tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-54712882011-04-21T12:50:42.204-07:00The Sciolistmusings, meanderings, attitude, phony science, political philosophyBillyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.comBlogger671100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1121051212227751562005-07-10T20:06:00.000-07:002005-07-10T20:06:52.233-07:00I heard on the radio the other day that not counting 9/11, seven hundred Americans had died in the past twenty years as a result of terrorist attacks. At the same time nine hundred Americans a week died of home bathtub accidents.Any way you cut it, to me that seems like a lot of need less death. But, taking into account the number of people dying in their tubs you can see why maybe Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1105088926560640212005-01-07T01:08:00.000-08:002005-01-07T01:08:46.560-08:00January 7, 2004 CE
I was listening to something on NPR – listening but not paying attention. Then out of the multi-hued noise the word, unborn, rang some kind of weirdness bell.
Taken out of context unborn is a fairly creepy idea. The context it was being used in when it popped into my consciousness was Alberto Gonzalez’s views on “right to life”. Apparently there was enough ambiguity that Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1102403809686829852004-12-06T23:15:00.000-08:002004-12-06T23:16:49.686-08:00I’m ambivalent about the storm troopers. I don’t believe we should support the troops unless the cause is righteous. We all share the same opinion of the Second Energy War. By their very causes, and natures armies kill. I don’t draw some phony line between murder and combat etc. The dead are dead regardless of what you call them, how or why they died. Some survivors will more than likely Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1100788484453552492004-11-18T06:33:00.000-08:002004-11-18T06:34:44.453-08:00“Bards of Passion and of Mirth,
Ye have left your souls on earth!
Have ye souls in heaven too?”
John Keats
It was free. I couldn’t resist. There was no way I was going to pay ten dollars or even fifty cents to see it. Two minutes into it I was so bored I was ready to walk out. Curiosity, and sitting in a world class viewing palace was the only reason I didn’t walk. Besides, unlike Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1099559021982570812004-11-04T01:02:00.000-08:002004-11-04T01:03:41.983-08:00November 3, 2004
I am reconciled. I was reconciled on the morning of November 2nd. I had hopes, but no expectations. The past several days, one at a time, friends and acquaintances asked the fated question – “who did I think would win?” I thought the Democrat would win, but each time I issued the caveat, “it’s impossible to tell”.
I watched the Lakers improbably win their first game last Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1097914178241407542004-10-16T01:09:00.000-07:002004-10-16T01:09:38.243-07:00Silence is golden. Keeping the aphorism in mind I have been banking much gold the past couple of months.
Events chilled my need to write. I was on the road for a long period without easy access to word processors, or the Internet. I communicated face to face with other humans. I ate most of my meals in the company of articulate, involved colleagues. I had observations to make, and Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1087595383143292202004-06-18T14:45:00.000-07:002004-06-18T14:49:43.143-07:00Martial law is exactly what the Bush crud wants in Iraq. They want the interim government to declare martial law as a means to completely dispense with the phony sovereignty turnover. They can tell the world the Iraqis themselves asked for martial law. The Sunnis, Shias, and Kurds will go crazy. The rebels will go ballistic. The Iranians will think it is worth taking a shot at Iraq as an Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1087332250700983512004-06-15T13:43:00.000-07:002004-06-15T13:44:10.700-07:00It feels more and more as if we are now truly poised on the brink of momentous events. It seems ironic that the wealthy and powerful that have through human history been those most concerned with the future in the long term are grasping at strictly short-term solutions to all challenges. This reversal seems to portend cataclysmic turbulence. I can’t get a handle on the change in behavior.
I Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1086939853357802162004-06-11T00:43:00.000-07:002004-06-11T00:44:13.356-07:00The Fear Factor
“We have nothing to fear, but fear itself”
FDR
“Henceforth the majesty of God revere;
Fear Him, and you have nothing else to fear.”
James Fordyce
“Men fear death as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased with tales, so is the other.”
Francis Bacon
“Early and provident fear is the mother of safety.”
Edmund Burke
“The concessions ofBillyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1086555701584227172004-06-06T14:01:00.000-07:002004-06-06T14:01:41.583-07:00Forget the politically correct horse crap being vomited across the media. Let us go back in time...
