Is The Pen/Brush Mightier Than The Keyboard?

Weekend Edition Sunday had an interview with author Philip Hensher and his love of the pen.  He wrote out his book, The Last Art of Handwriting, in longhand and talked about the intimacy people have with their writing instruments.

As I listened to the interview I was reminded of last week's lecture/class with Chinese calligraphist Harrison Xinshi Tu  at UAA presented by the Confucius Institute.     He too talked about the importance, in China, of four items:

the brush
the paper
the ink
the chop

You can see them all in the video below.  As he draws an artistic character and signs it and applies the chop. 

He pointed out they'd been used for 6000 years and still today calligraphy is done with the same materials as then. 






After going through the four elements needed, he then showed us the evolution of Chinese characters by drawing half a dozen or so and showing them changing over the years millennia.

The first three you should be able to figure out.  Basic parts of nature.  So is the fourth.  Stop and think about it a bit.  Actually, you shouldn't think, just relax and let it come to you.

OK, did you get the sun?  And if you didn't get the moon, it's probably hopeless.  Then mountains.  Then river.  Then man.  That's hard, but he's looking to the left with an arm hanging down  The last one is tree.  As Mr. Tu explained, the bottom half is the roots and the top half, the branches.  This row was what characters looked like 5,000-6,000 years ago.  About when the world started according to some of our science challenged fellow citizens.   Next is the chart after he completed it.  You can see how the characters got modified.  The second-to-the-last row are modern, simplified characters - the kind they use in China today.  Below that are the artistic versions of the characters. 

So going across, we have the sun, the moon, mountain, river (actually the modern character is the one for water), man, tree, sheep and fish.    On the far right top are two trees - a forest.  In the box on the right are two hands, which together mean friend.  the character in the lower right is 'you' (pronounced 'yo') or friend.

After he made the chart, he took it down and showed us how to make the six main strokes in Chinese characters.  Then we got a paper with the strokes and how to make them and some paper, a brush, and ink.

And then we made the basic strokes.

Here's one of my classmates from the Confucius Institute (at UAA) Chinese class, practicing the basic strokes.


So, between the two events - the NPR interview with Philip Hensher and the Calligraphy demonstration, I've been thinking about how the keyboard has taken me away from the pen.  There is something more satisfying about holding a pen and not just writing, but consciously creating the letters, beautifully, on the page.  The pen as an extension of my finger, flowing out words.  Words that spill my thoughts onto the paper.

But some of that happens at the keyboard, but my physical connection to the shape and size and heaviness or lightness of the line is gone.  The clues about who I am that Kensher says the handwriting leaves, that personal touch, is missing.  Every letter is so ruthlessly perfect.

Of course, like with most things, the answer, if there is an answer, is to find some balance, and nowadays, for many of us, we are far too heavily tilted to the keyboard.  Maybe I should hand write out some posts, take pictures, and post them.  But images are not readable online to those who can't see well and have to use software that converts the writing to voice. 

There's a part of me that never takes anything for granted.  Perhaps it's the legacy of my parents' world in Germany collapsing and having to flee to the US.  Everything but what  they were able to take with them was gone.  In any case, there's always this part of me that assumes all I have could disappear.  If a Sandy happened to me, it wouldn't be totally unexpected.  And so part of me has never totally trusted all the miracles of the electronic age.  When the electricity goes off, it's the tools of our ancestors that will get us through.  I have no confidence that my grandchildren will ever see this blog unless I make hard copies of it.  And then the video and links will be gone, but something will be left.

And there are others that are concerned about the lost skill of writing.  The SAT's have    added a handwritten essay.  From a 2005 Seattle Times article, 

An estimated 300,000 high-school students across the nation took the new SAT yesterday for the first time. The College Board revised the exam after being faced with the threat of major institutions dropping it as a requirement. The most sweeping change is a new writing section — 35 minutes of multiple-choice questions and the 25-minute essay.

The reverberations were felt yesterday on the third floor of the W Hotel in downtown Seattle, as well. More than 50 Puget Sound-area grade-school teachers were learning how to teach their students handwriting, a skill that some may have thought the computer keyboard rendered obsolete. Some elementary schools no longer teach cursive.

"They stopped training teachers how to teach handwriting in most colleges and universities about 25 years ago," said Jan Olsen, an occupational therapist who developed a handwriting curriculum a decade ago. "But instead of putting something reasonable in place, they just dropped it," she said.

A 2010 NY Times article says, though that only 15% of students choose the handwritten essay.  One professor is quoted:

Richard S. Christen, a professor of education at the University of Portland in Oregon, said, practically, cursive can easily be replaced with printed handwriting or word processing. But he worries that students will lose an artistic skill.

“These kids are losing time where they create beauty every day,” Professor Christen said. “But it’s hard for me to make a practical argument for it. I’m not one who’s mourning it because of that; I’m mourning the beauty, the aesthetics.”

