Fun Stuff

Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie, are cool.



I've got 2 job interviews tomorrow, so I'm going to bed now.

First lizard genome sequenced: Green anole lizard's genome sheds light on vertebrate evolution

First lizard genome sequenced: Green anole lizard's genome sheds light on vertebrate evolution

REPORT: 25 Corporations Paid More To Their CEO Last Year Than They Paid In Taxes

REPORT: 25 Corporations Paid More To Their CEO Last Year Than They Paid In Taxes: pLast year, as Americans across the country grappled with the widespread effects of the Great Recession, tax dodging by corporations and the wealthy cost the average U.S. taxpayer $434, even as corporate profits soared 81 percent. In fact, according to a new report from the Institute for Policy Studies, “corporate tax dodging has gone so [...]/p

Things my government never told me 2

Before we start talking about Who.
Let's look at a little more of the What...



You are being watched.  You should be aware of that fact.  Everything you do online, every site you visit, is logged, somewhere.  Unless you are a moderately advanced hacker, there's nothing you can do about it.
And I suspect, that to go totally unobserved you have to be a pretty advanced hacker.
With the advent of the computer, just about everything people do is tracked in some manner.
So, you have to wonder....



This is a segment from a Nova special called 'The Spy Factory'.  It's a fascinating little look into the halls of power.  You really should check it out.  You can get the whole thing, broken into nice, manageable little bits over on YouTube, or you can stream the whole program from Netflix or Amazon.



Now, let's think rationally, as difficult as that might be, cuz it seems to have escaped our government, but let's give it a try...
If you need to monitor the digital info from Asia, and the sheer volume is a problem, why do you wait till that traffic merges with domestic traffic before you tap it?  The most logical place to tap it would be one of the two stations before this.
And if all you are interested in is foreign traffic, how come there are 15-30 of these stations around the country?
And what good does all this data collection do if you don't use the information properly?
Mark Rossini was a FBI liaison to the CIA who was ordered not to pass along the information that 2 of Osama bin Laden's associates were in the U.S., months before the 9/11 attacks.  He also points out, that reasonably, there was more than enough evidence to get a warrant for surveillance of these 2 men.  FISA would not have been a problem.  If they had even bothered to try for a warrant.
If you put the information from 'The Spy Factory' together with the following....



You get enough evidence to raise some serious questions.
Follow the timeline of what happened after 9/11 and watch where the money went, and is still going, and you get more than enough motive to just ignore something that serves a disturbing agenda.
This isn't the only information that I have gathered that points to that disturbing agenda.  This is just some of the stuff that raises red flags for me.
Here I will point you to another bit of info. that keeps those flags flying:
Dick Cheney: What is the Price of Failure?  By The Pardu,  one of my fellow posters on Left Take.
We all know that the government lied about WMD in Iraq.  Why we continue to ignore that fact baffles me.
Why hasn't George W. Bush and/or Dick Cheney not been charged with perjury?
Why did we have to have civilian contractors involved in the war?
Why wasn't anybody regulating the bad business practices of the housing and finical markets?
I have lot's of questions.
And I don't really like the answers that I'm finding.
With this evidence of deceit and omission, I really have to wonder just what else are they lying about?
And what else aren't they telling us?

Sunrise

It was impressive this morning!

Tonight's the night...

Well, actually, last night was the night, but I still haven't been to bed yet....
Doctor Who returned for the second part of the 6th season of the new show.  I've been looking forward to this all summer.



For those who don't know, Doctor Who is one of the longest running shows in TV.  It is the longest running Science Fiction show.  It's one of the few things to be successfully remade.



Late one Sunday night, back in the 70's, I tuned to the local PBS station and caught an episode of a new show they were running.  I've been hooked ever since.



That's a clip from the Robot, the first Dr Who episode I ever saw.  This is well into the episode, but it has my favorite bit, the scene of the new Doctor finding himself, and the introduction of the famous scarf.
It may not seem like much now, but, back in the day this was impressive for television Science Fiction.  From that night, every Sunday night, for over 10 years, I tuned into the local PBS station to watch a new episode of The Doctor.  Quite often a group of us would get together to watch.
The original run of Doctor Who ended in 1989.  It had faltered a bit in the ratings, and then, according to rumor, Stephen Spielberg bought the rights.  I'm not sure exactly how all the maneuvering went, but The Doctor was officially dead at that time.  In 1996 there was a made for TV movie released in this country.
Thankfully, that never went any further.
At the time I was bummed, but the movie wasn't all that great.  I'm glad there wasn't an American version of the show.  I don't think we would have done as well with it.  I didn't really like the 8th Doctor all that much.
In 2005 The Doctor was revived, with Christopher Eccleston as the 9th Doctor.
I waited for that first episode with pessimistic thoughts.
And I was pleasantly surprised.










I've been consistently pleasantly surprised since then.
Doctor Who, 47 years, soon to be 48, and still going strong. Can't wait to see the new episode.



Check it out.

TGIF!!

Although, for me, it don't really mean much.  But I'm with all you wage slaves in spirit.

I did get a response from a place I applied to almost a month ago.  They regretted to inform me that the position had been filled.  But, hey, at least it's something.  Was beginning to think that all the apps were going off into the ether twilight zone.

It's been a long month.  A long couple of months, what with the swapping of operating systems, loading and unloading programs, messing with the Office stuff, switching of internet providers and such.

Yeah, last week I switched from Charter to Clear.  Clear's set up is way easier than Charter.  They sent me the modem and I set everything up.  Didn't need a technician to come out.  Which was cool.  It's gonna save me about $20 bucks a month.

