Author: Brian

At first I thought a Scapoose was a baby on the run. But no.

Chinook Chief Casino of the Kiersinno Tribe held stewardship at Scapoose, a meeting place. Bounty that astounded Lewis and Clark in 1804.

Machine-to-machine communication will outnumber human subscribers by a huge factor soon.

I like this one, maybe ubiquitous in our cities someday.

Load-Volume Tracking (LoVoTrack)
ultrasonic sensors, mobile comm and satnav to obtain information on the space available in trucks and containers.

‘We installed sensors on the ceiling of each container that continuously monitor the available empty space. This information, together with the precise location of the truck, is transmitted via a cellular phone network to a central server that follows the whole fleet….

Relatively easy to insert freight when space is available.

michael ruhlman:

Julia was the person who told this latchkey 9-year-old that he could make a pie.

I turned off the TV that afternoon, and made that pie…

Christine McLaren:

Of course, it’s not as though Alec or Katherine have any time to spend in bars. They’re far too busy reveling in the throng of excitement pulsing elsewhere in the city; starting free organic produce markets (The Free Market!), or riding their bikes naked with 5000 other people through the streets of Portland in the World Naked Bike Ride, which I obliged to join towards the end of my stay.

As I ride beside Katherine, a newfound friend of only a few days, stark naked on a rental bike, a man on the side of the street drops his pants in solidarity, clapping slowly as we jiggle by. I buckle over laughing.

“People just love nudity here,” I say, aware that I’m probably making a rather sweeping generalization.

Katherine keeps pedaling in the bright sun.

“No,” she says. “People just love freedom.“

How much chewing is meat?

All the issues which so worried Madison in The Federalist Papers have come to full flower: the power of the State has been legally channeled into Elites which have nothing to fear from any branch of the State because they are the State.

The world’s first water bottle that removes all waterborne pathogens and other pollutants creating safe sterile drinking water.

ey wot?

“Only when the tide goes out do you discover who’s been swimming naked,” said Warren Buffett.

Berkshire Hathaway, in which Buffett owns 27 percent, according to a recent proxy filing, has more than $26 billion invested in eight financial companies that have received bailout money.

The TARP at one point had nearly $100 billion invested in these companies and, according to new data released by Thomson Reuters, FDIC backs more than $130 billion of their debt.

To put that in perspective, 75 percent of the debt these companies have issued since late November has come with a federal guarantee.

Follow on here:

Even the most pious among us will sacrifice their principles when their own money is at stake.

Warren Buffet?

And the reason none of his investments went the way of Lehman and Bear has nothing to do with superior fundamentals.

And I didn’t even mention the accounting shenanigans these guys are playing.

Buffett SAYS a lot about accounting integrity, but his businesses are engaged in some very shady number fudgery.

Benedict Buffet?

People give Buffett a free pass because they think, deep down, he really cares about their interests. I think he does too. Just not when they conflict with his own.

Reuters, as our water goes dry.

American Taliban:
A leaked memo details Tea Party Patriots infiltrating and harassing Democratic town halls during congressional recess.

somnamdrillists:

But what Sarah Palin was saying is what is built into the very DNA of capitalism: the idea that the world has no limits.

She was saying that there is no such thing as consequences, or real-world deficits. Because there will always be another frontier, another Alaska, another bubble. Just move on and discover it. Tomorrow will never come.

This is the most comforting and dangerous lie that there is: the lie that perpetual, unending growth is possible on our finite planet. And we have to remember that this message was incredibly popular in those first two weeks, before Lehman collapsed.

Thoughts on our pillage of the incredible, by Naomi Klein.

Fraud throughout General Electric, from its financing arm to sales of trains and aircraft parts, falsely boosted the books by almost $600 million.

“We have concluded that it is in the best interests of GE and its shareholders to resolve this matter and put it behind us.”

Another Blue Chip flagship. Yeh sure.