 And when you look at the calligraphy video, you'll see Mr. Tu quickly drawing an artistic character.




 All the electronic devices are fine, IF we don't lose our connection to nature and the natural tools that humans have always used and the skills to use them.  Have you hand written a letter lately?   

AIFF 2012: Take Saturday Morning Tour to Iran, India (Calcutta), and France

You can book a package tour to many exotic places around the world. For $2500 - $20,000 plus airfare, you will be shown the sights of anywhere in the world. Or, for $8, you can go to the Alaska Experience Theater at 11 am and go on four intimate trips - about 20 minutes each. And remember, exotic just means some place you've never been. After all, most people in the world think that Alaska is exotic.

Really, these four films will take you on adventures that are much better than staying home cleaning the bathroom or wasting even more time on the internet. (Don't deny it.  After all, you're here.  Justify your time here by going to a movie.) And when the program is done there's still time to see if the ski trails are decent enough to use. And unlike the many package tours that will cost you thousands of dollars, this short tour will take you inside the lives of people you would never meet on a tour.

SATURDAY, DEC. 1, 2012  

11AM  

ALASKA EXPERIENCE THEATER, 4th&C

The tour goes again on SUNDAY DEC. 9, 2012 11:15 AM.  Same location.  


 Mossadegh

First the tour will take you to Iran, 1959. If you saw Argo, you saw a brief overview of the CIA overthrow of the first democratically elected leader in Iran - Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh. Six years later, under house arrest, he's ill. An American doctor comes to care for him. Is this his assassin? Directed by a USC film student of Iranian descent, the film offers an immigrant's view of the events. And Voice of America has a couple of interviews, broadcast in Farsi (I assume) about the film.  Check their website.

Calcutta Taxi

Next go wildly through Calcutta trying to find the taxi that went off with your luggage.  (The trailer hints this is just a metaphor for seeking much bigger things.)  Oh yes, there are demonstrations going on at the same time.  I can't find too much about this one.  It looks like the film maker is an Indian-Canadian.  Based on the trailer, you'll definitely go places you'd never go as a tourist.  To get ready, here's a deleted scene they have on the website of a street vendor making Indian cha.   India with no visa and no shots.

Naagahaan, Zinat… (Suddenly, Zinat…)

Back to Iran.  Today.  The Anchorage audience will feel at home in Teheran as the camera briefly catches the snow covered mountains surrounding Iran's capital.  I think most people will also be suprised at how much the Iranian middle class life compares to ours, at least in terms of consumer goods.  Not as ostentatious, but not so different.  A poor drug addict visits a middle class mother to claim the baby she gave up for adoption seven or eight years ago.  This film was made, from what I can tell, in Iran, by Iranians.  Americans should see more films from Iran so they can realize we have way more in common than not.  There's an interview with the film maker here and the whole fim itself is posted. 

Lapse

Finally, we head to Paris.  A thriller it looks like.  You can see Gilles Guerraz, the film maker's, pitch (with English subtitles) at what appears to be a French version of Kickstarter.  The trailer shows a beautiful woman disappearing around corners and into alleys and a man who doesn't remember something important, except that he has a feeling for this woman he keeps seeing.



When was the last time you got to Teheran?  Or Calcutta?  Or Paris?  (I think Lapse was shot in Paris, but that's just a guess.)  Well, do them all next Saturday (Dec. 1)  morning at 11 am at the Alaska Experience Theater.  The whole package for just $8.  There's a second tour a week later Sunday, Dec. 8. 

Here's the Film Festival link to this group of films titled "Native Tongue."   Yes, it's true, if you don't speak Farsi or French or Bengali you'll have to read subtitles, though the first two have some English spoken.  It's the price you have to pay to see grown up films that weren't made in the US.  (Well, the first one was. All this categorization gets confusing.)

AIFF 2012: Mormon Missionaries Fall In Love, or . . .

"East High student returns to Anchorage as an actor in Anchorage International Film Festival film, or . . ."

"Sometimes Skype really sucks."

These were all potential titles for this post.  

I got an email from Harold Phillips saying he was in "The Falls" which would be showing at the Anchorage International Film Festival  

Tuesday Dec. 4 at the Bear Tooth at 8pm

and he and one of the two main characters would be coming to the festival if I was interested in talking to them.

Local Boy Returns Triumphant is a great story line.  So we arranged to do a Skype interview.

Bad Skype connection

This was one of the worst skype connections I can remember.   Here's a screenshot.  This wasn't even the worst part.  The audio kept going in and out.  We tried recalling several times with only marginal improvements. 





They even moved to another room, which was a little better, but the audio and video were not synched making conversation difficult. 


