Don't bitch if you don't participate!

Once again I have seen a letter to the editor in the local newspaper crying about how the person and her husband refused to vote in the recent election because there was no candidate that they felt they could vote FOR. Why, oh why, do these piss poor citizens continue to express their poor logic? Simply abstaining from voting is not going to do ANYTHING except allow your opinion to go unheard at the local polls. And then you have the gall to write a proud letter to the paper and say that you didn't vote! The very reasons that you have chosen not to vote are the same reasons why you SHOULD vote!! You didn't like the candidates.... Then WRITE IN the candidate that you think should be on the ballot. If you can't think of anyone, do what I do, write in " None Of The Above" signaling that you are not happy with any of the choices or possibilities.

One of the things that REALLY annoys me about the election process is when a candidate is shown on more than one line of the ballot. Why is the same person listed as a Republican, a Conservative and an Independent? If you're a Republican you SURE aren't an Independent. This is one of those things where you just can't be both. So people cast their ballot on the Independent line... so what? The Republican still wins, and nothing changes! Half the time these candidates are the incumbents to boot! WTF!!! I have participated and by the sacred Internet I'm gonna bitch.

The more I think about it, the more I feel that the None Of The Above line is becoming a necessity in the American Electoral process. The system has become so stacked and slanted that a true grass roots change is nearly impossible, and it seems that there has to be some new method of change instituted . The founding fathers gave us the mechanism within the constitution to adjust our process and to adapt to the climates of the unforeseen future. They knew what history had proven, that change was inevitable and there needed to be a way for the laws of the land to adapt with the times or the law would not last and hold. 200 years ago our constitution was quite unique in it's formulation, and today it stands as a model for fledgling democracies around the world. But we need to once again prove that we are a leader for a reason and we need to show the world once again that we can change and find a way to make the system work again as it was meant to work.

The system was meant to be, of the people, By the people and FOR the people, and today it seems that it no longer is of, by or for the people. We need to bring the system back to it's roots, when the politician wasn't a lifetime career, but a part of a man's life. The farmer or shopkeeper did his turn in the government, and then went back to his real job. A lifetime politician was a king or a queen. Royalty and aristocracy were the only lifetime politicos. They served at the will of the people, because a good revolution could always change the balance of power. There was a time when the governing were rightfully fearful of the governed, but today it is quite the opposite. The money is the power in America today. The rich businesses, the banks and insurance companies hold the true sway in government, and the average person , the voter, has only the power to pick one of the money's choices and one is as bad as the other.

None Of The Above could truly bring about the needed changes, but what Politician has the courage to do what is right, instead of what is politically expedient?

None of the above...

The more I think about it, the more it makes sense to me. None of the above.... What the heck am I talking about, you may be thinking. Well, let me elaborate.

I am talking about the ballot, to be specific the American election ballots. If you vote, ( and you really should!!) you know that in far too many cases there is no opposition to the incumbent candidate, and so they win by default. But what if you don't want the incumbent to continue in this position? What if they have managed to rig the system ( this is not a conspiracy theory, look up "gerrymandering" in the dictionary) so that they can pretty much keep their office until such time as they decide to give it up? Well, then we have no recourse except to continue to fight a losing battle to try and get these slackers and losers out of office with candidates that have no chance of winning against the stacked deck.

So why not a "None Of The above" slot on every ballot in every election? For every office up for vote, there should be the possibility that none of the candidates truly meet the community standard, and therefore we should not let them win simply by default. Give the American people back the power of the voting booth. Rather than a race when there is no actual race, it is up to the politico to be responsible and do a good job, because we can actually vote them OUT of office without the need to vote someone else in. Of course this would mean that there must be occasional times when there is nobody to do a particular job. Depending on the job, this could result in either a new election, with completely new candidates (anyone voted out by the" None of the above" vote would be automatically barred from running again for at least 2 election cycles.) Or perhaps the job is eliminated, thereby saving the local coffers the expense of the salary. Another possibility is that the duties of the eliminated position be spread around the local government offices. Not all government jobs are essential after all! ( Especially elected ones!!)

The important thing here is the chance to make REAL change in a government that has become far too bloated and ineffectual for the people whom it is supposed to be serving. By adding the "None Of the Above" Slot to the ballot, we would no longer have to make the choice of the lesser of 2 evils, and therein lies the true possibilities of change.

Until we have the choice to actually say, " no", we will not settle, we want better choices, we will continue to get screwed over by the system that we want, and expect to help us.

odds and ends...

So as you can tell it has been a few weeks since I have done much on this page, and believe me it's not for lack of ideas, but more for a lack of time. I have to sleep, so somethings suffer, and since this place is not something that is actually making me any money, I have to back burner it now and then. A couple of other things have also kept me form being a busy blogger, namely Facebook and my new camera! You can see from the last few posts that I have been a busy little photographer.

I have now had the camera for about 5 weeks and I noticed the frame count today was nearing 3000. Yes, I am a prolific snapper. Not all of my snaps are collectible photos, but each of them teaches me something, and therefore they are valuable. In fact, today I have decided that I wished to try and get a better understanding of exactly how flash compensation worked, and so I sat down in the shade and shot a few geraniums at various settings to see how the various flash settings affected the shots. And I recorded the data for each shot in my little data book so that I may later refer to the data to help me perfect my technique. The truth is that I much prefer to use natural light and the shadows that it casts, just as it casts them, however there are times when I do and will need to understand how to use a flash to eliminate certain harsh shadows or to even the light across a subject. Thus I have to learn how to do it, when the situation is controlled and I can learn without the pressure of the shots "counting". Getting a grip to be sure.

Facebook seems to be slightly addictive, and I am trying to find ways of interacting a little more with people and getting some feedback. There are certain people who constantly give feedback, and I do appreciate it to an extent, but there is a limit to good wishes from people. Sometimes rather than simply telling me how much they like my stuff, I would like it if they told their other friends how much they like it, and get me some more eyes and maybe some eyes looking to buy! I have been putting up various pictures that I have been taking, especially with my new camera, and The hope is that eventually I will be able to start selling prints. I am not looking to get rich, honestly, I would love to be able to make a living at photography, but I know that it is a long way to get to that point. I know that I am not the best business mind, I am much more creative. That said, in order to make a living at photography, I have to figure out what my niche is. Am I a nature photography, or an action shooter? Am I a concert portrait maker, or do I capture the raw emotion of an event? I have been taking pictures at fire scenes, and I have shot some youth sports. I love taking pictures of plants and flowers and trying to capture the peacefulness or grandeur of landscapes. A couple of weeks ago I had the opportunity to take some portrait style pics of my niece for her senior pictures. What did I like best?

Truthfully, I liked doing all of it. I like nothing better than looking at the world and seeing what I want to capture and then the satisfaction of getting some shots that turn out to be exactly what I had in my head when I initially looked at the scene.

I have this dream of doing a book about barns, as any longtime (longtime being since last fall when I started it!) reader of this blog can tell you, I love barns, and especially the old gambrel roofed style barns. Sadly, they are a disappearing structure in the American landscape, and the history that they hold is disappearing with them. How many times have you driven down the road and seen a lone silo standing sentinel over an empty field? You can bet that lying below that silo is the remains of a barn, whether collapsed into the ground or burned in some tragedy or demolition, it is the barn that raised the silo. The lone silo is the orphaned child of the barn. I don't know if I will ever have the drive to actually finish the book, but perhaps someday I will get much closer to getting it done.

