The collapse of the american civilization has revealed things about ourselves that maybe we would rather not know. But then when we learn those things, many of us would prefer to believe that those things are not true. They would deny their fellow americans the dignity of their decisions. They would deny that their fellow citizens know their own minds. They would deny them their free will. Yes, deny them that very self-awareness that the slaveowners and murderers who wrote the constitution required as a fundamental assumption of our so called and very undemocratic democracy. The facts are that some huge percentage of the voting Americans chose racism and hatred. They chose to deny equal justice before the law. They chose to take children from their mothers and put them in a jail and destroy their lives as a policy of this republic. They did that. They said "hate" but my fellow "democrats" insist they meant "love". Oh no, my liberal friends say, they didnt mean that. But I say they knew what they were saying. They werent fooled by Trump and Fox News or the traitors in Congress although admittedly those three are guilty of inciting people to violence, and of supporting treason, and other criminal and immoral or at least amoral acts. They, the sovereign people of the united states of america knew that they were voting to put right wing nuts on the judiciary to create a judicial dictatorship against the will of the majority. They knew that the knee of oppression was being put on our throats to choke the life out of our country. This is bitter tea, perhaps, to many of us. Perhaps their immortal soul is capable of turning away from evil but perhaps not, also. They stood before god and man and said we choose racism and lies and we know what we are doing. They are not pretending to be racist. Who are you to deny them the right to have and own their beliefs?
Wednesday, March 17, 2021
Would You Deny the American People Their Sovereignty?
The MidCentury Building That is No Longer There
I am trying to recreate 1700 Main Street with computer graphics. This will be more difficult than I anticipated.
I dont recall them asking me before they tore this building down.
Monday, March 15, 2021
Nomadland and Other Films
draft
Excerpted from a conversation with [REDACTED]
"Nomadland" was a big disappointment for me. I had been led to believe that it was a movie about zombies that attack a trailer park. Well! Fuck me! No such luck. I did appreciate that whats her name shat (past tense of shit) in a bucket but that one element, as appealing as it is on the surface, could not carry the film.
Regarding influencing public opinion, I did not explain myself well. In my obsessive doom scrolling, I read review/analysis articles by annointed pundits (did you know that this word came via the British adventure in india and refers to a "pandit" who is a type of Hindu scholar knowledgeable about the Vedic scriptures among other topics?) who purport to tell me what I and any reasonable person should like and hate. In particular, this pundit pointed out that The Joker was an abomination and no sensible person would like that yucky film. Well, you know what? Although I resisted seeing yet another film anywhere at all related to "The Batman" I have to admit that this was an interesting film, at least in part, with some very strong performances. So fuck him. Fuck all of them, if you see where I am going with this.
I want to say something nice about "Tenet" which as you know is not a terribly well regarded film. Well, although the concept is "just OK", I think it gets a bad rap for reasons that are not actually part of the film itself. If Nolan was an unknown, and made this movie (in a somewhat reduced form) for ... (making this up) ... maybe 1/3 to 1/4 the budget, then I think it would be regarded as a somewhat entertaining action adventure film. This is the well understood problem of giving a filmmaker too much money and of course people having expectations.
Setting expectations is so important.
It is very clear to me that visual effects has lost its way. The best visual effects film of the year might be one without time travel or space craft it may be a film with 30 shots, not 3000 shots, although I dont know what this film is. I think the vfx section suffers from the problems that accrue from self-important people whose very small dick, metaphorically speaking, has gone to their head... wait that image needs work. I need to think about this.
Tuesday, March 9, 2021
The Rini & Meredith Willson Auditions for The Music Man
draft
Apparently Rini & Meredith Wilson needed to perform the entire play (The Music Man) by themselves and a piano (not clear who played the piano) for dozens and dozens of auditions. Auditions to get a producer, then a director, then a music director, then a theatre, then a music company to publish the music and the cast recording, investor, etc, etc. This is before anyone was cast. Some of these went well, some of these didnt go well at all. And of course songs came and went, and the "book" changed a lot. But here is the point, as far as I can tell from the book about the production (But He Doesnt Know the Territory), none of these were ever recorded and they do not exist in any form that we can listen to.
"But He Doesnt Know the Territory" by Meredith Willson on Amazon.