Harold Phillips, one of the actors (not one of the two missionaries), moved to Anchorage when his father was transferred to Ft. Rich.  He's a 1989 East High grad and when his father was transferred away, he liked Anchorage enough that he decided to stay on his own,  spending two years in the UAA Theater Department  before going off to finish his degree in Bellingham, Washington.  He eventually ended up in Portland, following a woman, whom he eventually married.

While he does some part time work, he sees himself as an actor and gets most of his income through acting.  He hasn’t been to Anchorage in five years and is looking foward to the trip and to seeing friends and spending some time over at the Theater Arts building at UAA the day after the Tuesday night screening. 



Jon Garcia graduated from film school at Portland State University in 2009.  He was already working on this film at the time.  When I asked him what parts of film making he liked the most and least, he quickly responded, “I like the writing.”  He actually started out as a singer/songwriter and got involved in a movie, and one thing led to another.  He really couldn’t think of any part he didn’t like.  The film was made on a tiny budget - $7,000 I think for the filming and then some more for post production work which took him two years. 


This is a movie about two Mormon missionaries on a mission in Eastern Oregon who fall in love, with each other.  Jon’s not Mormon.  And the Mormon setting just sort of happened as he was working on the script.  It wasn't what he started out to do.  He spent about six months intensively researching the Mormon church, including talks with some gay ex-Mormons whose stories provided some of the scenes in the movie.

 The video  improved a bit in another room, but not the audio

He’s hoping Anchorage Mormons come to the showing.  He and Harold emphasized that it was not offensive.  Mormons who have seen the film have told them that, and that it rings true.  Though in a YouTube interview he says that people have pointed out some things that wouldn’t have happened - like someone working without a partner.  That, he said, had more to do with lack of funds for another actor.

Of course, anyone can be offended by something that seems innocuous to others.   I understood that most of the Mormons who’ve attended showings of the film were lapsed Mormons including some who discovered their sexuality in their missions like the two main characters.  That group, apparently, have given Jon lots of positive feedback.  I’m sure for many devout Mormons, having this subject matter in a movie, no matter how well intentioned, will be offensive.

On the other hand, I also understand that lots of Mormons have gone to see the Broadway musical, "The Book of Mormon" and The Salt Lake Tribune's headline on its review was

'Book of Mormon' musical called surprisingly sweet

They acknoweldged that

"Many believers — especially older viewers or those easily offended — would see it as a blasphemous assault on scriptures . . .

"[b]ut the satire and tone were not as hostile as many Mormons feared . . .

 "I was expecting to be offended," said Anne Christensen, a 22-year-old LDS New Yorker, "but was pleasantly surprised by how incredibly sweet it was."

"Her mother, Janet Christensen, added: "It's not G-rated, but they treated us with affection. And they did their homework."

After watching the trailer for "The Falls", seeing a 20 minute YouTube interview with director Jon Garcia, and talking to him and Harold tonight via Skype, I suspect they've gone for the sweet too, but without the South Park sarcasm and profanity. (The Broadway musical was done by the folks who bring you South Park.)

So Anchorage Mormons should feel ok about attending "The Falls" here Tuesday, Dec. 6.[4]  [That's only a week from Tuesday.] Since it's part of the film festival's Gayla program, the gay community is likely to be there too.  It would be cool to have a discussion of the film afterward with the two different groups represented in the audience.  It's not an easy topic for many, but one that Anchorage folk across different political persuasions need to discuss. 

And East High grads - one of your alumni is in the film and will be there.  So you might want to cheer him.  Not sure the UAA theater students will have much time as they get ready to finals that week, but think of it as a good study break. 

Harold is definitely planning to be here.  Unfortunately the actor who was originally planning to come can't do it.  So now Jon is trying to get here as well, so there should be discussion with the film maker(s) after the showing.

People who know Mormons might want to let them know about the film. 

Here's the trailer.



The Falls trailer 2 from Jon Garcia on Vimeo.

Note, this film was invited to be the feature for the Gayla program and is not in competition.  

Oh &%$#!!!!!!!!!!!! - Gout or Fascia Trouble?

It started to hurt yesterday while walking around the house.  The instep seemed to be the ringleader.  J wondered if it could be gout - which I've had in the toes, but never here.  I looked up gout and instep.

Gout is an extremely painful inflammation of the joints caused by a buildup of needle-sharp uric-acid crystals.

The big toe is the most common target, but gout can attack the feet, ankles, knees, and hands as well.   (From Health.com)

 Feet.  So it was possible, so I took one of my gout pills before dinner.   I get an attack so infrequently that while I know shrimp and beer are foods to avoid, I don't have the whole list in my head.