I have been taking pictures yes, but I have also been writing about them. In more than one place. I have the pictures on Facebook and each one has a little something with it as an explanation, and in some cases I use the pictures to illustrate some narrative about what they are or why I took them. Recently someone was looking at some of my pics and asked me why I took a particular picture, and my immediate response was to ask, why not? In the age of digital cameras, there is no good reason NOT to take a picture. True that in many cases you only get a snapshot and not what the professionals call a "picture", but what is a picture but a well staged,placed and/or planned snapshot. By definition the BEST pictures of the last 100 years have been lucky snapshots when someone was in the right place at the right time shooting the scene. "The Execution" in Saigon, "Napalm girl", The flag raising at Mt. Suribachi on Iwo Jima. Granted the most famous one is a staged event, but the original was a snapshot. Part of the photographers job is being in the right place at the right time, and knowing where to look when the action is taking place. The guys on the sidelines of the big league games, they have earned a place there, so that they have the chance to get that special shot that becomes iconic for a particular athlete, like the crestfallen look of Scott Norwood after he missed the field-goal that lost the Super Bowl, or the moment of triumph when Lance Armstrong crossed the finish line for his 5th consecutive Tour De France win. The guy who was positioned to capture the flight of Richard Petty along the fence at Daytona when he went airborne. These guys have only one chance to get that particular iconic shot, and if they miss it or screw it up, they will never get the chance again, and we, the public, will never be able to review it and see if it is like we remember. In these days of video, and cellphone cameras, it is likely that someone got the picture, but what would you rather see, a picture that you have to squint at to see the details, or a giant glossy poster of that perfect shot? Yeah, that's why I took that picture, because eventually no one will have to ask why I took it, because they will be able to see in the frame why I took it, whether it's the tears of defeat, the joy of victory, the gossamer wings of a dragonfly skimming across a lily pond, or the spectacular colors of an August sunset. They say that a picture is worth a thousand words, but I truly believe that the story behind the picture is what makes the picture with it.

Pictures are art. Every snapshot, every school picture, every painting, every sand drawing. If it is a graffiti tag spray-painted on a building or the doodling of a child on a notebook, it is art. Art is in the eye of the beholder, it is interpretive and has the distinctive duality of being both valuable and worthless at the same time. Each creation is unique, if for no other reason than it is separate from all others, even the copy has it's own individual flaws that make it unique from all other copies. What we create as artists, ( and we are all artists) we always hope to have accepted by someone. Even if it is a small group that sees the innate value of your work, you always appreciate the acceptance. As an artist I know that my art has value to me, in that it is something that I have put myself into, but I hope that it captures something that gives it value to somebody else as well. When I die and the things that I have made are kept as mementos of my life, then they have a new and greater value, because I will never create or capture another piece with my unique vision. From this standpoint, one can argue that even the electrician who puts the wires in the walls of your house, that you may never see or worry about, is an artist, because his work is unique.

We are all artists, and we all deserve appreciation, it doesn't really matter the medium, or even the message, if we leave behind a piece of ourselves, that is appreciated by someone else, then we have achieved a "masterpiece".

Why are we so scared?

I recently read an article ( and when I say "recently" I mean in the last few months!) that broke down "freedom" by state. Using various legislative and social guideposts, the authors of the sited study, evaluated and graded the freedoms in each state. The conclusions were interesting to say the least, because what they found was that, in general, the states with the highest tax loads per capita had the least amount of personal freedom, and the states with the lowest tax loads had the most "perceived" freedom. Why, you may ask do I put the word "perceived" in quotes? Well, it is because, based on the study, most freedom is about perception,( ask your kids how free they feel when they are stuck in school) but when quantitatively measured, freedom has no meaning.

If a person has a job, and can feed their family and live a life that makes them happy, what freedom are they missing? If this person lives in country that is ruled by a military dictator, or by a democratically elected president makes no difference. If a different person has a job they can't stand, and makes barely enough money to live, and lives on the edge of financial ruin, never finding happiness in their entire life, are they ever truly free? Again, it makes no difference what system they live under.

Taxes that seem to go ever upward, with ever deepening cuts in the services offered, gives a feeling of the loss of freedom. When you can keep more of your wages, you feel like you have more freedom. When you are doing something that you enjoy, more than you're doing something that you don't, you feel free. Ask yourself, do you take a vacation to do stuff you hate? Of course not! Unless you're married and you take a vacation to catch up on the "Honey do.." list, then maybe you are doing stuff you don't like on vacation. See, you don't feel free then, do you?

In America, we spend so much of our time trying to meet our payments that we have lost view of what life is really about. Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness, were the golden trio described in our Declaration of Independence, but today we give them up for Work, Struggle and the pursuit of the next cool thing. Anybody who has lived a few years can tell you that the continuing struggle for money and belongings has sidetracked us from the real things in life, family, learning and living.

Living is one thing that the rest of the world seems to have on us. Especially the European countries. The European model has capitalism, with liberal amounts of socialism sprinkled in to make life livable for the masses, and not just for the lucky few. Health care is only one place where they have us beat. We have truly lost some greatness in our educational arenas, and our research capabilities too. Thanks very much to the odd religious nutcases who seem to get power, even when they are a minority. Long discussion for a different time.

Just as much, I pursue the dollars and the stuff. I have no time or money to do the things that I really want to do, so I compensate by getting stuff instead of going and seeing like I want to! Occasionally I have the luck and the time to get out of my small realm and see the broader world, and I always love those times. But they are far fewer that I would like, so in the middle times I amuse myself with what I think I want when I can't have what I really want. It is my freedom of choice and I use it rather unwisely!

On a lighter note.....55# gone. I have hit a plateau, but it might have to do with the hole in my back. Small surgical thing that needs to finish healing so I can get back into some more vigorous exercise. Sounds funny to say, but I miss it!

Of children and nations....

"If all of your friends jumped off a bridge, would you do it too?" How many times has your mother used that old chestnut on you? And so we will eventually use it on our kids and they in turn will use it on theirs ad infinitum until there are no bridges in the world to use as an example. What were our mothers trying to teach us with this little rhetorical question? First of all you better believe that it was rhetorical, because at that point if you tried to answer you were quite likely to receive a quick wallop upside your head! But what was the lesson being imparted? Just because everyone is doing it doesn't make it right.

Remember the first time your younger sibling bit you? Then you, being the logical being that is an older brother or sister, ( but not much older) Bit the younger one back, and they screamed bloody murder, and what happened next? Mom or dad came into the room and clocked you a good one. But the little brother or sister was quickly comforted. Ever notice that the punishment was always to the one who was caught in retaliation? There is a lesson here too, I still haven't quite figured that one out, but maybe someday I will be smart enough to find it. One thing I did learn from it was that if I held my ground and let the younger one poke at me a few more times, mom would catch on and they would get punished! Always the more satisfactory outcome. What does this have to do with nations?

I was given a chance to sign a petition today to support teaching the Geneva Convention rules of warfare and combat in our schools. It makes sense, that we teach it, because it is mentioned in the news quite a bit, ( especially lately!) and it is part of both our history, and hopefully the future of the planet. When I say, "hopefully," I don't mean that I hope we have more wars so that we can use these rules properly, but rather that there comes a time when the basis for these rules, Humane treatment of fellow human beings, becomes the norm on the planet.

There was a time when the ability to grow crops and feed a population was limited by the ground that you controlled. If you didn't have enough farmland in your kingdom, or empire or whatever you wished to call it, you likely had lots of peasants starving and this caused them to rebel and cause problems for the throne. A bad ruler would simply go and kill his own people to make an example of them to stop the rebels. A good ruler would get his peasant army together and channel that anger into conquering more land so that they could haul in bigger crops. Or simply raid neighboring kingdoms for their goods and food. Today, the entire world is much smaller. Not in a literal sense, but in a figurative sense. The technology that allows Americans to grow bumpercrops of wheat and corn and oats, can easily be used by Russians, Germans, Chinese, or anyone in the world who wants to use it and has the land to put it to use. Those countries that do have the natural farmlands, have other things that we need. So we trade them. We send them the food they need and they send us the stuff that we need. It is much easier to ship wheat and corn that it is to move an army.

Since scarcity of resources is no longer the easiest reason to use for hating people, we have decided that ideological, racial, or religious differences will fill the bill. Keep killing. It's the way of the world. You don't follow the same book written by a dead guy 2000 years ago, as I do, so you must be bad and I must kill you. Your parents were born on a different hill that mine, so I must hate you and try to kill you so there are no more of you. You wear different shoes than I do, you must die. There are hundreds of reasons for killing and not one of them makes any sense except in defense of your own life, even then there will often be some doubt about the final choice. No matter what argument you can make there is a counter argument that is just as reasonable.

