Category Archives: NASA

06/29/2015
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Citizens United, Fidel Castro, Koch Brothers, NASA, Privatization, Same-Sex Marriage, Space-X, US Supreme Court

Hot Air

The Next Appeal

Much of America jumped for joy upon hearing the Obergefell decision last week. Other Americans, though, groused, clenched their fists, and vowed to…, um…, to do something.

Those of us who think we’re familiar with this holy land’s system of writing, enacting, and interpreting laws might react with a derisive snort to the Religious Right’s pledge to act. As we understand it, once the US Supreme Court rules on a disagreement over a law, well, that’s that. There is no higher authority than the Supremes.

Ah, but that’s not so, say the Holy Rollers. There is god.

Anti-Same-Sex Marriage

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The Big Daddy-o in the Sky is mightily pissed, they tell us. Almightily pissed. They know because they talk him him regularly. The fact that their conversations always are one-sided means little to the pious of our nation. Somehow they know what his immensity is thinking. He’s thinking about unleashing earthquakes, hurricanes, epidemics, and other annoyances upon our blighted land because we’re now allowing same-sex couples to get married.

Don’t mess with god, the Very Right sez. He’ll hit you so hard your mother’ll fall down.

Teehee, the rest of us say.

Put the brakes on your snorting, sez me. Don’t laugh at the Religious Right. They’ve got a power behind them greater even than god. They’ve got the Koch Boys.

Murrica’s second richest clan engineered the Citizens United decision — declared, natch — by that very same Supreme Court in 2010. CU gives the Kochs the mechanism by which they can control elections hereabouts. And do you know what remedy some Republicans are touting? The election of US Supreme Court justices.

As in, Hey, vote for me, I’ll set you free! Imagine Donald Trump on the Supreme Court. Or Glenn Beck. How about Sarah Palin? You know, of course, one doesn’t have to be a lawyer to be a US Supreme Court justice, don’t you? The Constitution says nothing mandating lawyers as bench warmers.

Palin

Habeas Who? Nolo What?

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But if, say, Sen. Ted Cruz has his way, some specially anointed water-carrier for the Kochs just might make it into a black robe. Cruz is telling the world via his recently-released political memoir that we must start having general elections for Supreme Court justices.

Acc’d’g to him, the justices should reflect the will o’the people. Acc’d’g to reality, such elections would more likely reflect the will of the Koch Boys. And if the Kochs figure a candidate for the Supremes — who just happens to be a flamboyant god-ist — will serve their lofty interests, they’ll throw their dough behind him. Dough wins elections.

Let’s be frank: It’d be a sure bet a guy who’s philosophically simpatico to the Kochs would be a crucifix waver. Davey and Chuck know better than anyone the history and efficacy of the American plutocracy using Jesus to further its interests.

Those of us giddy that the US Supreme Court has ratified the freedom of any two adults who want to chain themselves together in wedlock had better watch out. The Religious Right has god behind them. And god has the Kochs behind him.

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The Explosion Of Privatization

So, another Space-X rocket ship has exploded upon taking off. It’s a shame. Now the astronauts in the International Space Station will have to wait for their latest copy of Entertainment Weekly magazine.

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Space-X is the rocket booster manufacturer and operator that scored a contract with NASA to resupply the ISS in the aftermath of the Space Shuttle era. The idea being private industry can do the job immeasurably better than a gov’t agency. That’s the philosophy behind privatization, right?

Right. Elon Musk put together the Space-X aerospace corp. with one of its stated goals being putting a crew of humans on Mars. Eventually. Till then, though, Space-X’d do the heavy lifting for the ISS.

In the last eight months, though, two Space-X vehicles have blown themselves to smithereens. That is, the last two Space-X ships are now nothing more than metal splinters. Make no mistake: space travel is a risky business. Hell, I can’t even lift myself off my recliner without help half the time. A rocket booster must lift tons and tons of stuff, pushing it up to 25,000 mph to escape the Earth’s gravitational pull. The Falcon 9 vehicle that blew up yesterday is designed to carry up to 27.5 tons of food, water, magazines, and toilet paper. That’s even more than I weigh.

Nobody can do it without taking the chance that the damned thing’d disappear in a burst of flaming fuel. Not a gov’t agency. Not a private corporation.

When NASA was first trying to launch rockets into space in the late 1950s, the ratio between successful liftoffs and blow-ups was a terrifying 1-1. In the ensuing six decades, though, the US gov’t agency in charge of space stuff learned how to send people and things off the Earth with a reasonable expectation of success. Oh sure, there’ve been disasters — Apollo 3, the Challenger, and the Columbia — but whenever NASA experienced such a spectacular failure, it had to shut down operations for long months and even years and explain to the American people why it screwed up. As for the non-governmental Space-X outfit, the American public will forget about Sunday’s explosion by the day after tomorrow. That is, those who even were aware of the explosion in the first place.

At least NASA had to put the lives of astronauts and the negative PR fallout from a mission failure on the front burner. The pols who authorized the billions of dollars for the agency’s operations insisted NASA launch a safe vehicle, and costs be damned.

That was then. Now, with privatization, cost is king. Private corps. put profit on the front burner. If one safety check or another cuts too deeply into the total expense of a mission, well then it just might have to be made more flexible, shall we say, or even nixed altogether. Shaving cost is the god of for-profit business. Maximizing revenue is its heaven.

I have no idea at this moment if Musk’s Space-X cut corners to put together its Falcon-9 vehicle. I assume NASA and the company itself will conduct a thorough investigation. But, guaranteed, that investigation will be done outside the public eye. And its findings will make about as much splash as the news that the City of Bloomington is using a new brand of paint for its parking meters.

Suffice it to say I’m no fan of privatization.

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Magical Monocrat

Funnyman Aaron Freeman points out a prediction made by then-Cuban prime minister Fidel Castro in 1973:

The United States will talk to us when you have a black president and the world has a Latin American pope.

Some folks are saying this is evidence of the revolutionary boss’s psychic powers — or at least his ability to read the geopolitical tea leaves. I say, Bah. His “prediction” was really code for “When hell freezes over.” I doubt he would have ever guessed that Satan would be shivering while he — Castro — was still alive.

Castro & Doves

Fidel & His Famous Dove Trick

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Now, if he would have said, “… when homosexuals can marry in the US and the Pope rails regularly against the evils of capitalism…,” then we could talk about his extra-sensory perceptions.

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03/17/2014
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B-Line Trail, Bloomington Certified High Tech Park, Climate Change Denial, Goddard Space Flight Center, Great Recession, Guardian UK, Habitat for Humanity, Huffington Post, Jamie Dimon, Jim Hightower, JP Morgan Chase, NASA, Overpopulation, Ralph Nader, Soma Coffee

Hot Air

The Mob

Ralph Nader quotes Jim Hightower in Saturday’s Huffington Post:

Assume you ran a business that was found guilty of bribery, forgery, defrauding homeowners, fleecing investors, swindling consumers, cheating credit card holders, violating US trade laws, and bilking American soldiers. Can you even imagine the punishments you’d get? Howe about zero? Nada. Nothing. Zilch. No jail time. Not even a fine. Plus, you get to stay on as boss, you get to keep all the loot you gained from the crime spree, and you even get an $8.5 million pay raise!

