For some years Yahoo 360 let its user blog then discontinued that. They let us download our blogs as a file. This was my blog called FLIGHT LOG as near as I can display it without having to go through a good deal of grief. I may pretty it up some time in the future but tath will be a tedious and time-consuming job, best done over a few months, and I have a life. For now, you will have to read it in its raw archived form.

TITLE: Final Entry AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 08/14/11 STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: Since Yahoo has discontinued publishing these blogs, This one has reached it's conclusion and all that is left is to make some finla remarks. Mostly what I am concerned with is the Haditha Massacre business.

Some two years ago, CBS 60 Minutes did a progress report on the trials of the Marines involved and a summary of events. It is as I thought. The worst aspect of all of that was the reporter interjecting his moral comments, It was, as is the case with all liberals, a desk jockey making judgements in an area where he has zero experience and the same amouht of credibility.

My concusion on the action:

• This was not a proper Marine mission. Properly, Marines are sent into enemy territory to confront enemy forces that are clearly identified. Such was not the case. The Marines acted p roperly for a Marine engagement, clearing out all persons in the zone of action. In a proper Marine engagement, all entities not known to be friendly must be presumed to be hostile, It being that case that action must be taken with all deliberate speed as part of the Marine mission is shock. As such, they are not suited to operate in an area that cannot be clearly demarcated between hostle and civilian or where some elements of the civilian population is hostole and some are not.
• These individuals, if they were the average age of US combatants in the last few decades, 19, are not well-enough developed cranially to operate under this kind of perssure. One of the major differences between the combat age of WWII and the last several wars is the age; 23 vx 19. This also is showing up in the number of psych problems coming out of these wars and the effects on returning veterans. This will no doubt be worsened by the video-game style training aids that reduce persons to "avatars": game pieces rather than enemy combatants. This may bleed over to civilian life where the veteran views an adversary as one of these unliving avatars and slip into that psychological mode. There had better be some de-programming method here.

The only good to come out of this would be to re-evaluate what is a proper Marine mission and what age a person going into such situation should be, with the sideshow barkers kept totally out of the loop ----- -------- TITLE: Entry #37 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 01/23/10 10:50 pm STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: There are things in science fiction that really gag me with a spoon.

1. Fully starfaring civilizations before 3500 A.D. These writers have no idea of what is required to spread civilizations. Unless interstellar travel is acquired by a tremendous turn of fortune or gotten from some alien encounter. Don't even think about it before 3000 A.D.

2. Star Trek. The original series was good but after that it was downhill, degenerating into Political Correctness claptrap. Besides that,  it sucks the aire out of everywhere it goes: Enough already.

3. Star Wars. This has morphed into some kind of fairytale. The only characters worth caring about are Han Solo, Prencess Leia and Darth Vader. The "philosophy" is so maudlin and mawkish that anyone with more depth than a saucer would root for the Sith.

4. The slavish attention to primitive religions and "magic" is just sooooo counter to science that the whole thing devolves into wish-fulfillment literature

5. Superheroes, The wish-fulfillment bleatings of the imptent made into some kind of fairytale. The best things that ever happened to Superman were Kryptonite, Brainiac and the Phantom Zone. For comic relief. Mr. Myxtlplyk or whatever ----- -------- TITLE: Entry #36 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 02/15/09 03:11 pm STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: Poor President Obama.

Now don't get me wrong. I like him. I liked President Bush. Both in the same way; as persons. I did note that both had policies that were disastrous. The reason I, and other Rightists, voted for, or preferred Obama to McCain is that McCain would have brought Liberal Derangement Syndrome to root in the Republican Party, polluting it with the same bad stuff as the Democratic Party, in effect creating Dem and Demmer.

But Obama has it really bad. Four tax cheats right out of the box? You need a good vetting team really bad. And the Senate did not cover themselves with glory by confirming Tax Cheat #1 to head Treasury. Like setting the fox to guard the henhouse; huh? But then, the opposite of PRO-gress is CON-gress. Whether it's because they're dopes, evil or just isolated from the real world, I don't know.

But back to Obama.

The dude is all hepped up on this massive Debt ...erm...Stimulus Package saying "we need to pass it now or the results will be a catastrophe" or to that effect.

Now aside from the leftist ham, bacon and chops. The things that will stimulate the economy, if indeed they will stimulate the economy, according to supporters of this thing, won't kick in for about 3 whole months. If death is as close at hand as the Apostle of Hope Over Fear leads us to believe, that means the patient will be nearly dead when the meat wagon gets here. But it's actually worse. When you set up something like this. You have to get the recipients, queue them up, vet them and then put the resources in place. Do you know how long that takes? Not three months but more like six. Not only that, but do you know the swarms of the currupt that steam shovelsful of money attract? just look at the contraband business. If the situation is as bad as Obama says it is. by the time the ambulance leaves the garage the patient will be stone cold dead in da marketplace. by about 3 moths.

And just what is the record of this kind of thing?

Remember CETA: Comprehensive Employment Training Act of the late 1970's? So riddled with corruption that it had to be withdrawn. I should know, I was a fringe player in some of it.

Remember Synfuels? again, late 1970's: Boodoggle AND corruption

Ever hear of the Johnson era Urban Renewal/Model Cities? Corruption, Boondoggle and jail time for some local city officials

Remember subprime mortgages/CRE's institued by CON-gress? Oh, right, that started this mess.

Great Record, huh? Brought to you by the same folks who gave you the public skoolz, VA healthcare and affirmative action (the quota system for those of you in Rio Linda). So why are we going back to the folks who ran us over with the 18-wheeler to set the broken bones that they gave us?

Well, President Obama says ".... I believe the Economists...."

Well, on my first day of Econ class, my instructor said "Economics has an abysmal record of prediction" Then, by the time I'd seen all the graphs and studied the so-called "principles" I knew no more about the real world than I did before and had a massive headache. I guess we see all of this becuase Economists need something to do.

But recycling Keynes? Ya gotta be REALLY desperate: Or Dumb. Who really believes that you can spend your way out of the hole that you spent your way into? Makes the astrologers, psychics and other Coast To Coast flotsam and jetsam look downright competent. In the mid-1970's the Keynesians outright admitted that the 'stag-flation" was contrary to their doctrines, So having failed to anticipate the key problem of that time, why didn't they just dry up and blow away like any failed system?

Even Ayn Rand's protege, Greenspan, has abandoned the free market despite the fact that he made his name on it and what caused this mess was NOT the free market system. I guess that's why she used to call him, privately, "the Undertaker".

If you believe the Establishment economists, who answer, not to us and the real world, but to the university-media-totalitarian complex, put what is left of your money under your pillow and a lady I know will take it and leave a bright shiny tooth there. You will be the better off since you will get something for nothing, unless you believe that air-money is worth the paper it's printed on.

Hey, Bartender. Gimme another whiskey. I gotta drive home and I need to sober up real quick. You know what they say "Hair of the dog that bit you".

----- -------- TITLE: Entry #35 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 01/03/09 04:20 pm STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: In my last "From the Cockpit" column I said of Dr. Dean Edell. "I dislike using him as a punching bag but he keeps merciessly beating his face against my poor fists", or like that. Well, he's not the only one. You don't have to be a liberal to be dumb.

You've heard me do Matt Allen of WPRO 630 AM weeknights. This dude takes himself very seriously talking about heavy matters and doing the usual Rightist rant about the Welfare State and "moochers and looters", terms borrowed from Ayn Rand's ATLAS SHRUGGED.

Well last night he outdid himself. First discussing developing psychic powers with a straight face. Then he charged headlong and head first against the concrete wall of Reason by saying "We have to get to a basic belief in God, Family and Country" . After being in the hospital for both sugar shock and prosaic acid poisoning, ccomplicated by contusions, lacerations and other physical trauma caused by hyper-convulsive laughter, I decided to write this blog entry.

One would think that the right would learn from nearly being obliterated for 50 years to come up with something more inspiring that THAT! There are cultures that go for that. What is more God, Family and Country oriented than Iran? Why doesn't Mr Allen go there? He'd be right at home.


There is nothing more shallow than Patriotism, which is the irrational loyalty to the nation one inhabits, or so ANTI-American and why I wrote why I am not a Patriot. The US deserves better out of its inhabitants. But then they inherited, and like all spoiled brats, haven't the slightest idea of the depth of thought that it took to make this nation. The least significant was belief in God, when you look at the time period where that was dominant, the Dark and Middle Ages and Early Rennassance, well would you really want to live there (that is. religious rule and the medical beliefs, political beliefs and social system that it spawnd and supported and just how compatible is THAT with the US) and please note that the US is the first product of the Enlightenment which was the follow-on to the Age of Reason which was a secular revolution. Behaviourally, Americans are atheistic, seeking the good things of the world and control of their own destiny: Especially conservatives.

As to family Nothing like the deification of Uncle Bob and Aunt Sarah. Think the rain will hurt the rhubarb or some other banality.

Let's talk about God and Matt Allen. Are we not told to beg for our sustenence as a race of supplicants? "....GIVE us this day our daily bread..." Now there' a creed to go out and risk life and limb, kill thousands of enemies and build giant space fleets for. I can't wait to utter that battlecry! In line with that Mr. Allen talks about being go-getters and the joys of capitalism. What is that scrap of prayer more in line with; Capitalism or the Welfare State. And if it's the Welfare State that you worship at the metaphysical level how can you support capitalism and the work ethic at the political level with a shred of integrity or not expect to be laughed out of the place?

When Mr. Allen rails against "moochers and looters" does he not remember the words of his God about "Judged not that ye be not judged"? Well, we've discussed his integrity elsewhere. This and his search for a "John Galt solution " are borrowed clothes that are far too large for his tiny frame of mind but it hearkens back to something I've observed elsewhere. It was the Liberal commentator Jay Diamond who said that these noisy theists' economic views are "...the product a devout Russian atheist". In fact Mr. Allen fits in ATLAS SHRUGGED exceedingly well. He and his like would be at home in the rediculous "Back to God" movement. I suppose if you're going to dis Rand, you can at least have the decency to make her a prophetess. This movement was one of utter futility. So I guess he's getting his "John Galt solution". If you let the cat in, does she leave her tail outside?

As to belief in God, if you came down with lymphoma, what would you do pray or seek mdical help? If you demonstrate your integrity and moral fibre by saying "Both", which would give you the luxury of the other? My answer is already in and has been for 10 years. As that of the Twitchells has been in for almost 20.

Now here's the real kicker. Let's look back to Jay Diamond. an unabashed theist and liberal. Let me first remind you that mainstream religion has been drifting unstoppably left. Well with "Give us this day our daily bread" as part of your creed, where else could you go but to the Welfare State. The only significant exception are the Evangelicals, who are also serving the Cause. They gave us McCain who gave us Obama on a silver platter. So they're doing their part. What does Mr. Diamond know that the inadeaquate defenders of capitalism don't? Well. If you look at the origins of the Progressive movement of th late eighteen hundreds. the three major components of this mess were intellectauls, clergy and politicians. So you have the clergy and pols in alliance. Is that what the conservatives mean by "God in Government"? How can these non-judgementa judgementalists complain about state-coerced redistibution? The libs are using the only governmental means open to them to give some their daily bread and it's the conservatives who advocate self-interest at the expense of this giving of daily bread. Matt Allen is one of these conservatives. I will not question or even discuss his integrity. That discussion has occurred elsewhere. The conservatives scream about the Democrats' scheme to "take back God". He was always theirs or more correctly, they were always His. It's the conservatives who despise poverty: It's the conservatives who preach prosperity and self-interest and it's the conservatives who preach reliance on technological advancement. the libs implement the whole theistic scenario. from abandonment of reason to loving our enemies and kissing their ass to the point of a permanent planet-sized hickey. So where's the beef?

And as far as belief in "country" was it not the liberal JFK who said "Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country"? so why is Allen bitching about those who are doing what he's asking for? If you love God why are you grumbling disobeidiently about those who are doing His work?

Ayn Rand was fond of the slang phrase "brother, you asked for it" except she give it a literal meaning. Still, my fists are killing me.
----- -------- TITLE: Entry #34 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 12/19/08 11:33 am STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: This should be called "The Forgotten Man in the Meltdown and Madoff".

In both cases, we hear the sob stories about "homeowners struggling to make their payments" and the various entities with whose money Bernie made off. What we are not told is is the truth. You have to pay attention. In the first instance As I said in ACCOUNT OVERDRAWN... I was approached to take part in a deal like this and it just didn't pass the smell test. Also I quoted a WPRO 630 AM audio clip of some woman saying "I can't afford a 3,000 mortgage on my welfare payment". Beyond that, many if not most of these properties were bought by sharpies who were trying to buy cheap and flip them; and let the next poor SOB get stuck with the Adjustable Rate Mortgage i.e. screwed, blued and tatooed as we say, but were caugt in the bubble when it busted. What am I saying? I'm saying that this was knowable, predictable and inevitable, it's just the Greater Foll Theory in action and now the not-fools are being hammered by the crooks to bail out the fools.

If you look at the Madoff make-off you find that most if not all of these entities were "100% invested with Madoff". HUHHH!!!! Now many of these were municipalities and charities for whome we are told to feel sorry. No and most charities act like sanctimonious twits from my dealings with their phone haunts. In all cases there had to be some professional investment counselling outsdie the Madoff crime empire. Surely those buying into the enterprise are aware of the First Rule of Investment: DIVERSIFY. Talk about the dumbing down of America; but that badly and at that high a level? Who's running these things, Alfred E. Neuman?

So, At best, what you have is the Darwin Effect running its course on those over whom the media are bleating and the government; the REAL Robber Barons, are just about ready to flush the economy down the toilet to keep from getting the fate that one could almost say they so richly deserve, I guess that is fine as long as it a 1.5 gallin eco-crapper.

But I have to ask "Are people really that stupid in such great numbers". I'm no investment guru. Well, maybe I am since I don't go there. Any institution that allows large scale buying on the margin or is based on "credit" that is finance-speak for "wishing will make it so" is fundamentally diehonest. These bailouts and hand-wringing are therefore geared to dishonesty and the dishonest. Hense Matt Allen's quoted "How about if we don't call it a bailout just as long as we can get it done." What could possibly motivate someone to try and obsucre the facts in a bum's rush to implement a crooked scheme? "How about if we don't call it arsenic as long as we can get it taken?"

If people are that stupid on such a scale; it's over and all we can do is let them go before they take us with them. If on the other hand they're dishonest... . Now most of the made off by Madoff were presumably competent, to believe that they were not is to tax credulity to the point of bankruptcy, yet they violated the First Rule of Investment. Now when someone who is presumably competent does something that seems crazy. you've gotta think "yeah. crazy like a fox" but, there's another saying "the fox that bit him is dead". so they outsmarted themselves. They saw easy money and they got sucked in, or rather, avarice made them stupid (nobody believes me when I say "evil is stupid" and I know why they don't, too; as the Dylan song say's "I used to be among the crowd you're in with."), forgetting that if it sounds too good to be true, then it is. They were not fished in by Madoff, they impaled themselves on the hook. Had they used a moiety of their marbles, like any Ponzi schemme, that one could not have even got off the ground, let alone rise to the level of 50 billion dollars. It's probably more on them than on Madoff. They made themselves Sgt. Schultzes: "I see nothing, I hear nothing, I know nothing and I want to know nothing", BY CHOICE and WITH EFFORT! They had to go out of their way to do it. Madoff was just Darwin's secret agent.

In the case of the "meltdown" which may simply be the empty air escaping and the economy shrinking to its true size, if these perosns hadn't been greedy to the point of stupidity, the'yd be renting and not out on a limb that they crawled out on by choice.

I often hear of "predatory lending". A predator takes its prey bo force. No one puts a gun to these persons' heads. Might it be more the case of "predatory borrowing" by individuals who either know they can't really handle this or who don't take the responsibility to look at the situation and where they fit or don't fit in. I can tell you true stories about that, too. But I learned my lessons by the time I was 19 (then too, I wasn't schepping 3 kids with 3 different last names around by the time I was 19, either)

Now, we know that this was engineered by the government as part of anti-"redlining" and we know that it ws engineered by the Democrats unless we are to believe that Republicans are pro-welfare all of a sudden. Now we don't know what arms were twisted or incentives were offered to get the finance companies to buy into this (how about "if you don't go along with this you can expect the usuall thugs and lawyers to go after you for red-lining"? or "We'll see nothing if you take whatever dishonest steps you have to to spread the loss over a large enough financial area to dilute it so that there is no real pain"? or if some other "offer he couldn't refuse" was made).

But for my money, which I've kept out of that system, it was crooks helping crooks approved of by a willing media and nobody wants to blow the whistle on the crooks that made it possible for the predatory borrowers, moochers and looters.

Be rest assured there are some real foxes here. Now why would the media that is so scrupulous in finding Sarah Palin's gaffes, be so ignorant of this (as well as the fact that Joe Biden thinks "jobs" is a three-letter word or that he claimed to have recently spoke with persons in a place that hed been closed for almost a generation; on national television!)? Do you suppose that they know that they've reported just enough and in just the right way to enable the government to grab more of the economy and more power, in accordance with a left-wing agenda that they may or may not have? Now, I know it fits perfectly and that Sherlock Holmes has said "If you remove the impssible, what is left, no matter how implausible is the truth", but isn't this a little paranoid? I'd like to get a look on their size 13 carbon cloven hoofprint; or, more acurrately mouthprint. BTW: is Chris Mathiews stil having that pesky orgasm in his leg? Must be a bitch when he's walking down the street and he suddenly keels over and his socks get soaking wet: Eww!

----- -------- TITLE: Entry 33 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 12/14/08 02:48 pm STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: If this were not ttilted by entry number, it would be "...and sideways, too. That's gotta hurt!"


Anyone old enough to remember anything past 1975 has to remeber that of all the businesses that the left put on their hit list, the banks, insurance companies and automakers were at the top of the list. Ditto the politicians. Ayn Rand obswerved of Jimmy Carter "He has used the kind of language to American busienss that he doesn't even use on the Soviets".

Today anyone who doesn't know that the home of all these lefties is the Democratic party has been in the home for way too long and really should get oriented before opeining his mouth.

Anyone who's been sentient over the last 2 decades knows how the leftists have called the Republican party the toady of Wall Street and Big Business; read banks, insurance companies and the car companies.

Now If I were Lennie the Leftist. How would I feel if I saw the government bailing out these businesses wholesale? and how would I feel if it was the Democratic party, the hammer-and-sickle home team leading the charge and the Republican party, the Haters of Truth, Goodness, Light and the Spotted Owl and the Toadies of Wall Street. resisting the charge? What part of my anatomy would this go up and sideways, too? That's gotta...

But wait, it gets even better. One of the things being noised about the auto bailout is the appointment of a "car czar". Ever seen anything with a 'czar" work out? We have a 'drug czar" to fight the drug war and that's a howling success, right? Oh, sorry about that. and there was the mother of all czars Ivan the Terrible... oops, shouldn't mention that. Well, Nicholas and Alexandra really moved the needle, right? Oh frak! Well did any good ever come of czars? [tick...tick...tick...tick]. Well, this time for sure, right? Czar-y about that.

Well Lennie Lefty, take heart. In the case of the bailouts the government is acquiring "ownership interests" in these entities, like shares of stock. Now there's something to cheer about: Banking by the same folks who run the public "education" system, Cars by Congress, Insurance by the VA. Sounds good to me, Right? Well yes, just think of where this will be in 2010 and 2012 and how it will suck being a media hack trying to cover up the reason for $6.00/gallon gas and how great it will be to be a Republican. Barack Obama gets it. why do you think he's appointing all the old Clintonistas rather than the Leftist Leftovers from the 1970's . And why do you think the lefty bloggers are screaming like stuck pigs? Hey, how would you feel if a blimp want up your...? And sideways, too. That's gotta hurt.
----- -------- TITLE: Entry 32 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 10/04/08 03:15 pm STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: There is a thing going around, especially among the Radio Right that if you are for somenoe or something, you are "in the tank". Probably because that is the case with most of them and John McCain.

