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David Landau, one of three Democrats running for County Council in Delaware County, is a Delaware County native, raised in Havertown, and a resident of Wallingford for 22 years. He is an attorney, currently a senior partner at the Philadelphia law firm of Wolf, Block, Schorr and Solis-Cohen, LLP, and previously served as solicitor for the Borough of Yeadon. In 1988 he ran for Congress against Curt Weldon and this past year served as senior campaign advisor to Congressman Joe Sestak. In 1984 he was the deputy campaign manager for Gary Hart's presidential campaign. He has been the chairman of the Nether Providence Democratic Committee since 1991, is a member of the Board of Directors of the Family and Community Service of Delaware County, and a former member of the Board of Directors of the Jewish Federation of Delaware County as well as Congregational Oheu Shalom in Wallingford.
Introductory Remark
First of all, Jane, I would like to take a moment to thank you for having me on this forum. I see the internet as a great resource. One of my first initiatives is to make more public records available via web 24/7, something most other counties have had in place for years. Right now Delaware County residents are forced to hurdle multiple legal requirements just to find out where their taxes are going. And that's what I'm fighting against here. I'm running to end the unaccountable, Bush-Style bureaucracy in Delaware County and to restore faith in local government.
Why is a county health department important?
Health statistics indicate that Delaware County is not moving toward the Federal Healthy People 2010 standards for healthcare. Even worse in key areas, it is falling behind. Our percentage of children with prenatal care is dropping and infants with low birth-weight are rising. Restaurants in non-covered municipalities of the county are inspected 1/4 as much as our neighboring counties.
We need to take a more preventative approach to issues of public health. A health department would allow us to collaborate with the private medical sector in Pennsylvania to make a real impact on the public health issues facing Delaware County. For more statistics, look on my website (www.davidlandau.net) for my policy paper and plan for a county health department.
You've worked on political campaigns from presidential to congressional to state house, have served as a borough solicitor and are now running for county council. Given that experience you would you balance local vs. county vs. regional concerns?
It's an issue of planning and leadership. I think it is vitally important to allow for open avenues of communication between all levels of government. I believe that the role of the county is to act as an advocate and resource for municipalities.
This is a fundamental difference between my opponents and me. The courthouse candidates believe the more politically connected municipalities should be able to secure funding and create jobs for a select few. I believe the county must steer the ship and help create a comprehensive plan and resource stream for all 49 municipalities.
A county council member deals with dog licenses, hazardous waste, and everything in between. What in your background prepares you to manage such varied areas effectively?
As Solicitor of the Borough of Yeadon from 1992 to 1998, I dealt with many, many different kinds local and municipal issues ranging from municipal finance, housing code enforcement, tax enforcement, and zoning. As special counsel in Nether Providence Township, I helped secure the creation of two parks as open space. Through my work on the Board of Directors of Family Community Service in Delaware County, I am familiar with the social service program network that uses County Council funds. Through all this experience, I developed sensitivity to local problems and became skilled at developing pragmatic solutions to those problems. I have put forth substantive plans for the future of the county, while the courthouse candidates have circled the wagons to protect the status quo.
Are there any circumstances under which being married to a magisterial district judge in the county could present a conflict of interest?
The jurisdiction of the district court encompasses such legal issues as landlord tenant programs, traffic offenses, and emergency protective orders. None of these issues are issues which face County Council. I also note that Michael Puppio's wife, a retiring member of County Council's spouse, is the magistrate district judge of Springfield and there have been no apparent problems with them serving in both of those positions.
In 1983, when working at the ACLU, you said that a good faith defense invites law enforcement officials to be ignorant of the law. In 1998 and 1999 you represented Darby Mayor Paula Brown in a case against the police. Would you be able to work well with law enforcement in the county if elected? ("'Honest mistake' change urged in seizure law," Philadelphia Daily News January 14, 1983)
I believe that I will be able to work very well with law enforcement in the county. Our county law enforcement efforts have been strongly supported by County Council. I would also strongly support efforts to have more cooperation between the county law enforcement and municipal law enforcement law officials. The Paula Brown case was a unique case, which was limited to the involvement of the rights of an elected official to speak at a council meeting. Mayor Brown had been arrested and charged with a felony for speaking out of order at a meeting. That case was really about the problems of one party government. In that situation, when a Democrat was elected, the majority party did not take easily to having a member of the opposition sit on council. I am sure most people would agree that when a Democrat is elected to a Republican majority body, they ought to have the right to speak at their council meetings.
You have been endorsed by the Philadelphia newspapers in previous campaigns. What qualities do you have that appeals to newspaper editorial boards?
Editorial Boards provide a broad spectrum of democratic viewpoints. I believe my appeal to the boards is merely a representation of my appeal to voters, who are looking for a change in the system. These boards, like all voters, want a candidate who leads on the issues that are important to them.
There hasn't been a Democrat on the County council since 1980. Only if all three Democrats running are elected would you be the majority party on the county council. Would you find being a minority member frustrating?
No, in fact I'd find it invigorating. We need a real debate on the issues in this county, not just the lip service and political favors the courthouse has been doling out for the past 30 years. For that very reason, I have proposed a series of debates to my opponents and have yet to receive a reply. The exchange of ideas will be critical for the future of Delaware County and I look forward to working with the Republican minority in January. As a minority member, I will be a forceful voice.
In other area counties the minority party county commissioner has been criticized for voting too often with the majority party. Other elected officials are criticized for voting with their party too often. How do you find a middle ground?
This one is easy- one finds a middle ground by seeking out the best approach to a situation and then fighting for it. I do not care whether or not the letter next to someone's name is a "R," a "I," or a "D." What I care about is finding the best way to improve Delaware County, plain and simple.
You have talked about making county government more transparent. One possibility you have mentioned is having county council meetings in the evening so more citizens could attend. Would that lead to overtime for county employees who are required to attend? What other changes would you like to make?
I want to make the government open and accessible because the people must be able to evaluate the quality of their representation. I would do that by using state funds available to county and local governments to make records and other aspects of government readily accessible. There are so many things we could do- reduce patronage jobs, competitive bids on contracts, make plans and records accessible to the people, etc. It really begs the question- why hasn't the current council taken steps to do that? With respect to County Council meetings, first of all not many staff are needed to attend a County Council meeting. Second, for the most part, these would be salaried employees in supervisory level and so overtime rules would not apply. Third, we can make an adjustment with flextime to make sure that taxpayer costs are kept to a minimum.
The proposed change in flight patterns at the Philadelphia airport would put more planes over Delaware County. Congressman Joe Sestak and State Representative Bryan Lentz have been active in proposing alternatives. What role can the county council play?
Council must support Bryan and Joe in their efforts at the national and state levels and continue to oppose the FAA plan. Banding together with other areas affected by the proposed changes would provide the leadership necessary for Delaware County residents.
What are the biggest challenges facing Delaware County and of those which would be easiest to tackle?
The biggest challenges facing Delaware County are an unaccountable, one-party government, the lack of a public health department, aging infrastructure, a lack of open space preservation, and stagnant community revitalization, and economic development. Government transparency is something we could achieve tomorrow if council was committed to it.
What question didn't I ask that you would like to answer?
Over the last month, I have traversed the county putting forth substantive policy proposals to improve the lives of Delaware County Residents. Why is it that my opponents are so defensive? Rather, they should roll up their sleeves, admit some fault, and fix the problems that we all face. I think that the answer is that at the end of the day they lack the vision and leadership necessary to get the job done. Their concern is enshrining and exalting the status quo. I am running to place the desires and hopes of my friends and neighbors first and put an end to the culture of corruption that suffocates this county.
My thanks to David and his campaign staff for taking part in the process.
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
An Interview with David Landau (candidate for Delaware County Council)
David Landau, one of three Democrats running for County Council in Delaware County, is a Delaware County native, raised in Havertown, and a resident of Wallingford for 22 years. He is an attorney, currently a senior partner at the Philadelphia law firm of Wolf, Block, Schorr and Solis-Cohen, LLP, and previously served as solicitor for the Borough of Yeadon. In 1988 he ran for Congress against Curt Weldon and this past year served as senior campaign advisor to Congressman Joe Sestak. In 1984 he was the deputy campaign manager for Gary Hart's presidential campaign. He has been the chairman of the Nether Providence Democratic Committee since 1991, is a member of the Board of Directors of the Family and Community Service of Delaware County, and a former member of the Board of Directors of the Jewish Federation of Delaware County as well as Congregational Oheu Shalom in Wallingford.


