October 28, 2010

Now that Favre is injured, here’s the new Vikings starting quarterback, Gavin Russell:

October 25, 2010

It’s a cool day in the neighborhood. First snow in SLC:

October 21, 2010

Top Corporations are helping the U.S. Chamber of Commerce  influence election campaigns. Prudential Financial sent in a $2 million donation last year as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce launched a national advertising campaign to weaken the historic re-write of the nation's financial regulations.  Dow Chemical delivered $1.7 million to the chamber last year as the group took a leading role in aggressively fighting proposed new rules to tighten security requirements on chemical facilities. And Goldman Sachs, Chevron Texaco, and Aegon, a multinational insurance company based in the Netherlands, donated more than $8 million in recent years to a chamber foundation seeking to limit the ability of trial lawyers to sue businesses. These large donations, none of which were publicly disclosed by the chamber, offer a glimpse of the chamber's money-raising efforts, which it has ramped up recently in an orchestrated campaign to become one of the most well-financed critics of the Obama administration and an influential player in this fall's Congressional elections. And, since the activist judges on the Supreme Court have made it legal for corporations to give as much as they want, money rules! Is this a great country, or what?

October 6, 2010

                       Ah, but what can we take along
into that other realm? Not the art of looking,
which is learned so slowly, and nothing that happened here. Nothing.
The sufferings, then. And, above all, the heaviness,
and the long experience of love...

                                                            Rainer Maria Rilke
                                                            "The Ninth Elegy"

October 4, 2010

 
            Josh and Sarah two years!

October 3, 2010

In a qualitative escalation, the Obama administration has for the first time used the “war on terror” against socialists in the United States. On September 24, the FBI conducted a series of coordinated early-morning raids at homes and offices in Minneapolis, Chicago, Michigan, and North Carolina. The political police seized computers, passports, books, documents, cell phones, photos, financial records, diaries, maps, and other materials. In one case, children’s artwork was confiscated. The warrants were issued under a 1996 statute signed into law by President Clinton making it a crime for U.S. citizens to provide “material assistance” to any organization designated by the government as “terrorist.” The raids centered on members of the Freedom Road Socialist Organization (Fightback). The warrant for one of those targeted, Michael Kelly, authorized seizure of materials related to “Kelly’s travel to and from and presence and activities in Minnesota, and other foreign [sic] countries to which Kelly has traveled as part of his work in FRSO; Kelly’s ability to pay for his own travel from the United States to Palestine and Colombia, and for travel within the United States from 2000 until present, including all materials related to Kelly’s personal finances and finances of the Freedom Road Socialist Organization (“FRSO”). When one of those targeted didn’t open the door fast enough to suit the FBI thugs, they smashed the door down so violently it flew across the room and broke an aquarium. The designation of any group as “terrorist” by the State Department is completely arbitrary, made without public explanation and without any recourse by any U.S. citizen. In the past the African National Congress, the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Irish Sein Fein were so designated, and then un-designated when that suited the U.S.  “Providing material assistance” is also a completely arbitrary term and can be interpreted in any way the government wants. The nine robed reactionaries of the U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled that merely talking to designated groups equals providing material support, in a case where pacifists wanted to persuade such groups to adopt non-violence. Those whose homes were raided have been active in many groups, including the Twin Cities [Minneapolis and St, Paul] Antiwar Committee, whose offices also were raided. This committee participated in a national antiwar conference in July, attended by 800 activists, which formed the United National Antiwar Committee and called for antiwar demonstrations next spring. Some of those targeted helped organize demonstrations at the Republican national convention in 2008 in Saint Paul, and were among many arrested in a police riot against the demonstrators. Charges were later dropped, but these new attacks give the authorities another bite at the apple. By targeting socialists, the Obama administration hopes to intimidate wider circles. Tom Burke, one of those whose home was raided, said, “The goal of these raids is to harass and try to intimidate the movement against U.S. wars and occupations, and those who oppose U.S. support for repressive regimes. They are designed to suppress dissent and free speech, to divide the antiwar movement, and pave the way for more U.S. military intervention in the Middle East and Latin America.” Things are just getting better and better. Guess I won’t be wearing my Obama t-shirts any time soon.

September 22-30, 2010

Drove out to Rockford, Illinois for the annual John Whitmer Historical Association conference. Had a good drive out and really enjoyed the conference. Met some great people, connected with a good friend, and learned interesting things.

Then drove up to Stillwater (no, not Backwater), Minnesota to visit my son and family, and meet my new grandson. When I drove up, Josh came out and gave me a hug, which meant a lot to me. It was really nice to see him.  I went in and met Gavin. I loved holding him and watching him move about and unintentionally headbutt things now and then. He’s beautiful and advanced physically and intellectually for his age. He’s very interested in what’s going on around him. He loved it when I walked around the back yard with him. We got along well, and I loved being able to hold him and get to know him a little. The whole time, I was enjoying holding Gavin and talking to them and just being together. They have made a great life together. It’s hard work having a new child with both of them working, but they are doing a great job. Here’s a brief video of Gavin and Josh:

And another of Gavin:

The trip was absolutely great for the things it was intended for, the conference and especially seeing Josh and Gavin. Really glad I did it.

September 17, 2010

A planet orbiting a star causes a slight disturbance in the star’s rotation, the effect of the gravitational tug between the star and the planet. Astronomers have been studying the wobbling of stars for a couple of decades, in hopes of finding a planet outside our solar system (exoplanet) that might offer the possibility of sustaining human life. Now, after 11 years of searching with specialized instruments in Chile and Hawaii, a team of American astronomers has announced in the Astrophysical Journal that it has found the first likely candidate. The planet is called Gliese 581g after its sun, Gliese 581, a red dwarf vastly dimmer than our sun and about 20 light-years from Earth. Potentially habitable does not mean Earthlike. It means that Gliese 581g is the right distance from its sun to be in the habitable zone, able to sustain liquid water and with enough gravity to retain an atmosphere. Gliese 581g orbits its sun in a bit more than 36 days and is almost certainly tidally locked, meaning the same side of the planet always faces the sun. That probably means wide extremes in temperature and a permanent twilight zone between night and day where the climates are more moderate. What makes this discovery so important is that it happened so early in the search for exoplanets and after examining only a tiny sample of small candidate stars as close to Earth as Gliese 581. In the paper reporting their discovery, the astronomers discuss the probable implications with carefully calibrated language that still doesn’t hide their excitement. “If the local stellar neighborhood,” they write, “is a representative sample of the galaxy as a whole, our Milky Way could be teeming with potentially habitable planets.” Way cool.