What's the difference?

When one is "in the tank", it usually implies that the target violates in smoe fundamental way, ones core principles.

For example I prefer Obama to McCain. Both violate my political and economic core principles. McCain violates my ethical principles of honesty by talking the talk but not walking the walk. Obama does indeed walk the walk in line with the talk he talks. To se the list of specifics on McCain read M C Gore DELENDA EST . As a Rightist I percieve him to be a greater threat than Obama, having influtrated the concervatives and with very little disguise. I theref9re look at Hannity, Carr and others as being "in the tank". This implies a basic dishonesty. This is discernable by the vitriolic diatribes that they launched at McCain with just cause and now thy're sooo 180'ed that they lack believeability It's one thing to say "Well, the guy's my last choice but he's better than..." and it's another to say, one week "that [blee] [bleep]-hole is in bed with [illegal aliens, the left, the Greens or all of the above] and is just a [bleep]up! who's lying through his [bleep]ing teeth!" and then say two weeks later "Well, he's better than...". If you knew what an ass-hole that makes you look like, you'd shut up and say nothing. It shows that McCain - and the Democrats are right to think these guys are, left to themselves, dumb as a stone, and should not be allowed withing 43 lightyears of the levers of power (and part of the reaons I intend to pull the Democratic master lever). Another case of "in the tank" is the Evangelicals' and other so called "put God in Government" types who fawn all over Sarah Palin. She has a pregnant unmarried teenage daughter. Worse, instead of taking Knock-up Honey in back of the barn, the bring him to the Republican Convention as an honored person. An honest Bible-believer would hold that, becuase of this stain of sin on the family, by strict Biblical standards, Governor Palin would not be morally fit to hold high offoce. Yet when someone brings it up, thise vessels of God's Righteous Wrath hem, haw, attack and deny like a liberal who is confronted with the irrefutable nature of the fact that 1+1=2. This is totally independent of what I think, it's just in the line of "Poppa Don't Preach [for over 40 years]". So we have another case of "in the tank"

The concept of tank'edness is attached to the concept of bias. The liberal mainstream media. Now proved beyond a shadow of a doubt to be in the tank with the loony left. The number of Pulitzer Prizes that the writers of NEW YOURK TIMES and BOSTON GLOBE published have had to retrun, due to bogus material and sub-par editorial oversight is driving these publications in the hole and Television news ratings are going down the drain faster than Liquid Plumber with his ass on fire.

Ye they charge Rush Limbaugh and others with 'bias", which has, as a characteristic, editorial dishonesty, as they know well.

Now I've done a job on Rush, Hannity and especially Neal Boortz. read CREDIBILITY. However you'll notice one thing. and this is where the game has chnaged; and the biggies should know this but they same strangely oblivious and when you show them, it's deer-in-the-headlights time. The WWW has made it possible to source a story with ease. and these guys have their webmasters link to the website and story that they read. In fact, I recommend the sites at the end of the article on credibility.

Now, just why the mainstream media don't get this, I don't know: Especilally since most of the websites that these persons link to are mainstream media sites and outlets. Rush Limbaugh does not use wierdo sources for his stories nor does Boortz although the spin they put on them occasionally taxes the idea of sanity but the story, if lined to is usually good. This is where the mainstream media leave the Reality Reservation and go "into the tank". Are they so far gone that they don't realize that this does not serve them well? Are they so stupid as not to grasp what's in plain sight, are they so childish as to think that persons can't find out what's up in 5 minutes or are they so mired in the last millenium that they don't reaize that radios and the Internet are everywhere ; "omnubient [more ubiquitous than 'ubiquitous']?".

How is a sane, aware and rational person to deal with this? It's like taking with a so-called medical doctor who doesn't know what "medicine" means or a mechanic who looks at you like a Martian when you mention things like 'wrench", "screwdriver" or "motor" and then turn around and talk and act lik you are the one that's dumb. LIke a top-flight financier lending $260,000.00 to someone on Welfare! Lemme guess, that's happened, right and the suposed'y smarter guardians of the economy have elected to bail them out, right? Wotta country!

If Al Qaeda ever discovers how dumb their opponents are, they'll either really pour it one or walk awy out of disgust and pity (What the hell's the use in flogging someone to shreds if they're too dumb to feel it and know they're being flooged to a pulP). PLease, tell me it's a case of rope-a-dope and part of some master plan devised to fool someone by persons with 180 IQ's, because mine, at age 63 is up in the high 130's and I'm flummoxed.

Can the Establishment be as dumb as it looks?
----- -------- TITLE: Entry #31 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 09/24/08 01:08 pm STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: Now, we all know who's on first. Some of us know that the mudder eats the fodder. But how many of us know about the persons who works in a leather (AFIK) factory and has to "dye ['die'] to live"?


Well back in '98, I took poison to live.


Now when you hear the hucksters of "alternative" medicine talk about it, it sounds like you're worse of than if you do nothing. I've also had radiation therapy and immunotherapy. I've even had anti-matter in me. So let me see, I've been in chemical, nuclear, biological and anti-matter warfare. Wall, as a 30th century Space Patroller, that sounds reasonable. Except that this was in the twentieth and twent-first centuries.


As I said, to hear the hucksters talk about it, I should be dead? No, note merely dead, but really quite sincerly dead. Not only am I not dead, but at the ripe old age of 63, I went on a 6 mile walk and figure to be abile to double that with little wear on the bod.


So what's the big deal.


Now to be sure, I've been poisoned. The substance is called Cytoxin (sounds like "cell poison [cyto+toxin and the chemical name is cyclo-phosphimide]". Also part of that was a substance calle vincristine, which is another poison and Prednizone, which is a steroid (So if you hear it said that I was doing steroids, you heard right). Yet here I am. It is true that by the middle of the fourth quarter of '98 I was a bit the worse for wear and at the end of the radiation therapy I'd lost a few pounds (which I could easily afford anyway) but I'm still hale and fit.


How come?

Well The radiation was targetted and well-aimed but the problem was that it was in the oral area where some delicate parts are.


the more interesting stuff was the poisons; cytoxin and vincristine. Now, vincristine is, they tell you made from a pretty flower; the periwinkle. However, it is a powerful alkalin and did the worse part of the wear on me. The Prednizone, while a steroid, was not the baseball steroid which is an anabolic steroid, Prednizone is a catabolic steroid. It's purpose is to make the cytoxin effective.


You see. for all the toxicity of the cytoxin, it's action is limited to cells at a very specific stage in their lives: Division stage. Now as it happens, this is the chief part of a cancer cell's life. The poor bugger is programmed to divide uncontrollably and as fast as its little mitochondriae will go. The purpose of the catabolic steroid is to encourage cells that are near the division stage to jump over.

I can just imagine it:

Cancer Cell is in its house, minding its own business and Prednizone knocks at the door and when Cander answers, Preddie says "I have here an invitation for you to start dividing at will", Cancie says "What do you take me for? I do that and I get the crap beat outta me". Preddie says "Do I look like I'm carring a weapon?". Cancie looks up and down, into Preddie's pocket and finds zada and says "Woo-hoo! and starts dividing, sticking its tongue out at the other cells. Then out from behind Preddie jumps Cy Toxin with a huge club and beats Cancie into a pulp. Then Cy and Preddie shake hands and Preddie looks in the addresss book and says "Hmmml 537-B Lymph Node Way: Let's go, Cy"


Now there are other "fast dividing" cells like hair and blood that kind of get caught up in the action and Preddie and Cy send you a note apologizing for "friendly fire". So with over a gram of a potent poison in me, I was in no danger at all and didn't even get the heaves.


How come you get the heavess? Well, the chemicals go through your whole body (which is why they're calles "systemic " therapy), including the brain. Part of the brain controls the heaves and cytoxin can bugger it up. However before they hit you with the maijn course (or coarse), they dose you up with something called Keitrel which blocks the cytoxin from that part of the brain. Then they give you some pills to take if needed called Toracin. After that they still have five other anti-heave drugs. So in the case of a "CVP-1" course of treatment, I was pretty safe.


Now ther is one thing that they like to keep track of: Liver function so they do blood tests every so often; just in case



So it wasn't as hideous as it sounded, the poison is a targetted poison. also called a "narrow-band" poison. So it's not like the hucksters portray it, although I was a bit the worse for wear but I did beat off a deadly enemy so it was worth it.

Now to be sure, I had a very mild ("indolent" and "low-grade") form of lymphoma. But it seems to be becoming the rule that chemotherapy and cancer therapies are not the gruelling experience that was the norm even 20 years ago.


Part of this is also early detecion which was made possible by the CAT scan, which has a Space Patrol connection
----- -------- TITLE: Entry #30 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 08/27/08 07:45 pm STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: I hote to use Dr Edell as a punching bag but he makes it so easy that not to would be a dereliction of duty. He should really shut up or learn what he's talking about. Each morning he does a syndicated pre-recorded medical minute.. Well on the week of August 20, 2008 His Nibs starts with the old diet thing saying how little the rest of the world has to eat. He then goes into the usual hate-America thing by saying that Americans should eat 2500 Calories and they in fact eat 3750 or thereabouts. and that "Maybe if Americans ate less there would be more to go around" If you doubt that he hates this country, it is the US he mostly rags on and he supported the God Damn America preacher (couching it in the usual "we have to understand..." which has long benn codespeak, I means loooooong, like before I was born and in the case of Pastor Wrong, out of date for two generations. How come Blacks who come here from other countries start right in and ride a rocket up the food chain, never looking back while American Blacks get the reputation of being a bunch of bitching gang-bangers?).

This is the same damn kind of guilt trip that every snotty lefty uses and that Ayn Rnad tore OxFam limb from limb for in the middle 1970's.That it is still being peddled proves that not only does the left not have a take, but it is NOT fresh and boy howdy does it suck! the "If it weren't for Americans there would be more to go around". If it weren't for Americans Earth would be more third world than its position in the Solar System. It was the United States that made the Industrial Revolution an international pheomenon. and it was the US that saved the world's chestnuts in World Wor II and won the Cold War without firing a shot by outproducing the Soviet Union to the point where they could not feed their war machine well enough to keep up. you know; the World's #1 Socialist Utipia, and saved the world from becoming a giant gulag. If you doubt the benevolent effect of the US, look at life prior to the Industrial Revolution. It was a world beset with sickness and plague. It was a world that ran on connivance, and brutality where your fortune in life was made by your status of birth, where looting and war were how nations improved their lot. It was a world of a 37 year Life Expectancy and from which (hopefully a quick and painless) death would be a welcom respite. It was a world without enought to go around. It was the world that the West and particularly the US went a long way in putting an end to. And for him to say this as plans were being maide to send humanitarian aid to the Republic of Gerogia. The worst that can be said of Dr. Edell is that he knows what he's talking about.

I alsways wonder about the nature of evil in this respect. Do its practitioners know how dumb they are? If Dr. Edell is this competent in miedicine then the world is in deep doo-doo. Just the bold-faced effrontery of this kind of thing says "I don't think you're smart enough to see the obvious".

Does he not know what country sends more aid to the third world than any?
Does he think that the world is a unified planetary polity so that nations aren't independent entities and the rules that govern one governs all and does he think that there is a single culture across the globe? and if he knows this is not true than how can he imply that we hold the fate of others in our hands? Does America's wrti run in Africa, China or anywhere in the "third world"? If it does, that's news to a whole helluva lot of people.
Let me quote Aym Rand "Freedom is what the 'haves' have and the 'have nots' have not".

But to promote the idea that, to stare the image straight in the face, it's the Americans who are taking food out of the mouths of the rest of the world is the kind of thing that has "wotta creep" wrtten all over it and can only have the prupose of moral intimidation. And said at the nation that has gone light centuries beyond the call of duty to ameiliorate pestilence, disease and poverty? Bettween "wotta" and "creep" requires "dumb" the kond of language that Ayn Rand said "...I do not care to see in print" followed by a session with the boys and a couple of stout clubs in back of the barn for the sheer effrontery. The fact that Dr. Edell can still speak is ample proof that there is no God.

Now at no point did Dr. Edell speak in medical terms, only political ones. It's this kind of crap that makes pigging out a virtue because it sticks the middle finger right smack dab in the facess of the Guiltocracy. So chow down America you've earned it! Oh BTW, how much money do you make Dr. Edell? You once said that you would not go back into medicine because you did not want the pay cut. Do you suppose that if you got less money there would be more to go around? You also bemoaned the state of medicine. Well why do you want to inflict upon Agriculture the same conditions that have ruined medical practice in the Socialized world and are doing the same in the US?

Given the tenor and tone of your political/social rants; the boat goes both ways. Not only that, but you'll have more of it to yourself on the way out than those coming here. Why do you suppose the West has an illegal immigration problem? So either take a hike or stuff the constant moral outrage. Aside from the hypocrisy, I at a loss for words to describe the intellectual credibility; read "smarts", of someone bitching and moaning for an hour about a place while standing a yard away from a door that is so widely open that you could drive the Death Star through it with a galaxy's worth of room to spare. Go figger.
----- -------- TITLE: Entry 29 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 08/01/08 08:05 am STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: Sometimes it's the afterthought that counts. The first thing you hear out of the Right is what they believe is right with the US (even if, like the war in Iraq, it's dead wrong and evil, having not been rationally based on a real threat). You have to ask them specifically for things that they think are wrong. On the other hand. The Left is all too quick to point out what they believe is wrong and you must extract from them what's right which is only gotten after much effort and a good deal of avian dental skill.


Rush Limbaugh was agog sometime back over a study that showed that Republicans were more satisfied than Democrats across social and economic lines. I presume this study was legit since he doesn't usually go for the crackpot fringe stuff (in fact he avoids it like the plague for fear of it rubbing off on him).


One of the reasons that Airhead America hit the crapper was that it was a continuous stream of bile.

Whether it's DailyKOS, The NY Times or James Carvil, and for the last 40 years from the Left has been one long vicious attack on the US and schemes. like Environmentalism, "post industrialism" and a whole host of things that are clearly visible as unworkable, designed to weaken and destroy it. The minute they open their mouths, a reasonably astue person will find the wrong in what they propose. And it doesn't take an Einstein, just someone who's awake, moderately intelligent and willing to take these folks at their word. Just look at what poor Barack Obama has picked up in the way of vocal supporters. Reverend Wrong and the aptly named Ludicrous; The scum of the Ear...Galax...Universe. and vicious scum, too.

there has to be a reason for this.


As to that reaosn I can only hypothesize since I am not of this ilk. I can only use what I know of history and psychology. If you look at the definition I use for the human soul it is "The faculty of volitional rational consciousness" Further, I hold that this characteristic resides in the human individual. Further, it is metaphysically and exitentially true that the individual of any group exists apart from and before that group.

Now look at the origins of the so-called "progressive" of which the liberal of today is a subcategory, having drifted left over the decades from 1965. The origin is in three groups. clergy, politicians and intellectuals. Well, to the clergy, Man is basically evil under the doctrine of "innate depravity" and the uptimate Utopia is a welfare state of some kind ("Give us this day our daily bread") either redistributionist or socialist or even Communist. For the politician, the answer to all problems is government.

This leaves the intellectual. Well, he goes from a (usually better off ) home into the protected environment of the University. Unless he is in the Sciences, in which case he's not an intellectual, he goes into the humanities. For the last 300 years, the job of the intellectual is to question. In its proper role, this leads to answers. However, today, the intellectual is trained to believe that there are no answers (then just what makes him an intellectual as opposed to a self-absorbed dream is not known. In fact, at this time they are one and the same). Over the past 140 years, led by the "muckraker" journalist, the intellectual is programmmed to look for what's wrong, whiich means everything that is not "progressive" which means some form of Collectivist, Marxist, Tribal or anything but individualism. fredom and capitalism. Thus you've seen the "Intelligentsia" drift from love of the Soviet Union, to Tribal Africa to the Muslim Arabic nations with the only consistent hatred being that of the West


In a sane and rational society, that is recognizing and being in touch with the world at large, the purpose of questioning is to find the answers to fix problems or to make things better. When these activities dearl with human nature, behavior and social structure, it is called "the Humnities". It is probably as vital as the sciences of Physics, Chemistry and Biology because it enables us to get the best use out of the special sciences and out of ourselves


However, the leitmotif of the intellegentsia has been as described by Ayn Rand as "militant uncertainty, dogmatic agnosticism and crusading cynicism". A kind of "Forgive me Father, for I know not what I do. and I don't want to know, either". The archtype being Sergeant Schultz writ large.


Well you see that kind of self-alientation of the intelligentsia, the basic egocentrism (being self-absorbed) and the self-righteous pseudo-elitism (how can one be both an elitist and egalitarian?) and you see why, after awhile, societies kill off the intelligentsia. No self-respecting humna being will tolerate being called crap by snotty, unemployable spoiled brats who never worked a day in their lives.

So, by and large for the Right, what is wrong with the US is an afterthought. For the Left it's the central thought, having been programmed to that way like mind-numbed robots. their minds are ste in reverse. I lost a lot of respect for Alan Combs when he called Howard Zinn a 'patriot". Zinn, during the 1970's was the quintessential hate-the-US far leftist. Of course, I lost a lot of respect for Alan Combs for trotting out Zinn in the first place. I mena Zinn? How about leisure suits, mood rings, disco and the other 1970's trashy kitsch? No wonder Shaun Hanity likes Combs: He's such an easy target.


The liberal who gives me fits, is Jay Diamond, who referred to the Conservatives economic view as a product of "a devout Russian atheist". Now, you gotta love the guy for that but when his attack on nuclear power is "uranium is rarer than oil", demonstrating the kind of ignorance that would have flunked him out of High School General Science in 1960, ya gotta say, "yup, he's a liberal all right. dumb as a stone'. That kind of stupidity just doesn't mesh with the insightfulness of the first statement. I guess he just parrots what he hears. Pity, I kinda liked him.
----- -------- TITLE: Entry #28 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 02/09/08 05:01 am STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: The title of my monthly column is "McGORE DELENDA EST. It explains why I adamantly oppose John M

Despite what the phoneycons and the hatefully desperate who happen to have made their home on the Right say. This guy is no Rightist. The record speaks for itself. He is an arrogant, unprincipled Washington insider. Well, he does have one principle: McCain uber allis.


Now, here's the crux of the matter. If you have no principled stand, then your "needle" is moved by something else. As I put it "[in politics] It's not what you know, it's who you owe". "Tell me who he goes with and I'll tell you who he is" goes the Italian saying", "Birds of a feather flock together", "Like attracts like [often said as 'shit attracts shit]".


The corollary is "like is attracted by like"


In short the similar band together.


Well who has McCain banded together with in a public way? If you find that out, then you know who he is like and who he owes.


Well, we have McCain-Feingold, reputed by Conservatives to damage the First Amendment by limiting freedom of political speech. Russ Feingold is said by the same Conservatives some of whom support McCaine, to be a liberal.


Then we have McCain-Kennedy aka the Shamnesty Bill. If you do not know what a screaming Commie that the Fat Drunk is then you need a life transplant



Then McCain-Liebermann puts him in the Green, as does his appearance with Arnold Maria Shriver (also a Kennedy) but do you know that Liebermann is a lib and considers himself a loyal Democrat.


We see that John McCain is very comfortable with big fat liberals, in fact more so that with those on the right. apparently regularly using the kind of language at supposedly his own that he would reserve for the North Vietnamese


So if he goes in with the liberal Dems beyond the point of happenstance then that is who he likes and who he is like.


And it follows like crap follows Ex-lax that these are the people he owes and in politics, it's not what you know, it's who you owe.
----- -------- TITLE: SHORT HOPS AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 10/29/07 10:35 pm STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: Short hops iS a kind of catch-all for the quick ones that really don't merit a whole entry but are still very telling. I'll just add the new ones at the top.

