like it well enough. My Darth Vader saber is showing signs of wear, however - I let some kids play with it, and the LED strip is not as bright (not a battery issue, I think some of the connections may be damaged in the tube). But whatever, it is still cool, and what good is a toy if you don't play with it and share it with others who will enjoy it - why else would I keep them in my classroom?

I'll try uploading a picture of it when I get it.

A Little News - A Month Late

2009-07-03T06:47:00.000-07:00

So, I meant to blog on this a month and a half ago, before the health care debate got into full swing, when one of the proposals coming out of the Obama administration was running directly counter to the idea of "insuring everyone". He proposed making injured vets cover any cost of their injuries out of private insurance if they had it. To me, this is ludicrous. These are men and women who volunteered to help their country, to protect freedom, and to ensure the safety of not just American citizens, but many citizens from many countries. If they are injured in the line of duty, it should be the nation's obligation to take care of them. They were hurt in an endeavor to take care of us. Think about it - if they were injured on the job, their employer would be culpable - this is why certain industries have such high insurance rates and death benefits - because they are so inherently risky. Trying to make these people pay for injuries acquired in the line of duty is just silly.

Not to mention that it is a killer for these men and women when trying to find a job. What employer is going to want the level of liability of caring for a long term injury? The unemployment rate for military personnel returning from duty is already about twice what the national average is, and this will only exacerbate the problem.

So I guess this administration wants to provide health care for everyone... unless you are an injured veteran. I don't think that this is an attempt to "get revenge" on soldiers following the Bush Doctrine, as some paranoid nuts might; rather, it is a cost cutting technique to shave money away from the defense budget to try and cover the massive outlays in spending that are projected over the next several years by the CBO (and by the way, the CBO is non-partisan, but always tends to undershoot spending projections, and overshoot income predictions from raised taxes, so look for the deficit numbers to be much worse than they project). Either way, however, it is a horrible idea, both morally and fiscally.

Basically, they are trying to find any way possible to pay for health care - a segment of our economy that is something like 20% of GDP (not sure on this number, just going from memory - look it up and verify if you want); if the government subsumes this responsibility it will be taking over a huge segment of the national economy, something it is seldom, if ever, successful at.

Speaking of paying for health care, why do you think the carbon tax was actually passed? Everyone on both sides agrees that it will not help the environment (this is borne out by the data coming in from Europe, check it out - carbon emissions haven't declined at all, unless you pick a baseline that is favorable, and even then, that only works with the numbers from Britain). Why do you think he floated the idea of taxing your health care benefits as income? Oh yeah, those are both huge regressive taxes, by the way - the carbon tax is based on consumption of a good that everyone uses, so the poor and middle class bear the brunt of that one (since they are larger segments, they pay more) and it amounts to a greater percentage of their income, and health care benefits again make up a larger portion of the income of the middle class, so who do you think is going to be impacted by this? For example, my employer pays 3/4 of my premium for my insurance, amounting to an expenditure of about $4000 per year - taxed at about 25 or so percent, depending on my deductions and income for the year, just a rough guesstimate there, that would be about $1000 extra in taxes per year, or almost $100 less a month if this were to pass... and guess what, I make well under $250,000 per year (who am I kidding, I don't even make half that), so I guess that whole promise about only taxing the rich was a bit of a stretch, huh? How else do we pay for a trillion plus in extra spending?

More forthcoming, even if you don't want to hear it.

And, yes, I know that the money my employer pays for my health insurance is effectively money paid to me and therefore could be legitimately taxed as income (though I have no choice in how that money is spent) that wasn't the point - it really is just that this is yet another broken promise. Are all you moderates who bought the rhetoric, hook, line, and sinker happy yet? And do you really think that if an employer pays for a government premium, that it would be taxed? If you do I have a bridge to sell you, and that would be even more unfair "competition" for the private sector (like there is any fair competition between public and private sector - the only place this even sort of happens is in education, and that is because public education - no offense to all the good teachers out there - is a bureaucratic nightmare, and people are willing to double pay for education to avoid the public system - once in taxes for the public system, once in tuition for the private system - that is how inept government is at running things. You want you health care run like the VA, the post office, the public school system, and the IRS? You can have it, but that is not my idea of a healthy America).

Transparency is the Watchword - No, Wait, Don't Ask Those Questions!

2009-07-02T20:05:00.001-07:00

Interesting little turn of events in the White House of late, and it may signal that the love affair that some in the media have with our President may be cooling some - the bloom is off of the rose, I suppose. The debacle with the health care debate has just gotten rather silly as a matter of fact. First off, people can't even say what they mean - Obama and the White House keep talking "Health Care Reform" when they really seem to mean "Health Insurance Reform". None of the proposals on the table are actually dealing with health care, they are all dealing with health insurance. Of course, a cynical person might say that people are too ignorant to tell the difference, while a more Machiavellian individual would say that the use of the words are calculated to inculcate the American people into a government run health care system.

I don't actually fall into either camp, though President Obama's tendencies in the past as a Senator make me believe that he ultimately would like a system in America that is similar to Canada or Great Britain, I do not hold stock in the Machiavellian notion I wrote of above. More likely, the distinction, while it is merited, is simply not a "sexy" enough topic. If you say "Health Care Reform", that can mean many things to many people. The Obama administration is not really going into much detail about their plans, simply because it is easier to drum up support for a program that is undefined and has a sexy catchphrase - it is done quite frequently on the left and the right; simply let your constituents interpret what you mean based on personal baggage and never define terms, then pass whatever the hell you feel like. This is a tad cynical, I'll admit, but I do not believe that people fall for it as much as the politicians would like. More it seems, simply do not feel like Federal legislation has much impact on their day-to-day lives, and thus ignore it. The few politically active people on either side get riled up, make phone calls, write letters, call talk shows, and try to sway their representatives. This has served the nation just fine for quite some time, as most legislation did not have huge impact with great immediacy. That is changing quite drastically right now, though it has been in the process of changing for a number of years (and, of course, this is just a repeat of earlier legislative trends, anyway).

But back to my main point. Last week Obama had a fluff piece on his health care reform initiatives aired, I believe, on ABC. Contrary viewpoints were given short shrift, and the few difficult questions that were asked were never answered (sorry about the passive voice). For example, a doctor asked, rather pointedly I might add, whether Obama would use the system or not. He basically dodged the question and did not answer - a very telling response in and of itself, and very characteristic of typically liberal elitist positions (it happens on the right as well, but I will detail that more later - that is usually dealing with sexuality rather than public policy). They say how great public education is, but God forbid they send their kids to a public school; they say how great the VA is for veteran medical needs but have never been in the system; and of course, any health care reform would not touch our darling senators and representatives very well-endowed health insurance plan. Imagine if George Bush had tried to ask for an slot of prime time on a major network to talk about his policies, and then avoided any controversial questions and did not allow for any democrat rebuttal - now tell me that there is no double standard in the media...

But here is where he really made a huge mistake. There are a lot of people in the media who voted for him, love him and love his policies. I have no problem with that; reporters and anchors are allowed to vote, and should be allowed their opinions; I would hope they also strive to maintain some journalistic integrity, but I do not believe that this is what most journalists want anymore - they graduate wanting to change and educate the world, wanting to help to educate the rest of the world with the wonderful ideas that they know are right from their college education, thus journalistic integrity has been on a downslide of late. But even people who are avowedly pro-Obama were shocked by the latest "Town-Hall meeting".

And let me say first, that I have never been a fan of this concept. It is far to easy to manipulate, to stack the deck, and to play to crowds. As a format, it favors quick-witted and manipulative people. I could take either side of many issues and probably win over many a crowd by artfully answering questions. All the format does is make people feel like they have been heard, whether they have or not. Bill Clinton and George W. Bush both used this type of meeting, and they both typically let in only supporters.Bush caught a lot of flack for this, Clinton less so, but both were called out by opponents on this tactic )though only Bush was labeled as a propagandist). Nonetheless, even this tactic did not always work, and both presidents were asked tough questions by supporters - that is why town halls can sometimes work - because even your ardent supporters will take you to task if they feel that you are not living up to their standards. Bush and Clinton both experienced this.

But Obama, who has an openly favorable press corps, as opposed to the openly hostile one Bush faced, or the sometimes hostile and sometimes helpful one that dogged Clinton, pushed this a step or five further. Clinton and Bush, on a manipulative scale for town halls were probably 7 and 6 respectively. Both stacked the deck, but Clinton was a better impromptu speaker, though Bush had more definite ideas (this could hurt or help, depending on the situation), but Obama just transcended the scale and pushed straight up to 11 (it's one louder than ten, innit?). He not only just let in supporters, but had scripted and rehearsed comments and questions for which he had prepped responses. And, boy, were some in the press corps everlovin' pissed when they found out. They grilled the hell out of the press secretary (can't remember his name right now) and he could not get out from under their fire, but repeatedly tried to change the subject.

Which then begs the question, "Why stack the deck so much in your own favor?" Is your plan so unsound that you cannot actually defend it? Why risk the favorable coverage you already get? I can only guess it was a combination of arrogance and ignorance that lead to this. Arrogance in feeling they could pull off whatever they wanted to (they have so far), and ignorance of the type of people that they may alienate, as well as of their own plan.

Because there was the most revealing thing about the ABC fluff piece. Obama continued to say that we have to pass the legislation now, but also admitted that they did not have an actual plan yet - in other words, vote for this sight unseen and once we have it we'll worry about the details of how to make it work - sorry but that is not the way legislation works.

And just one more little note - the private/public competition thing is a farce. It never has and never will work. Everyone knows that if there were actual competition the government would fail - how many people would be in social security right now if we had a private investment option? Right or wrong people opt out of government systems because they are generally rife with fraud and waste. IF the public plan is actually funded by premiums (which is doubtful - how could you insure the uninsured that way?), then it is just another HMO, and why would anyone choose it? If there are subsidies for the poor, and it is still all funded by premiums, who in their right mind would opt for this - your paid premium would have to cover you and someone (or ones) who could not afford it, and who wants to do that? This is not a question of greed, it is one of common sense.

If, on the other hand, the more likely government subsidizes this pseudo-private corporation, then the competition is inherently unfair to unsubsidized insurers, and they have to change their coverages to match the government's. On the face, this may sound appealing, however, it could only lead to bankrupting the private companies because they do not have the infinite power to raise revenue via taxation and then the government option becomes the main (or only) option, as the government steps in to rescue the situation once insurance agencies start failing. Think that this is ridiculous pessimism? Then just look back at the last pseudo-private corporation that was backed by the government and the weird types of competitions it generated in the private sector and the collapse that ensued afterward. That would be Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Oh yeah, I have great faith in the power of the government to establish legitimate private businesses (note heavy sarcasm). It was not under regulation that led to that collapse, rather it was other lenders struggling to keep up with the type of loans that Freddie and Fannie were doling out...

Do we really want a repeat of that mess in five or ten years and have the government take over health care completely? To some this might sound like a grand idea, but I have personal experience with family in the VA, and I can tell you that public health care ain't great and is rationed.

And besides, if we went to a socialized health care system, where would rich Canadians and Europeans go for their care? How would they afford their drugs without the American private system subsidizing the worldwide drug market.

Just a couple of facts before I go - Canada does not allow the prescription of the two most effective drugs for colon cancer because they are too expensive. The incidence of fatality from colon cancer is higher, and the rate of treatment is lower than in our private system. I could give many other examples. The bureaucracy that many decry in the HMO is only exacerbated by a government system - the things people complain most about in HMOs are also the exact same things that people complain about in socialized systems. Rather than tell patients that they need dialysis in Britain, there have been cases where people have simply been told that they have an "untreatable illness" and that there are no options for them - a much easier thing to tell a patient than "there isn't enough money allocated for dialysis". Lower incidence diseases will be less treated rather than better treated - just check Canada's drug uses - I would be terrified of this if I were an AIDS patient. They are a very small population with very expensive drugs; eventually a public system swallows a group like this and the best care is not provided - it is too expensive.

You want a bit of an example, think of the ending of THX1138, when they ran out of money allocated for him, he no longer existed - for him this was a blessing, it gave him his freedom, but for patients it condemns them to death that could otherwise be prevented.

Okay, time to get off the soapbox, but more at another time; I am sure that you are waiting with baited breath.

I'm Baaack (spoken in a creepy little girl sing-song voice)

2009-07-01T07:38:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the long absence, won't bore you with all the details, but suffice it to say I have had a lot of thoughts running around in my fertile (or is that febrile) mind, and not a hell of a lot of time to write them. Writing homework for the calculus book, prepping chemistry lessons (and explosions), organizing the end of the school year and the beginning of summer school, and wanting to spend time with my wife (she is leaving for a two month job today) have all precluded my taking the time to write (or right, as the case may be - pardon the literary/political/accuracy triple pun, if you would). But I am going to keep it short here, and stick to personal stuff, instead of dealing with the many political/philosophical ramblings that are normally my wont.

Instead, I am going to talk a bit about my birthday. I normally tend to ignore these days, as they are just like any other - marking one day closer to the grave, one more day with some of my potential left unfulfilled, and one more day of putting off for the next what I should be doing today (boy, that sounded depressing, but worry not, gentle reader, all is well). Since my birthday is June 25, normally my students don't do anything about it (obviously - it is the summer and I ain't usually teachin' then). But somehow, they found out about my birthday; I don't know whether they got it from someone in the school year, or if I offhandedly mentioned it in conversation, but the kids were really sweet about it. They brought me a pie, and cupcakes for the whole class, and then while we were in lab, my TA and a friend of hers (who I had taught two years ago) decorated the room with a big happy birthday sign and balloons. Oh yeah, and my TA, a nice young lady named Jen (graduated SI this year - good chemistry student and TA now) also baked me a gigantic chocolate chip cookie and frosted it with " Happy Birthday - Use the force, Mr. M" as well as a little frosting light saber. Then another of my students from the school year stopped by and gave me a chocolate cupcake, even though she is not in my summer class - for some reason she remembered and was thoughtful enough to mark the occasion for me. After that, my niece called from her cell phone at my mom's house to tell me happy birthday. So I finally finish working for the day, and Supergoober comes over to watch UFC 99 with me, and he, my wife, and I all went out to dinner at the Rainbow Island restaurant in Pacifica - coconut rice, garlic eggplant, spicy red curry chicken and potatoes, and mango prawns. Like I said before, I am not really one to celebrate, but I did feel pretty good that day, and (though I don't necessarily think I deserved all the attention) I definitely appreciated it.

And yes, I did thank everyone.

Also, the GM remembered earlier and gave me an awesome present - the Leatherman Skeletool - which I have put to good use already. Thanks again.

Now in retrospect of writing this, it seems kinda self-absorbed, and I am wondering if I should even post it; in a way it seems like a reproach to those who did not remember - if you get that impression, it is not that at all (besides, you probably already emailed me greetings and I would never know - my fault for not checking the emails, but I'll get to it soon, I promise) - I have been very deliberate in the past to not celebrate my birthday, so I have no expectations from any of my friends - they show there appreciation of me every day that we hang out together, so a birthday is not that special - I am just grateful that you are all out there when I need you, and not just on one day - so I want to take a minute to just thank you all for being my friends.

Wow, I guess I am in a sappier mood than I realized, but I do truly mean that, as trite as it may be in the reading.

CAFE Standards and the GM Bankruptcy

2009-05-20T06:50:00.000-07:00

Honestly, I could come up with long diatribes on each of these, but I will try to keep it brief. Just by way of information, I have been out of the loop for a while - busyness at the end of the school year coupled with numerous issues with COMCAST (they had to send out 6 different people before they figured out what the hell was wrong - a bad splitter ant the point where cable entered the house - it allowed signal in for the TV, but the bidirectional signal for internet and on demand movies was sporadic at best, so our phone lines and internet kept cutting out). Anyway, I have had a lot of ideas kicking around for the last month or so, and haven't written about any of them, so much of my thought process in the next several posts will probably be dated - but I think that the observations I will be making are both cogent and relevant, so continue, gentle reader, if you dare.

