I'm not sure I remember how to write. This has been such a wonderful Spring weather wise. We have had a lot of rain and I've seen enough of that. But our crops should do well. There have been some beautiful cool days. And daylight till 9PM.
I did very little all winter and didn't do too well on diet and exercise. It' been hard to crawl back and move around and lose weight. When May came I kind of came out of my shell. I went to 2 bon fires and played guitar sets. Then my son came to town for a week. I tried to keep up with him. We went to his cousin's wedding in Philly. Then my friend the professor from Norway came and visited for 3 weeks. I tried to keep up with him. We went to some cruise ins in my VW. We started my TR6 and drove it around the block. We drank gin and tonics and grilled out on the deck almost every night. We opened our pool. The prof went back to Norway.
I went to Loch Haven with friends in the Cherokee. The next day to another friend's airstrip Art's, and got to do a guitar set. Two days later to Cincinnati to see my buddy Geoff at his retirement party. Congrats my friend. The very next day to Baltimore to renew my instructor's rating. And on to Clearview to buy airplane stuff and dinner with buddy Dempsey.
Now I'm ready for the pace that I had during the winter. Part of chilling down I hope will be posting here. I'm behind on the mowing. The last few days I've done a lot, but there are still some wet places I can't get on. I'm busier than I thought I would be. With a long list of projects that I may be able to do. Maybe not.
As I grow older, do I get wiser? Yes, in many ways. But in many other ways, not so much. I am grumpier. Less animated. I saw a T shirt the other day that said:
"I used to care. I take a pill for that now".
I'm thankful that I am calm. Fed. Not in Pain. Have a beautiful, wonderful wife. A fantastic son, no fatal disease diagnosed as yet. I have troubles, we all do. We all will get sick and die. If I look around even just a little bit, I see folks with real bad troubles. If I ever get depressed because I can't have my way. Or some of my toys are broken. Or the day doesn't "click". Then I deserve to be told: "Lloyd, you are a stupid ass, shut up and get your perspective back!"
This is going to be a great summer with fly ins and cruise ins and I may have a little party here too.
Every day is a gift. Every day is a day you can re boot and start over. And for me, the full circle pilot:
Every day is Friday night!
Happy Solstice my friends. LLITTY :::::+:::::
Sunday, June 30, 2013
Tuesday, January 15, 2013
The Citadel
The Citadel. No, I'm not talking about the military college of South Carolina. That fine old school in Charleston known as the West Point of the South. A fine school indeed. No, there is another Citadel I really want to talk about. But where, where do I begin? The topic is so target rich for a liberal atheist like me. This is going to be lots of fun. I hope.
"The Citadel" is a planned gated community in Idaho. It is to be a walled city of 3 to 7 thousand people.
It will be centered around a gun factory called III Arms Company. The walled city will be about one square mile, but there will be housing outside the walls as well. The residents will be known as "Patriots". Before they can set up their residency, they will have to go through an application process. And sign the "Patriot Agreement".
I won't take time to tell you about the Patriot Agreement. But I just have to tell you one thing about it which is quite a tell. Each "Patriot" over the age of 13 must own at least three firearms: A handgun of his own choice, a rifle of his own choice, and an AR15 variant with at least 1000 rounds at the ready. And qualify annually with these firearms.
There is more. So much, much more. But we can all just go to their website and read all about it.
I'm interested in this from the sociological viewpoint. Fascinated! I wrote a post in this blog about rich folks dropping out of the "socialist big government America". It was back in August of 2011 and it was called "Tycoons and Typhoons". The folks I wrote about then were just babes in the woods compared to these Patriots. The island owning drop outs were just rich guys who didn't want to obey U.S. laws and never wanted to deal with poor folks unless they were servants. In that post I pointed out that it was just too easy to poke lots of huge holes in the idea.
Okay, enough background. I just can't wait to opine about this concept.
The first irony is: The Patriots (and I just love them) are seeking, according to their manifesto, Freedom. Ah, Freedom. So they are going to take their guns and get inside a walled compound with rules. Kind of like a prison? (Yea, this is too easy).
The second irony: They say that anyone is welcome to apply to join their ranks. They warn that Liberals, and Socialists, and Marxists will not be welcome. And they do not expect to have law enforcement, so they expect their members to be God fearing so all can be trusted. This reveals a naivete, do ya think? They all believe in god and guns. What could go wrong?
Third irony: Remember the story of Masada? The Jews up on the mountain top that had their own community inside the Roman Empire. They didn't have to do anything wrong or illegal, to make the Romans want to kill them. They just had to be there and not recognize Rome. Rome could not stand it. I'm sure you know what happened. Or can guess.
