Have you noticed how many misleading sites are appearing on the Internet lately? Lots of things are being offered free until you try to order and then find out they are free if you pay to join the group,
oddly never mentioned until you go to purchase what you want.
Another scam I encountered is being sold what is normally a free. When you order the item, falling for the line, you get billed for two other programs which quadruple your original purchase charge. When you finally can reach the company to complain you are informed that you should have read the entire page because the information was there telling you that you were purchasing these extra items as part of a special package...which you clearly did not see and can't find the same site again.
It seems that more and more merchants are, in essence, stealing from customers with little fees tucked in where least expected, draining as much as they can from the consumers. When a utility with 2 or more million customers adds a penny on every bill...for whatever their rationalized explanation may be, that gives them a free $20,000 extra that month. Most people don't phone in to make a fuss about that penny because they are unaware that they are one in 2 million who are being cheated.
For information on the Internet scams, go to the FBI site. Found there is: "Internet auction fraud was by far the most reported offense, comprising 44.9% of referred complaints. Non-delivered merchandise and/or payment accounted for 19.0% of complaints. Check fraud made up 4.9% of complaints. Credit/debit card fraud, computer fraud, confidence fraud, and financial institutions fraud round out the top seven categories of complaints referred to law enforcement during the year."
The Cybercrimes Most Wanted site has a wonderful listing , by categories, of these internet scams and illegalities. Some of the dangers are less direct to the individual Internet user. For example, foreign hackers who have broken into our National Grid ele4ctrical system may not show visible current damage but we have no way of how they would use the mapping they have to the entire system which, if sabotaged and shut down, would crush a great part of the activity of our people.
The moral of the story is that there are a lot of bad people out there who, with their anonymity, can do great damage to our country and to each of us individually. We cannot worry as non-professional computer people about saving the country but it is within our own power to protect ourselves with diligence, vigilance, and staying current in the ways to do this.
Saturday, May 16, 2009
Thursday, May 14, 2009
THE VARIETY OF NATURE
BBC 
There is a plant that takes care of watering itself, found in Israel. In the deserts of Israel, there is a plant that waters itself.
"The plant, a type of rhubarb, has specially designed leaves that channel rain water to its roots It is the only known plant in the world able to self-irrigate. The adaptation allows the rhubarb to flourish in extreme arid conditions by collecting up to 16 times more water than other plants in the region, say the scientists who published details of the discovery in Naturwissenschaften."
The Skunk Cabbage heats itself. If you are in New England in March, look at swampy
areas and you will spoit them Generally, if you look at the base of the plant in the snow, you will see that it has knocked off a few pounds himself
From 1993, Scientific Magazine comes: Some species of underwater plants, such as the Zostera marina species of eelgrass, produce blossoms and pollen and reproduce by underwater pollination. Pollination occurs when the noodle-like pollen structures stick together and come in contact with stigmas of female plants in shallow pools.
From what I hear, I'd rather be a pig!
A problem with self-pollination is like incest...fear being that gene errors will just get worse as they get strengthened by the loading.
Orchids have peculiarities
Some can grow above ground and some below.
Let's raise a toast to Nature daring us to be different.
There is a plant that takes care of watering itself, found in Israel. In the deserts of Israel, there is a plant that waters itself.
"The plant, a type of rhubarb, has specially designed leaves that channel rain water to its roots It is the only known plant in the world able to self-irrigate. The adaptation allows the rhubarb to flourish in extreme arid conditions by collecting up to 16 times more water than other plants in the region, say the scientists who published details of the discovery in Naturwissenschaften."
The Skunk Cabbage heats itself. If you are in New England in March, look at swampy
areas and you will spoit them Generally, if you look at the base of the plant in the snow, you will see that it has knocked off a few pounds himself
From 1993, Scientific Magazine comes: Some species of underwater plants, such as the Zostera marina species of eelgrass, produce blossoms and pollen and reproduce by underwater pollination. Pollination occurs when the noodle-like pollen structures stick together and come in contact with stigmas of female plants in shallow pools.
From what I hear, I'd rather be a pig!
A problem with self-pollination is like incest...fear being that gene errors will just get worse as they get strengthened by the loading.
Orchids have peculiarities
Some can grow above ground and some below.
Let's raise a toast to Nature daring us to be different.
WHEN PARENTS ARE KILLED BY AMERICANS, WE ARE SEEN AS THE TERRORISTS
"About a half-hour north of Jalalabad, the children along the road change. No waving. No smiling. No thumbs up. No screaming for candy. Only serious stares and empty eyes!
I have seen this in Iraq, and it's deeply uncomfortable until you get used to it -- if you get used to it. Children by nature are friendly, when they're unfriendly it's because their parents, possibly their extended family, maybe their whole community is worse than unfriendly. And the change can be fast, in the next village, yet most of the time the change comes slow. But you have to be looking. Otherwise you look up and the smiling and enthusiastic little ones are suddenly frosty and distant little ones." -- Embedded journalist in Farah Afghanistan, March 2009
Just as beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, terrorism is in the eyes of children whose parents were killed by Americans. What would it take for them to feel otherwise? What would our explanation be....."Oops, sorry!" I somehow don't think that words will work. These children have lots of years of poverty, living without love, lack of proper medical care and comfort, through which to clearly visualize their enemy. They will also have lots of Al Qaeda recruiters to help them get vengeance.
(CBS) CBS News chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan reported exclusively this year on the rescue of 24 starving orphans by the 82nd Airborne Division and Iraqi soldiers in Baghdad.
"The boys were discovered emaciated, wounded and tied to beds. Troops brought the boys to safety, and they are were being nursed back to health.
Since, Logan has checked up on them in their new orphanage, and found them more comfortable, but still trapped in a life very different than that an American special needs child would live."
She also reported, sadly, that on July 23, 2007, one of the boys, young Saddam Ali Abbas, died from his many health problems."
That is lovely and 24...sorry that went down to 23...is better than none but barely makes a dent in the 500,000 others.
Read this article for more details.
Lest we forget, we have also created many fatherless children in our own country. They are growing and hearing that the war was chosen by our leaders at the time, not warranted for our safety. How will they grow up having respect for leaders and authority?
Meanwhile, in the US, many people prefer saving eggs that are about to be tossed away rather than putting their energies into saving these many lives already alive and in desperate need of help in so many ways. Will anything reach them?
I have seen this in Iraq, and it's deeply uncomfortable until you get used to it -- if you get used to it. Children by nature are friendly, when they're unfriendly it's because their parents, possibly their extended family, maybe their whole community is worse than unfriendly. And the change can be fast, in the next village, yet most of the time the change comes slow. But you have to be looking. Otherwise you look up and the smiling and enthusiastic little ones are suddenly frosty and distant little ones." -- Embedded journalist in Farah Afghanistan, March 2009
Just as beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, terrorism is in the eyes of children whose parents were killed by Americans. What would it take for them to feel otherwise? What would our explanation be....."Oops, sorry!" I somehow don't think that words will work. These children have lots of years of poverty, living without love, lack of proper medical care and comfort, through which to clearly visualize their enemy. They will also have lots of Al Qaeda recruiters to help them get vengeance.
(CBS) CBS News chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan reported exclusively this year on the rescue of 24 starving orphans by the 82nd Airborne Division and Iraqi soldiers in Baghdad.
"The boys were discovered emaciated, wounded and tied to beds. Troops brought the boys to safety, and they are were being nursed back to health.
Since, Logan has checked up on them in their new orphanage, and found them more comfortable, but still trapped in a life very different than that an American special needs child would live."
She also reported, sadly, that on July 23, 2007, one of the boys, young Saddam Ali Abbas, died from his many health problems."
That is lovely and 24...sorry that went down to 23...is better than none but barely makes a dent in the 500,000 others.
Read this article for more details.
Lest we forget, we have also created many fatherless children in our own country. They are growing and hearing that the war was chosen by our leaders at the time, not warranted for our safety. How will they grow up having respect for leaders and authority?
Meanwhile, in the US, many people prefer saving eggs that are about to be tossed away rather than putting their energies into saving these many lives already alive and in desperate need of help in so many ways. Will anything reach them?
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
LOSING A FRIEND
There is nothing like the death of a friend to make me aware of my own mortality. Given survival of open heart surgery, a perfectly healthy looking person is diagnosed with a very rare kind of cancer. Eighteen hours or so of surgery later, she is tenuously clinging to life where she remains for over a month, in excruciating pain, clinging to that horrible place between life and death.
Today, blessedly, the committee beyond human control, in charge of these decisions, determined she could be set free since she wasn't going to be her former self again. The phone call to begin the chain of announcements began, turning the grieving process on in a myriad of relatives, each left full of memories and sense of loss.
The world lost a mother, grandmother, sibling, mentor, friend, and many more titles this lovely human wore. It lost a witty, talented, thoughtful, intelligent person whose death also takes away her music.
Grieving is a different process for each person who travels that road. Some do a fairly quick inventory as to how their lives will be affected while others take forever to grasp and deal with the reality. No two people feel the same, share the same memories, nor sense the same vacuum in their lives. She will be remembered in many places and in many ways as those of us who knew her play our own short personal videos of ways she touched our lives. It was time for her physical pain to disappear and our psychic pain to begin. As humans, between then and later, this process will be repeated many times, in many degrees, until we no longer have life left within us. We depart the world and leave grief to others.
Today, blessedly, the committee beyond human control, in charge of these decisions, determined she could be set free since she wasn't going to be her former self again. The phone call to begin the chain of announcements began, turning the grieving process on in a myriad of relatives, each left full of memories and sense of loss.
The world lost a mother, grandmother, sibling, mentor, friend, and many more titles this lovely human wore. It lost a witty, talented, thoughtful, intelligent person whose death also takes away her music.
Grieving is a different process for each person who travels that road. Some do a fairly quick inventory as to how their lives will be affected while others take forever to grasp and deal with the reality. No two people feel the same, share the same memories, nor sense the same vacuum in their lives. She will be remembered in many places and in many ways as those of us who knew her play our own short personal videos of ways she touched our lives. It was time for her physical pain to disappear and our psychic pain to begin. As humans, between then and later, this process will be repeated many times, in many degrees, until we no longer have life left within us. We depart the world and leave grief to others.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
DON'T ASK; DON'T TELL
Ex-Secretary of the Army, Alexander, spoke tonight on the Rachel Maddow show. He was very frank about how undemocratic the policy of 'Don't ask; Don't Tell' and destructive to the Armed Forces as well as the entire country. On CNN,
updated 10:57 p.m. EST, Mon November 17, 2008 104 retired military brass against 'don't ask-don't tell. "The center points out that Larson, a four-star admiral who supported the measure in 1993, has changed his view on the policy. "There were a lot of witch hunts and a lot of people were turned out on that basis," he is quoted as saying in a Palm Center release."
A few years into the war in Iraq, media reported that the translators of Iraq language program was in jeopardy because many of them were gay and had to leave the service. Today, many believe the policy is hurting the country because of losing so many talented and trained people.
Now the military is finding it difficult to recruit. Standards have been lowered dreadfully to make up for the 13,000 that have been discharged for their sexual preference since 1993 as well as that there is no end in sight. The impetus to give one's life to keep our country safe is really not what is seen by most as a goal in Iraq. As it was during the Viet Nam war, many face will prison time for there illegal behaviors if they don't sign up for military duty. Does no one consider the value systems or judgment of those making that choice?
Unfortunately, discrimination based on ignorance should not be determining life and death issues for so many people.
updated 10:57 p.m. EST, Mon November 17, 2008 104 retired military brass against 'don't ask-don't tell. "The center points out that Larson, a four-star admiral who supported the measure in 1993, has changed his view on the policy. "There were a lot of witch hunts and a lot of people were turned out on that basis," he is quoted as saying in a Palm Center release."
A few years into the war in Iraq, media reported that the translators of Iraq language program was in jeopardy because many of them were gay and had to leave the service. Today, many believe the policy is hurting the country because of losing so many talented and trained people.
Now the military is finding it difficult to recruit. Standards have been lowered dreadfully to make up for the 13,000 that have been discharged for their sexual preference since 1993 as well as that there is no end in sight. The impetus to give one's life to keep our country safe is really not what is seen by most as a goal in Iraq. As it was during the Viet Nam war, many face will prison time for there illegal behaviors if they don't sign up for military duty. Does no one consider the value systems or judgment of those making that choice?
Unfortunately, discrimination based on ignorance should not be determining life and death issues for so many people.
Monday, May 11, 2009
DAD'S IN THE US; MOM'S IN PAKISTAN
A Washington Post article lets us know how lucky most of us in the US are. Pakistani emigres must email and text to find out what is going on at home and whether family members are still alive. The Taliban is indiscriminately rocketing, and has laid down land mines. "Combat between government forces and Taliban fighters is tearing up the remote valley where Khan was born. Hundreds of thousands of residents are fleeing, and hospitals are filled with the injured. Yet journalists and most outsiders have been prevented from entering Swat. News accounts have relied on army briefings.
About 7,000 miles away, here in Brooklyn, amid pizzerias, ice-cream trucks and the clatter of the subway, the biggest Pakistani community in the United States has an ear to the battleground."
To be far from home must be reminiscent of the influx of immigrants from the Mediterranean countries and other Europeans between the mid 1890s up to WW1. During that period, many male heads of households came to America to work to be able to send money back home. There was no instant communication then...only months between letters sent and replies received. It was a period when few had control of much in their lives, unlike today when there are many services available for education, medical and employment...though employment opportunities may have seriously lessened with the recession.
We worry about our service men and women but not their underage children with them at war. Families of people working very risky life or death jobs know how constant anxiety feels.
All jobs are dangerous, some statistically more than others
About 7,000 miles away, here in Brooklyn, amid pizzerias, ice-cream trucks and the clatter of the subway, the biggest Pakistani community in the United States has an ear to the battleground."
To be far from home must be reminiscent of the influx of immigrants from the Mediterranean countries and other Europeans between the mid 1890s up to WW1. During that period, many male heads of households came to America to work to be able to send money back home. There was no instant communication then...only months between letters sent and replies received. It was a period when few had control of much in their lives, unlike today when there are many services available for education, medical and employment...though employment opportunities may have seriously lessened with the recession.
We worry about our service men and women but not their underage children with them at war. Families of people working very risky life or death jobs know how constant anxiety feels.
All jobs are dangerous, some statistically more than others
Sunday, May 10, 2009
OUR RIGHT TO FREE SPEECH
Like all else in this world and life, there is always another side to most things. Free speech must always be our right as our forefathers wished it for a free country, but they hadn't counted on the modern age of instant world communication available to everyone.
Today many confused, ignorant, paranoid or psychotic fools can talk their way into a seat in the Legislature and other important places. They can write or speak their hallucinations and impress everyone with their 'truth'...even that the world came directly to them from God. They can play into people's worst fears. They can tarnish the reputations of the righteous with their fantasies and lies.
In 2006, CRIMEDOG45 wrote an excellent essay on the subject. However, I, as a therapist, have always encouraged my patients to make a distinction between speech and action. Too often people take actions that are violent or destructive in other ways and define those as their right to free speech. It is time some scholars bring the free speech portion of our Constitution to our modern technological society. While it may be verbal, and technically speech, it should not be acceptable to plot the overthrow of our government or assassination of elected officials as part of the right to free speech. I believe it was originally intended for opinions and initially most town Commons had a covered grandstand of sorts to accommodate these speakers. When it didn't, people used soapboxes or anything to elevate them above the heads of the audiences that would gather, thus the expression standing on or speaking from a soapbox.
Laws, like most other things are never without overlap to other conditions. While there is 'free speech' we have made some curbs to public lewdness in speech as well as action. Laws governing what is permissible for children limit some of the programming on television. Another is the law prohibiting defamation of character. Suits are costly and many just don't bother to file them though it is likely that shock jocks, media journalists who take liberties to explain the thoughts, goals and emotions of people to whom they have never spoken and about whom they know little, fall in this category all too frequently. Some, like loose cannons, have shot off their mouths and rarely even lost their jobs over what they said...as Don Imus did in 2007 over a racial slur.
Keith Olbermann on MSNBC touches this subject recently when he discussed the worst person in the world that day. Watch this video.
Some would have those who speak out against religion as going beyond the right to free speech. However, it should remain uppermost that this country was founded by many who had fled England for their right to believe in that which might not have been universally shared with those who ruled religion there at the time. Atheists, for example, are as sincere in their beliefs as those who profess to follow the word of God or Jesus, though no living person really knows exactly what that might be. "Beliefs which are true and valid cannot be harmed by criticism, even by unfair and incorrect criticism. Beliefs which are not true or valid will only be revealed through criticism. What this means is that if we care about the truth, we should welcome criticism of even our most treasured beliefs: if they are true then this will strengthen us; if they are wrong, then we will know and be free to follow new beliefs. Attacks on free speech have most recently come primarily from Muslims. Some threaten violence if ideas, images, or words which they find offensive are given public expression. Others deplore both threats and actual violence, but they are perfectly willing to benefit from them and are no less eager to insist that criticisms of their religion are offensive and should not be permitted under the cover of "free speech." They don't seem to realize that the free speech which protects their critics protects them as well."
During the last Administration, our free speech on telephone and, it is said, email was violated and no longer free in the sense that records were kept on what people were saying what and to whom in some fashion which still has not been clarified to the public. Is there anyone who can clearly define what is acceptable to all in free speech. I rather doubt it. Laws may be interpreted by courts but they should not be so unclear that the common man has to figure out what the law covers.
Today many confused, ignorant, paranoid or psychotic fools can talk their way into a seat in the Legislature and other important places. They can write or speak their hallucinations and impress everyone with their 'truth'...even that the world came directly to them from God. They can play into people's worst fears. They can tarnish the reputations of the righteous with their fantasies and lies.
In 2006, CRIMEDOG45 wrote an excellent essay on the subject. However, I, as a therapist, have always encouraged my patients to make a distinction between speech and action. Too often people take actions that are violent or destructive in other ways and define those as their right to free speech. It is time some scholars bring the free speech portion of our Constitution to our modern technological society. While it may be verbal, and technically speech, it should not be acceptable to plot the overthrow of our government or assassination of elected officials as part of the right to free speech. I believe it was originally intended for opinions and initially most town Commons had a covered grandstand of sorts to accommodate these speakers. When it didn't, people used soapboxes or anything to elevate them above the heads of the audiences that would gather, thus the expression standing on or speaking from a soapbox.
Laws, like most other things are never without overlap to other conditions. While there is 'free speech' we have made some curbs to public lewdness in speech as well as action. Laws governing what is permissible for children limit some of the programming on television. Another is the law prohibiting defamation of character. Suits are costly and many just don't bother to file them though it is likely that shock jocks, media journalists who take liberties to explain the thoughts, goals and emotions of people to whom they have never spoken and about whom they know little, fall in this category all too frequently. Some, like loose cannons, have shot off their mouths and rarely even lost their jobs over what they said...as Don Imus did in 2007 over a racial slur.
Keith Olbermann on MSNBC touches this subject recently when he discussed the worst person in the world that day. Watch this video.
Some would have those who speak out against religion as going beyond the right to free speech. However, it should remain uppermost that this country was founded by many who had fled England for their right to believe in that which might not have been universally shared with those who ruled religion there at the time. Atheists, for example, are as sincere in their beliefs as those who profess to follow the word of God or Jesus, though no living person really knows exactly what that might be. "Beliefs which are true and valid cannot be harmed by criticism, even by unfair and incorrect criticism. Beliefs which are not true or valid will only be revealed through criticism. What this means is that if we care about the truth, we should welcome criticism of even our most treasured beliefs: if they are true then this will strengthen us; if they are wrong, then we will know and be free to follow new beliefs. Attacks on free speech have most recently come primarily from Muslims. Some threaten violence if ideas, images, or words which they find offensive are given public expression. Others deplore both threats and actual violence, but they are perfectly willing to benefit from them and are no less eager to insist that criticisms of their religion are offensive and should not be permitted under the cover of "free speech." They don't seem to realize that the free speech which protects their critics protects them as well."
During the last Administration, our free speech on telephone and, it is said, email was violated and no longer free in the sense that records were kept on what people were saying what and to whom in some fashion which still has not been clarified to the public. Is there anyone who can clearly define what is acceptable to all in free speech. I rather doubt it. Laws may be interpreted by courts but they should not be so unclear that the common man has to figure out what the law covers.
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