The hoodlum H-tower speaks of would  be the big boss of JP Morgan Chase, Jamie Dimon, a man whom, Nader reminds us, proclaims for all the world to hear that he is “so damn proud of this company.”

Dimon

“Proud”

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We keep forgetting that reprobates like Dimon were responsible for crashing the entire world’s economy back in the mid-aughts. It wasn’t socialism, or communism, or same-sex marriage, or legalized pot, or a Manchurian Candidate president from Kenya, or even god’s will that millions more Americans now live below the poverty line, millions are unemployed, municipalities are going broke, school budgets are being slashed, libraries are closing, and…, and…, oh, it’s all too depressing.

All those ills were brought to us courtesy of the Liar’s Poker, casino-mentality, degenerate gamblers in fancy Wall Street offices (and their coat-holders in Congress).

They all are the very definition of mobsters.

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Trade Rumors

Here’s an idea regarding the development of some land along the B-Line Trail that cuts through central Bloomington. Habitat for Humanity wants to develop a little strip of woods along the Trail, just northwest of downtown B-town. So the city’s angling for a zoning variance to allow HforH to build a couple of dozen homes for the needy there.

Habitat/B-Line

Habitat’s B-Line Neighborhood Is Next Door To…

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And, according to folks who don’t think much of the idea, the city’s positioning the question as an either-or: either you want to help Habitat do its good works or you don’t. The problem acc’d’g to some, is that Habitat’s property is the last lush green space near downtown. That, and it is apparently going to be difficult to develop.

Instead, say a group of petitioners, the city and Habitat should swap land. The city-owned Certified Tech Park butts up against the Woods parcel. The CTP already is zoned for high-density residential development, the argument goes, and much of the land is cleared.

Bloomington CTP

…Bloomington’s Certified Tech Park

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The simple solution? Let HforH build its homes on the Tech Park site and let the city take over the Woods and transform that land into a Parks & Rec facility.

If you buy this argument, slap your sig. on the petition calling for the land swap.

Then again, if you think the city’s gonna let low-income folks live in its shiny new neighborhood, you must believe you live in a liberal college town.

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A Dickens Of A Tale

Overheard at Soma the other day, a barista talking to a customer:

My parents told me my actual last name was Nintendo. When I was about six, they said I was the heir to the Nintendo family fortune but that my original parents disowned me because they didn’t like the way I looked. So I was adopted.

Does too much coffee do that to people?

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The End Is Near — Maybe

And finally, it took a foreign newspaper to report on disturbing study by this holy land’s own NASA. Our Murrican space geeks have sponsored some alarming research with the help of scads of scientists from a variety of disciplines that show humanity’s present rate of consumption and excretion could potentially topple our whole house of cards within a few decades.

Fin

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We’re using so much stuff and belching so much of our wastes into the air, the water, and the soil that our civilization itself could collapse of its own weight. Don’t laugh — countless civilizations before us have gone all to hell for a screwing up what they knew of the world a lot less than we are.

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center has submitted the study to the peer-reviewed journal of the International Society for the Journal of Ecological Economics. That gang contemplates stuff like this; you know, how much it costs us as a species to make sure everybody’s got all the latest hand-held devices and to keep our petro-plutocracy in charge of, well, everything.

Natch, Murrican newspapers and TV news outlets haven’t touched this thing yet because it has nothing to do with Justin Beiber or a white man shooting an unarmed black kid. Those, of course, are the only topics of import in this mad, mad, world.

Anyway, the study doesn’t come right out and say we’re doomed, only that we could be. There’s a chance, see? Except folks who think scientists are a political party would pooh-pooh the report out of hand, if only they had the intellect to understand it.

Inhofe Book Cover

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And here’s a conclusion the study makes that’s sure to make Ma & Pa Kettle bristle: We ought to stop having so many kids. Yup, overpopulation is strangling us, the study sez. There ain’t enough raw stuff on this planet to manufacture the products needed to satisfy all 7B of us. The conclusion is, those of us who have need to make sure that the rest of us have not; otherwise, we lucky few won’t have as much as we want.

Yeesh. So, when’s the last time you read the word overpopulation in your morning newspaper? Or heard the word uttered by a blonde, lacquered anchor lady?

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01/01/2014
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American Conservative Union, Barack Obama, British Empire, Climate Change Denial, Elton John, Fresh Air, Golden Disc, Larry Hart, NASA, NPR, Pale Blue Dot, Phil Robertson, Royalty, Science Laureate, Terry Gross, US Congress, Voyager 1

Hot Air

American Dis-Ingenuity

Okay, so, like, I’m sitting here trying to think of the one thing that most made 2013 2013 and, man, I just can’t get past this:

Screenshot from Raw Story

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I’d been thinking of the Phil Robertson dust up about gays being bad and Jim Crow being good and, really, that is very, very American and 2013-ish, indeed. But how can we ignore a congressional effort to silence scientists because they just might want to teach Americans something?

See, at first Congress was cool with the idea of naming an unpaid, ceremonial American Science Laureate whose job would be to fly around and tell schoolkids how fab science is. Honestly, how could anyone object? Someone did; namely the American Conservative Union‘s Director of Government Relations, Larry Hart, who, upon hearing of the idea, began a threatening-letter-writing campaign to Right-leaning members of the House. The threat being, of course, that if you even think of approving this, kiss your chances at re-election goodbye.

And you know what? The congressbeings caved! Yep. Whereas the whole Science Laureate idea was on a fast track to be rubber stamped by early September, after Hart brought the legislators to Jesus, House Republican leaders yanked it from their voting calendar.

Hart explained that with the nation being held hostage by our current Kenyan-in-Chief, the Prez himself likely would make one of his Schutzstaffel lackeys the Science Laureate and that guy would further the commie lie that there is such a thing as climate change and, just for kicks, take all our guns away and force our daughters to get pregnant just so they could have abortions.

Only the House bill did not call for the President to appoint a Science Laureate. That person would be chosen by, um, the House itself.

Oh well, the whole idea has been flushed down the Capitol toilet. America.

Just so’s I don’t depress my readers (and myself) too much, I’ve also chosen a positive, definitively American thing from 2013. That is, the discovery and announcement that the Voyager 1 spacecraft had passed the putative edge of the Solar System and continues on in its journey through interstellar space. Voyager was launched in the late summer of 1977 and has traveled nearly 12 billion miles in the ensuing 36 ½ years.

Here’s a photo that Voyager 1 took of the receding Solar System when it was some four billion miles out in June, 1990. The Earth is the “Pale Blue Dot” in the reddish-brown streak on the right side of the image. Try as I might, I can’t even make out the Monroe County Courthouse in this photo:

NASA/"Pale Blue Dot"

The Earth From 4 Billion Miles Out

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Keep in mind that in 1977, there were no personal computers, widespread wireless technology was still years in the future, the Internet hadn’t even been invented yet, and Miley Cyrus hadn’t been born. Such a backward time, no?