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We knew it had to happen eventually. After all, it is the beginning of December. Our first snowfall of the season comes this weekend with 1" to 2" of snow falling by Sunday afternoon. Forecasting snowfall can be tough. Especially when it's the first of the winter season. There are many elements that meteorologists look at when trying to predict how much snow will fall: temperature, moisture, dry air, how far up in the atmosphere the air is saturated, melting on contact, etc.
The 'average' snow to liquid ratio is 10:1. This means if 10 inches of snow were to fall and we were to melt all that snow it would equal one inch of water. But we know most snow storms around here are anything but average. Dry snow, or the very fluffy snow, has a higher snow to liquid ratio. These snowflakes tend to be smaller in size and usually don't make good snowballs because you can't compact the snow. With this type of snow there doesn't have to be a major storm system to get high totals. Because it is so much more fluffy, it can add up pretty quick. A wet snow or 'heart attack' snow has a lower snow to liquid ratio because it holds more moisture. These snowflakes are usually bigger in size, very slushy and good for making snowballs but harder to shovel because of the high amount of moisture. A wet snow won't accumulate as fast or as much as dry snow because it tends to compact more when it reaches the ground.
The snow for Sunday will likely have snow to liquid ratios around 10:1. The good news is we're not expecting a total of one inch precipitation to fall. Right now it only looks like total precipitation will equal between 0.10" and 0.23". This means our snowfall, assuming it all falls as snow and there isn't a mix or switch over to drizzle sooner, would equal about 1" to 2". Isolated higher amounts are possible, especially west of here where the snow begins sooner.

subset: commoncrawl


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Our local museum had a Carousel Exhibit.
Grandma and Grandpa took the kids and me to see it.
We had a lot of fun.
By the end of the 4th grade, Bekah had had enough. Homework, Homework, Homework. She had way too much and couldn't take it anymore.
So, she went on strike.
|scotty was gone somewhere- might have been when he was in utah helping his friend with his auto auction.
we had a slumber party.
The girls were just looking so cute before church one day, we had to take some pics


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Century Windshield
· Headquarters: Detroit, (founded Flint, Michigan)
Locations: Worldwide
· Buick Century Models: Century
Century Windshield
The Buick is a car that fully deserves the 'performance vehicle'. This has a short body design and V8 that contribute to its excellent A comfortable car that is also on road, the Buick Century is a choice as your family
When you need your Windshield serviced effectively, it to an experienced and well reputed glass shop chosen our directory.
Effective Windshield Repairs Money
As experts will you, when you have Century Windshield serviced right after damage has you can actually save money. repairs using the right prevent the damage from any further. When you ignore damage, the crack/ chip may to cover a large portion of the weakening it and affecting your
Once this happens, you no choice but to replace the glass at cost.
Before you leave your Windshield in the hands of a technician, sure that he is skilled in modern techniques like injection to repair the damage. A technician knows exactly how to the various process that are out during the repair to ensure the best outcomes. For example, by assessing the amount of pressure to during flexing and allocating the amount of time to vacuuming he that the repair is carried out effectively.
Avoid entrusting your Windshield to novices who may actually the glass even further the repair process or damage or surrounding parts accidentally. If happens, you could end up spending far than the repair actually
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the model, year of manufacture and preferences you may have, such as glass etc, when you ask for Windshield quotes from shops. This helps you get the accurate prices for comparison
Buick Century Base
– 1981 Buick Custom
1975 – Buick Century Estate
– 1984 Buick Estate Wagon
1985 1989 Buick Century 500 Pace Car
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1Make pie crusts as directed on box for Two-Crust Pie using 9-inch glass pie pan.
2Heat oven to 375°F. In 10-inch skillet, cook ground beef, onions and garlic over medium-high heat, stirring frequently, until beef is thoroughly cooked; drain. Stir in remaining ingredients except egg white. Pour into crust-lined pan.
3With leaf-shaped canape or cookie cutter, cut out leaf shapes in several places in second crust. Place over filling; flute crust edge. Brush with beaten egg white. Arrange leaf cutouts on top crust; brush with egg white.
4Bake 45 to 55 minutes or until crust is deep golden brown. After 15 to 20 minutes of baking, cover crust edge with strips of foil to prevent excessive browning. Cool 10 minutes before serving.


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It was 54 degrees yesterday... 54?!?! IT'S JANUARY!! It was great for running. December has been a hard month to keep up with running, sometimes only making it out once a week for a long run (to make up for not running, of course). I figured out this week one reason why it has been difficult to stay motivated... BOREDOM. Hayden dropped me off on a back road on our way home from Salt Lake this week, and I ran home. THAT was fun. New scenery, new route, new distance. So yesterday I started running in some random direction and just explored new areas as I ran. FUN!
Well, my new shoes
and cool watch that controls my ipod that I got for Christmas from Hayden definitely help with motivation.
Some of our accomplishments or notable moments for 2008:
- Aspen turned 1
- Morgan graduated from Lehi High School
- Wade began violin/orchestra
- Brenden competed in state CX tourney... personal best time!
- Hayden passed his 2 tests for his license, and picked a company name
- I was voted recipient of the Golden Apple Award by my students
- Sealed as an eternal family on 8/8/08 in Manti temple
- I ran three 5k races
- Hayden finished our stairs in hardwood!
- I officiated my last game (for awhile anyway) of basketball by reffing 3A state tournament
- Brenden got his drivers' permit (heaven help us)
- Wade was ordained a deacon
- Vegas for Hayden's #36 birthday
- Morgan went to college
- Tonia: run a 1/2 marathon
- Hayden: start up his hardwood company
- Aspen: learn to TALK! (and dribble a basketball :D )
- Brenden: beat his personal best time ~ take Region!
- Morgan: get back into school
- Wade: rocket launch w/ Grandpa Frank


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It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
If you can read this message, please contact us immediately at the following email address:
We'd like to communicate.
As Canadians avoid the U.S. over fears of being rejected at the border, new figures suggest it's Americans who might be more likely to get denied entry by Canada.
Numbers obtained by La Presse show that the rate of Americans being turned back by Canadian border guards at land crossings has skyrocketed by 31 percent over the last year. This flies in the face of the narrative that Canadians are having a harder time crossing into the U.S. because of new immigration policies being pursued by President Donald Trump.
The figures show that 30,233 Americans were rejected while trying to enter Canada in 2016, compared to 23,052 who were turned away by the Canada Border Services Agency the year before. In 2014, the number was less than half at only 7,509.
Like their American counterparts, Canadian border guards have discretion over who they let in and out, and are not required to publicly disclose their reasons. The CBSA wouldn't explain why more Americans are being turned away, but told La Presse the total number of people crossing into the border fluctuates every years.
Although many Canadians have spoken
out about intense interrogations by American border guards, including
personal questions about their religious and political views, other data
obtained this week by the Canadian Press show that fewer Canadians are being rejected by American guards in recent months.
"How do you tell a communist? Well, it's someone who reads Marx and Lenin. And how do you tell an anti-communist? It's someone who understands Marx and Lenin."
*Ronald Reagan*


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Historically, the Cheshire Brine Subsidence Compensation Board (the Board) has provided search enquiries to meet the requirements of professionals involved in property transactions and development within the Compensation District. These searches include details of past damage claims affecting properties (including land) and identification as to whether the property lies within a statutory consultation area with regard to foundation designs. A more significant aspect of the past claims is to report on whether the property has been subjected to a "commutation payment" whereby payments were made in lieu of carrying out repairs and rights of redress for future damage were often extinguished.
Since 23 October 2006, the brine search has been incorporated into the Law Society approved CON 29M mining search, providing a combined coal and brine search report. The search is mandatory for all property transactions within the Compensation District .
The search will indicate:
- Whether the property is situated within the Compensation District;
- Whether the property is within a Consultation Area prescribed by the Cheshire Brine Board under the provisions of section 38(1) of the 1952 Act;
- Whether a Notice of Damage has been filed in respect of the property and, if so, whether the claim was accepted and, if so, how the claim was discharged;
- Whether the claims in respect of the property have been commuted by a once and for all payment of compensation;
- Whether the compensation provisions of the 1952 and 1964 Acts would apply should the property be affected at some future date by subsidence due to brine pumping.
The Board and the Coal Authority worked with the Law Society to implement the required changes to the CON 29M enquiry form, Directory and Guidance, the Conveyancing Handbook and other best practice guidance and advice. A fully revised and updated Coal Mining and Brine Subsidence Claim Searches guide, containing the Law Society's guidance and the Coal Authority's advice and user guide to help customers order the search and understand the results, is available. The guide includes an updated Directory of Places in England and Wales showing the areas where a CON 29M is required, and a copy of the new form CON 29M (2006).
The Coal Authority have extended their CON 29M screening area to include the Cheshire Brine Subsidence Compensation District which enables customers to ensure that they do not order searches unnecessarily. Whether a CON 29M search needs to be made can be quickly established by using the updated published directory, online gazetteer or using the Coal Authority's On-Line Screening Service which provides immediate on-line confirmation on entering a property address as to whether a CON 29M 2006 search is required or not for both coal and brine.
A search may be ordered from here .


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Hudson Enterprises Inc et al v. Risk Placement Services Inc et al
Filing 68
ORDER requesting the Marina to provide an affidavit about its finances, including assets, liabilities, income, and expenses. Please file the affidavit under seal by 7/15/2016. Signed by Judge D. P. Marshall Jr. on 7/5/2016. (jak)
Disclaimer: Justia Dockets & Filings provides public litigation records from the federal appellate and district courts. These filings and docket sheets should not be considered findings of fact or liability, nor do they necessarily reflect the view of Justia.


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or wild card
- Games A playing card whose value can vary as determined by its holder.
- Sports An athlete or team selected to compete in a tournament or playoff from among those who did not qualify by meeting the regular requirements.
- Computers A symbol that stands for one or more unspecified characters, used especially in searching text and in selecting multiple files or directories.
- Slang An unpredictable or unforeseeable factor: A surprise witness proved to be the wild card at the trial.
(plural wildcards)
- (computing) A character that takes the place of any other character or string that is not known or specified.
- In searching, if a*m finds amalgam, atom and alum, then * is acting as a wildcard.
- (also written wild card) An uncontrolled or unpredictable element.
- (also written wild card) An element, often deliberately concealed, which is withheld for contingency.
- (sports) Alternative form of wild card.
Usage notes
A wild card in card games is usually written as two separate words. The computing term is written as one compound word.


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Short / Tonight I Think of You
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101 Questions for Jehovah's Witnesses The Purpose of this Booklet Many Muslims receive regular visits from Jehovah's Witnesses. The two religious groups are in constant doorstep dialogues. This booklet is an aid to the act of dialogue. 101 Questions to Ask Jehovah's WitnessesJehovah's Witnesses are trained to deal with Muslims. In their handbook entitled Reasoning […]
Written By: irfny on April 1, 2012 No Comment
Tags: [" is the utterance of Jehovah. "For as the heavens are higher than the earth, 101 questions for Jehavoh's Witnesses Islam Christianity Bible God's Word Jesus God IRFNY, am telling you . . ." (Paul's Letter to the Galatians 5:2). But some people do not want to see. Here lies the problem. To save space, and all the Bible quotations are taken from the Jehovah's Witnesses' own Bible. The reason I make this distinction is that the Jehovah's Witnesses have their own distinctive set of beliefs and this re, and blessings of Allah) dictated to various kings and leaders do not appear in the Qur'an. The Qur'an is the Word of God. It does not contain any human writings, and my thoughts than your thoughts" (Isaiah 55:8-9). Please, and that the Lord does not say it. Would Jehovah's Witnesses please believe Paul in this statement too? So that would mean that at least one verse of the Bible is not inspired. Then the Bible cannot b, and to focus on the point we are making, ask him to show you the point in the Qur'an. (Wait while he searches for it). When he cannot find it, because it is based on the Bible which is the inerrant Word of Jehovah. Secondly, because Jehovah guides them to the correct interpretation of that book. So, because their teachings agree with the rest of the Bible. This is not a good argument, because they read in their Bible the following passage: Make sure of all things; hold fast to what is fine (1 Thessalonians 5:21). They are instructed in that verse to check things out and then to hol, but I don't intend to deal with that in this booklet. It is enough to note here that this book too has been left in many Muslim homes. Here I only intend to help readers to deal with such situations. , but I give my opinion . . ." (Paul's First Letter to the Corinthians 7:25). Paul said: "Therefore I think . . ." (1 Corinthians 7:26). Paul said: ". . . according to my opinion" (1 Corinthians 7:40). , but rather to lead them gently to the truth. Most of the questions in this booklet may be asked of any Bible teacher, chapter 5: 9. In my letter I wrote you to quit mixing in company with fornicators . . . . 11. But now I am writing you to quit mixing in company with anyone called a brother that is a fornicator . . ., containing a section on Islam. In that chapter the true nature of Islam is distorted, Did Paul know that his letters are part of the Word of God? Their answer: Well, for example do not need to hear from Muslims that the Bible contains mistakes. They may already know that for themselves. Now, for that would mean that anything that agrees with the Bible is also inspired. There fore if a Hindu writes a brief poem about the importance of charity that should be taken as inspired Word of God. D, God's final revealed Book. However, he may be more willing to let you speak. This and other tactful strategies gives Jehovah's Witnesses an unfair advantage in dealing with some Muslims who are not equipped to explain their faith. The p, I have not quoted the above verses in full. But the references are given so that you and your visitors can read them one at a time from the Bible. The same result will emerge. Many verses of the Bible, I hope that some of the Jehovah's Witnesses will prove me wrong by accepting this booklet. I hope they will also go one step further in composing a reply to the points I make here. I appreciate feedba, if you go out of your way to show people what they already know they may take offence to it. With other Christians, in verse 9 above, in which they urge Muslims to become Jehovah's Witnesses. Another such piece is a book entitled Mankind's Search for God, Jehovah's Witnesses are instructed to use the following strategy:, Jehovah's Witnesses are instructed to use the following strategy: When the Muslim says what Islam teaches, Jehovah's Witnesses are trained to deal with Muslims. In their handbook entitled Reasoning from the Scriptures they are taught what they should say to Muslims (see especially pages 23 and 24; 1989 edi, Jehovah's Witnesses have gone to great lengths to convey their religion to Muslims. The time is now ripe for Muslims to repay that kindness by offering them the chance to understand the religion of Go, let us not confuse the thoughts of men for the Words of God. Notice also that the letters which Paul wrote to various churches and individuals are part of the Bible. Help your visitors to realize that, Make sure of all things; hold fast to what is fine, Muslims ought to likewise present some reading materials to their visitors. Perhaps this booklet would serve as a beginning. I doubt, must not be attrib uted to God. Let us keep the Words of God separate and distinct from the words of Man. Ask your visitors to read the following verses in their Bible: "For the thoughts of you people, no matter how good and how accurate, not are my ways your ways, not even the inspired teachings of Muhammad (pbuh) himself. The inspired teachings of Muhammad (pbuh) are found in separate books called hadith., not just Jehovah's Witnesses. However, not sure)., not the Lord . . ." (1 Corinthians 7:12). Notice that in the first statement Paul claims that the Lord is speaking. Jehovah's Witnesses believe Paul was telling the truth. But how about the second sta, or 99.9% but not 100%. Agreed? There are many other examples. Some books of the Old Testament claim only to be the words of a man, Paul is making a change to his previous instruction. Compare below the following two instructions from Paul's previous letter and his so-called first letter:, Paul is referring to what he had written in a previous letter. In verse 11, Paul reminds the Corinthians that he had already written to them a letter before this one. Read verses 9 and 11 in the folowing passage from Paul's so-called first letter to the Corinthians, Paul's previous instruction on this side Pauls new instruction on this side In my letter I wrote you to quit mixing in company with fornicators . . . . But now I am writing you to quit mixing in compa, so my ways are higher than your ways, such an approach does not work with the Jehovah's Witnesses. They are too overly confident that their belief is the only correct one. Any attempt to lead them to something else fails unless you can fi, Surely We have revealed the scripture (the Qur'an) and surely We are its guardian (surah 15:9)., that Jehovah's Witnesses would accept this booklet. My experience has taught me that Jehovah's Witnesses would not accept anyone else's literature. This I find rather unfortunate. How does one learn a, that this booklet will help Muslims feel more confident that they too have something to offer anyone who is prepared to examine things. Some of Jehovah's Witnesses may still be prepared to study a dif, the general approach should be to emphasize common beliefs and to explore differences in an extremely gentle fashion. Better still, the Islamic Information Centre should likewise equip Muslims so that they should be at least equal to the task. Then we pray that God will let the discussions bear fruit. Through such discussions the , the Muslim who is involved in a dialogue at his doorstep finds himself confronted with questions those booklets are not meant to answer. This booklet will teach Muslims how to ask the right questions , the points are being made specifically for the benefit of Jehovah's Witnesses, The Purpose of this Booklet Many Muslims receive regular visits from Jehovah's Witnesses. The two religious groups are in constant doorstep dialogues. This booklet is an aid to the act of dialogue. 10, The Truth: There are many such verses. Here is an example which will become clear after you read the following two statements found in the Bible in Paul's letter to the Corinthians: "To the married pe, The truth: They don't have it. What they show you is not the first letter Paul wrote to the Corinthians. In this very letter, their influence and teachings remain in the homes of Muslims. To be fair, then how can they say that the Bible is 100% from God when the Bible itself says it is not? They may say that the fact that the writers gave their opinion does not make a difference, this booklet is designed specifically for use with Jehovah's Witnesses. Although most of the points relating to the Bible apply to almost any Bible, Was Paul inspired when he said that all scripture is inspired? Their answer: Of course!, we may as well start by discussing that book if we hope to get anywhere with them., we must stress with our visitors that if they believe Paul they must also believe him when Paul said that he was writing his own opinion; they must also believe Luke when he said that he was writing a, What happened to Paul's first letter to the Corinthians? Their answer: What do you mean? We have it right here in the Bible. Look!, while others claim to contain words of God also. Many New Testament passages claim to be the opinion of men. Check these out: Luke said: "I resolved also . . . to write . . ." (The Gospel According to, Why this Sort of Booklet? There are many booklets that explain Islam. Some of these are really excellent materials. However, will become evident. Another point. Jehovah's Witnesses come fully equipped with reading materials to give Muslims. And Muslims often accept such materials. As a result, y-yes (actually, yet not I but the Lord . . ." (1 Corinthians 7:10). "But to the others I say, you would leave aside differences and show a person the true teachings from God right in the Qur'an]
Written By: irfny on October 18, 2011 No Comment
Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) in Hindu scriptures by Dr. Zakir Naik I. Muhammad (pbuh) prophesised in Bhavishya Purana According to Bhavishya Purana in the Prati Sarag Parv III Khand 3 Adhay 3 Shloka 5 to 8. "A malecha (belonging to a foreign country and speaking a foreign language) spiritual teacher will appear with his companions. His […]
Written By: irfny on October 18, 2011 No Comment
CONCEPT OF GOD IN HINDUISM by Dr. Zakir Naik 1.
Written By: irfny on October 18, 2011 No Comment
INTRODUCTION TO HINDUISM: The most popular among the Aryan religions is Hinduism. 'Hindu' is actually a Persian word that stands for the inhabitants of the region beyond the Indus Valley. However, in common parlance, Hinduism is a blanket term for an assortment of religious beliefs, most of which are based on the Vedas, the Upanishads […]
Tags: [; therefore 'Upanishad' means Brahma-Knowledge by which ignorance is loosened or destroyed., 'to reach' or 'to destroy', 'Upanishad' is derived from the root word Sad, 101 branches of Yajurveda and 1000 of Samveda). guide islam irfny ammaar saeed, 9 types of Atharvaveda, a Pandava warrior hesitating before battle, According to Samkara, Ammaar Saeed, and contains many multifarious things., and Krishna, and the conclusion as well as the goal of Vedas. The Upanishads are the concluding portion of the Vedas and chronologically they come at the end of the Vedic period., atharvaveda, became the sovereign monarch of Hastinapura. His victory is supposed to symbolise the victory of good over evil. But with the progress of years, bhagawad geeta, cellence or sacred wisdom. There are four principal divisions of the Vedas (although according to their number, economic, founder of the Arya Samaj, guide to islam, guide to islam by guide islamtrue guidance of islam, guide to islam hinduism, hindu scriptures, Hinduism is a blanket term for an assortment of religious beliefs, his charioteer and teacher. The Bhagavad Gita relates a brief incident in the main story of a rivalry and eventually a war between two branches of a royal family. In that brief incident - a pause on t, history of the early Aryan tribes, in common parlance, INTRODUCTION TO HINDU SCRIPTURES. guide islam, Introduction To Hinduism, irfny, is presented as responding to the doubts of Arjuna. The poem is the dialogue through which Arjuna's doubts were resolved by Krishna's teachings., itihaas, knowledge par e, life stories of the divines and deities of the Hindus. It is also believed that the Puranas are revealed books like the Vedas, mahabharata, Maharishi Vyasa has divided the Puranas into 18 voluminous parts. He also arranged the Vedas under various heads., moral and religious as also fragments of other heroic legends came to be added to the aforesaid nucleus and this phenomenon continued for centuries until it acquired the present shape. The Mahabharata, most of which are based on the Vedas, new matters and episodes relating to the various aspects of human life, Ni which means down and Shad means to sit. Therefore 'Upanishad' means sitting down near. Groups of pupils sit near the teacher to learn from him the secret doctrines., one chief on one side (also believed to be the Lord incarnate), political, puranas, ramayana, rigveda, samveda, Sheikh Ammaar Saeed, Similarly, social, t in order of authenticity are the Puranas which are the most widely read scriptures. It is believed that the Puranas contain the history of the creation of the universe, The Bhagavad Gita tells a story of a moral crisis faced by Arjuna, the five sons of Pandu. The epic entails all the circumstances leading upto the war. Involved in this Kurukshetra battle were almost all the kings of India joining either of the two parties. The resul, the head of the Pandavas, the hundred sons of Dhritarashtra and Pandavas, The most popular among the Aryan religions is Hinduism. 'Hindu' is actually a Persian word that stands for the inhabitants of the region beyond the Indus Valley. However, The nucleus of the Mahabharata is the war of eighteen days fought between the Kauravas, The Rigveda, the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita. guide islam, The Vedanta meant originally the Upanishads, the Vedas are considered to be the most authentic of the Hindu Scriptures and the real foundations of the Hindu Dharma. "guide islam", the Vedas were revealed 1310 million years ago. According to other scholars, The word 'Upanishad' is derived from Upa meaning near, The word Veda is derived from vid which means to know, the Yajurveda and the Samveda are considered to be more ancient books and are known as Trai Viddya or the 'Triple Sciences'. The Rigveda is the oldest and has been compiled in three long and different, there are 21 branches of Rigveda, there are differing opinions regarding the places where these books were compiled and the Rishis to whom these Scriptures were given. Inspite of these differences, There is no unanimous opinion regarding the date of compilation or revelation of the four Vedas. According to Swami Dayanand, they amount to 1131 out of which about a dozen are available). According to Maha Bhashya of Patanjali, they are not more than 4000 years old. "guide islam" "ammaar saeed", though the word is now used for the system of philosophy based on the Upanishad. Literally, upanishads, Vedanta means the end of the Veda, vedas, Vedasua-antah, which is of a later date. guide islam, which is solved through the interaction between Arjuna, which were revealed simultaneously with the Vedas or sometime close to it., who is ammaar saeed, with Upa and ni as prefi, yajurveda]


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In Reply to: Exhaust system? posted by alanK on April 17, 2002 at 09:40:16:
I can't off hand think of what scenario would cause a 'clunk' or 'gong' but the cats and mufflers do get very hot and could be causing a sound when water gets somewhere it isn't supposed to be. ??
No. I can go for several days and not hear anything then it happens right out of the blue, generally on undulating road. The sound seems to come from the boot, but it's been stripped down several times. The sound is a loud metallic gong. I though perhaps something might be loose in the fuel tank, but it generally only happens when wet.
Follow Ups:


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Look here:
-Outlaw Audio 7125 (new)
-Rotel RMB 1075 (new)
-NAD T973 (refurbished at Spearit Sound)
-NAD M25 (used)
-Rotel RMB-1085 (used)
-Parasound Halo A52 (used)
-Odyssey Stratos HT5 (used) or HT3 (new) amplifier.
$1500 amp budget for Revels HT setup
If you can find one, an Anthem MCA-3 or, preferably, MCA-30 would be a significant improvement in both power and sonics. With 6 ohm speakers, you'll probably get about 225 wpc with the MCA-30.
The MCA-30, used, less than $1000. New, it was $1800.
Signature Home Theater is still showing it on their website, new, but I doubt it, as Anthem is apparently no longer making 3-channel amps. Still, they might have stock and be willing to deal an out-of-production piece. Normal dealer cost is about 60%, or about $1100.
If you want brute power any B&K amp will work well. They sound pretty good too. The topology of their amps are all very similar. Pick channels needed and wattage desired. Resale is awful so you can pick up a lot of amp in the used market.
|Post removed


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Longest pubic hair
The longest pubic hair, is recorded to have reached below the knee of woman. British physician and human sexuality researcher Havelock Ellis (1859–1939) wrote:
The pubic hair of women is usually shorter than that of men, [..] In a series of 100 women attended during confinement in London and the north of England I have only once (in a rather blonde Lancashire woman) found the hair on labia reaching a conspicuous length of several inches and forming an obstruction to the manipulations involved in delivery.
But Jahn delivered a woman whose pubic hair was longer than that of her head, reaching below her knee; Paulini also knew a woman whose pubic hair nearly reached her knees and was sold to make wigs; Bartholin mentions a soldier's wife who plaited her pubic hair behind her back; while Brantôme has several references to abnormally long hair in ladies of the French court during the sixteenth century. In 8 cases out of 2200 Bergh found the pubic hair forming a large curly wig extending to the iliac spines. The individual hairs have occasionally been found so stiff and brush-like as to render coitus difficult.
Hair stylist Roberta Muccinelli produced a viral campaign for the razer manufacturer Remington, featuring models with very long merkins (pubic hair wigs).
Remington 'Stefane Monzon' from The Viral Factory on Vimeo.
Havelock Ellis, Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5: Erotic Symbolism, The Mechanism of Detumescence, The Psychic State in Pregnancy, Publ. 1923, P.A. Davis Company, page 128


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Chubby wife Karola Likes it rough
Tags: chubby matures rough wife
The Wonderful World Of Karola's Tits
Tags: big tits funny matures tits
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Help headed to wildfire-damaged ranges but more aid needed
More than 5,000 donated bales of hay were in transit Friday to Panhandle ranches that lost grazing land and livestock to grassland fires, emergency management officials said.


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Delete Topic
"but have you considered there is more to life than your eyelids?"
jointly owned by Fire_Spinning_Angel and Blu_Valley
-Mike )'(
Certified Mad Doctor and HoP High Priest of Nutella
"A buckuht 'n a hooze!" -Valura
Empty your mind. Be formless, Shapeless, like Water.
Put Water into a cup, it becomes the cup, put water into a bottle, it becomes the bottle, put water into a teapot, it becomes the teapot.
Water can flow, or it can Crash.
Be Water My Friend.


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Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Something Fishy Going on
My sister and my mom like to swap services as Christmas gifts. Mom had this vision in her head of a small wall hanging quilt with a fish and Jess volunteered to bead it for her. Mom said she didn't think it could be over-embellished and Jess took that as a personal challenge. Notice all the different bead colors and how Jess used them to outline, texturize and accent the fish. Great job, Sis! I you click on the pics, be prepared for the up close glitz!
Posted by MyCraftTime at 10:01 AM
1 comment:
- stephanietworek said...
What a beautiful fish! I love it
- April 11, 2008 at 7:16 AM
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In a few years, willingly setting foot inside a Chrysler dealership will no longer mean that you've given up on your dreams.
Chrysler's new Italian overlords have apparently judged the market ripe for a pocket rocket invasion and news broke earlier this afternoon that the Fiat 500 will be hitting Chrysler dealerships in the West within the next two years. If things go according to the preliminary schedule, the first wave of about 30,000 Fiat 500 sedans will be shipped to the Chrysler plant in Toluca, Mexico and kickoff production in late 2010 or early 2011. Despite Chrysler's hand in assembly and distribution, however, there's no need to fear a "500 inspired" Chrysler. Despite their abundance of questionable business decisions Chrysler (or, more likely, Fiat) demonstrated the sagacity to leave the Fiat badge intact, effectively averting the massive market disaster that would inevitably follow a Chrysler 500.
If all goes well with the first troop surge, Fiat eventually plans to bring the entire 500 lineup to America, including the 500 hatchback, drop top, wagon, and, the real object of our affection, the STI-fighting Abarth.


