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Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Humor: Report - Double Stuf Oreos Could Raise Tolerance To Stuf
From The Onion, so you know it's true.
Report: Double Stuf Oreos Could Raise Tolerance To Stuf
EAST HANOVER, NJ—A new report released by the Food and Drug Administration Monday suggests that regular consumption of Oreo's Double Stuf cookies could lead to an increased tolerance to stuf."For 90 percent of Americans, it now takes twice as much stuf to reach the same level of satisfaction once achieved with a single layer of stuf," the report read in part. "Millions of consumers have taken drastic measures to recreate their initial stuf experience, including the manual construction of quadruple-stuf Oreos and chronic stuf-licking. Some have even gone so far as to twist off one side of the cookie, scrape the stuf off with their teeth, and discard the two chocolate wafers."
Oreo executives downplayed a portion of the report claiming that children as young as 8 have begun lacing vanilla stuf with peanut butter stuf and mixing it with substances such as pizza.
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Monday, November 12, 2007
Speedlinking 11/12/07
Quote of the day:
"A truly great book should be read in youth, again in maturity and once more in old age, as a fine building should be seen by morning light, at noon and by moonlight. "
~ Robertson Davies
Image of the day:
BODY
~ Playing With Steroids -- "Whenever a steroid story breaks, the first person they call is Dr. Charles Yesalis. Oddly enough, based on the interviews over the years, we've been led to believe that Dr. Yesalis is rabidly anti-steroid. We may have been wrong."
~ Cancer Risks For Overweight Women -- "Half of all cases of womb cancer and a type of oesophageal cancer in women are caused by being overweight or obese, according to a new report published online in the British Medical Journal . This study provides the first reliable evidence on the relevance of being overweight or obese for a wide range of cancers in women in the UK today."
~ Fish And Omega 3 Linked To Mental Skills -- "A Norwegian study has found a link between eating fish and improved mental skills in older people, a Dutch study found a link between higher omega 3 in the blood and lower mental decline, while a New Zealand study found a link between omega 3 levels in the blood and better physical health, although the link to better mental health was less convincing. All three studies are published in the November issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition."
~ Advice To Eat Complex Carbs And Avoid Sugar Supported By New Research -- "Eating too much fructose and glucose can turn off the gene that regulates the levels of active testosterone and estrogen in the body, shows a new study in mice and human cell cultures that's published this month in the Journal of Clinical Investigation. This discovery reinforces public health advice to eat complex carbohydrates and avoid sugar. Table sugar is made of glucose and fructose, while fructose is also commonly used in sweetened beverages, syrups, and low-fat food products."
~ Exercise found to ease chronic pain of fibromyalgia -- "Regular walks and stretching exercises can help ease the chronic, depressing pain of fibromyalgia, a mysterious ailment with no obvious cure, researchers said on Monday."
~ Beta carotene protects memory in study -- "Beta carotene taken as a dietary supplement for many years may protect against declines in memory, thinking and learning skills that often precede Alzheimer's disease, researchers said on Monday."
~ Easy Weight Loss by Dr John Berardi -- "All day long, all across the web, folks are posting questions about why they're not losing weight, why they're not gaining weight, why their body comp isn't changing. They're frustrated, confused, and feeling helpless. However, I believe that for the majority of them, if they just made things simple, progress would follow."
~ Beauty of BOSU -- "Half a stability ball has the whole fitness world convinced. A wobbly sphere that was sliced in half, the BOSU® ball yields results—whether you jump, sit, step, get into plank pose or do pushups on it. Try these tips from Equinox trainer Kristen Gagne."
PSYCHE/SELF
~ Neurobunk: Politics, Phrenics, and Brainscans -- " As you might imagine, determining how the human brain works with fMRI is in the same ball-park of difficulty as determining how our mystery computer works with only a temperature sensor."
~ 5 Ways to Master Your Emotions -- "Get the top five ways to tweak your emotions and feel great."
~ Slower Brain Maturity Seen in ADHD Kids -- "Crucial parts of brains of children with attention deficit disorder develop more slowly than other youngsters' brains, a phenomenon that earlier brain-imaging research missed, a new study says...."
~ When Conventional Wisdom is Simply Wrong -- "All too often in psychological research, researchers look at a variable and then draw conclusions about that variable, assuming they’ve held all the other variables equal. But because life is so complex and our environment is filled with so many possible alternative explanations for the results (researchers call these “confounds”), researchers are very often simply wrong in the conclusions they draw from their data."