I've been having trouble with Charter.  I was losing signal anywhere from 1 to 5 hours every week.  It was happening most often during the work day, so before I got laid off I probably just never noticed it.  But, since the internet is now a very large part of my day, which I'm happy with, not having it was a problem.

I am happy that most of the application process has moved online.  I don't have to drive to the various places to apply.  Saves a lot of gas and time.

2 weeks back from Friday to Saturday my internet was down more than it was up.  Call Charter and they give you a message about a problem in the area.  Get through to a person and they say there's no problem, lets reset the modem...

Go through all that and still no improvement.  Monday and Tuesday it was in and out all day.  I couldn't get anything done.  So I called and signed up with Clear.

The switch went fairly well.  I had signal problems Tuesday morning, though.  The verdict is still out.  That, and I can't get Netflix to work. consistently.  I think it might help to move the router, but I don't have a long enough cable right now.

So last week I spent time tearing the office apart and moving cables and wires and installing a new modem.  I reorganized the desk while I was at it.  It's not all totally back together, I still want to move the router, but I have to get a cable for that.  I cleaned out a lot of old files and threw a lot more stuff away.  Then I redid the living room.

Then, last Sunday, I lazed around all day, enjoying my new living room.

My girls, enjoying the couch

We all like the living room.  Oz has discovered that there's enough room for comfortable snuggling, and takes every opportunity.

Unfortunately, the advent of the couch has strengthened Dusty's lap dog delusions.  She's getting used to the idea of snuggling next to me, but she doesn't like it.  She really wants to drape herself across my lap.  Still can't convince her that she's just too big.

And, of all things, Stupid Dog figured out that she can bark out the window now.

And then she introduced Dusty to the pleasures of barking out the window.  We've been having conversations about that for the last couple of days.

Being a bed there's no back or arms, and that is a slight problem.  I've got ideas on how to fix that problem.  But, that will have to wait until I have some sort of income.

I'm working on that.  I'm gonna start trying some more active internet marketing.  I'm checking into merchandising and demo jobs.  Next week I start applying to the temp companies.  I don't really want to go there, but there's not much choice.  I'm moving into the panic zone.  I need to turn up something soon.

But I can still pay the bills for next month and there will be money left for food and gas.  So not all bad.

This weekend I think I'm gonna do some sewing.  I want to make curtains for the shelves in the kitchen and the cloak is all cut and ready to sew.  Next I start cutting for my Archon costume.

I've got some plants to plant, I'm gonna do that tomorrow morning.  I think I've decided where to put them.

Right now, I'm gonna go work on an entry for the garden blog.  I've been neglecting that all month.

Hope everybody has a great weekend.

Things my government never told me....

First I want you all to think very carefully, and truthfully answer a question.
Which is the world's greatest terrorist state?  Which nation or regime has created the most terrorists?  Which nation or regime has perpetrated the worst acts of violence?
Before you read any further, do me a favor and answer that question.  Even if that's the only thing you do, even if you read no further, just answer that one question...

A couple weeks back I was hanging out with some friends and conversation turned, as it usually does, to the state of our nation.  In the ramblings of that conversation I realized that I had forgotten a name.
Me forgetting something is no surprise.  I forget things all the time.
But I was surprised to find that I could not remember that specific name.  It was the name of one of my favorite authors.  A man whose works I have recommended to many.  I was recommending his work to another person, or trying to.  At that moment I realized that it had been a long time since I had checked his website.  A long time since I had ventured into the areas that he writes about.
And I knew it was time to go back.
I did remember his name before the end of that conversation, and suggested that my friend look him up.  Now, I am recommending him to you.
The man's name is William Blum and he writes about things the US government doesn't want you to know.

Our fear that communism might someday take over most of the world blinds us to the fact that anti-communism already has.

That's a quote taken from his book Killing Hope .  I looked that quote up online and could find no attribution for it beyond anonymous.  Blum attributes it to Michael Parenti from a book called The Anti-Communists Impulse, published in 1969.  It's a very widely cited quote, but I guess since the book was written before the advent of the internet no one feels the need to attribute it correctly.
That's not really central to the point of this diary, it just irks me that we can be so lazy on such a large scale.  You'd think that pages that collect quotes would at least try to attribute them correctly...
While searching this topic I ran across a youtube video that lays this all out much better than I can.
Remember your answer to my question while you watch.



And yes, I have taken the time to, independently, verify some of the facts in Killing Hope, back when I first read it.  The verification is there, if you look for it.  In some cases it is part of the public record.
And I remember what we did in Afghanistan.  We created the Taliban, and we should remember that while we fight the latest of our wars.
And I remember Nicaragua.

What most of the countries on the receiving end of 20th century American imperialism had in common was their attempt to establish a society that offered an alternative to the capitalist model. In the eyes of Washington, this was the ultimate heresy, as it remains today. Such an endeavor had to be crushed, by any means necessary, lest it wind up serving as an example for others. Other targeted countries, while retaining free enterprise to one degree or another, were reluctant to allow the needs of American corporations to dictate their society's priorities; i.e., they were unwilling to permit the WTO/IMF/World Bank/free-trade beast to stomp in and privatize and sell the country's social assets to multinationals, to deregulate, erase their border, drive local industries and farmers into destitution, trash social services and safety nets, develop a cheap labor force, cheap raw materials, and a market for corporate goods, and put people in prison so prices could be free... by now a painfully familiar syndrome known as "globalization", merely the latest transmutation of imperialism, the natural extension of capitalist growth and control; for some years ago, while we were all busy leading our little daily lives, a handful of corporations came along, and step by step, unannounced, purchased the world, then hung a sign out saying "Open for business", and have since then, understandably, insisted on exercising the rights of ownership. Globalization is nothing less than the recolonization of the underdeveloped world.

