Unwired: Part 2 of a Non-LiveBlog

I decided to do an experiment and shut off the internet for a while, eventually going 12 days with no email, texting, no connection with The Web. I was curious what the changes would be since I've been connected to The Web for about 20 years. And I didn't tell anyone, just wasn't there .. there being here, on The Web. What were the results of the experiment?

I'm awake, up writing on and off The Web daily and early, a longtime habit. So I decided that instead of surfing and reading online, I would keep sort of a non-published Twiter feed to document the effects of being so disconnected. And then publish the results on The Web.

So here is Part Two of a Three Part series of the non-liveblog, for Part One, click here:

DAY FIVE

10:32 a.m.

I have many chores and duties outside of the house today. Will people detect the scent of a non-digital human?

Have my websites been hacked? My email? Are they okay?

11:15 a.m.

Gah! Really starting to hate this exile, this experiment seems akin to trying to quit tobacco or something. I’m getting ill tempered, angry, dislocated from the world.

1:00 p.m.

This afternoon I will be in several locations which offer free Wi-Fi and I fear my experiment will crash and burn faced with such temptation.

So am I addicted to internet access if I should give in? … Time will tell the tale, won’t it? If I do cave, will I confess and admit failure or will I pretend (aka lie about it) by claiming I only used a brief mobile access rather than my more usual use of a home PC?

7:00 p.m.

I’m pretty sure that after reading the preceding, no one will believe me when I say I did not cave in to temptation. How could I avoid the temptation? Simple: I did not take a mobile device with me which could use a WiFi connection.

I did speak with some friends and colleagues about some work projects and we all said we’d use email to flesh out the details. So I will likely be forced to end my experiment within the next 3 to 4 days.

DAY SIX

7:22 a.m.

Reports of tornado warnings are aired via my radio – I’d like to check out local radar online … can’t. Television offers a few glimpses but even the Weather Channel only offers a few minutes each hour of local radar. How much more powerful would my disconnect become should I shut off cable tv? The last time I did go cable-less, one could still pick up channels with rabbit-ear antenna, but that option no longer exists. Even though the cost for a digital reception box is low, our America now makes everyone pay a fee to watch free tv.

More and more, we have bought the narrative that the cost of accessing information shared via public spectrum airwaves is justified, normal and that everyone has access to computers, the internet, television and phones. Everyone has it. All that’s needed, according to this new worldview, is to buy a device or devices and boom! You are on!

I am amazed that I can still, if I wanted, buy a radio and to get programming, all I have to do is switch the radio on. And I could go more high end and get more specific and more diverse programming by buying a satellite radio and paying a fee for service. See – radio has free and pay options, but no other information service offers that option of free and pay services.

9:12 a.m.

Fridays are usually interesting days online – people post tales of events just ahead worth attending, share their joys about the week’s end, and generally take on a tone to lighten the mood. I have access to none of it.

I doubly damned since I work mostly from home – I don’t hear office buzz about what folks have planned for the weekend, or potential gatherings of friends or family. I like being able to scoot into social media sites to learn what friends and family are doing … without it, it adds even more to my outcast status.

Fridays often bring many perceptive essays and commentary on the events of the week and what the events might portend, folks share web discoveries and amusements, like the videos that have entertained them this week, share rumors and memes, link to movies or music shows they plan to attend. One gets a sense of a shared world offering so much.

I got nada going on here without all that access.

And no one can reach out to include me in their on or offline hijinks unless they call me directly on the phone, and since I don’t call others very much, they don’t call me.

1:30 p.m.

Here’s a nagging fact – I cannot say that my days are empty without the internet, I still do most of the things I’ve always done. I do lack a constant connection to everyone who uses the internet … but does that mean I lack human connection? No, not at all. Or am I utterly mistaken?

DAY SEVEN

9:00 a.m.

I am a modern-day Robinson Crusoe, though self-exiled, marooned with a few books and on the verge of trembling madness without any human contact. I never read the book, I read Moll Flanders instead, so I would really need to go to WikiPedia to read a synopsis and see if he did indeed have any books or paper or verged on trembling madness. Extending the metaphor, that would mean the internet is my Man Friday, the creature leaving a trail of footprints indicating potential human contact which I might follow, a lifeform that ends my solitude.

Now I am wondering what exactly Defoe’s tale told about the two – and I don’t have the ability to seek source info without the Web. I do recall with more accuracy ‘Robinson Crusoe on Mars” starring Paul Mantee as a marooned astronaut on Mars, who finds that applying heat to certain rocks produces oxygen so he can stay alive, and who finds a native Martian who is held in slavery by cruel overlords who force him and other native Martians to operate a mine. And Mantee did have a monkey too. I’m positive if I had a monkey, I would not miss the internet as much.

9:40 a.m.

Here’s a simple but vital element to having the Web, which I now lack, that I would dearly love to have right now. Have you ever had a snippet of song stuck forever in your head? My friends and I call these tuneful infestations ‘earwigs’, though I think there is a formal medical term for the condition. Anyway, anytime in the past I get attacked by a relentless tune, usually a tune I wonder how I even know, I can eliminate it by locating the song on the internet, playing and listening to it, and thereby canceling out the constant repetition in my head.

But no internet means I may just go insane now.

10:00 a.m.

I am starting to feel miserable. There are various items I preserved via an internet cloud and now cannot access, items I decided to store somewhere other than my own hard drive or flash drive in case a virus attacked my system. I’m in need of a few addresses and phone numbers I stored. In days long past I had a few address books loaded with such info. Now – I have nothing so simple.

10:22 a.m.

My decision to be Web-less seems most idiotic to me now. Who would chose to do such a thing? Am I just being sadistic to myself? And if I am, why am I doing it?

11:00 a.m.

I may listen to “Wait, Wait Don’t Tell Me” the humorous news quiz show, and I’m thinking that I won’t do very well trying to answer the quiz questions since I’ve had only some radio and tv news to inform me this week.

A giant FAIL on this test – the episode today is a rerun, so no test of the past week … maybe I’ll listen anyway….