Nevertheless, science geeks beginning nearly 50 years ago ideated, designed, and created a spaceship that has so far visited the planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune, has left the whole caboodle behind, and is still sending signals back to Earth.

And I can’t even get a good, solid broadband signal from Comcast in my home. Something’s amiss, babies.

Anyway, Voyager 1 is zipping along at a shade over 38,000 mph. It’s got enough battery power to continue sending signals back to us for another 11 or so years. After the year 2025, it’ll be on its own, crossing the “interstellar medium” (geekspeak for outer space nowheresville). And just in case some alien dudes and/or dudettes spot it and have the capability to capture it, the forward-thinkers at NASA placed upon it a gold-plated disc containing sounds of various forms of life on Earth, pix of dozens of human societies, a roadmap to the Solar System, and a bunch of other stuff that’ll show all those ETs who we are.

Voyager 1 Golden Disc

Hi. It’s Us, Your Neighbors.

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Thankfully, the disc includes no pix of current members of the House of Representatives nor of tailless monkeys like Larry Hart. We’d like to give the rest of the Universe a good first impression of ourselves.

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No Sir

Terry Gross ran a repeat interview with Elton John today on her Fresh Air show.

Not that I care all that much about Elton John; I’ve found one or two of his hits bearable but usually his music bores me to tears. So, under normal circs. I would leap for the radio dial to turn the interview off. But I was at the sink washing dishes from last night’s delicious New Year’s Eve lobster dinner (kudos to The Loved One) and so wasn’t able to react like a jungle cat.

Because of this I heard Gross’s intro to the interview and was mightily pleased when she continually refer to him as, well, Elton John. As opposed to Sir Elton John.

John

Plain Old Elton John, 1975

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Loyal readers will know I loath all references to the British empire’s antiquated and money-wasting royalty-cum-class system. You know, queens and princes and earls and lords and all the rest of those interbred goofballs. And something that makes me even more irate is the fascination we Americans have for English royalty and and all those assorted “nobles.” Why any one of us here in this holy land would care a whit about that new brat who was born to the Windsor tribe last year is downright bizarre.

CBS-TV Image

De-Evolved Zoo Denizens Cheer The Arrival Of The Royal Baby

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After all, we have our own royalty and nobility here: the Bushes, the Clintons, the Kardashians, and the Cyruses, as examples.

Anyway, I’ve always been a big fan of Terry Gross and today, I’m even more so. I guarantee she omitted the Sir bit intentionally. People refer to other rocks stars by their artificial tiles all the time, witness intros for Sir Paul McCartney or Sir Mick Jagger.

Terry didn’t go down that road and that’s a very cool thing.

As for the interview itself, well, it was pretty much as uninspiring as most of John’s music. He talked about how wonderful all the fellows who died in World War II were, how strong and wonderful his mother was, and how the 1950s were very bad times for a gay kid growing up. I’d bugged out by the 20-minute mark.

In any case, thanks, Terry Gross

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06/18/2013
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Abortion, Alex Seitz-Wald, Anna McClain, Buddy Guy, Christina Hammock, Donald Trump, Eric Roberts, Faith and Freedom Coalition, Jessica Meir, Kristan Hawkins, Lesbian, Marissa Meyer, Maternity Leave, Morning Edition, NASA, Nicole Aunapu Mann, NPR, Paul Parello, Republican Party, Sally Ride, Salon.com, Sarah Palin, Students for Life, The Dark Knight, Yahoo!

Your Daily Hot Air

Women’s Lib

How about this for good news?

The new NASA astronaut training class is 50 percent female.

Yup. Four of the eight members of next two-year training program are women. And get this: the NASA guy in charge of spin, Jay Bolden, tells us, “The selection is about qualifications. It has nothing to do with their genders.”

Imagine that.

2013 NASA Astronauts

Newest Astronauts (l to r):

Christina Hammock, Nicole Aunapu Mann, Anne McClain, Dr. Jessica Meir

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We’re becoming more and more genital-blind. We’ll have a woman president sooner rather than later. The fact that a woman, Marissa Mayer, runs a big outfit like Yahoo, isn’t breathtaking news anymore. And, with Mayer calling the shots, Yahoo now has liberalized its maternity leave policy.

Prior to these enlightened days, male company bosses preferred their female employees to squat in the field behind the factory, drop their babies, and get right back on the assembly line just as soon as they washed their hands.

So things are changing. We forget that when we fixate on the crypto-sociopaths who populate the loon wing of the Republican party.

Anyway, this is an appropriate day for NASA’s announcement. It was thirty years ago today that Sally Ride became the first American woman in space. She rode aboard STS-7, the Space Shuttle Challenger.

Sally Ride

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BTW: Sally Ride was a lesbian. Sadly, she felt compelled to participate in a beard marriage in the 1980s, presumably to protect her career.

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Frustration

Grrr.

So, I’m listening to NPR’s Morning Edition as I pound this post out on my keyboard. And I’m thinking I’m pretty smart, tying in the four new female astronauts with the Sally Ride anniversary. Just as I’m correcting some misspellings, whaddya think happens?

Those commie NPR rats (I know this about them because the aforementioned crypto-sociopathic Republican loons have told me so) run a piece about Sally Ride’s ride, leading it off with a mention of the new female space cadets. As if that isn’t bad enough, while I’m patting myself on the back for the song vid I’m going insert at the end of the entry, NPR plays that very song as a bumper after its story!

The jerks.

Well, I don’t care. I’m nothing if not a stubborn old bear. I’m still gonna insert a vid of the fab song “Mustang Sally.” Only this version is by blues bossman Buddy Guy. I’m way cooler than you are, NPR.

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Nepotism

This seems as good a time as any to shill for my very talented and cool cousin who runs the eponymous Paul Parello’s Blues Power radio, video, and live performance operation.

And, hey, here’s cuz (on the left) in a bit part as a tough guy in the movie, “The Dark Knight.” That’s Eric Roberts on the right.

From "The Dark Knight"

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What, you thought I was the only one with talent to emerge from the Parello gene strain?

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Abortion: It’s A Laff Riot!

Um, uh, yeah, I s’pose…, if you’re a member of — you guessed it — that gang of crypto-sociopathic Republican loons I twice mention above.

Alex Seitz-Wald in yesterday’s Salon tells us that the Repugnicans are thinking of flooding the interwebs with baby-killing humor just so’s they can attract that snark-loving younger crowd (who haven’t voted for the GOP since, er, um, ever.)

Audience Laughing

Stop It, Your Killin’ Me!

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Seitz-Wald quotes a member of the Hitler Youth…, er, sorry, Students for Life, Kristan Hawkins telling a panel at last weekend’s gathering of the Ku Klux Klan…, oops, sorry again, Faith and Freedom Coalition, “You can engage with sarcasm. It’s hard in the abortion issue, but you have to.”

Surprised? Need I remind you that many Republicans still hold to the terrifying belief that Sarah Palin would have made an acceptable Vice President of the United States of America?

Or that this man could lead our holy land?

