March 19, 2014

The whole picture, watching the news, reminds me of The Bedford Incident

a film from the mid-60's.

Logical and reasoned war-mongering which escalates to a horrific ending.

Having lived through the Fifties and Sixties, it scares the crap out of me that we are once again poised to make Russia our enemy and vice versa. It was a very bad time in America, despite what black and white comedies and family shows you might see on TV LAND.

March 18, 2014

Well, the Peter Principle has shown itself to be extant in 2014

For those who weren't around, the phrase "rising to one's level of incompetence" may not be familiar. The idea was that in management, people are promoted until they can't do the job effectively and thus become entrenched...and incompetence prevails.

Normally I watch or at least have on the TeeVee, MSNBC because in Philly, the lowest level of basic cable includes only that cable news station (I exclude FOX from that classification). So I am home today and decided, just for fun, to put CNN on. It is fascinating to listen to one anchor after another, including the inimitable Ashleigh Banfield, just incompetently wade through this cesspool of "ideation" which they have been provided. On top of everything else that is wrong, mixed metaphors provide great fun: Ms. Banfield was exclaiming in her repetitive fashion that the search was now over two and one-half million nautical miles..."Sit on that for a minute." she said. SIT on THAT!!? Happy Days is on in the afternoon and being broadcast on CNN, there must be some residuals in there somewhere for the surviving cast. Next up: Up your nose with a rubber hose and back to you

But it is all hypothesis-in-hyperbole. Every fourth sentence as uttered by someone is jaw-droppingly non-journalistic or just plain ignorant. I can only imagine that CNN would cover the raging academic debate of whether Fermat's Theorem was still a puzzle or if it had finally been proven by a mathematician, since all of the correspondents had taken algebra in ninth grade. This may all be so complex that it will take competent people months to discern what happened if ever. But when facts fail, they just show the heartbroken families over and over with all the adjectives on loop. And the head-shaking and shrugging! Can you imagine Cronkite, Huntley, McGee, Murrow, or anyone from that era, sadly, tearfully shaking their heads after playing the SAME fifteen second exhortation from the same parent who has literally lost a loved one as though they have heard it for the first time. THAT gets me shaking MY head.

But my favorite is when the anchor says, "Honestly..." That is a refreshing change from the rest of their pap.

"Uh-oh, we are out of time and we'll have to leave it there."

March 16, 2014

What I personally think is good news here in PA:

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/politics/state/20140316_Some_Democrats_wonder__Can_anyone_stop_Tom_Wolf_.html

Those who still read my posts my recall that I stated that I was supporting him early on:


ALLENTOWN - Tom Wolf compared the California and Florida strawberries at Bedway's Fresh Fruits on Thursday afternoon as a stream of shoppers at the Allentown Fairgrounds Farmers Market gave him glances of recognition.

"I see you on TV all the time!" one woman said, interrupting to shake hands with the Democratic candidate for governor.

And so it went, from the Stoltzfus Amish Deli, to the Mary Ann Donut Kitchen and Johnny's Fresh Meats - up and down the market shed. People loved the commercials, especially his daughters and the old Jeep.

Wolf, the multimillionaire York businessman who began the race as an asterisk, is now the front-runner for the nomination, fueled by a $3.2 million barrage of television ads that began Jan. 30 and continues.


Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/news/politics/state/20140316_Some_Democrats_wonder__Can_anyone_stop_Tom_Wolf_.html#fAYlKLdz0QyoqqkL.99

March 16, 2014

With John Barry's low key music in the background after the opening credits...

the Team of Six stealthily enters the commercial hangar where the Boeing 777 rests before the next-day flight to Beijing. With practiced assurance each of the black-clad technicians installs an aspect of the Commandeering mechanism, developed by the Chinese and brought via freighter to Kuala Lumpur. Forty-five minutes later, the mission completed, they leave for the waiting van disguised as a food-service truck which drives through the exit gate with a wave to the lazy guard in the booth.

Twenty miles away, on the roof of an otherwise indistinguishable office building, the satellite dish is pointed toward the geostationary communications satellite which stands ready to receive the data from the perpetrators. On the fifth floor of the building is a 777 flight simulator, except that in this case, it does not control a trainee, but the actual plane itself.

