duh...

I finally found the setting that allows anyone to comment even though they don't have Blogger.

Comment away.

What ya gonna do when the well runs dry, honey....

Chinese city panics over undrinkable water supply

Algae threatens Wuxi's water supply

They'll^TM soon tell us it's global warming, of course, making water levels lower and temperatures warmer allowing algae grow when and where it shouldn't. Sewage pollution? Naah, that's not all trendy and sexy like global warming. True, but not sexy.

What...global warming makes water levels higher, not lower? Make up your minds.

While you're thinking about it, don't forget the effects of resource depletion -- in this case, loss of safe drinking water -- on a community. They're hoarding now, but at least going through the motions of helping each other, and stiff fines are to be imposed for anyone hiking up the price of water. They're being civil to each other. But all of this could crumble with one good, hot, thirsty altercation at a supply depot, growing into a riot.

It was the food riots that finally brought about the French Revolution. Lack of water starts killing people long before lack of food does.

From the past...just a taste. Riots, looters, corpses, diseases, military, gun confiscations, general fear and loathing.

Resource depletion. Don't underestimate it.

The future limps forward

What we want:



What we get:



Never Waiting In Traffic Again

At a meeting in Munich in October, Mayor Yury Luzhkov gave Lipp the green light to test a system that would integrate buildings and roads. Roads for light vehicles would be built on top of commercial and residential buildings.

A raised road network would free up ground-level streets of 30 percent of traffic and cost at least $30 billion, Lipp said.

The project's viability rests on the results of a pilot: a 1.7-kilometer, four-lane highway atop a row of shopping complexes and residential buildings near Varshavskoye Shosse in southern Moscow.

'Cause those Soviet-constructed buildings are gonna hold that road RIGHT up. Strong and robust as Chernobyl, they are. No substandard materials and lowest-bidder contracts in Russia's construction history, no-sirree-Ivan.

Homeland Security will decide whether we can work

No jobs for US citizens without Homeland Security approval

"Under this already flawed program no one would be able to work in the U.S. without DHS approval - creating a ‘No Work List’ similar to the government’s ‘No Fly List.’"

Whoever's surprised, raise your hand. Next come No Rent Lists, No Primary Education Lists, No Buying Food Lists...You think I'm joking, don't you.


Work bill would create new ID database

There is no privacy requirement that the federal government delete the information after work authorization is given or denied. Employers would be required to keep all the documentation in paper or electronic form for seven years "and make it available for inspection by officers of the Department of Homeland Security" and the Department of Labor. It would also open up the IRS' databases of confidential taxpayer information to Homeland Security and its contractors.

After the chaos that will ensue due to incompatibility of database software, the next step will be to create one database. The more centralized the information is, the easier it is to manipulate it, since you only have to crack one database, bribe one employee, or forge one card instead of several.

The ACLU's Sparapani argued that the bill's penalties for noncompliance aren't tough enough to discourage unscrupulous employers from continuing to pay undocumented workers under the table. Under the new rules, "the black market economy is likely to grow rather than shrink," he said.

No shit, Sherlock. If it's too much trouble to hire people legally, why would people even bother to hire citizens and legal immigrants? It's now going to be MORE likely that illegal immigrants will find work and stay here, not less.

Ground Zero articles of interest:

Bring the troops home...quarantined, please

More drug-resistant body-invading organisms rearing up:

Acinetobacter Baumannii: Coming Soon to a Hospital Near You

Now dubbed "Supergerms", they spread without warning and seemingly
without official notices since they are infections instead of diseases. The
government is taking advantage of this technicality.

Apparently, "diseases" require official CDC notices, but "infections" do not. What is supposed to be the difference between "infection" and "disease" is beyond my current knowledge, especially since the CDC has whole departments for "infectious diseases".

But the crux of it is that this particular bacterium is showing up in military and veterans' hospitals, carried by patients recently returned from Iraq, and it isn't getting reported to the public.

So first I go to the VA hospital and get an infection, then I come back when I'm dying and they experiment on me. So not liking this.

CDC information on Acinetobacter

It seems Acinetobacter has been around for a while. Are we to assume it's always been resistant to common antibiotics, or did it get that way in recent times?