The CAFE standard proposal is just a couple of days old, and I have heard some comments by Carol Browner that confirm for me the level of commitment to ideology and idiocy in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary is going to be a hallmark of this administration, just as much (if not moreso) as it was for the last administration. In fact, based on the first hundred days, Bush Jr. looks positively like a contortionist by comparison to this rigidly inflexible and ideologically driven administration. More on this at another time (especially about Carol Browner and John Holdren - two extremists if I have ever seen them, and the level of Machievelian governance we will see in the next four years may make will make the "Bush Regime" seem like rank amatuers in terms of manipulations. If you think I am exaggerating, think of the moderate Obama campaigning vs the current governance and you can see what I am talking about. Some may have voted for him because they thought he would take these extreme steps, but most thought that he was a moderate for change. Wow, that was a long parentetical, wasn't it).

Interestingly, the CAFE standards are shifting to 30 and 39 mpg by 2016 (initial phase-in as soon as 2012, I believe, but I am not certain) - 30 for light trucks, 39 for other vehicles. What could possibly be wrong with this, you might ask. Use less gas, make cars and trucks more efficient, save the environment by lowered emissions, and besides, people want more efficient vehicles.

First - there is no global conspiracy to keep us dependant on "gas guzzling" cars. Industry is making more efficient vehicles because of consumer demand and marketing issues, not because the government imposes some ficticious standard. When the government does impose CAFE standards with arbitrary dates, companies are forced to employ tricks to get around the standards if the science is not there to meet the standards. For example, if the government in 1992 had said that this was a huge issue, and we must have the fuel standards at 39 mpg by 1996 to reduce emissions, we would not have been able to do it. Despite best intentions by the government, the technology wasn't there yet, and no amount of government standards could push the technology faster than it was developing. It took a long time to develop hybrids and market them to consumers because of the deficiencies of those vehicles, not because Americans do not care about the environment or because the evil oil companies were conspiring against the consumer and the Earth (capitalized for facetious reasons). It is actually arguable that current hybrids, while they save gas, cost a lot more in manufacturing and mining resources than conventional engines, plus the fact that the batteries that they use will have to go somewhere - battery recyling technology is not that good right now.

Another downside of the CAFE standards is that the principle way to meet them is by reducing mass of the vehicle and compromising passenger safety. While designs are getting better and better with light vehicles (crumple zones and such), mass is still an important concern with safety for a vehicle. If we really want to meet these standards, why don't we just make everyone drive glorified motorcycles - non-enclosed light vehicles with two to four wheels and light, efficient engines. We could meet and exceed these standards in a heartbeat, but, of course, safety would be drastically compromised.

This is really a political attempt to manipulate the market. Most companies will not be able to make SUVs or light trucks that meet these standards, and as a result consumers will have less choice. While some people do not think that this is a problem, I tend to worry any time the government makes a move to take away any freedom that is not exceedingly well justified. Since the science behind anthropogenic warming is sketchy at best, and the environment in America is cleaner than it has been in over a hundred years (and possibly longer) the justifications for theis power grab are weak at best. It is a base attempt to manipulate the market and force the American public to do something that it doesn't want to do, that the elite class of the Democrats have decided is good for us. If you think differently, look at the history of statements by Browner and Holdren (Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change and Science Advisor, respectively); both have long histories of statements and opinions requiring "de-development" of America and other first world nations - this is not some "tinfoil hat" conspiracy theory on my part, I eschew that crap with passion. Both of these advisors are profoundly anti-development and actually feel that the developed nations must shrink their economies (Browner was listed as one of the leaders of a socialist group's Commission for a Sustainable World Society, which calls for "global governance" and says rich countries must shrink their economies to address climate change - she was subsequently removed from that list by January 2009. Holdren has made numerous incorrect statements over the past 40 years with lunatic Paul Ehrlich about resource scarcity, population control, etc, including the fact that 280 million people in the US by 2040 would be far too many and be disastrous (I've paraphrased these, of course) - we are currently doing just fine with close to 310 million people here).

Well, I didn't get to discuss the GM bankruptcy, and I will in a forthcoming blog. Look for upcoming topics like the Obama Health Care plan, John Holdren, Carol Browner, proposal for injured veterans to use private health care to cover their expenses (yep -Obama wants everyone to have national health care except soldiers), and torture. And, yes, I realize that there is faulty parallelism in the previous sentence, and I know I shouldn't have started this sentence with "and".

I'll be back soon.

Carbon Dioxide, A California Pollutant

2009-04-24T17:51:00.000-07:00

California had listed CO2 as a pollutant a while ago (exactly when eludes me, but it has been a few months, I believe), and this is perhaps the most asinine move the state has made in a long time. Thank God that Gray Davis never got his way - he tried to recategorize both CO2 and H2O as pollutants if they came out of a car - emissions are too low, and the state has to have something to regulate. If your party has to get the green vote, and we are doing well in environmental policies, you must create more and more extreme positions to define your politics. Silly, but it seems to be the way of the world - especially as politics is more and more a substitute for religion.

The really dumb thing about CO2 as a pollutant is this - it is a naturally occurring compound with no environmental effect (unlike say SO2 which is very clearly detrimental - naturally occurring as well, but not a part of our ordinary atmosphere, nor a part of the carbon cycle, for example). Despite best efforts on the part of a shrill movement, there is little to no proof that carbon dioxide is a cause of anthropogenic warming. I can go more into that at another time, but let us simply say that you believe in CO2 as an anthropogenic warming nightmare. This is still a horrible idea.

Case in point - cement is the leading single producer of CO2 worldwide. There are a number of cement plants in California. The reason it is so carbon intensive is that you have to coal fire silicates to get them to have cementatious properties (so all those cement block homes are an environmental disaster as well). Our plants run on the clean burning low-sulfur coal that the US has and so are very low on the pollution scale. They do produce a lot of carbon dioxide, however. They have been ordered to reduce the production of CO2 by 12%; California says it will cost a certain plant 20 million dollars, the plant says 250 million is a more realistic cost. The truth probably lies somewhere in the middle, but the plant would probably have to shut down because it could not absorb those kinds of costs. "Hurrah," says the environmentalist, "we have struck a blow for mother earth. Either they clean up or they shut down, either way the world is a bit better."

WRONG!!! Right now, because of high labor costs and manufacturing expense, we import 40% of our cement from Mexico and China who have much weaker to no environmental restrictions (carbon, sulfur, or anything else), so the plant would close or lose business because of the expense, and more cement would be shipped in from environmental nightmare countries. The net effect would be a worse impact on people and the world, but because it is not in my backyard and because I took the proper symbolic stance, that is what is important. So for a symbolic gesture that might be completely erroneous anyway, we damaged the economy, lost jobs, increased pollution, and increased CO2. If you actually think that the environment is a big issue, you should figure out how to keep more manufacturing in the states, not close down our businesses to favor polluters in other countries. So even if you buy the global warming hype, this is a horrendous idea. In fact it is especially egregious if you do, because the carbon used in shipping the cement here coupled with the less efficient plants in China and Mexico mean much more carbon pushed into the environment.

But our politicians would actually have to think rather than focus on reelection by a panic-stricken and green-rhetoric-loving electorate to actually assess this. Then they would actually have to educate the electorate, but they wouldn't want that because it might reduce the stranglehold they have on California politics. It is much more about personal power and elitism than it is about actually doing anything right - I wish that was cynical, but I don't think it is, because I do not think that this is any great insight, and most people could follow this logic if it was explained to them, just the few in charge are trying to keep the rest of us stupid, because that is the nature of democracy when people without principles are in charge. That is why Plato favored a republic - of course he experienced a democratic lynching of his mentor, so perhaps he was a bit biased.

And before you mention it, I know we are a representative republic, but we have many of the trappings of democracy, and lean further and further towards this precipice of tyranny of the masses every election. Okay, that may be cynical.

James Joyce's "The Dead" (part 1 - from memory)

2009-04-23T22:23:00.000-07:00

This story is, in my humble opinion, one of the finest short stories or novellas ever written. I am about to reread it one more time, both for the enjoyment, but also to write a sort of literary analysis of it. I will do a brief overview of it now, if anyone is interested.

The basic framework of the story is that the main character, a fellow named Gabriel, is going to a dinner party. Gabriel considers himself a well-educated man, and resents most of the people with whom he is forced to associate in this party. The fact that they are related to him chagrins him to no end, and a number of awkward situations ensue throughout the party. It is narrated in third person, with a limited omniscience - we are sometimes able to tell how Gabriel is thinking and feeling.

And this is part of the true brilliance and craftsmanship of this novella - the narrative distance. While technically third person, the distance of the narrator from the character of Gabriel gets fuzzy at times - deliberately so. As we, the readers, get closer in to what Gabriel feels and thinks, the narrator gets less and less reliable. In essence, as we start to think like Gabriel, the narrator is very close to being Gabriel's own internal monologue and loses any sense of objectivity that a third person narrator should have.

This is a striking point of interest for me in this work, as it lends itself to a depth of reading that is provocative and fascinating (and for those of you who know me, you know I love puzzles - and this is one of the finest puzzles ever written - you can uncover something new on each reading).

What we really have is Gabriel, a puffed up buffoon of a man who is most remarkable for his pathos, self-absorption, and high degree of esteem for himself while eschewing contact with people who are not on par with him. The real problem is that he is a pathetic fool, who is neither smart nor witty - he is essentially a bad English teacher. What I mean by this is that he is an idiot with an education, and he gains some sense of self-importance from that and lords it over other people. If you have ever had an English teacher who is not that smart but who believes that he is, that is Gabriel. In a way, it is Joyce's ultimate joke on us - he places as a main character a man who is embodies all of the worst qualities of an erudite person, without any of the scholarship to back it up. This ends up as a joke on us if we take the piece seriously but miss those bits of humor, or a joke for us, as we get to laugh a little bit at ourselves for taking anything like this so seriously, and we get to see where our own foibles might dovetail with Gabriel's.

All in all, I think Joyce crafted a piece where he could make fun of people who didn't understand him but claimed to, all the while giving those of us with a hint of what might be going on a little bit of a laugh. Of course, this is all my opinion, and I have no scholarly research to bear it out. I know a bit about Joyce, Ireland, history, and context of the work, but I mainly rely on interpretation of the text, so take this for what it is worth - one person's opinion on an interesting piece of literature.

And if you think, perhaps, that I am giving Joyce to much credit for painstaking craftsmanship of literature, lets not forget that this is the man who said of his masterwork, Ulysses, that "it took me ten years to write it, I do not see why it shouldn't take you ten years to read it". I don't know if that is the exact quote, but it is pretty darn close.

Anyway, just from what I remember, the setup for this character and his contempt for others is started very early. (Forgive me, I do not have the text with me, and it has been three years since my last read, so some of my quotes are probably a bit off. I will fix them in a later post, but these are still useful, because I do remember some very particular statements). Almost the first line (if not the first) that we hear from Gabriel sets us up to dislike him if we pay close enough attention. He and his wife are late for the party, this makes him very frustrated, and when he is greeted at the door, he says something to his aunt of his wife; "You know it takes my wife three mortal hours to get dressed."

This one sentence tells us so much about the relationship between Gabriel and his wife. He has nothing but contempt for her. It is easy to write this off as a surface statement of frustration - he is angry at being late, and expresses it to his hostess. But dig a little further and really read the implications here. He is badmouthing his wife to his relatives when she is right there with him. The use of the word "mortal" certainly was not for use in polite company - it would almost be the equivalent of swearing - as you enter an elegant dinner party. And look at the verb tense. He did not use past tense. He is not merely upset at one incident - in his mind, this is a pattern of behavior, and he is the victim of it - he has little to no regard for his wife, and clearly this is a typical response from him. Interestingly enough, she bears it with good natured aplomb, and mostly laughs it off, although she does have a barb or two in return. She mentions about Gabriel's insistence that she wear galoshes - nasty rubber things that she does not like - she is a country girl and grew up tromping around in Irish weather - galoshes are an affectation for city folk - Britons and repressed people who are not in touch with their roots. Gabriel's insistence that she wear them asserts both a sense of the controlling type of relationship that he has, and also speaks to a degree of sexual repression as well - the rubber galoshes are not so far removed from the rubber condoms of the time - and the sexual imagery here is not much of a stretch.

An that is just from a couple of lines on the first page. I could go on and on and on. There is a wonderful scene where Gabriel's wife is on the balcony and he does not recognize her immediately - she is transfigured by an epiphany which she is experiencing (this is a very classic interpretation - I somewhat agree with it, but I digress from much of popular opinion in other of my interpretations) and I think that Gabriel is just smart enough to recognize that his wife is experiencing something that he never can. But because he is the well-educated one and she is just an Irish peasant, he cannot abide this, and forces an epiphany on himself. This is one of the most brilliant written parts of the work, because it is so deliberately trite. Gabriel analytically goes through a process of a very generic epiphany - the kind that a bad English teacher would write. He is not even self-aware enough to understand what he is doing, he just does it out of jealousy of his wife. We are left with a horrible feeling - he is so pathetic and self-deluded that he is The Dead while his wife is growing and going to surpass him. They are all covered by snow, and many people erroneously interpret it as death - but snow is commonplace for the Irish - it is only death for the foolish - Gretta will clearly survive and blossom in the Spring, while Gabriel will die, or at least be paralyzed in an eternal rime from which there is no escape.

Anyway, that is just scratching the surface; I need to read it again and write a much more serious piece about it. More forthcoming :)

A Day Late, but not a buck short ...

2009-04-22T12:57:00.000-07:00

Well, this little opinion is a day late, but I feel like I should write it down anyway. For those of you who care (and I believe that all of you should), yesterday, April 21, was Holocaust Remembrance Day. I don't know if my just mentioning this makes any difference at all, but it is really important that we keep this tragedy alive so that we can prevent anything like it from ever happening again.

And if you do not believe that it is possible for an evil like this to rise again, then you do not know human nature, or you consistently seek to deny it. Scapegoating is commonplace on the left and right politically, no one will ever blame themselves for their own inadequacies (GE), and so it is entirely possible that this level of crime against humanity could occur again.

I don't know who it might be against, but it has happened many times since the Holocaust, and it seems like we never learn. From Pol Pot, to Stalin's and Lenin's purges, to Sadam Hussein's near eradicationof the Kurds, to human rights abuses in Cuba, Afghanistan, Somalia, Bosnia, China, and all over the world. Yes we even have some here in America (but I believe that they pale in comparison to the rest of the world, and we work to try and stop them at home and abroad). This is one of the many reasons I bristle at people when they say that America acts too much the cop in the world and should mind its own business. There is a lot of evidence that America knew about much of the Holocaust before we went to war with Germany; we even denied entry into America to many Jewish refugees.

Had we "played the cop" a bit earlier, we might have spared the world a great part of one of the most monstrous evils ever committed, but we didn't. I think that human rights abuses do require us to take action - the more action we take, the less likely others are to follow suit with more abuses. All it takes is a few actions that show that we do not tolerate evil lightly, and others may start to fall into line because of fear of being acted against. This is why I will sometimes favor unilateral actions - if you know that something is wrong, should you wait for the rest of the world to get with the program, or should you do something about it when action is demanded.

I don't know if many of you remember the incident in the early eighties (I believe) where a woman was raped and killed in a courtyard where many people watched from their apartments above. No one took action, not even to call the police. All of them felt like someone else would do something. The same thing happens on the world stage, and millions of lives are crushed as a result. Sometimes we have to recognize that we have a duty to act.

I know that this seems like an extreme position, and many people might say, "How do you know that what you are doing is right?" This is a legitamite point, and can't be taken lightly - actions like these never can, but it is far better to take some risks than to risk consistent and depraved abuses against human rights. Others will say, "Who are we to act, when we have done so much wrong ourselves?" This is sophistry - merely acknowledging you have done wrong does not expiate your responsibility to act. If I admit to a mistake, and I know the mistake, that does not mean I cannot correct someone else. If we waited for perfection before tackling problems, no problems would ever get solved.

I know that I have wandered far afield, but I would like to conclude with this. There are very few Holocaust survivors left. We do not have much time to interact with firsthand observers of these atrocities. Help preserve their memories - if you know anyone, talk to them. This is not information that we can let die - trust me when I tell you that a firsthand source has much more power than you will ever encounter in a textbook. Every year there are fewer survivors around; soon there will be none, and we can't afford to let their experiences die with them. The phenomenon of Holocaust denial creeps a little closer with everyone who forgets; this view has an insidious way of worming its way into societies. 6 million Jews, 6 million other "undesirables" (including almost all European Gypsies) - people exterminated in the name of eugenics, "mercy killings", and other rationalizations; and we continue to give credence to those ideas, often dressed up or with substituted language to make them more palatable, but all coming down to that same reprehensible idea of "exterminating life not worthy of life".

