10 Thoughts for July 30, 2014.

1. 29 foot tall waves in the Arctic, where there used to be ice.  20 years from now, Santa's North Pole offices will have to be relocated permanently to the South Pole, where at least there is physical land below the glaciers.
2. Did you know that the Google Cultural Institute (yes, there really is one) has a dedicated site for street art?  It's a goldmine of great works of art from around the world, compiled.
3. This lawyer resembles Saul Goodman, don't you think?  Even has the ties and pocket handkerchief to match, I think.  Watch the video with him, over robocalls to cell phones.
4. On Russia's war with Ukraine: This ITAR-TASS poll shows that nearly 2/3rds of Russians do not want Russian troops involved, which is about the same as it was, earlier this month.  That, despite Russia growing more conservative.  NYT suggests that there are rumblings below the surface of dissatisfaction with Putin's tactics following MH17's crash.  While the Russian national polling shows that the western fears of a new cold war is probably overstated (more Russians want Ukraine-Russia conflict to be resolved diplomatically than to involve force), the problem here is that the Russian media's propaganda is fanning nationalism that can mislead Russians, just as the Japanese military and the Emperor did in WWII, right into a war.
5. Will South Korea support sanctions against Russia?  I would think that it'd be a slap in the face for the US, if, despite all the blood and money spent defending South Korea against North Korea, that South Korea wouldn't stand by the US' side.  That will rile up Korean War veterans, to be sure.  The wider the sanctions around the world, the sooner this whole thing will be wrapped up.
6. Doesn't it seem odd, that people who are against immigration amnesty, feel the need to openly state their support for legal immigration?  After all, the fine line is just a matter of changing the law to open the borders to economic refugees.  If the law were changed to allow for economic refugees, would these same people support legal immigration?  I think not -- this is why I sense racism below it all.
7. The next big shopping paradigm shift is coming: Skip the bulk goods and instead, subscribe to receive at regular intervals, at similar discounted rates, delivered for free. Bulk stores such as Costco will either have to adapt or disappear.  Perishables-only markets -- permanent (as in, not seasonal) farmer's markets -- will become a thing.
8. I don't think Democrats are talking up the GOP threat of an impeachment, but you might forgive Democrats if they do.  We all know how poorly the GOP did after the Republican House did in midterm elections following their impeachment of Clinton, and since 2/3rds of registered Republicans want to impeach the President, Democrats feel free to give Republicans a little nudge...over the cliff and into the abyss known as a big mid-term loss.
9. There are poll aggregators out there who provide weighting to polling, based on quality, which generally implies an offset to bias.  But to me, they're not quite capturing the true direction of an election.  When a GOP-based poll shows a Democrat ahead (and vice versa), it should be inherently more important in weighting than any neutral pollster; when a politically-affiliated poll matches that of its opposing politically-affiliated poll, the significance should be even higher.  That's how I would add weighting to polls.  The way the NYT and others are weighting polls could be interpreted as, "past performance is highly indicative of future performance."  I'm more fluid than that.
10. Listening in to the House "debate" of its vote to sue the President is amusing.  Republicans claim that the lawsuit is about separation of powers and the failure of the President to execute the laws.  But going back to President Reagan, presidents have been adding a signing statement when they sign a bill into law, and Republicans have balked at Democrats wanting to sue President Bush for his extensive usage of the signing statement to completely alter the meaning of Congress' bills, even when he altered GOP-led bills.  So it seems that politics are the primary driver of GOP outrage, as they have high tolerance for its own, but zero tolerance for others, who would stretch the meaning of laws.  In other words, Republicans are telling us to "do as I say, not as I do."  Still, I fully encourage Republicans to seize their inner outrage and sue the President -- you reap what you sow, so don't complain about it, later!

Do you play Line's Ninja Strikers?

If so, here's my sole advice: Align your sushi so that the golden sushi comes up when you're in the golden festival; use your gems to get the gold rush and use a sushi to get the lightning rush; at the end of your time, use the gems for a final spurt; when done, use additional gems to do the bonus roulette.

Today, I got everything to line up right, and lucked out so that the initial roulette resulted in 5x gold, and then the bonus roulette was an additional 5x gold.

Now that's how you work it for maximum efficiency.

Of course, I'm still on the fence on whether or not to give up the game. It's a lot more stable these days, but as I've realized with the world rankings, in-app purchasers will always have a leg up on someone like me who makes zero in-app purchases.

Combing through the rankings, everyone above me and many of those below me have at least one 6-star ninja which is just about impossible to get without in-app purchases of gems, let alone two or more of the 6-star ninjas. Without a single in-app purchase, in less than a year I've built up 8 5-star ninjas maxed out at power level 30.

Now, with enough luck I may some day get a 6-star ninja, but you see, the rules keep changing.  The game is rigged: When those who do not make in-app purchases start to catch up with those who do, they'll introduce a 7-star ninja, allowing in-app purchasers to leap ahead of everyone once again.

This is not the only game to do this sort of game-rigging, from Line.  Which is why I'm on the verge of dropping all of Line's games.  I've already stopped playing four other Line games.

Forest Park in the early morning.

Passed quite a few trail runners in the morning, but it was still much less crowded than later in the day when hordes come through here to escape the heat.

There aren't many scents as calming as a forest filled with fir needles and the heavy, humid air from a running creek.

On the Wildwood Trail between Lower Macleay and Holman fire lane

10 Thoughts for July 29, 2014

1. It was some 15 years ago when I first purchased Sun Microsystems' Star Office, upon which led me down the Open Office path for most of this time.  Of late, I'd been using Google Drive for document editing and spreadsheets because it's simplified and easy to access.  But, because Google does not offer client-side encryption, if someone is accessing your data, it's wide open for them, so I used OO for the most sensitive of documents then encrypted it.  This year I'm going to make a switch.  Kingsoft recently made its office suite free -- WPS Office.  A huge factor, is the 10 different encryption options with up to (selectable) 128 bit encryption length.  Where Google Drive Spreadsheets excels over WPS, is graphing simplicity and ability to make quick edits to stylized elements.
2. Many people believe that cloud storage is not as safe as keeping your stuff on your computer.  I believe the right cloud storage and set up is just as safe as storing stuff on your computer.  So here's how you'd do it: Two factor authentication with a client-side encryption storage service such as Tresorit, making sure that you encrypt your sensitive documents.
3. Don't do this. When you address people, do make sure that you know who you're addressing.  This congressman thought that he was talking to a delegation from India; instead, he was talking to government employees from the departments of state and commerce who are of Indian descent.  If you watch the video, Arun Kumar from the ITA has a big smile on his face as Nisha Biswal explains that the congressman probably meant to address this to the Indian delegation.  No apologies from the congressman, just a comment, "Okay, let's see some progress."  Hilarious stuff.
4. A hipster gets upset that his almond milk might not be good for the environment or all that nutritious, then threatens to spill some milk.  I officially called this, "Rolling Almond Milk."
5. The ludicrously disingenuous cognitive dissociation that is the flood of undocumented foreign children at the southern border: We are angry that children are being treated as poorly as this; we think we should enforce our borders to prevent this flood of children and deport them immediately.  It's the finest example of American NIMBYism.
6. Americans, I don't think, understand what impeachment is.  They seem to think that impeachment is a political tool.  Well, it is, but it's meant to be used to remove officials who've committed a criminal offense...aka "high crimes and misdemeanors".  It's not meant to wield against someone that you think has misinterpreted the US Constitution or laws passed.  If you think that, then half of SCOTUS should be immediately impeached frequently when the House majority is upset with a ruling.
7. It's official: Russia is directly at war with Ukraine.  Russia has been caught with satellite evidence of firing mortar rounds into Ukraine.  I'm not a statesman and I don't play poker, but if I were POTUS, I wouldn't have released this evidence via social networking.  I would have printed them out onto massive, 4' x 8' boards, and convened a general UN assembly with the photos, and request to have the UN either send arms to Ukraine to defend itself or establish a 25km wide demilitarized zone on either side of the border, patrolled within the zone by drones and UN forces that prevent arms from crossing over.  You see, the first option of a proxy war is a nudge to Russia into accepting a demilitarized zone and shut down the war, immediately.
8. The Ebola outbreak in western Africa is the largest ever, and is still spreading.  A death in Nigeria, of a man who had boarded an international flight, is a big deal, as in scary.  You see, a person can be asymptomatic for up to 21 days.  This also marks the first time that (a deadly variant of) Ebola has appeared in Sierra Leone, Guinea, Liberia and now Nigeria.  That should be disconcerting, because the primary path of transmission is through human contact with infected animals, and the usual hotspot of Ebola is nearly 2,000 miles away.
9. This one incident has stuck with me all these years, since I was a freshman in high school.  During PE, a couple of bullies were picking on an outwardly gay student by chasing and snapping a towel at him, as he ran around shrieking.  It didn't last very long -- maybe a couple of minutes.  This was nearly 30 years ago, back when people rarely came out officially.  If you recall, this was the Edwin Meese era.  Nonetheless, I feel ashamed that I did not step up and interrupt it, nearly 30 years ago, as I was probably the only one there in my PE class who did not fear bullies.  Hence, it has stuck with me all these years -- a compilation of the events where I fell short of my own standards.
10. Have you tried the online version of Autodesk's AutoCAD -- AutoCAD360?  Remarkably good.  I'm holding out hope that Autodesk makes basic AutoCAD good enough to use via the internet to make Chromebooks even more useful.  There are two versions, one which utilizes HTML5, but lacks some certain features including a command line. 

Waking up to a vivid dream.

Just over a decade ago or so, I came to understand how to have lucid and vivid dreams.  Both tended to occur towards the end of my sleep, when there was enough physical stimuli in the real world that made me aware that I was sleeping.  For instance, the alarm radio could be playing, or the TV still on and blaring.  In the case of lucid dreams, I could control a part of the dream by selecting what I did.  In the case of vivid dreams, I'd wake up with incredible, clear memory of it, even if I did not control it.

This morning, I could hear the TV still on, with some sort of evangelist preaching to his flock explaining how to go to Heaven.  With my subconsciousness latched onto this, I spent the next 15 minutes or so, in an odd and vivid dream.

The first event that I could remember, is finding myself in some church, going through a non-denominational Christian service with my friend, having dragged me into it.  Jumping past the service, I was exploring the place when I stumbled into my uncle and began having a crazy conversation.

At first he made me jump as I wasn't expecting him to be around the corner, and told him so.  In his usual jovial manner, he started laughing and then remarked that I should be, that he actually died the other day.  I was laughing with him, and...say what?  Dead?  What the?

In a split moment I had gone from being startled to having a good laugh, to being really sad.

As I looked at him, though, I was reassured as he wasn't sad but with his usual, content and happy face.  So then as we sat down, I asked him what I think anyone would have asked, "What is Heaven like?"  It's the $1B dollar question, after all.

He explained that when you die, just about everyone gets into Heaven, and your self is just the same as when you were living.  I was keenly amused at that, because it meant that all of Jehovah's Witness followers would be absolutely surprised and disappointed at all the time they wasted, upon realizing that the limits to get into Heaven were rather minor.

So who didn't get into Heaven?  It turned out that only the really bad, as in sufficiently evil as to being impossibly irreconcilable with God, were sent to Hell.  To which, my uncle pointed out that this had created its own conflict in Heaven in that in this vast world of everlasting life, a very large group of people had formed an alliance and had been causing trouble.

It was at this point, having gotten to the answer of the $1B dollar question, I realized that I was sleeping, and thusly woke up to the sound of a TV evangelist going on about how people have gotten it wrong about who can get into Heaven: You cannot simply be a good person and striving to make yourself better.  How odd, that my dream was exactly the opposite of the message of the TV evangelist!

But here's the oddest part of the dream: my uncle has been dead for several years!

Spooky?  Not really.  Being able to talk to my uncle was a comforting memory of my dream.  In life, I'd always learn something interesting when I stayed over at my aunt and uncle's place.

Anyway, thought I'd share this vivid dream.  The best part of waking up to such vivid dreams is that I don't feel tired or lazy to get out of bed.

Mary Poppins demands a living wage.

Love Kristen Bell. Watch Bell, as Mary Poppins, explain why a living wage is important.  Via Funny or Die.