5 May 2008

I saw on the main page a link that said "report for abuse" and when I did, I found not one whip-wielding dominatrix, not one liberal, not even a McCainiac: HEY, WHERE THE [BLEEP] CAN A DICENT GUY GET SOME QUALITY ABUSE AROUND THIS JOINT??!!?

31 October 2007


*I got two messeges, both were junk mail. Time for Yahoo to put in either a spam killer or a "report as abuse" feautre


*Speaking of Abuse: While I have had nothing but contempt for Big Charity and particularly the March of Dimes (for not riding off into the sunset after the victory over Polio). They reached a new low. A couple of weeks ago the head of the MoD spoke for the Dems in the mater of S-CHIP. When they go into the political arena, it's time to pull the plug on them.


*Speaking of S-CHIP. Ya gotta love the Democrats on this. What they propose is to extend it to cover middle class, even private school kids, to be supported by a cigarette tax. Now we all know that it's the poor who buy the butts. You gotta love a transfer of wealth payment upward. Rob from the poor to give to the rich. Works for me.


*I have decided to reject the term "Islamo Fascists". It simply represents an attempt to steal a generic topic and put it in one's own pocket. We have had for years, Islamic Theocrats. Why invent a new term unless you're up to something? LIke African-American, mentally challenged, senior citizen and the other politically correct Newspeak phrases that have come to garbage up the wordscape. And since when have the phoneycons NOT been up to something?


----- -------- TITLE: Entry #28 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 09/29/07 04:06 pm STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: A few entries back, I said that the Radio Rangers, by being serial liars will have earned extinction at the hands of the government whose job is to prohibit fraud. Well, I tuned in on Hanity and got in in the middle of a discussion of John Kerry and hered "....They said they were there, they saw what happened..." which was about the Swift Boat Vets for Truth. As I have shown elsewhere that was a whopper fit to make Burger King throw a fit of envy that would be seen across half the Galaxy. Since the phoneycons touted, aided and abetted these malcontents' lies, they, too, are liars.

However. As if to demonstrate that Realilty is my minion. This bunch of phonies firmly set themselves in point blank range and are steadfastly holding the berral of their enemy's gun to their chest with a grip that only Kryptonite could break.

How so?

Recently, they have spearheaded a drive to have the House and Senate condemn moveon.org and its like (someone of some consequence out to call these toxic sites out but we don't have the Legion of Decency anymore. Better yet, only the real hounds know anything about them, most persons couldn't give a dogturd about; them or putting the effort into knowing about, them so why not just shut up and leave them in the oblivion that they so richly deserve?).

Unfortunately for them, this drive was successful.

Given that these are legislative, that is government bodies, this has more meaning than having the Little Girls' Tiara Tea Time Club doing this. It has now brought it into the purview of the government. If these clowns are so opposed to (turn on the audio spectrum and width enhancement and Hall Reverb) BIG GOVERNMENT then why did they do this? would in not be better to let sleeping dogs lie? Let somone else rouse the Rotweiler.

When I was about 7, we had this cat of uneven temperament. Well, I used to get a kick out of lightly pulling said cat's tial to make him jump. One day my Uncle says to me "Some day, you're going to do that too hard and he's gonna take a hunk out of you". Now, I was a smart kid and figured I was too smart to do that. Well, almost said and done. I get the idea that If I give the cat's tail a good pull, he'll really jump. I did and he did. But I did not reckon with other feline characteristics: speed and agility, and got a claw raked across my cheek; good and hard (Crap! If I'd have known about the add-on I wouldn't have downloaded the program), too. Well I went crying to Uncle and he looked at it for a few seconds and then said "Good. Now you'll learn" in a matter of fact voice..

It seems that Hanity, O'Reilly and Company are unaware of the Arab Proverb that says "Be careful what you wish for. You may get it"

Also under the heading of "the dog that bites your ass is the one you let out" Hillary Clinton, in so many words, accused General Patraeus of lying and the 4F troopers got their skirts in a skein. Didn't the Swift Boat Vets say that the Chain of Cmmand was corrupt for giving Kerry his medals while these guys just stood there playing pocket pool? To quote Ayn Rand "Today's unchallenged slogans become tommorrows accepted truths"

I'm sorry if I delight in baiting ths gaggle of goof-ups, but they so impale themselves on the hook. To a psychohistorian, this is madcap comedy, specifically, farce.
----- -------- TITLE: Entry #27 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 09/28/07 10:25 pm STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY: I've been away fro a while, I've had a crash and a change of default browser from IE to Firefox and I had to do some customization work on Fx and get used to it. I also found that some of the javasxript and some of the games derived from that javascript, as well as my beloved Math and Science Cosole and my favorite calculator don't work

Now to brass tacks:

You no doubt have seen me do a job on several of the "Radio Ranger". Those who sit beind golden microphones and cheer on the Bush administration in this pointless, immoral and lost war: Pointless in that there is nothing in it for us. Immoral because it was founded on a tissue of lies and speculation to justify thuggish aggression and unwinnable because the two major premises. a threat posed by Iraq and the silly notion that the Iraqis would welcome us with a pat on the back (half-true, they are looking for the soft sppot to plunge in the knife) and is there any language that you know of where "alien invader" and "friend" are the same, were bogus and therefore could not be done and the third "regime change" was a) illegal, b) a floating abstraction attached to nothing in reality: Read "airy-fairy" and c) had, has, and will have consequneces to us that are worse than the original conditions. An Iraq friendly to Iran, about which we cannot do dogsquat for two reasons. The Democrats will not let us, having been made credible, given the high moral ground and the superior postition by the failure to win (an impossible to win war) and the US military is shot to hell and can't do the aforementioned doggy-doo and know it. I call these clowns "radio rangers" because they use all the military jargon and as a response to their use of the term "PowerPoint Ranger" as a term of derision.

At any rate, you see me giving them the shiv good and hard and may think that I want you to boycott them.

Not so. I want you to listen to them, just don't acknowledge it publically.

I want this for two reasons:
1) To hear for yourself.
2) To see if I'm lying.

I am not a cult leader. I want informed readers. I sepcifically want to cultivate a readership that is on the Right. The Left has been the source of most of the humna-generated trouble in the world with their tyrannical methods and collectivist goals. The war for the Soul of America is a civil war on the Right.

However, I want you to listen to them intelligently, not just like a sponge

To do this, right. follow this rule. Read what I have to say and then listen to these guys. Use the premise that I've indicted them, but you are on the jury and I have to prove my case.

This means that you need a clear mind. not just jumping to conclusions based on things half-absorbed and half-understood. When I make a statement that "...This means that...." check the logic. For example. Many persons believe that while it was either a mistake or wrong to attack Hussein "...we can't leave and have to win (or finish or...)". If it was a mistake to start it, is not continuing it just continuing the mistake? To win, the original premises had to be true AT THAT TIME since they were the cause of the action, they weren't. Unless you have a time machine and can go back and wave a magic wand and make them true, they are false and actions taken based on those falsehoods are falsely done. Things done for a lie are part of that lie and its continuation. Until that is understood and accepted, the rift between that and reality will constantly dog the effort and grow wider and as time and the logic of the universe take their course (or coarse) the consequences of the action and the continuation of the actions will just accumulate and get stronger and nastier on down the line. for America and its people. There is also another reason why the Iraq war is lost. Imagine of teh USC, LSU or some #1 ranked college team came into your town with it's Community College team and at the end of regulation time, your guys were ahead by a touchdown, the #1 ranked team bullies 3 overtimes at the end of which they have a tie game. Whadaya think?

That is why the Iraq war is the most critical issue of our day. and it's perps thrown out of power without recourse and their cheerleaders have the pom-poms taken from them at no cost to honor. Their honor sailed of on a Swift Boat with some Not-too-swift beoat vets. Sew the wind (swift boat vets) reap the whirlwind (DailyKOS). Which will lead to my next entry.
----- -------- TITLE: Entry #26 AUTHOR: Space Patroller Laser DATE: 08/04/07 08:19 am STATUS: publish PRIMARY CATEGORY: ----- BODY:

What does it mean to be libertarian?

First it refers to one's politics; either a mindset or "ideology" or a set of political tenets. usually those associated with the Libertarian Party or "movement" "Libertarianism". Now as Peter Schwartz has pointed out. one of the libertarian movement's leaders in the 1970's, Murray Rothbard has supported the Sandinistas in Nicuragua, knowing full well what they were, and the Ayatollah Khomeini. knowing full well what he stood for. In both cases, it was predictable as night from day, that the regimes that these would create would be more repressive than what they replaced. Therefore this individual was either a liar or missing a few teeth and not getting a good bite on Reality. Some of the Libertarina party platforms have supported the Soviet-inspired and dominated Nuclear Freeze in the middle 1980's. Apparent'ly preferring Russia to Rand (that war is another thing; why trash a rational intellectual movement for druggies and Fellow Travellers?). In short, there are things that the Libertarinas do that earn them a bad name. What's so libertarian about Communism and Islamic Theocracy?

An UNearned bad name is the libertarian position on "recreational" drugs. Put plain and simple, they ought not be prohibited. Why? Didn't we find out the Prhoibition is a mega-flop: Even if justified, not doable at a price we are willing to pay or under conditions, which sane persons would want? In fact, when I studied the 1930' sin High School in early 1962, I found that the ink wasn't even dry on the Eighteenth Amendment Repeal and the drug prohibition laws were being put on the books. I wondered why they were doing the same thing with drugs that was being done with booze and failed. What is the definition of stupid if not doing the same thing that didn't work in one case and expecting it to work in another? Now, it is generally noised about that the libertarins are either stoners or support using such drugs. Some do, most don't. It must be realized that "libertarian" means a polictical position, meaning what the government ought and ought not be allowed to do., not a moral position, meaning what a person ought or ought not do.

It is at this point that I enter the picture. I am libertarian, not "a Libertarian".

OK, what does that mean?

It means that I supprot the position that the purpose and only functions of government is to prohibit the initiation of force and fraud in human activities, without doing either.

What does that mean in real world terms? Gimme some examples.

Well here are two. While it is float out off-limits for the government to ban pot, coke, meth or the like, tiere would be nothing wrong with shutting down the dietary supplement industry or putting it under control, including going after the radio and television channels that advertise this crap.

What's the difference? The Health Nut industry makes medical claims that are not only unsupported by research but are just plain false and in many cases the product is harmful or dangerous (my Ottolarygologist put it this way "If it does no good then it does harm" regarding something that was mis-prescribed to deal with a set of symptoms that I had that were not as the prescribing physican thought). Ditto astrology and a few other things. This DOES fall in the purview of the proper function of government and is why, in the 1980's I was concerned that the Environmentalists were not exterminated. They've been wrong across the board hand in the late 1980's admitted to lying. The whole movement is just one big collection of malcontents and nutjobs under the leadership of subversive elements who want to grab political power. As such, we need to put it down hard so that this ilk is afraid to raise it's ugly head again.

Another proper target of government is threats. This addresses things that in themselves or used properly would not merit this attention but in the real world or, "common usage", are routinely misused. Disposable diapers fall into this category: The instructions say to rinse them thoroghly before disposing but it is so rarely done as to be neglible. Instead they are just tossed out, fecal matter and all where they are exposed and the pieces scattered about by dogs, cats and other animals, or put in ladnfills and the harmful material "leaches" into the soil and maybe water table. Also Nuisances. This pertains to cell phones, It is really an imposition to have these creeps walkig around in places like mrketss yapping about crapola "Yes Honey...Should I get strawberries or bananas?...OK pudding, I'll stop at the bank...[yadda-yadda-yadda]". I would not be averse to banning the non-business ownership of these, not to mention driving while yakking on the phone. Ditto "junk mail" . First the compaines that are doing this obviously aren't paying enough postage or they wouldn't be so free with the crapola they send out. A good stiff rate increase for bulk is in order. These clowns have been getting a free ride on the backs of those using First Class. Also, they ought have an opt-in setup. Send one issue of whatever it is (usually some shoddy newspaper about things like Paris Hilton or some other degenerate) and If you don't sign up then they leave you alone. All of these are impositions and a kind of force. On long trips by bus, train or plane, it ought be mandatory that cell phones be collected and returend at the destination. There's nothing more irratating than having some potential gene pool reject running his mouth for hours. If one of them got strangled by another passenger, not only would I vote for acquittal but I would recommend that passenger for the Medal of Freedom: Freedom from boorish subhuman birdbrains! I can tell you that the non-busienss cell phone crowd is a blight on the human race. Just look at the commercials that the companies run. Any parents who give their minor offspring cell phones ought be deemed unfit and put in the deepest, darkest hole in the Galaxy with no contact with any beings with higher IQ's than they have, which is about 53 going downhill with a good tailwind.

Another area of proper government action would be the excessively loud audio systems. While this is more of a local issue, these are imported and the Federal government does have a right to oversee dealings with foreign entities and ban those that it deems contrary to the national interest. Now, a readio or any electronically amplified thing has an amplifier that is either off (no power) or fully on. All controls operate at the pre-amplifier stage. It is generally the rule that the closer the pre-amp is to passing 100% of the signal the more distortion and noise there is. That means that the amplifier is run at half to two-thirds of full power so that to get 20 watts of sound you run a 30-40 watt amp. With modern (high-efficiency) speaker systems and things like equaizers, you can get very good "recover" and "tune" for room acoustics. For home use, nobody has any business bieng allowed to havemore than a 50 watt amplifier 0r 60 watt home theatre. I had a 100 watt amp that I inherited and I never had the volume up over 1/3, and I like to boogie. Since then I have gotten a 125 watt subwoofer that cuts out at 300 cps so even cranked up all the way on its own it is not overly loud. My regular amp is about 50 watts. In 1968 a band could fill a gym with 64 watt Silvertone (Sears) amps (they were listed as 100 watts but that was a no-longer-used measuring system used for guitar amplifiers). At no time should the consumer market include home amps greater than 50 wats and vehicle amps greater than 10.

From the libertarian perspective. the saying is "The right to swing your fist ends where another's nose begins". Actualyl, your right to swing your fist and a foot short of the right of the someone else to swing theirs. Nuisance is a kind of force in that it imposes oneself on others who may or may not want it

Other activities that merit action are those companies that uue random phone number generators and taped messages to bother people. How many calls have you gotten with a taped message about a credit cared account with a company that you never heard of. Consumer credit ought be banned as it is just an encouragement to behave irrisponsibly that serves no good purpose and only causes mischief, such as clogging the courts with cases that would not exist otherwise: There are mruderers patieny waiting their turn. "Don't Call" lists should be made airtight so that when I say "don't call" that is what stands. Rebates are a fruad and used to be illegal since they represent dishonest pricing techniques. Many of these simply put persons who do not wish to participate at an economic disadvantage and do not belong in the "public square" where all by law should be treated alike. "Senior dixounts'" read age-based pricing out be banned, if for no other reason they violate anti-discrimination laws, but also there is a good reason to believe that other customers are charged more to make up for these practices which does not constitute association of the willing. Besides which activities like this are so un-objective that they generated questions of honesty and are violations of the idea that is implicit on our dealings that when a place "opens it's doors to the public" all recieve the same treatment. Private association or "member" outlets are not not bound by that presumption that should be a rule. Unfortunately there seems to be the attitude of dishonesty that if it's legal and there's not stated rule against it then it's OK to do. This "shapy" attitude is what gives business a bad name: Now I would not be averse to treating high-volume customers in a special way as long as it's done up front and open to all

This touches on another matter; butts and belts. Some say that the government has the right to act against smoking. First the science, as presented, is weak, since, among other things, no dosage-response tables or curves have been made public and there are allegations of fraud in the area of "second hand smoke" by reputable persons. In fact the whole presentation has been sloppy for the last 30 years and just from what I've studied in Research Methods at the elementary level leads me to believe that it does not pass muster and, in fact, the scaremongering of the tobacco nazis is probably killing more people than the butts. As to seatbelts: Neal Boortz supports mandatory use based on one of his experiences. He was driving and got sideswiped by some kid driver and says "...If my ass hadn't been belted in place, I would have bounced around and lost control and killed somebody" Now he has to be one of about 5 in all of time that this has happened to becuase while I've heard it presented as an argument for seat belt laws for years, he's the only one that I've heard that it happened to. Do we really need to build laws around something that rare? Why not ban toothpicks? You could put an eye out with that thing as, no doubt has happened a few times (the gene pool is still in need of some cleaining up).

On the other hand, you have the lunatics like Hanity and Mike Savage or demagogues like O'Reilly who alos commit fraud. I mean you have Hanity saying stuff like (about Dingy Harry Reid) "...is telling the troops that the war is lost...". I think the troops have been telling US that the Iraq war is lost. "...You can't pull out of Iraq or the terrorists will follow us home..." 911 happened BEFORE the Iraq war so I don't think the terrorists have any trouble coming to our door. amd a whole host of other lies and half-truths, read fraud. read Democratic tsunami bait. It is somehow reassuring that the Dems wish to turn the hose of "Big Government" on these clowns. Harry Browne, the only worthwhile Libertarian referred to the Iarq invasion as "The Ultimate Excercize in Big Governmetn...claiming the right to declare war on the entire world". So, if these guys got ye olde axe, well, it would be a case of not watching where you throw the boomerang and getting clunked in the back of the head by it. Not to mention the fact that it would clear the real Right of a cancer (a really nasty Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma)

One would be inclined to say that if you set off a bomb in a croweded room, it gets you too but this is not an exercize in "Big Governemt". If the government shuts them down it is doing as it should. Do you know Rush Limbaugh said that the First Amendment protects lying in the political sphere. How false is that when the libertarian position is that the function of government is to PROHIBIT THE INITIATION OF FORCE AND FRAUD. Why would Rush want to protect lying? I certainly don't since I don't have anything to gain from it and do not intend to do it (that does not mean I won't do it, it just means that I won't do it without provocation and only after due consideration).

As you see, a libertarian politcal view does not mean that "anything goes" or "anythihg is allowed". Nor is it the abollition of government. An institution to protect the citizens of a city, state, nation, world or star system from domestic and foreign use of fruad or force or some combination thereof is vital to keeping the peace, security and freedom of a people. That institution is a proper government. This is perfectly in keeping with a libertarian ideology: An ideology being an integrated, coherent and systematic set of principles regarding that branch of philosophy known as Politics. and derived from Ethics, which is in turn derived from Metaphysicis and Epistemology which are themselves irreducible primaries -- and the only irriducible primaries in philosophy.

Another way to grasp this is to think of two polar opposite models or government: Whate List and Black List.. They go like this. That which is not permitted, the What List, is forbidden vs that which is not forbidden is permitted. The first permits some things and makes the othe subject to government action (thumbs up or thumbs down). The second lists a number of things that are forbidden and leaves the rest alone. As you can see, the list (white or black) must needs be finite. Since there is an infinite number of things in the world a finite set of which we have listed, then there is an infinite number of things not on the list. Whate List government gives the governemt power over the infinite. Black List government restricts the power to the finite. the libertarian ideology supportsr Black List government. Soon the Whate List government becomes what is not commanded is forbidden. the rational libertarian view further stipulates that, because you have such a great lattitude then any Black Listed actions carry a strict enforcement policy and very heavy penalty, all out of proportion to what one could gan from taking those actions.

The penalty should be the three r's: retribution; "payback's a bitch", restitution; "You busted it, now you pay to have it fixed" and remembrence; "that'll learn ya!". Enforcement should be the three c's" consequence; "you did the crime, now you'll do the time", Contiguity; " and it starts tomorrow" and continuity; "you keep doing it, and we'll keep doing you".

But what shall the job of government be. Since it is chareged with prohibitig the initiation of force and fraud and not allowed to initiate either then it shall have only three jobs that relate to those: Internal protection from thugs, cheats, liars and the like, known as police power. protection from external assault, that is military power and the power to act as the ultimate arbiter of claims and disputes. That is, judicial power. No more and no less. But that is quite a tall order. Please note that as the Federal Government has gone into other fields; Education, Insurance, Regulation, it has done the three major functions less and less well. Little Johnny is being well-indoctrinated to worship at the Church of Global Warming but his sister gets raped and his cousin gets mugged and the perps get off.