Fourth irony: From what I could read in their agreement, it seemed guns and freedom were the important thing. I didn't see the vision about crops and self sustaining energy and medical care and care for babies and the aged. They claim to want freedom and insulation from a collapse of the U.S.; and loss of the power grid, and a total breakdown of the U.S. infrastructure. So they have a bomb shelter mentality. They would never be able to hold off a bunch of starving, end of the world, Mad Max's, even if they had 1000 rounds each. The guys on the islands would have a better chance. But they've sucked me into their insane world with this kind of speculation. You can think of lots more things.
I could go on and on. I'd like to go on and on. But I'm not going to.
I really, really, hope that this community gets built. It's a grand experiment. I don't think it is noble. At all. And I think it will help us all learn things about ourselves as a culture. As a society. As a nation. My guess is that this experiment will somehow yield the opposite of what it's creators want.
I told my wife that I was going to write this post and I was pretty jazzed about it. She told me that Glen Beck is starting one of these communities. It will be called "Independence". I shall find out about that!
I wonder what kind of guns they will have.
LLITTY ::::::+::::::
"The Citadel" is a planned gated community in Idaho. It is to be a walled city of 3 to 7 thousand people.
It will be centered around a gun factory called III Arms Company. The walled city will be about one square mile, but there will be housing outside the walls as well. The residents will be known as "Patriots". Before they can set up their residency, they will have to go through an application process. And sign the "Patriot Agreement".
I won't take time to tell you about the Patriot Agreement. But I just have to tell you one thing about it which is quite a tell. Each "Patriot" over the age of 13 must own at least three firearms: A handgun of his own choice, a rifle of his own choice, and an AR15 variant with at least 1000 rounds at the ready. And qualify annually with these firearms.
There is more. So much, much more. But we can all just go to their website and read all about it.
I'm interested in this from the sociological viewpoint. Fascinated! I wrote a post in this blog about rich folks dropping out of the "socialist big government America". It was back in August of 2011 and it was called "Tycoons and Typhoons". The folks I wrote about then were just babes in the woods compared to these Patriots. The island owning drop outs were just rich guys who didn't want to obey U.S. laws and never wanted to deal with poor folks unless they were servants. In that post I pointed out that it was just too easy to poke lots of huge holes in the idea.
Okay, enough background. I just can't wait to opine about this concept.
The first irony is: The Patriots (and I just love them) are seeking, according to their manifesto, Freedom. Ah, Freedom. So they are going to take their guns and get inside a walled compound with rules. Kind of like a prison? (Yea, this is too easy).
The second irony: They say that anyone is welcome to apply to join their ranks. They warn that Liberals, and Socialists, and Marxists will not be welcome. And they do not expect to have law enforcement, so they expect their members to be God fearing so all can be trusted. This reveals a naivete, do ya think? They all believe in god and guns. What could go wrong?
Third irony: Remember the story of Masada? The Jews up on the mountain top that had their own community inside the Roman Empire. They didn't have to do anything wrong or illegal, to make the Romans want to kill them. They just had to be there and not recognize Rome. Rome could not stand it. I'm sure you know what happened. Or can guess.
Fourth irony: From what I could read in their agreement, it seemed guns and freedom were the important thing. I didn't see the vision about crops and self sustaining energy and medical care and care for babies and the aged. They claim to want freedom and insulation from a collapse of the U.S.; and loss of the power grid, and a total breakdown of the U.S. infrastructure. So they have a bomb shelter mentality. They would never be able to hold off a bunch of starving, end of the world, Mad Max's, even if they had 1000 rounds each. The guys on the islands would have a better chance. But they've sucked me into their insane world with this kind of speculation. You can think of lots more things.
I could go on and on. I'd like to go on and on. But I'm not going to.
I really, really, hope that this community gets built. It's a grand experiment. I don't think it is noble. At all. And I think it will help us all learn things about ourselves as a culture. As a society. As a nation. My guess is that this experiment will somehow yield the opposite of what it's creators want.
I told my wife that I was going to write this post and I was pretty jazzed about it. She told me that Glen Beck is starting one of these communities. It will be called "Independence". I shall find out about that!
I wonder what kind of guns they will have.
LLITTY ::::::+::::::
Monday, January 14, 2013
Them Sailplane Terrorists
Yikes. I havn't posted in so long. I should have a lot to say. I should be older and wiser. But it seems the older I get, and the more I learn, the less I really want to say. I'll probably never completely shut up though. I talk because I want people to pay attention to me. I desperately want people to like me. Yet I have been cocooning here at my place with my wife and a few animals. It's a big social day if I go out to the store. I'm also not attending to my toys which need to be run and warmed up and charged up and prepared for a long cold winter. Nor am I winterizing the house. Or writing a song or a book or a blog post. Is it alright for me to do nothing? My wife seems cool with it. Which makes me very lucky. Like me, she never seems to get bored. I'm not thrilled and extremely happy about doing "nothing". I just haven't had a yen to go somewhere, do something, or be somebody. As far as my health, I need to start moving around more.
