Beardy Guy Musings

The wrong direction 

1908- Ford’s Model T averaged 25 miles per gallon 

2003- Ford’s fleet of new vehicles average 22.6 miles per gallon

06/13/2003 
The banana conundrum 

According to this article at the BBC banana’s could be going the way of the dinosaurs. The article states that “Edible bananas may disappear within a decade if urgent action is not taken to develop new varieties resistant to blight.” Primary threats, according to the article, are two fungi Panama disease, Black sigatoka and “pests”. The New Scientist has compared the situation to the potato blight of the 1840’s. Supposedly fungicides are becoming less effective. The only solution presented in the article is genetic engineering. They also suggest that this is a much greater problem for Africa because banana’s are essential for survival there.

I have to ask, is genetic engineering the only solution? What’s the problem? Is the problem pests and fungi or are those things symptoms? What about the lack of genetic diversity? The variety of banana which is being threatened is the “Cavendish” and that is, apparently, the only seedless banana. That in itself is a part of the problem. Perhaps another part of the problem is the growing methods? I’m guessing that banana’s are grown in centralized, large farms. This kind of mono cultural farming has consistently caused problems because it operates against the processes and patterns of nature. The nature of nature is diversity. I wonder, how would a permaculturalist address the banana conundrum?

Last week I mentioned an article,  An Escape From Freedom*: reflections on the development of an American dystopia by Mark Anderson over at the American Sentimentalist. It’s now turned into a series which consists of four parts. It’s long and a difficult read in my opinion so get a cup of coffee before settling in with it. Anyone concerned with freedom should read it.

Mark does a great job of describing the current situation in America. His comments on current perceptions of the growth and definitions of fascism as well as the prospects for freedom are right on. He presents a useful description of the factors which allowed for the unfolding of previous fascistic movements as this relates to the current move in America ever to the right. In part three of the series he states that:

One of the primary characteristics of fascism is the perceived relationship between the individual and the state: through the elevated power of the nation, created by the iron-clad unity of the individuals who make up the non-disenfranchised groups within the society, fascism allows individuals themselves in turn to find power. This relationship, however, is symbiotic without being mutually-beneficial; inevitably, the state gains power over the individual, and not the other way around. However, despite the fact that the distribution of power in a fascist system flows one way and one way only, it is the perception and belief that matters most - the perception on behalf of the ruled that they are at the center of the state itself, and not the rulers, to whom they give their unquestioning support in return for this belief. This belief allows the purposes for which certain policies are carried out to be ultimately cast as for the good of the individual as a component of the wider society, and not as an effort to benefit any particular segment of that society, such as the governing elite. 

Which brings us to the United States of America. 

The laundry list of ways in which the U.S. is no longer a democracy is long and well-known among all but the most myopic of patriots: the expansion of corporate power replacing public power, the insertion of money into electoral politics, and the overlay of ideology on all but the most inconsequential moments of public and civic life. Much discussion and debate is currently taking place as to exactly how the United States expects to exist in the world for the coming millennium, and how it is to be run by its politicians and perceived by its own citizens. But what is often lost, however, are the ways in which the structural underpinnings of American society are wholesale being replaced, and the consequences such changes will have wrought. For, far from being a nascent society with a long future of increasing freedom ahead of it, America is instead a mature society in deep transition, and one that is in much more danger of diminishing freedom for its citizens than it is in securing them.

I think what Mark has stated here is spot on. These structural changes have been carefully orchestrated and are difficult to see. The move away from freedom and towards corporate control has been a gradual process designed to be invisible.

Mark paints a clear picture of the rigid class structure which has evolved in the U.S. and describes the dynamics of that class structure. Other important variables for the development of fascism are also discussed: September 11, U.S. military and superpower status, and racial scapegoating. He concludes the discussion of necessary conditions for fascism by addressing the near collapse of citizenship in the U.S. as well as the psycological results of this collapse.

It’s as though we have forgotten what it means to be a citizen. We’ve been slowly and carefully stripped of responsibility and the desire to participate. Freedom has become a catchphrase which is more likely to be used to sell a product than it is to be seriously considered as an idea fundamental to participatory democracy. A commitment to community, to a public life has vanished from our daily life. Even the idea of such commitment has vanished. Instead daily life has evolved into an orgie of anonymous consumerism and alienated work. We are inundated with propaganda in so many ways that we don’t even know it. You could call it friendly facism. It’s like eating candy. It’s “Friends” and “Survivor”. Wal-Mart and the mall.