Those are the words that I hear when I hear people making "quality of life" judgements on others, and I realize that we are closer to the brink than we might sometimes think. I hope that this is not too depressing, but just keep your eyes open and look around you, and be careful what you buy into - sometimes ideas can seem rational and reasonable but can actually contain a lot more...

Rational Morality and the problems it generates...

2009-04-15T23:00:00.000-07:00

I have had this discussion with a wide variety of people, but I suppose I am just going to throw some stuff out there, because I really want to write something to get in the habit, but I also really want to go to bed. Oh yeah, and sorry about the prolonged absence.

Many atheists make the claim that if we cannot construct a purely rational morality, then we do not deserve to exist as a species. That is, if we rely on the mythological/spiritual urge to undergird our sense of morality, we are selling ourselves short as a species. I have enumerated a few issues with this before, but I will now make an example of what it would be like to create morality from pure rationality - assuming that there is no soul, no spark of divinity, no creator - simply a random universe where a series of random events has lead to our creation and evolution.

Let us take a very simple moral principle; one should not kill other persons. Of course, one may argue that there are situations that arise that make the taking of a life necessary, but that does not make it good. Again, without splitting too many hairs, most moral theory has some sense of human life being important enough to preserve except in special cases (one might even use the word that human life is in some sense sacred, but we cannot use that in a purely rational argument).

So in the rational construction, we should look at a few different things - principally, what constitutes a person, and why is killing a person wrong. Assume that by person we mean human being - where does that lead us. What rationally is it that fundamentally distinguishes us from other animals. From a scientific perspective, the difference is genetics - 46 chromosomes in 23 pairs. Of course, this means that anything with those chromosomes is human, anything else is not. Therefore a zygote should be preserved, but a person with Down's Syndrome might not qualify (Down's Syndrome is trisomy 13, I believe - that is an extra chromosome 13 due to chromosomal nondisjunction in the meiosis process). Of course, that is a distinction that is uncomfortable, so we should adjust it to having the 23 pairs that constitute homo sapien within deviations of normal chromosomal abnormalities. Still a very basic definition, that fits rationality very well, but it disrupts the whole pro-choice issue very badly.

A rational approach might not choose the scientific definition of humanity, even though it is the most hard and fast logical approach. The chromosomal issue forces someone who may want to be pro-choice into a pro-life stance, so most modern atheists would discard this and go for other ways of defining humanity. One big one is brain function/consciousness. The problem with this is that it gets very arbitrary. When does brain function start? We have certain medical devices that indicate levels of brain function, but what constitutes consciousness? If you stick with a very simple definition based on brain scans/brain activity, this justifies the abortion end, but could also justify destruction of significantly impaired adults. Again, this is not a big deal for many, but it may be a sticking point. The problem with the brain activity argument is that it is arbitrary. Since we cannot truly know (right now) what is going on inside a person's head, any threshold is arbitrary, which means that we could arbitrarily shift it up or down - I think below a certain level of intellect is "sub-human" therefore I could find a rational justification for defining "humanity" in that way. I could make a number of other examples, but the further away from the chromosomal distinction what gets, the muddier the waters get.

And all this is still defining "person" - and still not touching whether an animal can be a "person". If not, why not. There are tests that show that certain of the great apes have a number of different intellectual capabilities that put them on par with extremely developmentally disabled humans. But beyond that - if it is okay to kill an animal, what makes it not okay to kill a person? Of course, some may argue a distinction between animal and human, but this collapses with pure rationality, as there is nothing particularly special about us, we are just another link in an evolutionary chain. In fact, I would be hard-pressed to come up with a rational reason that killing is wrong. Try giving me one, and I bet I can come up with logical flaws.

Of course one might say that killing any animal is wrong, but provide a rational basis for that. What is special about life? Or, to put it more bluntly, is life sacred at all? There is no rational reason for it to be sacred - surely a random and disordered universe has no particular love of life - in fact, one might say that nature favors non-life over life given the abundance of non-living things as well as the tendency for living things to not remain so. But even attributing favorable status via nature verges on natural law arguments which presuppose some kind of deity (in my humble opinion).

Another major flaw with rational morality is the necessity of convincing the polity of its veracity. That is you must either convince enough people to buy into it, or you must have enough brute force to make people adhere to it. This either leads to tyranny or excessive plurality... an example that may chagrin one of my friends (I guess I'll call you the oregonian, since I don't know if supergoober dubbed you with a nickname. If he did, or if you want another one, just say the word and you can have it). The problem with tyranny is obvious, but rationally it is the most efficient system ever created for government - come up with a rationale for freedom, and perhaps we can get rid of tyranny. Of course, plurality could lead to the result that we saw here in California - convince enough people that something is wrong, pass a law, then it is wrong - that is where rationality gets you - and using enough sophistry to convince an ignorant mob, and your logical or rational morality doesn't even need to be sound, you just need to speak well - which is where we enter the realm of the Sophist, Machiavelli, Nietzsche, etc. Plurality is simply tyranny of the mob, and can easily turn a supposed democracy into tyranny very rapidly.

Rational morality always descends to one of two places - might makes right, or mob rule. Neither one is an acceptable solution for social difficulties, and try as you might I defy you to argue for those. Well, actually, they are very easy to argue for if you are truly committed to an atheist perspective. Most atheists do not like this so they actually have morality that either mirrors most conventional morality with pseudo logical rigor, or they just degenerate into agnosticism to cover up the gaps in rationality. The trap that most atheists fall into is that they think men and women will always act like they currently do, forgetting the centuries of moral structure that lead to where we all are today.

Does that mean all moral structure should remain rigid and unchanging? Of course not. That is the convenient thing about divinely inspired morality - as we become more sophisticated, we can come to terms with wrong acts in the past and reevaluate morality based on current interpretation of the so-called "natural law". To my mind this is why Voltaire went with the line, "If God didn't exist, it would be necessary for us to invent him."

Seriously, I know this is incomplete, but I am going to bed. If anyone wants to comment, feel free, but be really careful with your logic if you are going to argue this point from a truly atheist point of view. Ta-ta.

Well, this just sucks...

2009-02-25T15:03:00.001-08:00

I had a terrible night last night, and just as bad a day today. Last night I got the phone call that no teacher ever wants to receive. Apparently that afternoon, one of my students died. Whether or not it was a suicide is still not technically resolved.

Anyway, of course, I have difficulties in dealing with this, but I think I did a decent job of helping my class process the event, and I had some counselor and campus ministry referals in the process. This isn't the first time this has happened in my career, and though I pray it will be the last, I know that that is unlikely as well.

And if you know me, you know that I am the type who keeps a close eye on his students, and I look for issues of depression, angst, eating disorders, and all the other various things that plague the mental health of teenagers. I just did not see this coming at all, but I also know that people who are depressed can get very good at hiding it, but she really seemed like a very normal sophomore girl. I always wonder if there was something more I could have said or done, and while cognitively I understand that this response is illogical, that does nothing to dull the pain.

I haven't decided yet what to do about her seat in class, and I think we will have to talk about that at some point in the near future. There is not too much worse than the elephant in the room of a student's empty seat, and I have the kids partnered up all the time; it has already been tough on the friend who was her partner in class, but she got to talk to her counselor today.

I don't know what else to say, but I feel like crap right now, and I don't see that changing really soon.

Just a quick couple of lines

2009-02-13T16:03:00.001-08:00

Just to vent for a second, I hate people who think that the rising sea level is coming from submerged ice - I know that even the science journalist for AP has made that mistake on a couple of occasions (he doesn't have a science background, just researches articles and writes his opinion, I think). Even people who think melting land bound ice is leading to sea level rise are incorrect, because the Antarctic Ice pack is getting thicker because of the global weather trend, and land bound ice growth about matches the rate of its shrinking - it is just being redistributed around the globe. The real reason for sea level rise (and it is rising to the tune of .3 cm per year on average - that's about 10 inches in the last century -though the IPCC puts it between 4.4 and 8.8 inches in that century) is thermal expansion. As sea water temperatures rise, the density decreases because the volume increases (this has to do with temperature as a measure of kinetic energy - how fast the molecules are moving. Higher temps = Higher Kinetic Energy = same amount of water taking up more space). On a small scale, this expansion does very little, but on the large scale it can lead to rising sea levels - albeit very slowly rising sea levels.

Worst case scenarios predict a 1 meter rise in the next century - very manageable, even in low lying areas with dikes, levees, and damns. The cost would be fractional compared to the draconian solutions many are positing. Further, there are parts of the world where the sea level is dropping - Alaska, for example, as plate techtonics pushes Alska up, sea level there can drop by inches a year!

Just some interesting facts - whether you believe in anthropogenic warming or not, it is best to know what the hell you are talking about (and I know not to end with about - it should be "know about that which you are talking", but damn it that phrasing is so stilted).

Boy Did I Step In It This Time ...

2009-02-10T17:23:00.000-08:00

I am not normally one to voice my opinion on political causes to students for fear of having undue influence over them. For the most part, I would have them become independent learners and persons of thoughtful conscience. I do sometimes influence the direction of that conscience towards caring for others and ideals of social justice, but I am neither heavy-handed nor am I overt in my approach for the most part.

My coworkers, on the other hand, know that I lean politically to the right and that I favor a more conservative, and what I deem as "common-sense" approach to the environment. Of course, since I do not jump on to popular fads, many of them believe that I am "anti-environment", which I am not. I just prefer to use credible scientific data to make informed choices about environmentalism. I am neither reactionary, nor am I revolutionary. I do not jump onto a cause because it is popular, and I do not dismiss a cause because it is popular. I try to see what the actual issue is and what the most rational and reasonable solution is that will benefit the most people and the environment simultaneously. Clearly, this opinion is difficult to capture in a few sentences, so I get labeled as a "anti-environment" guy.

With that preface out of the way, let me explain what happened at my school today. The seniors had a 45 minute presentation on alternative fuels today, and I went with an open mind hoping that the person would have some good things to say. The presenter, however, was not a scientist, but rather was a businessman who raised venture capital for green companies.

This would have been fine if he had confined his topics to businesses having a social conscience, and talked about why he was involved, and how he wanted to do his part. However, he tried to justify it from a semi-scientific angle, by showing slides of glaciers in 1904 vs the glaciers in 2004 to get a dramatic impact about global warming. Again, much as I dislike the level of specious reasoning involved, I kept my mouth shut and let the kids ask any questions they had (he had solicited that anyone ask questions at any time) - none were willing to. Since it was not my place, I maintained crowd control and paid attention to the speaker because I wanted to model appropriate behavior. This is really the way I approach anything at the school whether I agree or disagree, because it is generally not my view that it is my roll to interact in those situations.

However, (yep - one more use of the word however - it just seems to work for me here) he made such an egregious scientific error that I felt it necessary to interject, something that is very uncomfortable and difficult for me to do. I was very sincere in not putting my own politics into it, and I tried to give this Yale graduate a way to salvage his dignity. (That was how he was introduced - blah, blah, worked for Apple, blah, blah venture capital for CleanTech, blah, blah, graduated with a Bachelor's from Yale)

So here is what he said, and here is how I responded. He had been making several comments about global warming and carbon emissions and such, and was talking about sea level rise, and glaciers melting... then he used potentially the worst and dumbest analogy in history...
"So you've got a glass of soda and you put some ice in it... then the ice melts and the soda level starts to rise."

That is where I jumped in, because every frickin' fifth grader has seen the experiment where ice that is already submerged does not raise the water level. It has to do with displacement, volume and the fact that ice is less dense than water, but when it melts it has the same density so it takes up the exact amount that the submerged piece did - not everybody remembers why, but everyone should know that fact!!!

Before I mention what my response was, I will say that I could already sense the students in the room scoffing at his response; a good 30% or so had incredulous looks and, to my mind were going to shut off from anything good the guy might have to say. Those kids would talk to people around them, and not everyone would have been distracted, but he would have lost a majority of his audience - or so I thought. I could be wrong in my assessment, but I feel that I can tell when our students sense blood in the water - and they are the type to pounce if they can, or disengage completely if they can.

So here is how I responded. I remember what I said almost perfectly (credit social anxiety disorder for that, I constantly analyze and re-analyze what I have said). I said, "Wait a second, you probably don't want to use that analogy because it is flawed. You really want to be talking about ice that is not submerged, because when that melts it will raise the level of the water". Of course a number of students made some noise (no hoots or cheers, but just under that level), and he tried to correct himself - I really figured he knew what he was talking about, so I felt he could clarify his statement. When he floundered a bit and clearly didn't understand the distinction, students began to get a bit rowdy, so I interjected to quiet the students and explained that if glaciers on land melted that could contribute to sea level rise - which is what he was trying to say. The students settled down, and listened, but they began to ask questions themselves at that point, and he could not answer many of them.

And I credit the students - they asked good, on point questions, that were not loaded against him, but were thought provoking. For example, when he talked about how solar panels were manufactured, a student asked about energy and resources it took to build one, and how long before the energy they produced would offset their energy cost. Now that is a great question, but the guy didn' t have the answer, he hemmed and hawed, and said "I am not sure of the exact numbers, but I imagine that it is sooner than you think". Other questions included questions about battery life and use of resources to create the batteries, disposal problems with the batteries, etc. Again he couldn't answer, but he did respond very well with, "Those are some of the major issues, and that is where research is being done, and if you pursue a science education, you can help with that research". This was a great response on his part, because he acknowledged the weaknesses of the proposed solution, but showed where they could have a clear and positive impact. The problem is that anytime he got a science question, he would fumble a bit, and look to me for help - which I was unwilling to provide because my statements would have been in direct contradiction to some of his statements.

One of the things that he showed was the Tesla - a really cool car that you all already know about, 0 - 60 in 3.7 seconds, fully electric, uses 8,600 little batteries (the same ones strung together to run laptops), trying to impress them with green tech replicating the high end stuff. Here is the problem - he didn't know his audience. The kids who are uber-green at our school are also big into social justice, and so bristle at the extravagance, the kids who are analytical want to ask questions on the science, and he was unprepared for both. (This is not to imply that the pro-environment are not analytical, but just that they accept more of the green PR line and approach the topic from an emotional and social justice angle, as well as analytical). So he had one girl talking to him about how profligate and wasteful and impractical it was, while another asked him whether there were any numbers on whether plugging into a carbon generating grid was a more efficient and less pollutive. Both were valid assertions, both should have been addressed, but he could address neither.

He seemed like a nice guy, and I felt bad for him, and in retrospect, I am not sure whether what I did was right or not, but in some way I feel that it needed to be said, and that the students needed to feel like their voices could be heard. I think, however, that the rumor mill is going to ramp into overdrive about my roll in this, and some people are going to be pissed even though they weren't there.

That was the other thing that pissed me off. We have about 350 seniors, all of them and their teachers should have been there. Since our class sizes average 26, and many are smaller, we should have had about 15 to 20 people there. There were fewer than 10 teachers in attendance.

And now for my most major faux pas, which I have only recognized in retrospect, but which an outside observer may view as very insulting. As a result of the aforementioned social anxiety, I do not like to deal with situations with large groups, especially ones where I am forced to express myself, as I was then. In these situations, I tend to grab whatever is closest to me an fidget with it. In the past, this has been a pen or pencil, maybe some change, anything to keep my hand occupied - it forces me to focus on what is in my had so that the anxiety I often feel is dimmed to the background. But lately, I have been carrying a Rubik's Cube in my pocket, and I reached for that and idly started fiddling with it. I was using one hand, and not looking at it; for me, it was just a way to deal with stress (maybe I should get the pair of metal balls a la Captain Queeg). Of course, in retrospect, both students and faculty could see that and might perceive it as insulting - I picked apart a weak statement and then didn't pay attention and fiddled with the cube. Not a good image, and I will probably have to do some damage control with some faculty, but I really do not like talking about coping mechanisms for mood disorders to people (strange how the anonymity here makes it really easy to discuss), but I may have to cop to that.