This is from the introduction of his latest book Freeing the World To Death , which I'd be buying now, if I had a job.  You can read the rest of the introduction, as well as other bits of the book and some articles here: The William Blum Page  &  http://killinghope.org/

I underlined that bit in the middle.  Does it sound familiar to anyone else?

The point of a destabilization is to put pressure on the targeted government by ripping apart the social and economic fabric of the country. These are only words, "social and economic fabric," but what they mean is making the people suffer as much as you can until the country plunges into chaos, until at some point you can step in and impose your choice of government on that country a strategy that was ultimately successful in the Nicaraguan elections when the people of that country "cried uncle" and voted for the CIA collaborator, Violeta Chamorro.9 The rationales we used in Nicaragua were classic Cold War slogans: we were "fighting Communism" in the interests of our "national security"; they were a "Marxist bastion in our ownbackyard"; etc. More specifically, our leaders said at first that the purpose of this program was to "interdict the alleged flow of arms from Nicaragua to the rebels in El Salvador." Unable to prove any flow of arms whatsoever from Nicaragua into El Salvador, the Reagan team, followed eventually by George Bush, developed the propaganda line that they were "returning Nicaragua to democracy." When it was pointed out that Nicaragua had never had a democracy-certainly not under the brutal Somoza dictatorship-they began to speak of the "democratization of Nicaragua," ignoring the fact that Nicaragua had held elections in 1984 that were demonstrably more democratic than the elections that we have in our own Republic.

This passage from The Praetorian Guard: The U.S. Role in the New World Order by John Stockwell should stir some ugly echos in your thoughts.  Cuz, if you look closely at what's happening in this country right now, you could be looking at a tailor made destabilization.
Again, the underlined bit should be reminiscent of something from much more recent history.
And if you think the The Powers That Be, and I'm not talking about the figurehead circus that passes for politics, wouldn't do this, think again.
This quote takes us to another source I urge you all to check out.  Third World Traveler
The stated mission of the page is to:

…tell the truth
about American democracy, media, and foreign policy,
and about the impact of the actions of
the United States government, transnational corporations, global trade and financial institutions, and the corporate media,
on democracy, social and economic justice, human rights, and war and peace,
in the Third World, and in the developed world.

They also have travel information and tips.  So, if you're planning a trip to a third world nation, I'd definitely check them out.

And here are another couple of quotes to keep you thinking... 

"There is a transnational ruling class, a "Superclass", that agrees on establishing a world government. The middle class is targeted for elimination, because most of the world has no middle class, and to fully integrate and internationalize a middle class, would require industrialization and development in Africa, and certain places in Asia and Latin America. The goal of the Superclass is not to lose their wealth and power to a transnational middle class, but rather to extinguish the notion of a middle class, and transnationalize a lower, uneducated, labor oriented class, through which they will secure ultimate wealth and power.

The global economic crisis serves these ends, as whatever remaining wealth the middle class holds is in the process of being eliminated, and as the crisis progresses, the middle classes of the world will suffer, while a great percentage of lower classes of the world, poverty-stricken even prior to the crisis, will suffer the greatest, most probably leading to a massive reduction in population levels, particularly in the "underdeveloped" or "Third World" states."

Andrew Gavin Marshall, The Global Economic Crisis: The Great Depression of the XXI Century 

 "Some of the character traits exhibited by serial killers or criminals may be observed in many within the political arena... [They] share the traits of psychopaths who are not sensitive to altruistic appeals, such as sympathy for their victims or remorse or guilt over their crimes. They possess the personality traits of lying, narcissism, selfishness, and vanity. These are the people to whom we have entrusted our fate. Is it any wonder that America is failing at home and world-wide?"

 Jim Kouri

Here I will ask you to recall Abu Ghraib.

How many of you know that Amnesty International, the International Red Cross, and other human rights organizations had been  protesting the situation in Abu Ghraib for over a year before the U.S. took any action.  The only reason anything was done officially in this situation was, CBS had pictures and was preparing to go public.

Do you really think these were isolated, clandestine, activities, indulged by just a few bad apples?  If you, as most Americans think this was a singular occurrence, think again.

For those who think the United States has been unconscionably brutal to detainees in Iraq, here's how the US handled them during Vietnam: "Two Vietcong prisoners were interrogated on an airplane flying toward Saigon. The first refused to answer questions and was thrown out of the airplane at 3,000 feet. The second immediately answered all the questions. But he, too, was thrown out."

 William Blum Freeing the World To Death.

The fact is, the U.S. is a world leader in torture.  We've taught the terrorists factions in this world pretty much all they know.  Cuz, we don't, generally, get our hands too dirty, we pay someone else to do it.  For a more detailed account check out Killing Hope.
And I have seen an old copy of field manual to back this up.

And remember we had a problem in this country classifying water boarding as torture and declaring it illegal.

Well, the research for this, as usual with the OSS, spiraled out of control and this whole thing took way longer than it was supposed to.  I've got enough material, already, for at least 2 more posts on things the government won't tell you.  For now, I'll leave you with 2 names:  The Bilderberg Group and The Trilateral Commission, and hope you might do some research of your own.  Maybe we'll talk a little about The Powers That Be sometime in the future.
Right now, I've got to do my job searching for the day....

