Okay!

Fantastic news! The Supremes have had a moment of clarity and we're on our way to joining the rest of the world in how we care for our citizens...

I need to tune in CNN just to see the long faces on the Republicans.

Now, what does Romney have to say?

Images

I was just looking for some images of my other two grandchildren. We had spent some time at their swim meet two weeks ago and I'm certain that I had photos...somewhere. Then I remembered that I had used my smart phone to take the photos and now how do I get those photos from my phone to my computer. And I think I used Instagram. Now that really compounds my problems. I can see the photos on my Instagram folder on my phone, or is the folder somewhere in the depths of Instagram itself?

I used to do programming for a living! Now look at me...I can't find a simple file. But in my defense, Can you imagine the number of images that are out there? I wonder if anyone has ever counted the number of bytes that are stored just for images? Worldwide? And yet, we are still being offered tens of gigabytes for free storage of photos. Each one of us. Amazing!  

Let's take that little further and imagine the number of servers in a huge number of 'Server Farms' scattered all around the globe. And imagine the power needs for those servers! How many power plants are needed to generate that power?

All of this brings me to the number, 200 Giga-ton's. That's the amount of ice, in tons, that is shed annually from the Greenland ice cap. That's the ice that actually raises the level of the sea. So, if I find those photos, I will print them and then delete the files. Just doing my bit for mankind.

The Past Two Weeks

...have flown by as we have been spending all of our time (day and night) with our two youngest (9 years old - twins) grandchildren. It was time for their annual stay with 'papa' and grandma while they take swimming lessons. There are no lessons or even a pool where they live. We've been doing this since they were 3 years old and they have turned into pretty good swimmers. There is a lake near their house that can be used during the summer, so the lessons do have a value...a value beside the obvious one of pleasing the grandparent's by their presence.

Abigayle this year

Steven (my namesake) this year

Here they are in 2007...debating the reason for swimming lessons.  

Scary!

Statement as of 3:26 PM PDT on June 14, 2012

... Red flag warning in effect from 10 am Friday to 9 PM PDT
Saturday for wind and low relative humidity for fire weather
zones 215... 216... 263 and 279...


The National Weather Service in Sacramento has issued a red flag
warning for wind and low relative humidity... which is in effect
from 10 am Friday to 9 PM PDT Saturday. The Fire Weather Watch is
no longer in effect.


* Affected area... fire weather zone 215 northern Sacramento
Valley to southern Tehama County line below 1000 ft... fire
weather zone 216 central Sacramento Valley in Glenn, Colusa,
Yuba, northern Sutter, and Butte County below 1000 ft... fire
weather zone 263 southeast edge Shasta-Trinity nf and western
portions of Tehama-Glenn unit and fire weather zone 279
eastern Mendocino nf.


* Winds... north 15 to 25 mph with gusts up to 45 mph.


* Relative humidity... as low as 5 percent.


* Impacts... low humidity along with gusty winds and dry fuels
will result in critical fire weather conditions Friday and
Saturday with increased chances of the rapid spread of any
fire starts.


Precautionary/preparedness actions...


A red flag warning means that critical fire weather conditions
are either occurring now... or will shortly. A combination of
strong winds... low relative humidity... and warm temperatures will
create explosive fire growth potential.

The wind has already begun to blow...18 mph right now

Asperger's

Good reading that explains why we're so important.

http://www.economist.com/node/21556230

same old same old

There's so much to not like about yesterday's election results. We live in a 'Red' county so the fact that the same old miserable Republicans made it back into office was no surprise. The fact that it looks like the additional $1 tax on cigarettes will be defeated makes me angry. Philip Morris and the others of their ilk paid almost $50 million to defeat the tax while supporters were only able to pay about $15 million. And it's the advertising that does the job...sad isn't it? Heaven forbid that a voter might read about an issue; it's so much easier to just let the ads tell you how to vote. That is if they voted at all. Far too many never even bothered. Even the convenience of mail-in ballots doesn't seem to get some people to participate.
The Wisconsin vote will affect us all. It's open season once again on unions. And without unions, quality of work will decline. I saw it happen in the construction trades as non-union workers took over the housing and light commercial work. There is a good article on the fate of unions and just how important they are in this NYT opinion piece..
It going to be a long summer. But I did find some good summer reading, courtesy of the Nameless Cynic. He has the link to McCain's 2008 opposition file on the 'Mittster'.

4-Way

I attended two graduation ceremonies during the past week. One was for my 13 year old granddaughter as she moved to high school from middle school and another was for my 18 year old granddaughter as she graduated from high school. During one of those ceremonies the Rotary International 4-Way Test was mentioned as being inspirational and helpful for life. The 4-Way Test is...
1. Is it the TRUTH?
2. Is it FAIR to all Concerned?
3. Will it build GOODWILL and BETTER FRIENDSHIPS?
4. Will it be BENEFICIAL to all concerned?

All very admirable indeed. And then I thought about all of the candidates for leadership roles in our government. Okay, what wrong with that picture? I imagine that every candidate is a member. How could they pass up a chance to schmooze with a pack of businessmen? Think Romney; he has to be a member! Has he passed even one part of the Test? Of course not...

Rotary International should purge their membership roles of any candidate/member that hasn't followed the Test. If not, then we know exactly how hollow this 4-Way Test really is.

EricByler | NPR Provides Preview of November's (Attempted) Hostile Takeover of the American Democracy

EricByler | NPR Provides Preview of November's (Attempted) Hostile Takeover of the American Democracy

"The richest 100 people in America are providing 80% of the money going to Republican Super-PAC's, and, this constitutes 80% of all the money being spent by these lawless electioneering entities.  This report implies but does not come out and say that the "Citizens United" decree was a direct response to the advent of social media and crowd-funding, which made it possible for We the People to have a larger say in, for instance, who is elected president. 

At least 105 people are very, very worried about this development.  100 of them are spending millions of dollars to counter it, and 5 of them undermined the Constitution and destroyed their legacies as Supreme Court justices in order to help them.  America's plutocracy is spending so heavily this year because they feel they need to entrench their power so deeply that our votes (and the will of the People) will never matter again."

Well worth listening to...