I doubt it, though because anyone who sides with me will ignore it, while anyone who thinks that I was insulting will look at it as an excuse.

What to do? What to do?

Anyway, that's all folks, thanks if you made it this far, and I look forward to hearing your comments - my recollections are as unbiased as I could make them, and I think they display an accurate picture of what went on at this event.

Just Another Maniac Monday

2009-02-09T13:12:00.000-08:00

Yeah, I am well aware that it is not "maniac" in the Bangles tune - it's a play on words, get it :)

So I am just trying to get back into the habit of writing something everyday, even if it is just a quick comment; otherwise I get swamped with my ideas and thoughts and get overwhelmed and never put proverbial pen to paper.

Just a quick response to Supergoober's comments on the blog on salary regulations - as I said in my response to him, I don't think that the salary caps on executive pay are what is the largest flaw in the so-called stimulus bill (the only thing it stimulates are the pundits squawking about it), but I just used it as a leaping off point into what is fundamentally flawed about use of this technique.

Of course, it is also tragically flawed because it puts the onus on the wrong people, it seeks to enhance a sense of class jealousy, and expiates the need for responsibility on the part of the irresponsible borrower and blames only the irresponsible lender (there is plenty of blame to go around on all sides; people borrowed who shouldn't have, people lent who shouldn't have, and people created unrealistic regulations and ignored the need for reform).

But I guess the bloom is off the rose for you, Supergoober, eh? I don't honestly know why you believed that Obama would cut taxes on the middle class - he has no history of doing that, so why were you expecting it? It was simply campaign rhetoric designed to pull moderate voters off of the fence (people who didn't really want to vote Republican, but who also didn't really have a reason to vote at all). Besides, "middle class" is a moniker that is ill-defined in the political realm; both sides use it to describe different things.

The really big problem with the "stimulus" package is that it is simply an over-abundance of government spending in weird and often inconsequential directions. Infrastructure expenditures do little to actually stimulate the economy (though I have actually heard Democrats argue that these things would filter through the market by people employed being able to spend more money, freeing up business capital, therefore allowing the banks to become more solvent and deal with businesses better - a remarkably Reagan-esque argument that sounds a lot like "trickle-down" economic theory) especially because there is no actual value backing up the money that is to be pushed into the economy - therefore, inflation is a real risk.

Unfortunately, when these policies don't work, it will be a regular blame-fest on Republican opposition to the bill, and how G.W. really loused up the economy and even a genius like Barrack Obama couldn't fix it.

And what about the "politics of pessimism" that Obama said that he would avoid; right now he is making the claim that the entire economy will fall apart if his bill isn't passed.

In reality, no bill is going to have an immediate effect (except perhaps indexing capital gains to inflation, and that ain't ever gonna happen, even though it should), whether from the Republicans or Democrats, and of course I believe that my solutions are more reasonable than the Dem. solutions, otherwise I wouldn't put these forth as ideas.

But all-in-all, no one can really do that much harm or good, the economy will eventually come back, unless Obama and the Dems in the legislature decide to go full-on FDR for us, then we are in for a long haul. His idea was that you should create tons of government projects and handouts and to fund these projects he increased taxes on businesses. Of course, this slowed down the economy, and we were mired in an economic slump for more than a decade. Don't get me wrong; many of the infrastructure projects were quite valuable, but the main accomplishment of FDR was extending the tendrils of federal government into many more facets of our lives, and fundamentally changing the character of the nation. Some view it as a good change, by and large, I do not - it was really just the biggest power grab in US history, and if you do not believe that it was deliberate, and if you think FDR was not power hungry, may I remind you that he was the first president to ignore the long standing two term tradition set up by George Washington (and we were not yet involved in WWII, yet, so that is not an excuse - that was the excuse for his 4th term). People recognized this later, and set up the 22nd ammendment to cap the presidency at two terms. Do you really think that FDR wouldn't have run for a 5th term if he had survived?

Maybe I'm excessively cynical, but I am almost certain he would have. And it takes a certain kind of unbridled arrogance and egotism to even do what he did - bucking 150+ years of tradition. Not that tradition is always right, but there is something to be said for men being able to step down from authority and not do a blatant power grab.

A Bit of Honesty

2009-02-08T10:41:00.001-08:00

So I changed my profile picture, yet again, and I think I like this one the best...

It's a Noppera-Bō from Japanese legend and it is a critter that can mimic the faces of others to fit in where it needs to, but really has no identity of its own, and at times I feel a bit like this, where I have to put on different faces to fit into situations, and I often wonder if even those core things to which I claim adherence or those things which I supposedly deem "fun" are really me at all.

Especially since there are times that these things give me no joy whatsoever, yet I keep doing them out of ... well, I don't really know why; maybe habit, maybe doctor's advice, but is it really me?

And if it's not, what is? Maybe I've read a bit too much philosophy, but what is one's self, anyway? And how can we truly come to define that? What is it that makes me, me... certainly I am no more special than the next guy or gal, nor do I expect to be, but is there anything to actually verify consciousness? I can't remember the philosopher who hypothesized that self-identity is a delusion, and that all we are is the sum total of our separate experiences and memories, which our brains categorize as snap-shots, and we erroneously identify as our "identity", but which are nothing more than the sum of the parts... I always refuted that on the grounds that obviously one had to have a consciousness and self-identity to postulate the lack of that identity's existence, but that is a weak argument at best, and more put forward to dull my true fear that this guy is right; in which case everything is pretty much pointless.

I guess that is why I keep clinging to the idea of Voltaire's: "If god didn't exist, it would be necessary for us to invent him." I think I know the full repercussions of complete non-belief, and this option is reprehensible. To get a quick clue into how reprehensible, imagine the old adage of "live each day like it was your last", a bastardization of carpe diem (which is misused often enough as it is). If you really have a belief that there is no god, no soul, no nothing; how would you live your last day? Remove all moral obstacles, there are no long term penalties for anything you do, you just have one day to soak up as much joy as you can out of living before you are gone forever. If one truly believed this, I am certain that the "last day" phenomenon would be horrific - certainly, it might start out as goodbyes, but if there were any secret desires that you harbored and you knew that there could be no consequences, that everything was actually meaningless, how much would you do? How far would you go? Could you even care for other people that you hurt - knowing they would live on in pain might not be sufficient deterrent since you would only feel guilt for that day - and if that was the case, why feel guilt at all? Or to prevent them from living with the pain you caused, give them the sweet release of death as well?

Pretty grim, and maybe I am just in a black-hearted mood today, but I think I will explore the ramifications of this "last day with no consequences" idea further. And I know that many atheists would respond with the "human dignity" type of argument, but if you were up against the end and there were no consequences, how far would the idea of human dignity take you?

So, long story short, I think that the Noppera-Bō image really captures what I feel right now - who am I, really?

Well, It's Been Awhile...

2009-02-05T21:04:00.000-08:00

It has been a while since I have sat down at the old qwerty keyboard and tapped out random key sequences that are decipherable to some, meaningful to few, and relevant to none, so I thought I would come back to wasting the time of the few friends who will still bother to read this.

Yet again I am irritated, and I will lay out in some detail why. It began with watching the news this morning and noticing on the scroll at the bottom of the screen that the CEOs of banks that took federal money would be restricted to a maximum salary of $500,000 per year. I do not argue with the right of the federal government to attach provisions to money that they give out - that is exactly what they should be doing, but the provision of wage control has gotten this country into trouble in the past, at least twice that I can recall in great detail without having to do any research whatsoever. I am sure that there are other occasions of this, but I will lay out the two that immediately come to mind (and lest you believe that this is just another nCr on my part, you may want to note that one of the culprits of this asinine policy is a Republican, the other a Dem, and for my money, the Republican implementation had far more grievous repercussions).

But before the history lesson, just the stupidity of this restriction - you are not penalizing the people who got us into the mess, you are penalizing the people who are supposed to get us out. If you cannot attract the best minds with the best salaries, then you might get second class CEOs who can't figure their way out of the mess that Congress and the public, as well as Wall Street, got us into. In fact, lower compensation packages generally lead to more shady dealing in the finances because the people running the companies feel justified in "taking what they deserve". This is not to condone that attitude, but putting policies into place that foster that attitude are disastrous (as you will see later). In fact, many have argued that both the Executive and Legislative branches should be better compensated to lessen the desire to line one's pockets through political influence - I don't know whether I agree with that or not, but it is a strategy that has been in play in many European countries (with mixed results). But back to the main topic of this paragraph... if you want to penalize people, penalize the CEOs that got the institutions in to trouble, not the ones who are trying to get you out!

How about an analogy - You are financing a football franchise, and the head coach and GM monumentally mismanage the team to the point where they are long-time losers. You fire that coach and GM, spend a bunch of money on the franchise and hire a new coach and GM. But as you do that, you decide to put a bunch of restrictions on the new people, and basically try to manage the team yourself, even though you have no idea how that business should be run. All these restrictions serve to screw things up even more, because you really didn't understand the complex nature of the business, and you end up worse off than before you fired the bad guys - and then you get... the Oakland Raiders. Yep, Congress is just another version of Al Davis, and lest we want our nation to follow in the footsteps of the Raiders, we might want to look twice at what we are doing.

Obviously that analogy is a bit tongue in cheek, and really doubles as a shot at Al Davis, but the point is still the same - don't punish the guys who didn't do the crime (visiting the sins of the fathers on the sons, anyone?) especially if you were partly responsible for the f----ups in the first place (regulations on how lending occurred from Fannie and Freddie set up by Congress did contribute a lot to the mess on Wall Street).

But to the history of wage controls... the first example was a Republican president; Eisenhower. He had an idea of fairness where people who had the same job should be paid the same wage - which sounds good until one realizes that there is no way to reward people who are better at a particular job, and no way to penalize someone who is mediocre (unlike France, you could still fire the incompetent). Of course, companies still wanted to attract good employees, so they started providing benefits packages that could not be officially categorized as wages - thus giving birth to medical insurance, and eventually to HMOs and such (which, incidentally, are about as close to socialized medicine as you can get -and if you think that nationalized health care will fix the HMO problems, you are sorely mistaken, but I will speak to that at another time). Obviously, this was a much more sweeping policy and had much greater impact, but the point is still the same - wage controls suck.

The next incident was in 1996, a piece of legislation that Bill Clinton favored, and signed that capped salaries of corporate officers at $1,000,000 per year in all but two industries. Actually, it didn't officially cap them, but it might as well have. Salaries for a business are part of the operating expenses of a company, and therefore are not taxed as profit (because it is the cost of running the business, and the individual earning the salary pays personal income taxes). What the 1996 law did was to disallow salaries over $1,000,000 as an operating expense - making it a part of the company's profit even though it did not actually go into the company coffers. Of course, it then becomes virtually impossible to pay salaries above this mark, and to attract better people, companies began to offer things like stock options. Now CEOs personal income was, in many cases, tied directly to the value of the stock. Obviously, if your personal financial well-being is tied to the stock, you start to do things just to increase stock value, not because it will help the company. While not everyone would succumb to that temptation, the policy set up an environment that was extremely tempting for many even moderately ethical businessmen. You would not make the alcoholic the guy in charge of your liquor cabinet, would you? Nor would you put the recovering sex addict in a position involving quality control of strippers. A bit silly on the examples, I know, but you get the idea... making your personal wealth directly tied to the stock price, coupled with the fact that employees got similar bonuses made it very easy for CEOs to rationalize - the stock price is high, my employees are happy, I am happy, the investors are happy... whoops, the bottom fell out, we're all screwed - thus the bubble burst of the late 90s. Incidentally, the two industries that were exempt from this little law - movie studios and athletic franchises (two major Clinton contributors, but let's not beat that particular dead horse anymore). Also, as I write this, that law may have passed in 1993, not 1996, I can't remember for certain, but you can look it up.

So, long story short, wage controls don't work, and it is the wrong approach. BTW, my best time with a 3x3 Rubik's Cube is now 45.7 seconds, my best time with the 4x4 is about 4 min, 15 seconds, and I am averaging 11 minutes on the 5x5 cube (though it can hardly be called an average - I just figured it out and have solved it 6 or 7 times - still need to practice to get faster, but it is easier than the 4x4).

See you later, and I look forward to the slings and arrows to come...

A Quick Rant

2009-01-01T13:03:00.000-08:00

Just got irritated over the last couple of days by a few things that I have encountered, and I wanted to write a quickie complaint about them before writing up the game info and the house rules that I will be using this Saturday. These are my own particular idiosyncrasies, so I doubt if they will resonate with anyone else out there, but what the hell - what good is the internet if you can't whine about ultimately trivial and insignificant crap.

First, I saw that old standby of a bumper sticker that never fails to piss me off - "Your dogma ran over my karma" or " My karma ran over youre dogma" (I've seen both, and I have yet to decide which infuriates me more). It is part of a typical anti-Western religion crap that has taken hold of the country since the early sixties, stemming from mostly anti-establishment, anti-heirarchical movements. The thing that bugs me the most, however, is that karma is a dogmatic point of Hinduism (and also some sects of Buddhism). Dogma just means of a system of accepted principles (of a religion, for example), or a prescribed or established doctrine. Karma is an established doctrine of Hinduism and Buddhism that dictates that one's actions have effects in this life and the next, and that part of one's karma is their dharma, or adherence to religious doctrine. It just bothers me how some people think that Eastern thought is inherently better or less dogmatic than Western. It is just as extreme and just as frustrating as the idiots who insist that you must accept Christ (or their particular brand of Christ) to achieve salvation. In fact, in many ways it is more frustrating, because those people believe that they have all the answers because they have cherry-picked a miniscule aspect of a rich and complete faith tradition, and then purport to be enlightened. It is this trivialization to which I object very strongly.

This is not to say that westerners should not convert to Buddhism or Hinduism, or to say that Eaterners should not convert to Chrtistianity, Judaism, or Islam, or anyone not being able to select the religious tradition that holds the greatest appeal to them. I just think that people should be fully informed about whatever tradition of which they want to become a part. Of course people can still pick and choose the aspects of those traditions that resonate most with them, and in truth, there is a lot of overlap between most of the major religious traditions, just know what you are talking about before opening your damned mouth around me, and don't flaunt your ignorance with an air of superiority that just makes you look more stupid than you actually are.

The second thing that bugged me in the past few days, (and fortunately some reputable scientists wrote a counter, I'll link to it later when I have more time) was an AP story by their science editor who was claiming that Obama would save the planet, and that if all of the icebergs floating in the ocean right now were to melt, then the world would be flooded. Of course, he neglected to mention that the surface sea temperatures (a key indicator of "global" warming) have dropped 2 degrees (Celsius, I believe, but I am going from memory now), and that Obama's plans for a "cap and trade" policy do not lower Carbon Dioxide emissions, nor does the switch to "clean coal" - that eliminates SO2, not CO2 (SO2 causes acid rain, and also promotes global cooling, so fixing one problem may harm another, if you do not pay attention to the incredible complex nature of the climate in the first place). But you probably already know how I feel about the CO2 thing (H2O is the actual primary greenhouse gas, accounting for about 95% of warming). But the most heinous thing about the article was the contention that most third graders can refute from a lab that you could do at home. Drop several ice cubes in a glass, fill the glass to the brim, and then let the ice cubes melt. The glass won't overflow because ice is less dense than water, and the ice is already in the water - duh!!!

Of course, the idiot probably wanted to refer to the ice that is on land, but he didn't - and the ice on land, say the Greenland shelf, would have to all melt near simultaneously to make the sea levels rise to the level Al Gore mentions in his movie (a point which no reputable scientist thinks is even remotely likely to happen). My point is that we think that the climate should always stay the way we remember it as kids, and we fail to realize that we are part of an immense dynamic system that we have been living with for thousands of years - we have lived as a species through an Ice age, we are now in an interglacial period for the planet - expecting global stability is foolish, we need to adapt to changes as we always have. And, as there are indiginous tribes in both Arctic and desert conditions, surviving without modern technology, it is easy to see how well we could adapt to any change the planet may offer us - check out Bjorn Lomborg's book Cool It - he believes in a human contribution to global warming (moreso than I do), but he offers realistic and positive solutions that do not, in our first world arrogance, cripple third world economies (as most Carbon restricting plans would). Also, all that is on the planet has always been here - we lose and gain very little to space, and all the carbon that we are "generating" has always been here - some will argue the "sequestered carbon" point, and I can tackle that later, but suffice it to say that the carbon has not always been sequestered, and that as we unsequester it we promote growth of plant life worldwide...

