fractalnavel : flags

y.a.s.c.u.p. #(n + 1)

fractalnavel — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 20:16:10 GMT

seemed like a decent day to post. man, i haven't done anything since christmas. no laundry, no work outs - finally getting to it all today... dang shoulder just seems to keep getting worse, not sure what to do.

*whine*

* * * * * * * * * *

craig sent along a link to Bruce Sterling: State of the World, 2009, and that started me off onto a two and a half week intensive reading "program" on sustainable economies & lifestyles, aka peak oil, survivalism and The End of the World as We Know It ^TM. basically what i learned was that i'm gonna die - sooner rather than later, and after a good deal of uncertainty and suffering.

not that this is really any news to me. it was pretty apparent twenty years ago even from random bits & pieces of information. i was just never sure what could be done about it, at any scale from global to personal. coulda woulda shoulda - gotta deal with the here & now.

there's a lot of material related to this on the web of varying quality, as usual. the best jumping off point for me was dmitry orlov's stuff; he brings an interesting perspective to the current state of affairs, having been through the soviet version of it twenty years ago. he's more focused on pragmatics than mere doomsaying, and community rather than isolationism. read the articles linked to in the sidebar, and some of the linked blogs as well - there's not many, and the ones there are a good selection.

anyway, i still need to digest this, not that there's a lot of time left. i pretty much want to stick with actions that would be worthwhile to take even if the future was purely rosy. if i want a self-sufficient lifestyle, especially for eventual retirement, gotta start now. no need to be extreme about it, but certainly an elimination of unnecessary dependencies makes sense. problem is, i'm in the wrong place to start.

well, just need to apply the usual project approach to this. i do have some skills, the ability to identify and acquire new ones being the most important in this context. and it will go from there... more updates to come, i'm sure.

one personal observation: while immersed in this topic, the advertisement on tv, and other events, seemed downright surrealistic. things are coming down around our ears, while the tube runs merrily on, as if nothing was happening. oh, there's a mention of troubles, but then bang, onto next news item. the cognitive dissonance has been stunning.

* * * * * * * * * *

somewhere near the end of that i got sidetracked for a day or two into some mormonism reading. bottom line: yeah, it's a cult. somewhat benign, compared to many others, but a cult nonetheless. same applies to numerous other organizations, religions, academics, corporations, entire nations... mental and emotional abuse, deception and secrecy, in the name of god or an idea or any goal - sorry, not a good thing. of course, cultishness is a continuum; few groupings are exempt.

* * * * * * * * * *

let's see, what else has been happening. new national administration, sure. pretty impressed with the first few days. been watching news and various talk shows (moyers, rose), and there are a lot of popping eyeballs.

i gotta admit, i got a little teary at some points during the inaugural speech. took me a while to figure out why, since the language wasn't all that evocative, nothing earth shaking was being said, just good straight talk - and that was it. after all these years of outright idiocy from the previous holder of that office, it was the relief from the sheer humiliation and frustration of having to live with that jerk as the public face of a what could still be a great nation. the tears were a returning of a sense of pride that i hadn't even been aware that i had lost. not chest-thumping, nationalistic pride, but pride as a human, that's all - not the subhuman crap we've taken for the last eight years.

the contrast between bush and obama is breathtaking in just about every way. god knows where we'll be in days, months or years, but even just a few days of decency and honesty ^[1] makes a world of difference. i had some serious reservations about obama, and really, he seemed to be missing the point early on in many issues. but he learned! my god - the complete, asinine foolishness of "staying the path" when all evidence says otherwise. and not only that, but shit - much the same undertakings could have been attempted, but carried off far better, if that honesty and willingness to learn had been in place.

so - mccain or clinton ? at the moment, i'm glad it was neither of them. that's a change from my earlier opinion. what the fuck - let's give the new guy a chance. can't be a whole lot worse than the last century of bozos to date.

^[2]

i dunno - was that only more cognitive dissonance ?

^[1] well, apparent honesty at this point. we'll find out later - much later.

^[2] data from http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/data/popularity.php

feedback loops

fractalnavel — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 17:03:28 GMT

some thoughts from a brother on things auto industry:

Sent: Thursday, November 20, 2008 09:32

Subject: more car stuff & economics

...

