Author: Payam

Chemist, philosopher, vagrant.
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Doing Our Part to Warm the Planet

Only a Bush-appointed EPA chief can claim progress in reducing green house gases (GHGs) when the report issued by the agency he heads states pointedly that GHG emission had risen 16% by 2004, relative to emissions in 1990. Here is a direct link to the report at the EPA:

EPA : Global Warming : Resource Center : Publications : GHG Emissions : US Emissions Inventory 2006

Here is a local link to the “Fast Facts” document, which is also accessible through the above link:
US Emissions Inventory 2006
One wonders why GHG generation was down 1.3% in 2001. Could it have anything to do with airplanes not flying for a few days after 9/11? Or the economic slowdown that followed?

After examining the document, one might find it interesting that carbon dioxide emission increases as auto fuel efficiency decreases, and that emissions for electricity generation hold relatively steady. Clearly, regulations have an effect, and when cars–SUVs, specifically–aren’t regulated, the results are unsurprisingly dismal.

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U.S. Cites 91 Percent Rise In Terrorist Acts in Iraq

U.S. Cites 91 Percent Rise In Terrorist Acts in Iraq – washingtonpost.com

It would seem as if the war against terror is yielding as much success as the war against drugs: thus far, the war against terror has had as much effect on terror as the war against drugs has had on drug abuse. One can only pray that this “war against terror” does not last as long as the one against drugs.

Heaven help those who are about to die. They can expect help from no other source.

Read more.

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More Tax Breaks for Oil Companies

Followup: Exxon’s and Chevron’s record profits certainly do support this notion that they are struggling companies that need government subsidies.

The US Interior Department is allowing Chevron to forgo royalties it owes the public for extracting oil and natural gas from public territories. As already cited on Digg, Chevron (or any oil company) needs no help, yet our tax dollars are being wasted, again.

read more | digg story

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The Ultimate Angelides Ad

Epilogue: Angelides never went on the offensive against Ahhnold, and lost handily. Given Angelides’ total lack of backbone, I was all too happy to vote for the Green Party’s Candidate, Peter Camejo. I proudly counted as part of the 2.3% of disenchanted Californians who voted for the only rational candidate on the ballot, according the official election results. One wonders how much traffic, how many potholes, how much air pollution, how little public education and how expensive of a public university system people will tolerate before they vote for somebody who is dedicated to making California livable again.

09.28.2006 – Study highlights UC as tech-transfer powerhouse

It is utterly perplexing that Phil Angelides is losing his campaign to the embodiment of the stereotypical vapid politician. The Governator is also incompetent to boot. I hope the Angelides campaign uses this idea for their final campaign.

Read the above UC Berkeley byte about the Milken Institute report about technology transfer in California. The Milken Institute–hardly a “liberal” tank of any sort–concludes that the UC system is a an economic powerhouse, transferring much knowledge and expertise to the private sector in the form of technologies that have made California an economic powerhouse.

What does Arnold do with this economic engine that is the UC system? He cuts funding.

The Angelides campaign ought to take this report and juxtapose it against Arnold’s campaign ads claiming that Arnold intends to take Kahlifornia forward, and speak power to the truth. Is an economic policy that favors Indian casinos going forward? Does cutting funding to the academic institutions that gave birth to companies like Intel, Apple, Genentech, Amgen and countless others constitute any form of progress?

The Angelides campaign ought to make it very clear. The choice is between minimum wage jobs at Pechanga casino and high-tech jobs at Intel, Apple, Pixar, Genentech, and so on. Angelides ought to hit this point hard. Arnold is eroding the institutions that made California a powerhouse. Arnold does not deserve another chance.

The Ultimate Angelides Ad

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Unembedded: Reality from the Iraqi Theater

Unembedded

http://unumbedded.netIt is always nice to assess the price that one is paying for whatever it is that one is purchasing. Unembedded is a good site with which one may assess part of the toll being paid in Iraq.

Whether the toll being paid is a fair price remains debatable only because few are aware of the price depicted in these photos.

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It’s Unanimous: Bush is Clueless

Book Says Bush Ignored Urgent Warning on Iraq – New York Times

That is the assessment of every single official who has served with the man, and every single official who is still serving the man. The accounts are unanimous in their documentation of ignorance, of the sacrificing of reason and prudence at the altar of ideology and of absolute incompetence in waging war. The accounts are not fabricated by bogeymen, or political enemies. They are delivered by the participants themselves: Powell, O’Neil, Rumsfeld, Bush, Cheney, Wolfowitz, and all the other cast members of this ship of fools.

On the eve of escalation, therefore, it is perhaps a good idea to remember the most definitive documentation of GOP incompetence in waging a useless war.

How can an organization be so hare-brained that its members routinely contradict each other and themselves? That they cannot keep a single secret. That they are undermined by any rational person that good fortune places in their paths?

How is it that anyone agrees to board the ship when the crew advertises its incompetence so proudly?

It is good to live without fear, but it is tragic to live without reason. Titanic was sunk by an iceberg that crossed its path unexpectedly. Heaven help the passengers on the ship whose crew are steering directly toward the iceberg.

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Clint Eastwood is Steven Spielberg’s Bitch

This movie review of Letters from Iwo Jima is not going to be your typical review.

Much to my dismay, Clint Eastwood’s Letters from Iwo Jima turned out to be little more than another war propaganda movie. Infantilized, stylized and ultra-adrenalized for maximum emotional effect, the movie had the sole effect of evoking pity for the inferior Japanese whose pathetic technology, ignorant culture and inadequate production capability were no match for the superior America whose soldiers apparently meted justice randomly.

The critical response is puzzling, therefore. Every one of the presumptive adults who reviewed this movie is in awe of the cultural magnitude of what they call Eastwood’s great achievement. Much like The Flags of Our Fathers, Letters is another propaganda movie about how wonderful war against an evil enemy is, and everyone, it seems, is gullible enough to fall for the cultural gimmick and avoid or deliberately overlook the explicit propaganda of the movie altogether.

The movie’s appeal to the Japanese is not surprising at all, of course, because that country has cultivated a victim’s perspective with respect to World War II ever since it succumbed to the brutality of the atomic bombs. Letters projects an image that the Japanese wish to project these days. The movie mocks the “samurai way” of honorable death, even though the idea still persists pervasively in Japanese society. The movie portrays Japanese society as civil, though repressed, and the Japanese people as victims of the emperor, much like Japan’s enemies. Of course, the emperor remains in Japan, and his offspring are celebrities. So, this portrayal of victimhood is a false image that Japan projects for its own benefit and to the consternation of the Chinese and the Koreans who have yet to receive acknowledgment of atrocities from Japan.

So, why would Clint Eastwood make a propaganda movie? Why would a man who has made so many sophisticated movies resort to making a movie that insists on tying America’s greatness to a single event: World War II? The only salient answer is that he is simply the latest to cash in on the redemptive value of World War II. In a time when the US is involved in its second worthless, meaningless war in the middle east and its greatest blunder since Vietnam, people are desperate for redemption. At at a time of low national morale, people are desperate to see scenes that depict America as a great nation, a savior nation, a generous nation, a kind nation.

People also like violence that appears not gratuitous. Spielberg proved this with Schinlder’s List and Saving Private Ryan. It is only natural, then, that Eastwood would use the cloak of redemption to make a propaganda movie energized with graphic and realistic violence for the desperate masses.

So, yes, if you want to be manipulated into thinking how wonderful war is and how wonderful it is that the US won WW II, then see this movie. It will make you cry. It will make you sad, and it will make you forget what a wretched situation the US has created in Iraq. In as much, Letters from Iw Jima will make you feel good. That’s what good propaganda does.

But, Eastwood is older than Spielberg. He could have made a more sophisticated movie.

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Military Officers Criticize Rumsfeld. What a Surprise.

USATODAY.com – Retired military officers criticize Rumsfeld at Democratic hearing

It is good to remember the above USA Today article from September because John McCain decided to remember his military roots today. Yes, after being civil toward Donald Rumsefeld–the petty bureaucrat who singlehandedly assured failure in Iraq by micromanaging the war–for many years, McCain finally remembers that it was the micromanagement of stupid men like Rumsfeld that made a war hero of McCain, and McCain decided to unleash on Rumsfeld, finally.

It took no less than an army of political advisors to remind McCain of the need for wars to be conducted by warriors. Forget about memory enhancing pills. If you want to remember who you are, hire consultants who will remind you of who you are at the most opportune moment. Unlike McCain, the rest of us might wish to have this reminder right before intercourse. Or, right after.

McCain’s belated fury proves that his “maverick” ways are ultimately part of a political persona constructed meticulously by campaign advisors. In as much, this calculated outburst proves that the campaign consultants that run our political system are as lacking in imagination as the screen writers that churn out the tasteless Hollywood blockbuster movies.

There is, therefore, no wonder that people have become as numb to politics as they have become numb to the Hollywood blockbusters for which they can no longer shell $15 out. Like the last five Bruce Willis movies, the political plot has become bland, predictable and needlessly loud.

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First Official Record Uptime

Uptime on February 15, 2007Over 22 days may well be the current record. My lovely 12″ 867 MHz Powerbook has now served me faithfully (even though the factory hard drive did not) for three and one-half years. I cannot justify buying a new Mac because save for occasional speed problems, this baby stays up and running without reboot no matter how much punishment I dish out: working with 20 megabyte data files, compiling hundreds of megabytes of software, closing opening and closing and opening applications over and over, having Microsoft programs (and Apple programs on occasion) crash, installing new software and moving daily between a wired and a wireless networking environment. Never a hitch, never a hickup.

On this day in February 1997, the streak had to end because new operating system updates required a reboot. 🙁

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Microsoft, in Its Own Words

Software Notebook: Fun reading in Microsoft’s Iowa lawsuit

On the eve of the commercial release of Micro$oft Vista, it is good to learn how Microsoft admittedly arrived at Vista. They copied Apple’s OS X. They even say as much internal documents. Read the article linked above.

Microsoft does not sell cigarettes, but it does borrow the tobacco industry’s penchant for publicly denying the transgressions to which it openly confesses internally. And, in this case, the court documents show everything. Microsoft copied Apple’s Mac OS X. Shamelessly. Just like Steve Jobs said.

So, why bother with Vista, when you can get the original, genuine article, OS X, for less?