9/6/11

It's not that hard to answer

BuzzMachine: "So what the hell is journalism? Dave Winer says it doesn’t matter. “Journalism itself is becoming obsolete,” he argues well. Mathew Ingram recasts what Winer says, asking whether journalism is obsolete because anyone can do it."

This is a mite peremptory. Journalism is a professional pursuit of persons who combine writing skills, analytical capacity and investigative abilities. A journalist establishes direct contact with sources and events and reports on what she finds. Anything that does not involve most or all the criteria suggested here is not journalism.

Journalism is hardly dead, just not practiced as described in many cases.

Carol Bartz' not so excellent day

Carol Bartz no longer CEO at Yahoo (report) | ZDNet: "UPDATE 2: No one is mincing words today. Now Yahoo has chimed in and confirmed officially that Bartz “has been removed by the Board from her role as Chief Executive Officer.”"

One of the hazards of being employed, especially by people who simply look at the bottom line. I wonder how the fates of independent writers will be affected. I feel that AOL will have no capacity to become a magnet for such, given Ms. Huffington's famed reliance on unpaid contributors. Associated Content could contend if managed to reinstate with Google following recent flaps.

Salient question if you want to follow our continuing secret impunity exercises

Close Read : The New Yorker: "How many more ways can evidence of America’s rendition and torture practices come to light? "

Pretty soon our freedom talk will have an increasingly hollow ring. The President needs to open his eyes a trice.



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What you don't know could hurt you, or something like that

Milky Way galaxy might hold thousands of ticking 'time bombs': ""We haven't found one of these 'time bomb' stars yet in the Milky Way, but this research suggests that we've been looking for the wrong signs. Our work points to a new way of searching for supernova precursors," said astrophysicist Rosanne Di Stefano of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA)."



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Perry Bush 3 should have prayed for brains

Texas cut fire department funding by 75 percent this year | Raw Replay: "Under Gov. Rick Perry (R) this year, Texas slashed state funding for the volunteer fire departments that protect most of the state from wildfires like the ones that have recently destroyed more than 700 homes."

You cannot invent this stuff.

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This ought to work for everyone

Taking the Luck Out of Learning | Psychology Today: " Another reason why studying by testing is effective is that it is always best to study in the way that you are going to be tested. That is, the more that the study situation resembles the testing situation, the more likely you are to remember the information during the test. "


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Everything you may not want to know about Newt

Our Guide to the Best Coverage of Newt Gingrich and His Record - ProPublica:

This is the best investigative site on the Web far as I know so I present whatever they do as about 90 percent more reliable than anything else.

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Ever heard of the Barbary Coast?

The Complete History of Adam Panflick: "Orlando, a strapping fellow of working class roots, survived his few months of slavery in Algiers with nothing more than a few permanent scars on his broad back and one less eye than he possessed the day he was taken. He was returned to Chipping Norton, courtesy of the Queen’s Navy, following a successful raid on Algeria."
'
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Original Biblical Songs: Peter and Andrew

Original Biblical Songs: Peter and Andrew:

Me and my buddy Larry about 40 years ago strumming away. Imagining what it might have been like by the Sea of Galilee when Jesus came looking for a few hardy souls to fish for folk. We're still strumming.

Overturning Roe v Wade is moderate?

Mitt Romney Won't Back Away From Moderate Views:

Good grief!

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This sounds about right

The 'Top Secret America' Created After Sept. 11 : NPR: ""The government said, 'We're facing an enemy we don't understand, we don't have the tools to deal with it, here's billions ... of dollars and a blank check after that for anybody with a good idea to go and pursue it,' " she says. "Not only does the government find it difficult to get its arms around itself, [but now] it doesn't know what's inside, it doesn't know what works, it doesn't know what doesn't work. And nobody still, 10 years later, is really in charge of those questions.""

