Random Brain Droppings, July 4th Version

In no particular order.

From Gerard, the Short List:

A short list. In no particular order.

We told our children that any child could grow up to be President. And then we made it come true.

We had car shows, boat shows, beauty shows and dog shows.

We ran robots on the surface of Mars by remote control.

Our women came from all over the world in all shapes and sizes and hues and scents.

We actually believed that all men are created equal and tried to make it come true.

Everybody liked our movies and loved our television shows.

We tried to educate everybody, whether they wanted it or not. Sometimes we succeeded.

We did Levis.

We held the torch high and hundreds of millions came. No matter what the cost.

We saved Europe twice and liberated it once.

We believed so deeply and so abidingly in free speech that we protected and honored and, in some cases, even elected traitors.

We let you be as freaky as you wanted to be.

We paid you not to plant crops and not to work.

We died in the hundreds of thousands to end slavery here. And when that was done continued for a century and a half around the world.

We invented Jazz.

We wrote the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Gettysberg address.

We went to the moon to see how far we could hit a golf ball.

We lifted a telescope into orbit that could see to the edge of the universe.

When people snuck into the country against our laws, we made parking lots and food stands off to the side of the road so they wouldn't get hurt, and we let them use our hospitals for free, and we made their children citizens.

We didn't care what God you worshipped as long as we could worship ours.

We let the People arm themselves at will. Just to make sure.

We gave everybody the vote.

We built Disneyworld. Just for fun.

We had a revolution so successful it was still going strong two and a quarter centuries later.

We had so many heroes, even at the end, that we felt free to hate them and burn them in effigy.

We electrified the guitar.

We invented a music so compelling that it rocked the world.

We had some middling novelists.

We had some interesting painters.

We had some pretty good poets.

We had better songwriters.

We ran our farms so well we fed the globe.

We made the automobile and the airplane.

We let you get rich. Really, really rich.

We didn't care who you were or what you were or where you came from or who your parents were. We just cared about what you made or what you did.

We had poor people who, even at their most wretched, were richer than any other poor people on the face of the planet.

We were the most noble nation the world had ever known.

We had so much freedom that many of us voted to just throw it all away.

Even towards the end, as we dissolved into the petty bickering and idle entertainments that come with having far too much leisure and money, many among us were still striving to make it higher, finer, brighter, better and more beautiful.

Even towards the end, the best of us declined to give up and pressed on. "Where to? What next?"

Frazz:

(Dedicated to @PeeteySDee. He knows why.)

And finally, from Brooke:

Be careful out there!!

Random Brain Droppings...

...on millennials, and the law.

First, the millennials:

Airlines should offer millennial flights (or, someone should start 'Millennial Air'.)

Features:

• All first-class seating
• Free food - locally sourced, organic, all vegan
• Free drinks - Pabst Blue Ribbon, and a wide selection of craft IPAs
• Free wi-fi, with no connection to any triggers or micro-aggressions
• Guaranteed safe space once on board and for the duration of the flight.
• And, free airfare - all costs paid by the air crew, who are, of course, the 1%
• All non, non-white passengers required to sit in the back of the plane
• In coach seats
• All non, non-white passengers required to shut the f*** up.

I know it makes  no sense. but then, look at the market.

On the law...

...started with this throw-away response:

Found this from @BobbiJoR to go with my morning coffee:

...and we're off:*

And it was about here that I got frustrated with trying to get her to clarify what she was after, which isn't germaine to this post. What it seemed to boil down to is this:

"I'm worried about lack of due process and too may laws."

 * I've reconstructed this as best I can, getting what I think is the gist of the conversation. Any errors are mine.

I'm poking about in her timeline, and it interesting stuff, but it seems incomplete:

Who are the other 8%? I'm thinking the "power players". My guess is 8% would be about right, since it seems most drug convictions wold be for possession/use.

My other guess is, most federal convictions are for white collar crime. Aaaand, the guess would be wrong, according to The Overview of Federal Cases, Fiscal Year 2012, Schmitt and Dukes, Office of Research and Data.  Interesting reading. I skimmed it, and I'm not sure if it refutes or supports @JessSmith_TPC or not.

Definitions are certainly in order, which is what irritated my in my exchange with @BibbiJoR. Here, I want to know the definition of "violent offense", and how many of those offenses were part of, oh, say, a drug offense. Thre is no category for 'violent crimes' in the Overview, so I'd like to know where @JessSmoth_TPC got that number. It does appear that the feds slice and dice their data in a myriad of ways, so she quite possibly has a report that I haven't found.

More importantly, I'd really like to know what #JusticeForAll is about. Time to poke around some more, after some needed work gets done.

Happy Father's Day!

I needed something silly after this week.

As you can see, via @20committee

Go. Read and follow this woman.

Rukmini Callimachi: on Twitter and at the New York Times

Wrong

So much wrong these days...

Bretagne (Bumped and Updated) Bretagne Was Honored Before Her Passing

Bretagne has passed on.

Click the picture for the CBS video

More at the Houston Chronicle  Via @JusticeWillett

* * *
I just didn't feel like trying to post anything for Patriots' Day (9/11) this year. I'm rather news-averse these days, what with all of the seriously bad insanity going on all over the world.  But today, I found this and needed to share:

You can see the rest here! 

Thanks to  weaselzippers and KLFY!!

BFTP*

*Blast From The Past!!

Got this from one of my Boeing co-workers:

From left to right, Rob, moi, and Chuck. This was taken no earlier than 2002. I know this because I bought that shirt for my 2002 trip to Costa Rica. It was taken at the BBC, which is local speak for the Belmont Brewing Company. We were on the back patio which overlooks the beach. 

Both Rob and I have lost weight since then. I haven't been in touch w/ Chuck for years, which is something I missed, but apparently not enough to do anything about until now. 

We spent more than one 'last day before Christmas break lunch' there,  watching the waves and the cute, bikini'd roller skaters on the bike path.

The BBC was the first brew pub I ever frequented, and is still my favorite!  It, and my friends, are some of the few things I miss about SoCal.

We're screwed?

Scientists Admit Everything They Know About Physics Is Likely Wrong

 

Scientists at CERN have announced that everything scientists thought they knew about physics may be entirely false, following the discovery of two new baryon subatomic particles. 

 

“The next few years may tell us whether we’ll be able to continue to increase our understanding of nature or whether maybe, for the first time in the history of science, we could be facing questions that we cannot answer,” Harry Cliff, a particle physicist at CERN said in a recent TED talk.

 Article here.

Reminds me of the state of physics at the close of the 19th century. Everything was nice and tidy, except for the 'black body radiation' problem, which would be solved easily and real soon.

The solution was relativity and quantum mechanics.

Here we go again. The problem is, of course not in the universe, but in our theories and hypotheses.

Heh.

Memorial Day

Breaks my heart.

#CapitalismWorks!! (Updated)

 Update: I complemented Michelle on winning the internet today, and she responded:

Yes I think it (went) viral pretty quick but the legal department at KW made me delete the post bc it was getting too much attention! Thank you

 Another humorless corporation.

Via American Digest

Mothers' Day, Part Deux

Two older posts about my deburrings (skin cancer excisions), and my Grandma G. The grandma stuff is the important part.  (Spoiler: I survived the surgeries.)

Grandma and Grandpa G, ca. 1954.

The Deburring...

posted 07/11/08
Tough day, and it's barely 1:30 PM. I spent three hours this morning "under the knife" at the nearby medical center, getting some of the results of my youthful, tanned beach-god days removed. Whilst awake. But under appropriate locals.

As usual in these things, I had plenty of time to sit around waiting, and thus plenty of time to contemplate my navel. Intellectually, I wasn't worried. I told a co-worker the other day that I thought this would be much less unpleasant that a root canal. And I was right. But emotionally, I knew I was scared. And that somehow brought me to what must be my definitive "happy place", one that I hadn't remembered or connected with emotionally in a long, long time.

After the accident, mom took me with her to Illinois so she could heal up at her mom and dad's place. I don't know the exact events that took place after that, but my earliest memories are of grandpa and grandma G. living with us in L.A. They apparently moved to California to stay with us and help care for me. I don't know if grandma G's breast cancer was a factor in that move, but I do remember knowing that she had it. And I remember the huge machine that was used for her radiation therapy, and visiting her in the hospital.

What I remembered today was what I did and how I felt when I was little-little. Grandma G spent most of her time in bed, and I would crawl in with her and we would talk. Looking back, that was the happiest, safest place I've ever been in my entire life. It puts the the crazy babysitter and the psychotic nuns into a sharp relief, which I'm willing to bet put the cap on my preference for going it alone.

I guess that warmth and safety is the experience I've been looking to re-create all these years.

Interesting.

Sunday, July 19, 2009

Back Under the Knife

I spent about an hour or so under the knife, again. New surgeon, new hospital (more, later).

Once again, in pre-op, I found myself thinking of my time with Gramma G. I think what makes that time so special to me is that it was unconditional. I suppose she knew, or at least suspected, that she was dying during my time with her. If so, she never seemed to show me that she was afraid. It seemed to me that she had nothing else to do when she shared her time with me. I'm sure that her dying was a great strain to my mom and Grampa G, so they were, of course, distracted.

After she passed on, my life changed. Grampa G would take off for a few months to spend time with his other children in Arizona and Illinois. When he was gone, I would stay overnight at my best friend's house, and during the summers,stay during the day as well. This was because my mom worked the night shift at the hospital.

Anyway, I know where my "happy place" is. Thanks, Gramma.

Happy Mothers' Day!!

With nothing but respect to women raising children with dedication and love everywhere!

Politics...

...in two comics:

Baxter's Dilemma

Suzu

As I wrote to friends and family:

Took her in for a 'consult' this afternoon. Long and short, it seemed the best to let her go. She went very peacefully. 

I wrote more about it here: http://redlionwindow.blogspot.com/2016/04/suzu.html

 Thanks for your thoughts, prayers and support.

Erin Go Bragh

200 IBUs!*

 

 

 

Thank you, Stilton!


(*International Bittering Units)

Demon's Nest

Sheldon Leonard

...think about it.

Pipelines

Via the always unique XKCD

Demon's Nest - Murder

As always, via Brooke

Corporal Works of Mercy

Go. Read.

Meanwhile, Earlier Last Week...

The Jeff Bezos side of the Musk/Bezos Space Race

Mr. Musk's contribution:


McDonnell Douglas and NASA were futzing with this sort of thing back in the 90s, in the form of the Delta Clipper:


Sadly, it never really got off the ground.

(Bezos' and Musk's efforts found at SondraKistan)

 If you want to get an idea of the technologies involved in this kind of project, check out the job listings at Blue Origin!

Safe Spaces...

...and candidates.

Frazz on Safe Spaces...

Via Go Comics, Frazz by @JefMallett, Pibgorn by Brooke McEldowney

Bill's Choices

Via Powerline

Looks to me like the young lady on the right is thinking "Ewwwww!"

Demon's Nest

I think Brooke has found the problem!

Lavabo...

Water.  Bar of soap. Towel  Easy.  Simple.

This?  Not so much.

USB charging...

Unleashing the Dogs of War

From Small Dead Animals. Where else??

I read about these folks and their dogs in one of Linda Fairstein's more recent novels

Happy Birthday...

...Roy Batty, incept date 01/08/2016!

"Tears In Rain" by Source. Licensed under Fair use via Wikipedia - http://tinyurl.com/gveauq6

Via Gerard

It Begins in Earnest

Drudge links to Breitbart and Politico about Obama's new rules imposed by Executive Order.  It seems to boil down to your doctor may report that you are "mentally ill" to the NICS (the National Instant Criminal Background Check System), thereby disallowing you from purchasing a gun.

I see three problems with this right off the top.  First, it sets a precedent for sharing health information to people and organizations not directly involved with your personal health care, which was the whole point of HIPAA.

Second, it lumps the mentally ill in with criminals.  Strictly speaking, that means you have two flavors of unrelated data instances in the same database. I think any competent DBA would tell you that this is "Bad". (Think of the your liquor store guy telling the DMV what your weekly alcohol purchase rate is.)  It also reminds me of lessons we should have learned from the 20th century, especially from the 20s and 30s onward.  (I'm looking at *you*, National Socialists and Communists!)

My third concern is the total absence of any due process in the infringement of a Constitutional right.  A recurring theme of 2A supporters is that these "mass shootings" (Newton, Sandy Hook et. al.) might have been prevented by better mental health care, not by more gun laws.  And, I agree.  I think (IMHO) that someone who is diagnosed as incompetent or dangerous to others shouldn't have weapons, or maybe even sharp objects.  (I'm looking at *you*, Charles Manson!)

I think that abrogating *any* Constitutional right by bureaucratic fiat is morally wrong and illegal.  If I were to deteriorate to a point where arming me is truly a bad idea, I would still expect a hearing to determine my competence, one wherein I was represented by counsel and a good shrink.

Being denied that (or any) right on the word of an individual, enforced by an anonymous database is simply not American.

(Gerard has a longer post by O'l Remus detaining how he sees the resistnce unfolding.  His take: it won't.  It will be a death by a thousand bureaucratic paper cuts. Go RTWT.)

Christmas Shopping Surprise!

Bumped: Question du jour... (Updated for Neid's Dead Horse!) Updated for Reality Cheque

Update three: The WaPo has this article about Hamtramck.  Go, RTWT

Update two: Well, it's starting to happen. Hamtramck, Mi. (home of the Painless Pole dentist, played by John Shuck) now has a Muslim majority on their city council.  So far, it doesn't look good:

The nation’s first, but certainly not last, majority-Muslim city council has just been elected in Hamtramck, Michigan, a historically Polish city. But before anyone could break out the sparkling grape juice and toast our new diversity, Ibrahim Algahim — a Muslim activist in Hamtramck – crowed at a victory party:

Today we show the Polish, and everybody else.

Multicultural euphoria, meet Islamic supremacist reality. Algahim, at least, was not ready to link arms and sing “Kumbaya,” as the diverse peoples of Hamtramck marched towards multicultural harmony. Randy Wimbley of Fox 2 Detroit reported:
[H]istory [was made] in Hamtramck as voters elected the first majority Muslim city council in the country.
But rather than ease racial tensions, the comments from a Muslim organizer threaten to divide. [Algahim’s comment] may create or widen the rift between the growing Muslim and shrinking Polish community in Hamtramck.

RTWT at PJ Media.

Original post:

Serious question - under the Constitution, why should it be OK for Catholics to forbid birth control and abortion, OK to allow Jews to practice Kosher, but forbid Muslims from following Sharia?

This is a law question, not a "Muslims are evil question". (They may well be, but that is another discussion...)

Update - As always, ask a question, get an answer, of sorts:  Nied's Dead Horse ‏(@mflynny)  seems to think I'm advocating for Sharia.  I'm not  At.  All.

But, as I proposed to her... Dearborn Mi votes in Sharia as the law of the town.  Chaos ensues.  (You know it will.)  Suits are brought against it by the few sane people left there.

What are the legal grounds for overturning the Will of the People?

Or, to put it another way, what keeps them from turning our laws against us?

It's starting already - "If you put up a Nativity scene, you have to let us put up an anti-nativity scene!!!"

I think it's an important question, and I haven't seen much about it.

Oh. And I guess I should always expand some on why I'm asking a question.

My apologies to @mflynny.

We Are All Israelis...

As noted, via DougM at SondraKistan.com

11/14/2015

(h/t American Digest and @Van_der_Leun)

11/13/2015

My Two Favorite Veterans

Dad and Uncle Jordan:

Capt. Jordan Webber, USAAF, and SSgt. George Webber.

Thank you veterans, everywhere.

Who Were...

...POTUS and SECSTATE back then?


In plenty of time for the election.

Litigators

Fount this at Popehat:

If you know what you're doing, you bring in the litigators before you start running your mouth. The litigator is there to tell you, in the most supportive and affirming way possible, to shut the fuck up.

That is all.

Education

I posted a response to this article at the Daily Caller a while ago, and got a response back.  My response to the response started turning into a blog post, et voila'.

My personal experience leads me to the conclusion that the whole for-profit education industry is one giant Chas. Foxtrot. I was working at an F.P. in the Baltimore MD. area when the Senate report came out. We were told that because of it, there would be no more performance evaluations, therefore no more performance based raises, just COLAS.

Our numbers had dropped due to the economy, and they were cutting corners madly. Changed all the degree programs so they only needed people with Bachelors degrees to teach, not Masters. They also found ways to let the (expensive) full time faculty go, and replace them with much cheaper adjuncts.

Good times...

This was the response, from FoxnewsisaTrojanhorse:

Was it your intention to sing the praises of for-profit school?

You did. Quite nicely.

Abolish all not-for-profit schools. Let the free market work it out.

To which I replied:

Don't see how you got that I was "singing the praises of for-profit school".  I wasn't, in this case.  None the less, I agree with you about letting the market sort it out. That would start with getting Fed and state gov't out of the student loan and "standards" biz.

And let NFPs compete. In the same market. My education was "private" (Catholic), and a good one, worth the money. Of course, that was pre-gender/enviro/deconstruction nonsense.

The other problem I saw reminded me of the question of the 80s, when Japan was eating our economic lunch:

What do Japanese companies have that American companies don't?

Japanese workers.

The FPs here in Pa don't seem to have a great pool of candidates from which to draw. And that's the problem.

We need better students.

Buy A Nun A Book Day... Bumped as a Reminder!

...is approaching.  I'm consulting my nunnish sources, but all the evidence points to Real Soon - September 17.  Once again, I will be sending books to the good sisters who taught me in my callow youth.

I won't have time to consult this year (my bad), but I'm sure I can find a few books that might interest them!

It's a nice way to say "Thanks"!

Adjuncting

Doonebury pretty much nails it:

 

deVry in Long Beach was actually civilized.  But I discovered that, here in Eastern Pa, we seem to be considered as interchangeable parts. Plus, the students are more 'problematic'.

I don't really miss it. Which I find sad, because it used to be the most fun I could have with my clothes on.

Annoyance

So, the appliance dealer seemingly couldn't get a replacement door for my fridge, so he offered me $100.00 to close the 'ticket'. I accepted, and with that money, ordered a new motherboard, CPU and memory for the 'media' computer.  Amazon did their usualy spiffy job of getting it to me, it was here when I got home from work last night.  Just for fun, I thought I'd install the memory, CPU and heat sink last night. I didn't feel up to the challenge of doing the whole job, so I thought I'd gut the case and install the new guts today.

Or, not.

The heat sink attachment set up is a new one to me. Instead of the old spring loaded clamp mchanism, this one has two spring loaded hollow pins that fit through two attach points on the heat sink, then snap into the motherboard. They're held in place by a second pin that gets pushed through the first pin to anchor it.

So, no new media computer today. I pinged AMD (the CPU manufacturer), to get a kit sent out, and let Amazon know that the order was missing a part. I received a reply from AMD saying they had opened a trouble ticket.

 This is an automatically generated email, please do not reply.
Dear Customer,
Thank you for contacting AMD Global Customer Care.
We have created a Customer Care Support account based on the details you submitted with your service request.
A separate email containing your service request reference number will follow.
Thank you for choosing AMD!
Best regards,
AMD Global Customer Care

This is an automatically generated email, please do not reply.
Dear Customer,
Your Service Request has been received and will be processed shortly.  Depending on the nature of your inquiry, further automated messages with additional instructions might follow.
Service Request: {ticketno:[xxxx4114]}
We thank you for your patience.
Best regards,
AMD Global Customer Care

 We shall see...

Hometown Movies

Stumbled across this list in Timeout: Los Angeles called "Los Angeles movies: 50 films that best capture the essence of LA". While it didn't cause me to be homesick, it did renew my interest in having my own "L.A. Movie Marathon".

The list covers films from the 1940's up through2011, covering a broad range of directors, actors, and topics, from "The Big Sleep" to "L.A. Story", "Chinatown" to "Them!". If you are film junkie, it's a good quick read. Where ever possible, it has links stream and/or purchase the film.

My daughter and I bounced some emails back and forth about the list, and the aforementioned marathon. I told her I would put together a list of films that I have that would be covered under the umbrella of an L.A. Movie Marathon.  I just now finished the list, and voila':

2 Days in the Valley
Be Cool
Bewitched
The Big Sleep
Blade Runner
Buckaroo Banzai
Confidence
Contantine
Get Shorty
Heat
The Holiday
into the night (Yes, the title *is* lower case )
Disney's The Kid
Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang
L.A. Confidential
L.A. Story
The Player
Real Genius
Sunset
Salton Sea
Tequila Sunrise
(Italics == listed in the article)

Need to add Chinatown, The Big Lebowski, The Long Goodbye, To Live and Die in L.A., and maybe Repo Man, The Limey, L.A. Plays Itself, and Less Than Zero