Ohhh all right, one more quote.

 History does not tell us what a Soviet Union, allowed to develop in a "normal" way of its own choosing, would look like today. We do know, however, the nature of a Soviet Union attacked in its cradle, raised alone in an extremely hostile world, and, when it managed to survive to adulthood, overrun by the Nazi war machine with the blessings of the Western powers. The resulting insecurities and fears have inevitably led to deformities of character not unlike that found in an individual raised in a similar life-threatening manner.

Again, William Blum, from the introduction to Killing Hope.  I know the quotes are long.  But I realize I'm asking people to reconsider things they've held as truth their entire lives.  This takes evidence, in most cases, overwhelming evidence.  The quotes are from people who are way smarter, and know more, than me.  If you don't trust me, look at the evidence.  Verify it for yourself.


One of the members over on Left Take replied to this post and provided a few more links to check out.
Thanks SuzeB for adding a few more sources.

My minor was in Latin American History

by: SuzeB1964August 25, 2011 8:19 PM

So I am well familiar with the fascist and criminal acts this country has performed in order to spread democracy (aka corporate dominance) over Latin America. Here's a couple of anecdotes for you:
http://thoughtcontrol.us/same-... http://www.thirdworldtraveler....
http://www.thirdworldtraveler....
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/n...
The list goes on and on...

Been Pondering....

What should remain in public, government, control and administration.
I've played a lot of games that have involved building towns.  From D&D to Sim City there are a lot of games out there that involve growing cities out of nothing.  Few are detailed enough to require you to think about much beyond physical organization and taxes.  Some will make you think about the structure of government and laws.
And I've watched a lot of westerns where the struggling townsfolk hold meetings to decide how to deal with certain things.  So I have pondered this sort of thing before.
What, exactly does it mean to provide for the common good?
I really wish some of our politicians would lay awake at night pondering such thoughts.  I suspect most them, if they lay awake at night at all, are pondering the size of the next campaign donation, or wondering if anyone suspects they're- insert you favorite scandal here.  There's enough of them to choose from.
I think that we, as a nation, need to start pondering such things.
Our system is broken and it needs serious fixing.
And even though things are bad, and probably going to get much worse, I think we still have time before the shooting starts.  There's still time to change things in a more controlled manner.
So, let's consider, what should the government provide and be responsible for?
I'll state up front, my general base for these considerations is a truly democratic from.  One person one vote, the majority rules.  No electoral college BS.  I'll also assume public participation in the process...
Yeah, I know that's overly hopeful.
For now, we're gonna stick to the base question and think about oversight and control later.
Cuz, one of the first things that comes up in westerns is law and order.  In many a good western this gets outta hand, which is why oversight and control come into play.  But, as I said we'll ignore that for now.
Right now, just consider what services the community at large needs.

1. Keeping the peace.
And yeah, I phrased that intentionally.  Cuz, that's really what we want, right?  Peace?  The security of knowing that you can go to sleep at night and wake up the next day with your person and possessions intact?  The ability to go about your daily business in a calm and orderly fashion?  This is part of public safety.

Let's not consider rules and laws, just yet.

2. Fire department.
In Sim City these go along with police stations.  This is public safety too.

3. Education
Lot's of westerns deal with town meetings and hiring the new schoolmarm.  Education should not be only for those who can pay for it.

4. Transportation and roads.
I put transportation first, cuz that doesn't, necessarily, involve roads.  Some of my more successful Sim Cities were all rail.  We live in a new age, who knows what will emerge in the new century.  We should keep an open mind.

5. Health care
In a prior century, hospitals were non-profit institutions and doctors made house calls.  In my mind, at the very least, basic and preventative health care should be free.  We should reinstate the Hippocratic oath

6. Public safety
Certain standards should be established and maintained.  We all need trash pickup and sanitary conditions have to be considered.  Protecting people from unsafe industry practices and products is something that needs to happen on a society wide level.  All industries should be subject to some form of oversight.

7. Public Aide
An enlightened society would provide for those who can not provide for themselves. 

"A decent provision for the poor is the true test of civilization."
~Samuel Johnson, Boswell: Life of Johnson

"A nation's greatness is measured by how it treats its weakest members."
~ Mahatma Ghandi

"...the moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; those who are in the shadows of life; the sick, the needy and the handicapped. " ~ Hubert H. Humphrey

This is not a new idea.

8. Electricity/power
This is something that everyone depends on.  I don't see why boards of directors and stock holders really need to be involved.  This is something that affects the entire community and therefore should be controlled and maintained on a non-profit basis.

9. Water
Same as above, and again, here, we are talking about people's lives and public health.

10. Defense
National defense could come under public safety or law and order too.
And here we're talking about defending against real, direct threats to the safety of the nation.  Not fighting 2 useless wars because  we can trump up a reason to go for a preemptive strike.  Not interfering with the governments of sovereign nations, just because we don't like their politics.
(I'll add a note here.  What we did in Libya was not interference.  One of the few actions taken by this country in the last 60 years I can say that about.  The people of the country rose up to shake off an oppressive regime.  They asked for help.  The UN decided to act.  We aided the UN.)

12. Environmental protection
Leaving questions of Global Warming aside, it doesn't take a rocket scientists to figure out that pollution is BAD.  This is not something to leave to private concern.  This is something that affects the population of the entire planet.

Well, that's my base list.
I think these things should all be controlled from the top down.  These are things that affect the lives of every person in the country and should be uniform across the country.
That's all I've got for right now.  This is a big topic and I'm still pondering...