You are reading the one person who has said from day one we do not need to fight a war, we need Sherlock Holmes. We have fought two or three or more wars, entered a karmic drone nightmare and have done the exact opposite of what would have been done with a Holmes at the helm. It is sick, sad and more dangerous now than before. Money creates overnight experts who give bad advice and apparently this is what most of these folk actually do.

'via Blog this'

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New Tao Posts: The Tao honors no one and uplifts all

New Tao Posts: The Tao honors no one and uplifts all:

Values are subjects. Characteristics and virtues are predicates. Honor is not a subject. But it has been denoted a value by no less than Aristotle. Nietzsche was right in calling for a revaluation of values. Without telling us what the new values were owing to life-changing encounter with a cruelly-beaten horse in Turin followed by a decade of essential captivity prior to his death.

The Tao honors no one and uplifts all

The Tao honors no one and uplifts all
The Tao perceives each one as one alone
The Tao prefers none over anyone
And known or unknown silently moves on

Here's a semi-favorable Obama poll that is falling through the cracks

Obama strongly leads GOP candidates in California poll | McClatchy: "LOS ANGELES — President Barack Obama's standing has slumped among California voters, but he holds an expansive lead over potential Republican opponents, including two who have leaped ahead of the GOP presidential pack in California, a new University of Southern California Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll has found."

'via Blog this'

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Patrick Toomey would appear to be beholden to the Club for Growth and other usual suspects

Patrick Toomey (R-PA) U.S. Senate | MAPLight.org - Money and Politics:

He is also on the committee to forge a compromise around debt and governance.

Miniscule bright spot on the sexism front

Study Says Confronting Men About Sexism Makes Them Nicer: "Standing up against sexist comments can be difficult and uncomfortable. But one study shows it could actually make people nicer to you."



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The US Shari‘a scare is the tip of the iceberg

Banning Shari‘a « The Immanent Frame: "The pairing of Shari‘a and international law suggests that these bills cannot be easily reduced to mere hostility to Islam. These bills ban both Shari‘a and international law, identifying the latter with institutions of global reach and significance such as the UN, European Union, IMF, or World Bank (Arizona, Missouri, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wyoming). Shari‘a may offer the site of greatest polemic and fear, but its pairing with international law betrays a deeper fear and anxiety that has swept the American legislative sphere."

'via Blog this'

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Indonesia should reopen case of slain rights hero

Seven Years Later, Indonesian Government Fails to Bring Justice for Slain Human Rights Activist Munir Said Thalib | Human Rights First: "Washington, D.C.—On the seventh anniversary of the assassination of prominent Indonesian human rights defender Munir Said Thalib’s murder, Human Rights First calls upon the Indonesian government to reopen an independent inquiry and bring everyone involved to justice.

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Stupid poll questions get stupid answers

New Polls Find All-Time Lows For Obama, Congress:

"Both polls show only one American in five feels that the nation is "headed in the right direction," while both show roughly three out of four say that the country is "off on the wrong track.""

Why don't polls ask what the right direction might be?

Less oil? More oil?

Less consumption? More consumption?

The President has had a first term made worse than any President in history and he is seven points off even. That would be 50 percent. When he hits even in a few weeks or so, the polls will present him as hanging by a thread. When he rises, it will be seen as an anomaly. Garbage out. Garbage in. But Huff's lead for about the 100th time if you include the number of premature obituaries for the President straight from the lips of the Empress Arianna.

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Great Interview with Mariano Rivera (Video and Text)

Mariano Rivera's admirers start from behind the plate with Jorge Posada and Joe Girardi | yankees.com: News:

Mariano opens up. Betcha he will get that shot in center field one day.

New Tao Posts: The values of the Tao are only known

New Tao Posts: The values of the Tao are only known:

To speak of ontological values is to approach the exalted reality of values in the scheme of things and to be clear about the highest of these. At the top there is the universal value non-idolatry routinely flaunted by our several worships. Complementing it are tolerance, democracy and helpfulness. But these can hardly achieve their full flower if the core value is not central. The quatrain is located at the link above.