Looking it up now, I see some problems from yesterday:

Foods with the highest purine content include liver, organ, and game meats, sardines, mussels, anchovies, herring, and beer.
Foods with moderate levels of purine include red meats, chicken, fish, asparagus, mushrooms, peas, beans, lentils, cauliflower, and spinach. (from webmd)

 Choosing meats to eat is very tricky when you're on a restricted gout diet. In general, white meat is a better choice than red meat. However, there are some exceptions. Beef and pork are slightly less dangerous than turkey, goose or lamb, for example, while chicken and duck tend to be the safest choices meat-wise. (from Sympton Find)

I did eat the turkey liver in the morning.  And about six asparagus at dinner. And dark meat is my favorite.

I posted all these foods two years ago here.  The old list includes oatmeal which I eat most mornings.  I have avoided beer and shrimp  - which clearly preceded an attack once - and I've had no symptoms eating other foods that are forbidden - mushrooms, other seafood, like samon. 

This morning, when I got up, the pain was excruciating (see picture of my foot above) when I stepped on it.  It was bearable lying in bed doing nothing.  I took another gout pill and called the doctor.  My doctor of 30 years retired this past summer.  He was the doctor I could email from anywhere and I'd get a quick terse reply about what he thought and what to do.  I'd been thinking I should visit his replacement before I needed to. Just because I'm used to knowing my doctor.   Well, she wasn't in and the doctor I saw wasn't sure it was gout.  Sounded more like fascia problem to him, but not sure how that would have happened.

Under your skin, encasing your body and webbing its way through your insides like spider webs, is fascia. Fascia is made up primarily of densely packed collagen fibers that create a full body system of sheets, chords and bags that wrap, divide and permeate every one of your muscles, bones, nerves, blood vessels and organs. Every bit of you is encased in it. You're protected by fascia, connected by fascia and kept in taut human shape by fascia.  (From Runners' World)

Pain and tenderness associated with planter fascia strains are usually felt on the bottom of the foot between the heel and the base of the toes. Plantar fascia pain may be increased or decreased by stretching of the arch. In mild cases of plantar fasciitis, the pain will decrease as the soft tissues of the foot "warm up," however, pain may increase as use of the foot increases. In more severe cases of plantar fasciitis, pain may increase when the arch is stressed. Often the sufferer of plantar fasciitis will feel pain in the morning until the plantar fascia warms up. Foot pain at night may be a sign of plantar fasciitis as well as other possible problems. (from Medicine Net)

It does hurt when I stretch my toes up and down.  But I haven't done anything to strain my foot lately.  In fact I've been pissed about my lack of exercise since I banged my ribs two weeks ago after my bike tire hit some ice, shortly before I hit the ice. 

 Meanwhile I'm not a happy camper.  Though either the colchicine or the pain killer is starting to deaden the pain a bit.  Foot problems like these make me grateful that my body works as well as it does. (I did give thanks for that yesterday.)  And make me more tolerant of those whose bodies give them more trouble and more willing to share my surplus mobility with those who don't have as much.   

Thanksgiving Lemmings

This is a map of planes in real time over the United States at 6:30pm Wednesday night Alaska time.  You can check this site yourself at flightradar.   Most of these people - I'm guessing all of these planes are pretty full - have suffered TSA to be with family for Thanksgiving.

It would be nice to have our kids here and my mom, but I wouldn't want to subject any of them to a Thanksgiving weekend flying experience.

Here's Southcentral Alaska - Anchorage , Matsu, Kenai, and Prince William Sound - about the same time.  When you zoom into a smaller area the planes aren't so crowded together.  At flightradar you can put your cursor on any plane and it shows you the airline and flight number.  Then, if you double click on the id, it gives you lots more information.  I didn't do that when I got the original screen shot, but I just did another EVA plane that was just leaving Anchorage and here's what I got:

EVA638

© Timo Jäger [CGN-Spotter]

• Airline: Eva Air
• Flight: BR638
• From: Anchorage, Ted Stevens (ANC)
• To: New York, John F Kennedy (JFK)
• Aircraft: Boeing 747-45EF (SCD) (B744)
• Reg: B-16483
• Altitude: 27800 ft (8473 m)
• Speed: 480 kt (889 km/h, 552 mph)
• Track: 90°
• Hex: 8990C2
• Squawk: 0
• Pos: 61.2999 / -147.769
• Radar: T-F5M
• Cockpit View
• 
  

Cockpit view would be cool, but it says I need a Google Earth plug in.  I have Google Earth, but it's not working with the flightrader site.  I wonder if it is really a cockpit view or a Google Earth view from where they are.   Google Earth is showing Anchorage dressed for summer.  So is flightradar for that matter.



I've got enough things in my life pulling my attention in different directions, and I never quite understood how it would make my life better, so I've not signed up for Twitter.  But every now and then I do end up there and try to figure out how it's supposed to make my life better.

And I found a picture of the airtraffic map here.   Then I tried to figure out where it came from, since I didn't see a link to the source or any source.  I tried to embed the whole tweet, but all it gave me was his text.  I can cut and paste that myself:

Andrew Kaczynski ‏@BuzzFeedAndrew

This is insane. The number of planes currently in the air for holiday travel. pic.twitter.com/WEYOgIv4

Anonymous: Robin Hood of the Information Age or Looming Tyrant?

Is Anonymous a modern Robin Hood stealing information from the rich and giving it to the poor?  [Let me warn you, this is going to be a think-as-I-write post.  Somewhat rambling, raising questions without many answers.]

Or should we be concerned about Anonymous' certainty in their judgment about who deserves to be punished and their willingness to exact that punishment?

Is it ok as long as they reveal government and corporate coverups?  If they temporarily shut down computers at naughty corporate entities as a warning like a parent punishes a child?

Where is the line they shouldn't cross and who will stop them when they do?

Is this civil disobedience or is it like self appointed militia groups who take it on themselves to punish people illegally crossing into the USA?

Are these reckless adolescents (behavior, not age is the criterion here) experimenting with their power?  Why would we come down harder on these folks whose goal, at least now, is openness, than we do on those who experiment with new forms of financial instruments, who experiment with sending troops and weapons into countries across the globe?  The difference is that Anonymous are outsiders shooting their arrows at the those with power.  The reckless businesses whose experiments destroy the earth or feed us harmful chemicals to make a profit are inside the power club.  The insiders are far more powerful and dangerous and one could argue that Anonymous is merely trying to expose that danger.  But what will happen when Anonymous gets inside the power ring? 

The other day I posted a video tape from Anonymous warning Karl Rove that it was watching his computers.  Then after the election Anonymous posted a letter saying they had aborted an attempt by Rove to steal the election by tampering with the Ohio voting machines.  I'm waiting to see how long the mainstream media wait before picking up the story.


Are they trying to find ways to confirm the reports?  Are they waiting for bloggers to do their leg work?   Essentially the evidence I've seen includes how the 2004 Ohio election mysteriously switched from a Kerry lead at 11:13pm after a minute long computer crash into a Bush lead; that there was a similar crash around 11:13pm this year in Ohio;  and Rove's on air meltdown when FOX decided to call Ohio for Obama.  The explanation, supplied by the Anonymous letter is that Rove's operatives couldn't steal the election this time because they (Anonymous) had set up a firewall with a new password.

A Thom Hartmann video in a link I posted added Carl Unger's Boss Rove account of the 2004 Ohio election events to strengthen the evidence.  I got an email today linking an article by Thom Hartman and Sam Sack that puts that evidence in written form and a little more cleanly. 


While looking for the Anonymous video I posted, I also saw there were a lot of other Anonymous videos.  Like this one addressed to Pedophiles.  Its language caught my attention.  I understand that if there is one cause that most people would unite against, it's probably pedophiles.  But let's look at some of the language in the video.

"Pedophiles, we will come for you.  We will find you.
We will shut down your websites and kick you out.
You are not welcome here and we have had enough of you.
Leave our children alone and  and while you are at it  leave the rest of the planet alone.

This is not a threat, this is a promise.
We will hunt you down and exterminate you like cockroaches.
You are the lowest form of life on this planet and it is time for you to be extinguished.
We are the ones that will do this task."

It was the cockroach line that caught my attention.  Why?  This Daily Kos post criticizing Rush Limbaugh for calling President Obama and liberals 'cockroaches" explains:

In 1993-94, Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines was a Rwandan radio station which appealed to the Hutu population, with its combination of bawdy humor, popular Zairean music and racist propaganda against the Tutsi. "It frequently referred to Tutsis as "cockroaches" (example: "You [Tutsis] are cockroaches! We will kill you!"). The station was especially popular among young people, who made up the majority of the Interahamwe militia, which carried out the slaughter. Once the massacres started, RTLM radio actually broadcast the location of groups of fleeing Tutsis, so that the Interahamwe could track them down and machete them.

Repeatedly, announcers at RTLM referred to the Tutsi "cockroaches," reducing them to creatures less than human, disgusting and disease-ridden vermin. "A cockroach gives birth to a cockroach... the history of Rwanda shows us clearly that a Tutsi always stays exactly the same, that he has never changed." Human Beings are hard to kill, hard to hate, hard to eliminate, but the "Invenzi" were Tutsi cockroaches, and needed to be stepped on and crushed. Their elimination from the Earth would actually be a service to humanity.

[As an aside, just as gays don't choose to be gay, I suspect that pedophiles don't choose little children as their sexual turn on.  Are they really cockroaches or are they the victims of whatever programmed their sexual desires?  I can hear everyone saying, but they should never act on those desires.  Of course they shouldn't.  But who amongst you could keep such a pledge?  That's not to say that pedophiles should be allowed to fulfill their desires, but perhaps there's a more humane way to keep them away from their sexual prey.  Just raising a train of thought here.  I don't know the answers, but I think we need new questions on this topic.]