That's pretty much the sane libertarian ideology. and that's what it means to be libertarian.

This blog is part of a larger whole. As such, it does not stand alone. I often comment here about things I've done elswhere and elsewhere about things I've don here.

Part of that is correcting errors. I will go through the Archives of this blog or things on my website and find typographical or other errors and fix them. This may seem odd at first but you must realize one thing. I keep archives.

That means that just because a "From the Cockpit" has a specific month attached to it doesn not mean that when that month ended the principles or information became invalid or false. Consequently. I set up ways to access past "From the Cockpit"s and blog entries.

I do all the writing and editing myself. That includes proofreading. Now, the worst kind of editiong is self-editing. You miss your own mistakes very easily (especially, if like me, you are not used to making mistakes. No ego here; huh? Does "the size of the Death Star" do it for you). I use multiple pass-throgh, meaning I look the work over after I type it up. I usually find a few and fix them. Then I come back a few days later and find some more and when I come back a third time about a week later. Guess what!

This is not unique to me. I studied this in English Composition. My experience with Spell Check's have been less than promising.

More on the "Fairness Docrtrine" and the Radio Rangers

It should be noted that when the Fairness Doctrine was abandoned. the major media went from 85% Democrat to 93% and the bias in reporting became blatant, usually in the edtiong stage. One instance I witnessed is Howie Carr's (for whom I have no love but in whose case I must be honest) program where he did a full hour segment on 'gun control" while NBC was visiting and rolling film. I was l istening so I can speak to this. The calls were overwhelmingly against "gun control", having identified it as codespeak for confiscation, to the tune of about 3 to 1. the first pro call did not come in until 30 munutes after the hour. Don't you know that on the nightly news, that was the call they showed (cue image of Opus saying "Somehow, didn't you just know it"). This one I can speak to and Carr predictied that it would be the case, too. Not only biased, but STUPID.

But to recap the earlier post. The phoneycons who run the Radio Right are afraid that the Democratically controlled Congress will restore the Fairness Doctrine and use it to shut them down. The reasoning being that since there are no viable liberal counterparts, the stations that buy their syndicated shows will stop doing so. I don't see that as the case, but if so, so what? I've proved these clowns to be either stupid or dishonest and not worthy of being allowed to continue.

However, there is another side to this. If things keep going as they are going. the Democrats will have it all in the election of '08 and big time. Now, no doubt these guys will be screaming their heads off, not realizing or not caring that they will have helped their enemies. Or, some more Republicans will start opposing the War in Iraq, either seeing it for what it is--a lost cause or seeing their careers at risk. I mean this crap actually came out of Bill O'Reilly: the war is a lost cause because the Iraqi government is not meeting it's obligation but we can't leave or the poeple who want us to lose in Iraq will win (Newsflash to America's Demagugue: There was no WMD, the chaos is the Iraqi form of Democracy and you have regime change. Don't like it. Huh? and they've duelled us to a standstull for 4 years, the equivalent of a high school team duelling the N.E. Patriots to a standstil for 3-1/2 quarters: The "L" is in the record book already). Pretty sick stuff if you ask me. We should just take the loss, come home, get rested andback into shape and get ready to deal with Iran: We're pretty much at the raw ends of things now so that when Iran and Syria know that we're 3/4 whipped, they can come in and have an easy time of it. So, either way say "Hello Ayatollah". Hey Rush; where's that "cakewalk" you promised us.

Congress may be able to shut these guys down but I'm not very sure of that and they would be justified in doing so (For one thing, you pull the cat's tail and you get what you get), but ought they? First, this and sports keep AM readio functioning but let's look at another thing. The further out of power these clowns get, the shriller they will get. The Democrats and liberals can make them the "face" of the Right (which they claim to be but are not but when did "lying" and "politician" cancel the wedding? Don't forget Harry Reid was as heavily into Jack Abramoff as any Republican and all he said about it on Airhead America Radio was "That's old stuff"; you call THAT a denial?) So having them around serves a purpose. when there is opposition to, say, Carbon Dioxide rgulation (a persons can only breathe twice a minute). Some crackpot liberal can say "oh, do you want to be like Neal Boortz?" End of story. Then too, they can just point at them and laugh or worse yet. do the equivalant of patting them on the head and saying "so cute".

Kool-Aid poisoning in action.

"How's your universe"

That used to be how Ayn Rand greeted her friends

What has thsi to do with me?

I am a Randite. That means that I adhere to a specific central tenet.

The Universe exists apart from and prior to anyone's knowledge, information, data, thoughts, feelings, fantasies, wishes or ... and the only proper way to obtain knowledge of this universe is by the faculty or Reason, which is the uniquely human faculty that integrates the material provided by the senses or their surrogates into a non-contradictory, integrated, organized, hierarchical whole by means of logic.

Now if this is true and if the central tenet of Randism is the external existence of the Universe; How is it that Miss Rand had that particular greeting?

While I can't speak for her, I can speak about her. To my knowledge, Rand was human. Well, we are all human, more or less, right?

Being human means that we all have this property of Reason. Presuming that it is functioning properly and you use it correctly then what happens?

Well, in the section of "Randism" on philosophy I said to the effect that "...Philosophy will not tell you if you are in Uhtah or Iraq" or how to cure leprosy or even if that is possible."...but it will tell you how to find out".

It will tell me how to find out, too. it will tell Joe Schlunk the Midget how to find out. It will tell...

Isaac Newton observed that the laws of science operate throughout the universe and though the specifics vary, they general operation is the same. The Law of Conservation says that matter and energy cannot be created or destroyed, only changed in form.

If the keys to this are universal operation of the laws of science and the laws of science are acquired by reason and logic, as history has shown, and this is an aspect of philosopjy then philosophy models the universe: That is, makes a miniature of it in some way to meet one or more need. The sounder the philosphy the better the model. If each of us carries in the faculty of mind a model of the universe that is complete; only in miniature then each of us "has" a universe. just as each piece of a broken hologram carries the whole image

Now, I hold that Randims is the only proper philosophy since it holds to the absolute external existence of the Universe, or , Existence and the absolute, total and sole propriety of Reason as the tool of knowledge. Therefore as a Randite, I carry the best model of the Universe with me.

How's your universe? MIne is the best there is.

Oh how the mighty have fallen.

The Radio Right is now in fear of its job, Apparently certian persons in the Congress want to "do something" about them; Trent Lott, Barabara Boxer and Hillary Clinton.

Well if you look at the record, then you woold spare no tears for them: They deserve none. What they dewever is to be put out of work.

When Bill Clinton was impeached they shouted "Rule of Law!" in a single voice. The fact is that while Clinton did commit Perjury, it was really unecessary and therefore stupid ( I didn't despise him for being a liar as much as I did for him being a stupid liar). Had he told the truth, under a law that he pimped and signed, it would have been seen that there was no violation of any law. Monica practically stalked him. Now when Scooter Libby gets hit they scream. that there was no underlying crime for him to be covering so he ought to get off. That is true but the apparent gross and whoesale Perjuy was the crime. Libby was tried by a Jury of his Peers and found guilty. but this was a "prosecutor out of control. [heard that from the Dems in '98]". I guess it just depends whose ox is gored. But wait, isn't that liberal moral relativism?

Now, Shaun Hanity is wailing about "defunding the toops" referring to attempts to no longer throw goodly amounts of money down the rat-hole that is Iraq and has been for 5,000 years. This is a clever lie designed to bring up images of US troops being abandoned wholesale on the battlefield. There has been a White HOuse-Talk Show complex with the Radio Rangers repeating all the lies of the Administration and these were not stupid lies either, they were cleverly crafted by pairing certain images while not overtly linking them. But I guess when your a Party stooge, only the other party robots are robots.

Rush coined a term "Politics of personal destruction": And just what have this band of bitchers and moaners and the administration done to thsoe who disagreed with them? Scott Ritter was accused of a heinous crime by the Radio Robots and when told to produce, the "records were sealed". Richard Clarke was made to look like an lunatic and more, in a campaign that was worthy of the Clinton Adminisration. It'll take years to remove the crap that this crowd has smeared on the wall.

Talk about dumbing down the people? Neal Borrtz was peddling both the WMD theory and supposed links between Hussein and Al Qaeda enven after the Administration had given up on the former and just two days before the de-classification of documents refuting the latter. And we thought only the Teachers Unions did the dumbing down. Silly us. He's been a one-man NEA.

Not to mention that the phoneycon administration has cooked up illegal schemes and performed illegal acts to rival the previous one and has put us back into deficit and spent over 15% more on social programs and give-aways than the allegedly liberal predecessor. I suppose that fiscal responsibility is found in the bottom of a Kool-Aid glass.

And as far as being "green", Listen to Bush and tell me who he sounds like. Does "Jimmy Carter on 'roids" do it for you?

You get the point? To thine own self be true.

If I did not despise the liberals to whom the term "seat belt nazi", "safety nazi", 'health nazi", and now "carbon nazi" have been applied over the past two decades. and I did not coin these terms except for "carbon nazi"; in every case "nazi" is the repeating word, I would consider what Hillary and Boxer have in mind for these serial liars and abusers an unadulterated victory for truth and justice.

As it is I must support the people I despise beucause the Radio Rangers are getting a comeuppence that is a proper response to their antics over the last 4 years. It's just that the administrators of this mega-spanking are themselves covered in excrement. However, there is one thing that the Left cannot do; stab us in the back. The Administration has practiced serial Big Government. Now we cannot go after Iran as we ought because our cred is blown and we're beat up and tired. Who believes these Giabronis about Globull Warmingism, despite the fact that the carbon nazis cannot prove their claims for another decade? In fact, who believes them about anything? They've reached a status I once reserved for the liberals only the've sunk lower on both the integrity scale and the food chain, becoming fitting prey for stray paramecia. Even former Reaganites have turned on them. Notably, Jim Webb and Bruce Bartlett. If the Shamnesty Bill was not opposed by 80% of Americans and the CONgress wasn't sticking it's upraised Middle Finger in the face of the electorate, would you believe these fudpuckers? Perhaps the ultimate irony and justice will be that these clowns will be done in by an alliance of the statists for whom the'yve practiced serial enabling and the Monsters from their worst nightmares.

What I have catalogued here and elsewhere aren't simple errors and lapses, either. unless you believe that Rove, Perl and Wolfowitz are brainless dolts. Evem "Shrub" had better academic socres than either Kerry or Gore who we are still being told are smarter than Einstein. They're too subtle (with the exception of Mike Savage, who had the honer of being listed as one of the persons screwing up America by the same guy who showed liberal bias in the media to be an absolute fact, who mostly sounds like a bellowing bull in a hollow barrel with the manner of a low-grade crime boss and spoiled brat in need of some parental stimulation). So we know that they are deliberate. Their beloved Fox News is the toy of a man in bed with Hillary Clinton, shovelling big coin her way, and Red China (take a bow Ruppert Murdock) and is not even an American.

It is the job of Gonvernment to put the frudulant out of business, whoever the fraudulant are and whoever the government is. However if seems that this is the mice being eaten by the rats and would not be a thing to be cheered; only tolerated save that the Talk Show Turdocrats have been involved in the affairs of government for years and in defense of the most corrupt and, at the same time, inept and Socialist clique in years, having more in common with Ted Kennedy than Ronald Reagan.

I have come to the conclusion that one of the best philosophers in the world is Opus the Penguin. Opus was the character in Bloom County, which had its heyday in the middle 1980's along with Garfield, that seemed to always get it in the neck. What I have in mind is one particular strip. Opus is looking in the widnow of a door that indicates that this is a meeting of the newspaper editors, whom you see sillouhetted against the window, acknowledging some orders they are being given on the telephone. The second panel shows Opus watching them end the coversation with "Da [Russian for 'yes']" and "Yes Comrade" and the like. The third and final panel shows Opus looking at the reader with a pained look on his face and saying "Somehow, didn't you just know it?".

The reference is a dig at the Conservative image of the newspapers "taking orders from Moscow". Well, very few Conservatives believed that to be literally true and those who did were relegated to the tinfoil hat crowd by the Tories who had the train on both rails. It had been my contention that "Moscow was taking orders from the editors" which I explained with the idea that the Soviets were acting out the ideas propounded by the world's "intellectuals"

However, I did realize that Opus was on to something. Now, substitute for those editors some diminutive aliens carrying off a human. Or, US leaders talking on the phone to the head of the Council on Foreitgn Relations, or well pick your hate target and go to town.....

Again. you could have Opus looking at the Moon through a telescope, the second panel would show what he sees; the lunar landscape with a bunch of mismatched socks, Amelia Airhardt's plane and Jimmy Hoffa talking to her and a sign saying "Atlantis: 35 Miles" or... Panel 1; Opus picks up a BB gun. Panel 2; he fires it at a can about 20 feet away and Panel 3; he's looking at you with one eye gone and saying "Somehow, didn't you just know it?" Or...

Well that was my reaction when I was told about 3 days ago in a conversation that some experts were attributiong to "Global Waarming" a phenomenon that was previously attributed to some other cause. Now that has to be the most insightful bunch in the world considering that this notion has yet to be vetted after almost 20 years and the latest "proof" is less than a year old and itself would take 5 years to study (that's the nature of science. It's called "replication of finding", then you have to do actual experiments of the sort that say "if we do x then y will happen" after defining all your terms and how they meet spec and those have to be repeated with the same or reasonably similar results all of which means that you've got a decade ahead of you at the least). Somehow, didn't you just know it?

What is significant about this is the Social Science: Specifically of fads and manias like the famous study of flying saucer "clubs" (read "cults"). Now I don't know what the phenomenon was that was being attributed to GW or who the "experts" were but I can imagine, Science in The Public Interest, Earthshare, The Sierra Club or some other leftist cult comes to mind. However, the sign that a cult is at work here is revisionism to fit a currently fashionable model that has yert to be proven. This is so well known that jokes have been done about it since it was first alleged in the Soviet Union some 50 years ago. Any pairing of Eco-freaks and the Soviet Union brings to mind what the president of the Czech Republic said of them.

"Revisionism" is a sign that something is getting ready for the dog track. Given the recent program on British television showing that all is not well in Global-Warmingland and we just migh be finding out that this cult is ready to join the Flat Earth Society, or better yet, Heaven's Gate or Jonestown; Quick, pass the Kool-Aid. Especially since I've heard, not from the Radio Right, but from the True Believers that 2009 is the target date for "....regulating Carobon". Quick; hand me the Kool-Aid! I have to stop breathing!

Perhaps there is another name I could bring up. In "King Solomon's MInes' The 98 year old crone villainess, Gagool, upon seeing the tribe getting bent out of shape over an eclipse says "I've seen this before. It wil pass". I hope I can add her to my list of the wise in this case so that we can get back to living free of those who, at the very least, insult our intelligence and try our patience. Remeber "cold fusion"?..."Cold what? Fusion who?"...Exactly. 'Tis a pity we emptied the nuthouses those 3 decades ago in another liberal scheme with the same results as 99% of all liberal schemes. We have had 39 years to learn that Environmentaism, like Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Sick Building Syndrome and Irritable Bowel Syndrome is what is called a Mass Sociogenic Disorder, best explained by the words from Simon & Garfunkel's THE BOXER: "All lies in jest; still a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest".

There is a saying. "You can't go home again". In about 1989 or 90 I had a dream. I was in high school, specifically my class that was a jumped-up Civics, class but with a more global/current events perspective. As such and given that it was 1962-3, my Senior year, then it was during the "Cold War". Forget what you hear from the liberal wags (who were either dopes or on dope), This was real and was a real clash of ideas that could have turned violent and the Soviets were competent and well-armed. Anyway, back to the tale. While the setting was my class, the people were not my then-classmates. They were persons in my life, including my talk-show adversaries. Well, in the course of the dream, I became aware that these were not my then classmates and the year was not '63. I got in a conversation with my instructro, who was also my Home Room instructor. and he said "You can't go home again" to which I said, "That is true, but can I bring 'home' here?"

SpacePatrol.us is the answer to that question. In several ways. Let me tell you about Space Patrol and me. From the time I was almost 4, I had a fascination with things that fly : Birds, kites and especially planes, of which I saw many overflying my home. Then In the Spring of 1952, while still in first grade, at about 6-2/3, I saw this newsreel type show on television called TIME MARCHES ON. One episode of this showed the now famous flimclip of a rocket launch with the camera pointed backward, showing the receding earth, etc. I was blown away. At that point, I became a Space Nut. Some two months later, my older cousin was staying over. One Saturday, he got hold of the TV and turned it on. Up comes this program called Space Patrol. Well, my eyes must've bugged a foot out of my head. Then when I found that it was a regular thing; well....

Now, there's "space cadet TV" and Space Patrol. If you go to my site and watch the episode that I feature, you wll get the essence of this program, or go read SPACE PATROL FOR DUMMIES in the ORIENTATION SECTION. You will find that Space Patrol actually had some dramatic content. Though plot-driven, the characters had depth and were more than cardboard cut-outs. The format and perspective, not being confined to the Space Academy focusing on late adolescents, but focusing on adutl characters and going all over the place, gave a wide view of the 30th century civilization with the Space Patrol Handbook delving into the political system and many of the stories being about politics and Space Patrollers gone bad. The show had breadth and depth unlike no other of it's kind.

This put a whole new spin on things for me. By the Columbus day timeframe of that year. I had become associated by grownups with the belief that we would go to the moon. I had never express such, so I think they were putting words in my head that expressed something of their own ideals (of which going to the moon was only a part) and did not wish to take responsibility for. Having gotten the Space Bug before even knowing about "Space Cadet" TV, I knew the facts from the fiction. I had no idea whether or not we would go to the moon; I had just turned 7 by this time. In my second grade class, we had an art project that consisted of using construction paper to make a picture of one of Columbs' ships in the open ocean. While working on this, The memory of the attribution to me of the belief that we would go to the moon came to mind and I decided that, from what I was hearing of Columbus and given what wes going on around me, that, yes this would happen.

a few months later, I was a committeed "spce cadet". I was in a second grade science class and considering the issue of space travel in the context of Space Patrol, now a weekly fixture in my life, and concluded that if we are to see that kind of world, we would have to "get smarter", though I did not know what that meant specifically, I knew that the things like numbers and science were the central issue. About a year later. I was considering the matter of the future and the image of Space Patrol came to mind. I then asked myself if that was worth going for. Then a though hit me. It was not the specific concretes of the world, that is, Buzz Corry, The Terra V or anything like that, It was the KIND of world. I realized that I must decide if this was possible and if not, give it up. I decided that it was and realized that Space Patrol was a representation of a kind of future, not the future.

Now move the clock ahead some 15 or 16 years and I come across the fuction and non-fiction of Ayn Rand. I examamined her philosophical system. I was skeptical. The only thing we had in common was that we were both atheists. I was a "scientific socialist" and she a rip-roaring pro-capitalist and, to me, as to many persons who come across her, a conservative of some kind. This apprent contradiction just gave me cause to look more closely. When I "got" it, I said "This will power Man to the Stars: Space Patrol come to life [meaning the kind of world of which I now understood that SP was the best representation of]". Then when I read her work about "sense of life" I found that it explained with crystal clarity almost to the point of having a loud "click" and to the last decimal place, what SP had meant to me. So I grabbed it up and never looked back save for astrogational purposes.

In 1966, I became a devotee of the Combo Organ, it's slick, rocketship sound and futuristic looks just resonated with me to the nth degree. This instrument led to the various syntheisizers and things.

