Contrast!

Seed magazine editors endorse Barack Obama. I particularly like this statement:

Science is a way of governing, not just something to be governed. Science offers a methodology and philosophy rooted in evidence, kept in check by persistent inquiry, and bounded by the constraints of a self-critical and rigorous method. Science is a lens through which we can and should visualize and solve complex problems, organize government and multilateral bodies, establish international alliances, inspire national pride, restore positive feelings about America around the globe, embolden democracy, and ultimately, lead the world. More than anything, what this lens offers the next administration is a limitless capacity to handle all that comes its way, no matter how complex or unanticipated.

Then there is this from The 700 Club types. Don't these idiots know about the smack down Aaron got for praying to a golden calf?

'Jewsh People' Invented Only A Centry Ago

"No one is more surprised than Shlomo Sand that his latest academic work has spent 19 weeks on Israel’s bestseller list – and that success has come to the history professor despite his book challenging Israel’s biggest taboo.

Dr. Sand argues that the idea of a Jewish nation – whose need for a safe haven was originally used to justify the founding of the state of Israel – is a myth invented little more than a century ago."

Read the rest>>

Reminds Me of Nukeuler

On another subject there was this:

The term paper biz is managed by brokers who take financial risks by accepting credit card payments and psychological risks by actually talking to the clients. Most of the customers just aren't very bright. One of my brokers would even mark assignments with the code words DUMB CLIENT. That meant to use simple English; nothing's worse than a client calling back to ask a broker — most of whom had no particular academic training — what certain words in the paper meant. One time a client actually asked to talk to me personally and lamented that he just didn't "know a lot about Plah-toe." Distance learning meant that he'd never heard anyone say the name. More>>>

Joe The McCain

Bringing Heat

I watched Heat again last night. I was busy the first time it aired and didn't get to watch it all then. I saw enough then to know I wanted to see it all the way through. I know I could have seen it online but just didn't get around to it. I was still thinking about it when I got up this morning. I wonder if, in the future, there will be questions on driving tests about energy. Maybe people will need to pass an energy test to buy gas, meat, light bulbs or get a utility meter in their name. Maybe Oprah will have to have a permit to air her show and pay part of the cost of cleaning up after the mess caused by generating the electricity to power the televisions watching her yap. Then I ran across four powerful paragraphs about the show from Michael O'Hare.

Read this closely then go watch this a few times.

Repugnant

So objectionable as to elicit despisal or deserve condemnation: abhorrent, abominable, antipathetic, contemptible, despicable, despisable, detestable, disgusting, filthy, foul, infamous, loathsome, lousy, low, mean², nasty, nefarious, obnoxious, odious, rotten, shabby, vile, wretched.

Vote Now

Early voting started today in Texas. Do your part to speed things up and reduce congestion and delays at the polls on election day by voting early and soon. Instead of 'Drill Here, Drill Now, think, vote early, vote soon.

David Iglesias is paying attention.

Iglesias on Voter Fraud Hysteria David Iglesias, the Republican U.S. Attorney from New Mexico who was fired because he wouldn't pursue trumped up voter fraud charges against ACORN at the insistence of Karl Rove, is speaking out about the GOP's fake hysteria about voter fraud:...

Living in Lubbock, Texas

This brought back memories of when I lived in Lubbock.

Life in Lubbock, Texas, taught me two things: One is that God loves you and you're going to burn in hell. The other is that sex is the most awful, filthy thing on earth and you should save it for someone you love. ~ Butch Hancock

Debate Three and Joe The Plumber

It was strange to see the talking heads, going on after the debate, like McCain had done a good job of being aggressive and it seemed like they were thinking he might have won this debate. But then the numbers started coming in and they all started back-tracking and trying to get their stories to line up with what the public saw. It was like they suddenly realized that they were watching a different contest from what you and I saw. Mark Kleiman gets it right. I think.

David Gergen made the most important point of the evening, one that related to all three debates and one that, I thought, Obama grasped and McCain didn't. These were only formally and secondarily clashes between Obama and McCain. The voters weren't really measuring them against each other. These debates were the final step in Barack Obama's job interview for the Presidency.

The voters (like those in 1980, as Ed Rollins pointed out yesterday) had already decided they'd had about enough of the ruling party. But they needed to be reassured that the opposition candidate wasn't a fool, a lightweight, or a kook. What mattered was whether the challenger could get above the bar, put himself in the voters' comfort zone. Once that happened, there was sure to be a landslide.