So what the hell was my third thing that pissed me off... I can't remember right now, and I suppose that is for the best. I am going to stop this crap right now and write the game info on the L5R Blog I have running, then I am going to visit my mom with my wife for new year's day (but there is no point in celebrating, to my mind it is just another day - but my wife and mom both want to so I will be social - a good thing even if the reason is bogus; the real reason is that I want to spend time with them).

ADDENDUM:

I remember the third thing, it sometimes sets me off, and I have friends (some of you might be reading this) who go on this particular rant - and let me preface with the fact that none of you started this little rant, though sometimes, I will admit, that your rants can irritate me (as I'm sure that mine do to you) but this does not diminish the fact that we are still friends. Anyway...

The profligacy of the American middle class, or of middle class in general is something that many people rail against, and it can be quite irritating. I know that the middle class in general, and the American middle class particularly is blamed for having an extremely wasteful lifestyle and uses more than its fair share of resources, etc. There are a number of different ways to address this, but I want to pick one part of the topic in particular because I do not have a lot of time right now (I'm leaving for my mom's in 5 minutes). It has been said that people should not use as much as they do and that they are "wasteful". I would question by whose standards. Some say that to save the planet, each person should use less, etc. and this may wel be true, but right now the beliefs entailed in that are more religious than scientific, and I would still question - what is the correct standard. Using wood to build houses may be considered wasteful, unless you view that it sequesters the carbon that is in the wood and more trees are planted that suck up even more carbon, while use of "effecient" materials like concrete actually produce most of the worlds CO2 (the process of making cement produces lots of CO2 - the leading production in the world, actually amounting to 7% of the CO2, I believe). Even further, why should we stop there? Who is to say that no one should have a car, we should all switch to subsistence farming for ourselves, and make forced earth homes. We do not need electricity, we do not need processed food shipped from around the world, or even from several miles away, we could shift to a lifestyle of "peasant purity" like Pol Pot and Heinrich Himmler wanted their people to - this would really cut down on the waste.

My point is, what standard should we adopt? One friend said, "Get only as much as you need." But even this begs the question, what do we need? What do we want? We could easily do without heat if we forced everyone to live in more temperate climes and use blankets in the winter, but is this appropriate. No one needs a computer - they could get a job that does not require it, or they could support themselves by farming. Again, this is a bit ridiculous, I am well aware of that, but the question still remains - who determines "need" vs. want? Every country that has tried to dictate that has been tyrrancial in nature, and the reason Europeans are much more willing to deal with an extravagent upper class with a impoverished or minimally supplied middle/lower class is because of the history of nobility in those cultures. It is easy for them to feel like they can sacrifice and ignore the profligacy of the nobility because there is still the legacy of the divine nature of the noble lines (the divine right of kings, etc.) Obviously, this is a bit of a generalization and only touches on the attitude, I will address all of this more fully at a later date. Gotta go.

The Problem with True Atheism

2008-12-24T12:12:00.000-08:00

So, I've promised to write this out sometime, and here it is, at least in part. I have a bunch of things I want to talk about, and it will, in all likelihood, take more than one blog. I also will be talking about some Chicago machine politics soon, which should be fairly interesting - but is a totally separate topic.

Well, the title sort of says it all, and I am in part responding to a number of comments by friends about constructing a "rational" system of morality. I have already detailed a number of problems with this approach, and I will reiterate some of them here. I will also detail the history of the growth of the "atheist" movement in America (and, to a lesser extent, worldwide).

And note that I did put atheist in quotes, as this is my first point. Most people who claim to be atheists are, as far as I am concerned, agnostic. The may not acknowledge this or even be aware of it themselves, this seems to me to be the case. The reason that I say this is because they do not embrace the full ramifications of the nonexistence of any transcendent nature. The true ramifications of this are really fully explore by Nietzsche (and Machiavelli did significant work in this direction as well). Nietzsche is one of very few philosophers who truly embraced all the ramifications of the fact that there is no God.

Before I go much further, I must say this - I am nominally Latin Catholic (most people call it Roman Catholic, but it's correct name is the Latin Catholic Rite, one of what I believe is 13 Catholic rites), still practicing to a certain extent, and very well educated on the philosophy of my religion. This is not to say that I blindly follow dogma - much of the dogmatic has been removed from the religion with the advent of the Second Vatican Council, though there is still some dogma. One of the main responsibilities of adult Catholics is to be "persons of conscience" - meaning that each person is an individual moral agent, and they are responsible to their own conscience, which should be informed by the teachings of the church. I make this point so that you do not think that I am blindly trying to verify the existence of God because I have my beliefs.

Of course, in part this is true - my belief must extend in part from my upbringing in this tradition, but I have gone through a protracted period of non-belief; the main issue in this is that I have, over a number of years rediscovered my belief (which I still sometimes question) and looked at the ramifications of trying to construct a moral system without some kind of divinity.

And here is the crux of the issue. If we remove the sense of "specialness" from humanity, if we are just animals, and if existence is merely a random coincidence, there is no absolute morality. While this does not seem to be a problem on its face, it is quite a huge problem in trying to decide what can make something right or wrong. In fact, the very concept of right and wrong must be thrown out if you believe this. We must then, as Nietzsche says, move "beyond good and evil". The labels become ridiculous without some kind of transcendent nature. Try and define these terms without reference to God or to humanity being "special" in some way.

What is "good"? What is "evil"? If one tries to define these in a purely rational way, it is totally impossible. I challenge anyone to attempt this, and I can find fault with it. And please do not bother quoting from John Stuart Mill and Utilitarianism - he makes a number of mistakes that are easily observed, and in fact the mistakes that he makes are many of the same ones that modern atheists make.

Most people feel that there is no longer a need for God because people are basically good, and that blind adherence to dogma diminishes people because they are not allowed to think. In part they are correct - complete adherence to dogma does diminish people - but complete rejection of it is just as foolish. Belief that because people are currently good regardless of the hundreds of years of social history that molded their morality is giving yourself an enormous blind spot.

Let me give you an example in terms of science - obviously, this is simply an analogy, not an attempt to say that faith and science are interchangeable - they are not. If every generation decides that because we have more knowledge than the previous generation we can simply discard everything that they have done, there would never be any growth in society. If, for example, Jonas Salk discovered the polio vaccine and moved the world of vaccinations forward by leaps and bounds. If we just assumed that we know more now than he did then, we could discard all of his work. Same in terms of space exploration - they got to the moon with calculations on slide rules using Newton's laws. If we did not keep using the good that has been previously discovered, we cannot progress forward.

The same does work on a moral level. If we simply discard all that previous generations have done in terms of morality, our social and moral systems wouold never advance. One of the best examples of this is in the case of Martin Luther King, Jr. The reason his message caught hold so well all over is not because it was new, but because it was founded on the moral and religious principles that many people already claimed allegiance to. (and yes I know I ended with a preposition, I just don't want to rewrite it) He called people to task on their original religious beliefs and called them to look at how they were treating other people and how it was inconsistent with their professed faith.

I have to stop for now, and I really have not finished (I've barely even begun) but I will continue soon.

The Joy of Wargaming

2008-12-19T10:35:00.000-08:00

So, I am sure you all want to hear about my reflections on the nerdish pastime of wargaming - for me, the principle games are Warhammer 40k and Infinity (though I've dabbled in Warhammer Fantasy as well). I just started wondering why it is that I like it - and I really don't know.

I don't really care about winning, though I do try to win when I fight; winning is not a high priority - having a good time is. If I win, that is fine, but only if, in the process, the person I am playing also had a good time. I like the strategic thinking elements, I like the numbers game of constructing an army - but these are secondary pleasures for me. I guess it is the social context in which the game occurs that I enjoy the most - it is why I tend to play with only a select group of people.

After my attempts at a couple of games in conventions, finding min/maxing running rampant and attempts at cheating an obfuscation being more the norm than civility, I prefer to stick with people I know - from our group or from the group that I know at the local game store.

Not that min/maxing is really wrong - of course there has to be an element of mathematical efficiency in terms of army selection, but the tourny version consists of mathematical and army min/maxing. Using lists from armies that everyone knows are unbalanced with the rest of the game - but everyone at the tournament is using those armies, so it doesn't matter to them - it only matters if you are not playing one of the uber-optimized armies, like Tyranids or Imperial Guard...

But enough complaining - on to my critique of 5th Edition of 40k. On the whole, the rules are actually an improvement - they allow for an increase in tactical thought, while preserving the rapid play elements. For the most part the rules are very balanced, but then they had to release the Space Marine codex - of course, marines are even tougher now. With their new ability of being able to break 10 man squads into two five man squads (vital in the new troop based objectives of the game) and the ability to choose to pass or fail any morale test they want, in addition to the "And They Shall Know No Fear" special rule makes them a formidable foe for any assault based army. Terminators assaulted by Genestealers, no problem - voluntarily fall back (risking the wipeout from sweeping advance - some small balance at least) - then unload on them with stormbolters shredding them to bits. That coupled with the alteration of the "Rending Claw" rule that leads to a drop of an average of 22% in my lethal efficiency, and you can see why I am a tad upset over the turn of events.

But on the whole, the game is pretty balanced if you do not play space marines. Apocalypse is another story - Eldar and Space Marines rule the day in this game, but the 'Nids have a few tricks up their sleeves (if they ever wore sleeves). Since everyone has access to ridiculousness, it can be fun, but you run into the problem of since there are no restrictions, the person who spent the most money getting the cool Forge World models will likely win. But if you do not play douche-bags, it is still fun, and honestly, many people have had those Forge World models a long time and dumped a good deal of cash on them - why shouldn't they get the joy of playing them in a battle every now and then? As long as they are doing it for the fun and not trying to just overpower everyone because they spent the most money, thats cool.

But on to my latest joy - Infinity. This game is very, very cool, allowing for a great deal of flexibility in assembling armies while still maintaining balance. It is a skirmish based game (not unlike Necromunda or Mordheim) but it is so much better than any other it is ridiculous. The story is that we are several hundred years in the future, the makeup of the power structure on earth has changed dramatically, as well as wormhole travel opening up various planets for exploration. The fluff behind the game is really cool, but it really shines because of its mechanics.

You have an "order pool" based on the number of model, and you may spend those orders on any of your models in a turn (for example if you have 8 orders, you could spend all 8 on 1 model, 1 each on 8 models, or anything in between). This allows for immense tactical flexibility, but there is a price. Unlike most games, both players act on each turn. Any action by the offensive player generates a "reaction order" in any model from the opposing side that can see it. Use of smoke, crawling and keeping models in cover is very much the order of the day, and if you take a shot at someone who can see you, they may jump behind cover as a reaction, or they may shoot back - and if they are a better shot than you, you could lose your model on your own turn. Add to this the high tech doctors, engineers, and hackers on the board, and you have a very diverse game - with one side shooting while moving hackers up to try and take control of enemy mechs, while the other side responds with anti-hacking protocols and return fire - you get the idea - it is a very dynamic game.

Plus the number of special abilities that add depth to the game but do not overpower, and the special weapons that offer the same advantages - they introduced a value called "SWC" in addition to points cost for models. SWC is the special weapons cost, and you can have as many SWC as points in your army divided by 50. Since most games are 300 points, this means you can have 6 SWC - making you choose what you want your army to specialize in. Because of this you absolutely cannot have everything - for example, a heavy infantry with a missile launcher costs 70 points and 2 SWC, while a trooper costs 10 points and 0 SWC, and there are a ton of other options - you could field an army of all remotes and robots, or a infiltration based force, or an airborne deployment force, or even an undisciplined force of irregulars (they do not contribute to your order pool - each model keeps his own order, limiting, but much cheaper on points and SWC), or you can mix it up. I would love more people to give this game a try. Raveboy tryed it and really enjoyed it, and NTT's Brain enjoyed watching it (and I think he even tried a game). I think that the Acupuncturist played a game or two as well, so maybe we can play a few games with more of us next time...

Also, I am putting together a larger skirmish/battle game for L5R so that we can actually use some of the mass quantities of models that I own. My laptop charge is almost gone, however, and I am done blabbing for now.

So much to say, so little time

2008-12-18T18:56:00.000-08:00

Well, I have a ton of stuff that has been rolling around in my noggin over the last week or so, from mundane inanities like the Rubik's cube as a metaphor for both positive and negative views of life, to topics about which I have a great deal of passion - say the existence of god(s), end of life issues, rational construction of a moral system, and on and on and on...

But I don't really feel like writing much of the heavy s**t right know, so I will content myself with my Rubik's cube metaphor... this has occured to me on more than one occasion over the last two weeks, and I feel like writing it down (BTW, hit my best time yesterday - 55.4 seconds, and I haven't been close since, still averaging around 1 minute 30 seconds, dropping down to 1:15 every once in a shile and going up to 1:50 every once in a while, but consistently howvering around the minute -thirty mark)

Anyway...

It seems to me that the cube could be a metaphor for the pessimist's view of life (though some cynics might argue that this is the realist's view, and on my worst days I tend to agree, but then again, I am clinically depressed, so what the hell does that tell you?). You see the cube is really about perfecting an ultimately mindless and useless task, then repeating that task over and over and over, even if you can't get any better. It is much like Sysiphus (sp?) constantly rolling the boulder up the hill, but with an added cynical twist - you screw up the cube yourself then try to solve it, only to screw it up again. How like many jobs, where we rush to complete one mindless task, and in the process create other mindless tasks for ourselves, all of which are ultimately pointless... Or relationships that we hasten to fix and then break apart and remend in an endless cycle of misery... Or life in general where we hurry to get noplace so that we can save time to spend it on nothing, hurrying and scurrying until we meet our end having accomplished nothing except for endlessly repeating the same pattern... Which could go for the human race - endlessly repeating the same mistakes, not because of institutions, governments, or religions, but simply because we are people and that is our nature (incidentally, blaming religion or society or republicans or democrats or whatever group for being the root of evil is purest sophistry -all those groups have done great good and great evil, like virtually every group every, and they all have one common denominator - human beings - who ultimately choose good or evil).

Or on the lighter side, one could point to the zen-like state that you enter in the solution of the cube, performing a mindless task with a religious devotion like a mantra taking one to a state of non-existence of self, of other, of anything, just perfecting the task - like a swordsman trying to perfect the art of the draw, or a potter losing himself in his craft, etc., etc. Obviously this one is not as well thought out as the other - I am in a bit of a bitter mood, and have been for a couple of weeks - no good reason, just where I am, so this positive crap feels phony to me, but I think there might be a kernel of truth in it somewhere - it just doesn't seem like it right now.

But on to other things; I am going to be out of town for most of the next two weeks, and when I am in town, I don't know if I can game or not, but I am going to be adding a blog to this - an L5R blog. I am going to indicate whether a post is for the High or Low power group, and anyone can respond to the post (in character of course) and tell me how they interact with the situation. I figure that this way I can keep up my ideas for the games, have a place to post summaries, and be able to give experience for players who are out of the area... Oh yeah and I can post all the house rules in detail and see if anyone wants to volunteer ideas for other rules or getting rid of rules.

I think it should work out pretty well - look for it in the next few hours. Here is the link, it is in my list of blogs to the side as well: http://tosavethesteelthrone.blogspot.com/

Rubik's Cube and L5R new stuff

2008-12-12T18:20:00.000-08:00

So it's been a week since I learned to solve the Cube (simple 3x3 only, I am starting to look for patterns that would help me solve the 4x4 and larger, but that will take a while). I have been practicing fairly regularly - maybe 20-30 minutes a day, maybe a little longer on some days, none on others, but I got my best time of 1 minute and 18.56 seconds today (of course, listing the decimal is somewhat spurious in terms of the significance, because of the delay of pressing the button, picking up the cube, an pressing again when finished, but what the hell). That doesn't seem too bad for a week, but I would like to get sub-one minute, I figure it may take another couple of weeks to do that. Cutting from 3 minutes to 1:20 is pretty easy, but there comes a point where until you learn how to process the color differences faster and learn some finger techniques that you hit a wall. I'll note when I achieve that. One of the kids who taught me has a best time of 40 seconds ish, the other has a best time of 8.56 seconds - I saw him do it in my classroom at a Rubik's Cube Club meeting - he has one of those timeing pads and everything.

