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The First Amendment AMENDMENT I Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. [read more] ----------
For the first time in the annual State of the First Amendment survey, almost half (49%) of those surveyed said the First Amendment goes too far in the rights it guarantees — a 10-percentage-point jump from 2001, which suggests new public concerns in the wake of the Sept. 11 terror attacks. “The stakes have risen for the First Amendment in the wake of September 11,” said Ken Paulson, executive director of the First Amendment Center. “The results of our 2002 survey suggest that many Americans view these fundamental freedoms as possible obstacles in the war on terrorism.” In 2001, 39% of those surveyed said the First Amendment went too far in the rights it guarantees. [read more] thanks to wood zilla lot ----------
American Journal Right on, Merle. At another concert, June a year ago, he was quoted by John Derbyshire in National Review online as saying, "Look at the past 25 years we went downhill, and if people don't realize it, they don't have their fucking eyes on ... In 1960, when I came out of prison as an ex-convict, I had more freedom under parolee supervision than there's available to an average citizen in America right now... God almighty, what have we done to each other?" [read more] ----------
Why Pledge Allegiance?
Why pledge allegiance 07:02 AM - link Water
Not a drop to drink At the 10-day United Nations development and environmental summit in Johannesburg, South Africa, this week, one of the most pressing issues will be the world's dwindling water supply. More than 1 billion people have limited access to clean water, a number that could triple in 15 years. The U.N., World Bank and National Security Council all have warned that water, not oil, will bring nations to blows in the future. This week, the New York Times launched a four-part series on the world's water woes; one article focused on the simmering tensions between Turkey and Syria over the Euphrates River, another on how such multinationals as Vivendi have driven Argentines' water bills through the roof. Imagine the tangled plot of "Chinatown" on a global scale: political corruption, corporate interests, the manipulation of water from distant lands, a drought-stricken populace and even, in some cases, murder. [read more] ---------- As we in water-rich countries take our daily showers, water the lawn or laze about in the pool, it's easy to forget that fresh water is a life-or-death issue in many parts of the world. Of a population of roughly 6.1 billion, more than 1 billion lack access to potable water. The World Health Organization says that at any time, up to half of humanity has one of the six main diseases -- diarrhea, schistosomiasis, or trachoma, or infestation with ascaris, guinea worm, or hookworm -- associated with poor drinking water and inadequate sanitation. About 5 million people die each year from poor drinking water, poor sanitation, or a dirty home environment -- often resulting from water shortage (see "Tackling the Big Three" in the bibliography). [read more] thanks to American Samizdat
TestingTesting I finally got the pictures of our last TestingTesting up. Zoe took over 200 hundred pictures of Gideon Freudmann's show on the 15th. It took her some time to process them and edit them down to her favorite 159. Then I edited it down to 43, or maybe it was 44. I'm not going to count it again. You can look at the 43 pictures or go to Zoe's site for a link to the 159 pictures (you can set them up as a slide show while listening to the RealAudio.) And listen to the show if you haven't already. It was great!
 Our next TestingTesting will be this Monday night.
Birthday pics My family trooped up to Whidbey Island last Sunday for a celebration of the 29th anniversary of my 29th birthday. Zoe took pictures and has a slideshow at Ofoto (some registration required).
Earth Summit
Booby Traps at Rio + 10 On August 24, police even attacked a candlelight "freedom of expression march," held to protest these and other mass arrests. The spontaneously organized march was headed to a downtown prison, but before the crowd of 1,000 local and international activists had walked a block, riot police surrounded them and barricaded the road. Without warning, stun grenades were fired at the marchers, injuring three. The World Summit on Sustainable Development isn't going to save the world; it merely offers an exaggerated mirror of it. In the gourmet restaurants of Sandton, delegates are literally dining out on their concern for the poor. Meanwhile, outside the gates, poor people are being hidden away, assaulted and imprisoned for what has become the iconic act of resistance in an unsustainable world: refusing to disappear. [read more] ---------- The State machinery of intimidation and misinformation JOHANNESBURG 27 August - With only four days to go before the showdown in Sandton, the lines between protesters and the State have become increasingly apparent. Not only in the form of police repression – which according to many international anti-globalisation protesters has bypassed the draconian standards of Seattle, Québec and Genoa – but more sinisterly within the mainstream media as well. The corporate media has been working hand-in-hand with the intelligence agencies and other government officials in circulating untruths and fabrications aimed at demobilising mass movements rejecting the neoliberal agenda of WSSD and at justifying excessive use of force, unjustified arrests, torture and a flawed legal system. [read more]
Moving Day There is a Holy Modal Rounders (the only acid-folk group) song I always play when I move. I used to have to put on a vinyl album, then a CD, and now MP3s. Craig is moving so I sent him a RealAudio link to the song. Maybe others are moving too — it is the end of the month. If you are moving, enjoy Moving Day (RealAudio). If you aren't moving, listen to it and thank your stars you aren't.
Language & Politics Some thoughtful thoughts about our fearless leader and his lack of language, and what that says, by Joseph Duemer Not sure if my recent discussions with Chris Robinson fit into this discussion or not, but here's what we've been chewing on. What's pretty clear is that understanding the way that language works--in a sort of feedback loop with physical reality--is crucial to philosophy, ethics, education, politics & . . . everything. In the US right now we have a political leader who has no effective relationship to language at all & I'd want to argue that our political discourse has become blunted & vulgar as a result: "I'm a patient man. And when I say I'm a patient man, I mean I'm a patient man. Nothing he [Saddam Hussein] has done has convinced me—I'm confident the Secretary of Defense—that he is the kind of fellow that is willing to forgo weapons of mass destruction, is willing to be a peaceful neighbor, that is—will honor the people—the Iraqi people of all stripes, will—values human life. He hasn't convinced me, nor has he convinced my administration."—Crawford, Texas, Aug. 21, 2002 [noted by Jacob Weisberg, creator of Bushisms]. [read more] ---------- 'I'M A PATIENT man,'' President Bush said the other day. He was dressed in cowboy clothes. ''And when I say I'm a patient man,'' he added, somewhat impatiently, ''I mean I'm a patient man.'' The president was responding to reporters' attempts to make sense of the administration's scorching but confusing rhetoric about Iraq. His declaration of patience amended his declarations of war, seeking to douse expectations of imminent attack while promising that hostile action will come eventually. The nation is beholding something that can only be called weird. Ever since Bush announced his new doctrine of preventive war last spring, his administration has been engaged in an unprecedented war of words aimed at Saddam Hussein. In the beginning, the justification for ''regime change'' in Baghdad was entirely a matter of the threat Hussein represents but no more. Now the justification includes protecting the integrity of threat. We have to go to war now because we said we would. Language is no longer an expression of purpose but the shaper of purpose. The United States, in fact, is in a crisis of language. This is what it means to have a president who, proudly inarticulate, has no real understanding of the relationship between words and acts, between rhetoric and intention. [read more] thanks to reading & writing
Ghandi THE LAST HOURS OF MAHATMA GANDHI PUNCTUALLY at 3.30am on Friday, January 30, 1948, Mahatma Gandhi awoke to greet the last morning he would ever see. He was in the tense atmosphere of Delhi, staying in a ground-floor guest room of Birla house, the mansion of industrialist and benefactor G.D. Birla located in Albuquerque Road. Gandhi had arrived in the strife-torn capital of newly independent India on September 9, 1947 from Calcutta, where he had performed a miracle of peace-making. By January 30, almost four months had passed since his 78th, and last, birthday. It was 12 days since the successful end of his fast to bring about a reunion of hearts in Delhi. But 10 days before, there had been an aborted attempt on his life during the evening prayer meeting at Birla House. With the situation in Delhi having stabilised, Gandhi was again looking to the future, but his life was in grave danger - and he knew it. [read more] thanks to plep
Photography
 Welcome to Photo Japan's Photographer's Showcase...a collection of outstanding images of Japan created by photographers from around the world. [read more] thanks to plep Some great photographs of Japan. In 1957, at age 12, my family moved to Japan (my dad was a pilot in the Air Force.) These little motorcycles were everywhere in Japan. Back then they were Honda 50 Super Cubs with a peanut 50cc 4-stroke single cylinder engine. When we returned back to the States, in 1961, Honda was just starting to import them to the US (You meet the nicest people on a Honda.) I bought a red and white one in the fall of 1961. I rode it for two years. The little sucker had a top speed of 45 mph and got over 200 mpg. Over the years I moved up to bigger and faster bikes: Honda CB160, Honda CB450, Yamaha SR500, Ducati 750GT, BMW R90/6, and my trusty BMW R100RS. I still would like another Honda 50 Super Cub. Red and white, of course.
Piss Urine therapy refers to one of several uses of urine to prevent or cure sickness, to enhance beauty or to cleanse one's bowels. Most devotees drink the midstream of their morning urine. Some prefer it straight and steaming hot; others mix it with juice or serve it over fruit. Some prefer a couple of urine drops mixed with a tablespoon of water applied sublingually several times a day. Some wash themselves in their own golden fluid to improve their skin quality. Many modern Japanese women are said to engage in urine bathing. The truly daring use their own urine as an enema. Urine is not quite the breakfast of champions, but it is the elixir of choice of a number of holy men in India where drinking urine has been practiced for thousands of years. The drink is also the preferred pick-me-up for a growing number of naturopaths and other advocates of "nature cures." The main attractions of this ultimate home brew are its cost, availability and portability. It is much cheaper than that other "water of life," whisky (uisge beatha), which also has been hailed for its medicinal qualities. Unlike whisky, however, urine is always available, everyone carries a supply at all times, and, for most people, there are no intoxicating side effects. Furthermore, the urge to overindulge is almost absent when drinking urine. The same can't be said for good single malt such as Highland Park or a good whiskey such as Black Bush. [read more] thanks to DANGEROUSMETA!
Baby Carrot Outrage More Baby Carrot Scandal and Outrage! You may recall that I blew the lid off the "baby carrot" scandal some weeks back, when I divulged that "baby carrots" are not, in fact, baby carrots, but large carrots shaved down and shaped to look like infant carrots. I was angry back then. I wondered about truth-in-advertising and truth-in-labelling laws. I felt dumb for not having known and having been suckered by marketers into believing I was eating babies. Now I have new dirt on the baby carrot conspiracy: BABY CARROTS ARE NOT AS NUTIRITIOUS AS REGULAR CARROTS. [read more]
Where is Gorby when we need him?
Gorby in Johannesburg When the world communist system fell to pieces, the famous French oceanologist Jacques Ives Cousteau said the greatest harm to nature had been caused not by communism but by the market economy, for which every thing has its price but nothing is of value. [read more]
Wired From Cooped Up. Busted! At about 2:15 yesterday afternoon, while delivering introductory remarks to my Evidence class, I put up the address for Cooped Up, figuring that with the link from the legal education site JURIST, I would be found eventually anyway. Over the next five minutes, according to Site Meter, this site received ten visits from IP addresses within the law school. Coincidence? Given that the wired classrooms in our new law school building have network connections at each chair, I tend to think not. A note to students: I love having visitors to this site—indeed, I obsess over their numbers, as my compulsive checking of my counter shows. But when we're in class, I'd prefer that you give your attention to the live me, rather than the cyber me (or the cyber anything else, for that matter).
Baseball
A diary of baseball's coming crunch time Based on as many off-the-record temperature-takings as could be managed, which produced some hints, some deductions and an awful lot of confirmations, this is a road map of the likely events of the next two weeks, the crunchiest of crunch times in the baseball labor war. [read more] thanks to Cooped Up
War Against Some Terrorists An analysis of Bushe's justification that he can ignore Congress. Noting the White House counsel's opinion that the president does not need to seek congressional approval for an attack on Iraq, Kevin Raybould wondered what Glenn Reynolds, Talk Left, and I thought about the matter. My initial thought was that Kevin was right, and the White House lawyers were wrong. I have since done a bit of reading—not as much as I would like before rendering a firm opinion, but as much as I had time to do—and it has reinforced my initial impression. [read more] thanks to Tapped ----------
Forget War, Try a New Marshall Plan Here we are playing hawks and doves again on the matter on Iraq — war or no war? — with particularly peppy exchanges from our more excitable brethren on the right concerning "appeasement" and lack of patriotism on the part of anyone who isn't ready to nuke Baghdad now. Bubba and Joe Bob have a question: "Why don't we git Oh-sama Bin first?" I bring this up because it seems to me what the right wing is fond of describing as "the media elites" are so absorbed in their own tong warfare, they quite forget the American people have a great deal of uncommon good sense. Does life in Washington, D.C., actually resemble an endless round of "Crossfire," or does it just seem that way from the boonies? At last count, we were already involved in military actions in seven countries, counting Colombia, which is either a different set of terrorists or a civil war. Seems like that's a lot on our plate now. Under the new Bush doctrine of "unilaterally determined pre-emptive self-defense," we get to go around attacking anyone we want without provocation. Not so much as a "Remember the Maine!" or a Tonkin Gulf resolution. [read more] ----------
Daggers drawn in the house of Bush ----------
Saddam Does Not Have "Weapons of Mass Destruction" ---------- Igor Boog has the following excellent links. We the People, We the Warriors One common philosophical argument for democracy is that democratic regimes are particularly unlikely to start wars. When the power to declare war is closely tethered to the preferences of those who would bear the costs of fighting, it stands to reason that this power will be used sparingly. Thus, many political philosophers have followed Kant in supposing that the universal embrace of democracy offers the best hope of world peace. Our nation now finds itself on the verge of initiating war against another sovereign nation. We have not been attacked by Iraq, and we have thus far failed to produce convincing evidence that Iraq has aided, or plans to aid, those who have attacked us. If we go to war, we will be the initiators of aggression. It would be a mistake, however, to take this as fresh cause for doubt about the link between democracy and peace. We ought instead to view this imminent possibility as an occasion for raising hard questions about whether, in the critical matter of waging war, we still function as a genuine democracy. [read more] ---------- Have "prudence" and "foresight" become dirty words in conservative foreign policy circles? You begin to wonder, watching the debate taking place on the right about what policies the United States should adopt toward Iraq and Saudi Arabia. [read more] ---------- THE PUBLIC firestorm over the University of North Carolina's decision to ask that incoming students read a book about the Koran is a peculiar display of enthusiasm for ignorance. The university made an altogether rational judgment, in light of the circumstances in which this country finds itself, that students might benefit by reading and discussing a book titled "Approaching the Qur'an: The Early Revelations" by a professor at Haverford College named Michael Sells. In response, a group of conservative Christians sued, contending that such an assignment by a state university violates the First Amendment. North Carolina legislators, meanwhile, have threatened to cut state funding for the program. And some prominent people have denounced the book as a supposed whitewash of Islam -- or even objected to the notion that students might study the Koran at all. In a particular display of demagogic illiteracy, popular talk show host Bill O'Reilly last month compared studying the Koran today to reading "Mein Kampf" during World War II. [read more]
Traffic I lived in traffic (Seattle) until a little over four years ago. Now I work from my home on Honeymoon Lake. My commute, from where I sleep to the computer, is approximately 10 feet. I enjoy listening to the traffic reports. I did my share to reduce traffic but it doesn't look good.
THE SLOW LANE Since 1970, the population of the United States has grown by forty per cent, while the number of registered vehicles has increased by nearly a hundred per cent—in other words, cars have proliferated more than twice as fast as people have. During this same period, road capacity increased by six per cent. If these trends continue through 2020, every day will resemble a getaway day, with its mixture of commuters, truckers, and recreational drivers, who take to the road without regard for traditional peak travel times, producing congestion all day long: trucks that can't make deliveries on time, people who can't get to or from work, air quality that continues to deteriorate as commerce suffers and our over-all geopolitical position weakens because we are forced to become ever more dependent on foreign oil. This is the way the world ends: not with a bang but a traffic jam. [read more] thanks to This Modern World
War Against Some Americans August 22 Portland Bush Protest - Photos and Text - Part 2
 For no reason, and without warning, these officers started indescriminately pepper spraying the crowd. These cops must have little empathy for the people that they are spraying and the pain they are causing for no reason. Nobody besides the police were taking any aggressive action. [read more] thanks to BookNotes
Maybe we need a different set of Heros A must read. Granted, it is good to have historical figures we can admire and emulate. But why hold up as models the fifty-five rich white men who drafted the Constitution as a way of establishing a government that would protect the interests of their class-- slaveholders, merchants, bondholders, land speculators? Why not recall the humanitarianism of William Penn, an early colonist who made peace with the Delaware Indians instead of warring on them, as other colonial leaders were doing? Why not John Woolman, who, in the years before the Revolution, refused to pay taxes to support the British wars, and who spoke out against slavery? Why not Captain Daniel Shays, veteran of the Revolutionary War, who led a revolt of poor farmers in Western Massachusetts against the oppressive taxes levied by the rich who controlled the Massachusetts legislature? [read more] thanks to the bitter shack of resentment
FBI Documents link FBI brass to mob-informant scandal For more than 20 years, FBI headquarters in Washington knew that its Boston agents were using hit men and mob leaders as informants and shielding them from prosecution for serious crimes including murder, the Associated Press has learned. Until now, the still-unraveling Boston FBI scandal has been portrayed largely as the work of a handful of local agents -- mavericks willing to deal with the devil to bring down a Mafia family. But documents obtained by the AP directly connect FBI headquarters to a pattern of collusion with notorious killers. [read more] thanks to Joe Conason's Journal
A Whitehouse Howdy Pardner! Welcome to the Western White House! The Western White House is the private ranch home of President and Mrs. George W. Bush. Located in the remote, charming hamlet of Crawford, Texas, the Western White House is a modest and photogenic reflection of the Bush family's folksy, down-home authenticity. Completed in 1999, the Western White House was designed by President Bush himself, and is notable for its patriotic and evocative melding of architectural highlights from Baptist prayer halls, medium security penitentiaries, and antebellum tobacco plantations.
 [read more]
Fire! Round up the usual suspects! George W. Bush's new "Healthy Forests" plan reads like a parody of his administration's standard operating procedure. You see, environmentalists cause forest fires, and those nice corporations will solve the problem if we get out of their way. Am I being too harsh? No, actually it's even worse than it seems. "Healthy Forests" isn't just about scrapping environmental protection; it's also about expanding corporate welfare. [read more] ---------- President Bush's new plan for reducing the risk of Western wildfires includes nothing to inconvenience the timber industry, and plenty to worry the environmentalists. It would ease important environmental laws designed to protect not only the forests but also the legal rights of citizens who care about them. It proposes to revisit President's Clinton 1994 Northwest Forest Plan designed to protect the spotted owl. It is, finally, curiously unfocused. It devotes far more energy to complaining about red tape than it does to figuring out ways to help local communities move forward with an aggressive strategy of thinning underbrush and fire-prone small trees at the increasingly urbanized edge of many Western forests known as the wildland- urban interface. [read more]
Drugs Now the corporations want laws passed to force us to pay for their exhorbitantly priced drugs. This is sick. States Sued For Pushing Cheaper Drugs Via Medicaid In their latest and perhaps most aggressive attempt to contain exploding pharmaceutical costs, the nation's governors have begun steering scores of Medicaid recipients toward medically equivalent cheaper drugs, fueling hostilities with the drug industry and drawing the Bush administration into a legal brawl. [read more]
War Against Some Terrorists Even the army times is reporting on the rigged war games.
War games rigged? The most elaborate war game the U.S. military has ever held was rigged so that it appeared to validate the modern, joint-service war-fighting concepts it was supposed to be testing, according to the retired Marine lieutenant general who commanded the game’s Opposing Force. That general, Paul Van Riper, said he worries the United States will send troops into combat using doctrine and weapons systems based on false conclusions from the recently concluded Millennium Challenge 02. He was so frustrated with the rigged exercise that he said he quit midway through the game. [read more] thanks to follow me here... ----------
Shilling for the House of Saud It has been another dreadful month for United States- Saudi Arabia relations. On Aug. 6, word leaked out that senior Defence Department officials had been recently advised by Laurent Murawiec of the Rand Corporation that "Saudis are active at every level of the terror chain," and represent "the kernel of evil, the prime mover [and] the most dangerous opponent" in the Middle East (as opposed to, say, Iraq). [read more] thanks to kenlayne.com ---------- ---------- US Stranglehold on Middle East tightens The United States is keeping all its military options open in relation to a future conflict with Iraq. The deployment of significant numbers of US service personnel probably now in the region of 100,000, the quiet mobilization of US reserves and the steady build-up of naval and air combat assets have largely gone unnoticed by the general public and strangely unreported by the news media. It is now a force capable of launching a surprise and sizeable attack within a matter of weeks. The breadth of US deployment and bases in the Middle East is impressive and now includes some 10,000 in Pakistan, Uzbekistan and Afghanistan, Special Forces operating alongside Russian units in Georgia, a major build-up in Turkey with powerful ground and air assets at Incirlik near Adana and more importantly some 2,000 US Special Forces deployed inside the Kurdish areas of northern Iraq alongside some 5,000 Commando's from the Turkish 1st and 2nd Brigades. [read more] thanks to Ethel the Blog
Scanner Photography
 I have been slacking off on my scanner photography — reality keeps getting in the way. I still have some more dead bugs from Briony's collection to scan. Now friends are are not only giving me dead bugs but also a dead bird. This is a little series of a little humingbird.
Corporate Greed
Choc horror These days, though, there is something else in the air in Hershey: inexplicably, astonishingly, the shadowy trust that owns the iconic chocolate firm is planning to put it up for sale. And suddenly, devastation threatens the town dreamed up by the 19th-century confectionery magnate Milton Hershey - a worker's utopia of good schools, free healthcare, affordable housing, theatres, parks and a zoo, built on profits from the ubiquitous chocolate bar and the conical, silver-wrapped Kisses. [read more]
The Bad Taste is Timeless while Good Taste is Mere Fad Department
 [read more] thanks to reenhead.com
Environment
Ecological decline 'far worse' than official estimates The real level of world inequality and environmental degradation may be far worse than official estimates, according to a leaked document prepared for the world's richest countries and seen by the Guardian. It includes new estimates that the world lost almost 10% of its forests in the past 10 years; that carbon dioxide emissions leading to global warming are expected to rise by 33% in rich countries and 100% in the rest of the world in the next 18 years; and that more than 30% more fresh water will be needed by 2020. [read more]
Isn't Nature Grand Department Wild goose chase that led to an Inuit's freezer Researchers conducting the most elaborate wild goose chase in history are digesting the news that a bird they have tracked for over 4,500 miles is about to be cooked. [read more]
War Against Some Terrorists Bush Aides Say Iraq War Needs No Hill Vote Lawyers for President Bush have concluded he can launch an attack on Iraq without new approval from Congress, in part because they say permission remains in force from the 1991 resolution giving Bush's father authority to wage war in the Persian Gulf, according to administration officials. [read more] ----------
Flight of the Phoenix:From Vietnam to Homeland Security Having potential war criminals in positions of power is nothing new, but I'm one of those people who believe that all former CIA officers--especially those involved in "extra-legal" counter-terror programs like Phoenix-- should not be allowed to hold public office. I believe this, because the CIA is antithetical to democratic institutions. And that's why I was so surprised to see, that the guy I knew as "Bruce", is now Major General Lawlor, and a top-ranking official in the ominous Office of Homeland Security. By which I mean, he's someone who has access to Ashcroft's political blacklist, and he has control over the covert action teams that can be used to neutralize those dissidents. [read more] ---------- Taliban melt away before army sweep The commander of the biggest US search for Taliban and al- Qaida fugitives in Afghanistan for five months said last night that the quarry appeared to have been tipped off that the troops were coming. When Operation Mountain Sweep in the south-east ended it had nine prisoners and a tonne of weapons and ammunition, but it had failed to engage any sizeable units in combat. [read more] I think they are just recycling headlines from the past. I think this one originally read Viet Cong melt away before army sweep.
The Renewed Israeli Occupation The Zionist Lobby and American Foreign Policy A white flag of surrender is not enough Nablus- final report from Taayush action; inside Nablus. Settler Militia Violence Against Palestinian Farming Families Just How Much Does The New York Times Tilt Towards Israel; and How Much Does It Matter? Pro-Palestinian Activists and the Palestinians Israelis Tighten Belts, Keep Stiff Upper Lips
Birthday Celebration part 2 Everyone arrived, everyone ate, everyone left — a good time was had by all. A great day with family.
Birthday celebration Time to take a break from the old blog and get the house cleaned up. My family is coming over this afternoon for a celebration of my 29th anniversary of my 29th birthday (which was really yesterday).
Green Gas
Better Living Through French Fries The Granola Ayatollah of Canola, aka Charris Ford, slides behind the wheel of his 1980 International Scout truck and turns the key. The truck burbles to life and off we go, cruising down the gravel roads that divide the aspen groves of southwestern Colorado's Horsefly Mesa. It would be just a standard evening joyride, except that Ford's truck doesn't run on gasoline. Or diesel. Or electricity, or even the sun. This truck is powered by grease, all of it drained from restaurant deep-fryers in the nearby resort town of Telluride. [read more] thanks to Politics in the Zeros
The Dead
The life of the Dead They were such a strangely successful cultural anomaly, yet they're very much a part of what's become mainstream popular culture. The Dead went from being crazy freaks way out on the fringe to being a corporation with one of the country's most recognizable logos. How has their image of themselves and their place in the culture changed over the decades? I think they've got a wonderful sense of humor about it. The irony is that because they did it their way, and because their way involved ignoring every rule in the book, and because the end result was this remarkable and completely unforeseen success, it's just the best joke ever. I end one chapter by saying something like, for once the Grateful Dead had the last laugh. And it's true. [read more] thanks to Robot Wisdom
War against all Indians There are other monuments in the area and to really understand the show at Little Big Horn -- or to "complete the text" -- travel south along the semi-paved Bureau of Indian Affairs maintained Route 44. Skirt the lunar-like terrain of the Badlands and visit the Pine Ridge reservation, America's poorest county where 52 percent of people live below the federal poverty line. [read more]
Tatoos
 I created this website to generate interest in and increase understanding of traditional Japanese tattoos, known as horimono. In Japanese hori or horu means 'to carve,' and mono means literally 'thing.' Horu is the verb used to describe the insertion of ink into the skin when tattooing; in the 18th century this was done with sharp needles tied to a long handle of bamboo dipped in ink, thus 'carving' was a most appropriate way of describing it. Horimono attribute their great beauty to the ukiyoe art upon which they are based, particularly that of master artist Utagawa Kuniyoshi. Horimono are a uniquely Japanese tradition and I believe it is important to both understand and preserve their rich history and culture. [read more] thanks to plep
Bush Occupation I don't know enough about what the president is up to on Iraq. But I know too much about what the president is up to on a run. "It's interesting that my times have become faster right after the war began," Mr. Bush tells Runner's World in an exclusive interview. "They were pretty fast all along, but since the war began I've been running with a little more intensity. It helps me to clear my mind." So the bad news is: we haven't caught Osama. The good news is: W.'s times have improved. [read more]
Aeronautics
 Joseph Palmer's Paper Airplanes all three thanks to MetaFilter
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