But for this post I have motivation! A big dose of the muse! What is it? It's an aviation article I've read about a sailplane pilot who gets thrown in jail! I've had about a dozen forwards and links on this article sent to my E-mail. It's a surrealistic tale.
The guy takes off in a sailplane (glider). He is towed up and released a few thousand feet above his home base airport in South Carolina. He's going to fly a 500km triangle and return back. This is no little feat. The airplane has no engine. There are no mountain ridges to give him lift from the prevailing wind. There are no bigger mountains to form a "wave" to take his glider up ten or fifteen thousand feet. He's riding on "thermals". Shafts of rising air. He uses his vast experience to find these thermals. His flight on this particular day was almost four hours. That's a long time in an airplane with no engine. The lift (thermals) on this day were not as strong as expected. He had to cut his planned route short and head back home. He made a try for some lift by a lake in a known area. He crossed over a power plant he was familiar with. Then he circled in small thermals as the wind drifted him back toward home. He was monitoring the radio frequency of a nearby airport. He heard chatter on the radio about a glider and a power plant. So he called in to this nearby airport. And he was told that the authorities wanted him to land there. So he did. That is when he was arrested and handcuffed. He was put in jail for 24 hrs. He wasn't allowed to make a phone call for several hours. Enough time elapsed that his home field knew he was down somewhere, and possibly needing help. He was reported overdue. Finally, the folks at the home field found out he was okay, but still in jail. When he was released after 24 hours in a crowded cell, he was debriefed by the TSA, Homeland Security, and Sheriff. He was told that they would not let him go unless he agreed not to file suit.
----The solo glider pilot did not do one single thing against regulations on the flight.
----There was no restricted airspace in the area
----in fact he was within 2 miles of an active general aviation airport where airplanes fly every day.
----The 70 year old pilot is an instructor at his home airport, where among other things, he teaches
airspace rules and regulations.
----The FAA stated that this pilot had done nothing wrong.
Well I'm sorry folks. Maybe I just have an authority complex But it just chaps my roids to hear a story like this. So there are a dozen Sheriff's cars waiting for this "terrorist" to land. They rush him and cuff him. Okay. But he's in a little, light, glider. Easy to search the glider. No bomb or BB gun. A 70 year old mild mannered man. You check his credentials. The sailplane's credentials. Maybe see if he is drunk. Call back to his home base, he needs to talk to them anyway, for a ride and to decide what to do with the glider overnight,etc. Maybe call back to the power plant (which is not illegal to overfly) and check that all is well. You can do all this in ten minutes max right at the airplane. It all checks out. All is well.
So how did we get from meeting the airplane when it landed and challanging the "suspect", to taking the guy to jail and holding him behind bars for 24 hours? I must be missing something on this one.
When the TSA is hassling people, and it is obvious that the people are not terrorists, they (the TSA) are doing something they don't need to do. So how often do they not do things that they do need to do?
This happened last summer. Why didn't we hear about it sooner?
LLITTY ::::::+::::::
But for this post I have motivation! A big dose of the muse! What is it? It's an aviation article I've read about a sailplane pilot who gets thrown in jail! I've had about a dozen forwards and links on this article sent to my E-mail. It's a surrealistic tale.
The guy takes off in a sailplane (glider). He is towed up and released a few thousand feet above his home base airport in South Carolina. He's going to fly a 500km triangle and return back. This is no little feat. The airplane has no engine. There are no mountain ridges to give him lift from the prevailing wind. There are no bigger mountains to form a "wave" to take his glider up ten or fifteen thousand feet. He's riding on "thermals". Shafts of rising air. He uses his vast experience to find these thermals. His flight on this particular day was almost four hours. That's a long time in an airplane with no engine. The lift (thermals) on this day were not as strong as expected. He had to cut his planned route short and head back home. He made a try for some lift by a lake in a known area. He crossed over a power plant he was familiar with. Then he circled in small thermals as the wind drifted him back toward home. He was monitoring the radio frequency of a nearby airport. He heard chatter on the radio about a glider and a power plant. So he called in to this nearby airport. And he was told that the authorities wanted him to land there. So he did. That is when he was arrested and handcuffed. He was put in jail for 24 hrs. He wasn't allowed to make a phone call for several hours. Enough time elapsed that his home field knew he was down somewhere, and possibly needing help. He was reported overdue. Finally, the folks at the home field found out he was okay, but still in jail. When he was released after 24 hours in a crowded cell, he was debriefed by the TSA, Homeland Security, and Sheriff. He was told that they would not let him go unless he agreed not to file suit.
----The solo glider pilot did not do one single thing against regulations on the flight.