He is phenomenal - able to do it blindfolded, behind his back, one in each hand simultaneously (that is the most impressive for my money). He can even solve a 7x7 cube in under 5 minutes - look up Vcube on you tube and you'll find a number of solutions to this puzzle and get an idea of just how hard it is. He has even come up with an algorithm of his own for solving the cube -pretty cool!

I've also been teaching myself multi-variable calculus over the past couple of weeks - it is surprising how easy it is to pick it up. The basics of three dimensional vectors make a lot of sense, and the proofs of how the basics work is not that bad - mostly a pretty simple extension of analytic geometry... but reparameterizing equations seems kind of silly, I am going to have to look up why anyone would want to do it - there must be something I am missing, but it could have something to do with integral multivariable -since the reparameterized equations are in terms of the parameter s, the length along the curve (so the x, y, and z coordinates are in terms of the distance travelled along the curve rather than the arbitrary parameter of t that has no actual representation on the curve - and I suppose I just answered my own question - the new parameter has physical "reality" on the curve). But I just realized that this is probably terribly boring, and you would rather hear about the L5R stuff.

3rd Edition Revised came out a couple of weeks ago, and Masters of Magic (to go with Masters of War and Masters of Court) came out a couple of days ago. Revised fixed quite ofew ofthe errata, and introduced more errata with some of their corrections. It also added in the Spider Clan (Daigotsu's Shadowlands clan) for more interesting characters and NPCs. Here are the major new bits, all of which I'll be incorporating.

Defense Skill while in "Full Attack" posture - Always add 2x your def skill to your TN when in full attack - this is a very good reason to buy it up, especially for the Lion characters. I am not sure if this is too good, but I think it balances out. At rank 3 you add it to your TN at all times (except full attack), so a character with defense rank 3 adds 6 to his TN in full attack, but the opponent still gets 3 free raises so he effectively only gets a -9 to his TN instead of a -15 if the raises are used to lower TN
Defense Skill while in "Attack" posture - allows characters to use the defense skill even if they choose the attack posture; this makes no sense under their rules, but with us still declaring postures in reverse initiative, it is a very good option. You may make a defense skill roll, and the total replaces your TN from your reflexes. So a character with a 3 Ref and a 3 Def will average a base TN of 25 if they use this skill, rather than a base of 15. A normal Defense Roll would give plus 25 instead of the plus 10, but you did not need to be in full defense to use it.
Full Defense - the full defense bonus only applies against as many opponents as your insight rank. Abilities that allow you to use your full def on someone else means both of you have the bonus against the same attackers. You can only use this bonus if you know you are being attacked.
Heavy weapons and carapace - the Tetsubo only takes 2 off of the carapace, but removes the 10 bonus from armor, Dai Tsuchi removes 1 from carapace and 5 from armor bonus. Much more realistic, and there are still mastery bonuses.
Feint Manuever - this is now worthwhile. Make an attack roll. If you succeed, you do no damage, but for every successful raise you called towards a feint, you get two free raises on your next attack against the same opponent, as long as you attack befor the end of the next round.
Extra Attack - both attacks must be made against the same opponent unless you are attacking with a second weapon in your off hand. This can make dragons very dangerous, and can make some peasant weapons extremely effective (watch out for those wandering budoka masters who just look like peasants ;)
Movement Penalties and damage - When you are hurt (+10 TN) you also take a penalty of 1 to your water ring for movement purposes, when crippled, you take a penalty of 3.
Movement - Move Water x 10 feet per round. Full defense you may move half that distance. If you are in "Full Attack" posture, you may also attack after a full move. In "attack" posture, you may attack after a half move, or after a full move if you make a raise.
Attacking after getting up - getting up takes a full action - If you make two raises, you may attack as well.
Raises on contested rolls - simply declare raises and then subtract 5 x the number of raises from your final roll - this simplifies contests with multiple opponents (a very important rule with Winter Court forthcoming)
Raises for Damage - 1 raise adds 1k0, two raises adds 1k1, three raises adds 2k1, four raises adds 2k2, etc.
Raises for spells - a bunch of new stuff here, they basically systematized the raises for duration, range, and casting time. Each raise increases the duration by an amount equal to the base duration, each raise for range increases range by the base amount (ie 50 feet base, 100 ft with one raise, 150 with 2, etc). Each spell takes its mastery level in actions to cast, each raise reduces the casting time by 1, to a minimum of one action. (rituals take 10 minutes per mastery level, and require multiple casters). Raises are capped by Void or Ranks in Spellcraft, spellcraft of 5 gives a free raise on all spells. If you have an emphasis, at rank 7 you add that amount to your spell casting roll (mucho dangerous for specialists, putting them more on par with their bushi counterparts)
Void points for extra actions - you may spend 2 void points to gain an additional action on a turn. It can't be an attack, but it can be anything else (including a spell - so it is possible to cast two spells if you have enough Void). You can only gain one action this way, and it could be a spell after a normal attack (for example - the Maho Tsukai attacks someone to fuel his spell and then casts the spell - so he stabs you and uses your blood to fuel the evil magic that he casts at you - risky and difficult, but oh so scary)
You may spend a Void to add +10 to your TN for a round.

Those are the main differences, there are a couple of others that I may phase in gradually, but these are pretty straightforward, and are also pretty cool. I have a couple of house rules that we have been playing with so far, but I may as well systematize them here.

House rules:

Delaying actions - if you have a higher initiative and you delay your action to try and see what someone will do, you can make a contested reflexes roll to act before they do - no modifiers for being "quick" or having a technique that mods initiative - you already used that and are then delaying. This way, you can see what someone will do, and then make a move based on that if you are willing to take the risk.
Casting a spell that targets an individual you take a penalty to the TN of the spell equal to twice the ring that opposes the spell you are casting if the person is aware of the spell and actively resisting the effects (for example, you cast a Jade Strike at an Oni. The oni has an Air ring of 3, your TN to cast the spell is 6 higher). This gives people some actual resistance to spell casting, but not the full +10 TN that the books give now - it is halfway between the old system and the new one, and we'll see how it works ( I might change it to ring times 1/2 Insight rank, rounding insight up before multiplying, but I am not sure yet)
Declaring posture in reverse initiative order, this still gives the initiative winner a big advantage.
(NEW) Penalties for being in "Full Attack" posture happen when you declare the posture and last until your next action.

That's all for now, I am going to watch Two and a Half Men with the wife (funniest new show on TV, BTW).

Rubik's Cube

2008-12-05T16:27:00.000-08:00

So I finally learned the algorithms to solve a rubik's cube today - it is pretty easy, only took me a day to learn them, and I can finish a cube in sub-three minutes. I won't consider it much of an accomplishment until I can get below the one minute marker.

BTW, supergoober, thanks for the reminder on The Hospital... I had forgotten about that (don't worry, I still remember how it ends, just forgot to finish writing it). Incidentally, I am in a better mood now - four days averaging less than two hours of sleep a night does some strange things to your mind - lets just say the gun barrel joke came from a serious curiousity and leave it at that :)

But I got five hours of sleep last night and I feel much better. Though the good thing about sleep disorders is that you do burn more calories being awake - I did nothing different in the past four days (except not sleep) and lost five pounds from the anxiety - what a perfect crash diet - I wonder if I could sell it to Hollywood model/actress types?

Well, that's it for right now, I might do a more serious one tomorrow, if I finish writing my practice final exams for my classes and posting them on my website in a timely fashion - they dont have the final until december 19th, but I figure that they can have more time to study this way.

Maybe one of these days, I will just right a post listing a bunch of hotbutton issues and topics, but never actually discuss them, and see how many hits I get from people who just monitor this stuff because they have little else to do... seems like fun, huh?

So, it's three am and I can't sleep...

2008-12-03T03:15:00.000-08:00

So, it's 3 a.m. and I can't sleep, so I figured I'd get a bit of writing done and briefly foray back into the online world after a prolonged absence - due in part to being extremely busy prepping student leaders for a Kairos Retreat and due in part to struggling with some depressive tendencies - a weird combo, busy and depressed, but not so weird... depression can at once paralyze and also cause a person to be unnecessarily busy to avoid confronting him/herself... and what luck, I just used both unhealthy strategies :)

I have two stories and a poem floating in my head right now, but I don't feel like writing them - one story is too upbeat for the way I feel right now, and would just sound phony, and the poem and other story are just too depressing to put down on paper (or the electronic equivalent), so I will just resort to telling a few jokes - somewhat in the vein of the gallows humor of the comment at the end of the last paragraph.

I was just thinking in all the distopian futures, they always have suicide booths/parlors etc. This always seemed somewhat profligate to me - I know that you want to encourage such things in the dark times of the future (Soylent Green comes to mind), but I just got to thinking that it would be a lot cheaper and more effective if they just made flavored gun barrels - because who really wants that metally taste in their mouth before they die?

I guess that isn't as funny as I thought it was, but sometimes it helps to make a joke out of the more bizarre thoughts... maybe I'll go on to something a little less ... uh ... dark.

I always wanted to run my own mortuary, just so I could put truth back in advertising - my slogan would be "Your pain is our gain" - coffin sales are the most ridiculously exploitative businesses.

Guess that's not really any lighter is it?

What if alien abductions are happening? Their tech would be so far advanced it would be like us catching fish - just imagine the little fish posters underwater showing all the missing persons (or fish, I guess) and the fish police who have no leads - it's like these fish just disappeared completely from the world. And what about the ones who are caught and released - they just come back with a bizarre story of how they were swimming along like normal - spotted a tasty morsel and ate it, then they felt a searing pain in the mouth got yanked up out of the world where they couldn't breath, had a probe shoved in their mouth to remove a device (or maybe implant one??????) under the glaring light that they've never seen before, only to be thrown back in a different part of the lake than where they were eating...

Then they have to go home and explain what happened - and try to convince the other fish that it is not the cheap gin they been drinking or the methamphetamines they've been smoking, but it actually happened.

For my money, I still bet on the cheap gin and meth being the cause of human abductions...

Okay, so I'm not that funny right now, but whatever, at least I wrote something - get off my back.

Coming soon: a post on Voltaire's expression, "If God didn't exist, it would be necessary for us to invent him" in this post, then in my fiction post, a poem called "gossamer threads" and part two and three of "A Butterfly Caught in a Spider's Web"

Talk to you soon

Moral Imperatives and Social Need

2008-10-24T21:41:00.001-07:00

Just a quick hit to follow on a comment someone (supergoober) made to a previous blog. He used the term "moral imperative" for certain social spending, and jocularly, I shot back with a comment about of "I thought we couldn't legislate morality" obviously referring to the whole abortion argument in general. But of course, there was a little truth told in jest.

Supergoober's line did actually describe the feeling out there of how we should be kind and generous and giving to our neighbors - but that is, at heart, a religious/moral sentiment, and therefore a matter of personal choice. I deeply believe in the necessity of social justice, and in the religious tenet of "love thy neighbor", and neighbor is to be interpreted very broadly, but most of the social programs do not consist of me personally being generous, they consist of me insisting that people who have more than me be generous as well. I have taken my moral choice and evaded it by forcing someone with "more" to be generous instead.

Obviously, the government has some role in "promoting the general welfare", but as the government usurps this role more and more, it becomes easier and easier for all of us to neglect this aspect of our responsibility to each other. We succumb to an "I gave at the office" mentality - that is it is easier to evade our own personal duties if some mythical, mystical government entity can do it for me (perhaps very badly) and obviate me of any feeling that I might have of helping my fellow human beings. It is this fact that I find destructive to the soul of humanity, and while others might flinch at the use of the word, use it in any connotation you like, this attitude destroys any bit of the transcendent nature of our selves, whether that transcendence is divine or human doesn't matter.

Either way, you precisely are legislating morality, and in doing so, you are ultimately destroying the desire to make any moral choice in all of us. That is not to say, then, that we should never legislate morality - every law should be an extension of good moral sense - that is the origin of law. People who object to the "legislation of morality" really object to legislating anything that would feel bad for them because either it makes them feel guilty, or because they don't agree with the legislation of morality.

For example, it is immoral to kill, thus there are laws against murder. Were we to not consider that killing was wrong, we would have never legislated against it in the first place. A gross oversimplification, yes, but you get the gist of my point. We cannot escape the fact that morality is all we legislate - all civil rights legislation, for example, is an attempt to instill a certain form of morality, that is one of eliminating gender bias, racial bias, etc, so that we can treat each other as equals - but that is a fundamentally moral issue!!! Again, I am not saying that there is anything wrong with that - I think it is laudable and the way that laws need to be written. People start objecting when the "morality" in question makes them feel guilty about their own choices or those of their friends, and rather than process the guilt appropriately, they seek to externalize a moral standard that makes them feel better (a very typical, if dysfunctional, way of dealing with cognitive and emotional dissonance), or they object because the morality does not fit with their own moral sensibilities - I think you find the former more than the latter, however, especially with the abortion issue, and this is where the mantra of "choice" is ultimately detrimental and destructive.

Yep - I am about to write about that dread topic of abortion. I know that this is going to upset people, but I want you to realize exactly where this is coming from before I write it. It is coming ultimately from a place of care and concern, especially for children who have to go through this so-called "choice" (and believe me I have seen, on more than one occasion, the psychological and emotional trauma a 15 or 16 year old goes through when they have made this "choice" - and it is not because of some external standard of guilt imposed by a religion - they know that they had a child inside of them, whether fully developed or not, and as they are younger, they see the implications of what would have happened had their parents made a similar choice, but I digress, more on that later).

So, this is big-time a hot button issue, and rather than trivialize it, I will attempt to talk about some problems with our current standards. I am going to avoid the whole mess of legality or illegality; rather I am going to address the folly of saying that it is simply a choice (yep, I used folly, sorry if that is insulting, but my use of the word should become clearer as you read on) as well as the problem with allowing it without parental consent. And that part, the parental consent issue, is huge. I have had long discussions (and sometimes arguments) with my wife about this, and she makes some very valid points about how most children cannot approach their parents with a statement like "I am pregnant" or "I got my girlfriend pregnant". Very true, it is difficult to do, but I really hope that the majority of parent-child relationships in this world are not so strained and abusive that this conversation could never happen. That is my hope, but I know it is not necessarily a reality (but I believe that it is a reality more than not), however, allowing a child to make this kind of decision without her parents only serves to set up a government sponsored impediment to relationships between child and parent.

Let me explain; most of us (humans in general) avoid emotionally traumatic and difficult situations as frequently as we can. We try not to upset other people, and sometimes out of altruism or sometimes out of fear, we do not wish others to have to deal with our problems. This goes especially for teenagers, who are struggling through the tribulations of becoming adults. They have to deal with the fact that their parents treat them as children while they feel like adults; they struggle with impulses to simultaneously act childish and then engage in very adult behavior; and top all of that off with the fact that they have a feeling of invincibility that they do not want disturbed, and they do not want to admit that they were wrong about. That makes for a very messy, difficult space to approach a conversation with parents. If society gives them an out for this difficult situation, how are we going to expect them to ever develop the cognitive, social, or emotional skills for dealing with these situations? Yes, this would be an incredibly difficult conversation to have with your parents, but many teenagers might find that there parents were far more supportive of them than they had anticipated. Others might find that their parents are as flawed and human as they thought that they were. Either way, being able to struggle through this process is important, and while I cannot force this upon anyone, I bristle at legislation being used to give a "easy" out to this difficult situation. (GE)

Because it is not really an easy out. And this is the crux of the difficulty. When we say that this monumentally difficult decision is just a "choice" we do several things to the young woman involved. First, we make the decision, the blame, and the responsibility entirely hers. It implicitly states that it is her fault for getting pregnant - after all if she is the sole arbiter of choice, then she must be solely responsible. She is told that she has a choice, and that it shouldn't be difficult (again, this statement is implicit in the abortion rights movement, in my opinion), and when she struggles with the decision, and feels that there is a huge burden involved, she defaults to the fact that something is wrong with her. This conclusion is entirely wrong, but entirely common, and something young women must struggle with in silence. By telling a girl (and many are, unfortunately, just girls when they have to make this decision) that it is just a choice, when we use terms that make it seem like it is no different than choosing what breakfast cereal to eat, we set up a false expectation in them. When they struggle with the reality of the fact that they could give birth, in a short amount of time, to someone just like them, the decision becomes huge and traumatic. All our platitudes about choice serve only to undermine and separate the child involved. Because it was a "choice", her "choice", the implication is that she must make it without help. The trivial nature of the slogan is at odds with the traumatic reality, and, rather than realize that the slogan is wrong, she assumes that something is wrong with her - she doesn't feel comfortable seeking help, because she has always been told that she can make this decision by herself.