A few of my favorite quotes from the Gipper:
"I favor the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and it must be enforced at the point of a bayonet, if necessary."
--Ronald Reagan, Los Angeles Times, October 20, 1965
"I would have voted against the Civil Rights Act of 1964."
--Ronald Reagan, Los Angeles Times,Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1086314694593462982004-06-03T19:04:00.000-07:002004-06-03T19:04:54.593-07:00This is all becoming very complicated. Not that any of what has taken place is simple. We are now gong into the land of the double-double double cross. Pretty soon none of these guys are going to trust anyone, and the leaks are going to become floods.
They have pissed off the military, and the spooks. I think it is only a matter of time before someone in the inner sanctum goes off the Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1085121757360699132004-05-20T23:42:00.000-07:002004-05-20T23:42:37.360-07:005-20-04
I watched the PBS program Frontline this evening. The show’s title was, “The Jesus Factor/examining George W. Bush’s personal religious journey, its impact on his political career and presidency, and the growing influence of Evangelical Christians”.
As you probably know I have tremendous concerns about the influence of Evangelical Christians in the United States government. It was in Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1084864232178894412004-05-18T00:10:00.000-07:002004-05-18T00:10:32.176-07:00Ultimate Responsibility. The phrase has begun to appear regularly in articles about the Abu Ghraib prison abuses. The media is in a frenzy about where to hang the blame. Speculation is running rampant. The thrill is gone looking at the videos, and snap shots. The images retreat into the catalogue of misery, which humans perpetrate upon each other. Now the tale spinners, the army of forensicBillyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1084345957207277342004-05-12T00:12:00.000-07:002004-05-12T00:12:37.206-07:00Is it smirk, the republicans, radical Christians, zombie Nazis released from cryogenic chambers? Does it really matter?
I felt strangely unfazed by the Berg thing. From one photograph I got an image of a loser punk wanna be. I find it hard enough to believe Christian missionaries go to Iraq to do good, let alone an antenna salesman.
If indeed Mesopotamia were the cradle of civilization it Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1084129277136949892004-05-09T12:00:00.000-07:002004-05-09T12:04:33.576-07:00DO YOU REMEMBER WHEN...?
All the girls had ugly gym uniforms?
It took five minutes for the TV warm up?
?
Nobody owned a purebred dog?
When a quarter was a decent allowance?
You'd reach into a muddy gutter for a penny?
Your Mom wore nylons that came in two pieces?
All your male teachers wore neckties and female teachers had
their hair done every day and wore high heels?
Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1083992985945400792004-05-07T22:09:00.000-07:002004-05-07T22:13:00.700-07:00It was the best thing on this morning. It was better than Home Shopping Network, Teletubbies, the garbage trucks rattling the neighborhood, my morning wood.
There were rich white guys pissed off about their security guards not informing them in a timely manner that the Indians had gone off the reservation.
Teddy was operatic and nonsensical. Does John Warner know what century this is? Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1083448808114556512004-05-01T14:59:00.000-07:002004-05-01T15:03:16.746-07:00“The elephant in the room” is like a phrase du jour. Religion is the elephant in the room of this election. The press is scared to death of it, the Democrats are even more afraid, and the Republicans are just waiting for the Democrats to open the door so Bush’s reelection becomes a Crusade. I think the reason Kerry is stymied is because all roads lead to Jesus Christ Superstar. The Christian Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1082505578274944842004-04-20T16:59:00.000-07:002004-04-20T17:02:35.950-07:00Democracy.
Is it our god given calling to bring the democracy to the heathens of the Middle East? Our president, I think, believes that his god has called him to be the bringer of this democracy.
A lot of time money, and effort was put in by a lot of powerful, wealthy men to put the chosen one into a position where he could bring democracy to the heathens of the Middle East, and Southwest Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1082488347125606712004-04-20T12:12:00.000-07:002004-04-20T12:15:24.483-07:00Seems to me Woodward has become a stooge for the administration. From what I heard in 60 Minutes, and Larry King he makes the Shrub out to be a real thinker. Forget the seemingly surprising disclosures of timing, and petty infighting between Powell, and the other pukes. Both his books taken in totality make a pretty strong pro-Bush case. There are no questions regarding why go after Iraq. Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1081897499923525082004-04-13T16:04:00.000-07:002004-04-13T16:07:50.450-07:00The Undertaker and the Salesman
Pickard, and J. Cofer Black – errand boys, two clerks... It was interesting to note that Pickard who for eight months was Director of the FBI is not an attorney, but had an M.A. From St. Johns in Tax Preparation (not really his degree but in essence what his masters is in) So at a time of critical terror activity against the U.S. Ashcroft picks a guy that is best Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1081327752783107052004-04-07T01:48:00.000-07:002004-04-07T01:52:26.700-07:00 ODE TO G. W.
You, and those like you
Have exhaled a pestilence over the land.
Shiny suits, and slimy
Tongues slithering over
Yellow choppers
Clamped in a rictus in front of
Vampire mirrors.
Swallow another gallon
Of high-test sprinkled
With fulminating drops of
Infidel blood.
You, Shemp’s younger brother;
You, the fourth stooge;
You, with repressed silly laugh
At the end of Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1080684168638144692004-03-30T14:02:00.000-08:002004-03-30T14:05:25.076-08:00My beef with Barry Bonds is a result of his attitude. He is arrogant, which is nothing unusual in superstar athletes. He is egotistical to the extreme, again a common trait to superstars. He is self-involved, ditto the preceding. He is highly fan unfriendly, and completely disparaging of teammates, other players, and the press. Disparaging baseball players is understandable. One would be Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1080637786663900122004-03-30T01:09:00.000-08:002004-03-30T01:12:22.483-08:00What is perhaps most disgusting about these guys coming out of the woodwork claiming Bush did not pay enough attention to terrorism is this is more misdirection. It is disingenuous misdirection from guilty parties, political parties, and interested parties. Whatever Clinton or Bush did or did not do; the investigation into the 9/11 attacks, and any other terror attacks, obviates the truth aboutBillyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1080201294607671372004-03-24T23:54:00.000-08:002004-03-24T23:57:24.780-08:00I spent several hours today watching the 9/11 Commission Hearings. I wanted to see and hear Richard Clarke’s testimony. It was grand theater. It was tragedy in all the Aristotelian dimensions. It was momentous.
For the first time in my life I heard a presidential administration official, albeit an ex-official, apologize, admit the government had failed, that he personally had failed, and Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1079600385510961572004-03-18T00:59:00.000-08:002004-03-18T01:02:08.670-08:00What is the “coalition of the willing”? Who are the leading actors in this coalition? For the time being the leads are: the United States, Great Britain, Spain, and Italy. What is the first thing that pops out at you upon perusal of that list? Three of the countries had great empires, and pissed them away. The fourth has a de facto empire in the process of being pissed away.
Is this not Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1079406237853614002004-03-15T19:03:00.000-08:002004-03-15T19:06:19.530-08:00“The events in Spain are just more evidence of the lengths to which these killers will go to try and intimidate free people," the national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, said on NBC's "Meet the Press."
She also used the much stated BushCo chestnut that, “this just shows how weakened Al-Qaeda is that they resort to this”. So, by this logic the weaker terrorists become the more terror they Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1079229556577135732004-03-13T17:55:00.000-08:002004-03-13T18:05:11.170-08:00My first exposure to English literature was Classic Comics. They published classic English novels in the comic book format. One of my favorites of these was the Ivanhoe number.
One of the many reasons for Ivanhoe being one of my favorites was the graphic representation of the Rebecca character. She had a striking resemblance to Disney's Snow White, but drawn very sensual and sexy with much Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1078991951770513182004-03-10T23:59:00.000-08:002004-03-11T00:01:27.920-08:00I’m in a hole in the wall Thai restaurant having a very cheap lunch with a friend to discuss a mutual writing project. My friend is from, and lives in the Deep South. The waitress comes over and asks what we are going to have. My friend asks, “What business is that of yours?” I’m taken aback by the exchange. The waitress then smacks my friend on the shoulder, says, “you shut up, I’m asking Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1078474976238081952004-03-05T00:22:00.000-08:002004-03-05T00:25:06.890-08:00I wonder about this question of which one you would rather have as the skipper of the swift boat Kerry was on when he saved his man’s life. Would Bush have made the same choice?