Hey, I knew some things!! All on my own!! I knew that actress Heddy Lamar did research which helped develop cell phone technology and that ventriloquist Paul Winchell invented the first artificial heart. Good for me!

11:20 a.m.

Man oh man am I bored right out of my skull. Sigh.

9:39 p.m.

Let’s talk about Stumbling, the use of a Web app which allows for the random retrieval of web pages for a user to explore. I think it was late 2005 when I started using the app, first selecting a wide range of topics, from Astronomy to Geography to Zoology, and then clicking a button on my browser to go from page to page to page, and anyone who has or uses this app will tell you it becomes a habit to Stumble.

Stumbling through my own computer is a short exercise.

DAY EIGHT

8:44 a.m.

Waiting again, for the time when someone on radio or tv decides to share the current temperature. Meh.

10:00 a.m.

Prior to checking out of the Web, I had signed up for a Web app which allows for viewing several non-broadcast cameras backstage at tonite’s Oscar show. And no real-time commentary tonight on the Oscars either.

I did make use of a few audio books I’ve had stacked up for some time, which creates an illusion of a computer connection to a podcast or something. And I’ve been working on a few other writing projects, but I can’t say I’ve written more on those – my typical daily habits consist of writing as well as prowling the Web. Instead of prowling, I move around the house and get more exercise as I step out for a quick walk (or perhaps a stomping tantrum at the part of my brain which is enforcing this offline experiment).

11:33 a.m.

Bleh. Bored again with the non-Web world.

Tennessee Republicans Seek Theocracy

Tennessee Republicans make it clear in the current presidential primary race with their support for Sen. Rick Santorum - they want Tennessee to be a theocracy. Not that there were many doubts on that score.

The most recent MTSU poll results show the TNGOP supports Santorum by large margin - 40% for Santorum, 19% for Romney. Sen. Santorum is speaking at this moment at a private bible college, Crown College of The Bible. And he's been most plain over the course of his career and this current campaign stating that religion is the best and only guide for government.

So at least they have made clear their only their religious beliefs should determine governmental policy. If you hold a different view, not only are you wrong, you are damned.

Welcome to the new religious government of Tennessee.

Santorum also says if you want to go to college (like he did, for 3 degrees, like his children did) you are a snob. Odd then that today he's at a college. I must assume he means that if you get a college degree outside of a private Christian college, you are a source of evil and snobbery.

Unwired: A Non-Liveblog of Life Outside Cyberspace

I decided to do an experiment and shut off the internet for a while, eventually going 12 days with no email, texting, no connection with The Web. I was curious what the changes would be since I've been connected to The Web for about 20 years. And I didn't tell anyone, just wasn't there .. there being here, on The Web. What were the results of the experiment?

I'm awake, up writing on and off The Web daily and early, a longtime habit. So I decided that instead of surfing and reading online, I would keep sort of a non-published Twiter feed to document the effects of being so disconnected. And then publish the results on The Web.

So here is Part One of a Three Part series of the non-liveblog:

DAY ONE

11:30 a.m.
Have marked the first 24 hours with no online usage.

What if I were to decide to never return to explore the world via online access? What if this non-connected landscape becomes preferable? Will I become an oddity of creation? Not being part of online discussions, comments, image sharing and info sharing, will I become a person unwelcome should I prefer to engage the world in the flesh, face to face? Will I be perceived as a danger, a threat even?

12:20 p.m.
Should I have told people I was going to do this? As those who undertake some solo journey to an isolated location, like that guy in that movie “127 Hours” who did not let people know he was taking on a risky task, he got stuck in some rocks and had to saw his arm off, so should I have alerted someone?
Or have I already chopped off an appendage by abandoning my internet post?

I hope I don’t start calling people on the phone for no real reason or decide to become a phone texter. Texting seems alien to me now – maybe I should decide now not to fill in the internet absence with pervasive texts … I am getting a little nervous.

2:18 p.m.
No one here in the house has started a meme today.

There have been, however, several snarky and witty comments made, but no one wrote them down or shared them with anyone outside of the house.

My neighbors have not come by to show me any photos of funny cats or cute kids.

4:30 p.m.
It occurs to me that this document is sort of like live-blogging an event which is not really live, nor is it really taking place. It’s a running commentary on what is not happening. Or, it’s a commentary on something which is really just happening to me. I am going to continue, though, since I have encountered much which is utterly useless and self-serving on the internet, so this project seems worthy of coverage and reporting. To me. For now.

 ....

DAY TWO

5:30 p.m.
This day has not been too bad. One glaring difference is the ability to obtain news and information, as mentioned before. Cable local and national news are offering an astonishingly narrow selection of stories. So much of what I am seeing reminds me of the old Punch and Judy puppet shows of hundreds of years ago – laughable figures beating each other up in an endless loop. (Note: While I know the old P and J shows began many years ago, I cannot provide the actual date they began to take place and spread since I don’t have access to vast archives of research offered by the internet to verify or correct my claims.)
---

DAY THREE

8:24 a.m.
I had thought initially that I might try this experiment for a month, now I’m thinking a week will be my limit.        

1:20 p.m.
Daylight is really bright.


 DAY FOUR

3:05 pm
I miss being able to look at funny pictures of whatever I want. So, here’s a picture from my hard drive – Charles Napier in “Star Trek”

DAY FIVE
7:48 a.m.
Oh man, this tiny dribble of information coming into the house via radio and television is ridiculously inadequate. It’s barely a notch above using the Pony Express to share news and information.

I can measure this weak and puny stream of information not by the bytes arriving by second, it is words per hour. And I know too there are some in the wide world who may just be pining for my perspectives which have been absent.

I have resisted urges to go to a friend’s house or library to sneak online for just a minute to check email messages. But my resolve is fading … I imagine it will take at least one week to kill such urges.


8:48 a.m.
A few weeks ago when web site operators wanted to make a global protest against internet piracy legislation, the web sites shut down for only 24 hours to make their point and kill the legislation. 24 hours. What would the response have been if, like me, they shut down for 5 times as long (120 hours and counting)?

9:15 a.m.
Have I been released from a digital cage or have I been caged in an analog world?

