Rain Gryphon (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rain_gryphon) wrote2005-10-25 02:13 am
rain_gryphon) wrote2005-10-25 02:13 am
Entry tags:
Some Other Stuff
So, Rosa Parks has bitten the dust. She's gonna HAVE to ride in the back this time...
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Titan has made its last flight. That's a shame, really. I loved the big orange clouds of exhaust from those. Delta and Atlas are still going strong, though. The very oldest memory I have of space-related stuff was sitting watching the support gantry roll slowly away from an Atlas. I would have been a bit older than two then, I think.
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(a discourse on socialism, originally posted as a reply on a friend's LJ)
If society were culturally homogenous, and everyone held the same values with regard to work, property, appropriate public behaviour, and the environment, then socialism would probably be an ideal system. If you look, you'll note that in the Scandinavian countries where the populace is by and large homogenous, socialism functions well. The people there know that the poor hold the same values as they do, and are working just as hard toward the same goals. No-one minds helping them.
In a multicultural republic like the United States, calls for socialism are more a political weapon than anything. Here groups with common political interests are encouraged to perceive themselves as separate from the body politic as a whole, and in conflict with it and its other component groups to "get their share". The end result is that any program designed to give to the poor as a whole actually ends up strengthening political and ethnic groups who are in opposition to those groups financing the largesse. If you pay any attention to American political discourse, note how much of it is based around the notions of conflict and frustrated entitlement. Take a drink every time a politician promises to "fight for your rights".
The direction that we're currently heading to resolve these issues is, I think, that of politically and financially marginalizing the bottommost nonproductive stratum of society (welface recipients, etc), so that they can no longer have any effect on national politics. Those of us left, the working, middle and professional classes, have enough common interests to be able to transcend our differences and work together. I'll predict that once the welface classes have lost all political power, opposition to helping them financially will vanish.
That being said, a socialist outlook can work very well in limited areas of the country, such as the Bay, where everyone shares a common identity, or among social groups such as furries, for the same reason. I've given tons of stuff away to poorer furs that I've never met, simply because I knew they needed it, and they were people like me.
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The Arcade Museum.
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The Automated Welcoming Cat.
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The famed 1901 bulb. I've seen operating bulbs that are older but there's none that's been in continuous operation for as long. Lightbulbs fascinate me. I've got a few working Christmas bulbs from the 1930s myself. Someday I need to make my own homemade lightbulbs.
Fur them what likes looking at lightbulbs, there's BulbCollector.
And for old Christmas bulbs, there's Old Christmas Lights.
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It's hard to hear the name "Lubbock, TX" with a straight face. It always makes me think of buttocks. My favourite Texas town name is "Dimebox".
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Yet another solution to the Black Dahlia Murder. The fellow's writing style is execrable, near unreadable at times (I think he's trying to sound like Kenneth Anger), but he has an intriguing theory that probably makes more sense to a modern audience than it would have at the time. Be forewarned that the site contains some truly nasty pictures of the murder scene, the ones that are generally left out of the books. Also on reflection some of the narrative just doesn't make a lot of sense unless you're familiar with the case already. Red Manley, whose name pops up without explanation, was a pipe-cutter salesman who gave the victim a ride in his car on the day she disappeared, and was initially the chief suspect.
*****
Titan has made its last flight. That's a shame, really. I loved the big orange clouds of exhaust from those. Delta and Atlas are still going strong, though. The very oldest memory I have of space-related stuff was sitting watching the support gantry roll slowly away from an Atlas. I would have been a bit older than two then, I think.
*****
(a discourse on socialism, originally posted as a reply on a friend's LJ)
If society were culturally homogenous, and everyone held the same values with regard to work, property, appropriate public behaviour, and the environment, then socialism would probably be an ideal system. If you look, you'll note that in the Scandinavian countries where the populace is by and large homogenous, socialism functions well. The people there know that the poor hold the same values as they do, and are working just as hard toward the same goals. No-one minds helping them.
In a multicultural republic like the United States, calls for socialism are more a political weapon than anything. Here groups with common political interests are encouraged to perceive themselves as separate from the body politic as a whole, and in conflict with it and its other component groups to "get their share". The end result is that any program designed to give to the poor as a whole actually ends up strengthening political and ethnic groups who are in opposition to those groups financing the largesse. If you pay any attention to American political discourse, note how much of it is based around the notions of conflict and frustrated entitlement. Take a drink every time a politician promises to "fight for your rights".