Secret Service overstretched

Campaign Puts New Strain on Secret Service

"The protection work of the Secret Service has grown in magnitude and complexity since 9/11. . . . The number of protectees under your responsibility has doubled since 2002. At the same time, the global war on terror is driving up the intensity of your protective operations," Rep. Harold Rogers (R-Ky.) told Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan at a March hearing on his $1.4 billion 2008 budget proposal. "Your already stretched personnel and resources are going to be stretched even further."

Saddled with new duties, the agency is cutting back its traditional work on financial fraud and cybercrime.

So now agents are being pulled off their surveillance of the banks and the Internet.

Now we're even more open for something like what happened to Estonia.

Also, if they're going to have trouble finding the resources to scan the White House mail and other threats to the President, doesn't that leave things open for people to...er...

...I don't know, perhaps harm...if it's safe to say...

Oh, wait...if I say it, they won't catch me! They're too busy to FIND IT! WAH-HA-HA-HAAAAAA!

Stretched resources potentially leave the President vulnerable!

The act of running for President endangers the current President!

And you just TOLD everybody!!!

Another plane quarantine

Just in case you've already forgotten the fairly recent incident of the plane held in Newark, NJ for hours while the airlines sorted out sick people, here's another small reminder of how vulnerable we are to bioweaponry.

Psst. "Difficult to treat" = "drug-resistant".

U.S. authorities quarantine air traveler with TB

"This is an unusual TB organism, one that's very, very difficult to treat. And we want to make sure that we have done everything we possibly can to identify people who could be at risk,"

Tuberculosis is serious. A positive test for exposure bans you from health care and child care jobs for life. There are several antibiotic-resistant strains, because we've been treating it for so long. Oh, and it kills you slowly and unpleasantly.

Am I saying that these are cases of bioweaponry? Not necessarily; in fact, I don't think it's likely. Bioweaponry, when it is finally used en masse, will be harder to detect and spread more quickly than TB does. No, what these are is....practice. Drills.

Remember that a plague is a national emergency, and that President Bush now becomes dictator at his own discretion in a national emergency. They^TM have to see how fast authorities respond to such incidents so they can design an outbreak that gets past the authorities (the ones who aren't in on it) long enough to take hold. Next will probably come quarantine drills on public buildings.

Ground Zero articles of interest:

She finally gets it

Cindy Sheehan has resigned to spend more time with her family.

Wait...you mean she wasn't holding an office to resign from? Could've fooled me.

I'm not going to say everything that comes to my mind, because of my respect for her loss, a loss she has done much to disrespect. (Damn, I said I wasn't going to say stuff like that. This is difficult.)

The most telling point in her statement is this:

The most devastating conclusion that I reached this morning, however, was that Casey did indeed die for nothing. His precious lifeblood drained out in a country far away from his family who loves him, killed by his own country which is beholden to and run by a war machine that even controls what we think. I have tried every since he died to make his sacrifice meaningful. Casey died for a country which cares more about who will be the next American Idol than how many people will be killed in the next few months while Democrats and Republicans play politics with human lives.

Now you get it! You finally understand. He died for nothing. They're all dying for nothing. You can't "make it meaningful" because the only meaning it has is that there is NOTHING worth dying for in this clusterfuck.

Partisanship means nothing. You found that out when you disaffiliated with the Democrats. It's too bad for you that you didn't know it going in. They used you. But you used them. So it goes.

And the anti-war movement means nothing, either. The war machine does control us. They control us because they have better guns. A movement is only as powerful as those who enforce its results.

Ground Zero articles of interest:

Hope I don't get the placebo

Okay, you're about to die. Door number one, door number two, or door number three? No, we weren't asking YOU. Shut up and bleed.

Critical care without consent

The federal government is undertaking the most ambitious set of studies ever mounted under a controversial arrangement that allows researchers to conduct some kinds of medical experiments without first getting patients' permission.

As a veteran who makes regular use of the VA health care system, I've always assumed that they wouldn't hesitate to include me in studies whenever they felt like it, without acquiring my consent or even informing me. I mean, they're the government. It's similar to the way I've always assumed my cell phone conversations are being monitored: after a while it's not paranoia, it's just policy.

But then, that's what you sign up for when you enlist in the military. I suspect that we never become fully civilian again.