9:42 a.m.
This was a terrible idea.
....

That's the end of Part One, and when the other parts are published in the next few days, they will be linked here and here.

And a question for you, dear readers: How long would you be willing to go without The Web?

50th Anniversary of Friendship 7

Celebrations - but no ticker tape parades this time - are marking the 50th anniversary of John Glenn's flight into space as he became the first American to orbit our planet.

""He is a man of boundless courage, limitless optimism and unswerving honor."

 More pictures here.

Valentine's Day Sewage Plant Tours

All the romance offered by a sewage treatment plant can be yours!

"Brooklyn, New York’s Newtown Creek sewage plant will be the center of romance this Valentine’s Day. Plant superintendent Jim Pynn will take loving couples and others on morning or afternoon tours of the facility this coming Tuesday, Feb. 14.

“New York City’s Department of Environmental Protection is bringing two things together,” Pynn told Govpro.com. “We are going to give tour attendees a lot of information on our infrastructure, and we will give them an opportunity to express their love for each other—pretty neat, huh?”

Yeah. Neato.

"One impressive part of the plant is its eight futuristic, stainless steel-clad digester eggs. Processing as much as 1.5 million gallons of sludge every day, and working like a digestion system, the eggs break down the aromatic waste into non-toxic sludge and gas. 

“Just imagine going home and saying, ‘Where did he take me on Valentine’s Day? I went to see the digester eggs in Greenpoint, Brooklyn.’”

Yes, just imagine.

Birth Control as Political Theatre

I try not to be too surprised/disappointed by the ridiculous rants which pop up in American politics - history shows us absurdity often holds momentary sway. But I was surprised/disappointed when I began reading the hysterical wails about contraception and if it should be covered by health insurance (conversely, I seldom hear complaints about Viagra being covered by health insurance).

The contraception debate is rather old (Congress passed the Comstock Law in 1873 to criminalize birth control) - it roiled up in the 1960s to hysterical levels too -  movies, television, books, news companies all provided endless worrying and satire about The Pill, all while sales and usage skyrocketed. Pill protest rallies, support rallies and more swirled and faded since personal control over whether or not to become pregnant should so obviously remain a personal decision. End of debate ... until recently.

While I began pondering how best to explain this idiocy, the always reliable Southern Beale sums it up really well:

"America’s Goofy Other Party is desperate to attack the Obama Administration on something — anything. With the economy improving and Osama bin Laden at the bottom of the ocean, what have they got? Culture wars, of course."

And after providing information about how Catholics already allow for coverage via insurance for birth control, SB adds:

" ... let’s be honest here: most American Catholics use birth control. Sorry, church leaders can whine about it and complain about it but we all know it’s true. They lost this battle somewhere around 1977 and I’m just not going to get dragged into some church battle that the leadership lost 30 years ago."

And she winds up with:

"What the Catholic bishops are trying to do is get the federal government to enforce the church’s anti-contraception doctrine because they have failed to do so on their own. This isn’t an “assault on religious liberty,” it’s the exact opposite: it’s getting the government to enforce a church rule that no one has followed in decades."

So just read her post, end of debate.

Occupy Nashville Not Really Protesting, Say State Leaders

The state legislature is swiftly acting to pass a new law aimed at removing, fining and jailing the Occupy Nashville protesters. Legislators actually have to see this group, hear complaints about them being there, and as Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey says - these folks aren't really protesting, so there are no "free speech" concerns to worry with. 

"Average protesters, usually on some defined day centered around a specific issue, march or congregate en mass to demand redress of a specific grievance. Normal protests can get loud and they can get rowdy. Frequently, they can last long into the night. On rare occasions, they can last a few days.

Occupy Nashville is quite a different animal. This protest is not really a protest at all. It is, as the name implies, an occupation. I value our constitutional rights -- the freedom of speech most of all. Without the freedom to directly confront our leaders, our constitution isn't worth the parchment on which it's printed.

However, to continue to ignore the reality of Occupy Nashville would be to shirk my duties as a public servant. I have to tell the truth and the truth is this: your War Memorial Plaza - a place dedicated to Tennesseans who paid the ultimate price in service to their nation and fellow citizens - is no longer a place for visitors. It is unsightly, it is unclean and, depending on the time of day, it is downright dangerous."

There are anecdotal stories about the protesters acting badly - and don't we have laws already which could be brought to bear to arrest folks behaving badly? This new proposed law would make a crime of long-term protests.

Occupy Nashville does have does have specific grievances.

And they do actively express their views in ways which must truly annoy the legislature - removing, arresting and fining those who take part seems more to be for the comfort level of elected officials than anything else

Bringing The Cinnamon Challenge To Government

Each year thousands of new bills get submitted to the state and federal legislatures, with little to slow their apparently infinite growth. Outrage has been hot on the heels of many bills, as claims are made that they emerge from faceless bloated lobbyists and organizations whose true goals seem impossible to define.

And, more and more, these bills define regulations over every aspect of our lives, often demanding that citizens of our great nation and/or state must perform various tasks prior to attaining approvals, benefits, licenses, etc etc.

But what task do we, as citizens, require of our representatives before they submit a bill, whether it was given to them to submit or they crafted it all by themselves? Wouldn't it be a good idea to demand some kind of proof of personal sacrifice or commitment?

Well, I have a suggestion.

I happened across a semi-popular bit of behavior which I think we should adopt as a requirement before any bill could be submitted - it's called The Cinnamon Challenge.

This challenge began to appear online in 2001, and videos soon followed.

The Cinnamon Challenge: a person must consume one tablespoon of cinnamon without spitting it out or vomiting. If a representative can do this, then their bill can then be submitted and undergo the usual process of approval or rejection. I would also add that every attempt at mastering the Challenge be videotaped and uploaded to YouTube. In fact, Illinois Governor Pat Quinn recently took the challenge and passed it just fine - so it is not impossible to master this challenge ... or is it?