The values of the Tao are only known

The values of the Tao are only known
When chosen freely over lesser ones
Then made to shine in actions of such worth
That happiness spreads freely on the earth 

My daily Katia Lee Report

Hurricane Katia Weakens – Projected Path And Satellite Imagery - Irish Weather Online: "Hurricane Katia rapidly strengthened into a major category four storm on Monday before being downgraded early Tuesday to a category three storm as it moved north of the Caribbean, forecasters said. There is no immediate threat to land."

ATLANTA — Heavy rain from the former Tropical Storm Lee rolled northeast into Appalachian states Tuesday, spreading the threat of flooding as far as New England after drenching the South, spawning tornadoes, sweeping several people away and knocking out power to thousands.

+

Looks as though convergence is not likely. But you never know.

You can track the nice penguin by clicking on latest location

Sirtrack - NZEmperor:

If curious click. It won't bite. A human being should have such attention.

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Let's see Perry Bush 3 has been in office for several terms

Texas and Mass. Still at Health Coverage Extremes in U.S.:

And he has maintained the distinction of having the largest percentage of uninsured - a shade over one in four persons.

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As the earth drowns and burns nanotech marches on

The World's Smallest Electric Motor is Made of Only One Molecule - Forbes:

Is there a problem with anything larger than a cell?



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Russia's toxicity problem

Russian Monitors Confirm Toxic Spill to River Near 2014 Olympics: "SOCHI, Russia, September 1, 2011 (ENS) - Russia's environmental monitoring service Wednesday confirmed that Sochi's Mzymta River was polluted by a 30 kilometer-long spill of liquid waste that covered the river and Black Sea shore with white foam."

Three years to clean it up. Ready set ...

Go teachers!

Kenyan teachers strike due to overcrowded classes - Yahoo! News: "NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — More than 200,000 Kenyan teachers went on strike Tuesday to protest the diversion of government funds meant to hire more teachers and ease classroom overcrowding, a union official said."

Bet most people don't even know there are 200K unionized teachers in Kenya. I sure didn't. Solidarity forever and then some.

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Once again the progressives are wrong

I'll go out on a limb here. Daily Kos and other sage venues say the GOP won't compromise because they want Obama out.

I say they either will compromise. Or they will go down for the count.

The president is not playing just for 2012. He is playing to further humiliate the perfidious GOP into doing the right thing. Relentlessly, after this week, everything the White House does will either be a compromise that works or result in a GOP stonewall that kills the GOP with 80 percent of the electorate.

And no one will have any doubt about this.

And the progressives will once again credit Obama belatedly for achieving what they said he would/could never do.

Could you be a little more specific?

Rick Perry Faces Reality Check in 2012 GOP Debate With Romney, Bachmann - The Daily Beast: "“He’s fairly aggressive,” says Wayne Slater, the veteran Dallas Morning News reporter who has questioned Perry as a debate panelist. “He never backs down, or rarely backs down. He’s going to try to look very confident. Sometimes he’ll smile and smirk. One of the problems with that is that it reminds people of what they don’t like about Texas—the perception of these arrogant cowboy-type guys. There’s a danger there.” "

Did I hear a Bush 3?

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So what is this? Bureaucracy killed me? Literally?

CIA's Push for Drone War Driven by Internal Needs | Common Dreams: "The reason Hayden pushed for a much bigger drone war, it now appears, is that it had already created a whole bureaucracy in the anticipation of such a war."



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Texas wildfire video glut

Video - Breaking News Videos from CNN.com:

Punctuated by state of the art corporate interventions. Who was it that prayed for rain? Where is he now?

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20/20 hindsight why in God's name are we still here

Battle for Afghanistan's Gambir Jungle: Soldiers' tale of an epic fight - CSMonitor.com:

I have this image of enemies in the jungle. Are they coming to get me? Even if they are, are there not things that can get me first? Even if there are not things that can get me first, would they succeed? And why?

It took an educated fanatical guy with a very deep purse and charismatic capacities to convince idiots to kill themselves to recreate a fantasy Medieval caliphate and traumatize the world in the bargain. We have iced him at untold expense in the evident MIDST of the dumbest military intervention in our history.

You heard right. We are not leaving. One way or another we will manage to recreate the past. Give me a break!

Many of us prefer the term "Freedom Movement"

Civil Rights Movement Veterans Website: "The mass media calls it the "Civil Rights Movement," but many of us prefer the term "Freedom Movement" because it was about so much more than just a few narrowly-defined civil rights. The essence of the Freedom Movement was first to defy, and then to overthrow, a century of systemic racial oppression and exploitation across all aspects of society. At heart, the Freedom Movement was a demand for social and political equality, an end to economic injustice, and a fair share of political power for Blacks"

'via Blog this'

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The most original and the most versatile intellect that the Americas have so far produced

Charles Sanders Peirce Online - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com: "Who is the most original and the most versatile intellect that the Americas have so far produced? The answer 'Charles S. Peirce' is uncontested, because any second would be so far behind as not to be worth nominating. [He was] mathematician, astronomer, chemist, geodesist, surveyor, cartographer, metrologist, spectroscopist, engineer, inventor; psychologist, philologist, lexicographer, historian of science, mathematical economist, lifelong student of medicine; book reviewer, dramatist, actor, short story writer; phenomenologist, semiotician, logician, rhetorician and metaphysician."


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And then there's fire

"No containment" of Texas wildfire - CBS News: "There's been no significant rainfall over central Texas for a year, said CBS News correspondent Dean Reynolds, and today the consequences of that are being seen in Bastrop and other areas."

We start most fires. We help create weather extremes. We pray to be spared. We are evidently in an unprecedented situation, as Derrida predicted. But that's not good unless we alter our values so as not to repeat the past.

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Someone is not ashamed to support the President. Go Greg!

Greg Jones' BLACKS 4 BARACK ! Official Site:

Someone is not ashamed to support the President. Go Greg!

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Not so bad that we do not start building high speed rail.

Forget High Speed Leap Beyond Green - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Not so bad that we do not start building high speed rail. We need to think if lots of things beyond the usual. Such as re-population of now vacant areas."

Global Online Privacy

If I could point to one thing this book does

BEYOND CREED - Stephen Rose : IUniverse:

It can stand in front of the world for thirty years without causing more than a single ripple.

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Unless you are vision impaired

9/11 Covers: Beyond the One-Liner — BagNews: "Compared to the simplistic one-liners sprouting like mushrooms on cover after cover as part of the 9/11 ten year anniversary newsstand pileup, the New Statesman cover kept me going for a while, not just in bringing back names, episodes, chain-of-events, but also for (if you remember the big phrase during the anthrax scare) helping connect-some-dots."



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A history you need not repeat

Adam Drives to Illinois and Back 1953 - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"At sixteen, our hero started smoking. He joined others at Exeter who took advantage of the permission that came with age. He was a Philip Morris smoker. He could even surmise that the package was green. It was actually brown. He would continue his deleterious smoking habit until he was thirty-five, at which time he would stop precipitously and never take another puff. I would suggest that Adam's mode of doing things -- known as "snapping" by our advanced psychological interpreters -- was typical of our hero."

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Forsooth I know not why I am yawning

Robert Fulford: When words die | Afterword | National Post: "Words that have lost their currency won’t be banished from the language, however. They’ll remain in the full, gargantuan Oxford Dictionary of English, which runs to 20 volumes and will run more if necessary. They also appear in the Oxford Dictionaries Online website, which expands indefinitely, like the universe or the Internet."

Or: What goeth around cometh around.

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Pregnancy death risks in Sierra Leone:

Sierra Leone: Pregnant women still denied lifesaving medical care | Amnesty International:

"More than a year after the launch of the Free Health Care Initiative, pregnant women and girls in Sierra Leone continue to face serious challenges in accessing the drugs and medical care crucial for safe pregnancy and childbirth, Amnesty International said today. "

Dysfunctional system ...