########################

So we watch dozens of films, read hundreds of books which utilize this and other "wild" fantasies. Billions of dollars of revenue have come in to film companies and publishers of this genre. Could not happen in real life though? Think about this: in 1971 when I went to college, you picked up a phone receiver, literally dialed a number, and spoke to whomever answered on the other end. You paid a toll amount for that call. But...there were people who possessed what were termed "blue boxes" where there were three keys I was told: the first key would hold open a long distance line, accessed by dialing Information in the state you were interested calling, a second and third key would then somehow be utilized to dial within that toll region, making it a local call for a dime. Impossible! some said at the time. Universities were loaded with phone ripoff artists. But the public assumed that the phone companies were immune to this stuff...because...just because. But they were not.

And so it is with everything else: there is nothing which cannot be hacked or compromised. "Where there is a will,there is a way" is a truism, especially anything involving electronics. Many who denigrate "Conspiracy Theories" should understand that it only takes two individuals to have a conspiracy. It does not have to involve dozens or hundreds of people. "Something" happened here, it may be the vanguard of the next wave, it ma not be. We shall see, shall we not?

March 16, 2014

Some films for the younger generation given recent events:

The RWers want war with Russia! This is not a new concept...

Especially:

Fail-Safe
The Bedford Incident
On The Beach
Dr. Strangelove
Seven Days In May
Ice Station Zebra
The (Original)Manchurian Candidate
and

4
The 49th Man
7
The 7th Dawn
A
Albino (film)
Amerika (TV miniseries)
Apollo 18 (film)
April Captains
The Assignment (1997 film)
The Atomic Cafe
B
The Bamboo Saucer
Barbara (2012 film)
Barcelona (film)
Batman: The Dark Knight Returns (film)
The Beast (1988 film)
Blast from the Past (film)
Blind Justice (1988 film)
Buffalo Soldiers (film)
Bulletproof (1988 film)
By Dawn's Early Light
C
Catch a Fire (film)
The Challenge (1970 film)
China: The Roots of Madness
Colossus: The Forbin Project
Company Business
Countdown (1968 film)
Cry Freedom
D
The Damned (1963 film)
The Dancer Upstairs (film)
Dark of the Sun
The Day After
A Day Called X
The Day the Earth Stood Still
Death Train
Dien Bien Phu (film)
Doppelgänger (1969 film)
Dr. Strangelove
Duck and Cover (film)
E
Endgame (2009 film)
Enigma (1983 film)
Escape from East Berlin
Etter Rubicon
The Executioner (1970 film)
The Experts (1989 film)
F
Firehead
The Fourth War
Freiheit (film)
G
Game for Vultures
The Good German
Good Night, and Good Luck
H
Highly Dangerous
Homerun (film)
The House of the Spirits (film)
I
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
Invasion U.S.A. (1952 film)
Invasion U.S.A. (1985 film)
The Iron Giant
Ishtar (film)
J
JFK (film)
The Journey (1959 film)
K
Karol: A Man Who Became Pope
L
The Last Grenade
The Last Mercenary
Operation Leopard
Leviathan (1989 film)
Little Nikita
The Lives of Others
Lost Command
The Lost Missile
Lumumba (film)
M
The Man Outside (1967 film)
The Manhattan Project (film)
Matinee (1993 film)
Meteor (film)
Miracle (film)
Miracle on Ice (1981 film)
The Missiles of October
N
Namibia: The Struggle for Liberation
Night Crossing
Night Without Stars
Not with My Wife, You Don't!
O
October Sky
One, Two, Three
Orion's Belt (film)
P
The Package (1989 film)
The Pentagon Papers (film)
The Place Promised in Our Early Days
The Power of One (film)
The Prize (1963 film)
Q
The Quiet American (2002 film)
The Quiet American (1958 film)
R
Rabbit à la Berlin
Rambo III
R cont.
Rambo: First Blood Part II
Red Dawn
Red Heat
Red Heat (1985 film)
Red Nightmare
Red Scorpion
Red Zone Cuba
The Right Stuff (film)
Rocky IV
The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming
S
Scorcher (film)
The Secret Ways
Seven Days in May
The Shoes of the Fisherman
Silmido (film)
Six-String Samurai
Sky Commando
Soldier of Fortune (1955 film)
Space Cowboys
Special Bulletin
Special Delivery (1946 film)
Special Delivery (1955 film)
Stripes (film)
T
Telefon (film)
These are the damned
The Thing from Another World
The Third Man
Thirteen Days (film)
This Is Not a Test (1962 film)
Threads
Twilight's Last Gleaming
U
The Ugly American
The Undefeated (2000 film)
Under Fire (film)
Unknown World
Utterly Alone
W
The War Game
WarGames
Watchmen (film)
When the Wind Blows (1986 film)
The Whistle Blower
White Nights (1985 film)
The Wilby Conspiracy
World War III (TV miniseries)
X
X-Men: First Class
Y
The Young Lovers (1954 film)