"From some rough approximations, the car companies have added more value to the autoworker (and population) pocketbook than most other industries. Due to the automotive worker increasing wage, the average car price is going up; however, the recurring cost of gasoline has improved (mpg from 1970 to 2010+), while the $/gal gas cost has negatively impacted the car companies gains. Again, roughly - car companies have had a neutral effect on %take home pay, while housing, insurance (car & house), and health costs have reduced the take home. Taxes (income, property, sales, socsec, medicare) - I don't have enough information at this time to put this into perspective.

"Taking this into consideration, the next questions concern -

"is the automotive laborer wage chasing the cost of living or vice-versa?"

"how about other industries?"
i.e. if health care and general insurance costs (items everybody needs) rise, workers (union & non-union - both will feel the effect) will want compensation< to neutralize their effects.

"The three major increases in cost of living (excluding taxes, I'll still have to chase this) are;

housing

car insurance

health care (ins premium & treatment costs)
(house insurance a somewhat distant 4th)

"So - housing costs are up because raw materials are up? If so, then wouldn't house insurance increase also. Or are the claims not substantiating enough? Are house insurance claims less likely to be fraudulent, then the insurance model may be okay, and car insurance fraud should be minimized.

"car insurance costs are up because raw materials are up? True, however; here multiple factors are chasing themselves. The more cars are made the supply/demand pricing takes place, and labor wages are chasing themselves. However, those suppliers that failed to make the successful OEM original build bid, can still make aftermarket parts sold to PepBoys, AutoZone, Murrays, etc. I've seen similar initiatives at these places like GM's cost reduction to limit aftermarket increases. It's said that insurance customers should request OEM parts; however, all OEM's globally quote and source any component, including those Asian "counterfeits" who may have quoted on the OEM parts, and missed due to a number of reasons - price, timing, politics, procedures, lack of quality certificate (which doesn't always guarantee non-recalls, otherwise there wouldn't be recalls now, since all parts are sources with TS, ISO, or VDA qualifications).

"Insurance costs are minimal (low labor, low materials, low overhead), until claims are paid. Hence my comparison statement to housing insurance modeling rates against claims.

"So - should US car companies get a loan (not a bailout, like the underscrutinized finance industry)? Cars are globally made, each corporation having to adhere to each nations' specific emission controls and safety standards. But the unequalizer are tariffs. As was seen as lately as four years ago, US government steel tariffs requested by USSteel and other US steel makers, caused an increase in material cost until they were repealed, then the global market for construction boomed (construction uses about 70% of globally used mined ore), and supply/demand pricing once again flourished.

"Pricing including imaginary profit geometrically raises prices as OEM's raise outsourcing and their Tier1's have more Tier2's, then Tier3's, etc..... Then the Tier3's, and so on, don't have enough buying power to push the supply/demand principle to their favor. When the OEM's purchase material with their buying power for Tier1's to Tier3's+, then this is somewhat limited. But automotive is still competing with construction (industrial/commercial buildings, infrastructure/roads, transportation (shipping, rail, ...)."

...

which highlights the complex nature of any major industry in today's global economy.

funny that we merely blinked (really) at sending funds approaching $1T (that's $1,000,000,000,000 - !) to assist an "industry" that no one is sure is even real, but when it comes to actual physical goods, and a price tag less than %3 of what has been committed elsewhere, the prevalent attitude is decidedly unsympathetic - and that's stating it gently.

so many things wrong about all this (the national reaction, i mean). but it reflects more a historical antipathy towards detroit and organized labor (where did that come from?) than anything approaching a considered response to the matter at hand.

but what people miss is that (1) old concerns of a domestic car quality gap disappeared long ago, (2) a separable "domestic" auto industry has not even existed for a couple of decades now, and (3) outsourcing and anti-labor hiring practices undercut (sometimes costly) protections that people fought for for years in this country.

ask yourselves who all this benefits. again.