Free Market Fairy Tales points to those horrid days before deregulation:

You have been hauled in front of the auditors. Against all your instincts & better judgment, you go into the conference room kicking & screaming…”

Everything you know about addiction treatment is wrong??

Recent scientific research has discovered new avenues of treatment by showing conclusively that addiction is a chronic physical disease that attacks the brain, damaging key parts of the cerebral cortex and limbic system.

This isn’t about morals or behavior, but ripping neurons.

“Against this backdrop we offer a few thoughts.”

Mauldin’s letter on the economy is far reaching this week!

Naked Capitalism:

We have seen the financial sector, with its massive resources and access to the best minds of public relations… Malarky. This is all code for defer to the wishes of those who make money from these techniques.

Financial engineers on Wall Street are employed to make money for Wall Street firms and themselves. There is no hidden code that says they will design their products to align private and social benefits and costs.

Let’s keep score.

“Most Americans don’t understand how bad health care in the United States is.”

I think Ceci Connolly, June 9 at the Washington Post, has written one of the best summary on health reform. Nearly 3,000 follow-up posts refer to her piece.

Not partisan spin, but a terrific blend of facts and vinegar.

Bright young physicians trained at prestigious and expensive universities enter a profession built on perverse financial rewards.

They, like assembly-line workers of the past, are paid on a piecemeal basis, earning more money not by doing better but simply by doing more.

Among many snippets on health care, I like “We don’t ration care, we ration people“.

Articles that fairly explore our conundrum are not common. Most are position statements and many are outright propaganda no matter how many citations.

A Canadian analyst wrote a popular article in the LATimes:

Unfortunately, many Americans won’t get to hear the straight goods…

American democracy runs on money. Pharmaceutical and insurance companies have the fuel. Analysts see hundreds of billions of premiums wasted on overhead that could fund care for the uninsured. But industry executives and shareholders see bonuses and dividends.

Half of the insured population uses virtually no health care at all.

The 80th percentile uses only $3,000 (2002 dollars, adjust a bit up for today).

You have to hit the 95th percentile to get anywhere interesting… but except for pimp actuaries and insurance executives, conditional probability is tough for the human brain.

There is one key difference between the insurance companies and Madoff: Madoff’s players were accredited investors.

We live in a greedy little world
that teaches every little boy and girl
To earn as much as they can possibly
then turn around and
Spend it foolishly
We’ve created us a credit card mess
We spend the money that we don’t possess
Our religion is to go and blow it all
So it’s shoppin’ every Sunday at the mall

All we ever want is more
A lot more than we had before
So take me to the nearest store

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I42c6RP04xU&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0]

Instead of either running from the problem or trying to mend it, why not make the most of it? Just look what we’ve got here!

What does this say about the kind of people that we are? It is not just me. Each of us is a creative hub of consciousness, each has a soul, no one has more than one. All have been endowed by the creator with an inalienable and inviolable mind-space of their own.

We are a society of selves.

The idea that everyone is equally special in this way is extraordinarily potent — psychologically, ethically and politically.

And from the beginning, it will have transformed human relationships, encouraging new levels of mutual respect, and greatly increasing the value each person puts on their own and others’ lives. …the beginning of humanity’s interest in the human project, a concern with humanity’s past and humanity’s future.

I walk among the animals at least once every day. In the morning I walk around in their paddock, keeping out of their flight zones, investigating its condition and waking them up. They aren’t asleep but they are ruminating, and their brains are off line so to speak when they do so. You can startle them into action when they are ruminating, but it’s best to gently, stresslessly, wake them from their contented stupor.

“Without a practice of community and without religious organizations to help share or make sense of religious longings, today’s fundamentalist makes private demands, voicing private policies that are often the wishes of isolated individualists.

“Without a structure of fellowship and tradition, fundamentalists may be a type of anarchist acting in the streets or increasingly radical politics.

“Seeking to create so-called spiritual governments, railing against the state, and arguing against secular culture, fundamentalists may be only demanding that our state and culture serve their selfish interests.

