JayB

This might also be an opportune moment to revive the "Bad Photo Contest" thread. First entry...

I knew the disguises weren't fooling anyone (except for Off_White). I think I have the guy beat in the facial hair density and male pattern baldness department, but the resemblance is definitely there. I was hoping I wouldn't have to confront my parents with those 1973 adoption papers from Georgia that I found in the attic, but...

Que?

Yeah - I didn't read much beyond the first page, but there's some hillarious stuff in there. "A Hadith is a reported saying of Mohammad, and they vary in their status, depending on who did the reporting, and who was a witness. For example, Bush's reported comments...God would tell me, George, go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan. And I did...is like a Hadith. The fact that it is reported by a negotiator for the notoriously corrupt and inept Palestinian Authority, with no witnesses, makes it a very dodgy Hadith indeed. But that's what a Hadith is. And I never did find the "72 beautiful virgins" Hadith. I have, however, wondered long and hard about those virgins. Let me share some of my theological speculation with you. Firstly, are there 72 virgins for each male, or 72 virgins, period? You see, if it's the latter, it sounds like a lot, but then there an awful lot of men in Paradise, and the number is rising all the time. And if there are only 72 to go round everyone, then we're going to need some sort of queueing system, which we're not very good at. But let's say we're better at queueing in Paradise, and we all take a numbered ticket, and wait in line. Our ticket says 18 billion and something, and the display says 3 billion and change, but not to worry, we've got eternity to play with. Eventually, we're near the head of the line. The thing is, though, some of us are going to be more attractive to the virgins than others. For example, Salah Ad Din here on the left, perhaps known to you as Saladin, was a mighty Middle Eastern warrior at the time of the Crusades, and by all accounts was also sophisticated, civilized, learned and very charming. So when he appears at the head of the line, I'm sure our young virgin will experience a shiver of anticipation. But if it's our young Jihadi on the right, it could be a different story. You see, he's probably been blown up by a bomb, which tends to make a bit of a mess. Sure, they'll do some basic surgery to sew the various bits together, but materials are limited up there, and there are limits to what you can do with a silken thread and the beak of a Humming Bird. When his number finally gets called, he's going to be standing there, trying to look his best. For most men, they'll check their tie, and perhaps quietly make sure that their fly is zipped up. On the other hand, our unfortunate Jihadi is going to be trying to hold his intestines in with the burnt-off stump of what was his hand. So that's the night that our virgin suddenly remembers that she needs to wash her hair. Luck of the draw, my friend, take another ticket, go to the back of the queue. Alternatively, there could be 72 virgins for every male. Sounds better? Think about it. There are 72 of them and just one of you. They all have their needs and desires, both emotional and physical. So how are you going to satisfy them? Well, "one at at a time" is part of the answer. And you'll need a rota system. Plus you'll need a bit of rest and recreation yourself. Let's say you spend a night with each? It's going to take about 80 days before the virgin at the back of the queue gets to the front. So let's guess what sort of mood she is going to be in, after nearly three months of waiting for some attention. Ever kept your "significant other" waiting just 20 minutes? At a rough guess, she'll be somewhere on the scale between homicidal and genocidal. Not a good start to a relationship. Next night, it's the same, she's been waiting 80 days as well. And so on. And don't even think about limiting your favors to a select few. Maybe "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned", but don't imagine it'll be any better in Heaven either if you miss some of them out. You could of course declare that all relationships will be purely platonic, all that you want is company and conversation. Now all you need to do is find the one who's equally interested in taking motor bikes to bits. Or the one who'll enjoy watching Sumo Wrestling with you. Or the one who's any good at Darts. To be honest, I've never really believed in the virgins. I think it's just a myth invented by unscrupulous Imams, in order to persuade gullible young men to kill innocent people and themselves. Not that our Jihadis won't meet someone. But do you expect that a Good and Just God is going to reward a terrorist bomber with some sort of sexual Disneyworld? Instead, I rather think that one second after he says "One second to the beautiful maidens", he'll discover that the number is correct, but the description was a tiny bit misleading. The shaven heads and gaolhouse tattoos could be a bit of a give-away. 72 ex-convicts, just released after doing hard time for a variety of sex and violence offenses, and he's all theirs. They aren't gay, so there won't be any affectionate banter or camp and witty humor, but as our Jihadi is their only available option, they are going to make do with what they've got. In fact, they are so excited, they've rather neglected their personal hygiene for the last three months. Better get a rota drawn up as soon as you can. Just don't necessarily assume that it'll be "one at a time"."

I think that the ultimate goal of every well-managed corporation is profitability, actually. Self-perpetuation follows logically from that, but the desire to perpetuate oneself is in this case contingent upon the ability to produce goods or services that you can sell for more than it costs you to generate them, which in turn requires producing things that people want to buy. Stop doing that, and self-preservation is impossible - unless, that is, you can induce the government to enact legislation on your behalf that shields you from competition. In which case - it's correct to say that, market control no longer resides with the consumer. Which problems and poor people are you referring to BTW?

I'm not against rules and regulations for businesses any more than I would be opposed to them for individuals, but I think that rules which favor a particular business or industry are just as ill-advised as those which favor one set of individuals over another. With respect to the manner in which other nations elect to regulate their work-places, I think that ultimately they should be free to draft and implement their own policies. The reality is that for some nations, cheap labor is one of the few comparative advantages they have, and it's often not a choice between working long-hours in a factory and writing code in an air-conditioned office, but between long hours in a factory and prostitution, starvation, begging, sifting through garbage-dumps and who knows what else. When coupled with other reforms, these conditions tend to be more transient (Korea, Taiwan, etc) than those that arise from variants of protectionism. I think that there are methods for addressing the problems associated with such things that don't involve tarriffs, however.

The Religious Policeman Blog

VATICAN CITY - A Vatican cardinal said Thursday the faithful should listen to what secular modern science has to offer, warning that religion risks turning into "fundamentalism" if it ignores scientific reason. Cardinal Paul Poupard, who heads the Pontifical Council for Culture, made the comments at a news conference on a Vatican project to help end the "mutual prejudice" between religion and science that has long bedeviled the Roman Catholic Church and is part of the evolution debate in the United States. The Vatican project was inspired by Pope John Paul II's 1992 declaration that the church's 17th-century denunciation of Galileo was an error resulting from "tragic mutual incomprehension." Galileo was condemned for supporting Nicolaus Copernicus' discovery that the Earth revolved around the sun; church teaching at the time placed Earth at the center of the universe. "The permanent lesson that the Galileo case represents pushes us to keep alive the dialogue between the various disciplines, and in particular between theology and the natural sciences, if we want to prevent similar episodes from repeating themselves in the future," Poupard said. But he said science, too, should listen to religion. "We know where scientific reason can end up by itself: the atomic bomb and the possibility of cloning human beings are fruit of a reason that wants to free itself from every ethical or religious link," he said. "But we also know the dangers of a religion that severs its links with reason and becomes prey to fundamentalism," he said. "The faithful have the obligation to listen to that which secular modern science has to offer, just as we ask that knowledge of the faith be taken in consideration as an expert voice in humanity." Poupard and others at the news conference were asked about the religion-science debate raging in the United States over evolution and "intelligent design." Intelligent design's supporters argue that natural selection, an element of evolutionary theory, cannot fully explain the origin of life or the emergence of highly complex life forms. Monsignor Gianfranco Basti, director of the Vatican project STOQ, or Science, Theology and Ontological Quest, reaffirmed John Paul's 1996 statement that evolution was "more than just a hypothesis." "A hypothesis asks whether something is true or false," he said. "(Evolution) is more than a hypothesis because there is proof." He was asked about comments made in July by Austrian Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn, who dismissed in a New York Times article the 1996 statement by John Paul as "rather vague and unimportant" and seemed to back intelligent design. Basti concurred that John Paul's 1996 letter "is not a very clear expression from a definition point of view," but he said evolution was assuming ever more authority as scientific proof develops. Poupard, for his part, stressed that what was important was that "the universe wasn't made by itself, but has a creator." But he added, "It's important for the faithful to know how science views things to understand better." The Vatican project STOQ has organized academic courses and conferences on the relationship between science and religion and is hosting its first international conference on "the infinity in science, philosophy and theology," next week.

This might be the semantic pedant coming out in me again, but I still am not quite sure what you mean when you use the expression "Corporate Power." I am certain that governments placing artificial restrictions on trade, and subsidizing selected producers ofgoods and services is both unfair and harmful to the interests of both consumers and producers, some of whom are corporations, many of whom are sole proprietorships, partnerships, etc as well. Free-trade certainly increases consumer power, by enabling them to buy from whomever they decide is providing the best value. Producers who make the best product for the price will benefit, so perhaps this is the increased power and influence that you are referring to. However, its hard to see how this power means anything other than the freedom to continue producing things that satisfy consumer's wants better than any other market participant's products. Producers who have to compete for consumers are at the mercy of consumers. The only corporations that this is not true of are those whom the government favors and shields from protection with subsidies, tarriffs, and other measures - in which case securing government patronage becomes a primary business goal. Speaking of powerful entities - it's rather amazing to me that most of the people who oppose free trade and harbor deep suspicions of something that they refer to as "Corporate Power" presumably have no problem whatsoever with the activities of the Longshoremen, who currently excercise a power over the US economy that no single corporation enjoys. This is a private, unelected, unaccountable organization who uses force and coercion to secure a monopoly over the operation of critical public facilities - and has proven time and again that they are willing to use it to the detriment of everyone in the country who depends on imports and exports for their livelihood. If a corporation had the same monopoly and exercised it in the same fashion I can hardly imagine that it would recieve the same level of adulation reserved for the union - but perhaps someone can explain the functional difference to me.

Cool. Looking forward to the updates and TR's from over there. Now there's someone else to contribute to the"Everywhere Else" forum.

So how would reducing subisidies for domestic production and eliminating tarriffs against products produced in the world's poorest regions and promoting greater competition result in increased corporate power? State sanctioned monopolies reduce corporate power? Are GM and Ford more powerful as a result of Toyota, Honda, and Hyundai's entrance into the American marketplace? Are people in India and China less free and more destitute as a result of economic liberalization? If anything, free trade constrains corporate power, if we are talking in concrete terms that involve actual corporations, and the goal is to understand and address reality. If one's intention is to invoke and chant incantations about the grand, quasi-mystical nebulosity known as "corporate power," then speaking in concrete terms is really beside the point.

http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/federal/fed.htm

Very Zen. Very Zen. Those who wish to upset the "apple-cart" can do so by means of the voting booth. Those who wish to use violence in place of the ballot are more or less conceding the fact that both their ideals and the arguments that they've been able to marshall on their behalf are bound to be forever rejected by a permanent majority of the people that they will ostensibly benefit.

Nice place. How does Germany compare with Seattle for affordability?

So the people engaged in the anti-globalization movement in general, and those people rioting in Seattle in particular, were Republicans? The present administration is not perfect on free trade for sure, but that seems to have been more the result of spot-electioneering rather than something driven by a profound conviction that one can actually increase economic growth and real-wages with tarriff barriers and subsidies. It would be interesting to see what would happen to a democratic candidate who made promoting free-trade one of the centerpieces of his presidential campaign these days. I suspect that such a candidate would have broad appeal, but would induce much auto-flagellation amonsgt those who think that the Democrats lost because the problem with their "best" candidates like Howard Dean, was that besides coming off like Rowdy Rody Piper giving geography lessons during the "Yearrrrrgh!" speech - even he wasn't "radical" enough. This might be true of the people who grow weepy with nostalgia when contemplating the 60's, and rue the cruel twist of fate that kept them from joining the Symbionese Liberation Army, but it's hard to see how such a stance would actually win elections. The swing vote?

If you've already got your tickets, I'd consider something east of the crest. Maybe the Colchuck Glacier route n Colchuck if the avy hazard isn't too out of control there, or perhaps Mt. Cashmere with a camp at Lake Caroline (?). Even if the weather sucks the camping in the Colchuck cirque is scenic and relatively sheltered.

Could be worse dude. I would trade you a shitty season in CO for an epic season on the East Coast any day....

What would it stand for? Isolationism, protectionism, and more state intervention in the marketplace? I have a hard time understanding what, exactly, would appeal to people who define themselves as left of center, and scorn the Democratic party as it's presently constituted.

What would constitute a viable party for Leftists? Are we Talking Clinton/Blairite Third-Wayism or the old-school, England-in-the-70s model?

The only thing that I find funnier is watching the Volvo set attempting to curtail their 4-year old's tantrums with ad-hoc pop-psychology lectures. "Mine!!!!WHAP!!!!" "Now Solstice, we don't hit mommy..." "WHAP!" "Ouch. Now Solstice, it's very important that you understand that..." "WHAP!" An unintentional sitcom served up every day at your local PCC.

That was classic. "There's really no need for them to kill marine mammals, but our relativistic stance with respect to all morals and values, coupled with our reflexive loathing of Western civilization and our patronizing indulgence of all-things-native makes it impossible for us to make a coherent argument against it."

I really do think that integration is quite a bit more challenging in a country where national identity and ancestry are still closely interlinked. More challenging still when there's no cultural history of assimilating large numbers of immigrants, let alone large numbers of immigrants who are openly contemptuous and dismissive of the values that your civilization is founded upon, rather than seeing them as ideals to strive for. Couple that with a disastrously low birth-rate, a rapidly aging population, and an inflexible labor market hiding behind high tarrifs and subsidies and you've got quite the cluster going on. Hopefully their efforts to integrate the new arrivals succeed, as that's their only hope IMO. Unfortunately, relativistic PC dithering in the place of an impassioned defense of Western values, coupled with unconditional welfare subusidies and a stifling labor market seems like a less-than optimal approach to dealing with immigration. The US has its share of problems to deal with, but I'd take ours over theirs any day.

More like the Paul Ehrlich of our times, only this guy will be discredited sooner. On a related note, why aren't all of the anti-SUV folks jumping for joy over higher oil and energy prices? This will invariably lead to intensive conservation efforts, greater consumer preference for fuel efficient cars, etc, etc, etc. Ditto for anyone who ostensibly supports a progressive tax code opposing the proposed reduction in the mortgage-interest deduction....

Yeah - but everyone knows that direct manipulation of plant genomes (rather than random variation through cross-breeding) to produce crops with higher yields, better drought and insect resistance, and that require less fertilizer, less irrigation, and less-land under cultivation are represent a staggering threat to both the environment and humanity.* Much better to have perpetual famines, increasing salinity, decreasing fertility, and ever-expanding swaths of marginal cropland coupled with the arrival of mountains of subsidized crops from the developed world to ruin the local agricultural economies as well. *It'd be interesting to see how many people who criticize the Intelligent Design folks for their rejection of the scientific consensus embrace equally weak science behind the "Frankfood" movement.

The former doesn't negate the latter IMO, any more than Newton's much more intensive work in alchemy and feverish, million-word-plus ramblings on hidden prophecies and god-knows what else in the Bible negate his mechanics, optics, etc. I think that in most of Europe national identity is, despite the rhetoric, more tied up with one's ancestry than it is in the Americas - Canada, the US, Brazil, etc - and that makes coping with mass-immigration even more difficult than it is for the US and others. Given Europe's demographic profile and tends, I don't see the difficulties that they're having with this changing any time soon. I do think that labor-market liberalization within Europe would probably help lower the number of underemployed Muslim youths in Europe, but I suppose that won't surprise anyone...