To the woman who answered the phone at Senator Kit Bond’s office today

Today I saw this post at Huffington, indicating that Kit Bond is not a "yes" for any proposal to audit the Federal Reserve. I believe that the secret workings of the Fed need to be exposed. Where did all of the TARP money go? Who knows? Let's find out. I called the Washington DC Office of U.S. Senator Kit Bond [phone number: (202) 224-5721] to determine Bond's position. A woman answered the phone. "May I help you?" "Yes, I'd like to know Kit Bond's position on the current proposals to audit the Fed. I read in the Huffington Post that he has expressed support to audit the Fed." "Oh, well THAT ought to tell you something. What a ridiculous website . . ." "Hold on . . . That's a huge website with legitimate news. What is Kit Bond's position?" "He's in favor of auditing the Fed." "I don't see his position in writing anywhere. It's not on his website. How do I know that he's in favor of auditing the Fed. It's a huge secret society needs to be examined closely because it controls national monetary policy without any accountability." "I'm with you on that." "I need to know Kit Bond's Position and I'd like to see it in writing." "I will relay that." [end of call] Note: I've shortened the call a bit, but this was the substance of the conversation. My bet? She wrote nothing down at all, and that Bond is against an audit of the Fed. We'll see . . . BTW, you will rarely see such vapid platitudes of policy as you will see on Bond's website. It really makes you wonder whether Bond knows much of anything about the real world. It's also clear that Bond has never seen a war that he's against. Thank goodness he's retiring soon.

Continue ReadingTo the woman who answered the phone at Senator Kit Bond’s office today

Meditation Mitigation Incarceration

February 1, 2010 issue of Missouri Lawyers Weekly (available only to subscribers online) reports on a new "Enlightened Sentencing Program" sponsored by a nonprofit meditation organization. The MLW article advises that several St. Louis area judges have been impressed with the program. For example, Judge David Mason

Ordered more than 200 people through the program. Of those offenders, he said that he has had to revoke probation only four times, a 2% rate. Mason's definition of recidivism is if the probationer commits a new crime in the first three years. Missouri Department of Corrections statistics show a statewide average of 28% of prisoners are locked up again within three years after either violating parole or committing another crime.
Presumably, Judge Mason's statistics are not compiled in a double-blind way--he might be unconsciously skewing the sample by choosing a select sub-group of convicts for the program. On the other hand, this stark difference in statistics does sound promising; it seems like this is the kind of approach that might make more sense than throwing people in expensive prisons where they are subjected to constant humiliation and violence. I think I know what would make me less likely to cope on the outside, and it's not having someone slam my head against the metal bars of a prison cell. Judge Mason suggests that Missouri should invest in a pilot meditation program, and then it could see the results among probationers and potential tax savings. "People tend to be afraid to go out in front on the issue," the judge said. "It's a whole lot cheaper than a lot of stuff we waste money on."

Continue ReadingMeditation Mitigation Incarceration

The Apollo 11 launch close up and slow

Check out this a wonderful video and commentary regarding the launch of Apollo 11, the first lunar landing. All of this action is captured with a still video camera perched almost unimaginably close to the rocket exhaust. 500 frames per second turned 30 seconds into 8 minutes. This video reminds me about the many ordinary things that had to happen according to plan in order to allow the success of what has to be the one of the most spectacular journeys in the history of humankind. Keep in mind that the Saturn V Rocket was 363 feet tall, only one foot shorter than St. Paul's Cathedral in London. Each one of the F-1 engines (which are still the most powerful rocket engines ever built) were 12 feet in diameter at the nozzle, and there were five of these monsters powering the launch.

Apollo 11 Saturn V Launch (HD) Camera E-8 from Mark Gray on Vimeo.

Continue ReadingThe Apollo 11 launch close up and slow

Yet another disaster

At least when you have oil spilling, you know what you need to do: stop the oil from spilling. When the topic is dying honey bees, there's no known solution, and the problem is getting terribly serious, according to Alternet:

The number of managed honeybee colonies in the US fell by 33.8% last winter, according to the annual survey by the Apiary Inspectors of America and the US government's Agricultural Research Service (ARS). The collapse in the global honeybee population is a major threat to crops.
If only the deaths of bees were our only big problem . . . The mass deaths of our bees is just one example of what Arianna Huffington Perhaps we should start calling this the Age of "Much Worse Than We Thought It Would Be." Her emphasis was on economic and political disasters. She attributes many of these non-stop surprisingly big disasters to shortsighted thinking. Regarding what she considers to be an oncoming economic coronary brought on by national (and worldwide) debt, she suggests that we start thinking in long-term ways. For instance, "So instead of limiting the deficit debate to talk of cutting entitlements, how about also having a discussion about moving to an economy that focuses on investing in small businesses and communities, and puts a premium on education and technology rather than on exotic financial instruments."

Continue ReadingYet another disaster

Wondering about mowing

I'm still wondering how one of my neighbors (no, Pete, it's not you) can spend 44 minutes (I clocked it precisely with my watch this time) mowing his back yard with a loud gas-powered lawn mower, given that his back yard is only about 50 feet by 40 feet. This particular fellow, who seems to be in good health, is not the only guy who zones-out while pushing a noisy lawn mower. I've seen others do it--the loud noise seems to put some people into Zen-like trance. It's the same look I notice in other folks who get to that same mental state by simply walking down a street or through a park. I'm wondering how my neighbor would react if I offered him a chance to exchange his noisy mower for a cheap green mower like the one I've owned for ten years - - it has no engine, so it's fume-less; it's also human powered. I suspect that he'd miss the roar.

Continue ReadingWondering about mowing