In my own experience with war I had to make life and death choices more times than I would ever have imagined. The person I was before I went into combat would never have chosen to sacrifice my life for some guy IBillyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1078465315928373442004-03-04T21:41:00.000-08:002004-03-04T21:44:06.200-08:00Obviously, “activist judges”, is a Karl Rove code phrase. Every Republican spokesperson, flak or shill is using the phrase, so it is obvious Rove put out the word on how the issue is to be dealt with.
In the blink of an eye the phrase will mean John Kerry is going to appoint judges that will, “turn black men loose on your innocent daughters”.
One thing that is beginning to really piss me off Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1078180973340755622004-03-01T14:42:00.000-08:002004-03-01T14:45:00.293-08:00Ye who are without sin cast the first stone.
Both sides are dirty. That is if one can divide this into two camps. This is probably more like a box.
On one side is Gibson, an artist, filmmaker, and producer, expressing his philosophical point of view through a work of art. However scurrilous that work is it is his right to do it, and is protected by The Constitution, and perhaps by a greater Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1077914520432096632004-02-27T12:41:00.000-08:002004-02-27T12:44:55.030-08:009/11: Do you ever Wonder
Do you ever wonder why plain old incompetence is never mentioned as an option in all the theorizing that takes place, or the paralysis that might take over mediocre minds when momentous events take place? Is it too frightening to consider that the top of the food chain in the U.S. Government is populated by people incapable of making informed, lighting quick, rational, Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1077786040981130132004-02-26T00:59:00.000-08:002004-02-26T01:02:43.966-08:00I say I am an agnostic to deflect commentary I would receive if called myself an atheist.
I think from my first moments of cognition I was a doubter.
I was raised in the Catholic Church as an infant.
My mother converted to a Latter Day Saint as a choice of reason and conscience. She felt she needed to go in a direction that would lead me to be a better human. I was eight years old when that Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1077279327884844802004-02-20T04:15:00.000-08:002004-02-20T04:18:49.826-08:00Not that it makes it any better or more palatable, but Jim Hightower calls it spot on. Taking into consideration that the entire administration is composed of either corporate businessmen or lobbyists, then it would follow that the government would be run like a corporation.
Corporations are totalitarian, secretive, and designed for self-preservation above all. If everyone would get off the Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1077143543866078302004-02-18T14:32:00.000-08:002004-02-18T14:34:18.966-08:00In case you didn’t notice Clinton was the compassionate conservative.
The Clinton, Gore, Lieberman troika, and the DLC were Republican lite.
Most of the members of congress are millionaires.
With very few exceptions whoever is in power will be there at the leisure of the corporate world. For all the environmental stuff Clinton accomplished something was loosened elsewhere.
The basic Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1076749338072876862004-02-14T01:02:00.000-08:002004-02-14T01:04:09.043-08:00 The Strumpet and the Dude
You have two people whom have not built careers on rebellion, and creativity, but expedience and opportunism. One of them on the descendant and one on the ascendant.
Someone in the bowels of some beast staying awake nights trying to figure out how to continue making the payments on the Lexus, and keeping the mistress hidden from the wife comes up with a desperate Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1076662555870749502004-02-13T00:55:00.000-08:002004-02-13T00:57:45.043-08:00I purposely stayed away from the subject of hypocrisy. I purposely stayed away from the potential criminality of the Bush twerps.
The Viet Nam War is my subject. It is a convenient Everyman to any faction. It is used as political, sociological, psychological currency to espouse any point of view.
I really missed the period I was in the middle of. Never in my life had I or have been more in myBillyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1076643758354289102004-02-12T19:42:00.000-08:002004-02-12T19:44:27.686-08:00Okay, I’ll chip in.
From the top, I don’t think it should be an issue. A lot of young men in the Sixties and early Seventies did almost anything to avoid Viet Nam, and not just the sons of the wealthy. Most of the young men were thinking of their asses not morality. Those to whom ethics and morality meant something, and tried to avoid the war paid exorbitant prices.
I made a choice. I went.Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1076050381326893412004-02-05T22:52:00.000-08:002004-02-05T22:54:43.403-08:00My feelings about Clark are more visceral than logical and reasoned. I do trust my gut feelings about things. Mainly because your gut operates on the most basic logic, hunger, diarrhea, pain, satisfaction, fear, all that stuff tends to have exact reason and logic. By the same token some stuff that happens in your guts can be created solely by your imagination.
Most of my feelings about Clark Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1076016281711779562004-02-05T13:24:00.000-08:002004-02-05T13:26:25.140-08:00I have had more opportunities to watch and listen to Clark.
I don’t know why Col. John Hawksworth changed his opinion on Clark, but his first thought was his best one. Clark is a perfumed prince. To me he looks, talks and smells of opportunism. He is a very bright man. He is a competitor to the n’th degree. If the Republicans had not been in power he would now be running in Republican Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1075410921630071122004-01-29T13:15:00.000-08:002004-01-29T13:16:56.826-08:00We live in a culture motivated by self interest. That self interest is probably very necessary in this era, considering the rapid evaporation of resources of all kinds necessary for human survival. The media, print and electronic, the current administration, the Democratic Party, everyone is doing what they believe they need to do to survive and be viable.
Do you think Bush would do anything Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1075269629780209662004-01-27T21:58:00.000-08:002004-01-27T22:02:03.546-08:00Oh, my brothers and sisters I am sorely tried by the scourge of pornography. Every time I open my Email I am invited to partake of the fruits of evil. Hip slinging daughters of Satan expose their vile wares at website after website. A trip to the corner newsstand is an adventure in lasciviousness. I would scourge myself weekly to keep my temple clean, but that did not prove prophylactive Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1074766444187328042004-01-22T02:13:00.000-08:002004-01-22T02:15:31.996-08:00I was doing some research for something I’m writing, and I come across a disturbing bit of information.
The two largest seed companies in the world are Pioneer Hi-Bred International and Monsanto. That’s right Monsanto – the people that brought you fiberglass and countless other fine chemicals and and synthetic substances. So what is Pioneer Hi-Bred International? A duPont company. You know Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1074763218002895312004-01-22T01:20:00.000-08:002004-01-22T01:21:45.653-08:00 I have a litmus test for all of those that are so concerned with civil unions, homosexuality, and the issue of the sexual practices of homosexuals.
Does your sphincter dilate or pucker when you see or hear homosexuals, civil unions or two humans of the same gender holding hands.
If you are a male of the species and it clenches, then you may have some fear of being probed by homosexuals or a Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1073720824925811292004-01-09T23:46:00.000-08:002004-01-09T23:48:20.483-08:00Loyalty is an interesting proposition. It can take many paths. It is a good thing. If misguided it can be destructive.
From the outside the Middle East seems to be a tangle of loyalties; some horribly misguided, some of exhilarating nobility.
How are men to decide where to place their loyalties? Is there a choice if one has seen only one example across the span of their lives? If you have Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1073619349767644482004-01-08T19:35:00.000-08:002004-01-08T19:37:04.140-08:00Don’t get me wrong. I think biodiesel is a good idea. Except that I think it is economically and environmentally impractical. You can use any other vegetable oil, but it has to be one that can be produced as cheaply and in the volume soy can be produced otherwise it is no go. Corn oil and safflower can be produced very cheaply and in tremendous amounts, but you come up to the environmental Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1071695711739512202003-12-17T13:14:00.000-08:002003-12-17T13:16:04.360-08:00So what?
A disheveled pathetic old man is found in a “spider hole”. An MSNBC anchor woman does her impression of the old man sleeping in the hole in a wooden mock-up in a TV studio while a retired army general does play by play.
The Nation rejoices.
Or so it would seem gauging from the coverage given by the cable news networks. Fortunately the networks kept the football, soap operas and Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1070485344486093822003-12-03T13:01:00.000-08:002003-12-03T13:04:12.450-08:00Some simple mathematics.
