Walter Jon Williams explains the connection:

 I had an essay half-written on the Olympics before my life got busy, and then the Olympics were over, and the whole effort became irrelevant. But it’s suddenly grown a strange resonant pertinence, so here I go.

I intended to comment on the various Chinese attempts to control the Olympics and its public perception, and how so much backfired because autocratic Chinese officials were so deeply clueless as to the new technology, and to how a free information society operates. 

What I wasn’t expecting from Walter’s essay was  the painfully explicit parallels between the behavior of the Chinese government and the behavior of the authorities in the Twin Cities of Minnesota.

Do read the whole thing.

I found something nifty. A group of citizens concerned about the state of science and technology in the US kicked off an effort which is now co-sponsored by 38,000 scientists, engineers, and scientific/ engineering/ mathematics organizations, to quiz the presidential candidates on their knowledge of and positions regarding important scientific issues of the day.

Science Debate 2008 has posed a series of questions to each candidate on subjects ranging from climate change to energy to education to stem cell research and ocean health.

No response is up yet from McCain, but you can see Obama’s answers to the top 14 questions here. Here’s a taste of his position on one of my topics of concern, climate change:

Specifically, I will implement a market-based cap-and-trade system to reduce carbon emissions by the amount scientists say is necessary: 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050. I will start reducing emissions immediately by establishing strong annual reduction targets with an intermediate goal of reducing emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. A cap- and-trade program draws on the power of the marketplace to reduce emissions in a cost- effective and flexible way. I will require all pollution credits to be auctioned.

I am impressed with his specificity, here. A reduction of 80% below 1990 levels by 2050 is what climate scientists say is needed to forestall the worst effects of climate change. I’ve seen arguments made for and against cap-and-trade, versus a carbon tax. I’m no economist, but from what I have read from the experts, cap-and-trade should work, as long as it’s well thought out, and I would support this. (More on this if y’all are interested; just let me know.)

His answers to several of the other questions are equally thoughtful and have real specifics.  I’ll be interested to see McCain’s responses.

This is just a quick post — if I get time, I will delve into some of his answers and discuss his positions further, but my first impression is, damn — it sure will be nice if we can get a smart person back in the White House again. Digits overlapped…

And kudos to the people who thought this up — we need to be asking our leaders these kinds of questions.

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You can watch it full-screen in high-def if you click the link for that. Hardened old radical that I am, not much makes me cry any more. But this one did.

Saw it on Booman Tribune a few minutes ago. Click the pic.

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Tor.Com has just published my post-Reflex Millie and Davy story, “Shade” with this incredible Eric Fortune illustration.

Besides being able to read the story at the site, various DRM-free download formats are available:  PDF, Mobi-Pocket, HTML, and Sony, as well as an MP3 of me reading it.

Thanks, Tor!

I’ve been a baaaaaad blogger.  That is, to say, a non-existent blogger.  It started when mySQL problems at Digitalnoir.com caused me blog to become intermittant and then got worse when one of my efforts to fix the thing caused it to break further.  The outcome on this is still pending but I’ll try to get it up and going.  I will post further news as it comes.

It’s a bit like this door mat available online.

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Click the pic.

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My fondness for medical dramas, medical mysteries, medical documentaries, plague thrillers and the like doubtless has its genesis in shows like Doctor Kildare and Ben Casey (I liked Kildare better because Casey’s arms were too hairy.  I was very young).

These days as a consumer of Modern Medicine(tm), I’m frequently awed by all the cool stuff they can do, the extraordinary leaps medical science has made in my lifetime.  But I was reminded of another leap while reading a TV Guide that Sarcasm Girl brought me back from her vacation.  It had Illya Kuryakin on the cover (I was young, okay?) and listings of television shows from 1965 that I barely remember (and others I remember embarrassingly well). There was also a bound-in ad for medical insurance.  It notes in tones of alarm that the average cost of an overnight stay in the hospital had doubled in ten years.  From $18.35 to $36.83.

So I got curious: what’s the average cost of an overnight stay nowadays?  Granted, it’s forty years later, and nothing I know of has gotten less expensive.  But I googled about, and the best estimate I could find was around $1000 a night.  I assume that is not including tests, medication, surgical and medical services and soap in the shower: just the room with all its cool technology, and the nurses and orderlies and support staff.

I do understand the concept of overhead, of the hospital having to pay electricity and water bills and the salaries of everyone from the CEO to the janitor.  To keep the paint fresh and make sure the rooms are dust-free and the linens changed.  And I know that the new, cool technology comes with large price tags.  But holy hats.  27 times the 1965 cost, just for a night in the hospital.

Jane Eyre had it right: “I must keep very well and not die.”

I don’t like upsetting my friends, either, so I have been cowardly, and stopped posting on the ongoing march of destruction of the planet’s species. But this table, posted at Deep-Sea News by science blogger Peter Etnoyer, was pulled from his colleague Jeremy B. C. Jackson’s recent publication in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The table really says it all, and people do need to know. Even if we don’t want to.

Kate Wilhelm has a short story called “The Chosen.” It depicts the forests of the future, which have fallen silent. And still we mine them. This table is a glimpse at the reality that story predicted.

We are devouring our world. We are devouring our children’s future. Just thought you should know.

