What if Death Is Not the End?

 

First, before we get to that topic, talk about flight 370.   The official word is now that the flight plan computer was tampered with and reprogrammed to send the plane on an altered course.  No random hijacker could have just broken in and ceased control of the levers and started taking the plane every which way.  In fact normally a flight is programmed in for auto pilot for example, even if there is some mechinical system failure, the plane would continue in its pre set flight plan.  So whoever did it had to be well versed in computer programming.  I want to talk about the radar.  I'm going to tell you everything I know about radar tracking planes in flight- - and please no jokes about "Well then, it must be a short lecture".   We know that radar can locate both the radial or "longitudinal" direction of a flight- - but also compute the distance by the delay in the signal send back factor, which would have to be measured in cintillas of a second.  Don't ask me how they have instruments that precise but they do.  If you triangulate a signal, meaning more than one signal source, then the distance and location of the craft be pinpointed with exactitude, because triamgulation at those high frequencies is very accurate.  You astronomers know about "apparent" or relative magnitude.  This is that a bright dot could either be a very large conductive object, or a pretty close one.  You have heard them say a plane's speed can only be gauged if the transponder is working but I read the tea leaves differently.  Now days they have doppler radar to tell you if the target is advancing or retreating.  Now if you get a negatori on the doppler- - you can conclude one of three things.  The plane is hovering perfectly stationery in mid air, which is unlikely.  Or the plane is on a ninety degree course to the right or to the left in a straight line.  Now assuming a zero doppler reading on the first signal- - - if you pick a source to the "right" by X miles- - and THAT signal picks up the plane 45 degrees to the left of the first signal- - you can obviously trangulate- - but if the doppler reading on THAT radar says the craft is approaching at 450 miles per hour, you can do a little fast trig calculation and divide that number by .707  (I know, another plug for Boeing) and come up with something in the six hundred miles per hour range- - and know the craft is flying exactly ninety degrees to the right on a line perpendicular to the first reading.  While altitude cannot be calculated, there are certain altitudes that can be ruled out.  In terms of the size of the craft for one- - a higher frequency bean will give you reduced RF or decibel power- - but increased exactitude as to picking the thing up at all and a higher frequency signal will pick out a much smaller speck of conductivity than a lower hertz signal will.  But you keep in mind the curviture of the earth - - too.  Because in addition to a higher frequency signal "fading out" due to sheer lack of RF power- - the curviture of the Earth comes up into play setting up tangentally generated triangular "wedges" of dead or dark zones where the craft can fly undetected.  Depending on the distance (always the same on this planet anyhow) you can acertain what altitude the plane is NOT flying Lower than or conversely if you Don't pick up a signal but you believe the plane is there- - you know the craft is not flying any Higher than it particular point on the triangular wedge.  You got it now?

I'm not happy to see the President of the United States being trashed daily by people like Sean Hannity.  But on the other place I too am and have been disgusted with President Obama's spineless behavior in so many areas.  He has an inflated oppinion of his own words and his own speeches.  He should know his believability factor is down near zero.  As you know Pete Richards one said to me "One strength the President has is delivering a good speech" to which I objected and said "If he were really that gifted of an oritor, his poll numbers wouldn't be so Low".   The president apparently has never played any game involving strategy be it checkers, poker or bridge.  Maybe he's so dumb he doesn't know a very elementary secret to not getting clobbered as a novice in Space Invaders.  He'd flunk out as a salesman.  He seemingly never learned how to (how can I put this delicately)  - - - Play People - - not necessarily in an evil sense but just prudent social skills where you put your finger in the air and test the winds- - the vibes.  Does the president know for example jury psychology in a court room (which shouldn't be necessary but it is)  Does he know how to time and pace himself and "peak" at the right moment?  Is this president able to listen to diverse input and balance it all and chose the course that not only will afford the must success playing the odds and "going with the tides of events" but also a course that doesn't involve a sheer "Selling out" of all of your most personally held values and precepts?   Maybe this is what Sean Hannity was driving at today.  Even at that, it is our job as American Citizens to uphold and support this President as we support the interests of the United States, which is a concept the Tea Party people seem to have completely forgotten.