----There was no restricted airspace in the area
----in fact he was within 2 miles of an active general aviation airport where airplanes fly every day.
----The 70 year old pilot is an instructor at his home airport, where among other things, he teaches
airspace rules and regulations.
----The FAA stated that this pilot had done nothing wrong.
Well I'm sorry folks. Maybe I just have an authority complex But it just chaps my roids to hear a story like this. So there are a dozen Sheriff's cars waiting for this "terrorist" to land. They rush him and cuff him. Okay. But he's in a little, light, glider. Easy to search the glider. No bomb or BB gun. A 70 year old mild mannered man. You check his credentials. The sailplane's credentials. Maybe see if he is drunk. Call back to his home base, he needs to talk to them anyway, for a ride and to decide what to do with the glider overnight,etc. Maybe call back to the power plant (which is not illegal to overfly) and check that all is well. You can do all this in ten minutes max right at the airplane. It all checks out. All is well.
So how did we get from meeting the airplane when it landed and challanging the "suspect", to taking the guy to jail and holding him behind bars for 24 hours? I must be missing something on this one.
When the TSA is hassling people, and it is obvious that the people are not terrorists, they (the TSA) are doing something they don't need to do. So how often do they not do things that they do need to do?
This happened last summer. Why didn't we hear about it sooner?
LLITTY ::::::+::::::
Saturday, December 8, 2012
Solstice Shopping
The season has come upon us. Wife and I sort of push back a little against the celebration of the season.
I am very much a sentimental old softy about Christmas. I push back a little in the area of pressure and deadlines. I know that the stores set up xmas products before Halloween, so when I saw that happen I was ready for it. Not shocked. But "holiday creep" happened again this year. "Black Friday" is now known by all, but has been expanded to the evening of Thanksgiving. So now while you are actually, virtually, celebrating Thanksgiving, you are indeed Christmas shopping. But that's not all. "Cyber Monday" has now become "Cyber Week". In keeping the pressure off, I have never participated in these shopping holidays. I don't care how many shopping days are left before Xmas. And I usually shop on Christmas day. There is a little liquor store near me that is open on Christmas. And wines and spirits make great gifts. During the season I usually get myself a few gifts while I am at it. It turns out I'm really good at buying myself stuff. Actually I get that kind of shopping done early. As far as stuff for me, my xmas shopping is done already! I feel good about that. I can check it off. We packed up a box of stuff for our son. He lives in California. We bought him stuff from Target, Radio Shack, WalMart, Walgrens. It's in the mail now. A few years back I bought a really nice artificial xmas tree. It was high end price wise and I bought it after xmas for pennies on the dollar. It has never been opened and I won't be setting it up this year.
I usually have a favorite Christmas Carol every year. I think this year it will be "Run Run Rudolph".
This song was by Chuck Berry and was featured in the movie "Home Alone" from 1990.
The song was circa 1958. I noticed something about the lyrics. The author refers to two Korean War era aircraft. The "Saber Jet" (which was the F86) and the "Shooting Star" (which was the F-80).
There's a new Christmas carol out this year. I saw it on the internet. I don't expect it will catch on.
It's a song defending Christmas from those who would dare to celebrate a different winter holiday, or none at all. The lyrics tell the listener if they see a "happy holiday" sign in a store window, they should walk by the store and not enter. If they are in a store and are greeted with "seasons greetings", they should walk out of the store. The listener is told there is only one winter holiday. The birth of J. Christ.
I know that fundamental Christians don't like people asking them to adjust their Christmas celebrations in public. They are happy and proud about their religion and their holiday. And rightly so. Are they truly happy with good will toward men if they believe that the winter season can only be celebrated in terms of their god? By not acknowledging the phrase "seasons greetings" and being put off by it, it seems to me the fundamentalist is showing fear and insecurity at a time when everyone is just trying to have a nice holiday season. The winter solstice is the longest night of the year. Everyone on our planet can enjoy the knowledge and feeling of the promise of spring. So let's celebrate. Why play "my god's better than yours" when we're all just trying to light up the long winter's night. Christians have to be constantly reminded that they don't own history, and they don't own the seasons.
To all my friends: Baptists, Hindus, Druids, Atheists. Happy Holidays .