Friday, March 5, 2021
Filibuster Did Not Apply to Republican Tax Bill
draft
Why is it only the Democrats who have to be on their knees and beg the Republicans to please, please, please let them pass a bill. I checked and the Republican Tax bill which gave money to their rich friends and destroyed the deficit (remember: it was going to pay for itself by increased GNP, ha ha ha ha ha) was passed 51 to 49. So obviously its bullshit and they should just pass the stimulus 51 - 50 (with VP Harris) and move on to the next.
[Ha so the answer is that this was a reconsiliation, which seems weird to me, but there it is]
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/12/01/us/politics/senate-tax-bill-vote.html
Thursday, February 25, 2021
Trump Castrati and the Failure of the Constitution
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I think that recent events put to rest any thought of even the most obsessed old school liberal that bipartisanship has any value at all. It has none, it is dead. The Republicans and the so called conservatives have cut off their balls and presented them to the great moron. Their path to power is through manipulating the states to suppress legitimate votes and so use the completely insane mechanism of the electoral college to steal another election. The Democrats cant and wont stop them: game over. And if we want to lick the feet of the constitution ever again in my lifetime, then implement the 14th amendment, 3rd clause. Insert stupid excuse here, blah blah blah. But you cant just pick and choose like that. It makes it all an obvious joke. I think Biden is doing a good job given what he has to work with. Americans may deceive themselves that things are fixed but the knife is in and the problems cant be solved at that level.
Section 3
No Person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.
Wednesday, February 17, 2021
Hannes Leopoldseder
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There was a time, perhaps 1984 or so, long before computer animation was accepted by polite society, when the true believers would assemble at Siggraph. This was before the fall from grace and pretty much everyone there was dedicated and pure of heart. I would always stay through to the day after the conference and in the lobby of the conference hotel I would find my friends from Austria, always Christine Schoepf and usually Gerfried and Horst and maybe a few others from their tribe. Some years she was accompanied by someone who seemed very distinguished and interesting to me, but who I did not know well. Someone she called Hannes. I loved these people, people who were dedicated to the emerging arts as mediated by technology. Not just computer animation, whatever that might be, but the larger world of what computing and communications would bring to the arts as that world is defined by those communities. As the years went by, Christine and Hannes were able to sponsor me to visit Linz where I would torture them with my totally sincere and unplanned behavior as I explored Linz and bothered the hell out of the other juries of the Prix Ars Electronica. And always, there was Hannes who seemed to be above it all and yet in some sense it was clear that he was the keeper of the vision. One night at an event at a local restaurant, I saw Hannes at work and I realized that someone had to raise the money, someone had to convince the powers that be that these crazy artists or technologists or whatever were bringing something to Linz. That he and his partners in crime, Christine, Gerfried and the others, were here to contribute to their community and maybe even the larger world of contemporary art. I wanted to get to know Hannes better but circumstances did not permit that to happen. Did I ever thank Hannes for his generosity and his contribution and for allowing me to be part of their family for a few years? I dont remember. Thank you, Hannes.
Monday, February 15, 2021
Bachelor Vegetarian Cooking Internet Style
Friday, February 12, 2021
California and Vaccine Allocation
I may have sampling error but I think what the State of California did was to partition up their vaccine supply by the total population of each county instead of asking what proportion of each county was in the designated target audience, e.g. how many 75+ and health care workers. This would explain why counties with a smaller proportion of these designated victims could immediately move on to other target audiences whereas Santa Barbara, with a higher percentage of older people, perhaps, has been struggling.
If true, there are two morals of this story. First, one more time the State of CA is not being even minimally competent at the tasks they are called upon to do. I would expect better from any undergraduate economics student at a university and I do not even get that level of analysis from the state. Second, choose where you live carefully. and remember this is not the last pandemic.
Tuesday, February 9, 2021
An Anecdote and the Test of Character
So my friends parents lived in a house in LA. They maintained pristine social isolation except for one caregiver / assistant who bought the groceries, cooked the meals, and so forth. Unbeknownst to the caregiver, she was exposed to the coronavirus and was asymptomatic, brought the virus home, and the two parents were dead within about a week from the time they realized that anything was wrong. There is no doubt, none whatsoever, that if Trump and his co-conspirators had acted minimally responsibly the course of this disease would have been different. The details of their failure are still coming out and its apparently much worse than anyone knew.