The direction that we're currently heading to resolve these issues is, I think, that of politically and financially marginalizing the bottommost nonproductive stratum of society (welface recipients, etc), so that they can no longer have any effect on national politics. Those of us left, the working, middle and professional classes, have enough common interests to be able to transcend our differences and work together. I'll predict that once the welface classes have lost all political power, opposition to helping them financially will vanish.
That being said, a socialist outlook can work very well in limited areas of the country, such as the Bay, where everyone shares a common identity, or among social groups such as furries, for the same reason. I've given tons of stuff away to poorer furs that I've never met, simply because I knew they needed it, and they were people like me.
*****
The Arcade Museum.
*****
The Automated Welcoming Cat.
*****
The famed 1901 bulb. I've seen operating bulbs that are older but there's none that's been in continuous operation for as long. Lightbulbs fascinate me. I've got a few working Christmas bulbs from the 1930s myself. Someday I need to make my own homemade lightbulbs.
Fur them what likes looking at lightbulbs, there's BulbCollector.
And for old Christmas bulbs, there's Old Christmas Lights.
*****
It's hard to hear the name "Lubbock, TX" with a straight face. It always makes me think of buttocks. My favourite Texas town name is "Dimebox".
*****
Yet another solution to the Black Dahlia Murder. The fellow's writing style is execrable, near unreadable at times (I think he's trying to sound like Kenneth Anger), but he has an intriguing theory that probably makes more sense to a modern audience than it would have at the time. Be forewarned that the site contains some truly nasty pictures of the murder scene, the ones that are generally left out of the books. Also on reflection some of the narrative just doesn't make a lot of sense unless you're familiar with the case already. Red Manley, whose name pops up without explanation, was a pipe-cutter salesman who gave the victim a ride in his car on the day she disappeared, and was initially the chief suspect.
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The direction that we're currently heading to resolve these issues is
That does seem to be the direction you're going in, but I don't think helping the poor is the purpose or the cause of it, (and I'd argue about the possible results too, but that's another matter that I'm not touching). The Democrats seem to have tried to get votes from the Republicans by moving farther right. They just want to get elected. I don't see any higher moral purpose in it beyond that.
"I agree that... And I agree... I agree with that." - Al Gore
"And I also think..." - Al Gore
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It's nearly impossible to have any higher moral purpose to government in a pluralistic democracy. The system itself precludes it.
And do feel free to disagree. I'm quite happy arguing :)
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I was too, until people decided that they were going to argue with me about political topics when I make a non-political post, while when I make a political post (http://www.livejournal.com/users/dakhun/78147.html) on purpose it gets hardly any response at all.
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Someday I should go see the firehouse bulb. It's only about thirty miles away. I can almost here it burning from here. (bzzzzzzzzzz)
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For many years, there have been rumours that the Air Force flew their own Gemini missions out of Vandenburg from underground silos. Presumably they would have had to land using the Rogallo system, or else some sort of quiet sea pickup would have been arranged.
One of the more annoying aspects of the internet is that while you can find literally thousands of pages about the less plausible conspiracy theories (i.e., the idea that the government is in league with space aliens) it's almost impossible to find anything being written about several of what I'd consider the more likely conspiracies of the Space Age, such as the Air Force Geminis, or the Lost Cosmonauts.
Before the internet came along, the situation was almost reversed - you had to work hard then to get information on the loonier stuff, generally by sending off for xeroxed pamphlets from the classified ads in SF magazines, whereas the more sober theories appeared in editorials.
The interesting and suspicious thing to me is that while the amount of data for the crazy theories has literally exploded, with new stuff popping up here and there like mushrooms, and each new 'discovery' more lurid than the last; the information presented for the idea that the Russians lost some of their Cosmonauts in orbit then never admitted it, or that the USAF flew a series of secret space missions, remains as it was in the beginning, which is what I'd expect for something real.
On the other hoof, why would the Russians still hide that after all these years, when they've opened up about some truly disastrous blunders that they made over the years. Monday, fur instance, was the 45th anniversary of the catastrophe at Baikonur when some retarded general wanted to stand too close to the test stand to show how brave he was, so everyone else felt they had to as well, and 168 of them ended up getting killed when the experimental motor blew up. If they'll admit that, then why would they continue to hide deaths on orbit?
The USAF hiding a program 40 years later I can sort of see, especially if the money was supposed to be spent for something else. If you're interested in Geminis as weapons platforms, look up the "Gemini Blue" proposals. Most of those wouldn't have been launchable from silos, though, since they needed strapons or Titan IIIs for the extra mass.
Someday I should go see the firehouse bulb
You should go see the firehouse bulb, yes :)
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