That completes the story except for the ending, if it is an ending. Reread the first part.

when I was a kid, I lived with an uncle and aunt. If I got a bit out of line, one of them would ask "What would Commander Corry say if he heard about this" or if I was really kicking over the traces. It would be "Hey. Baccaratti!". Whenever I come across something or consider adopting some idea or other. The image of Space Patrol becomes the yardstick that I use to measure things, whether it's political, economic or social, and is why I was dissapointed when the anti-science, and sitll so, Environmentaists of the '70's were not exterminated (they more than any other part of the left represent the naked worship of primitivism and are anti everything that I stand for, no matter what veneer they try to put on it. Most people think that this first materialized in 1970, I saw the making of it in late '68 and had their number then. That it was the forward-thinking liberals that adopted this blight kind of finished the job of moving me over to the Right).

I've tried to bring home here. Over the last year spacePatrol.us has grown in the areas I want it to. Spaceifically in the area of...well...Space Patrol. I actually got to meet Ed Kemmer (Buzz Corry) as an adult. That was way better than meeting him as a kid since I had the perspective of over 40 years and learned what put the magic in it for me. Not long thereafter, I was given, by a fellow "spaceman" a big model of the Terra V. The lead role in this project was taken by Mr. Kemmer and he signed his last email to me, a response to my article about the relationship of Space Patrol to the invention of the CAT scanner, "Your CO...": I could not have been happier or prouder. Jean-Noel Bassior, author of the recently released book about Space Patrol, commentiong on my site, said "...Thanks for keeping the flame burning". Warren Chaney has also thanked me for keeping "...the Space Patrol universe alive..." and "I pity anyone who has not visited that site [referring to the calcultion and other tools there, which he says he actually used]". and "Cadet Bruce" over at Swapsale has recommended the site twice in his editorials. I always thought that if such happened to me, I would be as proud as a peacock and really strut my stuff. No, while I am very proud, I am also grateful and feel a sense of responsibility.

SpacePatrol.us was started as an expression of an interest and things that accompanied it in my hunk of the universe. Now it seems to have taken on a life of its own. It seems I did bring home here.

Now on to other things, I am 61 years old, I have had a very mild kind of lymphoma for the last 9 years and it is not expected to become a threat if watched and taken care of and modern methods make that no real discomfort to me. In fact, I find it a bit amusing that I now use the CAT scanner that Space Patrol helped create. However, when I was 20 years old, I was brought into sharp awarness of my mortality when I almost bought the farm in a rock-climbing incident and had a very scary minute or two. I am looking for ways to have SpacePatrol.us continue if "the unthinkable" happens. I, or any one person, am/is a thin reed. right now, if I go out, this goes with me and I don't want that to happen. If I have a good deal of time, I can save things and turn them over to someone else. What worries me is that if it is unexpected and I want to start planning and making provisions for that contingency.

It seems the minute I plan to put something in here, something happens to s**tcan that idea. Today's entry would best be called Frankenstein. If you recall. the old boy was put together from parts of dead bodies.

Re-read Entry #3

In that entry, I discussed navigation, or for spacemen, astrogation. However, If you fly a warcraft then there is another thing you have to know about: Tracking and Targetting of enemy craft. Those are the two steps prior to firing a guided weapon of any kind. Ayn Rand once observed "A political war is a skirmish fought with muskets, a philosophical battle is a nuclear war"

Now, just the other day, a Marine general said that we need more time in Iraq as dealing with an insurgency takes 10 years. Now remember Rush Limbaugh said that this adventure would be a "cakewalk" When cornered on it he said he was talking about the deafeat of the Iraqu army. Well he must live in a real pigsty because everyone knows that after you party, someone's gotta clean it up. Maybe that was the Oxy Contin talking (I do not fault him on the "hillbilly heroin": He had two bad alternative to choose from; that or a course of back surgery that had a dubious outcome and painful side effects for which he would need...well...Oxy Contin). Just what kind of credibility a Marine general has in a matter of occupation, I don't know. Uncle Sam's Misguided Children, as they call themselves, are a shcok force. Like Roger Ramjet and his Proton Pill, they have the energy of 20 atom bombs for 20 seconds. I don't see the Marines as a long-term fighting force unless they have to be. That is not their role. They covered themselves with glory in the island campaigns of WWII. But a lot of Regular Army guys told me that the Marines couldn't hold onto stuff. Second, after saying "No way, Jose" til it was blue in the face, the Bush adminstration is agreeing to enter into talks with Iran about Iraq. I suspect that this is more about making the eventual handover of Iraq to the Persians palatable to the world and American People than any real US goals being reached (I guess the sixth mission will be "stealth surrender"). Everybody knows the lay of the land over there. In fact, the "fellow politics junkkie" mentioned below preducted this a half-year ago and I did not argue.

In '04, I did something I really hated doing. Supported John Kerry's presidential bid based on his position on the Iraq war and another reason. I despise Kerry and when he withdrew his opposition at the second debate, I could at least stand down on that. But I had another reason. I told a fellow politics junkie "This is my thinking: Kerry could never win re-election on his own but will be the incumbent and a Democratic challenge would fragment the Party so they're stuck with him in '08 and porked. In 2012 Hilary will be too old, Kerry will be unpalatable and that will be it for the Democrats. It will also give the Republicans one election cycle to come up with a stud horse and when persons see what Kerry will have done by '06, the House and Senate will stay in Republican hands. I'd rather have 4 years of Kerry than 8 years of Hilary. Think of it as 'Kerry to block'".

Now, we find, according to a piece read by Neal Boortz (as long as he's quoting someone else, it's OK) that Bruce Bartlett, of the book about how Bush stole the Republican Party and bankrupted America (in essence ripping the mask of the phoneycons off for all who wanted, to see), and a member of the Reagan administration has said (like about a half-year before the thing even gets warm so I think he's blowing space gas just a bit) The Republicans can't win so the best thing that we can do is support the most conservative Democrat: Hilary Clinton. Well I'm of two minds. Do I say that he's speaking out of turn, which he is, but not by much or do I say "I told you so"? In the first place Hilary is not the "most conservative" but apparently the least liberal. There's a different, she is really in this image the least evil, if you believe her make-over which I don't.

Not for nuthin' does my real first name begin with "C'. It's not all Greek to me. Righ Apollo?

Well, we've tracked our targets but where is the philosophical aspect of this? There is a branch of philosophy called "Epistemology" that relates to the question. "What do I know and how do I know it"?. In the Randian philosophy the sole tool of knowledge is Reason; defined as "The faculty that integrates the material provided by the senses into a non contradictory whole". The tool of reaosn is logic, of which is said "Factual premises and valid reasoning lead to true conclusions" (not for nuthin' do I get called "Mr. Spock" a lot). Now back in '02 and early '03 the Military of the Mouth were complaining that the Bush Administration was not being as forthcoming with the "proof" of WMD as they would like. What they were selling the war on was the "could be mushroom cloud", "maybe tomorrow your city will be attacked by Iraqui biological weapons", "perhaps...". On Tuesday, 11 March '03 I turne on the Radio Factor to hear Bill O'Reilly say "...There are no facts in play, when we get in there we will find out..." What America"s Demagugue failed to say was (and this is the kind of thing that makes him America's Demoague) "and since we have no facts there is no justification for going in. Logic dictates that if a hypothesis is not proven to be ture, the Law of the Excluded Middle, 'A or not-A' requires it to be considered false" Now it turns out that a strong if not compelling case can be made that the cabal behind this war lied outright and had a willing President who may have lied but certainly did not peform due dillgence. For this lie the Republicans stand a good chance of paying dearly with near total annihilation. Ayn Rand once observed "when an animal is attacked from beyond it's range of awareness, it perishes" Well in consenting to the non-factual and therefore, unreal, this party has put the real world beyond it's range of awareness. When one side lies, that is: initiates fruad- and a claim to knowledge you do not have is a fraud, no matter how seemingly virtuous, to again give a nod to Miss Rand: "[that side is] automatically wrong" and the other side tells the truth for whatever their ends, or even if they say nothing at all, that "other side" is closer to Reason (factual premises) and therefore closer to or more in touch with reality, or one might say, more sane. They also have the morally higher ground. We are being told by the aforementioned Marine general that we must now remain in Iraq until about 2014-5. Look at the state of the fighting forces now and project current trends past '09, and 2012. It's not happening. Would you go into the boxing ring blindfolded? Well we went into a war on one or more lies or at least falsehoods. And that's the truth. When you act on a lie you act contrary to the facts of reality. and the universe, by it's laws of Metaphysics (the branch of philosophy that deals with "The way the World works", if you are a religious person, call it "God", If you are afraid of that word call it "karma" I just call it "the dog that bites your ass is the on that you let out") has many, many nuclear warheads and the means to deliver every one of them with pinpoint accuracty because the target has glued a nuclear warhead magnet to itself.

Should this entry be etiitled "Frankenstein" or "Casandra Strikes Back"?

Listening to Former intelligence director Tenant speak on 60 Minutes gave me cause to think.

First, he said that "I spoke with Condalizza Rice the summer before 9/11...". the summer before 9/11 was 2000. and the President was Clinton, not Bush. so why would he be talking to Rice? Unless he menat during the 2001 summer before 9/11 occurred.

He also said another thing, and this is scary. He said that (some Administration Official told him) "...'Iraq will pay for this', I just shook my head and walked away"

Does this explain why only one division was sent to Afghanistan and 12 to Iraq? Does this explain why, at the very point in time that they had Bin Laden trapped and ready to truss up and take home, they let it get away from them and blamed it on bad intel?

While the Administration was fear-mongering about WMD in late '02, chemical and biological weapons experts appearing on forums like the Jim Bohannon show were telling us that Hussein was nowhere near meeting the parameters of such weapons. Also on Jim Bohannon Scott Ritter said that he had been on the ground in Iraq and no such weapons were there. and all of a sudden the Kool-Aid drinkers came up with some story that Ritter, a US Marine had been charged with something like pedophelia and when asked to produce they said that the records were sealed. Is this why they trashed Paul O'Neill and Richard Clark and forced the former Military Chief of Staff out when he said that they could not do the job wit less than half a million troops? Just how bogus the intel job was can be seen on the O'Reilly Radio Factor, America's Demagogue said, on March 11 "...There are no facts in play" (meaning that nobody knew nuthin') "but we'll find out when we get in there..." and that was a week before the invasion started after a 7 moth drumbeat about this. What O'Reilly did not say, and this is the kind of thing that makes him America's Demagogue, was that if you don't have facts then logic, science, sound thinking and good sense demands that you reject the assertion and not act on it. It was at that point and with all the foregoing that I knew with absolute certainty the war was a lost cause that would only lead to a military disaster.

Can all of this be the result of bad intel? If so then it's time to scrap the intelligence apparatus and start from scratch.

As much as I despose "dirty Harry" Reid, he was right when he said that the war is lost. The mission was either fatuous or bogus and at least twice, scenarios of "In six months we have to...." have exceeded their period with the "have to...." not being done. You will notice that the White House and the Radio Ranger batallions: The Mouth Military uses terms like "cut and run", referring to "timetables" as "surrender dates" and it's all so orchestrated that only a fool or a product of the public education system can't see it for what it is. Anyone not suffering from Kool-Aid poisoning would know, no matter what he or she would like to be true, that this dog not only won't hunt, but CAN'T hunt.

Now we have some more to worry about only 47% of the troops in Iraq think that it's wrong to "mistreat civilians" and a couple of other bad statistics that recently came out in a poll of troops in Iraq. Add to that the Army's cover-up of the real nature of Pat Tilman's death and the meat is becoming more rotten as the day goes on.

Regarding Pat Tilman. The extent to which "friendly fire" incidents have occurred in military history would astound you if you knew. What people don't understand and need to understand is that this ought to be expected. it was the pristine image that the Army was trying to protect. During the time of the draft, when most young men went into the military. The kinds of things that could go down by accident or screw-up were well known. A friend's dad who was with a bomber squadron as ground support told me stories of near catastrophes that nearly happened just from guys screwing around that made my hair straighten out. Like I used to tell guys playing with knives and guns: "Hey, you're playing with bad shit. You screw up and it's gonna be really bad so don't frig around with this stuff. It's serious business". In Bio lab in college in '71, one of the guys was going to light up a cigarette despite the fact that we were using ether to kayo frogs and the air was thick with the smell. I yelled at him and almost knocked him down before he struck his match. In fact, I was known for yelling at people for doing stupid things with dangerous items and stuff: And I was only 26 years old.

When 18 or 19 year olds screw up. it's either through stupidity or lack of presence of mind (they know the score, they just don't apply it to the situation at hand). when people in their 50's and 60's do it. You gotta wonder. I hope that Mitt Romney will disengage himself from the debacle that is, and has to be, Iraq (It has been a debacle for 3000 years, why should it change now?). He has nothing to gain from it and everything to lose. Can you spell "tsunami"? Of course the Democrats seem to have the backbone of jellyfish or a case of the stupids and are not sticking to their guns so the Republicans may escape justice - for the moment.

Let me put it this way; If this war were on the Stock Exchange would you buy, sell or hold?

Of the major Republican candidates, I am supporting Romney. I would like Tom Tancredo but he's a one-issue man at this time.

Why not McCain? Two Reason, McCain-Feingold and he's married to the Iraq War. He is a genuine hero however. He is in the unenviable position of being percieved as a legislative lefty and joined at the hip with an unpopular enterprise. Can you say "tsunami" and "coattails"?

Why not Guiliani? His view of marriage is that it is disposible, which tells me about his ability to hold commitments which tells me about his character. He too is a good administrator, cleaning up the mess that Dinkins left and standing strong after 9/11. However, there is one thing that ought fill any Repulican with dread

SCENE: the second presidential debate in 2008 : The question to Rudy:" In your first bid for mayor you said to '...watch out for Republican tricks...'. Would you care to explain that?" After Hilary says "Rudy Giuliani warned us about Republican tricks and I guess he ough to know". can you say "Stick the fork in him" and "tsunami" and "coattails"?

But there's another reaosn. Twiec in the last 20 years, the Dems have put tow liberals up who came from the People's Republic of Assatwos**ts and they went down to narrow defeats. Can you imagine what part of the liberal-left's anatomy it would go up sideways if a percieved conservative from the self-same People's Reupublic came in and won? That would be soooo delicious. Aside from thiat. Mitt is not married to the War and can disown it. He is percieved as a conservative of some kind. While some are trying to make a bogeyman out of Mormon, that has a limited lifespan. The Republicans will not want to go down that road since he may win and the'll have to suck ti in and support him and they don't want a bloodbath over that issue since he may be the last man standing and can you imagine Democrats going there?

The Kool-Aid poisoning is in it's last stages.

"Kool-Aid" and the related terms come from the Jonestown incident of 1978 when the members of the leftist Jonestown cult committed mass suicide by means of poisoned Kool-Aid

Before you have Kool-Aid poisoning, you need "Kool-Aid drinkers", for that you need a cult in the modern sense of the word. One of the key characteristics of a cult is profound distrust of outsiders or non-cult sources.

As evidence that the mainstream Right is in that category I offer you this blog entry

Howie Carr, routinely condemsn and bashes any opponent of the Iraq war. Now he never did have much credibility anyway: Too many flip-flops on things like SUV's and the British Nanny Case and he's a Beautiful Person wannabe

On the other hand, I offer you Mo Lauzier. In one of my earlier "From the Cockpit"s, I mentioned him and that I once had respect for him as a commentator. As a psycho-historian, I follow such matters. He has a custom of having a Colonel from Iraq on who paints a rosey picture. Now The Right always points to media bias, of which there can no longer by any doubt. However, today, Mr. Lauzier, as part of the intro to his weekly confab with this Colonesl said "99% of what goes on in Iraq is invisible". Coupled with the anti-media zeitgeist of the mainstream Right, this now implies that anything the media says ought be ignored.

What if the media is right? It is said that "Even a blind sow can find mash on occasion"

These clowns will noever know becuase they've "turned on, tuned in and dropped out". So, since Nature abhorrs a vacuum and since this info vacuum has to be filled with somethihng. they listen only to each other. How do they know what to believe? Well, it has to support the Iraq war before it gets a hearing.

The system is fed back into itself.

Well, how do I know they're wrong? In the first place, I never bought into this mess, read my IRAQ: No Phobia This was written in late middle '02. Since then, there have been 3 times where it's been said that "in the next 6-12 mothis, to succeed, ...has to happen", in late '04, '05 and early '06 and the "...' s were different. They have not happened. In the past 3 months troop deployment schedules have been changed from 12 to 15 month periods, indicatin that the replacements just arne't there. These are discernible facts that if anyone is and was paying attention they'd know this.

As I said earlier "What if the media is right?". These people have lost the key to telling if this is the case.

This is both sad and dangerous.

Sad because ther's nothing more pathetic than a once sound-minded person or group falling into self-delusion .

Dangerous becuase there is much that they do that is needed. The Environmentalists have to be crushed and hopefully exterminated this time. Any more tax increases or Environmental regulation could spell the end of the economy: It can take only so much distortion before the elastic breaks.

The root of this is the media bias. as far back as 38 years ago Susan Ludel of TV Guide penned an article in Ayn Rand's Journal, THE OBJECTIVIST entitled "Who Programs the Programmers" Now when a group not allied with the Kook Right notices it, it's got to be there. I cna tell you a couple of specific incidents that prove the case and the appearance of the book about it by a media insider strengthens the case to the point of truth.

Well now the mainstream Right has come to the point of a cult mentality. Can the Kool-Aid poisoning be far from complete?

Then what?

Will somone please tell these bastards to SHAT THE **** UP!

From the inimitable Neal Boortz who can't seem to help himself: "Men are hardwired for freedom, Women are hardwired for security" and them some claptrap about "they can't help it that's the way they are".

First PLEASE do not awaken Ayn Rand and tell her that. Also don't tell Maggie Thatcher, Virginia Postrel of REASON Magazine or Lisa Junharr former editress of ERGO Newsletter or Kristen Hillary, Former editress and creator of EGO. Also someone better not tell Belinda. It was my aunt Oretta, whose nickname was "Jimmy" from "Jimmy Dugan" an early twentieth century comic strip, who taught me about personal strength and how to fight. Given the above, if Mr. Boortz is right, how come it is MEN who have done the most over the past 50 years to abolish freedom, whether it's the countless reams of regulations or the Patriot Act, It is interesting to note that Neal put this in the context of "men raised by woren" . But if the two sexes are 'hardwired" and "can't help themselves" than that is pointless and irrelevent. and therefore untrue. Maybe Boortz is hardwired not to notice these things.

Second and this is where the rubber meets the road and how Boortz puts a target on his chest. "hardwired for freedom" is an unsupportable oxymoron (Gr> Oxy=flaming +Moron:> Gr=fool). It is unsupportable because no informed physiological psychologist believe that this is true. This is because we know that the brain often shapes itself to accommodate behavior as in stroke recovery. It is oxymoronic since it implies some kind of biological determinism and determinism and freedom go together. Yeah, sure! Like matter and anti-matter. Who needs Jefferson if you have Hitler? If you are hardwired (preset) to be a certain way then your behavior is pre-programmed and you cannot do otherwise so freedom and liberty are pointless or even just the meaningless rants of those who are hardwired to rant, akin to demonic posession: i.e. The Devil makes them do it.

Third: Please don't let Mr. Boortz have anything more dangerous than childrens' scissors. he could inadvertantly hurt himself or others, No wonder he's a seatbelt Nazi (don't be a security vs freedom girly-man, Neal). Do cut his food for him.