(2) is even more interesting, because of the interdependencies globally and between industries. a domino effect would ensue if the supplier / skill concentrations are lost, not only for "foreign" auto makers, but other heavy industries - and _light_ ones as well. one of two things could happen: all those "foreign" companies could pull out, there being too little appropriate labor resources available; or they could stay but demand - and get - large additional labor compensation slashes, amounting to this country switching to a non-"first world" status. already, we're seeing many people not only seriously considering, but actually acting, on taking employment overseas because of "domestic" economic issues. you know how you look at mexico today ? well, start looking out your front window.

"oh, that could never happen - we're America!"

morons - it's been happening for over a decade now.

granted, preserving the huge global inequity pattern that has prevailed to date is neither wise nor possible, but there are far better ways to handle transitions.

and in a deep sense, the current perspectives, attitudes and trends are tied to the underlying "scientism" and "secular mysticism" that causes everyone to believe that everything is controllable, and that there are responsible parties for everything that happens. this is further interestingly compounded by the contradictory attitude that everyone believes in the existence of free choice. so - perfect causal chains of responsibility (determinism), ending at persons who chose to start that chain of events (free will).

the last few years i've run into many examples of this glaring logical error- the poor chose to be that way (laziness, maliciousness, whatever); the hyper-rich deserve their wealth (personally, as if there was something trans-human about them). and so on.

but no one recognizes it. and no one recognizes their own greed and intolerance as well.

burn censors, not books !

fractalnavel — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 01:57:59 GMT

... or movies.

big "wtf?!" moment this evening: getting back from the conference today, i think how i will be early enough to kick back with a beer or three and catch the the third harry potter movie (prisoner of azkaban) that was advertised by abc last week during the showing of the second harry potter movie. but i forgot what city i live in. flipping over to the channel, i see:

Sun, 20 Apr 2008 00:00:00 UTC
Your Reality Checked: Floral Designer
(#810006) A corporate executive contemplates leaving her job to become a florist. (House/garden, Series)

[2004-07-18]

Sun, 20 Apr 2008 01:00:00 UTC
The Insider's List With Julie Moran: Eco-Hotels
(#780016) The top 10 hotels that are ecologically-friendly. (House/garden, Cooking, Series)

[2004-10-18]

Sun, 20 Apr 2008 02:00:00 UTC
Chuckwagon Cook-Off
The annual competition takes place in Ruidoso, N.M. (Special, Cooking)

[2006-03-04]

proof ? hardly. but it's happened before here with this series and other flicks. you want me to believe that demand for the above garbage is higher than for a multiple academy award nominated film ?

bastards. not even so much the local station (cincinnati wcpo), but the fuckers in the community i live among. really, people, it only happens because you want it to. how fucking stupid do you think i am ? like you ?

this ~~also~~ especially goes for those who may not share those sentiments, but nevertheless stand by and let it happen. next time yuou hear this sort of attitude from a neighbor or coworker or whoever - challenge it.

intolerance is intolerable.

yeah. community "standards". sure, it's not like i have a right to view things on a private corporation's broadcast, and if it had never been placed on the schedule in the first place, what can i say ? but that isn't what happened, is it ? the garbage above is a local pre-emption of the national feed.

yes, y'all can do this crap and get away with it. way to go.

hard not to wonder what's been happening that's less noticeable. for that, a comparison to international programming is a start. not like that is any better in many cases.

"... i love my species. i love my species. i love my species. ..."

wish/tful thinking

fractalnavel — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 21:42:05 GMT

years ago, shortly after the first gulf war, it was very clear what was and was not to be done in such a situation, once the path had been chosen. it was very simple:

let the generals do their jobs
no half measures

these two points stood out especially in contrast to the conduct of the vietnam war, at least the little that i can directly remember.

but also important to consider in the original choice and planning:

do nothing that you cannot commit to

that's pretty clearly implied by the first two. there's ways of taking care of that; one is by using such overwhelming force and third party support that the actual hostilities are as contracted as possible; the other is by having a just cause, and a distinct goal. the gulf war filled all of these criteria, and it showed.

of course, things like length, justice and goal are highly contextual, not least of which is the supporting population's will to continue and commit, especially in a democracy. also, "commit": not just someone else's life & treasure, but one's own resources - across all the nation's various strata.

all of these considerations have been violated by the current enagement in iraq.

and yet - we are there.

