No nukes

I take it back. It's possible, but not likely that the U.S. will nuke Iran. It's almost certain that it won't nuke North Korea either. It's still possible. GW Bush has a bunch of nuts (including, possibly, himself) in his gang, but perhaps sanity is breaking out in the White House. In any case, it's much more likely that if they do intend to nuke (or actually do nuke), it'll leak and the whole gang will be lynched. So, merely out of self preservation, they probably won't nuke.

There'll still be tens of thousands of dead (maybe 90% of them innocent civilians) on the ground if the U.S. decides to go to war, but perhaps that war with Iran can be averted.

I was surfing along on Reddit, when I saw this discussion of why the U.S. is the target of so much worldwide resentment. There are many sub-pages (I think the summaries of those subpages should have more information, I almost didn't click on the header entries to go to the details) and I haven't read it all. So I don't necessarily agree with that. I don't know much about the authors either, so I don't know what kind of spin they're putting on things. Reading it will certainly be educational though, either because it'll point at uncomfortable truths, or because the details will be wrogn, exposing the mistakes in the discussion, or (more likely), it'll be some mix of both, exposing the reader's prejudices as the discussion works as a rorschach, although one tilted toward the truth rather than being purely random.

The list of coups arranged or supported by the U.S. has 35 or so coups listed. I'm aware of some of those, I wasn't aware there were so many. Nor do I know how deeply the U.S. is involved (possibly, on one or another it was just a fellow traveler, supporting friends). I'll need to read up, possibly from some other sources since the krysstal site might not be objective (likely it's not objective, everyone has an agenda, but possibly the data are objective enough, particularly if counter-checked against other sources).

Wow, the List of U.S. military interventions is too long, I lost patience counting them. Again, as above, more reading is required. I wouldn't be surprised though if the U.S. comes out far the worst.

I tend to agree with the base site's prologue though, that *The American people are generally a friendly, kindly and compassionate people. If they knew one tenth of what their governments get up to around the world and in their dealings with foreign governments and people, there would be an enormous outcry.*. On the other hand, those same people, nice as they are individually, are also to blame because they are just so apathetic, enjoying the benefits of their nation's bullying of others and hiding the inconvenient facts from themselves. And in so doing, they think far too well of themselves as if the glory of the Founding Fathers (whose glory was earned with genius, privation and war) was their own glory, when all they do now is bask in the comfort earned from bullying the rest of the world (and, to be fair, from the economic vitality of american workers, their willingness to work harder than any other first-world nation, and the resources of a large landmass, and the resources of those they can bully).

That's really too bad. The U.S. could still be a city on a hill, a beacon and a guide to the world. It's going to be decades though, perhaps generations, before the evils of the last century or so of expansion can be forgotten.

More U.S. prisoner abuse discussion.

I wonder if america will listen. probably not yet. It'll be another decade or so of bullying the world before anything good comes out of Washington. And it's likely that it won't be much good. America won't have learned anything. Or if they do, it'll be the wrong thing. That next time they should just nuke the enemy, or kill 1/10th of the population pour encourager les autres.

although I wouldn't be surprised if they nuke Iran and North Korea before ten years are up. It's the same old-same old. non-citizens don't count for much against a single american life. It's their right to make that choice, when they're attacked. These days though, it's the americans roiling up the world and sowing war.

The above is not a prediction, just an assessment of likelihoods. I hope it doesn't come to pass, but the character of the U.S. government, and the apathy of the american public to the pain they cause outside their country are not improved by wishful thinking.

Inspiring - damn, those spaniards have style

Now, see, *this* is style. FC Barcelona will put the Unicef name on their jerseys AND ANNUALLY CONTRIBUTE more than a million dollars to Unicef, inspiring. Instead of making money on the jerseys (other teams make many millions of dollars a year for the brand name placement), they're PAYING to put UNICEF's name on their jerseys.

That's so far from The hypocrisy of U.S. foreign policy they're not even in the same moral universe. Of course there's also bill gates and warren buffet giving so much money to charity, that's also inspiring, except not really since they have all that money and frankly, they're so rich they don't even feel human.

