Agreeing to Disagree

Okay, I've been on a roll the last few days with the "universal translation" theme, but now it's time to get serious for a minute. Yes, my big, red, pontification button has been pressed by the unlikely combination of my old friend Vicki and political activist Naomi Wolf.

Yesterday, two things happened: Vicki posted a comment on her Facebook page that read in part, "I may take some heat from this, but Julien Assange has become my hero;" and I read this article by Naomi Wolf on the Project Syndicate website: A Press Without Principles. The combination of the two sent my blood pressure soaring.

First of all, I believe Julien Assange, the founder of the infamous WikiLeaks website, is a self-important, holier-than-thou buffoon whose reckless actions have caused incalculable damage to international diplomacy and placed many people in danger. Second, I took great issue with this statement by Naomi Wolf in her article: "Most American journalists fully understand that Assange did not illegally obtain classified material; the criminally liable party is whoever released the material to the site."

Excuse me? Perhaps Ms Wolf has never heard of anyone being charged with the offense of "receiving stolen property." But it really doesn't matter. The point of her article is not to point out that Mr Assange is indeed guilty of something besides being an egotistical ass clown - it is to vociferously castigate the journalistic community for not rushing to Mr Assange's defense...after all, she points out, many journalists make their names by obtaining and publishing stolen classified documents, and many senior officials in government expose classified information for their own purposes - generally without incurring the sort of consequences that the Real People working at lower levels of government and the military would face. Sadly, this is true.

In a perfect world, governments would have no secrets from each other, and a clown like Julien Assange would not need to front a site like WikiLeaks. Everyone would get along, summit meetings would begin and end with hugs and choruses of Kumbaya, and the lion would lie down with the lamb. Well, the real world doesn't work that way. The real world is led not, unfortunately, by Gandhis and Woodrow Wilsons (the first of Wilson's famous Fourteen Points was, you may recall, "Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall be no private international understandings of any kind but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the public view.") ... it is led all too often by the Adolf Hitlers, Saddam Husseins, Mao Zedongs, and Hugo Chavezes - rulers who are not motivated by peaceful intentions and boundless love for their fellow man. Diplomats don't always have the luxury of being able to trust the motives and honor of their interlocutors, and their cables home - taken out of context - can make them look duplicitous rather than cautious and questioning.

In the real world, the lion may, in fact, lie down with the lamb, but the lamb won't get much sleep. And the Julien Assanges of the world aren't singing lullabies to help things along.

So...

I'm sorry, Vicki, but we have to agree to disagree on this one. Julien Assange isn't a hero in my book, but a brainless idealist whose damage to the international order may not be fully revealed and understood for years. He's a criminal...every bit as much as the individual who stole the material in the first place.

Both belong in jail.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Universal Translator, Part 2

Yesterday we talked about the concept of a Star Trek-style universal translator, and since such a device doesn't yet exist I offered you some helpful translations of how men and women understand the same words in different ways.

Here's another set of translations to help you out. If you are one of those people who has ever tried to picture a person from their self-generated descriptions in "In Search Of" ads or on dating websites, here's what they're really saying. On the left is what they wrote; on the right is what the reality is. Ladies first...

40-ish	48
Adventurer	Has had more partners than you ever will
Athletic	Flat-chested
Average looking	Ugly
Beautiful	Pathological liar
Contagious Smile	Bring your penicillin
Educated	College dropout
Emotionally Secure	Medicated
Feminist	Fat; ball buster
Free spirit	Substance user
Friendship first	Trying to live down reputation as slut
Fun	Annoying
Gentle	Comatose
Good Listener	Borderline Autistic
New-Age	All body hair, all the time
Old-fashioned	Lights out, missionary position only
Open-minded	Desperate
Outgoing	Loud
Passionate	Loud
Poet	Depressive Schzophrenic
Professional	Real Witch
Redhead	Shops the Clairol section
Reubenesque	Grossly Fat
Romantic	Looks better by candle light
Voluptuous	Very Fat
Weight proportional to height	Hugely Fat
Wants Soulmate	One step away from stalking
Widow	Nagged first husband to death
Young at heart	Toothless crone

And now for the men ...