Just to show that I am an equal opportunity insensitive commentator: Dr. Dean Edell quoted on his show, a survey from Psychology Today, which has supported Phrenology ("Is Phrenology Foolish" PSYCHOLOGY TODAY READER: 1971). This survey supposedly illustrated the difference between liberals and conservatives. The upshot of it was that conservatives are more rigid and fearful. In other words that same claptrap that I've heard since the late 60's. Now if that is true, why has most of the violence come from the left. For every Oklahoma Bombing you can give me, I can give you Song Hi Chou, UniBomber, Jonestown Burn! Baby, Burn!. Here's one for you When Dr. Edell wrote his EAT, DRINK AND BE MERRY: WHY THE HEALTH NAGS ARE WRONG, he wanted to use "Nazis" in place of "Nags" but the publishing company would not let him. Now we have "Health Nazis", "Safty Nazis", "Tobacco Nazis", "Food Police" all in common speech. Do you identify these persons as liberal or conservative? The conservatives generally support free-market economies. In the terms of the science of Economics the kinds of systems the liberals support tend toward "command" economics (usually mixed but more on the statist side). Is the Welfare State's basic preimis one of courage or fear? From John Hospers to Harry Brwone to David Brudnoy to REASON magazine: The sane members ot the Libertarian movement seem to have more trouble with the psychology of liberals. Even Neal Boortz spends far more time bashing the liberals than conservatives and identify the liberals as the most rigid and viciously agressive of the lot. It was the liberals, led by the Race Hustleers who canned Imus and who tried to lynch the Duke LaCrosse playters, It is the liberals who have been a driving force behind Environmentaism. The Global Warmingists of which the President of the Czech Republic called Marxists who, in genral have passed more laws that tax things to death and regulate more aspects of your life. In fact "Big Governmetn" and "Liberal" have come to be the same as "Nazi" and "Fascist". Need I go on? I could go on about my dealings with social workers, Northeastern pols but that would be piling rocks onto a mountain. if you don't get it by now I suspect that you are pleading the Shultz Amendment ("I see nothing,I hear nothing, I know nothing and I watn to know: Nothing!'). Culturally the liberals have tended toward Eastern mysticism and the shamanistic which are more primitive than Christianity. It is the liberals who gave us wicca and the re-energization of Atrology and it is the liberals who worship the most primitive, superstitious and hidebound cultures on earth and in history from Amerind tribes, to African tribes to the hardcore Islamic theorcracies (where they themselves would be stoned, clubbed to dath or burned: Well nobody ever accused them of smart enough to survive). Get this, I was the self-same Dr Edell who reported tha more Democrats than Republicans believe in ghosts and the like, from another survey. Hey folks, the gears just ain't meshing here. Someon is a few planes short of a carrier, in other words, not playing with a full deck. Need more? Read Real and Jean Isaccs THE COERCIVE UTOPIANS form 20 years ago. or even Paul Flynns AS WE GO MARCHING from 1940 (I was shocked to see how on target he was and that was 48 years before I got my hands on it) and it was the Libertarinas who coined the terms EPAcrats and Educrats

Yet Dr. Edell repeats the claptrap from PSYCHOLOGY TODAY as if it were Gospel, and Dr. Edell is an honorable man who rails about the suppliment industry in the name of science which is a means to discovering what is true. while drinking gallons of red Kool-Aid.

Physcian: Heal thyself.

I do not counsel persons not to listen to these pundits, I do, I tell you to listen to them with an active mind. Neal Boortz's show is a circus and he the clown. Dr. Edell is a dangerous tragdey. Dangerous becuase he commands some credibility so that when he screws up, you have to be sharp to notice it. A tragedy because on the special science of Medicine he usually has it right but in the loarger areas of philosophy, which determines what the culture does which determines how persons respond to facts, he gives it to the retrogressionists on a silver platter and wearing a target on his chest.

Now get ready, here comes the payoff pitch, it has been the liberal left that, from Stalin to the college campi, have been the champions of determinsm as in "hardwired" as in "they can't help themselves", whether it's in matters of economics or criminal justce. WAIT WAIT: DON'T TELL ME: It was the libertarina Boortz who used those words. Even to the point of using University studies to "show" that homosexuality is hardwired and "they don't have any choice"

STEEE-RIKE THREE!! Yerrr OUUT!!!

If you look at my new Blast, it says "I never ask to be believed. I ask to be understood. From that belef will follow"

What is up with THAT?!?

Well, several things, really. First: I don't want a coterie of "believers" that is, of followers. The ultimate end of that is Jonestown, Nazi Germany or anything where the leadership demands faith and the system is given time to run its course. It has to go there becuase nobody is minding the store in the intelligence department.

Second: I don't need the kind of people that are "believers" They can't think on their own. In all likelihood, If I get into a jam then they are helpless. Worse. they may become unstable and make things worse. Since there's nobody home up top, they can't interpret what I'm saying that they believe. Any belief-first group tends to produce what we would consider nutjobs and that can turn violent as in the Islamo-fascist or the Christo-fascist (anyone who is eductated and denies that separation of Church and State, read Bill O'Reilly, is a theo-fascist. Jefferson was explicit about it), who try and subvert the nation to their own beliefs,

Third: I hold that things can be understood. That is, it works by natural processes. If something is too good to be true; bet against it. If you see a "Cinderella Story" , look for a Fairy Godmother. or as Thomas Paine put it "It is far easier for men to lie than for Nature to go off its course"

Fourth: I know how to do it. In fact. I'm not the first, nor the five hundredth to make that discovery, In fact I did not make it. I did not coin teh phrase "Factual premises and valid reasoning yield true conclusions". As usual the devil is in the detail. However, you can learn to reason. It's called Logic and has been around for 2400 years. The big part is finding the factual premises. By the time you turn 30 you should have that down pat. it comes with experience and keeping your eyes open and minding the store at what you see. It is called the "smell test". For that, you don't need a fancy diploma, just sense enough to watch what's going on around you. Also, as you do this and meet with sucess, you will do it more and more until it just becomes a habit.

As proof of the validity of that phrase. I find myself having to say to persons whose education level is among the highest in the land and of whome Ayn Rand would say "You tink such persons would know better", "I told you so". And I have to say it to the better-educated more than the less well educated, too.

Now contrary to what you would think the only satisfaction I get from that is to discharge the anger I get from watching full-grown, supposedly intelligent persons, who pride themselves on knowing more about the subject thtan I do (and they usually do, which is why it's really lame) acting like a deer caught in the headlights. Having that state of affairs does nothing for me. If I tell you what is going to happen, I tell you how come or if it's just a "sneaking suspicion", then there's something you should do. That something helps me far more than saying "I told you so". I don't know fully why that is so. I might do better to cash in on the self-inflicted, avoidable misfortune of the forewarned (sometimes I do just to drive the point in harder, make it hurt more and maybe this time the lesson will stick). However, one does have pity for the deer caught in the headlights

Too often I get from the forewarned, afflicted individual "You have to be wrong one of these times". No, I don't HAVE to be wrong. If past is a predictor of the future then chances are I will be wrong one of these times. I may believe a false premise, I may misinterpret a factual one or I may slip up on the reasoning aspect of things. The system is infallible: I am not. Ever try using a hammer as a saw? However, that is not the issue. That is a cover-up for mental laziness, willfull misdeed or being a (willing) fool (hoping to get something and too caught up in that to make the effort to see things for what they are and just wanting any nay-sayers to go away. I can tell that when someone says to me "you're not gonna like what I did. I..." To which I say "No, You're not gonna like it, I'm past that point. I'll just say 'you were warned and knew better'") and not getting your up top act together. ('oh, it's too hard" "I don't have the mental discipline you have": that's a laugh. All I have is my curiosity and practice using it which goes with being a person. "You're such a know-it-all" or some other useless cliche)

When, as happens, one of my predictions goes south, THAT is the one I pay attention to. Thoe ones I get right are par for the course and tell me nothing. the ones I get wrong tell me I missed something. That is a mistake. There are too many new mistakes to make for me to repeat old ones.

Another thing I get is the cry of the self-abosorbed twit: "You can't tell me what to do!". Well, I can just as you can tell me what to do. We ignore each other to our own peril or advantage. If I tell you what to do, I expect rather than that cry of the (usually) soon-to-be-clobberized, "why should I?". Now we can talk and think and we can save ourselves some heartache.

Often I get, after it's gone belly-up: "Okay, smart guy: What do I do now?", I say. "Suffer. You didn't listen to me in the first place when I explained the whys and hows, so why would you do so now? Besides which, I learn how to prevent fiascoes so I don't have to think my way out of them so I really don't know what to do. All I can say is learn from it. One of these times you will get yourself into something fatal that was eminently predictable".

If you go to my FriendPages site and to the link page you will find there a link to some astrological thing or other: You will also find on the front page of that site a notice.

What has that to do with anything?

Well I stress here the issue of CREDIBILITY

Those of us who do this kind of thing, that is, comment on matters ethical or of sanity and TAKE A POSITION on such matters have a special obligation. This obligation applies to "walking the walk". Now there are two levels of behavior here. Casual, or, "the public square" and personal, or, "This is what I am".

I share the public square with many things. In the case above. I could not remove the astrology thing. Now, if it were to me, astrology would be banned outright, some 500 studies have proven that it is a fraud. However I have no say in the matter. I take it as I find it. Since it is the public square, I am entitled to be there so long as I do not disrupt. Let us say that "when in Rome, it is permitted to do as the Romans do" If one were obligated to avoid casual things on moral grounds, life would be impossible

Now on the other hand, where I can control, I am obliged to. This pertains to two things

1. Attributation by association. If that association is casual then no, if that association is "personal" that means. I deliberately and as a matter of course associate with certain types, then yes. This can be good or bad. In the good sense, If it is just something I got in with by luck then it is just that and I have no moral claim and it is seen as "making a virtue of necessity". If the good thing is something I chose and do as a matter of course then that "belongs" to me. In the bad sense, if it is not something I chose then I was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, If it is a thing I chose and do as a matter of course, it is "guilt" and the same goes for those with whom I associate. If I go to a ballgame and there also are Jesse Jackson, Al Gore and Jane Fonda, I am not there to see them, it is a matter of happenstance. if I go to an anti-war rally (being opposed to the Iraq war and making my feelings known) and they are there, and I just tolerate and am civil or polite to them (kinda tough keeping lunch down in the presence of bad odors), that's one thing but I still better have some good answers, If I run up to them and show some level of friendshop or kinship, presuming I am free to do otherwise and am not faking it (it was recently revealed that the close ties that Charles Lindberg developed with the Nazis was at the behest of our governemt for the purpose of aeronautical espionage), that's another thing entirely. I have attributed to the Environmentalists guilt for things that do not relate directly to their agenda. I do so becuase they repeatedly show more than casual ties with such groups. Whether it's druggies or Communists. On the other hand, I am opposed to the Iraq War and have been so since before it started. Unfortunately the Kook Left and other bad apples are likewise. This is casual and I generally repudiate them. They happen to be right only on this issue but for the wrong reasons. In this case, I also note that they are a threat becuase of their "carbon nazi"ism and the government actions that they will try to promulgate. I regard both the Iraq War and Global Warmisim as threats to the existence of America, which is worse is not a matter of principle but of which poses the greatest near-term danger. In the case of the war, the Left is right in action but wrong in principle. The elements of the Right that continue to support it are wrong in both. I am glad to find persons like Jay Severin and others on the Right that oppose theis mess. Morally the element of the Right that continues to suppor the war are the worst of all, since they have given the Left the moral high ground, gift-wrapped and with a "kick me " sign on their back, and therefore a victory that the Left could not have won on their own merits (they have none).

2) Direct actions. This pertains to endorsing products. If one hears a sports figure or TV actor endorsing a product, there is no moral question except if it goes to court and findings are made that the product is specifically fraudulent as in the case of Pat Bonne and Acne Statin. On the other hand. A Rush Limbaugh or Bill O'Reilly does have a higher responsibility.

How come?

Because theey "talk the talk" Both advocate and therefore, are spokesmen for, specifically moral positions, ethical systems and against others. As such, it DOES detract from their credibility if they advertise products based on things that are knowably or known to be false, like Ginko, Ekanacia and many of the Glucocimine-Condroiten products. As persons who put themselves in the moral spotlight and advocate a morality of truthfulness, they carry far more weight than the rock star, actor or ballplayer. It is incumbent on them to find out if thie product they're pimping is what they claim and does wht is purported or implied. If they try to duck it by claiming some other thing, well that's why I used the word "pimping" as in prostitution. Upon these persons lies the burden of "due dilligence". Bill O'Reilly brags about his "crack staff" and Rush Limbaugh has more money than their imputed God so they have the resources to find out the effacacy of what they're hawking. The Schultz Amendment is not an option. So, yes, it is not only proper that they be held to a highter standard, but it is the only proper thing to do and a thing that they should welcome, if for no other reason, to prove what they say.

I must add here that, since I used in my example products that a ballplayer might have access to specific knowledge of, either personally or by way of a trainer. He would also have a special responsibility since it is in his line of work. I would also expect that a person endorsing a product be morally required to be able to honestly answer "yes" if asked "Do you use this product routinely?". if the answer is "I just read the script that is put in front of me". Well, we know what you are, all that remains to be determined is how cheaply you are bought and sold. It is on the order of; if I give Coby Bryant an argument about Nike sneaks all he has to say is "Who's the pro basketball player here? Me or you?" I could win but I'd need something powerful enough to negate his natural advantage, such as test results, medical data or some obvious scientific principle that he is running afoul of, or have him give a physical demonstration of his point, which, if he fails at or refuses, tells it all, but those are extraordinary circumstances. Going in, he would have the advantage.

I am an intelligent and fairly well educated layman. However, I can be and have been fooled or misled. Usually I'm not because I can figure things out. As an advocate of Reason, therefore truthfulness and some smarts, I have a certain moral responsibility to "mind the store" and not advocate things I know to be false. However, I don't have the resources that the bigtimers have. Therefore, the requirements of "due dilligence" are different and less stringent or rigorous. That does not mean that they are non-existent. Also, I welcome the challenge as an opportunity. In one way the requirements are more rigorous: If it goes bad, it falls on me directly. I cannot blame hired guns, so I have more at stake personally. The bastard who puts one over on me gets a piece of me and you can guess where that goes sideways with someone whose ego is the size of mine.

There is a Chinese proverb that goes "a tiger leaved behind a skin: A man leaves behind a name".

As a writer of blog and articles, I am a journalist. However, I am a journalist of a specific type. That type is a Popular Journalist. This does not pertain to how well-liked my stuff is, it pertains to the "market", just as Ayn Rand was a Popular writer, she was writing for the middle-class market of her time. Judging by the economic results, she hit the mark squarely. Now. there is a difference between the Popular and Serious areas. The latter is presented in professional terms and would be too abstruse and arcane for "plain folks". it concerns itself with higher-level issues that will never come up in 'real life" but serve the professional well by having him think in the terms of the subject matter and allow him to look at real-life matters from a knowledgeable perspective. Popular activities pretty much take things for granted. Now as a Pop Journalist, I discuss things that are outside my special area of expertise. So what do I do then?

There are two answers here but they point to one overall and overriding factor.

I I run at 4 different levels. 1) Discussion Groups: The kind of thing that a group of like-minded persons set up usually on Yahoo. This is the most informal level I really don't check for typogrpahical erros more than in just a cursory way, and that kind of thing for this, I am more interested in getting the data across as quickly as I can. In that sense it is the most subject-related but least formal level. 2) Blog: Quick articles that I can do in about 1 to 4 hours. I do proofead and what you get here is mostly analysis by questions. if you look at my attack on Neal Boortz, you will see that it mostly asks questions, the answers to which I already know. These are mostly common sense types of things. 3) From the Cockpit: This is generally a monthly "editorial" column. The standards are a bit higher than for a blog. 4) In Focus. Longer, more detailed articles or links to things that are of interest. These are devoted to long-term things.

II Goals and Methods: This means that I am discussiong SOMETHING. a subject matter which I analyze at a certain level. Say global warming well, I have a background in Research Methods in Science and I am generally far better educated in the methods of science than most and well-educated in the body of knowledge that science encompasses. Then I get REFERENCES: Who says what and how do they back it up. Using my knowledge and mentality, I run the reference material "through the mill" and see what comes out. As a Pop Journalist it is then my job to put this in real-people talk.

My objective is to speak with some knowledge, some competence at figuring things out and the result is to be taken as true. Taken as a single whole, this is CREDIBILITY. Unless I am doing a less focused kind of thing, having more entertainment value than take-it-to-the-bank worth, which I probably will do at times. I'm not always thinking hign-minded thoughts; or even clean ones! For example I was a bit frustrated and annoyed at something and thought to myself "Now there's a Kryptonite jockstrap for you". Now it seems to me that "Kryptonite jockstrap" should be the crunchline of one of my jokes. My jokes have "crunchlines" not "punchlines" becuase when they hit you, they break bones.

Now there are side issues that contribute to the issue of credibility: Proofreading. means that I look for errors, inaccuracies and things that do not say what I mean with cliarity. Since I don't have a fancy-dan pro do my proofreading, I have to do it myself. Anyone who has taken writing knows that self-proofing is the worst way to proofread because, having wrttine what you wrote, you think it's right at the time. This is made worse by using a typewriter keyboard since it brings in the dreaded typo or typographical erro. This is not a misspelling like "Jak" for "Jack" it is more a function of hitting a key out of sequence like "teh" for "the" and can be a result of machanical quirks of the keyboard as well as mistakes. Like Ayn Rand, I do not hesitate to give my moral estimate of a person's character or comment on the state of their mental health. She has been chided for this. the first question is "How do you know the moral nature of the person whom you are attacking?". Neither Rand nor I attack kids. As she said (about socialism) "...young persons can be fooled, I was not.." Well, I was so I know the score. This means that the target is a grown-up. Now you expect grownups who put themselves in the arena to have a certain level of development, a certain level of integrity and a certain level of expertise. Given that, then, from what a person says, you get a glimpse of his or her character. As Rand says "One would expect such a person to know better"

Why is this last important? Persons do things for "reasons", These reasons relate to what their goals are or if they have any goals. A lunatic is just that. Such goals can be consciously held and stated or implied in their statements or actions and deduced by inference. If you look at a person's 'agenda", mindset or worldview then you find one or more common themes. The same goes for a movement. Two of the common threads of Environmentalism are hatred of the individual, both in their specific outlook and in the larger associations that they are an integral part of and more and more politcal power. Even the President of the Czech Republic called them "Marxists" and he ought to know. A true Randite is run by the following worldview or "mindset": Existence, Reason, Individualism, Egoism, Liberty, Capitalism. Thus, he or she is more concerned with the capitalistic system than Big Business, more concerned with Liberty than Capitalism, more concerned with Egoism (in the Aristotelian sense), than Liberty, more concerned with Individualism than Egosim. More concerend with Reason than specific doctrines of Individualism and more concerend with Existence (being in accord with the way things are) then Reason (the tool that ties the mentality to the real world). Rand once said "If I had to choose between Capitalism based on Reason or not at all, then the answer is not at all" Thus for the Randite the "Scinetific Socialism" of the early middle Twentieth Century would have more validity than Capitalism based upon religious teaching (unless the truth of the religious teaching could be verifie by rational processes). In a discussion on a report that petroleum may not be a finite resource because it is being renewed deep in the earth. Rush Limbaugh said "...God is making more oil". Do you know what an eco-fascist would do to him and rightfully so ("Are you kidding, lying or just a jackass?)? and with whom a sane grownup would have to side? Stick the fork in him. He makes Al Gore, Barbara Streisand or Jane Fonda look like a Ph D with that kind of drivel. It's like bringing a toy knife to a heavy weapons fight and leading the charge. Does "toast" do it for you?

To get back to moral evaluations Two persons in journalistic positions have said 1. From AccuWeather; Anyone who does not support the Global Warming theory should have their credentials removed. 2) Form Gristmill: Persons who do not except Global Worming are Global Warming deniers, like Holocoaust deniers and should be tried Nuremburg style. You know the MORAL, or at the most innocent, Mental Health status of these individuals: It not only shines like a flashlight in the dark, but also calls attention to itsefl like a powerful magnet. They are at best sicko's and at the wrose and most likely (Given what is to be expected of person given the power of the pen) tin hitlers. In facr it is the liberal-to-left to which, in the Popular mind, the term "nazi" has been applied for the last two dozen years: "health nazia", "seatbelt nazis", "food nazie" and I expect to see the term "carbon nazis". Some substitute "fascist" for "nazi" but the love is still there. To NOT identify and evaluate such so-called "persons" as human beings would be a dereliction of journalistic duty as well as a failure to administer some well-deserved payback: And you know what payback is.

Now, as a Pop Journaist. I comment on things that smoe persons know a hell of a lot more about than I do. What I then do is go to other professional sources and make my case based on what they show.

I also use history more than a specific journalist would. I track the subject over time to show how it has developed and evolved.

when I go after a person like I did Neal Boortz, that does not mean that I find no value to his actions. He is entertaining and he does get some of it right. What it does mean is that I will not use him as primary source. What I use from him is what he sources directly, such as reading, in the manner of looking through a glass widnow; what is important is what one sees. I do not know him personally but he seems to be a bit of a nutjob more than evil, or he is just being a ringmaster, presiding over a circus. The dangerous thing about this is that part of this circus or nutjobbery touches upon vital ideas and may taint them in the process of transmitting thme.

I do not pruport to know as much about climate as a Climatologist, rocketry as a rocket scientist or any specific subject as a professional, semi-pro or a well-practiced amateur. I am just an intelligent and well-educated layman who knows how to think, evaluate and present ideas, or if I don't, where to find and how to evaluate those who do. That is the nature of Pop Journalism

As with others, so with me. I too, have to stand evaluation. In that sense, I, like any other Pop Journalist am to be judged by HOW I do it more than the content (notice I said "more than" not "ignoring". If I use rubbish, then no matter how well I process it, I will turn out just better rubbish)/ Even so, I do not use the rigor of a professional. I am not at that level, I would lose you if I did (it's called "my eyes glazed over") and I'm not being paid for this. I'm doing it on my own. However, it is my responsibility and self-interest as a player in this arena to have a general level of credibility and it is my nature to want to get the highest level of credibility that I can within the limits of Popular Journalism. As such, I, and any Pop Journalist, is to be evaluated by HOW I come to the conclusions I do more than the goodness of my source data. As such I use the old Research Rule: 3 independent sources is a lock. The difference is lke that between a superior gunfighter, a sharp-shooter and a marksman. On the battlefield the latter two would be dead before they got off 3 shots. As a sniper the first would be woefully lacking in skill and resources.

Here's my solution to the kind of thing that the Iranians did to the Brits. This was done to to the United States by North Korea in the late 1960's for which no punishment was doled out.

First: Announce to the world that "As of this date" any military personel captured by any nation and strong-armed to sign a confession of some kind are ordered to do so if any threats are made. so you now know the worth of such confessions. This is not new. Ayn Rand suggested the like of this in '68. But I'm going one or two better.

Next: the offending country has 48 hours to return such personnel in the same condtion that they were when you encountered them. or else...

...Here is the "or else"...

Third: Failure to do so will cost you a population center every week. We know how to plant mushrooms and you're bringing this on yourself.

Now here is what I would do:

Upon the first instance of this and about a week after we got the personnel back, several small nuclear cruise missles would be launched into some, hopefully, uninhabited part of the offending country. and if any nation gave me any lip, I'd just say "OK so I lied: We're all grownups. There's plenty left over. If you want some, just keep on yapping"

I guarantee we will only have to do this once; if at all.

About Arab terrorists. It was suggested that we threaten to bomb Mecca and then, if provoked, do so.

Nice idea, but after we bombed Mecca, what else could we do. Her's a better solution. Put the word out that if a terrorist act is perpetrated against us, we will bomb Mecca. If it happens, we bomb HALF of Mecca and ask if they want us to finish the job.

Now the 80% of the sane Muslims will do their best to squash the fanatics. And they know how to do it, too.

If you look at my two proposals you find a common thread. I't's not what I do. It's what I show that I CAN do if you cross me. Loan sharks don't break your legs the first time, they beat you up to varying degrees first. In the end, they kill you.

However we would have to establish credibility. First, so people can know that we mean what we say and say what we mean. Second so persons can know that whoever gets pasted knew in advance and had it coming. It is this last that the invasion of Iraq deprived us of. Do you realize, according to Howi Carr, WRKO 680 AM Boston MA, Shortly after 911. A note of condemnation of Al Qaeda's action was read before the Iranian Parliament by Grand Ayatollah Monteziri. Now, If we had to do a serious operation, with what could we do it? We're tied up in Iraq and fast approaching the end of our resources to do such things. Besides which, given the right encouragement Saddam Hussein would have been a usefual ally, not being fond of Muslim fanatics and they not being members of the Saddam Hussein Fan Club. Now we can't make him an offer he can't refuse. Remember, his executioners shouted "Muqtata" as in "Al Sadr". You know him...

Any questions?

If you read this mont's From the Cokpit. Then you should know what is coming. It wasn't up for one little week and I get three cold slaps in the face; the kind that make you say "I needed that"

America's Demaugogue showed his true colors on the Radio Factor This past Thursday. "The government should oversee cleanliness and cleanliness is next to..." and his girl compatriont answers "Godliness" I won't here go thorugh the history of the effacaciousness of Federal regulations. I've eaten somthing I ought not have and my stomach is a bit queasy. I do not wish to blow lunch--or die laughing! Ane who shall do the regulating? What is the EPA loaded with; Traditionalists or "Secular Porgressives"? The best way to cheat a fool is to give him what he asks for. To lie to a liar, tell the truth and let him run himsif through on it. The dog that bites your ass is usually the one that you let out. Sow the wind Reap the Whirlwind. What goes around comes around: Twice as fast and four times as big.

Now; comes Friday:

On a radio program the name of which I did not ge, it was said that 2009 would be the year that "regulation of Carbon Dioxide" would be done

NPR: I believe it was "On Point"; some putz said "We are going to have to have a Carbon tax... Even conservative economists know that the best way to decrease something is to tax it"

To paraphrase Dr. Laura "We have a ringy-ringy-wakey-wakey and a date.

This is truly an iminent threat. In the 1980's I was strongly critical of the lack of a policy towards the Environmentalists: Extermination. Though like cancer, in remission, also like cancer, it could recur. and the experience of the 1070's had shown this thing to be an agressive high-grade cancer. having by late 1980 beem a major cause of 6 consecutive quarters of shrinkage in the US economy, Inflation of 14-16% yearly and a dacade in which prices tripled, and interest rates of up to 21%. Of them, at the Ford Hall Forum in '78, Ayn Rand said "Though it has lost it's tawdry glamor, it is wreaking havoc on American industry". That was when you could still buy things made in the US at the department store. Now, before you say it, I know what some of you are going to say, My answer is. Take a bath, get clean [off drugs] and sober, and get a job. and this is for grownups' eyes only.

We are at a dangerous place here. the current administration wants a blank check to fight a war that is alreadly lost in Iraq and they are sneaking away from in Afghanistan. Opposing this, is a group that wants to put a CO2 monitor in your body if they get their way. Rational persons may have to make an alliance with the hard right, hoping that the next administration will do the right thing in Iraq. We still have the rest of the War on Terror to prosecute, We have to fix the military and protect our borders. Fixing the military will take about 5 years. The Iraq war is a medium-term threat (2-4 years) The Carbon Comrades have ceased to be a potential threat and have reached the latency stage and are a short range threat. Rational persons may have to put their opposition to the Iraq war on the back burner, still there but at a lower flame then to the those whom the President of the Czek Repulic called "Marxists" (and he should know; right?). For those of you in Cambridge, MA, that means those of you in Cambridge, MA.

Hopefully, one or both of two things will happen. The Democrats, currently in power, wishing to hold their power will purge the left and the Right will pruge itself of the Bill O'Reilly's and Neal Boortz's replacing them with competent and credible persons. At any rate this current Administration will be out of power so the Republicans can make a fresh start

How does this guy crap himself in such grand style?

Well he is Neal Boortz

Not 5 days after he shoots off his mouth about Hussein supporting Al Qeada, a newly declassified document says that it wasn't so.

OUCH!

But Neal Boortz is an honora...er...intelligent man

Now he's bitching at Kerry for wanting to take action against the so-called Swift Boat Vets for Truth. You remember them. They were going around saying that Kerry was some kind of nogoodnik or other. Here is what old Neal had to say. "They have not been investigated..."

Here's what I have:

I heard their leader, a lawyer (Hey: watch your mouth!) named O'Neill, on Jim Bohannon's show saying that a key player, Rasmus, who had fallen into the drink in an action and was rescued by Kerry, was confused and did not really know what was going on, it being the middle of hot action. Now for those of you not in the know, none of these vets actually served with or even near Kerry but they seem to know more than those who did. It was at this point that I learned all I needed to know and made up my mind and became concerned that if the Republicans won on the strength of this group then there would be a reaction that would broom them out in '08. Some call it "karma", some say "As ye sow, so shall ye reap: Sow the wind and reap the whirlwind", some say "What goes around comes around" and I say "The dog that bites your a** is the one that you let out". By setting the terms and method of action, you program the results of the action. If President Bush wins by the grace of a squad of liars then what can follow but Hillary Clinton? and what else do people deserve?

But Neal Borrtz is an honora...er...intelligent man.

Libertarian-Conservative David Brudnoy, a well-known and respected journalist from 1969 and alk show host from 1976 until about 2004, mostly at WBZ AM 1030, Boston said "99% of what they [The Swift Boat Vets] said was made up".

But Neal Boortz in an honora...er...intelligent man

Arlene Violette, WHJJ 920 AM Providence RI talk show hostess and former RI Republican Attorney General, said that they were making it up and had a string of Vietnam vets on her show whom she knew persnally, including the most decorated man in the war, backing her up. She also said that several of them have recanted. One vet who filled in for her one day called the Swift Boat Vets for Truth out chapter and verse.

Mo Lauzier, WRKO AM 680, Boston MA, Kool-Aid drinker first class, to the point where he called his moral credibility into severe question, didn't even want to go there.

Bill O'Reilly did an hour on the Radio Factor and went over the whole publication and found no documentation and that there was nothing that could be used as "primary" material and took four of five steps to calling them outright liars but uncharacteristically stopped just short of that final step. At it's best it was hearsay.

But Neal Boortz in an honora...er...intelligent man

All but one of Kerry's unit mates backed him to the hilt and the only surviving other captain of the 3 Swift Boats involved in the action that was discussed backed up Kerry with his own decription and so did the logs.

The only persons buying that act or defending them were the usual suspects, Beck, Limbaugh, grape, cherry, strawberry, etc...

The national media and Democrats will use 'Swift Boat Vet" ted to mean subject to a campaign of lies. and for once they will be right (yes, i do hate it, but I hate it even more when someone gives his enemies the gun and bullets and paints a target on himself; something really irritates me about "I'm too stupid to live").

But Neal Boortz says there was no investiagation and Neal Boortz is an honer...er...intelligent man. True there was no Congressional investigation and you can bet tiaras to tinfoil that if there were, he'd be bitching like a PMS-driven shrew about "the waste of taxpayer money". But they did undergo a "hearing", a kind of peer review, by honerable persons and were found wanting.

Now, you may ask me "Why are you doing such a job on him? what's it to you?' First I'm a Rightist and I don't need this kind of guy throwing s**t in the gears and making us look like fools and mental bottom-feeders, thus doing half the Left's work for them. Second, If he's gonna shoot his mouth off and fire blanks, someone has to call him on it, ESPECIALLY since he's such a loudmouth, sanctimonious, over the top harridan. Now when he says that global warming is a hoax and the Left says it's real, who are you going to believe? He's kind of becoming the Colonel Klink of the Right. Worse, he makes the Left look like a truth squad

But Neal Boortz is an honora...er...intelligent man

Beyond this, If you believed what these clowns said, as Violette said often, How does that reflect on the Military? And those who support them accuse the persons who oppose the Iraq war of being anti-military. Hello--ooo! For these clowns to have been right. the whole military would have t o be corrupt to the point that a Hussein-led invasion of the US would be the REAL liberation.

Now, there's nothing wrong by me with shooting off your mouth, I do it enough to make up for 40 stong men and the taste of crow is not unknown to me (best served with a red Zinfindel and mushrooms) but make sure you're not fireing blanks. Not for nothing is it called a "trap". It is far better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool than to open it and remove all doubt. But then what can you say about a self-proclaimed "Libertarian" who is one of the Seat Belt Nazis?

But Neal Boortz is an honora...er...intellignet man

So are they all. All honora...er...intelligent men.

What makes a good blog?

Good blog entries

Thanks a lot: and WTF makes a good blog entry?

To best answer that, I need to know what blogging is all about.

it's about asking persons to consider what I write valuable enough to go through the effort of reading. Now, there are all kinds of persons, OK folks, thugs, airheads, etc.. So this means I wnat certain persons and really don't want others. So what I write will attract certain kinds of persons. I hope that the attracted persons will match what I want to have here.

Now, there is a saying a buddy of mine used to use back in the '70's: "S**t attracts s**t." A more genteel way of putting it is the Italian phrase "Tell me who he goes with and I'll tell you what he is". Well, this applies to blogs

what I don't want are the self-abosorbed, so you want find anything narcissistic here.

Wht I don't want are airheads so you won't find the banal here.

what I don't want are thugs, so you wnat find the low-grade garbage that attracts that ilk

Given all of that, You won't find "party" stuff, sportsfan stuff, the usual yawpings that are part of the 13-25 year-old non-mentality culture, You won't find knee-jerk, phoneycon rah-rah President Bush stuff here and you won't find the lefty hate-mongering here. You won't find the banal "my vacation" fluff here.

What I want here is the kind of thing that, when you are finished, you take something with you. I write on two levels. The first is the content and content-related thinking. The second is functional. Thus, it may be the case that the subject matter is different when you finish reading from when you started and you never really noticd the change. That is because the REAL subject matter, what I wanted you to "get", was something else entirely. It could best be conveyed by demonstration rather than explanation.

Also, This is part of a larger whole, so go to my website and you will find other things, the biggest of which is a Web 3.0 playground that will open up opportunities for you to experience a world that was created over half-a-century ago and is as fresh as Tomorrow. But there are other parts too, so be sure to go there as well: Unless you're the typical 7-year-old child who still cryababies and demands that Mommy cuts the crust off the bread for you.

A good blog entry is a window to a "take" that a person has on the world. It is personal but not self-absorbed so it's put in terms of real things that all can experience. It is made of things that matter and it reveals the depth, or lack thereof, of a persons's mentality. It does not need to be ponderous or that just scares people away, but it should challenge and absorb one's attention.

I follow Rome's Rules: It must be a take, it must be fresh and it must not suck.

I know a girl (anyone my age or younger is a girl) about a decade younger than I am who swears up and down that she is a choco-holic. Well about two weeks ago we went to the mall, as a surprise I got a box of double chocolate swiss rolls, both the cake and filling are chocolate. After we ate at the food court I reached into my space bag and whipped it out, expectimg a small supernova, She turned her nose up at it.

My best bud from the late sixties through the eighties really used to talk the hard line Right, just like I did-and do. He had the usual stuff; into guns, knives, binocs, you know, the adventure toys; talked the Security slanguage, worked in a defense-oriented job from which, in the mid '80's he recruited me into a neat little psy ops job using the Big Thing of the time; talk radio. Get the picture? In '78, one of his family's cars got stolen and he dragooned me out at 5:30 on the August morning that it got stolen to help him look for it and possibly have a nice day with the perps. I didn't think twice; just grabbed my knife and aff we went. We didn't find a thing. Well come the tail end of '90, I accidently got involved with a bad guy and wanted to lose him. My buddy used to fre4quent the flea market that this clown had a table at. At 8:30 AM that Saturday my friend says "I'll scope him out and then we'll talk to the police"; i.e. the smart thing to do and I was all for it. Well, come 4:00 PM my buddy shows up and gives me the lowdown and says "...tell the cops you got it from a firend who wants to remain anonymous. I have a mother and sister who still live in the area and I don't know what this guy will do" (for those of you counting, it took the guy less than eight hours to wet himself big time) which was a polite way of telling me where I could put the info since I could not source it. Well, as I said, the bad guy is dead: Hanged himself in the basement. He made the mistake of telling me a medical fact that I could spin into a tale of being laid up for a year and he had enemies. I don't mind telling you I was isolated and scared, so I did what I had to and in the best way I could. I teated it like a spy job except that instead of being part of a team, I was both the "cut-out man [the "face" of the operation that the Opposition sees; no choice there]" and the "operations team [the folks who make the snatch, or kill]. The bad guy knew I was a "brain" and "no angel" but didn't think because of my very damaged eyes that I picked up on things fast, not realizing that I have very good ears and pick up on things fast and that his ways were catalogued and he had been tracked and targetted for a psy ops job that was already in progress, although it did go bad after 6 months, the "poison" was already in him. When I tell a lie, I tell 3 truths, have or manufacture the evidence and even get the target to "prove" it to himself and know my target. After the suicide I checked and this dude had quite a few persons buffaloed, including a City Councillor, into believing he was big time and that he "had big help" doing himself in.

What does all this have to do with?

it's about the "Moment of Truth" There are some things about this event:

First: It comes by surprise. You do not pick it, it finds you

Second: It goes right to the heart of what you've said about yourself.That is why it is a monent of truth

Third. You don't know that it was a defining moment. My friend will swear up and down that she's a choco-holic and my ex-friend is probably saying we should nuke Iran and Iraq, showing off his knife collection and maybe bragging about the "caselss ammo" (about which I told him) he can get for his (illegal) SK-47 Chinese version of the AK-47.

Fourth: you're scared, really scared if you have any brains because this goes right to the heart of where you say you're at and if you're not there, it'll show up like cancer in a CAT scan (been there done that, too. 9 years ago, with 2 repeat performances and still here to tell about it). Now, I'm into the 1959-63 music and can play it but only "skeletally" mean I have the chords and some of the leads down (string ensembles were big then) just enough to demostrate what I can do. To play out, I would need to practice with the band I joined. Now in '93 this bass player who hung out at the same music store as I did calls me up on the Thursday before Halloween, that Saturday and asked me to play with him and a couple other guys he knew. You should see what was going through my head all at the same time : Tthings like "I thought it was that you practiced a bit and then played out; not played out then practiced", "This is gonna be an abrotion", I had never played out on stage with anyone except myself doing a kind of folkie gig and I never even met these guys. And "Oh, ain't this just great, my first shot and it's for real: nothing like a baptism of fire". Two things were going though my head. "I know where this is going and I don't want my first gig to be a disaster" and "Yeah but if you wimp out. that'll be a black mark against you and besides, maybe you can parley this into a working band". So I talk on with the guy, stalling for time and hoping to get as much info as I could. Now I was an unknown so I din't need the "no-show" rep but I could see "DISASTER" and a "parlor picker [not a pro], Not up to it" rep coming my way. Also, my main synth, a bigass Polymoog Synthesizer, was down, I had a Moog Opu 3, a Moog/Realistic MG-1 and a Sequential Circuits Pro-One. I could do a fair Hammond, excellent strings, excellent combo organ and a poor but passing piano (which matched my piano playing, I could bang chords, which the Opus could do as a piano. I took the gig; ready to drop a load in my pants for the first hour or so but I took it. Well a local country music celeb comes in and listnes to us do JAMBALAYA and acouple other tunes where I got to bang some piano chords, use the strings on the Opus 3 and use the organ on the same instrument. I played it really conservatively. During a break this dude comes up to me and say's "How long you been playing out?" I aid "This is my first time" and he goes "You'r s***tin' me!" which I denied.

I've been crowing about it ever since and nothing came of it.

So, if you're ever thinking of being a phoney for anything. Good luck. What happened to me lady friend, my ex-buddy and me will happen to you. Why? Because, by shooting your mouth off, you'll attract the real deal and put yourself in the way of the kind of thing that you are phoney about. So, unless you're ready to move in, don't even go there.

Why don't the Radio Rangers just go away?

By "Radio Ranger" I mean the likes of Jery Doyle (pity, I liked Michael Garibaldi on Babylon 5), Mark Levin (He was made mincemat of by WHJJ's Arlene Violette, former RI Republican State Attorney General, when he said or implied that President Bush knew more about law than the Supreme Court), PharoahNeal Boortz (King of Denial), Rush Limbaugh ("it will be a cakewalk." 4 years and 23,000+ causualties ago: Pity; I used to like him and he did upgrade the production and programming valies of AM/Talk radio) and the others of that type. Why don't they do the honorable thing or at least stop selling the Kool-Adi for a discredited administration that nobody believes anymore-or trusts (in the talking stage; the "surge" in Iraq was to be 10,000 troops it is now 24,000 and what can you say of an administration that outa a CIA operative?),

I call them "Radio Rangers" becuase they are so adement to send troops everywhere but how many of them saw action? And worse, they denegrate those who did see action. They're almost like "homer" sports talkshow hosts. Now, I stand in back of nobody in my advocacy of American strength and its display, when it is useful, warrented and not self-destructive. These guys are 100% on target with Iran and China as well as globull warming. But can you believe them? It is almost better to believe the opposite of what they say if you do not have other sources, the've screwed up so badly.

With the publication of his book, THE IMPOSTORS: HOW GEORGE BUSH BANKRUPTED AMERICA, Bruce Bartlett, a former Reagan Administration official, clearly showed that this administration has been the opposite of Reanganism, which the Radio Rangers claim to support.

Now the more these individuals prattle on, the more they make the real Right look either mad, foolish or evil. I wonder if their brains have been affected by Kool-Aid poisoning.

I hate to say this but New Gingrich should take a hike. Although he did the honorable thing and resigned when it was found that he was in a state of adultery, by being such, he has disqualified himself from any platform that has as a main plank moral uprightness. Also Hanity, who, according to his buddy Boortz, ponied up $3,000 for a Playstation 3 for his 8-year-old son, thus practicintg the values he preaches, right? Bill O'Reilly is just an out and out demigogue who is not aware of the Separation of Church and State; totally ignoring Thomas Jefferson's explicit statement, sort ot our own version of Ayatollah Khomeini (beware of those who claim to "watch out for you or 'the folks'", demonstrates that the "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" are liars but doesn't make a clear statement on it and sides in with the Envrionmentalists). Matt Drudge is just a crackpot who hates science; why he is on the 'net and not using stone tablets I have no idea.

These individuals help our enemies. the Left gain credibility by providing high-profile targets to point at and say. "look, this amalgem of the evil and crackpots is what the Right is". These individuals are like dead fish in the noonday sun, they shine and stink.

I started with talk radio when it was good. Beginning in 1974 when Avi Nelson stated at WHDH in Boston and challenged and derfeated liberal talkmaster Jerry Williams who was a radio icon. I used to be a Mark Williams and Mo Lauzier regular from 1980 to the end of the first WSAR Fall River 1480 AM talk radio incarnation and was a regular through the '80's and early 90's at WALE at 1400 AM Fall River so I had a 15 year run and even did some time as a caller to WBZ's David Brudnoy show. So I'm no stranger to this art form. I watched Airhead America come and go: Getting what it so richly deserved. So I know what's good. And this current crop is a Democratic tsunami in the making, even alienating the only other Rightist in this area.

The good that they speak is outweighed by the stupid and evil that they speak and just gets lumped in with it by the great bulk of the voters. I am told that they have only a small following given the small listenership to AM radio, especially at night and they are kept on becuase they're cheap to buy.

With "frieds", spokespersons and leadership like this; who needs enemies?

IT'S ABOUT CREDIBILITY:

I was prepared to give Neal Boortz some amount of credibility on his "Fair Tax" until today.

He took a call about a supposed link between Al Qaeda and Hussein. Now for those of you drinking the Kool-Aid, The two hated each other since the Ba'ath party is for secular government and the fanatics are for theocracy and was therefore a threat to Hussein who was mre interested in Hussein than Allah AND was good enough for Reagan. Any co-operation between the two was on an ad hoc basis and with one eye on each other and for Hussein's part, simply to keep them off his back. Much as Boortz did or tried to do some deals with some Democrats for the Fair Tax when he knew which way the wind was blowing. He of Great Purity of Heart (for which I would not blame him except that his is so smug and self-righteous).

The caller said that the President said there was no link Boortz said that the President also said that there waere no Weapons of Mass Destruction "...and there were". What was actually found was some old stuff, believed to be Soviet (you know, as in "there's a name from the past") that wans't a threat to anyone except those who would try to use them. This was the testimony of chemical weapons experts and bought into by the Administration.

Boortz then used this to launch into a criticism that President Bush does not make his cases strongly eonugh.

Now, Boortz is one of only about 2 or 3 guys still ridign that dead horse. The only others I can thing of are a small contingent of the Radio Rangers.

So here he is, second-guessing the people who have far greater knowledge and the Administration that started this war and folded on two key matters; the link and WMD issues. Don't you kinda look like a real loser when you aregue with the chef about what's in the soup?

What's worse is that If Boortz is right, then the Bushies are lying now, and If he's not, they were lying then (suing force and getting persons killed means that, by definition, you are claiming absolute, beyond-doubt certainty). In either case, Boortz has thrown in with liars by supporting their actions.

It's about CREDIBILITY. Why would I have any trust in anything he says that I don't verify elsewhere, He's either a liar or a nutcake (if I had to choose between being either evil or incompetent, I'd prefer evil, but that's just me). Given that, why would I trust his leadership on anything?

Here's the drill: You recommend him on the Fair Tax and the person you're talking to says "Hmmm...Bootz: Isn't he the guy still peddling the WMD and the link between Hussein and Bin Laden, when everyone who is sane and honest or even sane and dishonest knows better? Why are you following HIM?!" Does "too stupid to live" do anything for you.

Esta tudo acabado. folks

I suspect the only reason the radio stations carry these clowns is that they are cheap to syndicate and Airhead America took gas. Very few of them have quality programming values. Limbaugh is the only one that I can think of. O'Reilly can do some good stuff but he's a demigogue and nobody in the business really likes him as a person After doing a devastation critique on the Swift Boat Veterans for "Truth" he did not step up to the plate and identify them as the liars he proved them to be; so where's the courage of his conviction? Matt Drudge had his finest hour long ago and his record of prediction is...well..he's followed by Art Bell/Coast to Coast: You know ghosts, spirits, alien abductions and Flying Purple People Eaters. I've heard som good AM music programming out of Huntington, NY and Canada. Also old time radio dramas might do well. I'd like to try a mixed foramt of block-by-era-programmed 1959-69 music and Radio Spirit OTR programming. with some live Jim Rome sportalk (he's fresh, has a take and usually does not suck). Here's my drill: 5-9AM drive time: 1959-63music, traffic, weather, announcemnts; mostly tunes 9-Noon 1964-69 music, Noon-3 Rome 3-8 PM 1958-mid-63 tunes, traffic, announcements, mostly tunes.8-Midnight OTR Midnight to 5 AM 65-80-albums. I don't care if someone reads this and tries it out. I just hope it's in my area so I can listen.

"Well hello Mr. Soul I dropped by to pick up a reaso; for the thought that the thoughts in my head was the evento of the season" - Mr. Soul by the Buffalo Springfield, Mid '60's

Every time I hear about a "voyage of self-discovery", "self-expression" or a "coming of age" gig. I run the other way. "Been there; done that. Yawn" should be the proper response by anyone over 30. The only value that such can have is nostalgia for the feelings that one had during that time in ones own life. Yet it is the most used theme in the media. the plain fact is, you do not discover your self, you make it. The only thing you discover is your innate needs and abilities. These are no different than for anyone else. "self-discovery" is a passive process. that is you just sit theere and find whatever is there with no thought of what it is or how it goet ther. "It's part of my 'self' so it must be valuable". Self-creation is an active process and implies that there's somebody home up top with standards, principles, goals and purpose, making judgements and evaluations, rejecting the foolish or evil and crafting a persona that will stand one in good stead. The best example of that is Ayn Rand's THE FOUNTAINHEAD.

What seems really strange is that the apostles of self-absorbedness, of "self-discover" are usually the biggest collectivists going. To wit, the Hippies. The classic "me" generation and screaming leftist collectivists. What seems strange is not when you look at it. the person consumed by his/her navel has no psychological survival skills and feels that they need to be taken care of and have some innate right to be given what they need because they have a "soul". But when you look at this "soul" it is all fluff and no substance, usually expressing itself in some artsy-fartsy manner of no interest to anyone with a moiety of experience or creativity. I prefer the company of a day laborer who has real stories to tell that I can identify with and so does the artsy-fartsy type who is trying to get a look at "real life".

I never had to "discover" myself. I've known me ever since I was able to distingush myself from the external world. So anyone who is doing that at age 19 is very late to it and had better shake a tail-feather.

Now, I'm known as a pretty retro guy. But it is based on things and activities with the feelings taking a back seat to those. It's kind of strange, but the things I'm retro about, notably SPACE PATROL and the Tv space shows in general were actually the promise of the future. To be sure, I do miss somethings like tho balsa wood planes that aren't around any more like the Continental Saabre Jet and Thunder Jet and I prefer the old '60's pinball machines to what's out there now but that's pretty much it.

I do think that today's kids are being cheated out of some good things. I'd much rather go to a mid-'60's high school dance with a live band than a "club" run by a DJ. While I like video games for awhile, I'd rather play ball than drive a fake race car or rocketship.

We live, encouraged by the intellectual establishment, including the media, in a human environment of "Do your own thing", "Whatever floats your boat", "If if feels good then don't think twice" and the only corrollary there could be to that "Live for today and don't worry about tomorrow" forgetting that tomorrow can be a promise instead of a worry. The Age of Majority was lowered from 21 to 18 on the basis not of competence but on the principle that if you can be sent to take a life then you are competent to live. Since then two things: We got rid of the draft and we've spent the last 34 years taoking back what we gave, raising the drinking and firearms age back to 21 and a couple other things. I was 18 once and let me tell you: I didn't have a clue and I knew it. I was forced by circumstances to try to live as both a late adolescent and a working adult and let me tell you; I messed it up real good. Other results are we have grown children living at home at age 30 or moving back home in their mid 20 or the opposite, the person who, by the tiem they're 25 are confirmed cynics believing that you are either eater or eaten and anything goes. In the summer of '04 I was told that the USO was sending Kid Rock to play for the troops in Iraq. So being a rock and roll kinda guy I looked into Kid Rock with great trepidation and found him to be in the hip-hop/rap genre. At that point I said "It's over: We've lost". the average age of the WWII Allied fighter was 23, the average age of the US Vietnam soldier was 19 and it's pretty much the same now. A 19 year old trooper, even with the best of intentions and the best training just doesn't have what the 23 year old trooper has and worse, you are puttihg him as an occupying hostile alien that would test the mettle of the best men and add to that the quick tour of duty turnaround time, all in a land where a boy of 18 is a hardened , committed man in both staure and outlook: it's all bad. He will break, with that goes the cohesion of his unit. He is more readily distracted, the close mixing of the sexes puts undue pressure on things and he will do things that are just plain childish and of course, blame his superiors. Lindy English grew up in a world where S&M is a lifestyle choice so what the hell did she know, she probably thought it was "cool". Also, Marines, with their intense training have no business as part of an occupation force. The'yre not "Uncle Sam's Misguided Children" for no good reason. Their job is to deal hell and slog through it so that is what they do. Hadifa was to be expected and we will find more such before this mess is over. However don't tell Hanity, Rush, Savage and Doyle; they can't hear you: The Kool-Aid poisoning has scrambled their brains. War is not a high school crosstown rivalray and the way that sports rivalries are conducted these days: Don't get me started. Anything where grown men paint their faces and yawp like testosterone-poisoned savages ought to be banned outright.

What the whole of this amounts to is that thee kids are being tossed to the sharks before they can take care of themselves in the water in the name of empowerment. We are now learning that many of the nerves in the brain do not make the final connections until age 25. Would you enter a toddler in the Boston Marathon?

We live in an age that has glorified and made sacrosanct the "inner life: A thing is true or good because someon feels it is true or good" above and at the expense of the real world and the detriment of the 3/4 formed person that will be unable to think beyond the next moment or see beyond his feelings. Given that, integriy: knowing that what was true yesterday is true today and will be true tomorrow, truthfulness, adjusting what you think to match the real world and honesty, proclaiming that knowing that the weight both of the real world and the sanction of society will be badcking you up and lending their strength to you, have no place nor can they even havemeaing to the self-absorbed. For them, " The workd is what I feel about it, Tomorrow I will feel differently so the world will be totally different". Of what use are integrity when the world changes according to whim, turthfulness when the world works according to whim or honesty when I am alone in this world with only my feelings for a guide? In 1960 the US murder rate was 2,00 with a population of 180 million, now it is about 15,000 with a population of 300 million and crime stats have pretty much followed suit. Look at the drug use. Let me quote Ayn Rand "Happy self-conficent people do not seek to get stoned". As I've said elsewhere, I experimented with pot: It was controversial and I am by nature curious and more so in my 20's when I did not know as much. Once I found out what it did (as a musician, I like to be in touch with my music and my instrument and since pot pushes my mind into itself, I lose touch with time and my instrument. It's not that you play better when you're stoned, it's that you're so outta touch and fed back into yourself that you think you play or sound better when in fact, you suck and the only reason that people around you don't tell you is that they're stoned and haring what they want to hear), I said "Forget it!".

So let me say that the thoughts in your head are NOT the event of the season nor of the next nanomoment. It's what you make of them that is.

And that's the truth because that's the way the world works.

When you walk. drive a cae, sail a boat or fly a rocketship, one of the things you learn is navigation, In spaceflight, that's astrogation. That is the art of getting from here to there. that means knowing where "here" is and what is there. ...gation is the art of using landmarks to tell wehere you are and how to get there. This is as important for plotting the course of human actions, if not more so, as it is in plotting a course to the next room or the grocery store a half-mile away, New York, England, or Pluto or Procyon. It is more so because the course we are on in the dimension of human events will determine if we will even enter the state of affairs that would allow any astrogation at all. Well, Iet's ...gate.

There is a constant refrain that I keep hearing in this post Saddam Hussien world. The scene is that one of the Radio Rangers has a person on his show or on the line and askes. "Are we better off without Hussein?" , then luaches into the usual bit about how ghastly his rule was (probably true) and that he killed 300,000 people (not true, it was 350,000) and so on. Having been morally intimidated, the poor person, not wishing to look like a Big Blue Meanie says "of course we are", instead of "Hey Emperor, 'ja ever think you might be buck nekkid?".

Well, are we?

Hassein was responsible for the deaths of 350k people in 24 years. The number of "excess deaths" attributed to Operation Iraqi Bleed'em is 600k in 4 years. This puts us on track for 2.5 mega in the same time period and I understand that 2 million persons have fled. Now it is not likely that the deadly pace can continue at that rate but that is what whe have now. So we seem to have him beat by a factor of 8 at thsi point in time. If you use the number of deaths and refugees as a measure of beeter off'ness, where does that put us?

Plus we ourselves have sustained 3000+ dead and over 20,000 injured which would not have happened had we left it alone. How better off are we therre?

Over half a trillion in treasure that we could have used elsewhere, for, say, keeping the budget balanced while maintaining the tax cuts (both of which are conservative and libertarian ideals). Is that better off?

The election of the Democrats to both Houses of Congress and the current look show a Democratic tsunami in '08. meaning the depredations of the globull warming fantasy may be implemented along with the other Demo crapola that I thought the new crop would purge the party of, it having gotten them tossed out in '94. One definition of stupidity is doing the same thing and expecting different results.

And there is no end to this mess in sight. If the Iraq war were a stock offered on the exchange would you buy, sell or hold? I don't have that problem, I never bought in the first place. The whole thing didn't pass the smell test back in '02 and '03. and I thought the only reason the Dems in the Congress bought into it was to cash in on it in '04. I was wrong: The waited until '06 and are poised for the kill in '08. How better off are we?

This is what the phoneycons have wrought. Are we better off?

Beyond that. the Hussein regime was a bulwark against Iran, Iran has benefitted from Saddam's ouster in two ways:

1. we eliminated one of their enemies and replaced it with a government that looks like it may tilt toward Persia. 2. We have so used our military muscle that we are getting tired and used up our military resources that we are becoming depleted. Sun-Tzu is said to have said "If you have two enemies, have them fight each other": I wonder how that translates into Farsi.

Aside from this, the Democrats in the US and Labourites in Britain, with the respective present governemts having pissed away their credibility, will not permit any actions against Iran and even if they did, it is doubtful that we could muster up the energy and resources to have a go-round with them at this time. We're too tired and there just isn't that much gas in the tank.

So now, we have 4 incoming to dodge; all nasty and all were avoidable which really makes life suck. the future increase in Iranina power and them wanting a piec of us, The depredations casued by the Democrat left, having co-opted the Convervative movement, the phoneycons have discredited it and ruined it for at least two election cylcles and the instability of a fractured Iraq (could we hope to stop the Iranians ans Turks from doing a hard-core number on the Kurds in 2010? Could we stop Iran from annexing southern Iraq in 2009? Could we stop Syria from taking the Sunni Triangle as a "protectorate" in that timeframe? Before you say "yes" to any of this, remember, I'm the funny guy around here, not you). This is the future we face. As it is we have the instability of the present to deal with.

We sure's hell let the djinn out of the lamp, didn't we?

No, I don't have the answers because the specifics of the questions have yet to come into being. Generally when I see somethint like that brewing up, nearly surrounded by bad guys and half the fight knocked out of me with no help in sight and looking at 40 miles of bad road, I run like hell the first chance I get and consider living to talk about it a victory; having diddled the duck bigtime and living to tell .

So, Are we any better off? I report honestly: you decide.

GETTIN OUR CLOCKS CLEANED: Just why this occured to me I have no idea. Now with the new "Daylignt Savings Time" implementation in March, the fraction of the year spent on Daylight Saving Time is longer than that sepnet on "Standard" time. It follows that DST is more standared than Standard Time? Does that mena the DST or, where I am,, "Eastern Daylignt Time" or "EDT" is now the standard time. Does that mean that the other tiem setting will be "Daylignt Losing Time"? Somehow or other, when Congress or the Government in general gets involved in something, the normal order of things is SUFFER. Situation Universally Frigged, Fixing Exceeds Resources. Now you just know that the Dummocrats in CONgres will pass some idiot Geobbels Warming legislation to add to the idiocy that the Republiclowns did for Operation Iranian Takeover.

THE GREAT SUBWOOFER ADVENTURE:I went to Radio Shack the other day to get some replacement 8" wooferss as my 20-year-old ones finally went south on a perament basis. That was a no-go as they don't sell "loose" speakers. Since I needed to get the bass on my stereo up to speed: read "audible" I ended up buying a powered subwoofer. That was OK as i planned to do so anyway and have wanted one for a fiew years.

Best decision I ever made in that realm. HOWEVER I learned something NEWSFLASH TO RADIO STATION ENGINEERS: The music was fine, better than I'd hoped once I got it adjusted right. but the staion voice was so boomy I didn't know what to do. HINT. USE THE FRIGGIN' "BASS CUT" ON THE STATION MIKES. WILLYA?!

20 March 2007

This is the first entry in my first ever blog. What you will not find here are the usual kinds of things that everyone tells like their trip to East Cupcake or their day with Aunt Mary and Cousin Abner. I do not intend to say anything unless I have something to say. I will speak as many persons. The name of this beast is "Flight Log" and the image is a rocketship so that should tell you something. However, there is more to me than a Space Patroller. I have a Master's Degree in Psych and, if I understand correctly, a Minor in History (20 credits). I am a Randite. and a musician in the Rock genre> Do visit my domain to see what all that means. The material there is the reference point for much of what is here and if you don't know what's there, you'll be lost in space here (ouch! can't believe I said that).