10 Thoughts for July 24, 2014

1. As a guy passed me by while I was walking the dog, early Wednesday morning, I suddenly realized who it was: Russell Hornsby, aka Hank Griffin.  He had a skull cap on, so I didn't figure out who he was until I had just passed by him.  The other day I know someone was filming in the neighborhood.  Turnaround is about 6 weeks between filming and airing of episodes, so Grimm season is right around the corner.  I've seen David Giuntoli, Silas Weir Mitchell, Sasha Roiz and now Russell Hornsby, yet the ones I'd really love to pass by in person are Bitsie Tulloch, Claire Coffee, Bree Turner and Jacqueline Toboni.
2. You probably heard about the mixed rulings, just hours apart, on the ACA.  In the federal 4th District Court, judges ruled that, absent explicit language in the ACA, Congress' intention in the ACA should be obvious: federal subsidies were meant to apply to both state and federal exchanges, as the federal exchange was a proxy for state-based exchanges, were states to choose not to set up their own exchanges.  In Halbig v Burwell, the DC Court sided 2-1 with plaintiff, David Klemencic, that on the same issue, Congress' intention was to not fund subsidies for the federal exchange.  Suffice to say, the 3-person appeals panel will end up being overruled by the full appeals court 11 members.  Why?  See next item.
3. The plaintiff, David Klemencic, insisted that he was harmed (a necessary requirement to receive standing in court) by the fact that, were he not to buy insurance from the federal exchange (since his state did not set one up), he would thus be on the hook for a tax penalty.  Somehow the DC Court took this as injurious to Klemencic, even though SCOTUS ruled 5-4 last year that the penalty was legal and justified, giving him standing.  Then they ruled that there was insufficient historical record to know what Congress wanted -- total bullshit, by the way, as even the CBO scored the budgetary effect of federal subsidies for those using the federal exchange -- and stated that the federal exchange couldn't offer subsidies.  Or as I've said elsewhere, "Sir, I doth protest this tax, such that I demand that you take away my subsidies!"  See how dumb the case is?
4. Russia continued to push faked evidence yesterday, showing that Ukrainian jets had followed MH17 closely, and were responsible for shooting down the aircraft.  Why is this pathetic?  There hasn't been a single eyewitness to the fact that there were jets pursuing MH17, and the videos of the explosion show the remains of a contrail from the ground, not from the air.  Furthermore, the videos do not contain the sound of jets.  If you live near a national guard, air force or naval air station, you know that jets are not quiet, especially when they turn around.  Finally, were this true, then why didn't the rebels shoot down the jets?  Just today, another two Ukrainian jets were shot down, and there were a couple others shot down the previous week.  Jets are far more threatening than a transport airplane, after all.  That Russia would actually fake evidence, is lame.
5. Ted Cruz has taken to using Fox News style faked scaling charts.  Hilarious.  In other Ted Cruz news, he stated today that the FAA's ban on flights to Israel's Ben Gurion Airport was a secret plot by Obama to punish Israel economically.
6. It boggles the mind, that anyone had to actually perform a scientific study to conclude that dogs express jealousy.  Every dog owner knows not to dote over someone else's dog excessively in front of their own dog.  But that's not the only emotion dogs show.  They also express impatience, frustration, guilt, excitement, sadness, fear, anxiety, boredom, happiness, and the over-the-top unbridled joy.  Anyone telling you that dogs can't have these emotions hasn't spent much time trying to understand dogs.
7. This year might be the year of the partisan poll.  Republicans have apparently determined that polls are tools to manipulate public opinion, so this year there are a dozen or so newly minted GOP pollsters.  Attempts to aggregate polling data is much less useful this year.  The only meaningful partisan poll is the one which agrees with the other side's polling data -- something that has always held special significance for me, when analyzing poll trends.  If a GOP poll shows a Democrat ahead, then you can rest assured that the Democrat is indeed ahead, etc.
8. Texas' Rick Perry has called up his national guard to protect the border with Mexico.  But as I've mentioned before, it makes no sense.  You can't shoot at little kids and mothers coming across the border, to scare them off.  About all they can do is observe and report to the Border Patrol on activity.  He gave the odd excuse that they were going to combat the drug cartels; I don't think we need any more proof that Perry still lives in the 80s.
9. Oh, and the drowning death toll continued in Oregon this week.  Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday.  We're probably well past a dozen drownings this summer, and some people still don't have the fear of drowning.  You know, if waterboarding were compulsory as a part of PE, we'd probably have more people afraid of drowning.  I keed.
10. This was making the rounds yesterday: In the early 80s many Americans thought that an A&W 1/3rd pounder had less beef than the McDonald's 1/4 pounder.  The world makes a lot more sense to me, now.

When you know someone is exaggerating about their tech knowledge.

I rely on reviews of products to filter out which products not to buy.  On Newegg, every reviewer is required to provide self-determined rating of technical knowledge.  As you might expect, most people overrate themselves.  Here's some examples of people who rated themselves 5 out of 5 stars:

Ryan writes, "Hard drive didn't work out of the box. Plugged it in and Windows didn't recognize it. Turns out my PC also won't boot with this plugged in to the USB port."
 -- Yes Ryan, because you have USB set up as higher priority at boot.  (It's how one can boot ChromeOS from a thumb drive.)  And, it's not that Windows didn't recognize the drive, but that you haven't mapped it; plug and play has its limits.

 Joseph writes, "I have a brand new system works flawlessly I plug in this drive and try to copy it is my system core dumps with a Watchdog_Clock Error every single time."-- It's not the peripheral, Joe, it's your motherboard's BIOS and flaws in how it tackles data flow.  You're going to run into this issue even if you buy a different peripheral drive.

James writes, "First call to tech support ended up with downloading a new firmware version and being told the software would 'find' my device on the network. Not what I read, but ok we'll see. Tech was wrong, the device has a RANDOM SUBNET ASSIGNED. You will take years to try to get your PC to find the device."-- Well James, unless you attached directly to your NAS and changed it, you would always expect it to assign itself a random subnet IP address when attached to a router. 

I realize that computers shouldn't be this hard.  But, if you're not a certified computer nerd who hand-codes, runs an open WRT router and builds computers from the ground up, why rate yourself 5 stars?  Just because you play RPG, love tech and your parents rely on your knowledge, doesn't make you an expert.

Funny thing is, many demonstrably knowledgeable reviewers rate themselves 4 out of 5 stars.

FWIW, I rank myself 3 stars.  My strength isn't my knowledge of tech, but my ability to find answers.

10 Absurdities of Russian Propaganda.

Monday, we saw the Russian propaganda machine operating in full force, pumping out one big whopper after another.  So absurd they were, I could not resist mocking them:

1. "I can say with confidence that if on June 28 combat activities in eastern Ukraine had not been resumed, this tragedy most likely would not have happened." -- Expressing my inner Putin, I can say with confidence that I most likely turned off the stove before I went out.
2. Putin's repeated point -- that had there been peace in Ukraine this incident would have been avoided -- is a curious one, though, since it was Russia's explicit loosening of its border with Ukraine that allowed arms and personnel to flow into Ukraine to escalate the fight with the implicit guarantor of Russia's military (guns, personnel and tanks) parked at the border.
3. "At the same time, no one has a right to use this tragedy to achieve their narrowly selfish political ends." -- Which of course, points to the fact that broadly selfish political ends are justified, right?  That this is coming from the guy (Putin) who has used Ukraine as a punching bag to establish his Novorussia, is to be expected.
4. "We must do everything to provide security for the international experts on the site of the tragedy." -- And by "everything", of course Putin meant "sit around and do nothing but fabricate evidence".  Four days after the fact, and only now he's getting serious about demanding security?  Putin has met his Katrina, I think.
5. [Officials] "should acknowledge their responsibility both before their own people and before the peoples of those countries whose representatives were among the victims of this catastrophe." -- I wasn't sure...was Putin talking about himself or was he excluding himself from his criticism?  You know, instead of helping, for four days he dithered about what happened in Ukraine.  When the investigators have completed their report and point the finger at Putin's rebels, he's not going to take responsibility.
6. Russians and their rebels contend that the rebels never had weapons capable of bringing down an airliner at 33,000 feet.  And yet, we have several videos of BUKs being driven around in rebel-held territory and inside Russia near the Russian-Ukrainian border.  So, exactly how did these BUKs manage to pass through all the rebel-controlled check points without their knowledge?
7. Similarly, one Russian theory of the incident has Ukrainian soldiers firing at MH17 from their own BUKs.  But Russians never explained how it was possible for Ukrainians to sneak into and out of rebel-held territory, through multiple checkpoints, and without any videos, eyewitnesses or photos!  Maybe Ukrainian soldiers were using their special Harry Potter invisibility cloaks?
8. Four days after the fact, Russia finally found the evidence they needed to prove that a Ukrainian fighter jet was in the region, trailing MH17.  Curious though, because none of the videos of the explosion contain sounds of a jet flying, nor is there any visible contrail.
9. Actually, there are remnants of a contrail from a ground-to-air missile in the videos.  The people shooting the video shift the video camera up and down to trace the contrail, you see.  So, not only did the missile have to come from within the rebel-controlled area, but it could not have been fired from a fighter jet.
10. I'm not sure where the Russian media is right now, but at one point, they pushed the theory that Ukraine had shot at MH17 thinking it was Putin, or that MH17 was actually MH370, full of already dead corpses.  

All of this points to the basic truth about humans: We will concoct and trust the most ridiculous narrative in order to relieve our cognitive dissonance.  That the very rebels they were cheerleading for, shot down and killed 298 innocent people, is irreconcilable.  Predictably, the truth must be that the people they despise the most -- pro-Kiev forces -- were responsible for committing this heinous act.

10 Thoughts about MH17.

1. I've seen this before: People get into trouble, and despite the evidence made plain to them, dig themselves deeper by redirecting culpability and insisting that there's a conspiracy to fabricate everything.
2. Here's a list of redirection of culpability:
1. It was Ukraine's fault -- it's a Kiev conspiracy long in the planning;
2. It was Ukraine's fault -- they actually shot down the plane;
3. It was Ukraine's fault -- Kiev shouldn't have tried to restore control over eastern Ukraine;
4. It was Ukraine's fault -- Kiev had bad aviation security;
5. It was Malaysia Air's fault -- they shouldn't have flown over the region.
3. Even a Republican politician has gotten into the redirection game, blaming the incident indirectly on Obama.  You see, for some, politics colors everything they see.
4. Pro-Russian rebels, as I've noted previously, took credit for shooting down a plane thought to be an AN-26, hours before they tried to deny taking down any such plane, followed by insistence that the dead bodies recovered from the wreckage were staged.
5. Someone using a Russian Federation government IP was caught trying to edit Wikipedia to blame Ukraine for the downing of MH17.
6. According to rebels and Russia, the rebels didn't have Russian surface-to-air missiles,except, the videos and still images showing otherwise.
7. Audio recording intercepts show that Russian military and rebels were talking about the incident, the confusion over what was shot, and the ensuing panic to cover it up.  Oh, and CBS News' Clarissa Ward confirmed the voice of the commander in the recording. 
8. People may be poaching from the dead, including credit and debit cards.  No respect for the dead, whatsoever.
9. Rebels might be trying to destroy physical evidence while blocking investigators from the site, but they are a bit shortsighted, as there is no feasible means of removing the most critical evidence that would go to show that a missile hit the plane.  You can't remove every small bit of metal that would go to show that a Russian-made BUK surface-to-air missile was used.  Besides, the best evidence was already provided directly by the rebels themselves.  They'd be fooling themselves if they think that the BUK equipment can be moved out without being noticed, either.  
10. Had the rebels come out right away and confessed that they had made a tragic error in the middle of a war, they and their sponsor, Russia, would have had a decent chance to come out of all this with just tarnished reputations.  Instead, they've determined to deflect all culpability, which only focuses anger towards both of them, and will result in widespread demands that the International Court take on the issue of rebel war crimes and Russia's role.

Willamette River in the morning.

The best part of summer is the early morning sunrise, giving me the chance go ride the bike outside before traffic picks up -- both riders and vehicles.  At 5:30 am, only the diehard joggers are out there.

I will wistfully enjoy this photo in the middle of January.

The last Portland Rose Festival Fleet Week before 9/11.

I just dug through old CD archives of images in search of some projects.  We're talking thousands of files.  While reminiscing about all the photos I've taken over the years, I came across a bunch from Portland Rose Festival's Fleet Week, the summer just before 9/11.  So if you've been to the waterfront during Fleet Week since 9/11, you're well aware of all the security and restrictions.  These photos are a reminder of a time when people were allowed to float their boats alongside these grand ships coming in.

These photos are also a reminder of a time when the US and Canadian navies would send a bunch of their bigger ships to make this a grand parade.

Russian military weapons used to shoot down planes?

In a week, there have been four planes downed near the Russia-Ukraine border:

• Three Ukrainian military planes were shot down in the last several days, the most recent, coming yesterday.  In yesterday's incident, a fighter jet was reportedly shot down by a missile coming from across the border in Russia.
• And just now, a Malaysian airline flight, traveling from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, has crashed in eastern Ukraine, near the Russian border.  

The early evidence pointing to Malaysian MH17 being shot down:

• Its reported rapid descent from 10,000 meters.
• Separatists reportedly have Russian surface to air missiles, and such Russian military hardware in the hands of separatists was the reason and target for the Obama Administration's latest round of economic sanctions.
• Reuters, on the secene, has reporting that the debris of bodies extends 7 miles, suggesting that the plane had broken up mid-air.
• Debris on the ground, separate from the area on fire, intact without scorch marks; rather, large sections of the plane had been ripped apart;
• Ukraine has released an official report stating that a leader of the rebels had posted on his page, claiming for shooting down what he thought was a Ukrainian military plane, an AN-26, just prior to the reports of Malaysian MH17 going down.  This is the note (via another blog) in reference, from Igor Girkin's VK page:

17.07.2014 17:37 (MSK) Message from the militia. Sasquatch In the area just knocked the AN-26, lying somewhere in the mine "Progress". Between Kostiantynivka and Donetsk were 3 checkpoint ukrov (away from Konstantinovka on rivet -bull). Now they are removed and leave aside Kramatorsk. Fold, the beds in the car loaded, trucks are for people who are already deployed tanks, guns got (they were entrenched themselves), and all other equipment goes somewhere. Why would it? 13:50 (GMT) From Uspenka through Amvrosievka Ilovaysk proceeded towards 5 and BMP 2 Urals with podtseplennoy gun toward Novoivanovka. Periodically go shelling rare Lugansk. 16:45 (GMT) Re-opened artillery fire dill in Lugansk, strikes are in Upper Kambrody, Alexandrovka Ekaterinovka, Greenhouse.

This last item is central, aside from any forensic evidence they can find.  The Google translation might be a little rough.  Essentially, the post is referencing the Progress Coal Mine, in Torez.  I think this is the direct evidence Ukraine has spoken of.  The location in reference, is just a few miles away from where the plane crashed, in Grabovo.  For reference, see Google Maps.

Can Russia walk away with clean hands?  I don't think so, not this time.  They gave rebels weapons and training, and a rebel group shot down the plane by mistake.  Russia has lost Ukraine for forever.

---

Update:

And it looks like Igor Girkin has realized his mistake and has removed the portion of the post mentioning his attack: "Sasquatch In the area just knocked the AN-26, lying somewhere in the mine "Progress"." The rest of the post remains, but it is too late; Girkin can't hide the truth.

Update 2: This video showing the start of the plane explosion is curious.  It is located in an area surrounded by coal, and is pointed at the precise spot where the plane crashed.  That can't be a coincidence, can it?

10 Thoughts for July 14, 2014

1. Republicans want to use the national guard and military force to secure the Mexico-US border.  It does not make sense, because their three options, upon seeing people crossing the border, are to seize more people, shoot them or pretend to shoot at them to scare them off.  The first option results in MORE detentions, processing and backlog while the second option is a geopolitical nightmare and probably illegal, and the third option is a bluff that, once used, is rendered useless.
2. The Heartland Institute (conservative) offered up the ludicrous notion that global warming would be good for us.  People like that should be made to pay out of their pockets for leading people down the wrong path. 
3. Never, ever, read Megan McArdle.  Superficial thinking is contagious.
4. Things that don't make sense: Russia says that Ukraine shot mortar shells into Russian territory.  This doesn't even pass the smell test.  Ukraine has been trying to avoid a direct conflict with Russia, having done nothing to take back Crimea, so why would Ukraine shell Russia?  By the same token, Putin often seems eager to go to war with Ukraine, if only he could find a convenient excuse to do so.  
5. Republican Louie Gohmert from Texas thinks that "nobody plus nothing equals everything" applies only to the scientific understanding of the Big Bang.  He is wrong.  It is a paradox that applies to either the Big Bang or to God.  The Old Testament never addressed what existed before God, but we know that there was a period before God: "Before Me there was no God formed, And there will be none after Me." -- Isaiah 43:10.  In other words, you still need to rely on faith, to resolve the paradox.  With the Big Bang, it seems possible that science -- specifically quantum mechanics -- might yet explain how the universe was created from "nothing".
6. Doctors are seeing a surge in gonorrhea cases in Idaho, Oregon and Washington.  But they've yet to pinpoint a common factor.  The reason, as Dr. House would say, is that "everybody lies."
7. With a last push, it looks like PocketScan is about to hit its final stretch goal on Kickstarter.  I'm thrilled for the first project I've ever invested in, on Kickstarter. I even upped my pledge to get the special neoprene case, just so that I could help get them past the final stretch goal.
8. This ranking of states by quality of food and drink, has Oregon 6th in the nation, because so many national trends in recent years began in Oregon: craft brewing, food carts, local coffee bean roasters and specialty doughnuts.  Hawai'i was ranked 16th, but if you ask me, Hawai'i should be much higher because it has a distinct food culture that isn't found anywhere else, except by replication of what is found in Hawai'i.  That Texas is #2 seems to me to mean that being a gourmand is virtuous.
9. How to search for a song with your Android device: ask it.  "Okay Google, identify this song."  No need to install Shazam and pull it up as an app.
10. It looks like Netflix is trying to quietly kill its physical disc market.  Not only have they stopped delivering on Saturdays, but they've slowed processing of my queue.  In other words, Netflix needs some competition to keep it humble and attentive.

Some photos from the last week.

Hawthorne Bridge in the early morning.

Under the Broadway Bridge at sunset

Sunset from the pedestrian bridge over Union Station.

10 Thoughts for July 13, 2014

1. As of June, the US deficit is running 28.2% lower than fiscal year 2013 (starts October 1 / ends September 30), and 2014 is on track to have the lowest deficit since 2007.
2. With the official national unemployment rate at 6.1%, we've now reached a level not seen since September 2008.
3. Pompeii, I don't think, was meant to be funny.  At about 1:21:35, rocks falling from the sky hit two people in the head and they wriggle around as they collapse.  Now, the wriggling was itself a riot, but that the rocks falling from the sky, having been shot up some 1000+ feet, then falling another 2,000, bounce off the heads of people and off the tops of roofs.  Conservatively, with gravity, these rocks would be going at least 150 mph, though probably closer to 240 mph.
4. One of my IKEA small plates chipped when I accidentally hit it against the faucet.  Being porcelain and not regular ceramic, it didn't crack or shatter, but the chipped portions went flying, with one tiny piece striking my cheek and the rest landing on my hair -- I had to shake my head to get one piece out.  No cuts, but sad to have to throw the plate away.
5. Just one more monster left -- Delli -- to defeat in Poko Pang.  I have come up with a decent strategy to finish the game, but sadly it looks like it'll take at least another two months.  You see, Delli is so tough, using friend power barely made any dent, which means that Delli is as strong as 3 or 4 of the last monsters combined.  Nevertheless, I will get er done.  And no, no hacks or cheats used, and not a single cent spent, ever.  BTW, Line games are full of screwed up programming.  Four months ago I reached my all-time high of 6.9M points, but that was three monsters short of the end.  When I reached the final monster, my score was just short of 5.9M, and that's with the benefit of an extra museum challenge that adds points onto my total.
6. Speaking of hacks, or maybe it was an easter egg, I accidentally came across one in Ninja Strikers that allowed me to use one ninja to populate two slots.  Dunno how to replicate it and I'm not about to mess it up.
7. About Ninja Strikers: Talk about messed up.  The rules keep changing, even as they're not clearly explained.  In the newly created "world rankings", I was 5th in the first round which had just 50 people listed -- that seemed odd, too.  The next thing I know, with the competition period having ended, I was ranked 3rd.  This meant that there were two fake users listed above me.  The next period then started, and lo and behold, the top half-dozen users are all stacked with 6-star ninjas.  At that point, I said fuck it.  I don't give a shit about the world rankings because either the software is fucking with users in an attempt to get them to spend $$ to get 6-star ninjas or the game is totally rigged and there's no point to playing against other people in the "world".  They've pissed me off so much that I've ignored the "world rankings" BS and slowed down my game playing -- every time I open the game up, I am reminded of how much BS is built into the game, and I sometimes just close it without playing.
8. This is the third-straight year that I'm fully participating in CNET's Daniel Terdiman's Picture of the Day Challenge.  So far I'm 33 for 35, which probably means that I'm out of the running for the grand prize.  Still, I love playing these challenges because it requires one to pick up on visual clues and use the internet to find the location.  I've read that cheat sites have cropped up, but that takes all the fun out of playing, doesn't it?  The cool thing is, with my knowledge in Architecture and Landscape Architecture, I often know the structures photographed or can find clues as to where the location is.
9. I still don't get it, how Portland IKEA is the only one that features a monthly new menu special.  This month's special is pulled pork sandwich with fries.  Much thanks to Portland IKEA's management for setting up a monthly food special and sticking with the program.
10. The ACA is turning out to be a big winner.  Not only is it contributing to lower medical costs but also a significant plunge in the number of uninsured in America, and an ever-growing amount of federal budget savings.  Now, if only Democrats would stop running against it, and instead highlight what the ACA has done, rather than what conservatives think it has done.

10 Thoughts for July 11, 2014

1. Hurry up: Kickstarter project PocketScan is about to close.  It's the first Kickstarter project that I've signed up for.  I can see this working perfectly into many design workflows, but especially for capturing in-field sketches and usable construction drawing scans.  Sadly, without a last-minute rush, it looks like the stretch goal of text-to-voice won't be included.  
2. If you're thinking about buying a refurbished 2012 Nexus 7, I suggest spending a little extra and getting a refurbished 2013 Nexus 7 (FHD) instead.  Even as my 2012 Nexus 7 has gotten the latest Kit Kat updates -- now at 4.4.4 -- certain specific functions are missing.  Removed was the ability to force ART over Dalvik and the latest feature announcement -- casting screens to Chromecast-enabled TVs -- is currently disabled.  Mind you that ART will eventually replace Dalvik in L, and casting screens will eventually make its way to the N7 2012, but when you buy into the Nexus line, you're looking for front-row updates, so to keep you from being disappointed, I'm merely pointing out that if you spend a little more cash, a refurb'd 2013 N7 is better.  Oh, and the 2013 model also sports a rear camera which the 2012 model doesn't have.
3. Of course, if you aren't squeamish about DIY, you can always use the older Nexus 7 to load up CyanogenMod.
4. Oil prices are a reflection of human nature, it seems.  Under the guise of conflict in the Middle East -- Syria and Iraq -- oil prices, and therefore gas prices, rose rapidly this year.  Without respite in the conflict and amid continued threats, prices are now shooting down.  In other words, oil markets have calmed down and accepted the threat as non-existential and mostly a bump in the road.
5. In Greenwald's book, he mentions Ron Wyden's efforts to get James Clapper to tell the truth before a senate hearing, and how Clapper outright lied when he said that they didn't keep track of the numbers of Americans surveilled.
6. Sticking to spying: I'm not some idealist who believes that zero spying is the answer.  I however believe that Due Process and Privacy matters a great deal and they should never be laid to the wayside.  If you can't qualify a search under the low hurdle of the FISA Court, you probably don't have anything worth pursuing.
7. In the war between nature vs nurture, this study quantifies the influence of genetics and environment towards intelligence and finds that genes contribute more towards intelligence (in monkeys) than environment.  Mind you, it does not mean that if you have lousy genes, therefore you cannot grow up to have high intelligence; rather, it is easier to express high intelligence if the genes are in your favor.  If you drink and smoke weed when you're young, however, you pretty much throw any advantage away.
8. John Boehner seeks to gain authorization from Congress to sue the President.  This is interesting you see, because the Constitution clearly wrote the articles of impeachment and power of the purse as Congress' means to balance the Executive branch.  Which is to say that, were Congress to grant Boehner the right to sue, I predict that it could only end in a 9-0 slap in Boehner's face, by SCOTUS denying Congress standing to sue.  Vox has a great write up of the issues, including the mockery from conservatives who see this as nothing but political Kabuki.
9. On that intention to sue the President: Boehner wants to challenge the President's delay of certain provisions of the ACA, specifically the employer mandate.  This has many people scratching their head because, were Boehner successful, he would presumably be enjoining the President to plow forward with the very parts of the ACA that Republicans hate.
10. I accidentally ordered an adjustable neutral density filter from Hong Kong, when buying through Amazon.  I didn't mean to buy from overseas, as they usually take an extra long time, but I somehow missed the fine print.  When the order was fulfilled, it was then that I realized that it came from overseas when the estimated delivery was slightly longer than a month.  Fortunately, it arrived in just under two weeks.

10 Thoughts for July 9, 2014

1. There was a longish pause between postings.  I'd been settling into a comfort zone and blocking off all entry by not responding to phone calls, etc.
2. Marijuana stores opened on Monday in Washington.  I suppose I should make my feelings known about this.  I support the legalization, though I have never used nor will likely ever use marijuana.  I see this as a social and economic experiment, first and foremost, and less about "rights".  Over time, if we do not see statistically significant differences in crime or mental health problems, then I say we should legalize it across the nation.
3. It is hot in Oregon, and it seems that every day we're hearing about kids and adults drowning.  Crazy.  I don't quite understand why any adult would let their kid go out on the water without a PFD if they don't know how to swim.  Send your kids to swimming lessons.  If you're an adult and don't know how to swim, there's nothing embarrassing about taking lessons.  There is, however, considerable embarrassment when you need to be rescued from the water.
4. USC's 2015 class now has 4 guys in the Rivals 100.  They could be headed towards one of those epic Pete Carroll-like classes where 1 in 10 of the top 100 signed with the Trojans, now that they're allowed a full class, post-sanctions.
5. 7 - 1.  The last time a team lost by a wider margin was the 2010 World Cup -- Portugal 7 - North Korea 0, in group play.  The last time a team lost this badly after moving on from group play was in 1978 -- Argentina 6 - Peru 0.  That's how embarrassing this loss was, for Brazil.  There are many other terrible precedents set by Brazil, as noted by ESPN.
6. It does make you wonder therefore, what could have happened if the US had pulled out a win against Germany.
7. I must remind myself not to buy in bulk, except dry goods.  I keep throwing stuff away.  Tonight it was a big trash bag full of rotten apples, meats and vegetables.
8. The GOP game on immigration, simplified: They're against allowing children to stay here indefinitely, but blame Obama for their coming here, because he didn't deport them fast enough, but now that they're here, he needs to take care of the children and deport them, gently.
9. I watched an episode of Charlie Rose the other day, and David Brooks was on.  The man infuriates.  He described bipartisanship as an understanding that both sides reside in half-truths, and coming together to solve problems was to acknowledge the half-truths.  Total bullshit.  You see, in college I learned that any given issue has multiple viewpoints, and you have to empathize heavily to understand the concerns of others that underlie their viewpoint.  It's not a series of half-truths, but an accommodation and acknowledgement of the different viewpoints.  Now, some folks are full of bald-faced lies, so you must take great pains to weed out the purely self-serving assholes.
10. I read the most ludicrous and easily refuted online comment about volcano activity and CO2 measurements.  I was going to take the time to break it down and point out the most basic of errors, but then I decided otherwise.  One can't educate people who have closed minds.  No fallacy is too great, no lie too tall for a closed mind to accept as truth.

10 Thoughts for July 7, 2014

1. Hormones and chemicals that mimic hormones are the primary suspect for a bunch of recently discovered intersex fish in a group of rivers in PA.  Imagine if conservatives and libertarians got their way and eliminated the EPA...we could all become intersex humans.
2. Illegal immigrants or undocumented residents?  If their immigration were illegal, then you would expect them to be prosecuted and incarcerated; if they were undocumented, you would expect them to be deported.
3. Climate change, it turns out, will be worse.  That Antarctic glacier melting will be much faster, because Antarctic wind changes will heat up the water higher than previously believed.  
4. When Billy was possessed.  Not everyone will get it, especially kids.
5. This UK pedophile scandal is not (yet) extensive, but it digs deep into government, which is probably a lot worse -- pedophiles operating inside of government.
6. There are a lot of fonts online, carrying either the Apache or CC license for free commercial use.  But it's difficult to find good ones with extensive glyphs.  Most of them, though nice, do not extend beyond letters and numbers and so I do not install them.
7. I never wrote a post about Google IO 2014, but the reason isn't because I thought it was stale; rather, it was because it was such an enormous milestone in the future of tech, that it required an extremely long and intensive analysis to explain how monumental what happened.  Most people didn't seem to understand it, either, so they reported back that the change they saw was that the conference -- in line with WWDC -- moved emphasis back onto developers.  Indeed, the conference has always been about developers, but the underlying theme for the conference is that Google has spent a lot of time developing L -- the next iteration of Android -- for a wider future of the Internet of Things.
8. This blows the mind: Scientists may have accidentally discovered a switch in the brain that turns consciousness on / off.  We're not talking about being awake, but having your eyes wide open and losing consciousness.
9. Without support from Russia, Ukrainian rebels are rapidly losing ground.  Note the tension expressed by rebels to what they feel is abandonment by their benefactor (Russia).  It looks like the election of Petro Poroshenko was the turning point for Ukraine.  In the face of Ukraine signing a trade pact with the EU, Russia hasn't done much to stand in the way.
10. Okay, so now that the US has been eliminated, how have the World Cup games fared, in terms of American viewership?  In a word: Falloff.  The US - Belgium game garnered some 21M US viewers, but since then, the highest-watched game in the US was seen by just 6.4M Americans.  By comparison, some 60M Americans tuned into the SF-Seattle NFC Championship game, and over 111M watched the Super Bowl.  I think soccer is a fine sport, but it has nowhere near the amount of action and talent as in the NFL for the time being.  I know soccer fans want to trump up its popularity, but American Football is the number one sport in America.

The only issue needed to get rid of Greg Walden.

Do you think the government should at least get a low-threshold FISA warrant to conduct spying on Americans, rather than have a wide open ability to do almost anything it wants, relying on in-house oversight?

If you believe that Big Brother should stop spying and storing information on ordinary Americans, then you should read WaPo's latest story on raw intercept data from Edward Snowden showing just how pervasive NSA's spying is.

How does this relate to Greg Walden?  Well, he voted to pass the 2008 FISA Amendments Bill which legally enabled all of this stuff, even as the NSA and other government officials continue to lie about what the NSA does and doesn't do.

In other words, he voted to allow a program that has been terribly inefficient in targeting suspects while storing data on non-targeted people, giving the FBI and others access to this non-targeted data. According to WaPo, this is what's in the stored data:

"Among the [people who crossed paths with a target] are medical records sent from one family member to another, résumés from job hunters and academic transcripts of schoolchildren.In one photo, a young girl in religious dress beams at a camera outside a mosque.

Scores of pictures show infants and toddlers in bathtubs, on swings, sprawled on their backs and kissed by their mothers. In some photos, men show off their physiques. In others, women model lingerie, leaning suggestively into a webcam or striking risque poses in shorts and bikini tops."

You should understand therefore, this is what Greg Walden enabled.

Some, including Walden, might pass it off as an uninformed vote.  Unfortunately, it is probably true, as all but one Republicans in the House (and three abstensions) voted to make NSA's warrantless spying program fully legal while expanding the NSA's powers.  Then the criticism is, how could Walden make such a horrendous error in judgement to not carefully examine the bill, but rather, simply stick to the party line?  This was no run of the mill bill.  There were dozens of lobbyists arguing against this bill, including the EFF, ACLU and the Chamber of Commerce, but Walden did not care to listen to what people were saying.

---

An aside: The 2008 FISA Amendments Bill was an indefensible vote -- it is one of my criticisms of President Obama, actually, that he voted for this bill.  Hillary Clinton voted against it, and she was my first choice for the Democratic nomination.  I think history would have proven out that, unlike Obama, Clinton would have pulled tighter on the reins of the NSA.  But if there was a worse choice than Obama, it was most certainly John McCain -- the Abstainer.  Have some balls to state which side you're on.

---

Or, perhaps as Frontline had suggested, then-NSA Director Michael Hayden misled them with convincing arguments.  That seems to me to paint Walden in a worse light of being easily influenced by smarter people, incapable of seeing past the propaganda.

But worse, what if Walden actually supported (and still supports) these dragnet programs and Big Brother?

Therein lies the core of why Greg Walden needs to go: His vote is indefensible, if you believe that Big Brother is contrary to the US Constitution's 4th Amendment against unreasonable searches and seizures.

If you want to stop Big Brother, you have to stop Greg Walden.  You see, limiting Big Brother isn't even on his radar.  Like the doomed Monica Wehby, his focus is on repealing the ACA.

10 Thoughts for July 5, 2014

1. Even without the final slots filled in for the final 8 of the World Cup, we can now call it the war between the Americas and Europe.  Asia and Africa are shut out, here on out.
2. This video from Conan O'Brien on the World Cup, actually expresses my feelings on it.  Do watch all three parts.  I'm not actually watching the World Cup.
3. The NCAA is a favorite punching bag, for good reason, I believe.  But maybe this time it'll get it right...they've decided to reopen its investigation into UNC's widespread academic fraud.  I harbor zero faith in the NCAA, however, because the last several years has shown us that they can't even follow their internal processes.  All this might be moot, though, as the NCAA will be broken when they lose their trial against Ed O'Bannon.
4. This Christian Science Monitor poll is dumb.  According to CSM, Americans believe that the "failure to address extremist gains in Syria paved the way for the ISIS march through Iraq."  Why is that dumb?  Because the only way to address the extremists' gains in Syria was to support Bashar Al Assad.  A three-way war involving moderates fighting both ISIS and Bashar Al Assad would not result in victory...or maybe Americans don't remember what happened when Bush entered a second war.  The premise isn't whether or not Obama could have prevented the involvement of extremist fighting in Syria.  However, were this the case, the fact of the matter is that a majority of Americans at the time (and to this day) did not want to get involved in any way in the Syrian civil war.  Therefore, either this is push-polling, or complete horseshit by Americans incapable of accepting blame for their earlier opinions, or both.
5. The more conversations I have offline and online with people about climate change, the more I realize that most people just don't understand: At this point we're deciding whether we want to be screwed royally or royally x 10.
6. June is gone, but I wanted to trot out this post from June 2012, four months before the start of Windows 8 sales.  I said Windows 8 would fail.
7. Mt. Waialeale on Kaua'i, generally inaccessible, had an apparently massive landslide.  No one saw it happen, and no one heard it -- the only sign that something happened was tons of brown water in the ocean.  If you watch the video flyover of the slide, it is epic.  Drop jaw at the end.
8. Apparently a Palestinian kid was abducted, killed and set on fire by some Israeli kids.  That's pure crazy.  Killing an innocent kid does not make right what happened to those three Jewish kids abducted a week ago and found dead the other day.
9. WaPo has analysed college rape data for the period between 2010 and 2012, here's some info on Oregon schools:  Reed College is ranked 3rd in the nation with 9.62 reported rapes (on and off campus) per 1000 students; Willamette University is ranked 15th with 4.44 reported rapes per 1000; Pacific University is ranked 29th with 3.22 reported rapes per 1000; Concordia University is ranked 57th with 2.25 reported rapes per 1000.  It doesn't mean that these schools have higher incidence rates, but that they do have higher reporting rates.  Some schools might have a stronger, supportive culture for reporting rapes.
10. Oregon Representative Greg Walden (and former Senator Gordon Smith) voted for the 2008 FISA Amendments Bill (HR 6304 ,110th).  Oregon Democrats Sen. Wyden, Rep. Blumenour, Rep. Wu, Rep. DeFazio and Rep. Hooley all voted against it.  Frontline previously noted that this was the Bush Administration's attempt to legalize the NSA's dragnet.  Today, we find out via WaPo that this (called "section 702") dragnet netted about 9 in 10 people who weren't the NSA's target, and the information that was hoovered was kept. Whoa, this is major.  Greg Walden voted to spy on ordinary Americans, and then to keep that information collected.  He needed to go, yesterday.