40-ish	52 and looking for 25-yr-old
Athletic	Sits on the couch and watches ESPN
Average looking	Unusual hair growth on ears, nose, & back
Educated	Will always treat you like an idiot
Free Spirit	Sleeps with your sister
Friendship first	As long as friendship involves nudity
Fun	Good with a remote and a six pack
Good looking	Arrogant
Honest	Pathological Liar
Huggable	Overweight, more body hair than a bear
Like to cuddle	Insecure, overly dependent
Mature	Until you get to know him
Open-minded	Wants to sleep with your sister but she's not interested
Physically fit	I spend a lot of time in front of mirror admiring myself
Poet	Has written on a bathroom stall
Spiritual	Once went to church with his grandmother on Easter Sunday
Stable	Occasional stalker, but never arrested
Thoughtful	Says "Please" when demanding a beer

Any additions? Put them into the comments.

Have a good day. Read between the lines. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Universal Translator

One of the challenges of international travel, especially for Americans, is coping with the fact that the rest of the world doesn't always speak English. We Americans are notorious for expecting everyone else to speak our language, and widely known for our lack of linguistic prowess. To the average American, anyone from anywhere can understand English if you speak it slowly enough and/or shout it loudly enough.

The classic TV science fiction show Star Trek featured a "universal translator" which allowed Starfleet personnel (all of whom spoke English) to understand every alien who spoke just about anything. It was sci-fi, of course, and not real, although scientists are working on such a device. You can read about it in this article - Star Trek Translators Reach for the Final Frontier.

But what we really need isn't a clever device that allows us to talk with lizards from Alpha Centauri...what we need is a clever device that allows men and women to understand each other's language - after all, it's clear that even when we're saying the same thing, we're not saying the same thing. I don't have such a device, but here are a few helpful translations I've gathered over the years to hold you over until that Universal Translator becomes available at your local electronics store...

Wants and Needs (wontz and nedz) n.
Female: The delicate balance of emotional, physical and psychological longing one seeks to have fulfilled in a relationship.
Male: Food, sex and beer.

Thingy (thing-ee) n.
Female: Any part under a car's hood.
Male: The strap fastener on a woman's bra.

Lesbian (lez-bi-an) n.
Female: A woman who makes love to other women.
Male: A woman who has sex with other women so men can watch and get really turned on.

Glass Ceiling (glas see-ling) n.
Female: The invisible barrier that stops women from rising to the upper levels in business.
Male: What would really be great at work since that hot babe took over the office one flight up.

Vulnerable (vul-ne-ra-bel) adj.
Female: Fully opening up one's self emotionally to another.
Male: Playing ball without a cup.

Communication (ko-myoo-ni-kay-shon) n.
Female: The open sharing of thoughts and feelings with one's partner.
Male: Scratching out a note before suddenly taking off for a weekend with the guys.

Butt (but) n.
Female: The body part that every item of clothing manufactured makes “look bigger.”
Male: The organ of mooning (and farting).

Commitment (ko-mit-ment) n.
Female: A desire to get married and raise a family.
Male: Not trying to pick up other women while out with one's girlfriend.

Entertainment (en-ter-tayn-ment) n.
Female: A good movie, concert, play or book.
Male: Anything with one ball, two folds, or three stooges.

Flatulence (flach-u-lens) n.
Female: An embarrassing byproduct of digestion.
Male: An endless source of entertainment, self-expression and male bonding.

Making Love (may-king luv) n.
Female: The greatest expression of intimacy that a couple can achieve.
Male: What men have to call “boinking” to get women to boink.

Remote Control (ri-moht kon-trohl) n.
Female: A device for changing from one TV channel to another.
Male: A device for scanning through all 75 channels every 2 1/2 minutes.

Taste (tayst) v.
Female: Something you do frequently to whatever you're cooking, to make sure it's good.

Male: Something you must do to anything you think has gone bad, prior to tossing it out.

No need to thank me - it's all part of my ongoing efforts to help you cope with the world around you. My next project will be an electronic device that will translate political promises into plain English without throwing up.