To say that "Death is not the end" many people may call "old news".  But I'll tell you why you should take note, perhaps something you never even thought of.  Most people whether they realize it or not believe in a Soul Sleep theory after death.  For all practical purposes- - you'll "never see them again" while you live.  They can't contact you and you can't contact them.  Portions of the Bible say to even Attempt to contact them is Witchcraft or Necromancy or something horribly sinful like that.  The only "sensient beings out there" meaning "capable of interracting and responding" are either Angelic or Demonic beings, and only these to most people consider something other than Mortal, as all flash is considered Mortal and the Bible itself labels as Mortal- - meaning that life comes to an end.  People look for an "End of Days" or what they might call the "Beginning of Eternity" or the "Beginning of the Next World' or perhaps "Next Age" but it could be a hundred or a thousand or millions and millions of years off, and perhaps longer than that.  You needn't interrupt your smoking of a cigarette for fear of missing it- - - is my point.  People assume that Death is "the great reliever" and that without the mortal body- - there is no occasion remaining for imperfection or "Sin" and so many see death as "Salvation" even if they don't believe in the Cross.  I now maintain this is a misguided notion.  In the first place think about.  If your loved ones were alive- - - would they not want to contact you to assure you "Everything is All Right".  Especially if they were "Saved" and you were not, the only Christian thing to do, particularly for a loved one is to Reach Out and try to Save them.  But people like Neil of KFI say this never happens.  Whether the person who passed away was your best friend or your worst dreaded Enemy- - all communacation or direct knowledge about them Now - - directly - - - Ceases.  In the eyes of most people including most Christian.  It's as though their whole being "Ceases to exist".  It would be like vaporizing the Santa Monica mountains by some sort of UFO ray gun, leaving only flat ground, for example.  Can people have "issues with their Soul" not related to circumstance or the physical environment or their physical body?  I would say they can and do.  Hence- - - Corrupt Souls can and do exist "out there' in my oppinion.  There ARE certain realities like "Certain people are just Good - - and certain people are just Evil".   Let me give you an illustration of this.  One evangelist once said "When you get Saved and join the Church- - many people out there just do their same business on the other side of the street".  That is - - if you were passive agressive before- - you've be passive agressive in the church - - if you were manipulative and controling- -before- - you'll be that way now, just finding another way to express it.  People who are sex addicts- - just have to be a little more cleaver about it.  That's all.  People who were bullies before are bullies now, just using different "methodology to express their emotional needs".   People who were indecisive before will continue to be indecisive now.   People who were flakes before will continue to be flakes- - but now they have a whole set of new ways, perhaps even envoking God's name- - to cover their flakiness.  Personally I don't see how either the cross or the blood of Christ has a diddly doo to do with it.

In terms of Cosmic rock group origins - we continue with the "bird people" or Falcolns - which is the Federation name for them, we can expand this roster of groups and pip hits to a much larger figure than before.  For instance- -  Paul Anka is in this group - one of the most longstanding - - -and so is Bobby Rydel - - with the lone exception of "Sway With Me" with a back-story we've gone into before.  (The whole Bajoran thing)   Bobby Derin- - at least four radio hits- - starting with Dream Lover, of course, but also "Mack, the Knife" "Somewhere Accross the Sea" and "Artificial Flowers".  Frankie Avelon has always been aknoledged as in this group.  "Now It Begins" the first song to employ phase shift in the sound reproduction- - is another.  Of course we have the "Flamingos" and Johnny Mathas - - who may in fact be the proto type, being around the longest. However one artist I thought was on this list we can remove- - namely "Johnny Angel" by Shelly Frabes.  It so happens she, along with Paul Peterson of "She Can't Find Her Keys' fame- - are Aldeberan A's.   If you confuse that with "Aldeberan Eights" don't get bothered over it.  Aldeberan A's are located on Aldeberan VIII.  And by the way the Monkees are an Aldeberan "A" group too, for you slightly younger people like me.

