James-Speaks

Bonsai Gerrymander

Does anyone recall the furrfu over "Bonsai Kitty?"

How about bonsai watermelon?

Confession: We are not proposing to put an entire House district into a box, though the idea of putting Exterminator Man into one has appeal.

Nope, we suggest using computer technology (gasp) to draw House Districts based on the parameters (1) form factor and (2) demographics.

Paramater (1) would seek to make each district as compact as possible. Form factor means total area divided by perimeter.

Parameter (2) would be used to prevent violations of the Voting Rights Act.

Just a thought.

Vandals

via www.juancole.com

" I don't have time to comment much on all this right now, except to say that the use of force here is all out of proportion. Without electricity, you can't purify water, and uncooked water is a severe health problem, especially to babies. It can ultimately cause cholera. "

All out of proportion is an understatement. The probing questions are how and why.

Why first:

There were some interesting articles published just after the Ramallah and Jenin atrocities;long story short is that the invaders acted like Vandals. There was overwhelming evidence of needless destruction. One article was titled, "They Even Defecated Into The Photocopier."

British ITV had a nice clip documenting some Israeli soldiers who had pushed an infirm Palestinian woman, in her wheelchair, into the middle of a field. They had her surrounded and they were mocking her fright.

Today's occurrence is merely another occurrence. The destruction in Baghdad and other ancient cities, which some commentators now attribute to willful incompetence as prelude to deniability, all fits a pattern of racist violence by the US/Neocon and the Israeli/Likud cabal.

The why is simple. It is a worldwide pogrom.

The how is complex.

It requires a willingness on the part of Americans to allow Israel's creeping genocide to continue. This willingness is created and maintained through exploitation of the Holocaust and the stranglehold on reasoned debate by the Israeli lobby.

Our nation is ill if we allow Israel to trick us into abandoning our founding principles (We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal) in order to allow Zionists to pursue their childlike, racist dream.

Our nation can only be cured through careful reasoning and the courage to speak truth to power.

Here is an example. The pablum,"Israel has the right to defend itself." demands we consider exactly what defense means and how much of a right there is to self defense during a war of aggression.

Does Israel have the right to defend itself during pogroms against helpless Palestinians? Does Israel have the right to take water from one group of people in order to produce flowers for export?

At this point, there are many who now bring out the label "antisemite."

It is time to dispense with that nonsense.

The how question is answered with the non-defense of "We Americans allow Israel to destroy our principles." This fits nicely with the answer to the why question, namely "Israel is a racist nation with a genocidal agenda."


June 28, 2006 10:32 PM

Burn That Flag
We're Not Using It Anyway

The drama unfolds, conservative, loyal and patriotic Senators champion a constitutional comman^H^H^H^H^H^H amendment to relieve us the burden of watching the American Flag go up in flames. Apparently it has become such a problem that one hundred most distinguished men and women in America must take time to address this issue.

I know I have been traumatized daily by flag burning demonstrations in the neighborhood, at the store, everywhere. Thank God for the Republicans.

And now the Democrats to the rescue, defeating the amendment and saving our Constitution for more important issues, such as what, anything Democratic I guess.

The D's have the high ground on this one, but just barely. Their feet are still in the swamp though the nostrils breathe cool night air.

The problem here is they should have let it go. There is nothing left to protect.

The paradox of flag burning is that the flag represents our right to protest even if it includes flag burning. It's just a damned piece of cloth: it's the idea behind it that's important and if we prevent the burning with a Constitutional Amendment, all we have done is burnt the idea in its stead.

The flag represents other things as well such as the separation of powers among the co-equal branches of government, it represents the idea of representative democracy where the elected speak the truth, more or less, and think of the electorate as something more noble than fodder for their war machines.

I could go on but until we demand our Congress uphold the separation of powers and demand that President Bush enforce laws duly passed and signed, the flag is a symbol of nothing and merely a reminder of empty promises.

A Simple Experiment

Put a toy truck onto a wedge of cheese. At least it always looked like that to me.








