12/3/11

France scales down Iran embassy

France Recalling Staff From Embassy In Iran : NPR: "France is temporarily downsizing its embassy in Iran and will bring some employees and their families home, a French official said Saturday. The move is the latest fallout from protesters' storming of the British embassy in Tehran and adds to the international pressure on the Iranian government.

The French diplomatic official described the decision as a preventative security measure, and acknowledged it was a response to the attack on the U.K. mission. But he stressed the French embassy will remain open and declined to specify how many staffers will be sent home."

'via Blog this'

To suggest that there are no hostilities now is fatuous. We must in such a world be willing to do what we can to prevent untoward events but at the same time limit ourselves rigorously to the lex talionis in the face of actual attacks. This law is one of strict proportionality and we have failed to observe it repeatedly. This should not be window dressing. It should be our actual policy.



Global Online Privacy

Nonviolence must be our only course

Nonviolence must be our only course
It rises naturally as we move on
Without resistance in the face of force
Embracing values all should stand upon

Nonviolence will win the years to come
Uniting heart and soul and mind
Extending the same rights to everyone
Embracing all now left behind


The Tao renounces violence always

The Tao renounces violence always
No purpose is achieved by deadly force
Save to engender what the Tao rejects
Nonviolence must be our chosen course


Every logical evolution of thought should be dialogic

CP 4.551 (the 1906 “Prolegomena”):

Admitting that connected Signs must have a Quasi-mind, it may further be declared that there can be no isolated sign. Moreover, signs require at least two Quasi-minds; a Quasi-utterer and a Quasi-interpreter; and although these two are at one (i.e., are one mind) in the sign itself, they must nevertheless be distinct. In the Sign they are, so to say, welded. Accordingly, it is not merely a fact of human Psychology, but a necessity of Logic, that every logical evolution of thought should be dialogic.

Cap tip Gary F.

Want a piece of an underground canyon in China?

Letter from China: China’s Cave Inc. : The New Yorker: "Reverse mergers—by which a Chinese company gets listed through the back door, using the carcass of another firm—have proved to be one of the occasionally toxic byproducts of overzealous ambitions to bring China into global markets faster than its companies should have. "

'via Blog this'



Global Online Privacy

Need Your Help

This little blog complex has not been here long and I can hardly complain about the relative ease of maintaining it and the enjoyment I get out of it. This is a one person shop. I am not in it for any possible income. That would be laughable given the time I put in and the value I would set if anyone offered to pay me,

But I do balance my yes and my no to this effort according to the degree of subscribers I have. I say subscribers advisedly. I am not writing headlines for SEO purposes but for the small regular audience I have. Nor am I advertising beyond promoting posts on the normal social networks. So I must depend on you the reader, if interested, to subscribe and to encourage others to do the same. 

I am also trying to activate comments but there is a glitch here that I have yet to overcome. Once comments are available, I would hope you would use them to alert me to things that should be noted or to add to whatever the subject of the post is. 

I will appreciate any help in these areas. You will note my Cap tips to those who supply content. I will do the same for you if you note content that deserves mention.  

Global Online Privacy

Cain Out

Progressive News Daily - Progressive Political News with World & National News: "A defiant Herman Cain maintained that various allegations of sexual impropriety plaguing him were untrue, but nonetheless suspended his presidential campaign Saturday."

'via Blog this'

It was entertaining. It is painful for him and family. And for women along his way. Throw no stones. Watch to see who gains sans Cain.



Global Online Privacy

Pro Publica Text and Fracking Video Must read

Fracking - ProPublica:

'via Blog this'

Fair, balanced and alarming.


Global Online Privacy

My Proposed Communities

Beyond Pattern Language: The Habitation to Open Land Ratio:

"My proposed communities are no more than a mile across and no more than four levels above ground.

There would be massively more open land in the vicinity of such communities that one finds amid today's sprawl."

'via Blog this'

More at Beyond Pattern Language (the link above).