Someone once said that “Freedom is something you assume. Then someone tries to take it away from you. The degree to which you resist is the degree that you are free.” Will we fight back? Will we step up to the responsibility of defending Liberty? Can we each be an activist citizen every day?

Thanks to this post over at Counterspin Central I found this article at the Washington Post.

The lies are begining to pile up. I’m truly amazed that the anyone ever believed that Iraq posed an imminent threat to the U.S. and I’m disgusted at the degree to which the media has become a mouthpiece for the government. Of course that’s nothing new.

The folks over at Cyber Ecology are continuing the food systems discussion.

Tenniel does a great job of covering the possibilities for local involvement with our food. She discusses everything from putting in your own garden to Community Supported Agriculture to local farmers markets and food co-ops. The gist of her main point is that we need to reconnect with our food. We need to make an effort build a relationship with our food. That may mean we try to grow some of our own food or it may be that we make more of an effort to understand the origins of our food. It’s up to us to begin to take the action necessary to establish our connection. Read more….

06/06/2003 
Impeachable Offense? 
Missing Weapons Of Mass Destruction: Is Lying About The Reason For War An Impeachable Offense? 

John Dean writes:

President George W. Bush has got a very serious problem. Before asking Congress for a Joint Resolution authorizing the use of American military forces in Iraq, he made a number of unequivocal statements about the reason the United States needed to pursue the most radical actions any nation can undertake - acts of war against another nation. Read more…

A long but very well written summary of what’s going on with Georgie Boy.

06/06/2003 
Is Georgie Boy Arrogant? 

You decide.

06/06/2003 
Patriotic Son 

Ashcroft is a scary, scary man.

Of course, what is the man without the Patriot Act?

06/06/2003 
The Meat of Capitalism 

Serona over at Cyber Ecology has a follow up on meat and mad cow disease. I thought I’d point out that the problem isn’t mad cow disease. It’s really just a symptom. The problem is “our” food system which has evolved away from meeting human needs and which is increasingly ecologically destructive. More specifically, the problem is capitalism.

Want evidence that capitalism doesn’t work? Walk into a grocery store anywhere in the U.S. and look at the garbage that is being sold. Multinational corporations are not concerned with providing healthy food which has been grown using ecologically sustainable practices. They are interested in generating maximum profit which is why grocery stores are full of products that kill people. It’s true that there is a growing health food industry but that’s not an indicator that capitalists are interested in human health or ecological sustainability. It’s just a new source of profit.

Call me a radical, but it seems to me that our food system should provide food which nourishes the human body not food which makes it sick. I’d also go so far as to suggest that democracy should extend beyond government. Our food system should a part of democratic process. Our economics should be a part of democratic process. In fact, democratic process should be the foundation of our society. As it stands now, multinational corporations are not democratic. Nor are we taught to consider the social and ecological costs of the products we consume.

There are many aspects of our food system which should be examined. Of primary importance is the centralization of food production. Centralization refers to the scale of production sites, what many call factory farming. The centralized food production system is about short-term efficiency and short-term profit. It’s a system tied to a transition to chemical-based agriculture and a corresponding concentration of land into the hands of fewer, larger landholders. According to this articlebyGail Feenstra:

Many of these farms are highly specialized, growing mainly one crop. Small family farms are quietly disappearing, replaced by quickly expanding suburban developments, or in some regions, impoverished rural towns…

Our current, more centralized system is highly dependent on fossil fuel inputs for machinery, fertilizers, pesticides, irrigation, food processing and distribution. Fossil fuel inputs have increased dramatically over the last several decades so that today, we put 9.8 kilocalories of fossil fuel energy into our food system for every one kilocalorie of food energy we get out…

As the food system has gotten more centralized, fewer landowners actually live on and work their land, so they lose the intimate contact that is necessary to care for the land, water and other resources sustainably… 

If we are going to move towards something different we need to develop an understanding of what currently exists and how it evolved. Of course it’s not just about opposing what exists but presenting and creating alternatives. What kind of food system would be better? How would decentralized food production work? Why would it be better? Would it be more democratic? How would it tie in to the larger global context? As we enter this new century we see the continued growth of a movement to combat global capital. Across the planet activists continue to rally each year in opposition to entities such as the World Trade Organization, International Monetary Fund, and World Bank. The beauty of this movement is that it’s activists increasingly understand the root problem of global capitalism as a global process. It’s a movement that extends itself to confronting war, biotechnology, racism, arms proliferation, imperialism… the whole enchilada. Biodiversity, ecological sustainability, and food security are important issues within this larger movement and they will need to be explored further.

