Observations 2.16

The Poop Ship Chronicles ....

I didn't set out to write about the poop ship, I didn't want to, but it was forced upon me. I need to put the Carnival Triumph behind me. Maybe not so much the Triumph itself, it's just a ship after all, but some of the people who sailed on it.

If you don't know the story of the Triumph I'll give you the quick version. Before I do I have to say if you don't know the story you mustn't watch CNN because they covered it relentlessly even as meteors fell to Earth and a mini-war was fought in the Sierras. So here is the story: 6,000 people set sail on a three day tour, fire in the engine room, no power, no water, no toilets, towed to Alabama, some passengers not happy.

It's some of those unhappy passengers that totally bother me because it was the same ones over and over again. I understand, it was a week from hell, but nobody died, nobody got seriously ill, no plague infested the ship, they just had a bad week and had to find alternative methods of, well, pooping. For this week of misery the left the ship with their money back for the cruise, all travel and other expenses paid including anything they spent on the ship, $500 cash, and vouchers for a seven day cruise in the future. Basically they go home with close to $10,000 for a couple of bad days. I should also mention those most awesome white Carnival bathrobes they all stole on the way out.

But this is the age of the cell phone and instant video and some of these people couldn't resist a chance at their couple of days of poop drenched fame. CNN was only happy to accommodate these select passengers. More than once CNN talked of families being reunited on the air as they talked by cell phone. No mention was ever made that these very same people wouldn't have been in contact anyway because they were on a cruise and out of cell phone range.

Now the first lawsuits are beginning even though when you go on a cruise you sign a waiver so basically you can't sue the cruise line. But never let it be said that a mere signature, not to mention maritime law, stopped a ship chasing lawyer from attempting to making a score. As there were no serious injuries there really isn't a chance in hell of anybody winning anything. As The Washington Post said, "It was a drama, but not of danger. It was a drama of discomfort."

Poop happens, get over it.

Observations on Penn State 2.13

I was reading some Penn State news, starting to write my long overdue second scandal update post (l), when somebody asked me what THON is. I may have mentioned this before but THON is the largest student run charity organization in the world. Since it began in 1977 the Penn State IFC/Panhellenic Dance Marathon, or THON, has raised almost $80 million dollars for The Four Diamonds Fund of the Penn State Hershey Children’s Hospital. The fund helps children with cancer and their families by paying fees and expenses insurance doesn't cover and it also funds pediatric cancer research.

Last year Penn State Public Broadcasting made a short documentary called Why We Dance: The Story of THON that explains it much better than I ever could. Rather than try I'm going to post some videos and a link to the full film which is just under one hour long and I think worth watching. The first video is the film's opening sequence and does a good job of explaining what THON is about in just a few minutes. The second video shows the Bryce Jordan Center being readied for the dance marathon, some of it in time-lapse.

The 2013 edition of the THON dance marathon begins this Friday night at 6:00 PM and ends Sunday at 4 PM.

"What we do for ourselves dies with us. What we do for others and the world remains and is immortal," Albert Pine.

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Why We Dance: The Story of THON (full documentary, Vimeo HD)
from Penn State Public Broadcasting
Jeffrey Hughes, Executive Producer
David Aneckstein, Penn State Outreach News Bureau

"DVDs of this documentary are available for purchase through our website here. A portion of the sales goes to the Four Diamonds Fund."

Observations from the Window 2.12

Yesterday was a slow news day as it only had a Pope abdicating, the holy quit as Jon Stewart called it, and a North Korean nuclear test. Today could be much more entertaining with President Obama's State of the Union speech, followed by Senator Marco Rubio's Republican rebuttal, followed by Senator Rand Paul's wingnut rebuttal to the Republican rebuttal of the SOTU. Lost in all the excitement is today being Mardi Gras and there being a late Flyers game in Winnipeg tonight. Hard entertainment decisions have to made.

Mardi Gras and the Flyers game are self explanatory but the State of the Union has entertainment value above and beyond the politics of it. Almost a year ago the aging mentally challenged hair guitarist and gun freak Ted Nugent threatened President Obama's life. You might say it was just more nutjob radio induced hyperbole but the Secret Service took it serious enough to call him in for a chat. Tonight Nugent will be Texas GOP Congressman Steve Stockman's guest at the address. One can only hope Nugent talks to the press at any possible time before during and after the Obama speech. Nugent's attendance should also answer the NRA's question as to why the President and his family need protection.

Than there is Rand Paul. The only reason to watch this speech is find out what nutjob minds are thinking in cloud coo coo land or on the dark side of the moon. Enough said about him.

This brings me to Senator Rubio who Time has christened the savior of the Republican party, el salvador if you will. The Florida Senator may well be the GOP's only current hope but has problems all his own. He is the GOP leader on immigration reform where he takes a predictable hard line even though he himself is the son of Cuban refugees and whose grandfather and childhood idol, Pedro Víctor García, was ordered deported only to be saved by the Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966. The law still grants Cuban Americans special privileges Rubio apparently doesn't want to grant other immigrants.

Than there are Rubio's stands on gay and lesbian rights where again he doesn't seem to be the savior of anybody. He supports allowing states to grant same-sex couples the right to marry while at the same time supports limiting marriage to one man and one woman, I'm not sure how this works. Rubio says he is "against discriminating against people," but wont take a position on the long stalled Employment Non-Discrimination Act. He supports the federal government honoring states decisions on gay marriage but also supports DOMA which specifically prohibits the government from acknowledging those same decisions. Now we come full circle to his strongest issue, immigration. He doesn't believe same-sex couples should be included in immigration reform because he thinks it would just cloud the issue and once again says it should be left to the states. I repeat, how does this work as immigration is constitutionally a federal issue.

For Rubio's benefit I'll finish with this video.

"Every day tens of thousands of lesbian and gay binational couples fight for the right to live together in the United States because the federal government refuses to recognize their marriages for immigration purpose. Becky and Sanne: Fighting DOMA to Keep Their Family Together."


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Published on Jan 31, 2013

Becky/U.S. and Sanne/Netherlands, Asheville, NC:
Becky and Sanne first met while traveling around India several years ago. Though able to live freely in The Netherlands, the first country in the world to grant full marriage rights to same sex spouses, they are raising their 2 year old daughter, Willow, in Asheville, North Carolina, near the family, mountains, and community they love. By sharing their story, they hope to publicize the plight of binational couples while promoting a world in which Willow never has to suffer discrimination for having two moms.

For more information and how you can help:
The DOMA Project
The Devote Camapaign

update - The Violence Against Women Act re-authorization passed in the Senate today by a vote of 78 to 22. All 22 votes against it came from Republican men including, you guessed it, Florida's own Marco Rubio. I somehow doubt he will explain his love of violence against women in his SOTU rebuttal tonight. The bill now goes to the House where it faces wingnut opposition to a provision in the bill that would restore tribal authorities’ ability to "prosecute non-Indians who commit violence against the members of their tribe" on tribal land. Honestly, I do not make this shit up.

Sunday Observations 2.10

Friday I had just wanted to write a quick post to get my other drone thoughts out of the way before Nemo hit and my mind spiraled elsewhere. I started with following paragraph so you can see my mind always spirals elsewhere.

But speaking of Nemo, who the hell names a winter storm after a fish? Or maybe it's named after Captain Nemo or maybe I'm just putting too much thought into it and it's nemo as in the Latin word nemo. A storm named "no man." So you see how fast my mind spirals out of control. And now I have a Nemo post started ... but I never finished it. In the end the storm dumped a foot of snow on the Village on its way to terrorize New England where it left almost three feet of snow in some places. After the last few blizzards we had here, not to mention Sandy, a foot of powder on a weekend actually called for some fun. One lasting thought did come out of the storm though and that is damn the Weather Channel. Damn them for starting to name winter storms, damn them for naming a storm Nemo, and damn them for no longer having the hottest weather girls.

Nemo did teach me one thing. You really haven't lived until you have seen Fashion Week people trying to walk in snow in stiletto heels. It was totally worth the trip uptown just to see that rarest of social events.

Have you ever noticed Russian photographers are obsessed with big chunky furniture and Victorian settings? Do they teach that in Russian art schools or are they born that way? I mean seriously, simple and easy to look at they are not.

I was reading an article about population and found a bit of trivia. If it was concentrated as densely as it is in New York City the entire world population would fit in the state of Texas. There really is a smart ass comment in there somewhere which probably involves Rick Perry and contraception but at the moment I can't think of it. Now you might be wondering why I was reading an article from a two year old National Geographic and you would have good reason to. It was because the same month had a good article about the libraries of Timbuktu, the same libraries burned by jihadists retreating from the French in Mali. This too is how my mind spirals out of control but it seems perfectly rational to me.

Finally, Kate Upton is the cover girl for this year's Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue, it's her second time on the cover and yes this is important to know.

update - This photo is from Victoria Beckham's V.B. show at the New York Public Library earlier today. I'm only posting it because it could possibly be the only fashion line I've seen that looks like it was designed with me in mind. (Vogue)

Observations from the Coffee Shop 2.8

I want to write down my other thoughts on drones quick because snow is beginning to fall in the Village, Nemo seems to have arrived right on schedule. Usually the world is very black and white to me but these drones just have me torn as you can probably tell by now.

The drone war is an important story but it doesn't seem to resonate at all with a public that at times seems tired of it all. Tired of war, tired of politicians who get absolutely nothing accomplished, or just tired of the total ignorance coming from one side of every issue. Yesterday morning Joe Scarborough said he was scared because nobody seems to care about the constitutional issues involved. As I said that is part of the reason I was writing about it because I don't understand why I don't care more.

It's an important issue but it's also a very cynical one. Would people care more if Dubya was still President? There is a huge amount of trust involved and people just trust President Obama more than they ever did him. At the same time Obama wont always be President so what then?

An even more cynical part is the story of the Justice Department memo that was released this week. Supposedly it was found and released by NBC News after much journalistic effort. You might think it was on the level of David Corn getting the "47 Percent" video of Willard but you would be wrong. Now it seems that in all likelihood the memo was released by the Senate Intelligence Committee itself to create some drama for their confirmation hearings of John Brennan.

The White House says there are rules that are followed before drone strikes but they refuse to release them saying they are classified. Actually the whole drone program itself is considered classified. The problem is the drone war is part of a larger war that has been going on for ten years now. A dirty, ugly, secret war that shows no signs of ending anytime soon. That statement was proved recently by the French intervention in Mali and the terrorist attack in Algeria that followed. There are secrets in any war, there have to be, even more so in a war fought in the shadows as this one is and today the Congress of the United States is quite possibly the worst place on Earth to keep a secret. Also the ACLU is suing the government in civil court to force the CIA and Justice Department to release any and all information on the drone program and war. The thought of that lawsuit is laughable in an age where the Somali terrorist group Al-Shabaab has a twitter account.

But than there is the other, the constitutional, side of the story. Senator Robert Kennedy once held hearings into the terrible treatment of farm and other migrant workers. During the hearings he questioned a California sheriff who admitted to arresting workers without reason because the sheriff said he had a duty to stop them from causing trouble before they caused it. When Kennedy asked how he could arrest someone when they hadn't yet broken a law the sheriff answered "They’re ready to violate the law." At the next break Kennedy stared down at the sheriff and told him he should "read the Constitution of the United States" over lunch.

President Obama is the only President who studied, not to mention taught, constitutional law before he became President. One could say he should know better.

Observations from the Window 2.6

A couple days ago NBC released a Justice Department memo on drones, the government's way of saying yes we can kill you if you are an American citizen, happen to be overseas, and we even think you are a terrorist. That seems to be all any of the talking heads want to talk about now. That is unless you include The Washington Post who thought it fitting they publish an article about Michelle Obama's ass. Seriously.

One would think I would be all ready to rant about the drones, rights, and what you could probably call legal assassination but one would be wrong. Instead of writing this to vent I'm writing to try and rationalize why I don't feel that way. The only reason I can come up with is that for almost half my life this country has been in one form of war or another. For my generation the deaths of 3,000 people is the defining moment of our lives and for all practical purposes my sister's generation hasn't known anything but war. Maybe more important than that is we have lived with the Patriot Act the whole time. What gun control does to the second amendment pales when compared to what the Patriot Act did to the rest of the Constitution.

The notion that drone killing isn't who we are or what we do doesn't work the way it does with torture. The drone is a totally predictable evolution of the American way of war. Clinical, antiseptic, death from above delivered with nothing but a sound reminiscent of a snowmobile engine. Perfectly packaged for the evening news to show just before they report on how terrible the drone wars are.

So I just don't know why the whole thing doesn't bother me more. Am I just being cynical to the ninth degree? Is it the images of what I saw in the streets of New York ten years ago? Maybe it's the subtle feeling I sometimes get that, no matter how much I love it, technology will be the end of us all one day. I honestly have no idea so for now I guess you could say it bothers me that it doesn't bother me.

Time ran a very good cover story on drones that contains a very real warning. "The moral ambiguity of covert drone strikes will clarify itself very quickly if another country claims the right under international law to strike its enemies in the U.S. There may come a day when the U.S. bitterly regrets the precedents it has set." Just try and imagine the American reaction to a Chinese drone flying over San Francisco. It isn't all that far fetched because the Time article mentions a drone Grumman is developing that will stay in the air for weeks at a time.

A literary mind might feel the need to issue a more personal warning than Time by using a quote by George Orwell. But the book 1984 was written over sixty years ago, the year itself is almost thirty years ago, so people might only understand it in an quaint abstract sort of way. Something a little more timely is called for.

Skynet isn't as fictitious as it once was.

2/7 update - I did more thinking on this but I'm going to write an additional post rather than doubling the size of this one. I did want to that one of the major reasons this has even become an issue is John Brennan's confirmation hearing today in front of the Senate Intelligence Committee or, as I prefer to call it, the gang of cranky old men. Brennan, President Obama's counter-terrorism chief and the man who ran the drone wars, is nominated to be head of the CIA.

Something to think about this morning, Senate Intelligence Committee, that's a political oxymoron if there ever was one.

Sunday Observations 2.3

It being Super Bowl Sunday I want to start with a beer related thought. I often joke about signs of the apocalypse but I saw something this week that just might be the final sign. This week the Justice Department blocked Anheuser Busch, the makers of Budweiser, from a complete takeover of Grupo Modelo who just happens to make Corona. AB fully admits the takeover attempt is out of fear of good beer. "We must slow the volume trend of High End Segment and cannot let the industry transform," said an AB spokesman. In the last ten years the number of craft (read that good) beer brewers has quadrupled while over the past two years Budweiser sales have fallen over ten percent. The combined AB/Modelo would control over half the U.S. beer market hence the anti-trust suit by the DOJ which is enough to thwart the apocalypse for now. Or it should until the vegetable growers try and corner the lime market.

Here is an example of the fun side of twitter. I read this tweet a couple days ago, "Leaning over stretching, I panicked for a second b/c I suddenly couldn't move my head. And...I was standing on my hair." Sadly I fully understood how this could happen but it made me smile just to read it because hey I've been there.

There hasn't been any reason to mention Willard for some time now but I found out a couple things this week that have changed that. The first isn't surprising at all. You might remember that during hurricane Sandy Willie's campaign changed one of their events into a pseudo food drive for victims of the storm. I've been reading an ebook by BuzzFeed's Michael Hastings in which he says that before the event the campaign dropped $5,000 at a Dayton, Ohio Walmart to stock the rally's shelves with canned goods. You know, in case Romney supporters were cheap bastards who couldn't afford a can of beans.

The other thing about Willard really did surprise me and reminded me that I had once thought that if Willard had run as the Massachusetts Governor Romney, and not the right wing kowtowing nutjob Romney, he might have won. Thursday the Romney campaign filed its latest report with the Federal Election Commission. It seems that after the election, and with no announcement at all, they had donated $90,000 to the Red Cross for Sandy relief. I thought that I should give him credit for that after all the abuse I dished out over the last year. Than again I should also note that the campaign still has $4 million in the bank.

The Hastings eBook is called Panic 2012: The Sublime and Terrifying Inside Story of Obama's Final Campaign and costs just $5 on Amazon. It's basically a 150 page BuzzFeed article about the campaign's last months which is funny and totally eye opening. It's worth reading and no I don't get a cut.

I don't normally share personal email but this one from a friend on Friday sums up the week so well. "Israel attacking Syria, terrorists attacking our embassy, China attacking the NY Times, Republicans attacking Hagel, all of England attacking the artist who painted Kate's portrait, people attacking commercials... I need a beer." I hope she got that beer and it wasn't a Budweiser.

Have I ever mentioned that I would totally like to go to China?

Observations from the Coffee Shop 2.1

The Super Bowl is just a few days away so I thought a little preview was called for. Personally I think the last version of the Beetle was cuter and this 2013 model would look much better in black. I better shut-it though, I don't want Foxy getting jealous.

Don't sweat me brodder, the sticky bun come soon ....

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Volkswagen
Published on Jan 27, 2013
Jimmy Cliff - Rebirth

Watch our Super Bowl 2013 TV commercial, where you'll meet Dave and his newfound sunny disposition (that manifests itself in a curious way), all thanks to his new 2013 Volkswagen Beetle.

update - After I posted this it was brought to my attention that some people somehow find the commercial offensive. That a white man speaking with a Jamaican accent and driving a German car is somehow racist and not multi-cultural fun. This was just a little post but some people are just too damn serious and now it's much too long.

In its defense I give you Dr Claire Nelson, the Jamaican born president of the Institute of Caribbean Studies and the Caribbean Heritage Organisation. Dr. Nelson said what she and her group found offensive "are the mostly non-Jamaican critics who contend that the commercial is racist. Some going as far as saying that it's like putting a black face on a white or Asian person. We hasten to assure the viewing public, that being Jamaican, just like being American, is a nationality and not a race.We invite everyone to 'Get in and get happy. No problem, man."

Tourism Minister Wykeham McNeill said Jamaica can benefit significantly from the Super Bowl ad. "I think this is a very creative commercial, which truly taps into the tremendous appeal that brand Jamaica and its hospitable people have globally," he said in a press release. The Opposition Jamaica Labour Party has also endorsed the ad.

I rest my case.

Observations on Art 1.31

It was said that Pixar had killed traditional animation with its computer generated imagery. This simple fact was proved when Disney bought Pixar in a deal that made Steve Jobs Disney's largest shareholder. But somebody forgot to tell traditional animators that there art was dead.

Paperman mixes traditional and computer animation using a new software called Meander which was developed by Disney software engineer Brian Whited. While still 'secret' Meander allows CGI animation to be finished with traditional drawings to add detail. The process gives the finished film the look and feel of drawing but the stability and smoothness of computer generation. Paperman director John Kahrs said "There is something so primal and expressive about drawing, and our hope was to get it back into the CG animation process."

The short was first shown at the Annecy International Animated Film Festival in June and is nominated for the Best Animated Short Film in next month's Academy Awards. Disney released it to all on Tuesday.

It's pretty damn awesome.

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disneyanimation
Uploaded on Jan 29, 2013

Observations on Art 1.30

Two art posts in a row and it's not even Armory time! This may be something totally new. It has nothing to do with a lack of interesting things on my mind, or interesting things pissing me off, just my trying to finally get that balance between art and politics I've been after in both my blog and my mind. I'm not even going to bring up sports today.

I saw this column by Michael Reid in Art Market Monitor and I wanted to share part of it. Reid, who at one time worked for Christie's, is an Australian art collector and dealer. He is writing about the idea that we are all photographers now and by we he means everybody on the planet. It seems an obvious idea but it isn't something I've ever seen thought out before and it's amazing to think that within five years the entire human race will have the ability to take photos or video. What that means to art, not to mention politics and just human existence, is a thought that boggles the mind.

Below are the paragraphs that really had me thinking. In the rest of the column Reid goes into a more collector related slant but as he is a dealer/collector that's to be expected. This should be more than enough to get you thinking but it's worth reading the thing and you can do that here.

"The world of technology and imagery has changed almost every aspect of our lives. Every child born in the world today is a potential photographer. Irrespective of geography or wealth, it is projected that within five years all will have access to a communication device that takes photographs and films. And when I say “all of us” I mean the nearly 7.4 billion projected “all of us” – from the first of the First World, to the new telecommunications boom market of sub-Saharan Africa.

That’s is the killer idea. We are now all photographers, almost every single person on the planet.

With billions of people, hourly taking images, there will be more photographs made in the next five years, than say in the last one hundred years. Digital photography’s chief selling points, the abilities to see the finished product instantly and to take countless pictures without incurring any additional charge, have turned out to be mixed blessings. With effort and cost excised from the equation, photos have become plentiful. And at the same time, as more and more pictures are taken on smartphones, “shared” on social media to all, then lost to the cacophony of the digital universe, meaningful images have become too scarce. However, those photographs that are very good, that are meaningful, those rare few amidst the hundreds and hundreds of thousands, will be greatly valued. Enormously valued for being what they are, much better than the mediocre rest."

Observations on Art 1.28

This cartoon was just to good to pass up on an soon to be icy Monday morning. Lauren Purje is an artist living in Brooklyn, a graduate of Ohio University with a BFA in Painting, and draws funny cartoons that happen to be all too true. Lauren currently is a gallery assistant at Viridian Artists in Chelsea, paints, and draws these most awesome cartoons for Hyperallergic. Her work will also soon be published in the book Fucked in The Pursuit Of Glory. I mention that last item because I like the title of the book.

Sunday Observations 1.27

Have you ever read a magazine article and get to a point where it says continued on page 46 but when you get to page 46 it says continued from page 46 and the missing section is nowhere to be found? That just sucks. I needed to get that out of the way first.

In the mood for something a little different this morning I watched Ultraviolet on my Kindle while we were had breakfast. To be more precise I watched Milla Jovovich, read the Times, and ate waffles all at the same time. It seemed like a good idea to stay away from any of the Resident Evil movies because that might just seem impolite of me.

Here is some Penn State trivia for you. If you had to guess which sport has won the most national championships which would it be? Don't even guess football, there have only been two. I didn't know the answer so I guessed the women's volleyball team but even they have only won five national titles. It seems like they won more than that because four of those championships were consecutive, 2007-2010. No the correct answer would be the men's gymnastics team that has won twelve. I never knew that.

Something else I never knew is that both Nikon and Canon DSLR chassis are made by the same company, Ju Teng International Holdings of Hong Kong. The thing is I discovered this fact while skimming articles about a new Sony technology that originated in Canon film SLRs but was dropped when Canon went totally digital. The technology is an eye following autofocus that to me seems like more trouble than it is worth because of the need to calibrate your eye to the camera. You can read about it here if you want.

There was an article in The New York Times today about those end of the world as we know it, have your bag packed, I will survive even when the zombies attack type people known as preppers. So maybe the zombie attack is a bit of an embellishment but you get the point. The full extent of my prepping is to keep a full tank of gas and a camera in Foxy to avoid a repeat of Sandy when I didn't have enough gas to get off the island. Somebody in the article does mention the possibility of the bridges and tunnels of Manhattan being closed, which did happen during Sandy, and the need to raft across the river if it should happen again. A raft would be problematical but I remember old beetles supposedly floated so maybe I should just keep an oar in the trunk.

I started the day with Ultraviolet and finished it with Blood Diamonds. I'm not sure what, if anything, that says about me.

Observations from the Window 1.26

I was skimming through blogs a couple days ago when I saw a post that included a link to one of those things that will instantly analyze your personality. The answer is based on on a system developed by psychiatrist Carl Jung in his book Psychological Types according to which there are sixteen different personality types. Yes I'm trying hard to sound professional and I did have to try it out but before I get to my results I should a say you can read her post at Mo' Homo or try the typealyzer yourself if you want.

Normally I don't bother doing these things because a few years ago I did one that told you what writer you were most like. Paste in a few paragraphs of text, I used a blog post, and it came up with with an answer. The problem with mine was it said David Foster Wallace which, while flattering, just reminded me that Wallace had hung himself in 2008. I did this one because it was easy, just paste in the blog address, and the answer comes with a cute picture. I typed in my blog, hit send, and just started laughing when I saw the pic. If I believe the answer I have what is called an ISFP personality.

"The gentle and compassionate type. They are especially attuned their inner values and what other people feel. They usually have a strong appreciation for art and beauty or things around them that affect the look, taste, sound or smell. They are not friends of many words and tend to take the worries of the world on their shoulders. They tend to follow the path of least resistance and have to look out not to be taken advantage of. They tend to value their friends and family above what they do for a living. They genuinely care about people. They are extremely gifted at creating and composing things that stimulates the senses, such as art, music or food. They often prefer working quietly, behind the scene as a part of a team. They have no desire to lead others and they don't want to be led. ISFPs are sometimes not good at giving him/herself enough credit for things they did well."

Granted I may have seen something like this before but with my short term memory I didn't remember so now suitably intrigued I did some more digging. A psych website actually describes an ISFB  (Introversion, Sensing, Feeling, Perception) as "the Artist."

