By Thurman, on July 30th, 20102010-07-31T03:34:08ZF jS, Y%
I love the Internet, where else can I get glimpses into the thoughts of my fellow human beings all around the planet, opinions both in sync with my own, 180 degrees out of phase, and all points in between, and catch up with folks I knew twenty-five years or more ago (most of whom I thought had long since forgotten me), and a million other things I haven’t the brain capacity to think of just now or any other day.
That’s the great thing about the Internet, it’s the greatest tool for the dissemination of ideas and the democratization of the world to ever exist. With very little effort we can all broaden our minds and our horizons for as little as the price of a cell phone and a network connection.
That’s what scares the living shit out of the powers that be, the modern heirs of the robber barons and imperialist classes all over the planet. Heaven forbid that we, the common unwashed masses, should ever actually meet each other and realize that we are all truly all the same – brothers of the same mother, Earth.
Africa to be a bit more precise, and if we ever start to recognize the universal humanity we each share with the rest of our sapien relations, much less begin working together and demanding our fair share, the powers that be will be in trouble – up shit creek without so much as a spoon, much less a paddle. Continue reading Why I Love The Internet
By Thurman, on October 3rd, 20092009-10-03T12:43:00ZF jS, Y%
We hear a lot of big talk coming out of Washington these days regarding Iran’s “nuclear energy program.”
“Oh no, the evil brown people are ’bout to get a nukular bomb, Thelma Lou! We gotta nip it in the bud! Nip it, nip it, nip it!”
Developing a nuclear energy program might be a sensible option for any nation to think about these days. Let’s be honest, no matter how much oil there is left in the ground, the prospect of extracting it and putting it to constructive use gets more expensive and less economical every year; never mind the environmental costs of burning the stuff. If I were trying to build a sustainable energy program for a developing nation today, nuclear energy would probably be on my list of things to look into.
Don’t get me wrong, I have big qualms with nuclear energy. Having witnessed the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl incidents during my formative years I’m not exactly comfortable with the idea; but the older I get and the deeper I dig into the real electricity needs of an advanced western civilization, the more nuclear energy looks like a viable option. Why shouldn’t the folks in Iran and other less developed countries be thinking that way to?
Of course the real issue is the suspicion that the Iranians have an ulterior motive; building a nuclear weapon. We’re kind of like the pot calling the kettle black since we not only have nuclear weapons of our own, but we also helped several of Iran’s neighbors to obtain theirs. Let’s not forget that in helping Iran’s peers to obtain said nukes, our government acted in direct violation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty; a treaty which, incidentally, Iran signed when several of it’s neighbors refused. Continue reading Talking Persian Atomic Blues