As I looked at the different YouTube videos available that were billed as messages from Anonymous I wondered how one could tell if a video was really from Anonymous or not.  Or is that the point of Anonymous?  It wouldn't seem to hard to just use an old Anonymous video - the visuals are mostly the same - and learn how to imitate the Anonymous voice.  There's probably an App to make you sound like Anonymous.

I did notice that they all say at the end of each video:

We are anonymous.
We are legion.  
We do not forgive.
We do not forget.  

Expect Us.

My New Testament knowledge is pretty sketchy so I had to look up "We are legion' to find out what exactly it meant.  Most definitions say it means "we are everyone."  But apparently there are many interpretations, such as this one from Religion-Online:

One evident slap at Roman rule in Mark is the story of Jesus healing the demoniac that no one had the strength to subdue. Jesus asks the man’s unclean spirit for its name. "My name is Legion; for we are many," replies the man, using the Latin word for a large unit of Roman troops. The demons beg Jesus not to send them out of the country, but instead into a herd of swine; when he obliges, they promptly rush down a steep bank into the sea. Horsley believes the symbolism is unmistakable: Jesus takes control of the Roman forces who have brutalized people and foretells the army’s demise.

Others emphasize the demonic nature of Legion.

 So, we have Anonymous as Robin Hood, as Rwandan mass murderers, and as a crazy man in a biblical reference.  Probably none of them and maybe all of them are potentially accurate.

Going in a totally different direction, it's been a while since I first realized that  the Second Amendment was anachronistic and if people wanted to fight against a corrupt government, success would be through computer hacking, not through guns.  Anonymous seems to make this case well.

And perhaps we should consider a constitutional amendment to protect people's rights to computers and access to the internet.

In any case, hacking has the potential for serious abuse as well as good. 

And to the extent that Anonymous has major victories, what will stop evil imitators from using their hacking skills for evil?  If the allegations that Rove stole the Ohio vote count, (a big if, that I need more evidence for, but which I don't dismiss either), then it's already happened.

But even more troubling is the thought of what happens to people who gain power and begin to think they are omniscient?  And start picking more cockroach targets? Not just pedophiles?   Targets we might not so readily agree with.  Say iPhone users. 



Spinning out the Anonymous idea even further, what happens if others get inspired to go after organizations they feel are evil?  The Anonymous for Life folks take down Planned Parenthood's website and publish the names of everyone who has gotten abortions from them?  Ford wipes out Toyota's data bases.  UCLA erases every USC sports victory and every USC diploma from the records.  If the US and/or Israel can hack into Iran's nuclear power plants, why can't someone get into power plant computer systems anywhere and shut them down?

Is there a limited number of people capable of carrying off such activities?   And of those with the skills, what percent are prone to use them for evil?  I suspect that the absolute number of people who could potentially pull a lethal computer hack off is pretty big. 


In my mind, civil society works because people voluntarily cooperate.  They cooperate because society allows them enough of what they need that they have a vested interest in keeping things working.  So the way to prevent crimes is to create societies where everyone has a good chance of a decent life.  We can never prevent the stray psychopaths or discontented oddball, but we should be striving for societies where the most people possible have a good chance for a good life.  That's not the direction the US has been headed lately.

I'm for as much information equality as possible.  Too much secrecy, in my mind, is far more dangerous than too much exposure.  To the extent that Anonymous has exposed secrets that never should have been secret, that's good.  To the extent that they might fulfill their Superhero fantasies by stopping the theft of elections, that's probably ok.  But power has a tendency to corrupt.  Some who gain this kind of power, realize how dangerous it is and back off.  But others begin to believe they deserve their power and that they know better than everyone else.

Let's see, do I have any evidence for that?  I believe it to be true, but it falls more in the opinion based on personal experience than on hard evidence.  And I'd come down pretty hard on people's personal experience that comes to conclusions I don't hold.  So, I guess I'm just spinning out ideas here as I ponder the future of Anonymous and their hactivities. 



 There's even a documentary on Anonymous called "We Are Legion:  The Hacktivists". 
You can watch it and decide for yourself.  This is called the old version.  Wired discusses the release of the film and changes from one version to another.

Alaska Native Republican Shootout Supporter Loses in Southeast Election

[UPDATE Nov. 21:  The final tally had Kreiss-Tomkins ahead by 32.   KCAW reported that Thomas, when asked if he'd ask for a recount, replied

“I’m not going to say because I want the suspense to lay there. The guy was such an a–hole,” he said. “You know, he lied on so many things and he was supposed to run a clean campaign and he didn’t. So I’m just going to wait.”
Thomas also didn’t hesitate to make his feelings known about the results of the election.
“The district just committed hara-kiri,” he said. “They just didn’t realize what they had as far as seniority and leadership position.”

Not a lot of class, I'm afraid.  But I'd wager that he'll ask for the recount.  He's still in the free recount zone.]


Bill Thomas, the Republican representative from Haines,  seems to have lost reelection by 28 votes.  Democrat Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins of Sitka is now ahead with 100% of the votes counted.   Thomas can request a recount.



From the Division of Elections website:

HOUSE DISTRICT 34
		Total
Number of Precincts		15
Precincts Reporting		15	100.0%
Times Counted		8398/13964	60.1%
Total Votes		8207
Kreiss-Tomkins, Jona	DEM	4110	50.08%
Thomas, William A. "	REP	4082	49.74
Write-in Votes		15	0.18%

 Recount?

According to BallotPedia  (They make things easier to find than the Alaska statutes):

There are no automatic recount provisions in Alaska election law, except in the event of a tie vote for two or more candidates for the same office for which there is to be elected only one candidate. A recount may be requested by a defeated candidate or ten voters within a particular precinct or state house district. Recount requests must made by filing an application with the elections director within five days of the state review of the votes . . .

If the difference between the number of votes cast was 20 or less or was less than 0.5% of the total number of votes cast for the two candidates for a contested office, the state bears the cost of the recount.  Otherwise the application for recount must include a deposit of $300 per precinct, $750 per state house district, and $10,000 for a state recount request.

The difference was more than 20 votes, but less than 0.5% (which would be 40 votes if there was a total of 8000) so he wouldn't have to pay for the recount.  He has nothing to lose by asking for a recount. 


Thomas and the Shootout

It may be fitting that we learn this the week of the Great Alaska Shootout, because Rep. Thomas put money into the budget to subsidize rural Alaskans' flights to Anchorage to attend the basketball tournament.

KTUU reported in June:

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — The University of Alaska Anchorage says more than 1,500 people could receive free plane tickets in November -- funded by an appropriation from the state’s capital budget -- from 18 Alaska cities to Anchorage with the purchase of tickets to the 35th annual Great Alaska Shootout. House Finance Committee co-chair Rep. Bill Stoltze’s (R-Chugiak) office confirmed the source of the funds Friday afternoon.

The committee’s other co-chair, Rep. Bill Thomas (R-Haines), pushed for the $2.5 million appropriation to UAA. He said the money was meant to keep the Shootout alive, but didn’t come with restrictions on what UAA could do with it.

Dermot Cole had a blistering editorial on this, also last June, in the Fairbanks News Miner.


Loss of Minority Legislators Due To Redistricting

If this vote count holds, it would make the second Southeast Alaska Native to lose after this redistricting. Also, the legislature's only black member, Senator Bettye Davis lost after her district was gerrymandered to take away her base constituents and add much more conservative and white Eagle River into her district.

Meanwhile, Richard Mauer at the ADN has reported that the attorney who represented the parties challenging redistricting has a new filing in to prevent the current redistricting map, which was a temporary fix so there would be something in place for the 2012 elections, from becoming permanent.

In his filing with the Supreme Court, Walleri said his evidence shows the 2012 redistricting plan "resulted in the destruction of the Senate bipartisan coalition, and the racial gerrymandering in HD 38 greatly contributed to achieving that result." Wallari is a Democrat who has represented Native groups in past redistricting battles in Alaska.

Read more here: http://www.adn.com/2012/11/13/2691904/fairbanks-lawyer-accuses-board.html#storylink=cpy

The impact of the redistricting on minority legislators was a topic I've been wanting to write about, but I've been swamped with other things.  I'll try to get to it before too long.  

Extraordinary Financial Gifts

“What the president’s campaign did was focus on certain members of his base coalition, give them extraordinary financial gifts from the government, and then work very aggressively to turn them out to vote,” Romney said during a call with campaign donors Wednesday.

The Los Angeles Times reports that Republicans are distancing themselves from Romney's comment.  Here's a prime example: 

“We as a Republican Party have to campaign for every single vote. If we want people to like us, we have to like them first. And you don’t start to like people by insulting them and saying their votes were bought. We are an aspirational party,” Jindal said.

OK, but not dissing most of the population is only one reason to pull back from this comment. But whose supporters get the most extraordinary financial gifts?

More likely the Republicans don't want people to start talking about the much more direct and lucrative financial benefits they send their supporters.  After all, corporations would not be meeting their legal obligations to their shareholders if their political contributions weren't investments to increase their corporations' future income. 

And political investments seem to be remarkably efficient and lucrative for those who are skilled at it. 

The gap between the top 1% and everyone else hasn't been this bad since the Roaring Twenties

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/15-charts-about-wealth-and-inequality-in-america-2010-4?op=1#ixzz2Chg6Ktk3

The gap between the top 1% and everyone else hasn't been this bad since the Roaring Twenties

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/15-charts-about-wealth-and-inequality-in-america-2010-4?op=1#ixzz2Chg6Ktk3

The Project on Government Oversight (POGO) reports on Pentagon Contractors, – Lockheed Martin, Boeing, General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman, and Raytheon:

• The average worker in the U.S. earned $45,230 last year. These CEOs were paid more in an average day than the average American worker was paid all of last year.
• According to a 2011 Congressional Budget Office analysis, the median compensation (including basic pay, allowances for food and housing, and tax advantages) for enlisted U.S. military personnel with ten years of experience was about $64,000. Thus, the Pentagon could afford to pay the salary of 335 soldiers with the money from just one top defense contractor’s compensation package.
• The CEOs of these top Pentagon contractors are also making significantly more than their own workers. According to a Deloitte study, the average wage (just salary, not benefits) for the entire aerospace and defense industry in 2010 was $80,175. For the price of one CEO then, these firms could pay the salary of 268 defense and aerospace industry workers.
• Even compared to other CEOs these Pentagon executives are making an enormous amount of money. An Associated Press study of S&P 500 CEO’s (i.e. the largest publicly traded companies) found that the typical CEO received $9.6 million in total compensation last year. Thus, the top Pentagon contractors could afford two CEOs with the compensation they’re using to pay their current CEOs.

These five CEOs weren’t even the highest paid heads of Pentagon contractors. That honor goes to David Cote, the CEO of Honeywell, whose $35.7 million compensation package made him the sixth highest paid CEO in the U.S. last year, according to the Associated Press study.

Now these companies know enough that they have to give to both parties, but they seem, over time, to give more to that party that seems to think that military power is the best way to lead the world and got us into the Iraq war.  The chart below from Open Secrets
shows political contributions by defense contractors:

Screen shot from Open Secrets

And the accumulated effects of Republican tax policies and deregulation have resulted in the greatest wealth disparity in over half a century.  (And they couldn't have done this without the cooperation of Democrats.)

Business Insider offers 15 charts in "15 mindblowing facts about income wealth and distribution in America" starting with one titled,

"The gap between the top 1% and everyone else hasn't been this great since the Roaring Twenties."

The other 14 charts are of interest too.

And, by the way, if Obama was trying to help the 99%, and minorities in particular, maybe that was good policy.

The Washington Post shows us that minorities were hurt from Bush policies way more than whites in the recession:

Between 2005 and 2009, the median net worth of Hispanic households dropped by 66 percent and that of black households fell by 53 percent, according to the report. In contrast, the median net worth of white households dropped by only 16 percent.

The median net worth of a white family now stands at 20 times that of a black family and 18 times that of a Hispanic family — roughly twice the gap that existed before the recession and the biggest gap since data began being collected in 1984.

So, yeah, I think Republicans, probably are acting rationally, finally, when they start distancing themselves from Romney's remarks.   Oh, that last line of Jindal's "We are an aspirational party."  I don't think you're there yet.  Success used to be much easier for white males because of the all the extra barriers non-white folks and women faced.  While many still exist, many have come down and now white males have to work harder to get what they used to get coasting.  And I suspect that's behind a lot of Republican anger.  See this Jon Stewart riff on O'Reilly and Goldberg complaining about losing traditional America. 

November Shadows

It's barely a month before the winter solstice and the Anchorage sky doesn't get very far up the southern horizon these days.

The shadows are stretched out.

Unless the shadow surface is very close to and parallel to the original.







And the bare branches of the tree are softened seen as shadows through the shades.

Annonymous Warned Karl Rove Two Weeks Before

OK, if Anonymous could monitor Karl Rove's communication system, they can back date a videotape on YouTube.  But, for what it's worth, as we are learning about Anonymous' letter saying they stopped Rove from stealing Ohio on election night, here's the video they say they posted two weeks before.

Rove shouldn't have been so surprised when FOX was ready to call Ohio for Obama if he had heeded, or even seen, the warning.



[UPDATE Nov 18 10am: Sorry, I was working on a project with someone and took a break and posted this,  then went back to the project, so I didn't realize that blogger ate the link to the video.]

OK, if conservatives say that progressives are gullible to believe this, they'd be right. There's just about the same combination of fact and fantasy that FOX news uses all the time. But what I see Progressives saying on the internet, is not "Yes! This happened," but rather, "If this really happened . . ." The video says that Anonymous will turn over all their evidence to the proper authorities so Rove can be convicted. Well, let's just wait and see what comes next. But maybe someone should confiscate Rove's passport in the meantime. Just a precaution, not nearly as harsh as putting people in Guantanamo for years because they were at the wrong place at the wrong time.