compounding matters by not following through would be far worse. two wrongs don't make a right; we can't rewrite history, go home, and say "oops".

and then there's the issue of the very real likelihood of misinterpreted reality. despite the wrongheadedness of how we got into the position that we are in ("we" being the nation i'm born to), and how badly executed, we may have blundered onto what might be the correct path in the larger sense. sure, americans do some really stupid, dangerous, silly - and wonderful - things, but sometimes the world is less optimistic a place than we may have hoped.

some reading offered for your consideration:

some mental exercises to prepare for what follows
for those wanting a bit of a fictional introduction, dan simmons has a little "story"
and here's the point

not to mention that other religious ideologies have also all had their significant toxic periods for the rest of humanity / planet. nope, this isn't a war of religions, but many people are reflexively casting it that way.

short-cutting much more extensive discussion, what about practical matters ? there's a u.s. presidential election coming up shortly. are there any answers there, any message we can send ?

there is much more of distaste that i have with any of the frontrunners than anything to recommend them. strictly on domestic matters, i wouldn't go in the republican direction, but i don't see democrats offering much of intelligence either. perhaps just slightly less and/or different damage.

on the other hand, there is one clear difference from a foreign policy perspective: obama is clearly for early pull-out from iraq. and i think any such talk is dangerously premature.

leaves me with one distasteful alternative: clinton.

of course, this predicament is largely an artifact of the sheeple and their continued blind adherence to a two-party system; combined with a lack of historical knowledge.

i'll leave this hanging with something craig said the other day, referring to a slightly different topic, but related as to background:

" The US like any other country has it's mood swings with capitalism, "corporatacracy", big government, empire, isolationism. And I really thought early on in the Bush presidency when everyone kind of went wacko with 9/11 and the overreaction that followed that the boat would rollback to even keel at some point down the line. It always has. There's enough people who care enough to fight to right the boat. I read, listen and watch them all the time. They do exist. It just seems there are so many more people today than say 30 years who really don't care. They view all of this like the compressor on the refrigerator, it just works so we no longer hear it humming anymore. I don't know if it's apathy or accepting that it's all on automatic. Think about it. Since the late 70s, this country has really had it good. That's 30 years of nobody rocking the boat too bad. This is the younger generation who usually are the ones who would march in the streets, protest, have the idealism to demand change. Why mess with things when they see their parents never being involved and have lived the high life. The hippies grew up in the idyllic 50's and were use to having things their way and when Uncle Sam started carting them off to war they said hell no. The biggest complaint today is the overbearing entertainment industry. Wha? But anyway I just hope the critical mass of people are out there willing to right to the boat again. I try in my own way to bring up issues in conversations. Not so much my own opinion but "do you think the president has overstepped his bounds? do you think that congress is honest? do you think that journalistic integrity has a place on our tv anymore? etc. At least bring some of this up, raise awareness. I have to say I am concerned how things are going. I really am amazed at how far things have gotten out of hand in the 7-8 years since 9/11. And I think it's because nobody is around to say "stop that" or "lets try something different". "

we had been discussing Rick Falkvinge: Why the US is collapsing, which is food for thought, if not entirely credible.

[what was it that dylan had to say about change ?]

fractalnavel — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 16:37:37 GMT

Detroit Museum Reinvents Itself in an Effort to Stir Arts Renewal

The Detroit Institute of Arts completed a six-year, $158 million makeover in 2007, including the addition of interactive exhibits and a spotlight on local artists. Jeffrey Brown reports on the new efforts to attract visitors and survive amid state economic woes.

saw a bit of the report (left) on pbs last night. apparently, they've renovated the detroit institute of arts to make it more appealing to the masses. one striking part of this is the removal of the traditional notes and descriptions placards that accompany each work, replacing them with "exhibition style" presentations instead. they want to relate more to, well, the common man, not just the art connoisseurs or those with otherwise privileged perspectives. other changes reflect this as well.

the report goes on to mention that there are criticisms of this approach, that some are calling it "dumbing down" of art.

my own thoughts are a complex mix, but i'd have to agree with the critics. but not for the same reasons.

oh, i fear i will soon be mourning the loss of a beautiful institution, replaced by something with lesser historical and personal appeal, but that's not it. it's something else.