Trump

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12/15/2012
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Aaron Freeman, Al Pacino, Apollo 17, Columbine, Gary Busey, Gene Cernan, Harrison "Jack" Schmidt, Harvest Moon, Jack Levin, Jerry Sandusky, Joe Paterno, Kevin Sears, Mark Twain, NASA, Neil Young, Northeastern University, Penn State University, Ray Hanania, Ron Evans, Sandy Hook Massacre, Shoe Bomber, US Homicide Rate

The Pencil Today:

HotAirLogoFinal Saturday

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THE QUOTE

“We build a fire in a powder magazine, then double the fire department to put it out. We inflame wild beasts with the smell of blood, and then innocently wonder at the wave of brutal appetite that sweeps the land as a consequence.” — Mark Twain

Twain

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BANG, YOU’RE DEAD

I was as enraged as anyone after learning of yesterday’s madness in Connecticut.

I took to Facebook and ranted:

From Facebook

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— and —

From Facebook

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America, with its psycho-sexual fixation on guns, is indeed deranged.

That said, a sociologist and criminologist from Northeastern University named Jack Levin appeared on NPR’s All Things Considered yesterday afternoon to put yesterday’s horror in perspective.

“The truth is,” Levin said, “there’s still about 20 mass killings every year in this country, and that has been true for decades.”

In other words, things aren’t getting worse.

Which is scant consolation to the parents who lost kids in Sandy Hook.

Wait, there’s more. Funnyman Aaron Freeman points out this fascinating set of statistics:

◗ US population, 1990: 248,709.873 — 23,440 homicides.

◗ US population, 2011: 311,591,917 — 14,612 homicides

Chicago Police Homicide

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“We are,” Freeman writes, “moving in the right direction.”

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PEOPLE ONLY ACT WHEN FACED WITH CRISIS?

Politico Ray Hanania points out this example of how mightily weird our species is:

◗ One guy tries to use a shoe bomb on an airplane — Now every air travel passenger must remove her or his shoes before reaching the gate.

◗ Some 31 lunatics have committed school shootings since Columbine — No changes have been instituted.

Airport Security

Whew! I Feel Safer Now.

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ACTION!

Yesterday morning, Kevin Sears, the Toastmaster General of Bloomington, and I mused on the inevitable movie about Jerry Sanduski, Joe Paterno, and the Penn State scandal. Here’s what we agreed upon:

Gary Busey will play Sanduski

Al Pacino will play Paterno

Casting

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That’s all you need to know.

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THE LAST MEN IN THE MOON

Precisely 40 years ago today, Gene Cernan, Harrison “Jack” Schmidt, and Ron Evans departed lunar orbit and began their quarter-million mile trip back to Earth.

Cernan and Schmidt were the last human beings to walk on the moon.

NASA Photo

Jack Schmidt On The Moon

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Their mission, Apollo 17, originally was planned to be the third-to-last lunar trip but budget cutbacks forced NASA to cancel Apollos 18 and 19.

The two astronauts in the Lunar Module that descended to the moon’s surface from the Command Module spent a little more than three days on the Earth’s natural satellite. Their craft landed in the Taurus-Littrow lunar valley. The two walked on the moon for a total of 23 hours.

Schmidt was a geologist who’d go on to serve as United States Senator from New Mexico. Cernan was a Navy jet pilot before joining NASA. Both men are still alive and are approaching the age of 80.

NASA Photo

Cernan & Schmidt On The Trip Back To Earth

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Before he left the moon, Cernan carved the initials of his daughter on a lunar boulder.

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HARVEST MOON

One of the prettiest songs I’ve ever heard.

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12/02/2012
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Apocalypse, Astrud Gilberto, Bertrand Russell, Bigfoot, Corporate Media, David Morrison, Fox News, Mayan Calendar, Melba Ketchum, NASA, Powerball, Richard M. Nixon, Ryder Film Series, Sasquatch

The Pencil Today:

HotAirLogoFinal Sunday II

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THE QUOTE

“Man is a credulous animal, and must believe something; in the absence of good grounds for belief, he will be satisfied with bad ones.” — Bertrand Russell

Russell

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REALITY CHECK

Let’s get this out of the way right off the bat: There is no Sasquatch. AKA “Bigfoot,” the creature does not exist.

There are people who call themselves scientists — but who’ve abdicated their privilege to the title — who’d love to get you to believe nonsense.

Ketchum

Dr. Melba Ketchum: She’s Wrong — Trust Me

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Move on with your life. Ponder all the new exo-planets being discovered virtually every day. Stop running around and trying to do everything in the world by noon and listen to the birds in your neighborhood — all of whom are real. If you take a drive on SR 37, glance at the rock wall cutouts along the side of the road and, noting all the layers of sediment, consider that you’re actually looking at millions of years of history.

But, once again, push the notion of Bigfoot out of your mind.

Because if you do believe in Bigfoot, you are indeed out of your mind.

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LOTTERY LOSERS

Here’s another piece of advice. The next time there’s a ginormous Powerball payout, you will not win it.

121130050650-01-mo-powerball-1130-story-top

Statistically Speaking, These People Do Not Exist

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Recent calculations indicate that the odds of winning the average Powerball prize are 1 in 175,223.510. And because last week’s half-billion-buck purse attracted so many new players, those odds shot upward.

So save your dough. Or better yet, just send it to The Electron Pencil; we’ll put it to better use than you blowing it on a racket in which your chance of winning, in essence, doesn’t exist.

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DOOM

Let’s stick with the bunk. Admit it, that whole 2012/End of the World thing rattles around in your braincase every once in a while.

Mayan Calendar

The Mayan Calendar

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As we approach December 21st, the target date for all our lives to go kaputnik (don’t try to find a definition for this word, I just made it up), you can be sure our corporate media newsbeings will be covering this “story” with either a smug, knowing smirk or flat-out idiotic credulity.

I’m dying to see how Fox News covers the impending apocalypse.

To that end, NASA has issued an advisory explaining why our interpretation of the Mayan calendar is screwy. Here’s space scientist David Morrison explaining why you’re a loon if you give even an iota of credence to this end of the world scenario.

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Not that this well-thought-out, expert, fact-based argument will make a molecule of difference for the credulous.

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TRUST ME

Speaking of credibility, I have next to none left after announcing several baker’s dozen times the new Ryder website and the attendant marriage of this site with that one.

Swear to the god I don’t believe in we’re only days away from that long-awaited debut.

Ryder

Almost There

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I know, I know — you don’t want to hear about the labor pains, you only want to see the baby, so I won’t tell you what an heroic ordeal it’s been to get this thing off the ground. My technical and diplomatic skills have been tested to the extreme, but winners never quit, or so said someone like Dick Nixon, who eventually quit anyway.

So stay tuned and we’ll be making our grand announcement before you know it.

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ONLY TRUST YOUR HEART

Believe Astrud.

