2 Mysteries That Science Can't Touch

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Sunday January 11, 2015 · 7:39 AM PST

2015/01/11 · 07:39

(Spoiler: the mysteries are the old reliables, existence and life.)

Too often discussions of science or religion or both degenerate into
"Is so";
"Is not";
"Is so";
"Is not";
"Is";
"Isn't"...
modes of discussion. I have no hope of ending that, but I thought these notes might be useful for those who view these discussions from a little distance and get a feeling that the arguments are not about the reality of religion or of science. (At least it offers support for the view that no, these discussions are not getting down to the basic issues.)

petral

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Tuesday November 06, 2012 · 2:57 AM PST

2012/11/06 · 02:57

"Democracy" -- Leonard Cohen

It's coming through a hole in the air,
from those nights in Tiananmen Square.
It's coming from the feel
that this ain't exactly real,
or it's real, but it ain't exactly there.
From the wars against disorder,
from the sirens night and day,
from the fires of the homeless,
from the ashes of the gay:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.
It's coming through a crack in the wall;
on a visionary flood of alcohol;
from the staggering account
of the Sermon on the Mount
which I don't pretend to understand at all.
It's coming from the silence
on the dock of the bay,
from the brave, the bold, the battered
heart of Chevrolet:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.
It's coming from the sorrow in the street,
the holy places where the races meet;
from the homicidal bitchin'
that goes down in every kitchen
to determine who will serve and who will eat.
From the wells of disappointment
where the women kneel to pray
for the grace of God in the desert here
and the desert far away:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

Sail on, sail on
O mighty Ship of State!
To the Shores of Need
Past the Reefs of Greed
Through the Squalls of Hate
Sail on, sail on, sail on, sail on.

It's coming to America first,
the cradle of the best and of the worst.
It's here they got the range
and the machinery for change
and it's here they got the spiritual thirst.
It's here the family's broken
and it's here the lonely say
that the heart has got to open
in a fundamental way:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

It's coming from the women and the men.
O baby, we'll be making love again.
We'll be going down so deep
the river's going to weep,
and the mountain's going to shout Amen!
It's coming like the tidal flood
beneath the lunar sway,
imperial, mysterious,
in amorous array:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

Sail on, sail on ...

I'm sentimental, if you know what I mean
I love the country but I can't stand the scene.
And I'm neither left or right
I'm just staying home tonight,
getting lost in that hopeless little screen.
But I'm stubborn as those garbage bags
that Time cannot decay,
I'm junk but I'm still holding up
this little wild bouquet:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

Hey guys, Romney's "I know how to make jobs" went unanswered!

petral

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Thursday October 18, 2012 · 10:01 AM PDT

2012/10/18 · 10:01

This was his message from the start of the primaries. Obama spent months successfully dismantling it. Then, for the much larger audience of the first debate, Obama let it all go. AND, in spite of his change of style, he still let it go in the second debate!

Romney started right off with:

I know what it takes to create good jobs again.

There was no comeback like

You've never created good jobs, not in Massachusetts where you finished 49th in job creation, and not at Baines where you made hundreds of millions for your investors from businesses which you closed or moved to China.

petral

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Sunday September 30, 2012 · 7:00 AM PDT

2012/09/30 · 07:00

The failures of the second Bush administration were totally self-inflicted.

They wanted to regain the world's respect by "projecting American power"
... and ended up with so many troops pinned down in two small countries that they were virtually immobilized militarily.

They wanted to have an "owner society"
... and wound up with financial collapse.

Now the Republicans want to create prosperity through tax-cuts and budget-balancing
... and we already know that would be self-defeating. Like Herbert Hoover's belt-tightening, it would convert a financial crisis into a long-term depression.

There are two groups who seem unconcerned about the obvious destruction these policies cause.

The first is the (newly?) rich financiers who are as sensitive as small children or tyrants to any perceived insult. They've gotten theirs by concentrating the wealth that was accumulated over the past century into fewer and fewer hands. They've gotten it so fast and with so little need to consider where it came from that they're hardly aware of the larger complex society behind it.

The second group is those who gained a majority through Nixon's "Southern Strategy" based on the white backlash to the civil rights movement. The core of this group seems to be motivated, in the end, simply by fear of black neighborhoods. When they do gain power they are totally oblivious to the fact that the've gotten ahold of a fist full of sand (the tighter you squeeze it, the quicker it slips through your fingers).

In the end, it all seems to come down to:

Hard power is expensive and soft power is productive.

The problem is we have to live through their finding that out the hard way.

Here's a thought from Michelle Obama:

Here's the thing about my husband: even in the toughest moments, when
it seems like all is lost, Barack Obama never loses sight of the end
goal. He never lets himself get distracted by the chatter and the
noise, even if it comes from some of his best supporters. He just
keeps moving forward.
And in those moments when we're all sweating it, when we're worried
that the bill won't pass or the negotiation will fall through, Barack
always reminds me that we're playing a long game here. He reminds me
that change is slow -- it doesn't happen overnight.

If we keep showing up, if we keep fighting the good fight and doing
what we know is right, then eventually we will get there.

We always have.

Change isn't easy. Keep showing up! Read More

"Keep showing up", "Love is not a victory march" (oh, and um, "On, Wisconsin"?)

petral

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Monday May 21, 2012 · 12:46 AM PDT

2012/05/21 · 00:46

One of Karl Roves' techniques is to generate a "bandwagon effect" where people just accept that his side is winning. Right now, people in Wisconsin seem to be feeling this effect.

But he also let on, “I think Gov. Walker is well positioned to win, and the question is by how much. The bigger the victory, the bigger the impact."

This means that win or lose, every vote counts. At this point, no one knows how it's going to come out. Maybe it's just as well to let the pro-Walker Republicans think they've got it covered, while just working along slow and steady on the ground without worrying about the outcome. (Well, not slow...)

And when there's a choice and all other things are equal, concentrate on those State Senate districts.

Recently, Michelle Obama has been saying,

Here's the thing about my husband: even in the toughest moments, when it seems like all is lost, Barack Obama never loses sight of the end goal. He never lets himself get distracted by the chatter and the noise, even if it comes from some of his best supporters. He just keeps moving forward.
And in those moments when we're all sweating it, when we're worried that the bill won't pass or the negotiation will fall through, Barack always reminds me that we're playing a long game here. He reminds me that change is slow—it doesn't happen overnight.

If we keep showing up, if we keep fighting the good fight and doing what we know is right, then eventually we will get there.

We always have.

petral

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Wednesday March 21, 2012 · 2:03 PM PDT

2012/03/21 · 14:03

The Keystone XL pipeline from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico is not for getting oil into the United States, it's for exporting it out (tax free!) -- and for getting world prices for what is sold in the US.

Here's Maclean's Explaining Canada’s hurry to build pipelines in the U.S.:

[T]wo sources of growing oil production feed largely into the Midwestern market: Canadian production, both conventional and oilsands, and U.S. Bakken production in North Dakota and Montana.
. . .
Normally, it’s possible to take care of excess imports into one region by moving excess supply to another region, and that has been happening in this case too, but just not quickly enough.
. . .
Even with the added shipments out of the Midwest, a glut of oil remains, and the excess supply has pushed down prices. In the last year, the spread between what a barrel of oil is worth in the Midwest (called WTI–which is usually the oil price you see on the nightly news) and what it’s worth either on the Gulf Coast (LLS) or when shipped to Europe (called Brent–which is generally used as a benchmark for world prices) has widened to historic levels.

Estimates are that this keeps the price of gasoline in the Midwest lower by 10 to 20 cents. Read More

"It's beginning to look a lot like Solstice" -- anyone wanna help with a little rewriting?

petral

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Sunday December 11, 2011 · 4:07 PM PST

2011/12/11 · 16:07

Anyone want to join in this bit of nonsense to Help Keep Sol in Solstice?
I was inspired by a "War. On. Solstice." diary and an "It's beginning to look a lot like Gingrich" video clip. The diary is here and here's the clip:

Of course, for serious inspiration there's the Iceland series of diaries by Rei.

My attempt at rewriting so far:

It's beginning to look a lot like Solstice
with the sun so low.
Take a look when it's 5 p. m.,
it's ev'ning once again,
with shorter days
while longer nights still grow

It's beginning to look a lot like Solstice,
sunny nevermore,
Til the prettiest sight to see
is the morning that will be
when our sun will soar.

A cheerful mood in the gloom
and a game in their room
is the way of Barney and Ben.
Days that are dark
and no walks in the park
are the fate of Janice and Jen.
And Mom or Dad can hardly wait
for sun's return again.

It's beginning to look a lot like Solstice
in New Zealand, though
there the sun reaches high to tell
it's solstice there as well;
the other kind that never has the snow.

It's beginning to look a lot like Solstice
when light's return will start
and the thing that might help it spring
is the pots and pans you bring
to bang with all your heart.

I started this rewrite defensively -- just as a way of resisting the familiar onslaught of cloying Xmas songs. Originally, I was going to post the first few lines and then ask for other people's contributions but I kept doing little bits while going about my day. (Once the tune's in your head, you might as well reword it.) Anyway, if anyone wants to chip in with a few lines I'll keep updating/discussing along with them.

petral

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Sunday October 09, 2011 · 9:04 PM PDT

2011/10/09 · 21:04

Fortunately, the policy of consensus allowed some people of color to make the Declaration of the Occupation of New York City more broadly inclusive (and more socially sophisticated) than it would otherwise have been.

The original description of what happened attracted a lot of attention: SO REAL IT HURTS: Notes on Occupy Wall Street (two other people also posted reports which are listed below).

petral

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Sunday October 02, 2011 · 4:46 AM PDT

2011/10/02 · 04:46

It seems an inescapable conclusion that Bloomberg prefers conflict to allowing what he would think of as a happy hippy fair.

The mayor described what happened in Egypt and Spain as "riots". It was ranking officers (more than one), not rank and file policemen, who attacked and maced the marchers below Union Square a week ago. And there was at least some complicity by the police in facilitating, if not leading, marchers onto the (illegal) roadway and away from the (legal) walkway on the Brooklyn Bridge yesterday.

Of course, there's also the contribution of simple stupidity:

"They call them New York's Finest... not New York's smartest" is an old nyork saying.

However, it really does seem that the city administration has a strong aversion to seeing a peaceful anarchy spreading out on the streets of the city. That could become too attractive and irreversible. They have apparently decided to nip it in the bud by creating violent confrontations instead. Ideally, I'm sure, they would like the gathering in Liberty Park to just fizzle out; but if it doesn't, they certainly don't want it to become a growing encampment of responsible citizenship.

We will see what happens to the encampment, but the economic crisis for which it has become a landmark won't be going away any time soon.

Thirty years ago, when the fever of the go-go eighties was just starting, I knew a young woman who had gotten a job with one of the (now defunct) big brokerage houses on Wall Street. One day she walked up to an older man who had been there for quite a while and asked him "what's going to happen?" He said, "I don't know, but...

when it's over, it will all be over."

Below is a brief history of how we got to "it's all over now".

petral

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Thursday May 01, 2008 · 10:01 AM PDT

2008/05/01 · 10:01

She said "really proud" not just "proud".

Many people have mixed feelings about the mixed history of their beloved country. (It is much more difficult to make a sound bite out of "she said she had never been really proud of this country".)

Not paying the gas tax will only help you if you're not going to drive on the roads. If you're planning to use the roads, chipping in towards maintaining them is a good idea.

We can't get past something unless we start from where we are. There has been a lot of anger in the black community in the past 20 years and with the previous generation and that is one thing we might be able to get past but only if we accept its legitimacy.

more?

(If Obama is president for the next eight years, and I certainly hope he will be, I'm afraid we are going to have to listen to a lot of carefully chosen, but slightly ponderous and indirect, words. Oh well.)

untalked talking points

petral

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Sunday March 09, 2008 · 11:26 PM PDT

2008/03/09 · 23:26

A few points I get exasperated that nobody's making:

What about the voters in Florida and Michigan who didn't go out to vote because their primaries didn't count. And why was Clinton saying that the voters in Florida believed their votes would count? -- Were her local supporters telling people they would get them counted anyway?
(Actually, this does get an occasional mention. There seems to have been a lot of non-voters since the turnouts in the Dem primaries were less than in the simultaneous delegate-electing Repub primaries, unlike almost everywhere else.)

The drop in attacks on US forces in Iraq began after the 2006 election, not after the "Surge". The political change led to both the new US strategy and the Sunni "Awakening".

The Iraq war has left the US militarily defenseless. State governments aren't even sure they have enough National Guardsmen for local emergencies let alone the military having sufficient forces in Afghanistan for their purposes.

Americans are sacrificing their own standard of living to fund this effort to provide the Iraqi people with a stable anti-American government.

The Republican policy of borrow and spend is far more devastating to the economy than the Democrats' policy of tax and spend.

And furthermore...

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2 Mysteries That Science Can't Touch

Democracy is Coming to the USA

Hey guys, Romney's "I know how to make jobs" went unanswered!

Yes, Republican delusions really are self-defeating . . .eventually

"Keep showing up", "Love is not a victory march" (oh, and um, "On, Wisconsin"?)

It's simple: You don't need a pipeline all the way across the US to get oil into the US

"It's beginning to look a lot like Solstice" -- anyone wanna help with a little rewriting?

How the #OWS General Assembly reached consensus about ethnic/racial differences

Mayor Bloomberg seems to prefer confrontation (amid "the crisis of our times")

Short answers for BHO

untalked talking points