I have been telling people this for YEARS

Do not assume that the Internet will be there forever. Or even another year or two. Chances are it will be...but have a backup plan. Like local social networks. Bound books. When it isn't freely available any more...that is when information will truly become a commodity.

This is a scenario from the UK Daily Mail, based upon the recent denial-of-service attacks upon the country of Estonia:

Attack of the cyber terrorists

Estonia blames Russia, while the author of this article suggests that unaffiliated hackers are the more likely culprits. (The Warren Commission just called; they want their lone gunman back.)

We'll see.

In fact, we'll probably see up close.

Ground Zero articles of interest:

Well, that's fine for Europe...

(Follow-up to this post)

EU Probes Google Over Privacy Concerns

Oh, they'll get you too, Europe. Either that, or you'll find a competitive way to do it yourselves. You're not fooling anyone, you know.

"...just so long as I'm the dictator"

New presidential directive gives Bush dictatorial power

"The President shall lead the activities of the Federal Government for ensuring constitutional government."

Bloody hell.

Explanation and analysis of the document:

Bush To Be Dictator In A Catastrophic Emergency

Ground Zero articles of interest:

Okay, okay, we'll negotiate with SOME terrorists. But not the really naughty ones

US may negotiate with Iraqi insurgents

"One element of the plan is to try to identify groups of people -- including possibly Sunni extremists and militia groups -- with whom U.S. officials feel they can do business, such as negotiating power-sharing and cease-fire agreements and granting economic aid, the sources said."

Maybe this will work because, essentially, the hawks and the insurgents are on the same side. They each want to abolish the status quo of America.

Ground Zero articles of interest:

Sympathy for the bomber

This isn't a news article; it's a tidbit of information I picked up last week. There exists, in the current edition of Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, a condition called Intermittent Explosive Disorder. It is also known as Militant Episode Disorder.

Militant, hmm.

So does Intermittent Explosive Disorder cause militant people to leave IEDs around? It that what's wrong with terrorists? Those poor dears. Let's get them some help.

Who needs the FBI when we have Google?

Yeah, because Google's who I want running my life...

Google's goal to organize your daily life

"Mr Schmidt told journalists in London: 'We cannot even answer the most basic questions because we don’t know enough about you. That is the most important aspect of Google’s expansion.'"

Really? Seems to me they know plenty:

Google in bed with U.S. intelligence

Ground Zero articles of interest:

Remember, remember...

Evey confronts the Fingermen after curfew.


The movie "V for Vendetta" showed us an alternate-universe police state in London, England.

Now coming to a universe near you!

Street lockdowns proposed in Baltimore

"Under Curran's plan, the mayor could declare "public safety act zones," which would allow police to close liquor stores and bars, limit the number of people on city sidewalks, and halt traffic during two-week intervals.

Police would be encouraged to aggressively stop and frisk individuals in those zones to search for weapons and drugs."

More Dead Birds

Birds Dropping From Sky, Flying Into Buildings After Exposure To Smoke

Why do birds
fall down from the sky....
every time....
you walk by?


So birds have delicate lungs, and the toxins in smoke kills them? What effect do you suppose chemtrails have on birds? To say nothing of smog, for that matter...

Ground Zero articles of interest:

College locked down in Albany, Oregon

Here we go...and...action!

Linn-Benton Community College was locked down this morning and then closed after a report that a man wearing a trenchcoat on campus might have guns.

MIGHT have guns.

But he didn't.

Oh, those trenchcoats. Those fashion accessories of death.

Columbine! The West Memphis Three! Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no trenchcoats, for the police are with me; their tasers and their guns they comfort me....

No. They scare us. And that's what they're supposed to do.

You may not buy into it. You may love trenchcoats as I do. But you can no longer look at someone wearing a black trenchcoat without thinking of either Columbine or The Matrix. I defy you to do so.

Ground Zero articles of interest:

WITCH HUNT

The West Memphis Three were persecuted for their taste in clothes and music six years before Columbine.


Rumors spread, accusations fly.

Waiting...

Sigh...nothing like a slow news week to accompany one's statement of intent.

Welcome to On Beyond Zero

This blog will contain news articles, my comments on them, and, often, links to resources in which Clyde Lewis discusses the relevant subjects.

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