Here's a sample of videos of average American folks attempting the challenge:

A semi-popular comedienne named GloZell recently tried it (with appropriately wacky results):

So there's my idea - fail the Cinnamon Challenge and your bill fails. Pass it, and then the legislature can consider the bill. I'm betting it would reduce needless bill activity by a significant margin. For those that succeed, we have proof the representative really, truly cares about the legislation.

It's a win-win.

Senator Campfield's Follies Heading to Court

If the voters in Knoxville are paying attention, maybe the upcoming libel trial against state senator Stacey Campfield will be Reason 10,354 to replace him. Or is he indeed the Loose Cannon Which Serves A Purpose?

"It’s not too late to correct your mistake, but you better hurry. January was bad, but it’s going to get way worse when Campfield has to trek up to Campbell County to defend himself in a $750,000 libel suit filed by former state House candidate Roger Byrge. Byrge is a Democrat who lost a 2008 race by 391 votes to Union County Republican Chad Faulker, a Knox County deputy sheriff.

 

At issue is this Campfield blog post from September 2008: “Word is a ... mail piece has gone out exposing Byrges (sic) multiple drug arrests. Including arrests for possession and drug dealing. (I hear the mug shots are gold.)”

Unfortunately for Campfield, “word” was false, and falsely accusing someone of a crime is libel, so he’s been sued. Byrge’s lawyer, David Dunaway, accuses the senator of using his state-owned computer to make a false allegation with the intention of influencing an election.

And it wasn’t just any election. It was the election that changed the balance of power in the Tennessee House of Representatives from Democratic to Republican – by one skinny vote."

More from Betty Bean on Stacey Campfield

Push To Rewrite History: Comedy or Tragedy?

I look forward to the day when news about politics in Tennessee is not simply easy material  for comedy shows. But that day is not today.

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

Some background on how the state 'tea party' wants to improve/re-write history.

Local Referendum Vote May Be Overturned By State Legislature

Morristown's city council has been stalled since last summer trying to appoint a new person the the board of the Morristown Utility Commission. The council deadlocked when the mayor tried to appoint someone to replace a MUC member, whose term was up and who has been on the board for over 3 decades. In desperation, the fractured council has now pushed a measure forward which would have two legislators, Sen. Steve Southerland and Rep. Don Miller, create a "private act" to change the nominating process to the board - a process set in place when local voters made the change by a referendum vote in 2001. 

Sen. Southerland has said this will be resolved by the end of February, no problem.

That has set off a firestorm of debate, with many seeing the act as an "end-run around voters" and one which will be achieved with very little attention by media or awareness of city voters. So, members of the local citizens group, Citizens for Accountability, have sent a letter to Morristown voters and to the legislature's local government committee which says any change should go before voters via a referendum.

Here's the letter:

"Five City Councilmembers---Paul LeBel, Bob Garrett, Kay Senter, Chris Bivens, and Claude Jinks---have voted to cancel out the votes of the 3,202 people (72%) who voted “FOR” changes to the Morristown Utilities Commission in a 2001 REFERENDUM.  MUC already controls three major funds of the City: the Power System, the Water System, and the Broadband/ FiberNet System. These five want to change the 2001 voter-approved process for appointing members to the MUC Board, and they want to give themselves authority to transfer the City sewer system to MUC ---all without a REFERENDUM.

In 2001, MUC supported and 72% of voters approved changes to MUC, including setting up a new appointment process for MUC Commissioners. The voter-approved appointment process provided that MUC would screen all candidates for the MUC Board, and then MUC would recommend three qualified people to the Mayor. The Mayor would select and present one of the MUC-provided names to council for approval or disapproval.

Over the next ten years, no council-member tried to change the selection process that the PEOPLE had overwhelmingly (72% approval) voted “FOR” in the 2001 REFERENDUM.  

                        

 Now five councilmembers have decided that the 2001 voter-approved MUC selection process is not working and they want to change the appointment process-- without sending the proposed change back to the people in a  REFERENDUM.   

 The five councilmembers think that one person should serve on MUC even beyond the 34 years that he has already served. And that person, George McGuffin, adamantly refuses to pull his name in order to clear the way for a new person to be appointed to MUC. 

Instead of compromising and approving at least one of the ELEVEN different people nominated so far by the Mayor from the MUC list, these councilmembers have rejected all ELEVEN over the past seven months.  Since they haven’t gotten their way, these five have voted to change the law and replace the current voter-approved law for appointing MUC Board members with a process that will allow the five to have total control. Plus, they are giving themselves authority to give the City sewer to MUC without a REFERENDUM.

Mayor Danny Thomas and Council-member Gene Brooks support putting the changes to a vote of the people in a REFERENDUM, but the other five refuse to allow the people to vote.

Sen. Steve Southerland and Rep. Don Miller are sponsoring the MUC appointment and sewer changes in the state legislature. Sen. Southerland and Rep. Miller have refused to amend the bill to let the people vote on these changes in a REFERENDUM.

 When a major change to a Private Act is proposed—such as setting up a future sewer transfer—it should go before the people in a REFERENDUM.

When the people have already voted on something in a REFERENDUM—such as the MUC appointment process---any proposed change should go back to the people in a REFERENDUM.

                       

Remember these elected officials who put issues on the ballot and ask you to get out and vote (REFERENDUM-2001) and who then turn around, ignore you, and decide that they will overturn your vote in 2012.

----Citizens for Accountability

      www.morristownhamblencfa.com

With local utility revenues expected to hit the $100 million mark in 2012, whopping utility rate price increases ahead in 2012 for city residents due to critical repairs needed in the sewer system, decisions about who is charge of the city sewer system -- well, there's just heaps and heaps of questions about what's really going on and few answers.

 

Bistro Boots Campfield, Internet Lights Up

"

pic via the Knox News Sentinel report

The owner of the Bistro By The Bijou Theatre told TN Senator Stacey Campfield to leave the restaurant Sunday in response to some wildly distorted and dangerously wrong information he was preaching about AIDS and gay people, which I wrote about here. (UPDATE: Campfield sued for libel, headed to court)

I find it really odd that a state senator who claims "Homosexuals represent about 2 to 3 percent of the population yet you look at television and plays and theaters, it's 50 percent of the theaters, probably more than that, 50 percent of the theaters based on something about homosexuality." would patronize a place which is itself part of a "theatre" - they even spell it like one of those places where "plays" are. Gasp!

Bistro owner Martha Boggs says:

""I didn't want his hate in my restaurant," Boggs said in a interview this morning. "I told him he wasn't welcome here. ... I feel like he's gone from being stupid to being dangerous, and I wanted to stand up to him."

Reactions are lighting up the internet:

Sean Braisted: "There is nothing inconsistent or incoherent about discriminating against those with power who actively discriminate against those without power.  There is no difference between refusing to serve David Duke than there is Stacey Campfield.  While Campfield's views may currently have more resonance among the American populace, it doesn't change the fact that he wishes discrimination against people based on who they are.

Mike Donila
Southern Beale
Betsy Phillips
Trace Sharp
Towle Road
Daily Kos
Think Progress 
No Silence Here has a roundup of comments
And, Free Republic: Gays have their own street in Knoxville?

Sen. Campfield isn't backing away from his uneducated commentary - he's adding to it, urging folks to think that someone who has hemophilia or anyone who might be ill must be avoided because they are not "normal":

"Most "Normal" people I imagine would also stay away from the IV drug users, hemophiliacs, known disease carriers, prostitutes and other high risk people. Also conceding a man less likely to receive the disease then (sic) a women because of the nature of sex, the odds of a man getting AIDS from a female are pretty low."

Classy. At least he says "I imagine" as his imagination is completely running wild. And the real question is - will voters forget all this when his re-election efforts begin?

Camera Obscura: A Real 'Artist" of Silent Film Era

Just as Hollywood is lining up to celebrate the movie romanticizing the silent film era, "The Artist", one of the era's very talented and outspoken screenwriters, Frederica Sagor Mass, passed away in early January at the age of 111.

Fortunately, she crafted a most memorable memoir of her days as a screenwriter published in 1999, "The Shocking Miss Pilgrim", where she revealed the greed, lechery and brutal nature of the early days of filmmaking. Her memoir reminded readers that Hollywood has always been first and foremost about one thing - business, not artists. Here she is from a 1999 interview:

"I know I’ve been hard on the motion picture industry [in the book],” she remarks. “The facts and the stories I tell — about the plagiarism and the way I was handled and the way other writers were handled — are true. If anybody wants to take offense at the fact that I tell the truth and I’m writing this book …” She pauses a moment, collects her thoughts, then — Whammo! “I can get my payback now. I’m alive and thriving and, well, you SOBs are all below, because I’ve lived to 99. And I quit the business at 50.”

---

"Maas doesn’t think much of current films. “There’s no lack of material, there’s just lack of incentive to make anything else but what they consider box office. And, hell, who can dispute them? Pictures are making money. And people are getting stupider and stupider. They’ll pay seven and a half dollars to see a motion picture and it’s all in the same vein: sex, sex, sex, sex, sex and violence, violence, violence, violence. You know what they’ve done? They’ve taken the vulgar, low part of old-fashioned vaudeville — all those terrible little acts — and they’ve put it on TV.”

And from her obit in the LA Times:

"Both she and her husband, Ernest Maas, saw their ideas stolen and plagiarized, and they were blackballed by the industry after being wrongly accused of being communists, she wrote.

"Her book is perhaps the best muckraking memoir about early Hollywood," film historian Alan K. Rode said Friday. "She was one of the last living connections to silent film, and her autobiography is an irreplaceable record written from the rare perspective of a woman who lived through those times."

Her life and works deserve to be celebrated as much as or more than any box office hit of the moment. Here's to you, Frederica.

Widespread Reaction to Foxconn, Campfield, and More

I'm very happy to see that a few items I wrote about this week are getting more attention and scrutiny from the press and the public. It's vivid evidence that the internet is a very powerful force in sharing and shaping opinions.

First, the NYTimes has another story on the often deadly conditions in the Chinese factories which make electronic products for Apple, Dell, HP, IMB, Nokia and more, following up on stories I mentioned here and here. I am optimistic that all of you using smartphones, computers and gaming consoles don't want to these products being made at the cost of human lives - but first info on industrial conditions has to be reported and widely shared.

Another story I wrote I posted on the KnoxViews website about some dangerously stupid comments from TN state senator Stacey Campfield on AIDS and gays has been burning up the internets. I posted the story on KnoxViews since he is Knoxville's senator and Knox voters are the ones who put him in office. Reaction has been swift and widespread - MetroPulse, the KnoxNewsSentinel, the Nashville Scene, the Washington Monthly and many more. 


A story to keep your eyes on - following the massive opposition to the proposed internet censorship ideas in the failed SOPA legislation in Congress, there is another far sneakier bit of censorship headed towards the U.S. and Europe thanks to a super-secret treaty agreement called ACTA, the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement which endorses the worst of the SOPA provisions.


As the website Boing Boing notes that ACTA is an:

" ... unprecedented secret copyright treaty that was negotiated by industry representatives and government trade reps, without any access by elected representatives, independent business, the press, public interest groups, legal scholars, independent economists and so on. Time and again, the world's richest governmental administrations (only rich countries were in the negotiation) told their own parliaments and congresses that they could not see what was in the treaty, nor know the details of the discussion. The European Parliament was one of the bodies that asked its administration to share the treaty discussions with the elected members, only to be turned down. Cables in the Wikileaks dumps showed US officials orchestrating this secrecy because they knew how unpopular this one-sided, heavy-handed copyright treaty would be.

The buzz on this treaty is that it may bypass our nation's congressional review if President Obama signs the agreement as an 'executive order'. Bad idea - and hopefully more and more online users will catch this news and oppose it as strongly as they opposed SOPA.

Welcome Back to No Silence Here

After a brief absence, former KnoxNews columnist/blogger/media overlord Michael Silence is back online, highlighting all types of news, information, and bloggers-of-note at No Silence Here.

So bookmark his site, get his feed, do what you gotta do to become a regular reader.