Saying goodbye...

To the fish sheet!!

When I moved in a year and 3 months ago I didn't have a couch or anything to cover the big front window.

What I did have was a twin bed frame...

For various reasons I didn't want to keep the couch that was left here.  So I decided to keep the frame and get a new mattress for it.  I found a couple of mattress for about $100, and I was going to get one of them, but a twin mattress is not something you can bring home on a bus, and arranging for transport never panned out.
The only thing I had big enough to cover the front window were a couple of old sheets.  So, for the past year I've lived with the bed frame as little more than a catch all for the yard sale junk and the Fish sheet covering the window.

I bought curtains back in January, when Walmart had the ones I liked on sale.  The plan was to tie dye some old sheers that I had and hang the curtains.  But I could just never work up the motivation for tearing the living room apart.  Without some place comfortable to sit, there didn't seem much point.
I was closer to motivated when I started pulling out the yard sale stuff.  But with nothing to keep the dogs from bouncing around on the bed board there really was no point in going further.
Well last week, a friend of a friend gave me the motivation, and a twin mattress.  Finally things came together.  Someone wanted to get rid of a mattress, free for the taking, and I had the means to go and take it.
I spent this weekend working on the living room.  I finished sorting all the yard sale junk, dragged it all out from under and on the bed.  I tie died the sheers.  I dismantled and cleaned the living room and hung the curtains and put the mattress on the bed.  So now, after living here for a year and 3 months, I have a living room.

And it is really kinda cool.

I like the effect of the sun shining through the curtains.

It makes the front room way brighter and it's much more comfortable.

 

 

Everybody agrees.

Review: Kelly's Heroes

Year:1970

Run time: 144m

Director:  Brian G. Hutton

Studio:  MGM

Cast:  Clint Eastwood (Kelly), Telly Savalas (Big Joe), Donald Southerland (Oddball), Don Rickles (Crap Game), Gavin Mcleod (Moriarty), Harry Dean Stanton, Carol O'Coner, Stuart Margolin.

In the middle of WWII Kelly masterminds a bank heist.  Thirty miles behind the German line is a secret shipment of gold bars, sixteen million dollars, waiting for someone to come along and pick it up.  All they have to do is get to the bank...

This film is a serious, action, comedy.  There's plenty of bombs, flames, and wanton gunfire to sooth the wildest action fan.  The realities of the setting are not totally ignored.  The laughs are woven well in the dialogue and situations.

Eastwood is enjoyable as Kelly, the pragmatic motivating force for this heroic effort.  Savalas does a fine job as Big Joe, the more realistic, battle hardened Sargent.  Donald Southerland is my favorite as Oddball, the freethinking, free living, champion of positive vibes who commands three Sherman tanks.



They are well supported by an ensemble of actors including Don Rickles as a greedy supply officer and Gavin Mcleod (The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Love Boat.) as the negative tank mechanic, and Carol O'Coner (All In The Family, In the Heat of the Night) as a clueless general.

There are some highlights of cinematography such as the driver's POV shots as Kelly navigates a jeep through a mortar bombardment at the beginning of the film and Oddball's drive through the train yard.

            
 I like the soundtrack for this film.

From the opening ballad 'Burning Bridges' to the tight drum and horn work the soundtrack is interesting and enhancing.

I see this film as a good example of the changing styles of the early seventies.  Opening with a catchy tune and emphasizing the opposition of the common soldier and command, this isn't your everyday war movie.  Southerland's portrayal of Oddball seems a nod to the Hippies in the audience.

The film is a little uneven, but the joke plays well.  See it for the fun of it.  I give it a 6 out of 10.

I've been wasting time...

Surfing youtube and found clips from 'Paint Your Wagon', one of my favorite musicals.
Lee Marvin is one of my favorite actors.
And it's not everyday Clint Eastwood sings.



He does a fair job.  He's got another song in the first act, but I like this one better.
Lee Marvin's not known for his singing either but, 'Wandering Star' is still one of my all time favorite songs.



I know many people didn't like the casting of those 2 roles, but that's one of the biggest draws for me.  I like the movie.  It's funny and I think Eastwood and Marvin held their own well enough.
For real singers you've got Harve Presnell in the role of Rotten Luck Willy, singing 'They Call the Wind Mariah'.



Another of my favorite songs is 'No Name City'.



It's a fun show, if you're looking for something different you should check it out.  The end of No Name City is hilarious.

What is wrong with the world today?

Cross posted to Left Take

The simple answer: The Military/Industrial complex + Corporate State = World Domination…

OK, I started this with one thought, and research has thoroughly jumped that track to another train.  Man, I really, really miss having someone to talk these hare brained notions of mine over with.

Back in the day, the Deary Departed and I would sit in the mornings and have coffee, most every morning, weather one of us was heading to bed or we were both headed out or both free for the day,  we’d sit, with something, either cartoons, old WB’s and Harman-Ising’s, or something ‘educational’, on the TV and talk, about what ever was on our minds, it was always interesting.

Oh, for a lazy Saturday with ‘Art of the Western World’ and My Deary….

In those conversations and many, many others, my hare brained notions would be shifted, winnowed, and polished.

Now, they are left to the whims of my mercurial head.

Now, I just trail along behind and try to make sense of the shifting.

I started with the thought of tracing the problems of the present through the Industrial Revolution, to the rise of the Military/Industrial complex and through to the spawn of the Corporatocracy.

And I can still do that.  Very easily.  But reading up on the various elements and having the reading range all over the Web through uncounted links and shifts of focus, has lead to strengthening of another idea.