I need the Republican party in the Senate to find 17 loyal Americans who can do the right thing. This is the test of character. There will be no other test that matters. And we all know what is going to happen. This could be a moment of redemption and a step on the long road back. But they will fail this test, wont they.
Monday, February 1, 2021
Bipartisanship is So Dead Its Body Isnt Even Rotting
I wrote a many page email to try and create a narrative to explain my point of view. But it was long winded and tiresome. Here is the short more direct version. One party no longer subscribes to tit for tat as you put it. Their constituents have successfully created a party whose strategy is "I get everything; you get nothing". Nothing but total victory is acceptable to them, when you lose you scream bloody murder, when you win its because you were right. Negotiating with the enemy is just a way to run out the clock and fuck them so that they get nothing and you get everything. The hope is that you can sucker the stupid morons, the Democrats, into doing it over and over again. Charlie Brown and the Football. As part of this, the laws are bullshit for other people. When you do something its the right thing to do. If they do anything to oppose you its because they are left wing radicals who want to destroy america. So, it is the right thing to do to destroy the judiciary. It is the right thing to do to strangle black people on the street. It is the right thing to do. Statistically speaking, at the national level at least, this is the policy of the Republican party and there are no other Republicans. They are all Devon Nunes. Every once in a while you get a shill like Collins who pretends to want to do the right thing, but she never does, its just a tactic to make the stupid Democrats waste time before they get fucked again. Ha ha ha! We fucked you! The constitution exists as a way to fuck freedom and steal elections. Everyone knows that. As Matt Gaentz (sp?) says, this is how the game is played, stop complaining. When the other party is in power you fuck the country as hard as possible so that people will get mad at them and reelect you to continue your looting.
Therefore as far as I am concerned, we stop complaining and we start fighting. Term limits, End the filibuster. Pack the court. If we own the senate, then goddamn it, own the senate. Remove citizens united. Restore the fairness doctrine. Put the motherfuckers in jail where they can learn moral improvement and become better people. Game theory has proven time and again that you cant compromise with people of bad faith. There is no point in discussing racial equality with Nazis. There is no point in discussing it with Republicans, either. The good old days of the bipartisan approach to the US Government is so dead the body isnt even rotting anymore. Now its just a matter of whether we live in a right-wing authoritarian and racist society or we dont. Some of us are tired of being treated like garbage, we intend to fight back. Lets see if the constitution actually has any value or if it is the joke people think it is like the high-sounding constitutions of your other, shithole countries. Enforce the law on the criminals of the previous administration. Use the power we earned to pass the legislation necessary. We have two years. Bernie Sanders, my favorite democratic socialist jew from brooklyn, has warned the Democratic party that it is time to deliver results. If not, people will be real mad and the Democrats can kiss winning an election goodbye.
I say this for your own good!
Tuesday, January 26, 2021
Four Bad Things in One Day
draft
Let me tell you what happened today.
1. The senate republicans voted against a trial for trump on procedural grounds, and while they lost it indicates there is no chance of a trial on its merits. For a second time the Republicans vote entirely on political grounds and show zero integrity.
2. Manchen (D-WVA) indicates he will not vote to get rid of the filibuster under any circumstances. Without Manchen the Democrats will lose every vote in the Senate, and with the filibuster, most bills will not even get to a vote.
3. A Trump appointed judge in Texas put a hold on the temporary block that Biden put in place on deportations. The judiciary has been destroyed and even if we passed bills the Trump judiciary would just block them.
4. The Russians, who put Trump in power, loved the insurrection and so they are now hosting Parler so the nutty boy right can plan more deaths.
I propose that given the Republicans are traitors, the judiciary is fucked, that the Democrats do not control the senate and with the right now having a secure comm channel, that the situation is about as bad as it can be.
Friday, January 15, 2021
Oh Columbia! Oh!
Tuesday, January 12, 2021
Explaining Twitter's Ban of Trump
A friend of mine, Seth Haberman, is concerned about the free speech issues of Twitter banning Trump, who is an obvious criminal and murderer, from Twitter. This was my response.