DANGER - TOY TRUCK ON WEDGE OF CHEESE
DEAD AHEAD

GBR - Okay, it's not a truck on a wedge of cheese, it means steep downhill grade ahead. Put on the brakes. Shift to a lower gear. Go slower or go all kaputsky.

Now, imagine that the wedge of cheese has been replaced with a wedge of ice.
Help for the metaphorically challenged

Does it matter of you put on the brakes? No, it does not matter
BECAUSE IT'S ICE.

Now think about Greenland. Greenland is basically a very big truckload of ice on a very big wedge of cheese. Friction between the ice and the bedrock prevent the glaciers from sliding off the mountain very fast. Friction because there is no lubricating layer of meltwater. The glaciers slide off the mountain at a glacial pace.

Envision now, if you will, that someone replace the cheese in Greenland with melting ice. Do you think the glaciers will move at a glacial pace or do ytou think they will move faster, as in slip sliding off the mountain into the ocean and flooding 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue?

Think the latter, please, the resale value of my condo on the Isle of Palms depends on it.

If the glaciers were to move at the rate of, say, one foot per hour, slower than the little hand on your wall clock, you would see them slide off the mountain in:

(500 miles x 5,280 feet/mile) / (1 feet/hour * 24 hours/day) = 301 days.

And this means the ocean level would rise 21 feet in that time.

In other words, by Labor Day, there would be an extra four feet of water at high tide.

By Christmas there would be more than twelve feet of water. It would be like the tsunami everywhere.

Dude? Are you listening?

Global Warming is immediate. We do not know how close we are to this meltwater scenario because you cut off funding!

Clue: You will be the one remembered as the idiot, not your Poppy, not Dick, not Condi. You.

Suggestion: Restore funding to people who believe Global Warming is real and man-made.

Cheerio!

Help For The Metaphorically Challenged: It's not really a wedge of cheese, it just looks that way.

Leader Tips, Part Tres
(It's a Wilbury's Thing)

Fearless Leader said,

"QUESTION: I know you are not planning to see Al Gore's new movie, but do you agree with the premise that global warming is a real and significant threat to the planet --


BUSH: I think it's -- I have said consistently that global warming is a serious problem. There's a debate over where it's man-made or naturally caused. We ought to get beyond that debate and start implementing that -- the technologies necessary to -- to enable us to achieve a couple of big objectives: one, be good stewards of the environment; two, become less dependent on foreign sources of oil, for economic reasons and for national security reasons.


That's why we're pressing for clean coal technology. That's why the hydrogen initiative is -- is robust. In other words, we want our children being able to drive cars not fueled by gasoline but by hydrogen. That's why I've been a strong advocate of ethanol as an alternative source of -- of fuel to run our cars.


I strongly believe that we ought to be developing, you know, safe nuclear power. The truth of the matter is, if this country was -- it wants to get rid of its greenhouse gases, we got to have nuclear power industry be vibrant and viable.


And so I believe in -- and I've got a plan to be able to deal with greenhouse gases."


Dear Fearless Leader,

You got part of it. Here's the rest, and when I write Dude, I mean it in a nice way.

Dude, Clean Coal Technology has more to do with not seeing our economy go kaputnik as Peak Oil plays out than it does with global warming. Clean Coal Technology is actually harmful from a climate change perspective.

Fossil fuels have high energy density (putting your elbow onto the lecturn and saying) It mean's you get a lot of fire out of every pound of fuel.

Diesel has a very high energy density. Coal has a lower energy density.

Hydrogen is not a fossil fuel. Hydrogen is a storage fuel. You use hydrogen to make electricity
portable for use in an internal combustion engine.

Nuclear is not a fossil fuel either, but it a source like fossil fuels. You do not have to burn up something else to get uranium. You do have to burn something to get hydrogen. Like burning oil
in an oil fired power plant or like "burning" uranium in a nuclear power plant.

Coal, oil, gas and uranium are our sources.

Hydrogen, ethanol and bio-diesel are the "battery" fuels produced by consuming something else.

Dude: You got to concentrate on what can be done.

Clue: While fuel is still relatively cheap, susbsidize the stockpiling of steel. Stockpile I-b eams, W-beams, H-columns, rebar and most importantly, stockpile heavy rail.

Later on, when the price of fuel goes sky-high-sky and the dollar has gone all kaputnik, we Americans will say to ourselves, "Now, wasn't that George W. Bush real smart making us stockpile steel? Because if he hadn't, we would not be able to rebuild our rail system.

You see, Dude, transportation costs, I'm talking about the real cost in terms of time and fuel, are what's going to devastate this nation when Peak Oil hits, but if President Bush (you) plans in advance, then the reconstruction will be a thing of great national pride and if your right-wing talking heads talk it up enough, Dude, then we will remember you were the one with vision.

Because, Dude, if you don't do it, we will remember you were the one too caught up in Iraq to worry about our future.

So, hydrogen is good. We will need the technology, but even better is to use cheap oil now in massive transportation projects and in stockpiling steel for later on when oil becomes too expensive.

Be a great president, plan for our future.

Thanks, Dude

A Most Unpleasant Thought

Asher Karni, an Israeli citizen, was convicted of selling US made nuclear spark gap triggers, presumedly to an underground nuclear arms black market centered in Pakistan and to other countries. Wikipedia and the PBS program Frontline provide details.

Now, there is a great deal of hysteria coming from the neo-con/Zionist sector regarding supposed nuclear weapons of mass destruction as well as a great mass expression of reproof, rebuttal and, sadly, repugnance coming from the reality based [ambiguity mode on] left side of the blogosphere representing humanity. [ambiguity mode off]

What if the neo-con/Zionists know something we on the reality side of humanity don't, namely that there are Nuclear Warheads Out There and they know it because their ilk is responsible for selling them to potential terrorists?

Implausible? Ney, more plausible than a national TV network giving air time to the likes of Jonah Goldberg or Ann Coulter.

Verily.

posted by James-Speaks  # 1:56 PM 0 comments

If

any one of the big three had any hairs on their collectively skinny, white asses, they would give Helen Thomas an hour on Sunday mornings.

Some tips for our leader

There are four things you need to worry about. They are, in order of decreasing eventual impact:
1) Global Warming
2) All of the Wars.
3) H5N1
4) The Dollar.

In order of immediacy, they are:

1) The Dollar.

Dude, give up Iran. All they need to do is fiddle around with exports and the dollar is kaputnik.

Clue: when the dollar goes kaputnik, you will go kaputnik because no one will be able to buy food and we will all blame you.

A Humble Suggestion: Land on an aircraft carrier and declare Victory Over Iran. If Israel complains, bomb them instead.

2) All of the Wars

Dude, you're losing in Iraq. Some day soon Ali Sistani will tell you to withdraw troops and you will because if you don't, then Shii from Lebanon through Iraq (includes Jordan and Saudi Arabia) will bring down the House of Saud and there will be no oil for a few months. Without oil, the dollar goes kaputnik. (See item 1 above)

Clue: Do not listen to the sloppy talk about how violent Muslims are. Given the ongoing provocation a la Rumsfeldian idiocy, they are still much less warlike than, say, the families of Bush and Cheney. Imagine the helplessness you would feel if they all behaved as belligerantly as Ann Coulter or as stupidly as Jonah Goldberg.

In My Humble Opinion: Invade Indonesia (see H5N1 below)

3)H5N1

Dude, H5N1 stands for Hemagluttenin type 5, oh what the hell, you're probably going to mispronounce H5N1. It's the bird flu, dude, and it could mutate some more into a form which thrives at lower temperatures (37 degrees Celsius - 98.6 F) rather than 41C which is a bird's temp, it could pick up the alpha2,6 receptor protein making it more likely to thrive in the human throat where coughs and sneezes would spread it, and it could have that nasty PB2 E627K sequence which accounts for neurological (nurligical for you) and organ damage and high fatality rates.

Dude, it means (putting your arm on the lecturn and leaning forward) a whole lot of people are going to get sick and die.

Clue: A whole lot means upwards of 3/4 of everyone who catches it, meaning 2/3 of everyone on the planet. That's half the planet, that's half of six billion (billon) people. That's 3 with nine zeros. Get Condi to write a three on your left thumb and zeros on the remaining digits.

My Humble Suggestion: Tell Americans that we should stock up on surgical masks now, canned food now and ascorbate now. That way the production lines for those products will be able to produce enough. Surgical masks will not stop the virus, but if enough people wore them, the overall effect would be significant. It is as if enough people had voted against you in Florida in 2000. Oh wait, enough people did vote against you, but you weren 't paying attention.

MHS#2: Invade Indonesia and declare War on H5N1. Send Rumsfeld, Cheney, Wolfowitz, Libby, Ledeen and Feith to investigate.

4) Global Warming

Dude: Gore was right. You were wrong.

Clue: The problem today is not how to stop it, but how to adapt quickly to rapid changes in the near future.

Here's a laugh for you: Big glaciers move, and when there is enough melt water under them, they can and will move rapidly, as in sliding off the mountain and into the ocean within a few years time.

My Humble Opinion: Sink the Bush family fortunes into land in Louisiana, South Florida and coastal Texas, Carolinas and, of course, the Bahamas.

The high crimes of George Herbert Walker Bush
1) "Read my lips...."
2) George Walker Bush

The high crimes of George Walker Bush
1) Diddling around with aircraft carriers and books about farm animals while Rome burns.
(Help for the metaphorically challenged)

2) A sad guitar-man impersonation while New Orleans drowned.

3) Promising to put a man on the moon.

• It has been done.
• He could have gone himself. That's right - the First President on the Moon.

4) Believing anything Douglas "Let's attack Paraguay" Feith said.

5) Believing anything Paul "I'll do for finance what I did for the military" Wolfowitz said.

6) Not listening to Cindy "My son gave his life for your idiotic war" Sheehan.

7) Oh yes. For screwing everything up while the greatest threat warm blooded animals have faced in over two hundred million years burns its way through Indonesia. I'm talking about H5N1, the killer flu Steve King wrote about in "The Stand." This disease will so thoroughly devastate existing ecosystems that, combined with the species limiting effects of Global Warming, our planet's carrying capacity will suffer sustained degradation. All this while the chimp meditates on whether to use the rake or the hoe at his dude ranch.


As a public service, I'll try to make it easy for W's handlers.

Some tips for managing the "Presidency"

1. Tell him it's a secret mission against KAOS, and mixing stories here, that "Blofield" will be there, but that it is a secret mission, so he will be gone for weeks and weeks and weeks. Get that guy from Leno to appear at photo ops

2. Prepare a movie about the endangered Hawaiian Island off the coast of Louisiana. Have him declare NO a fish sanctuary. Pay everyone in NO $100,000 to move about a hundred miles upstream. Do the math, 500,000 souls x $100,000 equals about four days of the Iraq war.

3. Speaking of Iraq, buy a water purification set and a generator set for every family there. Do the math, 18,000,000 souls (please do not tell Jonah Goldberg that I said Iraqi people have souls, it would upset his world view) / five souls per household x $20,000 equals $72 billion. Not chump change but way less expensive than staying plus it would get us out with "victory."

4. Convince him that surgical masks (the new type made of polymer with 0.27 micron pore size) prevent abortions. Figure $10 per package x 300,000,000 Merkins = a mere $3 billion. Chump change. Let Halliburton handle the distribution: $100 per package. Or better, let Halliburton skim $90 per package and have Fedex distribute.

Just a few ideas.....

Rome is a metaphor for a) NY, NY, specifically the World Trade Center, and b) the world in general. As in Global Warming. You see, Bush diddles while GWOT - that's Global Warming, Ominous Threat - manifests itself through drought, category five hurricanes and melting glaciers

.