February 2012
3 posts
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Help stop the bloodshed in Syria →
Join the call to the Arab League to put a stop to Assad and his murderous regime.
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January 2012
1 post
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The newest threat to Internet freedom: ACTA →
A new global treaty could allow corporations to police what we do on the Internet. Last week we successfully pushed back the US censorship bills—if we act now, we can get the EU Parliament to bury this new threat. Add your voice now!
December 2011
1 post
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Dear Congress: It's no longer okay to not know how... →
This is really disgusting. It’s actually treasonous. Congress, the group that is supposed to be working in our interests, doesn’t know, doesn’t care what it passes. They’re so confused they think passing anything is better than passing nothing. Especially if it involves lots of perks and lobbyist dollars.
And the result will be an enslaved culture and a 1984 world.
October 2011
1 post
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“The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads...”
– Thomas Jefferson
September 2011
1 post
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Political activism: Control by sympathy →
This is a very enlightening look at “entitlement” programs and other hand-outs:
Sympathy is not compassion and it is not understanding. Tap a tuning fork and place it near a stringed instrument and the instrument picks up the vibration of the tuning fork. Sympathy is a feeling, an emotion, that is largely un-analytical or irrational. A sympathizing person gets into sympathy mode...
August 2011
3 posts
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Cyber weapons: The new arms race →
Fascinating article on how hacking has become a real tool of war with potentially severe international consequences, and the rapid growth of an industry devoted to providing weapons for use on computer networks, functioning essentially as an adjunct to national militaries (and criminal organizations).
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The bright future of solar-powered factories →
Fascinating article about the renewable generation of heat energy (not electricity).
July 2011
3 posts
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Fed audit: Trillions for foreign banks, conflicts... →
This is criminally outrageous, and it’s only the beginning, being only a watered-down initial audit:
During a 2½ year period starting at the end of 2007, the Federal Reserve provided more than $16 trillion in secret bailouts to banks and other companies around the world, according to a government audit of some of the U.S. central bank’s operations. Much of the Fed’s largesse was...
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Wealth and freedom lost →
Great article:
As the United States of America loses its wealth, it loses its freedom and as it surrenders its individual freedoms to the state, it loses its wealth. One can say that the spirit of anything is its quality of freedom, the expansiveness of its life, the capacity of the spirit to reach out and permeate the material universe with intelligence and use it for the purposes of...
June 2011
5 posts
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China waist-deep in debt →
Interesting article on China’s looming financial problems. They’re just less visible than in the U.S. because the central government juggles its books to make everything look good. (Not that the Fed doesn’t do that in the U.S., but it’s easier to control information in a censored society.)
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Syria drops off the Internet amid turmoil →
More Internet shenanigans from Middle Eastern tyranny. I wonder if they do more PR harm than “good” by pulling these stunts.
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Japanese corporation plans to turn the moon into a... →
This is a hell of an idea.
May 2011
2 posts
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Mike Rowe's Senate testimony on what's wrong with... →
This is an enlightening, spot-on look at what we need to do to bring our economy back to life. I found this particularly surprising:
Right now, American manufacturing is struggling to fill 200,000 vacant positions. There are 450,000 openings in trades, transportation and utilities. The skills gap is real, and it’s getting wider. In Alabama, a third of all skilled tradesmen are over 55....
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In public statement, TSA lies about the... →
The fight against totalitarianism in the U.S. is heating up:
Round two of the battle for travel freedom is well underway.
The first round, which garnered national attention in the fall of 2010, focused primarily on the TSA implementing new procedures…pat downs, body scanners….and the public outcry against it….boycotts, protests, calling congress to demand change.
But, as the public response...
April 2011
7 posts
4 tags
U.S. goes after some game-changing energy projects →
These projects could produce some very worthwhile technology:
Plants Engineered To Replace Oil (PETRO). Technologies for low-cost production of advanced biofuels are limited by the small amount of available energy captured by photosynthesis and the inefficient processes used to convert plant matter to fuel. PETRO aims to create plants that capture more energy from sunlight and convert that...
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How to tell false information from the truth →
This is a pretty good article on evaluating data.
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Astronomers may have witnessed a star torn apart... →
This is pretty awesome. The forces involved in something like this are almost unimaginable.
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An appalling story of Chinese government... →
The worst part of this is that it isn’t a shock.
On April 3rd, Chinese artist and citizen investigator Ai Weiwei was taken into custody by his government while attempting to fly from Beijing to Hong Kong. Initially, Chinese law enforcement would not disclose the reason, but yesterday announced they were investigating him for “suspected economic crimes.” His whereabouts are still...
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Who holds sovereignty in the United States? →
This is a great article on sovereignty and the U.S. government. From the intro:
In order to truly understand how the framers intended the U.S. federal government to function, one must first come to grips with a simple, yet fundamental, question.
Who reigns sovereign?
In other words, who gets the final say?
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“If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting...”
– James Madison
March 2011
5 posts
8 tags
“If man survives for as long as the least successful of the dinosaurs—those...”
– Arthur C. Clarke
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Obama’s War on Libya: A Constitutional View →
In short:
With military action taking place in Libya right now, the essential question must be asked: Is it even Constitutional? For those of you who don’t want to read more than a sentence or two, here’s the short answer. Absolutely not.
There’s a great deal more background in the article, which is very good.
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Larry Page Wants to Return Google to Its Startup... →
It will be interesting to see what comes of this.
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Apple's role in Japan during the earthquake →
A touching story of how Apple has been helping people in Japan after the earthquake and tsunami:
I work at Apple at one of its stores in Japan. The earthquake hit while I was working on the first floor of one of their stores. As the entire building swayed, the staff calmly led people from the top 5 floors down to the first floor, and under the ridiculously strong wooden tables that hold up...
February 2011
3 posts
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Suleiman, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the Illusion... →
An interesting take on the current situation in Egypt.
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January 2011
4 posts
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How Egypt switched off the Internet →
A fascinating technical look at how Egypt shut off its Internet connection to the rest of the world:
…the signs are that the Egyptian authorities have taken a very careful and well-planned method to screen off Internet addresses at every level, from users inside the country trying to get out and from the rest of the world trying to get in.
“It looks like they’re taking action at two...
“All over the place, from the popular culture to the propaganda system, there is...”
– Noam Chomsky
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China finds a way to increase nuclear fuel reuse... →
This is highly interesting:
The Chinese government just announced they’ve made a breakthrough in nuclear fuel reprocessing technology that would increase the reuse rates of nuclear fuel by 60 fold. Though nuclear power remains a touchy subject in the United States, countries around the world — like France, the UK and Russia — are turning to it as a ready-for-the-market technology that can...
December 2010
4 posts
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Frog Design: The Four Secrets of Playtime That... →
This is a great article with some interesting ideas about how to teach creativity to children. From the article:
Plato once said, “Necessity is the mother of invention.” What do our children really need to invent for themselves in such a manufactured, overly structured world? While an African child might be monetarily poor compared with his European counterpart, I would argue that he is...
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Schneier on security in 2020 →
This is a highly interesting analysis and prediction of the state of computer and network security in 2020. Schneier has some thought-provoking points. From the conclusion:
One old trend: deperimeterization. Two current trends: consumerization and decentralization. Three future trends: deconcentration, decustomerization, and depersonization. That’s IT in 2020—it’s not under your control,...
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November 2010
4 posts
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October 2010
3 posts
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Google is testing cars that drive themselves →
This is fantastic! Of course it turns out to be Google that pioneers the automatic car.