Then I looked around and realized I had several trees in my front yard. And they were big! I had these big beautiful trees and I hadn’t known how quickly they’d grow! But then I got mad because:

1. I hadn’t planted them the right distance apart (they were in this really haphazard configuration–some crowding each other);
2. They STILL weren’t getting enough water; and
3. When I looked more closely I saw they were actually weird looking and kind of ugly, because I had chopped off all these limbs from them. I remember looking at them and thinking, what the hell was I thinking??

*Sigh*

Shaddup, Subconscious, sez I. I got the damn thing finished. Are you ever satisfied?

(really cool tree picture, “Weird Tree,” by RJA Digital, published under a Creative Commons copyright 2.5 - non-commercial use only, share-alike.)

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*FINALLY

**Thank God!

Meanwhile, something delectable for your enjoyment — sent to me by our own LDA. Ferrous sculptures, created by Japanese artist Sachiko Kodama:

Here is more on the artist and her work.

But I can make flowers! I’ve been taking a cake-decorating class this summer, with a view to gaining skills so that I can subvert, as they say, the dominant paradigm. Granted, I’m unlikely to do that with frosting pansies and sweet peas and forget-me-nots. But in the larger scheme of things I can see a day when, instead of a basket full of flowers like this (last night’s class project)–

I could turn out a basket full of skulls. Or worms. Or zombies.

And that’s where I need your help, Brainiacs. I’m looking for candy molds–the weirder the better. Zombies, skulls, skeletons, eyeballs…anything ookie or weird. The lovely woman who teaches my class leans toward moles of ballerina shoes and puppies and doves in flight; I won’t find what I want there. And since I’ve also learned how to do sugar molding, if you find me a cool mold I’ll send you a set of molded sugar what-ever-you-finds, as a thank you.

Act now! Before the flowers completely take over! (They’ve already taken over the dog…)

You know how I am… It’s all a blur to me. I kinda almost remember stuff. Sometimes.

Lessee… what did I do this weekend? I remember riding into Austin on my Shadow on Friday evening. She Who Is Awesome and Jesse and I ended up eating dinner at the all-you-can-eat place, because the upscale places were all overloaded with those people who are about three cuts above my normal social class and prefer the restaurant music to be so GODDAM LOUD that you can’t hear your own intestines explode when the salmonella kicks in.

I normally don’t like the all-you-can-eat food places, but this one was quieter than usual and the food was extremely tasty, and apparently did not contain any salmonella. Jesse was taking us out to celebrate because he just got a new job installing cutting-edge solar technology to power laser-beam death rays on people’s roofs. I spilled ice cream on my shirt and licked it off, but it didn’t get really clean, actually.

Jesse had to go to bed early because he had to go in the next morning to start collimating the death rays. Me and Rach rode over to the nearest movie plex and saw ‘The Dark Knight’. I kinda remember it being pretty good. It was long, but didn’t seem that way at the time. I didn’t have to get up to go to the bathroom even once during the movie, which was nice.

Slept very late Saturday morning. Washed clothes, as I had forgotten to bring any clean underwear with me. Took a shower, and got back into the sweaty underwear, as the clean underwear wasn’t dry yet. Yeah, I know – gross.

Got to band rehearsal after the scheduled begin time that afternoon, as usual. We jammed out until about nine. We were mind-blastingly great, as usual, and everybody even seemed to enjoy it, despite the mandatory bitching and whining. I got to play loud, some. Caroline’s cello solo on the not-quite-last song (which is a secret song for the wedding gig, so shush!) was sublime.

Jesse was out shooting pool with friends when I got back to the apartment, so me and Rach wandered off and had TexMex at this quiet place tucked away in the wilderness that is Pflugerville. It was late, so we were the last customers to leave before they closed. I left a larger than usual tip, because I felt guilty about that.

We weren’t tired yet, so we rode off down I-35 looking for trouble, and… What did we do then?..

Oh, yeah, now I remember.

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If you don’t already know the story behind Rachael’s tattoo, it’s here.

I’d intended to get mine this past Father’s Day, but Collier, the genius who did both of our tattoos, is harder to catch than a greased cheetah on meth.

Uh, not that he’s really a cheetah. Or greased. Or on meth. It’s a metaphor, okay? I can do those, sometimes.

Here’s a picture of Collier, (who is a genius, did I mention?), hurting me:

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We finished up around 2 a.m. and finally found a Walgreens that was open and got some Aquaphor, which will be applied at least twice daily upon the new tattoo for a week to keep it shiny.

If you’re contemplating getting another tattoo next time you’re in Austin, you can go by Dark Angels Tattoos late one night and whisper the words ‘greased cheetah on meth’ in Collier’s ear, and he just might give you a discount on one of his works of genius.

I slept late again this morning, because I’d stayed up until almost 4 a.m. admiring my new tattoo. Then I rode back home in hundred degree Texas August Global Warming Climatic Meltdown and cleaned up the mess that my cats made over the weekend when they apparently had their cheetah friends over for a meth party.

Oh, also… I don’t remember for sure….

Have I mentioned here before that I love my daughter, whose name is Rachael?

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This is a view of the Pyramid of the Moon

From on top of

the Pyramid of the Sun.

We climbed all those steps. The altitude is over 7500 feet. Wheezer Geezers!

Inventor Glenn Martin has created a real, honest-to-guru working prototype of a jetpack, which recently took its first voyage at a flying contraptions fair in Oshkosh, Wisconsin.

Click on the image to watch the video and read about it at the Chicago Tribune.

(That, btw, is his 16-year-old son Harrison piloting it, neatly settling the debate over whether or not having an inventor for a parent is Teh Coolest! Thing! Evar!)