A sample of recent posts:

Tennessee's Gov. Haslam says anti-gay legislation a waste of time.

2-year study of 'red-light' traffic cams show don't decrease accidents - as Mike and I and many others have said, these 'cam-scams' are about making money. In a recent audit, Bluff City, TN is shown to be making more money from these cams than from property taxes.

Welcome back, Michael!

Foxconn vs American Workers: A Losing Game

Rallying for their lives

American media is beginning to notice that our low-cost demand for consumer goods and the deep desire for only huge profits by bosses is driving us over an economic cliff. This NYTimes report peeks a little behind the curtains ...

"An eight-hour drive from that glass factory is a complex, known informally as Foxconn City, where the iPhone is assembled. To Apple executives, Foxconn City was further evidence that China could deliver workers — and diligence — that outpaced their American counterparts. 

That’s because nothing like Foxconn City exists in the United States. 

The facility has 230,000 employees, many working six days a week, often spending up to 12 hours a day at the plant. Over a quarter of Foxconn’s work force lives in company barracks and many workers earn less than $17 a day. When one Apple executive arrived during a shift change, his car was stuck in a river of employees streaming past. “The scale is unimaginable,” he said. 

Foxconn employs nearly 300 guards to direct foot traffic so workers are not crushed in doorway bottlenecks. The facility’s central kitchen cooks an average of three tons of pork and 13 tons of rice a day. While factories are spotless, the air inside nearby teahouses is hazy with the smoke and stench of cigarettes. 

Foxconn Technology has dozens of facilities in Asia and Eastern Europe, and in Mexico and Brazil, and it assembles an estimated 40 percent of the world’s consumer electronics for customers like Amazon, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Motorola, Nintendo, Nokia, Samsung and Sony. 

“They could hire 3,000 people overnight,” said Jennifer Rigoni, who was Apple’s worldwide supply demand manager until 2010, but declined to discuss specifics of her work. “What U.S. plant can find 3,000 people overnight and convince them to live in dorms?”

The economic engines in China and in Asia are fueled in ways American workers can't or won't work under. It isn't a matter of whether American workers are skilled or not.

I mentioned recently the mass suicide attempt by employees at one Foxconn complex in a bid to keep the wages they had.

Reports on Foxconn's business model are just barely being provided. But the information is grim. And a global solution which might ignite a boom in the American economy is at best a murky concept. It's as if we are debating what kind of boat to take to sea after we have already leapt over the rails of a ship and are swimming away.

Vermin Supreme Vows Free Ponies for All if Elected President

Since I've painted such harsh pictures of the Republican candidates for president, it is only fair that I also present a non-party candidate who embraces idiocy as the heart and soul of his campaign. Plus he promises free ponies for every American and wears a boot on his head. Ladies and Gentlemen, here's Vermin Supreme. Wheee!!

Camera Obscura: The Sad Demise of George Lucas

It's sad to witness the strange demise of filmmaker George Lucas, who no only held great promise, but exploded the world of cinema and cinema fans with his original "Star Wars" trilogy, and then exploded the world of visual and audio effects with his breakout creations of Industrial Light and Magic. But that is all in the past, and here in the present, Mr. Lucas appears oddly lost and angry and I'm left to wonder what happened to him.

Yes, yet another fanboy critique of you and your work. I'm really sorry. I know it isn't anything you want to hear.

His company and he himself financed and released today a big-budget tale of the incredibly heroic World War 2 pilots known as the Tuskegee Airmen titled "Red Tails". And he's been very vocal about what he sees as Hollywood's failure to support big budget movies with all-black casts. Indeed, he drafted the creators of "Undercover Brother" and "The Boondocks" to write and direct this movie. But his own goal was to created a sort of patriotic African-American John Wayne hero movie when I don't know that anyone - regardless of their race - wanted one. Hey, you want a tough, he-man African-American genre movie hero? Watch "Shaft". And that was decades ago, and now, audiences are just expecting more.

Or better, if Lucas wants to energize Hollywood to support African-American directors and writers and actors, then give them the financing and the whiz-bang effects and tell them "Make the stories and movies that you want to make."

After reading this lengthy interview with the angry and seemingly disconnected Lucas in the NYTimes I was left with the impression that he has somehow been diluted into a weird sort of Howard Hughes person. He had too much success, too much money, too fast and too soon. Lucas' has really hokey ideas about movies (not necessarily a bad thing) and has nurtured an incredible amount of technical development of cinema - but hates anyone who might challenge his decisions to make "Star Wars" anything except what he wants it to be. Fights with a world of fans? Really?

Midi-chlorian machine

Here's my own personal fanboy rant against how Lucas unwisely changed the intentions of his "Star Wars" tale -- the original film (now called Part 4) was a hero's journey, a young man takes on adventure and ideas (empires even!) far beyond his grasp and changes the world as a Jedi Knight. But in "The Phantom Menace" (aka Part 1), we learn, hey, to be a Jedi, you have to have the right genetic code (something Lucas wrote of as a high Midi-chlorian count in the bloodstream) in order to be special. Heroism or wisdom is not achieved through effort and work, it's just about being born with the right heritage. ?????

He's about to release (again) the entire movie series now in 3-D, and from Part 1 through Part 6. But if you tell (or see) this story out of the original order, there is no mystery as to who heroic Luke Skywalker and villainous Darth Vader are. None. So what story are we watching now? Not the ones which forever changed movies and movie audiences around the world.

Let's put it this way and compare some basic movie-making concepts --

Also being released theatrically today is a movie called "Haywire" by the director Steve Soderbergh (who also did the camerwork and the editing), and he's been a critic-approved director and a blockbuster-movie-franchise creator too, for many years. But he also makes small-budget, tightly wound action and thriller movies too. "Haywire" is mostly a karate/kung-fu action yarn - a straight-up genre movie, expertly made. He's done this type of thing before with the excellent crime thrillers "Out of Sight" and "The Limey".

Compare that with "Red Tails" - it too has rousing action scenes, yes, expertly made. But "Red Tails" comes from real-world events and that history is pretty much discarded here. "Haywire" ain't history, did not cost a fortune to make, and is based in fantasy. And Soderbergh has also taken on huge historical projects too, like "Che: Parts One and Two", which don't skimp on history or action and is a truly notable achievement.

From here in my movie fanboy seat, I can easily pick the better filmmaker, and he's probably a happy fellow too. So it is not George Lucas.

I still like his early films too - "THX-138" and "American Graffiti" are great movies (which Lucas hates). But after 1980 ... it's all been downhill.

Here are a few more examples you can watch tonight on Turner Classic Movies - both sharp, witty, exciting crime thrillers, expertly made, and expertly written and performed by using well-made characters in settings both imaginary and real, which are both popcorn movie fun and still manage to speak to real-world ideas, like technology and individuality.

First, at 10 pm "The Anderson Tapes" by Sidney Lumet. Sean Connery and an excellent cast plot a massive heist at a luxury apartment complex in NYC. Fresh from prison, none of them know how much every move is being tracked by casual and police surveillance sources.

That's followed by the original version of "The Taking of Pelham, One Two Three", about crooks pretending to be terrorists as they hijack a subway car in Manhattan. Every performance here stands out, major and minor, they move and sound like real New Yorkers and real crooks. The recent remake was awful - this version is hugely entertaining.

The First Metaphor For 2012?

Yes, I know dear reader, I've not written in a week, which is nearly 17 years or something in internet-time. I have had the usual Enter The New Year's Unwell Episode, mingled with some Better Not Write That Thought Down and Put It Online days too. It is surely tough to offer a viewpoint on certain events in our world so as not turn this Cup of Joe into a bitter, ugly drink.

You deserve better than that and I'm just not happy to regurgitate the hate one so easily finds online.

The coming weeks and months of political elections as any one of the candidates provided on the Republican side of the footrace/musical chair game for the presidency is already awful. Their whole raft of folks has been a total tie between folks who are all being chosen dead last as the person anyone wants for their team. And the Tennessee legislature is back in session too, and all accounts reveal little good will come of it. So providing even a glimmer of good news will not be an easy task. I'll do my best though.

Giant internet resources went dark yesterday to protest a terrible bit of lawmaking via Washington regarding new internet rules, and that means, yes, Congress is back in session too. We are really seeing some of the most lackluster, if not utterly depressing, actions from our political leadership system. Blogger Seth Godin spoke of this problem yesterday:

"Sure, Congress has a marketing problem--largely because they have a problem with the decisions they make and the way that they make them.

At least they've left us a useful career guide about what not to do in the real world."

It's a good read. Depressing, but a good read.

I hold hope that the shipwreck of the Costa Concordia is not the iconic metaphor of 2012, but it looks more and more like lousy captains are loose in every direction. It would mean we're all going to have to work harder to make up for it.

Xbox Workers Threaten Mass Suicide

Conflicting accounts are beginning to get media attention about a group of possibly hundreds of workers at a plant in China who threatened to commit mass suicide over a pay dispute. Workers for Foxconn - which makes parts for the Xbox, iPhone, iPad, Kindle, Wii, and the PS3 - apparently took to the roof of one of the company dormitories and made the threat.

A report via Kotaku says the event followed an employee request for a raise, but were told they could either keep their jobs with no increase or quit and get severance pay. Other reports say the company told the employees their Xbox production line was being shut down and some would be transferred and the rest simply fired. As for the number of those who made the suicide threat, reports range from a few dozen to as many as 300. (More pictures here.)

Foxconn is the world's largest maker of electronic components, and is also the largest private employer in China. In 2010, one worker did commit suicide at one plant, which prompted the company to install 'suicide prevention netting' at some of their plants. Recent investigations at the some of the plants showed near-military like conditions for workers who are under constant surveillance as they work and live at the factory dorms.

Microsoft did issue a statement about the incident -

"Microsoft is one of many companies that contracts with Foxconn to manufacture hardware. Upon learning of the labor protest in Wuhan, we immediately conducted an independent investigation of this issue.

After talking with workers and management, it is our understanding that the worker protest was related to staffing assignments and transfer policies, not working conditions. Due to regular production adjustments, Foxconn offered the workers the option of being transferred to alternative production lines or resigning and receiving all salary and bonuses due, according to length of service. After the protest, the majority of workers chose to return to work. A smaller portion of those employees elected to resign.

Microsoft takes working conditions in the factories that manufacture its products very seriously. We have a stringent Vendor Code of Conduct that spells out our expectations, and we monitor working conditions closely on an ongoing basis and address issues as they emerge. Microsoft is committed to the fair treatment and safety of workers employed by our vendors and to ensuring conformance with Microsoft policy."

The radio show "This American Life" aired an episode on Jan. 6, 2012 about working in the electronics factories in China and for Foxconn.

The company's full list of customers is available here.

Pentagon Spy Drones For Home Users

Flying spy drones are making the move from military/police applications to home use. At the ongoing Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas, exhibitors are teasing the sale of these items for just about anyone to use.

"Like the HD video cameras now included in the livestreamers’ cellphones, aerial surveillance drones have progressed from ultra-expensive professional gear to impulse-buy items. What was once in the Pentagon budget is now at Toys “R” Us – in a simple form, at least.
---
"Introduced in 2010, the one-pound styrofoam craft has four rotors and a plethora of sensors to keep it stable and navigable. In some ways, it resembles an iPhone, with accelerometers and a gyroscope to measure movement and location, for example. Parrot says that it can fly 50 feet high, up to 11 miles per hour and stay aloft for about 12 minutes on a charge.

"Built-in Wi-Fi allows control from an iPhone or Android phone. The Wi-Fi also beams back moderate-resolution (640-by-480-pixel) video to the phone.

---

Rapid advances in this new spy tech are already underway:

"This updated version, due out in the second quarter of 2012 for a list price of $299, offers a better HD camera at 1280x720 resolution, as well as the ability to recognize and interact with shapes and colors for an augmented reality (AR) “gaming mode,” which layers digital drone obstacles and enemies atop the camera’s actual view of the real world.

