Musings

General-purpose musings

There are 780 posts filed in Musings (this is page 37 of 78).

Corazon Aquino

I was saddened to read of the passing of former Philippine president Corazon Aquino, who died yesterday from colon cancer at the age of 76.

Aquino brought an end to the U.S.-backed dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos and brought democracy to her country for the first time in almost 30 years. While a former housewife with no political experience kicking Marcos out of power was improbable, it was easy compared to actually running the country. Marcos had looted it for all it was worth, and much work had to be done. Aquino was frequently not up to this task, sad to say, but it didn’t matter: democracy had at long last taken root in the Philippines.

As a sailor I visited the Philippines during her time as president and was proud to see the Filipino people finally having a voice in running their country. She will be missed.

Daniel Boyd terror plot

Seven men were arrested in North Carolina on charges of being a terrorist ring, the leader of which is said to be Daniel Patrick Boyd.

These are very serious charges, and deserve to be heard in court. While it may be true that these gentlemen may be really bad men, they should not be tried and convicted in the press by the statements of the Justice Department. Spokesmen for the U.S. Attorney’s office and the FBI paint these guys as Osama Bin Ladens, and went on and on congratulating themselves for arresting them.

Then in today’s news where Boyd’s wife protests his innocence, U.S. District Attorney George E. B. Holding declined to respond to Boyd’s version. “I am sticking to the four corners of the indictment. We try our cases in court and won’t go back and forth before then.”

Oh, so now you try your cases in court, after you’ve already convicted them in the press.

I’m a supporter of law enforcement but I’m also a supporter of our justice system. I’d like to see the feds keep mum about these gentlemen until everyone has had a chance to hear the evidence.

New media scoops old media again

Here’s another case of new media scooping old media. From the Los Angeles Times:

At 5:09 a.m. Pacific time, nearly an hour before the official news releases went out, “American Idol” host and celebrity interviewer Ryan Seacrest hinted on Twitter that something big was about to go down: “Some biz ent news going to break this morning that will impact shows and stars. It will have impact one major network immediately.”

Twelve minutes before NBC e-mailed reporters the news about the departure of Silverman, who is launching a new production company with IAC/InterActive Corp. Chief Executive Barry Diller, Seacrest reported on Twitter: “guy that runs nbc- put office biggest looser [sic] etc on is leaving to launch a new studio. Bringing together most creative stars and producers.

“This means better shows from our favorite stars in u.s. and around the world. Ben Silverman just filling me in. This is big news in hwood.”

It was another example of how Twitter is fast becoming the go-to news site of the new media age.

New media vs. old media

All day Friday, this wedding video kept being posted to Facebook by my friends and relatives. I got around to seeing what the fuss was about and immediately posted it myself. It’s the video from Jill and Kevin Heinz’s June 20th wedding in St. Paul, Minnesota, when they danced to Chris Brown’s Forever instead of the usual heavy formal wedding march. In the span of about 24 hours, that video was viewed a million times.
Continue reading →

Alberto Contador

Stage 17 is done for the Tour de France. On the climb, race leader Alberto Contador dropped his Astana teammate Andreas Kloden, leaving himself isolated and dropping Andreas to fifth in the rankings. Seven-time champion Lance Armstrong is fourth in the standings, behind Contador and the Schleck brothers.

Contador tells interviewers that it takes a team for a cyclist to win the Tour, yet he seems to disregard this when he’s riding. He’s certainly a talented rider but his attitude is beginning to wear on me. Dropping your teammates is a good way to not have a team the next time around.

Has space lost its appeal?

A rather inane AP story ran today, questioning whether the romance of space has worn off of Americans. While reporter Ted Anthony’s answer measuring pop culture impact isn’t the way I would gauge interest, the question does bear asking.

I think America had big plans for our space program and those plans were never fulfilled. Sure, the first moon landing was a momentous occasion but humans last visited the moon December 1972. While that was exciting while it lasted, it didn’t continue. We cheered the astronauts’ successes and dreamed of getting our chance.

We’ve had the pioneers. Now when do the settlers get to go?

What we had in the meantime was the space shuttle. The shuttle’s appeals to us as it looks like a plane, and in our minds we hold out hope that spaceflight is as simple as hopping a plane. Even then, the shuttle is nothing more than a 4 billion dollar dump truck, unable to rise above low-earth orbit. It’s space on training wheels. Woo hoo.

If spaceflight is to be exciting again, people need to be able to see themselves as astronauts. In the last 40 years, the closest the general populace has gotten to spaceflight has been private enterprise, with the development of Spaceship One. With that milestone achieved, armchair astronauts could revive their dream. For the vast majority of us, though, spaceflight will remain just a dream, and a dream that can never be fulfilled tends to lose its appeal.

Finding a Southerner at the flea market

The family and I went to the flea market at the fairgrounds Saturday morning to window shop for some furniture. We enjoyed looking around at all of the wares for sale and chatting with all the people there. While talking about furniture with one man I felt myself comfortably slipping into my old Southern self, with plenty of friendly y’alls and an added accent.

It made me appreciate again how rich my heritage is; how I can slip back into this friendly Southern mode without thinking about it. It’s not forced, it is who I am. The bigger surprise to me is that I tend not to talk Southern most of the time. I tend to be a bit of a chameleon with accents, as I’ve mentioned here before. Maybe it’s because Raleigh has such a mix of people from all over. Still, I’ve enjoyed those visits I’ve made to the deeper South (and to flea markets) and the chances they provide to reconnect with my roots.

Dog as weather forecaster

Kelly and I were amused at our dog Rocket’s attempt to hide himself in our closet at bedtime last night. He’s usually banished to the den so that we aren’t kept awake by his snoring. Occasionally, he’ll park himself outside our door when he wants company but his sneaking into our closet was quite unusual. Four hours later, at 2:30 AM, thunder first rumbled outside. Like most dogs, Rocket is terrified of thunder.

Today I’m left wondering: did our dog somehow know about the thunderstorm long before it arrived? If so, how? Was it the drop in air pressure? If air pressure is the answer, why doesn’t he react similarly when fronts move through that don’t cause thunderstorms?

In other news, I’m thinking of selling my weather radio. 🙂

Cyber attacks … from North Korea?

Officials are blaming North Korea for the recent cyber attacks against U.S. and South Korean government websites.

Yeah, right. Have you checked out North Korea lately? While South Korea has some of the fastest home Internet connections in the world, North Korea has … well, maybe a 56k dialup connection? Broadband companies aren’t exactly falling over themselves to offer service there and I can imagine that the quirky communist government isn’t exactly encouraging it, either.

I know Kim II Jong is a movie buff but I’m betting money he isn’t exactly streaming his shows from Netflix!

Robert McNamara

A few months ago I watched The Fog of War, an interview with Vietnam-era Defense Secretary Robert McNamara. It was a candid, riveting interview where McNamara’s explains in his own words the decision making that pushed country deeper into the Vietnam War. It was sobering, too, to hear him call it a “terrible mistake,” but as his critics have said, he was three decades too late admitting that. It was also shocking to hear him describe how trigger-happy General LeMay almost got us all nuked during the Cuban Missile Crisis. I’m glad a cool-headed guy like McNamara was there to keep us from Armageddon.

McNamara died in his sleep this morning at the age of 93. While he’ll always be remembered for Vietnam, he also was the long-time president of the World Bank and worked for nuclear disarmament.