Everything Scott Walker Touches Seems To Lead to More Expense

Walker intends to charge citizens fee to protest | The Raw Story:

'via Blog this'

Wingnut might apply. But how about simple incompetence?

Global Online Privacy

The Planets Are Coming

Astronomers find 18 new planets: Discovery is the largest collection of confirmed planets around stars more massive than the sun:

'via Blog this'

Wait a minute. They were already here.


Global Online Privacy

A light goes on in the patent world

Crowdsource competition seeks to digitize US patent process | SmartPlanet: "In September, a new law went into effect that seeks to streamline the US’s messy and cumbersome patent approval process. Now, another effort to improve the operations in the US Patent and Trademark Office is underway, to help bring the process into the digital age.

TopCoder, Inc., a provider of online programming competitions, announced that it is working with the USPTO to launch a contest to draw software developers from around the world to to develop new and innovative algorithms to aid patent office in patent review. A $50,000 reward awaits the eventual winner."

'via Blog this'

From the Detritus of Sprawl

Leave your bathers at home: The abandoned waterparks where the fun has dried up | Mail Online:

'via Blog this'

New cyber-communities can grow. A gallery for those with eyes to see.

Without Love - Based on Paul 1 Cor. 13


Without Love -  Based on Paul  1 Cor. 13

Global Online Privacy

Could Huntsman Be The Newt-ron Bomb?

Conservatives Starting To Catch On That Jon Huntsman Is A Conservative | TPM2012: "Jon Hunstman is very conservative. This is news to no one, save for conservative commentators."

'via Blog this'

Well, there's nobody left. I'll give him veep on the Newt ticket.

Global Online Privacy

Crunch Time (Video)



A Reading of "We Are The Nomads of The Universe"


A Reading of "We Are The Nomads of The Universe"

Global Online Privacy

Veblen saw it all

The Theory of the Leisure Class: V: "For the great body of the people in any modern community, the proximate ground of expenditure in excess of what is required for physical comfort is not a conscious effort to excel in the expensiveness of their visible consumption, so much as it is a desire to live up to the conventional standard of decency in the amount and grade of goods consumed. This desire is not guided by a rigidly invariable standard, which must be lived up to, and beyond which there is no incentive to go. The standard is flexible; and especially it is indefinitely extensible, if only time is allowed for habituation to any increase in pecuniary ability and for acquiring facility in the new and larger scale of expenditure that follows such an increase. It is much more difficult to recede from a scale of expenditure once adopted than it is to extend the accustomed scale in response to an accession of wealth."

'via Blog this'

Global Online Privacy

Tweaks

Manhattan Bully Wars: 1 One Too Many Tweaks:

'via Blog this'

This semi-fictional account of bullying establishes that adults (teachers) were involved with bullying in the 1940s. I have the memories to prove it.

Complete Text of Manhattan Bully Wars

I used to always go for the front right side

Down In Front! Where Do You Sit In Movie Theaters? | Entertainment | TIME.com: "Over on his blog at the Chicago Sun Times, film critic Roger Ebert is discussing where people sit in the theater. Inspired by a post he read on film historian David Bordwell’s site, Ebert tells us that growing up he liked to sit in the middle, but over time he has drifted towards the back in order to gracefully sneak out when nature calls. (This assumes you are in a theater where the exits are located near the rear; in many of today’s multiplexes, the exits are located off an aisle behind the first four or so rows and in front of the majority of seats.) However, he notes that many film critics prefer to sit in the front row. As Bordwell puts it, the front row has many advantages: “Nobody’s head looms in front of you. You’re less disturbed by latecomers. You have more leg room, and it’s easier to stretch out for a snooze. And should you wish to leave, the front row is the only one that lets you sneak out easily from any seat.”"

'via Blog this'

Global Online Privacy

Who says Obama will have a vacation?