I suppose I should be pleased that people are trying to think about, and take seriously, such issues as freedom of speech, but I suggest you are overthinking it. Twitter supported a right wing criminal, bully and compulsive liar as long as they could, doing exactly what the Right told them to do. Then, when Trump gave that ridiculous speech and the rioters attacked the capitol, I suspect that Twitter's attorneys told their client to run for cover. Their position was and is legally weak, and the corporate sponsors knew that there was going to be a backlash from their users, from their advertisers, from voters, and from Congress. Twitter waited to the last possible moment that they plausibly could, I think they deserve credit for that. I am not sure what the final straw was, perhaps the guy in the horns, or the policeman who was murdered with the fire extinguisher to the head, or the MAGA folks defecating in the hallways of Congress, or maybe because a big part of their user base was hopping mad? Or maybe, like deVos, it was nothing of the sort, they just waited to the last minute to jump ship, at this point it is every person for themselves as they try to dodge the inevitable criminal indictments and civil lawsuits. I think it is nice that you and Merkel are concerned about the bigger first amendment issues, but I wouldnt worry, the right wing supreme court will keep things as they are. This decision was a pure CYA and had very little to do with ethics or free speech. That is and will continue to be just a superficial cover for the usual maneuvering for power and money.
Monday, January 11, 2021
Explaining Amazon's Action About Parler
Amazon removed Parler from their cloud after the riots on Jan 6, 2020, thus putting Parler offline, at least temporarily. Well, it was a good move, but before people think that Amazon is therefore a company of character, lets review some background here. This is a good example of why the riot changes everything.
Friday, January 8, 2021
Cassandra Speaks
I watched Fox News spew editorial garbage fueling the politics of resentment of the right, and yet there is no way to demand equal time to point out the nearly insane hypocrisy and even stupidity of what they were saying. I watched Putin, that KGB homicidal maniac, talking about the failure of our government. I watched Trump spend an hour on national television lying about how the election was a fraud and incite his followers to attack Congress and illegally keep him in power. And yet Trump is still in power with control of the weaponry that could destroy the world in 30 minutes. This situation was coming for years and I have been like Cassandra crying in the wilderness for all the good I have done.
Monday, December 28, 2020
draft
Did you notice that the internal security forces in Nashville had never heard what is arguably one of the more famous pop songs of a previous generation? Did you notice the police did not seem to understand or mention one possible reason for the song, which is at least plausibly as a motivational aid (think "Ride of the Valkyries").
And go down town.
Things will be great when you're
Down town.
No finer place for sure,
Down town.
Everything's waiting for you.
We have further information that Warner was a seeker of truth about the Lizard Conspiracy to control civilization. This makes more sense now.
Monday, December 21, 2020
Signs in Santa Barbara December 21 2020
Signs from my neighborhood in Santa Barbara Dec 21 2020.
... and in context ...
Sunday, December 20, 2020
Abominations of the Week December 20 2020
Friday, December 18, 2020
How we Finance Education and the American Dream
draft
Dear [REDACTED]
You were the kind person to explain the reality of what an educational loan is when I was confused and the information finally got through the layers of self-deception and for that matter, the layers of belief that I was programmed to have. And the core of that belief was: if you want to go to school, there will be a way to pay for it. This of course is not true. What I want to talk about here is what this policy, this system of educational finance, implies about our country and its fundamental mythology.
There is a school of public policy that believes that we can build better systems for our people by understanding how the world works, how we serve justice, how we decide to tax or not tax, how we elect representatives, how we decide to subsidize certain industries, how we feed our people and look to see empirically and theoretically what impact those policies have. It is implicit to this philosophy that ultimately we can distinguish between better or worse policies even though we may not be wise enough to predict the implications up front. The law of unintended consequences continues to screw up our best laid plans. Its complicated out there in the real world. When things go bad sometimes it is because people are being evil, but usually they are just wrong. Or the context changed. Or maybe people were not thinking it through. I have a favorite example and it involves the fairness of our elections. Every Southerner is familiar with various schemes to disenfranchise people of color and people who are poor. We have been doing it for a long time and we are good at it. One way we do this is to finance the election infrastructure by county, not by state. Well its not a surprise to learn that some counties are richer than others and that furthermore wealth is correlated with race. Furthermore, it turns out that some of the election systems are not as robust and have a higher percentage of either a misfire when a voter accidentally does not vote for their chosen candidate or when a ballot must be thrown out for technical reasons. And so it turns out that in a close election, this may be all you need to rig the game. That is the implication of the hanging chad, those chads did not hang at random. Those chads were associated with the cheaper and older voting systems in those predominantly black and poorer counties.