the motivation for these changes is not that the art world is too elite, it's that they think that joe sixpack won't value, and therefor show up and support, something he doesn't understand. or is that "won't" understand ? or, perhaps, "can't" understand ?

what does this say about us ? because sadly, it's probably true.

from a historical perspective, public art's main purpose was not aesthetic, it was communications. tell the common people what to think about so-and-so political figure, about such-and-such religious ideas. impress. persuade. subjugate. horrify. inform. the aesthetic was the vehicle, not the point.

it wasn't until we had climbed out of the dark ages that art began to take on a life of its own, where the exercise of the craft and associated intellect began to become a frequent primary motivator. in the twentieth century art - public art - attempted to throw off the last shackles of "message" in pursuit of the purity of the thing in itself.

that's quite a statement, really. a positive one, even though no such statement could have been intended. the statement was: each person is their own arbiter of taste. their own judge. they imbue art - and life - with a message of their own. in effect, it is a statement of ultimate liberty and democracy. it is the full bloom of the renaissance and the enlightenment.

and now it's being taken away.

who's scamming who ?

fractalnavel — Fri, 25 May 2007 00:12:41 GMT

a brother writes:

In a message dated 2007.05.23 09:10:50 Eastern Daylight Time, writes:

If you agree with this reporting, this sounds like more blog material.
(I've never heard of Ron Paul in written or audio media)

Maybe he doesn't fit the corporate image, or the presidential field is
to weak, or his ideals are not immediately recognized as non-pragmatic.

the material he is referring to:

http://www.infowars.com/articles/us/paul_ron_total_victory_yet_censorship_continues.htm

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Story?id=3147940

hard to really tell what's going on, and i know nothing about the candidate. if ABC's "explanation" is correct, then why wouldn't similar crap be happening to the other candidate's numbers ? there's too many of them to assume that only one has supporters with any technological adeptness. and hell, the numerical inflation would have skyrocketed to ridiculous numbers if "spamming" / stuffing were the case. etc. sorry, that doesn't hold water, and the fact that they offered a weak rationalization just makes things smell all the more.

meanwhile, as for me, i haven't been following any of this stuff. basically all i see is losers across the board, in any party. i need to figure out how to run myself. what the hell, eh ? i'll run on the "you're all idiots !" platform.

funeral for a friend

fractalnavel — Sat, 14 Jan 2006 03:21:00 GMT

In a message dated 2006.01.13 20:08:46 Eastern Standard Time, sowajf@ writes:

JEEP WRANGLER JK

Taking place of the current TJ.
It has many "features" that will be discussed for months (years?).

http://jpmagazine.com/featuredvehicles/154_0601_07jk/

piece of shit. it took sixty years, but the fucking germans finally figured out how to beat the american gp vehicle: buy it out from the greedy multinationals with the blessings of the "patriotic" republicans. and it wasn't enough just to kill it off - they had to turn it into a suburban weenie-mobile to destroy its reputation as well.

jeep is dead. long live jeep.

sunday mourning

fractalnavel — Sun, 25 Sep 2005 15:54:00 GMT

i was wondering why i haven't seen many items by new york times op-ed columnists in the news lists lately. so i visited nytimes.com. apparently, all of these regular nyt columnists are now premium content. a great deal of their influence comes from exposure on the web - the freeweb, i should say. a recent comment of mine here:

weird how a paper that so obviously wants to be a mechanism of social change will bury all its material. shows you their real priorities aren't much different than those they often rail against.

in this case they (the nyt business folks) are undercutting the exact reason these people write. if i were one of these columnists, i'd challenge this policy, and if unsuccessful, move on.

just part of an increasing trend of business interests annexing the commons. happens all the time, historically. this is not a phenomenon exclusive to the internet. restricting access to any information through monetary or geographical (as in libraries) or technological controls smacks of a type of elitism. more of an argument against unfettered “free” market capitalism ? it's no different than any other resource. the engines of commerce start to take notice of something that grew from the grass roots into something valuable, and they do what is expected of them. i would add that this in turn decreases the value of what they grabbed, but apparently this does not seem to matter to consumers who support the results by literally buying into it.