One that was shifted, winnowed, and polished back in the day.

The greatest tragedy of human existence is that we can conceive perfection, but we can never attain it.

And one of the big problems is that we all have our own vision of what perfection is, some of those conflict violently.

Where is this all going?

I have no idea, but…

With the thoughts rambling back and forth from the advents of recent days to the beginnings of recorded history, I can’t help but observe that the human experience is a series of big, ponderous, monolithic systems of control, growing, spreading and dying, with a couple of stabs at smaller, lighter organizations sprouting and being overgrown and consumed.

Most all of the biggies, Egypt, Rome, The Church, Capitalism etc… Are systems evolved in a very bottom heavy fashion.  A small minority supported by and controlling a much larger portion of the populace.  Egypt, with its focus of supporting the life of a god on earth was, perhaps, the one with the smallest in crowd.  These power out of proportion with support systems, all tend to a messy demise, with famine, privation, and poverty for the vast number of the participants following in the wake.

Here and there you get things like Greece, The Enlightenment, the birth of Republics, and various rises of the Proletariat.  Which are usually sabotaged and cannibalized by the bottom heavy systems.

And in those shifts I see a mind boggling tendency of the human animal to sell itself, extremely cheap, to the group with the best empty promise.

Egypt crumbles to be supplanted by Greece, Greece is swallowed by Rome, Rome disintegrates into the Dark Age and The Church rises, The Church stumbles on The Enlightenment and The Enlightenment dims in Capitalism.

We build em up and tear em down.

And only the surface changes.

All of our higher ideals; equality, honor, tolerance, justice etc, are constantly overshadowed and subsumed by our baser self interest.  If we think we can get a good deal we’ll sell our souls for a promise of a better future.  When that future doesn’t materialize, we just look for the next promise.

And we don’t even consider the validity of the promise.  We are a gullible lot.  We even bought the biggest scam of all; suffer in this life for a better after life.  That’s a good one.  Cuz with that one you got no dissatisfied customers to deal with.

Every time a system with the aim for equality and justice emerges it gets stabbed in the back by manipulation, greed, the drive for dominance, and judgment.

How long will it take us to learn that if you elevate anyone you eventually end up with a small group who have all the food and toys, and a very large group who have nothing?  Why is it that we always have a large number that will sell themselves, and anyone around them, for even a promise of admittance to the privileged group?  Why is it that we can name seven deadly sins, but we can’t recognize them in our own backyards?

What has happened to this country, and the world, is that the poison of human nature is running freely, and everybody's drinking the Kool-Aid.

Another one bites the dust...

It's not technically Monday anymore.  But I haven't been to bed yet, and my internet has been down all day.
Another week passes.
I got stuff done, and I submitted applications.
It seems like I'm just marking time.  But, really, my whole life feels like marking time most days, so not a lot of change there.
Felt like crap all day.  Saturday I had a wicked sinus headache.  Today... well today something's not sitting well.
But, I got up and I got out and I got things accomplished.  So not all bad.

These were GOOD!

Frankenstein cooking at it's best.

Frankenstein cooking:  Taking whatever you have in the house and combining it in new and different ways.

I'm calling these Pepper Pockets.  I can't claim that the recipe is totally original, got the idea from a recipe for stuffed Banana Peppers.  But I modified it a bit.

What you need:

1lb. sausage  (I used Jimmy Deans hot sausage.  It's what I had and I needed to use it.  1lb was more than enough to generously stuff 12 crescent rolls.)
Cream Cheese  (I had a little over half a 12oz container of Philadelphia spreadable cream cheese.  I used all of it, and I was spreading it fairly thick.)
1 onion, chopped  (I used a medium sized onion.  I did a coarse chop and since I was browning the onion that worked just fine.)
Peppers (I used a whole bunch of Hot Banana Peppers.  Sorry, can't really tell ya how many.  I forgot to count and they were all different sizes.  The whole point of this was to use up peppers from the garden.  I think this would work well with Red Bell Peppers, and one good sized one would probably do the trick.  Don't know how well Green Bell Peppers would work.  I think if I were gonna do it with Green I'd use a different sausage, maybe Italian sausage.  That actually sounds good.  Next time I'm gonna cut the peppers a little smaller.  I cut them in thick rings and that made the stuffing a little difficult.)
Crescent Rolls (I had two rolls of Shuncks brand and that worked just fine.)

What you do:

Brown the sausage and onions.
Clean and seed the peppers.  (The original recipe said to add a soft cheese and mix it with the sausage and stuff the peppers.  Some of my peppers were kinda small for stuffing so I just cut them up and added them to the sausage after it had cooled a bit.  You really don't need to cook the peppers, cuz they're going in the oven.  All I had in the way of soft cheese was cream cheese.  Adding it to the sausage seemed like over kill, so I just spread it on the crescent rolls.)
Once you get the sausage and the peppers mixed, separate the crescent rolls.  (You wanna do this while the dough is still cold.  It's going to take longer to stuff each roll than it would if you were just rolling them up for crescent rolls.  If you wait to separate them out they're gonna stick together.)
Take a section of dough and fold the skinny point down on the sloping side and press the edges together. (This makes it easier to stuff.)
Spread a thick layer of cream cheese on the dough.  (I used a piece of wax paper under the dough during these two steps, kept it from sticking to the work surface.)
Put a healthy spoonful of the sausage and pepper mixture on top of the cream cheese.  (Some of it may fall out when you roll it up.  You can either stick it back in or use it on the next one.)
Fold the dough over the stuffing and pinch the sides together.
Bake according to the package directions.  Which for the Shuncks brand was 13 to 17 minutes in a 350 degree oven.  I baked these for 17 minutes.

