Random Interactions

Yesterday afternoon, when I was carrying oars down to the dock, a woman started talking loudly to me and following me around so that she could talk. She never told me her name but she did brag a lot about her willingness to get in the Willamette River. She was carrying a big notebook and was middle aged. She looked like she worked in an office or something. She said she just had to come down to the water because "Water is my god". She said that she grew up on the river, and that she is willing to swim in it now, but she would not open her eyes in it. She went on and on. She told me that back in the 1960's her father and grandfather had the Guiness Book of World Records RECORD for longest water ski distance: from Portland to Astoria. But now somebody has beat that record. She was all right, though I did not know her intentions, why she would come up to a stranger and tell her story.

This morning, on my walk, a couple of bums were sitting in a sheltered spot along the sidewalk. They were in the sun, and one of them was shirtless, soaking up rays. They looked healthier than most bums, though the shirted bearded guy didn't speak and viewed me suspiciously. The shirtless man smiled and held up his hands, and said "The beauty that you possess is a gift from God." I smiled at him and said "Thanks, God." I wished the two guys a good day and kept walking. The shirtless guy kept smiling and the shirted kept scowling.

Half a Million Plastic Coffins

I just ran across a link to Suzie Q's blog where she posts several links with regard to a large stash of plastic coffins somewhere in Georgia (in the US, not Europe!). There is a link to the manufacturer of the plastic things (polyguardvaults) which seems to confirm that they are coffins, or perhaps coffin liners. The web is full of conjecture about what FEMA might be stockpiling coffins for.... I am curious to know if you have any thoughts on the matter.
( more )

On the American Dream and Who Can Be President

http://sad-sick-truth.livejournal.com/29458.html
I can't say it any better than sad-sick-truth did.

McKinney/Clemente instead of McCain, Obama, or Barr

The good news for Bob Barr of the Libertarian Party is that he's got about 5% of the polling vote, up to 10% in some states. Historically third party voters get less of the actual votes than they get of the polls. Still, Barr may get the most votes ever given to a Libertarian candidate. There are some who hope.
( more on the Libertarian and Green Party candidates for President )

Check Out Cynthia McKinney

Since Ron Paul is out of the running, Obama and McCain are part of the machine, I have been searching for someone that I can vote for and not betray my own values. This is the woman. I am going to vote for Cynthia McKinney. I hear you thinking, did you think I was a Libertarian? Well no, I'm not. I am simply in agreement with much of what Ron Paul says. I am also in agreement with McKinney. This speech is a little rough, but the principles are there. She was a democrat, before. So was I.

Steven Pinker on the Genetics of Compassion

http://cogweb.ucla.edu/Abstracts/Pinker_on_Wright_94.html
( a book review for the NY Times, 1994, on The Moral Animal )

The Butcher of Bosnia was Practicing Alternative Medicine

Yep. Radovan Karadzic had been in hiding for over a decade, after leading the Bosnian Serbs in the 1992-5 war. They forced quite a few Bosnian Muslims into concentration camps. I have no idea how many died. Karadzic was a psychiatrist. In Srebenica, 1995, some 8,000 Muslim boys and men were massacred, and Karadzic is supposed to have orchestrated that. It gives me pause to think that someone who has training in human nature is capable of leading such disastrous action. And then, after whatever the war did to him and those around him, he tried to be a good person under a new name.
( a little more )

Factoids

China now has more citizens with internet access than America, 253 million to 223.1 million.
The Hispanic population in America will outnumber whites in less than 100 years, if census trends continue.