American Madness

If you haven’t yet heard (though I am not sure how you could have missed it), Iran released pictures of a missile test they just conducted. The image they released was plastered all over newspapers world wide and showed 4 missiles taking flight simultaneously. The picture came from Agence France-Presse who said that they got the picture from Sepah News, they happen to be the media wing (or maybe propaganda wing) of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. There is something a bit menacing about the image of four missiles heading skyward in a successful test… That is until you study the picture a bit more.

It turns out that the missile, 3rd from the left was Photoshopped in. the dust cloud under the missile comes from the right hand side, the missile it self is identical to the one on the left hand side (the NY Times had a little fun with Photoshop themselves highlighting this). Now the question being raised is: Who is responsible for this? (more…)

We all knew Bob Denver (Gilligan) was a stoner. Denver was arrested in 1998 for receiving some marijuana sent to him in a package through the mail. Originally he claimed that Dawn Wells (a.k.a. Mary-Ann) had sent it to him. He later recanted this statement and said that a crazy fan must have been the culprit. It looked like the real story would never come to light when Denver died in 2005.

That is until some news yesterday brought this story back to mind. Dawn Wells was arrested back in October (I am not sure why Associated Press picked this up yesterday*) for driving under the influence AND possession of marijuana.

Looks like the story of Mary Ann mailing Gilligan some pot might not be too far off. Wells “was sentenced Feb. 29 to five days in jail, fined $410.50 and placed on probation after pleading guilty to one count of reckless driving.” Apparently a friend testified that he had borrowed the car and left the drugs in there himself. Yeah, likely story.

*Possibly because Sherwood Schwartz just got a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame last week

When your previous job used to be running around all day in a pair of spandex, getting sweaty with other men and then jumping on top of them, maybe you aren’t the right person to be coming out with a strong stance against gay rights.

Former Dallas Cowboys linebacker turn reverend, Ken Hutcherson of the Antioch Bible Church in Redmond, WA is claiming to be a modern day David against Goliath mega-corporations. Hutcherson is preaching that companies like Microsoft, who he says is attempting to become a political player in Washington state and push its policies on the entire state, can have their policies of toleration changed by the power of the shareholder.

Hutcherson is telling members of his 3,500 congregation to buy up shares of the company and reaching out to other religions, like Orthodox Jews, to do the same. The theory being that once they have amassed a controlling share of the company the can ‘correct’ the diversity policies currently in place , one of which includes an internal “affinity employee group” called the Gay and Lesbian Employees At Microsoft (GLEAM).

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Vermont and Washington are all set to be the first states to issue RFID (Radio Frequency Identification Chip) enhanced driver’s licenses. The programs and technology are in place in both states and plans are set to start churning them out in 2008.

The idea behind the RFID license would be to make border crossing easier between our neighbors to the North and South. No longer would you need to carry your passport with you to enter Canada or Mexico, but rather all you would need is your license (like it used to be before 2001). Seems like a nice idea to make life just that much easier.

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Remember when I wrote about the armed robots patrolling the streets in Iraq? Well, it might be time to start worrying about those machines.

Here’s the deal: “Many advanced military weapons are essentially robotic — picking targets out automatically, slewing into position, and waiting only for a human to pull the trigger.” Well, one of these robots, owned and operated by the South African National Defence Force (SANDF), didn’t quite wait for a human to pull the trigger and started blasting away on its own.

During a shooting exercise, where they were using live ammo, an Oerlikon GDF-005, designed to take down airplanes and other small, low-flying air crafts, went out of control, firing “hundreds of high-explosive 0,5kg 35mm cannon shells” which killed 9 and injured 14 others.

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When it was just a few articles here and there posted days after we posted them folks started saying it was just a “coincidence” that New York Magazine had written about the exact same thing that we had just covered.

Now, I am getting a little scared. I have had a small bottle of Lucid Absinthe sitting in my apartment for the last two months now waiting to be tasted and reviewed. The biggest problem I was encountering in getting around to tasting it was not having an absinthe spoon. Though technically not necessary you know me when it comes to my reviews I like to drink alcohol the “traditional” way. In terms of absinthe, this means with an absinthe spoon, sugar cube and water (and maybe some flame as well… we’ll see about that).

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Each year some Nazi-like parents in the middle of the country feel that some fantastic book is offensive and should be banned from libraries. Pretty much it depends on the community to decide whether to follow through on this parents request and ban the book or to allow freedom of speech to prevail and make all books available to the masses.

Unfortunately there are a number of books that have been banned from public schools and libraries across the country. Last year the book at the top of the list for banning was “And Tango Makes Three” by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell about a pair of male penguins that raise a baby penguin.

Why do I bring this up now you ask (and I’m glad you did)? Well, this upcoming week, starting tomorrow (sept. 29th) and going through October 6th, is Banned Book Week, sponsored by the American Library Association. The motto for the week is “Free People Read Freely.” Accoridng to the website:

Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read is observed during the last week of September each year. Observed since 1982, this annual ALA event reminds Americans not to take this precious democratic freedom for granted. This year, 2007, marks BBW’s 26th anniversary (September 29 through October 6).

BBW celebrates the freedom to choose or the freedom to express one’s opinion even if that opinion might be considered unorthodox or unpopular and stresses the importance of ensuring the availability of those unorthodox or unpopular viewpoints to all who wish to read them. After all, intellectual freedom can exist only where these two essential conditions are met.

To take part in banned book week all you need to do is pick up a banned or challenged book and read away. Do it in public, don’t be afraid to let people see you reading it, after all, that is the point, isn’t it?

Oh, also related, USA Today reports that the Federal government, after receiving enough pressure has decided to put banned religious books back into prison libraries.

For a list of banned books you can check out the ALA website, the site Banned Books, or just do a quick Google search for them. Or if you are too lazy for any of that you can just pick up Fahrenheit 451 or To Kill a Mocking Bird.or all the Harry Potter books, so, you’ve got some options.

In choosing a picture for this post there were so many good different images to choose from I decided to put a link to the Google Image Search here.

Google is being sued yet again. They must be pretty used to this feeling by now. It is starting to seem like every other day produces a new lawsuit for Google. A lot of the suits they settle out of court, especially the ones involving product theft and stolen ideas. They figure keeping their name out of the news is probably a good idea if they’re to keep their squeaky clean image.

Well, I am guessing this time around they aren’t going to settle. Dylan Stephen Jayne is suing Google for $5 billion for…wait for it… “Crimes Against Humanity.”

Yes, you read that correctly, he is suing Google for crimes against humanity. He’s claiming that Google aids terrorists and has put his personal safety at risk. How so, you ask? (And I’m glad you did.) Well, let’s allow Dylan to explain for himself:

“I, Dylan Stephen Jayne, plaintiff, has [sic] a social security number that when the social security number is turned upside down in its entirety it is a scrambled code that does spell the name Google®.”

Dylan clearly feels that this scrambled coding in the name Google that is the equivalent of his social security number makes him a prime target for identity theft. And who wouldn’t be worried? The Google name is blasted all over the internet these days with nary a thought of Dylan’s personal security.

I, for one, think Dylan has a very strong case here, full of merit; anyone claiming it is just “mental illness” and that he is a kook is just plain crazy.

Does anyone else remember the Time-Life Series “Mysteries of the Unknown“?

It was the one that had the long commercials asking how the Egyptians were able to build such incredible pyramids and the Sphinx and then commenting how the moon had similar structures on it. Basically the books, as far as I know (unfortunately, I do not have the complete 33 book set or even one of them for that matter), examined some world mysteries, some dealt with the paranormal, and (okay) most dealt with the paranormal. Some just doled out paranormal explanations for mysteries of the world. Well, I found a website that totally reminded me of the series.

I admit, I was always intrigued by the series (and, at that age, a little unsettled by it), which is probably why I just spent a bit too much time flipping through it today. Word Mysteries is broken down into a couple of different sections, each with a ton of writing on the topic (after a bit, I took to skimming).

Of particular interest was the map by Piri Reis from 1513, which accurately maps the coast of Antarctica, an area believed to be covered in ice for at least the last 6000 years, and the Baghdad Batteries (possible batteries dating back to 245 BCE) — some really interesting hard to explain things. The site goes beyond just these “mysteries” and also looks at some “Mystic Places” and Ancient Writing,” plenty of stuff to check out while wasting away an afternoon

My friend and colleague Eric Baum is one of the few ambitiously moral people in this universe. Where for others caveat emptor is the watchword, Baum here notes that Wall Street’s recent failure to embrace the categorical imperative has meant inflicting an unforseen wound on itself.

Blowback
By Eric Baum

The Central Intelligence Agency has a term called ‘blowback’ to describe the unintended consequences of hostile actions. In financial jargon there is no term to describe such quid-pro-quo sequences, but the subprime debacle may prompt financial analysts to coin one (ed: payback?).

Hedge funds and other money managers that cater to institutional investors are running for cover amidst a credit meltdown that is now demolishing equity prices. Financial insiders know the sequence of events that produced multi-billion-dollar losses at hedge funds managed by Bear Stearns and Goldman Sachs. These insiders now expect more damage in the weeks to come.

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