~ Childhood Trauma Contributes to Mental Illness in Adulthood -- "Troubles suffered in childhood can have a significant impact upon adult behavior, as the results of a decade-long study demonstrate. The study examined numerous childhood traumas and the effects that these early experiences have upon an adult's health and behavior. The results show that adults who experienced multiple traumas during childhood are much more likely to have poor mental and physical health."
~ Does the color red really impair performance on tests? [Cognitive Daily] -- "One of the things I was taught in English graduate school was never to grade papers using red ink. Students don't respond well to the color red, I was told -- it's intimidating. I always thought this was a little far-fetched, and my instructors couldn't offer a peer-reviewed journal article that definitively answered the question of whether red ink was harmful."
~ The Different Faces of Depression -- "Parsing the blues into subtypes."
~ Removing Despair from Depression -- "Overcoming sorrow by separating the emotions."
~ Theory and Practice in Therapy -- "'The world is much more than can be formulated by our theories, but when we approach it with a particular theory it responds in a particular way. Our theories can draw out different aspects of the world.' This quote comes from The Focusing-Oriented Counselling Primer, which I have just finished reading."
~ Men Talk More Than Women Overall, But Not In All Circumstances -- "A Gallup poll recently confirmed that men and women both believe that it is women who are most likely to possess the gift of gab. Some even believe that women are biologically built for conversation. This widespread belief is challenged by new research. Researchers found a small but statistically reliable tendency for men to be more talkative than women overall."
CULTURE/POLITICS
~ On the Overlooked Utility of Poetry -- "Forget Mystery's "method" or other forms of pick-'er-up gamesmanship. William Butler Yeats can get you laid." Maybe this is satire, if not, well, uh, yeah.
~ Deepak Chopra: The Second Injection -- "This seems to be an opportune moment to reconsider the death penalty. By giving last-minute stays to executions in Mississippi and Texas, the Supreme Court has effectively brought about a moratorium on all executions until next spring. At question is the accepted method of administering lethal injections, a method adopted by 37 of the 38 states that allow the death penalty."
~ WorkPlace: Gay? U.S. House Says That's Okay -- "It has taken more than 30 years for the House to pass the bill now known as the Employment Nondiscrimination Act, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation."
~ Can Obama Rock the Nomination? -- "The Senator from Illinois was the star performer at a Democratic candidates' dinner in Iowa, in a performance that suggests he has found his voice."
~ Hanson: Freedom, Even from Fear -- "We should remember on this Veterans Day that some very young people — with long futures, in the prime of health, and at the center of their families — died for the rest of us. They lost their lives not just for us to watch an OJ outburst in Vegas or American Idol, but for the idea that we — most often not so young, not so hale, and not with such bright futures as our soldiers — could be free at their expense; free, not merely from being conquered or enslaved, but free from the very thought of it."
~ E-Trade Loses More Than Half Its Value -- "Shares of online brokerage E-Trade Financial Corp. lost more than half their value Monday, with a Citigroup analyst saying customers were poised to flee and the company was at risk of bankruptcy."
~ Justices May Hear Second Amendment Case -- "The Supreme Court may take up a gun-control law that would interpret the right to 'keep and bear arms.'"
HABITATS/TECHNOLOGY
~ Charges Considered in Bay Oil Spill -- "Federal investigators were considering Monday whether to file criminal charges in San Francisco Bay's worst oil spill in nearly two decades."
~ The Dinosaur Conspiracy Theory -- "A study suggests that the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs did not act alone."
~ How Poisonous Plants Protect Themselves From Their Own Weapons -- "It is a known fact that plants are firmly planted in the soil -- they cannot flee from enemies which want to eat them. They are not helpless, however; they oppose their enemies with a large number of sometimes highly poisonous substances. But the plant itself -- how can it protect itself from these poisons?"
~ Warp Speed Improves Calculations a Million Times -- "Thanks to Einstein, physicists know that the world looks different depending on how fast you're moving. A new analysis shows that it a lot prettier (mathematically speaking) if you're moving at just the right speed, leading to an improvement in calculations describing colliding particle beams and lasers by factors of a million or so."
~ Rare great ape fossil challenges evolutionary theory: study -- "Archaeologists have discovered the ancient jawbone of what appears to be a new species of ape that was very close to the last common ancestor of gorillas, chimpanzees and humans, a study released Monday said."
~ Clean, carbon-neutral hydrogen on the horizon -- "Hydrogen as an everyday, environmentally friendly fuel source may be closer than we think, according to Penn State researchers."
~ Probing Question: Are Asteroids a Threat to Earth? -- "Hollywood thrillers such as Deep Impact helped to jump-start America's interest in knowing what our "deflection strategy" would be if a giant asteroid was on a potentially catastrophic collision course with Earth."
INTEGRAL/BUDDHIST
~ The progymnasmata -- "Wonder why the quality of writing today is so across-the-board poor? Well, perhaps there is a solid reason why. I’ve recently become aware of the progynmasmata. That is the name — literally, “preparatory exercises” — that were developed by ancient Greek educators, to teach people how to learn how to write."
~ Forms of identification and disidentification -- "A quick overview of some forms of identification and disidentification...."
~ What I've Learned About Love, and About Myself -- "I have learned an enormous amount over the last month from people I have come to love. I always get a kind of 'high' when I am learning a lot, and these days I've been walking around with a goofy smile all the time, and crying, both joyfully and empathetically, more than usual."
~ Dhamma-nating the conversation, part II: The Core Concepts and the Contoversy -- "This is the second installment of my brief amateure overview of Nichiren Buddhism. If you missed the first one you can read it here."
~ Self-Transformation & Praxis - Part 2 -- "In part two of our series examining the history & evolution of contemporary integrative transformative practices, we feature an essay by Jorge N Ferrer, Ph.D. Jorge is Associate Professor in the East-West Psychology Program at the California Institute of Integral Studies, San Francisco, where he teaches courses on transpersonal studies, comparative mysticism, embodied spiritual inquiry, and spiritual perspectives on sexuality and relationships."
~ Joe Perez on Integral Naked - The Power of Integral Reconciliation -- "The author of one of the most searing, courageous personal memoirs of our time shares how extraordinarily helpful an Integral Approach can be in reconciling and integrating even the most volatile, difficult, highly-charged aspects of one’s own being—and not only live to tell the tale, but find true meaning, peace, and wholeness." Includes free sample audio clip.
~ Gampopa - Compassion with Reference to Sentient Beings, Reference to Dharma, and without Reference Point -- "In a sense, what distinguishes these three types of Compassion that Gampopa sets out in 'Jewel Ornament of Liberation' is the development or level of our compassion (and wisdom)."
~ Towards an Integrative Theory of Peace Education -- "In this paper Danesh outlines an a multi-dimensional & integrative theory of peace. Danesh argues that an integrative theory of peace (ITP) incorporates many of the currently held perspectives and approaches to peace education, while at the same time challenges some of the most widely held concepts with respect to the nature of peace itself."
"A truly great book should be read in youth, again in maturity and once more in old age, as a fine building should be seen by morning light, at noon and by moonlight. "
~ Robertson Davies
Image of the day:
BODY
~ Playing With Steroids -- "Whenever a steroid story breaks, the first person they call is Dr. Charles Yesalis. Oddly enough, based on the interviews over the years, we've been led to believe that Dr. Yesalis is rabidly anti-steroid. We may have been wrong."
~ Cancer Risks For Overweight Women -- "Half of all cases of womb cancer and a type of oesophageal cancer in women are caused by being overweight or obese, according to a new report published online in the British Medical Journal . This study provides the first reliable evidence on the relevance of being overweight or obese for a wide range of cancers in women in the UK today."
~ Fish And Omega 3 Linked To Mental Skills -- "A Norwegian study has found a link between eating fish and improved mental skills in older people, a Dutch study found a link between higher omega 3 in the blood and lower mental decline, while a New Zealand study found a link between omega 3 levels in the blood and better physical health, although the link to better mental health was less convincing. All three studies are published in the November issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition."
~ Advice To Eat Complex Carbs And Avoid Sugar Supported By New Research -- "Eating too much fructose and glucose can turn off the gene that regulates the levels of active testosterone and estrogen in the body, shows a new study in mice and human cell cultures that's published this month in the Journal of Clinical Investigation. This discovery reinforces public health advice to eat complex carbohydrates and avoid sugar. Table sugar is made of glucose and fructose, while fructose is also commonly used in sweetened beverages, syrups, and low-fat food products."
~ Exercise found to ease chronic pain of fibromyalgia -- "Regular walks and stretching exercises can help ease the chronic, depressing pain of fibromyalgia, a mysterious ailment with no obvious cure, researchers said on Monday."
