What's in a name?

Does it matter that MNF-1 is now USF-1? Apparently not, except for t-shirts and Twitter, there's no difference.

As if we didn't have troubles enough around the globe,

now it's dust.

Too funny

The secrets of NASCAR racing revealed in this lucid, compelling video.

Try not to get too unglued

I've not gotten swept up in the healthcare debate/debacle in this blog, but this chart displays facts that are so maddening that I can't help myself. You've got to click on the chart to enlarge it, but when you do, weep or gnash your teeth or do something, anything, just to prove you're alive. (If, under our healthcare system, you still are.)

Mental illness?

For some reason, this morning I was websurfing and found myself visiting sites about Alan Turing, the genius mathematician. I believe I had begun my surfing with an article about autism and some reference was made to the possibility that Turing suffered from that affliction, although according to the several sites I visited about Turing not many mentioned that possibility. But I must say, Turing's life--his immensely interesting life and tragic death--made me think he may well have been autistic. Indeed, after my surfing, I thought what an amazing movie his life would make. (It has been made into a play, I understand.)

This evening I opened my NetFlix packet to watch the movie therein, not recalling what movie I'd rented, and to my amazement that movie was "A Beautiful Mind," about another afflicted scientist, John Nash.

I'm positive my morning surfing was done without conscious knowledge of what movie I'd NetFlixed for that evening. (My NetFlix plan allows me only one movie at a time, and this movie I'd rented weeks ago and had lying on my table unviewed over the holidays. I'd seen the movie before, but barely remembered it, having viewed it only once upon its release eight years ago.)

Two questions: First, was my subconscious at work this morning? Second, must one be mad to be a genius, or does it just help?

What the aughts were not.

Here's a brilliant essay about the decade that is about to pass into history, and why it perfectly forecasts the demise of what we thought was America.

Wouldn't you think they'd change the cover?

I mean, how hard can it be? Talk about bad timing.

If you think my last post about Obama's war policies was too harsh

check out this article at TomDispatch.

"Rope a hope"

Here's the text of a letter to the editor I've emailed today to the SB NewsPress. I'll update if/when it's published.

Update: It was published on December 18, 2009.

Who is he? Is Obama a war president or an envoy of peace? You can’t tell from his Oslo speech, its eloquent phrases belied by his escalation of the Afghan war. Is he a man of the people, or is he in the grasp of Wall Street and insurance-company influence? With all his common-man rhetoric, he throws billions to bail out banksters and refuses to support single-payer health care. Does he favor transparency in government? If so, why does his administration continue Bush’s secrecy policies? In short, is Obama truly the agent of “change” or is he the purveyor of “more of the same”?

Many of his supporters—including this writer—who campaigned ardently for him a year ago are more than merely disappointed or dismayed. We look to Obama’s deeds, no longer to his words, and feel betrayed. Indeed, we now understand (to paraphrase Muhammad Ali’s phrase after his victory over George Foreman in Zaire) we’ve become the victims of “rope a hope.”

A new slogan

to describe Obama's repeated failures to live up to his campaign rhetoric--and our sensation at having been betrayed by him--taken from Ali's boxing victory over Foreman in Zaire: "Rope a hope."

Afghaniconsternation

I wonder: Did Obama make his troop-increase announcement out of a firm belief that it was the best way to deal with Afghanistan and "terrorism"; or did he do so because he believed it was politically beneficial? Which causes me to ask this: Which is more frightening?

Talk about recycling!

Here's a solution to America's obesity problem.

Sometimes, other folks say it better than I

This is one of those times.

Isn't war wonderful?

The latest from our "victory" in Falluja. (Video)

Higher mathematics

Numbers like these for the costs of war make me sick, when I think of the uses to which such sums could be put back here in America. When I say, "sick," I mean actually nauseous, because not only are such monies diverted from our own benefit, they're burned up, literally, with no payoff to anyone and with evil consequences for the environment as well as the concept of peace. Awful, ugly, sickening.

Where's the outrage?

Have we grown so tired of stories like this that we're now immune to disgust? (The kicker, at the end of the article, is that we've lately extended the bastards' contract.)

McGovern and me

I guess I'm not crazy, saying that we should get our troops out of Afghanistan immediately. If I am, I'm in good company.

Accidental history

I wonder if this would work for our troops' withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan. A jumbled remark at a general's news conference, and all our troops would climb aboard their HumVees and drive out of the countries. It works for me.

About running

Besides fretting over the militarist and fiscally perverse state of our nation (and the equally troubling emotional state of this author), I also spend quite a bit of time running. I've been running regularly since I was 37 (in 1977), averaging, probably, 1000 miles a year. I run mostly for the good feeling I get when I do it (and to avoid that bad feeling I get when I don't), and rarely run in "races," such as the many local 10-kilometer events here in SB. I've run in about ten such races over my "career," mostly 10-k's, but a few longer events, too.

I've had my share of running injuries over the years, and so this NYT article, describing a new book about running, caught my eye. It appears to criticize the effect on injuries of these many new-fangled running shoes, with their various cushionings and supports and seems to foster the idea of minimalizing footwear to avoid running injuries.

Well, here's the deal. About five years ago, after undergoing a series of foot injuries that sidelined me for weeks at a time, I decided to try something different. Instead of lacing up my running shoes--New Balance brand, not too intricate in features--as tightly as I had all my life, I decided to lace them so loosely that they almost came off my feet as I ran. I'd always tightly laced my shoes--all types of shoes--because, I suppose, that's what my mother did when she tied my shoes back in my pre-shoe-tying days.

The result of loose-tying of my shoes: No foot injuries in the years that have followed. Not a one. True, I occasionally get other pains--a tight hamstring, a sore lower back--but not a twinge of foot pain. And so--I think I'll buy this fellow's book.

If there is a "god"

this woman writer has "nailed it" for me.