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Forget it. We are ALL knee deep in war

FedEx and Pepsi Are Top Defense Contractors? 5 Corporate Brands Making a Killing on America’s Wars | World | AlterNet: "FedEx and Pepsi Are Top Defense Contractors? 5 Corporate Brands Making a Killing on America’s Wars"

That is what democracy unleashes. For the good but also for the ill. We have all made the connection between killing and what we do in the way of support. Now it is up to us to elect people who will reduce the carnage. And maybe to understand who the main players are.

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AOL ruins all it touches

TechCrunch As We Know It May Be Over | TechCrunch: "If AOL tries to bring in their own Editor-in-Chief to run TechCrunch, it will be a colossal fucking mistake. The old adage: “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” — if AOL throws out Mike and tries to install their own despot, it will be breaking it just so they can fix it. And they might not like the end result. It may run, but it will never purr with the precision at which we purr right now."

And the market bites it for its unacceptable conduct and brain dead decisions.

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Summer knits and almost no cars in view. Slide Show

Readers’ Street Style Photos: Summer Knits - Slide Show - NYTimes.com:

Sometimes we are closer to heaven. Sometimes not.



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Cargohoppers are at least smaller than today's monster trucks

How Tiny Solar Trucks Can Save American Cities : TreeHugger: "But in the Netherlands, the country's fourth-largest city is actively working to make a cargo delivery "train" out of mini electric trucks driven by solar power, shifting the way the city approaches one piece of its freight transportation."

Small favors. At least someone is thinking. Actually we could get rid of cars and use these for people as well. Deliver at night. Ride days.

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Just what we need

Is a nuclear-powered car in our future? | The Car Tech blog - CNET Reviews: "As a design exercise to show what a vehicle capable of lasting 100 years without maintenance could look like, Cadillac debuted at the 2009 Chicago Auto Show its World Thorium Fueled concept car powered by nuclear energy. While the vehicle didn't contain a working thorium-fueled nuclear reactor, one researcher says that the technology is within our reach."

Yes the technology for anything is in our reach. Love these choices.

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Why dark and light, why birth and death, why these?

Abba's Way: 64 On Night:

"Why dark and light, why birth and death, why these?
Night ties us to unfathomed mysteries;
Night is a testimonial to truth,
The truth that life itself is meaningful,
Beyond what we, when wide awake, can see."

More at the link above.

Three aspects of letting go

Abba's Way is the Way of Universal Reconciliation - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Abba's way is a letting go of the burdensome days and nights of gray self-absorption when you thought your life could go nowhere.

It's a letting go of a fast lane existence that tramples over persons and principles and is powered by a compulsion to win at any cost.

It's a letting go of a magic fantasy world and a grasping hold of a world that will not let you down or deceive you, because you are simply being who you and who you will become."

More at link above.

Are values and politics synonyms?

Abba's Way - Stephen C. Rose : IUniverse:

I don't think so. Politics is the push and pull of governance within the immanent frame. Values are what we live by and Abba's values transcend politics - non-idolatry, tolerance, helpfulness, democracy. So saith this book.

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Are you ok with what you've got? (Video)

Labor Day | ThinkProgress:

Cap tip Yglesias.

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This is more what I had in mind

Less Work, More Living by Juliet Schor — YES! Magazine: "But fewer work hours for people with jobs is a key step toward solving the unemployment crisis—while giving Americans healthier lives. Fewer hours means more jobs are available to people who need them. Living on less pay usually means consuming less, making more of the things one needs at home, and living lighter, whether by design or by accident."

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Dumb way to do a 4-day week

Utah ends 4-day workweek experiment - Yahoo! News: "Former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman launched the “4/10″ workweek — 10 hours a day, Monday-Thursday — for thousands of employees in 2008 to improve efficiency, reduce overhead costs and conserve energy at a time when budgets are tight and resources are dwindling."

Better to have enterprises of all sorts function 24/7 and split the work up so more people have jobs. All this method does is further collapse service and add no jobs.