LLITTY :::::+:::::
I am very much a sentimental old softy about Christmas. I push back a little in the area of pressure and deadlines. I know that the stores set up xmas products before Halloween, so when I saw that happen I was ready for it. Not shocked. But "holiday creep" happened again this year. "Black Friday" is now known by all, but has been expanded to the evening of Thanksgiving. So now while you are actually, virtually, celebrating Thanksgiving, you are indeed Christmas shopping. But that's not all. "Cyber Monday" has now become "Cyber Week". In keeping the pressure off, I have never participated in these shopping holidays. I don't care how many shopping days are left before Xmas. And I usually shop on Christmas day. There is a little liquor store near me that is open on Christmas. And wines and spirits make great gifts. During the season I usually get myself a few gifts while I am at it. It turns out I'm really good at buying myself stuff. Actually I get that kind of shopping done early. As far as stuff for me, my xmas shopping is done already! I feel good about that. I can check it off. We packed up a box of stuff for our son. He lives in California. We bought him stuff from Target, Radio Shack, WalMart, Walgrens. It's in the mail now. A few years back I bought a really nice artificial xmas tree. It was high end price wise and I bought it after xmas for pennies on the dollar. It has never been opened and I won't be setting it up this year.
I usually have a favorite Christmas Carol every year. I think this year it will be "Run Run Rudolph".
This song was by Chuck Berry and was featured in the movie "Home Alone" from 1990.
The song was circa 1958. I noticed something about the lyrics. The author refers to two Korean War era aircraft. The "Saber Jet" (which was the F86) and the "Shooting Star" (which was the F-80).
There's a new Christmas carol out this year. I saw it on the internet. I don't expect it will catch on.
It's a song defending Christmas from those who would dare to celebrate a different winter holiday, or none at all. The lyrics tell the listener if they see a "happy holiday" sign in a store window, they should walk by the store and not enter. If they are in a store and are greeted with "seasons greetings", they should walk out of the store. The listener is told there is only one winter holiday. The birth of J. Christ.
I know that fundamental Christians don't like people asking them to adjust their Christmas celebrations in public. They are happy and proud about their religion and their holiday. And rightly so. Are they truly happy with good will toward men if they believe that the winter season can only be celebrated in terms of their god? By not acknowledging the phrase "seasons greetings" and being put off by it, it seems to me the fundamentalist is showing fear and insecurity at a time when everyone is just trying to have a nice holiday season. The winter solstice is the longest night of the year. Everyone on our planet can enjoy the knowledge and feeling of the promise of spring. So let's celebrate. Why play "my god's better than yours" when we're all just trying to light up the long winter's night. Christians have to be constantly reminded that they don't own history, and they don't own the seasons.
To all my friends: Baptists, Hindus, Druids, Atheists. Happy Holidays .
LLITTY :::::+:::::
Thursday, September 13, 2012
It Doesn't Matter Who Wins the Election
I'm long overdue for a political rant. This one will be somewhat bipartisan. Maybe. In terms of the big coming election, the conventions are over. The catty primary spats are over. We're 6 weeks or so away from the big day. There will be no significant third party or fourth party threat. No spoiler to swing the election. Just the incumbent and the challenger. Both candidates call it a "clear choice". Is it?
We all know, and everyone keeps saying, that both candidates are waging a war of advertising against each other that will go on for the next six weeks. Hundreds of millions of dollars. Both sides are being bought. Both sides are being invested in by the gigantic Wall Street international banking and cooperate oligarchy. Both candidates are beholdened to those who gave them money. We all know this in a bipartisan way. Your candidate and mine are bought and they owe.
It doesn't matter who the President is. The financial world will run the country and control the government.
Can this be changed? Anything is possible. But from where I sit, I don't see how.
There are a lot of books coming out right now about the shrinking middle class. It didn't happen because of eight years of George Bush. It didn't happen because of 3.5 years of President Obama. It didn't happen because of Democrats or Republicans. It happened because of normal human behavior. Should we be surprised that people are greedy and want to take everything for themselves? We are surprised, but we shouldn't be. We Homo sapiens are stupid. Very stupid. Being greedy is the least of our problems! We kill each other over territory. We kill each other over imaginary gods in the sky we believe in. We are stupid. That is why we can't eliminate starvation and war. So of course! we can't stop the shrinking of the middle class. It's just human behavior. Are we a thousand years away from having relations with our fellow man where the bottom line in disagreement is not violence?
How long will the Human Race survive? Of all species of critter ever on the planet, 99 percent are extinct.
What is the probability that humans will be around long enough to learn not commit violence against one another? Let alone set up a society where all creatures are treated fairly. We are stupid, we are greedy and we are violent.
Do I sound negative? I just want to be rational.
We are stupid. We argue about whether "global warming", more softly called "climate change", is going to be caused by man or caused by cycles of hot and cold. Or will radiation from war weapons kill the atmosphere? These things are bad. But they are not bad for the Planet. It only takes a few degrees hotter or colder to make Man extinct. The Planet will do just fine without Man. A forest fire is a tragedy for Man, and some critters, not the Planet.
I guess what I'm trying to say is: We are going to go ahead and kill each other. We are going to go ahead and cook the planet until we kill ourselves. We are going to go ahead and wipe out the middle class and end the U.S. as we know it. It won't be because of who wins the 2012 election!
