Pessimism

Sorry to bring you down, but I’ve been in a pessimistic mood lately, must be budget time effecting me.

Civilization is in a race to spread before the anti-civilization moieties gain the ability to destroy or delay the future. I think civilization is loosing at this point because of greed. As long as people get what they want for the most part, they ignore the long term. We are watching as Iran gains nuclear weapons. Civilization did nothing to prevent NK from getting nukes. Soon anyone who has the money and power will get nukes. Eventually one will go off in NYC or Tokyo. The people of the US will demand that any threatening nuclear power be destroyed. Who will pull the trigger on a nuclear holocaust. Any US president who pulls the trigger will be voted out of office. We can only hope that this occurs in the second term of a US president and he has the testicular fortitude to do what’s right, damn the consequences.

Episode III

Disappointed.

What can I say about Revenge of the Sith?

The entire movie was poorly paced. Scenes cut in and out that should have been longer or not included at all. Herky-jerky filming with poorly shot scenes. Stolid acting and poor dialogue added to the disappointment.

Excellent SFX, but couldn’t make up for the terrible film-making effort. Worse than any of the first 3 but better than the last 2. The final battle between Obi-Won and Anikan was good but not spectacular, and ended stupidly. Much too whiny. Palpatine was OK, but not as good or seductive as I expected, too transparent. The scenes between Padame and Anakin were, in a word, terrible.

I never really believed that Anakin really turned to the dark-side. I just felt he was going with what was convenient.

Of course this is my first impression, and I’m drunk of margaritas as I write.

I would still recommend seeing it in the theater in full digital. I didn’t see it in full digital and noticed thanks to the terrible projectionist.

Honestly, I liked “Chronicles of Riddick” directors cut better as a movie.

My Pessimism...

I fear that the future many Sci-Fi writers have beaten to death will come true. Civilization will be greatly tested in the coming years. Some of the things I fear:

1) Nuclear weapons will be used in a major population center triggering a world crisis ending in a nuclear holocaust. Billions will die and human civilization will be set back hundreds to thousands of years.

2) A biological attack triggers a pandemic that threatens the very existence of the human species. Billions die with the survivors, spread thinly throughout the globe, struggling to survive in the new harsh natural world. Civilization is set back to the bronze age or earlier.

3) Immortality is achieved through somatic gene therapy. The world population explodes as routine genetic treatments extend life thousands of years. Children are shunned as parasites and laws are passed preventing procreation except to replace those killed in accidents (you get smashed flat by a piano or head cut off by a 1200 year old Japanese sword you still die, you just don’t die of old age, cancer, etc). This one is so weird that I don't like to think about the consequences.

4) Economic collapse causes massive riots resulting in massive looses of productivity which cascade into a worldwide collapse of the economic infrastructure. Banks fold, inflation explodes, looting starts to make economic sense, the government cracks down and becomes totalitarian because it works.

I’m a weird mix of short-term pessimism and long-term optimism. I know that Humans can survive anything we throw at each other, but it will be real messy in the short term. I believe the only thing that can screw us now is an astronomical event (meteorite, comet, supernova, gamma-burst).

Yet another reason to boost the NASA budget.

Closer by Committe

There is a movement in the stat-head community that believes closers are overrated. It doesn’t seem right to me, but I haven’t seen the data so I won’t say.

Man you got smoked on Braves Journal today. Don’t worry. I got spanked a little bit back for claiming the Braves pitching couldn’t hold up since their WHIP and K/9 was crappy.

Ding Dong Dan KolBB is Gone!

The human WHIP machine was finally relieved today. The guy who somehow only walked 15 guys all last season already has 16 this year, just under a walk an inning. In short he was terrible from the start and even his saves have been a high wire act.

Cox sure took his sweet time making the decision, but it’s not like the pen is brimming with talent either. Reitsma was good until recently, but after last year’s end of the season debacles I can’t say I trust him. Of Reitsma, Benero, Sosa and Colon, I think the most of Sosa’s electric stuff, but he has major control problems. I would like for the Braves to trade for some pen talent, but they don’t have any money to spend on a real closer. Plus bullpens are blowing up all around the majors (Chicago, Oakland, Giants, KC, LA, Florida, Colorado) teams will have steep demands for good relievers. Realistically, I would rather trade for a replacement level outfielder than pen help. Then we could take Mondesi for a nice ride in the country.

Space...The Low Orbit Frontier

I agree that the ISS is boring and expensive, but I disagree that we haven’t learned much. Sure, we didn’t discover “breakfast beverage crystals” , ICMBs or anything cool like they got in the 50’s, but we are learning a lot about living and surviving in outer space. We are learning about the physiology of living in zero-g, fixing crap while wearing a space suit, etc. This is all stuff that we need to know for long term living in space.

Still, I want more and faster. I want the new space shuttle yesterday. They should have scrapped the “current” model after Challenger in 1987 and started fresh. I’d rather see a 5 year manned-trip hiatus than to pour money down the shuttle’s 1970’s rendered gullet. Ever wonder why the main fuel tank’s orange color is eerily familiar? That’s right it’s the same color as your living room carpet or beanbag chair! (No I’m not pedophile; these are the sites that come up on Goggle images…like this hideous combined orange shag-carpet beanbag chair, but I digress.) I want the government to at lest triple NASA’s budget and develop at least two different launch vehicles using modern technology and materials. I want to go back to the Moon and build a base. At the same time we should be building and testing Mars capable ships. I want to get launched into space for a few days so I proudly wear a T-shirt stating “I’ve puked in outer space”

Unfortunately, the Republicans would rather spend money on big new drug entitlements for our beloved seniors and…well…the Democrats want to spend even more money on bigger drug entitlements for everyone and put drug companies out of business to boot. Don’t forget the pork important infrastructure improvements including ever important federal interstate highway scenic covered bridges (well I made that last bit up, their not actually highway covered bridges, well not anymore, maybe 50-100 years ago they were considered highways but they aren’t highway highways, but I digress…again). Don’t forget the Helium and mohair subsidies, and personally I would rather take money out of the hands of agribusiness and into the hands of the aerospace industry. Agriculture is sooo yesterday and space is tomorrow.

Maybe we aren’t “stuck” in low earth orbit, maybe we are trapped. Maybe the moon landings were faked, or Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong died or went insane or became a threat to mankind and had to be killed upon return and were replaced by doubles created by the Illuminati or pentavaret. Maybe we are launching monkey after monkey from the ISS in hopes to understand what happened and PETA would go insane if they knew so NASA is all “nothing to see here folks, just boring science”. Then there are the aliens, but I digress...

Nice

Were the 5th hit on the Yahoo search for “chipper jones adulterer”.

As a wise man said: Heh

UPDATE from the Dawg: Whatever it was isn't anymore.

UPDATED UPDATE from the Dawg: That's weird. When I looked at this last night, we were nowhere to be seen. This morning, it looks like we're back. What's great is that the linkage is from two different posts. Maybe it's a subliminal thing we're sending. Anyone who knows Larry knows about his love of Hooters.

SS Doomed

Welcome aboard the ship of ethereal monies. I will now explain why SS will be ruinous to our economy. Without large new tax increases or benefit cuts there just won’t be enough workers in the economy to support the baby-boomers and sometime between 2010 and 2020 SS will bring in less than it spends. Big tax cuts wouldn’t help the economy and unless the demographic situation improves itself they would have to continue to rise. We could immigrate ourselves out of this problem, but that’s just exchanging problems because assimilating that many new people would be a monumental challenge itself. Raising taxes, cutting benefits and increasing immigration won’t fly politically. The solution is to take the hit know and privatize the system. Means test the rich out of SS (I’m sorry if this hurts anyone’s feelings…boo-hoo), raise the age of entitlement to 70 (if you can’t save for 5 years…tough), and cut everyone under 45 out of the system (you got 25 years to save…go).

Unfortunately SS is only 1/2 of the battle. Medicare is looming, but that is a different much more complex nightmare. Do you realize that easily 20% of all the money spent by Medicare is spent on last-ditch efforts to save someone’s life who’s condition is essentially terminal anyhow? Is it worth $50,000 in medical costs to prolong someone’s life for 2 weeks? How about spending $300,000 and about $25,000 per year of life after for a liver transplant on a 75 year old who has suffered from years of liver disease? Tough decisions that no politician wants to make.

ON the brighter side, I’m growing less pessimistic over the future of the economy. With China and India both rising fast it is now a race to see if Asia can replace Old Europe quickly enough for our economy to survive mostly intact. I see no hope for Old Europe as a whole. Our 2-5% economic growth can barely compete with Asia’s 7-12% as it stands, Old Europe’s 0-2% is quickly being left behind. Their pension system is in even worse shape and they don’t have much if any room to increase taxes above the current confiscatory rate. Their economies will implode, hopefully the US and Asia can work together to save themselves. I still think it will be bad, but perhaps not catastrophic.

One more thing:

THERE IS NO TRUST FUND!

Art and Star Wars

Art is marketing; it was the first form or marketing. Art was originally used to sell symbols like fertility, luck and religion. It is still used for those things today as well as selling actual stuff. All artists are trying to sell you on a viewpoint, be it religious or secular. Star Wars is art; not fine art, but decent art. Surely it is better than black-velvet Jesus. Maybe medium-end Hotel art (which can be decent as well as really bad).

As for the PG-13 rating, I just don’t share your point of view. I am trying to tamp down growing excitement for the release. I have been so disappointed in the first two that I had really low expectations for the third. Then I saw the trailer…man does it look really good. Then I stop myself…the trailer for Ep2 was really good too. Throw in the whole Titanic in Space kerfuffle, and I’ve been riding a roller coaster of emotions. The PG-13 rating is trying my resolve to not be excited. I fear that I have only days until I succumb to the Lucas marketing onslaught. Talking about a "bloodbath against old allies" didn’t help me at all.