All of our banal platitudes that were put in place with the best of intentions, our sincere attempt to diminish a child's sense of culpability in this difficult situation, have only served to undermine her emotional and psychological stability and, even worse, have only served to traumatize and isolate her. She can only seek the help of her peers, and even then only in whispers, not because of the stigma attached to abortion, but because she feels weak at not being able to make such a simple choice, or because she feels guilty at having made such a choice. And that guilt is not something for which she was prepared because, while she understood some of the magnitude of the decision, again, it was always trivialized in discussions on choice, and again, she feels wrong for feeling guilty.

So all that this choice for children has done is put them in harmful situations and removed any sort of support structure from them, all in the attempt of minimizing the impact of this decision. One cannot argue the good intentions - I believe that virtually all (with some specific exceptions) of the major players in the pro-choice movement are well-intentioned. They don't want people to feel the trauma that they felt or that they assume might be felt at the proposition of an abortion. Either that or they have excessively intellectualized the debate, and removed the emotional aspect from it in an attempt to diffuse the tension surrounding the issue. All this has served to do is to alienate young women who are going through this and who have intensely powerful feelings about it - when they were always told that they shouldn't have those feelings. Now when they experience guilt over the choice, their guilt is de-legitimized and they are forced to struggle with it alone.

So what do we do? I don't know, but I will give you my response. If it wasn't obvious up til now, I am nominally pro-life, though the descriptor is rather silly (everyone is both pro-life, and pro-choice, I don't know anyone who hates life, or anyone who wants to take away all choice - the issue at had is abortion, the monikers merely take away from the argument, so I seldom use them). In terms of moral culpability, from Catholic moral teaching (and many others, but I will cite Catholicism as I was raised Catholic and am well-versed in the moral teachings (not just the dogma)) the less choice one has, the less moral culpability one has. This is a nod to the "can you be evil with a gun to your head" line of thinking, and was introduced into Catholic moral teaching in full-force (though it had precursors) around WWII. It was originally given as a moral "out" so Catholics could feel comfortable lying to hide Jews and others from the Nazis - Catholics were good at guilt, and right and wrong, so Catholics who would hide Jews would feel guilty for lying to state officials about it and confess to priests, I don't need to go through all of it now, you get the idea, right?

Anyway, the less capable you are of making a decision, the less wrong it is. I do believe that abortion is wrong (more on the science of that in another post, and yes, there is science and not just dogma or emotion, though the science still relies on valuing human life; if you don't believe in the value of human life, then the science won't persuade you either). But a girl who is in an incredibly difficult situation, whose parents or boyfriend pressure her into the decision cannot be truly said to have committed a "sin" or done something truly immoral. Was the act right - no, clearly not, but it is by all major moral thinking less wrong than an affluent woman in her late 20s using abortion as a birth-control technique (and I hope that doesn't happen, but I would guess that it might have, but I would argue not frequently). It is the moral imperative of the community around a girl to support her through the difficult process of recovering from such a life-altering decision, not trivializing it and telling her it was nothing. They should provide counseling and emotional support (and yes I do mean professional counseling). Many women end up counting birthdays of unborn children, or have pangs of guilt when they see a child that they know would be the same age as the child they aborted. Do we force women to dear this guilt in silence by denying its existence, or do we help support them as people of care, concern, and conscience would? Do we diminish people by saying that the choice is trivial when it isn't? Should we try to eliminate the emotion involved in the decision, again by trivializing the decision, or do we help people who have made this decision come to terms with it and grow as a result?

My answers to these questions are pretty obvious, as I have already stated. Notice in my argument above, I didn't even get to the social and financial pressures that make the decisions even harder, or the fact that easy availability of abortion makes it easier for boys to exert sexual pressure on girls (and no, this is never explicit, but it is becoming built in to the psyches of young people as a potential out - fear of pregnancy is less acceptable as an "excuse" for a girl who doesn't want to engage in sexual behavior), but all these serve only to bolster my point, and I could write books about all of them.

I know that some people deny the existence of the feelings that I have mentioned above, or they attribute them to the moral upbringing in a puritanical society, but I do not agree with those contentions. Even from a purely biological standpoint, our emotions must exist to preserve the species, so the "love of a mother for her child" is biologically selected, even if you don't buy any of the moral arguments. It is very likely that the moral construct of guilt in the situation is biologically inspired as much as it is morally inspired (and many contend that our morality may flow out of our biology - I do not agree with that entirely, there are major flaws in the logic, but there are reasonable points that can be made). My point is that the guilt associated with abortion is not entirely a social construct of religion that we can eliminate. Many in the "pro-choice" movement tacitly accept that it can be removed because they do not want anyone to have to deal with the guilt. Rather, we should be focusing on how to support kids through the trauma, not invalidating it. By saying that there is or should be no guilt, we try to shut off a part of ourselves, and we damn the children to struggle with it in silence, alone. Even if you look at it from purely a therapeutic mindset - therapy does not seek to eliminate guilt, pain, or other emotional responses, rather it tries to put them into perspective so that we can live our lives as whole human beings rather than flawed constructs consumed with guilt and self-loathing or shallow non-entities who have shut off any capacity for emotion in ourselves to stave off uncomfortable feelings. I guess that gives a little insight into what I believe and why, and I hope that whoever reads this knows that the decision to be "Pro-Life" or "Pro-Choice" shouldn't be undertaken lightly, and what we say and do has a tremendous impact on each other, especially on the young and vulnerable in our society.

Wow, I had originally intended to talk about legislating morality and construction of morality outside of belief in a deity of some sort (a near impossibility if you want to generate a non-Nietzschean, non-Machiavellian morality - try reading John Stuart Mill, for example - his utilitarian ideals are so flawed you could drive a Mac Truck through them, not that they had Mac Trucks in his day, insert the Victorian equivalent), but my progression of thoughts led me to the abortion issue. If you've made it this far, I hope I haven't upset too many apple carts, and I hope that you can still engage in conversation with me later...

I suppose this one might pop up on a number of search engines now, and I might get wanderers in that don't normally read this blog - if that is you, feel free to comment, but try to remain thoughtful in your comments, as I tried to in this lengthy discussion. Feel free to dispute what I have said, but don't just come down on my side or on the opposition side with irrational or argumentative garbage... if you have a counter argument, I would love to hear it; this does not capture all my reasoning, but I have given it a bit of thought...

Thanks for reading :)

On Socialism

2008-10-22T17:16:00.000-07:00

In a response to the last blog, supergoober mentioned the word "socialism", and I responded with the fact that Obama clearly is "socialist" in his aims. I feel that I should define a bit more clearly what I mean by that, and mention the specifics where he, as well as many Democrats and Republicans have socialist tendencies.

But first to address the resistance to the word in general. Many people tie this to the failed economies of the Eastern Block, and rightly so, as those were communist governments (actually formed into oligarchical dictatorships) that had socialized economies - specifically the branch of socialism that deals with the state controling the means of production. The fact that Soviet Communism was deeply entangled with Socialism really did a lot to throw the economic principles of socialism into doubt.

Many people now will debate whether socialism and communism are the same thing, adherents to one socialism generally try to distance themselves from the name communism. Marx viewed the proletarian revolution and socializing of economies (socialism) as a step toward the communist utopia that he posited.

The actual history of the names, however, is much more interesting. Communism was the European term for the atheist utopia that Marx envisioned. In Protestant England, however, the term was deemed to be to close to Communion (the Catholic Sacrament) and the term socialism was favored. They both actually describe the same, or very similar, philosophies, however, adherents to each will spit hairs over who falls into what category.

Even among Socialism, which could be defined as the movement to remove control of industry from the hands of a few "capitalists" and return it to either the laborers or the government, depending on your flavor of socialism. A free-market socialism would have labor organizations running all businesses rather than individuals, while a national socialism (the term now being far out of favor since the Germans used it in that upsetting period in the late 1930s and early 40s) focusses on the state controlling industry. In addition, the Marxist philosophy of "from each according to his means, to each according to his needs" also affects social policy - particularly "liberal" social policy, which flows from the social democrat ideal (most notably used in England) of state ownership of key market industries and tax-funded social welfare programs for the population.

The social democrats (not affiliated with the Democratic party of the USA, though holding many of the same ideas), are the socialist ideology to which Barrack Obama is most closely aligned. He favors punitive actions towards owners of businesses (aka Joe The Plumber, sorry, but it is the most obvious reference) making him "spread the wealth around" to favor people who for whatever reason could not achieve what Joe did. He had some lines where he danced around the issue and said that he would have liked to do things to help Joe reach where he did (not that he needed any help, apparently), but now that he was there, it was his responsibility to help his fellows, not by employing them, but by giving back some of that presumably ill-gotten gain to the government so that Obama could "spread it around" as he saw fit. That is a distinctly socialist idea, and naming it as such does no harm.

If Obama does not like that, he should adopt a philosophy that does not espouse that, but it would undermine everything he ostensibly believes in. He should instead embrace the term and tell people what it means and why he believes that it will work. McCain could reasonably counter with why he thinks it doesn;t work and why free-market capitalism does.

But that would require both candidates to be intelligent and genuine, and it would also require that McCain be a free market capitalist. He is, however, very socialist in his approach to government, perhaps not so much as Obama is (ie socialized medicine), but attempting to manipulate the housing market and control that entire sector of the economy with a government institution is completely and 100 percent socialist. I don't know if he knows that or believes that it is actually the right solution (or is it just what voters want to hear?), but you cannot argue that it is anything but socialism. Government economic regulations put us in this position with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac being regulated into making these loans, and main street and wall street were complicit in this action (yes, theGM and I talked a bit about this, and I do believe that it is all three, I always have, but I feel that Wall Street gets all the blame, so my other blogs were an attempt to show where the Wall Street attitude came from. These loans used to be considered to risky, but when Carter started pushing for them, and regulations started mandating them, Wall Street quickly fell into lock-step realizing there was money to be made and that the Feds would bail them out, and main street jumped on board, conveniently never stopping to read the fine print and happy that the world was giving it up for them for once... long parenthetical finally concluding, Socialized Government started it, wall street and main street hopped on for a ride, but the fundamental precipitating act was the government attempt at controlling the economy and money supply).

So, long story short, McCain and Obama have very strong socialist leanings in their policy (government funding of energy - wind, solar, nuclear, etc. also socialist Mr. McCain), and I do not particuarly like either one. I am not a free-market nut, the government should oversee in a regulatory capacity, but I have an intense dislike for government ownership and for control of the economy as an engine for social policy change - because it doesn't work well (if it does at all). The need for social welfare from the government is largely self-fulfilling - the government usurped the roles of the traditional organizations involved in these activities and began doing it less efficiently and in a more dehumanizing way...

But that is for a later blog on liberal supermajorities in 1933 and 1965, and I think you can already see where this is going. Talk to you soon, I have to go tutor chemistry again :)

Republicans Wrong? Of Course!

2008-10-21T20:55:00.000-07:00

In answer to your earlier query in the blog response, I just want to unequivocally say that certainly there are times when I feel the Republicans are wrong. In case you don't remember, this cycle I view it as my civic duty to not vote for either presidential candidate. I feel that both of them are naive, neither has appropriate leadership qualifications, and both the economic plans are patently ridiculous. I will vote for the propositions and so on, but I refuse to vote for either candidate.

Some people at work who have heard me mention this say, "If you aren't going to vote, you have no right to complain about what you get." BS - not exercising one right does not mean I waive another (free speech). Even if you buy the non-sequitor, I still have the right to complain because my refusal to vote is because both are horrible. I will bitch quite loudly about disastrous policy decisions of either one, because I would if I voted for either one anyway.

In terms of why my comments are so resoundingly anti-Democrat, it is because I am not following any of the crap that is going on. I will listen to snippets of news, but I do not cruise the blogs or follow FOX or CNN religiously. I flip on network news every once in a while - since the press seems to have a love affair with Obama and Biden, I will more often hear their idiotic comments and respond to them.

If you recall a couple of blogs ago, I decried the "Carbon-Tax Plan" that Palin mentioned as about an idiotic idea as one could have, especially in the current climate (pun intended - check out the cooling trend of the last 7 years, plus the cooling trend of the economy - a carbon tax would screw up America, but it would condemn 3rd world countries to economic bankruptcy were it ever instituted in a widespread fashion).

As to the racist and overtly homicidal comments, I haven't seen them, but if I had, I would be quick to damn them. Rush's bit on being sexist is surely a joke - that sounds like it is right out of his playbook on commentary that would infuriate the left - and he tends to play this stuff as a "straight-man" style humor for as long as possible. What are you referring to when you talk about comments from the candidates - can you point me to a quote? I am not being flip, I am really not plugged into this campaign because it is such a joke on both sides.

As far as the election fraud, the Disney character bit is extreme, but the voter rolls not being purged of felons and deceased persons is ridiculous - that should be done immediately, because that is where real voter fraud takes place. ACORN is a politically active organization that does actually encourage voter fraud (a bit extreme of an accusation, but it can be backed up - now is not the time, because I need to finish grading (midterm grades due 8:30 am tomorrow)).

But what I really find troubling are the proposals Obama has made in the past - and he is just echoing the Dem. party line on these. He wants to allow "day-of" voter registration. That is you can register to vote the day of the election - eliminating checks on citizenship, residency, and eligibility - not overtly, but because there will be no way of immediately checking. This is a horrible idea, and it only encourages fraud, or at best ignorance in voting and bribing of voters (Chicago machine politics, anyone?). The other thing that he supports is eliminating the secrecy of voting for unionization - labor organizers could petition people and have knowledge of who voted against "organizing" and pursue aggressive campaigns to convince anti-union people. This is dangerous - when someone knows how you vote, they can intimidate you, and just as big monopolies tried to crush unions in the early 1900's, big unions have tried to crush opposition to them in the late 1900's to early 2000's (and yes, I know that I don't need the apostrophes, but dammit they look better).

An unfortunate necessity, however, is that of spoiled ballots being discarded. As much as people complain about this, it affects both sides about evenly. There are neutral parties who inspect ballots and discard any ones that do not meet certain requirements... it is impossible to intuit what a voter would have wanted if they could not follow instructions. While it seems ridiculous to discard a ballot that did not have a line completely connected (for example) when it is "readily apparent" who the person wanted to vote for, we cannot embark on the road of letting a third party interpret who they thought someone was going to vote for. This is the same way people lose points on the SAT and other standardized tests, and when you are dealing with that many votes, it is unfortunately the only way.

I will aways favor paper ballots, because there is a "paper trail". Can fraud occur? Yes. Can it occur more easily and less verifiably with an all electronic system? Oh my yes. To falsify large amounts of ballots, it would take the concerted efforts of many, while to screw up an electronic system on a fairly large scale would require less effort. I am not a tinfoil hat nut that says that evil liberals or evil conservatives would do this, but it puts voter fraud on a massive scale within reach of small pockets of people who, on some level, just like to f__k with computerized stuff.

So, long story short, Republicans piss me off on some level just as much as Democrats. There is nothing I hate more than having an idiot try and defend a position that I hold - and I am sure you feel the same way.

But more on that later, and I would also like to discuss the "Bradley Effect" and race in elections... coming soon to a blog near you :)

Joe Biden: Hello Mouth, Meet Foot

2008-10-20T12:00:00.000-07:00

Joe Biden has a habit of continually putting his foot in his mouth; and I am not talking about the kind of gaffs that go largely ignored because they are inevitable mistakes for a person who makes his/her living by speaking in public. Most politicians have many of these types of mistakes - how often do we all fumble over words at times. Most times, these mistakes are picked up by comedians (and sometimes journalists) to poke a little fun at a politician or politics in general.