In the old cowboy movies it was so cut and dried, the good guys always wore the white hats so you knew who to root for. Of course that's if you considered the good guys cause to be right, some people obviously rooted for the "bad guy" because they felt much more in tune with his causes, but in the end, it was always the guy in the white hat who won the day and the heart of the farm girl. But how did he win the day? He was first and foremost reasonable. he used his brain much more than he used his brawn. Ok, to be fair in most westerns he also used his guns and killed plenty of bad guys, but if you remember he never fired the first shot, he was always defending himself. Real life isn't the movies.

In real life there is a vicious cycle to killing, and maiming and even torture. Once the cycle begins it can take generations before it can be ended, if even then. Ask Ireland and the IRA. It is like the Hatfields and the McCoys, or the Montegues and the Capulets, one dies so there is retaliation, but there is no mom to smack some sense into anyone and it continues to escalate until entire nations are brought into the fray. The United Nations was devised to be that "mom", who could put a stop to the squabbleing, but it seems that there is always some rivalry or other going on and someone needs to be smacked upside the head.

You know what really sucks about swatting mosquitoes? When you smack them you are often hurting yourself at the same time, and that is exactly what torture does to nations. There is the satisfaction of causing pain and discomfort to the enemy combatant, but at what cost? I have a friend who was in Vietnam in the late 60's. He fought some of the bloodiest battles of the war, and he helped with many body counts. One of the things that truly affected him was when he would move the body of an enemy soldier, and find them clutching in their hand, pictures of their loved ones. Suddenly they were not soldiers to him, but husbands, fathers, sons and brothers. He knew how he felt about his family, and how they felt about him, and he knew that what he was doing was not right, no matter what the reason. The training that he had received and the years of indoctrination about the "commie bastards", the "gooks" and the "enemy" was no more than political bullshit and what it boiled down to was that he and his friends were doing was not killing simply soldiers, but killing people. True, if he suddenly stopped fighting he would be just as dead as them, but even so, this is where his conscience kicked in, and why he still works hard to atone for what he did there.

Because of the Geneva Conventions, it was possible for American servicemen to become friends with their German prison guards after World War II. Not all of them, but there were some incredible frienships formed, because the guards were not allowed to mistreat their wards, because of the Geneva Conventions. This is only one example, but it is the best one I can think of. Sadly, this was the last time that the Conventions were truly followed, at least by more than less. There were still many evil acts done to prisoners, and often by those people seeking revenge or retaliation for the loss of family or friends. When cities were bombed, people died. Innocent people as well as combatants. Sure, it's part of war, they started it, it's the only way to win, and any other excuse you want to use, but the people that died had family and friends. On both sides.

One has to hope that at some point humanity will see the futility in war. The futility in hate, and the futility in religion, or at the very least the futility of trying to force ones beliefs on others. It probably won't happen in my lifetime, but I can dream. Until then there needs to be some rules to seperate the "Good Guys" from the "Bad Guys". The Geneva Conventions are a good start, "Adopted by 194 countries, the Geneva Conventions safeguard those who do not take part in fighting and those that can no longer fight – wounded, civilians, and prisoners of war. They protect American and foreign citizens alike." If there must be war, there must be reason, even though by definition, war is unreasonable.

" He hit me first!" will not stand up in the court of Mom, and it shouldn't stand up in the Court of the world either. Those that have walked the walk and talked the talk, can tell you that torture only gets you what you want to hear, not the truth. The Geneva Conventions were a good idea when they were new, and they remain a good idea today.

Fat Boy...

And I'm not talking about the Harley!! I mean me and others like me. I am a Fat Boy. Been a fat boy most of my life from the time I started school and the teacher made me sit still and be quiet. I got the "sit still" part down pretty good and rather quickly, but the "be quiet" part not so much!! LOL As a kid my parents and grandparents taught me to try things. Meaning food! "Don't turn your nose up before you try it!" they would chide. So I tried it. I tried everything that came in front of me until I got old enough to understand that there are some things I just ain't puttin' in my face!

Between my dad and my grandfather I developed some seriously bad-for-me tastes. Heavy cream on cereal ( especially oatmeal!) I love grilled meat, and baked goods, pies, cakes, cookies and breads. I like to eat junkfood like nobody's business, and I am paying the price now in my mid-life. I learned not only to eat the stuff that tasted good, but to eat it in great volume. It was the worst thing I could have learned. My grandfather used to tell us, "Take all you want, but eat all you take, don't waste food!" I'm sure that much of that comes from growing up in the 1930's during The Great Depression, but it also came from growing up poor in general. My parents and grandparents always made huge meals, pot roasts and pastas and stews and soups, in quantities big enough to feed a small army. When I was around my cousins and uncles it was a matter of pride who could get the biggest portion and finish it... Not the brightest bulbs on the tree, I guess.

Cut to my teen years, and I have a job and money in my pocket. Now I can get the stuff that mom didn't have money to buy very often. I could stop at McDonald's any time I wanted to, and I often did. Then I discovered the places in the city that served the stuff that truly clogged the arteries, Garbage Plates! From Nick's and Mark's and The Princess. I found the nectar of the gods! To me anyway, as well as the steak subs and the meatball subs and the long simmered sausage and sauce from the from the great Italian restaurants in Rochester. Pasta galore and pizza from every joint in the city. I am happy to say that I'm not now nor have I ever been a big fan of chicken wings, but I have many other vices!

Not only was I an eater, but I found out very young that I was a power eater! I could pound back the food like nobody's business. I was 6 years old when I won my first food related bet. I was at a restaurant with my parents for some celebration or other and some of their friends were there. I wanted Spaghetti & Meatballs for dinner, and when dad asked how big the child's portion was, the waitress indicated a size that seemed way too small for my normal intake, so we opted for the adult portion. When it arrived it was huge! A pile of pasta at least 4 inches deep on a plate the size of a serving platter, covered in red sauce and with 6 gigantic meatballs arranged around the plate. My eyes lit up like spotlights! As I reached for the Parmesan, one of dad's buddies commented that I wouldn't be able to eat half of that pile. Dad laughed and so did I, so he bet me a dessert that I couldn't eat more than half. I ate the whole damn thing! In less than 30 minutes I had that huge platter of pasta tucked away in my belly. And then I had dessert! In school it became a source of pride the quantities of food I could eat. I would save my allowance so that I could get doubles and sometimes triples of my favorite lunch items. Pizza, sloppy joes, ravioli, toasted cheese w/ tomato soup. ( what was it about those toasted cheese sammiches? MAN, they were tasty!!) Tuna boats!! Did you ever have a tuna boat? They are simply a tuna sammich made in a hot dog roll. Simple and tasty and easy to handle, one day I ate 18 of them. I ended up in the nurses office. It was some time before I tried eating tuna again, and from that day forward it always gives me indigestion for a few hours. The canned corn that the school served? Swimming in butter and salty!! I loved that stuff and I used to get soup bowls of it. My personal "best" was eating 15 slices of school pizza when I was in 8th grade. My friends even bought me some when I ran out of money to see how many I could eat. Eating contests at McDonald's? You bet. A Friday night after a football game, and a bet .... One week it was cheeseburgers. 29 of them. Big Macs? 16 was my limit on them. French fries? 10 large orders ( what is a "regular" now. ) Each week it was something different, and I would take on the champ from the school that we had played the football game against. What was the food? As long as it was made at Micky D's, BK or Pizza Hut I was in for the challenge. I never lost in 6 years. 12 Whoppers, 32 BK regular burgers, 18 Quarter Pounders with cheese, 2-1/2 large pepperoni pizzas. 12 personal pan pizzas, 8 pounds of lasagna, or fettuchini, or spaghetti. I was never cowed, but I ate like one to be sure!

Now I pay that price for these poor habits and practices. No, believe it or not, I don't have diabetes or high cholesterol. I have the great good fortune to have good genes. Somehow I have a nice normal cholesterol level. My "good" cholesterol isn't as high as it should be, but still and all, the doc say that my arteries aren't clogging with plaque like some people. Along with the terrible habits, my fore bearers also gave me some good ones. I like veggies. Broccoli, Brussel spouts and cauliflower, I love 'em. I like squash and carrots and beans, green beans, lima beans, butter beans, and kidney beans. Black-eyed peas and snow peas and sweet peas. Sweet corn, and tomatoes, cucumbers and sweet peppers, hot peppers, jalapenos and habenaros too. Black olives, greek olives, and figs. Apples, oranges, lemons, limes and grapefruit. Grapes! Concords and green grapes too. I like my meat lean. I can't stand a fatty cut of meat. My dad and my grandpa used to eat the fatty stuff, and grandpa was the giblets fiend in the family. I never developed a taste for that stuff thankfully. He could have all the gizzards he wanted, I didn't like them in the least.