Don't wait up...that one will take a while.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Very Short Post

We appear to have dodged the expected meteorological bullet this morning - another ice storm had been predicted to bedevil our morning rush hour, but it now appears to be coming later today and tonight ... so far everything is still clear and dry and my bus is - allegedly - running on time with normal service. In the interest of taking advantage of unexpected good fortune and getting to work early to make sure all is in readiness for the offsite conference I've been setting up, I offer this very short post:

Sorry about that.

Check back for a "normal" post later this evening or at tomorrow's usual time.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Powered by Imagination, Part 2

Back in December of 2008 I wrote a post based on a news report about the updating of the classic red Radio Flyer wagon, and I shamelessly purloined the title of the post - Powered by Imagination - from the tag line of the otherwise unforgettable 1992 movie Radio Flyer. My point in that post was to comment on how ultramodern toys (in this case, a Radio Flyer wagon that was ergonomically correct, safe, and equipped with a dock for an mp3 player) rob our children of the opportunity to imagine the things an older, less advanced toy might call to mind. I asked myself - and, by extension - you, Dear Readers, this question: "how do we aspire to greater things without imagination?"

I thought about this topic again last week when I read this article on Slate.com - The Purpose of Science Fiction: How It Teaches Governments - and Citizens - How to Understand the Future of Technology.

Author Robert J. Sawyer wrote that...

"At the core of science fiction is the notion of extrapolation, of asking, 'If this goes on, where will it lead?' And, unlike most scientists who think in relatively short time frames - getting to the next funding deadline, or readying a product to bring to market - we think on much longer scales: not just months and years, but decades and centuries ... That said, our [science fiction writers'] job is not to predict the future. Rather, it's to suggest all the possible futures—so that society can make informed decisions about where we want to go.

An unfettered imagination is what allows children to learn and adults to conceive of a better future. If your religion forbids you to think about anything but achieving an eternal paradise after death, or if you deny yourself the ability or opportunity to ask yourself if this goes on, where will it lead?, we'll never learn and never advance.

Star Trek, 1984, the novels of Michael Crichton, and many other examples of very fine science fiction are out there - enjoy them, and don't lose the power of imagination. For a start, read the great novellas Who Goes There? by John W. Campbell (turned into an original and a remade film titled The Thing) and Farewell to the Master, by Harry Bates (the story on which the science fiction classic The Day the Earth Stood Still and its flashier but forgettable 2008 remake were based). You can thank me later.

Have a good day. Imagine a better future. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

There's an App for That

If you are one of the gazillions of people who own smart phones, you know that there are a lot of techno-drones out there coming up with vast numbers of applications ("apps," for short) that can be installed on those phones to allow you to do all sorts of non-phonish (I made that term up) things. Long gone are the days when you used your telephone to simply call up another person and have a conversation...now you can use your phone to send e-mail, text, surf the web, turn your home appliances on and off, program the digital recorder on your TV, and much more. If ET showed up today, he wouldn't phone home, he'd just remotely activate the mothership from his smart phone and tell it to have the coffee ready on board when it arrived to pick him up.

Many people have complained that all these electronic devices have, rather than improving our ability to communicate with each other, actually made it more difficult. Instead of the dying art of letter-writing, we have text messages written in shorthand. Instead of intimate face-t0-face conversation over a cup of coffee or a cocktail, we have whispered (or, more often, shouted) conversations over a cell phone in overly public places.

Yes, Dear Readers, your smart phone ain't necessarily your friend.

Consider this interesting article from CNN about some of the new apps that help you either to avoid human contact or - perversely enough - help you find the right thing to say if you've lost the art of conversation entirely. Here are a few of the better ones ...

iPology - don't know how to apologize for whatever it is you did (or didn't do)? There's an app for that on the iPhone! "iPology" will help you come up with just the right degree of grovel to meet your needs.

Profanity (for Android) and iSwear (for the iPhone) - when just calling someone a fatuous numbskull just won't carry the right degree of weight, but your drunken longshoreman vocabulary is coming up short, never fear - these two apps will have you cursing like a sailor in no time.

Pick-up Lines - if your love life consists of typing dialog to a large-busted avatar on a flickering screen, but you have no idea how to relate to a live, breathing woman, fear not! The "Pick-up Lines" app will have you spouting cheesy come-ons like a professional lounge lizard in moments! And the ladies haven't been forgotten, either - there's an "Anti-Pick-up Lines" app to help you shut down those pasty-faced Lotharios.

What If? (for iPhone) and Did You Know? (for Android) - okay, so you don't want to go for the goofy pick-up line ... you'd rather try to go the suave, debonair route and impress the lady with your erudition, but don't know how to start a meaningful conversation with a living being. These apps are for you - both will generate interesting observations and bon mots that will have you sounding like an international jet-setter before you know it.

Me, I'm looking for the app that will help me survive the 2012 election season by giving me new and powerful ways to respond to political robo-calls. I'm looking for an app that automatically replies to canned political flatulence and empty rhetoric with requests for specific information on specific policies. Even better would be an app that automatically generates ten votes for the opponent of any ass clown whose campaign annoys me with a robo-call.

A guy can dream, can't he?

Have a good day. You don't even need an app for it.

More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Cartoon Saturday

Violent unrest has spread to Egypt in the wake of the "Jasmine Revolution" in Tunisia; a man has been arrested in connection with the shooting deaths of two women in Michigan, one of them the mother of two small children; as Dallas gets ready to host the Super Bowl on February 6th, adult club owners are warning of a shortage of as many as 10,000 strippers to entertain the expected crowds; and Washington DC continues to recover from last Wednesday afternoon's rush hour snow and ice storm that stranded thousands of commuters, left streets clogged with abandoned cars, and continues to leave large areas of the national capital region without power ... conclusively proving that you don't need Republicans to bring progress to a grinding halt.

Just in time to help maintain your sanity, Cartoon Saturday is back!

The Department of Homeland Security announced earlier this week that it will scrap the useless and widely mocked system of color-coding terrorist threats. The search for a replacement system looked at how other countries assess threats ...

Forget the metric system ... there are a lot of other ways to measure things that are more meaningful ...

I don't know about you, but I'm really tired of television ads from lawyers urging me to sue on the basis of things I never heard of before. Sooner or later, we'll get to this point ...

Speaking of color-coding ...

Modern medicine relies on all sorts of exotic tests and reports, some of them more crucial to your treatment than others ...

Dancing with the Stars meets Perry Mason ...

Clever on so many levels ...

And finally, the weather forecasts here in Disneyland-on-the-Potomac are always telling us about snowstorms in winter and heat waves in summer. Perhaps we need a new sort of forecast that's more useful ...

Well, Dear Readers, you've made it through to another weekend. With any luck, the ice will melt from our street today so that we can finally get up the hill and do important things like buy food and stock up at the library for our next burst of winter, expected on Tuesday and Wednesday. I'm thinking of taking up a collection to buy an early spring - who's with me?

Have a good day. Stay warm and dry. More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

The Fun Continues...

Well, yesterday we dealt with the aftermath of our 5-inch mini-Snowmageddon. Not all that much snow (compared to what we got in Pittsburgh when I was growing up there), but plenty enough to cause amazing chaos in Disneyland-on-the-Potomac. Nothing - not even the Republicans - can do more to bring progress to a screeching halt than a little snow.

But that was yesterday.

Yesterday, I opted to take a day of unscheduled leave rather than try to drive sideways up our hill and out to where the roads had actually been plowed and treated. Today, the plows have come down my street and lovingly groomed the 5 inches of snow into 2-1/2 inches of ice. Yesterday, our local buses ran a "Saturday schedule," which means there was no service anywhere within walking distance of my igloo. Today, they're running an "adjusted normal" service, which means that my bus route is operating, but the buses won't come into the neighborhood - I need to walk a bit less than a mile up to the local shopping center to pick it up. I don't mind the walk...the problem is that the bus supervisors can't or won't tell you the times the bus will actually arrive at and depart from said shopping center.

Sigh.

The last time they did this, during the Snowmageddon of February '10, I hiked up to the shopping center in knee-deep snow, only to arrive just as the bus was leaving, whereupon I waited about 45 minutes for the next one.

Double sigh.

Well, enough kvetching. Time to put on my four layers of long johns, three sweaters, parka, two hats, gloves, mukluks, and Yak Trax, and hit the road in search of a bus.