Obama's super-controlled performances were all aimed at that end. Unlike his opponent, he knows deep in his bones the difference between tactics and strategy.

McCain tried to make much a due about Joe The Plumber. Apparently, Barack Obama was asked a question about taxes by a random (and I stress apparently) guy on the campaign trail. Mr. Obama spends several minutes explaining some of the basics of his plan in pretty cogent detail.

I think Obama missed a good opportunity to stuff the "redistribution of wealth" crap down McCain's throat last night. When McCain said it Obama should have said something like:

"My plan will stop the re-distribution of wealth that has robbed 95% of Americans and placed almost all the wealth and power in the hands of the richest 1% of our society or foreign individuals and destroyed the economy of this nation. By providing a lower tax burden for more taxpayers than ever before, my plan will put more money into the hands of people who spend it on the most important things in our lives. That will create far more jobs than all of the fancy yachts, airplanes, lobbyist retreats and golden parachutes combined. That is the kind of economy we need. We can no longer afford the kind of economy we've had under Republican rule where most corporations no longer pay any taxes at all. Every corporation and every individual will have to pay it's fair share to repair this nation's economy and standing in the world. We are no longer going to give corrupt businesses a pass to use the working class and the infrastructure that working class has built even while carrying the extra burdens of the rich on their backs."

I think Joe was a plant but who knows from which side. It was fun to watch anyway.

Sign This Petition Now!

Texas education is in deep do-do. Half of the committee appointed to review the science curriculum work for the Discovery Institute, are from out of state, and think creationism is a scientific theory. Two of whom just happen to be authors of a creationist textbook they hope to sell to the state.

Sign this now>>>

Real Altruism Is Sexy?

I'm not sure Phillips gets it just right when he says:

Dr Phillips said: “Evolutionary theory predicts competition between individuals and yet we see many examples in nature of individuals disadvantaging themselves to help others. In humans, particularly, we see individuals prepared to put themselves at considerable risk to help individuals they do not know for no obvious reward.”

Part of the "competition" tools between individuals may well be altruism. Over my brief lifetime, I've been around some folks that were pretty generous to the point of putting themselves in a bind on several counts to make sure someone else got a leg up or that a cause would be advanced that would actually do them no direct good in return. The best ones always seemed to make sure their effort was anonymous or appeared to come from some other source and they shunned publicity. I only knew what I knew by accident. I don't know that it got them mated but, it got a lot of good done.

Then there were a few that were always making sure everyone else knew how generous they were. They never seemed to fool anyone.

Small World

I stumbled upon some old computer stuff in my files as I was cleaning some stuff out the closet this morning. Back in the early days of computers there was this thing called a TRS 80 that was sold by Radio Shack. One of the guys I knew at the airport where I worked made stuff like disk drives for the TRS 80 way back then. John Lancione ramped up from there and created Clone Computer Corporation in 1978. They built a lot of computers and sold lots of software through the years until closing the doors in 2006. I wound up working for him in 2000.

I think the guy that wrote OS-80 for the TRS 80 also had a hand in writing the menu thingy we used to maintian the sales and inventory software that Clone used. It all resided on a very old Netware server that never ever died except once. I tried to build up a new box for it but the system would have none of the new hardware. So we scrounged around and found some almost the same parts as what had died and stuffed it all back into the original case with a new power supply and a little more memory. I plugged in the network cable, monitor, keyboard and mouse and turned it on. It just worked. So I powered it down and haulded it back to the server rack, plugged everything in, turned it on and it was still running when I left there several years later. I saw it one more time after the business was sold and that server was moved to another location. They asked me to help them set it up on their network.

I unpacked the old server at the new location, set it on the floor beside the desk of one of sales folks from the old company, plugged into their network and turned it on. I went to the workstation and logged on. Everything worked. End of story until today.

One of the things I found in the stack of stuff I thew away this morning was and ad for Montezuma Micro. The ad reminded me of OS-80, the second name for Percom's MicroDos. It was written by Jim Stutsman. Mr. Stutsman and his wife have The Sewing Room in Frisco, TX., just up the road from here. Jim even writes software for sewing machines.