Happy St Patrick's Day

First of all we mentioned that this Culture here in America is kind of a slave to religious idioms and what you might call a "common Christian heritage", which according to Glen Beck separates us from poorer less bless countries like Mexico, which according to Glen Beck, must not have this same Christian heritage.  (?) Glen Beck today began raving about the Constitution of the United States, as to the chief reason why there is more abject poverty in Mexico than in the United States.  Although someone like Rick Perry should be thrilled because real estate prices are much lower and "a person can find it much more economical to live there than er- - uh - - California - - oh I meant the United States.  I mean who cares if you're Rick Perry if there is no unemployment or welfare safety net and the crime rate is higher- - if you like Texas, then you should be in seventh heaven if you move to Mexico itself.  Huh?  But my point about Glen Beck was that he couldn't just leave it as "The Constitution" but had to bring in God Himself- - who is of course the being that actually Wrote the constitution, if you're Glen Beck.  [ I'm going to post this now and check it over after dinner to see if I screwed up anyplace.]  This idea that "Western Religion" or the "Judeo Christian Tradition" as conservatives refer to it is somehow anathama to "secular Greek philosophy" is of course nonesense.  Certainly Plato's allegory of the Cave figures heavily, particularly in the writings of Paul and John.  (George and Ringo have yet to be heard from)  Paul believed in a spirit realm filled with both good and bad spirits, and kind of considered the whole area too dangerous to mess with.    "Powers of the air" doesn't refer to birds but remember your Greek.  "Air" often translates as "spirit".  We also hear about the supposed "Holiness of Gowd-d!".Of course - - if you carried Pythagarean gnosticism- - a forebearer of Marcionism to its logical application- - the very idea of the approachability of God is itself an impossibility for mortal humans like ourselves to achieve- - with out the intervention of the miraculous anyhow.  The idea of "reproducing' God in any form or even of God attempting to reproduce Himself- - is anathama to these Pythagareans.   I only throw that word around because the branch of gnosticism I'm most fermiliar with is called this- - after the Greek Geometry guy.  Epicurianism is out.  Because this is basically pragmatism at all costs and "Whatever enhances a man's pleasure in life is good and right and should be pursued.  But then we come of course to Platonism and Socrates- - and the Idea of "The Idea" itself as a physical entity.  Which is to say that Ideas have an Existence not only equal to- - but Superior to this physical Universe.  This is an easy mental trap for psychics to fall into and assume that it's true without Proof.  It's an appealing notion to many because it presupposes that we are being as it were "Back-stopped' by a Divine power, and not left on our own.  It is my belief that feng chue strings- - - "engender ideas".  It as though certain strings are so pervaisive or suggestive of a certain idea- - that the notion of a certain Idea springing forth is almost inevitable.  This of course is just my oppinion.  

Last night at nine there was this new “Cosmos” show instead of “Family Guy”, which the previous week aired a half hour sooner anyhow.  We had “Snow White and Friends” or whatever it is now, what with Rumple Stillskin, and Queen Ragina, and now the flying monkeys from the Wizzard of Oz.   Anyhow the Cosmic show very adeptly explained how dogs evolved in just the past hundred thousand years or so from man’s days as a hunter and gatherer, where scavaging for food became lucrative, and dogs that wolves that were friendlier tword man, ended up living longer and then adopted physical characteristics such as “becoming cuter”.  Then they talked about the mutation of brown bear coats into white for polar bears that hunted on the snow and lived longer without being detected.   Here’s a thought that just occurred to me.  “Why don’t we see fossils of all these failed mutation and failures in evolution?  The answer is simple.  Only a very few Dead Animals gets to be a fissile- - and since there are so many MORE animals who survived and proliferated- - than died- - the odds steeply favor finding animals that were usefully evolved.  (Come on creationists- it makes sense)  At some point I dozed off- - and went to bed a few minutes to ten.  It was hot in here last night so I opened the window farther - - to cool off.

I listened to Breakfast with the Beatles and they said they were having one Beatle song and then one solo artist song.  They concluded with that “Flo and Eddie” song called “Keep her warm”, which is kind of an early Wings clone and was out maybe at the time of “Wild Life” and expressed concern about a lot of issues of the world, that we no longer seem to care about today.  It’s just not “cool” to be sensitive to the progressive issues such as violence or ecology, these days.   They played both “Give Ireland Back to the Irish” (Wings) and “The Luck of the Irish” (John and Yoco).   I thought that synthetic Wings song was "Dallas Romulan" but later I got notice that they refuted that.   Basically I can only think of six groups who are Dallas Romulan, these are James Taylor, Carley Simon,  Carol King, Neil Sadaka, Cat Stevens, and Seals and Croft.  This font shouldn't have changed and still stayed the same color but it did.  We could say that to be a Romulan in Ireland during that "three digit year" period- - was to be anti native Celtic.