More Georgie boy lies 

Nothing but lies. It is truly astounding but not unexpected.

Everyday there is new evidence that this administration has no problem saying whatever it needs to say at any given moment regardless of the truth.

“I don’t believe anyone that I know in the administration ever said that Iraq had nuclear weapons.” - Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, at a hearing of the Senate’s appropriations subcommittee on defense, May 14, 2003

“We believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons.” - Vice President Dick Cheney on NBC’s Meet the Press, March 16, 2003

Concerning the recent tax cuts Timothy Noah asks: Why did Bush’s tax cut exclude so many low-income families?

On April 26, President Bush said in his weekly radio address, “My jobs and growth plan would reduce tax rates for everyone who pays income tax.” 

That turned out not to be true. According to the nonprofit Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, an unspecified number of low- and middle-income families received no tax cut at all because they’d been excluded from an expansion of the child-care tax credit. 

A Republican spokesperson for the House Ways and Means Committee told the New York Times that the benefit had not been extended to these low- and middle-income families because $30 billion in tax cuts had to be taken out of the bill to suit Sen. George Voinovich, a Republican deficit hawk. 

That was obviously not true. As the Times reported, extending the benefit would have cost a mere $3.5 billion. It could have been put back in had Congress been willing to lower the top income tax rate to 35.3 percent rather than 35 percent, according to the CBPP. Or, if that had been too controversial, $3.5 billion in tax shelters could have been shut down. Read more…

The funny thing about Bush and his regime is that they are so blatant about their disregard for the needs of people and their willingness to abuse the power that they have. Stupid. They should know better than that. That kind of obvious arrogance will help to generate resistance. What’s that old labor movement saying? A bad boss is the best organizer.

I wonder though, when will we move beyond this disfunctional system? Electing a democrat is not enough. The system needs to be completely replaced. Not just “government” but how we organize work and economics. How we get around, how we grow food, how we communicate. 

Perhaps we might work towards creating a democracy?

Still eating meat? 

Some days I am sooooo glad I’m a vegetarian.

An excellent story over at a fairly new blog Cyber Ecology discusses what every meat eater should be thinking about. If You Only Knew: Mad Cow Disease, Beef, and Getting in Touch With Your Food. 

06/04/2003 
The Oil War 

Thanks to this post over at the The Daily Kos I found this article. Yes folks, no one suspected it but the truth may be that our recent bullying of Iraq was, according to the U.S. deputy defense secretary Wolfowitz, about oil.

George Wright reports that:

Oil was the main reason for military action against Iraq, a leading White House hawk has claimed, confirming the worst fears of those opposed to the US-led war. 

The US deputy defence secretary, Paul Wolfowitz - who has already undermined Tony Blair’s position over weapons of mass destruction (WMD) by describing them as a “bureaucratic” excuse for war - has now gone further by claiming the real motive was that Iraq is “swimming” in oil. 

The latest comments were made by Mr Wolfowitz in an address to delegates at an Asian security summit in Singapore at the weekend, and reported today by German newspapers Der Tagesspiegel and Die Welt. 

Asked why a nuclear power such as North Korea was being treated differently from Iraq, where hardly any weapons of mass destruction had been found, the deputy defence minister said: “Let’s look at it simply. The most important difference between North Korea and Iraq is that economically, we just had no choice in Iraq. The country swims on a sea of oil.” Read more….

06/04/2003 
Weapons of mass destruction… 

Here

“Do as I say, not as I do” Nuclear Policy… Michelle Ciarrocca writes:

The Bush administration has its foreign policy hands full with each nation in its “Axis of Evil.” From the ongoing search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, to the appearance of negotiations with North Korea, and the push to declare Iran in violation of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, President Bush is following through with his promise to make certain these “dangerous regimes and terrorists” can not threaten the U.S. with the world’s most destructive weapons. 