Let me end with a ray of hope. I think it's a huge ray of hope. We are learning facts at a very fast rate. We are sending these facts around the world in seconds due to our World Wide Internet. If a new Genome is discovered from some unknown species and it sheds light on who we are, we can all know about it the next day. If we know more about ourselves we may not need or want to kill each other.
I met a very smart young PhD the other day, and we were chatting about evolution and how half of America prefers the Garden of Eden story. I told the professor folks could look at how our bodies are larger just since WW2. Then he said "Oh well, you can prove natural selection over lots of generations in the lab. Can do it in a few weeks." I said "Go on". He said, "Well yes, you get some grad students and some fruit flies and you raise the temperature in their container and half of them die. You take the survivors and let them multiply a few generations and then repeat the experiment by raising the temperature again and so on. Instant heat resistant fruit flies. Mutation, natural selection. No big deal." We talked about my dogs, and our mutual friend Professor Mike, and what we were having for dinner etc. But I remembered the fruit flies and the ray of hope not just for the next four years, but for as long as man is on this Planet.
If fear, superstition, and hate, and the clinging to old wrong ideas can fade away, there is a chance that science and technology can teach us humans we are all in this together on the planet we all share as we hurtle through space and time.
LLITTY ::::+::::
We all know, and everyone keeps saying, that both candidates are waging a war of advertising against each other that will go on for the next six weeks. Hundreds of millions of dollars. Both sides are being bought. Both sides are being invested in by the gigantic Wall Street international banking and cooperate oligarchy. Both candidates are beholdened to those who gave them money. We all know this in a bipartisan way. Your candidate and mine are bought and they owe.
It doesn't matter who the President is. The financial world will run the country and control the government.
Can this be changed? Anything is possible. But from where I sit, I don't see how.
There are a lot of books coming out right now about the shrinking middle class. It didn't happen because of eight years of George Bush. It didn't happen because of 3.5 years of President Obama. It didn't happen because of Democrats or Republicans. It happened because of normal human behavior. Should we be surprised that people are greedy and want to take everything for themselves? We are surprised, but we shouldn't be. We Homo sapiens are stupid. Very stupid. Being greedy is the least of our problems! We kill each other over territory. We kill each other over imaginary gods in the sky we believe in. We are stupid. That is why we can't eliminate starvation and war. So of course! we can't stop the shrinking of the middle class. It's just human behavior. Are we a thousand years away from having relations with our fellow man where the bottom line in disagreement is not violence?
How long will the Human Race survive? Of all species of critter ever on the planet, 99 percent are extinct.
What is the probability that humans will be around long enough to learn not commit violence against one another? Let alone set up a society where all creatures are treated fairly. We are stupid, we are greedy and we are violent.
Do I sound negative? I just want to be rational.
We are stupid. We argue about whether "global warming", more softly called "climate change", is going to be caused by man or caused by cycles of hot and cold. Or will radiation from war weapons kill the atmosphere? These things are bad. But they are not bad for the Planet. It only takes a few degrees hotter or colder to make Man extinct. The Planet will do just fine without Man. A forest fire is a tragedy for Man, and some critters, not the Planet.
I guess what I'm trying to say is: We are going to go ahead and kill each other. We are going to go ahead and cook the planet until we kill ourselves. We are going to go ahead and wipe out the middle class and end the U.S. as we know it. It won't be because of who wins the 2012 election!
Let me end with a ray of hope. I think it's a huge ray of hope. We are learning facts at a very fast rate. We are sending these facts around the world in seconds due to our World Wide Internet. If a new Genome is discovered from some unknown species and it sheds light on who we are, we can all know about it the next day. If we know more about ourselves we may not need or want to kill each other.
I met a very smart young PhD the other day, and we were chatting about evolution and how half of America prefers the Garden of Eden story. I told the professor folks could look at how our bodies are larger just since WW2. Then he said "Oh well, you can prove natural selection over lots of generations in the lab. Can do it in a few weeks." I said "Go on". He said, "Well yes, you get some grad students and some fruit flies and you raise the temperature in their container and half of them die. You take the survivors and let them multiply a few generations and then repeat the experiment by raising the temperature again and so on. Instant heat resistant fruit flies. Mutation, natural selection. No big deal." We talked about my dogs, and our mutual friend Professor Mike, and what we were having for dinner etc. But I remembered the fruit flies and the ray of hope not just for the next four years, but for as long as man is on this Planet.
If fear, superstition, and hate, and the clinging to old wrong ideas can fade away, there is a chance that science and technology can teach us humans we are all in this together on the planet we all share as we hurtle through space and time.