We had our St Patrick’s Day party and I had to sit over at Jim’s table, where he used to sit.  Silva wasn’t there, and only this old lady was there besides me.  Since I had this grayish-green shirt on Sarah said I’d get some sort of snack prize.  Pat and Marcia sung a duet.  By far Marcia has the better of the two voices.  I’m thinking Marcia kind of reminds me of Dusty Springfield, if I had to classify her.  What the hell.  For the longest time I thought Dusty Springfield was Black, anyhow.  Joe Drisco claims he’s Irish by adoption or something. My guess is that the song “Danny Boy” is Scottish and not Irish, anyhow.   Of course someone suggested “My Bonnie”, which certainly is Scottish.  Songs ABOUT the Irish like “My wild Irish rose”, I don’t think would count anyhow, and it wasn’t sung.  We had green font in the previous file- - and very recently a green background file, so we’ve already “been there”.  We had turkey soup and corned beef and cabbage with a carrot slice or two.  We had iced chocolate cake and rainbow sherbet for desert.  In terms of cosmic news- - the latest blurb is that “Since I don’t have You” is not “Trumbolian” but it’s that “Falcoln” bird group- - that does these “dreamy” songs between 1959 and 1962.   Of course any other songs identified by me on this CD of about twenty songs- - remains opperative.  I left pretty much when I was done and didn’t hang around.  The decorations, of course, have been up for weeks.  I’ve been foraging for cigarettes.   

 Randy Rhodes or Ed Schultz - - somebody - - is saying maybe that flight 370 was remotely “hacked” and that the plane was being controlled by parties not even ON the flight.  That would be trippy.  My theory of course is that- - the whole flight was Shanghaied to some remote island where an air strip was secretly built, and maybe it’s part of some bizarre religious cult.  It's kind of strange that they haven't gotten to the bottom of this one in ten days with all of the advanced technology we have now.  Rush Limbaugh (I think) says the plane may have been shot down by Islamic terrorists using ground to air missiles.   Dr Levy as you know goes for the pilot suicide theory where two rogue pilots just drive the plane straight into the ocean with such intensity there would be no debris large enough to see remaining. 

 Rush Limbaugh talked at length about his cochlear implants today.  He got his left ear done with “twelve electrodes” but now has had to “turn off” six of them “because they make my face twitch”.  His speech comprehension has gone down from eighty percent to below fifty.  But he also says is there is ANY other room noise this severely cuts into his comprehension.  He said “The only music I actually hear as music are songs that I already know the tune to, because I can’t hear pitch”.  He also said that success in cochlear implants varies greatly from patient to patient.   Rush stressed that it’s important to get cochlear implants as soon as possible after you go deaf “or else the brain atrophies”.  But Rush is now going to have his right ear done but took a balance test first, which he passed.  He says basically he can only hear in conversation people who directly by his left ear.  He says even if he has his right ear done he won’t have stereoscopic hearing for reasons I don’t entirely understand.  But if his brain has atrophied eight years on that side, success is problematic anyhow.  Of course I know what you all are thinking.  It's been a lot longer than eight years - - more like twenty plus - - that Rush Limbaugh has had a dead or atrophied brain. 

Today I got up when that fire alarm thing kept going off before six.  I booted the computer and listened to Yardbirds Radio for a while such as “Good Morning Little School Girl”  (speeded up tempo), “Lazing on a Summer Afternoon” and “Well, Allright’ by Blind Faith.  I had Stephanie on and she and the whole gang were back, but not saying anything particularly interesting at any rate.  However Stephanie and the gang reported a strong earthquake, and I kept waiting seconds to see if the shock wave would reach here.  Apparently this area was the ONLY place that did NOT feel the earthquake at all.  My theory about this (short of divine shielding) is the interplay of sizemic waves against softer and firmer soil patterns causing what they call in acoustics "localized dead or cold zones".   (?)  It was a 4.7 downgraded to a 4.4.  I went down early for my medication.  We had oatmeal and I got a second bowl, perhaps by accident.  Owen had taken to staking up the bowls and perhaps the guy thought I hadn’t been served, or he was just being nice.  We had scrambled eggs, and toast and jelly, and hashed browns.  I wore this muted green shirt rather than the bright, striped one.  I had more of Stephanie on.  Bill got a new pack of cigarettes today, luckily for me.  President Obama gave a speech on TV.   He announced increased sanctions after yesterday’s bogus election result in the Crimean peninsula.  There was also talk about freezing the assets of rich Russians with money in this country, and the NATO community will be backing up our policies.  China voted neither for nor against us.  

