Epistemic Ingemination

More Google Earth geekery. If you want to play around with the same computer modeling that NOAA uses to predict hurricane paths, they live over here, added in real time as they become available. A very nice service; your government at its best.

Regarding the debt ceiling foolishness:

Look. There is no unavoidable crisis here. The “debt ceiling” debate is a canard; it is a will o’ the wisp. A false flag operation.

It is a myth, manufactured. By — And Only By — The Republican Party.

All that we are seeing is the end game of a decade of thievery.

You — all of us — have just gone through the most monstrous (and the most successful) plundering of a public treasury in the history of the world. Ask yourself: where did that money go? It is a massive amount of money — $5 trillion dollars in ten years. That’s 41.6 billion dollars a month over the 120 months. Somebody received that money.

Did you see any of it? I think not.

It went to military contractors; big pharma; insurance companies; huge reinsurance firms; big oil; big banks; big investment banks. And the politicians who enabled the plunder: they have their share of the booty, too; rest assured.

It was such a excessive orgy of theft that it crashed the world economy. It was such an excessive orgy of theft that the Pentagon can’t account for over a trillion dollars that it spent. It was such an excessive orgy of theft that the State Department can’t account for over a billion dollars in *cash* money that it ferried to Iraq. It’s all just “gone.”

Where do you think that it went? Someone has your money, citizen. *Your* money. And it’s not you.

Now that the numbers are in, we are fretting about the horrific results of our lack of engagement with this treasonous behavior. I’m not seeing so much flag-waving at the moment from you, eh, Patriots? Feeling proud now?

Well, you know what? There’s an elephant in the room, and it is not a Republican.

If we do nothing, the Bush tax cuts automatically expire, and we are well on our way to a budget surplus within fifteen years. If we do nothing at all. That is a CBO-vetted fact.

Except. At this time, we need to pass a normal bit of housekeeping that is a standard part of governing: a debt ceiling increase. It’s wholly routine. It has been a routine vote many, many times in the past. All this does is allow the treasurer to borrow money to execute mandates that have already been allocated by Congress. The money is already spent. It has to be spent. By law. Since it has to be spent by law, we have to issue bonds to do it. Pretty simple stuff.

Or perhaps not so simple, in these extraordinarily dense times. Let’s ratchet back. Let me rephrase.

The Republican party stole your money and gave it to their friends. You are on the hook for it. Now the Republican party says that you need to pay it back by giving up your retirement and your healthcare — for which you have been paying all your life. SS and Medicare are not some “government handout” for which you’re being billed. They are insurance that you’ve been paying for, for all of your working life, and the benefits are rightfully due you. The Republicans have no problem with stealing that as well – so that their patrons can keep your money.

The Republican Party is trying to take these entitlements away from you, to try to make up the deficit that they assisted others in stealing. They are crying ‘foul’ on a false, rigged game that they themselves rigged, falsified and have now declared fouled.

…

I run into politically angry people all the time. Fox News Angry. Uninformed angry. I hear them in the grocery line; I hear them at the convenience store; in the bank. Sitting next to me drinking shots at the bar. Family emails. Customers at places I work. Cigarette smokers out in the parking lot.

I don’t usually do politics in social situations; it’s a recipe for heartache. But I have someting to say to such people.

To you flag-waving patriots; you “libertarians”; you “they’re all the same” folks; you “working man” folks; you “America first” compadres; you “American exceptionalism” people; you “free market capitalism” contingent; you “might makes right” folks, and especially you “no taxes” people:

You think that I am calling you stupid. I am not. I hang with you every day, and you are wonderful, intelligent, talented and thoughtful folks, one-on-one. But as a group you are an absolute horror.

I am not calling you stupid; I am calling you much worse: I am calling you a fool. You are an intelligent, thinking human being, and all you do is vote for the best advertised bucket of chicken that stokes your anger and divides your power. I use such a strong word because you don’t take the time to figure out who is on your side. You vote against your own interests again, and again, and again. You vote for the politician who makes you the most pissed-off at the other politician — and that is invariably the politician who is interested in nothing but acquiring your power and your wealth. They are certainly not interested in governing for your best interests.

People you elect make *public policy.* Public Policy affects your life. Whether you choose to believe this or not, it is a fact. Facts do not change whether you choose to believe them or not.

Guess what? The people you vote for don’t care about facts. And if you elect people who make up their own facts, you do not have public policy based upon factual information. Your country is dying, and your hallowed flag is becoming meaningless, because you did not do your job as a Citizen of the country that you so love.

Engage yourself in your own future, fool. Vote for people interested in public policy and facts first and foremost; vote for those who most represent your political interests. And if you can’t do something as simple as that, then don’t vote at all. Because you are killing the country that we BOTH love.

Are we all clear now?

I think that Google Earth is one of the neatest pieces of software ever written. When you try to imagine all of the interlinked technologies that had to exist to make it possible, it is nothing short of amazing. I use it as a recreational diversion quite often.

But as with all things that we get used to, I discovered some aspects that disappointed me, too. To be specific, I wanted river names to pop up in my explorations. Enter the Geonames Features Network add-on. It rocks.

This little KML file adds configurable name data for just about everything. Mountains, rivers, streams, canyons, springs, mesas, stock tanks, caves, factories, airports, railroads, etc, etc, etc. Highest recommendation on this one. It easily enhances the joy of exploring around by an order of magnitude for me.

Open up Google Earth, and then click the following to add Geonames to your setup. (When your browser asks you what to do with the file, tell it to let Google Earth open it.)

http://www.geonames.org/kml/feature-networklink.kml

If you like it, then drag it out of “Temporary Places” in Google Earth up into “My Places” in the left panel. That will make it a permanent feature. Enjoy.

A good review of a couple of Richard Feynman bios; a better review of Richard Feynman, from someone who worked closely with him. Over here.

We live in a country half composed of mindless idiots.

You waved your flag for a decade, as the greatest plundering of a public treasury in history took place, destroying the middle class in the process. Now you want to default on your obligations and destroy the world economy, while you balance your thievery on the backs of the poorest and most vulnerable in our society.

Give me a 100% tax on the profits of investment banks, oil companies, pharmaceutical manufacturers, and military contractors (and their subsidiaries, and all of the bonuses and stock options paid to executives in these industries) until the entire debt is paid off. Then we can talk.