To Bret, With Love - Guns and Gear

Daily Caller: Guns and Gear

The Day The Earth Stood Peeped

...and other sci-fi/fantasy scenes created with the Easter perennial.

Sugary scifi scenes remade with Peeps

I can't remember any Peeps stories of my own right now, otherwise, I'd tell one.

The Do Nothing Website

I really don't need a website to help me do nothing, I'm already an expert at it.


do nothing

Alzheimer’s Game

One-by-one, the men and women are led to a computer room where they sit in front of a screen and play a new game designed to maintain and improve memory in people afflicted early- and middle-stage Alzheimer’s. Alzheimer's disease causes loss of memory and other cognitive functions, and, ultimately, death.

“You’re going to build a circle with three pieces, so which piece goes over here?” an instructor asks one patient. The woman, an elderly immigrant from Switzerland, begins using the computer to assemble the circle.

While there is no cure for Alzheimer’s, Israeli researchers have developed a computer game that say can slow down the progress of the disease. It’s called Savyon, and Israel hopes to export it to treat Alzheimer’s patients around the world.

Computer game helps Alzheimer’s patients retain memory

The Troubles of Somalia

The troubles of Somalia are in the news again, as Erik Prince of Blackwater fame is reportedly backing a private military company’s bid to work for the embattled Somali government.

With the varied meanings of the word “anarchy,” it’s easy to write off Somalia’s issues as merely the fruit of “anarchy.” But the problems in Somalia were created by rulers and aspiring rulers, not by any anarchists advocating no rulers. Somalia does not have anarchy and does not provide evidence that anarchism is unlikely to work.

Since the brutal dictatorship of Mohammed Siad Barre fell in 1991, Somalia has faced varying intensities of civil war between aspiring governments, not an overall defeat of government.

Many foreign observers do not understand the social foundations of Somalia on which a state is attempting to impose itself. The overwhelming majority of violence in the country is suffered in national government centers in the south. In these struggles as well as in piracy, foreign states exacerbate conflict.

The basis of Somali society is generally clan allegiance. Somali customary law, called Xeer, allows judgments to be rendered in ad hoc courts by anyone able to muster sufficient respect for his relevant abilities. This system of traditional authority, which has a tendency to devalue women and exhibit suspicion towards or take advantage of people outside the clan, should not be idealized. However, where traditional law operates without state interference it has generally caused less conflict than the state, and Xeer could provide a useful framework for social progress.

Within the borders internationally regarded as Somalia, there exist several states whose claims of independence or autonomy are not recognized by the “international community.” Apparently it is in the best interest of international elites to promote the existence of one Somalia under centralized rule instead of a confederation or several smaller states. But a cynic might wonder if the conflict which hinders the development of civil society and creates a power vacuum that can be taken advantage of, is strategically advantageous for international powers to perpetuate.

Violence is done in trying to force a centralized government on a country with decentralized power, and in forcing a modern state onto conflicting customary law. But proponents of central government are unable to accept that forcing everyone to obey whoever has government power might not be the best way to promote harmony among different interests and allegiances.

International activity in Somalia, whether to plant the flag, recover debt from defaulted loans, or rub out blowback from other empire-building projects, has persisted well beyond the famine relief missions of the early 1990s. Erik Prince’s new venture is only the latest in foreign intervention in the violent struggle to establish and maintain a central government. Forces of the United Nations, United States, and Ethiopia have attempted to influence the situation using military force. It might be impolite to look for parallels between these interventions and the establishment of colonies and protectorates in Africa during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

The hand of foreign exploitation is seen clearly in the piracy issue once the observer looks beyond the superficial explanation that boils down to “more force needs to be deployed to keep poor black people from committing crimes.” The long coastline of Somalia had traditionally been fished by locals operating small boats (who should thereby have a usufruct claim). But foreign ships either over-fished the waters or dumped toxic waste from wealthier nations. Somalis turned to piracy either to defend their shores or to make money in one of the few lucrative options left to them. When some “volunteer coast guard” operators engage in extortion against people who are not responsible for harming the Somali coast, they are only imitating government by levying taxes or demanding bribes.