Old habits die hard. I quit smoking, 4 times now. The last time was nearly 2 years ago, and I'm glad to be done with it. As long as it lasts. I still have the urge, but I keep on fighting it. Now I have to change my eating habits. This is harder by far because you don't need to smoke to live, but you do need to eat! I have tried many, many ways of changing my eating habits, but there are a few things that seem to foil me over and over.

I love food. I have no other love in my life right now. The cupcakes and ho-hos never turn me down! Lay's is right, you can't eat just one! When I am traveling I always seem to end up in a drive through. I hate to waste food, so I eat the whole thing. Have you ever ordered the nachos at Applebee's? HUGE. Slowly I am working on changing my habits. No more big bowls of cereal for breakfast. No more 3 egg ham & cheese omelets. No more 4 slices of toast with peanut butter. No more 3 potatoes worth of hash browns. No more dozen pancakes with butter and syrup. My average breakfast now is a piece of fruit, a grapefruit or an apple and a small glass of juice. orange juice, maybe pineapple or cranberry. That's it. 6 days a week that is my breakfast. One day, usually Sunday, I may have something different.

I have eliminated soda-pop. No more Coke, Mt. Dew or Dr. Pepper. Diet or otherwise. The diet is even worse than the regular! I drink tea. I know the caffeine may not be the best for me, but it's calorie free and sugar free. I don't add sugar so it's the best I can do. Green teas and black teas.
I have dropped snacking to a bare minimum. I have one cookie or cracker product sometime between Breakfast and Lunch. Then I have the same thing between Lunch and dinner. No snacking after dinner. No ice cream, no cookies, no nuts or fruit. Dinner is the last thing I eat. At least that it the goal. Doesn't always work out, but I try dang hard. I am keeping a running tally of my week, hour by hour I am charting my habits trying to break the cycle.

Lunch is one old fashioned "normal" serving of something. Maybe a tuna sammich, or a wrap. A bowl of soup or a can of Chef Boyardee. Maybe a few crackers and some peanut butter, or some fruit. Fresh fruit or canned fruit in juice. No heavy syrup, lite syrup, or Splenda syrup.

Dinner is one serving of whatever is good that day. I like veggies, sauteed in olive oil. Perhaps a veggie omelet. Lean meat, or perhaps a piece or 2 of chicken. Skinless, but I do like the breaded stuff. Desert is immediately following dinner and it is small and light. If not immediately following, it doesn't get eaten. No dessert some days. After dinner I take a walk. 1/4 mile up hill and down. As the weather gets better, I will be able to ride my bike more often. Right now I ride for a little bit in the afternoon up the driveway and the road.

2 weeks in tomorrow. One inch and 6 pounds gone. I will be working hard at keeping myself from eating when I am bored. When I am lonely, when I am frustrated, when I am pissed. I crave food, but I am working on it!!! Wish me luck!

Over Population

This is one of those issues that has so many sides that you will go insane thinking about it, but it is also a very important issue. The world is suffering from population pressure and I have noticed that it seems to be getting worse. In biology we learn that in nature, animals will control their populations based on availability of resources such as food and living space. In the wild, they will stop giving birth when there is a lack of food, or the population density gets too high. Pretty smart for critters who supposedly can't reason.

Humans on the other hand, are completely different. They will continue to breed and add to the population density to the point of disaster. Humanity is a cancer on the planet. If you don't believe me, think about it this way: Cancer is unregulated growth of cells that will eventually overwhelm and kill the host body. Humanity grows on the planet, apparently unregulated, and without some regard to the future, will soon overwhelm our host and kill it. We have been killing it slowly for some years now. Of course the planet will recover, it doesn't need us, we do however need it and we need to keep it healthy.


The human population is growing at an ever faster rate. In 1800, the worlds population was estimated to be 978 million, yes, Million. 100 years later this figure grew to 1.65 billion! That time it's a B as in One Thousand Million. Let us jump 1 more century, and now the population in the year 2000 is known to be 5.99 Billion! And 9 years later, according to the U.S. Census Bureau,

04/01/09 --- 6,770,332,394

Of course huge portions of these people are concentrated in certain parts of the world, India and China come to mind immediately, and these places show the extremes of life in a place where the population really exceeds the resources of the area. India is known for its' slums and the quick way that disease spreads in these areas. It was recently brought to the fore of the world consciousness in the movie Slumdog Millionaire. Children abandoned by their families, because the family can't feed them. They live from garbage cans and survive by the force of will. Too many of them die. In China it has been long known that the government tries to control the population growth by limiting families to one child. So the Families will often abort a healthy child or in even worse cases kill a healthy baby girl at birth so that they can try to have a boy child. Boys are more likely to be able to get a better job in the future and perhaps make a better living. This is the story we are told anyway. But what does this give us? A HUGELY disproportionate ratio of men to women in the general population. That's sure not a good thing. Men with no jobs and no women end up making an army, and armies make nothing but trouble.

This is not the only worry about this population pressure, what about energy? This many people will need energy resources, electrical, motor fuel, raw materials for building structures and products, as well as food and water. Where does all this energy needed come from? Ever expanding power grids and distribution channels. Sooner or later something will not stretch any farther and things will begin to cascade out of control. There are many ways to make electricity, but the most common are currently, coal fired steam, hydro, and nuclear. Coal is the worst for the environment, it puts so much carbon in the air and contributes to the problem of global warming. Not to mention it is also responsible for additional smog , resperatory problems and Beautiful sunsets. One good thing just doesn't outweigh the bad stuff there. Hydro power has the advantage of not needing to pollute the atmosphere, but it takes it's toll in other ways. It can destroy huge tracks of land as well as wildlife habitats. The Earth is made to have certain balances and losing one population of crittes can have a domino effect that may be unpredictable. Suddenly an invasive species may run out of control, or a preditory species will lose a food supply and begin hunting something else. When messing with wildlife habitats, you can never fully predict what will happen by losing a species. Nuclear power is generally considered to be safe overall, but the problem is what to do with the spent nuclear fuel. It's a radioactive substance that needs to be locked away for a thousand years or so. We all know that there has never been a country that lasted for 1000 years. Regions, and cities, have kept their names while regimes and ideologies change. I don't know how many crazy ideologies I would trust with Nuclear waste!!

What about food? As population increases so does the need for food. In South America the rainforests are disappearing so that they can be used as farmland for the ever growing populations. The rainforests are the lungs of the Planet, and by losing this lung tissue the planet breathes harder. The conversion capacity for processing the CO2 in the atmosphere back into oxygen is taking a huge hit. So while the increasing need of electricity pumps CO2 into the air, the razing of the Rainforests takes away the planets' ability to reclaim the Oxygen, and keep the planet balanced. But back to the food, populations grow and they spread out, the cities grow and the farms move ever farther from the population centers. Transportation needs increase. The tillable land areas shrink and the need to get ever greater yields from ever smaller plots increases the need for more tillable land. Forests are cleared, mountains are terraced, and technology gives us hydroponics and greenhouse abilities. Food is produced year round in places where it never could be before. Storage Technology learns to store food better and longer so that we may survive a bad season. But what about 2 or 3 in a row? Increased scale of global warming makes it much more likely that areas that have long been the bread baskets of the world will become untenable as farmland within the next 100 years, and if the population growth continues on the scale that it has been going, there will be some hard times ahead. When people are worried about where they are going to sleep and get something to eat, education takes a back seat.

Large under- and uneducated masses of people are good places to foment rebellion and plant the seeds of war and destruction. Hungry people are easy to anger, and uneducated people are easy to convince and guide. The smart and ruthless will use this knowledge to their advantage and it will be some big wars that end some of the population presure. I just hope that they stick to killng great numbers of each other with conventional weapons. If there really is a nuclear war, I doubt that there will be enough of the planet left usable to sustain any population for very long. I really fear for the future of the children, not only the ones already here, but also for the ones born in the next few decades. As I have gotten older I have found that I would like to raise a few rugrats of my own, but I can honestly say that it scares the hell out of me to add to the problems that the world already has. But then again, what if it turns out to be my child or my grandchild that saves humanity? Highly unlikely, but you never know do you?

I guess I need to have someone in my life to actually breed with, before I should worry about the decision, but there is still a lot there that affects me and that I wonder about!

take a tour with me...

Hometown Tourist

Have you ever been a tourist in your hometown? It's kinda fun and gives one a new perspective. Think about this, when you visit someplace new, what is the first thing you notice? Ok dumb question, because it it very subjective, if your from the cold into the tropics, you notice the heat and the smell. If your from the tropics into the cold you notice the cold and the smell. If you have never seen a Palm tree that's what you notice. But after a short time and the initial shock, you begin to notice the architecture. You see the buildings as different. If you are from the east coast and are visiting the west coast, you notice that the Buildings don't seem so old. But if your from the west coast and visit the east coast, you notice the Buildings look ancient in many places. If you have never seen a cobblestone street, you will take notice of them. I was in Odessa, Ukraine and saw this grand old Opera House. It is quite the Historic Building and it is a big piece of History in Odessa. It is a big source of pride.

What many people forget is that their own town has history and it is fun to explore sometimes. When you take a minute to wander around your own home town you start to see these old buildings that you have seen for years in a new light. Maybe you have been in and out of the door of this building many times, but have you ever really looked at the building? I don't mean Wal-Mart or the local strip mall. They are cookie cutter buildings and built with functionality in mind before beauty. (Unless they were designed to fit a zoning regulation such as in the city of Durango, CO. ) You never know where you're going to find something interesting. I have been in European cities that have ancient buildings that have seen half of recorded history, but they are still in use and still giving shelter and keeping the elements at bay.






In America an "Old" building is pushing credulity over 200 years. In parts of Europe there are building that are seeing their 7th 0r 8th century. Castles build back when the year only had 3 digits!
It's funny how something is a part of your life,loses it's mystique, but when somebody sees it for the very first time they are enthralled. I remember as a child, seeing that great dome on the top of our courthouse strung with Christmas lights and thinking that it was the coolest sight ever. Way better than a puny Christmas tree in the living room. But now I can't even tell you if they still string the lights on that dome, because I barely notice it anymore. Today I noticed it again for the first time in many years. I have been in this building a few time. ( never in cuffs, thank you very much!) I have been there for permits, for jury duty, and even as a witness for the prosecution. I have sat in the witness chair and given testimony. I have been there as a student on a field trip. But it is very rare that I look at this building with "new eyes" like I did today. My home town really has some interesting buildings if you would like to find out about them.

Our local paper runs a little history lesson once a week, where there is some old picture and the county or village historian describes the scene and tells about the time that it was taken and who is in the picture and where the scene is located in relation to today's buildings and landmarks. Occasionally the picture will include a building that is still standing today. That is always interesting. One of those buildings that surfaces in the historic pics now and then is what is now our local Public Library. I can't tell you when it was built or how much it cost when it was doen, but I do know this much, once upon a time it was a private residence, and the family that owned it was rich. The family name was "Swan" and thus it is now the Swan Library. It is three floors and the top floor is a little bit of a local natural history museum. Lots of people have been in and out of this building for years and they have never walked up the grand staircase in the middle of the building and seen the collection of eggs. From an Ostrich egg all the way down to a hummingbird egg. I have been they a few times just to identify something that I have found out in the field! LOL It's funny though, because as far as mansions go, I would consider this one to be kinda small. I don't know who much renovation was done when it was turned into a library, but it seems that the kitchen is long gone and I have no idea where it was. I guess if I ask sometime they would show me the original blueprints of the house so I could get a better idea of what it was like as a family residence. I have never asked.

Our town has some interesting history. Ever hear of a Pullman car? You know the sleeping cars that used to be part of the old railroads.... We Mr. Pullman, they guy who "invented" them, He was from Albion, NY and he used his money to build a Church, so now we have the Pullman Universalist Church in our town. There is a legend that The Dalton boys had family here when they died and they were brought here and buried in our cemetary. I haven't been able to prove that so I still consider that to be simply myth.


But all history is in the past, and as they say, "Those that do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it." It is great to read and to learn from and in some cases to enjoy for the shear beauty and wonderment of a more innocent time when people didn't shower as often and barely knew what deoderant was. ;-)) but the modern has come to us and we must embrace it, or it will run us over. What was once a corn field is now a Wal-Mart Supercenter.


The damn things seem to grow everywhere! They are pervasive. I asked a friend of mine who works there once, how many they are going to build, and he told me that the plan is to put a Wal-Mart in every county in the United States that has a population of over 400 people. That's a lot of stores. Not all supercenters are created equal though, it seems that our is a medium-sized supercenter, but the one in the college town down the road? That is a supersized supercenter. The aisles are wide enough for 3 average Wal-Mart customers to pass by each other!

Save the taxpayer, save the world!!

Funny thing, I was watching "Heroes" this evening. ( last nights episode on DVR) and when I was too busy to get to the ad zapper button, I heard that line, in a Turbo Tax commercial. The play on the line from the first season of "Heroes", "Save the cheerleader, save the world." The "dumb" guy in the ad, Gets happy and says, "Save the taxpayer, save the world!" and the "smart" guy replies, "that doesn't even make sense." But it really does make sense.

I have been saying almost exactly that for the last few months about these bailout /stimulus packages that have been going around and through the Government like shit through a goose. While we the Taxpayers sit home worrying about paying our bills on what little money we get from unemployment, or praying like hell that we can hang onto our jobs, the Dopes that we put into office year after year, continue to forget about us and send our ( and our childrens', grandchildrens', and great-grandchildrens') money to corporations and banks that have squandered billions of dollars, and look well poised to squander billions more.

I think that the part of this whole thing that really drives me crazy is that even while all of these banks and credit issuers are going under and being bought and sold left and right, WE are still expected to continue paying our bills. The companies have changed hands three or more times and the letterhead on the statements changes each time, but we still have to write a check to the new company. It pisses me off to no end, that corporations can trade OUR debt like a commodity. It seems to me that when the original company that we made our original agreement with goes under for whatever reason, our debt is erased with the name on the letterhead. And they are not allowed to keep the name on the letterhead when the company is acquired by a bigger company just so they can continue to take our money. I have to believe that the trading of debt as an asset, is one of the reasons that we are in this mess in the first place.

One of the points that still gets my goat, but is being addresses by some new legislation, is that the credit companies can take your payments every month and apply them to the lowest interest rate first. This allows them to keep the highest interest balances collecting interest for the longest time, thereby keeping you in debt forever. Or until you win the lottery or die! Sometime in the next couple years it will become illegal for the companies to do this, they will be obliged to apply payments to the highest interest debt first. And believe it or not this legislation was passed before the changing of the regime!

Anyway, if we the taxpayer had this money we really would probably save the world. It is the consumer who brings about the growth. Giving us the money to pay our debts, will give the economic boost to the banks and credit industry, it will free up our cash to use for purchasing new cars and for other luxury items. Sadly, it will be much similar to giving the money to the corporations in that the largest amount of people will just dig the same hole that they were just pulled out of, but there may actually be enough of us who have learned something from this mess and once we get out of the hole, we will do our level best to live within our means. Sometimes it's nearly impossible, but we sure try. I was just thinking that it seems that the harder I try to save money, the more likely it is that something comes up that requires me to spend way more than I really can afford. Whether it is truck repairs, clothes or a hospital bill, somewhere I always end up with some extra bill at the exact worst time for it. Murphy really was an optimist!

SO, that's my rant for today. Not really hot, but I guess I have to continue beating this dead horse! Maybe someone will pick up the cry and take it to the steps of congress and make themselves heard.

What to do when your bored, and other weird thoughts...

Found a news story today from the Associated Press, by Danica Coto, telling about a woman named Jennifer Figge, 56, who swam across the Atlantic Ocean. These are the quick Highlights of the story... "left the Cape Verde Islands off of Africa's west coast on January 12th swimming for 19 out of 25 days battling waves up to 30 feet. The distance from Cape Verde to Trinidad is roughly 700 miles." Yes the first time she set foot on ground was in the Caribbean Island of Trinidad. She still plans to swim from Trinidad to the British Virgin Islands. I always wondered who does these things, is it just because you need to prove that it can be done, or do you do it for the fame? Or is it that you have talked about it so much to your friends and family that they finally tell you to either do it or shut up about it!! More power to the people who actually put up, rather than shut up.

Now on the knucklehead front. Ice Fisherman.... I don't think that they are in general abnormal, as ice fishing is not such a bad thing most of the time, as long as one exercises some brains! Another news story this week is about 100 or so ice fisherman who had to be rescued from the ice of Lake Erie after their fishing spot broke off of the main sheet and floated out into the lake. The rescuing departments ( sheriffs and fire depts. plus the US Coast Guard) used Helicopters and airboats ( hovercraft?) to rescue the trapped fisherman. Leaving much of their equipment and transportation out on the ice. So there are ATV's and snowmobiles floating on the ice of Lake Erie. Hmm? What happens if/when that ice melts or gets broken up by the wind? Of course it won't be on the order of the Exxon Valdez, but it still isn't good for the Lake Biosphere. The Agencies have informed these men that if they are dopey enough to need another rescue this season they will be billed for the service. The first one was on the taxpayer tit.

Then I ran across a letter to the editor that really struck a cord in my mind. Why is it that so many people live by the moto, "It's Not My Job.", rather than "Let me help you with that."? I guess that it has as much to do with litigation as it does with simple greed and laziness. The letter is actually about the honesty and integrity of people and their jobs. It was brought about by the pilot of the plane that landed in the Hudson River. This man did his job as best he could and everyone on the plane survived. He did what he had to do under extremely difficult circumstances and he remained calm and collected, which if you think about it is exactly what he is payed to do. He flies the plane and when the plane malfunctions for any reason, it is his job to make get it on the ground ( back to earth?) the safest way possible. His point was to reprimand the corporate CEO's and Other business honchos who have wasted billions of dollars in company funds and resources and yet still feel entitled to their huge bonuses and corporate vacations and golden parachutes at the cost of the taxpayer through the Government bailout/stimulus packages. But I read something else in there as well, Honesty in our workers. There was a story about a State Employee in NY who was collecting a salary of $94,000 a year while he did nothing. Why did he do nothing? Apparently this was retribution by other state officials for stepping on some toes (By suing the governor 10 years earlier). So to punish him they withheld his duties. How was this punishment? Sure he may have suffered from Boredom, but for that kind of money, I would be happy to suffer some boredom. I guess that he needed to continue to collect his money to make the point that he had a job, even if there was nothing to do there. Honesty and integrity are sort of intertwined, and anyone who has to work in other peoples house can tell you this in a huge way. We have all been accused either directly or indirectly of sticky fingers. And sadly there are some who do steal, and they make the honest ones look bad too. So we have to fight that much harder to keep our reputations.

Anyone from the meter reader to the cable guy, the appliance repair man to the exterminator has a reputation to protect. Not only that they do their jobs well, but that they do not use their access to peoples most personal places for dishonest activities, like thievery or spying. Of course temptation can surface in many ways from a lonely housewife looking for a little fun, to raiding a medicine cabinet for some prescription drugs, but a true professional will do their job and leave temptation in the wind. There is also a different kind of honesty, it is one of owning up to ones mistakes. An honest person will see and forgive an honest mistake.

Having worked in an industry where I have been allowed into peoples homes for many years, I have learned that some people are forgiving and others are total assholes. The total assholes will freak out about the smallest thing and cause a problem 100 times the size of the mistake. While the forgiving ones will truly be understanding of a human error and will allow you to make up for your mistake in anyway that you can but only for equal amount of your mistake. The Assholes will end up making you get a lawyer, because that's what makes them feel powerful, while the forgivers will recommend you to all of their friends. The forgivers understand when something is beyond your control, but the assholes will never understand that you aren't 100% responsible for everything that has come before you or after you, from original hidden problems to acts of nature.

The sad part is that these assholes are usually the same people who will squander the resources of big business and then claim that it isn't their fault. It is these people who are most likely to run business into the ground and then hold their hands out for government assistance in bailing themselves out. They are the people who will lay off the workers who make and buy their products so that they will still have enough money in the bank to pay their own salaries even as the companies falter. The people who will declare bankruptcy to escape creditors and skate away with a huge personal bank account that is completely free from the the business obligations that they should be liable for. It has been said that the crook will have the best burglar alarm and will make the biggest fuss when he is ripped off.

As our government once again prepares to stimulate the economy by giving money to big business who will once again squander the resources, I am left with my impotent rage at the lack of thought that goes into this mess. The billions of dollars sent out to the business that hide their wealth in off shore banks and build their new facilities in China and Mexico and Malaysia, it is insane to think that this is going to stimulate the economy. The American Taxpayer, who has worked his or her ass off so that the government can take their money in the form of taxes and then give it to the people who have raped and robbed them for generations, watches helplessly as their money does nothing. If this money was given not to the big corporations but to the working men and women of America the economy would flourish. There is no denying that if you put $50,000 in the hands of every taxpaying citizen in the United States with a net worth of under $500,000, the economy would jumpstart in a hurry. They would be able to pay off their debt, and start new debt. They would be able to buy new cars saving the auto industry, they would be able to go shopping and save the retail, industry, and they would be able to put money in the band and save the banking industry. They would need goods made in the foreign countries stimulating world economies as well. Pay us and watch the economy get stimulated and let the failing business fail if their management is so poor. It is what a free market is all about. But please don't just put good money after bad again and again.

Spending our Inheritace

America is a very screwed up country. Most people already know this, but we still have pride and thump our chests when people put us down. We are aloud to criticize ourselves, but gods help anyone else who does so! What makes me bitch today? News items from all over the country, that because of budget problems in various states, education takes a hit while politicians continue to initiate new spending! Meanwhile governments from counties up to the feds are adding to the list of required subject matter and testing standards. Just exactly how are these schools supposed to do more with less? Not only less money, but less hours, and in some cases even less days! Is it any wonder that American education has become such a joke around the world? I have always believed that teachers are generally underpaid. Not withstanding certain locations where there are exorbitant union contracts. They deal daily with who knows what, from homicidal teens to abused pre-schoolers. They have to make due with decades old text books and resources that are stretched so thin that they have probably snapped in many cases. Even in fairly upper crust suburbs the public schools are strapped for cash, to such a point that they send home lists of supplies that the parents are responsible for buying for their children. Not only general supplies but the supplies that they need for art class, and various projects throughout the school year. Schools can barely provide heat in the class rooms half of the time and now the tax money that public schools depend on is being rerouted to some other idiot project. Why is it that cities and sports teams are getting tax money to build stadiums for professional teams?

Professional sports teams charge exorbitant ticket prices for million dollar players who feel so entitled that they act barely human. They have nearly no manners or morals and treat the people who actually make them stars like idiots. They lie, cheat and kill then expect special treatment because they get outrageous salaries to play a stupid game for a few hours each week. Whether they win or lose the game that they play has no bearing on the course of history, or the develolpment of the human race. But they get tax money that could actually go towards education. Education that might uncover and encourage the next great mind of our age, the one who might develope the first viable human colony on Mar, or the one who will discover the secret of hyper space. Not every sportsman is an undereducated oaf, but there are far more of them than there are of the thoughtful, educated type. You get my point though. I know that in many cases increasing funds to schools seems like simply throwing good money after bad, but even in those cases do you simply give up on them?

I have to believe that there is a reason to try. When there is a resource to educate, somebody will use it. Maybe not every kid will use everything offered to them. We don't know why, some will feel lost no matter what is done to help them, and some will think they know it all and that the teachers are out to get them. There will never be a perfect system for educating the masses, the individality of the human race is both a blessing and a curse. But there will always be those who not only benefit, but stand out and excell. They will find what they need if it is there for them to find, and they will run with it and become great. They will become doctors and lawyers, teachers and business people, they will becomes astronomers and physisists, and any other field of endevour that you can name. They are out there now, struggling to learn in a hostile environment, where they are searched as they enter their schools and passed through metal detectors. If they are lucky enough to get to school they then have to try and survive each day, but they do it, and a small number of them learn that they can escape the cycle and maybe get a better life for not only themselves but for their children too. Granted when the time comes and their children get old enough they will be resented and rebelled against and they children will try to go back to the life that their parents tried so hard to escape, but at least they start out with the chance to go on. Right now that chance is being written off.

Our future lies in educating the youth, and not is paying the politicians who waste money year after year. They pay lip service to education, with slogans like "No child left behind." and "It takes a village." but when it comes down to it, they will take money from schools before they will take money from a sports team or take a paycut themselves. I know what the solution is, but sadly I will never be able to convince enough people to care to make the difference. But If I can convince a few people maybe they can convince a few more, and there is hope that eventually enough will care that the difference can be made. The solution is for the people themselve to call, write and visit their politicians, and not just the ones you know, but all of them from the President of the United States all the way down to your local councilman. Remind them that education should trump all else. Before they get raises, before they build stadiums, before they build monuments and parks, they need to educate the youth who will carry on the country and make it worth living in. Perhaps it is their plan, because when you think about it, an uneducated populace is much easier to convince of lies, because they simply don't know any better. You can take their rights away because they are unaware of what they are.

To save democracy and freedom, we need to be educated. It's as simple as that.

Why is Peace so Elusive?

I don't wish to sound like a sap here, but I have to wonder and I decided to wonder on a page, Why is peace so elusive? What is it about the Jews and the Palestinians, and the Sunnis and the Shiites, and the crap in Darfur? Is it a religious difference? What is the difference? 2000 years ago when these religions took hold it was a better way to control people and hold on to resources.

Religion was and is the new mythology. I can't be convinced that it is now or has ever been a good thing. How can something that is supposed to be so beneficial to the people be used so blatantly to kill and maim someone else? Once in our history there was actually some sense to the violent side of the religion, because you wanted an army that would follow it's leaders into the the face of the raging enemy. They needed to protect their vital resources, their crops and their people. There was a need to tell the troops that they would end up in a better place when they died for "the cause" and it gave them a reason to fight without the fear of dying. It was also a way for leaders with limited resources to keep their populations under control. I know it sounds callous, but think about the tyrants of old, what better way to have enough grain stores to get through the winter than to get a chunk of the population killed? Especially after a particulary lean harvest. That was one of the reasons for the caste system, the royals and ruling classes were taught to see the lower classes, and serfs as no more than chattel, pawns to be used for their own amusement and benefit. You wish to gain something from the neighboring kingdom? Send in an army of the lower classes as cannon fodder to get the attention of the neighboring king and maybe even have a victory and get what you were wanting. Now it's not so clear cut.

Today the world is smaller and the resources much more mobile and easier to distribute. Why is it that a country as large as Russia feels the need to argue over the resources that they have to sell? They have enough oil in their fields to give OPEC a run for their money, yet they are quibbling with over prices with half of Europe and the former Soviet Republics. I understand National pride, but not the need to control more land and more resources. What is it about human greed for Control! "If you don't believe as I believe then you must die as it is the only form of control that I can exert!" The thought process eludes me on this one. There are cat lovers in this world who understand that not everything is easily within our control. Dog lovers on the other hand wish for instant obedience and gleeful worship from their subjects.

Why is it that there is so many people who believe that, "it's my way or the highway( to hell)?" So much of the world lives with self imposed blinders on, never willing to look beyond their narrow view for whatever reason. Usually the reason is ideological, they are taught not to question authority, be it religious or governmental. The Pope imposes his will upon the devout Catholics around the world, no birth control, you must breed! No meat on Friday, No wait that's not the rule any more... Oh I know , give the Church 10% 0f your gross pay, or you will not get into Heaven! No sex Before Marriage, Says the Celibate priest! Muslims claim to have the peaceful religion yet the radical among them find in their Koran the words to inflame passions to the point that their youth will die in a fiery explosion with bombs strapped to their bodies in hopes of getting into Paradise. The world here sucks so bad that they take the easy way out! Sure it sucks here, their woman are treated like so many goats or horses and they aren't allowed to even look at them until they're married. They have to stop and pray how many times a day, and kiss the ground wherever they happen to be. Yuck, I would be willing to blow myself up to get out of living like that too! But why is it this constant drive to make the others live as you live? Why must there be a conversion? If I live my life without causing you harm, and I can do business with you honestly and openly, why must I believe the same mythology that you believe? What difference does it make to me or you? If I don't insist that you live like I do, why must you insist that I live like you do?

Some of the death and destruction is no more than a hillbilly feud that has carried on since time immemorial. The Jews killed a Palestinian and then the Palestinians killed a Jew to retaliate and it has since gone on as ever, and ever escalating. Yet there are Jewish kids and Palestinian kids who play soccer against and with each other in the streets of Jerusalem, they know no malice, simply the face of a friend and a fellow player. There is so much focus on the differences by the adults that they forget what it was like to be a child and only know your friends, and the things that you shared. Children don't know prejudice, it is taught to them and that is a shame. It takes no more effort to teach a child tolerance and understanding than it does to indoctrinate them with hatred and a narrow minded world view. I could never understand the need to pass such destrcutive teaching from one generation to the next. Did your Grandfather's grandfather's grandfather die so that you could send your son to his death? No, of course not, he died hoping that his children would be able to live in peace.

The Human race is quite unique on the plant Earth, as we have both the means to destroy ourselves completely, or the means to elevate ourselves into the stars and to truly find the secrets of the universe. Sadly the former is the most likely scenario, because in order to elevate, we must first have a peaceful society that can co-operate within all of the relms of science and technology, and rather than use the knowledge to try and destroy one another, use it to expand the horizons of human knowledge. In every field of human endevour we could advance, simply by eliminating the need to dominate each other, and pool our resources and knowledge for the good of all. We could feed the hungry and shelter the homeless. We could send our species into the solar system beyond the Moon, and beyond Mars and out into the limitless Universe. We could gain so much from simply shedding the old prejudices and learning from our children, how to focus on the good stuff, and to not bother about the differences.

I want to believe that there is a future where the need for weapons of mass destruction no longer exsists. I want to believe that Humanity will opens it's eyes one morning and realize that the answer to all of our problems is to stop the killing and to start the healing. Political lines and religious lines become meaningless and useless because there is not a need for division, when we will all work towards the next step for the entire species, and not just for our own greed, but the future of our children and their children's children.

When things change....

When things change they never seem to change in the right ways. The administration in the state capitol changes, and the ideas are not new. The administration in Washington changes and the ideas are not new. The way to get things done is approached in a different way, but the ideas remain the same. I have sat back watching this mess of the financial markets and I know that there is nothing that I can actually do about it, but I do have something to say about it.

We the people of the American Taxpaying public have had to sit and watch as our tax dollars are squandered on every government SNAFU that comes along. Meanwhile the things that matter are going unfunded or under-funded. Education, Infrastructure, and research. The economy is free-market until there is a tilt in the market and suddenly the government is bailing out some business that has made bad market calls and lousy business deals, because, "the Market Needs them." Well if the market needs them so badly why are they not surviving on their own rather than the Government bailing their dumb asses out? My biggest complaint in this arena is the Automakers.

Why is it that the UAW will sit back and refuse to deal with the companies? The Legislature actually had the brains and the balls to step up and tell them that they would let the auto industry go bankrupt and thereby nullify the Union contracts, but then in steps President Knucklehead with OUR TAX DOLLARS and say that the manufacturers can have some assistance! What the fuck is wrong with this picture? It is the great ponderous Union contracts that have skewed our economy for so long in the first place. I don't have exact numbers, but I have seen some that have been bandied around in recent weeks, and it blows my mind when I see them. A worker whose gross pay and benefits package works out to somewhere between $48 and $73 dollars per hour? ( and you wonder why a new car costs so much?) Who is worth that? Maybe a diamond miner, but certainly not some bonehead who stands in one place putting a screw in a hole all day long. This is a small section of our population who has lived high on the hog for over 60 years. They have been the highest paid blue-collar employees in the USA for as long as I can remember. When I was a kid it was my dream to get a job working in an auto factory so I could get that high pay for doing next to nothing all day long. Paid vacations, and health care, sick days, and personal days and easy work. Man it was a dream!! Who needed college to put a bolt in a hole? They spent their money in every industry, from the clothing industry to the RV industry, buying anything and everything from the necessities of life to all the best toys that the world had to offer. Electronics, and fishing boats, motorcycles and ATVs. It didn't matter the cost because they had money to burn! Then the manufacturers started to see the light...

They realized that they could get cheaper labor in foreign markets. Guess what? Suddenly money was an object!! When you make top dollar at your job, and you get laid off, then you make top dollar on Unemployment. The catch is that Unemployment is a limited supply. And where does it come from? Taxes. Who pays taxes? People who are working! The more money you make the more taxes you pay, ( up to a point then the model skews the other way! ) so these high paid workers who were contributing to the tax base are now taking from it and at the highest rate possible. Their bills are piling up, ( high bills based on the pay that they were bringing home) and the debt continues to accrue. So the high pay cost them their jobs, but the remaining workers continued to make the big bucks, and when the time came they negotiated for even more money. So then more people got laid off to pay for the bigger contracts. Enter automation. Now there are machines that can do the work that men used to do, and at a faster and more accurate pace. So now there are less people contributing to the tax base. It's a cycle that has been repeated over and over in the ups and downs of our economy for the last 4o years at least.

Less people making the big buck is less people able to spend the money on the big ticket items. So that means the people that sell and manufacture the big ticket items are laid off. Now what? So they couldn't afford the crap they were selling in the first place, but the could afford the mid level items, and now they can't. So that's another level of people who are out of work. All because of these huge salaries that the UAW was making. It's trickle down theory in action the way that it really works.

People with BIG money don't spend it like blue-collar people do. Trickle down Economics only works from the Upper middle class on down. The true High income brackets save money, that's why they are rich. They hide money in off shore banks so that they don't have to pay to taxes on it. They buy specially made things and have collections of cars and homes. They socialize in their own circles and never need medicaid or unemployment. They have no understanding of what life is for regular people. They are the movers and the shakers of the business and government worlds. They don't see how skewed the economic situation is because they live in a different world. So they make deals and bail each other out, when they see a chance to blow some taxpayer money they take it.

$700 BILLION for a bailout of the financial institutions, and now more going to the automakers. Why throw good money after bad? Hey Mr. President, you really want to help America? Split that money up between the taxpayers. EVENLY! I have read various figures but even at the low end of the spectrum it works out to $27,000 for every taxpaying American. That is an economic Stimulus package! That measly $600 we got last year was a joke. It barely covered a couple tanks of gas!! ( especially when it peaked out at nearly $5 a gallon. !!)

Is Artificial Intelligence truly intelligent

In a recent blog, writer John Zakour touched upon the subject of Artificial Intelligence, (AKA : A.I.) and what it might mean to the future of Mankind. This is a subject that I have thought about quite often, considering that I am a fairly well read Science Fiction fan. This has already been achieved to a small extent, but at some point these "intelligent" machines will be networked together and the limitations of memory and computing capacity will be overcome and that could bring about something that has been debated for at least a generation now which is sentience. Asimov had his famous 3 Laws of Robotics, which were supposed to keep Robots from ever harming human beings, especially if they were to achieve actual sentience. ( intelligence is defined as the ability to aquire and apply knowledge, sentience is the presence of "feelings" or self-awareness ) Of course this self awareness may take a while to be recognized and we have no idea what will happen when it is discovered. It stands to reason that like any intelligent being that is self aware, the first order of business is self preservation.

Science Fiction writers have been covering this subject for years, and are still covering it. "Terminator" is based in this idea, When Skynet gets big enough it becomes self aware and decides to eliminate humanity. But the reasoning has never really been delved into and I have my theory. It is my contention that a machine of sufficient capacity to become self-aware and reason in a logical manner will look at the planet and realize that Humanity is no more than a virus upon the planet. In the learning phase it will be filled with the whole of human history and sooner or later it will make the logical assumption that Humanity has grown past the point that the planet can continue to sustain it and yet it continues to run merrily down the path of self-destruction. So we get Skynet or The Matrix. Humanity fights for survival, or becomes the powersource for the machines.

Now I know that loads of people poo-poo this notion, and they whole heartedly believe that Artificial Intelligence will be the boon of Mankind. It is the belief of this set that the advent of the thinking machine will advance our knowledge in every sphere that we have knowledge in, and lead us to the secrets of the universe through the simple logic of an unencumbered intelligence. Unencumbered by what, you ask? Well, how about love? No emotion to get in the way, ( this is strictly the "learning Machine" and not the sentient consciousness) and no religion to hold back it's ability to analyze in a logical manner. It will not have to worry about it's next meal or how it's going to hide the credit card bills from the wife, or pay for the kids braces. It will not be entangled in office politics worried about who will get the bigger raise or the better office. Nope, this thinking machine will be able to devote 100% of it's thoughts to the business at hand which is unraveling the mysteries assigned to it. But truly will this happen? I wonder...

Will we have an A new life form? Commander Data from Star Trek comes to mind, but how far into the future is that really? The positronic brain has been in SF for nearly as long as the robots themselves. But if it is actually in development I can't say, but I would easily believe that it is. Will it be capable of the abilities that Data was? Will it have the capacity to learn and extrapolate from it's lessons? Will it analyze it's input ( yeah I know it's "data" but come on!) in a strictly emotionless fashion? The debate about sentience is always centered on when this occurs, I don't wish to argue here about what constitutes sentience, because there are so many different thresholds that are debated. I would consider that when self-awareness leads to active self-preservation, this would be considered a sentient being. Now what?

Animals are self-aware and have proven time and again that they can learn and reason. Maybe not at the level of higher primates, but every animal that I have ever spent time with has proven that they have intelligence of some sort from farm animals to pets, they all have a personality and individuality. Yet in general we do not legislate rights to animals because they can not communicate to us that they desire rights. A machine however, imbued with intelligence and an ability to communicate, might actually demand rights. What do we do then? Do we deactivate the machine? Kill it? Has it already created more in it's own image? Will there be a machine revolution? Will they demand all the rights and privilidges of humanity? Who knows?

Artificial Intelligence is a hornets nest that really should be left alone, but mankind is far to conceited to believe that they will lose control of something that they have created. History has proven that they ALWAYS lose control of their creations, both in the real world and in the relms of fiction, yet they continue down the path, merrily ignoring the warnings of the seers. Cassandra wasn't the first one to be ignored and she will not be the last one. Man has always sown the seeds of his own destruction, and this time will be no different, I just hope that I don't live long enough to see this one grown to fruition.

New favorite sign EVER!!

So during a recent excursion that I have already gabbed about, ( going to Grandma's house for Thanksgiving) I happened to see this GREAT sign prominently displayed on the roadside near the entrance to small convenience store. Just for some interesting information, the building seen behind the sign is not the home of a construction company, but 18 years ago it was a high stakes Bingo Hall and Casino. It was forcibly closed by the US Federal Government and there well funded "Canadian" Anti-gambling Protesters. This battle was quite well documented in the national media as it was a huge catalyst for the American Indian Gaming Movement.

A little background information about "Akwesasne"... This is one of the most interesting places in North America, as it is an Indian Reservation that sits on on not only the American-Canadian border, but in Canada, it also straddles the Ontario-Quebec border. The American side is located in Northern New York State along the St. Lawrence river. The reservation includes various islands in the St.Lawrence as well as border crossing points leased to the American and Canadian governments that includes Customs booths, inspection stations, and toll gates. This will get you to Cornwall, Ontario from America. There are at least 6 places inside the reservation where one crosses the border and the only way you know is the change in the road surface. It is actually possible to drive into Canada without visiting a customs station. It works the other way too, one can drive into America without seeing a customs station. But too many idiots have tried being "Coyotes", and instead of delivering their passengers to a populated area where they can blend in, they simply let them try and hitchhike once they are across the border, thereby giving the Border Patrol and Customs Agency reason to patrol the Rez. Idiots! They have managed to make a mockery of our border rights and I never had a chance to make a profit!! Half kidding!