If you haven't heard from me by this time tomorrow, send out this guy...

Have a good day. Stay warm and dry while you wait for Cartoon Saturday.

Bilbo

It Ain't Snowmageddon, But It's Enough...

It's 6:20 AM as I start to write this...just about two hours later than my normal schedule. Why am I running so late, you ask. Blame it on the snow.

Yes, we had a fast-moving yet ugly snowstorm that rolled through here yesterday afternoon and evening, just in time to hose up the afternoon commute for the tens of thousands of drones that make Disneyland-on-the-Potomac such a wonderful place to live and work. Here are a few vignettes from yesterday afternoon and this morning ...

As the storm was approaching, the Federal Government announced it was shutting down and releasing all workers two hours early. The practical effects of this were as follows:

1. It didn't make any difference to me, because the first bus I can take home from the Metro station didn't run any earlier, anyhow. I left work an hour earlier than usual.

2. All the people whose commutes generally span a space of about four hours left work at once, which meant sardine-room only on all Metrorail cars. The overcrowding, predictably, prevented the doors from properly closing and - equally predictably - each time the driver opened the doors to try to close them properly, more people tried to jam in. Somehow, we made it to the Springfield station, where ...

3. The rain changed to sleet and then to snow while we waited for our local bus. Since this bus is almost always late in perfect weather conditions, we were not surprised to find it late in the prevailing conditions. We loaded up and the driver heroically carried us at a crippled snail's pace through appalling weather conditions and miserable traffic. He even, amazingly enough, drove the full route through our subdivision, which the buses usually won't do in conditions far better than those.

4. Time of arrival at home: exactly five minutes later than my normal arrival time, despite leaving work an hour earlier than usual.

All things considered, I had it pretty easy. There were plenty of horror stories of people needing seven hours or more to get home, and the roads were clogged with abandoned cars that had spun out and gotten stuck. But such is life in the big city.

This morning I got up at my usual time, bundled up, and went out to shovel out our driveway and sidewalks. We have about five inches of very heavy, very wet snow - the kind that is utterly miserable to shovel. I got the sidewalks cleared and a path dug out around the car, but there isn't much point in shoveling out the entire driveway, since our local streets haven't been plowed and are pretty much impassable. My local bus system is running a Saturday schedule, which means that it's not running to our neighborhood, so unless and until I can get up the hill and out to the main roads, I'm enjoying what we euphemistically call "a day of non-scheduled leave."

As storms go, this one was miserable, but nothing on the scale of last year's fabled "Snowmageddon" (you can relive that marvelous experience in pictures here and here), and we certainly didn't have the dangers faced by Amanda and her family in the Australian floods ... nevertheless, it was bad enough.

And now, I need to take a nice, hot shower and get reacquainted with my feet.

Have a good day. Stay warm. More thoughts tomorrow ... or perhaps later today, who knows?

Bilbo

Of Eagles and Turkeys

Many countries have chosen the majestic eagle as their national symbol. Stylized eagles appear on national flags, great seals, military unit patches, and recruiting posters. The mighty eagle, soaring high above his domain and swooping down mercilessly on his enemies, is an obvious choice for a symbol of national power.

Or is it?

It was on this day in 1784 that Benjamin Franklin wrote a letter to his daughter in which he admitted he was not pleased about the choice of the bald eagle as the symbol of America. He wished it had not been chosen as a symbol of our country because it was "a bird of bad moral character." Franklin wrote about the eagle: "Like those among men who live by sharping and robbing, he is generally poor, and often very lousy."

Mr Franklin believed there was a different bird that should have been chosen as the national symbol of his new nation: the wild turkey.

"The turkey," Ben wrote to his daughter, "is a much more respectable bird, and ... a true original native of America."

History may well have proven Mr Franklin right. The mighty American eagle doesn't soar quite as high as it used to, and Congress is long on squawking turkeys and short on mighty eagles. When I think about those who would murder us in the name of twisted religious beliefs, seize our merchant vessels off the coast of Somalia, and ship tons of drugs into our cities, I rather miss this fellow ...

Because there are some times when being a turkey just won't do.

Have a good day. Honor the turkey at Thanksgiving, and the eagle on the other 364 days.

More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo