Eclectic Writer

At 04:35:42, a magnitude 4.1 event occurred 16 km (10 miles) N of Palomar Observatory, CA, at 33 deg. 29.9 min. N (33.498N), 116 deg. 51.9 min. W (116.865W). The hypocentral depth is 8 km ( 5 miles). Those are the scientific measurements. It was a small event, on the scale of such things here on earth. I felt it, and more importantly heard it in my bed.

There was a distant sound, almost sub-audible, like a rifle shot heard a county away. Very quickly there after, I felt the shake and heard a second bang, like the breaking of the sound barrier. These two sequenced sounds were like hearing someone say Ta-Dah, as if the earth were trying to impress me with a ridiculous grandiloquent introduction.

As events go, this quake was small. I’ve slept though bigger quakes and rode a bush through the Northridge quake years back. But this even seemed to have produced mental aftershocks, triggering patterns of thought that bounce through my brain. I can not sleep.

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Did you noticed that the current economic collapse has roused the New World Order into full gallop.  We’re talking G20, G8, European Union, Breton Woods redux, and who knows what other alphabet soup mix of international organizations.  Now, I am aware that the phrase “New World Order” carries a very dark bias.  Many on the right see it as a dark blend of Nazi-Commie-Illuminati conspiracy bent on world domination and ending, forever, that special status that the United States is supposed to have as the City on a Hill, created by God as the New Canaan, destined to bring the light and Salvation to a the elect among mankind’s many people.  I am not talking about that “New World Order.”  What I see as a new world order, the little “n” little “w” little “d” new world order of International organizations that have evolved since the Geneva Convention in 1864 and the League of Nations in 1917 began the slow evolution of extra-national organizations designed to handle global problems in a global rather than a national way.

Many problems transcend national boundaries.  Even the most powerful nations can not approach real solutions to these problems on a unilateral basis.  A world wide depression needs a world wide response. This new world order to approach and solve the crises that threatens to sink all economies is the tied that floats all boats. In some ways, this appears to be a repudiation of the Bush years of unilateral national solutions to international crises. The global war on terror has failed because we as a nation tried to impose our will and our goals on the rest of the world. Approaching this new crises as a world seems to be the next best step to expanding the evolving international systems. From here, we can use these solutions to global warming (climate change if you prefer), and many other problems that plague humanity.

Saturn is showing off again, doing things that scientists do not expect and can not explain.  I am not implying magic, or some mysterious event, but it raises questions.

Mysterious glowing aurora over Saturn confounds scientists
A stunning light display over Saturn has stumped scientists who say it behaves unlike any other planetary aurora known in our solar system.
The blueish-green glow was found over the ringed planet’s north polar region just like Earth’s northern lights.
It was discovered by the infrared instruments on NASA’s Cassini spacecraft.

There is not enough time to write every story that comes to mind.  It is fun to play, just imagine.  What if intelligent life living in the Clouds of Saturn use auroras to contact a force that they conceive of as God or Gods.  Perhaps these beings manipulate magnetic fields to communicate as they drift though the clouds and raging storms.  These mysterious auroras are calls to God.  But it doesn’t have to be a religious message, perhaps they are using these lights to contact life outside their world.

We live in interesting times.  The world changed on November 4th, or so they say.  Obama became President elect, and a majority of the people in California who voted for Obama also voted to outlaw marriage between gays and lesbians.

On one hand we have this incredible landmark event.  A man, and a member of a group that many still consider children of a lesser god, was elected.  On the other, Californians voted to deny equal access to the law by other humans.    And it is human rights we are talking about here.   This is not simply about black and white, strait and gay.  We are supposed to be equal under the law.  As long as that laws dictate that the government determines who marries by require all applicants to acquire a marriage license, then it is a matter of the law rather than morality or religion.

This conflict has writerly applications.

This new law is the real opening of a new civil rights movement.  Just as the last civil rights movement in the 60’s caused enormous upheaval in our society, this new movement will also create conflict.  Heroes will arise on both sides of he question.  What new Martin Luther King Jr. will rise up for gays and lesbians to lead them?  Among those who oppose the very idea that a man can love a man and a woman can love a woman, will become the hero and lead those forces in opposition?

But twist this idea a little.

What if Gays and Lesbians were aliens.  In the original Star Trek series, Spock was half Vulcan half human and Worf was half Klingon and half human.  Yes, there is the problem that different species evolved independently on very different worlds would not find reproducing easy, or even possible, like attempting to cross breed a chitzu with a hermit crab.  They addressed that in a Next Generation episode by making all life the descendants of one distance ancestral race, long extinct, but I digress.

Keep the notion that it would be impossible to reproduce, what kind of cultural change would happen if an alien species came to earth and chose to intermarry with humans? Would that be bestiality, or would that simply be two or more loving people seeking to spend their lives together?  Two sexes is no limit with alien physiology.  Who has the right to say no?  Who is hurt?  Who wins?  Who loses?

It’s been a while since I”ve wailed at my wall.  Craziness just explodes as the quadrennial political silly season comes to a close.  Who will get the nod?  Will racism or voter suppression bring John McCain to the White house?  Will Socialism and voter registration fraud bring Obama to the White House?  How can anyone possibly undecided?

I suppose I need a crystal ball, a way to peer into the future and see something that says it’s OK to let it go, forget about my political obsession. I could stop scanning through my favorite website in the morning. I could use that time constructively to clean the garage, get the laundry done, and finish a novel.

But time, for us humans anyway, has a habit of moving linearly at a set pace. In one week and one day, I will do everything I can do to try and bring about what I think is the best possible course for this nation. No amount of obsessing over every bit of news and every change in the polling will speed the passage of time. That doesn’t make waiting any easier.

Things are looking good.

The DKOS Daily Tracking poll shows at 53 to 40, a 13 point advantage for Obama. Electoralvote.com puts the electoral college vote at 343 to 184, with 11 tied (Missouri). If you take away all states with less than a 5% advantage for Obama, he still carries 280 points, which still wins the election You have to go back to that Conservative Saint, His Holiness, Ronald Reagan to find numbers like that.

The tried but not so true strategy of Culture Wars, 9/11, swift boat tactics, fear, and out right lies have failed to stop Obama. Appointing Sarah Palin to bring the religious right home, along with all the uptight sexually deprived conservative Republican demographic hasn’t worked. Suspending his campaign and going back to Washington in a hissy fit didn’t work. Ignoring Obama and refusing to look at him didn’t work. Telling everyone not to vote for that scary black Muslim terrorist Obama didn’t work.

It looks really good. Some might say it is in the bag. And, you know, they might be right, except…

In between the pats on the back and the high fives, we should all consider taking a quick jaunt to the other side of the political divide. The term “Cold Civil War” rises far to often to the surface, along with some of the most remarkable lies. Spend more than 30 seconds and you will come away needing a bath, a mental enema, and psychic douche.

What we are seeing in a every rising, ever expanding anger. Should Obama do only half as well as it appears now, he will walk away with an incredible victory. With that victory, we need to remember the idea the concept of the Past as Prologue. When Bill Clinton won the Presidency in November 1992, there were stories of Republicans meeting to discuss impeachment in December of the same year. They had no idea at the time what they would high crimes and misdemeanors they would charge him with. That didn’t matter. People like Richard Mellon Scaife rose to prominence and a whole industry bloomed overnight to investigate and create crimes.

On November 5ht, the Conservative Republican Right will not be dead. They will wake up with a hate on for McCain that will drive them to purge their party of anyone that even pretends, like McCain, to be a moderate. Their very formidable list of Think Tanks, right wing propaganda outlets, and wingnut talking heads will get together and begin a two prong attack. Part of that attack will be to polish up their brand by insisting on conservative ideological purity. The other prong will be a relentless series of smears and attacks that will be carried by a mainstream media that can’t get enough of hate and discontent.

Within 6 months, there will be a well organized, well funded, and well publicized machine pushing the impeachment of Barack Husain Obama 24/7. Every news event will be spun to their advantage. Every lie that can conceivably be suggested will be broadcast on every news program.

What I am saying here is that all these rosy predictions of millennial peace and prosperity because we have finally put a moderate Democrat in the White House are just so much fantasy. The other side does not see the truth of our message or accept the purity of our intentions. We are not facing the ultimate victory in a war against the forces of darkness. The election of Barack Obama as President is just a small but important victory and we will have, at best, a few weeks to rest upon our laurels before we get back into the trenches.  Unless we are willing to continue the fight, the Impeachment of Barack Hussein Obama is a sure thing.

I’ve been thinking about death.

Not because death is imminent, or at least any more imminent than for all other humans who never know if they will be alive one micro-second from now.  And, I confess, I began thinking along these terms about 6 years ago when I turned fifty.  The thought of my demise since that time has tended to percolate upwards into my mind, slowing me down to reduce the risk that I might, through willful stupidity, kill myself in a moment of recklessness.

At that time, I even crossed over from passive agnostic Judaism to active agnosticism.  Perhaps if I were younger, I would have the courage tobe a full blown atheist.  Maybe, if I were older I would have the courage of faith.  But I have neither at this time.  I am content to accept non-existence as the inevitable result of death.  I see no need for a spiritual resurrection, and physical resurrection is ridiculous.  If there is a god, and there is life after death, I will concern my self with that realm of existence when the mind comes.  Then, I ran across a story on a piece of scientific research that has the potential to prove an existence of Consciousness apart from the biological computer I carry inside by bone box.

What Happens When We Die?
By M.J. STEPHEY
Tue Sep 23, 6:40 PM ET

A fellow at New York City’s Weill Cornell Medical Center, Dr. Sam Parnia is one of the world’s leading experts on the scientific study of death. Last week Parnia and his colleagues at the Human Consciousness Project announced their first major undertaking: a 3-year exploration of the biology behind “out-of-body” experiences. The study, known as AWARE (AWAreness during REsuscitation), involves the collaboration of 25 major medical centers through Europe, Canada and the U.S. and will examine some 1,500 survivors of cardiac arrest. TIME spoke with Parnia about the project’s origins, its skeptics and the difference between the mind and the brain.

Before I read this story and interview, I thought that I had put this behind me. This story, however, touched something, I suppose a deep dream of survival beyond the flesh. A research study that will attempt to discover what Consciousness really is. Does it last beyond the point when the brain no longer responds. If so, what is the relationship be Consciousness and the physical body.

Reading th story led to “The Human Consciousness Project,” the group of scientist performing the study.  The Human Consciousness Project “is an international consortium of multidisciplinary scientists and physicians who have joined forces to research the nature of consciousness and its relationship with the brain, as well as the neuronal processes that mediate and correspond to different facets of consciousness.” These scientists have accepted that consciousness is not necessarily a emergent property of a wonderfully complex biological computer.  Their study has the potential to rock the human universe, to let us know if we can look forward to something other than decay.

The list of stories captured from Yahoo on September 9, 2008 reveals what appears to be a conservative bias by Yahoo.  The story “Obama tries to steal Nebraska electoral vote from McCain” is as egregious a piece of bias as you can find.  The story links to “Omaha’s electoral vote draws Obama’s attention.”  The word steal does not appear in the story.  I can hear you asking, but what’s the difference. 

In my world, words mean things.  In this case, the word steal is highly prejudicial as well as being inaccurate.  Steal is defined as “to take without the owner’s consent.”  It is, by definition, an illegal act.  As I will show, Obama could not steal these electoral votes for two primary reasons.

(1) Obama can not steal the electoral votes because the November election has not happened yet.  Until that election occurs, nobody owns those electoral votes.  Yes, it is true that Republicans have tended to carry that state in the past.  But the fact remains Obama can not steal something that is as yet unowned and will not be available for stealing until the first Tuesday in November.

(2) If Obama should be able to draw enough votes in Omaha to manage to control 1 of the electoral votes, it would not be stealing.  Nebraska, as the story says, is one of two states that divide their electoral votes.  Should Obama manage to win in that district,  he gets the vote, nothing is stolen.

If theft has not happened, can not happen, and the word doesn’t even appear in the real story, what does Yahoo, or whoever writes their headlines, get from using a word that is prejudicial.  Most of the people who saw that headline will never click on it, but it will register.  Using words that carry a negative connotation help build a negative image of Obama and express a editorial bias.

The enduring myth repeated ad naseum in the main stream press is that we are a Capitalist society.  Of course, that’s a lie.  The bailout of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, is proof that the US is not now and has not been a Capitalist nation since at least sixties. 

As reported in Bloomberg, Freddie, Fannie Failure Could Be World `Catastrophe’. That is big stuff, world catastrophe I mean. What Yu Yongding, former adviser to China’s central bank, really said was:

“If the U.S. government allows Fannie and Freddie to fail and international investors are not compensated adequately, the consequences will be catastrophic,” Yu said in e-mailed answers to questions yesterday. “If it is not the end of the world, it is the end of the current international financial system.”

But what about the idea that any financial system within a capitalist society must be allowed to react to market forces? Failure of a hot-dog stand on the corner or a major bank occurs within capitalism when they fail to compete. Propping up such institutions would be anti-capitalistic and violate the core principals of capitalism.  And, of course, we seem to have been given our marching orders by Communist China that have loaned us vast amounts of money so that we can fight our wars and buy their products.  But we, the man on the street, will benefit form this, right?

The beneficiaries are really the big central banks of the countries that have loaned the US vast amounts of money.  If Fannie and Freddie fail, the central banks fail. If those central banks fail, there goes the neighborhood.  Closer to home, if Fannie and Freddie fail, the stockholders in these 5 trillion dollar enterprises loose their investments.  The little guy, who these mortgage giants loaned money to who are loosing their homes aren’t affected.  Those homes will be sold at auction.  Those little people will be homeless.  But the new purchasers can got to Fannie and Freddie to get loans, this time right from the tax payers and the pockets books of Americans.  And if Fannie and Freddie fail anyway, we will be holding the bag.

No, we are not capitalists.  A system where the government and corporations collude is called Corporatism.  Corporatism is a fascist ideology, practiced in Italy before World War II.  We are a country with a government that bails out big corporations because they are too big to fail and leaves the average citizen to wallow in poverty. 

Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not saying that it would be easy on us to let Fannie Mae Freddie Mac fail.  Such a failure will bring incalculable suffering.  I am saying that we as a nation and individuals should be aware of what we are.

FTL (Faster Than Light) is more than just a desired attribute for a pizza delivery service.  FTL is the dream of Science Fiction and Spooky Action at a Distance for Einstein.  No matter how your slice and dice it, if you can do it its time travel, even if you can’t go back in time and date your Grandmother when she was a hot Young thing in the days when they had a few Model T’s but no wet T’s. 

From Space.com we have a report of new developments that bring FTL closer to conception if not closer to realization.

Spaceship Could Fly Faster Than Light

Travel by bubble might seem more appropriate for witches in Oz, but two physicists suggest that a future spaceship could fold a space-time bubble around itself to travel faster than the speed of light.

We’re talking about the very distant future, of course.

The idea involves manipulating dark energy — the mysterious force behind the universe’s ongoing expansion — to propel a spaceship forward without breaking the laws of physics.

“Think of it like a surfer riding a wave,” said Gerald Cleaver, a physicist at Baylor University. “The ship would be pushed by the spatial bubble and the bubble would be traveling faster than the speed of light.”

In theory, the universe grew faster than the speed of light for a very short time after the Big Bang, driven by the dark energy that represents about 74 percent of the total mass-energy budget in the universe. Dark matter constitutes 22 percent of the budget, and normal matter (stars, planets and everything you see) makes up the remaining 4 percent or so.

Strange as it sounds, current evidence supports the notion that the fabric of space-time can expand faster than the speed of light, because the reality in which light travels is itself expanding.

For someone like me who grew up with Science Fiction before Star Trek, when people thought those of us who read it with were just a bunch of weird nerds, this is good news. For writers of Science Fiction, it provides a working model to use when they begin to extrapolate their own universe.