"The new 2.0 AR.Drone also offers pilots a “traveling” mode, allowing them to set the drone to automatically move and record in specific directions for maximum stability and image quality. As in the case with the Wi-Spi drones, the recorded video can be uploaded directly to the Web."

Stephen Hawking on the Universal Mystery

Like many people, I've followed the works and ideas presented by the scientist Stephen Hawking for many years with great interest and fascination. His ideas are always fascinating as he ponders the workings of the universe even as he himself is stuck in a physical form which has lost the ability to move or speak without the aid of machinery. He's quite enigmatic.

But in an interview published today in New Scientist magazine in honor of his upcoming 70th birthday, I've learned he and I share a tremendous curiosity for another endless enigma. When the magazine asked him "What do you think most about during the day?" he replied:

"Women. They are a complete mystery."

I'm with you, Stephen. 

Women are one of the best creations in the universe. While one might be able with diligent research and investigation to decipher the workings of time and space, and at least present a theory of some sort, which might be tested and explored, about our shared universe ... women continue to dumbfound men. (Not that difficult, really.) And I would hate to contemplate a universe without them in it.

Chuck Norris Ponders The Iowa Caucus

Bestowing meaning to today's vote in the Republican vote in the Iowa caucus is like pondering the meaning of what Punxsutawney Phil chooses to do on Groundhog Day.

Roughly four-hundredths of one percent of the American population participates in the vote in Iowa - mighty small numbers easily out-manned by the reporters and campaign-spinners who urgently seek ... something to report or spin about Republicans other than a Joke of the Day. Still, an election does have to start somewhere, though the winner of the GOP Iowa caucus in 2008 was Mike Huckabee and his effort tanked shortly after.

Republicans have nothing to gain by taking the presidency in 2012. They want to run Congress, and heap blame on President Obama for every ill in the world. It's like running a "long con".

 For more fun-filled election predictions, let's check out the Constitutional Thinking of Chuck Norris, who today offers his "10 Questions to Find Our Next President" -

"8) Who has the best working comprehension of America?

John Adams, America's second president, said, "I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy."

Up next: the Kardashian Family investigates health care while shopping. Ah, Republican politics, the comedy gift that keeps on giving.

Number One Blog Post of 2011

While there were many popular posts here during 2011, there was one which drew more readers and visitors than any other by an enormous margin. I was a bit surprised to note the constant rise in the number of readers/visitors over the months to the post. But given the reality that our Congress in 2011 has failed to lead or decide or act in any way which would benefit the nation's crumbling economy, then it should be no surprise at all the top post here for 2011 was a political fact-check which shreds the Republican claims about why our economy tanked and why it struggles to recover.

This post first appeared on May 10, 2011. And since the information provided has resonated with so many folks, I reprint it below. Thanks to all who made it so popular!

Dr. Evil Running Congress?

The talk flowing from Washington about the national debt sounds too much like the goofy comedy scenes of Dr. Evil demanding "one billion gajillion fifillion shapaduluullmeleleshaprenodlash mamillion dollars" from the nations of the world to halt a nefarious destruction of the planet.

House Speaker John Boehner and his GOP brethren (like my congressman, Rep. Phil Roe) are whipping up a scarefest about the status of the national debt - while avoiding the very obvious solution right before them. "Cut 2 trillion dollars!" cries Boehner.

Cutting spending by trillions of dollars is possible, nearly 9 trillion came from Bush era policies which were never paid for and should be eliminated -- As Peter Orszag, director the Office of Management and Budget said quite plainly:

"You mentioned that $9 trillion projected deficit over the next decade. That basically reflects three things.

The first is the failure to pay for two policies in particular, the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts and the Medicare prescription drug benefit. Those were deficit financed. Over the next decade they account for $5 trillion.

Second, the economic downturn, because it triggers the so-called automatic stabilizers, which raise unemployment benefits, they raise food stamps, they cause -- revenue tends to decline during an economic downturn, all of which is beneficial because it helps to mitigate that GDP deficit that I was talking about. But it also over the next decade adds $3.5 trillion to the deficit.

And then finally, the Recovery Act accounts for less than 10 percent of that total. So basically, the $9 trillion projected deficit can be entirely accounted for by the failure to pay for policies in the past, the economic downturn, and the steps we’ve had to take to combat that downturn, which is not to say action isn’t necessary, it absolutely is. But it’s also important to realize we didn’t get here by accident."

It's clear the House Republicans don't want to cut spending or reduce the debt - they want to scare voters today in hopes of winning elections tomorrow, no matter what the cost might be.

New Words/Phrases of 2011

In no particular order, a short selection of words of phrases which became prominent this year and will likely become more commonly used in 2012.

biopiracy - I'm betting this word (along with bioprospecting) gets more widely used in coming years. It became prominent in news reports and press releases regarding a massive lawsuit brought against the agricultural mega-corporation Monsanto by the nation of India, which claims Monsanto is "stealing" plants indigenous to India and slightly modifying the plant genetics in hopes of getting a patent on them and then cornering the market on supply. More info here.

underdemolished - I encountered this one several times in 2011, used in reference to the existing buildings of say, a bankrupt restaurant chain, which continue to operate despite barely covering costs - it isn't that there is an over-supply of buildings, it's just that the ones that are in use are "underdemolished". Also used to describe the glut of over-valued homes no one wants to buy.

tebowing - From the world of football, this is a verb describing the act of dropping to one knee to pray in a public event or location. (See Tim Tebow for more info.)

smartphone - I'm pretty sure I never heard this word prior to 2011. It annoys me. And I hope it soon goes the way of the "velocipede".

web curation - Instead of telling someone I write a blog or maintain a web site or write for web sites, I now can claim to be a 'web curator', which sounds mighty fancy and pays just the same as I make now.

ambush marketing - While it seems a redundant phrase, it refers to the way a company can piggy-back their logo onto events and services they do not sponsor but can simply invade. It's being rather common in describing the advertising orgy surrounding the 2012 London Olympics.

planking - Probably the most fun word of the year, the most ironic fad and something anyone can do anywhere, also known as the "lying down game". You can even mix together planking with tebowing and get this: