Taboo Plaza

There's different kinds of knowledge.  It is a disservice when we assume that there is only one scale intellectually upon which to measure one another.  Everyone seems to have a value.  That much, at least, seems acceptable.

Some people make it harder than others to want to see their value, but they have value nonetheless.

We've made an advance in technology.  I mean "we" in the sense of human beings.  In Geneva, Switzerland, 14 years of construction resulted in "the world's mightiest particle accelerator."  The Large Hadron Collider will send two protons crashing in on one another at 7 tera-electron volts.  The protons will travel 17 miles before they meet.

This will be an enormous accomplishment on a very minature scale.

"The long sought Higgs boson" may be discovered with this machine.  Specialized crowds will gather and people will get excited.  The knowledge in and of itself will not provide the answer though.  There will only be more questions. 

A digital readout on a computer screen will paint us a rendition from a machine to prove what we don't see in reality.  There is always the chance that our observations are affected by choices.  Anyone who claims direct knowledge should be held in high suspicion.  Michael Jordan understands gravity in a way many people don't.  Stephen King works in tension and symbols.  Sigmund Freud found significance in brooding. 

Humanity in uncertainty.

No one individual had the answers, but together they collectively provided the answer for the moment.  That point was the present.  These people pushed limitations.  They pushed our norms.  They dealt in being abnormal.  None could claim superior judgment on the meaning of life, but each may nuance our own answer to ourself. 

None can claim to know better though.

We might only suggest what seems best to us.

7 Holy Virtues- Abstinence

I watched the documentary What Would Jesus Buy at snagfilms.com.

 

I spent the first fifteen minutes laughing at Reverend Billy. 

"What a buffoon." 

As I got halfway through the movie I realized this guy is living the dream.  He's doing the message.  He's found a topic on which to speak.  He's found a problem that needs to be corrected.  A topic that may now only be addressed through something-like religious fervor. 

He's doing it.

This movie documents the mission of people trying to end the evils of Christmas.  I support them 100% in that effort.  Brief nuances of commercialism in this film couple with extended clips of apparently one man's mission.  It's a little intense in places and it really highlights the true nature of our 1st Amendment in relation to urbanization and private property. 

How free are you to speak when the venues for that speech can legally quiet you?

Current Affairs

Foreign policy news this week taxes poor American's geography skills.  Where exactly is Georgia? 



In comparison, where is Russia?  I think I know where that's at.



There's a hubbub taking place in the old USSR.  On August 15th, 2008, Turkish journalists filmed footage of being shot at in Georgia.

There's a long history between Georgia and Russia even prior to the formation of the Soviet States.  After the dissolution of the USSR, apparently the Georgians haven't solidified everything.  They've got a pretty solid literacy rate.  They're making some bucks, but they haven't firmly defined their borders.  Apparently there's dispute between Georgia and Russia regarding where one country ends and another begins.  There's also disagreement between Georgia and Azerbaijan as well.

According to some sources, parts of Georgia are lawless.  Who owns that section when the nation in charge can't control it?  In this type of environment, insert a long standing area of concern for both Russia and Georgia.  One area goes by the name of South Ossetia.



South Ossetia, and Abkhazia, have both been points of contention between Russia and Georgia.  These areas consider themselves autonomous like the Kurds within Iraq.  It is difficult to imagine a region of people in our borders doing their own thing.  We don't think much about Indian Reservations in this country if we're not gambling. 

Georgian military moved into South Ossetia and Russians moved into South Ossetia.  Nobody's really sure who moved in first.  The Russians will win a battle between the two with no problem.  According to some sources, the Russians moved 10,000 troops and 150 tanks into the area.  This ultimately triggered Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvilli to remark, "Georgia will never give up a square kilometer of its territory."

A cease-fire agreement has been signed between Russia and Georgia.  Some people don't expect Russia to leave Georgia's borders though.  Historically, it appears, Russia has been inside Georgia's borders for quite some time with Georgia complicit in Russia's position.

Now things have changed for Americans though.  We're in a presidential campaign and the "c" word has raised its ugly head.  Cold War is a hot button keyword, and why not?  Georgians had recently voiced their desire to join NATO.  NATO is a Cold War organization.

You know which country can't join NATO?  Russia.  If Russia were to join NATO, what would be the purpose of NATO?  The European Union has recruited quite a few, friendly, former Russian satellite countries into their fold.  As these former Soviet satellite countries join NATO, NATO places missile "defense" systems closer and closer to the Russian border.