 

The original recipe said they would freeze well.  Don't know if I'm gonna try that or not.

It's a complete meal.  I'll find out tomorrow how well they reheat.  Even using hot sausage and hot peppers the end product wasn't too spicy.

The Inner Sanctum

My office, where I spend a good chunk of my time, surfing the net, working on graphics and such, or, sometimes, just playing a game.  Lately I've been playing Penguin Puzzle.
The week before last, when I was messing around with the Linux, I thoroughly cleaned and organized the office.  I had a lot of time while I was waiting for programs to load and unload.

So what looked like this, once upon a time...

 Now looks like this...

 I got the CDs all back in their cases and organized.

 And I got all the wall stuff up.  Including my collection of pictures of all 11 Doctors.

I'm getting the house together, slowly but surely.

Holy Moly!!

There's a car sitting in my driveway.
And it's mine.
Free, clear, and actually legal.  Which, for me, is a big change.
It's been a momentous couple of days!
So many things have happened since Tuesday.
For those of you who don't know, my driver's license expired about 10 years ago.  Like so many other people, I wasn't paying attention.  It was about a year before I noticed that it had expired.  We didn't have a car at the time, so I just got a state ID and figured I'd replace it when we had a car...
In order to get legal, I had to take the driver's exam, both the written and the driving part.  I almost feel like a teenager again.
Almost, my knees and hips have been hurting too much to fully live the part.
I went down to the DMV on Wednesday and did the eye exam and the written part.  I passed with flying colors. 100%, nothing missed.  That sure surprised me.  I expected to fail.  I always expect to fail...
Yesterday E and I went down to the DMV and I did the driving test, and I passed.  Not 100%, more like by the skin of my teeth on that part, but I am now a legally licensed driver in the state of Illinois.
So, ya all better watch out.  :->
While we were there, we did the title switch and I got my plates.
All thanks to some INCREDIBLY AWESOME  friends!!  I have a car!  It has plates and everything.
Again, nothing fancy.  It's 2000 Hyundai Elantra.  The drivers side door handle is busted.  Today, when I took it out to get gas and such, the window fell into the door and now there's a CD stuck in the disc player...
But it runs good.
And while I was trying to get the window out of the door, had to partially remove the door panel.  I couldn't get it all the way off, couldn't see how to disconnect the electric window controls...
But, I got it loose and I got the window up and back in place, and it sorta works.  While I was doing that, I sorta fixed the door handle.  Sorta, The handle on the inside is hanging out of the door.  I couldn't get it to screw all the way back in.  Which in the end is a good thing, cuz now I can open the door from inside and I don''t have to worry about loosing the window down inside the door every time I want to get out of the car.  All I have to do is grab the handle and give it tug.
It runs.  It has enough room to carry just about anything I want to carry.  Even 9 ft. lengths of PVC, which I need for a project I've been planning for a while.  So it's all good.
My days of buses and taxis and being a burden to my friends are over.  If I ever get an interview I'll be able to go where ever I have to, no worries.
Life is good.
It takes very little to make me happy.  I got a car and I can almost bend my little finger again.  I'm doing good.
Oh, and hey, nifty household hint.  When I got done messing around with the car I had blank sticky stuff all over my hands and arms.  Soap didn't do any good, and even the alcohol only took a little of it off.  But I remembered something I read about WD40.  A couple of good squirts of WD40 and a few paper towels cleaned it right off.
I'm still submitting apps all over the place and I still haven't heard anything from anyone.  That's a bit discouraging.  But, now I can apply to places like QuickTrip and MickeyD's and be able to tell them, with no hedging, that I have reliable transport.
And I can apply for things that require a license.
And I've been working with Office 2007 and I can honestly say that I have a basic knowledge of Access and Excel.  I stand a better chance of getting some sort of job before the money runs out.
Next week I'm going to take a serious look at the flea market thing.  That will hopefully bring in a little income.  It's worth a try and I need to get all the yard sale crap out of here, it's driving me bonkers, there's little enough space in this house, and having that crap piled all over the place doesn't help.  Once it's all outta here I'll be a much happier camper.
What with prepping for the driver's test and the injury to my hand and studing the Office 2007 stuff I've been a little stalled on the sculpting.  I've been trying to make a Halfling, but I'm having trouble with the nose.  I had one with a good nose the other day, but then I messed up the eyes...
I'm still working on it.
Today I went and spent money I really don't have on a folding table.  It was $40.00 bucks at K-Mart.  Not much, but when you've got nothing coming in, even $40.00 going out takes some consideration.  In the long run I'm calling it an investment.  Weather I set up a flea market stall or have a yard sale, I'll need the table.  And now I have somewhere to lay out fabric for cutting, so it wasn't a total waste.  We'll see how I feel about it next month when the money gets really tight...
The other Holy Moly thing this week, happened Wednesday evening.
Dusty actually got a squirrel.
I don't know how it happened.  I only saw the aftermath.  The squirrel wasn't in the yard when I let them out.  I stand at the back door and make sure the stupid things make into the trees when I let the dogs out.  There's been a few close calls here and there, cuz the stupid squirrels will just stand and watch the dogs for a few seconds before they scamper for cover, but I always wait and call her off it looks like she's gonna get too close.
I check to see what the dogs are doing from time to time.  Dusty's been rooting in the flower garden.  Seems Ashron has taken to hiding out in there and Dusty thinks nothing of diving in to find him.  So I keep an eye on them.
Well, that evening I looked out and saw her with her head down, but I couldn't see what she had.  The last time I intervened in a similar situation she was about to grab a wasp.  Silly dog will go after anything.  I would have just let her get stung, but I can't afford a vet right now, and I don't want to deal with her having a nose twice as big as it should be.  I opened the back door and yelled at her.  She usually comes pretty quick when I do that, but that evening she wasn't moving.  I went out on the back steps and called again, still no response.
Then I heard the screaming of the squirrels, one from the big tree in the middle of the yard and two or three from the trees on the side.  I knew something serious was going down.
The squirrel was dead before I got out there.  I think it was dead before I opened the door.
The stupid squirrels have been laying into the tomatoes kinda hard lately.  They've gotten more than I have, so I'm not too upset over the demise of the little bugger.  But I could have lived without my dog being a cold blooded murderer.  Not that she's mean or anything.  When I got out there she was just staring at it.  I think she was wondering why it had stopped playing.  The blood on her paws was a good clue.  So Wed. I disposed of a corpse.
And then Thursday morning I disposed of another one.  I went to put laundry in the machine and found a dead mouse in the utility room.  Seems it's been a week for dumb animals.  But, ya know, if they're stupid enough to come in this house, or yard, there's not much I can do.
At least the squirrels haven't been hanging out in the yard quite as much the last couple of days.

