Titular Testation

I added a new title bar, Red faced, high in the clouds, Stone faced, getting revelation and standing a-skance from the light.

I like the new templates, very nice. Huzzah blogger, ol chaps.

So the FBI is trying to issue guidelines about University Employees to help people spot "enemies of state". Per slashdot.org

"FBI is offering to brief faculty, students and staff on what it calls 'espionage indicators' aimed at identifying foreign agents. Unexplained affluence, failing to report overseas travel, showing unusual interest in information outside the job scope, keeping unusual work hours, unreported contacts with foreign nationals, unreported contact with foreign government, military, or intelligence officials, attempting to gain new accesses without the need to know, and unexplained absences are all considered potential espionage indicators."

The trouble is, these guidelines need to be combined with some other common sense. I will take each of the identifiers they have used and comment on them:

Unexplained affluence
Just because someone in your employ at a school has some money, doesn't mean an explanation is even owed to anyone. Suppose he or she simply has a wealthy relative...even a wealthy foreign relative...and it just isn't anyone's business?

Failing to report overseas travel
I am not sure employees have to account to their workplace for where they go when they are not at work. Certainly one must possess the necessary documents to travel and this need not be dealt with at all by one's employer, it's an abuse of power and a violation of privacy I would think.

Showing unusual interest in information outside the job scope
Curiousity? Simple desire to learn new things? Are we all suddenly communist drones stuck in a fixed career for life? This is really a repressive notion.

Keeping unusual work hours
I work in IT and I know unusual hours can be common. If the hours comport with the job description this should not place anyone under suspicion, though as a management issue, some people need not be on site after hours.

Unreported contacts with foreign nationals
The implication that any social contact ought to be reported to an employer or school is really not sounding like my America. That is really disturbing. It is possible speak to foreign nationals regularly in this great land without it involving threatening national security or being anyone's business.

Unreported contact with foreign government, military, or intelligence officials
Again the word "unreported". As if I should file a memo to my boss all about who I met at lunch. What is the imagined hypothetical situation here? An employer spots his copy clerk at wine bar on the weekend sitting with a uniformed general and confronts the employee for not "reporting" the meeting? I find this kind of suspicion frenzy dangerous to civil, free society.

Attempting to gain new accesses without the need to know
"Hey...can I have the password to the server with the grades on it"...I suppose it's common sense that some employees or students do not need access to sensitive private information. Though this could lead to a knee jerk reaction to interest in perfectly legitimate public information.

Unexplained Absences
This can happen to anyone. Really, you have a personal emergency and miss a school day. How many people skip their own classes for no good reason at all? I don't think this one alone really seals the deal for determining a spy.

I care about my country, I love it enough not to want it to spiral into the salem witch trials because most every key identifier for espionage is something that could be a simple matter of liberty and privacy and not necessarily indicate anything.

Besides, how clumsy and stupid do they think someone would be if they were really a spy? The safety of the nation is important, though so is the character of the life we are preserving. If most people fit into some of these identifiers at some time we may be just inciting panic for no good reason, causing a majority of false positives and unnecessary suspicion and mistrust.

Our society is free because of trust. If the FBI allows the threats from abroad to erode trust they may be doing far more damage to our own country than an enemy could inflict on us.

=sw

Kyoto Politics

It is starting to become clearer that carbon dioxide emissions are becoming a global problem. The top 20 emitters are listed by the Union of Concerned Scientists. The top one is the United States, though China is a close second, especially considering the growth rate of emissions from that country.

If the problem is urgent, if American scientists and, increasingly, politicians know the risks, why has the U.S. refused to ratify the Kyoto protocols?

It may be, that under the current agreement Large emitters such as China and India, which could potentially grow much larger, are not required to reduce their emissions under the protocol. Though the U.S. emissions are dramatically higher, this is effectively a call to negate America's historical competitive advantages.

The theory behind Kyoto is that if America reduces its emissions then that leaves room for growth or sustained levels of emissions from other countries. In reality, all nations need to reduce emissions and rationalizing that some nations should not have to do so amounts to a desire to transfer economic activity from the U.S. to other nations.

Because this is an important global issue about which something must be done, it would seem that the U.S. would prefer to rely on its technical and innovative prowess to deal with the carbon dioxide issue rather than effectively hand its sovereign power over to other nations.

Should there be an accord that recognizes that every nation must work to reduce CO2 emissions and change its energy usage patterns, then that is an accord America could sign. The U.S. would also have an extra large responsibility to reduce emissions, under such an agreement.

What Kyoto represents is simply the transfer of economic and industrial activity from the United States to other countries like India and China. This is an obvious political and competitive coup through which American politicians can see directly.

If CO2 is a real problem, everyone must target downward, instead of trying to transfer American industrial and technological lead time to other nations in a kind of carbon welfare system.

The United States will, no doubt, need to seek solutions to the CO2 emission issue and the effects of global warming will impact every nation. Though, it is clear as day why the U.S. and nations like Australia do not ratify the Kyoto protocols. Both nations have signed the protocols, demonstrating the importance of the issue at hand. However, the solution must involve all nations seeking reductions, not some nations simply seeking a larger slice of American historical advantage, insisting on a school-yard catch-up game instead of seeking actual reductions of their own CO2 emissions.

The U.S. should keep its sovereignty and insist on accords that target reductions by all, and do not offer a kind of carbon amnesty for coming late to the industrialized technology game.

=sw

War Theory

Why is there war? Why are we at war?

I think, among some communities generally described as Arabs, like the Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon or extremist insurgents in Iraq, religion is a ready shield. It is so plain for me to see that a religion of peace has nothing to do with terrorism and gangster-like activity these groups of people undertake. I almost feel the sense of hopelessness even some military members feel. The voice that says "these people are insane fanatics that will never come to their senses" or "we should write them off and bomb them all".

I may not have much in common with these people though I have humanity in common. Why am I not motivated to exploit the religious sentiments of people to whip them up into a warring, irrational, hateful frenzy as some videos seem to show groups like these do. What would make me feel as hopeless, frustrated and desperately angry as these fellow human beings do?

I suspect there is a war on with Iran already. Maybe it's even with parts of Pakistan and maybe North Korea is even involved, certainly in the area of disseminating information about nuclear weapons research.

The war with Iran is being fought in political stand-offs, kidnappings, brash statements and crass conferences like the one hosted by iran denying the Holocaust. The 80's war in Afghanistan was a proxy war between the U.S.S.R. (now mainly Russia) and the U.S.A. and the Vietnam war was fought against Chinese backing, as was the Korean War. The wars in Palestine, Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan (of today) are looking like Proxy wars.

On the surface, the difference in the predominant religion of the parties may serve as a motivator in oversimplified anger building exercizes. As an American, I know I am not at war with Mohammed, Islam or any religion.

I believe these wars are about economics.

Now the G8 conference is on, remember that about 65% of the worlds economy is represented by Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States. This looks exactly like a post-world-war II bargaining table.

Excluded? Predominantly muslim countries. Not only them, but China, India, Australia, All of Africa and All of South America are, on the surface of it, excluded. I know other countries also hold meetings during the conferences, but really...

War is about wealth.

How do some more extremist muslim people feel? Slighted? Universally disadvantaged? Like other people, who do not share their religion, hold the billions to such a degree that they can win wars, assign territory and enforce it all?

I understand the deep seated need for a feeling of faith in justice. I can see why many people hope that Sharia Law (an example a system of laws that is consistent with muslim values) will afford some leverage, advantage or opportunity to over a billion muslims.

I have no sympathy for those who choose the path of terror, violence, war lordism, gang-like criminal behavior. And I, ofcourse, find the idea of religious law to be a contemptable concept that is not how I prefer to live, though I am trying to see what is the cause of war, of the warlike spirit.

I heard, last week, that the billionaires in Aspen, CO are trying to keep the pesky millionaires out. This trend is so unsettling. While the free market system is not without its benefits and advantages, and while I desire to be wealthy like many American Dreamers, I will always reject, out of hand, the notion that money elevates anyone to a higher worth as a human being. All the illusion, the trappings, exclusivity and ownership should never nudge a human being's inherent worth one 1000th of a nanometer abover another's.

I feel a duty to country to point out the risk of misdirection from important things speaking about Paris Hilton can cause. Don't let her distract you from important events like the "retirement" of General Pace, erstwhile chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the U.S. armed forces for 2 years now. Though Paris illustrates my point.

Paris Hilton's wealth and status may have led to the offer of special treatment for the "socialite" (oh geez, is this a career?) by the criminal justice system. This leaves other jailed women wondering if they couldn't just have a medical issue and be sent home as well. This manufactured class difference may be what leads to the anger that leads to the resolve to fight that leads to war. At least it seems to work that way for some apparently disadvantaged people in parts of the world.

Poor, angry with no prospects...many will fall victim to recruiting to these various factions. I believe that fighting poverty fights the ability of those wishing to exploit this anxious resource of idle stressed populations to prosecute a war.

So what is wealth really? I'll think about that one for a while and post later.

=sw

Parthenogenesis

I heard about the hammer head shark in captivity with other females who delivered a baby shark "Immaculate Conception" style in a process known as parthenogenesis. Probably named for ancient Greek myths. Can you imagine the construction workers from the Parthenon: "Listen, Telemakos, the Parthenon didn't build itsself!" Sadly, knowing the ancient Greeks, they were probably using slave labor. Democracy was not for everyone back then.

I prefer "Emaculate Conception". Candles, egyptian cotton, mood setting music, massage oil, no condom (It's conception after all).

It seems there are a lot of examples of Parthenogenesis in the animal world. Indeed every vertabrate that is not a mammal has exhibited this capability at some point observable to modern science. Also many non-vertabrates can "get her done", so to speak, "all by herself" as it were. Annie Lennox is a prophetess.

This is an amazing ability and except for the lack of a mammalian incident (much less a human one) on record, this would seem to lend credence to the concept of a "virgin birth" like the one in the beliefs held by Christians.

Mary was said to have been a virgin who was suddenly pregnant without even mention of a mans name....wait a tick...there was that bloke Gabriel. Probably, Mary hooked up with her cousin's boyfriend, a non-practicing jew who'd been living in Samaria and was sent as a "messenger" to visit the family and ended up standing over her at some point. Gabe said things to Mary that I have at least thought of saying to any hottie who has favored me with her charms like "Hail [name here] full of grace"... and as her robe falls to the stone floor of the summer home on Galilee..."blessed art thou among women"...and later that evening another utterance echoes through the atrium..."Mother of God". Warning: that was sacreligous. I should have warned you before it happened. I'm sorry, baby, Now you'll have some 'splainin' to do to Joseph!

Yes, Occam's razor, if used for nothing else in this postulation, tells me that the simplest answer is Mary did things in the usual way. You know, things happen and you lie to yourself about them and spin them to those whose reactions you fear most. Women are equipped for this sort of thing by evolution.

That's why Jesus looked so much taller than the rest of the O'Nazareths in the family portraits which we of course have in museums proving the whole story happened. Right? ...What? There's no evidence just copies of manuscripts about a story? Huh?

Parthenogenesis is a natural occurrence in some creatures, and if it happened in a woman once, it being a natural (if rare) phenomenon, that would seem to take the need for a miracle off the table.

I will let you all know as soon as I "genesis" an ancient Greek temple in my sleep. You can all party with me. Bring a silk pillow and some wine, wear a grape vine around your forehead and dress in a comfortable, loose-fitting robe. Women only. Hey it's my "Parthenon", genesis your own.

=sw

Great Book I am Reading

If you read me ever, and you are few and highly valued....you know I love to read Carl Sagan's writings and lectures. I am reading "The Varieties of Scientific Experience" by Carl Sagan...edited by Ann Druyan (Annnn Droooooyan!).

Thinking about the wars around the world...the Palestinians fighting eachother...the Sunni's and Shi'ites fighting eachother and other such conflicts, some of Sagan's words ring true. Here he paraphrases a way of thinking to demonstrate how dangerous it can be. This may seem familiar to anyone who has transitioned from faith in a belief system to self-determined free thinking.

"Our history is in part a battle to the death of inadequate myths. If I can't convince you, I must kill you... ...You are a threat to my version of the truth, especially the truth about who I am and what my nature is. The thought I may have dedicated my life to a lie, that I might have accepted a conventional wisdom that no longer, if it ever did, corresponds to external reality, that is a very painful realization. I will tend to resist it to the last. I will go to almost any lengths to prevent myself from seeing that the worldview that I have dedicated my life to is inadequate." -Carl Sagan

This book is a great read and seems as relevant as can be to today.

=sw

Damn Stars

I stare at the stars. They are so close yet so far away. I admire the stars and they know nothing of me. I long to be warmed by their rays and nearer to them. They are a danger to me. Like Ikarus to the sun or like a moth to the fire. I wish the stars were not so far...there are millions of them, many of them in pairs...many explode many have children orbiting around them. Like our star.

The stars have no use for me. They deny me access with distance. They tell me "No"...they tease me and run from me...red shifting...red shifting my face to shame.

Stars will be the death of me. I want to be around them...be in them...be a part of them. I feel I am made from them. I know they are a part of me and I long to commune with them. I have seen their auroras...watched their morning glow...gazed upon their sunsets and risen when they say and gone to bed as they ask. I have burned myself upon their intense heat and run to the cold distance of their systems to hide from the them. I am a million miles away and a million lifetimes hopelessly isolated and marooned from the stars. They are my peace, my bane...my hope and my shame.

There is nothing I can do to be at peace about them. No fix for my banishment. No amount of patience to meet the stinging urgency and no stopping the expansion of my universe...leading to endless distance and a cold, dark, ashen, silent isolation.

=sw

Golf

I have trespassed on some of the finest country clubs in the land ...on walks.

Apart from an innate ability to strike at things with a club, I am completely useless at golf.

I mean...the concept of grabbing a shaft close to my waist with both fists comes naturally to me, as well as the general concepts of "Flailing" and "Whacking". I love to be out in nature. Why shouldn't I like Golf?

I guess I just don't like keeping score. I wonder if drinking some scotch would actually help my game? I wouldn’t want to get ticketed for “driving” under the influence...or “putting” under the influence.

Golf was probably invented to keep firebrand scotts from flogging their mates.

In any case, until they make glowing balls that emit beeps, Golf will always be a big challenge for me.

=sw

HDTV

I have a little list of pet peeves like...

* No one ever taught me the secret language of love
* The CW's Smallville isn't on iTunes (yet).
* Fox's House isn't on iTunes (yet).
* Even though I wish there could be only Peace, I still think sometimes war is necessary
* Hamas won't acknowledge Israel and give up on their stupid evil desire to murder their neighbors
* Ipods Don't have a removeable battery
* and other important peeves like....HDTVs that are displaying stretched regular TV content

Let me just address that last one.

HDTV comprises such a complex field of products, specifications and numbers that I will just try to keep this simple.

HDTV displays and signals accomodate a wide screen. It is not quite twice as wide as it is tall. The typical ratio as I understand it is 16:9 where regular TV is 4 x 3.

So...if your screen is a regular TV that is 480 pixels tall it will be 640 wide. (480/3) * 4.

If your screen is an HDTV that is 720 pixels tall it will be 1280 wide. (720/9) * 16.

All over this damn crazy modern transitional world I see wide screen (16:9) screens with 4:3 content that has been stretched to fit!!! OMG this drives me crazy.

See, content meant for a certain screen is said to be 1:1...the proportions are true to reality. A circle will look round, a human head will be correctly proportioned and real looking.

Stretched content is not true to reality and thus distorts the way people look. It's an abuse of the technology. Regular screen content should leave blank spaces on the sides of an HDTV screen, so that it stays correctly proportioned. Only HDTV content should span the screen. I hate this trade off. It's so lame to make people and objects stretch to look unnatural just to spare the screen or use the full screen.

Here, I will visually demonstrate with this example from House (Fox) character Dr. Allison Cameron played by the lovely Jennifer Morrison...who is married...wait I have another pet peeve:

* Jennifer Morrison taken

Here she is in HDTV...



Here she is in a regular TV form factor...



Here she is in "faked HD" which is a regular TV signal stretched to fill an HDTV screen. It is Pure Visual Heresy and leaves the actor out of proportion from her usual attractive, natural human form. Yes, I am thinking about it too much.



I always say "stretched" as I walk by a TV in that mode. Not everyone notices, I have discovered, but to me it is obvious.

Imposed Culture

I know how the French feel now.

When Americans visit France, sometimes there is a cultural tension that results from the presumption of some American visitors that everyone should be able to speak English while providing any service. French people get very irritated at this because they have establsihed a wonderful French cultured whose fine lifestyle and values are closely intertwined with the French language to amount to "Frenchness". Something that is often envied and used in marketing around the world. The French are often the example to the world of a "good life" kind of society.

This is all wonderful, having a cultural identity. Things get uncomfortable for the French when immigrants don't want to assimilate to "Frenchness" and live the good life. Also, when foreign visitors presume there should be some accomodation made by the French to a foreign (to France) language or culture. The French feel "we are the source of high society and good living, you should adapt to be more like us, not the other way around".

I can see their point. We do like to use the French-mystique to our advantage when trying to portray something as exclusive or wonderful in some way. This is still true even given the disagreements between the French and Americans over Iraq policy.

Unless the world is supposed to homogenize to a bland averageness, local culture should be valued. This idea of culture will have some unfortunate ethnic and racial overtones at times. Simply having a unique culture means "We are We and Thou art Thee" and that means people will try to find characteristics they can use to sort out who's whom. Sometimes this will be language or perhaps a general "look". This is all quaint until it gets ugly.

When I visit another country, though I want some benefit of the doubt for simply not knowing everything, my cognitive position is that I am an outsider and should respect and adapt to local customs and laws. If local customs are so out of harmony with my beliefs and values that they are offensive to me, it is probably my responsibility not to visit that country or to keep my dissatisfaction to myself while I am there.

Now to my point. If I were to illegally immigrate into another country I would not presume having any rights or any privelage to ignore bothering to learn the local language. I know that when enough people who only speak Mexican Spanish arrive in my neighborhood that they will be able to run their own economy and culture never needing to learn English. Many of them will have immigrated legally, but many others will be here illegally AND make their own subculture. This might be organic, human and part of the process of change. I find it personally irritating and an affront to the law abiding, legal immigrants and citizens of the country.

It's almost like people from other countries don't "feel" that the American laws apply to them and they feel that the English speaking American culture is foreign to them and they don't see the hypocrisy I see in having migrated contrary to our laws. They are, after all, not "their laws".

Sometimes people display the flag of a foreign country on TV or in their vehicles. I saw a large Mexican flag being waved about live on camera on one of the 2006 New Years Eve specials.

This is America, it should be ok to speak freely or appreciate other cultures or display a flag from whereever you choose. I have always been an American patriot, even though I was born in Canada, because my mother is a patriotic American and taught me to love her home country. I have displayed French flags while learning French, just to appreciate the culture. I had a large Belgian flag in my room at one point. Lots of people display the Union Jack (British Flag) for fun or style cause it's a cool symbol. I am ok with similar displays of other flags, such as those from immigrant's home countries.

There is something different, though, when an ethnic group disregards our country's laws, immigrates en masse and doesn't even bother to learn the language or participate in the system of government much less the culture. Then I start to feel like the French. I feel more of an "us vs. them" mentality. I feel that this is my country and people came here to be in it, they should respect it and adopt it or go home. An illegal immigrant waving a flag is not simply showing pride in a culture, it starts to look like a cultural invasion.

I was trying to order a sandwhich at the local blimpie inside a BP gas station near my home. BP is already a foreign company, but the sandwhich counter rep. could not speak word one of English. It was as if...this is a place for spanish speakers only and that I was somehow out of place. I found this to be incredibly irritating. I have nothing against Mexican people or cultures. I think Spanish is a fine European colonial language just like English is such. However, I am an American. I speak English and I am here in America expecting those who come from other countries, like I did, to respect and adopt the American culture. I know they will add to it, but I simply do not accept that they should disrespect it and ignore our laws and culture. They don't have to come here to live if they don't want to.

My view is not oversimplistic, I am in favor of legal migraton and integration. I use a lot of new words that come from there being many Spanish speaking immigrants around. I welcome that. I eat Mexican Food with pleasure. Though I hold the line that illegal immigration is not tolerable. After that, even legally immigrating people need to understand they are becoming part of a vast and diverse American culture that is necessarily not going to be Mexican, if it is going to be a new and different life. Someone who doesn't see the importance of speaking my language in my country will not get my business.

What makes it so? All the little wars, skirmishes and social battles won in the past brought us to where we are. I want a United States type of America. There is a reason there is not a movement to become part of Mexico. We think we have something that cannot be had in the Mexican system and so do 12 million illegal immigrants from Mexico. The question is, can they flout the law and ignore the local culture and expect something better than the corrupt society they left behind?

The same goes for North Africans in France, West Africans in Spain and all the other migration around the world.
=sw

Walkie Talkie

I often hear the chirp of the Nextel/Sprint and other walkie-talkie cell services around the office. It's almost like a status symbol to say ..."I have this cool phone with this cool technology."

I think it should not be a status symbol. Think of it...someone else who has the ability to chirp into your phone and say whatever they please on a speaker phone at any time owns you. (for my geekier readers I am saying you are pwned)

I could never allow especially a best friend to have push button access to my personal audio earshot without a filter.
=sw