March 15, 2014

Hey! I just had an episiotomy...no, an epicenter...no, an epiphany!

I can talk like a RW Congressman, and I didn't even know it!

Examples:

"Fuck you!" followed by "I was inarticulate."

"Your mother's a whore!" followed by "That remark was taken out of context."

&quot Fill-in-the-blank) should be taken out and shot" followed by "This would benefit them greatly in the long run"

"You are a lying traitor!" followed by "I was not referring to you personally."

BTW, the best way to handle one of these folk if they insult you in some fashion as above is to allow them to completely finish and then say real sincerely and amazedly, "That's remarkable - that is EXACTLY what your wife said to me in the shower yesterday."

They will never ever be able to get that image out of their heads: everytime their wife says "I'm going to take a shower" or when they themselves get in the shower, or when they see you. I use it infrequently but to great effect.

Just a thought on a cold Saturday here in the City of Brotherly Love...

March 15, 2014

Any SF fans recall a short story entitled "A Subway Named Moebius"

from Groff Conklin's first Omnibus of Science Fiction?

A subway train disappears on the Boston tracks. Occasionally people can hear the train and signals can change but it doesn't appear anywhere. The narrator spends the story searching for the train - one of the funniest lines is (paraphrasing):

Physicist: The train may have hit a node and vanished.

Maintenance Chief: We don't leave no nodes lying on the tracks.

It is coincidence - or is it - that the only professor in Boston who could fully comprehend this situation is, of course, on the train.

Anyway, the narrator gives up, gets on a train weeks later and finds out that he's on it and that it's reappeared. The professor may be on another train...and THAT one has disappeared!

So: who was on that plane?

March 12, 2014

Did I just hear Chuckie Todd say:

"The dances that Democrats do to get voters?"

WTF?

March 12, 2014

Yeah Anderson, how DARE anyone come up with his or her own theory?

The implication of these Media Whores Onteevee is that although America is a free country, only they are allowed to hypothesize.

Let me tell you when I was willing to bet, and still am, that terrorism was involved: because that know-nothing Evan Kohlmann last night on MSNBC stated unequivocally that there was absolutely no evidence that this was a terroristic attack or hijacking of the plane. Not htat there WAS any at the time, but he has been so wrong so often that betting against him is almost as good as betting against Jimmy the Greek on the old NFL on CBS back in the70's and 80's.

Anyone who saw that performance of disinformation would have given him the Brass Filigree with Bronze Oak-Leaf Palm for his act. It is all just so weird...I don't know what is more intriguing: the whereabouts of the plane or the mechanism in place to 'handle' these events courtesy of TPTB.

March 11, 2014

I had to share this re: missing jet

One of my patients is very much involved in the Internet conspiracy community: I will paraphrase his speech to me this morning...

Him: You know, Doctor (I love that) the 9/11 attacks were practiced beforehand and this taking of the plane is the same. The perpetrators got into the cabin, disabled the transponder and radio, and hijacked the plane a la the movie Thunderball. That plane is somewhere either on a landing field camouflaged or on the shallow ocean floor and camouflaged. There were people on that plane they wanted and they got them. After all, you KNOW that there was no such thing as the Pentagon plane and those people are either incarcerated or dead somewhere. If there were a crash at the Pentagon where were all the seats and the bodies? So it is the same business here.


Me: So we're doing a DO on #3 today. Here's some pina colada numbing gel before the injection, OK?