But he’s going about it in a way that will actually increase the nuclear threat to the U.S. and the world. 

Buried in the President’s 2004 defense budget are two particularly troubling requests. The first seeks to repeal a 10-year-old ban on the development of smaller, lower-yield nuclear weapons, also known as mini-nukes. The second is a $15.5 million request to conduct research on a new bunker buster bomb called the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator. Read more…

and there

The pretext used by Georgie boy for invading Iraq was that Saddam posed a threat because he had the now famous “WMD”. Of course these have not been found. Some folks are starting to wonder if Bush and his pals ever truly believed:

The only evidence we need to know that the administration is simply in CYA mode is the fact they don’t seem very concerned about the “missing” WMD. If they really believed they existed, the hunt for them wouldn’t be motivated by a desire to justify the war, it would be motivated by the very legitimate desire to make sure the deadly weapons were not in the hands of evil-doers. Since the administration isn’t sounding the alarm along these lines, it’s obvious they’re unconcerned. They just want to find some scrap of something - a la the ridiculous mobile “labs” - to pacify the media and dupe the public. 

If there were WMDs, and we can’t find them, then we have problems. 

Conversations with my brother 

Iraq. War. George and Saddam. U.S. terrorism. Marriage and relationships. A few of the subjects of a very long conversation with my brother today. It was an amazing couple of hours and I think we both have a better appreciation of where the other is in life. Our conversation meandered to the topic of having kids and I suggested that having children might be a kind of child abuse. A child does not ask to be given life. It seems to me that given the fucked up state of the world it’s not unreasonable to suggest that life may not be a gift, but a punishment.

Perhaps that’s really twisted Denny logic, I don’t know. I do know that I do not plan on having children. I couldn’t bring a child into this world and feel that it was a good thing.

06/03/2003 
The results of the Iraq “War”? 

Ted Rall at Alternet describes The Rise of a Bigger, Better Taliban:

We warned the Bush Administration that invading Iraq would destabilize the Middle East and spread radical anti-American Islamism. We told the American people that taking out Saddam Hussein without a viable government to replace him would open a vacuum for anarchy, civil war and a power grab by radical Iranian-backed Shiite clerics. Now the antiwar movement’s doomsday scenarios have been fulfilled so completely that military history scarcely mentions a more thoroughly botched endeavor Ð and we’ll be living with the fallout for years. 

When we argued that Donald Rumsfeld’s low-budget occupation of Iraq would turn out as disastrously as it had in Afghanistan, right-wing Republicans called us stupid and un-American. Now that we’ve been proven correct on every count, is it too much to expect an apology? Maybe so. Given George W. Bush’s performance on the economy and the war on terrorism (where’s Osama? Saddam? the WMDs? the surplus?), betting against him hardly makes one a prophet. And no one is less pleased with the speed and totality of the Iraqi catastrophe than those of us who called it in advance. 

Todd Dominey, over at What Do I Know makes some interesting comments on the relationship between time and form in our “ownership” of music. He writes:

In the modern digital age, where music (for those with computers) is as abundant as air, there is way too much music to listen to in the limited amount of daily cognitive hours… 

But filling up iPods, hard drives, or jewel case racks full of new CDs before you’ve had time to fully enjoy and soak-in your current batch only robs you of the experience. Enjoy what you have now. Play your CDs or small batch of mp3s as often as you can. Repeat until they become a bookmark of now - this sliver of time in your life. Years from now, you’ll have a cache of vivid memories wrapped around every note, lyric, and album cover.

I may be out of the norm but I still tend to listen to the same music for weeks at a time before I rotate to something new. I think I currently have well over 1200 songs on my 10gb iPod but you wouldn’t know it because I’ve been playing Soul Coughing, Azure Ray, and Poi Dog Pondering all the time. Actually, Poi Dog is on the way out and the Dirty Three are taking that slot. Of course it might be argued that my listening habits have been formed by years of vinyl, tapes, and cd’s. Perhaps kids growing up with computer-stored music will have different listening habits, even a different relationship to music itself.