President Obama to jet off to Hawaii for SEVENTEEN-DAY Christmas holiday | Mail Online: "And Michelle and the girls will be back shortly for Christmas vacation, as we do every year.  We'll see if Washington gets its business done, so I can get here as well. But that's always a challenge.’"

'via Blog this'

Changes are that the President will slog it out with the Congress in dreary DC. Unless the GOP decides it prefers a holiday to continued criminality on the job.


Global Online Privacy

Rape Kit Lassitude in Texas and Nation

Despite deadline in new law, few Texas police agencies reported count of untested rape kits | The Washington Independent: "A National Institute of Justice report in May said that while nobody knows just how many untested evidence kits are out there, it’s a large percentage of the “18 percent of unsolved alleged sexual assaults that occurred from 2002 to 2007 contained forensic evidence that was still in police custody.” Nationwide, there may be 180,000 untested rape kits sitting in evidence rooms, according to another study released earlier this year."

'via Blog this'

We like our human rights untested.

Global Online Privacy

George McGovern falls, goes to hospital

George McGovern hospitalized after fall in SD - Yahoo! News: "SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) — Former Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern was being treated at a hospital in South Dakota after falling and hitting his head on the pavement outside a library bearing his name.McGovern's daughter Ann McGovern said her father was to be treated at a Sioux Falls hospital after being flown by helicopter from Mitchell, S.D., where a live C-SPAN interview was to take place at the Dakota Wesleyan University's McGovern Library on Friday."

'via Blog this'

Odd that this story had no birth date. McGovern was born in 1922.


Global Online Privacy

I see the passion for celebrity

Abba's Way: 54 On Celebrity:

"I see the passion for celebrity;
I see the shoving of the hurried crowd.
The private and the public are confused.
Let Abba lead you to a silent space
To think, to reason and be one with you.
Can silence overcome the marketplace?
Yes. Abba can create silence ‘mid noise."

'via Blog this'

This world to be has no antagonists

Abba's Way:

"This world to be has no antagonists,
Protagonists are history as well.
This world has those who bow to none at all,
For only Abba, Abba is their life.
We were all made with war inside our veins;
The power to fight and kill is not a dream.
War energy need not be used to kill;
Use it to make a world where true peace reigns."

'via Blog this'

Global Online Privacy

Millions of printers subject to serious hacks

Red Tape - Exclusive: Millions of printers open to devastating hack attack, researchers say: "Printers can be remotely controlled by computer criminals over the Internet, with the potential to steal personal information, attack otherwise secure networks and even cause physical damage, the researchers argue in a vulnerability warning first reported by msnbc.com.  They say there's no easy fix for the flaw they’ve identified in some Hewlett-Packard LaserJet printer lines – and perhaps on other firms’ printers, too – and there's no way to tell if hackers have already exploited it."

'via Blog this'

Global Online Privacy

OWS Will Occupy Foreclosed Homes

PND WEEKEND: Occupy Wall Street Goes Home: "On December 6th Occupy Wall Street will join in solidarity with a Brooklyn community to re-occupy a foreclosed home. The day of action marks a national kick-off for a new frontier for the occupy movement: the liberation of vacant bank-owned homes for those in need. The banks got bailed out, but our families are getting kicked out. The fight to reclaim democracy from the banks is growing from Wall Street to Main Street."

'via Blog this'


Global Online Privacy

Lack of face to face makes us ill

Beyond Pattern Language: Urban amenities everywhere:

"It is now appropriate to suggest that we have urban amenities everywhere and to further suggest that such amenities - under the cyber sign - include

global awareness that is unprecedented and should be universal as it sources and underlies democratic revolution;

the option of creating high-tech car-free communities that evolve the current practices of zoning into happy nonexistence and make life walkable again - unlimited schmoozing, as is possible out my window which looks down on car free Broadway. Cultural lag is catching up and acknowledging that lack of face to face makes us ill."

'via Blog this'

Global Online Privacy

RECCMENDATION Richard Gordon Quantum Touch

The Slow as Molasses Press