LLITTY ::::+::::
Friday, August 3, 2012
We Think of Him Often, Remember Him Well
For some reason I feel like writing with a Canadian accent. My father was Canadian. He called the Montreal hockey team the "Cana-dee-aans". And he would end a sentence with "do you see?" or eah? We had a back yard hockey rink when I was a kid in New Jersey. We'd had a few pretty cold winters strung together for a few years. My dad had terraced off the back yard to make a level grass court. He would flood it in the winter with hot and cold water from the house. It wasn't very big but we had some little hockey games and lots of neighbors came over to skate. My dad could really skate. He had played a few seasons of semi pro when he was young and it was in another world. On our little rink I don;t remember him ever skating forward, except once when I asked him to just go fast. He just ran across the rink on the toes of his skates. He was 56 years old then. Later when I was in junior high, he taught me rifle shooting. And he was a pilot too. He was long out of that by the time I started flying. But it seemed he added a lot of input and influence and encouragement to my flying career. When I started flight instructing I think he was proud of me. He had instructed during the war in the civilian program. I wasn't thinking of a career really. I was 22 years old and assumed I was immortal and knew everything. But my father used to tell me flying stories and they always had a moral. Usually a safety warning. But when I got that instructor rating he gave me his professional advice. He told me there were only three ways to make money in aviation. And instructing wasn't one of them! Get into crop dusting (he called it spraying); sales; or the major airlines. That's it son. He taught my brothers and I how to play chess. We kept trying to change the rules and make it more fun and play war with the pieces like toy soldiers. He would not let us do that. He made us be quiet and respect the game. We would also try to just take each others men in a sloppy chess battle. He would have none of that either. Either go for the checkmate or he puts the game away. Put the game away. When we got rowdy he used to say "put it up". He would sometimes play harmonica and sing old songs. Really old songs. We would sit by the fireplace and sing songs. But my father would only want to hear the old ballads.
My older brother has been playing chess for 56 years. He's been a rated player for maybe 25 years. He got the bug from Dad.
My younger brother played guitar and sang ballads professionally for many years and is still in the music business. He got the bug from Dad.
I'm the pilot. I got the bug from Dad.
I have a sister too. She is the oldest. The first born. She is like our mother. Very sweet, kind, gracious, sympathetic, tender, beautiful. But Mom wouldn't have had the drive or focus or will to go to law school and become a successful attorney. Sister got that from Dad.
It's almost 2AM. What shoud I do Dad, keep sitting at the computer?
"Put it up!"
LLITTY :::::+:::::
My older brother has been playing chess for 56 years. He's been a rated player for maybe 25 years. He got the bug from Dad.
My younger brother played guitar and sang ballads professionally for many years and is still in the music business. He got the bug from Dad.
I'm the pilot. I got the bug from Dad.
I have a sister too. She is the oldest. The first born. She is like our mother. Very sweet, kind, gracious, sympathetic, tender, beautiful. But Mom wouldn't have had the drive or focus or will to go to law school and become a successful attorney. Sister got that from Dad.
It's almost 2AM. What shoud I do Dad, keep sitting at the computer?
"Put it up!"
LLITTY :::::+:::::
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
111 Days To Go
A heat wave. A stalled economy. A drought. A deadlocked congress. This is like something of an an ancient mariner's epic. There was a lot of political jazz to listen to during the Republican primary. It was fun. Now we're just waiting for something, anything, to happen before November. I know a way to spice it all up! Tell you at the end of this post. The next pseudo- event I guess is Romney picking a VP. But the short list isn't really very interesting. What if Romney picked Chris Christie? I know, I know, Christie wouldn't do it. I'm saying what if. It would then be a great ticket. All you would have to do then is switch the candidates position so that Christie would be the nominee and Romney the VP. Then of course Christie would want to pick his own VP and it sure as hell wouldn't be Romney. Then Romney would be off the table and Obama would be defeated. In a piss poor economy the incumbent is pretty easy to beat. But you simply need a good candidate. Romney just isn't that good. He might just win anyway. But why not play it safe and put a better guy up against Obama? Is it too late? I don't know how a "brokered convention" works. But it would sure be exciting. Imagine a Republican challenger with the core and the moderates behind him. With an aura of excitement about him and the wind at his back. Then you could win. Not maybe win.
It's amazing to me how polarised the electorate is now. And more so every year. I think Obama is a polarizing force. Because there is a bloc of folks who will never ever ever vote for Obama. No matter what. They simply hate Obama. Part of it is race of course. But Hillary Clinton as a candidate was the same way. With conservatives you have an unbending stance. In a previous blog post I was sniffing around this concept of division and the line drawn in the sand of polarization. I said things like "haves and have nots". "Democrat vs Republican" Liberal vs Conservative". I want to go one little tiny step further.
I want to say: "those that believe everything can be boiled down to "right or wrong" "Yes or no".... VS "those who don't know because there are too many variables"
To me, conservative thinking is religious thinking. There are no grey areas.
Liberal thinking is making up your mind on a situational basis.
I pick on conservatives. But I know that one definition of a conservative is "A Liberal who has just been mugged!"
I'm very curious about an issue in the upcoming election campaign. My big questions are: Will the Democrats play the religion card against Romney? Is it a cheap shot to do that? Does a candidate's religion get a free pass? Exactly how wacky is Mormonism? If it is really wacky, could it hurt Romney? Wacky or not, could an attack backfire on the Democrats? Can it be the Dems haven't thought of this?
I think there is a special team in the Obama camp that is working on this Mormon thing. I think they are holding back. I think they have recruited disgruntled Mormons who had to escape from the religion and want to tell their bitter tale. The team is accumulating data that will shock us all. Maybe they want to explode it in October.
I have a blog post myself about the Mormons. It's called "Utah" from Sept. 2010. I was at the "Temple Square" in Salt Lake.
And last night I Googled up the Mormons and found these claims: Of course I don't know if they are true!
If you get married in a Temple you have to get naked.
God lives at a star called Kolob.
You wear special underwear 24-7.
The underwear has the logo of the Free Masons on it!
Some of the ritual sacrements are the same as the Free Masons.
Joseph Smith was a known con man before he became the prophet.
The Mormans have a living prophet that is exalted as a god.
There are 12 disciples the living prophet is the head of.
When a man dies "sealed" as a Morman he has his own planet in the afterlife with thousands of women at his command (this is so better than 70 measly virgins)
Joseph Smith dictated the Book of Mormon while reading golden plates which no one ever saw. He stayed behind a screen when he dictated. The guy writing it down decided to test J.Smith and claimed to have lost the previous page to see if J.Smith would then be able to dictate the exact same words from the golden plates. J. Smith got very angry about the page being lost and said that God was angry and that a different place on the plates would substitute because God was omitting the original page!
And there is more and more and more. Maybe it's a low blow. But I hope the Dems go for it. And I thought Romney was boring!
LLITTY ::::+::::
It's amazing to me how polarised the electorate is now. And more so every year. I think Obama is a polarizing force. Because there is a bloc of folks who will never ever ever vote for Obama. No matter what. They simply hate Obama. Part of it is race of course. But Hillary Clinton as a candidate was the same way. With conservatives you have an unbending stance. In a previous blog post I was sniffing around this concept of division and the line drawn in the sand of polarization. I said things like "haves and have nots". "Democrat vs Republican" Liberal vs Conservative". I want to go one little tiny step further.
I want to say: "those that believe everything can be boiled down to "right or wrong" "Yes or no".... VS "those who don't know because there are too many variables"
To me, conservative thinking is religious thinking. There are no grey areas.
Liberal thinking is making up your mind on a situational basis.
I pick on conservatives. But I know that one definition of a conservative is "A Liberal who has just been mugged!"
I'm very curious about an issue in the upcoming election campaign. My big questions are: Will the Democrats play the religion card against Romney? Is it a cheap shot to do that? Does a candidate's religion get a free pass? Exactly how wacky is Mormonism? If it is really wacky, could it hurt Romney? Wacky or not, could an attack backfire on the Democrats? Can it be the Dems haven't thought of this?
I think there is a special team in the Obama camp that is working on this Mormon thing. I think they are holding back. I think they have recruited disgruntled Mormons who had to escape from the religion and want to tell their bitter tale. The team is accumulating data that will shock us all. Maybe they want to explode it in October.
I have a blog post myself about the Mormons. It's called "Utah" from Sept. 2010. I was at the "Temple Square" in Salt Lake.
And last night I Googled up the Mormons and found these claims: Of course I don't know if they are true!
If you get married in a Temple you have to get naked.
God lives at a star called Kolob.
You wear special underwear 24-7.
The underwear has the logo of the Free Masons on it!
Some of the ritual sacrements are the same as the Free Masons.
Joseph Smith was a known con man before he became the prophet.
The Mormans have a living prophet that is exalted as a god.
There are 12 disciples the living prophet is the head of.
When a man dies "sealed" as a Morman he has his own planet in the afterlife with thousands of women at his command (this is so better than 70 measly virgins)
Joseph Smith dictated the Book of Mormon while reading golden plates which no one ever saw. He stayed behind a screen when he dictated. The guy writing it down decided to test J.Smith and claimed to have lost the previous page to see if J.Smith would then be able to dictate the exact same words from the golden plates. J. Smith got very angry about the page being lost and said that God was angry and that a different place on the plates would substitute because God was omitting the original page!
And there is more and more and more. Maybe it's a low blow. But I hope the Dems go for it. And I thought Romney was boring!
LLITTY ::::+::::
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