Spending for reconstruction:
Iraq: 20 billion dollars in 2003
That is $753.54 per person.
Afghanistan:
$41.00 per person
The federal budget for 2004 does not have a penny in it for reconstructing Afghanistan.
Troop deployments:
Iraq: 1 soldier per 189 people
Afghanistan: 1 soldier per 1913 people
Certainly it goes without saying, but I will say it, that Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1069962073504247892003-11-27T11:33:00.000-08:002003-11-27T11:41:45.950-08:00I keep reading about how the troops coming home have to pay for their own air fare beyond certain destinations. They have to pay the highest fares because they purchase them at the last minute.
So the airlines which the taxpayers, of whom the service personnel number, that have bailed out cant find it in there hearts to give service personnel discounts. I seem to remember that during Viet Nam Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1069739147937104892003-11-24T21:45:00.000-08:002003-11-24T21:46:17.920-08:00Hi, I’m Exxon and I’m a person.
How in blazes did we arrive at this state of affairs?
You have to go back to the first colossal give away by the federal government to business interests.
From the special finding of the facts in a Supreme Court case – County of Santa Clara v. Southern Pacific Railroad (I will come back to this case directly):
“By an act of congress approved July 27, 1866, the Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1069276360016362572003-11-19T13:12:00.000-08:002003-11-19T13:13:04.966-08:00Grover Norquist says, “The New York Times understands sex, it doesn’t understand money”. I think we the voters are in the same boat, and the corporate world and crony capitalists are kicking our asses because of that.
In the same manner that the “War on Terrorism”, and the invasion of Iraq was not about terrorism or a despotic ruler the Bush judicial nominees are not about; the family, right toBillyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1068758516567016272003-11-13T13:19:00.000-08:002003-11-13T13:22:15.653-08:00Let’s say for, lack of a better identifier, those of us who see the world differently than the fossil fuel guys and right wing crony capitalists, have made no progress in achieving wider dissemination of our message, critical questions, etc. A huge majority of the world’s population has a better idea of what is going on in the United States than an overwhelming majority of US citizens do.
Why?
Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1068149142649372062003-11-06T12:05:00.000-08:002003-11-06T12:05:41.020-08:00As I began thinking when the Ten Commandments deal was going on in Alabama, the real issues in 2004 are going to be religion and gays. Not that those are real issues that mean anything to humanity in any substantive way, but the Republicans lose on virtually every other issue so they will be forced to play the Christ card to their core constituency.
They will have to play education and the Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1068101359078151472003-11-05T22:48:00.000-08:002003-11-05T22:49:17.083-08:00Been doing a lot of reading about the Founding Fathers, and the period when the Nation was being conceived and coming into existence. In the past three or four years quite a few books have been written that demythologize the old patriotic bullshit history.
As you discover what a bunch of insane, religiously fanatical, corrupt, egomaniacs the Founding Fathers were it is absolutely amazing that Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1068056282395382272003-11-05T10:17:00.000-08:002003-11-05T10:18:00.710-08:00In Mexico, which is not a particularly well-read or highly educated country the political debate in the media and on the street is highly evolved. Mexican newspapers and TV news which glory in excesses beyond anything The Enquirer prints, which love graphic pictures of shark attack victims, which had a front page photograph of the Israeli restaurant bombing featuring the decapitated head of a Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1061531639219935792003-08-21T22:53:00.000-07:002003-08-21T22:53:59.080-07:00CARNAGE
C. Fry called it, “the ruby red stuff that runs my engine”. Blood is the cheapest commodity on the face of the earth. All you need to do is insert a penis into a vagina and in nine months you have a blood machine. It is an almost infallible process shrouded in almost unfathomable mystery.
Cut yourself shaving, and instantly you fight to staunch the flow. Grown men cower at the Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1060634042300472442003-08-11T13:34:00.000-07:002003-08-11T13:34:02.236-07:00Does John Ashcroft really care whether a crack dealer in East Saint Louis serves a three year term or fifteen years?
Does George W. really care how long a term a tax dodger in East Bumfuck, Egypt serves?
I think not.
Then why is there concern with federal judges and the sentencing guidelines?