But my point is not about who won that election, or how that system came to be, my point is that we can not be blind to the implications of our system of financing election infrastructure, not after 2000. As a Southerner I was really annoyed. Fix the goddamn voting machines, I thought to myself. I am tired of hearing about it. Yes it will cost a little money, deal with it. How we chose to finance that part of our system of government turns out to have implications that are important. We may not be able to end racism or feed the hungry but at least in this case we can make our elections just a little more fair. We should do it.
How we pay for education in this country is a non trivial part of who has access to education and also to who has access to elite education. Because, in case you had not noticed, America is incredibly elitist. Its not that there arent a few exceptions who through merit or luck can transcend their origins, it can and does happen. But the odds are not great. I laugh when I hear that a justice is an "originalist" because I am from Virginia and in Virginia elections were always for the several hundred families, all intermarried, who were the equivalent of landed gentry, plus a few merchants and bankers and craftsmen if they were well liked. I am very fond of Virginia on a number of different levels and I am proud to be from there. The first rule of an elite who has power is to see to it that they maintain power for their class and set. Not everyone realizes that one reason the military is so important to a Southerner is because it is a recognized way to improve your lot in life, to pay for an education, to have a career if you were not born with one. In 21st century America things are different than they were in 18th century Chesapeake. Now you may need a Doctor of Philosophy just to have a good middle class life. And you may need to be a member of certain clubs to run for office even though there is nothing on paper that says you have to belong.
If the American dream is contingent on who can get an advanced degree, then how we pay for it is crucial. The only people who can get loans are people who dont need one is a fundamental philosophy of every loan officer. This is not a level playing field. I am disappointed, one more time, in the harsh reality of America so different from its promise.
Thank you again for your patience and your good will.
Saturday, December 5, 2020
State of American Politics December 5, 2020
draft
I presume I dont have to tell you that the political situation is very bad, although I suppose it is somewhat better than before the election. The Democrats have to win the senate to avoid being destroyed by the Republicans, but they wont. Its possible, but its very unlikely. That means the Senate can block anything Biden tries to do that doesnt fit the executive order format and I dont think he has Trumps sheer willingness to fuck anything to get what he wants attitude. Since the American public is, to a large degree, pretty stupid, the Republicans will see to it that the economy sucks and frankly they have fucked things up so hard they dont have to do much. So, that means the midterms will be lost to the democrats and probably the presidential election as well. The post census redistricting in red states will be business as usual which means it is nearly impossible to regain the statehouses in those states and besides even if the democrats did it would not matter until the next census. McConnell will hold up any approvals for the judiciary, the supreme court will not be fixable, etc. Biden will absolutely pass on minimum justice for right wing criminals because he is one of those limp musnt annoy the nice Republican types. None of the problems will be fixed even if Democrats wanted to, which is not clear.
Other than AOC and a few people like Al Frankin I think the Democrats are in over their heads.
America's decline was always inevitable, Trump sped it up, maybe it will slow down a little bit because we wont have an obvious nut waving his little dick around.
When Biden fails to prosecute the rich and powerful for their crimes I will change my party affiliation from Democrat to Independent.
The only other good thing I can think of (other than Kamala Harris who is a character) is that we now know what we are dealing with in terms of racism and stupidity in the American people. That is not good news, but it is necessary to know these things, I think.
I am very disappointed!
Thursday, December 3, 2020
Should Trump Be Prosecuted for his Crimes?
draft
Lawfareblog published an analysis of whether Biden would pick an attorney general that he was confident would not prosecute Trump, his family, or his associates without Biden having to order him or her not to.
I think this article is wrong headed on several points. First, it neglects to mention how many Americans would conclude that our justice system is a joke and will never do the right thing in regards to the rich and powerful. Second, it sets no precedent that in any way would restrain the Republicans (or anyone else) from evil deeds since they would know that there is no penalty for the worst of crimes. Third, it neglects to discuss to what extent it would affect the Democratic party because of people, like myself, who would leave the party if Trump is not investigated at the least and prosecuted if the evidence warrants it.
https://www.lawfareblog.com/who-will-decide-whether-investigate-trump
100 Vectors Should Do It
draft
Now, with the supreme court (illegitimate) ruling on freedom of religion in a pandemic, for a hostile power to spread a virus in this country it will simply be a matter of sending a certain number of people to visit churches and synagogues, perhaps a different one each week. Then it wont matter how much this nation shuts down, the infection will still spread. If the virus has a long incubation and a higher fatality rate, the results could be spectacular. It will probably require the resources of a nation state to do this. But hey, there are quite a few out there that have that motive and opportunity.
Thursday, November 19, 2020
The Short List
Saturday, November 14, 2020
Arms Sales, Donald Trump, and Logical Deduction
draft
[This is a transcript of a discussion with a friend about whether or not there is a kickback to Trump from the many billion dollar sale of F-35s to the United Arab Emirate]
I apologize for not giving you better info on the kickback thing, I was being deliberately lazy and annoying. I have no hard evidence but my pathetic self-education includes studying the work of Holmes & Doyle (Hounds of the Baskervilles, etc) which means that we can use deduction and in this case the deduction chain is straightforward even if the money path is not. First some obvious comments on the arms business and the vast business of money laundering, then the more interesting things we know about the Trump administration and the various motivations here. This is going to be a little pedantic because it is much more work to keep it concise. Feel free to correct me at any point but keep in mind I read a lot of spy novels so I know something here.
1. The "corporate culture" of the arms business, in particular the arms business to 3rd world countries, is rife with corruption of which some form of unofficial transfer of the vast amount of moneys involved is the most common. Its one of the simplest ways to extract money from an official budget for personal use, and it is, to the best of my knowledge, very common. 2. The details of how the money gets transferred are arcane, have many variations, necessarily evolve with evolving law enforcement, and so forth. I have no idea what percentage of the money laundering business is kickbacks for arms deals, probably only a small percentage (10%? Less?) Some countries and institutions depend on this sort of thing although I suspect drugs and tax fraud are a larger part of this business. 3. But we would not expect to see a lump sum up front although we might depending on the level of trust. We might expect to see a series of payments at each step of the deal that go to various anonymous accounts in cooperative banks, where these accounts are for shell companies which transfer the money in relatively small amounts to other accounts at other banks in other countries, etc, until they end up making investments in something that in fact pays down the debt in another account at, for example, Deutsche Bank.
Now lets move from this to Trump and our foreign policy. 4. There is no evidence that Trump gives a fuck about American foreign policy nor that he understands what he is dealing with here. By supporting Israel illegal settlements and bribing various countries to support Israel, he could easily bring down governments and/or destroy Israel, or cause a war that spins out of control. He may not intend to do this, but there is no evidence he cares. 5. Quid pro quo is the very heart of many, perhaps all, negotiations; its just that with Trump we expect to see it to be a blunt instrument. But it would be perfectly reasonable to expect that if a country wants our most advanced defense technologies that they could not ordinarily get, offering to recognize Israel in return for F-35s is the sort of thing that Trump might easily do, although in a normal administration it might not happen because of risks (see below). 6. In the past, money has always been a part of the deal, and we are talking about Saudi princes, Lockheed executives, American Congressman and Senators, and so forth. Rarely, if ever, is the President *directly* involved although indirectly they probably are. The classic example was Nixon and the Committee to Reelect the President who apparently received excellent cash donations from various organizations like the mafia and others. Or there is Reagan who would break the law right and left and then lie about it. Iran/Contra? No problem. I doubt, however, that the president's net wealth has been directly involved but I am confident that in the past other elected representatives have definitely received money. 7. But its Trump and we know that he has some amount of debt coming due in a few years even if there are many questions about exactly how much, to whom, etc. You regularly see estimates at $400M but I think that it is probably more. This is real estate in the hospitality business and that business is on its ass due to the pandemic. Even if that improves (and it might, it should) financing Trump is going to be a very negative thing for many institutions, not least because Trump is without doubt cavalier about honoring debt. (You know the joke about how you say "fuck you" in Hollywood). So where does he get the money from. 8. If a few percent came off the top of this deal and ended up eventually at Deutsche bank through various intermediaries, that would be I think a very logical thing to do from Trumps point of view. He certainly would not hesitate because of laws, ethics, or the interests of his country.
9. Finally, lets add that Trump does seem to like to take care of his friends in Russia and thinks he is being VERY smart about it while Russia plays him for a fool, which he is. I doubt he has a clue what is really going on most of the time and he certainly does not believe what our intelligence community tells him. And so, Trump would ignore warnings that our most advanced defense technologies would be at risk if the destination country could not be relied on to keep it secret and that is why we only send that technology (at first) to very few countries such as Israel, Japan, Germany, the UK, etc, and even with them we usually water it down. Trump wouldnt give a hoot.
So in conclusion, Watson, it would be very logical to expect that there is a quid pro quo going on here, that the cards are not on the table which is normal, that our national security is not being protected, and that Trump would benefit financially in a substantial way. Of course, this would have to be proven but this kind of analysis is not going to be unique to me, I am not that smart or that original, sadly.
Thursday, November 5, 2020
Poor America that Cant Count Votes
draft
What Might We Look For in a MS Program?
The following have been mentioned by friends. Bob Coyne and Larry Stead have pointed out that Columbia has an excellent Masters of some sort in Computational Biology. Noah Wardrip-Fruin has pointed me to several Masters programs at UCSC. He he also pointed out that UCSB has a Media Arts & Technology program I knew nothing about. Magy is starting something up at UCSC and thinks I should be able to easily get into a Masters program. Jacki Morie has recommended a very interesting PhD program done mostly remotely that is based in Ireland. Cambridge University has a wonderful sounding MPhil in computer science (dream on, wahrman) and of course, CalArts has a famous animation program which results in a terminal degree. Michael Kass has pointed out that Cornell has some sort of joing program going with Technion in Israel.
Wednesday, November 4, 2020
Biden May Win but So What?
draft
Is this glass half empty or half full? What glass, what are they talking about? Well, even with a Biden win, but no senate, what we have here is a clearly failed political system that can not even shut up a moron/criminal like Trump, a right wing news organization spraying propaganda, a Senate ready to block all legislation, and a minority rule right wing nutty boy supreme court. On the bright side, with a Biden DOJ, if he has the guts, which I doubt, we could put a lot of Republican criminals on trial (and presumably in jail). A good executive order or two can stop the crimes against humanity by our little-Gestapo, and we can start rebuilding the cases the Republican DOJ dropped on orders from the Fuhrer. I think its a joke and the world knows it. The only people who dont know it seems to be Americans, or some of them.
Monday, November 2, 2020
Saturday, October 31, 2020
Will the Democrats Betray America Again?
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Will the Democrats win the Senate? If so, the seeds of destruction may have been planted. The mysterious forces of the so-called mainstream Dem party are already agitating against real reform. These are the people behind the Obama absolution of the rich and criminal classes in 2008 Oh no they will say! We can not reform the courts or work against real racism in this country. Lets do one or two symbolic fixes and then go back to our betrayal of social justice and workers rights. Lets not fix the Electoral College, we might want to steal an election ourselves one day. Then, the base, which has respond to the call to save the Republic from Trump, Kavanaugh, McConnell, etc will ... what will they do when the Dems start calling for "bipartisan" ship which is code for racism and surrender to the rich?
The Mystery Eight Ball does not say. It says "reply hazy try again later".
Friday, October 30, 2020
Shinae Tassia -April 22, 2017
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My worst suspicions were confirmed when I heard today that my friend, Shinae Tassia, who had disappeared on me several years ago and known to be in bad health, passed away on April 22nd of 2017.
Abandoned in Seoul Korea when a few days old, she was adopted by a Sicilian family in this country. She ran away and lived in Central Park when she was informally adopted by a (gay) couple in Brooklyn. I knew her from the American Museum of Natural History where she was on the systems team. A friend there told me that she was probably of Romulan origin. I found the waves of anger that were visible around her to be very appealing.
Good bye, Shinae.
Tuesday, October 27, 2020
Excellent Ranting Websites
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Many people think I spend too much time reading web sites that make me upset. They are right of course. Here is a list of such web sites for your benefit.