Seems the lies told by the Bush administration have been corroborated.
Rumsfeld is a slimy piece of shit. No wonder he’s no longer SecDef. He was a liability from day one and the administration was blinded by ideology and couldn’t see that he was exposing the administration.
And Dick Cheney is a slick old bastard. He’s the real puppet master. Do you think for a moment that George W. Bush can form a coherent though? Of course not. And if you look at the administration, Cheney, Rove, Wolfowitz, et al you see that the Bush Administration is nothing more than the Nixon administration carried forward. These aren’t Reagan Republicans, these are the worst of the worst.
19. Keep On Doin’ It – Aurra – Aurra: Anthology (Volumes I & II)
20. Another Man – Barbara Mason – Barbara Mason: The Greatest Hits (Expanded Edition)
21. Across 110th Street – Bobby Womack – Midnight Mover – The Bobby Womack Story
22. Brazilian Love Affair – George Duke – A Brazilian Love Affair
23. Yesterday’s Dream – Incognito – Best of Incognito (Remastered)
24. Say Yes – Lakeside – Fantastic Voyage
25. Freedom – Zapp – Zapp
When I look at it, the only recent artists in there are Sunburst Band, Philip Bailey (Still part of EW&F I might add.), Incognito, Shur-I-Kan, and Jamie Foxx.
Another treat is Barbara Mason singing “Another Man”. This was a tune from the late 70’s or early 80’s that details her having been left, for another man. Interesting song.
And some of those tracks, like those of the Brothers Johnson? I actually have the vinyl. Yes I’m a dinosaur. Actually Ride-O-Rocket is pretty damned funky. Take a listen for yourself and visit my profile on last.fm.
For the last five years congress was under the control of Republicans who pretty much rolled over and did whatever the Bush administration wanted them to do. And oversight wasn’t one of their top priorities for had it been so, the Bush administration would never have gotten its way.
The incoming Democratic administration had to pickup the pieces and that isn’t an easy process.
And the Kucinich articles of impeachment are gathering steam. There are quite a few co-sponsors on that bill.
But I was watching Bill Moyers on PBS and the guests made a very good point. Very few of our congressmen have any idea of the content of the Constitution and Bill of Rights. Maybe we should have a Know Your Constitution clause for all congressmen. Test them on it every year, make sure they know the framework for their jobs. Having our congressmen firmly grounded in Constitutional knowledge would benefit all of us.
So last night the weather cooperated to some degree and I trained the binoculars southward again. I saw the usuals, Jupiter, Antares, etc. But last night I added to my catalog.
All these stars are in the constellations Sagittarius, Scorpio and Libra if that sort of stuff appeals to you. I’m in the process of rigging up a mounting bracket to put the binoculars on a tripod and it also has a flexible arm on which to mount my digital camera. Aim and shoot. Maybe I’ll do a video of the movement of the stars. They tend to move upwards and to the right, otherwise known as right ascension.
I saw all this with a pair of binoculars, they’re Orion 10×50 and pretty good. But I want something more, something which which I might be able to resolve some of the Messier catalog and NGC catalog through the damned light pollution of my city. The something more is a SkyQuest XT10 Reflector. It’s only 55lbs so it’s light enough to carry, and a 10″ mirror is a pretty good light gathering platform. Of course I should setup the Truthspew relief fund, I mean I’ve already got a paypal account setup. And it’s only $550. Help a poor amateur astronomer.
So I had decided to listen to last.fm the other day and told it to keyword on Earth, Wind & Fire. Heard a track called Lovely People that I didn’t immediately recognize. I click on the song title and the web page pops up for the album, Illumination.
The core of the group is still there, Maurice White, Verdine White, Philip Bailey (Though he has done some very nice Jazz pieces) and Ralph Johnson. But they’ve added new musicians and brought on new vocalists over the years.
On this disc there’s Raphael Saddiq (Who was formerly part of Tony Toni Tone), Kelly Rowland, Big Boi (Outkast), Will I Am, Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, Taura Jackson, and Brian McKnight. They still tour, I saw them a few years ago and they’re still very tight on stage.
I love the lead track though. It’s a song that makes you move, even if you don’t want to.
I posted early about the new upstairs tenant. They have to be the noisiest people I’ve ever run across.
Right now the whole house is vibrating, it’s as though they’re dropping bowling balls on the floor.
And last night we were treated to the sounds of the husband beating the every loving crap out of the wife. Let me tell you, I abhor domestic violence but I’ve learned that you don’t even want to interfere. Let him kill her for all its worth, because calling the cops on them will only make it that much worse. At least if he kills her, it’ll be a little noisy for a bit, then quiet down as his ass is tossed into jail.
Right now I’ve got the headphones in and listening to EW&F’s Illuminations. Nice disc btw, take the traditional EW&F sound, tune it up, get artists like Raphael Saddiq, Big Boi (Outkast), Kelly Rowland, etc. to sing on it, and wham, good stuff. It also explains why I liked Big Boi’s “I Like The Way You Move”, the music is EW&F all the way and the instrumental version is on this disc. First off, I’ve have to get noise blocking headphones. But even those wouldn’t help here as the room actually shakes and vibrates. Earlier I mentioned bowling balls but this one sounds more like bodies being thrown.
Last night I hit the sack a little after midnight, and around an hour later was woken by a tremendous boom. Of course my first inclination when I’m woken in this manner is to yell at the top of my lungs, “WHAT THE FUCK!” That is when it suddenly became very quiet.
I’m going to have to do one of two things here, either move or pool the money and buy the building. Then I can kick their asses to the curb.
By measure of this video from 1946, I’d have to conclude that we’re already in a despotic situation.
Using their measures, I’d like to explain why I think we’re living under a despotic regime.
The respect and power scales are the first two indicators.
Respect can either be unrestricted, or restricted to few. The video says it’s about getting an even break, but it’s much more than that. When you consider the idols and heros of most Americans, we understand that respect is toward a restricted few. We definitely get no respect.
Power is the other interesting scale. It’s either shared or concentrated. In past few decades consolidation of power has become extreme, particularly with the Bush administrations theory of the unitary executive. I had thought absolutism went out with the monarchies of old, but George W. Bush and his team seem to think he’s actually King George.
It gets more interesting as the video then brings in two more scales to indicate when a society is tipping towards despotism.
The variables are those of economic distribution, and information.
If economic distribution tips in favor of one group or another it predisposes us to despotism. And if one takes into account the distribution of wealth in the U.S. you can clearly see that economic distribution is severely tilted.
Information goes from multiple sources of unfettered publication to restricted publication (Fox Network anyone?) and we’re heading toward despotism. Lets face it, if the so called news programs actually ran stories about what was going on, there would be rioting in the streets.
I wouldn’t call this a vaccine per se, but it’s definitely very good news. From what I recall this is especially effective against glioblastoma’s which seem to be the majority of brain cancers. They’re also one of the nastier forms of cancer of the brain because there’s no known cure, only palliative measures.
I lost a good friend to that disease. I wish he was still alive to benefit from this.
Little by little we’re beginning to conquer diseases which for years eluded any curative measures. This is good news. It means human lifespans will now extend a bit more.
So the upstairs tenants are pretty much moved in. The guy who maintains the property had a couple of college grad students but the guy who owns it rented to a family, with kids natch.
My Sunday peace has been shattered. One of the kids has done nothing but scream all afternoon. And they sound like a herd of fucking elephants.
Thankfully I spend a bit more than 40 hours a week out of the house. But I’m pretty sure this is going to drive Keyron up the wall.
So it’s been some time since I took out the 10×50’s. Those are binoculars if you must know. I consider it my first foray into amateur astronomy. Anyway with light pollution being fairly heavy here in the city, I don’t see very much with the 10×50’s though they do give me a better view than with the naked eye.
For example, when I focus in on Venus in the western sky I can see Saturn to it’s right, and Regulus (77.6ly away!) to it’s left. Swinging south I see Jupiter along with Al Niyat (741.3ly), Antares (604ly), Tau Scorpii (432ly). Directly to the right of Juptier I see Graffias (530.3ly), Dschubba or Delta Scorpii (402.7ly) and Pi Scorpii (459.4ly). All this in a badly light polluted city.
I’ll be doing regular stargazing logs. During this instance I think I spotted a 737-400 if the light pattern was correct and I actually tracked him on a northerly heading for a few minutes.
I did take off one of the caps on the focusing mechanism and to my surprise there’s a mounting socket. My next kludge will be a way to mount the binoculars, and my camera on the same tripod that way I can focus stars in and then let the camera take a long exposure picture.
Spewing Truth in the face of Lies 