Update: Mr. Stutsman comments and I stand corrected. That's how I learn a lot of things.:) The Internets is a great thing.

JFK an Introvert??

I was watching the news last night and they had a little ditty about some John F. Kennedy tapes that have been released. On one of the tapes Kennedy says something to the affect that he was an introvert compared to his dad. As an example, he said he would rather read a book on an airplane than talk to the person beside him. There was more.

I can do introvert and I don't think Kennedy would get much of a prize in that category. My first thoughts were; the guy was President for cryin' out loud. He had to have a crap load of extro to make that cut.

But it's true that really sharp people are much less confident in themselves than are incompetent people. There seems to be an inverse relationship between certainty and competence. Really smart competent people tend to work hard at getting things right and incompetent people invariably assume they are smart and have nothing to learn. That's something worth knowing.

Thunderf00t does the right thing, allows VenumfangX to live another day.

Thunderf00t demonstrates yet another reason to laugh at creationists.

Oh My!

Some lady in the audience at a John McCain rally had the microphone. She stood up and said, referring to Obama and why she wouldn't vote for him, ... he is an Arab. John McCain took the mic and said "I have to tell you. Sen. Obama is a decent person and a person you don’t have to be scared of as president of the United States...” a horribly weak response to clear and present bigotry.

I wonder if McCain may have finally come face to face with the realization that his candidacy is in such a fix and people's opinion of him are so low, even among his own supporters, that the only way they can justify supporting him and Palin is to try to demonize the opponent with common gutter level bigotry and racism. The McCain supporters even at the top seem way too comfortable with displays of some of the worst kinds of human indignities. One of the worst of those indignities is the attacks now flourishing in the conservative base against the great American melting pot heritage.

Today's good read about a must read.

Then my mother was ready. The mask came off, she held tight to our hands, and the morphine went in. Her grip slackened. My mother was still alive, in there somewhere, beyond our reach. Was she in pain? We don't know. She couldn't talk to us now, or focus on us, but she was awake, her eyes open. She gasped for breath, again and again, and we sat there, traumatized, waiting for her heart to stop, waiting for the very first sound that I had ever heard—my mother's heart beating—to go silent.

The rest via Pharyngula.

ICorrupt Justice Department

It looks like the Bush Justice Department has intentionally committed misconduct in order to get key evidence against Alaskan Senator Ted Steven thrown out. The defense rested it's case and Stevens will likely walk. The judge may even throw the whole case out of court. That stinks.

The P debate.

On taxes, Obama should have kneecapped the old man for saying that Obama would raise everyone's taxes and crush jobs. Obama is for lowering taxes where it counts the most. Lowering the taxes on the middle class will create jobs because people will have more money to spend. Lowering taxes for the rich will not help them spend more. Reagan proved that once and for all. Obama should have said that McCain wants to raise the taxes on the middle class, make it harder for the working class to get health care, wants to destroy social security and distribute all wealth to the rich. The rich should be very concerned to push more opportunity further into the population before there is a rebellion. One like the French revolution where most of the rich were beheaded.

On foreign policy, Obama is right to say that we have to rebuild our standing in the world. Obama is very popular all around the world. McCain is no different than Bush. He is backed by the same people. He talks just like Bush's people. McCain is detested around the world. Obama seems better positioned to convince the rest of the world that we can be a force for peace that the rest of the world can depend on. Obama has said that the U.S. must demonstrate strength of example rather than examples of strength.

No one on this earth who has drawn a breath since Bush invaded Iraq has any doubt that it was a crooked war started by a crooked president and that it severely damaged our chances for destroying the Taliban and al Qaeda. We must not allow McCain to become president because he will continue the reign of the conservatives and the bloody squandering of Ameican lives and treasure on totally failed world strategies.

McCain is talking about being tough on Russia and Obama should have jumped in his shit because McCain's campaign is full of Russian lobbiests. On Isreal, McCain is an idiot. Isreal is neither our biggest ally in the region or in the world. They are not a driving force for peace in the Middle East or anywhere else. They are a giant suck on everyone who touches them. They are mostly a bunch of arrogant assholes that play their god's chosen people baloney and do nothing for peace. Yeah they are in a pucker. We will have to protect them and we should. But we need to shut off the money and tell them to get their crap together and make more nice.