"You Didn't Listen Again" -Geddy Lee

One of the lines in "Boot to the Head" is the phrase "Politicians who can't think", which is rhymed with "The waiter who forgot my drink".   On one of the programs on "The Patriot " station around here, KEIB,  the idea that a number of these "horror stories" about health care are just completely made up.  And apparently Harry Reid cited one of these from the Senate floor last week.   This is where a lot of people get mentally very lazy and it comes under the general category of "Answer the question", in court.   What happened was that Harry Reid was attacked as a liar on a completely different issue- - on whether or not there was a ten year period where Romney paid no federal income taxes.  The answer to this question can't be known because Romney only submitted two years (of his own choosing) of his income taxes, and not the twelve years the Obama campaign wanted.  So there is just no way of knowing whether Romney did or didn't.   Interestingly these progagonists of- - the Hannity show I think - - had no clips of Senator Reid to play - - we take their word for it but MISSED in the whole exchange - - is that the charge against these "professional victims" wasn't even dealt with.  In legal lingo it's called "An unrefuted statement".    These people don't know how to read a report.  For instance they don't know the difference between the number of prospective Workers- - and the number of Jobs.  And they will tell you that an Obama executive order will cose two and a half million Jobs, when the statement was that two and a half prospective employees- - - will no longer be counted as part of the labor market because now the Obama order has freed them up from the sword of damacles of "losing your health care if your hours are cut" and they are free to invest some of the freed up time in educational and vocational self improvement.   And by the way should FOX news - - say that a "Popular vote of the people" is PROOF that the Soviets were justified in invading Crimea- - you say "NO".   I don't care is 100.0% of the people, a clean sweep- - voted for incorporation- - it was an ILLEGAL ELECTION under ANY circumstances under International and UN Law.   If you could just vote yourself out of a country after all, they never would have needed to have fought the Civil War.  Because Jeff Davis could just wave an election tally in front of President Buchanon   (I could make a joke about that too but I'll restrain myself) and say "Mister Buchannon - - here is the document that has just freed the South from "Northern supression" or whatever they call it.   But the thing is people are so adeled if not downright crippled in their ability to think clearly- - arriving at such obvious conclusions in this paragraph is a real "mental challenge" for them. 

Well Dr Levy did it again.  I should have known.  He convened class and didn’t even wait for eight o clock to roll around.  I said to him “You really seem to prefer coming on Sundays, don’t you”.  He said “I don’t come on Sundays; I come on Saturdays”.  In point of fact in the past six weeks since his return from a long hiatus,  I have documented no less than four of those times he’s come Sunday morning- - - and one of the two other weeks hasn’t been positively confirmed.   I don’t see why people deny things.   Obviously it’s the worst conceivable time of the week he could come, and today’s attendance showed that because it was poorer than I’ve seen it in a long time.  People are probably at Church.   They said that 95% of the people who voted to join Russia, which is strange because only about sixty percent of the people are in fact Russian.  But with all of those Soviet tanks trolling the streets, the intimidation factor is formidable.   People got to “check in” in somewhat more detail.  Joe loves his book on Surrealism.   Arleen has pink eye just like I’m getting over.  Mickey’s parents live in Garden Grove, and he used to be a house painter.  He talked about “hearing the voices”.  I asked Mickey "I've heard you say that before but just what is going on in your mind when it happens?"  Strangely - - nobody even CARES to ASK a question like that, which puzzles me.  Which brings me to this stuff Dr Levy likes in terms of poetry.  He likes poetry by mental patients the way he “ideally expects a mental patient to act”.  But were I to submit poetry that normal people qualified as poetry with rhyme and meter- - and better yet I employed to express an actual VALUE that I have- - somehow I don't feel this class would even care.   To them it's more like Twitter.  The object seems to be to yap and yap about absolutely nothing - and from that moment on you never have to think again.  So what you get like from Gail’s poetry is a rather scitzophrenic approach- - not the illness- - but it’s as though there are two “selves” talking.  I’ve never known how, for example, how born again Christians do it speaking of their old selves as though it were a different person and they’re nothing like that now.   Like there will be two lines of some doubt- - and then they jump into this other “person” and psychoanalyze the first few lines they wrote.  I think that genuine poetry from psychotic people would be fascinating to read, but you’re never going to get that with Dr Levy.  It’s always the theme of “Why can’t people understand the fact I have a mental illness and accept me for that?” which demonstrates a level of introspection a real mental patient would never have.  I asked Dr Levy if he was interested in any of my stuff and he pretty much said “No to everything”.    I made the statement “Actually I’d like toget some employment around here for maybe five dollars an hour”  (of half the new minimum wage rate) to which I was told “You’re dreaming!  It would be five dollars a WEEK - - if you’re lucky”.   Now, I could write about how I feel about hearing THAT.  I could write about for instance, ways to improve the way this place is run.  I could talk about “how I got here” to begin with”.  I could talk about my letter on economics to Tim yesterday.  I could talk about Putin.  I mention stuff I had done recently playing both sides of the evolution question - - pro and con.  I mentioned that paragraph on the Historical Jesus, I think is really good.  And I mentioned the metaphysics of- - things like Cause and Effect and their relation to each other.  Dr Levy didn’t want to have any of it.  Rather- - he would have me scrap everything I’m interested in- - and write about “How I hope to improve myself and my plans for the next five years”.   It’s hard to conceive of a more stupid topic to write about.  Just like the bracket predictions above, anything I say will most likely be laughable in five years anyhow.  I din’t FEEL like writing about that.  I have nothing to SAY in that area.  And maybe I’m too elementary but I believe that if you have nothing to say or contribute, then keep silent.   But Dr Levy’s mind works in patronizing ways.  It’s like people say to me “Oh you have great potential” in terms of some pie in the sky goal they suggest way off in the future.  But if you ask this same person “Will you halp and support me now in THIS thing I want to do right NOW?” they will offer a million excuses not to.    It’s like some art teacher on the Simpsons or some comedy- - they praise to the skies all the crap they see their students doing, but get someone with actual talent- - they will either ignore it- - or fine some anally fixated technicality to criticize it over.  It’s like Dr Levy wants to be known as “Do you see how supportive I am at helping mental patients- - I even support this kind of crap” but don’t have the sheer decency to inform the students “Perhaps THIS is not your area of talent”.  But once again Dr Levy said he’d be here next Saturday.  You know CS Lewis had this saying in the Screwtape Letters.  He said “The future is the LEAST real thing about yourself.  Either the PAST or preferably right NOW is far preferable”.    But Dr Levy is so inherently shallow- - and is like a broken record that I have long since tired of.  But he did give me two dollars for cigarettes, for which I am grateful and wasn’t even particularly expecting.

First of all in a word - yes.  I agree with the video - all of it.  President Obama has been horrible on consumer issues- - and the conservatives may not admit it - - but President Obama has probably been the most pro rich business president we've ever had.  His picks for sensitive economic posts have been nightmarish.  And the Clintons were just about as bad.  Clinton was pro NAFTA at a time where it was just me and Ross Perot who were strongly against NAFTA.  Now you have this rather stealth Trans Pacific Trade agreement that the President is trying to "fast track" through congress below the media radar screen.  Ed Schulz has commented at length on this.  I usually listen on WCPT in Media player nine to twelve weekdays.  In terms of Hillary - - people like Randy Rhodes were beating the drum for Obama saying this election is a done deal as far back as late February of 2008 before Hillary's campaign even got into high gear and began winning elections, as well as bettering Obama in any face to face debate.  But the dirtly little secret of course was that Me - - and all the liberals who vote on call in show polls- - consistently voted for John Edwards as our pick and the best choice for those concerned about the common man.   Unfortunately after that Edwards met his political demise- - which to this day I still have mixed feelings about.  But Clinton also got that Media reform act through of 1996 which pretty much shot the idea of broadcasting in the "Public Interest' idea all to hell.  That's when the nightly network news really began going down hill in this orgy of info-tainment news.   Krystal photographs well, I'll say that.  I bagged a photo of her off of Print Screen and saved it.   And if I were the Republicans I'd be making more that all ofr this stockmarket deboccle we had in 2008 traces right back to the late Clinton administration when he feld prowd he was now "able to work with the Republicans".   Bad idea.  Personally I favor Joe Byden, although whether it's Byden or Hillary- - it could be we'll have the next President a little "crusty around the edges" - - getting older.  I've been a fan of Joe Byden since the days of the Justice Bork, and the Clarence Thomas hearings of 1987 and 1991 respectively.  Byden has always protrayed himself as for the common working man.  I am less than enchanted with the "public image" of Elizabeth Warren, though I confessed I haven't heard that many of her speeches.  In terms of President Obama himself- - I like his two most recent executive orders.  One was in saying that people who worked a fourty hour week had the option of leaving their jobs- - without fear of losing their health care.  And the other just a day or two ago saying that people actually go back to getting Time and a Half for overtime.  This obviously will encourages business to hire on new workers, which they should have been doing all along these past five years.  But these two acts won't undo the damage - - in a lot of areas such as privacy- - where Obama has fallen down on the job.  George Washington's blog explained the Federal Reserve moras to me (better than Judy did) and I have a glimmer now of how the very rich could prosper so much getting 95% of the economic gains- - and yet not having inflation or stimulus either.  Obama has pursued kind of a "Milton Friedman supply side" view of the Federal Reserve- - which is really a pipe dream for people like Rush Limbaugh and the Koch Brothers.  They don't know what a good thing they've got going - - or maybe they do. 

In terms of this whole Putin thing- - unfortunately it's a case of "the boy who crief wolf".  We are told about "weapons of mass destruction" in Iraq and how wonderful it would be if democracy came to Iraq, when even people like Pat Buchannon agree that our overall national security if Less Stable now - - - fore the war ever started, and oil prices are sure a hell of a lot higher, if THAT was the goal.   The sickest thing about this almost love affair cerftain people on the Ultra Right have about Putin is "Well, he's trying to restore a pre Bolshivock Riussia - - with the Russian Orthodox Church reigning supreme- - and it fits in with the anti gay hysteria that has swept Russia.   These people on FOX news never tire of saying how masterful and macho Putin is- - and what a loser President Obama is.  It's sick.  Now John Kerry is making speech after speech outlining America's goals and values, and nobody - - at least on FOX news- - is listening to him. 

I wanted to talk a little about Power Point.  Yesterday I waded into it deeper than I ever had before and actually saved a file.  You actually can do slide presentations in Google Photo just fine if you're so inclined, and they make it easy to swap out the order of slides, if you're so inclined, and also can start and stop anywhere along the sequence, if you don't want to begin at the beginning.  Like Power Point, it does slides full screen and automatically timed, or a mouse click- - your option.   However in Power Point you can do quite a number of things.  Of course they give you "insertions" from anywhere you want including 'shapes" and even WordPerfect Letter Art.  You can import Excel charts or these "power organization diagrams" or clip art.  (these "bits" Microsoft thinks you should like)  But then there are the extra goodies I've always been aware of such as transition sound effects, and transition visual effects.  Some of the menus are hard to either find or remember where they were once you see them.  The drawing menu button- - isn't even ON the screen unless you do something.  Some of the "sound" options- - you have to click on the Sound File once you have alreaedy imported it to get that "dialog box" where you have start and stop times or coverage over how many frames.  One glitch that can occur- - if you opt for not manual mouse click- - sometimes if SOUND is playing - - the video will freeze untill THAT particular file has completed.  You can fix this in the "play accross slides" option but THAT is in a different Sound menu you click on the sound icon.  You have the option of not using sound already in the file by start and stop mouse clicks.  Also there is animation of shapes, and my only other experiance with these is a different program called Power Bullet- - which still plays in Firefox.  But I can't do any NEW files there because the basic program of that was never transfered over, just like Visual Basic  (not QBASIC but a different one) was never transferred over from the other computer.  Of course narrorating slides is a prominent option but what I'm unclear on is - - can you while you're narrorating- - controle when you see the next slide with a mouse click and will the program record THAT kind of like the old Windows 3.1 macros?  OK this is getting long so I'll wrap it up now.