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You have until 2:00EDT today - its a Twitter thing

Tweetup Briefing: Ask @PressSec Your Questions at the White House | The White House: "This briefing marks the third White House Tweetup, an in-person meet-up with people who follow the White House on Twitter. White House Tweetups give @WhiteHouse followers the chance to attend events, engage with Administration officials and share their ideas with other @WhiteHouse followers.

What are you waiting for? Learn more and apply here: http://www.whitehouse.gov/tweetup. Note: The deadline to apply is 2:00 p.m. EDT on Tuesday, September 6th."



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Abba's pledge of daily forgiveness

Windows on The Bible: Sixty Two Family Values 2:

"Earthly families will be upset to the degree all their members do not accept Abba's pledge of daily forgiveness for those who use the Lord's prayer as the center of their personal devotion. Families where this center is absent will live in tension and potential discord when one or two of their members heeds the call and the others resist."

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I like this little poem

Crazy Fairy Tales (poem) - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Let's take this boring life and be resigned

To face our truth and make our ground resound

By teaching fairies what we pixies do"

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Inflation? Try bubble. It fits better.

From an ad just received:

"Whether you're an NYC newbie or you've been hopping off the 7 train your whole life, you've probably suspected there's more to Times Square than jumbotrons and a giant ball. Get the real story behind one of the country's best-known destinations with today's deal from Manhattan Walking Tour: $25 for a 75-minute walking tour and continental breakfast -- a $50 value."

Now I live a ten minute walk away and the notion that I can learn a $50 worth of knowledge being told that Herbie's Flea Circus is no more is laughable. But what is not laughable is that we live in a world where economies are such that we must bilk tourists at inflated prices to make a living. I want Thorstein Veblen back. I want invention to be the mother of necessity.


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Winning The War Within Collected Sonnets: Thirty-Eight Our lead-us-not means we are taking hold

Winning The War Within Collected Sonnets: Thirty-Eight Our lead-us-not means we are taking hold:

"Our lead-us-not means we are taking hold
We trust that Abba now will be our guide
We shall not be led so far from the fold
That tempted we succomb to evil’s tide"

Full sonnet at the link above.

Bachmann and Palin are falling off the radar screen

Bachmann reversed herself on veterans benefits | The Washington Independent:

An interesting thing about today's politics is that expertise is in the eye of the viewer. When you see that Bachmann and Palin are no longer alive on the screen, you know they are probably politically dead. Cruel world. Bye ladies. Perry trumped Bachmann and Palin has a minus interest quotient now.



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It's government that's at an all time low

Obama hits all-time low, NBC News/WSJ poll finds - politics - msnbc.com: "But both Hart and McInturff contend that Obama wasn't the only party damaged by the debt ceiling debacle. A whopping 82 percent now disapprove of the job Congress is doing. In the history of this poll, it's an all-time high level of dissatisfaction with Capitol Hill."

Obama is the highest of the three branches.

He beats Congress by a mile.

And if the Court was included in the poll, it would rank last.

And if Obama had a good PR guy, that is exactly what he would say.



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Building tall buildings is stupid

Soft Target: At the Pentagon's New Office Complex, Disturbing Questions About Security - TIME:

Thoughtless, unmindful, unaware detriment. Comes back to bite you. The notion that we will be happier or better if we can be 25, no 50 stories, up is stupid.

We love the tall. We love other things that are stupid, that bite us. Hubris. We fail to heed the promptings of the soul toward simplicity, a human scale, smartness.

Christopher Alexander is right. Four stories max.  I am right.  Wherever 10,000 persons live and move and have their being should be car free. 


Yeah it's true we really never know

We Never Know Until We Actually Pray to God - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"These days we aren't quite sure what to do with the fact that the Gospels are so full of Jesus's healing activity. We read of phony "faith healing" ministries and we see instances where false claims of healing have been trumped up by cult leaders to create an aura of authority."

'More at link above.



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RECCMENDATION Richard Gordon Quantum Touch

The Slow as Molasses Press