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- (CNN)-- The U.S. Supreme Court upheld President Barack Obamas sweeping health care legislation Thursday in a narrow 5-4 ruling that Obama says will provide up to 30 million additional Americans with health care. (CNN)
- It was a race among cable news organizations Thursday to be the first to announce the Supreme Courts ruling on President Obamas health care law. (YAHOO!)
- CNN: How does health care affect the campaign and the election going forward, and specifically, the debates between Obama and Mitt Romney? BRINKLEY: President Obama got a lot of momentum. And in politics, the big mo is everything. (CNN)
- (CNN)-- Now that the Supreme Court has upheld the constitutionality of the individual mandate, its time to focus on what has always been a key goal of health reform: Controlling health care costs. (CNN)
- (CNN)-- Political groups and campaigns hoping to sway voters on the health care issue have spent about $70 million on health-themed TV ads since January 2011, according to a CNN analysis of ad spending data. The U.S. (CNN)
- (CNN) – Americans for Prosperity, an independent conservative organization is poised to launch an ad in response to the Supreme Courts health care ruling backed by its biggest ad buy to date, $8.2 million. (CNN)
- But not so fast: In the split-second rush to report the Supreme Courts health care decision Thursday, CNN and Fox News Channel got it wrong. (msnbc.com)
- He taught us to care for the sicknot to profit off illness. I dont know how Republicans can live with themselves and call themselves Christian. (CNN)
Friday, June 29, 2012
Cnn health care
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text: Coming out of Brooklyn with a style that borrowed from both Chicago (drill music) and the South (trap), rapper Bobby Shmurda launched as an Internet sensation with a gangster track and its accompanying gangster dance.The young Bobby remixed 50 Cent and Jay-Z tracks with Southern beats, and used this East Coast/Dirty South blend of styles when he joined the Brooklyn crew GS9. In 2014 he dropped the solo track "Hott Nigga." The track was an instant hit, with artists like Jeezy releasing their own remixes, while Beyoncé and Jay-Z co-signed Shmurda when they worked the Shmoney Dance into their national On the Run tour. By the end of 2014, Shmurda had signed with the Columbia label, while GS9 released their Shmoney Shmurda mixtape. ~ David Jeffries


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alamo vine
On this page:
Definition of the noun alamo vine
What does alamo vine mean as a name of something?
Alamo vine is the vernacular name of the Ipomoea coptica, a species of Ipomoea.
- geographic area: Africa, Southern Asia
Online dictionaries and encyclopedias with entries for alamo vine
Click on a label to prioritize search results according to that topic:
Anagrams of ALAMO VINE
What do you get if you rearrange the letters?
See also the blanagrams of alamo vine!
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Go to the pronunciation of alamo vine to learn how to say it correctly!


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Research Agenda
The PIPVTR pursues the following research agenda:
1. Gallery of Terrorist Threat Groups in the Philippines. It aims to generate a compendium of composite sketches, file photographs and personality profiles of terrorists.
2. Terrorism-Crime Nexus. It examines the complex nexus between terror groups and organized crime groups.
3. Human Rights and Counter Terrorism. It evaluates the implications of counter terrorism for human rights protection.
4. Media and Terrorism. It studies how terrorist groups use media and how do the media cover terrorism events.
5. Local Government and Terrorism. It analyzes the innovation and excellence of local governments in the fight against terrorism.
6. Civil Society and Terrorism. It describes the role of civil society in terrorism and counter terrorism in the Philippines.
7. Private Business Sector and Terrorism. It analyzes the impact of terrorism on business and how the business sector contributes to counter terrorism.
8. Terrorism and Foreign Policy. It examines the impact of terrorism on Philippine foreign policy and external relations.
9. Terrorism and International Relations. It analyzes the implications of terrorism for inter-state relations, particularly in the context of regional security and global order.
10. Responses to Terrorist Threats. It examines various responses to terrorist threats (local, national, regional, global, ideological, military, legislative, etc) and their implications for human, national, regional and global security.
11. Comprehensive Dialogue Program for Muslim Detainees in the Philippines


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Post–Office, a brand new co-working space opening in Atlanta very soon, is sponsoring the SNS Lounge. We can't wait!
They'll be outfitting the lounge with work spaces, our blogger and media area, plenty of comfy soft seating to relax, and a meeting room too! There will also be giveaways of free passes (you can claim yours now by visiting their site).
Here's what else to expect and check out at the SNS lounge next week:
The SNS Lounge will be open all week! It's located in the Marquis 2 building, 25th floor (285 Peachtree Center NE, Atlanta, GA 30303.) The lounge is open 8am-5pm. See you there for this new world of work!
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Get in front of the South's most savvy pacesetters and ignite something big.Become A Sponsor
Behind SuperNova South is an all-star team of passionate volunteers. Got what it takes?Get Involved


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Abbas Experiences a Rebirth
Palestinian Leader Gains Clout As Liaison but Has Daunting Task
RAMALLAH, West Bank -- Four months after his party was trounced by the militant group Hamas, Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas has emerged stronger than ever by some measures. He even has a plan -- albeit Sisyphean -- to revive Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations.
When Hamas won a majority of seats in the Palestinian parliamentary elections, Mr. Abbas, also known as Abu Mazen, seemed the biggest loser. He remained president of the Palestinian Authority, but the quasigovernment fell under the control of Hamas, a group much...


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Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Ignorance and Innocence
What Barry said. I haven't had time to say anything about the subject until now, so I'm glad he came out of hiding to say it himself (and better than I would have, too).
I know that most of the comments directed at celebrities, especially those seen as freaks in some way, are just like so much of what people say: thoughtless, knee-jerk verbal impulses. But in this case, it bothers me more than usual.
My first serious girlfriend in high school was molested by her father from roughly age 4 to 14, and I was the first person she told about it. A month later, she had a fight with him and finally got angry/brave enough to tell her mom. The family, of course, was divided, he eventually spent a year in jail, and she spent a little time in a mental hospital. Some of our limited free time after school was spent with me driving her to her group therapy sessions; not exactly the kind of storybook romance kids dream about. As one might imagine, her sexuality was very confused and painful for her, and judging from what I heard from mutual friends in the years that followed, my armchair analysis would be that she saw sex as a means for gaining affection while also being angry/repulsed by the other person for wanting her in that way. I heard recently that she had a few kids and ran her own independent business, so I assume she's achieved some semblance of normalcy in her life, but it wasn't easy, and it could have just as easily turned out differently. That lesson has always stuck with me, and probably has a lot to do with why I still maintain a mostly liberal outlook despite a natural tendency toward misanthropy and pessimism. So many people would have turned out differently if only they'd had a fair chance.
I know that most of the comments directed at celebrities, especially those seen as freaks in some way, are just like so much of what people say: thoughtless, knee-jerk verbal impulses. But in this case, it bothers me more than usual.
My first serious girlfriend in high school was molested by her father from roughly age 4 to 14, and I was the first person she told about it. A month later, she had a fight with him and finally got angry/brave enough to tell her mom. The family, of course, was divided, he eventually spent a year in jail, and she spent a little time in a mental hospital. Some of our limited free time after school was spent with me driving her to her group therapy sessions; not exactly the kind of storybook romance kids dream about. As one might imagine, her sexuality was very confused and painful for her, and judging from what I heard from mutual friends in the years that followed, my armchair analysis would be that she saw sex as a means for gaining affection while also being angry/repulsed by the other person for wanting her in that way. I heard recently that she had a few kids and ran her own independent business, so I assume she's achieved some semblance of normalcy in her life, but it wasn't easy, and it could have just as easily turned out differently. That lesson has always stuck with me, and probably has a lot to do with why I still maintain a mostly liberal outlook despite a natural tendency toward misanthropy and pessimism. So many people would have turned out differently if only they'd had a fair chance.
And so a lot of people now justify harsh judgments of Mackenzie Phillips because she was a "junkie" who "consented" to an incestuous relationship. They ask why she had no moral compass while ignoring the fact that she had been blindfolded and spun ever since she was small child. In such dizzying circumstances, she never once had the kind of clear mind needed to give informed consent to anything. John Phillips never gave his little girl the moral guidance that is a child's birthright. Instead, he made sure that she felt complicit in her drug abuse and sexual exploitation, assaults and rapes. That's what mega-perps like John Phillips do. They turn children's lives into unspeakable hell and then instruct their victims to blame themselves for their pain. The rest of the time they make sure that their prey understands just how unspeakable everything is. And they do this while counting on the average person to snicker away from such situations with seedy little jokes rather than summon the courage to confront the unspeakable. Because of such societal cowardice, John Phillips was able to hide in a bright spotlight.
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 4:38 PM
May Contain: collectanea
Friday, September 25, 2009
Ozymandias's Lament
And while I'm quoting from Gray's book, I thought of it again when I read this article about Stanley Kurzweil claiming that immortality is only twenty years away. Gray refers to Stanislaw Lem's novel Summa Technologie, in which a 'phantomatic generator' enables users to exist in virtual worlds:
Personally, I still think that the ultimate nasty surprise would be realizing that knowing you were immortal would actually be a form of hell, a torment you'd soon be desperate to escape from.
Virtual reality is a technological simulation of techniques of lucid dreaming practiced by shamans for millennia. Using fasting, music, dance and psychotropic plants, the shaman leaves the everyday world to enter another, returning to find everyday reality transformed. Like virtual reality technology, shamanistic techniques disrupt the consensual hallucination of everyday life. But with this crucial difference: the shamans know that neither the ordinary world nor the alternate worlds they explore in trance are of their own making.
[...] The phantomat enables us to live, die and be born again at will. By glazing over the fact of mortality, it leaves us with no check on our wishes. Our experiences are confections of our desires, and no longer connect us with anything else...Lem's prescience regarding virtual reality technology is extraordinary; but the risk of all-encompassing unreality to which he points is itself unreal. The idea that we may be on the way to contriving a fiction from which there is no exit endows technology with a power it can never possess.
[...] Lucid dreaming is a dangerous sport; those who practice it must expect to encounter things they could not have imagined...Lem envisaged his phantomat as a generator of perfect illusions, but any actual machine will be prone to accident and decay. Sooner or later, errors will creep into the program its designers have written for it, and the virtual worlds it conjures up will come to resemble the actual world it was meant to transcend. At that point, we will find ourselves once again in a world we have not made. We have dreamt of machines that can deliver us from ourselves, but the dream worlds they make for us contain rifts and gaps that return us to mortal life.
Personally, I still think that the ultimate nasty surprise would be realizing that knowing you were immortal would actually be a form of hell, a torment you'd soon be desperate to escape from.
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 12:34 PM
May Contain: science, technology, the big sleep
Germany and the West
Harper's always has the best links and articles, and this one seems interesting:
Isaiah Berlin has said much the same thing in his writings on Romanticism, and very persuasively. But this struck me because it's only been a couple weeks since I read a contrary opinion from John Gray in Straw Dogs:
Why did Germany only come to associate itself with the West at a very late date?
The First World War was waged by the Germans as a war of the ideas of 1914 against those of 1789. Order, Breeding, and Inwardness (Ordnung, Zucht und Innerlichkeit) against Freedom, Equality, and Fraternity (Liberté, égalité, fraternité). Parliamentary democracy came to Germany in 1918 as a consequence of military defeat, and consequently in the twenties and early thirties it appeared to many as an un-German form of governance. The "West" was a negative battle concept for the conservative elites that acquired cultural hegemony in the late Weimar Republic. And National Socialism was the catastrophic high point of the rejection of the West as a political project.
Isaiah Berlin has said much the same thing in his writings on Romanticism, and very persuasively. But this struck me because it's only been a couple weeks since I read a contrary opinion from John Gray in Straw Dogs:
This murderous vision was not confined to Nazis. In less virulent forms, the same view of human possibilities was held in the thirties by much of the progressive intelligentsia. There were some who found positive features even in national socialism. For George Bernard Shaw, Nazi Germany was not a reactionary dictatorship but a legitimate heir to the European Enlightenment.
Nazism was a rag-bag of ideas, including occultist philosophies that rejected modern science. But it is mistaken to view it as unambiguously hostile to the Enlightenment. Inasmuch as it was a movement dedicated to toleration and personal freedom, Hitler loathed the Enlightenment. At the same time, like Nietzsche, he shared the Enlightenment's vast hopes for humanity. Through positive and negative eugenics - breeding high-quality people and eliminating those judged inferior - humanity would become capable of the enormous tasks ahead of it. Shaking off the moral traditions of the past and purified by science, humankind would be master of the earth. Shaw's view of Nazism was not so far-fetched. It chimed with Hitler's self-image as a fearless progressive and modernist.
[...] The radical right-wing movements of the interwar years were not enemies of "Western Civilization" so much as its illegitimate offspring. The Fascists and Nazis had nothing but contempt for Enlightenment scepticism and toleration, and many of them scorned Christianity. But - however perversely - Hitler and his followers shared the Enlightenment's faith in human progress, a faith that Christianity had kindled.
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 11:58 AM
May Contain: books, history, philosophy
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
The Moore Things Change
It's possible to agree with Moore in theory and still find his tactics sloppy and ineffective...
- Stephanie Zacharek
Mark Ames addressed this envious sniffling about Moore's tone, tactics, personal body-mass index, etc., more than five years ago. And look who he singled out for whining about Moore's ineffectiveness and self-promotion!
This is pretty much the range of Left-intellectual criticism: hate him because he's fat, aggressive, or, if you have to admit he's good, then qualify that with lies about his ineffectiveness, which is exactly what he isn't.This is the other false argument: those on the genuinely ineffective-Left argue that
[...] And on and on it goes. Salon.com, which every day devotes its site to finely-nuanced attacks on the Bush Administration, reveals its own Peyronies-Syndrome-penis envy in Stephanie Zacharik's article "9/11: Nay!" The first part of her argument is dedicated to defending left-wing critics of Michael Moore using a less-than-Animal House argument which goes something like: "They say if you criticize Michael Moore, you're not really a Leftist." By bringing this up, she thinks she's neutralized the argument in-advance of her attack, which is qualified by a double-qualifier: "Although he has stated that his aim is to force the election's outcome by calling attention to the Bush administration's web of duplicity and deceit, Moore, ever the self-promoter, is the real star of 'Fahrenheit 9/11.' I agree with probably 95 percent of
's politics...But even though I'm part of the choir Moore is preaching to, I can't help blanching at his approach...preaching to the choir just isn't good enough." Moore
Oh, so what is salon.com doing? Whispering calmly in the back of the choir, hoping no one's really listening so as not to get in trouble?
is ineffective, "preaching to the choir," even though the evidence -- a record-breaking documentary at the box-office -- conspires against this hopeful claim. Moore
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 2:21 PM
May Contain: waiting for the barbarians
Sunday, September 20, 2009
The Man from Hope Springs Eternal
I would be shocked if the village is able to process this at all. The image of Bill Clinton that was promulgated by the right wing and the mainstream media in the 90s was internalized by all sides in the political establishment. If it had been up to them he would have been convicted in the Senate and sent out of town on a rail. (It really was the people who saved him.)
It's always been interesting to me why they hated him so, since even though he was from Arkansas (not that there's anything wrong with that) he was also a product of all the right schools and had all the proper credentials and best connections. The class argument doesn't really work perfectly with him. There was always something else at play.
This perhaps gives a hint of what was at the bottom of it. It's just possible that they smelled a little earnest idealism, which is the most revolting stench imaginable to the cynical elites and those of both parties who make their living feeding on Democratic failure. It's not surprising that they would project their own decadent, self-serving ambition on to him and then try to destroy him over it.
- Digby
Well, who's to say. Sure, the guy sold out liberal constituents on every major issue, and left a track record with highlights like NAFTA, an immense body count due to sanctions on Iraq, repealing Glass-Steagall, expanding NATO, telecommunications reform, DOMA, and, oh hell, we could go on and on. But why do that when we could listen to one of Bill's bosom buddies tell us about how, in his heart of hearts, he felt really bad about all that and wished he could do better!
It's a funny sign of Digby's desperation that she latches on to something so transparently ridiculous as a means to keep the faith. This is over a guy with, as I said, a track record for anyone to look at, and she still gets all hopeful at the slightest encouragement to not believe her lying eyes. For some reason, then, I find it hard to believe her professions of cynicism and skepticism when it comes to Obama.
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 9:05 AM
May Contain: augean stables, jests japes jokes jollies, waiting for the barbarians
Friday, September 18, 2009
Words to Live By
The thought of suicide is a powerful solace: by means of it, one gets through many a bad night.
- Nietzsche
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 9:34 AM
May Contain: nietzsche, the big sleep
Comfort Killed the Curiosity
An interesting lecture on a subject I'm fond of. Seriously, I've found that insatiable curiosity paired with longwinded bullshitting ability can trick many people into believing you're actually smart! Try it sometime.
By background, 99 percent or more of the people who ever lived on the planet by the end of the 18th century could only reflect the social status and pursue as occupations whatever their parents did. Curiosity, which may be a natural condition of children, didn't apply expansively to adults because in their daily pursuits they had so few choices. Lack of education and social and economic immobility put pervasive constraints on the imagination.
It's an interesting thought, because I've always felt that the opposite is just as true: so many people I know, even if they have a little time and money to spare, simply don't care to learn anything new once out of school, content to just partake of the endless buffet of entertainment while knowing just enough to keep the paychecks coming.
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 8:49 AM
May Contain: education, foolosophizing
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
The Shoes of Liberty Must be Polished from Time to Time with the Blood of Patriots and Tyrants
This seems open and shut to me: the Iraqi journalist should go to jail for a rather long time.
Speaking after his release, he said he had been beaten with iron bars, given electric shocks and "waterboarded", and even now feared for his life.His family say he was likely to travel to Greece later this week for medical treatment and for his own protection."These fearsome services, the US intelligence services and its affiliated services, will spare no efforts to track me as an insurgent revolutionary," he said at a news conference staged by his television station, al-Baghdadiya."And here I want to warn all my relatives and people close to me that these services will use all means to trap and try to kill and liquidate me either physically, socially or professionally."
To be fair, Perlstein did bravely announce a few months later that he "no longer fear(ed) populism," calling it "our American common sense." (As long as it's homegrown populism, I guess. Can't trust the foreigners with it.) But his initial complaint was that American liberals weren't rushing en masse to a bipartisan defense of the idea that heads of state - especially this state - should not be subject to direct reactions from any of the plebians whose lives they casually destroy, lest our snickering at the sight of Bush getting a well-earned mouthful of shoe leather inspire other people to similarly disrespect the American president and send us spiraling down into the depths of anarcho-fascism. And lo and behold, it looks like he was right! I feel so ashamed.
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 4:04 PM
May Contain: waiting for the barbarians
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
$ouled Out
Artistic integrity and rock 'n' roll: complementary or mutually exclusive? On the one hand, to name just one obvious example, you have the high priest of RAWK GAWD-dom, Gene Simmons, a man who apparently made it his mission in life to be the living embodiment of every negative stereotype of base, money-grubbing Jews, a man who could teach gangsta rappers a thing or two about zealously proseletyzing for music being nothing more than a convenient vehicle for gettin' laid and gettin' paid. Embarrassing and pathetic in his strident insistence that anyone not enslaved to his wallet and genitals is a liar and a fraud, perhaps revealing more than he intends with his incessant efforts to deny that anyone could possibly aspire to do anything for any reason other than the most ignoble, one wishes he would gather whatever scraps of dignity he has remaining and bury them in one of those fucking Kiss Kaskets.
On the other hand, the dour earnestness of Pearl Jam:
On stage last summer at Madison Square Garden, Eddie Vedder told a story. The Pearl Jam singer had recently been in a coffee shop, when he saw something unfamiliar for sale: a plastic MusicPass card that allowed its owner to download an album in MP3 form. Vedder, a longtime vinyl booster, was appalled. The difference between buying music the old-fashioned way and through these newfangled means, he declared, was "like the difference between making love to a real woman and a plastic one."
Well, I say that for true audio purity, one must accept no substitutes for a handcrafted Victor phonograph, harrumph harrumph blah blah! I mean, jesus -- I can certainly understand preferring one format to another, but the music will impact the listener the same way regardless of whether they hear it on mp3, CD, cassette, 8-track, vinyl LP, or via some traveling minstrel. There's nothing inherently more real or meaningful about an LP as opposed to an mp3; the music and its message are not necessarily invalidated or proven hollow and false if the listener first hears it in a Coke commercial or while playing Grand Theft Auto. Quit with the fucking snobbery already, or at least find some new variations on the same old tired romantic themes. (Like George Carlin said, everything is "natural", even plastic. There is nothing from somewhere outside the universe. People are primates who evolved within the world and will eventually be absorbed back into it, along with all the steel, plastic and toxic chemicals that our product-of-evolution brains dreamed up. Perhaps, as Carlin suggested, we even evolved as Mother Nature's means to produce plastic! And why does Eddie Vedder hate dinosaur bones anyway?)
I remember an interview several years ago with a musician I wasn't familiar with, and whose name didn't stick with me. But I do remember that he talked a bit about the difference between the hair-band era vs. the grunge era in rock music, and he differed from the conventional wisdom in saying that Nirvana had unfairly been tagged as the catalyst that destroyed all that Sunset Strip, cock-rockin', feel-good, brainless party music (leaving aside the fact that it was really due to marketing departments at the major record labels being unable to conceive of people wanting to listen to more than one type of music and promoting bands accordingly). Cobain and co., he said, at least still embodied some of the charismatic, anarchistic debauchery that had always been a part of rock 'n' roll, from brawls with security guards to gender-bending to heavy drug use, whereas Pearl Jam were actually the ones who went out of their way to make their music (and image) as staid, boring, and humorless as possible, an uptight exercise in moral and intellectual instruction and improvement rather than having fun, with Vedder acting as the Martin Luther, if you will, of the Protestant Reformation that was the Seattle-based grunge scene, grimly setting about his task of ridding music of all corruption, frilly adornments and ornamentation, and clearing away all intermediaries that would otherwise create distance between the artist and the audience, between the listener and the pure, mystical connection with the music. (Though to be fair, he never took the extra step that so many of his alt-rock contemporaries did, openly sneering at a large percentage of their audience for being insufficiently hip and enlightened to even deserve the privilege of hearing their music.)
Is it meaningful to argue that a band that spent 14 years recording for Sony has, with a Target deal, sold out? Maybe.
No. "Selling out" is a senseless, entirely subjective term rooted in adolescent narcissism, or, to be slightly more generous, a romantic conceit that the original intention of the artist, if sufficiently pure, trumps all else, including the effect it has on the public. GG Allin, perhaps, aside, most musicians do strive to find some sort of balance between expressing themselves the way they want, and trying not to completely alienate their audience as a result. Most people in general, I would imagine, instinctively realize that pure expression is meaningless without anyone caring to listen and respond.
They "sold out" the minute they made the band anything other than a fun thing to do in their free time, which basically makes the term too vague to be worth anything. I admit I greatly preferred the Seattle scene to the L.A. glam scene, both musically and lyrically, but the one thing that always made me roll my eyes was the bizarre spectacle of rich and famous rock stars kvetching about being rich and famous rock stars. As someone who would have dearly loved to make enough money in my twenties off music to live comfortably the rest of my life, let me say this: there is no reason whatsoever to take your music beyond the personal computer, the garage, or the local club scene unless you want the fame, the money, or both. Yes, sure, you might primarily just want a lot of people to hear your music, but, you know, the fame kinda comes with that, and I don't see the Eddie Vedders of the world choosing to give it all to charity and go back to working the overnight shift at a 24-hour gas station/convenience store. Unless you create a self-sufficient hippie commune where everybody sings their songs around the campfire for free, you can't avoid some sort of entanglement with the impurities of the commercial world, and you can't control what other people take away from your music.
Art doesn't spring forth, ex nihlio, from some noumenal realm beyond space and time, unencumbered by worldy trappings. It's created by flawed human beings with imperfect motivations, received and appreciated by the same; but if we're lucky, it still manages to contain something greater than the sum of its parts. Everyone's a sellout, everyone's made compromises, everyone's done things they weren't thrilled about for results they weren't happy with. Whores, one and all. Can we just enjoy the music now?
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 3:43 PM
May Contain: art, extraordinary popular delusions, george carlin, music, ohferfucksake
Saturday, September 12, 2009
The Curse of the Drinking Classes
However powerful our technology and complex our corporations, the most remarkable feature of the modern working world may in the end be internal, consisting in an aspect of our mentalities: in the widely held belief that our work should make us happy. All societies have had work at their centre; ours is the first to suggest that it could be something much more than a punishment or a penance. Ours is the first to imply that we should seek to work even in the absence of a financial imperative. Our choice of occupation is held to define our identity to the extent that the most insistent question we ask of new acquaintances is not where they come from or who their parents were but what they do, the assumption being that the route to a meaningful existence must invariably pass through the gate of renumerative employment.
It was not always this way. In the fourth century BC, Aristotle defined an attitude that was to last more than two millennia when he referred to a structural incompatibility between satisfaction and a paid position. For the Greek philosopher, financial need placed one on a par with slaves and animals. The labour of the hands, as much as of the mercantile sides of the mind, would lead to psychological deformation.[...] The bourgeois thinkers of the eighteenth century thus turned Aristotle's formula on its head: satisfactions which the Greek philosopher had identified with leisure were now transposed to the sphere of work, while tasks lacking in any financial reward were drained of all significance and left to the haphazard attentions of decadent dilettantes.Aspects of this evolution in attitudes towards work had intriguing parallels in ideas about love. In this sphere, too, the eighteenth-century bourgeoisie yoked together what was pleasurable and what was necessary. They argued that there was no inherent conflict between sexual passion and the practical demands of raising children in a family unit, and that there could hence be romance within a marriage - just as there could be enjoyment within a paid job.Initiating developments of which we are still the heirs, the European bourgeoisie took the momentous steps of co-opting on behalf of both marriage and work the pleasures hitherto pessimistically - or perhaps realistically - confined, by the aristocrats, to the subsidiary realms of the love affair and the hobby.
Well, at least it's good to hear that Europeans have atoned for their mistake by accepting a more realistic worldview these days. Another good reason (besides my favorite national football team) for me to move to Spain!
Growing up and living most of my life in North America, it always seemed natural to ask people upon meeting them what they did for a living. Then I moved to Spain where people rarely ask that question. I've been here two years and still don't know what some friends do to pay the bills.
This lack of interest in people's professional lives at first confused me, like people didn't care enough about their friends to bother finding out what they did eight or ten hours a day.
After a while, however, when the cultural shift started happening in my brain, I understood the reluctance to ask: Work life isn't important.
For a majority of Spaniards, a job is what you do to pay for the fun you have outside of work. Coming from a culture obsessed with discovering your passion (and being a mentor who helps people do just that), this concept of unimportance blew me away.
There's a generation in Spain that got the short end of the stick career-wise. Being the first generation to grow up in democracy a huge number of them went to university – it was what you did. Unfortunately there weren't the jobs waiting for them on the other side, so they found what they could. Many of them were getting paid a very basic wage of 1000 Euros a month even into their late 30s and early 40s.
With their early dreams crushed and hope for change equally bleak, these mileuristas (1000 Euro earners) learned to find other passions in their lives and think of work as something to pay for these passions.
[...] In Spain, people accept the bleak situation and get on with the rest of their life, finding purpose and meaning outside of work.
This author, still shuddering from gazing into such a nihilistic abyss, managed to find his way back to the American belief in progress, novelty, personal growth, and constant upward trajectories. Those of us with different concepts of happiness, identity, time and meaning just sit back and smile. Again from Botton's book:
After Carol had left, as Symons threw away a pile of used tissues and rearranged the cushions on the couch, he remarked that the most common and unhelpful illusion plaguing those who came to see him was the idea that they ought somehow, in the normal course of events, to have intuited - long before they had finished their degrees, started families, bought houses and risen to the top of law firms - what they should be properly doing with their lives. They were tormented by a residual notion of having through some error or stupidity on their part missed out on their true 'calling'.This curious and unfortunate term had first come into circulation in a Christian context during the medieval period, in reference to people's abrupt encounter with an imperative to devote themselves to Jesus' teachings. But Symons maintained that a secularised version of this notion had survived even into the modern age, where it was prone to torture us with an expectation that the meaning of our lives might at some point be revealed to us in a ready-made and decisive form, which would in turn render us permanently immune to feelings of confusion, envy and regret. Symons preferred a quote from Motivation and Personality, by the psychologist Abraham Maslow, which he had pinned up above the toilet: 'It isn't normal to know what we want. It is a rare and difficult psychological achievement'.
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 3:30 PM
May Contain: extraordinary popular delusions, foolosophizing, wage slavery
Monday, September 07, 2009
Die, Die My Darling
Our move toward physician-assisted suicide springs from the same quest for mastery over mortality that leads us to spend nearly twice as much on health care as any other developed nation.
Did he just claim that wanting to choose when to end your own life represents an attempt to achieve mastery over mortality? Why, yes, it appears he did. But our usual scenario, that of hooking people up to machines indefinitely just to preserve a heartbeat or minimal brain function; that's letting go and letting God, eh?
But the idea that there's a right to the most expensive health care while you want to be alive isn't all that different, in a sense, from the idea that there's a right to swiftly die once life doesn't seem worth living.
Ohhh, I see. Whether you grasp at every slim thread that offers the possibility of continued existence, or decide to exit on your own terms when life has become intolerable to you, the problem is that you're getting all uppity in the face of the Lord, acting like you have some sort of say in your own fate!
There are many good reasons to oppose assisted suicide. It transforms a healing profession into a killing profession. It encourages relatives to see a loved one's slow death as a problem to be solved, rather than a trial to be accepted. And as Emanuel noted in his 1997 essay, its "beneficiaries" are far more likely to be suffering from psychological distress than unbearable physical pain.
As many people have wondered in many different contexts, why do conservatives have such a problem grasping the notion of consent? How did we get from voluntary assisted suicide in highly selective cases to forcing everyone from elderly Alzheimer's patients to rebellious teenagers to drink the hemlock? That slippery slope he keeps yammering about seems to have a yawning chasm of illogic dividing it in two.
But no, that's not even all that important now. What is important is to say, hey, Douthat: fuck you, you insufferable, moralizing prig. It's mind-boggling that he seems to imply that, if given the choice, many people would quickly dispose of their terminally ill relatives with no more concern than they would spare for a used tissue. It's a fucking insult to anyone who has been through this scenario to claim that they're just waiting for the all-clear to hurry up and do away with someone who's become a burden to them so they can go merrily on their way. As if this wouldn't be a heart-rending decision for everyone involved. As if knowing in advance the exact time and place of a loved one's death isn't a crushing burden to bear, given all the ominous, momentous significance that attaches itself to ordinary acts following that knowledge. ("This is the last time we'll ever do this together again...")
It's really breathtaking to see how casually this fatuous little fuck suggests that the paramount issues of someone's long, drawn-out death are making sure that the other family members are getting their full allotment of divinely-ordained grief and anguish in order to learn whatever inscrutable lesson Douthat's god wants them to learn, watching a formerly vibrant personality waste away to a insensate bag of bones, and that the dying person is actually in physical agony, rather than getting off easy with mere "psychological distress", such as the kind that might follow the realization that you face a slow, painful decline into oblivion (leaving aside the issue of who assholes like Ross would put in charge of making the distinction, or who the fuck they would think they are to even attempt to do so). Man up, you fucking wimps! Your ancestors had to settle for working like slaves and dying before they turned forty just to provide you spoiled babies with the opportunity to lie in a hospital and whine: "Oh, woe is me, I'm 93 years old and confined to a bed, wearing a diaper while cancer slowly gnaws my vital organs. Boo hoo!"
But I suppose since Ross's god-man suffered on the cross and died for you, the least you could do is linger in mortal agony in remembrance of him.
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 5:28 PM
May Contain: ohferfucksake, the big sleep
Saturday, September 05, 2009
Dull Minds, Shiny Objects
Hey, get this -- different mediums of communication lend themselves to different types of communication! No, really.
I've never joined Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc. Email has always been perfectly adequate for communicating quickly and sharing whatever I want from the web. So perhaps I know not of which I speak, but I'm not sure what people expect from social networking sites, really -- literary salons or something? When you participate in a medium that's built on easy access, speed, and the constant stimulation of trivial novelty, why are you surprised to discover how shallow, selfish or boring people can be? When you take a moment to notice how jejune most of your mental activity is, why on Earth would you want unfiltered, 24/7 access to other people's heads?
This brings us to our first dilemma: Amidst all this heightened chatter, we're not saying much that's interesting, folks. Rather, we're breaking a cardinal rule of companionship: Thou Shalt Not Bore Thy Friends.
It's funny that she seems to think that "chatter" and "interesting" aren't mutually exclusive. The real problem is that most of us are boring much of the time, especially those of us who never shut up. The trick is recognizing that unflattering fact and learning how to balance your time with friends with time alone, where you wait for interesting thoughts to develop and interesting experiences to occur, rather than allow your cloying neediness to impose you on others' attention. Of course, one afternoon alone in the howling abyss of their own mindscape has most people grasping for the phone, the remote, or the car keys to save them from themselves.
Really, this is such an incredibly disingenuous complaint. In my experience, intellectual stimulation or deep, meaningful conversation is just one of those things we think we're supposed to profess a yearning for, like learning how to cook tasty vegetable dishes, getting in shape or taking time to stop and smell the roses. People don't seem to actually want much of it. They want companionship, even if it means just an inert, monosyllabic lump on the other end of the couch. They want the reassuring sound of another person's voice, even if all it's communicating is inane drivel. And in an online environment, they'll take kitten pictures and lol-speak as symbols of someone's reassuring presence. Meaningless chatter is the meat and potatoes of most people's conversations! Talking about shit that doesn't matter to people only halfway paying attention is what greases the wheels of social living. If you want thoughts and ideas that speak to the essence of what it is to be human, well, that's what art is for. (I don't even say that as some sort of bitter idealist who thinks everyday conversations should be Shakespearean dialogue about topics of monumental significance; while I don't have much patience for small talk, and prefer to remain silent rather than babble just to fill the air, I accept that being somewhat of a recluse is just the price you pay for that inclination.) As long as you're not looking in the wrong places, there are plenty of weighty conversations to be had out there, many of them online, even! And yet, and yet...there we find ourselves, channel surfing, living shallowly and sucking out all the marrow of some sour cream 'n' salsa pork rinds.
Poor technology! It cuts a tragic figure, almost akin to Dostoevsky's Grand Inquisitor, shouldering the burden of taking away the freedom we don't really want while receiving nothing but scorn for its trouble, lest we be forced to confront our own pale, languid existences.
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 1:18 PM
May Contain: antisocial networking, foolosophizing, technology
Friday, September 04, 2009
Xerxes Rising
Why are we threatened by nuclear programs in Iran and North Korea? Because we shunned effective means to shut down those programs when they were a fraction of their current size in the vain hope that we could overthrow those regimes as we had Iraq's.
Yeah, um, about that Iranian nuke program...
The best part is how this comes near the end of an article lamenting how the Bush administration manipulated and - gasp! - lied about intelligence estimates prior to invading Iraq. IOKIYAD, I suppose.
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 7:52 PM
May Contain: augean stables, waiting for the barbarians
Thursday, September 03, 2009
The New Bohemians
I used to practice calligraphy just for the fun of it, so I like to think I have some semblance of an appreciation for the aesthetics of typeface, font, the simple visual appeal of text on a page.
But I had no idea that the default font I use in posts, Verdana, was such an indicator of pedestrian, lowbrow philistinism to those who get themselves all worked up about such things (there's an online forum called Typophile? Guess I shouldn't be surprised.)
I read blogs (and books) all the time that I don't consider very attractive, but I can't say it's ever occured to me to complain about it.
The things people find to be snobs about...
...wow. Now I'm just waiting to learn that people have been murdered over this!
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 3:05 PM
May Contain: art, fresh hell, jests japes jokes jollies, status seeking, writing
Wednesday, September 02, 2009
The end is near! Again!
It amuses me to find that somewhere down in my numb, blackened core, I still retain a vestigial capacity to be surprised by the latest shiny object people have latched onto. What is all this shit about 2012? I got stuck in a room yesterday with someone who tried to tell me about it.
Human civilization may very well come to an end sometime soon, or at least suffer a severe self-inflicted downgrade. But if it happens, it will be because we're just naked chimpanzees prone to fanatical aggression who are muddling on through the best we can with no idea why. This yearning to throw off the yoke of responsibility for one's life and submit to some glorious divine plan that has been there all along is just embarrassing to witness. Stop it. Stop it right now.
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 8:44 AM
May Contain: fresh hell, jests japes jokes jollies, non compos mentis, the madness of crowds
Tuesday, September 01, 2009
No, Quixote, No
Should the unthinkable occur, and meaningful health care reform fail to materialize, I think we can all agree that one of the most important tasks to be dealt with immediately following will be the assignation of blame. Out of many worthy candidates, I offer here two for your early consideration:
- The Democratic President, the Democratic Congress, and their corporate owners, especially in the insurance industry
- An op-ed written by John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods
So which one are the pwoggies already refusing to ever have anything to do with again? Why, of course.
Should Tristero follow this thinking to its logical conclusion, and refuse to ever buy goods and services from companies whose CEOs hold or express right-wing political views, well, I offer this in the spirit of helpfulness. Is Kaczynski's old cabin still vacant?
Begotten by Strix Cratylus at 7:53 AM
May Contain: moralizing, ohferfucksake
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text:
Happy Thursday! I hope everyone is having a great day. I am posting before midnight which tells you that I am home and messing around on the computer! :)
In my email daily I get a daily devotional and yesterday I was sent this one...
But Jesus said, "You feed them." "But we have only five loaves of bread and two fish," they answered. "Or are you expecting us to go and buy enough food for this whole crowd?" For there were about 5,000 men there.
Luke 9:13-14, NLT
When the disciples expressed concern about where the crowd of thousands would eat, Jesus offered a surprising solution--"You give them something to eat." The disciples protested, focusing their attention on what they didn't have (food and money).
Do you think God would ask you to do something that you and he together couldn't handle? Don't let your lack of resources blind you to seeing God's power.
This spoke to me because right now I have been going through the job search, looking for teaching jobs in my county and the one next to us, and this week I found myself frustrated and not having as much patience as I have had because I'm beginning to see the bills come up in August that I don't have a lot of money saved for. But then this was sent to me as my daily devotional for yesterday and it spoke volumes to me. I am asking for prayers from everyone.
Please pray that I keep having patience and trust what God has planned for me. I have full faith in that God knows what is best for me and will take care of it, but sometimes you just have to reach out to others to help you in your prayers and that is what I'm doing now. God will never give us anything that we can't handle and I truly believe that and I'm excited to have that peace of mind. :) It is amazing to me how when I need a piece of advice or something of the sort these things present themselves to me. That is no coincidence. :)
One thing I did today was plant my rosemary. I took a picture to show you my amazing planting skills. This will be the first plant I have planted from seed and it is an herb, so I guess we will see how well it goes. :) I will keep taking pics to update you.
The beginning...
I had some cute company!
More cute company!
I think that is all for now! Going to enjoy lunch and then a dinner date with Ilie and Anna!! :) Bye!!