earlier posts here talk about things like what “freedom” really means, in particular free speech, and also about the reliability of information in a public commons. and one of my earliest posts, about information vs. economic status. not sure where i'm going here, but my head feels stuffed with unformed thought at the moment. see the i.c.k. post category for even more.

well, what i have written here isn't much more than the usual, but i have a growing internal sense of synthesis of these and other things, the the consequences thereof. right now this is just another notation on the information dead file, locked behind the tombstone pages of premium access notifications. and there is no life inside the grave; all is dust.

flags: business as usual ?

fractalnavel — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 21:50:00 GMT

craig passed this on: corporations now running the show. “Of the world's 100 largest economies, a majority -- 52 -- are corporations.”

definitely compatible with many arguments i've presented here. i just wasn't aware of these sorts of particulars. there are a number of scifi stories that present possible results of the continued evolution of this situation.

anyway, it's not just me ranting, so you can spread this one around. people need to think about this, and change it. as for me, you can be certain i will have more to say on this and related issues.

location is everything

fractalnavel — Sat, 10 Sep 2005 00:58:00 GMT

ok, time for at least a brief statement of my position with respect to things political. i'm neither right nor left, nor laissez faire. over the years, i have been alternately claimed and disowned as all of these things and more. at one early point, to my amusement, it was both left and right simultaneously. i will fight for or against just about anything regardless of perceived political persuasion, based only on my best efforts at independent evaluation. where i'm coming from is increasingly idiosyncratic, even eccentric, due to other non-political efforts at increasingly accurate worldviews, without regard to current attitudes.

however, i am a product of my background, as are we all (and as explicitly recognized in my current philosophies). i think i keep this in mind throughout my other efforts, and so is mitigated somewhat.

like i said, brief. argue with me. please.

hey, that's money....

fractalnavel — Sat, 10 Sep 2005 00:30:00 GMT

and this one's just stupid and bull headed: why are we turning away international aid when the pricetag on this whole thing is unbelievable ? oh, that's right - bush is more worried abiut his appearance than the pocketbooks of averagae americans.

on the “plus” side, at least we accepted mexican aid. wow. then again, i've never felt quite confortable about bush's relations with the south of the border folks - what the hell has he been up to there ? probably trying to get cheap workers for ol' dick's rackets - er, “businesses”.

"bring out your dead..."

fractalnavel — Sat, 10 Sep 2005 00:18:00 GMT

latest thing that's ticking me off (so many ticks, i need fumigating):

...

But soldiers who had been brought in over the past few days to help in the search were not seeing that kind of toll.

"There's nothing at all in the magnitude we anticipated," said Maj. Gen. Bill Caldwell, commander of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division.

[Col. Terry] Ebbert [the city's homeland security chief] said the search for the dead will be done systematically, block-by-block, with dignity and with no news media allowed to follow along. "You can imagine sitting in Houston and watching somebody removed from your parents' property. We don't think that's proper," he said.

...

so how are we supposed to believe any conclusions with a press blackout ? it is precisely becasue of the prevailing controvery that we need to see these efforts - and the dead.
dignity?! what “dignity” in this entire fiasco ? all censorship will accomplish is silencing the last - and perhaps only - voice these poor souls had. at the very least their silent bodies should be allowed stand in condemnation of our pitiful efforts. real respect and dignity will be achieved only in allowing these people their final mute testimony. yet again, the bush administration is cutting the tongue out of truth. “lets not alarm anyone” is apparently smirky's byword. what he really means is “must preserve the illusions”.

nothing like muddying the waters further. that's how they survive. god forbid any light may fall on anything.

by the way, i did see one brief news ad showing force being used - wicked force - to remove one of those remaining in the city. funny - i never saw the actual story, and the ad never appeared again. meanwhile, we're asked to believe that “we're trying our best to persuasively negotiate and we are not using force at this time”.

oh, for ... BULLSHIT !

i don't get it...

fractalnavel — Tue, 06 Sep 2005 06:37:00 GMT

...the events of last week, as a capstone to the continuing appalling failures of the bush administration, don't lead to any impeachment talk, but one inconsequential sexual escapade of clinton had us up in arms ?

“Breaking News: President Bush said Tuesday that he will lead an investigation into what went wrong with the response to Hurricane Katrina.”

oh no you don't, you little weasel ! we'll get someone else to do that. you just sit there smirking and head-bobbing like you always do. we all know what his “investigations” are like, white-washes for the mucky-mucks while the little guys are thrown to the wolves. 9-11 commission ? nowhere. abu-ghraib ? enron (and the rest) ? wmd and iraq ? don't make me laugh. hell, some of the perpetrators were even promoted (rice). this guy and his people are one long string of, at best, criminal incompetencies, and at worst, malign deviousness.

neo-con geography

fractalnavel — Wed, 24 Aug 2005 14:29:00 GMT

iraq, aka “new texas” ?

there must be more of these...

in other news, it seems the military's force transformation initiative is directed at creating a global protection racket. read between the lines of “Base closings hint at new air strategy”. you don't think ? then how will american taxpayers be able to continue to foot the bill for protecting the increasingly free market places in the rest of the world ? the other economies get the benefits, but none of the costs, of that protection. that's not what i call “competition”. they also get the benefits of free markets without the costs of many services, rights and privileges that we take for granted here.

it's already established national policy to use military force abroad to “preserve” national security - and that includes economic security. that typically means strong-arming regions into giving us what we want at otherwise unavailable terms. don't want to play that game with us ? no problem, we'll withdraw our “protection”. even better, we'll throw our support behind groups that oppose you.

all old news. the new part is that now it seems we will be doing the dirty work directly.

just an unbalanced note on one aspect of the issues here to remind me of some of the dynamics at play.

tech notes: flags: excuses, excuses

fractalnavel — Fri, 19 Aug 2005 15:17:00 GMT

double category entry here, and an unusual flag. this one isn't about politics, but is still has social impact.

i was in a local drugstore during a recent heatwave, and the power went out. instead of servicing the customers already in the store before shutting down, they kicked everyone out then and there. which kinda sucked since i was just finishing up, and shopping time isn't necessarily trivial. right down the drain. and why ? the computers were down. if they are that critical to a business, a proper operating plan should at least include enough backup power (from ups, generator, whatever) to process some expected number of shoppers. i suppose they may also have been concerned about theft & security. again, where's the backup power ?

i saw an article about the recent virus outbreak where the people just sat and twiddled their thumbs when the computers went down. didn't matter what type of business it was, that was the result. news agencies, customs, retailers, ... all were basically taken completely offline and all operations halted.

you'd think some lessons would have been learned after the wtc incident. you'd think the blackouts a couple years back would have taught lessons as well. well, the lessons were there, but the prospective students were all skipping class.

so what's the flag ? not just the inadequate technical infrastructure, which is bad enough. that's solvable, for a price. if our society is that heavily dependent on electronic devices then it is in taxpayers' interest to have a much more robust systems. if that means mini-generating stations on every block, or some other localized backup, so be it. or must we legislate that every independent business facility have their own backup systems ? this is already done with critical services such as fire, police and medical.

of course, that's just the power supply side of things. computing resources are affected by many things, like viruses. and to a society whose lifeblood seems to be information, computing needs the same robustness as does power, perhaps more so.

but it's not necessarily the vulnerable computing itself which needs to be directly addressed. people and businesses have forgotten how to operate without computing machinery. for years, unreliable computing was a concern that was addressed by having manual failover processes. that required some duplication of effort and recordkeeping, but was seen as necessary given the uncertainties.

now it seems we accept the inherent reliabilities in return for hyper-streamlining of nearly all processes. i can understand the difficulties involved when the computing based changes have resulted in qualitatively different approaches, or even entirely new businesses. but for retail, customs and even news ? the manual failover processes are obvious and simple. will things be as efficient ? no. but a complete stoppage is much less efficient than even that.

apparently the business lost - to a company, or even a nation's economy - is seen as an acceptable risk in terms of cost / benefit analysis. on the other hand, a lot of people in the front lines are just looking for any excuse not to work for a little bit. computer down ? no problem, i needed the breather anyway [wink]. nothing new there.

i don't know if this nearly complete dependence on computers is a great success story, or a horrible tragedy waiting to happen. or maybe it's already happened.