McCain got the last word but it wasn't worth much. Played the wo is me I sacrificed as a veteran and POW while everyone knows he had it great as the son of an admiral.

Obama didn't show me much but McCain comes from the party that damn near did this country in and I'll never again vote for conservatives no matter what party they are in. Obama should have reminded everyone every time he spoke that McCain is more of the failed regime.

Encouraging Comparison

Bill Maher's Religulous made twice as much money per screen as An American Carol even though
there was a lot more advertising for Carol. Religulous also beat the infamous Expelled per screen. Alas, all three are nothing but minor movies and they all have one thing in common - a lot of people haven't seen any of them. But I like the idea that the Maher show might demonstrate to advertisers that there is a godless market to serve.

Same as Bush, only a worse pilot.

1974:

At Fort McNair, an army base located along the Potomac River in the nation's capital, a chance reunion takes place one day between two former POWs....

McCain is studying at the National War College, a prestigious graduate program he had to pull strings with the Secretary of the Navy to get into. Dramesi is enrolled, on his own merit, at the Industrial College of the Armed Forces in the building next door.

There's a distance between the two men that belies their shared experience in North Vietnam — call it an honor gap.....

On the grounds between the two brick colleges, the chitchat between the scion of four-star admirals and the son of a prizefighter turns to their academic travels; both colleges sponsor a trip abroad for young officers to network with military and political leaders in a distant corner of the globe.

"I'm going to the Middle East," Dramesi says. "Turkey, Kuwait, Lebanon, Iran."

"Why are you going to the Middle East?" McCain asks, dismissively.

"It's a place we're probably going to have some problems," Dramesi says.

"Why? Where are you going to, John?"

"Oh, I'm going to Rio."

"What the hell are you going to Rio for?"

McCain, a married father of three, shrugs.

"I got a better chance of getting laid."

Dramesi, who went on to serve as chief war planner for U.S. Air Forces in Europe and commander of a wing of the Strategic Air Command, was not surprised. "McCain says his life changed while he was in Vietnam, and he is now a different man," Dramesi says today. "But he's still the undisciplined, spoiled brat that he was when he went in."

Read the rest>>

Aw, I get it now.

I'm pretty slow - that makes it even funnier. Sara Palin's VP debate performance was parady. She is just having a good time mocking the GOP and they may not even know what she's up to. She knows a gig at SNL spoofing Tina Fey will be a sure thing when the elections are over. There may even be a 30 Rock Tina Fey "twins separated at birth" roll for her. Fox news is turning out YouTube skits like this one to positition themselves in the Comedy Central market so they'll be viable after Nov. 4. Now that's funny.

The Perfect Mind Storm

A Christian demonstrates the ultimate self-conflicting destruction of the mind in an open letter to creationists. Ejecting creationists from Christianity or any other religion, for that matter, will not make that religion true or good for anything but a place for the next lunacy to breed and infect the minds of it's followers and the children they abuse with their teachings.

She didn't stink up the joint.

I watched the VEEP debate last night. It was hard to watch. The P&VP debates aren't real debates in that the moderators are pretty much constrained by the political parties involved. So one has to peer through some pretty dense fog to learn anything at all. It was very foggy last night. I didn't see much from Palin except that she didn't cry or anything to embarrassing. The bar for her was laying on the floor. I felt a little sorry for Biden when it was over. He showed that he is made of some pretty good stuff with his comport. He not only showed his capacity for making complex points, he did it while defusing the ticking bomb that Palins situation forced upon the debate. I think it was an important moment in Joe Bidens life and it was completely over shadowed by most people waiting for SNL moments from Palin. But life ain't fair and he showed he can handle that too. I cruised a lot of wingnut sites today and even they came away with little profit from the meetup last night. The only polls I've seen gave it to Biden in all the important categories. The right seems mostly satisfied that Palin didn't trip on the bar. She is done speaking to reporters until after the election unless you somehow count the likes of Hannity and Limpbaugh as reporters. I predict a landslide for Obama and company.

False News; We Report, You Decide.

Some Fox News guy interviewing bunch of older folks in a Scranton, PA diner. He asks for a show of hands to see how many are going to vote for McCain (like 2?) (one old guy starts to raise his hand and his wife grabs it and pulls it back down) and how many are going to vote for Obama (15 million), and then declares the vote a “split,” and the old people laugh at him for being...well, a liar.