But does the Somali case of authoritarians exploiting a fallen state mean that an anarchic area would necessarily be helpless against invaders? No. One must take note of the impoverishment of Somalia versus the prosperity of neo-colonial powers. Little was left in the hands of the Somali people when the looting state collapsed in 1991. They started with little yet were able to get somewhere.

A 2007 paper by Peter T. Leeson, Better Off Stateless: Somalia Before and After Government Collapse, shows that life for Somalis has on average improved relative to life under the Barre regime. Leeson examined a series of developmental indicators, including life expectancy, access to medical care, and access to communication technology. With more progress toward anarchy – by dissolving the authority of central government, regional government, and traditional inequality – more improvement could be made.

Anarchy didn’t establish dictatorships, make International Monetary Fund agreements, or deploy foreign militaries to Mogadishu. The problems in Somalia have been, and continue to be, caused by authoritarians and looters in government, business, and banking.

Somalia: New Players, Same Problems



C4SS News Analyst Darian Worden is an individualist anarchist writer with experience in libertarian activism. His fiction includes Bring a Gun To School Day and the forthcoming Trade War. His essays and other works can be viewed at DarianWorden.com. He also hosts an internet radio show, Thinking Liberty.

Period Drug Could Save Your Life, Even If You're Not A Woman

This is an unpleasant topic, in more ways than one...

An inexpensive drug frequently used to slow bleeding by women with heavy periods can save lives by limiting bleeding after accidents or in war wounds, researchers reported this week. Those given the drug, called tranexamic acid, were at least 10% less likely to die...

For people age 5 to 45, trauma is second only to HIV/AIDS as a source of death worldwide, with about 3 million people dying from it each year, many after reaching the hospital. Among those who do reach the hospital, about half die from exsanguination -- bleeding out -- in some settings.

Drug for heavy periods could save lives in accidents by stopping bleeding

Violence Justified say Young People Opposed to Present Government

Youth more radically opposed to present government than tea parties, poll finds A full 17 percent of those ages 18-29 said yes, that violence would be justified, while a further 15 percent were not “not sure.” Granted, while those figures come out to a clear majority of young people — 68 percent — saying violence is not justified, it also means that 32 percent either disagree or haven’t made up their minds.

Another statistic sure to surprise some beltway liberals were the responses of poor people, who tied with tea partiers at 13 percent in saying violence would be justified. A further 24 percent said they weren’t sure, bringing their level of certainty against violence down to just 63 percent.

Compounding the potential for civil unrest, the poor and the tea parties, according to prior statistics, were two very different, separate groups with virtually no cross-over.

In a survey of Americans who voted in 2008, the nonpartisan group Project Vote found that, by and large, those sympathetic to the tea parties were white, wealthy and affluent people, whose political views represented approximately 29 percent of the electorate.

By comparison, blacks, youths and low-income voters, who turned out in record numbers to support President Obama, make up 32 percent of the electorate — and their views could not be any more different than their conservative counterparts.

The poll, published last Sept., described tea party participants as “overwhelmingly white” and “universally dissatisfied,” even though having “the least reason for dissatisfaction.”

Youth more radically opposed to present government than tea parties, poll finds “Only six percent [of tea party participants] reported having to worry about buying food for their families in the past year, compared to 14 percent of voters nationwide, 37 percent of blacks, 21 percent of youths, and 39 percent of low-income voters,” they added.

Discussing the partisan rhetorical fray on MSNBC last night, liberal news anchor Keith Olbermann failed to mention these figures, focusing instead on tea partiers and violent rhetoric prevalent in many Republicans’ public discourse.

Global revolution?

Youth more radically opposed to present government than tea parties

Hair Today (or soon anyway)?

I don't need this. I have more hair than all four Beatles combined during the height of Beatlemania, but you, you poor bastard, you might have a use for this. The promise is of a "natural treatment for hair loss".

A cursory glance at the Norwood hair-loss scale is a sobering experience for many men of a certain age. Things look bad at stage two and go seriously downhill by stage four.

Don't even consider looking at stage seven, it's ghastly. Men retaining some semblance of sensitivity to what wider society thinks of them will have turned to the hair clippers long before they reach that depressing point.

Yet heads need not be exposed in this way.

...


That, at least, is the promise being proffered by a young biochemist called Thomas Whitfield, who has been on something of a mercurial entrepreneurial journey to take his Oxford PhD thesis from the university lab to the shop counter.

The Kirkcaldy-born 29 year-old's sales pitch is that his TRX2 pills are a natural treatment that works as well, if not better, than the existing treatments based on man-made compounds. These have well-documented side-effects. Whitfield is hoping that, as the body already makes his compounds, TRX2 will not.

Even a small share of the international hair-treatment market would be significant for the start-up. "Of the two US Food and Drug Administration approved market leaders, Johnson & Johnson's Rogaine lotion and Merck's Propecia generate over $1bn in combined sales each year," says Whitfield.- Thomas Whitfield's German roots help hair loss product launch

If it doesn't work, there's always the hairpiece option, or even, to look like a pale imitation of myself, the Beatles wig.

About QR Codes

Recently, QR codes have become more prevalent in marketing circles and have been integrated into both traditional and interactive campaigns. Media where QR codes have been deployed include: billboard ads, in-store displays, event ticketing and tracking, trade-show management, business cards, print ads, contests, direct mail campaigns, websites, email marketing, and couponing just to name a few. QR codes are of particular interest to marketers, giving them the "ability to measure response rates with a high degree of precision"

QR Code

Amazed and Alarmed

This one is guaranteed to get a Bret "Ginx" Alan comment. I'm currently working on an amazing computer program that will only produce posts that will attract Bret "Ginx" Alan's interest and compel him to leave a comment. If you want at least one comment on every blog post you create, you'll be amazed at what we're developing, but probably a little alarmed at the same time at the prospect of that much commentary from Bret.

High-resolution, low-cost cameras are proliferating, found in everyday products like smart phones and laptop computers. The cost of storing images is dropping, and new software algorithms for mining, matching and scrutinizing the flood of visual data are progressing swiftly.

A computer-vision system can watch a hospital room and remind doctors and nurses to wash their hands, or warn of restless patients who are in danger of falling out of bed. It can, through a computer-equipped mirror, read a man's face to detect his heart rate and other vital signs.

It can analyze a woman's expressions as she watches a movie trailer or shops online and help marketers tailor their offerings accordingly.

Computer vision can also be used at shopping malls, schoolyards, subway platforms, office complexes and stadiums.

All of which could be helpful -- or alarming.

Computers are watching us, and we're amazed and alarmed

Modern Methods of Mind Control

The more one researches mind control, the more one will come to the conclusion that there is a coordinated script that has been in place for a very long time with the goal to turn the human race into non-thinking automatons. For as long as man has pursued power over the masses, mind control has been orchestrated by those who study human behavior in order to bend large populations to the will of a small "elite" group. Today, we have entered a perilous phase where mind control has taken on a physical, scientific dimension that threatens to become a permanent state if we do not become aware of the tools at the disposal of the technocratic dictatorship unfolding on a worldwide scale.

Read the rest: 10 Modern Methods of Mind Control

China's Luck Is About To Run Out

According to the Chinese zodiac, 2011 will be the "Year of the Rabbit," which is considered to be a lucky sign. But I think China's luck is about to run out, and I'm not the only one who sees the writing on the wall.

...

The most pernicious impact China is having on world markets stems from a massive credit bubble similar to the one that blew up Japan in the early 1990s and the U.S. markets in 2007-2008. Hedge fund manager Mark Hart, who made a killing anticipating the U.S. subprime mortgage meltdown and the European debt crisis, is now focusing on China, saying in an article in The Telegraph that China is in the "late stages of an enormous credit bubble," and the "economic fall-out" will be as "extraordinary as China's economic out-performance over the last decade."

5 Reasons China Will Crash in 2011

The Collapse of Las Vegas

Having lived there, I know Vegas pretty well. It was still booming when I left, but not now...

Las Vegas is to the real estate bubble what Detroit was to the US automobile industry – Empty condo projects, apartments poorly built to face the desert sun, and the collapse of commercial real estate.

If Wall Street is the hub of American finance then Las Vegas was the manifestation of credit dreams going viral. Las Vegas, the beating heart of Nevada had a tremendous boom with the real estate bubble because it played into the narrative of making it big. Where else can unknowns strike it big and have their name put up in lights? With Wall Street feeding the frenzy Las Vegas seemed to be an endless playground of free flowing capital. During the boom it was hard not to notice the high end Rodeo Drive like stores of Gucci, DKNY, and Prada covering the floors of many casinos. The stores were full and money seemed to flow like the exhaust of Maserati’s cruising up and down Las Vegas Blvd. If heaven on Earth for kids is Disneyland Las Vegas was the heaven of debt. What once seemed as an endless dream has burst into a barren desert nightmare. Las Vegas once boasting some of the fastest growth rates now has largely led Nevada into having the highest unemployment rate of all states in the country. If Michigan was the result of the offshoring of American manufacturing and the demise of the US auto industry Nevada is the exclamation mark at the end of the credit bubble era.


Las Vegas Bubble

Midway Between the Gods and the Beasts

"Mankind is poised midway between the gods and the beasts," wrote Plotinus. A similar theme runs through most of the older mythologies: Did we come from the beasts or from the gods? Are we merely more evolved animals or fallen angels?

The answer, refined through millennia, is this: We're part beast, but far better than they are (though we often sink to their level or even worse), because we are the children of God, made in His image, no matter how much we pervert it. It's the meaning of a fairy tale like Beauty and the Beast, in which the Beast becomes human through love.

When I say we can sink lower than the beasts, it's because we're part devil, which animals aren't. Only people have self-consciousness, and are therefore capable of doing – and rationalizing – evil. Only man is part devil, and rationalizes it as being god-like. It's why we get popular Christian leaders claiming God is pro-war. Of course, they mean God is pro-their war.

Between Monsters and Gods

AltaVista Search Engine Will Be No More

AltaVista was launched in 1995 and, for a great many people including myself, was the search engine of choice for many years. It was set up by researchers at Digital Equipment Corporation’s Western Research Laboratory.

AltaVista and Delicious to Close in 2011

All Lies

From pollution to politics, the era of deception and duplicity has reached new heights and hijacked almost every form of media in the world. In the last frontiers for truth such as the internet, disinformation operations are in full swing to discredit and destroy any semblance of authentic and factual information available to the public.
How many more lies will people around the world accept as truth? Some say a global awakening is taking place, but at what cost? Will it take the destruction of most of the earth and its resources before people are enlightened?

The escalating media and political reports are so far fetched, cunning, and so beyond reality, it's as if each is trying to top the other with one sinister plot after the next. To demonstrate the outright lies by national governments and the media, let's take three examples from the last year alone, including the H1N1 scandal, airport body scanners and the BP oil disaster.

Read More: Everything Is A Lie: The Deliberate Intent To Deceive People Is At An All Time High

The American Dictatorship

It isn’t just corporate lobbyists or two broken political parties. Elections are rigged, government agencies meant to provide for national security are now doing little but spying on Americans, our military is spread across the planet, tasked with everything but serving the United States. All the while, the “news” is everything but. Americans, to a one, know something is terribly wrong, totally out of control and, even their attempts to get at some semblance of truth are turned against them. The news is censored. With the country embroiled in two failed wars, obviously illegal, proof of war crimes piling up, financial collapse, citizen’s rights trampled on, nary a word is said about any of it.

America is a Dictatorship

Starve the Beast and Accelerate its Collapse

Unless/until government paramilitaries start duking it out with citizen militia groups in the streets, this is an ideological battle… and it’s an uphill battle at best.

Government controlled educational systems institutionalize us from childhood that governments are just, and that we should all subordinate ourselves to authority and to the greater good that they dictate in their sole discretion.

You’re dealing with a mob mentality, plain and simple. Do you want to waste limited resources (time, money, energy) trying to convince your neighbor that s/he should no not expect free money from the government?

You could spend a lifetime trying to change ideology and not make a dent; people have to choose for themselves to wake up, it cannot be forced upon them. And until that happens, they’re going to keep asking for more security and more control because it’s the way their values have been programmed.

When you think about it, what we call a ‘country’ is nothing more than a large concentration of people who share common values. Over time, those values adjust and evolve. Today, cultures in many countries value things like fake security, subordination, and ignorance over freedom, independence, and awareness.

When it appears more and more each day that those common values diverge from your own, all that’s left of a country are irrelevant, invisible lines on a map. I don’t find these worth fighting for.

Nobody is born with a mandatory obligation to invisible lines on a map. Our fundamental obligation is to ourselves, our families, and the people that we choose to let into our circles… not to a piece of dirt that’s controlled by mob-installed bureaucrats.

Moving away, i.e. making a calculated decision to seek greener pastures elsewhere, is not the same as ‘running away’… and I would argue that if you really want to affect change in your home country, moving away is the most effective course of action.

The government beast in your home country feeds on debt and taxes, and the best way to win is for bright, productive people to move away with their ideas, labor, and assets. This effectively starves the beast and accelerates its collapse. Then, when the smoke clears, you can move back and help rebuild a free society.

Read the entire article here: Is the Collapsing Empire and Its Police State Worth Fighting For?

On the Brink of Civil Unrest in Ireland

The general secretary of one of Ireland’s largest unions, the Technical Engineering and Electrical Union (TEEU), Eamon Devoy, has warned that “we are on the brink of significant civil unrest in this country, the like of which has not been witnessed in this jurisdiction for decades”.

Speaking of a further €6 billion tranche of budget cuts, expected to be detailed on Tuesday, he commented, “When the draconian measures being proposed are heaped on top of the €14.5 billion cuts already implemented in the last three brutal budgets, life in Ireland will be unbearable.”

The TEEU congress is debating an emergency motion, which “condemns the Government for its criminal negligence in the management of the economy and for colluding with the banks in misleading the Irish people as to the seriousness of the crisis we face”.



The TEEU motion describes the actions of the government as a “policy of economic sabotage”, which “has led to the betrayal of our country and to the loss of the last shreds of our economic sovereignty.” It calls on the government to resign and call a general election, urging the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU) to head “a campaign of civil disobedience to force an election”.

Ireland “on the brink of significant civil unrest”

Christianity the "Modern" Way

Greg Egan is an Australian science fiction writer.

I was raised as a Christian, and I still retain a lot of the values of Christianity. The trouble with basing values on religions, though, is that the premises of most of them are pure wishful thinking; you either have to refuse to scrutinise those premises - take them on faith, declare that they "transcend logic" - or reject them. As Paul Davies has said, most Christian theologians have retreated from all the things that their religion supposedly asserts; they take a much more "modern" view than the average believer. But by the time you've "modernised" something like Christianity - starting off with "Genesis was all just poetry" and ending up with "Well, of course there's no such thing as a personal God" - there's not much point pretending that there's anything religious left. You might as well come clean and admit that you're an atheist with certain values, which are historical, cultural, biological, and personal in origin, and have nothing to do with anything called God.-An Interview With Greg Egan