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10/25/2012
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2016: Obama's America, Battleground State, Breasts, Chicago Cubs, Dinesh D'Souza, Floral Kiss Laptop, Fujitsu Limited, Hedy Lamarr, Jenna Sauers, Jezebel, Joe Ricketts, Laura Ricketts, London Olympics, Mars Curiosity Science Laboratory, NASA, NFL, Tom Ricketts, UFO, Victoria Beckham

The Pencil Today:

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THE QUOTE

“American men, as a group, seem to be interested in only two things, money and breasts. It seems a very narrow outlook.” — Hedy Lamarr

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THE VOTE

If you’re a Monroe County resident, you can vote today at The Curry Building, 214 W. Seventh St., from 8am-6pm.

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Again we remind you, in order to streamline the electoral process, Republicans are being asked to vote on Wednesday, November 7th. Do your part.

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I’M WARNING YOU, I’M GONNA SCREAM

If I never hear the words “battleground state” again, it’ll be too soon.

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See, I’ve heard those annoying words on the radio or read them online more times than all the following really important terms put together:

  • Collateralized debt obligations
  • Credit-default swaps
  • Glass-Steagall repeal
  • Deregulation
  • Ayn Rand-ism
  • Risky assets
  • Faulty bond ratings
  • Debt leveraging
  • The bubble economy

You know — all those things that got us into this economic shithole in the first place?

As long as we’re too dense to see elections as anything other than entertainment, like horse races or Super Bowls, guys who dream up “creative financial instruments” will continue picking our pockets no matter who takes what battleground state.

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GLANDULAR PROBLEM

As long as we’re on the topic of Things That Annoy Me, have you heard that the NFL this week will have its game officials drop pink penalty flags during a game between the New York Jets and the Miami Dolphins?

So, every time a defensive lineman attempts to bring down a runner by twisting his facemask, thereby severing the poor sap’s spinal cord — in other words, the usual Sunday afternoon fun — the referees, umpires, back judges, line judges, and all other striped constables on the field will toss pink flags rather than their customary yellow ones.

Throw The Pink Flag!

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(And why in god’s holy name do there have to be so many officials — gangs of them — on an NFL field? This is as baffling as why each NFL team has to have upwards of 20 coaches. That’s right, I’m not exaggerating — 20 or more coaches per team. Honestly, I think the NFL is insane. I mean, there are coaches and advisers sprinkled throughout each stadium, photographing plays, drawing up strategies, trying to divine what the opposition might do next, and all of them communicating with each other through electronic systems that make NASA’s Mars Curiosity rover radio set-up look like a couple of tin cans with string attached. Fellas, it’s a game for pity’s sake!)

Anyway, the NFL is going pink for breast cancer, natch. Every other sport has gotten into the pink craze the last few years. Hardly a day goes by when Major League hitters aren’t swinging pink bats or NBA point guards aren’t wearing pink ribbon patches on their uniforms.

■

Look, I’m a guy and I don’t have breasts to worry about, but, come on, is breast cancer the only disease left on the planet? And don’t hit me with the men-can-get-breast-cancer-too line. The odds of a UFO appearing over the stadium at London’s Olympics opening ceremony, according to one betting house, were precisely the same as those for a man suffering breast cancer — 1000 to one.

So, yeah, I’m not losing sleep over breast cancer messing up my life. I would assume most women are. And everybody’s been spending the last few years jumping on the breast cancer bandwagon.

The question has to be asked: Why breasts? Lung cancer is far more deadly for women in the US than breast cancer is, yet you don’t see NBA players bouncing basketballs painted up to look like spongy, alveoli-packed bellows, do you?

My take is breast cancer in women is the only thing that scares the poo out of American men because we have a breast fixation. If a woman loses her uterus to cancer, we shrug. But if she loses a breast, we’re aghast. Our puerile, tit-fetishy culture sees women pretty much as annoyances with big things on their chests we want to get our hands on.

In fact, we’re so obsessed with women’s racks that we go gaga over gals who’ve had bags of silicon surgically implanted under their thoracic skin.

Victoria Beckham’s Plastic

■

Reminds me of the time I had a drunken discussion at adjoining urinals at Chicago’s Club Lago with a guy I knew. He was raving about his new girlfriend. “Aw, Big Mike, she’s fantastic,” he gushed. “She’s got blond hair. She’s built, man! She’s got a good gig. She wants sex all the time.”

The guy zipped up and bestowed upon me the piece de resistance, the cherry on the sundae, the Number One in his Top Ten List of why his new girlfriend was the bomb. “And Big Mike, this is the truth,” he said, grinning, “she’s got fake tits!”

I swear I think he wanted me to carry him out of the men’s room on my shoulders.

As I said, I’m a guy, so I know this: We’re breast nutty.

The NFL, the NBA, the NHL, and Major League Baseball are virtually boys-only clubs. They want to show women that they care about them, considering females do buy tickets to games, but the idea of worrying about ovarian cancer or heart attack leaves them cold. But god forbid our little ladies should lose one or both of their tatas!

■

Then what would they be? The prospect is simply too chilling for most men to contemplate.

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GIRLISH POWER

And speaking of condescending to our holy land’s little gals, Fujitsu has introduced a spanking new laptop just for them.

It’s called the Floral Kiss, which sounds like a pretty cool new sex technique, but is actually a trademark for a new PC designed for humans who possess vaginas. The Floral Kiss comes in your choice of colors: Elegant White, Feminine Pink, and Luxury Brown. Your smart new laptop also comes with gold trim. Whee!

Ooh! What Happens If I Press This Little Thing-y?

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By “smart” I mean, of course, fashionable and trendy, not, y’know, having anything to do with you actually having to use your silly brain. So don’t worry your pretty little head off.

Jenna Sauers of Jezebel writes: “Maybe if you’re very good, you could ask your husband to buy you one for Christmas!”

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WHY, WHY, WHY?

It’s getting harder by the moment to be a Cubs fan.

The daddy-o of the clan that bought the team a couple of years ago for $845MM is the bankroll behind Dinesh D’Souza‘s “documentary” slopfest entitled “2016: Obama’s America.”

Joe Ricketts: Billionaire Blowhard

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In the film, D’Souza posits that the President of the United States actually hates America. Don’t ask me to explain; the “thought processes” of D’Souza and his flock are beyond normal human comprehension.

Anyway, why does the man who set his kids up as billionaires so they could buy my fave baseball team have to be the one who finances this gunk? (Happily, two of the Ricketts kids — Cubs chairman Tom and Board Member Laura — have disavowed Dad’s right wing stances.)

Isn’t it bad enough that the Cubs have not appeared in a World Series since 1945 and haven’t won one since 1908? Now I have to root for them despite the fact that the owners’ papa is a wingnut?

All This And D’Souza, Too?

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Believe me, if my boys ever win the Series in my lifetime, I’ll celebrate as never before, then I’ll wash my hands of them.

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The only events listings you need in Bloomington.

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Thursday, October 25th, 2012

VOTE TODAY ◗The Curry Building, 214 W. Seventh St.; 8am-6pm

STUDIO TOUR ◗ Brown County, various locations — The Backroads of Brown County Studio Tour, free, self-guided tour of 16 local artists’ & craftspersons’ studios; 10am-5pm, through October

POETRY & BOOKS ◗ Various locations around IU campus & Bloomington — Sylvia Plath Symposium 2012, celebrating 50 years since the publication of her “Ariel” collection, Through Saturday, Today’s highlights at IU Memorial Union, Whittenberger Auditorium:

  • Lynda K. Bundtzen speaks about Plath’s psychotherapy, & use of unconscious in her 1958 poems, Langdon hammer speaks about James Merril’s use of the Ouija® board for inspiration; 9:30-10:20am
  • Linda Adele Goodine & Suzie Hanna sepak about juvenile/adult fantasy & the liminal space between waking & dreaming; 10:30-11:20am
  • Jeanne Marie Beaumont, Annie Finch, Kathleen Ossip, & David Trinidad speak about PLath’s influence on the poetic process; 1-2:20pm
  • Bill Buckley & Peter K. Steinberg speak about Plath’s influence on scholars, students, & artists; 2:30-2:50pm
  • Linda Gates speaks about Plath’s relationships with A. Alvarez, Ted Hughes, & Assia Wevill; 3-3:20pm
  • Diann Blakely, Bill Buckley, Peter Cooley, Kimberly Maxwell, & Jennifer Thompson on being inspired, influenced, & healed by Plath; 3:30-5:30pm

POETRY ◗ Rachael’s Cafe — B-Town Poets, Open mic reading; 5-7pm

PANEL DISCUSSION ◗ IU Memorial Union, Walnut Room — “Human Trafficking & Media,” Penelists include Yana Hashamova of Ohio State University, Jon Daggy of Indianapolis Metropolitan Police, & Lesley Yarranton, London-based journalist; 5:20pm

BENEFIT ◗ Upland Brewing Company — 5th Annual Local Growers Guild Harvest Dinner; 6pm

LECTURE ◗ IU Neal-Marshall Black Culture Center — “Sex, Germs, & Worms: Infectious Disease in Primate Societies,” Presented by Charlie Nunn of Harvard University; 6pm

MUSIC ◗ Malibu Grill — Steve Johnson Trio; 6-9pm

BENEFIT ◗ The Fields Clubhouse, Clarizz & Moores Pike — Harvest Gathering, Dinner & silent auction, For Community Justice & Mediation Center, Featured speaker Jody Lynee Madiera of Maurer School of Law discusses her book, “Killing McVeigh: The Death Penalty & the Myth of Closure“; 6-9pm

FILM ◗ IU Cinema — “Blood of Jesus“; 7pm

MUSIC ◗ Max’s Place — Grandview Junction; 7pm

MUSIC ◗ Muddy Boots Cafe, Nashville — Zion Crossroads; 7-9pm

STAGE ◗ IU Wells-Metz Theatre — “Richard III“; 7:30pm

LECTURE — IU Maurer School of Law, Moot Court Room — Patten Lecture Series: “Why Pictures of People About to Die Depict News Events Involving Death,” Presented by Barbie Zelizer; 7:30pm

MUSIC ◗ The Player’s Pub — Open mic hosted by Martina Samm; 7:30pm

COMEDY ◗ The Comedy Attic — Michael Winslow; 8pm

MUSIC ◗ IU Auer Hall — New Music Ensemble, David Dzubay, director, & Joseph Schwantner, guest composer; 8pm

MUSIC & BENEFIT ◗ Rachael’s Cafe — Live music, Presented by WIUX PledgeFest; 8pm

FILM ◗ IU Memorial Union, Whittenberger Auditorium — UB Films: “The Campaign“; 8pm

MUSIC ◗ The Bluebird — Keller Williams; 9pm

MUSIC ◗ The Bishop — The Broderick Album Release Show, The Kernal, Fluffer; 9:30pm

FILM ◗ IU Memorial Union, Whittenberger Auditorium — UB Films: “The Campaign“; 11pm

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ONGOING:

ART ◗ IU Art Museum — Exhibits:

  • “New Acquisitions,” David Hockney; through October 21st
  • “Paragons of Filial Piety,” by Utagawa Kuniyoshi; through December 31st
  • “Intimate Models: Photographs of Husbands, Wives, and Lovers,” by Julia Margaret, Cameron, Edward Weston, & Harry Callahan; through December 31st
  • “French Printmaking in the Seventeenth Century;” through December 31st
  • Celebration of Cuban Art & Film: Pop-art by Joe Tilson; through December 31st
  • “Threads of Love: Baby Carriers from China’s Minority Nationalities“; through December 23rd
  • “Workers of the World, Unite!” through December 31st
  • “Embracing Nature,” by Barry Gealt; through December 23rd
  • “Pioneers & Exiles: German Expressionism,” through December 23rd

ART ◗ Ivy Tech Waldron Center — Exhibits:

  • “Ab-Fab — Extreme Quilting,” by Sandy Hill; October 5th through October 27th
  • “Street View — Bloomington Scenes,” by Tom Rhea; October 5th through October 27th
  • “From the Heartwoods,” by James Alexander Thom; October 5th through October 27th
  • “The Spaces in Between,” by Ellen Starr Lyon; October 5th through October 27th

ART ◗ IU SoFA Grunwald Gallery — Exhibit:

  • Buzz Spector: Off the Shelf; through November 16th
  • Small Is Big; Through November 16th

ART ◗ IU Kinsey Institute Gallery — Exhibits:

  • “A Place Aside: Artists and Their Partners;” through December 20th
  • “Gender Expressions;” through December 20th

PHOTOGRAPHY ◗ IU Mathers Museum of World Cultures — Exhibit:

  • “CUBAmistad” photos

ART ◗ IU Mathers Museum of World Cultures — Exhibits:

  • “¡Cuba Si! Posters from the Revolution: 1960s and 1970s”
  • “From the Big Bang to the World Wide Web: The Origins of Everything”
  • “Thoughts, Things, and Theories… What Is Culture?”
  • “Picturing Archaeology”
  • “Personal Accents: Accessories from Around the World”
  • “Blended Harmonies: Music and Religion in Nepal”
  • “The Day in Its Color: A Hoosier Photographer’s Journey through Mid-century America”
  • “TOYing with Ideas”
  • “Living Heritage: Performing Arts of Southeast Asia”
  • “On a Wing and a Prayer”

BOOKS ◗ IU Lilly Library — Exhibit:

  • “Outsiders and Others: Arkham House, Weird Fiction, and the Legacy of HP Lovecraft;” through November 1st
  • “A World of Puzzles,” selections from the Slocum Puzzle Collection

PHOTOGRAPHY ◗ Soup’s On — Exhibit:

  • Celebration of Cuban Art & Culture: “CUBAmistad photos; through October

PHOTOGRAPHY ◗ Monroe County History Center — Exhibit:

  • “Bloomington: Then and Now,” presented by Bloomington Fading; through October 27th

ARTIFACTS ◗ Monroe County History Center — Exhibits:

  • Doctors & Dentists: A Look into the Monroe County Medical Professions
  • What Is Your Quilting Story?
  • Garden Glamour: Floral Fashion Frenzy
  • Bloomington Then & Now
  • World War II Uniforms
  • Limestone Industry in Monroe County

The Ryder & The Electron Pencil. All Bloomington. All the time.