Welcome to reality...

How many times have you heard that in your life?
I think we all share some familiarity with this phrase.  Usually uttered by someone near and dear when you were dealing with life altering disappointment.  I can recall hearing it, or some variation, from parents, sibling, and friends.  Quite frequently coupled with 'life's not fair'.
Which is a very valuable lesson that we all need to learn.
Cuz, life isn't fair.  In fact, real life is downright harsh and brutal.
Which is something that we humans, as a species, by and large, have forgotten.
In the past, when I've heard the utterance of 'welcome to reality' it was in an instance when the working complexities of modern American life were suddenly revealed, when the unfairness of the system was naked and apparent.
I think in the future the phrase will take a whole new meaning.
Cuz the 'reality' I was sarcastically being welcomed into, is in fact, an all encompassing illusion.
Pause for a moment and consider the uproar surrounding the finical market, and realize that the average person's lively hood is tied to a system that deals almost solely in intangibles.  Face it, our entire economic system is just a huge Monopoly game.  There's very little real, tangible substances underpinning the market.  If it were based on something concrete we wouldn't have hedge funds,or be able to just print more money to pay a debt.
(If I tried to do that, which, given the right equipment, I could....  I'd end up in jail.)

The capital stock (or just stock) of a business entity represents the original capital paid into or invested in the business by its founders. It serves as a security for the creditors of a business since it cannot be withdrawn to the detriment of the creditors. Stock is different from the property and the assets of a business which may fluctuate in quantity and value.

From the Wikipedia entry on stock.
Note the word 'represents' in the first sentence.  When you buy stock yer not buying anything real, yer buying an idea of something.  If yer lucky, you get a piece of paper to represent your representation, though now days I'm sure that's not quite as common as it used to be.  Supposedly you are paying for a part of the business, but I'm sure if you turned up and tried to use your part ownership in some real fashion all sorts of hell would break loose.
In real terms our entire monetary system is based on the idea of the value of a dollar, and the dollar is no longer tied to anything real.
And even if it were still backed by gold.  What is that in reality?  It's a pretty rock, that in and of itself really isn't good for anything.  You can't eat it, use it to make a fire, or wear it.  If yer stuck out in the middle of nowhere with a lump of gold, it's not gonna do you much good.  Though I guess you could throw it at the bear that's trying to eat you and hope you have good aim.
The only real value gold has is the value that we agree to give it.

Money is any object or record that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts in a given country or socio-economic context.^[1][2][3] The main functions of money are distinguished as: a medium of exchange; a unit of account; a store of value; and, occasionally in the past, a standard of deferred payment.^[4][5] Any kind of object or secure verifiable record that fulfills these functions can serve as money.

 Again from Wikipedia.  I added the emphases on 'generally accepted', cuz it just goes to prove my point.

 The whole of modern human existence is a consensual illusion that we all automatically embrace.  The vast majority so deeply immersed that we think this is the only way the world could be.  The truth is, the world could be a vastly different place, if we choose to make it such.
The era of industrialization is coming to an end.
And I'm not seeing a graceful decline in the cards.
We need to start asking ourselves what we want the future to be.  We need to realize that our lives, as we have made and accepted them, are in REALITY just one big game.
Ask yourself what happens if the market collapses?
What happens when a dollar is only worth the paper it is printed on?
What happens if the oil runs out?
I'm not saying that any of these are going to happen anytime soon.  I know better than to make predictions.  All I'm urging you to do is to entertain the possibility.  Play 'what if' for a few minuets.  I feel that this is a very vital thing to do.  Cuz we are living in a house of cards.
And I think most of us realize just what that really means.  If you've never tried to build a house of cards, and I'm sure there are quite a few in the younger set who have not, give it a try.  (Pokemon cards will work just as well as a traditional deck.)
We need to start trying to come to grips with the realities of the world.  We need to start thinking seriously beyond the present game and asking the hard questions.
What is life going to be like when the environment is used and polluted beyond repair?
How would you move around, heat your home, if there were no oil?
What do you have that you could trade for a side of beef?
What are we going to do when our Monopoly game comes to an end?

Maybe if we start thinking about it now, we'll have an answer when we really need it.