“Whether it’s members express their burdens because they are globalized or urbanized or isolated, fundamentalism may reflect a type of alienation – less a spiritual movement than an effort to force culture to satisfy personal ambition and private belief.”

1. Olivier Roy at Eurozine from the Institute for Human Sciences shows how the return of religiosity acts against religion.
2. With thirty years of research behind him, Professor Bob Altemeyer of the University of Manitoba describes the key characteristics of “my way or the highway” tactics in today’s zealots.

Our Constitution:

An ornery, vocal, opinionated, aggrieved but non-violent man pontificating on what was unquestionably his own property should be absolutely inviolate.

bullies and badges

No, not fantastical to flood Sudan.
Or stilt Manhattan.

But it’s time for a bridled mind, not only scientific nor squinty faith, but a West of Yesterday bravado, against blood but guts willing.

Cathedral fall and we are more. Prove otherwise.

Catch up and take us along.

Jus’ tell gloomers you’re building new apartments, Apocalypse Circle by Upturn Associates. You know, those signs they put up at developments; something for everyone and a’ that.

There were two entrances to the Hollow Earth.

Hurry.

Inside Radio reports Sarah Palin is making overtures to networks.

“The main objection to Palin as radio talk-show host is that she would have to hold forth for three hours a day.

“While some of her recent remarks may indicate a talent for improvisation, anyone who’s listened to Rush Limbaugh or Thom Hartmann or Don Imus or Howard Stern or even Ryan Seacrest knows it’s the rare personality who can blab extemporaneously for 15 hours a week.”

Puhleeze. The hidden threat in health care as circulated by mercenaries of the insurance industry:

Baby Boomers will begin retiring in multitudes, expecting to reclaim the hard earned money they have been paying into Social Security. But this Health Care Bill, HR3200, has other plans for them.

Those 65 and older will be required to undergo mandatory “end of life” counseling to determine if they are worthy to continue to not only live, but take much needed resources from those who are younger and more worthy to receive them.

Counselors will be trained to discuss how to end life sooner, how to decline nutrition and hydration, how to go into hospice, etc.

This will not be done without coercion.

For those who have amassed assets enough to take care of themselves in their old age will have these assets confiscated in the name of fiscal responsibility, because by this time, every citizen will be entered into a national database under the guise of improved efficiency.

This database will be run by a type of “star chamber” appointed by the president, that will determine whether or not you deserve the much needed operation your personal doctor thinks you need.

…and seniors will be the victims…

And of course they’re selling books and stuff. I won’t offer the link.

At a recent town hall meeting, a man stood up and told Representative Bob Inglis to

“Keep your government hands off my Medicare ”.

The congressman, a Republican from South Carolina, tried to explain that Medicare is already a government program — NYTimes

Did you ever think of this really really scary issue?

If there’s a public health system, employees of the insurance companies would go to work for the government!!

Mark Morford at SFGate:

This is the amazing thing about rabid global economic recessions combined with volatile environmental collapses combined with a tasty national identity crisis combined with a truly historic, revolutionary president combined with a gnawing sense that our species might not be long for this world after all combined with the overwhelming sense that something, somewhere, something big and meaty and interesting and maybe even profoundly and butt-shakingly unexpected, has got to give.

A tiny example, signifying nothing: California state parks. They say our new, brutally slashed budget means that upwards of 100 of our beloved public pastures will just up and close. No hiking, no camping, no poison oak, no pissing in the wind. They say, furthermore, that Mexican pot cartels are already gleefully swooping into these selfsame parks and cranking up pot production to “epidemic” proportions, simply because the government can no longer afford to monitor and police them, and it’s prime growin’ land and, well, why the hell not?

Really, we as a country haven’t really been this unstable, this uncertain of who we are and where we fit into the world since we first split from England to go off on our own and slaughter some Indians and invent pornography and discover Starbucks.