randomWalks

Anyone want to buy a 40 GB click wheel iPod? It's been handled very gently and works like a dream. Comes with dock, cable, and unused headphones in original foil. These are sold for $400 brand new.

Celebrating hope in randomness is fine for monks and physicists, but it seems much less empowering in the service of someone holding a scratchoff card and a "lucky bear."

del.icio.us/merlinmann

On Bush's watch, America's environment deteriorated in many critical areas — including the quality of air in cities and the quality of water that people drink — and gained in very few.

Bush also has ordered dozens of sweeping changes to existing environmental policies, usually to benefit business interests. He reversed the government's course on global warming, power plant emissions, roadless areas of national forests, environmental law enforcement and agricultural run-off.

Environment Worsened Under Bush in Many Key Areas, Data Show

I don't like George Bush because he only likes Americans.

The Village Voice: NY Mirror: Shelter: God Bless América by Toni Schlesinger

I love the fact that all the students took off their shoes before climbing on it, says UC Berkeley philosophy professor John Searle, who, as a young faculty member, joined the movement 40 years ago. That's so American. Americans respect cars. They don't respect the police, but they do respect cars. I like that.

...

The notion that the Free Speech Movement was a victory of the left is a time-honored misconception. At the beginning of the school year in 1964 when, at the height of the civil rights era, the university banned political advocacy of off-campus social issues on school property, both liberal and conservative student groups joined forces, calling themselves the United Front.

After the Revolution, The Commemoration (washingtonpost.com)

The dean refused to see the other students, who, in turn, refused to budge from the building. The standoff continued into the next morning. A police officer arrested a mathematics grad student named Jack Weinberg for not identifying himself. But before the police car could take him away, students and their supporters surrounded the car, the roof and hood of which became the impromptu podium, sans shoes, for the day's rally of nearly 5,000 people.

...

I'll tell you a secret about democratic societies, Searle concludes. If a movement is successful, it has to be symbolically absorbed into the mainstream. I think that's what happened to the FSM. The FSM is not a threat to anyone if it's a coffee shop -- a cafe, for God's sake. If a police car can be something that former presidential candidates can climb on, it's no longer a revolutionary act. And I think that's terrific. It's a sign of a healthy democracy.

Healthy or ill as democracy may be, there is at least one lesson unlearned from this movement. Nevada rancher Larry D. Hiibel was arrested in May of 2000, in the words of Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, only because he thought his name was none of the [arresting] officer's business.

The only physical evidence the administration offered for an Iraqi nuclear program were the 60,000 aluminum tubes that Baghdad set out to buy in early 2001; some of them were seized in Jordan. Even though Iraq had a history of using the same tubes to make small rockets, the president and his closest advisers told the American people that the overwhelming consensus of government experts was that these new tubes were to be used to make nuclear bomb fuel. Now we know there was no such consensus. Mr. Bush's closest advisers say they didn't know that until after they had made the case for war. But in fact, they had plenty of evidence that the claim was baseless; it was a long-discounted theory that had to be resurrected from the intelligence community's wastebasket when the administration needed justification for invading Iraq.

The New York Times: The Nuclear Bomb That Wasn't

There are two basic ways to terrorize people. The first is to do something spectacularly horrible, like flying airplanes into skyscrapers and killing thousands of people. The second is to keep people living in fear. Decades ago, that was one of the IRA's major aims. Inadvertently, the Department of Homeland Security is achieving the same thing.

European countries that have been dealing with terrorism for decades, like the United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Italy, and Spain, don't have cute color-coded terror alert systems. Even Israel, which has seen more terrorism -- and more suicide bombers -- than anyone else, doesn't issue vague warnings about every possible terrorist threat.

These countries understand that security doesn't come from a scared populace, and that true counter-terrorism occurs behind the scenes and away from public eye. For earthquakes, the long term security solutions include things like building codes. For terrorism, they include intelligence, investigation, and emergency response preparedness.

The DHS's incessant warnings against any and every possible method of terrorist attack has nothing to do with security, and everything to do with politics. In 2002, Republican strategist Karl Rove instructed Republican legislators to make terrorism the mainstay of their campaign. Study after study has shown that Americans worried about terrorism are more likely to vote Republican. Strength in the face of the terrorist threat is the basis of Bush's reelection campaign.

Bruce Schneier: How Long Can the Country Stay Scared?

There is a widespread belief that President Bush is making us safe. The opposite is true. President Bush failed to finish off bin Laden when he was cornered in Afghanistan because he was gearing up to attack Iraq. And the invasion of Iraq bred more people willing to risk their lives against Americans than we are able to kill - generating the vicious circle I am talking about.

President Bush likes to insist that the terrorists hate us for what we are - a freedom loving people - not what we do. Well, he is wrong on that. He also claims that the torture scenes at Abu Graib prison were the work of a few bad apples. He is wrong on that too. They were part of a system of dealing with detainees put in place by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and our troops in Iraq are paying the price.

How could President Bush convince people that he is good for our security, better than John Kerry? By building on the fears generated by the collapse of the twin towers and fostering a sense of danger. At a time of peril, people rally around the flag and President Bush has exploited this. His campaign is based on the assumption that people do not really care about the truth and they will believe practically anything if it is repeated often enough, particularly by a President at a time of war.

George Soros: Why We Must Not Re-elect President Bush

NYT: Scientists monitoring Mount St. Helens, which erupted with a minor explosion for the first time in 18 years on Friday, said on Saturday that they were expecting a more powerful and possibly life-threatening explosion within a day or so.

The scene shows fewer tumbrils
but more maimed citizens
in painted cars
and they have strange license plates
and engines
that devour America

from In Goya's greatest scenes we seem to see, by Lawrence Ferlinghetti

Declaring that personal security is as important as national security, a judge Wednesday blocked the government from conducting secret, unchallengeable searches of Internet and telephone records as part of its fight against terrorism. (AP/Yahoo)

Throughout the week, a DOD blimp will float above the Washington area conducting tests to determine how effective electro-optical and infrared cameras aboard are at detecting potentially threatening movements on the ground. (WP/photo)

Growth of the lava dome in Mount St. Helens' crater could come either from a buildup of gases within the 8,364-foot volcano, which erupted with devastating force in 1980, or from molten rock moving into the dome, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. (AP/Yahoo)

The Montreal Expos will be playing for Washington, D.C. on Opening Day next April, ending the city's 33-year wait for a baseball team to return. (WP)

Federal Election Commission: Frequently Asked Questions About Election Day and Voting Procedures

The Tuesday after the first Monday in November was initially established in 1845 (3 U.S.C. 1) for the appointment of Presidential electors in every fourth year.  2 U.S.C. 7 established this date for electing U.S. Representatives in every even numbered year in 1875.   Finaly, 2 U.S.C. 1 established this date as the time for electing U.S. Senators in 1914.

Why early November?  For much of our history America was a predominantly agrarian society.  Law makers therefore took into account that November was perhaps the most convenient month for farmers and rural workers to be able to travel to the polls.  The fall harvest was over, (remembering that spring was planting time and summer was taken up with working the fields and tending the crops) but in the majority of the nation the weather was still mild enough to permit travel over unimproved roads.

Why Tuesday?  Since most residents of rural America had to travel a significant distance to the county seat in order to vote, Monday was not considered reasonable as many people would need to begin travel on Sunday.   This would, of course, have conflicted with church services and Sunday worship.

Why the first Tuesday after the first Monday?   Lawmakers wanted to prevent election day from falling on the first of November for two reasons.  November 1st is All Saints Day, a holy day of obligation for Roman Catholics.  In addition, most merchants were in the habit of doing their books from the preceding month on the 1st. Congress was apparently worried that the economic success or failure of the previous month might influence the vote of the merchants.

sere adj.
Withered; dry.

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company.

I've been whirling in the vortex surrounding Merlin Mann's take on Getting Things Done for a week now, and have finally decided to stop fighting the current. God save us, I ordered a label maker and some manila folders today.

I took the clippers to Sol's hair yesterday, after Lorraine mentioned that we're supposed to check him regularly for ticks upon returning from his little school in the woods. I'm sorry I don't have a picture to post yet, but we've taken to calling him "flock of seagulls" if that gives you an idea.

I honestly think it looks pretty good.

AlterNet: EnviroHealth: Shrooms: Not Just For Salad Anymore

Mushrooms graduated through evolution to become acute survivors that recycle life after devastation. About 250 million years ago, after a massive extinction from a meteorite, Stamets says fungi inherited the Earth and "recycled the post-cataclysmic debris fields."

Hurricane Risk for New Orleans: "if that Category Five Hurricane comes to New Orleans, 50,000 people could lose their lives. Now that is significantly larger than any estimates that we would have of individuals who might lose their lives from a terrorist attack. When you start to do that kind of calculus - and it's horrendous that you have to do that kind of calculus - it appears to those of us in emergency management, that the risk is much more real and much more significant, when you talk about hurricanes. I don't know that anybody, though, psychologically, has come to grip with that: that the French Quarter of New Orleans could be gone." (Nb. this excerpt from a fascinating 2002 American RadioWorks documentary does not refer specifically to Ivan.)

As he was falling asleep last night, after his first day of preschool, Sol asked me, "Daddy, why is the sky kind of a whitish blue sometimes and purple?"

History's New Look (washingtonpost.com)

For years [the National Museum of Natural History] displayed artifacts in old-fashioned dioramas with mannequins of Indians in sparse hunting gear. As part of its renovation, it has been tearing up those exhibitions. This summer it dismantled the hall in which they resided. It has also returned to tribes many items that had been collected and donated by scientists. One of the most famous was the brain of Ishi, who for years was believed to be the last Yahi-Yana of Northern California. His brain was sent to the Smithsonian by an anthropologist and remained in museum storage for 83 years. It was returned to his kin from other tribes in 2000.

The new National Museum of the American Indian avoids the anthropological approach in an effort to correct past museum practices by reflecting "authentic voices of native peoples themselves". (bugmenot, washingtonpost.com)

Merlin Mann's 43 Folders is brilliant, full of lifehacks for geeks.

Ultimately about learning how you work, where you get bogged down, and how your brain wants to operate. Once you develop the tweaks for your own contexts and special situation, you’re golden.