~ Beta carotene protects memory in study -- "Beta carotene taken as a dietary supplement for many years may protect against declines in memory, thinking and learning skills that often precede Alzheimer's disease, researchers said on Monday."
~ Easy Weight Loss by Dr John Berardi -- "All day long, all across the web, folks are posting questions about why they're not losing weight, why they're not gaining weight, why their body comp isn't changing. They're frustrated, confused, and feeling helpless. However, I believe that for the majority of them, if they just made things simple, progress would follow."
~ Beauty of BOSU -- "Half a stability ball has the whole fitness world convinced. A wobbly sphere that was sliced in half, the BOSU® ball yields results—whether you jump, sit, step, get into plank pose or do pushups on it. Try these tips from Equinox trainer Kristen Gagne."
PSYCHE/SELF
~ Neurobunk: Politics, Phrenics, and Brainscans -- " As you might imagine, determining how the human brain works with fMRI is in the same ball-park of difficulty as determining how our mystery computer works with only a temperature sensor."
~ 5 Ways to Master Your Emotions -- "Get the top five ways to tweak your emotions and feel great."
~ Slower Brain Maturity Seen in ADHD Kids -- "Crucial parts of brains of children with attention deficit disorder develop more slowly than other youngsters' brains, a phenomenon that earlier brain-imaging research missed, a new study says...."
~ When Conventional Wisdom is Simply Wrong -- "All too often in psychological research, researchers look at a variable and then draw conclusions about that variable, assuming they’ve held all the other variables equal. But because life is so complex and our environment is filled with so many possible alternative explanations for the results (researchers call these “confounds”), researchers are very often simply wrong in the conclusions they draw from their data."
~ Childhood Trauma Contributes to Mental Illness in Adulthood -- "Troubles suffered in childhood can have a significant impact upon adult behavior, as the results of a decade-long study demonstrate. The study examined numerous childhood traumas and the effects that these early experiences have upon an adult's health and behavior. The results show that adults who experienced multiple traumas during childhood are much more likely to have poor mental and physical health."
~ Does the color red really impair performance on tests? [Cognitive Daily] -- "One of the things I was taught in English graduate school was never to grade papers using red ink. Students don't respond well to the color red, I was told -- it's intimidating. I always thought this was a little far-fetched, and my instructors couldn't offer a peer-reviewed journal article that definitively answered the question of whether red ink was harmful."
~ The Different Faces of Depression -- "Parsing the blues into subtypes."
~ Removing Despair from Depression -- "Overcoming sorrow by separating the emotions."
~ Theory and Practice in Therapy -- "'The world is much more than can be formulated by our theories, but when we approach it with a particular theory it responds in a particular way. Our theories can draw out different aspects of the world.' This quote comes from The Focusing-Oriented Counselling Primer, which I have just finished reading."
~ Men Talk More Than Women Overall, But Not In All Circumstances -- "A Gallup poll recently confirmed that men and women both believe that it is women who are most likely to possess the gift of gab. Some even believe that women are biologically built for conversation. This widespread belief is challenged by new research. Researchers found a small but statistically reliable tendency for men to be more talkative than women overall."
CULTURE/POLITICS
~ On the Overlooked Utility of Poetry -- "Forget Mystery's "method" or other forms of pick-'er-up gamesmanship. William Butler Yeats can get you laid." Maybe this is satire, if not, well, uh, yeah.
~ Deepak Chopra: The Second Injection -- "This seems to be an opportune moment to reconsider the death penalty. By giving last-minute stays to executions in Mississippi and Texas, the Supreme Court has effectively brought about a moratorium on all executions until next spring. At question is the accepted method of administering lethal injections, a method adopted by 37 of the 38 states that allow the death penalty."
~ WorkPlace: Gay? U.S. House Says That's Okay -- "It has taken more than 30 years for the House to pass the bill now known as the Employment Nondiscrimination Act, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation."
~ Can Obama Rock the Nomination? -- "The Senator from Illinois was the star performer at a Democratic candidates' dinner in Iowa, in a performance that suggests he has found his voice."
~ Hanson: Freedom, Even from Fear -- "We should remember on this Veterans Day that some very young people — with long futures, in the prime of health, and at the center of their families — died for the rest of us. They lost their lives not just for us to watch an OJ outburst in Vegas or American Idol, but for the idea that we — most often not so young, not so hale, and not with such bright futures as our soldiers — could be free at their expense; free, not merely from being conquered or enslaved, but free from the very thought of it."
~ E-Trade Loses More Than Half Its Value -- "Shares of online brokerage E-Trade Financial Corp. lost more than half their value Monday, with a Citigroup analyst saying customers were poised to flee and the company was at risk of bankruptcy."
~ Justices May Hear Second Amendment Case -- "The Supreme Court may take up a gun-control law that would interpret the right to 'keep and bear arms.'"
HABITATS/TECHNOLOGY
~ Charges Considered in Bay Oil Spill -- "Federal investigators were considering Monday whether to file criminal charges in San Francisco Bay's worst oil spill in nearly two decades."
~ The Dinosaur Conspiracy Theory -- "A study suggests that the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs did not act alone."
~ How Poisonous Plants Protect Themselves From Their Own Weapons -- "It is a known fact that plants are firmly planted in the soil -- they cannot flee from enemies which want to eat them. They are not helpless, however; they oppose their enemies with a large number of sometimes highly poisonous substances. But the plant itself -- how can it protect itself from these poisons?"
~ Warp Speed Improves Calculations a Million Times -- "Thanks to Einstein, physicists know that the world looks different depending on how fast you're moving. A new analysis shows that it a lot prettier (mathematically speaking) if you're moving at just the right speed, leading to an improvement in calculations describing colliding particle beams and lasers by factors of a million or so."
~ Rare great ape fossil challenges evolutionary theory: study -- "Archaeologists have discovered the ancient jawbone of what appears to be a new species of ape that was very close to the last common ancestor of gorillas, chimpanzees and humans, a study released Monday said."
~ Clean, carbon-neutral hydrogen on the horizon -- "Hydrogen as an everyday, environmentally friendly fuel source may be closer than we think, according to Penn State researchers."
~ Probing Question: Are Asteroids a Threat to Earth? -- "Hollywood thrillers such as Deep Impact helped to jump-start America's interest in knowing what our "deflection strategy" would be if a giant asteroid was on a potentially catastrophic collision course with Earth."
INTEGRAL/BUDDHIST
~ The progymnasmata -- "Wonder why the quality of writing today is so across-the-board poor? Well, perhaps there is a solid reason why. I’ve recently become aware of the progynmasmata. That is the name — literally, “preparatory exercises” — that were developed by ancient Greek educators, to teach people how to learn how to write."
~ Forms of identification and disidentification -- "A quick overview of some forms of identification and disidentification...."
~ What I've Learned About Love, and About Myself -- "I have learned an enormous amount over the last month from people I have come to love. I always get a kind of 'high' when I am learning a lot, and these days I've been walking around with a goofy smile all the time, and crying, both joyfully and empathetically, more than usual."
~ Dhamma-nating the conversation, part II: The Core Concepts and the Contoversy -- "This is the second installment of my brief amateure overview of Nichiren Buddhism. If you missed the first one you can read it here."
~ Self-Transformation & Praxis - Part 2 -- "In part two of our series examining the history & evolution of contemporary integrative transformative practices, we feature an essay by Jorge N Ferrer, Ph.D. Jorge is Associate Professor in the East-West Psychology Program at the California Institute of Integral Studies, San Francisco, where he teaches courses on transpersonal studies, comparative mysticism, embodied spiritual inquiry, and spiritual perspectives on sexuality and relationships."
~ Joe Perez on Integral Naked - The Power of Integral Reconciliation -- "The author of one of the most searing, courageous personal memoirs of our time shares how extraordinarily helpful an Integral Approach can be in reconciling and integrating even the most volatile, difficult, highly-charged aspects of one’s own being—and not only live to tell the tale, but find true meaning, peace, and wholeness." Includes free sample audio clip.
~ Gampopa - Compassion with Reference to Sentient Beings, Reference to Dharma, and without Reference Point -- "In a sense, what distinguishes these three types of Compassion that Gampopa sets out in 'Jewel Ornament of Liberation' is the development or level of our compassion (and wisdom)."
~ Towards an Integrative Theory of Peace Education -- "In this paper Danesh outlines an a multi-dimensional & integrative theory of peace. Danesh argues that an integrative theory of peace (ITP) incorporates many of the currently held perspectives and approaches to peace education, while at the same time challenges some of the most widely held concepts with respect to the nature of peace itself."
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Daily Om: Rescuing The Rescuer
Today's Daily Om:
Tags:
Acknowledging Our Pain
Rescuing The Rescuer
Some people seem called to help others, often from very early on in their childhoods, responding to the needs of family members, strangers, or animals with a selflessness that is impressive. Often, these people appear to have very few needs of their own, and the focus of their lives is on rescuing, helping, and healing others. While there are a few people who are truly able to sustain this completely giving lifestyle, the vast majority has needs that lie beneath the surface, unmet and often unseen. In these cases, their motivation to help others may be an extension of a deep desire to heal a wounded part of themselves that is starving for the kind of love and attention they dole out to those around them on a daily basis. For any number of reasons, they are unable to give themselves the love they need and so they give it to others. This does not mean that they are not meant to be helping others, but it does mean that they would do well to turn some of that helping energy within.
One problem with the rescuer model is that the individual can get stuck in the role, always living in crisis mode at the expense of inner peace and personal growth. Until the person resolves their own inner dramas, they play them out in their relationships with others, drawn to those who need them and often unable to acknowledge their own needs or get them met. In the worst-case scenario, they enable the other person’s dilemma by not knowing when to stop playing the rescuer and allow the person to figure it out on their own. However, if the rescuer finds the strength to turn within and face the needy aspects of their own psyche, he or she can become a model of empowerment and a true source of healing in the world.
Some signs that you or someone you love may need to rescue the rescuer within are inner burnout from overgiving; underlying resentment; an inability to admit to having needs of one’s own; and an unwillingness to be vulnerable. Help comes when we allow ourselves to admit we need it, acknowledging our humanity and our wholeness by acknowledging our pain. The understanding we gain in the process will naturally inform and inspire our ability to help those in need to do the same.
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Barack Obama Steps It Up
Apparently, Obama had lost his mojo over the last few weeks. Being around 20 points back can do that. But Saturday he seems to have given the speech everyone who supports him has been waiting for. In this speech he returns to the "voice of the prophet" approach that served him so well when he announced.
Even Andrew Sullivan was impressed.
Here is partial text, provided by the Obama campaign people.
Here is some video for the visually oriented.
There are nine videos in the cue.
Even Andrew Sullivan was impressed.
Here is partial text, provided by the Obama campaign people.
A little less than one year from today you will go into the voting booth and you will select the next President of the United States. Here’s the good news. The name G.W. Bush will not be on the ballot. The name of my cousin Dick Cheney will not be on the ballot. We’ve been trying to hide that for a long time. Everybody has a black sheep in the family. [laughter]
The era of Scooter Libby justice and Brownie incompetence and Karl Rove politics will finally be over. But the question you’re gonna have to ask yourself when you caucus in January and you vote in November is what’s next for America. We are at a defining moment in our history…The promise that so many generations fought for seems like it’s slipping away…we’ve lost faith that our leaders can or will do anything about it.
It is because of those failures that America is listening…we not only have a moment of great challenge, but a moment of great opportunity. We have a chance to bring the American people together, in a new majority…
That’s why telling the American people what we think they want to hear instead of telling the American people what they need to hear just won’t do. Triangulating and poll-driven positions because we’re worried about what Mitt or Rudy might say about us just won’t do…
If we are really serious about winning this election Democrats, then we can’t be afraid of losing. The party of Jefferson and Jackson and Roosevelt and Kennedy has always made the biggest difference in the lives of the American people…when we summoned the entire nation to a common purpose, a higher purpose.
A party that doesn’t just focus on how to win, but why we should. A party that doesn’t just offer change as a slogan but real, meaningful change, change that America can believe in. That’s why I’m in this race, that’s why I’m running for the Presidency of the United States, to offer change that we can believe in!…I am in this race because I want to stop talking about the outrage of 47 million Americans without healthcare and start actually doing something about it. I expanded healthcare in Illinois by bringing Democrats and Republicans together, by taking on the insurance industry and that is how I will make certain that ever American in this country has healthcare…and I will do by the end of my first term of the President of the United States of America.
…I am running for President because I am sick and tired of Democrats thinking that the only way to look tough on national security is by acting and voting like George Bush Republicans.
…When I am this party’s nominee, my opponent will not be able to say that I voted for the war in Iraq…And he will not be able to say that I waivered on something as fundamental as whether it is okay for America to torture because it is never okay. That’s why I’m in it!
…I will lead the world to combat the common threats of the 21st century…and I will send once more a message to those yearning faces beyond our shores that says you matter to us, your future is our future, and our moment is now. America, our moment is now.
Our moment is now!
I don’t want to spend the next year or the next four years refighting the same fights that we had in the 1990s. I don’t want to pit red America against blue America. I want to be the President of the United States of America.
And if those Republicans come at me with the same fear-mongering and swift-boating that they usually do, then I will take them head-on. Because I believe the American people are tired of fear, and tired of distractions…we can make this election not about fear, but about the future, and that will not be just a Democratic victory, that will be an American victory, a victory that America needs right now!
I am not in this race to fulfill some longheld ambitions or because I believe it’s somehow owed to me. I never expected to be here. I always knew this journey was improbable. I am running in this race because of of what Dr. King called “the fierce urgency of now.” Because I believe that there’s such a thing as being too late, and that hour is almost upon us.
…I’m in this race for the same reason that I found for jobs for jobless and hope for the hopeless on the streets of Chicago, for the same reason that I fought for justice and equality as a civil rights lawyer…I will never forget that the only reason that I’m standing here today is because someone had the courage to stand up!
…That’s why I’m running, Democrats. To keep the American dream alive..in this election, in this moment, let us reach for what we know is possible. A nation healed and world repaired. An America that believes again.
Here is some video for the visually oriented.
There are nine videos in the cue.
Tags:
Super Spiderweb
Nature is awesome . . . and freaky. I speedlinked this story a while back, but it's cool to see video of it.
via videosift.com
via videosift.com
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Anton Chekhov - Short Fiction
If you've never read Anton Chekhov's short fiction, here is your chance. This site collects 201 of his short stories, by year of composition, into one place. The stories include notes where appropriate.
Check it out.
201 Stories by Anton ChekhovAbout Anton Chekhov: One of Russia's greatest writers, Chekhov began his career writing jokes and anecdotes for popular magazines to support himself while he studied to become a doctor. Between 1888 and his death he single-handedly revolutionized both the drama and the short story. Near the end of his life he married an actress, Olga Knipper. He died from tuberculosis in 1904, age 44.
About this project: Constance Garnett translated and published 13 volumes of Chekhov stories in the years 1916-1922. Unfortunately, the order of the stories is almost random, and in the last volume Mrs. Garnett stated: "I regret that it is impossible to obtain the necessary information for a chronological list of all Tchehov's works." This site presents all 201 stories in the order of their publication in Russia.
About the notes: I have added notes to explain both the cultural practices of 19th century Russia and the occasional Britishisms that Mrs. Garnett used in her translations. Passages marked in blue have an explanatory note at the end of the story. I am particularly indebted to Edgar H. Lehrman's A Handbook to 86 of Chekhov's Stories and Ronald Hingley's notes in the Oxford Chekhov (Volumes 4-9). A complete list of Constance Garnett's translations of Russian literature is here.
For those new to Chekhov: Reading the stories in order is a wonderful experience; however, I recommend beginning with a few humorous stories, such as "Oh! the Public!" (39), "The Orator" (92), and "A Transgression" (124). Next try one of Chekhov's most moving stories, "Misery" (45). Among the longer stories, I suggest beginning with "Ward No. 6" (166), "The Duel" (160), and "The Steppe" (148), which contains the most famous thunderstorm in literature. Finally, be sure to read the famous trilogy made of "The Man in a Case" (189), "Gooseberries" (190), and "About Love" (191).
Check it out.
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Satire: U.S. Intelligence: Iran Possesses Trillions Of Potentially Dangerous Atoms
From The Onion:
U.S. Intelligence: Iran Possesses Trillions Of Potentially Dangerous Atoms
WASHINGTON—Barely two months after U.N. inspectors in Iran failed to find evidence of an active nuclear weapons program, the Department of Homeland Security uncovered new information Monday proving the Middle Eastern nation has obtained literally trillions of atoms—the same particles sometimes used to make atomic bombs—for unknown purposes.
Enlarge ImageCondoleezza Rice displays for reporters one of the many varieties of atoms Iran is believed to already possess.
"We have no doubt that Iran now possesses an alarming number of atoms within its borders, despite countless warnings from the international community," Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff said at a press conference Monday afternoon, as he pointed to a satellite image marked with dozens of locations where his office claims the unauthorized atoms are being held. "The Iranians maintain the atoms are only being used to form the building blocks of all existence, but we cannot afford to take that risk."
The atoms, which DHS officials believe to be "the smallest indivisible units of any element," were first discovered in aerial photographs taken of a laboratory in central Isfahan. When the photographs were enlarged several hundred thousand times, additional clusters of atoms—known in intelligence circles as "matter"—were spotted in large cargo trucks parked nearby the facility, in storage units on the grounds, and in the pockets, shoes, clothing, hair, and skin of several nuclear physicists in the parking lot.
More alarming, officials said, is the "very likely" possibility that there are more atoms inside the laboratory.
"The threat of atoms in Iran is real," said Chertoff, showing reporters an empty vial to illustrate his point. "Even as we speak, Iranians are turning millions of carbon atoms into a powerful energy source they can use to strengthen their armies, pilots, president, and someday perhaps, a team of nuclear physicists."
'We could get into a situation where Iran has so many atoms that its increased atomic weight allows it to bully its neighbors.'
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
Earlier this month, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made a visit to the region, where she reportedly observed atoms being smuggled across the border from neighboring countries Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as daily shipments of atoms from as far away as Russia, China, and the troposphere. Secretary Rice also witnessed atoms being strategically used to deliver televised press conferences regarding the nonproliferation of Iranian atoms.
"Security checkpoints have been unable to stop the flow of atoms into Iran," Rice said. "Even with the best equipment available, it is nearly impossible to distinguish dangerous atoms that could be used in fission for the purposes of massive destruction from the kind of atoms that are functioning primarily as mechanical pencils."
Added Rice: "We cannot afford to let these atoms fall into, or be a part of, the wrong hands."
Vice President Dick Cheney and his staff were briefed on the atomic situation in Iran Tuesday with the aid of colorful interlocking plastic models and a short film.
"The United States will not stand idly by while Iran gains the protons, neutrons, and whatever else they need to threaten the free world," Cheney said at a press conference that afternoon. "Iran has demonstrated time and time again its ability to combine atoms of hydrogen and oxygen right out in the open, and we cannot allow that to go on any longer."
Iranian officials claim the atoms are being used only for peaceful, life-sustaining purposes, and that it is physically impossible for Iran or any government to create or destroy matter in order to comply with U.S. regulations.
Next month, U.N. inspectors will visit Iran to investigate and catalog all of the nation's current atomic holdings in order to determine if the country may be stockpiling dangerous atoms in unregistered laboratories, underground facilities, above-ground facilities, the citizenry, air, water, soil, grass, shoes, picnic lunches, pets, flaky pastries, or the numerous nuclear warheads the country has recently featured in parades.
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Sunday, November 11, 2007
Gratitude 11/11/07
Some things I am grateful tonight:
1) Ohio State lost to Illinois yesterday, bringing the Oregon Ducks one step closer to playing for a national championship, assuming they can finish the season strong.
2) I am mostly done with the article I am ghost-writing. I like finishing projects. The article is on the idea of "eldering," making the final stage of life more meaningful. I learned quite a bit writing this article, which is the fun part of writing.
3) I spent some nice time this morning with my friend Susie and two of her friends. It's nice to meet new people.
4) I took a nap today. I love naps -- and Sunday afternoons are a great time for a nap.
What are you grateful for today?
1) Ohio State lost to Illinois yesterday, bringing the Oregon Ducks one step closer to playing for a national championship, assuming they can finish the season strong.
2) I am mostly done with the article I am ghost-writing. I like finishing projects. The article is on the idea of "eldering," making the final stage of life more meaningful. I learned quite a bit writing this article, which is the fun part of writing.
3) I spent some nice time this morning with my friend Susie and two of her friends. It's nice to meet new people.
4) I took a nap today. I love naps -- and Sunday afternoons are a great time for a nap.
What are you grateful for today?
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Culture Shock - Rat Temple & The Standing Babas
A little cultural exploration -- of India.
Part One: Rat Temple
Part Two: The Standing Babas
Part One: Rat Temple
Part Two: The Standing Babas
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David Cronenberg and the Cinema of the Extreme (1997)
A very old interview with Cronenberg on his use of imagery as metaphor. Although he made his reputation with films dealing with "body horror," his last couple of films (A History of Violence and Eastern Promises) have been much more rooted in reality. More than any director I can think of, Cronenberg has continually evolved and refined his vision.
via videosift.com
via videosift.com
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Ravel - Piano Concerto in G Major
One of my favorite pieces by Ravel, especially the Presto (3rd movement). Martha Argerich nails this as the pianist.
Mov 1: Allegramente
Mov 2: Adagio Assai
Mov 3: Presto
Mov 1: Allegramente
Mov 2: Adagio Assai
Mov 3: Presto
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