Month: July 2008

"Black Hole" now racially offensive?

From Dallas Texas city council meetings.

A special meeting about Dallas County traffic tickets turned tense and bizarre this afternoon. County commissioners were discussing problems with the central collections office that is used to process traffic ticket payments and handle other paperwork normally done by the JP Courts. Commissioner Kenneth Mayfield, who is white, said it seemed that central collections “has become a black hole” because paperwork reportedly has become lost in the office. Commissioner John Wiley Price, who is black, interrupted him with a loud “Excuse me!” He then corrected his colleague, saying the office has become a “white hole.” That prompted Judge Thomas Jones, who is black, to demand an apology from Mayfield for his racially insensitive analogy. Mayfield shot back that it was a figure of speech and a science term.
I mean, WTF? The stupidity level of the world continues to increase. ]]>

Lyrics to Praan, the 'Stream of Life' song from Where the Hell is Matt video

guy dancing around the world. The song’s name is Praan and you can order it on Amazon. Stream of Life by Rabindranath Tagore The same stream of life that runs through my veins night and day runs through the world and dances in rhythmic measures. It is the same life that shoots in joy through the dust of the earth in numberless blades of grass and breaks into tumultuous waves of leaves and flowers. It is the same life that is rocked in the ocean-cradle of birth and of death, in ebb and in flow. I feel my limbs are made glorious by the touch of this world of life. And my pride is from the life-throb of ages dancing in my blood this moment. UPDATE: Here are the words in Bengali from the composer’s blog

Praan Lyrics – Transliteration

Some people have asked for this. So here you go.

Bhulbona ar shohojete Shei praan e mon uthbe mete Mrittu majhe dhaka ache je ontohin praan Bojre tomar baje bashi She ki shohoj gaan Shei shurete jagbo ami (Repeat 3X) Shei jhor jeno shoi anonde Chittobinar taare Shotto-shundu dosh digonto Nachao je jhonkare! Bojre tomar baje bashi She ki shohoj gaan Shei shurete jagbo ami
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Betancourt's Guardian Angel

Now that the hubbub of the rescue has ended, the media is rightly turning their attention not the rescuers, but the man who saved Ingrid Betancourt while she was a prisoner. William Perez, a young corporal in the Colombian army and fellow hostage, helped Ingrid eat, cared for her when sick, and gave her the strength to fight on even after she had decided to stop eating and just give up.

When Betancourt gave up the will to live and refused to eat saying she wanted to die, it was Perez who urged her to remain strong, who spoon fed her, who constantly reminded her she had to stay alive with “a spoonful for her daughter Mélanie, one for her son Lorenzo and one for her mother Yolanda.”

France24 will have an interview with him at 2:10 Paris time (GMT+2) on July 10.

Sadly, William Perez’s grandmother died of a heart attack upon hearing that he had been freed.

There is also news that Betancourt and her husband may be on the rocks. Of course it’s a bit early after years in the jungle to be back to normal, but something is up.

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Dragons, Leprechauns, Boogy Men, Truthers and Conspiracy Theorists.

This is a good article about how we are retrogressing intellectually by the spread of more and more conspiracy theories by folks who aren’t exactly the top thinkers in the world.

Sometimes it appears as if Western societies have regressed, adopting a medieval attitude towards calamitous acts. Back in the Dark Ages, people regarded accidents, disasters and other acts of misfortune as the work of hidden forces. Accidents did not happen, apparently – they were intentionally caused, either by divine or malevolent forces. Misdeeds were often said to have been caused by people who had been manipulated by ‘evil forces’.

This primitive outlook is making a comeback; it informs the way many people make sense of high-profile catastrophes today. Conspiracy theories are pushed forward to explain what happened on 9/11, or why there was such devastation in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina.

I’ve said it dozens of times. Anyone who believes in conspiracy theories has never been in charge of more than 4 people in business and have them try to do something the same way and in secret.

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When will the Georgia v. Russia war start?

For those who haven’t been paying attention, the war of words is escalating to guns, car bombs, and hostage taking in the former Soviet republic of Georgia. Condi Rice has just landed in Tibilsi in some last minute diplomatic push to settle down things before troops get involved. We’ll see what happens in the next few weeks.

Georgia Messenger is a good English language paper from Georgia. Moscow Times is a good one from Moscow.

UPDATE: For recent visitors, it is worth noting this post came a month before actual ‘hostilities’ commenced on August 7, 2008, but the situation in the region has been tense for years.

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Palbasha Siddique and a high-definition commercial for hope

Those who are on my email lists have probably gotten a dozen messages by now telling them to watch and enjoy the ‘Where the Hell is Matt 2008′ video that is taking the Internet by storm. But now I’ve actually found an article about the 17-year-old Bengali girl plucked from an obscure public access radio station clip in Minnesota and turned into an overnight sensation (#6 on Amazon downloads right now).

Great article on Palbasha Siddique in which the author properly calls this commercial a high def commercial for hope.

And in case you want to buy the song.

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Pentagon to rebid Tanker contract. Legal war bigger than real one.

The $40 billion tanker contract awarded to Northrop/BAE/Airbus last year is up for ‘rebid’ after crazy political pressure from Boeing.

Northrop proposed turning the Airbus A330A into a military tanker. Boeing had proposed retrofitting its commercially designed 767 into a tanker.

Politically, this puts the issue back in play during the election year, and forces the final decision on the next administration. McCain has been a fierce critic of Boeing’s earlier dealings, and 1000s of Boeing workers in the state of Washington and Northrop workers in Georgia will be watching.

I imagine the lawsuits will be flying fast and furious no matter who wins.

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