I'd consider immigrating to spain. or other points in Europe. I really like New Zealand, which is why sol and I are actually working and spending and investing real hard-earned money to immigrate there (it's nothing like a sure thing, we are doing what we can though, and we're hoping for the best). The U.S. though, much as I love individual americans, and in fact, generally, the people of the U.S.A., no, the politics and government, and foreign policy of that country are just so far on the evil side of things that I would never immigrate there.

I wish happiness to those who decide to immigrate there, and to those who were born there or have already immigrated. It's not for me though. And again, I wish the U.S. would fall back to its borders and stop threatening the rest of the world. Or if it wanted to do good, it could go to Darfur and do real good, instead of actively creating terrorists in Iraq and Afghanistan (and, likely, in the near future, in Iran, looks like George W Bush is spoiling for another fight so that the Republicans can campaign on GWOT and patriotism again, all this while he destroys his own country from the inside).

Atis season, Lanzones Season, and Camiguin Diving and fun

It's Atis season in the Philippines and I'm in hog heaven because of it. It's important to choose good atis (generally, large/fat scales) because the low quality atis aren't fleshy inside and are no fun to eat. I love the fruit. It's very sweet and satisfying when fleshy. It's a bit expensive in Manila, but then that's why salaries are higher here too, to compensate for the high prices and the general misery of city life (not that much of a problem now, since I'm very happily married, we're excited about the baby and I just don't go out. Home is wonderful (as is fast internet.

I just saw a post that said that Atis seeds are toxic (pounded into a paste, they are used to kill head lice). Fortunately I've never been tempted to swallow Atis seeds (not the case with lanzones and santol).

It's also Lanzones season. And it's going to be Lanzones Festival on Camiguin. Sol and I both wish we could go. We can't though, she's into her 8th month of pregnancy now and I don't think they let you on a plane at that late stage. Not that we could afford to go anyway, work is crazy (but great fun), and we couldn't Dive on Camiguin anyway, we miss diving at the unfished reserves on Mantigue Island and off White Island, and sol hasn't been to the great dive site off Sunken Cemetery yet. Maybe in May. When we were taking our advanced open water diver course, we had our night dive at

Tangub bay.
That was great fun. I didn't realize that there would be so many lionfish (even mating lionfish!) at Tangub at night, and we saw a lot of shrimp (easy to see at night, their eyes shine, hard to see in the daytime since they're almost transparent), sleeping/non-moving fish, and a very large cuttlefish which, when it got irritated by us shining lights on it, inked up and zoomed away so fast we could hardly see it.

This is from our

pre-wedding dive (the morning of the wedding, my mom thought we were nuts diving in the morning and marrying in the afternoon :-) at Mantigue island.

I miss Camiguin. Before I met sol, I lived in Cagayan de Oro and I'd go to Camiguin every weekend. I'd buy some fruits at the fruit stand and drive up to

Katibawasan Fallsand eat them there.

For our wedding, we had

Friends and Family with us. Lots of fun at the waterfalls and all around the island, including


White Island where, I think that's Paco snorkeling across my brother-in-law's perfect picture, I think this is where Paco was following the giant purple sea slug which was sliding along the shallow bottom there.

All right, this appreciation of the lovely Atis is getting away from me now. time to end it here :-)

clogged head

I've been, too slowly, recovering from the head cold, fever, chest cold, cough that I developed last week. Apart from the main problems, I was also dizzy much of the time. Still am, really. But things are getting better. I'll probably be able to go to work tomorrow (Wed). I'd like to go to work TODAY, but sol suggests resting until all the symptoms are gone. And, much as I'd like to work today, I can't contradict massive common sense. Ah well. Tomorrow.

The thing with a clogged head (haha, clogged sinuses, dizziness and the clogged headedness that all feels like) is that I can't even work remotely. Well, I could, but I doubt if the results would be any good.

St Luke's visa health tests

Sol and I spent five days or so going to the St Luke's diagnostics facility in Ermita. We're applying for immigration to New Zealand (prettier, less stressful than the U.S., among the least corrupt countries on earth, it's going to be a great place to raise a family). As part of that process, we both had to undergo a bunch of tests. I got some extra tests added on, so we had to spend more time there.

St Luke's has the best blood extractors I have ever met :-). Everytime I've had to have blood taken (including when I gave blood for my stepfather's surgery, when the med techs were very, very good) there's been a problem. At St Luke's too, there was a problem. It seems I have thick skin (the needle gets dull as it goes in) and the vein is shy (it moves away from the dull needle). But the med tech was very good. She stuck me in the right, the vein didn't like it, she stuck me on the left arm, and that worked very well. She was done before I knew it.

Overall, the service there is very good. One of my friends didn't like the way the staff told her where to go, but I think she was just being over sensitive. It's a very efficient system. I would get upset too if the system were inefficient, with to-ing and fro-ing in illogical and wasteful movements. But they really do have a very efficient system. Everyone knows exactly what to do, and they do it very well. Everyone is always pleasant too. As well they should be. I'm sure that St Luke's contract with the American, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand embassies for providing health screening services is very lucrative. I'm sure they put their best people there.

The system is also designed to be secure. As, again, it should be. Naturally, they don't want the records to be tampered with, or the doctors to be reached and influenced. They've got good safeguards in the system to make such tampering very difficult (nothing is impossible).

I had a hell of a time producing phlegm for the sputum test though. The doctors are very thorough and they added tests which, while someone else might have considered them unnecessary, if viewed objectively, were clearly easy to justify and not merely a matter of padding the bill (every test added to the costs, fortunately, we could cover those costs). I'd had lung damage a few years back, from a motorcycle accident. The doctors saw something suspicious in the lungs and, despite the knowledge of the accident, they ordered extra lung X-rays and the sputum test anyway. This was for detecting tuberculosis. Again, reasonable, and I have no quarrel with the choice. It would have been nice to have been spared, but it was understandable to have had that added on.

But again, I had a hell of a time producing the sample. One has to cough and produce sputum or "plema" from the lungs. And I had no lung problems (it had been perhaps 5 months since I last had a cough). I just couldn't produce anything. On the third day though (three samples are required, on consecutive days), I finally produced a good sample. I'd gotten a cold and a cough, perhaps from the cold airconditioning at St Lukes and at work, but also from being in the rain for a short while after work. So finally I coughed up something that looked like brains and that satisfied the medtechs.

All in all, I'm happy with St Luke's. It's a very good hospital, they have very, very good people there. It's expensive, but for this, and for things like Sol's ovarian cyst removal and upcoming giving birth, it's worthwhile.

spherical earth

I was reading Sardi on what scientists aren't telling you about stem cell research and I saw a pretty bold claim that

Actually the Bible describes a circular Earth and it was the scientific community that mistakenly asserted the world is flat. [Book of Isaiah 40:22]

Naturally, I instantly got sidetracked. I looked at a few online bibles, most translate the word there as circle. From the Jehovah's witnesses there is The Watchtower web site's New World translation. Bible Gateway's KJV says circle although the New Advent catholic site has "globe".

Circle doesn't seem to me to be conclusive demonstration of the knowledge of the earth being spherical (although, certainly, the greeks knew about sphericality long ago). I did a google search and found a discussion on Does the Bible Teach a Spherical Earth? which finally determines (after analysis of "key Hebrew words and their translations in modern and ancient versions...") that "there is no substantive evidence and thus no warrant for this claim.

OK, digression over for the rest of the day, I hope. Well, actually, I'll read the article and then move on to real work :-). I'm not making any particular conclusion on the matter. It's not such a big deal, I was just struck by the very positive way Sardi makes the point in passing.

Alright, I have got to think about this article on genius junk food

Pork rinds good? Drinking good? Well, I've read about the second quite a lot. Not quite buying in completely, but I can sort of see how that might work. But pork rinds? And sour cream? and chocolate bars?

Hmmm, ok, I wish someone would debunk the evil of brownies too, and ice cream :-).

Disturbing - American Deserters

Stories of american soldiers who have deserted the war in Iraq. Wow, I wonder how much of that is true. Maybe half of it. Maybe most. Disturbing though. Another reason not to go to the United States for a few years. The common people are great, most of them. I've never had problems with Americans I knew personally (although there was the one time I was egged by some New Yorkers in a pickup truck, but I didn't know them :-).

But the government is wrong to be in Iraq, and it's wrong to be destroying and killing Afghans and not rebuilding much of anything for the locals. And frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if I were to be turned right back around because the government is a bit nuts and frustrated and paranoid right now. Maybe when GW Bush and his evil vice president are out of office. Or maybe one or two administrations after that.

I'm sure going to miss my brothers, sister, in-laws, nieces, nephews and Victoria and sunshine, beloved though.

Libraries, books, Wow

I don't quite care for the title, but yeah, those *are* Lovely pictures of books and libraries and stacks. I would love to visit each of those at least once. For a year each :-).

Tendai Marathon Monks

Tendai Marathon Monks, Wow

IQ lower

Wow.

I recently took two IQ tests (one at work, and one online. The test at work was pretty damn exhaustive (also exhausting, although it wasn't just IQ), while the online test was very short. Both give a result that's 10 points less than what I thought my IQ was :-).

Both my previous tests (10 points higher than the recent scores) were from more than 20 years ago though. And they were *more* culturally biased. They also had large knowledge components. The recent tests had much smaller knowledge components and much higher image and space manipulation components [both of which I do very badly at]). Apparently I'm relatively weak at the abstract stuff and my general knowledge and english skills were pulling my scores up.

On the other hand, if the tests are equivalent and haven't been renormed, well, I'll accept that I've lost some pure intellectual capacity then :-). Perhaps I can make it up in experience and general knowledge :-)

Oh yeah, hotmail thinks email from iqtest.com is spam. Fortunately, I looked in the Junk mbox :-).

Good budweiser ad

Now, I'm no fan of the U.S. military adventures in Iraq (Afghanistan was justified, Iraq was adventurism). But this budweiser ad is great

Miserable Failure

Wow, I see that GW Bush is being googlebombed as a miserable failure. I think I'll join in the fun because George W Bush really is a miserable failure. Not that I have any standing, not being an american. But clearly, the man has made the world a far worse place to live since he became president.

alright, it's pointing out the blinding obvious isn't much fun at all. never mind.

No Air Travel

I hope that, at some point, the security theater (which is prudent for the moment, but which seems likely to be extended indefinitely) that is due to the British arrests of the liquid bomb plotters (good intelligence work there, and perhaps some luck if it's true that the tip was from someone in the British Muslim community) recedes eventually and air travel gets more sane.

I think that the restrictions will remain while GW Bush remains president. But I can hope that after he steps down someone more sane will take over and rationalize those rules. As it is, much as I love my friends and family in the U.S.A., I don't think I'll be travelling there anytime soon. I left the U.S. because the working life there was too tense. It turns out that vacationing there would be similarly tense.

But that's just a feeling I get. On the practical side, all laptops and electronics need to be in checked in luggage. I know people who've already lost laptops in luggage. When the environment becomes *much* more target rich, it's likely that the incidence of lost laptops will increase. It's not that the loss of the laptop would be impossible to recover from (although, since I live in a third world country, it's going to be at least 3 times harder to buy a replacement than it would be for some random citizen of the USA), but I'm attached to my laptops. And to my cellphone too. And sol and I are very happy with the MP3 player that my brother sent to us for our birthday. I'm just not risking the laptop in checked luggage if I can avoid it.

Of course there are some trips for which I would check in the laptop. A trip to New Zealand, for instance, if we're granted the privilege of immigrating there. I'd check in the laptop, sure. I doubt if it would get lost in NZ anyway. And if it did, well, it would be an investment.

But the U.S.A., while GW Bush remains president, I'm staying away. Frankly, I don't even want to fly within the Philippines while this state of hysteria (again, prudent, for the next few weeks, stupid if extended beyond that for no good reason) prevails.

man of steel, woman of kleenex

Long ago, I saw a short article by Larry Niven. I forget where it was, probably online. In UseNet or something similarly obsolete (this was *long* ago, the web browsers were still text based, gopher was still alive).

I'd always wanted to find it again, but I never got up the energy to do so. Fortunately, from Jerry Pournelle's Current View I find the link again.

Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex, by Larry Niven. Niven and Pournelle, of course, collaborate on science fiction. I always enjoy what they write, although often I don't read it until years after it's been out in the wild.

Petron gas station tax evading bastard

I sent an email to contact_us@cctr.bir.gov.ph, I wonder what the effect will be, if any:

I gas up at a Petron gas station on P. Guevara, San Juan. By default, they don't give any receipt. When I ask for an OR (explicitly saying "O.R.", not just "resibo"), they ALWAYS give a cash invoice, when I ask for an OR again, they will often ask if I really want a receipt
and only when I say YES I REALLY WANT AN OFFICIAL RECEIPT will they finally give me an O.R. This O.R. takes an inordinately long time to make.

All of this seems to be designed to make providing ORs to customers very unlikely (so that they can pocket the VAT, income tax due, etc).

Where do I go to complain formally? Is it sufficient to post it here and you will forward to the relevant BIR officers?

In contrast to this, there is a Shell gas station on Boni and P. Cruz which always provides O.R.'s whether or not it's requested (their POS terminal automatically prints the receipt, much like KFC or McDonalds do).

Is this a Petron corporate issue (they don't require franchisees to provide ORs by default and they allow evasion by avoidance) or is it just the Petron franchisee evading taxes?

US Policy, massacres, and discretion

My sister, sister-in-law, brother-in-law and nieces and nephews are coming to the Philippines in the next few weeks. They all live in the U.S., and they're more on the blue side since my sister's husband is retired Army.

I've got some strong (but not radical) thoughts on US Army (and Marines, basically, United States Military) arrogance leading to ignoring the rights of local populations and concentrating on minimizing casualties.

It's natural that minimizing casualties, in an environment where the enemy looks like the civilians, and vice versa, leads to artillery and air attacks which kills civilians. It's also natural for all those dead civilians to be written off as the cost of war. When I say that it's natural, I mean that I can understand why the American's are relatively callous about non-American casualties. They're not American citizens, they don't count for as much as a single dead American citizen would. Of course the soldiers at the scene care about the difference. But let's be frank, it's not the same. 20 dead civilians is nothing compared to one dead American soldier. Nor would I be surprised if the ratio were higher than that

I'm certainly not being sarcastic or ironic there. I'm being completely serious and practical. That's just the way things work out. If the soldiers there were Filipinos I would expect things to be WORSE.

However, and unfortunately, if you're not American the equation doesn't favor the Americans at all. Americans (and Tony Blair, if not necessarily the British Army, quite as much) come out as bullies. To be ignored, if possible, resisted where they must (if the American's come to my country and start throwing their weight around backed up by guns, of course I'd stand up to them, who wouldn't?), avoided if irresistible, attacked where they can.

But I'm not saying any of that when my sister and family come over. After all, the Americans are not throwing their weight (and bullets) around in my country yet. So all I can do is disapprove of their doing so elsewhere, and wish that they'd go home and defend their country instead of making other countries their foot rugs. Let them terrorize their muslim citizens instead of killing the muslim citizens of other countries. Let them get away from walking all over other countries so that those of us who are free can breathe a sigh of relief.

But none of that is getting voiced out when my family come over. They're not George Bush, after all. And if they support George Bush, well, let them. The U.S. is sowing the wind, it will reap what it deserves. Those of us who are not likely American invasion targets will watch from the sidelines, and maybe place a few side bets.

Fuck You. Strong letter to follow.

I saw that on:

http://www.capitolhillblue.com/blog/2006/03/bush_declares_war_on_freedom_o.html

which is a rant on how George W Bush is trampling all over the US constitution. I was going to put it in my sig quotes, it's so perfect. Unfortunately, I think I might forget to elide when it randomly appears on email to someone sensitive.

On the other hand, fuck it, I'll put it in there anyway. Embarrassed recipients will live. Or learn something, if they follow the link.

Pride and Prejudice

Sol and I went to see Pride and Prejudice last night (Thursday). I've been sick the past few days, but I felt a bit better that night so we decided to go to Robinson's Galleria to see the film. I wanted to see the film since I love the book and I read the book once a year or so.

The movie is "based" on the book, and Keira Knightley is good as Eliza, but, as with all film adaptations, I didn't like the movie as well as I loved the novel. The scenes and dialogue are from the book, sure, but the film's pace is just too far from the book's. I know that it's necessary to speed things up for film, but they had things happening one thing right after another, without even an attempt at maybe indicating that there was a gap of a week or two between events.

There are other things I didn't feel were right too. But I'm too non-verbal tonight. And tomorrow I'll be too lazy.