The wall in Berlin might have crumbled in the 80's, but a Cold War mentality persists.  American foreign policy was so much easier to run under the rules of the Cold War.  Position everything against an enemy and let the thinking take care of itself.  Developing alternatives to the Cold War involves actual creativity.  It is difficult to keep everyone on a common track without resorting to a common enemy.

Bush isn't up to the task.  In the recording below he kills two birds with one stone.  In a traditional Cold War tone, Bush urges Russia to standdown in Georgia.  (The question must then beg, 'Or what?')  Bush then opens the U.S. credit coffers to family members of Americans attacked in Beijing. 

He's either bored with the Cold War stance or just not accustomed to assuming that mantle.  Don't let Bush fool you though.  He only refers to the conditions "as of August the 6th," because geographically he couldn't explain to you what those conditions were.  He shouldn't be faulted for that either.  The president can't be expected to be an expert on Georgia- Russia relations.

John McCain seems to remember the Cold War stance a little bit better than Bush.

Don't let McCain fool you though.  How well can he really know the region when he doesn't know how to pronounce "Oh-set-eee-a."  Obama's approach is ambivalent compared to Bush's and McCain's.  People can interpret this as Barack being unsure of himself and his policies; or Barack hasn't reached a solid enough understanding of the situation to form an educated opinion. 

In the video below, Barack Obama urges restraint on the parts of Russia and Georgia.

In trying to understand what is happening between Russia and Georgia, it's difficult to get a full sense of the situation.  There's lots of history and it's difficult to understand the effects left from the Soviet Union unravelling.  An easy answer is to go to war.  A difficult directive is to follow through on that answer.

War produces death.  War consumes the economy.  War consumes spirits.  War is rarely the answer.

Many historians point out Hitler's initial moves outside of Germany's borders was when he should've been stopped.  This is a complicated issue that should not be fully decided in the next two weeks.  Few people in the States have a detailed enough knowledge of what is going on in Ossetia to form a well-reasoned opinion.

Ultimately, these events don't directly impact the United States of America. 

We have time to gather information and understand the conditions better.

Educated (but Essentially Uninformed) Analysis

This week on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace.   

"The last time I checked, the vice president is not an independent voice. He echoes the position of the president of the United States." -Tom Ridge (8/17/2008; Fox News Sunday)

I think we might have a problem when a potential candidate for Vice President of the United States of America comfortably makes statements like this on national television.  The Constitution as originally designed directs the Vice President to be the person with the second most votes for President.  The Constitution as amended in the 12th Amendment still suggests elections for President and Vice-President should be made separately.

I think Tom Ridge may want to check again, because all members of government have an ardent responsibility to do what is right for the American public.  At the very least they should try.

This brief exchange between Chris Wallace and Missouri Democrat Senator Claire McCaskill demonstrates the importance of interpretation.  The one thing that is never suggested (but remains absolutely true) nobody's one interpretation can be the only correct interpretation.

WALLACE: Senator McCaskill, the big news from Democrats this week is that after giving Hillary Clinton a speaking role on Tuesday night and Bill Clinton a speaking role on Wednesday night, now Hillary Clinton's going to get her name placed in nomination and to have a roll call.
Question: Is that the way President Obama would negotiate, to just keep caving in?

MCCASKILL: Well, first of all, there has not been any caving in. Hillary Clinton is not the enemy. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are working together on making this a great convention, where we can talk about changing this country.

You know, the policies of this administration, which are identical, the economic policies, to that of John McCain, have driven this country into a ditch. And Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are working together.

And what Barack Obama is doing is saying to Hillary Clinton, "What do you think would be best in terms of bringing us all together?" You cannot be afraid to work with anyone, certainly someone who agrees on the issues like Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama do.  http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,405132,00.html

Interpretations that don't make sense generally don't benefit the public.  For example, Former Republican Governor of Pennsylvania Tom Ridge's answer to Mike Wallace.

WALLACE: I also, though, want you to respond to the Obama camp which says that the McCain tax plan is Bush on steroids, that he would propose $3.4 trillion in more tax cuts than Bush has proposed, and that his plan would be even more geared to big companies, big corporations and the wealthy.

RIDGE: Well, at the time during this campaign where we're looking at each candidate to see how consistent they are on their — on very important positions, one consistent position that Senator Obama has is he likes taxes.

He's going to tax income, Social Security, dividends, capital gains, even raise the estate tax. So there is a certain level of consistency there. He's voted for tax increases 94 times. John McCain never voted for a tax increase.

Now, what John has said — in order to create an innovative 21st century job creation environment, you need to cut the corporate tax rate. You need to make the R&D tax credit permanent. You need to expand our markets overseas.

It's a job creation approach that he's taking, along with that all-in Lexington plan with energy. Let's deal with nuclear. Let's deal with clean coal technology. Let's deal with drilling offshore.  And the energy arena itself, with innovation, will create hundreds of thousands of jobs, if we embrace his all-in approach.  http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,405132,00.html

What the hell does that mean?  My analysis, it sounds like we're going to open the credit coffers to big energy companies for Research and Development projects.  Therefore these research projects will be publicly-funded but when final products develop for sale, the profits will be privately-held.  It also sounds like part of the plan is to continue outsourcing American corporations' reach overseas in cheap labor markets.

Gotta drive that consumer spending economy back home baby!

Building Blocks for a Better Government

Gas prices are dropping folks.  Energy crisis seems more like an energy concern now.  The prices for gasoline are far to high still, because the cost of oil is too high.  Four years ago, the cost of homes was too high.  Before that, the cost of internet websites was way too high. Some people made an ass load of cash during the last two bubbles.

Do you really think they weren't the same people?

Do you imagine there is some magical money-sharing space above you?

A large group of individuals benefit magically in their ventures and suddenly get carted off to the upper tier of the economic scale.  I don't know his story, but I imagine Bill Gates probably fits that description.  But, a lot of people can identify his face.  That says something.

That may say he is something special.  An aberration if you will.  He's unusual and therefore people know who he is.  Then there's the faceless minority of filthy rich people.  They're lurking on the edges. 

I'm not talking conspiracy though.  I'm talking about lot in life.

Gas prices are coming down and the stock market is shooting up.  I have no faith that either will continue on this course for long.  It's a roller coaster ride that sometimes appears like a shell game.  It seems like someone with a few million could potentially manipulate a portion of the market.  If they knew what they were doing.  That's not to say that people with a bunch of money are bad.  They've just got their own problems.

People with more than a million dollars have to worry about, at least, keeping their money in 10 banks minimum.  What kind of concerns do you think billionaires have that nobody else on the planet thinks about?  There's nothing wrong with rich, but rich has its own perils.  There's two kinds of money in this world.  Money produced from labor and money produced from investment in labor.  Labor is a person's life.  Labor generally produces something- be it a pair of socks, a new DVD or oil- and that something translates to money when someone else wants to buy it. 

The price of oil- and gas- is only as high as you and I purchase it for.  We stay strong and don't move back into the mentality of purchasing like two years ago; we might be able to turn our personal economies by force of will.  Oil prices are going down because demand has decreased.  That means you and I are not buying as much gas as we were one year ago when the price was too high approaching $4.00 a gallon.

$4.00+ gallons of gas brought record profits for dollars invested in labor.  The economically well-off must be desensitized though.  ExxonMobil delivers the highest quarterly profits ever generated by a U.S. company and the investors apparently shrug it off.  These people don't care about what you're doing today.  They're focused on the future.  They're not paying attention to now.  They're not practicing Buddhist beliefs for certain.  It is questionable whether collectively they share any beliefs, except: 

We need more profit. 
We need hope in the future. 
For that hope, we choose finances to guide us.

Prices are determined by the market.  The market can be manipulated, but prices will eventually come down.  With gas prices falling- short of a natural disaster- if we continue to consume gasoline at the rate we're going; we should be able to pay $2.00+ a gallon by this time next year.

If we continue to maintain our current level of consumption beyond that, could we see $1.00+ a gallon? 

That really seems like a pretty big dream.

Our Nation is Now Dumber for This…Thank You for Your Participation!

John McCain encourages his wife Cindy McCain to strive to be Miss Buffalo Chip.

My grandpa was a dirty old man most of his life. 




Grandpa always wanted girls like that his whole life too.  He just got creepy vocal about it near the end.

Something to Ponder

How many people could you fit into the space of your home comfortably?  For the space that is not being used in your home, is that wasteful?

Are these questions simple to answer?

Tip of the week

Dream one day to be president baby.  Apparently, it doesn't take too much knowledge or grace.









Belly Laugh

The skits on The Chapelle Show had a tendency for a while of becoming stale.  With only 28 episodes to play, once a week on Comedy Central shouldn't have lasted for as long as it did.  The repetitious rotation almost killed Chapelle Show.

It was brilliant stuff, though.  It's too bad Dave Chapelle couldn't have kept it up a little longer, but what he left us with is gold.