"As an ISFP, your primary mode of living is focused internally, where you deal with things according to how you feel about them, or how they fit into your value system. Your secondary mode is external, where you take things in via your five sense in a literal, concrete fashion. ISFPs live in the world of sensation possibilities. They are keenly in tune with the way things look, taste, sound, feel and smell. They have a strong aesthetic appreciation for art, and are likely to be artists in some form, because they are unusually gifted at creating and composing things which will strongly affect the senses. They are likely to not give themselves enough credit for the things which they do extremely well. Their strong value systems can lead them to be intensely perfectionist, and cause them to judge themselves with unnecessary harshness."

And still another site said, "People with ISFP personalities are very in tune with the world around them. They are very much attuned to sensory information and are keenly aware when even small changes take place in their immediate environment. Because of this, they often place a high emphasis on aesthetics and appreciate the fine arts. They are also perfectionists and can be their own harshest critics. Because they place such high expectations on themselves, they often underestimate or undervalue their own skills and talents."

Enough already, between horoscopes, karma, and history I have enough to worry about and I really don't need psychology too, still it does sound like me. Only 5% of people have this personality, two thirds of whom are women, including Hillary Clinton, Keith Richards, Britney Spears, Marilyn Monroe, Sofia Coppola, and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. So maybe it's not so bad after all, I seem to have good company.

And Michael Jackson.

They lost me.

Observations from the Window 1.24

It has been a fun couple of days to be a progressive/liberal/gay/woman or any one of the above. On Monday we had President Obama's Inaugural speech and than yesterday Secretary of State Hillary Clinton testified to Congress on the tragedy in Benghazi, Libya. After seven hours of testimony nobody was talking about what she said but what an awesome job she had done and how bad some of the wingnuts looked. Clinton looked every bit one of the most popular politicians in the country that she currently is. Confident, intelligent, at times emotional, she made a woman proud.

But enough before I get too serious because this is going to be an almost comedic post. I just wanted to share some of the things I have heard coming out of cloud coo coo land because, to quote Rush Limbaugh, "it's a puke fest out there." For the first time, and in all probability the last, I have to agree with him.

In his Inaugural speech President Obama mentioned gays for the first time in an Inaugural and he also mentioned Stonewall. On Fox Pat Buchanan asked "What was he talking about? Stonewall. That's a barroom brawl in Greenwich Village in 1969, when cops were hassling gays and their bar, and the gays fought back and threw them all out. Does that belong in a presidential inaugural?" As Jon Stewart later remarked yes that was Pat Buchanan for the wrong side of history.

During the Clinton testimony wingnut Senator Rand Paul said this; "I think that ultimately, with you leaving, that you accept the culpability for the worst tragedy since 9/11. And I really mean that. Had I been president at the time and I had found that you had not read the cables from Benghazi, you had not read the cables from Ambassador Stevens, I would have relieved you of your post. I think it’s inexcusable." I wont get into what dreamworld Paul lives in to think he would ever be president but I do wonder why 4 dead in Libya qualifies as the worst tragedy since 9/11 and not the deaths of over 4,000 in Iraq and Afghanistan. I should also add that in 2011 Paul proposed cutting the State Department's budget by 70%.

There are so many more of these I could post from Wisconsin wingnut Ron Johnson suggesting Clinton should have just called Benghazi on the phone to find out what was going to NRA President Wayne LaPierre quoting one of the more liberal justices in the history of the Supreme Court. In a totally unnecessary rebuttal to the President's speech LaPierre quoted Hugo Black as saying that there were absolutes in the Constitution that couldn't be debated. LaPierre didn't mention that Black had specified the second amendment as one of the exceptions to that rule.

One of the few politicians as popular as Hillary Clinton is New  Jersey Governor Chris Christie. Again I give you Senator Paul this time on the N.J. Governor and again showing why he will never be president. "I think criticizing the Second Amendment movement and the over the top ‘give me my money’ stuff, ’I want all 60 billion now or I’ll throw a tantrum,' I don’t think that’s going to play well in the Republican primary."

Why do I love politics? The thought of a Rand Paul - Chris Christie debate is all the reason I need.

update - My brother reminded me that Senator Johnson was the same Johnson who as a Senate candidate said of global warming, "I absolutely do not believe in the science of man caused climate change. It's not proven by any stretch of the imagination." In the same interview he also described believers in man made causes of climate change as crazy and "it's far more likely that it's just sunspot activity or just something in the geologic eons of time."