03/15/2012
1 Comment
Atheism, Black P Stones, Chicago Outfit, Clarence Darrow, David Coppedge, Intelligent Design, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Latin Kings, Murray Humphreys, NASA, Paul "The Waiter" Ricca, Richard Dawkins, Richard J. Daley, Rod Blagojevich, Sam Adam Jr., Scopes Monkey Trial, Uncategorized, Vice Lords, Wrongful Termination

The Pencil Today:

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THE QUOTE

“We are all atheists about most of the gods that societies have ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further.” ” Richard Dawkins

♢

OH, GOD

So, some god fetishist who got fired from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory for haranguing people with his myth-belief is suing NASA for wrongful termination.

David Coppedge says NASA tried to discipline him for spouting his fairy tale.

NASA says he created a hostile work environment for his underlings by laying Intelligent Design propaganda on them.

This is perfect, kiddies.

It’s the Battle of the Century. That is, the 11th Century versus the 21st Century.

Standing Tall Against Knowledge For A Thousand Years And Counting

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Democritus, Copernicus, Galileo, Darwin, and Sagan are all spinning in their graves. Hawking would spin if he could.

It’s god versus man in a cage match. The brain against the heart. Want a hint as to where I stand (as if you needed one)? The brain is the seat of thought; the heart is not. It’s a pump, dig?

I hope this lawsuit turns out to be as dramatic as the Scopes Monkey Trial some 90 years ago. I hope there’s a mouthpiece as deft and elequent as Clarence Darrow was. I hope NASA’s attorney puts Coppedge‘s lawyer on the witness stand. I can’t wait for the hologram movie about it all to come out in 50 years.

Who knows? Perhaps by that time we’ll have progressed so far as to tax churches. We may even have open atheists and agnostics running for high office. Our generals might not feel compelled to invoke the almighty to help us blow the brains out of enemy soldiers.

Nah.

I forgot; this is America.

♢

COLLEGE MAN

My old neighbor Rod R. Blagojevich gave his last press conference as a free man outside his home in Chicago yesterday.

The former governor of Illinois now begins his long stay at the federal hotel in Colorado. Or, as Outfit bosses used to put it, college. — as in, “Paul ‘The Waiter’ Ricca is still da man in dis operation, but he’s in college right now. Curly Humphreys is workin’ his ass off tryin’ to get him paroled.”

It’s funny: that’s the one thing Blagojevich was never accused of — playing footsie with the Chicago Mob. That’s probably only because the Chicago Mob was finished by the time Blago took over the state. Over. History, baby.

All the old Mustache Petes were long dead. Those who had been known as the Young Turks were either dead, senile, or in college.

“The Last Supper” Photo Of Chicago Outfit Bosses (c. 1978)

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Rod could have cleaned up had there been a lively Outfit to support him in his duties to the people of Illinois. The Outfit generally had county, state, and, on occasion, federal prosecutors in their back pockets. Judges and cops, too. Old Man Mayor Daley, the first pharaoh of Chicago, never made any bones about it — he had no choice but to work with the Outfit.

Now, thanks to the wonders of competitive capitalism, a Chicago mayor may work with any number of disciplined criminal organizations. There are, to name a few, the Latin Kings, the Vice Lords, and the Black P Stones. None of them, though, is as thorough and effective as the old Outfit.

None can point to their rolls and boast of a fixer as capable of gaming the political and justice system as Curly Humphreys.

Fixer Extraordinaire

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I’ll bet Rod Blagojevich rues the passing of the good old days.

Anyway, Blagojevich met the press and a passel of chanting supporters on Francisco Avenue yesterday. It was a circus. And Rod was the clown.

You’d expect a guy facing a stiff prison sentence to act somewhat contrite. Hell, most people would have the good sense to fake it if they still harbored thoughts of the unfairness of it all.

Not Rod.

He sounded more like a man running for another term in office rather than a convicted felon about to start a term in the joint.

What — Me Worry?

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“I believe,” he told the crowd, “I always, always, thought about what’s right for the people. And I am proud as I leave, and enter the next part of what is a dark and hard journey, that I can take with me the sense of accomplishment and a real belief that the things that I did as governor and the things that I did as a congressman actually helped real, ordinary people…. One thing I had a lot of was a desire to help average, ordinary people.”

Later, as he climbed into the car that would take him to O’Hare Airport and his flight to the federal pen, he said he had “a clear conscience and I have high, high hopes for the future.”

Wow.

Not a hint that he might have done one or two things differently during his term as the top influence peddler in Illinois. Not a breath that he even should have tempered his language, that maybe his faux tough guy, street wise lingo could have been misinterpreted. No.

“I’ve got this thing and it’s fucking golden, and, uh, uh, I’m just not giving it up for fuckin’ nothing. I’m gonna do it. And, and I can always use it.”

✍

Blagojevich spent his last day as a free man telling reporters, neighbors, and supporters what a terrific servant of the people he’s always been.

Man.

I’ll tell you one thing I learned yesterday. Blagojevich’s defense attorney, Sam Adam Jr., blew his best shot to get his client off. He should have advised Rod R. Blagojevich to plead not guilty by reason of insanity.

♢

01/10/2012
7 Comments
11/22/63, Barack Obama, Bringing the Shovel Down, Craig Thompson, Dave Torneo, Democratic Party, Eric Burdon & The Animals, European Space Agency, George Clooney, Guns, Habibi, ICBM, International Space Station, John F. Kennedy, Miles Kington, NASA, Nuclear Weapons, Open City, R.E. Paris, Republican Party, Ross Gay, Ryder, Samuel Beckett, Sky Pilot, Stephen King, Steve Jobs, Teju Cole, Vietnam War, Walter Isaacson

The Electron Pencil:

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TODAY’S QUOTE

“Astronomers. like burglars and jazz musicians, operate best at night.” — Miles Kington

♢

LOOK TO THE SKIES

If you’re a space geek and an early riser here in Bloomington (a scant club, I admit), you’ll have plenty of opportunities to see the International Space Station over the next couple of weeks.

With the late sunrises at this time of year the sky remains dark even after some of us unlucky souls are planted at our desks, casting dirty looks at our fellow miserable coworkers. But if you’re alert and can spare the energy to look upward you can see the mighty ISS shooting overhead between the hours of 5:30 and 7:30am.

Here’s NASA’s schedule of sightings from Bloomington:

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The ISS is home to a half dozen astronauts: three Russkies, three brave and handsome Americans, and one Japanese. Sorta neat how Russian and American spaceguys (and gals on occasion) are now cooperating for long months aboard an orbiting laboratory, isn’t it?

The International Space Station At Sunrise

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This is especially so considering that the true aim of each country’s space program back in the 1950s and very early ’60s was the development of intercontinental ballistic missiles. Eventually, thousands of ICBMs were pointed at cities in the two nations for the purpose of incinerating them with thermonuclear weapons.

It’s a wonder any of us who grew up in those psycho, edgy years are even acquainted with sanity now.

For that matter, who among our parents and grandparents alive during the Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima years would have dreamed Japanese and Americans would be among the tightest of geo-political pals in the 21st Century?