The sentencing guidelines were made federal law by a congress with a Democrat majority. The Democrats Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1059625185980696862003-07-30T21:19:00.000-07:002003-07-30T21:19:45.973-07:00It would seem that the taxpayer subsidizes every industry in the United States. Starting with the country’s first industry, the railroads, the taxpayer has in one form or another footed part of the bill. The railroad right of way included an acre of land on either side of the centerline of the track when the transcontinental rails were being laid. That adds up to quite of few acres from Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1058925718214070452003-07-22T19:01:00.000-07:002003-07-22T19:01:58.126-07:00What strange thing has happened in the Congress of these United States? One would think that they were all part of a Vulcan mind meld. The problem with that would be that Vulcans were extremely logical, and if memory serves right, they were honest and ethical. Those are qualities that seem to be noticeably absent in the chambers of Congress.
At the present time it is impossible to determine Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1057786588636410302003-07-09T14:36:00.000-07:002003-07-09T14:36:28.596-07:00Been reading Daniel Ellsberg’s book Secrets. The cast of characters is the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. David Halberstam ironically called them, “the best and the brightest”. That they were bright is beyond doubt. They were graduates of the finest schools in the land, eminent scholars, men that had won WW II and rebuilt Europe. They were men of great integrity, and morality. They Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1057099089662627882003-07-01T15:38:00.000-07:002003-07-01T15:38:09.680-07:00Cowboys
It was the Tet offensive of 1968. I was TAD to a destroyer squadron in the Tonkin Gulf. I had some familiarity of a short stretch of Vietnamese coastline the squadron had been assigned to shore bombard.
The little five-inch naval guns these destroyers were armed with could do little relative damage to shore targets. Missions of this nature were called H&I, harassment and interdictionBillyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1056853350862998392003-06-28T19:22:00.000-07:002003-06-28T19:22:30.883-07:00The Hours
The Hours is an almost unreadable book turned into an almost unwatchable movie.
It moves at an elegiac pace to an almost relentlessly repetitious score.
It is a chronicle of lives lived in the not living of them. The irony of Virginia Wolff ending lines about seeing life is fatuous.
Yet there are moments of brilliant acting and exquisite sensitivity in the midst of so many false Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1056677314658819432003-06-26T18:28:00.000-07:002003-06-26T18:30:29.796-07:00Watching the debate on the House floor of HR 1, the Medicare Prescription Drug Bill, was quite amusing. The Democrats would come up and say the Republicans were dismantling Medicare. They were privatizing the program. They were almost evangelical in their zeal. The Republicans, who all looked like they were members of the Rotary Club and sounded like insurance salesmen, said they were Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1056344022517235052003-06-22T21:53:00.000-07:002003-06-22T21:58:18.416-07:00I watched a war movie last night.
I have always liked war movies. I also like westerns. My father called them shoot’em ups. Although he is from a culture of hunting and owning guns he doesn’t like shoot’em ups. He likes movies with fist fights and brawls.
I don’t like war. I fought in a war. I still have vivid memories of that war. The most vivid memories are the olfactory ones: cordite,Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1056136972139274502003-06-20T12:22:00.000-07:002003-06-20T12:22:52.193-07:00 YOU THOUGHT YOU WERE JOHNNY CASH
The high wine whistling by your ear.
The sudden cold emptiness somewhere like down in your stomach.
Gotta flee.
The sun brandishing his burnished shield in your eyes.
The sound frightening.
Cigarette smoke, then put the butts in your ears to keep the thunder out.
Gotta flee.
Christ, will it ever stop?
That could be blood down there.
Or maybe I just pissed myselfBillyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1056136131742285422003-06-20T12:08:00.000-07:002003-06-20T12:08:51.766-07:00Like maybe everybody on the progressive/liberal side I have been thinking of what the proper attack is on the Right. I have written about the need for not being negative because I think that does not make a for position that the uninformed or uncaring can take up.
Maybe there is a negative approach that does work. Ironically it is an old Right Wing Republican position, but I think in terms Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5471288.post-1055366944802427092003-06-11T14:29:00.000-07:002003-06-11T14:29:05.146-07:00Billyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08924730336091681423noreply@blogger.com0