A photo of a hand made origami dragon!

Origami Dragon

I cohost Binary Revolution Radio tuesday night at 9:30PM. The show has actually already been recorded. I hope it turned out well. We shall see. I spend a lot of time talking about memes and MemeStreams. Let me know what you think. If you aren't able to catch it live, they will have MP3s available on the website for download at any time.

Decius is on Binrev right now talking about Memestreams

MemeStreams on BinRev Radio

The League of Women Voters put out this brief candidate guide. This is best example of non-partisan candidate information I've found so far, and while I'm glad this exists, I think its pretty sad that more information is not available.

I was thinking this morning that I don't really like the changes that have taken place in order to reform campaign finance. I think we're curtailed the freedom of speech. If I support a candidate then I ought to be able to say it, and I ought to be able to say it with a great big billboard if I so desire. This is America. I also think we've seriously violated people's personal privacy. I can find out what campaigns my employees and business partners have donated money to!! This is extremely dangerous and widespread abuse is only a matter of time.

What have we gained from this? Is the present election less corrupt then previous ones? I hardly think so. I haven't heard any explanation of that. I'm still walking into local elections knowing nothing about many of the races. Knowing none of the candidates.

There is a lot of bad speech in our democracy. A lot of signs on street corners that do not reveal anything about a candidate's competence, their voting record, their goals, even their party affiliation. A lot of our democracy goes directly to those who can generate the best name recognition by having the biggest marketing budget and simplest message.

But in my experience the answer to bad speech has always been more speech.

In California a booklet similar to the one the League of Women Voters put together here is put together by the government. Each candidate gets a least a page to state his or her case. Every office and referenda item is covered. You spend an hour looking it over and you walk into the ballot office knowing something about who you are voting for. Sure, people ignore them, chuck them in the trash, but at least its available. At least everyone gets a chance to tell you who they are, regardless of their budget. In Georgia its very hard to find out what all the races are and whose in them even if you really want the information. An uninformed Democracy is not a democracy at all.

Georgia Voter's Guide

] One of the things I learned in the years I have spent in
] law enforcement at both the federal and local level is
] that witnesses of traumatic events relate few details.
] When people are frightened or otherwise psychologically
] shocked, their minds don't record movies, but snapshots,
] and not many of them, either.
]
] Annie's story has a wealth of detail, so much that I find
] myself disbelieving that she could have been as afraid as
] she says she was.

One Hand Clapping: Criticism of Annie Jacobson's story

] "We are not talking retarded people here," the clinic
] spokesman said. The two "were simply unaware, after eight
] years of marriage, of the physical requirements necessary
] to procreate."

[ Ok, how sheltered do you need to be to miss out on this knowledge. I mean, on top of that, wouldn't biology... you know, instinct, take over at some point. I guess they sleep in separate beds and don't talk about things like desire or certain physical alterations that may accompany it? Some kinda marriage.

Fuck it, I think the clinician is wrong... these people *are* retarded... in the strictest sense of the word. Their stupid families retarded them by not telling them things. So much so that some seriously fundamental human bahaviors were totally blocked. If I were them, i'd be on the phone with mom and dad right now like "HEY, WHAT THE FUCK!?"

I'm holding back the rant I want to make, but suffice it to say that i don't approve of fundamentalist bullshit or 'protecting' kids by telling them nothing, ever. This would be funny if it wasn't so sad. -k]

FOXNews.com - German Couple Finds Out Stork Isn't Real

The United States is good at two things. Being rich, and being rebellious.

The first is the product of two geographic accidents and one extremely intelligent decision.

We were close enough to Europe to provide an exciting, temperate, and vast destination for the bored and downtrodden of the 19th century, and yet far enough away to keep us from taking much more then a few bruises when the place collapsed on itself in the 20th.

The extremely intelligent decision was to keep the church out of government affairs. Thomas Jefferson accurately predicted that our southern, "priest ridden," neighbors would succumb to corrupt ineptitude for centuries.

We peaked about 1955. The space program, adjusted for inflation, made our present fiscally unilateral adventures in the middle east look like a minor expense.

We're still quite accustomed to being the richest people on the planet and few seem to be aware that we're in decline. If our military expenditures don't suck us dry the coming implosion of Social Security and Medicare certainly will.

In 40 years we're not going to be the richest anymore.

Neither cost should be underestimated. The domestic concern is now quite well documented. On the other hand, Islamic fundamentalism is an ancient, intractable hate that flourishes because it gives meaning to lives that have none.

Can we really replace that meaning with economic purpose? We can't even create economic purpose here at home.

The other thing, besides being rich, that Americans are good at is rebellion. Our culture is the space that exists between the dress codes of protestant piety and the cloud of pot smoke emanating from the local motorcycle bar. You are taught how to be, and they you are taught not to be it.

Our heros aren't the ones who worked together to solve the problem. They're the ones who stepped outside and succeeded. We don't care about the team. Only the star quarterback matters to us.

Americans are good at going off in a garage somewhere and doing something innovative on one's own. Rebellion is at the heart of that. Thats why the hacker scene was so edgy.

Thats the one hope we have that we can really build a future on once our geographic blessings are spent and everyone else gets an education.

And we're killing it. Between the outsourcing, and the attack on options, and the skittish contraction of meaningful technology investment, we're eliminating the dream that you can go out and work on the edges and be successful.

Sure, Steven Levy found people doing innovative things in Silicon Valley after the crash. There are those among us who don't care about taking risks because they could loose almost all of their net worth without having to change their lifestyles. They are bored and have nothing better to do then tinker. Are we really hanging the future of our economy on a few guys who are rich enough to create their own space programs for fun?

One in one hundred are successful and the more we scale this back the more good opportunities will slip through our fingers.

Today technology innovation consists of screwing up the DNS system. And its not just there. We've even forgotten how to make good music. Our endless co-option of the rebels has been too efficient. The rebels don't have anything more to say.

Taxes and Terrorism. Thats all I can see for years to come. And I'm sick of it already. We heading into a Japanese style socio-economic malaise.

Malaise