Saturday, March 7, 2009

DYING WITH DIGNITY

Not until I read this article in BBC News did I realize that assisted suicide was decriminalized in Switzerland. I learned about it on this video clip of a couple who chose Dignitas. As with all procedures not universally accepted, usually for religious reasons or those afraid of 'slippery slopes', not everyone is in favor. Unfortunately there are those who claim to being pro-life, who want to take control of the life of totally, mentally competent people who wish to no longer live their life of pain, no hope of getting any better and knowing they are in a terminal illness which will only get more debilitating and painful. While those same pro-lifers seem to give no care for the quality of life or pain level for the person inhabiting that body, they have found legal means of taking over decisions from the inhabitant of the body and make decisions prohibiting the owner giving life up for it.

Today, euthanasia is legal in the USA in Oregon and Washington State. It is also legal in Belgium, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Luxembourg, Albania and more recently, Switzerland. It is rumored that kindly physicians may occasionally help the last few hours speed up for near-death patients but nothing has been documented for obvious legal reasons. We all know what happened to Dr. Kevorkian for his humanitarian attempts.

It would seem that religion is the greatest impetus in keeping the laws from legalizing euthanasia. One wonders, in a presumably secular society (which we have thought our government to be.... should wish to be free of religion interfering with laws)why we have remained so backward in rendering a humanitarian service when requested and, more pressingly, begged for by some desperate individuals. Those who have tried to fight for the right to die through courts have usually suffered until their death in the manner they were fighting to avoid; their natural, painful death.

Perhaps the United States has too long allowed itself to be governed by religious zealots rather than people who truly have compassion for human suffering and the desire to control their own bodies. In our rush to allow freedom of religion, many of us have lost our own freedom to someone else's religion.

Friday, March 6, 2009

HORSES WERE TRAINED 1000 YEARS OLDER THAN PREVIOUSLY THOUGHT

A BBC article says much about horse domestication than I had ever known before.

Horses tamed earlier than thought
Dr Outram working at the research site
The site has only recently been opened to researchers

"Horses were domesticated much earlier than previously thought, according to a team of researchers.

They found evidence suggesting that the animals were used by a culture in northern Kazakhstan 5,500 years ago.

Until now, the earliest evidence of horse riding was metal parts from harnesses dating from the Bronze Age.

Writing in Science, a team from Exeter University, UK, suggested that the community in Kazakhstan rode their horses 1,000 years earlier.

They also ate them and drank their milk, possibly as an alcoholic brew.

The researchers traced the origins of horse domestication to the Botai culture of Kazakhstan.

Analysis of ancient bones showed that the horses were a similar shape to domesticated horses from the Bronze Age.

The team studied the remains for evidence of damage to their mouths and teeth caused by the riding bits used to harness the animals.

The scientists also analysed the remains of food and drink in pottery and traces of horse meat and milk.
Horse milking
Communities in Kazakhstan have been milking horses for thousands of years

Horse milk is still drunk in Kazakhstan, usually fermented into an alcoholic drink known as koumiss.

Lead researcher Dr Alan Outram from Exeter University, said horse domestication was an important indication of the state of human civilisation.

"The domestication of the horse does have implications for human culture globally," he said.

"It increases people's ability to trade and it has great advantages in warfare.

"So if we are moving the origins of horse domestication much further back, we are going to have to think about the impact on the development of human culture at the time."

Some researchers associate the domestication of the horse with the spread of bronze working across Eurasia thousands of years ago.

It may also be linked to the ancient expansion of the Indo-European languages - a widespread language group which today includes English, German, Hindi and Persian."

Thursday, March 5, 2009

IF YOU CAN'T WIN AN ELECTION, TRY TO MAKE THE ONE WHO WON, LOSE THE COUNTRY'S GOALS TO PUT OUT SILLY LITTLE FIRES YOU'VE SET

Why should I be surprised at the media, Michael Steele/Rush Limbaugh and the rest of the bad-loser neocons of CPAC are grown-ups acting like spoiled little children. Is there no respect for the Presidency any longer...is that the level to which GW has brought us? Has the grandiosity of the thrice married Limbaugh. who claims to be of family values; this drug addicted loudmouth who lies too readily to capture his audience, entertainer that he is, who dare to pretend that the President has nothing more important to do than debate him on his turf, on a radio station? Why does the media even spread it around?

Now Rush Limbaugh is trying to get Michael Steele out of his job. Lawrence O'Donnell was one of the soundest minds commenting on the whole infantile issue. He made it clear that Rush Limbaugh is not trying to make anything out of the Republican party, he is only looking out for himself and loving every minute of the publicity which seems to be bringing his ratings up. One of the mistakes the media is currently making is to allow every weirdo to speak their opinions even when it is clear they are as daft, outside reality as Michelle Bachman, Representative from one of those frozen north states, the temperature of which seems to have frozen her brain cells.

The news seems to be filled by all the losers, who are inept, inappropriate for the positions they were voted to fill, politicians...unfortunately, at this time, mostly Republicans. For a party that wants to come back, they need to get some of the A team up front though it doesn't look like there are too many suitable and electable candidates within the party for that spot.

What is stopping the loud mouths from seeing that Obama's priorities are not the little blips that stupid politicians insist on putting in his way...like those who sneaked earmarks into the bill. I'd love to see (if anyone had the time to check) which party politicians put most of them in.

Most shocking to me is McCain's treatment of Obama, criticism, continued negative campaigning, poor sportsmanship and teamwork for the good of all, when Obama has reached across the partisan aisle to be courteous and as cooperative as he can be.

I am reminded of the lawyer, Joseph Welch, in the McCarthy era who looked at McCarthy who had insinuated that one Fred Fischer, a young lawyer at Hale & Dorr, harbored communist sympathies. He said, "Until this moment, senator, I think I never gauged your cruelty or recklessness....Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?" McCarthy was undoubtedly psychotically paranoid....what excuse can we give today's indecent, bordering on treasonous bad actors who put themselves on the political stage though they hold no current office like Limbaugh, DeLay, Santoro and others who boldly state they hope that Obama's policies fail. Do they not see that if those fail, the country will also fail? They do not have a better plan, only that they wish to continue the failures thrust on us by the Bush administration's incompetence for so long.

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

GLOBAL WARMING : WHAT WILL IT TAKE FOR SOME PEOPLE TO BE CONVINCED IT IS REAL?

Climate 'hitting Europe's birds'
Climate change is already having an impact on European bird species, according to British scientists.

"Details of the study by an international team of researchers have been published in the journal Plos One.

Some birds are expected to do well as temperatures rise, but these are in the minority, the researchers write.

"Overall, the trend is towards net loss," said a spokesman for the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB), which contributed to the study.

The researchers found birds that are expected to do well as temperatures rise had indeed increased in number since the 1980s.

But some 75% of species studied by the researchers had declined in the same period.

The study compared the change in population numbers of bird species over the last two decades with the projected change in their ranges and found a strong link.

These shifts in species territory are thought to be associated with climate change.

Of the 122 species included in the study (out of 526 species which nest in Europe), 30 are projected to increase their range, while the remaining 92 species are anticipated to experience a contraction in their territory.

The scientists developed a measure, which they call the climate change indicator, to describe how changes in temperature are affecting species.

Rising temperatures are likely to have a positive effect on some species, said co-author Dr Stephen Willis, from Durham University. This means some birds are likely to extend their ranges north.

That means some mainland species could colonise the British Isles if they continue to respond to climatic warming in the way the models predict, and in the absence of other barriers such as the ability to disperse and the lack of suitable habitat.

These potential colonists include the great reed warbler, the subalpine warbler and the bee-eater.

One UK species, the Scottish crossbill, could face extinction, the RSPB warned. The crossbill's range is already restricted to the Caledonian pine forests of Scotland.

"We need to redouble our efforts," said the RSPB spokesman, "for a G8 nation to lose a species is shameful."

The spokesman said preserving pine forests could be crucial to the survival of the crossbill.

The study was the work of researchers from Durham University, Cambridge University, the RSPB, the European Bird Census Council, the Czech Society for Ornithology, the French National Museum of Natural History and Statistics Netherlands. "


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Since most people don't measure the ocean temperatures on a daily basis, or track glacier melting, or the concrete signs that prove that the earth is gradually warming, http://www.virginia.edu/uvatoday/newsRelease.php?id=6758 to grasp the concept when they see snow in Atlanta, a northern winter sub-zero temperatures. If they would stop talking long enough to listen to how global warming is really manifesting itself, people might start to understand that it is not a Yeti roaming around waiting to be found; it is not something that will happen tomorrow, it is a gradual process that is being hastened to a degree that is ominous by the material misuse by modern man.

Mendenhall Glacier in 1973 from YouTube.



Monday, March 2, 2009

NEW ENGLAND WEATHER

Mark Twain said, "If you don't like New England weather, wait a minute...it will change." We are noted for a lot of snow in the winter but I don't recall having a snow storm that starts in Atlanta! The storm lines are as clear as they are in tornadoes. A town five miles away may get several more inches of snow.

Today has stayed in the mid and low 20's. It has snowed lightly, heavily, and we have had freezing rain. The phone company has apologized for having some difficulties, the airlines have halted flights, schools are closed and most of us are just hunkered down watching through windows in our heated houses if we are not so unfortunate as to have to go out. The picture on the left is a neighbor's house across the street. The berm that the street plows throw up is more than visible and this is all after everything got cleaned up. Now imagine it also full of freezing rain and you might get a feel of the problems it raises. The mound in the lawn was getting down during the warm days we had but is piled up a bit again. I think he is ingenious, the way he throws it all in the middle of the lawn so he can plow a path to his workroom behind the house and all his equipment (satellite stuff, etc).

The worst is cleaning off cars when
they are iced over. Believe me, that is pure ice under that fluffy looking snow and the temperature remains in the mid-twenties. Oh well, as the song goes, Spring Will Be a Little Late This Year!

Sunday, March 1, 2009

WHEN YOUR HASTE AND POOR JUDGMENT FAILS YOUR COMPUTER

Using computers is yet another thing there to make me feel totally inadequate. I bought my first computer 30 years ago. I currently have four working ones and use them all. a lot. However, there is quirky reason that viruses get into my head, as well as the computer, so all the rules I have been taught escape me, like today. Just as one does the elimination diet for allergies, so should new software be put on your computer...one thing at a time, to make sure you know which one is fouling it up, since one is plotting to do that.

Well, I did the unpardonable. As is my wont, I'd save time and download a bunch of Mozilla Firefox add-ons then see which ones I wanted to keep. Naturally, one of them locked up my browser so that I could not get anything but a list of add-ons when I tried to reach my home page on Firefox or tried any URL. None of the uninstall or disable characters would highlight or work. The evil spirit had changed all the defaults. After groveling on the phone to my computer guru friend, I tried a few more suggestions before ending up uninstalling then reinstalling Firefox. Fortunately I had the handy, dandy Foxmarks add-on which kept my bookmarks on its server and synchronized them onto a second computer. All were there in a neat file; I just can't find a way to get them back onto my Firefox. My friend, who looks at detail far more than I ever take the time to do, spotted that when you click on Firefox on 'all programs', it offers to open in a 'safe' mode. That allows you to uninstall the culprits, if you can find them. Checking on which didn't destroy another computer, I was able to assure that a few add-ons were safe, at least.

My sanity has been saved by having a backup computer for the inevitable, when one goes crazy on me. One time all three separate backups of the same thing gave out simultaneously and it wasn't even a Friday the 13th! I figure I could spend all my time, save for when I need to brush my teeth, backing up to protect hours of work and data. Having participated in chats and email , I'm now also in Facebook...wondering how I will ever manage yet another learning curve. When did I ever find time to raise a few kids, work all those jobs, have all those hobbies and just live? It was clearly before computers invaded my life. My intuitiveness is limited to people, not computers. I know there are people who still don't have cable TV or a computer and seem to exist...whether happily or not is lost on me. They will never know the joy of instant gratification by Google. They will never enjoy not having to go to a Mall. The hours that can be saved by a computer are lost just as the joy of having pets is sometimes lost to the hours at the Vet's office, paying the bills, vacuuming up fur and hair, cleaning cat litter, washing rugs after an accident from either end of the pet, repairing the furniture that is clawed or chewed. Listening to my friends with pets I have learned to appreciate that computers, like plants, die quietly and emit no bad odors.

My computers take as much maintenance as my body, house, and plants take together. I run a firewall, anti-virus protector, spybot remover, registry and other cleaner and, with all that, I try to remember to back up the important things. Nevertheless, with all the precautions I use, every once and a while I get bitten and spend an evening like this one, restoring my browser back to a reincarnation of what it had been just a few hours before. I ran out of profanity, aged markedly, and all for what? It was so that I could bore you with the details. It is not an altruistic warning of things to protect you, it is a simple rant although you would be wise to save yourself time and download as little as you can, letting your greedy self stay locked in the past. 'If you got along without it for so long, you probably don't need it now' is probably not a bad motto to follow, I have learned with much pain and waste of time.

WHOM DO WE BELIEVE IN TODAY'S WORLD OF GLOBAL INFORMATION

Meanwhile, many newspapers began to publish versions of their issues. Many of us loved this. No longer a soggy paper thrown under one of the cars or out where you had to get dressed to fetch it. You can just pop the 'on' button of your computer and get English versions of many of the best newspapers of the world as well as newspapers from all over our own country.

There was a time when you could trust a newspaper as being reasonably factual, knowing that three sources had to be checked before a story was published. When that began to erode as a standard, it only got worse as the Internet and other sources helped diminish the paper's subscribers to the point that ad money began to fall. As with all slippery slopes, when the money got tighter and tighter, the good reporters, who were higher paid, often got let go, taking with them integrity of the news being printed. It is not unlike the manufacturing company that fired workers until there was no longer enough product being made to carry the overhead and pay of the executives. We are seeing that in too many places today. Sometimes it's not the torso that is let go, it is the brain...as in academic institutions when the effective Deans and Professors feel they have to move on as the working ethos is no longer acceptable.


But now, there is no longer any governing principle and people are getting an overload of information and misinformation. Remembering that half the people are below average, many remain unable to sort out what to believe. YouTube, blogs, AlterNet, Huffington Post, Drudge, right wingers, left wingers...it is just all too much. Now the television shows all. Today I got to see Rush Limbaugh for the last 30 minutes of his 20 minute time allotment which went an hour and a half, while some people were chanting for him to run as the Presidential candidate in 2012. It will be interesting to see how someone who has lied publicly and has had the lies proven without doubt, can withstand the resistance to his campaign by those who know his lies.

It is more than the 'Eyes of Texas' upon us today. You can get rather in-depth reports such as on Obama's choice of new HHS appointee, Kathleen Sibelius. Or you can choose headlines in all sorts of places. If you hear a piece of something on TV but didn't capture the whole report, it is simple to go the network for detail, or to Google for more clarification. If someone is uninformed on anything published somewhere today, it is their own fault. What is not their fault is whether they know if the information is fact or not.

The speed of information circling the globe is staggering. I can remember finding out that Roosevelt had become President by watching a searchlight circling off the top of the Great Blue Hill in Milton MA. It took hours, if not days, before the win was confirmed but there was no Internet, and radio did not have the number of newscasts it has today. Many homes didn't even have a radio, in fact. The sudden availability of knowing what is going on everywhere seems to make everyone an authority. Expressing opinions has never been limited. Even in Colonial days there were soap box orators, they just didn't reach so many people. We not only can hear it, but we can see more with our own eyes.