05/30/2003 

I’ll be on vacation till June 8 and I’m not sure I’ll have internet access so there’s a good chance I won’t be posting. One parting thought though. In my limited browsing lately I’ve not seen any mention of an essay, An Escape From Freedom: reflections on the development of an American dystopia. I’ve just taken a quick look at it and it looks very interesting. No other comments at the moment, hopefully I’ll post a few later after I’ve had a chance to give it a real read. I just discovered The American Sentimentalist last weekend and after lightly browsing the site I think it’s just amazing…. more coments later.

That phrase (minus the Manipulation) was a part of Monsanto’s promotional materials for a while. It’s since been replaced with “Imagine”. Jeanne d’Arc over at Body and Soul has posted
a story about the AIDS relief bill which was passed by the Senate on May 16, 2003. Apparently “our” representatives in congress continue the push to cram genetically modified food down the throats of people in Africa. She writes:

I’m hardly an expert, so if anyone wants to take exception to this characterization, be my guest, but my impression is that the safety of GM food seems pretty well established, the environmental impact and the effect on the local agriculture (and, long-term, on local economies as a whole) a lot less so. There are reasons to accept GM food and there are reasons to be wary of it (plenty of American farmers are wary), but almost nobody is arguing the case on its merits.

I don’t know that the saftey of GM food has been established. I’m not an “expert” either and I’ve not been keeping up with this for the past year but the last reading I did left plenty of doubt in my mind. A part of the problem with GMOs and food safety is illustrated by the case of “Starlink” corn which was not approved for human consumption. It was approved for feeding animals but it found it’s way into the human food supply in 2001. Our food supply is, apparently, not as organized as it should be. As long as some foods are considered safe for livestock but not humans I think we’ll need better safegaurds to ensure that the two do not mix.

I don’t think we can make blanket statements about the safety of GMO foods. The general attitude of the FDA (and other agencies) has seemingly been that GMO’s are safe until proven guilty. Shouldn’t it be the other way around? I’m going to look into it further but my impression is that they’re far more lax about food saftey that we realize.

On the subject of GM, environmental impact and agriculture, the process whereby GM has been introduced is a real mess. Just take a look at how Bovine Growth Hormone, rBGH, was brought into play in the 1990’s. rBGH and GM generally have been adopted too quickly and with little public debate. An interesting sidenote concerning rBGH and the media is the case of Jane Akre and Steve Wilson. In many ways it’s a problem with technology generally. It seems to me that any democratic society should rigorously debate the adoption of new technologies, especially ones which could have such far reaching impact as genetic modification. Yet this did not happen in the U.S. The media hardly discussed it. Instead multinationals like Monsanto, Novartis, and DuPont forged ahead and the U.S. regulatory agencies let them. Just as with food safety, the EPA seems to take a stance that genetically modified organisms are innocent until proven guilty. Of course, the problem with this is that once organisms are introduced into the ecosystem they cannot really be contained.

Multinational corporations do not generally function for the benefit of ecosystems or human health. That’s a fundamental flaw of capitalism and unfortunately the flaws of capitalism are not widely discussed in our society. Nor are the intentions of corporations when they push new products and technologies.

Technorati Tags: Genetically Modified, GMO, Monsanto, Agriculture

Why in the world to these fucking things exist? Why do people buy them? Please help me to understand the irrationality of the human species. Wait, I think I’ve just come up for the equation that allows these to exist:

Obscene income + absence of eco-awareness + lack of concern for fellow drivers + advertising = hummer

A simple restatment might be: Income surplus + ignorance + manipulation = hummer 

That was easier than I thought. Anyone else care to contribute a different equation? This could be fun.

On a related note, Thomas Friedman writes in the New York Times that “In the wake of the Iraq war, the E.P.A. announced that the average fuel economy of America’s cars and trucks fell to its lowest level in 22 years, with the 2002 model year. That is a travesty. No wonder foreigners think we sent our U.S. Army Humvees to control Iraq, just so we could drive more G.M. Hummers over here. When our president insists that we can have it all – big cars, big oil, lower taxes, with no sacrifices or conservation – why shouldn’t the world believe that all we are about is protecting our right to binge?”

Help me out here. I’m trying to remember, trying to understand; why did we just beat up Iraq?

Was it a continuation of the “war on terrorism”? Was it to remove “weapons of mass destruction”? Was it to remove a dictator and create democracy? Thanks to Jeanne D’Arc at Body and Soul for pointing to this article at the Christian Science Monitor. According to that article there is increasing evidence that “between 5,000 and 10,000 Iraqi civilians may have died during the recent war, according to researchers involved in independent surveys of the country."

That would make the “Iraq war” “the deadliest campaign for noncombatants that US forces have fought since Vietnam.” It also puts civilian casualties far beyond the 3,500 that died in the first Gulf war. Of course this number doesn’t include the many people that are likely to die because people’s needs are not being met after the war. Hospitals are not even close to being stabilized nor are food needs being met. What about the radioactive wastes left behind? Just as with the first Gulf War, tons of depleted uranium bullets now liter the Iraq landscape.

Some might argue that it’s American-based multinationals that stand to benefit. Call me crazy but I think that may have been the plan all along.

For a continuing discussion check out salon.com has set up a new blog, Iraq Democracy Watch.

Technorati Tags: Iraq, War, War Crimes

“When the guy from the White House tells you to take your tie off, you don’t ask why.” –Brian Bosma, Indiana House Republican, minority leader, who, while attending a speech by President Bush, was asked to remove his tie so audience members would look like ordinary people.

Time Magazine, May 26, 2003.

You gotta love juicey little tidbits like this. Gotta make sure all us ordinary folk feel at home with “our” president. Gee, thanks fellers for being so thoughtful.

Technorati Tags: George Bush

Thanks to Jon Lebokowsky I found Adina Levin’s post discussing the dynamics of scale and democracy. She writes that “The “lobbying-and-marketing” approach isn’t just an elitist power-grab by special interests. It’s a practical response to a scaling problem. Representative democracy is a solution to the problem of aggregating decision-making power. The “lobbying and marketing” strategy is a solution to aggregating the power to influence decisions. The Sierra Club and the NRA can get hundreds of thousands of people to donate, vote, and contact representatives."

Social ecologist Murray Bookchin has proposed a democracy of the municipality which would shift decision making away from Washington D.C. It’s a radical proposal and calls into question our acceptance of the nation state as a required entity. His idea, greatly simplified here, is to think of democracy as a participatory process which begins in the neighborhood and then builds up to the city level and from there to a regional level through a process of confederation.

It’s interesting to think about in these times when many would argue that citizenship is dead or dying and has been replaced, to a great degree by consumerism; a gradual, but fundamental shift that is not healthy for democratic process.

What Bookchin and others have called for is actually a deep cultural shift as well as a political shift. The machine as it currently functions is not democratic and I’d argue that it’s incapable of democracy. It would be like asking a common kitchen toaster to fly accross the room. That’s not going to happen because toasters are not designed to fly. Similarly, the social, political, and economic systems of the U.S. are not governed by democratic process nor are they designed to cultivate it. It’s really about the management of people and resources by a fairly small group of people who function behind the facade of “representative” democracy.

Of course there are times when it’s pretty obvious that we’re not living in a democracy, or even a democratic republic. If we want a democratic society we will have make fundamental, radical shifts to the many layers of our lives. It’s not just about government. We need to examine the purpose and practice of our “educational” systems. What about the influence of corporations, which are private tyrannies, over public policy? How does car centered city planning affect the use and experience of public space? How is techonolgy being used? Who decides which technologies are used? Is the corporate media system really informing people or selling to them? Who controls the media system? What does it mean to be a citizen? What are the responsibilities that go along with citizenship? Is it possible to have a more direct relationship to public policy? Should democracy extend into the economy?

Technorati Tags: Citizenship, Democracy, Murray Bookchin

The FCC monster… 

Just a friendly reminder that on 2 June 2003 the FCC proposes to remove laws that prevent any single company from owning every TV channel or newspaper in your city. This is very, very scary. Remember, the mission of the FCC is to regulate the airwaves in the public’s best interest. They must be held to this mission. If the public doesn’t act on this the corporations will get their way. Don’t let one conglomerate control what you and your family can watch, read, or hear. See this or that and contact your representative."

05/20/2003 
Silence of the fishes 

I’ve decided to take as much of a break from human interactions as I possibly can. How will I accomplish this task? Basically, I’m going to shut the hell up and avoid people. Specifically, I need a break from the people I live with. So, I’ll play hobbit and see how it goes.

I’m just really fucking tired of the folks I live with. I know that sounds harsh but it’s the truth. Sometimes I love them but sometimes I can’t stand the sight of them. The negativity is overwhelming sometimes and fuck, let me tell you how tired I am of certain people’s high and mighty attitude. And I’m sick of people that don’t have any fucking money. Get a fucking job and feed yourself. I know I’m probably not the dream housemate but for fucksake, I generally try to be polite, pleasant, responsible and respectful.

On a positive note, it looks like we’re going to be able to keep the aquarium we recently obtained. It’s a monster: 125 gallons!! I’m slowly buying the supplies we’ll need to set it up as a planted aquarium: 230lbs of gravel and flourite, an expensive ass filter, plants, and light’s. I’m going to build the light hood myself and use standard 30 watt compact flourecents. For a planted tank 2-3 watts of light per gallon are recommended so i’ll need at least 250 watts of light or 9 lights. Hopefully we’ll get it all set up by the end of June then it’s time to add fish. I’ll move the 7 fish (black tail shark, bala shark, various gouramis among others) from their 30 gallon tank to the new one.

I’m looking forward to setting up this aquarium. I have no doubt that it will be beautiful. I think aquariums have an amazing calming effect in a room. We should line all the walls of our house with aquariums!

05/20/2003 
Frustrations with BellSouth FastAccess DSL 

It’s a real bummer that Directv DSL went out of business this past fall. In one year of service with those folks we had maybe 2 outages for a total of less than 1 hour. An added bonus was a static ip address which made connecting remotely much easier. Their service was the best I’ve had yet.

Enter BellSouth FastAccess which is almast as bad as Road Runner was. For starters, the signal drops out several times a week. These outages usually only last a few minutes but sometimes up to several hours. Very annoying. Another kicker is what they apparently do to discourage do-it-yourself home networking. From the start we’ve had problems posting from certain online forms or email services such as yahoo or hotmail. These problems only occurr when working through our Asante or Linksys router. A direct connection to the modem works fine for all pages and services. Why? Evidently Bellsouth throws a wrench in the works by requiring that data packets be smaller than what the router normally uses in some instances. This is not a problem that can easily be fixed or even discovered by the typical home user. I discovered a solution after many google searches and finally a post to the Asante support forums.

There is a solution though it’s a pain in the ass and I’ve not been able to get it working on all of the computers on our home network which range from Windows XP to Mac OS9 to Mac OSX. Each computer has to be configured to limit the size of it’s MTU (maximum transmission unit). The two machines easiest to configure were running OSX. I did a search for configuring MTU in Apple’s KBase and came up with this article. Pretty straight forward use of the terminal and the pico text editor to create a script and a file as well as altering another. Though it is described as an “advanced procedure” most anyone could do it if they simply follow the directions. Took me about 10 minutes to do both computers.

As of this writing the XP computer is still not properly configured. I downloaded a recommended shareware program, NetTweak Pro, installed and configured it but with no success. In fact I can no longer access the web on that computer. Nor have I found a solution for reconfiguring the OS9 computer.

Seems like Asante and other router manufacturers could allow for this kind of setting in the router? Perhaps future router firmware updates will include this feature.

Okay, so Georgie boy waged a war against a nation that couldn’t defend itself using a pretext that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction that could be used against the U.S. Have they found those weapons? Of course not. Will they find them? Probably not. Did they get Saddam? No, just like Osama bin Laden he seemed to disappear into the countryside. Did over a thousand innocent Iraqi’s die? Sure did.

So the “war” against Iraq “ends” and flyboy Georgie lands a jet on an aircraft carrier for his grand finale. “Our” fearless leader. Nevermind the fact that he went awol for over a year. That’s right, Bush’s military records show that he did not report for Guard duty for a year or more from 1972 - 1973.

What a joke this guy is. Check out GW Bush Went AWOL for more info and links to articles found in the mainstream press.

Technorati Tags: AWOL, George Bush, Iraq