Believe it or don’t, there is a bit of good in this mad, mad world.

♢

RYDER’S TOP TEN ISSUE

My pals R.E. Paris and Dave Torneo and I are three of the featured writers in the Ryder magazine annual Top Ten issue.

R.E. breaks all the rules and selects some three dozen books that fascinated her and, in her learned view, are representative of trends in the publishing universe. Her choices range from the “Steve Jobs” bio by Walter Isaacson to Stephen King’s “11/22/63,” an alternative history that supposes John F. Kennedy had survived his wounds on the eponymous date, and to the Islamic fairytale graphic novel, “Habibi.”

✍

Dave, one of the most serious readers I know, writes about his ten best books of the year. He actually read the 800-page “Letters of Samuel Beckett: 1941-1956.” Man, Beckett probably kept the Royal Mail in the black all by himself. Torneo also dug Teju Cole’s “Open City” and Ross Gay’s “Bringing the Shovel Down.”

Beckett

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Me? I pointed my smart-assed knives at the city and state’s elective office holders, pricking the top ten political stories of the year. (And, yes, the pun is intentional, on three levels). By happy coincidence, one of my top stories is Bloomington’s rewriting of its gun laws to coincide with Indiana’s. I note that it is now legal to pack heat in the Monroe County Public Library.

Comforting, isn’t it?

Guns N’ Books

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Anyway, pick up the Ryder this month or you’ll be woefully ignorant for the rest of the year.

♢

WE DO FACEBOOK SO YOU DON’T HAVE TO

A no-spamily, no brattle zone.

◗ Special educator extraordinaire Erin Wager-Miller directs our attention to movie hunk George Clooney’s take on the difference between the two parties in this holy land. The Dems, Clooney feels, can’t sell themselves as well as the Republicans.

✍

Here’s a closeup of the quote:

♢

SKY PILOT

Eric Burdon & The Animals‘ 1968 song was not about the elation of soaring through almost unimaginable altitudes (which I’d thought when I first heard it as a 12-year-old). It was an anti-war polemic about a military chaplain in Vietnam who blesses a unit of soldiers preparing to go out into the jungle for an overnight raid.

Now, nearly half a century later, we still pay military chaplains to sprinkle holy water on men and women to go out to kill and be killed. And, just as in Vietnam, this nation’s bosses still can’t give us valid reasons why in the hell they’re doing it.

♢

12/27/2011
2 Comments
Alycin Bektesh, Anonymous, Chad Carrothers, Franklin P. Adams, Goldilocks Zone, January Jones, John Wasik, Joy Shayne Laughter, Kepler Mission, Linda Wertheimer, NASA, Nikola Tesla, NPR, Ryan Lee Dawes, Stratfor, Thomas Edison, WFHB

The Pencil Today:

✍

TODAY’S QUOTE

“Christmas is over and Business is Business.” — Franklin P. Adams

♢

THE NEWS GOES ON

Got an update yesterday from Ryan Dawes on the state of the WFHB news department.

✍

Things are running fairly smoothly in the wake of former News Director January Jones’ resignation earlier this month. Assistant New Director Alycin Bektesh has been bumped up to acting ND and Dawes is now acting Assistant ND. He’s still keeping his day job at Rock Paper Scissors music promotion.

Dawes hopes grant prospector Joy Laughter can dig up some foundation dough to pay for an intern who can take over transcribing city and county meetings from CATS Week videos.

The hunt for a new ND goes on. I’ll say GM Chad Carrothers and the WFHB Board will be hard pressed to find a better candidate than Bektesh.

♢

MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE

I’m not revealing an Earth-shattering secret when I say credit card companies are run by evil geniuses.

It’s a sure bet they’re working at this very moment on a protocol that will monetize the air that we inhale during the 45 seconds or so it takes us to complete a charge transaction.

The only people in this crazy, mixed-up world who can approach them in creative deviousness are the shadowy figures who call themselves Anonymous.

Dr. No Would Have Made A Fine Credit Card Company Exec

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Anonymous recently hacked into the Austin, Texas-based Stratfor company’s internet servers. Stratfor is part of the global security-intelligence-complex that threatens to turn our little planet into a cheap dystopian science fiction novel.

Stratfor’s Home Page At 7:45am EST

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Rumors abound that Anonymous gained access to the credit card accounts of Stratfor’s customers and then made unauthorized contributions to do-good charities via those cards. The things Anonymous does may technically be crimes but I say, Keep on breakin’ the law, babies!

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Anyway, NPR’s Linda Wertheimer reports this morning that those credit card companies damn well won’t take criminal charity-giving lying down. She interviews an expert who says the credit card companies not only will hit the charities up for the dough that was given them but — get this — they likely will levy stiff fines against said do-gooders!

And just in case you’ve forgotten, credit card companies are the loudest of critics of any proposed regulations on the banking industry.

Sigh.

♢

WHO DO THE GUYS ON OTHER PLANETS PRAY TO?

Okay, give me props. I behaved myself during the just-concluded Christmas season. I endured the barrage of communiques urging me to celebrate the birth of the son of the mythical creator of the Universe (as well as to engage in a venal orgy of consumer greed — because, you know, that’s what “He” would want).

Honoring The Father And The Son

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I didn’t scream or kick or withdraw into a cocoon.

But now it’s my turn.

NASA’s Kepler telescope, which is scanning our little corner of the Milky Way galaxy as we speak, has confirmed the existence of 33 planets orbiting neighboring stars and is studying more than 2300 other probable planets. Part of Kepler’s mission as it circles the Earth is to find those extra-solar planets that reside in what’s called the Goldilocks Zone, the area around a star in which a planet might conceivably support life.

Cool, huh?

Even cooler: Kepler has now identified a couple of planets in the Goldilocks Zone.

✍

Remember, Kepler is really a primitive planet finder compared to what we Home Sapiens sapiens will have in a few decades. Expect a flood of Earthlike planets to be discovered in our lifetimes.

That means a lot more chances for intelligent life to have evolved all around the Milky Way.

Heck, one day we might even evolve into intelligent life.

♢

TESLA IN THIS MORTAL COIL

Speaking of alien lifeforms, Nikola Tesla was as odd a bird as ever bobbed into a research lab.

He developed the alternating current electrical system and an early form of radio in addition to dozens of other innovations. He was a brain on two legs.

Nikola Tesla

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Sadly, though, that brain was a tad faulty. He was obsessive-compulsive, would only stay in hotel rooms with numbers divisible by three, had a phobia of germs, avoided pearl earrings, and surrounded himself with pigeons (some have speculated he was even sexually aroused by them). Oh, and he was celibate.

He was, in short, nuts.

Tesla’s not as well known as Thomas Edison mainly because Edison was somewhat sane, if predatory. Edison is reputed to have screwed Tesla out of money and credit for his electrical advances.

My old pal, the green economy maven John Wasik, is working on a book about the man, entitled “Unlimited Power: The Secrets of Nikola Tesla.” He spoke about Tesla recently at a Midwest gathering of Serbian-Americans (Tesla was an ethnic Serb born in what is now Croatia.)

Here’s John:

♢

 

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