Biden spent a long time criticizing Bush's education policy and No Child Left Behind, and then concluded with the statement: “There’s less than 1 percent of the population of Iowa that is African American. There is probably less than 4 or 5 percent that are minorities. What is in Washington? So look, it goes back to what you start off with, what you’re dealing with.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/24/AR2007102402716.html

Anyway, that is not the only gaffe, but I do not want to rehash his long history of ignorant and arrogant statements, but one he made recently was incredibly stupid from a political standpoint. I don't remeber the exact quote, but he effectively said that within six months of being elected the world would test Obama the way it tested Kennedy. He implied that there would be some potentially catastrophic confrontation of Obama because of his lack of experience.

Whether this statement is correct or not, it shows an incredible lack of sophistication about national politics. The Republicans would probably never bring something like that up for fear of being called scaremongers or being too negative. But if Biden brings it up first, it all of a sudden becomes fair game. You go from being politically unable to touch the inexperience angle, and then Biden just opens the floodgates and makes that aspect of the debate relevant again.

Think about it. Biden basically says that because Obama is inexperienced, the world will test him - what exactly does that mean? It seems to express a real lack of confidence in his presidential candidate. That is not a good thing to have your running mate say less than a month before an election.

Just an observation, more later, but not on Biden - he is just another boring racist elitist, and there is lots of proof of that from his own mouth.

McBamaNomics

2008-10-13T17:03:00.000-07:00

Yep, well, I've been busy lately, and I don't have a ton of time to write right now, but just want to opine about the state of the economy and how our two wonderful candidates proposed to deal with economic issues, and how, if either one institutes their ideas, what a disasterous mess it will cause. Pardon me as I go through this, it will have a bit of a CW feel to it (check the sidebar for the definition).

Anyway, the first question was basically, "What do you think we should do about the crisis?" If either one thought that their answer was the right one, then God help us should either of them get into the White House. Actually, in a way I hope that Obama does, because it will (in my mind) mean the ultimate repudiation of his economic school of thought. Of course, no one else may actually be paying enough attention to what actually happens for this to matter, because his ideas are nice and help out the little guy (insert mewling voice here). Never mind the fact that they ultimately screw the little guy worse harder than Ned Beatty got screwed in Deliverance, harder than Jodie Foster got screwed in The Accused, harder than any contemporary porn actress gets screwed in any of the modern mysogynistic miasma of pornography, harder even than Greedo got screwed when Lucas editted Star Wars so that he shot first (now that should get you an idea how strongly I feel about Obama's plan - I don't want to live in a universe where Greedo shoots first!!!!!!)

But I digress... Obama's plan was basically this: spend money on public works, create government jobs, bailout any person who got in over their ignorant head, and tax the hell out of the evil corporations who got us here in the first place. If this sounds familiar, it should - it is a page out of FDR's playbook, and unfortunately, anyone with any historical savvy can tell you it did not work. It mired us in a worldwide depression for over a decade, and only a World War got us out of it. Not that even a world war would do that, now; we have switched from a manufacturing based economy to a service based economy, so a war would not really help gear up economic growth (and even that growth was government spurred, but not in the same way - that's for another time, kiddies). Anyway, if you want a decade of malaise, go with the Obama plan.

The McCain plan was just as bad, perhaps worse. His idea was to have the Treasury purchase and renegotiate loans so that the loan would not exceed the value of the home. This would supposedly stabilize home prices. Unfortunately, it wouldn't work. Lots of lessons in the past have showed us that government price and wage fixing don't work at all. Whether they were put forth as part of a disastrous domestic plan of Richard Nixon or of Jimmy Carter, they f---ed up the economy royally the last time. Trying to "stabilize" home prices is ludicrous. Some people are going to lose their homes, and lose their investments. Sorry, there are no rewards without risks, and that was the risk that some people took. If these cycles never happened, no young buyers would ever be able to get into homes.

I bought my home in 1996, at the bottom of a market slump that started around 1994 (which Clinton tried to reverse by freeing up capital by mandating Freddie and Fannie make more risky loans). I bought my house for $202,500. I only mention that because the guy I bought it from had purchased at the height of the previous craze for $330,000 and he got screwed in the deal. he couldn't afford to live in the area and was moving to the East Bay, and he lost all of his down payment, and actually owed more on his loan than we paid. Did that suck for him? Yes, but were it not for his bad judgement, I would not have been able to buy a home. There are many reasonable people who can now (or soon) afford homes in the area, and the prices will stabilize themselves. If that means that some people have to pay unreasonable amounts for a home that is worth less than the loan, then they had better keep doing it.

They have a couple of options: keep paying on a loan that is higher than the value of the home and wait for prices to rise again (as they will), or sell it at a loss because they cannot afford the payments because they got themselves into a stupid loan in the first place. That is it. End of story - just like owning a car, you make loan payments for quite a while when you owe more than the car is worth (instant depreciation) and no one has a problem with that unless they overextended to buy that car. Not too different, and it isn't rocket science.

But back to the plans - long story short, they both suck, but I take solace in the fact that, in all likelihood, neither will be instituted; debates are all about who sounds like they care more, and seldom actually have anything to do with what people are going to do in office.

Obama is not going to cut taxes on 95% of Americans (even his proposed plan doesn't work out to this number). He ran on a similar line for the Senate and always voted against any tax cut, whether for rich or poor. McCain will not get rid of earmarks, too many people love them - it is their principle method of getting re-elected.

I will have to labor these points more later, right now I am going to tutor someone in Honors Chemistry.

So, I'm watching the debate...

2008-10-02T18:36:00.000-07:00

So far, it is what I expected... Biden is playing it safe, and chanting the mantra about his tax cuts for 95% of Americans - avoiding details, Palin is doing about as well, saying the same McCain line over and over.

The problem that I am seeing right this second is that Biden is talking out of both sides of his mouth - we are causing global warming, "we know the cause" and yet still advocates "clean coal". Sorry, you can't have it both ways - if you buy the line that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, and that we are causing the majority of warming - clean coal doesn't help. In fact, according to their science, low sulfur coal would increase CO2, while decreasing sulfur - sulfur is actually toxic, but it actually results in cooling, so this is actually a horrible solution (switching from one carbon source to another does not lessen the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere).

Of course, I don't think that our production of CO2 has a marked effect - I'll explain why later - the point is still valid. It is hypocritical. But people don't care - they just listen to whoever says the words "clean energy" more - regardless of the truth.

And Palin just supported a carbon tax -a horrible idea (unless it is very small - statistician/environmentalist Bjorn Lomborg did a study that showed the optimal rate was two to three dollars per ton - any more puts the brakes on economies without measurable positive effect).

They are actually going after each other a bit, now, but it is actually pretty boring - McCain/Palin supporters will still go that way, Obama/Biden supporters the same. It is possible that a small portion of the undecided might be swayed - possibly to McCain - Palin seems a little more convincing, Biden seems to be saying the same thing over and over. I don't think that this debate would really sway anyone, and I am getting bored - both are just putting forth the standard campaign lines. I am just going to shut it off and play some more Silent Hill 5.

Regulatory Reform Act of 2005

2008-10-02T16:14:00.000-07:00

Just a quick blurb for supergoober, who earlier queried about my sources, here are a few interesting links on this act. Sponsored by Hagel - R, cosponsored by Elizabeth Dole, John McCain, and John Sununu, it called for regulatory oversight of Fannie and Freddie, including investigation into bookkeeping "irregularities". It attempted to stop risky loans and 0 down loans that were the hallmark of what the Dems wanted - to turn "The American Dream" into the American Right - that is, it is everyone's right to own a home.

I don't want to belittle the American Dream, and home-ownership is a big part of that. But it requires hard work, dedication, sacrifice, and it still might not happen. Hell, I wouldn't own if I hadn't gotten lucky with some idiot screwing up his own shot at the Dream. Sometimes, you can't always get what you want... and I know that this seems harsh, but shit happens and chips fall where they may and about a hundred other cliches - life doesn't always work the way we want it to - but the purpose is to live it and try and figure it out for ourselves, not to have people hand us stuff to try and pacify us into re-electing them (a long time Democrat strategy, oft employed by Republicans as well, but we can't forget who mastered the art of creating a dependent class of voters - that is a capital D!)

Anyway, as to the source, citations, etc. on the bill, I've included a summary below from govtrack.us, and their main source material is the Congressional Record (I still reminisce fondly about those days working in the Millbrae Library when I would read those on my break, so I could actually see what bills were like and how the debates went down).

The summary:

1/26/2005--Introduced.
Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005 - Amends the Federal Housing Enterprises Financial Safety and Soundness Act of 1992 to establish: (1) in lieu of the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), an independent Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Agency which shall have authority over the Federal Home Loan Bank Finance Corporation, the Federal Home Loan Banks, the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae), and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac); and (2) the Federal Housing Enterprise Board.
Sets forth operating, administrative, and regulatory provisions of the Agency, including provisions respecting: (1) assessment authority; (2) authority to limit nonmission-related assets; (3) minimum and critical capital levels; (4) risk-based capital test; (5) capital classifications and undercapitalized enterprises; (6) enforcement actions and penalties; (7) golden parachutes; and (8) reporting.
Amends the Federal Home Loan Bank Act to establish the Federal Home Loan Bank Finance Corporation. Transfers the functions of the Office of Finance of the Federal Home Loan Banks to such Corporation.
Excludes the Federal Home Loan Banks from certain securities reporting requirements.
Abolishes the Federal Housing Finance Board.

The site of this is http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s109-190&tab=summary

If you want McCain's remarks on the senate floor, they are at http://www.govtrack.us/congress/record.xpd?id=109-s20060525-16&bill=s109-190

Hagel's introduction of the bill is at http://www.govtrack.us/congress/record.xpd?id=109-s20050126-53&bill=s109-190#sMonofilemx003Ammx002Fmmx002Fmmx002Fmhomemx002Fmgovtrackmx002Fmdatamx002Fmusmx002Fm109mx002Fmcrmx002Fms20050126-53.xmlElementm39m0m0m

The full text of the bill is at http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=s109-190

Interesting video on the debate http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MGT_cSi7Rs - a montage of Democrats saying Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will be just fine, despite Republicans maintaining that we need more regulations on the two organizations. Check out Barney Frank maintaining that there are no problems, and that the Republicans are just trying to stir up trouble - and he has the audacity to now claim that it is the Republicans fault (and , yes, I know that I split that infinitive, but I felt like it, okay - get off my back!).

Also, the bailout bill sucks - do we really think any of the senators read the 450+ page bill - a typical Senate bill with loads of crap having nothing to do with the bailout - subsidies for energy, rum, railroad ties. So before you think that I am just listening to Right-wing nutcases, know that I love to research :)

No offense, supergoober, but one of your responses was a tad snitty, and what, no response on the origin of the universe ;)

Now I am off to play a little of Silent Hill: Homecoming before the debate - preliminary judgement - the game is frickin' awesome... a tad on the linear side so far, but I still hold out hope.

A Brief Musing on the Point of the Universe

2008-09-30T18:46:00.000-07:00

So, in one of my more self-indulgent moments, I was thinking about the whole origin of the universe thing, based on some of my discussions with supergoober and others, and I just started thinking about the actual "time" right before the Big Bang.

I use the quotes around time because it is highly probable that time did not really even exist. According to most theories, the universe was a infinitesimally small volume of energy heated to billions of degrees somewhat smaller than an electron in size, and uniformly energetic. The four fundamental forces were unified at that point, and the existence of "space" and "time" as we can currently conceive doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

You see, all of the dimensions that we know (plus a probable 6 or 18 others that we cannot perceive) were wrapped around each other and existed in that microscopic space. So even the question of measuring it and saying it "was the size of an electron" is somewhat specious. Since the dimensions were fundamentally different at that point, trying to establish a radius in something that fundamentally encompasses all of the spatial dimensions that we can conceive of is somewhat ridiculous. Space would be so turned in on itself, it would be like trying to measure to the edge of the universe right now. The problem is that you would have to take an infinitely curved path to get to that edge, because the dimensions did not behave as they do now (that is my personal contribution to the thought - I haven't heard anyone else say it, but I am sure that theoreticians must have raised this point somewhere). Even trying to question what was outside that energy at that time is not a great question. If there was something "outside" there is no way we could possibly come up with a description because it would be outside of all known experience. It would not even possess the dimensions of space that we hold so dear as absolutes (until you get close to light speed or on a subatomic scale).

But I digress... just millionths of a second after the Big Bang, gravity split off, and caused some of the expansion of the universe and dispersal of the energy (one of the reasons space has a fairly uniform temperature despite 13.7 billion years not being enough time for universal cooling to this extent). Very shortly thereafter, the strong and weak nuclear forces as well as electromagnetism come into existence and Hydrogen and Helium come into existence as a result. It takes much longer for other elements to form, because H and He must coalesce into stars so that nuclear fusion can happen (and incidentally, if the timing was any different, and the strong nuclear force was about 2% stronger, you can kiss the universe we know goodbye - Deuterium and Helium-5 or maybe Helium-6 becomes standard, stars do not form in the same way (if at all) and who knows what the hell the universe would be like, but we certainly wouldn't be here).

Anyway, this always makes me think of the whole life in outer space thing, and while I believe that it is a distinct possibility, the temporal distances (not the physical ones) are what seem to be the problem. Of course, physical distance is a problem, too. Let me put it this way - we have been humans (homo sapien) for 150,000 years. We have been a "civilised" species for about 12,000 years, and have been fairly mathematically advanced for about 3,000 years. We have been able to communicate via radio transmissions, etc for about 120ish years, and we might have another few thousand years as a species, say 100,000 years as an optimistic estimate. Since we are, by most accounts, recovering from a fifth major extinction event, any one of those previous eras could have made an intelligent life form as a dominant species. If another planet has a similar evolutionary pattern but was off of the creation of our planet by 100,000 years, they could have peaked and gone extinct far before we existed. Similarly, they could be occurring after us. The timescales are so huge, and the evolutionary scales are relatively quick (maybe 4 billion years from sludge to us, but that includes major extinction events). Suppose a planet doesn't have that first major extinction, evolves into an advanced civilization, then experiences that extinction (say, like sleestaks, for humorous comparison). We would not ever bridge the physical gulf to the suitable planet, and to then get there AT THE TIME that their civilization is comparable to ours would be statistically impossible. Just look at the slice of a 100,000 year peak period for an intelligent species (I just made that number up, but it seems like a reasonable amount -complicated intelligent species seem to have some self-destructive nature if we are any example - but maybe that is overly pessimistic - we've only been around at our current level for a very short amount of time, so that is why I am giving that time frame).

Suppose that the universe will last another 25ish billion years (another assumption, but reasonable for the rate of expansion and the point where energy may be diffuse enough to no longer support life as we know it). That means about a 40 billion life cycle of the universe, with a generous 100,000 year window for intelligent species. This amounts to a fraction of 1/400,000 of the time in the universe. Hoping that another species is intelligent in that correct window of time as well as within range of practical travel and technologically sufficient to communicate - a long shot at best. My point - don't bet on meeting ET outside of a theater any time soon.

But actually, that is not my only point. Many philosophers have posited that one only gains a soul through painful self-reflection and a growth of self-awareness. These two facts - the fact that we could need to engage in self reflection coupled with the fact that we feel compelled to explore the origins of the universe, led me to an unusual thought, one I think supergoober will like to muse on.

What if the whole existence of the universe is simply a struggle for self-awareness. That is, the sum total of all physical and natural laws of space and time is only an attempt for the universe to create something that can comprehend itself. Rather than individual self-awareness, it is a struggle for the actuality of the universe to comprehend itself. I know, it is kind of wacky, maybe something that many people contemplate while high, but since I have never been high and have missed out on those idiotic moments, I find this thought rather interesting.

What if the universe is on a quest to become self-aware, and we are just one of many possible divergent lines of "thought" for said universe? Like the different modes of reflection/religion/philosophy many of us muddle through as individuals in a quest for understanding of self and enlightenment, what if there are divergent strands of life (temporally and spatially forever separated) who are all engaged in the struggle to understand the universe because the ultimate goal of the universe is self-awareness.

So what happens if the universe does achieve this?

I don't know, but it is kind of cool to think about.

Hope I haven't bored you too much, and I will be writing about my Reno trip soon.